Frostbitten Wayfarer

The next two months flew by as Zoe spent most of her time lounging around in her room at The Chipped Stool levelling up her enchanting skills. Her Cosmic Mystic skills were all quite interesting as enchantments, Zoe found.

Cosmic Armour gave an object a copy of her Cosmic Armour skill, surrounding it in the twisting space and time, but only for a brief moment as it burned through whatever mana stores she could give it. Even with as much mana as she could fit into an enchantment, on the best frozen shard she had, it only lasted a minute.

Cosmic Step made an object teleport, or at least she assumed it did. When she enchanted a coin with the skill and then pushed mana into it, the coin vanished. She tried again several times before deciding to just give up, if it was teleporting then she wasn’t able to find a way to control the destination just yet. Maybe some nearby business owner would find a bunch of copper coins appear on their desk suddenly, Zoe laughed.

Cosmic Familiar seemed to be the solution to her security problem back home. Enchanting an object with the skill gave her a certain amount over when an enchantment activated, though it had no effect on how the enchantment performed. She could enchant an object with Cosmic Familiar and then with only a specific pattern of mana, activate the Cosmic Step portion of the enchantment.

Testing the limits of the enchantment, it only seemed to work with specific mana patterns, or specific Cosmos inputs. Earth, Gales, Frost, or any other element had no effect on the enchantment at all. Maybe there would be a Frost Familiar skill that would work with Frost, or a Fire Familiar skill that Emma and Joe could use more easily in some other class?

The last skill Zoe tested was Cosmic Rift, and she was glad she teleported quite a ways out into the forest to test it. When she pushed mana into the object, space and time warped like when she used the skill normally. But instead of shattering into two pieces, the twisting space seemed to expand to about an inch out from the coin and then vanish. Taking everything in the space along with it. The coin, the dirt and grass it rested on, all of the air in the space. Gone, and air rushed in to fill the vacant space.

Zoe tried it on a few different objects, more mana dense objects created larger spheres of destruction though even the best icy shard she had left only made it to about a four inch diameter sphere, and only on dirt. If she tried to destroy something more mana dense, the sphere shrank as more of its mana was spent ripping out the mana dense object. And if the object was too large to remove, then the enchantment just failed entirely.

It was powerful, if she could get enough mana into the enchantment. But for it to be useful in an actual fight, she’d need special objects that could handle far more mana. Even with her Enchantment Amplifier, the skill struggled to cause any serious damage. At least compared to just putting the same amount of mana into the skill itself, rather than as an enchantment.

One day, a few weeks into her stay at Darpi, she found herself growing annoyed at managing her storage items inventory and made a trip back to Foizo. She didn’t stay long, teleporting straight into her cave as soon as she could to dump off everything she didn’t need and back out a moment later. The whole trip took her several hours, which was exciting the first few times.

But the joy of flying and warping through the sky grew old rather quick, she found. Hours long journeys with nothing but the same forests and lakes far below you, with no interruptions or excitement to be found. She almost couldn’t believe the boredom she felt as she flew back to Darpi, but it had become tedium more than anything else.

At least, when she was just going back and forth to Foizo. She looked forward to leaving Darpi and seeing new places — maybe get out of the forested region she was in now and see some desserts or oceans. Fields of flowers, or rocky cliffs that she could explore. But Darpi was a nice place to relax for a while. The vibe was laid back and enjoyable, with the peak of excitement being the Takraw game that Horn had mentioned.

Zoe found a few courts where it was played, and the game seemed rather amusing — like a mix between volleyball and soccer. Three athletes to each team kicking a ball back and forth over a net that split the court down the middle. The sport had more brackets than Zoe would have expected, separating the athletes into different tiers of power.

To Zoe, as much as she hated to admit it, the most interesting brackets were the lowest level and the highest level. The ones in the middle were too, well, middling. At the lower level there was an abundance of strategy and teamwork, pushing each other to the absolute limit of what their bodies could handle. It was fascinating watching them, and despite being far slower than Zoe she had no expectations of being able to best them in their own game.

On the other hand, at the higher level, strategy and teamwork were thrown to the wayside — at least to Zoe’s eyes, in favour of overwhelming power. The small yellow ball rocketed around on the court so fast even Zoe struggled to keep track of where it was. Gusts of wind rivalling even the owl bear’s powerful strikes slammed into the barriers kept up by a group of mages just from the athletes rushing around the court in blurs of movement.

Maybe they did still have the same teamwork and strategy, but everything happened so fast that Zoe struggled to see it as anything more than an overwhelming display of power. The ball would slam into the ground, sending up a puff of dirt and she’d get a brief glimpse at the athletes as they stopped their frantic movements to celebrate the point before the court exploded with movement again.

In many ways, it was shocking to see such power in such a relatively casual display. She was rather proud of her speed and power, of the feats she’d accumulated. But against what the highest level athletes put on display, she may as well be a child fantasizing about greatness.

She supposed the same might be true if those athletes compared their mana to hers, but that wasn’t quite so visible. It was an eye opener for her, to see people who invested as much or maybe even more time than she had into something different. To see what path she could have taken.

And Zoe found she was fine with her decision. Magic was fun. Being fast and powerful was important and necessary, as a last resort. But magic was fun, enchanting was exciting and staying further away from danger was never a bad thing in Zoe’s mind.

In the two months she spent in Darpi, she managed to get all of her Everlasting Enchanter skills up to just over one hundred. There was an argument to be made to spend even more time getting them to her level cap of one forty, just in case, but she began to grow impatient.

Zoe sat down on the comfortable, covered bed at The Chipped Stool and brought up her class selections. There were thousands at this point, maybe even tens of thousands. Almost every combination of her skills gave her something different and unique, though not always powerful.

A space carpenter or a cindered blacksmith. Apprentice variations of almost everything she had, with different elemental variations even within those. Zoe wondered how many classes other people had access to, was it normal to have so many at this point?

She was glad she didn’t suffer too bad from decision paralysis, looking at the enormous list of classes, and then thought about what she wanted.

Her end goal was a powerful enchanting class, but she also had a small desire to work towards her sixth class. At level one forty five, her sixth class would be at the earliest level two hundred ninety. Possibly even four hundred thirty five if she got very unlucky.

She could take a different class now, for her fifth class and then take a powerful enchanting class when she got to her next cap. But did she want to wait quite so long for her new enchanting class?

Zoe wasn’t sure. Everlasting Enchanter was a powerful class, even if it wasn’t quite on the level of Seasoned Persistence or even just Cosmic Mystic. But it was quite powerful, regardless.

If she took another class, she’d have an enchanting class and something else that might be fun and exciting to get her to her sixth class. But if she took another enchanting class, she might end up being stuck with a redundant class for years. Maybe decades.

Zoe looked through her classes and narrowed them down to the ones that interested her the most. If she saw an amazing enchanting class, she’d take it. Otherwise, she’d commit to getting her sixth class.

[Cosmic Enchanter] A pursuer of mana, imbuing objects with the power of the cosmos. Increased mana regeneration. Increased maximum mana.

Requirements: Has an [Enchanting] class at level 100 or higher. Has the [Cosmic Affinity] skill at level 100 or higher.

[Vampyre’s Thrall] Fodder, prey for the powerful. Gain vastly increased experience from being consumed by Vampyres.

Requirements: Be consumed by a Vampyre

[Mystic Battlemaster] A powerful warrior, drawing on the depths of their mana to fuel their strikes and empower their defenses.

Requirements: Has a total of 300 levels in weapon-fighting skills, has a total of 1000 physical stats, has a total of 1000 magical stats.

[Dungeon Crawler] An explorer, delving into dungeons to harness their power. Increased power in dungeons.

Requirements: Has visited five dungeons

[Elemental Shaman] Draw on the power of the elements to restore life, or to destroy it. Increased healing power. Increased Elemental power. Increased mana regeneration.

Requirements: Has at least ten Elemental skills, has the [Healer] feat, has at least fifteen resistances, has been blessed

There were many other elemental enchanters and a dozen different archmage variants for all of the elements she wielded but none of them seemed new, or interesting. Cosmic Enchanter was even only on the list because it was the most powerful element she had access to, and she was interested in what imbuing objects with the power of the cosmos meant.

Vampyre’s Thrall was something that always sat in her list, tempting her to try it and see what it would do. What kinds of skills would a thrall get? What bonuses would she get? Being consumed by vampyres wasn’t something she ever wanted to do, but she was at least a little interested in what it would be.

The decision was difficult to make. Cosmic Enchanter and Vampyre’s Thrall she decided to ignore after thinking about them a little more. The enchanting didn’t seem revolutionary, and being a thrall wasn’t a real option longterm. She could try them out in the future when she had time to experiment and play with all of her options, but for now she wanted to try something new and exciting.

And the other three gave her that.

Mystic Battlemaster was interesting just for the sake that it was something so different to what she was used to. She’d never had a physical class, and this seemed to be a comfortable split between magic and physical. It was new, and it might be powerful. But it might change how she approached things, too. Would it force her to struggle in hand to hand combat more often, as more than just a last resort? Or would it bolster her ability to keep back, and provide her powerful tools when things hit the fan?

Dungeon Crawler might end up being the best if she was going to spend a lot of time in dungeons trying to accumulate more levels. Though, if she wasn’t in a dungeon it might end up being useless. And even if she was, it might be a challenge dungeon that restricted the class anyway.

Though, that would apply to any class she took here, she supposed. But even still, Dungeon Crawler being limited to only dungeons made it much less appealing than it might be. She added it to the list along with Cosmic Enchanter and Vampyre’s Thrall. Something to try out later, when she had the motivation and time to try a variety of classes.

Which left Mystic Battlemaster and Elemental Shaman as the last options that interested her. The shaman fit her current style more, while providing an almost dedicated healing class that would without question benefit her.

But trying new things was the whole point of what she was doing, and the fact that Mystic Battlemaster didn’t fit her ideals made it better suited to that.

Zoe went back and forth on the idea for a while before she settled on Elemental Shaman. Whatever the case may be, such a strong focus on physical power just didn’t interest her. Even if she was going out of her way to try new things.

*Ding* You have unlocked the Elemental Shaman class. Your body and soul will be adjusted to accommodate the change.

Effects:

- Elemental Shaman: Gain thirty eight points for each level in this class.

- Mana Sight: You can see mana.

- Healer’s Boon: Mana regeneration boosted by 450%. Health boosted by 200%.

- Nature’s Power: All healing effects boosted by 250%.

- Healer’s Might: Magical power boosted by 250%

Available Skills:

- Elemental Affinity: Increased Elemental affinity.

- Elemental Manipulation: Manipulate the elements with your will.

- Elemental Growth: Imbue plants with your elements.

- Elemental Creation: Weave the elements together to form life, enhancing plant growth.

- Nature’s Decay: Pull from another’s life to power your own.

- Nature’s Clearing: Create an aura of healing and safety.

- Nature’s Assistance: Summon a being of nature to help mend wounds.

- Nature’s Recovery: Draw on the power of nature to mend wounds.

- A Healer’s Room: Remove dirt and grime from objects.