Friday, April 5th, 2069

Those who said I would get used to following a B-rank hunter around were wrong.

“Or it’s only been two days, dumb-dumb,” Smegma assessed, from above me, where he lazily backstroked meaninglessly through the air. The change to his body was already a bit disturbing. Still, the way the goblin-imp moved now spoke of a litheness that usually was reserved for the naturally athletic or highly gifted hunters.

Still, his words barely stung this morning, I was following Sturdy Jeral into battle with my newly purchased weapon.

“Kid, you're husking delusional,” Smegma said with a snort of laughter. Again, I let the demon’s words slide off me. Sure I was acting childish but before he died I once heard my grandfather say that it is when you decide you’ve grown up that you truly have. Sure, it was just after he crop-dusted the whole living room and couldn’t catch his breath from laughing—but I think the sentiment still held.

“It’s mostly the deeper caverns left today,” my father said from my other side, which at least stopped Smegma from making another snide comment. “The deeper we go the more chance the crew has of running into slimes, so, Sturdy Jeral and the two archers with him are going to sweep each chamber more thoroughly before we start.”

It took me a moment to register what those words meant. Chance of monsters—slightly scary. Deeper caverns—much ominous. Hunter’s fighting those monsters in the deeper caverns—totally husking epic! And this time I had a warning of the sweep, so I could ask to watch from the front!

“Oh my god, you gotta stop going out half-cocked in the morning—I think you just spudded in your mining gear,” Smegma snidely added to the conversation.

“Just wait Brodie!” Willa said, clearly seeing my excitement and matching it with the tone she used. “Watching a coordinated hunting team fight is something you’ll never forget.” I mentally stuck my tongue out at Smegma. See I wasn’t the only one excited.

“She’s clearly faking it because she saw your O-face,” Smegma grumbled.

[Who husking pissed in your Barlies this morning?] I asked.

“You eat that strange serial with piss in it? What effect does it have?” Smegma asked. Thankfully, Willa and my father had begun discussing some ‘epic’ fights they’d seen over the years—which admittedly I wanted to hear, but it did also give me time to confront Smeg.

[No, it means what is wrong with you, or what has got you upset.]

Smegma gave me a stare that felt to be weighing me before he shrugged. Then physically stuck his tongue out but just like the drive in and this whole walk—something felt off coming from the imp. Like there was something he was deciding whether to tell me or not.

I gave up, the allure of hearing about epic battles witnessed pulling me back to the conversation at hand. “—then Derelict used his oil slick skill and dropped his cigarette. Just whispered boom and the whole floor went up like a gasoline drenched bonfire.”

Willa was using her hands to convey a great deal of the action, and seemed to excuse my far off look as daydreaming, cause she smiled even wider when I tuned back in. “Both your father and I think that’s where the line from Predatory X came from—you know the one where he blows up a gas truck to create the updraft that destabilizes the flying alien superhero guy.”

“That’s not what I said, Willa. I said, that movie came out years before we saw Derelict say it. Most likely he took that line from the movie!” My dad countered. “Still, it was pretty great.” My father wore a look that told me he was having an internal war. He didn’t want to glorify mining but also wanted to brag about the ‘good’ points of the job.

We finally reached a cavern still filled with Mana Crystals, and Jeral held up a gauntleted hand high—so we could see it over his door shield. The miners formed ranks and Willa helped me get into the right spot with a guiding hand on my elbow. That or she steered me to a spot at the front for a better view. I could literally hear my heart hammering in my ears as the three hunters un-shouldered weapons and shield.

Jeral moved to the front and hugged the right wall keeping his shield canted ever so slightly up and toward the wall. His legs were bent and loaded ready to react. I held my breath. The archers began moving after Jeral was ten feet in front of them. Four armored Mana Banks separated from the miners almost seeming to be towed in their wake.

My breath still held I studied the four individuals. They seemed to almost fade into the background when hunters were so close. Each one seemed to move in step with the other three, and thanks to the similar armor seemed to form two pairs of ‘identical’ individuals. For the first time in my life, I questioned my earlier dream of being where they were. Not because it was dangerous—but because wouldn’t it be the same as what I was doing right now?

Watching…

Eventually, my screaming lungs forced me to gasp in a breath. Willa and my father gave each other amused looks and patted my shoulders. The silence was highlighted by their choice to not poke fun. Smegma on the other hand had no such compunction. “Are you into the gag kink too? Really trying to pull out all the stops this morning, huh?”

[How do you even know about some of these references? Is it because you heard about them and desperately needed to know more?] I retorted still fixated on Jeral and the Hunting group. Smegma’s silence at the retort almost felt like a victory, but I knew it had been a somewhat weak comeback. Almost like a, ‘I know you are, but what am I.’

I just couldn’t give the demon the attention a better retort would need.

Five minutes later, Jeral signaled an all clear and I frowned. “That was husking anticlimactic,” I complained. However, it wasn’t like there wouldn’t be more caverns—

“Gary, Willa, Brodie, Fat Gary, and Dave, you’ll take this room.” One of the specialist miners called. The way the other miner’s looked outraged at my father but then softened when my name was called—told me that the specialist was doing my father a favor to keep me safe.

I seriously considered if there was a way to decline, because I wanted—no needed, to see a fight, but those same softened looks told me that they would insist. So, did I want to throw a fit in front of the Hunters? Nope, I did not.

“Good call don’t ever let the ones you love know how crazy you actually are,” Smegma said.

[I swear to God, I will figure out how to un-summon you if you keep this up.] Smegma paused then nodded to himself—almost seeming to come to a decision.

“Alright, fine. Once you start working, I’ll tell you what’s going on.”

[Thanks, oh benevolent one.]

“You think you can clear your own starting point, Bro?” my father asked. I nodded and followed the group to the center of the cavern, careful of where my feet were being placed.

Willa began placing the post and hung her light stone before directions were assigned. I still felt a bit disappointed we didn’t get to stay with the group and possibly see a fight, but I also couldn’t wait to see my new pick in action. Willa had scoffed at the thing when she saw it, but since my father had told her about my ‘skill’ already, she gave a semi-compliment about how smart I was to purchase a worn-down highly enchanted pick, instead of a somewhat serviceable low ranked option.

Thankfully both her and my father believed me when I told them it had a high-ranked penetration skill in it. Otherwise, they might have questioned the materials or lack thereof of better.

Smiling I raised up the pick and brought it down on a particularly spiky Crystal to begin clearing my assigned section. A jolt of vibration went through my monster hide gloves and up my arms, making me wince. The pick did crack the targeted Crystal but my flinch was for expected pain. Yesterday my hands and arms had gone numb but then ached as I worked. Today, though?

It felt like I hadn’t spent all day yesterday mining for the first time in my life. My brain worked through the problem despite my surprise. [Holy shit, is Recovery healing muscle fatigue and blisters?]

“Finally figuring out why your hands were okay last night?” Smegma asked, sounding slightly amused. I kept sharding out the circle I was going to work on, but mentally prodded him to elaborate. With a huff he continued, “Yes, Recovery was likely actively working all day yesterday, last night and even now. Remember your dad’s surprise when you had no blisters, and when you came running down the stairs for breakfast this morning?”

Blinking I saw the interaction with my father and mother this morning in a new light. Was that why they were looking at each other so worriedly? Did they think I would be in so much pain I might regret going to mine in the first place?

[Of course,] I mentally said. [They were somewhat thinking the difficulty of this job might reaffirm the choice to stay in school.]

“Bingo,” Smegma said sarcastically, but then called me back to task. “That’s twelve sharded already. Try to get a whole one, now.” I did so and found the pick reverberations in my hands worsen when striking the rock beneath the crystals, where the stem resided. And yet, the wood of the pickaxe visibly grew healthier when I made contact with the shattering glass like stem.

[Is that accumulation or does the pickaxe repair faster from hitting the stem?] I asked, over the noise of plinking glass, trying to understand why that particular strike seemed to do more.

“How the husk would I know? Do I look like a lesser demon—” Smegma paused and looked at himself. “—scratch that. I’m not a lesser demon who mined in the past!”

[Won’t hurt to experiment then,] I said, as I resumed sharding, after selling the intact crystal and mana inside for ninety-three mC. By the time I tried for my next intact crystal, I was sure that mining properly would give me better results. While sharding was repairing the pickaxe it was barely visible. It was steady, however.

So, when I struck the next stem and saw the wedge, that was friction holding the head of the pickaxe on, sink in and smooth, I wasn’t surprised. I was surprised when Smegma reminded me of his earlier words. “You haven’t asked me to tell you what’s going on yet…”

[Wow, do I need to ask for you to tell me? I figured you’d get on with it when you were ready…] I sent the mental image of a child who was throwing a tantrum and felt a thrill when Smegma gnashed his teeth audibly.

“Do you want to be a Ghast about it, or do you want to hear what I have to say?”

[First, what does that saying mean? Then sure go ahead…]

“Oh, for once you got caught with an idiom. I’m going to let this percolate. Enjoy my—”

[Something to do with wailing, I assume?]

“Husk you, Brodie. Just husk you,” Smegma responded, his voice instantly less excited than a moment before. “Not that you deserve to be offered this choice, but when the skill evolved yesterday, two choices were presented—here they are!”

That seemed a bit abrupt but the screen popping up in front of me seemed to be all the explanation I needed.

Demonic Vault 2.0.0.1

Secondary Effect Skills

Extract

Upon death this skill may allow the Demonic Vault user to reclaim skill cards from a targets heart. *The target must have used Mana on the owner of Demonic Vault or be an Ally who shared mana for the skill to trigger.

OR

My eyes froze on the ‘or’ as the realization hit me. This skill was what Morgan had been trying to trigger! This is what made him a snatcher. This single skill led to a killing spree up the east coast of the United States and eventually to me. My brain attempted to calm my emotions. Tried to point out how good this skill could be but I knew I wouldn’t be taking it.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

I didn’t want to turn into Morgan ‘The Snatcher’ Hallsbrad.

“Keep reading then, there is still the second option,” Smegma said, sounding slightly pleased.

Wait, hadn’t Smegma said Demonic Vault hadn’t been the skill—

“And it wasn’t—it was one of these sub-skills,” Smegma said. It felt a lot like gaslighting to me, but I let it slide in favor of reading the other option.

OR

Over Draft

Skills and items can either overcharge or overflow. Overcharge allows the item to increase its effects by 100%, whereas Overflow allows the excess Skill experience, Mana, or Power to be channeled to a person or object of the owner's choosing.

[Overflow chosen.]

Current Overflow target [Smegma]

Immediately I was able to figure out why Smegma was pleased. However, a quick mental click brought me into the box with Smegma’s name in it. Like a computer it had a pull-down menu which allowed me to select other targets. Everything I currently wore, and my pickaxe were there. Most importantly though, my name was there.

I toggled the other selection box to overcharge and found only the pickaxe available as a target. Plus, a description that included a time limit of five minutes.

“Leaving it on me should upgrade the Demonic Vault or Over Draft skill,” Smegma mentioned trying to sound off-handed. He wasn’t a particularly good actor. I could tell that leaving it on him would also give the demon something else. Maybe even a physical form?

Should I pick Over Draft? I still felt like I couldn’t take Extract—not to mention, know how to make use of it. I wasn’t going to start killing monsters anytime soon, right? And that was the only lawful way I could see it being used.

Changing the target of Overflow to myself and then switching the skill to Overcharge, I selected Over Draft. Immediately, I felt a connection form inside my Soul Universe. Still, sharding crystals to stay discreet I peeked into the space and found two ‘switches’. One allowed me to spin the planet inside the Demonic Vault skill in a circle aligning a red side or a blue side. I could tell Overcharge was red and blue was Overflow.

How could I tell? Well both sides had a small pedestal like mountain that depicted something. One was my face carved into the cliff face, and the other was a pickaxe. However, the red side was more of a volcano then a mountain and I could command it to erupt. Or overcharge I supposed.

I mentally prodded it and sure enough my Mana flew into the Demonic Vault skill as the volcano erupted in red energy. Smegma forced me to open my eyes when he squealed, “Wait you put the target of Overflow to yourself? Why?”

Answering was put on hold when I saw the small red nimbus that surrounded the pickaxe. My next swing was supposed to be the eighth sharded crystal, but I chose to try and get a full crystal and test my new skill. The pick hit the ground and cut through it—before clicking into the stem. It felt the exact same as any other time I used the pick.

When I sold the full crystal to Smegma, though, I got a full hundred and five mC. [Did I just get full price for that Mana Crystal?]

“I don’t care. Why aren’t you targeting me with Overflow! We could upgrade Demonic Vault and get more skills!” Smegma shouted. I didn’t bother responding, since he chose to ignore my question, and instead returned to sharding. After five crystals he answered, “Yes, it seems like it was full price—almost no mana loss. I’m assuming Overcharge doubled the Precise Enchant on the pick which helped your aim. Now, can you answer why I’m not targeted by Overflow?”

[If I’m the target I can figure out what exactly Overflow is doing. If you’re the target, I have to rely on you telling me what it’s doing.]

“It’s like you don’t trust me,” Smegma said sulkily.

[I really don’t,] I mentally answered as I continued working. Smegma stuck his tongue out at me and flew off to be alone. I shrugged; I may change the target to Smegma later if it really would help level Demonic Vault.

Five minutes later the barely visible red aura around the pickaxe faded, and I tried to swap the planet to Overflow. I found that I couldn’t. What I discovered upon closer examination was that the red planet currently had a black moon beside it. The moon was slowly moving around the planet. I kept working as I periodically checked on my mental universe.

After an hour according to my watch the black moon vanished behind the planet, and I could spin it around again. Unfortunately, that coincided with our first break for lunch and so I was forced to wait to try Overflow.

* * *

“Look at that,” Willa said, as she examined my new Pickaxe at lunchtime. “Some of the pockmarks you described are already gone, Gary. Plus the handle looks well maintained if still old.”

My dad smiled with a mouthful of ham sandwich. Well, ham or Wild Boar monster. That was a tough distinction these days. Farm raised Pork wasn’t always cheaper than Monster Pork, and if I was being honest the taste wasn’t noticeable either. I looked at my sandwich and shrugged, even as my father said, “So, what do you think? Should we both go out and buy one tonight as well?”

My few bites of sandwich in my stomach instantly became poison that it wanted to eject. I don’t think my stomach ever fell that quickly—like it was some sort of drop zone amusement park ride. I began shaking my head before considering what type of answer I was going to give them. They both looked at me, with concern. “You're pale as a linen sheet Brodie,” Willa commented. “What’s up?”

[Husk, husk, husk,] I thought desperately.

“Just tell them that you need to buy the picks. Or at least be with them. The repair mark doesn’t work on all the gear you tested it on last night,” Smegma gave me a probable lie, which I dutifully repeated.

“That’s probably because some of what you held didn’t need repairs, no?” my dad answered with an obvious piece of logic I clearly hadn’t considered. I looked to Smegma who shrugged. He clearly hadn’t considered that either. The prick.

“I can’t be sure that’s the case. I tried it on everything I held and only found this one. So, maybe let me purchase them for you?”

“Oh, that’s easy. You okay with him putting two on your credit card, Gary? I’ll e-transfer you the money tomorrow,” Willa said to my dad.

I was already at two thousand mC this morning from sales of Mana Crystals, which meant if I pushed hard I might be able to afford another Miner’s Pick tonight, but two?

“Just tell them you only found one or didn’t find any that you could mark after going to the mall tonight,” Smegma gave the obvious solution. I nodded in relief as my esophagus slowly unclenched, allowing my somersaulting stomach to calm down. My half-eaten sandwich didn’t look appealing at all anymore thanks to that rollercoaster.

This was the problem with lies…

“I’ll take a look tonight then,” I answered with a nod.

“I’ll come with you,” my dad said. I wanted nothing more than to close my eyes and swear at myself.

“I’d rather go by myself, if that’s okay,” I lied. “It was pretty hard to apply the mark to this one, and I don’t want your preferences making me think I can force it onto something I can’t.”

My father nodded shallowly, which probably meant he was confused by my response or slightly hurt by it. I didn’t like either of those but couldn’t really allow him to come with me, not buy something and then magically pull a Miner’s Pick out of thin air…

“You got enough room on your credit card?” my dad asked, skeptically.

“Yeah, for sure. I paid it off immediately after yesterday…”

I could tell by the silence that followed that both Willa and my father found my insistence odd, but thankfully Willa eventually broke the uncomfortableness. “Let’s get back to work shall we.”

Forcing the rest of my unappetizing sandwich down my throat I dusted off my disgusting hands on my disgusting Miner’s uniform and stood. This afternoon it was just the three of us on this cavern since Fat Gary and Dave were called to a deeper one a few minutes ago, which I suspected was my fathers doing. He likely wanted to be able to talk freely like we just had, and to get Willa on board with his plans from the drive home the previous night.

I kind of wished he hadn’t, now. Still, their conversation did flesh out my current plans a little bit more. If I got my father a Miner’s Pick tonight or tomorrow, and then Willa one on one of the following days—I’d have three people working to up the level of the Miner’s Picks and collecting Mana that I could turn into Mana Crystals.

[How exactly do I turn the collected Mana into Crystals?] I asked Smegma as I moved to the area, I had been sharding through this morning.

“That small gem that I told you to take out of the base of the shaft yesterday in the car. You just put that back in and it will create a Crystal. If the pick has enough Mana stored.”

[Okay, and how can I tell what level the item is at?] I asked.

“That’s a bit more difficult,” Smegma answered while biting one of his talons. “For that you need to purchase a scroll of identification.”

[How much are those?] I asked with a mental and physical sigh.

“Ten thousand mC,” Smegma answered quickly. I felt my hands clench around the haft of the pick. That was the same price as buying another pick. Smegma smiled at my frustration. “It isn’t like you need to know what level the pick is at. It will keep leveling up and improving itself whether you know where it’s at or you don’t. At least until it needs to evolve…”

I swung down with a frustrated grunt, taking my feelings out on Mana Crystal that shattered into pieces. A few jumped up and bounced off my safety glasses, telling me that I swung too hard. I didn’t bother changing the force as I moved onto the next one. This was surely therapeutic.

Thus, it took me multiple Crystals and a reminder from Smegma to remember Overflow. When I did remember it, I realized that I wasn’t feeling anything that would hint at what it was doing. I took another mental trip to my internal mental universe and found the ‘answer’ to my question.

Each time I struck with the Miner’s Pick a small white tendril left the Demonic Vault skill and went off into the utter nothingness of space that surrounded the skill. I had been hoping that Overflow would begin increasing my bodies strength or something like that. Surely, that’s what Smegma had been wanting to have happen, or at least that’s what I originally thought.

[I don’t suppose you’ll tell me what it’s doing?]

“I think it’s just Overflowing out into the darkness. Targeting yourself is probably impossible,” Smegma answered, far too quickly.

[I’ll keep testing for now.] I responded dryly. For the next several hours I was forced to put up with occasional sales pitches from Smegma for me to change the Overflow target. It became so frequent that I began using it for tempo.

* * *

“Mind if I try it on this deposit?” my dad asked.

I glanced at Smegma who shrugged. Since I hadn’t asked my question yet, I mentally rolled my eyes. [If I Overcharge it, will it still work for him?]

“It should,” Smegma answered sourly.

Wondering if my father would see the red aura I said, “One sec let me try something.”

My Mana drained, and the red aura around the pickaxe became visible again as I spun the planet and commanded the volcano to erupt. My father just watched me patiently and I looked between the pickaxe and him for a moment. “You don’t see the red glow?”

“No, I see a much better-looking pickaxe than I did this morning though!” he said excitedly. “Did you just reapply your mark?”

I nodded before handing my slightly better-looking Pickaxe to my father. My only concern was that the Pickaxe might not get any Mana to repair itself from ore deposits. However, Smegma’s original shrug of indifference made me a bit less hesitant to let my dad try it.

He hefted the thing with a few flicks of his wrists before he adjusted his grip slightly. “Weight balance is better than last night too.”

He didn’t wait for me or Willa, who stood watching, to respond, before stepping up to the Silvery vein of ore in the cavern wall. His first swing buried deeply into the stone just above the upper part of the vein and my father pulled the point back out and examined the Miner’s Pick pausing in his usual relentless swings. “Did you know it had a Trajectory correction enchantment on it?”

I shook my head, and he shrugged before getting back to work. Instead of disturbing him, I turned to Willa. “What’s a trajectory correction enchantment?”

“It’s a Precision Enchantment, dumb-dumb,” Smegma answered unhelpfully. I ignored him.

“Well, it’s not super common on profession tools, but we’ve seen it once or twice on a specialist’s pick. So, I’m not surprised you don’t know. Trajectory correction does what it sounds like. It adjusts a weapon strike to hit a more vulnerable spot on the target. In the case of mining, it shifts the trajectory to ensure you don’t ruin the ore or crystal’s value.” Willa spoke between the loud metallic pangs of my father’s swings. Her voice was loud to be heard but she couldn’t hide her excitement. “Can you see if you can get me one with that too?” she added between the next swing.

“I’ll try” I shouted back trying to be heard over the next pang.

It took my dad about thirty minutes to get the silvery ore out of the wall in large clean sections. I spent that time looking at my mC count. The afternoon had gone better than the morning, allowing me to be at a total of just over twelve thousand coins. We still had an hour left and I was somewhat anxious to get my pick back from my father to see if I could collect some more to help get Willa a pick sooner.

However, it wasn’t meant to be. It turned out that there was a reason Willa, and I could stand around watching my father work.

“All the Crystals are cleared out further down,” the porter said as he made piles of sharded crystals vanish into a large prospector pack on his back. Or I guess I assumed that the pack was the special storage item the guy used with his skill. “Is that Magna Steel?” he asked as he saw the pile of Silvery ore.

My father nodded while sporting a massive grin. “It sure is.”

“Are one of you a specialist?” he asked as he hurried to collect it.

“My son bought an enchanted pick last night. I used it for the deposit.” My father answered while resting the Miner’s Pick on a shoulder.

“Well, hopefully the value of the bonuses today will cover the cost of repairs—that thing looks ready to fall apart,” the porter said and indicated the pickaxe. Thanks to his comment I noticed that the pickaxe did in fact look like it had gone the other way, when my father swung it. My father un-shouldered it and winced as he studied it.

“Sorry, kid,” he said sheepishly while handing it back.

“How much is Magna Steel worth?” I asked while I accepted the Miner’s Pick back.

“Sixty thousand a pound,” the porter answered quickly and began writing something out on a paper. “You did manage to get eleven pounds here. Here’s the receipt.” He handed the paper to my dad, who nodded.

Willa and my dad waited for the Porter to leave to look at me and the Pick I was examining. The haft, and wedge looked far better than they had this morning, but the head of the axe didn’t. The pockmarks were still mostly gone now, but the point and wedge were bent and battered nearly beyond recognition. My dad winced, and asked, “I didn’t realize. Can your mark still work on it?”

“I think so. However, I think that means it only repairs when you use it on Crystals?” I answered, using the question as an excuse to add a bit more flesh to my lies.

My dad nodded and stroked his beard, even as Willa ran a hand over her forehead and into her hair. Hand still atop her head, and tangled in her hair she asked, “So, we’ll have to balance the use of them between Crystals and deposits?” At my nod she turned to my father. “Can we still claim to be specialists with that?”

“I think so. The Skilled Specialists can only do so many deposits a day. Why can’t we?”

Willa frowned. “I’m not sure it works that way…”

“Either way, let’s use our own picks and try to get these other ores out of the walls,” my dad said in answer, pointing at a few other deposits in our small cavern.

By the end of the day the mining crew retained three hundred thousand dollars in bonuses even after a few injures and paid healing. That meant that each person could expect to take home an extra seventy-five hundred or so. That was right up until the Lynx guide reminded my father and the crew leaders about the healing the previous day. “What do you want to do? Pay from today’s surplus or have the insurance take the hit.”

I could tell that the guy was doing the crew a favor, since the leaders, my father amongst them, chose to take the hit on today’s earnings rather than filing the report to insurance for the previous day. We still had just under a hundred thousand to split. Which meant each person would get around twenty-five hundred. I of course being new only got a thousand. But both Willa and my father should get five thousand due to their experience—so it balanced in our favor.

Well in their favor, I supposed.