Watcher's Test

by Sean Oswald

  Both Talvenicus and Dave had the good sense to be embarrassed for the delay that their conversation was causing and turned the floor over to Emily. She commented that she had increased her Essence Magic up to level 20 but that it hadn’t given her any new spells. Dave echoed that he had already tried that with Shaping Magic and that led to an argument about whether Dave should have told that to Emily or if as he maintained he hadn’t told her because he didn’t want her to lose hope that it might work. Talvenicus was able to explain why though. Apparently, only the first time that character points are put into a school of magic will new spells be automatically put into the mind of the caster. Also, despite the successes the Nelsons had, not everyone was compatible with all different types of magic. He went on to explain further that it was uncommon for an individual to be compatible with more than two types of magic but that in some rare instances, an individual would be compatible with all of the types. That indicated a person particularly gifted in magic and likely to go far. Such people were highly sought out, both by nobles and by magical schools since their potential was virtually limitless.

  The good news though was that if an individual spent enough character points to go into tier 2 all in one go, then they would end up with three spells spread out over tier 1 and 2. Dave wasn’t really keen on putting points into Essence magic. What is the point of being married to your own healer if you had to heal yourself? But since he had the points to spare, he tried to allocate 11 points into Essence Magic only to be the first of the Nelsons to learn that they were not compatible with a specific type of magic.

  Failure! You have attempted to apply character points to an incompatible magic. Please choose again. You will never be able to acquire Essence Magic.

  Well, that sucked. As suddenly after being told that he had failed, Dave wanted nothing more than to be able to cast healing spells. His pouting was a bit childish, but Emily reigned him in and asked Mira to try next. She thought it was a good idea for her to have some healing power too so she had no problem with trying. As soon as she placed the 11 character points, she got the familiar notification.

  Essence Magic: the most respected and feared of magics. Essence is the life force of all living beings and can be used to perform wonders of healing and in extreme cases, even resurrection. Yet Essence Magic is open to corruption as what can give life can also take it away. Effect: Determines the highest tier of essence spells available to you as well as increasing the effectiveness of those spells by 1%/level. 3x 1st tier spells gained.

  Minor Wither: Target is drained of water. Effect varies. Most people and animal type life will take 1 damage/tick for 1 tick/level and further suffer from the Fatigued status condition for the duration unless they resist. Plant forms of life will take 1 damage/tick per level for 1 tick/level. Range: 20’+1’/level. Cooldown: 1 minute - 3 sec/level. Mana: 30

  Minor Bleeding Wound: Target must have a susceptible wound. Resist spell or wounds on your person begin to bleed at 1 dmg/tick per 2 levels for 1 tick/level. New wounds may stack up to three times. Range: 20’ +1’/level. Cooldown: 1 minute - 3 sec/level. Mana: 40

  Lesser Regeneration: Target gains regeneration of health at a rate of 1/tick per 2 levels for 1 tick per level. Range: Touch. Cooldown: 3 minutes – 3 sec/level. Mana: 60

  As soon as she got the notifications, Mira read them off to everyone else in the room, which elicited some surprise. There wasn’t a specific spell that would allow for surgery of the removal of foreign objects, and what the heck, why were two of the spells harmful spells rather than helpful? Wasn’t Essence magic the type of magic that healed? They all sat lost in thought for a moment when the idea hit Emily. She told the rest of them what she was thinking, and they seemed skeptical, especially Talvenicus, but he didn’t want to stand up to her on the issue of treating a patient.

  Emily ran through the idea again in her head and was convinced that it was the best chance that the treant victims had to survive and hopefully even recover. The plan though would require her to learn two of the spells from Mira so it was time to see how that would work. Talvenicus told them what he knew about teaching spells, which was almost nothing, but it was still more than what they had known. This led to Emily and Mira sitting cross-legged on the floor facing one another. As they both tried to breathe deeply and focus themselves, Emily was struck by the thought of how natural it felt to sit on the floor like this. It must be an elven thing because somewhere in her thirties, she had stopped being able to comfortably sit on the floor. That was neither here nor there though, just another curiosity about Eloria to be pushed to the back of her mind. Eventually, when they both felt mentally ready, they placed their hands up palms facing out so that their skin was touching. Dave was struck by how similar they looked even with the whole elven vs half-elven thing going on. There was no doubt that they were mother and daughter, the one a beautiful reflection of the other.

  The longer that mother and daughter sat there with their palms together, the more a faint white glow began to form around them. After about a minute of focus, a small shock passed between them and they were both greeted with a similar notification:

  Congratulations!

  You have just imparted the spell: Lesser Regeneration. Base chance of imparting spell: 75% + 16.5% (bonus for average Intelligence), -20% (highest tier of spell usable by teacher), -20% (highest tier of spell usable by teacher), -0% (single school spell) = 51.5% success chance.

  “Wow, that was lucky, only 51.5% chance of succeeding,” Mira said with a low whistle.

  Hearing that, for some reason which defied his understanding, Dave chimed in, “Well as Grandpa used to say, ‘Every blind pig finds an acorn now and again’.”

  Both wife and daughter turned to look at him as soon as he said it. Neither had a happy look on their face and Emily’s voice leaked a tone of warning, “And who exactly is the pig in this equation?”

  Thanks to years of successful marriage under his belt, Dave responded without missing a beat. “Why, me, of course. I’m just so lucky that it’s all working out.” A silly grin was plastered to his face as he tried, and mostly failed, to exude a certain boyish charm. All done to the backdrop of laughter from Aloysia. As his wife and daughter continued to stare at him, he realized that he finally understood how all women seem to know how to give the look. Their mothers teach it to them and then they practice it on their fathers so they will be ready for those unsuspecting men who try to sweep them off their feet. Fortunately, though, Emily didn’t see any point in pushing the issue, so she just accepted his statement, and, after letting him squirm a bit under, her gaze moved on.

  Following that, there was a short discussion about the factors involved in teaching the spell which led to some snarky teenager teasing from Mira to her mother about the difference in their Intelligence scores and how Emily’s score had dragged down their chances by 5%. Secretly Dave was glad because that meant that Emily’s ire would not be directed at Mira and not at him, but he still pointed out that they could fix that by applying some of their stored-up stat points. Both the ladies had quite a few points saved up from the day hunting yesterday, specifically Emily had 9 points to spend and Mira had 11.

  As soon as Dave made the suggestion, Mira had called up her character sheet in her mind’s eye and, with all the restraint of a teenager, began to apply the points. She quickly spent the points as she had already decided to before either of her parents could try to tell her differently. 5 went into Charisma and along with her racial bonus for being half-elven that pushed her total up to 26 and then 4 went into Intelligence also bringing her total up to 26. She really didn’t want to put points into Constitution or even Agility because that wasn’t who she was planning on being. Sure, she had done gymnastics and such, but she was no jock and she didn’t need a bunch of health, just a lot of mana so that she could blast anything that came her way. She also loved the way that she felt when she increased her Intelligence. It was like she could see everything so much more clearly. Most teenage
rs back on earth might act like they were smarter than their parents but now she absolutely knew that she was smarter than them. As far as the points into Charisma, she learned that it not only affected her social interactions, but also her physical beauty, and honestly what fifteen-year-old girl wouldn’t make herself prettier if she could?

  Dave couldn’t see what was going on inside of her mind, but he could instantly tell from the way that she stared off into space that Mira was accessing her character sheet but before he could say anything, the most startling change started to happen right before his very eyes. She was a very pretty girl and that wasn’t just a proud father speaking. It was objectively true and all the more with this new body in Eloria. Yet in a heartbeat she became more beautiful, more alluring, well just more. It was hard to put his finger on it exactly, but the increase of 6 stat points all at once made a visible difference in her appearance. For the father in him, it made his hands clench tighter and more than ever he wished he had a shotgun so that he could sit outside cleaning it whenever any of the town’s young men came around.

  “Mira!” Only a frustrated parent could put as much inflection into a single word like that, but Emily just couldn’t believe that Mira would so recklessly assign points without at least talking to her and Dave. Dave might not always see everything clearly, but he certainly knew a lot more about getting along in Eloria than they did, specifically about the best way to assign points. The advice he had given her so far had worked out perfectly. “Did you just assign all your points?” And there it was, the rhetorical question so easily wielded by parents no matter what universe they are from.

  “Yep.” Mira’s one-word answer was positively dripping with defiance and so Dave had to step in because he knew a mother-daughter fight wasn’t going to be productive for anyone. As much as Mira could upset him, she was masterful at pushing Emily’s buttons.

  “It’s okay. We can talk about this later, but right now you need to finish up your plan to heal those men.” It might have been a bit manipulative, but Dave knew if anything would redirect his wife, it would be her empathy for her patients.

  “Arghh.” If Emily was a cartoon bull, steam would have blown out of her nose at that moment to match her frustrated cry. She knew Dave was right, just like she knew that Mira was pushing her buttons intentionally and Dave was trying to redirect her. “That’s fine, but don’t think I’ve forgotten about this. We can just talk later,” she concluded with a meaningful look at her firstborn.

  “So, I think you said you have 9 stat points to spend. What are you thinking about doing with them, hun?”

  “Well, I had been planning on putting 3 into Constitution since, if I understand it correctly, that will only up me to 10, and if I want to be able to be my crazy cool ninja self, then I had better be able to take at least a little bit of damage, right?”

  Dave started to answer her, but apparently, ninja didn’t have any translation over into the common human dialect of Eloria and so what Emily had actually said was the actual English word, “ninja”. That left Talvenicus and Aloysia confused so the latter quickly said, “Wait, what’s a n-i-n-j-a?” Taking care to deliberately pronounce the foreign word.

  The Nelsons all looked at each other and laughed at this sudden reminder that they were a long way from Kansas, so to speak. Realizing that an answer was needed though, Dave explained that it was something from their homeland and a little bit about what it was. That unfortunately only led to more confusion as Talvenicus jumped into the conversation. The confusion was that in their minds, a priestess did no fighting. The temple had monks, paladins, or just normal warriors for that sort of thing, at least as far as the tales went. Dave tried to answer their questions as vaguely as he could and assured them that while she was a Daughter of Redemption, there was nothing in her creed that forbade her from fighting, especially against beasts and monsters. Even if she was not supposed to hurt other humans and elves, if she could help it. Again, though, this continued to raise more and more questions until Emily stepped in again. “Enough, there are men in need of healing, and we need to finish here before I can do my duty.”

  Dave chuckled to himself as Talvenicus, who had been ready to debate and argue with him, just meekly lowered his head and said, “Yes, Holy Daughter.”

  With that confusion handled, Dave and Emily quickly went back and forth with a quick comment or two from the mayor and eventually they ended up assigning 3 points to Constitution and 6 to Intelligence given the amount of mana required for the new spells. Emily had wanted to put 2 of the 6 into Agility, but Dave convinced her that she really needed to increase the size of her mana pool at this time. The decision made, it was the work of a simple thought to assign the points, and then it was Emily’s turn to gasp as her mind was expanded in ways she had never expected. Jumping from an Intelligence of 11 to 17 was like going from an IQ of 110 to 170 in one fell swoop. What Mira didn’t realize was that Wisdom is required to make the most use of a higher intellect, but it was still a rush to suddenly be able to process and recall information so much better than before. The change in her mind was so significant that she didn’t even really feel the changes the 3 points into Constitution made as it made her bones, muscles, and even skin more resilient, and her body better able to take a blow.

  “Wow, what a rush. Now I can see what you were so excited about Mira. It almost makes me want to store up extra points just so I can spend them in clumps like this again in the future.”

  Everyone else chuckled as it was easy enough to understand the allure of leveling up in bursts like that since after the hunt yesterday, they had all experienced something like this. Shaking her head then, Emily said, “Well, let's do the next spell now.”

  Emily and Mira both got back into a cross-legged position, and this time it seemed to take even less time to soothe themselves and settle in. Palms touching, they were soon glowing with a soft white aura. Then, almost as soon as the glow had grown to a visible level, they pulled their hands back and Emily grinned as she filled the others in on the notification she had just received.

  Congratulations!

  You have just imparted the spell: Minor Wither. Base chance of imparting spell: 75% + 21.5% (bonus for average Intelligence), -10% (highest tier of spell usable by teacher), -10% (highest tier of spell usable by teacher), -0% (single school spell) = 76.5% success chance.

  “So how is a DOT going to help you with healing those men?” Dave asked perplexed.

  “A ‘DOT’? What do you mean?” Emily asked her own question in response to Dave’s.

  With that same silly grin, Dave got whenever he was trying to explain something that was obvious to him but not to her, in the past usually regarding some aspect of the law. “A ‘DOT’ is an acronym for any effect that causes damage over time.”

  “Ah, well, why didn’t you just say that in the first place?” Dave chuckled audibly this time at her chagrin but didn’t say anything back in response. “You are gonna just have to wait and see if it works out. Now, I need to go to check on my patients and see if we can fix this once and for all. Poor Gertrude has been working to keep them alive. Mira, now that you have that healing spell, would you be willing to come with me? I want to see if we can combine healing spells on a patient.” She asked her daughter rather than ordering her because she knew that Mira was squeamish around sick people, and for once, the quality upbringing showed and no matter how much Mira wanted to say no, she agreed to go and help. She knew that it was a matter of life and death and was still new enough and shocking enough to push her out of her concern about seeing sick people.

  Max watched vigilantly as only one who is responsible for the people around him can. He simultaneously scanned the surrounding sky and kept an eye on Hasert. The wizard had been right, he was the best choice to play bait. His protective spell was impressive and over the past few years, Max had come to realize just how resourceful the older man was. Then a flash a movement caught his attention. The beasts were making their move, but no, it was
n’t both wyverns. Only one had attacked the wizard. Its diving attack had pushed it through the protective spell. The magic stripped away its camouflage while crackling lightning danced up and down the length of the reptile from snout to stinger. Then in horror, Max watched as the forward momentum allowed that very stinger to plunge deep into his friend’s chest while carrying Hasert to the ground.

  At the same moment, chaos burst out behind him when the second wyvern made its presence known as it attacked the cluster of Karl the ranger, Adelmo the warrior, and Engel the defender. The squad had been divided into three groups besides Hasert. This group was to his right and behind him by about thirty feet. Now his attention was pulled in two different directions causing the veteran leader to hesitate for the briefest of moments. Olga, the wizard’s apprentice, felt no such hesitation as she bolted forward the moment that she saw her master so brutally attacked. Even as she ran, the words of a spell tumbled out of her mouth and before she had closed half the distance, bright white darts of magical power sprang forth from her fingers to strike the scaled hide of the wyvern. Its body now spasmed in the throes of Hasert’s spell. With another word, the young mage launched a second quickened spell and an invisible magical hand shoved against the beast laying atop her master with a force small greater than the young woman’s muscles would ever be able to generate. Her push spell had the desired effect of sending the wyvern flying a dozen feet, but it also had the undesired consequence of ripping the poison laden stinger out of Hastert’s chest where it was still lodged, opening the wound even further.