by Macronomicon
“The key difference is that anyone can use this,” Jeb said, glancing at Casey. “What’s your level?”
The goth teen pointed at herself with a questioning look.
“Yeah, you, silly.” Mike said.
“Why should I tell you?” Casey asked, crossing her arms and scowling at Jeb.
Ah there it is. Teens had a tendency to confuse belligerence with toughness.
“She doesn’t have a level yet!” Mike said, the angel on her shoulder breaking the stalemate. “We’d be just tickled if you had an interest in helping my child.”
“Please stop calling me a child.” Casey said, jaw clenched.
“Alright, a couple quick tests, then we’ll see if we can…what was the word? Cheese Casey with this. You guys are probably going to want to stand back in case it explodes.”
Ron had raised his hand with a grin until he was reminded of the very real danger of self-immolation.
Jeb rested the pistol-shaped wand on a rock, set its range to max, then joined the rest of them hiding behind a nearby rock.
He reached a thread of Myst out and used it to pull the trigger.
BOOM!
In the distance, a huge explosion roughly three times the size of Ron’s original drop of Myst shone bright for a fraction of a second before pummeling their eardrums with its force.
The thousands of flying monsters circling the mountain grew agitated, but they didn’t approach.
I wonder what’s stopping them? Jeb thought, looking up at them.
Jeb jumped over the boulder and checked the state of the wand. No hot spots, no sign of any of the welds coming loose…
In light of the size of that explosion, I’m going to put another safety feature on this thing.
He quickly welded a metal stopper into place right at the eighty-foot range. Any closer than that, and the wand might cause some serious damage to the person firing it.
He checked the three hundred foot range, then eyed the sky,
That one looks flammable.
Jeb reached a single thick strand of Myst out into the sky and snagged a bird-like creature with three heads. It squawked and flapped furiously trying to escape his grasp, but he reeled it in with all the merciless force of an electric winch.
One it was three hundred feet away – give or take – he closed one eye, aimed the wand at the distant target and squeezed the trigger.
BOOM!
The explosion was off by a dozen feet or so to the right, which wasn’t bad, all things considered. The monster was still inside the explosion.
As the bird tumbled to the ground in a streak of flame, Jeb patted all sides of the wand, checking for hot spots before carefully unscrewing the handle and capacitor casing, making sure nothing had shifted or been in any way damaged.
It paid to triple check your weapon, especially in the case of a homemade one like this.
Once Jeb was satisfied the wand wasn’t going to blow up in anyone’s hand, he closed up the handle and motioned for Casey to approach.
The girl hesitantly approached and received the wand from him like it was a live snake. Mike looked on curiously from her shoulder.
He briefly ran her through gun safety tips - in this case wand safety - and she followed along as best she could, her eyes wide with fear.
“Okay, relax your grip a bit, it’s making you shake. You don’t have to be tense, this thing doesn’t have any recoil.” Jeb said, correcting her stance. “Line it up with your dominant eye, don’t put your finger on the trigger until you’re ready to fire.”
“I know that.” She snapped in typical teen fashion.
Jeb kept going.
“Use the pad of your finger, not the crook,” Jeb said, pointing at his own finger to illustrate. “A lot of people have a tendency to let the trigger rest in that crook behind the knuckle, but that pulls the barrel off-target and makes your shots go wide.”
“God, I’m not dumb,” She said, shifting her grip to match his instructions while Mike put his fingers in his ears and whispered singsong about taking the lord’s name in vain.
“Now, depending on how dumb this System is, you should get experience just for pulling the trigger. Let’s get started.”
“Now!?” Casey asked, her eyes wide.
“You got a better time?” Jeb asked, raising a brow.
“You can do it Casey!” Mike cheered. “Draw your fiery blade and topple these ferocious beasts!”
Jeb reached out with his Myst and snagged another flier out of the air.
“Here he comes.” He said, pointing. “Wait until he’s about-“
BOOM!
Jeb winced at the early shot and waited until the echoes died down. “Wait until he’s at the same range that the other one was. This thing isn’t a gun. The explosion is always gonna be in the same spot.”
“O-okay,” Casey said, peering at the approaching critter. When she determined it was in the right spot, she pulled the trigger again.
BOOM!
I should make some earplugs or something, Jeb thought. Maybe our Body will prevent tinnitus.
The monster fell out of the sky, a smoking wreck.
“I got two levels!” Casey said, eyes wide.
“Good! Let’s try that a few more times, get you to level ten before we get you a weapon.”
“What?” Casey said, paling.
“You didn’t think you’d get to keep the training wheels on forever, did you?” Jeb asked.
“But I just got them!” Casey protested, clutching the wand to her chest, no longer afraid of it.
“We need to make sure you’re tough enough to run away if you have to,” Jeb said with a placating tone. “That wand only shoots eighty feet away at the closest. There might come a time when you’re the only one around to protect little Casey. Do you want to be able to protect your daughter?”
She glanced at the wriggling infant with Amanda’s hands acting as ear-protection, then back to Jeb. Her eyes gained a certain amount of steel above and beyond teen angst.
“I do.”
Single moms grow up fast.
“Good. That’s what this is for. On to the next one.” Jeb snagged another flier out of the air.
They kept at it until Casey got to level ten.
The girl dropped seven points into Body and three into Myst, weathering the cramps and headache.
Casey Thompson
Unclassed, Level 10
Body 20
Myst 7
Nerve 8
Once that was done, they strapped the young mother into some medium armor and gave her a spear and shield.
Under Amanda’s watchful gaze, they power-leveled the teen girl, with Jeb tossing monsters onto the side of the mountain in front of her hard enough to stun them, but not do too much damage.
Casey’s first monster, she hesitated, almost losing a limb to the creature’s maw before Jeb was able to pry it off her. After Amanda reattached the arm, an understandable amount of stress crying, and a visit to cuddle baby Casey, she went back to work.
When the dark-haired teen met her second monster, she didn’t hesitate, driving a spike through its eye.
Jeb stood there and watched the teen grow in real-time, from a frightened girl into a killer of monsters.
Still a brat, though.
It was times like this he marveled at the flexibility of the human brain.
He traced his thumb across the scar on his palm.
I. am. alive.
“I got it,” Casey panted, leaning on her spear. “I got level god-damned twenty.”
Mike covered his mouth with an alarmed expression.
“How many classes did you get?” Jeb asked.
“Three.”
Probably because the variety of her encounters was low. It was interesting to note Amanda had the most variety out of all of them, but not unexpected.
“Whatcha got?” Jeb asked.
The girl silently reviewed her classes for a moment before something made her scowl.
&n
bsp; Giver of life (S)
You gave birth in the impossible tutorial and kept the child alive. You’re either really lucky, or really tough. Maybe both.
+15 Body
+10 Myst
+10 Nerve
Ability: Mommy’s little helpers
Imbue objects with artificial sapient life. Objects are unerringly loyal to their creator.
Mystic Artillerist (B)
Used Myst-powered weapons to deliver long range, high impact devastation.
+10 Myst
+5 Nerve
Passive bonus to operating and maintaining Myst-based weaponry.
Ability: Phantom shot
With an effort of will, you can cause ranged attacks, wands or Myst Artillery to ignore non-magical, non-living obstacles. This includes armor and fortifications.
Damsel (A)
Somehow you kept getting rescued at the exact right time. Why not make a class of it?
+10 Nerve
+10 Myst
Passive boost to being rescued.
Ability: Favor
The User may Imbue one (1) object with their Favor. If the user personally gives this token to someone of their own free will, the token raises their Stats by 25%. Otherwise the token increases its bearer’s stats by 15%. This effect does not work on the damsel themselves, and it expires upon the damsel’s death.
“…which one should I pick?”
“Obviously not the damsel one,” Jess said, arms crossed and scowling.
Jeb cycled through the options in his head.
They were all good in their own way.
The greedy bastard in him kind of wanted her to pick Damsel so Jeb could get his Myst into the eighties in one fell swoop. Damsels must be traded like a potent currency.
On the other hand, the Myst artillerist looked real good at murdering people. Put a wand in her hand and she’d be able to fuck some shit up.
“…They’re all good,” Jeb finally said with a shrug. “I don’t think you should feel too bad about picking any of them.”
“I pick Giver of Life.” Casey’s eyes went wide, then she keeled over onto the ground, groaning in pain as the headache/cramps/overstimulus blind-sided her.
Sensible choice.
“The mommy class?” Ron asked incredulously.
“Well from the sound of it, she can make the baby’s diapers come to life and clean themselves. Do you want to change the baby’s diapers?” Amanda said.
“That is something I hadn’t considered.” Ron said.
“Plus the ridiculous stat boosts,” Jess said, nodding.
“Plus those,” Jeb said.
Off in the distance, Brett was meditating, trying to build his own Myst Core. It wasn’t coming along very fast, but the Soldier was driven. Being woefully behind everyone else was its own special motivation.
Casey Thompson
Giver of Life, Level 20
Body 35
Myst 25
Nerve 20
***
Jeb was sitting on the rock, all his various magical sundries laid out in front of him as he pondered what to make next.
I’ve still got a huge amount of Worm lens and Scarab Lens. And flames lenses.
Fiery scarab worm? Jeb thought. If it was possible to make flaming flies, it should be possible to make flaming worm-scarabs.
I need to figure out how these created monsters interact with the System. Do they have Stats? If so, how does one affect them? The only thing I can think of is increasing the thickness of the lens, or adding multiple layers. We’ll have to test it.
He was sitting there, pondering his options, when Smartass flitted up and landed on his shoulder.
“What’cha thinkin’ about?” Smartass asked.
“Trying to figure out this Myst stuff.” Jeb said. “We need every edge we can get.”
“You’ve got this grumpy look on your face,” Smartass said, making angry eyebrows with his fingers. “You weren’t all serious when we first met. Where’s the guy who scammed an entire clan of faeries?”
“He’s gotta be the adult now,” Jeb said, glancing up. “Back in the Safe Zone, it was just me by myself, and it was scam or die. I was shaken out of my rut by the circumstances. There just wasn’t enough time to stop and let the fear catch up to me. But now...”
He motioned at the kids, sitting around the camp and telling stories to keep themselves entertained. Humans weren’t designed to struggle for their lives 24/7.
“Now I’ve got plenty of time to stew.”
He glanced up at Smartass. “You know, two months before I came here, I tried to kill myself? Didn’t take.”
Jeb shivered as a cold wind caressed the back of his neck. He glanced up to the smoking peak of the mountain and gave it the finger.
“And this fucking mountain keeps leering at me.”
“Huh?” Smartass cocked his head to the side.
“I don’t think it’s the smoke keeping the monsters at bay.” Jeb said. “Pretty sure this mountain is alive. I can feel it weighing down on me. Looking at me.”
Having a high Myst came with a few drawbacks. Like viscerally knowing you were squatting on an evil entity’s doorstep. He’d had strange dreams, the last few days.
“Thankfully, the only other person who can feel it is Ron, and he’s too young to have issues.” Jeb motioned to Ron, where the ginger was cackling madly at Brett’s fishing story.
“Hmmm.” Smartass crossed his arms in thought and did a little barrel roll in front of Jeb’s face.
“I’ve got an idea.” Smartass said. “As a fairy, I can cure your grumpiness, or at least treat it. But not for free.”
Jeb raised an eyebrow.
“Oh yeah, how’s that?”
“I can’t tell you, then you’d do it for yourself. I need payment first.” Smartass said, holding out a hand and wiggling his fingers.
Eh, it’s worth a shot.
“…whaddya want?”
“Your fireball wand.”
“Try again.”
“The Fire-fly lantern.”
“Not a chance.”
“A custom-built wand sized for Faeries?”
“Uh-uh.”
“C’mon, all it would take is some dust and a tiny piece of metal.”
“You’re crazy if you think I’d give you the means to light things on fire,” Jeb said, crossing his arms and scowling.
“Cheapskate!” Smartass said, stomping his feet midair.
“How about a magic squirt-gun?” Jeb asked.
“Oooh!” Smartass immediately brightened, fluttering around his head excitedly.
Jeb pulled out the water lens and carved a small chunk off of it.
All he had to do was make a tiny squirt-gun out of steel, a little chamber for the water to manifest, and a hole a little bigger than pencil lead for it to squirt out of.
In a matter of minutes, Jeb had a little squirt-gun, appropriately sized for his tiny grabby hands.
“NNNG!” Smartass grunted, desperately reaching for the gun while Jeb kept it out of his reach.
“If you use this on me, I will take it away from you.” Jeb said, trying to impress his seriousness on the flying pest.
“I got it, gimmie!” Smartass said.
Jeb handed the squirt gun to the mischievous fairy.
“Yesss,” Smartass chuckled evilly, running his hand over the shiny steel of his new toy.
He aimed it at a nearby rock and Jeb saw a flicker of Myst get siphoned into the contraption.
PSSST!
A thin beam of water shot out and dug into the ground, while the recoil sent Smartass tumbling violently away, water spraying in all directions.
“AIIIII!” The fairy shrieked as he struggled to correct his flight before hitting the ground.
The fairy came to a halt just before splatting on the ground like a bug on a windshield. He was panting, shivering, wide-eyed, and soaking wet.
“That. was. AWESOME!”
Up the pressure a
bit more and it’d be a water cutter. Jeb thought.
“Well?” Jeb said.
“Well, what?” the fairy asked.
“Your side of the deal. You said you had a fairy way to make me less grumpy.”
“Ah yes,” Smartass said, flying up to Jeb’s shoulder again. “Stay still so I can work my magic.”
Smartass leaned in close and planted a kiss on Jeb’s cheek. “You did your best. Nobody blames you.”
“That was it?” Jeb demanded.
“You feel better?” Smartass asked.
He did, actually.
Jeb started laughing uproariously, slapping his knee. He kept going until he cried, and then he laughed some more.
***Casey***
“Hey guys.” Casey said as they watched Jeb’s sudden gale of laughter from the other side of the fire. “I think I’m seeing a fairy. Are fairies a thing?”
Amanda nodded.
“They’re a thing.” Ron said, glancing over at Jeb. The peg-legged man was half-sobbing as the fairy patted him on the head. “They’re not usually that nice, though.”
***The next day***
It was Jeb’s turn to watch the camp, and he found himself alone with Casey.
She was humming to her baby as Jeb’s homemade soup-pot stirred itself. Mike was kicking his heels on her shoulder, relaxing while their clothes were washing themselves in a sapient bucket of water.
It’s like beauty and the beast up in here. Jeb was half-tempted to suggest that she bring his wand to life so it could fire at its own discretion, but he was loath to let control of the powerful weapon slip away from him. It was like handing a stranger a brick of C-4.
You just don’t do it.
The way they were bouncing from task to task to her humming, Jeb was waiting for the animated objects to break into song and dance, but it never happened.
Jeb pushed himself to his feet, and the humming stopped as Casey tensed.
He sat across from Casey and tried the Scarab Stew, warmed by the fire-flies.
“Could use some salt,” Jeb said, giving her a halfhearted smile.
Casey pointedly ignored him.
“Where you from, Casey?” Jeb asked.
“New York.”
“Really?”
“Why do you care?” she asked.
“I don’t really. I’m just trying to lower your defenses and psychologically manipulate you into not being so mean to me.” Jeb answered honestly.