Another interesting fact about scrying spells, I could tell where the sensor was in relation to me. The reading was a little strange but I attributed it to the exotic nature of the dungeon itself. My sister was apparently several hundred kilometers above me, likely on the surface, and around the same distance horizontally.
I wasn't an expert on the surface's geography but I doubted she was in the eastern empires Katherine had mentioned. Though if the Crimson Lys was in bed with the upper classes, it was likely they plied their trade everywhere.
Out of curiosity, I tried to scry for someone else. I let a mental construct take hold of the first spell and started to cast another one, this time aimed at my mother. It locked on and I saw my mother in a very similar situation to Lussernia. In addition to the collar, they also had a set of bands around their wrists and ankles. Likely something to suppress skills. I panned the sensor around and recognized other women from the village, including Vel's mother.
"She's alive," Vel whispered.
I pulled her closer with my pedipalps.
"Not all is lost …" I thought back on my grandmother's words.
This time the sensor was further away in another location entirely, in a direction opposite of my sister.
I tried for a third time for my father but the spell failed to lock on. It felt like it couldn't find what it was looking for. I felt a pang of loss.
"I can't find my father," I said quietly. Vel didn't say anything, she just caressed my pedipalps softly.
With another try, I attempted to locate Lorathana. This time, the spell would have been able to get a lock but my Danger Sense blared at full volume in my head as soon as it did. I forcibly broke the connection and the spell fizzled out.
"And we need to be very careful with scrying," I said, "I think there are ways to follow it back to us. Danger Sense flared up when I tried it with Lora."
"Thank Gaia you picked it then."
I canceled the spells I had active. I didn't want to risk any mage detecting them.
"I think that's enough for today," I said, "I got lucky once and we can't afford any missteps with them."
"You're right," Vel said. Then she flopped down into my web.
I pulled two pillows out of storage and lowered my body next to her.
Sleep wasn't easy to find but thankfully, nothing happened during the night.
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The next day, our group continued through the jungle. More packs of monsters tried their luck at our group but none of them succeeded. The smarter ones tried to ambush us but I had so many magical sensors around our group that nothing could escape my gaze.
One good thing was that the battles gave me ample time to experiment.
The Arcana spells were a gamble but the results were undeniably effective when combined with Runic Magic. With the entire druid spellbook inside of my gauntlet, I had access to a large array of spells and I could draw up to three at once for maximum mayhem.
I also discovered that webs made for an excellent defensive weapon. I could create thread to block certain avenues or trap them if I used the cutting variant. Some monsters were dumb enough to run straight through. With Vel's help in shaping the terrain, there was no such thing as an exposed flank for our group.
Most of my divine spells were geared towards utility and support. Out of all of them, Divine Circle was the best when fighting as a group. The damage reduction effect allowed both of our tanks to handle more enemies at once and mitigated the need for healing. During the Taratect Queen fight, Darrel had relied mostly on potions to heal himself with some help from Elyssa thanks to some water-based healing spells. Since Vel and I both had several spells to heal, the consumption of potions had dropped down to zero.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
When out of combat, I let some of my mental constructs focus on filling the gaps in my memorized spells. I filled my two remaining Nature magic slots with Ichor Interlude, a blood based spell that could be used both to heal or harm by modifying the blood flow inside the target, and split my metal manipulation spells into two to get more out of them. Brass Crescendo kept the ability to move metal while Bronze Ballad shaped it.
To test the new metal control spell, I used the throwing needles I had acquired for our trial. I had neglected them after we had fled the village and had become a bit redundant once I had created the Arcane Mine spell. With Psychokinesis and Brass Crescendo however, I could combine them with Magic Strike to deliver a volley of touch spells on my enemies.
I dispatched one of the rune panthers that tried to ambush us with well placed needles infused with Ichor Interlude before it could move against us. The potential for assassinations with this technique was scary.
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In the middle of the day, the group took a break in a small clearing. I pulled the cauldron of soup from the previous day out of my storage amulet, still warm and ready to go thanks to the stasis, and we all ate a second serving. To go with the broth, Darrel provided several small loaves of bread to dip. It felt strange to taste leavened bread again, the bakers in the village exclusively produced flatbread for some reason.
Once our break was over, we continued our march through the jungle and I continued my magical improvements.
For Arcane, I took the plunge into the Ichor element and created two spells, Reconstruction and Destruction. The first was a healing spell, akin to a form of biokinesis. It required a more in-depth knowledge of the body to be used effectively but the tradeoff was that I wouldn't be restricted in what I could heal. Light-based spells were the norm among healers since they were mostly automatic once pointed in the right direction but they struggled to deal with conditions that were a result of a body's default state like genetic diseases or severed limbs after a while. With Reconstruction, I would be able to bypass those problems.
Destruction was a mirror opposite, it used a spike of pure Arcane mana to invade the target's body and leave Ichor attuned mana inside to wreak havoc on their organs. The spell's effectiveness was influenced by the target's mana resistance; higher level monsters with more mana fared better than lower level ones. I theorized that the same would apply to other sentients as well.
Combined with Magic Strike and the needles control technique, I had yet another tool in my arsenal that could potentially punch above my weight class once again. The last Arcane spell was Gravity Lift which created a field of inverted gravity that pulled anyone inside into the air. Very useful to disable packs of enemies and it was non-lethal as well.
For my Psychic set, I added a counterpart to Berserk in the form of Calm to pacify the targets, modified the Gravity spell into Singularity to create a better area denial option, added Stasis which wrapped the targets into a field of force to prevent them from moving, and Psychic Barrier to add to my defensive arsenal.
Skill Nature Magic reached rank 3, level 24 (+4 levels)
Skill Arcane Magic reached rank 3, level 26 (+6 levels)
Skill Psychic Magic reached rank 3, level 22 (+2 levels)
Reached Level 141 (Rank 5, +12 level)
Gained: 7 ES (Essence cap of 1000 reached, 7 ES overflow)
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When nightfall came, we established a camp in a clearing again. Gwynn and Katherine were responsible for the watch. I also threaded my webs around the camp as a second layer of security but I didn't anticipate any problems.
I wanted to attempt to scry again but Vel dissuaded me. Danger Senses had triggered last time but I wasn't confident there weren't ways to fool it. I also wondered if my aborted attempt had been registered. Was the probe enough or did it need a fully established connection? Was it possible to sense an active scrying sphere with Magic Perception? How long did it take to trace back through the connection? Could I detect it? What kind of anti-scrying defenses were there?
Those were the kind of questions I needed answered before I tried again.
The existence of scrying magic implied so many things for information security in the world. It was obvious there would be defenses and countermeasures. I doubted I was the only person with access to it after all.
And I had charged in blind like an idiot.
I couldn’t afford to take risks like that, I wasn't the only one who would bear the consequences. If the Crimson Lys thought some part of their operation had been compromised, I didn't know how they would react. It was possible they would … disappear their captives to remove all traces.
The possibility of Vel and I being captured was very real as well.