by Stone Thomas
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9 Resolve / 225 XP to Next / none / Total XP Cost: 0
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TOTAL BASE ATTRIBUTE XP COST: 2,050
Stats Affected by Change
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[Constitution] Health Points (HP): 500/500 –> 800/800
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[Vivacity] Action Points (AP): 82/180
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[Strength] Phys. Damage Inflict Range: 110-134 –> 150-183
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[Hardiness] Phys. Damage Block Range: 43-61 –> 54-76
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[Focus] Mag. Damage Inflict Range: 90-110 –> 100-122
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[Resolve] Mag. Damage Block Range: 49-68
Skills For Weapon Class: Battle Heels
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Locked. Toehold 1. For each successful consecutive attack against the same enemy, increase damage dealt by 10% over the previous attack. [20 AP to cast] [Requires: Focus 10, Strength 12] [125 XP to unlock].
Improve to Toehold 2 to increase damage multiplier to 11% and reduce AP cost. [19 AP to cast] [Requires: Focus 12, Strength 15] [250 XP to improve].
Intended Change: 0 –> 1
Cost Subtotal: 125
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TOTAL BATTLE HEELS SKILL XP COST: 125
Skills for Special Class: Snake Charmer
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Full Thrust 8. Summon up to 18 snakes to your side at once. [36 AP to cast] [Requires: Strength 8, Hardiness 8].
Improve to Full Thrust 9 to summon 20 snakes at once. [40 AP to cast] [Requires: Strength 9, Hardiness 9] [3,375 XP to improve].
Intended Change: None
Cost Subtotal: 0
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Slither In 9. Control up to 18 snakes at once with your mind. [Passive] [Requires: Focus 9, Resolve 9].
Improve to Slither In 10 to increase control limit to 20. [Passive] [Requires: Focus 10, Resolve 10] [3,750 XP to improve].
Intended Change: None
Cost Subtotal: 0
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Locked. Snake Coil 1. Instruct a snake under your control to wind into a tight coil, preparing to spring at enemies and other targets with great force. [30 AP to cast] [Requires: Constitution 8, Hardiness 10] [375 XP to unlock].
Improve to Snake Coil 2 to instruct up to two snakes to perform this task. [30 AP to cast] [Requires: Constitution 10, Hardiness 13] [750 XP to improve].
Intended Change: 0 –> 1
Cost Subtotal: 375
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Larry 1. Summon Larry with 5 minutes of boundless energy. [50 AP to cast] [Requires: Constitution 5, Vivacity 5].
Improve to Larry 2 to increase energy duration to 7 minutes. [70 AP to cast] [Requires: Constitution 7, Vivacity 7] [750 XP to improve].
Intended Change: None
Cost Subtotal: 0
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Locked. Midge 1. [Skiller Instinct Preview]. Issue a meek request for the privilege of witnessing Midge’s majesty. [100 AP to cast] [Requires: Strength 15, Constitution 15] [375 XP to unlock].
Improve to Midge 2 to invite the powerful Midge to make her presence known. [90 AP to cast] [Requires: Hardiness 20, Resolve 20] [750 XP to improve].
Intended Change: None
Cost Subtotal: 0
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TOTAL SNAKE CHARMER SKILL XP COST: 375
Summary
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Available XP: 2,815
Cost of Intended Changes: 2,550
Precision Training Discount (7%): 179
Total Adjusted Cost: 2,371
Total Projected Remaining: 444
Confirm?: Yes / No
∇
The next time Mamba kicked at the tier three rabbit familiar, her battle heels showered crimson sparks over her target. I wasn’t sure what the rabbijack’s Hardiness was, but Mamba’s attack damage range reached close to 200, and each consecutive hit would now increase by 10% over the last one.
One of Mamba’s snakes circled the inside perimeter of the flame wall until it sat behind the rabbijack. It wrapped itself up into a tight coil and waited there.
Lily was on her hands and knees. “I’m going to be sick.”
Ambry was laughing so hard she was crying and gasping for air.
“Be glad you’re not in full bloom,” Cindra said. “I’ve always had green thumbs, but this is too much.”
Mamba kicked at her target again, but the rabbijack jumped back. As Mamba shifted her weight and raised her other leg, the rabbijack brought up its fists and began to shake its rear. It stepped backward to get out of Mamba’s range, but her tightly wound snake erupted behind it. Mamba’s pet knocked into the rabbijack’s back and forced it to bound forward as Mamba’s foot flew toward it. Her spike heel sank into the familiar’s chest, poking a hole that released a thin trail of its hot pink lifeblood.
The rabbijack’s eyes pulsed with black energy. It screeched, baring its bucktooth fangs at Mamba and charging at her.
Now it was mad.
The fiend jumped onto Mamba and curled its legs around her torso, then lowered its teeth toward her neck. She tried to pry its face away from her, but the high level familiar was strong. Mamba’s Constitution was the lowest in our party. It wouldn’t take much to drop her HP to zero.
I watched this from midair, kicking my legs in every direction as I rose, slow and steady, away from the fight. Lily and Ambry were on the ground for different reasons, and Cindra couldn’t pluck flowers off her hands quickly enough to grip her bow.
Nola struggled to lift one granite foot an inch off the ground. She looked up at me as my back hit a tree limb. We locked eyes and smiled as the same thought sparked in both our minds. I could finally help.
I cracked open my skillmeister menu and improved Hardiness a few notches so I could unlock Vault, activating the skill as the soles of my boots touched the underside of a high tree branch. The skill propelled me forward, which in this case, was down. I leapt at the ground from high above, my spear aimed right at the rabbijack’s back as its teeth closed in on Mamba’s neck.
My spear sank into its body. A volcanic burst of pink erupted over the forest path that had become our battleground and I crashed into the dirt.
It was done.
Our status alterations vanished with the rabbijack’s death.
Ambry was the first one back on her feet, straightening out her red robe. She was blushing, but her face was tight and stoic again, like usual. She glared at me for a second, a look that said, “If anyone mentions that bout of the giggles, I will strangle them.”
We walked back toward Valleyvale to see what progress Nola’s familiars made on eradicating the anibombs.
“Hey,” Nola said, once we had a clear view of the city’s front gates. “I don’t take kindly to deserters.”
+18
“What are you talking about?” I asked. “Your familiar is doing its job, it has already killed a dozen anibombs.”
“We started with half a dozen,” she said. “One is missing.”
“Really?” I asked. Let’s see, there was the first one we sent in like an experimental lab rat. I guess that wasn’t too nice of us. Then the two that learned a little too late that spears are for stabbing…
“I’m the goddess of advanced mathematics,” she said. “I can count to five.”
“And I’m very proud of you for that,” I said. “So where is the fifth one? Was it killed?”
“No,” she said. “I would have felt that. It’s just… gone.”
“Walking off the job,” I said. “This is going in its end of year evaluation. But for now, we have an employee of the month exterminating anibombs like a pro. Look.”
Kāya’s familiars were vanishing one by one, even if it did take multiple stabs to kill them. Nola’s lone guardian whittled down their numbers faster than the energem towers could pump them out, and the archers still held off from getting involved.
It wasn’t until the last anibomb was gone that the archers took aim.
“Stop!” I yelled, running into the clearing. “We’re here to rescue you!”
One of the archers thrust out an arm, stopping his companion from shooting an arrow from atop his stone tower. The other tower’s archers lowered their bows and stared at me.
Nola stepped up, standing a few yards back from the closest of the wooden towers that held our stolen energems. One pulsed with lilac energy, threatening to toss another explosive creature our way.
“Many of your loved ones are in Halcyon now,” Nola said. “Wait for us at the portal arch and we’ll take you there, and anyone else who wants to leave. This is an invitation, not a demand.”
We stood there, motionless as the energem grew more vibrant. One of the archers lifted his bow and nocked an arrow.
I stepped in front of Nola and lifted my spear, but she put her hands on my shoulders. Let him make his choice, she said, stepping into the open again.
He pulled the bowstring back until it was taut. I lowered my weapon and swallowed hard. Lily and Ambry took places beside us.
“A wall of fire might burn up the arrows before they reach us,” Lily said. “Or I could try throwing ice at him.”
“No,” Nola said. “This moment is important.”
Cindra and Mamba came next. “Should I give him an illusion to aim at instead, just to be safe?” Cindra asked. The energem tower was brimming with energy now. Any moment, an anibomb would emerge, and then promptly burst.
“Thank you,” Nola said, “but no. It’s not the arrow I’m afraid of. It’s losing their trust. We need them. I can feel it.”
His fingers spread as he let his bowstring snap, firing an arrow at breakneck speed from two stories up. He had lowered his aim at the last second though. The arrow didn’t fly toward the goddess’s chest and send blood down her pure white tunic and skirt. It slammed directly into the glowing energem atop the central wooden tower, dislodging the rock and sending it skittering toward us.
The archers cheered. The rest shot their arrows at the energem towers, eventually knocking the gems from their perches. The towers were dead now, and the men looked around for a way down to the clearing.
“They chose us,” I said.
“I thought they might,” Nola said. “And unless they want to jump from their towers, they’ll find a way to open the main gates. They’re how we get inside.”
“You took the risk they’d shoot you just so we’d get inside?” I asked. “Nola, you can fly right over these walls.”
“But you can’t,” she said. “It’s one thing to put myself in danger with you all by my side. It’s another to fly in there alone. It was a calculated risk, and it will pay off once those gates open.”
I lifted the nearest energem. It was lilac, because we had filled it long ago with the life force energy of slain anibombs. It was Kāya that imbued the stone with her own skill though, and now that was its only purpose. It would forever churn out rabbit-shaped bombs.
“I assume you’d like to eat it,” I said, holding the gem toward Nola.
“I gave everyone a pretty hard time about the electric energem, and look how useful that turned out to be as part of our defenses,” she said. “I’ll exercise a little restraint… for now.”
“That’s so mature of you,” I said, tucking the energem into my pocket. As I collected the other two gems, Nola’s guardian returned from the clearing and approached us.
“All of that XP,” Nola said. “I wish we had been able to destroy those anibombs ourselves. I need more experience if I’ll ever catch up to Kāya, let alone Duul.”
“At least we can skill up your familiar now,” I said. I bent down to offer the seraph guardian further skillmeistering, but it approached Nola instead and knelt before her. It held empty hands out, one cupped inside the other.
“I think,” she said, “that it’s offering me something.”
“What?” I asked. “A prayer?”
She shrugged and said, “I accept.”
The familiar’s entire body exuded a golden light, then it vanished.
“Where did it go?” I asked.
“It gave itself to me,” Nola said. “Arden, I feel stronger but I didn’t do anything.”
I opened Nola’s skill menu. “The XP it accumulated from killing anibombs. It’s yours now.”
“So familiars can feed their XP back, instead of using it on their own skills,” she said. “Which means—”
“All of those cretins, war dogs, and generals,” I said. “If they return to Duul, they’ll make him that much stronger. Every person they’ve hurt, he’ll get the XP for.”
An explosion drew our attention to Valleyvale’s front gates. Dark purple smoke billowed from the space behind those metal doors.
“The archers,” I said. We all ran toward the dense metal doors that kept the city closed.
“They’re not coming,” Lily said, her ear pressed against the metal. “No one is.”
“This is our fault,” Nola said. “We killed all of her familiars, and she felt it. She waited for us to recruit and then she killed her own archers before they could defect!”
“No,” I said. “Deadly explosive anibombs are light purple. The one time Vix and I experienced dark purple smoke, it was from a larger, plumper rabbit familiar that sent everyone caught by the blast to different and unpredictable locations.”
“So they’re alive, but they could be anywhere by now?” Nola said. “We have to get in there and put a stop to this.”
“Agreed,” Ambry said. While Nola and I were distracted, Ambry had wheeled our siege tower out of the patch of forest surrounding the portal arch. She pushed the wooden tower on its belly, rolling it slowly to a stop in the center of the clearing.
“The lumber launcher,” I said. “Aim low and start battering the front doors with airborne wooden beams. Keep reloading and reusing them until you break the doors down.”
I doubted our log-throwing siege tower would blast those heavy doors off their hinges, but it was our only move.
“There may be another way,” Savange said. “Your world has shadowy underbellies, does it not? Those who live to hide and those who hide to live embed some secrets in plain sight.”
I turned away from Nola and whispered, “Now is not a good time for riddles.”
“Walk the walls,” Savange said. “I haven’t led you wrong yet, have I?”
I headed north, studying the city’s wall as I went.
“Where are you going?” Nola asked.
“I’m looking for another way in,” I said.
“There isn’t one,” Lily said. “I’ve seen the city’s schematics.”
“I have a… hunch I want to work out,” I said.
Nola shot me a suspicious look. I was worried she’d pluck that hunch from my mind, but she looked back at the city’s doors instead. “You’re being weird,” she said. “Go, get it out of your system.”
I continued to walk away from the clearing and rounded the corner of the city’s surrounding wall, out of earshot and out of sight.
“Why are you helping me?” I asked. “I’ve already brought you into my world, what more do you want?”
“Hell hath no worry like a woman bored,” she said. “There are no secrets left for me at home, but when the darkness overtakes this world and hides the light in a blanket of despair, I’ll be the only one of my kind who saw its unaltered form. Those hidden truths are a currency I’ll spend slowly.”
“Duul won’t tear apart the barrier between worlds,” I said. “I’ll stop him. You’re helping me stop him.”
“I’m helping myself,” she said.
I stopped walking. “I don’t care if you’re some kind of shadow-creature with no shape. Give yourself shape. I want to know what you think you look like.”
She sighed, but didn’t refuse. My shadow separated from my body and walked toward the city’s wall. It swirled and morphed until it was the shape of a lizard, with a long curved tail and round eyes that protruded from a head with a pointy face. Its plump body and squat legs swirled and morphed again until Savange gave it a new shape, one li
ke a tall woman with big hair and long legs.
“Better?” she asked.
“Sure,” I said, not actually sure of anything anymore.
Savange strutted along the wall and rested a shadowed hand against one of the larger rocks embedded in it. “Look here. A stone unturned is a most curious stone, don’t you think?”
We had walked one third of the way along this wall, already a considerable distance. It stood two stories tall and was built from large rough rocks that were all uniformly gray. One smoother stone caught my eye. It sat flush against the mortar that held it in place, perfectly aligned with the ground and the rocks surrounding it. The difference was subtle, but once my eye picked it out I saw other stones like it, forming a small rectangle at the base of the wall.
“A secret door?” I asked.
“A tantalizing prospect,” she said. “Even I don’t know what’s inside.”
I felt around the outline of the door. One stone was loose. I pressed on it, releasing some hidden latch that allowed the door to swing inward on unseen hinges.
“If I had to guess though,” she said as I pushed the door open, “I’d guess thieves.”
+19
The second the door swung inward, two large men with stubbly faces grabbed me by the vest and threw me to the floor. One knelt on my back while the other closed the hidden door, throwing the narrow corridor ahead into darkness.
The man at the door lit a match, then a torch that sat in a holder on the wall. Metal scraped against stone as he slid a bar across the door to lock it shut.
“Who are you,” the man on my back said, “what’ve you of value, and why shouldn’t I kill you after I take it?”