NOVEL WEB CHAPTER 43: CLIMBING THE VINE
Sarah Avery Vasilias, Great House Scion, Reborn Lvl 1
Tutorial Realm
Sarah Avery
Race
Human
Rank
Reborn
House
House Vasilias
Racial Gifts
Great House Seal, Enhanced System Access, Unlimited Inventory, Willful, Never Unarmed, Fast Healing
Attributes
Dominion
3 [Dimension] / 20
Speed
?? / 20
Precision
?? / 20
Growth
?? / 20
Arcana
?? / 20
Tensa Pool
120 sparks
Gear
Training Tunic, Sturdy Pants, Grippy Slippers
Grafts
The Edge That Cuts Anything [Dimension]
Sarah chanced a quick look down and immediately regretted it. She was a hundred and fifty meters up, clinging to the twisting, trunk like Vine that appeared to hold up the rocky island above the strip mall. She swallowed at the sudden vertigo and focused her eyes back up. Her blue hair dye had long-since grown out and her natural strawberry blonde hair had been cut short to keep it out of her eyes. Her muscles bulged as she pulled herself bodily up the twisting vine, climbing almost as quickly as she could walk.
Despite the vertigo, Sarah didn’t lose her focus. She knew if she did, she’d fall and that would be the end of her. She had to concentrate on reaching the top of the vine to accomplish her Quest. She wouldn’t be able to increase any of her Attributes until they were all unlocked, which meant she needed to find the Prize. Those four ethershards would establish her powerbase and give her a good idea of what kind of Class she could look forward to once she reached Stone rank.
The climb wasn’t too arduous. She’d brought supplies in a slim pack that was tied tightly to her. The pack contained some survival necessities, including a half dozen little autoinjector syringes. Gammon had called the autoinjectors “health packs” and had explained that they contained tensa-infused reagents which would repair physical injuries very quickly.
She had to be careful though since the healing would be using her own body’s energy reserves to accomplish its task, so if she suffered anything really traumatic, she could die from the attempt to heal it. Gammon had explained that there were stronger health packs—he’d called these Small Health Packs, but that they were designed for use with a Reborn’s fully unlocked Attributes in mind. If she used one of those now, it would probably give her a really aggressive form of tumorous cancer that would kill her more quickly than any injury she’d sustained.
Sarah hoped she wouldn’t have to worry about health packs. The only thing she had to be careful of were the Vine Aphids. And the Skewer-tailed Rathwings. The acid-drop spiders were worrying, but they weren’t monsters. Okay, there was plenty of danger on the vine itself, but Sarah’s anima was doing a lot of stealth work for her. The monsters on the vine—most monsters really—relied far less on standard sensory organs than on their ability to sense tensa energy. Being able to disguise that tensa energy was just about the only way to go unnoticed by a monster.
Sarah’s current anima configuration—Blanket of Shadows—was a stealth technique that was meant to spread her tensa signature out and make her appear to be just an abnormally dense blob of tensa in the area. The technique worked, though it had the disturbing tendency of attracting the Vine Aphids. They flocked to the rich source of tensa, hoping to find some burgeoning Vine flower to devour.
The aphids were cat-sized insect-like monsters with mad pink eyes and thick carapaces that protected them from almost any attack. Their mouthparts were a nightmare mix of hooks and teeth mostly designed to shred the tough fibers of the Vine while a straw like needle-tipped proboscis sipped at the sap. They were normally fairly docile, but Sarah knew that they’d swarm someone with insufficiently shielded tensa and they were absolutely relentless when they tried to get to her warm, chewy, tensa-infused center. It had happened to her the first time she tried to climb the Vine.
Now she just closed her eyes and concentrated on evening out her anima formation, smoothing out the rough patches and distributing it like a blanket over her. A swarm of Vine Aphids came creeping with their unexpectedly quick little scuttling legs. She examined them with the System, reading their entry as Gammon always told her to do.
Vine Aphid
Enhanced System Monster Entry
Description
Vine aphids are a subspecies of megaphidoida, monsters resembling insects that feed on the sap of megaflora. This variety is dangerous is large numbers but is otherwise harmless.
Rarity
Common
Class/Level
0/1
Type
Arcane Beast
Size
Small (less than 1 m)
Defenses
Chitin (light armor)
Attacks
Swarm – Physical damage. When more than 5 Vine Aphids use a Swarm attack, the attack gains a 1% cumulative chance of Paralysis. Paralysis lasts 2 seconds per instance.
Their bright yellow and green carapaces were eye-catching as they bobbed up and down while the monsters sped over the Vine. Sarah kept her focus as the Aphids swarmed over her, their legs digging into her as they gripped her like the Vine. One of the Aphids tried an experimental poke with its proboscis at Sarah’s right leg, but she smacked it away and it flinched, pulling its proboscis back into its mouth and making a little surprised squeaking sound.
Sarah held her breath. The Aphid just kept trundling along, completely ignoring her. The rest of the Aphids climbed all over her for a short couple of minutes, but they made no hostile moves and once they’d investigated her and found no source of tensa, they moved on. Sarah breathed out slowly, waiting for a long thirty seconds before she resumed her climb, making very sure to keep her Blanket of Shadows formation as smooth as she could.
The rocky island above loomed as big as a football stadium, floating impossibly above her. She felt the Vine moving in the wind and felt sure that it was the Vine that was holding the islands here like a kite string. Sarah had planned her route over the past week, using a pair of old binoculars Gammon had given to her. She was just about to the top. The route she’d planned was bringing her to a cavern-like hole that narrowed into a crevice. It should go all the way to the surface of the island where she could then begin searching for the Prize.
The wind blew steadily, making her clothes snap and pop as she climbed. She was on the last leg of her climb now, but that, of course, is where things stopped going smoothly. She had just pulled herself up to a small ridge in the curved vine, a place where she could sit and rest for a moment before the last push. The curve of the Vine made it so that she could stretch out without fearing that she’d fall.
She’d just stretched out, making sure to keep her Blanket of Shadows nice and smooth when she heard a warbling kind of shriek from her right. She sat up immediately, crouching low and looking over where the shriek had come from. There it was: a Rathwing. Once again, she examined it with the System, trying to find its weaknesses and strengths.
Skewer-Tail Rathwing
Enhanced System Monster Entry
Description
Skewer-tail Rathwings
Rarity
Common
Class/Level
0/3
Type
Arcane Beast
Size
Small (1-2 meters)
Defenses
Unarmored; Flying
Attacks
Panic Scream – Fear attack. Lowers resistances. Chance to apply Panic.
Skewer – Physical damage. Piercing. High chance to apply Rathwing Poison on hit.
Skewer-tail Rathwings were man-sized with hollow bones and large, leathery batlike wings. Their eyes were large and yellow with no pupils. Its head was almost doglike with floppy ears and a long muzzle. The muzzle was filled with needlelike teeth, though that was not the true danger of the Skewer-tail Rathwing. That was reserved for the tails for which they were named.
Sarah kept an eye on the Rathwing that had emerged from a hole in the Vine. There were all kinds of holes and burrows dug into the fibrous, treelike plant and the Rathwing’s mouth was still working as it swallowed something with pink blood that was still staining its muzzle. It cocked its head at Sarah as its namesake skewer-tipped tail snaked out of the hole it had just emerged from to wave menacingly above its head. The skewer was a meter-long bone protrusion dripping with some kind of caustic black substance that bubbled and hissed as it hit the Vine.
The Rathwing warble-shrieked again and Sarah felt her concentration skip. A System message flashed in her vision:
You have been affected by Skewer-tailed Rathwing’s Panic Scream. Your concentration and focus have been diminished!
The Rathwing’s scream scraped its way into her brain, digging at the fear and panic centers. Sarah clamped down on her fear, knowing that the Rathwing was just trying to find the diffuse bit of tensa she was emitting. If she let her anima formation go the monster would not hesitate to impale her with its tail, pumping her full of caustic digestive fluids. It crept forward, its huge lantern-like eyes scanning the vine in front of it. The skewer tail dipped low, poking toward Sarah inquisitively.
Sarah moved back slowly and smoothly, getting as close to the edge of the vine as she dared. She had a nearly three-hundred-meter drop if she slipped and she didn’t think that even her improved healing would let her survive that. The Rathwing kept moving forward, bobbing its head and looking at her like it was searching for something. It opened its mouth again and Sarah acted: she knew if she let it shriek again, she wouldn’t be able to keep her Blanket of Shadows, and then it would be on her.
Instead, Sarah dove forward, pushing her anima into a weaponform and flooding it with tensa.
Never Unarmed
Racial Gift – First form
Evolution Conditions - ???
Cost – 100 sparks per weapon
Cooldown - None
Description – Create weapons using Second Form anima projections. Infuse the projection with tensa to create a melee weapon. Size and weapon type are dependent upon the wielder. Weapons are considered Enchanted at level 1 for the sake of overcoming damage resistance.
Her Never Unarmed racial gift activated, turning her weaponform anima into a two-meter-long, transparent blue crystalline scythe that she cut in a wide arc. The Rathwing was not as surprised by the maneuver as she hoped. It wasn’t stunned into inaction by her sudden move but rather, it leaped off the vine, flapping its huge leathery wings. Its tail snapped out at Sarah, a meter-long hypodermic spike slamming into the Vine just where Sarah had been. She’d kind of hoped it would get its tail stuck in the Vine, but the caustic substance leaking out of the end made it easy for the monster to pull it out.
The Rathwing flew around her, lashing at her with its tail skewer while Sarah parried and dodged as best she could on the tiny ledge. She had no room to maneuver with a deadly drop on every side. She didn’t dare try to climb again, especially with her anima no longer hiding her tensa pool. Then a desperate thought occurred to her. She could use an anima configuration.
Anima configurations weren’t necessarily difficult, but they did take constant concentration. The Blanket of Shadows required a calm mental state and a serenity of spirit that Sarah just couldn’t hold onto right now. Instead, she pushed out her anima into as wild and chaotic a formation as she could, as far out from her as she could. With her anima all spread out, the effect was to seemingly inflate her tensa pool beyond what she could carry. It was like ringing the dinner bell.
The Rathwing hadn’t been stunned by Sarah’s attack, but her sudden anima formation had it wildly lashing out with its skewer tail, snapping at the air. Sarah knew the confusion wouldn’t last very long before it was able to pierce the anima form and find her but she hadn’t created this formation for the confusion effect it seemed to have.
Your Unnamed Anima Formation has produced the Bait effect. Bait will last for 10 minutes!
Sarah didn’t waste time trying to interpret what the System meant. It was pretty clear anyway and she knew she had to get moving before her ploy got her killed. The Rathwing was already reorienting itself to her when Sarah began climbing again, this time with reckless speed. She felt the vibrations in the Vine as hundreds—maybe even thousands—of Vine Aphids came swarming up from below and above.
More Skewer-tailed Rathwings took to the air, shrieking and warbling as they too scented the potent tensa Sarah was waving around with her anima formation. Sarah ignored them all, leaping to the next handhold and hauling herself by main force up the Vine as fast as she possibly could. The Rathwing that had been attacking her finally was able to break through the confusion her formation had caused. It snapped its tail at her again and again but the formation now was serving its true purpose.
The Rathwing was suddenly no longer alone. It was now forced to compete for Sarah with half a dozen other Skewer-tailed Rathwings and they were all in a terrifying feeding frenzy. Rathwing skewer tails snapped and sprayed black fluid everywhere as they screamed and fought over Sarah. She manifested a rake with blades for tines. It turned out that she could be very creative when manifesting weapons with her anima: so long as what she had could be used offensively, then it would form.
She lashed out with the rake, not at the Rathwings’ bodies, but at their big leathery wings. They shrieked with pain as they tried to wheel and dodge away, but Sarah’s rake sliced more than one wing. The Rathwings now began falling on each other in a true blood frenzy where they sensed weakness. They were all but ignoring her now. Sarah kept climbing, feeling her breath coming in hot gasps.
Her wild climb up the Vine was nearing its end. The crevice above was just three more meters away. The Aphids were still climbing after her, their small size belying a surprising turn of speed as they quickly gained on her. She pulled herself up, eyes locked on the relative safety of the crevice. She had just grabbed her first handhold on the rock of the floating island itself when she felt something slam into her right calf painfully like someone had thrown a baseball at her.
She looked down and was horrified to see a mangled Rathwing clinging to the Vine, its wings in tatters, its brownish body covered in wounds, and its skewer tail sunk deep in her calf. Before she could think, she formed her anima into a sword and slashed the crystalline blade at the bone spur in her leg. She expected the thing to shear off, but the bone was incredibly tough. The Rathwing shrieked, pushing its tail into her leg and lunging up to snap at her with its needle teeth.