While she was brewing something with a cauldron and the vial of semen she’d taken from me, I tried to test the ledge by the window. She’d laid down a strip of parchment engraved with a long series of runes which had burned themselves into the wood of the window.
I tried to poke them and was surprised to find a mystical force repelling my touch. There was some sort of barrier there, springy rather than hard. Like trying to poke into soft sand. I could dig my hand through a little, but the further in I pushed the harder it got to go deeper. Eventually I was forced back entirely.
“Don’t bother.” Sava said absently, with her attention still focused on the cauldron she was carefully stirring. “I configured that spell formation to keep you in this room. It isn’t the best spell formation the Riverweed tribe has at its disposal, but it’s strong enough that you won’t be able to break through it at your cultivation level. The zeal you wield is simply too weak.”
“You keep talking about zeal.” The English word loosely meant ‘the desire to do action’, though I got the feeling that the true word in the elvish language was something a great deal more mystical.
Sava shook her head. “It is little wonder that your cultivation base is so weak, since you do not even know that much. Your homeland must be a paradise for no one to need to know how to cultivate. Still, ignorance is never excusable.”
After a series of disparaging comments about my lack of a good education, Sava took pity on me and began to explain. According to her, this was all common knowledge.
Zeal was the natural energy that flowed through this world, taking on the aspects of everything it touched. The air had wind zeal, the ground had earth zeal. The oceans had water zeal, and fire had flame zeal. Those were the fundamental elements, and the higher elements were alloys of two or more of them. Those were river zeal, wood zeal, mist zeal, and countless others built from the basic elements, blended together in an unlimited number of combinations, like colors on a painters palette.
Those who had been initiated into the magic system, a practice termed cultivation, did so by wielding spellhearts. These were specific and focused containers that held vast amounts of zeal in a metastable state, like a sort of crystal. Using their spellhearts and eventually fusing with them, the elves of this world were able to enhance their mind, bodies, and souls to superhuman feats. This allowed them to fight monsters with their bare hands or even perform such fantastic feats as shooting dragons out their fists as they punch.
Vitality, also known as life zeal, was just as fundamental as the big four, but it was often not counted among them, because seemed to be something that rode on top of other zeals, but was never present in a pure, unadulterated form. Some even chose to call it a primordial zeal.
Apparently, there’s a sizable concentration of life zeal in the creek water here, which is what had been giving me that strange, wonderful sensation whenever I drank from it. It also may have been healing me in ways I didn’t yet understand.
Surprisingly, the elves could only enjoy the benefits of the creek indirectly. They couldn’t drink from it, but if they were careful, they could catch a fish and eat that.
I suspected it was all that iron in the water that was causing them trouble, iron seemed to hurt them a great deal more than me, which explained why I was able to drink from the creek directly.
The process of cultivation required an elf to cultivate their spellheart, and later their own body, mind, and spirit after they fused their spellheart with one of these three aspects of themselves. The whole time, they had to resist the force of the zeal they wielded, or it would corrupt their entire body, mind, and soul and destroy them.
That’s where vitality sources like the river came in. And me. I was a walking bag of vitality just waiting to be scooped up and drained dry. Part of being a ‘chaka’ meant that I could regenerate my own vitality, but there were still plenty of people who would be able to take more vitality than I was able to generate, at which point I would die. I made a mental note to myself to avoid getting drained dry.
The next few days I spent wandering back and forth around the tiny room in Sava’s tree house. Apparently, the room had previously served as her laboratory, as much of her herbalist’s tools were in here.
I began asking her about alchemy, which she seemed to be well versed in. It turned out there was a great deal more to the craft than making poultices and glowing liquids.
Sava herself had a nature attuned spellheart. That meant it had wood and fire for its fundamental aspects and required a high degree of vitality in addition to that. Using her spellheart, she was able to wander the surrounding forest and pick up plants and animal remains that contained traces of a variety of zeals and a variety of medicinal effects.
By blending and treating those plants and ingredients in just the right manner, she was able to make potions that were useful to her fellow elves. To her, I was a cheap source of vitality that was only very slightly affiliated with a type of zeal. Usually whatever I’d been eating recently.
The doorbell rang, which is to say that somebody stuck the brass bell Sava had anchored to the ceiling in the other room. I had long since learned that Sava made a living here selling potions out of her home, which seemed to be one of the most common trades here in the Riverweed tribe. The spell formation Sava had set up ensured I was stuck in the back room, so I couldn’t be seen by customers.
The bell rang again, and both Sava and I looked up. Her from the potion she was brewing, and me from where I was watching her. She’d already laid out all the ingredients she planned to use. Half of them were in the pot already, which was simmering on the cube of reddish-black wood that somehow served as a magical hotplate.
“Stir this for me. I’ve got a customer.” Sava handed me the spoon with just a bit of hesitation before standing up and passing through the doorway. A place I couldn’t go.
I took up the spoon, looking at the potion. It looked kind of murky green from all the dead plant matter. Probably lots of chlorophyll in there, assuming plants in this world worked the same way I was used to. Really, it looked a lot like a spinach smoothie.
As I kept stirring, I overheard Sava talking with her customer, who was being far louder than I’d expect a reasonable customer to be.
“This is a onetime offer only Sava!” the unknown female voice began. “I don’t know how you’re brewing so much these days, but if you’ve stumbled on a sacred grove, you’d be wise to share them with us. There’s no way you can keep such a secret forever. I know you have plans of becoming an alchemist, but we were all born from the same father. Don’t you think it’s a little unfair to your elder sister to keep all the good fortune for yourself?”
“There’s no good luck here, Katania. Only my own blood sweat and tears.” Sava replied curtly. “Besides, I sense your spellheart is still at the same level of power it was eight years ago. If you don’t make some progress, you’ll be calling me elder sister soon.”
Katania snorted. “It’s not as easy as you think. Breaking through from the fifth level of zeal accumulation to the sixth is hard. Harder than all the previous levels combined.”
Shortly thereafter, Katania left the tree house, climbing down the long rope ladder that I had noted seemed to be the only entrance or exit to this tree house.
I couldn’t really see much of the outside world from my small, isolated room in Sava’s home. Just the glimpses I could catch out the tiny window and through the floor hatch just barely visible by the door.
A week passed, maybe two. Sava’s customers came in ever-increasing numbers. Mostly because she was able to grow an ever-increasing number of potions, thanks to my contributions.
Sava would ask lots of questions about me and where I came from, but Earth was so different from this world that she had difficulty understanding much of it. On the other hand, I was finding her a fountain of good information. Especially on alchemy. I could tell it was her passion, and she’d even inadvertently started teaching me some fundame
ntals just, so I could help her around the shop.
After what felt to have been about two weeks, I was greeted with a surprising but entirely welcome message.
You have learned basic herblore! You have been rewarded with 300 points for your progress.
Perfect! Now I had over 500 points! That was more than enough to purchase the upgrade for the scanner.
Scanner level 1 (Upgrades Available)
Upgrade scanner for 350 points?
Scanner successfully upgraded to level 2
I bought the upgrade immediately.
“Mac?” I tried to project to my AI friend. No response from his end. Level 2 must not cover enough ground either. I sighed in disappointment, but as I did, I noticed that the level 3 scanner upgrade was not the only upgrade to become available.
Personalized Scanner Upgrade [200 points]
This upgrade allows the scanner to connect directly to you, allowing you to use its power to identify anything within arm’s reach.
That sounded interesting as well, so I bought it too, bringing my point total down to 84. Unlike the general upgrade, this seemed to give the scanner a specific new ability. Unfortunately, it left me nearly completely out of points. So much for feeling rich.
The first thing I tested the new ability on was one of Sava’s potions.
Heavenheart Cultivation Elixir (Tincture)
This potion, if ingested while using a good breathing technique, will allow the consumer to gain 300 units of vitality.
Well holy hell, this ability was a goldmine! It actually allowed me to examine things and figure out their names and uses! Ha, if only I could brag to Mac about this.
I looked around for Sava, trying to figure out if it would work on people too. Or in this case, an elf.
Sava Greenstem (Level 5)
Outer disciple of the Riverweed tribe in the discipline of herblore.
Level four seemed… surprisingly low. More than that though, the levels seemed to correspond directly to the local magic system. I knew from eavesdropping that Sava was at something called the fourth level of zeal accumulation, which seemed to be the very first level that an elf reached when they first started learning magic. I tried to scan my own body. If Sava was level four, that would mean I’d be…
Theodore Waltz (Level 0)
Human male. Prisoner of Sava Greenstem
Ouch. If this was a game, I’d be tossing it in the waste bin by now. I’d been here for weeks and I was still getting called level zero?
I pulled out the little black stone I’d acquired back in the caves when I’d first arrived in this world. Sava had pulled it off me and had been planning on selling it, though she returned it to me when I asked about it. She’d told me it was a death aspect spellheart, and that if I could bind it to myself it would allow me to become a cultivator. She warned me against trying to become a death cultivator. She must not have thought my chances of doing so were very high, since she didn’t say anything else on the matter. I think that she thought it was something that could occupy me.
Low quality spellheart of the death aspect.
Sure enough, it was a spellheart. Just like Sava said. This little stone was the essential ingredient that would let an elf become a cultivator and reach past level zero. Sava was at the fifth level of zeal accumulation, and my scanner listed her at level 5 that means each level likely correlated with a level of advancement in the local magic system. I was at level zero because I hadn’t bonded to a spellheart and so couldn’t even use any of the magical powers this world bestowed on its creatures.
The scanner was a bit of a disappointment in terms of information gathering. It never told me anything new, just the same one or two lines of information. Perhaps there would be opportunities to upgrade this feature if I kept leveling up the scanner itself, which I planned to do anyway so that I would eventually be able to contact Mac again.
This was the point in a game where I’d usually break down and read the wiki to get more information. But, there were no wiki’s here, so I had to keep quizzing Sava.
I asked Sava about it, hoping she’d know why I kept failing to bind the spellheart, but she simply told me that it was a matter of affinity with any particular stone, and to just hang onto it and keep trying. Maybe it would work, maybe it wouldn’t. She even let me inspect her nature aspect spellheart, which was woven into an amulet around her neck.
Living as Sava’s prisoner was actually significantly more comfortable than it had been on my own. If I hadn’t run into her I probably would have been, as she often said, dead ten times over by now. I was learning more every day about the larger world, and when I finally left her care, or escaped her clutches, I would be a lot more prepared.
CHAPTER NINE
After several nights of getting to know each other, Sava was finally convinced that she could let me wander the entire building, so long as nobody else was present. She’d worked on a portion of the spell formation preventing me from leaving so that the bit by the door would be removable. Unfortunately, that just meant the spell formation stretched to cover the entire house instead of just one room. Sava told me this weakened the formation, but considering my level I still wouldn’t be able to force my way through it.
Her blowjobs had become a regular occurrence, though afterwards she would always cap a bottle of my fluids for use in her potions.
“Oh, yes. That’s good Sava.” I said as I patted her head. She’d been getting better and better at pleasing me with her mouth. I felt bad she wasn’t letting me reciprocate, but she did everything with such an enthusiastic demeanor that it didn’t seem like pleasure had a place for her. She had a look in her eyes that was more greed than lust. Like I was her golden-egg laying duck and servicing me was a task she needed to do to get that golden egg.
I shoved my cock a bit deeper in Sava’s mouth as I blew my load. She glanced at me, a bit upset as she spat the cum out of her mouth into a vial.
“This stuff is valuable, Theo. I know you want me to swallow it but taking your vitality in such an unprocessed form would be a waste of good ingredients.”
The fact that Sava hadn’t managed to get a tube onto my cock before my orgasm meant that my whole shaft had been coated with cum, some of it even dripping onto the floor.
“It would be a shame to waste all this…” Sava said as she dug through her belongings for a tiny glass pipette, which she used to delicately suck up every spilled drop and place in a smaller container. After a moment of though, she pulled the stopper back out of the vial.
I raised my eyebrows, and she smiled back at me.
“Maybe just a taste.” She said, putting a drip on her tongue. The instant it touched her flesh it vanished in a puff of white, multicolored light that swirled towards her abdomen. She’d extracted the vitality from it in an instant and used it to push her a bit closer to level 6. Then she capped the rest of the vial and quickly tucked it away, a guilty look on her face.
At first, I thought she cared more for the money the potions made from it were bringing in, but after we started talking the ice between us was melting and she even seemed to forget that she was keeping me prisoner in her house. Maybe it was Stockholm syndrome talking, but I felt like we were starting to become friends. This, combined with the frequent personal attention I was getting, ensured I was feeling more and more at home.
My sessions with her had become more and more informal. The clinical milking I had experienced when I first arrived became more like a quick fun and playful blowjob from a close friend.
She let me wander around on my own for the most part, though not outside. The tree house was a lot bigger than I would have assumed. There was a whole second floor above the one I’d been staying, and that floor even had a small training room. In it, I’d found one of those gray-wood swords I’d seen the blue-haired elves wield.
Much to my surprise, I’d found it to be as sharp and hard as metal. According to Sava, it was iron wood. Not ironwood like back home, but
magical ironwood. Through a series of processes known only to the Ironwood tribe, a neighbor and trading partner of the Riverweed tribe, normal wood was grown in such a way that it took on some of the zeal and characteristics of iron. This substance was what the elves used for most of their tools, since they couldn’t use metallic iron without burning themselves with its touch.
Sava, for her part, was becoming comfortable leaving me alone. She’d often leave me to my own devices after closing the shop and sometimes disappeared for a couple hours at a time, usually returning with a bundle of wild herbs or other supplies.
This time she’d been gone for an unusually long time. I’d been spending the time with the necromancy Spellheart, trying to bind it like Sava said I’d need to do to use its power. No luck there though. It seemed no amount of concentration would be enough to give myself magic. Just as I was growing frustrated enough to toss the spellheart aside a pair of warm arms wrapped around me without warning.
“I’ve come to realize that while making money is nice, there’s room in life for a little pleasure too.” Sava whispered in my ear.
I was about to ask her ‘what?’ but I bit my tongue. I wasn’t that clueless.
Instead of answering with words I spun around and planted my lips on hers. Her lips were warm, and her tongue intertwined with mine. She was clumsy, but so was I. It would have been strange back home for a woman as beautiful as her to be so sexually inexperienced, but apparently not in this world where real men were few and far between. Few male elves survived to adulthood, and those that did were usually the treasure of their entire tribe.
Zeal of the Mind and Flesh Page 11