timewalk

  sat quietly on what had once been a log and was now a granite bench taking in the warmth of Mato’s cookfire and listening to the banter of versation around him. The food was good, as always. More than good. It was just that his stomach still seemed to be irritated after all that poison.

  He gnced over at Ali who had returo pying with the unusual gss-shard creatures they had fought.

  I almost died.

  He had e close to dying several times before, but nothing had hit him quite so hard as being impaled through the stomach with a spear of bone and tossed over the edge into the darkness like an insignifit bug.

  She almost died, too. That he owed his life to Ali’s quick thinking was obvious. But he uood just how much she had had to risk to even have a ce to reach him, and just how close they had both e to dying. For her to have had a ce, she had to have reacted instantly, throwing herself into dao save him without a sed thought or even the slightest hesitation. It felt like a heavy burden on his heart. How she possibly be an evil dungeon?

  For quite a while afterward, he had simply been stunned by how fast it had happened, and how little there was that he could have done. His friends had been trying to coax him out of his shock, by appealing to his i in new skills. Even knowing what they were doing, he was grateful, because he did actually feel better.

  I’m the weakest of our team.

  It was clear to him not just by the level of his css, but even more so by the o be rescued, and the fact that he had no power to save himself.

  Archer of Light has reached level 26 (+3).+30 attribute points.

  Radiant Archery has reached level 16.Arrows of Brilliance has reached level 18.Motes of Light has reached level 10.Explorer has reached level 16 (+2).Blessing of the Dawn has reached level 14.Eyes of the Ar has reached level 13.Righteous Fury has reached level 3 (+2).

  Bowcraft has reached level 7.

  Yes. Only twenty-six. How do I get stronger? He worried at the thought incessantly while carefully deg how to distribute his hard-eartribute points. He needed every single one. He sulted his notebook, finding a note he had left for himself. Oh yes, wisdom… Hmm. The problem was he didn’t have enough wisdom to really matter, and his css didn’t really use it directly. Ali and Malika would o be their mental ‘tanks’, so to speak. Still, he allocated two points for wisdom, vitality, and endurance, splitting the remainder evenly amoerity, perception, and intelligence.

  Aliandra Ali summoned aen Glimmer Shards. As she had expected, the elementals of light magic were summoned dead, just like the bone elementals she had learned before. A she was still fasated by them. For ohing, every time she summoned one, she got ten of them at the same time.

  By all ats, these creatures shouldn’t even have been ‘alive’ in the first pce. There was nothing about them that could even move, and their structure resembled an incredibly hard gss more than any kind of living creature she had ever seen.

  Oubsp;She drew back her finger hastily as the incredibly sharp raze of the squat triangur-shaped monster sliced her before she even had time to react.

  Malika leaned over and touched her, and her fiopped bleeding in a tiny fsh of healing magic.

  “Thanks,” Ali replied.

  “So, what are we going to do about the poisons?” Malika asked, her question pitched to the entire group.

  Ali studied her dead Glimmer Shards arrayed on the ground before her, fog more on her Are Insight for a moment. They’re almost like my barrier magic, she decided, after examining the structure. They were simirly transparent creations of pure mana and seemed just as hard.

  “I don’t think the poison is that much of a problem,” Mato answered.

  “I had two stacks, and I came within fifteen seds of dying,” Ali answered.

  “How is that even possible? That’s only six damage a sed,” Mato replied.

  “I only have two hundred ay health.” It would have been much safer if she could reliably block the poisoh but flying herself and simultaneously had left her with ra capacity to block. Even when she could use her barriers for prote, the toxic liquid sprayed by the wyverns spshed everywhere making her barriers less than effective.

  “Oh,” Mato said, his response filled with a sudden realization of the true scope of the problem.

  “Maybe we get some antidote potions?” asked.

  “If you solve everything with potions, Morwynne Fizzlebang is going to be your friend for life,” Malika said. “Aren’t those quite expehough?” It was a bit of a rhetorical question, all of them khat potions were generally expensive.

  “What about those pesky things?” Mato asked, pointing at the Glimmer Shards Ali had created.

  “I don’t think we will have to tend with those again,” said. “I’m pretty sure the wyverns and those shards are not dungeon monsters. That’s why they were all attag each other. We must have attracted them from below when I fell.”

  Ali studied the shape of the Glimmer Shard while they talked. I wonder… She initiated her barrier magic, trying to match the shape of the creature in front of her. What came out was… well, it wasn’t close. It looked like a blunt elongated disk. She dismissed it in frustration. She was so used to creating her barrier in the default disk shape that she was having trouble imagining how the magic could create anything different, even though she was sure it ossible. She tried again, but it was debatable if the tempt was aer tha.

  But her Sage of Learning seemed to be doing something in the background. At least she was losing some extra mana to it on each attempt.

  “Mato, does your book describe any g spells?” she asked. Clearly, her mind was still w about the poisons, unwilling to be satisfied with just the antidote idea.

  “Hmm…” he answered, rummaging around in his pack. He was the only one of them who still carried a ventional pack, as it vely disappeared every time he transformed for bat, reappearing ter entirely unharmed. He produced the book and began browsing through it.

  Ali attempted to duplicate the shard once again, trying to grip the magic through the raw force of her willpower. As she did, her Sage drew in some more of her mana, while her domain seemed to be trying to interfere with her barrier spell. The result would not be mistaken for a copy; however, it was different. It looks narrower at the part that’s supposed to be the pointy end, she observed, being quite generous with her critique. She tried to recall what she had done differently this time.

  There was definitely something strange happening with her magic. She wasn’t certain if her domain was actually doing something, or if her Sage was just trying to show her something, but she decided she would try one more time, and see if she could fully focus on it.

  Mato handed her the book, open to a chapter titled ‘Cure Spells’. But Ali’s hand failed to reach the book as she gasped in surprise. As her barrier formed uhe influence of her will trying to force it into the unfamiliar shape of a Glimmer Shard, she clearly saw the mana of her domaiing. Then her chime sounded loudly in her mind.

  Requirements met for skill adva.

  Synergy: Domain Mastery enhances your Barrier skill.

  Barrier gains Domain Synergy.Barrier gains the Domain trait. Barrier – level 24Mana: Summon a small are barrier shield. The barrier is a freeform are magic surface that resists physical and magic damage. You move your barriers freely.Domain: Barriers created within your domain may be supported by domain mana making them perma.Are, Defense, Movement, Domain, Intelligence

  “What is it?” Mato asked, still holding the book for her.

  “One moment, something happened,” Ali answered, rapidly reading through the notifications. Synergy? Domain? Ali had never seen a spell cost indicated as ‘domain’, but she had watched the iioween her domain and her barrier, and she thought she had a good idea of what it might mean.

  Quickly, she summoned a new barrier, using a familiar ft disk shape for venience, and ected with the new ability she had just been shown. As she shaped her skill in her mind, she simply reached out for her domain mana using her new Domain Mastery and pulled it in, weaving it through her skill instead of spending her mana normally.

  With a snap, and gasps of surprise from her friends, a gigantic barrier disk popped ience before her, a huge h wall of golden energy. Many times her normal maximum barrier capacity, it seemed denser and brighter too, drawing in nearby domain mana to support the struct.

  “Wow!”

  “What did you do?”

  “I just got this,” she said, sharing the synergy notification.

  “You cast the barrier… with your domain?” asked, his voice soundied and incredulous at the same time.

  “I just made that without using any of my own mana,” Ali said, pointing at the barrier that was still h in the air. Teically, her domain was her mana, but her mana pool hadn’t been reduced to create it. She was doing nothing to keep the barrier there – it was being sustaiirely by a trickle of mana from the domain itself.

  “That’s impressive, Ali,” Malika said, tapping the glowing struct. “May I punch it?”

  Ali chuckled as she nodded.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “Your first thought when you find something new is to punch it,” Ali answered, drawing ughter from both and Mato, and a grin from Malika.

  “Of course, how else you really get to know something?”

  “I knht?” Mato agreed.

  She drew back a fist and hit the barrier. The crack of her punch souhrough their camp, but the barrier stood unged.

  Nothing happened? Ali was curious to see how her barrier performed, but ion was a little more than she had hoped for.

  Malika’s body fred with her unique soul mana as she activated her powerful skills. Ali struggled to keep track of the rapid flurry of punches and fshes of Malika’s Soul Strike, but when she finally stopped hitting the barrier, it still stood. There was a small circur crack at the epiter of Malika’s attack, but even that was slowly closing as the barrier repaired itself with an influx of domain mana.

  “That’s impressive,” Malika approved. “I think might be able to get through it, but only if he goes all out with that crazy new skill of his – Righteous Fury.”

  Malika was very powerful, and she had barely scratched the new barrier.

  I move it? Ali wondered. Her usual barriers had been unmovable until the skill advahe first time, and ever since, she had been using her barrier as a tool to fly. In fact, the skill even dispyed a Movement trait now. She stepped forward, pg her hand on the enormous golden wall of magid it moved instantly and smoothly in respoo her will, as if it weighed nothing. She tilted it over until it was horizontal, about a step above the ground, and released her trol. The barrier stu pce, as immovable as a stone formation.

  Except stone formations don’t usually hover in the air. Ali climbed up onto it and walked around. It seems to work exactly like the normal barrier, she thought. Except much bigger and stronger, and it doesn’t e any mana to keep it. She raised it several meters through the air, like aor, and theed out her normal barriers, creating a small oo fly back down. Her capacity to summon her usual barriers was entirely ued by the giant perma barrier floating in the air.

  ***

  “Sorry about that, I got distracted,” Ali said, finally returning to her spot and taking the book Mato had offered.

  “No problem,” he answered. “That’s a cool barrier.”

  Ali smiled at him and then began to study the book, already opeo a chapter titled ‘Cure Spells’.

  Cure Poison: a spell that slowly weaken poisons, or remove them entirely when the Cure Poison spell is of suffitly high level.

  “This looks perfect,” Ali said. The spell wasn’t too high level for her to learher.

  “The only issue,” said, “is how to vihe wyverns to fight he runic circle. They seem to fly around a lot, and the circle will take time to make.”

  “It seems worth trying,” Malika interjected. “If nothing else, we retreat to it and heal if things go badly.”

  “I’m worried that if things go badly, it will be so fast that we ake it back,” said. “What if we get three or four of them? Remember that even a recall potion won’t help us against poison, we would just die ieleport room.”

  “I think it’s better to have the circle and not than need one and not have it,” Ali said. Besides, it wouldn’t be an enormous mana cost to set it up he battlefield. She would just o have the time to inscribe it before monsters showed up.

  “I like that idea,” Malika agreed. “Better safe than sorry.”

  Ali tuned out the tinuing discussion, turnitention wholly to the book before her, and began to learn Cure Poison using her Sage of Learning’s powerful magic to accelerate her studies. The world around her dimmed and faded as her magically empowered focus and attention locked on to the book and the enhanced words standing out on the page. Her sense of time disappeared as she felt her universe bee just her mind and the pages of the text she was reading.

  She looked up a few moments ter, as if she had just blinked, and saw that the others were sparring off to the side and the campsite had been ed up. She found a covered bowl of stew by her side.

  How much time passed?

  Sage of Learning has reached level 14.

  Looks like I got a skill level at some point during that, she thought realizing that she had not even heard the chime. She sampled her stew, finding it had cooled quite substantially, but it was still quite tasty and, as if the taste of food had woken her body, she suddenly realized she was starving. She fihe whole bowl while she used her Inspiration a her mana regee. Sage really uses a lot of mana.

  She got up and found a clear space to practice her new magid as soon as Runic Script began to flow, her attention was caught once again by a familiar rea in the surrounding mana of her domain.

  What did I do ter it st time? Trying not to distract herself too much, she studied the effect with her Are Insight and focused oing her Cure Poison circle. As usual, it took her several tries to master the inscription itself, but this time she didn’t have to refer back to the book at all, correg all her errors on the fly.

  Your reserved mana has increased by +117.

  Cure Poison – level 21 (Nature)Weakens or removes poison.Runic Circle

  The inscribed magic was expensive, but she had mao learn a high-level version of the spell. Her mind was still following the twists and swirls of mana that she had created, paring the iion with her domain from her barrier magic to what she saw in front of her.

  She hovered there on the cusp of uanding for several delicate moments, before she suddenly made a e, the feeling of how she had wielded her Domain Mastery skill to link to her barrier, and the tricky differeween it and her Runic Script skill.

  Requirements met for skill adva.

  Synergy: Domain Mastery enhances your Runic Script skill.

  Runic Script gains Domain duit.Runic Script gains the Domain trait. Runic Script – level 12You are profit with runic magiguages: A Dal’mohran, Elvish, Dwarven.Mana: Inscribe a runic circle with your mana. Reserve: by level.Domain: Runic magic written within your domain may be supported by domain mana and will not decay.Are, Domain, Knowledge, Intelligence

  A perma circle! Wow! Ali grinned as she heard the notification, knowily what it would say, even before she read it. She already kly how it would work, and she set herself the task of creating another circle – this time by wielding her domain mana instead.

  Cure Poison – level 22 (Nature)Weakens or removes poison.Runic Circle

  Glowing softly under her Are Insight, what was remarkable about this runic circle was what had not appeared in her notifications.

  No reserve. She released her first circle, watg it dissipate and her maurn to her pool, slowly rec. But the sed circle was ected directly to her domain, drawing mana from the abundant nature mana her pnts were emitting to sustain itself without any reservation whatsoever.

  Obviously, she immediately examined every other skill she had, but so far, nothing else seemed to i with her domain in the same way.

  Domain Mastery is far strohan I thought. On the surface of it, her new skill had seemed worth it, but it had immediately improved both Runic Script and Barrier, and with those synergies, the advantage seemed far rger. I’m beginning to see why my css said I’d be stronger in my domain. Her domain-enhanced barrier had been very impressive.

  ***

  They had stopped by the guild briefly to check the store, but Weldin Thriftpenny had not expanded his iory enough to carry antidote potio, and Ali had gotten a rather uling vibe from Mieriel. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it – other than and Malika’s suspis – but she was grateful that they decided not to stay.

  It took just a few mio walk from the guild to Pretty Powerful Potions, where Ali immediately noticed that the shattered window and broken door had been repaired, and both had received a fresh coat of paint. There was even a new sign above the door with a bubbling vial depicted with a rather expensive-looking animated illusion entment.

  Looks like she’s doing much better, Ali thought, recalling the blood and shards of gss on the now perfectly sidewalk where she and Malika had found the owner left to die by the thugs of the Town Watch.

  There was rance chime to greet them, but there was a loud bang from the other end of the shop, a puff of lic smoke, and some rather colorful swearing from behind one of the ters. A couple of points of mana trickled into Sage of Learning as it identified a few novel insults to add to her uanding of the Dwarven and Elvish nguages.

  The shop had obviously had a rather expensive overhaul. Any sign of vandalism and robbery had been thhly purged and every timeter of every surface was now covered with plicated apparatus. Tiny artifacts produg different colored fme were heating beakers and vials and leaking different fvors of mana to drift and mingle in the air. Pots bubbled, cauldrons simmered, fluid ran through coiled gss tubing while a violet densate dripped on the floor. Over in the far er, the lic smoke drifted up towards a vent in the ceiling. Strange and wondrous sts mingled with acrid chemical smells to create an uling medley of olfactory assault.

  She doesn’t have arance chime, but she has a wind entment to deal with smoke? Ali wondered how often something blew up in here, or if it was just a safety meism to clear the chaotigling of outgassing, mana, and even the occasional surprising snowfkes.

  “Hi there! Sorry about the oops! I’m Morwynne Fizzlebang, what brings you to my shop today?”

  All Ali could see over the tops of the bubbling vials and cauldrohe two shog pink high ponytails as the Gnome ran out from behind whatever co she was making.

  “Oh, it’s you guys! Sorry about the noise!”

  Ali almost didn’t reize her, even though she was the only Gnome she knew with pink hair. She wore several different colored adjustable goggles and monocles c most of her face, and over the entire traption, she had a sturdy-looking face shield. There was lic soot over everything, the face visor, her tank top, and her gloves.

  She pulled up the visor of the face shield and wiped her face, getting soot over everything. As she wended her way between the packed tables, she bumped something, knog it to the floor with a crash of broken gss. She unleashed aorrent of colorful iive in on, Elvish, and some uage Ali hadn’t heard before.

  “That was going to be my big breakthrough… oh well. What brings you to my store today?”

  Ali got the distinct impression that this kind of act had happened half a dozen times already today.

  “Mana potions, maybe?” she asked, looking expetly at .

  “Do you have any poison antidote potions?” Ali asked.

  “Ooh! What kind of poison?”

  “Poison affinity wyvern. It breathes this toxic green liquid that spshes everywhere. The poison stacks and sts about ten minutes.”

  “Aah, good, nothiic.” Morwynne nodded her head and ducked under one of the tables, scrabbling about and muttering curses under her breath for a few moments before she emerged with a box. She ope, revealing several vials of something green and viscous carefully secured and packed.

  Antidote Potion – level 18 (Nature)e: Attempt to cure toxins, venom, or poisons afflig you. Duration: 30 seds.Created by Morwynne Fizzlebang – “Also good for a tummy ache!”Potion

  “Now remember,” Morwynne said, her tone suddenly reminding Ali of a lecturer she had once had, “if the poison is higher level thaion, it will remove them much slower, or even just weaken them. So don’t pin if it isn’t as effective as it sounds!”

  “Looks perfect,” Ali said.

  “Anything else I offer you?”

  said, “No, that was it, thank you.”

  Morwynne quirked an eyebrow at him.

  “Ok, maybe a dozen mana potions,” he relented.

  With a beaming grin, Morwynne produced a tray of blue mana potions from a drawer and exged them for a handful of s. “Thanks for stopping by!” she said with what Ali was beginning to realize was her typical energy level.

  As they turo leave, Ali heard a crash and some more swearing and saw that Morwynne had tripped over one of the boxes she had upended in her search for their potions.

  “Is she always like that?” Ali asked.

  “Yup,” Mato answered with a smile “She’s something of a legend in this town. And as scatterbrained as she appears, the potions always work.”

  timewalk