Syl the mist elf woke up groggy, enthusiasm hadn’t replaced her need for sleep. It was still early in the morning and there was some time before anyone else would be awake. Being the designer of the system had its perks and she knew at least in theory what needed to happen for her to advance the mage class.
Sitting cross-legged on the bed Syl focused and brought the magic to her hands. It was disorienting, her body felt more awkward than the magic and the sudden rush of power burned and was painful. She tried to limit the power to something that wouldn’t hurt. Painfully and slowly she concentrated and reduced her magic to a trickle and finally and felt the pain subside. Burns covered both of her arms it was painful but she ignored it. She mentally flicked on her status screen.
Health F (3/8)
Healer would have been an easier class. Well, maybe not, she imagined burning up her body while trying to heal her avatar. She refocused on her magic, limiting it to a flickering candle like flame that appeared in the space between her hands. She focused on the sensation of the mana moving through her body and helped guide it along, creating pathways for the her magic. For the next hour she focused those pathways and gently reinforced them. It was time to check her skills.
*ding* Skill Magical Control is now 2 and has gained 1 point
*ding* Skill Magic Resistance is now 5 and has gained 4 points
*ding* Skill Channeling is now 2 and has gained 1 point
‘Okay, real progress’
She gathered up her Kaihed and quickly dressed. This morning she was going to tell Julie and Stan more about herself and hopefully not need to escape Ril. She found Julie already by the hearth stacking fresh wood and getting ready to light the fire for today.
“Let me handle lighting the fire?” Syl said.
Julie gave her an inquisitive look and nodded.
“Please don’t be scared, I want to tell you more about who I am.”
Syl brought her hands together by the fire and carefully willed a small flickering flame. She disconnected the fire from her avatar and could feel herself as the flame... freedom. There wasn’t a need to hold back anymore and the flame, a small part of her, felt intense joy. The feeling was fleeting, untethered her magic started to dwindle and she was barely able to make it to the log. The log flared up when she reached it burning with an intense magically ignited vigor.
Syl sighed feeling at ease. She stood holding out her arm, a small flame danced in the air. She pointed at the flame. Her previous plan for deception fell away. “This is me. I am from a place of mist, of magic, called Mistvale.” She watched as Julie’s eyes watched her flame in wonder. “I was curious about your world so became...” Syl released the flame and it evaporated and she gestured towards her physical form. “…a living person, a mist elf.”
Her shoulders prickled and she felt a rising fear and sadness. “You were so nice to me yesterday, thank you for making me feel welcome.” Syl said.
Julie didn’t say anything while she looked at Syl. The moment stretched out until Julie noticed the burns on Syl’s arms from her practice earlier.
“Your burned!” Julie came over investigating.
“It happened this morning, I was practicing and accidentally hurt myself.” Syl said.
“The light coming from your room?” Julie said.
“You noticed?”
Julie nodded and went to a cabinet.
“It’s hard to be sneaky around you.”
“I’m just glad you aren’t some kind of monster, you aren’t a monster right?” Julie said as she walked back over to Syl.
“No, pretty sure I’m not a monster.”
“Put your arms out.”
Syl put her arms out to the side and Julie started gently applying a cool cream then wrapped her arms with bandages. “Tonight we will need to clean the bandages and reapply the salve. You shouldn’t burn your body, its too cute to use as firewood.”
“Why are you so nice to me?” Syl asked.
Julie let out a long sigh and seemed to consider her words. “An empty home and an empty room.”
Julie looked solemn as she continued, “We have a childless marriage. When Theo found you he planned on taking you to his ranch and we begged him to keep you here.”
A deeper voice quietly added from the direction of their bedroom. “It’s hard to want something that seems impossible, then one night an impossible girl stepped into our lives. Thank you for choosing us Syl.” Stan said.
“How long have you been there?” Julie asked
“Long enough, breakfast?” Stan said with a smile.
Everyone in this house was sneaky Syl decided. “I’ll set the table.” She said as she walked to the cabinet with the dishes. Breakfast was an omelet with local herbs and a small amount of spiced sausage. Afterwards Stan walked with Syl to Terri’s shop. When they arrived at the door suddenly Stan stepped forward and held a hand to keep her back.
“You don’t need to hide who you are, let me help.” Stan said.
Without waiting for a response he opened the shop door. “Hey Terri! Come check out this thing Syl can do!” Stan shouted. Terri soon appeared staring daggers at them and Stan backed up and winked at her. If he wanted her to give a magic show, fine.
‘Evil nerd grin’
Her avatar couldn’t handle much more than a trickle of power though she could handle it consistently. A hypothetical normal mage would also have trouble drawing enough magic with their meager mana regeneration skill to do anything significant. Slow and steady magic was Syl’s cheat mode, she could show people something that would bring magic to this world in style. Something people would tell stories about for generations not a cheap parlor trick.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Time for a another test.
She smiled at Terri and Stan. “Please follow me.” Syl turned around and walked off the small cobbled street into the village square. It was a small square field that she briefly imagined was used for festivals and events. Syl bent down and pressed her hand to the ground. After she centered herself, she sent a small pulse of magic into the soil. It didn’t take long to find her target. A dormant seed of a great tree that never had a chance to sprout was about a meter below the surface. She extended a slow trickle of magic to the seed stimulating it and the seed exploded with growth. Magic was absorbed readily and a tap root grew as the seed cracked open ready for life.
The seed was too deep and the tree would die without her help. She decided to feed it more magic and used her slow trickle of energy to form a mana pathway in the fledgling tree. Hopefully the tree could learn how to draw on magic on its own and not need her help. Once the mana pathway was formed she coaxed a link to form with her realm, the tree would now have its own mana regeneration. Syl stood, the tree was now drawing its own energy from her realm as it grew and it evolved.
The ground where the tree was still growing under the soil started to seep smoke as the tree drew on her power. A thin crystalline trunk pushed through the ground and gracefully twisted towards the sky. Thick white bark formed around the base of the tree but didn’t grow up the trunk more than a meter. Most of the new tree looked like it was made of white crystal and soon it supported long white branches with blossoms of purple leaves. Syl could sense the trees connection to Mistvale and could feel the tree hungrily drawing in her magic, it was now bigger than the nearby shop.
She grinned at Stan.
‘Oh cats! I over did it!’
She had no idea when it would stop growing or why it looked so different from a normal tree. Her face was getting very warm. Stan started laughing.
*ding* Skill Magical Control is now 4 and has gained 2 points
*ding* Skill Magic Resistance is now 6 and has gained 1 point
*ding* Skill Channeling is now 4 and has gained 2 points
You have earned the title “Enchantress”
Congratulations Mage is now level 2
Mage bonus to intelligence +5
Mist Elf bonus to intelligence and wisdom, +6
Free Points 10
Mana + 72
You have learned the skills “Misty Helper”, “Imbue”, “Silverlight”, “Evoke”, “Mist Shield”
‘Yay…’
Terri looked at Syl and then back to Stan with a confused look. Stan pointed at Syl. “Mist Elf” He said with a goofy grin.
“Ohhh…” Terri said like that explained everything.
An older man walking passed spat, “Omen fired elves…”
“Morn’n Old Tom.” Stan said.
“Morn’n,” Old Tom looked at Syl while holding out his finger.
“We don’t need any..” Old Tom said still holding his finger out at her. He was about to speak again when his eyes caught on her brown Kaihed. His finger immediately shifted to the tree still rapidly growing in the field. “Fancy elf trees.”
“I think I’ll add a bench here, in the shade.” Stan said gesturing at a now shady spot.
“Hmph..” Old Tom said as he turned and walked off.
Terri looked at Syl. “Pretty tree, thank you.”
Syl blushed embarrassed, she hoped the tree would stop growing soon. Stan looked at them both and nodded. “I need to see about making a bench. Have a good morning ladies, oh and come by the stables later Syl.” Stan said as he excused himself.
The morning went well after that, the shop seemingly needed a great quantity of water and went through it quickly. Syl wasn’t sure why a tailor would need so much water but she spent most of the morning gathering it when Terri would hand her a pair of empty buckets. She also learned the names of the two kids, Clint and Rose. Clint was the former water transporter and eagerly warmed up to Syl after she brought back her first load of water. Rose was taking a bit longer to win over, the small girl would run off whenever Syl spotted her.
Syl read about her new skills on water gathering trips. She was eager to learn, the system had taken her lead on how to organize stats and created the skill system without her input. She imagined the system actively making new skills and classes even now. It was fun, she almost felt like a beta tester.
Magic didn’t need the system, though a person on Werthe wouldn’t have the fundamental knowledge to use it easily. Each skill seemed to be designed to illustrate an aspect of her class. “Misty Helper” for example created a magical familiar. The skill needed a magic stone that she would need to provide for it to work. “Imbue” created magical items, it functioned similar to how she enhanced the sapling tree so it could draw and use magical power. The skill also created the magic stone she needed for “Misty Helper”. “Silverlight” was a skill that at its core manipulated and created light. “Evoke” created elemental effects in a limited fashion and “Mist Shield” formed barriers of mist.
Behind the shop on yet another water trip she decided to use evoke to fill the buckets with water. She focused on how she wanted to summon water to fill the buckets and used the skill. There was a draw on her mana and then a trickle of water slowly filled the first bucket. When the water filled the bucket she switched and noticed the problem. The water in the first bucket was quickly reverting back to heavy smoke! She switched back to the first bucket to refill it and it stopped smoking though the second bucket began smoking the moment her trickle of water left it.
She thought about when she didn’t use a skill to create fire earlier and decided to try that again without using the skill to feel the difference. She mentally adjusted the inferno of magic to a trickle and summoned her power. Syl could feel herself as the flame and the bliss of being a pure form of energy and she could feel the tether of mana supporting the fire. She willed the flame to disconnect and float in the air. The flame was exhausted and consumed itself in moments.
‘Hmm’
Her skill “Misty Helper” seemed like a persistent spell though it needed “Imbue” to create a magic stone. Syl looked around for a suitable stone on the ground and used “Imbue” to make the magic stone she needed. She felt a huge wave of nausea as the stone was lashed with her power and her mana level slowly dropped by 2430 points! She had nearly instant mana regeneration! The stone was now a small red crystal. There was no way anyone but her could use imbue to make a magic stone until the world had extremely powerful mages if ever.
*ding* Skill Channeling is now 5 and has gained 1 point
*ding* Skill Trance is now 43 and has gained 42 points
’System, how would a new mage without a SSS rank mana pool use misty helper?’
They would not
You have earned the title “Inquisitive”
…
She looked at the stone and used identify.
(Magic Stone, F rank)
*ding* Skill Identify is now 3 and has gained 1 point
If this could could create a “Misty Helper” could it also create other things? Her gamers mind started churning. It was sort of the reverse order of how it would happen in a game. Slay a monster for its stone then use that stone to make a magic staff. In a game monsters might have these kinds of magic stones.
‘Oh cats…’
Syl didn’t have a desire to create a bunch of monsters, well at least right now, and she wasn’t sure what else would need to happen to do it anyway. Though it did possibly solve another problem, she liked her avatar and didn’t want to risk the relationships she was developing or risk Ril. Maybe she could use stones to create an alternative avatar for exploration. She picked up her buckets and went back to work, thinking about the possibilities.
It was early afternoon when she was released from the shop. A few people stood near ‘her tree’ which thankfully wasn’t visibly growing anymore and had settled on being huge. The tree was probably visible from most if not all of the village. She was looking at the people by the tree when she noticed a man staring at her with bright purple eyes.
He started to burn with purple flame.
A nearby man shouted and leaped back. A woman screamed and collapsed to the ground. Hush fell over the half a dozen people near the tree and the flames grew all around the man until he was obscured in purple fire. A voice then rose from the fire that every syllable that it spoke felt like a hammer striking iron in her soul.
NATIONS WILL FALL AND PERIL HAS ARRIVED. HOPE IN SMOKE, THE MOON AGAIN SHINES HER SILVER LIGHT. IN THREE DAYS MY ENEMY SHALL KNOW THE FIRST OF THREE CURSES AND ALL WILL KNOW THEM TRUE.
The man in the flames fell and his body turned to ash, the purple fire gone like it had never been.
“Omen fire… “ One of the remaining men whispered.
‘Enemy…’
Syl stood there stunned her mind reeling. For the first time since coming to Werthe she was afraid. With trembling hands she looked over the small crowd again and tried to remain calm. The group was still distracted so she quietly turned and walked away from the square towards the stables. She was an outsider that had joined the village less than a week ago, people were standing next to a tree that didn’t exist this morning and a prophecy was just spoken about a great enemy. The other goddess must have finally discovered her or knew all along. Maybe she wasn’t the enemy, but a great enemy now? It wasn’t looking good. Once she was out of sight she staggered and caught her breath. Syl missed home and her family.
She thought back to her time in Mistvale and wondered how long she had been a goddess. Her sense of time here might be very different than back on Earth. Had she been conscious the whole time? It might have been years or even lifetimes. Part of her knew that she couldn’t go back home, like how the system existed apart from her.
‘Wait… the system’
’System, do you know how long I’ve been a goddess?’
Yes
‘How long have I been a goddess?’
Goddess status was updated two days ago
‘Ugh’
She considered another approach.
‘System, when did you become aware including any time before you took on the title System?’
112,482,878 hours ago
‘You’re lucky I can’t kick you! Math… eh, a long time ago.’
That meant her family was dead unless time worked completely different now. Her connection to Werthe from Mistvale was stronger than anything and her name in “Werthe Campaign Setting” was a hasty edit. What if the edit wasn’t adding it to the book and instead something else. Syl decided she needed to find the other goddess. The books in her realm were a reflection of herself and that reflection might not be an accurate representation of the truth. Of all ‘people’ System seemed to have a good idea about things, as much as admitting that was terrible, though if System was alone for all those hours some of that was probably excusable.
’System, was I conscious the total time you were aware?’
You have been awake for twelve days, you only remember two of them.
You have earned the title “Boring”
‘I’m sorry System, I can’t even imagine.’
Status updated, “Boring” title removed.
Syl thought about the title, slept for eons, help create a world… she wasn’t sure how all of that happened.
‘Haha fat mist’
Syl wasn’t scared anymore, she needed to go to the stables and see Stan and maybe ride a wolf. That would be a great way to end the day she decided as she continued on her way through the village.