Taming Destiny - a Tamer Class isekai/portal survival fantasy.

You fixed its Evolution, breathed Tarra, her eyes as wide as anyone else’s. I take a few steps forward, aided by my Bound, then move to sit on the ground as soon as I’m far enough away from Fenrir’s Evolution process to not risk falling back into it.

Catch and River help lower me carefully to the ground – I’d probably have just thumped onto the dirt without their aid. Not that I would have cared much. Lathani sits behind me and I lean back gratefully against her – she makes an excellent backrest.

Reaching into my Inventory, I pull out a pot of water and drink greedily from it. One advantage of being the leader of the samuran village is that I don’t have to collect my own water all the time now – I can set it as a task for someone else to do. I feel a bit guilty about it, but remind myself that I’m doing things that no one else in the village can do; anyone can collect water from the river.

Once I’m feeling a little more hydrated, I grab some of my backup cooked meat and tear into it hungrily. The nausea and exhaustion abating a little, I look up at the samurans who are still alternating between staring at Fenrir and staring at me.

“I hope I fixed it, but we’ll find out when Fenrir comes out,” I say, remembering this time to make an effort for everyone to understand me. “Why do you all look so shocked?” I ask with my eyebrows drawing together a little in confusion.

Tarra eyes me then lets out a hiss that I can tell is her equivalent of a sigh of exasperation. She comes to sit down in front of me. Joy moves forward too, though doesn’t sit. Behind them, I see the other Pathwalkers and several Warriors, Shrieks included. He looks and feels thoughtful; Sticks is flabbergasted. Like I’ve turned the world on its head. Windy, unsurprisingly, is angry, though that’s just her default around me. Underneath the anger is more than a little shock too. Flower has a similar expression to Shrieks – thoughtful, with hints of calculation rippling through the Bond.

Just because you’ve done something impossible, Tarra answers my question with exasperation and the slightest amount of awe. To my knowledge, no one has ever interfered in an Evolution. Not with a better result, anyway.

“There’s no guarantee that this will be a better result,” I point out. “He could end up deformed or crippled at the end of it.” Tarra flicks her tail impatiently.

Then that will not be because of your efforts, she says plainly. Believe me, out of all the Pathwalkers, I am the one who knows the most about Evolutions. I’m the one who has tried to heal so many of those whose Evolutions have failed. I’m the one young Unevolved come to for advice about Evolution. I’m the one who, in my younger years, tried to find ways of improving the chances of Evolution with herbal draughts. None of it worked. The most I was able to do was to reduce chances of successful Evolution.

Yet here you are, she continues sounding almost aggrieved, though the emotions coming over the Bond are far more positive than her tone indicates, doing what I thought was impossible. What I had resigned myself to never being able to do. The lizog was about to fail to even condense a Core, dooming itself to being trapped as an Unevolved. Tell me – do you know if it has a Core now?

“Well, yes, he does,” I answer almost reflexively, reeling a little from what she’s revealing about the chances of me having done what I just did. I’m rather glad that I didn’t know all that before trying – it would have discouraged me, perhaps to the point where I didn’t succeed.

My answer is received by the wider samuran group with quiet clicks and grunts of, from what I can tell, elation and shock.

And that is precisely what I mean. I have never heard of anyone managing to help someone else gain a Core when they would otherwise have failed. Yet the evidence is before my eyes. It is now down to the beast and its ability to conceive of and believe in what it wishes to become. You have given it an opportunity which so many would be willing to give almost anything to achieve. And which many have lost their lives or their potential futures in trying to attain.

Now I understand, and I feel slightly embarrassed that, despite my Intelligence and Wisdom stats, it has still taken me so long to grasp why it’s such a big deal for them. I know that, for the samurans, becoming a Tier two all too often feels like an unachievable dream. Between the difficulty of gathering enough Energy, perhaps the right kind of Energy, and the dangers of Evolution itself, many don’t even try until they’re almost certain that it will work out. But if I can help fix problems with the Evolution process, then perhaps they can become a Tier two after all. At least, that’s what I figure they’re thinking.

“It may have worked here,” I say, making sure that I’m understandable by everyone. I don’t want to be misunderstood, or to give false hope. “Though I’m not even fully certain that it has worked in this case. But that doesn’t mean it would work for anyone else. I will have to do more testing to find out exactly who I can affect in this way. In addition, it has taken a lot from me, including resources which I would otherwise put towards my own growth,” I warn them.

After all, just because I was willing to pour Energy into Fenrir doesn’t mean I’d be willing to do it to a samuran who only decided to Evolve because he thought he had a safety net in me.

My words don’t seem to do much to reduce the hope in the samurans around me; I just hope it will make them think more about jumping into an Evolution tonight.

You used your own resources? River asks, concern leaking through the Bond.

“Nothing I won’t get back,” I tell her quietly, not making an effort for anyone other than my Bound to understand me. “But yes, I’ve used the Energy I was gathering for my next level up.” I don’t need to check my status screen to know that my words are true. She knows about level ups – we’ve discussed them before in trying to compare the rest of this world and me.

You must be careful with this, she says, the concern deepening. Bastet reflects the same emotion. I fear that you could easily do damage to yourself in trying to help others, she warns.

“I agree with you,” I sigh. I remember the feeling of fragility I felt when drawing from my own Energy to feed into Fenrir’s, and my continued weakness. I might worry that I’ve permanently done something to myself, but my strength is returning bit by bit. “I will be careful, but I’m still going to fix the damage the alcaoris did,” I tell them firmly. Besides, I don’t think that that will be nearly as taxing – controlling Fenrir’s own Energy was hard, but not draining in the same way as my later efforts.

As long as you’re careful, agrees Bastet in her maternal way. We stay silent after that, watching as the cocoon of red sparks is slowly reabsorbed.

Bit by bit, Fenrir is revealed. He’s bigger, and his scales look harder, some of them almost like the armour that I wear. As the last sparks are absorbed, he pushes himself to his feet.

“How are you feeling?” I ask him.

Good, he answers, eagerness and relief pouring across the Bond between us. Thanks. You help! At those words, he steps quickly towards me and butts his head right into my chest. Hard.

A huff of air is forced out of my lungs at his unintentional blow and I hear Bastet scolding him soundly over our network. I’m just happy that he’s alright after everything that happened earlier.

“It’s fine,” I gasp, still not quite managing to take in a full breath. Lifting my hands, I start scratching him under the chin. Apparently, he still enjoys it even if his scales are tougher. Continuing to scratch with one hand, I run the other along his body, feeling the differences.

His head is definitely more armoured – my chest can attest to that. The back of his neck is more protected, though underneath still seems a bit vulnerable. Maybe he didn’t focus on that because he still stands quite near to the ground – under his chin is less likely to be attacked than his spine. Peeking in his mouth, I see that there’s a greenish tinge to his saliva. Venom, I’d guess.

His back and sides have received even more armour than his head, almost starting to resemble something like a tortoise. Not quite, though – the scales are hard, but they still flex with movement and each scale is only about the size of my thumbprint. That’s bigger than they used to be, but not by as much as double.

His legs are thicker and more armoured, his claws are longer even if they’re not sharper. I have to guess that they’re more for stability than attack. I know that he started off the process thinking about speed, but nothing I’ve seen so far indicates he could have got faster. If anything, it looks like he’s traded speed for defence. Which is not a bad thing as a tank, though might have an impact if we need to cover ground fast.

The only new offensive thing that I see is a spike that he’s grown on either side of his tail. It’s not a bad idea, really – he offers his body as a target and then swipes the attacker in the side with his tail.

“Looking good,” I praise and he waves his tail back and forth in pleasure. I eye the spikes with trepidation – getting hit by those would probably not be a fun time. Especially since a slight hint of green to their tips indicates that they might be the equivalent of a snake’s envenomed fangs. “Maybe don’t wave your tail around, alright?” I suggest, putting one hand on its upper part to still it.

The Evolved lizog sends me a hint of plaintive pleading – the mental equivalent to puppy dog eyes.

“I don’t want to be stabbed,” I try to defend myself. Fenrir gives a quiet, sad hiss but obediently stops waving his new weapon around. “I’m going to Inspect you, OK?” I ask him. I could just check my Bound screen too, but I’m curious about the changes in that information.

Sure! he answers a moment later, tilting his head on one side. A lizard head full of sharp, venomous teeth shouldn’t be cute, but it is.

“Inspect Fauna.”

Lizog: Fenrir

Tier 2 Beast (evolved)

Special abilities: Burst of Speed

Health: 2070u

Mana: 0u

Minimum Willpower recommended to Dominate without other impacting factors: 64

Bound (Dominate) of Markus Luke Wolfe. A venomous Beast with high defences and high strength for its size, this creature relies on its packmates to overcome the enemies which it can withstand but not defeat. Social Beast with strong capacity to form bonds.

Close message? Y/N

The description of Fenrir matches what I observed of his body – is it showing up in the Inspect because of what I observed? Or would it have said that before? I have to guess that it’s a bit of both – I’ve proven before that observation adds to what appears in the Inspect boxes.

Fenrir’s changes are slightly underwhelming compared to Bastet’s, though the fact that he’s managed to Evolve at all is more than would have happened without my intervention.

Bastet’s health pool doubled, her mana pool tripled, and even her stamina increased a little.

Although Fenrir’s health pool is now massive, even higher than Shrieks’, it has only doubled – it has always been high. In exchange, he seems to have completely lost even the small amount of mana he had. He won’t be able to cast any of the shared pool of spells, that’s for sure.

His special ability, therefore, can’t depend on mana or it would be immediately useless. I have to guess, based on its name, that it will use stamina instead. Checking my Bound tab, I see that his stamina has increased from three hundred and eighty to five hundred. That’s an increase of less than a third – hopefully it will prove to be enough. After all, if he has slowed down, being able to use a sudden burst of speed could prove essential both in fights and in travelling.

I wonder suddenly whether my Bound will be able to share that ability just as they can Airblade or Firebreath. Or, thinking about it, surely all the other abilities of the Pathwalkers and Warriors I’ve Bound. We’re definitely going to have to make some time for testing – and sparring.

But that’s for later. For now, I dismiss the box and relate the changes to Fenrir and the rest of my Bound listening.

By this point, most of the samurans have disappeared. With the show over, they’ve returned to their evening meals. Some have even started making their way into huts to sleep. Others are sitting around the bonfire that someone has lit in the middle – a ‘tame’ version of the ‘life-devourer’ is endlessly fascinating to the samurans, though some are still too scared of it to go anywhere close.

My firestarter has seen a lot of use recently, though not from me. River has been teaching as many as she can how to start a fire and, thankfully, how to not to accidentally set things on fire which shouldn’t be.

I’m tired, but my apparent success with Fenrir has fired me up. Now that the weakness I felt after helping the lizog has disappeared, I’m eager to use my new knowledge to help others – without them being in a dire situation first.

“Alright Bastet, ready?” I check, then dive straight in at her agreement.