Ends of Magic

The Heirs spent the next day jogging over the desert-like terrain. They saw some evidence of the way that the villages here supported themselves - beyond quarrying clay or mining various ores, they herded livestock.

The goats that Nathan saw from a distance weren’t normal goats. They were even more demonic. Four horns, strange hourglass shaped eyes, and hair that looked like it could strangle a woodchipper.

Not hourglass shaped pupils,hourglass shaped eyes. Why. Who designed that? Given the history around here, probably some weird-ass mage from a thousand years ago who had a strange idea of aesthetics and too much capability with life magic.

Regardless, the Heirs were keeping their eyes peeled for threats. There wasn’t much out here. There were scattered bushes and tough grasses spread across the hillsides, and the Heirs hadn’t seen any of the predators that they knew to lurk out here.

I mean we’ve fought some of the scarier ones. Ashblood cobras are up there, and a Terrorghast is its own type of scary.

They could have detoured slightly and gone to the town of Cromer, but they were still fine on food, especially because Aarl had harvested a good deal of Ashblood cobra meat. It was pretty heat resistant, which made it hard to cook, But Stella could manage it, and it was very tasty. The Heirs were more likely to run out of vegetables than meat, but they decided that replenishing on fresh vegetables wasn’t worth the delay or relatively minimal risk of making contact with Cromer.

After all, they had their destination, and a deadline to get there. At their current pace they’d get close to the dungeon by evening, and be able to challenge it as soon as the Guild announced the go-ahead in the morning. Once they got within sight of the dungeon they could plan out their approach - it would be hard without an eye on the terrain.

The Heirs were practiced at keeping themselves entertained while traveling, talking about builds and various strategies they could try in the future. Nathan lamented that [Slow Fall] wasn’t ranking up as quickly as he wanted, and then was roundly mocked for being disappointed that he’d ranked up a High-Tier Talent to 6 so quickly.

Nathan protested his treatment. “Yeah, but it’s important! If I can Develop that Talent to Unique it’ll change everything!”

Stella’s tone was sarcastic. “And I want to develop Mana Shaping to Unique, which will also change everything. But that Talent is so hard to rank up. Faster when I have more mana types. To hit every target on the range, can you give me any more?”

Nathan furrowed his brow. “Give me a minute to think.”

The Heirs kept theorycrafting while Nathan jogged along, deep in thought.

Other than plasma, the obvious next steps would be particle theory - atoms and molecules, and the kinds of interactions between them. I’m… not entirely sure I want to go there yet. It’s kind of a slippery slope to nuclear stuff, and I want to think it through a bit more beforehand. What else is there?

There are so many things I can teach Stella. Would I need to go through chemistry to get to biology? Probably. Well, maybe not. I could start with cells as the minimal unit and go from there? Bah, I feel like I would need to talk about proteins to get anywhere. But I might be able to get her life mana or something, and that would be cool. Maybe wood, like that mage Qinven back in Farfield who could control trees.

Nathan wasn’t focusing on his surroundings, trying to plot out how he’d lay out the basic concepts of biology if he couldn’t describe what a protein was. He was startled out of his reverie by the crack of Sarah’s rifle. His head snapped up, looking around for the threat. He saw the other Heirs cheering Sarah as she lowered the rifle and took a quick bow.

Nathan followed their gazes to the hill opposite, where a weird lizard thing was rolling down the slope, very much dead. It was about twenty-five feet long and three feet across, with eight stubby legs that were capable of propelling it at incredible speeds.

Oh, it’s a Pseudowyrm. Basically a long crocodile that lives in the desert. And it looks like Sarah nailed it on the run. Damn. Will I get a level from that?

Nathan waited for a moment, joining his friends in congratulating Sarah on the two-hundred-yard shot.

So he asked. “Sarah, Did you level from that?”

She shook her head. “Nope, but ranked up [Steady Hand]. It’ll take more than a distant pseudowyrm to give levels to a level 86 [Headshot Gunslinger]. Maybe if there were five of them, and I dropped them all before they got close.”

And neither did I. I suppose it really wasn’t much of a challenge or a threat. To her, much less to me. Well, at least the dungeon should push me over that line!

Stella sighed in an exaggerated fashion. “Well, you won the bet. I will learn this lesson now, when the price is cheap. Now you get to ask Nathan questions about long-shooting.”

Feels a little weird that they’re betting on who gets to ask me questions. Flattering.

So instead of having to teach Stella biology, Nathan and Stella helped Sarah work through some calculations she was hoping would help develop the [Far Shot] Talent. After some discussion of bullet drop, she seemed enamored with the idea of using it to shoot at targets outside of line of sight, using bullet drop to arc a shot. Nathan just shook his head at the idea - but Sarah insisted it would work with her build.

—

Nightfall saw them making camp in the lee of a pile of boulders that looked too even to be natural. Nathan made sure they also erected tripwires in that direction, not trusting some of the gaps between the rocks to not contain random nocturnal monsters.

The dungeon wasn’t too far away, and they’d made good enough time to see it from afar before the sun had vanished from the sky. They’d also had time to backtrack to find a good campsite that was well out of line of sight from the Edrani fortification.

Long distance travel speed - surprisingly important to an Adventurer. I still think dimensional bags are cheating.

Their target for tomorrow looked like a small keep atop a tall hill. The first clue that there was something up was that the wide valley around it was all churned earth. It wasn’t a moonscape of craters but just - rough. Like the ground was turned over by a giant plow faster than wind and rain could flatten it out.

The dungeon itself really wasn’t very big, basically four stubby towers about fifty feet tall sticking up from the crest of the hill, joined together by thirty-foot high walls. The stone was the same dusty tan as the ground, and almost looked like a continuation of the hill. There wasn’t a trace of movement or indication that it was more than a little old castle.

At least, until night fell. Then Nathan saw the subtle glow of enchantments traced over the walls. More lights shone from inside the courtyard, painting the inner surfaces of the towers in shifting tones of blue, green and purple.

“What’s the goal? Seems a thing to start with.” Aarl was cooking over Stella’s fire, and was starting off their discussion.

Stella gestured with her hands in the direction of the dungeon. “There is dungeon. There should not be dungeon. When there is no dungeon, we’re done. Seems simple enough.”

Sarah rolled her eyes. “Yes, but how do we kill the dungeon? And do we need to disable every single enchantment in the mountain or can we just take out the one that blows up anything that walks around the valley?”

Khachi cleared his throat, drawing their attention. “We are done when it no longer poses a threat to person or animal. It is preferred if we keep the structure intact, since Gemore may decide to use it in some manner, but that is not a requirement.”

Nathan turned his head towards Stella. “Could you crack the hill? Make the hill collapse into the valley and then there’s no dungeon.”

“... maybe? It would take a while. And I would need to be close. And it wouldn’t work if they stabilized the hill with magic. The Edrani do that a lot. You can’t dig into an Edrani dungeon, especially the military ones.” Stella was deep in thought before she grinned wide, teeth flashing in the firelight. “You did mention other Insights. More destructive ones. Would that allow me to solve this problem?”

Nathan felt uncomfortable. “I don’t think I can teach any of that by tomorrow. And I haven’t figured out how to explain it yet. We should talk about that, but later. I’m wondering if the right thing is just for me to stroll up and start breaking things.”

Aarl arched an eyebrow at him. “The Edrani are also fond of placing golems in their fortresses. Their ideal outpost is fully automated defenses, removing all sources of mistakes. Do you want to fight a battalion of golems, Nathan?”

Nathan remembered Taeol’s golems, and how they’d almost killed him when he’d first escaped the mage-tower. He’d leveled a lot since then, but didn’t know if he wanted to fight dozens of animated statues. Nathan didn’t know if he could use his antimagic to disenchant a bunch of golems before they smashed him to a bloody paste.

Khachi tried to keep them on track. “How should we approach? Is there a way to outwit this enemy?”

Nathan shrugged. “I doubt it’ll be simple, it’s a high-magic fortification intended to defend against high-magic enemies. There’s probably no obvious weakness like flying in. But our advantage is that it’s unmanned, and will probably respond systematically. There’s nobody in there to help it make smart decisions, so if we can understand the rules it operates under we can exploit them to take it apart.”

It’ll be just like figuring out how a videogame AI works and then doing things that no thinking enemy would let you get away with.

He continued explaining. “That means we need to understand the rules. What attacks does it use? What are the targeting parameters? We should spend the first part of the Delve tomorrow just testing it out - probing inwards carefully. Luckily, I think I’m a prime candidate. If whatever it uses for detection can’t see me then I can approach and scout it out. If it can, then hopefully I can test out the defenses without being at much risk.”

There were nods around the campfire. Sarah cracked a smile. “So instead of throwing Nathan at the problem, we’re all just going to sit on a hill and watch him get shot at by a magical castle? Sounds like a good morning.”

—

The Heirs got up early the next morning, cutting short their morning exercises to get to the dungeon on time. They wanted to be able to take advantage of the entire Delve Day for experimentation - and to hedge against it being called off like the last one had been. That was when the Grave Tangle had erupted from a Monastery of Quaz and almost roadkilled Nathan and the Adventurers escorting the rescued villagers back to Gemore.

It was a good introduction to the heavy-hitters of Gemore, though. A pretty formative moment for me on Davrar, seeing the kinds of things that high-level Adventurers can accomplish.

They stood atop the hill overlooking the valley that was dominated by their target. It was weird to look across at a small castle and think ‘I’m going to try to break that today’ and know that you probably could.

At least with some help from my friends.

They waited until they got the go-ahead from Gemore before moving. Then Nathan got charged up on Stamina by Stella before he descended the hill. The rest of the Heirs stayed behind, observing. Once they’d established the distance that the dungeon fired then they’d approach closer, ready to support Nathan if he should need it. Stella would also see if she could block whatever the attack was.

Nathan reached flat ground and started marching across the pulverized pebbles that had replaced the larger rocks common in this terrain. He kept his eye fixed upon the castle, watching for anything suspicious. That and [Notice] were probably the only reason he saw the tiny blip of light fly up and over the walls, arcing towards him like a mortar shell. Nathan sidestepped, trying to throw off the targeting of the spell. It curved slightly to follow him, arcing down faster and faster.

Nathan stopped and abruptly switched directions, rolling away from the impact point right before the orb impacted the ground where he’d been a moment before.

It was a fairly small projectile, maybe the size of a tennis ball. But the explosion it produced was not small, sending Nathan tumbling with a burst of overpressure and teeth-rattling vibrations. The mana washed over him and was absorbed, and he picked it apart in a now-familiar game to understand the spell.

It’s like a thermobaric bomb. An elaboration on a fireball that emphasizes the pressure wave and also includes sound mana to enhance the destructive effect. There’s also something else in there - dream? To help with targeting, I think. Is it tracking thoughts?

Mid-tier Identify 9 achieved!

That skill’s advanced a lot. Much better at helping me figure out how spells work.

Nathan coughed as his lungs healed from the pressure wave. Then he got to his feet just in time to see another ball of light headed towards his position, seemingly launched as soon as it was obvious he’d survived the first one. He was standing on the edge of a fresh crater that stretched nearly twenty feet across.

He looked up at the spell, then back towards the Heirs.

Time to test if the engage range and disengage range are different.

So, Nathan ran backwards. Not towards the Heirs, but diagonally away. He checked over his shoulder for the orb and dodged away at the last moment, this time staggering only slightly under the edge of the blastwave.

Mid-tier Dodging Footwork 9 achieved!

Stamina: 890/890

Still getting a fair amount of Stamina from those. It helps that I’m better at absorbing spells I understand and I’m starting to understand this one better.

He kept going, starting to climb back up the hill. He was definitely outside of the range that the first spell had been fired at him.

Will it stop shooting, or have I offended it?

One more spell was incoming, but it had likely been fired while Nathan was still on the flat surface. He sighed and prepared to dodge again. Then three layers of force shield appeared overhead, interposing themselves between Nathan and the oncoming spell.

The orb elongated, becoming a spike that punched through the first layer of shield before detonating on the second. The first layer was gone and the second one was badly cracked, but the third seemed untouched. The barriers vanished as Stella dismissed them, frowning at the dungeon.

Well, I’m glad to only serve as a target part-time.

Nathan watched for another orb, but didn’t see anything come at him. He stepped forward just over the edge of the disturbed area, seeing another faint spark of light spring up from the castle. He took a few steps back as it arced towards him, once more detonating on a pair of shields. Nathan felt a tiny wave of pressure and mana from the blast, but nothing to seriously inconvenience him.

No more projectiles were incoming, so Nathan turned and hiked back up to the Heirs. “Looks like the disturbed earth is the limit of the range, and it’ll only shoot at anybody inside. Should we test multiple targets?”

Khachi nodded. “I will follow. I wish to test my new defensive powers. Stella should come after me.”

They proceeded to test the power, accuracy and limitations of the outpost. It did fire at Khachi as he followed Nathan out into the plain, but he was able to block the explosive spell with a shining dome of divine mana that barely rippled in the face of the explosions.

It didn’t fire at Stella as she came out, instead continuing to barrage Nathan and Khachi. Maybe it could only hit two targets at once? Nathan stepped back out of the targeting zone, dodging his sixth explosion with yet another juke and roll. He really stretched out the roll and got most of the way out of the blast radius on this one.

Mid-tier Tumbling 7 achieved!

Khachi and Stella were both shelled, reinforcing the idea that it could only attack two targets. They backed out of the targeting area, and the attacks ceased.

Nathan looked around. “I’ve got a plan. Are we ready?”

Status of Nathan Lark:

Permanent Talent 1: Magic Absorption 8

Permanent Talent 2: Perfected Body 3

Talent 3: High-tier Slow Fall 6

Class: Spellbreaker Juggernaut level 79

Stamina: 833/890

Juggernaut's Wrath

Antimagic Momentum

Raging Thrill

Juggernaut's Inertia

Unarmored Resilience

Utility skills:

Battle Meditation 2

High-tier Earnestness 7

Mid-tier Sprinting 9

High-tier Spellsense 6

High-tier Notice 1

Mid-tier Identify 9

Mid-tier Dodging Footwork 9

High-tier Enhanced Memory 7

Mid-tier Lecturing 7

Mid-tier Tumbling 7