[Piercing Shot Successful]
[Successful Use 96/100]
[Qi -30]
[Karma -5]
[Absorption Successful]
[Qi 1000]
[Karma 100]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1,831,227/23,824,636]
[Current Qi: 1,836,991/957,945,100]
[Current Karma: 95,298,547/107,275,977]
[Max Will: 9,579,451]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,692K,180P,687R,179Da,155De,105k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10680St]
I pop a strand on a dark robed figure and visualize trying to snatch him into my hand as a ball. What happens instead is his physical body disappears, all of his gear drops, a ball of energy zips into my hand, melds into me then dissipates. So… What just happened?
That wasn’t a soul suck --. I take several more arrows through the abdomen, sharp pains as they pierce my body, but it fades so quickly, and I know I’m healing it. I look around, hand still raised, confused as hell as I try to see if anyone else saw the absorb thing. I make eye contact with an archer who focuses on me, and I remember that these people are actively trying to kill, not just capture.
[Piercing Shot x2]
[Successful Use 98/100]
[Qi -30 x2]
[Karma -5 x2]
[Absorption x2]
[Qi 1000 x2]
[Karma 100 x2]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1831227/23824683]
[Current Qi: 1838921/957945100]
[Current Karma: 95298732/107275977]
[Max Will: 9,579,451]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,692K,180P,687R,179Da,155De,105k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10680St]
I flick my fingers on one hand at one target, then repeat with my other hand on another target, my wrists crossing before I swipe their balls, -- phrasing! -- and bank their gear.
[Piercing Shot x4]
[Successful Use 102/100]
[Qi -30 x4]
[Karma -5 x4]
[Absorption x4]
[Qi 1000 x4]
[Karma 100 x4]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1831227/23824778]
[Current Qi: 1842801/957945100]
[Current Karma: 95299112/107275977]
[Max Will: 9,579,451]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,692K,180P,687R,179Da,155De,105k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10680St]
I flick both hands twice, different targets for each flick, getting out four strings, tethering them for a quick pull, -- better, but no, -- and banking their gear. I feel slower than instinct, but faster than my conscious reflexes. Am I improving? It’s not a buckshot blast like my silk spray, these are targeted, precise, and I’m doing it!
Someone runs me through from behind, grabbing onto my shoulder for leverage with their free hand before palming my face.
[Absorption]
[Qi 1000]
[Karma 100]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1831227/23824778]
[Current Qi: 1842801/957945100]
[Current Karma: 95299112/107275977]
[Max Will: 9,579,451]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,692K,180P,687R,179Da,155De,105k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10680St]
I’m not sure what their original goal was, but the second their sweaty skin presses against face scales I snatch them. Not sure if that saved me on silk or if I reabsorb what I use, but thanks for the skin to skin, asshole.
I scan around for more opponents. There’s no one coming after me, but there’s still fighting. I still don’t know if they were going to try to break my neck or spike my head into the dirt and try to turn me into a pincushion, but I can check the Logs later if I really need to know. Further off there’re three men fighting the priest who dodges and disarms them, making sure not to kill, cripple or maim, but the assholes just take turns catching their breath and trying again.
[Piercing Shot x3]
[Successful Use 105/100]
[Qi -30 x3]
[Karma -5 x3]
[Absorption x3]
[Qi 1000 x3]
[Karma 100 x3]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1831227/23824874]
[Current Qi: 1846711/957945100]
[Current Karma: 95299497/107275977]
[Max Will: 9,579,451]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,692K,180P,687R,179Da,155De,105k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10680St]
I bank the equipment as the bodies disappear, the priest not giving the area a second look as he storms over jaw clenched. I glare at him as he approaches, still glaring as he passes me without pause, without word, to the cart, kneeling down to check on the struggling mule as it waits for death. It looks pissed at the inconvenience, but not desperate or afraid. Dude has an enlightened cart mule?
[Piercing Shot]
[Successful Use 105/100]
[Qi -30]
[Karma -5]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1831227/23824873]
[Current Qi: 1846681/957945100]
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[Current Karma: 95299492/107275977]
[Max Will: 9,579,451]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,692K,180P,687R,179Da,155De,105k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10680St]
I don’t know if this will work or not, but I snatch the mule to my bank. When Spring Cow leaps to his face and storms towards me I yelp and transfer after it. I go to pat my chest, trying to acknowledge my heartbeat, and I notice I don’t have any arrows sticking out of me. I might have banked them? Weird, but cool. Would have sucked if --.
The mule brays loudly, and I look over to see it waiting impatiently. Right! Healing! I put in a request, wait for a notification, but the mule just climbs back to its feet, sans arrows. Neat. I don’t know why I bow to it before opening a door, -- are these really my mouths? Since when? Always? I was just opening up wide and going, “look at my belly!”? -- the mule walking out without giving me another look.
I close the door then transfer out, standing back and waiting to see how Spring Cow will react. He’s talking to the mule like a dog. Reserved baby talk. His voice, different tone, but he hasn’t changed the pitch. He pats the mule, who looks proud AF before trundling back to the cart, -- is it literally waiting to be hitched? -- then turns to me. He was smiling, but when he focuses on me the smile drops. Ow.
“I don’t want to encourage such a misuse of your powers, but I will thank you in this instance,” he says, frowning disappointed dad says what? What the fuck? “The healing comes at a cost of the lives trapped within your voids. There is always a cost.”
Oh… Right. Wait, so if I run out of people I’m going to have to sleep again? I had people when the army attacked, right? But I went to sleep instead--, and they kept attacking me… Got it. Today I learned that I’m not going to chance people not attacking me in my sleep in the middle of a fight. Why in the hells did I ever chance sleeping during a fight? I thought it was involuntary.
Fucking, Silent Howl! Wait, are you --. Of course he’s the reason I can sit health bars. He’s still controlling my growth. Did he ever stop? I still want to know why I can’t block his access. ‘Cause if he needs my race name or personal info to affect me, surely I mutate too much for any of that to be of use.
I look around while stretching, checking for any missed loot as Spring Cow hitches the mule back to the cart.
“Quickly!” he says, hopping into the driver’s seat and tipping his head to indicate the back of the cart. “The squad traveling with us had sent out a message and were waiting on reinforcements before you brought out the Blood Rats.
“They’d already investigated the changes in Eager Heart, and the fact that the cause of the changes managed to break free and wander around was an opportunity they were willing to risk their jobs for. They only hoped to distract me and wound you enough to push you back into a long coma,” he says as I jog over and hop into the back. “You can read all of this in your logs. They sent a message by artificial bird to this last group. Who knows who they contacted.”
I’m sitting in the back of the cart staring at him in disbelief. He just said that the first group set this up. We were attacked by what were supposed to be reinforcements, traitors considering this is an Empire level thing. I’m assuming it’s been upgraded because of my Cataclysm rating, so it’s not just a Green River in Green Rivers thing. So traitors, cultivators, treasure hunters, cultists, and just random greedy wannabe lottery winners. And we’re trundling at a walking pace. He’s not even trying to get Zen Mule to move faster!
“All things in their time,” he intones, raising a hand in prayer as he bows his head.
I transfer to my void to start working on food.
“All things in their time,” I say mockingly, viewing the world outside my anchor.
Pffft, my ass! Telling me we need to move slowly and not looks suspicious as people come to kill me. Oh, I’m sorry, they just want to injure me so badly I go into a comatose state, while not harming him at all, so they can abuse my abilities while I can’t defend myself!
Outside I can see that the cart had continued a little further before stopping, my anchor perched just beyond the bed. Tch! I Will my anchor back in place and it actually shifts forward at a walking speed.
“Oh!” I recoil in surprise. “It worked.”
The implications of being able to reposition my anchor while I’m inside --. What are the side effects? I transfer directly to my kitchen, but I never put anything on. I’d run out of fish and I hadn’t decided on what plants to start producing to mix it up a little. I planted berries that grew on brambles, but wasn’t there like a berry that grew in a leafy bushel on the ground… Wait! Wine!
“Right…” I mumble, heading out to check on the boiled down tea with shiver thorn brambles steeping in it.
I bank 2 Jars of what Silent Howl reassures me is a really fucked up poison that practically causes the body to tear itself apart, literally super energetic seizing, while the blood thickens and turns to poison before the victim hemorrhages. If I can find the right herb I can simulate a fire venom wherein the poisonous blood boils and the body explodes as it violently rips itself apart, poisoning others wherein the process repeats itself. When I wonder what it tastes like he falls silent.
“Unhelpful,” I say before it occurs to me that I might be able to have self propagating wine --. “Nope. Mm-mm.”
I shake my head as I put a hard stop on that line of thinking. I split the leftover jar of jelly between three jars, adding water, and setting it off to the side to dilute. I’ll give it a good stir if I remember. New tea leaves go on and I remember that in order to turn my tea into wine I needed to add yeast and sugar. Fack! I did no such thing! Well, I’ve got Black Blood Tea. It doesn’t pack a punch, but it’s still very tasty.
I make sounds of appreciation as I think of having a good bitter tea with a meal of spiced fish and bread. Bread! I check to see if I’ve gotten any in my food tab. I remember a bunch of noodle, my brambles are producing brambles, greenery and berries, my tree’s got nuts and greenery and bark, and I still have ‘tatoes. -- Do I have tomatoes?
I head to the mills, pausing flour production on my dried pseudo-tubers, then remembering to stop drying the mushrooms at all. So… Fish, into the mill to be ground down. A bowl, mixed greens, berries, nuts, fish. Tada! I remember making a dressing, but eating the salad on its own isn’t bad. I bring out a bowl of black tea, still warm, and hum in appreciation. Good stuff.
I check outside my anchor and see the cart in the distance after a bit of looking, so I Will it back into the cart bed. Can’t I just have my anchor in the cart bed. As I’m complaining and imagining it in my head I’m surprised when the visual actually matches.
“Oh!” I nearly drop my bowls, attempting to set them on a counter that doesn’t exist. I’d just sat down near my mills, back against a shack support as I ate. “It worked!”
I set my dishes on the ground dusting my hands off since I’d foregone making utensils, and just watch as the cart moves down the road with my anchor. The priest turns to check on my anchor, gives a little head nod, and I, like a dumbass, wave at the image in my head as he turns around. I hear him laugh in response, so I freeze. Apparently my Logs register what’s going on around my anchor and in my void. I think I figured that out already and then got really annoyed that I’d have more stuff to read. Why was I so short-sighted considering how long I’m supposed to live?
I frown thoughtfully, picking up my meal and eating again while turning my thoughts back to the work I’d need to do. I can check the burrows later. I’ve got time. Maybe a memorial for the Four Bears and my --.
Where’s Persephone’s memorial?
I get up and start walking quickly to exit my yard under the house before remembering I’d enclosed the whole thing. I go through the motions of jumping over the berry brambles as I transfer, landing in the center of the burrows. Where did I have her memorial? It wasn’t farm from water, but my void’s changed since then. Did I put it on a hill --. There are no hills. I go into my bank list and search for the memorial, trying to remember if the bank list works with physically placed objects as well as stored items, but there’s no results. Statue --? There’s plenty of statues, but none of Persephone. I picture her reclined pose as she slowly sloshes her wine gourd while resting on my head, going to my logs to search.
They’d thought about selling it as art, changed their minds, and broke it apart to use the stone.
I walk to where the hill with my house would have stood, destroying the grain and grass farms as I move. I halt the production of the grains and grasses, as well as the harvesting after making sure there’s nothing left to harvest. I’ll destroy the burrows later.
Once I’ve got a nice spot to work with I set up a foundation, then attach to that foundation a stone replica of Persephone’s house along with a little Persephone lounging on her little round bed, one book open in her hand, the other propping up her head, the gourd around the wrist of the hand not holding the book. I will it to be one solid structure, with the little Persephone statue fused to the stone.
The material of the statue I shift to be death essence imbued black iron, grinning as I remember how freaked I was about her wraith baby form. My chest tightens, my eyes sting, my mouth starts flooding, and I turn away so I don’t make a scene in front of her. Don’t want to get her started. Not even her ghosts.
I laugh cry as I make the fairly short walk through the narrow woods to the lake, ignoring the defenses the bears had set up through the woods and around the closest lake shore. By the time I get to the pool of miasma mist I’m calmer. A quick scrub and wash of generated water to my face as I keep walking, then I try to remember what I was doing before.
“Ah! Eating,” I nod to myself as I go back to finish my tea and salad. The tree should be producing Golden Pears soon, if it hasn’t already.