Chapter 44
Mostly Harmless
When we started testing the squirrel forms we, and by we I mean Pierce remembered to set timers, giving me 15 minutes to try each form.
All eight elemental Aspects I ended up channeling while in elemental squirrel form were both Mischievous and Harmless , which just about proved to me that I was getting those concepts from the animal, not the elements.
Pierce insisted that I let the forms show what they really did, since the air squirrel had been so surprising in its ability to outright debilitate two adventurers without even trying.
The light squirrel was fun, it was Invisible, and interacted with the world by Projecting, Illusory images. I may have had a little too much fun with that one because it ended in a reset ten minutes in via mace applied to an invisible rodent that wasn't being quite as quiet as he thought he was.
The shadow Squirrel used the concepts of Warping, and Melding to both move between shadows that shouldn't be connected to each other and make normal shadows into frightening silhouettes. Pierce and I both spent nearly the entire 15 minutes scared out of our minds. Because the shadow Squirrel was Spooky and I wasn't immune to the influence that made its subjects easily frightened. Pierce spent the whole time making a concerted effort to kill me, but every time he got close I simply slipped through the shadows to another nearby location. On an interesting note, apparently the fear inspiring concept made it impossible for him to build up any anger, so he wasn't able to just use that crazy shockwave weapon aura to get me.
We took a much needed break after the shadow Squirrel. We left the arena and Ivo joined us for lunch in the guild hall. I insisted on cooking some of the meat that resembled ham, which I sliced and had along with cheese on some bread. We enjoyed the sandwiches, which were definitely not a new culinary concept. Then Ivo asked us about our testing.
I was willing to leave out our more serious fight, but Pierce told his partner how I was one hard bastard to beat. But I needed to learn to hesitate less, and take a hit when I had to. Apparently he was weak as a kitten after using his Tyrant's Decree on me, and if I'd taken advantage of it, I would have won easily.
He went on for a while about how to capitalize on weak moments, and know when my opponent was more vulnerable. He said that really knowing that kind of thing was something you could only do with experience. He also offered to beat my over the top reaction to a few scratches out of me. I made an earnest attempt to decline, but was actually vetoed by Ivo who said he'd help me with that, and left no option for argument.
After lunch, I tried the water squirrel. I barely noticed Pierce while I was in that form. I was intent on Collecting acorns, and any other thing I found edible or interesting. I stored them all in a hole I dug under the roots of a nearby oak tree. I found myself obsessed with making sure the water levels in the soil around the tree were just right too.
I had a sense for when things needed Hydrating, which allowed me to generate small streams of pure water that I could squirt out at a range of roughly 5 feet. Which Pierce and I both found out when he managed to get my attention by yelling at me. We also both found out that my malleable form was pretty resistant to blunt damage, as his mace only sent me flying with a mace imprint in my side. I squished a little bit on my landing too, but I just popped back to squirrel shape as if my insides were made of some sort of gel instead of flesh and bone, and got back to collecting.
The tunnel vision that water mana created was a real detriment to survivability. I wasn't able to redirect my attention from whatever task I was on without something pushing me to do so.
Fire came next, with my usual hesitancy for that elemental. But I needn't have worried, I was Warming, Nurturing, and Calming. I spent the entire fifteen minutes curled up on Pierce's lap while he calmly enjoyed petting my warm fur. I'm pretty sure we were both willingly lost to the mana's concepts on that one. It was actually kind of lovely considering I was so scared of my fire core.
Death was another surprise, it was Welcoming, Weak, and Poisonous. The poison it had was something that collected in its fur, and was just strong enough to reliably repel insects. I had the strong desire to rub my poison on anything and everything around me.
Pierce made the mistake of picking up my death-attuned squirrel self when I started rubbing against his boot. It startled me, and I released a concentrated burst of aura using all of the mana held in my tiny death core into him at once, the aura held only one Concept "Weak." It didn't last long, but it caused the man to fall, his heavy plate armor temporarily far too heavy for him. I was able to jump out of his hand and run off and climb a tree. Having expended all the mana from my little body, I actually gained strength instead of losing it when the Concepts power left me.
Life didn't get fifteen minutes, I canceled it before I could really start to be influenced by its Concepts. It seemed like life-attuned squirrels were entirely concerned with making more elemental squirrels. Which explained a lot about the one I'd been watching when I acquired the form. I quietly cataloged the Concepts for use only if I found someone really special, and moved on to Earth.
The Earth squirrel was maybe a little dangerous. Though Pierce never got to experience why. I was Burrowing, so the man only saw me dig a hole under the roots of the nearest tree, and disappear into it.
I spent the entire fifteen minutes Safeguarding the area with a rather extensive tunnel system. The maybe somewhat dangerous part was where I created paths that led almost to the surface, and used my Stabilizing Concept to make the dirt covering the foot width holes just strong enough to not collapse under the weight of energetic squirrels playing on top of it.
Alone, the small foot traps were nothing more than a nuisance, but the elemental squirrel I saw in the web of life lived in a colony with a mixture of all the elements. I would hate to accidentally stumble into their area, assuming they had the tendencies and Concepts I had adopted. Just picturing all of the effects I had seen being used together made me want to make very certain to avoid them in the future.
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After that reset I tried to explain subtly why we were only testing seven of my cores. I had to resort to a blunt explanation before he got it, and completely agreed with my choice.
Since we were finished experimenting with the squirrels, we called Ivo back in.
We had a long talk about the potential viability of the elements I had access to.
They asked me if I had found a life mana form that had the ability to heal, since that was a common use for life mana.
I told them about the aspect I had found before the golem and how I had some hope for it. It was able to progressively grow stronger and better adapted to opponents, at the cost of being a bit hungry for food or mana. I wasn't quite sure how the Bonding Concept that was attached to that aspect would really work, but from what I could tell it created consensual links between myself and others. I could use it to create a kind of mini web of life with people I chose to include, where we would have an awareness of each other's position, intent, and conditions.
Ivo seemed eager to try it, Pierce looked at both of us like we were insane, but went along with it.
They told me to go "big cat" since Pierce was adamant that I continue to practice like that, and we began the test.
When I established the bonds, I found out that I was more right than I realized when I mentally referred to it as a mini web of life. Ivo, Pierce, myself, and my staff companion could all feel each other. The bond wasn't intrusive enough to allow us to read each other's minds, but we could easily share thoughts and were aware of each other's emotions.
Ivo's emotions felt like he'd just had a suspicion confirmed, while Pierce seemed taken aback when they were unintentionally brought into contact with my companion's mind. My companion was ecstatic, the sapient staff greeted them excitedly with welcoming feelings. My staff had been spending most of my testing time in the arena off doing testing of their own with their new magic, in secret.
They came jogging over to where we were looking once again like a wooden version of my demihuman self. They bowed, and waved, their mind filled with happiness at interacting openly with people besides me.
"What the fuck Angel?" Pierce muttered, his mind filled with confusion as to exactly what this wooden creature was.
I did my best to explain, I intentionally left out anything about their origin.
"Living weapons are not unheard of, but usually their minds aren't quite as active or emotional as yours." Ivo said while looking directly at my companion.
"It is developing more ability to think and feel on its own isn't it? When you first entered the guild I felt nothing but an echo of your emotions from it. But lately I've been sensing emotions that didn't originate from you. I came to suspect the existence of an intellect recently. I didn't mention it since it seemed to be pretending to be a normal staff. I don't think that will work out in the long run." Ivo was staring at my bound companion, his emotions were tinged with worry, and a slight hint of disappointment in me.
Pierce suddenly radiated enough anger that it overwhelmed his partner's passive absorption."It's not right to bind an intelligent creature to your will." He growled at me, I felt his desire to protect the young life of my companion.
My companion's mind filled with feelings of fear and anger, they were so angry they punched Pierce in the helmet with a wooden fist, before running over to me and clutching my mane. I felt their fear that I would somehow try to sever our bond, since I had always wanted them to be free.
"You are free to stay with me as long as you want, I won't force you away."
The words echoed from my mind through the web, along with the desire to allow any choices that my companion wanted to make.
"What's their name?" Ivo asked me quietly.
I was shocked at myself that I'd never considered my companion's lack of a name, Ivo was right, it definitely needed a better name than "my staff" and Living Wood Thorn Staff was a description, not a name.
"I'm going to let them choose on their own, I think."
My companion released their hold on my mane and backed away, they looked between the three of us, who were all openly considering how wrong we thought it was for someone with a mind not to have a name.
They closed their wooden eyes and I felt how they were trying to think of something they wanted to be called. I felt their frustration. They shook their head.
"Well we can work on it together, it'll be easier when you can communicate better."
All of us nodded, we could feel each other's intent to help.
"So what can it do? I assume it is pretty special." Pierce asked, obviously considering how my companion needed to be worked into our plans.
I described their ability to switch to the same elemental aspects I used, and their spells, though neither I nor my companion were able to give a real list of spells yet.
My companion decided to show off their empowering spell from life mana.
They cast it on me first, it helped alleviate my Growing hunger.
Then after a warning, they cast it on Pierce. Ivo had to quadruple his emotional absorption, as the response from the buff was an intense burst of undirected rage. Because the spell empowered every class ability Pierce had, including the one that made him angry all the time.
We agreed that it would be amazing for him in combat, considering how his class grew more powerful with his levels of rage.
I could feel Ivo's apprehension as he asked to try the buff, he was not looking forward to the possible increase in empathic intensity. He said the bond had actually seemed to help him mentally manage the emotions he received from us more easily, but he still experienced what we felt on a different level than the bond provided.
When the buff was applied, it didn't seem to negatively impact Ivo's mind at all. Pierce, my companion and myself experienced a bit of a side effect though, as we felt all of our emotions drain away. We were left with nothing but logic and instinct. Then we all felt worried, it was obvious to me that the emotional influence was external, but it made me worried about the effects on our minds nonetheless.
"How long does this last?" Ivo asked, he felt nervous, and suddenly all of us were nervous.
"I don't know, not forever, that's for sure, but I never really tested how long. The one time we used it before, it ended in a reset when my staff tried a different spell on me."
My tail twitched, the nervousness was getting to me.
"Ivo, I'm sure it will be fine, you're making us nervous. Please stop, if you can."
"Oh shit." He said, and we felt embarrassed.
I laid down and covered my face with my paws.
"Let's just reset, so we can test something else."
We felt relieved.