“I remember the first time we did this all,” Rugrat recalled.
“Yeah, I do too. Han Wu was practically humping your leg to find out more about explosives,” Gong Jin said as he got on his mount.
“It was strange,” Rugrat agreed.
“Then he blew up half the damn road to Vuzgal. He learned fast.” Gong Jin laughed.
“The bigger the explosion, the better.”
Gong Jin scoffed. “Rednecks.”
“Heh.” Rugrat half-shrugged and grinned as he whistled.
George shot out of the sky, expanding into his full size as Rugrat jumped on his back.
“First Mages Squad, move out!” Second Lieutenant Couto ordered.
The platoon shook out as the mages led the way, using tree moving spells to clear a path.
“Seems almost peaceful,” Simms said, riding with the ease of someone that had done it most of his life. His eyes scanned the right side.
“What, other than the people rushing toward us to kill us?” Tyrone asked, looking over the left side.
“Well, that's just part of the job,” Gong Jin said.
“Everything is nice and peaceful until it isn't. Peace and chaos.” Rugrat snapped his fingers. “Just that close to one another.”
“Like hurrying up and waiting?” Gong Jin asked.
“Smart ass. Aren’t you supposed to be a team leader?” Rugrat laughed.
“Some days.”
“Halt!” an officer called out as the convoy came to a stop. Mages dismounted and used their spells. They stood on top of a large hill that commanded views over the mountain ranges in front. The remote hill was only reachable through flight.
Spells pulled back the vegetation covering the hill, naturally and purposefully placed. The remote and wild hill turned into a series of mortar pits and interlocking trenches.
“Shit, these are a bit big,” Rugrat said.
“These are newer, built to not only house mortars, but the new artillery cannons,” Tyrone said excitedly.
“Too much time around explosives.” Gong Jin sighed. The squads set to work clearing out the pits and preparing ammunition.
“Let’s work on the most important stuff—rooms,” Gong Jin said.
They moved away from the guns.
Rugrat jumped into a trench and reached his hands out to the side. As he walked forward, the plants moved, revealing trenches.
He stopped at the plots where the first squad would be staying. “I've got this one. Just want to test out my limits.”
“All right, Tyrone, Simms, watch him. Rest of you come with me.” Gong Jin walked off.
Rugrat increased the trench width. Compressing the dirt made it nearly as hard as stone, but porous enough to take water. He turned to face the cleared ground, creating three ten-by-twenty-meter outlines.
He reached out with his domain into the ground, and felt through the dirt, deep into the ground. Those streams will be useful.
He looked deeper into the ground, passing through dirt into the stone of the hill.
He fused the stone together, checking the clear patches of ground above ground.
“Up you come.”
Twelve stone pillars as thick as a tree shot up through the rubble and the dirt.
Rugrat stopped ten meters below the surface; stone spread out between the pillars, creating a fifteen-centimeter hyper-compressed slab of stone as strong as iron.
He pushed it up on the pillars, causing the dirt above to mound over.
In the space underneath, Rugrat created walls with compressed stone A-frames. Compressed soil created a door and stairs leading down.
The stone walls of the bunkers appeared. Rugrat compressed the dirt in bands to disperse the kinetic forces and cover.
He stopped raising the three rooms and formed the floor. “Let's check it out, shall we?”
Rugrat went to the first of the bunkers. He conjured mana blades to cut through the stone. They turned into hands pushing the slab in, grabbing it before it fell.
Rugrat took out light formations and stuck them to the ceiling. He saw the simple grey-flecked room he'd created.
“Need to make a bathroom; pull that wall out a bit. Have the showers in the right, shitters in the left.”
The wall on the right grew out, creating a dividing wall as the entrance section flew opposite, fusing with the floor and wall before growing into another dividing wall.
“Stalls, and more drains. Connect them to the wastewater chute and stream.”
The walls and pipes grew unseen.
Rugrat checked the field showers. They had holes in the wall and drains.
The bathrooms were a series of holes in the ground leading into the unknown.
“Simple, but effective. Always get a better dump squatting. Feels more natural,” Rugrat said to Simms who was admiring the bunker.
“If you say so.”
“Got bathrooms, sleeping area.” Rugrat altered the area around the steps, creating a trough leading to the drain. “If it rains, the water will drain away nicely. Just need to repeat it on the other bunker and make sure the other bunkers don't use my wastewater stream for their showers. That would suck!”
Rugrat walked to the entrance. Simms followed. Rugrat created a switch back entrance so they wouldn't need a door to protect them from the elements, growing it from the floor, ceiling and walls.
“Not even a dent in my mana pool. Shit, I wish I could have done this in some of the other places I had to fight. Damn hooch hotel around here. Get all that Gucchi shit.”
Rugrat saw the plan of the first bunker with his domain; sky, ground, stone, air. The bunker’s walls grew and reshaped according to the first bunker's layout.
“Come back here plants.”
The trees and bushes moved. Their roots entombed the bunkers, creating a living camo net from vines and bushes, hiding them from above.
“Okay. Now that I've done it once, it should be easy to repeat it!”
Rugrat finished creating the bunkers, impressing the artillery platoon who'd sighted in and readied their mortars and formation plates. Cold wind kept most of them in their new bunkers, waiting. Sentries watched the hilltop, scanning with their binoculars. Rugrat had a sheet tossed out, his custom railgun broken down into parts.
Rugrat used his mana-smithing abilities to alter the parts. He enhanced them slightly, decreasing their size, reinforcing the threading a bit more.
“That's plain weird,” Gong Jin said as he walked up.
“With my domain increasing, I can sense things clearly. Seeing that everything isn't perfect would annoy me to no end. I'm sure that, later on, I'll want to change it all again. For now, she's the best I can make her.”
Rugrat picked up his cup of coffee and drank from it, looking out over the mountains.
“Are you sure about this, sir?” Gong Jin asked.
“Sure about what?”
“Being out here. You're the lord of, well, Alva. Everything.”
“I ain't sitting in the rear with the gear. I know I shouldn't be on the front lines. Simple matter of fact is that I ain't built for command. I'm built to be where the metal meets the meat. Commander Glosil, the Silaz, they're better at that officer shit than I ever will be. Damn. I don't think I could be them, holding back, coordinating, watching and planning. That's one hell of a burden to carry and hold.”
28
Support from on Far
“You sure you don’t have anything better to do?” Kim Cheol asked as Erik studied his medical report at the base of the bed.
“You’re my little guinea pig. How you been feeling? Your vitals are stabilizing, and it looks like your body is starting to make its own headway on some of the scar tissue. Going to need a few more treatments still.”
“You cut any more out of me and there won’t be much left,” Kim complained with a smile. “But nah, I can feel it getting better. Just want to be back out there and doing something.”
“You been eating everything?
” Erik pressed his hand to Cheol’s leg. He sensed increased stamina and mana regeneration, but it would still take a lot of time for his body to remove the scar tissue on its own. They had cut out the really bad internal shit over the last two surgeries.
“Yeah.” Kim nodded.
“Okay. So, we’ve gotten rid of most of the scar tissue affecting your vitals: heart, lungs and such. You had a few burst blood vessels in your brain when I first saw you, but those have healed nicely and shouldn’t trouble you anymore.”
“Don’t use it all that much.” Kim grinned.
“Anyway, we’re going to move onto stretches and non-invasive therapies. We need to bulk you up again, replenish your energy and stamina, and get your body working to heal itself.”
Erik pulled out some tools, placing them on the bedside table.
“Why do those all look like torture instruments?” Kim said warily.
“There are two ways we can do this. One, we go light and careful; two, we don’t. The second way will mean that you will heal faster, but it will hurt more.”
“Ah, so they are torture instruments. I don’t like it when I’m right,” Kim grumbled before sighing reluctantly. “Option two.”
“All right, let me know if it’s too much.”
“Okay. What do they actually do?”
“These allow me to dig deep into the muscles, break up the scar tissue and promote blood flow to the area. You up for it?”
“Sure.”
Erik smiled at Kim’s uncertain tone.
“Ah shit, when you’re smiling like that, I know it’s not good.”
Erik rolled his eyes and grabbed a simple wooden dowel from the table among his other soft tissue mobilization tools. “We’re going to start on your legs first. Specifically your shins.” Erik positioned himself alongside Kim’s leg, placing the dowel against the top of his left shin under his knee.
He pushed down and along Kim’s leg.
“Oh-fuck-that-fucking-SUCKS!” Kim’s eyes bulged as he grabbed the sheets, clenching his jaw shut and stared up at the ceiling.
Erik continued working. “Back in the army, they used to do this if you got shin splints. Crude way to break up the tissues. Keeps you going because training didn’t stop. It does suck though.” Erik commiserated as he worked the length of wood, scraping it up and down Kim’s left shin. He sent bolts of electricity through the area, tiny amounts that were just enough to stimulate the tissues.
He moved to the other shin, then started to take out applicators. He activated the crude ultrasound formations and went to work on Kim’s feet.
“Sucks in places, but feels kind of nice, not so tight.” Kim hissed and tilted his head to the side with a wince. “Good spot,” he said breathlessly.
“Yeah, your feet were pretty bad. You were driving all your power through them, gripping onto the ground. It's built up real bad. We need to break it down and ease things out. These tools are basically a last resort. I’m going to give you stretches to get you moving again. Pain is bad; resistance is good. Stretching will allow you to open the muscles and get them moving more regularly. These applicators speed up the process, and with stretching, you’ll heal faster.”
“I’m up for some movement. Getting stuck in bed is enough to drive anyone mad.”
“Good. We’ll do these sessions. You do your stretching. Then we’ll add in fighting drills and sparring with others. Then we’ll move to body tempering. Your mana system is a wreck, though you can still draw some mana into your body. The stronger your system is, the more mana you can hold. I found out that tempering is just the method to hold elements within your body.”
Kim’s eyes were sober, even through the pain. “Will I really be able to fight again?”
Erik kept working on the calf. “I swear on my life.”
Kim held his eyes for a solid minute before he slumped back. “Tell me what I need to do, and I’ll do it.”
Even after I let them suffer to protect Alva and Vuzgal, to keep our secrets.
“Okay.” Erik focused on Kim’s leg. A swirl of emotions ran through his mind and turned his stomach.
Nearly an hour and a half later, Erik was done. Food arrived and Kim dug in with gusto.
“Okay, so do you have all of your stretches?”
“Add in movement. Make it easy. Do it for thirty seconds. Pain is bad, resistance good,” Kim said, holding up the page of stretches.
“The more stretches you do, the better. Means you’ll be out of here sooner. Now, I’ve got other patients to see.”
“I wanted to ask… Is something happening?” Kim asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Most people moving around out there are soldiers.”
“Willful Institute is targeting Vuzgal and we have an issue in the First Realm. The Institute stirred up people to attack the Beast Mountain Range.”
“They know about Alva?”
“No, but they have suspicions. Sects are messy things. They might be using this to bind the different kingdoms together, bringing them under their control. Shit’s complicated.”
“Better you than me.” Kim snorted and went back to his food.
Erik smiled and left the room, checking his clipboard.
“Thank you.” Kim’s words were soft, but Erik still heard them.
“You can thank me by getting better!” he called back.
Erik smiled as he walked down the corridor and into another room. It was a larger ward, with a few people that were talking among themselves.
“Lord West!” Fatima said. The three with her looked up and made to stand.
“Will you sit your asses down?” Erik growled.
They gave meek smiles and ducked their heads as they sat back down.
“You’ll be cursing me in a few minutes, so no need to act like your mother is gonna come around and smack you for not minding your manners.”
“I’ll smack you for not minding yours!” Momma Rodrigeuz’s drive-by comment passed the hall and Erik saw her amused smile as she winked at the people in the room, waving and continuing on.
Erik ran his tongue over his teeth and turned back to the group who had sucked on their lips so hard they’d inverted, letting out half-hidden snorts.
“All right, yah morons, let’s have a look at you.” Erik moved to his first patient.
They made to clear away the game of euchre; it had spread through the army after Erik and Rugrat had taught it to the Special Teams and through Alva shortly afterward.
Another group was playing board games. It gave them something to do, and the board games make them think tactically, which they could apply in fighting.
“No need to stop on my part.” Erik looked at the table and Rafael’s hand.
“Got a good hand, too.”
Rafael’s partner glowered at him, trying to decipher his cards as Fatima and her partner watched them.
Erik laughed to himself quietly and studied Rafael. They had burned their cultivations for one another. It could have crippled them and would take months to recover. I’ll make sure they’re stronger than ever.
“How was Kim Cheol?” Fatima asked.
“Probably cursing me in his dreams, but he’s a tough bastard.” Most of the damage was just scar tissue. His mana system was torn up, but sowing treated Lidel leaves into his mana channels created a latticework for his mana system to grow along. Using tough Lidel leaves to replace mana channels had worked surprisingly well.
The group laughed as Erik held Rafael’s arm.
“Let me have it.” Rafael released the tension. Erik cast Medical Scan and reduced the strength he was using.
“Euchre!” Fatima said as the round came to an end.
“I’ll need Rafael for a minute,” Erik said.
“Okay,” Rafael said, dropping his cards.
He moved him to a bed and got to work with the applicators on his shoulders and arms. Rafael was worn out as Erik put a sheet of stretches on his bedside table.
�
�Fatima, you’re next.”
Erik moved through the room, examining them, giving them stretches and working their worst spots over with the applicators.
They were lethargic and slow afterward.
“See you all tomorrow,” Erik said to a cacophony of groans that made Erik smile.
“It’s good to see patients with a healthy appetite!” Momma Rodriguez said as she walked into the room. Erik moved out of the way. The Adventurer’s Guild members perked up and smiled. They don't do that when I walk into a room. Erik grumbled, but his smile only widened.
“Fatima, all vegetarian with extra onions.” Momma Rodriguez pulled warm meals from her storage ring and handed them out. “And will you stop getting out of bed, or I’ll make Erik put you back in it!”
She looked over and winked at Erik as if to say: Good work! I have this now.
Erik thanked her with his eyes. He left the ward and walked down the hall to a reception desk.
“Lord West?” The lady smiled. He was around enough that she knew not to bow.
“Jen around?”
“She’s in her office.”
“Thanks. I just took a look at the guild members.” Erik passed the receptionist his notes. “Make sure they do their stretches and correct their posture. Maybe put a mirror in there so they can see what they’re doing?”
“I’ll see what I can do,” the receptionist said brightly.
“Thanks!” Erik rapped off a tune on the counter and headed for Jen’s office. Yao Meng and his people, who had been waiting in the hall, followed him.
“Time for the needle?”
“Yes, Yao Meng. Time for the needle.” Erik rolled his eyes.
“You’re already as pale as a sheet. You trying for see through?”
Erik looked at his glowing forearm. Shit. I’m white. Need a tan. He still flipped off Yao Meng for his accurate description.
“Heh.”
They wandered through the halls. Things were peaceful, most of the rooms were empty and the staff sparse. They passed a group of soldiers circling their first aid instructor, jotting down notes, taking in everything.
Erik knocked on a simple door.
Seventh Realm Part 1: A LitRPG Fantasy series (The Ten Realms Book 8) Page 32
