by Dakota Krout
“Sounds good, and how about we place warrens in the Boss room for the healing ones to hide? Then, when the Boss gets hurt too bad, they do a sprint-by healing, returning to hiding to avoid dying. Then you won’t need to spend more Essence to make new ones, and we can surprise groups who thought the fight was over.”
She was ready for my snarky-ness today unfortunately. “You’d likely still be gazing lovingly at moss.”
We got ready to create the new and enhanced Boss, marshaling our thoughts and readying my Essence, while we discussed the best way to proceed. After absorbing all of the new Bashers and carefully studying each pattern, I was prepared to begin. Applying the ideas of the last few hours, I made a new armored Basher and began to flood him with Essence and corruption, literally the energy of the heavens and the earth.
He began to grow again, and I applied more earth taint than I had originally planned. Slowly growing, he passed the F-rank eight. At F-rank nine, his armor fell off and new plates began to form. Collecting from the nearby granite, particles flew to join into the new, thick plating. The grinding rock segmented, allowing for greater mobility, while the multitude of plates themselves formed piecemeal as hexagonal chunks, which would make sharpened weapons skitter off without finding purchase.
At the end, this monster was near the size of what Dani called a ‘black bear’. Over waist height on a human, the creature weighed in at close to three hundred pounds. Due to the amount of time and Essence I had devoted to it, I decided that I would need to wait until someone killed it before absorbing the pattern. I saw that it had a new ability, but its aura was strong enough that without absorbing the Boss I could not tell what it did.
Placing hidey-holes around the Boss room, I directed a few golden rabbits to them, making sure they could help or escape from any part of the room. Then to fill out the second floor I made roving squads of the improved Bashers, and named them. The small Earth-types I named ‘Smashers’, the Air-types ‘Oppressors’, and the infernal ‘Impalers’. The Boss got an actual name, ‘Armored Basher: Raile’, while the golden ones had a slightly different flavor to their moniker, ‘Glitterflit’. (That one was Dani’s suggestion.)
I made squads of two Bashers, two Oppressors, and one Impaler each. I placed a few thorn-shooting Banes along the tunnel ceiling to make people look up instead of looking for traps, then, interspersing the rooms with several squads each, and a few Banes for ranged attacks, I was as ready to re-open as I could be. Confirming with Dani, I drew the Runed door into the ceiling for later use, then settled in to wait for the next group foolish enough to attack us.
~Fifteen~
After our normal morning routine of breakfast and boasting, we adjourned to the dungeon as per usual. To our great shock, the entrance was gone, blocked by a slab of stone that was obviously not a natural part of the surrounding landscape.
“What is this?” Dale murmured, poking at the obstacle.
“I'm unsure, but there is an energy moving in it that I am... unfamiliar with.” Craig sounded exceedingly confused. “Nothing for it men, let's alert the Guild Master.”
They climbed up the stairs, quickly moving toward the large tent housing the upper echelon of the Guild. They had to walk past the area which had been converted to glass, the rays of sunshine bursting from the glorious dawn glimmered off the reflective surface with awe inspiring intensity. They arrived at the tent, quickly being granted an audience with a harried looking Guild Master.
“What? What’s the matter? Why aren’t you in the dungeon?” Frank growled at a clerk as she dropped a stack of paperwork on his desk.
“That’s what we’re here about, Frank. Dungeon closed. There is a big ‘ol slab of rock in the entryway, and it has some kinda energy moving in it I can’t decipher.” Craig dropped into an unfamiliar cant of dialogue as he talked to Frank.
This got Frank's attention, as Craig was a well-known expert of all things Essence. He was widely thought to be the next man that would be moving into the Mage rank, great interest to the Guild as the Mage rank was something that was attained usually twice a decade or so. If Craig didn’t understand whatever the issue was, it could be very serious.
“Humph. Alright, I’ll send you a Spotter. Go check it out when he gets here, then have him report back to me. Actually, one of you come tell me what it is, they would stop to write a report for me to read. As if I didn’t have enough to do...” He scribbled out a note, and sent a runner to find the specialist. A ‘Spotter’ was a Mage-ranked person who specialized in determining the hidden properties of an unknown item. They could read Inscriptions, energy flows, and had a deep understanding of history and the lore of most abilities that had been seen before. They were often assigned to scout teams that helped determine when people, places, or items had gone down a dark path. Less well liked, the church had their own version called inquisitors.
“A Spotter?” Hans whined, “Do we have to work with one of those stuck up bastards?”
“Nope! You could take the day off of dungeoneering and help me out instead, we could use someone to dig a new latrine, ours is near overflowing.” Frank deadpanned with a gimlet stare.
“Oh, look at the time! It is work-with-the-Spotter o’clock.” Hans chattered cheerfully as he made his escape from the room.
“Mm hm.” Frank grunted. He waved the rest of them off, “Let me know how it goes, now shoo! The portal Mages will be arriving here in the next few days and I need to find a suitable location for them to set up. Good call giving that lot to the church, Dale, I hadn’t thought about a possible monster breakout.”
Dale, feeling a bit down about not dungeon diving this morning, brightened a bit upon hearing these words. Craig noticed his emotional shift and shook his head, sometimes it was easy to forget that Dale was so young. They stepped out of the tent, at a loss for what to do for the next while. Walking around, they played a game of ‘notice some random detail’, a way to train their perception and attention to detail by looking at all the new people that had arrived. Not all of them were Guild members, quite a few were simple treasure hunters, while others were people interested in joining the Guild.
“Half of these fools will be dead in six months.” Craig muttered darkly.
Dale was taken aback by the normally good spirited man's sudden mood shift, “Why would you say that, Craig? They all look decently strong to me, look at that massive guy, he looks like he could throw me over the mountain!”
“I forgot that you are looking with just your eyes all the time. I think you are ready to learn how you use your Essence, at least a bit.” Craig decided aloud, ignoring the surprised looks of the men around him. They stopped and the other men in his group, Hans, the near silent Josh, and the ranger Steve, now looked upset at Craig’s words.
“You think he is ready?” Steve quietly questioned, one of the very few times Dale had heard him speak.
“He’s been progressing quickly, much faster than we were able to when we became cultivators. At this pace, if we can get back into that dungeon soon, he’ll be breaking into the D rank within six months to a year.” Craig told the group.
They looked at Dale with surprise, then all seemed to simultaneously squint at him, nodding after a moment.
“Looks like it.”
“Yup.”
“Unfair.” Pouted Hans.
Dale looked around, “I know that is good; why are you acting like that is that strange?”
“Normally it takes quite a few years to get out of the F-rankings, Dale. You got very lucky, a solid group and a good dungeon to train in.” Craig informed him, “Listen, it’s time for you to learn how to be, well, actually useful to us, instead of a liability that just so happens to kill a few rabbits each day.”
Dale winced, “Ow, my pride. I thought I was doing better than that.”
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br /> “You are; I was exaggerating to make a point. So far though, you have been doing everything with just the strength of your body; when you can use your Essence to supplement your weak points, life can only get better for you.” Craig explained, “Time to let you in on a poorly guarded secret. You have a Chi spiral, but have you found your meridians?” Dale shook his head, knowing the lesson would progress faster if he didn’t pretend to know things he didn’t.
“Sit down, and get comfy. Good. Now, feel your center.” Dale focused, and was soon able to perfectly see his small Chi spiral. “You are looking at the spiral, good. Instead of looking at just your spiral, look around. Look in any other direction. Find the ‘walls’ that are holding your spiral in this place, the boundaries that contain your Essence.” Dale was easily able to follow these instructions, easily feeling his limits as they were so small currently.
Craig’s voice was soft as he continued directing his protégé, “Find the holes in the wall, the empty spaces that move further into your body, and extend some Essence to these places. Don’t be scared when your Essence begins flowing on its own.”
The Essence, not used to doing anything but spinning under Dale’s control, initially was too slippery for Dale’s mind to grasp. He had done a very good job of purifying, and the thread eluded his grip for several long minutes. Finally, of course, he managed to hold it, then was able to extend the Essence to the hole, but missed several times, bouncing it off the wall. This was as difficult to him as threading a small needle to sew with. Slowly, carefully, he poked the thread into the hole, succeeding this time. Thankful that Craig had warned him, Dale was still startled at the rapid pace the Essence unspooled from his center into the meridian.
“Good, now wait a moment before you try anything else. Follow the thread with your thoughts as it moves throughout your body. Also, you may notice this hurt a bit, but it should be nowhere near as painful as the last time we made you do things with Essence.” Craig chuckled a bit.
The thread left his center and traveled directly toward his heart. It impacted with the force of a hammer, for a few moments Dale’s eyes boggled as he clutched his chest. The thread looped around his heart in a tight weave, until the organ had the thread moving through every part: tissue, artery, and capillary. The purified Essence moved onward, leaving the weave intact as it continued. The pain subsided in its wake, and his heart began to beat regularly again.
Flowing downward, the thread hit his lower intestine with less force, and only created a weave in a small area before moving up to his lungs. It split just before them, and impacted them both at dangerous speeds, enough so that he coughed up a bit of blood and lost his breath. The weave placed on the heart repeated itself, forming tightly around both lungs, making it hard to breathe until the pattern completed. The split thread moved up his arms until it wrapped around the little finger and began its travel down along a slightly altered path until it found another hole in the walls of his center, rejoining his Chi spiral from an unexpected angle.
Dale opened his eyes, and wiped a bit of blood from his mouth. He felt calm and rested, heart beating powerfully while he breathed more deeply than he could ever remember doing. The sense of calm lasted only until he looked up into the expectant eyes of his groupmates, who had looks of relief on their faces.
“What?” Dale nervously stammered.
“That was an interesting choice for the first meridian to open.” Craig’s eyes were inspecting the weave along Dale’s heart and lungs.
Dale was surprised, “I had a choice?”
“Of course. It is good that this is the one you used though. The heart meridian can be… Somewhat dangerous to open once you get older. The initial hit to your heart can kill those that are unprepared, or try it without help. Don’t worry overmuch, if yours had stopped, we would have of course restarted it.” Craig informed him seriously.
“There are twelve paired meridians, six ‘yin’ and six ‘yang’. Then there are two single sets, the ‘governing’ and ‘conception’ sets. Those are what allowed you to formulate Chi in the first place, and were forced open when you were younger, usually at birth. You can reinforce them with your Chi, and you should, but make sure we are around any time you plan on opening a new meridian.”
“Right, so what just happened?” Dale examined the group surrounding his prone form, “I mean, I feel good, but I was bleeding. Did I hurt myself? Did I do it wrong?”
“You just strengthened your heart, lungs, lower intestine, and a few muscles in your arms. In practical terms, this means that your endurance is going to skyrocket, the rate at which you heal will also increase as your body gets used to this transformation.” Craig imparted with a smile. “You did the job perfectly.”
“As an added bonus, you should be able to see that your Essence seems smaller, but in actuality it is all still there; some of it is constantly following the unique pattern you have created for it. Before you think that you can just do all of those different meridians in one go, please realize that if you go below a certain amount of Essence in your center, you may die. Just do what you have been doing and you will be fine; you simply need to build up the amount of Essence you have again before you open a new meridian.”
A smile on his face, Craig then directed, “Now, from that meridian, pull a bit of Essence to your eyes, and see what happens.”
Dale reached inside himself yet again, pulling Essence upward. His eyes quickly gathered a bit of Essence, and the light in the area became overwhelming. He squinted, and was suddenly able to see the flowing Essence in the other men. Their spirals were powerful, howling twisters that spun Essence into smaller twisters that continued deep into their centers.
“Wow!” Dale breathed. He looked at them all, amazed, “You see like this all the time?” Looking around, he could see Essence moving through everything, the colors almost sickeningly bright. The best comparison he could think of was pouring honey on a massive dessert cake with creamed ice on the side, then trying to eat it when you were already full to bursting.
“In the dungeon, yes. Out here, it can be a bit... overwhelming. Practice this on your own, as often as possible.” Craig commanded him. “Since it doesn’t leave your body, there is no Essence cost associated with this skill, all of it will make its way back to your center when you stop using it. Now, look at the men in this and tell me what I meant when I said they would all be dead in a few months if they planned on delving into the dungeon.”
Dale looked at the unknown men, shocked at the thick corruption in their centers. The Essence they had in them was stagnant, simply sullenly sitting there, festering like a disease untreated for too long. “Was this what I looked like to you all before you stripped my Essence?”
“Yes. You were able to see what it looked like inside yourself, this is an outside perspective, which is why it looks a bit different to you. See that giant man over there stuffed full of earth taint?” Craig pointed at the massive man they had discussed a few minutes ago, “For all of his bulging muscles and nasty attitude,” the unknown man had just punched someone whom had accidentally bumped him, “within a few months your arm muscles will be fully reinforced with Essence, and you will easily be able to beat him in an arm-wrestling contest, or stop a blow from him as you would a child. Life lesson here, don’t forget he will still outweigh you, don’t try to grapple with someone that huge!” Hans laughed at what was obviously an inside joke.
Craig nodded at Hans, also grinning, “This is just the start for you, the more meridians you have cleansed and opened, the more powerful your physical body will become.” Craig glanced at Dale, ensuring he had his full attention. “I’m hoping you are beginning to understand the advantage you are gaining over the average person, but remember that in the Guild we use this power as it is intended to be used; that is, to help our fellow man. Well, those tricky Elves too, I suppose.” Craig reluctantly allowed.
“Now,” Craig broke into a smile, “I wasn’t sure if you noticed when it happened,
so have an official welcome to the sixth rank of the F series!”
The others clapped Dale on the back, cheering at his success. Dale grinned, happy that this day had turned out so well. They decided to continue walking around, and possibly visit the new priest and see how his preparations to build were going. They walked to the shining lot, seeing Father Richard praying in the center. They waited a moment until he noticed them and sprang up. “Lovely! Good morrow to you m’boy!” Father Richard cheerfully called out, walking toward them.
“Good morning Father.” Dale intoned respectfully.
“Beautiful, is it not?” Father Richard gestured towards the lot. “Turns out that giant lot is now solid quartz! I thought it was glass, but was so pleased to be wrong! In an unexpected and fortunate turn, it also seems that this entire sheet collects celestial Essence from the heavens and sunlight. I will be able to build a monastery that will bring people flocking from all corners of the world!” His eyes were burning with fervor, and he was wildly gesticulating.
“Really?” Dale had never heard of objects collecting Essence on their own. He decided to try his new ability, so collected Essence in his eyes and looked at the quartz. The entire clear pane now was filled with solid bars of golden light. ”Ah! My eyes!” Dale cried, slapping his hands to his face.
Hans curled his lip and looked at him piteously, “You’ll learn, kid.”
“Heh. Oh, to be young.” Father Richard chuckled, “Anyone know where I can find a good builder Mage? Quarrying enough stone from the area to build this church would take a decade, and the craftsmen I’ve been talking to are all trying to sell me on sandstone. This place is lousy with granite; why would I not take advantage of that?”
“We have portal Mages that should be arriving in a few days, if you have the coin I know a few I can recommend from the Lion Kingdom, for a small finder's fee.” Hans stated greedily. They quickly dissolved into discussion while a young boy ran up to Craig, telling him that the Spotter was waiting for them near the stairs of the dungeon.