Joe clenched his teeth and pulled out another arrow even faster, aiming for another different type. His strike flew true, but again brought no reaction. Joe grimaced, rapidly pulling out another arrow and aiming, but took a bit more time, spending more of his focus on options than actually shooting at the moment. His distraction cost him a few moments but he still sighted on another target before loosing once again. This time, he chose some ursine creature, massive and tall as it stood on hind legs and roared in defiance at the city. Joe tried the same tactic one last time but this time chose to aim for a much more delicate and painful area, swaying between the male bear’s hind legs. The arrow struck true, hitting the left one. The bear like thing didn’t even respond, the roar continuing unabated before it dropped to his front legs again and joined the rest of the line in a slow lazy jog towards the city walls once again. The arrow’s fletching dragged across the ground, bouncing and jarring, but the bear ignored it. Joe groaned, frustrated and felt a pinch between his eyebrows. What on earth is going on? This is just… not natural!
Joe’s grimace was part frustration at a failed tactic, but much more a wince at the pain he could only image the monster must be feeling. Right. Let’s put it out of its misery.
Joe aimed, his arrow pulled out and laid to string almost as quickly as it took to raise the bow, but then he froze. Right… so rubber’s hit the road. I gotta start killing them and I’ll need infusion to do it cause if I go for kill shots… that’s… I’m pretty sure that’s going to leave behind a bunch of perfect cores, and that will be noticed very quickly. Man… I should have checked… Joe found himself feeling worried even though he was certain of why he was getting so many cores and so many perfect cores. Joe sighed, and shook his head. Whelp… can only try this and hope it works, then. Do or die time.
His little bit of time he’d had to practice before the monsters all roared, he’d found that it seemed the mana connected to the construct in the arrow was a problem. He couldn’t leave a connection. With some work, he’d figured out how to make some mana constructs, but it all still fell apart rather quickly. OK… so… then…
Joe sent mana up the shaft and into the arrow head, it twisted up in a long spike, looking much like a normal infusion. OK… so … withdraw my mana, cut it off. You should stay and hit… well… crap. As soon as Joe cut off his mana connection, the long twisted vine began to fade then fell apart in less than a second. OK… but… that worked a bit better? It lasted a bit longer, anyway. Joe watched the arrow fly away then picked up another. So… a battery. That seems to make sense. Right? He did the exact same thing, but in the shaft back within the fletching, Joe began pumping in mana, and a small balloon like structure began to form, swelling. Joe grinned. OK. That… that looks right. Should work, right?
He cut off his mana, leaving the typical infusion vine spiral and the balloon at its rear and the mana lasted a bit longer this time, his grin growing when he saw that. He moved it up to string the arrow to the bow but then the mana ball at the back began to destabilize in a way Joe couldn’t visually understand. Somehow, it was collapsing and falling, but not in anyway Joe could readily recognize. It then pretty much fell to pieces and then the infusion collapse shortly after that. The arrow actually made it half way. Joe frowned, then smiled. OK. Not what I wanted, but progress. Relax! So… mana ball kinda works, but it destabilizes… so how to stabilize… well, spinning works in real life, so… Let’s try…
Joe tried again bringing up another arrow and filling it up once again as normal with the mana infusion once again then began making his mana bubble in the rear of the arrow. Once it had filled a bit, he then focused. Right… spinning… How would I… Ooh! As soon as he thought if it, the mana sphere began spiraling wildly in the direction he’d been thinking of and Joe began to grin. OK. Nice. Ha! Then he felt his eyebrows climb upwards as he saw the mana settle in near the fletching, spiraling around in the shaft before it seemed to compress in some form of another dimension than the three his eye was used to seeing. It was the strangest thing he’d ever seen, but he couldn’t readily describe it any other way. It can’t be another dimension, though… I can still see the mana… if it moved along another axis, it would… it should move in a direction I’m literally incapable of seeing… so… what’s… what’s happening?
Joe found himself frozen for a bit, staring at the mana which had formed itself into a strange spherical shaped vortex. It was definitely a vortex. Joe was certain of that. But it was also a sphere. The imagery of what he was seeing was starting to give him a headache. No time to think about it either… focus and shoot!
He released the arrow and watched it go flying across the sky. It flew well and slammed into a monster, deep in the haunch of an anteater looking thing. The anteater kept moving on, its rear leg spazzing slightly, but continued to march with relative ease. Joe frowned. That… Why isn’t it… Joe kept an eye on it as he continued firing, not infusing these shots, and after a good while, the anteater finally died, collapsing to the ground. Joe pondered that for a bit with a frown as he continued firing until he decided to make a single small change.
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Joe concentrated a little, drawing his mana from his torso towards his hand and up the shaft of the arrow. The mana twisted up it, much like a vine, but it spiraled almost perfectly and not so much in the typical random path of a vine. This time, it was the head of the arrow that took in the mana sphere, shifting in a strange way his eyes couldn’t follow even as the sphere grew both in size and in incredible speed, spinning wildly within the arrowhead.
Joe chose another bear again and shot the arrow, this time aiming more for center of mass. Uh… does a bear get mana from the same place? Center of mass behind the heart? Joe almost hesitated before mentally shrugging and releasing the arrow at the original target. Joe had no way of knowing, and could only assume similar mana morphology. Or… I hope so!
His arrow flew true, striking into the upper back of the bear as Joe had no shot at the chest of the bear. Maybe it needs to be closer, too, to the mana organ? Shot it too far in the back? Try closer to the chest with this bear. But, the closest thing to where he thought the mana organ would be was the upper back. If mana intrusion is going to cause damage, and it seems it does damage directly to the core, then getting it close to the core should… Joe grinned even as he saw the arrow strike and the gigantic bear stumbled to the ground before arching wildly, its entire body spasming in some form of pain or death. Works? I guess? Hmm… maybe try the rear thing again?
Joe shot another arrow with the mana battery in the fletching, and noticed the same slow death as his last shot with the mana battery in the fletching at the rear of the arrow, even with the shot landing in the body of the monster. Right… seems like the mana is slowed traveling down the arrow shaft. Why… donno… good to know… add to the list of testing! Joe sighed and turned back to the fight, now certain of what to do. Right… load the mana in the arrow head. Works… Ok… But… now let’s check mana levels…
Joe kept his eye on the bear as it still spazzed on the ground, so this time he upped the amount of mana in the arrow before losing it at a badger that was the size of the bear he just shot. Same place, same area, same size monster? See if there is a difference?
Joe watched with bated breath, eye’s flickering back and forth between the bear arching in spasms even as his arrow struck the badger. The badger took a single step and collapsed dead. Joe blinked. Right… maybe over did it a bit? Is that…
Joe’s thoughts fluttered in shock for a minute before he nodded and began pulling out arrow after arrow and dumping in an amount of mana that was between the two attempts, although he did err on the safe side and put in an amount closer to the latter larger amount than the first weaker amount.
Joe kept his eye on the bear, watching it as it writhed but kept the most of his attention on his shots as he began to rapidly down monster after monster, now rather certain of what was happening. Another couple of minutes later and another couple dozen monsters dead, Joe’s eyes flicked back to the bear again, in between his shots, and found the bear stilled. Dead? Then… probably could waste a bit less mana?
Joe considered it on his next shot, but then sighed. Better not. Maybe there is some kind of size thing. Maybe it’s a bit like poison? Need an amount based on the weight? Joe settled on what he’d done before, then upped it a bit more. Hmm… maybe up it a bit and check my mana regen? Make sure I can have enough mana? Or… no… let’s leave it at what I’ve got… check it against the regen for now.
A decision finally made, Joe infused the same odd spherical vortex into the arrow head and let the arrow go. Joe aimed at the next monster in line, sinking the arrow near where Joe assumed the heart would be. He didn’t wait to check, immediately pulling out another arrow even as the other flew through the air. He emitted mana as soon as his hand grasped another arrow and had it swirling down the shaft even as he had the arrow set on the bow ready to shoot. He aimed absentmindedly at the next monster but found himself still focused on the mana as it twirled down into the arrowhead. He actually lost a second or two waiting for the sphere vortex to form before he could loose his arrow. Joe frowned a bit as he realized he was losing almost two seconds of time. Probably can speed it up. Was a bit distracted this time, and didn’t immediately infuse mana as soon as I picked up an arrow… that would probably help, right?
Joe loosed his next arrow and immediately emitted mana towards his fingers even as he dropped the hand down for another arrow. The mana had made it to his elbow by the time his fingers found an arrow and slid across his palm into the fletching as he brought it up. As he notched the arrow, the mana swirled down the shaft and came to rest in the arrowhead even as he drew it back. He still had to wait a split second for the sphere vortex to form but found himself firing the arrow much faster than before. Soon, he found himself in a groove, emitting his mana as quickly as possible to try to form the vortex in the arrow head and allow himself to return to firing as quickly as possible. After another dozen or two arrows, he found that he was able to fire arrows almost as quickly as he could without pushing his mana into it. There were a couple times where he didn’t pull it off perfectly, but he was confident enough that he could turn his focus to his mana consumption and flipped up his status to take a look.