Wyatt lay on the ground, breathing heavily, feeling very nauseous.

Beside him lay the corpse of the level 7 mummy.

It had taken a lot of beating to kill it, and the only reason he was still alive was because it had been weakened by Devitalize and hadn’t had any limbs left to hit him with.

Thankfully it didn’t try to bite him like a zombie, so he was free to bludgeon it to death as it thrashed beneath him.

Even its thrashes were strong, and he’d been flung off several times. His titan skin was now at ninety-one percent cohesion.

Eventually Wyatt caught his breath and sat up and glared at the corpse.

Only for sudden excitement to overtake him at the potential of the orb this one would contain.

He wasted no time cutting the body open and liberating it.

🞠

Wyatt stared at the message he’d gotten for this latest orb. It was another new type.

⦗Item Orb, Level 7⦘

He lacked the compulsion to eat this one as well, but unlike the Essence Orbs, he could use it right away, it seemed.

Spend ⦗Item Orb⦘ to gain random item of type (Special)?

Can I use it in any other way?

He focused on it and tried activating it, but the same message appeared.

He tried upgrading it with his Reformation Orb, but nothing happened, maybe because it was level 7.

Shrugging, he gave his assent, and the orb began flashing, colors rapidly shifting. Then it gradually slowed until stopping on a deep blue, almost violet.

Then the orb crunched in on itself in his hand and suddenly gained a massive amount of weight.

He quickly let go before his arm could be ripped off.

The imploded orb hit the ground with a solid thunk, leaving a deep divot in the dark stone floor.

Then it exploded. But instead of fragments flying everywhere, the explosion halted in midair, the fragments forming a shape.

There was a final flash of color, and the item took full form and thunked to the ground, cracking the floor further.

Wyatt glared down at it.

“A shield? Are you kidding me?”

He examined the item.

⦗Rune Shield of Consumption, Level 7 (Special)⦘

His disappointment faded slightly.

Shield of Consumption? Does it steal life or something? Or is it going to consume me? It probably doesn’t mean tuberculosis.

As fun as experimenting was, he wished the messages gave more information.

Maybe that’s an upgrade I can get.

He stared down at the shield.

It was a shade of dull pewter, six symbols etched into its face. Three were the same, but the other three were all different.

“How am I supposed to carry you? Can I even use a level-seven item?”

He tried lifting it.

He could manage it, but he wouldn’t be going anywhere fast.

Or slow. Or at all. It felt like it weighed twice what he did. Maybe more.

He could deadlift it up, but there was no way he could actually wield it.

Its back had a simple leather loop, and he couldn’t imagine how it was capable of supporting the item’s weight. Or how it wouldn’t simply rotate around anyone’s arm who tried to use it.

He was about to try running Energy into his mantle to see if it would lighten things he was carrying as well as his body, but stopped and tried running Energy into the shield instead.

It suddenly felt like it weighed nothing at all and the golden lines from his armor expanded to the shield. There was an additional drain, but it didn’t feel like it was on his Energy. Instead it felt like the same amount of Energy was now flowing through both items.

He also got two new messages.

Synergy discovered

Is sharing Energy the synergy?

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

He still couldn’t get any more information about what the synergy was or what it did, but the second message was more informative:

Rune Shield of Consumption

Effect (Special): Effortless Defense

Runes active: None

Runes available: 3

Open Slots: 3

Is the special effect why it’s lighter?

He focused on the runes available, and a new message appeared.

Rune of Hunger

Rune of Desire

Rune of Alacrity

He activated the Alacrity rune.

The drain on his Energy increased so swiftly that it drained him dry before he could react, all the items from his belt falling to the ground as his titan skin retracted to the diamond on his chest.

His Energy gone and thus no longer flowing into it, the shield suddenly gained weight again, and this time it did pull him down with it.

He grunted as he freed his arm from the binding. His titan skin had completely retracted when he’d run out of Energy, but the only damage was a friction burn where the shield’s handle had rested.

And a very sore shoulder and knee.

I guess I need more Energy. Or maybe I’m supposed to activate the runes on an enemy. Or I’m too low level.

He sat down, letting his Energy recover and the pain in his knee subside, and thinking.

I can put Energy into it even though it’s a level 7 item and I’m level 0. Item levels might have nothing to do with a person’s level, or maybe that’s why it drained so much Energy when I tried to use a rune. I can use the weight-reducing effect at least, and that takes barely any Energy.

When his Energy was full again, he ran some into his mantle and tried picking up the shield. It was its normal weight until he got full hold of it, then it lightened. Not as much as running Energy directly into the shield, it still felt heavy as hell, but he could carry it and move around.

He ran Energy into the shield, then stopped putting any into his mantle.

It’s definitely lighter this way than using the mantle. Almost weightless. Effortless. So better to just put Energy directly into the shield.

He tried again to get some kind of interface for his titan skin, but couldn’t get anything to appear.

I can see the effect on the shield, but maybe that’s because its type is Special? The titan skin and mantle don’t have a type listed.

I wonder if it’s actually decreasing its mass, or just making it feel light…

He tapped the shield against the wall. The wall cracked.

Wyatt considered the crack, then hit the wall again, harder this time.

A minute later the whole section of wall had crumbled, revealing a black material with veins of white running through it. Whatever material it was made of, it was utterly impervious to his assaults.

Moving to the opposite side, he put Energy in his mantle and stopped putting it in the shield, then tried hitting the wall again.

He eventually got it to crack, but only slightly.

So my mantle actually decreases its mass or weight somehow, but activating the shield only makes it feel to me like it’s been lightened.

Moving a few steps down the corridor, he put Energy into both at the same time, then very lightly jumped.

He still hit the ceiling, but not hard. He maneuvered the shield beneath him and drifted to the ground. When the shield made contact, the ground cracked.

So it preserves momentum, or maybe just kinetic energy? I guess that would make sense, since it only relies on mass and velocity, and while velocity is low its not zero, and mass doesn’t seem changed, just the force I expierence.

He built up speed by running the way he’d come until a bend in the corridor.

Instead of turning, he charged straight into the wall.

It was obliterated in a single hit, revealing that black, white-veined substance beneath.

I can run much faster with the mantle because I’m lighter, yet keep my strength and my feet seem to fall at the normal rate when I’m running. And it seems like the shield keeps its mass, I just can’t feel it when I run Energy into it.

Is it selectively altering gravity?

He swung the shield then tried altering its trajectory mid-swing. He could do so easily. So if it preserved momentum, it was only when it made contact with something, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to alter its course.

He charged down the corridor again, back to where he started.

No wind. So it’s air-resistance too?

He set the shield down and tried it with just his mantle.

It felt the same, no wind in his ears. So that effect at least was fully from his mantle.

He tried it again, this time putting Energy only into the shield.

He couldn’t run anywhere near as fast and he felt wind on his face, but the bit of wall he impacted with the shield was similarly obliterated.

So putting Energy into the shield makes it feel like it weighs nothing to me, and I can reduce what seems like my own weight with the mantle. And the mantle seems to preserve my own body’s mass, since I nearly broke my wrists when I jumped up and hit the ceiling. But falling to the ground with just the mantle, I impact lightly.

It must be changing things based on the circumstances.

Or maybe I should stop trying to apply known-physics to something that seems like magic to me.

Next he sat down, resting the shield against the floor, and tried the rune of Hunger.

Same result as Alacrity: it drained his Energy. This time he was quicker to cut it off before it could drain all of it.

He tried Desire next to the same result.

So either I don’t have anywhere near enough Energy to activate the runes, I’m supposed to use it on an enemy, or whatever their effect is, is channeled. Like Emma’s Willbreaker skill.

At least I have a more durable weapon than my titan skin. Cohesion is still at a hundred percent even after bashing the walls.

He considered his next options as he reformed his belt and picked up the items he’d dropped and put them away.

As he was stuffing the cerements he’d gathered into their pouch, he realized he hadn’t checked the level seven’s, and he scanned the rubble for the corpse.

⦗Decayed Cerements, Level 7⦘

Attempting to use the Reformation Orb on them yielded no results.

He tried it on his shield next, which also failed to produce a result.

That lends more credence to it being related to the item’s level, since it also didn’t work on the Essence Orb or cerements from the level 2.

He bundled up the level 7 cerements and formed another pouch for them on his belt. It was getting full to the point of awkwardness, but he wasn’t going to leave any loot behind.

Items tested and loot gathered, Wyatt continued on through the corridors, encountering another level 1 mummy, which basically exploded when he hit it with his new shield, and getting another Essence Orb which he didn’t even have to cut out of it.

He’d attempted to use one of the runes at the moment of impact, and his Energy had been drained by doing so, but he couldn’t tell if using the rune had been why it had exploded, or whether it’d had any effect on the mummy at all.

He’d felt something though, some resonance with… something.

Is that the synergy? With my skill? Hunger? But I don’t feel hungry when I use Debuffer. The opposite. I feel fed.

Am I eating something? Stealing something? Is that how it’s debuffing? Taking some vital force away and replacing it with something else?

A message suddenly appeared before him.

[Debuffer] arcanum discovered