A Shadow in the Mist

“We have also learned to create ranged weapons for Wardens since Relics are melee and skills rarely offer any ranged attacks. These weapons can be powered directly by a Warden’s core and allow for a variety of effects such as the thunder-musket’s ability to shoot bolts of lightning or bows that charge their arrows with fire ether, so they explode on impact. These pseudo-skills are not as effective as those given by a Relic, but they do allow for ranged options and surprise attacks, or use in a firing line atop a wall.”

- From Kiedra Mithradati’s introductory to Wards and Enchanting, 532 AB

Cain- Thursday, September 5th, 564 AB

I stood in the hall of the Mist school with the rest of the first-year students as our instructors lined us up.

“Today you will be given an etheric ranged weapon crafted by the various crafters of our academy,” Lord Scarisen said. “If you already have one that’s fine but if not, you will be assigned one. These weapons are yours to care for, not to keep, if you lose them, you will be expected to reimburse the school for their loss and since each of these weapons is constructed with a demon ether gem that is not a cheap price.”

“There are not enough of each weapon for you all to have your pick so you will cast lots to see which of you gets first pick.”

Our instructors came by with a fistful of sticks in each hand. I drew a stick and smiled as I saw it was fairly long. Not the longest I saw drawn, but still putting me ahead. Enoch had drawn a straw a little longer than me and we went up together to the tables with weapons on them. There were ether-muskets, blunderbusses, pistols, crossbows, longbows and recurve bows on display. Each of them was tagged with the type of ether gem powering them. Not all ether gems were useful in weapons but nearly all could be used to power one in some way. Just like with relics, the royal trio were the favorite.

Enoch picked up a musket powered by a storm gem. I reached out to grab an identical one but paused, the memory of a lightning filled sky and a burning house filling my vision. My hand moved to the side and I picked up a recurve bow set with a fire gem. I went to stand with Enoch as we waited for everyone else to go through and pick up their own weapons.

“Now we will go through training you to charge your weapons and maintain them,” Lord Scarisen said. “I expect these weapons to be returned in the exact manner you have them now.”

We exited the school out into a section of the muster yard reserved for ranged weapon practice. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Rineer was the trainer for the group Enoch and I were in.

“Ether weapons are a crude attempt to replicate Relics,” Rineer said. “You will find somewhere on their handle an interface rune. When you touch this you’re going to feel a tugging sensation. This is the enchantments on the weapon trying to draw ether out of your core.”

“How much ether?” one of my classmates, a blonde-haired boy named John asked.

“That’s where their inferiority comes in,” Rineer said, pulling a longbow off his back. “A single shot from one of these will take at least fifteen ether.” He released a shot that hit the target, burying itself deep in it before exploding in a blast of fire.

We all winced at that. That was over a tenth of my ether maximum right there, and it wouldn’t be different for almost anyone else here. Even as my level went up, that cost would still be a heavy price; we weren’t women who had a massive ether pool and had to rely on our physical prowess a lot more than the ability to constantly spam abilities.

“However,” Rineer continued, drawing back another arrow to his ear and holding it there for a lot longer this time. “This is where flexibility comes in, you can also feed it a lot more than just fifteen points of ether.”

When he released the arrow this time a trail of smoke followed after it. As soon as it hit the target it exploded in a massive ball of fire, obliterating the target entirely.

“You can use this to get a powerful sneak attack off against a higher tier djinn before it even knows you’re there,” Rineer said.

“Isn’t that dishonorable?” Kyle, another of my classmates, asked.

“Djinn don’t care about your honor,” Rineer said. “They gut you whether you're the bravest man alive or a sniveling coward. Better to stab your opponent in the back and lie to the poets later than get speared through the chest and have someone tell your wife how brave you were in your final moments.”

There were no follow up questions about honor directed at Rineer.

“Alright, let’s have you all start practicing. No point in me standing here yapping at you all day,” Rineer barked. “All of you line up and pick your targets. You’ve all used weapons like these before I’m sure, so let’s see how good a shot you are.”

I drew back an arrow and felt the tugging sensation in my pointer finger. I pushed at the ether in my core, it responded and I felt ether leave my core. It was similar to how it felt to use a skill, if more alien. I released the arrow on Rineer’s command. There was the rumble of thunder next to me as the musket in Enoch’s hand bucked, and a bolt of lightning shot out of it.

I flinched next to him but pushed aside the fear and memories, refusing to let them take hold. I drew back and loosed another arrow, again and again until my core went dry. Try as I might, my mind kept drifting back to the past. I was only brought out of it as I felt a pain in my core when I tried to draw out ether it didn’t have. I let my bow drop my side.

“Well done,” Rineer said. “You have all bravely annihilated the stationary targets we set up for you. Now get out there. Use and don’t lose them, and try not to make them blow up in your face.”

I would have liked to just go out with Enoch and practice with the bow on some djinn but unfortunately, I had my mandatory hour of humiliating defeats to endure. I trudged off like a prisoner sentenced to his execution as the bells tolled, signaling the end of the day’s training period.

Aranea

We were copying the same ward again today, drawing it on the slate over and over again. I got a bit bored and pulled out my personal journal, looking over the ward’s I had copied from the advanced tome the other day. I quickly closed it as Madam Layrora walked over, examining my slate.

“Perfect,” she said for the fifth time. “Erase it and do it again from memory.”

I bit back the sigh I felt and did it. I’d already perfectly copied it without looking up to examine the design on the blackboard and wanted to move on, but most of the class were still working on perfecting it. I quickly drew it again before opening my journal again to examine the more advanced wards and enchantments. The ward we were making now was only a few lines, the ones in the advanced book were worlds apart.

We got wards in two ways. Experimentation, or the Voice rewarding diagrams in Quests. The wards in the advanced book were so complex that they could only be the result of rewards for difficult quests from the Voice. Their effects weren’t simple things like the ward we had now to keep earth djinn from spawning, instead they did things like made djinn afraid to approach, or caused a burst of fire to flare up if a creature walked over them.

“Are you paying attention?” Madam Layrora asked behind me, making me jump.

“Yes ma’am,” I said, closing my journal again.

I left it closed for the rest of class as I waited while my peers finally mastered drawing the basic ward. Madam Layrora brought out willow boughs, shears, and twine and started having us bend and twist them into shape to create the wards. Hannah and I already had practice doing this with the ether catchers we’d made with her mother-in-law, and I quickly bent and tied three boughs into the shapes required to shape the ward.

I set it down and waited for Madam Layrora to come along and inspect it.

“Well done,” she said, examining it. “Your knots are different than I would have tied them but that is more a matter of style than necessity. As long as they hold, they will function, but make sure to tie them in a way where you can untie them if you need to make an adjustment later on.”

I nodded, taking in her instruction. My knots were all tight and would be much easier to just cut through than untie. I made another, and another, Madam Layrora examined them and congratulated me each time. I had made a total of six, the most of my entire class, before the end of our training.

We went to lunch and I sat down with my usual classmates.

“What are you doing after lunch?” Deliah asked me.

“I’m going to the library again,” I said.

There were still many wards I hadn’t copied into my journal yet. I wanted to get them all copied in case some librarian discovered the book and moved it to somewhere where I wouldn’t have access to it.

“After that, I need to start threading the corruption out of my core,” I said. “Cain’s core was almost completely full last night from the mist he and Enoch were hunting.”

“Enoch is your husband, right?” Clara asked Hannah.

“Yes,” Hannah said. “My father-in-law has been training him and Cain for the past few weeks, it’s how I met Aranea.”

“He’s giving them dueling lessons?” Deliah asked.

“No,” Hannah said. “They’re working on using their skills without speaking.”

“Why?” Jasmine asked. “They’ll naturally unlock the ability to do that after a few years.”

“He believes it’s more important than just training for combat,” Hannah said. “I don’t really understand the reason behind it either, but I don’t have a Relic.”

“Seems like a foolish waste of time,” Deliah said. “What good is it to be able to use your skills without speaking if your opponent is better with his blade than yours?”

“They’ve actually made some progress already,” I said, feeling the need to come to Cain’s defense. “Cain and Enoch can already summon their weapons to their hands from across a field.”

“That’s impressive,” Clara said, trying to brighten the conversation. “They usually don’t train you how to do that until your second year.”

“Because it’s not necessary,” Deliah said. “What advantage does it give them that can’t be bested with better combat technique. My father is one of the best duelists in the land and he still can’t do his last two abilities without speaking out loud.”

I wanted to say something, but I didn’t have an argument of my own to counter her with. The conversation lapsed into silence before Clara asked a mundane question to Jasmine and we left the awkwardness behind us.

I left to go to the library where I pulled out the tome again. Taking out a quill and ink, I started copying them. I sprinkled fine sand over the pages to keep the ink from smearing. There was a thud and I looked up to see Noah sitting across from me, another book in his hands.

“Still looking over that tome?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Still reading about the Caswain War?”

“You know they call it the Emmerian war,” he said. “But no, I’m reading a military analysis of the first war against the Warlocks.”

“I didn’t think we had accurate histories of that time,” I said.

“We don’t,” Noah agreed. “It’s mostly speculation based on oral accounts passed down.”

“Then why read it?” I asked.

“Because understanding the thinking of those men is valuable,” Noah said. “They didn’t know what a Warlock was yet, but the Voice warned them. It gave them quests to kill those men but they ignored it and let them get powerful. That kind of hubris still exists today, people are always trying to tame corruption instead of exterminating it.”

“Isn’t that experimentation valuable?” I asked. “What if it leads to a way to purify a fell man of corruption. Isn’t that worth the risk?”

“Maybe, but the morality of those experiments is always questionable. And that’s not to mention the dangers implicit in it,” Noah said. “There are too many stories of a pet fell beast evolving and then mauling one of its owner’s children. Is the possibility of a cure worth the lives of those children?”

“No, it’s not,” I said.

“Well not all see it that way,” Noah said, turning back to his book.

Cain

We dismounted, and Hero strained against his leash before being pulled back.

“Heel,” Enoch ordered.

Hero didn’t listen right away but Enoch hauled at his leash and snapped his fingers by his side.

“Heel,” he said again.

Hero bounded over and started running in little circles.

We started moving and I passed into the Mist.

Quest

Type:

Search

Difficulty:

Lethal

Search the Mist and find the Soul Forge to upgrade your interface.

Reward: Soul Anvil, 15,000 XP

Yes/No

I dismissed the forbidden quest and we walked into the mostly pine forest. The occasional twig would snap under our feet but Enoch and I were trying to follow Rineer’s lessons about moving unseen through woods. This was made impossible due to the enthusiasm of a very energetic puppy. I moved off to the side again and stayed low as we scoured the undergrowth.

Hero’s yipping carried through the air and any djinn within hearing distance would be headed our way. We moved deeper in and I saw a flash of white. I froze, nocking an arrow and waiting. Three mist soldiers were moving forward, also crouched low as they stalked towards Enoch and Hero. There were a few dozen beasts and imps following after them.

Quest

Type:

Hunt

Difficulty:

Moderate

A group of strong djinn are gathering strength in the Mist, exterminate them before they get stronger.

Reward: D grade Cloak, 100 XP

Yes/No

I accepted the quest.

“Ghost Walk,” I whispered.

The string of my bow was drawn back to my ear as I sighted along the shaft of my arrow. I felt the pull of the bow and fed it almost thirty ether. I released the shot and the arrow plunged into the smoke-filled ribcage of the lead soldier then exploded in a gout of fire.

39 XP gained

The djinn broke stealth and charged forwards towards Enoch but the fire had alerted him of their location and he shouldered his musket, a blast of lightning bursting forth. I flinched, but moved forwards, drawing another arrow. The blast of lightning connected with the lead soldier djinn as it lunged towards him spear first. It collapsed on the ground but wasn’t dead yet and Hero set upon it, his sharp puppy teeth digging into the back of its neck. The soldier djinn was so low on health that it crumpled to a pile of bone, moss and leaves beneath Hero.

Four more soldiers emerged from the trees headed straight for Enoch.

Quest Updated

Type:

Hunt

Difficulty:

Hard

A group of strong djinn are gathering strength in the Mist, exterminate them before they get stronger.

Reward: C grade Cloak, 150 XP

The threat was increasing as djinn neither of us had seen appeared and popped up on our mini map. I powered another shot and released another arrow for twenty-five ether. My arrow struck another soldier in the chest, exploding on impact and taking it down in another gout of fire.

42 XP gained

I quickly drew and charged a third shot as the djinn split, searching the undergrowth for my location while the others continued towards Hero and Enoch. My next arrow took a soldier djinn in its mask from only thirty feet away.

45 XP gained

I hung my bow on a tree limb and drew Achlys from where it was sheathed on my shield.

“Hurricane Step,” I said teleporting forward into the back line of the imps and beasts.

I slashed out with Achlys. “Lunar Smite, Hurricane Strike!”

I spun through the first ranks wiping out ten of the imps and beasts in a single second.

71 XP gained, 10 Corruption absorbed into your Core, 31 ether regained

A soldier blurred as it activated one of its skills, phasing through Enoch’s spear and appearing behind him driving its spear forwards. Enoch shouted in pain as the spear drove through the metal and leather of his ring mail. He activated a repelling blast of wind that pushed back all the djinn in a ten foot radius around them tangling them with each other.

Another soldier moved up, activating an ability and thrusting three doppelganger spears at me at once.

“Fog form,” I snapped out and the spears all passed through me harmlessly. “Lunar Smite!”

I retaliated and struck out at the soldier, cleaving through one of its three arms. I ducked back as it stabbed back at me with its spear and the etheric length of my weapon vanished. Jumping in I stabbed up into its chest and it collapsed to the ground as leaves and bone.

50 XP gained, 1 Corruption absorbed into your Core, 21 ether regained

I rushed towards Enoch as he was being swarmed, ignoring the pounding in my chest.

“Lunar Smite, Hurricane Strike!” I shouted to activate my abilities and draw focus away from him and Hero.

Like a child’s top I spun across the ground, moving forward through the ranks of child sized imps and beasts. Leaves and bits of bone scattered across the ground as I mowed through the lesser djinn reaching the piles of foliage Enoch had built up.

66 XP gained, 12 Corruption absorbed into your Core, 28 ether regained

He ducked and dodged, Hero darting in and out from under his legs snapping at the djinn attacking him. I reached out and grabbed Enoch by the shoulder.

“Celestial Healing,” I said, fixing the damage he’d taken from the soldier and the other minor attacks from the imps and beasts.

“Behind you!” Enoch shouted, pushing me away.

I rolled as a bone white spear from a soldier thrust into the space I had been. Enoch caught the spear on his shield. He lashed out with a Wind Phalanx killing at least eight lesser djinn with a single use of the skill. I rolled to my feet.

“Bark-skin,” I said and rushed back into the fight.

A slash of my dagger cracked the mask of a beast, sending it to the ground in a shower of leaves.

11 XP gained, 1 Corruption absorbed into your Core, 6 ether regained

A spear from a beast stabbed into my stomach, but it only pierced a half-inch through the skin after tearing the fabric underneath. Two soldiers charged me and the lesser djinn around me crowded around, pinning me with the press of their spears. I froze in indecision for just a moment. Enoch crashed into the two soldiers with his shield.

“Move!” he shouted at me.

His words broke me from my panicked indecision. “Cyclone Strike, Lunar Smite!” I shouted, spinning through the djinn around me as their spears jabbed through my toughened skin and damaged my armor but did little damage to my body, thankfully.

54 XP gained, 9 Corruption absorbed into your Core, 34 ether regained

Level Up! You have reached level 13! 15 Stat points are available to spend, Ether core increased by 5.

“Hurricane Step,” I said teleporting away.

I opened my character sheet and quickly dumped ten points into Agility and five into Might. I charged back towards the fight.

“Lunar Smite,” I said, opening with a powerful broad sweep across the right flank.

My attack cut through four imps and two beasts, leaves and bone fragments going flying.

47 XP gained, 6 Corruption absorbed into your Core, 18 ether regained

Enoch rolled backwards, grabbing his musket off the ground as a soldier rushed after him, raising its spear to finish him off. Enoch raised his musket and blasted, taking the soldier point blank in the chest, and it fell to the ground as leaves, moss, and bone.

The two final soldiers were rushing towards him as he was still on the ground. I rushed forward, blocking the strike of one of their spears on my targe and shoving the other to the side with my dagger. I had around a forty percent boost to my stats right now, making me move in a blur and giving me strength beyond my level. Enoch pushed up to his feet.

“Wind Phalanx!” he snapped out, and etheric spears of wind stabbed into the soldiers and the lesser djinn packed around them.

The imps and beasts dropped to the ground but the two soldiers were still standing and the final dozen imps and beast rushed in to take their place.

“Lunar Smite, Cyclone Strike,” I said, spinning forwards and finishing off the djinn and half the lesser djinn.

147 XP gained, 8 Corruption absorbed into your Core, 34 ether regained

Enoch stepped forwards and his spear flashed.

“Wind Phalanx,” he said, and the last few imps and beasts were destroyed.

We sat down and I reached down for Enoch and Hero.

“Celestial Healing,” I said.

The wounds across their body healed and their hit points were restored. Enoch tied Hero away from the djinn’s bodies as we started to harvest them.

“Can I ask you a question about the fight?” Enoch said uncertainly.

“Sure,” I agreed.

“I’ve noticed during fights you start moving faster and hitting the djinn harder the longer the fight goes on,” he said. “At the start you move your same speed but towards the end you were almost twice as fast.”

I hesitated. Mother Leora had told me to tell no one about my trait but I valued Enoch’s company and opinion. He was the only friend I’d made at the academy so far and, even though we’d only known each other for a few weeks, I already trusted him with my life. People were bound to notice the effect of my trait eventually, but I hadn’t expected it to happen this soon, and it spoke to how observant Enoch was.

I made the choice to trust Enoch. I opened my character sheet and didn’t obscure my trait from him as I showed it to him.

“That’s incredible!” Enoch said. “My trait just gives me a ten percent bonus to my stats while outnumbered, but yours is a rising increase. Why haven’t you shown this to others, that’s the kind of trait that men follow, and creates kingdoms with men marrying their daughters to you and their children to yours to secure their dynasties.”

“Because of the implication it has tied with it,” I said. “Imagine what would happen if my core got oversaturated and I became a Warlock.”

“Oh,” Enoch said, his mood sobering. “You could get to the point where you could kill Exarchs or Dragons in a single hit.”

That wasn’t an exaggeration, if I became a Warlock and didn’t use any of the corruption in my core to create draugr or aptrganga I could quickly get to a thousand percent increase to my stats. Even if my enemies’ levels were higher, or their skills more evolved, it wouldn’t matter in terms of who would be stronger.

“I was told when my trait was revealed not to show it to anyone,” I said. “I’m trusting you to keep this secret. Maybe someday I’ll reveal it but, for now I don’t want anyone but you to know.”

“Why not just say your increased speed was an effect of your trait?” Enoch asked me. “You didn’t have to show it to me.”

“I trust you,” I said. “You feel like a brother to me and we’re going to be fighting a lot with each other. I want you to know that I’ll have your back.”

Enoch clasped my wrist in a warrior’s grip. “Brothers,” he said, nodding.

Hero’s yipping made us both turn our heads to watch him strain against his leash trying to get at the bodies of the djinn.

“You know we can’t absorb all of this?” Enoch said, looking around. “A djinn requires fifty corruption to evolve into a soldier and there are six of those here not to mention all the imps and beasts.”

I paused, thinking. We could come back for this later or…

“Let’s absorb what we can then bring the horses over,” I said.

I kept a close watch on my character sheet this time, stopping once I got to ninety-five corruption. I might be able to get one more imp but there was no point risking it.

47 Corruption absorbed by your Relic; 47 Corruption absorbed by our Core

We got three djinn weapons out of it but they were just imp spears about as long as my arm and basically useless. I stowed them in my pack for now, we might be able to sell them later.

I brought back our horses while Enoch kept watch on Hero and made sure nothing came by to start eating the djinn, possibly getting to the point where it would be a serious threat to civilization. I tethered our horses to a nearby tree and pulled out an emergency tent. Laying it out, I started piling the remains of the djinn on it. Luckily djinn didn’t actually have that much physical weight, it wasn’t until they got to Jtunn tier and beyond that they stopped being mostly ether and became more physically grounded entities.

I pulled out a hatchet and cut down two saplings, tying them to my horse’s saddle and securing the tent to it so it wouldn’t drag across the ground and rip open.

“Good thinking,” Enoch said, holding the struggling Hero who was trying to dive into the pile of leaves and bone that were the remains of the djinn.

We moved out of the trees slowly, then sped up as we got on the road. We were silent for a time until we came across four senior Wardens on horseback headed our way.

“Excuse me sirs,” I said.

“What is it?” the lead knight asked.

“We were completing a quest in the forest and killed a large number of djinn,” I explained. “but we weren’t able to absorb the corruption from all of them. We brought them with us but we need someone else to purify their remains.”

“How many is it?” he asked.

“Six soldiers and about three dozen imps and beasts,” I answered.

“You two brought down that many?” he asked, surprised and skeptical.

“Yes sir,” I said.

“Well my core’s empty but I don’t think I can hold all of that,” he said. “Thomass why don’t you give me a hand with this.” He called out behind him.

In the end all four Wardens split the absorption among themselves.

Quest Succeeded

You have successfully completed the Quest, Hunt, Hard by exterminating and purifying the group of djinn you encountered.

Reward: C grade cloak has been added to your inventory. 150 XP gained

They handed us half the cores, keeping the other half as compensation for their part of the job. That was fine with me and Enoch. What was important was that the corruption wasn’t left around for some imp to eat and evolve into a Jotunn or Demon, or worst case a Dragon.

“See you tomorrow,” Enoch said.

“See you tomorrow,” I agreed.

We wouldn’t be going out hunting but would be training with Rineer instead. I turned off the road into town and through the town gates. I moved down the cobbled stone streets and through the second gates onto the academy grounds. A stable-hand took my horse and I tossed him several imp cores as thanks. I climbed the stone steps up to the wing of the massive castle that served as housing until I got to mine and Aranea’s apartment.

It was late but I opened the door. I’d stopped in the forest after piling the djinn in the sling behind my horse to cut some wild roses I’d spotted. Aranea was humming and stirring something at the stove, she’d already changed removing her outer layer of skirts and into the snow white of her evening dress. I moved up behind her silently then wrapped an arm around her, the bouquet of roses appearing before her face.

She gasped and stiffened in shock before relaxing, her hand closing around mine as I pulled her close, my other hand wrapped around her waist. I buried my nose in her hair, smelling the sweet floral scent she always wore.

“How was your day?” I asked.

“Good. We didn’t learn many new things in class but I’ve been studying some advanced wards in the library,” she said. “I think I might try my hand at enchanting something more powerful for you soon.”

I stepped back. “If you think it will help me I’ll wear it.”

“You’re not going to warn me to not mess with dangerous wards?” Aranea asked me.

“Are you messing with dangerous wards?” I asked.

“No. Well,l I don’t think they’re dangerous to me,” she said.

“I trust you,” I said. “You’ve already progressed more than me in your training, if you think you can do it I believe you can too.”

I stepped into the washroom and took off my armor. I winced as I pulled off my shirt, the dried blood ripping off with it. The wounds had all closed but there were still faint pink marks where they had healed. It would take a highly damaging attack to leave a scar on me. I took off my clothes and sank into the hot water of the tub. Aranea came into the washroom and took a cloth she ran in across my back and chest and I sank back relaxing as I enjoyed her touch.

“Was your quest successful?” she asked.

“Yeah, maybe too successful,” I said. “Enoch and I killed more djinn than we could absorb so we had to drag them out of the Mist. We met some senior Wardens from in town who absorbed them for us.”

“And how was your time in training?” Aranea asked gently, her hands soft as they traveled down my torso.

“Better than yesterday,” I said. “We got etheric ranged weapons today and learned how to use them. My dueling practice was…the same as before. I don’t think they’re even trying to teach me anything, just beat me down again and again.”

“You’ll get better,” Aranea said. “I believe in you.”

She stood up and unfastened the belt at her waist. Lifting up her dress, she let it fall to the floor before joining me in the bath, her hands running through my hair as our breathing intensified.