A Simple Transaction I
- Thread starter Rihaku
- Start date
- Original
Aabcehmu
Confusion as a Natural State of Being
- Location
- Chicago, IL
- Pronouns
- Any/All
@Genesys @runeblue360 @Shard your votes are technically unchanged, but you may want to reevaluate given that I've replaced two of the artifacts and significantly upgraded Penitence.
@Fumbles I have altered Penitence for the better, I think, but I have also hopefully included two new more powerful artifacts, so you may still want to reconsider your vote.
Also, let's see what I can do for Horatio's SI...
[DD] Write-in: Split your focus between achieving higher levels of Devildoor and experimenting with cybernetic enhancement. Cybernetics, being composed of local matter and being built by local humans should hopefully retain a significant amount of realness even once installed, Devildoor should ideally make incorporating tinkertech enhancements easier and more reliable than otherwise as well hopefully improve their realness even further, and you have three tinkers at hand to request cybernetics from, albeit none of them are truly specialized in it.
[DD] Jack
Jack holds the group together, so even if this particular offensive ends up being a bust, if you kill him, the likelihood of the S9 falling to infighting is vastly increased, which will in turn allow other people a much better shot at picking off the remaining members one by one.
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Lealope
Not yet invincible
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[Aab] Catharsis
[Aab] Forsaken
Nah, heartless and lonely; that's the ticket.
Well, she'd probably get almost immediate Stage 3 Mitigation given her level of power at the time of the offer (assuming her Ordinal build allows for it). Considering she likely took some variant of King's Sceptre, would probably spend her Lesser Remittance on even more Ordinalism multipliers on top of her already absurd level of talent, TSH and Purity and would be at a level of power where the speed of Progression is very pronounced, she'd be in pretty good shape since the Apocryphal wouldn't do something as boring as immediately send a near peer level opponent to kill her in her sleep. All she'd have to do is outpace the Apocryphal and keep getting passively buffing Attainments.
Honestly, given the sheer number of multipliers she'd have to Ordinalism and her probably fanatical dedication to furthering her Golden Path, her growth rate would might have been approaching Hunger's.
[Aab] Forsaken
Nah, heartless and lonely; that's the ticket.
Well, she'd probably get almost immediate Stage 3 Mitigation given her level of power at the time of the offer (assuming her Ordinal build allows for it). Considering she likely took some variant of King's Sceptre, would probably spend her Lesser Remittance on even more Ordinalism multipliers on top of her already absurd level of talent, TSH and Purity and would be at a level of power where the speed of Progression is very pronounced, she'd be in pretty good shape since the Apocryphal wouldn't do something as boring as immediately send a near peer level opponent to kill her in her sleep. All she'd have to do is outpace the Apocryphal and keep getting passively buffing Attainments.
Honestly, given the sheer number of multipliers she'd have to Ordinalism and her probably fanatical dedication to furthering her Golden Path, her growth rate would might have been approaching Hunger's.
ImperatorV
The Laughing One
- Location
- The Voyaging Realm
Her primary remittance was regalia, actually. It's listed in her bio.
On the topic of how she survived that Curseload, her bio seems to imply she achieved the 26th ordinal before becoming a Cursebearer - which would certainly give her absolutely absurd mitigation power. If you can toss 3-4 mitigation stages at each curse right as you start those 4 Greater + 1 Crowning Curses look a little more manageable. Not easy, certainly, but survivable.
On the topic of how she survived that Curseload, her bio seems to imply she achieved the 26th ordinal before becoming a Cursebearer - which would certainly give her absolutely absurd mitigation power. If you can toss 3-4 mitigation stages at each curse right as you start those 4 Greater + 1 Crowning Curses look a little more manageable. Not easy, certainly, but survivable.
Zampano
🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈
- Location
- Simping for DSB
Post-Halloween Omake wordcount update:
To summarize, DSB's vote change to Defer narrowed the fanwork gap for the current update and dramatically widened the gap for the previous update. The Favor/Grace contest is mostly unchanged.
Total output for the Justice update cycle so far is now 167,127 words. Of those, 43% are from Birdsie.
The vote totals for Favor & Grace have remained close, despite a few defections from each side. Favor is still down about 19K words this update cycle. There are also several images for Favor.
The vote totals for Defer and Exalt haven't moved much, but DSB's vote change cut Exalt's wordcount advantage in half, down to 22K. It remains a big task for one poster to put out enough fanwork to overcome the wishes of 12 other voters.
Favor still has 28K residual wordcount lead over Grace.
The big change here is that Defer now has a dramatic wordcount lead over Exalt, 47K in total.
Does anybody have any feedback on the following table format? I think that just repeating the Forced Induction chart is unhelpful.
To summarize, DSB's vote change to Defer narrowed the fanwork gap for the current update and dramatically widened the gap for the previous update. The Favor/Grace contest is mostly unchanged.
...
| Justice | Favor | Grace | Defer | Exalt |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Votes | 34 | 33 | 27 | 16 |
| Wordcount | 66900 | 86814 | 54658 | 76847 |
| Share of Total | 40.0% | 51.9% | 32.7% | 46.0% |
Total output for the Justice update cycle so far is now 167,127 words. Of those, 43% are from Birdsie.
The vote totals for Favor & Grace have remained close, despite a few defections from each side. Favor is still down about 19K words this update cycle. There are also several images for Favor.
The vote totals for Defer and Exalt haven't moved much, but DSB's vote change cut Exalt's wordcount advantage in half, down to 22K. It remains a big task for one poster to put out enough fanwork to overcome the wishes of 12 other voters.
...
| Forced Induction | Favor | Grace | Defer | Exalt |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wordcount | 56243 | 28013 | 63984 | 16680 |
| Share of Total | 60.1% | 30.0% | 68.4% | 17.8% |
Favor still has 28K residual wordcount lead over Grace.
The big change here is that Defer now has a dramatic wordcount lead over Exalt, 47K in total.
...
Does anybody have any feedback on the following table format? I think that just repeating the Forced Induction chart is unhelpful.
| Contest | Justice | Forced Induction |
|---|---|---|
| First Place Boon: | Guidance is winning. | (This isn't even a contest.) |
| Second Place Boon: Favor 34 vs Grace 33 | Favor down 19K words | Favor up 28K words |
| Third Place Boon: Defer 27 vs Exalt 16 | Defer down 22K words | Defer up 47K words |
- Location
- Pindorama
I must say, despite the little effect it had, seeing those vote-switches away from Guidance still hurt a lot. More relevantly, I legitimately think Birdsie's vote of Guidance/Grace/Exaltation is way better than Deferral taking that last slot. Empowering Aobaru would not only be useful in terms of fighting the next Apocryphal event, but also in fighting against his nemesis and restoring the Voyaging Realm.
Given our chosen course of action, something much like Exaltation will be necessary eventually as long as he needs to finish those tasks, especially since we have our own target to worry about. And if so, why not get it from the best source possible? I hardly think there will be a better way to empower Aobaru, and this single action might be enough to prevail against both outstanding threats we are aware of! It's an incredibly efficient choice, all told, and getting it would be much safer than trying to be greedy and banking all the power for later, something we might come to regret! So I'd actually consider Exaltation to offer more safety than Deferral right now, and so I'd suggest voting for it. We'd have little to regret.
Unless we roll a failure, than we'd have a lot to regret. But it's totally worth it even considering that, so vote for it! I'm sure Rihaku will be in a good mood after we choose to empower his SI and won't punish us too hard if the worst happens; a very safe gamble!
Given our chosen course of action, something much like Exaltation will be necessary eventually as long as he needs to finish those tasks, especially since we have our own target to worry about. And if so, why not get it from the best source possible? I hardly think there will be a better way to empower Aobaru, and this single action might be enough to prevail against both outstanding threats we are aware of! It's an incredibly efficient choice, all told, and getting it would be much safer than trying to be greedy and banking all the power for later, something we might come to regret! So I'd actually consider Exaltation to offer more safety than Deferral right now, and so I'd suggest voting for it. We'd have little to regret.
Unless we roll a failure, than we'd have a lot to regret. But it's totally worth it even considering that, so vote for it! I'm sure Rihaku will be in a good mood after we choose to empower his SI and won't punish us too hard if the worst happens; a very safe gamble!
- Location
- Louisiana
My main problem with exaltation is that it puts an insane amount of resources towards someone whose loyalty we haven't really guaranteed. I don't see Aobaru turning against us but I could definitely see him going his own way if the cards fall that way, then a third of our wish goes poof, gone. This is a unique opportunity we won't get again, I'd rather secure things we can use long term no matter the circumstances, zero chance to lose our benefit. Also there's a slim but still there chance that we actually lose something off of this. Imagine the absolute mountains of salt if we blow a wish to kill Aobaru. It would be apocalyptic.
Birdsie
Sharp Talons Cleave The Worthy
- Location
- Poland
Offer: Peace Treaty
If I can get a written concession from the thread (markers, m'boys) that Aobaru takes priority after this vote, I'll take Favor + Guidance or literally anything you want. I had a good night sleeping so I'm in a favorable (badumtss) mood and I decided we can end this destructive conflict if we all act like mature humans. Don't commit to this offer too quickly without consideration and discussion, because I want some people on my side if this is going to happen.
Also, just in case, have the next episode of Gabrielos Gaiden. This one's very long and very juicy so you best strap in and get ready, boys, and girls!
Just in case anyone asks, since the story below is technically an FI: Characters in this story have no connection to actual people, all similarities are coincidental with the exception of Hope who not only gave permission but outright volunteered her participation.
Wordcount: 4570
If I can get a written concession from the thread (markers, m'boys) that Aobaru takes priority after this vote, I'll take Favor + Guidance or literally anything you want. I had a good night sleeping so I'm in a favorable (badumtss) mood and I decided we can end this destructive conflict if we all act like mature humans. Don't commit to this offer too quickly without consideration and discussion, because I want some people on my side if this is going to happen.
Also, just in case, have the next episode of Gabrielos Gaiden. This one's very long and very juicy so you best strap in and get ready, boys, and girls!
Just in case anyone asks, since the story below is technically an FI: Characters in this story have no connection to actual people, all similarities are coincidental with the exception of Hope who not only gave permission but outright volunteered her participation.
The ingredients, slowly but surely, began to arrive at Gabriel's house. It took almost the whole day for every single object on Prolessarch's list to arrive.
Some of Gabriel's friends asked some questions as they arrived. Maira asked how Gabriel was feeling, Samuel asked why he needed depleted uranium shavings and wondered if he was making a nuclear reactor out of his microwave, while Jacob was the one to bring the weed for the spiked water.
Gabriel thanked them, closed the door, and moved to place the items on his living room table.
Three ingredients from the list were missing, which would be brought pretty soon by Hope and Sante.
There was a knock on the door.
Please, no more mailmen, Gabriel thought to himself, as he watched through the peephole.
A headful of long, purple hair occupied his view. "Open up, I know you're there."
Gabriel sighed in relief, and opened the door. "Hey, come right in," he said with a soft smile, gesturing to the inside of his house.
Hope was an athletic girl, almost as tall as Gabriel was, with purple hair and hazel-brown eyes. She wore a black skirt with black, thigh-high stockings and a white sweater on top. The new glasses on her face gave her an air of intelligence, which committed suicide whenever she smiled in her usual, intentionally dorky way.
"Don't mind if I do," Hope replied, entering the house with a cheery spring to her step. "How have you been? And what's with the eyepatch?"
Gabriel pursed his lips, closing his eyes for a moment and drawing a breath in. "Don't worry about that. Do you want me to explain first, or do you want the full surprise?"
"I like surprises," Hope replied, in a carefree voice.
"Then go in the kitchen," Gabriel said warily, pointing to the kitchen door, which was closed.
Hope opened the door, and her eyes widened at the sight.
The Prolessarch had, at some point, converted the kitchen into an alchemy lab. A number of his parents' vaunted glasses had been repurposed into beakers, a shard of broken and then immaculately blunted glass was used as a mixer. The stove was repurposed into a calcinator, with a number of thin aluminium frameworks used as a stand for the glasses.
One of them had a mixture consisting of the leaded gasoline and green-apple flavored grape juice, while the Prolessarch was tapping away at another one, which contained the cannabis-stained water, which, surprisingly, didn't look too different from normal water and the Diet Jolt Cola which he'd poured from a refrigerated can. Most of them were bubbling and producing streams of white fumes, casting the darkened room in an ominous light.
The skeleton's head creaked, turning almost 180° in a swift motion as it regarded the girl with exceptionally profound serenity. "Hello."
"Gabriel?" Hope started, turning to look at the boy.
"Yes?"
"Why is a skeleton making potions in your kitchen?" she queried, as calmly as one would speak if they saw a toddler drawing on the wall.
"Why is she not screaming? I thought I looked scary," the Prolessarch voiced a grumbly complaint in the background.
"She, uh," Gabriel turned to Prolessarch, "Dabbles in the paranormal, somewhat."
"Excellent!" the Prolessarch cried, as if overjoyed at the news. He picked up one of the concoctions - a disgustingly dark green mush, with a strange neon underglow that suggested it was either radioactive or toxic - and tossed in a strawberry. "Please, taste it, and rate its pH value. I do not have tastebuds so I can't do that myself."
Hope pinched herself under the armpit as hard as she could, eliciting a hiss of pain.
She looked up, and pinched herself again, this time calling out, "Ow! Okay, not dreaming. Wow."
"Prolessarch, you do know tastebuds are not that advanced?" Gabriel said, reaching out for the neon concoction. He took it from the confused Prolessarch and then put it on the table, away from Hope, whom he knew would be absolutely capable of actually tasting it.
"They are not? Most Organ-" He slapped himself on the skull. "Oooh, riiight! Baseline humans. It's so easy to forget that not everyone who surrounds you can, just, you know… fly and punch through city walls like they're made from clay."
"I can't say I'm confused, because what I see is pretty clear-cut," Hope said, putting down the plastic bag she was holding, which contained two of the remaining ingredients.
"You dabble in the paranormal, yes?" the Prolessarch asked, turning to Hope. "How dabbly are you?"
"Crystals and auras," she replied, looking to the interested skeleton. "And herbs, salts… you know, the stuff that witches did when they were burned at the stake by the Church."
"Interesting." He cocked his head to the side. "What does my aura hold?"
"Bones," Hope said.
"Fascinating."
Hope spun to regard Gabriel with a firm expression. "Are you going to tell me what's going on?"
"You should clue her in!" the Prolessarch suggested. He turned around in order to once again play with his alchemical setup. He poured one of the concoctions into the other, and there was a sudden hiss of steam, as mystical purple fumes emanated from the blackened, charbroiled glass. "Otherwise, you cannot add her to your Coterie! That would be a lethal move."
"T-that's what I planned to do. We'll have to go fetch Francesca too, and… Sante, I suppose, but he'll be here in around thirty minutes," Gabriel said, gazing at Prolessarch for a moment, only to look back at Hope. "Look, uh… at my birthday, I was approached by what I can only define as a very powerful entity."
"Huh-uh?" Hope said, reaching for a chair to sit on, as she listened intently.
"He wasn't the Devil, since you will inevitably ask," Gabriel warned, and then continued, "but he made me a deal. Since a powerful entity was coming to this reality to possibly destroy it, he offered a portion of his curses in exchange for a portion of his power. And here I am."
"What about the funny skeleton?" Hope queried, pointing at the Prolessarch with a hand.
"I'd call it collateral damage, but it's more of a collateral advantage. I trust him," Gabriel said, throwing a quippy smile to the lich in his kitchen.
As if the universe wanted to intimidate Gabriel with the profundity of how wrong he was, there was a gunshot crack from the kitchen, alongside a sudden release of purple smoke and an incorrigible peal of maddened laughter. "Yesss! It reacts! Soon enough, no secret of the Surgecraft shall be outside my grasp! Every Imaginary Element will be mine to distribute! Yesss!"
Gabriel facepalmed, saying, "He's making a concoction to initiate me into a magic system."
"Is the bathroom free?" Hope asked, turning to Gabriel for a split second.
Gabriel sighed, knowing where this was going. "Yes, it is," he replied dryly.
She shot up and quickly walked for the bathroom, the door slamming behind her.
Sounds of retching echoed through the apartment.
The Prolessarch emerged from the kitchen and tossed a pair of blue latex glove into the trash as he did, before asking, "Why is your friend vomiting?"
"Shock, I suppose," Gabriel said, sighing heavily.
"A reason as good as any to void the contents of one's body," the Prolessarch said. "The main catalyst is ready, but it's obviously rather useless without the primary substrate. Which I can't make because I do not have all of the ingredients yet."
The doorbell rang.
"That's the rest of them," Gabriel declared, heading for the door just as Hope emerged from the bathroom. "You okay?"
"I am now," Hope answered with a resolute nod, rubbing at her eyes for a moment.
"Let us greet the rest of your friends, Cursebearer!"
"Just one, for now," Gabriel said, opening the door.
"Oh. Where's the ethidium bromide?"
Gabriel opened the door.
"Ooooooh–" Sante started and instantly shut up at the sight of Prolessarch. The plastic bag in his hand dropped to the ground.
"Oooooh!?" the Prolessarch repeated the shout, lilt and timbre a perfect mimicry. It had a questioning aura. He looked at Gabriel.
"We greet each other shouting like monkeys," Gabriel explained with a chuckle. "It's a joke."
"What a… sophisticated and eloquent manner of communication," the Prolessarch said, clearly off-put by the idea of monkey-screaming.
Sante was a very, very tall person, almost as tall as the doorframe. He was rather skinny, which was partially hidden by a pair of jeans and a grey, baggy hoodie. He had glasses as well, very large lips, and short, brown hair.
"Gabriel, I'm afraid to say that your friends do not accept the fact that I am a skeleton, as to them, it seems impossible." The Prolessarch reached into his robe and pulled out a small wand. "I could, however, offer them exposure therapy by subjecting them to a number of paranormal phenomena, as to normalize the concept. It would be extremely unpleasant. What do you think?"
"I'm okay, skeleton," Sante said, bending down partially to pick up the plastic bag. He handed it to Gabriel, as he kept looking at Prolessarch. "What is he?"
"If you say so, Monkey-Screamer," the Archwizard muttered quietly, before saying, "I am the Prolessarch, a Lich of the Diagram."
"Okay, and where are the cameras?" Sante asked, looking at both Gabriel and Hope.
"I have eliminated all of them," the Prolessarch clarified before either could speak up. "We cannot afford to be recorded by the government. It has already sent its agents after us."
"There were cameras?" Gabriel asked in shock, turning to the Prolessarch with an expression of disbelief.
"No, no," the lich answered, looking at Gabriel and straining to keep himself from laughing. Voice a touch quieter, as if to avoid being overheard, he answered, "I'm just saying that to fuck with them. It's hilarious."
Gabriel snorted. "Agreed," he said.
"I took it exceptionally well," Hope argued back, shaking her head and crossing her arms.
"The toilet didn't," Gabriel snarked, at which point Hope burst out laughing.
"Here," the Prolessarch offered a glass to Hope. "Water."
Hope accepted it and took a whiff of its contents. She deemed them to be non-hazardous and took a few sips. "Thanks."
"Okay, explain, please?" Sante queried, turning to Gabriel. They went a couple of steps away, where Gabriel proceeded to explain what was going on.
Whilst Sante and Gabriel had their conversation, the Prolessarch whipped out his notebook and separately questioned Hope in the background. "Do you feel a tingly sensation in your fingers or toes? Do you feel like your hair is about to change color?"
"Not really, and I know what that's supposed to feel like," Hope said, curiously looking down at her free hand.
"Huh." The Prolessarch appeared to see something in Hope's fingers no one else could, because he wrote down, and simultaneously muttered, "First test… positive. Subject achieved super-molecular emanation, leading to conclusive..."
Meanwhile, in the other room, Sante raised both eyebrows. "What do you mean, Cthulhu is coming to eat us?"
"I mean that quite literally," Gabriel said, shaking his head and sitting on the bed.
"Well, more like Yog-Sothoth, if we're strictly literal," the Prolessarch walked back into the room after a moment, a rather disturbed-looking Hope trailing after him. She was looking at her own fingers as if they might explode at any moment, and the Prolessarch like he was Adolf Hitler in disguise. He turned around and muttered some instructions to her. Gabriel caught one in every five words, "deadly explosion," "powerful energy emanations," "drink lots of water-" "regular exercise," "maybe superpowers." Once he was done, he turned back and walked into the kitchen, whistling a merry tune.
"And a powerful being approached me at my birthday and gave me superpowers in exchange for a portion of his burdens," Gabriel explained calmly, running a hand through his hair to get it out of his face.
"What kind of burdens?" Sante asked, frowning worriedly.
"A curse that makes me weigh more when I do bad things and weigh less when I do good things, a curse that makes sure I always have a rival that wants to kill me, and a curse that makes sure I can never find peace in life," Gabriel listed, matter-of-factly.
"Right. What's with the eye?" Sante asked skeptically.
"Don't worry about it," Hope replied before Gabriel could even speak. Gabriel turned to look at her, and Hope shrugged.
"I'm somewhat concerned for your friends' abilities to measure the seriousness of a situation," the Prolessarch confessed from the kitchen doorframe where he was energetically mixing what must have been ethidium bromide with common, jarred honey. "I mean, if I was missing an eye? I'd get real pissed if my friends didn't care. I'm missing both, though, so I guess it doesn't matter."
"Well," Gabriel said, pulling off his eyepatch and revealing a red crystalline glint in his eye socket. "I have a magical eye too."
"Holy shit." / "Oh, man."
"Did that hurt?" Hope asked, immediately reaching for Gabriel's face, cupping it tightly and turning it around to get a better look at the eye. "What does it do?"
"I don't think that hurt," Sante said, bending over to look at Gabriel's eyesocket. "It's magical, after all, no?"
"It hurt like a bitch, never get a magical eye unless you have to," Gabriel confessed, pulling away from Hope's grasp and swiveling to look at Prolessarch.
"Sante, right?" the Prolessarch asked, looking at the tall boy. He stopped mixing the concoction. With a handwave, he caused the concoction to spark blue, then settle into a deep, menacing, black-purple color. "Would you like superpowers?"
"Superpowers?" Sante asked, raising an eyebrow. "What kind?"
"The magical kind. To be more precise, if this sub-concoction works as I predict it should for a baseline human, you'll be twitchy and have some nightmares for three days and nights, and then you'll develop a moderate capacity for self-mutation with pseudo-elemental vectors. If you ever wanted to mutate blades that are made out of fire, but the fire is also the concept of 'death,' then I have just the thing."
Gabriel instantly turned towards Prolessarch. "Can you make one for me too?"
"Is it even safe?" Sante asked, in wide-eyed shock.
"No, I'm turning you into an actual Elementalist," the Prolessarch answered Gabriel. "You need building-destroying power, not cool transformations. Also, yes, it's safe." The Prolessarch looked back at Sante and extended the cup with the potion.
Sante watched Gabriel for a moment. Gabriel nodded, to which Sante observed the cup before him. He grabbed it, and took a whiff to get an idea of the taste it'd have, then gagged slightly.
"Drink all of it in one go, or the mutation vectors may be incomplete and you'll be unable to wholly control your powers." The Prolessarch pulled out his notebook, eager to jot down everything that was about to happen. "It'd be troublesome to have to rework the metastructure of your spirit at that point, so please avoid forcing me to do so."
Sante pursed his lips, and then sat down. He plugged his nose, raised the glass to his mouth, and then gulped the entire glass in one, single gulp.
"'Attaboy! Any immediate symptoms or interesting sensations? Is there a cool feeling, like a pit in your stomach?" the Prolessarch proposed. "Perhaps a strange, subtle burning in the space that surrounds your brain?"
"The last one you said," the boy replied, holding his temple with one hand and massaging it softly. "It's less than subtle, and definitely not strange."
"That would be the frontal and parietal lobe adjusting. Fascinating." The Prolessarch wrote it down for posterity.
"What superpower did you give to Hope, Prolessarch?" Gabriel queried, turning to him and folding his arms.
"A version that, assuming she doesn't vomit it up in the next two hours, is going to grant her a much weaker version of standard Surgecraft without killing her," the Prolessarch deigned to explain. "Also, it will unlock the potential for the Unified Emanation Theory, within her, which I do not suggest she ever practice unless she wants to die in a massive explosion."
Gabriel frowned, and Hope smiled like a dork.
"Okay, this is… the situation," Gabriel said, standing in front of both Hope and Sante. "You're two of the three most important people in my life, and I want you to stay safe. Knowing full-well that my curses aren't merciful, the best place for you to be to stay safe is by my side. The government is already moving to crack down on paranormal threats, and Cthulhu is going to arrive and wreck everyone's shit, sooner or later, unless I– we stop it."
"Yog-Sothoth," the Prolessarch annoyedly corrected.
"What about school? And our families?" Sante asked in worry, placing both hands on his thighs, clutching the rim of his hoodie.
The Prolessarch turned to look at Gabriel. He didn't say anything and a skull could bear no expression, but Gabriel received the distinct sensation of a face that said, 'Is this dude kidding? He's going to have superpowers and save the world from Yog-Sothoth and school is his major concern?'
Gabriel turned to the Prolessarch, as if analyzing that nonexistent expression, and then back to Sante. "Fuck school, and…" Gabriel turned back to the skeleton. "Prolessarch, can you do something about their parents? Our families? We won't be bringing them with us to the house in the mountains, but I still want them to stay safe."
"Oh. From the way you sounded at the start, I was thinking you were about to ask me to assassinate them," the Prolessarch said. "And, I don't know. What do you want me to do about them?"
Gabriel pondered on it, but it was Hope that spoke before him, proposing a solution. "Pocket dimension?"
"You want me… to create a pocket dimension and store your families in it?" the Prolessarch asked, looking at her placidly.
"That'd be the safest option," she said. Gabriel and Sante nodded amongst themselves, and then agreed with a nod.
The lich continued, "How long do you plan to keep them in there?"
"Well, as long as it takes to take care of the threat," Hope said simply, shrugging helplessly.
"Gabriel," the Prolessarch addressed the boy Cursebearer with a calm look. "Would you kindly describe the Apocryphal Curse to her, so I don't have to?"
Gabriel sighed, pursing his lips. Right. "The Apocryphal Curse is… something that makes my life interesting."
"That's it?" Hope said, raising both of her eyebrows in surprise.
"That means there will always be a foe to fight, a problem to solve, a threat looming over our heads," Gabriel noted.
"And that foe is always going to be one that's on par to challenge our mutual friend," the Prolessarch added. "I'm afraid in this context, 'as long as it takes' is going to be a trans-infinite amount of time, or, more kindly, at least several million years. It's not practical to maintain an entire pocket dimension for that. Especially since I do not remember how to make them."
"Which is why I'll have to protect all of you," Gabriel announced, looking down at the ground morosely.
"Don't take all the credit, mate, we're here too now. We'll help, and we have a skeleton friend who can give superpowers to people," Sante said, clapping Gabriel's back with his firm, large hand.
"You have four Coterial Orbs unless I'm mistaken, Gabriel. You should add them to your Coterie and assign the powers. Also, work on the Pentex. I'll be right back with the elixir of your transcendence briefly," the Prolessarch said with an unusual atmosphere of regality, before absconding the room in favor of the kitchen.
Gabriel sat down on the bed next to Hope silently, and Hope, instantly getting the message, leaned in and wrapped a single arm around him, patting his back gently.
"Okay, guys, uhm," Gabriel said, looking up from the ground and to the sides, to both of his friends. "I'm not sure if you should stay, or go back home until we are ready to move. You should inform your parents of this."
"Will they even believe a word of what we're saying?" Sante queried, puffing up a cheek.
"Prolessarch? Do you have any convincing spells or potions?" Gabriel called out, raising his head so that his voice would reach the kitchen.
"Not currently, but I can work on it," Prolessarch replied from the other room.
"Alright," Gabriel said, with a resolute nod. "Go back home, keep in contact with me, and don't tell anyone about this. Hope, remember Prolessarch's instructions, and Sante, do not use your new powers in the open. Just to be safe, not even in your own house, we can never know."
They both nodded. The trio exchanged goodbyes, and Sante and Hope left to go back to their own homes.
Gabriel sighed heavily and sat on the ground, returning to his meditation cycles.
A good half-hour passed. Gabriel spent a vast majority of that time focusing on the study of the Pentex. The Prolessarch claimed that its powers were subpar for any magus, but Gabriel, with the help of Prowess, was beginning to see a kind of beauty to its five-partite execution. He was discovering several patterns when it came to the conceptual mixing that allowed him to maximize raw power and versatility in any given spell, mostly involving the way that concepts with certain associations meshed together. As a result, he managed to produce a significant quantity of acid blast spells, quite a few healing spells, and some others. None of them were particularly strong, but it always helped: they'd never decay and they'd never become weaker. The Pentex wasn't omni-dimensionally reliable, but so long as he was in this universe, it was reliable to him.
Gabriel was starting to get in some of his initial movement katas in, with the Ring's assistance, when the Prolessarch finally emerged from the kitchen with a simple flask of distilled, crystal-blue water. Gabriel stopped and examined it curiously. It looked far clearer, brighter, and somehow more watery than any water he'd seen; like it had been infused with the very stuff of life.
"A true Surgecraft elixir!" the Prolessarch declared jovially. "Normally, you're supposed to bathe in it, and do it as a baby, but… well, I'm me. So all you have to do is drink this and you should gain access to an Imaginary Element in less than a couple of minutes!"
"So I drink this, and I have even more superpowers?" Gabriel accepted the flask. It felt slightly warm to the touch, which he assumed was the fact that it had been boiled for the last hour in a large pot. "I wonder what my element will be like. They're not literal elements, but… elements that contain weird stuff in them."
The Prolessarch nodded enthusiastically, standing akimbo. "Correct! Drink it, and let's find out."
"Here goes..." Gabriel breathed in nervously, uncorked the flask, and then downed it in five, full gulps. He didn't feel anything for a moment.
And then, the vibrations started. In his feet and fingers, there was a subtle, errant twitch, as if his limbs were each possessed by a separate demon working on a different frequency. The world seemed to become much brighter, as if his pupils widened in order to take in more light. It was almost painful.
After ten seconds of that, everything stopped, and Gabriel started to sense an emergent pressure building up within him.
Fascinated, he raised his hand and focused on the pressure. He pushed it through his skin, and what emerged was a flame, light violet in coloration and it emitted a pleasant warmth, like an amethyst gem married to the color of love. He could tell its abilities as instinctively as if he'd been using it for a week.
"Affectfire," he thought. That would be a decent name.
"Ooooh! This is so riveting!" the Prolessarch said, pulling out his notebook. "I have some questions to ask before you get back into training."
Gabriel sighed. This would be a long day.
–-
[ ] Affectfire: The heat-blazed release, a pure flame that represents and embodies love and affection, its fire providing warmth and comfort to those who should receive it, and unfailingly immolating those who'd seek to destroy it. In its simplest form, a fire that spreads like napalm which conveys the Elementalist's affection. Dimmed, it's the quiet torch that provides comforting light during sleep; heightened, its vengeful rain will scour the land in search of anyone it finds guilty of hurting those under its aegis. It is the very essence of love and flame congealed into tenuous action, a semi-sentient desire to protect and nurture directed as a blast or shield.
Gabriel's Imaginary Element is determined by his relationships.
Affectfire is a wonderful element for nearly any use: offense, defense, support, and utility. It has only a single manifestation, and yet one whose manifold actions encompass the wide umbrella of actions ranging from the protective to the vengeful. It holds a low degree of near-sapience and perceptive recognition, understanding who is the user's friend and foe on the same level that a bird understands it must fly south.
Those who are friends, its touch heals and nurtures, restoring them from the darkness of fatigue and burning away their wounds in an alexandrite conflagration, and it infuses them with a depth of spiritual and physical zest bordering on the peak-human.
Those who are enemies, it sticks to like vengeful napalm, never letting go until each due of hatred is repaid and until their very existence is gone. There is very little that can extinguish it if you've truly hurt those it cares about.
*The Elementalist can fire shaped blasts, make barriers, or propel balls of Affectfire. As an element, Affectfire works similar to ordinary flames, but its color is bright, luminous white-violet and it distinguishes between friend or foe. Allies who are subjected to Affectfire heal wounds at an accelerated rate, even to the point of slow regeneration in high doses, and experience a minor degree of physical augmentation and bravery while the element is in their system. Foes are treated as if struck by sticky napalm, which burns even underwater and continues to wear away at them with more heat than ordinary fire.
Some of Gabriel's friends asked some questions as they arrived. Maira asked how Gabriel was feeling, Samuel asked why he needed depleted uranium shavings and wondered if he was making a nuclear reactor out of his microwave, while Jacob was the one to bring the weed for the spiked water.
Gabriel thanked them, closed the door, and moved to place the items on his living room table.
Three ingredients from the list were missing, which would be brought pretty soon by Hope and Sante.
There was a knock on the door.
Please, no more mailmen, Gabriel thought to himself, as he watched through the peephole.
A headful of long, purple hair occupied his view. "Open up, I know you're there."
Gabriel sighed in relief, and opened the door. "Hey, come right in," he said with a soft smile, gesturing to the inside of his house.
Hope was an athletic girl, almost as tall as Gabriel was, with purple hair and hazel-brown eyes. She wore a black skirt with black, thigh-high stockings and a white sweater on top. The new glasses on her face gave her an air of intelligence, which committed suicide whenever she smiled in her usual, intentionally dorky way.
"Don't mind if I do," Hope replied, entering the house with a cheery spring to her step. "How have you been? And what's with the eyepatch?"
Gabriel pursed his lips, closing his eyes for a moment and drawing a breath in. "Don't worry about that. Do you want me to explain first, or do you want the full surprise?"
"I like surprises," Hope replied, in a carefree voice.
"Then go in the kitchen," Gabriel said warily, pointing to the kitchen door, which was closed.
Hope opened the door, and her eyes widened at the sight.
The Prolessarch had, at some point, converted the kitchen into an alchemy lab. A number of his parents' vaunted glasses had been repurposed into beakers, a shard of broken and then immaculately blunted glass was used as a mixer. The stove was repurposed into a calcinator, with a number of thin aluminium frameworks used as a stand for the glasses.
One of them had a mixture consisting of the leaded gasoline and green-apple flavored grape juice, while the Prolessarch was tapping away at another one, which contained the cannabis-stained water, which, surprisingly, didn't look too different from normal water and the Diet Jolt Cola which he'd poured from a refrigerated can. Most of them were bubbling and producing streams of white fumes, casting the darkened room in an ominous light.
The skeleton's head creaked, turning almost 180° in a swift motion as it regarded the girl with exceptionally profound serenity. "Hello."
"Gabriel?" Hope started, turning to look at the boy.
"Yes?"
"Why is a skeleton making potions in your kitchen?" she queried, as calmly as one would speak if they saw a toddler drawing on the wall.
"Why is she not screaming? I thought I looked scary," the Prolessarch voiced a grumbly complaint in the background.
"She, uh," Gabriel turned to Prolessarch, "Dabbles in the paranormal, somewhat."
"Excellent!" the Prolessarch cried, as if overjoyed at the news. He picked up one of the concoctions - a disgustingly dark green mush, with a strange neon underglow that suggested it was either radioactive or toxic - and tossed in a strawberry. "Please, taste it, and rate its pH value. I do not have tastebuds so I can't do that myself."
Hope pinched herself under the armpit as hard as she could, eliciting a hiss of pain.
She looked up, and pinched herself again, this time calling out, "Ow! Okay, not dreaming. Wow."
"Prolessarch, you do know tastebuds are not that advanced?" Gabriel said, reaching out for the neon concoction. He took it from the confused Prolessarch and then put it on the table, away from Hope, whom he knew would be absolutely capable of actually tasting it.
"They are not? Most Organ-" He slapped himself on the skull. "Oooh, riiight! Baseline humans. It's so easy to forget that not everyone who surrounds you can, just, you know… fly and punch through city walls like they're made from clay."
"I can't say I'm confused, because what I see is pretty clear-cut," Hope said, putting down the plastic bag she was holding, which contained two of the remaining ingredients.
"You dabble in the paranormal, yes?" the Prolessarch asked, turning to Hope. "How dabbly are you?"
"Crystals and auras," she replied, looking to the interested skeleton. "And herbs, salts… you know, the stuff that witches did when they were burned at the stake by the Church."
"Interesting." He cocked his head to the side. "What does my aura hold?"
"Bones," Hope said.
"Fascinating."
Hope spun to regard Gabriel with a firm expression. "Are you going to tell me what's going on?"
"You should clue her in!" the Prolessarch suggested. He turned around in order to once again play with his alchemical setup. He poured one of the concoctions into the other, and there was a sudden hiss of steam, as mystical purple fumes emanated from the blackened, charbroiled glass. "Otherwise, you cannot add her to your Coterie! That would be a lethal move."
"T-that's what I planned to do. We'll have to go fetch Francesca too, and… Sante, I suppose, but he'll be here in around thirty minutes," Gabriel said, gazing at Prolessarch for a moment, only to look back at Hope. "Look, uh… at my birthday, I was approached by what I can only define as a very powerful entity."
"Huh-uh?" Hope said, reaching for a chair to sit on, as she listened intently.
"He wasn't the Devil, since you will inevitably ask," Gabriel warned, and then continued, "but he made me a deal. Since a powerful entity was coming to this reality to possibly destroy it, he offered a portion of his curses in exchange for a portion of his power. And here I am."
"What about the funny skeleton?" Hope queried, pointing at the Prolessarch with a hand.
"I'd call it collateral damage, but it's more of a collateral advantage. I trust him," Gabriel said, throwing a quippy smile to the lich in his kitchen.
As if the universe wanted to intimidate Gabriel with the profundity of how wrong he was, there was a gunshot crack from the kitchen, alongside a sudden release of purple smoke and an incorrigible peal of maddened laughter. "Yesss! It reacts! Soon enough, no secret of the Surgecraft shall be outside my grasp! Every Imaginary Element will be mine to distribute! Yesss!"
Gabriel facepalmed, saying, "He's making a concoction to initiate me into a magic system."
"Is the bathroom free?" Hope asked, turning to Gabriel for a split second.
Gabriel sighed, knowing where this was going. "Yes, it is," he replied dryly.
She shot up and quickly walked for the bathroom, the door slamming behind her.
Sounds of retching echoed through the apartment.
The Prolessarch emerged from the kitchen and tossed a pair of blue latex glove into the trash as he did, before asking, "Why is your friend vomiting?"
"Shock, I suppose," Gabriel said, sighing heavily.
"A reason as good as any to void the contents of one's body," the Prolessarch said. "The main catalyst is ready, but it's obviously rather useless without the primary substrate. Which I can't make because I do not have all of the ingredients yet."
The doorbell rang.
"That's the rest of them," Gabriel declared, heading for the door just as Hope emerged from the bathroom. "You okay?"
"I am now," Hope answered with a resolute nod, rubbing at her eyes for a moment.
"Let us greet the rest of your friends, Cursebearer!"
"Just one, for now," Gabriel said, opening the door.
"Oh. Where's the ethidium bromide?"
Gabriel opened the door.
"Ooooooh–" Sante started and instantly shut up at the sight of Prolessarch. The plastic bag in his hand dropped to the ground.
"Oooooh!?" the Prolessarch repeated the shout, lilt and timbre a perfect mimicry. It had a questioning aura. He looked at Gabriel.
"We greet each other shouting like monkeys," Gabriel explained with a chuckle. "It's a joke."
"What a… sophisticated and eloquent manner of communication," the Prolessarch said, clearly off-put by the idea of monkey-screaming.
Sante was a very, very tall person, almost as tall as the doorframe. He was rather skinny, which was partially hidden by a pair of jeans and a grey, baggy hoodie. He had glasses as well, very large lips, and short, brown hair.
"Gabriel, I'm afraid to say that your friends do not accept the fact that I am a skeleton, as to them, it seems impossible." The Prolessarch reached into his robe and pulled out a small wand. "I could, however, offer them exposure therapy by subjecting them to a number of paranormal phenomena, as to normalize the concept. It would be extremely unpleasant. What do you think?"
"I'm okay, skeleton," Sante said, bending down partially to pick up the plastic bag. He handed it to Gabriel, as he kept looking at Prolessarch. "What is he?"
"If you say so, Monkey-Screamer," the Archwizard muttered quietly, before saying, "I am the Prolessarch, a Lich of the Diagram."
"Okay, and where are the cameras?" Sante asked, looking at both Gabriel and Hope.
"I have eliminated all of them," the Prolessarch clarified before either could speak up. "We cannot afford to be recorded by the government. It has already sent its agents after us."
"There were cameras?" Gabriel asked in shock, turning to the Prolessarch with an expression of disbelief.
"No, no," the lich answered, looking at Gabriel and straining to keep himself from laughing. Voice a touch quieter, as if to avoid being overheard, he answered, "I'm just saying that to fuck with them. It's hilarious."
Gabriel snorted. "Agreed," he said.
"I took it exceptionally well," Hope argued back, shaking her head and crossing her arms.
"The toilet didn't," Gabriel snarked, at which point Hope burst out laughing.
"Here," the Prolessarch offered a glass to Hope. "Water."
Hope accepted it and took a whiff of its contents. She deemed them to be non-hazardous and took a few sips. "Thanks."
"Okay, explain, please?" Sante queried, turning to Gabriel. They went a couple of steps away, where Gabriel proceeded to explain what was going on.
Whilst Sante and Gabriel had their conversation, the Prolessarch whipped out his notebook and separately questioned Hope in the background. "Do you feel a tingly sensation in your fingers or toes? Do you feel like your hair is about to change color?"
"Not really, and I know what that's supposed to feel like," Hope said, curiously looking down at her free hand.
"Huh." The Prolessarch appeared to see something in Hope's fingers no one else could, because he wrote down, and simultaneously muttered, "First test… positive. Subject achieved super-molecular emanation, leading to conclusive..."
Meanwhile, in the other room, Sante raised both eyebrows. "What do you mean, Cthulhu is coming to eat us?"
"I mean that quite literally," Gabriel said, shaking his head and sitting on the bed.
"Well, more like Yog-Sothoth, if we're strictly literal," the Prolessarch walked back into the room after a moment, a rather disturbed-looking Hope trailing after him. She was looking at her own fingers as if they might explode at any moment, and the Prolessarch like he was Adolf Hitler in disguise. He turned around and muttered some instructions to her. Gabriel caught one in every five words, "deadly explosion," "powerful energy emanations," "drink lots of water-" "regular exercise," "maybe superpowers." Once he was done, he turned back and walked into the kitchen, whistling a merry tune.
"And a powerful being approached me at my birthday and gave me superpowers in exchange for a portion of his burdens," Gabriel explained calmly, running a hand through his hair to get it out of his face.
"What kind of burdens?" Sante asked, frowning worriedly.
"A curse that makes me weigh more when I do bad things and weigh less when I do good things, a curse that makes sure I always have a rival that wants to kill me, and a curse that makes sure I can never find peace in life," Gabriel listed, matter-of-factly.
"Right. What's with the eye?" Sante asked skeptically.
"Don't worry about it," Hope replied before Gabriel could even speak. Gabriel turned to look at her, and Hope shrugged.
"I'm somewhat concerned for your friends' abilities to measure the seriousness of a situation," the Prolessarch confessed from the kitchen doorframe where he was energetically mixing what must have been ethidium bromide with common, jarred honey. "I mean, if I was missing an eye? I'd get real pissed if my friends didn't care. I'm missing both, though, so I guess it doesn't matter."
"Well," Gabriel said, pulling off his eyepatch and revealing a red crystalline glint in his eye socket. "I have a magical eye too."
"Holy shit." / "Oh, man."
"Did that hurt?" Hope asked, immediately reaching for Gabriel's face, cupping it tightly and turning it around to get a better look at the eye. "What does it do?"
"I don't think that hurt," Sante said, bending over to look at Gabriel's eyesocket. "It's magical, after all, no?"
"It hurt like a bitch, never get a magical eye unless you have to," Gabriel confessed, pulling away from Hope's grasp and swiveling to look at Prolessarch.
"Sante, right?" the Prolessarch asked, looking at the tall boy. He stopped mixing the concoction. With a handwave, he caused the concoction to spark blue, then settle into a deep, menacing, black-purple color. "Would you like superpowers?"
"Superpowers?" Sante asked, raising an eyebrow. "What kind?"
"The magical kind. To be more precise, if this sub-concoction works as I predict it should for a baseline human, you'll be twitchy and have some nightmares for three days and nights, and then you'll develop a moderate capacity for self-mutation with pseudo-elemental vectors. If you ever wanted to mutate blades that are made out of fire, but the fire is also the concept of 'death,' then I have just the thing."
Gabriel instantly turned towards Prolessarch. "Can you make one for me too?"
"Is it even safe?" Sante asked, in wide-eyed shock.
"No, I'm turning you into an actual Elementalist," the Prolessarch answered Gabriel. "You need building-destroying power, not cool transformations. Also, yes, it's safe." The Prolessarch looked back at Sante and extended the cup with the potion.
Sante watched Gabriel for a moment. Gabriel nodded, to which Sante observed the cup before him. He grabbed it, and took a whiff to get an idea of the taste it'd have, then gagged slightly.
"Drink all of it in one go, or the mutation vectors may be incomplete and you'll be unable to wholly control your powers." The Prolessarch pulled out his notebook, eager to jot down everything that was about to happen. "It'd be troublesome to have to rework the metastructure of your spirit at that point, so please avoid forcing me to do so."
Sante pursed his lips, and then sat down. He plugged his nose, raised the glass to his mouth, and then gulped the entire glass in one, single gulp.
"'Attaboy! Any immediate symptoms or interesting sensations? Is there a cool feeling, like a pit in your stomach?" the Prolessarch proposed. "Perhaps a strange, subtle burning in the space that surrounds your brain?"
"The last one you said," the boy replied, holding his temple with one hand and massaging it softly. "It's less than subtle, and definitely not strange."
"That would be the frontal and parietal lobe adjusting. Fascinating." The Prolessarch wrote it down for posterity.
"What superpower did you give to Hope, Prolessarch?" Gabriel queried, turning to him and folding his arms.
"A version that, assuming she doesn't vomit it up in the next two hours, is going to grant her a much weaker version of standard Surgecraft without killing her," the Prolessarch deigned to explain. "Also, it will unlock the potential for the Unified Emanation Theory, within her, which I do not suggest she ever practice unless she wants to die in a massive explosion."
Gabriel frowned, and Hope smiled like a dork.
"Okay, this is… the situation," Gabriel said, standing in front of both Hope and Sante. "You're two of the three most important people in my life, and I want you to stay safe. Knowing full-well that my curses aren't merciful, the best place for you to be to stay safe is by my side. The government is already moving to crack down on paranormal threats, and Cthulhu is going to arrive and wreck everyone's shit, sooner or later, unless I– we stop it."
"Yog-Sothoth," the Prolessarch annoyedly corrected.
"What about school? And our families?" Sante asked in worry, placing both hands on his thighs, clutching the rim of his hoodie.
The Prolessarch turned to look at Gabriel. He didn't say anything and a skull could bear no expression, but Gabriel received the distinct sensation of a face that said, 'Is this dude kidding? He's going to have superpowers and save the world from Yog-Sothoth and school is his major concern?'
Gabriel turned to the Prolessarch, as if analyzing that nonexistent expression, and then back to Sante. "Fuck school, and…" Gabriel turned back to the skeleton. "Prolessarch, can you do something about their parents? Our families? We won't be bringing them with us to the house in the mountains, but I still want them to stay safe."
"Oh. From the way you sounded at the start, I was thinking you were about to ask me to assassinate them," the Prolessarch said. "And, I don't know. What do you want me to do about them?"
Gabriel pondered on it, but it was Hope that spoke before him, proposing a solution. "Pocket dimension?"
"You want me… to create a pocket dimension and store your families in it?" the Prolessarch asked, looking at her placidly.
"That'd be the safest option," she said. Gabriel and Sante nodded amongst themselves, and then agreed with a nod.
The lich continued, "How long do you plan to keep them in there?"
"Well, as long as it takes to take care of the threat," Hope said simply, shrugging helplessly.
"Gabriel," the Prolessarch addressed the boy Cursebearer with a calm look. "Would you kindly describe the Apocryphal Curse to her, so I don't have to?"
Gabriel sighed, pursing his lips. Right. "The Apocryphal Curse is… something that makes my life interesting."
"That's it?" Hope said, raising both of her eyebrows in surprise.
"That means there will always be a foe to fight, a problem to solve, a threat looming over our heads," Gabriel noted.
"And that foe is always going to be one that's on par to challenge our mutual friend," the Prolessarch added. "I'm afraid in this context, 'as long as it takes' is going to be a trans-infinite amount of time, or, more kindly, at least several million years. It's not practical to maintain an entire pocket dimension for that. Especially since I do not remember how to make them."
"Which is why I'll have to protect all of you," Gabriel announced, looking down at the ground morosely.
"Don't take all the credit, mate, we're here too now. We'll help, and we have a skeleton friend who can give superpowers to people," Sante said, clapping Gabriel's back with his firm, large hand.
"You have four Coterial Orbs unless I'm mistaken, Gabriel. You should add them to your Coterie and assign the powers. Also, work on the Pentex. I'll be right back with the elixir of your transcendence briefly," the Prolessarch said with an unusual atmosphere of regality, before absconding the room in favor of the kitchen.
Gabriel sat down on the bed next to Hope silently, and Hope, instantly getting the message, leaned in and wrapped a single arm around him, patting his back gently.
"Okay, guys, uhm," Gabriel said, looking up from the ground and to the sides, to both of his friends. "I'm not sure if you should stay, or go back home until we are ready to move. You should inform your parents of this."
"Will they even believe a word of what we're saying?" Sante queried, puffing up a cheek.
"Prolessarch? Do you have any convincing spells or potions?" Gabriel called out, raising his head so that his voice would reach the kitchen.
"Not currently, but I can work on it," Prolessarch replied from the other room.
"Alright," Gabriel said, with a resolute nod. "Go back home, keep in contact with me, and don't tell anyone about this. Hope, remember Prolessarch's instructions, and Sante, do not use your new powers in the open. Just to be safe, not even in your own house, we can never know."
They both nodded. The trio exchanged goodbyes, and Sante and Hope left to go back to their own homes.
Gabriel sighed heavily and sat on the ground, returning to his meditation cycles.
A good half-hour passed. Gabriel spent a vast majority of that time focusing on the study of the Pentex. The Prolessarch claimed that its powers were subpar for any magus, but Gabriel, with the help of Prowess, was beginning to see a kind of beauty to its five-partite execution. He was discovering several patterns when it came to the conceptual mixing that allowed him to maximize raw power and versatility in any given spell, mostly involving the way that concepts with certain associations meshed together. As a result, he managed to produce a significant quantity of acid blast spells, quite a few healing spells, and some others. None of them were particularly strong, but it always helped: they'd never decay and they'd never become weaker. The Pentex wasn't omni-dimensionally reliable, but so long as he was in this universe, it was reliable to him.
Gabriel was starting to get in some of his initial movement katas in, with the Ring's assistance, when the Prolessarch finally emerged from the kitchen with a simple flask of distilled, crystal-blue water. Gabriel stopped and examined it curiously. It looked far clearer, brighter, and somehow more watery than any water he'd seen; like it had been infused with the very stuff of life.
"A true Surgecraft elixir!" the Prolessarch declared jovially. "Normally, you're supposed to bathe in it, and do it as a baby, but… well, I'm me. So all you have to do is drink this and you should gain access to an Imaginary Element in less than a couple of minutes!"
"So I drink this, and I have even more superpowers?" Gabriel accepted the flask. It felt slightly warm to the touch, which he assumed was the fact that it had been boiled for the last hour in a large pot. "I wonder what my element will be like. They're not literal elements, but… elements that contain weird stuff in them."
The Prolessarch nodded enthusiastically, standing akimbo. "Correct! Drink it, and let's find out."
"Here goes..." Gabriel breathed in nervously, uncorked the flask, and then downed it in five, full gulps. He didn't feel anything for a moment.
And then, the vibrations started. In his feet and fingers, there was a subtle, errant twitch, as if his limbs were each possessed by a separate demon working on a different frequency. The world seemed to become much brighter, as if his pupils widened in order to take in more light. It was almost painful.
After ten seconds of that, everything stopped, and Gabriel started to sense an emergent pressure building up within him.
Fascinated, he raised his hand and focused on the pressure. He pushed it through his skin, and what emerged was a flame, light violet in coloration and it emitted a pleasant warmth, like an amethyst gem married to the color of love. He could tell its abilities as instinctively as if he'd been using it for a week.
"Affectfire," he thought. That would be a decent name.
"Ooooh! This is so riveting!" the Prolessarch said, pulling out his notebook. "I have some questions to ask before you get back into training."
Gabriel sighed. This would be a long day.
–-
[ ] Affectfire: The heat-blazed release, a pure flame that represents and embodies love and affection, its fire providing warmth and comfort to those who should receive it, and unfailingly immolating those who'd seek to destroy it. In its simplest form, a fire that spreads like napalm which conveys the Elementalist's affection. Dimmed, it's the quiet torch that provides comforting light during sleep; heightened, its vengeful rain will scour the land in search of anyone it finds guilty of hurting those under its aegis. It is the very essence of love and flame congealed into tenuous action, a semi-sentient desire to protect and nurture directed as a blast or shield.
Gabriel's Imaginary Element is determined by his relationships.
Affectfire is a wonderful element for nearly any use: offense, defense, support, and utility. It has only a single manifestation, and yet one whose manifold actions encompass the wide umbrella of actions ranging from the protective to the vengeful. It holds a low degree of near-sapience and perceptive recognition, understanding who is the user's friend and foe on the same level that a bird understands it must fly south.
Those who are friends, its touch heals and nurtures, restoring them from the darkness of fatigue and burning away their wounds in an alexandrite conflagration, and it infuses them with a depth of spiritual and physical zest bordering on the peak-human.
Those who are enemies, it sticks to like vengeful napalm, never letting go until each due of hatred is repaid and until their very existence is gone. There is very little that can extinguish it if you've truly hurt those it cares about.
*The Elementalist can fire shaped blasts, make barriers, or propel balls of Affectfire. As an element, Affectfire works similar to ordinary flames, but its color is bright, luminous white-violet and it distinguishes between friend or foe. Allies who are subjected to Affectfire heal wounds at an accelerated rate, even to the point of slow regeneration in high doses, and experience a minor degree of physical augmentation and bravery while the element is in their system. Foes are treated as if struck by sticky napalm, which burns even underwater and continues to wear away at them with more heat than ordinary fire.
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- Location
- Louisiana
Birdsie if you commit to favor guidance I will personally argue with all of my might that Aobaru gets first class treatment at the next immediate opportunity. My marker and loyalty is on offer.
- Location
- The Surface Of A Hostile Planet
personally, I think exaltation >>> grace
it's the same sort of immediate survival for half the opportunity cost, plus it boosts our boi immediately instead of in some nebulous future after Ruling Ring + Fisher King + OaF II
it's the same sort of immediate survival for half the opportunity cost, plus it boosts our boi immediately instead of in some nebulous future after Ruling Ring + Fisher King + OaF II
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Lealope
Not yet invincible
- Pronouns
- She/Her
man, prolessarch
from a loyal servant of the schools, you do the diagram proud
stealing the show, every single update
- Location
- Pindorama
Do you mean Defer, or are you actually against Guidance? Because frankly, I think that would be more helpful to our long-term survival than even Grace, and it's useful for much more besides. When Haliel herself thinks we should pick it, we'd better listen.
- Location
- The Surface Of A Hostile Planet
I'll commit to Aobaru stat/relationship +s. We must Shepard our young apprentice to be better than we were. He's the Naruto to our Jiraiya/Kakashi.
CHADbaru is my homeboi bruh and voting for him pissed of the Gisena EFB gang so you can always count on me for that.
Rihaku
The Internet
What a twist... but with the update coming in less than two days, is there really time enough to work out a deal with such inertial juggernauts of mass fanwork?
As for KonoMena, I'd have to go with Frogs and Accept Tea. They should be able to make considerably more Eris than the Patrol mission, since you don't have to stop at 5 frogs, and unlike in canon their ranged attack options are far more prolific. Even if Kazuma will inevitably be humiliated by ingestion into a frog a few times, the extra money should be worth it, since cash equals gear. If Kazuma maintains distance and uses Charity / attack spells then he should be able to avoid most complications beyond the Misfortune-mandated ingestions, especially if he sends Subaru to scout.
Could also be a good opportunity to recruit Darkness, and to train up Kazuma's casting stats in general. Does the Dragon Meat provide a flat or scaling XP bonus? If there's no advantage to consuming it later, he should go ahead and consume it now.
Birdsie
Sharp Talons Cleave The Worthy
- Location
- Poland
Isn't that the point? The closer the deadline, the more pressure there is; the more pressure there is, the more concessions I can derive!
That seems to be the overall winner so far, with overwhelming support for both of those options. I'll get started on the next update soon enough.
He intends to consume it for dinner alongside his party members. It provides a flat XP bonus, equivalent to roughly 50 XP per bite. Altogether, it should be enough to push Kazuma and his party members out by several levels. For Kazuma, that means a stupidly large amount of Skill Points to spend, or in other words, new upgrades and development options for you.
It'll also be during dinner that Kazuma brings up the option of adding Subaru and Aqua to his Retinue in order to also let them benefit from his Progression.
Birdsie
Sharp Talons Cleave The Worthy
- Location
- Poland
Good news.
The war is officially over; Bard and I have signed the peace accords on Discord.
Herein lie the conditions: I, Birdsie, change my vote to any one that contains Favor. In exchange, Bard offers two vetoless markers to be called in to determine options for portions of votes which have options that involve Aobaru directly in some manner, with the understanding that I, Birdsie, will use my best judgment to not call them for options which are clearly, actively suicidal. In addition, I accept the offers from @GenericName and change my vote to Favor/Guidance accordingly.
S-Rank Technique: Cessation. The Infinite Fanworkyomi Seal is now back in place, you're free from the genjutsu.
[X] "I wish for the Seraph's favor." (2 wishes)
[X] "I wish for the Seraph's guidance."
[X] Night's Ambition
In order to seal this accord, enjoy the next episode of Konomena.
Wordcount: 5010 words.
Rules for Upgrading Spells
Basic Magic: Per upgrade level, +1 SP cost. (1st Upgrade: 1 SP. 2nd Upgrade: 2 SP. 3rd Upgrade: 3 SP. 4th Upgrade: 4 SP.)
Intermediate Magic: Per upgrade level, +1 SP cost. Every two levels, +1 SP cost. (1st Upgrade: 2 SP. 2nd Upgrade: 4 SP. 3rd Upgrade: 5 SP. 4th Upgrade: 7 SP.)
Advanced Magic: Per upgrade level, +2 SP cost. (1st Upgrade: 4 SP. 2nd Upgrade: 6 SP. 3rd Upgrade: 8 SP. 4th Upgrade: 10 SP.)
This math only applies to Arch Wizard and (to a lesser extent,) Wizard Classes. Adventurers and other, miscellaneous jobs would see more difficulty in learning spells.
Rules for Upgrading Skills
Per upgrade level, +1 SP cost, unless the Skill isn't one that belongs to your Class, in which case +2 SP cost.
The war is officially over; Bard and I have signed the peace accords on Discord.
Herein lie the conditions: I, Birdsie, change my vote to any one that contains Favor. In exchange, Bard offers two vetoless markers to be called in to determine options for portions of votes which have options that involve Aobaru directly in some manner, with the understanding that I, Birdsie, will use my best judgment to not call them for options which are clearly, actively suicidal. In addition, I accept the offers from @GenericName and change my vote to Favor/Guidance accordingly.
S-Rank Technique: Cessation. The Infinite Fanworkyomi Seal is now back in place, you're free from the genjutsu.
[X] "I wish for the Seraph's favor." (2 wishes)
[X] "I wish for the Seraph's guidance."
[X] Night's Ambition
In order to seal this accord, enjoy the next episode of Konomena.
Rihaku-42342 said:
Fadeless Spirit
The party of Aqua, Subaru, and Kazuma set out in order to apprehend the Giant Toads. Kazuma made sure to set a waypoint for teleportation back in town, so they wouldn't have to waste time going back.
They'd agreed that with Kazuma's power, it would be safe to hunt down at least twice as many toads as the quest's demands postulated, for a total of 150,000 Eris, which they'd be able to split three-ways. Kazuma would use that money to pay off his debts and then go straight to Wiz.
The fields outside Axel were impossibly vast, stretching on for what seemed like peerless miles of greenery with no flowers obscuring the impossibly even grass.
Surrounding those hills and plains was a tight band of forests in pinewood and leaf, as well as a handful of crevasses and mountains with notched tops as if some giant's blade had levelly cleaved through and beheaded them a century prior.
Even at a distance of over a kilometer from the city, the weather remained supernally pleasant. The freeing breeze poured over Kazuma's face and hair in excessive abundance as if wishing him good luck.
They reached the tenacious roosting grounds of the Giant Toads in less than twenty minutes on foot, although had no luck finding any actual members of the species on the edge of their territory.
It would have been much easier to jump a single, isolated individual rather than having to wake up entire nests of them by making a racket. It was less than efficient.
The main issue with the Giant Toads was their effect on the local farming and livestock, as they had a tendency to eat goats and cattle, as well as errant farmers who came too close. They usually didn't finish consumption on the latter, but fatal accidents happened.
Subaru breathed in deeply as if psyching himself up for a grand deed of heroism. "Kazuma, I think we're deep enough in. This is good enough."
Aqua nodded determinedly.
To Kazuma's delighted surprise, the goddess, for all her many flaws, was almost as determined to emerge victorious from this great ordeal as he was. Perhaps his speech from yesterday sparked something in her. He didn't even think to call the goddess resolved, but there was an eagerness to work in her that wasn't there previously.
Kazuma nodded, then looked at Subaru. "Do you thing."
In an earlier conversation, Subaru uneasily claimed that he possessed a rather peculiar ability which drew monsters to him like moths to a flame whenever he used it.
It had some caveats, namely that he could not activate it too many times in a row, lest he risk a fatal heart attack, but despite the rather gruesome nature of that ability, he was more than willing to use it for drawing the Giant Toads out.
Once more, Kazuma was deeply and profoundly disturbed by his fellow's casual disregard for dangers to his life. He was starting to think Subaru might not entirely comprehend what death or danger meant.
"Alright," Subaru said. He started to speak, before his face suddenly twisted and he was forced to stop, "I can Return by-" The boy let out an intense breath, which coincided with a tremulous rustling of the terrain beneath them.
At least three unburrowed from the earth, tossing aside vast amounts of warm, humid soil to reveal their hulking postures. Kazuma found himself daunted by their volume, as each Giant Toad was the size of a minivan mounted on four legs.
The Giant Toads started to hop around, and one of them stopped and looked directly at them, before croaking ominously, its throat expanding like a pumped bubble. This drew the attention of the other pair in green and blue respectively, who turned and did the same. Like a war-cry, a territorial warning to leave or suffer the consequences.
"Aqua!" Kazuma shouted. "Do as we discussed!"
The goddess nodded, then raised both of her hands. "Enhance Magic! Enhance Speed! Blessing!" With each casting, a stream of gentle light came from her fingers and into Kazuma's body, filling him up with radiant warmth and a sensation of invigorating fullness.
Kazuma did some research prior to embarking on this quest and conscripted Subaru to his aid in this difficult task. There was no internet in this world, and libraries were scant, especially ones with relevant information. They'd found out some rather interesting factoids in the process of questioning various other adventurers and paying for their drinks as a bribe. Giant Toads were near-immune to water-aligned and blunt attacks and tended to attack in overwhelming groups, as well as thrash around as they gobbled their prey in order to stun them and make wriggling out harder.
Finally, she cast her last miracle. "Magic Barrier!"
A magic circle sprung into existence, coming down from the heavens above and from the earth beneath and clipping through soil and cloud both, without disturbing either. The circles rested in a tight formation around the toads, whose movement arrested with it. They would be unable to escape the blast radius, and unable to overcome Aqua's Magic Barrier in less than at least half a minute. That was more than plenty of time for Kazuma to do what he planned.
Giant Toads also had a notable weakness. As much as they were near-immune to water, they had a strong vulnerability to its opposite element.
"There's your chance, Kazuma!" Aqua declared. Subaru was surveying the nearby area to make sure no other surprises managed to sneak up on them; a job that he was uniquely suited for according to his own words.
The Adventurer Card told Kazuma exactly what he needed to do in order to accomplish the casting of the spell. It was as if he'd done it a thousand times.
Kazuma raised both hands in the toads' direction and focused the magic at his fingertips. With a mental command, the mana contained in his body rushed to the ends of his limbs as if drawn in by an intense magnet. It waited there, raging and billowing, steadily awaiting its release.
The space around Kazuma became darker as if light were being siphoned and robbed from it. Heat manifested in his joined palms from nothing, a mere spark that nonetheless acted as a vortex, gathering immaculate power from the surrounding air. Everything became colder as he focused the entire heat of a thirty-foot zone into his palm, then magnified it with a constant infusion of energy.
At Kazuma's command, it started to spin and build up velocity without leaving its spot, the very stuff of motion blocked through willpower; potential energy.
In less than a full three seconds, Kazuma's fingers held a blazing fireball, like a white-orange globe with a shimmering, delicate rubber surface. Lights danced on its surface, like coruscant solar plasma on the surface of an active star.
Kazuma's eyes and mouth felt dry from the feeling of the glowing edifice in his hands. Despite that, he was immensely satisfied and thrilled to see what this would do.
"Fireball!" With the incantation, Kazuma sent the bright globe of fire at a straight trajectory towards the toads.
None of the hapless monsters could react, as the projectile raced through the intervening space in less time than it took to take a proper breath. There was a loud explosion and a release of gas, dust, and fire which obscured a wide part of the impact zone.
It settled moments later, revealing the gored bodies of three toads. Kazuma felt a sudden rush, as the infusion of experience flooded him and offered him a level-up, then another one in quick succession. Aqua received some experience of her own, not through the slaying, but the aid she offered, and Subaru received the most paltry sum.
One of the toads was alive, Kazuma noticed.
He cast a much lesser, undercooked Blade of Wind, its power equivalent to a sword-cut from a novice swordsman at this range. It was nonetheless enough to finish the creature's life in a merciful manner. There was another flood of vital life-force infusing Kazuma's bones and elevating him even higher.
There was a deep, sadistic thrill in this kind of growth, although Kazuma was careful not to relish in that sensation for too long, remembering the warnings that his patron offered him regarding the nature of power.
There was a loud rustling, the earth being pushed aside. Kazuma's ears caught it a split moment before Subaru warned him.
"On our six, boss-man!" Natsuki cried loudly. Before Kazuma could turn around, he heard the spell, "Ul Shamac!"
Kazuma finally spun around just on time to see the spell taking place. Black dust flowed and surrounded a wide space behind them, down the hill, like grainy diamonds floating in the air before congealing into a suspension of darkness in the air, like ink in water.
It obscured the Giant Toads, but likewise probably obscured their own positions. It was a net positive for Kazuma, as his magical powers were indiscriminate one way or another, and the Toads needed precise direction to launch their long-distance tongue-strikes they'd been warned about.
"In there!" Subaru declared loudly. "Four of them!"
Kazuma couldn't wait for Aqua to perform her casting first. The enemy was much closer right now. Kazuma focused on his spellwork and directed twin, growing balls of live flame into his palms, then released only a second later with minimal build-up. "Fireball!"
The orbs raced into the darkness then disappeared. There was no sound or even vibration, aside from the slight distortion in the dark cloud.
Kazuma waited. A second later, there was an infusion of life-force lesser than either of those prior. He managed to hit and kill one target, but what about the others?
He received his answer, as a tongue lashed out from the darkness, slightly charbroiled and bleeding in places. It was like an extending whip or a reaching fist, moving faster than Kazuma could mentally react, wrapping around him as fast as a bullet would fire out of a gun.
"Kazuma!" Aqua cried in that exact moment, cold shock tangible in her voice.
It reeled him in at a quarter of that velocity, but Kazuma managed to react this time. He slammed both feet into the soil and cast Mold Earth wordlessly, making the spell near-useless for its actual purpose but managing to cobble together a slight outgrowth from the soil, slowing him down even further.
Kazuma's feet dug a pair of furrows as he was pulled, resisting hopelessly against the force of the Giant Toad's tongue muscles.
His right arm searched uselessly, unable to reach due to the tongue wrapped around it.
"Damn it! Spark!" Kazuma's body released a sudden deluge of electricity. A pathetic joy buzzer's worth, but it was enough to make the tongue slip a little as if the toad on the other side was hesitating whether to keep holding on or not.
It was enough to briefly release Kazuma's right wrist.
He practically slammed it against the dagger in its sheath, pulled it out with a hiss of metal, and then swung once at the tongue. At the apex of the swing, the tiny knife became a long zweihander with a prodigiously sharpened edge and a blade that was as heavy and thick as a steel ingot in its middle.
Moving impossibly fast as the motion started when the blade was practically weightless, the sword managed to casually sever the tongue. An arterial spray of blood and saliva coated Kazuma's entire outfit and body, a lot of it covering his face and hair. The foulness of blood filled his mouth, salty-sweet with a metallic aftertaste.
The gunk of heroes, he thought grimly as the sword snapped back into dagger-form which he sheathed into the scabbard.
As soon as he was done, another toad lashed out. Its tongue flew out of the darkness, across the plains, and then slammed into the earth ten meters to his right, producing a gunshot crack due to its velocity at the end. Kazuma curiously realized that if he wasn't almost supernaturally durable, his spine would have cracked from that.
This was evidence the toads didn't have any idea of his current position. Good. It meant he could freely charge another spell.
Kazuma took a one-second glance behind himself. Aqua was cowering down on the ground, one hand covering the back of her head. Subaru was kneeling and using a natural rock formation for tenuous cover, probably readying to refresh his spell as soon as it was necessary.
It wouldn't be.
Kazuma raised both hands then gathered heat and flame into them, making a pair of separate fireballs. As with the first one, he was patient and allowed the spells to cook themselves to a nice, appreciable, critical mass.
"Fireball! Fireball!" Once again, with a pair of loud cracks, like bullets into the darkness, twin orbs flew and exploded into spots they couldn't see. Stained viscera rained out of the darkness bubble of Subaru's casting, trailing bright redness and black smoke after themselves. Kazuma felt the depth of his spirit widen, as another brick was added to the foundation with the absorbed life-force.
There was silence for a long moment. Kazuma awaited a reaction from the enemy, gradually stepping off to the side and changing his position. He didn't want to get hit by a lucky tongue again.
The darkness bubble settled, like inky mist falling into the earth; dust joining a larger pile. This revealed the entire battlefield to their eyes. There were a couple of scorched craters, dead bodies covered in charred skin, shedding immense amounts of water vapor and black smoke, but no living enemies.
"We're safe!" Kazuma declared to the party, turning around.
With visible relief, Subaru moved out of cover after a moment. The boy looked at the dead amphibians and smiled brightly. "Wow! Good job, Kazuma! You're a real powerhouse."
Kazuma smiled at him and nodded, then looked at Aqua and frowned.
"Hey, I said we're safe," he consoled the goddess as he approached. Aqua remained in her earlier position, one hand protectively wrapped around herself, eyes closed shut and tight. She was muttering something, like a safety mantra. "Goddess? Aqua? Earth to Aqua?"
To no avail, it seemed. Kazuma's frown deepened, but Subaru approached him and whispered something; an idea. Kazuma nodded with a smile, then loudly asked, "Is that a demon?"
The goddess stood at once, visible aggression pouring off of her. "Where?!"
Subaru laughed jovially. Kazuma sighed and mentioned, "We're good Aqua. The Giant Toads are dead."
The goddess' eyes blanked, as she remembered her state a couple of seconds prior.
"Oh."
The fact that she didn't seem to be entirely self-aware was more worrying than it was funny. Could she have... developed PTSD from leaving behind the Divine Realm?
No, that sounded as close to ridiculous as something could be, but it was clear that she wasn't used to combat yet. He'd need to be more careful with her in the future, slowly acclimatize her to increasing brutality. Even now, she appeared to be uneasy with the amount of blood on Kazuma's torso and face.
"'Oh,' indeed. We have three left, although I'm starting to run low on magicka."
Kazuma considered the use of manatite in order to recharge his stores, then kicked that thought out. Manatite was incredibly expensive; that he managed to buy it for less than a hundred thousand was a true miracle on the level of Aqua's own.
Truthfully, even if he cast teleportation now, it'd leave him deeply exhausted for an hour or two afterward, but he didn't want to tell them that. If Kazuma had to cast another mighty fireball and then teleported, he might collapse upon return, although he could preemptively and partially evade that problem by downing one of his stamina potions.
Neither of those options sounded tantalizing, but there was an agreement between them when the day started. They'd kill no less than a total of ten Giant Toads. It was the optimal amount to ensure a good payout from the Guild, and Kazuma needed to work extra because of how much he slept.
He shook his head, then looked to the goddess. "Pick a direction, and let's continue hunting."
Aqua tapped at her chin, then looked down the hill.
Her finger started moving in a repetitive rhythm. "Eeny-meeny-miny-moe. Catch the archer by his bow, if he looses an arrow let him go, eeny-meeny-miny-moe..." She pointed south, the direction furthermost from the city. "That way."
He wondered if this was a trick from the Affliction of Misfortune. Should they move in the opposite direction instead? That struck Kazuma as equally random, and therefore, equally useless.
"Let's go," Subaru eagerly said before Kazuma could do any more thinking, jogging downhill. Aqua followed after him without question or complaint.
With a mental shrug, Kazuma braced his feet against a steeper portion of that same hill and then skidded down after the pair.
Kazuma didn't really mention any of this to his teammates, but he would have never expected actual monster-hunting to be this satisfying. He'd already gained several levels from his exertions, and his companions weren't too far off.
Apparently, the Adventurer Cards' term, 'EXP' was actually a clever PR move to distract from the fact the cards were vampiric in nature; they stole the accumulated life-force of the slain creature and converted it into nebulous, quantifiable power the user of the Card was able to spend.
A 'Level' was a codename for the number of essence breakthroughs that your soul went through, and the larger their number, the harder it was to attain more of them. At the same time, each one offered even larger benefits as one's very being approached something that resembled perfection of their class archetype
Naturally, the Cards had a judicious system for distributing that life-force. Those who dealt the final blow were prioritized, but so were those who supported them.
It was more or less fair: an adventurer received a sum equivalent to their contribution to the fight, even if that contribution was minimal.
Kazuma's Adventurer Card, though, seemed to require much less of the life-force in order to produce much faster gains.
He'd need to add both of his companions to his Retinue later on, preferably as they ate dinner. And discuss the oaths they'd make to each other. Kazuma intended to keep his Progression to himself for a single day, to see what it was like, but now it was time to start sharing.
Naturally, though, it felt good to have power.
The party walked south for about three to five minutes, and finally emerged in a miniature and shallow valley of sloping hills.
There were signs of extensive digging and burrowing over a length of time, suggesting this was a major nesting ground for a large number of Giant Toads. Kazuma wasn't the best at crime scene investigation, but he would've said at least four of them, perhaps more. To be pessimistic, he assumed five.
"Maybe we should take a break? If we're in for a large battle, it'd be smarter to let your energy recharge," Subaru recommended in a suitably friendly voice.
"Also, you smell," Aqua added. She pinched her nose and waved through the air comically. "I should have done this earlier."
She raised a hand to cast Create Water, and Kazuma pondered stopping her, but ultimately decided to let her. He spread his arms in acceptance.
A water hose of pressurized water impacted his side and arm, then started to move up and down, working over his head and neck. Kazuma allowed this to continue for a couple of seconds when Aqua reached his other side and he said, "Alright, alright. Enough."
Aqua stopped the spell, and Kazuma used Tinder and Wind Breath in quick succession to dry himself off. The water she produced was holy, and therefore it held restorative and cleansing properties, which meant that Kazuma was about as clean as if he'd taken a thorough and long bath with liberal application of soap.
I'm starting to get real tired of taking showers and baths in my own clothes. Although it's nice to have a tactical bath with me at all times, I suppose.
Kazuma sighed, and then considered Subaru's words. "Fine. We'll camp out here for a couple of minutes and have our rations."
"Yippee!" Aqua jumped out into the air, then opened her knapsack and unrolled a picnic towel in the middle of the hill. She also took out a comically large bib and tied it around her neck, while Subaru began to unpack the meal of turkey and lettuce sandwiches they'd bought.
"Don't forget to create a magic circle around us," Kazuma said testingly.
"I know, I know. Magic Barrier! There. Oh, this looks good!" The goddess excitedly sat down, moving for the nearest sandwich.
She grabbed it, smelled it, then drew in some air and chomped down on the food in a very un-ladylike fashion, getting the brown sauce all over her cheeks and face. The bib seemed kind of redundant because of the messiness of the whole deed.
Subaru frowned, and took one of his own. He started biting on it, before stopping and looking at Kazuma. "You're not eating, Kazuma?"
"I'm not really hungry, no," he said. He didn't even have breakfast earlier that morning, now that he thought about it. Kazuma looked at Subaru and shrugged. "I don't think I need as many calories anymore."
"Well, you should still eat," Subaru insisted, pushing the wooden box with the sandwiches in Kazuma's direction in a subtly obstinate and encouraging manner. "You might not be feeling hungry, but your body needs its nutrients to function properly. I used to be an athlete in high-school, I would know, alright? If you're taking part in any strenuous activity, it's important to eat a lot, even if you have to force it down! Also, drink lots of water." Subaru accepted a filled waterskin from Aqua, then passed it to Kazuma.
Kazuma accepted the waterskin and took a swig, then shrugged and picked up the sandwich nearest to himself. He took a satisfying bite out of it, crunching on the meat and lettuce.
As expected, it tasted like turkey, lettuce, bread, and a faint addition of creamy garlic sauce. It flowed evenly and nicely across his tongue, like a caressing finger on a cheek. It was a simple meal, but a filling and tasty one.
"It's good," he commented after swallowing.
"It's very good!" Aqua said with a full mouth. In both hands, she wielded a pair of sandwiches, taking interchanging bites out of them. Kazuma stared at her with a sort of disgusted incredulity for a moment, before sighing and pressing two fingers to the bridge of his nose. Subaru just laughed.
Once their delicious repast was over, they cleaned up after themselves and prepared to face more of their enemies.
Subaru used his ability in order to draw out the Giant Toads, while Aqua used a Magic Barrier to limit the toads' movements. Her circles weren't fully reliable: they could prevent entry or exit, but with enough willpower or prolonged effort, an adversary was capable of overcoming those impositions.
Such wasn't the case, because the amphibian monsters would not get that much time to act.
Instead of five toads, six of them unburrowed. Learning from previous experiences, Kazuma had already been charging up his Fireball even while Aqua and Subaru used their own abilities. As a result, he effortlessly laid the Giant Toads to waste in a single, precise casting of the Fireball spell.
It was rapidly climbing through the ranks to becoming his favorite spell. Kazuma expected that he'd need some degree of tactical flexibility, but now, he supposed that destructive power was enough for creatures as simple-minded as Giant Toads.
Once more, there was a powerful rush of energy that brimmed and filled out Kazuma's heart, and they were done for the day.
Kazuma marked the spots where they'd killed the collections of Giant Frogs on the map the Adventurer's Guild provided for them, added some written instructions for maneuvering the terrain, and then had Subaru and Aqua cross-check the map to ensure everything was correctly marked.
After letting Kazuma recharge his magical energy for another couple of minutes, he teleported the entire party back to the gates of Axel, and they moved in the direction of the Adventurer's Guild in order to take back their reward.
As predicted, Kazuma felt deeply exhausted from the spell. He was good at hiding it, but he could only barely force his legs to shamble forward in a zombielike manner. Both of his party members were slightly concerned at the sight.
---
You've gained 180,000 Eris, as well as a 25,000 bonus for exceptional work, minus a small 5,000 deduction for substantial damage to the bodies of some of the Giant Toads. Splitting this between Aqua, Subaru, and Kazuma, each one of them has made a rather impressive sum of 65,000 Eris, with the rest being put away into the party's collective expense account.
Although the value doesn't translate as well because of the technological, cultural, and magical differences between societies, 60k Eris is very roughly $600. That said, its value for "basic commodities," such as bread is actually as much as 50% larger, but slightly smaller (5-10%) for luxurious items such as soap.
Before Kazuma goes to visit Wiz, he's got some decisions to make regarding his Adventurer Status.
Name: Satou Kazuma
Class: Arch Wizard
Level: 8
[XP]: 300/400
Skill Points: 20
Strength: 44
Endurance: 46
Constitution: 36
Dexterity: 50
Agility: 45
Intelligence: 55
Wits: 60
Magic Power: 65
Luck: -967
Basic Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze, Tinder, Create Water, Create Earth, Wind Breath, Spark, Basic Illusion (+1), Counterspell)
Intermediate Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze Gust, Fireball, Hydrostream, Mold Earth, Blade of Wind, Lightning, Teleport, Paralyze)
[ ] Illusion - Create a false sensory input for everyone in the area, with a maximum of four senses at once. Upgrades to Major Illusion, Mist, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Fear - A mental spell that infuses the target with great fear, overcoming the effects of natural bravery. Upgrades to Terror, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Charm - A mental spell that has a chance to cause a monster to consider the caster an ally. Upgrades to Charm Person, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Courage - A mental spell that infuses the target with great courage, overcoming the effects of fear and cowardice, but not rendering them without logic. Upgrades to Berserk, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Unlock & Lock - Never carry a lockpick around for anything. This spell lets the user open locks or break seals on objects; applies even to slightly abstract targets, but might not always be reliable in that case. It can also do the opposite with its antipode: Lock. Upgrades to Seal/Unseal, Animate Item, etc.
Intermediate Magic: Costs 4 SP to buy.
[ ] Advanced Magic - The highest tier of ordinary magical spells, although not representative of specialized sectors like the Detonation Series, Golem Series, or other, more rare forms of magic. Unlocks Crystal Prison, Inferno, Bottomless Swamp, Earthshaker, Tornado, Lightning Strike.
Advanced Magic Stage: Costs 20 SP to buy.
[ ] Upgrade - Upgrade a known spell. Pick which one.
Most spells are unlocked either by learning from a tutor, or upgrading one of the starting spells granted at the purchase of a Magic Tier to unlock better, refined versions for purchase. It's also possible to encounter new types of magic, such as the Detonation Series. Chiefly, however, upgrading is the main way to get new spells. If a spell is upgraded sufficiently, it may advance in rank to a higher stage, or it may lead to spells that can only be bought at higher stages.
For example, the starting Basic Set will eventually unlock these spells, among others: Icicle Shot, Fire Shot, Create Acid, Create Stone, Windblast, Shock Orb. The Intermediate Set will eventually unlock these spells, among others: Ray of Frost, Ray of Flame, Water Prison, Earth Hammer, Wind Curtain, Chain Lightning.
The initial cost for upgrading Basic Magic is 1 SP, for Intermediate Magic is 2 SP.
In addition, how should Kazuma broach the matter of Retinue to his friends?
[ ] Smooth & Easy - Add them both to the Retinue, no questions asked.
[ ] Reasonable but Strict - Everyone swears a fealty to everyone, with the conditions of: "I promise not to betray the Retinue for personal gain," "I promise to do my best to protect the lives of every member of the Retinue as if their life were my own," "I promise to act within the best interests of the Retinue to my best ability, unless I wholeheartedly believe that doing so would impede my own growth or happiness, and in which case, I promise to broach the subject with at least one other Retinue member regarding the subject, but only to a degree I am comfortable with."
[ ] Write-in.
The party of Aqua, Subaru, and Kazuma set out in order to apprehend the Giant Toads. Kazuma made sure to set a waypoint for teleportation back in town, so they wouldn't have to waste time going back.
They'd agreed that with Kazuma's power, it would be safe to hunt down at least twice as many toads as the quest's demands postulated, for a total of 150,000 Eris, which they'd be able to split three-ways. Kazuma would use that money to pay off his debts and then go straight to Wiz.
The fields outside Axel were impossibly vast, stretching on for what seemed like peerless miles of greenery with no flowers obscuring the impossibly even grass.
Surrounding those hills and plains was a tight band of forests in pinewood and leaf, as well as a handful of crevasses and mountains with notched tops as if some giant's blade had levelly cleaved through and beheaded them a century prior.
Even at a distance of over a kilometer from the city, the weather remained supernally pleasant. The freeing breeze poured over Kazuma's face and hair in excessive abundance as if wishing him good luck.
They reached the tenacious roosting grounds of the Giant Toads in less than twenty minutes on foot, although had no luck finding any actual members of the species on the edge of their territory.
It would have been much easier to jump a single, isolated individual rather than having to wake up entire nests of them by making a racket. It was less than efficient.
The main issue with the Giant Toads was their effect on the local farming and livestock, as they had a tendency to eat goats and cattle, as well as errant farmers who came too close. They usually didn't finish consumption on the latter, but fatal accidents happened.
Subaru breathed in deeply as if psyching himself up for a grand deed of heroism. "Kazuma, I think we're deep enough in. This is good enough."
Aqua nodded determinedly.
To Kazuma's delighted surprise, the goddess, for all her many flaws, was almost as determined to emerge victorious from this great ordeal as he was. Perhaps his speech from yesterday sparked something in her. He didn't even think to call the goddess resolved, but there was an eagerness to work in her that wasn't there previously.
Kazuma nodded, then looked at Subaru. "Do you thing."
In an earlier conversation, Subaru uneasily claimed that he possessed a rather peculiar ability which drew monsters to him like moths to a flame whenever he used it.
It had some caveats, namely that he could not activate it too many times in a row, lest he risk a fatal heart attack, but despite the rather gruesome nature of that ability, he was more than willing to use it for drawing the Giant Toads out.
Once more, Kazuma was deeply and profoundly disturbed by his fellow's casual disregard for dangers to his life. He was starting to think Subaru might not entirely comprehend what death or danger meant.
"Alright," Subaru said. He started to speak, before his face suddenly twisted and he was forced to stop, "I can Return by-" The boy let out an intense breath, which coincided with a tremulous rustling of the terrain beneath them.
At least three unburrowed from the earth, tossing aside vast amounts of warm, humid soil to reveal their hulking postures. Kazuma found himself daunted by their volume, as each Giant Toad was the size of a minivan mounted on four legs.
The Giant Toads started to hop around, and one of them stopped and looked directly at them, before croaking ominously, its throat expanding like a pumped bubble. This drew the attention of the other pair in green and blue respectively, who turned and did the same. Like a war-cry, a territorial warning to leave or suffer the consequences.
"Aqua!" Kazuma shouted. "Do as we discussed!"
The goddess nodded, then raised both of her hands. "Enhance Magic! Enhance Speed! Blessing!" With each casting, a stream of gentle light came from her fingers and into Kazuma's body, filling him up with radiant warmth and a sensation of invigorating fullness.
Kazuma did some research prior to embarking on this quest and conscripted Subaru to his aid in this difficult task. There was no internet in this world, and libraries were scant, especially ones with relevant information. They'd found out some rather interesting factoids in the process of questioning various other adventurers and paying for their drinks as a bribe. Giant Toads were near-immune to water-aligned and blunt attacks and tended to attack in overwhelming groups, as well as thrash around as they gobbled their prey in order to stun them and make wriggling out harder.
Finally, she cast her last miracle. "Magic Barrier!"
A magic circle sprung into existence, coming down from the heavens above and from the earth beneath and clipping through soil and cloud both, without disturbing either. The circles rested in a tight formation around the toads, whose movement arrested with it. They would be unable to escape the blast radius, and unable to overcome Aqua's Magic Barrier in less than at least half a minute. That was more than plenty of time for Kazuma to do what he planned.
Giant Toads also had a notable weakness. As much as they were near-immune to water, they had a strong vulnerability to its opposite element.
"There's your chance, Kazuma!" Aqua declared. Subaru was surveying the nearby area to make sure no other surprises managed to sneak up on them; a job that he was uniquely suited for according to his own words.
The Adventurer Card told Kazuma exactly what he needed to do in order to accomplish the casting of the spell. It was as if he'd done it a thousand times.
Kazuma raised both hands in the toads' direction and focused the magic at his fingertips. With a mental command, the mana contained in his body rushed to the ends of his limbs as if drawn in by an intense magnet. It waited there, raging and billowing, steadily awaiting its release.
The space around Kazuma became darker as if light were being siphoned and robbed from it. Heat manifested in his joined palms from nothing, a mere spark that nonetheless acted as a vortex, gathering immaculate power from the surrounding air. Everything became colder as he focused the entire heat of a thirty-foot zone into his palm, then magnified it with a constant infusion of energy.
At Kazuma's command, it started to spin and build up velocity without leaving its spot, the very stuff of motion blocked through willpower; potential energy.
In less than a full three seconds, Kazuma's fingers held a blazing fireball, like a white-orange globe with a shimmering, delicate rubber surface. Lights danced on its surface, like coruscant solar plasma on the surface of an active star.
Kazuma's eyes and mouth felt dry from the feeling of the glowing edifice in his hands. Despite that, he was immensely satisfied and thrilled to see what this would do.
"Fireball!" With the incantation, Kazuma sent the bright globe of fire at a straight trajectory towards the toads.
None of the hapless monsters could react, as the projectile raced through the intervening space in less time than it took to take a proper breath. There was a loud explosion and a release of gas, dust, and fire which obscured a wide part of the impact zone.
It settled moments later, revealing the gored bodies of three toads. Kazuma felt a sudden rush, as the infusion of experience flooded him and offered him a level-up, then another one in quick succession. Aqua received some experience of her own, not through the slaying, but the aid she offered, and Subaru received the most paltry sum.
One of the toads was alive, Kazuma noticed.
He cast a much lesser, undercooked Blade of Wind, its power equivalent to a sword-cut from a novice swordsman at this range. It was nonetheless enough to finish the creature's life in a merciful manner. There was another flood of vital life-force infusing Kazuma's bones and elevating him even higher.
There was a deep, sadistic thrill in this kind of growth, although Kazuma was careful not to relish in that sensation for too long, remembering the warnings that his patron offered him regarding the nature of power.
There was a loud rustling, the earth being pushed aside. Kazuma's ears caught it a split moment before Subaru warned him.
"On our six, boss-man!" Natsuki cried loudly. Before Kazuma could turn around, he heard the spell, "Ul Shamac!"
Kazuma finally spun around just on time to see the spell taking place. Black dust flowed and surrounded a wide space behind them, down the hill, like grainy diamonds floating in the air before congealing into a suspension of darkness in the air, like ink in water.
It obscured the Giant Toads, but likewise probably obscured their own positions. It was a net positive for Kazuma, as his magical powers were indiscriminate one way or another, and the Toads needed precise direction to launch their long-distance tongue-strikes they'd been warned about.
"In there!" Subaru declared loudly. "Four of them!"
Kazuma couldn't wait for Aqua to perform her casting first. The enemy was much closer right now. Kazuma focused on his spellwork and directed twin, growing balls of live flame into his palms, then released only a second later with minimal build-up. "Fireball!"
The orbs raced into the darkness then disappeared. There was no sound or even vibration, aside from the slight distortion in the dark cloud.
Kazuma waited. A second later, there was an infusion of life-force lesser than either of those prior. He managed to hit and kill one target, but what about the others?
He received his answer, as a tongue lashed out from the darkness, slightly charbroiled and bleeding in places. It was like an extending whip or a reaching fist, moving faster than Kazuma could mentally react, wrapping around him as fast as a bullet would fire out of a gun.
"Kazuma!" Aqua cried in that exact moment, cold shock tangible in her voice.
It reeled him in at a quarter of that velocity, but Kazuma managed to react this time. He slammed both feet into the soil and cast Mold Earth wordlessly, making the spell near-useless for its actual purpose but managing to cobble together a slight outgrowth from the soil, slowing him down even further.
Kazuma's feet dug a pair of furrows as he was pulled, resisting hopelessly against the force of the Giant Toad's tongue muscles.
His right arm searched uselessly, unable to reach due to the tongue wrapped around it.
"Damn it! Spark!" Kazuma's body released a sudden deluge of electricity. A pathetic joy buzzer's worth, but it was enough to make the tongue slip a little as if the toad on the other side was hesitating whether to keep holding on or not.
It was enough to briefly release Kazuma's right wrist.
He practically slammed it against the dagger in its sheath, pulled it out with a hiss of metal, and then swung once at the tongue. At the apex of the swing, the tiny knife became a long zweihander with a prodigiously sharpened edge and a blade that was as heavy and thick as a steel ingot in its middle.
Moving impossibly fast as the motion started when the blade was practically weightless, the sword managed to casually sever the tongue. An arterial spray of blood and saliva coated Kazuma's entire outfit and body, a lot of it covering his face and hair. The foulness of blood filled his mouth, salty-sweet with a metallic aftertaste.
The gunk of heroes, he thought grimly as the sword snapped back into dagger-form which he sheathed into the scabbard.
As soon as he was done, another toad lashed out. Its tongue flew out of the darkness, across the plains, and then slammed into the earth ten meters to his right, producing a gunshot crack due to its velocity at the end. Kazuma curiously realized that if he wasn't almost supernaturally durable, his spine would have cracked from that.
This was evidence the toads didn't have any idea of his current position. Good. It meant he could freely charge another spell.
Kazuma took a one-second glance behind himself. Aqua was cowering down on the ground, one hand covering the back of her head. Subaru was kneeling and using a natural rock formation for tenuous cover, probably readying to refresh his spell as soon as it was necessary.
It wouldn't be.
Kazuma raised both hands then gathered heat and flame into them, making a pair of separate fireballs. As with the first one, he was patient and allowed the spells to cook themselves to a nice, appreciable, critical mass.
"Fireball! Fireball!" Once again, with a pair of loud cracks, like bullets into the darkness, twin orbs flew and exploded into spots they couldn't see. Stained viscera rained out of the darkness bubble of Subaru's casting, trailing bright redness and black smoke after themselves. Kazuma felt the depth of his spirit widen, as another brick was added to the foundation with the absorbed life-force.
There was silence for a long moment. Kazuma awaited a reaction from the enemy, gradually stepping off to the side and changing his position. He didn't want to get hit by a lucky tongue again.
The darkness bubble settled, like inky mist falling into the earth; dust joining a larger pile. This revealed the entire battlefield to their eyes. There were a couple of scorched craters, dead bodies covered in charred skin, shedding immense amounts of water vapor and black smoke, but no living enemies.
"We're safe!" Kazuma declared to the party, turning around.
With visible relief, Subaru moved out of cover after a moment. The boy looked at the dead amphibians and smiled brightly. "Wow! Good job, Kazuma! You're a real powerhouse."
Kazuma smiled at him and nodded, then looked at Aqua and frowned.
"Hey, I said we're safe," he consoled the goddess as he approached. Aqua remained in her earlier position, one hand protectively wrapped around herself, eyes closed shut and tight. She was muttering something, like a safety mantra. "Goddess? Aqua? Earth to Aqua?"
To no avail, it seemed. Kazuma's frown deepened, but Subaru approached him and whispered something; an idea. Kazuma nodded with a smile, then loudly asked, "Is that a demon?"
The goddess stood at once, visible aggression pouring off of her. "Where?!"
Subaru laughed jovially. Kazuma sighed and mentioned, "We're good Aqua. The Giant Toads are dead."
The goddess' eyes blanked, as she remembered her state a couple of seconds prior.
"Oh."
The fact that she didn't seem to be entirely self-aware was more worrying than it was funny. Could she have... developed PTSD from leaving behind the Divine Realm?
No, that sounded as close to ridiculous as something could be, but it was clear that she wasn't used to combat yet. He'd need to be more careful with her in the future, slowly acclimatize her to increasing brutality. Even now, she appeared to be uneasy with the amount of blood on Kazuma's torso and face.
"'Oh,' indeed. We have three left, although I'm starting to run low on magicka."
Kazuma considered the use of manatite in order to recharge his stores, then kicked that thought out. Manatite was incredibly expensive; that he managed to buy it for less than a hundred thousand was a true miracle on the level of Aqua's own.
Truthfully, even if he cast teleportation now, it'd leave him deeply exhausted for an hour or two afterward, but he didn't want to tell them that. If Kazuma had to cast another mighty fireball and then teleported, he might collapse upon return, although he could preemptively and partially evade that problem by downing one of his stamina potions.
Neither of those options sounded tantalizing, but there was an agreement between them when the day started. They'd kill no less than a total of ten Giant Toads. It was the optimal amount to ensure a good payout from the Guild, and Kazuma needed to work extra because of how much he slept.
He shook his head, then looked to the goddess. "Pick a direction, and let's continue hunting."
Aqua tapped at her chin, then looked down the hill.
Her finger started moving in a repetitive rhythm. "Eeny-meeny-miny-moe. Catch the archer by his bow, if he looses an arrow let him go, eeny-meeny-miny-moe..." She pointed south, the direction furthermost from the city. "That way."
He wondered if this was a trick from the Affliction of Misfortune. Should they move in the opposite direction instead? That struck Kazuma as equally random, and therefore, equally useless.
"Let's go," Subaru eagerly said before Kazuma could do any more thinking, jogging downhill. Aqua followed after him without question or complaint.
With a mental shrug, Kazuma braced his feet against a steeper portion of that same hill and then skidded down after the pair.
Kazuma didn't really mention any of this to his teammates, but he would have never expected actual monster-hunting to be this satisfying. He'd already gained several levels from his exertions, and his companions weren't too far off.
Apparently, the Adventurer Cards' term, 'EXP' was actually a clever PR move to distract from the fact the cards were vampiric in nature; they stole the accumulated life-force of the slain creature and converted it into nebulous, quantifiable power the user of the Card was able to spend.
A 'Level' was a codename for the number of essence breakthroughs that your soul went through, and the larger their number, the harder it was to attain more of them. At the same time, each one offered even larger benefits as one's very being approached something that resembled perfection of their class archetype
Naturally, the Cards had a judicious system for distributing that life-force. Those who dealt the final blow were prioritized, but so were those who supported them.
It was more or less fair: an adventurer received a sum equivalent to their contribution to the fight, even if that contribution was minimal.
Kazuma's Adventurer Card, though, seemed to require much less of the life-force in order to produce much faster gains.
He'd need to add both of his companions to his Retinue later on, preferably as they ate dinner. And discuss the oaths they'd make to each other. Kazuma intended to keep his Progression to himself for a single day, to see what it was like, but now it was time to start sharing.
Naturally, though, it felt good to have power.
The party walked south for about three to five minutes, and finally emerged in a miniature and shallow valley of sloping hills.
There were signs of extensive digging and burrowing over a length of time, suggesting this was a major nesting ground for a large number of Giant Toads. Kazuma wasn't the best at crime scene investigation, but he would've said at least four of them, perhaps more. To be pessimistic, he assumed five.
"Maybe we should take a break? If we're in for a large battle, it'd be smarter to let your energy recharge," Subaru recommended in a suitably friendly voice.
"Also, you smell," Aqua added. She pinched her nose and waved through the air comically. "I should have done this earlier."
She raised a hand to cast Create Water, and Kazuma pondered stopping her, but ultimately decided to let her. He spread his arms in acceptance.
A water hose of pressurized water impacted his side and arm, then started to move up and down, working over his head and neck. Kazuma allowed this to continue for a couple of seconds when Aqua reached his other side and he said, "Alright, alright. Enough."
Aqua stopped the spell, and Kazuma used Tinder and Wind Breath in quick succession to dry himself off. The water she produced was holy, and therefore it held restorative and cleansing properties, which meant that Kazuma was about as clean as if he'd taken a thorough and long bath with liberal application of soap.
I'm starting to get real tired of taking showers and baths in my own clothes. Although it's nice to have a tactical bath with me at all times, I suppose.
Kazuma sighed, and then considered Subaru's words. "Fine. We'll camp out here for a couple of minutes and have our rations."
"Yippee!" Aqua jumped out into the air, then opened her knapsack and unrolled a picnic towel in the middle of the hill. She also took out a comically large bib and tied it around her neck, while Subaru began to unpack the meal of turkey and lettuce sandwiches they'd bought.
"Don't forget to create a magic circle around us," Kazuma said testingly.
"I know, I know. Magic Barrier! There. Oh, this looks good!" The goddess excitedly sat down, moving for the nearest sandwich.
She grabbed it, smelled it, then drew in some air and chomped down on the food in a very un-ladylike fashion, getting the brown sauce all over her cheeks and face. The bib seemed kind of redundant because of the messiness of the whole deed.
Subaru frowned, and took one of his own. He started biting on it, before stopping and looking at Kazuma. "You're not eating, Kazuma?"
"I'm not really hungry, no," he said. He didn't even have breakfast earlier that morning, now that he thought about it. Kazuma looked at Subaru and shrugged. "I don't think I need as many calories anymore."
"Well, you should still eat," Subaru insisted, pushing the wooden box with the sandwiches in Kazuma's direction in a subtly obstinate and encouraging manner. "You might not be feeling hungry, but your body needs its nutrients to function properly. I used to be an athlete in high-school, I would know, alright? If you're taking part in any strenuous activity, it's important to eat a lot, even if you have to force it down! Also, drink lots of water." Subaru accepted a filled waterskin from Aqua, then passed it to Kazuma.
Kazuma accepted the waterskin and took a swig, then shrugged and picked up the sandwich nearest to himself. He took a satisfying bite out of it, crunching on the meat and lettuce.
As expected, it tasted like turkey, lettuce, bread, and a faint addition of creamy garlic sauce. It flowed evenly and nicely across his tongue, like a caressing finger on a cheek. It was a simple meal, but a filling and tasty one.
"It's good," he commented after swallowing.
"It's very good!" Aqua said with a full mouth. In both hands, she wielded a pair of sandwiches, taking interchanging bites out of them. Kazuma stared at her with a sort of disgusted incredulity for a moment, before sighing and pressing two fingers to the bridge of his nose. Subaru just laughed.
Once their delicious repast was over, they cleaned up after themselves and prepared to face more of their enemies.
Subaru used his ability in order to draw out the Giant Toads, while Aqua used a Magic Barrier to limit the toads' movements. Her circles weren't fully reliable: they could prevent entry or exit, but with enough willpower or prolonged effort, an adversary was capable of overcoming those impositions.
Such wasn't the case, because the amphibian monsters would not get that much time to act.
Instead of five toads, six of them unburrowed. Learning from previous experiences, Kazuma had already been charging up his Fireball even while Aqua and Subaru used their own abilities. As a result, he effortlessly laid the Giant Toads to waste in a single, precise casting of the Fireball spell.
It was rapidly climbing through the ranks to becoming his favorite spell. Kazuma expected that he'd need some degree of tactical flexibility, but now, he supposed that destructive power was enough for creatures as simple-minded as Giant Toads.
Once more, there was a powerful rush of energy that brimmed and filled out Kazuma's heart, and they were done for the day.
Kazuma marked the spots where they'd killed the collections of Giant Frogs on the map the Adventurer's Guild provided for them, added some written instructions for maneuvering the terrain, and then had Subaru and Aqua cross-check the map to ensure everything was correctly marked.
After letting Kazuma recharge his magical energy for another couple of minutes, he teleported the entire party back to the gates of Axel, and they moved in the direction of the Adventurer's Guild in order to take back their reward.
As predicted, Kazuma felt deeply exhausted from the spell. He was good at hiding it, but he could only barely force his legs to shamble forward in a zombielike manner. Both of his party members were slightly concerned at the sight.
---
You've gained 180,000 Eris, as well as a 25,000 bonus for exceptional work, minus a small 5,000 deduction for substantial damage to the bodies of some of the Giant Toads. Splitting this between Aqua, Subaru, and Kazuma, each one of them has made a rather impressive sum of 65,000 Eris, with the rest being put away into the party's collective expense account.
Although the value doesn't translate as well because of the technological, cultural, and magical differences between societies, 60k Eris is very roughly $600. That said, its value for "basic commodities," such as bread is actually as much as 50% larger, but slightly smaller (5-10%) for luxurious items such as soap.
Before Kazuma goes to visit Wiz, he's got some decisions to make regarding his Adventurer Status.
Name: Satou Kazuma
Class: Arch Wizard
Level: 8
[XP]: 300/400
Skill Points: 20
Strength: 44
Endurance: 46
Constitution: 36
Dexterity: 50
Agility: 45
Intelligence: 55
Wits: 60
Magic Power: 65
Luck: -967
Basic Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze, Tinder, Create Water, Create Earth, Wind Breath, Spark, Basic Illusion (+1), Counterspell)
Intermediate Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze Gust, Fireball, Hydrostream, Mold Earth, Blade of Wind, Lightning, Teleport, Paralyze)
[ ] Illusion - Create a false sensory input for everyone in the area, with a maximum of four senses at once. Upgrades to Major Illusion, Mist, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Fear - A mental spell that infuses the target with great fear, overcoming the effects of natural bravery. Upgrades to Terror, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Charm - A mental spell that has a chance to cause a monster to consider the caster an ally. Upgrades to Charm Person, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Courage - A mental spell that infuses the target with great courage, overcoming the effects of fear and cowardice, but not rendering them without logic. Upgrades to Berserk, etc.
Basic Magic: Costs 2 SP to buy.
[ ] Unlock & Lock - Never carry a lockpick around for anything. This spell lets the user open locks or break seals on objects; applies even to slightly abstract targets, but might not always be reliable in that case. It can also do the opposite with its antipode: Lock. Upgrades to Seal/Unseal, Animate Item, etc.
Intermediate Magic: Costs 4 SP to buy.
[ ] Advanced Magic - The highest tier of ordinary magical spells, although not representative of specialized sectors like the Detonation Series, Golem Series, or other, more rare forms of magic. Unlocks Crystal Prison, Inferno, Bottomless Swamp, Earthshaker, Tornado, Lightning Strike.
Advanced Magic Stage: Costs 20 SP to buy.
[ ] Upgrade - Upgrade a known spell. Pick which one.
Most spells are unlocked either by learning from a tutor, or upgrading one of the starting spells granted at the purchase of a Magic Tier to unlock better, refined versions for purchase. It's also possible to encounter new types of magic, such as the Detonation Series. Chiefly, however, upgrading is the main way to get new spells. If a spell is upgraded sufficiently, it may advance in rank to a higher stage, or it may lead to spells that can only be bought at higher stages.
For example, the starting Basic Set will eventually unlock these spells, among others: Icicle Shot, Fire Shot, Create Acid, Create Stone, Windblast, Shock Orb. The Intermediate Set will eventually unlock these spells, among others: Ray of Frost, Ray of Flame, Water Prison, Earth Hammer, Wind Curtain, Chain Lightning.
The initial cost for upgrading Basic Magic is 1 SP, for Intermediate Magic is 2 SP.
In addition, how should Kazuma broach the matter of Retinue to his friends?
[ ] Smooth & Easy - Add them both to the Retinue, no questions asked.
[ ] Reasonable but Strict - Everyone swears a fealty to everyone, with the conditions of: "I promise not to betray the Retinue for personal gain," "I promise to do my best to protect the lives of every member of the Retinue as if their life were my own," "I promise to act within the best interests of the Retinue to my best ability, unless I wholeheartedly believe that doing so would impede my own growth or happiness, and in which case, I promise to broach the subject with at least one other Retinue member regarding the subject, but only to a degree I am comfortable with."
[ ] Write-in.
Wordcount: 5010 words.
Rules for Upgrading Spells
Basic Magic: Per upgrade level, +1 SP cost. (1st Upgrade: 1 SP. 2nd Upgrade: 2 SP. 3rd Upgrade: 3 SP. 4th Upgrade: 4 SP.)
Intermediate Magic: Per upgrade level, +1 SP cost. Every two levels, +1 SP cost. (1st Upgrade: 2 SP. 2nd Upgrade: 4 SP. 3rd Upgrade: 5 SP. 4th Upgrade: 7 SP.)
Advanced Magic: Per upgrade level, +2 SP cost. (1st Upgrade: 4 SP. 2nd Upgrade: 6 SP. 3rd Upgrade: 8 SP. 4th Upgrade: 10 SP.)
This math only applies to Arch Wizard and (to a lesser extent,) Wizard Classes. Adventurers and other, miscellaneous jobs would see more difficulty in learning spells.
Rules for Upgrading Skills
Per upgrade level, +1 SP cost, unless the Skill isn't one that belongs to your Class, in which case +2 SP cost.
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Well, I can't say I'm not disappointed, since I really wanted to see Grace/Exaltation, but I'd already decided to tactically vote for Favor in order to avoid Defer before you gave me hope that wouldn't be necessary, so I'll just leave my vote for your name.
Edit: @Birdsie it shouldn't be necessary, but can you edit your vote to include Night's Ambition again, instead of leaving that part of it blank?
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What a drama filled episode - anything to add that would be quoted in New AST Times?
Such capitalistic mindset...
Rihaku
The Internet
Guys, we've turned Kazuma into a more optimal version of Megumin.
Megumin: Casts 1 Explosion and is useless for the entire day
Kazuma: Casts 5 Fireballs and is useless for 2/3rds of the entire day
Result: Great wealth and advancement!
If Advanced Magic is _significantly_ more mana-efficient than Intermediate, then I think we should go for it. Otherwise, it may be wise to diversify into more utility spells.
Did Kazuma's team eat the Dragon Meat yet? If so, the next batch of SP probably won't be as easily acquired, and we may want to consider saving a bit.
Birdsie
Sharp Talons Cleave The Worthy
- Location
- Poland
I was never against Favor in the first place, nor did I particularly care for Exaltation; this was a calculated to move to secure a greater future for Aobaru while ensuring that Hunger survives, which in turn, ensures that Aobaru survives.
I'm happy that the Senju and Uchiha tribes can lead a peaceful co-existence.
It is the methodology of winners.
To be fair, Megumin's Explosions were sufficient to one-hit kill a Demon General, which Kazuma's current Fireballs would not be able to even get close to. Although it's still a nice trade.
Advanced Magic isn't particularly more efficient than Intermediate, although all numerical spell parameters (cooldown, casting speed, duration, potency, control, range, projectile velocity, radius, mana cost) scale with the number of Upgrades appended to them. If you were to Upgrade, let us say... Create Water, four or five times, you'd be able to produce enough water to sustain an entire convoy of thirty people plus animals with absolutely no issue even if your mana stores were pathetically weak.
Also, no, they didn't eat it yet.
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I believe it doubles for each subsequent one, the same way higher tiers of magic double what each spell costs?
Illusion (2)
-upgrade 1 (1)
-upgrade 2 (2)
Charm (2)
-upgrade 1 (1)
Courage (2)
-upgrade 1 (1)
-upgrade 2 (2)
Counter spell (0)
-upgrade 1 (1)
-upgrade 2 (2)
Mold Earth (0)
-upgrade 1 (2)
Teleport (0)
-upgrade 1 (2)
Spent all 20 points. Kazuma seems to have good enough offense for this low level, I'm hoping these spells will be useful. Courage is for Aqua, the rest should be obvious.