Chapter 45: CHPT 45: Weapon of choice
Sunday Oct 8 2240, Sometime after Arne delivered the breaking news.
"Great. I'm a fucking endangered species." Claude said plainly while running his wet hands through his hair. He looked at them under the rippling water. As it stilled, his reflection suddenly came into focus.
"What the fuck??!" He said while his hands flew straight to the face he barely recognized.
"[Ahhh yes, this is your first time seeing yourself.]"
"....."
"[Once your changed, your body goes into a sort of high speed evolution involving a increase in muscles mass, size, strength, speed, durability, senses and recovery as well as sexual appeal— all to prepare your body for the transformation and to increase the size of the Lupine population. By all accounts you are a great representation of the last Lupine of Romulus.] Arne explained.
He now stood in the pond looking at himself in shock. He looked older— by at least 3 years meaning most people would assume he's 18. His face still held its scars, but it was matured— more angular and light stubble lined his jaw. He kept turning his face back and forth noticing that his skin had this lively glow beneath the shadow that his midnight black hair cast as it fell down the sides of his face and almost to his shoulders.
He slowly brought his arms up noticing the veins lining his biceps and forearms, he had to have put on at least 20lbs of pure muscle in his three weeks of slumber. His bronze scared and glowing skin looked painted on over his muscles. He slowly prodded his midsection with a look of disbelief.
"An 8 pack.....really?"
"[.....]"
***
Sometime after getting a little more used to his looks, he stepped out of the pond and put his old v-neck and brown pants back on. He stepped back out from under the shade of the forest and felt the warm sun rays hit his damp hair and cooled skin.
"So, tomorrow I go back to the University." He said while bathing in the sunlight.
"[Yes, you do in fact return to the University tomorrow.]"
"I'll have to speak to the detective then won't I." Claude asked.
"[Yes, but you'll be in a much better state now that you've more or less come to terms with what you are. Also we'll be sure to exercise before you get there. Until then, what do you plan to do.]" Arne replied.
"There's really only one thing to do. Train."
***
A few hours later, Claude sat on his knees in the grass in between the front of the cabin and the forest— his hair and body were slick with sweat from effort. Wooden spears were laid out all around him chaotically and Frosty was laying nearby with one in his mouth. The only thing driving him to keep going was the thought that if he got stronger he could avenge his father.
Claude spent many hours using his Nature/Forest Element to make wooden spears and get more comfortable manipulating it in general— he often had to take breaks and replenish his mana. He did so by sitting and meditating to also calm his breathing in the process.
He made different styled spears just to practice and see which ones were the easiest to make and use, he did so by messing with the length, curve, thickness and style of the blade.
He really wanted to become proficient in wielding a long and graceful looking classic spear but found that he somewhat disliked having two hands on one weapon— he still liked it more than his short sword, but it didn't feel..right.
"Fuck!"
Snap!
He broke the long 6ft spear in half over his knee in anger after practicing with it for an hour and still finding that it didn't feel quite right. He held the two halves of the spear in his hands looking at them in wonder. He flipped them simultaneously a couple times.
"If the weight was distributed properly, these could be interesting." He thought to himself.
DING!
[Mana is at 5%]
"Crap."
Claude dropped the two halves of the broken spear and sat in a criss cross position. He was beginning to find a sense of familiarity in sitting and trying to speed up his mana recovery while feeling incredibly exhausted. After 25 minutes he received a message from his system saying his mana was replenished. It seemed he also received another.
DING!
[Mana is at 100%]
DING!
[Acquired Skill Unlocked: (Combat Meditation LV1)]
"Huh?" Claude said in surprise. He wanted to learn more about the skill so he went to his stats screen and focused on the skill. It moved in and out like it was being pressed and then a new screen came up with the description of the skill.
[Combat Meditation: An Acquired Skill obtainable by spending a few hours trying to focus your mana in an fatigued state. Combat Meditation at level 1 grants the user +35 mana upon activation with a 1 hour cooldown.]
"Arne?"
"[Yes?]"
"What's an Acquired Skill?" He asked in hopes that Arne had an idea.
"[Its a skill you can gain from outside of your skill tree by doing certain repetitive actions.]"
"Interesting."
He thought it would be a good idea to look at the other new skill he had now that his stats screen was already up. He looked down the list until his eyes fell on "Unbound".
[Unbound: A skill given by the God of Wolves, Fenrir. Upon activating Unbound at your current level; Disciple, you have a 15% chance of negating/breaking out of binding skills and debuffs. Mana cost: 50. Cooldown: 3 minutes.]
"That could be pretty powerful at max level." Claude thought.
After reading up on his two new skills, he got back to training. The sun was setting causing the cloudless sky to be covered in hues of orange and blue.
He walked back over to the spear he snapped in half and played around with it, performing stabs and slashes in multiple directions. Eventually Claude put the spears down and used his Element to make two smaller legit spears at about 3ft. He imagined the shape and design as the tree branches closest to him began to morph and combine.
The finished product was two shorter but thicker spears. They felt good in his hands— they felt like an extension of his limbs. He tightened his grip around the dark wooden exterior of the spears and slowly began to get back into the rhythm of training.
***
He concluded his solo sparring session with an impressively executed twin stab, anybody that watched the movement would be able to tell there was power behind the simple strike.
He stood up straight and brought the spear in his right hand up near his face.
Green energy faintly flowed from his hand and onto the spear until it was weakly shrouded in his Aura.
"Now this feels right."
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
_Avatar0FFury_
_Avatar0FFury_ Hey thanks for reading. Let me know what you think of Claudes weapons of choice. Also thanks for the powerstones, frenandoi, NomiBarom, Daoist945947, subastion and Daniela_Cruz_4644!!!! I really appreciate the support.
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