by Jez Cajiao
“What’s wrong with your arm?” she asked, and I shrugged, tugging off the small shield that Grizz had lent me and passing it to him, then flipping the latches to release the armor.
Once I had it all unlocked, I twisted the vambrace and there was a click before the lower section released. I tugged it free, revealing that my arm ended just below the elbow. Soween blinked at the truncated arm, as Oracle spoke up.
“I still can’t believe you cut it off; what were you thinking?” she asked me, and I shrugged.
“It seemed a good idea at the time, that’s all,” I said simply, before looking over at Soween. “If you could concentrate on the alchemy lab, first, please, then we can at least make sure everyone has a potion or something to use when the shit hits the fan next.”
Soween nodded, straightening, and saluted, fist to chest, Legion style, before striding from the room and gathering up the others she’d brought with her.
They headed straight down into the lower decks, searching for rooms that would be the best to use. Oracle and I looked at each other, and I sighed, getting up and walking to the door, determined to get some fresh air while I worked through the welter of notifications I could see furiously blinking away.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
I left as Tang entered to talk to Jian, and smiled at his friendly exchange with Tenandra. Then I walked out onto the deck of the ship, looking around and making sure we weren’t being snuck up on again, as near as I could tell.
In all directions now, there were angry gray clouds, but at least the majority of the storm was behind us, with a much gentler rain still pattering across the deck. I walked up to the edge of the railing at the bow of the ship and gazed out, Oracle slipping into her smaller form to ride on my shoulder.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” I whispered to her, looking out over the sea that ran out to the horizon to our right and behind us, while in the distance ahead, the continent was clear, with trees and the shore becoming distinct from the waves. To my left, I could see the bay that the cities of Himnel and Narkolt shared, and I looked down at a sudden movement, catching a glimpse of something the shape of a plesiosaur, but the size of a super-tanker, dipping back under the waves and making me shudder at the thought of being on sailing ship.
“It is,” Oracle agreed. “But I can’t wait to return home. I know I’m not tied to the Tower anymore, but…”
“But it’s your home,” I finished for her and nodded in understanding. “Mine, too; I can’t wait to get back there, to see everyone, and most of all, to get the place repaired, to make them all safe!”
“Can you imagine Oren’s face when he sees the ships?” Oracle asked me, grinning. “He’s going to be pestering us for the Battleship inside the hour, I bet.”
“And Seneschal and Heph will be arguing over the Golems as well!” I said, smiling at the thought.
“Not to mention Flux; he’s going to be pestering the Legion to train him in fighting as fast as he can!”
“Oh god, yes.” I groaned. “First thing we do when we land is have a damn party. Let them all see each other and interact. Then we get everyone out onto the ground outside, make sure they’re all out of the way while we fix the place up, and we get things sorted, get the Tower configured for battle, get the Golems into production and for the love of god, get us a room with a real door and a real bed!”
“That sounds like a plan,” my companion said, looking up at me and smiling. She’d been wearing a black top and camo pants when I’d looked out to sea, but as I glanced up to where she perched on my shoulder, she was suddenly, and starkly, naked, and I swallowed hard.
“That is so not fair,” I said to her in a low voice as I took in the view.
“I know,” she said breezily. “Know what else isn’t fair?”
“What?” I asked.
“That you’re wearing proper pants. If you still had the Drow ones, that had that hole that led through from the pocket, I could have had all kinds of fun right now…”
“Oracle!” I groaned, trying to calm myself down as I stared longingly at her.
“I know,” she said, grinning. “But I missed you!”
“I missed you too, but damn, you’re a tease!” I growled, pulling up the notifications.
Congratulations! You have killed the following:
2x Human ship’s soldiers of various levels for 22,150xp
3x DarkSpore for 230xp
1x Drow Shifter for 17,400xp
A party under your command killed the following:
7x Human ship’s soldiers of various levels for 56,870xp
9x DarkSpore for 530xp
Total Party exp earned: 57,400xp
As party leader, you gain 25% of all experience earned
Progress to level 23 stands at 229,066/420,000 Exp
Congratulations!
Forces under your command have seized the following strategic items:
1x Merchantman Airship for 35,000xp
Due to no formal declaration of War being in force between you and the ship’s previous owners, you gain no additional XP for this capture.
I shrugged and dismissed it, while trying not to admit to myself that I was gutted we didn’t at least get an ‘assist’ for the death of the two ships, and Mal driving off the third.
Congratulations! You have raised your weapons skill ‘Swords’ to its first specialization. You must now pick a path to follow. Will you choose the path of the BLADE, or follow instead the path of the STORM?
Choose carefully, as this choice cannot be undone.
BLADE:
An adherent of the Path of the BLADE believes that there is no need for a secondary weapon, as their sword is a part of them, in much the same way their arm or foot is. To lose one, is to lose all.
Gain 2 points to Dexterity and +5 to damage when wielding a single blade.
Ability Learned: Lunge!
Once per fight, you can force stamina into an ability, ‘Lunge,’ allowing you to drive forward up to five meters with your blade extended. Any attacks that are landed as a result of ‘Lunge’ do double damage.
STORM:
To win requires not that you be a fixed, immobile object; instead, you must be fluid, flowing around your enemies and slicing them apart. Followers of the Path of the STORM specialize in wielding multiple weapons and gain a +5 to damage when wielding more than one bladed weapon at a time.
Ability Learned: Flurry of Blows!
For a cost of 100 Stamina, you can increase your physical speed, more than doubling the strikes you can make for up to 60 seconds and imbuing them with the element of your choice.
Fire: Additional chance to inflict ‘Burning’ status
Water: Additional chance to inflict ‘Freezing’ status
Earth: Additional chance to inflict ‘Slowed’ status
Air: Additional chance to inflict ‘Confused’ status
Light: Additional chance to inflict damage on undead and evil-aligned creatures
Darkness: Additional chance to inflict damage on living and good-aligned creatures
That wasn’t really a hard choice there either, considering that I occasionally fought with multiple weapons, yeah, but more often than not, I used my naginata, and as soon as I had two hands again, I’d be making the most of that again. I chose ‘Blade’ and gained the skill ‘Lunge’, before dismissing the confirmation prompt and moving on.
Congratulations! You have raised your spell ‘Battlefield Triage’ to its Second Evolution. You must now pick a new path to follow. Will you choose to continue to Generalize, or will you Specialize?
Choose carefully, as this choice cannot be undone.
Generalist:
Your healing spell ‘Battlefield Triage’ has once again grown ready for evolution. In choosing to generalize further, you find that your understanding deepens regarding the interactions that magic and the living form can achieve together. Instead of focusing on a single issue, you blanket the entire area, pumping in mana until wha
tever remains in that location is healed.
Healing will now be increased by 5 points per second and cost reduced by 10%, effecting all targets within a radius of 2m
Surgeon:
Your recent experiences have taught you to view all those around you in a different light. No longer are they defined by their differences in structure; Instead, you see their likenesses. You have grown to identify the common themes in humanoids, and with such knowledge, you are more efficient when fixing them… as well as breaking them, when need be.
When healing humanoids, you achieve an additional 10 points of healing per second, for an increased cost of 5mana across all healing spells. When attacking humanoids, you do +5 additional damage, due to your knowledge of their inner workings.
Bonus Ability: Examine and Excise!
Due to your recent practice, and the integration of your Greater Examination spell, you have gained the ability to slice and dice with far more finesse than you ever thought yourself capable of. When using this ability, weaknesses and errors in your target’s physical make-up may be identified at a 25% chance of success, allowing you to fix issues that your target never knew they possessed...
Cost: 25mana per second; chances of success rise by 5% per second of examination
This one was more complicated, but after a few minutes’ thought, I nodded to myself. I could feel Oracle’s focus, and I agreed with her unspoken suggestion as I selected ‘Surgeon’ this time. Yes, it’d be cool to have an AOE heal‒well, one that worked on everyone that didn’t take forever to cast in a fight‒but the weakness of the generalized path had been all too clear when I had worked to heal Tang and Bane.
You have selected ‘Specialist’ for your second Evolution. your Spell ‘Battlefield Triage’ has evolved to ‘Surgeon’s Scalpel’ and can now be used to fix problems that your target never even knew they had!
For a cost of forty mana per second, you now heal 32 points of damage, and can choose between healing the body in a wide arc, or focusing in on a single point. Continuing to channel this spell into an area that is already healed may have beneficial effects.
Due to creating your own unique Journeyman Spell, you may now choose a bonus:
1) Additional healing effect: when in desperate times, additional mana can be channeled into this spell, increasing the effectiveness by half for so long as the spell lasts.
Cost: 2x single spell cost
2) Genetic Drift Examination: due to your own background knowledge, you are aware of the difference between the ideal genetic template and the end product, much as a patient might have their growth stunted through years of poor nutrition, while another may excel due to an abundance of opportunities. Now, rather than your spell working on all areas slightly, you may focus this, improving a specific point of a target to their ultimate potential,
Cost: 2-5x ‘Surgeon’s Scalpel’ spell cost for 2% per second effect.
I quickly chose the ‘Genetic Drift Examination.’ It was both a mouthful, and a pain in the ass, if I was reading it right, but… I knew that my people were far from what they could be. I’d healed Amaat from his reduced state when we’d first met, into a great example of his race, doing the equivalent of curing male-pattern baldness as part of healing him, but he was still only an average-sized example of his species as near as I could tell.
If I could use this to work out how to make him into the ideal, literally heal him to the point that he was all that he could be physically, he’d have a huge advantage over others of his race, and the thought of doing that for the entirety of the Tower?
Hell, I might even be able to heal my own scars away, so I didn’t look so much like Freddy Kruger was my masseur.
I nodded to myself and shared a smile with Oracle as we dismissed the last of the prompts and strolled across the deck, towards the hatches.
I clambered down the steep ladder leading to the inner decks and looked around, checking the rooms, as I walked down the corridor, until I found Soween and two of her crew carrying out a canvas bucket filled with mulch.
“We’re working on this room; it’s the second largest and least contaminated, plus it has a solid seal around the porthole, so it’s better than most of the others,” she said abruptly, wiping her cheek and leaving a smear of grime behind. “Give us another ten, fifteen minutes, and we’ll have it ready. By the way, I heard what happened to your bodyguard, Bane; is he alright?”
“Pretty much. He was captured by an asshole noble; the nephew of Hannimish if you’ve seen him about?” I asked, and she nodded thoughtfully. “What do you know about him?”
“He’s honest enough, for a noble…” she said, stepping to the side and letting the other two move past. “We’ve had some contact with him, as members of the Smuggler’s Guild, I mean. He paid his bills and didn’t try to cheat us, so there’s that. You’d be surprised how many nobles think that you should be thankful that they were willing to take things from you, never mind actually paying for them. He never tried that, and never ordered anything dodgy as near as I saw; mostly just gemstones, always uncut, and artifacts from the Empire; where we could get them and they still ran, anyway.”
“Well, his nephew was totally different, then,” I replied. “Little shit of a man. Got me with a dodgy dagger that would have killed me if I hadn’t cut my arm off,” I said, waving my stump at her. “Seemed to be working with someone else, from what he said, but I have no idea who, or what, the story was with the dagger and the journal. Something else to look into when I have time,” I said, shrugging.
“Okay… anyway, here.” She pulled a bag out of the large one on her pouch. “This is all the alchemy ingredients I’d bought for us. I know Mal said he’d give them all to you, but I was planning on trading them for some potions myself, so if you have any spare later? I’d appreciate a couple, at least…”
“Depending on what there is, I’ll make you some,” I reassured her and she smiled.
“That’d be appreciated, sir. Anyway, we found a table in the room two down, and we’ll move that into this room as soon as its clear. Is there anything else you’ll need?”
“A chair would be good, but as this was a gnome ship, I’m betting the table is tiny?” I asked, and she nodded. “Ah, well. I can sit on the floor then; guess I should be thankful they didn’t go in for low ceilings and be thankful for it, eh? Thanks, anyway.”
Oracle and I waited in a side room while I meditated again, getting the practice in while I could, as Soween and her crew sorted the room out. I heard occasional grumbling coming from further down the corridor as others worked on another, larger room. When Soween came to me, telling me they’d done all they could, and the room was as clean as they could make it with the equipment they had, I thanked her and her team, and stepped inside, inspecting the spaces where the filth had been scrubbed away wherever they could reach.
I took a deep breath and asked Oracle to manage the fire, as I summoned a fountain of pure, clean water, and started to guide it around the room.
Oracle held her hands out and let the water flow into the Firebolt she conjured between them, turning the icy cold water into a jet of water hot enough that it could scald if you weren’t careful.
We quickly moved round the room, essentially using a high-pressure jet wash to sluice the room down one last time. The water that ran out between the boards in the floor, down the walls, and off the ceiling was filthy, seeping into the lower decks, but I ignored it, concerned only with clearing the room as best I could.
It took a few more minutes before I was almost out of mana, but at least the room looked clean, and it even had the frame for a bed in it still. I glanced at it, then at Oracle, and we shared a naughty grin, before I shook my head and closed the door behind me.
“We haven’t got time to play,” Oracle said to me, despite the smile she was giving me. “You know as well as I do, if we start, we’ll not get anything else done, and as much as I’d love to, we actually need the potions!”
“I know;
I’m just thinking that the bed is actually a better height for the kit to go onto than the table, as I can kneel at it, and it’s both wider and longer than the table…”
“Go on…” she said confused, as she could feel my horniness, but couldn’t see where this was going.
“So, I was thinking it would be best if no one were to walk in and catch us naked, right? Better if we work on getting the potions done now, and play later?”
“Yeah…” she drawled out, watching me suspiciously.
“Well, it turns out you’d fit under the bed great, and that would mean your mouth would be at just the right height…” I hinted, grinning, before she laughed, cutting me off.
“I knew it! I knew you’d have something dirty in mind!” She laughed. “Well, tough! It’s not fair, as I want some of the fun too!” She gestured to the Alchemy set I was pulling out and setting up. “Besides, if I put my mouth to work properly, you think you’d be able to concentrate on your work?” she asked, and I shrugged.
“Not sure, but in the interests of science, I’m willing to experiment and find out!” I offered, raising my eyebrows suggestively.
“No, especially not if you’re using acids and poisons, not to mention boiling substances… You might spill some on my head, and then I might bite down after all, and that’s the last thing we want!” I winced in imagined pain at her very logical point. “Besides, I think we have a hand to regrow?” she offered, and I nodded.
“I’ll certainly not refuse,” I stated, lifting my stump. “How bad do you think it’s going to be?”
“Not good,” Oracle responded, frowning at the arm. “With the Genetic Drift, it’ll be easier. though. At least, because your genes know you should have an intact arm, it’s essentially providing the power to your body to do its own work, rather than having to learn regrowth from scratch.”
“Okay, so…”
“So, lie down, but take your armor off first!” Oracle said quickly, as I started to lie down. I sighed and climbed back to my feet, then stripped down to my regular pants and tunic, grimacing all over again at the state of them.
