The slight bitter taste of regret for not giving more serious consideration to improving his spell efficiency was washed out with a shocking flood of anticipation. As the other two discarded volumes faded, he barely registered that the new one merged with and expanded the original Arcane Spark spell. Understanding of the changes flooded his mind. There were holes, broken bits. Anything associated with the damaged sections of the original spell felt like bridges to nowhere. He should know what that did, it was based on the same fundamentals as the prior spell, only that association was like a 404 not found error.
Also? Also like a 404 not found error?
What the hell was a 404 not found error!?
Frustration arced through him at having these little hints of memory bubble shockingly to the surface without the context for meaning and relevancy. For instance, he knew that when something failed to connect you to something else, it could be called a 404 not found error. Presumably, especially being a ‘not found error’, that was referencing something about… not… finding something. What that was, why the 404 part, how often his past self had not found things that they needed a numbered error, how one could even need to label more than 403 errors in the first place, all of this was just unknown.
Anger polarized his thoughts, building frustration like a dearth of electrons. His focus jumped rapidly from target to target as he saw Them coming closer. If he’d paid closer attention, shifted his view around just a little less than lightning fast, he might have noticed the shift in their behavior. It wasn’t drastic, really, but it would have given him some forewarning of what was in store for him in the future. Instead he drew upon the spell structure for Arcane Spark. He understood so much more now. About the spell itself, but also about how spells worked in general. It was like learning the first third of his ABCs, which he presumed was something that small children would learn, yet he felt no shame at his infantile spark of understanding. Anything was better than zero.
Before, he’d built the spell by copying the structure. The resulting copy was more than a mere echo or duplicate though, as he learned when Arcane Spark overloaded. They were linked somehow. Now his mind flowed like electrons over the circuit. It was not significantly changed, though there were certainly gaps in his knowledge of the original circuit. It was mostly that he understood some bit of why each part was there, a little of why it was shaped that way. He understood in particular, the basic ‘user manual’ for the spell.
Mana Bolt had its two dials. Arcane Spark had multiple modes and a single dial. That dial controlled the charge threshold for the spell portion which stored Mana converted into Arcane Lightning Mana. Once converted, unlike with Mana Bolt, he could not reabsorb it back into his core. He couldn’t refine it like Chaos either, it was still Mana and attuned to him. Instead it would damage him and potentially cause him to leak Mana or lose Shadow if he tried. So instead the spell had several other means of safely discharging.
The primary circuit which the capacitor portion was connected to by default, released a Spark at all targets within the range of viability. There was no intelligence, the Arcane Lightning Mana rather sought all Chaos as an opposing charge within a range. Any Chaos within the range was resonated, somehow, by the spell, before the release occurred. Since it wasn’t true lightning, there wasn’t protons and electrons involved. It did, however, act in a very similar way. Significant though was that technically, the range limitation and the targeting were a function of pure Mana used in an area effect. Area… aura? An Aura? The word stuck in his mind from some vague memory.
Might as well keep it. The Aura resonated the Chaos and the Arcane Lightning Mana, phew that was a mindful to think, struck all those targets equally. The other two circuits were much more interesting. One was the emergency discharge that would have prevented the overload. It allowed him to release the spell into the surrounding matter, resonating with micro-Chaos that the spell at least assumed existed. This would bleed the spell dry over time. Using this circuit also closed the spell off from receiving any more Mana from his core.
The third circuit was triggered by physical contact, using the Shadow to Shadow connection as a conduit. It was dramatically more targeted and more potent. Additionally it discharged proportionate to the Chaos in the contacted target, whereas the ranged default discharged entirely amongst all targets. Sure, the ranged version would put out more Arcane L- energy to bigger targets with more Chaos, but it was proportionate to the total Chaos in range. So a big part of the inefficiencies was that the spell used way too much energy on each target.
As was now his habit and since he had enough time as he glided around the gathering prey, the spell was built painstakingly with as much reinforcement as he could manage. The main Mana conduits felt potent, heavily reinforced. This version of the spell enjoyed a lot of small changes that he assumed improved flow and potency. Some conduits were substantially larger than the broken version that still hung adjacent to it. Could he have cast both versions at once if he hadn’t damaged the first one?
A thought for later. For now he had a bunch of Them to fry!
The jolts of Arca- energy as he slammed into each of Them ran through him with a hot, almost pleasurable sensation. The flash of light was almost entirely gone when discharging by contact. Mana churned continuously into the spell, fueled by much greater amounts of Chaos being drawn in and refined as he zigged and zagged through the horde. No longer did the Big Blobs concern him at all. While he did keep a maximally empowered Mana Bolt spell prepared, it went completely unused. Instead he felt invincible as he actively encouraged the BBs to form until a Really Big Blob started to grow tentacle legs.
The first leg snaked towards him with a lightning fast strike, the tip a jagged point of thickened Shadow. With equal speed and anticipating the increasingly predictable movement, he snatched at it.
And missed. Only the miss didn’t matter, for the moment the Shadow started to force itself unrelentingly into his own shell, like hot arcs through a conductive metal, Spark bit back. The sudden shift in charge froze the RBB’s limb and Chaos ruptured from it in long jagged rifts up to its center and out along all of the other limbs. In the moment of a bolt of lightning, the RBB exploded into swirling rainbows and darkness. For a moment, he was Overwhelmed, but the Spark spell did not dissipate so easily. Nor was the triggering manual like with Mana Bolt. As such, when more of Them tried to take a bite, he bit back. Rather the spell did, but semantics were not necessary for success.
Where before Arcane Spark had been less efficient, even though it had given him breathing room, now it was generally much more efficient. It also did not care how thick the Shadow was on his opponent, conducting better through those heavily armored foes. So he let the RBBs form. One. Two. Three at a time. Gliding around he encouraged them to entangle and grow. Two merged together as he expended a chunk of Spark on a third. He was Overwhelmed, but Spark sucked greedily at his rapidly filling Mana, charging again to max. The RBB that lashed out at him now was at least as large as the one he’d nearly fallen to before. The one which had been killed from a distance by the other person. The Sniper, he was calling him now.
A baker’s dozen, which was thirteen for whatever reason, of spiked limbs impaled themselves a hairsbreadth into his Shadow. Pain flared through his mind. The agony of it was eclipsed by the very heaven’s seeming to unleash their angry wrath down the length of the offending intruders. The RBB flinched back, Chaos spewing splits all down the thirteen legs and well around the center. The big, angry one of Them condensed rapidly, forming harder edged Shadows, many jointed appendages. They were highly irregular, jagged, sharp, but they were much more solid looking.
Chaos pulsed back as the rents in its shell started to seal over and some of the rigid structure softened, but only a little. It hadn’t been killed by a single full Spark. It had though, come quite close. The larger of the splits was no longer erupting with Chaos, but was still a rainbow rift of substantial size. Mana Bolts ripped along it, some missing, most finding their mark. Glee at his ability to totally overpower these terrifying enemies filled him with as much satisfaction as the Chaos and Shadow as the bigger RBB split fully open, collapsing into energy.
He was once again Overwhelmed, this time greatly so. His center would fill at this point. In a few more seconds, he would think through some insight and then-
The long, smooth spike of pitch black Shadow which grew from his chest broke through his thoughts. He felt at first, only bewilderment. Why had his Shadow grown this long spike? That was followed by optimism. He was no longer Overwhelmed! Had he developed some ability to process or hold greater amounts of Chaos? As the sense of wrongness started to overcome his shock, the screaming pain burst into his awareness. It had been there, but he’d been too surprised to recognize it. Now it consumed his every thought. The foreign spike of Shadow in turn, consumed his Mana and even the Chaos he had been absorbing.
It must have taken mere moments, for Spark had triggered, yet the jagged path of its travel, reduced to a tiny size by the recent full expenditure of the spell capacity, seemed to crawl along the spike. Perhaps some god above was cursing him. Perhaps, instead, they were blessing him, for whatever had driven that spike through his back and out the front of him was unprepared for even such a small amount of damage from Arcane Spark. The spike was removed, revealing a gaping hole, devoid of anything, within his chest.
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The hole closed in moments, taking with it the burning pain. The half emptied core of Mana and complete lack of Chaos within him though, confirmed that it had indeed been there. There had been no resistance. No sense of imparted force or motion. The spike had been as long as his arm could reach after it had already pierced through his body. The void feeling of abject terror joined the feeling of emptiness where there had just been energy within him as he turned to gaze upon his hunter.
It was surprisingly small. Whereas the RBBs started forming when they reached a sphere at around his chest height, this was barely waist high. It was also not amorphous or shifting like the rest of Them. A glint of Chaos formed a facsimile of eyes, insect-like, over silently snapping mandibles. Eight solid, triple jointed legs held it low to the ground. It completely lacked claws, but a long serpentine tail covered in sleek sections of hard, armor-like Shadow rose above it. On the end was a long, thin spike. The very same which had driven through him.
The creature screeched in anger and surprise despite such a gentle rebuke by his depleted spell. In the moment of his predator’s hesitation, he frantically shoved Mana into the circuit. Thankfully he’d barely warmed it up. Spark discharged. Again. And again. Rapidly, though each was very minor and did not overwhelm the rate he was charging it. He risked a glance around him, breaking his view from the much deadlier opponent, to find that the little ones of Them were practically erupting from all around in close proximity. Their bodies were more compressed, there were hints of little legs, though none seemed to be using the wiggling nubs for any purpose. Hundreds were just throwing Themselves at him in violent, jerking motions.
Some minor premonition, instinct, or perhaps he’d seen the motion in the edge of his vision and reacted without conscious awareness, drove him to dive sideways. The spike missed his center, stabbing through a shoulder and pinning him down against the ground. It was a very odd situation to be in.
It was painful, yes. Incredibly so. His Mana was sucking into the spike rapidly, the Chaos he had collected even more so. Yet, even yet, his mind registered the previously unfamiliar sensation of his back pressing against a hard surface. He’d been able to lean over, touch the broken earth with his unfamiliar and gnarled fingers. He had been wholly unable to lie down though. Ever floating, ever gliding. An existence lacking any connection to the astral body upon which he was trapped, possibly for all eternity. The new experience was almost worth the injury.
Even more so because Spark was almost halfway charged.
As before, though much more quickly, the spike was withdrawn. This time, Mana as well as Chaos flooded into him. The Mana collected immediately back into his core, rapidly filling him to about three quarters. The Chaos Overwhelmed him for only a moment. It was enough of a moment that the Scorpion, as he thought of it, was starting to recover from a shocked and stumbling retreat. Not enough to stop him from starting to charge Arcane Spark again before the spike once more struck.
There was, as he should have expected, a flaw in his plan. Firstly, those smaller of Them had not relented. They consumed an agonizing, though relatively small, portion of Shadow before Spark once again burned them back. Additionally, Spark was barely a tenth charged when the spike drove into his stomach. It snapped back at the Scorpion. The Scorpion flinched once more, drawing out its stinger. It did not flee even for a moment. Instead it readied for another strike.
The damned thing was realizing that the damage it was receiving was less than the damage it was doing to him. He was only surviving because it kept trying to escape the pain of Spark. If it didn’t withdraw the stinger, however, it would have simply consumed him completely after Spark expended itself. He really didn’t have any other option, so he opened up with Mana Bolt. Not on the Scorpion though. It was far too thickly armored for Mana Bolt to do much. Instead he let loose a stream of smaller, concentrated Bolts on the little ones all around.
Many of Them withstood one, two hits before breaking apart. Some collapsed immediately. There might have been more vulnerable areas or angles with which to hit them. That would have to wait for later testing. Right now he just sprayed as many Bolts as he could, clearing the space around him and charging Spark as fast as possible. Fear was still a sucking pit within him. Survival though, the determination to survive sat itself upon the opening and sought to hold back his hope and ability to react from draining into that void.
It worked, well enough that rather than try to dodge or flee the Scorpion, he instead drove himself towards it. The spike ripped a jagged line in the edge of his shoulder, but did not impale him. Spark didn’t care, ripping through Scorpion via its tail. The deadly hunter did not flinch this time, lunging forward with its snapping mouth parts. Before the Chaos flowing towards him would Overwhelm him again, he turned Mana Bolt upon the Scorpion. One, two, three, four thicker Bolts struck hard around the glowing ‘eyes’. Whether they were actually functional organs, the Scorpion flinched from the blows. This allowed him to glide a little around it while his disoriented enemy was forced to find its target again.
The smaller, semi-solid of Them had also temporarily stopped their nearby spawning and assaulting. Those already out losing some of their form and returning to the slow, undulating and bobbing behavior they normally had. Mana Bolt was hot, too hot to use safely, so he dismissed the circuit. Spark was also feeling fairly warm. The lightning spell was able to channel a lot of energy without overheating. Part of that had to be due to the upgraded circuit form. Spell efficiency skill really seemed like a good future prospect if it had such a significant impact. Since Spark was able to handle a few more full discharges before risking failure, he charged it as quickly as possible once more.
When the Scorpion refocused on its prey, the prey was just an arm length away, reaching out for it with a ghastly hand. It could have jumped out of reach. It was much faster than the gliding, two limbed being of Shadow and Lightning. In fact, it did jump. Rather it tried. Its eight legs braced, twisting and tilting and driving the mass of its thick Shadow and core of Chaos backwards with acceleration totally impossible for its prey to match.
He smirked at his own mental thought of what the Scorpion might be thinking as he flipped the spell mode back to default. Though there were a number of the small ones of Them within the Aura, the blob of Chaos in the Scorpion eclipsed them. Eight or nine Sparks erupted from him. All but one were small, thin and jagged, almost invisible. One was a thick tear through space that struck right into the body of the Scorpion, ripping into it and spreading out in violent rifts along the shell. The Scorpion erupted with a stream of Chaos and still some traces of Mana. It looked to hold itself together for a long few moments as it stumbled drunkenly.
It was not to be. Too much was lost and the creature collapsed. The thick cloud of Shadow blocked out the world as it pulled into him. The Mana and Chaos flowed in with it. His center chugged through it all and within a few handfuls of seconds he felt it reach that feeling of fullness. He even knew what insight he had to offer it. The Scorpion had taught him a valuable lesson. Two valuable lessons, really. The second, perhaps, he’d save for the next compression. In the meantime…
Overconfidence is a greater danger than any foe.
His core compressed happily, continuing to fill with Mana as the Chaos swirled and swirled. Idly he charged up Spark, shifting back to contact discharge, as he considered the three options which presented themselves. They were all three new to him. Excitement tingled along like… wait, had he been making an odd number of references to lightning? Somehow, despite the jolt of understanding, there was a burning hot arc of desire within to strike upon a similar pattern of words more than once. Though… perhaps there should be limits. It still charged him with a feeling of warmth. It felt like some core part of him had been sparked into being.
Now that was… that was just taking it too far! Could he turn his own brain off? This would take some effort, perhaps. He would have to conduct himself carefully lest the strange choice of words become more of a challenge than choosing from his current selection.
UGH!
Focus. Focus on the sparkling new knowledge!
The first, a skill. It was tempting to take a new skill, now that he had two active spells to apply it to. Maybe it wasn’t related to spells though. The perfunctory knowledge filtered through. It would teach him how to actively compress energy within the output structure of spells. It would, what? Make his spells denser? Would that make Mana Bolt have more penetrating power? Arcane Spark didn’t seem to suffer from a lack of density, since it conducted well through Shadow. Maybe that would be an issue in the future though? Improving the utility of Mana Bolt would help to bring it up to the value of the upgraded Spark though.
The second two were spells. New spells! Considering the first one, he almost selected it from the sheer excitement of it. The spell was incredibly complicated, that much he could tell. It would form a sort of ball of Mana which could be directed within a short distance. Most significantly, he felt that the spell could form echoes of his other spells. Did that mean he could use it to cast multiple Bolts or multiple Arcs at once or that he could just cast them remotely? There was a definite impression of a downside, however. The spell bled a fair bit of Mana to maintain itself. It also couldn’t be continuously charged, nor could it be reabsorbed. It was like a temporary familiar or an automated assistant.
The next and last choice was not entirely dissimilar, though entirely a Shadow spell. If he took it, that would be the first Shadow spell he had. The structure felt dramatically different. The idea of consuming his Shadow, which seemed to be the stand in for his body and life, was disturbing to say the least. Thinking though on how the most difficult of Them to fight heavily utilized Shadow against him, it seemed foolish not to learn such spells at some point. It was also only the second time he’d been offered a Shadow spell. The skills were also generic, he felt that he could Empower or Obfuscate the Shadow spells just the same.
The spell itself though created a sort of echo of himself. A doppelganger, which could be sacrificed to protect him from attack, serve to distract, but it could also cast spells on its own. The spell would remain continuously a part of his own Shadow, with a sort of artificial core of Mana which he could continuously supply. Whether the spells would be duplicates or just a remote casting of his spells, he was also unsure. Neither of the spells had any real sense in that regard, so maybe they would allow duplicates, maybe not.
Importantly though the Shadow spell did not operate on a discrete set of energy, it was channeled continuously. It also felt tightly controlled, efficient in its structure. It could probably be maintained permanently even and with very little maintenance cost.
Spark started discharging joyously, little bits of Shadow and Chaos merging with him and being pulled into his ravenous center. He could take his time, probably. They did seem to be already starting to entangle. So maybe he didn’t have as long as he thought. Still, even an RBB would fall to Spark. He should make a careful choice. Every option had potential. He weighed them carefully in his mind, looking over them and trying to glean some new information. None came forth.
It was time to choose.