Chapter 76, 1/2

Chapter 76, 1/2

Erick had originally planned to go to Oceanside and get help, then go back to Spur to join the search for Messalina, but that did not happen. He got roped into creating a light slime dungeon and figuring out how to overcome a [Scan] problem that had gone unsolved for 1200 years.

Poi gave frequent updates, though. Spur was doing better now that the Headmaster’s Elites were in residence. Every day, they uncovered more and more dream worms among the people. A pattern quickly appeared that gave credence to the idea that Caradogh was involved in the worming, somehow, for every wormed person was someone either in the Farmer’s Council, or close to Erick in some meaningful way. (Or else there was a very complicated plot afoot, which was not entirely ruled out, because Messalina had more than enough reasons to keep her own eyes on Erick.) But Caradogh Pogi was in the wind and completely unavailable for questioning. That was rather damning circumstantial evidence, especially considering the stories told by people close to the Lower Trademaster of Portal.

Valok, Apogough, and Krakina were all wormed, but they were doing better. Going over their last few weeks of actions, they had apparently been fucking up their sales and their payments to their people and a hundred other smaller and much larger things that, taken separately, might not have meant anything, but taken together, were about to get them replaced as the Farmer’s Council of Spur.

That was a bit of a shock for Erick. He hadn’t really spoken to them much; he rained on the farms and then usually got back to work on his own needs. He did not know that the farms were being mismanaged at all.

He hated that he was stuck in Oceanside while all of this was unfolding in Spur, but then he talked to each person on the Council, through a connection made possible by Ophiel, after he heard about their wormings. None of them were up for a long talk. They were all reeling from what they had done, or not done. They told Erick that whatever he was on the hook for down there, he should hurry up and finish and then come back, but the farms were fine. Now that the worms were gone, they could start hammering out the problems that those worms had caused. Valok and Apogough spoke for a little while longer than Krakina, but none of them gave Erick very satisfactory answers to any of his questions. It was Krakina who broke out the real answer, with a shout and an end to the conversation:

‘I just don’t know, Erick! I don’t know what happened! Don’t talk to me! Goodbye!’

Silverite was happy for the Elites in her town. She was surprised that Erick was actually able to get the Headmaster to supply her with help. If the Headmaster demanded him complete a ‘light slime dungeon’, then he best keep his word, and when it was complete, and since Erick offered for Silverite to get in on his ‘I get to use it whenever I want’ clause, she was very much going to take advantage of that offer. In fact, news was already spreading in the world that ‘the Headmaster had figured out how to spawn light slimes’. Silverite was ecstatic to find out that it was actually Erick who created the dungeon. This made her plans to figure out a way to gain access to easy [Lightwalk]s quite simple. No need for begging and concessions, or any of that nonsense. She was just going to demand a fair share; thank you, Erick.

By this time next year, she wanted at least five people with [Lightwalk].

‘But I thought a strong light just made the shadows stronger?’

Silverite laughed through their connection, saying, ‘Well yes! But there’s more monsters than Shades in there, and besides, the people I’m thinking of all have [Shadowalk] anyway. And you are correct; a strong light does make the shadows stronger. There is a very deep synergy there, between the two skills.’

‘Oh. That’s good to know.’ Erick added, ‘That’s why the Headmaster suggested I get both [Lightwalk] and [Shadowalk].’

‘[Shadowalk] would be hard for you since you’re never going into Ar’Kendrithyst.’ Silverite added, ‘But shadow essence monsters also thrive in the Shadow Canyons of Frozen Nergal and the Fractured Citadels of Central Quintlan. Those are where archmages usually go to harvest shadow essences. Do you have an Elemental Body skill, yet?’

‘Not yet.’

‘You should get [Lightwalk]. But know that if you use that around shadows, they really do get much stronger.’ She added, ‘[Air Body] is good for escape, though.’ She said, ‘Spur is doing fine. You continue to do what you’re doing. Don’t worry about us.’ She ended the conversation.

Erick sat back in his chair, in Windy Manor, thinking of what it was he was actually doing with his time.

And then he got back to reading the massive tomes that the Headmaster had lent him. Kiri was already through five of them; she had finished up her part of the light slime dungeon yesterday.

Kiri, along with a dozen other people, had crafted over ten thousand fist-sized diamonds into radiant jewels that flashed brilliant under kaleidoscopic lights. The dungeon itself was mostly complete; all except for the lighting. Erick transitioned from fully filling in every single arched alcove in the ceiling, to filling in every tenth alcove, just to get the whole dungeon lit so that other, non-light slimes couldn’t accidentally spawn.

A sliced-up river ran through the whole, brilliant white and partially prismatic dungeon space. Dozens of streams and pools and waterfalls and smaller play areas filled the land, waiting for their occupants to spawn. Erick’s original dungeon was being personally managed by Apell, too, as the slimes there were starting to overcrowd. She wasn’t going to be responsible for that space forever, but she was responsible for that space, for now.

And so, Erick cast permanent lightwards into the ceilings of the dungeon, and when he wasn’t doing that, he read about [Polymorph] and tried to figure out this whole messy ‘[Particle Scan]’ problem.

Five very full days and four very full nights passed.

Erick stood in the living room, in front of a four foot wide open tome on a stand, while the stars twinkled over the sea, beyond the large western windows of Windy Manor. Several of these stands were set up around the large central room; the couches had been pushed aside days ago to make space for the tomes.

The tome he was currently reading from was from a second crate of magical knowledge on loan from the Headmaster. Erick had developed a theory on [Polymorph] after reading what most of the other tomes had to offer. Upon hearing what Erick wanted, the Headmaster was confused, because [Polymorph] and this spell had nothing to do with each other, aside from the fact that they were both very complicated magics. He obliged Erick, though, even through his own confusion. Even if knowledge of this second spell didn’t line up with Erick’s pet theory regarding [Polymorph], it was still nice to learn more magic, either for a change of scenery, or for other ideas regarding other desired magics, like [Gate].

For this was a tome on [Teleport].

It was massive and made primarily of wood and vellum. The rune for [Teleport] was inlaid in electrum on the white oak cover, while steel plates protected the edges of the solid front and back, and gold edged every page. And it was absolutely devoid of math. And there were pictures! It was the best [Teleport] book Erick had ever read.

The Illustrated Life of Spatial Traveler Everlin Etherspray, was exactly what it said it was, with lots of pictures and lots of places traveled, with most of the book talking about locations in the Old Cosmology. Everlin Etherspray was the accomplished helmsman of an ‘ark’, which was a type of vessel used for traveling the Mana Ocean; for traveling between the planes. It was a large vessel a class above a ‘cityship’ but below a ‘worldship’. Everlin’s Tempest Rider was much larger than any sailing vessel Erick had ever seen before.

Everlin was an elementassi born well before the Sundering. Her father was an air elemental while her mother was an elf with a thing for summoning elemental slaves, to make magically gifted children. Everlin was an outcast with little power, who blossomed later in life. She rose to power on her ability to navigate various ‘teleport’ spells in her twenties. That ability allowed her to finally escape her mother and a life of slavery, and drudgery.

[Teleport] worked very differently before the Script. All spatial magic did. Firstly, you had to know the exact nature of the manasphere at your precise location, as well as how it connected to your destination spot. If you were standing upstream in the mana flow, and you wanted to go downstream, then the magic was rather easy. You basically just had to ‘pick yourself up in one location’, then ‘ride the mana forward’, then ‘drop yourself off at your destination’.

(Erick had no idea what those specific phrases meant, in the grand scheme of [Teleport], and how all of this translated to the current day understanding of [Teleport], but he had a pretty good idea of what it all meant.)

But if your destination lay across the prevailing mana stream, or even worse, upstream, well... that’s where the great spatial mages were separated from the rest.

(And all aspects of spatial magic were called [Teleport] before the Sundering. There was no easy, lower ranks, like [Blink]. It was all difficult, all the time. Even good mages heading downstream might find themselves missing a limb or dead, by the time they blipped out at their destination. That never happened to Everlin, though. She was very, very cautious. She always over-calculated her [Teleport]s.)

Everlin was simply one of the best spatial mages, ever. She was able to navigate a perfect [Teleport] through a Mana Maelstrom, or ply the calmer waters between worlds like they were solid paths of egress. With her perfect skill, and for some unknown reason, Everlin was briefly a pirate, but that ended after an unknown confrontation that saw her blip back to port without a ship. After that, she gradually built an honest life for herself. Soon enough, she was navigating merchants and then her own family, and then her own family business, through the Mana Ocean, safe as could be. Soon enough, she was a grandmother on her ship, guiding her people through thick and thin, until the Sundering came.

When the universe broke, Everlin navigated the breaking Mana Ocean one last time, to land her people on the newly forming Veird, to save the lives of her family and everyone she was able to reach in time.

Her time on Veird guided her to invent [Blink], explore the entire new world five times over with a ship and a dream and without [Teleport], and then, after she invented [Teleport], she explored the whole world five more times, taking her time to map the whole world, and to draw sketches of all the other refugees she met, and all of her favorite places. In the middle of all of that, she went on to found the Wayfarer’s Guild, and to pass on as much of her knowledge as possible to those who would come later, in order to have other people capable of [Teleport] besides just her.

(It wouldn’t be for another 75 years that Rozeta and the Relevant Entities of the Script would vote to allow [Teleport] into the open Script.)

Everlin’s life ended in the middle of a sailing lesson with her great grandkids. They were only eight to ten years old, while Everlin was considerably older, but still able to sail a dinghy with the best of them.

She died alongside a billion other people, when the Old Demons fucked up something very essential in the Script, killing every single half-breed person on Veird. Everlin Etherspray, the Arch Spatial Mage elementassi, died alongside all the other elementassi on Veird, the original dragonkin, the alvani, the half-orcs, and a scattering of other refugees who were also the offspring of two separate species.

It was a downer ending to Everlin’s biography.

Erick closed the book, and conjured a seat to sit. As his butt hit the cushion, Ophiel lifted from his shoulder, twittering in flutes. Erick looked up at the little guy, flipping around in the air, then he looked out to the window.

It was dark outside.

Erick looked to the right. Kiri had summoned a comfortable chair to sit in to read her own large tome, but she had fallen asleep. A small trail of drool tracked downward from her green scaled mouth.

Erick whispered to Ophiel, “It’s really late, isn’t it?”

Ophiel twittered in affirmative cellos; a deep sound and a direct, angry counterpart to his flute sounds. Kiri flinched awake, shaking her head. Erick smiled, getting the gist of Ophiel’s demand for orderly bedtimes. He got up out of his chair, nodding silently to Kiri as he walked upstairs. Kiri flubbed out of her own chair, and silently started walking up behind Erick. He turned into the bathroom on the second floor. Kiri kept walking up, to the third floor, to her room.

Kiri groaned, “Oh, shit.”

Erick poked out of his room. “What?”

“It’s sunlight, already!” Kiri said, “I mean— it’s morning. Dammit.”

Erick looked into his room, and to the small windows that looked east. A slight brightening hung in the darkness beyond the tall trees. Erick said, “I’m not going to the dungeon without some proper sleep. Go to bed, Kiri. See you in eight hours.”

“Gladly.” Kiri shuffled off to bed, shutting the door behind her.

Erick shuffled off to the bathroom first, then, finished with that, he shuffled off into his room and slipped into bed. Ophiel immediately and half-angrily took his spot on the covers beside Erick’s hip. Erick smiled as he patted Ophiel. He fell asleep seeing the brightening sky beyond the dark trees, beyond his window.

He dreamed of [Teleport].

Erick jokingly said, “Who’s the archmage here, Kiri?”

“Certainly not you,” she said, without missing a beat.

Erick just laughed.

- - - -

Erick stood on the open lawn in front of Windy Manor. A sunset breeze flowed across the grass, and through the trees and vegetable gardens nearby. Teressa stood near the garden with her eyes closed. She was feeling the manasphere; silently watching with her Mana Sense for any small people who might be flying around. From her silence, Erick knew there were none; for now.

He continued with the experiment.

Ophiel hovered in the air; ready.

Kiri stood beside Erick, saying, “Have you considered, instead of this notion of superpositioning, the fact that every single Elemental Body skill has a pseudo-[Teleport] at their ultimate rank? Maybe this has something to do with [Gate].”

“Yes. I have considered that. Since I do not have one, that is the fallback option, and honestly? It might be the real answer to this [Gate] dilemma. Everlin was born with the natural equivalent of [Airshape], after all.” Erick said, “I guess I’d go for [Lightwalk]; the dungeon will make that possible, rather soon. Anywho! You know how they call it [Blink]? Or how the word ‘sight’ is bracketed in the skill? Like it’s an alpha spell? I don’t think that’s a coincidence, so much as what the skill does to you when you use it.”

Erick [Blink]ed forward.

In that brief moment the world turned dark, like he had more than closed his eyes. It was like all his senses had turned off, all at once. He was adrift in eternity. And then the spell blipped him back into Reality. In the split second before Reality returned, first came the sense of Self, and then came his feet back on the ground, and then came his eyesight and every other sense, all at once. It was a disorienting feeling the first hundred times Erick had [Blink]ed or [Teleport]ed, but that was thousands of blips ago, and each time it was the same sensation. The exact same sensation.

He turned to Kiri, saying, “I think, by blinding the ability for the user to perceive Reality, that the user is able to adjust their position to a predetermined secondary location, because that secondary location is suddenly shifted to be the location where the user is most likely to be. Therefore, its just a matter of returning the senses to the self, and then ‘blip!’ you’re where you expected to be. Mana does the rest of the heavy lifting.” He added, “This is my hypothesis. Right now, the spell provides the secondary position, and like you have said, I might need to provide the secondary position through some sort of Elemental Body skill, but maybe I don’t.”

Kiri frowned a little, but said, “I think... I think your fallback plan is going to be the real solution to this problem.”

“Probably!” Erick cast a perfect wardlight sculpture of an Ophiel into the air, with all the proper densities and shadows and eyes and wings as the original. Erick had gotten rather good at copying, in wardlight, what he could see with his own eyes. “But for now, we have this.”

Ophiel fluttered down to the unmoving copy of himself, quizzically trilling flutes and harps. He adjusted his malleable body to perfectly match the hovering wardlight sculpture.

Erick stepped back from the wardlight, then took control of Ophiel. He positioned Ophiel upwind of the wardlight sculpture of himself. He shut all of Ophiel’s eyes, but turned on [Detect Intent]. A gentle glow of white illuminated everything in barely-there glows even though his eyes were closed, as mana flowed with ambient intent all the time. Erick’s own body was standing to the side, glowing white. Kiri and Poi were green and blue glows. The wardlight that looked like Ophiel was particularly bright white, as the intent there was freshest.

This next part would be tricky, because Erick had no idea how it was supposed to actually happen.

He focused Ophiel onto the airborne copy of himself, and then pushed mana out into the air. White glows caught in his [Detect Intent] sight, as mana spun out of Ophiel like mist, to flow along the breeze flowing across the front lawn. Intent-filled mana caught on the wardlight-Ophiel.

Erick, inside Ophiel, focused Ophiel’s intent on that fake Ophiel.

... nothing happened.

He tried again.

Twenty minutes of trying later, while the sun set over the western ocean and Erick shut off Ophiel’s senses or opened them wider or opened one eye and then physically blinked it, but without [Blink]ing, Ophiel blipped.

Erick came back to himself just in time to see the remnants of his [Familiar] scatter into the ambient mana, destroying both the [Familiar] and the wardlight sculpture in a blazing pop of white mana. Why had he come back to himself? His [Familiar] had died, of course. So he had returned to his body. Simple explanation, there. What he couldn’t explain, at all, was what he had done to make Ophiel blip.

As Kiri started cursing up a storm and Poi laughed loud, and even Teressa’s eyes went wide, Erick instantly summoned another Ophiel. The little guy reappeared in a flurry of justified flute-filled screeches.

Erick said, “So there are some issues, but the theory works?”

Poi laughed again.

Kiri said, “What the FUCK are they teaching in arcanaeum?”

“I didn’t get it right, Kiri. There was obviously a problem.”

Ophiel screeched again, punctuating the fact that yes, there had been a problem.

Erick would have to summon two Ophiel for the next set of experiments. He knew enough about his [Familiar] to know that the screeching was not because Ophiel didn’t like getting blown up, but because there had briefly been zero Ophiel in existence, and Ophiel hated not existing.

Erick added, “This is basic stuff, Kiri. It’s not tiered magic. Maybe that’s what they teach?”

Teressa clarified, “And a lot of math.”

Erick commiserated, “So much math.”

Kiri cursed into the sunset. Poi laughed again.

- - - -

Three days later, Erick still hadn’t managed to make Ophiel ‘[Blink]’ without exploding him, no matter what supplementary spells he used. [Lightshape] to create a different sort of ‘illusion’ of Ophiel, which was altogether very poorly done, [Airshape] to mold the windy ‘corridor’ of magic that led to the fake Ophiel, making Ophiel as simple as possible. Erick even tried having Ophiel [Polymorph] into a rock, but that did nothing at all. It wasn’t possible for a person to [Polymorph] into something inorganic, but Erick thought that Ophiel wasn’t really a person, so it might have worked; but it did not!

Erick did find out how he was able to do this ‘half-[Blink]’, though. When he got back to Windy Manor from yet another 12 hour day at the dungeon, late at night, Kiri confronted him. She had the answer.

“I found the answer!” Kiri said, “What you’ve almost managed to do was find a Repeatable Quest left open since the beginning of the Script. All Basic Spells have this quest attached to them, but no one does them because the spells were made by ancient archmages and no one can do them. There were warnings all over the books.” She added, “Because... you know... the exploding.”

Erick exclaimed, “So that’s what I’m doing? Cool!”

Kiri blanked. She scrunched her face in confusion, saying, “I don’t understand what temperature has to do—”

“It’s just a saying, and I know I’ve said that before to you.”

“Probably. It’s late. I’m tired.” Kiri shook her head, saying, “Anyway! Repeatable Quests!”

Erick asked, “Like... repeatable repeatable?”

“Five times maximum. The books were clear on that part, and also very clear that the explosions we’ve seen are one of the nicer outcomes of an improperly done Basic Spell. This is also why they don’t teach this method.” Kiri said, “The reward is 1 point, though.”

“Nice!”

“Very nice.” Kiri said, “Now, if you can do it without the exploding, then you might actually get that point. So I think you’re going to need an Elemental Body skill. These illusion [Ward]s are close enough to work, but they’re not the real thing. I think, as you said before, that the mana, and maybe even the Script is covering for this inarticulate display of magic.” She paused. “But... Uh... that’ll take a while for you to get an Elemental Body. So...” She asked, “So I have the parts to make a [Familiar], now, and I would like your help. Could you help me on that?”

Erick smiled wide. “Of course! What kind are you going for?”

“[Lightshape], with a focus on this infrared light.” Kiri said, “I’ve been able to get that specific ‘lightwave’ right, but I’m pretty sure all I’ve been doing is a [Heat Ward] sort of thing. But maybe that’s all a [Heat Ward] truly is? I don’t know.”

Erick kept smiling. “Infrared sounds like you, for sure.” He glanced out at the dark sky beyond the large windows of Windy Manor. He said, “But I’ve got to sleep. Are you thinking tonight, or—”

“Tomorrow. Yes.” Kiri said, “Tomorrow. At noon.”