The idea of personal physical violence has an undeniable attraction to me. I can shoot you, blast you apart, use poison gas against you or turn your blood to poison, but I still want to be able to beat the shit out of you. I guess some things never change. And yes, that ranking up enhances many physical attributes makes that a sensible idea, but still that is not the reason I want it.
So I use another skill book right after waking up. I learn the „Way of the Sage“
Washing with cold water is no fun, magical body or not. Pavol intercepts me even before breakfast, which we are having together.
PN: I wanted to ask you something regarding … regarding my mother in law’s body. We feel … that she did not belong in this world. Burying her here would be like trapping her far from home.
P: I see, however, I don’t think this area will provide enough dry wood for a cremation.
PN: No, we were wondering … . You have the power of annihilation, don’t you?
P: Yes.
PN: After breakfast?
P: Yes of course.
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RP: It is your turn to cook.
DT: Yes, but I have decided that we’ll offer our stuff to the aliens. If we are to travel together we must get to know each other.
RP: And you decide that just as it would be your turn to cook.
DT: Yes
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Our „guests“ want to join us for breakfast. They are offering tea. And deliciously smelling bread. I expect objections. But obviously Zora is a member of the school of keeping your enemy even closer. So I conjure an additional table to put next to the existing one and a few chairs. She does only take from bread one of them has already taken from, though.
The tea is excellent. Their leader seems agitated.
RP: Do you think they have understood what we want?
DT: I think so, but they do not understand why we want to do so. How could they?
OL: Maybe we should depart on our own and let them follow?
DT: I don’t dare.I fear we are already being watched and they just don’t dare attack unknown people with unknown backers.
KN: May I suggest that we leave this place? It carries too many bad memories. And it has few practical advantages. We don’t even have water.
L: Our guests want us to go to a city on the coast.
P: I doubt that they want to sell us into slavery. But I am not certain. Following them into an intermediate camp seems a good idea. We can get stronger and learn the language.
L: We should depend tomorrow.
Nobody disagrees. She stands up, points at the sun, slowly traces a path across the sky and back through the ground.
RP: I think she suggested leaving tomorrow.
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We have assembled.
KN: Mom, you gave me everything. We will preserve this family. I’ll never forget you.
She nods to me. I annihilate the corpse.
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I’ve found out that [Eldritch Eyes] can be used to give water to sleeping people. According to Karolína they are not unconcious in the classical sense, but neither are they asleep. She is watching them. If this last much longer I presumably could feed them broth this way.
The rest of us has gathered, while our guests are standing watch or meditating.
I raise my hand and clear my throat. Nobody objects.
P: I am tired to the bone. We are surrounded by death, people who shoot at us, monsters and just fled from a world that was crumbling. But we are still threatened and we don’t know whom we can trust. I got some of you into this mess and other we met on the way. I know that tired people make rash decisions, but we are together in this universe. In fact we are the only people from our universe.
Z: You sound like a politician. You should find out whether they do elections at all before you train electioneering.
L: Least of all with us as test subjects.
P: There. If you openly talk about your feelings, it’s wrong. If you keep them to yourself, it is also wrong. Anyway, some of us have magical powers at their disposals, other have not or inferior forms of that. I have picked some things up that can change that. Pavol, here are essences for you and Karolína. I can do the rituals.
Zora nods in approval, Lidija’s mien is unreadable.
Argus #1 starts ringing and the younger man among our guests comes running to us, yelling something we don’t understand.
RP: Desert horde lizards! A medium swarm!
P: Zora, wait I need to build a pipe to you, so I can feed you mana for your new gun.
It takes half a minute.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Then we accompany our guests. The elven lady among them is now carrying a spear made from a blue glowing, etheral substance. We arrive on the ridge. In front of us a group of hundreds of lizards slowly crawls towards us. They are quite close. Zora immediately starts emplacing magical mines in front of us. In between them she curses lizards.
Z: Use artillery. Go all out. We might stop wounded stragglers, but if the whole group comes through …
The younger man among our guests conjures a blue translucent man-high shield supporting itself on the ground with a rod pointing backwards and a massive crossbow that rests on a pin dedicated to it on the upper rim of the shield.
Their leader draws a circle in the air. The bearlike creature steps out of it.
I go for it [Nebelwerfer 42] materializes and I use chemical warfare on it. Tubes are added. That has drained me to a dangerous extent. I cast [Cornucopia]. I feel multiple auras washing over me. Their leader raises his hand. I shake my head and wave him down, pointing at my artillery.
He nods. They have been watching us.
I give the monsters my best strike. The artillery piece is loud like a mutated organ played by a mammoth on drugs and within seconds a few pieces of lizard monsters rain down on us. Dozens who were directly hit are dead. More than half are wound or poisoned.
Zora opens up with her new monster gun. I let my assault rifle speak. Some die but a majority lives. Olutha casts javelins of light. Many she hits die instantly, some merely burn. Rupert sends a bolt that explodes into the horde. His ballista seems to rachet itself back to readiness. He conjures a smaller crossbow.
In less than two minutes the majority of them is wounded. They have located us. Olutha has switched to targeting the fast hale monsters with her magic spear, which she hurls at them and returns by telekinesis. It reliably finishes them.
The rest of us just keeps firing into the crowd. Zora begins slacking. I hand her a stamina potion. We don’t have many of them, but some are left. Zora’s gun begins hammering again. I feel [Cornucopia] coming to an end. [Joy of sustained fire] gives out mana. It is not enough. I start draining a few poisoned monsters. It heals them, but allows Zora to keep going for a few seconds. It must end. She ceases fire. Lidija succeeds in getting my attention after a few seconds.
L: Cast a pipe on me.
I hastily pour out the salt. She steps on it. Meanwhile Zora has switched to targeted mines. Lidija steps into the circle. The pipe starts forming and I start firing again. The first lizards start reaching our protective mines and blow up. Some start flanking us. Dean orders his bear to clean up our left flank. It is bronze rank. Its claws tear them apart. But it is only that flank. Olutha starts casting another barrage of javelins. Lidija starts a chant. I telekinetically throw lizards on our right flank backwards onto a heap. Lidija’s chant is finished. Mana channels through me to Zora. Her rotary gun starts hammering again. That secures us breathing room. Lidija’s aura has recharged the rest of us. Olutha throws out another barrage of javelins. I think I can do something more useful than firing bullets. I have created a concentration of monsters. I chant for [Wrath of the Magister] the full form and annihilate them. Lidija starts chanting again. She refills me. I need to wait for it to come of it countdown. I start firing again and put my staffs into my other hands. They are weakened by numerous wounds so that the staffs kill. Zora is spent in terms of stamina. She screams for me to create another concentration, while Lidija’s aura replenishes her stamina. I cast [Wrath of the Magister] again, this time the form for coloured beams. I use a few beams for reducing resistance.
Zora takes off. The front line again crashes into the mines. This time a few stragglers makes it through. Zora crashes down like a bomb on a concentration. Like a blur she returns to our lines with, leaving a wavy line of speared and burning lizards. She opens her mouth and finishes those in front of us. We actually have a short respite in which only my staffs and Rupert’s crossbow keep killing. The wounded majority will soon be upon us. Lidija casts [Mantle of Frenzy] on Zora. Dean starts a lengthy chant. Rupert follows suit. I go into hulk form and hand out spears.
A whirlwind of leaves covers us. They form a layer of flexible armour on our skins. As Rupert is finished purple light of force appear around our limbs. What follows is a carnage, but we kill so many that Lidija’s aura makes us for practical purposes unkillable.
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Lidija and I have looted the monsters. We compute the numbers and it turns out that we have killed about 900 monsters. Lidija actually needed to use [Regenerate] to fix a head wound caused by a superheavy loot bag.
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OL: This feels like the monster surge is very close.
DT: Tell me that you got this on a recording crystal.
RP: Sure did. But that filled up my last crystal. You wanted me to make more recordings.
DT: Sorry, out of crystals. Olutha?
OL: Sorry, I don’t carry recording … Wait, Chodhen gave my a box of his. He thinks battles against bandits should be recorded. - Here you are.
RP: These are the expensive ones from the artisan association.
OL: Yes. So what?
RP: These things have a MULTILINGUAL OPTION!
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Sleep is out of the question right now. I need to calm my thoughts.
Gun: [Tools of the Magister] Special Ability Iron 2 (63%) [Joy of Sustained Fire] Blood Special Attack Iron 2 (29%) [This is my Gun] Myriad Special Attack/Conjuration
Iron 2 (73%)
[Chemical Warfare] Defiance Special Attack/Conjuration
Iron 1 (46%)
[Hyperkinetic Cannon] Gun Special Attack/Conjuration Iron 1 (11%) Vast: [Giant Form of the Ancestors] Special Ability Iron 1 (69%) [Immortality] Tree Special Ability Iron 2 (36%) [Nebelwerfer 42] Focus Special Attack/Conjuration Iron 1 (25%) [Arsenal of the Mad Scientist] Magotech Special Ability Iron 2 (33%) [Eldritch Eyes] Water Special Ability & Attack Iron 1 (25%) Dimension: [Teleport] Special Ability Bronze 0 (0%) [Dance by my Will] Dance Aura Ability Iron 3 (23%) [Eternal Moment] Reach Special Ability Iron 1 (78%) [Path in Time] Hunt Perception Ability Iron 2 (74%) [Wrath of the Magister] Corruption Special Attack/Spell Iron 1 (99%) Battlefield: [Equip the Army] Special Ability Iron 3 (33%) [Robotic Servant of War] Magotech Special Attack/Conjuration
Iron 2 (17%)
[Pipes of War] Unity Special Ability Iron 1 (52%) [Cornucopia] Feast Special Ability Iron 1 (11%) [Feast of Decontamination] Light Special Ability Iron 1 (2%)
I spit blood onto the floor of my car. It takes a few spirit coins to clean that up. Not an issue after this. And while I am at it another book. I used that stuff today. „The Way of the Trickster“. Well, why not.