Scott held her close and it was not long before the beautiful high elf, who totally did not need makeup anyway, looked like the world’s most beautiful raccoon.
The sorcerer cried. The elf goddess of love cried. It even began to rain, so perhaps ARS itself was crying. Then again, maybe it was tired of seeing so much emotional rigmarole and wanted to force the couple into their tent. ARS would not have to bear witness to their relationship any longer if they just hid their shame a little.
Inside the tent, the lovers held each other close and whispered sweetly to each other. It seemed as though both of them were venting and releasing the emotional turmoil of many long years of loneliness.
Rhea kissed Scott tenderly on the lips then nuzzled against him. She clutched at his sides with her hands and looked away from him with a glassy eyed expression.
Scott ran his fingers through her lustrous blue hair and caressed her back. What had he done to deserve such a person in his life? Seriously, he would like to know the answer.
“It was as tiring for you as it was for me, wasn’t it?” asked Rhea softly.
“Hmm?” asked Scott.
The elf maiden lifted her head so that she could look him in the eyes. “I used to watch you when you cried. You would berate yourself for being a wuss, or unmanly. You even joined the army to toughen up and have an adventure, right?”
Scott bucked a little as a spasm of emotional pain ripped through his body. “Yeah... Sounds about right.”
“You were beautiful when you cried.” said Rhea. She kissed him on the chin.
Scott was immediately, and distinctly, uncomfortable after hearing that. “Why do you think that?”
She smiled gently then spent a moment looking at him before she answered. “I... Think about the calm and confident man who rescued that poor little fat girl, and then I think of the man who cried in the shower. Did you think that if you let the water wash away your tears it would make them not be true?”
Scott squirmed a little underneath her, but slowly became still when she kissed him on the eyebrow and then on the cheek. Why was she saying these things? He did not want to hear this. “Rhea...”
Her face took on a soft pink tinge before she spoke again. “I wanted to do that every time I saw it. After a while I thought that perhaps you were trolling me. You cried a lot.”
He grunted then looked away from her. Why did she keep mentioning it, the crying thing?
Rhea kissed him sweetly on the lips. Her nose softly brushed against his. Her hands rose up to cradle his face and in that moment Scott knew true defeat. He could never win against her and her soft kisses or her innocent desire to get to know him better. Remnants of his guilt began to fall away in that moment.
“I forgot that for a while. I was jealous, kind of bitchy even... But I won’t forget again.” said Rhea.
Scott blinked away a few stray tears but said nothing. What was there to say?
“Can you forgive me?” she asked the sorcerer.
Unable to comprehend a situation like this, all the man could do was answer honestly. “There’s nothing to forgive...”
“That’s not what I asked...” she said softly.
Scott nodded slowly then forced himself to turn his head and look at her once more. He looked into her wide and trusting eyes. He searched them for a hint, a whisper, of malice or deceit. He saw nothing in them but a deep and abiding sincerity.
“Rhea...” said Scott softly.
“Yes...?” she replied with equal softness and a hint of worry in her tone.
Scott closed his eyes tightly for a moment. His chest began to heave as his breathing became labored. However, the moment passed and he slowly opened his eyes once more. His eyes locked with hers and he said, “Origin... I... love you.”
Rhea’s eyes slowly widened. All time seemed to stop for them. After that moment where the world stood still, her eyes began to shimmer and the world’s most beautiful raccoon became slightly more beautiful. Hot tears of joy flowed freely.
“Scott!” cried Rhea before she kissed him several times in rapid succession. First she kissed his lips and then she kissed his nose. She kissed his cheeks, and his chin. Any place above his neck that she could find that deserved a sweet heartfelt kiss received it. At long last, she could finally sense his true heart and knew that it included a special place just for her.
Chapter 11: Elf-Blocked
All eyes were on Scott as he called upon his new power. He had not fully realized what having access to primordial magic meant. He had thought that it was just a spell that could be charged, a common thing in games.
The watery attack speared outward with great force. His companions clapped as though they had seen a great show. He knew that the spell could have great attack power, but the type of interest it had garnered was strange to him.
“You still don’t see it?” asked Rhea?
Scott shook his head. “Other than the charge ability, and the increasing damage, no.”
The elf maiden smiled. “That’s probably because you have not gained any normal water spells. You should have enough ability points... Try one.”
The sorcerer glanced at his beautiful love interest for a moment then called up his skill menu. He did have plenty of ability points to burn when it came to something as simple as a class one spell. The sorcerer selected his class one water spell option, “Drowning Sphere.”
Scott envisioned a sphere of water that fit around someone’s head. The spell, when used, looked remarkably like his vision. The ball of water that was formed floated in the air roughly one arm-length from his position. It moved as his hand moved. After roughly ten seconds it fell apart.
“That might be useful when it’s mastered, but I don’t know what’s so great about it.” said Scott.
Rhea grinned at him. “You’ll see. Check your blue fang spell.”
Scott squinted at the girl for a moment then checked his spell information. He blinked twice and then his eyes widened with excitement. He immediately called out, “Blue Water Fang!”
The spiraling columns of water and the lightshow were no different than before. The water moved to a sphere above his head, just as it always had. When he released the spell, it fired off toward his target, a broken barrel, and impacted heavily. Up until that point it was no different than before. However, immediately after impacting the target, the water swirled quickly and formed into a perfect sphere that encased the barrel.
He could combine water-element spell effects with his blue water fang spell! “That’s not bad...” Scott could see many possibilities for such a power. It wouldn’t be terribly useful against the Shar-Shar, a race that breathed water, but it might drown a Corpse Rat or two in the future.
“Not bad.... Seriously? Try again! This time charge it as much as possible.” demanded Rhea. She was more than a little annoyed by how casually he dismissed such a great power. She could not learn primal magic in her current class.
“Bossy.... But I like it.” said Scott. He grinned at her and Rhea snorted in response. She did her best to resist the urge to smile at him.
“I’d like to see it too, Scott.” said Ero softly. She currently sat on Rhea’s shoulder and looked quite happy to be able to sit there.
“Yeah, like, that would be so cool.” said Kiley.
Neira nodded her head. She wanted to see it, too.
Scott shrugged then repeated what he had done before. “Blue Water Fang!”
Instead of casting it immediately, he charged it four times. The result was incredible! When the spell hit the large sea shell he was aiming at, a much larger sphere of water rose up. If he had to guess, it could have potentially encased a normal sized car in a perfect sphere of water. He immediately realized that he could potentially drown several rats at once! Even better, the effect lasted for well over half a minute. If he had to guess, he would have said that charging the spell stacked the effective usage time.
“That’s awesome, but it makes my mana drop like a rock.”
said the man. He fully intended to use that spell in the future now that he could attach additional effects to it, but it did require a lot of mana to use.
Rhea laughed at him. “True, but just look at the effects! If you master your drowning sphere, the mana cost would drop by a lot.”
“That could be useful... I wonder how I should upgrade it. I still haven’t chosen an upgrade.” said Scott.
“Any of the upgrades would be great. I mean, it’s an absurdly powerful spell already.” said the elf.
“Yeah, it looks like something I could do if I ever had my abilities unlocked.” said Ero.
Scott looked to the fairy then acquired a thoughtful look. “Does it make me a bad person to admit that I sort of want to go drown some people just to see how much damage it will do?”
“Yes.” replied several voices at once.
“Good to know.” said Scott. He had mostly been joking about drowning people.... mostly.
“If you want to know how much damage it can do, just consider your intellect and the force of the spell.”
“It could do up to four hundred points of damage?” Both the primordial spell and the Drowning Sphere had a force of one, but his force-up bonus after reaching level ten increased all spell damage by one force level. The combined force of the spells increased the damage factor to four.
Rhea said, “Sure, if you don’t charge it. If you do charge it, you’d be doing that much damage every ten seconds to a small group.”
Scott rubbed his chin. So, the tradeoff for expending most of his mana was the ability to generate up to sixteen hundred points of damage in less than a minute. Honestly, that was something he could do with one of his other spells with far lower cost.
After he said that aloud Rhea rolled her eyes. The high elf sighed loudly, “Yes, at the moment you’re right. Master both of those spells and you’ll see the difference.”
“I think my biggest issue is that my class one spells have no cool down period. I can just cast them to my heart’s content. I also don’t have to stand there with my hand out like an easily targeted moron.” said Scott.
Rhea calmed down a little then said, “Well, that’s true. Drowning Sphere is only a class one spell. Of course, if you went full damage you could have a force of up to twenty-two for every single cast of that spell.”
The elf raised a hand into the air and loudly said, “I guess that isn’t a big deal either. It’s just a spell that allows a force of twenty-two for the horrible cost of five mana.”
Scott opened his mouth then blinked. Had he heard that right? “That’s eleven thousand damage in less than a minute.”
She smiled at him again. He was finally starting to get it. However, her hair nearly stood up on her head when he spoke again.
“Not bad, but it’s too resource intensive. A little over one hundred eighty damage per second is a crappy tradeoff when I can spam my other spells without a cool down, and do several times that amount of damage.”
“What will it take for you to admit how awesome this spell is!” exclaimed Rhea heatedly.
“Why are you so personally invested in this? I can’t help it if I can spam sixty burn spells in the same amount of time that it takes me to cool down from a max cast of the blue water fang spell.”
“You’re over-trained! What sorcerer at your level could do nearly a thousand points of damage per second with a class one spell while wearing nothing but blue swimming briefs!” cried Rhea. She loved that he trained his stats so hard, but come on. He had a rare spell, with high-end functionality and he treated it like it was nothing special. It was infuriating.
Scott shrugged. “I’ve never met one personally. Am I special or something?”
He knew that he was far from special. Any sorcerer could have stats similar to his if they had forsaken their second class spells and special attacks to focus mostly on their attribute development. He had a few bonuses due to his titles, but beyond that there was little remarkable about him.
Rhea sighed loudly then nodded. “I’ve always thought so, but this is annoying. How is it that you’re more powerful without using a primordial spell? There is something weird about that.”
“No idea, but if it makes you feel better, it’ll probably be better later.” said Scott.
She nodded. “Yeah, higher tier spells and greater spell effects would be good.”
“I do wonder how I should upgrade it, though. Pure damage seems like a waste considering how it won’t even compare with a class one spam session.” said the sorcerer.
The elf maiden nodded at him. It was true that his raw damage was better when using class one spells. “Maybe additional effects would be useful?”
“Maybe, but wouldn’t that mean that I would have to add other water spells?” asked the man. He could not afford to purchase a class two spell with his ability points.
“Actually, I am not certain. I am not a primordial magic master. Sharde uses primordial fire, so she might be able to tell you more about it.”
“When we finally get to Eizen, I should talk to her a bit. There might be something we are missing.” said Scott.
Rhea sighed. She had never practiced such magic. Everything she knew, though admittedly she knew a good bit, was second hand knowledge.
“I’ll wait till I know more before making a decision.” said Scott. He was not terribly impressed with the destructive potential of his new spell currently, but in the future it could be quite dangerous.
There was a brief lull in the conversation after that. A lot had happened recently, but no one had anything uniquely interesting to say.
“What now?” asked Ero. It was the most logical thing to ask at this point.
The mermaids looked at each other and then they looked at the others in the group. Neira said, “Do you want to train a little more, or do you want to go fight the Shar-Shar? There is plenty of time left, probably.”
Scott felt a little uncomfortable leaving those poor girls in the hands of their captors. Training was important, and he could honestly use more of it, but there was a limit.
He looked to Rhea and then to Ero. The Shar-Shar were not supposed to be that strong, not even as strong as the ones they had faced here. Yet, they would only have one chance at it.
Rhea nodded. “We should train tonight and set out in the morning to finish this.”
Neira smiled brightly then clapped her hands together. “Great! That’s, like, so great!”
Kiley nodded her head enthusiastically. Finally, they would go help their friends.
“Let me take a brief nap to recharge my mana. We can hunt till around midnight then come back.” said Scott.
“A brief nap does sound nice.” said Kiley. The mermaids had been up on guard duty most of the day. Ero could protect the island when her power was in effect, but she had not been using it recently. They were in training after all.
“I’ll take watch since I slept the day away.” said Rhea. As far as the mermaids knew, that was true.
Scott walked over and gave her a warm hug. “Your snores gave me courage.”
She punched him on the arm then shook her head. “Goof...”
He kissed her on the cheek then said, “Good night dear.”
Rhea giggled a little then smiled. “Good night...”
“Good night Rhea!” exclaimed Ero before fluttering off toward Scott.
The little fairy found her lower half in a tight feminine grip immediately afterward. She gasped and struggled a little. “Hey, Rhea... What’s this?”
The high elf grinned at the fairy. “There should be two people on guard duty if it can be helped, right?”
“Wha...? But... But...” The fairy reached toward Scott then made a cute little grunting noise, much like a lonesome puppy.
“Ooooh, Elf-blocked.” said Scott in a cheery voice before slipping off into the tent.
“No fair! No faaaair!” cried Ero.
Scott immediately walked back out of the tent and over to the tiny little thing.
He stroked her cheek with his finger then granted her a smile before he walked back inside.
A brief, awkward, moment passed. The elf held onto the fairy, and the fairy held onto her annoyance.
“Don’t you like spending time with me, little sister?” asked Rhea sweetly.
Ero pouted at her then unleashed a loud snort. “Yes, I do...”
The elf pulled the little fairy forward and did her best to kiss the annoyed little dear on the cheek. She whispered, “I’m working on it.... OK.”
Ero sighed. She knew what Rhea meant without having to ask for clarification. The goddess of love just needed a little more time to work through her feelings.
The fairy kissed Rhea on the lips gently, a far less sensual sight that might have been implied. It was more like a younger sibling sharing a simple moment with an older one. “OK...”
The elf maiden released her fairy companion then walked toward the closest high sand dune. It would be a long few hours. Ero fluttered along beside her, neither would have the tender moment that they currently desired. The sorcerer in their life was too tired for romance.
Chapter 12: My Heart’s Not Ready
Final preparations were underway. The five member party would soon disembark. Their first destination would be the grotto that the mermaids called home. Neira and Kiley wanted to see if any of their people had doubled back. There was another distinct possibility, however. The Shar-Shar might have taken up residence there as well.
Scott did something that he had not done for weeks. He opened up his quest menu. When he had first arrived on ARS he had taken many quests, but since he had left Victory Station there had been no chance to take any.
He had been a little surprised that he had not received one when they had agreed to help Neira rescue her people. Many thoughts had gone through his head, but in the end he had been wrong.
After the request opened up in front of him, he had asked Rhea about it. The mystery had been solved immediately.
Neira had accepted their desire to help earlier, but it was not until she had seen how well they could work together that she trusted them enough for an actual quest to generate. It was much like comparing an event where someone accepts a stranger’s offer to help plant a garden versus taking the time to officially hire a professional gardener. The sorcerer looked at the current quest information and rubbed his chin.
Origin ARS 3 (Origin A.R.S.) Page 13