Training picked up. The mines now had the peculiar mood of a home army camp on the eve of deployment. Half of it was all business, but the other half did their best to make the circumstances more pleasant. The baths were kept clean and well-flooded, there were new constructions rising every week and a few kind souls had spent a lot of time and mana to create bushes of wildflowers, bringing some much-needed green to the desolate place. Viv spent her days either practicing outside or accompanying convoys to and from the Yries camp and specific hunting grounds that only the Hadals dared travel. She fought the moles again, the bats, two giant worms, a sort of trap lamprey that dropped from the ceiling and a particularly pungent gut spiller. The Yries asked her to help clear the vale outside their cave which she did for a few more services. Her efforts bore fruit and she got a pleasant surprise after a particularly intense practice with the inquisitors.

Mana sense, mana manipulation and mana absorption have merged into the advanced skill: mana mastery at novice 1