One Year Later

  A year was both a lot of time and none at all. It had taken Rory three years to set up the magical mechanics needed to process raw resources in larger and more efficient bulks, grunt work that amounted to mindless days of work.

  The year separating them from the first Siege Wave was different. Camp Architect—the unflattering name Apostolos had nicknamed their settlement—needed an arsenal that could make up the number difference to prepare for the Siege Wave. Each day, Rory would trek to the Maw, bringing the young serpent along, and begin offloading gathered materials from the second floor to their cargo transport linking their camp and the Maw. It was a streamlined process: spend two months gathering and transporting materials, another month of extensive crafting, and repeat. When he could, he often sent Eia off to hunt on her own to push her ascension as quickly as possible. Her tier rapidly rose from tier one to tier two, then to tier three shortly after. It helped that the serpent was the product of a Territory Alpha’s meddling and further enhanced by Rory’s experimentation with her scales. More potent than her tier suggested, the serpent was capable of hunting an entire tier up, all the way until she reached tier four, where she was capable of hunting -if not a whole tier- she could at least hunt a high-tier-four as a base-tier-four. It took four months to reach tier four and another nine months to reach tier five; by the time the serpent was tier five, Rory was sure that, under ordinary circumstances, the serpent would have likely become qualified as an Alpha Variant. At level fifty-two, the serpent had begun to spend time with Apostolos, hunting the more powerful monsters that were further out from the relative safety of the nearby forest.

  Rory had half expected the serpent to undergo massive changes during those tier-ups. Yet, the serpent stayed almost entirely the same, with the same piercing electric blue coloration. Even her size remained the same, albeit thicker around, closer to a python than a viper now. She still couldn’t speak, which Rory was half surprised about; the Khan of Blue Lightning was more than eloquent. The other half of him was thankful that Eia was still unable to speak as it stood. As much as he’d grown used to treating the snake as a peer rather than a pet, the thought of having a talking monster always around still felt a bit much to accept. Even if speech was beyond the young monster, there was no denying that the young serpent was more intelligent than other monsters of the same tier or even a tier above her. Whether it was due to her initial gestation being exposed to the Khan of Blue Lightning or spending so much time around humans -well, he was a human, Apostolos wasn’t anymore- was uncertain.

  Aside from her intelligence and general growth, the serpent had also gained several skills, ranging from active skills, such as her scales turning into crystal plating, to passive effects, such as the ability to degrade and even absorb the magic of others, like an anti-magic aura field. That little passive skill, Rory was convinced, was due to the integration of her base affinity for energy itself and the living Energy Rune that Rory had inscribed within her scales. Notably missing was any electricity or lightning-based skills, something that seemed a tad odd to Rory but one he wouldn’t lose sleep pondering over.

  Eia wasn’t the only one to grow either. Finally breaking through the tier five wall, Apostolos cracked through tier six shortly before Eia reached tier five. It had resulted in days’ worth of ribbing from the young man.

  “Soo…. We’re in the same tier now. As you don’t have blood weave anymore…. And I’ve focused my attributes more on combat than you have at this point… And I’ve got this fancy scythe…. Does that mean I’m the boss now?” Apostolos had said to him one afternoon, bunching his eyebrows up sarcastically at Rory.

  “You want to have a go?” Rory had said, surprising the not-quite-so-young-man, who was now similar in age to Rory when he’d first appeared on Aelia even if he still looked barely older than seventeen.

  “Wait, seriously? Like, we can-”

  “Spar, fight, whatever you want to call it. Now that we’re the same tier, I don’t see why not.”

  “Hah, you’re on.” Apostolos had grinned devilishly. “Don’t complain when I beat your old ass.”

  It had all been fun and games until afterward, Apostolos could be seen moping around the camp, grumbling under his breath.

  “Cheating. That was totally cheating.”

  Rory could understand why Apostolos had felt that way. He’d grown tremendously ever since diverging from Rory’s path years ago. Even with Scholar’s Retreat hindering the ability to gain combat skills, Apostolos finally managed to develop not just one but three combat skills wholesale without the aid of having them handed to him; they were gained purely through his efforts.

  The first was one he’d achieved shortly after his race change, a skill called Body Control. The description had gone to describe controlling one’s breath and body, finding inner harmony, yada yada yada; it all sounded overly mystical to Rory for a skill that was ‘You’ve practiced using your own body enough that you’re damn good at moving.’ It wasn’t different from any pro athlete or dancer who’d grown intimately familiar with how their bodies moved.

  Okay, sure, there was an element of magic to it. The skill also mentioned eventually learning to bend his spiritual body to conform to the image of his mind. Still, Apostolos wasn’t at that point yet, so Rory dismissed it for the time being.

  The second skill Apostolos had developed was a skill Rory personally found rather amusing solely because of its name.

  Solar Battery was a skill that utilized solar energy to reinforce Apostolos’s physical attacks and body, helping to compensate for his reduced durability due to his race and durability conversion to anima. It did nothing for his magical attacks, but so much time spent drilling under the light of the suns above hadn’t been without gain.

  What Rory found so amusing about the skill was that he was almost positive it was a pun on assault and battery.

  The final skill Apostolos developed, and his newest skill, was simple Polearm Expertise. After practicing with his War-Scythe for as long as he had, Apostolos suddenly gained the skill almost out of nowhere, as if Eon had finally recognized his efforts after years of practice. It had done essentially nothing for his direct skill with the War-Scythe -after all, it was his personal ability that had gained the skill and not the other way around- but what it had done was gifted him knowledge of fighting with any weapon classified within the polearm family, from spears to halberds, even simple staves were included.

  All those, plus his ascension to tier-six, had left Apostolos confident he would beat his former master in a friendly spar.

  Hence why, after being laid out on the grass, Apostolos spent several days sulking.

  It wasn’t as if Apostolos was totally wrong when he’d accused Rory of being a cheater, either.

  “What the hell was that?” The younger man had asked as he stared up at his smiling master, offering his hand shortly after his victory.

  “A successful trial run,” Was all that Rory had said.

  While it was true that Eia and Apostolos had directly grown -their tiers were proof- Rory had also changed, albeit more subtly. While not working on his preparations for their camp to withstand the assault of a Siege Wave, he’d been slowly building out the blueprint of an idea he’d had for some time, a way to finally fight on a more even playing field, even without a combat skill.

  And that was to make one.

  It had started with accolades and discovering he could use his two minor accolades to purchase a skill. Without the ability to acquire a combat skill, Rory had thought it was a dead end until he’d seen the Ghost Image skill, which allowed one to project an intangible image forward.

  It was more of a utility skill than a combat skill; it couldn’t be interacted with after all, but Rory had seen potential there almost instantly, namely, how it might interact with Architect’s Reality, which could project an image from his Mind Palace forward, even if only he could see it. While there didn’t seem to be a benefit of the two in tandem with one another, there was something else Rory had contemplated.

  His issue with magic was that he sucked at freeform Pneuma utilization. Sure, he could, in a pinch, do a bit, and he had gotten better over the years, but he was hardly a wizard; igniting a fireball was already an effort of concentration, whereas someone like Apostolos could fling out blades of sunlight almost entirely thoughtlessly. Manipulating Pneuma for crafting purposes was more manageable, but that was also because he had several skills that aided the crafting portion, allowing him to focus the brunt of his cognition on the task.

  So, if his issue was visualization, concentration, and general talent with Pneuma, what if he shortcut the entire thing? Having an image already premade in his Mind Palace and then conjuring that image forward that only he could see with Architect’s Reality was like coloring between the lines of a coloring book rather than drawing purely from imagination. Something that even the clumsiest drawer without a lick of artistic ability could do.

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  Or that was his initial idea, but there was an essential component to manifesting one’s will upon the world that the Architect’s Reality was incapable of; it existed only to him.

  Thus, Ghost Image was necessary. While the projected image was intangible, at the very least, it did exist to the rest of the world. Used in tandem, Rory believed he could pump Pneuma into the manifested image, turning the conjured image into reality.

  That had been the initial theory, but theory always proved more straightforward than practice. With as similar as the effect was between the two skills, rather than synergizing, they sought to override each other, forcing Rory to learn to balance the two skills. Perhaps because it was a combat skill he was attempting to develop, no moment of skill fusion was offered, either.

  Still, over time, Rory had slowly reached the point where the two skills could co-exist, though only with around a sixty-five percent success rate. While sixty-five percent didn’t seem that high, it was still enough for Rory to attempt phase two, turning the image into reality, truly manifesting Architect’s Reality.

  That was where the next roadblock had appeared. It was expensive. Rory was missing something, that much he was sure, as for some reason, manifesting an image from Architect’s Reality into reality was far more taxing than conjuring something through ordinary intent and Pneuma. Conjure a fireball with intent and Pneuma? It was not exactly easy, at least for Rory, yet it was still manageable, and more importantly, it didn’t take every ounce of pneumonia he could readily utilize.

  Take that same image of a fireball, form it within his Mind Palace, and then project it into physical space? Far more difficult, if not damn near impossible, his hard cap was two times before he was utterly exhausted.

  Something is missing from this formula.

  Understanding that energy was his primary issue, his short-term answer had been brute forcing it. After his defeat at the hands -claws- of the Architect’s Bane, Rory had discovered he could directly ‘wire’ into the energy reserve of their settlement. Without a combat skill to channel the Pneuma through, he’d been almost exclusively locked into using a single big attack when wired into the settlement’s reserve. However, with the slowly developing combat skill -name still to be determined- Rory could finally use that extra reserve in a way that wasn’t just one or two big attacks such as what he’d done against the Architect’s Bane.

  So, when Apostolos finally brought up the idea of a spar to Rory, it was the perfect opportunity for Rory to test using the reserves of the camp to power the budding skill in an actual combat setting.

  The ever-confident Apostolos had shortly had his confidence wiped away when the battle had turned into a one-sided onslaught. An endless barrage of knives—suspiciously similar to his master’s prized crafting knife—had continuously manifested into existence and zipped through the air after him. Blocking or deflecting a knife was nearly as bad as taking a direct hit. Made from pure Pneuma, the manifested knives would explode when destabilized.

  All he could do was dodge, a losing proposition in the end, which had finally resulted in Apostolos lying flat on his ass, staring up into the sky as a swarm of knives seemed to vibrate with potency above him in a storm cloud of steely death.

  “Cheating.” Apostolos had grumbled as his master pulled him to his feet. “I don’t know what that was or how you did it, but you cheated. You’ve never done anything like that before.”

  “And that is why you’re the apprentice,” Rory smirked before flicking the younger man in the forehead. “Overconfidence will get you, if not killed, at least in a bad situation.”

  “Yeah, yeah, you’ve said that before.” Apostolos had grunted. “But really, what was that? Can you do that anywhere?”

  “Nope,” Rory had said with a slight frown. “The short answer is, it’s still a work in progress and pretty much limited to only being used within the bounds of our settlement claim.”

  “It’s a skill, right?”

  “Nope,” Rory repeated. “Or, not yet, at least. It takes a fuck ton of Pneuma. Like I just dumped two months’ worth of Pneuma down the drain. And not two months’ worth of what I could do, rather, two months’ worth of the camp’s reserve of Pneuma.”

  Apostolos said nothing, his response a low, drawn-out whistle.

  While the development of the quasi-skill was moving along, Rory had known after the spar with his former apprentice that it would have to be almost exclusively reserved for what would surely be the ‘boss’ of the Siege Wave because Rory was certain that there would be a primary threat in a wave consisting of a thousand tier-five monsters. Even with two tier-six and a powerful tier-five monster -a force to be reckoned with- the Siege Wave promised hundreds of tier-five monsters, if not more, which would be a lot to handle, even for them, even before considering a boss monster.

  Thus, the main focus of the year between the initiation of the Siege Wave and its arrival was their defenses. About ninety-five percent of the resources he harvested and processed from the Maw went toward the preparations. First, he’d expanded the clearing between their camp and the rest of the forest, taking advantage of the land they had claimed for their camp but left untouched. With all that extra space, a quarter of a mile in any direction, the first proper defense Rory set up were secondary and tertiary walls at one-hundred-fifty and three hundred meters out from their main walls. The furthest wall was made from the downed trees and hardened clay siding that their primary walls had once been made of. Enabling the walls to hold up, at least a little, against the strength of tier five monsters, at equal-distance points through the outer wall were pillars, conduits, that channeled Pneuma from the camp to reinforce the outer walls to a small degree. They weren’t meant to hold back the hoard, not really; they were there as a staging point for the first portion of their defense; magic constructs had been built into the upper portions of the outer wall that would fire thick wooden darts with sharp metal tips into oncoming monsters, targeting any Pneuma signature that did not match the three inhabitants of the camp.

  The secondary walls—and their first fallback location—were more interesting. They were made of bloodwood and reinforced with metal struts and bindings. Unlike the tertiary walls, which would fall after only a short period under duress from a tier-five monster, the secondary walls would hold for longer, made of materials capable of withstanding a tier-five monster without factoring in further magical enhancements such as pneuma-powered inscriptions. Further, unlike the tertiary walls, the secondary walls had more advanced defenses built into them, what Rory had named Solar Coils.

  Crafting them had been somewhat annoying; he’d been forced to borrow Apostolos whenever Rory wanted to work on a new coil, as he needed access to Apostolos’s solar affinity to craft gems attuned to solar energy. However, the final product more than made up for the temporary irritation. Designed with the idea of a tesla coil in mind, a Solar Coil would draw in solar energy as well as the supplied Pneuma from their camp, charging up to unleash lashing arcs of solar-aspect energy that could tear rents into even powerful tier-five monsters. Against tier-six monsters, they would be far less effective, but they wouldn’t face a wave of tier-six monsters; they’d have abandoned the camp if that were the case.

  While powerful, Solar Coils had the unfortunate downside of requiring a sizable amount of Solarite to build. The coils needed at least twenty-five percent alloy of the material to function correctly. Otherwise, they’d be rendered inert even with the solar-aspect gems functioning as the heart of the automatic siege weapons. Given how much they chewed through their Pneuma reserve, it wasn’t the end of the world that they were limited in just how many they could build in the time they had. Still, Rory wouldn’t pretend he wouldn’t take more if given the choice.

  Finally, their last line of defense was the true walls that separated the heart of their camp from the rest of the wilderness. Material-wise, they weren’t that different from the secondary walls, the main difference being that they were far more heavily inscribed with defensive runes and could freely drink in the reserve of their camp’s Pneuma. They’d hold until they were either circumvented or the reserves were depleted from an extended siege. Still, with years’ worth of backup, that was far less likely to happen, at least if they were facing a standard wave of tier-five monsters and not the extended Siege Wave.

  Adorning the walls were what looked like watchtowers, housing several more Solar Coils and defended by constructs that looked like a cross between a gargoyle and a chimp. They were modernized versions of Imp Constructs, defensive constructs he’d first made years ago and promptly forgotten until recently when Rory had begun planning their immediate defenses for the upcoming wave. The updated Imp Constructs were made with more modern materials and advanced inscriptions and even partially powered with a gem-crafted heart. Armed with a bolt thrower and oversized tower shields, they could provide extra offense, but more importantly, they were there to protect the Solar Coils, which could dish out far more damage than the Imp Constructs could.

  It was an impressive defense for only a year’s worth of work, made possible only thanks to the foundations they’d laid spanning more than a decade, from their energy grid to the simple resource processors or the Stellar Forge, which was critical for creating materials such as Stellarite or Solarite.

  “It’s good work.” Apostolos had said as the unlikely trio, student, master, and not-a-pet snake observed the fortress their home had morphed into.

  “I’d hope so,” Rory sighed. “Don’t exactly have much time left.”

  A timer floated in the corner of his vision, reminding him there were less than three days before the destined wave arrived.

  “You’ve done all you can. Why don’t you kick back, maybe iron out the rust, and practice with those chains again.”

  Not a bad idea.

  Outwardly, Rory shook his head. “I plan to do a bit of practice, but you’re wrong. There still is one last thing I’ve got time for.”

  “Oh?” Apostolos seemed curious. “What do you mean?”

  Another time floated just below the Siege Wave timer, indicating a day left.

  “My last lockout is almost up, and I intend to clear it for good this time,”

  It took a moment before recognition sparked in Apostolos’s eyes, understanding what his master was getting at.

  “The Trial of Space?”

  Rory nodded. Over the last year, whenever Rory had free time, he’d journey down into the third floor of the Maw, making his way to the mysterious Colosseum and challenging the Trial of Space. Over the year, he’d steadily progressed, having cleared eight of ten total sub-trials.

  With only a day remaining before his week lockout from the last attempt was over, Rory fully intended to clear the entire trial in one last go, right in time for the Siege Wave to arrive.

  “Is it really worthwhile?” Apostolos questioned. For a while, Apostolos had attempted the trial as well. Still, after some time, he’d gone less and less often before finally shrugging it off entirely to, in his words, ‘Leave the complicated stuff to you.’

  “Hard to say,” Rory said simply. He wanted the Null Window, which would make constructing a Spatial Doorway far more straightforward, but it was more than that. The trials had been insightful, and he’d picked up a few intriguing glimmers of insight from them. While it wasn’t vital to the success of withstanding the upcoming wave, Rory felt the need to leave nothing unfinished before the Siege Wave arrived.

  More than anything, it was a sort of ritual to make peace with his mind and go into the battle entirely focused.

  “Fine, whatever you say, if you think it’s worth your time, then it is,” Apostolos said with a shrug. “I’m just here to blast some monsters into little giblets.”

  Rory heard a hiss that sounded rather irritated from his side as the serpent’s head rose, eyeing Apostolos incredulously.

  “You know what I mean.” Apostolos rolled his eyes at the serpent. While Eia couldn’t speak, it wasn’t hard to pick up the body language of the serpent.

  Rory smiled. It was an odd little group, but it was their group.

  And he intended to see it through this next challenge.

  But first.

  He had a Trial to ace.

  will definitely become more common, primarily when the stuff in between can be boiled down to "And then they killed a lot of trash mobs/built a bunch of shit, and nothing else of interest occurred" because realistically that's how life often works, nothing happens for periods, then everything happens all at once.