I felt myself pulled in several directions before my vision faded back into focus, and I found that I was in a very different place. The deck of an enormous ship surrounded by an endless ocean. I could feel the pressure of the water around me, but it somehow didn’t impede my movement. Around me stood a crew of humanoids who were all varied amalgamations of sea creatures. A man with crab claw hands strode up to me.

  “Follow.” I said nothing and stayed a step behind him. My Sense Power skill was telling me that everyone around me could absolutely destroy me if they so desired. So I would be as careful, and polite, as possible.

  Soon, I found myself standing before the woman from the token, a pale woman with horns erupting from her head that were actively clicking crab claws. She wore a dress seemingly made of seaweed like her hair and held a thick, barnacled oar as a staff. She sat upon a large chair made of broken bits of ship. She REALLY triggered my Sense Power and I had to manually turn it off so I could focus.

  “You have a lot of gall to come here after breaking my tutorial puzzle,” she said, looking only slightly annoyed.

  “Sorry about that,” I tried to laugh, but I knew it sounded forced, “I had no idea that it was yours. Honestly, it was good fun figuring it out.”

  “You didn’t ‘figure it out,’ you broke it with your Hunger. Let me get a good look at you.”

  I stepped a little closer. She stared at me for a long time before she spoke again, a fascinated smile plastered on her face.

  “Dan, Dan, Dan! You really should have told me you bore a Concept! And such a powerful one at that! Did you even know you were a unique life form?”

  “I didn’t tell you my name, and I don’t know who you are,” I said, feeling more and more uncomfortable and confused.

  Her laugh was like the waves crashing upon a beach. “That is true. My name is Thalassa. You may call me Lassa.”

  “Lassa? Lassa it is, then. Yes, I did learn not too long ago about being a unique life form, but this is the first I’ve heard of bearing a Concept.”

  She nodded, “Understandable! Most don’t know much about them, which is, in general, the point. Tell me, how did you come to choose this form?”

  “I had no other choices in the end.”

  “You mean you had others that went away?”

  I nodded.

  “Truly wonderful! Your form breaks so many rules of the System, yet it forced the option upon you. It even let you break one of my greatest puzzles, one designed to teach the inductees to work together.”

  “I mean no offense, Lassa,” I said, “ but what do you mean it breaks System rules?”

  “By now, you must have already received several System messages where it had to consider what you did and attempt to create a balance.” I nodded. “This is because you forced the System to do something outside of what is standard.”

  I considered her words before answering. “There have been several times, yes. But it only truly felt like forcing it the last time.”

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  “Tell me of it as you walk with me.” She said, standing. She was taller than I’d thought and stood at least 5 meters tall so I had to speed walk to keep up despite her relatively slow pace. Her oar clunked loudly on the deck with every other step. She opened a hatch and we entered the ship, which somehow was even larger on the inside. I explained what had happened as we walked.

  We reached a dining room with a long table filled with piles of cooked fish and other sea-based bounty. The other side of the Token. She sat at the head of the table and motioned for me to sit to her right.

  “Before we get into what Concepts are, I will give you my full name. I am Thalassa, Primordial of the Sea, Bountiful Queen and Doombringer, Mistress of the Hunger of the Deeps. I hail from the 2nd Multiverse. I’ve been looking for someone who has your capabilities for some time.”

  “Primordial? So you’re one of the first or most powerful of deities?”

  Her smile widened, “Isn’t it just fascinating how the lore of the multiverse trickles into the mythology of most realms in some form or another? Yes, the gods of the first two multiverses became known as the primordials. Let me tell you it was much more difficult to attain back in the early days as the System was growing!”

  I saw her hand slip under the table and rest on my leg, as I felt a hungry aura settle heavily upon me. It was a different kind of hunger. If I’d had any reproductive organs, I was certain they’d be raring to go at the touch. I felt my core begin to pull on and devour the aura around me, keeping it at bay. I gently grabbed her hand from my leg and moved it back onto the table, careful to keep my expression neutral. Her eyes had gone wider and wider as I moved her hand.

  “Oh, this is really something! You seem immune to my aura and touch! We have much to discuss. Please, eat.”

  The bounty at Lassa’s table, unbeknownst to me, was of such renown that many gods had killed entire universes to get a chance to sit at the table. My first bite triggered the deep hunger within me, and I woke up a relatively short time later to Lassa enthusiastically clapping. The table, once filled with food, was empty. I felt sated, if a bit embarrassed, and sat back down next to her, wiping my hands with the provided napkins.

  “Dan, my dearest All-Devourer, we are going to have a long and fruitful relationship, I hope,” she said as I noticed a new notification from the System. I nearly fell out of my chair.

  You have consumed Bounty of the Deeps, Unique. You gain a pool of free points to spend as you see fit. Your free points are equal to the sum total of your race, class, and profession levels times ten. You cannot gain this effect again, even if you consume another Bounty of the Deeps. Current Free Points: 1570.

  “Ten free points per level?!” I said louder than I intended.

  Lassa was also a bit surprised. “No one has ever in the history of my table eaten everything. Normal ranges are more like 3 to 7. I was always curious what the maximum was. Thank you!”

  “No, thank you!” I said with utmost sincerity. Ten free points per level was amazing! I now had 1570 points to use, but I wanted to consider what to put them in, so I kept them free for now.

  Afterward, we spoke for some time, where I learned many things that I hadn’t known or even put together. The Omnis Vorare selection was of sufficient hunger to ‘consume’ the other options, forcing me to choose it. She didn’t know what may have opened the option for me, as most races have prerequisites. I posited that it may have been the fact that I hadn’t eaten for a long time before the System hit our universe, and she nodded in thought.

  “Your profession is enchanter, correct?” she asked. I nodded. “You should focus your profession on the types of enchantments that consume, as those will naturally be stronger. Your race clearly has an inherent affinity for consumption and hunger.”

  I hadn’t really thought about it, but it did make sense. My first enchantment, the light stone, was easier to construct because it consumed the ambient magic around it to power the enchantment.

  “This has been a surprisingly educational meeting, Lassa. I think I may need to get back to my-” I hesitated as I considered them. I settled on “friends.”

  “You needn’t worry about that. This is my realm, and I fully control it, even the relative flow of time. You will only be gone for a second or two despite the amount of time you’ve been here.”

  “You can even control the flow of time here? That’s awesome!” I said, my worries assuaged.

  She nodded, taking the compliment graciously. “There are a few more items I wanted to speak to you about before you go.”