18
I dismissed the achievement as I stood in the cobblestone clearing beside Gerard, both of us still recovering from our shared ordeal. I had received a rare chest from the achievement, and I got another notification immediately afterward:
You’ve unlocked a new skill: Sorcery - Level 1
Your key spellcasting statistic is Charisma. This statistic will affect your casting time, rate of mana recovery and the potency of your spells. New spells are acquired or unlocked through experimentation, Sorcery trainers, and Arcane Distillates. Skill level increases through use. Increases in skill level allow access to higher level spells and expanded spell variants.
I looked at Gerard, who had recovered his hound’s head cane. “So, what now?” I asked, taking one more look at the crystal focus he’d given me. As far as I could tell, it hadn’t done anything during the Origin Story spell. I handed it back to Gerard. “What was this thing for, anyway?” He took it and pocketed it.
“It’s a spell focus. Spell Books are terribly costly to make, so for a new apprentice it can stand in for situations like this. If you were inclined towards the Wizard’s path, your spell would have channeled through the crystal. As to what’s next…”
He tapped the cane against his palm idly as he considered. He had fully recovered his composure, and was back to his self-possessed stately self. Thinking on it, I had always kind of figured I would instantly dislike anyone who was ‘Noble born.’ My roots are about as blue collar as you can get, and like most people raised in a democracy, I didn’t have much respect for the idea of inherited authority. I didn’t know anything about how nobles worked in Antellion, but the idea that some rich asshole’s equally prickish son would just be automatically handed power seemed fucking problematic to say the least. My classist leanings aside, I liked Gerard. He was hard not to like, and I suspected he had very high charisma. In spite of peacocking with his choice of attire, he had a quiet certainty and a sort of lazy dignity about him. Before he continued, he lit a cigarette and took a long pull. The smoke billowed out slowly as he responded.
“Well, since I’m aware of your less-than-peaceful intentions with the arcane arts, I’ll forgo the standard apprentice-level stain-removal spell. Laneth, my dear instructor, used to make me do his laundry with that spell. To this day I can’t cast it without a haunting memory of all the terrible things I saw in his underclothes.” The necromancer looked like he was barely holding back an actual gag. He cleared his throat. “Instead, we’ll focus on two spells - one of which you seem to already know. Only, you don’t know you know it. The other is simple as well, but much more…fun.”
I blinked. “I already know a spell? How the hell did that happen?” I asked, surprised. Gerard nodded.
“Illuma. You cast it during Origin Story. It’s how the Flow manifested when you released it for the first time. It’s a simple light spell, takes its name from the Goddess. It’s impressive you were able to grasp it and give it shape while you were in a state of…distress. You made the light into a sphere, which is far from inventive, but it’s a good sign for a sorcerer. You seem to have some natural talent for visualization, which will serve you well.” He took another long drag on his cigarette, then turned the hand with the cigarette over, palm up. Smoke drifted up between his fingers as he muttered “Illuma,” and a speck of white light appeared floating just above his palm. The light began to expand and quickly grew into a sphere about the size of a golf ball, then brightened further and grew to the size of a large grapefruit. As I watched, it shattered, and the disparate pieces hung in the air, then swirled into a new shape.
I grinned as I saw what it was. A luminous, leering skull. The skull’s face pulled up into an impossible, diabolical grin. My eyebrows rose as a spectral, skeletal hand rose from nowhere and lifted a glowing, steaming cup of tea to its mouth. It even had its boney little pinky finger extended as it sipped from the delicate cup. It lowered the cup and proceeded to belch out a little puff of light before it broke apart and disappeared.
I laughed. “You know, I know a skeleton just like that one, from Earth, only he’s got an afro. In addition to tea, he also loves panties. His best friend is a kid made of rubber.” Gerard only raised a brow. I shrugged. “He’s from Japan. Trust me, that figures strongly in the equation.”
“What’s an afro?” he asked, tilting his head in question.
“It’s a very, very powerful hairstyle, Gerard.”
There was a pause. “Like, an enchanted haircut?”
“You could say that,” I replied.
“Curious,” he said simply. “Anyway, as you can see, the shape the spell takes can vary according to your will. This is where sorcery truly shines. We shake off the confines of the rigid means used by arcane bibliophiles and instead, we paint with power.”
“I guess that means you’re a sorcerer too, right? Er, a specialist-sorcerer, I guess? I didn’t see a spellbook,” I said.
“There are plenty of spellbook users among the ranks of specialists, but yes, I do indeed use sorcery. Fortunately for us, that means I’m able to use my considerable expertise to teach a few spells to a bewildered apprentice sorcerer.”
“Wait,” I said suddenly as something occurred to me. “Can I learn necromancy spells too?”
Gerard eyed me, pondering, “That’s ultimately up to you. I suspect a few of the less complicated spells wouldn’t be beyond your means. Anything beyond that would require attunement to the Dark Aspect. If you choose to specialise you can access the more…iconic of the necromancy spells. I smirked.
“Like the ones where you raise people who pissed you off from the dead?” I asked, raising a brow. His look soured.
“Yes, like those,” he replied thinly. He gave me a warning look, and I shrugged with a sheepish grin.
“Sorry dude, it’s just so god-damned hardcore. It says ‘don’t fuck with me’ in a way that’s utterly unmistakable,” I said, then quickly continued as his gaze darkened. “Anyway. Two spells, you said? Let’s do this.” I paused. “Is it going to suck as much as Origin Story?” Gerard shook his head.
“No, nothing so intrusive as that. I daresay that dam has broken open for good, for better or worse. You will feel the Flow moving through you, of course, so be prepared for that.You’ll pull the power in, and shape it as you did when under the effects of Origin Story. It should be considerably less…uncomfortable this time around. Hold it, give it the shape of light as you did before, then release it through the conduit you formed down your arm and out of your palm. Eventually you won’t require a direct channel; you’ll be able to cast from any point on or around your body,” he said, and directed my gaze downward to his foot.
A small sphere of light appeared balanced on the toe of his fine leather shoe. I blinked as he popped it up into the air, let it fall, then kicked it up again, using the outside of his foot. The sphere jumped up again and I gaped as he proceeded to hackey-sack the god-damned magic ball of light like a stoned freshman on the back lawn of a dorm building. Which is to say, like a fucking pro. Watching him, it was a bit like a clean-shaven Charlie Chaplin performing hippy kung-fu.
He finally popped the glowing ball high in the air one more time, grasped his hound’s head cane, and batted the thing like a baseball. It burst into a shower of sparks, and Gerard spun his cane deftly and tapped it on the ground. He looked at me, and the bastard tipped his hat. Something welled up in me and burst. I laughed, and I didn’t stop until tears were streaming from my eyes. There was a point where it sounded just a little manic, but by the time I was done, I felt a deep sense of relief, of release, as though the bundled tension of the past few days unwound.
“That was the greatest thing I’ve seen since I got here.” I grinned. You’re better than my college roommate, Discball Jimi. Considerably more sober, too. It’s weird, but he was always better when he was blitzed.”
“Discball?” Gerard asked with a raised brow.
“Uh, it was a dumb name we gave to air hockey, which is a whole other thing,” I said. I drew myself away from college dorm antics and puffed out a breath. “Okay, I don’t think I can quite match that performance, but let’s see if I can at least make a lightbulb.” I gestured solemnly to Gerard. “Enlighten me, Master Val Torn.”
He smirked, and step by step, we went over the process by which my initial casting of Illuma had occurred. When we finished, I took a deep breath and settled myself. I closed my eyes and searched for the Flow. I imagined the roaring river of swirling power that lay just beyond my sight, just beneath the surface of the world itself. I reached for it, pulled my mind around it and grasped it. The sensation was like flexing a muscle I never knew I had, and I coiled it as I drew in the power. Once again, the ice-cold surge sang in my chest, roiling as it gathered within me. I still couldn’t believe how cold it was. The effect was like someone pouring ice water inside me, where it spread through my chest and into my limbs. I gasped at the frigid feeling and heard Gerard speaking.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
“Focus, Luck. It’s easy to get caught up in the Flow. Condense it then give it shape,” he encouraged. I forced my body to stop fighting the ice in my veins, and began pulling it back into my centre, the place just behind my solar plexus. In my mind, I spun the power slowly into a sphere. It was composed of swirling potential, almost chaotic, and it begged for definition; pattern, a focus, a name, and I instinctively knew what it needed.
I found it there, an answer whispered by the Flow. I knew it; the shape of light. The signature. The sound. The name. I drove it into the sphere of power and felt it snap into its right place, its perfect place. I released a slow sigh as I let go and felt the swirling power surge down my arm, up out of my palm, and take shape in the physical world. I could feel it as before, like a gentle weight bobbing just above my palm. I hesitantly opened my eyes, and there it was. A little sphere of pulsing white light, bobbing in the air above my hand. I looked at Gerard and grinned.
“Got it,” I said with satisfaction. I got a notification:
You’ve unlocked a new spell: Illuma
Range: 5 meters plus 1 meter per level of the spell
Radius: 5 meters plus 1 meter per level of the spell, to a maximum of 20 meters
Cooldown: N/A
Damage: N/A
Sorcery Note: Spell modifications possible
This spell forms a small light for lighting stuff up. You can move it around within range, and you can make it brighter as it levels. It’s named after the Goddess of Light…Illuma. She’s pretty nice, as far as gods go. I hope you weren’t expecting much lore for this one. It’s a floating lightbulb, yo.
“Excellent,” said Gerard with a sideways smile. “You are now at the level of magical affinity one could find in a small child.” He then forced me to practice the spell ten more times, then another ten with my eyes open. I managed to level up the spell twice as a result, and by the end of our practice I could cast Illuma in the course of a few seconds. As the last of my little globes of light faded, Gerard told me to take a short rest before we moved on to what he called the ‘Fun Part.’
“This spell is variously called Magic Missile, Arcane Bolt, or simply Bolt. It’s the first offensive spell any mage learns, so be prepared to face it regularly if you plan on fighting mages. I don’t generally recommend fighting mages, but for you I suspect it’s going to be a matter of pragmatism. The spell concentrates mana into a condensed form of kinetic energy that slams into the target with the force of a physical blow. It has a small magical burn effect, but not enough to set things aflame, unfortunately.” I grinned as he described the spell. Magic Missile, eh? Classic. Practically mandatory.
He went on to describe how to shape the flow into a different type of energy, to give it a different signature. It involved more visualisation, and a more complex set of steps. The Flow was gathered, given the pattern of force, then shaped into a projectile - basically any projectile the caster could imagine, though its size was limited by the power of the spell. Then one had to inject momentum, building energy until the mana requirements were met, then release it as a burst. It was like firing a gun, but much less noisy. Unlike the classic version of the spell, the missiles didn’t automatically hit their target, they had to be aimed.
Gerard demonstrated by lifting his palm and forming a speck of glittering blue light that quickly elongated into what looked like a small, energetic lance. It was about a foot long, and each end came to a sharp, glowing point. He raised his arm, and the missile burst from his hand and sailed at a speed that left a blue tracer in the air behind it. It impacted a nearby tree and a sort of energetic splash burst outward, bark flying away in shards and chips. As the glow faded, it revealed a smouldering circular impact crater, about the size of a basketball. Small tendrils of smoke rose from its centre.
“Awesome,” I said. I meant it. “I need that.” He gave me a knowing grin, and we began what was an unfortunately slow process of teaching me the spell. I had trouble changing the signature of the Flow; I felt as though I instinctively knew its shape, its pattern, but I couldn’t find it. It was like a word on the tip of my tongue, frustratingly just out of reach. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of meditatively searching my mind, I found it, and when I did, it was like I had always known it. Like it was a language I had once known intimately, but hadn’t spoken for centuries.
My first bolt was a simple blue sphere, and it flew at about half the speed of Gerard’s and had about a third as much of an impact. My mana ticked down by about ten percent as the sphere flew away. A notification flashed as the bolt burst against the tree’s bark.
You’ve unlocked a new Spell: Arcane Bolt
Range: 10 meters plus two meters per level of the spell
Cooldown: 3 seconds
Damage: Low. Increases with level
Sorcery note: Spell modifications possible
You can call it Magic Missile, we checked. Still, those wizards on the coast might be mad. This relatively simple spell works as advertised, launching a magical projectile at a target within range. The higher the level, the more it hurts.
I grunted in satisfaction at the notification, but wondered about its description. Meta-Me seemed to be less snarky, which was weird. Vedict’Atohl hadn’t deigned to describe the spell, leaving it to my Personal Predictive Model. We then proceeded to practice relentlessly for the next hour. About halfway through, I started experimenting with the physical shape of the bolt, as Gerard had done. Repetition after repetition, I slowly refined the image until I was able to recreate it externally. When I did, I grinned. It looked like a rocket or a small missile, just about a foot long. It was like something you’d see fired from a shoulder mounted rocket launcher, or released in a salvo from an Apache helicopter. It even had a little arcane afterburner and smoke trail effect as it spun away towards the tree and impacted in a shower of energy. It was a shame they didn’t explode like a real rocket. Regardless, if you ever get the chance to blast some stuff with magic, I highly recommend it. It’s a good time.
Gerard told me my display was a bit unnecessary, and I agreed it was a little inconsistent with the general fantasy vibes here, but it looked pretty cool. This spell also levelled twice in the course of my efforts that morning, which increased its range and power. By the time we agreed to wrap up our practice session, I had a good grasp on both spells. I was still a little slow on the draw with Arcane Bolt, or Arcane Ordnance, as I had begun jokingly thinking of it, but I was improving. My short term goal was to get it to the point where I could cast it every time the cooldown expired.
We agreed to stop in at the Fleet Fox for a break and a noonday meal before I was planning on returning to the forest to do some grinding and get a sense of what the goblins were up to. I noted that the quest timer was down to four days, 20 hours, 14 minutes. The other, the Great Hunt timer, was at 57 days and counting. I idly wondered at how specific the time on the goblin raid quest was. Were they going to attack precisely when the timer ran out, or was the timer simply the outer limit of when the attack could occur? It could also be a deadline indicating when the raid had to be successfully driven off. I quizzed Sage, and she in turn quizzed the Central System, but no explanation was forthcoming. I figured the lack of information was an effort to increase the tension. It worked. I ultimately decided that the best way to deal with this question was to answer it by acquiring information of my own. I would start using Softstepper’s Tactical Automap and tracking the numbers and movements of goblins by creating daily maps.
Quicklily had evidently convinced the Mayor of Spade’s rest that something was coming. He was an older human man with long greying black hair named Tansel, and he seemed to take it to heart, because the town was abuzz with activity. Everywhere men and women hurriedly moved through the streets, attempting to organise supplies and defences. I saw Tally and Squish in conversation with Willy and several men and women, and they seemed to be discussing how to arm the few citizens we could leverage as defenders. I strongly, strongly disliked the idea that the townsfolk would remain within the walls. I had advocated for moving them to a hidden location relatively nearby, but far enough that they might be safely away from the fighting, but in the end, we were forced to decide that they remain within the town. The nearest settlement was days away, and there were more monsters than goblins out in the wide world. We couldn’t spare any of our precious few defenders to accompany the townsfolk and watch over them.
If we simply abandoned the town and collectively fled, we’d be giving the goblins a foothold from which they could advance further south, and I’d be failing the first Meta Quest. As such, the townsfolk who couldn’t aid in the defence would be spread throughout three large cellars in the town, each with a small group of guards to defend them. The bartender, Selwyn, volunteered for this post. He had smiled grimly and hefted a mean-looking maul almost as big as he was. Gerard assigned a few zombies to the task as well. Pamela was, evidently, a competent knife fighter, which I had trouble imagining, but it wasn’t something Gerard would joke about in this situation. It turned out Prick Richard had an ability called Social Distancing which cast a weakening disease on a target that could spread through enemies in a close proximity.
Tally and Squish, the most militarily competent of both the zombies and humans, would organise the defense of the walls, as they had experience with siege warfare. I didn’t envy them the task; the walls and gates were in very poor shape, and it would be a miracle if we could get them up to any reasonable standard before the goblins struck.
In spite of my suggestion concerning the townsfolk, I had long since decided that I would leave the details of the town’s defense to Quicklily, Gerard, and the Mayor. It simply wasn’t my place to assert myself in this situation. I was inexperienced and underpowered compared to my companions, and Tally and Squish had real military knowledge and experience we could draw on. For my part, I intended to be a surgical knife that undermined the goblins from the rear. I’d also be hunting their leaders.
After my brief meal with Gerard and Richard, who Gerard said was imploring him to convince me to bring more goblin ears. I grimaced. “I’m not sure that’s something I really want to do voluntarily,” I said. Predictably, and as though the world intended to spite me, a piano flourish sounded and a new notification popped up.
You’ve received a repeatable quest: Snack Time!
Prick Richard, the lovable zombie with a troubling past, is always, always hungry. Thanks to you, he’s developed a taste for goblin ears, and he wants more. Always, always more. Feed the Prick! Return five goblin ears to Prick Richard at the Fleet Fox.
Note: This quest is repeatable. Rewards can be claimed multiple times.
Completion of this quest will result in the following rewards: 1 Common Chest, 1 Uncommon Chest. 50 gold pieces.
“God-damnit,” I said with a sigh. “You just had to fucking incentivise mutilation, huh?” I looked up at the ceiling. “Assholes.” I looked over at Gerard. “I swear to god, one day these bastards are going to have me committing war crimes.”