Ends of Magic

Surprising nobody, the Heirs spent the next few days training. They figured out a route for their morning jog, keeping clear of a particular ancient castle that was manned by animated suits of armor who would launch ballistae at anything in their line of sight. It was a shame - the castle looked awesome, like a giant rectangular block with arrow-slits, gates and crenelations melted into it.

They spent a good deal of the rest of the time training in the dell outside of the cave, where trees and grass grew around the stream emerging from the ruin nearby. It was as much to stave off boredom as anything - the Heirs weren’t used to sitting still and twiddling their thumbs. Though they did all have several significant advancements to consolidate.

It’s not like we have a pile of board games. Actually, maybe I should grab some sticks and stuff and make a makeshift Catan board or something. Need to figure out cards…

It turned out that Stella was very good at Catan, though Nathan managed to win the first few games through sheer familiarity.

The most important thing Nathan did was spend tens of thousands of Stamina on enhancing his body, making puppy dog eyes at Stella to beg her for mana. It got to the point where all Nathan had to do was turn and look at her mournfully and she’d zap him with lightning or light while the rest of the Heirs laughed. Her effectively infinite mana became his nearly infinite Stamina, and Nathan stretched the boundaries of possibility.

Everything he could think of that didn’t seem like a horrible risk, he did. Thickening and strengthening bones, toughening ligaments, padding out cartilage. He increased the range of motion of some of his joints and increased his reaction speed by streamlining the myelination of his peripheral nervous system. For all of the significance of these effects, they didn’t change his appearance much - it made him a bit beefier, but most of the changes were quality rather than quantity.

I bet I could put in some effort to enhance the stature of certain body features. But I already have enough of a problem ending up naked. I don’t really want to increase the risk profile there.

After some trial and error, Nathan improved his vision past 20/20 and increased the sensitivity of his hearing. And that trial and error was not easy - Nathan first made his vision so bad he basically blinded himself. Then he tried to up the receptivity of his photoreceptors to see better in the dark but had to tweak his pupil to narrow far enough that he wouldn’t be blinded in bright light. Then he tuned his hearing so high that normal speech was deafening. Everything was a balancing act.

He also figured out how to control his hair growth. This was really to stop his facial hair from growing so he wouldn’t need to shave anymore. But it also let him grow his hair out if it got burnt off or anything. Nathan’s preferred hair length was a bit shaggy, but not so long it would get in his eyes.

Nathan started experimenting with even more exotic enhancements to his own body - he wanted to try to toughen his skin with spider silk proteins, or integrate limpet teeth material into his bones. But his early attempts were met with failure and he had to revert the changes.

It’s not very much fun running experiments on your own body, where the test is how much weight it takes to break a finger after you’ve messed with it, or how hard you need to stab your arm to penetrate skin.

Perfected Body 3 achieved!

Nathan also earned a few other rank-ups during the training period - through various methods.

He had kept up his tradition of recounting various stories from Earth in the evenings. He was in the midst of the Lord of the Rings, reciting the stirring part of the Ride of the Rohirrim when he was interrupted by a familiar blue box.

High-tier Enhanced Memory 6 achieved!

Nathan continued with barely a break, recounting one of his favorite stories as the fire burned merrily by his side, and Aarl gazed out into the darkness, a saber across his knees and his shotgun leaning against the wall behind him.

There was a real sense of isolation in the darkness - the only sounds came from Nathan’s tale, the crackling of the fire and the occasional call of a monster. It felt like they were in a bubble of warmth, companionship and safety that isolated them from the world outside and only intensified the comfort of the moment.

Some of those predators had tried to attack their cave. A Crushbug had approached during the previous night, but Stella had blasted it with lightning and fire and it had retreated quickly. The giant armored bugs were fast and tough, and they’d decided not to go after it unless it started stalking them. But the next morning the only trace of the force-magic wielding arthropod was a series of tracks and crushed trees.

Other nighttime attacks had been taken care of even more summarily, like when some steel screamers had tried to harass them in the middle of the night until a groggy Sarah had dropped three of them with her pistol.

That skill that lets her see through the darkness is no joke.

Nathan’s other ranks came from taking a potentially unwise risk. He decided to get some dodging practice from the ballistae-happy castle. It was definitely not safe, even for him - the ballista bolts were tipped with enchanted heads large enough to cut Nathan in half - but unless they hit him somewhere truly critical Nathan figured he would survive. Stella was just behind a rock, ready to haul him backwards with rocks and zap him with lightning if he needed help.

But in the meantime - and still keeping the Guardians’ advice in mind - Nathan needed to get used to how his bodily enhancements improved his reaction times and movements. He didn’t find the changes that hard to adapt to, especially with a skill helping him keep his feet. Nathan practiced standard dodging before proceeding to more acrobatic movements, spending nearly half an hour dancing across the hillside, dodging projectiles bigger than he was.

Mid-tier Dodging Footwork 7 achieved!

Mid-tier Tumbling 4 achieved!

He’d thought about gathering up the bolts that had been fired at him, but they seemed to be conjured bolts that evaporated into mana quickly even before he tried to grab them. They were also enchanted, which meant it was possible to conjure enchanted materials.

There are more secrets to magic than I can dream of, clearly.

The rest of the Heirs also made progress - Khachi was practicing the new spells Kia had suggested, while Aarl and Sarah were getting accustomed to their new weapons. Sarah’s ability to generate ammunition made them less conservative, and their aim improved and familiarity with the new weapons increased dramatically.

At Nathan’s suggestion, Sarah practiced to see how quickly she could get from unarmed to an aimed shot from the hip. She was fast, boosted by skills she’d already had that let her quickly draw and swap weapons. They also let her grasp the correct reload quickly - she started whittling new speedloaders to give her more capacity to reload rapidly.

Aarl, meanwhile, was in love with his new shotgun. It turned out the skill that let him effectively wield a two-handed sword in one hand also let him effectively fire the shotgun in one hand, though it looked ridiculous, and the pump-action did require his other hand to be engaged.

It would be kind of hilarious for Aarl to get in a swordfight and then win by way of shotgun. Not hilarious for whoever he shoots, of course.

He was also practicing with his new pistols, but not nearly as much as with the shotgun.

Stella was even busier than the rest of them, trying to further explore her new mana types and the synergies between them. She also had a whole catalog of new types of spells to master from the resources her parents had given her. Some of them needed to be adapted to how she understood and used her mana types, but with others she found she could already do something superior. Understanding the deeper laws behind her mana types was an amazing boon to her - it helped her understand why various spells worked the way they did and devise more efficient ways to achieve the same goals.

A classic limitation of light mana as an offensive tool was its range - basically no light mana spells were capable of a beam that wouldn’t diffuse out into uselessness after a hundred feet or so. But this was an area Nathan knew a lot about - he’d done a lot of microscopy, and you needed to know optics to do that well.

Nathan spent a while talking about lenses and collimation, then took a detour to explain lasers, the diffraction limit and coherence. Stella latched onto his discussion of lasers and clearly intended to build a laser-like light mana spell that used constructive interference to bolster light magic to incredible heights. It wasn’t going to be simple to build a magical laser, but damn did that sound cool.

Also, absolutely terrifying. Especially if she can also figure out gamma. Grasers here we come? Even X-rays would be pretty scary.

Mid-tier Lecturing 7 achieved!

It’s a good thing I have so many things of significance to lecture about. I was honestly thinking about that skill as temporary, but the more I consider it the more it’ll be essential in the long term if I want to enact any sort of long-term change. Paper and books, knowledge vaults against the next ending, all the stuff with crops I was considering. I’ll have to explain it to somebody. It won’t hold a candle to what I would have been able to accomplish with the classes I was first offered when coming to Davrar, but it’s better than nothing.

“So. You called it plasma. I want to hear about it.” Stella’s next question caught Nathan off-guard, though it really shouldn’t have.

He frowned, then spoke carefully to try and avoid upsetting Stella. “I think we should wait until you have a better mastery of light and magnetic mana. Both will be critical to shield us from the power of that kind of spell.”

And I need to figure out how to dance around radioactivity. I trust Stella with my life, but I’m not sure I trust her with nukes.

Stella didn’t take that particularly well, furrowing her brows and glaring as her tone got sharp. “You said you would explain the dangers, and trust me with these Insights.”

Nathan scrubbed a hand through his hair, trying to figure out how to defuse the situation. “And I will - once you understand how to shape magnetism and light better. I will tell you what the first lesson of plasma will be though. How to use the path of light to guide lightning.”

Electrolasers!

Stella did get a bit excited about that idea, though many of her questions had a challenging edge now, as if daring Nathan to withhold information. He wasn’t sure he liked it.

Shaking his head, Nathan went out to gather firewood.

—

Their training was interrupted a few days later by a [Message] Stella received. She explained it all to them. “The Dusteaters are due west of the village of Tarren, and are requesting help. They’ve been tracking a series of Ashblood cobra nests for the past few weeks. They just found the central lair that spawned all of the rest, and want help clearing it out. They’re offering loot-right as an incentive. The Guild is pretty sure there’s a Matriarch.” The mage sounded excited at the possibility.

Sarah cocked her head. “Do the Dusteaters have a mage capable of [Message]?”

Stella shook her head. “No. But Tarren does, and the Dusteaters went there to report, before going back to the lair. They’re picking off the brood-serpents that leave to establish their own nests. But they need help. It’s about a day and a half west of Tarren.”

Nathan frowned, consulting his mental map of the area around Gemore. “We could get there in a day if we pushed hard. Would this be much earlier than the next team?”

Frowning, Stella cast [Message] to ask. A few moments later she nodded. “Yes. The next team would have to come from Gemore, and it’d be at least three or four days.”

Aarl shrugged. “Let’s go. If this is a Giantsrest trap then I’ll take up Hydra farming.”

Nathan blinked at the expression, but nodded in response. He, Khachi and Stella needed to hit level 81, and this fight was a good opportunity to get some more levels. Granted, it wouldn't necessarily be the best experience for him, since he wasn’t going to be great at fighting the giant snakes with four-foot fangs who could spit flaming venom.

But I like Nornan. He’s hilarious, and strikes me as exactly the kind of Adventurer I want more of in Gemore - loyal and cares a lot more about protecting people than glory or status. And a lair of Ashblood cobras is pretty dangerous.

Aarl and Sarah were in obvious approval, already starting to stand to pack up the cave. Khachi was about to interrupt them, but then he shrugged and started packing as well.

They were able to pack pretty quickly, especially Sarah and Aarl. They had class skills related to being able to pull exactly the intended item out of dimensional storage, and so tended to just throw things into their bags. Khachi and Stella were a bit more careful, but only a bit. And Nathan just took care of some last-minute cleaning, throwing food scraps into the river and making sure the fire was fully extinguished.

And then they were off - jogging over the rugged terrain. They knew the area around their little hidey-hole pretty well after the week of exploration and morning exercises. There were a few places they might have been interested in delving - but there hadn’t been a Delve day declared, and they weren’t about to go after a dungeon without one.

The area around the cave had been somewhat arid, but the mountains had been covered with greenery. As they kept going south the trees got smaller, more sparse and more scraggly, while the grasses were replaced by scrubby bushes. The mountains around them gave way to rocky hills, lower and with more evidence of erosion. The profile of dungeons changed with it - more of them were built into caves or cliff faces instead of tall constructions atop peaks.

They were moving quickly south from atop a barren ridge when Nathan had a question. “So Ashblood cobras. Isn’t it a bit weird to find a nest out here? I remember Jolba saying they needed a lot of water to breed. They should be more common out by the river, even if they like to live in drier environments.”

They were all jogging, but were quite able to hold a conversation without any issues. Khachi responded to Nathan, sounding puzzled. “Yes, it is. My guess is that they have found some source of water in the hills. A spring is sufficient for a broodmother, but for a Matriarch to breed should require a large pond or small lake.”

Stella spoke up from behind. “The [Message] said something about a cave with ruins inside. The landmark is an old Sklias semaphore tower. You know, the ones that look like a snake?”

“By the Endings, it couldn’t be any other way. Cobras coming from an old Sklias city. Or is it a tomb?” Aarl’s question was a bit bitter, and only half-rhetorical. He wasn’t a big fan of snakes.

Stella’s answer was uncertain. “It was described as larger than a tomb would normally be. Either it’s an especially large tomb, or a small underground city or town.”

Nathan broke in to pull the conversation onto a new track. “So. Ashblood cobras. Big snakes that spit venom and like to eat people and livestock. Jolba said they’re easiest to take down from range and elevation, since they’re big targets and can’t climb very well. Anything else?”

Sarah chipped in next, looking off into the distance as she recalled their lessons. “The ones who go hunting are the adders, the males. The females are the broodmothers, who can hatch adders, but not very many, and they can’t hatch more broodmothers. It’s only when they get pretty old that they become Matriarchs, huge serpents who can hatch legions of snakes.” She swallowed. “And the Dusteaters found a Matriarch.”

Khachi’s voice followed her up, grimly supplying more facts. “The adders can strike nearly as far as forty feet, but only when they rear back. The biggest danger is the flaming venom. It can reach nearly a hundred feet, is hot enough to melt skin and the toxin is quite potent.”

Nathan thought the next question was obvious. “Is the flame of the venom magical? Or alchemical? I want to know how worried I should be about it.”

It was Stella who answered him. “Magical. They imbue it with fire mana, and the older ones can spit out fireballs which produce toxic gas. Their blood also catches fire when it meets the air, and is very sticky. Be careful not to get it on you.”

“Charming.”

Sarah spoke to Nathan next. “What can you tell us of Nornan and the Dusteaters? You’ve spoken to them more than we have.”

Yeah, that’s true. The Heirs have always been objects of awe for most of the rest of the Adventurers because of who their parents are. That’s especially true for village-born Adventurers like Nornan and his team. But I was more approachable. Until the Solstice, I suppose.

“Nornan is great. He’s funny, but very serious about being an Adventurer. He leads the Dusteaters, a team from the villages down here. I only know the names of two of his teammates. Ucric and Inaral, they’re catfolk. I think they’ve got hunter-derived paths, so bows, traps and stealth, though they also carry spears. They’ve got a fourth human teammate, but I never learned his name.”

That was the end of the conversation, and the Heirs spoke of other things as they continued their rapid travel to meet up with the Dusteaters. They didn’t get attacked along the journey, by either monsters or Giantsrest.

The lack of monsters wasn’t so surprising - the Heirs were moving quickly and keeping to areas with long sight-lines. The abundance of dungeons and harsh environment meant there were fewer dangerous monsters out here, and the ones there were had mostly learned not to hunt Adventurers.

But Nathan kept expecting Taeol to teleport back in and make another attempt, potentially accompanied by another Archmage or this mysterious Badud. There was no obvious way for Giantsrest to find the Heirs - but there was always magic. Maybe Badud could scry somebody from just their name, or had some other bullshit magic that could let him find them.

And we’ve still got a ways to go before I want to fight somebody like that. Level 81 at a minimum. And then maybe they’ll get bored, or political shit will happen! Who knows!

Status of Nathan Lark:

Permanent Talent 1: Magic Absorption 8

Permanent Talent 2: Perfected Body 3

Talent 3: High-tier Slow Fall 5

Class: Spellbreaker Juggernaut level 72

Stamina: 799/820

Juggernaut's Wrath

Antimagic Momentum

Raging Thrill

Juggernaut's Inertia

Unarmored Resilience

Utility skills:

Battle Meditation 1

High-tier Earnestness 7

Mid-tier Sprinting 8

High-tier Spellsense 5

Mid-tier Notice 10

Mid-tier Identify 8

Mid-tier Dodging Footwork 7

High-tier Enhanced Memory 6

Mid-tier Lecturing 7

Mid-tier Tumbling 4