Master Of None

”I think he is sensing more mana than he was before.” Su pointed out the fact that Walker was making slight movements every time that there was some movement in the water. Like he was making his mind one with it so that he could tell if there were any dangers within.

”I would say you are right, there are plenty of water spirits that are coming to see him. I thought that we wouldn’t see any.” Since Gil saw the shapes of water spirits moving in and around the water, he realized that they had all been focused on Walker. Like they were talking using just mana.

While the world had given everyone the ability to communicate no matter the language, this was different. This was purely using elemental manas and not words. Conveying information and not spoken words or traditional communication in the least.

Things only grew more intricate as Walker made a few motions causing the nearby water to shift. This was when everyone noticed that the ripples of water also moved upwards. In to what the group would have expected to be air.

”And there’s even floating balls of water connected by invisible water. The water elemental plane is the most confusing.” From this point on, Remey was able to grasp that the elemental planes were not flat whatsoever. They were all around them.

The entire party, minus Walker, had not focused on that aspect of the elemental planes. Mostly because they had not needed to. The mountains were easily climbable. The winds were always shifting so it was not easy to notice. But here, the water was divided up in to different forms before it froze in to large bodies of ice further on within the water elemental plane.

Now they could see a much clearer outline of what the elemental planes were. They were not just flat. As they traveled through, the planes shifted. So naturally, there was a hard chance that they would even notice that they were removing up and down as well as side to side, forward and backwards.

Even as they stood on the boundary, the mists shifted and the entire party realized that they had moved slightly closer to the water elemental planes. To an even more shocking degree, Midnight leaped in to the air and started to swim. But she was not struggling to breathe. The water mana was water mana, it was also water itself. But it was not something violent by nature that meant to kill.

Water was also a basis for life. Therefore, beings that entered the water could also breathe. Could also survive. Hence why Midnight had trusted the instincts she had and leaped in to the water elemental plane when Walker had given a slight nod.

He had also realized that there was no danger in breathing when it came to the water elemental plane. Because there would always be minute amounts of wind mana along with life mana, there would be no reason to use mana to breathe constantly. A great bonus since the party would be able to maintain their mana levels.

”You aren’t tired brother?” Omnyx realized that everyone had been moving rather quickly. They had forgotten to take Walker in to account. He was weaker now than before. If he couldn’t keep up then they might unwittingly be forcing him beyond his current limits.

”No, I’m still full of energy. It’s the mana here. My body is using it to remain in top form.” Walker even made a few flexing gestures to make Onyx chuckle a little before leaping in to the waters himself. ”You also have to remember, I am gaining strength by being here. Just like Remey will the closer to the fire elemental plane we are.”

To be fair, Onyx should have recalled this. He was already focused on the light elemental plane which he sensed was also in borders with the water elemental plane. Much more closely than what he had noticed when in the wind and earth elemental planes.

Yet, there was the fact that things shifted. So he might just not be in the palace where the planes were close enough to sense one another clearly. Especially since the boundaries would also be a mix of manas which could confuse anyone’s senses.

As they all got used to the odd feeling of swimming in what could be the air, the party started to move ahead. Waker could sense disturbances in the water mana. There was an awkward vibration that wasn’t making sense as he pushed forward. Not monsters fighting. Nor was it something that the water spirits seemed to know either. Especially since they were moving around Walker and warning him with their manas to be careful.

”I can tell you sense something ahead. Let me tell you what it is since I can already tell.” Gil’s slight;y surprised tone was because their voices still traveled normally. The wonders of the water elemental plane could be researched another time though.

”Ahead, there are a few weird looking zombies. I am pretty sure that they are not normal either.” without a proper appraisal, Gil had yet to get more information. But that would happen in a moment because they were coming closer to what they could see. Which was just more proof that they were following the immortal king still.

’Drowned

The drowned is a living being brought in to the water elemental plane and forcefully made to absorb water mana as they perished. This is a very terrifying experience that created a violent undead with no intelligence at all.

The only boons of doing this were that the undead has an extremely high ability to swim within water along with using water mana to enhance its nails and teeth to bite and scratch whatever it is attacking.

These are the bodies of humans kept alive through unknown means but still able to be transported. It is most likely that they were rogue adventurers…’

Walker and the others didn’t want the other information. They knew well that whatever else they learned would just make them hate this even more. The immortal king had somehow captured people, kept them alive, and then dragged them along with him to use as experimental subjects.

Why he waited for the water elemental pane, who knew, but it was still wrong. These were zombies that could have been saved if the party had been faster. Which meant that they might have the chance to save others that had been taken here. There was still the unknown about how many undead or captives the immortal king might have thought.

”They are coming this way.” Three of the ugliest zombies that the party had ever seen were moving toward them.

The skin was pale, both from missing sun and also from being forced in to the water. The water mana had seemingly forced its way through the body causing a unique quick rotting process as the bodies were also forced to become zombies instead of just perish due to the over use of water mana. Most people would not survive dense manas being forced in to their bodies all of the sudden. Hence the experiment was even more cruel.

Su blocked one of them and noticed that water had coated the nails of the drowned. It was even enough to make scratches on the improved twin shiels which the wandering blacksmith took great pride in. Even as Walker used the water mana to make the water around them denser so the drowned struggled more, not that it really did. Walker saw the improved swimming ability right away.

Hence, he took out one of the many swords within his high spatial storage and used it to slash at another approaching drowned. Remey also had made a move. Midnight backed her up so that she wasn’t pushed back as the drowned gained speed and tried to clasp on to Remey. With Midnight’s help, the pair were able to stop themselves from moving away from the party.

Fighting in the water would allow them to separate much more easily with the flow and the forces of water moving. But Onyx was using that to his advantage. Moving his body to whip his tail forward, he was able to psalm the three drowned backwards much more easily. Opening up a chance for Gil to use his daggers to slash at the tendons in the legs.

It wasn’t a defeat, but it weakened them for the time being since they were still reliant on their rotten and water logged bodies to be intact to some degree. This allowed Walker to channel the water mana the same way that the drowned did. But Walker channeled it alongthe blade of the sword in his hands and used it to slash at the weaker joints of one drowned. The perfect method to slowly but surely cut them to pieces before he could use magic to put them to rest entirely.