[Sapping Snare] has evolved into [Ties That Bind] (Unique)

You have bound and been bound. Forged ties both temporary and permanent. Connections that have helped and healed. Connections that have hindered and harmed.

Those connections are yours to weave.

"What does this mean?" Jun asked, willing the screen to be shared with Shiori.

The black cat floated there for a few seconds, her tail flicking as she looked at the screen. Jun couldn't tell what her adoptive mother was thinking as the seconds dragged on in silence. Before it got unbearable, Jun heard a mental sigh in her mind.

Consider a skill as a bowl. Shiori manifested a series of bowls of different sizes to float in the air next to her. As Jun watched, the smallest of the containers, one barely larger than a tea cup, floated in front of her.

A Beginner's skill is not yet strong enough for the system to acknowledge, barely holding any mana. It is small and easily overflows. A silver liquid like mercury began to fill the tiny vessel, quickly rising to the top and threatening to spill over. As the silvery liquid began to tip over the edge, another larger bowl floated beneath and caught the substance before it could fall to the floor. The tiny bowl tipped over and emptied itself out into the larger container before floating away

As a skill develops and is acknowledged by the system, it becomes a Novice skill with a greater potential. The larger bowl began to fill with more of the silver liquid until it too threatened to spill over and a new bowl appeared to catch the contents. Once the skill fills again, it evolves and grows further.

The scene repeated again and again as container after container filled, growing in size every time until a bowl large enough that Jun could sit comfortably inside of it threatened to flood her room with the silver liquid.

Each rank is exponentially stronger than the one before, from the lowliest Beginner to loftiest Grandmaster skills. But, each of these ranks has a maximum potential. A limit to their power. While a Grandmaster skill could raise or topple nations, it is still limited by its potential. It will grow to a point, and then it will stop because there is no more room left to grow, having reached the peak of its potential.

But… Shiori paused, her tail slowly swishing as the seven bowls vanished, leaving behind a floating glob of the silver liquid.

Unique skills are different. They exist outside of the system's rank structure. Skills whose existence defies the system's attempts to understand, with an unknown potential. A Unique skill is both an invitation… and a warning. To get one so young… Shiori stopped, her gaze focused on something far beyond Jun's room. The substance held by Shiori's power shifted between liquid and geometric shapes as her adoptive mother stared into the distance.

…for now, do not share this with anyone. Now, get ready for the day. Your teammates will be here soon. With those words, Shiori and the floating liquid vanished, gone between one blink and the next.

Jun stared at the vacant space where her adoptive mother had just been, her thoughts a jumble of confusion. An invitation and a warning? Shiori had never truly held anything back before, but the cat's cryptic behavior over this was strange. It was the first time she'd been told to keep something Shiori taught her to herself, which only increased her concern. Whatever having a Unique skill meant couldn't be safe.

As much as Jun wanted to listen to her adoptive mother though, there was a problem. Channeling mana into her snare spell, she felt the mana trickle away again, stolen before it could reach the spell form she felt floating in her mind as the phantom tail reappeared. She had a suspicion that would happen. Ever since she woke up at the infirmary, every attempt at casting one of her snares resulted in the mana being stolen by the strange tail spell that she suspected was her Unique skill, not that she was sure about that. If she couldn't channel mana into the spellform for her skill, she couldn't begin to figure out how to hide it. Someone would certainly notice if she wasn't able to use one of the spells that'd become her staple in combat even if they didn't notice the giant tail on her back!

Calmer after a good night's sleep, Jun curiously examined the spell with her senses. Running her hands over the glowing thing, she felt fluffy fur under her hands that was soft to the touch. A tingling sensation ran up her spine as she stroked the tail and she blushed again, though the embarrassment was nowhere near as bad as when she first discovered the change in her spell.

Reaching out with her mind like she would with her old snares, Jun experimentally sent orders to it as she fed it mana, willing it to move like any other spell. The spell seemed to drink in her mana and Jun felt a brief surge of confidence, only to frown as her orders went ignored. Focusing her will, she pressed her intent into the spell, only to encounter a strange block that seemed to ignore her intent.

Pushing on, Jun felt the block begin to budge ever so slightly as her mind began to feel the beginning of some strain. Continuing to push, the tail twitched in a way that Jun instinctively knew was displeasure. An uncomfortably painful pressure built in her mind as she pressed, but Jun stubbornly ignored it, the block eating at her with its very presence. A spear of intent shot out at her from the block, sending pain stabbing through her head!

Jun hissed in pain, recoiling from the block as the migraine repeatedly stabbed her head. The manifested spell sent an impression of mocking laughter as it swayed in front of her, glutting on her mana. Growling, Jun pushed past the throbbing, stabbing pain in her head as she threw her will against the block again, sharpening it into spears that she threw her mana behind to power her strikes as she attacked the block again. "I won't let this stupid tail beat me!"

Stolen novel; please report.

Under her withering assault the block crumbled away and Jun flooded the rogue spell with her intent, wrestling with it for control. She wasn't sure how long it took, but eventually she wrestled the spell into submission. Mentally battered and bruised, Jun clamped down on the spell with fangs of intent and held it down until she felt it send her feelings of begrudging submission. Slowly, Jun withdrew her senses from it, wincing as the pain of her migraine made itself known again.

Taking a few minutes to rest, the pain slowly subsided until all she had was one of the worst headaches of her life and slowly fed her mana into a tendril that she sent towards the spellform for her snares.

The first thing Jun noticed was how much larger the spellform floating in her mind seemed to be. The familiar four sided pyramid of her old [Sapping Snare] was gone, instead replaced with complex spellform that seemed to fluctuate and change, pulsing to an unknown beat. As she probed at the spellform with her mana, she "saw" different faces and symbols folding in and out of existence in a complex dance, some faintly glowing to her senses with her mana while others only had the barest amount or mana or none at all. She tried to count the numerous faces of the strange spellform, but she quickly lost count as they folded in and out of each other, though she noticed a group of facets that seemed to remain relatively stable and unmoving.

Sending her mana tendril deeper in towards the unmoving facets, she felt a rush of relief as she recognized the arcane symbols for her old spell. As her mana made contact with the glowing facets of the spellform, instinctive knowledge rushed into her, conjuring images of all the ways she'd used her old spell. The rush of knowledge told her that she would still be able to use her spell as she did before with some effort, but that her spell was much more than that now.

Channeling more mana into her tendril, she fueled the symbols one by one, feeding it her intent as she opened her eyes to see a veritable forest of thin of snares as over a dozen tendrils manifested from her shoulder. Dismissing and casting the spell a few times, she experimented with it while the phantom tail vanished and seemed to sulk in the back of her mind, but it didn't give her any more trouble.

Controlling the massively increased number of tendrils proved too much for her, but she was able to fold the tendrils into each other which simplified things until she was left with an even four that looked similar to her old snares. Moving them around was more intuitive than before, and it wasn't long before she finally felt comfortable with her spell again.

Reasonably confident now, Jun finally got out of bed and dressed, grabbing her bag before she exited the room now well lit by the midmorning sun, only to find Sara outside her door, her hand raised to knock. The woman was dressed in a casual tank top and shorts that only came to her mid thigh as if it wasn't the middle of winter, though it made sense with how warm the dormitories were with whatever enchantments the Academy surely used.

Memories of a firm hug as she buried her face into the elf's soft chest sent heat creeping across her face and stole just a bit of the strength from her legs. "Uh… hi!" Jun squeaked, her heart racing as she mentally berated herself for her awkwardness.

"Good morning!" Sara said brightly, graciously ignoring Jun's embarrassment as she held out her other hand clutching a folded letter. "A staff member left a note for you last night, but I didn't want to wake you. You seemed pretty out of it."

Getting her flush under control, Jun reached out for the letter, a surge of electricity sending tingles up her arm as their fingertips brushed. Sara smiled at her prettily, spiking her blood pressure even more. "Well? What does it say?" she asked.

Coughing, Jun hurriedly looked away from the pretty elf and unfolded the letter, finding a quick note penned in neat handwriting on a piece of paper stamped with the Academy's coat of arms. As Jun read the note, a mix of complicated emotions welled up inside of her.

"To Student Jun of North March,

The Academy regrets to inform you that we have received verified reports of the death of Faculty Advisor Arwen Swiftwind.

A new Faculty Advisor has been assigned to oversee your team.

Due to the death of your previous advisor prior to the completion of the Winter Expedition, and the lack of a satisfactory report confirming your meeting basic proficiency standards, you have been placed on academic probation pending evaluation by your new Faculty Advisor.

Baron Sean Vorn

Registrar

Forest's Edge Academy"

The signature at the end was accompanied by a splatter of deep blue wax imprinted with an intricate insignia. Wordlessly, Jun handed the letter over to Sara as she thought through the information in the short few lines. She hadn't seen Arwen since before the fight at the river, and there hadn't been time to ask after Arwen as they fled the Forest. A large part of her only felt relief hearing that the heartless bastard was dead, but she wasn't sure how to feel about being assigned a new Advisor so quickly. Worse still, the words "academic probation" didn't sound like a good thing. Jun could only imagine the jerk of a Registrar smiling as he wrote that part of the letter.

"Academic probation?!" Sara yelled, pulling Jun out of her thoughts. "Are they serious?! They can't possibly be holding his death against you!"

"Whose death?" Cecilia said as she came out of her room, sleepily rubbing her eyes as she slumped onto the couch. Jun turned to look at her other roommate, her flush coming back as she saw the well muscled warrior half dressed in sleep rumpled clothes.

Sara looked at her and the letter with an unspoken question and Jun nodded. If anyone had a right to know Arwen was dead, it was Cecilia. Wordlessly, Sara handed the warrior the letter and motioned for Jun to join her on the other couch. Moving woodenly, Jun sat next to the elf as Cecilia began to read.

"Yes! That bastard's dead!" Cecilia celebrated, cheer on her face at the news, but it slowly faded as she read on, her brow furrowing with every line. "Wait… that jackass Sean," she growled. "He didn't even tell you who your new advisor is, or when you're supposed to meet them. What does he think he's—" Cecilia paused as someone knocked on their door.

Exchanging looks with her roommates, Jun got up to answer the door but by the time she opened it, whoever it had been was gone, a simple folded note left on the floor outside. Looing around the long hallway outside, Jun didn't see or hear a trace of anyone. Whoever dropped the note must have run away as soon as they knocked. Frowning, Jun picked it up and, seeing it addressed to her, opened it and quickly read the short message inside.

"Who was that Jun?" Sara asked as Jun shut the door.

"It was another note, they were gone before I got to the door," she replied, handing the elf the new note.

Sara quickly skimmed the note and handed it off to Cecilia before she rushed to her room. As Cecilia did the same, dropping the note on the couch as she did, Jun snatched it up and shoved it in her bag. She didn't need to read it again, it was short and to the point.

"Jun, come to the third training hall on the East end of the Academy. You are being watched."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.