The next few days passed by rather quickly, from Henry’s point of view. Especially with how busy he found himself to be.

  By day 2, counting from their fight against the seahorse, Henry would say he was almost 85% recovered. His constant therapeutic soul baths—which he called the process of infusing his whole body with a mix of energies from his healing Skill, Life Surge, along with a dash of Thaumaturgy and Renewal essence—had been pretty efficient at accelerating his recovery, and by then, he was confident in resuming his strengthening exercises. Just like his experience with physical therapy, he alternated the baths with mildly strenuous pressure exercises, though he never got anywhere close to the intensity he had achieved in the fight and by now he was sure. He was seeing progress. Not just in healing, but in the resilience he was building up in his soul.

  Henry believed that if he hadn’t started on these exercises days before, the damage he self-inflicted would have been much, much worse. And while his previous life’s common sense whispered that only a few days of an exercise would not be enough to make such a difference, Henry had to remind himself that he was far, far from human. His standards were very skewed, and his capacity to adapt and evolve was likely some of the highest in this world, even to this place’s standards considering his nature and arsenal of abilities.

  Plus, it seemed that these soul strengthening exercises weren’t that common, so it made sense that the early progress would be fast.

  Velistraine, of course, had called him a moron, but she also added that if he got his training regimen to work to let her know. Right now she was busy helping the two teens—Ash and Fabian—into getting the last couple of levels before their attempts at the B+ upgrade. Henry was helping as well, but so far, most of what they encountered were either too dangerous, or too weak.

  While he worked on his recovery, Henry often hung out under the ship. Sometimes, he’d swim ahead, joined by Maurice as they explored the depths, and sometimes, he was content to stick one of his arms to the keel and let himself be dragged as he meditated.

  He had even tried flying. He had considered doing feathers, but that felt like a pain so instead, he opted for the bat-kind of flight, where he basically left two of his arms to himself while extending and thickening the membrane between his others arms while adding some bones and joints within them.

  Flying was not easy. With his arms attached to the ship, he tried parasailing which was awkward as all hell, but whenever he let go and tried to even out his flight, he always ended up in a clump of limbs, crashing down to the water. No matter how much he lightened his weight and tried to make his bones less dense, he wasn’t getting the hang of it.

  Maurice had loved the idea and was already working on his own version, while the rest of the crew had been either impressed or horrified, and Henry had to agree.

  Seeing a bat-like kraken flying after you was a horrifying sight. But Henry had to admit that it had been fun, and that he would keep trying to get the process down. Maybe if he increased his wingspan and reinforced it a little more?

  He shook his head as he secured himself to the keel. He’d figure that out later. For now, he had a fusion of Skills to attend to. Because as he’d been recovering, he had nibbled on the seahorse’s flesh and had used all that time to consider and think through what he titled ‘the toxicity rework’. And he was ready to act on his plans.

  Break down Venom Production in two parts. The cataloging/copying and production part, and the production part. Hook the Library to Bite and try to include the malicious mana in the catalogue. Hook the production capability to Bite and Toxic Ray.

  Henry let out a slow breath and spread his scouts a little wider as he flattened against the keel. He had a clone in his chamber in case he needed to get out of the water, but he didn’t expect to need it. Sending his attention inward after telling Maurice he’d be busy for the next few hours, Henry got started.

  ***

  By the time Henry cracked his eyes open once more, the ship was swaying violently. His clones above were hearing the howling of wind and thunder, and while the crew were handling it with professionalism and competence, the kids were having a hard time. As for Maurice, the crab had anchored himself to the bow of the ship, and was having the time of life as he waved his claws about, as if he was riding a roller coaster while the sky rumbled and roared, criss crossed with lightning.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  At least someone was having fun, Henry thought as he stretched his arms about and yawned. He hadn’t slept since the fight, though the process he’d just come out of might just be what knocked him out.

  But he was successful and finally, he pulled his list of notifications and looked through them.

  Toxic Shroud (D) added to Ephemerals

  Toxin Catalog: Aetherbane of the Stinglance synthetized

  Those two he’d gotten from nibbling on the seahorse, and Henry was looking forward to test and play with the mana-devouring toxin the seahorse had used. Though he found it funny that even though the notification was older than the modification he’d just went through, the name of the Skill got updated. After all, Toxin Catalog was a new addition. Looking at the new Skills and their definition, he nodded.

  The effort had been worth it.

  Trickster’s Toxic Concoctions (C)

  Passives:

  Toxin Foundry: Below your skin and within your mouth, glands continuously produce and store the toxins you know. Their production can be greatly accelerated with the use of mana.

  Toxin Catalog: You have a great aptitude at breaking down and copying the toxins you encounter, whether by sampling them through ingestion, injection, or cutaneous exposure.

  Available toxins:

  Numbing of the Pufferfish

  Spasmodic of the Sea Serpent

  Tranquilizing of the Mesmer Eel

  Anticoagulant of the Sea Drake

  Agonizing of the Lionfish

  Fulminis Bane of the Thundermaw Kraken

  Bedlam of the Stinglance Seahorse

  Aetherbane of the Stinglance Tyrant

  Veilwatch’s Mark

  Actives:

  Toxic Shroud: Exude a miasma of your toxins, cloaking yourself in a poisonous haze that seeps into foes who draw near.

  Toxic Ray: Unleash a focused pulse infused with the toxic energies of your choosing.

  The rework had taken Venom Production out of Bite, but as he eyed his own mana-venom added to the list, he chuckled. Henry was happy with the result. It was much easier to keep track and use what he had acquired in this manner, and he could already sense them, building up below his skin. Though he guessed this probably made him inedible for most creatures out there. And he was going to need to be careful when interacting or touching people. He didn’t want to risk exposing innocents to his residual toxins. It should be easy enough, so long as he was careful. And considering he was creating the toxins himself, he’d take some time to work on a way to quickly neutralize them, just in case.

  A toxin to destroy all of my toxins. Or I could develop something with Life Surge? I’d have to look into it.

  With that out of the way, Henry asked Velistraine through his clones to let him know if his help was needed, then as he looked through his network of clones and the ones he’d left behind as relays, he got back to his soul exercises.

  The next day, Ash and Fabian officially made it to B-rank, also securing the B+ demarcation and two days later, the first of the Emerald Isles came into view.

  Click here to join

  If you want to support me and read ahead, there's . I use the new subscription model, so you will not get double billed on the first of the month.