Ch.39
Somehow or the other, we managed to get home in one piece. We were a lot more paranoid about making sure we weren’t being followed after the wererats managed it the first time, too. Between our Sixth senses and high Perceptions checks, WAY above average Stealth, and Survival checks, which was the skill that let you track and counter-track in L&L, to throw off tracking attempts, I thought we were probably okay.
Chris was fairly amused when I had him cast a Floating Disc spell and tether it to me so I could run on water using Unbroken Stride with him being towed along.
The look on his face was hilarious as I sprinted along, literally running on water Naruto ninja-style as his face went between exhilaration as I really got up to speed on the straight aways, and fear as I took sharp turns at 45 mph...
I won’t lie, when I saw how much he was enjoying it, I might have started pulling out all the stops to give him a better version of my improvised carnival ride... the guy died less than two hours ago, after all! If anyone deserves a fun time, it's probably him!
Maybe they could sort us out of the crowd at Rock-’n-Bowl, but there had been hundreds of people there coming and going all night long. I hadn’t noticed any cameras outside of the building, either, which doesn’t mean that they weren’t any there, but I wasn’t sure what else we could have done once shit started going down, really.
It's not like I’d walked into the Rock-’n-Bowl expecting any of that shit to happen, after all! Of course, that’s the entire reason that tonight went to Hell in the first place!
Once we got home, Chris and I talked over our plans for the next few weeks, and we basically agreed to take time off of work and basically everything else and just focus on a few things.
Before anything else, we drew a Non-Detection Ward in one corner of the sub-basement; it required a pretty hefty Spellcraft and Lore Arcana check to get it to work, but we eventually got it active. We had to pour our personal energy into it to get it to activate, leaving both of us pretty tired, but once it did it seemed like it could pull in enough ambient mana to continue functioning.
That makes sense, though. It's not a very high-end spell. Still, it’s great protection from lower-level Divination magic.
Then we dumped everything we’d looted down there until we could melt it all down or extract the mana from it for use in other stuff!
Next, we made bug-out bags in case our number was up and we needed to, well, get the Hell out of Dodge. We figured that if anything crazy was gonna happen, it would be in the next few days.
After that, we started working on how to properly Ward the property. A lot of that would have to wait until the construction crew was done building the crafting building/fallout shelter. We'd be pretty limited as to what we could do until we were a little higher level, but it wouldn’t take very long...
As we’d just proved, both of us could hit ridiculously high Lore Arcana and Spellcraft checks, which made starting to set things up, to get things ready, a simple process.
The plan was to combine Stoneshape, Transmute Mud to Rock, Wall of Stone and Wall of Iron, Non-Detection, Magic Circle, Sanctum, Dimensional Anchor, and a few other spells like Tiny Hut to make us a sweet ass magic fortress!
The biggest limit on it all was going to be how damned expensive it was all gonna be! That said, once we got all the crafting areas set up and Chris got his caster level to 9th so he could cast 5th Circle spells, and it shouldn’t take him more than a few weeks to get there, we'd be ready to get things going!
Lastly, acting a bit paranoid was now one hundred percent appropriate, because it's fucking NOT paranoia when they really ARE out to get you!
“I dunno, Ray. Are you sure we shouldn’t just get out of here, man?” It was hard to blame him for being skeptical about the idea.
I shrugged. “Hey, I’m just playing this all by ear, man. Think about it this way, though. If they have access to scrying magic and can track us down with it, what difference does running make? Teleporting, portals, hell, things like Wishes and Miracles make anything we do completely useless if they have access to them. Either they do NOT have access to that kind of stuff, in which case staying here should be fine, or they do and we’re totally fucked no matter what we do. Right?”
Chris sighed and rubbed his temples. “Yeah. Maybe? I won’t lie, part of how I’m feeling is the lack of control we have over the situation, here! The lack of understanding of what our... well, enemies, I guess? Yeah, what our enemies can do is also crazy. I just think that trusting our Spellcraft and Lore Arcana skills this much, especially with how low our actual Ranks are no matter the DCs we can hit, just feels bad, man.”
I understood what he meant. Every time I put a new point into a skill, if felt like information was being downloaded into my brain. If it was a physical skill, like Acrobatics or Stealth, muscle memory was also getting downloaded. To say it was an odd sensation is simply TOO massive of an understatement!
It wasn’t that we didn’t trust the knowledge that we were getting that way... it had proven super useful and it had been essentially completely correct. No, what we were worried about wasn’t that the knowledge we’d gained was wrong, but that it was incomplete!
The fact was that we’d both gotten messages from the Grand Method and both had conversations with Melnaria. Yeah, Chris had also spoken to her, and we’d both guiltily agreed she was HAF, that’s Hot As Fuck!
Those messages and conversations had both agreed that external manifestations of magic shouldn’t be possible, yet we’d just fought a pack of undead led by a necromancer who’d cast several spells at us. Plus, vampires charming people and a Fey using a Glamour – basically an illusion spell!
Not to mention the bullshit with the Federovs!
Chris looked annoyed. “It doesn’t make sense! Were we lied to? Intentionally misled? Those would almost be better than the idea that whatever is powerful enough to do all of this didn’t KNOW that there was already magic!”
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“I’m not sure it needs to be any of those things, Chris.”
He looked at me strangely. “Ok...”
“All the message spoke of was ambient mana. Now that I think about it... yeah, that’s gotta be it. What I think is going on is that these guys can use magic because they ARE magic. Which means, maybe, that they can MAKE magical energy... Mana, or whatever you want to call it. The only person we’ve seen who wasn’t from a magical or supernatural race themselves was the Necro Cowboy...”
Chris spewed cola out of his nose when I said that, then started laughing. “The Necro Cowboy!? You dick! You totally waited to say that while I was drinking!”
I grinned back at him. “I mean, you DID die today, Chris, so this IS sort of a wake... those are supposed to be fun, right?” I said, wiping soda off of my face and still chuckling at the look on HIS face a few seconds ago.
“Jerk! So, you think the,” he made air quotes and chuckled, “Necro Cowboy was rolling around with that pack of undead because they’re mobile mana generators, and the fact that they’re also muscle and he can use them as damage sponges are just side benefits?”
I nodded to him. “Yup. Which makes us getting to 7th level something we need to do ASAP.”
He looked at me oddly. “Ok, I’ll admit, I’m not understanding that reference. Not caster level 7 but Primary level 7?”
I nodded. “There’s a series of four Feats you can take that lets you get an Animal Companion, make it your level, instead of Primary level –3, and then choose a magical beast companion, instead of a normal animal.”
Chris’s eyes got wide. “Shit. That’s also the level you need to be in order to qualify for Leadership... and the same Feats that let you take a magical beast companion also let you turn your henchman into a monster follower!”
I nodded. “Yup. If magical critters work the way it looks like they do, not only will four magical beasts, all between 5th and 7th level, provide us all the mana we probably need to work magic, but they’ll also be able to provide security and such. Can you imagine Banner as a Blink Dog or a Foo Dog?”
Banner, hearing his name, climbed into my lap where I was seated on the couch and applied the power of Puppy Dog Eyes to get some scritches.
Banner’s Puppy Dog Eyes attack was Super Effective!
Chris grinned. “That would be pretty sweet! Hah, wait! Aren’t there a TON of dinosaurs that you can get as animal companions? I wonder if I could template one of them into being a magical beast? Like, an Earth-aligned Triceratops, or a Fire-aligned T-Rex!?”
I rolled my eyes. “Not sure anyone’s gonna appreciate you making a mini-Gojira, man! If you do decide to do that, probably go with it as your follower from Leadership. In L&L, you get to micro-manage everything about those characters, but you have less control over what an animal companion gets. More likely you could slap a racial template or class onto a follower.”
Chris grinned at my reference to the famous movie kaiju. “I guess we’ll find out. Shit, does that mean we need to wait until we hit 7th level to start all of these projects up?”
I shook my head and shrugged. “No idea, man. Logically, though, yes? At least until one of us is 7th. I’ll probably get there before you, though. As much as I don’t want to waste exp on buying stuff at a higher level than I need to, getting that up and running is probably the most important thing right now, don’t you think?”
He nodded. “Yeah, plus its only one level’s difference if you do it. What, stuff will be 16.5% more expensive? I mean, that’s not great, but it's not the same as me skipping even MORE levels before catching up.”
Chris had spent almost a month less than I had grinding up Feats and Masteries to try to reach 5th so he could start grabbing Advanced Classes. It had made a lot of sense at the time, and it made even more now that we might have a target on our backs.
Plus, he was right. If he rushed ahead, he’d be spending 40% more on Feats and Masteries. That was a lot more grinding!
“Ok, so that’s the plan. You get to 5th level ASAP and start raising your Advanced Class levels and catching up on Feats and Masteries, and I go for 7th so we can have access to magical followers that can start providing us the magical energy we need to start setting up defenses. You’ll hit 5th in what, two days? I’ll be at 7th in two days, too... unless? Shit.”
Chris looked at me oddly. “What?”
I groaned. “Not sure. I had a talk with the Guard Captain in Thistleglade, in the Kingdom of Farinfel. He told me that there are Gates that artificially restrict level advancement. The first one is when you're trying to go from 5th to 6th level.”
He looked at me with a frown. “Wait? We might not even be able to hit 6th level?”
I nodded. “Yeah, though I was under the impression that 10th to 11th was the first real hurdle for most people. It sounded like 5th to 6th was just time as long as you kept at it. I guess I’ll find out in a few days. I’m gonna go walk Banner, then turn in, man.”
Chris waved as I grabbed Banner’s leash and took him outside.
This was a really late night for Banner, it being almost 3 AM, but he was just happy to be hanging out with his person... and I was of course happy to be hanging out with him!
The idea of Banner becoming a combat companion wasn’t any less disturbing than it had been the last time I’d considered it, but considering he’d been right there when I’d been gunned down, I knew that him being around nasty fights in the future was probably inevitable.
If I made him an animal companion, at least he’d be able to defend himself and help out in a way that we really needed for right now!
And on top of all of this, I still need to decide what to tell the Marshals about all of this! On the one hand, them finding out that there are a lot more supernatural critters around than I thought isn’t gonna make them happy at all. On the other hand, having more backup by way of Chris is probably a good thing?
Shit! I need to ask Chris if he even wants them to know he’s Awakened, now! Uggh. My life is becoming complicated!
Banner did his business and we headed back to get some sleep!
-----------------
The next day, I grabbed Pneuma Adept/3.
Hit Points, skill points, and Feats were grabbed. Pneuma Adept/3 gave me 3 particularly noteworthy abilities. First, it gave Runic Singularity, which let me regenerate +1 Pneuma/round and spend +1 Pneuma/round, both nice upgrades.
Second it let me choose me two new Glyphs. The first one I took was Wind’s Speed which gave me or one ally I chose the equivalent of a Haste spell for one Pneuma, so +1 to hit, AC, and Reflex save, +30’ enhancement bonus to move, and 1 extra standard action per round! Like all glyphs, it lasted 1+Ini. Mod., or 9 rounds... at which time I could just recast it.
Haste is the first truly OP spell in L&L. When I say that it's OP, I mean that its borderline game breaking, to be honest. Of course, I took it the first chance I got!
The second new glyph I took was Spirit Anchor, which acts like the spell Dimensional Anchor. Basically, if you can teleport, travel to, and/or mess with other dimensions, this spell-like ability stops you from doing any of that!
I could apply it either as part of a hit from a maneuver or fire it as a ranged touch attack. Shutting that kind of thing down really screws up the day of higher leveled magic users and monsters, who quite often rely on various kinds of teleporting and dimensional shenanigans for some of their nastiest tricks.
Then, the next day, I finally grabbed Monk/6.
I was pretty happy that there were no issues to advancing whatsoever. I had no idea if that meant that no Dreamer/Awakener would have a problem with the Gate between 5th and 6th level or not, but it just wasn’t a problem for me!
Monk/6 gave me a +1 attack bonus, +1 to all saves, another Qi Power, I took Shocking Ray, the lightning variant of Scorching Ray, +10’ movement, and a Monk Bonus Feat, which I took as a Wildcard Style Feat, a special ability from Style Master, letting me use the Wildcard as any Style Feat that I had the prerequisites for.
That was going to save me buying just a TON of Style Feats! The only bad part was that I’d need to be a 10th level Monk before I could grab another one.
For my Mastery I took a Soulblade Blade skill, Focused Offense. It allows me to use my Wisdom modifier in place of my Strength modifier for all combat rolls. Yeah, that’s just a huge upgrade, too.
Basically, I now fought more based off of instinct and intuition, in part, and instead of physical force driving my attacks, and their force was now amplified by my Will and its command over supernatural energy!
Basically, my Wisdom drives everything now, at least as far as my powers and melee combat is concerned. I was basically using psychokinesis and Qi to power my attacks, now, instead of physical power!
Wisdom now was giving me Power Points, Qi, Pneuma, Initiator modifiers for Combat Arts, saves versus Combat Arts & Qi Powers & Combat Arts, AC, to hit and damage...
It’s like it all happened like this on purpose or something!