It’s a massacre. The invading army burns buildings and slaughters people they find hiding. To one side of the city near a modest castle defenders are trying to fall back in an orderly manner. They repel the front runners of the attackers as screaming people flee to the castle. Light flares up around two individuals as I watch. One is from the attackers and one from the defenders. The attacking army halts its assault as a shining man in black armor steps in front of the defenders. From behind the defender’s ranks the other glowing individual steps between the line of shield bearers. This one wears a blue scaled armor that glistens as if wet.
The two figures stand before one another for a moment. Neither wearing a helmet, I can see their lips moving as they speak to one another. I can’t hear what they are saying but from their looks it ends in a shouting match. The black armored attacker with hair the same color reaches over his head. Gripping the hilt of a large sword four feet long and a foot wide at the guard he draws it over his shoulder. The blue armored defender with short, spiky blue hair also reaches for a weapon. From his side he pulls a coiled up whip, shinning with points of metal along its length. The two combatants set themselves for battle and their weapons light up with magic power to match their attire.
The defender rears back with his whip preparing to strike as the attacker charges forward. As their battle starts I am moving up, unable to catch the details, but somehow still able to see atrocities committed around the city. Not comprehending the situation I’m in I catch glimpses of scenes that are all the more disturbing for my lack of reference. An elderly woman having her head caved in by a hammer wielding attacker, a small boy trampled to death by a horse, a middle aged man being surrounded by jeering soldiers as he tries to protect a woman with him. All this is seen in a blink as my perspective ascends to its previous place above it all.
It is familiar but still unknown to me as the glowing world begins to dim. Like I have witnessed this before but can’t grasp details. I keep getting farther and farther away and the world shrinks. I can feel my thoughts getting cloudy the farther away I get. As the world becomes only a speck of light in a landscape of such things my mind fades even further. Remembering nothing, only existing, I watch as even the specks of light fade and there is only black.
Again I come to and find I’m tucked between three women. Not being the first time this has happened I’m able to comprehend faster than before. I feel a lingering memory of a strange dream I had but the details elude me. All that remains is a sense of urgency. Not wanting to wake the rest of my party I decide to look into something that I put off before, my new specialty. Opening the status page and then the talent tree for it I see that I only get one TP per two levels. Azzaria told me this is what happens for the second subclass as well. This means that I have seven at the moment. The tree has four options to start from, and they’re all interesting.
Soul Bind Item will bind an inanimate object to a person’s soul. This will make it useless to anyone else that wishes to use it and makes the item more effective to the one it’s bound to. I place a point into this maxing it out. Infuse Soul will place a small part of a person’s soul into an item and allow it to get stronger as the user does. I place a TP into it and then another when I see that the next one strengthens the infused soul, bringing out its full potential. Hide Properties does just like it says. Skills like Analyze and my Identify will not work on items that are soul bound unless the owner wills it. This can be very useful for things like my staff so that people won’t get greedy about it. I place one point in this as well to max it out.
I have placed four TP into the tree and need to place one more to see what is in the next tier. The only one left is Soul Bind Living. This has a total of three points possible and the first description of it tells me that it allows me to bind the souls of two living things together. This will allow them to sense the general direction of each other. Not having anything else to place a point in I put it here. The knowledge I get after choosing this tells me that the two souls being bound together must be willing. Now that the next tier of the talent tree is open I can see there is something a little more sinister lined up after Soul Bind Living. It’s similar, but will allow a bonding enchanter to make a bond that is dominant over another soul. Animals only, according to the description, but that could change farther into the tree. I make myself a promise never to delve into that territory.
The rest of the things in the talent tree’s second tier down are less spine shivering and more useful. I always want to get everything when I see what things can be taken in my trees but I need to remain practical. The further down the talent tree the better the things are bound to be, so I need to stick to a plan to grow and keep advancing. Return and Mana Consciousness are both things that will be usefull in the versatility of the soul bound items, but what is needed most right now is to remain inconspicuous during our trip into the human kingdom. With that in mind I take Hide Item as the last two points I can distribute. The first one makes soul bound items hard for people to focus on so that their attention just slips off of it. This is referred to as glamour. The second TP I placed allows for the owner to add a simpler appearance to the item along with the glamour.
Mentally reviewing the information I have gained about my new Specialty I’m glad to find the things I can do now with it can be applied to anything whether it’s previously enchanted or not. The concept as far as I can tell is that the bond is ethereal and connects things regardless of the materials they are made from. This means that they can augment an item that is already heavily enchanted. Another thing is that the bonding is upgradeable. By this I mean that I can bond an item now and then add a consciousness later when I get the talent or I can give someone the Return function for their bonded item long after the original Bonding. This is possible because the changes are made to the bond itself, which I can now detect. I suspect that this specialty of mine will allow me to make set items in the future.
By the time I am done spending my TP and reviewing everything I can feel the girls stir as they awaken. “Alright ladies, time to get up” I say gently. I look to my left and right, smiling as I see them open their eyes. They all give me a kiss on the lips and move to get up. When we are all free of each other I hand Azzaria some eggs that I had in my storage. “Can you cook us some breakfast to get started? I have a few things that I want to try.” She nods and takes the eggs from me while Timbre starts a small cooking fire in the Safe Room.
Free from restriction, I bring out my staff and look at it. It looks the same and the description is how I remember it, but something feels a little different. Not knowing what else to check I just continue on with what I have planned. Focusing on myself, I search for where the link I need to form will attach. I thought this would take a while, but using the bond I already share with Thia as a reference I found it. So this is my soul? Using mana how the new instinctive information I received tells me to I stretch it into a line that is buried in the center of the hazy presence that is my soul. The other end goes into the center of the staff where I feel it spread out through the core of my weapon. Holding this connection for a moment I feel it solidify and strengthen. When I release control of it the bond remains.
Next is to use Infuse Soul on it. Now that the bond between me and the staff has been established this is much easier. I think. Reaching into myself with mana I use it to scoop out a piece of what should be my soul and then feed it through the bond to my staff. Sounds simple, but that doesn’t take into account the pain. For a couple seconds it takes to remove and then funnel the piece of myself through the bond it feels like someone is digging out my heart with a spoon. When I bring myself back to the present I find myself hunched over on my knees with someone holding me from the left.
“Master! Are you OK?” Thia is shaking me lightly and I can hear the concern in her voice.
“I told you to call me Vol” I tell her between panting for breath. My heart rate is slowing down now that the pain has subsided. “I was just using my n
ew Professional Specialty to improve my staff. The knowledge I gained didn’t say it would be so painful.” As I finish saying that my staff starts to glow. This draws the attention of all three of the ladies in my life. I am holding it as the glow intensifies, but there is no heat. Before the light gets too bright to look at we can all see it shrink and start flowing up my arm. A moment later I have nothing in my hand and the glowing has settled around my wrist. After the glow dissipates we can all see that the staff is now a miniature of itself that is wrapped around my wrist with the butt of the staff and the head laying side by side.
Inspecting it, I find that my staff has leveled up somehow. On top of that it got a new ability called Transform. It is what allowed it to make itself a small bracelet. Taking a moment to feel out the new addition I turn my senses to the bond with my staff. It feels alive, but not with thoughts. With a thought of my own I tell it to change back and it shifts into a staff again. Then I test the Hide Item feature of my binding. The staff in my hand then looks like a regular steel rod. Shifting it back to a bracelet makes it look like a regular steel band. Done admiring my staff and its upgrade I look back to the girls, who have been quiet while waiting for me to explain.
I spend the next half hour or so as we eat describing what I can do now and the change that occurred to my staff. When we are done eating Timbre brings out her hammer and shield. Timbre’s idea catches on causing Azzaria to grab her bow and Thia brings out her wand and casting orb. I ask them if they are all sure because a person can only infuse a part of their soul into an item a couple at a time. After that they will need to allow the soul to recover. Apparently souls are fairly durable and will grow back the lost pieces over time. If too much is taken at once the soul will recover but it can damage a person’s mind.
After I get confirmation from all the girls I warn them about the pain. They all have a determined look on their faces. “This will make us stronger and will grow with us. We wish to stay with you and know that we will need strength” Timbre tells me. With that I stop trying to talk them out of it and bind their weapons to them. They all handled the pain about the same as me or better in the case of Timbre. While they recover I use my ability to remove enchantments on Thia’s Titanium Casting Orb to take the Mana Barrier enchantment off. I replace it with one for my Magic Armor since her new bracelet also has the Mana Barrier skill. The resultant active skill is like what my Automated Defense talent will turn my Magic Armor spell into. Thia will now be able to keep Magic Armor by sacrificing ten mana per minute in her regeneration.
When everyone recovers from the massive pain they start to look at their weapons again. I take a moment to check the message I got while working. My enchanting went up to level fifteen with all the work on our weapons. When everyone is ready I stand up and look at them all. Then I realize something, it doesn’t smell like the rotting dead down here. I didn’t notice it when we first came downstairs because we were all tired. Taking a deep breath I test the air. It’s musty and stale, but otherwise it isn’t making me want to hurl like it did on the first floor. My mood a little improved I turn to the others.
“Everyone ready to get started on this floor?” I ask them.
I get a chorus of agreement from the three beauties in front of me. With that we head out the door opposite the stairwell we entered through and into a hall. Looking around I can see the same purplish torches lighting the area. Unlike the first floor though, this is a hallway with brick walls and ceiling. Looking down the hall I can also see a turn a little ways down that is at a right angle, unlike the curvier caves upstairs. Nothing hostile reveals itself to us yet, and I wonder what it is that we will face here. I still don’t detect the stench of the zombies we fought before. Everyone gives me a look and I nod to them so they know to keep moving.
Timbre takes the lead again and we start to move down the hall. When we get to the end we stop before the turn. Timbre pokes her head out briefly and when she pulls back and turns to me she gives me a wave. Moving up next to the wall before the turn I do the same and take a quick look down the hall that turns to the right. When I see what we are going to face I understand why there isn’t much of a smell. Skeletons! My Identify skill says they are reanimated skeletons, and there are three of them waiting for us in the next hall.
All of them are level fifteen and we should be able to take them without much problem, but I need to think about what spells will be more effective. Timbre’s hammer should do pretty well, but will lightning even hurt them. I don’t see what Azzaria can do with her bow. The skeletons just aren’t substantial enough for arrows. There’s nothing for it. We will just need to try a few things. I tell the other girls what we are up against in a low whisper and ask Azzaria to focus on her spells. We cast our buffs and then we step out into the next hall with Timbre at the head.
A moment after we all enter the hall fully the skeletons turn to us. They start making a chattering sound by clicking their jaws together rapidly. The agitated undead stalk toward us and we can see the dark purple glow in their eye sockets. Now that I can see them better I can tell that they may have been different races in life but it’s hard to tell now that there is no flesh on them. Their pale white bones are all human shaped and about that height but one is noticeably thinner in the shoulder than the others and another looks like it has more pronounced brow ridges. That isn’t the important thing now though. What really has me worried is that they are stalking forward in a very controlled manner.
Not wanting to let them advance uncontested I begin casting. I start with fireball that I pitch forward to explode on the middle one, the concussion of the blast knocking all three down. They are also burning from the magical flame, but it doesn’t look like it’s doing much damage to them. Switching elements I bring up my left hand and cast Earth Spike. It comes up underneath the middle skeleton and breaks off a rib as it impales the skeleton a couple feet off the ground. At that time Thia’s Chain Lightning hits the one to the left and then jumps to the rest. I quickly check the icon for my combat log in the corner of my vision to confirm. The Lightning is doing a little less damage to the skeletons than it was doing to the Zombies but not much.
Still seeing if I can do anything more, I switch again. I reach back with my arm and then swing it forward. Half way through the motion my spell takes effect and the water in the air coalesces into a whip. Swinging into the impaled skeleton the whip smashes the bones apart and they go spinning away. The other two have closed with Timbre at this point but they don’t do very well. One is carrying a dagger and the other a sword. The dagger wielding skeleton hangs back as the swordsman (swordskeleton?) lunges forward. Timbre deflects the sword, but the dagger comes in shortly after to score a cut across the arm with her hammer. She was able to move her arm in time so the damage is only minor.
Before it can retreat though, Timbre backhands the dagger carrier with her hammer. The blunt force damage is obviously more effective here than it was upstairs, because the skeletons whole arm breaks off from the force. It’s also staggered, giving Timbre the room she needs to turn back to the swordsman. She quickly dodges to the side to avoid another thrust, then uses her shield to bash it in the head. Thia and I both hit the disarmed skeleton, me with Wind Slash and her with Zapp, while Timbre rears back and swings the hammer into her target. The one I was aiming at blows apart from the duel attack and Timbre’s target has its skull crushed in before the whole thing falls limp.
Even before the last skeleton hits the ground Azzaria has cast a healing spell on Timbre. When I check her status bar in the corner of my vision I can see that she is back to full health again. I’m confident that we can handle the level after this encounter. “Alright everyone, it looks like this is doable. Azzaria, sorry but it looks like we’ll need you to be casting for this floor. If you can use your roots to help keep them at a distance then that would help. Also, casting a heal on one of them may cause damage from the conflicting magic types. We can try that at some point. Let’s loot and move on.”
We go around to the scattered bones of our kills and watch as they dissolve. The loot is left wherever the skull was. Skeletons give slightly better loot than the zombies, with one of them dropping a silver piece. I’m really enjoying the new property of my staff now that I don’t need to set it down or store it all the time. It makes looting and searching around for hidden treasure much easier, and I feel better having the benefits it provides all the time. I think the increase to spell efficacy also applies to all my casting now because I no longer need to channel the spell through the staff itself. I’ll have to test that some time.
Moving again, we fight a couple more groups of skeletons before we get to a room. For loot we get more coins and a few bones here or there. The bones are ingredients, probably for alchemy. Through the fights the rest of us did good damage but it was Timbre shining through with her hammer. Using her shield she was able to bash them off balance to give her a chance to finish them with powerful strokes from her weapon. It only took one hit to the head or chest when she used her Power Strike skill to end them. As we work our way through the halls of the dungeon’s second level I notice that the layout is the same as the first floor. The turns are at right angles but the basic layout is the same. There are even Bone Worms in the same places that we found their zombie counterparts upstairs.
A Mage Rising: (The Chronicles of Herst 2: A LitRPG Saga) Page 15
