The clean cut through the mountains had broken as if the stone walls were attempting to come back together to close the wound. One side had fractured to send rubble to the floor below where it now lay scattered among the ruins of the training team. Of their original number, one had already died and only one was relatively uninjured.
Daniel awoke to find his leg pinned by a stone large enough to be considered for use in landscaping. A much larger one was close to his head and had done him the favor of knocking down a tree big enough to prevent its smaller kin from completely crushing his leg. The trunk allowed him enough space to gingerly withdraw his limb, skin scraped in places where the rock protruded.
He hurt. Not as much as he had before falling, but he was covered in bruises and cuts that were only half healed. His arm felt strange, but it wasn’t agony to touch. Mana burn, he realized. Sunlight still shined on the valley of boulders, but was it still the same day? Then he took in the fact that there was no auras around him. Hunter! he cried out mentally, and then repeated it as a shout. The silent watcher took notice but did not intervene. The lack of response mortified Daniel. The aura from Identify Creature disappeared whenever he slept, or was forced to sleep, though Hunter sharing it would preserve the auras. That there were no creatures visible around him meant the ringcat was unconscious, or worse.
The phone in his hand had no answers for him. Notifications were only present for so long and there was no history to review. He had three advancement potential available, more than enough for level 2, but all Daniel cared about was finding Hunter. He was also wounded, which meant he hadn’t had enough mana to fully restore himself. In other words, he had nothing to help him find Hunter. Was there even anything to find? he thought, seeing rocks the size of tanks had spilled out around him. No, he couldn’t think like that, not until there was no other possibility.
“Hunter!” He climbed one of the rocks, grateful his body had healed as much as it had. He couldn’t see anyone or anything, not even the other members of the team. Had they found everyone else and left Daniel behind? Were they crushed beneath the fallen rocks? “Khare! Kob! Sigron!” he shouted, and then after a pause, “Tlara!”
No one responded. Movement in the distance, but it was just fallen rock settling. Daniel started walking, intent on searching the entire pass despite the fading of the light telling him there was only an hour before dusk. Despite the wyverns that were doubtlessly being drawn by the commotion, and even now could be lining along the ridges far above him. It only took him a few minutes to find what he was looking for. Hunter had jumped towards him, but the midair explosion threw him off course. For one terrible moment, Daniel knew Hunter was dead, until a green aura surrounded the beast. Dead creatures couldn’t be identified.
Hunter was alive! But, how? Where the pouch had rested against his body there was a charred gouge of flesh missing. It was an uneven, grotesque wound that revealed rib in several places. The ground, covered in dust from the shuffling of rock, had soaked the blood spilling from it and indicated the massive amount Hunter must have lost. Far less had been needed to end the ringcats that attacked on the plains. No blood spilled from the beast now. Had it ceased on its own, or was there no longer enough to spill? Not even the silent watcher, repositioning to get a better vantage, could tell. Neither did it intervene. It wasn’t the time for that yet.
Hunter! Daniel thought. There was no response. As he rushed to the ringcat, there was a weak breath. The blood-mixed dust smeared onto his knees when Daniel kneeled to place a hand on Hunter. The fur on the side facing him was mostly gone, burned off in the explosion. The intricate ring patterns were present on the hide itself on the parts not broken.
Hunter didn’t respond, and Daniel didn’t want to press harder for fear of injuring him. The ringcat had to be out of mana, just like him, so the passive healing boost of Regeneration was the only thing keeping him alive. At level one it was a gentle flow of restorative energy. Even with the feature, Daniel didn’t know if these wounds were survivable without the intervention of a higher power.
The only one in the group that could heal him was Tlara, and she was nowhere to be found. He held his Focus and moved all three available advancement potential into intelligence. It was the only thing that could help.
Daniel committed the change. It was a strange juxtaposition, the rush of leveling up and the dying friend in front of him. He also felt, for lack of a better word, off balance by the changes. He guessed it was level disparity kicking in, but he didn’t care about that at all.
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Your Intelligence is now 20! Powers acquired with this Attribute will now be level two. Features you have previously awakened from intelligence may be heightened to Level: 2.
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By developing a Core Attribute to 20, you have improved your Artificer class to Level 2! Your Mana Pool has increased, and the Mana cost of Powers below Level: 2 is reduced. You will now awaken Powers at level 2, but will suffer greater effects of Level Disparity when using level 2 powers awakened from Attributes below your current level.
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Alert: Your Strength, Dexterity, Endurance, Wisdom, and Charisma are below your current level. Powers reliant on these Attributes will suffer from Level Disparity until the attribute is increased to your current level.
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Your Intelligence is now 21! You have gained Feature: Quick Mind and Ability: Telekinetic Reach.
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The intelligence powers didn’t seem like they would help, but Daniel read over all of the new powers his Focus would display in desperation.
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Artificer – Level: 2
You are an artificer, a Class that embodies the Ideals of innovation and creativity. Your Core Attributes are Endurance and Intelligence. Upon taking this class your current Dexterity is halved. Your artificer Focus will take the form of a magical tool.
Attributes:
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
- Strength: 21
- Dexterity: 13
- Endurance: 14
- Wisdom: 14
- Intelligence: 21
- Charisma: 12
Artificer Features:
- Arcane Creator, Level: 2 (Automatic): You are now capable of reproducing and developing Formulae: Enchanting up to level two. The Mana and time cost for using formulae of Level: 1 or lower are reduced. This is an automatic Feature improvement that does not require mana or heightening to use.
- Bartering
- Beast Friend*
- Focus Enhancement, Level: 2: Improve current enhancements on your Focus for a minor Mana cost per Function.
- Maps, Level: 2: Generate a map based on your observed surroundings. This map is retained unless the Focus is lost.
- Music, Level: 2: Improves the maximum volume of playback by 100%.
- Encyclopedia, Level: 2: Allows collection of additional information into the Function based on close observation of a target through your Focus. Living Creatures grant more progress towards entry improvement than deceased creatures, as do intact corpses compared to damaged ones.
- Settings, Level: 2: Allows all Functions to resist Magical Suppression of level: 2 or lower.
- Identify Creature
- Quick Mind (Feature, Intelligence, Domain: Knowledge, Level: 1): You possess the Power of rapid thought and calculation. This feature improves your ability to read, perform mathematics, and formulate arcane problems beyond the normal rate for your intelligence.
- Quick Mind, Level: 2 (Automatic): Further improves efficiency. By acquiring this feature at Level: 2, you do not need to heighten it to gain this effect.
Artificer Abilities:
- Mark Weakness
- Moment of Clarity
- Scatter Shot
- Snap Shot
- Telekinetic Reach (Ability, Intelligence, Spell, Domain: Universal, Level: 2): You possess the Power to interact with physical objects with Telekinesis for a short time. Manipulation of physical objects requires a minor Mana cost, scaling with the duration of the effect, distance, weight of the target, and the target’s Endurance if it has one. Items actively possessed by a creature will be considered as having that creature’s endurance. This mana cost inversely scales with your intelligence. This ability has no direct effect on Creatures with an endurance higher than your intelligence. This is a Magical Ability that does not function within an area of Magical Suppression.
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Damn it. Damn it! Daniel read it three, four times to be sure, but there was nothing. Then he realized how stupid he’d been. If anything could have given him a healing ability, it probably would have been endurance. All intelligence had done was make him better at math. He’d focused too much on leveling up and just assumed he’d get something useful. It was Bartering all over again. But, when he had gotten Bartering, there was a hidden ability far more useful that he didn’t initially see. Daniel placed both hands on Hunter, mimicking Thomas and Tlara. Nothing was happening, but whatever they had used worked slowly, so maybe, possibly-
Cold. Hunter’s thoughts were slow but free of pain. The return of his consciousness re-established both the telepathy and the emotional link. Even this close to Hunter, Daniel could hardly feel anything through it.
“Hey, stay with me! You can make it through this! Just don’t die,” he pleaded, not moving his hands.
It took a few moments for Hunter to respond, and a half minute to string together the few words. No. I am dying.
“You-” Daniel was about to say the ringcat was fine, that it wasn’t as bad as it looked, but he couldn’t delude himself that much. His voice was breaking so he stopped talking and thought towards Hunter. Regeneration should be healing you! You, you can’t be dying.
Share, was the only response. It wasn’t immediately clear what Hunter wanted him to do until the smallest bit of mental pressure was applied against Daniel. Hunter had no mana to share Daniel’s senses, but reaching level two had deepened the artificer’s reserves. Not a full restore, but he had some mana to work with.
How could he refuse? Daniel’s sense of his body faded as he pushed his mind through the nearly destroyed wall between them. Despite himself, he wondered if he could project abilities from Hunter while doing this, until the feelings that replaced his own body drove any curiosity from him. There had been the expectation of some pain, a deep ache that would survive blood loss and shock, but there was no sensation in the large body he mentally occupied. Vision was hazy and the strength to keep the eyes open at all limited. Air was taken in by struggling lungs that faltered during inhalation, weakening with every breath.
Regeneration wouldn’t keep Hunter alive, it was only prolonging his death. Daniel knew that now as deeply as Hunter had. The Artificer pulled away and hated himself for it, but the pull death had on the ringcat was far too terrible to endure for one who would not venture with him.
I… He didn’t know what to say or think.
No regrets, Hunter thought.
I killed you. Tears had finally come, now that the inevitable was known. If I’d just separated the bolts or kept them myself you wouldn’t be like this.
No. Hunter’s head lifted slightly but couldn’t turn to meet Daniel’s eyes. The Artificer abandoned the healing attempt and sat in front of his eyes. No regrets. You gave me freedom worth a short life. You.
Hunter? Daniel asked after he paused.
Go. Find another. It will make the same choice.
I don’t want another. I- He couldn’t complete the thought. He knew how petulant it would sound. That wasn’t how he should behave next to his dying friend. I’m not going to leave you to die alone. The light of the aura was dimming. Everything that they’d fought had died so quickly that Daniel hadn’t made the connection between the aura’s strength and the life force of the creature, thinking it a binary thing. It seemed there wasn’t much time left. He pulled out his phone. Nothing on it would heal Hunter, but something could ease his passing.
He carefully placed the Focus on a patch of remaining fur and set it to play a song. Most of what he remembered enough to play was thematic or meme music wildly inappropriate for what was happening, but there was a piece of classical music from a recital the twins had played in their senior year. That was when he was 15 and bored, dragged to the event by his parents. There was no name for the track, he hadn’t bothered to remember it. From what his mother had said it was a famous piece. The school only attempted it because Alex was a near virtuoso on the violin and had a solo near the beginning.
Like the photo on his lock screen, it was another memory Daniel regretted. He’d almost slept through it and had to be nudged by his father on a few occasions to stay awake. Now, listening to his sister play, for it was the version she had played, there was only the wish to be in that auditorium again.
What? Hunter asked weakly.
It’s ok. I’m right here. Daniel let the music play and held Hunter’s head in his arms.