Farmstead
"Nice try, glowball!" Geir said, unwittingly using Miiba's term for Danny, "But any idiot could make up that much! Everyone knows that World-Walkers, Hero or not, come from different places! Lots of 'em talk about how they don't have magic, or monsters, or how they have moving metal vehicles that can even fly! And anyone can come up with a sobstory about incurable diseases! I still ain't buyin' it!"
Then Miiba, little as she was, went
off on the red haired human. Both Mira and Geir turned to her with wide eyed surprise. The magic user actually seemed hurt, both by the goblin's words and by her own empathy
for what Miiba said. Geir, on the other hand, began to shake as his grip on his axe tightened.
"You're right, I'm no Hero. I'm just a guy tryin' to get by in this fucked up world--that's why I can't trust any of you MONSTERS!" he yelled back, determined to get the last word in even as Miiba turned and ran. But before the goblinette could get around the corner of the house, she smacked into something rising out of the earth. And not too far away, around the other corner of the house, now came the big man himself.
"What's going on out here?" called Lear's powerful voice. He stopped, and at a glance with a veteran's intuition, took in the strange poltergeist sitting on top of his chicken coop, the clearly distressed goblin girl, the greatly confused Mirabelle, and the seething Geir.
You used Soil Manipulation!
You are attempting to use Possession on an Inanimate Object!
This method is unusual, something unpredicted may happen.
Your Earth Affinity is increasing! Soil Manipulation's effect is boosted!
Your Spiritual Awareness has boosted your understanding of what is happening!
Your Ghost Touch contributes to manipulating the physical environment around you.
Your former variance, Stone-Hardened, has caused a synergistic affect!
...
...
YOU HAVE TRANSFORMED!
(Immature) Ectoslime > (Pseudo, Immature) Rokklit!
A much smaller, weaker form of Earth aligned elemental creature. You have attained a Pseudo-form, imitating a proper creature but lacking key characteristics or certain natural abilities and status. Rokklits are quite rare outside of areas charged with powerful Earth Mana, as they are essentially stones imbued with some form of life through concentrated forces of magic. Their bodies toughen as they mature, becoming as tough as boulders by adulthood. As a child, however, their bodies are light enough to be lifted and fragile enough to break when thrown.
Your Base HP has increased!
Your Base MP has been decreased by [Possession]! If the [Locked] MP is used up, you will no longer be able to maintain this body! Your MP has been reduced by roughly 25%.
Your Base Stamina has slightly increased!
Your Base physical strength-related stats have all returned to previous values.
Your Base physical defense-related stats have increased!
Your Base physical movement-related stats have decreased.
Skill Gain: Earth Affinity I (1.0)!
You have developed a bond with the earth. At this rank, MP/SP cost for all Earth-related skills is reduced. Earth-related skills will develop more quickly. Increase the rank of your affinity by deepening your understanding of the Earth element.
Your MP is Low!
As Jason pulled himself out of the ground, he felt...very different. Being a Slime, with a gelatinous membrane instead of skin and hydraulic insides instead of muscle had been weird enough. Being dead had been
very weird. But this was even more different. His body was made of stone, yet still he could perceive the world around him somehow. His magic now flowed through solid material instead of some metaphysical circulation system, and he could feel some of it, at his center, locked in place and unmoving. He
could draw on it, though only with great difficulty...and at the risk of slipping back into that limbo. And, despite having no muscles with lactic acid, and no mouth to eat, he felt very tired and somehow hungry. He had, however, achieved his goal. Once more, he had a body--and unlike before, when he became a Necroslime, his hunger didn't seem so all-consuming...
"Where'd that come from!?" Mira gasped. Geir hefted his axe and turned it so that the hard, hammer like side would come down first.
"Hell if I know, but I swear to the Maker--"
"ALRIGHT, EVERYBODY SHADDAP AND NOBODY MOVE!"Jason and Danny were both familiar, somewhat, with the [Warcry] skill. Either using it themselves, or having it used on them. In comparison to Lear's voice, all of that experience was like comparing dunking one's head in a tub...and being dragged down under the ocean. Their bodies froze, and they were so shocked by the sound and intensity that their hearts and minds seemed to simply skip a beat. For Miiba it was much the same, as if she were being stared down by a giant bear or some other terrible predator. Geir broke out in a sweat, and Mirabelle actually dropped to her knees.
Lear stood, arms crossed, staring all of them down like naughty children. He looked from Danny, to Jason, to Miiba, back to Jason, back to Danny.
"You first. Yes or No. Used to be Human?" He pointed at the Poltergeist. Then at the Rokklit.
"Yes or No. When you were summoned here, you remember a figure with black hair and red eyes?" Now the farmer looked at Miiba, and his expression softened as he crouched down to her eye level.
"Miiba, do you know these two people? And do you think they came here to hurt anyone?"
Deep Forest
While Femus took to ground, Nira turned to face the oncoming trio of fairies with a bright and cheery greeting.
"Nuhy-seeng! Gahaha!" The "friendly" Pixie imitated some of Nira's words again, and the others echoed her giggles. They seemed to be intrigued by the sounds of language, but as to whether or not they had one or understood what Nira was saying, it was still up in the air. They flew around her, looking at her dress and the herbs gathered around her. One of them, a male with a fiery head of red hair, came forward a little more timidly than the others. He landed on the ground and, on shaky legs, approached Nira with constant sidelong glances. Tenderly, he reached out and touched her leafy clothes--then immediately shot back off, practically leaving a cloud of sparkles in his wake. The other member of the three, another female with long, wavy blue hair, began to pluck various bits of grass and a healing herb out of the ground, and threw it onto herself--though she seemed frustrated when it didn't stick to her figure like Nira's dress.
"Ah! Ah!" the blue haired fairy said, pointing at Nira's dress and then at her own grass clippings. The redhead zoomed back, hovering over Nira's shoulder and peering at her this way and that. The first pixie, on the other hand, seemed to be peering around as if she were looking for something. Then she looked back at Nira in confusion, and pantomimed a spherical shape before making a sound like crackling electricity or fire with her mouth.
Meanwhile, while Femus was successful in hiding his glow for a few moments, when he began to Meditate there was a slight "buzz" throughout his body. The Meditation only began to work as normal when he stopped trying to use his Suppress Presence skill...which caused his glow to brighten. The pixies were still focused on Nira, but if they happened to turn around as he regathered his magical energy, or look more closely under the layers of herbal foliage...
Unspent Skill Points: 20
Current Skill List:
Alert I (1.5)
Lesser Flight I (1.65)
Minor Heal I (1.0)
Muffle (1.55)
Shield I (1.1)
Mana Orb I (1.1)
Meditate I (1.05)
Aqua Sphere I (1.1)
Magic Analysis I (1.025)
<UNUSABLE>
Charisma (0.95)
Crafting (0.2)
Keen Ear (0.2)
Mana Strike (0.1)
Point Strike (0.3)
Stealth Kill (0.3)
Suppress Presence (0.5)
Monster Analysis (0.3)
Smash (0.1)
Faster (0.35)
Magic Analysis (0.95)
Iron Gullet (0.2)
Charm (0.4)
Deception (0.2)
Pacify Animal (0.2)
Taming (0.2)
Plant Analysis (0.3)
Mana Sense (0.2)
Spell Chant (0.3)
Stronger (0.3)
Use Light Equipment (0.05)
Mana Shape (0.2)
Focus (0.1)
Mana Control (0.15)
Rat Party
As the Bugbear headed towards the Troll's cage--and Asteria--Ed sought to distract the guard by hurling the nearest rock. From a vantage point in a nearby tree, the Rat Man was able to throw the rock across the small campsite. It hit one of the ramshackle fence posts, near the opposite corner of the hillside, and bounced off into the bushes. All of the guards, not just the one investigating the cage, turned to look.
"The hell was dat 'crack!' noise?"
"That didn't come from ova dere--might be more than one of 'em! Let's all search!"
In this moment of distraction, Asteria was able to get away from the Troll's cage. Using her new Soil Manipulation, she wriggled back into her tunnel under the fence and covered herself with dirt.
"If ya seen sumptin, tell me what it was! Quitcher yellin'!" The first Bugbear had turned back to his original task, and now berated the Troll from outside its cage. He slammed his wooden club against the bars, causing the blinded creature to recoil. It couldn't see its tormentor, but turned its head as it listened. It began to make whimpering sounds, not quite recognizable as language, but when the Bugbear dragged his club across the bars again it snarled defensively.
With her newly upgraded Telepathy, Asteria projected a strong, emotionally charged attempt to convince the Troll to do something about the Bugbear. And as she did so, she felt a powerful resonance through this link--anger flooded her own body for a moment before she cut the connection, causing her eyes to dilate and her snout to wrinkle as a low growl built in her throat. The Troll didn't need much convincing, just an opportunity. The Bugbear waited a moment too long to take his club away from the bars--the Troll snatched at it with a roar, grabbing the club in one hand and the Bugbear's wrist in the other.
"Oi! Ya bastard!" A short struggle ensued, but there was still a cage wall between the two. The Bugbear beat at the Troll's arms and hands with his free fist, and once he grabbed its fingers and twisted hard enough to pop them, the blinded creature shrieked and withdrew. The hairy guard spat at the prisoner, and rubbed his weapon-arm where it had clawed him. "Tried to tell 'em, can't have no Savage in a tribe! Takes too long t' beat 'em into werkin' right!"
Meanwhile, the Hobgoblin and the other Bugbear had started to move. The second Bugbear moved in the direction that Ed had thrown the stone, while the Hobgoblin moved perpendicular. They scouted all the way to the fence, looking back and forth as they did so. The Hobgoblin's gaze lingered for a bit on the tree that Ed sat in--but the Rat Man held still enough, or else the Hobgoblin's eyes hadn't adjusted enough, and soon the greenskin turned back and began inspecting his side of the fence more closely.
There was a slight huffing noise from down below the tree--Mother Rat was trying to get Ed's attention. She reared up on her hind legs, putting her forepaws on the trunk, before dropping back down and pointing her snout. The trail of myrminor blood Ed had brought all the way here stood out even in the dark, thanks to the Beast-type monsters' increased sense of smell. It indeed circled the camp--but it also, of course, had followed Ed and Mother Rat all the way from the site of the Myrminor Scout's murder. And now, as they looked, the grass was beginning to sway and the dirt was starting to poke up here and there, like the wake of a tunnelling mole...
With the guards all away from the central fire, the entrance of the Hill was exposed...although, there was still the matter of how many bandits might be waiting inside. And the longer the guards stayed on patrol, the greater chance they might find the rodents sneaking about...
Monster Party
Ash syncronized her breathing with her concentration, and attempted to draw in as much mana as possible. She had become quite familiar now with the amount of magical energy her body could hold, given how often she repeated this process nowadays, and while she recharged her goal would be to try and force herself to channel a larger amount. As her MP topped out, she drew in another deep breath...and a feeling, much like the exhilaration that follows in the wake of exercise, or the natural wide-eyed awareness of the rare morning where one wakes up with no alarms and no struggle to get out of the bed, spread through her.
Your MP is Full.
You have acquired Temporary Extra MP.
Skill Gain: Focus I (0.9 > 1.0)!
By spending at least 30 seconds focusing before using an offensive Skill or Spell, you can increase its damage or range. At this rank it is comparable to increasing the power by one rank (eg Mana Orb I to Mana Orb II) while also increasing the MP cost by half again (spend 1.5x Mana Orb I's cost).
Her second round of experiments, in her attempt to create a Fire spell, saw a more intense heat and a brighter color from the red Mana Orb when she put all of her attention on a single sphere. Upon launching it, it crackled and spat just like a regular Mana Orb, but when it struck the ground it made a snapping sound like a firecracker. A black singe mark was left upon the dirt. Every time she repeated this process, the orb grew hotter. From red to orange, from orange to yellow, and then a white center grew in the yellow sphere's belly. Waves of heat emanating from the sphere turned into small wisps of steam and smoke, then tiny red sparks began to spit out here and there like a sparkler at the end of a wand. And then, finally, the orb condensed in her scaly palm and, on the third try, it burst into flame! This time the spell had a noticeable arc when she threw it, and when it struck the earth it left behind a short lived blaze that spread to a few stray leaves. Reducing these dry bits of debris to ash, the flame died out immediately.
Skill Gain: Fireball I (0.8 > 1.0)!
The fire-themed version of a basic magical attack. With roughly the same power, range, and MP consumption as a Mana Orb, it has the unique property of being able to inflict a burn on the target. However, as an elemental spell, these same properties render it harder to use in certain circumstances. Non-flammable or elementally opposed targets, for example, will be much less effected.
Meanwhile, on shaky legs Oberon stood in his newly transformed body. While one wouldn't think Oberon's small body could consume a particularly enormous amount of food, the group's supplies were indeed getting a bit low. The Kele and Argeps they had collected a few days before had been depleted not just by meals, but by the fact that without any refrigeration they had already started to go bad or to wilt and had to be carefully picked through to find the ones that were still edible. The Giant Rat meat, by the same token, was starting to spoil a bit and, aside from fire, the party really had no way to prepare or otherwise preserve it. The pieces of Rat Jerky Digbie had secured were pretty much the only less-perishables they had, and out of politeness since he had been the one to find them no one had stolen any from the transforming goblin's stash. The stream outside was a good source of fresh water, but it was still an outdoor stream. It wouldn't be completely sterile, though if the group was going to get sick from drinking it they likely would have already experienced such discomforts.
All this notwithstanding, Oberon found himself hungrier than he'd ever been since awakening in this world, and surprised himself with how much he was able to pack away. Once he was fully sated, he turned to refilling another aspect of his new body, his magic storage. Given the development of his affinity and its recent rank up, Gather Light seemed the best option...
However, in the time it had taken them to deal with all the goblins, the orc, their magical experiments, their evolution, and taking their meals, the day had continued to go on. It was now late sunset--to find some place where the last rays would hit him directly, Oberon had to move around in the upper trees around the campsite.
Yet even with such little daylight remaining, Oberon could feel the energy pouring into him just as strongly as he had earlier in the day. His MP rapidly began to recover, and for a few moments he focused only on recovering his magic while letting his mind drift to the possibilities of further magic. But, in a moment of practicality he elected to go ahead and spend some of his Skill Points.
Skill Gain: Gravity Well I (1.0)!
Within 30 feet of the caster, create a spherical area with a diameter of 5 feet. Magical force infuses the physical phenomenon of gravity, increasing its effect upon the target at the center of the sphere. The target experiences a crushing force roughly equivalent to a fourth of its own weight concentrated into a single instant.
While the Sprite did these things, the Palablin also awakened from his strange journey of growth.
You used [Analysis]!
---You (Adolescent Mystic Stone-Hardened Palablin)---
A never-before seen Goblin-subtype, created under circumstances that have not been replicated. It may be impossible for other Goblins to achieve...or is it? If the Demiblin is a Goblin that has garnered the favor of Demons, this Goblin has instead gained the favor of something else. However, even if it is not a Demon, there is always a price for power. Fair trade is the means by which two parties prosper. The Palablin's skin will lighten, from greens to whites or yellows and in between, or a lighter hue of any other pattern such as that of a Blue- or Redcap. They are of a similar size to hobgoblins and demiblins, but their eyes seem to gleam with a greater intelligence. --You have access to your own Skill List, allowing you to see all Magical and Physical Skills you possess. You have access to your own Inventory and Equipment, with the individual Analysis category skills to assess their properties, quality, and value. You are in the service of the Divine Spirit Jehanne.
---Ash (Adolescent Mystic Winged Kobold)---
Small, reptilian creatures with odd primate characteristics like upright spines and grasping limbs. Quite similar to Goblins, often competing with them for the same territories and resources. Some individuals have other characteristics--the Winged Kobolds are often said to have Draconic power in their veins, and are often revered in their tribes. You know Ash is a Reincarnator like yourself, and that she has a wide variety of magical skills. You can see that she has equipped herself with some crafted items, such as a magical spear and the satchels you made for her.
---Oberon (Adult Sprite)---
A highly territorial, but otherwise relatively friendly type of creature. Quite similar to Pixies at first glance, they are much more empathetic and even altruistic than other types of Fey. Unless an enemy presents a threat to their homes and families, they often prefer to flee rather than fight, but if something enters their nesting area they are known to swarm much like wasps. However, you have not felt compelled to follow all of this behavior due to your unique circumstances. Sprites are aligned with the light element and their wings have scales similar to some types of moths. When these scales fall they sometimes glitter, and the Sprite's body is often covered with them. You know Oberon is a Reincarnator like yourself, and that he has a wide variety of magical skills. You also know that his physical skills and base stats are lower than your own, as his species is more suited to magical abilities. He currently has no equipment, but his Transformation has improved many of his abilities.
You used Crafting II!
Long Grass + Refinement
Your method of refining the raw material is more sophisticated than expected of your species. Quality is boosted.
Something fell into place in your favor! Was it luck, or an unknown quality of your material? Quality is boosted.
You crafted an item!
Obtained: Grass Twine (Well-Made)!
After examining his new body, and those of his friends, Digbie set about trying to complete the quest his newfound patron had given him. However, when he asked if he could use the ring as a bead, as well as requesting a signal of Jehanne's answer, there was no wind at all. The ring would certainly fit on the twine. It had a little bit of sparkle, despite its tarnish. And with the ring on the loop, there would still be more than enough room for the other bead materials, and perhaps more. But there was no indication from the Divine Spirit as to whether or not this would be a fitting answer to the quest's requirements. Even with the Guidance skill, it seemed getting actual "guidance" wouldn't be so easy.
And, unbeknownst to the rest, Torrent continued her own spiritual journey...
"You return, to the Shadow. Have you set your Will, and defined What is Not for yourself? What Shadow have you cast?"The Liar, the shadow with a feminine shape that deceived flesh, danced around the hollow, empty space into which Torrent cast herself. Two other Figures accompanied her, and Torrent could remember with vivid clarity her dream about the Shadows she sought. The one who held the tome of Hidden Potential locked his singular, bright eye upon her as he turned the pages in the great black book. The Accomplice of Injustice, keys silently jingling around his neck, tossed one contemplative knife up and down in a bandage-wrapped hand.
"Such fledgling deception, for the poor goblins. But a fledgling deciever, is a deceiver still. What do you seek here?""Such an ignorant pursuit of potential. But acknowledging ignorance is the first step to true introspection. Do you not fear what seeks you?""Silent steps, a presence unnoticed, skin that blends, and more. A shadow grows longer, unseen by eyes that face the light. Is it best for your eyes to look too long?"Torrent could still feel the pull from her body, a million miles down below. She had gone further, and the disk of color floating in the void had grown smaller. The pull was strained, like a rubber band stretched to its limit...
