CH56

“Myriad, do you seriously not have any idea what it might be?”

<My race didn’t produce technology the same way others did, there wasn’t a need to know something like this.>

“How do you destroy an entire planet without any technology?”

<We specialized in ritual magics, chemistry is far outside of my available knowledge.>

Ben let out a sigh. “He says he doesn’t know Abrus, are you sure you’ve never heard of it?”

“I could easily have encountered it in my life, just not by that name, or it could be as Globolgork said yesterday about names being translated to match equivalents. Perhaps there simply isn’t something similar enough that it would be called that name, or maybe its makeup is different enough that even if it does the same thing it wouldn’t be recognised as such.”

“God what a pain,” Ben said dejectedly. “Looks like that’s one dream down the drain, and today was going so well too,” As he sat down and stared at the tube in front of him someone took a seat to his side.

“What’s the matter?” Thera asked as she looked at what he and her father were staring at.

“Oh hey, since we finished up with all the braces I thought I would try and get your dad to help me with something since he was here watching anyway, but it looks like it was a bust.”

“You already finished?” Penelias surprised voice came from behind him before moving to her husband’s side. “I had 40 people waiting for you, from what Sonya said I thought it would take you a couple days.”

It seemed she wasn’t even going to try and hide that she had given him an unreasonable amount of work, but it didn’t much matter to Ben. “They all had significantly less mana than Sonya so it wasn’t too hard, plus my skill leveled up from being in contact with all of those different minds so it got a little faster too,” He had the chance to interact with 25 succubi and incubi, as well as around 15 members of a variety of other races with passive magics in the city. It really showed him the importance of practicing in a variety of ways instead of just interacting with the same people over and over again.

“You got a level up? Lucky,” Thera said with a small hint of envy. He knew she struggled getting her own skills up, at least when it came to her magics, but he wasn’t going to be keeping any secrets when it came to his skills around her if they were going to be working together, who knew what could be necessary to save their lives when they were hunting one day, which was why he also included his other bit of good news.

“Actually I also got a new skill called hidden mind. It looks like trying to keep my thoughts and feelings from leaking into 40 people paid off,” The name seemed self-explanatory enough, it was a skill that hid his mind from others. He had just been trying to keep any of his lingering feelings from bothering anyone he dealt with today, but it looked like it worked out for him. Not that he was sure how many skills had mind-reading aspects to them like his own, but it didn’t hurt to have at least.

“So now when you practice you’ll be able to hear my thoughts but I won’t be able to hear yours? That’s not fair,” She told him with a pout.

“It’s not that different yet, here,” He grabbed her hand and connected with her. Since his level went up again it no longer felt like mutterings from her, instead right away he could tell she was embarrassed about having her hand held in front of her parents after the scene they made yesterday, and he let go. “How was that from your perspective?”

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She gave him a complicated look for a moment before answering. “Your thoughts were definitely more clear than before you leveled up, but it still mostly felt mumbled. I could, however, pick up on the fact that you had a pretty good idea what I was thinking.”

He tried to laugh it off. “Ha well, it is part of the package after all. I’m sure with some practice you could get the skill as well. Besides, since my connect leveled up we should redo your brace later to see how much it affects it. At least since I got this it should make it a bit easier for you to sleep.”

“Hmm fine. So what were you talking to Myriad about then?”

“Myriad?” Pelenia asked, looking around. She had certainly heard Ben say the name, but there was nobody else there.