Chapter 207
Bracket Buster (Part 1)
I don’t know if it is me being paranoid, or if my paranoia is just alerting me to future potential problems, but I had one of those moments.
No, not a creating a new school of magic moment. Nor one of those, oh look I finally figured out how Qi exists and works. No, this was a far more existential moment, but one that I think might have helped me prevent myself from doing something stupid.
At least, that is what I interpreted from all the warnings that the world around me was giving me.
And of course, by all the warnings around me, there was really just the one. The ever present growing pile of golden energy that likely represents and impending threat to me and my future.
What is this threat? I don’t know.
In fact, I still have a quest all but taunting me to figure out what this threat is.
New Questline Discovered: Curse of Cassiopeia (Ongoing): You have discovered a brand-new form of energy that has given you a warning that something terrible is about to happen to you. Try to find out what looming threat is set to befall you before you are made aware of the looming threat by traditional methods. Rewards: Experience, Bloodline Markers, Variables.
Yeah, I know, a bunch of jerks teasing me.
Worse, I think some of the people behind this questline are actually trying to help me. That or make me go crazy.
How do I know this? Well I don’t, not really.
All I know for certain was that I might have fundamentally tried to change some of the universal rules of this world and been warned in no uncertain terms that should I attempt to change anything, the fate that awaited me would be terrible.
How did all of this information get passed to me? Why do I think the world created a cunning way to try to prevent me from changing some universal truths about myself? Well to put it all into perspective, I should probably start with my initial thought process that got me here, and why I am now mostly content watching a bunch of sweaty mages and cultivators battle each other in round after round of seemingly the same flashy attacks with very little substance. Or at least very little new substance that I think would be worth stealing.
And by stealing, I of course mean just breaking the observed process down into smaller parts that are easily digestible and copying them until I get a new skill related to the new process and then finally take those unique parts of their class and steal it.
So far, that is the number one thing I’ve truly managed to take away from this world. While we might all have the same base class, what skills and powers we learn and incorporate into our daily lives are individually owned and driven, meaning that two office workers being the same exact level, with the same exact sub-classes could have entirely different builds and impacts to the world around them based on fundamental components that one might have been able to gain over the other.
Also, in a part to try to push creativity, I might have inadvertently broken a few unwritten rules about being a gracious announcer.
“Gee Bob this is our first match of the Sweet Sixteen matchups. Today we will see the remaining eight cultivators square off against each other. Additionally, we will see the remaining eight magic users.” Jean, the magical expert, stated. Her comments instantly pull my mind into the myriad of roles I will take on tonight, everything from being both announcers, the referee, and of course the medical practitioner for the competition.
“I wish I could be sixteen myself, Jean.” Bob, the cultivation expert states.
“You and me both.” Jean replies.
This I think was where the initial seed of chaos was lodged in the back of my mind, and allowed to rattle around until I had time to stop and actually focus on the rolling thought. Unfortunately, with so many other distractions going on, I could only recognize the germ of an idea, but was unable to do anything with it, as I fell into my roles easily.
My first order of business was trying to describe the first two combatants in a way that made their cultivation profiles easy to digest and hopefully give the audience something to expect from the battle. Admittedly, Bob’s abrasive personality might have gone a bit too far in his description of the two cultivators from our first competition of the night.
“Oh, look. Here is Mr. Sweaty Hands going up against Ms. RBF,” Bob declares.
“Ms. RBF?” Jean asks.
“Yes, Roasting Breath Face,” Bob clarifies.
“You mean because her primary attack the last two rounds has been to roast her opponents alive by exhaling violent fire Qi onto her opponents when they get too handsy with her?” Jean asks.
“That is it exactly, though I am curious to see what if anything Moist Man here can do to counteract the Flaming Princess.” Bob presses.
“Again Bob, language.”
“Sorry, you’re right Jean. It’s just that I’ve been a little put out recently.”
“Oh?” Jean asks.
“Yeah, you see. I’ve been going through some deeply personal life events right now, and I don’t quite know how to handle it.” Bob replies.
At this point, both competitors are just staring at me like I have an issue.
Seeing their stares at me, I shake myself losing the momentary train of thought where I really thought Bob would be going through a deeply troubling personal development, like a divorce or a spat with his partner. Then to have that broken by the competitors who apparently think this entire competition is all about them.
“Contenders ready?” I ask, switching to my referee voice, which is right down the center.
Both competitors nod.
With that, I shout, “begin!”
What ensued next was a basic move for move recreation of the two fighter’s previous movements and experiences in the ring. Honestly, I would have almost thought these two were trying to throw the match, had it not been for the fact that I don’t think the world can be as organic with its evolution of fighters as it can with mages.
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
I think most of this discrepancy is due to the fact that there haven’t been that many players who have become cultivators, making the algorithm’s slightly mechanical and predictable in their presentations. At least that is how they appear to me, which I don’t mind calling out.
“Oh look, we see Mr. Sweaty palms covering his body in sweat to help insulate his body from the intense breath attacks of Ms. RBF.” Bob states.
“Don’t you mean he is coating himself with water, his primary element and using that element to provide resistance to his opponents fire based attack vectors?” Jean asks, clearly trying to spin these generic reprints of attacks in a new light.
“I call it like I see it. Or in this case, like I’ve seen it.”
“Oh, so you know who will win?”
“Yes, RBF does a fiery strike. Sweaty Palms slides under giving a sweeping leg strike that knocks down Burnhilda. Burnhilda tries to rise up, only to get a sweaty heel strike to the chest, causing an internal combustion of flames.” Bob states, then everyone stops, including the two participants as the Water based cultivator is standing overtop of the fire cultivator waiting to give the killing blow, but pauses as both contestants stare at Bob. Well, at me.
“What do you want? You all are so predictable that I can practically call these matches now. Sweaty Palm guy loses next round, but wins the final. Where he then moves onto the Elite Eight, that’s where he ultimately loses to the Lightning Master who will be able to burn through your attacks as you won’t come up with a water based counter to lightning by tomorrow. Lightning guy will then go to the finals against the Wind Girl.” I state, basically calling all the Cultivator matches from here until the end of these matches.
Silence.
With that the crowd in the stands goes quiet and I realize that I have overstepped myself.
“Look, maybe I’m not cut out for this. I mean you all are fighting for scraps of food to survive. I get it.” I state, then frustratedly I rise up and do what I should have done from the very beginning of this quest.
Spectral Drift.
Once again, I make myself weightless as I begin flying upwards. Then once I’m at a relatively good height, I begin casting Cleansing Rain.
“What are you doing?” The Sweaty Palms guy asks, moving off from the female fire cultivator.
“Doing what needed to be done from the beginning. I’m clearing up the Blight, then I’ll be gone.” I state, a sort of solemn anger filling me as I let myself get caught up in what I thought would be fun. Yet, it wasn’t. The danger was real, these people were trying their best, but were so focused on just being able to survive that it was only now that I realized why I was hating my days, while waiting to come back here at night. The fact that I still had three more nights of this left after today only made this worse.
The quest was easy, something is broken so fix it. Not this, try to push a broken thing forward trying to appease everyone stuff. No, find a problem fix the problem, then create problems for others to fix. Or something like that. I’m pretty sure that’s how the world works, or at least is supposed to work.
Fortunately both myself and my Simulacrum were able to stay on this floor for the past three days. During that time either I or my Simulacrum moved around to parts of the tree that were most heavily impacted by the Blight. Thanks to my Ethereal Simulacrum aura, my Blight-Healing Energy Aura, I had already broken up a lot of the infection to smaller more manageable chunks.
“Awe.” The crowd let out a cry of surprise. For a moment I was confused, before a child called out from the stands.
“Look mom, a rainbow.”
Yeah, just rub it in little kid that you can see refracted light, go on.
But then I realized I was still being tense about this whole situation.
“What’s this Jean?” Bob asks.
“Well it looks like the referee finally got her head out of her…”
“Hey, there are kids listening,” Bob interrupted.
“You’re right Bob. No, but this looks to be some type of Blight Cleansing Rain spell. No wait, I am being told that this spell is actually called Cleansing Rain.” Jean, the magic expert spoke.
You, know having two people give live commentary about what I am doing is somehow a lot easier than me trying to explain to everyone what it is that I am actually doing.
“What does this spell do?”
“Well Bob, as you can see. Everywhere that these charged rain drops fall, the rain actually burns a hole straight through the infecting Blight. Then is slowly seeps outwards until it connects to other drops of cleansed water that will eventually burn away and destroy any lingering sections of Blighted land.”
“That sounds intense Jean, is it just me or does it appear that the remaining patches of Blighted land are actually moving?”
“You would be correct Bob. What you are seeing is the action and response of a semi-sentient parasite that is slowly killing off parts of the world tree Yggdraspirit.”
“Is it just me, or is something off about this Jean?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, doesn’t there seem to be a lot of rotting holes that are appearing?”
“Oh, you would be correct about that Bob. Let’s see, no, it seems that the Blight here has somehow mutated into an invasive ivy that is slowly siphoning off energy from the great tree to feed itself and grow.”
Having both personas of Bob and Jean make this easier for me to understand what is happening as well, as I am trying to understand what these vines are doing, and why no one has done anything to stop these growths.
“Mom, she’s killing the sacred flowering vines.” One kid states loudly from the stands.
And there is my answer as to why no one did anything to stop these vines from spreading. As apparently they were pretty to look at, or had somehow been incorporated into the religious practices of this floor and beyond.
“Wait, we need to stop her. She is killing the sacred flowers.” Another voice calls out from the crowds.
“I don’t understand this Jean,” the voice of Bob booms out loudly over the stands drowning out any signs of protest.
One thing I have learned from my long life to this point, often who is right doesn’t matter, but she who is loudest will be the victor. As such, I crank up the volume and mental suggestion aspect of my Illusion spell. I don’t force the people to change their minds, but rather I make it a mental suggestion that as long as my spelled voices are heard, their mind will not be able to interpret any other sounds from the surrounding area.
New Spell Created: Forced Selective Hearing [Tier VIII] (C): A spell created by Cassiopeia Spiritlight that mentally stops a targeted person or area from hearing any voice other than the caster’s while the caster is speaking. Now there is no way for your significant other to say they didn’t hear you.
With that last sentence, I see the golden energy for the ever-growing looming danger glow in intensity. Not much, but I can’t help but feel that this is a slightly ominous message. That and the fact that I don’t normally get snarky responses in my system messages. Well aside from when I conduct inadvertent attempts at necromancy by forcefully shoving dragon protectorate souls into a much smaller shape than normally acceptable.
Maybe this is a new thing? Though I don’t sense this to be along the same vein as those snarky remarks. This last sentence seems to be a wink-wink, nudge-nudge type of comment meant to gain attention, while the other one was a stop that now, type of comment.
Still, even as I realize this, I realize that my first line of action is taking advantage of this new Forced Selective Hearing spell, and use it to try to deescalate the tension that is unfolding.
“Are these people stupid or something,” the voice of Bob states, and like that, my plan to deescalate the situation went right out the window by Bob being Bob. Still I had a nearly unlimited time to speak and get my points across. Both the Forced Selective Hearing spell, and my Cleansing Rain spell were channeled, meaning that they took up a fixed amount of mana from me and while I couldn’t do anything with that mana, I could maintain this indefinitely, unless people began to react violently.
Of course, that was the time that people began trying to cast spells from the stands.
“Bob, that is a little uncalled for at the moment. Perhaps you should break it down and explain why you have a disagreement with the thoughts and actions of these good people.” Jean cuts in, trying to play the moderator, while I begin rapid uses of Disrupt Casting and Quick Casting in rapid succession to break most of the spells that are now coming towards me.
Given my distance and the fact that I am flying high in the air, most spells that don’t have a locking feature miss me wildly. While those with a locking feature are so rudimentary that I just focus on breaking the locking portion of the spell, and letting the rest of the energy dissipate into the air. Or fly off in random directions away from me.
“Well Jean, what I mean is that here we are. We are having a contest for people that are starving, all so people can beat each other silly to earn food for their family. All while the real reason why they aren’t able to feed their family is that there isn’t enough crops being born, due to this poisonous ivy that is effectively killing off not only their homes, but also making it so the places where they could normally grow food from is also being destroyed by these weeds.” Bob states, this time adding a bit more thought to his outbursts.
With that, the majority of people, well the majority of the mages in the crowd stop to ponder my words. Only those wearing some form of robe are still trying to cast. At first I thought they were mages, but I guess these robes likely indicate that they are members of some odd floor 210 cult? Stupid eyesight, and not being able to notice the obvious.
“Don’t listen to…” One of the robed casters begins to state. Hearing that I realize it is my turn to keep talking, fortunately I can apparently narrate from two different characters’ points of view while maintaining five spells, all while disrupting any spells that get relatively close to me. Though, I will admit that I do feel the slight onset of a headache, which I don’t know if it is related to having to try to avoid hearing about the views of some random tree killing cult, or if it is due to the strain of keeping so many active thoughts going in my head. Though most of the spells are fortunately automated at this point, allowing me to really just have to focus on keeping up my banter while I dart about in the air trying to dodge random hurled magical projectiles.
“Well Bob, that is a lot better way of putting it than just stating everyone is stupid.”
“No, you are right Jean. At this point, it is clear that most of the people here aren’t stupid, they are just being mislead, likely by these morons in robes that are still continuing to fight, while everyone else just stares at what is happening around them.”
With that, everyone that had stopped casting then turns their eyes on those few robed individuals that are still casting.
“Isn’t it odd, how those people that are still casting right now, never had to enter into the contests to fight for their own food?”
“Good point Jean, I wonder if the reason why they didn’t have to fight was due to their already being supplied with food.”
“You mean like some type of sick cult that grows an invasive plant with likely psychotropic characteristics, feeds that to the masses in prayers. Then offers to hold the food supplies, while making everyone fight and kill each other for their own amusement?”
“That’s exactly what I mean Jean.”
“That is sickening, but seems to be the case here.”
Faction Notice: Your Faction Status Against Zealots of the World Tree has Dropped. Your new status is Heretic.
And like that I was once again considered a heretic. Not going to lie, this time, I didn't mind the designation.
Smiling to myself, I decide to start taking this seriously.