Broken Lands

Collected Knowledge would simply allow her to know what Cliff did about monsters in his Collection without having to look it up. It meant she would know about both weaknesses and things to be careful of based on the Species and possibly Sphere of enemies, if monsters worked the same way as the people around her did.

It wasn’t entirely clear, but Sophia suspected that if Cliff managed to Collect information on people with Spheres, she’d eventually start to know what people could do as well in the same way. Her Sphere was so flexible that she knew that wasn’t enough information to be a complete predictor, but it would probably help if she had to fight someone. Technically, it was all information she could have by asking Cliff, but the Ability meant she wouldn’t have to.

She probably wasn’t going to take it. Cliff seemed to be willing to speak up when he saw something important, and he already had that ability or something close enough.

The other four that caught Sophia’s eye were mirrors of each other. One would let her magic shatter her opponents’ shields more easily based on their similarity to something Cliff had Collected, while the other amplified the damage of her spells after the shield was broken. The last two were the same thing, but for her Imbued Blades.

Sophia wanted Collected Knowledge. It didn’t directly enhance her ability to fight the way the others did, but it would be incredibly important if she ever ran into something with a strength or weakness that Cliff knew about and she didn’t. She was certain she’d take it at some point, but was it the right choice now? Did Cliff know anything about the corpsevines that the locals didn’t?

The immediate answer was easy: he didn’t. Sophia already knew what he could tell her about the Fresh Corpsevine Cutting they fought and there was nothing there she didn’t already know; it was also basically what they’d been told by Rensyn. In fact, the only new knowledge he had was the modifier “fresh” in front of the creature’s name. It implied that there were other options, but not what they were.

Collected Knowledge would probably have that problem a lot. She’d really only learn things after the first time she saw them. In that sense, it was more of a memory aid than anything else. She probably didn’t need a memory aid right now.

It was easy to discard three of the other four abilities. She was going to try to specialize in spellcasting, which meant the ones for her Imbued Blades weren’t what she wanted. On top of that, while shieldbreaking was useful, so was hurting things after the shields were broken and the corpsevines didn’t have shields.

Her choice was between Collected Knowledge and Antithetical Destructive Spell. For the corpsevines, Sophia thought Antithetical Destructive Spell was probably the best choice. She knew it would work on them and be useful.

She rejected it in favor of Collected Knowledge anyway.

Collected Knowledge led in the direction she wanted to go more than simple destructive power, but that wasn’t the deciding factor. It didn’t occur to her until the last moment, but while Antithetical Destructive Spell would undoubtedly make fights that they could already win easier, it would make only a small difference on fights that were tough. Collected Knowledge might make no difference at all, but where it did make a difference it was likely to be large - and it seemed more likely to matter in the tough fights. Perhaps it wouldn’t matter against the corpsevines, but it was worth the chance. She could take Antithetical Destructive Spell later.

Unlike Dav, Sophia didn’t feel anything because of any of her new Abilities or her Level, beyond a slight tickling sensation as mana moved around her. The only one that might have had an effect was Collected Knowledge. She was glad it didn’t, because she hadn’t even considered it until after she took the Ability.

A glance at her Status satisfied Sophia, though she definitely wanted to talk to Dav about both of them picking up the Individual Telepathic Link ability when they had the points. They’d said they’d consider it when they had more points, but they both had to have it or it was useless and Dav wouldn’t have had enough points.

Sophia

Spells:

Unaffiliated Abilities:

Warped Human

(Rush, 1, 1)

Innate Communication (Bonus, Free)

(Feather Image)

(Spell Hardening, 1, 1)

Body: 6

Martial Abilities:

(Visual Targeting, 1, 1)

Core: 8

(Stunning Roar, 1, 1)

(Disruptive Magic, 1, 1)

Shield: 30

Species Spells:

Species Abilities:

(Force Bolt, 1, 1)

(Aura Armor, 1, 1)

Wisps: 1

(Force Blast, 1, 1)

(Spell Reservoir, 1, 1)

(Feather Image)

(MageSight, 1, 1)

Spheres

Attunements:

Spellblade (Hallow)

Contraceptive Amulet, 3

Spellblade Abilities:

Level:2

(Imbue Blade, 1, 1)

(Animate Blade, 1, 1)

Collector (Linked)

(Animate Spell Blade, 1, 1)

Level: 2

(Collected Knowledge, 1, 1)

She flicked the screen to Dav. He zeroed in on a difference she hadn’t paid attention to. “Why is your Shield thirty? Mine’s only twenty.”

Sophia shrugged. She couldn’t answer that. All she could do was guess. “Well, Cliff’s Level also went up. Maybe that’s it?”

“Maybe.” Dav sighed. “I wonder if there are any Abilities that give more Shield?”

“Possibly under Unaffiliated?” It sounded like the kind of thing that would be there. If she’d thought of it before she increased her Level, she’d have looked. It might have been worth taking, given the way everyone talked about delaying Leveling as long as possible.

That reminded Sophia to check: just how bad was the hit to point costs from Leveling? With the way everyone talked about it, it had to be pretty severe.

Body: 6

Wisp Dedication - Sophia

Ability Slots:

75 Wisps

Available Wisps: 1

Spellblade Spell: 30 Wisps

(Feather Image)

Spellblade Martial Ability: 30 Wisps

Core: 8

Unslot Ability:

Species Spell: 40 Wisps

75 Wisps

Spellblade Spell: 1 * Slot Level * Spell Level

Unaffiliated: 70 Wisps

Spellblade Martial Ability: 1 * Slot Level * Spell Level

Species: 50 Wisps

Spheres

Species Spell: 5 * Slot Level * Spell Level

Spellblade: 90 Wisps

Spellblade (Hallow)

Unaffiliated: 5 * Slot Level * Spell Level

(Feather Image)

Level:2

Species Ability:201 * Slot Level * Spell Level

Unaffiliated Abilities:

20 Wisps

Spellblade Ability: 10 * Slot Level * Spell Level

Dedication Requires Available Slot

Collector (Linked)

Species Abilities:

Level: 2

Dedication Requires Available Slot

No Dedication Possible

Spellblade Abilities:

Dedication Requires Available Slot

“Oof.” Sophia scanned the list again. Was there anything that wasn’t double its previous cost?

“What’s wrong?” Dav grabbed for the pot with one hand while he held the other out to touch Sophia reassuringly. “It didn’t hurt you, did it?”

Sophia shook her head, inwardly pleased that Dav was concerned about her but more interested in reassuring him. “No, no, I’m not hurt. It’s the prices. I think everything doubled.”

Or had it? Sophia stared at the Spellblade Ability Slot cost. Hadn’t she paid 40 for it? If it went up by the usual amount, that would make it cost 100 Wisps, not 90. The others seemed to have doubled from their current cost, and she didn’t have an open slot to check prices to see if those went up. They probably had, but how much was a good question. With that kind of price increase, getting Individual Telepathic Bond was going to be even harder.

“I don’t think Body and Core increased,” Dav said. He sounded a little puzzled. “Everything else did, but those two are the same as after I increased them once. Do you think that’s why Rensyn said not to do more with it?”

Sophia looked at the left side of the screen and found that he was right; 75 Wisps was only half again what she paid for the first increase. It was a notable increase, but it certainly wasn’t double the way almost everything else was. “That can’t be the whole story or he wouldn’t say to always increase it one. It’s really annoying that they don’t seem to be able to predict how the Wisp costs will rise.”

“Did any of yours go up by more than double?” Dav dismissed his screens and turned towards Sophia. “My Species ability slots did, but the Species Spell Slots didn’t, they’re only up by about fifty percent. I think.”

Sophia shook her head. “I’m pretty sure my Spellblade slots didn’t quite double, but I don’t have anything that’s over double. At least, not anything I can see; I can’t see what the Abilities themselves cost.”

Dav paused, then called up his Status. “Hmm. Unaffiliated’s the only place I have an empty slot, and I don’t remember a lot of the costs. Most of them seem to be double, I think, but there are some I don’t remember and some of the others are actually cheaper, I think?”

Sophia blinked at that. Why would some of them be cheaper? “What are you seeing?”

Dav didn’t answer immediately.

Sophia waited; he was clearly taking his time to read through the list. It took her a moment to realize that there was something different about him and another moment of puzzling to realize what it is. “Is your armor done synchronizing? It looks different.”

Since Dav first bonded the armor and changed its appearance from stone, the armor had always looked sort of like the surface was made of purple scales, but now they weren’t just purple. They were mostly purple but there was also blue and many of them had some iridescence. They also seemed to be very, very shiny, as if they were polished. It still didn’t look like real scales.

At least as importantly, the armor had shifted its form somewhat. Sophia couldn’t quite name the armor, but it reminded her of something from a movie she’d gone to with her aunt set in Roman times about Scipio Africanus. She was pretty sure the plot wasn’t historically accurate, but the armor was really similar to what she saw in the movie, so she mentally tagged it as “sort of Roman.”

“I haven’t checked,” Dav admitted, “but I expect so. All of the ones I’m seeing that are cheaper have to do with my armor. I wonder if it’s not that they’re cheaper now but that they were overpriced earlier?”

Sophia squinted at the idea. “I’m not sure that makes sense, but maybe? You mean this is the price they always should have been?”

Dav barked out a sharp laugh. “Well, closer. Four hundred is less than five hundred, but I’m not paying that many Wisps for the ability to temporarily shroud my armor in shadows at either price. Covering it with a dark cloak would do the same thing and it wouldn’t cost mana to maintain.”

“Ah,” Sophia started. That was quite a bit more than she thought that was worth, too. “Do you think it will come down more?”

“I hope so. It explains why no one can give us a straight answer, at least. They don’t understand it either.” Dav flicked away his screens, then stretched. “I can move more easily, especially my shoulders. I hadn’t realized it was binding a little; I thought it was just the weight. This seems lighter, too.”

“Or maybe it’s because you increased your Body?” Sophia had to offer the obvious alternative.

Dav shook his head. “I doubt it. I don’t think you were around when I asked Revina about Body and Core. She said that increasing Body doesn’t actually change how strong you are. It sounds like it’s pretty fuzzy, that it sort of improves everything but only in the areas you focus on?” Dav shrugged. “She did say that the most common starting Body is two and Core is zero, or one for spellcasters. She wouldn’t tell me what hers was, but it was probably close to that. I figure we’re both well ahead of the curve there.”

Sophia didn’t have a good way to test her physical body, but testing her magic was easy enough. “Give me a minute.”

It took longer than a minute. In fact, Sophia was still testing her magical prowess with exercises she’d learned growing up when Dav interrupted her for dinner. “Any luck?”

“Yeah,” Sophia answered. “I don’t know if it’s the Core increase or the level, but my aura’s larger and my mana pool is deeper. I don’t think I have any more ability to sense details or work with them, but I think I can push a little more mana into spells as well. When we have the points, I think I should buy another point in Core and check again.”

She should do that after they both bought Individual Telepathic Link. It was expensive and she definitely didn’t need the cost to go up any more.