Cole was standing in a wide field, somewhere outside the village palisade. According to Argyle, this season of monster waves for Venture was mainly nocturnal. Luckily for him, this meant he had a few hours, until moonrise, to get back into the town borders.
Standing across from him was Thesta, who was watching him intently. Cole shivered, he didn’t think he’d met anyone half as intense. She hadn’t said a word to him for the whole time it’d taken them to get out there, only now opening her mouth.
“What’s your class?”
Cole looked at her, confused “Didn’t you hear…”
Wrong answer.
Thesta’s face took on a sour look. “What. Is. Your. Class?”
Cole thought it was best not to poke the bear a second time. But he also didn’t think she knew he’d lied about it. If he had, she would have reacted to what he’d said back below the Guild Headquarters. This was probably just some sort of hazing ritual, like the military, designed to make it clear to him who was in charge.
‘What a waste of time’, he thought, but nevertheless, Cole acquiesced.
“My class is the [Runic Knight]”
Thesta nodded. “And that’s why you’re with me.”
“What’s your class?”
No response. “Great”, he said. More stupid hazing.
Thesta rolled her sleeve up, revealing a swirling rune on her wrist. Cole looked on Wait, was she a [Runic Berseker]?
No that couldn’t be right. Tamika had described Thesta as having a ‘crazy strong class’. A [Runic Berserker] could do a lot of damage, sure, but they weren’t ‘crazy strong’, definitely not on the same level as Argyle’s [Monk of the Solar Flare].
Cole watched as Thesta’s rune began to glow blue, the same shade as the lights he’d seen flashing through his window. A vortex of light began to rotate above the rune. It almost looked like…
A portal. It wasn’t quite a Gate. For a second Cole thought Thesta was a [Spatial Mage], but they didn’t use Runes, and the Instant Portal technique was seamless, similar to the portal from that old game series with the funny robot and evil potato.
Thesta reached into the portal with her other hand, pulling out a large tome, which had Runes inscribed on its front. She flicked her arm, and the portal closed, swirling back into the rune on her wrist.
The grey haired woman let go of the heavy book, which remained floating in the air as the runes inscribed on it lit up. Cole began to have an idea of what class she was.
“I’m a [Runic Scholar]. Or at least, I was in my second phase class, but that’s all you need to know for us to work together.”
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[Runic Scholars] were a variant of the basic [Mage] class. Where Cole had gone through forcible development into a [Spatial Mage] after he discovered the Instant Portal technique, Thesta was someone who had developed the normal way, choosing to gain her magical power from Runes instead of elemental or primordial mana.
He began to get excited. Although he’d never be able to use as many Runes as Thesta would, this was a fantastic opportunity to explore the limits of his class, as well as gain some power.
Cole did have to wonder what her class had evolved to from [Runic Scholar]. After discovering the Instant Portal technique, he had never felt the need to develop the class, as he could match most third phase classes in combat. As a result, Cole knew very little about third phase mage classes.
“Show me what Runes you have access to. It should be around 4 or 5,” ordered Thesta. She didn’t yell or bark, just calmly spoke the words and expected them to be followed. Cole guessed that you didn’t really need to yell when you could kill someone in a matter of seconds. Especially if that someone knew you could kill them in a matter of seconds.
“I uh.. only have access to 3 runes, si.., ma’a… milady,” he stammered out.
Great. Of all the honorifics he could have picked to address her by, Cole had chosen the most neckbeard, fedora tipping one. Luckily, he’d had enough sense not to run his mouth about the 4th rune he couldn’t even use.
Thesta glared at him,
“Only 3? Obviously wherever you came from doesn’t have quite the same calibre of classes as us.”
Cole neglected to explain that Earth didn’t have classes.
He drew out his first rune, the one that gave him Runic Speed.
“I’ve got Runic Speed,” said Cole, as his legs began to glow. He did a quick dash back and forth to demonstrate, before dismissing the rune.
He then traced out his second rune, focusing it into one arm. “Runic Strength.”
Cole slammed his fist into the ground, wincing as the earth cracked around the impact. Runic Strength didn’t do anything for his durability. He picked up a loose piece of rock from the ground, sending it skyrocketing away in a huge arc.
“…and Runic Blast”
The young man raised his hand and traced out his final rune for today’s show and tell. A purple blast of energy flashed out above him. He let it drop, looking at Thesta expectantly. She hadn’t moved a muscle the whole time.
Cole waited for her to say something.
“Slow. Sloppy. Weak”
Huh? He didn’t think it had been that bad! Maybe she’d noticed him wince. But in terms of actually executing moves, he thought he’d done quite well.
“Slow. You’re wasting time using only one finger to trace the runes.”
Thesta ripped a page out of the still floating book, flicking it towards him. On it was the symbol for Runic Blast. Only here, it was labelled ‘Basic Runic Blast’ with the post-script ‘short range use’.
“If you look at the rune’s design, you can see how they’re designed to be drawn using all the five fingers of your hand at once. You people do have five fingers right?”
Cole stared at the rune, looking back and forth between his hand and the page. She was right. While he wouldn’t have guessed it on his own, after being told the truth it was plain as day.
Rather than tracing his finger in a circle to create the rune’s outer boundary, he could simply rotate his whole hand. For the inner details, he could flick or tap his fingers at the same time, instead of creating individual details with the one digit. Huh. Cole thought that was pretty cool. Unfortunately, Thesta wasn’t done talking.
“Sloppy. While you manifest your runes well, regardless of how long it takes you, you dismissed your runes without reconstituting their energy. Who trained you? You’ll last half as long in combat doing that.”
Well that criticism was packaged with some unfair assumptions, thought Cole. No one had trained him. He did have to admit that the theory made sense, although he had no idea how to apply it.
“..and Weak. This leads off my second point, but you’re outputting far less power than a second phase class should be. Wasted energy from poor dismissal is part of it, but you’re also just not as strong as you should be. It’s like your power is being sucked away by something…”
How was that his fault?! That was like telling a kid it was his fault he was too short to properly compete in basketball (not that Cole had any unresolved trauma in that area). He did have to wonder if it had something to do with the ‘hacking’ of the two classes in that void, which now felt so long ago…
Thesta snapped her finger, returning the floating page back to her book. She turned to another section. Suddenly a swirling rune appeared in the air above her. It pointed directly at him.
“What’s that for?” asked Cole, nervously staring up at the glowing symbol. It seemed to face him even if he walked a few steps to each side.
“Ignore it. I want you to use your Runic Blast.”
“Ok…”
Cole began tracing out the rune. A bolt of energy hurtled out of the swirling rune, striking him directly on the forehead. Although the pain quickly faded, it still stung.
“Ouch!” yelled Cole, clapping his hand to his head, forgetting completely about the rune. He’d started tracing it with one finger, which explained the punishment.
A second bolt flew out, this time striking him in the stomach. Thesta chuckled. What had the second one been for? At least he knew why he’d got the first one!
“First was for tracing the rune wrong. Second was for wasting the energy.”
Damn it.
It was going to be a long afternoon.
Cole began to trace the rune once more.