Author’s Corner: Like I said in a post in the last chapter thread, sorry all for not posting a chapter yesterday! Snowstorm came through and knocked out my internet all day. By the time they got it fixed I was already going to bed. So, to make up for it, have a super length chapter!
By the way, for those curious, the current game date is 02/21/3016
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With the skeleton of the diamondback wolf added to my collection, we went off to find more monsters to use for training. Unless there was an emergency, I wanted to let my ‘team’ take care of things themselves. That way they could get the greatest amount of experience and level up more quickly. Meanwhile, I was thinking over the things that would happen once Yang evolved. “You said that she’ll get an advanced class soon after evolving, but those aren’t really that easy to get unless there are some specially made for evolved creatures.”
Celeste nodded her head. “I looked into it a bit, and there are a few. For instance, out of curiosity I looked into the class your mom got, Shadow Stalker I believe? That is a rogue advanced class with a focus on shadow-based magic. It’s a common class for Shades to receive, as they will almost always get something linked with shadows and darkness. For Yang, it should be an advanced class with a focus on Nature Magic. The thing is, nearly every main class has an advanced class like that.”
When I glanced over to her curiously, having to look over one of the birds as I did so, she continued. “If she goes down a crafting route, she could become a Natural Craftsman. They specialize in creating powerful objects from natural resources like plants and bones. Like how you wanted to make a plant with the scythe of a mantis. Mix a Natural Craftsman with enchanting skills, and it can create weapons as powerful as most tech.
“However, if she went for a fighter, she could end up as a Wild Paragon. They imbue their bodies with aspects of different plants or animals to make themselves stronger. Your current ‘battle form’ would be a good example, but you are a druid instead. If she chose to be a mage, her advanced class would likely be ‘Mage Alchemist’. Not a very common one, but they focus on Nature Magic and Alchemy to perfect their skills. They’re the types that will figure out how to make a potion that lets you breathe fire or fly. Like I said before, it’ll all depend on what path she picks when she trains.”
I gave another nod, looking ahead at where we were going. Off in the distance there seemed to be another forest, which seemed to be our current destination. “What are we looking for over there? The scythe mantis?”
“Right. Also planned for you to look for a few herbs that will let you make stronger products. You’ll need to have a few prepared to sell when we go back to town, because you’ll have to buy a new companion bracelet for Yang.”
I blinked, glancing over to her at that. “Oh? I thought they were free for the first one?”
Celeste smirked a bit. “For you, yes. However, Yang will be your evolved companion. With that in mind, they’ll consider it as a second bracelet for you. It’d also be best if you got the upgrades for the two bracelets so that I can connect to them remotely. That way, she won’t have to train a new AI, can benefit from what I’m learning, and I’ll have a second set of eyes to watch things.”
I shook my head, and couldn’t help but let out a soft sigh. “How much will it cost?”
“In the local market…. about one gold and twenty silver.” I felt my eyebrow twitching slightly as she said the sum. “Don’t worry, the stuff that you can make combining the plants here with what you already have will be able to cover it after about.. five batches I think?”
“But… I don’t have any vials to put them in.”
“I know, I already considered that. That’s why you should practice making alchemy pills! Since their production method is a bit difficult, and their effects last longer, alchemy pills are valued at a higher price than potions.”
I could understand that, so I nodded my head slightly. “Do regular pills not have the same effects?”
Celeste shook her head as she spoke, and I could tell that she researched quite a bit in case I asked these questions. Or maybe she was just curious too. “Medical pills and alchemy pills are two different things. Medical pills that doctors make are generally more specialized, but have a stronger effect over time. For instance, a doctor might make a pill to cure a certain disease, and it would be more powerful than if an alchemist were to simply make a pill designed to cure diseases in general. For this reason, doctors also rarely use magic when making their medicines, because some species will react to certain types of magic differently.”
“So… alchemists are the jack-of-all-trades, while doctors specialize.” I thought about it a bit. “Different species will probably react to medicines differently, so a doctor would need to take that into account, too… I’m glad I didn’t decide to go with that path.” I shook my head, dismissing the idea. Although a doctor would likely make a lot more money than an alchemist, it also takes far more studying.
“Right, so once we get to the forest, keep a look out for the mantis.” She sent me an image of the scythe mantis, a two meter tall, three meter long green insect that in most ways looked like a typical praying mantis, aside from the fact that their front arms were replaced by long scythes. “In the meantime, I’ll watch for the herbs you need. After Yang evolves, you can send them all back to the grove so that you can practice making pills.”
We were about a hundred meters from the forest, and I could see that there were a few diamondback wolves blocking the way. “Don’t think we’ll be able to wait for Yang to evolve against the mantises.” Hearing that, Celeste grumbled under her breath.
“But.. the plan…”
I chuckled slightly, smiling towards her. “It’s alright, we can still use most of the plan. But really, did you think we’d make it all the way without finding another group to fight?”
“Well… I hoped… It would have made things so much easier.” The AI was sulking besides me as she realized that her plan wasn’t going to work out.
“Fine, fine. I can take care of these by myself.” I couldn’t help but laugh, and pulled out my rifle from my grove. It was even able to put a wound on a giant dragon-like creature in the plant world, so there was no doubt that it would be able to take out a few wolves.
Hearing my decision, Celeste perked up beside me, nodding her head quickly. “Okay! Let’s go with that.”
Now, in most games, there would be an ‘aggro radius’. That means that an enemy wouldn’t notice you until you approached it. However, still a hundred meters away, and the wolves already turned towards me. Having a giant slime rolling along beside me probably didn’t help, but they noticed me pretty quick. “Six wolves, let’s aim for six shots.” I raised the rifle, and Celeste provided the laser sight. Since it was only visible to me, it was natural that the wolf wouldn’t see as it centered on its head.
With a quick pull of the trigger, the first wolf was killed, and the other five all jumped into action. With their speed, they would be on me in under ten seconds. Two more quick shots, each one aimed at a head, but one of the wolves jumped to the side as the plasma shot out of my rifle to avoid it. “That is totally not fair.” I grumbled as I sent the rifle back to my grove, pulled out my beam saber and pistol, and ran forward. Yin and Yang flew up off my shoulders to watch, since I instructed them not to join this fight.
“You know, they can still rip you to shreds if you fight them head on.” Celeste advised as I approached the wolves, and I quickly activated the Aspect of the Armored Beast to give me the scale armor skin. “A bit better, but not really going to help against their claws.” She sighed helplessly, but soon vanished to let me focus on the fight. There were still four wolves left, and this time I was fighting solo. Though, this time I was also essentially fully outfitted with good gear, so I didn’t worry too much.
Celeste, you take the left arm. I thought to the AI as I swung my sword at the first wolf, who dodged to the side. I was in no way proficient fighting with two weapons at once, but I hoped that with Celeste controlling my left arm with the gun, that would be taken care of. Soon, my arm was lifting up and shot the wolf I had just targeted before it had the chance to recover from its dodge. Although it wasn’t a fatal blow, the wolf had been hit near its back legs, so its fighting power would drop significantly.
At the same time, the last three wolves arrived as well, and I decided to start using magic to help as well with the fighting. I’m a druid, after all, I should be doing druid things! Out of the surrounding elements, earth would be less useful thanks to their skeletons, while fire would be the best choice. As such, I used my magic to grant myself a flaming breath weapon, hoping that I wouldn’t be burning my mouth by doing this. It would be ridiculous for the lesser orthrus to burn itself every time it used its fire breath.
As the wolves began surrounding me, I turned to the nearest one and spat out a ball of fire, thankful that the flame formed outside of my mouth rather than inside of it. Without waiting to see if it dodged or took the hit, I spun to the next target and jumped forward, borrowing the momentum of my spin to do a twisting slash with my beam saber. The plasma blade cut right through the wolf’s head, but at the same time I failed to regain my balance and ended up sliding along the ground while Celeste fired off another shot at the first injured wolf, this time killing it.
Two down, two to go. I looked at the last two wolves, and it turned out that the one I tried to spit at had dodged, while the one that had originally been behind me was lunging. Celeste took a quick shot at its exposed stomach, and I slashed with my saber, and then there was only one left. It felt really strange for one of my arms to be moving on its own like it was, and I was going to try not to make a habit of this, but I had to admit that it was useful.
As the final wolf charged, I braced myself to slash at it again with my saber. However, just as it jumped for me, there were two quick blasts fired from the pistol, and my killing blow was stolen from me by… myself. Is it possible to kill steal against yourself? I don’t know, but I feel like I just did!
“Oh come on, it’s not that bad.” Celeste spoke up next to me suddenly, and I felt myself regaining control of my arm. “If I hadn’t fired, there was a decent chance of it closing in and attacking. With its claws, it probably could have torn through your armored skin.”
“Yeah, yeah… still though…” I regretted not being able to deal the finishing blow myself, kind of? I mean, I did deal it, but it wasn’t me… Ahh! This is just confusing. I walked over and studied the aura of the last slain wolf, as it was the most intact corpse. Casting my Mana Sense through it, I committed the aura to memory while Yo went around feeding on the rest of the bodies. As I had originally thought, there weren’t very many differences between these wolves and basic ones, aside from the composition of their bones.
Still, another form added to my ‘database’ was always a good thing, so I learned it anyways before letting Yo take this one as well, and added the skeletons to my inventory again. At this rate, I’d need to put them in my grove eventually to save space before we returned to town. But that wasn’t such a bad idea in itself, it would just create a lot of clutter in the grove and somewhat limit the amount of space I had available to plant herbs.
With this taken care of, I got back to walking towards the forest, with Yin and Yang once again taking their places on my shoulders. When I began wondering again which was which, Celeste provided me with some assistance by putting their names above their heads. Finally, I shall know which bird is which! Though this is somewhat pointless since Yang will be evolving shortly.
The forest was a vast expanse of densely packed trees, the covering of which caused the entire area within to look dark as night. “Celeste… what is this forest called?”
“Hmm..?” She spoke up, somewhat guiltily. “Uhm… the Dark Wood? Don’t worry, there’s no curse, local boss monster, or anything like that. It’s just that the trees grew dense and large enough to block out most of the light. I’d suggest going forward with night vision and Aura Sight active.”
I shook my head and continued on in, activating my Aura Sight and changing the vision mode on my Cybernetic eye to see in the dark. “Alright, how deep are the mantises, do you know?”
“Answer unclear, try again later.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle slightly at that, and we walked into the depths of the forest. “Are there any other monsters in this area that I should be worried about?”
“Hmm? Well, it’s mostly just big insects. Uhm… er…” Celeste’s voice suddenly got a lot more nervous. “Wait, you have a fear of spiders? Why haven’t you thought of that before now?”
“Who likes to think about things they’re scared of?” I grumbled under my breath, no longer feeling so enthusiastic about this venture. “Please tell me the spiders are only in the deepest region of this forest, and don’t openly attack people?”
“Uh… no… they actually prefer the edges of the forest, because more animals can be caught going in and out. And they like meat… People sized meat. And there’s a web above you.”
I immediately turned my vision up, and indeed there was a massive web spanning several trees above me, but thankfully no creepy crawly menaces inside of it. “Fuck this forest, fuck this forest, fuck this forest. Can I just burn the whole thing down!?”
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“Well… you could, but it wouldn’t help. Remember, almost every animal here has in some way absorbed stone into their body. For these spiders… their exoskeleton is made of stone, so they don’t burn or fear fire.”
“Spiders that don’t fear fire, I’m going to have nightmares for years. And from the size of that web, giant fucking spiders that don’t fear fire. Please tell me that they have a glaring weakness I can take advantage of?”
At this point, Celeste spoke up rather happily. “Ah, yes! They are extremely weak to bludgeoning attacks, and earth manipulation should be able to crush them since their skin is made of stone. Since they aren’t magical creatures, they should not have a resistance to the control.”
That part made me calm down slightly, though I still clutched the plasma pistol and beam saber for dear life. “Oh, good. Giant spiders that I can kill with a thought. Now it’s only mildly terrifying.”
“There’s one right in front of you.” Suddenly, there were several shapes highlighted on a large tree in front of me, which I had initially taken to be patterns on the wood, but now could clearly see were legs wrapped around this tree with a diameter of at least three meters.
“Fuck this, fuck this, fuck this!” I sent a wave of mana, likely far more than needed, and used my Earth Manipulation. I could clearly sense the massive frame of the ‘creature’(if I pretend it’s not you-know-what, maybe it’ll help!) on the other side of the tree, at least five meters long. Using my magic, I caused its rocky exterior to crush it like the awe inspiring power of a giant’s boot. Unfortunately, when I spread out that wave of mana, it spread past that first tree, and I found out why there were no spiders in the trees.
They were all on the ground, hiding beneath the surface or clutching trees like the one in front of me. “Nope, nope, nope!” I began using as much energy as I could to crush them one by one. “Take all of my nope!”
Possibly, the only thing more disturbing than knowing that you were surrounded on all side by giant stone spiders, was seeing that you were surrounded on all sides by giant stone spiders scurrying in every direction. “Gah! Nonononononononono!” One of the spiders ran into, and through, Yo as it sought to escape the mass slaughter, neither party seeming to notice the others’ presence.
At some point, I released my wings, and activated my mana leech. My feathers looked like a myriad of colors representing all of my affinities as I sucked in as much mana as I could to fuel my ‘nope’ inspired rampage. Somehow, mass murder of these creatures was therapeutic. I think I even pulled earth mana directly from my grove to launch against the arachnid menace. All I know is that I was crushing every stone I could sense that moved, and pulling mana from everywhere that I could in order to do it.
You have leveled up!
You have leveled up!
You have leveled up!
By the time I was done, the area around my looked like a warzone. Craters filled the ground, stone shrapnel or long, spike-like legs stuck out of trees, and I had even managed to knock a few trees over to get at the creatures hiding under them, allowing light to pour into the area. I felt several soft feathers wrap around my head, the lovebirds clinging to me as if they felt my former terror and rage at the spiders. Yo was simply relaxing in one of the craters, his large body enjoying the chance to look like a big puddle.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Celeste appeared in front of me, hands clasped as she apologized profusely. “I didn’t know, I swear!”
It took me several long moments and deep breaths before I was able to calm down. I still felt really twitchy, and when one of the pieces of shrapnel fell from a nearby tree, I lashed out at it with my magic on reflex, causing it to burst open. “Celeste… think very carefully… are there any other creatures here that I need to know about?” I was not feeling in a very good mood at the moment, and she seemed to be able to tell. Immediately, I felt a surge of information as she sent me a list of every creature type in this forest.
Giant centipedes, hornets, beetles, half of which eat rock or use it to attack, and the other half disguises itself as rocks.. I would rather be in the jungle planet again than here. At least when I was there I had a trick to hide from everything! Okay… deep breaths, deep calming breaths and kill anything that twitches wrong.
Since I noticed the level-up messages, I decided to take a look at my status and spent the points. To my surprise, I found that my little rampage actually gave me a full 2% boost to Earth Affinity, likely because I was drawing so much in from both exterior sources and my own grove, which had shrunken slightly. However, if raising Earth Affinity meant throwing myself into a horde of rock spiders, fuck that I’ll abandon the element.
NameFalenel HulettRaceHalf-Elf(Woodland)TitlesVengeful Heart, Amateur Brain SurgeonFame0Level 2428%ClassDruidSub-ClassWild ShaperDeityMalthanHealth160/160Health Regen0.27Mana860/860Mana Regen1.52Strength15Wisdom100Agility21Intelligence86Dexterity22Charisma10Vitality16Luck20Points Remaining0Earth 13%Fire 10%Wind 10%Water 10%Lightning 10%Light 11%Dark 11%Plant 11%Void 10%Metal 10%
More deep calming breaths, and I put away my two plasma weapons. Instead, I pulled out my staff of the elements, and got ready to use my magic to murder any creepy thing this jungle had to offer. Scythe arms… are they worth it… Okay… but we have to be quick. Not staying in this place a second longer than I have to.
With my mind made up, I sent Yo into the grove, since he would mostly slow us down, while Yin, Yang and I took off deeper into the forest. I continuously watched for mana signatures with my Aura Sight, and kept my Mana Sense up so that I could crush whatever spiders came between me and getting the hell out of here. Thankfully, they all seemed to have been scared away, or I had already decimated the local population. Either way, I was happy because they were not coming for me.
When one of the mountain hornets flew down at me, I lifted my head up and sent out a blast of fire. Unlike the spiders, these do not have stone body armor. Rather, they make their nests in large hills and mountains. But fire works against them splendidly. Though it didn’t kill it, it scared it off. I also came across a boulder crawler, which is a giant centipede that rolls its body up to look like a big rock. Since I was being especially wary of big rocks, I sensed what it was and immediately crushed it with my magic. Take no chances, take no prisoners!
It was after over half an hour of running that I finally caught site of a pair of scythe mantises. They were engaged in a battle with a giant beetle twice their size, a goliath beetle. From what Celeste told me, these things aren’t actually made of rock, just colored to look like it so that they can attract the other insects that do eat rocks. Although the mantises don’t qualify, it’s just as likely to eat anything else that crosses its path as well.
I debated letting the three of them fight it out, then take the winner and steal one of the mantis bodies… but that would take too long, and I really wanted out of this godforsaken forest. “Yin, blast them. Yang, paralysis poisons.” I wasn’t sure if the two birds understood, but they caught that I told them to go fight, and what I said was their usual battle plan anyways, so it all worked out. Meanwhile, I began charging up my mana to do one big blast. Kill without destroying..
My wings turned pitch black as the darkness pooled around me. Although Yin and Yang had decent coordination, they were just too small to do anything to the goliath beetle. At most, Yin had managed to knock over one of the mantises for a moment, but Yang wasn’t having any luck at all. The insects likely had some resistance to poisons or something.
But that was fine, I wasn’t charging forever. Just one minute while they distracted the giant insects. There were a few close calls, as the scythe mantises nearly got them with their blade arms, but the birds were far more agile in the air. As for the beetle, it was too slow to even dream of catching them unless they went under it, but they weren’t doing that.
Out of the way. I transmitted my thoughts to them once my wings had charged up what I felt was enough dark mana, the feathers dripping a stream of inky shadows down to the ground. I didn’t bother charging up half as much as I did when fighting the nature wyrm, because these things were far less powerful. But, as I sent the command to the birds, they looked over to me and flew off to the sides. Flying up has shown to be a terrible idea, since that is where the giant spiderwebs are.
Once they were out of the expected blast zone, I released the hold on the mana I had built up. This was a full minute of charging, so nearly one hundred pure darkness mana. Small amount for sure compared to what I have fired off before, but it is still pure mana. Like the difference between shining a flashlight and a laser beam, this showed me what darkness was like when fully developed, even in a small amount.
The inky black feathers on my wings coalesced into black spikes that shot forward, striking against the three insects, as well as several trees. Naturally, the largest insect took the most attacks, and had the most obvious result. Rather than piercing, the spikes splashed onto its armored hide like raindrops, spreading out to wrap the goliath beetle in a black coat. What I expected to happen next was for it to destroy it from within or something, but instead the beetle began sinking into the ground, as if it were melting. At the same time, the mantises were getting struck by their own shadow spikes, and were being drawn into the ground as well. Perhaps because the trees were too large they didn’t suffer the same effects.
After the insects were fully brought below the ground, there was no longer any trace of them left visible, aside from an especially dark spot where they had stood. Walking over, I could sense that there was a deep darkness energy from the shadows spots, as well as the shifting auras of the insects. They had not melted, but at the same time they hadn’t been killed either. Instead, they were now trapped in the shadow. And I had no idea how long that would last.
Well… I was told that getting good with the Dark Affinity would let me merge with shadows… I guess fully mastering it lets me make other things do so too… Gulping slightly as I realized how strong that power could potentially be, I put a bit of thought into it. I could feel that the ‘shadow prisons’ were drawing mana from all of the nearby shadows to sustain themselves. Logically, once the mana runs out the effect would end, or if the contained creature was too powerful. However, this was the Dark Wood, named for its eternal shadows. The insects would most certainly die before they were freed.
Though, this posed a problem for me as well, because I needed a scythe mantis body to study. Although I could feel the aura within the shadow prison, it was far from enough detail to replicate. As such, I isolated one of the shadow prisons of the mantises, and cut off its connection to the dark mana around it, before using light mana to shine on it. Almost immediately, the mantis lifted up from the ground, and if I had to guess at its facial expression, I would say it was pissed.
“Yeah, yeah. Didn’t go as I planned either. Bye bye now!” I said as I sent an earth spike directly into its abdomen, then summoned my pistol to do a quick head shot. Its head was bigger than mine, so aiming wouldn’t have been an issue even without Celeste’s help.
I smiled slightly as I looked to the dying mantis, and waited for it to finally stop twitching before I stepped forward and did a quick scan of its scythe claws. Once again, I was relying on Celeste’s help to store the information as quickly and efficiently as possible. And just as I finished, I heard an unfamiliar, but distinctly female voice from behind me.
“M… master? I got big…”
Hearing the voice, I immediately understood what had happened when I wasn’t paying attention, and gulped.
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Author’s Basement: Here you are, a double length chapter, ended with the evolution of Yang!