The first thing Dylan looked at was the new deck enhancement, Favored Card.
Recalling the name led him to think about what it might mean, and as he opened the catalog to the correct section, he couldn’t help getting excited, hoping that his speculation wasn’t wrong.
When he finally had the description in front of him, Dylan smiled.
[Favored Card: When the enhanced deck is loaded, choose one of the cards it contains to be its Favored Card. When the enhanced deck is summoned, if the Favored Card is not out of play, it will always be included in the opening hand. When the enhanced deck is reshuffled, draw the Favored Card immediately.]
It was more than Dylan had hoped for.
He’d guessed the enhancement might let him designate a card to be in his opening hand from the name, and even by itself, that ability was game changing. But this went beyond that. Drawing his Favored Card every time he reshuffled would ensure he had constant access to whatever card he considered the most important in his deck.
And he didn’t overlook the word “immediately” in the enhancement’s description. Normally, reshuffling would leave him with an empty hand until a turn had passed, but now, he could reshuffle without leaving himself in quite so vulnerable a position.
If I manage things right, I could even play my Favored Card the moment I draw it, Dylan thought. I could do it repeatedly.
If he wasn’t worried about the mana cost of maintaining his deck, he could activate his chosen card several times in a row with multiple reshuffles. It would take careful energy management to set up, and he’d likely have to stockpile as much as his body could safely support before he began. The resulting mana consumption would also cripple his longevity in battle. But depending on what his Favored Card was, the effects could be amazing.
If it weren’t for the high activation cost, Dylan could almost imagine himself quickly summoning a small group of Lizard Ravagers.
He also thought of Phantom Rally. If he was able to save both copies of the card and discard them when he had one or more active archers, he could reshuffle his deck and discard the card again to give his phantoms eight times their normal damage. Because of the time required to reshuffle, there would probably only be one chance to shoot at full strength, but with Dylan’s current magic power and the Phantom Archers’ stat scaling, that one shot could hit significantly above his normal weight class. For those few seconds, the archers’ physical power would easily cross into tier two.
Of course, that would be a lot of work and planning for just a moment of payoff.
A more conservative pick for his Favored Card would be something like Lunadera’s Bloom. Not only would it help him and any potential teammates keep up their mana, but the ability to get the card in his hand at any time could provide on demand group support to both clear and protect against mental debuffs.
Each card in Dylan’s collection passed through his mind, offering what felt like endless possibilities. He had to forcibly reign in his thoughts before getting carried away. He hadn’t seen everything yet.
There were still two new cards to examine. Two more options to choose from.
Dylan willed his catalog to turn its pages and looked for the new additions.
The first he came across was Assimilating Void.
Now that I think of it, is this thing in alphabetical order?
Dylan shook his head. It wasn’t important right now.
He brought his eyes to the card. Its brand resembled a black hole and was slightly uncomfortable to look at.
[Name: Assimilating Void]
[Type: Spell]
[Summoning Cost: 3 Mana]
[Activation Cost: 1 Blank Card]
[Effect: Summon and sacrifice a Blank Card from the Card Catalog to create a void capable of absorbing 1 attack. The void will exist for 5 seconds or until 1 attack has been absorbed, whichever is shorter. This process consumes the Blank Card. A Temporary Card will be added to your hand approximating the effects of the absorbed attack.]
Dylan didn’t quite know what to make of the card.
Depending on how it worked, it might be good. But it might also be terrible. It all hinged on how effective the void was at blocking attacks and on the power of the Temporary Card that it created.
Dylan checked the catalog for the new term’s definition.
[Temporary Card: Temporary Cards are cards added to a summoned deck during Card Play, and they cannot exist outside of Card Play. If played, discarded, or if the deck it is tethered to is unsummoned, a Temporary Card will be permanently destroyed. If a deck is reshuffled while a Temporary Card is still available to play, the card will be reshuffled into the deck.]
It was as he’d thought.
Essentially, Assimilating Void would turn a Blank Card into a shield before redirecting a blow’s power into a tool he could use to counterattack. And after Dylan used that tool, it would be gone.
It all came back to how it worked in practice, to how efficient the card was at converting the damage it absorbed into a form he could use.
He’d have to test it out before he felt comfortable bringing it into battle, but because of how limited his Blank Cards were, that test would be expensive.
It’d be great if I could find a way to turn Temporary Cards into permanent ones, Dylan thought. Then at least he’d know he could get something of value out sacrificing one of his Blank Cards. Once I’ve finished rounding out my deck, I’ll see what I can do.
Before moving on to the next card, Dylan quickly checked Assimilating Void’s detailed view and found the only thing that scaled was the number of attacks it could absorb. It could block one per class tier.
If it can eventually block multiple attacks but still only creates one Temporary Card, does that mean elements of each attack will be integrated into the card it makes?
Dylan found the idea more intriguing than what he could use the card for currently. But he put his thoughts aside; he still had some time before reaching tier two.
He willed the catalog to flip away from the glossary and back to his card collection.
When he found Wisps of Knowledge, he was met with the image burned onto its face. It was of a card being circled by two balls of energy.
[Name: Wisps of Knowledge]
[Type: Spell]
[Summoning Cost: 5 Mana]
[Activation Cost: Free]
[Effect: For each card you draw, summon a Wisp that lasts for 2 turns. Channel 1 Energy/turn. Wisps are considered Type: Summon, and Subtypes: Creature, Wisp. They have a Resilience of 2.5 and a Magic Power of 6.25. Skill: Ethereal.]
The stat values weren’t particularly high; after checking the detailed view, Dylan discovered that the creatures’ magic power was a quarter of his own, and their resilience was set to one tenth of it.
While looking at the scaling, he also found that the duration was one plus his class tier. It wasn’t a massive increase, but he could see how it would be useful. A longer duration meant more potential wisps active at the same time.
Before making any more judgements about the card, Dylan also checked what the skill did.
[Ethereal: A creature with Ethereal exists in a state that is not fully tethered to this world. There is a 50% chance for any attack directed at the creature to pass through it, causing no harm.]
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It was a nice ability that would help compensate for the wisps’ extremely low resilience.
Still, Dylan wondered how useful the card would be with its numbers the way the were, but he persuaded himself not to dismiss Wisps of Knowledge until finding a chance to actually test it. Besides, if the wisps he could summon were anything like the creatures he’d learned about in school, their relatively low attack power may be supplemented by a high attack speed. While that might not help against opponents with high damage mitigation, it could let the wisps burn through anything moderately vulnerable.
Dylan imagined himself surrounded by a fast-zapping stream of energy balls, and the more he thought about it, the more he couldn’t help but want to build a deck around the card. His real vision would have to wait for him to have better cards in the future, but it wasn’t impossible to make a simplified version of it relatively quickly. All he had to do was set Wisps of Knowledge as his Favored Card and then fill the rest of the deck with energy generation to maintain it.
If nothing else could be said for the deck, it would be consistent. Every turn, he would draw a card, summon a wisp, and then use the card he’d drawn to pay for his channeling upkeep. Its relatively low summoning and maintenance costs would mean that Dylan could keep it active for a while, and after two turns, he’d almost always have a pair of wisps to use as his means of attack. If one died before its duration was up, there would be a new one waiting to take its place when the next turn began.
At the same time, the deck’s shortcomings were also obvious. With nothing but Wisps of Knowledge and the energy cards needed to support it, the deck would lack versatility and explosive power.
He only had five Intermediate Energy cards, and because they were his only way to generate what he needed to both maintain Wisps of Knowledge’s channel while giving him extra energy to activate other cards, Dylan’s current ability to supplement the deck would be limited.
His best choice would be to either add things like Lunadera’s Bloom and Mana Surge to help keep him keep going for longer or Draw to give him an instant way to add new wisps.
If he wanted to make a deck centered around Wisps of Knowledge truly shine, Dylan would need more efficient and varied ways to draw cards and generate energy. It also wouldn’t hurt to have something similar to Phantom Rally that could interact with and empower the wisps.
But most of that would have to wait until he mastered a few of his cards and could start messing with their keywords.
Until then, if Dylan wanted to play around with the deck he'd imagined, he’d need to settle for its simplified version.
But thinking about mastery made Dylan wonder something about Wisps of Knowledge.
If he mastered the card, would Ethereal be included in the keywords available for card creation? The ability to add it to more powerful creatures than the wisps seemed really useful.
More than that, if creature skills were included in a card’s keywords, could those skills be appropriated for other types of cards? Ethereal’s ability to ignore attacks and Unfettered’s ability to resist control effects could both be valuable additions to his card pool.
Dylan sighed. He wanted to experiment now, but knew that this wasn’t something that he could rush. He could work and train, but based on the amount of progress he’d seen on his other cards, full mastery would still take a while.
He looked back at his catalog. He hadn’t yet checked were he stood with his progress after the Tutorial.
His eyes scanned over the book’s pages, willing the cards’ descriptions to switch to their detailed view. What he found was expected but mostly disappointing.
While every card that he’d used had gained at least a little mastery progress, many of the numbers were depressingly low. They weren’t even close to one hundred percent. On the bottom end was Giant Web at 0.01%. Most of the rest were hovering somewhere between 0.50% and 3.00%, but surprisingly, Dylan did find a few outliers.
Phantom Rally was at 5.98%, and Phantom Archer was even higher, sitting at 7.14%.
The one that truly shocked Dylan, though, was Immobilize. Its mastery progress was at 18.71%.
But when he calmed down to think about it, he supposed it made sense. People were able to increase their stats faster when meditating after challenging themselves and making meaningful use of their stats, skills, and abilities. The numbers he was seeing led him to assume that card mastery operated under similar principles. And in the dungeon, no use of his cards had been more meaningful or challenging than what he’d done with Immobilize.
From the most basic actions of briefly holding the weaker monsters to the more creative usages like stopping the arrow before it’d hit Alice in the second fight or catching himself just after going off the cliff, the card had proven itself versatile and valuable. He was constantly thinking of new ways to employ it. And then there was the final battle. Excepting the creation process for the DESTROY card, nothing he’d done in the dungeon had been as difficult as simultaneously channeling Immobilize against the two bosses.
If gaining mastery worked the way he was beginning to think it did, then the varied numbers he was seeing across his collection would have an explanation.
While examining his cards, Dylan also discovered another surprise that made him feel relieved. Mastery progress was shared across all copies of a card. He wouldn’t have to level up each card individually. Even if that fact didn’t actually lower the requirements he needed to fulfill, it did make his goal feel more attainable.
After checking the catalog, Dylan found his last reward. Ten Blank Cards. Their presence reminded him that he could probably make another because of the teleportation time difference he’d experienced.
When he’d successfully created and put away a new card with the other ten, Dylan willed the book to close and let it dissipate.
Looking out the window, he could see that the sun was beginning to set. If an assault was coming, it would probably begin soon.
Dylan worried about his father, his thoughts bringing back the man’s parting words.
There was a gift from his brother on his bed, and from their earlier conversation, he knew that gift was the reason his father had returned early.
There was only one thing Eric would give him that would be valuable enough for his father to try and rush it to him before the Tutorial.
Adaptive gear.
To keep his mind distracted, Dylan walked to his room to check. What he found was a small metal box resting in the middle of his bed. On top of it was a letter.
He broke the seal and unfolded its contents.
----------------------------------------
Dylan,
Hope you’re doing okay back home.
I wish you could’ve come visit with Mom and Dad. The capital’s amazing. There so much more here than in Fairbasin.
But we all know that travelling close to the Tutorial isn’t the best idea for anyone about to go through it.
Speaking of which, I made you something. You know I’m still new at this, so don’t expect miracles, but it should be able to give you an edge in the Tutorial.
It’s a bracelet.
Since we don’t know what class you’ll get, I made something anyone can wear. I wanted to do a ring, but I’m not good enough to compress the size that much yet.
Once we know what you’ll be, I’ll help you customize something more suited to your needs for when you can equip a second piece of adaptive gear at tier two.
Anyway, make sure you keep the bracelet on you at all times. We don’t know how soon the Tutorial will start, and it’s better to be prepared.
Professor Hillcrest says that things may kick off even earlier than usual this year. Don’t be caught off guard.
Once you enter the Tutorial and get your class, bind the bracelet. It’ll help.
I want you to get through everything safely.
And get better rewards. Those are always nice.
Now, I’ve probably rambled on enough. Ask Dad if you have any questions.
And once everything’s over, you have to find a chance to come and visit me.
Take care,
~Eric
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Carefully putting down the paper, Dylan moved his gaze to the box. When he opened it, he found a thin band of silver about three inches wide. It looked like it would be a little loose on him, but that wouldn’t be a problem after binding it. The size would adjust automatically.
Despite its simple appearance, the bracelet held an inexplicable attraction to Dylan. He couldn’t remove his eyes from it. There was nothing but smooth, curved metal, but his subconscious mind insisted that there was more.
Dylan took it from the box, and for the first time since he’d received his card catalog and starter deck, he focused his will and thought, Examine.
A small screen appeared in front him.
[Unnamed Adaptive Equipment]
Moving the box and the letter off his bed, Dylan sat down and wore the bracelet on his left wrist. He then began to meditate, channeling his mana into the accessory.
Binding with a piece of adaptive gear was simple but a little time consuming. It required flushing the object with mana until it formed a resonance with its wielder. In the process, it would shape its physical form to better suit its user while generating stats and bonuses tailored to its user’s class. Establishing resonance with larger equipment could take the better part of a day, but Dylan guessed that the bracelet wouldn’t take more than an hour.
As he channeled his mana, metal molded itself around his wrist, fitting snugly against his skin. Cool at first, the bracelet warmed until it matched Dylan’s body temperature.
He felt a connection forming, not the same as but also not dissimilar to what he experienced with the creatures he summoned.
After more than half an hour, a wave of mana washed out from the bracelet. It spread through every recess of Dylan’s body, swimming through his veins for about five minutes before returning to the metal around his wrist.
The bracelet shook. It was done.
Dylan looked down and once again thought, Examine.
[Unnamed Deckmaster Equipment]
[Magic Power: +10%]
[Mana: +10%]
[Mana Regeneration: +5%]
[Extra Enhancement Slot: A Deck Enhancement may be applied to Unnamed Deckmaster Equipment. This Deck Enhancement will apply to all loaded decks. After applying or changing this Deck Enhancement, all decks must be reloaded for it to take effect.]
The bonuses were powerful and just what Dylan needed.
Magic power. Mana. Mana regeneration. All of his essential stats were boosted, and because it was adaptive gear, the bracelet operated under percentage increases. It would remain relevant for a long time.
And that wasn’t even looking at its ability. An extra deck enhancement. It was another game changing addition to his power.
He’d already subconsciously accepted Favored Card as his default deck enhancement, but that would leave him without the added utility the other enhancements could provide. Now, that wouldn’t be a problem.
Dylan smiled and brushed his thumb against metal.
Thank you, Eric.
He pulled up his stats to check the changes the bracelet had brought.
[Statistics]
[Resilience: 25, Tier 1]
[Physical Power: 7.8, Tier 0]
[Magic Power: 27.5 (25+2.5), Tier 1]
[Mana: 133.1/133.1 (121+12.1)]
[Mana Regeneration: 1.281/minute (1.22+0.061)]
[Class Statistics: Resilience, Magic Power]
Dylan was starting to get excited.
He wanted to test out his gains. He wanted to experiment with card creation. He wanted…
His thoughts were interrupted by a distant bang and a flash of light coming through the window.
The night’s assault had begun.