Sid POV

  “What the hell was that?” Varun asked. His voice had a tight, uneven edge, a mix of fear and disbelief. The surrounding forest had gone still after the pulse of aura, the air holding a faint pressure that had not yet dispersed. Unlike Rohan, he and Pallavi had never faced an aura-type skill before, and it showed in the way they kept darting glances toward the direction where Tony had stood.

  Sid did not respond immediately. His attention lingered on the fading pressure that had washed over them. The shock of realizing that Tony had already unlocked his trait less than a week into the dungeon kept him silent. He had always considered Varun promising. Even then, Tony’s pace made that comparison feel almost pointless.

  “Was that a skill, like that goblin shaman?” Rohan’s voice came from Sid’s side, thin and cracked. He kept glancing at Sid as if hoping for reassurance and gripping his spear so tightly that his knuckles had gone pale. He could tell Rohan was trying to label what they felt as Intimidate to make it easier to understand.

  Sid thought of the trait that had earned Tony his nickname—Tyrant’s Aura. At early levels it behaved like Intimidate, a pressure that rattled the target. As it grew, it extended its influence, strengthening allies and weakening enemies. People had joked that Tony was born in the wrong era, because the trait suited someone who commanded battlefields.

  It would have been manageable if it had ended there. Sid still did not know the exact source of Tony’s true strength. Maybe it was this trait, or maybe there was a second trait hidden behind it. What mattered was that Tony became stronger the more people he fought. His presence built momentum, and his aura swelled with every opponent, turning him into a one-man army.

  “It felt similar, but weaker,” Sid said, letting his voice settle back into its usual calm rhythm. Rohan relaxed a fraction, not much, but enough to notice.

  “What happened to his teeth?” Pallavi lowered her weapons and faced Sid. Her brows tried to meet each other, and she kept glancing between Sid and the direction where Tony had been, as if expecting an explanation from either.

  “Whatever happened, it was after they got here. That is not a birth defect. Those guys have enough money for plastic surgery.” Varun tried to play it off, forcing a short laugh. Sid saw the flicker of guilt behind it, the kind that appeared when someone joked to cover discomfort.

  Sid knew TK came from money. Everyone at the guild knew. He had paid out the contracts of the top delvers out of his own pocket before they saw their first windfall. Sid wondered how Varun had figured it out though.

  “Do you know what happened to him?” Rohan asked. His posture was tense, his eyes fixed on Sid.

  Varun and Pallavi shook their heads.

  “I am not sure, but I can take a guess.” Sid’s words came out slowly, as if he was unsure of what he was saying.

  All three of them turned toward him, giving him silent permission to go on.

  “Whenever you get a skill crystal, it says compatible in the message, right?” Sid looked from one teammate to the next, waiting for recognition to appear on their faces. “What if there are some incompatible skills, and he absorbed one?” His tone steadied as he voiced the idea.

  Rohan kept a neutral expression, absorbing the information. Pallavi’s eyes widened as understanding hit her. Varun’s expression shifted into a thoughtful frown, the kind he used when he was trying to connect pieces he had overlooked.

  “Well, it’s just a theory. It’s not like we can ask him about it.” Sid let out a short laugh. It carried little humour, with Varun and Pallavi exchanging a glance, picking up on the strain he tried to hide. They had added another powerful enemy to the list, and Sid’s mind was already drifting toward the idea of leaving the camp entirely, even without a healing skill.

  “Should we leave this camp?” Pallavi voiced what he had been thinking. Rohan turned sharply toward her, while Varun raised an eyebrow, waiting to see if she would walk it back.

  “I mean leave camp for good.” Pallavi met Sid’s gaze.

  “Things are not as bad as you guys are making them seem. Besides, we have Naga and Aditi here,” said Rohan, meeting Varun’s glare head on. “She is still our friend, and it was a difficult situation. I would give her the benefit of the doubt before we grab the pitchforks. I am also not comfortable abandoning her.”

  Sid respected Rohan’s loyalty. A part of him, however, kept circling back to the gaps in what they knew.

  He had been trying to understand the connection between Aditi and the Kurushingal family. It had to be more than gratitude for saving Sunny’s life. She might be opportunistic or even a gold digger, but she was not foolish enough to chase money and status on Earth, when people died every day in this place.

  The ‘Tyrant’ himself handed him a clue to solving that puzzle. Tony mentioned Aditi twice in their terse conversation, almost reflexively, and there had been intent in the way he said her name. When paired with Tony’s lifelong bachelor status and the snippet Joe mentioned about Aditi being their future sister-in-law, the picture grew clearer.

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  Tony had been one of the most eligible men in the country once the tusks faded on evolution, yet he remained unattached. That detail had never made sense to him until now. Aditi and Tony had known each other before they entered the dungeon. Sid lacked concrete proof, but the sense of it settled into place like a missing piece in a jigsaw puzzle.

  “I vote we leave this place,” Varun said. His voice dropped lower, as if he feared someone was eavesdropping. He raised his hand, though.

  Pallavi and Rohan both looked at Sid. Rohan’s eyes flicked toward Varun, then back, silently urging Sid to take a position before the argument grew sharper.

  “Let’s stay out for a night and see how it goes,” Sid said, his posture thoughtful. “We might have to come back if one of us gets injured.”

  Varun nodded. The reluctance showed in the way he exhaled and looked toward the camp boundary.

  “Alright, let’s pack and leave fast. I want to move out before someone else comes looking for us.” Leaving now was disastrous politically. It would let their opponents twist the events however they wanted. Staying felt worse, as if they were letting circumstances dictate their actions.

  The group returned to their tasks. Sid sorted through the mushrooms again, brushing dirt from the caps and organizing them into balanced piles. Rohan and Pallavi moved toward the pond to fill their spare water bottles, and Varun sat nearby shaping wooden spears, pausing occasionally to test the weight and balance of each shaft.

  Sid handed four bundles of mushrooms to Pallavi when she returned. She accepted them with a nod and packed them away. Sid pushed himself up, rolling his shoulders until the tension eased.

  His thoughts kept circling his growing to-do list. His progression plan and the hidden realm strategy both demanded attention, yet every interruption pushed them further back.

  Sid brought up his status to get a clear view of where he stood.

  Name: Siddharth Krishnan

  Race: Human (Tier 0)

  Traits [1/1]:

  ????: Contract [0/1]

  Strength: 3

  Agility: 3

  Endurance: 3

  Vitality: 2

  Perception: 11

  Intelligence: 13

  Willpower: 9

  Charisma: 2

  Affinities: None

  Skills [3/3]:

  Veil of the Mind’s Eye (Common)—Level 12

  Mist Blend (Common)—Level 5

  Keen Eyes (Common)—Level 7

  The only upside of using the veil on himself had been the jump in its level. The memory of waking from that distorted state left him uneasy, and he still could not piece together how he had escaped it. He knew he would never attempt it again.

  Mist Blend and Keen Eyes continued to rise steadily, and he planned to reach level twenty with both. He would only evolve them once he found another skill to merge them with.

  His gaze lingered on his traits, and a bitter weight formed in his stomach. With the advantage of his future memories, he had thought himself to be so far ahead of his peers. Then Tony appeared, already using his trait instinctively. The comparison left Sid feeling off balance. It frustrated him more than he wanted to admit.

  Unlike skills, traits usually provided passive enhancements, such as stat boosts or improved proficiency for certain activities. Nothing in his status hinted at a straightforward way to use it.

  He had been reluctant to test his trait because his status showed he had only one attempt. Risking that in a blind experiment felt reckless. Though he could not keep avoiding it. He would try it soon, not on people, but on goblins—he could eliminate the other side in the contract and try to reset it if they were goblins.

  Another thought followed close behind. He had leaned too hard into efficiency during his fights, always going for lethal hits. It made sense tactically, but it limited his skill growth. He could have tested the effects of the veil on goblins more before he tried it on himself.

  Rohan handed Sid his backpack and asked, “Are we going towards that cave?”

  “Yeah, it gives us a safe place to stop and sleep.” Sid opened the pack and checked the contents. His fingers brushed over the notebook and pen he had packed for mapping out his approach to the hidden realm.

  Sid had already charted a course to a place ideal for training. It was about a day and a half from the camp, an area controlled by a Silkenfang Spider Matriarch. The Matriarch was far beyond anything they could handle, but her offspring were plentiful and perfect for grinding skills. With enough encounters and luck, they could even push Rohan’s Mana Web to the Rare rank.

  As Sid glanced back toward the camp, he spotted movement. Three, maybe four figures approached through the trees, walking with purpose.

  “Varun, you can finish the weapons later. Let’s go. Now.” Sid swung his backpack over one shoulder and tightened his grip on his staff.

  Varun hurried to pass spears to Rohan and Pallavi. Rohan took his with a quick nod. Pallavi adjusted her grip, already scanning the treeline behind Sid.

  Sid always made sure the team carried more weapons than they strictly needed. Each of them carried a spear and two daggers. Varun alone favoured the short sword, having swapped it in place of a dagger.

  Sid remembered Naga asking him earlier to donate more weapons to the camp—a request he refused. He had already given a sling, two daggers, and a short sword. As he watched the figures draw closer, he wondered whether some of the tension around the camp stemmed from resentment at their refusal to share not just skills but also weapons.

  “Why are we rushing?” Rohan asked while tucking a dagger into his belt.

  “There is someone else headed this way.” Sid’s jaw tightened with irritation. “I do not know about you, but I have had enough people showing up and threatening us for one morning.”

  Rohan hesitated, likely torn between concern and loyalty. He did not stop preparing, though. “What if they need help? What if it is a monster attack?”

  “Then they can handle it.” Varun crossed the distance to Sid and passed him a wooden spear with a blunted tip. The tip had broken during their last fight with the goblins.

  Sid started moving, and Varun and Pallavi immediately matched his pace. Rohan lingered for a moment, weighing the choice, then followed with a resigned exhale. Sid did not want to force him, but delaying meant risking another confrontation they did not have time for.

  Sid respected Rohan’s compassion. It reminded him of who he used to be. However, once you saw the world without rose-tinted glasses, it became difficult to put them back on. All Sid wanted was the strength to chart his own course in life and not let the world decide it for him.

  He needed that strength when he returned to Earth. He would not allow his choices to be controlled by money or political pressure ever again.

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