“Again!” The [Guild Master] bellowed, already cocking back his fist for another devastating blow.
“Maybe if you gave me some constructive criticism, instead of just ordering me around, my progress would actually impro-SHIT!!!” I was whining about my treatment for what felt like the hundredth time, but was forced to hastily erect (Ahah, ‘erect’) my usual layered honeycomb barrier, the only difference being that my beastly instructor wanted me to do so without the aid of my [Totems], or my staff, relying solely on how fast I could ‘weave’ the [Barrier] on the fly.
How come I could do that now? Well, when Sheeno was done teaching me about the political intrigues and social norms that plagued [Nexus], she actually brought along her next visits the advanced versions of the books I had taken so long ago at my old [Guild], which included the aptly, if unoriginally, named ‘advanced spell-weaving’ and ‘advanced Mana manipulation’. And I was incredibly grateful to her, so much so that I didn’t complain whenever she decided that she wanted to reprimand me for how easily I could doubt the legitimacy of the [Gods]; but, in my defense, [Luck] never made herself known whenever this happened, making me think that she was probably just making sure that no other [God] could listen in on the blasphemy, so… oops?
Although, Sheeno didn’t say anything about her [Patron], so maybe all the [Gods] purposely didn’t meddle in this kind of discussion? I don’t really have a way to determine so, and [Luck] will ignore me whenever I bring up the topic, so I’ll have to shelve it for now.
I still don’t know what came over me to be that antagonistic to the [Gods], and it kind of worries me more than their eventual reaction, if there ever will be one.
My inner monologue was about done when Rubicon’s fist impacted my [Barriers], breaking them all apart, but not before they managed to dampen the impact enough that only a bit of wind pressure remained at the end of his punch, which only ruffled my hair a little bit.
“Good enough. But if you spent more time concentrating, and less complaining, maybe it could have done even better”, the [Guild Master] remarked, while inspecting his knuckles.
Of course, he was expecting the damage to his fists: I was finally able to return at least some of the kinetic energy my shields were hit by back to the sender.
And don’t get me wrong, it was harder than I had originally thought, and it only worked with my [Runes], at least for now.
And speaking about [Runes]: I just thought that they were the basis to put [Enchantments], [Skills], and [Spells] on physical material the old-fashioned way, akin to [Arrays], but apparently one could repurpose the rigid lines they were composed of with pure [Mana], literally enabling anyone to accomplish anything, at least as long as they could afford the insane cost in [FP]. Because that was a major drawback, the high [Fatigue] cost, and not the necessity to memorize the highly complex tri-dimensional [Runes] in their entirety, where the slightest mistake would just render the whole thing useless.
There was also the matter that it wasn’t as fast as simply activating a [Skill] or [Spell], so I guess you could consider that as a drawback, but since I was a ‘harassing-backliner’ to begin with, it didn’t really impact how I fought, so it didn’t change much from my usual tactics.
Thankfully, that was where some of my more unused [Traits] came finally to use, like [Immaginative Mind] allowing me to perfectly recreate the structures in my mind, [Artistic Inclination] making it so I could more easily extrapolate the equivalent [Runes] from what I observed (more on that later), or [Mind Over Matter], which single-handedly made it so I could summon the little sticks of Mana to my leisure, making them ignore normal constraints like outside interference or other types of obstacles that would normally stump someone already decently versed in the medium.
But not me, and even Rubicon quickly found it hard to match my improvements in making quick [Runes], except going less easy on me. But then I started switching between completing the [Runes], and basting their unfinished form into unstable sparkles of [Mana], creating a veritable minefield of damaging dust of unstable energy, which I could command at my leisure thanks to my [Manakinesis].
Still, on the matter of [Runes], the biggest difference I was experiencing between them and a [Matrix] was that they were visible to the naked eye of other people, so if you were slow, another party could just mess it up into uselessness, and for some reason, their nature as segmented ‘sticks’, and not circular ‘rings’, made it so they weren’t limited to what your [Class] could do, even though it did come more natural if you limited yourself to that, but it also meant that you couldn’t ‘save’ your creation as a [Spell] or [Skill], but could only use it as a one-time type of thing, that you needed to recreate from scratch every single time you wanted to utilize it.
I can only surmise that the [Guild Master] understood that I would excel in the art of [Rune-Crafting] from what he knew about me, or what he learned during the first few days of intense physical training, since I had started experimenting with [Runes] only I found them being briefly mentioned in Sheeno’s books; and, honestly, that only pointed out that he must have a monstrous amount of [Insight], or he was just that good at finding a person’s specialty, even when they themselves didn’t know about it.
I don’t know which was worse, but I currently didn’t care, since I was mostly pissed off at the relatively small change my [Status] reflected after two weeks, and the utter lack of anything new on my page relevant to [Runes].
“But there has to be something specific for this: It’s too OP to there not being one!”
BODY
MIND
SPIRIT
Strength
38
Acuity
62
Energy
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
99
Dexterity
50
Will
160
Serendipity
70
Reflex
64
Insight
85
Ego
36
I mean, overall the gains I guess are nice, with increases across the board, but for some fucking reason [Energy] decided to stop a fucking 99!
I was so painfully close to getting my [Secondary Stats] before [Lvl 10], and yet everything I did felt like it was rebuffed by some invisible barrier, stopping me from accomplishing any kind of progress on that front.
“They really need to advertise such walls, or people will go mad trying to overcome them!”
Such a wall can be overcome, but usually, it requires one to push against their limits to an unbearably painful degree.
I am honestly more surprised about your Ego-growth, showing that the meditation worked even better than expected.
“Yeah, I guess that’s nice…”
Apparently [Ego] couldn’t be increased by random chance or by [Lvl-Up], there were no [Classes] that gave such bonuses, but only through dedicated effort. Such effort normally required you to sit alone in a room and ponder on the reality of self, also known as good ol’ introspection, but said the other way sounds cooler.
Also, it is as boring as both ways make it sound.
“And… I guess that marks the end of the two weeks of mandated isolation”, the [Guild Master] rudely brought me back to the present, “now, if you really wanted to train, you could remain under my care for a little longer-”
“Yeah, no thanks”, I interrupted before he could try to rope me in for some more torture.
“Fair. Then get out and don’t make me find any reasons to make you come back”, and with that last recommendation, he appeared behind me, grabbed me by the back of my shirt, and threw me out of the chamber.
“May our fates not cross again!” I shouted on my flight out, used by now to the treatment.
So used to the treatment I was, in fact, that I had an elasticized [Barrier] waiting for my butt to intercept my landing. A tactic that I dedicated myself to learning as soon as [Runes] were introduced into my training, because he had been throwing out of his room every day since we had begun.
Not that a normal [Barrier] couldn’t shield my bum just as easily from the impact, but there is a difference between simply displacing the impact upon contact, and being hefted back up by a ‘trampoline-like’ sheat, which mainly comes down to how comfortable it feels on my buttocks.
Comfort is king, after all.
“Likewise!” Rubicon shouted just in time for his voice not to be cut off by the massive doors slamming closed.
I dusted my cape for a moment, jiggling the staff on my back for a moment, to make sure it was still there and went on my way.
“Bye Doris, have a good day, and may our fates cross again!” I cheerily said to the usual [Secretary].
“Goodbye Mr. Dulcet, thank you, good day to you too, and may the [Gods] will it”, she quietly responded with a light smile.
What a sweet lady: She’s kind of wasted on the likes of Riverfist.
I was going down the needlessly long staircase when I met up with Sheeno halfway up.
“Oh, you’re out! I was coming up for a last round of teaching, but I guess we can finish that at home”, She said, surprised, and almost bumping into me, even though I had stopped well enough in advance, given that my [Unavoidable Detection] had already caught her on my radar.
“I mean, sure; I think we’re just missing to go over the geo-political conflict between Gem-based Fae and Metal-based Dwarves. But before that, I really need a freaking bed for my room first”, because yes, when Rubicon had asked for my accommodations to remain austere, Sheeno had delivered. And, oh boy, did she deliver: My room was completely empty, except for the equivalent of a yoga mat and a straw pillow to sleep or meditate on.
Again, comfort was king, and I was suffering from such an utter lack of it.
“Well, we could share mine, if you weren’t such a wimp about it”, she retorted, as had become usual the last week.
I don’t know what came over her lately: Last week she still was kind of pissed off at me for that rant about my perceived nature of the [Gods], and now she was coming over on me very blatantly.
And I didn’t care about normal social conventions enough to not relent and finally ask directly the interested party.
“Can I ask you what changed for you to start flirting so aggressively?” I queried my companion.
“You can ask, but if I’ll answer is an entirely different matter”, she cheekily answered, without betraying any expression on her face, an ability indubitably learned when she was still in line for her throne.
I just sent her an unamused glare, and she raised two of her hands in mock surrender.
“Ok, ok. I just realized that our two cultures must have highly diverse courting methods, and since I was getting tired of waiting for you to make the first move, I’ve started the courting instead”, she relented, blushing slightly.
“Wait, all this flirting was for real then!?” I asked, genuinely surprised.
Though my [Precognitive Aura], which still held some trait from the previous [Empathic Aura] it [Evolved] from, I could see her actions had affection behind it, but so did most of hers in my regard, and since we had already confessed that we liked one another I didn’t put much weight in it besides it being that.
But Sheeno wasn’t randomly flirting, she was ‘flirting flirting’.
“Of course it’s real: Why shouldn’t it be!?” She asked back, now slightly annoyed.
“Because we already had a heart-to-heart during our [Quest], where we agreed that it was a bit soon to start a relationship!?” I answered with another question, now equally annoyed.
“That was almost a month ago! Since then we spent almost every hour of the day in the company of each other, and I changed my mind. Am I not allowed to do that!?” Sheeno was getting to the point of shouting, so, without any word, I just grabbed her hand and hurried her to the teleporting room, and more precisely towards our personal [Array] aligned to the one in our mansion.
Not even a minute later we were in the privacy of our home, and since Sheeno had understood what I was going for she hadn’t said anything else until now,
Emphasis on the ‘until now’.
“Well!? I’m waiting!” She said, visibly annoyed now, with two of her hands on her hips, and the other two folded under her breasts.
“Of course, you can change your mind, I’m in no way in the position to decide otherwise, nor anyone should ever be. It just caught me by surprise that you did it so quickly, but that must be what you meant by the differences in our cultures”, I finally answered, leaving the teleportation room, and entering the living room of our private living arrangements.
She observed me for a few seconds, until she seemed to decide that calming down was the right course of action.
“No, I meant something else, more akin to what your people would call it ‘who wears the pant in the relationship’; the fact that pre-[System] people valued time differently actually didn’t even pass my mind”, she explain-
“I-uuuhhhhhh… Wait, what!?” I intelligently exclaimed.
Sheeno just rolled her eyes, grabbed me by the front of my shirt, and lifted me in the air.
“What are you doing!?” I asked alarmed and surprisingly turned on by what I hoped was going to happen.
“This”, she simply answered, just before she forcefully brought me in for a kiss.
Not that I resisted it, au contraire…