My left arm had simply disappeared…
— Agh… what the hell?! — I shouted, more from shock than pain.
Right in front of me, crouched low to the ground, stood something. It had appeared as if out of thin air. A massive creature with the muzzle of a fox and a long, sparking tail. Its fur bristled, and real lightning crackled between its paws.
«When I said I wanted to meet someone alive, I didn't mean a gigantic beast that would rip my arm off. What the hell is this thing?!»
*It is a thunder-fox*
A fox?! The only things fox-like about it are the tail and the muzzle! That thing's at least three and a half meters tall. It'll crush me!
*You can defeat it with ease*
— Defeat it? I'm missing an arm, in case you haven't noticed! — I snapped, watching as the creature lowered itself further, its fur snapping with electric discharges. — What am I even supposed to fight it with? Throw rocks at it? Poke it with a stick?
*No. Use magic*
After Elaris spoke, something like electricity shot through my body. Not the destructive current coming from the fox, but something else — internal, deep. As if thousands of invisible threads had pierced the space around me, and through them pure, primordial energy began pouring into me.
My mind practically exploded with knowledge. It wasn't like reading a textbook. It was more like suddenly remembering a long-forgotten dream. I "saw" the world differently. The air around me was no longer empty — it was filled with tiny glowing particles. And my body… it was greedily absorbing them.
I looked at my left arm. No blood flowed from the stump. Instead, a silvery mist was dissolving into the air.
Somewhere deep inside, I felt a pull toward those particles drifting around me.
I squeezed my eyes shut for a second, focusing on the strange warmth pulsing in my chest. I simply wanted my arm back. And the magical essence around me responded obediently.
The silvery sparks floating in the air suddenly rushed toward my wound, weaving into thin, almost transparent threads.
I froze, unable to tear my eyes away from my own shoulder. From it, shimmering lines began stretching outward one after another, intertwining and building the clear outline of an arm in empty space. It didn't hurt. On the contrary, I felt only a pleasant, enveloping warmth flowing from my shoulder down to the place where emptiness had been just moments ago.
Layer by layer, the threads overlapped, and before my eyes the contours of muscles, joints, and skin emerged from nothing. It all happened incredibly fast and smoothly, as if someone invisible were simply sketching me back into existence. First the elbow formed, then the forearm, and finally, from the glowing weave, a hand and slender fingers extended.
The moment the last thread fell into place, the glow faded. I instinctively clenched my new hand into a fist — it worked perfectly.
Sensing the threat, the thunder-fox roared. The ground beneath its paws blackened, and three branching bolts shot toward me at once.
But now I could see how slowly that energy moved. I simply raised my new palm forward and took the hit, subconsciously thinking it would work.
[Recorded: Racial Skill "Observer" activated]
[Recorded: Interaction with anomaly
Analysis complete
New skill acquired: "Abyss"
Reproduction capability confirmed]
For a brief moment, I felt something strange — as if Elaris had said something, but the source of those words was different, deeper somewhere within. I registered it at the edge of my consciousness, then pushed it aside. Perhaps this was the "Skill Manager."
Mana boiled inside me, forming a thin, almost transparent film in front of my hand. The lightning struck it and… was simply absorbed, causing me no harm. I felt the foreign power fill my veins, making the silver hair on my head crackle with static.
The energy that had sunk into my palm now circulated through my body, concentrating at my fingertips, as if searching for an exit.
The beast that had attacked a second ago now stood frozen, staring at me with fury. Sparks leapt from its eyes, its fur snapping with charge — it was preparing to strike again.
But I didn't wait.
[Recorded: Energy successfully absorbed
Analysis complete
New skill acquired: "Thunder Discharge"
Reproduction capability confirmed]
This time I wasn't surprised. So I'm doing everything right. I'll have to ask Elaris about this later. But for now…
I raised two fingers toward it and mimed a shot.
In that instant, all the accumulated energy compressed into a single stream and burst forward. It took the shape of a thin, almost invisible needle — dense and soundless — tearing through the space around it.
The impact was deafening. The air collapsed with a roar, like two cars crashing at full speed. Everything was swallowed in a cloud of dust, residual discharges flickering through it.
When the dust settled, the beast was gone.
In the place where it had stood yawned a crater about two meters wide. At its bottom, among the melted earth, lay a small sphere, dimly glimmering like a pearl.
Did I do that?
*Incredible…*
Elaris said something, but I barely heard her. A faint ringing filled my head, and all my attention was fixed on what lay at the bottom of the crater. I took a step forward… and suddenly felt as if the support inside me had been ripped away.
My legs gave out, the world swayed before my eyes. Just a meter short of reaching it, I lost my balance and collapsed onto the ground, slipping into darkness from sudden exhaustion…