[Role requirement,] Echo warns. [Sanity Level: 97%]
Maybe I can ignore it. I mean, it’s just an obnoxious, constant pressure in my head. An itch that’s getting worse and worse the more I don’t scratch it. A mental white noise that’s progressively hissing out all other thoughts.
[Role requirement. Sanity Level: 96%]
But that doesn’t mean I have to, right? I still have free will. I’m still my own man!
Well, not technically speaking, but…
[Role requirement. Sanity Level: 95%]
I’m sure that sanity level stat has absolutely no ominous implications at all.
[Role requirement. Sanity Level: 94%]
I wish I had teeth to grit. Fingers to stuff in ears. Eyes to screw shut. But there’s nothing I can do to stop it. It’s like a mental tinnitus, a ringing that gets higher and higher and higher and—
[Role requirement. Sanity Level: 93%]
FUCK okay!
I’ll go wash a dish or something. Happy?!
The mental pressure immediately recedes, my “Sanity level” holding at a steady 93%, and I breathe a metaphorical sigh of relief. That was awful, and I never want to experience it again. But that means I’ll have to actually follow through with Trenevalt’s order. Indignation washes over me. Even though there’s no one to actually witness this defeat, and the wizard himself seems blissfully unaware of what he’s done, it still stabs me right in my pride.
The static nibbles at the edge of my mind as I hesitate.
Alright, alright, I sigh. I’m going. The question is, how?
Now that I’m back up on the stand, I know it’ll knock another 2 HP out of me if I decide to fall onto the table (not to mention how I’ll even get down from the table). Last I checked, that’d put my total hit points at a big old goose egg. And using my mana isn’t an option, either, since it’s already run out.
At least I have the passive regeneration. But I can’t afford to wait hours for my health and mana to get back up to their max—Hell, I can’t even afford to wait ten minutes for them to go up one point. This “Role requirement” doesn’t seem to understand patience.
But wait a sec, I say. If my health regenerates six points an hour, then shouldn’t I have healed back to full health last night?
[Negative,] Echo replies. [When Attunement is in effect, health and mana regeneration is paused.]
And it took 8 hours to do all those attunements. Damn, quite the trade-off.
[Sanity Level: 92%]
A trade-off I will have to consider at a later date.
How about my inventory? I ask. That doesn’t take mana to use, right?
[Affirmative,] Echo says. [Retrieve items from inventory?]
I don’t see any other options at my disposal. I call my only belongings, four hunks of glass, back into existence. They blink into reality before me. One is smooth and pointed, while the other three are still jagged shards. I guess that’ll have to be enough.
I lean three pieces of glass against my stand in a sort of makeshift ramp, and use the fourth to start gently nudging myself off the stand. This should keep me from taking any fall damage, but there’s just as great of a risk of the ramp accelerating me off the table before I have a chance to stop. Gently now… Careful…
I tip over the stand’s rim and slip down the ramp. As I’d feared, I spin out of control, colors whipping past me faster than I can make out.
But I can still feel the shards, like anchors in reality, giving me some perspective of direction and motion and even speed. Using the shards to ground myself, I resist the direction of my roll, tensing every atom of my… glass… and finally slow to a stop.
Phew. One hurdle down, who knows how many more to go.
I call the shards over to me just as Echo begins to warn they’re nearly out of range, and they huddle around me like tiny glass dogs, ready to leap into action. Awww. They’re kinda cute.
If I don’t think too hard about the surreal and existentially horrific circumstances I currently find myself in.
Maybe I can sit on them like some kind of hovercraft. They float, right? And I’m not that much bigger than them. Worth a shot.
I gather the glass around my base, and try to lift the pieces into the air. And they do lift up—barely—but just as quickly come to a halt, unable to levitate me with them. Seriously? I’m like a three-inch tall hollow orb of glass, I can’t be that heavy.
Okay, new plan. I roll as close as I dare to the edge of the table and look down; just a sheer drop to the wooden floor below. Making a quick lap around the table, I find this is the case in every direction. There’s a chair on one end which would cut the drop in half, but that’s still more than enough fall damage to claim my last two hit points. But without any messes to actually tidy up on the table itself, I don’t have much of a choice.
[Sanity Level: 91%]
The static digs its claws deeper and deeper into my mind with every passing moment. God. What happens when that counter hits 0%? Will it eventually drive me mad? Or will I desperately fling myself off the edge before it gets that bad?
Come on, come on, think!
The glass isn’t strong enough to levitate me. But could they be strong enough to hold my weight? I already hate the idea, but I don’t have any others.
I arrange the four pieces of glass around me once more, positioned like deflated petals of a flower. Slowly, carefully, I push the pieces of glass up underneath me, maneuvering them from being flat on the desk to pointing upright like a set of stilts. If I had a stomach, it would have dropped through the floor, because soon I’m balancing on four tenuous slivers of glass that could give out—or drop me—at a moment’s notice.
I decide I’m not going to think about that.
Quivering, I lean back, pick up one of the front shards, and edge it forward. I lurch, dropping the fraction-of-an-inch gap to where the shard is waiting, but it catches me. Leaning forward, I pick up one of the back shards to shuffle up closer behind me. Then I take another step. And another.
Oh my god. I’m walking! Like a person!
A four-legged glass-bottle person!
It’s amazing. It’s freedom! I can finally go where I choose, and I don’t have to do it while spinning nauseatingly end-over-end, unable to see where I’m going.
I miss a step, my gut lurches, and I wobble precariously. Swinging a glass leg around, I catch myself. Stabilize. Box away the realization I nearly just died. Again. (Again again.) Keep walking.
Maybe I’ll just… slow it down a little from now on.
I hate what I’ll have to do next, but seeing as I’ve made it this far, I can’t stop now.
Nervously humming a Queen song to myself, I edge up to the lip of the desk. No fancy curves or indents, the leg runs straight down to the floor—which will probably save my life.
I remove one of my four legs and stab it into the side of the desk. It feels secure. Or I guess, as secure as a tiny shard of glass can possibly feel. I lower myself back to the surface of the desk, then stab another piece of glass into the side of the table. And the third.
The three shards of glass extend from the wood like a cluster of porcupine quills—they’ll be the only thing that stops me from dropping straight down to the floor. I hover the fourth leg in the open air, at the end of the three, like some sort of morbid crossbar on a death rollercoaster. Taking in a mental breath, I roll into the arms of my glass net.
The shards tinkle faintly, quivering under my weight. But they hold. Oh, thank god, they hold. Step 1 complete. I’d sure love to not die in step 2.
I remove one of the three glass legs, so just two of them are holding my weight, then lower it half an inch down the table leg and stab it back into the wood. Once I feel it’s secure, I repeat the process, removing one of the higher shards so I drop the half-inch in a gut-wrenching lurch to the lower two. I move the highest shard lower than the others, and brace myself for the next lurch. Then I do it again. And again.
It would be an exaggeration to say I’m inching my way down the table. The tortoise and the hare would be equally embarrassed. Before I even reach the halfway point, the very hungry caterpillar would have already finished gorging itself and spun into a cocoon.
Chrysalis?
Which one’s for butterflies?
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I don’t know how much time it actually takes to reach the floor, but it feels like hours. I don’t seem to have stamina, so I’m not physically exhausted, but man would I love to be able to turn my brain off for a while. This all takes way too much concentration, and that damn “Role requirement” just won’t stop pestering me. 90% sanity, by the way.
But I make it. On the floor. Ready to do some motherfucking chores.
The question is, where to start?
If I were back in my apartment, I could wash dishes, or sweep the floor (that’s a lie, I never sweep the floor), or put some clothes away. But somehow, all these things seem slightly out of reach for what amounts to a tiny glass crab.
So what is within my capabilities?
The ground thumps, rattling my glass, and I teeter out of the way just in time for Trenevalt to walk past. He doesn’t look down as he hobbles toward the front door. No, wait! Maybe if he sees me, he’ll realize he unintentionally gave me orders and put an end to this madness.
Or maybe he’d have me wash his socks.
Or maybe he’d realize he’d botched his spell and decide I’m destined for the scrap heap.
Before I can decide, the door thuds closed, and Trenevalt is gone.
[Sanity Level: 89%] Echo warns.
No time for pondering. The stupid mind fog needs action.
I start walking, just to abate the encroaching mental static. And if I’m allowed to say so, I’m starting to get pretty damn good at this. There’s a sort of rhythm involved, one foot at a time. And once I have more mana, I’ll get these shards all shaped the same so I don’t feel like a drunk pirate on mismatched peglegs.
Things sure look different at ground level. The ceiling is so far away, and all the furniture seems inverted, only giving me a peek of its underbelly instead of what might be on its surface.
And the floor. My god, it’s filthy.
Dirt shoved in the cracks between floorboards; sticky black gunk of unknown origin squished into the grain; dust bunnies everywhere, but especially under the desk and bookshelves.
Aha. An idea.
I might not be able to wash any clothes or sort books by the author’s ego, but dusty floors are something I can do something about.
I take a quick (relatively speaking) lap around the house, cataloging the state of each room. Trenevalt’s Command is technically just to clean the main room, but since the study is more of a nook than its own space, the kitchen and living room both fall in the same open-concept layout. I hear those are all the rage these days.
The dust bunnies are bad in the kitchen, tucked beneath the lip of the cabinets and drawers, and even worse underneath the plush chairs and coffee table in the living room. But it’s here I find what I’m looking for. A stray feather has been swept underneath the chair, untouched for possible decades, judging by the other filth that’s migrated beneath the furniture.
Either Trenevalt’s last homunculus was really bad at its job, or it was never tasked with optimizing his feng shui.
I reluctantly roll off my makeshift legs (ew, oh god, I’m going to get smeared with Trenevalt’s old skin dust) and then use my shards to grab the feather.
Well, try to grab the feather is more accurate. It’s like using chopsticks with the wrong hand. My one small consolation is that no one is here to witness this embarrassment.
“Kanin!” Noli appears like a magic trick, skittering over to my side. “You made it off the table! Amazing! And you have more of those glass things—that’s great too, I think!”
Oh please, just walk away. Walk away and let’s pretend this never happened.
I finally manage to clamp the base of the feather between two pieces of glass. Hah! Success.
“What are you up to?” Noli asks. “Is this some sort of camouflage?”
I wonder how long I can sit here not doing anything before the “Role requirement” starts to eat away at my mind. Surely, that’s preferable to the blow to my ego that will result from Noli watching me dust this wizard’s floor.
I hate this so much.
“Or is it for a spell?” Noli covers her nonexistent mouth with two tentacles in some ridiculous impersonation of a shocked gasp. “You are a wizard! Or maybe a warlock. Or maybe a sorcerer. Or maybe a mage. Or maybe…”
She’s almost worse than the mind static. I can’t take it any longer. I roll out from under the chair (ew! Ew ew ew!) and sweep the feather after me. Immediately I feel the itching pressure on my sanity lessen, and relief washes over me.
[Sanity Level: 93%]
Noli, unfortunately, follows after. “So what’s the plan? Is this a spell to cause some kind of distraction? Then we make a break for it?”
God, this all would be so much more tolerable if she wasn’t watching. I angrily brush the feather from side to side. This however only stirs up the dust bunnies, rather than consolidating them into one pile. Ugh. This is why I got a Roomba.
Noli watches with apparent confusion. “That’s not like any spell I’ve ever seen.” I swirl the feather in a circle in an attempt to corral the dust. “Um. Do you need help drawing a spell circle? Are you trying to form a pyre? No?”
I roll a little way down the length of the chair and repeat the process, forming a pint-sized pile of dust and hair that I desperately try not to think too hard about.
“Wait…” Noli follows, examining each pile I leave behind. “Are you… dusting?”
Bingo. Now if she could just step out of the way of that hairball…
“Oh no!” Noli signs, horrified. “Did he put a spell on you? Are you cursed?”
I mean, I don’t know if that’s technically the case, but it sure feels like it. I pause to tap out a “Yes.”
“Oh, Kanin, I’m so sorry,” she laments. “I never should have left you alone! Now you’re stuck cleaning his house for eternity—”
I sure hope not.
“—and I haven’t been the slightest help at all!” Her signs switch from dramatic and sad to choppy and fierce. “Don’t worry. I’ll figure out how to get you out of here. And if I can’t, then I’ll avenge you!”
Okay, now hold up. Let’s rewind back to the “Getting me out of here” part before we jump right to “Vengeance.”
“Should I go try to find Trenevalt?” she wonders. Before I can tap out a hasty “No,” she’s shaking her head. “No, he’d only try to capture me. Maybe I can help you clean up instead. Then we can get it done faster, so you can take a break!”
Well, I certainly won’t object to that. Noli hurries off to fulfill whatever idea her hyperactive whims have supplied her with. That’s fine with me; easier to sweep the dust up without her scurrying around, and bonus: now I might not die from mortification.
Cleaning, thrilling though it may be, leaves me a lot of time to myself to think. If Noli is right, and this is some sort of spell or curse, the question becomes: How to break it? Trenevalt should be able to, once he knows what’s going on. I mean, he would want to break our spells, right? Surely, once he understands what happened, he’d want to help us?
The uncertainty disturbs me. And maybe I’m getting ahead of myself. Either way, I need to master this glass magic and figure out a way to communicate with him, first.
Or Noli can. She can probably write. She seems to be able to understand Trenevalt, so they probably speak the same language. We’ll still need to get that ink open, but once it is, she could write him a note.
If only I could communicate this idea to her. I mean, she should be able to figure it out on her own, right? I look for Noli, and find her tugging at the corner of a curtain. I pause, baffled, as I wait to see what she has planned. Yanking a little harder, the corner rips. Noli jumps back. Hesitates. Then runs away.
Aren’t elves supposed to be elegant and smart or something?
I go back to sweeping.
Echo, I ask. How long has it been? What are my health and magic at now?
[Sanity Level: 100%]
[HP: 4/10.]
[Bonus HP: 8]
[Mana: 2/10.]
Hello. Bonus HP? What’s that?
[Bonus Hit Points,] Echo recites, [represent impermanent additions to the caster’s total health. These may come in the form of spell enhancements, body augmentation, or Attunements.]
Sweet. So if I keep adding more attunements, that means I’m less likely to die? How come this didn’t show up the last time I did a Check? I ask.
[The Attuned glass was stored in the caster’s inventory,] Echo says. [If the source of Bonus HP is destroyed or out of the caster’s range, the Bonus HP will be reduced accordingly.]
That’s fair, I guess. I can’t hoard Attuned glass in my inventory to act like some kind of discount horcrux. Unfortunately, it also seems like it doesn’t stop my main body from taking damage, but at least I could maybe use it to cushion any future blows.
I turn my attention back on my mana. I need to start planning out how I’m going to spend it in advance. Sculpting is pretty quick, but Attunement costs me almost an hour for each mana point I use. Which means no matter how fast my stats recover, it will still take around ten hours if I use all my mana to Attune more glass at once.
Or maybe I’m not thinking big enough. Maybe I could accomplish a lot more with a lot less if I wasn’t just working with tiny shards of glass in my arsenal.
Echo, can I Attune these floorboards? I ask. Or the whole house for that matter. Like a knock-off Baba Yaga.
[Negative,] Echo says. Ah well, I had sort of expected it would be too big. But she continues, [Affinity needed for attunement.]
Affinity? I repeat. You mean only certain things will work?
[Affirmative,] Echo says. [Your current affinities include: Glass, void.]
There’s that void thing again. What does void mean? I ask.
[A subfield of null arcanum,] Echo says.
Obviously. And what is null arcanum?
[The essence of Between.]
I can Attune with that? I ask, skeptical. With… the metaphysical concept of the moment between time and place between space?
[Affirmative,] Echo says, as if this is a perfectly normal thing to have an affinity for.
I can’t even wrap my mind around what the implications of attuning the physical manifestation of “An instant” would even entail. But I guess there’s only one way to find out.
Alright Echo. Let’s Attune some void.
[No target selected,] Echo replies.
Oh. You mean I have to be touching it in order to Attune it?
[Affirmative.]
Well that’s ridiculous. How the heck do you expect me to touch a concept?!
Echo remains silent.
Well. I guess that’s off the table for now, then.
Glass was the other affinity you mentioned, I say, pivoting to the far more concrete and familiar option.
[Affirmative.]
Is there any more around here I could pick up for later Attunement? I ask.
[Unknown,] Echo says. [Skill for locating objects with your affinity not obtained.]
Well can I just… obtain that? I ask.
[Negative,] Echo says.
Of course not. Thanks for all your super helpful suggestions.
So this means I’ll need to find those pieces of glass Trenevalt threw away if I want to Attune anything else. That, or there’s always that glass body still sitting back in the corner of his study.
Naw. Nope. Not touching that with a ten-foot pole.
Sculpting, then, I finally decide. I should have enough mana now to at least Sculpt one of these legs. And since it won’t knock me out, like Attunement, I can keep up the dusting while I’m at it.
I carefully maneuver one of the glass shards away from my rustic feather duster, still using the other three pieces of glass to continue sweeping. The shard tinks against my side. [Target acquired,] Echo reports as I activate a Sculpt.
Splitting my attention between the glass shard I’m Sculpting and the feather I’m still holding is a bit like patting my head while rubbing my belly, but I manage it with only a little fumbling. If I had to throw rolling into the mix I’m sure I’d break something, but luckily there’s plenty of dust to go around, so I don’t have to move at all in the two minutes it takes to smooth out my tiny glass appendage. Soon, I have two identical smooth and Sculpted legs to work with.
[Sculpt level up!] Echo says. [Sculpt level 2: Mana cost is reduced by 10% and spell duration is increased by 10%.]
Nice! But again, not really much of a discount when each of these Sculpts is only taking 2 mana to start with. Not to mention, I’ll need to wait another 40 minutes to save up the mana for Sculpting these last two legs, if I’m not wrong. Fortunately (or unfortunately?) at the rate I’m inching my way through this living room, that won’t be an issue.
As the morning drags on, I dust and finish Sculpting the last of my legs, while Noli skitters around picking up pieces of litter too big for me to move. Along the way, Echo bequeaths me a “Cleaning Skill,” which, as far as I can tell, does nothing, and is entirely useless. Even so, we’ve made shockingly decent progress. There’s a pile of dust forming in the middle of the room that I’ll have to figure out what to do with later, but in the meantime, the floor is looking decades younger.
A wooden thumping of footsteps alerts us to Trenevalt’s return only seconds before he steps back into the house. Noli dives under a nearby chair. I hastily look around, but there’s no time to get back up to my stand.
Echo, put the glass back in my inventory, I hurriedly order. The shards vanish, leaving the feather to drift silently to the floor, just as Trenevalt steps inside. The wizard pauses in the doorframe, a basket of mushrooms in hand. And I’m just sitting there out in the middle of the room, like a kid caught with its finger up its nose.