by Skyler Grant
"We Djinn aren't like you. We remember everything and can go back and forth. We're from the Sea of Moons."
"Are there many Glitch like Jess? Ones you can have a conversation with?" Alex asked Yasmine.
"Pretty much every high-tier can talk, not that you'd much want many of them to. You can speak with most of the ones that used to be human. Specters, were-creatures, vampires ..."
"Why do you come here?" Alex asked.
Jess said, "Things are very formal back home. Everybody holds the same position that they've had pretty much forever and there are all these rules and obligations, and it is just boring."
"They come here to drink and screw and cause massive natural disasters," Yasmine said.
Jess huffed. "We only do that if someone makes a stupid wish and that isn't our fault. We warn them."
"What is the deal with the wishing?" Alex asked.
"You can have pretty much anything and everything you ever wanted, if only you can get the wish right. People never get the wish right."
Yasmine said, "That isn't quite true. A few people have made wishes that actually worked out for them."
"But not usually as they intended. I just want to make that clear so that you don't do it. Never make a wish around me, not even joking. Even if I like you, that isn't enough to save you," Jess said firmly.
"That I didn't know. You don't control what happens?" Yasmine asked.
Jess shook her head. "I control my illusions and my magic—those are all things I brought with me from home. We don't grant wishes there. That only happens around us when we're here."
Yasmine considered all this in silence as they walked.
"Can you give me some examples of things going wrong?" Alex asked.
"If you want a bigger dick, you really need to specify where. Wishing for a fortune can result in anything from being buried in a tomb full of treasure to teleportation to some really nasty places," Jess said.
Alex winced.
"Then there are the ones people think are going to be safe but aren't. Like, ‘I want a ham sandwich’. They think that a sandwich is just going to appear in their hand and never in the sky far overhead—and them joining it a moment later." The conversation seemed to be troubling Jess.
"You really don't like it? Do you?" Yasmine asked.
"Hurting people? Why would I? I'm here to have some fun, not slaughter a bunch of stupid idiots. I mean, it can be pretty funny sometimes when it is something minor, but no, I don't like it when people die."
"You can probably learn to control it. Most Glitch can, what is instinctive when they come through can be brought under conscious control."
"I've never heard of it," Jess said.
"Me either, not for Djinn, but it works with others," Yasmine said.
16
“I just wished I could live forever, that was it. I’m not the first that tried, and I’ve lived long enough to see some of the others. They haunt me. I don’t have a secret, dumb and lucky.” Conversations with an Immortal
Evening was quickly approaching when they saw fires on the horizon. Drawing closer they observed a small military encampment on top of a hillside. Taking positions in some bush, they watched.
"These are them. The ones that killed Melody," Jess said.
"Their tracks went a different way. We haven't been following them," Alex said.
"I don't care. I know him," Jess said, jerking her head towards a spindly, mustached youth standing and taking in the scenery.
"Youlash colors," Yasmine said. "What about Chakram? I didn't see any weapons where they burned her."
"They uh ... they weren't very nice to her. When they burned Melody she was naked and they'd broken both her arms and legs," Jess said somberly.
"Enough details. How many do you estimate are up there? Twenty?"
Alex squinted, "Around that."
"There were more, lots more, before they caught us. Melody killed a lot of them, it made them really mad," Jess said.
"You don't hunt humans, remember," Alex said to Yasmine.
"I'm not being paid. The rule isn't don't kill humans," Yasmine said.
"Where is the upside in this?" Alex asked.
"Horses, fresh supplies. If they kept Chakram’s, a set of decent weapons and armor that isn't falling apart for me, and my hand-me-downs for you. And those murderous fuckers dead to the last man. I'm not seeing a downside."
"They brought down a Glitch Hunter and have her equipment. They have something to even the odds," Alex said.
"How did they take her down? Yasmine asked Jess.
"There were just a lot of them. They kept coming," Jess said.
"Overwhelming numbers. So we hit them in a few hours and from two directions. We can take away most of that advantage."
"You're letting your emotions get in the way of your judgment," Alex said.
Yasmine stared at Alex for a long moment and let out a grunt. "You're right. They play so little role these days I sometimes forget I have them. Stay here, I'll be back within the hour. I need to see what I can find around here."
Yasmine slipped away leaving Alex alone with Jess.
"So, are you any good in a fight?" Alex asked.
"I hate fighting. I mean, I like watching other people fight, but I don't like doing it."
"That isn't really an answer."
"I don't do any battle magic or anything like that, just illusions. Even there I'm better with things like this dress than scary monsters."
"Speaking of that. So you're actually still ..."
"Naked? Yeah, just like you found me on the post. I was all fireproof, but my clothes weren't. If you two kill these guys I'll probably steal something from them and make it nicer," Jess said.
"Aren't you cold?" Alex asked.
Jess gave him a wry smile. "Freezing, but I almost always am even with clothes. Home is way warmer than here. I may be unkillable, but I still feel things like discomfort and pain."
"That could be very bad in the wrong circumstances."
"Yeah," Jess said simply.
It was only about fifteen minutes until Yasmine returned carrying a few fronds of some spiky-leafed plant.
"Potions?" Alex asked.
"Something else. Scan it into your Grimoire and go hunting for more. We want as much as we can get before morning," Yasmine said.
Alex focused on one of the fronds until his vision flashed.
Dintalla
Visually Dintalla have dark green fronds with a distinctive spiked pattern to their leaves. Intensely bitter they are mildly poisonous when ingested. The plant has some applications in both alchemy and Glitchemy.
"You're hoping to poison them?" Alex asked.
"Not quite. Just gather for now and you'll see what I have planned."
Alex activated Analysis Mode and keyed it to identify this specific plant, and set out into the darkness. Night was falling. As always his sight allowed him to see the terrain clearly.
The plant was a difficult one to find even with the Grimoire advising to look for dry patches of soil. He simply had to hug the sides of hills as he searched and hope.
It was half an hour before he found his first cluster. After a few hours he only had a small armful when he made his way back to the others.
Yasmine had made a pile, a bit less than Alex, and he added his fronds to this. Alex's arms were red and irritated where they'd made contact with the plants.
"That should be enough," Yasmine said with a grim smile.
"Going to fill me in on your plan now?"
"The basics we've already discussed, we're going to hit them from two sides. The majority seem to be on the north side. I'll hit there and I want you to come at them from the south."
"What are these plants for?".
"Jess, you said you can go invisible. Can you carry these up that hill and dump them into their fire?" Yasmine asked.
"I could, but why should I? You don't even want me here," Jess said.
"For Melody," Yasmine
said.
"And I get to come along, wherever you go?"
"Absolutely not."
"It isn't like she isn't already following us," Alex said.
"I don't care. Chakram may have decided that a higher tier Glitch was a good traveling companion, but I don't agree."
"Then I don't want to help," Jess said.
"If she likes, she can follow me. I don't mind," Alex said.
Jess beamed Alex a smile. "I'm okay with that!"
"I'm fairly certain you're thinking with the wrong head, but fine, on that head be it. Everybody to their positions. Whenever you're ready, take and dump the plants, Jess," Yasmine said.
They moved to their respective places and Alex sat watching the hillside. They hadn't agreed on any sort of signal. It would obviously be when the plants hit the fire. That should make a pillar of smoke that his enhanced vision would be able to pick out even in the darkness.
Before anything like this happened he heard a shout from a man and a panicked squeak from Jess. It was followed swiftly by the crackles and pops of damp vegetation burning.
Alex drew his weapons and ran up the hillside. By the time he made it to top it was already wreathed in smoke. Yasmine hadn't warned him what to expect. The smoke from the Dintalla fronds burned his eyes. He found himself quickly tearing up and his mundane version became a useless blur. Operating off dissonance and sound, his night vision still functioned.
That must have been Yasmine's plan. Not only were they taking the soldiers by surprise and blinding them, the fight had become spectacularly unfair. The first soldier on his feet that Alex met didn't defend himself at all as Alex thrust his sword into the man's throat.
You have hit the Human with your Songblade
Target Vulnerable
14 Piercing Damage
Critical Hit
Doubled
28 Damage Dealt
A Human has been killed
No XP awarded
The next soldier he met didn't die quite as easily, requiring several savage blows to the face with the hammer to finally cave in the man's thick skull.
This wasn't a fight, it was a slaughter.
You have been hit by a Human
12 Piercing Damage
13 Magical Damage
The hit has targeted an area unprotected by armor
25 Damage received
A crossbow bolt had almost found its mark glancing off the side of Alex’s head. It was still enough to send him crashing to the ground with his head ringing and the world a blur.
Alex briefly glimpsed Yasmine kneeling over him.
"You'll be fine. Stay down, I've got this," Yasmine said, rising.
Around Alex were the sounds of blades in flesh, screams and coughing sputters of lungs filled with blood. At least laying on the ground the air was clear of smoke and the bitter stinging of his eyes was fading.
Half an hour later Alex was sitting on a fallen log while Yasmine went through the fallen bodies, searching for items of interest. There had been fewer men in the camp than expected, only about fifteen.
They found prisoners. A blonde woman killed one of the soldiers and then herself with a knife stolen when the fighting started. Another, a dark-haired young woman in leather armor, was currently washing her eyes out with water treated with some herbs Yasmine had found.
"Feeling any better?" Alex asked her.
"It helps. I'm glad you decided to go on a murder spree when you did."
"What happened to your companion?"
Jess answered for her. "You know what happened. I already told you, they weren't nice people."
"Her name was Peony and I didn't really know her. I was just traveling in her carriage when the soldiers took it. I'm Ryn, by the way," Ryn said.
Alex and Jess introduced themselves.
"Was she some kind of noble?" Jess asked.
"Merchant’s daughter, more the pity for her and good for me. As feral as these fellows had gone, I don't think they'd have done to a noble what they did to her," Ryn said.
"What would make them behave like this?" Alex asked.
Yasmine appeared, setting down a heavily bound chest in front of Alex. "Give people Glitch to hurt and sometimes they think anything goes because they're so in the right. Then they run out of Glitch, but they've got a taste for it. Smash this thing while I keep looking around."
Ryn flicked her wrist and a set of lock-picks appeared in her hand. "I've got that."
"If you can do that, why didn't you escape?" Alex asked.
"Rope, not shackles. I tried to slip them. Guess what I'm practicing soon?" Ryn said, as she knelt before the chest and worked the picks into the lock.
"So, you're a thief?"
"I don't normally advertise that fact and I'll ask you to keep it to yourself."
"That is so amazing," Jess said excited, kneeling beside Ryn and staring at the chest. "Do you climb walls? Have you ever stolen a horse? What about gems?"
"Is she serious?" Ryn asked.
"They're Glitch Hunters," Jess said.
"I noticed," Rynn said. The lock clicked and she pushed up the lid. Inside was a set of Glitch Hunter gear, more ornate than any that Alex had seen.
"They kept it," Yasmine said, coming back and tossing a pack in front of Jess.
"This looks nice," Alex said.
"Chakram came through around the time I did. Last I knew we were the same level. While I had to scramble for everything I had, she got all of this from her predecessor. I was worried the bastards might have burned it with her."
Jess let out a happy squeal as she pulled a well-tailored red gown from the pack.
"So why are a couple of Glitch Hunters traveling with an idiot?" Ryn asked.
"I'm a Djinn," Jess said brightly as she rose to her feet, her illusionary appearance fading as she started to get dressed.
Ryn stared for a moment. "Right, that makes perfect sense. Where else would you find a Glitch, but with Glitch Hunters?"
"We're going to Falkirk. Want to come? I bet they have lots of stuff to steal," Jess said.
Yasmine said, "We're not a caravan. There will be monsters, bad things, and the site of an upcoming major disaster. My advice, stay away."
"I can help you to sell what you pillage off these bodies and I've a good eye for what’s valuable anywhere. I’ve friends in Falkirk. A quarter share of this and whatever else you find while I travel with you," Ryn said.
Yasmine didn’t hesitate."Fine. Least you'll be more useful than she is."
17
“Of course life has a price. A price to save, a price to take. The only question is being are you paying your own way or are you in debt to someone else?” Theodore Voulge
They stripped the bodies in the camp and threw them into a large fire. Yasmine was insistent on burning the dead because it prevented many of the Glitch that could arise from corpses. It was in their best interests to see no vengeful spirits arose.
Yasmine and Alex were short of sleep and spent a few hours in one of the camp tents. Afterwards Yasmine pulled up her findings.
Yasmine and Alex got upgrades. The armor she retrieved from the chest was scalemail, made of some sort of opalescent scales that against all logic fit her perfectly.
Alex got a set of chainmail that was in some ways better than the armor he currently wore.
Military Chainmail (Set)
Slots: Torso, Arms, Hands, Legs, Feet
Condition: Excellent
Quality: Common
Keywords: None
Slots: 0 / Points: 0
Blunt: 5
Piercing: 3
Slashing: 5
Magic: 3
Dissonance: 0
It was better against mundane weaponry, although worse against dissonant attacks. When Yasmine handed it over Alex took the opportunity to ask about a statistic that puzzled him.
"So, can you explain about what I see when my bracer analyzes a set of armor or a weapon?"
"Sure, some of it is
self-explanatory and some of it can be confusing. The first thing that you'll want to look at is the quality," Yasmine said.
"This chainmail is common. The set I got from my predecessor is rare."
"Common is what you can expect to get from your basic village blacksmith. They might know their craft enough to put something together, but they don't give it any extra oomph. Talented smiths are almost like Glitch, in a way. Their constant act of creating has infused them with abilities to create things of unusual power," Yasmine said.
"So, they're stronger?" Alex asked.
"Not exactly. The strength of armor depends on the materials used to produce it and the technique of the smith. Specifically, this power of creation manifests in keywords."
"This chainmail has none. My other armor has two. Insulating and Agile," Alex said.
"Which is a nice set of armor. Common armor will have no keywords, uncommon one keyword, and rare armor two. My new set has Well-fitted, which isn't a lot of use in combat, but it means it will never need to be resized," Yasmine said.
"Do the armorers pick the keywords?"
"Exceptional armorers can, but for the most part it’s random. They also aren't always favorable. Armor can be fragile, or restrictive. Revealing is surprisingly frequent although that isn't strictly speaking a negative," Yasmine said.
"Oh, that sort of revealing ... I wouldn't say so, no," Alex said.
Yasmine snorted, "I bet. Then there are slots and points. Slots are places where you can attach Glitch gems, I've explained those before."
"Like what Helen found in the Cockatrice corpse."
"Exactly. Points are places where a mage can inscribe a sigil and those can have uses of their own. If you ever get a piece of exceptional gear, I suggest devoting one of those points to a Fetch sigil that lets you recall the equipment if you should ever lose it."
"Personal experience?" Alex asked.
"Lessons hard learned. Then you get the protective values which are subtracted from any damage you receive."