After a few minutes of browsing and inspecting the various armors before him, Lanek made a sobering discovery. While hide armor would indeed let him put enchantments that benefited his spell casting, they were far from ideal. For example, the hide armor would not accept the enchantment for spell cost reduction and any mana regeneration enchantment would be half as effective as it was on his bracers.
Alright, this is getting annoying. There HAS to be a way around this. However, Lanek didn’t have the luxury of arguing with the System or the Mark at this point, so he continued to explore the options available to him before finally finding something appropriate. Unfortunately, that something turned out to be a gray coat trimmed in white fur and silver feathers made from a northern owlbear. Now, there was nothing wrong with the coat itself, it looked and seemed quite comfortable to Lanek, but it was a far cry from being as protective as even basic armor.
He attempted to take it and place it over his karuta yoroi armor, but the Mark would not accept that. Apparently, the coat would need to take the place of his armor. In the end, Lanek chose the coat over his armor as it had a truly staggering number of enchantments he could potentially buy, including a few that would buff his movement speed and even provide some defense. Also, he reasoned that there was nothing stopping him from getting a normal piece of armor and wearing it underneath the coat at some point if he wanted the best of both worlds. Fuck it, if this world wants to put these weird limitations on me, I’m for damn sure going to look for loopholes.
The first enchantment he opted for was the same one his karuta yoroi had, weight reduction. Yes, the hide jacket was already lighter than his previous armor had been, but he would still like it to be as light as possible. With that out of the way, he added on the mana cost reduction and mana regeneration enchantments that were present on his bracers. Finally, he selected an enchantment that he hadn’t seen on the list for any other piece of gear: temperature regulation. Just reading that it would keep him at a comfortable temperature regardless of the weather or season brought a smile to his face. While he had loved the karuta yoroi, it got uncomfortably hot now that winter had passed.
Dismissing the Mark’s armory, Lanek returned to the world and immediately summoned his new coat, at which point Kazuma promptly took it as his replacement vessel now that the karuta yoroi was gone. The coat extended to his lower shins, almost reaching his ankles and had several straps that could be used to cinch it closed. He was delighted to discover that the coat also included a hood, but thankfully it was just a simple fur-lined hood without a giant owlbear head adorning it.
Okay, I have to admit it, I may just like this more than my armor already. Sure, it doesn’t offer a lot of protection, but it is so comfortable. Hell, with the enchantments, I don’t even need a blanket or anything when I sleep, I can just curl up in this. I’m sure that I’m going to feel a bit unprepared the next time I get into a fight, though. Ah, well, that’s an issue for future Lanek. He thought as he settled back down to get some sleep.
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Morning came all too soon for the party as no one had slept as soundly as they would have liked. It was hard to sleep well when you were half-expecting to be attacked in the night by their enemies. As it turned out, the sea trolls had come very close several times to finding their little camp, but Pharaoh had remained vigilant and led them away with his illusions. Unfortunately, this had proved to be quite taxing for the tressym and he was currently sleeping very deeply in front of Lanek atop Maximilian’s back.
As for the rest of the party, Lanek had been forced to explain to a somewhat irate Liv why he no longer had any armor to summon and was just wearing a coat. She was somewhat mollified when he said that he had needed to do something about his mana consumption so he could provide better support. That being said, Lanek suspected that what had really calmed her down had been his appeal to her vanity when he mentioned that he could count on her and the furballs to handle the close quarters fighting.
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“So, what should we do now?” Liv asked. “Continue west or change directions?”
“Well, my mana has completely recovered. I say we stop running and put down some sea trolls. I really want to try my new ability out in combat.” Lanek said with a grim smile.
“Sounds good to me. Let’s deal with the raiders and see what kind of loot they have in that ship. Sea trolls are notoriously greedy, so they probably have lots of shiny stuff in there.” Liv said with a laugh.
The party turned to the east and began carefully heading back to the coast and ran into their first foes within an hour of departing their camp. A patrol of sea trolls had crossed their path and immediately moved in to attack the party, but they weren’t expecting an ambush. The first troll to pull his arm back to throw a spear at Liv was buried under several hundred pounds of cat as Kazuma pounced from the tall grass. A brief scream echoed through the area before being abruptly silenced. Another troll turned to check on its companion and was taken down from behind when Sanguineus lunged and clamped his massive jaws around the troll’s neck. A brief shake was all it took to snap the troll’s neck.
However, as Liv had told him the day before, the trolls would not be easy prey. One of the trolls, presumably the one in command of the patrol, shouted a few orders and the rest of the patrol pulled into a tight formation, spears and shields facing outward. Lanek only had a moment to wonder what their plan was for himself and Liv when arrows began flying from the center of the formation, forcing Lanek and Liv to pick up their speed to make themselves harder to hit.
As for Kazuma and Sanguineus, the pair were struggling to make any progress as the wary trolls were quick to respond to any noise or movement in the grass. Sanguineus barely managed to avoid being skewered by multiple spears after one of the trolls had noticed a ripple in the grass from his movements.
Kazuma, acting on instinct, began pumping out his mist. It didn’t take long to cover the area around the patrol, but it didn’t seem to help all that much as the trolls were still quick to react to any attacks.
“I don’t think that’s going to work. The trolls have to deal with mist all the time on the oceans!” Liv called out to him.
Lanek cursed to himself. I don’t know if they can see through the mist or are using their other senses, but it definitely seems like the mist isn’t much of a hindrance. I need to break that formation…
A few moments later, the trolls shouted in alarm as a series of stone darts struck the side of their formation. The cannonball-like effect of the projectiles tore through one side of the formation and out the other, eliminating at least two of the archers in the center. As soon as the formation of almost a score of trolls wavered, Liv and Yuri slammed into the trolls from another angle, further terrifying and confusing the trolls. In the end, the trolls couldn’t maintain their cohesion as Kazuma and Sanguineus slipped into the gaps in the trolls’ lines and began lashing out with claws and fangs.
Lanek had to give the trolls credit, they never broke and ran. This was probably because they had kept the presence of mind to realize that they would be picked off easily if they attempted to flee. Their only hope had been to stand their ground and fight. Lanek shook his head, realizing that he didn’t even have to get involved after his initial attack, his companions would handle the rest with ease.
He started to relax when Maximilian leapt back several meters, likely saving Lanek’s life. Where they had been standing moments before was a troll in black armor pulling a long spear from the ground. Where the fuck did he come from?
Maximilian growled and tensed before charging straight at the troll. Lanek drew his sword and prepared to strike when the troll simply grinned at him and leapt into the air, easily clearing Lanek and Maximilian’s charge and landing about ten meters away. Lanek and Maximilian reoriented on the troll before the demigryph’s instincts caused him to leap to the side.
Lanek cursed as he barely hung onto Maximilian. He scowled at the troll, the creature having used its incredible jumping ability to launch himself spear-first at him. The troll watched him for a second before tensing his legs and leaping away from the battle. Lanek was confused for just a moment before he noticed that Liv and the furballs had finished the rest of the group off and were coming to help him out.
Oh, you’re not getting away, you bastard. Lanek pulled a metal sphere from his pouch and activated [Mass Driver]. The troll, now some distance away and feeling confident that the human and whatever the hell the horned thing was couldn’t catch up to him, never knew what hit him.