《Before They Came (Magical Apocalypse)》


 Chapter 1 - Before the Wave

    It kinda happened at the best time. We were already almost drunk. I had just gotten through 4 loaded vodka tonics on a fine Saturday afternoon when the world ended. The rippling pulse through reality interrupted me and my girlfriend''s very chill afternoon of drinks and epic shark attack movie marathoning. I was working my way through my favorite buffalo chicken dip when that mythic pulse carried an unrecognizable voice in a language that had too many grunts and clicks to be familiar, yet we somehow understood the gist of it. The announcement, "ASK AND YE SHALL RECEIVE" reverberated throughout the collective psyche of the entire human race that day. But many missed the emotional undertones that simultaneously conveyed a darker message, "BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR", and even more missed the softer instinctual undergirding, "LIFE AS YOU KNOW IT, IS OVER".


    To be fair, I''m not really sure how much of that ripple I understood that day, but my girlfriend Sarah sure grasped the top layer of meaning. Without spilling a drop of her Jack and Coke, her tipsy hippy ass looked up and managed to giggle out, "I want to be one with nature!¡±This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    Her flesh turned brown and craggy while her fingers grew thin and long. I couldn¡¯t even drop my drink as her digits sprouted thick bunches of leaves while her legs joined together and gnarled and pushed into the floor of our house, splitting the couch we were on. I couldn¡¯t bring myself to move even as I watched as her Irish complexioned face darken and turn upward as her hair and body grew to fit her new state of being. Less than a minute went by and my soon to be fianc¨¦ was an adolescent tree, in our living room, in our fucking house.


    I couldn¡¯t believe it. She looked like the younger, hotter version of the talking tree from Pocahontas. The tortilla chip loaded with buffalo chicken dip halfway to my mouth had lost its earlier sense of priority, but I couldn¡¯t open my hand to even let it go. Tidal waves of meaning and various inputs staggered my brain and this agonizing pressure built behind my eyes as alcohol sought to both dull the pain and haze the message. [FUCK!], I thought as I leaned closer to work though the image my betraying eyes were showing me. Still unwilling to put my drink and snack down, I inched my foot closer to my woman¡¯s foot/root. It did look like oddly fleshy bark in the shape of a foot. I could see the bump where the ankle was and the groove where the legs joined together. Even as a tree she still had a rockin body.

 Chapter 2 - Halfway Prepared

    [That¡¯s the last fucking time I date a god-damned hippy. Kinda wish, WAIT! Does this mean I have one question that will literally be answered if I use the ¡°W¡± word?]. My thoughts and I were having an odd powwow. Half of me wanted to test the limits of the new reality, and the other half was desperately clawing at my disbelieving soul to face it and prepare. Turning my head, I looked at the MacBook; it was no longer on, and the screen had a crack running through it. My phone, next to the computer, also had a large crack bisecting it. Still not letting go of the chip, I used my pinky finger to hit the center button on the smartphone to see if it would light up. Nothing. Turning back to Sarah, her face was locked in an expression of painful joy.


    Now I wasn¡¯t a true blue prepper, but my former less foresty lady had jokingly halfway prepared for apocalypses of various kinds, and this was making my paranoid instincts tingle. Several guns were in the house along with some throwing axes, canned food, winter coats and a bug-out bag. SMACK! An almost wet, fleshy sound shattered my reverie. Looking up, I saw a neighborhood cat peeling itself off of our window. Its red eyes promised death even though it was comically at odds with its diminutive size. Screw it]. I shoved the last bite of heaven in my mouth and ran my hands over the tree. After confirming that she was in fact, a tree, did not seem to be conscious, and was made out of solid wood, I sprinted up to my bedroom, slamming the door behind me. My drunken haze was leaving faster than it had ever done before. Tearing apart my room, I threw on thick old, black jeans, my old Army boots, a leather jacket, put a pistol holster on my belt, shoved my Smith and Wesson .45 in it, and grabbed the two spare mags. Grabbing my thick leather jacket and AR-15 rifle out of the closet, I stuck the throwing axe and KA-BAR knife in my various pockets. This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.


    ¡°Alexa!¡± I yelled as I put myself together, ¡°Anything I should know about?¡± No response. I turned to look at it over by the large screen tv Sarah gave me last Christmas. A large crack that wasn¡¯t there an hour ago was running through it. Everything electronic was broken. I couldn¡¯t turn it on. The sound of shattering glass downstairs jolted me out of my disbelief. Quickly scanning the room, the digital clock was off and cracked, my girlfriend¡¯s phone was off and cracked. I cracked open the bedroom door to the hallway. The movement coincided with a vicious and small cat howl. The neighborhood stray cat had gotten in and decided that I was lunch.


    I didn¡¯t have gloves on, so trying to manhandle the cat didn¡¯t seem like the brightest idea. Guess I should let its own enthusiasm be its undoing. I opened the door a little more to let its head in as it ravaged the door. It would almost be funny. The plan was to smash the door on it as it tried to come in, but its little claws were making good headway on the door, as if it were cheese. A red glow emanated from its eyes and claws. I pulled my .45 and shot the cat while it was somewhat stuck in the door, one paw reaching for me. As it fell, the weird red glow slowly left the extremities of the cat.

 Chapter 3 - Best Trip Ever

    Ok. Time to put the last of my drunken courage to use. Obviously, things are not normal. Stray cats going insane with ?the ability to claw through wooden doors, check. Girlfriend is a new tree, check. My turn. Kicking the dead cat back into the hallway, I shut the door to the room and pushed the dresser up against it. Closing my eyes, I focused on the message of the first ripple. Oh god I hope I don¡¯t screw this up. Sitting with my back to the dresser, I formulated how I wanted to gain a serious advantage, and what better way than magic. Because what fuckin nerd doesn¡¯t want to be a mother fucking sorceror. I¡¯ve read too much and this was too weird to pass it up. Now, for those of you who don¡¯t know, sorcery is the concept of your soul being given understanding of an element, to the point where you can conjure (create), banish (get rid of) and manipulate it freely. [Breathe in, breathe out]. But what kind of magic would keep me alive now and allow me to grow later? [Breathe in, breathe out]. What scales with time? Knowledge. Nature. Man it¡¯s hard to focus. Damn, I don¡¯t have time for this! Forcing my mouth to say what my mind was scrambling to put together got harder as time inched forward. I drew some inspiration from my favorite series and shouted,


    ¡°I wish for a journey through the Primordial Chaos to grab what sorcery my soul can grasp!¡±


    Space shifted. Time slowed. Breathing stopped. Life morphed. Colors assaulted. Bliss and agony ripped through me. Put the craziest acid you can find with an epic rave and then condense it to the size of a pin and throw a solar flare at it. That was me, in that timeless moment. But I didn¡¯t have time for that either, I had a plan, albeit not a very well thought out one. I focused my small soul on mana, the stuff of magic itself, and runes, the language of magic, to make the temporary permanent. The lights around my pin sized self coalesced into understanding. The pin grew. I grabbed that branch of understanding and walked it to earth. I tasted pebbles, granite, metal and crystal while visions of traveling through the core of the earth rocked me, volcanoes bleeding. My self cracked. Humans come from earth, FLESH! Need that too, gotta heal, regenerate, heal me, heal others, fix what was broken and make it stronger. The branch split. Blood, bones, ligaments, skin and nerves. My chaotic shape morphed from a pin into a torso with legs/head/arms. This stream of consciousness was helping branch and connect the magic together. STREAM! Water. The branch split again. Humans are made of that too. Ice invaded my veins; water poured from every orifice while cocooning me. My shape deepened and details returned. Eyes formed and fingers flexed. I didn¡¯t have long. The human shaped pin that is me was falling, falling back to nature. NATURE. Nature springs from the elements I had grabbed. The branches of earth and water joined into understanding of plants, soil, and life. Unbidden, the core of magic in my being wrapped the tendril of nature to that of mana. Slamming back in my body, I heard the joining name itself, ley lines. If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

 Birthing Pains

    Pain. Agony. That¡¯s what greeted me back at home. My soul was too big for my body. My skin felt stretched. Some of it missing. Some of it felt like it was being ripped off of me right now, like, RIGHT THE FUCK NOW!


    Opening my eyes and seeing a few mangy stray cats working on my limbs and nose was not the best way to finish a journey from the birthplace of the universe itself. Magic roared out of me as I sat up. Instincts that weren¡¯t there before manifested. I grabbed the cat eating my nose with hands sheathed in granite and crushed its skull. Blood, my blood, speared the other cat lunching on my leg. The pain, I couldn¡¯t think. As the tidal wave of pain crested, my soul finished integrating with my body, the pain recalibrating my very being. I got up and stomped on the 2 dead cats just to make sure they were dead. Stumbling to the bathroom, I saw my face. It was bleeding profusely with black crud shot through the sides of the wound. Gripping the sink with my granite covered hands cracked the frame. My heart pulsed, and a wave of flesh magic rippled out. I blame the pain. I didn¡¯t know what to do, but my body did. I grabbed healing for this very reason. I floundered about for a minute with my magic before I was able to put in a pain block on my entire body. Once that was done, the bleeding became my next priority. Threat assessment came second. I looked out of the bathroom. No cats. No dogs. Nothing but a bloody room. Where the fuck did the dead cats go?


    So, do I have to consciously heal or does the magic work automatically? I fumbled with my instincts as the onset of adrenaline hit. Shutting the door to the bathroom, I looked at the mirror again. I noticed that part of my nose was slowly regrowing. Checking my leg, the raw open cat bites were no longer gushing blood, in fact, they also were slowly growing back. Regeneration, check. I focused on my face and pushed the magic there. The pain block was on, but that still didn¡¯t feel good watching my nose regrow. After doing the same to my leg, I carefully removed the pain block. More or less ok. I was suddenly ravenously hungry, but the smell of blood was doing its best to curb that. Through my flesh magic, I went from head to toe, checking each section of my body, making sure that I had no torn muscles or open wounds or internal bruising. Once that was done, it was time to secure my house. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    I conjured thin stone armor to cover my forearms and shins, and then did the same to my chest and back. I did a jumping jack to make sure it wasn¡¯t too heavy and that I could actually move. Going back into the room, I checked every inch of it to see where the cat corpses went. I sat still for about 10 seconds, just listening for anything out of the ordinary. With nothing else in the top floor of my house, I was ready. [Breathe in, breathe out]. I moved the dresser back from the door, banished the stone on my hands, drew my .45 in my right hand and carried the K-bar in my left. Slowly opening the door, I peeked out to check the hallway leading towards the stairs. No cats. No bodies. Carefully, oh so carefully, I loudly tip-toed in my boots all the way to the stairs, clearing every corner. I leaned over the banister to check the stairs, all good. I wanted to do a shock and awe entrance to storm the living room, but the liquid courage wasn¡¯t there. I was in the Army Reserve for a few years, but I was a desk jockey. We shot weapons once a year and did physical fitness tests. I had never deployed, never been in real combat. The elementary school dodgeball was the closest I had ever been to a firefight. I was not cut out for this, yet.

 Munchkin Time

    Shaking my head, I forced myself to focus. Couldn¡¯t forget that my fiance was a freaking tree in my living room, and that dead cats vanished from my bedroom. Gathering my magic, I let the awareness of it spread through my whole body. I felt more in touch with it than ever before, like I was a trained dancer. I slowly walked down the stairs, and checked every room of the house on the main floor. No cats. Seriously, this is why I am a dog person. I bet a dead dog wouldn¡¯t get up and walk away. He would have been a good boy and stayed dead. I did notice that most of the windows in my house were broken. Walking up to the large ones in my living room, I thought about how to fix this. Marble is too heavy, granite presents the same problems. Maybe I could cover the windows in quartz. I put my hand on the window, closed my eyes, and conjured quartz. Surprisingly enough, it was fairly easy. The energy drain from me was low, and my earth magic was more than happy to make the quartz almost perfectly see through. With new confidence filling me, I locked every outside door of the house and went to every window and covered them with thick, sturdy quartz. By that point, I was a little drained and slumped on the couch near my arboreal woman.


    Throwing back the last of her drink, I said, ¡°Well babe, what the fuck.¡± I didn¡¯t really expect an answer. She didn¡¯t give one. I set my .45 on the table in front of me with my knife and put my head in my hands. Think. What would Sarah do? She would probably tell me to ¡°Stick it to the man¡±, whatever that means in this situation. Cheater time. Whatever Diety that decided to alter the fabric of the universe probably doesn¡¯t care about little ole me. And if that¡¯s true, then maybe I can do a little universe altering of my own. You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    Running through the twisting branches of magic threading my soul, there was something there that I had to try. Runes. My instincts were telling me that runes and enchantment were linked, but only in a symbolic way. I ran out of gas conjuring quartz throughout the house, but what if I didn¡¯t have to? Looking at my hands, I conjured a small, flat stone. Then, I concentrated on Einstein¡¯s famous mass times light squared equaling relativistic energy formula, but this time, energy meant mana. The formulae mutated in my head from m*c^2=e to m*c^2=e=E. The big ¡°E¡± meant energy, as in magical energy, mana. The little ¡°e¡± was the kind of energy I didn¡¯t care about, the nuclear kind. I am definitely not smart enough for that yet. Sinking the energy matrix into the rock plate, I put it in my pocket. Free mana! Now, the feed wasn¡¯t that great, but it didn¡¯t tire out and it was constant. Now, I just needed something to handle the overflow, the excess mana I wasn¡¯t currently using.

 Inner thoughts

    But first, food. Chips, dip, some diet soda, a few beers, and a couple cans of tuna. Perfect. I tore through those tuna cans. My body needed some raw material to heal with after the cats eating part of me. Just thinking about that almost made me hurl my meal. Fat, full and happy, I rejoined my lover on the couch. Maybe talking out loud to her wouldn¡¯t help her, but it was sure helping me.


    ¡°So, how long are you going to leaf me like this?¡± Uhg, I couldn¡¯t resist. The raw strangeness of the past hour wore on me. ¡°Dude, there are a bunch of different ways to be ¡®one with nature¡¯ without being a freaking tree. You could have been a druid, a dryad, a woodwitch, a tree spirit. But no, you had to go balls to the wall and be an actual tree.¡± I leaned on her. ¡°So what now babe. Shall I treat you like Wilson, talk my sanity away as your stare into space?¡± No response. Maybe, maybe she couldn¡¯t talk. Or, maybe she just couldn¡¯t talk out loud. Part of my magic was nature centric. Maybe this could actually work. I put both hands on her thigh trunk, and reached out with my senses. Green. When I close my eyes, I could feel green energy, cocoon-like. I didn¡¯t sense conscious thought at the normal human level, but there was definitely something there. Potential. Sleeping potential. New, with an egg-like mindscape. ¡°Well, you¡¯re not dead. And you¡¯re not awake, but you are a tree, therefore, you are alive. You can¡¯t really defend yourself, but maybe that¡¯s my job. How hard could it be to keep a tree alive? Don¡¯t worry babe. I got this. Somehow.¡±A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.


    The sun was casting light shadows through the new windows. I wasn¡¯t too sure, but I guess that it was somewhere a few hours after noon. On to my next idea. Batteries. First, I had to figure out how much mana I could store inside of myself. Experimentation time. I conjured a rock and banished it. The fist sized stone didn¡¯t really cost much. I then did the same for a fist sized piece of ice. Also easy. Ok, harder things. Then I conjured a piece of bone, living bone. I mean, if my blood could spear a cat, then maybe I could do stuff with bones? Again, easy. I was able to conjure bone outside of my body and shape it to cover it, like armor. Now, my energy talisman had a decent outflow. Not more than I can handle, but definitely more over time than I need. Clasping my hands together, I concentrated on the excess mana being generated, and held it in. A few minutes went by, and my body started to shake. I was full. It felt like a full belly with a long day of long-division math problems on top of it. I then conjured a 6 inch hexagonal crystal in my left hand, and channeled the mana slowly into it. It was like pouring a cup of water down a well. That bulk of energy that was hurting me didn¡¯t make a dent in this crystal. Perfect. I reached my mind into the crystal; the energy was still there, and I could pull it out. I then crafted an ambient mana collection enchantment on it. Within 5 minutes, I had an easy system. With these principles, I could definitely scale my abilities later. Now, while I¡¯m not doing anything, once I¡¯m full of mana, this battery will soak up the extra mana I generate and the extra from the mana generator.

 The Last Level

    But how to fix this problem now? I need a power source, a bigger one. One that could reinforce my house and keep me safe tonight. I¡¯m not afraid of the dark, but I got the feeling that the dark tonight may be a bit different. I mean, if a nerd/desk jockey like myself could get this powerful, it really made me wonder how epic some other real D&D nerd could get. Or forget them, I bet prisons aren¡¯t a great place to be either right now. Really don¡¯t want to think about a bunch of hulked out, wish-fulfilled prisoners with a new taste of freedom. Oh, I wonder what happened to professional athletes. I would bet my non-existent money that they didn¡¯t go the nerd route. But back to the problem at hand; I need a power source, a big one.  The best place for me to put it would be the basement, but I haven¡¯t cleared that out yet. Hopefully, nothing weird is down there.


    I gathered my weapons again, and this time I took a minute to gather as much mana as I could. With my .45 in my right hand, my knife in my left, and conjured bone armor everywhere else, I figured I was ready. I spanked my wooden lady for good luck. ¡°Now, don¡¯t go anywhere,¡± I told her, ¡°I¡¯m just gonna go kill some mutated spiders and crickets. And I can¡¯t believe I just fucking said that. Now that I said that, I had to re-bulk out my armor. I put a toughness enchantment on my boots, jacket and jeans, and then conjured a bone helmet with see-through quartz lenses for my eyes. ¡°Party time.¡±


    The door to my basement is in my kitchen. The stairs go down and then swerve to the right. The half of the basement that the stairs open up to is the finished part, and then the other half was the yucky storage place. I am not doing this right. I may never have deployed with my time in the military, but all of my idiot meathead friend did. Their advice for clearing an area, grenades. Shock and awe levels the playing field. I don¡¯t have shock and awe, but maybe I could make some. I conjured a small pebble and put a light enchantment on it with a conditional trigger. When I drop it, it will flare ridiculously bright. Too eager to test them out, I made about five more, shoved them in my pocket, and kicked open the door and threw two light pebbles down the stairs. As soon as they left my hand, I put my back to the wall next to the stairwell to avoid blindness. The flashing lights stopped in 5 seconds. I rushed down the stairs looking left and right, scanning for anything and everything. The open area to the left was Sarah¡¯s painting section, and the right was the bar hangout area. No spiders. No crickets. One last section to go. I grabbed the last three pebbles and repeated my strategy. 5 more seconds of flashing lights as my nerves pounded from the stress. I whipped around the door frame with my pistol point out and down. Nothing skittered at me. Whew. Thank the Ripple. A sudden heavy weight landed on top of my head knocking me forward a few steps. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    ¡°What the FUCKING FUCK!¡± I screamed as I swiped at whatever took a crack at my skull. A crack sounded behind me just after the weight left my head. It sounded like slate being dropped. ¡°Better not be a goddamn big ass spider!¡± It was exactly that. I lifted my boot and covered it with conjured stone to make it a big ass boot and introduced it to the spider. It was not the only one down there, but the experience was quickly forgotten due to its traumatic nature. Over-armored spiders are not a good idea. I¡¯m just glad that modern weaponry prevailed, and boots.

 Reinforcement

    I grabbed a squeegee, conjured water on the corpses, and scraped them all in a pile, conjured a stone box, shoveled that crap in and sealed it off. The spiders were about the size of a small household cat, and 11 corpses made for a decent size box. It was too damn heavy to carry, so I shoved it to the wall with my earth magic, and conjured more stone all around it to make it part of the wall, like a nice box chair. I¡¯ll deal with that spider casket later. Time to repeat my fortification strategy. I went to the six small basement windows and sealed them with quartz. Then, I conjured a stone table, about 6 feet long and 3 feet high. On this, I conjured three granite cylinders, two feet tall and eight inches thick. These were going to be my generators. Inscribing my improved Einstein magical formula on each one didn¡¯t take long, but the gradual soaking of the enchantment into each one did. An hour later, the whole process was done. I wasn¡¯t sure how long it would take for an enchantment to degrade, so I had all three on very low power, but each one had a different purpose. My plan was to check them every day to get an idea. Stone, when it breaks down, gives off plenty of energy, but I¡¯ll definitely have to experiment with different materials. Maybe some precious metals will hold the enchantment better, like say a gold cap on top of the stone cylinder, with a handprint keyed to me for access control. Anyways, these will do for now.


    The one on the left is my designated battery charger. I conjured ten more versions of the smaller crystal battery that I had made earlier, and placed them around the generator. If I can¡¯t hold a hundredth of what my crystal batteries can hold, but I can carry ten of them around, I¡¯d be a fool to walk about unprepared. I linked each battery to the generator and turned it on. Now, for the carrying part. Back in my meathead days, I had purchased a weight vest, which had ten compartments for cylindrical sandbags. This was going to be my first attempt at dual body armor plus carrying around power. My personal energy talisman, for now, is rather small and weak, but its main focus is to keep me healthy and to up my own regeneration. The batteries would be for the oomph. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    The middle generator, now that one would be the main one. I turned it on, and then gave the energy a direction, down. This one would power my house. I added a main enchantment whose whole purpose was to cover my house and every wall and the foundations in stone. The secondary enchantments were of banishing, in case I needed to alter something, and then an energy capacity, so the walls could take a hit from whatever the hell wanted to eat me. The generator would keep that capacity full and my house a freaking fortress if I did it right. Now, to see if I could get fancy. The stone being created on the inside of the house would stop there, but I wanted stone on the inside and the outside. No such thing as overkill with unlimited energy. The stone quartz windows would serve as the energy conduit to the outside of the house, which after the inside, would then get covered. I put this plan in the enchantment, and after feeling it settle, I began to think about the third generator. Now this plan would be a bit of a stretch.

 A Maybe Plan and Complication

    I do realize three generators might be a bit much, but I honestly don¡¯t know how long enchantments last, or if the whole thing will explode because I did something dumb, or if I can even make enchantments with the kind of detail that my mind can plan. I¡¯m a smart guy, but the just above average kind of smart. I¡¯m not that in shape or particularly muscular. My best chance of survival is reliance on complete paranoia and utter overkill. I only have the first right now. My fight with the spiders served to remind my dumbass that I didn¡¯t grab much offensive power during my journey through the Primordial Chaos. Lightning, pure energy, fire, force, time, space. Some great options. And I didn¡¯t grab a single one of them.


    My last plan involved me going outside. Not a huge fan of that. I had an idea and am not completely sure that it will work, but if it does, fuck yes I¡¯m awesome. I want a tree, four of them. The concept is to gather some acorns and plant them at the 4 corners of my house, link them to the life giving generator in my basement and connect them to the wards of my house. Then, the trees will sprout in the shape that I want due to my Nature magic, and my house will be covered and protected by four big ass, magically reinforced oak trees that know me and love me as their own. My house would then be an epic double-layered stone shell with a magical oak covering. Fortress, druid style. But I still had to go outside, and it was almost dark. There was an old oak tree just across my street where the neighborhood squirrels loved to gossip and throw nuts at people. I can sprint there and back pretty fast. Making sure I had my usual getup on, with my weapons in my pockets, I looked out my front window. Didn¡¯t really see much out there. Was really hoping there wasn¡¯t much out there. I don¡¯t even want to think about what my new neighbors are thinking right now, or the small town drug dealer across the street either. Acorns. That¡¯s my focus.Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.


    Throwing caution to the winds, I hurtled towards the old oak and began scrambling around the gnarled roots for acorns. ¡°One, two, three, come on! Where are ya you little bastard. Just one more . . . , gotcha!¡±  Acorns in hand after 20 seconds of searching, not bad. Shoving them in my pocket, I turn to make my way back to safety when I hear a low moan. Nope. I do not have time for this. This moan didn¡¯t sound human, it sounded hungry. I made it back to my living room in record time. The door locked and sealed with stone. Once I caught my breath, I looked out the window. It looked like a freaking zombie, and not a fresh one. Cemeteries! FUCK! This damn house is 80 yards away from a cemetery, and 500 yards away from another. Why in the goddamn world do I live in historic Fredericksburg, VA during an apocalypse where apparently the dead come back. What fucking luck.


    The ugly fuck stumbled towards my house, which was mostly covered in magically reinforced stone at this point, and began to bang on my front door. I ran downstairs to my middle generator to check the house enchantment. Almost done. The only thing left was the roof and the outside. The inside had a nice granite layer two inches thick and all the windows were either quartz or reinforced with it. To hell with it. I have to get rid of the zombie without attracting more attention from other ones. But these acorns come first; I am safe for the moment. I turned the generator on the right on, and then set it to emit a small bit of power, and then split that four ways. Cupping the acorns, I soaked them with what I want to call an ¡®intent enchantment¡¯. The intent was for them to soak up energy without growing, and crystallize the concepts of protection, strength, and hardiness. This way, when I plant them tomorrow and open up the energy tap to the generator, I can remove the stasis part of the enchantment and have fully grown oak trees in a month. I placed the acorns on top of the generator and went back upstairs. Now that the semblance of the future plan is underway, time to get rid of my immediate problem. Mr. Moan was still there, mindlessly banging away.

 Success

    It was annoying. I was tired, my head hurt, and this was the straw that broke the camel¡¯s back. I looked around to see that this was the only zombie, and he didn¡¯t look like the ripped fast running kind of scary zombie that will take over the world. This dude looked like a slightly more in shape version of Walking Dead zombies. He could probably jog. I went and found my small axe that was a gift from last Christmas. It was for practice as she had proven that she could throw an axe better than me. Man, I am never going to live that down. Axe in my right hand, and a stone gauntlet on my left, I pulled open the door and spartan kicked the zombie. He landed on his back in my front yard. I gestured up with my hand and the earth softened like quicksand, encasing the zombie from the neck down. Bringing my axe up, I let his head have it. It did not smell good. I didn¡¯t think that it would, but I never really thought it would be that bad. My stomach also agreed by covering the split head with its contents. Now this is just too much. Using my magic, I sank the whole mess about 6 feet under, and then transmuted the earth to stone. Earth magic is great for cleanup.


    The next day came too soon. I had passed out on the couch, my weapons strewn around me just in case. Putting my hand on my woman, that egg-like feeling was still there. Still no movement. I didn¡¯t sleep well, and dawn was here. Coffee is my normal go to morning routine, but my dumbass had no fire or electricity. Eh, I could experiment. I covered the coffee table in front of my in stone, and then conjured a small stone pot. Then, I put a rune for fire in the bottom of the pot and conjured water to fill it up. If I could get this to work, french press coffee! Inserting a small bit of magic into the rune caused it to bubble a little, and just a bit more made it bubble a lot. I put my hands right next to the pot without touching it, heat, SUCCESS! Five minutes later, I had perfect french press coffee. Now, if I could make a pot that heated water magically, then I should be able to help out my now powerless fridge. I conjured four square stone blocks, put a rune of ice onto each one, and imparted the concepts of absorbing heat. To be clear, the runes I use are pretty much anything I want. The magic only seems to care about the intent and the fact that it has something to hold on to. I could be wrong, but it works for now. I put one fridge block in the fridge, and three in the freezer. If this works, I should be set for preserving food. Hell yes. It¡¯s barely after dawn and I¡¯ve solved my two biggest problems, coffee and food preservation. Then I took the food that had weirdly spoiled and stuck it in a paper bag, and tossed it into the back yard. Turns out I could bury it with earth sorcery from twenty feet away.The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    Talking to my tree lady might make me seem a little nuts, but it definitely helped to talk out my plans. I mean, she couldn¡¯t disagree with me right?


    ¡°Ok babe, I do have a laundry list of shit to do today. Check on acorns, plant them, and turn them into my house protecting slaves. Find a solution to the way-too-close graveyards near me. I could probably just transmute the dirt around the coffins into stone right? That shouldn¡¯t be too hard, just time-consuming. Man am I glad that we went grocery shopping three days ago, so I don¡¯t have to worry about that right now. Oh! And figure out some magic that¡¯s effective with distance. Earth and ice and nature. That¡¯s some close up shit. Yes, yes, I know that I have two guns, but my ammo is limited, and I honestly don¡¯t know how effective it will be in the long run.¡±


    I had an idea or two, but there were rather iffy. I needed to see how my basement plans were coming along first. Going down into the basement was heady. I could feel the mana just washing over me. The batteries on the left were full, and the left and middle generator were just churning out mana. Checking on the enchantments showed my boneheaded mistake. I didn¡¯t put a governor on them at all. There was no conditional trigger to turn off. The good news was that the enchantments themselves didn¡¯t degrade at all. Fixing time. About an hour later, it was all taken care of. The left generator had 10 slots for the crystal batteries and it would turn off when they were full. The middle generator would be off until something decided drain the house reserves of energy by attacking it, at which point it would turn on until the reserves were full. The right generator had soaked my little acorns in energy. They were ready.

 Risk Reduction

    I was feeling better about myself. I had my weight vest on with 10 full crystal batteries in them, all of my weapons that I had enchanted with durability, my small pocket generator, and some bone and stone armor to cover the rest of me. So why the hell was I so damn afraid? All I had to do was walk outside and plant 4 acorns, link them to the preset enchantment on the last generator, and then secure two graveyards. All I could think about was how unprepared I was. I have flesh magic and I haven¡¯t enhanced my body in any way. I have sorcery over mana itself and I have no epic magical weapon. I have nature magic and no badass creature to slay my enemies. Hell, with a few spiders and one zombie, this almost seems a bit gentle. A gentle apocalypse. Who would have thought. Not me, for sure. One of mine and Sarah¡¯s favorite pastimes was to talk about various apocalypses while we drank and what we would do. Her family has a cabin deep in the West Virginia mountains that we could live happy hippy lives at while the world burned. Now that she¡¯s a tree however, that ain¡¯t happening.


    [Breathe in, breathe out]. I can do this. Someone has to. I should probably check on my neighbors and see if they¡¯re still alive, or even if they know what¡¯s going on. Part of me is kinda freaking out. I expected much more violence from we humans. Shaking my head to concentrate just a bit more, I planned my strategy, with some testing along the way. Zombies tend to kill humans due to endless endurance more than anything. I don¡¯t have that, but I might be able to mimic it. Concentrating on the pocket generator, I altered the enchantment to have two flows, one to keep my personal mana well full, and one to send me healing energy, and a valve so I could alter the size of each flow. My theory is that the healing energy would keep stamina up. The sprint to the graveyard would prove my theory. Another issue to fix, my pocket generator is small, giving a small but constant feed of energy, but I can only handle a small flow right now and I need to figure out why and how to change that. I don¡¯t seem to have a problem manipulating the already present mana in the batteries, just as long as it¡¯s not in me. Problems for another time. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    It took me two minutes to quietly navigate to the closest graveyard. It¡¯s very small, maybe thirty yards long and wide. I think some old money families have their dead here. Peeking from behind a tree, I only saw one disturbed grave. God I hope that was the dude I buried yesterday. I counted twenty graves. Easy. I went to the first one and reached out with my earth magic. Yup, there was a coffin in the dirt, and turning that dirt into stone, also pretty easy. I didn¡¯t even need to dip into my batteries to seal all the graves. I turned the dirt all around each coffin into stone, and put a stone cap on top of that for extra security. Now that my theory was correct and easier to pull off that I had originally thought, time for the next cemetery. As I made my way over there, I picked up the pace bit by bit. By the time I got there, I was sprinting my ass off and not even winded.  I could feel the healing energy removing bodily fatigue, lactic acid, and carbon dioxide. I could make the average man a marathon runner if I wanted. So caught up in my own thoughts and accomplishments, it took me a second to realize that I had stopped my sprint in front of a horde of zombies.


    ¡°Fresh meat for my army I see!¡±

 Punching Down

    Standing on top of a huge decorative gravestone was a small figure in a cheesy black cloak. The high pitched voice made it hard to guess at the gender and age. That could be a short woman or a pre-teen boy, or a cursed skeleton for all I know. What I did know was that I was fucked. At least a little bit. Easily thirty zombies turned to look at me as blood drained out of my face. My inner dialogue was beautiful. [Fucking fuck, you stupid, brainless, can¡¯t pay attention miserable fuck!]. My outer dialogue was less so. ¡°Fuck you asshole!¡±


    I mean, it was already too late. They had seen me, and the intention of little dude was clear. I was definitely afraid, but I also remembered my experience with the zombie from yesterday. I could do that again, but on a larger scale. Thrusting out my hands, a ripple of earth magic tore from me, turning the ground around the zombies and six feet under into the siltiest, softest sand I could think of. As the small horde sank out of sight, another ripple of earth magic turned it back into solid stone. Quickly checking my batteries, I saw that I had used less than half of one of them, and it was refilling from my personal overflow.


    ¡°What the hell did you do that for?¡± the small figure screamed, pulling down the hood of the cloak, ¡°Do you have any idea how long it took to raise and control all of them? Some of them have been dead for decades!¡± Definitely an adolescent boy, probably around 5¡¯3, pimples, glasses, revenge of the nerds. I so did not have time for this. I looked around and saw that some of the nearby houses had some people looking out their windows, and some were even coming out with guns. The ranting kid¡¯s voice grated on me in a way that made me consider some serious violence. A little voice in the back of my head also whispered that I honestly did not know if this kid had added to his zombie collection from just the graveyard, or if some innocent bystander was forcibly recruited. A bolt of black energy punching me in my chest plate rudely interrupted my thoughts. Looking down, I saw that the bone plate covering my battery holding vest was melting fast. I banished the plate and conjured a replacement, and then covered that stone and bonded the two. You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.


    ¡°You just tried to fucking kill me?¡± I said, ¡°Are you serious? That would have dissolved my chest!¡± It was hard coming to terms with a tiny teenager throwing some kind of death energy around. The second black bolt was thrown with no hesitation. Dodging that one, I conjured a stone wall in front of me, and then made it big, and then I made it thick. I pulled out my .45, thumbed off the safety and prepared to cross a boundary I hoped I would never meet. I mean, how do I do this without killing him, especially when he can throw things that dissolve bone? I haven¡¯t even mastered a magical shield yet, or some kind of sleeping spell. Fuck. Thinking fast, I conjured up a handful of pebbles and threw the flashing light enchantment on them. I added a sound enchantment as well, instant flash-bang grenades. I threw them up and over the wall with one hand while gripping my gun in the other. The instant they landed and did their thing, I pivoted around the wall and pointed my gun at the kid. He was definitely disoriented. Drawing on my flesh magic to boost my body, I tackled that little fucker like a bull. The instant we hit the ground, I punched him and used my earth magic to sink him until only his head was above ground, then turned the earth to stone. Time to figure out exactly what was going on here.

 Avoiding Bloodshed

    ¡°No hold on right there,¡± said a grisly voice, ¡°Put your hands on your head and turn around, slowly.¡±  I heard the click of a safety being thumbed. Now, I was fully armored up, bone helmet, spelled armor and everything. But I had not tested myself out against bullets yet. Better safe than sorry. I did as the voice requested. 10 inches from my head was gun, pointed right at me. The hand holding that gun didn¡¯t waver, and the older gentleman with that hand wasn¡¯t smiling. ¡°I don¡¯t plan to act like I understand what¡¯s going on here, but if you could remove your helmet, slowly, that¡¯d be good start.¡±


    ¡°Well officer, frankly, I would rather not. I don¡¯t know if you saw this, or how much you did or did not see, but the little fucker behind had a horde of zombies. And you look like you don¡¯t have a problem with my head suddenly having some holes, so I¡¯m going to leave it right where it is.¡± During my reply, I was reaching out with my earth magic towards his gun. I know I could manipulate earth and crystals, but I hadn¡¯t tested out metal yet. Worth a shot. I felt his firing pin, ready to go off, and then bonded it to the side of the gun. Now, pulling the trigger won¡¯t be doing any good. Another facet of my magic that worked out. I felt a tiny bit safer. Maybe I should go a bit further. I then grabbed the last 2 inches of his pistol with my magic, and crunched it. The officer stared at his gun in disbelief. Stolen story; please report.


    ¡°What the . .¡± he stumbled out, ¡°How did ya . .¡± He turned his gun around to examine its sudden lack of utility.


    ¡°Magic. Apparently it''s a part of our world now. Which brings us full circle to the necromancer behind me. The buried pipsqueak who can control the dead and throw dissolving death at people. But I don¡¯t have time for this, and neither do you.¡± I pulled off my helmet, ¡°See, I¡¯m human, just with magic. There was some Ripple that vibrated reality yesterday, and I am different, you probably are too. But good luck with that.¡± I put my helmet back on, fixed his gun and gave it to him, and went to the buried kid.


    ¡°Look you little shit,¡± I said as I crouched near his head, ¡°I¡¯m not going to kill you, yet, haven¡¯t really made up my mind honestly.¡± His eyes grew huge; he opened his mouth and I conjured it full of ice. ¡°I didn¡¯t say you could talk yet. Now, you¡¯re going to nod yes or shake your head no. Have you killed anyone?¡± Head shake no. ¡°Were all of those zombies from this graveyard?¡± A bunch of ridiculous nodding. ¡°Ok, for future reference, if I ever hear of you killing someone and making them into a zombie, I will kill you and bury you in the core of the earth. Am I clear?¡± I know, I¡¯m soft. It doesn¡¯t help that I was a pathetic nerd in school all my life. I let the kid out of the earth and banished the ice so he could speak, even though I hated his voice. Him taking off was probably the best thing he could have done. Those skinny little legs moved his ass fast enough that I didn¡¯t have time to reconsider my actions. But I had plenty else to do.

 Turtle Up

    The next hour was spent sealing the graveyard, just in case some other trumped up fucker decided to do what squeaky did. Not on my watch. This was not out of any sense of duty, but merely not wanting to deal with some undead down the road. I don¡¯t have a good answer for this problem. My magics are defensive in nature, and they have scaling possibilities down the road, but damn that fight was just awkward. That pathetic excuse for a wizard could have wrecked me if he were smarter or any better. I need options, hell, I need training. But I don¡¯t think I¡¯m getting that anytime soon. My bullets will run out eventually, and for some reason, I honestly think that this isn¡¯t the end of the changes. I made my way back to my house, stopping at the abandoned gas station. I picked up what canned food was left over; not much was left. The medical supply section and beer section were wiped clean. That means the grocery store and Wal-Mart would be dangerous places right now. I may have to grow my own food if this keeps up. Great, another project. This laundry list just keeps growing.


    Well, if I''m going the tank route, I might as well do it right. The next idea was shields. All magic users have some kind of magical force field that blocks bullets and spells and makes them invincible. Turns out, that shit is crap. Or maybe, my shit is crap and I have to work around it. Returning from my adventures with the undead to the basement of my house was a huge relief. My reinforced walls gave me a feeling of security. I took off all of my equipment and set it down. My mana batteries were full due to my pocket generator, which meant the one on the left was free for use. Linking myself to it and turning the flow to low, I conjured a piece of granite about the size of a dinner place, then I did the same for cold iron. It was all easy until I started on precious metals. What instantly popped into my hand when I conjured it, the stone, did not work the same way for gold or silver or platinum. Instead, they started out small and grew until I cut off the energy flow to the conjuration. It took about ten minutes to conjure a disk the width of my palm and the thickness of paper. It took longer than that for the platinum. I put the various disks next to each other. Time to test. I created an energy matrix enchant for durability and pushed it into the stone. It sunk in with a small bit of resistance. Doing the same to the iron was a lot harder, but well within my efforts. The crazy part was doing the same to the gold, silver and platinum. There was no resistance to the silver, the gold seemed to suck it down, and it slid right off the platinum. I made the same enchantment, put more energy into it, and put it on top of the platinum and Pushed! The whole energy matrix collapsed. This is definitely something for me to use later. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    I put the silver, iron, and the granite next to each other, shaped the first to make it a rectangle about the length and width of my forearm, and then shaped the others to match. The plan was to layer them to be a magic shield. The stone to be the middle layer, with enchantments to be overly hard and to project a field that repels physical force (bullets and punches). The iron is the covering, and it holds enchantments of dispelling, to block magical projectiles such as curses or fireballs. The silver layer is the inner layer with the control enchantment. Through that, I will control the shape and size of the shield. After the enchantments were done, I bonded them all together and sealed the outer edges with a crystal covering edged with the gold. The shield plate was about an inch thick. Then, my piece de resistance¡¯. I put an enchantment on the crystal covering to project a field of draining, to weaken any curse that came my way and then absorb what it could and divert it to an overflow battery. Multiple layers of protection, first the draining layer, then the dispelling layer, then the physical layer, then the control layer. I conjured a bone gauntlet, sealed the shield plate inside and put it on. Not too heavy, maybe about 3 pounds total on my off arm. I don¡¯t know how much power it¡¯s actually going to take to use, but I linked it to the battery vest just in case. The light streaming through my basement windows showed me that it was well past noon. I had taken care of my defensive needs, now I had to figure out the offensive.

 Body Consolidation

    Since I worked well past lunchtime, I grabbed a meal shake from the fridge, because those things are ''fresh'' for years. This should keep me going till dinner. I hadn¡¯t realized it due to the events of the past day or so, but I was fucking gross. I stank. I went to the bathroom and turned on the hot water. Nothing. Of course. No electricity, no shower. Maybe I could do one better. I grabbed the soap and conjured a constant stream of water from my palm and fingertips. Perfect. Within a few minutes, I was clean. I stepped out of the tub and banished the water there and on me. Towels are old school. I looked in the mirror; my tired face looked back at me. ¡°Dude, gotta do something with the racoon eyes, and maybe some of these old acne scars can go too.¡± I poked around my face with my flesh magic for a bit. It was easier than I thought. The scars vanished, the current under the skin acne went away, and I tightened up the very beginnings of a double chin. If I can do that, what can I do with the rest of me? My desk job and pre-Ripple life choices had been less than kind to me over the past couple years. I parked my naked body in front of the full length mirror and started from the neck down. I removed some stretch marks and old scars, and I grew out my nails a bit from my hand and enchanted them to be much more durable. I used to bite my nails, but if they were as hard as stone, then that wouldn¡¯t be a problem anymore. I shrank some of the desk job pudge away. Now for the hard part. I need more muscle.


    The current body I have is weak. It¡¯s human. Offense has to start from the body. I went and got my pocket generator and held it in my hands, letting it flow full tilt. I lay down and began to work on my body, my flesh magic was more than happy to bend to my will. My body started to shake as exercise was simulated, muscle fibers snapping and regrowing, bone cells growing harder and more dense. After about an hour of almost vibrating out of my skin, I was exhausted and ravenous. It was like going to the gym and dieting hardcore for three years rolled into one yoga session. I needed to freaking shower again. The floor was covered in sweat and nastiness. I conjured water over everything and banished it. I could make a fortune as a maid. The fifteen steps to the kitchen was the longest hike of my life. I got to the counter, found the vitamins and downed a handful, slugging down some conjured water. I ate some canned soup from the pantry and four of the meal shakes. I was too tired for the rest of the day. I had even forgotten to plant the damn acorns. If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.


    I woke up to screeching. Horrible, high-pitched, angry screeching, and I was naked on the couch. I fumbled around in the dark for my equipment. It wasn¡¯t even the next day, but there wasn¡¯t a clock to make me be specific. I could barely make out my things, but fear made me fast. In less than two minutes I had my stuff put on and weapons in my hands. My new fancy shield gauntlet was on as well. I had nothing prepared for the night; I hadn¡¯t even wanted to consider what might be out there at this point. The screeching stopped. I conjured a handful of the flashbang pebbles and put them in my pocket. Being so used to making them made it a fast process. I conjured two more and held them in my left hand with my pistol in my right. My knife was in it¡¯s sheath on my belt. I need light, a constant source. I quickly conjured a rod of crystal and shoved some energy into it, making it a makeshift glow rod. I walked through my house, just to make sure it was secure and that nothing had gotten in. I wanted to go to the windows to look outside, but I really didn¡¯t want to attract any attention. I turned off my the glow rod and sat on the couch, waiting. After a few minutes, a faint scratching sound came from the windows on the side of the living room. I looked at the direction of the noise but still didn¡¯t see anything. Now, my windows weren¡¯t perfectly see through, but the star light should have illuminated a shadow. I sat there in silence, just waiting for the dawn to break. This is not a good start to my day.

 Remembered my acorns

    The dawn came, but not nearly fast enough for me. I estimate that I had been awake since 4 in the morning, and I usually sleep in to 7am. That was three hours of me freaking out, just praying my preparations were enough for the thing I could not see. Sarah was less of a comfort than I hoped she would be, not that I really expected anything else. My magic told me that nothing had changed with her, and my gut was telling me that time was what she needed. The last hour of me waiting for the sun was quiet. No scratching or shrieking. I had pretty much calmed down, or at least wrangled my nerves to a manageable level. [Breathe in, breathe out]. I went and got my acorns from the basement. They were full to the brim with magical energy, almost hot in my hand. I went outside, after checking for zombies and weird invisible scratching monsters.


    Earth sorcery made burying the acorns exactly where I wanted them a piece of cake, and water sorcery made them wet. Then I turned the soil around the acorns from Virginia clay to perfect black loam. Going back inside to the basement, I put my hands on the generator on the right. I turned it on and split the energy into four streams, each connected to an acorn. At the base of the power link, I put a growth limiter so that when the acorns sprout, their growth wouldn¡¯t be literally explosive. I could feel the little acorns quiver with my nature magic. I created a structural enchantment in my head for the acorns. The trees would grow up the corners of my house, like towers on a castle, and then branches would grow out from each tree to connect to the others, eventually making one giant house covering tree with four trunks.  Time to get this baby started. I pushed that structural enchantment into the base of the powerfeed and let it flow to the acorns. I could see it starting to work. The acorn shells split and tiny roots began to make the soil their own. The growth limiter was mainly there for my peace of mind. I would be easier to alter the plants if something went wrong while they were small. By my estimation, it should take around a week or so for this to become a reality. I can work with that. Now, I¡¯m just one acorn short for my next plan.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.


    Getting that acorn was easy. In two days, I had made great strides with my magic and I was feeling pretty confident. I walked across the street, leisurely selected a fat acorn, and walked my butt to my front porch and sat in my rocking chair. I was still geared up and armed to the teeth, but I was chilling on my front porch. I even had a soda there. I felt a bit silly. No one was outside. There were no threats that I could see. The street looked abandoned. Day three of the Ripple reality and there is nothing here. Perfect. I took that fat acorn and I conjured a quarter-sized disk of iron, another disk of silver, and a dime sized disk of gold. Now this would grow to be my weapon. What does every good wizard or badass sorcerer have? A magical staff. Something that can help you control magic beyond your normal means. The lever for your magic that can move ridiculous obstacles. The dragon slaying stick. That¡¯s what I was going to make. And I was going to invest everything I had into it. If I did it right, then this staff would be more powerful than I.

 The Unclear Weapon

    I sat in my front lane and extended my earth senses to the max. I was searching for the last part of my journey through the Primordial Chaos, ley lines. If I understood what my magic was telling me, ley lines were natural rivers of magic that flowed through the planet like veins and arteries for the body. They could be tapped for use, or serve as natural gateways or barriers to various entities. I wanted to see if I could use this to my advantage, a kind of a magical forge for making my staff. I was also looking for a certain kind. Ley lines that run through volcanoes were fire and earth based, but I had to work with what I had or could find. As I extended myself, I felt a pull behind me, near where the river lay. The Rappahanock river cuts through Fredericksburg and was about a 20 minute walk away.


    I passed two neighborhoods on my way to the river. Some houses looked abandoned, two were burned down, and I passed an old guy working on his truck. His cursing was colorful and entertaining. ¡°Scuse me sir, what¡¯s uh, what¡¯s going on with it?¡±


    ¡°Damn thing won¡¯t start!¡± he sputtered without even turning to look at me, ¡°Neither will the generator or wind-up radio. Whole damn town¡¯s gone dark!¡± So I wasn¡¯t the only one. I figured that would be the case, but it wasn¡¯t the relief I thought it was. With great power comes great responsibility. I didn¡¯t want to be more powerful than everyone else, mainly because I didn¡¯t want to take care of everyone. The feeling that this wasn¡¯t the end just wouldn¡¯t go away. I¡¯m either missing something, or this is the part before the tidal wave where the water recedes from the beach. I don¡¯t like either. I reached the river not long after. The pull of the magic turned me west, towards where the land was rockier. Five more minutes of walking along the river bank wasn¡¯t that bad in the late summer weather. It was actually nice but my eyes were still peeled. An electric current through my foot stopped me. Magic. Thick and dense. It felt like I stepped on a live wire of life. The flavor was wet and rocky, like a waterfall with salmon jumping in it. I looked around; I was on a loamy bank about ten feet from the river. The woods were fairly empty. The ley line was about 5 feet under me and concentrated in elements that I had sorcery over, nature/earth/water. Perfect. This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    I sat down and put the ingredients for my staff in front of me. I turned the disk of gold into a ring, and put it on the acorn and set it down. Then I put the iron disk on top of the silver one, and then fit that on the bottom of the acorn, using earth magic to form it to cover the bottom. I then conjured three small lumps of diamond and placed them in a close triangle formation around the acorn. I then pushed the acorn into the earth. Closing my eyes, I crafted what I wanted in my head. A staff, about six and a half feet tall, with a golden ring in the middle where my hand would naturally rest. The top of the staff was a knob of wood with the three crystal pieces in it as a battery and projection platform. The iron would serve as a symbolic base, to make the oak a kind of iron-wood. The silver would be a base cap, to transfer and ground energy if need be, or to be a tap for ley lines when possible. I crafted that image in my head, as detailed as I could, and filled the mental matrix with energy that I pulled from the ley line, gently so as to not fry myself, and sank it into the acorn.


    With my hands, I pushed the acorn into the ground that I softened with earth magic, and then encouraged it to drink from the river of magic under it. I could barely hold it together. The spell matrix was shaking and the acorn looked like a grenade of life energy. ¡°Grow damnit! You want to grow. Exploding is too much work!¡± The ley line energy soaked up through the silver and iron, up into the seed and through the gold ring. Boom! Through my senses, I saw the acorn sprout a root system to put any grown tree to shame. I grabbed the three crystals from off the ground and held them over the acorn. It started to grow in an upward direction. Roughly two inches a second, gradually thickening as it did. As the knob formed on the top, I put the crystals where I wanted to and held them there so the wood grew around them. As the staff finished growing, I grabbed it around the golden control ring. A feeling of completeness washed through my arm and the staff snapped off at the base. I looked down. The stump started to grow again. I stumbled back holding my staff, happy that what I wanted was actually here, but confused at the rest of the process. Now that I had removed the trunk, my staff, the roots were making another one, but weren¡¯t stopping. The golden control ring that guided the growth was on my staff, but this new tree had a mind of its own. I reached into its base with my nature magic to see what these changes could mean. I am not trying to unleash a tree monster or something that would drain life from the land forever.

 Triumph and Boot

    Soaking the staff in my hands with my magical senses, I felt the striations of silver and iron shot through it and the crystals and their molecular bond to the magical wood. The golden ring was at the perfect height for my hand to rest while walking with it. Through it, I could feel the power and versatility of my new tool. I don¡¯t even know what it''s capable of, but I could test it out. The tree in front of me kept right on growing as I took a minute to examine my staff. It was already taller than a house. I lifted my staff like Gandalf and stabbed it into the earth. Through it, I felt the tree chugging from the ley line like a dehydrated dog. Thinking fast, I crafted an intent enchantment and forced it into the tree, shoving it into the heartwood. The tree felt the intent that it was done growing, nearing the end of its maturation, and no longer needed the energy provided by the ley line. I watched the root it had grown that was stabbed directly into it dry up and detach. One possible disaster averted, although I don¡¯t know what would have happened had I just let it go.


    One thing I noticed about this experience as I flopped on my back. I didn¡¯t have to touch any of the energy I was carrying around this whole time. The ley line provided everything. This means if I¡¯m away from home, I could find places to recharge my batteries, or build places to function off the overflow from ley lines. Turning my head, I looked at my staff. This was a great start, but I had a lot left to do. My drudging walk back home wasn¡¯t painful due to my healing amulet, but my mind was tired. Handling that kind of energy straight from the source of the earth is draining. It also carried a kind of emotion with it, a kind of whimsical peace balanced by solid gravity. The mana my amulet generates is different, almost sterile. I want to say cleaner, but that¡¯s not quite right either. I guess the mana from ley lines is aspected in some way due to its very nature. And I don¡¯t really know what that means, but my sorcery confirmed that was correct.Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators!


    My musings were interrupted on my way home by a blaze of light. This heat wasn¡¯t unbearable, but it Rippled.


    ¡°THE BLACK HOLE SPOUTS, ANOTHER OCTAVE WAVES.¡±


    The pounding cymbals in my brain rang with that announcement. I was in the street on my hands and knees retching my guts out. My house was forty feet away.


    ¡°Earth joins the rest, spiral arm in arm.¡±


    I¡¯m crawling, one arm over the other. My ears are bleeding. I¡¯m ten feet from my porch. The grass is soft and hot. This is not how I want to die. I¡¯m clutching my staff; I feel it shielding me, absorbing whatever energy is crushing me. I feel like an ant meeting a boot.


    ¡°Prepare remnant, peace never lasts.¡±

 Regaining Composure

    Safety. It was all I could think about. The door to the inside of my house was Everest. My mind was fried. Everything burned. Everything. I don¡¯t even know if it was from fire or heat. Mana burn? Chaos burn? UV burn? I don¡¯t know. All I know is that my HAND IS MELTED TO MY FUCKING STAFF! And if this is what happened to me, then what the fuck happened to everyone else? The shards of my pain wracked mind scatter, contemplating anything that could be a momentary distraction. I curl into a ball in my living room, too hurt to close the door. I¡¯m shaking so hard that I can¡¯t concentrate. The healing enchantment on my amulet is dumping mindless energy into my system, speeding my regeneration, preventing me from going into total shock. I finally manage to get a pain block going on my nervous system. The shaking stops. I conjure water and drink some while I pull my body to the kitchen. Downing vitamins is hard when you can¡¯t feel anything, but being able to force the water where you want it with magic is awesome. I set about healing my body, banishing the burnt skin and regrowing the new stuff, conjuring blood to replace the loss, speeding up my digestive track to make up for the nutrients that I¡¯m not smart enough to conjure. I take off my clothes and examine each body part, healing as I go. In about 30 minutes, my body is back to normal.


    My mind is not. I can¡¯t stop my hands from shaking. What was that? It felt like the Ripple from three days ago, but this time it hurt. It was different, not just a cosmic loudspeaker telling us shit was coming, but a wave of something Earth had never considered on its periodic table. I looked out the window, expecting fire and scorched earth, but everything looked fine. Was I the only one affected? Was it a Ripple of Chaos and magic, only hitting things soaked with either? My staff! I just got the damn thing made, did the Ripple break it or fuck it up in some weird way? I scramble for new clothes and run to the kitchen where I had left it on the floor. I poked it with my toe, seemed normal. I¡¯m half expecting it to do something, grow arms and break shit. I grab it by the base, avoiding the control ring. It is cool to the touch. My magical senses are going haywire though. The crystal batteries at the top are full, and dense, in a way that I hadn¡¯t felt before, but that¡¯s not saying much. For that matter, so was the battery on my shield gauntlet and the batteries in my vest. It feels like Change. Like potential, a shard of captured infinite potential. But a bunch of them. My staff has three, vest has ten, and the gauntlet has one. Fourteen pieces of incomplete infinity. I gingerly walk to the front door and close it. Still not prepared for this level of insanity. What the fuck did that voice mean? Is this going to happen again? The shakes hit again, harder this time. How many times can this ant get stepped on and live? WHERE THE FUCK IS EVERYONE ELSE? My city seemed strangely depopulated on the way to the river earlier. Now, my fiance and I were a cute hermit couple; best friends that hung out way too much. I find it hard to care about all of the people I don¡¯t know, but my curiosity was killing me.Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    Can¡¯t think about that right now. I need a drink. I grabbed some Jack, two cubes of ice and a Coke. I slugged it down and made another. My body is ok, felt like I rebuilt it again with flesh magic, but my mind is shot. I sat my ass down on the couch next to fiance-tree. ¡°Ok, so reality had two big Ripples. One made me a minor demi-god, and the other nearly killed me. I enchant badass armor and cheat the system, and a little punk tried to kill me with black magic and zombies. MY WOMAN IS A TREE!¡±, my voice rising as I rant to the silent woman, ¡°My house is made of stone and will be covered in a giant four-trunked oak. And now I have something I do not know how to handle in my kitchen. Another drink. I need a plan. I need to redo some things, or everything, I don¡¯t know.¡±


    The alcohol was helping. It took about ten minutes for my hands to return to some semblance of a four year olds motor skills. I put my drink down and felt my magic, all of it, trying to see if anything had changed that department. I didn¡¯t feel anything different soul-wise, but this does feel like a child playing with power tools. I really don¡¯t know what I¡¯m doing, as in I am sure that there are consequences to my actions that I just can¡¯t foresee. But I need to prepare. You heard the great Ripple, we aren¡¯t alone.


    First, I re-enchanted my clothes to be as tough as chainmail. Then I remade all of my basic gear in case I couldn¡¯t handle or manage to understand what they became. That was the rest of my day. I was focused. The house was fine, I could feel that through the wards. When dusk came to greet me, I was decked out in everything I needed. I replaced the Chaos charged batteries with normal ones in everything except the staff. The staff sat off to the side for now. I was where I started this morning, except with raw potential. The Army boots were spelled for strength and durability, leather jacket and jeans with the same enchantments, a helmet made of bone with quartz eye lenses, shield plate in a bone gauntlet, and my human weaponry was in the designated pockets for easy access.


    Now to clean up the Universe¡¯s mess. I conjured a stone box on my kitchen counter, with enough space for the Chaos rocks. I used the kitchen tongs and set them inside, sealing the top with stone. I placed a rune of concealment on there and put as much energy as I could into it. Hopefully no one will know or be able to see what I have, because I sure don¡¯t. I honestly don¡¯t know if that would work, but my sorcery told me the runes I put on there would work. I had inscribed the All-Seeing Eye of Horus on the top, and then put a giant X on it. I guess intent matters more with this kind of thing.

 Work with the Circumstances

    My staff. Now this fucker I had to straighten out; just too much potential in a ley-line formed ironwood staff with fragments of who knows what in it. This was supposed to be my answer to magic bigger than myself, and targets I can¡¯t get to. My magics of Nature, flesh, earth and water don¡¯t lend themselves to the latter, but I might be able to change that. What is Chaos really, but change, or the possibility of change, or even the personification of chance. If it could make me more than what I was, and do that in weird ways to other things, then the only thing to do is to say, fuck it. I pulled out a piece of paper from the kitchen drawer and began sketching on it with a marker. An ugly bonfire, a lit candle, a tornado, a lightning bolt, anything I could think of magically based that could wreck someone¡¯s day from a hundred yards away. These would be my first sketches of runes for the concepts I needed to hold in my head if I was going to make this work. There are three stones in the staff, but this did not mean that had to be the end of it. Cursing myself for sealing the other Chaos crystals, I spent 30 minutes working to get back into that damn box. Connecting its wards to the house made it like trying to break into your own when you forgot the key.


    Finally pulling one out, I set about relocking that box. Now, a wizard¡¯s staff is  awesome. Everyone knows that. But what about a wizard¡¯s spear? I might have been going about this the wrong way. My concepts shifted. I sat on the ground in the kitchen with my staff laying in front of me, the crystal studded head pointed at me, my feet holding it still. Cupping my hands, I thought about the runes I had sketched, and I tried to merge them in my head with how they actually looked. The first was the lit candle, pure potential. Candles burn. Candles illuminate. Candles are also seeds. The greatest wildfires start with one idiot lighting a flame. Channeling a third of the energy from my battery vest into my cupped hands while creating a spell matrix of flaming intent was fucking hard, it kept wanting to grow, to feast, to live!  Keeping it compressed, I grabbed all the mana I could from my vest and forced it into the first stone. Absolutely anti-climactic. The stone just sucked it right down. Sweat dripped from my nose, falling on the newly minted stone of chaos and fire. There, in the streak made from two drops, I could see something different. I shined the stone with my sleeve. There was a rune there, a small rune that looked like a candle, and it was moving in slow motion. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    With my initial proof of concept down, I had to prepare for the other parts. Fire, down. What compliments fire? Air. And then lightning would be the final piece to the generating aspects of the staff. What was getting me excited was the spearpoint, the Shard of Chaos. At the end of the whole process, I would be able to have a spear that would also function as a staff and be able to manipulate the energy that I had no affinity for. But I was not ready for this, my battery was empty, and my stomach was reminding me that I was still definitely human. Dinner was two cans of tuna with some mayo and pepper. Just enough to keep me going. I took my staff and the future spear point and went to the basement. I may not be able to hold the excessive amount of energy I need, but who cares? I have generators. I went to battery focused generator and turned it on, and then I cranked it up to max flow. With this amount of energy flowing through me, the next steps of imparting the essence of a lightning bolt and a windstorm was cake. Each of the little stones had a rune on it, slowly shifting as you focused on it.

 Gungnir

    Grasping the Chaos shard, in one hand, and my staff in the other, I focused on the core of the crystal. Flexibility of purpose with versatile joining, a commensurate combination of purposes. I shaped the crystal using my earth magic to be a three-bladed spear point, with a thin pointed base to have a solid foundation in the staff, which I stabbed into the top of the spear. My nature magic opened up the wooden top of the staff to welcome its crown and close around the bottom.  The base of the blades connected to the three crystals, swiveling to join in a wickedly sharp point. Almost done. I took the feed of the generator, disconnected it from myself, and stuck it to the golden control ring on the spear. As the raw mana it flowed through the increasingly brightening staff, I put an enchantment of joining and melding through it, to make the spear a whole, not just a machine of many parts, but a spear with one function, to fuck shit up.


    The raw Chaos in the crystals reacted to my enchantment almost joyously. It seemed to want to make the impossible just a bit more within a mortal¡¯s reach, allowing me to do what I wanted to do for less than what it would cost others, just before it finished, I threw my last Hail Mary at it, a spell-matrix copy of bone, and set it in the very core. I sat there, chest heaving as I contemplated the spear. Its grueling construction was over. Beautiful. The grey of the ironwood with diamond flecks through the bulk of the staff was still nothing to compare to the crowning tri-point of death. I could feel the seed of the bone matrix in the core, slowly drawing on the Chaos and mana, assimilating to the combination of materials in the spear. A spear fit for Odin. All it was doing now was soaking up the raw mana provided by the generator. Now I would have a backup if my batteries ever got low in combat. Ten minutes of raw, pure power later, I sensed it was full. I put the generator on low and put the crystal batteries in their slots to charge. Checking the matter to mana function on the enchantment on the generator showed that there was no degradation. That¡¯s a relief to not have to worry about. Maybe tonight I¡¯ll hunt that fucker that was scratching on my door. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    I caught a quick nap on my couch to rest my overtaxed brain, definitely not comfortable in full battle-rattle, but necessary. Sitting up made my back scream at me, the crystal batteries do not provide decent lumbar support. A quick refresh of flesh magic set me to rights and woke me up. I need lights. Noticing that dusk was approaching made me remember what a bonehead I¡¯ve been. Seeing in the dark is badasses, and I¡¯m not there yet. I conjured a pocketful of the flashbang pebbles for later, but took one of them out. Holding it in my hand, I placed a governor spell on it. It would absorb ambient mana, my house provided plenty, and when I said said the keyword ¡°lux¡±, it would provide a soft white light. Testing it and making a few more was the work of ten minutes. I conjured a couple crystal stands with prongs to hold the light stands and placed them around the house. Took me a few days, but I was getting life back to a semblance of normalcy. Humans need light. We have to have it, and not having it available when the dark comes scratching at our door robs us of our dreams, the very core of what allows us to act upon the possibilities of life. And how to do we sleep peacefully to get to those dreams? With light on demand. I made another handle of the light pebbles and added a gradient to the brightness, so that if I sent out a pulse of mana, they would get significantly bright, say, spotlight level. The shadows fell across my living. Hunting time.

 Pest of the Night

    Hunting time is waiting time. I was under no disillusions. I am bait, hear me squeak. But this little mouse is angry. Fucking angry. It started with me contemplating the fact that the love of my life is a tree, and then it spilled into almost dying twice in the span of three days. I was afraid, and that fear overloaded itself, no more flight, fight. I wanted to try to sleep, catch some zzz¡¯s before Mr. Scratchy came clawing, but I just couldn¡¯t. I was too keyed up, also, a little afraid that if I used flesh magic to put myself to sleep, I would be out too hard to wake up.  Might as well put this nervous anger to use. I grabbed some more paper and a pen out of one of the kitchen drawers. Goals, what are my goals. Two columns for my goals, short-term and long term. Above them I put wrote in big letters, THREATS/QUESTIONS. One of my key long term goals is to build a greenhouse for my food, and to gather seeds to make that possible. My magic would make that a piece of cake. I was uniquely suited for long term solo survival and fortifications, which led to my second long term goal, fortifications. I could build down, using iron and steel as supports, or maybe just a magic generator to give the stone some structure. A hidden bunker, I liked the sound of that. Maybe I could divert a ley line near me with magic from a new mana converter generator; having that around would probably mask my huge power output.


    My short term goals would be easier, but probably more dangerous.  Exploration of the surrounding area would be key. Cars don¡¯t seem to be functioning, but I had an idea for a stone hoverboard that I could propel with earth magic. There¡¯s two big food stores nearby, a Wiess and a Giant. Not too far away from those is a hardware store with a few pharmacies within a stone¡¯s throw. My car as one of those state maps in it which will be useful for later. My planning was interrupted by a timid knock at the door. ¡°Who in the fucking hell,¡± I whispered while putting down my new life¡¯s journey. I grabbed my spear and strode to the door. Looking out didn¡¯t reveal anything. Again, a soft knock. ¡°Hello?¡± I said, ¡°Who¡¯s out there?¡± I went to the window near the door and tried to get a bead on my knocker from the side. As my face was pressed up against the window something slammed into it from the other side.


    The force transferred through the window to me knocking me back. A long slimy tongue caressed the window from bottom to top, ¡°Come out food. I can hear your heartbeat. Come, let me take that fear away forever, so delicious.¡± Uhg. The only thing slimier than that tongue was the voice in charge of it. Its sibilant tones pressed on my overstressed nerves. I checked the wards of my house, still strong. The strength enchantment backed by my generator had no difficulty for this thing. I still couldn¡¯t really make out what it was, but it did keep taunting me, and that¡¯s what really mattered. My spear began to pulse with light, in tune to my heartbeat. I had been geared up for hours, ready for this fight. My left hand went down to my flashbangs. Now, three options quickly presented themselves. Ignore this shit and not sleep, go Conan the Barbarian on its ass, or lure it inside my house where I could apply some pressure from the house wards. I liked the last one the most, but I didn¡¯t want our fight to go out of control, still had a tree woman in living room. Besides, she spent many long hours decorating the house just the way she liked it and I didn¡¯t want to deal with her anger if it wasn¡¯t that way when she woke up. Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    Conan the Barbarian it is. Now this was a hell of a gamble and probably not the smartest play, but I hadn¡¯t tested out my spear yet. It¡¯s like asking a waitress at Starbucks to build you a new car from the junkyard and then driving down a hill towards a lake to test the brakes. Not smart. Anger overrode that though. I kicked open the door with my spell-warded boots. ¡°Bring it you skinny ass slimy motherfucker!¡± My spearpoint led the way out the door as I threw two flashbang pebbles right after it. My pebbles bounced off the banister of the porch and went off followed by a shriek of epic proportions. So glad I armored my ears to alleviate this. Score one for forethought. The freak stumbled back from the porch furiously blinking its eyes. I grabbed a few more of the flashbang pebbles and the new Lux pebbles from my other pocket. Quickly throwing those at its feet I screamed, ¡°LUX¡±, followed by a pulse of raw magic. If he wasn¡¯t happy a second ago, he was pretty damn pissed now. The thing looked humanoid, around seven feet tall and had the build of an obsessed meat head. I probably don¡¯t want to tangle up close with that. It was bald and had somewhat of a mottled grey and green tone to its skin. Since he was on all fours in front of me trying to shake off his light-induced delirium, I used my earth magic to sink him into the ground till only its head was showing. Hey, if it works, don¡¯t fix it. Turning the earth around him to stone, I took a step back and tossed out a couple more light stones cut them on. Gotta make sure this fucker doesn¡¯t have friends hiding in the shadows. A ripping sound spun me back around. The creep had an arm free and was furiously working on the rest of himself.


    ¡°Tasty humans full of mana should just lie down. Easy prey dies faster¡±, it muttered as it pulled itself free, blood dripping from the jagged stone. Deep midnight eyes narrowed as freedom inched its way closer.


    ¡°Fuck you!¡± I yelled as I pulled out my .45 and unloaded on the creature. I had it at a disadvantage for the moment, which gave me a few seconds to test it out. Eight rounds lodged themselves in its chest and belly and one in the neck, but it didn¡¯t seem to care. [SHIT]. Dropping my gun and gripping my spear with both hands, I pulled half of the energy my battery vest had and channeled it down the staff. I couldn¡¯t miss, I was five feet away. The resonating pulse that went from my vest to my arms and into the staff was legendary. I watched as it flowed down the wood into the three crystals, rage into three different elements, and then forced together in the tri-blade, explode into existence at the tip of the spear. I was not strong enough. The resulting explosion knocked me back to my porch. Thank the Ripple my shield gauntlet was alive and well. It negated the impact almost completely. I stood up. My lawn was a crater that extended into the street.

 A Hint of an Answer

    ¡°Holy fuck,¡± I sputtered, gripping the suddenly ice cold spear even harder, ¡°No fucking way he could have lived through that.¡± The crater was molten, the sides steaming and slipping down deeper into the earth. I conjured water, spraying everything around me and then conjuring dirt and clay to fill in the hole. Time and magic would fix my yard, but the street, that would just be ugly. Asphalt is not a naturally occurring element in nature, meaning I couldn¡¯t conjure it, so I filled in the scar with smooth grey stone. The entire time I was working, I was listening intently for signs of life, stopping every twenty seconds to look around. Just so weird to not see street lights, or lights on in the neighbors¡¯ houses, or even people for that matter. I live next to a college. I expected a bunch of rowdy college students to have some epic wishes. My staff finally started to return to a normal temperature. After collecting the surviving light stones from my clumsy battle, I turned towards the house to get some much needed rest.


    ¡°Greetings mortal.¡±


    Ok, I know for a fucking fact that I had been checking my surroundings like a paranoid schizo for the past five minutes, AND my magic senses were maxed out. Who, how the fuck did something get past me? Commanding my frozen muscles to obey, I slowly finished the turn, looking at my porch. An eight foot tall slim golden statue of a man in a well-cut Italian suit was chilling on my rocking chair. ¡°Hello?¡± I eked out, ¡°So, I take it this means that you are immortal?¡± My joking a response to my overwhelming shock. The man¡¯s laugh was musical, off putting in a holier than thou kind of way. I assessed my magical stores of energy with my senses, more than halfway full and going up all the time with the pocket generator. The stranger didn¡¯t even resonate to my senses, a contained void that defied my infantile attempts of unmasking. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    ¡°I was never a fan honorifics or ridiculous abasement from the younger races, but they certainly do excel at brewing fantastic drinks. Is this yours? I hope you don¡¯t mind, I took the liberty of purloining it from your stores.¡± His smirk ticked me off, and the easy way he downed my liquor hinted at a power beyond my meager scraps. Setting the drink down, he pulled a pack of cigarettes out, offering out the open carton. I didn¡¯t move. I was watching every sinuous twitch he made, all the while gathering as much energy as I could and concentrating it, molding it into a formless mass, ready to react at the slightest hint of a threat.


    ¡°Come come, I mean no harm, scouts honor,¡± he chuckled, playing with a lighter that shifted back and forth from formless light to embossed silver. Carved on its face was a set of beautiful angel wings attached to a Nike shoe. Fuck me. He laughed again, lighting his cigarette, ¡°Ah, the rusty wheels begin to turn. Let me illuminate this fine twilight you find yourself missing.¡±


    I didn¡¯t stop stop gathering enough magical energy to flatten a mountain, but I did stop pointing my spear at him. ¡°What twilight exactly did I miss? I mean, I got the fucking message from the first time, kinda how I am what I am now. That second one though, that one was messed up, almost killed me.¡±


    His eyes narrowed. ¡°You weren¡¯t actually supposed to be here still. Most of humanity is gone, some picked up by the elder races to be brought to the light, others for their fantastic potential. More still, the children, were saved by the distant strains of man.¡± His calm demeanour as he dragged on that cigarette made my heart plummet.


    ¡°How about you tell me that story in the comfort of my house,¡± I said, furiously trying to work an angle, anything to grasp more knowledge, ¡°I¡¯ll make you another drink, several in fact.¡±


    ¡°Are you inviting me in as a guest mortal? No one has done so since the Great Rending.¡±

 A few welcome drops of knowledge

    ¡°I certainly am,¡± I cheesed out with a big grin on my face, ¡°Especially if you would deign to impart what passes as general knowledge for your kind.¡± This was my shot, maybe my only shot to figure what the fucking hell was going on.


    His handshake was mountainous. This ant got to shake hands with the boot. I opened the door and invited him in. In about ten minutes, I had the bar cart from the dining ladled with all of mine and Sarah¡¯s favorite drinks, Jack and Coke, Jameson and Ginger, Vodka martini and an Epic Screwdriver. I also had a 24 pack of Guinness just in case. To top it all off, a plate of Sarah¡¯s homemade triple chocolate fudge brownies with the last of the vanilla ice cream that I had been saving for myself. Couldn¡¯t believe I was going to feed this fucker my absolute favorite dessert.


    ¡°Sweet Heavens!¡± my guest moaned as he sampled everything while laying on the couch, his feet on my tree-lady, ¡°This is better than Aphrodite¡¯s teat!¡± Leaving brownie crumbs in his beard, he turned and said, ¡°Well, infant sorcerer, I¡¯ll answer two questions for you. And if I can¡¯t answer it or don¡¯t know, I¡¯ll let you ask a replacement.¡±


    Seeing his feet on my woman made me want to test out my new spear on a god. I knew who this dude was, Hermes, or Mercury. The wings on the lighter were my main hint, plus the fact that I could not even sense him. That either meant he was out of phase with this reality, or he was so powerful that I didn¡¯t have what it takes to register him. And if our mythology had anything right, he was the god of messengers, basically the intelligence wing of the pantheon. Not somebody you want to fuck with. Time to real this fly in with honey.


    ¡°I am afraid that I¡¯m going to have to plead ignorance as I¡¯m honestly not really sure what to ask,¡± I replied as I sipped my own drink, ¡°Most people are gone and I really don¡¯t understand to where or how, and I also don¡¯t understand what exactly changed with the laws of our universe, I mean, I know magic is real now, and some creatures that only existed in stories actually walk around but the only reason I have any power at all right now is due to my liquid courage at the time of the Ripple. Also, I don¡¯t know what you mean by the Great Rending or Elder races.¡± I was very careful to make statements instead of questions. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work!


    He looked at me without saying anything for a long moment. Downing the last of his drink, he opened the bottle of Guinness on the table in front of him and took a long pull. ¡°We gods have not been able to walk this earth in many thousands of your years. It does feel like yesterday to us as time means nothing immortals, for what  is a million of your years when I shall see a million more of those? It¡¯s also why we hold grudges for eons, because we never go away, except for here. Here is where magic left, or rather, where your earth left magic. The greatest shamans and magicians of your time somehow managed to split this earth from the multiverse, into its own dimension. You remember scant stories of before and of us. The ¡®Ripple¡¯ as you call it, was the death of one of the gods of Change, one whose Name you aren¡¯t even capable enough to hear. The fight causing the death and the death sent out waves of pure change and uncharted Chaos, destroying the inverted seal and reverting your Earth and its surrounding bodies to their former state, one with the multiverse.¡± He finished the Guinness and went for another, deftly popping the top and draining that dry in two pulls.


    ¡°The meaning you understood from the Ripple is your fractured genetic memory resounding from the return of MAGIK.¡±


    The last word blew my short hair back and knocked several pictures off the wall. My shield barely held back the shockwave.  My right hand slowly inched towards my spear that I had propped up on the wall. He put his hand up, trying to placate me, ¡°My apologies, I am a guest in your home and you have treated with me well. I meant no harm.¡± I stilled my hand. ¡°The energy here in your house is raw and pure, unusually so. I did not know the name of Power would react that way.¡± He set his drink down and sat up, facing me directly. ¡°Let me remove the stain from my actions by giving you this.¡±


    Opening his hand revealed a small seed. ¡°This is an acorn from Yggdrasil, the world tree whose smallest branches and roots now entwine with the soul of this plant. I do hope this is satisfactory recompense for my actions.¡±

 Branching Out

    The acorn weighed a ton, in the magical sense of the word, but it was even heavier with a sense of importance. The energy it contained was dense, compact in a way that I really didn¡¯t want to touch. The nascent supernova marble of swirling power it contained gave off an earthy scent and gravity itself was being warped, my drink and a pen lifted off the table, slowly orbiting the acorn. Such a small piece of humongous life that could change everything. Before my visitor had left, he warned me that the seed, if planted could create a gateway for my own use, but if done, would also more deeply connect Earth to the World Tree, letting gateways open far easier than ever, not that there weren¡¯t a few already spitting otherworldly creatures across the deserted surface. His parting words before he vanished were what worried me the most. As Earth is now mostly abandoned and humanity (about 98% of us) was saved the coming tumult, he told me, ¡°Earth is up for grabs.¡± That scared me more than anything. A new form of warfare was coming to Earth, and I am at ground fucking zero.


    Other small items around the living room began to float, one at a time. Pictures began to look as if someone was pulling them off the walls while the acorn¡¯s glow strengthened and pulsed. I am way too tired for this shit, this day needs to be over. I grabbed the newest annoyance of my life and as soon as I touched it, it stopped, the new solar system in my living room falling all around me. Opening my hand revealed, on the strictly visual spectrum, a normal acorn, calm and sleeping. On the magical side of things, it was gobbling energy like a starving elephant. Looking like I don¡¯t have long to decide what to do with this little time bomb, if I wait any longer, it may sprout in my hand and decide that I¡¯m the dirt. Shaking that horrific thought out of my head with exhaustion nipping at its heels, I ran inside to grab some special ingredients, thensprinted to the front yard and conjured a stone ladder on the side of the house. I still had my helmet on, and used my magic to make a socket for a lightstone, instant miner¡¯s helmet. A shred of an idea had popped into my head, and I was frantically trying to come up with the rest of it. I had four normal Earth acorns that had barely sprouted planted at the four corners of my house and a generator with pre-programmed spells ready to go and my house was already bunkered down with a double layer of energized stone. Time to make with the magic. I stood next to the chimney and conjured about two feet of dirt across the entire top of my house. Planting the World Tree seed in the center of my new plot with my added ingredients, I cast my mind into the four corner-placed seedlings with their enchantments and connected them to the newest addition, slowly adding in a rune of willpower to the enchantment, trying to bend this force of nature to my own volition. This tree will be mine. It will be my gateway, under my control. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    My magic reached through the enchantments down to the generator in the basement that was supporting them. I slowly changed the power flow to about medium, and I could feel the seedlings slowly grow up the corners of the house until they looked like vines under the direction of my Nature sorcery. I really didn¡¯t have the mental energy for this, at all, so my plan had a stop-gap. The seedlings met at the World Seed and formed a small cage around it, then I took the growth-limiter enchantment already present in the seedlings, and forced it on the World Seed. Now, it will gain energy and life from the generator like a battery, but sit in stasis till the morning. I stumbled off to bed, my magic barely able to keep me awake. Laying on the couch next to my lady, I used my flesh sorcery to put me in the deepest sleep I could muster without courting death.

 Rudely Awakened

    Feral screams woke me from the most restful sleep I had ever had. My flesh magic induced coma along with the pocket generator amping up my healing factor put my in the best condition possible. Ridiculous bangs accompanied the shrieks, making me frantic in putting my combat gear on. I was decked out. The screaming grew even more shrill as I checked out my window; little green ugly things were running around outside, and some of them were were attacking my house with shiny bows and some with strange silvery rods. Behind them was a small group of the little fuckers just across the street that were just staring at my house, their pitch black eyes looking up. My Seed! These bitches are after my Seed!


    More than I could comprehend hinged on that tiny gift from the Messenger god. Plan, plan, I needed a fucking plan. My spear wasn¡¯t right for this job, it was for overpowered monsters mundane weaponry couldn¡¯t handle; this was a large group of small creatures and I need precision. Running upstairs, grabbing my AR-15 and the spare magazines took thirty seconds. I slung it around my shoulders so it was hanging in my front, but not so I was actually holding it. With my spear in my left, I conjured five of the oh so reliable flashbang pebbles in my right. Taking a second to check all of my gear also allowed me to fully wake up and summon the anger that had been bubbling inside for the past couple days. I killed a fucking nightwalker last night and met an ancient deity, no goblin-lookin shitstains are gonna ruin my day.


    ¡°Shock and awe, shock and awe,¡± I muttered as I held the flashbang pebbles, pouring energy into the enchantments to crank up their power. These puppies would put an elephant on the ground. I pocketed three of them, opened the door and hurled the other two at the group across the street and then tossed the rest in my front yard. Slamming my door shut, I quickly modified my bone helmet to cover my ears and I made the quartz eye lenses to be like shades. Bet I looked badass.


    The flashbangs went off and out the door I hopped with my rifle in one hand and spear in the other. I stabbed the base of the spear into the lawn, activated my shield gauntlet and sighted down my rifle, finally putting army training to use. I gunned down the six alien creatures writhing on my lawn, bullets seeming to have no issue killing them dead, unlike the fucker from last night. The larger group across the street wasn¡¯t fairing any better, I ran across and dealt with them, permanently. God they stank, their green blood carried strong hints of sewer and rotten flesh. I turned back towards my house and saw a group of three on top of my house. These ones were much bigger than the fodder I had just taken care of. About 25 yards away, they were definitely an easy shot for me. Old magazine out, new one in. I knelt and took aim, my crosshairs on the closest one. The rooftop invaders weren¡¯t looking at me and didn¡¯t even seem to notice that they had no midget army. All of their attention was on the center of my roof.If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    ¡°Ugly fucks came to the wrong damn house today,¡± I growled, pulling the trigger. My first bullet ricocheted upward, revealing a rippling light where the puncture should have been. ¡°Fucking shields?!¡± I cursed, not believing that someone else had magic, ¡°Who the fuck said you get to have shields!¡± Their lack of a response just pissed me off. Angrily pumping the rest of my rounds on the shield revealed that it was getting weaker, as the ripples grew more frantic from the rounds hitting it. I went through the rest of my three spare mags in less than a minute. Fine, if they were going to play ignore the human behind their fancy magic shield, and I couldn¡¯t exactly bring the house down, then I was going to bring the house to them. I may not be able to get through their shield, especially since I didn¡¯t want to harm my house, but I could work around that, or rather, under that. I walked back across the street and past my spear, upright in the yard, and placed both of my hands on one of the oak seedlings, feeling the magic running through it, connecting it to the others and the focal point on my roof. ¡°You want my fucking seed? I¡¯ll give you my fucking seed bitch!¡±


    I reached my mind into the generator powering the whole setup and set the energy flow to high, directed the raw mana to flow from the seedlings to the World Tree acorn and removed the growth limiter on everything while immersing my nature sorcery in the enchantments embedded in the plants. The seedlings visibly grew in size and width, growing more branches that snaked upwards all the while pumping the Seed full of pure life. The special ingredients I planted began to show their worth. I had put ground up lemongrass and sage which are symbols of cleansing and purity into the soil, hoping that it would fertilize a powerful aspect of purity to the tree. The rapid growth vacuumed all of the energy being sent at it from the generator as the oaken coating encased my house. I had no problem moving up my time table to make my house a fortress, and I guess corpses do make good fertilizer. The cage surrounding my latest planting kept the energy sealed, basically a pressure cooker, but I needed it to pop. I redirected the battery charging generator in the basement to send its energy to the four oaks and cranked up the flow to max. The rooftop cage started shaking, cracking with streams of light pouring from them.

 Another Atypical Morning

    For some reason, I was most comfortable with my earth and flesh sorcery as I used it constantly and for almost everything. I really need to learn to take advantage of the water and nature sorceries more. Can¡¯t believe I¡¯m pondering this as hulking goblins are on my roof trying to steal from me, but what else do I have going on? It was one of the moments that for some reason just kinda stretched, as if the world was frozen and I had all the time in the world to contemplate it. I could instantly make ice spears and hurl them, summon a tidal wave and drown my enemies, or throw rose vine seeds and use them to tear and strangle enemies while the animals of the earth heed my call to battle. A few weeks of rest and calm experimentation would do me good, if Earth¡¯s invaders decide to leave me alone. Fat chance.


    Each moment was a flash of staggered movement, a rave dance in the day time, a slide-show of action. The cage broke as the Seed sprouted, four roots extending out and connecting to the four seedlings. I watched with my magical senses as the fifth root plowed through the double-layered reinforced stone roof with a full generator reinforcing it like butter and plunged straight down basement floor to the earth beneath the foundation. It kept going, far past what my senses could reach. Even as this happened, the upward growth was just as scary, growing two feet a second, and widening just as fast. The growth enveloped the three intruders like the Blob, crushing and absorbing them within seconds and bursting the shield they had in place. The purifying aspect of the tree also removed the horrendous smell of the goblins. Wondrous. The trunk widened to encompass my house and I then began to shape the enchantments embedded in the core of the tree to make the tree grow up while not crushing my house. The oak seedlings became roots for the World Tree and they also grew in girth, anchoring the cosmic plant, turning it into a shield for my living space. I now have a fucking treehouse, take that mom, telling six-year old me that grownups don¡¯t live in treehouses. Showed her. I turned off the battery generator that had been redirected to the tree and then turned the other one down to low. Altering the growth enchantment to a mana storage and structural reinforcement enchantment took me about an hour, as it flowed to the entire plant. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    It looked awesome, it really did. My house was a part of the World Tree. I could sense the soul of the tree stretching out and connecting to something other, something that stretched far past what I could feel. Stepping back brought me to a cross breeze that wafted the putrid scent of the dead goblins lying around me. Getting rid of dead bodies is just too easy for my earth sorcery, damn good thing I¡¯m not a serial killer. I sank the bodies into the earth and gathered them near the roots of the World Tree, might as well feed my newest pet.


    With the memory of the smell ruining my appetite, I decided to skip breakfast and explore. Those damn goblins had to come from somewhere, and probably somewhere close. I put away my rifle away in my house, blew a kiss to my lady and grabbed my spear as I set off. Not only could I smell the stench on the wind, but I could feel magic to theeast that felt like my tree. Space or gate magic, I mean, the tree was definitely soaked in nature and life magic, but the soul of it gave off another more solid feel that didn¡¯t have the crumbly touch of earth. I made it about fifty feet in all of my gear before sweat started beading my scalp. My flesh magic made my body in shape the other day, but it was still hot outside. I stopped and conjured a longer and wider stone version of a skateboard and put a repelling earth enchantment on it. My improvised hoverboard sat about 2 feet off the ground. I expanded the enchantment to the entire board and placed a propulsion enchantment so that it would move in the direction I leaned. Ten minutes of adding two foot-shaped indents into the body of the board for stability and testing and I was off!

 Surprise from the Sky

    Coasting on my hoverboard at about ten miles per hour gave me a chance to think as I headed towards what I hoped was the entryway of the goblins. I had picked a rose from the neighbor¡¯s rosebush before leaving, and was now playing with the seeds with my nature sorcery. My goal was to see if I could make disposable thorny rose vines that ensnared whatever I target. Crowd control is king. I put enchantments of fast growth and structural reinforcement in the seed core along with a vampiric thirst on the parts that would grow into thorns. I channeled a bunch of mana into the seeds and set a conditional trigger so that when I throw them they¡¯ll go off. A feral grin crossed my face as I looked forward to testing these babies out.


    My trip east took me eventually took me down to where the river widened as it made its eventual path to the ocean. It was a beautiful day and I didn¡¯t see anyone at the river. Wonder what happened to that old guy and the necromancer kid? Can¡¯t even guess if they¡¯re still alive. I bet if I hadn¡¯t scared the crap outta that kid he definitely would be. I took a break at a bend in the river and just sat on my hoverboard for a bit, feet dangling over the water as I strengthened the earth-repelling enchantment so I could float about ten feet above the river. I hadn¡¯t been this far away from my house since everything changed and anxiety was rearing its ugly little head. Some outlines for future plans popped into my head as I watched the river toss and play under me, glints of fish darting in and out of the sunlight.


    I really should have known, or at least anticipated something close to it. In a rare moment of peace, I let my guard down and relaxed. The day was clear without a cloud in the sky and nothing in sight, at least around or below me. A shadow shielded me from the sun for just a second as I rested over the river. There was no sound or cry or scream, just a missile of flesh and feathers that hit me from above, knocking me off the hoverboard into the river. ¡°Fuck youuuuuu¡±, I screamed in the two seconds it took me to fall. The impact from my stealthy attacker tore my spear from my grasp even as my hoverboard stayed floating up in the sky.  Cold water tore at my senses, breaking my shock but my water sorcery came at my beckon, cushioning my fall, then pushing me towards the surface. I stood on the surface of the water and pulled the water from my skin, instantly drying me, then commanded the river to bring me my spear. An arm of water spit it to me. I searched the skies, the water pivoting to aid me. Can¡¯t believe I hadn¡¯t played on the river with water sorcery, I felt like a creature made for this. It jumped and played around me in whatever shape I desired and fed energy to, all the while my will threaded and diffused through it. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    The shadow covered me again and I instantly pointed my spear up bracing myself with the obedient river all the while being blinded by the sun.  My attacker swerved around my spear and took off away from me. I caught a glimpse of it before it flapped almost straight up towards the sun, trying to hide in the bright source of daylight. It was ugly, like most things I had met after the Ripple, the feminine body was marred by wings for arms and a cruel eagle¡¯s beak for a mouth, a harpy. A harpy, according to the general mythology, is a cross between a woman and a bird, usually of a cruel and nasty nature. This bitch¡¯s attacks seemed to be proof of that. I really wanted to hit her, and the spear didn¡¯t seem to be the best way to do it, probably due to my lack of skill with it. As if it heard my thoughts, the spear¡¯s wooden core and the crystal spearhead condensed until I was holding a mace in my hand. Holy fuck it read my mind. Choosing not to question the weapon¡¯s reaction to my offhand desire, I held it like a baseball bat, sinking into the water, a coiled cobra anticipating my prey. As the harpy made another dive bomb, I had the water catapult me directly at her as I swung for the heavens. It wasn¡¯t even fair, the magically enhanced spear/mace coming into contact with her head was gross. Her head split open like a smashed melon while the energy I had stored in the staff erupted out to vaporize the rest of her. Landing back in the water was a relief as it caught and cleaned me in one enveloping embrace.

 Little Warning

    Getting back to my hoverboard was easy, the water lifted me up and then left just as easy. Damn I love sorcery. Good sense would dictate staying on the river, being in my element affords a level of protection that feels similar to home. I eased the enchantment on the hoverboard so that it floated on the surface of the water directly instead of ten feet above it, river surfing. Holding my newly formed mace, I considered strangeness of its actions not five minutes ago. It turned into a mace when I wanted to smash something, and it released concussive energy without me directing it to, almost like it was somewhat sentient or sensitive to my emotional desires. As the river gently pushed me down its current, I focused on my weapon, Gungnir, and imagined that it was a knife. Nothing. I filled it with energy and did it again, no dice. Well fuck, if will doesn¡¯t work, then maybe emotion might. I imagined the goblins from earlier and me stabbing them, the weight of the mace didn¡¯t change but its shape matched to what I viscerally imagined, a slender, wickedly sharp, serrated dirk. ¡°You and I are going places beautiful,¡± I cooed to my beautiful shapeshifting blade, admiring the way the light played through the crystal, ¡°I might even use you to do some crazy shit. I dunno, slay a dragon, destroy a Gate . . .¡±


    ¡°When did humans get so pathetic?¡±


    No sir. That did not just happen. My weapon did not just talk to me. I fucking swear, if this is . . .


    ¡°Seriously, when? I mean, it''s only been a couple thousand years without magic. Back in my heyday y¡¯all had balls.¡±


    Ok, the voice is definitely not coming from the knife. I swiveled around on my hoverboard, searching and stretching with my magical senses for anything.


    ¡°Down here ya misguided sack of primordial chaotic slime. Your hairy cousins could figure this out faster.¡±


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    A lizard. A talking lizard. A small talking lizard swimming two feet from my hoverboard. A small talking lizard that burned with the magical might of the sun swimming next to me. Fuck no. Just one glance at it revealed that this little iguana lookin creature could wipe me off the map by sneezing. It¡¯s magical signature was a mix of incandescent orange and bitterly sharp sharp blue that met and exploded in the middle.


    ¡°You gonna give me a ride or let a little dragon work his ass off trying to keep up with your lazy ass huh?¡±


    My shock was eventually overridden by the ingrained instinct of years of conservative household upbringing, manners maketh man. ¡°Well good sir, you may if you would like, but I may require some information during the course of the ride?¡± Maybe my forced kindness would wrangle something out of this fucked in the head lizard.


    ¡°Agreed.¡± He grunted, slapping his tail to propel himself on the hoverboard. I expanded the board to make room for the passenger as he was in midair.


    ¡°Oooohhh, a baby sorcerer, this early in the game huh? Hahahaha, can¡¯t wait to see what kind of carnage you wreak.¡± He chuckled as he sprawled on his back, ¡°Always so fun in the beginning, but they never really last.¡±


    This is why I went the tank route at first. I figured that the odds were stacked against me, but I¡¯ve come out ahead-ish so far. Making myself hard to kill is conducive to a decent lifespan. My flesh magic could probably make me immortal, but the rest of it would keep me immortal. Taking his words to heart, I carefully rechecked all of my gear for the most likely outcome ahead, bloodshed. My hands almost went to the shard of Chaos I slipped in my lower leg pocket. It was my trump card, my bit of forced insanity that may let me flip the table if the cards fucking suck.


    ¡°So what¡¯s a little lizard like yourself doing all the way out here?¡± I asked, calculating a little bit of risk with the minor offense, I¡¯m surprised some of the neighborhood dogs haven¡¯t come nippin atcha?¡±


    He opened one yellow eye to look at me. ¡°Dogs know better than to mess with a dragon,¡± he rumbled, the word dragon oddly two octaves lower than the rest of his sentence.


    ¡°Ok, hold on, how are you a dragon? I thought they were huge with wings and spitting fire or some other element along with capturing the sexy princess?¡± I joked, trying to keep things light.


    ¡°Oh don¡¯t worry, the mana on the planet just isn¡¯t dense enough yet, but it will be soon,¡± he laughed, his tail trailing in the water while his claw whipped out, snagging a fish, ¡°And when it does, I¡¯ll be the least of anyone¡¯s worries.¡±

 Second Contact

    Gate, gate, gotta focus on finding the gate. I don¡¯t even know what it looks like. The little dragon was no help at all, falling asleep in the bright sun. I didn¡¯t get a feeling of hostility from him, but damn he was heavy. He made the board gradually sink and I had to keep pumping mana into it to reinforce the levitation.


    A whizzing arrow flew by my head, the instincts of keyed up nerves keeping me barely alive. Turning sharply on the board, I whip it towards the nearest goblin hiding behind a tree trying to put another arrow in his bow. Jumping off the board to the river shore I hurl a tremor through the earth as I land on the sand, knocking down the little fucker and his unseen friends. Their surprised cries enlightening me to their location. Springing forward and driving my knife, Gungnir, into the first one¡¯s chest was satisfying. Gungnir turned into a mace as I smashed the head of a second goblin five feet away and then into a spear as I channeled another earth tremor through it to the surrounding area. There were about twenty goblins that I could feel with my magical senses, and I could hear a bunch more in the surrounding brush, their shrill cries alerting the rest of their number.


    I stabbed Gungnir into the soft sand with both hands, ¡°Protect me and kill goblins!¡± I yelled, testing out my staff. Might as well see if it can do shit on its own since I decided to dive into combat without a solid plan. I called water from the river to me, forming two solid ice maces that I reinforced with constant mana from my pocket generator and capping all of my armor with overlapping scales. Fueled by unending stamina from the amulet, it was a slaughter. Ice maces crushing goblin skulls while their blows bounced off my ever-present mana shield, spikes of earth ripped through their wimpy small bodies as the trees themselves answered my call to battle. Their rugged roots tripping them showering leaves to impede the goblins vision. It almost didn¡¯t feel real, the battle. It was too easy. I was a storm of slaughter and they were grass before my momentum. Sinking their bodies to mask the evidence and stench took more time than the battle. Using the water I had called to me, I rinsed off the green blood and banished it, though I still kept my shield active. Can¡¯t let my guard down. I could feel the Gate, it wasn¡¯t far away. Now that the goblins were dead, its magical signature was far easier to feel. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°Nasty little fuckers. Never taste good, no matter what planet you¡¯re on.¡± The tiny dragon with no wings sauntered up next to me. ¡°The only thing keeping them alive is the amount of fucking they do.¡±


    ¡°Ok, ok! Shut up, I really don¡¯t wanna picture that!¡± I snapped, ¡°Got more important things to do than worry about goblins.¡±


    ¡°Haha, don¡¯t know about that, you leave two goblins alone and you¡¯ll have thirty running around in two months. They¡¯re your version of locusts.¡± He replied.


    ¡°What¡¯s your name anyway?¡± I asked, realizing I may have given offense to this powerful creature, his demeanour making me treat him like a fellow human.


    ¡°Gorgorath. Close enough to what you can pronounce.¡±


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m calling you Rath, with one ¡®R¡¯, easy to pronounce and similar to ¡®Wrath¡± with ¡®W¡¯.¡±


    He squinted at me, ¡°Fine, you¡¯re lucky I¡¯m in a good mood right now. Just gimme some of that raw mana rolling off of you and we¡¯ll be square. Hard enough being on this planet with barely any free mana floating around. I had to become tiny and everything. That¡¯s why you won¡¯t see any truly powerful beings yet.¡±


    Aha! Leverage! I knew I had some, but didn¡¯t realize it till now. My generators of mana put me head and shoulders everything else right now. There simply wasn¡¯t enough mana to sustain most mythological creatures at this point, but that would change soon. I did have time, some, but I really wasn¡¯t sure how much. The upcoming war for Earth possessed the tiniest possibility of being managed if I played my cards right. What I needed most right now was information, and this little lizard had it.

 An Elder Race

    But this could wait till the gate was taken care of. Down a gully, past a copse of twisted cherry trees and around a sneaky pitfall, the hum of magic got louder. I slowed my pace to a crawl, each step carefully placed with my sorcery softening the earth beneath my feet to eliminate any and all sound. Rath, arrogant dimunitized dragon that he is, ran right into my back foot, completely bowling me over. ¡°Gah!¡± I uttered in mid-air, desperately trying and failing to keep quiet.


    ¡°Blessed mana!¡± Rath exclaimed, zipping into the underbrush, ¡°Oh how I missed thee!¡± His tail whipping the brushes in his excitement, ¡°Come to papa!¡±


    Scrambling to my feet I sprinted after the noisy reptile, stealth thrown to the winds and caution right after it. ¡°Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!¡± I snarled as I took off in the underbrush, my nature sorcery allowing me to thread the dense plantlife as if there was a nice path to follow. I stopped five feet before the woodline; I could see what looked to be the gate from here. It was an entrance to a cave, but the stone arch looked carved. It had runes that were hard to make out, their shifting nature defied being pinned down. Rath¡¯s fat head was nuzzling the cut out frame of the gate, purring all the while, even his tongue flicked out and licked it, his eyes rolling in the back of his head. I watched as his tail grew just a bit longer.


    ¡°Rath!¡± I stage-whispered, ¡°Dude, cut that out!¡± The darkness that was the entrance to the cave began to shimmer, and then grow dark, and then darker still. The black mouth yawned so deep that it almost turned purple. I conjured the trusty flashbang pebbles in my hand, and then amped them up. Pulling out Gungnir, I began to pour all of my excess mana from my own regeneration and the amulet¡¯s into it. I conjured bone armor plates to cover the armor I was already wearing and created a wall of stone in front of me four feet high and about forty feet wide, making a small fortification to change the landscape in my favor. As the gate continued to emit weird energy, I summoned a wall of ice identical to the stone one right behind it. So glad I made the rose vine seeds. Palming them in my left hand, I began to channel as much energy as I could into them without letting them sprout. I only had time for one last preparation before the gate disgorged its passengers; I reached out and made the ground directly in front of the gate thin stone with a conditional enchantment to shatter if I willed it, then turned the ground underneath it to very silty sand. I love it when a plan comes together.Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    I really did not expect what came out of that gate. Humans. Big ones. The smallest of the first four was a slender but well built brunette woman around seven and a half feet tall, decked out in futuristic armor that screamed the marriage of advanced science and magic. Behind her were three men, going up in size and height till the last one was around nine feet tall. She had a gun and the three men had blades sticking out of their armor everywhere, knives, swords, machetes and more. I thought I was prepared, these tall humans put me to shame. I was expecting monsters, goblins or elves or orcs or some other creature straight outta Tolkien, but not tall as fuck humans. The woman in the front looked down at the still purring lizard. She spoke words in a language I didn¡¯t know and Rath replied right back. She turned her laser grey towards the woods, looking straight at me. She pointed at me and barked something I couldn¡¯t make out, the other three laughing at her comment. I really wanted to fight and run at the same time, but I knew when I was outclassed. ¡°Hey Rath, wanna let me in on the joke?¡± I yelled from behind my wall.


    Turning towards me, he said, ¡°They were wondering if you¡¯d put up a good fight. This is their ancestor¡¯s home planet, and they want to see if humanity has grown up or degenerated in their absence.¡±


    ¡°And?¡± I asked, gripping my tools of war.


    ¡°Eh, maybe.¡±


    That reply seemed to have been what they were waiting. It was all one motion, their teamwork flawless. The woman in front knelt and sighted down her rifle at me while the huge dude in the back drew his spear and jumped up and back on top of the gate, pulling his arm back to throw. The two middle dudes, almost twins it looks like, drew swords that hummed louder than the damn gate and began to run to either side of me. I would have rather taken on a goddamn dragon.

 These are not the Humans Im looking For

    I had a plan for a reason. I had a nice plan for a damn good reason, just in case this scenario didn¡¯t go the best way possible, just in case Chance decided to stop fucking around. The woman¡¯s rifle spit a round of some kind of magically charged plasma that blew right through both walls. My frantic dive to the side barely saved my ass, but I did manage to crack the thin stone underneath her, but I didn¡¯t have time as the giant dude threw his spear threw my walls as if they didn¡¯t matter. What didn¡¯t matter was my well thought out plan, literally. These freakishly tall meatheads just overpowered my plan and shit on it. My shield deflected it, barely, knocking me back. Twin one and two were on my as I used the momentum from the spear to hop back to my feet. Using earth magic to soften the earth beneath them to slow them down, I conjured little walls in front of that, trying to trip them up, all the while dropping the thorn seeds on the ground. I released the cap I had on them and dumped more energy into them. I knelt to to present a target, trusting in my beefed up shield to block their strikes to give the vines a second to spround. Twin two¡¯s kick bounced off but Twin one¡¯s blade went right through my shield into my right arm. My scream of pain made him smile. His brother¡¯s scream of pain wiped that smile right off. Twin one was on the ground, nasty sharp rosevines entangling him, slowly drinking his blood and constricting every limb like a snake. Twin two yanked his sword out to prune the vine caging his brother and as he did I thrust Gungir forward with my left hand, channeling diffuse energy through it. The spear threw a concussive blast of lightning charged air that blew him forty feet away.


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    My flesh magic was already stitching my wound back together and pocket generator was supplying the energy, wiping away fatigue as well. The woman¡¯s second shot hit me right in the gut, ejecting me down to the ground, my shield barely holding. Thank the Ripple for my battery vest. That shot took a whole battery¡¯s worth of energy, and I had nine left, and no idea how many rounds she had. I could hear Rath laughing and chatting with the woman from where I lay on the ground. A shadow covered the sun for a bare moment, oh fuck. I used earth magic to shove me to the side and then burrow into the ground, diving forty feet under. The big guy had jumped off the gate and tried to land on me with his spear. I actually felt the impact through the earth. Ok, time to fucking cheat. Gathering my energy, I summoned hands of stone that grabbed him and his weapon, and pulled him down into the earth, about 70 feet down and encased him in a ten by ten stone box. That should take him a while. I did the same to the twins and put their solid stone cages about ten feet away from the big guy¡¯s cage.


    That took about half of the total energy from my battery, five left full, with my pocket generator keeping me healthy, my personal energy stores full, and the overflow going to the empty batteries. I took ten minutes underground to slowly summon a wide disk of platinum, and then grafted it onto a disk of stone with a handle. From my experiments at the house, platinum seemed to be a null metal. I could conjure it as it was a naturally occurring metal in the earth, but it seemed to be immune to magical energy, to mana itself. I couldn¡¯t put energy into it or an enchantment of any kind. It made for a perfect anti-mage shield. I couldn¡¯t even do anything else with it. Party time bitch.

 First Step towards Peace is always War

    I¡¯m pretty sure the woman was in charge. She was the first out of the gate, the only one with a gun, and everyone seemed to act when she spoke. The best course of action would be to hand her a solid defeat without humiliation, and if that didn¡¯t work, just bury them in the heart of the earth and an oversized stone coffin. Either way works for me. Using my earth sorcery, I could feel her location, fifteen feet to the left of the gate on solid earth, crouched and aiming all around. The damn lizard was curled up asleep on the other side of the gate, snoring like my overweight uncle. I exploded out of the earth underneath her, my shield facing up like a battering ram. Her reflexes were catlike, using the momentum to leap up and away from me, but midair is just where I wanted, can¡¯t dodge unless you can fly. Flipping in mid-air, she unloaded a plasma bolt at me which splashed off my platinum shield, barely heating it up. The reaction to energy was interesting, couldn¡¯t wait to get home to experiment. Just before her feet touched the earth in a landing that was going to be very graceful and skilled, I turned the earth to thick wet mud, about six feet deep, just enough to disorient and hamper her movements. The mudpit welcomed her with open arms, her head just barely above the surface.


    I pointed Gungnir at her and channeled my water sorcery through it blasting her with an instant firehose of pain. I kept up the flow for fifteen seconds, stopped, turned the mud to stone and froze the water everywhere except her face. If looks could kill man. She started yelling at me, but it didn¡¯t really help seeing as I didn¡¯t speak that language. ¡°Rath!¡± I yelled, not turning away from the trapped woman, ¡°A little help here please?¡± I checked on the three trapped men, their stones coffins still had about five minutes worth of air in there. I quickly banished the earth to create a little air tunnel down to each of their stone cages, and then put a small airhole in each one. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    ¡°RATH!¡±


    ¡°Whazzat?!¡± he yelped, startled awake, ¡°Trying to nap here!¡±


    ¡°Seriously, I need a translator, I got them all trussed up but no way to communicate, except for you.¡±


    He trundled over to me, licked his lips, and then bit me in the calf, his teeth sinking in a good two inches, then quickly releasing. ¡°What the fuck was that for?¡± I screamed, pointing Gungnir at him, pumping it full of energy, but not releasing just yet.


    Rath had already turned around back towards the gate, not even caring, ¡°Just wait, I gave you the language, calm down infant.¡±


    Turning my mana sight towards my leg, I saw a small packet of condensed mana shooting up my vein, going to my tailbone, and then rocketing up my spinal cord to my brain, spearing it and then branching out and dissolving. The lizard ignored my screams but the woman started laughing as I clutched my head. ¡°I hope it hurt inbred excuse for a human.¡±


    I turned to her, clutching my skull, using my flesh magic to block the pain, but the agony I was no longer feeling still made my eyes water. It actually worked! I heard the noises she made, obviously not English, but it sounded like it in my head. I focused on her arrogant face and said very slowly, just in case, ¡°Fuck you asshole.¡±

 New Dog on Top

    Her blatant surprise made me feel good, so good in fact, that I stood up and put Gungnir two inches from her aristocratic nose and as it pulsed with fire and electricity, I said, ¡°Anything else you want to tell me?¡± A surprisingly large glob of saliva was loogied on Gungnir, which instantly evaporated. ¡° You sure that¡¯s how you want to play it?¡± I asked, ¡°Cause your gangbang is a hundred feet under right now, and I could cut off their air supply or just crush them from here?¡±


    A chuckle escaped her lips, ¡°You don¡¯t believe an already dead ape like yourself could ever defeat warriors of the Centauri empire do you?¡± I double checked the stone cages where big man and the twins were, yup, still there. I turned and sealed the entrance of the gateway with conjured stone, and then manipulated a rune of of Earthbound strength into it. The rune looked like a clenched glove of stone with a keyhole on it. That should give me a few minutes if reinforcements start to arrive.


    My eyes hardened and the tip of Gungnir pointed at her nose grew longer and slimmer, a crystalline needle with a small ball of flickering light at the end. ¡°Playtime¡¯s over. You can either answer my questions willingly, or I could use flesh sorcery to make you feel pain that no creature has ever felt before without actually hurting you, and I can make so that every second of absolute agony feels like a thousand years. Take your pick.¡± Mental exhaustion pounded at my brain, but I couldn¡¯t let her see that, have to maintain my image, the main leverage I have.


    ¡°A sorcerer?¡± She asked, her face scrunched up, ¡°Impossible, they died out several millennia ago during the Great Rending. Their sensitivity to magic made them burn out from the inside when Chaos fell.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s true.¡± Rath chimed in, ¡°Been watching him for a few days.¡± He rolled over to get more comfortable and closer to the gate, ¡°definitely a sorcerer, purest mana I¡¯ve ever felt too.¡±


    She looked at me, and then back at Rath. ¡°If you let me and my companions free, then I will swear on the broken throne of Atlantis that we will do you and yours no harm.¡±


    ¡°Not good enough,¡± I snapped, ¡°I need information too. If there are no sorcerers, then how are y¡¯all doing magic, I can feel it running through your veins and weapons. Also, how do I permanently shut down a gate, and how long do I have before alien armies start walking Earth, and why the fuck are y¡¯all so tall? Some kind of beefed up space cows where you¡¯re from? Oh, and the three stooges are going to make the same oath you did as well.¡±


    Her curt nod and repeat of the oath allowed me to relax a hair. Every second I stalled allowed my pocket generator to wash away fatigue and fill up my batteries. Seven were full at this point as I had amped up the output of the pocket generator. I banished the ice covering here and made the earth push her out of it. ¡°Put your weapons on the ground, all of them, and very slow.¡± That suit of armor was skintight, so I had no idea where all of that futuristic weaponry came from, knife, pikes, swords, spears, guns, grenades, some spiky ball with an empty core, a few glowing chains. I encased it all in stone and sank it ten feet down.This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    I pulled up her companions one at a time and she explained the deal to them, each swearing the oath while removing all of their weapons, which was a ridiculous amount, each getting their own stone case ten feet down. The four freakishly large humans watched me as if I was a tiger about to spring at them. I bet this really didn¡¯t help their egos, getting bitch slapped by me, a short sorcerer. I sat down on the ground, leaning back on a tree, Gungnir in mace form draped across my lap, tapping the handle like an old school villain. Feeling cocky for once, I conjured stone chairs and gestured for them to sit down. ¡°Please, sit, relax. We got time.¡± I said in a carefree yet slightly mocking manner, ¡°Just wanna know what¡¯s up.¡±


    The big man actually growled at me, his pupils suddenly looking like slits. The woman made a cutting motion with her hand at him and he stopped, then sat down in the chair in a huff.


    ¡°My name is Captain Reeanth,¡± She said, ¡°And that is my second in command, Jorgan¡± she pointed at the sitting giant, ¡°And these are Gerome and Gerone.¡± The twins slowly sat down, never taking their eyes off of me. This was getting creepy. ¡°As to your questions, we are not sorcerers, we are combat wizards.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the difference?¡± I interrupted.


    ¡°Sorcery is gifted understanding of the element by the soul and Chaos, allowing one to command, conjure, banish, and commune with the element.¡± Reeanth growled, ¡°Every halfwit child from the Centauri empire knows this. Wizards have to build their own understanding to work with any element, let alone use it. Mages can only use one element, but they essentially demigods when they are near it, and combat wizards integrate magic into their bodies to be unstoppable weapons of war. And warlocks, well, we hunt down warlocks, fucking scum.¡±


    Okay, not touching that subject if at all possible. ¡°And the rest of my questions?¡± I inquired.


    ¡°Gates can¡¯t be permanently sealed,¡± Gerome answered. ¡°But they can be locked.¡± Gerone finished. Yup, still creepy.


    ¡°And more will come when the ambient mana for Earth becomes naturally dense, which will take about one of your planet¡¯s revolutions around Sol,¡± Reeanth picked back up, ¡°The only reason we are here is the stored energy in our armor, if not for that, we wouldn¡¯t be able to survive. The honorable Gorgorath¡¯s size is due to this fact, but he will return to his former magnificence in time. That¡¯s probably why is he staying near you, you are putting off an unseemly amount of mana, pure mana.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, yeah, not talking about my mana here, we¡¯re talking about you.¡± I said, waving Gungnir, ¡°Answer the rest of them.¡±


    ¡°We aren¡¯t tall. You¡¯re short. When mana left your planet, everything that needed it left or died. But the remaining humans didn¡¯t die, they adapted. Our scans show that your genetic code is slightly fragmented due to lack of mana, which indicates your lack of proper height and muscle.¡±


    This bitch really just called me short. The other three were snickering, not even trying to hide it.


    ¡°Ok, ok, where is the rest of humanity? I took one trip through Chaos itself and most were gone. Took me days to figure out that fact.¡± I asked.


    ¡°The Conglomerate picked up most of them,¡± Reeanth answered, ¡°They will be integrated properly into their society after repairing their genetics. The Centauri empire also grabbed two landmasses worth of humans. Our war needs soldiers and your people needed fixing. The last twenty percent were picked up by the Others and the Elders. Your lack of exposure to mana, when reintegrated with it, seems to come with an incredible ability to adapt and improvise. Oddly enough, your genius¡¯ IQs jumped by thirty percent after just three weeks of exposure.¡±


    I caught that. ¡°Three weeks, what do you mean three weeks? It¡¯s been only a couple of days.¡± Each word got louder until I was standing with Gungnir in my hand, fully extended into a spear, radiating power.


    ¡°You said you took a trip through Chaos, how is that possible?¡± Jorgan¡¯s deep base rumbled, ¡°Nobody survives that.¡±


    ¡°If it¡¯s true,¡± Gerome started, ¡°Then it explains the sorcery¡± Gerone finished.

 Rock my World

    No fucking wonder. I had missed out, literally. Most of Earth was picked over by fucking aliens while my soul was swimming in Chaos. That¡¯s why cats were eating my body, and that¡¯s why it hurt so goddamn much coming back, because my body was fucking dead at the time when my soul was slammed back into it!


    My mind bounced back and forth from speaker to speaker as they argued with each other about sorcery. ¡°SHUT THE FUCK UP!¡± I screamed, an insane pulse of light from Gungnir punctuating my words. Their faces went white, the arms of the stone chair crumbled slightly under Jorgan¡¯s hands. ¡°How long has it been since the first Ripple, and how many more Ripples are there going to be, and what exactly are they?¡± My voice frantic as I tightened my grip on Gungnir.


    Reeanth put her hands up, placating, and calmly said, ¡°The first Ripple as you call it, arrived on this plane twenty-three days ago. Four have come and gone, and there are three left, though each successive one is weaker than the last. They will each riase the ambient level of mana and continue to break the remnants of the dimensional seal on this realm. Ripples killed the sorcerers last time as they suffered a severe mana burn on their souls from the occurrence, and the wizards and mages mainly went insane from the raw Chaos. Warlocks grew incredibly powerful and witches became unstoppable as their practices are strengthened from Chaos.¡±


    ¡°We need to go,¡± Gerome said, ¡°Time grows short.¡± Gerone finished.


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    ¡°They¡¯re right,¡± Jorgan said, standing up abruptly. He turned to me and growled, ¡°Undo your seal for a moment and let us leave. Our mana grows thin. We will not trouble this area again.¡±


    ¡°Please, let us leave, and I will give you something that will help.¡± Reeanth said.


    ¡°Fine, but I am keeping one of each kind of weapon from y¡¯all for myself.¡± I answered.


    ¡°That is acceptable.¡± She said as her complexion began to lose its healthy glow, the same happening to the other three. I banished the stone seal in front of the gate, and brought their weapons to the surface, keeping one of each kind in the earth. They gathered them up and stumbled to the gate, the three men vanishing instantly. Reeanth turned around whispered, ¡°Good luck sorcerer, the corrupted races require less mana than us to sustain themselves, and they are far less kind than we.¡± With that, she turned and vanished through the gate. I conjured the stone seal again, this time, twice as thick and covered in iron, and then I put the sealing enchantment and rune on it and keyed it to my blood.


    ¡°Smart move,¡± Rath said, making me jump. I completely forgot about him. ¡°That¡¯ll stop most mana heavy beings.¡±


    [Breathe in, breathe out]. Don¡¯t annihilate the lizard that is actually a tiny but ancient dragon. Damn it¡¯s hard to take Mushu seriously. I brought the spoils of war to the surface, a magitech gun, advanced spear, sword, axe, and spiky ball thing. Hopefully I could reverse engineer these to get a serious boost to my combat, not that I needed it. My run-in with the snooty Elder humans showed that. But maybe I could fix my genetic deficiencies with my flesh magic, I wondered, already picturing myself as a better looking He-man. Just another thing to add to my ever-growing list of shit to do. I gathered the weapons up and carried them to the hoverboard. Rath followed me without offering to help. Without a word, he hopped on one end of it and fell asleep. My world had been shaken enough, I was done with today. I coasted home up the river, put the lizard on the porch, the weapons in the basement, checked on Sarah and ate dinner.

 Wings of Fate

    Numbness. Lack of physical feeling. That¡¯s what I was struggling with, except in my brain. I couldn¡¯t think. All I was doing was staring at the wall, my dinner of cold baked beans and weenies forgotten in front of me. My list of short term and long term plans next to my plate had no additional entries, even though I had a bunch more to add. The desire to move, let alone think, had completely left me. I felt safe in these walls, why would I ever leave them? I had freaking sorcery, epic magic of a scale that no human has possessed in millenia, and no desire to use it. A literal dragon was on my front porch, and I didn¡¯t want to talk to him. Pathetic. Everyone I knew, gone. Taken from here, and there was nothing I could do about it. Soldiers in a war, and they were going to be fixed ¡®genetically¡¯. Miserable alien cunts thought they were doing us a favor by drafting humanity in a war they never knew about. This all stemmed from where I knew we all were on the totem pole, the very fucking bottom. Literally lower than the bottom feeders though, right down there in the muck where bugs eat the bits of flesh that flake off a corpse and blow away in the wind. Insignificant is the word I¡¯m looking for. Small just doesn¡¯t cut it. Miniscule sounds too smart for we humans, as if we aren¡¯t worthy of it, cause we¡¯re beneath that still.


    A jolt ran through me, my flesh sorcery reacting to the unhealthiness of my thoughts, correcting the imbalance of chemicals, the imminent cascade to depression. ¡°Lemme in! Lemme in, lemme in, lemme in!¡± Rath¡¯s scream cut through my internal struggle as he bounced up and smacked off the window outside my house. It was almost dark out. He jumped to another window and smacked into it screaming some more, ¡°For the love of all that is mana, LEMME IN!¡± Right behind him was a giant bird, pitch black with flaming blue eyes and wicked talons the size of my leg. This bird was big enough to fly off with a minivan. I used to my flesh sorcery to finish rebalancing my brain, then stumbled to the front door and opened it just enough for Rath to plow his way in. I quickly shut the door just as the talons of the bird bounced off the reinforced wards. Ten minutes of an annoying giant crow banging at my house was enough to make me angry, angry enough to do something about it. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    Grabbing Gungnir from where I leaned it against the wall, I calmly walked outside, my shield at max power. As the big fucker spied new prey, I channeled mana into just the rune of wind on Gungnir, waiting for the right moment. The bird didn¡¯t dive down like an eagle, he swooped down about thirty feet away and braked, flapping his humongous wingspan. A gale of wind almost knocked me over, but it was diverted by Gungnir and gathered into a very small, condensed ball of air. With a thought from me, the spear sent the ball of air above the crow, and released the binding keeping it together. The air expanded rapidly without a controlling influence, smacking the bird down into the ground like a giant hand. I channeled even more energy into the air rune on Gungnir, creating a powerful downdraft to keep the bird in place. The spear turned into a mace, and I clubbed the bird in the head, knocking it unconscious. Cutting my palm and placing it on the bird¡¯s head, right where I smacked it, I channeled my flesh sorcery through the animal and focused on one thought alone, MINE. The bird twitched as my energy washed through it like ocean waves. MINE, I sent, over and over.


    My flesh sorcery instinctively embedded in the creature¡¯s brain and body that it belonged to me, and my commands were ingrained in its blood. Using both hands, I lifted it beak and examined the bird, no wonder Rath ran away. Looks like this dude could hunt small dragons. I put my hands on its forehead, and instilled the idea that the World Tree is its next, and it needed to guard all the lands around it. Healing the bird took less time than dominating it, but this was the first time I had done this. I wanted to test it. I woke the bird up with my flesh sorcery after making sure there was nothing wrong with it, no old broken bones that hadn¡¯t fully healed or anything like that. It popped up like nothing had happened and chirped at me. ¡°You, you are my noble steed.¡± I declared, ¡°And your name shall be Norn, for your fate is tied to mine.¡±


    It sounded pompous, but I loved the name. Being a nerd all my life grants me certain liberties in my own head, especially since there¡¯s barely anyone around to object.

 Planning for Hell Day

    It sounded pompous, but I loved the name. Being a nerd all my life grants me certain liberties in my own head, especially since there¡¯s barely anyone around to object.I looked in Norn¡¯s plate sized eye. ¡°Don¡¯t fuck with me,¡± I said, my hands on his beak, ¡°Now, I want you to make a nice nest in this tree behind you, and patrol the skies, alerting me if goblins or humans or any kind of monster comes near. Got it bird brain?¡±


    A sense of warm affection and understanding gently flowed from Norn to me, to my mind. Awesome, a telepathic eagle-crow the size of a bus. Look out Blue Angels, there¡¯s a new man in town. I stepped back, Norn doing the same, then with one flap of his wings, took off. I watched him for a minute, feeling out the new mental connection I had. His thoughts were primitive, almost infantile in nature, obsessed with ¡®food, prey, nest, watch, master/mother, tree, home, safe, food¡¯, and it went round and round. This mind muscle is not something I started with, or had ever considered even dreaming that it existed. Telepathy is not one of my strengths, but the bird bonding experience awakened a tiny kernel of my brain that would have any nerd drooling over it, the doorway was opened for new things. Again, I did not have time for this either, but having a dragon sized eye in the sky keeping watch for me does mean that I get to try out one of my crazier experiments.


    Follow me here. Human bodies are frail, weak, but apparently, we can be better, and supposedly were much more robust before the Rending. If I could somehow fix my genetics, I could get there too. The problem is, I don¡¯t know shit about genetics,or the hows and whys and differences between me and the other-than-this-earth humans. And since my flesh sorcery branched off of my own understanding of the human body, which might be more than the average dude, but nowhere near close to what a doctor would know, I couldn¡¯t just wave my hand and fix it. So part of the idea would have to wait till those arrogant assholes returned, but the other part remained possible. I could probably raise up the base level of my body, as it does somehow contain the fragmented potential of giants. The only thing I could think of that would bring that out would be a combination of ridiculous stress and flesh sorcery. The key to this, would be a tiny fragment of sorcery that came with the earth based sorcery, gravity.Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    I went to the basement, ignoring the sleeping lizard sprawled on my dining room table snoring like a chainsaw. Sitting on a conjured stone bench in my basement in front of the generators, I conjured stone one piece at a time, carefully enchanted it, and then laid it out like disassembled medieval plate armor. A chest and back plate underneath a stone helmet with holes for straps in it, gauntlets for my forearms and pauldrons for shoulders, then finished off leg coverings and curved stone plates for my boots. It was almost dark, so I wanted to get this done before tomorrow morning so that a day of hell could begin. Each piece of the stone armor had an enchantment on it with several conditional factors. First, the enchantment would increase its own personal gravity/weight when I activated it. Second, the weight would evenly distribute across my body so that no muscle would be missed. Third, all of the enchantments were linked so that when I turned it on and off, it would apply to each piece.


    My main pocket generator would be powering the entire suit as it had more than enough output for it, which then lead to me making a second pocket generator. This one had two different healing enchantments on it. The first one¡¯s focus would be to wipe away fatigue and banish lactic acid and carbon dioxide so that I would not get tired, instant marathon runner enchantment. The focus of the second was to rebuild my body from the cellular level up. It would make my bones denser, my muscles repair so that they grew in strength, both fast and slow twitch muscles, and the ligaments and tendons would repair themselves, but not with scar tissue, replace any lost blood, and also slowly banish old cells bit by bit so that new fresh ones could take their place. When everything was laid out perfectly for tomorrow, I decided to do the last experiment for the night. With my flesh magic, I wanted to see if I could reverse my age.

 Paranoia Prep

    Now, scientists and workout freaks seemed to have come to a consensus that a man¡¯s prime, if he was in good health, took care of himself, ate well, and religiously exercised, would be around his early thirties, where his physicality would reach its peak. Not like football players whose peak is around twenty-six due to the incredible amount of abuse during their career. This only applies if those exercise and eating habits start earlier than that though, like around 19. But, that wasn¡¯t me. I¡¯m 28, and while I had used my flesh magic to put me back into decent shape, I needed a restart. A real one. Years of desk job work and ice cream had not been kind to my overall health. But first, a test, cause I am not going to try this shit out on myself. I went outside, feeling secure in the moment due to Norn keeping watch. Reaching out with my senses, I found a robin¡¯s nest in the tree across the street, with two eggs inside, perfect. In no time, I was back in my basement with one egg cupped in my hands, eyes closed, fumbling around my flesh sorcery instincts, trying to see how much of it would be explained on its own.


    It¡¯s hard to describe, as sorcery is literally a part of my soul, but imagine being really good at soccer, and not finding out until someone kicks a ball at you and you do a bicycle kick from forty yards away and score a goal. Sorcery is having understanding and innate talent with a particular element of magic. Wizards seem to have the handicap of not having the magic work with you, but rather against you. After about twenty minutes of meditation, I reached out my senses to the battery generator and connected to it, turning the flow on and as low as it could go. Then, soaking the egg in my magic, I slowly began to age the embryo, speeding it along its journey. I saw the yolk sac inside shrink and the baby bird actually begin to form. [SUCCESS] I thought, because if I could age it, then reversing that would be possible. And it was, just way fucking harder than I thought. As soon as I began to reverse the age, the power requirements spiked. I amped up the generator to match the flow. It seems that with de-aging something, the power requirements are massive, as in multiplicatively massive, and doing it fast takes stupid amounts of energy, but it can be done. Whew. That¡¯s all I need to know, as I have three generators that could help me out if necessary. I put the egg¡¯s age back to where it was, and then returned it to the nest, magically wiping off the smell of human.


    The plan was almost ready, but one thing stuck in my mind from my house getting attacked earlier. The generators are awesome with their constant outflow of mana, but what if something can put out more damage in an instant than their output can manage, like a bomb or a deity? I need a battery, a big one. In the corner of my basement was an old cast iron boiler that we had never moved due to its size and weight. Banishing it was the work of seconds. I then conjured in its place a diamond, which was easy as a diamond is simply very well stacked carbon, and carbon is one of the most abundant materials on Earth. I made this diamond five feet tall, four feet deep, and eight feet wide. This was going to be anti-nuke/anti-giant battery. If something hit my house and it was too powerful for the constant output of the generators, then this would be the extra oomph came from. I took about thirty minutes to make another stone cylinder generator and put it on top. I linked the diamond battery to the house wards so that it could automatically be engaged if something attacked the house or World Tree, then I linked the new generator to the battery and put a conditional trigger on it. The new generator would operate at full power to charge the humongous battery, and shut off when it was full, and turn back on if it ever went below full. This may seem paranoid, but I have precious cargo in my house AND it¡¯s the base for the infant World Tree on top of it.This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    Sarah kept a full length mirror in the yoga room in the back area of the house. After inputting my anti-giant measures in the basement, I went there with my first pocket generator. I wanted to watch this; the goal was to put my age at nineteen tonight, and then eat and sleep. No human has ever grown younger before. Tomorrow, the plan would be to work out with the gravity armor while the healing enchantments would keep me in tip-top shape and bring my body to the absolute best it could possibly get to, and then slowly bring my age back up to twenty-five while continuing the hellish workouts. This would simulate years of working out and taking care of myself and put me at a magically-induced base level of an Olympic athlete. [Breathe in, breathe out]. I stood in front of the mirror and took my clothes off, kicking them to the side. Weaving the enchantment of reverse-aging through my entire body took twenty minutes as I kept checking it. Setting the reverse aging process to be glacially slow, I set it in motion. The pull of energy required was instantly about seventy-five percent of my pocket generators total outflow. My muscles were slightly twitching as horrible smelling greyish black stuff began to ooze out of my pores, all of them, and my eyesight began to fade while my hair grew rapidly. The smell was so bad that I turned off the enchantment and stumbled to the bathroom. I conjured water from my hands to wash and peel the stuff off as it hardened within seconds. Every pore on my body had this crap in it, the smell was unbelievably wretched. I turned and puked in the tub, nothing on this green earth was this gross. A hacking sound from the dining room told me that Rath was hurling too.


    ¡°What in the wretched seven hells is that stench?¡± he gasped, hopping off the table and peeking in the bathroom, ¡°Only cultivators do this kind of shit, and they have the decency to do it far away from anyone else!¡± He puked on the floor, adding to the putrescence of the experience. ¡°Uhck, filthy, nasty, disgusting humans, purifying and expelling weird shit all the damn time.¡± He muttered as he went to the basement, slamming the door behind him with his tail. Checking with my flesh sorcery revealed that it was rotten, aged flesh and cells that my body expelled in the de-aging process. So fucking gross. I took five minutes to wash and peel everything off and conjured more water so that I was standing in two inches of filth in the tub, then banished it all. [So glad Sarah can¡¯t smell this right now], I thought, [Her cleaning OCD would have her burning the house down to fix this]. Three hours of this is what it took to take off six years. I was back in my twenty-two year old body. [Good enough, twenty-two works, fuck nineteen. I can¡¯t take much more of this shit]. Exhausted after another hour of cleaning up after that horrifying process, I skipped dinner and hit the hay.

 Wish I had Music

    ¡°Get up boy!¡± A solid, scaly headbutt to the arm woke me out of a deep slumber, ¡°Wake your lazy ass up!¡±


    ¡°Whassup?¡± I said, wiping grit from my eyes, ¡°Huh?¡± Rath¡¯s giant head was in my face. I scooted back away, scared almost shitless. ¡°What the fuck happened to you? You¡¯re fucking big?!¡±


    Rath, who yesterday was the size of an iguana, or double the size of a large housecat, was now the size of a hefty labrador retriever.


    ¡°I know!¡± he exclaimed, ¡°I went to your basement last night cause I couldn¡¯t stand your smell, and these nice stones were giving off such tasty mana, so I slept next to them and woke up like this.


    His head turn around, facing his back. ¡°Check it out! My wings are back!¡± Two tiny almost vestigial looking wings were on his back, the size of my hand and flapping hard. ¡°Ladies love wings.¡± He cackled.


    Looking out the window, I saw that the sun had just risen. Hell time. Taking care of my morning ablutions and grabbing a small snack was peaceful. The birds greeted me when I walked outside decked out in the stone workout armor with the two pocket generators secured. Reaching out mentally to Norn, I checked through him that there was nothing in sight to worry about. Turning on the generators and activating the healing and gravity enchantments, I began to run around the neighborhood, cranking up the gravity till everything started to hurt. I put in a pain block to deal with the soreness, and continued. I slowly got faster until I was sprinting at top speed, the healing enchantments wiping away the fatigue. Then I began to crank up the gravity part, and kept going. I could feel my hard fibers gaining muscle while every ounce of fat on my body slowly melted away. I was condensing a 10 mile a day everyday for a month workout into 4 hours, and sorcery made it easy. At the end of the four hours, I was perfectly capable of sprinting around twenty-five mph for an hour straight thanks to my healing enchantments. With my cardio taken care of, I took a food and water break, eating nothing but protein and a couple multivitamins. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    Strength time. Cranking up the gravity more, I began conjuring stone weights and doing every exercise imaginable, tearing my muscles to thin threads. The pain block kept me from feeling the insane pain, but I could tell it was getting its own workout. Stopping every ten minutes to eat more protein, drink water and use the bathroom, I kept this up for four more hours. Deadlifts, squats, curls, pushups, box lifts, powerjumps and more, this became my obsession during that time. The enchantments kept me from getting tired and they built the muscle thousands of times faster than a normal metabolism could. All I had to do was the work itself and supply the nutrients. As night fell, I cranked up the gravity till I could barely walk; I really had no way of knowing how much it was, and then I took a step at a time, pushing the healing to the max. Every time a step became easier, I cranked up the gravity to match. When the ground started to crack underneath me, I turned it down by one notch. This is where I¡¯ll train. Forcing my legs to move was no cakewalk, but it was much harder to keep my heart from exploding or my veins from popping. My walk turned into a jog. The amulet took care of all of that, the constant healing adding more power, adding mana itself to the very cells to make them even more powerful on the basic level. I conjured stone barbells to hold in my hands. This whole time I was breaking down my body, the healing amulets were adding mana to everything they fixed, weaving an extra element to every thread that rebuilt. My jog turned into a sprint, sweat pouring from me. I conjured water in front of my face and drank it down, and then conjured more on top of me as a quick drench to remove the sweat. Every time I lapped my house, I stopped for food, though I couldn¡¯t feel the pain, my body was screaming for nutrition. This went on for two more hours.


    It was dark. The sun hid its face and Norn tucked himself into a branch far above me. I lay in my front yard, done with today. The gravity enchantments were off, but I left the pain block and healing ones going. My chest was heaving. ¡°Oh get over it you wuss.¡± Rath mocked, laying on the porch swing, ¡°It was just a little workout. You¡¯re lucky I¡¯m still here keeping your hungry visitors away.¡±

 Light and Fire, and maybe Plants

    This is not what I wanted to deal with right now. I wanted to work out like this for at least another week, relax, and see just how far I could push my magic. Flesh sorcery has so many possibilities to explore, but nooooo. People just don¡¯t wanna leave me alone. A week would be nice, a month would be ideal; but as the mana grew denser from the Ripples continuously weakening the remnants of the Dimensional Seal, things that ate humans would grow more numerous. Still laying on my back, I held my hand up, summoning Gungnir from where it was propped up on the porch. It went from spear to mace as the base whipped into my hand, which I promptly stabbed it into the ground. ¡°Protect me,¡± I said, letting go of the mystical weapon. The mace turned back into a spear, its crystal blade glowing and projecting a shield over me. I rolled over and got to my hands and knees, then sat on my legs. Deep shadows flickered across the street, darting from tree to house to tree, moving ever closer. Taking the first pocket generator, I turned it on, keeping the gravity enchantment turned off, and connected myself to the flow of mana, turning it to max power. Mana filled me and I directed it into my hands, conjuring a small stone crystal and implanting a bright glow enchantment on it, and then pumping that bitch full, I tossed it twenty feet in front of me. ¡°Lux!¡± I yelled, while covering my eyes, the bright light washing over the surrounding area.


    Hideous screams of pain let me know somebody wasn¡¯t happy. I tried to add an element of UV in there, betting sunlight would deter the hidden monsters. ¡°That¡¯s right, fuck you!¡± I said to the threats I couldn¡¯t see, channeling a ton of energy into Gungnir. Pulling myself to my feet, I closed my eyes and felt the aura of my house wards and the fledgling, yet still dense, aura of the World Tree covering that. Back when I planted the tree on top of my house, I added ground up sage and lemongrass to the soil; each of those herbs is associated with purity and cleansing, and I was seriously hoping that they were ingrained into the World Tree¡¯s aura. If so, it may be protected from creatures of disease and darkness, and maybe, possibly, hopefully extend that aura to me and the house right now. Picking up Gungnir, I slowly walked backwards till my back was at the door of my house, staring out into the creeping darkness, the deep shadows twisting and moving at the edges of my sight, frothing in anger. ¡°Nope, not fucking with this tonight,¡± Rath said, hopping of the porch swing and knocking me aside to get into the house, ¡°My wings are too small and they don¡¯t taste good.¡±You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    ¡°What doesn¡¯t taste good?¡± I asked, pumping mana into Gungnir and following him in, shutting the door firmly behind me. ¡°Can¡¯t leave me hanging like that man, what doesn¡¯t taste good? What¡¯s out there?¡±


    ¡°Nightmares, nightwalkers, nosferatu, a couple bukavacs, and even you could definitely smell the ghouls. Ya know, all kinds of hungry things that love the taste of tiny dragons and mana-rich humans,¡± he snorted, curling up on the couch. ¡°The night is not your friend young sorcerer. You could threaten them if you had light or fire, but I haven¡¯t seen you use those yet outside of weak enchantments, so I¡¯m guessing you don¡¯t have either.¡±


    I didn¡¯t want to confirm his suspicions as I didn¡¯t completely trust the dragon yet. I really didn''t know his motivations outside wanting to be big again. Thinking back to the short amount of time we''ve spent together, he hasn''t actually done anything except be near me and chill. The only questionable thing I could think of was being too friendly to the Centauri Elder humans. A loud collision from the other side rang out, reminding me that I had no combat gear on. ¡°This shit is getting old,¡± I mumbled, pulling my gear on from where I had draped it on Sarah. ¡°Any ideas on what it¡¯s gonna take to keep these assholes away permanently?!¡± I yelled.


    ¡°Light and fire, I just told you! What¡¯s the matter human, fear made ya deaf?¡±


    I mean, I knew that. He did just say it. My problem is that I don''t have sorcery over light and fire. I have to build my inner understanding of those like a wizard, which would take tons of time. But, I could build some things to work with those elements for me. Gungnir is completely different as it has shards of pure Chaos that do the work and thinking for me. So, creations of fire and light. I could do that. How would a druid handle this problem, or better yet, how would a sorcery-soaked druid handle this problem? I need to play to my strengths, warp what I can with what I have. I noticed during my run earlier that the neighbor¡¯s front yard had a little garden, with azaleas and sunflowers and some weird little blue flower as well. Totally bet I could alter the sunflowers to actually emit UV light, or maybe a UV aura. Strategic planting of mutated SUNflowers could keep all the freaks away from me, and maybe I could also plant the thorny vampiric rose vines combined with essense of garlic along with sage and lemongrass all around the house too. That would deal with the unclean fuckers and make the area smell nice. The only problem would be that my house would smell like an Italian kitchen 24/7. I really didn''t want to be constantly hungry.

 Unanticipated Loss

    Seeing as how night is what brings all the monsters to the yard, I decided that being inside and creating their kryptonite would be the best use of my time. Light and fire huh? Well, fire is heat, or rather it is the visual expression of intense heat that is consuming combustible materials as long as there is oxygen right? So what is magical fire? Eh, I probably shouldn¡¯t play with this inside, I mean, I do have a living tree in my living room. Speaking of tree, I stopped my musings and walked over to Sarah. Looking at her showed no outward physical change; I placed my hands on her trunk and sent my magical senses inward, trying to find any information I could. Emptiness is what I felt. The egg-like feeling of potential was, gone, or rather, it had moved. My senses felt a downward tug and I followed that to about fifty feet or so. She had grown a root that snaked down the house to join with the front root of the World Tree. This bitch! Being a little tree wasn¡¯t enough, she had to go and join the infant World Tree, which was connected to the ACTUAL World Tree, the backbone of the collective multi-verse!


    I felt a nudge at ankle, ¡°Who¡¯s this looker?¡± Rath asked. I had to take a minute to pull myself back and collect my emotions.


    ¡°This looker is, was, my fiance.¡±


    ¡°Whoa brotha!¡± his eyes going huge, ¡°Dryads have more stamina than any mortal man! How¡¯d ya swing that!¡±


    ¡°Uhm, she wasn¡¯t a dryad a month ago. When the Ripple came, we were drinkin, and she wished to be one with nature. And apparently, now she¡¯s one with the Cosmos.¡±


    He looked at me, then back at the now empty shell, then back at me, ¡°Dude, she isn¡¯t dead. She¡¯ll be back. World Tree Dryad are even more rare than seeds of Yggdrasil, but she¡¯ll come back. Give it a couple thousand years or so.¡±


    ¡°WHAT?!¡± I freaked, ¡°A couple thousand years? For fuck¡¯s sake! What the fuck takes that long?¡±


    ¡°Good grief, you don¡¯t know shit,¡± he grumbled, making his way to the basement with me right on his tail. He curled up at the feet of the generators.The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    I turned them all off except the main one powering the housewards. ¡°Oh fuck no, no mana for you unless I get some goddamn answers.¡±


    Opening one eye, he muttered, ¡°So touchy.¡± He sat up a little, ¡°Fine, the more powerful a dryad, the longer it will take for them to gestate. It takes even longer if the tree is on a ley line or is some kind of epic magical tree, like the World Tree, duh, and it takes even longer if a human converts over to a dryad as the soul has to undergo incredible amounts of change to handle that kind of paradigm shift. And your lady, has all of those. This house is on a growing ley line thanks to your mana pumps saturating the air with mana causing the nearby ley lines to shift their path here. And, she was human, AND, she is in the newest addition to the World Tree. This will probably take about four thousand years for her to regain consciousness. On the flip side, she will be one of the most powerful nature beings to exist in the cosmos. Even deities like your visitor won¡¯t be able to touch her.¡±


    Every negative emotion possible rocked my soul, one after the other. Blinding white hot anger at being alone, abandoned. Sticky, deep jealousy at the differences of power and lifespan. Wet and dark depression for realizing that the love of my life is no longer in it. Cloying despair, realizing that maybe her wish was way better than mine, and that maybe she would truly be happy this way. Ugly infectious guilt, because she probably didn¡¯t even know any of this. How could she? How could she know that this could possibly separate us for millenia, or turn her into a tree, or that the wish would even be real? We were drunk! She didn¡¯t even know what she was doing. Hell, I still didn¡¯t know what I was doing. Man, I am low. I don¡¯t even deserve her.


    Rath just watched me. In my anger, my sorcery conjured and banished over and over various blobs of wicked bloody ice that floated around next to ores of iron and stone with carnivorous plants sprouting out of them. Spikes of bone exploded out of my body only to vanish a second later. Rath spoke, ¡°Calm down mortal, before I eat your MAGIK!¡± The true name for magic rocked me back with energy I didn¡¯t understand, bringing me back to myself. In those few words, the little lizard seemed to be larger than a freaking jet airliner, wreathed in magma and raw physical power, on a scale simple Earth creatures haven¡¯t seen since the days of magic. My soul interpreted his true nature for a split second when he drew back the curtain on his true self. It just pissed me off more. I wasn¡¯t thinking clearly, but then again, I didn¡¯t care. Fuck this iguana. In fact, fuck them all.


    I turned on the rest of the generators with my mind, linked them to the house crystal battery, connected it to Gungnir and pumped the mana output to the max. The entire process took half a second. Now, several days ago, when I finished altering Gungnir, I used a crystal shard of Chaos to make the spearpoint, but I had never really tested out the full capabilities. But what I was seeing now, is that the solidified embodiment of pure Chaos that is my spearpoint could easily handle the amount of raw energy that would have instantly vaporized any living thing. Gripping it with both hands, I set my feet and pointed it at Rath. ¡°Don¡¯t fucking threaten me lizard,¡± I said, ¡°Raw Chaos doesn¡¯t care what you are.¡± Crackles of shifting energy snaked up and down the base to the point, punctuating each word, my anger making the entire spearglow.

 Coming to Grips

    ¡°What, did you say is in that spear exactly?¡± Rath gulped, all traces of power and arrogance gone as he slowly backed away.


    ¡°This, heh, this spear is forged from a ley line confluence not too far from here and was later altered with a piece of crystal infused, Ripple-induced Chaos. And I¡¯ve really only gotten to test it once.¡± I replied. Gungnir was still vacuuming up all of the mana being sent to it by three matter to mana generators. It was started to shake in my hands, probably reaching its full capacity.


    ¡°Odin himself would love that spear,¡± Rath mumbled while he started to visibly shake, ¡°And Hephestaus would love to take it apart.¡±


    Everything in me wanted to end everything around me. One of my favorite books from before said something along the lines of, let the world burn and we¡¯ll roast marshmallows in the flames. But I have no one to roast those marshmallows with, so I can¡¯t really let the world burn, yet. I shunted the generators back to their original purposes and turned the power flow back to very low. Leaning my spear up against the wall, I crossed my arms and leveled my gaze at the lizard. Taking a deep breath, I spoke slowly and carefully, ¡°I might be new to this whole fucking thing, sorcery and monsters and fiance trees, but do not underestimate me. This world is mine, it just doesn¡¯t know it yet.¡±


    ¡°If you play with the unbridled insanity that is Chaos,¡± he said, trembling, ¡°You might be just mad enough to do it.¡±


    ¡°Mad enough?¡± I asked, ¡°I am beyond mad. I know exactly what it takes to be considered a sane individual, I¡¯ve done that my entire life. But since the Ripples have come and gone and changed literally everything and aren¡¯t even close to being done with this planet, maybe I don¡¯t need to act like a nice little human. Maybe I could do some fucked up shit and be Sorcerer-King! Armies of flesh sorcery-twisted goblins and dragons and huge ass eagle-crows at my beck and call, or maybe I¡¯ll conjure some water and earth and nature elementals so that the very land the invaders step on rips them to shreds! I haven¡¯t even sat down to think about what I¡¯m capable of. What if the people that took all the humans come back for round two?!¡± Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.


    I looked mad, as in off the deep end mad. I conjured a bucketful of water and splashed myself with it, then sat on the stone chair behind me. Looking at Rath made it hard to believe that just a minute ago his dragon self was shown to me in all its power and glory. I¡¯m not impressed. I¡¯m just tired. My anger drained from me as the water sluiced down my body. ¡°I¡¯m sorry. I¡¯m really not upset with you,¡± I said, one hand supporting my head. ¡°It¡¯s late, and I need sleep. You can stay here if you¡¯d like, just don¡¯t fuck with me.¡± I waved my hand and banished the puddle of urine beneath him and the water all over me.


    I lay on the couch next to the shell of Sarah, my gear cleaned up and on the ground next to me. ¡°A couple thousand years huh?¡± I said to myself quietly, ¡°I¡¯m a motherfuckin sorcerer. I can hang on for a couple thousand years. Flesh sorcery kicks Father Time¡¯s butt.¡±


    But how? I need to cheat. Literally. I need to cheat Father Time, the endless march of the ticking clock. I could reverse old age, but could I do it easily? Could I just stave off death, or did age heal like a wound? I¡¯m young right now, could I simply put a semi-stasis or permanence enchantment on my cells so that perfectly replicate their genetic code, effectively keeping me at my pseudo-twenty five? My first attempts at reversing age worked, kinda. I mean, I really didn¡¯t know what I was doing, and still don¡¯t actually know. Hmmm, flesh sorcery. Maybe I could incorporate some strands of DNA from a creature with ridiculous longevity into my own, but how far was I willing to go? I conjured a stone box, about six inches across and deep, then imprinted a rune of timelessness on the lid, a broken hourglass. Then on the bottom, I put a rune of sealing, a picture of an actual ¡®Ar Ar¡¯ fat arctic seal, because magic follows intent more than structure. I laughed to myself a bit. No one would figure that shit out. Using flesh sorcery, I opened a vein and poured blood into the box until it was half full and then healed the vein. On the underside of the lid, I put a rune of ice, with the intent of freshness. Closing the box and sealing it, I put it on former Sarah and sunk it into her chest using Nature Sorcery. ¡°Here babe. A literal piece of me. If I ever get too crazy or twisted somehow, I can come back here and rewrite my biology back to old me with this.¡± The World Tree, linked through Sarah¡¯s root, recognized my magic, the one that brought it up and protects it and feeds it the purest of mana, swallowed the box down and sent it out of range of my senses. [Good night babe. I¡¯ll marry you, even if I have to wait a few thousand years.]

 Too much Angst

    I take it back. Having a giant eagle-crow is not great. In fact, it fucking sucks. Hmmmm, because maybe it isn¡¯t just a giant eagle-crow. Maybe, just fucking maybe, it is a giant eagle-crow with a bit of rooster mixed in there. And not the frill or beak or wings or weird legs of a rooster, but just the part of the damn chicken that decides to wake up at the butt-crack of dawn and wake up the entire state by cock-a-doodling. Why, oh dear Ripple why? Looking out the window showed the barest hint of the sun beginning to rise, and all I wanted to do was rip its head off and feed it to whatever animal likes big fucking birds on a stick. Oh wait, it¡¯s my bird, as in, I literally control this bird. Grabbing the mental link this early in the morning was only made harder by the fact that the wakeup call would put exploding mortars to shame. Finally, I found it and yanked, cutting off the next cock-a-doodle halfway. [NO MORE] I sent down the link, burning it into its brain, [ONLY IF YOU SEE ENEMIES].


    I am not a morning person. Using flesh sorcery to finish the waking up process wasn¡¯t fun as it spurred me to the bathroom. Morning necessitations completed, I went to the fridge and looked through it and the freezer. Almost empty. This was probably the best time to take advantage of no one being here. I geared up and went outside, whistling for Norn. His big ass was more than happy to be up at this hour. I ordered him to follow me as I hopped on my hoverboard and flew a couple miles to the nearby Giant food store, circling it twice to make sure that there were no obvious things here that wanted to eat me. I pointed Gungnir at a wall and blew it wide open. Power is awesome. Floating inside the abandoned Giant was not the usual happy-go-lucky experience that modern day shopping usually affords. For starters, the lights were all off and it stank, spoiled milk and rotten seafood were the first hints that even corporate America couldn¡¯t take a hit from the Ripple. Even Norn decided that the smell was too unpleasant, as he shit on the ground right in front of the hole I had just made. ¡°Awww fuck you!¡± I yelled at him, wheeling the hoverboard around, ¡°Everything smells like ass and you have to add your own to it?¡±


    I circled the building again, this time blowing man-sized holes every twenty feet. I was after the preserved food, such as cans of soup, tuna, vegetables, and seasoning. As I finished my circuit of creating doorways and ventilation, Norn began squawking at me, rapidly increasing in volume till I made him shut up. Strengthening the hoverboard enchantment allowed me to rise up about fifty feet. ¡°So where is it? Hmm you stupid bird?¡± Looking at the giant eagle-crow¡¯s face as he flew around me showed me that it centered on the store, but I didn¡¯t see anything yet. ¡°Anybody in there?¡± I shouted as I charged up Gungnir, my voice unintentionally amplified by the powered up crystal tip.


    One of the walls that I hadn¡¯t ventilated exploded outwards, a ugly looking feline shaking its head, growling and spitting out bits of brick as it stumbled through the rubble. Thin, slimy tendrels sprouting from its shoulders were wiping at its while a few more along the spine were stabilizing it. I could see missing patches of skin where its bones were clearly displayed. Holy fuck that¡¯s a cat, I mean one of the dead cats that was eating my face and disappeared just a couple days ago! You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    A giant zombie cat with prehensile appendages in the grocery store that I wanted to loot, is nothing easy in this new world? No, not dealing with this. I¡¯m safe on my floating hoverboard fifty feet in the air. The Weiss grocery store was just a half mile away, I could go there, loot the soup and canned meat and veggies and hightail it outta there. As I pivoted the board around, a chunk of brick came flying by my head. I rose another ten feet and shouted, ¡°Hey now! We don¡¯t have a problem. I¡¯m up here and you¡¯re down there.¡± The scrappy lookin fella was not happy about missing, which was evidenced by the fact of three more tentacles grabbing more ammo and hurling it up at me, which they just bounced off my shield. ¡°Dude, I swear, one more brick and I¡¯ll show you how to throw a goddamn rock!¡± The shitty kitty obliged with a brick the size of a human chest, which just exploded on my shield from the force. Its milky zombie eyes squinted in unfulfilled anger as it yowled and futilely hurling shit at me.


    A solid bar of yellow light rammed the zombie cat from the size, sending it right back into the store. ¡°Foul Beast! The great goddess Astria sends her wishes!¡± a shrill feminine voice rang out.


    ¡°That¡¯s right! Suck it fiend!¡± The second battle cry from a slightly more masculine version of the shrill voice being followed by another bar of light blasting into the hole where the zombie was first sent. ¡°And it¡¯s Astrea, get it right, we¡¯ve been over this!¡±


    I pivoted in mid-air. Three humans on the smaller side in mis-matched armor made out of various sports gear were running flat out sprinting in my direction. Two of them were dual wielding aluminum bats with some more strapped to their backs, and the shortest one of them was holding a hockey stick with some crystals and stone pendants hanging from the curved part by string. A pitiful attempt at a roar came from inside the food store, sounding more like a very angry whine. The secondary appendages came out of the shadows of the hole, gripping the edges and slowly pulling it out. Out of the four main legs, only two were working, but the tentacles were shrinking and the flesh of the legs was slowly getting thicker. ¡°Not on my watch you nasty kitty,¡± the smaller one yelled, her voice giving her away, ¡°The Amazing Advocates of Astraea have come to put you down.¡± She posed with her hockey stick pointed at the regenerating zombie cat, its pendants glowing a soft white.


    Lame paladins. Lame adolescent paladins. That¡¯s all I needed. They couldn¡¯t even get their pronunciation of their goddess straight, but here they are. And I suppose they weren¡¯t just going to let me leave in peace. This whole time I was pumping mana into the levitation enchantment and angling it away from this area, a silent retreat.


    ¡°And where are you do you think you¡¯re going punk?¡± A blast of light flew near me. ¡°We clean up your mess and you just want to run away? The traffickers of darkness shall be cleansed by our Lady, the pure one!¡± A rather pompous announcement from the tallest of the teens.

 Pathetic Piety

    Shock and awe baby. It¡¯s my favorite answer, right next to bomb and bounce. Most of the humans on earth were gone, and I didn¡¯t want to add to our under-population problem as they could serve as a nice bumper to the monsters of this new world. This lead me to the decision of not wiping the three arrogant paladins off the face of the earth. But I couldn¡¯t leave them to that thing, I mean, it ate my face the other day, I DESERVED REVENGE! So, as I didn¡¯t want to show my hand at what I could do myself, I struck a nice compromise. [OHHHH NOOORRRNNN], I called out to my giant bringer-of-death-from-above through our mental link while simultaneously sending an image its target along with the call. A black comet plunged from above, slammed into the cat, breaking every bone in its slinky feline body, the airstream from Norn¡¯s dive and braking maneuver plowing into the little paladins and knocking them over. Norn screamed like an eagle, a king of the sky declaring all the pitiful creatures bound to the earth as his prey, then bit down, severing the cat¡¯s head, and then took off with his lunch.


    I looked at the dazed paladins and shouted, ¡°Don¡¯t worry kids, the bird is mine!¡± I laughed, hoping to scare them off, ¡°Oh, and there should be another cat like that around here, so take care!¡±  The main reason I didn¡¯t attack the kids or put them in their place personally, is because I don¡¯t their goddess. If I recall correctly, she had something to do with purity, or was it virginity? Something along those lines. Anyways, I still had food to get, and my main hauler of foodstuffs was out with his chinese takeout. Peeling away from them felt good. Took out a zombie cat without lifting a finger, put the fear of magic into some kids, and I still had another grocery store to loot! Woohoo!


    The next store was abandoned, literally. The lights were out and I just decided to blow holes in the roof until the whole thing collapsed. Overkill is the safest to stay safe. Lowering my board to the rubble, I began banishing it bit by bit until I came to the canned food section, and then I started banishing the wood, metal, and stone to reveal the entire aisle. Bingo. Crafting a long barge of stone forty feet long, fifteen feet wide and about six inches thick with a hover enchantment took fifteen minutes, but gathering all the canned stuff I could handle took me about two hours. I had the barge off to the side with the enchantments off and stacked way high with canned goods that hadn¡¯t broken open. All the canned meats and soups and vegetables would keep me going for a long ass time, but getting it home would be a problem. My main problem became the fact that the barge was taking a significant amount of power to keep off the ground, as in one of my ten batteries was going dark every five minutes kinda output, which is insane. And that was just the levitation, not even the thrust required to move the damn thing. I spent another fifteen minutes adding on a gravitational negation enchantment, which was costly in and of itself, but it drained my energy at the rate of one battery every fifteen minutes, which is a 300% efficiency increase. I finished this right as the sun started beating down on me, The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    As I started on trying to get this show on the road, Norn¡¯s signature squawking alerted me that I was not alone. Shit, I didn¡¯t even know that the bird had returned. Standing up straight made a couple vertebrae in my back pop, hadn¡¯t even realized that I¡¯d been hunched over enchanting for so long.


    ¡°Thought you could get away from us huh?¡± Pipsqueak Paladins One and Two with their glowing aluminum bats were about thirty feet away.


    ¡°I wasn¡¯t hiding, shit man, I was only a half mile away and I¡¯ve been busy for a couple hours,¡± I mocked, ¡°How out of shape are ya? Kids your age should be little balls of annoying energy.¡± I had stuck Gungnir into the ground a while ago, its crystals quietly gathering ambient mana and heat like a solar panel the whole time I had been working. ¡°Man I love this staff,¡± I muttered, ¡°Time for another show.¡±  Pulling it from the ground with both hands, I looked around me, desperately hoping for a ley line. I did not want to tangle with these nuisances at this time, wait, where¡¯s the third one? ¡°Hey, where¡¯s your little sister?¡± I yelled at the first two.


    ¡°Right here you fat old man!¡±


    I made sure my shields were up and at full power, then turned around. The little bitch was standing on top of my bird! He was perched on top of an abandoned Humvee ten feet away, looking sheepish with that small pest on his back. ¡°Dude?! Shake her off, what the fuck?¡±I sputtered, sending him the same images of what I wanted the bird to do. I quickly conjured large stone and supporting iron handles on the barge and turned off the levitation environment and cranked up the gravity negation enchantment and sent him another image, and sent it again even stronger. ¡°Ok feathery fuckface, when I do the thing I sent you,¡± I growled, glaring at my traitorous bird, ¡°You do the other thing I sent you, got it???¡± Gungnir pulsed with red light, sparks dripping from it, in perfect sync with my rising anger. Norn answered with a tiny nod.


    The little lady answered, ¡°You will do no such thing! By the power of Astraea, I CLEANSE thee!¡± Smacking Norn on the head with her hockey paladin staff, the glow from her pendants washed over him. I felt my mental link starting to fail. [OH FUCK NO] I thought, then channeled a blue pulse of my water sorcery through Gungnir and pointed it at the kid. A firehose blast of water trucked her right off my bird, who just before then ducked fast as lightning to give me a clear shot and then caught the girl before she hit the ground by her armor. Powerful cannon blasts of energy hit my shields from behind, the kinetic energy being dispersed but some of the heat leaked through. ¡°Hold her still and take that staff away!¡± I yelled at Norn, then turned to the older threats, ¡°And fuck you guys, attacking from behind. Not noble, but smart.¡±

 Trying Teens

    I didn¡¯t scare them enough last time, although in my defense, a giant eagle-crow wrecking ball woulda scared the crap outta me, especially one that carries away and eats cougar sized zombie cats. And I can¡¯t kill kids, that¡¯s just low, and not socially acceptable, not that we have a society to frown upon us in this time of high falutency. The kids did go after my bird, which is pretty damn smart, but they have no idea what I myself can do. After I freed Norn from his paladin purloiner, he hopped to the barge rails, and actually managed to pick it up and fly away (with help from my anti-gravity enchantment). Now I just have to see if he drops it off at the house like I told him. Dude, why can¡¯t I stop these half-second daydreams that happen at the worst of times? I mean that literally? WTF. While I was watching Norn to see if my enchantment would work, a bulldozer made up of two teens and their fucking bats (modern maces) blew me out of my reverie. My shield did cushion the blows, but not enough as I was now one with the Humvee. This is why I strengthened my body, to take unexpected hits like this. As my regeneration went to work, I could hear the screams of the kids over my pounding headache, something about attacking their little sister and how they were going to purify or sacrifice me when they were done beating me senseless.


    No, no no, no more. The two older ones where hammering at my shield with their deity-buffed bats, screaming all kinds of religious stuff that honestly just made the headache worse, the stacking concussive forces bleeding through my shield. The younger one had picked herself up at this point and was chanting something while doing a weird little dance. I banished every bit of metal that the Humvee was made of, which dropped me to the ground gracelessly, then forcefully called on my reserves of mana. I stood up as waves of power rolled off of me, forcing the paladins back and unintentionally blasting away the glass and plastic leftovers of the car. I called on the earth to raise me up about ten feet, then made it sink beneath them and all around me about twenty feet. I was on a pillar of stone with an empty moat. I called Gungnir to me and stuck it between my feet, ¡°Fill it up!¡± I said, channeling water sorcery to my trusty spear. As it began to rapidly conjure water and fill the moat, I used earth sorcery to smooth out the walls of the moat so they couldn¡¯t get a grip and then began blasting the two munchkins with gouts of water to keep them occupied and off their feet. The third one had collected herself and was doing her chanting routine again, to which I stopped with a blast of water. I really didn¡¯t know what to do. Not even sure why they¡¯re attacking me in the first place. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    The water in the moat was deep enough so that it was forcing them to swim. They had dropped their bats and taken off their armor, doggy paddling to stay afloat. There was enough clearance that they couldn¡¯t get out. The tallest one was a boy, about fifteen years in age, with hair to his chin, and the shorter of the two was a girl, right around thirteen or fourteen. I created two small ice floes near them, just big enough to keep them afloat but not get out. ¡°Now, you two stay there, and I¡¯m gonna talk to the small one to sort this out.¡± I said, shaking my finger to make them feel small. They probably had huge egos, being picked to be a holy warrior and all, but somebody had to bring the real world crashing down, adult like a boss to these upstarts. I conjured a bridge of stone from the side of the moat to the top of the pillar and walked calmly to the third kid. She was clutching her hockey stick, her hockey mask on the ground next to her.  ¡°What¡¯s your name?¡± I asked, sticking my spear into the ground and squatting in front of her. ¡°My name is Nate, and I promise not to hurt you.¡±


    ¡°You lie!¡± She screamed, scooting away from me, ¡°You sent that thing after us! We saw you talking to it, taking our food!¡±


    Definitely a lot more venom there than I was expecting. I put my hands out, ¡°Wait, I mean it, I mean no hard, I¡¯ll even let your other holy rollers go if you promise to not attack me.¡±


    She kept scootin. ¡°I don¡¯t believe you, we¡¯ve been fighting dead things for days! Goddess Astraea says that magic is what is keeping the dead from their rest, and that¡¯s why they¡¯re hungry! They need more magic, and we saw you using it!¡± Her voice getting more heated and high pitched as she made butt scoots like I was the devil himself. ¡°Magic isn¡¯t clean, it makes yucky dead things that eat and make bright things black!¡± Throughout her mini-monologue, her stick¡¯s glowing increased in intensity, till she was a shimmering globe of soft white power, almost solid in consistency. ¡°Ya know what? I don¡¯t have time for this,¡± I said, thinking about the food I needed to take care of, ¡°I am a sorcerer of earth and water and nature,¡± I said, conjuring a ball of dirt and dropping it, then doing the same with water, ¡°I¡¯m almost a freaking druid!¡± How am I supposed to reason with hormonal holy rollers with an actual goddess behind them? The only two real answers that popped in my head summed the first stirrings of a migraine.


    ¡°FUCK IT! You¡¯re all coming with me!¡±

 Forced Acquiescence

    A trumped up babysitter. I could not believe that this is the point to where my epic journey thus far had taken me. Punk One, my new name for the smallest of the trio, was a mess. I ended up having to turn Gungnir into a sword and cut through her shield and use flesh sorcery to put her to sleep. Then I put her hands behind her back and conjured stone around her wrists so there¡¯d be no chance of fighting. ¡°Hey!,¡± I yelled at the Punks Two and Three, still paddling around in the moat, ¡°I¡¯m taking y¡¯all to my house and your patroness and I are going to have a discussion. Now, we can do this the easy way or the hard way? Your choice.¡±  The ice floes had chilled the moat; their teeth were chattering so hard that I couldn¡¯t tell if those were nods of ¡®yes¡¯ or not. Eh, close enough. I banished stone until there was a rough ramp for them to climb out. ¡°Yes, the little punk is asleep,¡± I said as they climbed out, shaking and shivering, ¡°She is not harmed in any way.¡± Punk Two, the girl, shot her worst teen glare at me. I looked at Punk Three, the slightly older boy, ¡°Behave, or I¡¯ll knock y¡¯all out too, I promise. It¡¯s been a long day already.¡± Punk Three decided to keep his head down.


    I conjured a stone cart with no wheels, slapped a quick and dirty anti-gravity enchantment on it and put the sleeping kid on it. ¡°What did you do to her,¡± Punk Three asked. ¡°Are you going to make zombies out of us,¡± Punk Two followed up, their angry looks offset by their entertaining shivering.


    ¡°You¡¯re not in a place to ask questions right now, but no, I don¡¯t make zombies. I work with water, earth, and nature,¡± I said, ¡°And she¡¯s asleep because she was hysterical. Besides, that was my bird that killed the zombie, remember?¡±


    ¡°But magic is dirty and unclean!¡± Punk Two said.


    ¡°Magic isn¡¯t dirty!¡± I retorted, ¡°It¡¯s a tool like a hammer. I could hammer a nail or smash a skull, same tool, but very different uses.¡±


    The boy just looked at me, curiosity and confusion warring on his face.  ¡°Don¡¯t listen to him!¡± Punk Two said, her hands clenched into little fists still shaking with the cold, ¡°We¡¯re just zombie parts for him!¡±Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    ¡°Okay, more craziness, joy.¡± I muttered, reaching out with one hand and tapping her skull. She bonelessly slumped to the ground, put to sleep by my flesh sorcery. I put her on the cart and shackled her hands with stone as well. ¡°Alright,¡± I said, pointing Gungir at the last awake member of this pain in my ass trio, ¡°You¡¯re going to push the cart with your friends where I tell you, got it?¡± He couldn''t nod fast enough. I conjured stone around his feet, ¡°That¡¯s just to make sure you can¡¯t go anywhere for a minute.¡± I told him. Walking to the moat, I could see their gear spread out at the bottom. I called on the water to spit out the stuff and it obliged, delivering the bats and sports gear armor and setting the stuff at my feet. The armor was a mix of hockey and football gear. I picked up a shoulder plate, running my hand over it while trying to feel it out with my magical senses. A slick white film of power just barely covered it, rebuffing my sensory foray. ¡°Fuck it, I¡¯ll deal with it later.¡± I said, gather it all up and putting it on the cart and covering it with ice. Banishing the stone at Punk Three¡¯s feet, I said, ¡°Follow me.¡±


    The twenty minute walk home was quiet. My hoverboard plodded along at a slow pace, matching the boy as he pushed the awesome anti-gravity cart to my house. I tried to ask questions, but he gave no responses to anything other than my directions to the house. And I asked everything, what are your names, how did y¡¯all get to be paladins, what have y¡¯all been doing since the Ripple, how did you discover an ancient goddess, and the list went on. Nothing. Little shit. I mean, I was a little shit too at that age, but damn dude, it¡¯s the apocalypse, a little common courtesy would be nice. I mean, I didn¡¯t blow them all to kingdom come or encase them in a coffin of ice. That was nice of me. Honestly, I don¡¯t even know why I¡¯m taking them to my place. They tried to kill me and honestly believe that magic is the root of all evil, when everybody knows that it is in fact stupidity that is the root of all evil. Most of mankind¡¯s ills, I truly believe, came from the dark womb of stupidity. And what are the bedfellows of stupidity? Youth and ignorance, as showcased by the pitiful paladins.


    The two girls woke up by the time we arrived at my house. I turned off my hearing for a moment as I banished the ice around their weapons and threw them on the ground, then buried them with my earth sorcery. Then, I banished the shackles and the cart, dropping the two of them to the ground. Restoring my hearing was also a mistake, as their whining and screaming did not cease with my less than kind treatment. The boy didn¡¯t say anything this whole time, just looked at me with his arms crossed. I conjured a flashbang pebble, threw it up high, and detonated it, the boom silencing the children. ¡°I am not your mother, I am not your father, I am not your guardian, and I am not your friend,¡± I growled, ¡°But I am not evil, I will not turn you into zombies, and I will not do anything weird or unacceptable towards freaking kids! Got it?¡± All three just looked at me blankly. ¡°What do I have to do to get it through to you boneheads? I seriously just want to be left alone and prep all of this . . .¡± waving my hands gesturing at everything around us, ¡°for the upcoming war and invasion of our damn planet. Now, how the fuck do you summon your goddess? She and I are going to have words.¡±

 Rough Patches

    ¡°Ya know what? No, I don¡¯t wanna meet your goddess, probably gonna shanghai me into permanently baby-sitting you ungra . . . ¡° My rant cut off as my inadequate mental faculties engaged, finally, ¡°Wait, wait, you said you¡¯ve been fighting zombies for days right?¡± I asked them. All three nodded. I asked, ¡°How many zombies have you taken out, and were they human or something else? And your goddess couldn¡¯t be here without magic, my last visitor confirmed that, so I¡¯m definitely not the enemy here.¡±


    Punk Two opened her mouth to talk and the little one smacked her and loudly whispered, ¡°Don¡¯t talk to him!¡± Punk Three put his hand on Punk One¡¯s head and gave her a look. Then turning to me he said, ¡°We¡¯ve fought about twenty so far, and they were always animal looking things like the cat from earlier.¡±


    The sound of my own rusty gears turning in my head was not pleasant. ¡°And how many magic users have you fought so far?¡±


    ¡°Two.¡±


    ¡°Ok, ok, and how exactly do you know they were magic users? Gimme some detail,¡± I said.


    ¡°One of them wore a black cloak,¡± the boy started, ¡°And he had two zombie dogs with him, and when we fought he threw some black ball that melted through a tree. And the other person was a girl who set fire to everything she touched.¡±


    ¡°Right, right, and what exactly did you goddess say about magic itself?¡±


    ¡°That it was keeping the zombies alive,¡± he answered.


    ¡°Ok, so she didn¡¯t say that ALL magic is bad did she?¡± I asked, ¡°Just that the zombies were kept alive by magic, and so you probably took that to mean that all magic is bad right?¡±Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    The little one started up again with her whining while the other girl actually looked like she was thinking about what I said.


    ¡°Ah ha! I knew it!¡± I said, pointing my finger at them, ¡°Your goddess couldn¡¯t be here without magic anyways! She wasn¡¯t telling you that magic is bad, she was telling you the source of the zombies. Would you SHUT UP!¡± I turned to the small one, her sudden silence filling me with joy. ¡°A necromancer, by the way, is what you¡¯re looking for. Probably the black cloak wearing death throwing fucktard y¡¯all fought.¡± My mouth was moving slower than my thoughts, so they probably thought I was rambling. But the goddess Astria was some slavic goddess who embodies purity, so necromancy would be anathema to her. This is also why her paladins are children, because children tend to be pure of heart (sometimes) and also due to being pure in the Biblical sense as well. Perfect vessels for her message and power. Now, if I could just knock the stupid out of them, we could get some shit done here. But I am not taking chances.


    I told the older boy to sit on the porch swing, then marched the two girls inside and made them sit on the couch. ¡°RATH!¡± I yelled. A couple thumps and odd banging heralded the arrival of the mini-dragon. ¡°Watch them,¡± I told him, ¡°And don¡¯t let them go anywhere, do anything, or touch anything. Got it?¡±


    ¡°Sure sure, make the ancient dragon do the dirty work,¡± he grumbled, ¡°Not like I don¡¯t have shit to do and naps to take.¡±


    I ran around the house gathering various items that may help tilt the upcoming conversation to my advantage. My batteries were charged and my liquor was secure. I did check, Norn actually deposited the canned food barge in the backyard without breaking anything, glad that bird is good for something. I stepped outside and checked my gear, making sure everything was good to go. The generators were on and at full power, and I made sure to have a link to the World Tree as well. Its aura recognized me and wrapped around me like a nice hug. I¡¯ll just imagine that was my beloved sending good thoughts my way. Gungnir all charged up, check. Batteries full with epic power tap at full flow, check. World Tree has my back, check. Bonzai.


    ¡°Ok, I¡¯m going to need your name before we get started,¡± I said to the kid, ¡°I¡¯ve been calling you guys Punks One through Three in my head all day and I¡¯m pretty sure that¡¯s not what your parents named you.¡±


    ¡°John.¡±


    ¡°And the other two?¡±


    ¡° Macy, and the brat is Lonnie.¡±


    ¡°Ok John,¡± I said, rubbing my hands together, ¡°When I tell you to, call your goddess, and not before, I¡¯m trying to start off on the right foot here.¡±


    I used earth sorcery to cover my entire front yard in stone, then used earth sorcery again to inlay runes of purity and sealing as well as the concept of scaling will and strength against the tides, then pressed an enchantment of durability into the stone. After connecting it and Gungnir to the house wards for endless power, I pulled as much mana as my body and soul could handle, then nodded at John, ¡°Go ahead.¡± He tilted his face upward, his eyes closed.


    Across the street, a little girl walked out from behind a tree, shadows fleeing from her steps.

 Negotiations

    Her blonde hair did not obscure her dark brown eyes as they seemed to take in everything around her in a glance. She looked like a sweet little five year old girl, her curly hair and heart shaped face would have made women across the globe do that annoying, ¡°awwwww, she¡¯s so cute¡± nonsense in tones pitched high enough to give any nearby canine an aneurysm. The shadows cast from the still bright evening sun did not come close to her at all, just stopping within twenty feet from her feet. Her hands were cupped together, as if she were holding a bug, but streaks of light were leaking through her fingers.


    ¡°A sorcerer has never called upon me before,¡± her soft voice carried power that almost made me take a step back, ¡°Please tell me why you have my champions.¡± This was creepy. She literally sounds like a five year old girl, complete with enough sadness and innocence to bend even the strongest wills. That¡¯s why stubborn ass built the giant stone plate on the front yard, to bolster my mortal mind with enchantments more powerful than I.


    ¡°Oh no, we can have a real conversation when you stop the act,¡± I said more confidently than I truly felt, ¡°I mean no harm to you or yours, but I do have a sapling of Yggdrasil behind me. Banishing anyone from my house or the surrounding land is easy with that kind of power.¡± I was totally bluffing. Completely out of my league, but desperately banking on the fact that my enchantments plus the presence of the World Tree would pull through. Gungnir pulsed soft red and yellow light, seemingly as if in agreement.


    ¡°What is it that you want?¡± she asked, sounding as if I had somehow personally wronged her or popped her balloon at her birthday party.


    ¡°I want you to tell your champions to leave me alone,¡± I said, ¡°They have some crazy idea in their heads that magic is wrong, bad, or evil. I don¡¯t make zombies, I make earth and water.¡±


    ¡°Your spear says otherwise,¡± she replied, her fingers shifting, letting out more light, ¡°I see fire and lightning and death.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve had to fight to live!¡± I exclaimed, ¡°I woke up to cats eating my face off! Have you ever had a cat eat your face? Pretty sure that¡¯s a no.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re very bold for a mortal,¡± she said quietly, imperiously, shifting her hands some more. Turning her hands, some of the light escaping through the cracks in her fingers turned more solid and blasted me to the porch.This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    The only thing that kept me alive was the platinum shield that I had grabbed and kept in front of my chest the whole time. That light was pure, raw, condensed magic that cut through my magical shields and wards like a pressure washer through soft cheese, but rebounded off the platinum, transferring the kinetic force to me. My shields softened the kinetic blow enough for me to survive, but several bones were broken. I felt like an old man, picking myself up after that. A pain block and the pocket generator slowly put my body back to rights. I cracked my neck, gripping Gungnir so tight that my knuckles turned white.


    ¡°I was going to invite you in as a guest,¡± I said, leaning on Gungnir, ¡°but that¡¯s off the table. Now, it¡¯s an armed negotiation.¡±


    The shock on her face mirrored my own inner surprise. Did not think I would live through that. I cracked my neck, feeling a bit more like myself. [Think, think!]. How the fuck did I get here? Oh, by being stupid. My usual problem rears its ugly head and now I am face to face with the consequences.


    ¡°How did you survive that?!¡± she gasped, ¡°Only enchanted orichalcum dipped in dragon¡¯s blood can withstand starlight!¡±


    Guess platinum is not a common metal anywhere else in the universe. Tuck that nugget away for later.


    ¡°I don¡¯t even know what that is,¡± I said, ¡°What I do know, is that I have your three paladins and am now far less likely to be kind. How about I use the World Tree to send them to the far reaches of the Multiverse so that no one will ever find them? That way I¡¯m not responsible how they meet their end, and you never know what happens to them? Sound like a plan?¡±


    ¡°Wait!¡± she yelled, stepping forward till she reached the edge of my wards. Her face was pale and arms trembling. Maybe that blast of magic took it out of her. The messenger god did say that the mana on Earth isn¡¯t dense enough yet for this kind of thing yet. It¡¯s probably hard for her to be here for long. I guess the main reason it¡¯s possible is due to the generators putting out mana to the surrounding area as well or the ley lines near the house.


    But back to the frantic goddess. I knew it. Her frantic expression right now, cupping the light in her hands tightly, showed true emotion now. Children get attached to new things, and this deity-child was attached to her champions. Her laser assault on me gave it away, a knee jerk reaction to me provoking her. ¡°I let you get one shot in,¡± I said, my healing almost complete, ¡°But no more. I don¡¯t mean any harm, I promise. You can even have them back, just tell them to leave me alone, or clarify that only certain magic is bad. I don¡¯t care.¡±


    ¡°Let them go and I will,¡± she pleaded, her visage seeming just a little less solid now, her fingers cupping that ridiculous light also starting to waver. I opened the front door of the house, not taking my eyes off her.


    ¡°Hey come outside now, your goddess is here to see you.¡± I said, ¡°And, she¡¯s about to clarify, I¡¯m not the bad guy, like I promised, right?¡±


    Astria nodded in agreement, ¡°Yes, now come to me my faithful warriors, come quickly.¡± The two girls sprinted to her with John closely following. ¡°It¡¯s all better now,¡± she said from the middle of a group hug. Then she opened her hand and dropped the ball of light. They all vanished as the ball of light hit the ground, then exploded.

 Real Life Reset

    That shit hurt. The only thing that kept me alive was my paranoia. Children are great, if they¡¯re yours. If they¡¯re not, they tend to be vindictive little shits that steal your kid¡¯s truck when he¡¯s not looking. Betrayal. That¡¯s what I expected. Bitch vanished and dropped a bomb to cover her tracks. But the explosion was a thing of beauty, divine power combined with hyper-concentrated starlight would have annihilated everything if it weren¡¯t for two pieces of prep work, the loving aura of the sapling World Tree that I grew who cares not for the affairs of gods or mortals, and the Chaos crystal, one of my several get-out-of-jail-free cards, I had shoved in one of the battery slots just before telling John to summon his backstabbing patroness. As the light fell to the earth, just before all hell broke loose, I curled up and ducked behind my shield. Gungnir was braced behind the shield in mace-form, fully projecting a field of energy channeled from the Chaos shard. I knew from the initial attack that raw magic couldn¡¯t stop Astria, and since platinum did work some, Chaos was my only trump card. Pumping energy from the generators into the nine normal batteries, then focusing it through the Chaos shard and then channeling new mix of Chaos tinged mana through the bit of the aura of the World Tree that surrounded me and then projecting that through Gungnir was no easy task. But my survival depended on it.


    I could feel the agony of being blown apart, but it wasn¡¯t actually happening to me. Everything was happening in slow motion. The white light of the star touching the ground and erupting, earth and asphalt being blown away from the epicenter of the blast. My stone plate cracking and crumbling and being flung at the house with the intensity of IEDs. My wards caving in to the god-like power of the white hot wave. I was out of touch, out of phase with reality. For three whole seconds, I was a ghost enabled by the Chaos shard warping the space-based energy of Yggdrasil, watching the explosion reshape everything around me, reducing reality to its component parts, including my house. It vanished. Everything around the roots of the tree washed away in the rapid expansion of heat and light, including the food stockpile in the backyard. Every bit of my old life is gone, even my crappy car parked down the street and the neighbors¡¯ abandoned houses. The only thing that survived was the basement and that only by the thinnest of threads due to the anti-nuke battery I had installed. Fuck me man, fuck me.


    As I felt my body phasing back in line its normal frequency, I began conjuring ice and water on me and all around me to counteract the residual heat as fast as Gungnir would amplify my water sorcery. My regeneration and healing enchantments kept the worst of the damage of the residual heat from killing me. I took a moment to feel out the wards of my house, gone. My generators were out too. The explosion made the enchantments degrade, engaging the safety mechanism for automatic shutdown. I put that there to prevent nuclear reactions from turning Fredericksburg into Chernobyl. The ley line was still intact and running under the World Tree, I could rest easy knowing that the vein of the world would provide my immortal fiance the energy to survive, as it fed the enchantments I embedded in its core. Damn, it looked very weird though, not having a house supporting Yggdrasil¡¯s sapling. Four former oaks, now roots, with the main root shooting straight down were all that was left of my little house in the suburbs. Ahhh, still too hot. I began climbing one of the roots of the tree, using my nature sorcery to grow small bulbs for my hands and feet to grip. With my power amulet powering me constantly, I made it up to the first branch about seventy feet in the air and lay down, just fuckin beat. Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators!


    My mental link with Norn was still available, thank the Ripple something survived my second encounter with a deity. I used his eyes to check the area, nothing right now, then I told him to fly around double check the area. No more stupid shit. I was done. Looking out for myself was probably my best course of action, how else would I survive four thousand years to see my woman? If I keep going at this rate, I won¡¯t last the year. I need a better plan. Sitting up, I look at the trunk behind me. The damn tree is as thick as a house, and all I need right now is a room, somewhere I can sleep, recover, and plan for the day. Putting my hand on the rough bark, I began using my nature sorcery and channeling all of the flow of my power amulet into the tree. A small opening began to form, just big enough for me to slip into. I kept the power going until it was roughly ten feet by ten feet, then I stepped in, and channeled power until it closed.


    I pulled out a flasbang pebble and modified it to be a light emitting pebble only, and set it in the middle of the wooden room. My very own treehouse! A little sparse, but a great bolthole for tough times, like now. I stripped off all of my gear to take stock. My batteries were empty and the enchantments on them were coming apart. Gungnir was the only thing in perfect condition, it had even absorbed some of the star and divine energy from that blast! I could see and feel the flecks of white energy floating through the Chaos crystal shards. The platinum shield was surprisingly fucked up. The center of it had a huge dent, and the bottom part was sagging as if it melted and then cooled really fast. My normal weapons strapped to my legs, my knife and axe, were bent out of shape from the heat and concussion waves. The regeneration had kept me in somewhat of a normal condition, but my hair was missing, all of it. No eyebrows, chest hair, head or pubic hair, all gone. I conjured a large stone pillar, about five feet tall and three feet in diameter and put it in the center of the room, then used nature sorcery to sink it down until only two feet of it remained in sight. Then I spent fifteen minutes adding the matter to mana equation enchantment to the top of it and conjuring gold to host the enchantment and another ten to sink the structure of it till it filled up the stone cylinder. This new power generator was several times more powerful than the ones in my basement combined as it had a gold enchantment controller to increase the efficiency by a factor of five and the size of the cylinder scaled up the output as well. With this, I opened up the tap of power and let it flow to me. Time to get some fuckin work done.

 Frog in a Well

    First, I pulled in as much energy as I could and fixed my body, every bit of it, my regeneration taking the flood of energy and taking care of all my aches and pains. Then I channeled the full outflow of energy to Gungnir to make sure my best weapon was fully charged. As Gungnir¡¯s storage potential seemed bottomless, I just linked the two and let half of the energy go to Gungnir as the other half was more than enough for my needs. So far, I had been more than enough of a threat to anything that came my way, except for the deity level crap. I need an overflow. What do streets do when gigantic storms come through? They have ditches and sewer systems to divert the excess. With this in mind, I banished all of my armor and recreated it, this time it was all bone. I took the time to carve runes of underneath each piece, and then in each rune I conjured enough silver to fill them up. On top of each bone piece, I conjured a layer of diamond, inlay gold runes, and then another layer of diamond on top of that. Each piece of armor was going to be its very own full on shield like my previous gauntlet. Layers, I need layers. The runes were all control runes with conditional enchantments for various scenarios.


    I had discovered earlier that diamond holds exponentially more energy than basic quartz-like crystal due to the dense nature and ordered structure of the diamond. The runes I placed on the diamond parts mainly dealt with anti-shearing so they wouldn¡¯t shatter from a piercing blow, and other runes of sealing and storing energy. The bone layer held enchantments of diverting concussive forces, my main weakness right now. It also held the silver runes to handle the overflow of energy, which would be diverted to Gungnir, or if I didn¡¯t have my weapon, to the main batteries. I then capped all of the armor in a thin layer of black cold-iron and sank enchantments of dispelling in it and made it permanent with runes. The dispelling layer¡¯s purpose was to unravel the structure of spells coming at me, such as turning an exploding fireball into a weaker fireball that didn¡¯t explode or a hurled icicle into bolt of water. All of my new armor had runes of reinforcement, energy intake and diversion, kinetic force intake/conversion to energy/, and growing/banishment. As they lay in front of me, I wove an enchantment of bonding over the entire set of armor and pumped as much energy each piece could take from the power generator. Now each piece would be more powerful together than they would be by themselves.  When the whole set was fully charged, I took my time and put each piece on. Being armored felt great, felt safe. I used nature sorcery to put a small hole in the tree trunk so that I could see if night had fallen, almost, which is close enough for me. I closed the hole and put myself in a restful sleep.


    I woke up six hours later hyperventilating, dreams of white fire burning away everything till only my soul was left over a barren world. I shaped a hole in the trunk, needing to breathe, needing space.


    Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    ¡°Hey neighbor!¡± Rath¡¯s fat head popped into the hole I just made, scaring the living daylights out of me! I landed on my ass scrabbling backwards before I truly remembered where I was. ¡°What, don¡¯t like me anymore?¡±


    ¡°YOU! USELESS SCALY SHIT!¡± I screamed, picking up Gungnir and shaping a human sized hold in the tree, ¡°You didn¡¯t do shit, you don¡¯t deserve shit, you should be strung up by your tail and eaten by ME!¡±  I was pointing Gungnir at Rath, my sorcery making small branches grow from the tree and wrap around the lizard, encasing him in a cocoon with only his head showing. ¡°You got a lot of fucking nerve showing up after not helping AT ALL!¡±


    ¡°What do you want from me dumbass?¡± he said, tilting his head, ¡°You¡¯re the retard who brought a goddess here and held her paladins hostage.¡±


    He¡¯s right, but that¡¯s not how it happened. I can¡¯t kill kids, even psycho religious ones. And, I was trying to show them that I wasn¡¯t the zombie maker, and if I could have done that, then maybe I could have made an ally in this damn freaky time. Fuck me! I was so angry, mainly at myself, because the goddamn lizard was right. I was dumb, and made some epically stupid decisions. I brought all of this on myself. Fine, fuck it. I need to focus my anger towards constructive solutions.


    ¡°All right Rath, I am too angry to be thinking many rational thoughts right now. You¡¯re old as shit. How do I get more powerful?¡± I growled, ¡°What are some of the ways that wizards and sorcerers of old became so damn powerful that they could seal off this Earth to its own dimension?¡±


    He was silent for a minute, that stretched into two, and then three. ¡°I will help you become a huge dragon again?¡± I wheedled, ¡°Maybe a little source of mana all for you if you answer all my questions?¡±


    ¡°Fine,¡± he said, ¡°Anything is worth being big again.¡±


    ¡°Tell me, what did they do to get a leg up?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Well, some of them put runed tattoos on their body, allowing them to activate complex battle spells in an instant, others created ways in their body or soul to store more mana than a ley line,¡± he answered, ¡°Some even incorporated bloodlines of mythical beasts for strange and powerful abilities. Others crafted weapons that the gods themselves would be jealous of, and even fewer than that bargained for power at the feet of devils, sacrificing their fellow man for temporary scraps of fell power. Much more common was the self sacrifice of power to gain divine favor and leadership amongst a flock of worshippers. Some of them even learned to cultivate from the Daoists of the High East.¡±


    ¡°Ok, what did sorcerers do to get more powerful?¡± I pressed, knowing that there was a lot in that little head of his.


    ¡°Well, sorcerers made pacts with elementals of their particular type, each bargain different, and some sorcerers defeated and consumed the souls of other sorcerers to gain their flavor of sorcery, some tamed creatures of the void or even joined with them to explore the vastness of space.¡±


    ¡°What?¡± I sputtered, ¡°You¡¯re telling me that someone can kill me and take my sorceries for themselves?!¡± A whole other side of evil and opportunity was just staring me in the face.

 Depths of Idiocy and Ignorance

    ¡°You didn¡¯t know?¡± he grinned, ¡°Real Moriarty types. The worst of them bargain the souls of innocents for sorcery, and some for the ability to reincarnate at the cost of their current sorceries, and then come back life after life gathering bits and taking it from others until they have enough and are basically gods themselves after a couple millenia. The most common way wizards use to gain sorcery is they figure out how to regularly access the realm of Chaos and capture shards of it and merge with it, using runes to channel the energy to get a particular kind of sorcery. It takes them a couple times to get a complete grasp of an element, but it does work.¡± I seriously had a long way to go.


    All of my plans sucked. Knowing what I know now just goes to show how little I truly know. Damn, the beginning of wisdom does suck, which maybe means that I¡¯ve actually stepped onto the path of wisdom.  My best play is to stall for time, or go unnoticed, which directly clashes with my desire to own this freaking state. The only thing in my way right now are deities. ¡°Rath, what do gods fear?¡± I asked, ¡°That¡¯s my last question I promise.¡±


    ¡°Each other,¡± he said, ¡°And places like this Earth before what you call the Ripple. Without mana, they can¡¯t manifest, and manifesting saps a lot of mana from the area before they do. Your house put out a ton of mana which leaked a lot of mana into the surrounding area, and it also had elements of purity in it from the herbs when you planted the Seedling. It was a perfect place for that particular deity to appear, a personalized calling card if you will. The ley line also helped.¡±


    Yup, realizing that I had crafted my own doom just made it worse. I am dumb. Ok, no more paladins, and if they come a¡¯callin, then I¡¯ll just bury them and dip. Dig and dive. Now, I need food and more than one place to lay my head. This bolt hole here in the World Tree works for now, but the best place would be to make a home under the river. My earth and water sorceries would make that a cinch, and who the fuck would look for me under a river? My stomach growled at me, reminding me that I also lost enough food to last me years. I used flesh sorcery to shut that shit down. I don¡¯t need food right now, humans can last for days without food if need be. Keeping a small bottle of vitamins was my contingency plan. I could conjure water and swallow the vitamins and last for quite a long while without food.


    ¡°Hey!¡± Rath, yelled, interrupting my thoughts, ¡°Hold up your end of the bargain, gimme gimme gimme!¡±


    Uhg, I conjured a small pebble and put two enchantments on it, one to absorb ambient mana from the area, and the other base enchantment was the power generator for the greedy lizard. Then I conjured some copper wire and made a necklace, which I put around his neck. ¡°There, an endless stream of mana,¡± I said, ¡°decent flow but small enough to not attract attention, and an ambient mana soaker so that people don¡¯t notice the bleed-off.¡± I closed the bark behind him as he left. Hmmmm, wire. Metal can be made thin enough to be turned into wire, which can be braided into cables for extra strength, like muscle fibers. Can I do the same with crystal? Or maybe I can create crystalline structures in my bone fibers, so that I am a living battery of mana, or that the overflow of energy/mana/kinetic force will charge up my bones? The best example I have of this is the blending of materials that took place when I made Gungnir. Speaking of that staff, I¡¯ve had it charging all night and never checked on it. If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    Gently touching it with my magical senses showed that it was still nowhere near full. The three element crystals and the Chaos shard seemed to be a literal bottomless storage pit for power. I could crack a mountain in half with just the raw mana discharge alone, let alone using it in an aspected way. Chaos shards! Thinking about those freaked me out, what if they hadn¡¯t disintegrated from the blast? Leaving raw potential alone like that is not recommended. AH! MY WOMAN! I mean, she moved out of the shell into the tree a while ago and the tree survived, but holy fuck me on a stick! Man I¡¯m a bad fiance. I ran to the wall of the room that closest to the heart of the tree and pushed everything I had into the center of Yggdrasil¡¯s sapling. Felt way bigger on the inside, I mean, it is a tree that manipulates space, which is just a sub-section of time. Whew, she¡¯s ok, she seems to have stabilized her position in the heart of the tree. Ok, next priority, I checked my new upgraded armor, fully charged and good to go. Then I grabbed Gungnir, leaving it linked to the generator and giving it the full flow of mana. My staff seemed to shiver with excitement. ¡°All right, you like the mana, I got it,¡± I said, petting the magical mace, ¡°Now let¡¯s go see if your cousins are all right.¡±


    I linked myself to the mace¡¯s stores of energy just in case I needed it, then opened the tree and slowly climbed down, checking my surroundings every few feet. Norn was keeping watch, but I didn¡¯t trust the little bitch right now. He didn¡¯t help during the last confrontation or the one before that. I need to work on my magical mind domination for beasts. Perfecting that will give me so many options down the road. Yup, still looked like a bomb went off. I went down to the hole under the World Tree, and began hunting around for the Chaos shards. I felt two immediately and stuffed them in a pocket and then spent the next thirty minutes slowly searching the backyard. The blast would have sent them towards the alley behind the back yard. I found two more embedded in the neighbor¡¯s trees and one in the house further back than that. Two hours of painstaking searching did not lead to more easter eggs. Five would have to be enough for now.


    I set about repairing the landscape near and under the tree, conjuring dirt and rocks to fill in the hole and using nature sorcery to encourage the grass to grow quickly over it¡¯s new real estate. Yggdrasil now looked like it had its own tiny hill to stand on. Maybe I could take a lesson from Mr. Tolkien, and build myself a hobbit¡¯s burrow, but nuclear silo style. I went to the backyard and began to dig downwards toward the main root of the world tree. I kept going, banishing dirt and periodically turning the tunnel walls to stone for stability, until I was roughly sixty feet down. Then I began banishing more dirt and framing the walls with granite until I had a giant room to live in. Copying the plan from the arboreal room, I put another thick generator down here as well next to the main root spearing down from the new ceiling, but I also put runes of concealment and misdirection all over the generator, so anyone looking down here wouldn¡¯t see anything, their mystical eyes glazing over my living space. Then I made another huge crystal battery and linked it to the generator, having the same rough plan as before. I made a small side room with a stone tub that had a drainage chamber underneath that was set to banish its contents whenever it got full. Makeshift shower. Then I went back to the main room and made a granite countertop and put a stone plate off to the right, which, after putting a conditional heat enchantment on it, became my impromptu frying pan. Now I need to get some food and steal a couple beds for my bolt holes, then work on the next part of my buff-me-up plan, tattoos!

 Riverside Livin

    Passing out after a full day of getting my ass handed to me and enchanting is not hard. Flesh sorcery makes going to sleep and waking up too easy, as if I had perfectly planned out a schedule and stuck to it. I took some vitamins and silenced my hunger again, preparing to face the day. A nearby 7-11 store would have plenty of canned food, and there were several of those around. I got out of the underground hidey hole and crafted another barge and hoverboard and flew to the first one. Gathering all the canned contents was easy as I was on high alert and using Norn as a sentry and food pickup/dropoff. I repeated this for all of the gas stations and quikmarts and 7-11s nearby, filling up my living spaces with preserved food. That took most of my day as I also began knocking down the abandoned buildings. Pointing Gungnir at various buildings and saying, ¡°Knock that shit down¡± worked better than expected. Sometimes the spear blasted out concussive waves of force or summoned a tiny but fierce tornado. My own weapon gaining a kind of sentience is a little frightening, but fucking cool. I¡¯ve even noticed it shifting forms to suit my mood. I really need to ask Rath about that later.


    Getting back to my new underground home was a relief. A day without insane conflict or crazy deities was a good day. I scarfed down two cans of beef soup, guzzled some water and lay on the floor. I put my head next to the main root of the World Tree and put Gungnir on my chest. This tree is a gate, a waypoint to other places, the rest of the universe, or maybe a place nearby. One of my daily goals I had laid out in my head was to see if I can commune with this tree and figure out how to use it to get to places I want to go. My cheat is the nature sorcery, which should in theory allow me to make this process way faster than a normal dude asking a tree to take him somewhere. Meh, no luck today.


    I need blood. I want to make tattoos on my body with runes for a whole bunch of things, but I need blood. Blood is the only substance I can figure out that can hold magical power of a specific kind for a long time and grant it to other things. And it can¡¯t be my own. If it is, my regeneration will recognize it and reabsorb it into my body. I know, I tried. I spent hours with a pain block, bleeding and healing and then forcing inordinate amounts of mana into the bowl with the blood with some dark plant juice and carbon that I made into ink and then sticking myself with it over and over to get it to work. No dice. I need something like dragon¡¯s blood as a catalyst, but Rath just ran from me when I approached him with a giant needle. I did think about using the sap from the World Tree, cause sap is just plant blood, but I wasn¡¯t going to jeopardize the development of this tree in any way. This issue is also complicated by the fact that the mana levels of this world just weren¡¯t dense enough for powerful magical creatures to live here yet. Basically, I¡¯m either going to have to figure out how to travel to other worlds quickly to get what I need, or wait till Earth gets its big boy pants on and my ingredients for tattoos and bloodlines come here. And I really wanted to avoid other sorcerers right now, I¡¯m just too damn young to play in their yard. Fuck, I had more questions.


    I started by conjuring a flat stone to cover a big section of a wall to be my makeshift chalkboard. Then I conjured a shard of pure graphite and began to write out plans for power. Runic Tattoos that need powerful magical blood for my skin and bones, find epic beast and somehow steal or assimilate a bloodline, make epic weapons of war, find an elemental or creature to make into powerful familiar, travel far away and learn to cultivate, merge muscles of my body with crystal/metal to upgrade durability and magical storage, learn how to use gates including the World Tree, find out how to use Chaos shards for more sorceries or expand applications of what I already have, and last, how to kill a fucking goddess. Staring at my myriad options, I began marking ¡®P¡¯ for possible next to some of them and ¡®TMW¡¯ for too much work. Really need to start with the easier things, most of that shit was in the ¡®TMW¡¯ category for now. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    Since my two first hidey-holes were roughly done, I needed to make the third one, the under-the-river one. First, I went outside of my hole and went to my backyard. I know which way the river is, but I¡¯m doing this the safe way. I put a rock down and made a magical mark on it, investing just enough energy so that it would serve as a signal for me. Then I went back down to the underground room and closed it up, then turned and faced the signal. If you stand in my house and head for the back, and then just keep going for about three-quarters of a mile, you¡¯ll hit the river. So that¡¯s what I did with my little pocket generator handy, I started walking in the direction of the river, banishing dirt and lining the new tunnel with very thick stone about two feet thick, every ten feet or so adding a T-bar of solid iron coated with granite for stability. My tunnels were about seven feet tall and five feet wide, and I put small crystals with light enchantments on the T-bar reinforcements. It took an hour to finally get within fifty feet of the river as I really took my time making sure that this was safe and not gonna come down around me. I wanted this new residence to be my main one, with a tunnel entrance and a water entrance.


    As I could feel that I was within fifty feet of the river, I began making the tunnel head down as the room to be directly under the river, my water sorcery keeping me mindful of exactly how far away the current was. I kept going until I was directly under the center of the Rappahannock river. I made a little room here and then made another large generator for me as this next part was going to require stupid amounts of power. I linked myself and Gungnir to it and then turned the power to max flow and got to work. I simultaneously turned the surrounding dirt and mud to stone, then slowly banished it to expand the room until I could fit a warehouse down here. When I finished making room, I used earth sorcery to put runes of strength, stability and concealment on the walls so that the new cave would not implode under the weight and force of the river. Now to make this efficient; I grasped the ceiling of the cavern with my sorcery and slowly made a pillar of stone grow up from the roof of the stone cavern until it was in the bottom of the river itself and then grow up some more, but not so that it was sticking out of the water. On this pillar, I used earth sorcery to put runes of kinetic conversion, so that the current of the river washing and pushing on the stone cylinder would constantly generate mana, and then I created a transference enchantment so that the mana generated from the kinetic action would drain into the runes keeping the entire cavern perfectly structurally sound. Placing small crystals with light enchantments after all of this was actually the hardest part as my mind was exhausted from all the channeling.


    I used flesh sorcery to temporarily refresh myself as I wanted to get this whole project done today. I conjured a thick stone cylinder that extended out of the roof of the cavern into the river, then I banished some of the stone inside it so that it was hollow, but with a stone seal every ten feet. This would serve as a river entrance with my water sorcery. I could get to the hollow cylinder by diving in the river, banish the stone seal and get in, then seal it back up and banish some of the water, and repeat until I traveled through it to my cavern. This was the emergency entrance/exit if I needed it as it had so many steps to get in and out. The main way to get in would be using nature sorcery to walk into the hollow tree that I was going to grow on the river bank, and using the stairs to get to the tunnel, which is what I went outside to finish.


    Night had fully fallen by the time I finished making the secondary entrance tunnel with stairs and growing the oak tree and convincing it that being hollow was in fact not a bad thing. Three entrances to my main home, and it had a generator to start my next round of projects. My hands were coming off the hollow oak tree when I heard a whine behind me. I whirled around with Gungnir pointing at the source of the sound, the glow of the blade illuminating a small dog, cowering in the sudden bright light. My back was to the tree, so I didn¡¯t have to fear a threat from that specific direction, but that didn¡¯t stop me from using my magical senses to assault the area to try to find the dog¡¯s friends. I didn¡¯t sense anything other than this beat mutt, weird, dogs usually run in packs. I turned Gungnir into a knife and pivoted my hold so that the blade was running along my forearm, not pointed at the dog. With my left hand, I pulled a can of beef soup out and placed it on the ground. Conjuring a small bowl, I popped the can and poured it in, not taking my eyes off the dog.

 Smarter Prep work

    ¡°Hey buddy. I have food,¡± I said in the softest, kindest tones I could muster, ¡°My lady always said she got to my heart through my stomach, and you¡¯re man¡¯s best friend.¡± I used flesh sorcery and my very weak mental abilities to try and send comforting thoughts of safety and food and kindness to the animal. It stepped forward slowly, favoring its back legs. It looked like a pitbull mixed with a boxer, and then throw a little rottweiler in there too. I bet it would be a beautiful animal if it wasn¡¯t so starved and beat up. ¡°Come on then,¡± I whispered, ¡°I got more food.¡± I popped another can of soup and set it next to the bowl. As the dog came closer, I nudged the bowl further away from me and closer to it. The mutt never took its eyes off of me while it ate, wolfing it down. I slowly reached over when it finished and the dog jumped back. I poured the second can of soup in the bowl and retracted my hand. ¡°Hey now, I¡¯m not gonna hurt ya, I promise,¡± I said, ¡°Wouldn¡¯t go through all the trouble of feeding you just to getcha.¡± It finished the second bowl faster than the first. I sat down indian style and put Gungnir on the ground and just watched the dog as it gave me the puppy eyes treatment.


    The dog looked at me for a moment and then limped over and laid down in front of me. I slowly reached out and put my hand on its side. I looked down and checked, yup, that¡¯s a male dog. ¡°Hey, you got a name? Maybe a nice fancy collar from a rich family that loves ya?¡± I asked, slowly petting the dog, letting tendrils of my flesh magic slowly connect and start the healing process. I took my time, carefully putting in a pain block and healing the poor pup as I talked to him about nothing. I removed a couple nasty open cuts and the beginnings of an infection, then realigned the break that had halfway healed and fixed the surrounding tissue. I went from head to tail making sure that he was in tip-top shape. I lay back, exhausted and done for the day. My flesh sorcery showed me that he was an adolescent mutt and that I was probably right on the mixture of the breeds, and that he was probably around two years old. ¡°I don¡¯t have the energy for cool names right now,¡± I said, fighting the mental strain of a full day of working magic, ¡°I dub thee Spot! Cause you got a big-ass spot of soup on that dirty face of yours.¡± I conjured a bit of water to wash out his bowl and then more to fill it up.


    Picking myself up, I opened the hollow tree, Spot¡¯s head shooting up off the ground. ¡°You comin?¡± I asked. He looked at his water bowl and then proceeded to get up and lap it all down, then he sprang into the tree. I pulled Gungnir who then changed into a mace and began to glow, lighting our way. Ten minutes later, I was passed out on the floor of my river bottom home with a new friend.


    A nasty wet tongue woke me up out of a dead sleep, which I pushed away with my hand and wiped my face off. ¡°Gerroff¡±, I mumbled. A sharp bark finished waking me out of the dead sleep, ¡°All right, alright,¡± I said, ¡°I¡¯m up.¡± Spot was prancing back and forth. Ah, morning time. I had a dog years ago, this is when they like to sniff and crap. I picked up Gungnir from where it was charging all night and took Spot outside. He sprinted around sniffing his new territory and doing his business. As he was doing his morning routine, I was doing mine, checking my armor. I let my magical senses flow over everything, making sure everything was still good to go, fully charged, and that the enchantments hadn¡¯t degraded. As Spot wasn¡¯t back yet, I pulled out my two pocket generators from where I kept them. I really needed to rework these. I¡¯ve noticed that the bigger generators, due to their size and structure, are far more stable than these little ones. The power outflow at this size just overpowers the structural integrity of the enchantment causing it to degrade over time. I took one of them and strengthened the enchantment and made the overall stone base bigger so that it was a cylinder the size of a large water bottle. The power outflow was several times more as it directly coincided with the size of the generator. I then turn Gungnir into a spear and lay the Chaos crystal spear blade on top of it so that they were parallel. I sent the image of Gungnir enveloping or storing the generator to the spear and with a weird pop the modified generator vanished! Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    I could still feel it though, pumping out mana which Gungnir happily stored away, and gave to me when I linked myself to it. FUCK YES. I honestly believe that I¡¯m just going to have to bind this weapon to myself as it is just way too useful to let go. It can change forms, use my own sorcery and others that I can¡¯t, and store my mana generators for me! Hell yes I¡¯m pumped. It took about an hour to figure out how big of a generator Gungnir could hold. The one¡¯s back at my river-bottom home were way too big; the biggest it could fit was about the size of a basket-ball, so I made that generator special. It was a granite sphere, as that is the most stable of all the shapes with a fairly low molecular bonding, and it had runes of stability and conversion along with the classic matter to mana formula. I filled everything in with as it holds enchantments the best and sent it into Gungnir. I then took my last pocket generator and wrapped it in black gold and shaped it to fit around my neck and a bit of my chest. Then I put two enchantments on its and directed the split the power flow to both. The first enchantment was only for boosting my natural healing regeneration and stamina upkeep, and the second was for healing at my direction. And then I put a conditional statement in the enchantments, that if they are damaged in any way, that they will just shut down completely. Last but not least, I cut open my hand and covered Gungnir in blood while I healed and conjured more inside of my body. With my blood covering it, I wove an enchantment of binding and joining between me and the weapon so that I could easily call it to me if it wasn¡¯t within reach and so that I would always know where it was, a sort of ever-present compass in my mind.


    ¡°FINALLY DID SOMETHING SMART DID¡¯YA!!!!¡±

 A Mind of its Own

    No fuckin way. I looked around, definitely wasn¡¯t Spot, or Rath for that matter. Logic dictates that it¡¯s probably the magical shape-shifting weapon that I bound to me with buckets of blood. I looked the bloody Spear up and down, then reached towards it with my mind.


    ¡°I¡¯VE ONLY BEEN BEGGING FOR ATTENTION, BUT NOOOOO.¡±


    The mental shouting from the spear felt like a jackhammer inside of my skull trying to burrow its way out.


    ¡°Way too loud asshat,¡± I grunted out, massaging my head, ¡°Please turn down the volume or I¡¯ll throw you in the fucking river.¡±


    ¡°Not likely,¡± it retorted, ¡°I¡¯m too epic for that.¡± I could feel its smugness through our link. ¡°AND, I¡¯m gorgeous. Check out these lines of POWER!¡± The inner veins of magic and metal flowing through the wood lit up different colors. ¡°Dude, let¡¯s go slay goblins or wreck some nightwalker¡¯s day!¡± it crowed, then adopted a grunting chant, ¡°We got monsters to kill and mana to drink, blood to spill and thoughts to think!¡±


    Way too much energy this early in the morning. It¡¯s like I combined the yappy energy of a Chihuahua with my own inner sadistic, sarcastic dark side. ¡°POWER OVERWHELMING BITCHES!¡± Gungnir shouted, sending out an omni-directional pulse of multi-colored mana.


    "HEY!¡± I said, blasting my thoughts at the weapon, ¡°You are mine! No doing crazy shit unless I fucking say so. GOT IT?!¡±


    Gungnir sent thoughts of a dog tucking its tail between its legs. ¡°All right,¡± I said, ¡°Now, with all that crazy energy ya go going on there, what smart thing would you recommend I do?¡±


    ¡°Dude, you need a familiar,¡± it answered, ¡°I¡¯m awesome, but you need a set of eyes and ears watching your back, like that furry thing over there, forty feet behind you. My scans show that its senses are far superior to yours as well as its stamina. Does that translate sexually?¡±


    I didn¡¯t even know how to answer that, so I just ignored that last part. I can¡¯t be seen arguing with my own spear about the sexual complexities of humans. ¡°Familiar? Spot? Wouldn¡¯t some awesome magical creature like a dragon or wyvern be better?¡± I asked.


    The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°Hahahahaha, you couldn¡¯t handle bonding with one of those if they were unconscious and brain dead!¡± Gungnir replied, vibrating with laughter, ¡°The dog is man¡¯s best friend, practically pre-made to be your traveling partner. Besides, who says you can¡¯t give it an upgrade?¡±


    It¡¯s right. I could totally pimp out Spot. I let out a sharp whistle and Spot came running, jumping right into my arms and knocking me over, licking every scrap of skin he could find. Pushing him off and petting him, I lay back against a tree and started to think, which of course Gungnir just had to interrupt, ¡°Yo! Make it bigger! Make the fur sharp and spiny! OH WAIT, merge it with an elemental or expand its brain! WAIT! Use one of those morphing rocks to give it sorcery! That would be so cool, a furry attack thing shooting fire or riding the earth!¡±


    Ya know, maybe the incessant spear had a point. I could experiment with the dog, see if some of the upgrades I had planned for myself were viable in other living things. But I gotta make sure this dog actually likes me and plans on sticking around, so that¡¯s how I spent the next couple days. I formed a tiny mental link with Spot and slowly strengthened it while keeping him fed, weaving a bond of magic between us. Soon I could feel his emotions and things he wanted, such as [FOOD] or [PEE]. Very basic but understandable drives. I also took the time to flesh out my three bolt holes with furniture and canned food that I looted from the surrounding houses while playing fetch with Spot. I used baseballs and tennis balls that I found in the abandoned houses. I also began knocking down buildings with Gungnir to get Spot used to my various attack magics. The damn spear was all too happy to fuck shit up, finding different ways to blow up cars and houses after I had looted them. Some things I definitely made sure to get were various cooking items and toiletry things, enough for all three hideouts. But as the week drew to a close, I began getting nervous. I had almost lost track of the days because the last few were fun and relaxing. But I knew that another Ripple would be here soon, and I needed to prepare.


    It had been almost a week since the last Ripple came through town, leaving everything untouched except the magical entities of this world. The Ripple seemed to take the mundane and make it magical, and exacerbate or twist or enhance the existing magical. That¡¯s probably why I was in such pain last time, the Ripple inundating me with Change while my flesh sorceries tried to keep me in one piece. The pain was from resisting the change, I think. Then again, I could be totally fucked up in my thinking. But I am not the creature to test this out on. I conjured a standard diamond, about the size of my thumbnail, and conjured a thin shackle of stone around it, making a large ring. Calling Norn to me, I placed it around his ankle. If the big bird survived the waves of a dying god, then I could test him and the stone for weird magical energy or unexplained changes. I thought about testing my theories out on Spot, but needed to make our master and familiar bond more permanent. I went to my river-bottom bolthole and set up about gathering and conjuring materials to keep me busy; I planned on enchanting some awesome weapons while the Ripple rewrote the surface, and having Spot around to keep me company.


    Pacing around in the cavern was not helping anyone, least of all Spot. Fucking spaz kept thinking we were going for a walk or something, running around barking and hopping. I had conjured a nice ten by ten foot plot of soft loam and sprouted lush green grass all over it so he could crap all over it. Of course he chose the furthest corner of the cavern to do his business in. I had bars of gold, silver, iron and stone laid out near the power generator that were calling my name, and a small plot of land with several small different kinds of trees growing there, rowan next to cedar and oak. I had an idea for small disposable wands to serve as foci for different works of magic that I normally wouldn¡¯t be able to do along with permanent wards based in living wood and control ring enchantments etched in precious metals for stability and flexibility. Maybe after this Ripple I could begin to knock down buildings and create a dense forest soaked in my magic, the land itself resisting my enemies at every turn. Whew, good thing my flesh sorcery can reverse old age, cause I got a lot of shit to do.

 Beef up the Pup

    But Spot wouldn¡¯t let me do it. The energy of a young dog is rather hard to deal with when the outside land bursting with life is so close and yet so far away. ¡°Fine! You want epic mind-blowing abilities that no Earthen dog has ever possessed before?!¡± I shouted, tossing a tennis ball up into the air. As I caught the ball, Spot¡¯s full attention was lasered in on it. My outward excitement mirrored his as he vibrated with happiness as the thought of fetching a ball.


    ¡°Yeah!¡± Gungnir joined in, ¡°Give it to him! I need a wreckin buddy!¡±


    I tossed the ball to the overeager dog, which he tore to shreds in a few moments of epic bliss. I reached out and scratched behind his ears, then used my flesh sorcery to gently put him to sleep. I took a shard of Chaos that I had specially prepared beforehand with runes of joining and flesh. Placing the shard on Spot, I turned on the big generator to full power and began channeling the mana through me and into Gungnir, and then into the Chaos crystal, super charging it. I mentally sent my plan to Gungnir through our link as his senses were superior to mine and could make necessary changes on the fly. Also, his ridiculous stores of mana were there just in case. Making a small cut on Spot¡¯s shoulder, I put the tip of the shard in the wound and let the mana flow from Gungnir to the shard, which began to dissolve into the wound. All of my concentration focused on joining this animal with the raw energy of possibility and creating what wasn¡¯t there before. I gave Spot an instinctive sorcery over flesh, using my own sorcery as a framework, a pattern to be followed as it sank into every cell, permeating the very fiber of his being. Intents, thoughts and images flowed from me to Spot, concepts of self healing/regeneration/bone armor coupled with enhanced strength/speed/endurance. My dog will be a bony bruiser, capable of pulling sentry duty and healing when needed, but something was missing. As the crystal shard had almost dissolved, I imparted the concept bloodline stealing as well. I wanted this dog to eat other creatures and gain from their loss, to become a powerful familiar that make my enemies run in fear.


    ¡°Oh that¡¯s the right stuff,¡± Gungnir cackled with excitement, ¡°Scaling mutt gonna make all the goblins run, and don¡¯t even talk about the squirrels. Them fuzzy bitches won¡¯t know what hit them! Yo! Make him able to climb trees, even cats will know fear!¡±


    The spear suddenly cut off the flow of magic. ¡°All done with this dude man, can we do another?¡± it pleaded.This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    I think I might have imprinted my less than sane side to the spear. Some of its ideas were great, but it really had no concept of brakes. You need to test what you create, and then go from there. I had time, it had time, we all had time. But fuck yeah I wanted to make another. Actually, I wanted to improve this concept right now though. The main reason for giving Spot flesh sorcery was for the foundation it gave. It¡¯s more than healing, it''s manipulating your body to accept a new normal, to invent a new standard. Crystalline muscle fibers for strength and mana storage is not normal for mutts, but it will be for this one, soon. Using my own flesh sorcery as a scaffold or pattern for Spots would also allow me to more easily make changes in his body. I made Spot grow in size and muscular density until he was the size of a big wolf, then I made sure his bones were a little denser than a normal dogs would be and I overpowered his bite strength and back leg strength, giving him the ability to leap incredible distances and flat out tackle enemies. He had the sturdy build of a pitbull with rottweiler in there, so I worked on his weaknesses. Using flesh sorcery to grow more nerves in his shorter nasal cavity cranked up his sniffing sense to be more acute than a bloodhounds, and I messed around for a while with his eyes until he had the kind of vision Norn would envy. I widened his paws for more grip and toughened every part of his body, adding some more bone here and there to give better support and lengthened his teeth by just a bit, making sure that the enamel was much thicker than normal. If I saw a goblin, I wanted to be able to ¡°Sick¡¯em¡± and let Spot deal with the problem while I dealt with whatever else was going on. As I was making sure the final touches on the first transformation of my pooch was good to go, mainly checking for inherent mechanical problems, the fifth Ripple arrived.


    I had prepared for this moment in several different ways. There were going to be seven Ripples total and three of them left. My first visitor, who I¡¯m pretty sure was either Hermes or Mercury, had told me that when this particular deity died, the Ripples were pure change and Chaos, which was the only thing that could break the dimensional seal keeping Earth in its own closeted magic-less space. After putting in runes of stability and reinforcement all along the walls of my river-bottom cavern, I had also taken some time to put runes of energy diversion/dispersal/conversion all over the walls to counteract or shield my living space from the Wave that might kill me. But that wasn¡¯t all, I had also cleared a small piece of land not far from my hollow tree entrance and placed a couple key items there for when the Ripples came. I had five shards of Chaos that I recovered from my last run in with a deity, and used one of them on Spot, leaving me with four. These shards were my best and greatest trump cards as they could maybe do anything if I figured out the best way to use them. Which means, that I needed more. On that plot of land, I put out small conjured spheres of granite, onyx, obsidian, gold, silver, platinum, diamond, quartz, and a pile of glass from looted houses. Maybe I could find a material that when exposed to Chaos, became the crystal shards that I could use. And if worked, then there were two more Ripples coming my way that I could seriously take advantage of.

 The Fifth Ripple

    ¡°ONE ETERNITY ENDS, DUST CLAIMS ITS DUE.¡±


    The message shook my hopefully safe cavern, all of my wards and runes lighting up. I didn¡¯t feel any pain and Spot was sleeping peacefully next to his bowls of soup. I gripped Gungnir, ¡°Just in case, I need you to protect Spot and I,¡± I told the spear, ¡°Absorb whatever energy makes its way through the wards.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re telling me to eat?¡± Gungnir giggled, ¡°I can do that all day! I mean, I already do that all day. Can weapons get fat? Humans can and dogs can, but what about me?¡±


    ¡°The bleeding weak lift their throats, set loose the cull.¡±


    The glowing increased in intensity all around as I knelt next to Spot, Gungnir in spear form pointed up. ¡°Bring it on! Gimme that beautiful delicious power!¡±


    Its jubilations were started to get on my nerves, but I was glad for a reliable shield. Spot woke up suddenly and looked at me, concern and curiosity twanging our mental link. ¡°It¡¯s ok buddy, you¡¯re safe,¡± I reassured him while petting him, ¡°And, I gave you epic upgrades too!¡± He looked over and began wolfing down his food.


    ¡°Alter, shift, change, adapt, transpose, grow.¡±


    As the first segment of the last part of the Ripple rang out, Spot jumped up and sprang across the cavern, knocking the bowls everywhere. He landed in a crouch, then began howling at the ceiling as the rest of the emotional levels of the Ripple vibrated reality.


    ¡°Uh oh,¡± Gugnir said, ¡°Didn¡¯t see that coming.¡±


    Spot¡¯s body began to contort and twist, growing until he was the size of a small car, his fur turning dark brown and black. Spines of bone sprouted along his spine and then shrank back in, the same happening to the nails on his feet. Bone armor sprouted along the flat areas of his body and then vanished. This was happening so fast that my shock kept me frozen.


    ¡°Uhm, hello?! Wake up fleshbag!¡± Gungnir¡¯s voice breaking the slow motion shock I was experiencing, ¡°Might wanna keep that bond going before the Change breaks that!¡±Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    Pulling energy from Gungnir, I focused on my mental connection that I had been weaving between Spot and I and saw that the threads I¡¯d been braiding were slowly stretching and snapping. ¡°Oh hell no,¡± I growled walking over to Spot, ¡°My dog, my sorcery, my bond, MINE!¡± The entire time repairing the bond and sending pure mana down that link, adding more strings to the entire rope and fixing the snapped fibers. I treated it like a muscle and my flesh sorcery took over, making the entire bond stronger from the stress. A wave of instinct rushed out of Spot, cresting over my mind like a tidal wave hitting a cliff. Run, hunt, food, master, scratches, pee, HUNT, food/prey, change, GROW! His primitive thoughts rebounded off of me as I made the mental bond stronger, incorporating his own pack instincts into it and using my flesh sorcery as the authority. I am the alpha. I am the master. I direct the hunt.


    Spot grew again as the last of the Ripple faded away, bulging to the size of an armored humvee. The bonds once again strained and bulged as the instinct to challenge rose up, which I mercilessly squashed with my mind while at the same time using my flesh sorcery to take over his, forcing his body to submit to me. As his minor flesh sorcery was gestated from my own, his body would always obey me. It could not rebel as my sorcery ran through every enhanced cell in his body. His huge body lay down and rolled over, exposing his belly. I felt his normal puppy mind come to the fore as the effects of the Ripple flowed through and out of him. My dog was huge, not Clifford huge, but big enough to seriously fuck a place up. I let my senses wash through him, examining the changes in his body. The Chaos had done a better job than I could have, making and melding everything perfectly in his body, enhancing his size and sorcery, and even his mind. I could see that he somehow could grasp more complex commands, his brain was larger and sparking fast. Fuckin tight. An intelligent tank sized attack dog with bone armor and ridiculous regeneration. Can¡¯t wait to test this out.


    It took me about an hour to expand my tunnels and entrances so that Spot could get out. I don¡¯t think he¡¯s an inside dog anymore, but I need to be able to put him back in the cavern for the last two Ripples. I really wanted to check on my various materials that I had left out for the Change, but I wasn¡¯t taking any chances. My armor was ready to go and Gungnir was rip-roaring eager. He kept spouting songs in my head, and as we emerged from the tunnel to greet the new Earth he kept screaming ¡°LET THE BODIES HIT THE FLOOR!¡±


    I emerged into an almost alien land. I was on top of Spot, riding on his big neck, with my new platinum shield and tricked out spear, ready to do battle with whatever was here, but nothing was the same. The river behind me was gigantic with a waterfall over it, which was impossible as the Rappahancok river is a very small tame river. The trees around me were also huge, redwoods would be jealous. The smallest I could see I wouldn¡¯t be able to fit my arms around, and the canopies almost blocked out the sun. ¡°Stay,¡± I ordered Spot as a herd of whitetail deer the size of cars came running by. They ran past us, on to the river, and sprinted on its surface out of sight. ¡°Gungnir, I dearly hope you know what¡¯s going on.¡± I said very, very  quietly.


    ¡°Duh,¡± it said, ¡°Alter, shift, change, adapt, transpose, grow. Don¡¯t you remember? It was like an hour ago.¡±


    ¡°Right you stupid spear, but what exactly does that mean?¡± I pressed, looking around me and seeing nothing of the old Earth.


    ¡°It means that maybe the dimensional seal fully broke and mana is all the way back, which also means that the next two waves are really going to fuck shit up. Check it out, the mana levels are ridiculous!¡± it said, its happiness translating into emitting lights like an old school rave.

 Rough Neighborhood

    Just when I think I¡¯m coming out ahead, like right now, when I¡¯m sitting on top of a huge fucking attack dog covered in bone armor that could eat a rhino for breakfast, some-fucking-how I still feel small and unaccomplished. The trees are huge, the deer are huge, the river is huge, my dog is huge. I¡¯m gonna need some fucking therapy by the time I¡¯m done with this shit-show. ¡°Oh hell yes!¡± Gungnir screamed, ¡°Get them bitches, go on, don¡¯t you let prey get away!¡± Apparently Spot heard the encouragement he was looking for as we are all mentally linked together through me. Time slowed for just a second as I felt his haunches bunch up and his body aim at the herd of deer, his snout zoning in on the fleeing deer. I used that second to grow a set of handles and footrests on Spot¡¯s armor, which I barely grabbed in time as the living crotch rocket took off. In my panic, I hadn¡¯t even noticed Gungnir slipping out of my hand and morphing into a sphere the size of a bowling ball, one half of it was crystalline while the other half was wood shot through with the precious metals from when I crafted it.


    It was floating by my head, keeping pace as Spot tore through the forest, it was all I could do to hold on for dear life as I knew that I let go or somehow slipped then this dumb dog would chase the deer to the ends of the earth. ¡°Gungnir,¡± I wildly thought at the satellite that was my weapon, ¡°For the love of fucking god, shoot one of those deer! But just one, and in the leg!¡±


    Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a blue flash pulse from the ¡®eye¡¯ of Gungnir, a long spear of ice ripping out of it and downing a giant deer. There was no hesitation whatsoever from Spot. As the deer was tumbling from one leg being taken out, the furry linebacker hauled ass and trucked it right into a tree, then grasped its neck in his jaws and whipped it around like a chew toy, its spine clearly broken from the nasty pops that echoed out. ¡°Bullseye bitches!¡± Gungnir celebrated, ¡°Another one bites the dust!¡± I felt it condensing mana, ¡°WAIT!¡± I commanded, ¡°Go for one with horns, a male.¡±  Another bright blue bolt shot out, I turned my head to watch it travel, mist trailing behind it. ¡°Pooper shot!¡± the modified floating sphere cried out as the ice spear disappeared from view. ¡°Spot, come on . . . ¡° I started, but after seeing him enjoying his meal as if he¡¯s never eaten a day in his life, I decided not to get between a mammoth dog and his food. ¡°Gungnir, with me, you¡¯re my eye in the sky,¡± I said, drawing on the energy flow from Gungnir to buff myself up. It felt weird not actually holding a weapon, especially the one that I crafted and is now bound to me. I¡¯m not sure how much or what exactly I did when I bound it to me, or what the effects of the Chaos shard spearpoint are. Did I give Gungnir true sentience, or did he copy/absorb a part of me, so I¡¯m fighting with an extra limb so to speak. What I would give to speak to an experienced magic user.


    Sprinting to where Gungnir shot the ice bolt took no time at all as the magical energy blasting, smart ass, partially psychotic satellite had really damn good aim. The deer was less than fifty yards away from where Spot was feasting, lying on the ground with its vitality pooling on the ground. It was humbling. What used to be a deer that I could throw over my shoulder would now take a tow truck to move. ¡°End it,¡± I said, ¡°Always be respectful in the hunt.¡± Without snark, an ice bolt speared the deer through the head, instantly killing it. A deep growl came from the left, stepping out of bushes, shadows pooling around something I had never seen before, something as big as Spot. I took a step back as scaled forearms revealed themselves and giant gorilla head roared at me. A freaking cross between a gorilla and a monitor lizard, complete with scaled limbs and torso with a thick tail dragging behind it, slowly stepped forward, confident in its size and prowess, the alpha of its territory. Basically, an armored gorilla came here to take my kill. Gungnir displayed no reticence, no fear, no hesitation, and began pumping out lightning and ice spears and high powered balls of condensed wind. As Gungnir was my weapon that floated instead of staying in my hands, I stepping back and whistling for Spot while yanking on our mental link. The various magics crashed against the scaly chest of the gorilla, the ice spears barely piercing while the air cannons hit him like decent punches. What really got him angry was the lightning, momentarily paralyzing and burning him. Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.


    I gathered power from Gungnir and began pooling it, condensing it in my right hand, raw mana ready for molding, and then began injecting my flesh sorcery into it, molding concepts of domination/submission/obedience into it. The mana became visible and morphed into solid rune that looked like chains with thorns wrapping around a heart. I felt Spot getting closer, the ground vibrating with his stampeding fury, already angry that his beloved friend and master was in danger. In combat, words were too slow. I sent Gungnir a quick mental picture of a giant lightning strike knocking the mutated gorilla to the ground. Not even a second went by before Gungnir made it so, a white hot bolt of lightning the thickness of a man¡¯s torso rammed into the gorilla¡¯s forehead. The lightning hit so fast the gorilla didn¡¯t even react, just took a step forward and began falling, right into the charging giant armored dog that tackled him into one of the redwood sized oak trees behind it. I sent Spot an image of subduing the beast, his jaws around its neck and a truck tire sized paw on its chest. As Spot finished his tackle into the tree and came back down, Gungnir unleashed another lightning bolt, smaller this time. Spot bit the lead foot of the gorilla and yanked him off his feet then lunged and secured the gorilla by the neck, just tight enough to make breathing difficult. I waited for ten seconds, just to make sure the gorilla got the message. Walking around the gorilla, my mind idly wandered for a second, thinking of Norn as our mental link was so thin, probably meaning he¡¯s very far away. Back to king kong over here though, his eyes tracking me and the pulsing red rune of dominating flesh magic vibrated in my hand. I used earth sorcery and conjured stone all over the gorilla¡¯s limbs and then cranked up the weight by adding a temporary gravity enchantment on all four limbs. It was shaky but I only needed it to last for a minute.  I quickly walked to the giant head of the gorilla and slammed the basketball sized rune into gorillas forehead, he roared and the world shifted.


    ¡°Enter my mind and think to restrain me?¡± the reptilian gorilla roared, his voice reverberating off the dark cavern we found ourselves in. He was oddly small, suddenly small enough for a normal dog to take him out, and I was huge. I didn¡¯t really understand his words but the thoughts in his roar communicated well and my flesh sorcery was kind enough to translate the gist. My body was less solid but far more powerful than I remembered, the rune I had slammed into his head was back in my hand but smaller by half. I conjured stone and nothing happened, I couldn¡¯t feel my magic except for the flesh sorcery. The little ape launched itself at me and I caught it by the throat and slammed the rune into its head again, this time slamming it with the full force of my flesh sorcery. ¡°Serve me,¡± I sent, my flesh sorcery making it shake this mental realm inside of the ape¡¯s mind, ¡°Bound to me, to my will, bound to mine, tighter still.¡± The rune of a heart bound in thorny chains unwound and speared into the small ape in my hand. I let go of the ape and it fell to the ground, ethereal blood leaking from the small wound. The heart itself moved down to its chest and sank in, then the chains sank in after it. The ape sat up, hate in his eyes, his tail whipping like an angry cat before it lunges.

 Poor Planning Diverted

    The next moment had me back in my body staring at the prone ape, his will bound to mine, his body still. ¡°Let go boy,¡± I said to Spot, ¡°It¡¯s ok.¡± Spot stepped back gingerly, not trusting the former attacker of his master. His lips were peeled back from his teeth, a low growl rumbling out. His muscles were bunched, still ready to pounce just in case the gorilla made the wrong move. Gungnir crackled with lightning, floating around my head while I put my hand on the gorilla¡¯s head and pushed my flesh sorcery in, taking command of his body and mind. ¡°You will not harm me or mine. You will obey the language and spirit of my commands, you will do everything to help me with whatever context I clarify at the time. Your main job is to serve as my guard. Your priority is that my enemies never get close to me. Treat well with me and I will do the same for you. I will do my best to make sure you are healthy and well taken care of.¡± My flesh sorcery imprinted every emotion and intent of my words into the gorilla¡¯s cells, binding him to me and creating a master/slave mental link.


    I stepped back and let him up. That big body rolled over surprisingly quick for its size. ¡°All right, I need a name for you. I¡¯m not too good with names, I mean, I called the dog ¡®Spot¡¯, but ¡®Kong¡¯ is overrated anyways even though it fits,¡± I rambled, ¡°but it could be short for ¡®Wukong¡¯ instead of ¡®King Kong¡¯, so that may work. Nerds could make a good case for a roided out skyscraper climbing gorilla versus the mystical martial arts master monkey. Eh, this requires too much work, Kong it is!¡± Being a little drunk on my own power felt great, good enough to let the lameness of the naming slide. I reached out with my flesh sorcery and healed the newly dubbed Kong, then I put a conditional trigger enchantment in his spine near the base of his skull. If I ever needed to, I could trigger it through a code word or a touch of sorcery and it would instantly paralyze him. Paranoia isn¡¯t paranoia if it might actually happen, so instead, I¡¯m going to prepare.


    ¡°Listen up Kong,¡± I looked up at him, ¡°I have a job for you. I want you to patrol this forest and chase away anything considered a threat to deer. If it¡¯s too dangerous for you to take on, watch it and learn about it and report back to me. Be back at this tree by tonight, got it?¡± Kong nodded his head, chuffed and then looked himself over, slightly amazed that his wounds were all gone. Then he walked into the bushes and vanished with scary silence. ¡°Fuckin sleuthy snake monkey,¡± I muttered, turning back to Spot, ¡°That¡¯s your new friend. You both are my guards now, got it?¡± Agreement came in the form of enthusiastic barking that nearly made me deaf. Using Spot¡¯s muscle, I had him drag the huge deer Gungnir iced back to the river-bottom cavern. It took forever as he kept trying to eat it the whole time. Gungnir was oddly silent the whole time, staying two feet away from my shoulder, floating smoothly but erratically crackling with sparks and breaking ice. I conjured a large stone box near my makeshift magical kitchen to be my meat freezer and put in runes of cold and freshness up and down the sides of it. As I was butchering the humongous deer and using a conjured sharp stone knife to do it, I asked Gungnir while evaluating it with my magical senses, ¡°What¡¯s going on with you?¡± A verifiable sun of magical power was contained within Gungnir, beating at the inner edges of the crystal half, ¡°Dude, what in the world is going on?¡±


    The matter to mana power generator that I had placed inside of Gungnir had been altered somehow. It looked like the power governor and conditional shutoff had been removed and now it was just pumping out insane amounts of raw mana and being condensed inside of the Chaos crystal that was Gungnir. I grabbed it with my mind and forcibly wrenched it into spear form, then sprinted to the far side of my cavern where my magical senses showed me the river¡¯s ley line of power flowed. It showed up blue to me as my nature and water sorcery outlined the exact location. Gripping Gungnir, I stabbed it into the wall and forcibly lengthened the crystal tip until it was in the ley line and created a channel for the excess energy to flow out from the spear to the ley line. It was the right idea, but the smart thing to do would have been to let go just before making the channel and let the magical energies do their own thing. I let go half a second too late and it was as if I was connected to an electrical socket the size of a mountain, blowing me back forty feet. My shield protected me from the inertia and my armor absorbed the bleed off of the spear, completely charging every bit of it to full.Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    The sight of this process was amazing to watch. The sun of power contained in the spear being injected into the river of natural mana was just awesome, magnificent reds and yellows swirling with purples and greens meeting the blue of the ley line and dissipating. As it became safe-ish to approach, I grabbed the handle of Gungnir and reaching in with my magic and felt the power generator, and replaced the conditional triggers and safety governors on it. ¡°That, was, AWESOME!¡± Gungnir¡¯s voice squeaked out, ¡°We need to do that shit again!¡±


    ¡°You did this?¡± my temper rising as I clarified.


    ¡°Well duh,¡± the weapon replied, ¡°I wanted to see how much power I could hold.¡±


    Seeing the lack of responsibility and intelligence from my spear, I began to weave an enchantment of restriction and confinement and placed it inside the crystal, surrounding the generator. ¡°Oh come on!¡± Gungnir whined, ¡°That¡¯s no fair! What if we need the power?¡±


    ¡°Then I¡¯ll take it off,¡± I replied, ¡°but you do that again and I take it out, completely. You get a set amount of mana, a constant low stream. I can¡¯t have you going nuclear here.¡±


    ¡°But, but, POWER!¡± it started,


    ¡°Is outweighed by intelligence.¡± I finished. ¡°Now, we need to do something about this. I have to finish with that deer and then craft another weapon. If you¡¯re going to be floating around as my Rod of God satellite and power source, then I need something to hold and focus here.¡±


    ¡°I vote ax! Or a humongous sword, ladies love a big sword!¡± Gungnir chirped. Crap. It was back. Already miss the silence.


    It took two hours to fully dress that deer and clean up the mess, I was tired but had enough meat to last a whole year. Now it was time to create a new weapon. I had Gungnir for killing or stunning huge monsters like Kong, but I did need something for many small targets, like a swarm of goblins or pack of dogs. A gun would be perfect, but I didn¡¯t have those anymore and finding them would be hard to do, especially if the entire world got changed to what I saw just a few hours ago. I wanted to go find my test materials, but I really had no confidence that I would be able to in that wild mess. Conjuring a large stone plate, circular in shape and about two feet across, I placed it on top of the generator in the center of the room. Then I ran down my tunnel to where it came out near the World Tree and began pumping mana into the root, making it grow a small disk of wood which I then separated with nature sorcery and put in my pocket.


    Running back to my experiment plate, I put a rune of joining/combining on there and framed it within a rune of will and concentration. Focusing on the symbology and intent of what I was trying to accomplish, I placed the piece of the World Tree on the plate and conjured a disk of bone the same size next to it. Taking a bar of gold from the pile, I placed that on the plate and put the bone and World Tree fragment on top of it so that all three touched, and then gently placed a small, smooth riverstone on top of that. Looked like a pyramid a child would make. I grabbed Gungnir and focused on sending my thoughts to it, as it was going to help me with this process. My plan was to craft something that would be a complement to my sorceries, a sort of focus for the magics I have since Gungnir left my hands to morph into an incredibly powerful security satellite, which was not my original intention, but useful nonetheless. Wizards need a staff, but sorcerers need something else, and I need something more than that.

 Bad Movie Madness

    ¡°You¡¯re missing something,¡± Gungnir chimed in.


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Well, think about it. Your armor is pretty damn good, and I am an epic generator of raw power with incredible mountain destroying magic with a tiny piece of your soul, but you have no weapons.¡±


    ¡°I already know that,¡± I replied, ¡°That¡¯s what I¡¯m doing right now.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but your thoughts were unfocused,¡± Gungnir clarified, ¡°You basically wanted something awesome with these materials, but didn¡¯t have an end goal. And you can¡¯t lie to me, we¡¯re connected.¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s right ya know.¡±


    I know that voice. Surprise removed all of the questions that my interrupted conversation generated. Whirling around brought me face to face with Rath, big Rath. Uhm, not happy Rath? His voice was much deeper, but I could swear there was a tone of anger threading through his words.


    ¡°You are missing something,¡± he rumbled, ¡°Humility.¡± A small exhalation of flame washed over me, my shield easily blocking the small puff.


    I was still kneeling over the crafting plate with my materials and Gungnir in knife form in my right hand. Somehow, Rath had gotten into my river-bottom hideout and was ten feet away from me, and now he wasn¡¯t so small. This little dragon-lizard was now big, as big as Kong, and he did not look happy with smoke curling out of his nostrils.


    I slowly stood up, Gungnir in my hand, ¡°Whatcha talking about there Rath?¡±


    ¡°I shoulda ate you when I had the chance,¡± he growled, straightening up, each syllable punctuated with bits of sulfur tinged flame, ¡°You¡¯ve threatened me with Chaos when I was small and then brought a goddess to annihilate your home, WITH ME IN IT?!¡±


    Spot woke up as Rath was roaring and jumped next to as Gungnir morphed into spear form.


    ¡°Think your fat pet is going to deter me sorcerer? That¡¯s just another snack,¡± he laughed, his wings flapping out, no longer out of proportion with his body. ¡°I didn¡¯t tell you this before, but another reason sorcerers are rare is because they¡¯re a delicacy for dragons!¡±


    I took another step back, mentally reached into Gungnir, and took the limits off the generator and turned the flow as high as I could handle. Spot started growling, putting his big head in front of mine. I sent a thought to my faithful companion and he began creating bone armor to cover himself.


    ¡°Your sorcery will add to my own power, help me to recover from that cursed child god that ruined me and that lovely source of mana you created,¡± Rath said, taking a step forward and started to inhale. That last step of his had a bit of a limp to it.


    ¡°WAIT, wait,¡± I said, ¡°How in the world did you get down here?¡± Grasping at straws was the only thing I could think of, anything to distract him and give me just a few seconds to think of something, anything to shift this seesaw in my direction. This hideout was directly below a river, and I put an escape hatch from the river to here when crafting my hideout, and my paranoia forced me to place an emergency valve conditional enchantment within my wards. Perfect. ¡°And how the hell did you find me?¡± I kept on, ¡°And why eat me now when I could be so delicious later?¡±Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    ¡°I¡¯m a dragon. Dragons can shapeshift,¡± he said, derision dripping from his voice as he took another step forward as we took one back, ¡°It¡¯s almost a pity. An ignorant sorcerer with so much potential, but I can¡¯t let you mature and be a threat to me. The ones with grimoires are such a pain that they¡¯re not really worth it. And finding you, that was easy, the remnants of your magic are purer than ley lines. I could smell that through a gateway.¡±


    Filing those tidbits, survival comes first unfortunately. I reached out and twanged the mental link to Kong, telling him to get to the area near the river ASAP, my magic forcing him to pick up the pace. I send a series of thoughts and images to Spot, my haphazard plan that may give us a chance for survival, and Gungnir listened in on that as well. I called on my sorcery and conjured a ten foot thick wall that was eight feet high and twenty feet wide, turned and sprinted my ass to the other side of the cavern, drawing on as the ridiculous power supply from Gungnir. Spot leapt over the wall with a snarl and tackled Rath just before unleashed his flame breath. The collision knocked Rath¡¯s head upwards where the flame spewed onto the ceiling, scorching the stone. Gungnir flew up and began condensing a bright chaotic bolt of energy pointed at the escape chute, which I activated the opening enchantment with my mind. River water began spewing down and Gungnir widened the opening by blowing the whole thing open. Even more water gushed out and Spot disengaged from from where he was getting knocked around by Rath.


    ¡°Come back snack!¡± Rath screamed, one of his wings bleeding profusely. Spot retreated to me as the cavern began filling up with water, burn marks covered his armor and a huge chunk of missing flesh from his shoulder was beginning to regenerate. Rath vomited a huge fireball in our direction.


    ¡°My territory now bitch!¡± I screamed back, calling on my water sorcery and taking control of the environment that was rapidly shifting in my favor. The water, now several feet deep, sprang up from the floor and extinguished the fireball. ¡°Water beats fire, paper, and rock!¡± I yelled, gesturing in front of me with my hand shoving a tidal wave at the dragon, blasting it into the wall behind it. ¡°Boss, you¡¯re way more badass in the water,¡± Gungnir said.


    ¡°I know,¡± I said, ¡°And I plan on taking full advantage of it.¡± As the kept pouring down, I checked with my water sorcery instincts, yup, I could breathe underwater. Hell yes. The water was about ten feet deep and I grabbed Spot who was starting to doggy paddle as it was just deep enough for him not to walk and I extended my water breathing influence to him as well. Looking back at Rath, I kept up the current against him, pinning him to the wall for the moment. His yellow eyes were full of rage, and every time he opened his mouth I blasted water at it. He managed to get his legs on the wall and dove into the water, a dragon missile intent on me being a snack. The cavern was fully underwater now and I shoved Spot up hole and mentally told him to get to shore, but stay near the new opening in the bottom of the river. I used water sorcery to move faster in the water than Rath, using eddies and swirling water with conjured pebbles to foul his movements and irritate his eyes. I also started turning chunks of water into ice around me and Rath until I finally felt that Kong was near. The river was about fifteen feet deep from where the surface of the river was to where the hole to my cavern opened up. Pulling deeply on Gungnir¡¯s reserves, I pulsed out an omni-directional wave from myself while holding Gungnir and shot towards the surface, turning as much water around me in the cavern to ice, and when I cleared the tunnel, I began plugging it up with ice, making it thicker by the second.


    I needed to put self-serving lizard in his place, and I had just the wicked idea. Total humiliation would be possible, just had to get him in a horrible position, which is where Kong would come in. I mentally made that Ape stomp out into the river, he was large enough that his head was barely over it. I checked that Spot was paddling around me and still able to breathe water. I extended that ability to Kong temporarily as well and sent my plan in a burst of mental images. Rath¡¯s head slammed into the plug of ice down below. He can¡¯t breathe underwater, and trying to break through on limited oxygen will weaken him if he manages to break through or if I¡¯m lucky, he¡¯ll just pass out. Another slam made a huge crack in the ice and I couldn¡¯t keep up as Rath started tearing at it with his huge claws.


    As his head broke through, I propelled myself backwards, conjuring ice all around him and his head, anything to slow him down. I tried to keep the ice around his mouth solid, but it was no match for a dragon¡¯s jaws, so I did the next best thing. I manipulated the water to stay around his head, like a cat stuck in a fishbowl. Rath crested the water like a magnificent salmon, just in time for Kong to rear up and sucker punch him right in the belly knocking him back down into the river. I¡¯m going to drown this lizard till I get I want. Spot swam down and latched on to Rath¡¯s tail and began paddling to keep Rath under and Kong dove under to bearhug Rath¡¯s neck from behind. It was awesome, my very own B-movie playing out right in front of me. A mini King Kong choking out an ancient dragon that wanted to eat me with my own tank sized dog playing tug-of-war with its tail, and me twenty feet away, using water sorcery to rain on the dragon¡¯s parade. Magnificent.

 New Sheriff in Town

    I tell ya what, that dragon could sure hold his breath. It felt like thirty minutes before he finally passed out. The whole time I was supporting my two giant beasts, healing them and making sure that breathing air and water wasn¡¯t a problem, all the while keeping that water bubble permanently on Rath¡¯s face so he couldn¡¯t get any air. When he did pass out and go limp in the water, I propelled myself closer and used flesh sorcery to check on him, making sure that he wasn¡¯t dead. Normally, if someone is conscious or has a lot of magic, I can¡¯t seem to use my flesh sorcery unless I manage to overpower them or they are willing to be healed/manipulated in some way. I had to force a binding on Kong and make Spot became a familiar before I had free rein to use flesh sorcery. Rath was an ancient dragon. I didn¡¯t have a chance in hell to dominate him like the other two, so I was going to have to do something really messed up to solve this issue. There might be a way around that though; I conjured a flat stone plate and put runes of sleep and exhaustion and energy draining and put it in my pocket unactivated.  First, I had Spot drag Rath to the shallows and had both Spot and Kong secure him, then I used water sorcery to pull the water out of Rath¡¯s lungs so that he wouldn¡¯t die. Then I conjured stone all over Rath until only his eyes, nose and a bit of his neck showed. Placing runes all over the stone coffin as the base for my enchantments allowed me to create something that could hold him for a minute or two, then I put that plate on Rath¡¯s head.


    Looking over my work, I¡¯m glad that I had Spot and Kong as my insurance. Conjuring a huge double-sided axe proportional to Kong took no time at all. I put enchantments of strength and endurance on the shaft and sharpness and durability on the blade and then made a giant hammer as well for him complete with enchantments. ¡°Ok Kong, you¡¯re Spot¡¯s backup. Spot, bite on Rath¡¯s neck, but don¡¯t bite down hard. If he wakes up, just let him know you¡¯re there, but don¡¯t kill him, got it?¡± I said. Spot nodded and took his place over Rath, opened his big jaws and put Rath¡¯s neck in his mouth. Turning to Kong I said, ¡°Do not harm Spot or anyone except for Rath. Your job is to hit him in the head with the hammer if he causes problems, and the axe is for if he gets loose, got it? That muzzle on his face should keep him from flaming y¡¯all.¡± Kong bared his fangs but nodded. ¡°Good. I¡¯m going to fix the cavern real quick and put everything back to where it was,¡± I said, ¡°Holler if he wakes up.¡±


    I had to do this quick. I down to the new hole to my cavern, floated there for a second and then landed next to it. I I pushed back the water flowing around me creating an air bubble and said, ¡°Gungnir, hold the river back, just let it flow around us. I need to get air back down there when I banish the water.¡±


    ¡°Too easy,¡± it said, pulsing with blue light, using my water sorcery to force the river to flow around the hole.


    I slowly lowered myself into the hole, constantly banishing water as I went and air rushed in from up above as I created a partial vacuum from banishing the water. I managed to get the whole cavern free of water in five minutes and then conjured stone stairs back up to the hole. Looking around, all of my stuff, not that there was much was strewn around. I grabbed the disk of World Tree wood and check it over with nature sorcery. It looked fine, but I pumped some mana into it and it glowed a soft green. I¡¯ll worry about this plan later. Climbing out of the hole and resealing it with several stone seals with ¡®you-don¡¯t-see-me¡¯ enchantments took another five minutes. I dove into the water and Gungnir followed, letting the river resume its normal course. Water sorcery is freaking cool. The river flows around me but I¡¯m in command of everything my magical senses can touch. Catching any kind of fish I can feel is beyond easy, and any enemy in this domain of mine is at my mercy. Now I want to go build a fortress under the sea, start my own Atlantis. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    ¡°Atlantis would be awesome!¡± Gungnir said, intruding on my thoughts as we coasted towards our prisoner, ¡°I¡¯d be a badass trident, and we would RULE! Get some mermaid bitties up in that underwater palace and endless sushi!¡±


    ¡°Cool it,¡± I said, ¡°Still got a damn dragon to deal with. I¡¯m thinking since he¡¯s way too old and strong to dominate, we use him. Not against the goddess since she still overpowers him, but he could be useful in other ways. I mainly need what¡¯s in his head. You don¡¯t get to be that old without learning tons of useful things.¡±


    ¡°Well, if you mainly just need his head,¡± Gungnir started, ¡°Then take his brain. Easy peasy.¡±


    Take his brain huh? Could it be that easy? I could take his brain and his bloodline and use him for crafting epic gear. What nerd hasn¡¯t dreamed about being decked out in epic gear? That was rhetorical. EVERY nerd has dreamed about this moment. And, my crisis of conscience had long passed in this new Earth. It was well past time that I take my rightful place and claim that which I conquered. And today, I would be a dragonslayer.


    I held out my hand, my will and determination calling to Gungnir, who turned into a spear as it hit my hand, the shaft getting shorter while the blade lengthened, its shimmering crystal depths glowing with promised death and power. Kong looked at me as magical lightning and fire crackled down the length of the blade in my hand. I coated the edge in ice and said to Spot, ¡°You can stop slobbering on him now. We¡¯re feasting on dragon steaks tonight boys!¡± I conjured two large crystal pillars next to Rath¡¯s unconscious body and cut runes of preservation and freshness in them, and then conjured one more crystal about the size of a pumpkin and began inscribing runes of will, clarity, memory, obedience, submission, chains and torture on it. Turning to Kong, ¡°I want you to remove the stone plate from that dragon¡¯s head and put that crystal,¡± I gestured towards the one I just made and placed in front of Rath¡¯s face, ¡°on top of his head and hold it there, got it?¡± Kong nodded and picked it up, rolling it in his hands while keeping hold of the axe I gave him. ¡°Do not, for the love of god, break that crystal,¡± I threatened, ¡°Gungnir, let¡¯s do this.¡±


    ¡°Right on!¡± it said, ¡°Can I have its soul? I mean, you aren¡¯t gonna use it right?¡±


    ¡°Sure, I need Rath¡¯s brain and body, you take the soul.¡±


    I stepped next to where Spot had slobbered on Rath¡¯s exposed neck and rotated Gungnir so that the point of the blade was downward. Using flesh sorcery, I jumped up fifteen feet straight into the air, Gungnir held high. ¡°NOW KONG!¡± I screamed at the apex of my jump. Kong ripped the stone plate off Rath¡¯s head and quickly replaced it with the binding crystal just before I descended and plunged Gungnir straight through Rath¡¯s vertebrae. Using my magical sight, I was able to see where a weak spot was as Rath was unable to defend himself at all. Gungnir¡¯s tip slid right between two vertebrae and blasted lightning and Chaos mana straight down, decapitating the once great dragon. I didn¡¯t have time to celebrate, this was a crucial moment. As soon as Kong hit Rath in the skull with the crystal, the dragon woke just in time to feel his head separating from his body. The crystal activated and sucked in the bright yellow light that was being expelled from Rath¡¯s eyes, his memories all mine now that the meat brain was defenseless as Gungnir had retrieved the soul of the dragon. ¡°Stay right there Kong!¡± I ordered as I took Gungnir to the side of the corpse and began cutting with Gungnir. I had to do this fast. Using my flesh sorcery, I kept the corpse on the edge of life as I cut to the heart, removing the truck tire sized organ from the body and placing it in one of the hollow crystal pillars. Then I drained enough dragon blood to fill up the container completely and sealed it off.


    Walking over to the head, I saw that the memories were still flowing. I walked to the back of Rath and with one swing chopped of his tail. ¡°Come here boy, here Spot!¡± I called, the big pup tearing the ground in his excitement, ¡°Enjoy buddy,¡± I said as I kicked the tail. ¡°This part is all yours.¡±  Kong hooted at me. Perfect. I ran to the head and changed Gungnir into a small hatchet which I used to gently cut open the head. I had Kong pull the brain out carefully and put it in the second container, which I also filled up with blood. Night had fallen and I wanted to get this juicy prize back to my river-bottom cavern.

 Reflecting with a Piece of My Other Self

    Turns out that nobody wants to mess with a giant reptilian gorilla armed with an axe or a beefy tank sized canine or their dragon-slaying master. It took a while to enlarge the tunnel and entrance to the cavern, but moving the body was easy for Kong and Spot. I had the storage crystals safely put in a deep pit and sealed them with preservation and life runes so that the precious ingredients wouldn¡¯t go bad. The remainder of the body went into a new freezer I made just for this occasion. It took up a sixth of my space, but I had plenty of room. ¡°PLEASE HELP ME!¡± Gungnir screamed as we finished moving everything where I wanted it, ¡°He won¡¯t shut up! Going on and on. Oh, my beautiful body! What have you done to me? Oh, hey, that was a dirty dirty insult. I¡¯m glad he butchered you you backstabbing overgrown fart of a lizard!¡±


    All I wanted to do was sleep, but I used flesh sorcery to wash the worst of my exhaustion away. ¡°What the hell man?¡± I asked, ¡°Way too late for this. What¡¯s going on? Is the little lizard giving you problems?¡±


    ¡°Little!? His soul is huge! Takes up half the power flow to keep him under wraps, and it¡¯s almost impossible to actually keep him quiet! I¡¯m a piece of your soul, he¡¯s a whole of his!¡±


    ¡°Then drain him of power pansy!¡± I cursed, ¡°Kong, patrol the forest but don¡¯t go too far. I don¡¯t know what¡¯s out there that may find you tasty. Sleep in a tree near the hollow tree in case you¡¯re needed. Spot! Spot! Spot?¡± I turned around, looking for my ever faithful companion. He was curled up in the far corner of the cavern, next to the impromptu dragon freezer. I walked over and put my hand on his leg, it was somehow petrified. His fur was matted and grey where it stuck out from between the bone armor. Powdery or ashy grey stone covered him completely, like a cocoon of sorts, and parts of it looked like it was scaly. I reached out with my flesh magic, tiny tendrils running over the new carapace of my pet. As they touched it that was it, they made no headway nor could they go inside to see what was going on.


    ¡°This is so cool!¡± Gungnir said, ¡°It¡¯s like Medusa got in here and whacked the dog! Do you think she takes commissions?¡±


    I started panicking until I realized that when I gave Spot flesh sorcery he also gained the ability to devour other things and gain strength, and since I fed him the tail of an ancient dragon, there might be some changes going on. ¡°Oh, that would make sense,¡± Gungnir interjected as he read my line of thinking, ¡°Wonder how much he¡¯s gonna change. I think you should do the same thing. A dragon sorcerer would be badass.¡± I hooked up a small mana feed to the cocoon from the big generator, hoping that a little extra pure mana would help this process out. ¡°It would be badass,¡± I replied, ¡°But I have too much to learn before I start down that road completely. Besides, there might be some creature out there that would complement my abilities better, although taking something from a dragon would help round me out.¡± I pondered the pros and cons while I took some time to get myself cleaned off from the day then headed down the tunnel to the under-tree bolthole and passed out.


    Waking up to silence was disturbing in its own way. No explosions or monster attacks to freak out and respond to was almost making me paranoid. It had been a couple days since I had made my armor, so I checked each piece carefully as I put it on. It was a great attempt at epic armor and had stood up decently well since I¡¯d made it. Only one piece needed needed adjustment and that was the helmet. Since making my armor, I hadn¡¯t even realized that mental combat was a thing until I took control of Kong. Sitting on my bed with the rest of my armor on, I took the helmet with both hands and felt the enchantments running through it, there was plenty of room for what I wanted to do. I conjured a small diamond the size of a silver dollar and placed a rune of will inside a rune of defense, a clenched fist within a tower shield. I then took out the World Tree disk and pushed mana into it to make it grow a casing which I broke off and used to cover the entire gem. Using flesh and earth sorcery to peel back the outer layers of the helmet, I got to the base bone layer and implanted the new diamond into it while weaving it into the enchantments that were already there. I reset the iron and diamond layers with the runes crafted in silver so that the diamond couldn¡¯t be seen. My mental abilities were indirectly linked to my sorceries instead of directly as bonding with Norn is what brought them about. This made it my weak point and the diamond was my answer for this. It would serve as ever present shield for my mind and also hopefully be present for any mental battles that came my way. The other insurance I had was Gungnir, as the bound spear was also part of me since it had a tiny piece of my soul in it. Chances are I could probably take it into mental combat with him if I needed it. This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    Gungnir bobbed over and sighed, ¡°It must be nice to sleep. Floating around while you lay there unconscious is pretty boring.¡±


    ¡°I mean, you do have things you could be doing,¡± I replied, ¡°Like draining Rath¡¯s soul of energy so he¡¯s pliable, figuring out ways to make me over-powered, working on the viability of our long term plans, ya know, useful things?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s already on the wall over there,¡± it said, ¡°See? I carved it while practicing creating a fire laser.¡±


    I don¡¯t believe it. Between caveman drawings of our battles with Rath and Kong and the Centauri humans were lists of plans with checkmarks and x¡¯s all around. ¡°I meant in an organized fashion,¡± I said, shaking my head. ¡°Whatcha got?¡±


    ¡°First, I¡¯ve checked on the stony dog every hour, no changes that I can see. Also, draining energy from the stubborn dragon is hard. Probably going to take a month before his soul is down to a manageable strength. I¡¯ve also been perusing the brain crystal we got, and that is not organized, which is going to take a week¡¯s worth of nights to sort through as he¡¯s lived for over twenty millenia.¡±


    ¡°Twenty thousand years?¡± I freaked, ¡°How in the fucking world did we beat him?¡±


    ¡°Uhm, luck? Maybe also the fact that he was arrogant and careless as you are a baby sorcerer? AND, you DROWNED a FIRE dragon!¡± Gungnir said, as if I were slow. ¡°He decided to fight you and you changed the terrain to match your strengths to his weakness. It¡¯s also possible that he was seriously weakened by two things, one, the bomb blast from the kamikazee child deity, and two, the fact that mana has only recently come to this world and he didn¡¯t have much to recover with.¡±


    I did do that whole thing rather well didn¡¯t I? Fought a traitorous dragon and won. Beat up King Kong¡¯s little brother and now he¡¯s my angry forest patrol and an armored car of a dog to keep him in line. I let out a bark of laughter, giddy with success and the incredulity of my survival so far. I went to the wall under where Gungnir had carved its attempts at art and I used earth sorcery to write in the wall: dragon slayer, keeper of Yggdrasil, sorcerer, defender of Earth, builder of epic forts, crafter of weapons and enchantments, dominator of beasts. This was for me, my list of accomplishments. I needed to learn that I was actually capable of doing incredible things, feats of power and strength and will that would not have been possible before. Suddenly, the future didn¡¯t seem so dark, as if a small light were pushing back the cloying darkness that had threatened my psyche since the First Ripple. [I could do this], I thought, holding the disk of the World Tree, rubbing the grain of the wood with my thumb, [I might actually be able to do this].

 Chapter 62 - Replacing Gungnir

    I looked over the haphazard writing on the wall and sighed. Gungnir was right, exploring the area after the Change was a priority, definitely more of a priority than what he wrote above that, {Find a woman}. Definitely not important right now. ¡°Definitely is important!¡± it said as it saw me shake my head reading its notes, ¡°Your woman is gone for at least the next couple millenia, you do get a bit of license to try out some alien chick,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°Maybe some of them super tall and ripped Centauri ladies hmmm? They¡¯re human, kinda, I mean, one of them ladies could manhandle you.¡±


    I smacked the floating orb with my armored gauntlet. ¡°Knock it off,¡± I said, ¡°We are crafting me a weapon and exploring while Spot is incubating. Kong will be the one on guard.¡±


    ¡°Just take Norn if you can find him.¡±


    Damn orb was right, in more than one way. Norn would be a better way to scout the area, but I could feel that he was really far away and I didn¡¯t know how the last Ripple had changed him. It might have broken down our mental bond to the point where he won¡¯t listen to me. That¡¯s on my list to do today as well. I went down the tunnel to the cavern and spent an hour making everything all nice again and putting it back the way it was before I flooded it. I gathered up the crafting materials from before and put them together in a stack next to the generator. Bars of gold, silver, stone and iron all sat next to each other next to the crafting plate and generator.


    Next to the crafting plate I made another plate but with a different purpose. It was a preservation plate, about the size of a dining room table, complete with runes of freshness of flesh and life and semi-stasis so that the next task would be more manageable.I banished the disk of bone and went to the freezer where Rath¡¯s body was. Opening it gave me chills, the headless and tailless body still exuded an aura of power and death even though I was the one who chopped his head off. The brainless head was next to the body and I pulled that out of the freezer and wrangled it to the preservation plate. After closing the freezer to keep the body fresh, I used magic, muscle, and Gungnir to dismantle the head, laying out all the teeth, cutting out the tongue, removing the jawbone and eyes and gently peeling off each individual scale. The first thing I wanted to do with this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity was take advantage of it.


    I took the tongue and went to the kitchen where I used Gungnir in knife form to chop that long appendage up into small bite sized pieces, which I then seared lightly on my magical hotplate. The tongue was way too big for one sitting, so I conjured a box for the leftovers and put it in the freezer. The rest of the tongue bits were sitting on a stone plate in front of me where I sat at my table. It smelled good, a bit on the spicy side even though I hadn¡¯t added any spices to it. This was my friend not too long ago, or acquaintance really. It really struck me how different life was now. I am eating a sentient being, a thinking creature. That thought didn¡¯t hinder me from shoving the first bite in, which I promptly spit out. Plain gross, like rotten seaweed mixed with mashed up caterpillars. I turned off my sense of taste with flesh sorcery and tried another bite, a little chewy and weird with no flavor but it went down.


    My flesh sorcery has a component of incorporating strength to my body by eating or assimilating, but it¡¯s also good at recognizing if what I put into my body will actually do that. My instant vomiting was more than my body recognizing that eating a fire dragon was not just horrible for me, it was my everything rejecting the essence of what I had taken in. As I was hunched over my plate with tears streaming down my face, hands gripping the stone table, my sorcery instincts were all screaming at me that fire dragon was not what my body needed to become more powerful, that it was completely wrong and at odds with every iota of my being. Fire does not mesh with water and nature and flesh, it evaporates and burns and scars on the most basic level. Great. I had gone through all the trouble of slaying a freaking dragon and I couldn¡¯t even eat it.Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    I conjured water and drank it while I cleaned up my mess. I gathered up what was left of the tongue, conjured water around it and froze it solid, sticking it back in the freezer. Damn that hurt. My stomach was still in knots as I made a bowl of thick vegetable soup from a can. ¡°So, that didn¡¯t go as planned,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°Which means there¡¯s a lot of dragon meat you can¡¯t eat, so either Spot or Kong is gonna be real happy when they find out about this.¡±


    ¡°Speaking of not real happy,¡± I said, ¡°How¡¯s our incorporeal lizard, and did you put the governor back on since our tussle with him?¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± Gungnir said sheepishly, ¡°I did and put the flow back down low. No more kaboom for me. Oh! And I crafted some soul runes that shut him up! Blessed silence and peace!¡± I rolled my eyes, cause I never get either of those. ¡°And, the energy I¡¯m draining from him is so dense that it may take even longer that I previously projected. I need a ruby crystal or something aligned with fire so that I can hold it and purify it. Did you know that your sorceries are incompatible with fire, like completely?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what the upchucking meant dude,¡± I said, glaring at the bobbing orb, ¡°Pretty much the only thing I can get out of that body now is crafting material and food for my familiars. We¡¯re also going to see what we can do with that soul of his. He said sorcerers could be eaten to add to his own power. It may work the other way around to, but I don¡¯t think he was talking about my body specifically. What if he meant my soul, like eating me, or the vessel of my soul is what would add to his power? If that¡¯s the case, then it Rath¡¯s soul that I would need to eat to gain power.¡±


    ¡°But its mine!¡± Gungnir said, sounding like a petulant child, ¡°I wanna eat it!¡±


    ¡°You are me dummy,¡± I said, ¡°You can do everything I can and more, besides that¡¯s if I decide to do this. Fire is great, but I don¡¯t know if that¡¯s what I want. I need something compatible with me, that would enhance what I can do. Look, if there¡¯s a fire dragon, then there might be other dragons of types that I could eat, like earth or water, ooooohh, or maybe a storm dragon? That would be awesome!¡± I wolfed down my soup, the many possibilities racing through my head. Sitting down down after taking a quick water sorcery shower, I sat down in front of the plot of land where I had my trees growing, the rowan, cedar and oak. I used nature sorcery to check over them and heal any damage from being flooded for a while. There was a little spot in the center between the trees where I dug a little hole and buried the World Tree disk. I made a link between it and the cavern¡¯s generator and slowly cranked up the flow while coaxing the living disk to form roots and a stem.


    A little World Tree just for me! I made a thin but tall stone pillar behind the trees and put a special lightstone facing down. It had an enchantment to exude only sunlight and a governor so that it would turn off and on every twelve hours. Then I put a growth limiter enchantment in the plot of soil itself so that the trees wouldn¡¯t outgrow my cavern. I made the little World Tree grow another disk which I detached and took to my crafting table which was next to my preservation table with Rath¡¯s dismantled head. I took one of his fangs and used flesh sorcery to sculpt it into a footlong rod and did the same to the disk of the World Tree. Then I grabbed a bar of each of the crafting materials I had laying next to the table, gold/silver/stone/iron and put them next to the molded tooth and tree. I summoned Gungnir mentally and relayed my plan to him. ¡°Nice,¡± it chortled, ¡°But you¡¯re missing one piece. That river rock was a stroke of genius when you set this up last time and now it¡¯s missing.¡±


    Absolutely correct, the symbology for the sorcery is what was needed. I ran around the cavern until I found that river rock, which now contained vibrations, leftover energy from the fight I had with Rath here. It was a symbol of victory as well as the merging of my earth and water sorceries. I placed that on the plate and linked the cavern¡¯s generator to Rath and cupped the orb in my hands. Focusing on all of my sorceries, I pushed the magic into all of the ingredients, willing them to combine into the perfectly clear image in my head, my new weapons.

 Chapter 63 - Svalinn

    Magic is an incredible force, but sorcery is just awesome. The raw understanding of the various parts of magic combined with the soul-entrenched authority to make it bend to your will is a drug that will never get old. Using Gungnir, my old weapon that had become my paraclete, my focus, the materials I had gathered in front of me melted before my eyes under the flow of incredible power. I projected my will and the image of what I desired through the powerful flow of mana using Gungnir as the governor and forklift for the load. The generator is the only reason this was even possible, the nuclear reactor of mana powered the entire process that would have otherwise killed me. Gungnir handled most of the channeling itself as couldn¡¯t harm him at this level. But what my weak body could not do was more than made up by the creativity of my soft brain. Even though my hands were holding the usually talkative orb, I could almost feel ethereal hands of mine grasping the liquid ingredients and shaping them, molding them to the image in my head. I already had a name picked out, Svalinn. The mythical Norse shield that protects the Earth from the deadliest of our Sun¡¯s rays. A fitting name for that which was forged with dragon bone, precious metals, sorcery, and the wood of the World Tree.


    The completion of the process was actually finished by Gungnir, it took care of the small details and measurements while I channeled images of how it would look and function to my mini-souled satellite. I am weak, for now, but I will get stronger. In many ways, I needed something that would serve me a lot longer than a plain staff or weapon. It felt like ten minutes, from the time I began sending Gungnir the images of what I wanted to me standing over the masterpiece. It was beautiful. The shield is diamond shaped, edged with the dark blue of my water sorcery and shot through with solid browns of earth. The blue was embossed with dragon bone and the back was framed with Yggdrasil. Runes of gold and silver were etched into the bone and stone, and the centerpiece of the Shield were two clenched fists gripping the symbol of eternity that had a blade protruding from each side. Picking it up almost knocked me over as it felt weightless, the shield responding to my sorceries like a long lost lover returning home.


    The back of the shield had two arm braces on top of each other, but rotated ninety degrees than a normal shield had. Perfect. I put both of my arms in there and pulled them apart. Svalinn separated down the middle, forming two shield blades along my forearms. Flexing each aspect of my magic molded the structure of the shield so that they became full-length, from shoulder to knuckles, gauntlets. As gauntlets, the runes lined up, forming channels where magic could be stored and unleashed by a mere thought. I put my arms together in front of me, as if I were bracing a tower shield, and it manifested in front of me, so smooth that no sound was made from the startling entrance.


    ¡°NOW THAT¡¯S WHAT I¡¯M TALKING ABOUT!¡± Gungnir screamed, ¡°WHO¡¯S THE BEST?! I¡¯M THE BEST! And you don¡¯t even know the best part!¡±


    I flexed my will and Svalinn became gauntlets again. ¡°Come on now, I helped make it, what¡¯ja do?¡±


    ¡°I channeled all of Rath¡¯s soul energy and sorcery into the forging! Who¡¯s so smart?! I¡¯m so smart!¡±If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    ¡°What the hell does that even mean?¡± I said, starting to freak out a little, ¡°You put the damn dragon in here? He wants to eat me remember? Or are you just too drunk on power to think about that??¡±


    ¡°No, no, not his brain or soul, his soul energy and sorcery. Dragons eat sorcery which gets converted to make their own kind, like Rath¡¯s was fire, even stronger. You tried to eat it but couldn¡¯t because you¡¯re not a dragon, duh. So, I stuck it in the shield.¡± Gungnir explained, ¡°And because it¡¯s in the shield, that thing, and by extension you, are immune to fire blasts of any kind. And combined with your sorcery with the runes in there, that shield can turn into gauntlets with blades or channel or protect you from magic way too powerful for you.¡±


    I had just imagined a shield powerful enough to fend off the sun. Gungnir went about ten thousand miles past that. ¡°I mean, I kinda did,¡± it said reading my thoughts, ¡°I¡¯m not a spear anymore, and you needed something else to keep you alive while I float around and blow stuff up.¡±


    I stretched out an arm and channeled a mix of earth and water sorcery into it. A reinforced blade of tungsten came out the front above my knuckles while spikes of ice grew out of the top of my arm from the elbow to my shoulder. Just to try it out, I channeled some nature sorcery into it and vines popped out underneath the joining scales forming a braided whip with a ball of thorns at the end of it.


    ¡°And the other best part, other than being completely fireproof,¡± Gungnir added, ¡°Is that I left the enchantment tied to your flesh sorcery but open in case you learn of something awesome that you want to add.¡±


    It began to hit me that I was becoming less like a human as the days rolled by. Innocence stripped away through violence and betrayal. Kindness removed by loss and pain. Trust eroded by power. Is that what it takes to survive in a world touched by mana, monsters and deities? Don¡¯t get me wrong, these abilities are beyond fucking awesome, but everything has a cost, a consequence. I may have already paid those consequences, but I sure as hell didn¡¯t look at the receipt when I did.


    My soul was weary. The loss of mental energy combined with the exhausting effort of crafting Svalinn left me vulnerable to the more despondent side of humanity. That, or my blood sugar was low. Wolfing down a can of clam chowder and drinking water helped, but I couldn¡¯t help but think about the radical changes this planet has gone through, and what I have gone through because of that.


    ¡°YO!¡± Gungnir mentally blasted at the walls of my mind, ¡°Knock it off and get yo fat butt up! We have bridges to burn and bitches to get!¡±


    The profanity of the floating orb combined with its ironic statement put a quick stop to the downward spiral of introspective darkness. The chuckle turned into a laugh which then rocked into full-blown belly laughing. ¡°I¡¯m not kidding! We have gates to find and close and creatures to hunt and aliens to run off and man the list just keeps on getting bigger! Maybe find some leftover humans and bring them here, then be king!¡±


    Leftover humans huh? I like that idea, but not the ruling part. People are trouble, too much trouble, which I don¡¯t want to deal with. ¡°Yes, people are trouble,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°But you are people too, and that comes with a sex drive and a need for company.¡±


    ¡°I can tone down or turn of my sex drive with sorcery,¡± I retorted, ¡°Besides, that¡¯s when we men do stupid things, when we¡¯re horny and there¡¯s some hot chick in distress. Mute that drive and suddenly I have forty more IQ points than normal. Besides, taken remember?¡± I gestured in the general direction of Yggdrasil¡¯s main Earth sapling.


    ¡°Four THOUSAND years remember?¡± Gungnir came back, ¡°That¡¯s a long time for one woman.¡± Damn orb had a point. I don¡¯t like it, but still had a point.

 Chapter 64 - Danger at the Doors

    Gathering my faculties around me once more, I banished my tiredness with flesh sorcery and checked all of my gear. I felt like a tank, a tank with big arms. Svalinn was awesome, but maybe a little clunky. As the little complaints made themselves known, the dual shield-gauntlets began to creep up on the top of my shoulders, moving mass around until they connected around my neck covering the upper parts of my back and chest. There we go, somewhat sentient magical gear is awesome. I conjured water on the fingertips of my right hand and combined the five drops into one, spinning it with a flick of my will. The right half of Svalinn was softly glowing blue, the runes themselves a mix of white and blue.


    ¡°Oh, forgot to tell you,¡± Gungnir said, making a sound as if he smacked himself in the head like an absent minded child, ¡°Svalinn also stores energy from the environment and any excess power you give off. The dragon soul energy in there also will keep it powered for probably the next decade or so.¡±


    Right on. I checked on Spot one last time, hoping for a crack in that petrified exterior. No change as of yet. I patted his stony head and set off, intent on finding out what¡¯s become of Norn. Stepping outside is always a strange shock, being a human from a period in our technological advancement where a time-telling device was ever present. Without a clock telling me the exact time, I came to realize that my internal clock was nowhere near as accurate as I used to think. It was roughly an hour before dusk and here I was ready to go for an adventure. Damn it, I wanted my freaking bird. Creating another hoverboard, since I lost the last one, took about ten minutes. Hopping on, I turned towards where my thinning mental link told me what direction Norn was, and began strengthening the lift enchantment. I got up to about fifty feet before common sense smacked me, reminding me that these old pre-Ripple trees were the size of redwoods now. Zipping over trees on a hoverboard just doesn¡¯t work anymore as the higher up I go, the less I get out of the anti-gravity enchantment, which pushes against the ground for thrust and levitation.


    Learn from my mistakes, actually learn from my mistakes. Darkness and night in post-Ripple Earth are not safe places for soft humans such as myself. I did still have the link to Norn, however thin it was now. Maybe I could still use it? ¡°What do big eagle-crows like?¡± I muttered, leaning against the hollow tree entrance to my tunnel. ¡°Birdseed and bitches!¡± Gungnir crowed.


    ¡°Mention bitches one more time and I¡¯m removing your ability to ability to say that one word,¡± I growled. I heard the mental equivalent of Gungnir taking a deep breath to spew a diatribe of synonyms when it hit me. I already had a thug ready to do my dirty work. I conjured a ruby the size of my head, put a few enchantments on it and summoned Kong with my mental link. Turns out the great ape lizard was sleeping right above me and not very happy. He dropped down to the ground in front of me and let out a roar that shook the earth.


    ¡°When you get back from this errand, I¡¯m teaching you how to clean your mouth out,¡± I said, turning off my sense of smell with flesh sorcery, ¡°And you can do this tomorrow instead of tonight, cause I¡¯m not a douche. Take this stone, don¡¯t drop it or forget it. It will lead you to a big bird named Norn. Touch him with this stone and return home quickly. It will make him want to follow you. Got it?¡± I finished as I tossed the ape the stone. I might want to rethink that thought of not having people around to do my mundane crap for me. I mean, if I could get a giant battle gorilla to do my bidding, how hard would it be? After Kong left, I crawled into my bed under the World Tree bolthole and put myself to sleep with flesh sorcery.


    Soup is great, but it¡¯s not really a breakfast food. Waking up to corn chowder did not inspire great thoughts of magnanimous action towards my environment, but it did get wake me up. I grumped my way down to the cavern and checked on Spot. My magical senses didn¡¯t alert me of any change, and after going over the runes carved into the cavern walls for an hour or two, I was bored. Very bored. The smart thing to do would be to hunker down and prep my three living areas for the new circumstances, but I reasoned my way out of that bit of intelligent thinking because fortifying the areas would mitigate their best feature, not being noticeable in the first place. Besides, Gungnir¡¯s nightly tasks while I got my beauty sleep were to alter/update the runes so that the structural integrity of the hideouts would be in perfect shape and so that they would be unnoticed as much as possible. Part of this was me banking on the intense energy presence of the nearby ley lines and Yggdrasil tree to mask what my living areas. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    So what¡¯s a bored sorcerer to do with a wide open day full of promises and opportunities as well as no guiding force? Build an army. Gungnir popped out from whatever dark corner it was hiding in, ¡°AN ARMY?!¡± it screamed, playing death metal music in my head, ¡°HELL YEAH! Finally a plan worthy of us!¡± Following me, Gungnir and I exited the river-bottom hideout through the escape hatch, I took my time popping my head out, using water sorcery to breathe as I looked around the the murkier bottom of the river. Using my sorcery, I could feel the current around me and the creatures aligned with this wonderfully wet element, and my flesh sorcery could detect their hunger. A giant set of jaws from a crocodile bigger than Spot was coming straight at my head. I instantly ducked back into the escape hatch, sealing it shut, then went back down into the cavern. ¡°Fuck me,¡± I said, emerging back into the cavern and going down the stairs, ¡°Hell no,¡± Gungnir said, bobbing next to me. I muttered to myself the entire way down the tunnel to the Yggdrasil¡¯s root. ¡°I heard that ya know,¡± it said, only making me say even more vile things under my breath.


    We reached the stone door and used magic to check the immediate vicinity for anything that could reasonably eat me if given half a chance. I also took that moment to check my mental link to Kong, seems like he left not too long ago, which didn¡¯t bother me. Any disobeying my commands and I could do any kind of nasty things to him from afar. The place that used to be my front lawn, with an asphalt street in front of it and surrounded by neighborhood with white picket fenced in houses, was no longer that idyllic picture. Where children used to run and cars chugged along was now a wilderness, pretty much all traces of human progress wiped away. I felt along the earth with my magic, thinking that the street was still there, ten feet in front of me where it used to be. Maybe it was just covered in dirt. A minute of examination with my senses revealed that all hints of the street were gone. ¡°The Ripple of Chaos probably just broke it down to its component parts,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°And also probably superpowered up some of the plants and animals which had their own magically induced feeding frenzy. Just wait till you find some bugs, gonna be some B-horror movie madness!¡± The excitement in its tone did not inspire the same for me.


    ¡°The plan is for you to fly high and find something I can dominate, like I did with Kong,¡± I told Gungnir, ¡°And we use whatever that is to do it again, and again, until the woods within a couple miles of the hideout are relatively safe.¡± The orb took off, squealing with happiness. ¡°QUIETLY!¡± I yelled after it. A soft hiss above me stopped me cold for the barest half second as Gungnir was already well away from me. Diving forward was all that saved me from an impact that resembled an explosion due to the force. Svalinn came alive, forming two bladed shields along my arms as I pulled out of the tumble and turned partly in mid-air. A quick mental message to Gungnir is all I had time for as some kind of twisted snake pulled itself out of the crater, spider-esque arms gripping the crumbled rim. Its slit pupils had a rounded point in the center that wasn¡¯t the same color as the rest of it. It¡¯s head was the size of a country boy¡¯s four wheeler and two sets of small black wings flared out from the back of the base of its skull. Perfect.


    I hopped backwards while conjuring water and channeling it through Svalinn, turning a normal blast of water into a firehose that froze on contact with the twisted snake. It was all I could think of, as reptiles tend not to be a big fan of the cold. Not liking my cordial welcome, it shook itself, breaking the first layer of ice and reared back, searching for the meal that fought back. A scream of ¡°Tally Hooo!¡± accompanied a blast of lightning from the sky as Gungnir dive bombed right in. The animal caught the blast square on its soaked head and I swore it snickered. I kept up unending blasts of ice water that froze while running backwards. I saw that the tip of the snake¡¯s tail was shoved into the Earth. ¡°It¡¯s grounded,¡± I sent to Gungnir, who was sending bolt after bolt of lightning at the snake, ¡°Knock that off till it isn¡¯t.¡± I kept walking backwards conjuring blasts of water, hoping the snake would get angry enough to follow me, but it kept flexing its coils to break the newly formed ice. I started only using one arm to blast water while holding out my other arm, which Gungnir flew into in spear form. A quick mental back and forth changed the whole plan. Stopping the water conjuring completely, I lined up a shot, and hurled Gungnir, who guided my aim straight into the grounded tail of the beast.

 Working up the Ladder

    Momentarily pinned, Gungnir began channeling my flesh sorcery, attacking the snake from the inside. I felt it using the soul of Rath to establish a struggle for dominance as I took up the freezing blasts of water again. As the water pooled around the snake, I began drawing on the vast amounts of energy in Svalinn, and conjured a huge torrent of water with chunks of rock in it above my head , and hurled it at the snake. My impression of an unforgiving waterfall smashed the snake into the tree behind it, where I began spraying it again and freezing every bit of water near it. I split my focus and made the earth underneath the grounded tail force it up. ¡°Now!¡± I sent to Gungnir. Yellow sparks formed a cracklin current that seized up the muscles in the snakes body, its two spidery front legs twitching, a beautiful dance that I¡¯ll never tire of. ¡°I got it! I got it!¡± Gungnir sent back to me, ¡°Quick, dominate it! Rath¡¯s soul and the current made it vulnerable, get in here!¡±


    I formed stone over the creature to trap it and put my hand on its wide head. Drops of blood were slowly leaking out of the corner of its eyes while its tongue hung limply from the side of its mouth. I conjured ice with one hand to force its mouth shut, and with the other hand I shoved my focus into the snake. I wasn¡¯t drawn into a mental battle at like I was with Kong, the creature too simple to fight me on the mental level. Using flesh sorcery, I bound its will to mine and sculpted runes of domination on the scale plate protecting its forehead, and then a rune of enslavement on the bones in its skull. So weird, this twisted snake felt like several creatures mashed together, not just physically, but mentally. Bits of thoughts and memories clashed with angry instincts. I felt around the mismatched body and mind of the creature finding a snake, obviously, some kind of big spider, a raven, and even weirder, a ferret.


    As far as I could tell, these creatures were fighting in pairs, the snake and ferret and the raven with the spider, during one Ripple and combined to form two sets, which during the next Ripple, combined the conjoined critters to form this chimera. And what I really wanted to know, was how in the world on the mental level is the ferret still alive. I could clearly in this thing¡¯s brain how the ferret was scampering around the spider and its web while dodging the dive bombing raven and pissing off the snake. I reached in and grabbed each translucent animal one at a time in my left mental hand, while the other hand grabbed the other critters and jammed them together. Forcing my will, my hands together, I poured mana into the disparate minds and created something with new instincts, my very own sapper.


    For those who don¡¯t know the lingo, a sapper is, in short, a combat engineer, but an offensive one, and I planned on twisting this to be a trap setter. The sneaky nature of the ferret with the creativity of a raven combined with the ambush instincts of the snake and trap making nature/capabilities of the spider, I had the perfect recipe for an evil sapper. Redoing all of my domination runes took some time as I had messed with the mind and soul of this creature, this sapper chimera. Healing it took a bit as I had to make sure that all of the non-compatible parts of the creature were taken care of. Chaos didn¡¯t seem to plan when it threw their bodies together. I fixed the symmetry and healed the wounds. ¡°Huh, it¡¯s warm blooded, no wonder the ice didn¡¯t work as well as I¡¯d hoped,¡± I muttered, while rooting around magically in its body. Fixed the defunct spinnerets, grew the wings out some more and made the feathers harder than steel while correcting the mixed up nerves that governed its heat sensing glands. ¡°Gungnir, take over,¡± I said, pulling my hand back from my new trap maker, ¡°It¡¯s mostly done, just needs to know who¡¯s boss. Time to get this army party goin!¡±


    ¡°My turn to name it!¡± Gungnir burbled, bouncing around happily, ¡°John! You¡¯re name is John! There, that¡¯s easy to remember!¡± If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.


    ¡°John is a human name,¡± I said, ¡°Go with something better, like ¡®Arachne¡¯, or ¡®Kimerak¡¯.¡±


    ¡°No, you¡¯ve picked stupid names so far. I¡¯m calling it John. It¡¯s short for John the Bomb!¡±


    Shaking my head, I left the nutty weapon to its own devices. And on it went, the whole damn day. Find some weird looking creature and beat it down with Gungnir while it gave them very human names. A beast army, man that felt good, not really what I wanted, but kinda convenient. When Kong returned with Norn in tow, tossing the gigantic bird in front of me, I had the snake chimera John, a fox-wolf pack about eight strong called pups (1-8),  a dog-sized racoon crossed with a praying mantis named Kimmy, and a couple lizards as big as motorcycles that seemed to eat rocks named Huey, Duey, and Louie. Not as many creatures as I was hoping for, but it would do for now. ¡°Look what the ape dragged in,¡± I said, eyeing Norn up and down, his feathers now streaked with a bit of gold. I dismissed the other creatures to patrol the forest. Kong huffed at me and scratched at his chest and leg where blood dripped out of long scratches. ¡°The bird do that?¡± I asked, getting an angry chuff in reply. I put my hand on Kong¡¯s leg, closing up his wounds. ¡°Sorry to do this to you mate,¡± I said, looking at Norn, ¡°But I can¡¯t have you going anywhere. Kong, sit on him.¡±


    The big ape grinned and smacked Norn so he was flattened to the ground, spread eagle, putting his ass crack right on top of Norn¡¯s beak while holding Norn¡¯s wings with his hands. Norn squawked and struggled, his eyes going wide as I approached, sending me longing thoughts of freedom and open skies through our thin mental link. ¡°You know what,¡± I said, lowering my hand gently to his head, ¡°That¡¯s fine, but the tree, this tree,¡± gesturing to the World Tree, ¡°Is home. The forest is home. I am in charge.¡± I took the idea of the forest around my domain and put it carefully in Norn¡¯s hindbrain, the place where his instincts ruled him, and made the concept of home synonymous with nest. I needed him to be the ¡®king of the sky¡¯ for me, the ruler of the creatures in the forest as he was already almost as big as Kong now. I spent thirty minutes using flesh magic to imprint runes of domination to me in his skull, and then put a rune of sky ruler, a crown on top of a cloud, on his breastbone.


    I also healed him as Kong lifted his ass off of Norn¡¯s beak, the great ape stomping twenty feet away. ¡°No sir!¡± I said loudly, ¡°Not done with you. We got one more scumbag before you take a break.¡±


    Kong grunted while scratching his stomach, empty growls resonating through our mental link. ¡°Fine, go eat,¡± I replied, ¡°But be back when you¡¯re done. We got a croc to catch.¡±


    I hadn¡¯t forgotten Mr. Big and Bad scalyface that chose me as prey earlier today, freaking giant crocodile wanted to snack on me. He¡¯d be a perfect guardian for the river. Now, I didn¡¯t want to have a beast army, honestly, but that¡¯s what I had available. These freaky creatures all around will serve as guards for my majestic hermit self. They¡¯ll also serve as distractions or shock troops if I need to defend or attack mystic invaders. Once I get this all set up and have most of the woodland freaks under my control, then it would be time to hunt down the rest of the gates.


    Another hour¡¯s worth of prep was really all I needed for my next conquest. Kong returned from his lunch and I had a giant Kong-sized net grown from sorcery-enhanced plant fibers complete with thorns and a vitality draining enchantment woven through it. What took me the longest was folding the damn thing. Gungnir wasn¡¯t any help, flitting through the forest messing with the various creatures I¡¯d dominated.  ¡°All right, you¡¯re not gonna like this,¡± I said, standing over the net, ¡°But we are taking down a croc, which won¡¯t be as bad as the dragon, I think, but we won¡¯t know till we try.¡±


    A feeling of smug arrogance rolled off Kong through our link. ¡°Yeah, yeah, cocky fucker,¡± I said, rolling my eyes, ¡°This would be a lot easier if Spot were here too. You throw the net on it and jump on its head while Spot wrangles it by the tail. Fine, we can do this the hard way.¡± Kong picked up the next and slung it over his shoulder with one hand while picking up his axe with the other, cooing to it like a psycho with his knives. ¡°Enough of that,¡± I said, twanging the mental link to get his attention, ¡°Let¡¯s go fishin.¡±

 A reminder

    Fishin¡¯ woulda been great. Riding on top of my magnificent magical mountain of a monkey to conquer the big bad beast of the river bend made me feel like a badass, the mad sorcerer-king of the New World. Unfortunately, as we hit the tree line, my daydream was interrupted by the sight of my targeted prey already on the sandy beach down by the river, upside down and trussed up like a prize pig. The mouth was tied shut and the legs tied to its own body. It looked like freaking Gulliver¡¯s Travels down there, a giant reptile being manhandled by conniving ants. Little green goblins were scrambling over the gigantic scaly body, hammering at the incredibly thick scales while what looked to be two goblin shamans were in front of its eyes. I could hear their chanting, each syllable accompanied by a spark of green or red light. The little worker bee goblins scaling this beast looked to be carving or painting esoteric runes on it while others were adding lengths of rope around its joints, small bits of shiny metal catching the glare of the sun.


    I used mental communication to bypass the concerns of sound. ¡°Kong, are they doing what I think they¡¯re doing?¡± I thought at my ride, making sure to include the side thrust of the need to stay silent. He didn¡¯t shake his head, but sent back a mental nod. For a tree-sized monkey, he sure was stealthy, but I had to make sure he stayed that way for the next few moments. I wanted that gator, and I wanted these stinking goblins to have it even less. Actually, I wanted them in its belly, but I¡¯ll get there when I get there. Counting all the goblins was hard as they kept moving, almost erratically like insects. But as far as I could tell, there were three shamans, two of which were busy doing their gator hypnotism and one on guard duty, fifteen or so of the small ones crawling up and down the gator, and ten of the bigger soldier looking ones. The bigger ones looked to be about my size, complete with armor and weapons and permanent scowls. [Wish I had freaking fire sorcery] I thought, [They look greasy enough to burn].


    I could take¡¯em, easy. Well, easy enough with Kong doing most of the work. Sending him my plan took place at the speed of thought, and our next actions seemed comically slow to me. Kong tore out of the treeline with his prized and began punting goblins into the river while swinging his axe at the ropes tying down the gator as I used this distraction to gun for the third shaman. Luckily, the shaman on guard was paying attention to the rampaging ape instead of the sneaky sorcerer as I shaped Svalinn into blades coming out of my forearms and took his head. One down. The other two shamans began chanting faster and faster, waving their arms and staffs. The damn ape was cutting the ropes holding down the gator with his axe, fucking lawyer. I didn¡¯t mention anything about not cutting the ropes, just getting the goblins out of the way, and it seemed that he was taking literal liberty with what I didn¡¯t say.


    I yanked on our mental link to clarify that having a trussed up lizard was perfect for us and to STOP CUTTING THE FREAKING ROPES! Kong roared in anger but obeyed, and kept kicking and smacking the goblins into the river while the bigger hobgoblins were throwing spears to try and slow him down. I used flesh sorcery to pull all the blood out of the body of the shaman I¡¯d shamelessly ganked and formed it into two floating spears, which I sent at one of the hypno-shamans. As the spears entered his body from the force, they also became less solid and more like and invading squid, forming into tentacles that ravaged his body while strangling him. The last shaman just gave up and ran, and the rest of the surviving goblins joined him in the small rafts and boats that were beached on the shore. Kong really left an impression on them as his axe obliterated any goblin it touched. Each goblin he smacked with that oversized weapon was instant hamburger, a bloody pancake for the insects to feast on. If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    The smell was horrible. Goblins stink. And while the smell of goblin blood made me throw up just a bit, it more than anything made the big ole¡¯ gator wake up out of his funk, and he wasn¡¯t happy. ¡°Fuck!¡± I yelled while clutching my stomach, using flesh sorcery to calm my insides. [Restrain it!] I thought, launching that message down Kong¡¯s mental link. He jumped on top of the upside down gator as it began to flex and snap the restraints, using his axe to press on its throat. I don¡¯t know how those goblins got the gator to be upside down, but it really was in a vulnerable position, but I could work with that. Its tail was whipping back and forth, sending waves of sand in one direction and water in the other, desperately trying to move. I walked closer, pulling blood from the seven goblin bodies that were near me and condensing it into a broiling ball that hovered six inches above my hand. Forming the ball of blood into my rune of domination, I used magic to hurl and guide it right into the yellow slitted eye of the downed gator. The bloody rune wavered for a half second, and then dissolved, the magic slivers shooting down the optic nerve straight to the animal¡¯s brain.


    It was both easier and harder to dominate this giant reptile than it was to conquer Kong. It didn¡¯t have the forebrain or capacity of complex thought to mentally work its way around the binding, but it did have rivers of pure rage and instinct that I had to circumvent. The entire time our wills were duking it out, I was slowly walking closer to it, using my proximity to strengthen the mental connection even while I struggled to block out the sensations of sweat dripping down my forehead, beads of saltiness that threatened my eyes. The gritty sand in my boots fought for my attention while the screaming cries of fear of the riverswept goblins railed at my focus. [Fuck, all, of, YOU], I raged in my mind, [No matter how big, or how many, or how goddamn smelly, I will rule!]. It was more than confidence, more than mental power, it was recognizing that my will had the power to create fact. I could bend this, this insignificant reptile, to my will. I just hadn¡¯t done it yet.


    That was it, that was the key. I was fighting a battle of will when I didn¡¯t have to. Reaching into its brain, I found its instincts and just added one more. I made Kong hop off the gator and back up to the forest while it looked at me as if seeing me for the first time. Using water and earth sorcery concurrently, I pulled the water of the river up onto the shore while shifting the sand to pull away from the gator on one side and pushing up on the other so that it could flip over. As it landed on its belly, it flexed its limbs and broke the ropes, glared at me with one eye, and then took off into the river as fast as its bulk would allow.


    A questioning grunt from Kong reminded me that he was still there. I had forgotten about him for a full ten minutes as I was watching the river with my new minion, the gator making the swimming goblin survivors disappear as the river took its due. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about him,¡± I said to Kong softly, his keen senses easily picking up my voice, ¡°I just helped him realize that I was the biggest, baddest croc around. From there, it was easy.¡± Turning towards Kong, I gently took our mental link in my ethereal mental hands and squeezed just a bit, making him wince. ¡°And don¡¯t you forget it.¡±

 The Staggered Change

    I used earth and water sorcery to get rid of the evidence of the great Gator vs Goblin battle, but this became my next couple days, which was not what I wanted to do. Norn would alert me about some minor invasion of green people that would start to deforest or defile the immediate area and I had to go take care of it with my animal army. Damn goblins. Little green nasty fuckers just kept coming back. They stank and apparently didn¡¯t care that this was my land, all of it. To be fair, I hadn¡¯t formally delivered a message to them, but slaughtering them every time I saw or smelled them should be crystal fucking clear. I also couldn¡¯t seem to find a chain of command or some dude in charge to talk to, but the message was clear: stay off my land. Maybe this comes off a bit xenophobic, but who cares about this crap in a magical apocalypse? Not me. Already sacrificed my conscience in hopes that maybe I¡¯ll get to live a couple thousand years. Gripping my mental hub, my magical visualization in my head where I could communicate with all my bonded creatures, I sent a command to all of them, that goblins were to be driven away or killed. And if they could not kill the goblins without sustaining casualties, then I was to be alerted.  What made it worse was that I had no idea how the goblins actually got here, or why they kept popping up randomly. I assumed it was through a spacial gate I hadn¡¯t found or that they were just really good at sneaking around.


    It¡¯s hard to tell or communicate why I harbored this instinctive hatred for these alien invaders, but something about them made it feel like my soul was vomiting. My very magic reacted to their presence like it was food poisoning, an instant disgust that made me want to eradicate everything. Their very presence disgusted me even while I washed them away in the river or buried them far below the forest floor. And since my magical instincts had kept me alive so far, I figured that I¡¯d just run with it. But it just kept making me angrier as I stomped out each infestation. The only upside was that I encountered and and got to dominate a whole bunch of weird magically twisted animals along the way. The grumpy armadillo that spit acid from its two heads that Gungnir named Grump and Gramp was not a fun experience, and the exploding seed throwing chunky squirrel with eight legs and three tails that Gungnir named Gumbo. The stupid flying orb weapon was really upset when he found out I dominated the gator and let him go without being named, which is why he kept giving the other creatures stupid names.


    ¡°Gumby! Rocky! Fuzzball! Haunchy!¡± Every name was a bob in the air combined with a burst of rave-light from Gungnir.


    ¡°Enough! Fucking Stop! Dear god please,¡± I begged, ¡°It was just a herd of deer, you don¡¯t have to name every living thing in this Ripple-cursed forest.¡± We were trekking through the forest, gathering creatures and scoping out the land.


    ¡°This is your fault!¡± Gungnir whined, ¡°Which technically makes it our fault!¡±


    Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Look,¡± I said, grabbing the orb with magic with both hands and glaring at it, ¡°If you can find out why the damn goblins won¡¯t go away or keep coming here, then you can name the gator.¡±


    ¡°Really? You mean it?¡± Gungnir rejoiced, ¡°Scaly! Rath Jr! Fat legs! Treecodile!¡± Kong started groaning from behind us, his displeasure at the one-track weapon coloring our mental connection.


    ¡°AFTER!¡± I yelled, chucking Gungnir, ¡°After you solve the goblin problem.¡±


    Gungnir bolted upwards and slammed into Kong¡¯s forehead. ¡°Fine, but I¡¯m taking the monkey!¡±


    ¡°What the . . ¡° I said, turning around to see Kong¡¯s eyes glow red to match the light that Gungnir was putting out. ¡°How did, what,¡±


    ¡°Your flesh sorcery, duh,¡± it said, ¡°See ya!¡±


    The orb-controlled reptilian gorilla wheeled around and took off, its gait looking far too much like a human instead of an ape. I don¡¯t even know what to think of this.  Screw it. I leave the forest in the stolen hands of Kong with my psychotic split self shape-shifting weapon.


    Going back to my cavern, I began to prepare for the second to last Ripple that I knew was coming soon. The worst part about the Ripples was that Gungnir seemed to be the only thing that had the capability to shield me from it. So, what would happen to Spot and all the other bonded creatures when the Ripple hit, and then hit again? There were other effects of the Ripples that I only noticed after they hit. First, magic is a lot easier to do after each once, as if it is slowly loosening the strict laws of reality. Second, it also seems that enchantments are less stable than normal, as if magic itself is fighting against being bound in any kind of ordered way. The evidence for this was the miniature generator around my neck. I could easily see that what used to be a smooth process of slowly converting matter to mana was breaking down, the structure of the enchantment simply wasn¡¯t enough anymore. The flood of power went from being a calm stream to a raging river, wearing down the integrity. I kept having to fix the enchantment and dial down the amount of power it was converting so that I wouldn¡¯t inadvertently start a nuclear process I couldn¡¯t control. If I couldn¡¯t use my power generators, I would be forced to find a new way to cheat, to make free mana some other way.


    And the weirdest part of all of this that I noticed was that even though I was shielded during the last Ripple by Gungnir, somehow, my personal reserves of mana were growing, or stretching. I couldn¡¯t tell if it was due to simply being full with mana all the time because of my generator, or if my soul was similar to a muscle, and using sorcery or channeling power was the equivalent of hitting the gym. Really makes me wish I had grabbed soul-based sorcery help figure this crap out. Thinking about all of this wasn¡¯t really helping me out as I simply just didn¡¯t know. My ignorance will be the death of me more than anything else.


    I spent the rest of the day conjuring crystals of all kinds and placing enchantments of energy entrapment and deflection in them and sticking the crystals in the walls of the cavern. My plan was to create a kind of energy sink/drain for the Ripple using all of the enchanted crystals, and see which crystal actually accomplished what I was setting out to do. Some of them were rubies and sapphires and quartz, and then interspersed with those were some wrapped in gold or other precious metals that seem to hold enchantments better but have lower energy efficiency overall. What I wouldn¡¯t give for an experienced wizard right now so I could pick his brain. Brain. BRAIN! I have a brain! One that isn¡¯t mine!

 Pieces of the Puzzle

    As smart as I am, I sometimes forget that I had planned this course of action out already and it was not time for this yet. Gungnir¡¯s nightly task has been to organize the several millenia¡¯s worth of information from the dragon¡¯s brain, which was still ongoing, and that means that me diving in the barely alive brain of an ancient dragon is probably not the best idea. Well, the walk back to the cavern wasn¡¯t completely useless though. I had used earth magic along the way to send out pulses of mana to see if I could find those test materials from forever ago. I really wonder what happened to them, but I honestly had no way of knowing. Something could have eaten them, moved them, or simply disintegrated from the Ripple.


    Thinking back, I was way too comfortable seeing all the trappings of modern life swallowed up by the forest. Every house from the former neighborhood was some kind of tree or bush now, and every car and truck was either mostly disintegrated, eaten, or partially subsumed by a plant. The asphalt roads were now dirt or grass covered and the power lines covered in some kind of ivy. Norn has been mentally sending me updates from his patrols as his intelligence started increasing, and it looks like the sleepy town of Fredericksburg is now a gigantic forest cut through by the oddly bigger Rappahannock river. The department stores are rapidly decomposing and even the University of Mary Washington is nothing like it used to be. the dorms are now rock formations and some of the teaching facilities are sinkholes. Thinking about this made me feel at peace.


    Whoa, hold up. Is my magic affecting my thinking? I froze in my tracks, my hands cradling the latest ruby I had conjured. I mean, my abilities are centered around nature or that which is a natural state or found in nature, which might be affecting me in some way. Oh hell, is this the road to hippy-dom? No, no, no, no. I need bacon and whiskey and I need it right now. Banishing the ruby, which would have been priceless before the Ripple, I sprinted towards my stores of food. Canned goods lined my stone shelves, none of it was bacon. In all of my panic, my dumbass had forgotten to get the four basic food groups: beans, bacon, whiskey, and lard. What kind of an American am I? A piss-poor one right now. A sense of loss came over me. I had served in the US Army Reserve and was the son of a Marine, and now, there was no America. No real borders existed, and humanity wasn¡¯t the only race out there. There was no one to save my bacon if I screwed up. This was all on me. And it didn¡¯t even have to be, I could hole up in my boltholes and play with my magic till the entire world rotted around me. I didn¡¯t have to do squat. Yeah, a war was coming. Who cares.


    ¡°My, my, my, how you¡¯ve grown young sorcerer.¡±  A liquid voice from off to the side startled the freaking crap outta me. Instantly, I engaged Svalinn from gauntlet to weaponized bladed shield mode and brought all of my sorcery to the forefront of my mind as I turned to the unwelcome distraction from my well-earned wallowing. I had been working in the cavern for a couple hours all alone, and the last time this shit happened, it was something well above my paygrade. ¡°When my brother whispered in my ear about you, I had no idea you¡¯d be so, creative.¡±Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    A vision of loveliness was draped on the petrified body of Spot, using the stone neck of my dog as a lazyboy. Her golden hair did not obscure the idealization of feminine perfection that was her face even as her leisurely sprawl showed off curves that would drive anyone wild. Even my flesh sorcery muted animal urges were bleating in the back of my mind. I found that I actually couldn¡¯t make my eyes focus on her face as it kept seamlessly shifting between the features of my fiance and some celebrity, always seeking to show the perfection that mortals can never attain. Her attire was not a robe, but light body armor that skillfully showed skin and no weapons were in sight.


    Returning Svalinn to gauntlets took but a moment. ¡°Forgive me,¡± I said, opening my hands towards her but still holding my magic at the ready, ¡°You startled me. And your brother is . . ?¡± I kind of already knew based on past encounters, but he wasn¡¯t too forthcoming with information making it hard to distinguish between fiction and reality.


    ¡°Hmph, well can¡¯t you guess who I am?¡± She said with a raised eyebrow, ¡°Your legends clearly provide some context.¡±


    ¡°The male visitor I had was either Mercury or Hermes,¡± I replied as I took a slow step back, ¡°Which makes you either Aphrodite or Venus, but I¡¯m not really sure how that works. The myths or legends either make you out to be separate deities, or facets of the same one, like different personalities.¡±


    ¡°Be grateful it is I instead of the Muses,¡± she said, pointedly ignoring my questioning statement, ¡°They wanted to meet you and would definitely have never let you go. It¡¯s always, hero this, and we need the story, and oh how tragic, with them.¡± She clearly pantomimed a whine she had heard many times before. ¡°I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about. My brother found you intriguing, but the goddess of victory simply cannot establish good odds without meeting a candidate first.¡±


    ¡°Odds? Candidate?¡± I said, taking another step back. [Gungnir!] I screamed mentally through our link, [GET YOUR ASS HERE]. If I could just get off another few steps, I¡¯d have the main cavern generator at my back. No sudden moves set off the goddess. ¡°I believe you may have the wrong idea,¡± I delayed, pushing for every second. I did not like where this is going.


    ¡°Oh come now,¡± she said, sliding down off of Spot and landing way too gracefully, ¡°The Forest Folk have established themselves in what you call the Amazon Rainforest and the Hegemony has claimed the new continent.¡± She walked closer to me like a cat stalking a mouse. ¡°The wyrms are ravaging the delicious continent of Asia and the Hungry Ones have laid claim to the empty white wastes in the North and South.¡±


    My back bumped into the generator and I connected to the flow, its mana filling me with more power as Svalinn began to hum softly. ¡°What about the rest, Europe, South and North America and Africa?¡±


    Her chuckle was disturbing. ¡°Europe burns as the Horde vents their wrath from their imprisonment and Africa is controlled by the Shifters. And what you call the Americas, well, that¡¯s up to you.¡± Her finger poking my chest only served to emphasize those words.


    ¡°Honestly,¡± I whispered, ¡°I don¡¯t know what any of that means. I can guess, but am definitely not sure.¡±


    ¡°Your race has forgotten more than you¡¯ll ever know,¡± she said, her velvety tones making me feel suddenly a lot less secure than just a moment ago. ¡°The Elder races certainly had the right idea.¡±


    ¡°Which was?¡± I dared to ask.


    ¡°They ran.¡±

 The Rest of the World

    Her leaving was the best part of my day. In the time it took me to blink my eyes, she vanished leaving me a hell of a lot more than just shaken.


    ¡°I¡¯m back! I¡¯m back! I¡¯m back! What the hell is going on?! I got a whole army of beasties behind me but Kong won¡¯t stop fondling his axe . . ¡°


    ¡°Stop,¡± I said, ¡°Gungnir, just, stop.¡± Gaining control of my breathing should have been easy with flesh sorcery, but not even my magic wanted to cooperate. I sent a mental packet of the past couple minutes to it. Ancient and powerful deities were way too common for me to ever relax again.


    ¡°Oh crap,¡± it said, ¡°Yeah, I¡¯d run too.¡±


    I looked up sharply. ¡°What the hell do you mean you¡¯d run too?¡± I shouted while waving my arms all around me, ¡°From what? From who? To where? You¡¯re attached to me Mr. Piece-of-my-soul that¡¯s in a weapon that I crafted. Where would¡¯ya go?¡±


    ¡°You have a World Tree. Anywhere you want, duh. Wouldn¡¯t take you long, but you can go wherever the hell you want as soon as you figure it out.¡± Gungnir replied, ¡°Oh, and we definitely want to run from the Hungry Ones. They are no fun at all. At least with the wyrms you could establish a territory and be left alone, or in the Hegemony you buy your way to the top.¡±


    ¡°Explain more!¡± I fumed, ¡°You¡¯re doing the same shit that goddess was doing. And explain her too! And how the fuck did you get the, wait, you¡¯ve already learned some things from Rath¡¯s brain haven¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°And the boss gets a cookie!¡± Gungnir celebrated, pulsing rave lights from its core.


    I turned on a heel towards my shelf of food, muttering dark imaginings and wishing dreadful things towards Gungnir. ¡°I heard that!¡± it chirped behind me.


    Opening a can of soup and sipping it slowly, I sat down in a recliner I had saved before the latest Ripple. ¡°Spill.¡± I commanded, ¡°With details. No beating around the bush, assume I don¡¯t know jack shit.¡±


    Through our mental link, Gungnir began showing me the bits of information it had started gleaning from our reptilian database. ¡°The Hungry Ones are the undead, and everything associated with them. They are in the North and South Pole as well as the upper parts of Canada and Russia, basically anywhere that is ridiculously cold where their bodies won¡¯t rot away. Pretty much zombies and all kinds of nasty things that avoid areas of sun.¡±


    ¡°So, what¡¯s gonna happen when it¡¯s permanent daytime for six months?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Well, they can dig nonstop, and they have some magic users that can construct castles or caves out of ice or snow or stone. But they also have some kind of darkness cloud magic that can block out the sun. That¡¯s their long term plan.¡±


    ¡°And the worms, wyrms, however the hell you say it?¡± I continued.


    ¡°Those are dragons, or dragon-esque things, like drakes and lizards and snakes and dragoons and dragonians of all kinds,¡± Gungnir answered, ¡°Reptile based creatures from all kinds of lore are pretty much king in the Asian area. That¡¯s just barely safer than the territory of the Hungry Ones. Now remember, the really powerful things on all sides aren¡¯t here yet, we still have two Ripples to go before the mana here is dense enough for things like Lichs or Mountain Eaters or True Elementals to start throwing their weight around. I mean, I wouldn¡¯t be able to be here or function right if it weren¡¯t for the generator you stuck in me.¡±Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    ¡°Are you telling me that they¡¯re already here?¡± I yelped, almost spitting out my soup.


    ¡°Maybe, but they¡¯ll be like Rath not too long ago, either in a weaker form to save their energy, or just outside of a gate waiting to come in,¡± it answered, ¡°besides, you didn¡¯t seem to pick this little tidbit up, a new continent! That means one of your oceans probably spit up another landmass, and why did neither of you discuss Australia? Wonder what happened down there?¡± Rath went on.


    ¡°There¡¯s too many unknowns right now to even contemplate that one,¡± I said, ¡°What are the Forest Folk, the Hegemony, and the Horde? And what did she mean that North and South America are up to me?¡±


    ¡°The Forest Folk are Aelves. Usually human-like with pointy ears and powerful magic accompanied by an incredible skill with swords.¡±


    ¡°Not bows?¡± I asked, ¡°Really?¡±


    ¡°Not according to Rath¡¯s brain,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°Only their children use bows, the adults use magic of some nature alignment to close the distance and powerful swords crafted from magic steel to cut through anything. Apparently these dudes are beyond fast. Man, your legends are really out of wack with reality. Oh, and they hate the Hegemony, which is pretty much a kind of warlike bureaucracy. The only thing they love more than conquering other areas is making them submit to endless regulations and committees.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s downright evil.¡± I said.


    ¡°I know, which is why I said you could probably buy your way up. They do love gold, which an earth sorcerer can easily find. And money always greases the government wheel. The Horde, now they¡¯re nasty. They are the things imprisoned from the Gate under what used to be the Vatican. The closest translation in English is demon, or hell-infected. There¡¯s a kind of blood magic mixed with black and fire magic that turns things into the Horde. Like a living horde of zombies that retain their intelligence and breath fire while using weapons.¡±


    ¡°That sounds worse than the Hungry Ones,¡± I interjected.


    ¡°Yeah, until you find out that the Hungry Ones are pretty much your weakness. They eat magic like yours for breakfast and never get tired. They¡¯re freaky strong and infectious. You have no inherent fire or holy magic to fight them, but the Horde could be turned away or dominated by your flesh sorcery,¡± Gungnir answered, ¡°And besides, you could always run, you have the World Tree.¡±


    ¡°What happens if the zombie horde reaches the World Tree sapling?¡± I asked, ¡°Sarah is in there for a couple thousand years, wouldn¡¯t they love to eat that tree? It¡¯s chock full of magic.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but that sapling is pretty much set,¡± Gungnir clarified, ¡°It has the generator you gave it for a magical boost and the elements of purity that you enchanted into it back when it was a seed. Nothing undead or unclean is going to make any headway on that. Once it actually connects to the main trunk of Yggdrasil, it¡¯ll be unkillable. A literal vein of the spine of the Universe where your house used to be also guarded by the Valkyries. But that may take some time.¡±


    I banished the empty aluminum can of soup after staring at it for a minute. ¡°So, I don¡¯t get to leave,¡± I whispered, ¡°Not yet.¡± Looking back up at Gungnir, I asked, ¡°Ok, what¡¯s in America then? What do I actually have to contend with first?¡±


    ¡°Animals,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°Most of the humans are gone, but there are little pockets of them here or there. It¡¯s mainly animals that have just gone wild since the Ripples. The zoos were unattended and the wolves and tigers and all the other cuddly predators from around the world are not the same as they were before. The Evergreens are a piranha and alligator paradise while the plains are home to giant packs of feuding wolves and lions while the mountains are home to humongous tigers and bears. The redwoods in California almost put the World Tree sapling to shame and are populated by eagles bigger than airliners. Even the buffalo and deer are freaking dangerous now. The weirdest ones are the fish from the zoos that mutated and are now amphibious monsters that are just downright ugly.¡±


    ¡°Animals aren¡¯t a problem for me,¡± I waved off, discounting that particular threat.


    ¡°Yeah, not till the Hungry Ones get down here,¡± Gungnir rebutted, ¡°Most worlds either have a purge when they find out the undead are here or they get consumed. The more powerful you are when you die, the better addition you are to them. You become one of them, but an uglier, smellier, never full kind of them. The undead hungry horde will simply add another horde of beasts to their number. And their ultimate goal is to cover the world with darkness so they can roam freely and eat everything.¡±


    ¡°Fuck me.¡±


    ¡°Might wanna go try and make nice with those paladins huh.¡±


    ¡°FUCK me!¡±

 The Sixth Ripple

    Of all the things I did not want to think about, being invaded by a gigantic horde of insane and hungry undead magic eaters was definitely one of them. The only comfort was further research that I made Gungnir do in a frantic hurry which revealed that it would probably take hundreds of years before the undead could make any headway towards the equator with their cloud of magical darkness. The sun¡¯s rays are just too strong near the equator for the Hungry Ones to extend their power that far. What this means for the Temperate Zones, thankfully, is that I shouldn¡¯t see them for quite some time. Apparently the zombies I had killed so far weren¡¯t the ¡°Hungry Ones¡±, because they came from a different kind of magic, one less evil than the other even though I didn¡¯t understand Gungnir¡¯s attempts to explain.


    Honestly, I really didn¡¯t care to take the time to figure that out right now. According to what we pulled out of Rath, this has happened before on other planets and planes the dragon has lived on. The funniest thing Gungnir pulled out of the lizard¡¯s brain was a memory of the undead invading a desert planet that had an ocean of magma covering a decent chunk of surface area. Needless to say, that invasion didn¡¯t last long.


    ¡°Hey, you might wanna take a look at this,¡± Gungnir said, interrupting my train of thinking, ¡°My generator ain¡¯t working the same right now.¡±


    I took the floating orb in my hands and pushed my magical senses into it, reaching inside with my magic and pulling out the matter to mana generator and setting it in front of me. Gungnir was right, something was screwed up. The enchantments holding the process together weren¡¯t handling the energy flow properly, almost as if they simply weren¡¯t strong enough, as if someone had replaced a steel strut in a car with wood. ¡°What the hell did you do?¡± I asked Gungnir, tossing it back into the air while I examined the giant rock.


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me, honest,¡± it answered, ¡°I mean, yours ain¡¯t doing too hot either.¡±


    ¡°Shit!¡± I exclaimed, pulling off my personal generator. The emergency shut-off hadn¡¯t activated, but the entire enchantment was wearing down on all sides. If this keeps up, my endless supply of power concept will cripple some of my long-term plans. Hold up a second. Shutting off the personal generator and the one I took out of Gungnir, I ran to the main generator in the center of the cavern scanning it very carefully with my magical senses. This one wasn¡¯t breaking down or wearing out.


    ¡°My mana, my beautiful mana,¡± Gungnir whined, pulsing pink and purple lights while playing soft violin music, ¡°You gotta fix it!¡±


    ¡°When the hell have you been able to play music?¡± I asked, a little bewildered by the strange ability. I didn¡¯t stop scanning the generators, but I just had to know.


    ¡°Well, I copied all the music from your mind, in the correct key cause you can¡¯t sing, and then the rest of it from Rath¡¯s mind. Did you know he spent a 100 years on the other side of a Gate in Louisiana, just listening to music from a bar? That lizard has heard everything!¡± Gungnir rambled on, ¡°And Bon Jovi and Def Leppard, what a time to be alive?! Can¡¯t believe we missed all of that!¡±


    Gungnir was also a jukebox. Great. And the fact that the stupid orb didn¡¯t get tired meant that it was a 24 hour jukebox, randomly switching between Bayou Beats and classic rock with interjections of Bach to my pain and pleasure. I spent the next two days working on the damn generators, trying to get them figured out. The answer finally hit me the morning of the sixth Ripple when I just got pissed at Gungnir and out of anger made Gungnir¡¯s former generator grow to a huge size just so it wouldn¡¯t fit inside of it anymore. But really, Gungnir pointed it out.This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    ¡°DUDE! LOOK!¡± it screamed, shooting a beam of red light at the generator. Our mental communication happened faster than words but my magical senses revealed to me what was going on. My fit of anger actually solved the problem. Making the stone matter to mana generator bigger stabilized the process. The issue wasn¡¯t that the enchantments weren¡¯t stable enough, it¡¯s that they weren¡¯t big enough, they couldn¡¯t hold up under the ¡°current¡± or ¡°flow¡± of mana that was being generated. The generator itself had to be bigger. As magic enters our earth, saturating everything, the level of prevalent energy rises. Imagine the mana from the generator as a little river with a little dam, and now that the Ripples have begun strengthening and changing every magical process, that little river quickly became a big river, which needs a bigger dam. Now, it¡¯s being flooded with mana and a dam needs to be rebuilt to contain or channel the constantly growing outlet. That was my problem. The generators could be small in the beginning because Earth wasn¡¯t fully integrated with the rest of the Universe where the mana levels are exponentially higher. This probably means that I¡¯m going to have to find another portable source of mana, crap.


    ¡°So size does matter!¡±


    ¡°Shut it Gungnir,¡± I snapped, ¡°This screws you over just as much as it does me. We¡¯re gonna have to find something else. Big generators are perfect for the cavern and Yggdrasil¡¯s sapling, and tapping the kinetic flow of the river works great for the runes of the cavern, but none of that is portable. Dig around in Rath¡¯s head and see what works the best at holding raw energy.¡±


    ¡°Fine, fine, such a pansy,¡± Gungnir whined, bobbing away, ¡°It¡¯s not like you couldn¡¯t easily fix yourself to carry more mana or generate more. Or hell, even walk along a ley line to fill up on it.¡±


    Stupid orb. Stupid, crazy, whiny, BRILLIANT ORB! Oh so many ideas, so little time! I knew the Ripple was coming soon, probably today, and I could handle it, but I had lost track of time. The Ripple brings change, pure, unadulterated Change. My beasts bonds probably won¡¯t stick if I can¡¯t get the animals here and shielded. Also, I really didn¡¯t know if I could shield them all, Gungnir has been tested to show that it can absorb the raw energy of a dying deity of Chaos, but Svalinn hasn¡¯t been tested in that realm yet. And all of my mineral and nature experiments are here in the cavern so I won¡¯t lose them like last time.


    ¡°Gungnir! You¡¯re on guard duty! Stay no more than three feet away from me and make sure that the Ripple doesn¡¯t kill me. Absorb as much raw Chaos as you can and see if you can solidify it if at all possible. Also, summon all of the beasts that you can reach to the cavern and we¡¯ll see if we can shield some of them too. We might end up saying goodbye to Norn and Gator . . ¡°


    ¡°Jaws! His name is Jaws!¡± Gungnir interrupted.


    ¡°That¡¯s a stupid name. Jaws is a shark movie . . ¡°


    ¡°So, you said I could name it, and since we aren¡¯t going to the ocean anytime soon, WHERE WE WOULD RULE, I¡¯m naming him Jaws.¡±


    ¡°Fine, we may have to say goodbye to Norn, Jaws and Kong for now because we still have Ripple number seven to contend with,¡± I said, ¡°And fighting them twice to dominate them is a total pain.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re here!¡± Gungnir sang in my head while outwardly playing its own rendition ¡°Happy Birthday to Me¡±. A minor stampede of animal flesh crowded inside the cavern, which I immediately began enlarging. Kong was carrying the snake chimera John on his back while pups 1-8 ran between his legs before darting to lounge around petrified Spot. ¡°Hey, where¡¯s the rest of them?¡± my saddened orb pouted, zipping around the disorganized zoo. Three eagle sized crows flew threw the cavern door. ¡°Norn!¡± Gungnir screamed, joining the three birds in flight.


    ¡°What? What are you . . ¡°


    ¡°Oh yeah, forgot to tell ya. Norn figured out how to split up into smaller versions of himself,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°Smaller and faster and can cover more ground, and when they spot big prey, they combine back to giant Norn!¡±


    Looking closer, I saw that the smaller versions of my first bonded beast actually were smaller versions of him. Magic is fucking cool.


    ¡°The tree is consumed, the seed set adrift.¡±


    ¡°Sunder the bonds, shatter your chains.¡±


    ¡°Rise from my fall, grasp what you will.¡±

 Evacuation

    The intense warping of reality never gets old. Every living thing in that cavern, except for me, shuddered and changed as each wave of the Chaos coursed through the cavern. Seeing the strange energy getting eaten by Gungnir did not take away from the wonder of watching REALITY RIPPLE! I can¡¯t even pretend to guess as what the first part of that message meant. What seed? Which tree? Gungnir¡¯s thoughts consisted of insane ranting along the lines of ¡®loving this,¡¯ and, ¡®gimme more!¡¯ and ¡®oooo baby!¡± Stupid orb, we¡¯re all about to die on the razor¡¯s edge of reality and it¡¯s basically having an orgasm. What really made this intense was how I could still think of stupid questions when all the mutated creatures were CURRENTLY in the process of mutating AGAIN!


    The first mini-Ripple lit up every runed crystal I had installed in the walls, making it look like a warehouse rave. The raging streaks of the rainbow put the Los Angeles nightclubs to shame. And while I really wanted to see the results of my experiments, the jewels¡¯ reactions to Chaos, Kong¡¯s and Norn¡¯s screams were deafening, almost loud enough to shatter the stone floor. Sitting still was a real bad idea. Both creatures had tendrils of magic crackling through them, starting from their core or heart and writhing in and out of random parts, powerful enough that I could see flickers of their insides lighting up, like an x-ray.


    [Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!] I thought, taking a few quick steps back towards my immature tree garden while snatching Gungnir out of the air. The rest of the otherworldly message was clear enough, even for me. I knew what ¡°shatter your chains¡± meant, and it definitely not in my favor. The second mini-Ripple hit within a second after the first, stone chips flying off of Spot as cracks ran down his petrified back. The eight fox-wolves ran around Spot¡¯s still prone form, howling and yelping while inhuman notes joined their symphony. I kept inching back towards the exit tunnel, gripping Gungnir and readying my sorcery for a fight.


    The third mini-wave came right after the second, somehow more powerful in its meaning and strength. I felt every warped animal in that moment start to fight the mental bond I had constructed in their beings. That desire to be free, intrinsic to all lifeforms, fought that hold I had carved in the animals¡¯ skulls and souls. Kong¡¯s wide eyes narrowed at me, one furry hand gripping his axe, veins pulsing in rage as his other hand clawed at his head, as if ripping out the mental chains. He took a menacing step towards me. Norn¡¯s three split bodies darted around the cavern screeching and chasing the lights while the chimera John began spraying web at the fox-wolves and Norn.


    SNAP!


    The chains of flesh sorcery induced servitude of every bonded shattered under the creatures will to be free as they were bolstered by the cry of a dead god realms away. The sound of the bond breaking was unnatural, shattering metal combined with breaking bone, but completely in my head. The third wave gave their will the strength to fight the weakened bonds. My frantic thoughts were knocked aside by the incoming pain of the disintegrated mental bonds which knocked me on my ass. ¡°Get up!¡± Gungnir screamed at me, ¡°Go, go, go, go!¡±  Duh, no shit. As if staying in the cavern full of recently freed mutant magical creatures while was a good idea.


    I tried to mentally respond through our link with my usual sarcasm, but the pain was too much for that function to work. Rolling over, I began to crawl through the dirt as Gungnir distracted the animals by blasting them with jets of water or balls of hardened dirt. Reaching the entrance to the tunnel, I shouted back over my shoulder, ¡°Turn off the generator!¡±, winced at the pain, then used my sorcery to conjure water with dirt all around me to make mud and made it slide me across the tunnel. The impromptu magically assisted mud slide proved to be an effective getaway method as I slid all the way to the World Tree bolt hole. Gungnir flew right behind me and filled the tunnel with solid stone, sealing the underground entrance. The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Pain block you idiot,¡± Gungnir snapped at me, ¡°Put one in, this ain¡¯t the time to be weak.¡±


    ¡°Fuck you,¡± I snapped right back, even though it was right. Now was not the time to screw around. I used flesh sorcery to make it so and then my earth and water sorcery to instantly clean myself off. I looked around the Under-Tree bolthole for a moment,  Kong¡¯s roars were still audible, even from here.


    ¡°All my babies!¡± Gungnir whining interrupted what was the start of my regaining my bearings. ¡°This shit is just gonna happen again in a week! Fuckin useless waste of a Chaos deity, screwing up my bindings and freeing my pets.¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± I muttered, ¡°Maybe bonded beasts weren¡¯t the way to go.¡±


    ¡°But, but, but, they¡¯re mine, I mean, ours! Right?¡±


    ¡°Yes, you miserable floating orb,¡± I growled, ¡°But obviously raw Chaos won¡¯t sit still and let us control beasts. It may just keep breaking the bonds, which is too much work to do over and over. The beast army plan is just going to have to wait until after the Ripples are gone. We¡¯ve hopefully only got one wave more to get through and then we can go full tilt down that path.¡±


    Gungnir went silent. ¡°What?¡± I asked.


    ¡°No more pets?¡± The whining tone was now way overdone.


    ¡°Not until the next wave is over! I¡¯m not doing this again just to have it undone!¡± I yelled, ¡°Didn¡¯t you see Kong?! One second of freedom with that giant fucking axe and I¡¯m meat paste and you¡¯re a damn pinball!¡±


    The orb sunk lower, conjuring small drops of water that fell like tears. ¡°Knock it off,¡± I said, feeling a little bad, but just a tiny bit, ¡°We¡¯ll get them back when we can and you can name all the new ones.¡± I knew I was going to regret it, but I was too irritated to argue.


    The response of joy was not verbal, but luminescent, blinding even. ¡°Dude! Stop!¡± I yelled, turning my head to avoid the blinding joy, ¡°Seriously, go away. You know what? Go ahead and let all of them out of the cavern, we don¡¯t want them eating each other or fucking with Spot.¡±


    Gungnir shot off like a rocket, screeching with happiness. I shouted down our mental link as it thinned with the rapidly increasing distance, [Make sure the main generator is off, the trees are fine, the gems are ok and that the cavern is sealed when they¡¯re gone!]. Sometimes I feel like the crotchety dad yelling at a teenager. Today was definitely not going the way I had hoped it would. The suddenness of the Ripple wrecked my plan of having Gungnir shield me and the animals from the wave, but the nature of it didn¡¯t surprise me one bit. Chaos seems to be all about breaking limits. If humanity wasn¡¯t mostly gone from this planet, the Ripple really would have given us as a whole the boost to be far more than what we¡¯ve been for thousands of years. The downside obviously is that the darker half of human nature would also have been set free, imagine Stalin or Mao with the ability to actually make their dreams a reality. Shuddering at the darker thoughts, I walked to the root of my World Tree Sapling and put my hand on it, sending my nature sorcery through its veins and heartwood and reaching up into the core of the upper trunk.


    ¡°Hey babe,¡± I said softly, the tendrils of my magic stopping just short of the seed orb that was Sarah, ¡°Still don¡¯t know how you¡¯re doing in there, but damn I miss you.¡± My other hand wiped away a tear while my magic examined the feed of power connecting the Tree to the Under-Tree bolthole generator. ¡°I¡¯m here whenever you¡¯re done doing whatever the hell it is you¡¯re doing and this should keep your hopefully temporary home strong and healthy. Shit, it¡¯s definitely more magic than I need, but I¡¯m guessing a piece of Yggdrasil can handle it.¡± I stood there for ten minutes, examining everything and just wishing there was something I could do to help or even for a way to communicate with her. I could see her soul or her form, but it was encased in a shell of power that was simply beyond me, a condensed star¡¯s worth of energy covered her like a second skin rebuffing all contact, but radiating a strange sense of calm potential and peace.


    Music heralded the return of Gungnir, pulling me out of my sad trance. The stupid orb was audibly and mentally playing the soft melody of ¡°Wait for You¡± and it made me want to kill it. ¡°I swear to Chaos . . .¡± I said, whipping around.


    ¡°What?¡± Gungnir said, pulsing soft pink and purple light to show sadness. It hard stopped as it saw I had conjured a stone bat to knock it into next week, ¡°I can¡¯t believe you made me let them go, I mean, a whole week before we can get them back? What¡¯s that about?¡±

 The Other Side

    ******


    ¡°Captain!¡± Jorgan rumbled, his deep voice cutting through the noise of the gathered Centauri.


    Reeanth¡¯s cold eyes didn¡¯t shift from the object of her desire, endlessly searching the vast depths of the liquid surface of the gate. She remembered her grandfather telling her about discovering the old thing buried in their family¡¯s abandoned ruins, and how frustrated the old retired space wizard was when he couldn¡¯t get it to work. Any gate outside the Union¡¯s control was simply beyond valuable, from smuggling goods to sneaking troops anywhere in the universe. The grey stone structure was anything but ordinary even though it looked like a primitive human¡¯s attempt at making a gate. The finest weapons of the Centauri Empire couldn¡¯t scratch it. Reeanth knows because she¡¯s tried, several times. Unbidden, her right hand went to her left shoulder, rubbing the long scar that traced from her collarbone to her elbow, reminding her of the last time she tried to put a dent in this gate with her brother¡¯s top of the line plasma knife.


    All gates are generally built and carefully accounted for by the Integrated Teleporters Union, but not this one.  This one was opportunity, pure opportunity. The only problem was, it only went to one place. The runes were locked by a power greater than hers to the coordinates of a planet long thought to be lost to the ravages of history.  The runes lining the outer ring hadn¡¯t been lit for thousands of years judging by the dust encrusting the sharp lines of the runes, but they had come to life a couple weeks ago allowing Reeanth¡¯s team to explore the other side.


    ¡°Yes Sergeant?¡± She said, staring at the void in the gate with her teeth grinding at the memory of the primitive sorcerer with far too much power.


    ¡°We¡¯ve gathered the weapons you¡¯ve asked for and the twins are eager to put the sorcerer in his place,¡± Jorgan said, ¡°Also, we have a backup squad as well, all vetted by the family. I too, am eager for this conflict.¡±


    ¡°Will it even work?¡± she asked, ¡°Wizards tend to be a poor test for weapons against sorcerers, but we cannot chance using voidling weapons yet. That¡¯s our ace in the hole for the Hegemony.¡±


    ¡°They worked well enough against the dragon half-breeds, and all they do is spit magic,¡± Jorgan grinned, holding a large double-sided axe with runes carved along the blade and handle. ¡°I even had the armorers edge one blade with platinum just in case I got the chance to use it.¡± He tossed it in the air, it flipped twice before coming down and being caught by one giant hand. ¡°I think the twins love their new toys.¡± He gestured behind him to where Gerone and Gerome were tossing silvery blades back and forth like an old Earth circus.


    ¡°Why are we going back to Earth?¡± Gerome asked, adding another blade to the mix. ¡°Yes, what does the backwards land offer to the great Centauri Empire?¡± Gerone clarified, adding yet another knife to the performance.The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    Reeanth turned her head towards the twins and said, ¡°Chaos.¡±


    Jorgan almost dropped his axe in surprise. ¡°Do you think, could it be true?¡± he stuttered out.


    ¡°Yes,¡± she said, grinning like a satisfied cat, ¡°Areas that were previously devoid of magic and Chaos radically change in strange and new ways when they are brought back to it, but it rarely happens. Almost as rare as a dying god. There is a chance that we could find shards of Chaos or new and powerful MAGIK.¡±


    ¡°We could be sorcerers!¡± Jorgan roared, veins popping out of his massive arms, almost gripping the axe hard enough to bend the magically enhanced steel.


    ¡°Calm yourself,¡± Reeanth cut in, her cold voice putting a lid on her team¡¯s excitement. ¡°The mana levels are almost dense enough for our race to survive on the surface, but we could beat the other heavy hitters to Earth if we take enough mana batteries in our suits.¡±


    ¡°But what about the Ripples?¡± Gerone asked. ¡°Yes, what will that do to us?¡± Gerome finished.


    Jorgan grumbled, ¡°Not much. It may make our souls a bit stronger, but it has the greatest effect on those untouched by magik, such as the primitives we rescued from Earth. Not many have the agency to truly grasp for power like the sorcerer, and even fewer manage to survive once they do have it.¡±


    ¡°But what if he was our friend?¡± Gerome asked. ¡°And what if we helped each other?¡± Gerone finished. ¡°We could help each other,¡± they both said in sync.


    ¡°Stop fucking doing that!¡± Jorgan yelled at them, pounding the butt of his axe into the ground. ¡°It¡¯s creepy enough that your twins and constantly in sync, but it¡¯s worse that you never truly separated your mental bond from birth.¡± He turned to Reeanth, ¡°I¡¯m getting food Captain.¡± Then stomped off muttering to himself, ¡°Fucking twin magic, disgusting. No clue how to have an original thought or stand on your own two feet.¡±


    The twins raced after him up the stairs out of the ruin¡¯s basement, ¡°Awww, is the big man lonely?¡± Gerone teased. ¡°Can¡¯t find a woman big enough for the giant?¡± Gerome chimed in.


    Reeanth turned back to the gate, ignoring her subordinates. They were the best team she¡¯d ever had, the only team really. Wizards tend to be raised in teams per the order of the Wizard Most High of the Centauri Empire. This allows them to form powerful close-knit teams with enough variation to handle any situation. The only thing they hadn¡¯t counted on was the damn sorcerer. Rubbing her jaw to relieve the tension of gritting her teeth, she thought to herself that maybe the twins did have an original thought for once. What if they worked with the sorcerer instead of the usual tactics, which of course was grinding all opposition to dust beneath the inexorable might of the Empire.


    If only she could get this damn gate to work though! Everything had been tried, from rearranging the runic coordinates to pouring pure mana into the control base. Stepping forward, she pulled off her glove and traced some runes on the side with her bare hand. ¡°Dimensional settings, mana density, number of passengers, energy levels, but no real filters for the space folding set,¡± she muttered to herself. ¡°If grandfather couldn¡¯t figure it out, then I don¡¯t have a chance in Hell.¡± The gate¡¯s runes along the circular frame began to softly glow and gradually get brighter as the voices of her team faded in the distance. Reeanth tried to pull her hand back as the frame of the gate as the liquid center changed to show another area of Earth instead of the pitch blackness of the void from just a minute ago.


    ¡°No damnit! Let me go!¡± She yelled, pumping mana into the runes of her combat suit, bolstering her strength and fortifying her boot¡¯s grip on the earth beneath her. Her other hand was gripping the stuck arm, pulling with all her might. ¡°Jorgan! Twins! Get your ass back here!¡± she screamed as the gate sucked her in and shut off.

 Unfulfilled Expectations

    *******


    I am an idiot. But, I am the smartest of all the idiots. Trust me, I checked. After Gungnir let all the animals out of the cavern and shut the vaulted stone door, I went back there and began crafting like a maniac, experimenting with the different stones that were warped by Chaos, playing around with the twisted trees that were suddenly hungry after their encounter with a dead god¡¯s death throes. It was beautiful, my very own trip to childhood for a few hours. The only cloud in the sky was the fact that Spot was still stone, but it looked like the crack in the petrified exterior had some normal dog hairs poking out. My magic didn¡¯t reveal too much, but it did feel like some kind of metamorphosis was going on there. I put Gungnir on full time organization of the dead dragon¡¯s brain while I carefully examined the changed gems and trees.


    ¡°Ok, gold mixed with Chaos seems to have some kind of incredible power storage,¡± I muttered to myself, standing over the collection of gems, ¡°Might want to consider making epic batteries out of this. Man, hope it¡¯s a magical equivalent to a superconducter!¡± I kept sorting them, using earth sorcery to feel out the differences between them. ¡°Silver, huh, feels kind of alive,¡± I kept on, poking it with my finger, ¡°Almost seems to respond to my thoughts. Maybe I could make a true artificial intelligence and stick it in a staff to control the spells. Gungnir 3.0.¡± The whole talking to myself definitely wasn¡¯t helping my own view of my sanity, but it did allow me to organize my thoughts.


    ¡°I heard that!¡± Gungnir screamed from its docking station in the crystal vault holding the brain. ¡°No stinkin staff is gonna replace me! I am you! Or, a piece of you. You know what? Screw you!¡±


    ¡°Calm down. I¡¯m just kidding, sheesh.¡± I retorted. ¡°Besides, I got enough on my plate. Keeping track of one crazy magical orb is enough.¡± I turned back to the layout of jewels. ¡°The ruby, huh, that one¡¯s got its own glow.¡± I said as I reached out to touch it. I quickly pulled my finger back, the ruby putting out enough heat to actually burn me. ¡°What the friggin hell!? It¡¯s like, eating mana from the other gems to produce heat!¡± The weirdest part of all of this was that the crystal shards seemed soft somehow, like a shell or a seed with fruit inside.


    I spent the next three days cataloging all the changes in the stones, tending the tree nursery, and eating the bare minimum of canned food to keep me going. The more I learned about the gems and trees, the more a special idea took hold. Looking up from where I was wolfing down a can of soup, the adolescent trees thirty feet away from me where emitting some kind of psychic whine that my nature sorcery barely picked up. The damn things were hungry. Very tentatively, I extended a tendril of nature sorcery towards them and felt the primitive thoughts make themselves known. Now, all trees are are pretty much after the same things, water, sunlight, soil, but these ones wanted a bit more iron in their diet in a form I didn¡¯t really want to provide. Blood. They wanted blood. Actually, they wanted my blood, something about the magic in my blood just made it smell better to them. It was honestly starting to get a little creepy.


    Turning my attention back to the gems, I picked up the sapphire and then picked up the sapphire I had covered in gold. The first one seemed to be completely different from the latter. The naked sapphire was full of energy, but in a watery kind of way, whereas the gold covered one was filled with water aspected sorcery itself. I shook the gold covered crystal, hearing a rattling inside. I started to shake. ¡°Holy shit! Gungnir! Get over here and check this out!¡± I yelled, ¡°I might have actually done it!¡±


    ¡°You yelled at me yesterday for leaving the brain, and now you¡¯re telling me to leave the brain?¡± Gungnir complained, ¡°I ain¡¯t no idiot, besides, I bet what I found is much better than what you did!¡±


    ¡°Fuckin doubt it,¡± I said breathlessly, moving on to check the other crystals. The same results seemed to bear out across the gems. The naked ruby held fire energy, but the gold covered ruby felt like fire sorcery. The granite held earth energy, but the gold covered granite held earth sorcery. The weird ones were the pure quartz and diamonds, seeming to hold pure energy, but the gold covered quartz and diamond crystals seemed to have a tiny piece of rapidly shifting Chaos inside of it, a solid piece! The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Dude, trust me, I¡¯m totally right.¡± Gungnir said, the mental smirk carried over our link. ¡°I know how to use the World Tree sapling to travel like a gate. Rath¡¯s brain showed me that nature, water, and earth dragons regularly use it to find new realms or worlds to nest in. And since your sorcery is right along those lines, shouldn¡¯t be too hard for you to go wherever the hell you want!¡±


    ¡°Uhm, anywhere?¡± The words rang in my head, again and again. Anywhere. The World Tree could take me anywhere. What nerd doesn¡¯t want to see the universe? What Star Wars or Star Trek lover wouldn¡¯t give their soul for this opportunity? What star-gazing layman wouldn¡¯t trade their left-nut for the barest close-up glimpse of an alien system? Gungnir may be right, this might be cooler than holding literal sorcery in my hands. Because not only can I go anywhere I want with Yggdrasil as my house, but I can pop in anywhere the World Tree touches.


    ¡°So what¡¯cha got huh? What beats vacationing in Nirvana?¡± Gungnir teased.


    ¡°Uh, well, the possibility of more sorceries?¡±


    ¡°Shut up.¡± Gungnir deadpanned, ¡°That¡¯s not funny.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m serious, but I¡¯m not really sure what I¡¯m looking at exactly,¡± I said while gently putting down the strange creations. ¡°These things don¡¯t look like what I thought they would.¡±


    ¡°And how would you know?¡± Gungnir said, exasperated at my obvious ignorance, ¡°You¡¯re a baby sorcerer on the World Stage with no knowledge in your brain or information in your bones. Let me see that.¡±


    It undocked from the crystal vat and bobbed over, peering at the carefully laid out experiments. ¡°Crap, crap, double crap, useless crap, worthless to you crap, ooooh! Wait, still crap.¡± Gungnir turned towards me and said, ¡°All of this is crap to you, except for that one over there.¡± A soft beam of green light illuminated a small silver covered shard of quartz off to my left. ¡°I don¡¯t know why, but there is some kind of solidified pure Chaos in that one. Might be useful for getting a light-based magic, but the others,¡± Gungnir paused for a second, ¡°The others are different. They¡¯re a kind of self-recharging battery for different kinds of preset magics. You could set it up to run on its own while you¡¯re out.¡±


    ¡°WHAT?¡± I yelled, ¡°All that effort, a damn animal revolution, and I get stuck with shit I can¡¯t even use?¡±


    ¡°You can use it,¡± Gungnir clarified, ¡°Just not for what you wanted. Those aren¡¯t sorceries, those are crystals for holding purified elements. The Chaos inside of them is minute. The only purpose it serves is to change ¡®wasted¡¯ energy into whatever type it is.¡±


    ¡°English man. Not following.¡± My glare showed the orb I meant business.


    ¡°Think about it this way. Make a flamethrower that runs off of magic. Stick that fire stone in there. Works like a battery. When it runs out of power, it will self-recharge from the ambient energy that you can¡¯t use or feel in the environment.¡±


    The light bulb slowly sputtered on. ¡°I¡¯m so glad all the crystal lovin hippies are gone,¡± I muttered, ¡°They¡¯d be insufferable if they know that their beloved crystal shit is worth something now. Freaking rechargable magic flamethrowers! Finally, something cool!¡±


    ¡°But wait, there¡¯s more!¡± Gungnir said, adopting the voice of Billy Mays, ¡°You could use these crystals to create all kinds of things. Rechargeable weapons, that¡¯s for kids.¡±


    My sentient weapon levitated to about six feet off the ground, sending out beams of light to create projections on the walls around us. ¡°Giants of magic and steel that grind our foes to dust!¡± Gungnir announced as images of several story tall machines wrecked a modern city. ¡°Living flames to ravage wastes of the Undead!¡± A fast-forwarded segment of the old show Game of Thrones played on the wall where a dragon blazed a zombie horde to ashes. ¡°Or bring the gods to their knees with a cleverly crafted trap!¡± Dizzying images of various rituals scrawled in blood and parchment flashed by, ancient and powerful things pouding at the bars of their cages, howling for release and murder.


    ¡°You don¡¯t have everything you want here,¡± Gungnir whispered, ¡°But you do have everything you need.¡±


    Those words stopped me cold. The images flashing across the wall stilled, as if a giant hand stopped the ticking of time itself. ¡°For what exactly?¡± I said, narrowing my eyes as my hands clenched so hard that knuckles began popping on their own. ¡°I have many needs,¡± I said, my voice steadily growing louder. ¡°Stop the eventual flood of the Hungry Ones at the northern border of the continent? Survive the last freaking Ripple? Figure out how to actually claim this continent so the Elder Races leave me alone? Learn how to use my power to its fullest potential? Kill a goddess?!¡±


    Sweat dripped down my face, my raw anger unconsciously using my own water sorcery to banish the irritation. ¡°Or maybe,¡± I said, my voice dropping down to just above a whisper, ¡°A way to stop my own abilities from altering my mind?¡±

 Containing the Earthquake

    People often associate the feeling of anger with the raging blaze that is fire. A careless spark or unattended campfire which leads to a devastating forest fire, incredibly hot and wrathful, devouring every living thing in its path. The machinations of man contrived to create a controlled flame, such as the concentrated power of a blowtorch which cuts through the hardest steel. What the lowered eyes of mankind has failed to see and understand in our limited wisdom is that the true expressions of anger are those exhibited by Mother Nature herself with the elements most needed for life, earth and water. That which is the foundation of life is also the most widespread consequence of death.


    Victims of truly powerful earthquakes and tsunamis grasp on the most basic level that the 10 on the Richter scale isn¡¯t just the earth shaking her fist, it is a total rejection of what is on her surface. The shockwaves of the indignant mother reducing the surface to rubble, and then to dust. Everything we have ever known as humans would be crushed and ground to pebbles as we tumble to the floor, suddenly unable to walk as the most steady part of our world acts like jello. And then, it wouldn¡¯t get better. The follow-up of the initial cosmic temper tantrum is a tsunami. Multiple tsunamis that emanate from the core of the outburst. The total and utter obliteration of the remaining structures along the coastline. Mother Earth flips the table while her son, the Sea, the Ocean, hurls his wrath at what he can touch and drags it back to the unconquerable depths of the blackness.


    It wasn¡¯t hot. It didn¡¯t burn. My anger exhibited none of the attributes of fire. It cracked, and split, and tore like the crust of the earth breaking open. It flooded, and drowned, and washed away the remnants. Realizing that after all of this time, my abilities, my powers, my fragments of a dream that brought wonder to my life, were changing me, altering me in a way I didn¡¯t understand until now. Not only had my body and soul been crafted to fit something more, but my mind itself was shifting, and I didn¡¯t like it. I wanted to still be me, I am still me, but something about me was not the same. Is this what it takes to achieve my goals? I have to become something different? All I really want to do is survive, and survive long enough to see my fiance again, but at what cost? Humans only live around eighty years for a reason. Our minds are not built to withstand the test of eternity. The stress of eons of living is what kills us. The accumulated weight of the ages is what keeps the majority of us from reaching past the point of our first century, and then twists the knife so that those who do break the first limit are soon dead.


    The natural disasters of my anger were twisting inside of me, raging to be let out, loosed upon the uncaring vista of the world. The realization of my own nature combined with the circumstances fought with my soul, my human spirit, the only indomitable thing about me. The only part of me that had a chance in hell of surviving, of enduring. I had done things I wasn¡¯t proud of. Enslaving animals and beasts? I had done that for the sake of surviving, but it wasn¡¯t me, or was it? The act itself had changed me. It made the next enslavement, the next domination that much easier. Murder? I had done that too. Maybe in self-defense, and maybe it would be considered a reasonable action, but I had still done it. Would it make the next murder incrementally more quick? Would I pull the trigger, push the knife, squeeze the throat as if it were nothing given enough time? How much change happens before I am no longer me, before I walk up to a mirror and not recognize the face that stares back? Take over my continent? How gigantic my ego must be for me to contemplate that idea?


    ¡°Be Kind.¡±


    My fiance¡¯s favorite phrase echoed in my head. That¡¯s what she always used to tell me every morning before I went to work. Be kind. Sometimes it was irritating. I didn¡¯t want to kind, I wanted to be tough and direct. Sometimes, it was comforting. There¡¯s love there, a genuine reminder to make the world a better place, one word at a time.


    ¡°Be Kind.¡±


    Looking down at my hands, I noticed that they were covered in powder and some of it was wet. In the minutes I took to fully explore my anger and let it run through me, my sorcery had reacted to my emotions, conjuring rock and crushing it, conjuring water and changing its shape to produce random rough spikes that whipped around, flailing like a caught octopus struggling to escape its fate. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    ¡°Be Kind.¡±


    The words rippled through my soul harder than the throes of a dying god. The memory of fiance evoking feelings and thoughts that I had pushed aside, claiming I didn¡¯t have time to deal with them. But I¡¯m not stone. I am not the unforgiving tide washing away the frailty of my humanity. I am not the pounding avalanche crushing my enemies beneath the inexorable weight of my strength. Yet.


    My flesh sorcery alerted me that some of my thoughts and feelings were not originally my own. They came from my other sorceries, which are alien to the natural state of the human soul. Mankind was not meant, not built to casually hold such power, such control. I conjured a small pebble in the palm of my hand and studied it. First, I am me. Rubbing the surface of the slightly pitted stone, I coalesced my thoughts, MY thoughts around what I felt my core to be. I am me. I am a sorcerer. I control myself, my abilities, my thoughts and my powers. They do not control me. The sorceries were a part of me, they had been since the day everything changed, but now, I could feel them coming to heel, a well-trained hound sitting at my feet, patiently waiting its owner¡¯s commands. Bit by bit, flavor by flavor, the swirls of power granted to me by events outside my control began to join and mix. The sorcery of flesh commanding the bones of the foundation to accept the filling presence of earth and the nourishing rain of water while filling them both with the caress of nature. The sorcery of magic itself blanketed everything, fleshing out the cracks and providing a canopy of protection on my soul.


    Control. I could feel it again. This is what I¡¯ve been missing for so long. The ability to control every facet of every particle of me. The colored tinges of intentions no longer altered the power of my thoughts. I could feel it. The previous desire I had to dominate the changed beasts of the surrounding area to make it safe for me was no longer forefront in my mind. It had originally only been a side plan, but the flesh sorcery unconsciously pushed it to the fore. The water sorcery pushed me to build a base under a river as I sought that which could provide protection. My thoughts, now unhindered, showed the various actions I had taken while literally under the influence.


    I didn¡¯t really want to be king of everything I saw, the undisputed ruler of the unpopulated North American continent. My nature sorcery drove those thoughts, to be the biggest tree in the forest, the most powerful wolf in the pack. It seemed to have worked in tandem with my flesh sorcery to up my aggression levels and need to be the alpha. Don¡¯t get me wrong, it had certainly helped me survive, but a rational human would have run from a dragon instead of trying to drown it. Or made off like the roadrunner when meeting the ¡°genetically altered magical humans from outside our galaxy¡±.


    ¡°You ok there?¡± Gungnir said bobbing in front of my face, cutting my introspective journey short. ¡°Don¡¯t wanna alarm you, but the walls were shaking like crazy there for a bit and your skin was freaking glowing.¡±


    I shook my head, coming to grips with regaining the fringes of my mind. Banishing the evidence of my magical freak out, I looked at Gungnir, the sentient shape-shifting weapon that housed a piece of my soul through pure accident. Another mistake. An overreach by several orders of magnitude. One wrong move by the wrong player and a piece of the most integral part of me could have been destroyed, or even worse, captured. ¡°Hey buddy,¡± I said, my voice tired all the sudden. I lifted my hands. ¡°Come here.¡±


    Gungnir floated slowly down towards my hands, ¡°You¡¯re kinda creepin me out here. I¡¯m not the one you should be angry at. I was just giving you options!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not that,¡± I sighed, taking the orb out of the air and willing it back into spear form. Reaching out with my magic, I felt the inner core of my weapon, where a piece of my soul resided. ¡°I¡¯ve just realized some of the mistakes I¡¯ve made in my ignorance, and having the most vulnerable part of me floating around is not the smartest thing I¡¯ve done.¡±


    I gripped the spear with both hands and flooded my sorcery into every part of it, and then centered my power on the core crystal blade.


    Three loud whumpfs resounded through the room. ¡°Hooray! I¡¯ve been rescued!¡±


    ¡°Shut up Gungnir.¡± I snapped, my need to secure a piece of myself warring with what sounded like someone knocking on the door or stomping on the earth overhead.


    ¡°Open up sorcerer! I can feel you down there!¡± Three more muffled whumpfs sounded. ¡°Don¡¯t make me come down there!¡±


    I willed Gungnir into knife from and secured it to my belt. ¡°No fucking way,¡± I muttered, turning towards the staircase leading to the opening under the World Tree. ¡°It can¡¯t be.¡± I walked up the stairs and put my hands to the stone door, shaping a tiny hole in the stone door so I could peek out. My shock was outperformed by my mouth. ¡°What the fuck do you want Reeanth?¡±

 The Shoe is on the Other Foot

    ¡°What is she good fooooor?¡± Gungnir began to sing, pulsing the beat in my hand, ¡°Absolutely nothin!¡±


    ¡°Not right now,¡± I growled across our mental link, ¡°Definitely not right now.¡± Sweat beaded on my forehead, the anticipation of combat fought my flesh sorcery¡¯s innate control over my body. Last time we met, it wasn¡¯t that fun. One mistake and I was toast. The little hole let me see out just enough to make out parts of her face while her voice definitely confirmed that it was her.


    ¡°We don¡¯t have time for this! Open the cursed door!¡± she screamed, banging on the stone then taking a step back. With a bit of distance, I was able to make out some more detail, the sorry state she was in tugged at the remnants of my human decency. Her silvery battlesuit was torn and shredded along her shoulder, her weapons non-existent. Blood was everywhere, streaming down her arm. ¡°By all the gods and nameless Deeps, I swear eternal loyalty if you¡¯ll just let me in!¡± Her pride began to break at her last words, her bloody but functioning arm slapping the door, nails scraping in desperation.


    The shrill fear in her voice freaked me out. What the fuck scares a soldier from an magically advanced civilization that storms worlds and saves entire populations just so they can fight in a far-flung war? Whatever was out there definitely scared me a lot more than her.


    ¡°Oh hell yeah!¡± Gungnir raved, ¡°Exactly what we needed! A lady to take care of all your worries so you don¡¯t have to mess with me! Life is still within my grasp!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not good enough!¡± I yelled back at Reeanth, taking full advantage of my position, ¡°I need more than that!¡± Always negotiate from a position of strength, and this moment definitely qualified. I widened the peephole just enough to shove Gungnir through. [Stall whatever it is so I can do this right] I commanded the floating weapon. It zipped off mentally yelling back at me, [Only if you don¡¯t take me apart you bastard!].


    Incoherent snarls of curse words not invented by humanity tumbled through the hamster wheel that was my brain. I needed more time, more time to think. I knew Gungnir couldn¡¯t actually run from, since I could just summon it back, but it is a serious liability as well as the most powerful tool I had. It could probably delay just about anything we¡¯ve encountered so far as long as it¡¯s careful.


    Now Reeanth on the other hand. She didn¡¯t look like she was faking and that amount of blood with that lovely wound requires a fuck ton of dedication to go through with it to fool someone. A familiar roar shook the bolthole I was in and all the trees outside. The roar was accompanied by a strange thud then almost instantly followed by the crack of thunder. I expanded my magical senses to feel around the area, a familiar sensation greeting the magical pulse. I knew exactly what was scaring her. Grinning just out of her sight, I called down the enlarged peephole, ¡°Not good enough bitch! I remember your last greeting!¡± I began forcing the stone door to slowly contract the peephole with my earth sorcery, the promise of her salvation creeping closed.


    ¡°What do you want? Money? Power? Tools?¡± she begged sticking her arm in the peephole to grasp towards me, ¡°I have it all!¡±


    ¡°Not on ya,¡± I replied, the tiny tunnel ever so gradually filling in, ¡°The only thing you bring to the table is a fucking mess.¡± I didn¡¯t want to be cruel, but this opportunity wouldn¡¯t come by again.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°You can have me! Anything you want you can have.¡± Her sobs began to make her harder to understand.


    ¡°Nope, already taken,¡± I replied, obviously leaving out that my woman was a tree. Using flesh sorcery to tamp down on my sex drive was doing wonders for my thoughts process. Being able to think was such a wonderful gift after an offer like that. ¡°What else ya got, cause I don¡¯t have time for whiny baggage.¡± She did have something I wanted, but the chances of her giving it to me willingly were small.


    ¡°What else is there? Anything, I¡¯ll do anything!¡± she wept as she fell to the ground just out of sight. I looked through my mental connection with Gungnir, she was curled up at the base of the door, cradling her left side. Her left arm was clearly broken, and maybe her collar bone was too. A gnarly slash under her arm was bleeding profusely, her strength going with it. The angular runes on the remnants of her suit were pulsing red in time with her breath. ¡°I¡¯ll even be your slave,¡± she gasped, her voice getting softer.


    Not what I wanted, but close enough to get me to what I did need. ¡°Swear it!¡± I yelled, urgency filling my voice. I could tell through Gungnir¡¯s sight that she was bleeding out. I could fix that easily, but not without a guarantee that she wouldn¡¯t turn on me or give me what I needed. ¡°Swear it or I¡¯ll let you get eaten! I know what¡¯s out there, and trust me, he¡¯s always hungry.¡±  [Come on, come on], I thought to myself, [Take the fucking bait!].


    I barely made it out, her gasping breaths, ¡°I, Reeanth Le¡¯Talv, do swear by the honor of the Alpha Centauri Prime, the guard of the lost throne of Atlantis, and by my soul¡¯s wizard binding, to serve you and your cause in all ways until I am released by your will.¡±


    Not how I would have phrased it, but I guess good enough for the circumstances. I banished the stone keeping her out and dragged her in by her leg, using flesh sorcery to knock her unconscious. This woman needed to live and I had the feeling that maybe she wouldn¡¯t be the most cooperative prisoner, even with her oath. I started working on her wounds not even worrying about the stone door. Gungnir could handle Kong.


    Now that I wasn¡¯t listening to a dying woman¡¯s pleas for help, I could hear the giant ape¡¯s roars just after the crack of thunder, Gungnir playing the role of fast floating taser to keep Kong away. Gungnir¡¯s thoughts were off in the background of our mental link as I focused on healing Reeanth. I took a second to scan her with my flesh sorcery, one hand on her wounded shoulder while the other was on her forehead. Her insides were a mess. If anyone were here, I¡¯d put money that she tried to take on the giant ape out of sheer arrogance.


    Fixing her was actually easy. My sorcery easily overpowered her body¡¯s inner magic as it was obviously drained from her fight with a three story monkey. Closing the veins causing her internal bleeding was the top priority, then I conjured blood to replace what she lost. Then, I took my time slowly banishing the pieces of shattered bone from her collarbone and shoulder while healing the total body bruising. Thirty minutes worth of work had her out of the woods, but I didn¡¯t heal all of her body. I left her complete left side in such a way that she couldn¡¯t move her left arm at all. I mean, I could easily have fixed it, but I wanted to make sure that her oath was bind. All of humanity has heard of oaths or the concept of swearing by whatever. Our stories and myths tell us the folly and danger of agreeing to contracts with magical beings. My guess was that magic made oaths a little more permanent than what modern humans are used to.


    Gungnir whipped back into the entrance of the bolthole. ¡°Yooooo! You did it!¡± it celebrated, bouncing around in the air, ¡°Got yo¡¯self a woman!¡±


    My glare shut it up. ¡°All right, all right,¡± Gungnir said, floating back a few feet, ¡°I¡¯ll leave it alone. By the way, Kong left, minus a few patches of fur. Tasing him in the balls worked wonders! His hollerin scared the crap outta this bitch. So, how¡¯d it go? What¡¯ya get out of her.¡±


    I stared down at the unconscious woman, her seven and a half foot tall body sprawled at my feet. ¡°Nothin yet,¡± I answered, ¡°But if this goes well, shit might actually start going on our way.¡±


    ¡°Does this mean you don¡¯t need to take dissemble me?¡± Gungnir asked, pleading tones bleeding through our link, ¡°I mean, without me, you wouldn¡¯t have a space-faring combat wizard begging for your help. Kong would have finished the job without ole reliable me zapping him off.¡±


    ¡°Fine,¡± I snapped, not looking forward to the next couple days, ¡°But you¡¯re the one who gets to add her data to Rath¡¯s brain vat.¡±


    ¡°Wooohooooo!¡±

 The Quick Turnaround

    ******


    ¡°Ya know, maybe this isn¡¯t such a good idea.¡±


    ¡°Seriously, you wait till I¡¯m about to do it and then voice your concerns? I spent like two fucking hours setting this up!¡±


    ¡°What if you fry her brain? What if something leaks in the wrong direction? Besides, that helmet is lame. All the powers of sorcery at your disposal and you make it look like some Frankenstein rip-off.¡±


    ¡°Gungnir. If you have a better idea, then spill. If not, we¡¯re frying the alien.¡±


    ¡°You know she¡¯s not an alien.¡±


    ¡°A genetically advanced human with wizardry and magical battle armor qualifies. Besides, she¡¯s a foot and a half taller than me.¡±


    Reeath¡¯s unconscious body was slumped over in a solid stone chair in front of the crystal vat holding the dragon¡¯s brain. Her limbs were encased in conjured iron shackles as thick as a man¡¯s forearm while a multi-pronged crystal helmet secured her head to the back of the chair, which had a wires of gold connecting it to the vat. Gungnir was resting in the shallow divot that served as its docking station. I had one hand on the orb with another on my prisoner¡¯s head. My bright idea was to see if I could copy all the information from Reeanth and drop it into my makeshift biological computer and then have Gungnir go through it so everything would be nice and easy.


    The only thing standing in my way was the fact that I wanted to dissemble my uber-weapon that housed a vulnerable slice of my soul, but the damn thing was my only hope of actually making this work. And, it randomly has good ideas that might save me from myself, like the possibility of me royally fucking this up.


    ¡°You catch more flies with honey!¡±


    ¡°Stop.¡±


    ¡°Kindness is never wasted!¡±


    ¡°Shut-up.¡±


    ¡°Love makes the world go round!¡±


    ¡°I swear. . . ¡°


    ¡°What is love? Baby don¡¯t hurt me!¡±


    My grip on the orb tightened as a tiny bit of magic crackled down my arm. ¡°ENOUGH!¡± I yelled, ¡°For the love of magic, enough!¡± One eye twitched as I reined the whimsical desire to bury both Gungnir and Reeanth. ¡°I am not actually frying her, I know she¡¯s not actually an alien, and she really isn¡¯t my slave!¡±


    ¡°Wait, what?¡± Gungnir sputtered, ¡°Then what¡¯s the whole damn point?!¡±


    ¡°You know, for being an extension of me, you really suck at this,¡± I said, ¡°I don¡¯t want or need her to be a slave, all I want is the information in her head. Besides, we don¡¯t really know if magically binding oaths are a thing. They probably are, but that doesn¡¯t mean I know how to make it stick. We are ignorant about magic, remember? Just because we¡¯re powerful doesn¡¯t mean we are educated.¡± I gestured at the bound over-sized but proportional woman in front of me, ¡°She is a means to an end, the only end that matters, knowledge. That¡¯s what I need, cause we don¡¯t know shit. Besides, the whole point of scaring her into accepting being a slave is to make her feel better later when I scan her brain and then set her free. She can¡¯t be that mad at having her information copied if she is free to complain about it.¡±


    ¡°I know plenty of things. The brain vat is full of things! You literally don¡¯t need her,¡± Gungnir pouted.


    ¡°You¡¯re wrong, we do need her. Do you think dragons care about enchantment and futuristic weapons beyond the fact that those things are a threat? No. I bet dragons only care about food and power, and there is more to life than that. We need that info. Stop acting like a child,¡± I grimaced but continued, ¡°See, this is one of the reasons I wanted to dissemble you. You¡¯re an immature liability with a whole bunch of useful capabilities. Too dangerous to exist, but it¡¯s far too risky right now to be without your added power. So grow up. You¡¯re a piece of my soul, which means you should be able to mature, so fuckin do it.¡±Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.


    The orb rotated in its dock so that the Chaos crystal eye was looking me in the face. ¡°You¡¯d really do it wouldn¡¯t you?¡± Gungnir asked.


    ¡°If I have to,¡± I answered grudgingly, ¡°But I don¡¯t want to. The fact is, I need all the power I can get, but without losing myself or my life. You¡¯re a liability and a powerful tool all rolled into one annoying ball.¡± Shaking my head at losing a bit of focus, I turned back towards Reeanth. Using flesh sorcery, I put a nerve block at the base of her skull and then woke her up.


    ¡°Mornin sunshine!¡± My greeting didn¡¯t inspire the happy demeanour that I was hoping for. Her eyes went wide and she began attempting to thrash around, which looked oddly funny as the only part of her that she could even move or feel was her head.


    ¡°Seriously, stop. Relax. It¡¯s all you can do right now. I put in a nerve block so you can¡¯t actually move your body below your neck, and I¡¯m using flesh sorcery to keep you clear headed so you can understand what¡¯s going on.¡± My voice had taken on a lecturing tone, both to convey my absolute control in this moment as well as to communicate the simplicity of what I wanted.


    I put both my hands on her face and made her look me in the eye. ¡°I am not going to hurt you. I promise.¡± I said, ¡°You were wounded and I healed the worst of it. You swore yourself to me and I only want one thing, and it¡¯s not your body.¡±


    The frantic whites of her eyes receded as her brain caught up with my words. Her heavy panicked breathing began to slow down. ¡°Then what do you want?¡± she asked, fear making her voice rough and a bit low.


    ¡°Knowledge. I want everything you know, with nothing left out. Knowledge is power, but knowledge is also context, and I need that too. I want to know everything I should if I had grown up in your society. I want to know who the big players are in the big wide galaxy, what to watch out for when invading a new planet, your society¡¯s understanding of magic and how it works as well as what you forbid and encourage about magical research. Trust me, the list goes on.¡± I removed my hands and took a step back. ¡°Now, I¡¯m going to have Gungnir copy everything in your brain and store it,¡± I said, gesturing at the now quiet orb, ¡°And I need you, Reeanth, enforced by the terms of your oath, to let this happen. That¡¯s it. That¡¯s all I want. And, to top it off, if you cooperate fully and willingly, I¡¯ll finish healing your body so that you¡¯re as good as new.¡±


    She gulped and nodded. ¡°How, how does this work?¡± she asked, ¡°What are you going to do exactly?¡±


    ¡°You are going to sit there, and relax, and keep your mind open. My sentient weapon Gungnir, yes, the glowing ball thing right over there, is going to GENTLY,¡± I said, shooting a warning glare at the orb, ¡°gently scan your brain and copy it and transfer the copied data into that vat, that holds the brain of dead dragon. It¡¯s pretty much a biological computer that we¡¯re working the kinks out of.¡±


    ¡°I could just answer your questions, anything you want to know I¡¯ll tell you!¡±


    ¡°Honestly, I don¡¯t know if I can trust you, so I¡¯m doing it my way. This way I get the feelings associated with your memories as well, so hopefully provide some context. Gungnir will be discreet, and will erase all of your personal and private memories that don¡¯t relate to what we need from the copied set of data.¡±


    An hour later, we had what we needed, but not really in the way we expected. With one hand on crystal helmet Reeanth was wearing, and the other on Gungnir, the process was kinda fucked up. I had envisioned a seamless copy and transfer of data from Reeanth¡¯s brain up through the helmet, which served as an amplifier and transmitter, through my body and governed by my flesh sorcery to be poured into Gungnir, who would then deposit the information in the giant brain of Rath. This is not what happened.


    Gungir used my flesh sorcery in a totally different way. First, it did scan Reeanth¡¯s brain, and then began using it as a template to grow another brain on top of Rath¡¯s brain. The brain of the dragon had a human brain tumor sticking out of its side. [What in the fucking fuck are you doing Gungir?] I thought at the orb, [This is not what we planned!].


    Gungnir replied, [I¡¯m not done categorizing the dragon¡¯s brain yet, or even from stopping it from thinking that it¡¯s still alive. So, I used some of the unused portion to make a copy of Reeanth¡¯s brain in order to give the foreign data a safe place to be before I get everything fixed.]


    It made sense, but it was weird. [Besides,] it continued, [This way, since you have a conscience now, if you need to get at some memories that may be locked away by oaths or magic, you won¡¯t have any problems breaking the copied brain to get to it.]


    [So this is like trying to break into encrypted data. The data can be copied no problem, but it will still be encrypted. And I won¡¯t have to burn out Reeanth¡¯s original brain to break the code.] I thought back, surprised that I hadn¡¯t thought of it first, [Keep this up and I¡¯ll keep you around.]


    [Exactly! Am I smart, or am I beyond smart?]


    Growing the exact copy of our resident prisoner¡¯s brain took fifteen minutes, and the data copy and transfer took forty-five minutes. I caught random memories here and there, a secretive first kiss, the pride at being inducted into the Council of the Cosmic Knights, the frustration of of the mundane task of overseeing the ¡®appropriation¡¯ of genetically damaged humans. Other parts flowing the data stream were pure white, the packets of information concealed by a shield of magic brighter than any I had seen so far.


    Then, it was over. The only reason I knew that an hour had flown by was that Gungnir kept a rough track of time. My mind was heavy. The mental exertion of acting as the magical equivalent of a sorcery-enhanced MRI was taxing in a way I was definitely not used to. ¡°Gungnir, fix her. Regrow her missing bones and heal the bruised muscles,¡± I said, stumbling off to my vault of canned food. I opened several cans of soup, set them in front of me, and sat in my chair, watching Gungnir through my magical senses as the orb undocked from its station and floated to Reeanth¡¯s lap and began healing her. Bones began to grow while torn muscles knit back together.


    [So, what are you actually going to do with her?] Gungnir asked through our mental link as it finished healing her, [I mean, she¡¯s pretty hot, and you could use some extra help around here.]


    [Nothing honestly,] I thought back, wolfing down the soup, [Knock her out so both of us can get some sleep. I¡¯ll let her free in the morning after I feed her and check on the spare brain. If she were loose, free from her shackles and decided to fight, I don¡¯t think I¡¯d win right now. My head hurts too much.]

 Renegotiation

    Morning brings out the worst in people if you belong to the vast majority of sunrise haters. The few, the proud, the morning people, now that¡¯s a despicable crew. And, thanks to flesh sorcery, I have unfortunately joined their ranks. It takes just a second to will my flesh sorcery to begin and rapidly process the entire mental exercise it takes to strangle the intense desire to stay in bed. To be clear, it was also greatly assisted by my prisoner¡¯s screams, the piercing wail of unbelievable torture.


    ¡°MY LORD! LET ME OUT! PLEASE! I HAVE TO PEEEEE!¡±


    ¡°Fine, fine, I get it, sheesh. One second,¡± I said, only registering select pieces of that statement as I got dressed and called Gungnir to my hand, its form changing from orb to spear. In an attempt to keep some semblance of control of the situation, I quickly removed her pain nerve block and imperiously tapped the spear tip to her shackles then banished them even as I opened the door to the outside. Wasting no time, Reeanth sprinted out the front door.


    ¡°Hate to watch her go, but love to watch her leave!¡± Gungnir sang softly.


    ¡°Leaves work as toilet paper!¡± I yelled after her as I walked to the opening, oddly enjoying the very human reaction. For just that moment, I forgot that she had tried to kill me just a week or two ago. Her lithe form disappeared into the ungrowth. ¡°And hopefully she doesn¡¯t come back,¡± I muttered as I reconjured the stone vault door and turned away.


    ¡°Pleeeaaseee, don¡¯t leave me! I always say how I don¡¯t need you . . ¡°


    ¡°I realize that there is a song for literally every situation a being can encounter,¡± I started, ¡°But if you do not shut . . .¡±


    ¡°Baby come back!¡±


    ¡°Ok, that¡¯s it. That¡¯s fine. Plenty of things I can do with you.¡± I growled, stomping over to the crystal vat, using my will to change Gungnir back into a ball. I shoved the orb into its docking station. ¡°You will sit there and decode all the information and organize it into cohesive subjects. Do not leave until it¡¯s done.¡±


    ¡°Head like a hole, black as your soul, I¡¯d rather die! Than give you control!¡±


    ¡°One more out of date lyric and you¡¯re done. I will stick you inside the freaking World Tree and put you on guard duty until Sarah gets out, which by our last estimate, was four thousand years.¡±


    All I heard was an audible gulp down our mental link, then blessed silence. It truly was a wondrous new day. The Centauri woman was gone, Gungnir was silent, and I had a whole bunch of new magical lego pieces to play with, but my main problems were that I needed the info locked away in that crystal vat before I played with them intelligently. Living through the last Ripple and then eventually surviving the invasion of the Hungry Ones were the two tasks weighing on my mind as they fought with my desire to experiment. It made me not want to craft anything due to the chances that Chaos might undo what I just did.


    Refocusing on what mattered for the time being, I grabbed a can of soup and sat down in my comfy chair, pondering my options. Mindless eating helped grease the squeaky wheels in my brain. So far, the Ripples have changed the landscape of Earth, allowed other things and creatures to travel here and back, given me opportunities for supernatural power, and mutated the plants and animals. Also, it undid the various forms of domination Gungnir and I had put on the animals as well as allowing forgotten deities to make a comeback.


    One of the weird things that I had noticed as the Ripples flooded our plane, is that the Ripples were getting weaker as the levels of magic were rising. Chaos seemed to have the greatest effect on the things that were untouched by magic, such as Earth before the Ripples, or me. I was a prime example of this, shoot, rocks were an example of this. Crystals seemed to have some kind of ability to inherently change their characteristics after coming into contact with the raw power of a dying deity. How many other worlds were experiencing this, or was it just us? Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    I stared at the collection of changed crystals off to the side that I hadn¡¯t put away. The stone of fire couldn¡¯t give me sorcery, but it could be used as a perfect weapon against the undead. The other one, the quartz, Gungnir mentioned something about it having sorcery related to light. I did have an idea for that, but not in the way I initially thought, but it will wait till later. Damn, everything hinges on information, which unfortunately, is what I lack. Well, I could experiment with things that probably won¡¯t change when the Ripple hits, namely, myself. The entire concept of power that I was previously using, creating my own personal dominated army of mutated beasts, won¡¯t work until the Ripples stop entirely. The summoner or necromancer builds just don¡¯t work for me yet.  Personal power inherent to myself is what I need to work on.


    Some things I found were rather interesting, for instance, one of the things that I did pick up accidentally from Reeanth¡¯s mind flow is that it is standard practice in the Centauri Empire to undergo a kind of genetic cleansing, and not the 1930s sense of the word. Part of that cleansing, is a sort of basic restructuring of the body¡¯s internal system from bones to nerves. One of the reasons that their bodies tend to be so much taller than ours, Reeanth, as an example, is short for their kind. The Centauri need a larger frame to house a sturdier product. The average height for the females of the Centauri Empire is around eight feet tall weighing in around three hundred and fifty pounds, and the men are proportionally bigger, but not by too much. Using strands of biologically compatible crystal, they fundamentally changed the basic standard of human durability.  They also seem to have shortened the genetic gap of strength and speed between men and women as well.


    One of the ways that their combat-centered empire adapted to meet the need of matching supernatural creatures in terms of power is two-fold, enhance the body internally, and enhance it externally. The external side focuses on the many years their wizard scientists took to perfect combat suits that are covered in runes enhancing everything from cardiovascular health to miniature mana shields to soak up damage. Basic grunts get a pain-blocker with clotting potions as well as the common life-support system. As one goes up the ranks in their military, the suits get fancier as well, to mana storage containers and embedded spell-runes that fire various kinds of elemental damage.


    Boom, boom, boom.


    ¡°My lord Sorcerer! Please let me in!¡±


    ¡°And now she¡¯s back, from outer space!¡±


    Great. Gungnir alone is bad enough. Reeanth, polite Reeanth? She actually came back. Now that¡¯s just cruel. How the hell am I supposed to handle this? At least when she¡¯s being a dick I can be one right back, but this? Fuck man.


    ¡°Go away!¡± I yelled at the stone door while setting down the empty can. I glared at the two foot thick, solid stone portal, imagining her outside, fearfully looking around for Kong who just might be hoping for round two.  ¡°A badass Centauri captain with thousands of years of magical learning behind her education doesn¡¯t need little ole me.¡±


    ¡°I swore a binding oath of loyalty my lord!¡± she stated firmly, ¡°Doesn¡¯t that mean anything to you?¡±


    Groaning audibly, I stood and walked to the door and made another peephole. ¡°This is gettin real old lady. You have nothing I want now. Also, I fixed you up back to normal and don¡¯t want to deal with you. And no, it doesn¡¯t mean anything to me. How could it? I don¡¯t know how magical oaths work, or if they¡¯re even a thing?¡±


    Her face made her opinion clear. Apparently, they¡¯re definitely a thing. ¡°A magical oath sworn by a soul capable of magic binds that person¡¯s life to the oath,¡± she said, her grey eyes losing their sense of arrogance for the second time. ¡°I am sworn to you and your cause until released by your will. You should be honored that one such as I am championing your pursuits.¡±


    ¡°Right, I figured that, but that doesn¡¯t mean I trust it. I mean, I don¡¯t trust you. At all,¡± I said flippantly. ¡°Besides, my main goal is to survive the next four thousand years. I got wedding plans on hold thanks to some magical apocalypse fuckery, but that ain¡¯t stopping me. You my dear, are a hindrance to that. Besides, how did you get back here anyways? I plugged up the gate y¡¯all used? And where are your goons?¡±


    I feel that the uncaring tones and disrespectful manner of Earthly communication aren¡¯t really having the same effect on her that they would with any other human. Usually, a person¡¯s eyes would have narrowed from the realization that I was clearly talking down to her, belittling her in the pursuit testing her patience, to purposefully get a rise out of her. Nothing. She answered respectfully as if I were a corporate CEO making a minion clarify something on their bad presentation.


    ¡°The sorcerers of old were mighty nobles in our empire. Power is treasured and respected while weakness is ruthlessly weeded out. If you were back in our cluster, then many would be seeking your hand in marriage for the hopes that your children would have a seed of sorcery. Here, you could be king!¡±


    ¡°No, seriously,¡± I deadpanned, ¡°How do I know for sure that you are not fucking with me? Trying to take advantage of my lack of magical education. You know that I¡¯ve had magic for just over a month while your civilization and every other one out there has had it since time immemorial. I have too much to do and figure out before I start taking on even more risks, because I¡¯ve already taken too many of those. I¡¯m surrounded by a forest by beasts that I¡¯ve enslaved. They managed to escape by the way. Also, goblin-esque creatures that hunt down giant alligators and have attacked me already roam the area, and some freaky things at night come knocking even though I can¡¯t even see them. And it just gets worse and weirder every time the death throes of some unnamed dead god of Chaos hit my planet.¡±


    Felt good to get that off my chest.

 Chapter 78 - Possibilities

    It felt so good in fact, that I almost shut the door hole in her face. It occurred to me, that with my abilities, I could just leave and hollow out a mountain somewhere nearby and do whatever the hell I wanted. I could burrow down and create an underground fortress, or make that mountain indestructible from the inside! Oh the possibilities. I could experiment for a few hundred years while using flesh sorcery to keep me young and energetic and go full on mad scientist. I could wait out the Ripples and the various arms races that each continent was holding. And all of this would be a helluva lot easier if I had someone capable and not completely ignorant watching my back. The lack of choices is certainly painful, but it could be worse, way worse.


    ¡°How do I prove to myself that this oath, this vow of loyalty is real?¡± I asked her through the hole. ¡°What proof do you have?¡±


    She hesitated for a second. ¡°Blood,¡± Reeanth said, ¡°Lies hurt, but disobedience bleeds.¡±


    ¡°Explain.¡±


    ¡°If you order me to tell the truth and I lie, I will feel pain until I comply. If you order me to do something and I defy you, I will bleed.¡±


    ¡°How badly? Like, can I test this in a non-life threatening way?¡±


    ¡°It depends on the severity of the offense. The more it angers or disappoints you, the worse for me it will become. This is why our cadets follow their leaders so faithfully, one, because they swore to do so. And two, because the leaders make an oath back to be a good leader and to make intelligent decisions that keeps the soldiers¡¯ well-being in mind. Both parties are held by magic in a pact of obedience, loyalty, trust, and decency.¡±


    My left eye-brow rose a fraction. ¡°Sounds like there¡¯s plenty of room here for maneuvering around that.¡±


    ¡°We follow the spirit of the oath as well!¡± she snapped, ¡°We are not the Fae!¡± Her sudden vehemence took me off guard.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t mean to insult, but what are the Fae? The Elves or Aelves, however you say it, they are in the Amazon rainforest. That the same thing, Fae and Aelves?¡±


    ¡°My lord, we have a lot to talk about. Your education is very poor.¡±


    ¡°Of course it¡¯s poor! How many times do I have to explain this to every fucking idiot that drops by for a visit?¡±


    Flexing my will, I activated the weapon-rune components of Svalinn, blue energy making the blades lengthen down my forearm, and then banished the stone door, taking a few steps back. ¡°Come on in Reeanth. Let¡¯s test this oath.¡±


    She gingerly walked in, eyeing Svalinn as it crackled with stored power. ¡°That¡¯s new.¡±


    ¡°Yup, and don¡¯t give me an excuse to test it too.¡±


    She stopped just inside the door.


    Looking her up and down and noting the ragged state of her uniform, I noticed her tense stance. She actually viewed me as a threat right now. Guess I¡¯m coming up in the world.


    ¡°I order you, Reeanth, to fetch me a can of soup.¡±


    She didn¡¯t move. Well, her body didn¡¯t, but her face barely scrunched as a line of blood began to flow down her forehead originating from her hairline. This was kinda cool, but freaky, like when you watch a horror movie about a haunted house and you see blood dripping down the walls but there¡¯s no signs of violence and you just want to make sure that your eyes are not lying to you.


    ¡°Reeanth, drop and give me twenty.¡±


    A small cut opened up on her exposed upper right arm, a small trickle of red creating a stream down her arm. I let a little bit of my temper leak out.


    ¡°KNEEL!¡±


    She held still for a moment, then folded like a cheap plastic chair. ¡°Oh shit! Oh shit, shit, shit, shit¡± I cursed, making Svalinn withdraw the blades as I jumped to her side. ¡°I rescind all my orders!¡± I freaked as I pushed my flesh sorcery into her wounds, sealing them up and examining her insides. ¡°Way too far!¡± I muttered as my sorcery showed me the battlefield that was her body. The damage was extensive, and I would not have believed it if I hadn¡¯t seen it for myself. Her own body, her red blood cells and nerves had literally attacked her on the cellular level, ripping molecular tears in her muscles and overloading her synapses with alternating hormones. At this moment, her body had stopped fighting me, but the damage was incredible. I had to reconnect the muscles fibers and seal up the the micro-tears in the arteries and regrow half of her nervous system. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    Thank the Ripple that my flesh sorcery contained the instincts to do this almost autonomously. The fact that sorcery is guided by will is what makes what I do look so easy even though I can watch the million steps it to actually get something done. Without my personal generator, I used Reeanth¡¯s own energy and the ambient mana in the area around me to power this regrowth. ¡°Uhg, generators. Another problem to fix. Another awesome plan wrecked by the freaking Ripple.¡± I muttered as I dragged the unconscious woman to the cot I had set up in the corner. Several grunts and a constant stream of cursing later, I had her heavy ass lying on the cot, her feet hanging off as it was meant for a person of normal height.


    ¡°Gungnir, did you find anything about mana storage or batteries or generators of any kind yet?¡± I yelled over my shoulder to the docked orb.


    ¡°Not really. Dragons don¡¯t care about mana generation as they make plenty of their own, and their bodies store the excess that they generate,¡± Gungnir answered, ¡°Which is why big dragons tend to be the most powerful. They also tend to nest or store their hoard on a ley line of their preference for faster growth.¡±


    ¡°So, everything always comes back to size huh?¡±


    ¡°Yup. Ask your woman when she wakes up. That¡¯s why they¡¯re all so big. Their bigger bodies are designed to hold far more mana. I bet they had a flesh sorcerer long ago who came up with the template for the enhanced humans. It also might be the root cause of what got rid of sorcerers in their society.¡±


    Ignorance. Cucked by my own ignorance. What I couldn¡¯t give to have a greater IQ. Now don¡¯t get me wrong, I¡¯m a smart guy, but that¡¯s compared to humanity prior to magic returning. How do I measure up to an alien wizard with centuries of learning and experimentation?


    ¡°Ok, so the body can hold mana, right. But what else can?¡± I questioned. The basics most of all were what I needed to know. ¡°Is there anything in that vat about exercising your soul so it can hold more magic or be more powerful? What about increasing how much mana my body naturally generates? There¡¯s gotta be something.¡±


    ¡°Dude, there¡¯s like tens of thousands of years of memories in this big brain, and this little brain on the side of the big brain has literal ENCRYPTION in parts of it. This is gonna take a while.¡±


    A while. Fuck a while. I wanted to explore. One Ripple left. No personal generators. A horde of living animals that were former slaves circling my forest. Boredom. My new greatest enemy. It may be the death of me. Fuck boredom. I sat my butt on the floor next to Reeanth¡¯s cot. Normally, my hermit instincts serve me well, the natural drive of the introvert to chill and wait out the situation is perfect for this situation. But even I need a group, a place to be social, once in a while. The human condition requires a pack, companionship. It seems to be a built in weakness, one that I am not immune to.


    I scanned Reeanth, noting that her body was back to normal. Guess oaths are a thing. I¡¯m going to have to be very careful with my words from now on. ¡°Hey!¡± I shouted, ¡°Time to get up!¡± Using my flesh sorcery, I forced her pain-induced unconsciousness to recede. ¡°We¡¯re going to test this oath for real. I have experiments and things to do outside, and you¡¯re going to watch my back. Protect me with that over-sized body of yours and I¡¯ll make sure that you¡¯re always in one piece.¡±


    Not sure she caught all of that. Her wiping the crud out of her eyes did not inspire my belief that she heard me. ¡°Reeanth!¡±


    ¡°Yes my lord. I heard you,¡± she said sitting up, stretching like a cat after a long nap. Her grey eyes seemed to convey no emotion whatsoever. ¡°In order to accomplish my duty properly, I will need to repair my suit and find a suitable weapon.¡±


    My sarcasm trotted out like a proud knight peacocking around in brand-spankin new armor. ¡°Right. Because I can repair high-tech alien magical armor. If that were the case, I would have already made some. I¡¯d be walking around in some Iron Man suit wrecking zombies if I had that kind of power. But no, my dumbass didn¡¯t choose fire or energy or light, I picked earth and water.¡±


    ¡°You can conjure metal right?¡± she clarified, her voice holding a hint of amusement.


    ¡°Yes. All day. But I don¡¯t see how that helps. I already examined your armor. It¡¯s freaking platinum mixed with iridium. Both of those are super rare and my sorcery takes a long time to conjure stuff that rare. Besides, after I¡¯ve conjured it, it¡¯s almost impossible for me to affect platinum.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t need those for now. Regular steel works.¡± She said smugly.


    ¡°If you would be so kind, my lord, I shall show you.¡±


    Conjuring a bar of iron in my hand, I held it up. ¡°Steel doesn¡¯t occur naturally. We got iron though.¡± In my other hand, I conjured a small diamond. ¡°Diamonds are easier to conjure since they are made from carbon, which is the most abundant element.¡± I banished them both and then conjured a small block of titanium. ¡°What about this?¡±


    ¡°That, that actually works.¡± she said, eyeing me with new respect. ¡°How does conjuring work? Our mage-techs can¡¯t do that. In order to build, we have to gather the materials and place them in an assembly circle and then load a schematic into the guidance diamond. Then it tells us the missing elements from the process before we begin, and then using the supplied mana from the storage batteries, the circle manufactures whatever the schematic wants once the required materials are present.¡±


    ¡°Dude, that sounds like freaking alchemy.¡± I said, my inner nerd getting excited.


    ¡°No, alchemy is the science of transmutation. Wizardry is the science of building. We use alchemy for body augmentation and potions.¡±


    Totally cannot wait until we break into her cloned brain. I¡¯m gonna learn so damn much.


    She took the block of titanium from my hand. ¡°And we use nanobots for this.¡± She reached down and pulled a small block of translucent material the size of an ice cube from a hidden compartment at her ankle. Then she squished it to her chest and then held the block of conjured titanium to the new wet spot. I watched fascinated as the block of titanium shrank and the tears of her armor slowly filled in. ¡°Quick my lord, I need more. I don¡¯t have many repair cubes left!¡±


    I quickly conjured several more and handed them to her, which she quickly put them on different parts of her suit that were being repaired. The blocks sank in, dissolving before my eyes as her ragged and torn Centauri battle-suit fixed itself. My eyes were huge, then they quickly narrowed as I looked at Reeanth in full battle-rattle.


    ¡°So, can you make more nanobots if you had the raw material? Cause I want one of those suits.¡± I said enviously, images of me in an epic futuristic combat suit running through my head.


    ¡°I can,¡± she said, ¡°But they would all be keyed to my DNA. It¡¯s to prevent the enemy from copying our abilities. These suits allow even untrained wizards to use their full power. The only training required is the mental part, where they learn to activate the runes which does the magic for them.¡±


    Her words rocked me. ¡°Hold up. You¡¯re telling me that pretty much most of your soldiers don¡¯t actually know how to use magic?! Their suits do it all for them? THEN WHAT¡¯S THE FUCKING POINT OF HAVING MAGIC!¡± My voice got louder as my body caught up to my surprise. ¡°You have this incredible ability, this amazing power, and you let something else use it? What the fucking hell is wrong with all of you?!¡±


    ¡°We are at war sorcerer,¡± she snapped. ¡°I don¡¯t expect you to understand, but we, the Great Centauri Empire, don¡¯t have time for the traditional apprenticeship or schooling of two decades to teach each generation how to feel the magic, and then guide the magic, and then integrate it into yourself, and then how to create the tiny building blocks of magic with conditions so that it does exactly what we want it to without burning us out from the inside. The wretched Hive does not give us time to train. All the Hive does is eat and enslave. Wizardry takes a long time to properly use and train. We haven¡¯t had combat sorcerers in so long that their ranks were taken out of our manuals. These suits, saved our civilization millenia ago and keep us alive today.¡±


    Great. More enemies. Woohoo.

 Chapter 79 - Children of Power

    The Hive. Every nerd, every geek, every science fiction lover understands the concept of invading space bugs that want to eat our brains. Normal people don¡¯t because they don¡¯t care, because space-bugs didn¡¯t exist two months ago. At least, not to us. What made it worse was that a huge chunk of humanity, normal humanity, was conscripted into the Centauri military to fight these freaking bugs.


    The rest of my day was very uneventful. I explored the terrain around my hideouts with Reeanth and nothing bothered us, and I¡¯m pretty sure that it wasn¡¯t the stone axe I conjured for Reeanth that scared them away. I think it was me. Sorcery is part of my soul, and emotions flow from the soul, which means that my abilities are intrinsically linked to the state of my emotions, and I was angry. The earth in front of me warped to be smooth, pebbles crumbled to dust and the ground where I was staring became soft and pliable while nearby plants pulled back out of my way. As we neared the river, the current of the now giant Rappahanock picked up and twisted as if it were dancing in a storm. My family. There was a really good chance that my family was conscripted to fight in a war they never had a stake in.


    Reeanth explained to me before we left Yggdrasil that the Centauri Empire had a longstanding pact with the Orion Conglomerate to split up Earth whenever it rejoined the rest of the galaxy, and apparently they meant that in every way except the most literal. The Conglomerate were pure mercantilists, a nice way of saying enterprising slavers, and humans would be the newest fad for the rich and powerful of the universe. All they cared about was money. The Centauri were the peacekeepers, the almost fanatical warlords with Justice as their god. Their mission for the last eighteen hundred years was to contain the scourge of the Hive, and before that, their main enemy were the Hungry Ones.


    Her further explanations of galactic politics didn¡¯t help my anger, and neither did her attempts to soothe me by telling me that non-magical humans were the perfect basis for her Empire¡¯s shock troopers. Our lack of mana-exposure meant that we were were incredibly versatile for genetic re-engineering and augmentation in ways that her enhanced warlike race were not. The only bright side I gathered was that they had the technology to cure my little brother of his epilepsy, but I immediately got even angrier because they did that just so he could be another spear-thrower for them.


    ¡°You know, you never answered my question about how you got here.¡± I said to Reeanth as I looked across the turgid river. I breathed in the fresh air, thick with moisture that heralded a coming storm.


    ¡°I came through a gate, a different one actually,¡± she answered, her voice coming from behind me. ¡°An unsanctioned gate.¡±


    ¡°What does that mean? Seriously, if it¡¯s a question one of the people y¡¯all captured would ask, assume I would ask it as well and just explain what you mean.


    ¡°All gates are manned and operated by space mages. The Teleporter¡¯s union has a process to make a wizard into a space mage, and then control the gates for most of the galaxy. They are the most powerful force, but largely unnoticed as they don¡¯t care who they transport as long as you pay their fees.¡±


    ¡°I feel like the more I ask questions, the more questions I have, but I don¡¯t want to stop asking as that makes me willfully ignorant. And I¡¯ve dealt with enough of those kinds of people in my life.¡± I didn¡¯t turn around, instead I stayed facing the river as the clouds darkened overhead. My initial feelings of anger were being lost to the storm as it rolled in gracefully, streaking the evening sky and bowing the trees. ¡°They ¡®made¡¯ a mage? Gates are controlled, so does that mean you don¡¯t use spaceships to get around? And if the Teleporter¡¯s Union is the real power, how come they haven¡¯t stopped the Hive?¡±


    I didn¡¯t like her answer.


    ¡°They¡¯re completely neutral, our version of what you call Switzerland. And mages can be made, but that process is guarded carefully by the Union. Space mages are some of the most powerful entities in the universe. Mages of other elemental types happen in rare cases or strange circumstances, and are highly coveted by whatever race they belong to. It¡¯s enough to establish a mighty clan if done correctly.¡± She took a deep breath, ¡°And yes, all space-faring creatures use spaceships, but traveling between the vast emptiness is pointless when we can use a gate that portals to a destination. Some portals are one way and don¡¯t need a space mage, and some are gigantic, and can change destinations when needed.¡±


    Rain began to pelt the surface of the river, soon, uncountable ripples added to the flowing rage of the current. ¡°I love storms. I always have.¡± I said, turning my face upward and feeling the water stream down my face. ¡°For some reason, the raw beauty of nature¡¯s fury calms me. A movie put on by Mother Nature herself.¡± Using my water sorcery, I pushed the water away from myself and created a dome around me of dryness. ¡°And now,¡± I said as I raised my hands to touch the boundary of magic between wet and dry, it¡¯s not enough. My magic resonates with this masterpiece.¡± This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    A bolt of lightning cut the angry sky. Thunder boomed after. ¡°Nothing I¡¯ve heard so far eases this pulse of rage I feel.¡±


    ¡°This isn¡¯t safe anymore,¡± Reeanth said as she entered the dome. Putting her hand on my shoulder, she persisted. ¡°My lord, look up! It isn¡¯t safe! Elementals are behind this storm!¡± Her stone axe had a spear point between the axe blades, and it was pointing up at the storm where the bulk of an ominous purple cloud touched the mountain top across the river. I¡¯ll never get over the fact that the Ripples changed this world in such a way. Mountains didn¡¯t use to be in Fredericksburg, Virginia. And this river used to be so shallow you could walk across it. But now, it looked like untouched wilderness, bigger than ever.


    My gaze followed where she pointed. Small balls of rapidly changing light were dancing in the wind, chasing each other. Some looked silvery while others were flashing yellow, crackling with sparks on its edges. The wind brought in the storm like a blacksmith¡¯s hammer. Rain pounded and the wind pushed and shoved everything in its way. Bolts of light whimsically cracked the night sky as a huge one split off and blasted the lake twenty feet in front of me. The cynical part of me, the everlasting fountain of sarcasm and nihilism, wanted to joke about the preposterous nature of my current experience. The animal side, the oh so very tightly wound instinctive side, wanted me to get the hell outta there. I am not proud of which side won.


    ¡°No! Fuck you!¡± I screamed at the sky, using my command over Svalinn to turn the left gauntlet into a shield while the right gauntlet extended a wickedly sharp three-foot blade that glowed with power. All I could think of in that moment was the once great Toby Keith singing loud and proud in my head, or was that Gungnir? ¡°I¡¯ll put a boot in your ass! It¡¯s the American way!¡±, which I screamed with no regard to being in tune. I mean, I was never confused where the damn orb got its annoying tendencies from.


    I was set. My feet with solid and stable with my earth sorcery making me as steady as the planet¡¯s bedrock. My water sorcery kept the rain off of me but pooled it into four giant blobs of water the size of a small car each that writhed in the storm. Normal humans stay inside during storms like these, and those that get caught out in them get inside as quick as they can. My magic told me that there were no living creatures in the vicinity, and logic dictated that all intelligent life had already found shelter.


    ¡°My lord sorcerer!¡± The shrill tone of her voice let me know that in that moment, she realized that maybe I was a little less than sane. Another bolt of lightning streaked down, caressing the upheld arm holding Svalinn.


    It, was, incredible. The rush. I knew what Gungnir could do in combat. The orb had been tested in multiple ways in many different situations. But this, this was different. My enchanted shield didn¡¯t block the lightning, it ate it. I could see the lightning, the raw energy itself, be converted into pure magical energy, mana, and sink into the shield. Shallow runes became visible as the power rushed through the shield, and the excess drained into me where the other half of Svalinn, the bladed gauntlet, pulled the rest of it into itself. This split second of wonder was interrupted by a hailstorm of lightning bolts, each one being eaten and processed, but more and more excess power was being handed off to me by shield-Svalinn and siphoned by blade-Svalinn.


    Withdrawing the blade, I connected the two halves of my shield together and they formed a large tower shield and it all stopped. The pounding static discharges, I couldn¡¯t feel them anymore.


    ¡°The whisper on the winds never lies.¡±


    ¡°How many more before the sorcerer dies.¡±


    Reeanth gripped my shoulder as she crouched behind me. ¡°They speak,¡± she said breathlessly, ¡°They¡¯re not supposed to speak.¡±


    ¡°They who woman?¡±


    ¡°The elementals. They¡¯re the equivalent of magical royalty. All races are beneath them in their view, as we are hindered by our bodies from being ¡®true magic¡¯.¡±


    I could feel something changing though, but it was hard to pin down in that moment. It¡¯s that moment several days after a hard workout and your muscles feel just a tiny bit bigger, as if they¡¯re ready for another push, another stretch, that your potential increased by just a tiny bit. I was past that. I was full, and Svalinn was getting there too. The raw power contained in my enchanted shield was almost blinding to my magical sight, but the elementals showed no sign of stopping, just raining down lightning on me as if it were rain.


    Rain. Screw it. Using my water sorcery, I took the giant blobs of water I had accumulated and put a thick dome of water around us. Svalinn retreated into its gauntlet form, almost sighing in pleasure in the back of my mind. The lightning almost immediately stopped.


    ¡°Hidden from sight, protected by rain.¡±


    ¡°Flesh is weak and you shall be slain.¡±


    I turned to Reeanth who was crouched behind me gripping the stone axe so tight that her knuckles were white. ¡°So, the real reason we don¡¯t mess with elementals is because they¡¯re plain creepy right?¡±


    ¡°Did you not see the sheer amount of power they threw at you?¡± she gasped, incredulous at my reaction. ¡°They can do that relentlessly! Nothing has more magical power than the elementals. They¡¯re linked to their own plane which supplies them with power and they play with no concept that their play reshapes planets!¡±


    ¡°It also seems to up the ambient mana levels in the area as well.¡±


    ¡°This isn¡¯t a time for study or experimentation!¡± she very quietly growled at me. ¡°We need to go. Those ones were small. We really don¡¯t want to run into the bigger ones.¡±

 Chapter 80 - Work Conflict

    ********


    The next couple days sort of flew by, literally. I enchanted a new beefed up hoverboard and flew around the Fredericksburg area, going as far north as Woodbridge and as far south as Ruther Glen, and then I went east and west on the Rappahannock till I got tired. Reeanth followed behind in my old hoverboard that I linked to my new one so that she could tag along as backup. Using an old map I had stashed away, I notated all the changes in the landscape as best my ugly art skills would allow. Every bit of nature was exaggerated in size and in color.


    What used to be small bushes were now easily bigger than most cars and trees definitely loved the new magical environment. A few of them even swung at me when I wasn¡¯t paying attention. The river was wider and deeper and small hills now looked like they were straight out of Switzerland. Animals we saw were bigger and some of the tamer mutations were two-headed whitetail deer with razor sharp horns and ants the size of golden retrievers that used some kind of cutting magic to carve out their homes. And don¡¯t even get me started on beavers. I saw one bite the tail off a crocodile while its mate went toe to toe with the front end of the croc.


    And it was all gone. The mark humanity had left on this world, at least in this part, was gone. The little towns out west near the mountains were swallowed up and the string of apartments was now a treacherous gully where flying critters played. The parts of Earth that did not have magic were now gone, consumed by the wave of change. What made it weird on the instinctual level, was watching the animals as I tried to interact with them. Before the world went and flipped on our heads, animals used to be afraid of us. Stray cats ran and birds only came close for the food in our hands, and unless they were domesticated after years of selective breeding or conditioning from birth, animals stayed away from humans. This was no longer the case.


    Sparrows dive bombed us. Ants spewed some kind of magic that I dodged at all costs because I saw the projectiles cut chunks out of trees. A freaking pangolin hurled boulders and shot needles out of its tail while mountain lions screamed loud enough to blow tree branches off of their trunks and almost threw me off my board. Nature was terrifying already, but magically enhanced nature with a grudge was more than enough for my lizard brain cry for its mother. By and large, the animals were generally bigger than they were before, but not many were the size of Kong or Spot. I did see a gigantic green snake in the distance, sunning itself in what used to be a commuter lot, but like hell was I going to check it out.


    Reeanth was quiet during those couple of days, silently eyeing me with distrust and constantly watching over her shoulder. I mean, it does make sense. I had an inordinate amount of power over her life, literally. We did get into a bit of an argument when she found out that the stash of Centauri weapons I took from her and her gang were blown up along with my house by some insane goddess not too long after I kicked Reeanth back to her world. Even though I held her life in my hands, words such as ¡°idiot, moron, fucking stupid¡¯ and batshit crazy¡¯ flew around for a bit. The best part of it all was me telling her to shut up and it worked. You¡¯ll never see that in the modern world without magic.


    I was not an ungrateful sorcerer, I did spend plenty of time making Reeanth some cool new weapons out of the results of my earlier experiments. Since she couldn¡¯t run away or betray me without serious pain or injury, I didn¡¯t hold back making some epic stuff. As I worked with the magical items, I also took the time to work through my own misgivings about her being a ¡®slave¡¯. I didn¡¯t really want one, or even need one, but it did impart a feeling of safety having someone watch my back, albeit under duress. And I asked her several times if she minded or cared, but apparently this kind of thing is far more common where she¡¯s from.


    Not only did I get a lot of exploring done, but I accomplished a ridiculous amount of fortifying. Using my earth sorcery, I made the walls of my river-hideout and under-Yggdrasil hideout to over forty feet thick by transmuting the dirt and soil to solid stone. Then I added runes of hardness and strength mixed with kinetic absorption as the river was now several times bigger than it used to be. And to the Yggdrasil sapling itself, I made sure that the generator was double the size, big enough to be stable and not meltdown like the last couple. That part was the trickiest, as there were many pieces of that puzzle to consider. Is hooking a nuclear mana generator to Yggdrasil going to benefit me in any way? At what point does my over-prepping become enough? Should I create mini-tree minions to guard the square mile area around the tree in case I¡¯m not there? Why am I so goddamn paranoid?


    In my paranoia, I also created a stash of weapons at each of my three hideouts, the river-bottom one, the hold-under-the-World-Tree one, and the one inside the World Tree about a hundred yards up. Each stash contained fifty flash-bang pebbles, fifty strobe light pebbles, fifty packs of insta-grow thorny vine seeds, and ten bang batons. Yes, lame names but they work. The bang batons have three settings, one throws softball size rocks almost as fast a bullet, one shoots icicles about a meter long, and the other spits the insta-grow thorny vine seeds. And next to those were the big guns, the storm staffs, for when I have to bring the rain. Those ones were spears that had two functions, one was store and shoot pure mana blasts with mono-molecular edges to cut through just about anything, and the other to act as a leyline finding rod. Anybody could stick the butt end in the ground and light would shine out of the crystal spear tip in the direction of the nearest leyline. Even if all else fails, an idiot normal human with no magic could survive for a while in one of my hideouts.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.


    Several days before the last Ripple


    ¡°Put it down!¡±


    ¡°No!¡±


    ¡°Put the knife down!¡±


    ¡°Woman! This isn¡¯t your call!¡±


    ¡°This is overridden by my original oath!¡±


    ¡°Fuck you! I order you to shut the hell up and let me experiment!¡±


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t work.¡±


    ¡°Fuck your interpretation!¡±


    I guess from the outside looking in, it may look bad. I was sitting on the ground in the river-hideout beneath the river kinetic-current mana converter surrounded by various crystals and magical materials that I had gathered. And, oh yeah, I had a wickedly sharp stone dagger poised over my left wrist and I was doing my damndest to stick it in with Reeanth doing hers to keep me from my goal. Not explaining myself may not have been the smartest thing to do, but who cares, I¡¯m the boss.


    ¡°There¡¯s a point to this!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what I¡¯m keeping away from you, you most idiotic of Sorcerous lords!¡±


    She was right. I was an idiot. I didn¡¯t need a pitiful knife. I have flesh sorcery. Letting go of the knife, Reeanth stumbled back and fell on her ass, to which I gestured with my right hand and used earth sorcery to make the stone beneath her swallow up her lower half. And there we sat, glaring at each other.


    ¡°If you die I die!¡± she yelled, ¡°And I swore and oath to you and your cause, which means I can¡¯t let you die!¡±


    ¡°Who the fuck said anything about dying? I¡¯m trying to work here.¡±


    ¡°By summoning a demon?!¡± Her look of sheer terror convinced me that maybe I overlooked something.


    ¡°What, the, fucking, hell, are you talking about? All I¡¯m trying to do is use my flesh and earth sorcery to add some crystalline fibers to my body and maybe carve some precious metal runes on my bones. I can¡¯t compete pound for pound with anything outside these walls without my magic.¡±


    ¡°You truly don¡¯t know?¡± she asked, her legs and butt and hands still encased in stone. ¡°This is almost exactly how you summon a creature from the Infernal dimension, or protect yourself during a treacherous summoning.¡±


    Maybe I¡¯m not the idiot.


    ¡°What part of my actions makes you think that I can, or would want to summon a demon?¡± I asked, incredulity dripping from my voice. ¡°Your body is fundamentally wired differently than mine with some kind of crystalline fibers, and so I was going to see if I could do a better job, but I need exposed flesh for that. You, are just getting in my way.¡±


    Bowing her head, her voice quietly cracked, ¡°But why? You¡¯re a sorcerer. You don¡¯t need to do that.¡±


    ¡°What am I missing here?¡± I asked but kept going. ¡°All of the power I have accumulated so far has either been a big success or a ridiculous miss. Enslaving various beasts hasn¡¯t worked because the damn Ripples set them free. My dog ate part of a dragon and now is a lovely statue, my woman is in a tree, and my best weapon now sings all the damn time, OUT OF TUNE BY THE WAY!¡±


    The soft humming in the background quieted.


    ¡°And, the only things that have worked or lasted are the things that have to do with me personally, like exercising or experimenting with my abilities, or crafting armor and small enchanted weapons or my hideouts. It stands to reason that enchanting or enhancing my own body is probably the best way to increase my power permanently. Summoning a demon is not on my list of things to do. I have a distinct feeling that they aren¡¯t fun to work with.¡±


    ¡°But my lord, they are easy to work with. They will do anything you ask, but the price is always greater than the gain.¡± Her gaze met mine, her intensity creeping me out just a little. ¡°I have lost many a friend who has done what I thought you were doing. Some in pursuit of power, and others as suicide soldiers when all seemed lost on the battlefield.¡±


    ¡°Besides all the questions that just popped into my head, let me assure you that I am not going to summon a god damned demon.¡±


    ¡°My lord.¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Can you let me out please?¡±


    With a wave of my hand, the stone released its hold on her. ¡°Now that you know I¡¯m not going to do anything stupid, are you going to let me work in peace?¡±


    ¡°Yes my lord.¡±


    ¡°Finally,¡± I muttered, turning my focus back to my wrist.


    ¡°My lord.¡±


    ¡°For pete¡¯s sake WHAT NOW?¡± I yelled and turned, my exasperation getting the better of me.


    ¡°I feel that it is my duty to tell you that your dog is not a statue, not truly. It isn¡¯t dead. My suit detects most threats and your stone canine is most certainly one of them.¡±


    ¡°I know that,¡± I replied, ¡°Spot is in some kind of stasis. My flesh sorcery showed me that a weird kind of metamorphosis is going on. He¡¯s also not a threat. I gave him a seed of flesh sorcery when I bonded with him so that as he ate magical things or creatures he could instinctively take on some aspects of his prey to become stronger, so, I fed him the tail of a dragon I killed. The same dragon whose brain is in that vat over there. Now, no more questions, please.¡±


    Now, I had an idea of what I wanted to do, but two hours of examination later, I concluded that I didn¡¯t have the knowhow to actually do what I wanted to do. The concept was easy enough, blend molecules of graphene which are properly chained carbon atoms, to my cells to make them more durable on the fundamental level, and then do that to every part of me. But no. I did not possess the necessary knowledge to be able to do that. And, the worst part was that my flesh sorcery did not want to help me for some reason in this regard. There was deep-seated unconscious fear every time I tried to merge a red blood cell with the graphene, my flesh sorcery rejected it.


    So, if merging doesn¡¯t work for some unknown reason, maybe the runic enchanting will. But if I¡¯m going to go down this route, I have to figure out a more basic question first. How does my body produce and store magical energy, or is it something that my body takes in from the outside and assimilates?

 Chapter 81 - Yeehaw

    This feeling is odd. The feeling of safety. Here I sit in my giant magically reinforced cavern hidden underneath a river with a loyal slave (which I don¡¯t want but who won¡¯t leave) and nothing in here that wants to kill me. Which is a good thing because my bare veins and bones are exposed on my left arm with the flesh peeled back in this exact moment. The sounds of gagging behind me are not helping my concentration. The only reason Reeanth isn¡¯t actually trying to stop me is due to my flesh sorcery keeping everything kosher.


    In the past five hours of exploration and minor experimentation, I have learned that the production of mana is a two-fold process for me, but a one-way flow for Reeanth. Let¡¯s start with the similarities. Mana can be absorbed. Both Reeanth and I can slowly absorb mana, and with meditation and practice, can make ourselves absorb it faster. We breathe in the lion¡¯s share of magic, and our pores do their part as well, and even hair seems to partake.


    The main difference between us is that I actually produce it as well. It took me a while to figure this out too. After meditating for two hours, I was able to get my body to stop absorbing mana completely from the area around me, and as I finally stopped the inflow, I was able to see the now pronounced outflow. Every cell did it. It looked to be a new byproduct of my very cells. Each red blood cell produced a teeny mote of mana, and my bones and organs stored a bunch of it while producing some as well. My heart was the big one as it constantly beat like a drum, producing mana and managing the flow thereof throughout my entire body. My brain didn¡¯t produce much mana, but it looked to be chock full of mana, but in a working storage sense. Mana was mainly stored in my bones, but it was put to work supercharging the marrow to produce mana-holding blood cells.


    The brain though, and the spinal column, that entire skeletal section quickly stores as much mana as they can hold and then slowly release it over time, and then quickly release it as I consciously used magic. But there was one part of all of this that puzzled me. I had a theory, but I actually couldn¡¯t prove it. I can see how magic is used and stored and circulated throughout my body, but without the intake of magic from the air, my body still produced a lot more magic than it should. From what I can tell, my body seems to have an intangible field, a second inner skin that produces mana itself. If I had viable money at this point in time, I¡¯d bet that it was my soul. Of all the sorceries to pick, I didn¡¯t pick soul sorcery, which means I can¡¯t confirm what I think. But this field, this soul-skin, produces magical energy making me a net-producer of magic.


    If I can test and master this, this soul-skin, then maybe I could beef this thing up. I could be my own mana-generator!


    [Boss! Of course you have a soul. It¡¯s called soul magic, and you beef it up by eating other souls or by living for a really long time.]


    Gungnir¡¯s mental voice suddenly brought me back to reality. Damn orb, it¡¯s like having two voices in my head.


    [Tell me you¡¯ve learned something about this from Rath¡¯s brain]¡± I sent back through our mental link.


    [Uh, some things, but this one is easy as it¡¯s what dragons obsess over. This is why they eat everything, and target sorcerors specifically. You have to have a powerful soul to do that kind of magic, and eating those that do is like steroids for your soul.¡±


    Steroids huh? [So, how do I work it out naturally? I¡¯m not down with steroids. They give you performance issues down the road, and a weird kind of sagging.]


    [Oh, easy. Do sorcery. Experiment. Meditate. Try to understand exactly what it is that you¡¯re doing when you do it. Sorcery comes with instincts. Your job is to make those instincts truly your own.]


    [Hey, how long have I been out of it? Feels like I¡¯ve been meditating on this for about half an hour.]


    [Dude, try seven hours.]


    [That would explain the incredible pins and needles in my legs.]


    I¡¯m so glad that nobody was there to witness my clownish attempts at getting up. Flesh sorcery aside, the body still needs blood flow. After five minutes of massaging my calves and whining like a little bitch, I stumbled down the tunnel to the other hideout and then outside to do my business.


    [By the way, Reeanth is out there somewhere too. She got tired of staring at you and left.]


    Finishing my business is a lot harder when someone is in your head talking to you. All I wanted to do was pee. In order to relax, I started to work out in my head how to further my body-enhancing research. If melding different materials didn¡¯t work, then enchanting or adding runes may be the next experiment.


    ¡°OH MY GAWD! DIS SHIT IS AWESOME!¡±


    The southern frat-boy sounding shout almost made me zip up the most delicate part of me. Wildly looking around while finishing my business is not a recipe for efficiency.


    ¡°My lord! Run! Lunatics!¡±


    In the few precious seconds I had, I managed to finally put everything away and turn to see Reeanth pelting down the forest path between the giant trees. I couldn¡¯t really believe what was chasing her.


    ¡°COME ON BACK NOW YA GIANT HOSS!¡±


    If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    ¡°RICKY LIKES¡¯EM BIG!¡±


    Several four-wheelers with thick southern boys dressed up in Mad-Max crappy body armor waving poorly constructed weapons and few firearms were hot on her trail. Yup, my eyes did not deceive me. There were Bud-Lites strapped to their fronts like hand grenades. As they flew towards me at forty miles an hour, my irritation at having my me-time disturbed stretched out and turned all the dirt in front of me into deep quicksand.


    ¡°Jump!¡± I yelled to Reeanth as the growing edge of quicksand reached her. With a carefully executed long jump that would have made our Olympic judges¡¯ jaws drop, Reeanth landed ten feet behind me. The first hooligan and his four wheeler tried to slow down but instead skidded into the quicksand as his buddies swerved to the side.


    ¡°RICKY!¡± yelled the biggest guy behind him. He had on a metal helmet with sautered horns on top of it and a Lowe¡¯s axe strapped to his back. ¡°You ok Ricky?! If you die can I have your beer?¡±


    ¡°Shut your fool mouth idjit! Ain¡¯t nobody touchin my beer!¡± Ricky yelled from his sinking ride. Thinking quickly, he pulled one off of his makeshift bandolier and began chugging it.


    ¡°Don¡¯t waste it if yur gonna die!¡± a whiny feminine voice rang out. The burly man stepped to the side, pulling a length of extension cord out of his pack.


    ¡°Shut it Sally. Let the man have a beer in his last moments.¡± he grumbled as he began winding to throw the end to Ricky. ¡°It¡¯s what I¡¯d do if I was stuck in that mess.¡±


    ¡°Billy, if it¡¯s his last moments, how come yous bout to throw him a line?¡±


    ¡°To get the beer dummy!¡± The last person to speak was a man so skinny that beanpoles idolized him.


    ¡°I wasn¡¯t askin you Tommy. You done drank all yours, so you ain¡¯t gettin none of this.¡±


    As I live and breathe. Hicks. True blue southern hicks. I really couldn¡¯t believe it. I got family like this, but I hadn¡¯t seen them in years. Time to put the accent I outgrew back to good use.


    ¡°Howdy. How come y¡¯all are chasin my woman?¡±


    All four of them stopped and seemed to notice me for the first time. They looked around at each other and counted, and then realized that I wasn¡¯t one of them. I flexed my will to make the quicksand stop sinking Billy and his four-wheeler.


    ¡°That¡¯s yur woman?¡± Billy asked as he popped open another beer. ¡°And what the hell is a fine woman such as herself doin with a nerd like you?¡±


    ¡°Do not insult my lord!¡± Reeanth spoke earnestly. ¡°This magnificent sorcerer could wipe you out with a wave of his hand. Know your place.¡±


    ¡°Welp,¡± Billy burped, ¡°As far as I¡¯ve seens it, this is the United States of America where you can kiss my fine ass. Besides, ain¡¯t no government man around to enforce the law, so it¡¯s my law. We¡¯re in the US of Billy right now!¡±


    I chuckled, ¡°Billy, you love your four wheeler don¡¯t ya?¡±


    ¡°Hell yeah, built this purty mama with my own two hands, and not one moment of that was sober.¡±


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m the one who sank it. But I can give it back to you if you maybe exercise some of them manners yur daddy whipped into ya.¡±


    His drunken eyes narrowed ¡°Whaddya mean, you sank it.¡± he said, drawing out the syllables.


    ¡°He means magic you insipid fool.¡± Reeanth barked. ¡°My lord is a powerful sorcerer of earth and water and nature. This entire forest would eat you alive if he willed it.¡±


    From attacking me to singing my praises. I¡¯m not sure I¡¯m comfortable with the new Reeanth. I shook my head and let out a breath. ¡°Ignore her,¡± I said, ¡°What I¡¯m telling you is that you can have it back if you¡¯re nice.¡±


    ¡°Prove it!¡± Sally said, taking off her helmet, her blond hair falling down around her shoulders. ¡°And we¡¯ll be real nice if you got beer.¡± All of their faces lit up at that.


    ¡°I don¡¯t have beer, but I do have some food I¡¯m willing to share. But, you¡¯ll have to share your stories too.¡± I held my hands out with palms up to show my willingness to negotiate.


    ¡°Fine, I ¡®pologize for my rudeness. I let my excitement get away from me. That lady you got is mighty fine, nice gams and all.¡± Billy said.


    I figured that was the best I¡¯d get outta them. I used the quicksand to push the fourwheeler and its occupant to the edge and then pulled back the quicksand from the vehicle so that there was nothing to gum it up, then turned the quicksand back to dirt.


    ¡°Reeanth, go get our guests some food and water and we¡¯ll have a nice chat in my home.¡±


    She turned and stalked back towards my bolthole, muttering dark things under her breath.


    ¡°Now, lady and gentlemen, if y¡¯all wouldn¡¯t mind parking your vehicles right over there,¡± I gestured to the clear area to the right of the World Tree, ¡°And follow me inside where we¡¯ll get ya cleaned up and fed.¡±


    The display of magic did more for their behaviour than anything I would have thought of. They quietly followed me inside and their mouths dropped open as I conjured stone chairs for them to sit in at a stone table that I magically grew from the ground beneath us.


    I had shown Reeanth a while ago how to use the runed hot-plate I made a long time and she used it to heat up cans of soup for our guests. I also conjured cups of stone and filled it with conjured water, which made them look at me as if I were some kind of terrible genie. I was rather enjoying myself, wowing the people with my abilities. I wonder if this is how stage magicians must have felt back in the day.


    ¡°Did you really just pour water from your finger?¡± Sally asked.


    ¡°What are ya, Jesus, but in reverse?¡± Billy piled on.


    ¡°Naw, the good Lawd made wine, which is why he was good.¡± said the big man whose name I hadn¡¯t caught yet.


    ¡°Amen,¡± chimed Tommy.


    ¡°Yes, I did Sally,¡± I said, conjuring a small ball of water and making it hover over my palm. ¡°It¡¯s just water, but it is magic. It¡¯s what I wished for in the beginning. What did y¡¯all wish for?¡±


    ¡°Muscles,¡± the big man rumbled.


    ¡°Like an idiot, cause you already got some,¡± Sally said, swatting him on arm. ¡°Come on now Jimmy, shoulda wished for brains to round you off nicely.¡±


    ¡°Well, what did you wish for Sally?¡± I asked. ¡°I hope it was somethin good.¡±


    ¡°This dumb bitch wish to change!¡± Billy howled, slapping the table and cracking open another beer. ¡°Now, she can change her hair color and make her nails any color she wants, cause that¡¯s so damn useful.¡±


    ¡°Quiet down now y¡¯all,¡± Tommy said, ¡°That was a better wish than mine. I wanted to work with machines better cause I¡¯m a mechanic and have been since I was little. And then these damn Ripples done took away all the machines and replaced them with critters! The only things we got left are the cars in the garage I used to work in and the guns we got holed up. Sometimes though, it looks like the metal kinda bends when I want it to.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s the beer dummy,¡± Jimmy said, ¡°You¡¯re just seeing things again.¡±


    ¡°Well what¡¯d you get Jimmy?¡± I said, trying to keep the conversation going.


    ¡°Nothing man, I was passed out drunk when it happened way back,¡± he answered, ¡°But, I swear I can smell liquor a mile away, and beer, two miles!¡±


    ¡°Now who¡¯s talkin shit,¡± Tommy said, ¡°You¡¯re always smelling it cause you¡¯re always drinking it!¡±


    It¡¯s like herding cats. ¡°So where are y¡¯all from? And how¡¯ve you been surviving since the first Ripple?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Well, we were all drinkin in Tommy¡¯s garage where he was fixing up our four wheelers so we could go on out when the damn thing hit,¡± Sally answered, ¡°We¡¯ve been holed up there ever since, using good ole Southern gumption to survive. Most of them beasties are pretty tasty if you cook¡¯em right. Which is why Billy ain¡¯t never cookin no more.¡±


    ¡°Hey, beer soaked chicken is delicious, so why wouldn¡¯t deer soaked monster be any different?¡± Billy burped.


    ¡°Because we fry the chicken in beer batter, and we ain¡¯t had no batter cause Tommy ain¡¯t got no girl to cook for him, duh.¡±

 Chapter 82 - The Southern Rundown

    Reeanth pulled me away as an argument erupted. ¡°My lord, are their mental faculties compromised? Are yours? You sound like them as well!¡±


    ¡°Calm down. I grew up in North Carolina. I got rid of my accent when I moved up to Virginia because Northern Virginia is not like the rest of the state. It¡¯s the city part that looks down on its bottom half.¡± I answered her with one hear turned towards the argument which went from the right way to cook a monster to the best tasting monsters.


    ¡°Besides, it doesn¡¯t matter, southerners are good people, and loyalty is their strong suit. And they¡¯ll die for you if you have fried chicken and biscuits. Trust me. I¡¯d do the same.¡±


    ¡°Then we need to secure fried chicken and biscuits my lord. You need serfs to do the menial labor.¡±


    ¡°Damn it Reeanth, I¡¯m not a noble, we¡¯re not in the Dark Ages, and nobody is a serf!¡± I angrily whispered. ¡°That¡¯s not how any of this works. Besides, I think all of them have magic of some kind.¡±


    ¡°Them? Impossible!¡± She looked affronted, as if magic wouldn¡¯t deign to grace the lives of our guests.


    ¡°What? Don¡¯t tell me you didn¡¯t catch that with your enhanced intellect?¡± I teased, ¡°Sally, the blonde, can change her appearance, which means she might be able to shape-shift with practice, and maybe only in minor ways. Tommy, the mechanic, probably has some kind of techno-sorcery and maybe metal sorcery. The big dude got more muscles, so maybe he¡¯ll be fantastically strong. And Billy, poor Billy, he got an enhanced sense of smell. The fact that they still have beer and are chugging it the way they are either means that they keep finding it due to Billy or they had an impressive stockpile when the Ripples came.¡±


    ¡°Astute my lord,¡± Reeanth said, ¡°I did not put those clues together.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s just a hunch, but we¡¯ll see where it goes,¡± I replied, ¡°Besides, we have to figure these people out. Southerners are either the nicest people on the planet and would give you the shirt off their back, or they are literally the worst people you¡¯ll ever meet. There¡¯s no in-between.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll get my axe my lord.¡±


    ¡°You will not. You will be a good hostess and make sure that they eat until they are full. If they need to be taken care of, I¡¯ll do it myself. Am I clear.¡±


    ¡°Yes my lord.¡±


    Sheesh. She may be from an advanced civilization, but she sure has some backwards traditions.


    We walked back in with a pitcher of water and more heated canned soup. ¡°I apologize, but this the only kind of food we have,¡± I said to my guests, ¡°But I do have plenty of it. If y¡¯all come back and visit again I¡¯ll treat you to a slow cooked deer. The whitetail around these parts is huge, so piggin out in the future is an option.¡±


    ¡°Wooweee, I can¡¯t wait!¡± Billy whooped, ¡°Maybe we¡¯ll bring some beer and get Sally drunk for ya.¡±


    ¡°Scuse me?¡± she said, ¡°I don¡¯t do that no more, highschool is over.¡±


    Big Jimmy laughed deep and low, ¡°You did that two nights ago.¡±


    ¡°Shut it muscles!¡± she said, gritting her teeth, ¡°Or no more for you!¡±


    ¡°My lord doesn¡¯t need the . . .¡±


    My glare cut Reeanth off. ¡°What she means to say,¡± I cut in, ¡°Is that that¡¯s not necessary. We¡¯ll have ourselves a cookout and relax. And if y¡¯all need some shelter for the last Ripple, then I¡¯d be happy to offer it to you.¡±


    ¡°Another one? Shit, we don¡¯t have enough beer for another one.¡± Tommy said. He turned to me to clarify, ¡°We get plastered every time one of the Ripples comes through, cause we were sure as shit drunk during the first one.¡±


    ¡°You know what,¡± I said, rubbing my scruff, ¡°So was I. Maybe that¡¯s why we didn¡¯t get picked up by the Conglomerate or the Centauri.¡±If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    ¡°The who¡¯s and the what¡¯s?¡± Sally interjected.


    ¡°Genetically advanced humans and the Orion Conglomerate, which is composed of many alien lifeforms for the purpose of commerce and profit.¡± Reeanth clarified. ¡°That¡¯s the reason most of humanity is not on this planet.¡±


    ¡°Holy cow, you kiddin me?¡± Billy freaked, setting his beer down. ¡°I always thought my uncle was crazy, talkin ¡®bout them anal probin little green men.¡±


    ¡°Ok! That¡¯s enough!¡± I cut back in, ¡°The little green men is probably not true, but the alien part is real. Look at Reeanth, she is human, but her genetics were magically enhanced, or fixed to what they should have been back when humanity had magic. Apparently we¡¯re all supposed to be way taller and more muscular. But what you said was more interesting. Y¡¯all were drunk when the Ripple came?¡±


    ¡°As a skunk,¡± Tommy answered, ¡°Why? That¡¯s not new though.¡±


    ¡°No, no. The only people I¡¯ve talked to about the first day itself are sitting right here. Everyone else I didn¡¯t even think to ask. Reeanth,¡± I said, turning to our resident alien, ¡°Did y¡¯all do some kind of brain scan to sort us, or to know who to pick up?¡±


    ¡°Absolutely. Every human was scanned and catalogued and rescued,¡± she said, her voice fully of pride.


    ¡°So, how come it missed us?¡± Sally said, her eyes narrowing.


    ¡°Probably because we were drunk,¡± I guessed, ¡°There¡¯s a good chance that we got missed because of our altered states of mind, we didn¡¯t register as sober functioning adults.¡±


    ¡°What other parameters did you search for during the initial scan?¡± I questioned, turning to Reeanth, "And how the hell did you miss something that simple?"


    ¡°All healthy men and women of all ages, and all those with mental disabilities. Such things are easy for our genetic recombinator treatments to fix. Besides, we Centauri do not use mind-altering drugs of any kind. It hinders our performance on the battlefield.¡±


    ¡°What about those with bacterial infections, or people who were unconscious during that time?¡±


    ¡°The Conglomerate picked them up for testing. The Centauri only wanted those that were easy to fix with the standard genetic package that all Centauri citizens are entitled to. We need soldiers, and this agreement was done several millennia ago. Those missing limbs or with severe bacterial infections were not picked up. The genetic treatments do not fix those issues.¡±


    ¡°What about those with altered states of mind, such as us. We were drunk when it happened. My fiance was drunk too. Does that mean stoners or people who were high or on some kind of mind-altering drug were missed?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s possible,¡± Reeanth said, looking a little uneasy.


    Sally stood up and screeched, ¡°Oh my god! That means Vegas is still full of people!¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± Reeanth said sadly, ¡°But the city known as Las Vegas is no more. It was bombed when we noticed a Hive infiltrant there.¡±


    ¡°A what?¡±


    Petulance and boredom flowed through the mental link. I put my head in my hands and sighed. ¡°Fine. Come on out,¡± I said, and then mentally screamed, [But behave!]


    ¡°Woohoo!¡± Gungnir rejoiced, ¡°My turn!¡±


    My most powerful weapon floated over and landed in the center of the table and became the futuristic magical version of a disco ball projector. Light coalesced in its crystal core and refracted out to show our guests what the Hive looked like in all of its various forms as Gungnir¡¯s voice artificially deepened and narrated like David Attenborough. I sat back and enjoyed the show as this doesn¡¯t happen often. Movies didn¡¯t weather the apocalypse too well.


    ¡°It¡¯s like Star Trek!¡± Billy said, his entire face in awe.


    ¡°Dummy, Star Wars had the holograms,¡± Tommy correct.


    ¡°I thought that wuz Stargate?¡± Sally chimed in.


    Reeanth whispered in my ear, ¡°My lord, I¡¯m not sure that this is a good idea. We don¡¯t know anything about these people.¡±


    ¡°What would you have me do?¡± I whispered back after looking at the four guests who were enraptured by Gungnir spinning what it called, ¡°The New Order¡±.  ¡°These are good people, tried and true Americans that managed to survive this long. I could make them some epic gear or try and enchant what they have to be powerful, and they could thrive here. And if they survived, there¡¯s a good chance other people did too.¡±


    ¡°I thought you didn¡¯t want to take care of people my lord, or at least that¡¯s what your paraclete said.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t, but these four probably will, see where I¡¯m going with this yet?¡± I had my eyebrows raised and everything, trying to communicate with this dense woman without actually saying the words. I have my own responsibilities, which means I don¡¯t want to leave my area if I don¡¯t have to. Powering up and properly equipping four people with somewhat complementing magics and their own history is a godsend if handled properly. The mechanic could hopefully make anything if I conjured metal for him, and Jimmy ¡®Muscles¡¯ could be their tank if he had armor, and Billy could be their scout if he learned to shut up while Sally, well, we need to see about Sally. I¡¯d bet she has the most combat potential out of all of them, but that depends on her temperament and exactly how much she can ¡®change¡¯.


    ¡°That true or are ya pullin my leg?¡± Billy asked, frowning at the orb as it cut off the light show.


    ¡°That¡¯s some serious shit right there,¡± Jimmy rumbled.


    ¡°Yes it¡¯s true,¡± Gungnir answered, ¡°I¡¯m a magical floating orb that put on an epic holographic show for you bumpkins. I got no reason to lie.¡±


    Billy burped, ¡°Awesome! We totally get to kick some zombie ass!¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t have enough supplies to make zombie weapons,¡± Tommy cut in, ¡°We need axes and leather armor and baseball bats and all kinds of shit.¡±


    Jimmy sat there staring at his plate sized hands. ¡°Not sure I wanna fight zombies. Your dick don¡¯t work if you get bit by one right? Cuz zombies don¡¯t need to fuck, so if we turn into one, no sex.¡±


    ¡°Hey, hey, knock it off. Relax,¡± Gungnir attempted to soothe their fears, ¡°Weren¡¯t you listening? It¡¯s gonna take a long ass time for them to get down here. The only thing you gotta worry about is giant creatures and mish-mashed monsters. Oh, and other people too, we¡¯ve met some not so nice teenagers with a peeved deity. But that¡¯s besides the point.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s enough outta you,¡± I interjected, putting my hand on Gungnir and silencing him, ¡°But, I would like to invite all of you to stay for the night. I have some beds and mattresses stored away from before the Ripples messed everything up and in the morning I¡¯ll get a couple things ready for ya. There¡¯s one Ripple left, and I don¡¯t have a good feeling about it.¡±

 Chapter 83 - Master Plan

    *******


    The next morning brought its own set of worries. The last Ripple was just two or three days away and something wasn¡¯t sitting right with me. Each Ripple has been getting weaker as the Dimensional Seal keeping Earth locked away is opening more and more, but something just wasn¡¯t sitting right with me. Murphy¡¯s Law is what rules my life, and it definitely carries a grudge. Lying in my bed, I was playing with a ball of rock, using my earth sorcery to mold it and shape it like a child would with play-doh. A whim of will could turn solid granite to dust in my hand, and it never ceased to amaze me that magic is real!


    My flesh sorcery allowed me to pack the necessary amount of REM sleep into just a few hours, and I spent that extra time playing around with runes. So far, I had been using runes that I had made up, some arbitrary caveman-ish drawings actually worked and functioned roughly the way I wanted it to because sorcery and enchantment works off of intent. This did not mean that it was the most efficient way. The first sorcery I had gained was related to runes and enchantments, but I hadn¡¯t fully explored that. I had the distinct feeling after examining Reeanth¡¯s battlesuit, which is covered in many runes, that my made-up runes were like a musket compared to a modern sniper rifle that she was packing.


    And now, playing with my baseball sized piece of granite and forming it into different shapes, I noticed that magic flowed differently through it. What made it worse is that I couldn¡¯t be specific in how or why the magic treated shapes differently, but it did. This is one of the areas that my lack of knowledge was really holding me back. The only thing I had going for me was my overwhelming power, the unending supply of mana I had in the way of the kinetic-current converter in the river hideout and the two big generators in the under-tree hideout and the in-the-tree hideout. And those ones are going to require some serious maintenance soon.


    Damn, what I wouldn¡¯t give to go back in time and go to college for something worthwhile, like nuclear or mechanical engineering. Shit, or even medical school so that I could fully use my flesh sorcery to its utmost potential. My problem is me. I¡¯m too dumb for this. Other than endless mana, my other strengths are diverse powers and stubbornness, and I have that last one in spades.


    My mind randomly began turning over another subject. What Reeanth said in regards to altered states of mind, that they weren¡¯t picked up. Which is either a really good or really bad outcome depending on the circumstances. Mine went rather well, other than my fiance incident, and is still going alright. I mean, I¡¯m still alive and am more powerful than any human in recent history, but I guess that the leftovers might not have had such accommodating circumstances, or even made a wish when they had the chance. My skittish mind hopped around again as long term-benefits warred with short term convenience. Bumpkins one through four, there might be a way to swing this whole thing in my favor.


    They couldn¡¯t live too far from here, and they probably don¡¯t have much gas left. Also, they¡¯re probably good people that would want a larger community. One possible avenue would be to build an inverted version of a skyscraper for them, an underground bunker with a bunch of apartments. Or, I could build into a mountain or even just make a bunch of Hobbit houses in some small hills. I figure they¡¯d probably want to bring back lone souls they find out on their exploration trips and wouldn¡¯t mind having a safe place to bring them back to. I could also train them, or help them expand their abilities as well as equipping them.


    When I got tired of thinking about it, I put my energy to good use in the early hours. By the time they woke up, I had presents for them. ¡°Morning sleepyheads,¡± I greeted them as they stumbled into the main room. ¡°Coffee is on the table, I have sugar but no milk, and as soon as you finish waking up, you¡¯re gonna love what I got for ya.¡±


    Bleary eyes opened only when they heard the word ¡®coffee¡¯. Without caring that it was hot, they poured themselves a cup, threw in some sugar, and nursed it like addicts. As they perked up under the magical effects of the wonder drug, I began placing various items in front of them.


    ¡°Let¡¯s start with you Jimmy. You were the easiest cause you were the biggest. I don¡¯t know how y¡¯all have been defending yourselves up¡¯n till now, but melee weapons don¡¯t run outta bullets,¡± I said, hefting a three and a half foot bar of steel with foot long handle at the base and a point at the tip. ¡°This bad boy right here, can turn into a solid baseball bat, an axe, a sword, or a pick. I¡¯ve attached a diamond crystal in the base so that it can store energy automatically when not in use and it will shift based off of what you imagine. I am gonna need a drop of your blood for it to work.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s it?¡± he asked, hunched over his coffee, ¡°Just one drop? What¡¯s the skinny? People don¡¯t do shit for free.¡±


    ¡°Honest. This was easy to make,¡± I answered, ¡°And this will hopefully grease the wheels of our friendship. I got a lot of shit going on myself that I gotta worry about, and if y¡¯all can survive with just a little boost from me, than I won¡¯t have to worry about ya.¡±


    He grunted and stuck out his finger, and I stuck it with his new weapon. Taking a second to heal his finger with flesh sorcery, I put it down in front of him. ¡°All yours,¡± I said proudly, ¡°And . . . it can repair itself if you stick it in the earth near a leyline, which the crystal at the base will light up if you¡¯re near one. Gungnir will fill you in more later.¡±


    I turned to Tommy. ¡°So, your¡¯s was also easy, I made two of what Jimmy got, but smaller. I used more metals in yours in case a hunch of mine proves true. And Sally,¡± I said, turning to her, ¡°Yours are pretty much the same thing, but smaller. And, you get more of them. I think your ¡®changing¡¯ ability is going to become your main weapon later, but having a bunch of shape-shifting daggers will help you out as you figure that out.¡±


    Her puzzled look told me that she probably didn¡¯t know what the hell I was talking about. ¡°And! Moving on! Billy, you good sir, get something a little bit different. These are actually patterned after my own weapons. These go on your arm, and function as shields.¡± I demonstrated with Svalinn, flexing my will to make my gauntlets extend out to form a small round shield on each arm. ¡°And, they aren¡¯t just for defense,¡± I grinned, forming the blade extensions on Svalinn. ¡°See, beautiful.¡±This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.


    The enormity of what I had done hadn¡¯t sunk in yet. All but Jimmy were still hunched over drinking coffee, their eyes half-lidded from sleep. My grand vision was unrealized by the simple fact that these people, were not morning people. Which is totally fine, because up till the point I got sorcery, neither was I. But, a million gamers are turning over in their graves at the utter lack of reaction from the faces of my guests. My excitement was stifled, but not stopped.


    ¡°Annnnnd . . . I have armor all laid near your four wheelers as well and a whole bunch of goodies to go with them!¡±


    No applause. No happiness. Nothing. Fine. Screw it. Reaching out to each of them with my flesh sorcery, I woke them the hell up, removed the lag that sleep had clouded their minds with.


    ¡°Holy moly! That¡¯s better than coffee!¡± Billy exclaimed, ¡°But, now it¡¯s hair of the dog time!¡±


    ¡°Damn it Billy,¡± Sally said, ¡°That miracle was so good I¡¯m gunna hafta¡¯ join ya!¡±


    Tommy stood up and shook his giant shoulders, towering over the table. ¡°Enough,¡± he said, his size granting him early morning authority. ¡°This sorcerer is kind enough to give us coffee and magical weapons. We should probably hear what he has to say before y¡¯all get shitfaced.¡± With that, he gestured for me to speak and sat down.


    ¡°Thanks man,¡± I said as the shamefaced alcoholics sat down. ¡°Well, I was thinking of coming to see where y¡¯all lived. Maybe I could build an underground bunker for y¡¯all and add some more people to your group. There ain¡¯t much of humanity left, and I was hoping maybe y¡¯all could find some mo¡¯ just like you found me. And I don¡¯t know where y¡¯all stand with gas, like, how much you got left, but if you¡¯re gonna be out soon, but I might make ya some kind of magical four-wheeler or hovercraft.¡±


    [Boss, you¡¯re starting to sound like them too] Gungnir sent me.


    [Shut up! My accent comes back when I¡¯m around Southerners.]


    Billy looked at me, and then at Reeanth and said, ¡°Sorry y¡¯all, but we don¡¯t really know ya that well. This was real kind of you, but not sure we¡¯re gonna go for that.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± Tommy said, ¡°I feel like this guy¡¯s got some answers we need. He ain¡¯t done nothin wrong yet. Fed us, been kind, made weapons and gear, and you see the way he whips around magic?¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s see how this goes first,¡± Jimmy said, finishing off his coffee. ¡°He¡¯s got good ideas and we¡¯ll test out the stuff. More people, that¡¯d be good too though.¡±


    Sally was not to be outdone. ¡°Well, I like him. Nice, kind, well to do. Not like you three got¡¯s a brain between ya. We could use a planner like him.¡± She looked at me and nodded, clearly letting me know that she¡¯s on my side.


    ¡°It¡¯s up to y¡¯all. I also got a few more tidbits for ya, a hunch if you will,¡± I said as I poured myself some coffee. ¡°I think y¡¯all got more magic than you realize. I¡¯ll have to examine you to be sure, but I bet that you guys are more powerful than you think.¡±


    Jimmy looked at kind hard, ¡°Explain,¡± he said.


    ¡°I mean, I don¡¯t know for sure. But Tommy is easy to figure out. He probably has some kind of metal sorcery and mechanical magic. I bet if he got ahold of a book or two, he¡¯d made some awesome stuff in no time, and I bet metal will do more than slightly bend if he puts his mind to it.¡±


    Tommy started dancing a jig. ¡°Woooweee! If he¡¯s right, I can get us some air conditioning going and maybe some kickass rifles!¡±


    ¡°Hey now, don¡¯t forget the best part!¡± Billy said, ¡°COLD BEER!¡±


    Sally swooned. ¡°Oh yeah, I¡¯d do a lot for a cold beer,¡± she said, looking straight at me.


    ¡°And Sally,¡± I said, cutting her off, ¡°I bet you got some kind of shape-shifting or flesh sorcery to be able to change hair color and stuff. If you wanted, with practice you might be able to change anything you want about your body, from healing to getting taller or crazy shit like growing claws.¡±


    She shivered with almost sexual joy, ¡°Look like anyone I want huh?¡±


    ¡°Now Jimmy and Billy, you¡¯re the two I¡¯d have to sit down and examine,¡± I said, swirling my coffee, ¡°Your descriptions of what you wished for and can do seem to have some kind of logical discontinuity with what my magical senses are telling me.¡±


    ¡°Whatcha mean?¡± Billy asked, ¡°I didn¡¯t get much. I was thinking of beer when the damn Ripple hit.¡±


    ¡°Right, and how¡¯ve you been getting it. You got a stash or do you keep finding it?¡± I asked, leaning in a bit.


    ¡°Both . . . uh, is that weird?¡±


    ¡°I mean, maybe,¡± Tommy said, ¡°Did you say you found a box of Coors underneath a log or somethin that one time?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, and that time you found some in that house where giant squirrels were guarding it?¡± Sally said, her eyes getting wide.


    ¡°Yeah, bet you got enhanced senses, and your best one is probably your nose. Human bloodhound is what you are.¡± Turning to Jimmy, ¡°And you muscles, you wished for muscles, which is what you got, or already have since I don¡¯t know what you looked like before, but I think you might have gotten some kind of flesh magic too, or something along those lines. It depends on what you were focusing on when the Ripple came. You said that you said ¡®muscles¡¯, but were you thinking of power and strength as well or just literally and only ¡®muscles¡¯?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t remember,¡± he said, flexing one thigh sized bicep, ¡°But every cut I¡¯ve had ain¡¯t there no more, and that squirrel fiasco, whoo, we wuz all bloody after that.¡±


    All four of them shivered. ¡°Nope, not doing that again,¡± Sally said, holding her arms close to her chest.


    ¡°Ok, moving on from an obviously bad memory,¡± I said, trying to divert the conversation. ¡°The point is, y¡¯all probably got more than you asked for and can probably do some cool things with practice.¡± Conjuring a small ball of water and another of ice, I picked each with my hands and ¡®stuck¡¯ them in the air where they hovered above my head. Then conjuring a ball of granite and molding it into a the shape of pistol, I said, ¡°Trust me, magic is fucking cool.¡± With a clap, I banished my conjurations.


    ¡°My lord, you don¡¯t need to justify yourself to them,¡± Reeanth said with a sniff.


    ¡°What bug crawled up her ass?¡± Sally snorted, looking at me.


    I stood up. ¡°Hell no,¡± I said, shaking my head, ¡°We ain¡¯t doing this. Reeanth, sit down and apologize. We treat guests with respect round¡¯ here.¡±


    Her glare showed her obvious disagreement. ¡°Reeanth. I order you to apologize and remove yourself from this room.¡±


    Facing the four, she put her fist to her heart and bowed slightly. ¡°I apologize for my behaviour. It is unbecoming one such as I to lower myself to insult guests,¡± she said through barely gritted teeth. Standing straight, she turned and promptly left.


    ¡°Sorry about her, she is from a society very alien to our own,¡± I explained, ¡°We would be nobles where she¡¯s from due to our magic and she still isn¡¯t ok with the notion that ¡®lesser races¡¯ could possess sorcery. It¡¯s a work in progress.¡± Using my fingers as quotation marks to emphasize my point, hoped that my sheepish look would convince the four southerners of my sincerity.


    ¡°I think it¡¯s time we head on out,¡± Tommy said, looking to the other three for confirmation. Damn, I knew the gifts were pushing the boundaries of being a good host, but I had surprises in store, and Reeanth made them suspicious, or at least creeped out. Fuck.


    Each of them picked up their weapons and then headed out, hopped on their four wheelers and left after a half-hearted goodbye. You¡¯d think they at least would be happy to see people other than themselves, or happy with the fact that they now knew what the hell was going on.


    As I watched them roar off down the forest trail, Reeanth peered over my shoulder. I heard her breathe in as she was about to speak. Just before she did, I spoke, ¡°Yes, I did all of this on purpose. Yes, I gave them awesome gifts. You almost fucked the whole thing up. And yes, there was a point, there are tracking spells in those weapons.¡±

 Chapter 84 - The Calm Before the Storm

    ¡°Devious! Very cunning use of magic my lord!¡± Reeanth¡¯s smile was almost predatory. I saw her strange hunger out of the corner of my eye as we walked back into the main room of the bolt-hole.


    ¡°No no, stop. I¡¯m not going to actually track them down. This was kind of a test on several fronts. One, to see if they would attack me with those weapons, two, to test out a proximity based tracking rune I designed, and three, to see if the weapons work long-term.¡± Pouring myself another cup of coffee, I continued on, ¡°But that last one will take time to see the results.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand,¡± Reeanth said, plopping down in the chair across from me, ¡°We¡¯re not tracking them down?¡±


    ¡°No. The rune is loosely designed off that old Egyptian glyph, the Eye of Anubis. I don¡¯t know enough to make a tracking rune work, but the ones I put in their weapons will simply let me know if they¡¯re near, kind of like that kid¡¯s game where you yell ¡®hot¡¯ or ¡®warm¡¯ if you¡¯re getting closer, and cold if you move further away.¡± Tossing a small stone disk in front of Reeanth, she rubbed at the four rubies on it arranged in the cardinal directions.


    Bringing it real close to her face, she examined the insignias I had inscribed into the rubies with my magic. ¡°And these represent the four being tracked?¡± she asked?


    ¡°Yup, the tankard for Billy, the chameleon/lizard for Sally, the flexed arm for Jimmy, and the car for Tommy. By the way, I¡¯m rather proud of myself for making it look so real. Couldn¡¯t draw for shit before the Ripple, and now my magic does it for me. And the disc, the corresponding ruby will vibrate a little and light up if that person comes near.¡±


    Sliding it back over to me, she pulled out her own weapons and put them down in front of her. ¡°I¡¯d like the same runes on my weapons,¡± she said.


    ¡°For what?¡±


    ¡°You may not care where they are or where they live, but I¡¯m going to go see.¡± Taking a deep breath, she let it out and continued, ¡°And, if I don¡¯t come back for some unforeseen circumstance, I¡¯d like you to be able to find me, hence, tracking sigil.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re missing the point. It¡¯s not to go find them, it¡¯s to let us know if they come back. That¡¯s it.¡± After taking a minute to finish my coffee, I did pull her weapons closer to me. The first, a long silvery dirk with a few tiny runes carved into its side, and the second, a mana-maul. I was particularly impressed with the latter, as it was beefed up with a gravity fluctuation enchantment to greatly enhance its cutting or smashing power. The enchantment allowed the user to swing it around as if it weighed nothing, but hit a target as if the gravity of the surrounding area concentrated right on the face of the maul, or edge, whichever side my murderously minded Centauri decided to use. Ten minutes of concentrating later, I had her weapons connected to a stone sphere with a sapphire in the middle. All I¡¯d have to do is drop it the sphere on the ground and it would roll right on to Reeanth.


    ¡°There, happy?¡±


    She took the weapons without saying anything and left. I couldn¡¯t stop myself from watching her great ass sway out the door. I looked up to where the root of the World Tree entered the ceiling. ¡°Sorry babe, guess I¡¯m still human after all.¡±


    Shaking the distraction that my biology demanded I pay attention to was harder than I thought it would be, but nothing clears the mind like hard work, or flesh sorcery. With that thought held firmly in my head, I grasped the basic urges of my genetics with my flesh sorcery and soothed them away. The ever-present male needs of FEED, FIGHT, FUCK slowly submitted under the inexorable power of my will bolstered with sorcery. I ate a can of soup to ease one of those urges, then moved on to my next plan, the workaround to my failed generators.


    One of the branches of my sorcery was related to ley lines, and as far as I understood them, the layman¡¯s explanation is that ley lines are rivers of magic, of pure life that flow like blood under the skin of the earth. And ley lines seem to have some kind of significance beyond just power, but I¡¯m not real clear on that yet. But, my sorcery confirmed for me that working magic while on a ley line is a lot easier because the amount of mana/power in the environment is significantly higher. And ley lines also have an elemental affinity, a flavor, if you will. Ley lines near rivers will be blue, or water in nature, which means that water-based magic will be much easier to use, and the same goes for fire ley lines near volcanoes, and I think there might be ley lines way up in the atmosphere, the new equivalent of jet streams. Time will tell on that one though.


    Now, I always have a sense of in what direction ley lines are and how powerful they are due to my earth and mana sorcery, but they present another problem. I used to be able to carry around a little generator that filled up my internal reserves of mana indefinitely, but the ambient level of mana made them unstable. And I can¡¯t have a mini nuclear reactor around my neck if there¡¯s a solid chance it might turn me into a mock-up of Nagasaki. But the ley lines, those I might be able to work with.


    My idea came from our lore, our stories of old, where the fat old wizard carried around a staff. Why did that old man carry around a staff? Probably to tap into ley lines, that would be my guess. Now, I like that idea, but modernizing it, that could be fucking cool. The concept I¡¯m running with, is the parallel that I can draw between modern maglev train. The ley lines will be my tracks, and I¡¯ll put runes of siphoning in a staff and on the bottom of my boots, and then they¡¯ll drain mana directly into me, my weapons, and mana storage batteries. And if I¡¯m on the ley line or near it, I¡¯ll just tap it for infinite mana, and if I have to get off of it, then I should have more than enough to deal with anything in my weight class.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    Getting this done fast was a definite priority as Reeanth was off doing her own thing and the last Ripple was coming sooner rather than later. As minutes passed, I could feel my own anxiety level skyrocketing, which is weird for me. I¡¯ve always been a calm dude. Going through Army basic training tends to take the softer edges off of you for life, but man did I feel the pressure of what was to come. Taking off all my armor, I put it on the stone table piece by piece, examining each inch for wear and tear. Some of the runes looked a little worn down, but conjuring the prerequisite precious metal didn¡¯t take much time. The entire set as a whole has held up wonderfully, beyond the quality of what I would have expected my untrained expertise to create.


    There were runes of silver and lines of gold for the energy absorption runes to disperse enemy magical attacks, and adding a few directional sigils didn¡¯t take me very long. Now, the runes would absorb energy from a ground-based direction as well and direct it up the linked armor to the energy storage function in Svalinn and the mental defense diamond in my helmet which also functions as a mana battery. The efficiency of the entire concept is what made it deadly and durable. The elements making up the armor fell under the categories of my different sorceries, so fixing it and upgrading it posed no problem, but I felt like I was running out of ideas. If I can¡¯t epically upgrade my physical body due to ignorance yet, then hulking out my armor seems to be the best route. Man, what I wouldn¡¯t give for one of those Renaissance reenactors right now, especially the blacksmith.


    [Just use the dragon] a tinny voice sounded in my head.


    [Damn it Gungnir, what dragon? The hell are you talking about?]


    [The dead one!]


    [What about him?]


    [Bruh, dragon armor! I know you spent most of your free time playing Skyrim! Everybody loves that dragon armor, and you got a bigass dragon to work with here.]


    [Exactly what is the bright idea? I¡¯ve already thought about using dragon scales as armor and Rath was just too damn big. One of his medium scales would cover my entire back plus some, and his small scales are brittle now.]


    [True, but use the skin underneath. That stuff has to be the godly version of cow leather and most likely gonna be easy to enchant. Besides, if you don¡¯t want it, you can experiment with it and give it to Reeanth. Bet she¡¯d look lovely in a skintight leather suit.]


    [No, and no. I¡¯ve given her enough stuff already, and she¡¯s got some nice weaponry. Besides, she¡¯s got that magical nanotech armor. Some hick sorcerer can¡¯t do better than that, not yet anyways.]


    [Good point. By the way, I¡¯ll have this dragon fully decoded and organized in about four days.]


    ¡°HELL YES!¡± I shouted audibly, sending my excitement down my mental link as well.


    [Bad news though . . . ]


    [What?]


    [No idea on Reeanth part. I¡¯m a piece of you, not a full on AI or computer. I¡¯m lost, there¡¯s passwords and encryptions in a language I don¡¯t know. We may be out of our league in this particular piece of grey matter.]


    [Fuck it,] I sent back while putting my slightly upgraded armor back on, [Work on Rath¡¯s brain, that¡¯s the priority, and we¡¯ll hit the next one later. Besides, we should be able to get it out of her eventually and then I¡¯ll see if I can formally and officially get her out of the magic vow she¡¯s in.]


    ********


    I was trying to relax. Sipping coffee, living the high life, and relaxing way up on one of the branches of the World Tree just kinda looking over the amazing view. It was glorious, honestly, being this high up in a tree not even two months old. Nasty old thick orange Virginia clay is apparently good for a young growing cosmic sapling. The bark was almost soft in the crook where the branch met the trunk and formed the perfect curve for me to recline. If it were any bigger, I could build an old school colonial house on this branch alone. I still had my armor for three reasons. One, I had gotten used to it and it was comfortable now, two, this world is spontaneously dangerous, and three, that little ache in the back of my head telling me to watch out. The main problem was that little ache, that pinprick pressure that screamed like a faraway mouse, was yelling ¡°DANGER!¡± over and over.


    What made this worse, was that I was safe. Roughly speaking, I was actually safe, no danger in sight or anything that should activate the tiny bit of my intellect dominated by my lizard brain. But here I sat, freaking out. Gungnir was inside doing its thing, Reeanth was out doing who knows what, and I had nothing to do. Oh, I had things I wanted to do, but something, wasn¡¯t, right.


    Draining my cup, I set it in front of me, the stone mug settling nicely on the coarse bark. Reaching out with my magical senses, I pulsed them out as far as they could go, trying to catch a glimpse, a niggling, a blip of something, anything that might be the cause of my instincts going haywire. Peace. Utter peace. No wind was blowing. No leaves were falling. No animals cries or natural sounds were uttered. Stillness. And it was driving me CRAZY.


    I jumped to my feet and banished the stone mug. Using my nature sorcery, I made the bark of the tree grow convenient hand and footholds while I clambered down. Racing inside the under-tree hideout, I went down the stairs and sprinted to the cavern with Gungnir. ¡°Get off that. Get over here,¡± I said to my weapon, holding my hand out.


    [God you¡¯re tense.] Gungnir sent over our mental link while changing into spear form and slapping into my hand.


    [Fuck me man, I know. This is the calm before the storm, but I can¡¯t tell where the storm¡¯s coming from. I feel like there¡¯s a giant invisible bear in the room but I¡¯m the only one that knows. Is this what crazy people feel like? Ya know, like those apocalypse preachers on street corners?]


    [I mean, other than the upcoming Ripple, the last one, ain¡¯t no storm around here.]


    [That¡¯s in a couple days, right? We got time. Besides, it¡¯s the last wave, and they¡¯ve gotten weaker over time, so this last one should be cake, easy street.]


    [Nope. It¡¯s tomorrow.]


    My grip on Gungnir tightened, my body¡¯s ingrained fear of the Ripple asserting itself. [The HELL do you mean tomorrow?] my mind screamed. The mental scars of almost dying under the reality-bending wave hadn¡¯t left me like my physical injuries had. A pulse of pure mana, originating from Gungnir, traveled up my arm and stimulated my flesh sorcery, temporarily calming me and restoring a semblance of a clear mind. I have to remember to do that more often, the ability to make myself think clearly is a benefit I definitely needed to use more often.


    [Thanks.]


    [No problem. I don¡¯t have a body to regulate, for which I greatly thank you for. And the Ripples aren¡¯t an exact science. If our Olympus based visitors are to be believed, then it¡¯s the shockwave of a dead god who¡¯s so old we can¡¯t even know its name. It doesn¡¯t function on our timetable. Besides, you¡¯re right. Something isn¡¯t right. The mana levels are dense, absurdly so.]


    [I mean, we¡¯re in the cavern. I have a humongous generator ten feet away, duh.]


    [No no, the mana from outside, it¡¯s clinging to you. Like you just walked in from the rain. You don¡¯t even notice because you¡¯re always full of power, a battery that¡¯s never full, but any other wizard right now is probably high off their rocker. It¡¯s probably due to the Ripple coming early, or it¡¯s related to it somehow]


    Aw shit. Already? Fucking Reeanth. I just made the damn tracking ball and I already have to fucking use it.

 Chapter 85 - The Last Ripple

    Some time later . . .


    Brainworms. I finally remembered what it was called. That stupid song that gets stuck in your head for days on end, like when ¡®Golddigger¡¯ was my best friend seven months in at college and nothing would get it out. Still remember whistling the ¡°She gives me money!¡± part as I walked down the main avenue just rocking out in my own head. Right now, my current brain worm was a sing-songy old favorite of my hippy fiance when she would get home from work and complain about her horrible boss, ¡°Fuck you, fuck you very very muuuuuch!¡±. I couldn¡¯t even stop myself from singing it under my breath as I followed the stupid tracking orb I had made to find Reeanth. Pain in my ass and all I could think about was tearing that bitch a new one.


    Describing what I am feeling is rather hard at this moment, because it¡¯s so much more than just tension. Just think about being at the zoo checking out the tigers, and everything is great, and then you look over and you realize that the door is unlocked, that the door KEEPING THE TIGER AWAY is UNLOCKED. Now that bodily reaction, that oh shit split second of a freeze, take it and stretch that out. Stretch that tension out until you begin to voluntarily let it inside of you, where it can nest and feast on your peace. This nice little nature walk to go find Reeanth before the big bad Ripple comes is turning into some kind of sick mind game that reality is playing with my head. Nothing is out right now and I am a badass sorcerer but I feel that the door to the freakin tigers is open and they are going to jump out at any second.


    [What if, and hear me out, what if, it¡¯s not weak?]


    I know what Gungnir meant. The Ripple, the last one, supposedly the weakest one.


    [I¡¯m starting to feel it now too,] Gungnir continued, [The mana feels, electrified, like it¡¯s about to pour down rain.] I just let it go on. [I mean, death throes are a thing, why would a deity be any different? What¡¯s to say that this last Ripple won¡¯t be the mother of all Ripples? The freaking tidal wave? The gasping spasm of a god of chaos, wouldn¡¯t that be epically catastrophic?  I mean, I¡¯m just spitballin¡¯ here.]


    My pace picked up. Fuck you Murphy¡¯s Law. If you could take all the possible strings of Fate and organize them from best to worst, I bet there are plenty of times that my name shows up bright and clear in the frayed strands near the bottom. I passed trees as orb-form Gungnir floated a foot above my right shoulder, keeping perfect pace as the tracker ball rolled on. A thought I hadn¡¯t considered pulled me up short, what the freaking hell am I doing? Why am I chasing after some giant magical alien female when every remaining instinct I have is screaming ¡°DANGER¡±? The tracking ball rolled on, and I just watched it as it crested over the hill and vanished from sight.


    ¡°Yeah,¡± I muttered, ¡°Fuck you, fuck you very very much.¡± Turning, I looked at the trail behind me, then back to the hill in front of me. ¡°Eh, just one more hill,¡± I said, ¡°Gungnir. If we get to the top of that hill and we don¡¯t see her, we¡¯re going back.¡±


    A mental confirmation clicked down our link. Reeanth had started to grow on me, but I had other priorities, namely, my own ass, so sticking my neck out far wasn¡¯t in the cards. Jogging up the steep hill littered with leaves, I pondered my earlier thoughts. Why the hell was I running after Reeanth? She has an epic suit of magical nano-tech armor that self-repairs and has plenty of weapons, that grown woman can take care of herself. I mean, she looks like she could tear a normal human in half with her bare hands. Out of all my instincts, I for some reason decided to go with the dumbest one, the pack instinct. Humans are herd animals like sheep, and that doesn¡¯t speak well of how we work as groups. One of these days I¡¯m going to have to do a deep dive in my instincts and see what I can do in there.


    Reaching the top, I took a breath and looked around. ¡°Waste of fucking time,¡± I sighed.


    ¡°Totally,¡± Gungnir agreed, adopting a surfer dude accent, ¡°But, that alien butt is righteous. I¡¯d run after it too.¡±


    ¡°Uhm, except I¡¯m two feet too short and one wife too many. Besides, she ain¡¯t right in the head. Btw, just to reiterate for my peace of mind, you don¡¯t go further than two feet away from me. When this Ripple hits, I need to first, protect me, and then second, capture as much as you can if possible.¡±


    ¡°Already on top of it. Got a few three dimensional runes that I pulled out of Rath¡¯s brain a couple days back and I think they are geared towards energy imprisonment and stasis. It¡¯s like the dragon¡¯s internal mechanism to store energy that isn¡¯t compatible with their body at that time, but still allowing them to hold on to it if they can manage overpower or merge with it over time.¡±


    ¡°I cannot wait until I actually have a conversation that I leave with more answers than questions.¡±


    ¡°Hey, is that her?¡± Gungnir asked, shooting a small harmless beam of light off into the distance. ¡°Looks like she¡¯s in the middle of a, what do you call those, a crop circle?¡±


    A few minutes of jogging later, Gungnir and I made it to where Reeanth was furiously digging runes in a small clearing with her maul. ¡°What in the world are you doing?¡± I asked, surveying the strange scene before me. Glancing at me with a crazed look in her eye, she continued to dig. ¡°Reeanth!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s coming!¡± she huffed, almost out of breath with her exertions, ¡°It¡¯s almost here and I¡¯m going to die!¡± She could only mean one thing. The Ripple.


    ¡°So what if it¡¯s coming, how¡¯s it going to kill you? It¡¯s the death cry of a dead god right, so didn¡¯t it hit the entire universe?¡± I asked, puzzled. ¡°This doesn¡¯t make sense, doesn¡¯t that mean that all wizards or Centauri are going to die?¡±


    ¡°What, no?¡± she answered, her face scrunched incredulously as if I asked a stupid question.


    ¡°Don¡¯t give me that, I literally don¡¯t know shit. A god of chaos died and I became a sorcerer from it.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not the cry itself that will kill me, it¡¯s the mana differential of the environment reacting to the tsunami of power.¡±


    Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    Rubbing my temples, I ground my teeth, ¡°That¡¯s not a fucking answer.¡±


    ¡°I get it!¡± Gungnir said, ¡°That explains so much.¡±


    ¡°Any time now man.¡±


    ¡°Think about it this way, throw a rock in the ocean and it makes a wave, but that wave doesn¡¯t hurt anything. Because a wave in the ocean doesn¡¯t mean anything because a wave is water that¡¯s already in the water, but it¡¯s just moving. That¡¯s the Ripple in the areas other than Earth; it added magic to magic that was already there, like throwing a bucket of water into an ocean. Now, the Earth has no magic, or almost none compared to the rest of the Cosmos, so when you add magic to it, it¡¯s like a tsunami hitting the little beach town. Way different results.¡±


    Working through this hurt, because how the hell are we supposed to survive a magical tsunami?


    ¡°Hey!¡± Gungnir interrupted my train of thought, ¡°You¡¯re literally thinking of dumb questions. In the beginning, you had no magic, so when the water, or the magic hit, you were the sand that absorbed the wave. Now that you have magic, you¡¯re basically the rock formation getting pounded by the wave. It¡¯ll hurt, but you¡¯ll live. Besides, I¡¯m your shield, which¡¯ll help a lot.¡±


    ¡°Then what is she doing?¡± I asked, pointing at Reeanth.


    ¡°Uhm, got me there. Woman! What are you doing exactly?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a rune of containment within a Greater rune of diversion,¡± she said, pointing at the squarish one within a squiggly in front of her. ¡°And the two here,¡± she pointed to the ones to her right and left, ¡°Are the directional siphoning circuits to bleed off what the first doesn¡¯t handle. The last . . ¡° as she pointed behind herself to a crude rune with a glass bottle in the center. It was filled almost halfway with a thick red substance. ¡°That one is intent substitution diversion with a desire-based thought matrix.¡±


    ¡°A what and a huh?¡± I¡¯m a smart guy, but I¡¯m having an inadequacy problem at the moment.


    ¡°I don¡¯t have time for this!¡± she screamed, hopping out of the crude circle of runes and placing her hand on Gungnir. She closed her eyes for a second, and then hopped back to her work.


    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s ambitious,¡± Gungnir said, ¡°Insane, but it might actually work.¡± I could hear the obvious respect in the orb¡¯s tone.


    The crystal eye of the orb turned to me and caught me glaring at it. ¡°Oh, right, shit, uhm, didn¡¯t mean to leave you out of that,¡± it stuttered through like a five-year old that got caught stealing candy. ¡°She just allowed me to download her plan. Ok, so this whole thing is for protection, mainly. The Ripple hits the circle she¡¯s standing in, which acts as a kind of magical shield, and the runes direct the flow to protect her. The tricky one is the one behind her, it¡¯s her blood, which she put a single rune containing a thought or want inside of it, the desire for sorcery.¡±


    I raised one eyebrow and motioned for Gungnir to continue.


    ¡°Well, it will serve as a distraction, because magic, pure magic, is almost sentient. It kind of just acts if left to its own devices, like wild magic, very dangerous stuff. So, the blood jar will serve to function as bait, so the wave will hit the rune circle, and if it¡¯s not enough, will be diverted to the other runes, protecting Reeanth inside the main circle, and then direct the chaos towards unprotected bait, the blood jar, which may also have a tiny chance of capturing a sorcery if all goes well.¡±


    ¡°Huh. So, why¡¯s she freaking out?¡± I asked as her digging picked up the pace.


    ¡°Something to do with the lack of proper ritual materials. The image in her head that she sent me was a seriously elaborate ritual complete with focus crystals and storage gems and silver/gold rune inlays with a blooded inlay.¡± The orb floated a little closer to Reeanth, as if to get a better look.


    ¡°Hey!¡± I shouted, grabbing it with my hands and pulling it back. ¡°No sir. You stay near me. Besides, I might be able to help.¡± With Gungnir showing me mentally what Reeanth had in her mind, I began to use my earth sorcery to smooth out the rough edges of the dirt circle and transmuted it into granite with two inch channels connecting the Cardinal directions. Walking to the top rune, I slowly conjured a quartz crystal in the shape of the rune and placed it in the dug-up slot, and then did the same for the left and right runes. ¡°This is pretty easy,¡± I said jokingly, ¡°What¡¯s all the fuss?¡±


    Glaring at me, Reeanth snapped, ¡°Sorcery makes everything easy!¡± Her eyes softened just a bit, ¡°But thank you. This will hopefully make my chances better of surviving. Your hideouts didn¡¯t have the right runes or anything to prevent the Ripple from making tangible contact. That¡¯s why I started making this, for a piece of a chance at survival.¡±


    ¡°Gungnir could have easily protected both of us dummy,¡± I said, derision lightly tingeing my voice. ¡°You didn¡¯t need to do any of this,¡± I continued as I gestured at the circle. ¡°But, the blood jar, that can capture sorcery? I¡¯ve been trying to do that crystals and I barely got any results, except for a maybe that I need to test out.¡±


    ¡°Worry about that later!¡± she said, waving her hands in my face, ¡°We don¡¯t have much time, at least finish what you started.¡±


    ¡°So ungrateful,¡± I grumbled as I kept on conjuring crystals and smoothing out the runes and turning the dirt into stone. ¡°Do this, conjure that, fucking princess.¡± Within ten minutes, the crude dirt drawing had been transformed into an almost respectable ritual. An inner and outer circle were carved into beautiful marbled granite with shiny quartz crystals studding the Cardinal directions, and Reeanth was in the middle, shaking with fear, or anticipation. I couldn¡¯t really tell. The blood jar was sitting on its own platform at the Southern point. ¡°Does that one need a rune, and where the hell did you get a fucking glass jar?¡±


    ¡°My suit¡¯s nanites and sand,¡± she answered, ¡°And they also carved all the necessary runes at the molecular level, so this is the most reliable part of this entire ritual.¡±


    ¡°Well shit,¡± I said quietly to myself as I looked around, ¡°Why the fuck not?¡± I inspected Reeanth¡¯s setup one more time and then found myself some room about forty feet away. ¡°My turn bitches!¡± I crowed, using my earth sorcery to make a much more tidy version than what Reeanth originally had. I conjured a granite platform with disk shaped slots at the cardinal directions, and then put in the same runes in the same places, but this time I filled in the circuit lines with copper, as that was much quicker to conjured than gold due to how common it is. Then, using Gungnir as a memory bank, I conjured the quartz version of the blood jar, complete with runes, and stuck it in its place. Using flesh sorcery, I nicked open a vein on my left arm and bled into the jar and then continued to bleed while directing the flow to cover the copper wire circuitry. With a quick flex of will, I healed myself, replenished the lost blood and stood in the middle of my much better ritual circle.


    ¡°My lord, please, we don¡¯t have much time before it arrives,¡± Reeanth said, with a pleading look on her face. ¡°These channels won¡¯t do anything, they need some kind of metal to act as a circuit.¡±


    ¡°Seriously?¡± I groaned, walking back over to her. I conjured copper to fill in the channels and looked her in the eye. ¡°Anything else?¡± She shook her head no. ¡°Good,¡± I said, walking back to my own circle.


    Sitting down indian style in the center, I faced my blood jar and stuck my finger on the outside, lightly resting it at the lip. [Breathe in, breathe out]. Calming myself was harder than I hoped in that moment, I couldn¡¯t afford to mess this up. I really didn¡¯t know if this would work, but the possibility existed that I could get another sorcery. What would work best? Man, my current power set is awesome, but kind of limiting in some ways. It lends itself to long-term survival and fortifications as well as healing and defensive power, but that very same combo prevents me from being compatible with other kinds of sorcery, like fire or death or void.


    My elements are earth, water, nature, flesh, and mana/enchantment. Fire is antithetical to my core, and lightning is a purified expression of fire. Energy would be cool, but severely limited with the odd restrictions. The only way I even came to that conclusion was when I tried to ingest Rath and his power, the fire dragon from not too long ago. That encounter made me realize that the harmony of my capabilities is almost more important than the abilities themselves. Sorcery is inherent to the soul, and a powerful soul is required to even have it. I have several sorceries, and if I had opposing kinds, then the disharmony wouldn¡¯t allow me to have more than a set of two. But the fact that everything I have literally works together in the world, the synergy allows for me to possess more than I should. So what would work with what I have?


    The hair on the back of my neck stood on end right as Reeanth let out an oddly pitched screech. ¡°My lord! Prepare yourself!¡±


    Looking over at her without moving my hand, I saw her body start to shake just a little harder than the shiver from five minutes ago. Her head tilted up and I followed her line of sight. A smorgasbord of oil-slicked rainbow colors streaked across the sky, making the sun and the barely visible moon Ripple. The clouds followed suit as reality bore the weight of change on its shoulders. It had arrived.

 Chapter 86 - The Overwhelming Tide

    ¡°THE CYCLE RENEWS, FALLS THE GREAT TREE.¡±


    It¡¯s one thing to see it, and know that it¡¯s there. It¡¯s a whole ¡®nother ball game to see it coming right at you. The tsunami of change, of raw potential, pure random, writhing entropy, barreling down from beyond the sky like the implacable uncaring tidal wave of power that it was. It was beautiful, and terrible. As it crashed into the soft flesh of our world, a flicker shot across space, making the night sky taking over for justit look like nighttime for half-second. And in that half-second, I saw other worlds as if they were plane ride away, teeming with life and scenes that Hollywood couldn¡¯t match in their wildest dreams.


    ¡°LIMITS UNBOUND, POTENTIAL REALIZED.¡±


    I had felt it before, lived through its effects, and survived its toll, but I had never actually seen the Ripple in all its reality-altering glory. Watching it casually flick through our dimension without a care in the world was awe inspiring, and demeaning at the same time. I never really knew, or inherently grasped how infinitesimally small I really was until that moment. I was an ant, edging towards the biting lip of a cliff, trying to see a pod of whales in the distance, uncaring in their size, relaxed in their power, yet, so much bigger than me that they would never even know about me. I, was, small.


    ¡°THE GATES RETURN, THE BALANCE IS FREE.¡±


    Cracks opened up in space, some cleanly cut across the sky and others jaggedly broke up the earth. Through several gates in the sky, islands floated out, chunks of land with their own ecosystems gently coasting on the wind, adrift to their new rhythm. Through other gates, sleek shapes glided through on lazy wings, roaring and chirping and screeching a welcome to their new home.


    ¡°EVERY END IS TRANSIENT, . . . FOR ME.¡±


    A sharp, cracking sound reverberated through all of Earth¡¯s existence at the end of the last wave, the remnants of the seal keeping this planet away from the rest of the Cosmos falling off like a snake shedding its scales. Bright silvery shapes made themselves known on the horizon, flying around at angles and speeds that simply weren¡¯t organic, quickly disappearing from sight.


    Back on my little section of earth, my surprise almost rendered my impromptu experiment impotent. Holding Gungnir to my chest with my left arm, my right arm was stretched out halfway with one finger carefully transmitting one multi-sided thought to my blood jar, my life/soul/consciousness/me. The act of focusing my thoughts was difficult, but I pictured one of those old Chinese acupuncture/pressure points and meridian diagrams. That one idea itself, encapsulated with the entire concept of what makes up the core of a person, traveled down my arm, given power through desire, and resonated with the crimson part of me in that jar. Removing my finger in the nick of time, the crash of was more seen than felt as the ritual circle did its job better than I expected, with Gungnir was greedily gobbling whatever leaked through.


    The Northern rune glowed a solid pearl white, and green incandescent runoff traveled down the siphoning circuits to the East and West runes where they turned a pulsing blue. The rune under the blood jar glowed a deep, royal red, which was slowly overtaken by a softer yellow mixed with white. ¡°IT¡¯S ALIVE!¡± Gungnir cackled, the orb bouncing in my arm as if it had the body to actually laugh. ¡°MWAHAHAHAHA!¡±


    Turning to look at where Reeanth¡¯s circle was, a soft boom shuddered through the air. ¡°Uh, you uh, might wanna, turn around. Slowly.¡± Following the advice of Gungnir¡¯s suddenly quiet voice, I carefully turned while gently expanding my magical senses.


    ¡°Secure the jar!¡± and ¡°Take him out!¡± rang out simultaneously right before a booted foot crashed into my face, knocking me clear out of my earthen circle and into a downed tree ten feet away. Not taking a second to catalogue my injuries, I trusted my flesh sorcery to instantly start the regeneration process as I activated Svalinn¡¯s defensive measures. Both gauntlets expanded and shielded my prone form with a secondary layer of stone covering that unfortunately blocked my vision as well.


    ¡°I said slowly!¡± Gungnir angrily whispered. ¡°That wasn¡¯t slow!¡±


    ¡°It was fucking slow, like impress the mom of a sloth you wanna date kinda slow!¡± I growled back, struggling through a fucked up lip while shaking the cobwebs out of my head. ¡°You know what? Fuck this.¡± I¡¯m no pansy, and I¡¯m done rolling over and ¡°being kind¡±. Pulling stored power from Svalinn, I stood up fully using earth sorcery to make the stone shield explode outward like a fragmentation grenade, my gauntlet shields suddenly long blades as my magical armor engaged now that the surprise was over. Except that it wasn¡¯t, what I hadn¡¯t gotten a visual of was what had treated my face like a kick-in training door for the Army¡¯s recruits.


    Twenty dark silver futuristic guns pointed at me, each held by a hulking human form dressed in almost skin tight metallic glowing armor way too tall to be a normal human, easily over seven feet. Bladed weapons attached to their backs showed over their overly muscled shoulders, face masks obscured their features except for the biggest dude in the back. Various runes glowed a menacing red and sharp green as they softly crackled in the background of my thumping pulse. Mr. Big and Tall was standing on a ramp that extended down from his cigar shaped, from what I¡¯m guessing, spacecraft. ¡°You two,¡± he said, his deep voice cutting through my shock as he pointed at two of his soldiers, ¡°Check the captain, make sure she¡¯s all right, and secure her container as well.¡±


    Initial greetings aside, I decided that I didn¡¯t like these people. Reaching out with my mind, I strengthened my link to Gungnir so that we wouldn¡¯t have to talk to be on the same page. The orb rose and hovered two feet above my head and quickly projected a thick magical shield over myself as I reached out with earth sorcery and sunk my entire ritual circle and my blood jar twenty feet down into the earth, neatly packaging it safely away from the coming conflict. With that out of the way, I did the same to Reeanth and her jar, taking a moment to leave her a nice sized air bubble down there.


    Feeling my pain recede as my flesh sorcery did its work did not in any way curb the earthquake of rage tremoring through me. A cold shiver of rationality worked its way up my spine, reminding me that these people probably don¡¯t have too much intel on what¡¯s going on right now, and they or their main group also probably have my family. Taking a half second to pulse my magical senses around me, I saw that the one who booted my face was closer to me than the rest of his group, which meant he would be the perfect example. Gungnir turned into a spear and fell into my outstretched hand, which I angrily slammed its base with a pulse of power into the ground causing a minor earthquake, knocking everyone to the ground. Gathering more power, I grabbed the earth underneath the face-booter and turned it to mud that reached up with earthen hands and pulled him down into the mire until only his head was showing. As he sank down, I used water sorcery to make the mud as slippery and nasty as it could be, then pulled the temperature down so that it was just above freezing. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    As the Centauri soldiers attempting to regain their feet, I walked forward and put Gungnir¡¯s three sided speartip to the mud-sunk idiot¡¯s eye. ¡°Move and he loses an eye,¡± I said softly, rage sharpening my tone, ¡°Attack me and I¡¯ll sink him and use him for experiments. Threaten me, and I¡¯ll dissect every last one of you while keeping you alive, and then feed you to my pet alligator, who trust me, is a messy eater.¡± As I spoke, I used my power to conjure water near my feet, which began snaking out and shackling the downed men with ice restraints. Holding the silence for ten breaths after that made it clear who the top dog was. Nobody moved, they barely breathed. Looking down at the blue-lipped captive at my feet, I squatted down, tipping his head up with the speartip. ¡°Do you want to live,¡± I asked, suddenly all lackadaisical, as if I had not a care in the world, ¡°Or do you want to die, suffocating in freezing cold mud a hundred yards down?¡± The forced tone change pushed my agenda, that maybe I had a few screws loose and wouldn¡¯t mind following through on some of my promises.


    The world¡¯s softest explosion went off behind me, all sound and literally no pressure wave. My armor¡¯s shields were still active and didn¡¯t register any kind of assault, so I took my time standing up and turning around, but only part of the way so that I could keep my prisoners in sight.


    ¡°Bonjour mon ami!¡± The most unassuming wrinkled old man wearing grey robes and holding one gnarled, but polished old cane in one hand and a small book in another. Putting the tattered book in his pocket, he took off his small, pointed hat and executed a very formal bow. Standing up with a big smile, he took a deep breath to talk and I quickly cut him off.


    ¡°English dude. English. No France¡¯!¡± I said, punctuating the French accent.


    ¡°Oh! My sincerest apologies my good man!¡± he tittered, the happiness never leaving his demeanour. ¡°You must be terribly confused,¡± he continued, suddenly adopting a thick Cockney accent. ¡°Blimey! I know I am. But, all of us God¡¯s children look alike but Babel in different tongues.¡±


    Understanding him took me a second as his accent was overly thick. ¡°I don¡¯t mean to be disrespectful . . .¡±


    ¡°Then don¡¯t be!¡± he cut in happily.


    ¡°Right, well, fuck that, but, who the hell are you?¡± I said, my patience running short. ¡°That¡¯s the best Merlin costume I¡¯ve ever seen, and since magic is real, might you be him?¡±


    ¡°The nerve! Merlin?! You mistake me, Monsieur Flamel, for that half rate trickster who bandied tricks to peasants?¡± The change from almost drugged up happiness to barely sane anger threw me for a loop. Engaging his evidenced bipolarity, the old man flourished his hat, waving it at himself, ¡°I am Monsieur Flamel, philosopher king, maker of wonders, the Twister of Time, at your service.¡± At which point he bowed again. My puzzled look threatened to tip the fragile scale of his personality as he realized that I had no clue what he was talking about.


    Since it felt like the combat part of my day had truly left, my mental connection with Gungnir relaxed just a little, so normal communication resumed. ¡°I don¡¯t sense any kind of magic or power on this guy,¡± Gungnir said quietly, ¡°Which is kinda scary. Even Rath, who was way above us in terms of power, we could sense.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, first time I couldn¡¯t sense anything about someone was a while ago,¡± I answered, ¡°And I¡¯m pretty sure that was a god.¡±


    ¡°I assure you, I am not a deity, merely a humble naturalist in pursuit of the greatest mortal goal,¡± Flamel cut in.


    ¡°Which is . . . ¡°


    ¡°Have we lost so much already?¡± he said, shameful wonder undergirding his voice. Looking past me, he scanned the small platoon behind me, still on their backs and one in the ground. ¡°But, how then?¡± he continued on, I was pretty sure that he was talking to himself at that point. ¡°Clearly some skill or lore remains. Knowledge my boy, knowledge!¡± At this point, it was clear his five-year old attention span was back on me. ¡°With knowledge we can turn back time, bring down the gods, create anew and even turn the heavens to the devices of men!¡±


    [Uhm, I¡¯ve seen that look before,] I sent to Gungnir, [That¡¯s crazy, pure fuckin crazy right there. You see a chick with eyes like that, you run, and run fast.]


    Turning my attention to Flamel, I said in my most soothing customer service, ¡°Then let my apologize for my rudeness. I truly didn¡¯t know who you were or what you were. Earth has only recently regained magic and I have had it for about two months now. Whatever knowledge I have surely pales in comparison to yours.¡±


    [Got it, got it!] Gungnir mentally whispered, [Flamel, Nicholas Flamel, better known as the dude who turned lead to gold. Took me a minute to sort through your memories, damn they¡¯re unorganized, but he was mentioned in the freaking Harry Potter series as the guy who made the Philosopher¡¯s Stone. Then you spent a day looking him up. According to whatever accounts you read, he really wasn¡¯t much, just some guy ahead of his time in search of an impossible goal.]


    [Clearly humanity got some things wrong man.] I sent back, mentally whispering as if I had gotten caught with my hand in the cookie jar.


    ¡°Fiction! You know me from fiction!¡± The old man¡¯s eyes were bulging, threatening to explode out of his head and cause some serious damage. ¡°With my potions I have escaped the ravages of time! With my tinctures I have removed ailments from the masses. With my solutions I have brought down an empire and raised another!¡±


    [How the fuck did he . . . ] I thought.


    ¡°And with my knowledge I expanded my mind! Your tittering words don¡¯t go unheeded by me, even if you don¡¯t speak them aloud. Pitiful, simply pitiful.¡±


    Following my gut instinct that combat was in fact, not over for the day, I mentally synced up with Gungnir again and took a step back, preparing for the worst while trying not to escalate this situation any further.


    ¡°Better, that¡¯s a bit better,¡± Flamel said, his demeanour bouncing back from erupting indignation to thoughtful examination. I got the feeling that this man was literally looking through me as his sharp eyes took in every detail. ¡°Also, no genetic enhancement for the young sorcerer? Smart, smart. Recombinator treatments stripped the Centauri of the chaos in their strands, removing their sorceries and displacing them from the halls of power. Anyways,streams of consciousness are much harder to discern than individualized thought fragments, and combining the two of yours creates a variable of indefinite chaos of sensations. Brilliant! Oh, I must study this!¡± Dropping his study session of my thoughts, he reached into the folds of his coat and pulled out an amorphous blue blob and tossed it in the middle of the downed Centauri. The gelatinous blob popped on contact with the ground and billowed out like a pressurized cloud that was set free. The soldiers¡¯ wide eyes and sudden frantic efforts to escape my bindings told me that this was probably not good.


    Leaving them to their fate, whatever that might be, I fell backwards, using my earth sorcery to swallow me up and push me to where I had stored my blood jar. Taking another moment to sense and orient towards Reeanth, I traveled through the dirt as if it were water. Hopping into her bigger bubble, I grabbed her blood jar and her ankle and prepared to use earth sorcery to get us the hell outta there. A quick kick from her knocked me into the dirt wall. ¡°It¡¯s me dumbass, stop kicking.¡±


    ¡°My lord! I¡¯m sorry, I couldn¡¯t see.¡± Her fumbling around with her hands was a little awkward, as I had just a little light from Gungnir to show my face.


    ¡°Forget it. Some guy named Nicholas Flamel showed up, and . . ¡°


    ¡°And you escaped?!¡±


    Turning to her, I willed Gungnir to be a bit brighter. ¡°Yeah, but he didn¡¯t really . . ¡°


    ¡°We need to go my lord, NOW!¡±


    I began making our makeshift magical bubble in the earth go down, till we were sitting a hundred meters down. ¡°Ok, we¡¯re pretty far down here now,¡± I reassured her, ¡°So, who the fuck is he? I mean, delusions of grandeur got nothin¡¯ on him.¡±


    ¡°Nicholas Flamel is certifiably insane my lord. He is a wanted criminal in every known system, but no one will take him down, and those that are powerful enough to do so will not as he is the only one sometimes who can help them with problems on their scale. For us mortals, he is an uncaring psychopath who deals out blessings and curses at a whim,¡± Reeanth¡¯s voice broke as she continued. ¡°He once saved a planet of Fae from a horrible plague, and his cure made them stronger. Centuries after that, we found out that he was the genesis of that plague! And if he has his eyes set on you for any reason, then we are not long for this earth!¡±

 Chapter 87 - Family Problems

    As soon as the words left her mouth, something ripped us both out of the ground, not gently. It was as if the earth had suddenly gained a mind of its own and spit us out. I landed on my shoulder, my armor softening the impact as I attempted to roll with it while gingerly curling my body around the blood jars. The ringing in my ears from the ejection was making concentration impossible. ¡°My good lad! You¡¯re back!¡± The old man¡¯s excitement would have put any two year old¡¯s birthday jubilations to shame. ¡°Oh hush now Granidorth, here¡¯s a snack. Do me a favor and restrain them ??both, gently!¡±


    Not so gentle hands made of constantly moving earth and rock hoisted me up, then hugged me to a wide body of even less comfortable dirt and sand. In the two seconds I had to make my eyes focus, I saw that my captor was a golem, or some kind of earth elemental. Its pale yellow crystal eyes communicated no emotion as it forcefully sank me inside of its body, only leaving my head exposed facing forward. Out of the corner of my eye, Reeanth struggled with the outstretched arm of the golem, its fist wrapped around her waist. Her kicks and punches were useless, and even the bursts of magic bleeding from the weaponized runes on her suit did nothing.


    [Yup, she¡¯s screwed. Nothing we can do to save her. But our asses on the other hand . . . ].


    [What the fuck? Gungnir, where the fuck are you?]


    [Hmmm, guess that hit to the head musta¡¯ been harder than I thought. I¡¯m stuck to the backside of your shoulder. Forget about me, your flesh sorcery will fix your head in a minute. I¡¯m working on this hunk of rock right now. Distract the old fart.]


    Lucky for me, it turns out I didn¡¯t have to. In my haze, and the conversation with Gungnir that took all of my brainpower to focus and work through the minor head injury, I didn¡¯t notice another old man taking up all of Flamel¡¯s attention. This guy was old, but not in the frail kind of old that everyone fears they will be when year 80 hits. This guy was that kind of old that makes you afraid just by looking at him, like the old man in a young man¡¯s profession. He had the physique of a powerlifter or a lumberjack from his old days, and apparently did his best to stay in the kind of shape that Vikings would drool over. Veins stood out on his massive forearms like steel cables, and his ice blue eyes crackled with anger. Loose grey pants that would not be out of sorts at a Buddhist temple clashed with a rainbow short sleeve shirt and steel shod boots. But what made this man scarier than his own visage, was the expression of fear and petulance that Flamel wore, his hands shaking as his knees began to knock together.


    ¡°But, you¡¯re on vacation!¡± Flamel screeched, waving his arms and gripping extravagant vials in his hands, ¡°You weren¡¯t supposed to be here yet!¡±


    The large old man stalked towards Flamel, steady and confident in his power, each step reminding the mountains how frail they are. Trees shuddered in his wake. ¡°Another step and I¡¯ll end them!¡± I almost wished he would. Flamel¡¯s voice was grating on my ears worse than Gungnir¡¯s early morning renditions of Bowling for Soup¡¯s song ¡®1985¡¯.


    Mountain man paused, his gaze smoothly taking in my predicament and then resting where Reeanth continued to struggle.  A small smile quirked the left side of face. Raising his left hand, he snapped his fingers, light glistening off of a thick golden ring. The golem holding Reeanth and I blew away softly, like an ocean wave dragging a sand castle back to its composite parts. Falling to my knees, I used flesh sorcery to forcefully reengage my limbs that had fallen asleep so that my face wouldn¡¯t hit the ground. A second snap rang out and the world twisted.


    ¡°Flamel is not one to be taken lightly young sorcerer.¡± Only the sound of Reeanth¡¯s retching several feet away from me kept me grounded as I heard what easily could have passed as the voice of Santa himself spoke perfect English. My own stomach threatened to rebel but another flex of flesh sorcery kept it at bay even though my eyes would not agree with what my logic dictated should be true. We were back in my under-tree hideout. The stone table had food displayed in nice china dishes and a big covered pitcher wafted the thick heavenly smell of coffee towards me.


    ¡°Wait, how,¡± I stuttered, swiveling my head to take in the view. Reeanth was hurling her breakfast next to the chair Sally sat in not too long ago, and the huge old man whose presence felt like a burgeoning thunderstorm was leaning on the wall where the Yggdrasil sapling¡¯s roots cut through the stone.


    ¡°Mastering wild magic has its perks.¡± I could hear the raised eyebrow that I knew accompanied that statement, the calm self-awareness of his power and the confidence that it gave while trying to gently explain a complex subject to a child. Reaching out with flesh sorcery, I calmed Reeanth¡¯s ill constitution and quickly checked her for injury as I tried to wrap my mind around what just happened.


    ¡°So,¡± I started, taking measure of what Odin must have looked like before his bargain. ¡°If that was Nicholas Flamel, and he¡¯s not what I would have ever pictured, then who does that make you?¡±


    If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    ¡°Merlin,¡± Reeanth croaked from where she sat on the ground, scooting herself away from her mess, ¡°Supposedly the last sorcerer.¡± With a flick of earth sorcery, I made the rock swallow up the stinky puddle.


    ¡°Not anymore,¡± Merlin chuckled while setting his large frame into the stone chair I had made for the big southern man Jimmy. ¡°Besides, letting that rat bastard get his hands on you is not something I would want to deal with down the road. He isn¡¯t anywhere near as powerful as me, but he is far more sick.¡± Resting his chin in one giant hand, he leaned forward, looked into my soul and asked, ¡°Which begs the question, why you?¡±


    ¡°Why me what?¡± I asked back, trying to make sense of this damn confusing day. ¡°Blood jars, Centauri soldiers, a legendary Alchemist who turns out to be real, the last Ripple, me being a sorcerer? Where the hell do you want me to begin, or even how much should I even be telling you?!¡± My voice got louder and louder as my list went on, but not loud enough to be considered actual yelling. Reeanth¡¯s wide eyes and slightly shaking head were my warning signs that maybe I was going a bit too far, to which Gungnir stridently agreed telepathically.


    ¡°How about you tell me all of it?¡± he asked calmly. My silence spoke volumes. ¡°Seriously,¡± Merlin said, ¡°If I wanted to kill you, I would have just left you with that lunatic. And I don¡¯t want anything from you, trust me on that one.¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s say that I do, just for a moment,¡± I began.


    ¡°Can I speak with you for a moment my lord?¡± Reeanth asked, conveying with her eyes that I was about to make some kind of idiotic blunder. It was the look that wives give their husbands who meet their sensitive friends for the first time, the ¡®shut the hell up and be polite¡¯ look. I had barely gotten my excusal out and Reeanth had whipped me into the adjacent room, slammed the door and began berating me with all the frantic energy of a starving pitbull, but quietly. ¡°What are you doing? This is Merlin, THE MERLIN, the last sorcerer, the first sorcerer for that matter! This man, this demi-god, is not someone you want to piss off!¡±


    ¡°I uh, hold on . . ¡°


    A light slap cut me off. ¡°Do not hem and haw right now. Merlin is the barely mortal sorcerer/mage king of wild magic. He is the only reason humanity as a whole still exists. He travels at the whim of his magic to wherever it takes him and works miracles, ends wars, diverts disasters, saves the lives of commoners and royalty alike. Flamel is the most insane individual you will meet outside of the gods, and Merlin scares him!¡±


    Mental whiplash all over again, which lead to my usual eloquence. ¡°Huh?¡±


    Reeanth¡¯s eyes bored into my own as every word she said hit with the force of a sludgehammer. ¡°Treat him like a god!¡±


    Even though my flesh sorcery had fixed my ails by now, finding myself back in the main room, sitting in a chair in front of Merlin who was calmly sipping coffee prompted me do another scan of my brain just to make sure that this wasn¡¯t some crazy hallucination. Reeanth was standing behind me just off to the left a bit, her hand on my shoulder. ¡°Mr. Merlin sir,¡± I started, not really knowing where to begin as Reeanth¡¯s grip tightened on my armor, making it creak audibly. ¡°Before I tell you anything, just tell me why you even ask.¡±


    I saw him suppress a small chuckle. ¡°Truly, not knowing is ecstasy,¡± he said.


    ¡°Uhm, ignorance is bliss?¡±


    ¡°Yes! That¡¯s the one!¡± he roared with laughter. ¡°Ah, how I love idioms. The English language is so stuffed of them.¡±


    ¡°Full of them?¡±


    Laughing way too hard for this situation, Merlin hit the table hard enough with one bear-sized hand to put a few cracks while his other hand was wiping away tears.


    ¡°Not to spoil the mood, Merlin sir,¡± I carefully interjected, making sure to chew over each word slowly, ¡°But are you maybe a little bit crazy too, or is that just a normal side-effect of immortality?¡±


    I noticed the magical strain on my armor as Reeanth was putting out an incredible amount of force in gripping my shoulder.


    ¡°A fair question, several fair questions in fact,¡± Merlin said, downing the rest of his coffee in one pull. ¡°The first, I simply want to know. What was it like to suddenly have sorcery, to meet deities when they¡¯ve been myths to your culture for so long? And as for the second . . .¡± He said as he leaned in, small strands of green lightning crackling in his eyes, ¡°We¡¯re all mad here.¡±


    As the pucker factor shot through the roof, I quickly began to tell this imposing mountain of a yoked Santa my tale, leaving nothing out. Gungnir illustrated my autobiography holographically in the middle of the table, often portraying me as a bumbling idiot, victoriously stumbling blindly in such a way that Lady Luck herself must have had both hands on the wheel.


    ¡°I had no idea,¡± Reeanth said as show and tell ended. ¡°What pain you must be . ¡°


    ¡°Fuck off,¡± I said, stopping her short. Turning to face her, I stood up and stuck a finger in her face, ¡°I don¡¯t need your pity. I don¡¯t need your sympathy. I don¡¯t even need this fucking oath you gave me. All I need is knowledge right now, and I have a copy of your brain.¡± Ouch. That came off a little harsh, but reliving the past brought a little too much up right now for me to be kind.


    ¡°And you!¡± I said, whirling around to give Merlin the same treatment. ¡°Over seven billion humans were on this planet before the Ripple, and now most of us are gone, kidnapped by freaking aliens and weird-ass futuristic humans that might as well be aliens. Where were you?! And then, you come to visit like some long lost uncle, just bouncing in here with your belly full of jelly? What are we, related?¡±


    ¡°Well . . .¡± he started.


    ¡°Oh fuck no,¡± I said, ¡°Bullshit! Out of everyone, I¡¯m the descendant of the great Merlin?! What are you trying to pull?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not as you imagine young sorcerer . . . ¡°


    ¡°Then ¡®de-imagine¡¯ it for me!¡±


    Nervously looking between Reeanth and I, he spoke slowly. ¡°I¡¯ve watched humanity through the seal since the Divide. Your capacity for stories is as unmatched as your tendency towards distortion. The one you call Zeus, he is real, but the Greeks attributed some stories to him that were really about me.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh, and which stories would those be?¡±


    ¡°My lord, I believe he is referring to the accounts of randy encounter.¡±


    My surprise took a while to catch up to my face, but as it did, Merlin continued, ¡°In fact, a large portion of your population is actually related to me in some regard. Arthur was one of mine in fact, but the best example is from your own history. Ghengis Khan, a significant percentage of humanity has some of his genetic markers due to him procreating with so many women in his time. Well, my appetites of old make him look like the humble Taoists.¡±

 Chapter 88 - Unexpected Freedom

    ******


    Right after the first Ripple . . .


    There are days where sane people consider ending everything, usually after a horrific divorce or losing a job when the banks are breathing down their necks, or when their health takes a turn so drastically wrong that the pain simply isn¡¯t worth it. That was my life. Every day. My entire life, I have been trapped in my own body, and all I wanted to do was have it end. But I couldn¡¯t. I literally, physically, could not if I wanted to. Couldn¡¯t wipe my own ass. Couldn¡¯t feed myself. Couldn¡¯t brush my teeth, shit, I couldn¡¯t even walk to the bathroom to get the whole damn process started. MS was its name, multiple sclerosis for the uneducated, and fucking over my entire life was its game. I had, in the words of my doctor, ¡®the autoimmune disease equivalent of a quadrapalegic¡¯. But mine was worse than that because I couldn¡¯t even move my mouth to communicate how much I wanted to have this cosmic irony that is my life over with. That is, until I had the weirdest dream.


    Usually, waking up is kind of a dreadful affair. My dreams generally consist of me flying around like Superman, or wrecking a taco eating contest, or just straight up owning the Olympics in every event, and leaving said dream is a rude awakening back to my normal hell. The small-ish television in the corner of the small hospital room blaring whatever channel the nurses decide to put on. The best time of my life was when some lady obsessed with learning only had the Discovery channel on, and I got to watch all kinds of survivor shows. Then some fat lady took over and all we ever watched was Telemundo. Thankfully, I had eventually learned to read years ago through matching the spoken word to subtitles, so it wasn¡¯t too bad. I got the gist. At least they were nice enough to give me a decent position so that I could look out the window and see the boring outside of suburbian Woodbridge, VA. Nothing ever happened here.


    But this, this wakeup, wow. I went from dreaming about about ripping monsters apart with my bare hands on top of the Empire State building to the sensation of a soft blue light entering my eyes. The first thing I noticed was that I was definitely not in a bed anymore. First of all, I was floating in some kind of cylinder filled with blue goo, and second, the only reason I figured that out is because my hands MOVED on their own to swirl the goo so I could see it. I moved. I fucking moved! My hands, each one moves as if they had been waiting their entire existence to do so. Bony white fingers fit for a skeleton curled and twisted, to which I made each hand touch the other. I had never touched someone, or something else before and felt it! Oh, many people have moved me or talked to me while holding my hand, but never did I have any agency, any kind of power or motivation to engage. But now, they moved! And move them I did. I moved them up and down and swirled my bony hands connected to my bony arms in the blue goo, not even questioning if this was a dream or not, because I could actually feel!


    ---- Subject A000000000001 response to liquid tactile stimulation proves genetic recombination is viable for lower life forms. Appendage motions are well within predicted parameters for range of movement. Suggested implementation exceeds minimum requirements for enhancement. This suggests that Lower Humans are more malleable than the Predecessors. Nanotech assisted reconstruction combined with lessening quantity of stored CHAOS suggests internalization of healing and possibly deviation in line with neurochemically enhanced subconscious desire of communication and movement. Dreamstate may have been a factor. Recalculating. -----


    Hearing the mechanical bite behind each word let me know that no human spoke those words. Reaching forward, I put both hands on the convex walls of the tank. Looking around for the first time, I could see that I was actually lying in a tank that was horizontal. Large, things, walked around in shiny metallic jumpsuits, some of them holding glowing crystals in the shape of a clipboard. Other things yelled at other things while gesturing wildly around at other pods in the area. I couldn¡¯t clearly make them out. Some seemed to be wearing giant fur cloaks, or was that their skin? Others were weirdly tall and stretched out.


    Humans. Out of the corner of my eye, I recognized those shapes. Those other pods were filled with humans. I could see a girl floating in a tank next to me, both of her legs were missing as she floated unconscious in the futuristic tank filled with goo, but hers was green. Turning my head, a new first for me, the person on the right was fat, egregiously so. Several cords of dark metal were plugged into his gut and more throughout his body at random points. Never before had I ever been able to talk, let alone scream or communicate with anyone about anything. But right now, somehow, my body knew how. My sheltered, cynical prison of flesh reacted to my emotional state, and I SCREAMED with everything I had. As hairline fractures creased my mask, I saw even bigger cracks begin to worm their way through my tank, as if two giant hands were simultaneously squeezing and pulling on the tank.This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    ----- Warning. Fragility of subject¡¯s mental state not factored in. Scanning . . . . . Subject has never received experiences through self piloting. All experiences were shown through primitive television. Grasp of reality seems to be tenuous. Recalculating . . . . . . Administering psychologically targeting injections. Warning. Subject¡¯s mental capacity growing. Burgeoning psionics detecting. Internalized CHAOS is being assimilated by the subject at an exponentially increased rate. Warning. Warning. Implementing Emergency Procedure ROGUE ARCHON. Power levels exceeding containment protocols. Subjects within containment area are at risk. Possible actions. Silence, ineffective. Psionics overriding sound waves, mental fluctuations cannot be contained. Tranquilizers to aid unconsciousness, ineffective. Mental energy rejects outside influences. Termination. Ineffective. Delivery equipment and nearby personnel have experienced cranial hemorrhaging. Last avenue possible. EJECTING. ------


    I was still screaming. I screamed as I heard the voice that tasted like iron. I kept screaming as it contemplated how to deal with me. And then I screamed some more as every color known to man plus some invaded my being, then it all stopped. I was back. In my bed. But it was dark. Thank god that nightmare was over. Sitting up, I put my head in my hands and rubbed at my temples which hurt worse than the last time the doctors tried some weird ass medicine on me.


    Wait, in my dreams I could move, but now I can. Looking down at my bony hand, I reached out and touched my leg. The cold, but soft touch of my finger was felt by my leg. Tears leaked from my eyes as I opened my mouth, stretching my jaw. Oh god, it was real. The whole thing. But how. Turning my head, I looked around the most familiar place in the world to me. The lights were off and the tv had a giant crack running through it, but I was fine, I was cured!


    Hopping off the bed let me know that I wasn¡¯t completely ready to go. I landed harshly in a tangle of uncoordinated limbs, my legs smacking into the underside of the raised bed while my arms barely prevented my head from getting to know the floor. I could feel and move my legs, but the strength to do so like I had seen the rest of humanity possess wasn¡¯t there yet. But I could feel it just out of reach. My arms didn¡¯t have much strength either, but lying on the ground in my hospital room reminded me that I was but naked. Odd sounds croaked out of my mouth. Yes! Come on, speech! My next obstacle! ¡°Uuuhhhhh,¡± I groaned some more. Damnit, almost. Forcing myself to move, I commanded my body to cooperate. I had a goal, the chair two feet in front of me. Left hand forward, plant on ground, do the same with right hand, pull with both arms while attempting to push with legs. After sweating for five minutes, manually contracting each individual muscle, I moved four inches. I managed four inches.


    My frustration began to boil over. I was healed, cured, but still couldn¡¯t do shit! Couldn¡¯t talk, couldn¡¯t actually ambulate to a fucking chair. Again. Pull with arms, push with legs, flop with belly, and . . . another four inches in five minutes. FUCK. I let out another frustrated groan. Another twenty minutes of struggling combined with ten minutes of rest and I¡¯d be at the chair. As my anger reached a boiling point, I pictured a gentle giant of a hand picking me and putting me in the chair, taking great care to to orient me correctly with my but in the seat and me facing forward. What happened blew my mind. It felt like someone grabbed me by my ass cheeks, flipped me around and chucked me into the chair, which only stayed upright as it was back against a wall. My view during the second scariest time of my life is what I imagined a rollercoaster looked like to normal people, just flipping shit around so that you completely lose your bearings.


    Looking down at my naked body and wondering how I didn¡¯t get knocked out, I could see that there was nobody else in the room with me. My bed was to the left of me, broken tv off still sitting in its corner, and my naked way too skinny body sprawled in a chair. I moved my arms to cover my privates, hahaha, another first. Was that me, did I do this? I¡¯ve watched a lot of tv, more than anyone else I¡¯ve ever heard of in my life, and I recognized the word ¡®psionics¡¯ out of that mechanical babble. Something to do with with mind over matter or moving shit with my mind. But, that¡¯s not real. Is it? So how do I, a rational former prisoner to my own mind and body, explain this? My body did not get up and put me in this chair. The drying sweat from my body proved that. So, what the fuck did?


    ----- Appropriate containment measures found. Retrieving temporarily portaled subject A000000000001. Mental dampeners fabricated and implemented in Neutron Class pod . Initializing . . . . . Subject found within acceptable proximity to transient dimensional weakening. Retrieving . . . . Importation successful.


    Colors flooded worse than last time than faded as my body was taken, again, from my hospital room and dropped into the blue goo. I got a better look at my captors right as I started to scream again, but a quick slap to the face shut me up as the overbuilt alien with odd facial structure that resembled a human forced a helmet on me complete with a mask, then dunked me in the tank. Taking a breath of the hissing air being pumped into my mask, I flailed about trying to sit up. A strange lethargy overtook my limbs, and my eyelids closed.

 Chapter 89 - Good News

    *******


    Present Day


    Coffee addiction must be a real thing, but more than that, it must be a super real thing, because the first thing I did after finding out that my long-lost magical ancestor was the baseline for the stories of Zeus¡¯ rutting habits was to go make some damn coffee. That drink might just be the bedrock of my sanity. I mean, I know there was a whole pitcher of it on the table in the main room, but I just had to go through the motions of making some more. Conjuring water to fill a stone pot, heating water in the pot by touching the rune for ¡®heat¡¯ with a finger full of mana, pouring it into the big french press I saved before everything went to hell, carefully pouring a large helping of Baileys into the bottom of my mug and smelling the lovely combination of heavenly flavors as I strained the coffee to make the most comforting drink ever invented. And there I stood at my granite counter, slowly sipping the first bit of alcohol that I¡¯ve had in weeks, and Holy fuckin Moly did it taste good!


    I could see Merlin through the doorway still sitting at the table with Reeanth gushing over his every word, fangirling hard as he laughed and drank just had a jolly ole time. Dude, I know shit. Maybe I can play the family card and get some info for once that is actually useful. Gathering my wits steadied by a liberal amount of the good stuff, I made another Irish coffee for Merlin, collected my butt and sat it back down at the table with authority.


    ¡°So what¡¯s really going,¡± I asked as I slid the mug over to him. ¡°You shagged a bunch of people way back when, and now you¡¯re here?¡± I didn¡¯t let his sheepish face keep me from a bit of a rant, although Reeanth¡¯s glaring may have slowed it down a touch. ¡°Seriously Merlin, I get that we might be related, but it¡¯s gotta be like the grandmother¡¯s, boyfriend¡¯s, third cousin to the umpteenth power. What gives?¡±


    ¡°Yes, what gives Merlin?¡±


    Goosebumps bigger than softballs ran down my spine at those words, because I couldn¡¯t tell where they came from. I¡¯m not gay, but that was the weirdly most sexy voice of a masculine flavor that ever spoke, and those weren¡¯t even words meant to seduce. It put the Mr. Clean voice to shame.


    ¡°That¡¯s not funny Gav¡¯riel,¡± Merlin said, calmly sipping his coffee, focusing his eyes at a spot several feet above and off to the right of me. ¡°I can talk to my descendants some if I want to, especially the ones that actually show some potential.¡±


    ¡°You know the strictures of the BAN!¡±


    ¡°If the kid¡¯s not an idiot, he¡¯s already figured it out.¡±


    I kept real still. I didn¡¯t feel anything with my magical senses, just heard the voice from nowhere.


    ¡°Besides, angelic paladins? Really?¡± Merlin¡¯s eyes hardened. ¡°Or are you going the route of your fallen brethren?¡±


    ¡°CHOICE IS NEVER VIOLATED!¡± Bright light bereft of pressure and sound exploded behind me. My body froze as my eyes tracked what could only be described as perfection stepping into reality. The masculine humanoid floated ominously towards Merlin, it¡¯s white and golden wings not flapping. The pressure in the room dropped, as if a compressed storm was psyching itself up for a prize fight.


    Merlin¡¯s eyes sharpened as he spoke, both his gaze and tone vying for the right to shred the Angel. ¡°Except for mine.¡±


    Continuing on as if Merlin hadn¡¯t said a thing, Gav¡¯riel said, ¡°Besides, We of the Host have not bestowed neither boon nor judgement in this realm for several millenia.¡±


    ¡°Dude, this shit is nuts,¡± Gungnir whispered to me audibly as a cartoonish picture of me sneakily backing away popped into my head. ¡°Let¡¯s get while the gettin¡¯s good.¡±


    The laser focused ire of the intruder broke off from Merlin and landed on me. ¡°Necromancer!¡± Gav¡¯riel shouted. Turning back to Merlin, it pointed its oddly shaped weapon that appeared out of nowhere at him. ¡°Since when does the Protector of Man sit with the defilers of the dead, the slayer of souls?¡±


    My quiet backing up got a lot louder real quick as I turned and sprinted for the tunnel leading to the under-river bolthole. My magical senses barely let me know in time that something invisible but definitely made of magic barred my way as my body reacted to my panic. Planting one foot while pivoting blindly towards the only direction not blocked off put me right back in front of what could only be an angel, and one that for some reason didn¡¯t like me.


    Awesome power erupted where the thing was, light and sound and power all beautifully choreographed to carefully let me know how pitiful and small I was. The lightshow blasted me into the magical walls behind me, to which I bounced off of and landed on my chest. An awful tearing sound in time with something getting ripped off my shoulder didn¡¯t herald good news. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    ¡°Don¡¯t you see Merlin? A necromancer. One of your brood, which would make him the most powerful of them if given time.¡±


    Slowly and painfully propping myself up on my elbows, I saw that the warrior made of light was holding Gungnir who had been attached to my armor just a second ago. I couldn¡¯t even feel the mental link while Gav¡¯riel¡¯s hand cradled my weapon.


    ¡°Look again,¡± Merlin chuckled, ¡°Not only did you harm a mortal, but that¡¯s not even what you think it is. Damn y¡¯all have gotten dim for all the light you put out.¡±


    I could see the angel¡¯s field of vision as light shot through with purple and green emitted scanned the ball. ¡°This is a soul Merlin! Or, at least a part of it. The human must have eaten the rest of it already.¡±


    ¡°Look at the human Gav¡¯riel, and then look a bit deeper. Tell me, who¡¯s soul does it remind you of?¡±


    The green and purple lights left off scanning Gungnir and turned to me. Suffice to say, it wasn¡¯t pleasant. It was the combined experience of a doctor lasering a patient closed after surgery and a dentist all up in your mouth examining your gums when you know you haven¡¯t flossed as much as you should have, and then add your mother¡¯s worst nagging on top of it.


    ¡°His own soul?¡± Gav¡¯riel said, ¡°What depraved and ignorant idiot would be dumb enough to use their own soul in making a tool?¡±


    Merlin chuckled again. ¡°Apparently, ¡®one of my brood¡¯.¡±


    Gathering my courage, or my stupidity, I growled at the angel, ¡°Then fix it.¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°I said, fix it,¡± I answered, ¡°If I¡¯m so dumb and depraved, and I fucked up, then fix it, but in a way that Merlin over there would approve of. I take it from y¡¯alls conversation that one of you messing with a mortal maybe has some dire consequences, so you owe me. Fix it or owe me a favor.¡±


    ¡°You dare to command me, Third of the Host, the Herald of the Most High, the Horn of all the Seven Heavens!¡±


    Merlin¡¯s laughter nearly drowned out Gav¡¯riel¡¯s outburst. I never thought I¡¯d see a historical figure spray coffee out through his nose. ¡°Oh ya got him him by the small hairs now boy!¡± Merlin roared, his feet kicking as if he were being tickled, ¡°Take him for all he¡¯s worth! Angels don¡¯t get themselves twisted up very often!¡±


    Gav¡¯riel¡¯s glare evoked the image of a thousand burning suns while thunder boomed from everywhere and nowhere.


    ¡°You know what,¡± I said, ¡°Fuck it. Don¡¯t fix it, fix my wife.¡±


    ¡°What?¡± Confusion stopped the impotent rage of the angel. ¡°What wife? All bonds of matrimony are recorded in the Book and sung for eternity by the Seraphs, but no such cord wraps your heart.¡±


    Pointing up at the root of the fledgling World Tree that adorned the center of the room as it plunged down into the earth, I kept going, my voice getting more intense. ¡°My wife! She was my fiance, the love of my life, we were going to get married in two months before this stupid apocalpyse happened and now she¡¯s in a FUCKING TREE!¡±


    Merlin¡¯s laughter cut off. Painful silence ruled as I took a moment to gather myself. The painful ache in my chest deepened with every beat as all the hurt I had pushed down in order to survive began clawing its way back. ¡°Just bring her back. Please.¡±


    The illuminated glare of Gav¡¯riel¡¯s gave softened. ¡°Of all the things you could ask for from the Host, you ask for this? All the possibilities of power and you ask for the redemption of another, one who¡¯s fate or heart isn¡¯t entwined with your own?¡±


    ¡°Uh, Gav,¡± Merlin interrupted, ¡°This is one favor you can¡¯t grant.¡±


    My pain whipped me around. ¡°What d . . ¡°


    ¡°Not your fault boy,¡± Merlin interrupted again, ¡°He hasn¡¯t even taken a look yet. Trumpet boy, you¡¯re a bit confused here. His wife isn¡¯t that lady over there.¡± Merlin¡¯s finger was pointing at the fainted figure of Reeanth in the doorway of the kitchen. ¡°She¡¯s up there.¡±


    Gav¡¯riel looked up. Like the thunder, the raw ambient noise that accompanied the Heralding Angel, soft music reminiscent of a soft rain at a funeral emanated from the core of the being of light.


    ¡°Yeah, I figured,¡± Merlin said sadly, ¡°Nothing we can do but wait.¡±


    ¡°He didn¡¯t even say anything,¡± I said as I slumped to my knees. Gav¡¯riel knelt beside me.


    ¡°You heard my sorrow, the music that called to your own tortured soul?¡± he asked.


    I barely nodded as I tried to look Gav¡¯riel in the eyes. It was too intense, but not in the way of burning your pupils, which it almost did. There was too much truth there, like my soul was not ready to step up to an angel¡¯s. It hurt in the way that a judge looks at a convict, already knowing that the convict is guilty with every sin and unclean part laid bare. This light wasn¡¯t kind, it just was, clean. The way bleach cleans, by killing everything.


    ¡°That music is the only thing angels and humans have in common. It is a higher form of communication that we use consciously.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s enough Gav¡¯riel¡±, Merlin cut in, ¡°He¡¯s too young to be that close to you. You might harm him further.¡±


    The light dimmed considerably as the Host vanished from sight. ¡°I haven¡¯t left,¡± a voice spoke as Merlin and I looked around. ¡°But the wild sorcerer is right, on many accounts. I have made more than one mistake here today, a first for me. I cannot help you with your mate, but do know that she is safe and in very good hands. Nothing less than one such as I can get near her, it¡¯s rather remarkable that you can. In regards to the favor, as you asked for someone else¡¯s soul instead of your own, I¡¯ll grant you two boons. Both of which though, I shall choose.¡±


    Gungnir, laying on the ground at my feet in spherical form, went dark. A flash of light immediately followed by an entire orchestra¡¯s symphony packed into a two second packet washed over everything from the invisible form of Gav¡¯riel.


    ¡°The first boon is the restoration of your soul fragment from your weapon with your own. The weapon still works and doesn¡¯t need any enhancement that I can give. The benefits of having yourself whole after all of your trials are many, but the one you will notice the most is that your well is much larger than before.¡±


    The ache in my heart where my wife resided pulsed hard enough for my flesh sorcery to instinctively check that I wasn¡¯t having a heart attack. Nope, just fresh emotional pain, or is it soul pain?


    Gav¡¯riel kept going, interrupting my thoughts. ¡°The second is a healing of your companion and a tidbit of knowledge. The higher star known as Astraea, the one who violated the Strictures by harming you. I have been allowed to let you know that she has been encumbered. If she strikes at you, she may only do it through her mortal followers, and even then she is weakened. I have spent too long here. Merlin, a word.¡±


    Another flash of light and both the Angel and Merlin were gone. Absent the awfully brilliant being of light, cooling ??shadows regained their supremacy as I look up in shock from where I knelt and looked where my wife rested in her arboreal cocoon. ¡°Hey babe, got some good news. You¡¯re safe enough that I don¡¯t actually have to worry about you as much. And, I got it on pretty good authority too.¡±


    A deep bark cut off my monologue.

 Chapter 90 - Personal Growth

    I heard that. I freaking heard a woof. My body flew on its own, around the stone table, threw the runed tunnel door, down the softly lit tunnel itself, toenail scratching sounds speeding my steps as I reached the door to the under-river bolt hole hurling it open. ¡°SPOT!!!¡± I screamed with sheer joy as I saw my gigantic mutt for the first time in what felt like years. I couldn¡¯t stop my eyeballs from leaking as I jumped on his head that was easily big enough to fit three of me. But, he wasn¡¯t comfy. I slid off his head to give him a good look. ¡°Back up and sit,¡± I commanded as I pulled out a runed lightstone from my pocket. ¡°Fucking hell dog, you trying to commit copyright infringement?¡± I muttered to myself. ¡°You look like Clifford the big red dog had a threesome with Skeletor and a dragon!¡±


    My big dog was red, and not just red, but the scaly kind of red. Every bit of fur that a dog usually has was replaced with large red scales, his eyebrows had bulges of bone armor that seemed to form a smooth helmet specifically made for ramming or headbutts. His fluffy tail was now a thick whip of scale-covered muscle, ridges of bone curved down his back and adorned his knees. This armored pseudo dragon of a dog with more raw mana packed into his frame than a freaking bomb sat in front of me like a proud puppy, his tongue lolling out and bits of drool hitting the floor and sizzling.


    A soft whine escaped his humongous jaw and I caught a glimpse of teeth that were way too big to fit in there comfortably. ¡°Shit dog,¡± I said in wonder as I examined his teeth. Looking down, normal toenails were now ebony-esque claws that cracked the solid stone floor. A fermented smell wafted up to my nose, drawing my attention over to the corner of the cavern. Besides the old broken open cocoon, a large pile of brown material lay there steaming.


    ¡°You better be worth it,¡± I grumbled as I gave my pup a hug. ¡°Let¡¯s get you and this place cleaned up huh?¡±


    Several hours later, Spot and I sat on the bank of the Rappahannock river enjoying the evening sun. It had been a total pain in the ass to excavate the dog poo and the now much larger dog from the cavern. I also moved Reeanth to a chair in the under-tree bolthole and used a bit of flesh sorcery to put her in a deeper sleep. The sight of the angel didn¡¯t have as good an effect on her. I remember stories about angels from when I was a kid when my parents took me to church. Angels were either associated with giving good news or passing judgment. The Bible talked about whole crowds of people falling over themselves, weeping, or fearing for their lives when they saw an angel. I mean, they¡¯re pretty much the self-guided nukes of the Big Guy, so I didn¡¯t blame her. Better passing out than risking another Sodom and Gomorrah.


    For the first time in a long while, I felt a measure of peace. Having Spot back was one worry that I didn¡¯t have to think about anymore, but what really did it was the divine reassurance that my wife Sarah is ok. I felt like I could finally let go, exhale for once. This whole time I¡¯d been running around while holding my breath, not knowing shit, and trying to punch way outside of my weight class. But now, I could breathe. Sarah was fine, is fine, and is going to be ok. The sun dipped down a bit lower, crowning the mountains not too far off in the distance. They used to be hills, and that waterfall didn¡¯t use to be there either. How much more of this mudball is magic going to change. I already freaked out three times on the short walk to the river from my house because floating islands are a thing.


    Spot thought the floating islands were closer than what they were, bouncing and jumping as high up as he could. The reverberating booms of his landing scared off all nearby wildlife, which was good as it lead to a few solid hours of actual peace. No monsters, no craziness, no magic, and no worries. Spot lay down and coiled his big heat exuding body around me forming a living wall. In comfort, I passed out.


    ******


    Chirping birds, the morning sun, and the incredible, all powerful, undying primal desire to pee woke me up. I posted one arm on Spot¡¯s tail and vaulted in a hurry to the nearest tree to relieve myself. Pure bliss. Looking around after finishing my business, I saw that Spot was still passed out in a giant red ball of snoring. I conjured a small ball of water and washed myself with it, then banished it. My stomach rumbled but I silenced it with a flew of magic. Sitting next to Spot and leaning on him, I started to consider where to go from here. One part of me was chewing over the events of the past day and the other part was arguing with it. My emotions were happy and pleased that the angel confirmed that Sarah was ok, but my logic was railing at me for wasting an angelic favor like that. The emotional side argued back in the manner of, ¡°How could you say such a thing?¡± while the logical side reasoned that with our mix of sorceries we would have figured out that Sarah was just fine if we stopped once to do a super in-depth examination.


    The in-charge part of my mind told the other bits to shut the hell up because none of it matters because it¡¯s already over. The curious side of me spoke up though, so, what about Gungnir, how come we didn¡¯t wish for our family back, is the Big Guy even real or could I use the World Tree to magic my way into one of the heavens? The in-charge part again said shut up and addressed the only concern that I could. The angel said that I was now whole, and a whole bunch of things were going to be better because of it. What better time to do a dive than right now? Spot will keep away anything too hungry for its own good.


    Closing my eyes, I started with consciously regulating my breathing, because what the hell do I know about self-examination? After a few minutes, I started consciously feeling out my magic, going through the tendrils of colors woven into my soul. I couldn¡¯t feel my soul itself, but I knew that sorcery was somehow related to it, which meant that I could work back. I kind of pictured it like a human tree, like the first tree version of Sarah, but with my face and body. My energies are all spur of the moment, but with enough foresight that they worked together. Earth and water, nature and flesh, the basic elements linked together with the sorcery of magic itself acting as a glue, it formed a naturally beautiful but a literally ugly picture in my head. My feet showed as compacted dirt while my toes were long spears of stone gripping the earth itself, water twisted up my wooden legs while leaves of pure magic sprouted out of the fleshy torso. Underneath my feet ran thick streamers of pure energy that I interpreted as ley lines while my arms and head were unattached translucent bodies of consciousness.


    As I sat there concentrating on the freaky personification of my magic, the details became clearer as my pulse slowed just a bit more and I focused on the arms and head. They were literally separate from the rest of the body of sorceries, floating about four inches away from each spot where they were supposed to be attached. My heart slowed a bit more as my will walked closer to the tree-mee. Nothing, there was a barrier of nothing severing the blobs of consciousness. My body looked like a partial stump of a tree. The blood jar! Fuck me! I left it in the damn tree hideout! No wonder, I had acquired the mixed bag sorcery of will/life/consciousness, but I hadn¡¯t actually used it. Damn I¡¯m an idiot sometimes.


    Shaking my head out of internal examination, I kicked Spot awake, yes he¡¯s so big and tough that it takes a kick from a normal human to wake the damn dog, and rode him back home. Carefully but quickly gaining entrance to my hideout, I saw that Reeanth was still passed out on the chair and the precious blood jar was sitting on the stone table. Weird, I don¡¯t remember actually putting it down. I pulsed out my magic making sure that no intruders were around, and I looked back at Spot who was laying down facing the door from the outside, his big head taking up most of the doorway. No growls or signs that I should be uncomfortable. Walking up to the jar, I saw that a note filled with almost doctor-level handwriting was underneath it. Moving the jar to the side, I took about ten minutes to decode that horrible handwriting.


    Yes you dummy, you forgot all about the jar because you¡¯re an idiot with no sense of priorities, so I, in my wild graciousness, decided to keep it safe and out of sight from Flemel and the Foghorn, that¡¯s the angel in case you couldn¡¯t figure that out. People can do some freaky shit to you if they get ahold of something like this. I don¡¯t know how long I¡¯ll be gone since time doesn¡¯t matter to me, but I may show up again or I may not. Enjoy the fruits of your sneaky universe-cheating labor. Don¡¯t worry about Flamel, he¡¯s going bonkers testing some zombie spices a couple octaves away. Your lady is fine, which trumpet boy told you, but what he didn¡¯t tell you was that your magic making rock is powering her up in such a way that it would take a colliding planet to harm her, literally. So, you¡¯re basically off the hook for the next couple thousand years. Go on, have fun, use magic, conquer shit, that kinda thing. Your weapon ball still works, but the piece of your soul animating it is back inside of you, so have fun being alone. Also, no, you can¡¯t magic your way into heaven through Yggdrasil, tried that and they weren¡¯t too happy about it, something about how I ¡°didn¡¯t earn it¡± and ¡°didn¡¯t have anything resembling faith¡±. Lame. Oh, and sorry about your liquor, I drank it all as payment for all my good deeds. Now, the last bit of advice that I can get away with, not all of your family is gone.


    That¡¯s it. Seriously? No more, just a little bit of fuckery at the end, something to send me on my way with? Which family member? Where are they? How many? As my hands shook, a bit of light from the door caught the back of the paper showing smudges. Carefully, I turned the paper over and read the rest.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    HAHAHA! Just kidding, we old people gotta have fun sometimes! I mean, I¡¯m not really kidding but I¡¯m not gonna leave ya hanging like that. Your next youngest brother is alive and well, roughly a thousand miles south of here, in what you humans called ¡°Miami¡±. Oh yeah, the Centauri have also claimed that area, so have fun! P.S. There¡¯s a dude about forty miles east of you who might help, but you¡¯ll have to help him first.


    Equal parts relief and worry caused my hands to split the note just a bit at the top. Shards of various instinctive plans bounced around in my head like frantic pinballs loaded up on some high quality cocaine. ¡°Some dude forty miles away and my brother a thousand miles away? Uhm, recapture Norn and fly him around? Go after that fucking gator and take the coast then head on down? Maybe ride Kong and make a giant animal army to storm the area? How about an earthquake, can I even make my own earthquake?¡±


    Exactly how do I go about this, does my brother even want to come back with me? Because I¡¯m ok now with leaving the immediate area for a bit, but my paranoia won¡¯t let me stay gone for too long. What am I gonna do with Reeanth, or the damn hillbillies? I felt strangely responsible for those four knuckleheads, but my priorities took a massive shift in the past three minutes. Looking up at the blood jar and then back down to the note, I carefully folded it and put it in my pocket. No time like the present. Grabbing the contained sorcery, I walked over to Reeanth and nudged her foot with mine while belting out the most annoying good morning children¡¯s song I could think of. ¡°RISE AND SHINE AND GIVE GOD THE GLORY GLORY!¡± My lovely singing voice in the tone of nasally child woke the sleeping soldier out of a dead magically deepened slumber.


    I should have expected the obviously violent reaction to being woken up in such a manner. Luckily for me, I was still decked out in all of my magical gear with every shield activated, so the blast of raw magic just got sucked into Svalinn. Holding my blood jar in front of me with both hands, I shook it just a little. ¡°So, how the hell do I use this thing?¡± Her gaze followed my own to rest on her blood jar which was tightly clenched in her left hand. She had had a death grip on it since yesterday, which Merlin would have given high praise for. ¡°Don¡¯t tell me I gotta drink my own freaking blood, come on?¡±


    ¡°Coffee,¡± she grumbled, standing up on shaky legs. ¡°I need coffee.¡± Stumbling off to the kitchen, she came back a few minutes later carefully holding a pot of coffee with two mugs and her blood jar. Pouring both of us a cup, she sipped her coffee and stared at the crimson depths of her jar. ¡°I never thought I¡¯d be staring at this,¡± she started, focusing her whole frame on the blood jar, her right hand listlessly holding the coffee. ¡°This, this is pure power.¡±


    My face scrunched just a tiny bit. ¡°Ya know, I never really got the chance to ask you what kind of sorcery you went for,¡± I said, ¡°Get anythin¡¯ good?¡±


    She seemed to come back to herself after losing herself in thought for a moment. Taking a deep breath, she set the blood jar down. ¡°Sorcery of sight my lord.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m gonna need a bit more information than that. Clearly you¡¯re not blind, so . . . ¡°


    ¡°Sorcerous sight. I¡¯ll be able to see magic, in all its flaws and glory. Most wizards muck their way along, barely feeling the power they hold, like a surgeon blindly performing heart surgery with a blindfold on. They know what they¡¯re supposed to be doing, but without sight to guide them, how crude their constructs must be. With this,¡± she gestured at the jar, ¡°I¡¯ll be able to wield magic of perfect efficiency, see the kind of magic my enemies use, see magic invisible to most, spot flaws in enchantments and it just goes on.¡±


    ¡°Damn, that¡¯s actually pretty fucking cool, and very insightful.¡± As I said that, a trace of fear made its way to the surface of her eyes. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m not going to take it from you, sheesh. I mainly want to know how to use the damn thing. See, here¡¯s my jar.¡± Setting my own in front of hers, I noticed for the first time that they were actually different colors. Yes, they were both red from the blood, but mine was a solid crimson, the deepest of reds, while hers was a lighter, almost watered down red bordering on orange. But while mine was solid, probably due to having the literal focus of me-ness, hers had a rainbow of particles glittering throughout.


    ¡°My lord, it is a blood jar. If you properly created it, then all you need to do is put some mana into it and it will form a glass needle which will pump the contents inside of you. Then you will need to internalise this.¡±


    Draining the rest of her coffee that had cooled off in our talk, Reeanth raised her blood jar and poured mana into it until the jar morphed into a sphere, which then proceeded to form a thin point at the bottom part. ¡°For power, for honor, for service,¡± she intoned, bringing the point down and stabbing it into the meat of her thigh. I watched as the blood jar¡¯s contents drained into her leg. As it emptied, the glass contained shrank perfectly until it was just a needle jutting out of her thigh. With a breath of air, it dissolved away. Slumping over onto the table, I tenderly reached out my hand and set it on her shoulder, letting my magical senses feel out the process. The red glow of power had already sank into her thigh and shot up the veins straight into the heart where it stayed until all of the sorcery gathered, and then shot up again into the brainstem where it pounded away at her brain likes waves on the shores, slowly molding the soft tissue. The weird part was what my own sorcery of magic was telling me, how it the sorcery lost some of its power because it had to flow to where it needed to go instead of being directly input into her brain.


    Maybe she could have stuck it in her ear. Looking at the process as a whole, I couldn¡¯t help myself. Reaching inside of her leg with my magical senses, I began to pour mana that was perfectly neutral into it and used it to gather the sight-based sorcery and pushed the missed remnants up to the brain. I had to take it slow as my magic was on the cusp of being rejected by her body. Bits of her sorcery were left in various parts of the veins going to the heart, a third portion overall was in her heart, and another small part was stuck in her neck kinda hanging near her vocal cords.


    Taking my time to unravel the bits of scattered mess, I gathered up the fragments, pieced them together and fed them up through the brainstem to reconnect with the rest of the sorcery, which showed up as bright blood contrasting with the rest of her system. Shit man, maybe I should have gotten some magical sight, cause from what I could tell, mine was like a kid¡¯s crappy microscope and hers was a damn electron microscope. Anyways, I shouldn¡¯t be wondering about her sorcery as I¡¯m trying to fix the faulty delivery system, but I couldn¡¯t really help myself. I noticed through my flesh sorcery that the body of the Centauri soldier had some hidden pieces of technology inside of her. There was a chip in attached to the top part of her heart, and a weird patch made of wires and some nanotech on the inner side of her breastbone, and then some material I couldn¡¯t identify in her tailbone that pulsed in time with the electrical impulses of her heart. I wanted to remove the stuff out of some weird principle that my sorcery was nudging me towards, but the focus of this was to make sure her own sorcery didn¡¯t get fucked up.


    The rainbow bonanza of power sat on her brain, and then slowly was absorbed, as if the brain was a sponge. The eyes soaked up most of the magic, the optic nerve getting all the sparkles, and the lighter red magic fluid stuff settled in the rest of the brain and the brain stem with bits filtering down the spine. After ten minutes of monitoring Reeanth after fixing her sorcery assimilation, I felt comfortable enough to extract my own magic from her and plan my own. Obviously the delivery system was built into the blood jar, but the concept of placement mattered a helluva lot more than she thought. Without me there, her sorcery would have had over a thirty percent efficiency loss due to the ill-planned journey.


    Given what I¡¯d learned along with the added benefit of my much more powerful Chaos granted abilities, I said fuck it. Breathing in and out for five minutes, I managed to put my mind in the meditative state I reached earlier that morning, where my magical tree body/soul thing was. Using the flesh sorcery to automate my next actions, I focused my attention on the upper body of the tree-soul. My body picked up the blood jar in one hand, put it up and over my head and placed it right on the side of my neck. Oh so carefully, I used flesh sorcery to deaden that section of my neck. Feeding a thin stream of mana into the blood jar, I directed the contents of the jar, the concepts of self/consciousness/me-ness/soul, straight into my neck with a tube of mana sectioned off into two pieces, where sixty percent forked up into my brain while the other forty partitioned off into my heart.


    Taking a lucky guess from all the crap fiction I¡¯d read in my life, I figured that a person¡¯s soul wasn¡¯t just one piece of them, but it was a combination of the mind and heart to make the soul. I mean, it makes sense. Plenty of people used to lay in hospital beds, perfectly braindead, just vegetables waiting to go, but some of those people also hung on by a thread for decades. We are more than just brain, or heart, but one without the other is useless.


    Suffice to say, it wasn¡¯t pain that I felt, it was agony. Mind opening, mind numbing, brain pain on a level, nay, a dimension yet unrealized. What made it worse was that due to my sorcery induced meditative state, I could feel every gritty piece of glass-like power grid its way through my upper nervous system. The heart part, well, that didn¡¯t hurt worse than losing Sarah so I kinda just powered through that one. Even though the pain was metaphorically blinding, my magical senses allowed me to stay on point and watch the tree personification of my soul made up of different sorceries actually combine with the consciousness one. My separated head and arms broke through whatever that shield of nothingness was and attached to the trunk, sending bright bits of light straight into it. Those bits of light left a glowing trail as they worked their way from my neck and shoulders and connected to the center, where my heart was. Then, after growing in luminescence, the light then traveled down what I assumed were imitations of my veins and arteries as they filtered through my legs/roots.


    The whole picture of exactly what I was culminated in a sorcerous whole that actually opened up its eyes and stared at me. Freaky. Holding its hands out with the palms up, it looked down and them, and slowly put its hands to its face. Its eyes lit up with the soft white light of joy and then began to feel around, touching the barky knees and the hips made of solid bone, flexing its stone toes and brown compacted dirt feet. With the innocence of a child, the embodiment of myself began to dance with joy as the dark place we were in began to fill up with different elements as they began to slowly leak out. Instead of standing on nothing, its dance left footprints of dirt and mud. Jumping around left puddles of crystal clear water that sparkled. I was happy, for a few moments, the conjoining of myself and everything that was me, was content.


    Coming back to myself, the me that was a literal human body, was a mixture of pain and please. My head and heart were pounding, throbbing as if a migraine and mini-heart attack had a mutant baby, but the rest of my body felt so aware. If I wanted to, I could watch my hand reach and smack Reeanth on the shoulder to wake her up, but the moments between the seconds of neural impulses that physically moved my hand, I felt it. I felt the decision making process that twitched the arm just right so that I would have maximum power to swat her, the tenseness of the forearm as it locked into position, and then the rest of my body saying, maybe this isn¡¯t such a good idea. HAHA! There it was! The voice in my head that speaks up when making a bad decision, that little bitch finally grew a pair and learned how to speak from the gut. Setting my arm down, I casually used flesh sorcery to slowly soothe away the pain. Merely speeding up my healing factor would make sure that I didn¡¯t overwrite any changes to my body that inputting a new sorcery would, and the day had just begun.

 Chapter 91 - Re-tool and Re-meet

    Heating up a couple cans of chicken noodle soup constituted making breakfast nowadays, but eating with Reeanth wasn¡¯t the restful activity one would hope for. Mulling over what the various immortals said in their carelessness over the past day was hopeless as the Centauri soldier (now sorceress) glared at me. Her vision now literally was painful, her eyes emitting beams of light that saw more than they should while scouring off the top layer of flesh.


    ¡°I said I was sorry!¡± The glare didn¡¯t stop.


    ¡°Seriously, turn that shit off woman.¡±  The circumference of light pouring from her eyes lessened but the intensity picked up, as if a sick kid were burning ants through a microscope. My natural regeneration via flesh sorcery was more than enough to keep the damage to a minimum, but my temper was starting to pick up.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to give you to the count of three,¡± I growled, picturing myself talking to a child as my flesh steamed and regrew. For a split second, the light intensified then shut off. The hand holding the spoonful of soup trembled as I contemplated burying her way down deep in the earth, or making Spot learn what human tasted like. Sometimes, imagining random thoughts of violence helped keep me sane, like thinking about running people over in horrible highway traffic.


    ¡°That¡¯s better. How was I supposed to know there were weird boundaries about messing with someone¡¯s magic? For all I knew, you knew nothing and fucked the whole thing up.¡± Her silence was a sharp riposte to my ignorance.


    Looking down at my bowl and taking another bite, I murmured through the food, ¡°Guess I should;ve let you be fucked up. Then at least I wouldn¡¯t have to deal with some psycho who got pissed off with me helping her.¡±


    It¡¯s like modern society all over again, with some certain kinds of people acting like assholes when you hold a door open for them. Everyone knows what I¡¯m talking about, instead of saying a simple ¡®thank you¡¯ and continuing on their day, the shitstain of society goes off on how they could have gotten it themselves or ¡°what, I¡¯m too weak to get my own door?¡¯. Fuck them. It¡¯s called being nice or polite, or having basic manners. Some things never change.


    ¡°You know what?¡± I growled, looking back up at her, ¡°You¡¯re swore your service to me, either you get your shit together or I¡¯ll make you butt-fuckin¡¯ ugly, literally. I¡¯m a damn flesh sorcerer and that would be waaaay too easy. Think pimples on your face and your butt while you struggle with buck teeth.¡±


    Her attitude ceased, or at least the outer show of it did. One of the things I figured out from the flesh copy of Reeanth¡¯s brain that wasn¡¯t encrypted is that the concept of privacy seems to have a much greater social consequence in the Centauri society. It seemed to be related to everyone having magic on some level. Because magic is an exercise of the soul, at least in part, the Centauri regarded the inner workings of their soul as taboo to outsiders, the way some fundamentalist religions of old held the burka in regards to the faces of their women. Some things were just kept secret for the sake of it.


    ¡°I won¡¯t do it again if I can help it, and besides, we went over this. Random bits and pieces of the power were stuck in the wrong spots,¡± I explained as I wolfed down breakfast. ¡°Anyways, magical sight and some kind of eye-beam that hurts? Wonder what it¡¯ll do to some mutated animals?¡± The attempt at humor didn¡¯t help.


    Still not talking to me, Reeanth¡¯s eyebrows rose as her curiosity got the best of her. ¡°Yes, we¡¯re going east. Gotta find some random dude and then he¡¯ll help me get my brother, supposedly.¡±


    Angrily throwing her soup back, Reeanth slammed her bowl into the table and walked away. ¡°Fine! Stay her and guard the damn tree!¡± I yelled at her rapidly diminishing figure. ¡°AND DON¡¯T DO ANYTHING STUPID!¡±


    Grabbing the ball off the floor that used to be sentient Gungnir, I walked outside and leaned my back on the tree noting that the sun was still rising to the east, the direction I needed to go.  Looking down at the compact sphere of magical crystal and wood, I held a moment of silence for Gungnir. My magical senses told me that it was still technically the same thing as it was two days ago, but the driving intelligence was gone. With a flex of will, it morphed into a tri-bladed spear, then into a small javelin and then into a crystal-capped staff. Stabbing the metal-tipped base into the dirt, I pulled a small bit of energy from the earth up through the staff, let make its way through my body and then back out my arm as it reached its final destination in the crystal blades. A soft pulse let me know that non-sentient Gungnir was full up on energy, that and the way it thrummed with power, a barely audible hum coming from the weapon.


    Uhg, this reminded me of my old nemesis, or the previously conquered issue that plagues all magic users, mana. The personal generators I had that converted matter into mana, kinda like a nuclear process, didn¡¯t work anymore due to the heightened levels of ambient mana in the atmosphere interfering with the delicate process. The newer idea of using Gungnir as an energy tap while walking on ley lines held some promise, but I couldn¡¯t guarantee that I¡¯d always be walking on a ley line. Using my new sorcery of consciousness, I felt the emanations of my soul, how the living part of me that the old earth didn¡¯t believe existed created mana by the simple fact of living, but not too much. It made or exuded more than I needed at any given time when I wasn¡¯t doing anything, but the output wasn¡¯t overly huge. What was big was how much I could hold of my excess, but that paled in comparison to what Svalinn, my arm gauntlet shields, and Gungnir, my shifting staff weapon, could hold.


    Remembering my old gear, the weight vest filled with energy storing crystals, I began conjuring and shaping small diamonds roughly the size of a twenty-first century phone and then placing them on the ground. That old concept was good, but I could make it far more efficient. With a bit more power, I forced the small diamond plates to have a curved shape so they would contour better to my body. Then after calling Spot over, I used flesh sorcery to take a small piece of bone armor off his knee and then began making it grow into various sizes as armor coverings. In the concave curve of the shell-like coverings, I input various slots where the crystals would go, and then used earth sorcery to carve runes of energy storage and stasis in the diamonds.


    Fitting the ten new coverings on top of various armor parts, I then floundered about with my mind for a bit, managing to make a crude automated process that ran like a background program to direct the overflow of mana that I produced into the new storage containers placed around my body. Now, when I¡¯m not doing anything or am going from place to place, my mind would automatically direct mana that I wasn¡¯t using into the batteries, Svalinn, or Gungnir. With this, I could hold many times more mana than my own personal well of magic, and with the magical weapons at my disposal, I could concentrate power greater than what I could summon at any given time or tap into the ambient mana much more efficiently. Now I know why wizards or sorcerers went bonkers for magical weaponry, it¡¯s a force multiplier. It¡¯s like giving a guy a freaking machine gun when he¡¯s used a small knife for self defense his entire life.


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    Magic batteries, check, epic named weapons, check. Taking another couple minutes, I took inventory of the flashbang light grenades I had in my pockets and then ran through all the runes silver and gold carved into my armor. With everything in working order, I crawled up Spot¡¯s back using his bony protrusions and attached Gungnir to my back.


    With his own brand of flesh sorcery modeled after my own, Spot didn¡¯t need any words to know what I wanted. The big red lizard of a dog took off east like a bat outta hell, and the jolt of his excitement flooded through me. On a side note, I could feel that this mutated dog contained and produced enough mana to be an actual nuclear power plant. I could feel his joy as every living thing in the gigantic forest fled knowing that they were much lower on the food chain than Spot.The brown redwood sized trees blurred as the canine easily went over forty miles an hour, hopping over small inlets from the Rapphannock river, darting over fallen logs and underbrush. While my ride was horribly bumpy, I molded parts of bone sticking out of Spot¡¯s spine to have handholds for me. Finally getting a legitimate grip, I reached out with my magical senses, trying to feel the life, the nature around me.


    This wasn¡¯t like being up in the air, where everything is in plain sight. Riding Spot to some unknown guy in an unknown situation for an unknown purpose for a chance at helping out my brother was the least of my worries. Falling was a serious concern, even with the handholds. Dying after falling was a more serious concern, but I had a lot of faith in my armor to prevent that. The situation itself, or the way it was phrased was cause for concern. I¡¯m fucking powerful, and Merlin said that I would need this guy¡¯s help, which meant that either what I¡¯m going up against is ridiculous, or this guy is as ridiculous as me. I¡¯m not sure I liked either of those scenarios. A third possibility did present itself, in that maybe Merlin just wanted me to rescue somebody for some reason I didn¡¯t know yet. Maybe another distant relative descended from Merlin¡¯s randier days. Who knows.


    Spot¡¯s sudden stop launched me into the back of his thick bony neck, where I bounced off with way too much momentum. Luckily, my magical armor engaged a force field preventing an unplanned broken nose, but it did slam my ass back down on Spot¡¯s back. We¡¯d been going at a good clip for a while now and my butt had gotten used to the cadence, enticing me into not paying attention. A low rumbling sound came from deep inside my four legged vehicle. ¡°Come on now lassie, use your words. I know Sammy ain¡¯t in no well,¡± I grumbled as I hopped off, pulling Gungnir off my back and morphing it into a spear. ¡°Let¡¯s see what¡¯s got you all riled up.¡±


    A huge roar coupled with many simultaneous smaller screams answered my good natured complaining, but the smell was so bad that it hit me before the visual input did. Many small piles of what could only be poo were everywhere. Through the haze of my screaming nose and watering eyes, I made out a giant ape wielding a stone axe surrounded by many smaller monkeys that were either really really angry, or really really happy. But I couldn¡¯t really tell which. What I could tell, was that Kong was not happy to see us. The damn monkey that the Ripple set free was still here, but this time, the little bitch had an army.


    Luckily for me, I had Spot. My faithful dragon-mutated giant dog crouched low growling deep in his throat, as if he were straight up ready to brawl but waiting for my word to go. While the bigger animals were glaring at each other waiting for the other to make the first move, I noticed that all of the other monkeys were focused elsewhere. Following their line of sight, a way less hairy monkey up on a thick tree branch holding a banana the size of a small suitcase while fighting off the much hairier monkeys. Quickly conjuring some water to clean out my eyes, I took another look and saw that the not-hairy monkey was actually a young man, probably around fifteen years old. Oh the balls on that kid. The weird grace he carried himself with spoke of either years of gymnastic training or something more magical at play. The hand not carrying the over-sized banana was wielding a thin staff that sparked when it came in contact with a monkey.


    ¡°That banana better be worth it dude!¡± I yelled up at the kid, ¡°Cause these monkeys ain¡¯t gonna stop!¡±


    My poorly timed shout knocked the kid off his game causing him to misstep just enough for one monkey to yank his feet out from under him. ¡°Fetch!¡± I screamed at Spot who understand all too well what I didn¡¯t say.  My dog bolted to where the kid was falling while I tossed a small flashbang pebble at Kong¡¯s feet. I purposefully made it much less powerful as to not overly piss him off.


    ¡°Hey, remember me big guy?¡± I said to Kong, ¡°Don¡¯t want any trouble today, but I¡¯m leaving with that kid and the ?banana.¡±


    Kong¡¯s howl said otherwise.


    I grabbed Gungnir off my back and pointed it at Kong, light exploding menacingly from the crystal blades. ¡°Hold on right there. I¡¯ve made some mistakes in the past but I can sure as hell repeat them. Now what¡¯s it gonna be big guy?¡±


    Raising the arm rippling with enough muscle to tear out a mountain, Kong pointed his axe at me and roared.


    ¡°Fine, fuck you too dick. Let¡¯s see how you like this!¡± A tiny bit of fear mixed with the adrenaline coursing through me. Flexing my versatile earth sorcery, I used the gravity aspect to greatly increase the weight of the stone axe so much that it just slipped right out of Kong¡¯s hand. Three bounds later I put my hand on the axe and banished it. The look on his almost human face was worth it. ¡°Yes, I gave you that axe, and at the risk of sounding like a suburban mom, I could take it away.¡±


    Pointing Gungnir at Kong again, pulsing lights and all, I let just a teensy bit of anger reach my eyes. ¡°Anything else you want me to remove fatty?¡±


    Kong took a step back and looked at his screeching army. With another roar and a shaking finger, he pointed at me. ¡°Shit, shit, shit,¡± I freaked, turning and sprinting to Spot, who was proudly holding his catch of the day. ¡°Some help here mutt?¡± I yelled frantically, ¡°And drop the kid!¡±


    A wet splat heralded the sad looking boy  as he desperately tried to defend his fruit. I reached Spot¡¯s side and pivoted as he stood at full height over the kid. ¡°What¡¯s your name kid?¡± I asked hurriedly, ¡°Chop chop let¡¯s go. Spot¡¯s scary for about three minutes before people realize his weakness.¡±


    ¡°My name¡¯s Johnny,¡± the messy splatter said, ¡°And what¡¯s his weakness?¡±


    ¡°Belly rubs, duh? Never met a dog before?¡±


    Wisely forsaking an answer, Johnny simply pointed at the oncoming tide of raging monkeys. ¡°Shut your eyes, trust me,¡± I said as I grabbed a handful of my flashbang pebbles and threw them, overloading them with extra mana just before they left my hand. As the cacophony of fun went off about twenty feet away, I turned and pulled Spot¡¯s head down and used he and I to cover Johnny  just for a second a two, then turned back around. All of the monkeys were on the ground, clawing at their eyes and ears. Even Kong was leaning on a tree howling in pain, big crocodile tears leaking out between his fingers.


    Spot started a high pitched keening sound which cut off after ten seconds. I felt his flesh sorcery healing up his eardrums and retinas. While was going on, a couple well placed flexes of my earth sorcery later and all of the monkeys were buried in the earth up to their necks. Kong was too big to quickly bury, but I knew for a fact he knew who the top dog was. The smaller apes, man, I was actually more afraid of them. The bajillion piles of rancid poo didn¡¯t come from Kong.


    I grabbed Johnny and sent a pulse of healing magic into him just before hurling him up on top of Spot where I joined him. ¡°All right boy, hush now,¡± I cooed to Spot as his healed eyes focused on the crowd of helpless prey. ¡°Now is not the time.¡± Spot harrumphed to show what he thought of that, but did quickly pad past the dazed troop.


    Ten minutes of silent riding later, Spot shook us off and jumped in the nearby creek, lapping it up with his surfboard sized tongue.


    ¡°This shit really happening?¡± Johnny asked me.


    Finally getting a good look at him, I noticed that he wasn¡¯t white, but Oriental of one flavor or another. Probably got some Japanese in him, not that it really matters, not that it really ever did. Humanity has much bigger issues to worry about than our old divisions. How petty and small we must seem to other races, which makes me wonder what stupid things they discriminate about. Can¡¯t believe that my mind can wander around like this, but really, wait. Wander . . .  thinking . . . holy shit. My thought process is way faster than usual, I can see it, or visualize it. Hohohoho, hell yeah! Right about now, Johnny actually finished asking the phrase that I saw him asking, like right now, his lips just closed. Sweet. If this is something I can get a serious handle on, maybe I might just live past a year. Somehow, probably related to my consciousness sorcery, my brain is thinking at a higher rpm, giving me precious seconds to think and decide and plan, and I use it to wonder about alien discrimination. Can¡¯t fix stupid huh?


    ¡°Yes this shit is happening, no it will not stop, yes we need to go, and I¡¯ll tell you more later.¡± My rapid fire answers shut him up for a second, which he used to take a deep breath.


    ¡°Yes that¡¯s my dog, no that¡¯s not my monkey but it used to be, I¡¯m a sorcerer. What are you?¡±


    ¡°Cultivator!¡± he answered quickly.


    ¡°Haha!¡± I exclaimed, ¡°My wife taught me that trick. Get people nodding or agreeing with you with rapid fire questions and answer and then hit them with one. Works half the time!¡±


    A little bit of red colored his cheeks. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, whatever the hell you have is probably cool too,¡± I said, laughing at his discomfort. ¡°But trust me, magic is better.¡±

 Chapter 92 - Striking a Deal

    As it turns out, magic may not have been better. While riding on Spot further east, my conversation with Johnny showed me that his fucking wish was beyond over-powered.


    ¡°When that weird ass high hit, like a few months ago and told me to make a wish, I did! I was like balls deep in some hottie after a couple weed brownies and I screamed at the heavens, ¡®I wanna cultivate some power!¡¯ right at the end there. And dude, man, I¡¯mma¡¯ live forever!¡± he said.


    When I snorted back a small laugh, he got defensive making his voice go up hilariously in pitch. ¡°Yo! It¡¯s awesome! Trust me, this shit is beyond real!¡± Johnny crowed as Spot leisurely walked alongside the river. I mean, I know it¡¯s fucking real, mainly because I couldn¡¯t get Johnny to shut up about it.He wished to be like a character in some weird Chinese novel or someone from a show called Dragonball Z. According to him, a cultivator is something that internalizes power, some ethereal external power, and uses it to empower itself. He went on to describe going up in power over time, staving off old age by banging hot asian chicks while simultaneously doing some hippie-one-with-the-earth shit.


    Hearing it was fucking funny, but my magical senses showed me that a veritable storm of power rested inside of that kid. Most of it was some kind of diffuse cloud, but at the very center there was a tiny pea-sized dots of super condensed power that seemed to have its own gravity. Maybe this was the dude Merlin wanted me to get. I mean, probably. He¡¯s annoying, incredibly powerful, long-lived if he isn¡¯t dumb, and very durable, uhg.


    ¡°Right, I gotchu¡¯,¡± I said, ¡°But how does it work. I mean, I use mana, which is the stuff magic is made of. My soul produces some, I can see that you make some, the earth has rivers of it, the sky has currents, living things produce it . . . Do you see where I¡¯m going with this?¡±


    ¡°Bruh, it¡¯s all around you. You just gotta feel it, like meditate, take it in, woosah!¡±


    Let¡¯s try a different track. ¡°So, with my magic, I can conjure, manipulate, and banish a bunch of different elements. What can a cultivator do?¡± I asked, almost slow enough to be insulting.


    ¡°Anything man. I¡¯m like Goku, just get stronger over time.¡±


    ¡°Johnny, come on now,¡± I said a little more kindly, ¡°I did just save your ass from Kong and his troop of poo-flingin¡¯ monkeys. Just tell me something¡¯.¡±


    Just as he opened his mouth to answer, we arrived at the clearing in front of the World Tree. I hopped off Spot and faced Johnny. ¡°Better yet,¡± I said, ¡°Just show me.¡±


    Johnny didn¡¯t move from his spot.


    ¡°I¡¯m not going to touch your banana,¡± I said with a straight face, ¡°Nor do I want to.¡±


    Still nothing. Seriously, no reaction to the most obvious penis joke. This fucking fifteen year old didn¡¯t even crack a smile. Uhg, the Ripple changed everything.


    ¡°Spot . . .¡± I said, to which the big dog bucked the kid right off. He landed way too gracefully, which made that small mean part of me like him even less. Looking at me, then back at the towering canine, Johnny walked over to the edge of the clearing and gently set it down.


    ¡°You gonna tell me about that banana or is that another mystery?¡± I teased.


    Turning around, the kid gave me a solemn martial arts bow, his face peaceful. A sonic boom later, he was right in front of me, his right foot coming up to punt me right where he shouldn¡¯t. Thank all the stars above that my magical armor engaged a force field way faster than what my unengaged surprised brain ever could. Rationally, it¡¯s a low blow, technically, it¡¯s a fight winner. We males are are given a weakness, comparative to females, as we generally are bigger, faster and stronger. The downside is, that if we face another male, we have a level playing field but both sides have a gruesome weakness. This little fuck however, was more than willing to hit below the belt.


    Johnny¡¯s foot, with all the momentum of his power behind it, smacked into my immovable magical force field that drew its stability from mother earth. This caused a beautiful burst of kinetic feedback that instead of sending me to the moon or begging for mercy, Johnny¡¯s foot was blasted back causing him to somersault directly into my shield, his face smooshed against it like a dog smackin¡¯ into a glass door.This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    ¡°A friendly spar you dick!¡± I yelled at him as he shook himself off. ¡°Sheesh, I promise, I mean you no harm.¡±


    The blood running down from his broken nose combined with the lack of words was an answer in and of itself. The friendly portion was over fast. The soft blue of the force field rippled every place the exploding blur that was Johnny touched it, and he touched it with the force of a sledgehammer. Taking a firm grip on Gungnir, I posted up like Gandolf and slammed the base of my spear into the dirt and drew up some of the residual energy lurking down there. It wasn¡¯t a leyline but Mother Earth¡¯s rivers leave many pools lying around.


    My overpowered shield just kept absorbing the barrage of attacks, the runes on my armor soaking up some of the kinetic energy while both portions of Svalinn was greedily devouring the strange energy that Johnny¡¯s attacks were giving off. Reaching out with my magic, I turned all of the earth around me into quicksand while making the quicksand itself repel me. A nice depth of about four feet was more than enough to stop any normal attacker.


    ¡°Hey! Hey! That¡¯s not cool!¡± Johnny yelled from the muck. Grabbing big handfuls of it, he futilely started hurling it at me. ¡°It¡¯s nasty and it¡¯s sucking me in!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what he said!¡± I howled, laughing at his sheer bewilderment. ¡°Dude, relax, I just wanted to know what you could do. I¡¯ll even heal your nose, for free.¡±


    ¡°Then let me out!¡± he yelled, twisting and turning to get out. I felt a small pulse of something come from Johnny as he stood still and closed his eyes, his hands coming together like a prayer. After a second of utter stillness, he placed his hands out and a long silvery staff appeared. It extended in length to about thirty feet. Johnny placed the staff in front of him in the quicksand and I noticed that the two far edges of it were out past the quicksand. ¡°Haha sucker!¡± he yelled, grabbing the staff and pushing himself up and out of the muck like a gymnast doing the extra part of a pullup that makes everyone hate them.


    Not only was he strong enough to fight the vacuum of quicksand, but that freaky staff was strong enough to hold his weight even though it was only about an inch thick. Like a cat, he ran down the improvised balance beam, jumped dramatically to the packed earth, rolling and turning to pick up his weapon. Without taking his eyes off me, he began to spin and flip the luminescent staff around, faster and faster until it was a blur of silvery light. Suddenly, Johnny went still, his staff pointed directly at me, his feet set with his body sideways to present a smaller target. The silver particles that made up this weapon were even brighter than they were before.


    ¡°If you can take my final blow,¡± he said as I snickered. Seriously, I couldn¡¯t help myself.


    ¡°What is so funny?¡± he yelled shrilly, a slight wobble of his staff let me know that he wasn¡¯t as calm as he was trying to be.


    ¡°Come on now,¡± I giggled, ¡°You can do better than that. This ain¡¯t no fucking anime show dude. Why in the world would I let you have time to get ready for a final blow?¡± Mockery dripped from every word. ¡°This is the end of the world as we know it man, and it¡¯s been like this for a while. Trust me, just take a look behind you.¡±


    Johnny snuck a look behind himself. Unbeknownst to him, at my direction, Spot had silently crept up to Johnny, his slavering jaws barely holding in the drool that was nearly as hot as magma. All it would have taken for Spot to have a small human sized snack was a mere thought from me.


    ¡°You act all big and bad,¡± I continued, ¡°As if you¡¯re the most powerful kid on the block, but in reality, you¡¯re nothing. I am nothing, we are all nothing, even Spot is nothing. I didn¡¯t really want to have a dick measuring contest but here we are. Spot . . .¡±


    My tank sized canine used his nose to knock Johnny to the ground and then set one heavy paw right on his chest. Oh so delicately, he reached down and picked up the ¡°stick¡± with his mouth and looked at me. ¡°Good boy,¡± I chuckled. Walking forward, I took the staff and hurled it behind me, to which Spot reacted by bounding after it, bowling me over and smashing Johnny into the dirt.


    ¡°See what I mean,¡± I gasped, ¡°Nothing. That¡¯s all we are.¡± I turned my head to see the kid, his eyes wide open as he clutched his chest, struggling for breath. ¡°A damn dog took both of us out in a heartbeat because he wanted a stick. And I made that dog. Imagine what else is out there that can and might do way worse.¡±


    Using my flesh sorcery, I fixed the micro-tears in my muscles and the hairline fractures in my ribs, then walked over and squat next to Johnny. ¡°Try and relax for a minute, I¡¯m going to heal you, and then, you¡¯re going to help me.¡±


    Ten minutes later, Johnny was in my under-tree hideout holding a mug of coffee, looking at me like I was some kind of monster hidden in a human skin. ¡°I know, you don¡¯t trust me,¡± I started, ¡°But it only gets weirder and honestly much more awesome in both the good and bad way from here on out.¡±


    An eyebrow rose as he looked at me, then at the unconscious form of Reeanth in the chair behind me. ¡°Yeah, she¡¯s part of it, but that¡¯s only the beginning. So, what do I have to do to make you believe that I¡¯m a good guy, or a good enough guy, huh?¡±


    He took a quick sip of coffee and then sighed. ¡°Ya know, I don¡¯t know,¡± Johnny muttered, ¡°I haven¡¯t even seen another human since it happened, and this seems too good to be true. I mean, don¡¯t sorcerers sacrifice to demons an shit¡¯? That dog looks like it¡¯s got some demon in it.¡±


    ¡°First off, I¡¯m pretty much a druid, so demons and me don¡¯t click,¡± I explained, ¡°And the dog, who¡¯s name is Spot by the way, has some dragon in him, not demon. I haven¡¯t even seen a demon that I know of. I¡¯ve seen dragons, deities, zombies, mutant animals and fucked up paladins. I think I incinerated a vampire too. Oh, and my wife is a fucking tree. So, everything is weird, get used to it.¡±


    ¡°Soooo, how¡¯d you get to be this way, I mean, druids are dope but,¡±


    ¡°I was drunk when the Ripple hit,¡± I said, crossing my arms, ¡°And I got what I wished for. My woman also got what she wished for, but in the most literal of meanings. Sleepyhead over there,¡± pointing at Reeanth, ¡°is an advanced wizard soldier from the Alpha Centauri Empire and she wished for a sorcery of her own.¡±


    ¡°And I¡¯m a badass cultivator!¡± Johnny said smugly, his stupid grin at odds with the glint of street-smarts I saw lurking in his eyes. ¡°Give me enough time, and I¡¯ll be able to do anything. We get stronger and faster and more powerful the older we get.¡±


    ¡°Well, how about if I help you grow a bit,¡± I suggested, ¡°I mean, a sorcerer can do many things, but what would give you a leg up, armor, weapons?¡±


    Setting his mug down, he took at me a bit funny. ¡°How easy is it for you to heal?¡± he asked, ¡°And how long can you do it?¡±

 Chapter 93 - The Possible Cost (End of Arc/Book 1)

    The next day for me was fun. Johnny and I had settled on a plan the night before, where I would help him train for a week using my sorceries to cheat wherever possible, and then he would come with me to find my brother. I didn¡¯t tell him all the facts yet, or anything broader about what I¡¯d learned about the world. What I did do was show off my enchanting abilities, which had gotten a serious upgrade from consciousness sorcery. Now, I could partition off pieces of my mind to ¡®hold¡¯ an enchantment, which allowed the rest of my brain to concentrate on making a new piece of enchantment or fit the new piece into the old one. Up until now, everything has been pretty much on the fly, and I noticed that my own personal gear is showing signs of wear and tear or efficiency loss.


    Now, splitting up the processing power of my brain wasn¡¯t the most comfortable thing to do, but we don¡¯t use all of it anyway, and this exercise was slowly expanding the percentage at which the mushy sponge in my head could be utilized. I had one section working on ¡®holding¡¯ the enchantment, another actively scanning for weaknesses, one testing efficiencies, and the rest of my brain working on building the other part. It¡¯s like building a computer but having one other person there to hold pieces in place while you do most of the work. And this enchantment, whew, such a doozy.


    I woke up at the butt-crack of dawn to get this one done, and I was super proud of it. Johnny and I had discussed things that would help him progress and get stronger, and he had noticed that after being injured, that part of his body was somewhat more durable. He had bite marks all up and down his arms and legs, and he told me that after a while, animal bites took a while to worry their way through his skin, almost like it had become toughened leather. He also carried boulders on his shoulders and climbed trees like a monkey and this kid is literally in better shape than any normal human athlete.


    Well, back to the enchantment. I created what looked to be a mini stonehenge. I had a circular stone platform that was ten feet in diameter and it had four ten-foot tall and two feet wide columns placed on it at the cardinal directions with another stone platform on top of that. Using my earth sorcery, I molded the pieces together to become one, and then I started the work of enchanting. The entire contraption was a gravity-based compressor. The four columns and the two caps could work independently or cooperatively. I slowly enchanted each section of the compressor with runes of solidity, directionally based gravity, and then control runes that registered to the brainwaves of the person inside the compressor. The entire thing also could only be powered by the energy run-off of the person inside of it, simply so that it wouldn¡¯t actually be able to crush the person. But what that does mean, is that the platform scales off of an individual¡¯s strength, so it will be useful down the road as well.


    For safety¡¯s sake, I also tied the control runes to myself, so that it simply couldn¡¯t be used without my express permission. I¡¯m not up for being used for free. Oh, but it was beautiful. The caps, the top and bottom stone platforms, were two feet thick, making the entire thing a fourteen-foot tall, ten foot wide monstrosity, and I was proud. This was also an experiment for me as I didn¡¯t physically touch the thing while creating it. I sat in a meditative pose with non-sentient Gungnir stuck in the ground in front of me. I wanted to see how much control I had over my magic in a perfect scenario. I can¡¯t enchant on the fly in the middle of combat, but this exercise proved that if I had time, I could make some fucking awesome stuff!


    It was draining though. Laying back after finalizing the finishing touches, I looked at the early morning sky. Probably three hours had gone by and I hadn¡¯t even noticed. The only reason I let myself concentrate in that manner was due to Spot sleeping ten feet away from me. Bless that dog. No animals even came near my hideout anymore because his scent carried a hint of dragon, and nobody is dumb enough to mess around in a dragon¡¯s territory. Literally, Spot is the perfect guard dog.


    Using water sorcery, I conjured some water and took an impromptu bath. Being able to banish the water with the grime made showers a fast and pleasurable affair.


    ¡°What in the Ripple is that?¡±


    ¡°Well good morning to you too Reeanth,¡± I said from my comfortable spot. ¡°Bout¡¯ time you woke up.¡±


    ¡°My lord, this, this,¡± she stuttered out, ¡°What is that? It¡¯s blinding!¡±


    ¡°That, my dear alien,¡± I said proudly, ¡°Is a magically based personnel compressor complete with self-regulating subroutines. I call it, the compactor!¡±


    ¡°My lord, I don¡¯t know if you¡¯ve realized this, but the magical signature that it gives off is bright enough to draw some very powerful things here,¡± she said, her hands on her hips, as if she were my mother lecturing me.


    Turning around, I pointed at the giant fucking World Tree behind her. ¡°And you¡¯re telling me that doesn¡¯t? I mean come on, it¡¯s a World Tree sapling, not even a year old, and it¡¯s bigger than a damn cruise ship. Besides, it gives off enough magical power that everyone on this planet knows where it is. They¡¯re just not dumb enough to come here.¡±


    ¡°Yes my lord, I understand that,¡± she said, cutting me off as if I were a few screws short. ¡°But it¡¯s not that simple. Natural magic, from nature, from animals, from the cosmos, is easily differentiated from synthetic magic, or magic that is crafted, such as your enchantments. This is part of what makes dragons and gryffins and manticores so dangerous. They give off magical energy, but it tends to blend in with their environment. This on the other hand, sticks out worse than emperor banging a whore on the street!¡±


    A little bit of color fled my cheeks.


    ¡°And, instead of assuming that some powerful magical creature is guarding a natural treasure, they can reasonably assume that a sentient is here, and if a sentient can get here, than so can ANYBODY ELSE!¡±


    Hmmm, maybe I had fucked up, just a little.


    ¡°All right, all right,¡± I muttered, ¡°I can fix this, uhm, what absorbed magical energy?, uhhhhh . . . ¡°


    Then it hit me. ¡°Reeanth, look at Yggdrasil and see if you can tell that there is man-made magic there,¡± I ordered.Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    ¡°What, no, there¡¯s nothing there but nature,¡± she said, wondering if I really had lost it.


    ¡°I¡¯m serious, look again,¡± I pressured, ¡°At the roots, at the crown, the main trunk, look at the whole thing.¡±


    Her eyes brightened till they were white, similar to what the angel¡¯s eyes looked like when it looked at me. After a few minutes she turned back to look at me, her eyes normal again. ¡°There¡¯s a hint of magic that isn¡¯t the trees, but it¡¯s like finding a particular spark in a bonfire.¡±


    ¡°Haha! Perfect!¡± I yelled.


    I ran over to where a root of the World Tree bulged out of the ground and lay my hand on it. ¡°Come on little buddy, do some work for papa,¡± I whispered as I poured energy and intent into it. With my senses, I could feel the tapered point of the root began to grow in the direction of my contraption. As my mind was somewhat in the root itself, I could feel the big generator¡¯s power flowing through the circulatory system of the Tree, and I pushed it to bend its shape to my desires. The root grew out, slowly, until it touched the earth near my compactor, where it began to grew in a different shape. Over ten minutes went as it grew into a circle just wider than the base platform. ¡°And then up,¡± I muttered, pouring my own reserves of energy into the root as I watched vine-like tendrils creep up out of the ground and cover my magnificent invention. Thirty more minutes and the solid white of the stone couldn¡¯t be seen for the green of the arboreal covering.


    ¡°Look now,¡± I panted, feeling absolutely drained.


    ¡°I can¡¯t, it takes too much out of me,¡± Reeanth explained, ¡°I can only use this ability for a small amount of time.¡±


    ¡°Dude, just a peek,¡± I said as I pointed at the gently glowing rootlets. ¡°They¡¯re absorbing all the energy, and it looks like they¡¯ll be able to power the damn thing too if I want. Suck it aliens!¡±


    Reaching out with my foot, I put it on her leg, pushing out my own mana into her. ¡°There, that should help you out for a second or two.¡±


    Using the little I gave her, Reeanth¡¯s eyes flashed white for just a second. ¡°How did you know?¡±


    ¡°Trade secret.¡± My smirk was entirely justified. Yes the Centauri warrior was beholden, sworn, to me, but that doesn¡¯t mean I trust her completely yet. But if the World Tree¡¯s abundant energy signature could cover up the big generator in its base, then it stood to reason that it could cover up the compactor. As I was mulling over my genius, and simultaneously pouting in my head that only the big generators worked, the door to the bolthole flew open and a Johnny shaped blur flew out, slipped and sliding into the newly ¡®greened¡¯ compactor.


    ¡°Is this what I think it is? Is this for me? Is it Christmas in the New World?!¡±


    Reeanth¡¯s eyes bugged out of her skull. ¡°My lord, who, what, who is that?¡±


    ¡°Leave me out of it. Introduce yourself.¡± By my guess, it was getting close to noon and I was already wiped. So much to do and time is just flyin¡¯. I kept one hear out for what was going on as I used flesh sorcery to go through each part of my body and wash away my fatigue. It still amazes me to watch my body


    ¡°Hooleeeee shiiiit! You¡¯re tall as shit lady!¡±   SMACK!


    ¡°You will address me with respect you backward primitive. My name is Reeanth Le¡¯Talv, sword-sworn of the mighty sorcerer . . ¡°


    ¡°Yeah, fuck that. I don¡¯t give a shit who the hell you are. Ain¡¯t no messed up alien wannabe Gigantor gonna smack me around. These hands are rated E for everyone!¡±


    Not the best start to a relationship, but I¡¯ll take it. I spent the next couple minutes shaking off the mental stress and trying to get my healing sorcery to work on my headache and exhaustion. Channeling magic isn¡¯t hard physically, but it does feel like I¡¯ve been staring at a computer for three days straight working on some last minute paper while chugging coffee to keep me going. My flesh sorcery was more than happy to wash away lactic acid and repair muscles, but mental exhaustion seemed to be its own beast. The best I could come up with was a temporary infusion of mental energy and forcefully cleaning out the pathways in my brain. It felt like I had gotten a solid two hour nap in, not perfect but definitely workable.


    Coming back to the present didn¡¯t render the idyllic glade of peace that had been there this morning. Patches of grass were bombed out into holes of mud, scarred heartwood showing on the trees that ringed the clearing, small fires scattered around and my two companions were facing each other, both bleeding from several injuries.


    ¡°Stand down mutt, and I¡¯ll show you mercy out of respect for my lord.¡± Reeanth¡¯s entreaty looked a lot less imperial as she was clearly gasping for breath. Her bruised face and bloody arms weren¡¯t pretty, and her nano-tech armor was missing whole pieces.


    ¡°I faced down a twisted lookin wolf-deer thing, a giant spider-bear, a talking green mutant, and then a monkey king and beat his homies too! You got nothin on me. Your fat ass ain¡¯t tough, besides, your old ass is two seconds from passing out!¡± Johnny¡¯s mocking was as empty as his gas tank. Every part of his body was purple, several teeth were knocked and his silvery staff was pulsing softer and softer.


    ¡°This is not what I meant,¡± my bark cutting through the stand-off. ¡°Seriously, Reeanth, lighten up. This kid is gonna help me find my brother, but first I¡¯m gonna help him out first. And Johnny, dude, she¡¯s a battle wizard with some high-tech shit neither of us have seen yet. I think she¡¯s taking it easy on you.¡±


    Walking over to the bloodied combatants, I stood between them with my arms crossed. ¡°Shake hands.¡±


    Glares crisscrossed the clearing, but Reeanth¡¯s actually held some heat. ¡°Do it or I won¡¯t heal you.¡± The threat of having to bear the injuries for a while got their butts moving. Johnny¡¯s hand glowed silver as he gripped Reeanth¡¯s nano-tech gloved hand. I heard the creak of straining bones as their respective abilities warred for the two seconds they shook hands. Grabbing both of their arms, I reached out and fixed the worst of their injuries. ¡°There,¡± I said, ¡°Mostly better. You can heal the small stuff on your own because of your bad attitudes.¡±


    Wheeling around, I took Johnny over to the compactor. ¡°See this? This is your new best friend.¡± I took his puzzled look for what it was. ¡°Yes, it¡¯s the compactor thing we talked about last night. You get in it, and the more you meditate or gather energy or whatever it is that you do, it will take that and blast you from all sides with concentrated gravity fields. Oh, and here.¡± Remembering the other present, I pulled out a two foot long stone spike with a jade on the blunt end. ¡°This bad boy, stick this in the earth, and when you¡¯re done getting compacted, put your hand on the green part. It will draw energy from the earth and heal you. Part of it will accelerate your own healing process, and the other part will simply pump you full of natural healing energy.¡±


    The puzzled look of the young idiot morphed into joy as he put the pieces together. ¡°So I can just, and like go in there, and then, BOOM, and, do it again!?¡±


    Good thing I used to be not that smart, because I understood what he was trying to say. ¡°Yup, you sure can,¡± I chuckled, ¡°But you¡¯re gonna have to feed yourself. I recommend hunting something big and cooking a lot of it before starting this. Your body is going to need a lot of raw material, and I ain¡¯t doin that for ya.¡±


    After showing Johnny how to use the setup, I walked over to Reeanth and looked up at her. ¡°Did ya have to play that rough?¡±


    ¡°My lord, young cultivators are usually imbeciles. The power goes to their heads and then they forget to use it. Besides, I¡¯ll have to spar with him after every healing session for him to get the full value of it.¡±


    I looked at her as her implacable gaze fixated on the energizer bunny that was Johnny and he whooped and bounced into the woods.


    ¡°Uhhh, there somethin¡¯ you wanna tell me?¡±


    ¡°Cultivators are not to be taken lightly my lord. They may start out simple, but they do not stay that way.¡±


    ¡°Well that was incredibly unhelpful. Care to elaborate?¡±


    ¡°Cultivators grow in strength, in power, and in capability as well, but it does happen in stages. Some leap forward and vanish into the depths of the universe while others sit for millenia on a rock as life simply goes on around them. But, their saving grace is that they are rare, so rare in fact that the Centauri Empire has only come into contact with three. Two of them we put to death, and the last one broke us before we managed to send him into the Great Hole.¡±


    ¡°Broke you? So you¡¯ve met one before?¡±


    ¡°No, it broke our Empire. The cultivator annihilated our space-faring navy, crushed the two royal moons, and then savaged multiple worlds before Merlin intervened.¡±


    The sounds of a young boy¡¯s joyful hunt faded as I reconsidered, well, everything.

 Chapter 94 - Guardians of the Glade (Book 2 Chapter 1)

    ********


    Frankenstein was my muse man. Not the pieced together from dead people monster, but the real one, the scientist behind it all. It was from him that I drew my inspiration as I shouted with my hands raised to the heavens, ¡°Rise, rise, RISE! My beautiful creation, RISE! Ah ha ha ha ha!¡±


    The reality was not as glitzy as the one taking place in my head, but it was rather fascinating no matter how you sliced it. Taking a page out of Flamel¡¯s book, fucked up psycho that he is, I embarked on a journey of my own. Today, I am a parent.


    ¡°My lord, it doesn¡¯t look right.¡± Reeanth¡¯s lovely voice was tinged with condescension, but I couldn¡¯t let that stop me.


    ¡°Then you do it!¡± I growled back at her, ¡°You try creating a consciousness from nothing and sticking it in dirt. How else do you plan on making a goddamn earth golem?¡±


    ¡°But you don¡¯t need . . . ¡°


    ¡°I never need, but I definitely want!¡± Damn right. I have an inner child, and what the hell is magic for if I can¡¯t let that child out and do some fucking awesome shit?


    ¡°You don¡¯t need to make an earth golem my lord, you can simply summon one.¡±


    The small marble of diamond I had conjured and then so very carefully engraved with many tiny golden runes slipped through my fingers. With a flick of magic, Reeanth caught it and pulled it towards her open hand. Holding it gently between her thumb and forefinger, she raised it up to her eye. ¡°My lord, what is this exactly? I can see . . . are those runes, tiny engraved runes?¡±


    I snatched it back. ¡°Yes they¡¯re runes! I was trying to create a core of some kind that included runic restrictions of loyalty and anti-malicious intent so that I could legitimately have an earthen guardian golem around here. If it worked, I could make a couple sentries that would keep this offshoot of Yggdrasil safe.¡± The hand not holding the small marble was resting on the arboreal shell of my wife.


    ¡°You never told me why you¡¯re so adamant about keeping this tree safe my lord. It is a World Tree. Very few things in the known universe could hurt it, and less than that would even want to. It is more closely tied with the fabric of existence than anything else. Harming this, any of this, would bring down the wrath of all that lives. What are you worried about?¡±


    A wave of emotion swept through me, it was hot and heavy and somewhat prickly. ¡°My wife.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand, I¡¯ve never met a woman near you or even seen any kind of desire from you, and I can see in every spectrum.¡±


    ¡°Look, I don¡¯t want to go into all the details, but my wife is inside that fucking tree, and I use flesh sorcery to tamp down on my natural sex drive. There, happy?¡± Turning around, I stomped out into the clearing where Johnny was lying bloody on the ground, one hand on the healing stick.


    ¡°What¡¯s got your balls in twist?¡± he croaked, the small cuts and large bruises fading away as magic pulsed from the earth through the conduit into his body.


    ¡°Your leige is lonely.¡± Reeanth proclaimed.


    ¡°Don¡¯t look at me bro, I don¡¯t swing that way.¡±


    A pulse of mental exhaustion and frustration backed by my flesh and consciousness sorceries exploded out from me. Reeanth hit the ground and Johnny¡¯s hand fell off the healing stick along as his neck lost all muscle tension. Shit, didn¡¯t know I could do that. Both of them were unconscious, like knocked the fuck out by Mike Tyson unconscious.


    I poked Johnny with my toe, then a few more times. ¡°Hey fuckface, wake up.¡± Nothing. I gave the poke a bit more force and a little better aim, still nothing. Grasping at my instincts, my sorceries gave me the convenient answer that somehow I could project my feelings or mental state to someone else and I didn¡¯t have to discriminate while doing it. But in order to reverse it, I either had to wait for it to wear off or heal them. Against the suggestion of my inner anti-social hermit, I pulsed out waves of pure healing and mana, and then I let out my inner child. The dirt underneath both of them began to bounce as I played with my magic. It rolled and bounced and shook them around as if they were on a water bed and some kids were jumping on the other end of it. Hahahaha, mini earthquake on demand, damn I love magic.


    After fucking with them for two minutes, listening to their beautiful squals of helplessness, I used the earth to flick Johnny up and over to the compactor and Reeanth closer to me. She landed on her butt in front of me and I squatted to look her in the eye. ¡°Now, instead of letting me waste an entire day on trying to plan something seriously complicated, how about you just tell me that there¡¯s a way easier way to do what I¡¯m trying to accomplish, capisce?¡±


    She gulped. ¡°But, my lord, you didn¡¯t tell me what you were trying to do. You just sat down and meditated.¡±


    ¡°Fine. Fuck it. How do I summon an earth golem?¡±


    The look on her face did not bring me joy.


    ¡°You don¡¯t know do you?¡± The earth around us began to rumble as my earth sorcery translated some emotion into actual motion.


    ¡°We use a runic circle, a contract, plenty of mana, and the dwarves who have many contacts among the Realm of Terra.¡±


    ¡°Lame, fuckin lame,¡± I grumbled, shoving my hands in my pockets and walking away. My frustrated muttering continued. ¡°Johnny¡¯s been making so much progress in the past three days and I¡¯ve got about four more before we head out, and what have I accomplished? Shit, that¡¯s what. Waste of time. Useless, and gross, that¡¯s what it is, gross.¡±


    Because I wasn¡¯t paying attention, I didn¡¯t even notice the oddly curved tree branch as I walked straight into it. ¡°FUCK!¡± I yelled, holding my nose with both my hands, blood spurting out. ¡°You have got to be kidding me!¡± Spitting out blood, my nose began began to quickly heal the minor injury that was about to break the camel¡¯s back. All my power and enchantments and shielding and a stupid tree breaks my nose because I¡¯m walking slow and not paying attention. Grasping the earth underneath the slender tree with my magic, I prepare to bury the annoyance. It felt like I had stubbed my toe, but instead it was my face. I was in that moment of incoherent rage that follows the stupid small pain that weirdly hurts oh so much, where you want to fling the thing that you stubbed your toe on.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.


    ¡°Wait! No! Please!¡±


    A soft cry came from the tree, interrupting what was about to be the world¡¯s smallest earthquake. Not releasing my earthen grip on the dirt, but loosening it just a bit, I held off. ¡°Great, don¡¯t tell me trees can talk now,¡± I said softly, a little ashamed at being caught in this particular moment. ¡°Who said that?¡± I asked a bit louder.


    A slender brown arm grew out of the tree, placed its hand on the trunk, and pushed itself out. What came out of the tree was a woman, a woman made from smooth brown bark, with soft leaves for hair and the brightest green eyes that no human could match.


    My eyes bugged out of my head. ¡°Is this a common thing, are all trees hiding a woman somewhere?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand, I¡¯m not a woman,¡± the clearly feminine figure said, her form pressed against the tree.


    ¡°I mean, sure, but ya look like one, so, what are you?¡± I pressed, a little weirded out by the minor assault of an immovable tree that birthed a woman.


    ¡°Do you not know? Has your lore forgotten so much?¡± Her eyes seemed so very soft, submissive almost.


    ¡°Not sure,¡± I stalled, taking in my surroundings which had gotten slightly darker all the sudden. ¡°Yeah, being separated by a veil for a few thousand years will muddy the mythological waters a bit. So, what are you? A tree thing, uh, an awakened tree? Dryad! That¡¯s what they¡¯re called, am I getting close?¡±


    Her chuckle was oddly sexy. ¡°Silly mortal, I am a hamadryad. We are tree spirits who protect and guard the land upon which all walk and play.¡±


    Hmmmm, this might work. ¡°Do you know any earth golems, or dirt elementals that might wanna talk to me?¡± I asked politely, slowly pulling back my magical grip on the soil beneath her tree. ¡°I¡¯m not sure what they¡¯d want, but I¡¯m sure a sorcerer like me has a lot to offer.¡±


    ¡°Oh, they¡¯re easy to please,¡± she tittered, ¡°Me on the other hand, well . . .¡± Her innocent smile bled its soft look as her teeth began to look just a bit more pointed as she gently stepped towards me. ¡°My kind needs a strong hand with a caring touch.¡± Said hand reaching out towards me grew nails that looked like sharpened sticks. Roots sprang up from underneath me, wrapping my legs and trapping my arms close to my body.


    Oh, hell, no. Grasping the constricting roots with nature sorcery to hold them still and give me room to breathe, I looked at the tendrils of green magic animating them and followed them as they led down into the earth, out to and up the tree, and connected to the deceitful and hungry tree woman who¡¯s mouth began to get wider. Drawing on the energy contained in my crystal batteries, I used the roots as a conduit to shove my nature sorcery through them and take an inner hold on the core of the hamadryad. Feelings of rage, helplessness, an odd hunger for minerals, and the need to protect assaulted the fringes of my mind but my grip on her held. She froze as my magic completely overpowered her, even her eyes stopped twitching and focusing. Instead of an animated creature, she looked like a horrifying wooden statue that a skilled craftsman had made.


    Flexing my will as a quick test, I found that I could literally control her body. Forcing the roots back into the ground, I stepped around her to her tree placed my hand on it, maintaining the flow of power. With a mental effort, I forced her to turn around and face me.


    ¡°Maybe we should start over. I¡¯m a sorcerer, and nature is part of what I am, and since you¡¯re a part of nature, well, you get the picture.¡± She couldn¡¯t even glare if I didn¡¯t let her, but I could certainly feel her trying. ¡°Seriously, I don¡¯t want to hurt you, or even control you, but what in the world? You attack me for no real reason? I know you¡¯re not actually hungry for human flesh, I can tell that from your core.¡±


    Releasing her facial muscles, she shook her head and smacked her lips. ¡°We¡¯ve been watching you sorcerer for most of a season now, defiling the Mother, playing with the soul of the forest and somehow thinking that you would get away with it?!¡± Her tirade ended with a scream, to which I eloquently answered.


    ¡°Huh?¡±


    The hamadryads inner core of power, that magical thing that really was her, began to pulse and shake, trying to throw off my grip.


    ¡°Are you talking about the tree, Yggdrasil?¡± My words sparked another round of inner struggling on her part.


    ¡°Fucking stop it. I¡¯m not playing around, the only reason I¡¯m still in the area is that my wife is in that tree. I¡¯d rather go hollow out a mountain and play around with my magic than sit here and guard this tree BUT I CAN¡¯T!¡±


    I let my own anger pulse through my magic and spark up and down the tree lady¡¯s core. The red manifestation of my magic clashed with her green core, leaving red lines that bled a light green light.


    ¡°That¡¯s why I asked about elementals or whatever they are. I need guardians to place around the World Tree that has my wife so that I can leave the immediate area with some peace of mind.¡±


    She cut in with a puzzled look on her face. ¡°But that¡¯s our duty! We guard the Tree, the well of Life, the door to the Heartland. The veil kept us away until several moons ago and the scent of fire and drake keep us away still.¡±


    I relaxed my grip on her soul just a tiny bit while pushing a bit of healing mana into her. ¡°I¡¯ll say it again, I am a sorcerer of nature. Hurting the land and anything about it is contrary to everything I am.¡± Tightening my magical grip for a second, I stepped closer to her so I could look deep in her eyes. ¡°But if any harm comes to me or mine because of you tree spirit ladies, I will shatter every tree in this forest to root you out and then drown this entire area in a flood of ice and water and salt. Am I clear?¡±


    If she were made of flesh and blood, the amount of fear I felt in her would have been the piss her pants kind of fear.


    ¡°Great and powerful sorcerer,¡± a soft voice said off to the right of me. I turned carefully while engaging all of my defensive gear and not loosing my grip on the hamadryad. Another woman very similar and yet perfectly different stepped out of a tree. Like a snowflake, she was so similar and yet unique such that her visage was just different enough to tell that she was a separate hamadryad, but obviously the same kind. I summoned Gungnir in its short spear form and pointed it at her as she fell to her knees. ¡°I entreat you to release my sister, and we, we of the sap of the forest will gladly guard the great Mother who stands in the glade. Have mercy, and we will happily be the buffer to all that enter Her shade.¡±


    ¡°Kinda quick to change your tone huh?¡± I said, my distrust not allowing me to relax my guard.


    The newcomer placed her hands on her heart. ¡°I am much more mature than the zealous youth you''re holding right now with your mighty magic. I easily can feel your nature magic while she is still untrained in our ways. Silly fruit trees are not the best of us.¡±


    My prisoner let out a low growl.


    ¡°I can also show you how to accomplish what you¡¯ve asked for great sorcerer,¡± she pleaded, ¡°A drove of hamadryads with several rock and crystal elementals would make sure that the Mother is never harmed or disturbed. We can chase away all manner of those who stalk in the night and even the unnatural run from our power.¡±


    It sounded too good to be true. Exactly what I wanted and needed, which meant that there is a price hidden in there somewhere, but it might be worth it.


    ¡°Well, based on my experience so far, we got a Jekyll and Hyde situation going on here. So, I¡¯m going to trust but verify. Walk over here slowly and let me put one hand on you and verify this with my nature sorcery. That work for you?¡± I said, keeping my voice light as to not spook her.


    ¡°And if I say yes great sorcerer, will you let me and my sister go?¡±


    I took a long minute to think that over. Her eyes were just the right kind of watery and her lips were oddly attractive as my forcefully repressed sex drive began to pound at the cracks of my sorcery-reinforced self control. My consciousness sorcery sent me a little ping from the back of my mind, overlaying another spectrum of magical vision over what I already had running. Small and barely perceptible waves of green and lusty red magic were wafting off of the hamadryad, bits of unconscious seduction magic that were ever so slightly changing the vector of my thoughts. Another ping from my consciousness told me that she probably wasn¡¯t currently influencing me other than her natural presence.


    ¡°If you mean me and mine no harm and are not being deceitful in any way, then we¡¯re good.¡±


    Her smile lit up her entire face, as if sunlight poured over a hidden idyllic clearing in the rainforest, naturally beautiful. Fuck, I gotta figure out a longer term solution to my primal drive. She slowly stood up, walked over just slowly enough to show off her assets and then knelt at my feet with an impish smile.


    Taking charge of the situation that I was starting to lose control over, I placed my unoccupied hand on top of her head, mainly so I wouldn¡¯t be able to see her eyes. Tendrils of nature sorcery connected my inner soul to her mind, and she was beautiful. The mental image of my sorceries, the bizarre tree form of my soul, connected to her core. Soft dark green and nutty brown with the scent of untouched nature permeated every mote of her. The dark boundary of my mental manifestation grew out until her core was part of that landscape. She was a glowing orb that was six feet tall, floating with small roots hanging off of her. My roots connected and I felt it, open honesty, curiosity, and the desire of a tree to be one with the forest.


    As I pulled my hand back content in the knowledge that she was telling the truth, she grabbed my hand and pulled me down to her level.


    ¡°What, what are you?¡± she said, sadness and joy making her voice crack. ¡°I can feel your thoughts still, you¡¯re, a tree, and yet, you¡¯re not? I don¡¯t understand?¡±


    She wasn¡¯t wrong. Even now there was a whisper, a gentle wind on the edges of my mind that carried sensations back and forth. ¡°Master?¡±


    ¡°Yooooo! Magic man got himself another lady!¡±


    Johnny¡¯s voice was just annoying enough to bring reality crashing back. ¡°Damn it Johnny, I told you, I¡¯m married.¡± I said brusquely. ¡°Besides, this lovely hamadryad, uh . .¡±


    Our mental whispered her name, ¡°Meliad.¡±


    ¡°Meliad, and her grove will be the new guardians.¡±

 Chapter 95 - Gifts of Power (Book 2 Chapter 2)

    At some point, magic will become old hat. The wonders of willing reality to bend its implacable foundation to your whims, will become the norm. The shock of endorphins ransacking your body as raw untamed power flows out and through and around you will become commonplace. The sheer volume and variety of wickedly cool lifeforms will simply be expected. On that day, please, someone, anyone, put me out of my misery, because watching two hamadryads, female tree spirits born from magic, simply call out to their earthen brethren was breathtaking. Meliad and her grove sister sang the soft melody of the evening breeze, motes of light taking the message away.


    ¡°Quick great sorcerer, conjure a body. Quickly, the elemental needs a stone vessel, freely given, to stay here on this plane.¡±


    Easiest task a woman has ever given me. I conjured a basketball sized heart of solid granite, filled in the ¡®soft¡¯ tissue part with thick Virginia clay mixed with dirt, structured the ¡®bones¡¯ with obsidian flecked with quartz, and then padded the outer layers with gravel and sand. The empty golem lay on its back in front of me as I quickly shaped thick limbs and coarse digits. After fitting two conjured rubies in its face for eyes, I obeyed an odd impulse and stuck the golden runed diamond marble inside of its heard where the brain would be.


    ¡°Be prepared, it comes!¡± Meliad warned, her voice joyous as brown streaks of light flowed through the ley lines underneath the glade up into the conjured golem. Using just a bit more energy, I traced runes of cohesion and energy storage on its torso while grabbing three of my energy crystal batteries and shoving it in its chest where the lungs would be.


    ¡°He¡¯s here!¡± Meliad began jumping around, clapping as if she were a three year old girl on her birthday. ¡°Oh, and he¡¯s gonna like this! Not many sorcerers make a vessel this complex, they usually just shape one outta mud and say ¡®that¡¯s it!¡¯¡±.


    The ten foot titan of earth sat up, its ruby eyes lighting up as awareness flooded in. One hand reach up to touch its face, the other held in front of itself, almost, inspecting it, as if it were a thinking sentient being.


    ¡°So,¡± I said, with my usual irreverent aplomb, ¡°Got a name?¡±


    An overly large mouth opened and a deep, crumbly voice cascaded out as the golem focused its imposing stature on the feeble fleshling in front of it.


    ¡°Is, this, for, me?¡±


    Looking at Meliad who gave me the slightest nod, I happily replied to the living boulder who spoke too damn slow, as if he had to chew grind out each word. ¡°If you agree to guard this glade, the forest around it, and most importantly, that tree,¡± I said as I pointed at Yggdrasil¡¯s offshoot, ¡°And allow those I wish unfettered or partial access to all of the above, then yes. Yes I do.¡±


    The gashed mouth of dirt became a crescent of cobbly happiness as it began to shake the ground with a jig. ¡°This, is, so, generous, master!¡± The gushing was a bit painful to listen to as its voice sounded like someone had thrown pebbles into a blender, but its joy was amusing to watch.


    ¡°You¡¯ve made a friend for life,¡± Meliad said softly behind me.


    Turning to face her, my raised eyebrow communicated its own question.


    ¡°Silly sorcerer. You didn¡¯t just give the simple elemental a body, you gave him a vessel for a Duke.¡±


    The other eyebrow joined its partner.


    Meliad let out an exasperated sigh. ¡°You know, a Duke, not just the elementals who call boulders and dirt their home, but rather a proud owner of a mountain. Their realm is just a boring expanse they share with the fire elementals, nothing there but dirt, magma, and some crystals. But here, here they can grow and become more or less than what they were.¡±


    My eyebrows didn¡¯t go down.


    ¡°How are you this powerful, yet know so little?¡± she asked, one hand playing with her leafy hair, the other resting on her hip.


    ¡°I keep asking myself the same question,¡± I said jokingly, tossing up a small duplicate of the runed diamond brain marble that I put in the golem¡¯s head. ¡°Anyways, do you know his or its name? Bah, is it a he or an it? I didn¡¯t put a dick down there so I¡¯m not exactly sure.¡±


    ¡°It will have a gender when you name it.¡±


    I looked at Meliad, then at the grumpy younger hamadryad skulking behind her.


    ¡°What about that one? She got a name? Cause if not, I¡¯m callin her Barky.¡±


    Meliad¡¯s giggle was cut off by Barky¡¯s scream.


    ¡°My name is Lyra!¡±


    ¡°Whatever you say Barky!¡± I said, turning back towards the golem. ¡°And you, damn, all the cool mountain names are really fucking long, like, Monongahela, or Killamanjaro. You know what, your name is Everest, cause you¡¯re gigantic rock and I¡¯m all out of creativity.¡±


    Everest shook the earth as his knees crushed the ground in front of me. ¡°Everest, me? This, is, my, name?¡±


    ¡°Yeah big guy, you¡¯re a dude and you got a name. Good one too,¡± I replied. ¡°And . . . what could I get or what would you if I gave you this?¡±


    I tossed up the golden runed diamond to his eye level and his ruby eyes followed it back down as it landed in my palm.


    ¡°Something tells me that this pretty little thing is quite valuable to you, considering how happy you are with your body.¡±


    ¡°Heart, stone, is . . . ¡°


    I cut him off. ¡°No, this is your brainstone.¡±


    ¡°Great sorcerer, spirits do not have brains. His spirit is contained in that stone, making it a heartstone. Stones such as that allow for him to grow mentally as well as in power and in size. This is why he is so grateful. The most powerful of elementals can think.¡±If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    I tossed it up again. ¡°Ok then, heartstone, what would you do if I gave you another one of these?¡±


    ¡°Nothing,¡± Everest grunted.


    ¡°What?¡± I said, taken a bit aback. ¡°What do you mean nothing? It¡¯s a whole nother¡¯ heartstone?!¡±


    ¡°Already, have, one.¡±


    Damn it. There goes my dream of a literal mountain protecting my wife-tree. Fuck.


    ¡°Why not simply summon another? I¡¯m sure there are plenty of elementals who would love be elevated above their intangible station?¡±


    Meliad¡¯s simple question combined with my observations of Everest¡¯s joy to form a devious idea. Unable to contain my absolutely staggering genius, I grabbed her by the shoulders, my words spitting out rapid fire. ¡°Can you find or summon another elemental who would be willing to do this but travel with me and not have to be out summoned all the time is that possible can you do it!?¡±


    ¡°Uh, uh, of course,¡± she whimpered just a tiny bit, ¡°Please, you¡¯re overly rough.¡±


    ¡°Do it and you can be in charge of the forest except for me,¡± I bargained. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure I can make that happen.¡±


    ¡°You swear?¡± her tone softening as my grip eased up.


    ¡°As long as I don¡¯t have to do anything crazy.¡±


    Barky couldn¡¯t take it anymore. ¡°That¡¯s not fair!¡± she screeched. ¡°I won it fair!¡±


    Lyra¡¯s wooden fists were balled up, thorns sprouting from her knuckles while vines wrapped around her to form body armor. Thick bark covered the impact points of her body, her knees and elbows, while a literal crown of giant thorns sprouted from her head.


    ¡°How?¡± I asked, not really believing that I actually had to ask these kinds of questions. ¡°What kind of contest do trees have? Grow bigger? Grow bigger fruit? Let¡¯s see who has the widest leaf? Come on,¡± I mocked.


    Meliad¡¯s sultry voice provided a lovely to my own. ¡°Simple, great sorcerer. She was able to plant her tree the closest. It¡¯s hard for us to stand the overwhelming raw energy of the Great Mother. We would be subsumed if we got too close. That is why we guard the forest and the glade instead of growing near to her.¡±


    ¡°So, do I have to replant you or get rid of her?¡± I asked, ¡°Cause, I¡¯m totally willing to do either, maybe both.¡±


    Meliad pointed at the diamond in my hand. ¡°You could give me that.¡±


    My eyes narrowed. ¡°What now?¡± I spent hours making two of these ridiculous diamonds and I wasn¡¯t gonna give it up or my portable golem plan without a damn good alternative that would seriously benefit me. ¡°Why, what would it do for you exactly? And how would it help me?¡±


    ¡°I could show you,¡± she started to which I instantly closed her mouth with nature sorcery.


    ¡°Or you could fucking tell me. I like my plan better.¡±


    Releasing her from my magical grip, I let her speak. I kept reminding myself that these things, these creatures, they aren¡¯t human. They are not even close, which means that bargaining with them is fraught with peril as they do not think like us. And I couldn¡¯t let my guard down, which is why I had to make sure that they knew, that they all knew, that I was the big dog round here.


    ¡°Answer, him!¡± Everest roared from over top of me.


    Meliad¡¯s eyes went wide as she cowered at my feet.


    ¡°I could bind a minor earth elemental to myself and move my tree closer to the Mother. It would also allow me to manipulate not only the nature around us but the dirt beneath my roots. An embedded treant and an Earthen Duke would be able to fend off a dragon if we had to!¡±


    Pinching my nose, I took a second to take a deep breath. It really hurts how much my ignorance is getting in the way.


    ¡°Treant?¡± I said, confusion mixing with a bit of self-directed anger. ¡°The hell is that?¡±


    ¡°Like, me,¡± Everest answered, ¡°But, a, tree.¡±


    Great. Less than helpful answers.


    ¡°Your turn Leafy, think you can maybe expound on that?¡± My gritted teeth with my fake smile was not at all comforting.


    She pointed at Lyra who hadn¡¯t moved but was shaking in anger. ¡°I will be able to do all of that but can coat myself with earth in any way I want.¡± She then pointed at Everest. ¡°And, I¡¯ll be able to grow that big if needed and have more power than he.¡±


    I knelt down in front of her and looked her straight in the eye. ¡°So, if I give you this,¡± I said, holding the diamond marble in front of my nose as our faces were nine inches apart, ¡°Then you have to swear that you will protect this forest, this glade, the Great Mother, and by that I mean that giant tree, and obey me. You will also have to let people that I designate to come and go as I direct you. Can you work with that? Nod once.¡±


    As her head bobbed once, I used my nature and consciousness sorcery to lay her soul bare in front of me. There were more memories in the snapshot I experienced of her life than I had ever dreamed. To be fair, most of them were simply enjoying the simple pleasures of a nice sunny day or a refreshing rain in the summer, but the sheer volume was heavy. After determining that she meant it, I pulled my mind out of the ocean¡¯s worth of memories.


    My nature sorcery clung to the dreams of relaxing underneath the warm sun as I shook my head, trying to bring reality to the forefront. With my consciousness sorcery, I boxed up the parts of not-me and sent them to the back in a folder titled, ¡®Not my actual memories¡¯.


    ¡°Here,¡± I said, handing the exquisitely detailed runed marble to Meliad. ¡°Don¡¯t misuse this and we won¡¯t have a problem. And you!¡± Turning around to face Lyra, I pointed at her with one finger that was glowing with a bomb¡¯s worth of mana. ¡°Either get off your high horse or fuck off. Meliad is in charge now after me and Everest over there.¡±


    I held her gaze until she looked away, her thorns and armor shrinking back inside of her. Her lithe form melted into the forest. Looking down, I saw that Meliad was now a ball of wood, her form still visible but literally melted together as if she had grown that way. Poking her with my toe, I cleared my throat, ¡°Ah hem!¡±


    ¡°Give, her, time. I, will, guard.¡±


    ¡°Thanks Everest. Ok, you¡¯re in charge while I¡¯m gone,¡± I explained. ¡°The young kid named Johnny, about yea high with the powers of a cultivator, he can come and go. The big ass woman, Reeanth, her too. She¡¯s about a foot and a half taller than me and she rarely takes off her silver nano-tech armor. Also, she has sorcery that centers around her eyes if you need something to verify her with. Got all that?¡±


    A simple nod followed my ramble.


    ¡°Good. Now I got more shit to do,¡± I said as I walked away from where Everest knelt over Meliad. Ideas raced through my head, taking my mind off the insanity that was my life.


    The next couple of days went by in a whirlwind as my self imposed limit of a week came closer whether I liked it or not. The good news was that I was incredibly productive. I used my time to outfit Reeanth and Johnny with badass weaponry, but I was extra proud of Reeanth¡¯s new helmet specifically. Using a bit of her nano-tech and some time consuming rune work, I was able to make probably the second most dangerous weapon I¡¯d ever come up with so far. The helmet was outfitted with a thin and clear diamond partial face mask that would absorb the latent/unused eye-based sorcery emitted from Reeanth¡¯s eyes and store it. Then, at Reeanth¡¯s mental command, the focal diamond at the top of her could do several things. It could display whatever she was thinking, sort of like a mentally controlled hologram, or project a force field, or even serve as a short ranged laser.


    Johnny got a neat set of plate armor that was full of kinetic feedback runes. As he moved or was hit by anything that discharged kinetic force, his armor would store that energy so that it could be used in a multitude of useful waves. My personal favorite use was the bouncing effect that allowed him to move as if his hundred pounds of armor was much lighter. It could store the downward kinetic motion and use that to power the upward movement. It could also be discharged as various points across his body if he wanted to make a punch or kick have the force of a car crash. The hardest part was making it so that Johnny could control the armor¡¯s functions through his mind, and that tuning with my consciousness sorcery took an entire day.


    In order to prep for anything, my controlled paranoia forced me to make several general survival tools that could be incredibly useful. The first things I created were personalized healing sapphires for all three of us. Each gem held a flesh sorcery based snapshot of each person¡¯s specific body, and if held while injured, the stored energy of the gem would follow the ¡°fixed¡± framework and correct whatever injury was there. I then added a function of simple accelerated healing that would be great outside of combat but wouldn¡¯t be fast enough if we were up against a wall.


    Small flash-bang grenades were also made, but this time they were made out of small squares of wood that I inscribed runes on. The wood squares would be much lighter than my original idea of flash-bang pebbles, but they couldn¡¯t be thrown as far. My most innovative work was actually not even item related. With the consent of my companions, I used flesh sorcery to temporarily darken the skin on the tops of their heads . Their hair covered up the makeshift runic tattoo.


    ¡°What¡¯s this for again?¡± Johnny asked, poking at his scalp. ¡°It feels kinda weird, like you¡¯re gonna go all mind control on us when we ain¡¯t lookin.¡±


    ¡°Damn it Johnny, we¡¯ve been over this a bunch of times,¡± I said, completely done with this kid. ¡°It¡¯s an anti-mind control runic tattoo. The center rune is the one for self, and it is inside the rune of defense that is woven in with the rune of serenity. I got one, Reeanth has one, I¡¯ve even put one on Spot, although I pity the person that tries to control him.¡±


    His brown eyes squinted at me as he chewed on that for a second.


    ¡°So, what you¡¯re tellin me, you ain¡¯t trying to mess with my brain?¡±


    ¡°Johnny,¡± my voice getting softer as my patience ran out, ¡°I don¡¯t need your brain. I need your help. Why would I mind control someone I am helping. Trust me, the help I am giving you is priceless. The help you¡¯re giving me is personal.¡±


    He took this opportunity to quickly change track. ¡°So if you can fake tattoo up some anti-mind voodoo, can¡¯t you do the same thing to like, muscles and shit? Maybe draw me up some magic powers?¡±


    Full stop. Holy shit. From the mouth of babes, and apparently idiots.

 Chapter 96 - New Toys (Book 2 Chapter 3)

    Runes. Runes are physical drawings or etchings that capture a screenshot of time, the frozen essence of a fragment of magic. They are not necessarily as set in stone as the English alphabet, but rather they are guided by intent, or that¡¯s true as far as I¡¯ve been able to figure out. The more my mind believes that the rune resembles what I think it should accomplish, the more effective it is. Using a circle to seal runes in one section to me allows for a border for containment or sealing, while somehow weaving runes together combines their effect. What I don¡¯t know is how it will affect their use if other people are using it themselves.


    But Johnny¡¯s barely intelligible speech kicked off a pebble in my mind resulting in an avalanche of ideas that I didn¡¯t have nearly enough time to work through. The simplest of these is runic tattoos, but that¡¯s just the beginning. If I could make a runic tattoo on someone¡¯s skull to prevent mental tampering, then why couldn¡¯t I do something crazy awesome with it, like inscribing a rune of fire on someone¡¯s hand so they can use a ¡®fiery punch¡¯? The first answer that that my mind supplied for me is that it might be incredibly painful. If someone had a rune of fire inscribed on their hand, and they tried to use it, it might set their hand on fire. It doesn¡¯t necessarily make them fireproof, or does it?


    Maybe these runes would work on clothing, and maybe there are ways to make the runes themselves even more powerful. Using flesh sorcery to darken someone¡¯s skin into the shape of a rune was child¡¯s play for my abilities, but what if I actually made my own ink and planned out a beautiful rune set and then painstakingly etched it on someone¡¯s skin while imbuing that with mana? Would it work better then? What if the individual is not actually able to use magic, what then? All of these questions and more raced through my head as the deadline for our trip loomed over my head like an avenging storm ready to unleash all hell. But what if?


    Is a conscious mind with the ability to intelligently think required for runes to operate? Could I tattoo a freaking deer and turn it into an indestructible idiot herbivore, or would it simply be a useless feature? The issue of my amazing abilities is that even I don¡¯t know what I¡¯m capable of, and I truly need at least ten years to flesh out what my actual capabilities are. Every time I learn something new, it¡¯s like I discovered a whole new science with its own fields of study. The only reason I¡¯m not going insane from curiosity is that I know that I can reverse old age on myself, which theoretically gives me a semblance of immortality. I could literally be one of the most powerful semi-mortals in the universe if I kept this up. But do I have enough time right now?


    Speaking of time, the answer to that is no. My brother is somewhere in Florida and I have no freaking clue what¡¯s going on down there. He could be hurt or dead for all I know right now and giving myself a week to get ready was more than enough. Actually making the temporary melanin tattoos was easy, the hard part was planning it. After Johnny¡¯s accidental spark of unwitting genius, I locked myself away in my under-river hideout so I could draw runes on the stone walls of the cavern in peace. I wanted to do this right, but in order to do that successfully I needed to put off this trip. Unfortunately, that was not an option. My deadline was in two days, and I wanted to have my plans laid out and the temporary tattoos on everyone by tomorrow so we could have a day of testing before setting out.


    The part of me that was actually having a good time was my inner psychopath. That guy had come up with some incredibly wicked ideas just in case it was a no-win situation, but that was something I didn¡¯t want to dwell on. Those particular bits of fun were stashed away in a leather pouch sitting in front of me, it almost seemed to have its own presence as I didn¡¯t really want to be near it. Setting that on the floor a good teen feet away, I sat back down at the stone table. It was cool, but the runes I had carved out in front of me earlier on the wall gave off more heat than I was expecting. The concept of fire was grasped in the grip of lightning, a weird sentence but it was how I was imagining it. Literally, it was a clenched fist holding a lightning bolt that somehow was also on fire. It was how my mind was picturing plasma. It doesn¡¯t really make perfect technical sense as plasma is superheated gas like the kind that stars produce, but my artistic license was only letting me etch this.


    Using earth sorcery, I wiped away another attempt at putting elemental runes together. Human bodies are just too frail. The entire morning was spent trying to put runes of fire or lightning or plasma on my body, but actually attempting to use them resulted in my body getting burned or electrocuted or ¡®plasmafied¡¯, if that¡¯s even a word. All I know is that it fucking hurt. The runes that showed promise so far were runes of regeneration, which looked like a miniature salamander, strength, which resembled the Arm and Hammer logo, and hardness or defense, which looked like Roman tower shield. Those ones went on easy, actually performed as expected when mana was channeled into them, and made me feel like I had accomplished something. The others, well, the others made me feel like I had a future in high energy explosives.


    Sitting back in my chair staring at a clean slate, a weird thought popped into my head. Maybe the rune stuff wasn¡¯t working because it was somewhat against my nature. I am not a sorcerer of fire, or energy, or lightning, but of water, earth, nature, flesh, and mind are. Not having anywhere near the amount of time that I wanted, I stopped wasting it and got back to work. Conjuring a small block of granite, I let inspiration take over. Using my earth sorcery, I inscribed a defense rune on the front of it, a small cartoonish looking bomb in a tree on the bottom for explosive growth, and sharp points on the back of it. On the side, I did my best to put a tiny picture of a gnarly thorn bush on it and then pulled a tiny seed from my pocket. Giving it a quick kiss for good luck, I infused energy into it and pushed the seed into the granite cube which willingly swallowed the implant. Conjuring a small bit of quartz the size of a pencil eraser, I filled it with energy and pushed that in the cube so that it was touching the seed.


    Chuckling evilly to myself, I quickly made a handful more and stuck them in secret compartments in Svalinn. Those bad boys were the magical upgraded version of caltrops. I¡¯d be able to chuck them anywhere and the runes would cause the seed to quickly grow into a bush covered in super hard granite thorns. They could be used to clog up doorways, create dangerous obstacles, and what made it even better is that due to the seed, I¡¯d even be able to control the rock covered mutant plant if I wanted. I would totally give some credit to Meliad for helping me with this particular idea. The blend of living plant and impenetrable rock had so many uses that I hadn¡¯t even begun to tap.


    The next contraption was even deadlier. I called them ¡®cryoshards¡¯. The name wasn¡¯t that inventive, but it was better than the name for the last trap, ¡°planttrops¡¯, the combination of ¡®plant¡¯ and ¡®caltrops¡¯. This concept was much simpler, but far deadlier in so many ways. I conjured small shards of sapphire in the shape of playing cards, one side being etched with a skull inside a whirlpool and the other with a picture of rock being broken open by a hammer. Now these worked one of two ways, the first is that I could slap the sapphire card to a door or a wall skull side down so that the broken rock and hammer was showing and the card would use the ambient mana in the air to completely drain the heat out of the object it was touching while pumping cold magic into it rendering the object extremely brittle. Or, I could pump the card full of mana and slap it broken rock side down and the skull side whirlpool would not only explode out a wave of cold but it would suck out all the energy from the object that it was attached to.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    My earth sorcery could work as an easy delivery system for both sets of destructive creations, but my water sorcery has been left out of my strategic thinking for too long. It¡¯s obviously an incredible asset if I¡¯m near a body of water, but conjuring water to use it in battle is far slower than using the resources that I already have around me. Now, don¡¯t get me wrong, conjuring water is fairly fast, but I have so many options available that are simply faster. In a rainstorm though, I¡¯d probably be unstoppable. Taking off my armor, I set it down in front of me all perfectly laid out. What if I could take the slower part of water sorcery out of the equation. The issue isn¡¯t really that it¡¯s slow, it¡¯s that I only have so much brain power and can only do so many things at a time. Part of this can be mitigated by my consciousness sorcery, but I am limited. What exactly limits me? The presence of water or lack thereof slightly limits me. Nature and earth and flesh all either all around me all the time or literally make up my body, but water is in my blood, so using that as a medium for combat isn¡¯t conducive to longevity. I mean, the stuff that literally keeps you alive shouldn''t be the stuff you fight with.


    Tracing the kinetic runes on my armor that absorbed impacts, I idly found my finger making squiggly lines that kind of looked like waves. A mental ping went off. Closing my eyes, I started to meditate. Earlier in the week, I realized that even though I had consciousness sorcery, I still couldn¡¯t actively use one-hundred percent of my brain. Some of that was sectioned off for regulating my physical body, a large chunk went into my conscious thinking, but the other part was my unconscious mind. What I discovered was that somehow my unconscious was capable of a lot more than I had ever given it credit for. Using my mind sorcery, I created several processes wrapped in a question and sent them into that part of my brain. It was manual input of what normally happens to other people when they go to bed with a problem, sleep on it, and somehow wake up later with the answer. Their unconscious mind worked it out. Sometimes, the conscious mind just gets in the way, and that ping noise, was my unconscious mind spitting out an answer to a question I gave it days ago, how can I better use my magic?


    Water is motion. Motion is kinetic energy. Water is always moving, even if it¡¯s a lake, there¡¯s always the wind making a soft ripple or a fish splashing around. Water also fits to the shape of any container it is in, and frozen water can move too. Glaciers reshape landscapes with inexorable power. Holding this in my mind, I began to draw runes of oceans on the flat parts of my armor while carefully drawing runes of winding rivers at or near the joints. At the center of my chest plate and the center of my back plate, I carefully molded a fist sized circle with runes inside. A book to represent knowledge and the mind, all of the elements that I had control off and a miniature stick figure to represent my armor. Then, sectioning off a small piece of my mind and forming it into a situation specific subroutine, I devoted that to water auto-conjuration duty via the runes of my armor.


    Perfect. Not only would the kinetic and water runes work together to absorb impacts and keep the joints working smoothly, but in the midst of combat, I could just order my suit via the water runes to constantly conjure water and that would free me up to use it. Cutting out an entire step might just save my ass in combat, and because water doesn¡¯t get in the way in the same manner as earth or nature, it shouldn¡¯t cause any issue in regards to impeding movement.


    After putting more runes on my armor, I then pulled out seeds from a thorny vine I¡¯d collected earlier and pushed them into my armor so that they were just below the surface. Etching a rune of control and fast growth on top of it was easy, and I grinned evilly again. Nobody would suspect me to sprout vampiric vines if combat got too close for comfort, and if I keep up this evil look on my face, I might have to use flesh sorcery to fix that later.


    Now for the pi¨¨ce de r¨¦sistance, I pulled out a sealed stone box that I had stored away what felt like eons ago. Some of my Chaos altered minerals and metals from during the Sixth Ripple had been tucked away and I had almost forgotten about them. Outfitting Johnny and Reeanth with awesome gear actually wasn¡¯t that much of a plus or minus for me in any personal way. I made sure that I didn¡¯t give them anything too powerful, but in reality, their gear was practice for me. Some of those runes I had to redo due to impractical resonance, and working on different things helped me learn more than anything here so far. The truly epic items were Svalinn and Gungnir, but losing the active slice of Gungnir seriously hurt my combat potential. The armor I wore made up for it some and the consciousness sorcery picked up the slack, but there had to be something else that I could make.


    Touching the box with my finger, my earth sorcery cracked the lid open. A hunk of Chaos infused gold set next to a hefty bar of silver that seemed to undulate in the yellow light of the firestone. These plus a perfectly preserved dragon corpse that I still had in stasis could make gear epic enough that nerds would tell tall tales about it for centuries, if only I had the fucking know how to actually use the resources at my disposal. Again, having Gungnir hack the brains in the crystal brain vat would have been useful, but another ping kicked an idea from my unconscious to the forefront of my mind. Who truly deserves lovingly crafted, handmade magical gear other than my most faithful companion?


    Shaping the right gauntlet of Svalinn into ten inch razor, I walked over to the gaint freezer where Rath¡¯s body lay. The section of his body that I wanted was easy to get to. After climbing into the freezer, I hacked at the wing joint where it connected to the shoulder and did the same for the other. With both wings off, I tossed them to the side and began the worst part, getting to the hamstring. An hour of delicate cutting and cuss-word laden hacking later, I pulled yards of tendon out of the damn dragon and laid it next to the severed wings. Damn, this is gonna take forever.


    Suffice to say, I didn¡¯t get to sleep as much that night as I wanted. It took two hours just to cut the thick tendons up the way I wanted, and the skin of the wing was plenty soft for what I wanted, but the real prize was the skin on the tops of the bones. That was the toughest but most useful skin I could get to. Weaving it all together into a giant collar took forever compared to the three hours of enchanting I put into it. Where a dog tag would be, I put the Chaos-infused gold that I had shaped into a shield shaped pentagon and stuck the firestone inside of it. Then, using earth sorcery, I stroked the rippling silver until it became super thin wire which I wove into the fibers of the makeshift collar.


    I hooked up the gold pendant with a mana link to the river kinetic converter runes so it could charge up to the max amount while I worked. Surprisingly, the gold held about fifty times the amount of energy than all of my crystal batteries did put together. When the charging was done, I etched into the firestone the most complicated set of dependency runes that I could. An unconscious control rune denoted by a brain with z¡¯s floating around it was the big one, and inside of it were runes of fire control and healing as well as durability and energy containment. My whole goal of making this elaborate collar was two-fold. The first was to beef up my part dragon, fire and flesh sorcery wielding mutt as much as magically possible, but the second was also a test case. Does enchanting with resonating materials create a better product?

 Chapter 97 - Unfortunate Truths (Book 2 Chapter 4)

    *******


    ¡°Stupid, nasty, icky, fuckin useless ass lump of half-living leather, FUCK!¡±


    The process of carrying the heavy woven enchanted leather collar for Spot wasn¡¯t hard, or it wasn¡¯t supposed to be hard. In fact, it was annoyingly weird. It turns out, enchanting things whose nature is the exact opposite of your own carries strange side effects. I was more than physically capable of actually lifting the collar, but moving it almost made the damn thing come alive. It kept twisting and turning and undulating like a snake that wanted to get the fuck away from me.


    ¡°I MADE YOU!¡± I screamed at it, both hands gripping the gold medallion. I could almost hear it hiss in displeasure, but my mind reassured me that it didn¡¯t have a mouth or lungs. It was the middle of the night and all I wanted to do was sleep, but this thing did not want to cooperate with me. I had mentally pinged Spot twenty minutes ago so that he would meet me at the under-tree hideout entrance, and he was excitedly barking his head, jumping for joy even though he couldn¡¯t see me. ¡°I will curse you, I will drag you, I will fucking UNDO YOU if you don¡¯t just come with me!¡± I growled, cracking the medallion up and down like a whip. ¡°You know what? Fine, you wanna play this way, let¡¯s fuckin do it, let¡¯s go bitch!¡±


    Losing my patience on something I made wasn¡¯t new, but the last one that talked back was Gungnir, and I don¡¯t really like it when inanimate things talk back. Conjuring buckets of sand, I used earth sorcery to encase the medallion and the giant dragon-leather collar into a ball of sand. ¡°How do you like me now asshole?!¡± I celebrated, easily pulling the ball of sand. Kicking open the door from the tunnel to the under-tree hideout, I smugly skipped through my living room.


    ¡°What¡¯s with the giant tennis ball?¡± Johnny said, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. ¡°It¡¯s too damn late to be playing fetch with that big ass dog! What the fuck man?¡±


    Reeanth stepped out of the kitchen doorway. ¡°Silence runt,¡± she commanded. ¡°The lord of the land has no need to explain himself to you.¡± Turning her head to face me and the wayward collar, her eyes lit up scanning the makeshift container. ¡°Did you make an enchanted snake with a heart of gold? Are you creating living things now my lord?¡±


    ¡°Yo I don¡¯t fuck wit¡¯ snakes man . . . ¡° Johnny said, backing up with his hands partly up in the air. ¡°They¡¯re all kinds of messed up. Poison, chokin, hidin¡¯ and sneakin¡¯ round. Oh no, sounds like my last girlfriend, so hell no.¡±


    Before I could say anything at all he bolted back out into the room I had tunneled for him. Reeanth turned her eyes towards me.


    ¡°Ah come on!¡± I yelled, putting the giant floating ball of sand in between us, ¡°Turn that shit off! You know it burns!¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry my lord,¡± she said, cutting of the sorcerous eye beams, ¡°I do forget the side effects of my own abilities at times.¡±


    ¡°Well put some practice into it, and get some sleep. We got a long day tomorrow.¡±


    But my day, or night really, wasn¡¯t over yet. Opening the door to the outside freaked me out just a bit as Spot¡¯s mouth was wide open right in front of the door, his tongue lashing around and his horrible dog breath coming in hot.


    ¡°Back up mutt! I got a present for you!¡± I said lovingly, ¡°And I¡¯m sure it can¡¯t wait to see you either!¡±


    Spot bounded back and ran around the glad like a puppy hunting for a place to pee. Tossing the sand ball in the middle of the clearing, I banished all the sand and let the collar fall. What I hadn¡¯t anticipated was that the minute sparks of Chaos that had remained in the firestone somehow combined oddly with the living silver to form a semi-intelligent thing. What was worse was that I couldn¡¯t really grasp what it was looking for. All I can figure out is that a sum greater than its parts had emerged. Looking back, it might have been totally brilliant. The leather came from a fire-aspected dragon, and dragons love treasure, and making the collar was combining things that really should go together, such as dragon leather with Chaos-altered gold and silver and an altered firestone. The whole idea was then to give the completed project to a mutated canine that had eaten part of a dragon and gained characteristics of said dragon from the flesh sorcery that I had given it. Maybe, just maybe, this all would line up and make my canine even more badass, hopefully.


    I stayed right in front of the entrance of my home, ready to haul ass if I had to. The now free magical collar reared up, its medallion seeming to look around as if it were the head. Spot crouched low, growling deep and angry. I sent a picture of what I wanted to Spot, for him to dominate and put on the collar. I also sent the feeling that it might even be better than a treat, but I definitely had a treat for him when he was done.


    With a giant bark and leap, Spot landed on the collar with his two front paws, growling at it as he exuded waves of raw mana. The collar almost let out a squeak as it went limp. Spot snatched up the medallion with his teeth and flung it into the air, pointing his snout perfectly up. Almost as if an artist painted it, the collar opened up and fell down perfectly snug around his neck.


    ¡°Don¡¯t look smug¡± I said, grinning my butt of. ¡°I made it just for you boy.¡±


    My trusty canine¡¯s tail thumped like a machine gun against the ground, almost causing me to fall.


    ¡°Hey now, I know you want the treat. Stay,¡± I commanded, ¡°I¡¯ll be right back.¡±


    Ten minutes later, I had thrown Spot a basketball sized chunk of dragon meat and I watched him to make sure he didn¡¯t go into another metamorphosis coma. It was fascinating to watch with my flesh sorcery what was going on. I stood next to Spot with one hand on his leg and felt his seed of flesh sorcery that I had given him, only, it wasn¡¯t a seed anymore. The implanted magic had grown and woven itself into every fiber of his being, and the DNA or magical parts of fire and dragon had been as well. I turned my attention to Spot¡¯s stomach were the chunk of dragon was sitting. Spot hadn¡¯t even chewed or gnawed on it, simply swallowed the whole thing as if I actively starved him. It was dissolving in his stomach acid super fast, as if it was a furnace in there. I waited for twenty minutes just to make sure that nothing weird happened, then called it a night.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.


    The next morning brought all the promise of a new day but all the perils of the apocalypse with it. I spent the early morning finishing drawing the temporary tattoos for my companions and making some canned soup for breakfast. When the other two woke, I had steaming bowls of mushroom soup for them, and a stone tablet each with runic carvings, and I gotta say, earth sorcery makes carving so easy.


    ¡°Look, I know it doesn¡¯t go together, but it¡¯s what I got right now.¡±


    Johnny looked at me, Reeanth, then at the soup next to a hot cup of coffee. ¡°Hard times for farmers huh?¡±


    ¡°Yeah man,¡± I answered, ¡°But we¡¯re hunting off the land from here on out. Most of the other cans of food are spoiled. It seems methods of preserving that don¡¯t involve magic might be out the door.¡±


    ¡°Yes my lord, higher levels of mana simultaneously do and do not accelerate the overall decay rate.¡±


    ¡°Huh?¡± Johnny mumbled through a big mouthful of soup.


    ¡°Preserved foods in the presence of mana deteriorate faster,¡± she clarified. ¡°The same goes for dried meats. Most people or mundanes use nullification or stasis boxes for food preservation. It is by far the most energy efficient technology for food.¡±


    ¡°Huh?¡±


    I looked at Johnny, ¡°Magic dude, magic.¡±


    ¡°Oh.¡±


    Rolling my eyes, I turned back to Reeanth. ¡°So, take a look at that tablet there, those hold the blueprints for the melanin tattoos I was gonna do for you if you want. They¡¯ll only last a couple months, but they may just save you life. Also,¡± I paused to pull out a belt. ¡°This goes with it too. It¡¯s a kinetic energy distributor as well as an extra mana storage unit.¡±


    ¡°Looks like a belt man.¡±


    ¡°Yes Johnny,¡± I said, ¡°It is a belt. It¡¯s an enchanted belt.¡±


    ¡°Oh.¡±


    ¡°So this does what my lord?¡±


    ¡°The runes over here go on your sternum, back, and all four limbs. Those ones distribute kinetic energy across your whole body instead of just one point, so bullets shouldn¡¯t be a problem for you. And, if the energy is too much for your entire body to handle, the belt will handle the bleedoff,¡± I explained. Continuing on, I said, ¡°The best part is that it can store an incredible amount of energy and also you can use what you¡¯ve stored to power your suit or heal or whatever you want. These ones over there, are regeneration runes. They¡¯ll help your body deal with extra lactic acid or carbon dioxide so your stamina should just be ridiculous. And lastly, these ones are rune channels so that your nano-tech suit can draw or push excess mana up and down them.¡±


    Her jaw dropped. ¡°Thought you might like that,¡± I smirked, ¡°And, I also took the liberty of implanting kinetic and transfer runes on your mana-maul. There¡¯s a small diamond in there too just in case you need some extra oomph.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not worthy my lord! War runes are not for one such as I? Only landed vassals may have such things, and that¡¯s after graduating from the Poly-Arcane Institute of War and Research!¡±


    My eyes narrowed just a bit from curiosity. ¡°What uh, tell me a bit about that?¡± I said lightly.


    ¡°Only the richest and most powerful go there my lord. I am a noble now that I have sorcery, but I haven¡¯t been recognized by the Centauri ranks as a sorcerer yet. The shortest education you can receive is a decade long. Your ancestor Merlin helped to found it, but it has changed in the last few millennia.¡±


    After lodging that tidbit of knowledge away in my brain, I turned to Johnny. ¡°Want a tattoo man? It¡¯s not permanent but it¡¯ll help you kick ass.¡±


    ¡°Fuck yeah!¡± he said through his last bite, scraping the bowl clean. ¡°Let¡¯s do this! As long as you let me show the monkey king who¡¯s boss when we get back.¡±


    ¡°Fine.¡±


    Taking my time after breakfast to use flesh sorcery to make tattoos was not as involved as I thought it¡¯d be. My abilities were more than happy to darken melanin however I wanted in whatever shape I desired. Reeanth¡¯s flesh almost leaped at my touch, bending to my magic like a willing worker who is obviously overpaid. Her body took to the runes as if they were meant to be there all along. Johnny however, something about his body rejected all but the most basic runes. The mana storage runes barely worked, but the kinetic absorption worked great, as if he were meant for movement and combat.


    The regeneration runes I put on him also wouldn¡¯t link to the mana storage runes or the rune channels to a mana storage gauntlet I¡¯d made for him. They only worked if it pulled from his body¡¯s internal stores of power. I figured that it had something to do with his dependence on a different kind of energy than what I was using.


    ¡°Johnny, what kind of power do you use? I use mana, but your body uses something different, what is it and how do you picture it?¡±


    ¡°Hell if I know the name of it. I just call it power. And it works best when I¡¯m at peace.¡±


    ¡°Peace huh?¡± I muttered to myself, wiping off all the mana storage runes from his skinny bare chest. Taking a moment to picture something that¡¯s completely alien to me, I carefully opened myself fully to my flesh and mana sorcery, taking in every detail of Johnny¡¯s inner workings. As I watched his heart beat and his blood pulse, I mapped out in my head piece by piece every biological system and their connections. [There, there, over there, and . . . . some right there, weird,] I thought to myself. [There¡¯s little holes that exist metaphysically all over him.] My consciousness sorcery joined the mix to open up my senses to his soul, and that¡¯s where information started flooding in. Certain points on Johnny¡¯s body, many points in fact, seemed to emit a kind of suction, but I couldn¡¯t see what the point was until I saw his soul. Johnny¡¯s soul was tied to his body at well over a hundred different points, like little tiny anchors. And those anchors were sucking up some kind of energy that was invisible to me but I could tell were there as his soul rippled with every pulse of inward suction.


    There was a big point in the middle of his forehead, but it seemed to be exhibiting less force than the rest of his points that were much smaller. Taking a small leap of logic, I put my finger on his forehead. No change in the odd suction. I couldn¡¯t even feel it, physically or meta-physically, as if I existed on a different wavelength than the energy Johnny needed to survive. Coaxing my flesh sorcery, I started to coax the skin on his forehead to darken and my unconscious pinged me. Pulling my magic back for a moment, I retreated into my mind as waves, no, flashes of memories and information rocked my head.


    ¡°You ok man? What¡¯s goin on?¡± Johnny¡¯s concern was nice, but it didn¡¯t help the raging headache that came from nowhere.


    ¡°Nah man, my head hurts,¡± I said, trying to keep the information I¡¯d just been bombarded with from the forefront of my brain. ¡°Maybe I overdid it the past couple days. Anyways, you¡¯re good to go, have fun.¡±


    Standing up, I hurried back to the under-river bolthole and locked it down. I didn¡¯t look at anyone or anything until I knew I was totally alone. Suddenly, my chest started heaving and feeling heavy. Using flesh sorcery, I forced my body to calm down, but something I had unconsciously learned was freaking out the part of my brain that no human normally gets to meet. Shakily forcing myself to sit down, I scooted over to the center of the cavern where one of the giant matter-to-mana generators quietly pulsed. Putting my back against it, I tried to relax and let my mind play through the information.


    Gungnir, the conscious bit that stuffed back into my head by Gav¡¯riel, had brought information with it when it got put back. Some of the stuff was the surface information from the copy of Reeanth¡¯s brain, but some of it was the organized stuff that Gungnir had retrieved from Rath¡¯s brain.


    The spur of the moment idea that I had that I was going to experiment with was apparently dangerous, the way that a literal dragon would view it as life-threatening. Since the mana containment and mana siphon runes wouldn¡¯t work for a cultivator, I wanted to see if I could make runes that would let him draw in his own kind of power. Going with the stereotype, the Eastern religion thing, I pictured the image for Yin and Yang, somehow feeling in my gut that would probably get the job done for him. In that moment, memories from Rath retrieved by Gungnir kicked my subconscious into action.


    Images of sorcerers in chains, painting scripts and vile runes in their own blood while cultivators lashed them with crackling whips covered in thorns. Snapshots of dragon nests dashed to pieces while cultivators ripped eggs apart. Flashes of wizard towers torn down by groups of cultivators maniacally laughing. The pictures stopped as suddenly as they had started, but one phrase came to the fore, You know not what has been unleashed.

 Chapter 98 - You Cant Stop the Bear (Book 2 Chapter 5)

    ********


    Where do we draw the line between trusting ourselves and our own senses versus what someone else tells us? Trickles of somewhat relevant information kept coming to me at times when I wasn¡¯t actively pondering something. Rath¡¯s knowledge broken down by long-gone Gungnir fed into my brain as we flew down the remnant of Interstate 95 South. The road itself, the asphalt and cement, were gone, but it formed a rough valley ridged by hills and mountains on a north to south bent; it was nature¡¯s highway now. The view was great from up here, three giant mutated avians a little smarter than dolphins had agreed this morning to let Johnny and Reeanth and I ride on them in exchange for letting them roost in the high branches of the World Tree. The hardest part of that conversation was the translation issues but Meliad was more than happy to be our mediator. Something about my ¡®squawk¡¯ was highly appealing to them, that and the way me and my gear constantly put off ¡®squawking¡¯ mana. Birdbrains. I was all for supplying guardians for my wife-tree, but it seemed that too many people or things as of late just wanted to be near her. That¡¯s one mystery I¡¯ll have to table for later.


    The simple hamadryad was also confused as to why I made deals with the flock instead of simply enslaving them like I clearly had the power to do to her with my nature sorcery, but the thought of doing that left a bad taste in my mouth. I clearly remembered Kong¡¯s pure hatred for me after he was free, and I know for a fact that a community of some kind is key to long-term survival. My community now isn¡¯t entirely human, but I can make it work, and giant crowlike eagles are excellent air support.


    Spot¡¯s whine brought me back to the present as the wind whipped us with almost frozen air. The collar I had made for him included small things that Rath had been able to do, most convenient of which was the ability to change size and constantly generating heat. I know I didn¡¯t put either of those magical effects in there, but the resonance between the materials and the genetics of the part dragon-canine must have triggered it. The tank of a dog wouldn¡¯t fit up on the bird at first, so we planned on leaving him. To which Spot responded by sprinting across the clearing in a frenzy, shrinking until he was the size of a great dane and then bounded up on the bird with me. Unbounded loyalty combined with magic produces the weirdest things.


    Passing what used to be Richmond, the capital of Virginia, was a total drag. A bombed out looking giant crater that magically enhanced nature was doing its best to reclaim. Humanoid forms somewhat larger than my golems back home fought around gigantic bonfires while what looked to be dinosaurs paced in humongous pens made from fallen trees and boulders. The somewhat smaller city of Petersburg just a bit further south was in a similar situation, but the crater was ringed with walls at least eight stories high. A very skinny silver spire dominated the center of the crater while a strange inky darkness obfuscated the view of the surrounding area of the spire from view. Thick smoke billowed up from the darkness randomly freaking out our rides who pushed themselves to climb higher than the smoke.


    Not having to fight traffic or air control did wonders for our time. We hit right around where South Carolina was before we landed for the night. I studiously ignored the glares from my human companions as they sprinted off to do their business while I conjured and shaped earth to form a temporary shelter roughly the size of a doublewide trailer. Birds one through three took off to find themselves some food as Spot grew to his normal size and followed on foot.


    Reeanth stormed towards me as I finished up getting our camp ready.


    ¡°Just because you can use flesh sorcery to manage your body does NOT mean the rest of us can ignore HAVING TO PEE!¡±


    Holding one hand in front of my eyes to ward off the glare of light coming from hers, I chuckled. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, seriously, I totally forgot. This ability is too convenient.¡±


    ¡°And water too man? Where the hell do you keep pulling it from?¡± Johnny asked, joining Reeanth in tearing me a new one. ¡°Kind of a dick move to not share summa¡¯ dat. Little thirsty here!¡± With a quick pull of his hands, he finished zipping his pants up.


    ¡°You do that out there,¡± Reeanth said to him, rolling her eyes. ¡°No one wants to see what you lack.¡±


    ¡°What I lack?! Bitch! All that height and no titties? Who¡¯s lackin now?¡± Johnny fired back. ¡°Tall girls aren¡¯t worth climbing unless they got fruit up there, and trust me, I see no fruit.¡±


    One of Reeanth¡¯s long legs whipped out, punting Johnny back into the woods. Reeanth followed his momentarily airborne form, screaming the whole time.


    ¡°Guess no one wants water, or to help me set up the fucking camp,¡± I grumbled, turning back to the camp. I easily dug a firepit and then another but much deeper hole with stone blocks in it. With a flex of will, I conjured enough water to fill it up. ¡°One more step and hot tub, here we come!¡± I celebrated, dancing a small jig as I finished looking over everything. The sunlight was fading fast, so I gave in just a bit to my hermit instincts. Using my earth sorcery again, I walked around our camp conjuring up a three foot thick, ten foot tall stone wall with a glass-like exterior. Leaving one opening in the direction of where my companions were duking it out, I conjured three piles about the size of a twin mattress each of the softest sand my earth magic could make in three separate rooms. The temporary house had more than enough room for the three of us, and each pile of soft sand went to a respective room.


    Thinking of security, I formed the doorways to be skinnier than anyone would think to do. Most doorways in a house are at least three feet and change wide to allow a normal person to walk through comfortably, but I formed mine to be as tall as Reeanth but only about a foot wide. This way, I wouldn¡¯t have to go through the problems of making hinges or sealing people in so that I would have to get out. Also, large predators wouldn¡¯t be able to squeeze through the slender opening, and if the smaller ones were able to take care of my companions, then I chose poorly for this trip. Walking out the entrance to the camp wall, I held up a stone I enchanted to give off a ridiculous amount of light and looked around.


    ¡°Bring back firewood when you¡¯re done!¡± I yelled, scanning the woods. Not hearing any sounds of acknowledgement, only yells and screams and booms, I dropped the light stone I was holding and quickly made another. Holding that in my fist, I summoned Gungnir and started walking towards the woods. ¡°You better be fighting each other and not something stupidly big and dangerous ya hear!¡±


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    With a flash of light, Johnny sprinted out of the darkness and slammed into me, bouncing off my magical shield.


    ¡°Get outta my way fool!¡± Johnny¡¯s yell accompanied his mad scramble to get back to his feet. Dirt sprayed from where his feet kicked off as he tore off in the direction of camp. Using earth sorcery, I turned the ground to quicksand and watched him epically flop into it.


    ¡°Where the fuck are you going? She¡¯s not that scary man.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but the bear is! And it ain¡¯t fuckin normal!¡±


    Using the quicksand as a giant hand, I pushed Johnny back towards me. ¡°What did you do?¡± I asked intensely, the light from the pebble pulsing and making my face look like a creepy mask.


    ¡°It didn¡¯t look like a bear! I thought it was a rock, so I peed on it, ya know, doin what dudes do in the woods, and holy shit did that rock get angry. So we need haul ass, like now!¡±


    I turned back towards the woods just in time to see Reeanth get blasted out of the woods. Landing at my feet, I saw long bloody claw marks healing before my eyes as she grasped her mana-maul. Between the torn links in her nano-armor, I saw her regen runes glowing, my mana-sight revealing to me that my experiment worked. A loud crack interrupted my thoughts as her ribs rearranged themselves just a bit.


    ¡°What kind of bear did you piss off, or on?¡± I asked incredulously, frantically scanning the deepening darkness of the edge of the woods. A load roar quickly boomed, almost as if answering me. ¡°Fuck, that¡¯s definitely way too close for comfort¡± I muttered, dropping the light stone to my feet as I activated Svalinn. The gauntlets came alive as metal on both arms grew out to form mini shields, the smaller-twins of the giant magical shields that snapped into existence five feet out from me. The swirling blue light with streaks of red captured the overpowered shields from my gauntlets. ¡°Yeah baby!¡± I yelled, stabbing Gungnir¡¯s base into the dirt between my feet. ¡°Don¡¯t get to take you out for a spin too often!¡±


    Using my consciousness sorcery, I activated a runic subroutine that I had duplicated on the inside crystalline strata of Gungnir and on the inner side of the two parts of Svalinn, the energy resonance diagram. This was my most ambitious project to date as it began to combine some of the lessons that had bruised my pride in the past. The gravity compactor I made for Johnny incorporated using multiples of runes at the correct location to create a more powerful, more focused effect, while my consciousness sorceries showed me more clearly how to link magical objects together.


    Also, my consciousness sorcery also showed me a memory from a while ago that I hadn¡¯t gone over in too much detail. When fighting those teenage idiot paladins, I hadn¡¯t noticed at the time, but all of their magical gear was somehow in sync. It¡¯s weird how smart our brains are separate from our conscious minds. My brain had held on to that memory with far more detail than I ever dreamed possible. Using my mental talents, I was able to go back and take another look, and actually see that their armor was combined with many little runic effects that came together to form a more powerful whole. The copies of the diagram I carved into my tools allowed them to easily share their more individual characteristics. Their split stores of energy could now flow back and forth and the fire nature in Svalinn that came from Rath¡¯s soul could now be channeled by Gungnir while Svalinn could tap into the projection nature of Gungnir to not only make shields but push them out, simulating someone getting hit by a truck of magical force.


    My excitement somehow got the better of me, clearly ignoring the valid danger that kicked the crap out of a baby cultivator and a Centauri battle wizard. I took an old hunter¡¯s trick and sang at the top of my lungs. ¡°Come on, shake your body baby, do the conga, I know you can''t control yourself any longer!¡± I let the words of the probably dead singer Gloria Estefan ring out as I waggled my hips just a tiny bit. Couldn¡¯t help myself. If you hear that song, somethins¡¯ gotta move.


    The out of tune answering roar heralded a bear bigger who at the shoulder was as tall as Kong, but it¡¯s almost an insult to call it a simple bear. The flickering light from my light stone revealed long fangs that looked like speckled granite, shoulders that boulders were jealous off, and even its fur had a gritty quality to it. My earth sorcery and mana-sight showed me that this bear was as in touch with the earth itself as me. Marble shards were in its bones, obsidian covered its claws and there was a kind of flesh-stone amalgamation of body armor just under its fur, as if it were wearing a sort of natural kevlar.


    My singing died in my throat as the second verse caught at the sight of this behemoth. Bravado forced my fear to unclench my asshole just a bit as my natural sarcasm screamed for me to joke in the face of danger. ¡°How do you ¡®bear¡¯ all that weight you overgrown twat?! How come you get to walk around in ¡®bear-feet¡¯ but I get yelled at when I do it? This story will be ¡®bear-ly¡¯ believable! I can ¡°bear-ly¡¯ stand cause I¡¯m so FUCKIN SCARED!¡±


    ¡°Fuck the puns man!¡± Johnny yelled from somewhere behind me. ¡°Just run!¡±


    The dark part of me wishes that I had tripped Johnny, letting the bear do the dirty work that Rath¡¯s memories begged me to do. I hadn¡¯t forgotten what the dragon¡¯s memories had shown me, but doing that to some innocent kid, I¡¯m not sure that I would have been able to live with myself after. And as far as I can tell, he¡¯s got more than enough missing up top to not be a serious threat to me. The other thing keeping him alive is that I honestly like him. He¡¯s dumb and strong and has the potential to live as long as me without my interference, and immortals don¡¯t come by every day. Big bear¡¯s deafening roar brought me back to the present.


    My knees were almost knocking together. The sheer presence of this primal creature was terrifyingly frightening, not just in its size, but in the concept of the absolute truth that this animal was the king of the forest and I was an ant that normally was tolerated simply because I didn¡¯t matter. But now, somehow, this ant and its ant companions had to go and prod something that could literally step on us with a thought and end us. And I knew that, instinctively, until my flesh and mind sorcery hailed from the back of my mind to remind me that I had magic. This was a bear, yes, a big one, but I wasn¡¯t just a human, I am a mother fuckin sorcerer.


    Reaching down with one hand, I grabbed Reeanth and dragged her behind me and reset myself, deeply drawing upon my stored energy and infusing that into my brain. Reaching out with condensed nuke¡¯s worth of mana, I infused it with the fear that my body had felt, and spiked it directly into Big Bear¡¯s brain. The giant animal¡¯s eyes rolled into the back of its head as it collapsed. The earth bucked with its weight, almost making a tiny localized earthquake.


    ¡°Did you kill it, did I miss it, how¡¯d you do it?¡±


    Johnny¡¯s chatter irritated Reeanth more than it did me. Dusting herself off, she rounded on him and growled, ¡°Magic.¡±


    ¡°I mean, duh, but,¡± he sputtered, ¡°I didn¡¯t see shit.¡±


    Taking a few deep breaths to come to grips with the fact that I had fear-factored a mountain of a bear, I turned my suddenly achy body towards Johnny and formed a small sphere of mental energy empowering a rune above my hand. The wispy mental energy softly glowed to my sight as the figure for mental defense pulsed. ¡°You don¡¯t see this?¡± I asked, staring at the space above my outstretched hand. ¡°I made a rune and empowered it.¡± A whole minute of him squinting at my hand goes by.


    ¡°Nope. Nothin there dude.¡±


    ¡°What about this?¡± I dispelled the condensed energy and then conjured a bit of pure magic at the point right before it would have conjured earth and held it towards him.


    ¡°Dude, there¡¯s nothin there.¡±


    I let the potential energy flare in its normal process that usually is a million times faster. The soft earth popped into existence and fell into my hand.


    ¡°Now ya got some dirt there. I see that.¡±


    ¡°My lord, we have bigger concerns than his inability to see magic in its purest form.¡±


    Dropping my hand, I looked over at the bear. ¡°Yeah, sooo,¡± I said slowly, ¡°I¡¯m not actually sure about this. I know what I did, but, I¡¯m not sure what that means exactly . . .¡±


    ¡°My lord?¡±


    Scratching at my chin, I examined the bear in the magical spectrum. ¡°It¡¯s definitely still alive, I just don¡¯t know in what context. I took a huge spike of mental magic, infused it with the fear I felt when the damn thing roared at me and hurled it into its head. It¡¯s obviously not dead, but is it a vegetable? Did it faint with fright, or did I burn out some neurons, and now we have a literal retarded bear that¡¯s halfway made out of stone? I¡¯m not sure which of these is the worst option.¡±


    ¡°Can I keep it?¡± Johnny quipped. His hands were in the classic begging position that any three year old knows.


    ¡°You certainly may not!¡±


    ¡°Sure.¡±

 Chapter 99 - The Wider Picture (Book 2 Chapter 6)

    *******


    And by ¡®sure¡¯, I meant, ¡®what the literal fuck¡¯ or ¡®are you fucking kidding me¡¯ or ¡®if you can . . ?¡±. To be perfectly clear, I was stunned that I had taken down this animal in a non-lethal manner without explosions or bloodshed, but actually doing something with this creature presented several problems. First, I wanted to get some sleep and get on my way down to Florida, and second, I didn¡¯t really want to be here when it woke up. Reasonable paranoia was screaming its bloody little head off, warning me to pop smoke and disappear from over sized magical animals, and if I wasn¡¯t dumb enough to do that, then to put it down for good.


    Gingerly walking up to the slow-breathing bear, I stopped five feet away. The sheer girth was awe inspiring, but its breath was kickin¡¯. Reaching out with my mind sorcery, I carefully rooted around in its brain and found where the hibernation instincts were, and then followed them to where they ended near the normal sleep instinct patterns started. Weaving a small runic diagram of peace undergirded with safety and security, I wedged it right between its instincts and put plenty of mana into it, long enough that it should last for a month unless I removed it. Taking a few steps back, I gathered up my companions and took them back to camp.


    ¡°Ok,¡± I started, making sure to keep my voice softer than usual, ¡°No creature is dumb enough to mess with a bear that big except for us, and now it won¡¯t wake up unless we do something stupid. I want to head down south and fast.¡±


    ¡°My lord,¡± Reeanth whispered, ¡°Is this not another opportunity?¡±


    ¡°For us to get eaten? Yes, that¡¯s exactly what this is. Play stupid games and you win stupid prizes.¡±


    ¡°Aw come on man!¡± Johnny interrupted, his voice barely louder than my own. ¡°Can you see me riding that beast into battle? We could be badass kings if we wanted to! You got your flaming dog and I got a mountain bear, and we find something stuck up to fit your giant lady friend.¡±


    Before another fight could erupt, I put my hand on Reeanth¡¯s arm and squeezed just a bit. Her readied outburst died in her throat as I glared at her. ¡°Now¡¯s not the fucking time for this,¡± I growled at both of them. ¡°I say we sleep and get a move on early and let the bear wake up naturally and do bear things.¡±


    ¡°My lord is correct, although, if it is still asleep when we return then it may be a valuable resource to harvest. There are many in the multiverse that would pay a handsome price for such a specimen. Mana-mutated animals on this scale tend to be rare, and can even be potent ingredients for weapons, food, supplies and alchemical potions.¡±


    ¡°We are not turning my bear into a goddamn rug!¡± Johnny fired back. ¡°I¡¯m gonna tame it, ride it, and we¡¯re gonna be best friends!¡±


    My head dropped into one hand as the beginnings of a headache crept into my temples, which my flesh sorcery conveniently banished. Three deep breaths later, I looked Johnny dead in the eye.


    ¡°How?¡± I asked, ¡°How in the world are you going to tame that?¡±


    ¡°With this!¡±


    A small flash of light pulsed from his staff that was currently in its short walking stick form. A small scroll popped into existence just above his hand and plopped down suddenly. My intense bewilderment prompted Johnny¡¯s answer.


    ¡°My staff dude. It¡¯s like a magical suitcase. I can stick stuff in there and this scroll came with it. Some mumbo jumbo voice told me when I was high that this could get me a pet or something, but I would have to choose.¡±


    To my magical senses, the scroll felt like a completely normal piece of paper. There were a bunch of scribbles on the inside that I couldn¡¯t immediately decipher, but there was no mana or magic or sorcery in that scroll whatsoever.


    ¡°So, I¡¯m going to do something really dumb man,¡± I replied, somehow squashing my surprise enough to formulate a thought. ¡°I¡¯m going to trust you.¡±


    He took a deep breath as his face lit up. Reeanth quickly smothered his imminent explosive jubilation with her hand. ¡°Quiet cretin! This definitely does not work if you wake it now!¡±


    Sheepishly nodding while clutching his scroll, he went really still to show he got the picture.


    ¡°Good, now stay that way, or I¡¯ll break your leg and kick the bear in the nose, leaving you here as a distraction,¡± she threatened, taking her hand away from his mouth. She casually swung her mana-maul around in her other hand to show she meant business. That weapon weighs well over thirty pounds and Reeanth was handling it like a child¡¯s toy. His Adam¡¯s apple jumped up and down as he gulped with a hint of fear, miming zipping his lips closed.


    Turning to me, Reeanth wasted no time. ¡°My lord, is there a way that you can keep the bear mentally pliable or vulnerable. This scroll seems to be a Chaos based artifact form when the Ripple altered the Earth. There is a very good chance that this would work on the bear, and honestly, it would be an incredible asset to have.¡±


    Looking back towards the monstrous bear and then back at me, she continued, ¡°Everything in the universe respects strength, and your strength attracts more of the like. It would be a waste to not take advantage of this.¡±


    I took a few minutes to think about it as my two companions gathered dead wood from the surrounding area. Threats of waking the bear and assurances that I could keep it asleep sufficiently motivated them to do the work for me. The light from the enchanted lightstone was calming as sleep poked at the edges of my awareness, which I promptly pushed back with flesh sorcery. A giant bear, who would have thought? And besides, a giant armored bear, you couldn¡¯t ask for a better playmate for Spot. This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.


    I really wanted to let Johnny have at it, but the simple fact that the scroll looked like nothing significant to me bothered me more the more I thought about it. Does this mean that the energy that Johnny uses is invisible to my senses, kind of in the same way that my pure magic is invisible to him? He does his cultivation meditation thing, and I can see in the magical spectrum that his body is changing, but I cannot see the agent or medium by which it is. It just looks like his body is doing its own thing, taking in a nutrient that I can¡¯t perceive, and getting better because of it.


    ¡°What¡¯s it really like out there?¡± I asked, directing my question to Reeanth who was building the fire. I checked to make sure Johnny was still sitting up on top of the wall surrounding the camp meditating. ¡°I know the universe is big and all, probably in the way that I cannot conceptually conceive it, but . . .¡±


    Taking her gathered wood and arranging it into a pyramid, Reeanth touched it and softly spoke a word. A spark jumped from her fingertip and the fire was lit.


    ¡°The many realms are not just ¡®big¡¯ my lord, but they are far apart as defined by how you understand space. Some races choose to brave the endless wastes of the cold void in search of new places to settle, while others manipulate space itself to shorten the distance. Portals, gates, spatial cracks, wavelength transportation, and the most insane travel by way of the Cosmic web.¡± Leaning back against one of the piles of dirt in the shape of a couch I conjured, she put her feet up and stared into the blaze.


    ¡°There are many ways to get where you¡¯re going, but you actually have the safest of them all, the World Tree my lord. If you¡¯re wise, that can take you anywhere. But that holds danger in and of itself. There are many realms above and below in frequency. Your people had many tales of what we call Mirrored worlds. Sister realms tend to be the closest in relationship, but your planet¡¯s was quite strange. You not only had the Faerie realm occupying the same space but different frequency, but your Mirror Earth was directly across the sun from Earth. You simply couldn¡¯t see it due to your technology¡¯s shortcomings.¡±


    ¡°What?! No way that¡¯s true. I mean, the Faerie realm, sure, but the Mirror image of Earth on the exact opposite side of the sun? I call bullshit.¡±


    ¡°I do not joke my lord. Before the Great Rending, Earth and her sister Terra . . ¡°


    ¡°That is terribly unimaginative.¡±


    ¡°Yes it is my lord. Humanity also has its lows as well as its highs. As I was saying, this planet functions as a small nexus for a significant network in the Cosmos. It¡¯s not hard to go from here to anywhere, as long as you know where to look. Your realms of Nirvana and Sheol are just as close to Earth as Faerie, but far more dangerous. Your ¡®demons¡¯ and ¡®angels¡¯ come from there. Their war is really the only constant in the universe. Theirs is the only thing that stretches back consistently into the expanse of history.¡±


    My eyes squinted as I looked at her. ¡°Do you not remember Gav¡¯riel?¡± I asked. ¡°Big dude completely made out of light, you know, not a normal occurrence?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s completely possible to meet an angel or demon and not remember it. They are the undisputed masters of thought and memory manipulation. They¡¯ve been doing it to Earth for millenia through, although most of you can¡¯t remember it, only shards of vague memories seem to remain. The best course of action is simply not to anger them. Sodom and Gomorrah were real, and I¡¯m sure you¡¯re familiar with that particular ending.¡±


    A few suddenly tense heartbeats elapsed as I scanned my brain with my consciousness sorcery to look for gaps. Nothing came up, but that¡¯s the kind of thing that really conjures up fear, the thought that someone can change or alter what fundamentally makes you you.


    ¡°So angels are real, got it, and apparently demons, but that was probably a given. But what else? Is the universe undergoing some crazy giant war, or is there some kind of intergalactic peace? Who rules the roost around here?¡±


    She took her time formulating an answer, almost too long. ¡°There is much of the universe that is at peace, simply because most of those planes have some kind of patriarch or LawKeeper that can keep the area in line. As I said, strength matters. The Hungry Ones have their secret set of realms and worlds, and much to the multiverse¡¯s dismay, no matter how many we find and destroy or liberate, they are like cockroaches. They always come back from somewhere, and they¡¯re always at war with anything that lives. It also is not uncommon to find a completely untouched natural realm. Terra was one such natural paradise before the Great Rending and now it is desolate wasteland.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t stop now!¡± I spat as she went quiet. ¡°What happened?¡±


    ¡°Humans. We happened. Mik¡¯hael and Gav¡¯riel didn¡¯t dare to break the treaty with the Legions and fight on Earth, but Terra was a perfect substitute. Almost nine centuries of the most vicious war with sorcerers and battle wizards with their golems and giants and dragons at the center of the fighting, the ravenous dead of the Hungry Ones simply couldn¡¯t resist. Several of their Nightmares and Deathnaughts at the direction of Eelgatroth the Lich, the Holder of the Scepter of Pain, poured their forces through portals powered by sacrifices. The temptation of all the piled up mountains of dead was too much. Those corpses would have been realm-changing in terms reanimating a demon and angel undead army. Due to this, both sides decided on their first cease-fire to burn the world to ash using wytchfire. Now, only shattered fragments of skeletons remain there to this day. It was a painful reminder to both the Host and Heathens.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t even know what to say.¡±


    ¡°I say, that after retrieving your family, you make your next priority to rid Earth of the Hungry Ones. There is a collective agreement that whoever is the most instrumental in removing the threat of the undead from a plane is put in charge of it. Again, strength is respected, but also rewarded.¡±


    ¡°Lady, I got bad news for you,¡± I countered, ¡°They are literally my weakness. The only true weapon I have against them is the big ass flaming canine. That¡¯s one reason I wanted the Centauri weaponry, even though it¡¯s gone now, but I was hoping to maybe fill in some of the gaps for combating them. I¡¯m guessing that light as well as fire hurts them, but it¡¯s not like I have a specimen or two to experiment with.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s always the High Council of Witches. The Hags would do anything if you were to help them out with their little problem.¡±


    ¡°Assume I do not know what you¡¯re talking about, please.¡±


    She let out a soft chuckle. ¡°The Witches are an incredibly powerful force, almost as big as the Centauri Empire but far more deadly. They are known to be staunch allies but treacherous by nature. They¡¯ve discovered how to preserve themselves into a mockery of eternal life, but eternal youth, that is what eludes them.¡± She turned to look me up and down and continued. ¡°And flesh sorcery, would return them to their younger, more beautiful forms. In fact, they may even want to trap you forever simply to keep them looking young.¡±


    ¡°Uh, no. Not gonna risk eternal imprisonment for someone¡¯s vanity.¡±


    ¡°You may not have a choice soon my lord. Their Amazons are most skilled at seducing and controlling men. They¡¯re also one of the most feared fighting forces. They excel at hunting magic wielders and their reptilian mounts have fought off dragons. They keep a breeding house of men with magical talent for breeding so that hopefully some of their offspring will have the potential to be a Witch.¡±


    I fought off a shiver. ¡°Ok, note to self, immediately flee or mindwipe Amazons. Ok, well, what do you know about cultivators, like Johnny? I¡¯ve learned some disturbing information, but it does conflict with other things I¡¯ve learned.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re both respected and feared my lord. They follow the rules of dragons. The older they are, the more powerful they become. Their hoard is their lifeblood and they¡¯ve fought wars with pretty much every race in their search for items and objects of power. Their last war was with the Riders of the Flame, humans who cared for the fire-aligned dragons in exchange for bits of soulbound fire sorcery. The Riders were a most deadly foe, the combined cunning and creativity supporting and directing the raw power and presence of a dragon turned many battles. They were the frontline against the Hungry Ones for many centuries. That was until a group of cultivators decided that dragons and their breeding grounds were meat farms, and the sorcerers could be used as magically bound combat slaves.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not reassuring me about him,¡± I said, motioning towards Johnny with my head.


    ¡°My lord, cultivators occupy one of three areas. They either literally do not matter when they are off contemplating the mysteries of the universe for uncounted years, or they are your worst enemy. But, it has happened before, they could also be your best friend and most powerful ally. It truly is up to you. I believe that you may stand a chance at shaping a young one if you play your cards right.¡±


    ¡°Fuck it, I¡¯ve decided.¡± Letting instinctive impulsivity rule the day for once, I stood up and jogged to the wall where Johnny sat. ¡°Get up dude, we¡¯re gettin¡¯ you a bear!¡±

 Chapter 100 - The Price of Power (Book 2 Chapter 7)

    ******


    The issue of telling the kid that I was going to give him an oversized teddy bear was that our policy of silence got blown out of the water, to which I had to literally bury him in the earth using sorcery to shut him up. I will say though, his excitement was contagious. Thirty minutes of making plans later, we decided to do this in the morning so we could get some decent sleep. I slept next to Spot to make sure that he didn¡¯t go ballistic in the presence of another over-sized alpha creature, but morning still came way too fast.


    ¡°Spot, you¡¯re backup, so keep your furry butt over there! STAY! Reeanth, you¡¯re on skull-cracker duty with that maul. I filled it up last night with mana, so if I give the word, we¡¯re having bear-brain soup. Johnny, use the scroll however you think best because I don¡¯t have a fucking clue. I¡¯m on coordinator duties, so what I say goes. Got it?¡±


    My drill sergeant tirade would have been awesome if I didn¡¯t have to whisper-yell it. All of my implements were stuffed to the brim with mana because I tapped a nearby ley line before everyone awoke. Gungnir was currently shaped to look like a legitimate wizard¡¯s staff with a crystal ball capping it instead of a three-sided speartip. Currently holding most of the power in the shapeshifting weapon was an overcharged mental construct of a runic diagram, something a bit more dangerous than what I¡¯ve tried in the past. This piece of work was a careful confluence of peace and calm tied together with compliance, but the nasty part was the sensitive over-stimulation trigger. The more the bear fought the enchantment, the more its own nerves would fire off, causing the outer nerve sheaths to breakdown causing an epileptic breakdown. I figured why not use the bear¡¯s own strength against it since I had a whole day ahead of me.


    Spot¡¯s whine let me know that he didn¡¯t like my plan. Apparently I was too far away, and the twenty feet of distance was simply unbearable for the confused pup. ¡°Dog, relax,¡± I said, trying to console him, ¡°I¡¯m fine, you¡¯re fine, and soon, you¡¯ll have a new friend. Besides, if all goes well, you¡¯ll have another new friend by tomorrow too.¡±


    The drumbeat of his tail against the dirt got louder as he understood the gist of what I said through our mental link. ¡°It¡¯s time.¡±


    Johnny stood up from where he had been meditating since dawn, five feet in front of the damn bear. This had caused Reeanth no end of irritation, but I reassured her that if it woke before we were ready, then she would get to kill it. Johnny took the scroll in his hand and walked up to me, oddly solemn for one usually so full of energy.


    ¡°I uh, just wanted to say . .¡± he started, his eyes downcast as both of his hands tenderly held the scroll. ¡°No one¡¯s ever been this nice to me before. I just wanted to say thank you. This is beyond cool what you¡¯re doing for me.¡±


    Clapping one hand on his shoulder, I looked him in the eye as his face turned up. ¡°Yeah man, you¡¯re welcome. Now, if this doesn¡¯t work, I¡¯m gonna let Reeanth kick your ass again, but if this does, I think you might be the one winning those fights,¡± I said with a smirk. ¡°Now come on, let¡¯s get this bear.¡±


    His face lit up as he spun in place, his left hand holding his staff out while his right held the scroll up above his head.


    ¡°TODAY!¡± he shouted, power filling his body and channeling from his staff and his body into the scroll, ¡°WE FIGHT!¡±


    Unfurling the scroll, he slammed it onto the bear¡¯s skull as if he were a big ol¡¯ booty that he was slappin¡¯. Condensed light blazed out from the impact point, strange diagrams and runes I had never conceived of raced across the bear like tattoos given life. Big Bear¡¯s eyes snapped open as the power held it down, Johnny¡¯s face screwed up in a rictus of pain with veins bulging in his neck and arms.


    I gripped Gungnir tightly as I monitored with my senses the bear¡¯s muscles and Johnny¡¯s mental state, but he almost seemed to be gone. As I looked into the bear¡¯s eyes, I could see what seemed to be miniature versions of the bear and Johnny fighting, flickers of their clash darting across the mud-brown iris. Explosions of virtual power criss-crossed the pupil as the whites of the eyes slowly changed into silver.


    ¡°Now my lord?¡±


    ¡°Not yet woman, I¡¯ll tell you if or when it¡¯s needed.¡±


    I hoped it didn¡¯t come to that, the risks and rewards of this venture were both incalculable. Spot took a step forward as he watched his humans struggling with something he couldn¡¯t help with. The alpha instincts of the bear started to buck just a bit as the proximity of Spot began to set them off. Quickly adjusting my already fixed enchantment on the bear¡¯s instincts in its hindbrain, I let some of the power flow towards the part that allows for general unconsciousness, trying to divert what could be a disaster.


    ¡°Spot!¡± I growled, reinforcing it through our bond, ¡°Get back and sit!¡±


    As my dog obeyed, I felt the hindbrain of the bear start to calm as its energy went back towards its mental battle with Johnny. More than once, I saw the runes on Johnny¡¯s body flicker as small wounds opened up and quickly closed. His staff also shivered everytime it happened, as if it were feeling the pain as well. I didn¡¯t get worried until about twenty minutes in when Johnny¡¯s closed eyes started bleeding.


    I stepped forward to reach him and Reeanth caught my hand. ¡°This is his battle my lord. I have fought him many times, and he has more to give than this. This is not over.¡±


    The small wounds opened and closed even faster until Johnny looked like someone had dipped him in blood. The bear¡¯s ears started twitching forty minutes in and even some random muscles started lightly twitching. Johnny¡¯s heartbeat began to steadily increase as his runes were emitting constant light now. His eyes popped open as his outstretched staff began to undulate.


    It was so unexpected that I took two steps back, well out of his reach. The staff moved like a living whip, the top end of it morphing until it was a silver snake that turned to look at me and hiss. Without pausing to see if I was sufficiently intimidated, the staff-turned-snake whipped around and bit Johnny in the arm that was touching the bear. Thick silver light pumped freely from the snake¡¯s fangs into Johnny, his arm bulking up like Popeyes¡¯ on spinach as that light then shot down his arm and into the bear.


    As if he were gut-punched by the earth itself, the bear let out a huge chuff and collapsed into the dirt, its eyes closing as bits of silver formed strange signs in its irises. Johnny collapsed into Reeanth as she caught him with one arm, her other hand still holding the maul at the ready. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°No Reeanth,¡± I said, already answering her unspoken question. ¡°I think it worked.¡±


    ¡°But at what price my lord?¡± she asked, looking down at his arm. The staff was back from its snake form, but Johnny¡¯s arm was all kinds of messed up. The two holes from the fangs were now black and horrible bruising stretched up his veins. His fingers were gnarled as if he had Cerebral Palsy.


    ¡°A reasonable one I think,¡± I said, touching his elbow with one finger and probing the wound with magic. ¡°Some kind of steroidal venom that gives power at the cost of destroying the cells. This is the kind of thing that my magic is perfectly suited for.¡±


    Two minutes of flushing out the toxins from his bloodstream later, I had repaired the extensive bruising, strengthened the weakened connective tissues and put his muscles in a state of recovery. I healed the two holes last as they were the convenient outlet for all the crap from the snake-staff. I even took the time to heal his brain that had the tiniest bit of swelling, probably from an intense mental battle, probably the only one he¡¯s ever had! Hahaha, I probably accidentally made him a bit smarter too. My healing magic is a little too potent sometimes, it feels like a dog that wants to fetch not just the stick you threw but also every stick in the woods.


    Reeanth put him over near the bear when I gave my approval. A wet smack knocked me on my face, Spot¡¯s giant tongue plowing me into the dirt. With a push of earth sorcery, I let the dirt swallow me up and carry me behind the dog where it pushed me back up. Bad decision, as the happiness of a dog is directly related to how fast and hard its tail wags, which knocked me to the side about twenty yards. Landing in the trees wasn¡¯t fun as Spot thought it was a game, and chased projectile me and again tongue-attacked me into a tree. Thank all the heavens for automated magical shields.


    Also, thank the heavens that slobber falls under the category of both flesh and water sorcery, allowing me to clean off quickly from dog spit. ¡°Stupid mutt,¡± I said affectionately, scratching behind one big floppy ear. ¡°Your friend will be awake soon enough, just go get some lunch. You deserve it.¡±


    Two bounds later, Spot was barking happily and out of sight. ¡°Where¡¯s our insurance going?¡± Reeanth joked, the entire situation making her act just a bit out of character. I think the danger got to her.


    ¡°Food. I bet that bear would be a lot less likely to eat us if we got a big ole¡¯ pile of meat for it. Besides, I didn¡¯t do shit today, but I¡¯m kinda exhausted. Too much anticipation is draining.


    Sitting down next to me, she leaned up against the tree. ¡°I feel the same way my lord.¡±


    We sat there in silence as we watched the morning eased into midday, birdsong lightly harmonizing with the breeze.


    ¡°It almost feels surreal ya know, or maybe you don¡¯t,¡± I jabbered, ¡°I mean, magic is awesome! But for us normal humans, it was just a fairy tale. It wasn¡¯t real, and now here I am, sitting with a futuristic kind of genetically altered space wizard, and we just watched some kind from bum-fuck nowhere Virginia tame a goddamn bear the size of a hill. AND, this bear has armor. Armored bears! I feel like if I don¡¯t stop moving, I might actually explode from all the implications of this.¡±


    ¡°We grow up surrounded by it, but it¡¯s almost like an invisible machine. Oh how we all envy the sorcerers of old, able to will power into existence and make matter move to your whim. We are taught just enough to keep us safe, but not enough to thrive.¡±


    ¡°Magic is magic. That doesn¡¯t even make sense Reeanth.¡±


    ¡°My lord, wizardry is not sorcery. In order for wizards to use magic, we have to know and understand every little piece of how it works,¡± she replied, the slightest tinge of condescension in her voice.


    ¡°How so? And you have sorcery now anyways, so what does it matter?¡±


    ¡°It makes all the difference!¡± she retorted. ¡°In order for a fire sorcerer to make fire, he has to simply want it, and it does his bidding like a slave that loves her master. But a wizard, a wizard has to patiently craft every step. Separate out each process and carefully partition mana into each mental construct and then assign each part duties. One to gather the air, the pure mana that will burn, the second to gather the oxygen required for fire to exist, and then third to manage the proper proportions and keep them in check. And that is just for a small flame! A fireball is then prepackaged with an excess of mana and the spell is bound to itself in a temporary and barely stable construct, and then the entire construct is shaped to be aerodynamic so that it can actually fly further than three feet without unraveling.¡±


    ¡°Sounds like that sucks, and maybe might be incredibly weak too,¡± I mused.


    ¡°Sounds like? It is! A fire sorcerer would be able to simply command the wizard¡¯s fire and now the wizard is out a spell and mana! Young battle wizards use runic suits of armor or runed blades that do all of the hard work for them. This allows them to simply pump mana into a ¡®translator¡¯ and out pops the spell when it¡¯s full. Full battle wizards have crafted grimoires that have spells carefully transcribed into them, full rituals of power and death that can wipe battlefields clean. But young wizards can¡¯t use grimoires as they don¡¯t have the mana capacity, the energy storage to utilize that much power.¡±


    She let out a loud huff. ¡°And do you know what makes it worse my lord?¡±


    I opened my mouth to say no, but she cut me off as if she didn¡¯t even notice.


    ¡°I have sight sorcery now. I can see how it all works, but I can¡¯t do anything about it. I can see the inefficiencies of every spell, I can see the weak points and the points of binding. Everything is open to me, but I am two hundred years too young to do anything with it. With this, I could be as powerful as a sorcerer with the education and physicality of a combat wizard, but I¡¯m too young.¡±


    ¡°What are you talking about? Just use the mana stone I gave you,¡± I said, pointing at her weapon. ¡°It¡¯s in your maul. It gathers ambient energy from the atmosphere, extra energy from you that you aren¡¯t using, and it also automatically converts kinetic energy from you and everything around you into condensed mana so you can use it.¡±


    Her eyes bugged open staring at the finely crafted weapon in her hand.


    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me woman that you have sight-based sorcery and you haven¡¯t even looked at your weapon?¡± I teased, rolling my eyes. ¡°It¡¯s got enough energy in it to crack that bear¡¯s skull wide open, and that thing is tough enough to take a freaking missile.¡±


    Picking it up with both hands, Reeanth turned to me and held it up as she kneeled in front of me. ¡°This is a kingly gift my lord, I cannot take it! You do not understand its price!¡±


    I wasn¡¯t gonna move from my comfy spot to indulge her idiotic cultural crap. Putting one hand on her maul, I gently pushed it towards her and away from me. ¡°It¡¯s  a gift dummy. Keep it. Besides, if you haven¡¯t looked at that, then you should probably look at the rest of your gear. That belt is holding more energy than the maul.¡±


    She gasped as she grabbed her belt buckle with her hands. ¡°Most artifacts from the Aelves don¡¯t hold this much mana!¡±


    ¡°What kind of shitty enchanting do your people do? This is the most basic setup I¡¯ve made.¡±


    ¡°Ours doesn¡¯t store much mana at all as it simply bleeds out of the gem. We set up circulation runes to redirect the bleed off back into the body as it stores better than any crystal.¡±


    ¡°Bullshit, crystals store way more energy than flesh. I know, I¡¯ve tried. I had that bleeding energy issue too for a bit until I went in with earth sorcery and straightened out the structure to remove the internal flaws, and then I used magic to etch some tiny runes of storage and mana attraction in the center of it. And voila¡¯! Some of them can hold more power than an exploding volcano.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s it, that¡¯s IT?!¡± she screeched. ¡°It takes SORCERY to make perfect crystals for mana storage?! That is a secret of the Ancients that has been lost for EONS!¡±


    Her head hit her hands and I started to wonder about her sanity as she started talking to herself. ¡°Sorcery is the key, the key to everything?! Bred out and slaughtered the only thing that kept everything running, none of this makes sense? Why would they let this happen, it can¡¯t happen again . . . ¡°


    ¡°Well, uh,¡± I stuttered, no longer considering that my spot was super comfy. ¡°I guess, I don¡¯t know, maybe I don¡¯t know what I¡¯m talking about and I¡¯m just super talented?¡±


    Not taking my quip very well, Reeanth picked herself up and slammed her maul down in the dirt at my feet. ¡°I pledge myself wholly to your service until the day we both die or agree to sever this contract. I make this vow with or without your consent as a contract is already in place. Do you accept my pledge?¡± she asked angrily, her eyes blazing.


    ¡°I¡¯m confused at to what the fuck is going on, but if it will get you away from me and stop being so damn weird, then yes. I accept you doing what I tell, and now I¡¯m telling you to fucking chill.¡±


    ¡°You do not understand my lord. You possibly the sole hope of returning all civilizations back to the heights of the Age of Magic! None of the ancient artifacts have intact energy accumulators anymore.¡±


    My lack of understanding must have been clearly written on my face. ¡°Energy accumulators? Do you mean batteries? You can¡¯t store power?¡±


    ¡°NO!¡± she yelled, almost frantic. ¡°No one has been able to store power since the sorcerers all but vanished. All of our devices are tied to people or ley lines for power, and some even use power portals that are linked to stars, but the only individuals with portable energy storage devices are those who passed down ancient heirlooms. If anyone finds out about this then you¡¯ll be hunted down and enslaved for sure!¡±

 Chapter 101 - Inconvenient Prepping (Book 2 Chapter 8)

    News of another faction that would desperately want to capture, enslave, or kill me just didn¡¯t really hit me the way that Reeanth expected. There were no tears, no outbursts of indignation, cries for help or even fits of terror. It just felt cold, a thick wet blanket of cold settling around my shoulders. Realization, that¡¯s what it was. Realization that my life will probably never ever know a moment of peace. I can either grow so powerful that no one will ever be able to harm or manipulate me, or I can do the quiet hermit routine. I like both. Although, I''m pretty sure I¡¯d be the worst prisoner to have. My mix of abilities would be a nightmare to try keep down. I could think of a couple ways to negate magic, but my flesh magic could even make that moot. They¡¯d have to literally have to . . . .  nah, I¡¯m not even gonna think about it. I¡¯ll plot my own demise when I have the time just in case I meet another sorcerer as wildly lucky as me.


    Two questions began to fight in my mind as I contemplated the scene in front of me. It was already after midday and Johnny was still in front of the sleeping bear from where Reeanth and I dumped his unconscious form. The big question of ¡®when the fuck are we going to leave¡¯ was roaring at the forefront of my mind, while the little question of ¡®if Reeanth can see my magic and put the pieces together, what can I do to hide my secrets from the world?¡¯ was pricking at the back of my mind. After reluctantly deciding that waking up a giant bear and his human wasn¡¯t a good idea, I decided to run a quick test.


    I conjured up a small marble of diamond and took my time correcting the flaws. One thing that I¡¯d noticed about my abilities is that earth sorcery does not give a shit if it conjures up a flawed rock, and it usually doesn¡¯t matter. The agency of altering falls to me. Using magic to delve into the crystalline structure of the gem, I smoothed out the broken flaws until it was beautiful in a mathematical sort of way. Putting the finishing touches on the mana storage and strengthening runes on the inside, I began to pump some mana into it until it was about halfway full.


    ¡°Reeanth!¡± I called, staring at my hand as I closed it around the diamond.


    ¡°Yes my lord?¡± she answered, turning towards me from where she sat up against the wall.


    ¡°I¡¯m running a little experiment here and I need your help.¡±


    ¡°Anything I can do is at your disposal,¡± she said demurely.


    ¡°Good. I need you to use your vision sorcery to look at my hand and tell me what you see.¡±


    A flash of light turned into a soft beam that lasted three seconds. ¡°I see a brightly burning sun in your palm. I assume that¡¯s the accumulator you created?¡±


    ¡°Yup. Ok, so the first assumption is correct. Flesh does not block the mana wavelength.¡±


    Holding my closed fist against my chest, I turned away so that my body and my armor was between me and her.


    ¡°Ok, try again.¡±


    ¡°I can barely make it out my lord, the mana in your armor and yourself sort of drown it out. The small accumulator is insignificant compared to the rest of your suit.¡±


    ¡°Fuck.¡±


    Turning back to her, I sat down and opened my hand. With the other, I touched the smooth surface and poured a bit of earth sorcery into it while muttering to myself.


    ¡°Flesh doesn¡¯t work, mana signatures can overpower it, what blocks the flow of mana? Platinum works but that also negates the purpose of the gem as it completely disrupts the mana transfer process, hmmmm.¡±


    ¡°What are you trying to do my lord?¡± Reeanth asked. Her maul was next to her on the ground, one hand on top of it. I had a feeling that she¡¯d literally never let it go even if someone cut her arm off. I chuckled at how something so simple that I¡¯d made was considered so valuable.


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m trying to figure out a way to either diminish the mana signature of the item, or completely block anyone from being able to tell that a gem I have can hold massive amounts of energy. What could I do to make that happen without completely killing the actual storing and transferring of mana?¡±


    It¡¯s as if mana gave off light, and the little gem I had made was the equivalent to a bright candle. Everyone could see that it was burning if it were dark, but my suit of armor as well as all of my gear and my stored mana combined was like a bonfire, making the candle seem insignificant. Who cares about a candle when it¡¯s on the other side of a bonfire? What I needed was concealment, something or some way to make the ¡®flames¡¯ invisible. I can¡¯t every thing or creature that is sensitive to magic looking at me like a goddamn steak.


    Then it hit me. I might not be able to completely erase my magical signature, but I could dampen it. Thinking back on everything that had happened to me, I had made a platinum shield that partially blocked a blast of unknown energy from a goddess, and that same metal was in parts of Reeanth¡¯s armor. Following my frantic train of thought, I pumped as much mana into the gem as I could channel from the earth underneath me.


    ¡°Quick Reeanth, take off your breastplate and stick this in it! Then look at it and tell me what you see!¡±


    Reeanth jumped at my command, tossing her armor to the dirt in front of her and stretched out her hand. Time seemed to flicker for the split second this action occurred as my brain boosted by consciousness sorcery recorded the whole thing. The armor she was wearing acted as if it were alive, clinging to her like a living rubbery blob that didn¡¯t want to let go. It kept its shape but the edges looked as if they tore where they parted instead of simple unlatched or untying like normal armor. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    I tossed her the gem to her outstretched hand and she stuck it under the breastplate. As her hand touched it, I noted a ¡®tendril¡¯ reach out for her, but not quick enough to make contact with her hand.


    ¡°Come on, look at it! Can you see the glow? If not, pull out the gem and tell me what you see!¡±


    Her eyes lit up illuminating the details of her armor.


    ¡°I don¡¯t, I don¡¯t see it my lord! But wait, I can see its emanation coming out the sides of the armor, but it¡¯s much lighter.¡± Reaching in, she pulled out the storage gem and quickly turned her head as if slapped, covering her eyes.


    ¡°And it¡¯s definitely bright and still working,¡± she said, cutting off the flow of sorcery to her eyes while rubbing at them.


    ¡°Perfect! Yes!¡± I celebrated, snatching the gem from her and running to my temporary house. I love it when my theories are confirmed. Platinum works perfectly as a shield, but its other use is concealment from magical senses. The hard part was just beginning though. This damn precious metal is not only rare, making it harder to conjure, but after conjuring said metal, magic starts to slide right off of it. What I had seen though after examining Reeanth¡¯s armor with my earth and mana sorcery is that there was a significant iridium to platinum portion, right around forty percent iridium to sixty percent platinum, and that¡¯s not counting the portions of repaired armor that were made up of titanium and steel.


    I believe this means that if I conjure the platinum and iridium together, it would make the platinum somehow pliable enough to manipulate with magic but still be able to do what I want it to. And I don¡¯t need much, the entire plan revolved around me covering up the lion''s share of my armor with the thinnest possible later of the stuff, basically covering up the ¡®bonfire¡¯ of mana that I could hold. This project literally took the rest of the day, taking off each piece of armor and oh so freaking carefully conjuring the perfect mix of iridium and platinum in the most minute amounts and applying it while taking great care to not cover up the runes. I figure that if I have runes showing on my armor, that people would interpret it as running off of the mana my body is constantly generating, similar to how the Centauri battle suits function. The runes on her armor can store a tiny bit of mana, but they mainly activate when the wearer pumps power into it.


    I had just finished covering up over ninety percent of my armor when I looked at Svalinn on my arms and Gungnir. Plating them with this mixture was not something I wanted to do. The hunch I had was telling me that it would be anathema to their nature, their purpose, as a key component for them was not just channeling large amounts of power, but ¡®eating¡¯ or diverting what energy enemies throw at me. Passing them off as ¡®ancient¡¯ artifacts might work, but that would still make me a target. Forgoing that line of thought, I figured I¡¯d return to it later. Maybe Reeanth would have a better idea.


    I met her at the now crackling bonfire in the middle of camp after having a surprisingly productive day. Losing a day¡¯s worth of travel time didn¡¯t piss me off like it would have if I¡¯d sat down and relaxed all day.


    ¡°Hey, look at me real quick with your eye magic and tell me what you see!¡± I said, unable to cover up the excitement I felt. Haha, maybe with magic, I¡¯ll never grow up. I felt like a giddy kid on his birthday getting the loudest fire truck and happily annoying his family with it for the whole rest of the day.


    ¡°Your staff and your gauntlets glow brightly my lord, but the rest of you seems to be rather dull except for the runes. They flicker as they¡¯re used, what did you do?¡±


    I couldn¡¯t keep the huge smile off my face. ¡°I did it! The proper ratio of platinum and iridium worked! Turns out, there¡¯s more than one kind of iridium, and some of those were radioactive, but I found one that wasn¡¯t! Now, if only I can find a way to tamp down on Svalinn¡¯s and Gungnir¡¯s magical signature I¡¯d be golden!¡±


    ¡°Which is which my lord?¡±


    ¡°Gungnir,¡± I said, waving around the spear. Then touching my gauntlets, I clarified, ¡°and Svalinn. The spear of Odin and the shield that protects the Earth from the Sun. I thought the names were fitting. This bad boy is probably the most dangerous weapon I¡¯ve ever seen, and these gauntlets were forged from the bones of a dragon, part of the World Tree, and a whole bunch of other stuff. It¡¯s even got some of that dragon¡¯s soul in here too to help with eating magical power.¡±


    ¡°Well, items with souls in it are not uncommon, as different souls hold different amounts of power. You may not need to conceal those. Did you bind them?¡± she asked.


    I thought about this one for a minute. ¡°I¡¯m not really sure to be honest. Gungnir, I¡¯m pretty sure I bound that one, I don¡¯t think so. See, this is where a magical education would have been helpful.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s an easy test for that my lord. Let me see them, one at a time. And when I try to use them, just think about it either returning to you or not working for me.¡±


    Tossing her Gungnir, she immediately leaped into action, attacking an imaginary foe, jabbing and stabbing while pumping mana into it. I didn¡¯t like it. The feeling was instinctive, but it felt meaner than than.


    ¡°No!¡± I barked, holding out my hand. The spear ripped out of her grasp while she was in midair, fouling her beautiful display of limber combat gymnastics. ¡°Gaaaah, I¡¯m sorry, but, I, I couldn¡¯t take it.¡±


    She let out a small chuckle. ¡°That¡¯s perfectly reasonable my lord, your spear is definitely bound to you. I was pumping mana into it to channel an energy blade and it just kept eating it but not doing anything with it.¡±


    Carefully removing Svalinn, something that I rarely ever did, I tossed them to her one at a time. She put them on and her armor came alive, slivers of the silver metal attaching to my armor and covering it. As soon as she had both on and they were covered up, they slammed into the ground taking her with it.


    ¡°My lord! I can¡¯t move!¡±


    ¡°What, they¡¯re not that heavy!¡±


    Her forearms were flat in the dirt as she awkwardly squat. Taking a deep breath, she leaned back and attempted to heave as if lifting a giant boulder. ¡°They¡¯re definitely yours if they¡¯re doing this to me!¡± she gasped, her back and legs straining against the invisible mountain holding them down.


    ¡°Sweet,¡± I said, relief filling me. I walked over to the scene that went from scary to hilarious real quick. Touching the gauntlets, Reeanth¡¯s suit covering them peeled back like I was acid and the gauntlets popped free. ¡°That¡¯s right boys, come to papa,¡± I cooed to my gear. With great relish, I slammed them home on my forearms, feeling the mixture of smooth bone and wood conture to my shape.


    With a flex of will, the gauntlets morphed into their tower shield form, which I slammed together in front of me. Holding a thought in my head, they then turned into teardrop shapes whose point was bladed. I went through every form of shield I could think of, a standard buckler, the medieval knight¡¯s, the embossed viking¡¯s, and then Captain America¡¯s just for kicks. Turning them back into normal armored gauntlets, I looked at Reeanth. ¡°So, they¡¯re definitely bound to me. What¡¯s that mean exactly?¡±


    ¡°Others cannot use them unless you wish it, you¡¯ll always have an internal compass pointing to them if they go missing, they respond to your thoughts, and if you do it correctly, they may even grow in power as time goes on. Trust me, these might even be legendary artifacts that your descendants will rely on.¡±


    I liked the sound of that even if I didn¡¯t want to think about the possibility of me dying. Eh, who cares, I at least have a couple thousand years to figure that out. I did have one last idea that I could probably do before tomorrow while I wait on Tweedle Dee and Dum to wake the fuck up. I made Reeanth sit still as I took all the items I had given her back and spent the rest of the day modifying them with the platinum/iridium mix. I couldn¡¯t have her gear giving me away either, and when that was done, I did that to Johnny¡¯s armor, rolling over when necessary. The damn kid didn¡¯t even change his snoring as I flipped him over, out like a light.


    ¡°You better wake up tomorrow or I¡¯m gonna have to leave your ass,¡± I growled, finishing up the concealment on his armor. ¡°This bear better be fuckin fast too cause we¡¯re flyin¡¯ and you¡¯re probably riding this overgrown rug.¡± The snoring just kept on going.


    Picking myself, I got comfortable by the fire and ate some soup that I¡¯d brought. Johnny¡¯s staff somehow had a bunch of food and supplies in it, but I couldn¡¯t get to it. And Reeanth was off hunting but I didn¡¯t want to wait. Spot was already asleep next to the entrance of the walled off camp, doing his due diligence as guard dog. The birds were perched on the top of the walls fast asleep as well. Taking the cue from everyone else, I hit the hay.

 Chapter 102 Ridin High (Book 2 Chapter 9)

    It really sucks when the hay hits back, and by hay, I mean daylight. Waking up still sucks. Yes, I know that I can, and do, use flesh sorcery to make it super easy, but there¡¯s just something about being a morning grump that makes me feel human with everything that¡¯s going on. I can deal with it, I truly can, but sometimes I just want to grump. And grump I did, kicking sticks in the early morning light as I stalked around camp and then around the wall of camp. ¡°Stupid fucking kid, with his stupid fucking bear, and no goddamn coffee cause I¡¯m a stupid fucking idiot. Yup, forgot eggs, bacon, steak, cause the only thing I have is old ass soup. Fuck you Campbells, the last remnants of a dead and nearly forgotten civiliza . .¡±


    ¡°Good morning my lord! Isn¡¯t it wondrous? The peace! The quiet!¡±


    Don¡¯t kill the help. Don¡¯t maim the help. Don¡¯t bury the help under a mountain. Don¡¯t feed the help to a bear. Being nice is so much harder when being joyously mean or evil just has so many better options. Yup, probably time to use some magical help here. Taking a deep breath, I used my flesh sorcery to refresh my brain and body, taking the last dregs of grogginess and morning evil, I mean grumpiness, with it.


    Breathe in, breathe out.


    ¡°Good morning Reeanth. Have those two moved at all?¡± Without pointing, she caught both my meaning and the urgency that I couldn¡¯t remove from my voice.


    ¡°No my lord. I fear they may actually be hibernating. Is there something you can do to speed this along?¡±


    ¡°Maybe,¡± I said, taking out a can of soup and popping the top. Taking a few sips didn¡¯t really help me focus as the damn soup needed salt, but it did give me a second to go over my options. ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ll check¡¯em out but I¡¯m not waiting another day.¡±


    Taking a second to conjure salt, I poured a bit into the soup. Yup, much better. Downing the last of it, I hopped up and made my way over while drinking some conjured water.


    ¡°I¡¯m still not sure how all that works my lord, how do you conjure with such ease?¡±


    ¡°The simple answer is sorcery. Conjuration isn¡¯t really creating anything, it¡¯s more like summoning it. The most common elements and material are super easy, like water and earth, and even diamond is almost as easy because it¡¯s technically carbon which is one of the most common elements on Earth. The harder stuff is platinum or iridium. It¡¯s also logical to assume that even though water is common on Earth, it would be much harder to summon it in the Sahara desert. That explanation makes the most sense. The other one that is possible but less likely is that conjuration somehow works with another dimension, like a parallel one, or maybe a nearby one in which there¡¯s tons of raw Chaos.¡±


    In turn, I conjured and banished a ball of water, then stone, then dirt, and then a tiny nugget of gold, and then bone and blood. ¡°The weird ones to me are the flesh based ones, it¡¯s almost like it goes through a weird process, like summoning water and iron and other trace elements and then transforming it into what I envision based off of what¡¯s near. Like, that bone was identical to my own, same dna and everything, but the blood was yours. I think the more esoteric stuff gets funneled through Chaos really.¡±


    ¡°That can¡¯t be my lord!¡± I wasn¡¯t shocked at her rejection, but the explanation was a bit weird.


    ¡°That would mean that the demons were right, that Chaos is the liquid border to every realm and dimension in the multiverse. But the Host decreed that all is upheld by the Order of the Tree and the secured by the Sacred Roots.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t going to parse my way through that, but it didn¡¯t sound like those two things couldn¡¯t coexist. Yggdrasil could do that, maybe that¡¯s what they¡¯re all referring two. Don¡¯t trees take the broken down elements, aka Chaos, and turn it into something orderly? But I digress. Reaching our two sleepyheads, I scanned Johnny first. What used to be a tenuous link between him and the bear was much more solid, but the odd part was that some sort of forced unconsciousness was coming from the bear straight into Johnny¡¯s hindbrain. Yup, I¡¯m too sexy for my own magic.


    Following the link back to Big Bear, the trouble was centered on the backup sleepy enchantment I had placed on its instincts. It looked like the hibernation aspect, which I tied in for security, was twanged a little too hard putting the bear in literal winter-time hibernation mode. Carefully picking them apart, I returned the normal rhythms of rest to the bear and let that wash over Johnny.


    ¡°Did you fix it my lord? It blends together too much in the head area, I can¡¯t tell what¡¯s going on.¡±


    I turned to see that she was way too close, her glowing eyes staring intently at the dissolving patch of magic. The weird part was simply the scale of her body, as Centauri humans seem to be a standard deviation or two larger than humans, making me feel like a child next to an adult. Dusting myself off, I mentally called out for Spot and the big bird, who I affectionately named Tuki after the parrot I had when I was little.


    ¡°Yeah, but it¡¯s still going to take a day or two to wear off naturally. The brain isn¡¯t something to mess with casually. I¡¯m going to go on ahead down to Florida with Spot and Tuki, and you¡¯re gonna stay here with these two. Catch up when they¡¯re awake, and use the birds to find us. They share a kind of hive or flock mind.¡±


    ¡°What? Who¡¯s, what¡¯s a Tuki?¡±


    A blast of air answered that as Tuki landed on the building behind me, his giant wings buffeting us as he landed. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    ¡°That¡¯s a Tuki,¡± I smirked, ¡°Might wanna name yours too. I¡¯ll scout the area when I get there and set up a forward operating base. I should be seeing y¡¯all in three days. Don¡¯t be late.¡±


    Whistling for Spot, I climbed up on Tuki as he jumped and took off with a mighty flap. Tuki flew over the wall and glided low near the water where Spot in his smaller form was sprinting alongside us with a fish in his mouth.


    ¡°Damn it Spot! NO!¡± My cries went unheeded as the wet dog carrying a slobbery fish jumped and landed right on me, moisture of dubious scent quality everywhere. ¡°Awww come on, you stanky ass fishmonger.¡±


    Ignoring me in the fashion that only loved ones can do, he proceeded to devour his catch while I used water sorcery to clean up and then dry off. Banishing the water from Spot¡¯s coat and Tuki¡¯s feather and then turning it towards myself to get rid of the mess, I couldn¡¯t wait to get outta here.


    Roughly following the coastline and the long continuous valley that used to be Interstate 95, we made what I approximated to be Florida. The sights along the way were unexplainable. Three floating islands that I wanted to explore but knew I shouldn¡¯t were probably the coolest things I saw, but there were also broken down brick buildings that the Ripples hadn¡¯t fully gotten rid of. Three towns full of humanoids were bustling with activity and there was one oddly large port city that looked like something out of a science fiction novel. Smooth silvery spiral skyscrapers with no sharp edges jutting out of the earth near incredibly wide boats that looked to be portable piers as well. We passed that place real quick because I didn''t have time to figure that out.


    Using my consciousness sorcery and combining that with Tuki¡¯s experience as a bird and his instincts, I created a sort of map in my head as a constant background process, keeping track of the landmarks and cities and rivers. The floating islands were marked as well with arrows roughly declaring the direction in which they were floating. One of them was floating in a geosynchronous orbit, which I noted for later. Areas of super-concentrated forest were also noted as they had some unfamiliar characteristics. Imagine a super dense rainforest that was very tall and wide, but also had a border around it that was so clean that it almost looked manmade. There were a bunch of these, where it looked as if a giant hand took a lawn mower and went around the forest as if the entire forest were a bush to be trimmed.


    Off in the distance, west of the Atlantic ocean, the Appalachian Mountain Range was still visible as if it had grown south. I don¡¯t remember them extending this far south, or even this far East. Landscape variability had definitely changed with the Ripples, as standalone mountains weren¡¯t uncommon. Some of them were small, like a bump in the middle of a plane, but I flew over a river, and in that river was a random giant mountain that the river flowed around both sides of it. I was happy to also not have run into any sort of aerial predator. Tuki could probably take down most things, but I knew that dragons were real. Killing one gave me a real appreciation for their power, as I almost died to a weakened one.


    My main goal for today was to get near to where Miami used to be, and I knew it was right along the Atlantic coast, but not all the way down the panhandle. The note from Merlin said that my brother was alive and well in ¡®what you humans called Miami¡¯, according to him, but he also said that the Centauri ruled or claimed the area. This didn¡¯t tell me much but it did give me a place to start. I really didn¡¯t want Reeanth to be here for the start because diplomacy was actually my first option, and scorched earth being the second. From what I¡¯d learned from Reeanth¡¯s cloned vat-brain, her type of vow was highly frowned upon by her society and I wouldn¡¯t want to start off on the wrong foot.


    It was late in the afternoon when I spotted a whole bunch of structures and a couple little mini-islands just off the coast. Never having been there before, I couldn¡¯t be sure that this is where I wanted to be but I¡¯d spent enough time planning a little getaway that never happened before the end of the world. What really dominated the landscape was a skeleton. At least as long as a skyscraper is tall, the bleached white monstrosity must have been incredible, and fucking scary, to behold. Not a bit of flesh was left on it, but its ribs looked to serve as support beams for some kind of building. There were people in there, working with machines to turn that thing into a building.


    Nudging Tuki with my mind to climb higher, we got a good overall look at the city, or what used to be the city. There were more skeletons, and from up here they were obviously crocodile skeletons. The first one we saw was already fleshless, but two more were in various states of butchery. One of the things going to town on a humongous gator tail was a tall metal man with blades for hands. Hovering vehicles were picking up house sized chunks of meat and viscera and carting it towards a building that could only be described as a Costco¡¯s wet dream. Tall and rectangular with giant windows to show off the massive shelves studded with a whole bunch of futuristic crap.


    I didn¡¯t even know where to start, but using my mental sorcery, I looked through Tuki¡¯s much better eyes and took mental screenshots of the entire area. We scouted for an hour, circling the area in greater and greater circles to gather as much information as possible. I didn¡¯t see any kind of alien or magical race, just humans that could have been Centauri or normal ones; it was hard to tell being so high up. There were all kinds of fantastical machines though, some kind of construction mechanoid and then clearly some security ones. The off-putting feeling I had though centered on groups of longhouse looking vehicles that studded the area. They were in groups of five, were jet black with no wheels, but floated above the ground in a rough pentagon formation. No one went in or out of those, they didn¡¯t emit any kind of magical signature that I could tell, and even the area as a whole, minus the gator remains, was rather low in ambient magical energy.


    But those curved remnants, the ribs that speared into the ground, those were shining bright in the magical spectrum, even that was nothing compared to the upper plate part of the giant snout. Even from way up here, it looked like a little star, floating above a million tiny stars, which I figured out to be the creature¡¯s teeth. If I had to guess, they were somehow using the bones of the crocodile as a huge mana battery.


    The great part about using my mind as a camera to take mental screenshots, is that I can overlay and filter anything I saw in both the magical and mundane spectrum. The unconscious holds on to a lot more information that people realize simply because easy access doesn¡¯t exist for most people. After scouting out the area, I turned Tuki around flew thirty or so miles off to a large flat plain nestled up against a mountain where I set up a temporary camp. Taking a cue from me, my avian friend went off in search of food while Spot stood guard as I meditated, creating a detailed three-dimensional mental diagram of everything that I had seen. Every bit of detail didn¡¯t escape the notice of my mental sorcery, and I noted patterns of guard rotations in the hour I scouted as well as the general routes of where the workers traveled. Peeling back layer upon layer of magical energy, I hunted my diagram stuffed full of historical data for some sign that my brother was down there.


    I hadn¡¯t seen him for at least a month before the Ripples started, so knowing his magical signature was impossible, but I knew what his face looked like. I also wasn¡¯t dumb enough to take Merlin¡¯s word of ¡®alive and well¡¯ at face value. That could have meant, oh your brother was turned into a newt and is living his best life in an aquarium¡¯ for all I knew. The actual state of his existence was never explained, and that fact clawed at my sorcery-induced peace. Eagerness, impetuousness, whatever you want to call it, some part of me wanted to take Spot and cowboy our way in to rescue my blood, my brother.


    Another little part stewed over something Reeanth said a while back about sorcerers, something about being a ¡®noble¡¯ or ¡®royalty¡¯, some status bullshit that I hadn¡¯t really paid attention to. My powers at that moment offered up a nice little option, to go in my mind and relive that moment, but I pushed it aside. It didn¡¯t matter. All that matters is that I get him back. The entire shock and awe part of this probably wouldn¡¯t work either as I had taken careful steps to mask my magical presence just a day or two earlier. As I chewed over this problem while waiting for Tuki to return, I noticed a little sparrow flitting around his body, and a few more of them flying around in the sky.


    On a whim, I reached out with my mind and nature sorcery and gently tapped the little guy on the head, beckoning him to come to me. After a minute of going back and forth with the birdbrain, I managed to get it across that I wouldn¡¯t harm him or feed him to my dog, the little brown sparrow hopped up on my arm. As I softly petted his feathers, I noticed that there were many more of his friends than I had originally spotted, and that they connected. Running my mental finger down the strand of magic connecting this little guy to his flock, I found that there were well over fifty individual strands coming off of him. Pulling out a chunk from my opened soup can, I fed it to him while laughing quietly to myself. I think I just found nature¡¯s intelligence network.

 Chapter 103 - Turning up the Timetable (Book 2 Chapter 10)

    Nature has a power all to itself that encompasses every facet of life from beginning to end. And one of the worst parts about it is simply being spoiled for choices. As I ponder the answer to one of my problems and get nowhere, the solution to another problem sorta pelts me in the back of the head going, ¡°I know! I know!¡± like the annoying girl in grade school who obviously has all the answers but just wants to be an ass about it. That¡¯s my subconscious sometimes, an inconsistent dick, but a useful one nonetheless. While examining the sparrows and banging my head against a wall trying to figure out how to wrap their tiny minds around the concept of James Bond, one of the little dudes landed on my boot and proceeded to do just what birds do when they see a nice new target.


    ¡°Asshole,¡± I muttered, turning my magical senses towards the little miscreant with bowel issues. Turns out he had too many worms for breakfast and was taking it out on me. Worms, because it always starts with worms, great ideas I mean, because in the cycle of things, it ends with worms. And what are the undead but the literal last part of the cycle before being claimed by the worms? Humanity believes that death is the end, the severance of the pumping vitality of life, and undeath was never an option until magic reentered the fray. Following that line of logic, undeath is the optional final phase of death, a sort of hanger-on or last gasp before being claimed by the worms and dirt.


    When means . . . . and cue the inner drumroll in my head . . . .  finagling ways to kill or give the final rest to the undead is most likely in my wheelhouse, I just have to find it. Memories of me using sunflowers to store and emit real sunlight to repel nighttime invaders weren¡¯t forgotten, and I had also used the symbolic herbs of purity such as sage and lemongrass when making my house, grasping at any kind of straw from humanity¡¯s splintered lore to fight with a semblance of competence.


    This would be so much easier if I had an actual undead, a zombie or skeleton or whatever the Hungry Ones actually are, to test on. Fire would probably work, all the stories say fire burns, duh, and sunlight probably isn¡¯t their friend, but I don¡¯t really have the unvarnished access to fire like I do to water and the rest of my sorceries. Also, getting into a consciousness fight with something that has experienced one side of death is probably not the smartest idea either. The two best ideas I could come up with, if I had to fight the undead in the next month or so, are complementary in style.


    The first part would be to remake the sunflowers that harness and store sunlight and release it in the presence of undead things, and then combine that powered-up sunflower with a kind of scavenger thorny vine with earthworm tendencies. Which would leave me with a finished product of pure anti-zombieness, a UV radiation-emitting flower with thorny vines that would break down dead things that got tangled up in them. This would function as a perfect first and second and third line of defense as well as providing excellent fertilizer.


    Solution number two would be to incorporate some of those concepts into my nature-based allies back home. Making a bunch of tiny crystal batteries with some UV conversion runes would be cake for me, and then I could embed them in the outer crust of the golem Everest or in spears or maces for the hamadryads. Spot obviously doesn¡¯t need any enhancement against the undead, but there''s a solid chance that I could get Kong and his horde of monkeys on board. Some sunlight emitting maces would be a huge hit for them and a damn useful buffer for me. To be clear, I don¡¯t even know if that would work, which is why I shoved those ideas to the back of my mind as I kept glaring at that fucking sparrow who shit on my boot while trying to solve the issue at hand.


    ¡°Dude, you suck.¡± Shaking my boot to get the little douche off of me, I felt around on the mental connections that the sparrows had with each until I found the most dominant or intelligent one. It was hard to tell which is which in the mind of a bird, but this little dude was just sitting on a tree branch somewhat above me, staring as if I had all the breadcrumbs. Lifting a finger to make a perch, I whistled gently and nudged his mind. My other hand sifted around in the dirt until my earth sorcery kindly pushed up a small worm for me.


    ¡°Little worm for a little work, whatcha say?¡± I said, doing my best to mentally coax him down. A loud squawk from Tuki threw off my concentration. ¡°Jeez dude, come on now.¡±


    Hopping off the tree, Tuki landed in front of me and got real low and close to my face. A series of images streamed from his mind to my own, but to translate it into human terms, it went something like, ¡°I¡¯m a much better, way bigger and smarter bird than that one, SQWAAK! Want a roost in the Big Tree!¡± Dropping the worm, I pet Tuki on the beak, reassuring him. ¡°Yeah man, you¡¯re right.¡±


    Unfurling his wings, Tuki jumped and flapped, catapulting his big body upwards. The windblast pressed me against the tree that I was already leaning against, but not hard enough for me to miss Tuki¡¯s beak reaching out and snapping up the little sparrow, a flash of satisfaction coming through our temporary bond.


    [Well that takes care of that.] I thought to myself as Tuki¡¯s shape grew smaller in the distance. His mental tone almost sounded insulted, as if I were fostering off his duties, his agreed upon duties, onto a smaller and therefore less capable bird. Another thing to watch out for apparently, differing levels of innate intelligence amongst magically altered or evolved animals. If I didn¡¯t take any action other than spying, I could reasonably expect peace and quiet for the next week waiting for the landbound allies to arrive. The diplomatic option could begin tomorrow morning depending on how fast Tuki did his thing. Deciding to put that off until I had more information, I set about getting my forward operating base ready.


    Scuffing my boot into the dirt to get the bird crap off, I looked around at the nice little area I found myself in. It looked good from way up in the sky, but it would be almost a pointless outpost in the future other than a safe place to bed down. The mountain was huge but not really near anything in the way of resources, in fact, it almost looked like the grasslands part of the Serengeti in Africa. Long grass with a few sparsely placed trees and a truckload of nothing else were all one could see from down here. Digging up my inner optimist, I decided though that this was still not a bad place to be and also the perfect time to try something out that I¡¯d always wanted to do, hollow out a mountain!


    Now I¡¯ve done some pretty cool shit since getting my sorcerous abilities, but my childish imagination was always captured by tales of hearty dwarves feasting in their humongous underground cities that sprawled under mountain ranges, dragons roosting in the heights of the peaks while thunderous waterfalls shrouded the valleys with their fog. Looking at the mountain in front of me, it¡¯s safe to assume that I won¡¯t realize my dream here, but I sure can practice. Stabbing Gungnir into the base of this mountain, I felt the pull of a ley line but not anywhere close to here, shit. Without the endless overabundance of mana provided by a generator or ley line, draining what I had to whimsically make an under-mountain fortress wasn¡¯t smart. Back home had plenty of leylines to pull from, and the big generators only worked because they were huge and in sealed areas. Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.


    This is why I hate traveling, it has none of the comforts of home. Suddenly a bit paranoid now that I¡¯m not near an endless source of power to tap, I checked all of my equipment. The crystal batteries were pretty much full as well as Gungnir and Svalinn, but it felt small compared to the incredible excess that I was used to. The auto-feedback function I had built into my gear, the enchantment that siphoned off energy that I wasn¡¯t using, was keeping everything in tip-top shape, but this kernel of insecurity I felt must be part of why wizards must be so skittish. They don¡¯t have batteries full of power to draw upon, only their inner stores. This makes me sound like a rich kid who¡¯s only complaint is that ¡®the water I drink is too cold and it makes my teeth hurt¡¯.


    What I wouldn¡¯t give to have Elon Musk¡¯s intellect at this point. He¡¯d probably magic some stuff up that would solve all my problems. Speaking of famous people, I wonder what they¡¯re up to right now? Is J-Lo shakin¡¯ her ass for the aliens now? What is Bill Gates doing now that money and Microsoft is completely obsolete? How hard did the soldiers of the various Earth armies react when the Centauri conscripted them against the Hive and their endless bugs? Would I have even made a difference in that war? And the Orion Conglomerate, Reeanth mentioned them but how much of humanity did they really get? What kind of impact, technological or otherwise could we even bring? Humanity is like the forgotten red-headed stepchild of father¡¯s third marriage, nobody cares. Still, all the nerds must be having a good ol¡¯ time right now, with magic and fantasy being real.


    Putting aside my unproductive train of thought, I saw that my hand was playing with a bit of shiny quartz that reflected the sunset beautifully. Sunset, sunlight, solar power! That¡¯s it! One of the issues with solar power before magic arrived is that it¡¯s too diffuse, the energy content of sunlight was simply too spread out for humanity to use properly. We were also held back by the lack of efficiency in regards to batteries. Our lithium ion batteries were great, but compared to the energy output of natural coal and gas, disregarding nuclear because we hadn¡¯t even researched it for a solid century yet, all of these could be solved by magic. My runed crystal batteries can store energy with almost a hundred percent efficiency, and I could make solar panels that could easily channel heat and light into conversion runes to make power. Even if I were in some place that literally had no mana, but had heat or light, I could use my own stores of energy and craft a device to feed me mana over time.


    Using earth sorcery to conjure thing sheets of quartz, I used my fingers to trace out two quick runic equations. One side of the sheet attracted the ambient heat and light while the other side absorbed it and converted it into pure mana. On the conversion side of the quartz plate, I attached a small crystal battery and then covered up just the battery with a thin layer of platinum. Putting that out in the sun, I watched for twenty minutes as the quartz plate began to heat up and then stay a steady temperature as the absorption process evened out. Not giving myself time to celebrate, I quickly made four more and then set up the plates as if they were on a five-pointed star. In the middle, I conjured a stone circle the size of a dinner table and then coated it in with a thin layer of silver which I inscribed with runes of durability.


    Taking time to cover my butt, I put in a control rune to shut off both the channeling function and the absorption/conversion functions as well. Conjuring gold wire, I connected the silver of the tabletop to the batteries under the solar panels to form five arms, and then connected each plate to the one next to it, threading the gold wire from battery to battery to form a golden pentagram. As the sun set, the usefulness of this makeshift artifact dropped to zero, but if all stayed well, I could test it tomorrow. Carefully, I conjured soft dirt to cover up my unwieldy project from prying eyes and turned the entire thing off. It wasn¡¯t until the entire contraption went dark and cold that I sat back to relax against the mountain.


    Some sparrows were still up in the tree, clearly already oblivious to the fate of  their brother from earlier. I watched as they huddled together for warmth not two feet away from where Tuki had snapped the branch in a whimsical desire for a morsel of food. The animal kingdom moves on so fast, not even caring that their fates and rhythms are so in touch with the cycle of life and death. Calling Spot over from where he sat patiently, I leaned against his leg and fell asleep.


    The morning came bright and early, my mind sorcery more than happy to function as a perfectly polite alarm clock. Memories of lying in a warm bed with my fiance fading as the daybreak continued its inexorable cycle. Tuki¡¯s wing was draped over top of me, a very warm blanket as the rest of me was cushioned by sleeping Spot. Carefully wiggling free, I scurried off to pee on the morning dew and used water sorcery to have a quick rinse. Banishing the water after using it, I used flesh sorcery to work the kinks out of my joints and jumpstart my brain. That early morning brain fog is no longer a problem as magic seems to be the cure-all. Deciding to get on with my day, I curbed the first pangs of hunger and walked over to my solar panels and banished all of the dirt covering up the plates.


    Tracing my hand on the center sigil of the main collector, I started up the plates and set them to a low setting, taking a step back so I could keep an eye on it. Tuki and Spot almost looked like a cute couple from here, albeit one of those mismatched ones. My dog was curled up on his side and the bird was clearly using him as a nest and a heat source. The nights out here were a lot colder than I thought they¡¯d be but two giant warmblooded creatures easily kept the chill at bay.


    From where they lay ten feet away from me, I almost didn¡¯t want to disturb them. Both had done a lot of work, Spot with his attentive sentry duties and Tuki with his scouting, but the day waits for no one. Reaching out with my mind, I sent feelings of needing to pee to Spot. His back leg kicked out as if I tickled him. Trying a bit harder, I put a little bit more urgency into my sending, causing Spot to kick all of his legs, startling Tuki who woke and squawked and tumbled off to the side. With a yelp, Spot awoke and ran in a circle before running off to take care of business. After fulfilling the role of overgrown rooster, Tuki stood up and dusted himself off, watching Spot run off and then eyeing me as if he knew that I was the culprit.


    ¡°No sir, don¡¯t look at me. Just a little earth sorcery makin¡¯ himself a sand castle, that¡¯s all you know.¡± And I was, just not really a castle though. Trying to keep the guilty expression off my face was hard, so I did something constructive instead. Using earth sorcery, I began to craft a miniature landscape of what I saw of the Centauri outpost in the dirt, complete with white marble mockups of the skeletons, the giant warehouse looking building and even some little dust soldiers down there too. As I leaned over my creation, Tuki hopped over and eyed my recreation of the Centauri camp. Leaning closer and closer, he very carefully put a big hole in the warehouse and squawked.


    ¡°Seriously? That was petty. The hell man?¡±  Using earth sorcery again, I filled in the warehouse and started to add some details as Tuki reached over and this time smashed it down harder and squawked. Sitting on his feet, he lowered his neck, presenting his forehead to me, and then gently bumped me with it. ¡°I¡¯m guessing something changed huh?¡± I said, reaching out with my mind to connect to his. ¡°Show me what¡¯s up.¡±


    The memory was almost unbelievable, not because the bird¡¯s brain simply has different priorities overall, but because of the scale of difference in what we saw yesterday and what existed when Tuki went back to spy. The warehouse building was still there, but the skeletons of the giant reptiles were taken apart and placed on top of the building in a creepy formation. Rib bones were sticking up from the square roof, almost coming together to form a giant circle. Crackling energy ran up and down the bones as some humanoid robots were carving or welding runes into the calcium structure as others were repairing their obviously broken companions at the foot of the building.


    ¡°Shit, that looks like a humongous gate.¡±

 Chapter 104 - Undercover (Book 2 Chapter 11)

    ********


    Screw waiting. That looks like a gate, like a ¡®walk-between-realms¡¯ kind of gate, the kind of gate that gods and monsters and alien armies waltz through as they laugh maniacally about how they¡¯re going to grind our bones to make our bread. Fuck, it does look big enough for giants. Great, that¡¯s just what this world needs, giants, as if giant monkeys and dogs and crocodiles weren¡¯t enough.


    The air from way up here on Tuki¡¯s back was frosty as the early morning chill hadn¡¯t worn off. Winter was well on its way and even the southern region of what used to be the United States didn¡¯t want to change its weather patterns for the apocalypse. Spot sat in my lap, acting as a heat buffer to prevent speed-induced hypothermia. The peace of the early morning was really at odds with my pounding heart and racing thoughts. Looking back through my memories with my consciousness sorcery, I remember covering one up with stone back before I really knew everything, and there¡¯s a glimpse or two of one from slivers of Reeanth¡¯s memories that I¡¯d been able to glean. Combing through what I possess of Rath¡¯s memories wasn¡¯t really that helpful, as dragons seem to have their own workaround to walking between dimensions.


    As the encampment came into view, I decided to go with the most diplomatic option first, saying hello. Asking Tuki to drop us off about a mile before what I assumed the edge of the territory, I made sure Spot knew to stay in small-dog form and that as little magical energy as possible was leaking from my gear. Svalinn was in gauntlet mode and Gungnir was an unassuming dagger at my waist. I looked well armored, but not like any sorcerer I¡¯d imagine. I always pictured a Gandalf looking dude, big robes with a fancy staff, and my silvery platinum and iridium covered bone armor almost made me appear as some kind of fancy magical knight. To round out the disguise, I used my consciousness sorcery to branch off a background process in my mind to project an unassuming wave of mental magic that simply communicated ¡®not an active threat¡¯. I couldn¡¯t guarantee that these people wouldn¡¯t instantly attack, and convincing them of something that clearly wasn¡¯t true would be harder than a deflection, as I am not currently a threat to them as long as they don¡¯t attempt to harm or threaten me.


    Tuki¡¯s mental bond let me know that he was way up above the camp by now, waiting on my call to swoop down and get us out if we needed him. Spot bumped me in the leg, reassuring me that he was dog enough to muscle us out of there as well. Taking a deep breath, I turned and started jogging towards the camp. Spot easily kept up, his optimistic canine demeanour not knowing or really caring that this might be the most dangerous or dumb thing that we¡¯ve ever done, he just liked to run. I couldn¡¯t help but chuckle just a little bit, loving the way that animals could be so in the moment.


    And me, trying to live in the moment, almost got myself killed. Not paying attention to how fast we were going, we got pretty close to the edge of the camp and I hadn¡¯t even been in touch with my ongoing magical scans. A warning siren sounded in my head pulling me up short just as a magical veil came down revealing ten huge tower shields facing me, their silvery spiked fronts covered in black runes that crackled with energy. As if that weren¡¯t intimidating enough, each shield was held by a giant Centauri warrior that held a fearsome futuristic black carbine propped on top of their shields. It was a shield wall complete with guns; I didn¡¯t miss the hilts of swords sticking out of their backs either.


    Now that I was actually paying attention to what my magical senses were telling me, I could feel the strangeness of their firearms. There was no detectable explosive material like gunpowder at the base of their bullet, but each bullet was shaped like a shotgun shell. Speeding up my perception of time temporarily as I stopped with my hands up, I took a closer look at the bullets pointed my way with my senses. The entire weapon system looked more like a miniaturized railgun than anything, but the shotgun-ish rounds themselves were filled with pieces of silver coated diamond spiky ball that were half the size of a pencil eraser. Keeping in mind the size difference here between a regular human and a Centauri human, the rounds were also proportionally bigger as well. One blast from that thing would probably cut me in half, and maybe Spot too if he got shot in his smaller form.


    On the back of their tower shields just above where their arms were gripping the handholds, I could make out magazines full of different kinds of ammo. The more I thought about it, the more it makes sense. As far as I know, the Centauri don¡¯t have sorcerers but they do have battle wizards, and if you couple that with a blend of futuristic technology and magic, you get beefed up magical guns that would any nerd drool. But that¡¯s the kind of firepower it takes to live in a universe where magic is real and even dogs are capable of easily eating unarmed humans, let alone the kinds of monstrosities that our outdated legends describe.


    Mentally commanding Spot to sit next to me and look friendly, I carefully and very slowly took a step back with my hands up. ¡°I mean no harm!¡± I said clearly, ¡°I¡¯m just looking for some help. Please, is there someone I can talk to?¡± Their helmets covered their faces, so I couldn¡¯t even tell if they understood me.


    ¡°English? Please, anyone? I can talk mind to mind if that helps?¡±  Opening up the barriers to my mind, I kept my consciousness¡¯s tendrils out in the open but ready to retreat or attack at the first sign of danger. One of the Centauri on the edge of the shield wall, left his shield standing there and faced me, his gun pointed straight at me as his other hand pulled the sword from its sheath. He yelled something I didn¡¯t understand, but from his motions it was clear he wanted me to get on the ground. Slowly taking another step back, I raised my voice. ¡°I mean no harm, I promise, but I am not doing that!¡± I said, shaking my head, trying to get across that I wanted to talk to someone but I wasn¡¯t submitting to anything.


    The soldier¡¯s yelling turned into a bark. As one, the other nine Centauri lifted their shield walls, and the unmanned shield came with the rest, took a step forward and slammed them down. This wasn¡¯t really working the way I was hoping. I couldn¡¯t understand what they were saying, and whatever Rath gave me forever ago that allowed me to understand Reeanth had clearly worn off. She could speak English now due to our magically enforced bond, but that doesn¡¯t help me now when she¡¯s at least three days away.


    ¡°Reeanth Le¡¯Talv! Reeanth Le¡¯Talv!¡±


    The bristling intimidation tactics stopped as all ten of them looked back and forth at each other. I knew that Reeanth was a ways away, but they sure didn¡¯t, and I could work with that. While their faces weren¡¯t visible, I could feel their residual emotions leaking out, familiarity with what I said and confusion as well.


    ¡°I know Reeanth Le¡¯Talv, let me speak to someone who knows English or a damn good translation spell!¡±


    The way they hunched forward again with their weapons pointed at my face communicated that they understood somehow that I cursed in their direction and assumed that I was insulting them, even though it wasn¡¯t directly meant for them. Centauri number ten outside of the shield wall, who I assumed was in charge, took a couple steps back and raised his forearm holding the sword near his mouth and started speaking. His gun was still pointed at me, but lowered as if he recognized that I wasn¡¯t an immediate danger to him or his men.


    As I was waiting, I took the time to take mental pictures of what my senses were showing me about Centauri number ten¡¯s armor and weaponry. Reeanth¡¯s weapons were gone when she swore herself to me and her armor was in seriously bad shape, but this guy had the full kit. Their system of magic was so different to mine. Reeanth was right, they didn¡¯t have batteries, but what they did have was a sort of flowing closed system. They banked their energy preservation process through a system of rune channels and devices with their body as the primary producer!


    In layman¡¯s terms, they did not have batteries to store their energy, but they did a bunch of strange runes clustered every couple of inches from each other that acted as a kind of mana sink, where it pooled until it overflowed and then traveled down another channel to another mana sink. They barely lost any energy as the magical power wasn¡¯t actually being stored, but moved around like a closed hydroponics system. The bleedoff of the power that the system couldn¡¯t catch was constantly absorbed by their weapons which also had a similar system of runes and channels. The Centauri body itself, the flesh and blood, was the main generator of power, the spring that fed the energy into the suit, and at the end of the runic channels, the magical power was fed back into the body. It was genius, they worked with what they had and created a kind of energy preservation system that mimicked a river. Without being able to store power, but having the capability to produce it and the technology to channel it, they created a sort of web of constantly circulating magical power. You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    At the fingertips of their armor, and at other combat contact points such as feet, knees, and elbows, were runes that gave off a feeling of hunger, which I deduced were a kind of vampiric structure, allowing them to directly drain enemies of their mana. This would allow them to offset the cost of using their magic while in combat. Noting the same runes along the blade of Number Ten¡¯s sword, I turned my attention to their shields. The more I applied my consciousness sorcery to my magical senses, the more I could feel or almost hear some kind of intent behind the runes.


    A grouping of runes near each of the spikes on their shields felt hungry, obviously some kind of blood or mana draining function, and then there were lines of runes along the seams of shields where the adjoining one connected. Those sounded like stubborn dogs that won¡¯t let go of food when you¡¯re trying to open their mouth. My guess is that was the binding mechanism for the shields to withstand a charge or assault from larger enemies. A cross-like inscription of runes ran up the middle and trailed along every edge of the individual shield, invoking the strange image of kids playing hot potato. Now that one was confusing, something about transference or quickly getting rid of something. The feeling got stronger until it hit me, that was their version of kinetic transference runes. When you put it all together, the vampiric runes would make the enemy bleed if they crashed into the shield and drain them of their mana at the same time. Then, the binding mechanisms at the edges would keep the shield wall a single unit the entire time while the kinetic runes would absorb the charge and channel the kinetic energy from the blast or assault into the earth. I bet some of that kinetic energy also got converted into pure mana for their gear and armor but I couldn¡¯t make out the back of the shields too well.


    Focus, focus, speed up perception of time for a moment and screenshot everything for later . . . . . aaaaaaannnnd done! I finished up just in time for three even bigger Centauri soldiers to arrive and start conversing with the guy I designated Number Ten. Two were pointing at me, their voices quickly getting louder while the third mediated with his arms crossed. Spot sent the mental equivalent of a question to me, now? Giving a firm no as a reply, I sent down the feeling of me petting him on the head to keep him calm.


    While I was keeping my dragon-canine from hulking out and playing ¡®fetch¡¯ with the Centauri, my own patience was beginning to wear thin. I thought about how easy it would be, use a bit of earth sorcery to entomb them, flesh sorcery to drain them of their mana, and then consciousness sorcery to pry their minds open and get the answers I wanted. That would of course eliminate any possibility of us becoming allies, unless I altered their memories, but this whole fiasco was in full view of the quasi-settlement, simply not worth the risk. Turning my attention towards the gate that was put up way too fast, I saw that it was exactly as Tuki¡¯s memories showed me, or a bit further along in construction. Runes larger than cars were being etched and filled in so that I could clearly see it from way over here, but at least it didn¡¯t look ready.


    ¡°Hey!¡± I shouted, surprising the arguing mini-giants. ¡°Reeanth Le¡¯Talv! I know you know who that is, and she¡¯s on her way here. She¡¯ll be here in a couple days. I don''t have time for this! My brother is here, I followed a tracking spell and god fucking damn it I ain¡¯t leaving without him!¡±


    The mediator started laughing as the other two drew their weapons. ¡°Quit playing with the human, can¡¯t you see he¡¯s shaking with fear?¡±


    My jaw dropped. The bastards understood me this whole damn time. The other two larger soldiers doubled over laughing as well.


    ¡°Stand down Reavers. It¡¯s obvious he¡¯s a native.¡± The non-shield wall soldiers straightened up after a minute and took off their helmets, wiping the tears of laughter from their eyes. All I wanted to do was flatten them, in this exact moment, or better yet, feed them to Spot. The one who didn¡¯t point a weapon at me was a male, easily a foot taller than the rest of his soldiers and about as wide as a freaking bear. The other two were female, judging from their long hair, feminine bone structure and higher pitched voices. Try as I might, they just had too much armor on to see if there were female parts, yeah nope, they got hips.


    ¡°What¡¯s your name, son? And how long have you been out here?¡±


    Gritting my teeth, I answered slowly. ¡°Nate, and too fucking long. Close as I can guess, probably anywhere from four to six months. You tend to lose track when you¡¯re fighting for your life.¡±


    The two females happy expressions vanished instantly. ¡°You mean at least four years right?¡±


    ¡°Captain, it can¡¯t be true?¡± The second female looked at the Captain and then back to her counterpart. ¡°That would mean . . ¡°


    ¡°Yes Corporal, it would mean exactly that.¡±


    Spot¡¯s quick singular bark cut them off. ¡°Mean exactly what?¡± I questioned, trying to look each of them in the eye, ¡°You know, for those of us who don¡¯t know?¡±


    At the Captain¡¯s nod, the first female answered. ¡°First, my name is Smith, Corporal Ashley Smith, and this is my bond-friend Corporal Ava Johnson. We were rescued from the tearing of the Veil four years ago.¡±


    Corporal Johnson picked up where her friend left off. ¡°We were told that time passed differently between the rest of the universe and here due to the introduction of magic into a zone that didn¡¯t have any, but no one really knew how much. The overwhelming tide of it skewed every kind of reading, both scientific and magical that was possible.¡±


    ¡°And I am acting Captain Casparai, former United States Army Ranger, inducted into the grand army of the Alpha Centauri Empire. Formally, we are under the lost throne of Atlantis branch as that was the former capital of the Empire that we hope to recapture while we¡¯re here.¡±


    ¡°So,¡± I sputtered, ¡°You all are human, or, used to be? You¡¯re huge, all of you! And how did you learn their language?¡±


    ¡°Modern alchemy and cool magitech,¡± Corporal Johnson answered, ¡°In order for us to use magic and have a chance at returning home, we had to undergo alterations. The three of us chose to do so with a bit of frost giant blood, so now we¡¯re much bigger and stronger than any normal Centauri and our inherent magic is deeper. And here.¡± She tossed a small necklace to me. ¡°That is a universal translator. It¡¯s a bit rough but it gets the job done. Over time, it will imprint the latest language in your brain and you won¡¯t need it. See, we all have one.¡±


    ¡°You can come too if you want,¡± Corporal Smith offered while also showing off her translator. ¡°They offered the enhancements for free if we agreed to join the military and scout out earth. Our orders are to restart civilization again and find the lost capital of Atlantis.¡±


    It was all a little much. They were too friendly, even if they were telling the truth, which I just couldn¡¯t believe.


    ¡°No, thank you, but I¡¯m good. All I want to do is find my brother. His name is Andrew Jones, and he goes by Andy. He was twenty-one when this whole thing started, but that would make him twenty-four or twenty-five if time got all mixed up like you said. I have it on good information that he¡¯s here.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure we know anyone by that name,¡± Captain Casparai said slowly, ¡°Most of the able bodied chose the genetic treatments and species alterations. The promise of a much longer life and fantastic abilities was too much for most to resist. It¡¯s not just physical issues that these treatments fixed, but mental ones went away. So many former service members with post-traumatic stress disorder jumped at the chance for a ¡®cure¡¯.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, but I feel like you¡¯re avoiding the question, or there¡¯s something big you¡¯re not telling me.¡±


    Corporal Smith cut in with a pained smile. ¡°What the good Captain means to say is that some cures and treatments had a contingency, and those usually were to join the frontline against the Hive. They¡¯re a sort of insect based alien that . . ¡°


    ¡°I already know about the Hive, and honestly, I have much bigger problems to deal with. I just want to know if you have a soldier or human or whatever kind of person here that used to go by the name of Andrew Jones. My name is Nathaniel Jones, but everyone called me Nate.¡±


    ¡°What do you mean you don¡¯t care about the Hive?¡± Corporal Johnson gasped. ¡°If you know about them, then you know they¡¯re the biggest threat humanity as a whole is facing, and should be begging us to help fight them!¡±


    ¡°Do you think the Hive is a bigger threat than the Hungry Ones?¡± I asked innocently.


    The relaxed posture of all the Centauri suddenly changed into a fearful kind of angry watchfulness. I could feel that every one of them was suddenly a lot more tense.


    ¡°I can take care of myself, genetic treatments or not, but you¡¯re in for a huge surprise if all you¡¯ve been told about are the Hive.¡± Finally putting my hands down, I knelt down next to Spot and scratched behind his ear. ¡°I¡¯ll tell you where they are if you let me see the faces of all of your soldiers here. I¡¯ll be on my way if my brother isn¡¯t here.¡±


    ¡°Sorry kid,¡± Captain Casparai replied, ¡°We really can¡¯t let you leave now, operational security and all that. But we can let you see if your family is here, it¡¯s the least we can do. What kind of magic can you do anyway? I have to keep my men safe.¡±


    ¡°Ahem!¡±


    ¡°And women.¡±


    Not stopping my steady scratching of Spot, I took a deep breath and thought about it. Letting them know that I was a sorcerer was definitely not an option, and I didn¡¯t miss the overt threat either. With my dog here, the most believable option is what would keep me sufficiently under the radar.


    ¡°I¡¯m a beast-tamer.¡±

 Chapter 105 - Possible Temptations (Book 2 Chapter 12)

    Their laughter wasn¡¯t funny for me. It was honestly the best lie I could come up with at the time, and somewhat plausible too. ¡°Spot, change!¡± I¡¯m normally not very good at lying, but having consciousness sorcery really helped out my ad-libbing skills right now. Normally, my bad memory would screw me over in the department of keeping track of what lies I told and to whom, but preprogrammed emergency verbal responses on command certainly help, especially considering how little brain power it actually takes to come up with a plausible lie.


    Reinforcing my command mentally with exactly what I wanted him to do, my dog grew to his normal size and bounded around as if that¡¯s what he wanted to do all along. Three jumps and buttload of barking served to freak out the soldiers who fell behind their shields from the earth shaking, which I helped just a teeny bit. ¡°Good boy! Now shake!¡± His giant tail began to wag back and forth, bowling over the captain and his corporals.


    ¡°Damn it dog, not ¡®shake¡¯ the tail, shake hands!¡± I laughed out loud, holding one hand up. My favorite dog did exactly what I wanted him too. ¡°We can play with Kong when we get back, I know you want to,¡± I cooed, unable to hide my own laughter.


    Spot carefully lifted one paw right in front of my face and I high-fived it. ¡°Good boy, now get small again. Can¡¯t be freakin¡¯ out the new locals now can we?¡±


    In a flash of fire, my dog was normal size again, sitting calmly at my feet. Pointing up in the sky, I caught Captain Casparai¡¯s eye. ¡°And that one up there is mine too. Don''t¡¯ shoot him or we might have a problem. I¡¯m not really a threat, but that¡¯s Spot¡¯s snuggle buddy.¡±


    So maybe I wasn''t what a dungeons and dragons nerd would classify as a usual ¡®beast tamer¡¯, but I sure could fake it, especially considering Spot¡¯s enthusiasm to prove me right. A loud crack of thunder from the gate cut me off from having to explain further. Snakes of white lightning arced from one giant set of runes to another as the inner space of the gate where air used to be started to liquify and swirl like a whirlpool that some deity decided to flip on its side.


    ¡°What the fucking hell is that?¡± Even though I asked the question, I¡¯m pretty sure that I didn¡¯t need an answer just yet. Finding my brother and taking this whole thing down while not making new enemies all fell to the wayside as the sharp scent of ozone became more prominent and things began crawling out of the gate. Wasting no time, Spot grew to his largest size, easily over two stories talls with angry flames dancing across his fur.


    ¡°It¡¯s a damn gate you backwards normie,¡± Corporal Smith said, turning her weapons towards whatever it was coming out of the gate. ¡°And that isn¡¯t supposed to be happening! Captain, those don¡¯t look like reinforcements to me!¡±


    ¡°Decant the sleepers, we¡¯re gonna need em!¡±


    At the Captain¡¯s orders, Corporal Johnson speed off towards their camp, the rest of the soldiers hauling ass after her. As the other Corporal ran off after her battle buddy, Captain Casparai rounded on me and slapped me on the chest with a small medal that stuck in my armor.


    ¡°Welcome aboard pipsqueak. You¡¯re hereby deputized into the Marauders, the vaunted 2nd Legion of the Reclamation fleet. Wear the shield proudly.¡±


    That odd disk wasn¡¯t just a medal. The instant it hit my armor, a set of tiny metal spikes began doing their best to burrow through my chest plate to get to my skin, and even smaller tendrils of magic were poking at my armor too. Clapping my hand over it, I focused my earth and mana sorcery into it, ripping up the enchantments and crumpling the disk without letting the Captain see as he had already turned back towards all the hubbub.


    What could only be described as Godzilla¡¯s ugly ass cousin from West Virginia stepped, or stomped, or crushed its way through the gate. The large black longhouse looking structures were now floating up and away from the chaos while opening up from the long sides, sets of five fully armored soldiers hopping out. Forming up into shield walls, they met up with the other groups of awakened ¡®sleepers¡¯ and began retreating, or tactically moving in a rearward direction.


    Grabbing a hold of Spot¡¯s knee, I hoisted myself up to his back to get a better look at Fugly emerging from the gate. Parts of it were solid black, shiny like a beetle¡¯s carapace, while other parts looked like raw flesh that was slowly weeping some kind of ooze. I didn¡¯t have time to talk. As quickly as this situation was devolving, I had to find my brother. Mentally communicating my plan to Spot, my trusty canine took off and ran down the Captain before he could get very far. As gently as he could, Spot snatched him up and tossed him up and over so that he landed, painfully, right in front of me.


    ¡°Wha-oof!?¡±


    Not giving him time to react, I grabbed him by his shoulders and flung us backwards, quickly using my earth sorcery to turn the dirt we landed on into a much softer kind that swallowed us up. With a concentrated spike of mental sorcery, I drove my mind into his, bypassing his somewhat formidable but badly set up mental defenses. Thirty feet below the earth¡¯s surface, I held the Centauri soldier perfectly still with my will alone as I plundered his mind for what I wanted. Reeanth¡¯s mind was full of ciphers and encryptions, but this guy was relatively new. He didn¡¯t have the hundreds of years of training and programming that she did to keep me out. His mind wasn¡¯t even well organized, not that I should be complaining or even have any room to talk. Mine was a kid¡¯s playroom until I got my consciousness sorcery.


    There! A tightly bound packet of information wrapped in a cube of runes was buried in his mind. Tiny threads of information connected it to the rest of his mind, but I still couldn¡¯t read what was in there. Eh, I didn¡¯t need to do that anyway, as long as he could. Keeping him still by manipulating his nervous system, I reached into my own mind and summoned an image, a family photo that used to sit on my desk at work. Constructing a 3-D version of that photo, I set it straight into his brain.


    [WHERE IS HE!]


    Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    The authority carried by my mental shout coupled with the fact that my magic was literally forcing his body to be unnaturally still almost killed him. The simple shock of the realization that there was absolutely nothing I couldn¡¯t and wouldn¡¯t do to get what I wanted sparked something in Casparai, fear.


    [I don¡¯t know!]


    [THINK! Ask your database Captain! I can see it in your mind, and if you don¡¯t, I¡¯ll purposely trigger its safeguards. You¡¯ll be a fuckin vegetable.]


    His resolve hardened just long enough to mentally spit in my eye. [Fuck you normie! Without me, you get nothing!]


    Seeing as I was inside of his head, he couldn¡¯t hear the laughter reverberating through my soul. Opening up just a tiny bit of power into his forebrain, I showed him just a glimpse of what I envisioned for him. He saw his body wasting away under my flesh sorcery while I used water sorcery to drown him and revive him over and over. He saw his body seize as I caused his nerves to fry and then seize again as I healed them. Images of hungry plants and angry pointy insects crawling in and out his orifices entertwined with endless solitary confinement miles below the Earth¡¯s surface. As the vision ended, I pulled his mind just a bit closer to mine to let him feel the unwavering resolve that had kept me alive so far, and just a bit of the anger that kept it hot.


    [None of that was a lie, and every bit of it can come true. All I need you to do is tell me where the fuck my little brother is, even if he isn¡¯t little anymore, and I¡¯ll be on my merry fuckin¡¯ way.]


    As Casparai pissed himself, I watched his fragile mind take a long look at the image of my family. [That one! I recognize that one!]


    The frame zoomed in on my father. [He was a prime candidate for the life extension process! My family bought the rights to him years ago! We were told that he spent years in your military and was an excellent pilot, perfect for the Portal Corps.]


    [Bought, him!?] The grip of magic that held Casparai down tightened as my temper threatened to break loose. [Fuck it!] I snarled. Reaching another fist full of power into his mind, I grabbed the small silvery cube of Centauri magitech and ripped the threads from their anchors. As Casparai died from his own nervous system revolting, I used his nervous system to read the last couple data packets coming from the cube. Tag Marauder, Designation Alpha Shield Tango, all of that was denoted by the Marauder Tag on the Centauri battle suit on the shoulder. My brother¡¯s Marauder tag was a shield with the Greek symbol Alpha, but the Tango meant which sleeper hover pod he was in.


    Letting my earth sorcery pull me up to the surface, I broke into the sunlight to a scene that wasn¡¯t the hell I was expecting. Big Fugly was curled up off in the distance and all of the Centauri were stiffly walking around or working. The gate was silent and gave off the feeling of dense cold, as if it had given its last breath to birth its passengers. And Spot, Spot was sitting in his tiny form on a lady¡¯s lap, twisting and turning under her caresses to give her the best angle for a belly rub.


    Her dark eyes were only matched by her raven hair, scarlett streams of raw magic gently flowing off of her in waves, as if a dragon were given human form. Her gaze fixated on me and the sheer presence of her being crashed into me.


    ¡°Still conscious I see? Maybe the survivors have some backbone after all.¡± Her left hand kept petting Spot while her right arched up as if to grab the stem of a wine glass that wasn¡¯t there. From her slightly pointed finger, a cannon of untainted force blasted me away.


    My view of the sky was simply gorgeous from where I lay, hurting. Flesh sorcery working overtime to repair the bruised tissue was almost as taxing as my consciousness sorcery forcefully shunting aside the screaming tide of pain signals coming from all over. And yet, there was a little teeny voice in the back just screaming, get the fuck up, almost as if from very far away. Engaging, Surprise Survival Protocol: Mole Mode. In my spare time, I had programmed responses for my mind to engage in if shock ever kept my conscious self from action. My earth sorcery opened up the dirt beneath me like a mouth and quickly buried me two hundred feet below the surface while my flesh sorcery kept right on chugging.


    My senses were on full alert, sparing no effort to make sure that the alien woman couldn¡¯t touch me like that again. My mind sorcery kept replaying that moment in every spectrum we could perceive. That blast of energy almost bypassed every kind of defensive magic I had. If Svalinn didn¡¯t do its job of draining and diverting overloads of incoming power, that sneak attack would have utterly smashed me. The scene replayed again, and again, and a dozen more times. Ten minutes of straight healing and scared meditation later, I finally saw deviousness. There were tiny connections of red power that were coming from her fingers to Spot as she was petting him. The power that almost killed me wasn¡¯t hers, it was my freaking dogs! That bitch, that witch, stole my dog¡¯s overwhelming strength and used it against me.


    Two can play at that fucking game. Double checking to make sure that I was in one solid piece, I pulled Gungnir from off my belt as it turned into a wicked looking spear. Down here in the Earth, I could feel the ambient mana settling down, a calming pressure that to others would feel oppressive, but to me felt like home. Gathering a mass of power, I started to feel the dirt and rock underneath the woman and as I began to sink my mana into it in order to make a giant sinkhole, a few words floated to my ear.


    [Oh no darling, don¡¯t do that. My little love tap was simply the price for what you stole, besides, witches do love to play with sorcerers.]


    Her tone wasn¡¯t actually audible, but the intent of a psychotic dominatrix somehow rang through, as if all of my efforts were futile and always will be. The feeling of being transparent scared me, but like hell was I going to take this lying down. This Earth is mine, and down deep in it, I was definitely king. Feeling out with Gungnir, I swam down through the dirt and rock until the pressure of the Earth was compacting raw mana into barely stable condensed gems of power. Stabbing one of them with Gungnir, I focused my will and pulled.


    First, the giant gate sank, cracking the warehouse building upon which it sat, then all of the sleeper soldier carriers sank as well, which I ended up placing next to each other. Stabbing another stone of power, I pulled every soldier down so that only their heads were showing and turned that dirt into solid stone. And for the best, most satisfying part of all, I sank the bitch. As the tumbling rock and dirt tore her and my dog apart, I pulled Spot to me, creating a large enough air bubble for us to be comfortable. The witch, she had her own special prison, a nice solid coffin of granite with two tiny air holes. Pulling that to me, I used earth sorcery to carve runes of power extraction, confusion, sleepiness, mental weakness, and then nausea to top it off. I didn¡¯t have enough power at my disposal to solidly cover the entire thing in platinum, but she wouldn¡¯t be able to work magic in there if she couldn¡¯t concentrate in the first place.


    Taking Spot and I up to the surface, we came face to face to Fugly, standing over his buried charges. The soldiers looked pale, those that weren¡¯t wearing helmets, and all of them were screaming for mercy or help. Casually tossing up a stone of power that I swiped on my upward journey, I looked the ugly monster in the eye.


    ¡°You know I¡¯m the Alpha here!¡± I shouted at it, mentally sending the same emotional tones as my words. ¡°You can either fuck off or die.¡± At my last words, Spot took it upon himself to grow as big as he could, gouts of flames erupting randomly from his body. The tip of Gungnir began to pulse with white light, a low but loud and ominous hum coming from it. As the beast continued to stare at me, I had enough. Slapping the power stone to Gungnir, I braced the butt in the dirt and used earth sorcery to reinforce my stance.


    Strands of molten earthen power creased up the grain of the wood as Gungnir sapped all of the power from the nearby earth, the three bladed crystal tip flashed with light, channeling the condensed power at Fugly. The jet of power didn¡¯t blast Fugly, it evaporated a hole so big I could shove a car through it. Not even waiting for the rest of the body to fall, Spot tackled it and began eating as if I had starved him.


    ¡°Damn it dog! No! Bad Spot!¡± I yelled, sprinting at the tangled up mess. Jumping up, I stabbed Gungnir into the corpse, doing my best to drain as much leftover power from the body before Spot ate it all. My flesh sorcery was channeling the stored bio-power from the body into me through the medium of my weapon, but the crazy part was the crystal tip was also storing the blood and the wood was drinking it. Without prompting, Svalinn extended blades of bone that stabbed into the beast as well, drinking up blood and power from the body. As Spot messily continued his eating, slopping bits of flesh and blood and sinew everywhere, including on me, my flesh sorcery cried out with joy as bits of energy flowed in to me from the simple contact. Just what was I becoming?

 Chapter 106 - Break the Witch (Book 2 Chapter 13)

    Before I had time to delve into my introspective thoughts, a soft melody floated from everywhere at once. I couldn¡¯t make out the words or even the language that it was in, but Spot just ignored it in favor of the feast in front of him. Nothing good could follow that almost-Gaelic music, so I threw myself into draining as much power as I could from Fugly¡¯s body. I walked into this fight with full power and that epic blast cost me most of what I had in me and in Gungnir. Svalinn was still pretty much good to go, and from what I could tell at a glance, it wasn¡¯t draining power from the corpse but actually eating, as if the piecemeal soul of Rath that I put in there was hungry.


    As pulses of crimson energy in time with the dying heart of the beast washed into me, purified by my spear and armor and stored in the crystal batteries, I checked again for a ley line. Being so used to having unending power may actually be the death of me some day, but my hope was that it wasn¡¯t this particular day. With every bite Spot took, I saw in the magical spectrum the vast quantities of power that were being added to his own, replacing what the witch stole from him in her initial attack against me. The pressure of available energy being funneled suddenly lost its power, slowing to a trickle. The damn singing had gotten a bit louder and as I turned my head to see the landscape of my probably temporary victory, two man sized portals opened up.


    The first portal was a sort of off-white, like freshly shined pearl or super organic milk, streams of light burning their way through,and the second portal was purple smoke mixed with black thorns that cut their way into our reality. At the same time, two visitors stepped out and landed on the dirt.


    ¡°She¡¯s not here, hehehehe, does this mean I¡¯m free?¡±


    ¡°Silence filth. If you ever shut up you¡¯d feel that the Mistress isn¡¯t far. And we don¡¯t get to play unless we obey her first.¡±


    The one who spoke first, a pitch-black woman with glowing purple tattoos and too many spikes to be nice to snuggle, sulked at her partner before taking a good look around.


    ¡°Maalik, I don¡¯t see her but maybe I can play with them first?¡±


    Her glowing yellow eyes honed in on me as she drew two whips from off her belt and cracked them. At the ends of the whips were cobra heads, literal heads of cobras with fangs that dripped poison. In her eyes, all I could see were visions of agonizing torture, dripping poison that burned like acid while being suffocated by the sinister fog that wreathed her body. Before I could completely engage my mind sorcery, the brightly glowing man with golden wings and two blazing swords stood between me and the she-devil. What could only be described as an angel stood with his back towards me.


    ¡°I may not be guarding Eden anymore with Uriel since the Fall, but I¡¯ll be damned thrice over before I let you take another mortal. Your whips don''t need another face, Enera.¡±


    ¡°Fine,¡± she pouted, ¡°Let¡¯s find Mistress and then have some fun.¡±


    Not that I wasn¡¯t glad for the heavenly intervention, but something about this angel seemed, less, way less than the last one I met. Gav¡¯riel seemed to be the personification of a compressed holy nuke, while this guy was his baby brother who just learned how to play with matches. And her, freaky smoke and whip bitch over there, she was an F5 hurricane of acid rain that I did not want to tangle with, ever. Redoubling my efforts to take in as much power as possible, I compacted a mental letter of commands that was going to go to Spot in just a minute. My best bet would be to get the fuck outta here. Both of these supernatural creatures were way above my weight class. Maybe, just maybe, they couldn¡¯t mess with me just like Gav¡¯riel, but the fact that they showed up right after I buried their Mistress means that something great is not on the way.


    Sensing that I had gotten all that I was going to get energy-wise from Fugly, I used a bit of my flesh sorcery to banish the gore covering me and then dove into the ground like a fish. Going down deep into the earth where I stashed the giant black sleeper pods, I inspected each one. [Tango, tango, fucking Tango, which one is fucking TANGO?! Got it!]


    Pushing the entire thing up to the surface with my earth sorcery, I deposited it next where Spot was still wolfing down what he could. Checking my magical senses, I could feel the angel and the demon rooting around in the dirt to get to the witch, so I shaped Gungnir into a spear and blasted the hinges off both sides of the longhouse sized pod. ¡°Spot, get those tops off!¡± I ordered, taking a couple steps back. Reluctantly stopping his gorging, my faithful dog got a good grip on the top parts and ripped them clean off.


    ¡°Too fat, that¡¯s a chick, whoa, didn¡¯t know catgirls were actually a thing, uhm, lizard man, let¡¯s take this helmet off here, dude with two heads, nope, and that¡¯s definitely too weird.¡± My constant diatribe was the only thing keeping my anticipation and anxiety from driving me insane. The one side of the pod didn¡¯t have my brother in either the top or bottom layer. Most were some kind of mutated or ¡®enhanced¡¯ human, and some were just plain aliens.


    Rounding the corner, the first face I saw was my brother¡¯s. Brown eyes, his face a little larger than I was used to, proportionally speaking, and that dopey expression on his unconscious face. Other than meeting the standard height and weight for a Centauri, it didn¡¯t look like he had any other kinds of genetic changes. Carefully cutting him out of the harness, his body fell forward knocking me to the ground. ¡°Fucking fat ass! Wake up bro!¡± I yelled, pushing him off of me and onto his back. No response.


    Ignoring everything, I put my hands on his head and dove into his mind. Steel, all I found in there was steel. Every thought, every feeling except for the unconscious was held in perfect stasis, but it was some kind of mental metal that kept him unconscious. Even I couldn¡¯t tell if it was literal or figurative steel in there. My earth sorcery kept telling me that it wasn¡¯t metal in there keeping him this way and my mind sorcery kept telling me that it wasn¡¯t his mind. Then, my mana sorcery pointed my senses to a grouping of flowing silver needles that were in line with the nerves in his neck. The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Fearing that my touch would burn his nerves out like Casparai¡¯s, I withdrew from my examination. As far as I could tell he was ok but, this didn¡¯t have the feel of something voluntary, it stank of someone taking advantage of naivety. My little brother was a total nerd just like me, and would have jumped at any kind of opportunity the enterprising Centauri put in front of him. What nerd could resist gaining magic or centuries of life or even the chance to travel space like it was a damn highway? I wouldn¡¯t have missed that chance for the world. But what stopped the Centauri from having hooks in their travel package, nothing. But hooks I could deal with. What I couldn¡¯t deal with were the two beings behind me who had already brought up the platinum coffin of their master.


    ¡°Oh my, did you find what you were looking for?¡± Enera¡¯s smoky voice sent all the wrong kinds of shivers down my spine.


    ¡°I believe he has my pet, and if he had but asked, I might have even let him have it. That was however, before he killed my favorite one.¡±


    Turning around, the silvery prison was upright in the dirt thirty feet from me, demon on one side and angel on the other. Now that they were a bit closer, I could see a thin golden tattoo on Enera¡¯s neck just over where a jugular would be, if demons had jugulars. A matching one but in purple was on Maalik. Through the eye holes of the prison that also functioned as air holes, I could see the witch¡¯s eyeball staring straight at me.


    ¡°How¡¯d you?¡±


    ¡°Use magic while inside this? Hmmm?¡± she laughed, ¡°Easy. Not all magic requires power. Some require knowledge, others require simple talent. What¡¯s your name, young sorcerer. Beast tamers don¡¯t have that kind of power offhand.¡±


    ¡°How¡¯d you know I said beast tamer to the Centauri?¡± I shot back, trying to keep the upper hand.


    ¡°Because they¡¯re mine. I bought them. How else do you think the great leader of the Alpha Centauri regime keeps back the hordes of undead that constantly assault the fringes of their empire?¡±


    ¡°Huh?¡±


    ¡°They don¡¯t pay us in gold dear, they pay us in lives. Earth is not the first harvested world for the Centauri and it won¡¯t be the last.¡±


    My mind was scrambling. Reeanth told me that the Amazons were the footsoldiers of the Hags, what I¡¯m assuming the witches are, which means that¡¯s probably who this lady is. So what in the world are they doing with Centauri soldiers?


    ¡°Now please let me out. Wytchfire will do the trick but it¡¯s certainly hell on one¡¯s complexion.¡±


    Wytchfire, the stuff that cleansed Terra, the former paradise mirror Earth from long ago?


    ¡°Hold on lady,¡± I interrupted, gripping Gungnir tight and fully activating Svalinn, wide bladed teardrop shields forming on my forearms. ¡°First off, you ain¡¯t going nowhere. Those two limp-winged dicks can¡¯t touch me and you know it. Second off, this is my brother, and he is going with me. So I can either have Spot eat you now and shit you out later, or I can take my brother and we all leave in peace. Whatcha say?¡±


    Forcibly using my mental sorcery to keep me calm and my flesh sorcery to keep my face from giving any tells, I pulled on all of the power in and near me and pushed it into my epic weapons. This was a total fucking bluff. I had nothing that could do a thing to either a demon or an angel, probably. Svalinn hasn¡¯t been fully tested yet, having pieces of a dragon¡¯s soul in it that probably could eat many different varieties of creatures, and Gungnir was just badass all around. But what hurts an angel other than another angel? What hurts a demon other than another angel, a demon, or a fucking priest? All of which, I¡¯m fresh out of.


    One part of me wished Reeanth and Johnny would hurry their fat asses up, but even then they wouldn¡¯t get here in time dragging that bear behind them. The other part of me contemplated the uselessness of that venture. In front of me was a literal angel. Angels were heavenly shock troopers from what I remembered from church. They made people blind, rained fire on cities, killed thousands in a night with a silent blade, and that was only half the problem. Who knows what demons can do? My only saving grace was lingering deductions from what Gav¡¯riel said and did near me, and holy shit I hoped I was right.


    Carefully flexing my will, I caused the dirt underneath the platinum prison to swallow it up again. Damn I love that tactic, so freakin useful. Pulling out the knob of wood that I took off Yggdrasil, I threw it into one of the torn out sections of the witch¡¯s beast while mentally ordering Spot to back off his feast. Making sure that her minions went right back to cursing and digging her I out, I made sure to get scarce. Dragging my brother over to it, I flooded the magical backup plan with mana carefully, right at the maximum flow that Yggdrasil piece could handle. As that was going on, I took out the razor thorny vine caltrop seeds out and planted them all around and linked them all together. True to form, the vine seeds planted and the thorns speared into the corpse, absorbing it directly and converting it into energy. Taking a hold of that process, I forced most of the energy being broken down into myself where I hold it and feed it into the Yggdrasil that, WASN¡¯T GROWING. The stupid thing just kept drinking down the energy like pouring water down a drain.


    ¡°Come on,¡± I muttered, using nature sorcery to communicate what I wanted the knob of living wood. ¡°Connect you damn thing, you¡¯re the same thing.¡± I was working off of half-assumptions and hunches here, but if this bit of wood was a part of Yggdrasil, and the World Tree is always connected to every part of itself at all times, then this piece of wood when activated should give me access to all of the mana powering my under-tree hideout. The big generator worked there still, and maybe I¡¯d get a less than perfectly efficient flow, but this means that I could plant the knob and have access to all the power I needed! Not to say that this would help me in my specific situation as I didn¡¯t count on fighting Higher and Lower beings, but it was a proof of concept. Also, it might let me escape in a last ditch effort to travel back home to where my seat of power truly was.


    Wait, I had people coming this way. Not today, but in two or three days, my own group of idiots would stumble over here into a camp of Centauri soldiers and an unhappy witch. Fuck. Doing this the nice way might not be the answer for once. Scorched earth tactic time. Leaving the whole mess of plants right where they were, I cut my palm and leaked some blood on the World Tree bud, binding it to myself. Taking a second to see where I was mana-wise, I pulled all of the mana it didn¡¯t need to survive and pushed it into Gungnir and Svalinn. The lynchpin here was the damn witch. Ordering Spot to guard Andy, I dove back into the earth. Watching an Angel and a Demon cooperate to dig out an alien witch is not something you see that often.


    [If she dies, do you both go free?] I asked, sending my thoughts to the angel. I figured I¡¯d get a better response from him.


    With a grunt that I translated as a ¡®yes¡¯, he kept digging. Flexing my magic again, I forced her coffin to sink another hundred yards.


    [Dig a little slower dude,] I thought at him, [Trying to help us both out.]


    [If I go free, Enera does too, and the Host have a duty to bind those who seek to interfere with Choice.] he sent back. [I failed at the Gate with her, and was bound to her in my Failure.]


    [The witch or the demon?]


    [The witch you imbecilic monkey! You think I¡¯d let even a Fallen such as myself be bound to a demon willingly?! I was under Uriel¡¯s command in guarding Eden, so my duties were transferred to guarding the gates of Hell after Eden fell, and when Enera escaped from her duties there, I was cast to the witch.]


    [So if I get rid of the witch, you¡¯ll take care of Enera?]


    [I will remove her from this dimension yes, but she will always hate you, and chase you if given the chance.]


    [Done.]


    Grabbing the coffin with my earth sorcery, I forced it down as deep as I could handle it. With the pressure of mother earth all around me, the agony was sharp, but my sorcery never felt more alive. Slowly forcing a fist closed, my magic mirroring my intent, I couldn¡¯t even hear her screams.

 Chapter 107 - Learned My Lesson (Book 2 Chapter 14)

    ¡°She¡¯s dead! We¡¯re free!¡±


    I was still in the rock, swimming through the dirt as easily as a fish does water, but the other two beings did not. They were digging with physical bodies, albeit supernaturally empowered ones, even though I had seen those kinds of creatures phase in and out of reality as well as teleport. Looked like they were trying to take their time in freeing their mistress. Both of them had stopped their digging the instant I compacted the witch though, Enera celebrating while the Maalik seemed to test the air.


    ¡°If we¡¯re free, then why are we still here?¡± he murmured. His blazing eyes turned towards me, and then to what I held in my hand. ¡°Not yet we¡¯re not.¡±


    ¡°Not completely free,¡± Enera clarified, shaking her assets as close as she could get to Maalik, ¡°But free to fuckin party!¡±


    ¡°The chain is still there, but there is no will behind it. Mortal.¡± Maalik called, ¡°Would you care to talk to us, I know you can hear me. That gem you hold is the remnant of one we would see truly meet the Endless Wheel.¡±


    Not trusting either of them, I used my magic to push myself even deeper into the earth until my powers were straining to keep me alive down here. The amount of power at this kind of pressure was simply incredible and my instincts were saying that I was safe at least for the time being.


    ¡°Dead but not gone,¡± Enera said, licking her lips and rubbing her hands together like a pirate who found the ultimate treasure. ¡°Just the right kind of freedom.¡±


    Their focus never wavered from the compressed platinum and witch that stayed in my hand, but something wasn¡¯t exactly right with it.


    ¡°Yes mortal, not gone. She may not be alive, but her spirit is still there. Mother Earth recognizes abominations and actively tries to confine them when they¡¯re brought to her, but that one will never stop trying to return.¡±


    Phasing through the rock, Enera came within twenty feet of me and spoke, her presence filling my magical senses like a thick dark cloud. ¡°You can stay down here forever keeping her trapped, or you can give her to me. I promise to make sure that her soul will be well taken care of.¡±


    Maalik¡¯s presence joined Enera¡¯s, buffeting her darkness like a sunbeam. ¡°Or . . you can give her to me and she can return to her own.¡±


    ¡°Oooohhhh!¡± Enera squealed as she clapped her hands together. ¡°That¡¯s even more evil! My, how I love it when your sense of justice twists just a teensy bit.¡±


    ¡°Her soul will face justice as the hands of the Hags. The Heavens need not get involved, and Hell has enough toys.¡±


    I¡¯m way out of my weight class here. On one hand, I seriously kicked some ass due to my armor acting as a perfect disguise in hiding my true magical power. On the other hand, I was right about the Higher and Lower beings not being allowed to interfere outright with mortals. The biggest danger was twofold, properly disposing of this compressed magical construct filled with a raging witch¡¯s soul, and making sure that no one knows who I am. Also, to me, this thing in my hand reeks of necromancy, something that is the antithesis of my nature and could also garner the attention of said Higher and Lower beings. As I thought about it, I noticed that the tip of Enera¡¯s tail was turning corporeal and scratching strange runes in the rock while she whistled absentmindedly.


    As I watched, a super-fast packet of information smacked into my mental shields along with a message, ¡°Carve it into the prison dumbass!¡± While the tone was insulting, my mental sorcery instantly broke down the information that unrolled like a scroll. Wasting no time, I used earth sorcery to imprint the runes her tail drew into the squished witch¡¯s prison.


    Maalik¡¯s eyes grew huge as his surprise exploded along with his burning aura. Swinging his flaming swords at Enera, he almost managed to take her head off. ¡°Damn filth! The moment you get just a speck of freedom you commit the worst of sins!?¡±


    Dancing away with an evil grace, Enera spun and twirled and twerked her devilish ass again and again out of his reach. ¡°Whatever do you mean my self-righteous cocksucker? I didn¡¯t make him do anything, mortals do what they will.¡± Her wings extended at perfect, almost pre-planned, moments and diverted sword thrusts that she couldn¡¯t dodge. ¡°Besides you bitter man, knowledge isn¡¯t a sin.¡±


    ¡°It is if it takes away Choice!¡±


    ¡°He doesn¡¯t have to give it to you or I,¡± she spat when Maalik realized that his rage was futile. It was literally like trying to hit smoke. ¡°There are many places on this wretched planet he could take it where she¡¯d be imprisoned for eternity. He could even shove it to the core if he was willing to die, or he could find a way to the Aelves. They love playing with witches.¡± Her cackle in and of itself evoked the feeling that I would have nightmares tonight.


    Feeling that there was way too much going on, I stepped in by pushing my body closer to the Earth¡¯s surface and speaking up. ¡°I just wanted my brother. She got in the way. Now all I want is for this thing and you two to be gone AND, I want you both to never talk about me or what happened here. How do I make that happen?¡±


    The runes given to me made the prison stop its squirming. I couldn¡¯t feel any kind of mental pressure coming out of it and it just looked like a cool space rock that some kid drew on. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work!


    ¡°Morai does have plenty of enemies,¡± Enera mused.


    Putting away his swords, Maalik stopped glaring at her and turned to me. ¡°That would work.¡±


    ¡°What would work? What is it with you people and not answering questions, or talking in half-sentences? I¡¯ve got half a mind to send this off into a realm of madness and Chaos if I can find one.¡±


    ¡°NO!¡± They both shouted.


    ¡°Witches thrive on both you insipid child!¡± Getting real close to my face, Enera¡¯s fangs became real apparent. ¡°We¡¯re trying to help you and you joke about making her even more powerful?!¡±


    There is just no pleasing these people, or spirits, or whatever the fuck they really are. They seem to fit the standard visual expectations of Judeo-Christian mythology, but is mythology even the correct term if they¡¯re standing right in front of me? If only high school and college degrees covered shit like this, how to handle an angelic/demonic encounter? It really ticked me off because even the church didn¡¯t handle that very well. All they did was burn witches and touch children and then take our money while telling the sheep how evil they are. Not that the Aztecs were much better, with their human sacrifices and cannibalism, or even the Statists who just loved how human governments routinely slaughtered their own people century after century. Are we, humans, the problem? Maybe, as a valid point could be made for both the highs and lows of human accomplishment. All I really wanted was to fucking chill with some nachos, my hot wife, and maybe a goddamn roll in the hay. Fuck.


    ¡°Who said I want that?!¡± I yelled back, ¡°Who said anything about doing stupid things? I just want to be done with this shit. Which one of you insufferable douches will take this thing far away from me, deal with it so that she¡¯s gone for good, and never return?¡±


    They both started talking at once.


    ¡°That¡¯s not helpful!¡± I felt like the small child who had locked himself inside the turned on car in the Wal-mart parking lot with both parents arguing as to how to get the door open, the mean mother screaming threats of punishments with the easy going father kind of laughing at the whole thing and saying to just open the door and we¡¯ll go get some ice cream.


    ¡°And what did you mean when you said return to her own?¡± I asked, ¡°You said that like it was some kind of wicked punishment, and that I might benefit in some way.¡±


    ¡°You yourself wouldn¡¯t benefit directly,¡± Maalik clarified. ¡°We would deliver the remnant of the Witch Morai to her enemies, and they would release us and Centauri soldiers. Witches hold grudges and would do anything to satisfy such. You killed Morai¡¯s slave, the one called Casparai. She would have hunted you by proxy for eternity if she had survived. Many would gladly perform some onerous task for a simple chance at revenge, and Morai has done wrong to many.¡±


    Enera giggled. ¡°Oh it would be beautiful! They might even let me play with her soul for a bit too! No one would care about the random lost Centauri soldiers on a fringe world that just rejoined the fold.¡± Her eyes bulged out of her head. ¡°You could take over our brand!¡±


    There was simply no helping it at this point. When else am I going to have an opportunity to milk beings like this for information and actually get some results? I knew what she was getting at, that I could be their new master, not that I wanted that headache, but there were some definite upsides to it, information being the key one. Not dismissing it out of hand, I pulled myself up to the surface and conjured a block of stone to sit on. If I were near a ley line or was full up on power, I would take the time to carefully coat this entire prison in at least six inches of runed platinum just to make sure that there was no escaping, but again, I really don¡¯t know if that would work.


    As Enera was dancing for joy at her imagined transfer of ownership that hadn¡¯t even happened yet, Maalik was standing imperiously in front of me, his hands resting on the pommel of his swords as their points were in the dirt.


    ¡°Most would jump at such an opportunity mortal.¡± For once, the slight snobbishness was gone. ¡°Do you not care for such power?¡±


    ¡°Not really, but I¡¯m not gonna answer that further,¡± I replied, staring down at the now inert lump of metal. ¡°Why would she rather be transferred than free?¡±


    ¡°Power.¡±


    ¡°The kind of power where she eats my soul or the kind of power that being on the mortal plane sort of upgrades her, like the elementals?¡±


    ¡°A bit of both really. Devils and demons certainly grow stronger by eating souls, but mortal energy has a much different flavor than what they produce allowing them to grow differently than what a normal devil would.¡±


    A bit surprised at his candor, I pressed. ¡°So how do angels get stronger?¡±


    ¡°We are either given Grace, bestowed relics of power, or allowed to grow more wings. Hunting demons and the Eldritch bolsters our abilities while tribulations harden our souls. Mortal magic does not help us grow in power, but at times it does allow us to gain different abilities,¡± he mused. ¡°Some of the archangels have kept their status due to being changed by sorcerers of old. Merlin was very fond of Gav¡¯riel long ago, and the Herald now can almost rival Mikhael.¡±


    Tossing the prison up lightly and catching, I watched his eyes track it. ¡°What would you do with this if I gave it to you? She seems to think that she¡¯d have a lot of fun with it, but what would you gain?¡±


    ¡°Freedom,¡± he answered. ¡°I could take the soul of a Vile One to the Host and they would either purify it, returning her to the Wheel, or give her to Justices of Sheol. They would gladly balance the scales for one who has evaded death for so long.¡±


    ¡°And what would you give me?¡±


    Pressing down on his swords, Maalik pushed them a foot each into the earth and stepped back, gesturing at them.


    ¡°These. I would gain much for performing a deed of such weight, that losing these would mean nothing to me. Take them. Learn from them. The undead cannot stand Heaven¡¯s flame.¡±


    Holy shit. Too damn good to be true. Flesh sorcery to forcefully keep my poker face, and . . . bluff.


    ¡°That¡¯s not enough,¡± I stated. ¡°I¡¯m trying to avoid being noticed. I can¡¯t walk around with two swords from a freaking angel, especially with a crazy demon walking around. Hell no. That will draw all the wrong kinds of attention, and I don¡¯t need that. What I do need is for you and her to be gone, nobody to know about me, this damn witch gone for good, and knowledge of how to effectively fight demons and angels and the undead.¡±


    ¡°Agreed.¡±


    Reaching forward, he pulled his swords from the ground and a flash of light momentarily blinded me. His weapons were gone and in his hands was a small lump of something grey. Touching it to the tip of Gungnir, the speartip took on a streak of solid-iron grey that grew down the rest of the spear.


    ¡°You call it star-iron, our word is too harmonious for human ears. This can alter the magic from your weapon so that it is inimical to all manner of unclean. You can also store items in your weapon at will. The star-iron can hold things on a different octave of reality than what you touch and bring them back by changing the frequency of the molecular structure. Inside, I have placed a familiar spirit, one who¡¯s sole focus is the acquisition, storage, and distribution of knowledge. Commune with it to learn more.¡±


    A flash of light strobed out many times brighter and faster than the last one, stunning me where I sat. When I came to from where I fell behind the stone block, the prison was gone. Using flesh sorcery to heal the pounding headache and afterimages, I saw that the evidence of the battle, the entire thing, had been swept clean. No devils, no angels, no witches, no giant pit or smashed anything. The Centauri were out of the earth lying unconscious and my dog was sleeping where the corpse of the Fugly used to be.


    Everything was quiet except for my pounding heart. Picking my butt up off the ground, I ran from soldier to soldier, checking their pulse and their faces. None of them were injured, not even a scratch on them. Finally, I got back to where Spot was laying, my brother¡¯s body propped up against him. Breathing out a sigh of relief that he was still here, I double checked him. Pulse felt good, nothing to indicate any kind of damage. Sitting down next to him, I leaned up against Spot and finally let myself relax, several tears of relief streaming down my cheeks. I had done it, finally.

 Chapter 108 - Family Feud (Book 2 Chapter 15)

    The worst part about it was that it didn¡¯t really hurt as much as I thought it would, the rejection that is. I spent a week nursing all of the unconscious Centauri back to full health and explaining as much as I could to them while conjuring nicer than average earthen homes for everyone to sleep in. I even put details into it, like conjured marble fireplaces stuffed with ready to burn wood and lovely stone stairs complete with oaken railing. Damn swimming pools with a filtration enchantment to purify the water sat behind the houses with lovely trees for shade. In my free time, as healing didn¡¯t take too much for me, I put a serious dent in my offhandedly concocted plans to build a town or city here. With a touch of whimsy using nature sorcery, I made the entire area bloom up with lush grasses and fruit trees, and then made several trees grow into bungalow houses right over the water. The last day I completely zoned out and worked on the building housing the small piece of Yggdrasil, what I was calling World Tree part two, to push down my feelings.


    It wasn¡¯t really my fault. That¡¯s what my brother said. It wasn¡¯t my fault that he didn¡¯t feel connected to me anymore. To him, I had been dead or missing or enslaved for over four freaking years, but to me, it¡¯s only been a couple hectic months. The time dilation that Earth experienced fucked me over in this almost as much as losing my wife. To make it worse, all of the Centauri that Andy was here on Earth with, they were all a part of some mutual magical bond experiment. Every single one of the former normal Earth humans was not only a Centauri soldier, but they were linked magically as if they were their own giant hive-mind or witch coven. They could share magical or physical energy across their bond, they could disperse damage across twenty bodies instead of just one. They were more of a family than anything I¡¯d ever seen, and I wasn¡¯t a part of it. Shit, they even got along better with Johnny and Reeanth who sort of meshed with their whole setup.


    ¡°What do you mean you wanna stay?!¡±  My puzzled rage bundled up in the loaded question most likely did not help the situation, but at this point I didn¡¯t care. ¡°I AM YOUR BROTHER! I fucking found you after hounding a goddamn Angel and Merlin himself, and that¡¯s AFTER killing a dragon!¡±


    The stubborn little shit, who coincidentally was much taller than me now, glared at me with a confidence I¡¯d never seen in him before.


    ¡°You were dead! You were dead or gone or something, fuck! I thought at worst you were a mindless slave to the Conglomerate by now!¡± His foul mouth matched my own. Growing up with a Marine Corps father will do that to ya. ¡°And you attack us, kill my blood-brother, and slaughter our guardian Leviathan! How the fuck are we supposed to keep our beachhead?¡±


    The normal older brother response to this would be to punch the younger brother and show him who¡¯s boss, but that dynamic is definitely gone now he tops almost eight feet in height and at least a good hundred and fifty pounds on me now. I bet if I kicked his ass with magic that he¡¯d view it as cheating. I punched him anyway. I was angry, I felt betrayed, and more than a little hurt. My fist didn¡¯t do much, in fact, it crumpled when it met his jaw. Flexing my flesh sorcery, I healed my hand, and then punched him again.


    ¡°You¡¯re not bigger than me anymore,¡± he said with a smirk. ¡°You¡¯ll never beat me in a fight ever again. And besides, I have an entirely new family now. We¡¯ve fought and bled together, for years! And where were you? Sitting here on Earth having a good ole¡¯ time?¡±


    The next punch wasn¡¯t just human. Even though I wasn¡¯t wearing Svalinn right now, I had more than enough tools at my disposal. Flesh sorcery strengthened my bones and skin to boost their durability and a quick conjuration covered said fist with bone and then again with mana-hardened stone. That punch, well that one took him down, or would have if he hadn¡¯t caught it.


    ¡°Yeah Andy! Kick his ass!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s my squad leader! Hell yeah, show the normie who¡¯s boss, fuck¡¯em up!¡±


    His squadmates had formed the classic high school circle in the parking lot to watch us fight, and it seemed like we were more than happy to oblige. There¡¯s not much a mundane would be able to do against a fully trained Centauri warrior, but I don¡¯t fit that category anymore. Armoring my body similar to my fist, I concentrated most of my mana into my brain to speed up my perceptions. My brother¡¯s fist barely missed my face as I ducked and sent my left fist up into the elbow of his arm holding mine. Not worrying about his injuries, cause I could heal them, my empowered strike shattered his elbow letting me get my right arm free. Squatting down and focusing, I pumped power into my legs as I did a sort of jump uppercut right into Andy¡¯s gut. As he sank to his knees trying to pull air into his struggling lungs, I used flesh sorcery to deaden his nerves and fix his arm.


    ¡°It hasn¡¯t been a ¡®good ole¡¯ time¡¯ brother. Sarah is a fucking tree now but somehow still alive and I¡¯ve been protecting the goddamn area!¡± I growled in his face. ¡°Zombie cats, goblins, nightmares, dragons, aliens, you name it, I¡¯ve killed it. Sarah and I were drunk and happy when shit rolled through and kicked off the magical apocalypse, and pretty much everyone else was gone.¡±


    Finishing healing his body and dispelling my armor, I continued on. ¡°And then some messed up excuse for an Angel comes through and tells me that you¡¯re alive! Then I get a flippin¡¯ slice of hope in me and then as I fight my way to see you, you aren¡¯t even happy to see your fucking brother! Fuck you asshole!¡±


    Standing up while still holding his stomach, my once little brother glared at me. ¡°Months!? You¡¯ve experienced months of hardship? Boo-fuckin-hoo you little bitch. Me and my new family have been at war for years! And let me tell you, the Hive don¡¯t just kill you, they fucking eat you alive if they get the chance! And to start the whole damn thing, the Centauri fixed our gene sequences but it was six months of torture at the cellular level. Many died just from the fucking pain!


    ¡°I didn¡¯t kidnap and experiment on you! Why the fuck are you mad at me!¡±If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    My brother¡¯s presence seemed to grow as his anger hit a boiling point.


    ¡°Because you were supposed to be there!¡± He roared as he threw a rocket of a punch. It slammed into my magical force field that I hastily erected.


    ¡°You were supposed to protect us!¡± Another punched rocked my shield.


    ¡°James is dead!¡± Slam.


    ¡°Mom is dead!¡± Slam.


    ¡°Dad is sold!¡± Slam.


    ¡°And¡± Slam. ¡°You¡± Slam ¡°Weren¡¯t¡± Slam. ¡°There!¡± Slam.


    His fists were a bloodied mess, but he wasn¡¯t cowed at not being able to touch me. It hurt my heart. My little brother is all grown up. I used to change his diapers, drive him to school, fight his bullies, and here he is, a full grown warrior. He was right, I had failed him. And while it wasn¡¯t my fault, I understood his pain. He was really mad at the world, but me, I had plans to make it burn.


    Coming back from my memories on the back of Tuki, I pondered my next steps as we flew back towards home. Blaming my brother was pointless though. In his mind, I had been dead, he had moved on with his own crazy life and built something to cherish and protect. It was like coming back home to a small town after a year at college and all of your old friends weren¡¯t really as welcoming as they used to be because they all stayed and their lives went on. This was the softest version of the cold shoulder that I¡¯d ever experienced. One of his squadmates explained to me that the witch that I killed was not really regarded as their slave master, even though that¡¯s what she was. These soldiers looked at her as their big gun, their sword to fend off the dragons that they couldn¡¯t handle, their nuclear option, and I had just taken that away from them. I had given them freedom, but they didn¡¯t really want it, not even my brother.


    Every conversation I had to try and get to the heart of the matter, the irritating part that just wouldn¡¯t allow me to shut up, every single one of them would just huff and stomp off while the rest would glare at me as if I had just shit on their mother¡¯s grave. It also didn¡¯t help that I killed their beloved Captain too. The reason they were surprised about Fugly coming through the gate is because the witch and her pet weren¡¯t due to be here for at least another week and they had never seen a gate of that size activate before. Technically, I did start the whole thing when I killed Casparai looking for my brother, but then learning that my family had been bought and sold put me in a state of mind where I wasn¡¯t thinking too clearly when I came to the surface to the sight of a witch torturing my dog didn¡¯t help. They were expecting the witch but not her monster. That¡¯s what spooked them.


    I was the enemy. Me. I scared them. I had stepped in enough shit that even my own brother couldn¡¯t stand the stink, and it pissed me off. He didn¡¯t want to be free. He didn¡¯t want to leave his comrades, and when I offered to make them awesome weapons so that they wouldn¡¯t have to depend on a witch for protection they just scoffed at me. I even scanned their brains at night to see if it was some kind of magical compulsion to love the witch and nope. This group of Centauri honestly believed that they were in a good situation and didn¡¯t want to fuck it up, that is, before I came and killed their witch and their guard-dog-monster godzilla lookin¡¯ thing. I was the problem.


    But I couldn¡¯t just leave. Coming all this way to find out my family didn¡¯t want to see me hurt, but I was still the big brother, and big brothers do what big brothers need to do. Where I planted the knob of Yggdrasil, I had spent another week feeding it energy and making sure that its root system was particularly deep. This was still hurricane country and trees tend to fly around here. This spot became an arboreal fortress, complete with a Yggdrasil interior and an enchanted stone to cover the outside, making it virtually impenetrable. I also created stone boxes full of enchanted melee weapons that could feed off of either ambient mana or whatever the wielder decided to pump into it. I also spent my nights upgrading their shields and fixing whatever enchantment problems I saw on their weapons.


    For the final touch, just to make sure that my asshole brother knows that I still cared, I crafted the most powerful shield necklace I could. Two days worth of planning and meticulous crafting went into it. The work of art was based on the enchantment design of Svalinn. The platinum mixed with iridium covering would allow him to have a coveted portable power source that was undetectable to any magic users. Although, I did sort of cheat as the design wasn¡¯t just a shield.


    Several enchantments were meshed together to form a sort of constant energy feeding system that would intertwine with his armor. It functioned as a sort of alarm system, so that if he was near death then he would be able to access all of the energy in the battery. The two that I liked the most were the nightly overboost enchantment that would run a sort of flesh sorcery based internal cleanup process while he was sleeping and the one I call the daily pep. The first one would speed up the normal processes that a body does while sleeping and also coax his body to slowly overcome his normal physical limitations, so while other people will eventually hit a cap on what they can lift, he will be able to slowly improve even past that. The second functioned as a sort of magical coffee effect, where all of the unused or waste matter his body produced would be broken down completely and then converted into pure magical energy so that his endurance would be off the charts compared to his comrades.


    The last two enchantments I put into his necklace made me think about redoing some of the enchantment matrices on my own gear, but it could wait until I got back home. I also thought about what Reeanth and I discussed right before I left with Spot.


    Several days prior . . .


    ¡°I respectfully refuse my lord.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t give a shit what you refuse, respectfully or not! Fuck your feelings. I¡¯m giving you a goddamn order and that¡¯s that. You¡¯re the one who wanted to be a sworn vassal, and now I¡¯m telling you to do it.¡±


    Her glare didn¡¯t dissuade me at all as I carefully put the final touches on Andy¡¯s shield necklace amulet thing. This was supposed to be a final defense, but ideally there should be multiple layers of defense and planning to stave off death, and one of those would be Reeanth.


    ¡°For the last fucking time, I order you to stay here and guard my brother as if he were me. Protect him with your life. Shit woman, Johnny and the bear are staying too, so you probably won¡¯t have to do much. Just keep him alive.¡±


    ¡°Yeah crazy lady, this shit¡¯ll be fun!¡± Johnny joined in. ¡°Fightin¡¯ gators and wreckin shit while clappin alien cheeks! What more is there to life!¡± Leaning in close to where Reeanth and I were arguing, he whispered. ¡°There¡¯s like, two or three tall ass hotties who wanna get with this lusciousness if you know what I mean, right?¡± His hands traced his skinny biceps as if he were showing off for a photoshoot. ¡°I mean, what kind of lady can resist this much power?¡±


    Rolling my eyes I focused back on Reeanth. ¡°See, just give in to his power,¡± I joked, ¡°You got nothing to worry about.¡±


    I mean, it¡¯s a solid plan. The wrong kind of action seems to follow me around, and while I¡¯m an uber kind of powerful, people can get caught in the crossfire. Johnny and his bear were more than happy to be the big guns around the budding settlement and Reeanth would be a perfect bodyguard for my brother while I took the madness that seemed to follow me elsewhere. It did hurt knowing that I wasn¡¯t actually welcome here, but it would make me feel better to know that one brother was taken care of. What I do know, is that after the Hungry Ones are taken care of, I¡¯m coming for the Centauri.

 Chapter 109 - Chasin the Dream (Book 2 Chapter 16)

    The whole trip sucked moose wang. I wanted something soooo simple, but instead, everything got all screwed up. Arriving back at home with Spot was a gigantic relief. With my luck, I half expected the forest to be up in flames upon my arrival. Grumpily complaining to Spot the whole time back sort of allowed me to work through the emotional turmoil of the past chunk of almost wasted time. Reeanth was back in the mutated wetlands of Miami guarding my brother and Johnny was tasked with protecting the budding town, more importantly, guarding the tertiary root of Yggdrasil that I¡¯d planted there. Binding it with blood was no small feat, but my nature and flesh sorcery was more than up to the task. Now, nobody would be able to access, use, or harm that important little plant. While securing it with runes and enchanted traps, I kept feeling a weird sensation of home emanating from it. I mean, I know that Yggdrasil is one tree that holds the universe together, but this particular side branch of it emitted the same energy but a bit weaker as the generator that I had in my under-tree hideout in Virginia.


    Exhausted from being put through the emotional wringer, I went straight to bed after arriving home. Spot didn¡¯t pay any attention as he took off into the woods at his normal gigantic size, and Tuki flew with his group, his murder of eagle-crows, and set about making their nests leaving me in peace.


    The next day found me earlier than I had hoped. As much as I wanted to sleep in, my flesh sorcery made sure that my sleep was as efficient and restful as could be, so after five super intense hours of unconsciousness, my ass woke up at roughly four in the goddamn morning. Fixing the bit of grogginess with another pulse of energy, I snagged some the ration cubes that I stole from the Centauri. After having Gungnir altered to have a magical storage space, I grabbed two whole boxes of the supplies when they weren¡¯t looking and stuffed them in there along with three changes of clothes and two of the Centauri nano-suits complete with matching rifles. This wonderful innovation of pre-packaged meals was the kind of thing that Pre-apocalypse Earth militaries would have killed for, not including the futuristic weaponry. Each cube was roughly twice the size of a normal sugar cube but contained at least four thousand calories, and each box held two thousand of them. The Centauri needed around three of these cubes a day to keep going, but normal size me only needed one.


    With a solid supply of food for at least the next two years stashed in my staff, I could worry about things that actually mattered, like showing the undead bastards who¡¯s boss. In case it wasn¡¯t apparent, that would be me. I figured though that technology would be the perfect way to shore up the weaknesses in my offense towards the undead. Without having a sorcery over fire or lightning or air, my options were limited in dealing with the undead in the normal fashion. My entire childhood was filled with stories of epic wizards flinging fireballs or lightning strikes and wiping out hordes of moaning zombies, but my dumbass had to go and pick powers with a ¡®long-term¡¯ focus. That¡¯s fine, because you know what? Dumbledore and Dresden ain¡¯t seen nothin¡¯ yet.


    And for those that can imagine what sort of insanity my loose morals can justify, just add in the fact that all is fair in love and war, and this sorcerer plans on bending even those rules. Knowing that I didn¡¯t really have any kind of timeline to stick to, I figured that melding my particular abilities with what I stole would be a damn good place to start. Ignoring Meliad¡¯s insistent pleas to play, which I took to have a different meaning than what an innocent child would mean, I barricaded myself in my under-river bolthole for the foreseeable future.


    My worktable was bigger than it had any right to be. The solid grey stone was more than capable of supporting any kind of weight that I would need, but it felt good to have a table that big. I felt like a damn general overlooking the map of the world that I¡¯d loosely constructed. The deconstructed Centauri rifles lay out in orderly pieces as I took my time in understanding how each piece worked. Being in the Army Reserve for a couple years and having a Marine for a dad instilled a love of firearms in me, but this technology was a bit beyond me. There was no firing pin, no bolt carrier, no bolt, and the magazine was all kinds of fucked. The mechanical process of shooting a piece of metal simply did not compare, for the most part, to energizing a sliver of hardened runed glass and spitting it out several times faster than the speed of sound, creating for lack of a better term, a blaster bolt. The speed at which the round came out combined with the infused mana turned the glass into a highly energized particle beam that could easily cut through any metal. The only protection I could see that would legitimately work would be magical shielding, and even then it would have to have a massive power source to hold off more than a few rounds of fire.


    The magazine of the Centauri rifle puzzled me the most. A normal AR-15 semi-automatic rifle has a magazine that holds thirty rounds, and any normal human can pick up a magazine, unload it and then count the rounds. But the magazine for the Centauri rifle was solid. As far as I could tell, where the bolt carrier and firing pin would be, was a magical mechanism that shaved off a piece of the magazine, imprinted runes into it, charged it with mana, and then hurled it faster than anything normal humanity could come up with. The Centauri rifle looked to run out of power before it ran out of ammunition. The coolest part of the entire thing though was the super condensed line of runes that ran down the inside of the barrel. They literally hurt my eyes when I shined a light on them and looked at them. Using mana sorcery, I could do a sort of copy and paste function, but doing so hurt my brain in such a way that using magic for a day simply wasn¡¯t possible. Whoever the genius or madman was that came up with that combination of runes certainly didn¡¯t want people figuring it out.


    Above the orderly display of dissembled rifles were the two solid blocks of nano-tech armor. They looked like silver cubes, but these two were special, these two weren¡¯t keyed to anyone¡¯s DNA. I designated the one on the left as Cube A and the one on the right as Cube B. The first was my experimentation cube, and the second would be the ¡®final form¡¯ for when I got every kink worked out of the first one. Oh lordy me, I had so many plans, so many ideas that I just couldn¡¯t wait to play, no, fuck, no, institute, no! Taking a step back from my worktable, I pushed my excitement down and took a deep breath.


    ¡°Need some goddamn liquor,¡± I muttered, looking over the organized chaos. My consciousness sorcery was bubbling up like an excited child that had gotten into the fucking cookie jar. Random ass concepts kept bouncing around my head, nano-tech armor combined with dragon flesh for Spot, diamond golem guardians with enhanced intelligence and armed with nano-tech weapons while metal-girded hamadryads sported Centauri rifles.


    Shaking ideas of the far future out of my head, I settled for what I could accomplish within the more immediate time frame. Without peering too deeply into the enchantments of the rifles, I took snapshots of them and stored them in a separate mental process and sprinted for the crystal brain vats. Barely making it in time, I deposited the rough schematics into Reeanth¡¯s clone brain. Pulsing packets of information slammed into the fleshy mass, unburdening my mind from knowledge too weighty for my current self.


    Rath¡¯s much larger brain floated silently next to its tortured compadre, alive in only the most technical of senses. ¡°You¡¯re next fucker,¡± I promised, glaring at that just out of reach nexus of information, the sweet nectar of immaterial power. ¡°You know what? Fuck later!¡± I¡¯m fresh, at the top of my game. I kicked a witch¡¯s ass and threw down with a monster from Stephen King¡¯s nightmares. What¡¯s the point of overwhelming power if it can¡¯t fix all your problems? Setting up a link between myself and the matter-to-mana generator, I cranked it up to full and plastered my face to the crystal vats like a kid staring at a fish in an aquarium.


    ¡°You¡¯re all mine.¡± I growled, wondering why I had ever been so cautious around these two brains. It¡¯s not like the soulless balls of flesh have a will in and of themselves. Rath¡¯s soul was gone, eaten by Svalinn, and Reeanth¡¯s clone brain didn¡¯t have one because I freaking grew it! Well, grew a copy of the original, but who cares about semantics. In fact, I had probably gone about this the entire wrong way. ¡®Work smarter not harder¡¯ was one of my father¡¯s ¡®dad-isms¡¯ that popped out every time I tried to brute force something that required a more delicate touch, and the magical equivalent of brain surgery certainly qualifies.


    ¡°Be the brain, be the brain. We are the same brain, I am you, you are me.¡± My mantra helped to center my focus, creating the intent to give my flesh and consciousness sorcery something to grasp. Gently lowering my hand into the vat, my fingers caressed the slimy lobes of the fleshy mass, soft waves of persuasive magic slipping into the unsuspecting nerves of the cloned brain. After a second of lightning fast communication, my delicate argument delivered by enhanced neurons managed to convince the brain that we were one and the same, and because of that, the decryption vanished! Desperately tamping down on my excitement, my mental probe moved deeper until the mental manifestation of the silvery Centauri security cube presented itself. Last time I saw it, it was solid, like a bright box of forged steel, and now, it was moldable as if each molecule of it was alive, shifting with every minute pulse of brainwaves.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    [Magi-tech armor, show me the controls of the magitech armor.] I thought, scanning the random incoherent fragments of thoughts. Brains without souls are like computers without programmers. There are background processes that run but without direction, there¡¯s no real power behind the intent. The consciousness doesn¡¯t exist without a will, and I became that will. Using my consciousness sorcery, I reworked the mental visualization until the entire experience became me sitting at a normal laptop computer. True to my will, the brain was more than willing to organize itself in ways that I would understand and find useful. There were several really cool folders that I copied and put on their own harddrive for later, awesome concepts like Centauri tactics and spaceship piloting training, and then another folder held all kinds of hand-to-hand combatives as well as instinctive weapon handling for all of their military¡¯s standard weaponry. Made a copy of that as well.


    Because the brain thought it was necessary, it kept bringing up the vital processes of breathing and blood pumping as if I needed to know how to constantly do that. Shoving that to the side like an annoying notification, I kept browsing until I hit an early memory for Reeanth. Making sure to keep myself as the outside viewer so not to be the one ¡®experiencing¡¯ the memory, I carefully watch as her father handed her a silvery cube. I didn¡¯t recognize the language at first but the intent bled through after a hint of puzzlement became apparent from me to the brain. Her father, Tarkon Alsarond Le¡¯Talv, placed the cube on her left hand, and as she looked at it he quickly slashed the other palm with a knife and pushed her hands together. The blood seeped into the cube, its metallic form melting and stretching like the blob to cover her forearms. Bond with the armor. His voice was more of a vibration in her memory, but even from my outsider¡¯s perspective, it shook me. Feeling that it was coming to a close, I backed out with my copied folders and downloaded them to my brain after making sure they stayed unencrypted.


    Looking at Rath¡¯s brain made my own feel a bit queasy. The mental journey seems to hold its own kind of rigors. My body felt fine but my mind was a bit shot. That one can wait a few days. I got more than enough from Reeanth¡¯s clone brain to keep me busy for at least that long. ¡°Dobby has a sock!¡± I cackled, sprinting down the tunnel to the under-river hideout. Hell yeah I was happy, having a good ole time solving problems that I wish my brain had figured out a long-ass time ago. You can only get so smart before it actually gets in the way. Plans of hacking the brains using some kind of flesh-sorcery enhanced virus were at the top of my mind for a while, as if that couldn¡¯t go wrong. And then there were great little ideas of making some sort of brain eating monster that digest the brains and then spit out the answers to all my questions, a sort of flesh based Gungnir when he was alive and kickin¡¯. The little devil sitting on my shoulder cackled at the thought of all of those ideas running amok. I can¡¯t be the guy who unleashes potential plagues of brain-eating monsters or viruses that hack into brains turning people into zombies. I mean, I could, but I really shouldn¡¯t.


    A Hail Mary idea came straight out of the background of mind, pinging off the others that really should not be thought about. The shapeshifting spear-staff weapon I have, Gungnir, was just pimped out by a dragon to function as an extra-dimensional storage space. What if I simply broke the game? What is to stop me from filling up a bunch of crystal batteries to the brim with mana and storing as many as I could in Gungnir? It may not be the perfect endless mana solution that I had in the beginning, but wouldn¡¯t this be the next best thing? Besides, I¡¯m still American at heart, and what American doesn¡¯t fucking love overdone firepower? I mean, I could build my old giant crystal battery that I used to power the shields of my house before a goddess blew it away and stick that in Gungnir, virtually creating a power bank of immense proportions. The little devil on my shoulder popped up again and whispered in my ear. ¡°You¡¯re right evil-me,¡± I chuckled just a bit, letting out my inner Invader Zim. ¡°I could fill it up with one big power bank, OR, I could fill up Gungnir with a thousand little batteries and rig them to explode on impact after being launched at high speeds!¡±


    Perfect. A mana-crystal based grenade launcher inside of a magical spear wielded by a stunningly handsome Earth sorcerer covered in upgraded Centauri nano-magitech armor, awesome. Forcefully retrieving my soaring ego, I gathered up my plans and supplies and headed back to my worktable in the under-river bolthole. By the time I got down there, I made the mental transition of coming up with a brilliant name for said hideout, the Lab.


    Now the Lab has always been the hideout under the river, but actually naming the damn place always seemed to slip my mind. Weird right? Especially for someone with literal magical control of their own brain, but even I can¡¯t get past the inherent flaws of humanity. And since I¡¯m naming the river hideout as ¡°the Lab¡±, it just makes sense to call the under-tree hideout ¡°the Hole¡±.


    But back to the Lab as I never fully laid out the actual placement of things. The tunnel from the Hole opens up to a giant cavern with a huge freezer on the left that was filled with a mostly dead dragon and a makeshift experimental garden on the right full of oddly hungry trees. My work table was near the freezer and the stone wall above it was smooth and shiny for me to put ideas on. The center of the Lab had one of the two remaining matter to mana generators that was actually still able to function. The other one was in the Hole inside of one of the roots of the World Tree. As far as I can tell, there are several reasons that they¡¯re still stable. First, the enchantments for durability that I place on them from time to time are starting to add up and the second reason is that they¡¯re in a closed environment. The generator in the Hole is protected by the World Tree root, and the one in the Lab is in a sealed cavern that has enchantments covering the walls and ceiling. Also, I¡¯ve made sure to put the energy output to either very low or off so that the enchantments governing the process wouldn¡¯t be dealing with much stress at all.


    The part of this dwelling that really made me tip my hat to myself was the kinetic energy converter enchantment on the ceiling. That set of enchantments is tied to several stone pillars that stick up from the river-bed of the Rappahanock and bleed off the energy of motion from the river¡¯s current, basically creating a magical version of a hydroelectric generator. Now that one didn¡¯t scare me at all as it didn¡¯t play with the building blocks of the universe, it simply turned mechanical energy into magical energy.


    Using the abundant energy of the sources around, I conjured a hundred small bits of crystal about the size and shape of a .223 rifle round and placed them in an orderly pile in front of me. Repeating the same process, I made a hundred round pile of shaped crystals for .45 pistol ammo, 30.06 rifle ammo, and then a pile of fifty small crystal orbs the size of a tennis ball. Rubbing my hands together, I categorized my creations. ¡°.45 ammo for small arms fire against human size enemies or smaller, .223 for further away but roughly the same size targets.¡± Holding two 30.06 rounds in one hand, which were considerably larger, and the ¡®grenades¡¯ in the other, I admired my handiwork. ¡°For you,¡± I said to the big rifle rounds, ¡°Big targets, armored enemies, and people I really don¡¯t like. That¡¯s what you¡¯re for.¡±


    Gently tossing up the crystal grenade and catching it to check its weight like a pitcher contemplating his next throw, I softly murmured to grenade, ¡°You¡¯re for everything else my little pretty. We¡¯re gonna blow up buildings, hordes of zombies, and soooo much more!¡±


    Maybe I was a bit too excited, but who cares. Being an Army Reserve paralegal and an IT guy meant that I never got to play with the good stuff, but in the new reality where I could make my own shit, I say it¡¯s time to indulge the good old American pastime, testing explosive items with wild abandon.


    Two hours and no explosions later, I felt like bringing down an entire mountain just to get my frustration out. The fucking bullets wouldn¡¯t actually explode! I put my enchantments on the crystal rounds and filled them up with a tiny bit of energy so the boom wouldn¡¯t be big at all, and then used Gungnir to magically shoot them at a giant stone wall covered in three feet of thick Virginia clay. Nothing. Zilch. Bupkis. I was missing something, something small but vitally important, like the idiot who built a perfect engine but forgot to actually put the stupid spark plugs in. Realizing that beating my hyper focused brain up over something like wasn¡¯t super productive, I put a few mental background processes on the problem while I concentrated on something else, my armor.


    Ten deep breaths and a ration cube for lunch later, I chugged some conjured water and glared at the cube of magical nano-tech. ¡°You better be easier than some fucking magical bullets asshole!¡± I growled, forcing open the skin of my right palm with flesh sorcery and slapping it on top of the cube. ¡°Mine!¡±


    My yell was completely unnecessary as the cube greedily absorbed the blood, sparks flying off it as it dissolved into a moving blob of silver. Pseudopods of metals arced up and around my arm as I quickly used flesh sorcery again to open up my other palm and stick it on the morphing futuristic technology. Injecting my authority over metal with my earth sorcery into the blob and backing it up with my mental sorcery, I felt a skin-like connection, as if it wanted to be covering, to sit and rest as a skin on top of another skin.


    Directing my flesh sorcery to step up red blood cell production, I put the rest of my focus on manipulating the Centauri tech to conform to my needs. My needs were simple, I need a last line of defense that nobody sees. Humans are very squishy creatures and some would argue that we¡¯re poorly designed as well, be it by deity or nature. My current armor, the flesh sorcery strengthened bone covered in runed platinum, is pretty damn awesome, especially with all of the enchantments to catch, convert, store, and deflect mana and kinetic based attacks. But my paranoid way of thinking demanded more. Unfortunately, the magical blob also wanted more. Instead of covering my skin and forming an epic suit of flexible armor, the pseudopods turned jagged, stabbing into every bit of open flesh that was available.


    Using my blood as a power source, it went from timid skin covering to ravenous flesh devouring machine in an instant. I had watched the memory of Reeanth bonding with the armor more than once, I had even tasted the emotions of the joining. Pain, agony, fear, none of the emotions I was feeling were in that block of time. ¡°FUCK!¡± I screamed, my seizing hands shaking as all of my magic concentrated on the metallic invader. Earth sorcery gripped the tiny metal bots attacking my flesh while my consciousness sorcery kept the pain at bay. My mana sorcery analyzed and attacked the miniscule runic structure of the nanotech while my water sorcery froze the water in my body to hold them at bay. I hate it when a plan doesn¡¯t come together.

 Chapter 110 - Taming the Terminator (Book 2 Chapter 17)

    Did you ever see the Terminator? Not the new shitty one, but the old one where Schwarzenegger fights the liquid metal version himself, the blob terminator? That¡¯s what¡¯s currently wrapped around my arm, trying to eat me molecule by fucking molecule. If not for my blend of exotic sorceries, I¡¯d already be dead, and as of right now, I was in the process of dying. Even with my flesh sorcery deadening my nerves, the amount of pain coming through lighting up my brain was staggering. My earth sorcery was actually keeping it at bay and my consciousness sorcery was well, keeping me conscious, but it was also picking up the barest signal from the unfriendly blob. Same. Consume. Become. Meld. One.


    My sheer surprise allowed my attacker to gain another inch on my arm. My right arm, my favorite arm, my writing hand, my pointing hand, throwing arm, was being devoured by a mother-fucking blob! Another surprise hit me from the other arm. The left arm gauntlet of Svalinn thrummed and pulsed, sending a wave of emotion and intent up into my brain. It was much louder than its competitor.


    EAT! CONSUME! DEVOUR! DOMINATE!


    Rath¡¯s disembodied voice, the vessel of his instincts, roared through me. Even though his mind was long gone, his barren soul was in Svalinn, and it was angry. Dragons don¡¯t get eaten. Dragons do the eating. And nothing should ever beat that which was able to beat a dragon, which was me. Raw indignation and pride swelled from Svalinn to me creating a tangential bridge of emotional power. Focusing my several mental processes on keeping the blob at bay, I grabbed onto my connection with Svalinn and pulled some of the power from my gauntlet shield in a way that I had never done before. Normally, my batteries and Gungnir are power sources, and Svalinn was the dedicated shield, but make no mistake. Svalinn contains more power than both of those tools combined. Svalinn contains the disembodied soul of a dragon along with its devouring nature. Its main purpose is to swallow as much energy as possible from enemy attacks and divert what it cannot intake. And right now, was the perfect time to utilize its last ditch functions.


    Power from a fire dragon is not something that I honestly wanted to handle as its nature is literally the opposite of my own, but I needed the raw power with the hungry nature of it right now. Pure animal rage powered through me as Svalinn¡¯s stored energy ran across my body from my left arm gauntlet through my chest, skipping around the heart, and down my right arm. Red mana clashed with silver pseudopods in the battleground of my flesh. The somewhat consumed part of my arm almost disconnected in the initial clash, the metallised bone flexing out and bending like a freak of nature gone really wrong. Screaming with agony, trying to endure the sheer violation of what was happening, I called to Gungnir through our blood bond.


    My oldest and most reliable weapon flew from the table and slapped into my right hand, the solid wooden shaft met silvery skin through the blob. If blasting this problem with raw power from one side wasn¡¯t enough to deal with this issue, then what was a real man to do other than hitting it with raw power at the same time from another side? I¡¯m a smart guy, but not very complex. Brute strength fixes most issues, and if it doesn¡¯t, then obviously you¡¯re not brute forcing it hard enough.


    Gungnir¡¯s pulse of pure white energy cannoned into the blob from one side as Svalinn¡¯s hungry wave of power tore into the very fabric of the armor blob cube from the other side. As the opposing energies turned the tide, doing to the blob what it was doing to me, the ingrained enchantments holding the blob together began to fall apart. Now that it was under an incredible amount of distress and no longer shielded, my mana sorcery actually had a chance to read the basic enchantment structure of the cube blob. It wasn¡¯t just a super cool suit of liquid metal magitech armor, which I knew now due to its less than friendly actions, but it was a form of control. Embedded deep in the nanobots was a kind of mind control enchantment that screamed ¡°Evil¡±. Little runes that projected a mental image of tightly wound chains glowed red to my magical senses.


    Envisioning an angry dragon¡¯s maw chomping at the bars of a cage, I channeled that image, that will into the current of Svalinn¡¯s power, giving a focus to the constant firehose of raw energy.


    ¡°Life is a lemon and I want my money back!¡± I scream-sang at the top of my lungs, adding my own power to the torrential outpouring of agony that was my right hand. When in doubt, Meatloaf always has the right lyrics.


    The mystical chain symbols shattered as the armor cube bent to implacable waves of power. Before the entire thing liquified, I grabbed the twisted concept of the armor, the broken chains part, and shoved my will into it. It felt like making Gungnir for the first time, the outpouring of myself with my intention of making it mine, reclaiming that which was broken and forging anew. Gungnir and Svalinn, attached as they were to me, held the blob together with magic as my desire overwrote the inherent runic controls of the nanotech armor. Almost as quickly as the entire ordeal started, it was over. The metal stopped trying to eat me and became as obedient as a scared child.


    My flesh sorcery kept on working overtime, fixing the destroyed cells, but now it was hurriedly regenerating most of my hand that had been subsumed by the armor. Taking a second to stop Gungnir and Svalinn from pumping more energy into me, I established a mana-feed from the kinetic-river energy matrix to keep me going and fill up my equipment. The blob that was the armor cube reformed into an armor cube bit by bit as my own flesh regenerated. It was like watching the liquid Terminator dude reform himself, the silver sheen of the metal turning flesh colored as biology reasserted itself and technology taking the back seat.


    Plopping my ass down on the cold stone floor, my entire body shook as I held that cube. I almost just died. And it would have happened too if I didn¡¯t have stupid amounts of power in random areas on call. Nothing from Reeanth¡¯s memories indicated that a simple nanotech armor cube would be the freaking blob from hell in disguise. My hand still shaking, I extended out a tendril of magic just barely touching the cube.


    Contact established. Recalculating logic/language parameters. Previous directives overriden . . . . Scanning . . . . Scanning . . . . Dominance protocols adjusted. New host overrides genetic recalibration. Attempting to establish contact with Authoritative Directive Source. Failure . . . Magus Collective does not apply to current host. Alpha Centauri Sorcerer Killer protocol overriden and replaced.


    What, the actual fuck?


    Sexual activity between biologicals and automatons was banned in Collective Era prior to the invasion of the Hive. Reporting attempted crime per protocol 80324, ERROR! Does not apply. New host has overriden genetic recalibration and Dominance protocols. Highest authority established due to overwhelming power. Subspecies of fire drake detected, instrumental in breaking down of Hierarchical Order structure.


    [No! You stupid thing, I¡¯m not trying to have sex with you! The word ¡®fuck¡¯ is slang!]


    It was talking to itself, and me. My armor was talking. Fuck my luck, wasn¡¯t Gungnir enough? Didn¡¯t I put up with enough sentient items with their own opinions? Once was enough in my book.


    Previous orders have been made obsolete. Directive?


    Now that¡¯s more like it.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    Swallowing a ration cube to help provide more biological materials for my flesh sorcery to work with, I considered my options. Are the rules of artificial intelligence at play here, or was that a bunch of bullshit that humans came up with to help out science fiction writers? Ehh, who cares.


    [Directive one. All orders issued by me have the highest priority. Directive two. There is no overriding authority to orders given by me. Directive three. Your primary purpose is to function as armor for me. Directive four. Do not reveal yourself as an entity that can communicate in any way. Clarifying principle, do not talk to or communicate with anything other than me in any way unless I direct otherwise. Directive five. You will not harm or bring harm to me or my tools unless directed by me. End of directives at this time.]


    Directives received. Communication and interspatial communication abilities have been disabled. Weapon settings placed on standby. Storage mode, activated.


    With a shimmer, the liquid look of the nanotech cube hardened into a solid block of metal. Setting it down on the table, I went back to my seat on the floor ten feet away. Several chills ran the back of my spine as the idea of the end hit me. If shit kept up at this pace, making it past a year in the apocalypse doesn¡¯t look good, let alone the couple thousand years so see my damn woman. Fuckin¡¯ hell man, this shit ain¡¯t good. Wish I could hibernate inside of a damn cave for a slice of eternity and come out all bright eyed and bushy tailed chock full of enough power to fight a damn god. Which is what my fiance will be able to do if she can get there. It would make me feel better if I could build a damn fortress around her tree, but now I¡¯m getting off topic. She¡¯s way better set up to stand the test of time than I am right now.


    A nagging feeling began to poke at me. It said that I don¡¯t know enough, or anything for that matter. The Greeks had a saying ¡®know thyself¡¯, which many people took as an excuse to not do anything with their lives because they were always on a journey to get to know themselves. I feel that my circumstances warrant such an excursion though, how many other humans go through the kind of roller-coaster ride such as my own? Be it far from me to make light of the fact that billions of humans were kidnaped by aliens.


    The act of mediation is more than saying ¡®Kumbaya¡¯ or ¡®ooooommmm¡¯ while sitting in the dirt. My fiance was a big fan of meditating every day, using ten minutes or so to sit in the quiet and ponder the events of the day, mulling over good and bad decisions while making sure that she was at peace with it all. Me, I never could sit still physically doing nothing for that long. It ate at me in the worst way, the quiet, the lack of activity. Maybe me and myself didn¡¯t really get along, but now there¡¯s a bit more to me than there used to be. Now, I have magic.


    Taking hold of the bit of inspiration that hit me, the energizing insight that provided a bit of motivation, I ran to the table and snatched the armor cube up. Going back to my spot near the generator, I set the cube in front of me and arranged Gungnir so that it was laying across my lap while Svalinn, both gauntlets of it, was in contact with my staff. Not liking the setup, I scooted forward until the cube, which was roughly six inches across every dimension, was touching my leg as I sat Indian style. Now that a part of me was touching all of my gear, I closed my eyes and centered my focus on my magic. This was the part of me that could be active without my body literally doing anything. This is what could make mediation useful for me. The very act in and of itself is supposed to be relaxing, the whole ¡®breathe in, breathe out¡¯ mantra, but the excitement mixed with inner turmoil was making this hard.


    Grasping at my flesh sorcery, I forced my body to slow down, for my breathing to smooth out and the kinks in my muscles to loosen, and while that evened out, I used my consciousness sorcery to forcefully put aside the unnecessary thoughts that interfered with the required peace of mind. Ten minutes of manipulating my internal chemistry later, my inner mindscape came into view complete with the magical soul-tree of my sorceries and the projections of my equipment at its feet or roots. The glowing eyes of my magic stared at me, a question in its eyes.


    ¡°Yes,¡± I answered, knowing where this was going. ¡°We¡¯re making a new friend here.¡±


    A translucent brown root picked up Svalinn in its united shield form while another picked up staff-form Gungnir. The silver cube sat directly at its feet, unmoving and still.


    ¡°That¡¯s the one. It¡¯s armor, or, it should be. Think of it as a seed cause I¡¯m pretty sure that magitech nano-bots can be anything we want.¡±


    The dirt under the cube lifted it up until it was at eye level with my soul-tree. Dirt tendrils popped out of the mound of earth and flipped it around so it could be examined from another angle.


    ¡°No dummy, it¡¯s not a fucking rubix cube,¡± I said, facepalming. Reaching forward, I put my ethereal finger on the cube and injected a bit of will into it.


    Integration at the Quasi-Proton level requested?


    ¡°No!¡± I shouted at the cube. ¡°You don¡¯t do shit! Sit there and shut up! Tree! Establish dominance over the cube!¡±


    I couldn¡¯t let this get out of control. My soul-tree was supposed to subsume the magitech, treating it like the other tools. It would be seriously bad news for me if it happened the other way around. Luckily for me, I¡¯m pretty sure that Svalinn and Gungnir already did most of the heavy lifting anyways.


    The manipulated pedestal of earth upon which the magitech cube sat quivered as my soul-tree stared at the weird display. I almost couldn¡¯t believe it, this scene looked like something out of a wet dream from a hobo tripping on acid. I even felt like all I could do was watch, but bull-fucking-shit to that. This is my body, my mindscape, my tools, and my fucking soul-tree. I can do whatever the hell I want, and that includes balls to the wall improvisation.


    ¡°Alpha Centauri armor cube, what is your inherent designation?¡±


    Project Living Armor designated the production line as ¡®Flexible Shield¡¯. All other labels are personalized per the Freewill Subversion Protocol. As the named owner, said designation is subject to change. All protocols have been disassembled and no longer apply.


    It needs a name huh? Fine. ¡°Your new designation is ¡®SAW¡¯. It is an acronym for ¡®Swiss Army Wall.¡±


    Designation ¡®Swiss-Army-Wall: SAW¡¯ accepted. Primary directives applied. Integration at the Quasi-Proton level requested?


    There¡¯s that unnerving question again. Quasi-Proton? What the fuck is that, I mean, is that the techo-speak for ¡®soul¡¯? It would make sense as it¡¯s right next to the magical incarnation of my soul and all of its elemental power. Uhhhhhh, I hate not knowing the exact right answer, but c¡¯est la vie bitches.


    ¡°Request denied. Stand down. New directive: accept all changes and integrations as initiated by the Quasi-Proton entity. Living Armor unit now known as SAW is directed to take a supporting role in the unification.¡±


    Directive received. Supporting role assumed in line with new primary and secondary directives. Sub-molecular wavelength detecting . . . . detecting . . . . identified. Sub-protonic particulate structure detecting . . . . detecting . . . . identified. Integration paths identified. Directive required.


    Yup, still not smart enough to understand what any of that meant. Best guess though, the damn thing is ready.


    ¡°Define ¡®Integration Paths¡¯. What does that mean?¡±


    Mutable structure of SAW allows for multiple options in accordance with unique Sorcery-based structure. Option 1, Living Weapon.


    A small image appeared in front of me, a mini-blob at my feet, defending me like a personal attack dog. It bounced around and broke down numerous small enemies while shooting small needles of liquid metal.


    Option 2, Living Shield.


    The image changed to me in my normal set of gear, but with liquid metal octopus arms extending from my back and shoulders acting like shields to deflect all kinds of attacks. Each arm moved as if it were water, molding itself to catch thrown projectiles and smack away people trying to engage in melee combat.


    Option 3, Hidden Shield.


    The scene shifted to me walking in the woods, and my skin shifting tones to blend perfectly into the background. The image of me skulking through the woods was hard to follow until I jumped out at my prey, many spikes of metal goring the beast.


    Option 4, Shifting Runes.


    The image again shifted, but it was just me in my armor, chillin. ¡°SAW, explain Option 4. I don¡¯t see anything.¡±


    Shifting Runes is a tool enhancement feature.¡±


    ¡°That doesn¡¯t tell me anything. Break it down.¡±


    Selecting Shifting Runes as an option will eliminate the other options. Shifting Runes functions as an energy transference network between enhanced objects. Projections calculate that this will be the most efficient use to Authoritative Host. All tools in use will have improved energy conductivity. All shielding functions will have adaptive runic scripts. All weapons will have mana divergence capabilities for combat overflow.


    The image of me shifted to mini-me defending myself from a magical blast in slow-motion. Svalinn was out, catching the fireball, and just before it hit, a thin metal covering morphed to have runes of ice, countering the fireball. Another shift and mini-me was projecting a blast of raw mana at a forest fire and a small bit of metal shifted to runes of water, allowing the raw mana to have characteristics of water and put out the fire. I had to have it. This could actually be the solution to my personal weakness against the Hungry Ones!


    ¡°SAW. Select Option 4!¡±

 Chapter 111 - A Slower Slice of Life (Book 2 Chapter 18)

    While my soul-tree was pulling an Iron Man, I decided to just watch. No, not literally pull an Iron Man, but damn close enough. Right in the middle of my soul-tree¡¯s chest pulsing with a soft bluish white light, strands of wiry metal ran throughout its form like another circulatory system laid over top of its skin. The silvery fibers contoured every bark covered muscle while forming small plates of armor at the knees, elbows, and shoulders. And I kept watching, making sure to keep a close magical eye on everything. Even though I circumvented the ¡°Sorcerer Killing¡± process of the Centauri tech, I didn¡¯t trust it, which meant I had to verify over and over again. Every inch of growing fiber was examined as if it were literal cancer; I even set up a background scanning process devoted to monitoring the bonded nano-tech. Hours of frantic waiting later, I managed to put some faith in myself and take a break. The auto-scan set up with my consciousness sorcery had my soul-tree completely mapped out and I built in a ¡®freeze and alert¡¯ alarm just in case it made a move I didn¡¯t like.


    Coming back to myself was not a pleasant process. The extended soul-twisting meditation was even more exhausting than battling the witch and downloading Reeanth¡¯s clone brain combined. I¡¯ve made some damn good progress in the past couple weeks, including figuring out a way to defend myself against my personal weakness. I looked lovingly at Gungnir, peering magically inside of it to look at the Centauri rifle. I hadn¡¯t actually figured it out, but I could use the rifle itself, and Gungnir could still shoot the crystal rounds just like an actual gun. Figuring that that was good enough for now, I turned my attention to the rest of the Lab.


    One of the goals that I had had back when I was a normal vanilla human was to have my own personal greenhouse jungle. I wanted to be able to walk into a building filled with awesome edible plants, my own ecosystem thriving under my care with exotic fruits and veggies covering every square inch. To be transparent, it was all in the pursuit of the perfect smoothie. I had scoured every Smoothie King, Jamba Juice, and Orange Julius hunting for the perfect blend of icy goodness, but nowhere had the perfect smoothie. I even went and explored all the Amish stores that southern Virginia had to offer, and while they were good and some even great, they just weren¡¯t perfect. Which is where my aspirations of a greenhouse came in. If I couldn¡¯t find the perfect smoothie, then I¡¯d have to make one.


    As the apocalypse reordered my priorities, surviving took the top spot and smoothies took their necessary place far lower than that, but I needed something to keep me going. Obviously fooling around with my fiance was out of the question for the next couple millenia, and all of my friends were fucking gone, that left pleasurable projects that don¡¯t require too much overt brainpower, such as what men normally did like working on cars or carpentry. But since both of those options were out of the picture due to the post-apocalyptic conditions, making a greenhouse or jungle definitely more likely to be in the realm of possibility.


    I could take a week or so and try to relax. Hell, I deserved it! And honestly, I could probably make a damn fruit jungle in a week if I wanted to. What else is nature sorcery good for if not for the pursuit of the ultimate frozen fruit confection? Buoyed with thoughts not filled with death or danger, I purposefully strut out of the Lab, down the tunnel, and out the Hole. Darkness barely illuminated by the dancing stars greeted me as I took a deep breath of fresh air.


    ¡°Greetings Master!¡±


    Meliad¡¯s sweet voice was not what I wanted to hear at this damn time of day, or night since I completely lost track of the hour. Yes, consciousness sorcery has an internal clock but I didn¡¯t bother to check it in my excitement.


    ¡°Aren¡¯t humans usually in the soft embrace of the little death right when the sun hides his face?¡±


    ¡°Sleep, Meliad, it¡¯s called sleep.¡±


    Her pout at being corrected didn¡¯t stop me from glaring at her.


    ¡°And I¡¯m gonna do whatever the hell I want when I want. Now, I¡¯d bet you have a bunch of young dryads who¡¯d love to help me out if I asked them to, right?¡±


    Her sultry smile and curvy figure brightened in the starlight giving off a soft green glow. ¡°But of course! I can have a grove here by the dawn¡¯s loving light if you wish! I¡¯ll make sure they¡¯re the prettiest of . . .¡±


    ¡°Nope,¡± I interrupted, ¡°It¡¯s not for me. I don¡¯t care what they look like. No banging dryads for me unless you want to piss off that root of Yggdrasil over there.¡±


    Her face was devastating, that pout, oh my god. I almost couldn¡¯t resist.


    ¡°Not kidding woman, just need a couple tree-ladies to tend the garden that I wanna make.¡±


    ¡°But not partake of nature¡¯s bounty? It¡¯s freely offered, and the Mother is never stingy with what is hers. Sharing is nature¡¯s way!¡±


    I rounded on creature who was clearly more knowledgeable about the carnal side of man than the restrained side.


    ¡°It¡¯s not about that,¡± I growled at her, ¡°Nature also eats itself and anything that is weak. Also, it¡¯s the fact that I don¡¯t want to. Sure, using flesh sorcery to suppress my sex drive is a bit of a cheat that no man would ever have the chance to use let alone even think of it that way. But it¡¯s more than that. When I date or fuck, I date or fuck one at a time. I don¡¯t have the time or energy for more than one woman at a time; that¡¯s just too much energy let alone the money and focus. I had friends who could date or be with several at a time but I couldn¡¯t. And what makes it worse is that I know it¡¯ll take a long ass time to see my woman again and I¡¯ll probably have a girlfriend as the ages drag on, but not right now. It¡¯s still too fucking soon.¡±Stolen story; please report.


    My rant didn¡¯t just silence her, but shamed her. I could see it in her doe eyes, the bewilderment at my reaction combined with her puzzlement at the kind of man that would turn her down. I mean, yes, I¡¯d love to have a good roll in the hay, and it would probably help me out in a bunch of ways, but I couldn¡¯t do that right under the awning of my future wife. I¡¯m fucked up, but not that fucked up, at least for now. And it¡¯s weird to divulge my thoughts in such a blatant manner, but somehow my guard was down. Must be the stress.


    Watching me like a feral cat that discovered that children like to pull on tempting tails, she backed up and I visibly relaxed. With a slow formal bow, Meliad gracefully conceded my position and took a step back. ¡°My deepest apologies Master. I did not know the depths of your pain nor the anguish in your heart. I will gather the dryads for your garden and let them know of your will. We shall commune with the Mother in the morning. Please, rest. Nothing but peace shall enter here.¡± A calm night breeze picked up as Meliad dissolved into green motes, leaving me to my thoughts.


    ¡°Stupid, root.¡± Gravelly words broke the silence. ¡°All, of, them. They, do, not, think.¡±


    Turning off to the side, I saw a big boulder that wasn¡¯t there before. ¡°Everest? That you buddy?¡±


    His eyes glowed red, but it wasn¡¯t creepy like the horror movies always made red out to be. The rubies were clear and their edges were octagonal in shape, making it almost look comically like a lava lamp stuck in a rock.


    ¡°Roots, don¡¯t, think. Rocks, do. It¡¯s, our, hobby.¡±


    I chuckled at the simplistic thoughts of my guardian golem. I suppose that from his point of view we were all a bit lacking in the thinking department, especially since they get most of eternity to think. What else are earth elementals good for if not pondering heavy thoughts? Maybe to them, we¡¯re just momentary distractions as they endure the turning of the seasons. I¡¯m just glad he didn¡¯t call me a ¡®root¡¯. Hell, I¡¯d ask for some of his thoughts if I didn¡¯t know it would take forever to get them out of him.


    ¡°Thanks man,¡± I chuckled, turning to survey the area in the dim light of the moon. No hamadryads in sight. Spot wasn¡¯t even in his normal spot at the edge of the clearing. It¡¯s hard for me to look around and believe that this entire area was one big suburb. My house was right behind me under the freaking World Tree, and there were two houses to the right and ten to the left. Behind our houses were little yards with what my fiance would have called ¡®cute¡¯ fences. Even further behind that was a nice dog park and a jungle gym for the neighborhood kids to plan on. Now, it was just one big ass forest. The small Rappahanock river two miles from my residence was several times wider and deeper than before, and even the fancy museums and little shoppettes of downtown Fredericksburg were now rolling hills and epic rock formations.


    Squatting down in the middle of the clearing in front of the Hole, I used a bit of earth and nature sorcery to make a comfortable lawn chair with the perfect amount of incline to it. Gingerly testing it out, I placed my derriere right in the proper curve. Ahh, sweet heaven, think ¡®Hobbit¡¯. The basic structure was stone, but the portions of the chair facing up were hardened clay with softer clay on top of it with a layer of soft grass that any country club would be proud to have as their green. It was a cross between a nice beach chair and the most comfy lawn chair. Before I knew it, I was out.


    Sunlight woke me up in the usual fashion, shafts of piercing light knocking on my eyelids as if they just didn¡¯t give a fuck. Birds chirping joined the choreography of pain as my ears also decided not to let me sleep. I did love mornings, but only after I had gone through the disgusting problem of waking up over the course of an hour, or that¡¯s how I used to handle mornings. Now I just used the elemental powers of the universe to perk me up and take care of the cleaning stuff too.


    With my morning ablutions completed, the entire day stretched ahead of me like a fat ice cream cake, one of the many foods I constantly daydream about, smooth and full of delicious promise while still holding the promise of quickly melting faster than hoped for.


    ¡°He¡¯s shorter than I thought he¡¯d be . . . ¡°


    ¡°Does he always wear armor? Can¡¯t even see if he has muscles . . .¡±


    ¡°Does it matter? Meliad clearly said he¡¯s off limits.¡±


    The voices were sweet, softer than any human tones but I clearly understood their dulcet language that sounded like a blend of Spanish and Old English. Turning my head, I saw several women reminiscent of Meliad straddling the horizontal branch of the oak tree at the edge of the clearing. My gardeners had arrived. All the jokes about picking them up at a Wal-Mart bounced off my teeth as I knew they wouldn¡¯t get it. They had the lovely Latina curves from what I could tell but if their conversation was anything to go by then they¡¯d probably be just as much trouble.


    ¡°You¡¯re right, it doesn¡¯t matter.¡± My voice scared one of them so badly she almost fell out of the tree. ¡°You¡¯re here to work, and that¡¯s it. I already know that you¡¯re getting a serious leg up on your rival groves.¡± I¡¯m definitely spitballin, but there¡¯s a solid chance I¡¯m right. When in doubt, act with confidence. Sheep will fall in line and the wolves will be kept at bay by the simple fact of having more power than them. The leafiest of the dryads smacked her sister so that she almost fell out of the tree.


    ¡°He¡¯s a nature sorcerer you tangled branch! Uhg, you should have been grafted to a vine for all the good you are!¡±


    ¡°Hey! Not everyone gets to pick where they¡¯re planted! Some of us had to work for our trees!¡±


    Great. Plant-based arguments, just what I wanted to hear. After listening for a minute, I waited to see if the forest ladies had any semblance of human perception in regards to social situations. Their bickering told me either no, or they were like human females just enough so that they just didn¡¯t care that there was an oblivious human male in their midst. Sending a bit of power into the tree that they were sitting on, I caused the branch to buck wildly sending them roughly to the forest floor.


    ¡°Anyone else want to pointlessly argue in front of their boss or should I have Meliad find me more useful, less talkative creatures?¡± My wry tone was lost on them as they started tearing up. Quivering lips and shaking limbs as they picked themselves did not sway me, mostly. Throwing themselves at my feet, their pleading was almost more irritating than their attempts at using their feminine wiles. It was like a group of kids all trying to tell you the same story of how one of them horribly skinned their knee but you can¡¯t make out a freaking word.


    My forced glare eventually shut them and blessed silence reigned once again in the clearing. My patience was definitely thinner than it was twenty minutes ago, but now I at least had their attention.


    ¡°Look, uh, ladies? I guess? I¡¯m a simple guy with a simple vision. I want all of you to make a jungle where every plant is edible AND delicious. I¡¯ll show you the area that I¡¯m intending for this venture but I basically want to be able to walk through and pick fruit off the trees at all times of the year and enjoy it. New and exotic fruits are perfectly fine to put in here, and if you need anything let me know. But I need to have a place that is all mine where I can relax and there¡¯s nothing but peace. Does that sound like something y''all can do?¡±


    Their puzzled looks were so cute but not very effective, praise be for fuckin flesh sorcery.


    ¡°A yes or no will suffice, a nod of the head, some kind of affirmation would be nice . . .¡±


    Their effusive agreement was again in the vein of multiple children all talking at once.


    ¡°Good good, all right, sheesh, QUIET!¡± Taking a breath to just to give myself a second, I pivoted to take them on a tour of the proposed site of my future smoothie jungle.

 Chapter 112 - Playing with Sunfire (Book 2 Chapter 19)

    Beautiful. Simply magnificent. It was everything I wanted and more. Quite literally ¡®more¡¯, as in more than what I laid out, more than what I expected, more than what my sometimes flighty mind can cook up on a spur of the moment idea rampage.


    ¡°It¡¯s beautiful! Simply Magnificent! Isn¡¯t it everything you wanted Master?¡±


    Fucking dryads, or is it hamadryads? I may never truly know. I hate it that we sometimes think along the same lines to where our thoughts literally match. It¡¯s probably due to the fact that my nature sorcery is turning the once innocent and carefree creatures into innocent and carefree creatures that won¡¯t leave me alone! Damn I¡¯m a grump today.


    After showing the leafy ladies the size of the jungle I wanted and spending hours describing the kinds of fruits, veggies, and berries that I wanted in it, the damn things took off like a bat outta hell. I didn¡¯t hear from them in days so I decided to rest and relax and work on my internal enchantments as well as the temp tattoo ones as well. AND IT WAS GLORIOUS! I relaxed, had a couple rations cubes while not wearing armor on the riverbank, played fetch with Spot and climbed trees to bug Tuki when I got bored. Other than the fact that I was completely away from all ¡®human¡¯ contact, it was awesome. I put in some serious work to make my living spaces in the Hole and the Lab as comfortable as possible. I made chairs out of living wood that I enchanted to conform to the body of whoever sits in it, enchanted the main stone table so that it could act like one of those strategic sand tables on command, and I even got a super nice big bathroom going with water conjuration and banishment enchantments for a hot tub/shower duo. Fancy looking marble and polished wood made the living space almost look like the inside of one of the old school Virginia mansions where people with way too much money on their hands used to live.


    I even had a blast messing around with trees in the forest surrounding my home. I didn¡¯t really dare to mess with the Yggdrasil offshoot that was my home, but all other trees were fair game. Several of the big oaks became stashes of weapons and armor while others had conveniently placed knobs for me to quickly climb up and out of sight. I even took the time to grow treehouse blind to hide in if ever I needed them. Some rowan trees also littered the small clearings in between the larger trees and I remembered that rowan trees tend to be symbolically or magically significant in books that I¡¯d read. Naturally, I had to mess with that too. I placed several small super-charged crystals of quartz or ruby or sapphire in their roots and carved a small rune for health on their trunks. Maybe over time they would gain unique properties or become excellent materials for all kinds of experiments.


    One section of forest I created my own personal version of an outdoor gym, something that is much more common in the United Kingdom than America. Of course I didn¡¯t need it thanks to flesh sorcery, but it was a lot of fun pushing my nature sorcery to make a natural setting for unnatural things. There were stone blocks for weights with defined carvings for the approximate weights, pull-up bars and body-weight exercises. I even stuck in super nice seven foot by four foot mats of luscious grass that would have made any golfer drool. What took me the longest was putting in the most epic swimming pool complete with a waterfall with auto-filling/draining enchantments to regulate the water and its freshness. Off to the side was an imitation of a bar complete with bar games such as pool and darts, each bit lovingly conjured and shaped to be as accurate as possible. The pool balls were slick marble and the pool sticks were polished oak while the dart boards were hardened clay with self-refilling enchantments so the board would always look brand new.


    I pretty much made a bachelor¡¯s outdoor dream setting now that I think about it. The trees were more than happy to bend to my wishes as I put in a ¡®cover-the-area¡¯ setting in their trunks with an enchanted crystal. When it rains, the trees will bend their branches to largely cover up the play area and divert the water away from the fun.


    On the outskirts of the forest, about two miles away from home, I set up an explosives  testing area next to one of the Rappahanock river¡¯s bigger banks. I had an idea on how to fix the explosive crystal shells in Gungnir as they wouldn¡¯t actually go boom yet, but testing them close to home was definitely not in the cards. The river bank was a mix of sand and clay, which I extended up a bit and then spent time hardening the soil and dirt near the trees ringing the river bank. Even though I love explosives, I didn¡¯t want to ruin the setting of the forest with my magic bombs.


    After conjuring and shaping an 8x8x8 foot stone table in the middle of the cleared river bank, I set one small crystal round that had about a ten percent charge in it. My theory for why it didn¡¯t explode when shot was due to the crystalline structure actually being too perfect. Perfection, when in reference to structure in a crystal, directly affects how durable it is. Diamonds tend to be the hardest crystal as they have the most ordered and perfect structure, and because I conjure my own crystals, I force them into the most orderly structure possible. Due to that habit, they just don¡¯t have the necessary weaknesses for them to shatter when necessary to distribute their explosive payload. A normal bullet consists of pieces that when properly used distribute the tip inside of the target causing the damage. In my case, the crystal shard is flung by my weapon Gungnir at high speeds from within the spatial storage area. The payload was not only the sharp carbon crystal, but also the raw mana tucked away inside.


    Taking my time, I picked up the crystal round and began banishing tiny bits of it to form a weakness that would hopefully split it after impact. Ten agonizing minutes of detail rendered what I hoped would be the perfect bullet. Popping it into Gungnir, I focused out on the water and mentally ordered, ¡°Fire!¡±


    WHOOMPF!  No boom. Feeling out the area with my magical senses, my water sorcery showed me the fine particles that the round shattered into, but I didn¡¯t see or feel any kind of explosion that I was hoping for. Attempts two through eighteen revealed roughly the same results. The round was more than happy to shatter on impact, but not actually explode. I dipped them in my magically charged blood for the next score of attempts, and that didn¡¯t do shit. The next twenty involved putting even more mana into the damn rounds, but the energy still dissipated when the round shattered. And when I didn¡¯t put in the strategically placed weakness into the round, charged it and shot it, it didn¡¯t break at all. It functioned like a freaking piercer round. Staring at the latest conjured crystal round in my hand, I saw the temporary tattoos on my arms, the kinetic conversion rounds.


    ¡°Hahaha, well I am a certified idiot,¡± I chuckled to myself, ¡°But at least I¡¯m one when nobody¡¯s lookin¡¯.¡±


    Reworking the enchantment in my head, my mana sorcery tweaked what I had to convert kinetic energy, from the round being shot from Gungnir, into heat energy and provided a visual of the rune for me to use, a cartoonish looking bomb that Wily Coyote would have used. Putting that bomb rune on the round, I charged it up to about half full, shoved it in Gungnir, and fired at the river again.


    KABOOM!


    ¡°FUCK YEAH BITCH!¡± I screamed as I ran out and danced on top of the water. Pulling a Jesus is pretty damn cool, but I¡¯m sure He wouldn¡¯t appreciate it, so I ran back out onto the shore and conjured a whole mess of bomb rounds. Charging them up to full power, I stuck them into Gungnir and began blowing up, I mean testing, the river. Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    Then it hit me, why stop with explosive rounds? I mean, I already have piercing rounds, and the rounds with the crack in them can function as a sort of scatter shot after hitting the initial target. Conjuring another normal round, I put a hammer rune on the tip and charged it up as much I could. Slipping that runed bullet into Gungnir, I conjured a ten foot cube of solid granite on the riverbank and ran about a hundred yards away. Aiming carefully, I fired the hammer round at the cube.


    PUMFFF!


    Hmmm, nothing I can see from here. Running back to the cube, I noticed that there was a fist-sized crater in it, but no other kinds of damage that I could see. As soon as I ran my hand over it, the entire cube just fell apart, as if I smacked a sand castle at the beach. Running both of my hands through the mess, I scooped up a handful and examined it with earth sorcery. Yup, it was still granite but now it was granite sand. Holy fucking shitballs on stick! I am a goddamn genius! I have rounds that go boom, some that are completely normal, and some that shatter, but now I have the wallbreakers, the tomb-busters, the tower smashers; I have crystal rounds that can literally carve through solid rock. Damn I love magic.


    Whistling all the way back to my lab, I set up another set of solar panels that converted UV radiation into mana and put it outside in the clearing in front of the Hole. In the center of it, I put a large empty crystal battery and then made another and buried it underneath. After making a power bank, I set it up for continuous charge and then began the boring work, carefully conjuring crystal rounds of each kind and storing them in Gungnir for the eventual undead crusade.


    ¡°Is he dead?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t wanna touch him, you touch him!¡±


    ¡°He might think we¡¯re flirting with him, Mother forbid!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t invoke Her! She favors him! We¡¯re just the outermost leaves, just get his attention somehow.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t you see how much power he¡¯s playing with right now? That¡¯s more than we can make in a century of sunbathing.¡±


    ¡°He made a mini-sun, or sunlight gatherer? I can¡¯t tell, scoot over!¡±


    I was steadfastly ignoring them and concentrating on my work until that last phrase, sunlight gatherer. Every damn book, movie, joke, and reference that I can think of holds sunlight as what kills the undead, well, that and holy water and silver bullets. But I am a sorcerer with nature in my repertoire, so doesn¡¯t that mean that maybe this is something I can get a hold on? Pausing in my bullet conjuration, I closed my eyes and sort of felt around my magic for a bit, various applications of each part coming to the fore, but nothing related to sunlight itself. My nature sorcery let me know that sunlight is related to what I work with, but it¡¯s not within my purview. Having sunlight around certainly makes it far easier to work nature magic but it isn¡¯t something I can directly control.


    ¡°Then I¡¯ll do it indirectly,¡± I muttered, turning back to my work. The manufacturing of the crystal rounds was now governed by several automated processes thanks to consciousness sorcery, which left me free in the rest of my brain to think of other ideas. I remember an old collection of novels where the humans had these ¡®sunstones¡¯ that kept away dinosaurs that wanted to eat them but didn¡¯t affect the herbivores. Fuck if I understand how that science/magic worked, but my problem is undead-centric. Sunstones, or my version of them, is something I could use if I could actually make them. Shit, why the hell am I trying to figure this out when I have more than three sources of information behind me.


    ¡°Ladies? Do you think you can answer a couple questions for me?¡± I asked, making sure to stay still as my body and magic was working on conjuring and storing crystal rounds. A chorus of ¡®yesses¡¯ and ¡®of course master¡¯ was actually nice to hear for once.


    ¡°First, I¡¯m gonna need your names,¡± I said as a vision of lovely dryad flesh paraded in front of me. Their eagerness to please was way too attractive. ¡°All of you look similar enough to be identical siblings and how do you know Meliad?¡±


    ¡°We don¡¯t have names.¡±


    ¡°We are seedlings, the youngest kind of dryad.¡±


    ¡°Meliad is our Root.¡±


    ¡°The Root is to us what the Mother is to Meliad.¡±


    Not helpful, really. And yet they just kept looking at me as if that was plain English, as if I were the dumb adult who couldn¡¯t understand that the floor was lava and walking on it would result in death. Fuck it.


    ¡°Okaaaay,¡± I mused, deciding just to go ahead and skip the obvious lack of connection in the hopes of getting somewhere. ¡°Do you know what a sunstone is or where I can find one? And what do you know about the Hungry Ones?¡±


    The instant I finished my sentence, the dryads screamed and shot up the nearest tree.


    ¡°They¡¯re not here!¡± I yelled, making sure to stay still. ¡°I just need to know what you know about them because I¡¯m going to have to go on a hunt soon. I got bullets that I think will work but I need some kind of backup magic and all I can think of right now is fucking sunlight!¡±


    Two green heads popped out from the oak tree¡¯s canopy. ¡°Th-th-they¡¯re not here?¡±


    ¡°No.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re always h-h-hungry. Life, flesh, it¡¯s never enough, they just eat and eat and rend and tear!¡±


    ¡°Cold, they like the cold, they bring the cold, everything is dark and hurt when they come, but they always come.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, no, I got that, but does sunlight do anything against them?¡± My exasperation clearly wasn¡¯t noticed. ¡°Or is it fire that they fear? Come on now, I need a weapon that¡¯ll blow them away, something epic that they won¡¯t see coming.¡±


    Another dryad popped out from the tree. ¡°A sunstone might work. There¡¯s a bunch on the other side of the mountain! They glow and it¡¯s so nice to sit near them if I¡¯m not sleepy when the sun goes down!¡±


    The last dryad slunk down the tree, cautiously looking around as if the Hungry Ones were going to pop out of the shadows. ¡°Nothing is ever enough, not even life, or energy, or mana. They just grow stronger and hungrier. You would be their favorite if you came near them, they can smell you. You reek of raw life, upturned soil and fresh spring. But they run from the sun. Dawn is their enemy, it burns them, weakens them, reveals them for what they are. For the Hungry Ones are more than the dead, they are the living dead. Some fly and drink from the throat of those with blood, some scrape flesh from the living and add it to their own like the Slaker Vine. The most fearsome simply look and their gaze makes the living wither away.¡±


    That about covers it. I need a portable sun. Where the fuck is Doctor Octopus when you need him? Shaking my Spider-Man nerdom out of my head, I contemplated possible solutions, something along the lines of the solar panel. I could capture sunlight in sunstones, possibly, or is it more energy efficient to use runes to convert mana into sunlight or UV radiation?


    ¡°You, and, uhm, you, go get me a couple samples of the sunstone, the brightest most powerful ones you can find. Other you and other you over there, go find me sage and any other plants that undead things hate. We can grow and weaponize those down the road if need be.¡±


    As they scampered off, I saw that my hands and earth sorcery were done conjuring up stacks of bullets. Carefully checking the piles of rounds stored in Gungnir¡¯s storage space, I sent my thoughts into the crystal speartip and concentrated on sunlight, focusing all of my energy on what the sun means to me. It does seem that the more I invest emotionally in my work, the more power or oomph it seems to hold. The sun, I mean, it used to just be the big ass yellow ball in the sky that made summers too hot or burned my almost too-white skin, but it was also the source of life on our planet. It grew our plants and heated our oceans and turned the entire system of weather that nourished life on our little blue marble in space. I can¡¯t control the sun or the magic related to it, but everything I have, all of the magic that I am is intensely tied to the sun, and that is what I¡¯m working with.


    As I meditated on my magic and its relationship to the sun, I focused on the runic aspect of my mana sorcery. I needed something special, as I had the feeling that the basic circle with squiggly lines wasn¡¯t going to cut it for the kind of power that I wanted. Symbology is oddly important to making magic work; it sort of creates a tie between the ¡®belief¡¯ aspect of magic to the ¡®will¡¯ and then sticks a bit of ¡®emotion¡¯ to glue it all together. The whole concept sort of falls apart if you don¡¯t believe that it¡¯ll work. The Hungry Ones were probably not the nice sort of people that will give me many opportunities to test out my weapons on them, so going in balls to the wall is probably the best way.


    Holding a disk of stone in my hands, my earth sorcery kept sketching and erasing and re-sketching different images that meant ¡®sun/life/power/purity/nature¡¯. At one point the image was the stupid sun from the Teletubbies show with the weird looking baby, uhgg. I did way too much baby-sitting when I was younger. The next was a nice visual representation of a sunflower. I had used sunflowers before, in fact, that¡¯s not a bad idea, gotta remember to find and grow some more around the forest. With luck, I¡¯ll be able to use nature sorcery to turn those little dudes into the Hungry Ones¡¯ nightmares, or daymares for that matter.

 Chapter 113 - A Wild Ride (Book 2 Chapter 20)

    As my thoughts wandered, my magic kind of did as well. The image on the stone shifted again to a cross ringed by the sun and then the cross morphed into a three-tiered sunflower still ringed by the sun. After a minute, small curvy lines indicating a flowing river cut across the stone, I liked it. The symbology seemed to fit in my mind, the sun as the outer foundation, that which all of my power depends on in a tangential sense, and then the sunflower to capture and hold the sunlight as well as represent my nature sorcery. And then the water flowing around as the source of life itself, again keeping in line with my water sorcery but also to bring to life the meaning of older tales such as the undead being afraid or unable to cross flowing water. This symbol was odd in the way that it was everything that¡¯s important to me, but specifically in the direction of fighting the Hungry Ones, the undead. All I really wanted to do was hermit down and relax for a couple thousand years while playing with my magic, but life has it in for me.


    Fixing my mind on that symbol, I created a mental picture of it complete with all of the emotions tied to it and stored it away as a spell matrix in my brain as well as Gungnir. It almost seemed to hold a deeper meaning than what I currently attached to it. Standing up and stretching, my back cracking let Spot know that apparently I could be bothered.


    ¡°ACK! FFTPHT! Keep your damn tongue to yourself!¡± I sputtered, my hands useless against the slimy slug that was Spot¡¯s tongue. Three licks later I was drenched in dog slobber. Conjuring a bunch of water, I rinsed off and then banished the rest of the mess.


    ¡°Something on your mind pup?¡± I asked, giving double scratches behind the ear. ¡°Who¡¯s a good boy who¡¯s been neglected for too long? Do you need some lovin, some good ole fashioned SCRATCHES!?¡± Putting my back into it, I made sure to get behind both ears and then push him to let him know that it was belly rub time. My giant dog flipped over, more than happy to oblige.


    ¡°Does he really like that Master?¡±


    ¡°Wanna try?¡± I asked Meliad who was tiptoeing as if she were interrupting a special time. ¡°Spot doesn¡¯t really care who you are as long you give good belly scratches. Here, try.¡±


    She timidly walked up and extended her hand out and proceeded to rub gently on his big belly.


    ¡°Aww come, get in there,¡± I teased. ¡°Use both hands and give him some love. And while doing it, you always say, ¡®Who¡¯s a good boy¡¯, or ¡®You¡¯re such a good boy¡¯.¡±


    ¡°But doesn¡¯t he already know that he¡¯s a good boy? He can¡¯t answer you anyways . . .¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not the point woman,¡± I said, trying to explain the simplistic relationship between a man and his dog. ¡°You rub the belly. You scratch behind the ears. And then the whole time you coo like a child and tell the dog that he¡¯s a good boy. That¡¯s step one on how to treat a dog right.¡±


    As she imitated what I was doing, I kept going. ¡°And dogs are easy. You just love them and feed them and they treat you like one of their pack, kinda like I guess y¡¯all have groves, maybe, not exactly sure how y¡¯all work.¡±


    ¡°We are extensions of each other. Individuality is more foreign to us than it is to you or Spot.¡± She paused in her scratching. ¡°The eldest commands the Roots, and the Roots command the Branches. Leaves are the youngest or most ephemeral of the groves, whereas the Oaks and Redwoods tend to be the Mothers. Silly fruit trees don¡¯t live as long, so they tend not to be the Mothers, see?¡±


    ¡°Longevity equals authority, got it.¡± Several more questions popped into my head as I kept scratching Spot who was just loving the double amount of attention. ¡°So what about Meliad, she¡¯s a what?¡±


    ¡°A treant, neither a Mother or a Root, but a Thorn. Thorns guard the forest and all that are in it. If you elevate some more dryads, you can have your own Bramble!¡±


    Still not really answering my questions straight out, gotta love their childlike mindset. ¡°And what¡¯s a treant exactly?¡±


    She turned her beautiful green eyes on me, and I watched with fascination as they sparkled into shades of dark green and soft brown and then back again. ¡°Treants are not just the guardians of the grove, but they are the forest. Because you made one so close to the World Mother, I cannot bear to imagine how powerful Meliad will be. All animals will come to her aid if need be and even the plants shall awaken.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh,¡± I said, motioning with my hands is if she were to keep going, ¡°And what else? What do they look like, what can they do, can they travel, are they sentient?¡±


    ¡°Oh yes, Meliad will be even more beautiful than ever before! She¡¯ll have several trees to call her own and even trolls and ogres won¡¯t be a match for her! She¡¯ll be big enough to pet Spot with one hand and walk a mountain range in a day! But she won¡¯t be able to go far from her source of power.¡±


    ¡°Fuck.¡± I cursed, coming to terms with yet another idea not being viable for making an epic army capable of taking on the Hungry Ones. Images of treants and earth elementals rampaging through hordes of undead as I overlooked the battle left my head. Beast hordes won¡¯t work as the undead as they can just kill¡¯em and add them back to the horde. Treants can¡¯t travel all the way out there. Damn, where¡¯s a freaking swarm of fire breathing dragons when ya need one? The upper reaches of Canada and all of the Arctic favor the Hungry Ones, it¡¯s their form of having the high ground. Only my earth and water sorcery will be helpful up there, but there¡¯s not really enough heat or sunlight for me to be up there long term unless there¡¯s some epic leyline I can work with.


    Cursing myself for the millionth time for not picking a fire or portal related magic, my scratching was actually hard enough to annoy Spot who did one of those dog kicks when you hit the wrong area. The dryad caught me before I flew too far. With a huff, Spot looked at me askance and got to his feet, shaking the dirt off as he bounded away.


    An almost inaudible ringing in my ears made me pay attention, my consciousness sorcery was pinging me. A background process I had set up a while ago was complete and had answers for the conscious side of my brain. Momentarily silencing the alert, I asked the dryad to find some seeds for sunflowers and thorny vines and have them ready when I got back. Rushing off to the Lab, I sat next to the mana generator and focused on the pinging which brought me to my mindscape. Looking around, I was in a futuristic classroom with gigantic touch screens instead of chalkboards. The statement at the top was ¡®how to get rid of the Hungry Ones¡¯. Pretty basic stuff, but underneath there were different solutions and some of them were crossed out due to lack of knowledge or power, but a few of them held serious promise.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    ¡°Grow a mini-Yggdrasil in the North and use it like a portal,¡± I read. ¡°Then, it might be possible to funnel power, mana, or stored sunlight from the main Tree to the satellite to power a forward operating base. Huh, I like it.¡±


    That actually might be possible. I could bypass the entire issue of needing a portal if I could figure out the damn tree in my yard. If sunlight really is the answer, and the Arctic or Antarctic don¡¯t really get the kind of powerful sunlight we do closer to the Equator, then using the World Tree to bypass the distance may actually work.


    ¡°Find a usable leyline in the area and use runed sunstones to convert the energy to sunlight or a weaponized state to battle the Undead,¡± I muttered. ¡°Also possible, but we really haven¡¯t established if sunlight is the go-to weapon or not.¡±  In smaller letters underneath read: If sunlight works, make solar bullets too!


    I chuckled at what unconscious me came up with. I do love bullets. Option three was pretty cool but probably wouldn¡¯t work due to the amount of time it would take. ¡°Bring the forest to the Arctic. Make it grow northward and then let nature take its course. Hahaha,¡± I chuckled, imagining trees stomping on zombies. ¡°Plants versus zombies, and here I thought it was just a stupid game. Okay, option four, assemble a strike team and assault the area. Eh, I don¡¯t know enough people. Table that for later. Option five, find a magic user who can command the weather and use them to remove the evil cloud cover the Hungry Ones use. Then, all other plans will have a much greater chance at succeeding if their security blanket is gone.¡±


    That¡¯s right, they do use some kind of dark magic to create permanent cloud cover so they can walk about unhindered. It was in front of me the entire time but this bit of evidence points in the direction that sunlight is not their friend. Why else would you plan to cover the planet in darkness, duh. Option six was the last one on my imaginary touchscreen, but it was also the most ambitious. Back when the Earth was manaless, a lot of proponents of solar technology used to say that ¡®if we could just harness the sunlight of the Sahara Desert, then we could power the entire world for free¡¯. While I applaud their forward thinking, sunlight simply isn¡¯t as dense of an energy source as oil or nuclear. With that being said, those poor hippies didn¡¯t have magic.


    ¡°Option six, if the portal bypass system works with the satellite Yggdrasil, then establish large solar farms and energy banks in desert regions such as Texas, Nevada, and California and use that overabundance of solar based energy to assault the Hungry Ones. Sidenote, since Yggdrasil is a real thing, and it touches all realms, then maybe the frozen plane of Jotunheimr is real too. This would mean that the World Tree can adequately survive the frozen wasteland that makes up the polar ice caps.¡±


    Damn, unconscious me is ambitious, I¡¯ll give him that. Looking at the bottom, there was another note in even smaller handwriting. Leaning down, I squinted for a second until I realized it was literally all in my head. Waving my arms, the touchscreen zoomed in. ¡°Large solar panels with perfectly efficient crystal batteries would allow for a foundation of a city, a society, a functioning civilization, just something to think about.¡± Turning around, I shouted at the blackness that was inside my head. ¡°Fuck you unconscious me, I¡¯m not playing king of the hill! If you see what passes for pride around here, tell him to shut up!¡±


    Now that my self-indulgent venting was over, I turned back to the options and went over them again. I honestly liked them all, but for efficiency''s sake, and because I love overkill, I figured that the most effective plan hinged on pooling most of this together, but it all depended on making a dependable World Tree based portal system work. Which, if I could get it to work, the implications would be earth shattering.


    ¡°Now, who would be better to tell me how to travel via tree, than an actual talking tree?¡± I mused aloud. Finished with my inner dialogue, I came to next to the mana-generator and hopped to my feet. Downing one ration cube that I pulled from Gungnir along with a bit of conjured water, I hustled back outside. ¡°Meliad! Ohhh Meliad!¡±


    ¡°My lord sorcerer,¡± a familiar voice softly spoke, ¡°Meliad is still currently in her Seed right now. She won¡¯t be ready for another month.¡±


    Spinning around, I saw Lyra standing submissively about ten feet away at the edge of the clearing. ¡°Leafy! Thought you hated me?¡±


    ¡°I have been instructed in the error of my ways master,¡± she said quietly. ¡°Meliad was quite cross with me. All nurtured fruit from my tree is given to the grove for the next score of seasons and I am to be your beck and call as well.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t want a slave,¡± I said, a bit of anger darkening my features. ¡°I just want answers, and without an attitude if at all possible.¡± Her head dipped even lower.


    ¡°Of course Master.¡±


    I pushed her chin up. ¡°None of that, just don¡¯t be a dick, that¡¯s all I ask. Now,¡± I continued, noting the hints of fear in her eyes, ¡°Do you know how to travel via Yggdrasil?¡±


    She gasped. ¡°The Mother? Only the strongest of dryads dare to do so. We simply cannot bear the strain!¡±


    ¡°Wait, what? Then how the fuck did you get here in the first place?¡± Again, I was missing some crucial piece of information.


    ¡°We crossed through the tears. When the veil broke, many such rips were opened across the fabric of existence, and many things came and went. We took a chance as our world was dying.¡±


    Not really what I wanted to hear, but she didn¡¯t say no to my original question. ¡°So, you could travel via Yggdrasil, but only if you were strong enough. What would it take for you to survive a trip through there? I¡¯m pretty sure I can shield you from pretty much anything.¡±


    ¡°You would do that, for me?¡± Her surprise was not amusing. What I wanted was simple, but she was making it out to be some huge deal.


    ¡°I will shield you and take you on a journey through the World Tree,¡± I said slowly. ¡°I just need a tree to show me how to travel by tree. Got it?¡±


    She was so happy she couldn¡¯t even speak, her mouth wide open and her hands clasped together as if in fervent prayer. I kinda wanted to poke her in the eye because she wasn¡¯t even blinking.


    ¡°Today Leafy.¡±


    ¡°Oh yes of course Master!¡±


    This version of the World Tree, Yggdrasil, my fiance¡¯s incubator, was a ginormous monster of a tree. Even though it was less than twenty feet away, the scale of the monstrosity is hard to capture for anyone¡¯s perspective. I¡¯ve seen the redwoods a couple times in California when I visited family, but somehow this tree was bigger than even those. It was thicker and wider and exuded such a feeling of raw life and unconscionable power that it was almost uncomfortable. And that¡¯s not even describing the amount of mana it gave off, as if it weren¡¯t functioning like a normal tree where it gets its nourishment from the nutrients and water in the ground. This tree seemed like it was giving nourishment to the world, like the natural process was backwards.


    Lyra shrank as we walked closer to Yggdrasil, eventually becoming the size of a small house cat and climbing up my armor to sit on my shoulder. ¡°Now,¡± she squeaked, ¡°Touch the tree and extend your shield to cover us up, but let just a bit of your hand actually touch the bark. Feel it with your magic, let your rhythm match the Mother¡¯s.¡±


    Accepting that hippy crap is now a constant part of my life, I slowed my breathing and extended my nature sorcery to Yggdrasil. While this was just a tiny cell of the World Tree, the amount of power and breadth of vastness of the main tree was too much for me to handle all at once. ¡°Fuck, I¡¯m not ready for this,¡± I cursed as it felt like I licked a livewire of the universe. Gritting my teeth, I grabbed Gungnir and touched it to the World Tree as my magic reached into Svalinn. Forming a three part system, I closed the circuit with Yggdrasil and the pressure eased.


    With both hands somewhat touching the bark, Lyra¡¯s tiny voice spoke up. ¡°Now feel where you want to go. Any tree that has been touched by those blessed by nature have more life and can support you. Pick one close by and take a step.¡±


    With the circuit of magical power closed and my magical tools helping to insulate me from the white noise, I could feel what Lyra was talking about. Soft green and brown lights stood out in an expanse of grey and black. Keeping my focus small as I could feel innumerable twists and turns in the vastness, I found a calm glow about a mile away from where we were. Turning my attention there, I started to take a step when Lyra shouted, ¡°NO! Not that one! Meliad isn¡¯t ready yet!¡±


    My consciousness sorcery was reinforcing my focus enough that I didn¡¯t act up or freak out. Taking a wrong step right now could land me in some weird or scary ass place. Another light glowed softly and I felt Lyra¡¯s mind ping off of mine as I looked at it. A nice oak tree, full of life and one that welcomed the wash of mana since the Ripples came, sat proud at the edge of a valley south of where I was. ¡°Oaks are good, oaks are strong, go there! Not too far either!¡± Lyra¡¯s excitement spiked as I took a step into a from Fredericksburg, Virginia into a whirlwind of color. In that wild ride of pinwheeling colors, all I could hear was the ¡°Stairway to Heaven¡± as I screamed my heart out.

 Chapter 114 - Thanks for the Memories (Book 2 Chapter 21)

    The wild ride was over before I knew it. One second I was swirling down the nature drain and the next thing I know I¡¯m in a tree, or what passes for the living room of a tree that can or maybe will have a dryad in the future.


    ¡°Yo, what gives?¡± I said, looking around. There were no lights that I could see, and yet I actually could see everything around me.  The bare room seemed to be made for someone at least several feet taller than me, and the wood that made up the walls was moving, inhaling and exhaling from the looks of it.


    ¡°Is this alive, like in the sentient sense, or the ¡®can be¡¯ sense? Leafy?¡± I questioned, turning to take everything in, not that there was much to take in.


    ¡°Master, of course it¡¯s alive, all trees are alive.¡±


    I looked down at the squeaky voice down by my feet, but the rapidly growing figure of Lyra was pointing at the far wall. ¡°See, there, that¡¯s how we get out. Just touch it like you did the Mother and done.¡±


    Squinting didn¡¯t really work. It wasn¡¯t until I switched to my magical senses that I saw the knot of power that looked like an actual doorknob complete with a keyhole.


    ¡°You¡¯re kidding right?¡± I said, turning to Lyra. ¡°That¡¯s kind of an odd shape to be here naturally without pre-existing intelligence huh?¡± With a flick of power, I summoned all of my gear including Gungnir and Svalinn and then slammed the dryad up against the inner wall of the tree with Gungnir¡¯s knifepoint at her throat. I didn¡¯t really trust Lyra and my suspicions were driving my paranoid self just a bit crazy.


    ¡°This stinks Leafy,¡± I growled, ¡°And it ain¡¯t just the tree. Don¡¯t make me rip it out of you. This blade hasn¡¯t been fed in quite a while.¡±


    Lyra¡¯s eyes went white with fear, sweat burst out of her as if she were a sponge that I squeezed. ¡°It¡¯s not a trap master! It¡¯s not! All dryads have such doors!¡±


    My magical senses flooded the area, laying everything bare. I can¡¯t believe that I was this wound up, but something just didn¡¯t seem to add up to me. Forming two tendrils out of mental energy, I sent them straight into her forehead. She didn¡¯t like me from the outset, and I honestly didn¡¯t really like her. The fact that I tolerated the stupid dryad in the first place is because I was way further up on the totem pole than she would ever be, that and the fact that my blend of sorceries literally made her my bitch.


    ¡°The truth, now!¡± Gungnir¡¯s blade pricked her throat just enough for a bead of greenish blood to ooze out. My nature sorcery held her completely still as my mind sorcery forced her to be honest. Her mind connected to mine and it all came tumbling out. She was trying to help, but there were ulterior motives, jealousy at not being picked to be the guardian of my grove, rage at Meliad for always one-upping her, planned helpfulness to get me to look at her in a better light, and so much greed. Greed for the power she gained traveling through the World Tree while shielded by me.


    Grasping the thread of that last thought, I pulled more information from her. Apparently if she had tried that stunt without my protection, she would have been completely subsumed by Yggdrasil. Using me as a filter, she gained enough power to start several groves of her own and bargain with an earth elemental to become a treant. People are selfish, it¡¯s the inherent concept that drives them, and apparently dryads are close enough to humans to have the same flaws. Keeping her still, I conjured a small battery crystal etched with the proper runes and placed it on her chest.


    ¡°Push the power into this crystal until I tell you to stop,¡± I ordered, my blade pushing just a cinch deeper into her neck. ¡°Nobody uses me. Honesty is the best policy bitch, especially with me.¡±


    Not even having the room to gulp, Lyra pushed the power from her overstuffed core into the battery, tears leaking out as half of everything she gained left before I cut it off.


    ¡°There, you can keep some,¡± I said slowly, far less angry now that I figured out that this wasn¡¯t malicious towards me. I can understand wanting to move up in the world and doing whatever it takes to get there, in fact, I respect it. This would have been far darker if she meant to harm me in any way.  I continued after putting Gungnir away and healing her neck, ¡°It''s definitely more than you deserve but it¡¯s not as much as Meliad can hold. I¡¯ll let you keep that much for showing me how to travel via tree.¡±


    Storing the now dryad-centric power battery in Gungnir, I walked over to the door knob knot of power and simply turned it with my magic while touching it with my hand. Sunlight hit me instantly. Yup, I was certainly not in Fredericksburg anymore. Hopping back into the tree, I made Lyra shrink down again and tree-travelled back home, all the while making sure that she didn¡¯t get any extra power.


    ¡°Whew, that was fun,¡± I said to myself, mentally checking off one experiment off my list. With a bit of magic and coaxing, I managed to get a bit of rootwood from our neighborhood Yggdrasil and shape it into a ball. In that softball sized portion was several drops of sap and a tiny bit of heart wood. Using nature sorcery, I split it into two identical pieces and then made the bark form runes of stasis. Chuckling to myself, I pulled out the battery that I kept Lyra¡¯s stolen power in and very carefully split that into two pieces as well, gently forcing the Yggdrasil seeds to accept the foreign substance. With my seeds complete for transplant, I stored those away.


    Going back to the Lab, I set out the seeds of Yggdrasil and went back over my plans. ¡°Ok, so I can tree walk, great,¡± I muttered, ¡°But I¡¯m forgetting something . . . AHA!¡±


    Traveling via tree was definitely possible, as I proved by moving myself with magic, which then meant that moving energy the same way is most likely possible as well. In fact, it may even be easier or more efficient! Peering into Gungnir, I saw with my magical senses that all of the things that I had stored in there were perfectly organized in what looked to be a white room with nice stone shelves. The Centauri food was nicely placed at the bottom of the shelves in their boxes while the weapons were beautifully displayed on the wall, and all of my gems and stones and bullets were organized off to the side in individualized crates. There were even two pedestals with indentations on them that perfectly fit the Yggdrasil seeds I¡¯d made.


    Above the pedestals for the seeds was something I didn¡¯t know how to process. Two blazing swords, one crackling with white lightning and the other burning with a fire so blue it was almost white were crossed into an ¡®X¡¯ and where they intersected was a clear glass ball with a tiny fire that glowed like the sun. Trust me, I didn¡¯t do that. I just used magic to shove things I wanted near Gungnir and the damn weapon sort of just made it vanish. My mind sorcery shot me a quick memory of the last interaction I had with Maalik the Fallen. If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    ¡°Holy Canoli BATMAN!¡± I screamed. Is this what grief and trauma do and adrenaline do? Do they make you forget, do they make you freaking forget that Gungnir stored away the answers to all of my goddamn problems and didn¡¯t tell me?! AND, just to twist the knife a bit more, Maalik said he left a ¡®familiar spirit¡¯ for me in Gungnir as well. Mentally willing Gungnir to change its shape, it flowed to become a smooth foot-long shaft of wood with a multi-colored sphere on top.


    ¡°Come on out dude!¡± I called out to my weapon both out loud and mentally. ¡°You¡¯re gonna have to forgive my human flaws, because even though my memory is ¡®magically perfect¡¯, it still ain¡¯t.¡±


    What came out wasn¡¯t a dude, in the literal sense of the word, but I meant it more in the California sense of the word where it refers to anyone or anything. It was a white and purple orb of light that flashed and sparked like an angry lava lamp on crack. Like any good sorcerer who doesn¡¯t know what the hell he¡¯s doing, I put my hand out for it to land on. I mean, if an angel gave it to you it can¡¯t be all bad right? Wrong. Maalik was a ¡®fallen¡¯ angel, maybe not his decision or his desire, but he was running outta Grace when I saw him.


    I couldn¡¯t resist. ¡°Oh great Spirit of the Spear!¡± I said pompously with a horrible English accent, waving my arms as if in religious rapture. ¡°Soul of Sky¡¯s Fallen Swords! Speaker of the Staff!¡± Every irreverent word made the orb pulse a shade brighter.  When the core of the orb finally became apparent through the vibrating light, it was definitely not what I expected.


    ¡°Orrrrr, Cyclopian Squid of the Spear?¡± I¡¯m not kidding. The shape inside of the glowing orb from Heaven¡¯s fallen soldier was a damn underwater-looking thing with one big ass eye and a whole bunch of tentacles. It was even speaking in bubbles! Right around a foot tall now, the miniature cephalopod undulated as it floated closer, bubbles rapidly frothing and bursting between its tentacles. Finally, it plopped on top of the spherical crystal part of Gungnir and just stared at me. A questing tendril of mental magic from the creature gently knocked three times on my forehead.


    Since the knock was so kind, I answered with my own strand of mental energy while at the same time pouring some serious magical power into my mind shields. The deepest voice devoid of any accent sounded, [Greeting mortal sorcerer. To your implement I am bound, to your will I am not.]


    I didn¡¯t really know how to take that. [It¡¯s uh, nice to meet you too. So you¡¯re the reason that everything is super organized in Gungnir?]


    A feeling of rank disgust and smug superiority stank up the mental connection we had going on.


    [A weapon of the gods? This pitiful excuse for a sorcerer¡¯s staff?] I heard it sniff even though it clearly had no nose. [As a Scion of Order, it was simply beneath one such as I to reside in a dimension of such disarray.]


    [I did not know that it was such a mess in there, I haven¡¯t had it long.]


    It¡¯s inaudible mental grunt showed me that it really didn¡¯t care about my sufficient time to tidy up. But, seeing as it was a literal gift from an angel, I decided to cut it some slack instead of letting loose some beautiful insults.


    [Well thank you so much for being so kind. Is there something I can do to help or make your day better?] When in doubt, pour on the good old southern charm, that is, until I remembered something missing from my storage space. [Where, by chance, good sir, are the piles of full crystal batteries that I put there?!]


    [A sorcerer who doesn¡¯t deign to organize his possessions doesn¡¯t deserve to have a say in how they¡¯re used.]


    My eye started twitching. Fuck southern hospitality. [Listen here you slimy ass piece of worn out sushi. Where the fuck is my stuff?]


    It¡¯s one eyeball looked off to the side, almost as if it were ashamed, or lying. [I was hungry. You hadn¡¯t seen fit to feed your own Spirit of Knowledge nor had you even thought to rearrange anything in your space so that your possessions wouldn¡¯t react improperly in the demi-dimension. Besides, the space you had was far too small for any magic user worth their salt, so I expanded it.]


    [USED? FEED? The fu . . . wait, hold up. Explain that to me. You expanded the spatial storage? As in you made it bigger? How big is it? And what in the world do you eat?]


    [Higher beings subsist on the material making up the universe, what you call mana. Your purified dense collections of it were quite satisfying, so much so that I even did you the favor of expanding the tiny box that was my home.]


    [I see . . . ] I thought at the creature, figuring this out a little more. [You thought that your home was too small, not that my storage space is too small. This was all about you!  You know the whole thing is mine right? That weapon, I made it, enchanted it, fed it, it¡¯s mine through and through and you¡¯re just an add-on. Besides, if you want more crystal batteries to eat then you¡¯re shit outta luck dude. I found out that I¡¯m the only one in the universe who can make those.]


    A wave of sadness and submission drove through our mental link. [You wouldn¡¯t deprive your own gifted familiar of sustenance would you?]


    [Given to or cursed with? Seriously man, which is it? What the hell are you and what can you do? I really don¡¯t wanna make a new weapon but if you¡¯re some kind of alien parasite then we¡¯re gonna have problems.]


    The small spirit puffed up in anger. [I am NOT a curse! I collect knowledge and organize data! The library of Alexandria was managed by spirits of knowledge such as myself. In fact, we were the curators of the Atlantean Arcaneum! We Scions are noble spirits of the Ethereal Constants.]


    [Uh huh . . .  right . . . . So you¡¯re basically an OCD librarian?]


    [It is NOT a COMPULSION! It is ORDER!]


    I couldn¡¯t help but tease the poor off putting creature. I could feel through our mindlink its need to prove itself and its ocean of insecurity, both of which are marks of being very young. This creature may be the descendant of something that works in the library of Alexandria or whatever the hell the Atlantean Arcaneum is, but it doesn¡¯t have that kind of knowledge or it wouldn¡¯t be here.


    [All right, all right, calm your squiggles dude, haha. I¡¯m just messing with you. So, I can¡¯t really let you off the hook for eating all my crystal batteries, but you did do me a huge favor. So how about we call it even and start fresh?]


    It¡¯s lone eye turned back towards me. [Fine], it sent sheepishly.


    [Great, let¡¯s begin. Hello, my name is Nate, what¡¯s your name? I¡¯d like us to be friends. I¡¯m a sorcerer with multiple elements and epic amounts of power. I lack training and knowledge but I¡¯m doing all right on my own so far. I have a dragonized dog named Spot and a whole bunch of cool gardeners who happen to be dryads.]


    It felt like platonic speed-dating but as long as it opened the doors then I¡¯ll take it.


    [You can call me Kraxin¡¯eldra as my full name should never be given.] The amount of noise between the syllable¡¯s of its name could not be pronounced properly by a human mouth. Shove a bunch of popping bubbles and crashes waves and then a dolphin call and you¡¯re almost there.


    [I¡¯ll call you Kraken then just to keep it easy. Nate is my nickname and I won¡¯t give you my full name for the same reason.]


    With a quiet pop, Kraken vanished back into Gungnir but our mental link did not.


    [And don¡¯t you eat anything else in there! If you need something to eat just let me know! I¡¯m gonna make some more batteries but those are for me!]


    Grudging acceptance traveled down our link as I started a long day of remaking my emergency power banks. Two days worth of careful conjuration and crafting later, I had made a whole bunch of crystal batteries roughly the shape of a Lego brick but scaled up to a normal brick size. My three magical solar panels pumped my pile of bricks full of converted mana and I popped them into Gungnir. Kraken and I had worked out a pretty good deal. He, yes it¡¯s a he because I asked, organizes everything I put in there and will consult me before expanding the storage space if need be.


    Also, he¡¯ll work with me in decrypting and managing all of the magical knowledge that I have to include Reeanth¡¯s and Rath¡¯s brain. It was interesting to find out that the Scion is basically an immortal creature or spirit, they¡¯re really kind of both, but they don¡¯t grow up based on time like humans do. Scions grow when exposed to power, of which I had more than enough. My pure generated mana from the generators and converted solar panels is exactly what the little thing needs to grow but I need that just as much as he does. I made it easy and made his own solar panel converter in the clearing of the Hole. Putting a larger than normal power bank there wasn¡¯t a problem and when it¡¯s full he can come out at any time and suck the thing dry.


    Kraken was so grateful about the basically infinite over time mana supply that he even offered to help me complete a round of upgrades on all of my gear. Through our mental link, I directly shared all of my knowledge, from the magics I had to my less than great public school education and my ideas for the future, and Kraken organized and compiled it into a mental database. After finishing that, he did the same thing with Reeanth¡¯s brain and added all of it to his storage and then began on the dead dragon¡¯s brain. We had complete schematics of all of my gear in a mental framework, but working with it and Kraken at the same time was like watching a sci-fi movie. Everything, because it¡¯s all in our heads, was like when Tony Stark had Jarvis rework his Iron Man suit. Waving my hands made bad parts go away and another wave added runes to particular pieces. The next two weeks were an exercise in creative bliss.

 Chapter 115 - A Squids Derision (Book 2 Chapter 22)

    ¡°What do you mean that¡¯s not how it works? I fucking made it and it¡¯s been working great ever since. Shit man, I even blew up a goddamn vampire and gigantic witch¡¯s pet with that bad boy!¡±


    My professional complaints fell on deaf ears, or ear holes. Kraken didn¡¯t care that Gungnir is an epic work of deadly art that¡¯s served me well for months now. The stupid spirit squid just took my mental schematics of all of my gear and shredded them. In short, my rune work was pathetic and apparently I only got by because the materials I used in construction of my stuff had incredible synergy.


    [Shoddy! Shitty! Shite! Shovel this to Sheol!]


    ¡°Your alliteration is asinine you abominable anus!¡± I yelled back. Kraken had actually kicked me out of the shared mindspace, grumbling the whole time about how he could do it so much better. Our relationship had improved over the past couple weeks but we still fought like siblings. I left Gungnir in a slot in one of the solar panel mana converters to charge up some batteries in there while I experimented with my collection of sunstones. Thankfully, sunstones are a naturally occuring kind of mineral that my earth sorcery was more than happy to conjure for me. I just couldn¡¯t do it earlier because I didn¡¯t know exactly what I was looking for until the dryads brought me some samples.


    ¡°So if they sit in the sun they charge, duh, but at night they just blow through their energy,¡± I muttered to myself as I held my samples at my outside temp lab. ¡°So, either gonna need runes to get them to hold on to their charge throughout the night or put them in a specially shaped crystal battery to govern the energy dispersal.¡±


    My main weapon Gungnir had been already altered by the Angel Maalik to have some kind of ¡®star-iron¡¯ metal that was inimical to the undead, but it wasn¡¯t something that I could recreate. I had an idea about manipulating the sunstones in such a way that they could be weapons I put on Everest and Meliad so they¡¯d never have to worry about the undead ever, but I had to come up with more viable solutions in case I needed to arm other people. I knew that while I¡¯m alone here for right now, humanity isn¡¯t completely gone off of this planet.


    In one of my experiments, I did find that the sunstone material was much better at gathering sunlight than my own freaking solar panels, so I spent a day reworking all of them to have sunstone coverings to up their efficiency. The power intake spiked beyond what I had even dreamed to the point I had to put in a governing rune function to prevent explosive accidents. Underneath each solar panel setup, I buried a giant crystal battery bank to handle the overflow just in case I wanted to do some power intensive enchanting or crafting. The power bank had a crystal spike that came up through the surface of the earth and connected to the solar panel providing an avenue for the energy to drain safely.


    With the energy-experiments mostly completed, I had also taken the time to make about eight more Yggdrasil seeds so I could see about making a personalized travel system for me. They all were taken from the same area of Yggdrasil, and I was hoping that there would be enough compatibility between the seeds so that I could put the travel trees and be able to basically teleport freely around the North American continent. I had the actual World Tree to start from, which was powerful enough to keep anything from using it to get to my main base, but the others I planned on putting elsewhere.


    The first one would be somewhere in Death Valley or the deserts out west if they¡¯re still there, one to be my forward base in northern Canada, and one at the impromptu base near my brother in Florida. The others would be get out of jail free cards if necessary. I tested one seed just to see and it did work. All I had to do was plant the seed, shove enough energy in it so that it could handle travel to the main tree, and step through. Forcing the plant to grow that fast also causes it to completely burnout so I don¡¯t have to fear anyone following me by the same method. I ran back to the original travel point and there was a burnt out pile of ash where the travel tree was. Or, if I had time, I could plant it and grow it like normal to be a travel/teleportation tree. But, it was good to know that I had options.


    One of the things that I had been too afraid to do but had actually started doing now was communing with the World Tree. Yggdrasil is that which holds the universe together, so the legends say, but the fucking thing also currently has my wife. I made it a practice at least once a week to merge my mind and magic with the tree hoping to find some conscious trace of my wife up in there. What I found instead was the local network of arboreal life that my section of Yggdrasil was attached to. From the magical senses perspective, it was like looking at an aerial map but that only had different shades of green. In fact it almost looked like rivers of green and brown flowing around that I kind of assumed to be ley lines for the surrounding area.Now, it was real clear to me that the damn World Tree doesn¡¯t look at things the way we humans do, so traveling around was a bit of a pain. Plenty of plant life extended up and down the eastern seaboard and a decent distance out west but it stopped in the east probably due to the Atlantic Ocean out there. And as far as I could tell, there were big dead spots in the west that the World Tree really didn¡¯t touch. My educated self planned on starting there to see where the deserts are.


    I loved the fact that my plans were coming together. I wasn¡¯t finished with any of them really but the simple fact that progress was being made on multiple fronts was exhilarating. With Kraken¡¯s help and my solar panel and sunstone experiments nearly complete along with the travel-tree concept working as planned, taking on the Arctic to rid it of the Hungry Ones seemed more and more likely.


    One of the things that fascinated me the most was studying the two swords that Maalik stored inside of Gungnir when he left. While they both burned slightly different colors, one pure white and the other with a shade of light blue mixed in with the white, it was hard to get close to them. The issue wasn¡¯t really the fact that my body couldn¡¯t get close, it¡¯s that my mind seemed to constantly shift away as if the swords were covered in oil and my focus kept slipping off. Kraken had said something about being ¡®too mortal¡¯ to understand the Adamic or Enochian runes and ¡®some things are not meant for mortals and others really aren¡¯t meant for mortals¡¯. When I summoned the sword outside on the ground and bent to physically pick it up and examine it, Kraken had screamed some kind of sound wave to knock me away and then explained afterward that it would have either blown my hand off or burned it off instantly.


    So I spent time magically meditating on the swords and the little angel feather display. It was magic all right, but not any kind that I could handle or replicate. There was something inherently alien and painful about it. The swords possessed a quality of fire that was more powerful than sorcery, but definitely not something my magic was capable of handling. If Maalik had wanted to do anything to me, I would not have been able to stop him. I tossed rocks and water and raw mana at the swords and they just shrugged it off like water off a duck¡¯s back. Enchantments lasted a bit longer but I don¡¯t think half seconds count. For fun, I enchanted a stick to be harder than steel and threw it at one of the swords. The damn steel stick just fell into two pieces.


    [Quit playing with Heaven¡¯s blades. Did you ever stop to think maybe you have a duty like Merlin? Didn¡¯t he carry around Excalibur for a while looking for the rightful owner of the sword? Sheesh mortal, not everything is about your or even belongs to you.]


    [Fuck off squid,] I growled inside my head. [Either tell me how the damn things work or put some of those ever-shifting runes on those armor schematics.]


    [What do you think I¡¯ve been doing for over two weeks? Higher Runes don¡¯t just get slapped on? They have to be properly aligned, and be set in the right material, and they also have to be attuned so that they don¡¯t burn your less than perfect self to dust!]If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    Sometimes, magic fucking sucks. I replied with a bit of irritation, [Then make another schematic not using those particular runes as well. I¡¯m going to need an upgraded suit of armor now-ish and then we¡¯ll actually work on the way more detailed powered-up one later.]


    [Grumble, grumble, snark, snark.] Or at least that¡¯s all I heard coming down the shared mental link.


    [Hey! It¡¯s time for our session anyways. Come on dude.] My excitement rolled through our link. Kraken wasn¡¯t the best at answering all of my questions about the universe at large as he¡¯s still just a young Scion, but his powers of deduction and knowledge in regards as to how magic works were invaluable for me.


    [I still don¡¯t get the distinction between mages and sorcerers, and what do you mean I have to train my mana capacity? I have generators and batteries and power banks and solar panel converters, come on dude?]


    Kraken just stared at me. His bewilderment was clear but it carried the tinge of an adult watching an idiot child ask a really dumb question. [We have been over this!] he sent, frustration making our connection a bit tenuous, [Sorcerers use the element and Mages COMMAND the element. They are the element. You throw water at a water mage and he takes it away from you while laughing and drowning everything around you. But, the mage can only use the one element he has, so you throw a rock at him and he better get the fuck outta the way. It¡¯s why mages tend to settle down and never leave their area of influence. Water mages live near the ocean or in river-boats, nature mages never leave the forest, and fire and air mages fuck like rabbits and are inseparable.]


    [Ok, that does make sense,] I thought, mulling it over. [But what kind of training do I have to do that wizards do? Aren¡¯t they pathetic in terms of holding power, which is why the crystal batteries are sort of a huge deal?]


    [Yes, wizards don¡¯t have the same capacity you do, but because of that they train themselves to hold more and more over time. Also, yes, wizards are not as powerful as sorcerers but if you ever run into an old ass wizard you better run like the Hells themselves are coming for ya.]


    [Yeah, I hear ya, but I¡¯m not seeing how that¡¯s possible. I command water and earth, what¡¯s a wizard going to do with it that I can¡¯t?]


    [Think with me for a second,] he chuckled, his mind pulling me his own. A live-action cartoon movie started playing. [Ok, the blue dude over there is the water sorcerer, and the old man is the wizard. Watch the wizard shoot a couple sharp icicles and see, the sorcerer just laughs at it.] And sure enough, the young man arrogantly waved his hand at the incoming missiles which went from ice to water vapor. [But look, wizards tend to use implements a lot more than sorcerers or mages and it gives them an incredible amount of variety to use.]


    The old man chuckled, icicles pouring out of his wand like a machine gun and the young man barely paying attention at this point as the projectiles turned into vapor to the point that fog was starting to hamper visibility. The old man grinned for a quick second as his other hand held a different wand that quickly blasted a spiky ball of solid rock that plowed right through the fog into the sorcerer. The impromptu movie cut off.


    [I get it, wizards use tools as their preset spells and pump mana through it to up the number of spells in play, but they have a bunch of wands ready for variety. That wand belt was pretty cool. Do they normally carry around that many?] I asked, replaying it in my mind.


    [Yes, they really do, and they stress their mana capacity every day too. Eventually, they get to the point where they hold almost as much power as you do with your batteries on their own but that takes decades of dedicated work. They¡¯re big fans of living near ley lines or having familiars or elementals to supplement their mana expenditure.] Kraken¡¯s answers were enlightening, kinda scared me a bit too. I felt like I was missing out on the grade school education that everyone else got.


    [So how¡¯s it work, how do they gradually increase what they can hold?] My question prompted a two hour discussion on basic mana manipulation training techniques and breathing exercises that were frankly exhausting. Kraken ended up throwing his curriculum away after finding out exactly how much power I carried around in my batteries.


    [You¡¯re already doing the craziest workout I¡¯ve ever heard of? Just being near that much power 24/7 is forcing you to expand your mana capacity, and that¡¯s not including your blend of diverse sorceries and proximity to the World Tree!] At the end there, his voice through our link was getting a bit raspy. [Did you know that most humans are simply not durable or resistant to the level of mana being put out by Yggdrasil? Shit, most creatures can¡¯t handle that. It¡¯s like dragons nesting in a volcano not just because they want to but because they¡¯re really the only ones who can!]


    [So, I don¡¯t need to do all that hippy shit?]


    [Meditation and breathing exercises are not ¡®hippy shit¡¯! Communing with the foundation of the multi-verse is NOT hippy shit!]


    I laughed him off as I opened up my magical senses to feel the surrounding area. Nothing but forest and raw power as far as the magical eye could see. ¡°Feels like hippy shit to me,¡± I grumbled with a small smile.


    [Look, haven¡¯t you noticed that even your canine companion doesn¡¯t even stay around here for long? He comes by for some fetch, belly rubs, and then runs off?]


    [Yeah . . . but that¡¯s what dogs do man. He¡¯s got private parts to lick and deer to chase.]


    [This area is hard to live in for things that are not plants you freak. You should not be alive. Besides, you¡¯re probably gonna die as soon as the other realms start traveling here. You¡¯re pretty squishy and can¡¯t even fight with a blade.]


    That for some reason actually got under my skin a bit. He was dismissing me as non-threatening, like a child with a loaded gun but with no actual strength to cock it. Reaching into all of my batteries, I pulled as much power as I could handle and surprised myself to find myself not even full from the batteries on my chest. Linking to the power banks, I pulled even more, draining one out of three, until my head was pounding and my heart straining.


    My gear activated, every rune lighting up across my body even as Svalinn expanded to the bladed shield form and Gungnir crackled with power. My presence, magnified by the weight of all the power cascading off of me, was starting to make my limbs shake before I let it all go back to storage. Gasping for breath, I managed to mentally send as I couldn¡¯t voice the words, [See? You¡¯re telling me that¡¯s vulnerable?]


    [You know anti-magic weaponry is a real threat right? All of that does not matter one iota to one of the many groups that hunt magic users.]


    [You¡¯re kidding!]


    Kraken shot a snippet of a memory at me, hordes of silver plated warriors in the sun cutting down magic users left and right, their armor shrugging off spells while their weapons knocked aside or nullified their spellforms. The last few seconds showed several wizards fighting back, their staffs now maces or swords.


    [You¡¯re fucking kidding me right?] I scoffed, [We¡¯ll just do this the American way, shoot them. Gungnir has Centauri rifles and I¡¯ve even modified bullets to blow up. Magic may not work but physics is hard to ignore dude.]


    [This is why teams are important,] Kraken stressed, shaking his one big eyeball. [We¡¯ve talked about this. That¡¯s why the Centauri still fight like your ancient Romans did. Formations of many kinds of weaponry ensure success far better than being a lone wolf. Even mages work in teams with enslaved creatures to cover their blind spots. Wizards learn how to fight with physical weaponry, and the Hive races use the swarm tactics. You can¡¯t protect against everything perfectly. There are even accounts of the Hungry Ones¡¯ overlord arming their hordes with anti-magic weaponry complete with gauntlets to shield them from their own weapons!]


    [So, bullets don¡¯t work? Is that what you¡¯re trying to say man? Cause I¡¯m definitely short on manpower over here. There¡¯s some hillbillies that I might want to check in on, but we won¡¯t be making SWAT teams out of them.]


    [Your normal human definition of ¡®bullets¡¯ won¡¯t work, and you being all alone really won¡¯t work either. You¡¯re squishy, like me, but I¡¯m the spiritual form of squishy which means that I¡¯m way less squishy than you. Most things tend to be either too durable for bullets or they¡¯re a bit advanced and have some basic shielding against high-velocity projectiles. It¡¯s really why wizards don¡¯t use guns. The craziest ones use big longbows with crazy enchanted arrows, and most use swords while the rest use beefed up staffs.]


    [So I need an army, or, fuck, a fucking team. Fuck! FUCK!] My stomping off ended the conversation but it didn¡¯t end the fact that maybe the little shit was right. [Wait, fuck you!] I mentally yelled back as I turned right around stomped back up to Kraken. [Can¡¯t I just hide out, go rogue, not really show off and be unnoticeable? If Spot the dragon dog can do it then so can I right?]


    [Maybe in about three hundred years of practice if you¡¯re lucky,] Kraken scoffed, poking me with one barely corporeal pseudopod. [You¡¯ve shown me your magics, and if you were smart, you would have stolen some weapon skills from the Centauri you killed. Up close combat is your greatest danger, followed by your own idiocy.]

 Chapter 116 - A Sunny Blob (Book 2 Chapter 23)

    Well my plans to leave in the next month or so got kicked back by at least six if not more. Anytime I thought I was ready, gung-fuckin-ho to kick some ass, Kraken would emerge from Gungnir, laugh, and then shoot me a made-up vision or scene of me getting annihilated in some stupid way. And it¡¯s not that I¡¯m actually an idiot, it¡¯s more like I¡¯m ignorant. The multiverse is inconceivably huge, and I just don¡¯t know anything compared to some child who¡¯s had magic his entire life. It just frustrated me that Scion, who openly considers himself young, a veritable baby of his race, and yet has so much more knowledge than me. I did manage to get some grudging respect from him when he first examined my armor as he noted that platinum is especially difficult to work with.


    I spent a week just straight up coming up with runes that I could use to conceal myself and my magical signature with better. The runes on my armor do a pretty good job at muting my magical signature, but actually vanishing from sight is a really hard thing to accomplish. The best I came up with was a sort of lame blending, but magical creatures that survive by hunting either with their noses or mana fluctuation would be able to instantly notice me as they tend not to be vision oriented. My worst enemy would be a damn dog since they¡¯d probably smell Spot all over me.


    My focus of magical self-improvement has been based on staying alive, defense. And defense is great for sittin¡¯ tight and surviving, which is my main plan. The problem with defense is that you don¡¯t go out and assault an enemy with a castle. You need some freaking offense. For all of my power, I still felt some reticence in using all of my abilities to the fullest. My flesh sorcery so far has been utilized in minor ways, healing, fortifying my body, conjuring bone armor that self-heals, but I know that I could take that way further. The biggest issue with that is time and ignorance. I could grow a freaking monster army to assault the North and South pole, but monsters have to be fed, and they can die which means they could be resurrected by the Hungry Ones against me.


    Also, experimenting with life itself is incredibly dangerous on the macro scale as well. If I introduce a new life form, there¡¯s no guarantee that it won¡¯t wipe out a natural ecosystem, or go mad with power. Playing god is not what I want to do. The mana and rune sorcery is perfect for long-term figuring stuff out, kind of like what I¡¯m doing right now, and it has seriously buffed me in the defense and implement department. Even my nature sorcery is perfect for defense or localized ambushing, but air or fire would have rounded me out to be a better magical fighter.


    Meditating in the clearing was helping me to go through my options. If I couldn¡¯t solve this problem then there would be no point to me ever leaving this area ever again. I¡¯m still human which means I¡¯m still squishy. Offense, offense, offense. Using the process of elimination, I managed to define what was left once I removed enchantment, earth, and nature as those primarily are defense. What was left was flesh, water, and mind sorcery. ¡°Damn,¡± I grunted. ¡°It¡¯s still a lot left, more versatility if I can just pound my brain to give me a bit more.¡±


    Let¡¯s go back to flesh. Keeping in mind that it¡¯s probably not the best option against the undead, it can still buff me personally. I can alter my body so that I myself am a singular weapon. I can wield a sword or staff or mace and fight off opponents while being enhanced with flesh sorcery. The constant healing as well as alterable bone armor and bone spikes would make me a pain, hahaha, to deal with. If I got close enough, I could probably even attack a living thing¡¯s internal workings from the inside, and if worse came to worse I could use blood as a weapon. I¡¯m pretty sure that if I tried hard enough, I could literally rip the life out of someone, but again, that would not work against the undead.


    My mind sorcery is definitely something I could use as a weapon. In the past, I dominated the mind of Kong and Norn, but that really made me sick to my stomach, in the moral sense. Fighting someone inside of their own mind is also a kind of offense, but one that is singularly focused, not the kind of widespread magical destruction that a good fireball would provide. Which leaves me with water.


    [Now you¡¯re getting somewhere, just think about where you¡¯re going, eventually]. Kraken¡¯s mental interruptions are something that I¡¯ll never get used to. It¡¯s not that his voice is like a weird oily sensation in my head, cause it kind of is, it¡¯s that the deeply sonorous tones of his voice just don¡¯t fit the almost cute image of the aquatic-based spirit familiar of knowledge. His voice should be high pitched and cute, or that¡¯s what modern cartoon culture has taught me. He should be like a squeaky kitten, but he¡¯s not. His fucking voice is smooth and dark, like Mr. Clean combined with the Koolaid Man coming out of the woodwork to wreck my concentration.


    But the melodious little shit had a point. Everything past the upper part of the former United States and on up through Canada is frozen, which means that ice and snow with a little bit of dirt mixed in is where my water sorcery will fucking shine. Instant ice coffins, easy to use blades of water and firehouse power combined with tons of dirt, the very material of the surroundings at my beck and call, yeah, maybe I won¡¯t be so weak up north.


    [Keep going, think harder . . .].


    [FUCK YOU SQUID!].


    [Don¡¯t be like that,] Kraken teased, condescension dripping from every syllable. [It¡¯s just so fun to watch your hamster wheel turn but with no one running on it.]


    [I swear you insignificant speck, if you don¡¯t SHUT UP and let me work I¡¯ll create a whole bunch of elementals to hound you forever! And I¡¯ll make sure that they¡¯re water elementals too. That way, you won¡¯t even be able to hide in the depths of the damn ocean!]


    [Bingo folks! Ding Ding Ding! We have a winner!] Kraken cheered, doing a little tentacle dance on top of Gungnir. [The monkey has won the prize, the mouse has beat the maze and earned the cheese!].


    I was so mad at the annoying familiar that it took me a second. Water elementals, perfect, they would literally be perfect for what I¡¯m trying to accomplish. They won¡¯t have a problem up north; slicing up some zombies is right up their alley, and they don¡¯t even have to be big elementals like Everest.


    [Yes monkey-boy, that train of thought is exactly correct. Sheesh, anyone with half a brain could see you aren¡¯t using the full range of your magics,] Kraken lectured. [You could even attack from the ocean if the Hungry Ones have some kind of coastal stronghold. Ice and snow are not hindrances to one such as yourself and little elementals would do anything for the chance to spend some time on this particular plane of existence.]


    I stared at Kraken, wondering the whole time why it took me so long to figure it out. Guess I just got stuck, pigeonholed into the viewpoint of what I¡¯ve been doing that¡¯s worked for so long. It¡¯s as if a fighter used his fists for every single situation even though it¡¯s clearly not the answer. Closing my eyes and taking a deep breath, I let out the rest of the annoyance that led to a stroke of genius. Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    ¡°Water, fucking water. Great, no problem, none at all,¡± I mumbled to myself as I got up and started walking off to the nearby river. ¡°Easy day huh, stupid fucking easy answer staring me right in the face the entire damn time.¡± My hands were in my pockets as I walked, one foot at times kicking small rocks out of the way. You know how when you mess something up but the answer was so simple? Kind of like when you have your alarm set for the right time number-wise but put PM instead of AM and then you¡¯re really late for work? I felt like that kind of idiot.


    My walk didn¡¯t take long as the river wasn¡¯t far at all. I didn¡¯t even stop at the bank of the river, nope, I just kept walking while using water sorcery to pull a Jesus. This formerly tiny excuse for a river at one point now raging silently underneath my feet was a simple sidewalk to me. Looking down I could see the fish, playing as larger fish swam past twisting their mouths to snap up a quick meal. It spoke to me, called to me, the soft chill of the ever-winding river playfully moved as I looked across its width. What used to be a shallow river that a ten year old could cross now required a boat, or water sorcery.


    Pulling with my water sorcery, the greenish blue liquid climbed up my body until I was fully encased, minus my face, and had four extra limbs of water hanging off my back like Dr. Octopus. It felt cold, but in the way that a nice fall does, where the cold doesn¡¯t bother you because it feels great and your body still remembers the ever present cloying heat of summer. Flexing my will a bit more, I pulled globes of water out of the river, some had fish still swimming along not even realizing that their environment had changed.


    Chuckling at their blank expressions, I released my hold on the water, the fish diving back down to safety. ¡°Take me to the river!¡± I sang as I skipped across the surface of the river. ¡°Drop me in the water!¡± I crafted a small kayak shape out of water and then froze it solid. Dissolving it a second later, I made more shapes and then froze them as I kept on singing. A small ice castle, an epic surfboard, a dolphin, each new thing I made floated along the surface as I played, I mean experimented, with my abilities. I made weapons of ice and water, shields, suits of armor, and then when I got bored of that I made cars and motorcycles, biplanes and lawn mowers. Each creation melted with a flick of power and returned to its source.


    Yes I was having fun, but there was a purpose in me being here. I needed to get comfortable with this, humans are not meant to live in the water but near the water. Here I am, the magical anomaly, and I needed to be, to feel as much at home here as I do with my feet on solid ground. This environment favors me, it actually empowers me. The rushing current of the Rappahanock is renewing and I could feel it fill me mana effortlessly as if it were a ley line.


    ¡°Come on, come on,¡± I said, looking around as I continued to goof off. There was more here as well that I wanted to accomplish. One of the discussions I had with Kraken on my short walk here to the river was about water elementals and how flexible they are, in both literal form and metaphorical ability. Water is change, water is movement, water can sit still but it also exists in multiple states easily. A water elemental can surge up from a river, take on an almost human or beast form, and then shoot ice and then evaporate into fog to run away. It¡¯s the whole symbolism of how Aphrodite came out of the sea, water is tempermental and constantly changing, which is why we men sort of equate the two. The number one trait of the water elemental is adaptability, which is really what I¡¯m after.


    Hefting a sunstone in my hand about the size of an acorn, I conjured an aquamarine stone of equal size and pushed them together with earth sorcery. Writing tiny runes of power and mind on its surface, I examined my experiment in the sun. The sunstone half filled with light and I could feel it gaining power, but the blue aquamarine half was starting to shake. Squatting down, I held it under water and watched as the river flowed around and past my creation, constantly adding mana and balancing out the almost opposing energies. ¡°Any water elementals want a home?¡± I asked out loud, still holding the two-sided gem under the water as I used earth sorcery to continually meld the two sides. ¡°I¡¯ll be honest, I need some help taking out some zombies and would really appreciate it. I can make more of these too.¡±


    [You¡¯re doing it wrong,] Kraken interjected, [You have to command them! You don¡¯t ask them!].


    A happy bouncing bubble zig-zagged underneath the water before resting its outer edge on my hand. The sensation of joy and light like children happily popping bubbles resounded in my head. ¡°I¡¯ll take that as a yes!¡± I laughed as I watched the bubble dissolve into a million tiny bubbles and ram into the sunstone/aquamarine sphere.


    Kraken¡¯s disbelief echoing in my head made me laugh even harder, his sputtering sounding the opposite of the happy water elementals. [Earth elementals don¡¯t mind being bound but water elementals hate it! How did you, what did you, whaaa??]. Taking my sweet ole time, I made about nineteen more sunstone/aquamarine fused cores, singing the entire time. ¡°This is what dreams, are made of!¡±


    My happiness came through in my magic, my water sorcery pulsing gentle waves of joy to which bunches of water elementals came bubbling over to me. Each one was more than happy to get their own core and seemingly did not care that I was going to fight zombies, even though I made sure to tell each one what my goal was and that the sunstone part was supposed to help them do it too.


    [That¡¯s not even possible? Elemental fusion?! What are you going to do, have water elementals that are fully capable of absorbing and redirecting stored sunlight as a weapon? Who the fuck thinks of that?]


    Rubbing my face on the first fusion stone, I cooed as if it were the cutest kitten ever. ¡°Who¡¯s a good zombie killin¡¯ sunlight blastin¡¯ baby? You are, that¡¯s right, you are! And who do I get to shove in the cranky squid¡¯s just to show him how awesome I am? That¡¯s right, you! All of you!¡±


    I was in a damn good mood. I went with a ¡®fuck-it¡¯ moment and let inspiration guide my magic and it paid off. Twenty fused elementals that love me, probably due to my water sorcery and the fact that I gave them a home, and they were also more than happy to be stored in Gungnir. Visions of me launching them out into a crowd of zombies made me chuckle as I imagined them washing them away with sunlight infused water. With solar panels and sunstone batteries combined with the frosty terrain of the north, I actually had a viable offense against my personal weakness.


    I took the rest of the day to make a big stone pier that extended out about fifty feet into the river. I sunk granite columns down past the mud and anchored it into the bedrock and then put up a modifed guardrail along the edges. The guardrail was expanded so that at certain places it looked like I had tables set up along the edges. On these flat portions, I made smaller than normal sunstone solar panels and then set them up with crystal batteries that were hidden inside of the stabilizing pillars of the pier with a thin line of copper wire to act as the transfer for the gathering energy. Two hours of creative magic work later, my pier looked like a longhouse without a roof. I had a nice wooden frame for a bed with two nice desks that I grew out of a small tree and even little diving platforms off the side. Sticking Gungnir in a slot I made just for it, I placed one of the smaller solar panels there for it to charge.


    ¡°Come on out you bubbly things!¡± I called, pushing my will into Gungnir. The small water elementals popped and started snooping around. Each one took its own land-based form, some were frogs hopping around while others were snakes and lizards. Three of them stayed as blobs and just rolled around aimlessly. Projecting my intent with mind and water sorcery, I communicated as best I could. ¡°River over here or constant fresh water,¡± I said as I pointed out over the greenish blue expanse. ¡°This is my home and also yours too,¡± I kept on, pointing at the new deluxe pier. ¡°And over here, and here, and there, are fresh sources of concentrated mana and sunlight.¡±


    [What are you doing? You¡¯re giving them a home? I thought they were for killing zombies, aren¡¯t you ready to go?]


    [Dude, don¡¯t be a dick.], I sent back. [Trust me, they feel like the weakest of all water elementals, so, I¡¯m going to get them to the point where they¡¯ll be unstoppable. I just don¡¯t know how long it¡¯ll take exactly but with almost unlimited power and sunlight and access to water . . . ].


    [Right! Why contact and bind a big powerful elemental that won¡¯t want to listen to you when you can just bind twenty little guys who you can feed till they¡¯re big and will love you forever!].


    [Yes Pinky, it¡¯s how we¡¯re going to take over the world!].


    [What?].


    ¡°Nevermind,¡± I said, turning towards the newly minted paradise. ¡°You wouldn¡¯t get it.¡± Grabbing a couple graftings of different trees along the river bank, I planted them near the pier and spent the rest of the day growing them so they covered the half closed to the shore like a roof. ¡°Haha! Improv mangrove trees! Damn I love magic!¡±

 Chapter 117 - Bad Beach Day (Book 2 Chapter 24)

    The chill of fall did not hit the way I expected it would. As far as I could tell, it was supposed to be early October or late September, but the leaves weren¡¯t changing colors on the trees and the nice autumn breeze with a breath of frost hadn¡¯t made itself known. According to my mind sorcery, which keeps track of pretty much everything, it should be the first week of October which is solidly in the ¡®fall¡¯ zone, but summer clearly has not let go of its iron grip yet. Sweltering humidity combined with three minute downpours of almost solid rain in the afternoon were the best indicators that even the seasons were no longer dependable. Who knows when fall or winter will make their debut, but I anticipate it will be with the arrival of the Abominable Snowman himself.


    And since it was still summer as far as I could travel easily in a day, I decided to treat it like summer. My pier now had an epic stone grill for the obvious summer fun and above it were racks for pans that don¡¯t exist anymore and hooks to hang drying or smoked meat on. I probably could use earth sorcery to conjure metal and shape it into frying pans and pots but I certainly don¡¯t know enough to give it that ¡®no-stick¡¯ quality that modern science gifted us with.


    My little elementals were more than happy to find me fish and bring it to me, then throw back the ones I didn¡¯t want. They were like dogs, sort of, mainly in the way that they just wanted to play and touch everything and be everywhere but absolutely hated it if I left. My solution was to put them in Gungnir when I traveled around but their absolute favorite place to be was near my pier on the river. I was laying by the river enjoying a nice lazy day and monitoring the playful water elementals growth when Kraken, who was almost done with my upgraded armor schematics, popped out of Gungnir freaking out.


    [The Veil, it¡¯s torn! Run! Scatter! Move! NOW HUMAN!]. Kraken¡¯s mental tone shocked me out of the lovely drowsy haze of the afternoon.


    [The fuck is a Veil?] I sent back, summoning a wave of water to clean me off as I started yanking on my armor. [What¡¯s coming and from where?]. I didn¡¯t see or feel anything, and my magical senses unfurled to double check the nearby area.


    [No time for lessons, MOVE!].


    The urgency in his voice is what made me move. Calling Gungnir to my hand, I took two large steps down the pier and dove into the river. Using water sorcery to maintain a bubble of air around my head, I sent out feelings of danger to my water elementals who wriggled their way to me. As they clustered around me, we all sank deeper until I was knee deep in mud in the bottom.


    [Okay, we¡¯re pretty fucking safe down here Kraken, now spit it out, what the fuck is a Veil?], I questioned, making sure that I had as much mana as I could hold ready to go. Down here at the meeting of my most two powerful elements, not much could match me in terms of raw power.


    [It¡¯s just a term, really, but it¡¯s never a good thing. Usually those are followed by something very very big and not nice. Traveling by magic is fraught with danger. You can travel by an established portal which has been stabilized by the influence of ley lines and enchantments which tends to be the most common and safest or you can travel via the World Tree if you¡¯re strong enough to brave that kind of immense energy that usually dissolves anything. Or you can use magitech and travel through the stars by going up or down a layer of reality to sort of time-skip your way through. That way is less common as space is full of its own perils,] Kraken explained, his big eyeball looking around anxiously as we conversed at the speed of thought. [Now, the most desperate way is to just hop through a natural rift WHICH IS INCREDIBLY STUPID as you don¡¯t know what the hell is on the other side unless you¡¯ve already traveled through it. You could end up in a volcano or at the other end of the universe in some planetary dungeon. ¡®Tearing the Veil¡¯ is when you just grab the fabric of space and rip your way through it to go somewhere, anywhere else.].


    [And anything big or strong enough to do that . . . ] I started.


    [Is not something you want to mess with.] Kraken finished. [Just to cover the other option, tearing the veil is also done by the desperate. If you have to, you weave an ¡®anywhere else but here¡¯ spell and use some wild magic to escape but you¡¯ll have no control where you end up, and the multiverse is a lot bigger than anyone can dream. Some realms have magic, other dimensions do not, and in certain circumstances, there are even parallel planes of existence, but that¡¯s less common than you think.].


    [Okay, we¡¯re not going down that rabbit hole right now. Is it safe to go up yet or should we wait? Better yet, can you sense what¡¯s out there? My water sorcery is too loud in my head right now for me to feel anything.].


    Kraken shook his eye no, his shivering getting a little worse. He jumped back into Gungnir and hid, proving once and for all that he is at least a bit smarter than me. I gathered all of the elementals around me and traveled back up to the surface, the water churning as I was ready to unleash hell at a moment''s notice. Peace and calm greeted me. No monsters turned their ugly heads, no burning forest sending up smoke, all was as it should be. Or so I thought until Kraken who could read the general tone of my thoughts did the equivalent of a mental smack on the head.


    [FOCUS! And for the love of all that is magic, HIDE!].


    An oily smear of pain tore in the middle of a small clearing about twenty feet away from the river. Light that was more than light, a visible beam of fractured blackness cut space itself, widening until it was twenty feet wide and ten feet tall. Large horned furry creatures that walked on two legs stampeded out wielding giant axes and mauls. As if they were afraid, the invaders began instantly cutting into the trees around them, widening the clearing as more of them poured out. They were pushing and shoving each other out of the way as they tore out of the wobbly portal as if something vicious was on their tails.


    Try as I might, I couldn¡¯t understand them. Their guttural noises and thick grunts were clearly not any English that I¡¯ve ever heard, and as soon as a hundred of them spilled out of the tear in the fabric of space, more of them came out riding oversized black lizards that put Clydesdale horses to shame. Liquid fire dripped from their jaws as they snarled and snapped at each other, their riders lashing them back into compliance with crackling whips, sparks jumping randomly from their weapons. In less than a minute, more invaders than I could count had stormed the area and were instantly fortifying the rapidly growing clearing.


    [Minotaurs! Shit! They¡¯re probably here for the dryads!]. Kraken said, his message quavering in my head. As this was going on, I had already sunk back down into the river until only my head was above it. My water elementals swirled around me under the surface as well, playfully waiting for my commands.


    Several smaller and elderly looking minotaurs stepped out of the portal, collapsing into the arms of what looked to be their guards. While the fourth one coming through was still halfway in, the portal began to close but not before a monstrous sweaty hand that looked to be made of coiled fat gripped his leg. The massive arm began pulling as the elderly minotaur started bleating and waving the staff clutched in its gloved hands. The tip of the staff glowed scarlet and one of the bigger minotaurs yanked it from the older one and hurled it through the shrinking portal like a spear. The nearby minotaurs weren¡¯t watching helplessly, two were holding the elderly one by his horns, one had him by the arms and the one closest to the portal held his own axe up and swung down. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    The meaty arm retracted with the severed leg just before the rip closed. The other old minotaurs came and hunched over and began chanting, or mooing? Green light spilled from their hands and staffs and the new wound began to close up. [What the fuck did I just see?], I shot to Kraken, [What eats Minotaurs? And why the fuck do Minotaurs want dryads?].


    More trees fell as Kraken sat in silence, his terror coming through loud and clear even as his voice was gravely soft. [You know how you thought the Hungry Ones were your weakness and you¡¯ve been spending all of your time figuring how to fight them? Well, Minotaurs are the weakness of every magic user. They¡¯re mainly herbivores but they eat dryads because they¡¯re just sentient plants that are chock full of power. They¡¯ve evolved to shrug off magical power like yours like a duck shakes off water. You¡¯re screwed if you fight them. I say run, and run far.].


    My shock was taken as disbelief, which it kind of was too. I mean, I¡¯ve given the damn squid a decent rundown of my past couple months and he thinks I¡¯m about to let some overgrown cows fuck me up? Fine, maybe pure magic doesn¡¯t work, but I won¡¯t be throwing fireballs at them. The terrain favors me, hardcore.


    [Do you understand them? Can you translate or something? And do they think humans are tasty?] I sent to Gungnir, glad that we could talk at the speed of thought through our mental link. [And do they actually eat magic or are just really thick-skinned?]. His lack of response was not comforting. [DAMN IT SQUID ANSWER ME!]. My mental shout shocked him back to some semblance of active thought as another tear in space opened at a different edge of the same clearing. Shiny black suits of armor about four feet tall came through carrying large futuristic rifles in their arms and tower shields on their backs. [Dwarves?! They hate young planets?], Kraken said, finally coming out of his funk.


    As they poured through, I noticed some kind of facial fur or beard poking through their helmets. Their grunts and shouts were just as guttural as the Minotaurs but theirs was in sync, a clear sign of an organized military. They ran in ordered columns, shouting cadences and lining up targets, firing silver shafts of light from their rifles as the Minotaurs began flinging rocks and tree trunks they hadn¡¯t used yet. A crazed battle broke out. The cow people with their hastily built fortifications gained a slight advantage as their magical elements joined. The elderly small Minotaurians began swaying and chanting and stomping, flows of mana becoming bright as I saw it pulse through their veins. Reddish green blood trickled from their noses and the corners of their eyes as they sang.


    Thick roots sprouted from their shoddy fortifications spiraling up and out and down to form a living wall. The dancing flung droplets of blood across the wall and around the forest causing different rocks to begin to mold together. Little earthen soldiers picked themselves up from where the blood fell, the blood itself forming into glistening runes at random spots as the earthen soldiers began to slowly grow larger. Not to be outdone, the dwarves began tossing out silver marbles that made the earth ripple when they hit the ground causing the growing earthen soldiers to vibrate to pieces and knock the minotaurs over.


    I watched in awe as the flow of battle went back and forth, neither side giving an inch. The minotaur magic users, which looks like their version of an old Indian shaman, were fascinating to watch in the magical perspective. Flows of solid green and red connected them to their much bulkier foot soldiers and I saw injuries fade as the red and green flowed from one healthy fighter to the wounded one. The shamans also acted as the ¡®eye in the sky¡¯, coordinating through the ropy mana. I saw one minotaur who was about to get stabbed in the back suddenly turn after a shaman saw the dwarf and pulsed power down their connection.


    The dwarves were honestly not that fun to watch other than their magically concealed warriors trying to sneak around. To be fair, they had to be the ones to give the Centauri their runetech, because their shield wall did the same thing but better. The raw power of the minotaurs¡¯ axes slamming into the shield wall generated tons of mana when it converted from kinetic energy to power for their rifles. It almost seemed pointless as the rifles were pouring bolts of mana at the minotaurs; it didn¡¯t really do anything except piss them off. All of the minotaur wounds came from one of the melee weapons that the dwarves had. The chaos was incredible when the minotaur¡¯s mounts, the lizard things, joined the fray. All I could do was watch and learn.


    Cybernetic cannon walkers climbed out of the dwarves¡¯ rift. About the size of colonial cannons, they walked on four legs and had a spike that they drove into the ground, drinking up the available mana to charge and the lobbying black bombs full of power to disrupt the minotaur''s lines and knock them over. As soon as one of them would fall, the dwarves would break ranks to try and keep the downed warrior downed for good.


    [See mortal? You aren¡¯t ready for this kind of conflict. They¡¯ll squish you softer than me.], Kraken said softly.


    [Yeah, fuck that,] I chuckled, [This is way too close to home for me to ignore. Besides, think about it for a second. All I have to do is make the terrain favor me and not them.].


    [They both have magic users whose specialty is earth based magic! You don¡¯t stand a chance!].


    [Think squid think! Where the fuck am I right now?] I asked, smugness rolling off of me. [Hahahaha, come on, you can do it, work that tiny ass brain.].


    [I hate you sometimes. You know that right?].


    [Yup.].


    Ordering the elementals to get ready, I pulled myself up so that I was standing on top of the river wreathed in flowing water tightly in my magical grip. I wish I had a mirror because I must have looked freaking awesome. The fighting stopped as I stood there, surveying the area as if I owned it, which I kinda did. [Make it so they can understand me, I don¡¯t wanna yell nonsense at them.], I growled down our link. A fearful mental nod was all I needed.


    ¡°Separate from each other and point your weapons at the ground,¡± I said calmly, gathering more and more water behind and around me. ¡°Further violence of any kind will result in your death. If you wish to fight, you may do so ten miles down the river. Any questions?¡± I fear that my translator messed something up because while they did separate from each other, as soon as they did they started firing at me. The wall of water behind me moved to the front catching all of the thrown weapons and bolts of mana and bombs. With a thought, I sank back down to the bottom and shot a quick vision of what I wanted down to my elementals who were more than happy to oblige.


    The river¡¯s current surged up and over the bank, sweeping over everyone and everything, and then pulled everything out to the middle. The mechanical legged-cannons sank to the bottom as the water elementals separated everyone from their weapons and armor. I made sure to have one elemental grab all of it and encase the gear in ice at the river bottom for me to look at later.


    [You so cheated,] Kraken huffed. [Not actually using magic on them but using magic around them.].


    [You¡¯re just upset because you didn¡¯t think of it,] I replied, laughing at his pissyness. [Who cares about throwing raw magic at them trying to overpower their natural resistance when I can just throw a river at them? Now what the fuck did you say to piss them off?].


    [They really don¡¯t like to be unarmed. Besides, dwarves and minotaurs are almost as bad as demons. And you really don¡¯t wanna mess with demons. They just attack and attack and eat and then fuck and then do it all over again. It¡¯s really why nobody survives going to the Infernal Realms, because everything there is literally trying to eat you.].


    My shit-eating grin was so big my face hurt. Boo-fuckin-yah bitches! I had two elementals taking stuff and guarding gear and the other eighteen were taking care of the floating minotaurs and dwarves who were sputtering for air. The elementals thought it was great fun to drown the intruders and then push them to the surface for a breath and then tug them back under again. It¡¯s like they were playing bob for dwarves, or is it dunk the cow? My point is, I won.


    [Uhm, you might wanna look over there. We missed one.].


    Spinning around, I saw one really angry dwarf who had somehow managed to scoot up a tree and in one arm held a big grenade and in the other was some silver box with a big red button. With a roar that I¡¯m sure translated to a ¡®fuck you¡¯, the dwarf smashed the red button with his face. The dwarven rift was almost closed at that point, but at the exact moment that the button was pushed, sharp white light cut through it again reopening it to even greater heights. Several other rifts also cut their way open, white light shining through them as well.


    The dwarf up the tree started laughing so hard he almost fell out. Beautiful people stepped out of the white rifts, three in total. Their long white wings were shaken open as if they had been asleep for ages. Each held a different weapon that oddly corresponded to the color of their eyes. The one on the left held a large sapphire samurai sword while the one in the middle licked the two crimson hatchets. The one on my right coolly took everything in while leaning on a thick staff that had many smooth bumps up and down its length. All three of them wore a circlet of silver and a collar of gold, but I could see some red woven into the jewelry.


    [Well mortal, it was nice knowing you.]. Kraken¡¯s fear had abated only a tiny bit and now, I felt a heavy sort of acceptance.


    [What now coward?], I growled. [Three skinny white dudes with wings show up and you¡¯re done? They¡¯re not angels, I can see old wounds and fresh blood on them from here!].


    [You¡¯re right, they¡¯re not angels. They¡¯re even worse. Those, shit, those are nephilim.].

 Chapter 118 - No Friends of Mine (Book 2 Chapter 25)

    The alien culture lesson that I knew was incoming attacked me before I could get any goddamn information from Kraken. The mean looking fuck with the hatchets didn¡¯t hesitate. The instant he saw me he blasted off, his wings giving him the lift needed to get to me. I¡¯ll never forget the look of sheer insanity in his eyes, just the raw unreasonable hate sent in my direction. For once I acted with instinct, pulling the river water around me and blasting it at him as I yanked myself back and down into the river trying to put some distance between us. All I could hear in the back of my head was some drill sergeant from years ago joking about using the terrain to your advantage. He would yell ¡®Location, location, location¡¯, like some greasy real estate agent looking to score on a first time home buyer. But to be fair, the dude was right. The river was definitely my location.


    Blades of fire cut into the surface of the river over and over, the winged nephilim flying over in a screaming maniacal rage. Sitting deep in my consciousness sorcery, I had time flowing in my head twice as slow as normal allowing me to keep pace with what was going on. My flesh sorcery was actively fortifying my brain making sure that I didn¡¯t get an aneurysm from the stress of processing twice as fast. My body moved ten feet to the left just as the entire river parted. All I saw before it crashed back together was the silent glare from the blue-bladed freak, his samurai looking sword steaming thick blue smoke.


    [Forget the dwarves and minotaurs!]. Kraken was right. I shot off a quick mental call for help and then quickly gave the order to drown the prisoners and freeze them together. My elementals happily swirled around, forcing water into the lungs of the minotaurs and dwarves and then dragging them to the bottom of the river where they stuck them to the big rocks down there. Pulling out Gungnir, which had been in knife form the entire time in my boot, I willed it into staff form and planted it in the giant ice coffin full of hundreds of quickly dying bodies. I didn¡¯t even allow myself a moment of remorse as I yanked on the weakened life force of all of the minotaurs and dwarves. Relying on my instincts from flesh sorcery, I knew that the best time to yank out someone¡¯s life force is the moment before death when their defenses are down. Trying to do so before when they¡¯re conscious and active is just too much work when you have someone¡¯s entire being fighting you.


    Gungnir soaked up the power, channeling all of the life force into the Chaos shard that made up the heart of my most powerful weapon. Slapping the slot in Svalinn, I yanked out the planttrops that I had made so long ago, the thorny vines capable of explosive growth, shoved them all in a ball and froze them together in a ball of ice. Using water sorcery, I planted all of my planttrops deep in the mud and channeled all of that life force from Gungnir straight into the makeshift seed. Looking up, the axe-wielding fuckface was still blowing his load all over the surface of the river, the flames coming nowhere close to me.


    ¡°Come on you useless bitch, you owe me this,¡± I growled in my air bubble, constantly making sure to use water sorcery to keep it fresh while checking on my mental links. Thank the heavens this stupid idea worked because it was the only reason I¡¯m still kickin in this fight. A shockwave shook the river, emanating from where I planted my planttrop seed cluster in the muddy bottom, stirring up the muddy silt turning the visibility to zero. Shutting my eyes and relying on my magical senses to feel the world around me, I added to the churning of the river to make sure nobody could see my silhouette.


    Activating my security monitoring protocol on a preset background mental process with my consciousness sorcery, I focused the rest of my attention on the vibrating cluster of overcharged seeds. Wrapping will and mana together, I formed a rune of control out of ice and as the thorny vines exploded into existence I forced it onto the vine. Twisting the original purpose of the vine, I used nature sorcery to control its growth until it stood out of the water. Grabbing onto a protruding thorn, I rode the veritable giant as it erupted into a many armed monstrosity oozing river mud. My giant grabbed a boulder out of the river with two vine tentacles and flung it at the two nephilim on the river bank as three other arms smashed the flying axe wielder out of the sky. I didn¡¯t even watch him skip across the river even though I really wanted to.


    My magic as a whole tends not to be flashy. I primarily work with mana, which is invisible to the naked eye, and water and earth, which every human is familiar with. I don¡¯t shoot out fire or lightning which of course is what everyone pictures when they think of sorcerer or magician. Big explosions aren¡¯t really in my repertoire unless I have a lot of time to plan and I make the perfect runes, but one simple fact has escaped me for too long, I can go BIG. And dear lawd¡¯ it was worth it just to watch that little shit¡¯s face when my oversized vine monster smacked him into next week. My face though, I did have my own look of pure and utter shock when I saw that the several ton boulder that my monster threw simply bounced off of a magical shield where the two nephilim were standing.


    The one holding a staff just smirked, or kept smirking? I don¡¯t recall paying too much attention to his face, or its face. The nephilim had a sort of homogenous beauty about them that made it hard to tell if they were male or female. But what I could see was arrogance, that¡¯s what it was. Obviously this dick was the cause of the glowing shield as the sword wielder just wasn¡¯t there anymore. As I frantically looked around for him from atop my thorny giant, pounding thumps reverberated the edge of the forest.


    ¡°Finally! Spike, here boy! Sick Em!¡± My furry and scaly mixture of a canine bowled through the forest and slammed into the magical shield, barking flame after flame at it as Lyra was catapulted straight at me from Spot¡¯s sudden slam on the brakes. A smaller vine deftly caught the dryad around the waist and brought her to me, her scent filling my nostrils. She smelled of a field after fresh rain. Shaking my head to shrug off her natural ¡®come-hither-ness¡¯ that all dryads seem to have, I pushed her into my spot. ¡°Can you control this thing?¡± I asked, pushing her hand into the trunk of the vine giant. Deftly manipulating the green energy inside of my creation, I bound a temporary tether to Lyra¡¯s hand. She nodded as soon as I did. ¡°Good, kill the nephilim. I want them dead. This thing is yours if you can do that.¡±


    Diving back into the river, I pushed my worries about Spot and Lyra in combat with an enemy that scared the scrap out of Kraken away. One problem at a time. The hatchet wielding nephilim, who I now call Crazy Eyes, was easy to spot underwater as his flaming hatchets were still burning wildly as if they were made out of phosphorus. The stream of bubbles combined with the hissing flares gave me a target as I controlled all of the water around him and blasted him into the silty mud. Manipulating the mud as well, I kept pushing him deeper into the river bottom, freezing every inch of mud above him as Crazy Eyes went further down.


    His magical presence, a searing white glow wreathed in shades of red and orange didn¡¯t diminish with distance but instead grew brighter. [What the fuck Kraken? Why isn¡¯t he dying?!], I cursed, pouring on the power. [These tactics killed a freaking fire dragon!].


    [Twisted they may be, they still have an internal connection to the Lower Reaches of Heaven also known as  . ].Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.


    [How do I kill them!], I raged, interrupting Kraken from his lecture mode.


    [You can¡¯t. Nephilim are the mingling of mortal races and angels, but only the lowest of Angels, those serving in the lowest reaches of Nirvana would dare to lower themselves to create such things. Nephilim are driven mad by their tenuous connection of power that links them forever to the layer of heaven that their sire came from. Their purpose is to fight demons as Heaven¡¯s fodder. They shouldn¡¯t even be here. They wield weapons forged from their own soul and have some powers that Angels themselves have, but the most common and frustrating one is their ability to regenerate from almost nothing. Imprisonment is the best option you have.], Kraken explained in a huff.


    [Fine,] I growled, my anger flowing down my magic, encasing the poor bastard in alternating layers of ice and solidified rock. As the makeshift coffin grew thicker, I forced portions of it to harden even further into a blade and slice the nephilim into disparate parts. [Can¡¯t fight if you can¡¯t move bitch.]. Examining my handiwork, I noticed that the magical presence dimmed but not by much. My gruesome actions might damn my conscience but quartering Crazy Eyes twice over might keep him out of the game long enough for me to win.


    Tasking five elementals to stand guard over my riverbed of coffins, I took the other fifteen with me as I erupted out of the water. The sight that greeted me was both scary and hilarious. Spot had somehow gotten through McStaffy¡¯s shield and was shaking him by his bumpy wooden staff as if he were a toy rope and Lyra¡¯s samurai dude was desperately chopping away at the vine giant¡¯s relentlessly growing thorny arms. His sword was dripping blue fire that was retarding the growth of new vines but my giant couldn¡¯t be stopped, especially with incredible amounts of stolen lifeforce inexorably powering it forward.


    ¡°Good boy Spot!¡± I yelled, cupping my hand and trying not to giggle like a little girl. That poor magic user that Spot was whipping around was not having a good time. ¡°Fetch boy! Bring¡¯em here!¡±  My trusty companion walked over, still wrenching on the staff, the nephilim¡¯s feet at least ten feet off the ground. Dropping the dazed wretch, he started barking as I used earth sorcery to sink the guy into the ground until only his implement was showing. ¡°Get the stick boy, come on, get that stick!¡± Unable to resist now that he was encased in solid stone, Spot had no problem taking the nephilim¡¯s staff, worrying at it as if it were a normal stick. Recreating my quartering solution on sucker number two, I shoved him about twenty feet down in a coffin of stone where he was separated at the wrists, shoulders, neck, knees, and ankles.


    With Crazy Eyes and McStaffy out of the way, I resisted the urge to just sit and watch Lyra with my behemoth take on McStabby. Seemingly immune to frustration, McStabby¡¯s face didn¡¯t even change as the vine giant just kept growing more spiny arms and lashing out with them. The severed pieces themselves actually started reconnecting where they fell on top of each other, creating a treacherous terrain. Every wave of his sword not only cut through the outreaching arms, but ethereal blades of energy also cut out from the path of the sword giving him more reach than any swordsman should have. Moving almost faster than the eye could see, McStabby skillfully wove a shield of blades with his one sword, dicing everything around him. Turning on his heel, his eyes narrowed just before he exploded in my direction.


    Spot moved just a hair faster, interposing himself between me and my attacker, snarling liquid flame as his giant body grew even more scales than ever before. Dragon dog versus an angel¡¯s bastard with his sword, I¡¯m not sure who would win that fight. Luckily, I didn¡¯t have to bet on one or the other as I planned on straight up cheating. Summoning Svalinn¡¯s central power to the fore, my trusty dragon soul artifact generated a magic shield right in front of Spot¡¯s just after the flame spit left his mouth, thankfully not in front of it though. I knew fighting hand to hand with a dude like this was beyond insane so I wasn¡¯t going to attempt it. I brought a gun to sword fight.


    Pulling knife-form Gungnir from my belt, I willed it into a staff and stabbed it into the ground, powering up the cannon enhancement. Just like I predicted, the sword wielding acrobat blew right past Spot by going up and over him as if he were a freaking high jumper. But you can¡¯t turn in mid air on a dime at this distance even if you have wings, which I proudly took at advantage of. It worked beautifully. Gungnir spit my crystal shard bullets at my psychotic target like a machine gun on crack. It was all I could do to hold on as fifty rounds ripped his personal shield to shreds and another thirty tore him apart. Wet meaty thumps followed the rain of blood as his sword landed point first into the ground twenty yards away from the bullets¡¯ impacts. Flexing my will, I gathered the pieces of McStabby into their own stone coffins and buried them. Doing the same to his sword but at least fifty yards away from his piecemeal corpse, I looked at my battlefield.


    [It¡¯s not fair! You cheated!] Kraken yelled in disbelief, coming out of Gungnir to also look at the mess I made. [Everyone runs from Nephilim, everyone! You¡¯re just too damn ignorant to know that it¡¯s good for you to run away and never look back! And minotaurs!?]. Kraken pantomimed waving his tentacles. [You just swipe your hand and the river does all the magic damned work!].


    ¡°One last thing,¡± I chuckled, turning towards the woods. ¡°Spot! Fetch!¡± I sent a mental picture of the dwarf who pressed the red button, the one who started this entire mess. I cleaned myself up as my dog tore off into the woods to bring me his new toy. Gathering up the nephilim¡¯s weapons, the two red flaming hatchets along with the chewed up staff and the now silent blue sword, I attempted to put them inside Gungnir¡¯s storage space but they wouldn¡¯t go.


    ¡°What gives?¡± I said, forcing more energy into the auto-storing enchantment. [Kraken, put these away, I can use them later when I figure out how they work.].


    [You¡¯ve exceeded the energy threshold here. Only mundane items will fit now,] he clarified. [The angel swords with the feather take up all of the available energy here. Anything else will split your weapon wide open. You can maybe put some more bullets and basic supplies but nothing overtly powerful.].


    Uprooting Gungnir and planting it in the middle of the clearing where all of the rifts had opened, I put it on an alert cycle so that it would let me know if any more rifts suddenly opened. Reaching out with my earth sorcery, I pulled the three sets of nephilim bodies out of the ground in front of me, still encased though. It was clear to anyone with a hint of magical power that the pieces weren¡¯t dead, if anything they were desperately trying to get back to their original places. Sticking the weapons off to the side but still where I could see them, I forced Kraken out of Gungnir and got in his face.


    ¡°What do you mean I can¡¯t put magical shit in there anymore? Last time I looked there was plenty of goddamn space!¡±


    [There is not enough energy in your spatial matrix to hold that kind of condensed power! It doesn¡¯t function like a normal box where there¡¯s a specific amount of space. The more high energy items you put in there, the smaller the box you have. That dumb it down enough for ya?]. Two of Kraken¡¯s tentacles were propped up on his ¡®hips¡¯.


    ¡°So how much space would I have if there weren¡¯t angel swords in there?¡±, I asked.


    [QUIET! That¡¯s not the kind of thing you say or think out loud you imbecilic twit! Do you have any idea how many paladins and holy warriors would be knocking down every door to this planet if they knew you had what you had???].


    ¡°So what the hell should I do with them, or those, whatever you¡¯re supposed to call pieces of partial angel spawn?¡± I said, looking at my grim collection. ¡°I could bury them but that¡¯s gettin¡¯ kinda old. They have a kind of energy that I can¡¯t really mess with; kinda feels like trying to grab a steel ball slathered in oil. Got any ideas?¡±


    [Feed them to your dog. Dragons of all kinds love a good snack. Besides, some of that power originated literally from one of the Heavens, and since you plan on fighting the undead with all of their sickness and death magic well . . . ]. Kraken looked me up and down, a feeling of curiosity colored with a hint of fear. [Look, we have things to do real soon but I have to say, I¡¯m glad that I¡¯m your familiar spirit. You took down three rogue nephilim as if they were nothing. Any other race I can think of other than dragons, Titans, mountain giants, and Duke Elementals as well as Demon Kings would have run, pissing themselves the entire time. And if they did get away, they¡¯d have nightmares for the next twenty years, looking over their shoulders expecting imminent death.].


    Going with the paranoia rolling in my gut, I kept conjuring layers of stone over the various bits and pieces of my enemies, while using a bit of nature sorcery to heal the scarred land around me. Even though Gungnir was about ten feet away, the bond forged by blood was strong enough that I didn¡¯t have to touch it to pull from the pool of power. ¡°Look, I get it dude, you¡¯re freaking out about the nephilim right now, but have you already forgotten about that little area over there?¡± I said, gesturing towards the clearing that had rifts opening and closing randomly. ¡°We¡¯ve already had three kinds of not-friendlies come through there and who knows what¡¯s next? How the hell do we close it? And why is it doing that in the first place?¡±

 Chapter 119 - Uninvited Guests (Book 2 Chapter 26)

    [There¡¯s probably something holding it open,] Kraken replied, watching the landscape slowly heal. [I¡¯d bet my mana packs on the dwarves, they¡¯re always doing experiments to mess with realms. One of their major beliefs revolves around the idea that they can build a portal to tap into pure Chaos itself and pull unlimited power from it. It doesn¡¯t work but it does cause chaotic things to happen, such as a thinned area of space where portals are far easier to manifest.]


    ¡°Right! So how do we close it, or shut it off, or I don¡¯t know?! I¡¯m way out of my depth here man.¡± Pacing back and forth was not helping me figure out my options. My magic, my sorceries, all of my abilities do not help me out with portal magic. The last portal I messed with I just kind of covered up, but that one at least had a physical structure I could mess with. These were just rips in space, glowing back ovals rippling with colors that made your head hurt when you looked at their edges. Extending my senses out, I felt that actually touching one of the portals with my power would be hurtful. Turning around, I felt a muted glow of life energy from the river, the river bottom to be exact, shit.


    I was at the point of pulling my hair out, there were just too many problems right now. I had nephilim bits that just wouldn¡¯t die, a funhouse of portals where weird shit could pop through at any moment, and to top it off, not all of the fucking dwarves and minotaurs were completely dead. As I was going through this in my head trying to work out rational solutions, Kraken stuck his nose in again, [What did you think was gonna happen? You tried to use pure magic on a group of bonded minotaurs? Now they¡¯re basically just in freaking stasis down there in ice, and yes, most of the dwarves are dead except their Magitech Specialists. They probably have some backup life support stuff implanted in them. A decent amount of them were young blood mages.]


    The deep whomping sound heralded the return of Spot as he crashed through the forest, dropping the slobbery dwarf at my feet. The wet splat he made was gross, but at least he was in one piece, mostly. Yowling like a kicked cat, the dwarf was clutching his ankle where the foot had been bitten off and cauterized. ¡°Good boy Spot! Don''t worry, I got some treats for you! Definitely some stuff you¡¯ve never had before!¡± I laughed, rubbing behind his ears as my magic wrapped the dwarf in a stone cage, making sure to anchor his limbs to the cage floor.


    Looking down at his pitiful figure, quivering with fear and covered in dog slobber, a bit of human empathy stole through me, something I hadn¡¯t felt in quite a while. Not sure if locking away a decent chunk of emotion in order to focus might have some future consequences but it really does help in high-intensity combat. I¡¯ll worry about that later. The dwarf¡¯s beard was thick and black with braided amulets threaded throughout, sparks of mana coming from the amulets. One of them was clearly some sort of shield enchantment that had since broken down, another a kind of radar or sense-heightening enchantment? There were more that I had no idea but the strangest one was the one closest to his throat because it had mana that was greyish in color and tied by intent to his vocal cords.


    [That¡¯s a translator enchantment,] Kraken interjected. [Many don¡¯t want to go through the pain of tweaking their own personal translator spell in their minds so they tie it to whatever organ that actually does the communication and then the sounds waves are funneled to and from the translation device.] Fiddling with it for a minute with my mana while prying his beard apart with my hands, I managed to flip it on, giving the entire greasy ensemble a yank.


    ¡°Let go¡¯a me ya feck or I¡¯ll make sure¡¯a that a right nastie beastie will be a comin¡¯ tru dat mess of riffs! Yankin¡¯ on me beard like a wee lass wid no tiddies to call her own! And when we¡¯re a dun given¡¯ it to ya from behind wit me axe I¡¯ll take yur head back to me mistress and let her fock¡¯it wit a cock bigger than me own! And it¡¯s gut spikes inner thingie too doncha know? Me wife is even meaner wit her own bastard snatch.¡±


    I was kind of impressed. He went from angry alien to Scottish sailor really damn quick. I couldn¡¯t even be mad, in fact, part of me thought I should be taking notes on how to properly cuss someone out in the face of almost certain death.


    ¡°And when I¡¯m dun holdin¡¯ yur face for me brood to do all kinds of unspeakable things to yur mouth hole, I¡¯ll make another hole fer¡¯ em to fock! Yur skull will be ma¡¯ drinkin horn and yur ears¡¯ll be great wipers for me arse!¡±


    Turning his translation amulet off so I didn¡¯t lose my awe at his venom and so that I wouldn¡¯t rip his head off, I listened to him snarl in his native language. ¡°Kraken, dude, why the hell is he Scottish?¡± I asked, looking at my spirit familiar. ¡°Don¡¯t get me wrong, I don¡¯t have a problem with it but it doesn¡¯t make any sense.¡±


    [It¡¯s the static of the interaction between your brain and his. Your consciousness sorcery is interacting with the translator naturally, allowing for better communication than what normally happens this way but you hear a random accent.]


    ¡°Can I keep him? Please Lord Sorcerer, oh pretty please?¡± Lyra¡¯s unexpected plea stopped me just before I was about to rip some answers from his mind. Hopping down from the vine giant that curled up into a huge thorny ball when not in use, the dryad sauntered over, waves of magic unfurling from her like a flowering opening in the morning. The green energy encircled the dwarf but didn¡¯t touch him, quivering six inches away like a hungry dog being told to wait as a treat is dangled in front of them.


    ¡°Keep him?¡± Turning towards her with an upraised eyebrow, I asked, ¡°What are you gonna do with him? I need answers from this salty piece of crap, like how to turn off whatever they got making rifts around here? And why are they and the minotaurs at each other''s throats? I could go on.¡± My foot tapped impatiently as I quelled the adrenaline from the fight. I looked around just to make sure there weren¡¯t any other nasty surprises in the immediate area.


    Reaching through the coarse bars of the stone cage, Lyra placed her hand gently on the dwarf¡¯s sweaty forehead. ¡°Since you are still new to all of this, I¡¯ll explain,¡± Lyra said, minute green particles of magic gently floating out of her mouth and forming a halo around the prisoner¡¯s head. ¡°We dryads can glamour foolish sentients who defile our lands. We don¡¯t do all of the labor ourselves, but maintaining a healthy forest requires a lot of work. Dead wood must be removed and burned, dying forests need sacrifices to replenish their lifeforce, and even we spirit creatures require the touch of manflesh now and then.¡± Turning her heated gaze upon me, she continued, ¡°And since you deign not to touch that which you have already dominated, I must look elsewhere for my needs to be satisfied.¡±


    Because I couldn¡¯t help myself, I chuckled with a hint of fear, imagining falling sway to the human version of a carnivorous plant, which is pretty much what a dryad is. They¡¯re the kind of flower that look beautiful and smell delicious, and all the while you¡¯re enjoying what they have to offer, you haven¡¯t even noticed their clutching grasp closing around you with no hope of escape. I wasn¡¯t fooled, but damn I could see how I might be. ¡°Just get him to tell you how to close the rifts or stop the machine causing the problem,¡± I said, taking a step back but watching intently in the magical spectrum.


    Lyra smiled like a cat playing with a mouse. Leaning forward, she slithered her body between the gap in the cage bars and kissed him on the head, breathing magical pollen all down his face. The green motes of power entered him every time he breathed and his countenance relaxed as if we just gave him a shot of morphine. Closing her eyes, I watched as she wove a tether of power that completely shunted his free will and natural defiance into a binding that channeled that energy into pleasing her. The more he tried to resist, the deeper he would fall under her sway.The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Eeehhhh, that¡¯s fucking sick woman! Come onnnn, he¡¯s basically a vegetable now. . . . Like you!¡± I could see that the little green bits of angry magical pollen were eating his brain, that¡¯s what was happening, and then they were actively replacing the grey matter with some kind of brain plant matter that directed the rest of his brain. I could see it, every bit of it. I took a couple steps back feeling sick to my stomach.


    Sitting up and stretching, Lyra stared deep into the dwarf¡¯s eyes. ¡°Come now slave, do as my master requests,¡± she purred. Turning to me, Lyra motioned at me and then pointed at the cage. Still trying not to vomit a bit into my mouth, I dissolved the stone cage so he could move. He reached up to one of his amulets and pressed it, a ball of light exiting it and flying off into one of the open rifts. A tense minute of waiting later, the temporary portals wavering before closing one by one.


    Just before the last rift shrank complete, I was breathing a sigh of relief and turning to look at the mesmerized dwarf when an explosion of red and white light sent shockwaves throughout the area. Svalinn had activated a shield unconsciously preventing any kind of injury, but as I turned to look I was shocked more than anything.


    All of the rifts themselves were gone but in the wrecked landscape of the clearing instead were humans, people, normal looking humans, albeit in pretty rough shape. Anywhere from eighty people or more were looking around frantically as if they were in a zoo with all kinds of strange aliens looking and poking at them as if they were the exhibit. And it wasn¡¯t just men that I saw, but women and children and even a couple babies squealing their little heads off.  Several men and older teenagers were decked out in medieval looking combat gear with swords and maces, about ten others were in standard US Army camouflage with M-4 rifles and a few of the adults in the center were wearing thick robes and holding what looked to be wizard staffs.


    ¡°That¡¯s NOT what I asked for Twiggy!¡± I growled in Lyra¡¯s direction. ¡°I wanted the rifts closed. Do you remember me asking for a whole bunch of strangers in my fucking neck of the woods, or do you remember something along the lines of ¡®close the fucking portals¡¯ huh?¡±


    ¡°That wasn¡¯t us master,¡± Lyra gulped, her eyes darting between the almost catatonic dwarf and the pile of rogue humans trying to sort themselves out. A decent chunk of them were vomiting, probably due to portal travel, and the more put together ones were already staring in our directions with their weapons clearly pointed at us. The staff holders'' implements were glowing bright blue and yellow and I definitely heard the very familiar sound of rounds being chambered. The camo guys had immediately taken cover behind trees and boulders while the medieval dudes had put themselves between me and the bulk of their group.


    ¡°Shit, shit, shit . . .¡± I mumbled, taking in everything. This was not something I wanted to deal with, nor was I remotely prepared for this. Unending streams of messed up magical aliens, that I could deal with. But a crowd of humans, that¡¯s just an enormous headache. Because I also am a human, they¡¯re going to assume that they¡¯re safe with me, and that I should provide for them, and that I¡¯m part of their group, and I know that this is my anti-social paranoia talking, but I really don¡¯t want to deal with this crap. I have bigger fish to fry, not even counting the undying spawn of Heaven¡¯s adultery.


    Well, Spot didn¡¯t take to the display of force very well. Stepping over me as if I were just a tiny pebble, my trusty companion put himself between me and everyone else, growling deeper than I¡¯d ever heard before. If a mountain itself could growl, that¡¯s exactly what Spot sounded like, boulders crushing and grinding together as if they were actually aiming at you when they fell. It made my sphincter pucker just a bit.


    The improvised mexican standoff held for a minute as both groups looked at each other. I can¡¯t say that they weren¡¯t shocked as I probably would¡¯ve been too. Lyra¡¯s sensuous form was still forest green and her backdrop was the balled up vine giant three feet behind her, and Spot wasn¡¯t exactly normal standing at well over fifteen feet tall right now, dripping liquid flame with patches of solid red scales interspersed throughout his shaggy fur coat. And me, I was covered in magical armor that glowed with mysterious runes while holding my epic version of a wizard¡¯s staff, but a spear simply because it¡¯s way better than a staff. Almost a hundred people, half of them clearly non-combatants, cowered like sheep less than fifty feet away with their armed fighters on the group¡¯s edges. I noticed more than a few weapons being held by not so steady hands.


    ¡°Don¡¯t do it,¡± I muttered under my breath, sizing up the itchy trigger fingers. Cautiously, I double checked to make sure that all of my shields and gear were still in tip top shape and then I checked my batteries which were still plenty full. I haven''t had to worry about mana expenditure in a while as I¡¯m always around either the solar generators or working small projects that don¡¯t need much power, but combat definitely makes my stores of energy take a hit.


    ¡°Get down on the ground!¡± The army guy behind a boulder with his rifle propped up on top of it was not one of the nervous ones. This calm and collected man had some serious ice in his veins to not only point a gun at a magically armored dude with a dragon dog but to not even waver as he shouted at me. The barrel of that gun was pointed directly at the spot between my eyes. ¡°Call your dog off or he¡¯s first!¡±


    [Fuck,] I thought. It¡¯s one thing to threaten me, I can get past that, but to threaten my dog when we ain¡¯t done shit? No sir. I could feel the heat of my anger color my cheeks just a bit as I saw a tiny bit of red. I get that they¡¯re scared, but come the fuck on. As far as I know I didn¡¯t drop them here. Sending a quick message to all of my elementals on our shared link, I kept very still and just watched.


    ¡°I said, GET ON THE GROUND! All of you!¡±


    An outburst of furious whispers broke out amongst the group as I did absolutely nothing outwardly, but inwardly I was tracking my pack of watery sneaks. Several shouts went back and forth between the group showing me that it wasn¡¯t one big group but actually several small groups that had probably thrown in together for one reason or another.


    ¡°We don¡¯t know if he¡¯s hostile Mark! Besides, you can¡¯t just threaten a man¡¯s dog, no matter how big he is!¡±


    ¡°Shut up Tonya! Who¡¯s been bailing your ass out for the past week huh? Me and my crew, now do your hocus pocus crap and protect the women and children and stay outta my way.¡±


    Another voice I hadn¡¯t yet heard spoke up. ¡°I dunno Mark, they haven¡¯t moved but they also haven¡¯t made any noise either. Ain¡¯t we supposed to positively identify if they¡¯re a bad guy before we get ta¡¯ shootin¡¯?¡±


    As they were distracted, I quickly conjured two walls in front of me, Spot, and Lyra, one three inches thick of granite and the other six inches of clay. Their surprised shouting intensified as I wasn¡¯t acting like a scared doe anymore. Taking another second, I covered my walls with a foot thick coating of ice just in case those wizards were partial to fireballs. As soon as I felt that I had a dense enough barrier between me and the desperate humans, I put my hand on Spot to reassure him. ¡°Stay here boy,¡± I said, scratching under his jaw. Motioning to Lyra to stay with Spot, I stepped to the edge of my wall and called out, ¡°I mean you no harm as long as you intend the same! I¡¯m coming out, but if you point your weapons, any weapon, at me again, you will regret it.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re outnumbered, outgunned, and we got you pinned down. You¡¯re in no position to negotiate!¡± Mark¡¯s voice was quickly becoming annoying. My decision making process was being hampered by the fact that there were unarmed women and children here. I¡¯ve always had a soft-spot for the defenseless, but I can¡¯t let some asshole with a gun dictate what I¡¯m going to do. And, what makes it worse is that if I do deal with the one asshole, there are a bunch of other well armed people who might agree with him and force me to deal with them instead of talking to them. Right now, as far as I can tell, there¡¯s only one who¡¯s gungho and antagonistic towards me while the others are just watching, waiting to see how I¡¯ll react.


    ¡°Mark! You saw him just raise a freaking earth wall! He¡¯s obviously not defenseless, and might be powerful. Back off for a second!¡±


    ¡°God damn it you coward! Every time we¡¯ve run into something not normal it¡¯s either tried to kill us, eat us, or sacrifice us on a bloody altar. I¡¯m done being nice out here! You already forgot that mess of freaks that thought we were the funniest cattle they¡¯d ever seen?¡±


    ¡°But he¡¯s human-¡±


    ¡°WE DON¡¯T KNOW THAT!¡±


    As they were arguing I had already made a decision. It started with the question, ¡®what the hell am I doing wasting time right now¡¯, and ended with me saying ¡®screw it¡¯. Giving my commands mentally so as to not alert the contentious mass of people, I made sure to quietly sink the separated pieces of the three nephilim about two hundred yards deep into the earth, and then do the same with their weapons but about fifty yards deeper than that. Spot pivoted and tore off into the woods away from everyone else before they could react and Lyra dove into the vine giant that swallowed her up and rolled down the river bank. My water elementals had taken this time to get into position, slithering like snakes to remain undetected. Their part in my plan was simple, a non-threatening disengagement plan. They identified anyone with a weapon and covered them in ice from the neck down and then retreated to the river. On the other hand, I simultaneously kicked up a giant cloud of dust around me and slapped my hand on my wall, quickly inscribing a short message into it, ¡®My name is Nate and I¡¯m not your enemy¡¯.


    As soon as I was done, I sprang into the river, using water sorcery to travel faster than a sinking stone down to the river bottom. As my water elementals joined me in their natural playground, I had them separate the dwarfs and minotaurs that were still alive from the giant ice blocks and fuse the living ones into a new ice block for transport on the river. Making sure to grab the separate cache of weapons as well, I moved me and my cargo down the river.

 Chapter 120 - Mental Wrestle (Book 2 Chapter 27)

    ¡°What the fucking hell am I supposed to do about it, huh?¡± My complaining from the back of the vine giant was irritating the shit out of Lyra but I really didn¡¯t care. My plant based monstrosity was dragging the consolidated weapons and bodies from my rift fighting bonanza while the water elementals made sure that the entire ice block chest slid along the forest floor on the way back to the Hole.


    ¡°Whatever you want, whatever you desire my -¡±


    ¡°And children? With freaking young ass mothers looking scared as shit clutching their babies and their pearls?¡± I ranted from atop my seat. ¡°I don¡¯t have time for this. Experiments to run, so I can get some zombie killin¡¯ done, and then my smoothie jungle . . .¡±


    ¡°But Lord Sorcerer, you don¡¯t need to-¡±


    ¡°For the love of all that is magic and awesome, there were other magic users that didn¡¯t do anything except stand there lookin¡¯ dumb!¡± My rant continued, ¡°And then, not only did a whole bunch of humans show up, but they show up AFTER all the shit went down. Did they help with the dwarves and minotaurs, and where were they when the nephilim were coming for me with their glowy weapons? Oh, no, they just hadn¡¯t arrived yet, as in they showed up when all the hard work was already done. Fuckin figures.¡±


    My grumbling had more to do with the fact that I really didn¡¯t know what to do with women and children, I mean, I really didn¡¯t want the responsibility of managing a bunch of humans where actual risk to children might be involved. Damn my own genetics ya know? The very makeup of being a human male on the biological level entails that we fall for women, who use us to protect and provide for them so that they can produce us children that carry on our family line. It¡¯s the circle of life that I¡¯d been conveniently avoiding simply because my wife is a freaking tree.


    I had read way too many books about sorcerer overlords, or mayors with magic, and I wanted nothing to do with it. I like things the way they are, me playing with my magic and doing all kinds of awesome experiments while blowing shit up and taking on the new world. Companionship is cool, but drinking beer while playing darts is just not on the menu for the foreseeable future. I have the potential to live for thousands of years and I need to adjust my thinking because of it. Humans as a whole live eighty years, and in those eighty years, we grow old, we have families, we fuck and we fight and we feast and then we raise the next generation to do the exact same thing. So what? It¡¯s probably why humans are great overall. Our spark burns brightly because it¡¯s so brief, so what can happen if we just give that spark a lot more fuel?


    Shaking away my introspection that I recognized might be a downward mental spiral, I oh so carefully stashed my feelings away like any good man would. I was honestly a bit mortified at my reaction to seeing my own kind. This was not something I was used to, just the constant irritation of what I saw popping up in my head. I¡¯d always wanted to be a dad and I knew I¡¯d make a great one, I even had my life planned out with my fiance with how many kids we were gonna have and where we were going to live. The domestic bliss is, was, something I wanted and was looking forward to, until the world ended.


    But what do you do? What do you do when all you can picture in your head is the vulnerable blonde mother looking around, clutching her child as if another monster is going to come out of the woodwork and pluck it from her grasping hands? The dried tears on her face, the tears in her clothes, the dirt on the baby that was too tired, too hungry to cry, what do you do? And it wasn¡¯t just one mom, there were at least ten of them there in that crowd, and then worse was their slightly older children standing near them. Their shell-shocked faces and dull eyes looking around, as if death was something they were used to, expecting. Their little chubby hands listlessly holding on to a scrap of clothing so they knew by touch where their mother was, but forgotten by the parent in the moment as the baby was the most vulnerable.


    It explained the hostility of the men with rifles, and the sheer terror of everyone else. What did everyone look like at the end of the Trail of Tears, the infamous death march that Native Americans were forced to take by the US government? I never saw the old photos but I heard the stories and I imagine they looked somewhat like this group, this lost displaced cadre of fearful humans.


    ¡°AAAAAHHHHH!¡± I yelled into my hands, wrestling with the scraps of my conscience forcing its way to the center of my attention, demanding action, crying for assuagement, promising no sleep if I didn¡¯t. By the time I had decided on a course of action, albeit reluctantly, Lyra, Spot and I had returned to the clearing in front of the Hole with my giant ice box of bodies and alien tech.


    ¡°Don¡¯t say a goddamn word Lyra,¡± I ordered as I hopped down to face my usually grumpy dryad. ¡°You are going to take this vine giant along with Spot here and guard that group of humans. You will do it in such a way that they will never know you¡¯re there. The only thing you will do that they might find suspicious is put something I¡¯m going to make in the path that their group is taking, got it? Just nod, good.¡±


    Turning around before I even saw her affirmation, I walked over to a birch tree at the edge of the clearing and coaxed the tree to grow a large sheet of birch bark that stuck out like a misplaced wing. Using nature sorcery, I took my time and reviewed my memories of flying on Tuki¡¯s and Norn¡¯s back, gathering a complete mental map of the entire area. I started with the Rappahannock River and laid out where it fed into the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and then the new valleys to the south and plains with random mountains to the west. After finding an ideal spot southwest of my location, I made sure to circle it and then on the back of my map quickly carve a message into it for the human survivors.


    I know you don¡¯t know me and I¡¯m ok with that. I am human, mostly, or at least I used to be before the world ended. What matters is that I have made a life out here and you can as well, all of you. Follow the map. You will be safe. This valley will be safe. Rest easy.


    Making sure to mark a route that avoided the area claimed by Kong, I handed the map to Lyra. ¡°Wait,¡± I said as she turned to leave. ¡°One minute, hold on.¡± I knew the people may not trust the map, so I had to give them some kind of olive branch. Conjuring a disk of stone, I carved in big letters on one side with earth sorcery ¡®healing stone¡¯, and then placed a healing enchantment on the other side. Making sure to keep it simple, I designed it so that it would heal their wounds when placed anywhere on their body, but would draw on their own energy to do so. This allowed the enchantment itself to be long-lasting as the energy wasn¡¯t coming from my healing stone but from the person using it. The beauty of it was the fact that it was so simple, it pretty much just quickened their own natural healing to the point where it would be noticeably faster.


    Grabbing the map again, I scrawled a note at the quickly detailing how to use the healing enchantment and then tossed both to Lyra. ¡°Put that in their path, make it obvious, but don¡¯t be seen,¡± I instructed. As I was left alone for what felt like forever, I went over all of my hard won gains. I had a whole bunch of minotaurs in ice-bound stasis, a good chunk of dwarves that were still holding on, and all of their tools. The nephilim weapons and severed bits needed to be taken care of, but all that stuff was probably safe where I put it.


    Time to put my lack of raw creativity to work. Communicating mentally to my water elementals, I had them shift the giant ice block full of living things off into the woods a good two hundred yards away from the Hole and not in a place that would be near the Lab either. Using earth sorcery, I began clearing a space big enough to sink the ice. As I was getting my plans together, I noticed that there seems to be some odd thing I have with burying shit. Who cares, it works. Taking the ice coffin and positioning it pretty much perfect, I then separated out the block that had the gear and set that off to the side. In about thirty minutes of careful earth magic, I had the entire block of ice twenty yards deep underground. Taking another hour, I transmuted the dirt into stone and used earth sorcery to carve stasis runes into each side, making sure that they drew the minimal power they needed from the life force of the prisoners inside.This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    ¡°Can¡¯t forget to put a solar panel on that so it doesn¡¯t drain them dry,¡± I muttered, jogging over to the weapons cache. ¡°One headache down for now, too many to go.¡± I had the elementals shift the gear all the way down into the Lab where I could break it down at the proper time and not when there were too many unknowns at my proverbial door. Using a bit of flesh sorcery to keep me constantly fresh, I sprinted back to just outside the area of this morning¡¯s combat. The majority of the group was gone but the robed magic users were standing in a circle directly overtop where I buried the nephilim stuff and arguing back and forth.


    ¡°Cassandra, we¡¯ve been over this. We need to go.¡± The oldest looking one not only had a wizard¡¯s staff, but at least three wands in her belt. The younger lady she was arguing with had an oversized book balanced in one hand while holding a feathery wand in the other, a small bird perched on her shoulder.


    ¡°Mother, you felt it too! The kind of power he had, it was leashed, hidden somehow. We need to find him, or it; he can help us!¡± She was pretty, a slender brunette with way too much attitude. I definitely pitied the mother in this instance, trying to parent in the apocalypse can¡¯t be easy, especially with magic thrown in the midst.


    ¡°No, and that¡¯s final. There¡¯s safety in numbers and Percy has flown around enough to know that something big and hungry prowls these woods. It¡¯s eaten or chased off everything else!¡±


    I kept my snicker to myself. Spot is too good, well, for his own good. ¡°I can¡¯t be around Mark and his group anymore, they keep staring at me like I¡¯m a piece of meat!¡± Cassandra¡¯s little bird chirped in agreement.


    The older woman smirked, ¡°As if a well placed fireball can¡¯t fix that issue? A woman having magic is like us having concealed carry. Most of the old world problems women faced stemmed from being physically weaker than men, but the great equalizer of power prevents that now.¡±


    Before she could say anything else, a gaggle of teenagers broke into the clearing all talking at the same time. All I could make out was, ¡®Come on¡¯ and ¡®it¡¯s time to go¡¯ and a bit of ¡®show us some magic on the way¡¯. One of the older guys in full camo stepped out of the woods behind them, scolding them for breaking off from the main group. His glare let Cassandra and her mother know that he meant it for their edification as well.


    I kept waiting nearby just out of their line of sight, patiently keeping still as the smaller group joined the larger and moved on. Keeping my paranoia happy, I waited for at least another twenty minutes before I unfurled my magical senses to examine the nearby area. Yup, all clear. Summoning my water elementals, I called Gungnir to my hand and drew on its stores of power to unearth my spoils of war. Three nephilim weapons encased in stone and all of their bodily bits in separate containers nice and neat greeted me as the earth pushed them all out.


    ¡°Sweet,¡± I said, kneeling over everything and taking a good look at it. To my magical senses, each piece of everything shone brighter than the sun. ¡°So glad I had Reeanth help me with this a ways back,¡± I said softly, not minding how it looked as I talked to myself. Picking each encased piece up one by one, I slowly conjured the thinnest sheet of platinum over each one and inscribed runes of stasis into them, triple-checking to make sure the magical signature faded to almost nothing. ¡°Good enough,¡± I muttered, setting the last one down in the pile. I kept the weapons separate from the bodies and then the bodies themselves were separated by general regions, so all the heads were together, and the hands and the feet, just so that by some messed up chance the bodies wouldn¡¯t just magically come back together.


    My water elementals covered the piles in ice and then formed giant ice balls out of them, rolling them all the back to the Lab as I jogged behind them. ¡°Runnin¡¯ through the jungle with a dead body!¡± I sang, copying the old Marine Corps running cadence. ¡°I¡¯m a real mean wizard with no company! Sound off!¡± Switching to the Army cadence I knew, I tweaked it and kept chanting, ¡°Down by the river! Took a little walk, ran into aliens, had a little talk. I pushed¡¯em, I shot¡¯em, I THREW THEM IN THE RIVER!¡±


    [For the love of, shit, you kill some small fry and you think you¡¯re all big huh?] Kraken scoffed from his seat in Gungnir. [It¡¯s bad enough that I have to live with you, but your singing is just godawful.]


    Just for that, I took a deep breath and switched to Toby Keith, ¡°And we¡¯ll put a boot in your ASS, IT¡¯S THE AMERICAN WAY!¡±


    *********


    I did my best to stay away, but the social instinct was just too strong. Even my consciousness sorcery kept allowing me to wonder about the bedraggled group instead of focusing on deciphering the dwarven tech. The way they instilled an odd resonance that boosted energy efficiency was just somehow not interesting enough compared to freaking people, uhg. Taking a step back from my work bench, I looked around the Lab. Some might call it dreary, I call it homey, in a nice shed kind of way. No rugs covered the floors, no paintings covered the walls. My sunlight contraption kept everything well lit but the hungry plants on the other did give off a bit of a bloodthirsty vibe to the whole thing.


    [You¡¯re not a cave troll,] Kraken admonished, even as he worked diligently on the schematics for my next suit of runed armor. [You¡¯re not a cave troll but you act like one. If I didn¡¯t know better, I¡¯d say you¡¯d never had a lady in your life before. Sort of believe that you¡¯re making it all up.] My glare at the polished crystal blade of Gungnir where Kraken sat did nothing to shut him up. [Doesn¡¯t work on me anymore. I¡¯m your damn familiar, so you better get used to my company. Besides, now that I¡¯ve watched you fight, I¡¯ve had to start from scratch for this entire project. The amount of power you throw around is obscene! You handle it like a child flinging sand, no art or grace to your technique.]


    My glare intensified for a moment. ¡°I need something to do,¡± I said, standing up suddenly. ¡°This is just going to have to wait.¡±


    [But you haven¡¯t done shit. You just buried the nephilim remains in a stasis box like all of your other problems and now you¡¯re about to run off. What else do you have to do?]


    Grabbing Gungnir, I called Kraken out of the storage space. ¡°Do the Hungry Ones ring a bell? That¡¯s a big ass problem that certainly deserves the lion¡¯s share of my attention. What about witches huh? I killed a big one not too long ago, and I¡¯m not dumb enough to think that more won¡¯t come.¡±


    [Oh get off your high horse, you know you don¡¯t have to worry about the Hungry Ones for at least another century, sheesh. They¡¯ll contend with all of the other big powers in the regions for a while before they manage to actually start extending their cloud cover south,] Kraken said, doing his version of rolling his eyes which looked rather comical considering he only had one which made his entire body move. [You¡¯ve already got plans figured out, and most of the legwork for the prebuilding is already done, so what¡¯s your problem, really?]


    My blank stare wavered as I looked at nothing. [Oh, your prisoners,] Kraken realized. Squinting at me for a moment, he looked off in the direction of the cemetery for the not so dead dwarves and minotaurs. [Yeah, you¡¯re going to have to make some tough decisions there. You could always off them and feed them to the forest, bet they¡¯d make great fertilizer. Or, you could mindwipe them and give them to the human tribe as work slaves. OR, you could be REALLY dumb and set them free.]


    I chuckled at the last one. That went out the window when I killed most of the dwarves and their nephilim. The minotaurs, maybe, maybe I could forge an alliance with them. Giving them land and getting them established south of me might actually work as a sentient-based barrier to really anything trying to come north. I shook my head, discarding that idea because that would be just way too much work. Grabbing Gungnir, I started to head out before another idea popped into my head, why not set the minotaurs free but plant the desires to ally with the human group in their heads while they¡¯re in stasis? Then, hopefully, they might form a bigger group, something a bit unconventional but powerful enough that they would serve as a decent distraction for myself. If they build a city or town just the right amount of distance away, nobody would come to my forest looking for me, and with mind magic, none of the minotaurs would even remember me.


    [That won¡¯t work dummy,] my familiar said, cutting into my reverie. [Mostly immune to magic, remember?] Fuck, he¡¯s right. [But, they are kind of like cows. If you can convince the bull to head in a certain direction, then the herd will follow.]


    ¡°Fine, I got it, convince the shaman cows and the cow people will follow cow instincts, am I getting this right?¡± I asked sardonically. ¡°I¡¯m talking about sentients like they¡¯re cows, actual cows.¡±


    [It¡¯s because they are! The same way that goblins are the magically perverted union between primordial cave elves and a dwarven descendant of a dragon when a mad wizard decided to do bloodline experiments uncounted millenia ago. Minotaurs are dumb, and not generally, but most. Their shamans literally hog all of their brain cells while the rest of the herd holds all the muscle.]


    ¡°Great, my familiar is a specie-ist, is that the right term?¡±


    Now it was Kraken who was glaring at me. [Scions of Order care not for such pathetic distinctions! At least we didn¡¯t go to war because we had different shades of melanin in our skin like you humans! Sheesh, every time, on every planet, you all fight over the dumbest things. The only thing that matters, overall, and don¡¯t you forget this, it¡¯s power. Power matters. Equality as you believe it, only works when you have a roughly equivalent baseline of capability. Humans had that until magic returned, and trust me, dragons don¡¯t give a damn what species you are. They just eat you.]


    ¡°I don¡¯t need a lecture fuckface, it was a JOKE!¡± I replied, rolling my eyes and heading out the door. ¡°Good grief, sounds like you hate humans more than you hate each other.¡±


    [I don¡¯t hate humans, they add more to the Arcane Emporium¡¯s store of Knowledge than any race, even the dwarves who are a close second. The Aelves are content with their power and grace and tend not to innovate, especially when they hit their second millenia.]

 Chapter 121 - Putting Some Pieces Together (Book 2 Chapter 28)

    I took his words with a grain of salt as I kept walking, but what stopped me cold just before I reached the doorway was a vision. It was over in less time than it takes to blink, but the effects of it shook me. [You¡¯re restless because there is something unfinished, you just didn¡¯t know exactly what was missing.] Holding Gungnir up to the light of the evening sun, I waited as Kraken popped out and then I grabbed him.


    ¡°Explain,¡± I growled, scanning him and myself with magic. No injuries or anything malicious that I could tell, but the vision couldn¡¯t really be described with words, it was more a compact eye-fuckery of feelings. Loss, heartache, indecision, loneliness, unfulfilled searching, it was Kraken. Those were his feelings, those were how he felt in the space between Realms without an anchor.


    [I¡¯m a Scion of Order, but I am also a spirit-familiar, your spirit-familiar. Maa¡¯lik gave me to you and completed the first part of our bond but it remains unfinished. I can do so much, help so much more, but not the way I am right now.] Kraken explained. [We only exist in the loosest sense in the word without a mortal, a fleshling, or something to keep us here. Even the Knowledge Kings, the first and most powerful of the Scions of Order require a bond to be in the physical realm.]


    ¡°Hold up, what are they bonded to to stick around for so long?¡±


    [Dragons, World-Tortoises, phoenixes, Elder Unicorns . . .]


    Well shit. This was just weird, almost too weird. And like any good human, I¡¯m inherently distrustful of things that I don¡¯t understand. Pulling out a meal cube from Gungnir, I downed it with some conjured water and walked outside. Standing in the clearing in front of Yggdrasil, I will Gungnir into spear form and planted the base into the dirt. ¡°Everest!¡± I called, outloud and mentally. ¡°Is Meliad awake yet?¡±


    A soft rumbling no was my answer. ¡°Aight, make sure no one disturbs me for at least a full day. I got some internal therapy to do.¡± I took his silence as a yes. Sitting cross-legged in front of Gungnir, I closed my eyes and took my time calming down the biological rhythms of my body, using a bit of flesh sorcery to cheat the standard meditation progress. Using my mental sorcery, I brought myself to my mindspace, or soulspace, whatever it is where my visual representation of my soul was.


    ¡°Hey soul-tree!¡± I called, standing in front of the magical visualization of my magic. ¡°How¡¯s SAW treatin¡¯ you? Can¡¯t be bad right? I haven¡¯t gotten and alerts from the alarm protocol.¡± My soul shook his head, stroking the knot of magitech in its chest.


    ¡°Pretty cool in here! I¡¯ve never seen a sorcerer¡¯s soul before!¡± Kraken¡¯s voice scared the crap out of me. This time, I physically heard it instead of mentally. ¡°Of course dummy, I¡¯m a spirit, and you¡¯re communing with your own spirit, so it sounds like hearing me physically instead of mentally.¡± Right, the day¡¯s getting weirder.


    ¡°Well Squiddy,¡± I said, gesturing around. ¡°Take a good look. Behold, this is soul-tree me. And that right there in his chest, is my version of Iron Man. It¡¯s some Alpha Centauri magitech that I stole and took. The bonding process is slow because it used to be a sorcerer killer. Once I get this figured out, I¡¯ll have a banging suit of armor and more power than I know what to do with.¡±


    Kraken, who had been flying around my soul-tree, inspecting it, halted and blasted over to me. ¡°YOU HAVE A WHAT IN YOUR SOUL?¡±


    ¡°Relax, it¡¯s harmless,¡± I said, trying to get him to calm down. ¡°It¡¯s been purged of pretty much all programming since I couldn¡¯t remove the bad stuff piecemeal ya know?¡±


    ¡°I can see that! But that¡¯s not what I meant. I¡¯ve been working your stupid armor trying to get it enhanced with Heavenly rune against scrying and undeath, and you¡¯ve had the perfect material to work with the entire time?! This thing is beyond useful and you haven¡¯t even let me touch it?¡±


    My blank look made Kraken turn a deeper shade of purple. ¡°BOND WITH ME YOU IGNORANT HUMAN!¡± His tone wasn¡¯t really angry, it was exasperation, as if I had had the answers to some test the whole time and didn¡¯t know it. It was the tone of the tired parent telling a know it all child why ice cream is not dinner for the eighth time. And I wasn¡¯t falling for it.


    ¡°Reasons Kraken, I need reasons, not emotion. Explain to me why I should. What would that do for me, why should I do it?¡± My voice got louder as I went on. ¡°This kind of thing is new to me, I didn¡¯t grow up in a world where magic was freaking real, so spit it out.¡±


    ¡°Magic frays the mind. It¡¯s different for some people, some it drives them mad, and others just a little bonkers. Your consciousness sorcery definitely helps you in that department but familiars act as a buffer between the mind and the magic when necessary. No, it doesn¡¯t separate you from it as it is tied to your soul, but you aren¡¯t made of magic necessarily which introduces a sort of spiritual friction,¡± Kraken said, propping himself up on the leg root of my soul-tree. ¡°It¡¯s why all of society views magic users as crazy, because to some degree they are. Now tangibly, if we finished our bond, then I could finish your suit of armor by tomorrow morning, regulate and fix your programming for the empty Centauri tech, and even be a solid fountain of ideas for you. I could use your sorceries as starting points and just create a giant list of possible solutions and ideas for you to work with.¡±


    I stroked my chin, noting the sizable beard growth and wondered why in the world that would be something I noticed inside my head. I mean, I¡¯m not really here, or am I, this soul place is weird. Maybe it¡¯s more real, who knows. Refocusing on the matter at hand, Kraken hadn¡¯t even stopped.


    ¡°From what I¡¯ve seen from the memories you¡¯ve shown me, I could function as a director of spells from inside Gungnir, forming complicated offensive reactions with SAW, enhance your ability to multi-task to the nth degree, and even work on separate projects while you¡¯re doing something else. Bonding with me will allow me to use your sorceries. I could be making a workforce of earth golems if you put me and this spear next to one of the solar panels while you work on the icebound prisoners. Shoot, I can even act as a second repository for extra mana, the list goes on.¡±


    ¡°So how does it work,¡± I asked. ¡°And I get that it¡¯s good for me, but what does it do for you?¡±


    ¡°I gain knowledge. I gain a bit of power. I get to live. Without you, I don¡¯t get to taste or touch or feel anything! Do you know how much that sucks!¡± he ranted. Generating a hologram of a table covered in platters of fruits, he looked at it longingly and then back at me. ¡°The worst part is, I can remember being solid. I remember what I¡¯m missing. I can¡¯t wait for your jungle of delicacies, the forest of fruits, the symphony of smoothies that awaits!¡±


    This, this I could understand. This was honesty, true desire that had the ringing tone of truth. Everybody is selfish in some way, or maybe a better way of putting it is that everyone has self-interest. It is what keeps us alive, even charity is a form of self-interest as it makes us feel good. The best self-interest is when it lines up with someone else¡¯s, the farmer who needs a shovel and trades his extra produce to someone who¡¯s hungry and doesn¡¯t need the shovel. Self-interest drives everyone, but mutual self-interest builds everything.


    ¡°Fine,¡± I said, a small smile peeking out. ¡°I get it, I accept. Bond with me, as long it doesn¡¯t mean we have to do anything freaky.¡± Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    With a whoop of joy, Kraken spun around and dove into Centauri orb in my soul-tree¡¯s chest. [It¡¯s a perfect fit! You won¡¯t regret this!] The silvery lines began to glow as Kraken sank deeper into the runed recesses. My soul-tree let out a soft sigh, a pressure I hadn¡¯t known but sometimes felt lifted off of me, but that was it, no earth shattering change, no crazy realizations or boosts in power. Reading my face, Kraken laughed, ¡°Most of the work was done weeks ago when the angel bonded us, and that wasn¡¯t much work to begin with. You just had to actually accept it. Now, I¡¯m going to get used to everything here and I¡¯ll get my own little tattoo that mirrors your soul tree and then we can rock and roll.¡± Finally accepting that my life was far beyond the scope of normal, I ate a meal cube and went to bed, resting far better than I had in a long while.


    ******


    The next day brought all of the promise of a lighter soul, a free mind. I figured that I¡¯d get a little bit of peace since Kraken was in my freaking soul-tree doing who knows what, but since I couldn¡¯t see anything wrong with it, and trust me, I¡¯m constantly monitoring that entire area, I decided to just continue with my day. Part of the day was spent restoring the area by the river back to its natural state after the battle with the nephilim and then the rest of it was split between monitoring the pack of humans moving on to the place I laid out and doing an in-depth examination of my alien prisoners.


    I¡¯m not even sure if I should call them aliens, I mean, they didn¡¯t come from space and they don¡¯t have rocketships full of anal probes. I lack a term to properly identify them as a whole, which means alien might have to do. Everything I¡¯ve met or heard about so far seems to have some relation to tales of Earth from our lore that we all just believed was made up. But to be fair, Earth or old Earth, didn¡¯t have evidence of dwarves or minotaurs or dragons, we had dinosaur fossils but nothing in the last couple eras that would have given us a hint that we weren¡¯t alone.


    Choosing not to overthink things that don¡¯t matter, I had a ball just letting my flesh sorcery get familiar with the physiological structure of the dwarves and minotaurs. My own magic kept trying to start enhancing my body with concepts that were garnered from the different bodies like an overeager puppy. The dwarven bone structure is unbelievably dense, traces of different metals that didn¡¯t exist on this planet were woven through the latticework of the bone cells. The musculature supporting this was almost just as heavy, easily several times denser than what a chimpanzee would have. It definitely made sense as to why they fought the way they did against the minotaurs. Dwarves are low to the ground and freaking heavy, which meant that their planted tower shields would be literally unshakeable.


    The minotaur on the other hand, their bone structure and musculature definitely had some serious differences to the dwarves. In fact, their entire body, every bit of it was far more open or receptive to magic itself, but in a plantlike kind of way. They didn¡¯t really seem to have the ability to form scar tissue. In cutting them and healing them to see how the body would react, the normal human response of making scar tissue just didn¡¯t happen. A burst of stem cells, or their equivalent of it, would flood a latticework of magic that covered the area, following the blueprints of the magic to bring the flesh back to brand new. The dwarven body healed from the cut far more similar to humans in that scar tissue formed from the cuts, but magic was the healing helper instead of the director.


    Sitting back in my chair in the lab, I looked at the two bodies kept unconscious by my flesh sorcery in front of me. Turning my vision towards my own hand, I called Gungnir to my hand in knife form and shallowly cut the meat of my palm. My hand healed just as fast as I was cutting it. ¡°Fuck,¡± I grunted, making sure to temporarily cut off the pain receptors in my hand as I tried a couple more times, each attempt I quickened my brain to make everything look like slow motion. Yeah, my body not only responded with stem cells, but there was a magical latticework helping and directing the flow of stem cells. The damaged parts of the skin also used mana to just stick itself right back together like play-doh, my flesh was freaking play-doh with the magic I wield!


    I hadn¡¯t played around with my flesh sorcery too much as of yet, it had mainly become a support based capability centered around keeping me healthy, whole, and focused. Conjuring the bone armor and enhancing my dog were probably the craziest things I had done with it so far but so many possibilities were open with the simple concept of flesh sorcery. I knew that I hadn¡¯t even begun to plumb the depths of what I could do with it, the issue being time. With the Hungry Ones biding their time at the poles, and if Kraken is right, then maybe it wouldn¡¯t be a bad idea to try some flesh sorcery stuff out. My main problem is that I¡¯m comfortable in my body, I know how to use it. The real question is how do I make it more durable, more physically hardy, without sacrificing the great and flexible design of the human body? It seems that even dwarves and minotaurs and probably Aelves are designed roughly the same way, two legs with two arms and one head.


    Thinking about it some more actually made me want to not do this. If I could learn a bunch from these measly bodies, holding off and gathering information might be the better course of action. Using flesh sorcery, I scanned each body and created a holographic matrix of it in my head with mental sorcery, storing it away for later. As I was about to put them back in stasis, I made a small incision on both and stuck my finger in, allowing my flesh sorcery to create a copy of both of their DNA sequences to add to the mental matrix of their bodies.


    ¡°Now to get my hands on some epically magic creatures,¡± I said, wondering about what made the Aelves so different. ¡°Or the NEPHILIM!¡± I shouted, running to the freezer. Grabbing the door, I wrenched it open and went to the foot section, rifling through to get the staff-user¡¯s foot. ¡°Ok, ok, this is the big one,¡± I said, trying to keep my excitement on a tight leash. ¡°Let¡¯s see whatcha¡¯ got big guy.¡±


    I slowly peeled the top layers of the box off, the runed platinum taking much longer than the stone underneath. It was goop. There was no foot in the damn box, only goop. I was about to stick my hand in just to see if my eyes were deceiving me before I thought better of it. Making one of the experimental bloodthirsty trees in my lab grow a small branch, I tossed some of my blood on the tree and then snagged the branch when it was occupied. Pulling my power through the length of the stick, I made sure that it was good and dead and then stuck it in the goop and pulled it back out. The hissing sound it made was disgusting as the goop began to burble and smell like mint that someone shit on.


    A few seconds later the goop went back to being still and I examined my stick. The part that went into the goop was gone. My frustration almost made me throw it against the wall but my curiosity wouldn¡¯t let me. Extending my senses, it was too easy to perceive the goop in the magical spectrum. It burned with a white purifying light that hurt to look directly at. From this side, I could see sparks of white power drifting up like it was actually burning. The motes hit the ceiling and phased right on through.


    ¡°What the fuck?¡±


    [Heaven jealously guards its secrets.] Kraken said, popping out behind me into existence. [I¡¯m not expert but it looks like that if the nephilim is butchered and then kept in small enough pieces, it loses its structural integrity and can¡¯t maintain the connection to Heaven. You did it, you actually killed a nephilim, or you will if you open the boxes one by one and let the stuff evaporate.]


    I rounded on the innocent looking spirit, his eye looking around as if anything else was more fascinating at the moment. ¡°And since no one has managed to kill a nephilim that we know of,¡± I started.


    [Yup, it means I did not know this would happen.]


    ¡°Grrrhgfhgf,¡± I snarled, quickly capping the container of goop all over again. ¡°So I have the world¡¯s most exotic acid, great. Fuckin great. Does that mean they aren¡¯t snacks for Spot then? I figured the dragon part of him might like something new.¡±


    [Give the mutt a small bit of it. Dragons eat all kinds of weird shit. Have you heard about the shadow dragons that live in the darkest part of hell? They¡¯re worshipped by demons for their torture techniques as their fire makes you feel like being dipped in a bath of needles that slowly burrow their way through you. Long story short, those dragons got that way by eating too many demons and dark magic users. ¡®You are what you eat¡¯ applies to them more than most.]


    ¡°So a dragon mixed canine with a bit of fire and flesh sorcery stands a good chance of eating an angel¡¯s bastard, tight. I can dig it.¡±


    Carefully setting the box down, I conjured a clear quartz bowl big enough to put a watermelon in comfortably and then filled it three quarters of the way up with water. Placing the acid goop container in the water, I slowly peeled away the layers again.


    [What are you doing?] Kraken asked, floating in front of my face staring down at the concoction and getting in my way. [That stuff burns, like a grease fire, and you don¡¯t throw water on a grease fire!]


    Shoving him off to the side, I decided that he might be right and took the precaution of conjuring a clear quartz covering over the bowl. Using my magic, I kept removing the outside of the container bit by bit, explaining what I was thinking as I did so.


    ¡°You probably don¡¯t know this Kraken, but during pandemics, the Catholic popes put holy water in squirt guns and shot it on their parishioners. Now the way I see it, they prayed and got holy water, but how much more powerful must holy water be if I mix in a bit of Heaven itself, hmmm? And what if those squirt guns shot real holy water?¡± Images in my head of me mowing down hordes of zombies with epic squirt guns distracted me for a second, ah, it was glorious.


    Taking a step back from the workbench, I banished the last layer of the containment box, the burning white liquid pouring out, mixing with the water. Watching carefully in the magical spectrum, the white sparks that burned off last time when exposed to air simply mixed with the water. The feeling of danger slowly went away as the entire bowl joined with the small portion of dismembered nephilim.


    ¡°Voila bitches!¡± I yelled, dancing around the room, pointing and laughing at my very confused spirit familiar. ¡°You won¡¯t get it, but I just completed the first steps to manufacturing the ACTUAL Holy Hand Grenade!¡± Artfully making my voice deeper, I got into character. ¡°From now on, I shall fear no undead or decapitating rabbits!¡±


    [Humans make no sense,] Kraken muttered, wondering why I found any of this funny. [You just made glowing acid water, big whoop.] Wrapping up a copy of a memory from a beloved movie, I shot it over to Kraken through our mental link.


    ¡°Watch this and trust me, there¡¯s more but we¡¯ll get to that later. But with this stuff, if we do it right, there¡¯s a solid chance that I¡¯ll be able to make some damn good anti-undead gear.¡± Darting out the front door, I stood in the middle of the clearing, mentally calling for Spot at the same time as I yelled for him, ¡°Come here boy, I got a real nice treat for you today!¡±

 Chapter 122 Well Deserved Fruition (Book 2 Chapter 29)

    I can¡¯t believe it. The little, I mean big, SHIT brushed me off! My fucking dog told me ¡®no¡¯. It¡¯s definitely a word he¡¯s familiar with but to actually hear it from his mind directed at ME? My mental command hit a wall of sheer joy and unrestrained happiness that was disgusting, revolting, sickening. Grabbing our link with a vitriol only a rejected owner could muster, I peeked at what could make him act like a puppy who got in the snacks, children. He was playing with children. Running through the happy memories because Spot simply didn¡¯t care if I wandered his mind, I looked at the events of the past day.


    Hide, hide, watch, ball? Stick? Am seen, play? Small humans play? Stick, woof, stick! WOOF! STICK! PLAY! JOY! FETCH! Small humans . . . too big, be small, self be small, like small humans! Play now? Afraid? No, joy, happiness, small woofs. Run, can¡¯t catch, play!


    His running mental monologue was simple but the accompanying images almost broke my heart. He had been caught watching by some of the children as they played with makeshift balls and swatted at each other with sticks. When stepping out to fetch due to instinct, he had initially scared them due to his size and shrank down to be less frightening. Apparently being small and cute with a wagging tail can make even the adults trust you as they watched the playful dog scamper around fetching all manner of sticks.


    [LYRA!] I called, blasting down our thin mental link. [What did I say about staying hidden? That meant Spot too!]


    Due to the distance, images more than words were sent, but what I received was a laughing scoff that conveyed, ¡®As if I could stop a giant dragon dog from doing whatever the hell he wants¡¯. Fair point, but still fucking annoying. I need that damn dog, I mean, I HAVE SNACKS FOR HIM.


    [He can¡¯t fight his nature,] Kraken interjected, giving the feeling of patting me on the back. [Lighten up. Besides, letting Spot ingratiate himself with the group for a bit won¡¯t hurt your chances if you want to say hello. From your memories, people trust other people who have nice dogs. Humans are weird, ya know that? Basing basic suppositions on the disposition of a simple canine.]


    [That¡¯s cause you¡¯ve never had a dog,] I shot back. ¡°Guess we¡¯re waiting on that plan for a bit,¡± I muttered to myself. Figuring that Spot was more than capable of taking care of himself, and since nobody else could blood-bond with him like I did, letting him have fun with the human group for a while wouldn¡¯t harm me or my interests, especially in the long run. I might have been working him too hard and being too close to Yggdrasil is apparently painful for most creatures. Odd to me that I never considered that that might be the source of most of my peace. I¡¯ve been walking on eggshells expecting a helluva lot more incursions and enemies to pop their unwanted heads into my business.


    [Kong does a pretty good job keeping most pests away as do the giant birds who patrol the forest,] Kraken interrupted.


    ¡°I¡¯m never going to get used to that am I?¡±


    [Nope.]


    Rolling my eyes at him even though he wasn¡¯t out of my soul-tree area, I picked up Gungnir and shook it. ¡°You done with my armor yet or what? Sheesh, I thought this would be fast dude.¡±


    [Almost . . .]


    ¡°Almost?!¡± I yelled. I knew that I didn¡¯t have to yell but I felt that the situation warranted just a bit of volume. ¡°You said -¡±


    [I know what I said!] Kraken half growled, [There were complications. In order to figure out how best to go about this while still taking into consideration what you want in an over-powered super magic suit, I had to go through your memories.]


    ¡°If you hadn¡¯t been given to me by an angel . . .¡± I snarled.


    [I know, I know, but calm down. I¡¯m literally tied to you on a level you really don¡¯t want to understand, and trusting Maa¡¯lik was the right thing to do. He had just been freed by you and wanted to clear his debt so his intentions of helping were genuine. I¡¯m not in the dominant position here.]


    I had figured as much. Trusting anyone is fairly difficult for me, blame it on the stupid decisions I¡¯ve made in the past but other than tree-wife, there are few people I get along with. Kraken¡¯s post-conversation silence was odd.


    ¡°Well?¡±


    [Humans are weird. I mainly skimmed through your life to see how you think so I could help you but damn, as the humans would say, ¡®you need a therapist¡¯, or, ¡®you got issues man¡¯.]


    Taking a deep breath, I forced my hand to stop gripping Gungnir so hard, imagining that I was wringing Kraken¡¯s slimy neck. ¡°Duh, we all do,¡± I retorted. ¡°Humanity is by and large fucked up, and I¡¯m nowhere near the worst, trust me.¡±


    [Oh I do, I have to, hell, I¡¯ve seen it through you. Your teenage years were pretty sad if I¡¯m understanding it right, but-]


    ¡°Ok, skip the shit that doesn¡¯t matter. My teenage angst is well behind me. Yes, high school sucked but it does for most nerds,¡± I answered, a bit of heat in my voice. ¡°Besides, before the apocalypse, I was definitely nowhere near the bottom of the trash can like some of my classmates. I had a good tech job, was making great money, about to get married to a hot sweetheart who loved me and loved making me sandwiches. I had it good. So let¡¯s get past my life because that part is over. Where¡¯s my SUPERSUIT!¡± Sorry, couldn¡¯t resist.


    [Sheesh, I¡¯m almost done. Might as well come on in. Such a grouch.]


    Gathering what passed for a semblance of inner peace, I walked into the Hole and sat in a chair where I could be comfortable for an unknown amount of time. Breathing in and out, I easily slipped into my soul-tree area.


    ¡°Check it out!¡± Kraken¡¯s now-audible sounded like an announcer for the WWE. ¡°Here he comes folks, all the way from the Shattered Lands of Altered Earth, the former capital of the Arcaneum, the Scion of the Mad Sorcerer himself . . . .¡±


    ¡°Dude, what the fuck did you do to my soul-space?¡± I wasn¡¯t complaining, it was the shock that made me sound angry but I really wasn¡¯t. My soul-space looked like a banging bachelor pad complete with three giant floating televisions, a huge water bed, and my soul-tree acting like the lamp that made up the spine of the domed room.


    ¡°It¡¯s your dream bedroom! This is your soul space, it can be anything you want!¡±


    Soul-tree and I glared flatly at Kraken, both impressed but not really amused. ¡°Seriously, I come here for a supersuit and you deck out the inside of my brain?¡±


    Kraken flew in front of the tvs, gesturing at them with two of his arms as they lit up with very different pictures. The one on the left had two images, the human bone structure and a naked representation of me. The middle tv had a line dividing two sets of complex interconnected runes while the right tv had several pictures of different suits of armor.


    ¡°Just wait, I promise, you¡¯ll love it,¡± he promised, shades of yellow and orange coloring his pointing arms. ¡°Ooooh, I¡¯m so excited! I don¡¯t think any Scions back home will believe that I got to do this!¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Moving on! All right! I¡¯ve divided up the three relevant layers as you can see here, your body itself on the left split into the inner bone and outer skin. Both can function as a canvas for runes due to your flesh sorcery. The display on the right is the suit you had versus the suit the Centauri have with your probable modification and the suit I want to make by melding the two together. The center display is the rune structure, one for you to inscribe on your bones and by extension your skin, and the other to be laid out on the armor by the Centauri nanotech function.¡±


    The sections separating the three TVs joined together to form one giant curved projection as sections of the runes split up crossing the expanse of the screen to burn their way into each bone of the skeleton. The flesh image welcomed its own set of runes as it covered up the skeleton taking its rightful place as a normal naked body. The last couple sections of runes formed a beautiful twisted artwork across the suits of armor and they smashed together in a cartoonish explosion to make a new set of armor.This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.


    ¡°It¡¯s, too beautiful,¡± I breathed, a bit of air getting caught. ¡°I can¡¯t wear that.¡± The silver tones of the nanotech were smoothed out over the ivory of bones spikes at places convenient for combat like the elbows and knees. If you took the most wicked looking spiked armor from a demon and then had an angel purify, that¡¯s what I¡¯d be wearing.


    ¡°Psshhh, it¡¯s nanotech, mostly,¡± Kraken said proudly. ¡°You can make it look however the hell you want! My personal favorite is the Redeemed Wrecker! The formerly fallen angel who smites his foes even as his heart bleeds for their pain!¡± The outer shell shifted to more futuristic look similar to the Alpha Centauri getup, but with silver wings and a spiked tail.


    Kraken continued as if he were showcasing brand new cars to a first time buyer. ¡°And here we have the Vorpalian Vengeance, the terror of Deep Space, where even seasoned Fleet Captains dare not travel! This suit is far better adapted to water and aerial combat as the wings are made with a combination of flesh and mana sorcery to complement the natural shifting abilities of the nanotech!¡±


    And on it went. I made notes of the ones I liked but too be honest they were all a bit too over the top. They gave me some serious ideas about what maybe I could do in the future but it was just too much. Since I was inside my own brain, I magicked up a glowing tablet and took pictures of the different suits and put my own ratings next to them. After about ten suits in, I held up my hand to get Kraken to stop.


    ¡°Dude, I love it, I really do-¡±


    ¡°Buuut . . .¡±


    ¡°Buuut . . . I need something on the tanky side of slender, ya get what I¡¯m sayin?¡± I said, letting my mind wander just a bit. ¡°Imagine something like a souped up Power Ranger, everytime they get hit, they might spark a lot or a little but they never really bleed. Let¡¯s start with that. Or where¡¯s the classic sorcerer look? The one with black armor striped through with ominous silver runes with crazy magic leaking everywhere?¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t like them?¡± Kraken¡¯s big eye quivered.


    ¡°Keep it together!¡± Reaching over, I pat him on the head. ¡°Dear lord, it¡¯s all right. I liked them all, but you didn¡¯t have to draw all of your inspiration from animals did you? We need to table some of this for when I get some real life minions dude. I can make more than one suit, and I¡¯m pretty sure I can either get the nanotech to replicate or I can steal some from my little brother.¡±


    ¡°Fine,¡± he grumbled, waving one tentacle arm and making all the images vanish.


    ¡°No!¡± I yelled, waving an arm and putting everything back. ¡°I didn¡¯t say it was crap, I said we need something with a different direction. What did you have in the way of innovations for current tech? We gotta work our way up or I won¡¯t be able to use it as effectively as I could, ya know?¡± I waited as he gave a grudging nod.


    ¡°Ok, so, let¡¯s start with the basic framework of runes on the skeleton and skin. I love the idea, but help me out with some of these runes please.¡±


    Huffing ever so softly, Kraken pulled the diagrams of runes on the skeleton and body off the screen and in front of me. ¡°Runes are multiplicative in nature, and when you line them up correctly, their effective capability can even become exponential when you factor in resonance. Synergies are the hardest diagrams to plan as one bad placement can cause the opposite effect. These runes here . . . all over your skeleton, are runes of kinetic redirection, energy absorption, and disbursement. This entire setup is to keep your bones from melting under high intensity explosions. The bleed off channels are set up here, here, and here . .¡± he pointed out the wavy lines that flowed between the clusters of runes. ¡°These will allow the extra energy that would have killed enter feedback runes of healing and focus so you can stay conscious through pain and not die.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s this over here?¡± I asked, pointing at a cluster of runes that I hadn¡¯t seen before. They were set in an octagonal formation at all of my major joints.


    ¡°Those are neuro-link bypasses. If you can¡¯t move any part of your body yet due to injury, these will function as joints until you do. They keep a power charge of about ten minutes worth of movement giving you time to haul ass if you aren¡¯t in a position to heal. The other runes on the spine that look similar are siphon runes. Those will allow you to greatly speed up your internal intake of mana if you need to without the issue of burnout. You may need some new bones but as a flesh sorcerer, that shouldn¡¯t be a problem.¡±


    Layering the image of the body over the skeleton, the runes were a bit more edgy, a sort of tribal look crisscrossing the skin. ¡°Now all of these are pretty much your standard combat runes but with all kinds of Heaven rune-based camouflage. No demon, angel, or deity will ever be able to divine your position in the universe unless you allow it or carry something of theirs. These runes bounce off similar ones on your skeleton allowing for a broader muddling of your personal signal. And then you have your mental defense runes coupled with a focus diagram and a hardness frequency on your skull, mana channeling combined with absorption and bleed off runes for physical combat if necessary, and your legs the kinetic expulsion runes for uber jumps and devastating charge kicks.¡±


    Blowing up a small diagram located on the chest, Kraken continued as if it were a standard college lecture. ¡°This particular diagram is an elemental refraction field upping your resistance to the basic elements. Fire, electricity, raw mana, sympathetic strikes, as well as wave-based attacks will all be seriously blunted and maybe even absorbed as raw mana. These babies are sort of all over the body as well as between other rune channels to maximize the coverage.¡±


    A low and slow whistle escaped me. I couldn¡¯t even begin to think of what it took to pull this off. This was way above my paygrade and I bet the damn squid knew it. ¡°Here are the standard anti-teleportation runes with the voluntary enhancement array if you ever need it, which all wizards do. You don¡¯t need the regen runes as your flesh sorcery does that for you and you don¡¯t need the under-water setup either which gives you a ton of room to play with some more risque¡¯ stuff like bound tattoos. You capture the soul of some creature, tattoo it on your body while pouring its power into the ink and you have a tatted protector as a secret watchdog. Venomous snakes, vicious cats, and wolves are usually the recommended ones as their enhanced senses really work better than anything you have.¡±


    Adorning the feet and hands were impact runes, I recognized those on my own. My mana sorcery was helping me piece together the runes bit by bit, but some of them I had come up with before. ¡°Those there, those will help with hand to hand combat right?¡± I asked, trying to show off just a bit.


    ¡°Hehehehe,¡± Kraken tittered. ¡°I know you don¡¯t know shit man. I went through your memories. Hahahaha, trying to bluff your own familiar! Hahahaha!¡± Fake wiping a tear away, Kraken moved on. ¡°Don¡¯t forget about these, these are the basic bio-enhancement runes that most humans use. They make your stomach process waste far more efficiently, regulate your body more so that your muscle tone never falls below a certain point, and it even tweaks your flesh sorcery to always keep you fresh without having to waste a background mental process on it. Sleep can also be instant with a rune tattoo but I don¡¯t think you need that one . . . Oh! And the scent removal array so that tracking you by scent will be an absolute bitch.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s with that channel? The one from the shoulders to the collarbone and then to the spine all the way down to the forepad of the foot and heel?¡± I asked, getting closer to examine the spiky blue lines.


    ¡°That my friend, is an experimental channel I came up with based off of your water and earth sorcery. That will allow you to transfer any extra energy or kinetic motion into the river or dirt if you¡¯re standing on it. It also allows for reverse channeling of power from ley lines even easier than before. Basically, this turns you into a fortress if you¡¯re in your element.¡±


    ¡°Oh hell yeah!¡± I freaked, I mean geeked, I mean shrieked. ¡°Let¡¯s get this shit done right fuckin¡¯ now!¡±


    ¡°Hold up!¡± A wet smack of Kraken¡¯s tentacle pulled me back from my excited momentum towards the real world. ¡°We still have your suit dummy!¡±


    Grumpily sitting down, I looked at the screen. ¡°Let¡¯s go, come on Squishy. Whatcha got?¡±


    Rolling his big eye, Kraken made all of the suits disappear except for one. ¡°Here, since you¡¯re so eager, this is the final product since you pretty much hate all the other suit ideas. Lame ass,¡± he said, muttering the last part to himself.


    ¡°This focuses more on streamlining your power storage capabilities as well as some brand new features you might like,¡± he continued. ¡°Most of your current power storage is in batteries that you¡¯ve now stuck in Gungnir. Well, I took your initial design and combined it with your second design. Listen before you say anything, because you haven¡¯t thought about this in a while. I recreated your matter-to-mana generators and fixed them so that they¡¯ll work in a mana rich environment. It took a lot of rune work as well as platinum coverings to keep everything stable, but small generators can now work as long as you keep it inside of Gungnir.¡±


    My jaw hit the ground. ¡°How did you, wha-¡±


    ¡°Yes, I figured it out. I had to re-rune the entirety of the storage space in Gungnir, but now it actually can hold energy related things much better and the outer structure is no longer super permeable. That being said, you won¡¯t have the kind of power flow you used to with it, but its passive output will be more than a solar panel. That being said, the crystal batteries have been reworked as well. They¡¯re more of a solid energy now providing at least three times more energy before. You won¡¯t understand the math but every ¡®brick¡¯ of power you had now equals at least three.¡±


    ¡°So where are they?¡± I asked, looking over the suit for the battery pack holder.


    ¡°They¡¯re in your suit, not in Gungnir. The plan is to have you conjure the bone enamel armor like before, lay down the initial rune patter, and then put in the small batteries as you layer more bone enamel armor on top with another layer of runes. Then, the nanotech coating will be coupled with microscopic bits of platinum so all magical attacks will be blunted against you. Notice anything odd on the back?¡±


    Walking around, I noticed that there was what looked to be a form-fitting backpack on the other side. ¡°These look like solar panel runes,¡± I said. ¡°Hey, that¡¯s my old hoverboard!¡±


    ¡°Yup! These solve the issue of your mobility! The hoverboard works pretty much as before but with an upgrade. It uses runes based off your earth sorcery to project anti-gravity allowing you to skate around. The upgrade is that it can go ridiculously fast if you¡¯re near a ley line and can even pull extra power from it to put into you or your batteries if need be.¡±


    ¡°And the solar backpack?¡± I said, motioning with my hand for Kraken to hurry up. ¡°What¡¯s the point of that if I have my generators back?¡±


    He looked at me like I was dumb. Reaching one tentacle forward, he slapped the hologram on the back, the smacked rune glowing, forcing two wide, thin wings out. ¡°Solar wings. These will let you fly, slowly, but they¡¯ll let you fly. They combine anti-gravity runes projecting from the bottom and solar-panel runes on the top that pull in power from the sky as well as effect-amplifying runes on the edges to create a much larger surface area so that you can actually fly. This is not a set of combat wings, but flying is something you¡¯ll be able to do, albeit clumsily. It is a super-intense drain on your power which is why you won¡¯t have much airtime but it¡¯ll work in a pinch. This pack also has two large independent batteries if you need just in case, giving you about ten times the amount of stored power you had before. Three hours of flight time is the max of what you can get, hence, the attachable skateboard.¡±


    My jaw hit the ground again. ¡°Flight?¡± I croaked. ¡°Kitty Hawk kind of flight? One small step for man, a giant glide for sorcerer-kind?¡±


    ¡°Yes, it¡¯s not perfect,¡± he continued, straight up ignoring my sheer amazement. ¡°This is why the hoverboard is perfect. Over ley lines and water, you¡¯ll be able to go incredibly fast. The wings are also for the hoverboard as they can flare out to passively intake heat and light while also functioning as steering apparati.¡±


    ¡°And I didn¡¯t forget about the craziness you were doing in the lab either. That water you made with nephilim goop is a perfect candidate for an experimental weapon you made.¡± Kraken said, making four sets of ice blue glyphs glow on my armor projection. ¡°These are the water conjuration and control runes for up close defense. If you¡¯re going to fight the undead, I added four sealed storage containers in your armor for you to put four capsules of nephilim matter. Conjuring the water at these points will free the nephilim stuff, mixing it with the controlled water and allowing you to have four holy water arms controlled by your sorcery. With Gungnir who already has holy star iron in its makeup, you now have a personal arsenal that works perfectly against all undead and unclean things.¡±

 Chapter 123 - Making Friends (Book 2 Chapter 30)

    ¡°And I didn¡¯t forget about Svalinn. There really wasn¡¯t much to improve on as that as it has a dragon soul in it and would probably try to eat me. It¡¯s almost as if wild magic helped you make that damn thing,¡± Kraken snorted. ¡°Maybe feed it some nephilim, maybe not, who cares. It¡¯s a ridiculous shield and lives up to its name. It attaches the same way to your arms and you¡¯re done!¡±


    At Kraken¡¯s pronouncement, I didn¡¯t even take a breath. I thanked him profusely, running out of air because of my excitement. Kicking myself out of my mental/soul place and back into the real world, I numbed my body so that I wouldn¡¯t be able to feel a thing and used flesh sorcery to transcribe the runes on my very bones and skin. The bone ones were orderly, organized, inordinately structured, but the flesh ones, those were graceful dance lines, those were art. The runic tattoos on flesh flowed like water around the natural lines of the body creating a raw sensation of power, as if I had opened the doors of potential that my body had kept secret from me. My magic finally was expressed on my body, and I LIKED it! My consciousness sorcery allowed me to perfectly transcribe what I had seen onto my body as if Michaelangelo himself had done the work.


    Grabbing my old suit and laying it out on the solid granite workbench, I lifted Gungnir and pulled power from its stores of energy and slammed the point of my weapon down into the chest plate of my armor. Weaves of pure power flowed from Svalinn, Gungnir and myself at the same time into the armor as tendrils of silver magitech nanobots poured over the old gear. Following the schematics in my mind just as Kraken had made them, I couldn¡¯t help it as a small tear leaked out for the old armor. ¡°Goodbye old friend,¡± I sadly chuckled, ¡°Time for an upgrade.¡±


    Pushing my sentimentality aside, I worked with Kraken for the next three hours until the massive undertaking was finished. By the time early afternoon rolled around, we had even included some light-bending camouflage along with sound dampening boots, put enchanted knives that used a bit of channeled flesh sorcery to overly rend wounds into sheaths at various places while two holsters were made for reworked Centauri pistols that had a channeled connection to my powerpacks of mana.


    [This, this is a masterpiece] Kraken said, panting with exhaustion from inside Gungnir. [I¡±m just gonna, just gonna, pass out over here and recharge.]


    ¡°You do that buddy,¡± I said, slumping in my chair, staring at my armor. It really was beautiful, in a magically ominous sort of way. The whole getup screamed ¡®BADASS SORCERER¡¯, which is where I¡¯d be in about ten years. Although I was proud of myself, I felt like a kid playing with his father¡¯s gun, not even being able to pull the damn lever back. The rune diagrams made sense as Kraken was explaining them to me, and my mana sorcery agreed with him that that is what it was, but this level of design was at least twenty years ahead of my current ability. It was the difference of knowing how to skate and watching an Olympic ice skater do crazy flips on top of someone else while you barely hold on to the side rail.


    Forcing myself to stand up, I pulled on my flesh sorcery to refresh me a bit and then put the armor on piece by piece. The last component we had added was a sympathetic blood bond tied to a central ruby from the armor pieces to Gungnir. My main weapon was already blood bonded to me, which meant that no one could use it or take it from me, ever. This blood bond however, was of a different nature. This was a subset blood bond between it and Gungnir which would allow me to store my armor in Gungnir and then put it on instantly whenever I need it. I had gamed out my armor so that I could take it off or put it on instantly and at will.


    Recognizing that I had accomplished more in the past day that I had in a long time, stressing out my magic, my soul, and my brain, I downed two meal cubes and used my flesh sorcery to put me in a deep, healing-centric sleep until the next morning.


    *******


    As the sun broke through the curvature of the world allowing dawn to arrive at my little slice of apocalypse heaven, the needs of the morning were less pressing than they used to be. I mean, I still had to pee, but it just wasn¡¯t the urgent need of a dying man like it used to be. Walking outside, I inspected the clearing before conjuring water to clean and rehydrate myself before banishing it away.


    ¡°Perfect dryness,¡± I breathed, twisting and turning to stretch out the kinks of my deep sleep. ¡°What an awesome cheat,¡± I said even as I used a bit of flesh sorcery to perk myself up back into the land of the living. Not having coffee anymore sucks but I had a way around it


    [Oh come on, test it out! I worked on the pocket generator and the spare all night!]


    Peering into Gungnir, I saw that Kraken had set up two mini-pedestals in there on the opposite wall from the angel sword display. The generators looked way different from the ones I had previously made. They both were cubes about the size of a small moving box with an upside down bowl seamlessly attached to the top. Sticking out of the bowl were what looked to be silver and gold antennae.


    [Yes, yes, I¡¯m awesome, thank me later. The inside of the cube is solid granite, the base ingredient being converted into mana, and the outside is layered cold iron and platinum with so many runes to govern the amount of power going out. I also repurposed a bit of World Tree wood on the outside of the entire structure so that no external mana could get in here to disrupt the delicate regulation process,] Kraken gushed, geeking out just as much as I would be if I had made it. [Don¡¯t mind the antennae, those are mostly nanotech transmitters tied to your armor through sympathetic magic, and HERE!]


    The sexy version of a hoverboard popped out of Gungnir¡¯s storage space in front of me. It was more like a longboard had a bastard child with a freaking Tesla. Metallic flames shot up and down the length of the board in the coolest paint job I¡¯d ever seen with bits of and blue where the tips of the flames almost looked alive.


    [Yes, it¡¯s also tied to Gungnir, yes I added retractable wings to the sides similar to your backpack set so it should add another hours worth of flight along with increased maneuverability.]


    No more words were needed. With a leap, I landed on the board and leaned forward, my magic wrapping around it and through the runes, instinctively letting me know more about it as I flew. The fifteen or so minute walk to the riverbank took just over a minute as I blew down the path. Hitting the river itself, the hoverboard held true to its nature as we did our own rendition of Back to the Future with magic power. Waves of water cut out to the side as I turned downriver and poured on the gas.


    ¡°YEEEEEHHHHAAAAAWWWWW!¡± I screamed, loving how the wind whipped at me, urging me to go faster. Once I hit the point that I felt the board might not be controllable due to the insane speeds, I leaned back as it shot me into the sky at a fifty degree angle.


    [This is awesome BUT GET YOUR WINGS OUT!]


    Laughing like an adrenaline junkie, I recalled the board into Gungnir as I flared out the suit¡¯s wings with my magic. The wind grabbed me and hoisted me higher as I fed power into the runes. I was flying, freaking flying on my own. The Rappahannock River lay out before me like a long greenish blue road, strange rock formations and giant hills pushing it north and south as the river did its best to run west towards the Atlantic ocean.


    Mentally pulling up a list of auto-mental processes that I had made a while ago but not used, I grabbed the ¡®learning modifier¡¯ one and engaged it. Muscle memory is something that all humans have, and it allows them to perform actions unconsciously. It¡¯s the way that some people drive to work and not really remember the trip because they¡¯ve done it so many times that their unconscious mind does the work instead of the conscious side. This process allows for me to not only shorten the amount of time it takes to learn a physical action, but it moves it over to the unconscious side so much quicker.This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.


    And so I flew. I flew down the river, attempted steep dives and nailed some awesome twisting maneuvers while blasting out some crystal rounds from Gungnir at full speed. I had fun exploring how to hoverboard down the river and through forest paths and then experimented more with powered hoverboard to flight takeoffs and vice versa. This day was dedicated to me and freedom.


    There are multiple kinds of freedom. One such freedom was the one I was currently enjoying, the uncompromised ability to travel up while the rest of the human race walks. The other kind of freedom, well that one hit me from above. That freedom was the sheer freedom from thought, it was the freedom from the thoughts that would be saving my life as something big and mean and loud cannonballed straight into my back as I was five hundred feet over the river.


    The river welcomed me in a nicer way that it would have anyone else who didn¡¯t have water sorcery. A blast of water erupted before I hit the surface, breaking the surface tension and catching me as all of my new runes served their purpose in preventing my death. I overcame the disorienting effect of being hammered out the sky quicker than I would have thought as I crashed into the silty water. Forcing myself to stay underwater, I did a quick status check. None of my bones were broken, my shields were intact, and my suit of armor was relatively undamaged.


    [The wings were almost sheared off but they retracted in time,] Kraken reassured me. [The nanotech will have that part fixed in ten minutes but you probably need to have a chat with whatever the hell that was.]


    [Agreed,] I replied mentally, gripping myself and a minor tsunami¡¯s worth of water and vaulting up to the surface. A long grey winged form flew by, the wave of air buffeting the surface of the river. [The fuck is that? Sickly dragon? Wyvern? Flying snake?]


    [That my friend is a wyvern, and where there¡¯s one, there¡¯s more.]


    My answer to Kraken¡¯s doom and gloom answer was more than one high powered crystal round lighting up the son of a bitch. I pointed Gungnir at the monstrosity and fired two hammer rounds and three penetrator rounds in quick succession, using magic to effortlessly switch between the different kinds of bullets. Keening screeches emitted from the bleeding reptile as my rounds softened it up and then blew through its tough scales.


    [Overkill?] Kraken wondered. [Are you actually overkill for wyverns?]


    [Good.]


    Diving back into the water, I traveled a hundred yards downstream before popping back up and scanning the sky. It was so bright that I couldn¡¯t see so I opened up my magical senses to their fullest.


    [This is where those bound spirit animal senses would come in handy right now . . .]


    [Shut up and let me fight dumbass!] I snapped, searching for the bloody corpse¡¯s friends. Reacting to the sudden flare of magical presence behind me, I spun and blasted the river water in front of me with the force of twenty firehoses quickly following it with a shower of crystal rounds. Pushing myself to the side with water sorcery, I dove back in just in time to avoid having my head taken off by another wyvern.


    [They hunt in packs like wolves. Even dragons think long and hard before putting up with this kind of annoying shit.] I hate not knowing for myself how these creatures hunt but I did trust Kraken to give me the facts I didn¡¯t have. Diving deep, I grabbed the two wrecks of wyvern bodies and froze them together at the bottom of the river. Damn I hope Spot is hungry. Rising back to the surface, I hopped on the top of it like it was pavement.


    ¡°Come and get me fucker!¡± I yelled to the sky, pivoting to stay on guard as Gungnir glowed an ominous kaleidoscope of yellows and greens. ¡°You want a magic snack?!¡± There! Behind me of course and off to the upper left, I felt the wyvern tuck its wings in and dive. I didn¡¯t even have to turn as Kraken shot the right kinds of rounds at the wyvern in perfect sequence. While he took care of that one, a far larger version of the wyverns, one with four wings instead of two, plummeted out of the sky and slammed into the water causing his own tidal wave.


    Of course that didn¡¯t do anything to me. Flexing my will, the wall of water enveloped me harmlessly and slid past. Arching one eyebrow, I was a bit perplexed at the sight of the big one floating on top of the water, his four wings out to the side giving him surface tension to almost sit on top of the river. Eyes blacker than coal stared at me as the Alpha lay there in the water, judging me. His breath stank.


    [Should I kill him?] I shot to Kraken, [I mean, he¡¯s not doing anything but I think he¡¯s outta peeps.] Reaching out again with my magical senses, I double checked to make sure nothing was diving outta nowhere.


    [This is weird behavior, especially for wyverns. They¡¯re oddly primal in that they just want to eat, fly, and fuck.] My spirit familiar¡¯s lack of a helpful answer did not provide the information I was hoping for. Knowing that if these winged creatures sort of hunted like wolves and had a pack mentality, then I know that backing down wasn¡¯t an option. Right now, this big creature was deciding if I was either dangerous enough to listen to, if it is brave enough to attack and win; it was all a game of dominance, but only if I was right.


    A soft tapping sound came through the mental link I shared with Kraken. [Yes?] I sent back, maintaining eye contact and a dominant attitude in the direction of the wyvern.


    [That wasn¡¯t me,] Kraken replied quietly, [I think it came from the wyvern.]


    Making sure that my mental defense and focus runes were fully powered up, I followed the pinging back to its source.


    [When did the males lay claim to this new realm? What group of wizards do you call your own?]


    The voice was very feminine, high-pitched with an unbelievably haughty tone. My shock traveled through the mental link before I could completely tamp it down.


    [Ah, a young wizard then. My dear, you didn¡¯t have to kill my pets, you simply could have run and there would be no bad blood between us,] the sultry voice said, hitting all the right spots that would have any normal red blooded man dizzy from lust.


    I let my anger leak into my voice as I yelled outloud, ¡°I don¡¯t deal with bitches who sick their guard dogs on me. Especially when I killed them so easily. Who the fuck are you and what do you want?¡±


    [The Winged Witches control all that flies my dearest, our hearts belong to the freedom of the sky even though at times we feel the need for the restricting arms of a man.]


    [I could be wrong,] Kraken thought to me only, [But I think the Winged Witches are harpies or women who used to be and used their magic to get prettier. They rule several odd magical realms where it¡¯s pretty much only floating islands or solid clouds.]


    [Great,] I huffed back. [And are our myths about harpies true? Do they capture men and fuck them to death and then eat them? Just spitballing¡¯ here.]


    [That¡¯s pretty close. As you can see, they¡¯re really good at mind control. They mind control flying creatures like wyverns and dragons when they¡¯re really little and raise them to be their muscle. Their men, they use to get themselves pregnant and then drain them of life and magic to feed to themselves or their pets.]


    The witch seemed to catch on that I was talking but not to her. [Don¡¯t bother contacting your superiors now, you¡¯re already mine sweet morsel.


    I laughed out loud. ¡°Where do you call home, you ugly excuse for a hag? Everything you see around you is mine. The river, the forest, the mountains, and yes, even the fucking sky!¡± Taunting her to get her blood up, I pulsed a mental message down in the water and in all directions, calling for some friends of mine. ¡°I¡¯ve flown around a lot and not run into you which means that this isn¡¯t your home. And the name is Nate, by the way.¡±


    [Your name doesn¡¯t matter, manling. You¡¯ll be twisting in my aerie soon enough, just let go into my sweet embrace and peace will be all you know-]


    Her words were creepy enough that I just had enough. Giving the command to Kraken, he used Gungnir to fire two hammer rounds and three penetrator rounds directly into the skull of the Alpha. Unlike normal guns, magical propulsion of rounds is quiet, there¡¯s no explosion to make a sound. Instead, there¡¯s a quiet pop, like a small fourth of July firecracker that all the kids look at in disappointment.


    Bloody meat exploded from the wide flat plate of armor on the wyvern¡¯s head as my first two rounds broke down the solid structure of the armor and the following rounds drilled deep into its brain and out the back of its head. It didn¡¯t even have the time to flail about as the body caught up to its brain before my water elementals grabbed the body and yanked it to the river bottom, securing it there in ice.


    ¡°Hellooo?¡± I called, looking around with a smarmy grin. ¡°I can¡¯t hear you? Any other fat skanks need some learnin¡¯? Cause if this is a big dick contest then I¡¯m winnin¡¯!¡±


    [Dude, she can¡¯t hear you.]


    ¡°It¡¯s called gloating,¡± I shot back, unable to stop smiling. ¡°Did you get it though? I left that mental link up long enough.¡±


    Kraken couldn¡¯t help his own evil grin. [Yup, just before you killed that beastie, I managed to dig out where their roost is.]


    Given a few quick orders to my elementals, I pulled up the mostly whole bodies of the wyverns and froze them, watching as they started pushing and sliding the masses back to my Lab. Hopping on my hoverboard, I checked real quick to make sure that my suit¡¯s wings were back to normal and took off down the river towards home, humming the whole way,


    ¡°A-hunting we will go


    A-hunting we will go


    Heigh-ho, the derry-o


    A-hunting we will go¡±


    *******


    Expanding my freezer was a bitch. Why are my hoarder instincts the way they are? I mean, are they gamer instincts too, should I just be a packrat and hog all the gear or ingredients? Well, ya keep whatcha kill, is the saying I believe. So I did what I had to do, which was burrow way deep into the Lab, quadruple the size of my stasis freezer, and then construct a way to get in there from the outside. The outside door reminded me of an underground flight hanger, big enough to move dragon-sized masses in and out of hideout.


    [Is this necessary? I mean come on, Nate. This can¡¯t all be for Spot . . . can it? Isn¡¯t that damn dog powerful enough?] I just let him ramble, knowing he¡¯d eventually get to the right conclusion. [So much damn meat, and you can¡¯t eat the fire dragon, and the wyverns are downright poisonous, so you can¡¯t give it to the humans, why are you blocking me from what you¡¯re thinking?!]


    ¡°Oh come on,¡± I teased, spinning around spear-form Gungnir around like a baton. ¡°You¡¯re almost there. For once I have an answer that you want.¡±


    [Ngnshrns,] Kraken grumbled, [WAIT!! You don¡¯t mean . . . really? That¡¯s your plan? A flesh golem?]

 Chapter 124 - Social Interaction (Book 2 Chapter 31)

    [You can¡¯t be serious, only perverts of the worst kind make that kind of shit! I¡¯m serious! They kick wizards out of the arcaneum for that kind of weirdness, it¡¯s almost as bad as the what the necromancers do!]


    I ignored Kraken¡¯s pleas because he was fundamentally wrong, and apparently ideologically prejudiced. I had a plan, a solid plan, but every plan needs a test case proving that the plan is viable, which is what I was doing.


    ¡°I¡¯m not going to fuck it, you idiot, I¡¯m going to use it. Surely you can think of another use for a flesh golem than having sex with it, hmmmm?¡± I stared at Kraken as he didn¡¯t even have the sense to look ashamed. ¡°Cause I was thinking of using it to absorb the bodies of the dwarves, minotaurs, wyverns, and some of Rath and maybe making some workers or shock troopers.¡±


    [But everyone else-]


    I cut him off, seeing the visions playing through Kraken¡¯s mind. ¡°Seriously? That¡¯s it? People use flesh sorcery to make living flesh dolls to fuck? Where¡¯s the creativity in that?¡± Disgusted by the lack of intelligence that my forebears had, I mentally smacked Kraken in the back of the head.


    ¡°Ok, listen, this isn¡¯t that hard. I DON¡¯T want to fuck it. I¡¯m going to make one flesh golem as a test for the group of humans. If I do this right,¡± I stressed, ¡°It will be able to assist them with healing when they need it and the experimental part is that it should be able to upgrade them. Like if they drag back some kind of spider, one kid might use the flesh elemental to give him Spider-Man like powers. See where I¡¯m going with this?¡±


    [You¡¯re outsourcing the creative aspect!]


    ¡°Exactly. If they come up with something awesome and it works, then I could probably do it better.¡±


    [So what now?] Kraken asked.


    Picking up Gungnir, I walked into the Lab and placed it in a slot on the crystal vat holding the floating brain of Rath. ¡°You my friend, are you going to work on this brain. I want anything and everything that a dragon knows that might be useful. I¡¯ve got what I needed from the other one so I¡¯m going to put it to work.¡±


    Reaching into the vat, I pulled out the clone Reeanth brain and walked to my stasis freezer. The slimy grey organ barely pulsed as my magic kept it alive outside of the tank. What I had planned was gruesome, morbid even, but I felt that it was necessary. Sticking the clone brain in a small stasis box off to the side, I pulled out two different minotaur bodies, one shaman and one normal, and put them on my workbench, taking care to make sure that they were still unconscious. Taking out the youngest looking dwarf, I put him next to the others and undressed them.


    ¡°Yuck time,¡± I muttered, taking out the clone brain again. Gathering a veritable fuckton of mana, I began the process of wiping the brain clean of memories. Every feeling, every hint of a thought, I purged from that organ until it was pristine. Then, I began forcing the brain to split into two sections until I had two smaller, but complete clone brains. Putting one away in the stasis box, I took the other and held it in my left hand. With my right hand, I arranged the three bodies so that they were laying each at a point in a triangle with their arms spread so that they were holding hands.


    Placing the clone brain in the middle, I forced the clone brain to grow an extra flap of square flesh on top of itself and then inscribed the rune for flesh in it. Quickly conjuring a stone knife, I cut the wrist of each body and used flesh sorcery to direct the blood so that the pouring crimson connected to each cut like a cable bringing life. My strange bloody ritual was laid out almost perfectly, but it was missing the spark, the generating event to get it going. ¡°Fuck,¡± I growled, calling Gungnir to my hand.


    [What? I had just gotten deep in-] Kraken sputtered.


    The bodies weren¡¯t bleeding out but their lifeforce was draining, already weakened from when I tore a good chunk of it out a few days ago to make my vine giant. ¡°No time.¡± I said, cutting him off. Pulling from the stores of power in my weapon, I poured mana into the bodies while I used flesh sorcery to force the bodies together, the different kinds of skin and flesh melding into a single unit. The arms joined and the formation tightened as each body moved closer, the three heads eventually touching the clone brain in the center. Reaching out with Gungnir, I placed the tip of the spear on the brain, inputting commands and directives as the brain absorbed the bodies. The folds of the grey matter smoothed out as the different races became one beach ball sized blob.


    [Don¡¯t fuck this up!]


    ¡°That¡¯s the plan!¡± I said, gritting my teeth as I pushed the tip of Gungnir in with one hand while I speared my other hand straight into the blob. I didn¡¯t relax until I verified that my flesh sorcery had complete and utter control over the blob, the flesh golem. Gungnir¡¯s tip and my hand completed the circuit of magic I had flowing through it, It had no thoughts of its own, no will to make it independent, it was just a tool, although a particularly odd one. Kraken began putting together a thought control construct, a mental matrix if you will, and stuck it in the heart of the flesh golem.


    [Ok, so in order for a normal person to use it, they have to touch it. Then they can have the golem heal their wounds, change their hair color or remove deformities,] Kraken explained, putting the final touches on the control center. [And you can even break off a small piece and use it to heal other people, and it will get bigger or smaller depending on how much you use or feed it. So if they give it a deer, it¡¯ll consume it and break it down for raw materials.]


    ¡°Don¡¯t forget enhancements as well,¡± I said, still channeling large amounts of mana. ¡°I want people to be able to fix hormonal issues if those pop up, add muscle or tendon strength for flexibility. This needs to be a doctor as well as a personalized body augmenter device.¡±


    [Doctor . . . workout machine . . . flesh enhancer . . . anything else?]


    ¡°Uh, yeah. It needs to be secure. We can¡¯t have a Carol Baskin running around killing people and feeding it to the flesh golem to cover her tracks.¡±


    [A what?] Kraken asked, his focus turning to rifle through my memories.


    ¡°Forget it,¡± I said. ¡°Just allow it to imprint on three people who have the authority to use it, or we can do it when we present it to them. We don¡¯t want kids running amok with this kind of ability, it needs to have someone administering it.¡±


    Pulling out another minotaur body from stasis, I lay the body next to the flesh golem and then promptly cut the minotaur¡¯s arm off with a knife and then closed the wound with flesh sorcery. ¡°Testing time!¡± I said, sticking my arm in the golem. Using the rough control interface to guide the golem instead of my own magic, I allowed it to use my senses to understand me. The blob reached out a pseudopod and picked up the arm, swallowing it into its own flesh. ¡°Now fix it.¡±


    The flesh golem reached out a new pseudopod and stuck it on the shoulder of the minotaur, the connection of flesh morphing into a new arm, forming a minotaur arm complete with hair and bones and knuckles until it was whole, disconnecting at just the right point of contact. The remainder of the pseudopod shrank back into the flesh golem as I pulled my own arm out and inspected the newly crafted one.


    ¡°It worked!¡± I crowed, dancing a quick jig of excitement. ¡°Who¡¯s the man? I¡¯m the man! Wait, one last limiter on its capabilities before we hand it over.¡±


    [What now? This is already way beyond generous.]


    Rolling my eyes, I pointed at the flesh golem. ¡°We do not want this thing getting out of hand. This is why we have movies, to show us why some ideas can be dumb, like giving robots too much autonomy, que Terminator. Why don¡¯t we make dinosaurs? See Jurassic Park. Why don¡¯t we let flesh golems make new life and grow without limit? Watch the Blob. So, this creation of mine cannot be allowed to consume flesh without direction, and it cannot create new life ever. Its functions extend to healing, enhancing, and regrowing.¡±


    [Fine, even though its a lame reason.]


    ¡°It¡¯s not lame, it¡¯s smart. I¡¯m not going to give someone else the equivalent of biological nuke, in fact, we¡¯re not even gonna go there.¡± I thought for a minute or two, gathering a couple possibilities. ¡°Do you think it¡¯s too much if I put a bit of dragon in the golem? Ya know, just to give some more DNA options for the settlement?¡±


    I could almost hear Kraken rubbing his hands together. [Why not? Put some wyvern, giant deer, fire dragon, put all of that in there. Don¡¯t forget to put human in there too, the golem needs the base material as a starting point.]Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know if I count as that anymore thanks to all of my sorceries,¡± I replied, ¡°I mean, am I even human anymore?¡±


    [Doesn¡¯t matter, maybe it¡¯ll give someone the ability to use magic however small.]


    Taking a chance, I cut my hand and poured a bit of blood on the flesh golem before closing up the wound. Taking Gungnir, I cut off a bit of haunch from Rath¡¯s leg and then the same from the big wyvern and put it in front of the golem. Sticking my arm into it, I ordered it to consume the pieces of meat and then make the minotaur grow scales on his newest arm. It worked like a charm, the golem absorbed the meat and slapped a pseudopod over the minotaur¡¯s arm covering it completely. After a minute, it retracted and there on the unconscious minotaur¡¯s arm was a set of blazing red scales.


    I made the golem put it back to normal to reestablish a baseline. For the next hour or so, I had the golem add and remove all kinds of modifications to the minotaur. My favorite was the four armed version with scales on the arms and chest. It was a bit tricky as we had to alter the sprint and ribs a lot to accommodate a second set of shoulders, but all in all it was pretty easy. The golem was more than able to keep the subject unconscious on its own, easily manipulating the hormones and nerves so that the minotaur stayed in a state of bliss.


    [I can¡¯t believe you found a way around their natural immunity to magic!] Kraken said, absolutely geeking out in the middle of my experiments.


    ¡°It seems to be concentrated in their skin,¡± I explained, poking and prodding the minotaur. ¡°They¡¯re malleable enough once you get underneath it and to the blood, or maybe it has something to do with the fact that he¡¯s unconscious and can¡¯t resist without focusing on it. You saw the same thing I did during our fight, they were using magic, all of them, but the shamans were directing it.¡±


    [True, true, anyways, I deem this a success. Just to let you know, I added a couple more useful side functions as well. It can function as a medical kit in combat. It has a portable function, just touch the blob to the wound and it¡¯ll close it up. A blob of flesh golem in your back pocket can replace a blown off hand or foot or face. You¡¯ll need the main golem for all the fancy stuff.]


    ¡°I like it,¡± I said, smiling like an idiot. ¡°Imagine all of the lives that could have been saved if hospitals had something like this.¡±


    [You know all of the men are going to use this to make their dicks bigger, right?]


    Even though he was definitely right, I couldn¡¯t just down my race like that. Ignoring Kraken for the moment, I shoved the flesh golem into Gungnir and put the minotaur back into the freezer.


    ¡°If you have time to think about dicks even though you don¡¯t have one, then you have time for what I originally wanted you to do,¡± I said, walking back to the Lab and sticking Gungnir into the slot on the brain vat. ¡°Useful info, chop chop.¡±


    I ignored Kraken¡¯s good natured grumbles as I snagged a quick meal cube and jogged outside. The rest of the day was dedicated to replenishing my stores of conjured crystal ammo and updating the sunstone solar panels with expanded surface runes so that each panel could grab several times more worth of surface area. After building up an impressive stock of them with accompanying platinum covered batteries, I stored them away in the lab and pulled out a dwarven rifle.


    What had been bugging me for a while was I did not truly understand some of the magical tech in my possession. The runic channel in the barrel of the Centauri rifle shone too brightly for me to get a really good look at it, which Kraken might be able to help out with. The dwarven rifle was something I hadn¡¯t had a chance to delve into either, but the biggest frustration was my lack of success with my own freaking crystal grenades. It took awhile for me to fix the crystal rounds to actually achieve the effect I wanted, but the grenades were just a bit too dangerous for me to screw around with.


    Laying the grenade and both kinds of rifles in front of me, I used mana sorcery to peer through everything to get a general sense as to how they worked. From earlier inspections, I knew that the Centauri rifle shaved off metal needles, charged them with mana from the wielder and blasted a part energy/part matter projectile that could do some incredible damage. The dwarven rifle, from what I¡¯d seen in our last fight, was that they shot pure mana, raw energy. It puzzled me because their rifles don¡¯t have any power packs or batteries that I can make out, just a complex set of runes that seemed to change the basic structure of the energy bolts.


    I could make out runes to change the rifle output to act like a flamethrower, some kind of short range shotgun taser, and there was also a kinetic blast function as well. There was a barreled chamber on the side for what I was guessing was specialized rounds or bombs. What I wanted to do was combine the two rifles into one, adding in the unique long ranged firepower of the Centauri rifle with the versatility of the dwarven one. And then if I get my crystal grenades figured out, I¡¯d be able to change them so they could be fired out of the rifle. Now, I didn¡¯t really need this particular form of weaponry, personally, but what American son doesn¡¯t love an awesome gun?


    Using earth sorcery, I banished the grenade crystal and resolved to get to that later. Now, my earth sorcery gives me a decent amount of control over metal, I can work with it but it¡¯s a lot harder as it requires more energy. Conjuring a wall of stone or earth is almost an instantaneous process, but trying to do the same thing with metal is far slower, probably due some great science I don¡¯t understand yet. What earth sorcery did excel at with metal is the detail work, allowing me to very carefully take apart the magitech carbines.


    An hour¡¯s worth of careful work later, I had both rifles in segmented pieces laid out in front of me. What was missing was the technology that I had, the crystal battery. The magazine for the Centauri rifle was something I didn¡¯t want to get rid of, and the barrel of that rifle with its rune channel went with this specific kind magazine to produce the energized projectile. Taking the multi barreled part of the dwarven rifle, I used my earth sorcery to bond the Centauri barrel to the multi-barrel and then hollowed out the dwarven grip and put a new crystal battery inside of it. The dwarven grip was thicker than the Centauri allowing me to put a bigger battery inside when I hollowed it out.


    ¡°Flamethrower function I stole, Centauri shard rounds, kinetic blaster, taser cannon . . ¡° I said, putting the best pieces of each rifle together, using earth sorcery to cheat to force the pieces to fit together. To finish off the first iteration of the rifle, I added one more barrel with a summon and fire function allowing it to summon the crystal rounds directly from the storage area in Gungnir so I could use my own personal rounds. Looking it over, it looked good. It was reminiscent of someone combining an old school six shooter with a modern AR-15 rifle. The barrels would rotate when you flick the safety and a thin layer of blackened platinum covered up the energy signature of the crystal battery which I made sure to fill to the max.


    [Oh the dwarves would storm a mountain for that beauty,] Kraken said, his mental voice all breathy. [Let me see! If you¡¯re gonna stick me on brain duty then I get to see the pretty rifle!]


    [Yeah yeah, hold on,] I sent back, triple checking to make sure that everything lined up perfectly. I jogged back to the Lab and held out my new masterpiece as Kraken popped out of Gungnir.


    [Oh it¡¯s gorgeous! Look at those sleek lines, and damn that was a good idea, having the rifle pull from a battery instead of you. The dwarves standard design pulls extra energy from the surrounding area or a ley line if they stumble across one. Wait, where¡¯s the grenade launcher? And what did you do to that rune channel?]


    ¡°I uh, took it from the Centauri rifle and put it in this one,¡± I said, worried that I screwed something up.


    [This would have blown up in your face! There¡¯s no alternating connection between the barrels and the battery? One would have worked, exploded, and the other barrels wouldn¡¯t have done shit. Good grief, gimme that.]


    We spent the next hour ¡®improving¡¯ my design. It was both irritating and reassuring to know that I still had a ways to go. The main part I was missing was an ¡®alternating¡¯ pivot enchantment that allows for multiple outputs. The channel of power from the battery was only connected to one barrel and required the necessary pathways to power the others.


    [We¡¯ll need to put the grenades off till later if you want me to make any headway on the brain. That thing is thick.]


    ¡°Sure,¡± I said, waving my hand. ¡°It¡¯s not a serious priority, just something that needs to be done one piece at a time when we actually have the time. The last thing I want to do is make some scaled down versions of this rifle for the group of people as well as giving them two of the new solar panel setups for when they get their settlement going.¡±


    Standing up with the new rifle, I waved it around a bit. ¡°And just imagine, once we get these perfected, we can stick a couple oversized rifles on a vine giant and we¡¯ll have our own plant mech! Or, long range weaponry for Everest! I freaking love magic!¡±


    [Don¡¯t get ahead of yourself. Everest ain¡¯t smart enough for a gun. Just give him a big axe or a stone pillar. And for the love of god, do NOT give Kong a weapon! I saw your King Kong movie memories, let¡¯s avoid that snafu.]


    It took days for me to get ready. It wasn¡¯t just crafting solar panels, new rifles and loads of ammo to go with them, or even the research for the grenades, it was being too chickenshit to go out and see new people. Damn, it was hard enough to do that kind of thing at a bar before all this went down and now I actually have to follow through and go say hello to a group of two hundred strangers? Shoot me now. I¡¯ve fought a dragon, their greyish cousins, witches, some kind of nightstalker, beefed up goblins, and Centauri warriors not to mention freaking nephilim controlled by dwarves in the middle of a fight with minotaurs. My safety really wasn¡¯t in question.


    [It can¡¯t be that hard,] Kraken pressed. [Humans have done ¡®social interactions¡¯ for literally all of their history. You can¡¯t be the one retard can you? You show up, you give gifts to ease your conscience, explain them so they don¡¯t kill themselves with it, and then dip.]


    Sitting on top of a barge-like boat I grew out of a tree near the river, I leaned against the huge stone container in the middle. This box held thirty rifles, sixty sealed cases of ammo, a hundred grenades that actually worked, and my flesh golem. Part of me was still going over the really stupid, really small issue that initially prevented the grenades from working, they were made too well. I ended up having to make a small flawed crystal battery in the middle with a metal spike who¡¯s point was embedded in the flaw. Pushing that spike in all the way activated a rune channel which would overload itself after four or so seconds. Once I got that down, I just had to pump the grenade full of mana and coat it in scaled down penetrator rounds and voila! These babies had an instant kill radius of about twenty yards, a horrible injury and probable death radius of forty, and I didn¡¯t have time to test them out further than that.


    ¡°Huh? Sorry, wasn¡¯t paying attention, what?¡± I checked in again with Spot through our mental link just to make sure for the thousandth time we were going in the right direction.


    [People, they¡¯re just people. You can talk to people. And then, when you¡¯re done talking to people, you can leave and not talk to people for a long time.]


    Great. People. Woo fuckin¡¯ hoo. The trip really didn¡¯t take long. About an hour and a half down the river, we arrived at the entrance of the valley just as Lyra popped out behind a pointy outcropping of rocks. The valley was ringed by thick forests crawling up giant mountains, an idyllic place for any settlers as the river cut right through the middle of it continuing on for another thousand miles. There was plenty of arable land for farming and the forest would provide all the necessary lumber for housing. I brought some tools I invented just for these people, I couldn¡¯t bring things only related to death and destruction.


    Lyra¡¯s head hit the ground as she kneeled, bent over. ¡°My lord! I have failed you! Take my life in penance, remove your gifts from me, I seek your forgiveness and mercy!¡±


    ¡°This is weird, get up,¡± I said, leaning back as if I wanted to not be associated with this over the top display of repentance. ¡°Just tell me what¡¯s wrong?¡±


    ¡°I couldn¡¯t stop them! They took your companion and discovered me as well! Run my lord, it¡¯s a-¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not a trap you melodramatic leaf!¡± I spun around, all of my gear lighting up with mana as I hadn¡¯t even sensed anyone else nearby. ¡°We just wanted to talk to your master, or whoever had you spying on us.¡±


    An absolute vision walked out of the trees, dark red hair with green eyes complete with a figure that would make any man stop dead in his tracks. This was the kind of woman that would cause beer bottles to fall from hands if she walked into a bar. It took all I had not to adjust my pants even through the sex drive inhibitor I had running in a background mental process.


    ¡°Get away from him Lovera!¡± A loud series of crashes sounded through the underbrush as good ol¡¯ Mark posted up on a nearby tree, his rifle trained right at my face. Several other men in camo did the same, spread out at least ten yards apart.


    ¡°Damn it Mark! We had this conversation!¡± Another lady stalked through the woods, this one holding a glowing staff. ¡°This is a diplomatic mission that we agreed would be handled by the NICE lady instead of the MEAN man!¡± Spinning towards me, the stone adorning her staff no longer glowing ominously. ¡°I¡¯m so sorry about Mark and his friends, they¡¯re just overeager. My name is Cassandra.¡±


    I forgot how much I hate people.

 Chapter 125 - Breaking the Ice (Book 2 Chapter 32)

    The women were a whirlwind of well-practiced organization. They outright shamed Mark and his men into putting their rifles down, had somehow packed up all my crap and gotten it towed to their tent village by Spot who was more than happy to drag shit if a child played fetch with him, and then had me placed at the head of a roughly hewn table filled with wild game dishes next to Lyra as if we were the guests of honor.


    Questions like, ¡°What¡¯s your name? How long have you two known each other? Are y¡¯all together?¡± and, ¡°What¡¯s it like living all alone in the woods?¡±, ¡°Oh tell me about your magic?l!¡± were asked by the ladies as Mark and his crew sitting across from me had their own set of questions. ¡°Where are you from? What do you want? What are your intentions?¡± Each question quickly following the other, not even giving me time to respond.


    It was too much. I sat in silence, taking in the barrage of queries, my mental sorcery compiling a list of answers even as my eyes were wide and my gear stayed at full power. ¡°Let him breathe!¡± The soft voice interrupting the interrogation fiasco shut everyone up. ¡°You¡¯re scaring the man, and I don¡¯t think this is the kind of man we want to scare, is it?¡± The woman named Lovera stood next to Mark, glaring at everyone to get her point across. It was the look a woman gives her man to shut him up in front of her work friends, or the one a parent gives to a loudmouthed child in front of guests.


    Looking at me, she continued, ¡°My apologies for our lack of manners.¡± Her hand tightening on the back of Mark¡¯s chair as she smacked him with the other. ¡°Curiosity seems to have gotten the better of us. Please, eat, relax. We have plenty.¡± If I didn¡¯t have a wife I would have drowned in her eyes.


    [Dude, nut up. Do something cause you ain¡¯t thinkin¡¯ straight.] Kraken was right. Taking a deep breath, I used flesh sorcery to tamp down on my raging repressed hormones and my consciousness sorcery to focus and act like a normal freaking human being.


    The table was full of people, not just Mark and his crew who looked like normal guys who had a rough go of things lately, but further down were two magic users with their staffs arguing over a roasted duck leg and some children at the end eating as if their lives depended on it, their eyes big as they watched the grownups argue.


    ¡°My name is Nate,¡± I said, ¡°And uh, I survived the apocalypse.¡± Man that was heavy. I haven¡¯t talked to normal humans in months, or a year? It feels like forever ago that I was in suburbia, getting drunk and watching Sharknado movies, the comforts of toilet paper and fast food at my beck and call. Everyone just looked at me, hanging on every word as I decided how to condense months of pure insanity into syllables capable of capturing it. ¡°Sorry, I¡¯m not good at this. God, what am I, stuck in AA?¡± I fumbled, taking off my helmet and setting it on the table next to my plate. ¡°It¡¯s been a wild ride for some time, a long time, and I still feel like I¡¯m on it.¡±


    Running my hand through my hair, I kept going. ¡°This green imitation of a woman here is a dryad named Lyra, and no, we¡¯re not together. I¡¯m good with magic and live in the forest down the river where Fredericksburg, Virginia used to be. I¡¯ve been fighting for my life and munchkining it like there¡¯s no tomorrow.¡± My hands clenched and unclenched, bits of memories floating back to me, fighting Rath underwater, first time meeting the Centauri, using magic for the first time while a cat was gnawing on me.


    Grasping at my power, I forced my mind and body to calm. [Why?] I thought, grimacing inwardly. [Why, of all times, is this getting to me?] It might be because I hadn¡¯t actually stopped to process any of this, and it also might be a side effect of messing with my hormones with flesh sorcery. Both, that was the answer supplied by my consciousness. The answer was freaking both. ¡°I could use a drink,¡± I said after taking a moment to breathe.


    One of the soldiers looked at me, then askance at his buddies as they gave the barest of nods. Reaching into his Army coat pocket, he pulled out a thin silver flask and handed it to me. ¡°Snuck this right out from under one of them Centauri patrols,¡± he said gruffly. ¡°It¡¯s good stuff. Glenlivet scotch, probably the last we¡¯ll ever see. I¡¯m Scott by the way.¡±


    I liked Scott immediately. Reminded me of some of my old friends from way back. Taking the top off, I sniffed the thick nutty bite of the liquor and took a small sip, handing the flask back. The burn went down my throat nice and smooth as my muscles relaxed in ways I didn¡¯t know they were tense. It was the shiver of warmth good alcohol hits you with, the stuff that lets you know you¡¯re alive.


    ¡°Thanks man,¡± I said, my voice thick because I knew how precious that flask was to him. Looking him dead in the eye, I kept my voice steady, ¡°That was the best I¡¯d had in a long ass time. I got something for you too.¡± Since he was the first one here to show me real kindness, I decided to use Scott as the icebreaker.


    ¡°Lyra,¡± I said. ¡°Please have the container brought over.¡± As she got up to do as I asked, I set Gungnir in knife form on the table, pulling out my own personal rifle, the souped up sweet alien magitech combo. I had actually made two of them, one was to be my spare in keeping with the prepper mindset, two is one and one is none. ¡°Scott, this is for you. I imagine you¡¯re a little low on some good homemade weaponry, so here¡¯s mine. She¡¯ll treat you better than anything made on Earth, pre-apocalypse of course.¡±


    Scott¡¯s eyes almost popped out of his skull as they devoured the sleek black deadliness that was my rifle. Every place that was a hard line or a sharp edge, I had used my earth sorcery to smooth those down so that the rifle had the overall appearance that it had been grown, like some alien metallic plant. ¡°It shoots energized particles, shotgun electro taser bolts, a kinetic blast, and even fires long range crystal magitech rounds. This baby can take out a dragon if you know what you¡¯re doin¡¯.¡±


    I raised my voice a bit louder. ¡°And I have more gifts, tools really, as a show of good faith. Lyra, if you please.¡± My dryad played the role of showgirl assistant as she pulled out samples of the gear that I had made. ¡°Rifles complete with boxes of ammo made by yours truly, some basic stone and steel blades, grenades, and magitech solar panels for charging all of your mana needs.¡±


    All of my products were laid out nicely in the grass in front of everyone as I pointed to each in turn. ¡°I¡¯ll show you all how to use everything if you want, but for those less inclined to violence, I do have something else.¡± Pulling out the real prizes of the day, I laid them out on top of the table. ¡°These, these are building wands,¡± I said, waving my hand at the fifteen slender wands. ¡°The five on the left are for stone and dirt, the middle five are for growing and manipulating plants of all kinds, and the five on the right are for water. They all work the same way in that they¡¯ll pull mana from you and shape the element they¡¯re made for. Anyone can use them, it¡¯ll just take some practice.¡±


    Everyone got real quiet. Mark¡¯s intense gaze hitched up to eleven. ¡°Anyone?¡± he said hoarsely.


    I took a quick peek around on the magical side of things. Yeah, everyone glowed chock full of mana. ¡°Sure,¡± I answered. ¡°Anyone with mana, all of you have it. Some will probably take to it quicker than others but all of you have it.¡± I could tell from the various looks on their faces that they didn¡¯t believe me.


    ¡°Seriously,¡± I said with a wry chuckle. ¡°Even kids can use it. I made these so anyone could build themselves a house out of the ground, or grow it out of a tree. These could make the most incredible garden you¡¯ve ever seen, and help you build a dam . . . The only thing they won¡¯t do is be useful for combat. They work slowly.¡±


    ¡°Can I try?¡± A little girl popped up next to me, her big blue eyes full of wonder. ¡°That one?¡± She pointed at one of the plant wands. I looked around for her mother or father, seeing if there was someone who would give her the permission she was looking for. Not seeing any objectors, I handed it to her but didn¡¯t let go when her tiny hand grabbed it.


    ¡°Sure sweetheart,¡± I said, pointing at a small sapling not far from the table. ¡°You gotta practice first. See that tree? See if you can make it sprout some leaves, and if you can, we¡¯ll see about getting you some flowers to practice on, ok?¡±


    Nodding with way too much excitement, she sprinted over to the tree as I got up and followed her, crouching behind her as she pointed the wand at a low hanging branch. ¡°Grow!¡± she ordered imperiously, like any child given authority for the first time. ¡°GROW!¡± At this point, a decent chunk of women were glaring at me for getting a little girl¡¯s hopes up.


    ¡°It¡¯s not working,¡± she pouted, turning to look at me.


    ¡°What¡¯s your name?¡±


    ¡°Sheila.¡±


    ¡°Well Sheila, I need you to close your eyes, no peeking,¡± I admonished her, pouring a tiny bit of mana into her hand, pushing it through to the wand. ¡°Now, imagine that the wand is glowing. Put some of your mind and soul into it and make the glowing touch the tree. Think of a leaf, of how it grows. It starts with a little bump on a branch, and then after some rain and sun, the little bump cracks open and little teeny leaves grow out.¡± Putting one finger on the butt of the wand, I pushed it forward until it touched the bark of a thin, low branch. My mana joined with hers, giving it direction. I sped up my mind with mental sorcery giving me the chance to closely watch a child do magic. I¡¯ve always been intimately familiar with my own abilities, but other people work and think differently.Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    ¡°I feel it!¡± She squealed, gripping the wand tighter with both hands, the tip of it embedded in the bark. Her own mana moved in bits and spurts as her faith in herself and me gave her just the right amount of motivation.


    ¡°Honey, it¡¯s ok if you can¡¯t do it!¡± Someone called from behind me.


    ¡°Ignore them,¡± I whispered. ¡°You can do it, you¡¯re almost there.¡± The nature wands were all set up with growth and directional growth nature-based runes with a small disc emerald in the base and a pointy emerald shard at the point. The moving mana was clear to me as I could see in the magical spectrum even though I doubted any of them could. Just as the little girl was opening her eyes in frustration, a needle of green mana speared into the branch, invisible to everyone else, causing three tiny leaves to poke out. ¡°YOU DID IT!¡± I sang, pointing at the leaves.


    ¡°I DID IT!¡± She screeched, right in my ear. I turned to show everyone but they were already there, their faces three inches away from the branch.


    ¡°Holy shitballs, she really did do it!¡± One of the ladies I hadn¡¯t met yet smacked the guy in the shoulder.


    ¡°Not in front of the kids!¡±


    ¡°But Cassie, look! She hasn¡¯t been able to use magic like any of the other kids, but she touches a wand and all the sudden she¡¯s like you? Somethin¡¯s up.¡±


    Taking a step back, I stood up and looked at the group ooing and ahing over what looked to be a miracle in their eyes. Grabbing an earth wand and water wand, one in each hand, I came back over to Sheila and held them up in front of her. ¡°Which one you wanna try next?¡±


    Pointing at the earth one, I handed it to her and walked over about ten feet away from the tree. Using a bit of earth sorcery, I conjured about a bucket¡¯s worth of sand at my feet. ¡°Same thing Sheila, do it the same way. Picture a little sand castle in your head, focus on the warm glowing feeling, and touch the wand to the sand.¡±


    The presumptuously cute little girl walked over, her blonde curls bouncing with every step. Closing her eyes for a moment, she bent over and stabbed the sand. A two-tiered castle complete with watch towers, a gate, and a little sand princess next to a flagpole popped out of the ground.


    ¡°Holy shit,¡± I said, not expecting that level of detail on her first try with a wand. The lady from before glared at me as well, letting me know that even if I was a powerful sorcerer, cursing was still not allowed around the kids. Establishing my dominance by rolling my eyes, I handed Sheila the water wand as I conjured a block of ice in front of the castle. Giving her the go ahead, Sheila had no problems melting the block of ice and wrapping it around the castle, giving it a moat.


    Just before anyone noticed, I reached over and poured a bit of mana back into her. Being so young and new to magic, I was beyond impressed at the amount and variety of tasks she could do with the three simple wands, but she didn¡¯t have the mana capacity to do this all day. The entire set of wands was quickly snagged by various individuals as they all started trying to use them.


    ¡°HOLD UP!¡± I yelled, getting their attention. ¡°To be clear, the wands do not conjure materials like I¡¯ve been doing, they only manipulate it. The substance has to already be present.¡±


    Turning around, I saw some people struggling with it and others making things with precise detail. ¡°I can¡¯t do it,¡± Mark snarled, looking ready to snap the water wand he was holding.


    ¡°Me neither,¡± Scott said, frowning but with a lot less anger. Looking in the magical spectrum, I told them to take a minute and meditate. As they attempted the second time, I noticed something different with them compared to Sheila. The men had plenty of mana, but it got stopped up at various points like their shoulder joints or wrists. The majority of their mana was concentrated in their torso, their heads, and legs.


    ¡°Odd,¡± I muttered, zooming in as much as I could. ¡°You guys have some kind of blockage there, what the hell is this? Some juncture where your mana doesn¡¯t seem to wanna go past.¡± Reaching forward, I put one figure on the center part of Scott¡¯s wrist bone and started to push some mana through the blockage.


    [STOP!] Kraken screamed from his Spot in Gungnir. [Wait, stop, pull your mana back real carefully now. You don¡¯t wanna do what you were about to do.] Carefully following his instructions, I held up one finger to tell the men to give me a minute.


    [What, do you know what this is?] I asked, keeping my vision focused on Scott¡¯s arm, examining the blockage.


    [Yeah, I found it in your memories a while ago from the stuffy you pulled from Reeanth¡¯s clone brain. People like these are rare. They can¡¯t use magic in the normal sense, instead they have special runes tattooed on them and are given special gear to use their kind of magic. They¡¯re called the ¡®Glyph Blades¡¯.]


    I hadn¡¯t had a chance to go through all of Reeanth¡¯s memories yet, but this definitely sounds like one of the things I would have loved to learn on my own. [Keep going,] I sent back.


    [It¡¯s pretty simple. It¡¯s rare, but some people can¡¯t use mana normally because their body has a strange connective network with their soul. Those are the ¡®blockages¡¯ you see. Glyph blades, if augmented correctly, can become the most terrifying hand-to-hand combatants in the multiverse. Essentially, they put runes on the blockages giving them certain effects, like being able to infuse that part of the body with a specific amount of mana and jump up a skyscraper. There are accounts of Glyph blades having actual ¡®blade¡¯ runes on their wrists, allowing them to sprout blades of concentrated mana that can cut through pretty much anything. They¡¯re only tied down by their runic tattoos.]


    ¡°Well boys,¡± I said, sighing as I did so. ¡°I got good news and bad news. Bad news, this child will forever and always be better with a wand than you.¡± The stank eye came from every direction. ¡°The good news is uh, that you¡¯ll probably be able to fight a giant with one arm tied behind your back.¡±


    Turning his wrist over, I used flesh sorcery to give him a bit of my own magical sight and had him look at himself. Explaining to Scott what I learned from Kraken, I then pointed out the difference between himself and Sheila.


    ¡°So I¡¯m all stopped up?¡±


    ¡°Yup. Here . . .¡±


    Taking a set of runes supplied by Kraken, I used flesh sorcery to make a complex rune channel made up of melanin that I darkened. The base, starting about six inches before the wrist, was the control rune to allow Scott to properly will the magic into existence from his source of mana. The next rune, two inches closer to the wrist, was the flesh protection rune to give his arm the durability necessary to wield the magic, and then meshed together on top of the wrist joint were the blockage siphon rune and the rune for fire. Double checking my work, I took his right arm and did the same thing but for kinetic manipulation.


    ¡°What did you do?¡± Lovera said, stepping in and examining Scott¡¯s arms for herself. Scott pulled them back, wriggling as he did.


    ¡°Ah! It itches! What the fuck!¡± he yelled, continuing to shake his arms.


    ¡°Calm down crybaby,¡± I teased, ignoring the people around me tensing and reaching for their weapons, even the ones I gave them. ¡°Give it a minute, I just gave you superpowers! Hahaha, the left arm can shoot fireballs while the second arm basically gives you a falcon punch. If you get really good, which might take a while, you¡¯ll be able to create and manipulate the flame however you want with your left arm while the right arm will have some pretty cool shielding abilities.¡±


    ¡°No fuckin¡¯ way!¡± he gasped. ¡°My arms are basically guns now!¡±


    ¡°Magic guns,¡± I corrected. Looking around in the magical spectrum, I confirmed the bit of disbelief that had been bugging me. [Kraken, dude, I thought you said that the kind of body required for Glyph Blades is rare?]


    [Yeah, so?]


    The rest of the group of humans had joined up to watch the magical spectacle at this point, hanging on my every word. [Then why do I see at least twenty people with the same thing?]


    Thirty minutes of explaining later, I had identified everyone who had the capability of being a Glyph Blade and let them know. I was inundated with people wanting me to rune them up as well, to which I had to conjure a freaking stone pillar underneath me to raise me up, giving me just a bit of breathing room. From ten feet up, I started yelling loud enough for everyone to hear me.


    ¡°All right, all right, calm down people. I got one last thing here for everyone and I¡¯m going to let everyone know everything about it so it doesn¡¯t get hogged by just a few people. Lyra, bring out the flesh golem!¡±


    Lyra tipped over the heavy stone container causing the meter thick ball of flesh rolled out. ¡°This here is a flesh golem. I already gave you the healing stone but this thing is so much more.¡± Quickly sending a mental message to Kraken who was still inside of Gungnir, I tossed my weapon so that it landed point down in the flesh golem.


    ¡°This particular creation is a multi-variant body healer and enhancer. Stick whatever part of your body you want in it and the flesh golem will heal it or fix it to however you want it. If you lost a finger, it¡¯ll put a new one on with your exact DNA. If you lost an eye, stick your face in it and you¡¯ll have a new one. It can fix obesity, lack of muscle tone, and can even upgrade you in whatever crazy fashion you want. I¡¯ve put dragon, minotaur, dwarven, and wyvern DNA in there, which means you can grow wings, scales, horns, beards . . . the list goes on.¡±


    I took a deep breath. ¡°For what it¡¯s worth, I just put some new programming in there for you people who are the unique body type. You can have that flesh golem put melanin tattoos on you however you want. Experiment, go nuts, because even if you mess up, that thing can put you back together.¡±


    ¡°This is too generous, what do you want?¡± Stepping into the fading light, Cassandra stood in front of everyone. ¡°Everything has a price.¡±


    My eyes narrowed as I looked at her. I didn¡¯t know where this confrontational attitude was coming from, but I guess it was just general distrust of too much benevolence, which was fair. ¡°Everything does have a price,¡± I agreed. ¡°This price of the flesh golem is that it must be fed. If it shrinks, kill a deer and give it to it. It¡¯ll absorb it no problem. Everything else, well, I¡¯ve already paid the price for it.¡±


    Yes, my collection of gifts was above and beyond what anyone would normally do, but this was the freaking apocalypse, or it was and still might be. For people not as overpowered or prepared as I was, I could see how it might come across. Honestly, I didn¡¯t care. Something in me just wouldn¡¯t let me go without at least tangentially providing protection to freaking children. Damn, I wanted to have kids with my woman before she went all tree on me, but human instinct is hard to fight against.


    I accepted the offer to stay in camp and meet all the people I was helping out. It didn¡¯t take long for the magic users of the group to jump on the solar panels right after I explained what they were and how they worked. All of the men had mobbed the flesh golem and I¡¯m pretty sure I knew exactly what they were ¡®fixing¡¯ over there. The children fought over the wands and I did notice that none of them had the Glyph Blade issue. Of the twenty people who qualified for that, eighteen of them were men. Two of those ladies sought me out later for advice and other activities as they pointed me towards their makeshift shelter. A quiet, polite decline at the public table saved me some embarrassment and unwanted questions as I got up to go discuss with the men their tattoo arrangements.


    ¡°Telescopic vision combined with fast reflexes is definitely better than melee combat!¡± Mark argued, waving his new rifle around. ¡°I¡¯m telling you, if you can kill a man and his friends well before they see you, then you won. Screw waving a sword around when you¡¯ve got a baby like this!¡±


    ¡°And how well did that work out for ya when fighting the Aelves, or the Beastman for that matter?¡± Scott argued back. ¡°Shit man, everybody seems to have some kind of shield against bullets. It¡¯s almost useless! I¡¯m getting me big ass muscles and some awesome tattoo craziness.¡±


    Another man spit off to the side. ¡°Yur both idjits. Magics the answer, flingin¡¯ flangin fire and the lightnin¡¯ of gawd hisself is what¡¯s gunna mess¡¯em up.¡±


    I arrived right at the height of the furiously quiet discussion. ¡°Nah, mobility and endurance is key. Can¡¯t kill whatcha can¡¯t hit or catch.¡±


    They all turned to look at me dumbfounded as I sat there with a grin. ¡°Aw come on boys, I didn¡¯t see combat in the Reserves but I¡¯ve seen plenty since then. Let me tell you about this one time I drowned a dragon . . .¡±

 Chapter 126 - The Human Side (Book 2 Chapter 33)

    Turns out, each one of the soldier guys had their own flask, and Mark, their de facto leader, had some secret ring that functioned like Gungnir in the way that it could store an incredible amount of crap. Sitting around a big bonfire, we all swapped stories as we sipped on potent liquor from different flasks that Mark kept surreptitiously filling up from his ring. The one that made us laugh the hardest was their retelling of how they nabbed twenty huge kegs of thick brown rum from a Dwarven caravan, but they all got quiet when I asked where they kept it. Keeping my gaze flat, I pulled out Gungnir and had it pour out a pile of bullets.


    After that, we were suddenly best friends. All of the guys who were ready to kill me as soon as they saw me accepted when they figured out that there was really nothing they had that I wanted. My own power, the kinds of things I could make, as well as the overt generosity let them view me as another one of them. To which, we found ourselves in front of the flesh golem off to the side of the entire party where the light petered out into the dark forest.


    ¡°Come on Scott, you do it. He¡¯s your butt buddy, which means you¡¯re first.¡±


    ¡°Fuck off, you know me Stacy are having fun.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s why you¡¯re right here! Hahaha, can¡¯t satisfy her can ya?¡±


    I looked around at the guys who were nervously looking around at each other while still cracking jokes, all knowing what they wanted to do but not really trusting anything about it. Holding in my laughter at this moment was the hardest thing I¡¯ve ever done. For all they know, they have to put their dicks in the golem for it to enlarge them, but I fibbed a little bit knowing something like this would happen. All they had to do was stick any body part in there and the flesh golem would do the enhancement anywhere. If they were going to replace a leg, then sticking that particular leg in is what they¡¯d have to do. So here they stood, all of them wanting bigger dicks but not man enough to just shove it in.


    ¡°What?¡± I said. ¡°Don¡¯t look at me. I¡¯ve already done this.¡± Total lie, but worth it.


    ¡°All right you sick fucks, we¡¯ll do this the way we pee in the woods together. No eye contact, and look up if you have to.¡± After giving his drunk order, Scott pulled his pants down and shoved it in. Shouts of ¡®just do it¡¯ and ¡®fuck yeah¡¯ somehow gave them all the courage to do the same, except for Jamal who just sat there.


    ¡°What?¡± he said, as I looked with the question clearly on my face. ¡°Dude, I got nothing to complain about down there.¡± Chuckling at his buddies, he took another pull on his flask and leaned over. ¡°Just between you and me man, they bout¡¯ to learn about big dick problems.¡±


    We couldn¡¯t stop laughing and it got even worse when Scott took a step back, proudly showing off an extra appendage. ¡°I know for a fact Stacy ain¡¯t down with both lanes!¡± Mark said as Jamal and I howled with laughter. Grumbling at the fact there were more men than women in the group, Scott used the flesh golem to remove the extra dick. ¡°Oh my god! I can¡¯t wait to tell Stacy what you were thinkin¡¯!¡± Mark said, tears streaming down his face.


    I leaned on Jamal for support even though he was making it difficult due to his full on belly laughing. After five minutes of making fun of Scott, who eventually joined in laughing at himself as well, Jamal looked at the flesh golem and then back at me. ¡°Anything huh? Just touch it and I can do whatever I want to my own body?¡± A quick shrug with a nod was all he needed. Placing his hand on it, Jamal closed his eyes, whispering out loud, ¡°Shredded as a mofo, and uh, let¡¯s put the heart of dragon in me too.¡±


    My eyes bugged out. ¡°Wait, what!?¡± I yelled, lurching forward to put one hand on the golem and another on his back. Enveloping them both with my flesh sorcery, I watched as the flesh golem sucked Jamal in until his most of chest was inside of it but his head was still out. Tendrils of invasive red magic speared through Jamal¡¯s heart, twisting it, devouring it while simultaneously replacing the bits just like he drunkenly wished for. I was so glad that I put in the automatic pain-numbing programming in the golem because otherwise the pain itself might have killed him. Regardless of not feeling the pain, the sheer speed and power of the violent internal changed rocked Jamal, his body trying to seize and vomit but the golem wouldn¡¯t allow his body to react.


    Using my own magic, I quickly knocked him unconscious and assisted with the change, making sure that the all of the subsidiary veins and arteries were strengthened to handle the increased power of a dragon¡¯s heart. Subtle changes were needed as well, the shaving off of the instinctive heightened aggression and dominance that comes with the draconic territory, the lessening of the hoarding desire as well as the overwhelming lust part too.


    As soon as it was over, the flesh golem spit Jamal out, returning to its normal orb state, albeit just a bit smaller. Waking Jamal up, I smacked just to drive my point home. ¡°What, in, the, FUCK!? At least ASK before you do something that drastic and STUPID! The flesh golem is LITERAL! Doing just that would have killed you in the five minutes after the change if I hadn¡¯t fixed you!¡±


    He came to all hazy, his eyes unfocused as he spoke, ¡°Did it work?¡± Handing him his own flask, I pulled Jamal to his feet, doing my best to return his mind and body to a calm state.


    ¡°Yes,¡± I answered, shaking my head. ¡°But damn dude, that kind of change needs to be planned out first. Ask me next-¡±


    ¡°ME NEXT!¡± I didn¡¯t have time to react as Mark walked into the golem, squatting a bit so that he fit inside except for his head which stayed just above it. God it looked weird, like a two-tiered fleshly snowman. Putting my hand on his hand to get a picture of what was going on, I looked Mark in the eye.


    ¡°Whatcha mean, next?¡± I growled, noting the changes. Honestly, I was surprised because the changes weren¡¯t overly radical. With a dopey grin, Mark stepped out of the golem after two minutes, the golem much smaller for the change as Mark was much bigger, much. He had gained about two inches in height and about fifty pounds of muscle. The man gave the Greek statues of Hercules a freaking complex right now.


    ¡°If a dragon heart is too crazy for a change, then I¡¯ll settle for being able to kick Schwarzenegger¡¯s ass!¡± Flexing to show off his naked body, Mark twisted and did every exaggerated pose a body builder would, each muscle popping out.


    ¡°Gross dude,¡± Scott said, turning away. ¡°You¡¯re a steroid experiment gone wrong! Bet your dick shrank off too.¡±


    ¡°No steroids here baby,¡± Mark grinned. ¡°Just hundo P perfect magic muscle here! Bet I could bench a freaking tree right now.¡±


    ¡°Betcha can¡¯t scratch your head.¡± We all had a good laugh as Mark instantly tried and failed to do so.


    Deciding that we had had enough drunken fun with the golem for one night, I overrode its programming and shut it down until I could get someone to be in charge of it, preferably some magic user with a background in healing or transformation. The next morning came too soon for some, but for me it wasn¡¯t an issue. Hangovers don¡¯t exist for flesh sorcerers. Waking up early to do a quick reconnaissance flight around the camp, I stumbled upon a group of women quietly arguing amongst themselves around the flesh golem.This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    ¡°You don¡¯t need this! You¡¯re already perfect!¡±


    ¡°Shut up Lovera! Not all of us popped in perfect condition like you did! Shit, I know for a fact that my nose is too damn long, fucking genetics and fucking parents!¡± Cassandra angrily whispered. ¡°My big nosed dad had to find himself a hooked nose wife and then looky¡¯!¡± Pointing at her own nose, Cassandra slapped the flesh golem. ¡°And then the guys had to play with it and break it!


    Yup, I was peekin¡¯. This was just too good not to watch. Fifteen women in all arguing with each other how perfect the rest of them were while simultaneously shooting greedy looks at the golem as the women magic users kept examining it trying to get it to work. Several teenage girls were there as well arguing with what looked to be their mothers. The usual arguments of wanting bigger boobs to go with a nice ass deflected by the matronly ¡®perfect-as-you-are¡¯ speech while the other moms without kids were discussing getting rid of stretch marks and toning up certain parts.


    ¡°Ladies, please!¡± I interrupted after not being able to hold in my laughter anymore. ¡°I turned it off for the night so the guys wouldn¡¯t do anything more stupid than they already did. Real quick, who¡¯s in charge of the camp? I need to figure out who¡¯s planning everything.¡±


    Lovera looked at me, a bit of relief flashing across her face. ¡°We have a ragtag council and one emergency leader,¡¯ she answered. ¡°Mark is in charge of the soldiers which I guess now are mainly the Glyph Blades? Cassandra is in charge of the magic users which is made almost entirely up of women, is that normal?¡± Plowing ahead without letting me answer, she ticked off her fingers while finishing. ¡°Stacy is in charge of logistics relating to living spaces and children while Jamal splits his time with helping out logistics and perimeter security.¡±


    Looking around, I asked the more obvious question. ¡°So who¡¯s in charge of healing? Is there a doctor round here?¡±


    The group got quiet. ¡°That person¡¯s dead huh?¡± The look everyone had on their faces was one of resignation, fear, and pain. ¡°I didn¡¯t mean to hit a sore spot, but is there a replacement or someone who could learn? This golem can do more harm than good if used incorrectly, just like a surgeon.¡± Leaning forward, I put my hand on it lightly and reactivated it. ¡°And remember ladies, it needs to be fed when it shrinks. It can alter, enhance, upgrade, heal, and replace any kind of flesh.¡± Looking at the older ladies of which there were a few who were around the forty mark, I spoke forcefully to make sure I got my point across. ¡°Yes, it can also restore a sizable resemblance of youth, but if you don¡¯t know what you¡¯re doing and make huge changes, those changes may end up killing you. Jamal almost died last night, he would have if I weren¡¯t there.¡±


    A veritable storm of questions instantly were thrown in my direction. Raising my hand to quiet them, I continued, ¡°He¡¯s fine, in fact he¡¯s better than he¡¯s ever been. He replaced his heart with a dragon¡¯s heart without considering that the rest of his body had to be adapted to accommodate something that powerful. Getting a boob lift or removing some excess fat you don¡¯t want or even healing an old messed up ankle is no problem, but trying to make yourself a teenager again is a lot. Do this in small steps, in bits and pieces so you can easily reverse it if you need to.¡±


    Touching the flesh golem, I found the DNA of Mark, Jamal, Stacy, and Cassandra already inside. With a bit of help from Kraken, I made them the ¡®admins¡¯ of the golem so that it couldn¡¯t be used without one of them present. The only exceptions to that rule were standard regenerative healing and Glyph Blade tattoo alterations; all of this was mainly making sure that no one fed a human to the flesh golem in the dead of night.


    Just to make my point, I took one of the older ladies and walked her through the process of flesh alterations. Heather took to it like a duck to water, making small changes at a time. I monitored everything with my own magic as she first removed some skin discoloration, and then a wrinkle or two, and then injected some youth and health into her skin section by section. With a bit of encouragement to experiment, Heather began doing the alterations that most women do when they see swimsuit model magazines, quick skin tightening in the chest area with toning in the midsection as legs. Going a bit further with a bit of advice from me, she added some muscle and repaired tendons at the microscopic level while letting the magic of the flesh golem restore her eyesight to perfect vision.


    Ten minutes later, Heather pulled her hand back looking a good fifteen years younger. ¡°I feel, fantastic!¡± She screamed, jumping around and hugging her friends who were salivating at the chance to feel the rush of youth again. I left Heather to it as she worked with the older women, Lovera pulling me off to the side.


    ¡°Does it really make you younger? Did you just give all of us eternal life?¡± Her eyes were burning as her fingernails dug into my arm.


    ¡°Not really,¡± I answered, raising one eyebrow and glancing at her hand. ¡°Why, you mad that everyone has a chance to be as pretty as you or that you can¡¯t believe that there isn¡¯t a tangible price?¡±


    Her questioning face turned red as her jaw dropped. Laughing at her because I couldn¡¯t help myself, I pulled back just a bit. ¡°Relax, the easy answer is the price feeding the damn golem and putting up with women that will soon be too beautiful to handle. The guys won¡¯t be complaining but if I know anything about female politics, well . . .¡±


    A disapproving frown showed that maybe I hit a bit too close to the mark. Modern society before the apocalypse had a sort of hierarchy between women that got more and more fragmented as society became bigger and bigger due to social media. It used to be that in a small farming village, the biggest and wealthiest dude married the hottest and wealthiest girl and had a bunch of kids, while the second biggest and wealthiest dude got the next hottest and wealthiest girl and so on and so forth. With social media, womens¡¯ options opened up to hundreds of miles away from their zip codes and men had to compete with men hundreds of miles away from their own homes for the girl next door, so women could have whoever and men¡¯s competition just got many times more intense.


    Now, we¡¯re back to old school politics, where there will probably be one man generally in charge of the men and one woman in charge of the women and the strongest and most powerful person leading the whole thing. Without digital media to connect people from hundreds of miles away, and travel being perilous in the world now that magic holds sway, their options are limited once again to their group. This made being a hermit have its upsides, cause I¡¯m outside the political structure. But all of these people probably aren¡¯t thinking about it this way, the women are probably making alliances and subtly shifting their ways of thinking to figure out their own hierarchy while the men are off doing their own thing not knowing or caring about the political machinations taking place. This is why I made sure to have at least two men and two women as admins, so that there would not be a monopoly on the biggest game-changer in the settlement.


    As I left, one girl I hadn¡¯t seen yet who was in her early teens walked up to me and pulled me a bit closer so she could whisper in my ear. Closing my eyes so as to not laugh at the ridiculousness of the request, I whispered, ¡°No, you can¡¯t be a ¡®cat-girl¡¯, not yet anyway. You have to find a cat and feed it to the golem.¡± I walked back to the overcrowded golem and erected a stone wall behind it, inscribing the directions of how to use the golem, the administrators of the golem, and then all of the available functions and DNA types available for use. Satisfied with a job well done, I thought for a second and put a big caution message at the type for those attempting more radical changes.


    Jamal bounded over when I finally extricated myself from the growing horde of women. ¡°Yo! My dude, what¡¯s happenin¡¯, what¡¯s goin¡¯ on, that your group of women now?¡±


    ¡°Hey man,¡± I said, my voice wavering a bit with caution. ¡°You feelin¡¯ ok?¡±


    ¡°Never better! I feel like a million bucks fucked steak and shrimp buffet with a small bucket of cocaine DAMN I FEEL GOOD!¡±


    Reaching forward quickly, I poked Jamal in the chest with my finger inserting my flesh sorcery and instantly calming him down. Twisting his clashing hormones down a bit, I then tweaked his adrenal glands that were wide open to close. His body was experiencing its own form of shock thanks to the dragon heart.


    ¡°Ok, that was weird,¡± he said, looking at me. ¡°What¡¯d you do?¡±


    ¡°Turned your shit from eleven back down to three man. I guess I¡¯m gonna have to stay here for a couple days. Your uh, changes, or alterations need a bit of maintenance to make sure you¡¯ll be ok,¡± I answered. ¡°The human body wasn¡¯t meant to house a dragon¡¯s heart and we¡¯ll see exactly what needs to be done to keep you alive.¡± Continuing with my examination, I fixed the micro-tears in his muscles and tendons and a couple hairline fractures in several bones. Tweaking his natural physiology again, I allowed his heart to ramp up his healing processes so that these issues would be taken care of.


    ¡°If all goes well,¡± I said, explaining a bit more for him. ¡°Then the dragon heart will break down your body and repair it bit by bit so you¡¯ll actually be more durable and dragon-like by the time you¡¯re done. Make sure to eat a lot or visit the golem for extra healing.¡±


    ¡°Thanks man!¡± Taking off at a sprint, Jamal vanished into the woods. And this is how the next week went. I spent it tweaking body enhancements and watching as the children and some adult magic users did some incredible work building the settlement with my wands. The solar panels really helped speed things along as it just recharged the people who ran out of mana and allowed some of the people not using the wands to practice their magic all day. The Glyph Blades tried out a bunch of rune combinations and started making their own compendium of useful runic channels.


    I assisted the endeavor by compiling everything Reeanth knew about the Glyph Blades as well as any knowledge of Centauri rune channels and combat techniques in a compacted memory file with consciousness sorcery. That file, I stuck in the flesh golem along with a lot of the knowledge I had discovered so far. It was downright genius of me to use the golem as a freaking computer as it removed how necessary I was to the day to day operations of the camp. I didn¡¯t have to heal because of the golem, I didn¡¯t have to build because of the wands, I didn¡¯t have to make them gear of any kind because they already had my knowledge; I worked myself out of a job.


    Feeling pretty damn good about myself, I took one last tour around. A bunch of single story houses had been built, some out of stone and some grown out of trees. There was a large pier built into the river complete with several canoes and two barges grown out of trees. Communal showers had been hooked up away from the settlement kitchen and the wizards of the group had done a damn good job enchanting all kinds of various tools, especially with my memories to go off of. Heating enchantments on stone disks to functions as a stove, stone knives with self-sharpening enhancements, directional lightstones and sunstones spotted each house and the dirt paths of the settlement.


    There were two things the wizards had trouble doing, which was conjuration and summoning of elementals. As the final piece of goodwill, I helped four teenagers bond with elementals, one boy and one girl each got a water elemental and another boy and girl got an earth elemental. I made sure to educate them on the elemental growing in stature and in power the longer they were bonded but that didn¡¯t matter to the elemental as much as they measured millenniums the way we measure days.

 Chapter 127 - Exit and Education (Book 2 Chapter 34)

    My plans to leave got wrecked at the last minute. What made me stay another freaking week longer than my already extended plan was not only the magic users coming to me for advice, but several men had started bonding with nearby dryads. That entire event almost turned into a fiasco as even the taken men were eyeing the unique seductiveness of the women of the forest. I couldn¡¯t really blame the men though as a lot of them spent time in the woods either hunting or scouting the area. The wizards though had a lot of questions.


    Sitting in the new meeting area, a beautifully constructed amphitheater, I stood in the bottom fielding questions as a good thirty people sat around. They didn¡¯t really want to learn from the memories I had put into the flesh golem, they wanted to hear it straight from me even though there were certain issues I had carefully avoided such as Kraken¡¯s existence, the fact that I was a sorcerer not a wizard, and anything related to my wife in stasis inside of Yggdrasil¡¯s newest splinter.


    ¡°Yes, Cassandra, let¡¯s start with you,¡± I said, pointing her out. Figuring I¡¯d start with their leader, I almost started laughing while looking out across the crowd. The sheer amount of model-level beauty was staggering. Not one woman or man had neglected to put the flesh golem to good use over the past week but to their credit, I only had to intervene about three times. One woman made her skin so shiny that it sloughed off because she kept growing it way too fast and one of the Glyph Blades didn¡¯t think before putting a rune similar to a bomb on his wrist. The last one was a young woman who went full on into the transformation schtick. It took forever for me to unravel the dragon heart and spine that didn¡¯t want to work with the minotaur skin immunity or the dwarven bone structure that kept trying to leech all of the magic out of her flesh.


    ¡°Thank you. I have several questions, one or two about you specifically and one in regards to the wider implications of the changes you¡¯re responsible for.¡±


    Cutting her off real quick, I answered sharply, ¡°First, I¡¯m not responsible for the ¡®wider implications¡¯.¡± My fingers made quotation marks at ¡®wider implications¡¯. ¡°I gave all of you tools and how you plan on using those tools is up to you. I¡¯ve got my own problems that I¡¯ve put off for too long so next question.¡±


    Frowning at me, she continued. ¡°So you plan on leaving us so soon?¡±


    ¡°Yup,¡± I answered, moving on to the next girl even as Cassandra looked at me in shock. ¡°You in the back, dark red hair, yes, you.¡±


    The young lady stood up, her eyes partly turned down. ¡°When you leave, are you taking anyone with you?¡±


    ¡°Nope. Where I live is too dangerous. According to what I know so far, the ambient mana levels are so high that all of you will die. You¡¯re not magically altered in such a way that it would be feasible, and just to head off the next question, no, I will not be altering anyone in that way. Too much work and it¡¯s not worth it.¡± What they didn¡¯t know is that my sheer amount of sorceries combined with all of my gear and living through the Ripples changed me fundamentally. High levels of mana mean nothing to me but I wasn¡¯t about to let them know that.


    A young man stood up, raising his hand. ¡°We¡¯re not in school, man, just ask your question.¡±


    He gulped, looking around briefly before meeting my gaze. ¡°Can you uh, maybe uh, help us out in the weapons department before you go? Some of us are still unarmed and a decent chunk of us don¡¯t have magic at all or that weird tattoo magic.¡±


    I hadn¡¯t thought about that. There¡¯s a good chance that I could give people magic, but that would lessen my own abilities and I¡¯m not about that. I¡¯m sure it might grow back if I gave them a seed of it, but I am completely out of the Chaos crystals necessary to do the heavy lifting. It was only possible to give Spot a seed of flesh sorcery due to a Chaos crystal. I quickly shot down my own idea of crafting magical weapons that siphoned life from enemies to power enchantments and while making crystal batteries for everyone was definitely feasible, it would make this settlement a target if it ever got discovered.


    [Yo, need some help here,] I sent to Kraken. [People who can¡¯t do magic at all. Can I bond them with an elemental or can I use the flesh elemental to give them magic via magic organs like the way Jamal got a bit of fire magic from the dragon heart?]


    [This is new territory. Just about everyone has magic of some kind, even if it¡¯s beyond weak. Mana is integral to life as we know it, except this forsworn planet behind the Veil apparently. Shit, try it out.]


    Coming back from my nigh-instantaneous conversation, I looked back at the young man. ¡°I¡¯d recommend using the flesh golem for personal body enhancements. Once it has ingested the right ingredients, magic may not be out of your reach. For now, use that to give yourself more strength and speed, harden your body, give yourself heightened regeneration or modified body parts. I have given this new town everything it needs to survive, if you¡¯re creative enough.¡±


    Two stick thin people stood up, a man and a woman who looked to be twins. ¡°We read your memories left in the golem,¡± the woman said, looking at twin and then back at me, her hands trembling on her wizard¡¯s staff. ¡°Is it true, about the undead at the poles and the demons in Europe?¡±


    ¡°Yes, and what do we do about it?¡± Her brother chimed in, his hands shaking as well. ¡°How do we prepare against such horrors?¡±


    ¡°Better questions, thank you,¡± I said. ¡°First, the pile of sunstones I¡¯ve planted for you in the center of town grow over time. Those can channel mana that I believe will hurt or destroy the undead. This is what I¡¯ve been told as I haven¡¯t had a chance to test it yet. The demons, I¡¯m not worried about them as much as from what I¡¯ve been told the Vatican stands on more than equal footing. If I were you, any of you, I¡¯d say your best option is magic research and bonding with elementals. You can talk to the rascals I helped the other day. Earth elementals can help build pretty much anything and are nigh indestructible in a fight. Water elementals are powerful if you can keep them focused. Both of those together would make this place a fortress.¡±


    Just as I finished, three incredible smoking hot blond babes stood up glaring at me. ¡°And just what do you plan on doing about these, these, DRYADS!? They take the men and keep them out to who knows how late?¡±


    The middle one joined in as the first one took a breath. ¡°Dryads are wrecking our community! We need the men to defend this town! Food needs to be brought in, land needs to be cleared, and where are they?¡±


    ¡°Banging the forest sluts!¡± Yup, there was the third one. God this is annoying.


    ¡°And this is my problem, how?¡± I chuckled. ¡°How is it my fault y¡¯all can¡¯t keep your men? I bet the dryads are nice and sweet. In fact, they also can help y¡¯all out with the new greenhouses if you ask nice enough.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not right! It¡¯s not natural? What if they get pregnant? What kind of monsters will we have running around?¡± These women had worked themselves up into a righteous fury. I can only imagine they were ¡®Karen¡¯ stereotype, trying to talk to the damn manager when the apocalypse hit. Now, thanks to me, they looked like supermodels but that doesn¡¯t change their personality.


    ¡°Let me give you the truth ladies, in fact, let me give everyone the truth here. Life as you know it is over. America doesn¡¯t exist. Government does not exist. You are here and you are free, if you can keep it that way. There is no police to run to, there are no rules to live by unless you so choose, and no HOA to make your neighbor behave. I am not your king, I live far away and do not want to be bothered by pitiful neighbors and my conscience wouldn¡¯t let me leave young women and children out in the cold, so to speak. Your men can bang whoever they want, AS CAN YOU. So, get over yourself and live your life. Prepare for the worst and hope for the best.¡± My rant wasn¡¯t over even as I watched their faces fall while others perked up.


    ¡°Magic is real. Real fucking magic, is real. Power is now an individual characteristic. Equality of capability is now a myth. Notice I didn¡¯t say ¡®worth¡¯ because that¡¯s not what I¡¯m talking about. Some of you will be able to fly, maybe move some mountains on a whim and others will do some freaking amazing things, but no one is equal anymore. And in that sense, everyone is equal. Everyone with magic now has the equivalent of a loaded gun in their back pocket. Now, you can use this to make your own version of utopia, or you can use it to rule with an iron fist. I don¡¯t care. What you do need to look out for is that magical threats are also real. Dragons that fly and eat and burn everything are real. Dwarves, demons, minotaurs, monsters, giant gorillas, spirits, vampires, undead, fuck man the list just goes on! It¡¯s all real.¡±


    You could have heard a pin drop in that amphitheater. Nobody expected this, and they sure as shit didn¡¯t see me getting angry and happy all at the same time. My voice got softer as I continued, ¡°This could be the best or the worst thing to ever happen to any of you, but it¡¯s completely up to you. Oh, and to answer your accusations, ladies.¡±If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    Glaring at the three women now trembling before me, I called Gungnir to my hand in spear form, the swirling blade glistening with red light. Slamming the butt down, I looked at them each in turn. ¡°You now have to work to keep your man or the dryads will happily take them away. There¡¯s no divorce court here to drag a man through. I¡¯d advise you to be nice and above all, useful. And that goes for all of you, there¡¯s around two hundred of y¡¯all, which means there is more than enough work to go around. I¡¯ve done plenty to get y¡¯all started but the rest is up to you. I recommend teamwork as a general rule and letting peoples¡¯ talents dictate where they work. Don¡¯t put your best enchanter as a fisherman, duh.¡±


    With that, I summoned my hoverboard and took off towards the side of town. Three solar panels had been set up near the greenhouses and the young teens with the smaller kids were working with the two that had bonded earth elementals. I had given Jenny and Simon, the two with the earth elementals, a secret assignment a couple days ago and I wanted to know how it was coming along. Those two were building houses and erected stone walls with their elementals doing most of the heavy lifting as the children were taking turns with the earth wands putting in the detail work like doorways, windows, and stairs. The children took turns with the wands when they ran out of mana, scurrying back to the solar panel for more in a rush to do more magic. Their assignment was to eventually make this entire town secure and I let Scott know so that he could secretly organize the entire thing.


    Moving on after watching them for a bit, I got to the other set of wands being wielded by mostly teen girls and a few young men in the greenhouses. They had the other most important job of planting and tending crops, which they had three solar panels to assist them as none of them were used to this level of constant power output. The two water elementals bonded to Kyra and Jackson were watering the plants as several others with the plant wands were coaxing them to grow. Two earth wands users were out making the rows nice and perfect as the outside crops were to supplement the greenhouse ones.


    ¡°There you are!¡± Turning around, I saw Jamal jogging up to me with Scott. ¡°You can¡¯t be leaving just yet! There¡¯s so much to drink still and you know Scott can¡¯t hold his liquor!¡±


    ¡°Ha, sorry man,¡± I said, just a bit of sadness creeping in. ¡°I got too much work to do on my own right now. Also, I have too much power to stay here for long, people will want to start putting me in charge and that¡¯s something I hate. Also, I hate having a boss so that¡¯s a no go there.¡±


    Scott punched me in the shoulder, just soft enough that he didn¡¯t hurt his hand on my armor. ¡°Dick,¡± he said, a smirk creasing his face. ¡°Ya come, show us all up, make all the women swoon and then dip. That¡¯s cruel. I like it.¡± Grinning at me, he pulled his new rifle off his back, the spare one I had made for myself. ¡°Sure you don¡¯t want this back?¡± He asked, offering it up to me. ¡°It''s pretty sweet.¡±


    ¡°Already got one,¡± I said, punching him back. ¡°Besides, this baby is the real weapon.¡± Hoisting Gungnir up, I changed it from a spear into a knife and then shifted it to a mace, finally lengthening it so that it looked just like a wizard¡¯s staff. ¡°Shoots better than any gun. Anyways, got somethin¡¯ to show ya.¡±


    Leading Jamal and Scott to a small hut near the pier, I opened the door and walked down the earthen stairs. This was the only building in the settlement made by me, the arms room. The pier had two solar panels on top of its roof that were attached to wires that I had buried and connected to a contraption deep in the arms room.


    ¡°What the hell is it?¡± Scott said, looking over the stone contraption with four crystal spikes sticking out of the top. Four slides stuck out the bottom leading to four wooden buckets.


    ¡°Behold! Your ammo maker!¡± I said grandly as if it were a brand new car. ¡°This bad boy right here will conjure, rune, and charge your ammo all in one go. When y¡¯all finally learn how to make your own guns, you¡¯ll be happy about this machine as it makes .45 pistol ammo, two kinds of rifle ammo such as the .223 and the 7.62. The last bit is for making grenades. The solar panels from the pier feed into this so all you have to do is turn it on. It¡¯s slow but it¡¯ll work all day when you¡¯re gone.¡±


    ¡°Stop, please, my dick can only get so hard!¡± Jamal crooned as he hugged the machine. ¡°Oh sweet baby Jesus this is the best gift! Unlimited ammo for a dragon cannoneer!¡±


    ¡°What could go wrong,¡± Scott joked, pulling Jamal off. Seeing an odd package off to the side, Scott poked it with his foot. ¡°What¡¯s this?¡±


    ¡°That my friend, is a sample box. I¡¯ve included as many kinds of metal as I can conjure in there. Your two family friendly earth elementals in town can either find or slowly conjure whatever metal you need. Which means, y¡¯all are set.¡±


    ******


    Leaving was a relief albeit a sad one. The children were an absolute joy to be around as their innocence gave them no preconceptions on how to ¡®properly¡¯ use magic. Several of them called out for friends in the woods one random ass day and had freaking familiars gladly accept their call. I saw three mountain lions, a lizard-spider, and two big ass birds bond to the children much to their guardians¡¯ shock. I might have also contributed a bit of chaos by making a few more plant, water, and earth wands for the kids and swearing them to secrecy. Before I actually left via hoverboard down the river, I saw little stone castles instead of sandcastles on the riverbank and a couple tiny treehouses hidden pretty well unless you had vision in the magical spectrum to do all the hard work.


    Getting home was a breeze though, surfing just above the waves without a cloud in sight. Gungnir was out as I hadn¡¯t forgotten about the harpies¡¯ tendencies to send freaking wyverns as a welcome party, but the overall mood was good. Whistling, that¡¯s something I don¡¯t recommend when traveling eighty miles an hour down the river. The wind just rips it right out of your mouth but damn I tried.


    Finally arriving at the clearing in front of the Hole, I yelled out, ¡°Hey Everest! Is Meliad out yet?¡± A grunt I took to mean ¡®no¡¯ rumbled out. ¡°Well fuck,¡± I muttered, taking out a meal cube and downing it.


    [Hey, before you get started on some more projects we need to get some schooling done,] Kraken said just as I sat down. [This¡¯ll be quicker and easier if you just join me. I got questions for you too.]


    Closing my eyes, I dropped off into a meditative state to join Kraken in my upgraded soul space. ¡°Education for what?¡± I asked, looking around. There were more tvs here than last time and the space was a bit bigger with various holographic statues decorating the place. ¡°And what the hell are those?¡±


    ¡°These, my good friend, are possible runic tattoos for Glyph Blades and some for you as well, and over there are my latest incarnations of your armor. Over there we have some viable long term and short term plans we need to discuss but most importantly, your enemies. We need to talk about them, but first I have some questions, ¡± My spirit familiar¡¯s tentacles crossed like a teacher dealing with a smart but lazy student.


    I waved for him to go on. ¡°Fine,¡± Kraken said. ¡°What the HELL were you thinking? Giving all those humans so much goddamn shit?! Weapons, I understand, and maybe some solar panels but all the other stuff too?¡±


    I looked him in his big watery eye. ¡°Damn it Kraken, I¡¯m an over-gifter, and I get that that¡¯s no excuse but come on man, there were kids there! Children are the future, and yes, they have way more than what they need to survive, but I don¡¯t want them to just survive. I want them to thrive! Besides, I¡¯m a sorcerer, it didn¡¯t really cost me anything other than time which we both know I have plenty of.¡±


    Kraken huffed at me. ¡°Fine, well, if that¡¯s the way humans do things than whatever. I have basic information that you seem to lack on the other subject, due to you growing up in a magic-less environment. As such, I¡¯ll assume you don¡¯t know much. Let¡¯s start with your greatest long term threats as of now. To be clear, it¡¯s not the deities you¡¯ve tangled with before due to the Angelic cloaking runes hiding you from their sight. We¡¯re gonna talk about Liches.¡±


    Conjuring up a footrest as I was inside of my own head, because why not, I leaned back. ¡°Aren¡¯t those undead wizards that live forever and build zombie armies? I asked.


    ¡°Well yes, but you completely missed the most important word in your own sentence, ¡®wizard¡¯. Liches are undead ¡®wizards¡¯,¡± Kraken stressed. ¡°They are not sorcerers, they do not have the instinctive command over elements that sorcerers do. Why are Liches the way they are?¡±


    I shrugged. ¡°Dude, I don¡¯t know, I just need to know how to kill them, right?¡±


    ¡°Wrong, it does matter. Liches are wizards that willingly hang on after death, usually by a necromantic ritual that binds their soul to a crystal or set of crystals called a phylactery. They also may keep their original body, using magic to strengthen it far beyond what any normal living body would be able to tolerate. Now, Liches usually become Liches because they¡¯ve run out of time. They couldn¡¯t get to their dream of either eternal life or incredible power before death.¡± Kraken lectured, waving one tentacle and bringing several holograms of Liches into view.


    The first one looked mostly normal, the skin grey instead of normal peachy flesh color and the eyes were grey. The middle rendition looked more like a corpse that had spent some time in the sun, the flesh drawn tight and it looked like it wouldn¡¯t be winning any flexibility contests. The hunched over posture and gnarled hand spoke of years getting used to being undead. The last one was mainly bone with bits of tied flesh adorning the joints, blue orbs of fire where the eyes should be and odd growths of bones sprouting in random places.


    ¡°Liches are wizards,¡± Kraken said promptly as I took in the disgusting sights. ¡°And . . . the reason that matters is because wizards, for lack of a better term, are what you would call OCD. They obsess over power or how things works beyond reason, following their compulsions methodically until it becomes a disorder. Wizards plan, and when an OCD wizard hasn¡¯t reached their goal, they hang on and make the decision to become a Lich. And what happens when an OCD wizard becomes an OCD Lich with infinite amounts of time? They can plan and achieve pretty much anything at this point.¡±


    ¡°So you¡¯re telling me,¡± I said, trying to make sure that I got the picture from this fragmented explanation. ¡°Liches are wizards who couldn¡¯t reach some goal in their life and decided to pursue that goal into the next life as well? And also that because their compulsive need to reach their goal was so strong, they willingly became one of the undead just so they could reach it?¡±


    ¡°And?¡± Kraken said as I worked through it.


    ¡°And . . . once they become a Lich, they turn their OCD, which initially led them to become a Lich, into strength which they channel into learning magic far better than any mortal wizard simply due to the amount of time they can practice it. So comparatively, a Lich could work on a spell for a hundred years to perfectly understand it in every scenario because he¡¯s immortal so who cares about a hundred years. But a normal wizard will just learn how to cast a fireball and be content?¡±


    ¡°Exactly!¡± Kraken said, conjuring a pointer stick and poking his hologram. ¡°Liches are not just feared, they¡¯re also respected. They more often than not are the forerunners of magical research because they have the time to take the time to do the research. Most of the entire discipline of alchemy was pioneered by one Lich, Eugen the Poisoner. He wasn¡¯t nearly as bad as most Liches, he didn¡¯t really make undead hordes and prey on the living. Eugen simply worked in a hospital and experimented for two millennia to make the most insane discoveries!¡±


    ¡°Huh,¡± I grunted. ¡°So this means that I have to either plan like a Lich, which isn¡¯t probable, or fight like a meteor sent from God if I want to win?¡±


    ¡°Exactly,¡± agreed my familiar. ¡°You probably won¡¯t win the planning battle. They tend to plan decades in advance. Short of nuking the area, victory will be out of reach for you.¡±


    ¡°So what do Liches fear then? I imagine with all that time on their hands, they¡¯d have spells to shield them from sunlight and pretty much any kind of magic.¡±


    Kraken¡¯s eyelids for his single eye creased up like a smile as he didn¡¯t actually have a mouth. ¡°I¡¯m so glad you asked. That¡¯s the exact right question. What do Liches fear? The answer is nothing. Liches are still technically mortal, which means that angels don¡¯t get to mess with them unless they start summoning demon princes, which has happened before. But other than some kind of angelic intervention, wytchfire and dragonfire and maybe some seriously packed holy water would have an effect on a Lich.¡±

 Chapter 128 - Desert-HO! (Book 2 Chapter 35)

    ¡°Huh,¡± I grunted, taking in the conversation and pairing with the generalized holograms in front of me. ¡°Got it, Liches, bad news, yup. But you said, ¡®enemies¡¯. What else am I supposed to be worried about?¡±


    ¡°Short term, not much other than that,¡± Kraken answered, waving his arm and replacing the holograms with a new set of images. ¡°Long term, warlocks.¡±


    ¡°Bet I¡¯m not going to like this answer either.¡±


    The three images were now instead showing two, one normal looking dude with some pretty wicked tattoos and the very stereotypical demon towering over him. ¡°This is a warlock. Generally speaking, they tend to be someone who either has just enough magical talent to be dangerous to normal beings but not enough to threaten someone like you without a lot of planning or backup. And next to him, is a demon.¡±


    ¡°So we put the two together which makes a warlock right?¡± Putting some of the pieces together wasn¡¯t really hard but nothing is ever easy nowadays.


    ¡°Yup, but the magic user makes a contract with the demon, and it is that act that makes a warlock. They can bargain for power, sorcery, teachings, meldings, life, pretty much anything that the demon has and the magic user does not. And because there are so many kinds of demons, not all of which are diametrically opposed to humanity, there¡¯s no telling what kinds of contracts you¡¯ll run into.¡±


    I held a hand up, stopping the conversation for a moment. ¡°Let¡¯s focus on the short term now, what can you tell me about harpies? I mean, I already know how to kill¡¯em, but where can I find them? Other than a few mountain peaks around here there¡¯s really nowhere for them to-¡±


    I smacked myself in the head. ¡°FUCKING FLOATING ISLANDS HUH?¡±


    ¡°Got it in one.¡±


    Taking a deep breath, mentally since I was already inside of my own head, I had Gungnir pull up a map of the area as far as we knew. From what we could tell, there were several floating islands in the area by which I mean at least four. The closest one was fifty miles away and several dotted red lines criss-crossed the sky of my map.


    ¡°Lemme guess, predicted flight patterns of moving floating islands? How¡¯d you get that info?¡±


    Kraken looked at me smugly. ¡°There are trees up on those islands, so I used your nature sorcery to tap into Yggdrasil and got a pretty good picture of any area with flora. Apparently floating islands count too! Wanna know the weirdest part? Some floating islands have literal rivers running through them! The water just evaporates at the edge of the island as if it¡¯s not fully a part of this world!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s too cool for me to blow up, which means I have to find the exact right island and invade it. Troublesome.¡±


    The holograms changed again, this time to show me harpies. ¡°The ugly looking one on the left here is the typical harpy. It¡¯s got a beak for a mouth, the arms are the wings, the hunchback for extra muscle used for carrying off heavy prey, and the grunginess to just complete the nasty image.¡±


    ¡°Well what¡¯s with the hot one?¡± I asked, pointing at the other image. ¡°It¡¯s like night and day, ugly ass feral looking monster over here and the supermodel angel version over there!¡±


    ¡°The one on the right is the magic user,¡± Kraken chuckled. ¡°You know it¡¯s not an angel because its presence doesn¡¯t actually burn mortals and they don¡¯t rant about hunting demons 24/7, but these particular harpies can use magic. Control of air and light are typical while the less common ones are full-on Storm Riders. We¡¯re not sure if they¡¯re attractive due to being able to weave illusions or if that is how they actually look.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not gonna get close enough to a damn harpy to find out,¡± I declared, looking back and forth between the two. ¡°Most likely a trap used to lure in unsuspecting idiots. And I assume when you say ¡®Storm Rider¡¯ that means those harpies are weather manipulators?¡±


    ¡°Yup.¡±


    ¡°Fuck.¡±


    We spent the rest of the afternoon discussing different kinds of enemies that I might run into. All of this was pulled from the parts of Rath¡¯s brain that Kraken had been able to decipher so far; there¡¯s a lot of good information still in there but that hunk of brain matter was its own bestiary. The funniest part about it was that the list of creatures in there was divided up into two categories: tasty and yucky, because that¡¯s how dragons apparently view the world. What ended up pissing me off about the information that Kraken had deciphered was the bit that he skimmed over because he thought it ¡®wasn¡¯t important¡¯. The little bitch had information about wizard towers! And the more I learned about them the more I freaking wanted one.


    ¡°You don¡¯t need it! You¡¯re a goddamn sorcerer! What in the world would you need with a freaking wizard¡¯s tower!¡±


    ¡°Every kid wants a wizards tower! Correction, every MAN wants a freaking wizard¡¯s tower! How the hell did you not know this?¡± I screamed, dancing around. ¡°AND, I already know the PERFECT FUCKING PLACE FOR IT!¡±


    As I was still inside of my mind/soul space with Kraken, I grabbed the mental fabric generating the scenery and twisted it. Blazing heat hit the both of us like a Saharan sandstorm, the sun so bright that it hurt to look around even though the rushing river cutting through the dry rocky landscape begged for someone to jump in it.


    ¡°Welcome to the ass end of Arizona! Where the Colorado river makes the arid piece of shit land just bearable enough to make the fishing worth it!¡±


    ¡°Uhg, I hate it,¡± Kraken grumbled, shielding his eye from the brutal sunlight. ¡°Why the fuck did you bring us here?¡±


    I couldn¡¯t keep the grin off my face. ¡°Ok! It¡¯s just for shits and giggles, but I want this to be your side project! Picture this!¡± Waving my hand, I forced the mindscape to bend to my will, a giant tower made out of textured sunstone mixed with runed granite bursting from out of the riverbed. Epically contoured solar panels extended from the top of the tower like flower petals that had sex with dragon wings, crystal cannons shaped like spears jutting from the sides, and an oddly twisted cactus tree spiking out of the top.


    ¡°What in the fucking world is that monstrosity?!¡± Kraken gasped. ¡°It¡¯s HIDEOUS!¡±


    ¡°Oh calm down, it¡¯s just concept art right now. I¡¯m thinking sunstone mixed with granite will boost the solar energy gathering to the max as Arizona is literally the desert. The cactus plant is the Yggdrasil root I¡¯ll have to magic up to survive better in the desert. Those are crystal focusing lasers to be my siege weaponry and the little satellites in the cracks will be mana sensors or soundwave blasters! And in the base . . .¡± I continued, waving my hand again so that everything turned into a black and white computer design view. ¡°The base will have the largest crystal battery I¡¯ve ever made. This can be my jump point or main base to set up for assaulting the poles!¡±


    Kraken waved two of his tentacles, returning the mindscape back into a bachelor pad. ¡°Dude, that was the dumbest shit. Wizard towers are supposed to be hidden fortresses, not out in the fucking open point blank in your face eyesore!¡±


    Crossing my arms and glaring at my familiar didn¡¯t carry the weight of authority that I hoped it would. Childish, yes, but usually effective. Waving my arms again, I brought the scene back but with some crazy modifications. This time, five stout wizard towers about two stories high and sixty feet across sat in a pentagram formation connected by sandstone looking walls. In the center, connected by rooftop bridges was a six story wizard tower with a tree poking out of it that towered above the flat landscape.


    ¡°Fine,¡± I grouched. ¡°You wanna argue? Work on that! A wizard castle! Complete with solar gathering walls in a magic formation and a Yggdrasil core so I can send ARMIES to the North Pole if I wanted to! Whatcha think about that?¡± Adding some more finishing touches, I made sunstone spikes grow out of the upper parts of the walls while the walls themselves smoothed out so that nothing could get a grip to scale them. More and more rune shapes colored black began to appear on the walls as I mentally wrote ¡®durability, solar and heat siphoning, storage¡¯ all across my castle.Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.


    ¡°This is a waste of time and resources!¡±


    I genuinely laughed at Kraken. ¡°Come on man, I¡¯m a sorcerer with some pretty good picks for power. The only thing this is going to cost me is time, and I¡¯ve got plenty of that. The sun will provide all the power I need.¡±


    ¡°What happened to one portal tree and a small field of solar panels? That plan was nice and simple and above all, EASY!¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but you forgot to factor in one possibility. What if we simply get our butts kicked? What if we get our asses handed to us and we have to retreat? I¡¯d rather retreat to a tricked-out wizard bunker with enough firepower to level a continent.¡±


    The argument finally came to a close when I bargained to let Kraken use Rath¡¯s brain to help with some of the mental load of designing all the things I wanted to do with the wizard¡¯s tower. The way he explained it made sense, that the more of Rath¡¯s brain that he unlocked and deciphered, the more he could use it as a biological computer. It also hastened the overall decrypting process as the unlocked portions of the brain worked to bring the rest of it into submission. The estimation I got was about another two weeks before we could fully dive in and get everything we needed from it and by that time all of the tower schematics would be done too.


    And since I was able to put his lazy spiritual ass to work on the things I wanted done, this allowed me to work on my as of late favorite pastime, experimentation. The flesh golem experiment seemed to be a roaring success once I managed to work out the minor bugs, and the ammo maker for the magic rifles as a proof of concept held up pretty well. This meant that magic automation is possible. What I didn¡¯t show the residents of that little town is how the creation process actually worked, because honestly, I cheated. Inside of the machine was an example of the finished product, one of each kind of bullet, and then moving the switch put the ¡®conjure a copy¡¯ rune pattern over the bullet and turning it on pushed power into the diagram creating another bullet. This would go on until it either ran out of power or someone turned it off.


    That simple concept worked for simple products, but the next step was to add another layer of complexity. I was thinking of making earth elementals composed of diamond and sunstone but held together with basic dirt. The summoning of the elementals themselves would not be part of the automation process, but I could make a machine that would make all of the bodies for me.


    To start, I figured that I¡¯d follow the old model in which I make the first body and the machine copies it to make more, but this time there¡¯d be a layering process. I exited my mindspace and headed for the Lab, where I etched schematics on the granite workbench. ¡°Sunstone core with an extra large crystal battery,¡± I muttered, bringing my vision to life. ¡°Diamond focusing crystals for eyes with sunstone blades hidden in the arms. Can¡¯t forget the binding runes on the core to give the dirt body some cohesion.¡±


    An hour''s worth of drawing and conjuring later and I had my test earth golem, roughly four feet tall and four feet wide, the body resembled a basic cube given limbs. I probably went overboard in the dirt to precious stone ratio but sometimes more is actually more. Conjuring a small crystal square, I began to input a complete picture, a mental matrix of the structure of the golem into it and then set it off to the side. My conjuration machine was basically going to be a 3-D printer and the crystal plate was going to be the harddrive with the blueprints of what¡¯s being made. Taking another couple minutes, I made twenty blank crystal plates for later as I thought about all the things I¡¯ve made that can be put on them down the road.


    Rubbing my hands together in anticipation, I got to work. Conjuring a crystal battery block the size of an old school VCR was the first step as it¡¯s the base for the entire operation. Then I placed the sunstone golem template crystal on top and made the battery grow up just enough to form the edges of a slot. On the back side of the crystal, I conjured a coating of silver to function as the governor so that no power surges would blow the entire device and then formed thumb-sized sockets for metal wires that would connect to whatever power source I decided to use.


    Using Gungnir as my test battery, I conjured copper and braided it into a thick wire to which I tied one end around the crystal speartip of Gungnir and the other I molded into the socket of the conjuration machine. Realising that I had a spacing problem because I didn¡¯t have a conveyor belt or an actual place to put all of the conjured golem bodies, I formed somewhat bendable wire arms that extend out to where the conjuration process would actually occur.


    When I had finished, Kraken examined my work, did his usual displeased huff and added some more commands to the matrix to automate the process to make five bodies at a time and then move the arms to make five more. As I had never gotten into programming, I was quite happy that he did that for me. Although it did backfire on him when I gave him the mental blueprints for all of my projects and asked him to put them in each one of the crystal records so we could automate things in the future. The only thing we really had a consensus on was that we could probably get Everest or Lyra to do the elemental summoning themselves instead of us as we provided the bodies.


    ¡°How is this going to help you again?¡±


    ¡°You can¡¯t have a freaking sunstone castle without sunstone elementals guarding the damn thing Kraken!¡± I yelled, as my maniacal plans were coming together. ¡°And if I need an army, then I can just portal them straight to the battlefield, after I make a base out of ice of course. Cause what sorcerer doesn¡¯t want a badass holy water ice fortress huh?¡±


    ¡°You can¡¯t be serious!¡±


    Of course I was. Putting aside one container of Nephilim as a snack for Spot for whenever he decides he needs something a bit more exotic, I drew up plans to have an ice and stone fortress to be my first forward operating base up in northern Canada. The general idea was to have my water elementals do most of the heavy lifting for that and the obvious cheat is that I¡¯m going to meld another World Tree seedling with a big ass pinetree and use that as a pipeline of power to siphon energy from the overabundant nature of the deserts sweltering sun. The Nephilim bits would be a perfect deterrent against evil undead for obvious reasons and putting that into the very structure of an ice fortress would make the entire thing anathema to them!


    ¡°He¡¯s insane!¡± Kraken moaned mostly to himself. ¡°Out of all the new humans that rejoined the universe and I had to get the absolute worst pick of the bunch!¡±


    ¡°I heard that!¡±


    Saving the other half of the Nephilim bits was mainly to cover my ass. I hadn¡¯t forgotten that the Antarctic stood a solid chance of being an undead stronghold. I wasn¡¯t as worried about that one though as there¡¯s no landbridge to another continent as far as I know, but the Arctic pretty much has its greedy fingers in every damn pie. After another week of driving Kraken up the wall as we argued, I mean discussed, all of the plans and how to make them perfect, there wasn¡¯t much left to do but the doin¡¯.


    Five of the new young elementals were put on border duty of the forest and the rest were all hunkered down in the clearing to charge up their extra stores of power and wait for my signal. I had done an incredible amount of preparation for the next leg of my journey; pulling out a thin plate of slate, I set that down on an inactive golem¡¯s head right in front of me.


    [You don¡¯t need a checklist, you have me,] Kraken said from inside Gungnir. Popping out, he flew around and inspected all of the sitting golems. [Tell me why you¡¯re doing it this particular way again? Why do you need a whole base instead of just a jump point?]


    I sighed. You would think that a spirit that had access to all of my memories would be able to put it all together without me but I guess spirits aren¡¯t perfect either. ¡°Ok, what is island hopping and why did it suck for the United States Marines in World War II?¡±  A blank look was all I got.


    ¡°Good grief Kraken, ok. The question of, ¡®what will we do if we lose¡¯, is a valid question. So what I¡¯m doing is taking the two-fold strategy of the military when we fought Japan and folding it into one. I¡¯m going to be an island hopping nuker.¡± The blank look continued. ¡°Dude, the main base is right here, guarded by Everest and Meliad, whenever she wakes up, and a bunch of water and earth elementals that have been infused with Nephilim matter. The second base will be a freaking sunstone castle in the middle of the DESERT! See where I¡¯m going with this?¡±


    I scratched my head as Kraken didn¡¯t move one ethereal muscle, looking at me as if I was nuts, which I¡¯m not, well, not completely nuts. ¡°And the final piece is the ice castle plan infused with holy water made from Nephilim AND an energy pipeline of mana and sunlight straight from the desert. And I¡¯ll have another army of elementals and I can¡¯t forget about Spot.¡±


    ¡°So what¡¯s the ¡®nuking¡¯ part?¡± Kraken asked, finally joining the conversation.


    ¡°The nuking part is the very makeup of the bases. If I lose my fight up in the cold, I can retreat to the ice castle, which is basically a defensive nuke. And if I lose there, then I can portal to the desert and collapse the ice castle while destroying that World Tree fragment. And if I somehow get followed to the desert, which is the worst place for the undead to fight, then I can make them suffer for every inch they take and then retreat to here  where all my other big cannons are, Everest and Meliad. See, I¡¯m not the Marines in this scenario, I¡¯m Japan, except I¡¯m fighting offensively. The bases are the ¡®islands¡¯ and the fortresses themselves are defensive nukes.¡±


    Shaking his watery head at me, Kraken rolled his big eye. ¡°I knew it. You are crazy. But do you have all the things on your list? Got the Yggdrasil quick-growth seeds, the 3D-Conjurer machine, the copies of the crystal memory plates, and the bits of an angel¡¯s bastard?¡±


    ¡°Yup.¡± Feeling a bit restless due to all of the excitement, I hopped on my hoverboard to go find Spot. The furry eating machine wasn¡¯t too far. Our mental link let me know which direction he was in and I wished I hadn¡¯t really gotten to see what I saw. Hopping off my hoverboard, I stood in front of the mouth of a cave, one big enough to back a plane into. All kinds of weird growls and excited howls were coming out of it. Two much bigger than normal wolves who looked like they were supposed to be standing guard were lying at the sides of the cave mouth, sheepish looks on their faces. So weird how they can have such human expressions.


    They didn¡¯t even look at me, deliberately looking away as I took careful steps towards the dark entrance of the cave, Gungnir out and glowing menacingly, my gear fully powered up with a mana shield covering every inch of me. It only took me a second to assess that I wasn¡¯t in any danger here so I extended my senses into the cave. Sex. My dog was having sex, rough fucking with a she-wolf big enough to take on a tank and win. And the worst part was, I wasn¡¯t using my eyes to view the cave but my magical senses, which means the damn image was burned into my brain.


    ¡°FUCK! DUDE! WHY!¡± I screamed, shutting down my magical senses and turning around, completely understanding where the other wolves were coming from. They were the animal version of putting a sock on the doorknob, but wolves don¡¯t have socks. Angrily composing a mental message in my head, I blasted it down our link and took off on the hoverboard. ¡°Damn, gross,¡± I gagged. ¡°Human sex is great, beautiful even, but that, that¡¯s just wrong.¡±


    Kraken chimed in. [What did you expect? You put dragon in him, and a dragon¡¯s sex drive is not a small thing to contend with. They either eat anything that moves or they fuck anything that moves. Just wait till you visit the Dragoon villages in the spring. It makes your Valentine¡¯s Day look like a boring day at the office.]


    ¡°Stop it!¡±


    [Just wait till you see the shenanigans all the fuckers get into at the Multiverse Magic Academy! You have to visit when you get the chance, it¡¯s like your West Virginia University parties and takes up whole streets, but bigger!]

 Chapter 129 - Power of the Sun (Book 2 Chapter 36)

    *****


    The next morning -


    Yggdrasil¡¯s main root on this planet was for all intents and purposes of the layman beholding it, a tree trunk, a gigantic fucking tree trunk. The fact that a multi-dimensional tree holding the universe together isn¡¯t pure crap still boggles my mind but here it stands, gently pulsating powerful green ripples of pure life and mana as steady as the ocean¡¯s waves. Raw power saturing the very dirt and air of this area makes it nearly impossible for most things to even survive here, with me being the freaky exception. As my combination of sorceries allows for me to survive in this zone of extremely dense mana-pressure, it¡¯s probably going to feel odd to be somewhere else for a while. Staring at the exalted woody prison for my woman, I ran through my mental checklist over and over, procrastinating on leaving as I was still afraid of leaving this area unprotected by me personally even though I knew that this was probably the safest place in the world at any given time.


    [For a badass sorcerer, you¡¯re such a fucking chicken. Nut up and jump, pansy.] Again, the stupid spirit was right but all I wanted to do in that moment was double-check my preparations again and again. Peering into the storage space inside of Gungnir, I checked on the most precious cargo, the six Yggdrasil seeds I¡¯d crafted. This time, I engineered a new design, something meant to be a bit more adaptable than normal as I¡¯d be traveling to incredibly different environments and didn¡¯t want to screw it up.


    ¡°Easy day, easy day,¡± I whispered to myself. ¡°Little road trip with my dog, that¡¯s all it is.¡± Taking a deep breath, I reached over and scratched Spot¡¯s head. Standing at a normal height for a dog right now, he wagged his tail and bumped me, vibrating with excitement. My other hand rose to touch the rough bark of Yggdrasil, brushing past the sheathed knife form of Gungnir at my belt. Its presence filled me with confidence, the simple fact that it was there put my mind at ease. It¡¯s the motion of a hunter cleaning a favorite gun, a lumberjack sharpening his axe or the relationship between tool and craftsman. I¡¯ve read in books where people joked, ¡®what¡¯s a wizard without his staff¡¯, but seriously, I get where they¡¯re coming from. What¡¯s a freaking gun without bullets or a tattoo artist without ink?


    [The mental act of contemplation isn¡¯t the physical act of jumping! Scoot!]


    I scooted. Just a hint of irritation pushed my will forward and into the World Tree, the blindingly powerful magic of the primal scaffold of the universe sucked me and everything near me into it and spit me out in the general direction I wanted as I barely managed to wrap me and Spot up in a cocoon of power. It happened so fast but for one sheer split second I was able to use my consciousness sorcery to guide me where I wanted to go as the place I actually wanted to go wasn¡¯t actually available. Using a mental map that Kraken had put together from my memory of the United States, I knew where the Colorado River was in Arizona, but Yggdrasil wouldn¡¯t send me anywhere that didn¡¯t have enough plant life. It was shunting me towards places I had already been but it didn¡¯t even accept the desert as a viable location. So, the closest place that qualified with dense enough plant life was in California, the land where the redwoods were still king.


    The journey lasted ten seconds after the one second of split decision making I managed to grab hold of. The redwood that was my magical layover spit me out like a toddler discovering lima beans.


    [INCOMING!] Even as I landed on my face in a disoriented haze, I had enough presence of mind to engage Svalinn¡¯s defensive features that projected a shield of pure mana while covering that with alternating layers of conjured stone and iron ore. High pitched whistles heralded the many impacts that I couldn¡¯t see as my stomach tried to violently revolt. Regaining control over the internal revolution of my guts with my flesh sorcery, I threw out my senses to gather information from within my bunker.


    [Aelves! Fucking Aelves! Run dipstick! Run!] Going from chest down on the floor to a tight crouch, I maintained my shields as I gathered power, readying for an explosive exit before I noticed that Spot wasn¡¯t exactly next to me like I thought he was. The ejection from Yggdrasil spat him several yards away from me . A pained howl rearranged my priorities as I brought the non-magical shields down, pulling Gungnir from my belt as it extended into a wizard¡¯s staff. Standing straight up, my weapon pulsated with silver light as the butt of it sank into the ground, siphoning mana from the earth hungrily as I looked around and saw Spot chasing thin humanoids through the forest. Long, thin arrows stuck out from his skin and scales at various places, Spot¡¯s own flames slowly burning them off as gouts of fire exploded from his maw. At this point, I was still willing to leave, my mouth opening to yell for Spot to stand down so I could talk us out of this when one arrow took him in the eye in a glancing blow.


    It was crazy that with the forest of flying arrows that Spot had been shot so few times, but the heat field he was giving off was burning most of them before they actually reached him. There were places on the ground still burning from where his superheated paws hand landed, patches of burning brush and trees clearly marking the erratic path of his chase. In mid-leap, Spot bit three arrows out of the air on his left side when an arrow that would have missed from above glanced downward across his and down his jaw. The light skinned, slant eyed shooter of that arrow exploded into chunks of flesh as five crystal rounds from Gungnir took him in the face and chest.


    Two heartbeats of silence followed the sudden gory shower as everyones¡¯ eyes tracked their newest target once they realized that something far deadlier than a dragon dog was in their midst. ¡°That¡¯s a warning fuckfaces,¡± I snarled to the unnaturally still attackers, not caring if they actually understood me as Gungnir pulsed softer, a menacing hum beginning to vibrate from its crystal core. ¡°You attacked my dog and half-blinded him! Another arrow and you all die.¡±


    A flurry of words passed between the Aelves, many of them staying in the shadows hidden from my eyes but not from my senses. Spot, at my mental command, calmed the blazing flames covering his body a bit and slowly walked backwards towards me, growling menacingly with each soft step. A soft call sounded, like a horn mixed with a lonely wind racing through the tree. At that, all of the Aelves sharply looked in that direction and ran off, each one faster than most humans could track with the naked eye.


    Extending my senses out even further, I made sure that they were gone from the immediate vicinity as I conjured water and dirt to put out the flames. Turning to Spot, I slowly scratched one ear as I numbed his body with flesh sorcery and slowly began pulling out the few arrows still stuck in him. Most had already been ejected out by his own magic, his dense musculature helping with the pushing. Pouring healing magic into him to bolster his own flesh magic, I paid special attention to his eye, taking a solid ten minutes to regrow the damaged tissue. Once my pet was back to fighting shape, I summoned my hoverboard and headed south east towards my destination, my head on a swivel.


    The next two hours of traveling were nerve racking. My paranoia not letting me let Spot out of sight as we didn¡¯t know squat about the surrounding area. All of my gear was powered to the max and Kraken was on full alert, ready to fire crystal rounds at any threat but nothing seemed foolish enough to take us on after our initial display of power. Spot¡¯s giant form ate up the mileage at a decent pace so we were able to go around forty miles an hour even though my plan had initially been to fly to Arizona and let Spot just catch up to me. Using Kraken as my own somewhat accurate GPS, we knew from my memories that my uncle who lived in Arizona near the Colorado River, even though he was probably gone, that that area would be perfect for my base of operations. Now, it wasn¡¯t the hottest or sunniest place on Earth as the Sahara Desert and Death Valley fight for that honor, but where I was heading was still a freaking desert, but a desert with a respectable amount of water there making it an ideal place for a sorcerer of my abilities to set up shop.


    Reaching the edge of the redwood forest, I let myself relax just a bit. No attacks stopped us from ¡®retreating in a dignified manner¡¯ and thanks to my personal matter to mana generator, I was more than full on energy even as everything was dialed to the max.


    [We¡¯re safe now, we can fly the rest of the way there,] Kraken said, his mental voice soft even as he also scanned the surrounding area. [Besides, your dog is part freaking dragon, let him run loose a bit. I¡¯m pretty sure no sentient creature calls the desert home.]


    I shrugged but sent a mental picture of a giant sandworm as a reply. [Shai-hulud isn¡¯t real!] Kraken replied, exasperation tingeing his voice. [Besides, the mana levels of this planet aren¡¯t really there yet for some of the bigger monsters, yet. And while some desert planets have worms that big, this isn¡¯t the Sahara which would be the right climate. This desert is mainly dirt and rock, not endless wastes of sand. The most you¡¯ll have to worry about are the animals mutated by magic.]


    ¡°Fine,¡± I grunted, turning to Spot after I scanned the area again with my magic. ¡°All right boy, just meet us there. You can follow our bond, and besides, I have a treat for you when you get there.¡± Grinning with a barely evil yet humorous smile, I pulled a stone square cube out of Gungnir and popped it open, waving it under Spot¡¯s nose. The sloshing of the diluted Nephilim solution drew his eyes as he tried to snatch it out of my hand. Sealing it shut and storing it away, I laughed as I hopped back onto my hoverboard and zoomed off. ¡°Don¡¯t take too long!¡±


    Getting up to a good speed took me about fifteen seconds with two pulses of power allowing me to take off as soon as my wings extended, Kraken storing my hoverboard as we took to the sky. The energy gathering runes instantly began drinking in the heat and relentless sunlight as the near-desert climate of this part of California powered the solar panel and heat-to-mana conversion runes. I was particularly proud of those last runes as they allowed me to stay somewhat cool even in this oppressive heat. My destination was roughly six hundred miles away as the crow flies which gave me and Kraken some time to commune as that would take us a little over five hours of continuous flight. The climate here was so full of energy thanks to the heat and sunlight that stopping to recharge wouldn¡¯t even be an issue.Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.


    [You¡¯re lucky you escaped with your life! Shit, Spot¡¯s lucky that his own goddamn freaky magic managed to burn most of those freaking bolts away. Anything a bit less durable than he would have been skewered! You don¡¯t mess with Aelves in the forest!] Kraken¡¯s admonishment did not go unheeded but he continued with his rant anyway. [You may have nature sorcery but so do most of them and they¡¯re way better at it than you!]


    The craggy emptiness of America¡¯s desert lay before me, windswept wastes of dirt mixed with random eroded rock formations. Hardy plant life clung to what bits of shade they could find, their flickering life force calling to my nature sorcery, calling for rain, anything in this harsh climate. I flew in wide circles every once in a while as I scanned the area looking for signs of life or anything usual. Turning my attention back to my familiar, I kept our conversation going mentally so I didn¡¯t have to shout over the wind. [I thought all sorcerers were gone?]


    [The human ones are. They pretty much killed each other and the dragons finished off the rest but the different magical races definitely have their own. Aelves like wind and nature, some water ones are mixed in there. But you know that¡¯s not common right, sorcery? Magic, yes, wizardry and shamanism, oh yeah, but sorcery? No. It¡¯s too hard for humans to get as y¡¯all like to live bundled up in cities or ghettos. You need chaos itself to get sorcery and you don¡¯t find that where everything is ordered.]


    My barebones education continued as our destination approached. The shimmering desert air did not fool my magical senses even as the heat waves distorted the view, mirages tricking the human eye even as the river spoke to my water sorcery, calling me. Around here, the Colorado River was nowhere as big as the other rivers that crisscross the North American continent but it was definitely large enough for my purposes. Landing in a good clear spot about five hundred yards away from the river, I pulled out four solar panels and set them up in the cardinal directions, each at least a hundred yards away from its polar opposite. Then, I walked to the very center of it all and stabbed Gungnir¡¯s speartip deep into the earth.


    ¡°Workin on a buildin¡¯,¡± I sang with an exaggerated southern accent, mentally telling Kraken to get started with our predetermined plan. Pulses of mana poured from me down Gungnir to the buried crystal blade as I channeled my sorcery, allowing Kraken to wield my power in a bigger way than he normally could. Waves of power rolled through the earth, rippling out and transmuting the dirt twenty yards out into a crystal circle with connecting crystal lines that extended out to the solar panels. The channeled power unfurled the newer designs of the solar panels as they opened up like flowers and turned towards the sun, reminiscent of sunflowers. The edges of the ¡®leaves¡¯ had surface extending runes acting as an attractor for heat and sunlight. Within five minutes, the temperature was almost unbearable as the wash of power blasted back to Gungnir where Kraken caught the wave and turned it towards our project.


    ¡°Workin on buildin! A Holy Ghost buildin! For my Lawd! For my Lawd!¡± The hick churchy song of West Virginia left my mouth even as I heard Kraken gear up to tell me ¡®not quit my day job¡¯. Pushing another bit of power down Gungnir, we controlled the energy into transmuting an inner circle of dirt around us into a perfect formation of solid diamond with thinner lines of copper connecting to the outer crystal circle. The inner circle circle we were standing inside of was a new kind of battery, one that I planned on being able to help solidify the foundation required for a root of Yggdrasil. As Kraken guided the energy into the model that we wanted, I reviewed again how it would look. With the solar panels at the cardinal directions combined with the surface enhancing runes and sun-tracking abilities along with heat-to-mana conversion as well, the amount of power that this area could generate would be simply awesome.


    The large outer circle would be the secondary intake of power that could extend out to an even larger circle if I ever decided that more power was needed. The expanding design would allow for more and more surface area to be covered if I ever felt that we didn¡¯t pull in enough power on a day-to-day basis. Now, the dirt circle I was kneeling in was actually meant for one of my Yggdrasil seeds, but it would actually be the last part of the entire operation. Pulling out four more solar panels, I placed them at the cardinal directions near me and then rotated them all clockwise forty-five degrees to hit the halfway points between North, South, East, and West. Another pulse of power guided by Kraken moved the solar panels away from the center of the circle till they were about forty yards away. The setup for the inner solar panel ring at a distance of forty yards away gave me a total inner diameter of eighty yards, a bit smaller than the outer ring which had a diameter of one hundred yards, or a radius of fifty yards away from the center.


    I avoided the general pentagram formation as most nerds assumed that was related towards a summoning function, and I personally believe only fools truck with demons. I went with the four point diamond formation denoted by the solar panels sealed within a circle of crystal as that shape for a ritual would make it impervious to any kind of invasion. The inner circle was the same design but rotated forty-five degrees. Kraken was still in the process of using my earth sorcery to flesh out the design but that design was to be the framework for the fort which was going to be built on top of it. But right before the outer walls of the fort were to go up, the plan was to have a massive crystal battery conjured underneath the base.


    My plan for the siege battery was birthed way back when I still had a house underneath the roots of Yggdrasil and it helped preserve some of my belongings from when it was attacked by a goddess. This one, this one was designed with a bit more than that in mind. The very nature of the desert area surrounding the fort combined with the efficiency and extended area of the solar panels allows for an incredible amount of power intake, and to allow for maximum power storage, a humongous crystal battery seemed to be the correct answer. The last battery was a solid block of crystal that was roughly the size of an old basement boiler, a little shorter than an average man.


    This battery that I had planned was more along a combination of modern tech and magic runwork. Overall, the battery design was going to be set up with crystal ¡®cells¡¯ covered in thin platinum except the input and output parts would be a thick gold cable connecting to another battery of the same design. Each of these batteries were going to be supersized, roughly the size of a fridge, and placed end to end with another layer of linked batteries stacked on top of each other. The initial plan was to have a top layer of batteries buried twenty feet deep and the layer of batteries themselves were to be four batteries long and six wide, resulting in each layer having twenty-four batteries. And if God forbid, I could add layer after layer of buried batteries thanks to the cheat that was my earth and mana sorcery. The power to do all of this would not come from me directly, but from the overabundant light and heat provided from the desert environment.


    [It¡¯s a great plan for you because you don¡¯t have to do shit,] Kraken complained from inside the partially buried spear. [Oh yeah, give the poor stuck spirit the blueprints while the oh-so-powerful sorcerer gets to play and explore the area, woohoo.]


    [Shut up!] I snapped back, trying my best to hide my hint of sadistic joy. There really wasn¡¯t any guilt in having my spirit familiar fill the role of a 3-D printer. Our power channeling ritual really wasn¡¯t that complex but it was time consuming, and since Kraken was more than capable of overseeing the management of everything, this gave me the freedom to scout the area and maybe work on any kinds of experimentation inspiration that may strike. Due to the scale of the project, our estimate to have everything up and running was about a week, maybe two. I couldn¡¯t go far though as unforeseen issues may pop up.


    [Chill for a bit man,] I sent to Kraken. [You don¡¯t need to worry, you¡¯ll be safe in Gungnir and I¡¯ll be safe with this baby!] Pulling out my personally altered magitech rifle, I hefted it and rotated the barrel. [Between my batteries, the hoverboard and wings along with this gorgeous gun, I¡¯m good to go!]


    And off I went, cruising away in my hoverboard straight towards the disparate coolness of the Colorado river. I couldn¡¯t really help myself as I headed there way too freaking fast, pulling up and shooting in the sky at an angle as unfurled the metal wings on my back to get a bit more air. Turning around in midair, I executed two flips and halfway belly flopped down into the river. I took the rest of the day to relax and hoverboard around, returning to the river each time to cool off from the oppressive heat. Kraken¡¯s work was slowly, but steadily growing as he didn¡¯t need sleep at all but I slept like a baby on top of the river, nestled out in the middle of it supported by my water sorcery.


    The morning greeted me with all the glaring shine of the American Midwest, mainly West more than Mid at this point, but it was grand nonetheless. Conferring with Kraken to make sure everything was on schedule, I skated across the river¡¯s surface and up on to the bank. While my familiar was working on a building that had an emphasis on fortification, I figured that I would build a house based on comfort close to the river. I looked over and saw that the barest bit of sunstone peaking out just above the surface of the earth near Gungnir, the particular nature of that magical rock would also allow for an incredible intake of power as a parallel to the solar panels at the edges of the crystal circles. My home though, the home away from home, now that was going to be marble.


    The first thing I did was set up two more solar panels, the first on a rock sticking out of the river, which I shaped the rock to hold the panel a bit better, and the other was just off to the side near me. After activating both of them, I forged a loose channel with each of them so that they would just constantly pour the mana straight into my own reserves of power. ¡°Desert home, home in the desert,¡± I muttered, looking over the sad stretch of land that was to be transformed into a little paradise. With the river close by, nothing was out of reach comfort-wise.


    First, I began banishing the dirt with my earth sorcery, forming a big pit. When I was little, my parents took me to the Luray Caverns in Virginia and I couldn¡¯t help but wonder with my small child brain why in the world it was so cool down there when it was almost a hundred degrees at the mouth of the cave. My father told me that the earth is the best insulator, especially when you give it some distance to work. So I formed my own pit, the basis for a Hobbit home. The next hour or two rounded out the general design, basically a buried yurt made out of stone with layers and layers of dirt covering the top of it for insulation. The next two hours were spent carefully designing an underground channel so that the river would flow into my home, form a fresh pool of constantly circulating water, and then flow out. This would give me a place to sleep, the ultimate water bed with my water sorcery, but a quick way to escape if I ever needed it. Few things could match me in the water.


    Runes of water and cooling decorated the inside of my home along with a kinetic current converter rune placed at the bottom of the carved river channel. That was linked to a couple sunstones for light which were placed around. A flex of will would brighten up the room or darken it whenever I wanted. Ten minutes of conjuring and shaping stone gave me a nice set of stairs runed to always be cool even with the desert heat, the stairs leading to the thick stone doorway. [Or you could be making weapons, or golem bodies, or something useful instead of having me do all of this shit!]


    [What would you rather be doing?] I sent back, a bit of sarcasm letting Kraken know how I felt about his objections. We had agreed on this particular plan as he, a spirit, would not mess up any of the delicate measurements that might compromise the conjured structure that he was building. [I need a place where the heat won¡¯t eventually kill me. And that fort won¡¯t have the cooling rune work in it until the very end, right now, it¡¯s a straight up heat trap.]


    [I know what I said, what I¡¯m saying now is that it¡¯s BORING!]


    [Look, I¡¯ll help you out when Spot gets here, and at the pace that dog can run, it should be in about three days at the most unless he gets distracted.] A grunt of begrudging affirmation was all I got, which I took to mean that maybe I could get some work done in peace. Downing a meal cube and a bit of conjured water, I threw myself into my work. The sun had set for at least an hour before I had my bachelor pad ready. The magical water bed, a bunch of mini fruit and veggie plants tastefully hanging on the walls with runes that routinely conjured the right amount of water above them. Up on the wall off to the right, I had drawn out a couple possible plans that I could easily accomplish here in the desert, which I thought about long into the night.

 Chapter 130 - Unwelcome Interruption (Book 2 Chapter 37)

    Kraken was still at it when I woke up which I had to double check as it didn¡¯t look like there was much or any progress until he sent me a mental screenshot of the below-ground view. Several of the big batteries in the first layer were done and the crystal rings connecting the solar panels were sprouting gold wires to tie the inner and outer circles together at different points. He sent me another screenshot of the bird¡¯s eye view where the gold wire was also going to be layered in such a way that it actually formed a giant rune of life. The rune itself was buried under the first so as to not draw attention from above but soon the sunstone fortress would do that all on its own.


    My goal for today today was something I hadn¡¯t tried before. Today was a day of experimentation. From what I know, and I made sure to run through my memories with consciousness sorcery just to be sure, there are trees that actually thrive in the desert. The American desert is rife with small thorny bushes and big cacti, but the big trees such as the baobab trees live in Africa and Australia. That tree would be perfect for my purposes, but I need another tree as well, a hybrid one actually. Willow trees, if left alone, can become gigantic, but they tend to do best near a river. I wanted to see if I could merge a willow tree with its cousin the desert willow and then plant it on top of my nice bachelor pad. The nearness of the river would give it what it would need to survive and the hybrid characteristics of the desert willow would give it the chops to survive the harsh climate of Arizona.


    But first, I had to test out my nature sorcery. Conjuring stone and water was second nature to me now, but I mainly used my nature sorcery as a way to shape and manipulate plants. I hadn¡¯t gone full mad scientist with that yet as I simply hadn¡¯t had the time. Now, one of the things that I had noticed is that the efficiency of magic goes up the more you know about it, and that extends to sorcery as well albeit in a lesser manner. But knowing stuff about water and stone as well as having a general education on it definitely allowed me to manipulate it more with less of a strain on my personal mana reserves. Plants, I¡¯ve never been really good with plants.


    Sitting in my underground house, I held a simple acorn in my hand. Now, it definitely is not the plant I wanted, but I needed to start somewhere familiar. Fully diving into my nature sorcery, I groped around for my instincts, trying to find out the limits of what I could easily do. Could I just straight up conjure another acorn? With one in front of me, turns out the answer is yes, and it didn¡¯t really cost much energy either. Taking another breath, I focused on a willow seed. I spent about nine years of my childhood in North Carolina and the house across the street had a monstrous willow tree. Many hours were spent climbing up and down that beast as I slew dragons and fought pirates. The hanging tendrils of the willow tree were covered in little seeds, sometimes I can still smell the freshness of it after a rain. Latching on to that image, I pulled with my nature sorcery, a small pop heralding the arrival of a freshly conjured willow seed.


    ¡°Score!¡± I yelled, jumping up, tightly yet gently clutching the fragile seed. Carefully setting it off to the side near a sunstone lamp, I sat down again and channeled my excitement, carefully picturing the baobab tree. Now, I had never been near one, never climbed up its thick trunk or eaten its fruit. All I had ever seen were pictures of it on the internet, heard videos on Youtube about chains of people linking arms to wrap themselves around the tree all the while gasping at the age of the baobab tree. Some of them can live up to over two thousand years. My knowledge, although bereft of personal ties and experience, gave my nature sorcery enough of a limb to work with. The cost of energy was much higher as the tree itself is most likely a rarity but I did remember my uncle telling me that some crazy gardener in California was tending some baobab trees.


    A small pop and a little multi-colored nugget of a seed appeared in my hand. ¡°Fuck me, it worked!¡± The little kernel of a seed just a bit smaller than a child¡¯s marble rolled around in my hand. Feelings of grand potential and long sought after majesty wafted off the prized embodiment off what could be thousands of years of stored life. It was almost too small in its stature for me to believe that some of the oldest and thickest of trees get their start from such a humble beginning. Closing my hand around the seed, I gently let my nature sorcery permeate through it, carefully taking the measure of the seed. The little ball of stored potentiality opened its nature to me, different general shapes appearing to my mind, varieties of traits making themselves known. Gently sorting through them, I pulled the hardiest traits to the fore as well as the biggest while pushing my own vision of what I desired. The little seed was more than happy to conform to my wishes, combining all the different traits I wanted while discarding the unneeded ones, sacrificing those potential growth paths to power the ones I needed.


    As my power sank into the tree, I concentrated on different runes and associated feelings with them, trying to push them as well into the seed and match growth tendencies with runic capabilities. For basic growth, I thought of runes for mana storage as well as life force storage, and for the bark I pushed the idea of malleable hardness while the heartwood I concentrated on unwavering strength. Uncurling my fist, the little seed marble rolled around in the palm of my hand glowing with mana and just a bit of my hopes and dreams.


    [Holy shit man, that, is an EPIC idea! I¡¯ve known that nature sorcerers can do some cool shit but that can be game changing!]


    I chuckled at Kraken¡¯s intrusion. [What?] He sputtered. [I¡¯m bored as shit over here, might as well peek in on what you¡¯re doing. Most people carve the runes in a plant after it''s grown or while it¡¯s in the process of growing, but to implant it in the seed itself, genius.]


    [That¡¯s the plan. I can¡¯t have an epically magic fortress with a weak ass portal tree in the center. I need something diametrically opposed to the undead here that could augment me if needed. The river for my water sorcery, I¡¯m always surrounded by dirt which works for my earth sorcery and these two seeds will give me ample plant life to work with for nature sorcery. Now combine all that with the magic formations and solar panels pulling in mana and all the batteries storing more than I could ever use, then this acre of land will be about as magically dense as the forest back home.] Wiping a bit of sweat out of my eyes that had formed in spite of the cool air from the runes in my new underground home, I pocketed the two seeds and made my way back to where Gungnir was stuck in the ground.


    Kraken popped out one of the World Tree seeds that I had stored away in Gungnir¡¯s spatial area as I approached. The very fact that I have nature sorcery is really saving my ass right now, basically Macgyvering my cheating butt through all kinds of impossible obstacles that would have made normal wizards quit by now.  Although it was late in the day, the heat was still incredible, especially when you think about the very spot I was standing in. My energy formation gathers heat and light, concentrating it and then converting that into mana which is channeled from the solar panels through the gold wires into the crystal circle back into the gold wires and then down into Gungnir which channels the excess into the batteries. Now, the massive flow of power is being used by Kraken to conjure and shape the batteries themselves until we have at least one layer of twenty-four of them, but the sheer magnitude of what¡¯s going on is still mind-boggling.


    Realizing that I should probably wait to plant my tree until after this whole thing is done, I figured that tomorrow would be a better day spent doing better things. Besides, the amount of heat here would kill any kind of plant life and the only reason I¡¯m actually still alive from the concentrated heat is because Svalinn was greedily lapping up all the excess heat and mana it could grab. I keep forgetting to feed the damn gauntlet shield. Returning to my much cooler underground house near the river, I tucked in for the night.


    After my morning ablutions were taken care of, I greeted the too-bright morning with a customary yawn accompanied by a colorful curse that was mostly unintelligible grumbling about the lack of coffee. Resigning myself to my usual morning practice, I used flesh sorcery to instantly perk me up and put my system at full alertness.


    [Mornin¡¯ sunshine!] Kraken¡¯s greeting was way too fucking happy. [I figured it out! I can get all of this done by the end of the week easy! I¡¯ll simply do all the conjuring during the day while the power flow is beyond intense and then do all the rune work at night because that doesn¡¯t require as much power as it does concentration. That¡¯ll give you more than enough time to merge the Yggdrasil seed with the baobab as well as giving Spot enough time to process his treat when he gets here.]


    ¡°Nobody should be this happy in the morning,¡± I growled, wishing for that sweet nectar of coffee. I know I don¡¯t need it, but damn do I miss it sometimes.


    [You could just conjure a freaking coffee plant you dumbass!]The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    [I JUST realized that!]


    Adding that to my to-do list for later, I pulled out my baobab seed and my Yggdrasil seed. From what I¡¯ve learned so far, the World Tree tends to be very forgiving with the kinds of plant life it associates with, meaning that as long as it''s big and healthy then any plant is more than good enough to be added to the World Tree. This particular peculiarity is what is going to allow me to pop in and out of various parts of the world, in essence giving me a way to freely travel incredible distances with the minor cost of setting up the destinations  correctly. It would probably come back to bite me in the ass if I didn¡¯t make the area with a Yggdrasil root at least somewhat inhospitable.


    The fist-sized Yggdrasil seed was oddly warm against my hand, as if the life inside of it was straining at the woody barrier that was its shell. In contrast, the baobab seed was small and cool, seemingly relaxed as if it knew that its time would come whether or not I did anything, giving off the sense of inevitability while the other was exuding over-sized life. So I did what any enterprising mad scientist/sorcerer would do, I smashed them together. And when I say smashed, I mean skillfully used my nature sorcery to push the smaller baobab seed into the very core of the Yggdrasil seed and merge them together. A burst of energy started to flare up as the inner layers of the Yggdrasil seed openly welcomed the intruder, doing its best to explosively grow in that exact moment.


    ¡°Shit, fuck, damn, FUCK!¡± I yelled, wrestling the energy back to a dormant state. ¡°It¡¯s not growing time yet!¡± It was like wrestling a small child that didn¡¯t want a diaper change. You knew eventually that you were going to win, but it was definitely a messy process. Every arc of energy that started to burst forth I had to squish, gently, back into the seed. What won me the fight was setting a multi-tasking process to lightly carve stasis runes in the outer seed covering with my mental sorcery, allowing me to tame one region of the seed at a time.


    Leaning back against the cool stone wall, I set a condition for the stasis runes to disappear when I actually bury the seed. Setting it on the table, I sat up and stretched just in time for Kraken to start screaming in my head. [DINOSAURS! Are those ZOMBIE dinosaurs?! Get your ass out here!] Knowing that I wouldn¡¯t believe him out of sheer incredulity, Kraken sent me an accompanying image in my head which really kickstarted my adrenaline. The Mad Max version of The Land Before Time was charging towards my very unfinished fortress and I had nothing prepped, I didn¡¯t even have Spot here to serve as my frontline.


    Sprinting out of my dark new home into the brightness of the desert morning, I turned on a dime and hauled ass towards Gungnir, my only saving grace. [Cut it off or pause it Kraken! I need Gungnir more than the damn fortress does right now.]


    [Already done, keep moving!]


    My hoverboard allowed me to reach Gungnir in five seconds flat, giving me at least ten seconds to set up some semblance of defense. Kraken had done good with the little time we had. Speeding up my mind with mental sorcery, I double checked to make sure that everything below me was stable and then quickly forged a link between the entire power gathering ritual and Gungnir, making sure to include the batteries as needed. Pulling my spear out of the ground, I whirled it and slammed the butt back in the hole where the blade was. One arm was on Gungnir while my rifle was at the ready in the other. Svalinn roared to life, extending out like bladed shields from the gauntlets at each arm. A pulsing flaming hunger enveloped me, asking, begging me to rip my enemies limb from limb and feast on their blood.


    [Whoa there! Might wanna rein that back a bit! Here, lemme help.] Kraken reached out with my earth sorcery, making the outer layer of solar panels fold up and sink into the earth where they¡¯d be safe. Flicking out a burst of power, he turned the inner circle of solar panels to full gather and then ran power along the crystal circle. [Hallelujah! You can thank me later. I got a basic shield inscription running along the inner circle and it¡¯s got plenty of juice for now.]


    ¡°I¡¯ll thank you now,¡± I said through gritted teeth, doing my best not to growl as I fought Svalinn¡¯s hunger, forcing it to heel. SAW, my nano/magitech armor, also came to life.


    Severe existential threat detected. Engaging all physical enhancement systems. Influx siphons set to max capacity. Link established with named Norse artifacts. Gungnir detected. Svalinn detected. Offensive and defensive measures rendered irrelevant by Norse artifacts. Sensory and reaction enhancements engaged.


    Silver lines of liquid metal ran up and down the length of Gungnir as other tendrils extended from my arms to wrap around Svalinn, giving them both the appearance that they had metallic veins. Not having time to ponder what SAW called my main gear, I braced myself in the earth with my sorcery making me as steady as a mountain. The ground shook from the pounding feet of creatures long dead, their size and weight giving them power and momentum while their undead nature gave them unending stamina turning them into giant meat missiles. Two Triceratops flanked a charging T-rex as smaller dinosaurs that looked to be Velociraptors playfully skipped and ran at their heels.


    [I can make out riders on top of them,] Kraken said at the speed of thought. [And those are definitely zombie dinosaurs. Someone is controlling them.] Sending me a zoomed in picture of the stampede, I was able to make out a female with long black hair on top of the T-rex and the triceratops were carrying one male each, one black and the other mixed, couldn¡¯t really tell what though. [Don¡¯t get cocky, each one is packing some serious firepower.]


    Taking his warning to heart, I looked in the magical spectrum for just a second. The raven haired chick was clearly controlling the zombies, dark purple magic floating off of her in waves and concentrating in the eyes, brains, and bones of the zombies. Her own eyes were blazing orbs of purple fire, obscuring her facial features in the magical spectrum because they were so bright. She wore a thick black circlet on her head that was ringed with red gems and silver chains that draped her crouched figure glowed brightly. Various rings and bracelets glowed with much less power but the sheer number of her enchanted gear was a bit disturbing.


    Her dark skinned friend on the triceratops shined almost as bright as Heaven¡¯s Herald, Gav¡¯riel. His power though was concentrated on one medallion half the size of dinner plate on his chest. The gold chains holding it were overly stuffed with multi-colored mana that was threatening to burst free at any second. The mixed guy on the other side was riding like an Indian, his feet easily keeping time with the gait of the triceratops as he stood, riding it like a surfboard, each hand spread to the side for balance while holding a bat. The metal bat on the left didn¡¯t glow as brightly as the wooden bat in his right hand, but it felt far more dangerous.


    They didn¡¯t even stop like I thought they would. The solid barrier of mana shone bright yellow to me even outside of the magical spectrum. The T-rex slowed down as both triceratops  sped up, slamming their giant horns into the barrier; I could barely make out the black dude singing his head off, ¡°We came in like a WRECKING BALL!¡± His medallion shook as power channelled from his mouth into it, expanding and amplifying the twisty mana and sending it at the barrier.


    Humongous ripples exploded out from both impacts from the triceratops and the T-rex timed his charge perfectly to slam his head a split second after the other two did most of the work. The bat wielder followed up as the mana barrier wavered, allowing him through as the dinosaurs rebounded.


    ¡°He can do that?¡± I gasped.


    [Structural shields have a weakness I guess, that singin¡¯ probably had somethin¡¯ to do with it.] Kraken said, his mental voice tense as I almost started firing. I held off as I didn¡¯t want the rounds to bounce back at me from the inside of the shield. Using a bit of my earth sorcery, Kraken quickly turned all of the dirt inside the inner crystal circle into quicksand twenty feet deep as my armor started automatically conjuring water, swirling it around me.


    ¡°Help!¡± The dude was stuck in my quicksand, sinking just slow enough for him to cry out for help before slipping beneath the surface. The gothy chick screamed in rage as her zombies redoubled their efforts, ramming the barrier that grew thinner with each attack.


    The black guy switched up his song. Staring lovingly at the goth chick, he started croning, ¡°I knock down the walls for you, cause I need you!¡± His medallion shot out multi-colored mana that drilled into the barrier causing the shield runes to start smoking as they began to deform.


    [That¡¯s song magic! Knock him out now or something! Song magic is a form of directed wild magic, less powerful than Merlin¡¯s mojo but way more predictable and definitely in your league of power!¡±


    The moment I was about to start blasting I heard the goth girl scream, ¡°Louder Remy!¡± Her singing buddy amped up the volume, completely bringing down the shield. Reacting instinctively in perfect tandem with Kraken, I pulsed the quicksand to make it impossible for them to get close to us while Kraken fired hammer rounds followed by piercing rounds at the knees and skulls of the big three zombies completely taking them down. The dead flesh slowly sloughed off of the skeletons as they lay partly in the quicksand. The bat wielder was flung up and out of the sand pit, hollerin¡¯ the whole way to the ground.


    The three big dinosaurs couldn¡¯t move as their joints were destroyed along with the cores of magic inside of them, but the other smaller dinosaurs, the Velociraptors, used the big bodies as springboards to leap at me. Svalinn projected hovering shields of mana and flame all around me causing the raptors to completely bounce off and land in the quicksand, sinking to the bottom.


    PREY DOES NOT ESCAPE! Svalinn¡¯s hunger raged through my mind as at least seven of the smaller zombies fell to their earthly prison. Ignoring it for a moment, I let Kraken work on solidifying the sand like concrete as I calmly and methodically fired crystal rounds into the three big dinosaurs, systematically rendering every joint into mush. The goth girl had gotten to her feet, her face white with fear. Turning, she began sprinting away, dragging her singing friend away.


    PREY DOES NOT ESCAPE! Gouts of fire exploded forth but doing nothing as they only reached about twenty feet away. Svalinn shook as the rage of the fragmented dragon soul lashed against the prison I had bound it to. ¡°Prey won¡¯t escape,¡± I said grimly, soothing my vicious shield.

 Chapter 131 - The Twisted Knife (Book 2 Chapter 38)

    Bouncing to his feet, Fernando twirled his bats, giving each a kiss for good luck. Not even looking over his shoulder to see the two lovebirds sprinting away like the devil was on their tail, he knew that they were just outclassed, a trio of weasels squeaking at a lion. Buying them time would be worth it if they could just get home, anybody would balk at entering the wreck that was Phoenix. It was supposed to be easy, scout the area, get whatever uber powerful magical artifact that made every wizard¡¯s hair stand on end, smash anything in the way and head home. Cracking his neck, Fernando fed power into his bats. The punk wizard wouldn¡¯t have believed that anyone could have taken the three of them on, especially after all the sand dragons they¡¯ve killed in the past six months, but then again, anything was better than that demon horde that ravaged the city. Putting down that summoner/necromancer would give him nightmares for the rest of life. The last words of that dying fuck right before Fernando¡¯s bat caved in his skull, he was shrieking like a banshee, ¡°You¡¯re not ready! We¡¯re all not ready! He comes! From the desert he comes! Wearing black bearing the Cruel One¡¯s spear! All shall kneel! No mercy! Death, so much death, sweet beautiful implacable death! Angels and demons weep for our souls! His dragon shall devour us all! Beware!¡±


    Fernando shook his head, clearing the memory of the bloody shower from the skull spraying its contents across his face, the evil man¡¯s clawed hands pointing west before going limp. And here he was, right now, facing Death himself. Funny, he figured Death would be taller. Dressed in black armor with silver runes cutting an intimidating figure, the man spoke so softly that Fernando couldn¡¯t make it out, something about praying? A menacing spear that cut down the dinos without even moving exuded a pressure all its own that was so great that Fernando was forced to take one step back after another. In the other man¡¯s hand was a futuristic gun that he held effortlessly with one hand and what made Fernando almost wet his pants were the shield gauntlets. They didn¡¯t even have eyes but he knew, Fernando knew, that without a shadow of a doubt those things wanted every bit of his flesh, every bit of his soul.


    He thought he knew what power was. The last months of near constant combat had shown him the depths of depravity that humanity was capable of. Phoenix was a city of over a million people and now there were less than a thousand. Between the invasion of insectoid people with magic weapons pouring through random portals and power-mad humans flinging fire and summoning demons and the dead, the city was a gutted wreck. Only his trusted bats had seen him through, that and maybe a bit of help from his friends. Damn, if only he could stop his hands from shaking.


    Another memory hit Fernando in a flash, putting down cannibals after the city had run out food. No matter how many times he crushed their skulls they just kept regenerating and getting back up like freaking trolls. Fire was the answer to that issue but the man behind them was also an evil psychopath in black, someone who liked to scream to the sky about world domination and the power that magic brought as anything that was dead came back to life at his command. That fight had killed more people than the bugs and demons combined, skeletons and zombies and nightmares from your blackest dreams coming to his beck and call.


    Nates perspective


    Why blow his head off? I mean I could, I probably should, but today was supposed to be a nice, easy day of experimentation and I just couldn¡¯t let that go. I had plenty of things to do today but I got attacked by fucking zombies and BY GOD I wanted to know why. So fuck it. My gaze seemed to freeze him in place, his entire body had a quick shiver as if he finally figured out who¡¯s day he royally screwed up. His face was a deer seeing a wolf for the first time, not knowing what it was but knowing in his heart of hearts that this strange new creature was bad for his long-term health. I made a helmet a long time ago that I imprinted with a gem and inscribed with runes of mental strength and defense well before I had consciousness sorcery. Now, I figured out that I could use it for offense. Concentrating everything through my focusing gem, I lanced my mind straight at the kid, using our gaze as the pathway to burrow into his vulnerable consciousness.


    His life in snapshots fluttered through my brain, letting me see more than I actually wanted to know. Fernando was his name, a typical college nerd in Phoenix who loved DnD and partying on the weekend. The nightclubs were awesome and plenty of people were out drinking and still drunk in the morning when the First Ripple hit. He was at a 24 hour batting cage drinking with Jeremy, or Remy to his friends, and Nicole when reality took a nosedive. Always wanting to be a wizard as he was an avid devourer of the Harry Potter and Harry Dresden books, he thought being a punk wizard with magic bats would rock, finally allowing him to hit the baseballs that always seemed to dodge when he went up to bat. Skipping a month of time or so, images of insane night violence filled with fire and death flashed through my brain as the taste of blood and scenes of red skinned terrors peeling the flesh off of their prey touched my mind. The horrors winged their way through the city, snatching up anyone not fast enough to get away.


    Scenes of laughing power drunk maniacs dressed in black, wreathed in magic that melted cars and turned dead children into hungry zombies also had their turn with the city. The graveyards were no longer full of peaceful dead and Fernando with Remy and Nicole had made a final stand at the Phoenix Natural History museum after months of constant fighting. That¡¯s where they found out that even long dead bones could be brought back to a semblance of life. Remy¡¯s music magic with that strange medallion had kept them alive as Fernando¡¯s incredibly versatile grasp of magic helped them maneuver through many sticky situations. Nicole¡¯s power saved them all in the end, even allowing her to shape what she called ¡®ether¡¯ into a simulacrum of flesh, but at the cost of making her like the sickos out there. Hearing voices and sudden violent urges were now a constant companion as her power tainted her mind.


    I watched a memory of the three of them arguing about finding whatever it was in the desert that drew the attention of anything magically sensitive. Anything to make her stronger is what Nicole argued, anything to make her happy said Remy, and Fernando just wanted a way to make the city better, safer, normal again. Unlucky for them, I looked enough like the necromancers from the city in my scary armor that they didn¡¯t even hesitate to attack. Everything they¡¯ve faced has been a threat so far so why wouldn¡¯t I be one as well? Not to mention, there had been plenty of group kidnappings from Aelves and other magical creatures. Very few from that number had ever been seen again.


    Coming back from the memory slideshow, I blinked and Fernando had keeled over, knocked unconscious from meeting my own mind, pity. The whole process must have taken longer than I thought as Nicole had run back to the dino bodies during my trance and crafted herself some bone armor for herself and Remy, pulled out a wicked looking bone scythe, and then molded an skeletal horse from the shattered dinosaurs. Slamming the scythe¡¯s butt into the ground, her guttural chanting  grew louder and more twisted, her eyes glowing purple seemingly adding to her chant with keening of their own.


    Deep lavender blasts of mana from the scythe struck the humongous fallen corpses around me, their rotting pseudo-flesh sloughing off faster as bony hands and claws ripped their way free. A small army of roughly humanoid skeletons complete with augmented canines, tiger like claws, spiked skulls and spiny tails soundless screamed with rage as their glowing red eyes let me know that they weren¡¯t friendlies about to ask for fucking directions.


    To end them or not to end them? Svalinn certainly had an opinion on the matter and Kraken really just wanted me to examine the medallion, I did too. My familiar also made sure to parrot back my own thoughts to me last time I visited a group of people, that having them strategically placed can be more good than bad as it might remove attention from me. But this Nicole bitch though, something in her eyes told me that she wasn¡¯t going to let this go, that she had power now and was going to grind me to pieces if I gave her half a chance. She used to be pretty too; I could tell from the fine cheek bones and remnants of a great figure but lack of proper food had left her lacking in the seduction department. I was also really curious about Remy, something about his innate love for magic and his application of it fascinated me.


    Thinking quickly, I sent out a general semi-powerful pulse of magic blasting Nicole and her minions away giving me a few free seconds to run to Remy and wake him up. I knew now that the douchebag wasn¡¯t actually opposed to me personally, he just thought I was another maniac wizard out in the desert. Shaking him and quickly injecting a bit of healing magic into him to kickstart his body''s own healing system, I held him by the head and yelled, ¡°If you don¡¯t stop her then I will!¡± Kraken made the blade of Gungnir blaze with menacing light to add some oomph to my point. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    That¡¯s when I saw it, two lines of purple runes forming thin, tight, almost invisible rings around Fernando¡¯s neck and temple. [That¡¯s not normal.]


    ¡°Thanks genius,¡± I muttered as another wave of images crashed into my brain,  Fernando waking up suddenly thinking another midnight attack was happening but it was just Nicole. Nicole? The fuck is she doing here this late at night? She and Remy are a thing, have been since grade school. Soft whispers that sounded like echoing ghosts flowed as a bit of purple smoke lashed out from her lips, binding my throat and head. Now my own actions outside of her will bring pain.


    Pushing myself out of his memories, I pulled Gungnir out of the ground, turning it into a slender knife which I imbued with power and deftly cut Fernando twice severing the runic chains. The whole time I knelt doing that I had my rifle propped up on my knee in the general direction of the other two. Judging from what I¡¯d gathered, if Fernando was being mentally fucked, then Remy probably had some of that kool-aid too.


    ¡°Nooooo!¡± Nicole¡¯s screech almost made me gash open Fernando¡¯s neck. Making a yanking motion, I saw several smaller purple orbs of power get ripped from the mangled leftovers of the dinosaurs and get absorbed by her scythe. She did it again and several smaller ones came out of Fernando but these ones were absorbed by the chains she was wearing. Gaining a life of their own, those chains grew in length lashing about, seeking something to strangle. One latched on to Remy and another to his chain, draining all the mana in his body. A thinner chain that I almost didn¡¯t notice slapped the skeleton closest to me causing it to blow up. The shockwave buffeted me but didn¡¯t hurt me. Fernando was blown twenty feet away. Lobbing a mana packet with a rune of healing at Fernando, I hoped that would keep him alive for the next couple minutes.


    [I mean, we should definitely kill her now, she¡¯s using living beings and zombies as mana batteries.]


    DO NOT LET PREY ESCAPE!


    SAW was in complete agreement with Svalinn. Imminent danger. Summoning ritual detected. Source . . . . scanning . . .  Neophyte necromancer. Error . . . source . . . lives of reaped victims. Recommended action . . . elimination . . . timeframe . . . IMMEDIATELY!


    I didn¡¯t want to kill a big titty goth chick, there¡¯s so few of them left. The conjured water around me formed into two swirling discs of jagged ice with a flex of will and then blasted at Nicole, one right after the other aiming for her head and waist. At the same time, Kraken fired a crap ton of rounds, blowing each skeleton monster to bits. Not leaving anything to chance, I enhanced my strength momentarily and hurled spear-form Gungnir at her heart as a follow up. Four skeletons threw themselves in the way, getting completely demolished but it did manage to stop the ice discs but not Gungnir that plowed straight into her diaphragm. Using the last bit of enhanced strength, I leaped the twenty yard distance with Svalinn extended as my bladed shields, making sure to finish the job.


    Looking over at Remy, he was convulsing on the ground, the purple runes on his neck and head were still siphoning his life to keep Nicole alive. ¡°Fuck!¡± I cursed, ripping Gungnir free, turning smoothly back into a knife right when I needed it allowing me to quickly cut Remy free from the enchanted mind control. Re-stabbing Nicole in the heart with Gungnir just to make sure she was down and staying down, Svalinn shook on my arms.


    FEED ME! FEED ME! FEED ME!


    ¡°How you stupid shield? HOW?¡± The two extended blades quivered as they grew longer by another foot, serrated metal teeth extending on the underside like a jaw. ¡°Well shit, fine, go ahead.¡± My hungry shield gauntlets lurched forward, the toothy blades diving right in, one to the heart and one to the brain. Nicole¡¯s body seized like we were doing an exorcism as Svalinn poured dragonfire into the body, but the fire didn¡¯t actually burn it. The red flames poured into the wound and then red flames heavily mixed with purple roared back out. Her body flopped bonelessly back down, not a hint of mana or magic power left.


    Svalinn retracted the blades returning to normal shield gauntlets and falling silent, the hunger and mental pressure that was so great just a moment ago completely gone. Both of the young men were lying down, completely out of it. Suddenly, a big whoompf sound reverberated out of the medallion around Remy¡¯s neck causing its own mini-Ripple in the immediate area. I instantly hopped back, bringing Svalinn in front of me and generating every shield I could think of.


    ¡°Fortune smiles her fanged mouth at you today mortal.¡± Peeking over Svalinn, a wispy cloud extending from the chained medallion was speaking to me. ¡°Let your shackled dragon finish the job and I¡¯ll be free to do your bidding, there is much I can do for my liberator.¡±


    The blue cloud was fucking talking to me. Why the fuck is a blue cloud speaking? ¡°Oh, you don¡¯t like this form? Maybe something a bit more comforting . . .   wait, I can¡¯t see your thoughts at all?¡±


    [It¡¯s a Djinn!] Kraken freaked. [Give it nothing, ask and answer no questions! They¡¯re worse than the Fae and so much more powerful! They can¡¯t really do anything if you don¡¯t engage with an enslaved one.]


    A memory from Fernando popped to the fore as I slowly stepped back, the three of them wasted at the batting cage as Remy wished for more wishes, Fernando drunkenly wishing the two baseball bats were epic wizard tools as Nicole was behind them. He couldn¡¯t remember what she said but her eyes had been dark purple ever since. Concentrating hard for a second, I moved all memories not my own to a separate spot in my brain and locked them there with several conditional filters. I couldn¡¯t have distractions like this popping up at random times, especially with all the craziness going on.


    ¡°Even a fool, when he keeps his silence, is considered wise,¡± the Djinn said sagely, its cloud twisting as a hot desert breeze blew across the battlefield. ¡°What tempts one such as you? Freedom, no, not for you . . . for someone else maybe?¡±


    His words made me freeze. Freedom. I had freedom but I know someone who doesn¡¯t. What do they say about something too good to be true? That it¡¯s a fool''s bargain. But his empty promise was enough to actually make me angry, throwing something in my face that I want, I need, the one thing that¡¯s been burning a hole in my brain for far too fucking long.


    ¡°Ah yes, your woman. Just a bit stuck isn¡¯t she?¡±


    Lowering Svalinn, I pooled all of my power, every bit of it, into Gungnir¡¯s blade, pointing it at the medallion. I wasn¡¯t fooled, it¡¯s real body was trapped in that damn coin and the cloud was just for show as it twisted into the shape of a svelte dancer covered in silky sheets of misty fabric. ¡°Now now, don¡¯t be trite. Your spirit¡¯s mind isn¡¯t as guarded as yours, such secrets locked away from even you? Hmmmm. I do wonder what others might like to know of your treasure?¡±


    Not listening to the ongoing rant from Kraken inside my head, I stalked forward, solidly touching the medallion with Gungnir¡¯s blade. Coldly channeling all of the power, all of the mana from my personal stores to Gungnir¡¯s and including the solar panels with their batteries, I pushed the coin until the spear blade sunk in about half  an inch.


    ¡°What is this? What are you doing?!¡± The Djinn¡¯s scream was music to my ears as I formed runes of chains on the smooth back of the coin. My blade turned white hot as Svalinn joined in, its natural rage joining my own. No one touches what is mine, a sentiment wholeheartedly agreed upon by my shield.


    [I¡¯m not sure this is a good idea!] Kraken¡¯s warning went unnoticed as I channelled unimaginable power for three whole seconds into the concept of absolute bondage, the idea of the chains being so permanent that the limbs being bound would grow to accept the chains of their own. My mana sorcery supplied all of the auxiliary runes to allow my will to mesh with my desire. Making the idea of enslavement its base, its natural state, this Djinn, unlike all the others, was supposed to be bound, it was only right, only natural. So pure was my rage that I twisted Gungnir just a bit more, forcing the mana of the runes to not just touch the medallion itself, but the spirit of the Djinn.


    Ignoring the memory of my trapped wife telling me in the back of my mind to ¡®be kind¡¯, I set my rifle down and slashed that hand on Gungnir¡¯s blade allowing the red fluid to drip down it into the medallion¡¯s cut. Most of my blood sank into the medallion while a good portion traced the runes of bondage on it, leaving them a red so dark it was almost black. Yanking back on Gungnir, fell back and passed out completely. For the first time in a long time, I was out, completely out of mana. That last working had taken something from me; I¡¯d paid a price that I didn¡¯t know the full extent of. A concussive blast of mana exploded out of the Djinn¡¯s prison, completely knocking me away like a paper plane in a hurricane.


    The generator inside of Gungnir was still going even as I was unconscious. [Fucking stupid human doing stupid human shit!] Kraken cursed, quickly taking over the link between me and all the sources of constant mana. Splintering off one link, he pushed it into Svalinn, triggering the auto shield function making Svalinn conjure a dome of alternating stone and iron over me. In the cocoon, I slept.


    Coming to after that was not a pleasant feeling. It was dark in the dome cocoon but it did little to help the nightmare headache. Compounding that pain was the body aches which felt just plain rude. My flesh sorcery had been working on my overall state for an indeterminate amount of time but my body was just run down.


    [Wake up idiot! Wake up!] Forcing my eyes to open, I felt that my personal mana was a little over thirty percent full and my batteries were completely empty; Svalinn was tapped out and Gungnir was empty too.


    ¡°Did we win?¡± I grumbled, tapping my dregs of power to wash over me, stimulating my flesh sorcery to heal as I put in a pain block so I could function.


    [Maybe, I don¡¯t know. I¡¯m trapped in here with you right now and the ground is shaking so maybe not dipshit. Get up! You don¡¯t get to rest when you do dumb stuff like that!]

 Chapter 132 - Sunstone Castle (Book 2 Chapter 39)

    I hadn¡¯t been hurt this bad in a long ass time. My entire body was telling me to just go back to sleep where all the aches and pains wouldn¡¯t trouble me. Blissful unconsciousness was the siren call that I knew I had to resist, but there was one other call that I didn¡¯t ignore, the deep heartbeat of the earth calling to me. Everytime danger came just a bit too close, I followed my instincts and dove into the earth, giving myself time to think in a safe environment that few can touch let alone freely navigate. Quickly making a decision, I abandoned the domed protection that Svalinn conjured and sank into the earth as my magical senses extended in all directions.


    [How long have I been out of it?] I asked Kraken as I kept a firm grip on Gungnir in knife form.


    [I¡¯ve been yelling at you for at least twenty minutes while managing all the mana feeds to keep you alive. You¡¯re fucking lucky you¡¯re still connected to the solar panels through that handy tool. I can¡¯t contribute to this fight as you¡¯ve drained everything and you¡¯re about thirty percent full up on mana, good fuckin¡¯ luck.]


    Keeping my eyes closed, I focused my attention on the constant drumming sounds and piercing roars. Huge mutated lizards were pounding on the dome that was now cracking as I had already cut the power feed to keep them stable. The goth chick was still definitely dead but the other two were nowhere to be found.


    [HELLO? WHERE ARE THEY?] My mental roar was deflected by Kraken¡¯s impressive interjection of a quick memory showing Remy singing ¡°Speed¡± by Montgomery Gentry and a wild desert horse showing up to take them away. A quick key change later and his singing went to ¡°I Hate Everything About You¡± which summoned a nearby pack of angry mini sand drakkens to keep me busy.


    PREY DOES NOT ESCAPE!


    [I got it you fucking annoying ass, pathetic excuse for a miserable reptile!] Knowing that my internal growling was useless, I shoved my anger back down deep into that little hole I keep closed and tightly locked for all the wrong reasons. Sinking further down into the earth, I started heading towards the river just as the dome up above shattered. Following the loosened soil from my passage, the sand drakkens dove into the earth like fish and came after me, their scaly hide allowing them to thread their way towards me, undulating like sharks on the prowl.


    Every chance I had, I diverted a bit of power from my reserves to the earth behind me as I conjured bits of water and froze them, leaving them spiky to function as caltrops in the earth to slow down the drakkens. It managed to give me enough time to reach the riverbed. Exploding out into the open water, my water sorcery gave me the strategic high ground. As the drakkens were following me too quickly, they couldn¡¯t stop themselves from joining me in my home turf.


    ¡°Surprise muthafucka!¡± I yelled, forcing the water to form a whirlpool and drag the pests to the bottom of. The pounding in my head hadn¡¯t completely gone away at this point as I was much lower on mana that I had ever been before. Making sure my flesh sorcery instincts weren¡¯t messing with me, I pulled one of the sand lizards to the top of the river and stabbed it with Gungnir, pulling the mana from the beast into myself. What felt like lines of fiery ecstasy rolled through me as the drakken¡¯s lifeforce was ripped from its body. ¡°Whoa mama!¡± I breathed, barely able to believe the incredible amount of power I was able to snag.


    [Now you know why necromancers are so damn prevalent yet reviled in the arcane community,] Kraken cautioned. [They also consume the soul though which contains far more power than just the body but since you¡¯re constantly meeting angels I¡¯d highly recommend you don¡¯t do that shit.]


    Each stab and twist of Gungnir ripped the life and power from the drakkens as my water sorcery pulled them towards me and held them still. By the time I was done, the water of the river was stained red as my own stores of power were almost full with a substantial amount held in Gungnir.


    ¡°What a fucking rush!¡± I screamed to the sky as I sprinted across the surface of the river, step being augmented by the water itself pushing me towards the shore. As I jumped on my hoverboard with SAW¡¯s wings outspread to further amplify the amount of solar power I could gain, I turned Gungnir into a knife and stuck it in my belt as I dexterously bent over and snagged my rifle as I passed the area of my dino battle.


    [You gonna kill¡¯em?] Kraken¡¯s question didn¡¯t go unnoticed even as I didn¡¯t answer in the moment but I did slow down the hoverboard. There really wasn¡¯t any way they could escape, the nearest place was Phoenix which was a solid hundred and sixty miles away. Breathing deep, I focused on gathering power and channeling it to myself and my suit, allowing them to get about thirty minutes into their journey, just long enough to think they¡¯d escaped. What was I going to do with them? Killing them would definitely make me feel better but is it the most efficient long-term plan. Several memories flipped through my brain reminding me that the two young men were enslaved by Nicole, a thought that made me grip my rifle that much harder.


    ¡°Fuck!¡± I growled. Stifling Svalinn before it could roar its opinion another time, I ordered Kraken to focus on filling up our stores of power while we were still in range of the solar panels. Being carefully silent for once, he brought the four buried ones back to the surface and turned them on, instantly doubling the amount of power feeding to me and Gungir with all my batteries. I got Nicole and Svalinn made sure that she was gone for good, but I had to do something about the other two, but helping them was definitely out of the fucking question. Conjuring a small flat piece of quartz in my hand, I closed my eyes and put together a lengthy message as well as a couple memories, packaging them up inside my mind and putting it to the side.


    ¡°Kraken, put that in the crystal, now.¡± Without a word, my spirit familiar wrapped up the mental packet and transferred it to the memory crystal, imprinting several runes on it. The moment it was done, I checked that my stores of power were enough to do what I wanted and took off, tightly gripping the memory crystal in my hand. Kraken kindly put a green dot in my vision in the direction that the former enslaved were heading in. The horse they were on simply couldn¡¯t hold a candle to the hoverboard, especially with all of the power freely given by the desert sun.


    ¡°And it¡¯s still fucking morning!¡± I growled again to myself, remembering just another reason why mornings suck. The animal was beautiful as I pulled alongside it, its sandy coat glistening with sweat as muscles perfectly designed for running did their job in the blazing heat. After making sure that they saw me, I pulled ahead of them about fifty yards and pivoted, pulling out Gungnir and blasting a line in the dirt. Their horse reared on its back legs, throwing Fernando off as Remy barely hung on to its mane.


    Floating closer to them, Fernando wetting his pants and Remy frantically holding on to the bucking horse brought a smirk to my face. While I was antsy from all the combat induced adrenaline, the whole scene was still funny. No, no, they still set a pack of sand drakkens on me to make their escape, understandable, but still the intent there was lethal. Raising one hand, I forced the earth to reach up and anchor Fernando¡¯s limbs to the ground, perfectly immobilizing him. Another twist of power forced the horse to calm and stand perfectly still even as Remy kicked his heels. Turning to look at me, he took a deep breath to sing something out which I didn¡¯t give him time to do. A quick blast of raw mana knocked him on his ass next to Fernando. Hopping off my hoverboard, I slowly walked towards them, letting them sweat, letting the fear build up.


    ¡°What do you want?¡± Fernando screamed at me as I silently stalked forward. ¡°It wasn¡¯t us! We tried to escape, to run, anything! I swear! She made us do it. Please!¡±


    Remy opened his mouth and I pointed spear-form Gungnir at him, its blade bright with power.  ¡°No talking from you or you die. I¡¯ve seen what you can do.¡± Closing his mouth, Remy¡¯s eyes bulged in fear as I held Gungnir pointed at his face, only planting the butt in the dirt when a look of utter defeat framed his face.


    Taking the crystal still in my hand, I tossed it in the dirt between them. ¡°No talking, either of you. I¡¯ll keep this simple,¡± I snarled. ¡°I¡¯m not your enemy. Put that to your head and see some of my memories. Come anywhere near my area,¡± I said, waving back behind me, ¡°and I¡¯ll kill you and wipe your fucking city off the face of the earth.¡±


    Both of them nodded like bobbleheads in the fist of a two year old. Hopping back onto my hoverboard, I turned and blasted off back towards my unfinished fortress.


    ******


    The past week of Kraken gathering power and working on the entire setup was plenty of time for me to more thoroughly go through the memories I¡¯d taken from Fernando. I got to watch his experiences with magic as if they were my own, from the time he discovered his own power to when he enchanted his bats. The wooden one was a multi-purpose tool while the former aluminum one was purely combat oriented. Fernando used the wooden bat to direct, absorb, and redirect spells and the aluminum one was now harder than any steel with the ability to store up an almost infinite amount of power and release it on command as well as reflect energy. Memories of Fernando literally homerunning giant lizards danced through my brain. There was something about that former sporting equipment that was weird though, there were no runes on it at all. The damn bat, both of them, weren¡¯t normal wood or normal aluminum. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    Interrupting my thinking, Kraken explained. [Look, the wooden bat was made of ash wood, which is already a powerful component for staves and wands let alone necklaces and armor. Wizards tend to cultivate their own private gardens or orchards or they pay through the nose for those that have them. Put ash wood together with Chaos and there¡¯s not telling the powers it holds. And aluminum with Chaos is a whole nother animal. It¡¯s almost mithril in terms of hardness but now it''s a tool that''s probably as powerful if not more so than Gungnir before an angel put star-iron in it.]


    ¡°I got to find a way to get some more goddamn Chaos,¡± I muttered.


    [Don¡¯t be stupid!] Kraken scolded. [The fact that you¡¯re alive right now is due to blind luck! Give it another five hundred years before you start trying to play with that stuff.]


    I kept on muttering to myself, mulling over all the lost opportunities that I didn¡¯t even think to think of. Pushing the useless thoughts from my mind, I got up and took a quick tour of the progress. My personal home next to the river was pretty damn great so far, just deep enough into the earth to sit at sixty-five degrees as the small channel of river water helped to keep it livable. I planted my willow tree on top of my home, taking a whole day to encourage the roots to wrap around the hardened rock that was the shell of my living space. Daily meditations next to it were now a favorite new hobby as it helped to center my mind as well as guide the growing tree into exactly the shape I wanted. The young willow had no reservations about growing its roots towards the river as it needed that constant refreshment to survive in this harsh climate.


    The fortress itself was coming along nicely as the sun constantly beat down without a cloud in the sky, allowing my super efficient magic solar panels to drink up enough power to work at incredible speeds. The underground batteries were now three layers deep with each layer having twenty-four fridge sized batteries meaning I now had seventy-two oversized power banks. At this point, they weren¡¯t anywhere close to full as all of the power had gone into conjuring and shaping them, but when this place is all done and charged up it will be nigh impenetrable.


    The above ground portion of the fortress was about five feet tall so far and still growing but it hadn¡¯t had runes inscribed into it yet. Kraken was using the sunstone¡¯s natural properties to help absorb enough power to also go towards conjuring more sunstone. If not for SAW¡¯s energy conversion runes turning the heat near me into stored mana, the accumulated heat would actually be cooking me alive. It¡¯s like a Texas parking lot in late July but times about ten, that¡¯s what the sunstone was doing for me.


    [Don¡¯t worry,] Kraken said, trying to reassure me as I looked around rethinking my whole plan. [When the structure is done, I¡¯ll put all the right runes on so that it¡¯ll be comfortable for mortals to be in it. The excess heat will be funneled down into the batteries much better with the proper runic channels. About another couple days and the building itself will be done and two weeks after that the batteries should be all filled up too.]


    Looking at Gungnir in the center of the conjuration ritual where Kraken was monitoring the work, I smiled. ¡°And then we can plant Yggdrasil part two.¡±


    [You mean part three right? Didn¡¯t you plant one in Florida?]


    ¡°Oh, right, yeah, kinda forgot about that one. I don¡¯t think I¡¯m going to tether that to the main tree just yet. I want to get ready for the North before I go see everyone.¡±


    Leaving Kraken where he was, I spent the next two and a half weeks practicing with my sorcery and conjuring more solar panels and various other tools. I didn¡¯t know enough about the Hungry Ones to consider myself well prepared so I took my time making another vest with battery inserts for some redundancy as running out of power in the middle of battle completely sucks. Spot arrived about a week back and ate the bodies of the sand drakkens that I¡¯d killed. I had stuffed the containers with the Nephilim chunks in the sand drakkens¡¯ bellies and frozen them to the bottom of the river to keep them fresh. Now Spot was a petrified statue again, curled up next to my growing willow tree looking like a weird boulder.


    I figured if anyone could get some use out of the Nephilim it would be him, but due to their very nature, I kept a very close eye on Spot¡¯s metamorphosis. When meditating in the shade of my tree, I spent an hour of my meditation scanning my dog, closely monitoring every single change. My flesh sorcery showed me that the color, or flavor of Spot¡¯s magic now had streaks of bluish white in it, as if the fire of his blood burned even hotter now. From lore, nerds have come to figure out that if dragon fire can cut through stone then it must be at least over two thousand degrees Fahrenheit. But blue fire, that stuff can get up to three thousand degrees.


    All in all, my time in the desert passed very peacefully, as nothing came even close to the area, probably because they could smell dragon-dog. I even took the time to make five very large sunstone golems to function as my sentinels, each one standing thirty feet tall armed with focusing crystals, bladed arms, runed shielding plates, and beach ball sized battery in the chest for extra oomph. Kraken was more than happy to provide a mental matrix imprinted on a slab of quartz four times the size and shape of a computer harddrive. I wanted to see if I could make autonomous golems without using earth elementals just yet but the hardest part was the actual programming itself. After playing with it for a couple days, I decided that they were just too clunky and summoned one earth elemental to take up residence in one golem so that it could be the ¡®captain¡¯ and command the others when necessary.


    Satisfied that a certain amount of planned paranoia was capable of serving a functional purpose, I still managed to actually relax. I had a stack of ten more solar panels ready to go as backups and I spent some time practicing finding and drawing power from leylines without Gungnir. Since the amount of sunlight and heat in the Northern hemisphere would be almost non-existent in terms of power output compared to the desert, alternative sources of mana would need to be found. Now the desert seems to be the desert in more than just terms of scarcity life and water, but without the ability to convert sunlight and heat into mana it would also be a deathtrap for anyone looking for some spare power. The closest leyline I could find other than the one running below the river was at least a hundred miles away in every direction.


    Using my hoverboard, I went in every cardinal direction and the land was simply bare until I hit what used to be the national parks where thin ley lines of brown and green-brown mana began to flow. Spending a couple days west of my sunstone fortress, I practiced pulling the thick stubborn mana from its natural course up through my boots and into my suit. Each time felt like a damn fight, not as if I were tapping a river of power that wanted to flow but a vessel of life that wanted to stay right where the fuck it was.


    Talking it over with Kraken over the next week helped me figure out that this kind of action definitely does require a tool in order for it to work efficiently. Somehow, using a staff or rod allows the mana to act as if it were part of the landscape, using it as a natural outflow for the expression of power. Doing it myself was almost anathema to the process as I was regarded as a thief of power instead of something wanting to grow. Part of figuring it out was when I was meditating and communing with the earth elemental in the sunstone golem, who I named Sunny.


    From the images I gathered during our mental conversation, the land is alive, but it¡¯s a different kind of consciousness, one that doesn¡¯t mind naturally flowing through something that was once part of itself. Which is why using Gungnir would be a viable and efficient option as using myself as a conduit for power was akin to a tick sucking blood from a human, unwanted and regarded as a pest.  With that in mind, I took the time to grow and carve off two foot long pieces from my willow tree and bond them to SAW on the side of my calves. If ever I need to, I could use SAW to plant the willow sticks into the earth and function as siphons for power, allowing me to neatly sidestep the issue of doing it directly myself.


    The last day of fortress construction was boring for me. I had everything ready to go to put the last yet most important part of the whole thing together, the Yggdrasil seed, but I couldn¡¯t do it yet. All I wanted to do was get started on growing the World Tree as the core of my building but the temperature, due to all of the sunstone focusing the heat and light from the desert sun, it was well over two hundred degrees in that building. Kraken was furiously using the mana to inscribe all of the runes into the building but the ENTIRE building had to be inscribed, and I mean every freaking inch of it was covered in the proper runes channels so this could be a fortress of stored sunlight. Noticing a couple odd bits near the top, I started to shoot Kraken a question when he sent me a quick mental slideshow of some schematics.


    With the environment being the way it is due to the conversion runes providing more than enough constant power, Kraken had decided to put some old school ideas into the fortress. The fortress itself was square, and at this point about three stories tall, so the idea given to me was to have eight gun emplacements set up along the walls, one at each corner and one between each corner. He had already gone ahead with the ammo conjuring machine I came up with and meshed it with the design of the Centauri rifle rune channel to produce a concept of magitech cannons. The bit of his slideshow was a picture of a horde of sand drakkens trying to storm the fortress and the high-rise machine guns blowing them away. He made sure to include a swivel bit below the guns so they could turn around and fire inside the fortress in case something somehow got through the World Tree that we didn¡¯t want. Shooting Kraken a quick reply, I watched him quickly add bins so thousands of rounds of conjured ammo could be stored at each gun emplacement.


    ¡°Love it when a plan comes together,¡± I grinned, taking a breath of biting dry air. One of the reasons Virginia sucks is because it¡¯s always so damn humid but the desert, the desert has that dry heat that¡¯s just not as miserable.


    [That¡¯ll add another day and a half, maybe two days if you want all the ammo banks full of charged ammo with grenades. Put another two weeks on top of that if you want every layer of siege batteries full before you start with Yggdrasil. Since you¡¯ll be guiding the tree¡¯s growth personally I don¡¯t know how much energy that¡¯s going to take or how long you¡¯ll be shaping it.]


    ¡°We¡¯ve come too far to not do it right. I want everything charged and ready to go before I start growing Yggdrasil another root. I may not be able to stop and something may come along that needs some attention so I want Sunstone Castle war ready.¡±


    Giving me the mental equivalent of a nod, Kraken got back to work as I began making more sunstone golem bodies and placing them in the dirt between the two crystal energy gathering rings that connected the solar panels. I had tons of room and plenty of power which allowed me to make an army of two hundred sunstone golems. Since the idea of using the earth elemental as a captain for the initial group was a damn good one, I summoned three more earth elementals, gave them sunstone golem bodies and then proceeded to even out the numbers so that each ¡®captain¡¯ had fifty golems to command if needed. Each golem also had a beach ball sized crystal battery and with their sunstone structure they would be able to charge up to full in no time.


    The pouding beat of the song of the Empire from Star Wars played in my head as I imagined marching to war with my magnificent golem army, my magic version of the clone armies doing my bidding as I rode before them. Deciding to really put the fear of God in my imaginary foes, I took my time and conjured oversized granite maces for each golem. Once I conjured the first one and inscribed runes on it to make it harder than steel, I kept the mental schematic foremost in my head and walked around conjuring copies at the feet of my new army.

 Chapter 133 - Tying Up Loose Ends (Book 2 Chapter 40)

    ******


    Being done was great. The feeling that I had accomplished something was definitely reinforced by the dopamine dump in my brain, until my favorite hateful familiar chimed in right as I was taking the final tour of the fortress after finally planting Yggdrasil and setting up my very carefully pre-planned runic growth schematics. The fortress was beautiful, complete with eight mounted magitech gatling guns, reinforced anti-undead walls, layers of underground siege batteries, AND a freaking army of giant armored golems commanded by earthen elementals. All I had to do now was take the time to very carefully coax my tree to grow exactly how I want it to and step two of my plan would be complete, EXCEPT, Kraken had to go and ruin my good mood.


    [All right, job well done, now there¡¯s some loose ends to tie up before we go much further.]


    ¡°What?¡± I said, my grumpiness bleeding into my voice. ¡°What now, seriously? This is good news! I¡¯m a badass mutha¡¯fuckin sorcerer ready to kick some zombie ass!¡±


    [Well, there¡¯s a bunch of things here you¡¯ve forgotten about in your one-track mind. Let¡¯s start from the beginning, whatever happened to the kid necromancer who¡¯s ass you kicked when the whole apocalypse kicked off? What happened to the rest of the people there?And, did you know that you have a whole white light-based sorcery stone of Chaos back home somewhere? How about the fact that somewhere in your forest there are random ass Chaos stones spread around from when a goddess blew up your home?]


    Whipping around in a panic, my jaw hit the floor. ¡°How did you, wha?¡±


    [Your memories dumbass! And that¡¯s not all! This shiny memory over here is of a particular ancestor telling you that you¡¯re gonna need Johnny and you left him in Florida?! Or how about the fact that the Hungry Ones are sentient and maybe can be reasoned or negotiated with? You¡¯ve set up a whole goddamn plan with an army to wipe them out and you haven¡¯t even verified the claims given to you in YOUR IGNORANCE!]


    My sputtering got worse as Kraken handed me my ass. [And let¡¯s not forget that you¡¯re already dead set on wiping out the Centauri because of what they did to your family when you haven¡¯t considered the fact that they are the main reason humanity isn¡¯t wiped out as a whole. It¡¯s not just undead and demons you have to worry about, it¡¯s the freakin Hive! Or did you forget about them too? And the Djinn you sealed, that was a smart thing to do in the heat of the moment but you weren¡¯t able to grab the coin prison cause you passed out. Now let¡¯s be clear, Djinn are immortal! He won¡¯t forget what you did. You¡¯re gonna need to get some kind of countermeasure for him too.]


    I rocked back on my heels, all of the other things, the consequences, the bits of information I didn¡¯t want to face were now all up in my face. With Kraken laying them bare, I could see that my consciousness sorcery went along with the wishes of my unconscious, the desire to not face some uncomfortable facts, the desire to accomplish something when everything is going to hell. I had done what any messed up workaholic would, pushed it all down to a place where I could ignore it. I had more problems than I knew what to do with.


    [And that¡¯s not all buckaroo. What about Tommy, Sally, Billy or Jimmy? You haven¡¯t once thought about them? Why not help them get to that settlement you helped make? Are they even alive? No thanks to you, I put the directions to both that place and the Centauri base in the crystal you gave to Remy and Fernando, sheesh, at least give them a chance to survive.]


    My arms felt weak, my head light. ¡°I hadn¡¯t even thought .¡±


    [You¡¯re right! You hadn¡¯t ¡®THOUGHT¡¯! How much thinking have you been doing lately? None! You can¡¯t keep working like this without thinking about all the other things going on. You have a kind of power that unfortunately makes some pretty damn big waves.]


    He was right. Fuck, Kraken is right. But not completely. I hadn¡¯t fucked everything up. I had done a lot of good with what time I¡¯ve had so far, with what I¡¯ve known so far. Putting a bit of stiffness in my backbone, I turned and glared at my familiar. ¡°Fine. I get it. There¡¯s plenty I haven¡¯t done and the list of things I need to attend to has only gotten longer, but you cannot deny that I haven¡¯t done a lot of damn good things that I really didn¡¯t have to do. Reeanth is alive because of me, the hicks are most likely alive because of me, that settlement is doing damn fine because of me, and my shitty younger brother, well, I do need to go set some things straight there.¡±


    [Look,] Kraken said, his exasperation with me clear in his voice. [I¡¯m your spirit familiar. Keeping you alive is my job, because if you die then it really sucks for me. You¡¯ve done great, really, but marching off with all of this unfinished business just isn¡¯t smart and your sorceries do leave you with some glaring long-term weaknesses. Can¡¯t you tell? They amplify parts of you. Because of your earth sorcery, you use earth when fighting, so you tend to bury your enemies and get hyper-focused on gear. Your water sorcery makes you really uncomfortable to be away from water and drowning your enemies is another go-to strategy. And that¡¯s another thing, whatcha gonna do with the dwarves and minotaurs you have in storage, huh?]


    ¡°Fuck!¡± I cursed. ¡°There¡¯s not enough me to go around and do everything.¡± Taking a deep breath and focusing inward, I channeled my will into my mental sorcery and began reevaluating my actions and my thoughts. Everything Kraken had brought up was correct, I did have pressing concerns that I¡¯d put off and with my mind based sorcery obeying my unconscious will those concerns had almost been walled off to the far back of my mind. The outside perspective of Kraken really was a godsend, what kind of hole could I have easily avoided if I had consciously decided to remember my problems instead of blindly pushing through from one objective to the next?


    ¡°Ok Kraken, you¡¯re right. Put together a plan for me to review, something I can follow to wrap up all of those concerns. Right now I still need to get this tree going till it¡¯s mature and doesn¡¯t need my direction but that shouldn¡¯t be too long.¡±


    The next week was spent carefully guiding growth of Yggdrasil¡¯s newest root as it was combined with a baobab seed. The roots were persuaded to dive deep and wrap around the interconnected battery layers and then several roots were sent off in the direction of the river for constant access. The runes I had put inside the layered seed were now spreading and multiplying as the tree trunk itself grew up and out, almost completely taking up the inside of Sunstone castle. Kraken made sure to include reminders for me to eat a meal cube and drink water as I also meditated and focused on making mental subroutines to help strengthen my mind against the brain-altering tendencies of my sorceries.


    Along with the reminders, my familiar and I had gone back and forth on deciding how best to go about wrapping up loose ends. In the end, we decided that after this base building goal was complete, the best course of action would be to scour my forest in Fredericksburg for any sign of human life and then persuade them to relocate with the settlement west of my original home. Then, download copies of the brains of the dwarves and the minotaur shamans and keep them for myself to see if I could get any information out of then and then set them free, using a bit of mind sorcery to keep them docile and friendly towards me. Once that was accomplished, the next step would be to put them on a boat and take them down to Florida and see if they could maybe mesh in with the Centaur and form a whole new settlement. At that point, I should have enough info to know if the Hungry Ones were truly the threat I was led to believe they were. If so, then I¡¯d pick up Johnny and Reeanth and bounce my way up North and kick off the end of the Zombie pre-apocalypse.


    Our biggest disagreement was on what to do with the Chaos stone with the light sorcery. Kraken was all for making some kind of tool with it as from my memories the stone was really small and didn¡¯t have enough juice in it to give a whole new kind of sorcery on the same level as my others. I didn¡¯t really like that suggestion as I had more than enough tools, which led me to my other weakness, the fact that I¡¯m generally alone. My next suggestion was giving it to someone to help forge a close tie, like maybe giving it to Reeanth to help her gain another sorcery, or maybe to Scott from the settlement so they could have at least one champion to keep the peace there. The suggestion to make a light-based nuke with Chaotic light sorcery to wipe out the North was tabled for later as I wasn¡¯t exactly sure how to do that.


    My last two days in Arizona were spent growing furniture and making amenities for both my home and Sunstone castle. Beds, dressers, chairs, tables, bars, light fixtures, the whole kit and kaboodle had to be done before I left as I wanted this place to be livable just in case. My paranoia wouldn¡¯t let me have it any other way. Yggdrasil¡¯s newest root required much less supervision as it reached the tail end of its growth freeing me up to do other things, but I still had to stick around just to make sure that I hadn¡¯t overlooked anything stupidly small that might cause unintended problems.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.


    [You did good, it¡¯s done, all of it. Go home, get a good night¡¯s sleep and relax for a second. The plan is going away any time soon.]


    Heeding my familiar¡¯s wise words, I put my hand on Yggrasil¡¯s trunk and warped back to good ol¡¯ Fredericksburg.


    ¡°You should tell him!¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t do it, you should tell him!¡±


    ¡°Me? I wasn¡¯t even awake when it happened! It¡¯s not my fault!¡±


    ¡°Is too! You wilted flower!¡±


    ¡°Dried up fruit!¡±


    ¡°Bark-less wonder!¡±


    ¡°Useless weed!¡±


    Lyra was in the clearing arguing with an incredibly beautiful dryad, but one that looked way too human to actually be a dryad. Her skin barely had a tint of green and hot damn her figure was too distracting in and of itself for this to be pheromones. Turning to me, the drop dead gorgeous woman ran to me and tackled my legs without knocking me over.


    ¡°Thank the Mother he¡¯s back!¡± Lyra grumbled as Meliad cried.


    ¡°I¡¯m so sorry master! I didn¡¯t mean it! Please don¡¯t send me away, please!¡±


    Throwing my hands in the area and looking to Lyra for help, she just crossed her arms and frowned, looking away from the pathetic scene in front of her. Doing my best to extricate myself from this situation, my magical senses answered the question that I hadn¡¯t even said out loud yet. This was Meliad.


    ¡°Do what? What did you do? And how are you no longer a dryad?¡± My question sparked a new round of unconscionable wailing. ¡°What did I say?¡± I looked back over to Lyra who was now glaring at Meliad.


    ¡°She ate them.¡±


    ¡°Ate who?¡±


    Her watery eyes looked into mine with all of the sadness that a child who just skinned her knee could muster. ¡°The people! I ate the people!¡±


    Lyra sighed and put her hands on her hips. ¡°Her tree ate the people. Well, several of her trees actually. That area of weakened space about a mile from here opened up again and there was another fight. It happened to break out right as Meliad here was waking from her Ascension slumber and her instincts acted out in accordance with your will. So, she did what any Thorn would do. She fed them to the forest.¡±


    Looking incredulously at Lyra, I didn¡¯t even know what to say, at which point Kraken took over. Popping out of Gungnir, my familiar looked back and forth between the dryads. ¡°Exactly what people did she feed to the forest?¡±


    ¡°Orcs, ogres, goblins, trolls, some baby wyrms and two hydras. It was a mess! But at least the forest will be healthy.¡± She said sardonically. Huffing loudly, Lyra muttered to herself as she walked away. ¡°And, she gets all the glory!¡±


    Leaning over, I picked Meliad up, forcing her to stand. ¡°Relax Leafy, just don¡¯t eat the humans and we¡¯re good. Also, let¡¯s try and not eat dwarves, aelves, minotaurs, and other things like that unless we¡¯re certain they''re hostile. Maybe we can get some allies in the process.¡±


    Wiping away her tears, she sniffed and launched herself into my arms. ¡°I¡¯m just so glad that you¡¯re so kind and nice and sweet! Whatever would we do without your generosity and mercy!¡±


    Pushing her back to arm¡¯s length, I shook off the lovely bits of plant lady snot. ¡°That¡¯s enough waterworks for one day woman. You did good, great even. What happened to you though?¡±


    She stopped sniffling long just long enough to string a couple thoughts together. ¡°I¡¯m not my usual self. I¡¯ve lived as a dryad for several centuries but I¡¯m only a few days old as a Thorn. My treant self is still new. It¡¯s going to a while before my body catches up with my mind and my emotions will be juvenile until that happens.¡±


    For a minute there I thought she had literally eaten the people in my stasis freezer. Slowly backing away as Meliad put herself back together, I waited until she wiped her eyes before I fled to the big outside entrance of the Lab.


    [That¡¯s one lady you don¡¯t wanna piss off, especially since she can do earth elemental stuff as well as plant lady stuff.]


    Making sure that my gulp wasn¡¯t too audible, I rotated my shoulders to get a bit of stress out, making sure to crack my knuckles as well. ¡°Is it better to find the people that might be in the forest first, or should I make a couple hovercrafts for them to use?¡±


    Kraken popped back out of Gungnir. ¡°I¡¯d say send a couple birds to find the humans if they¡¯re still around. That way you can make the transportation as well as the brain copies you were talking about.¡±


    ¡°Good shit,¡± I said softly, casting my mind out for the small birds flitting around. After finding a couple sparrows, they agreed to scout for ¡®man-things¡¯ in exchange for a meal cube. As they flew away, I got busy making a very basic hovercraft. On the bottom were gravity reflecting runes to make the whole contraption much lighter than it had any right to be. Several rows of quartz crystal alongside the craft were runed to absorb ambient mana and the two parallel joysticks up in the front were carefully inscribed to be the thrust and steering. The last bit I put in were seats that the passengers could channel mana into to make the entire craft go faster if need be. If they chose not to, the hovercraft would go a comfortable thirty or so miles an hour but with a full load it could probably hit up to two hundred.


    The next three hours gave me six hovercrafts total. I made sure to include a memory crystal that had the most complete map I could put together, with Kraken¡¯s help of course. It was made from my memories of flying with Norn and Tuki as well as the general knowledge I gained from teleporting through the World Tree. Anybody in the craft could touch the crystal and add to it but I made sure that deleting was not a possibility for them. Any edits would be adding an additional ¡®memory¡¯ to the total memory map and users would be able to look at every version of the area.


    Jogging to the inside of my lab, I decided not to put off the onerous task of brain cloning even though all I wanted to do was hit the hay. Part of me just wanted to do it tomorrow but the mindless nature of the job would just get worse the more I put it off. Grunting and groaning, I felt the pain of work as I watched my water elementals do all the heavy lifting. Watching someone else work sure makes me sweat, hahaha.


    Each brain had to be carefully examined for damage and then each body was healed back to perfect health before I actually scanned the brain and used flesh sorcery to make clone brains in my giant vat. Like Kraken pointed out before, the shamans were the only useful brains of the minotaurs but the dwarven knowledge is really what I was after. Their stuff had an odd kind of enchantment ¡®resonance¡¯ that made their stuff not have any wasted energy. To put it into perspective, human technology in regards to solar panels wasn¡¯t that efficient as the energy that could be absorbed wasn¡¯t as much as the combustive process of fossil fuels. Now, yes, one is cleaner than the other but I was able to fix the energy issue with solar due to magic and magical materials, aka the sunstone. I bet if I could get a couple dwarfs to work for me then the kinds of things I could make would simply blow me away, the problem being that I didn¡¯t want to give up my secret of magic batteries. Pushing those thoughts into the ¡®do-later¡¯ box in my brain, I kept on cloning and copying, taking special care with the dwarven brains.


    [Don¡¯t disregard the minotaur shamans¡¯ knowledge too much. There¡¯s a reason the dwarves didn¡¯t hold back in that fight you saw. Their herd blood-links have a lot of utility beyond passing healing and mana back and forth.]


    ¡°Yeah,¡± I answered, thinking it over for a second. ¡°I can see how that would be useful if I had a couple sorcerers or wizards to work with. But I don¡¯t right now. Anyways, the shamans¡¯ minds aren¡¯t encrypted like the dwarven ones are. It¡¯ll take time to crack those like the others.¡±


    Putting them all back into stasis ended my day allowing me to grab some much needed rest. Properly wrangling my flesh sorcery allowed me to pack in a week''s worth of restorative sleep into ten hours. While that was going on, I had my consciousness sorcery sorting out memories in a more efficient manner, sort of like ordering my dreams to work for me by planning out scenarios and bringing back things I¡¯d forgotten as well as reliving some bad decisions that I¡¯d made so far. The directed lucid dreams allowed me to go over every mistake, possible outcomes of making better decisions in the moment, reminding myself what I fought for and why, and last but not least, mapping out a long term strategy to actually live out the next four thousand years without dying.


    By noon the next day I had all of the minotaurs loaded up on three hovercrafts about ten miles south of me and the dwarves with the same setup but about ten miles east of me. Even though I didn¡¯t speak their language, I left the same memory imprints in each individual to make sure that they felt coming back to this forest was not good for their health and that safety could be found far to the south. I didn¡¯t forget to make sure that they each had a pseudo-memory of how to work the hovercraft along with its map. I also left them with very basic weaponry that they could use, spears enchanted to be incredibly sharp and durable shields respective of their size.


    [I¡¯m surprised you didn¡¯t just kill¡¯em.] Kraken said as we got back to the clearing. [You saw what feeding them to the forest could do.]


    I shuddered when I thought about Lyra filling me in on some details that Meliad left out yesterday. Feeding trees enough mana gave them the possibility that one day a dryad might be birthed from said tree, but feeding that tree with enough sentient lifeforce and dryads of immense power could be conceived. And Meliad had fed enough lifeforce to the trees near my house to birth an army of overpowered dryads, not something that I had in mind. Shaking the foreboding feeling away, I thought about going to go see my brother. If I left now via World Tree, I could be there in less than an hour, giving me plenty of time to do what I need to do well before the immigrants that I sent would arrive.


    As I started to reach out towards the tree to portal to the Centauri base in Florida, I stopped as something I dreamed the night before came back and hit me. Sprinting back down into the Lab, I scoured the walls, feeling around for the runed safe that I had put there months ago. ¡°Aha! Fuckin found it!¡± Yanking the safe from the wall, I tore the top of it off, revealing the contents within.


    [Found what? To do what exactly?] Pulling the small shimmering quartz crystal from the box, I cupped it gently in my hand.


    ¡°I know how I¡¯m going to fix my bro.¡±

 Chapter 134 - New Miami (Book 3 Chapter 1)

    I really hadn¡¯t been gone that long, had I? I mean, two months give or take, but come on. The washed out skeleton of a city that was Miami was gone, replaced with a clean, beautiful, but smallish futuristic looking metropolis that seemed to be birthed from a crazy mashup of Star Wars and Avatar. Slender pyramids with needlelike points topped with blazing diamonds sat in a rigid order forming a square whose points touched a giant wall the color of heat blasted sand that stood at least fifteen stories high. Not only were they tall, but the walls could have easily fit a suburban house between the inner and outer edges, allowing for people to travel along the top like another road. People, all kinds of sentient, walking, talking beings were down there, carrying on with life as if this planet hadn¡¯t already been harvested, nearly stripped clean of the inhabitants that used to be here. I could barely make out Centauri in their gleaming silver suits of nanotech armor, graceful Aelves whose dull green and brown garb stood out in contrast to the colors of civilization surrounding them, and many others I couldn¡¯t make out from this height. The answer to how they even got here lay in the epicenter of the city behind its own set of formidable, yet smaller inner city walls, the gate.


    Putting two and two together took me longer than it should as the view was very different than what I expected; when I buried the gate the last time I was here I didn¡¯t actually destroy it, I merely sunk it, apparently not far enough though. The gate itself was intact as the silty earth of Florida swallowed it up, preserving the structure until the Centauri could dig down and get it back up and running. The depression of the earth only served to highlight the interdimensional traveling apparatus from where I sat way up high scouting the area as I flew with SAW¡¯s wings outstretched, using the combination of magitech and runework to keep me up at my strategic vantage point. The warm ocean air constantly rolled in as steady as its waves, the lateral movement providing lift to the slant of my wings giving me the appearance that I was hovering overhead on an updraft like some great metallic bird of prey.


    Last time I encountered the gate, the main frame of it was made out of humongous rib bones covered with runes while the base it sat on was a giant block of a building resembling a warehouse. This time the base was the same material as the outer walls of the city and the bones were still the frame of the gate but now they were ornately covered with carved, shiny stone runes that were pressed into the bone so that they were flush with the ivory colored surface. Where the rib bones almost connected at the zenith of the gate, the space there was bridged MY FUCKING TREE! Dear fucking LAWD! They grew my tree, my little sapling of Yggdrasil to form the missing arch of the Gate. Where the rib bones curved upwards but didn¡¯t quite touch to make a circle, somebody forced my beautiful tree to grow up from where it was behind the base of the gate to attach to the back of it, framing the structure up the sides to meet at the space between the tips of the rib bones.


    Forcing the irrational spike of anger away, I remembered Kraken telling me in a lesson a while ago that shapes do hold magical significance, general circles are for containment, protection, and space itself while shapes with corners are meant for strategic defense. Apparently it was a universal concept that was so old that actual metaphysical significance was invested in mere simple shapes, making it an primal instinct for magic users to weave their craft in such ways.


    Thinking back, there had to be something to it. My cavern that made up the space in the Lab was almost perfectly circular, the Sunstone castle was a square within two staggered circles and even the runes on all of my gear either were at right angles to each other or in a beautiful looping curve.


    ¡°I don¡¯t get it.¡± That was all I could really muster at the moment. A city like this would have taken decades for humanity to build, and that¡¯s not considering the sheer beauty of it as well. The view was art, a landscape drawn by a soldier obsessed with art along with the talent to make it happen. The walls were perfect in terms of total security, tall enough so that giants would have a hard time assaulting it and thick enough to make battering rams of any kind completely useless. The main ingress of the city could almost be considered a tunnel as it was a small tunnel from all the way up here. There were no giant doors on those fifteen story high walls to let people in but there was a little door, which, putting it in perspective, was probably big enough to fit a couple semi-trucks through side by side. Smaller walls surrounded the Gate in the center of the city, a precaution against someone getting control of the other side and trying to invade. Smart.


    It¡¯s times like this that I¡¯m glad that I cultivated a proper sense of caution. Some people might call it overblown paranoia but since I¡¯m still alive and kickin¡¯ then who gives a fuck. Instead of traveling from my splinter of Yggdrasil directly to the one in Miami, I hitched an interdimensional ride to a dense copse of trees about thirty miles away and flew in and boy was I happy that I did so. I was even happier that I took the time back home to make sure that my stores of power were completely full, even the extra ones in Gungnir.


    [Don¡¯t be so surprised,] Kraken said, using SAW to boost the range of our magical senses as we tried to get a better picture from up here. [The Centauri have had plenty of time to fix this place up. With nanotech carving the runes and drones doing the heavy lifting with the soldiers, I¡¯m surprised this is all they¡¯ve managed to do. By now they should¡¯ve had most of this continent mapped out for the harvesters.]


    [It¡¯s one thing to know it but, man, it¡¯s a whole ¡®nother thing to see it.]


    Highlighting the city in the visor of my helmet like a sci-fi headset, Kraken began pointing out the different buildings and their purpose. The slender pyramids were a dual purpose power sink, capable of converting solar energy from the sky into mana as well as converting heat from the earth into mana and combining the two. The square formation of the pyramids fed mana into the overly large walls creating a veritable ¡®river¡¯ of available mana that flowed around the city and through every building. Since they didn¡¯t have any way of storing their power, they simply had a current to do it for them.


    If they needed to actually defend the city from an attack, the Centauri battlesuits would drop silvery cords from the nodes on their backs which would connect to any structure linked to the city¡¯s mana river. The diamonds on top of the pyramids could also project power outward in the form of a city-wide shield or as a beam of raw destruction. One line of crystal sheathed in stone connected to the side of the Yggdrasil opposite the portal, using the World Tree as a siphon for power as well. All in all the setup was pretty ingenious for lacking basic battery technology.


    [Just to reiterate since we¡¯re thinking this over,] Kraken said, trying to instill a proper sense of caution since my own personal paranoia somehow wasn¡¯t enough. [Don¡¯t underestimate the Centauri soldiers, and least of all their veteran battle wizards. One of the hallmarks of their training is their soul-capacity program. Over time, they learn how to force their bodies to produce and hold more mana, or it might be their soul, we¡¯re not really sure. But it does allow them to function as their own battery.]


    [So compared to me, how much power can they hold?] I asked, genuinely curious. An education in magic is something that I¡¯m clearly lacking but the rest of the universe has already quantified this and moved on. Universities and academies for those with power are not uncommon and they have already gone through the process of creating metrics for power. The ¡®thaum¡¯ was a common unit given to a bit of mana whereas some races go even further and use ¡®points¡¯ of mana, rating on a number scale as opposed to an effect scale.


    According to Kraken¡¯s long winded answer that ended up being very informative, the way power within magic is measured is as varied as there are races in the expanded multiverse. It can be as simple as, I feel that I have enough power to do an action and the will to see it through. Or, one unit or point of magic power is sufficient to generate a flicker of fire like a lit candle and keep it going for one second. Humans tend to use the base of fire as we¡¯re so close to it, the flicker of life that allowed us to leave the caves and tame the world around us. The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    A significant portion of the magical community tends to use thaums as a metric of power instead as it¡¯s a more general approximation of power. The thaum in its base form is enough to complete an action of simple magic such as generating a flame or conjuring a basic element, or to pull a small object to oneself. But putting thaums together is to describe power in terms of a multiplicative reality such as keeping a magic shield going to protect your body while also conjuring fireballs at an enemy. The approximation description of power being used at that moment would be at least four thaums of power as each action requires the conjuration of a magical act, the shield and the fire, and then each requires another thaum for either maintaining that act or manipulating that act. The shield must be made and then maintained, and the fireball must be conjured and then flung.


    Most humanoid users of magic tend to fall into the ¡®four thaum¡¯ realm of power as using multiple magics at the same time directly increases the power of that user. To describe the same output of power with the ¡®point¡¯ metric, based off of skill, a wizard who has the equipment to help him keep track of his power might say a mana shield takes fifty points of mana to conjure and ten a minute to maintain, while the fireball is a hundred points of mana that would require another fifty to hurl. But even if you have a million points of mana but can only do those actions, you would still have roughly ¡®four thaums¡¯ of power as that¡¯s the max complexity of the actions you could do.


    The Centauri try to get around this the typical way, by using magic implements to shoulder the burden of multicasting, which is what I do as Kraken and Gungnir have some capacity of working independently. But it¡¯s all up for interpretation as the metrics of measuring magic power tend to break down when dragons enter the fray. A fire dragon will breathe fire with the power to melt through a fortress, which technically is one action, but no one is going to say that was ¡®one thaum of power¡¯. The other way of looking at it would be that a dragon expelled a breath attack of ¡®twenty thousand mana points per minute¡¯.


    Digesting all of this was enlightening and confusing all at the same time as it still didn¡¯t answer my fucking question. Taking advantage of my mental sorcery to allow for faster conversation, I pulled Kraken into my mindspace where we could talk while SAW kept a vigil.


    ¡°Compare me to a typical Centauri warrior and then to a Centauri battle wizard and to Merlin. Is that a more clear question?¡± I asked, my tone similar to a dad begrudgingly asking for directions.


    ¡°It¡¯s not that simple!¡± Kraken said, pulling out the trusty big screen tvs as I sat down in the comfort of my own mind. ¡°You break all the rules with your batteries, which is fine because I like the saying I found in your head, ¡®If you ain¡¯t cheatin, you ain¡¯t competin¡¯. Yes both systems of measuring have their flaws but think of it this way. A typical Centauri warrior uses magic to enhance their body and power their weapons, which they can do all day before they run outta steam. A Centauri battle wizard can power their suit, their weapons, and all of the rune tattoos for about half a day at full power which makes them able to take on at least ten lesser warriors if the skill levels are roughly the same.¡±


    ¡°And Merlin?¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s just say Merlin has about ten thousand years of practice on you, not just counting the unstoppable nature of the sorcery he has. Wild magic can¡¯t be mastered and he did it, so, there¡¯s really no point in using him as an example at all. But without your gear and your weird tactics, you can easily take down a platoon of Centauri warriors and probably two of their battle wizards. With your gear, well, it¡¯s just not fair.¡±


    Resting my chin in my hand, I pondered the mess that I was tiptoeing around. ¡°Ok,fine, so don¡¯t even think about Merlin because he¡¯s not just outta reach but off the freaking planet.¡±


    ¡°Yup.¡±


    ¡°What about the minotaur shamans? Where do they stand in all this, comparatively?¡±


    Pulling up an image of a minotaur shaman on one tv, Kraken had the other two display a battle wizard and me. ¡°Shamans are different due to the kinds of magic they wield, generally related to ¡®pack¡¯ or ¡®herd¡¯ magic. Werewolf or shapeshifter shamans fall into this category as well. The very nature of their magic means that it has a small multiplicative effect, like two minotaur shamans are twice as deadly as two battle wizards because they instinctively know how to mesh their power together, they know what their partner is thinking and what they¡¯re gonna do.¡±


    ¡°Gotcha, like two good friends on a basketball team versus two strangers.¡±


    ¡°Yes, exactly, but now start adding in more shamans on the same level of teamwork with minotaur soldiers to share the burden of mana and injury and the danger level skyrockets. The dwarves kind of achieve the same scale of ability as they have a culture of combat based on solid crafting and enchanting. For example, each one of their tower shields does the exact same thing and their shield wall is nigh impregnable.¡±


    Replaying the fight of the minotaurs and the dwarves in my head, I remembered the flows of mana jostling back and forth differently between the groups. Pointing out what I hadn¡¯t noticed in the first place, I threw the scene of the battle up on the roof of the room like a projector.


    ¡°So the minotaurs use each other as batteries for mana and the dwarves primarily pull it from the ground right?¡± I said, talking fast as my excitement grew. ¡°So what do the Aelves do? And are the elementals completely different from everything else?¡±


    Chuckling as he made more tvs full of different races, Kraken answered, ¡°Yes, you¡¯re correct on the dwarves and minotaurs. The minotaurs share mana regeneration between the members of their herd and channel it to the one needing it the most, usually the shamans. The dwarves do pull from the earth but due to the unusual amount of metal in their blood, dwarves gain and lose mana faster than most. Their mana capacities tend to be small but they regen it very fast. They taught the Centauri the trick of using mana flows to substitute as storage for power.¡±


    ¡°So lemme guess, the Aelves tend to have very large internal mana capacities but regenerate that incredibly slowly.¡±


    ¡°Correct. More than any other race, they use meditation to speed up how fast they produce and gather mana while Elementals have an internal line feeding them power from whatever Elemental plain they came from. It sustains them but they only grow in overall strength from mana given from a mortal, however flimsy the term ¡®mortal¡¯ actually is. Summoners, if they know the tricks, can be as powerful as dragons in terms of power due to the unique nature of elementals.¡±


    The images on the screens were replaced with the memory of the minotaurs fighting the dwarves as Kraken removed the projection I had of it on the ceiling. Separating the most powerful individuals in that fight to their own screens, Kraken began pointing out the racial differences of the battle.


    ¡°The minotaurs¡¯ overall strategy is to tank and bash,¡± he explained as red lines linked minotaur, the thickest of which were directly connected to the shamans. Wire thin green lines overlay the red mana lines to show the different spells being channeled. ¡°They use their overwhelming lifeforce, their health pool magnified by the herd blood-links, to weather the storm and their strength, size, and numbers to mow down their enemies. Dwarves tend to favor the defense game.¡± Brown lines speared down from their armor into the earth and looped back up, feeding into the enchantments and weaponry. ¡°See here, with their high mana regeneration with earth mana siphoning, it combines with their well crafted armor and siege weaponry allow them to fight from a defensible position forever.¡±


    Following the logic, I chimed in. ¡°So I¡¯m guessing that Aelves favor woodsy terrain and like either long distance combat or a mix of nature based ambush techniques.¡±


    ¡°Yup.¡±


    Wiping one screen clean, I brought up the image of new Miami. ¡°And cities of mixed races with magitech and a big fucking wall are not meant to be assaulted?¡±


    ¡°Not by you.¡±


    ¡°Joy.¡±


    Leaving the mindspace and returning my awareness to where it belongs, I consulted SAW to see how long the impromptu lesson was. Two minutes of accelerated mind time equating to a good twenty minute conversation is pretty good, which means in terms of planning that I can look at problems ten times longer than anyone else. That realization set off my inner villain, complete with the overblown maniacal laugh that promises a really long, boring monologue.


    Now that we were back to reality, Kraken spoke to me mentally. [Assaulting the city is NOT a smart course of action!]


    Agreed. The Scion correctly recommends action in line with self-preservation protocol.


    [See? Even the nanobots agree with me? Don¡¯t do it!]


    I fired back with just a hint of irritation. [I wasn¡¯t going to do that! I¡¯m not a complete idiot.] Shaking my head at the lack of faith, I continued looking at the city. [Besides, witches remember?]


    Putting about a mile''s worth of distance between Miami and myself gave me plenty of space to land and examine my gear. I had to make sure that my armor didn¡¯t give off too much of a magical signature. I didn¡¯t know what else to do about the city other than walk up and see if I could get in. With the increased population, the chances of me randomly running into people who remember me from the last time is incredibly low, which still isn¡¯t good enough for my paranoia.


    Taking my time, I worked with SAW to cover up the ¡®leaky¡¯ parts of my gear with platinum and anti-discernment runes. I used a closed eye to signify someone just overlooking my armor, hopefully achieving the effect of making one¡¯s eye slide over without actually seeing much. [It¡¯s good enough,] Kraken said, wringing his tentacles nervously. [It¡¯s already suspicious enough that you¡¯re gonna just walk up and say hi. You need a story, some reason or backdrop to give you a bit of legitimacy, otherwise they may just waste you. Centauri aren¡¯t known for forgiveness.]


    ¡°And I¡¯m not known for weakness.¡±

 Chapter 135 - Politics (Book 3 Chapter 2)

    Confidence. Confidence is key. It¡¯s how you pick up women at a bar, sell someone a car, and even convince them to go to the doctor. But confidence is more than just knowing what you¡¯re doing, it¡¯s believing that you¡¯re right, that you know the actions you¡¯re taking possess something inherently valuable. Confidence gives you weight, and if you have enough of it, people get out of the way. But confidence also makes people notice you, makes you stick out, and since discretion is the better part of valor, well.


    So I did my best to not look confident, and then mixed that up with a bit of flesh sorcery panache so that I wouldn¡¯t be recognized. A quick deep tan plus some reshaping of the cheekbones with a tiny brow restructure to make myself look much older and my own damn brother wouldn¡¯t recognize me. Making sure Gungnir was a small knife in my boot and my armor was a dull shade of brown, a marked change from black and silver, I started walking towards Miami.


    The walls were even more awe inspiring from down here now that I could get a proper look. This couldn¡¯t have been built by dumb machines and nanobots, there¡¯s just no way. The amount of raw power coming off of it was simply too much for even me to do, let alone the criss-crossing lines of runes on every house-sized block. Dark whorls of obsidian were clearly visible streaking throughout what could only have been some kind of glass-like stone. No person built this, this was made by an elemental.


    [You¡¯re not too far off,] Kraken said, answering my thoughts. [Some archmage probably got paid some big bucks to pop in through the gate, work his magic and haul ass away again. Probably made some serious money too.]


    [The Centauri have archmages?] I said, careful to make sure that my facial expression stayed the way it was supposed to so that I gave nothing away as I held a completely internal conversation.


    [Yes, but not many,] he answered. [Some other human dominion probably sent one over. The Centauri aren¡¯t the only human based empire, simply the largest. Academy archmages are actually a tiny bit more common than you¡¯d think and they¡¯re always jonesing for money to fund their research projects. Bet the witches gave him somethin¡¯ good.]


    Continuing to walk towards the city, I did my best to hold back a laugh. [Did that sound dirty for a reason?]


    [Oh yeah, witches man. Uber powerful, not only do they know the secrets of wytchfire, but they are not afraid to use it. Sex to them is a weapon, a tool. They¡¯re masters of manipulation and political power and intrigue get them excited. Pretty much any queen or hot maid is either a witch or a prospective one.]


    [And the difference between a witch and a wizard again, other than the sex?]


    Kraken¡¯s exasperation was clear. [It¡¯s not about the sex. You know what wizards are. Witches tend to be several steps beyond that. One key trait of most witch covens is that they have a shared pool of ancestral knowledge. They can actually pass down techniques, spells, knowledge, anything they know is imprinted on their soul and can be given to descendants, blood or otherwise.]


    [That¡¯s not fucking fair!]


    [Look who¡¯s talkin¡¯.]


    [Focus! They can easily see you now!]


    Generational knowledge functions in a similar way that compound interest used to make retirement accounts so attractive. Having lives that were limited to roughly eighty years is such a limiting factor on the productivity and creativity of humanity, but if you could break through that barrier then there¡¯s no telling what could be accomplished. And if you can¡¯t find a way to live forever, then passing on literal memories and skills would be the next best thing, and compounding that over and over could in fact give a person, a witch, multiple lifetimes or generations of skill and knowledge that a normal magic user simply couldn¡¯t compare to. I bet one of them or even more than one of them probably have the answer to magic batteries locked away in one of their memories and don¡¯t even know it!


    Recentering my mind from the distracting mental tangents as I was within a football field of the entrance to the city, I began coaxing my consciousness sorcery to extrude outwardly from me, subtly influencing the area around to make people view me as less of a threat. My goal of entering that city peacefully hinged on trying something brand spanking new. Ten well-armed soldiers stood at the opening of the tunnel, their guard hounds behind them sleeping. Even from here I could see bony spikes sticking out of their spines and shoulders.


    Not having planned for the dogs, I grasped at my flesh sorcery, forcing my sweat glands to temporarily give off the scent of someone way younger, weaker. Assuming that Centauri hounds work similarly to Earth dogs, not only would this change put them at ease but it might even make them completely disregard me.


    ¡°Ho to the gate!¡± I called, slowing my walk as I approached. Four soldiers kept their hands on their weapons as the rest of them kept lounging. Two were petting the dogs. ¡°It¡¯s true, it¡¯s really true! A city, here!¡±


    [Yup, Johnny and Reeanth aren¡¯t out here to greet you. I knew we should¡¯ve sent them a message.] Kraken whispered, even though nobody could eavesdrop on our mental link.


    [I know! I know, but we might be able to make contact with them in the city. Just gonna take a bit of time.]


    The Centauri closest to me said something garbled and then his buddy smacked him on the arm. Reaching up to his helmet near his ear, the first one touched a rune that glowed softly. Looking back at me, he tried again, this time clear English came out. ¡°Stay where you are! Corporal, search him!¡±


    Two soldiers stood to the lead man¡¯s left and right, their rifles pointed at my feet as the Corporal snapped his fingers at a hound. Walking up to me, the hound followed at his heels. ¡°Hands out to the side, spread your feet!¡± It was weird to see his mouth move while his helmet clearly produced different syllables.


    [Translation spell built into the helmet. It has an auto-detect function built in and as long as the language is there it will go ahead and translate. Pretty useful for occupying the area.]


    Keeping my face perfectly still as I complied, different scenarios kept playing out in my head. Assaulting the city head on did not appeal to me but that¡¯s what kept coming up. The smartest option that presented itself was succeeding at convincing them that I was a harmless individual, one not worthy of notice. The large canine languidly sniffed at my boot as his handler began patting me down. Giving a snuff at my boot, the spiky hound turned around and rejoined his pack, curling up near the wall.


    ¡°What¡¯s your business here?¡± Looking at the one guy with the translation spell capability, I carefully worked a small tremor into my demeanour, further creating the impression that I was frail, weak, at least enough to not be considered a threat to anyone.


    ¡°The city! I haven¡¯t seen one in so long? Are there people there? Humans, anything?¡± I begged, my knees knocking together. ¡°There¡¯s monsters out there!¡±


    [You¡¯re too good at this.]


    [Fuck off Squid!] I shot back at Kraken, making sure that my face didn¡¯t betray my internal dialogue.


    ¡°We know there are monsters out there, that¡¯s why we built this city,¡± he growled. ¡°Most of the refugees were gathered a long time ago. How¡¯d you manage to survive for so long?¡±


    ¡°The birds!¡± I gasped out, right as one of the soldiers searching me pushed way too hard on my gut. ¡°They talk to me, letting me know when anything is near!¡±


    All of the soldiers froze, then slowly backed off. One of them near the sleeping hounds yelled something I couldn¡¯t understand then threw a small device to the lead soldier. Taking her helmet off, a lush mane of blonde hair framed the most aesthetically pleasing face an artist could design. Miss Gorgeous caught it and pointed it at me while muttering something about ¡®damn sorcerers¡¯, a small but insistent beeping sound grew louder. Touching the side of her helmet, she activated her own translation spell.


    ¡°Show us your true face shapeshifter,¡± she said, her voice way too warm for how imperiously cold she was acting. Every soldier had their shields out and planted at her words, their rifles pointed directly at my face. None of the hounds had moved a muscle though, still content to sleep in a humongous pile near the entrance to the city. ¡°I don¡¯t ask twice and we haven¡¯t had a lot of action lately so I suggest you get to it.¡±This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    [That¡¯s an aura scanner.] Kraken clarified. [One of your brother¡¯s friends must¡¯ve scanned you at some point last time you were here. Unless you know how to intrinsically change how your soul gives off power, fooling that device is not possible for you. I thought those were outlawed a long time ago, too many royals kept sneaking around on their wives and blaming it on shapeshifters or facethieves.]


    Keeping my body still, I allowed my flesh sorcery to slowly put my face back to normalcy. ¡°Well, if it isn¡¯t the sorcerer Nathaniel Jones, brother of Lieutenant Andrew Jones, wanted for the murder of Captain Casparai of the Mauraders, 2nd Legion of the Reclamation fleet. Arrest him.¡± Oh how I wanted to wipe the haughty look right off her face even though she had at least a good two and a half feet of height on me. Fuckin¡¯ Centauri genetics.


    It was moments like these that made me happy to have a functioning sense of cautionary paranoia. The entire time this conversation was going on, I had several planttrop seeds hidden in slots near the bottom of my boots that popped out and were growing insanely fast due to the amount of power I was pumping into them. With my nature sorcery, under the helpful guiding influence of Kraken, the roots extended underneath each and every soldier, ready to spring just in case things went south because my life could never be easy. If I was wrong, I¡¯d simply be out a couple plant seeds which means nothing because I have several dozen on me. If I was right, then avoiding sudden violence and a whole lot of bloodshed was within the realm of possibility.


    Every soldier pointed their rifle at me, their bodies tense, ready in case I moved one muscle in a way they didn¡¯t like. Letting a smirk tease out on my face, I activated the planttrops, thorny vines exploding out of the earth knocking away weapons and shields. The thorns didn¡¯t pierce their armor but they did poke painfully into the joints ensuring minimal struggling. Still, the wolves stayed in their sleepy snuggle pack over by the city entrance. [It¡¯s not weird dude,] Kraken said as I glanced over towards the hounds. [Animals are much easier to influence than people, should have thought about that. They don¡¯t have the same nanotech implants that the Centauri do.]


    Shaking my head at the oversight and tucking it away for later, I put my arms down and sighed. ¡°I¡¯m not going to kill you, relax. This whole thing,¡± I said, gesturing at the vines currently constricting the soldiers. ¡°This whole thing is for your safety not mine. I just want to visit my brother, take a look at my goddamn tree, and maybe do some shopping. Looked like a whole damn city in there.¡±


    The vines relaxed their grip on each soldier as I put them to sleep one by one, ensuring that their unconscious state would last at least for the next eight hours. Trying to unlock their brain would result in a total system failure just like Casparai when I ripped the information out of his mind, which is part of the reason why I seem to be persona non grata around here. Using Kraken, as he has a much gentler touch than I, I had him scan the surface level thoughts and recent memories of the city, seeing if he could grab snippets of info without causing any harm. Once everyone except the wolves were asleep, I used my mind sorcery to make sure that the spiny wolf pack thought of me as one of their own.


    Kraken manipulated the vines to hold some of the soldiers up so that it would look from the top of the wall that they were still standing guard. The others were put next to the wolves and sitting up next to the wall itself.


    [So, plan B? Operation Mole Scout?]


    Sighing with frustration at Kraken¡¯s suggestion even though I knew that most plans don¡¯t survive first contact, I double and triple checked each soldier to make sure they were out and that the wolves didn¡¯t care. Gathering a bit of power, I sank into the earth and slowly swam through the stone and dirt under the city. Kraken carefully extended his magic senses looking for my brother as my full attention was on moving as quietly as possible without getting noticed, not that my magic made physical sound but I was doing my best to keep my aura, my magical signature as muted as possible. Not knowing about that damn scanner fucked with my head as I was sure that my first plan was flawless. The task itself wasn¡¯t impossible but very difficult, like being forced to think your way through an action by forcing every muscle individually to do what you want instead of muscle memory just doing it for you. Aura control is going to take some serious practice.


    [You don¡¯t need to go to the center of the city, the gate¡¯s there. Move around the inner city part. The Centauri like to disguise their buildings as normal shops or residences so spies have a harder time finding important targets. If you haven¡¯t noticed, not only is everything symmetrical, but damn near identical.]


    Not saying anything as he could feel my agreement with his assessment, I moved clockwise under the city.


    [It sure is something, civilization that is. We got Centauri humans, native humans, more than a few Aelves and some Fae, a small contingent of Orkaane over here . . . oh shit! Go deep, go deep!]


    Trusting my familiar, I dove from my current depth of thirty yards under the city to over three hundred, where I sat as I shaped stone above me to be a thick, solid plate of reinforced granite. [What was that?] I said, doing my best not to let my tension show in my mental voice. [What happened?]


    [There was a whole bunch of witches arguing up there with some team of research wizards. And your brother was smack dab in the middle of it. Still no sign of the Dummy Duo though.]


    [If we can¡¯t be near it, is there a chance we could listen in on it?] I asked, knowing that lack of information has been my Achilles heel. [Think about what we could learn!]


    [I thought we were interested in NOT DYING!] Kraken shot back. [That¡¯s not the JV team up there, is that the right saying?]


    [Close enough.] I replied, thinking it over. If they could sense something coming up through the ground then that would definitely be cause for alarm, infiltrating the city itself actually wouldn¡¯t be. The guards figured me out due to their scanner but if I popped up in an alley or correctly timed coming out of the soil so that I was hidden by a corner or a building shadow then I could be just another pedestrian on the street. The disadvantage to that though was the fact that the meeting was probably shielded from the sides and above to prevent people like me from eavesdropping but who in their right mind would shield the floor? That in and of itself was a good enough reason to try and get close from below as opposed to trying to sneak a listen through a door or window crack.


    [Or we could just wait till nightfall when everyone¡¯s asleep?] Kraken suggested.


    [Nah, the convoys I sent will probably be here by then and who knows when the next guard rotation outside the city is,] I answered. [We¡¯re on a time crunch here.]


    Kraken sighed, which since this was mental communication, it came off as really loud and obnoxious as if he were about to undertake some monumental task. [Fine. I¡¯ll do my spirit thing and just phase through the floor to listen in.]


    Holy shit! I¡¯ve got some serious tunnel vision. Kraken is a spirit familiar. The damn squid is basically a ghost when he wants to be. As my eyes bugged out of their sockets, my mind swirling with the possibilities, Kraken exited Gungnir and phased up through the solid rock, stopping just short of our estimation of how sensitive the magical senses in that room were.


    [Ack! Hold on, so many damn languages to translate for you, slow fleshling, only knowing one damn dialect. Ok, here we go.]


    ¡°Shut your mouth manling! Still barely wet from your wretched mother¡¯s womb and still mewling! How ever did my cousin deal with it? Pathetic.¡± A voice far too old for a body that hot was disgusting to hear, an abomination all its own. The blonde woman wielded her charms like knives, putting her feet up on the table while adjusting her cleavage, sparks of mana zigzagging down her hair as her molten red eyes tried to bore holes through the men in front of her.


    ¡°Then how else do you propose we deal with Hell¡¯s invasion of Europe? Or of the Oni repossession of Asia while more than a few Drakes and Wyrms stake their claims in the mountain ranges across this world?¡± My brother¡¯s staunch refusal to back down in this contest of wills spoke well of him, even if we were at odds. ¡°The North American continent is the safest place to have a beachhead, and with the gate here in the city we can strike from anywhere at any time! You couldn¡¯t ask for a better strategic setup!¡±


    Santa¡¯s muscular cousin leaned forward on the table, his black armor out of place with his joyous smile. The man was more barrel than bowl full of jelly but his scarred hands spoke of many battles that he¡¯d raged his way through. ¡°She¡¯s not wrong lad. She¡¯s just uptight. Witches work like the Fae, all about their deals and games and promises.¡±


    The tension ratcheted up several notches as an evil smile graced her lips. ¡°Do not be deceived. I am not my cousin Morai. It will take more than a few men to divert me from my path.¡± Standing up, the woman slammed her palms on the table, greenish-white flames billowing up and then suddenly vanishing. ¡°I command wytchfire in all its forms! The corpses in the north and south will flee from me and even Hell¡¯s legions run from my wrath!¡±


    ¡°Hehehehe!¡± The big man chuckled. ¡°I am no mere man! I am Rolf, here for the hunting! New realms are full of danger and fun! My men guard this area as a courtesy to you, wench.¡±


    Not taking a step back even though he thought it might be the safest thing, Andy looked the woman in the eye. ¡°Yes, I know the witch Morai allowed this settlement to be built with the promise of protection, but we owe you nothing! Rolf was the one who contacted the mages to build the wall. Rolf was the one to have contacts in the Portal Corps that allowed the assimilation of the World Tree for the gate. What do you offer except more bonds and misery? Do you pledge anything but? No one here is afraid of you Sybella.¡±


    Not backing down, Sybella leaned forward, her words dripping with scorn. ¡°None of you are needed alive, manling. The great Alpha Centauri empire would not care if one little contingent went missing in a colonization effort, and they¡¯d certainly give me much more to ¡®protect¡¯ them. And the Hounds of Polaris care not for your cause either, Rolf himself will tell you that.¡±


    The big man shrugged. ¡°Maybe, then again, maybe not. He might be small but he did save my life several times against the soldiers of the Hive. If not for his quick thinking, we would have lost many more to their brain worm sleepers.¡±


    ¡°My division head, Major Colonel Septinel, gave the go ahead for the uplifted humans, we natives, to retake Earth. We¡¯ll be coming back and when we¡¯re all here, nothing will stop us.¡±


    Sitting back down, Sybella let out a belly laugh, making a great show of wiping a tear from her eye. ¡°You think your commander cares about retaking Earth? He¡¯s just hoping you all will fuck like rabbits so he can get more humans for his armies! Oh that¡¯s rich! You thought he cared for your cause!¡±


    Tearing my mind free of the argument, I banked my anger so that it burned low and slow. He might be a dick right now, but no one fucks with my brother other than me. That¡¯s my job.


    [Don¡¯t do it. Just wait a few more minutes, lemme get some more info that might save our bacon later.] Wisely listening to Kraken, I focused inward, mentally forcing myself to envision my anger as a fire, allowing it to burn but only how I wanted it to burn. It needed to be ready, the banked fire of a blacksmith¡¯s forge right before he starts for the day, the potential for a wildfire at any moment but simply waiting.


    Regaining my composure, I forced myself to wait. And wait I did, for at least two hours I sat there, pondering, thinking of a plan, prodding my uncooperative brain to conceive of anything to help me. As I sat there in my state of grumpy half meditation, I felt a shiver run through me. One of my background mental processes that I had set to low level scanning picked up that Reeanth was somewhere near.

 Chapter 136 - Quick Reunion (Book 3 Chapter 3)

    As I followed my scan, it revealed that Reeanth was moving in a direction roughly towards me and the building that I was under, her steps coming fast and hard which probably meant that she was running. My earth sorcery was more than happy to let me know every time her foot hit the ground, providing a nice triangulation between my general magic senses and my earth sorcery. What was troubling was that my earth sorcery was telling me that someone was running next to her but that wasn¡¯t showing up to my usual senses.


    [Probably Johnny,] Kraken commented. [ It works both ways between magic users and cultivators. Your inability to manipulate the other¡¯s energy means neither of you can sense the other in the usual extrasensory ways.]


    Scanning protocol dictates a tracking protocol to bypass inherent biological weakness. Recommended course of action . . . reviewing host¡¯s memories . . . comparing alternative signatures . . resolution found. Track via enhanced armor and weaponry bestowed by the host.


    Great. Even my suit has a bit of snark. Joy. Focusing a bit harder, I could tell that the man generally invisible to my senses was in fact Johnny, I¡¯d recognize the handiwork of the armor with its enchantments anywhere, definitely mine. [Time¡¯s up dude!] I yelled, yanking Kraken back to Gungnir as my unease grew. Why were they running towards me, wait, they don¡¯t even know I¡¯m here. Why are they running towards the political powder keg above me?


    Two options fought for supremacy in my head. The easiest would be to wait and see what happens but my well grounded sense of paranoia was screaming to pop up and get ahead of whatever problem was coming down the pip. Gritting my teeth, I went with my gut and popped out of the earth in front of Reeanth and Johnny as they came within a hundred yards of the building.


    ¡°Whoa! Whoa! It¡¯s me!¡±


    It was the first time in months that I¡¯d laid eyes on my former companions. Johnny was barely able to stop himself from smashing my face in with his mystical silver staff, its snake head extended out with massive fangs dripping greenish black venom. He looked leaner, no new scars to speak on him but his armor was pretty banged up and his pet Big Bear clearly wasn¡¯t around. My self-proclaimed vassal¡¯s mana-maul was impressively pulled back mid-swing as she recognized who I was. Plenty of Centauri weapons adorned her armor in strategic places, several pistols and wickedly serrated knives as well as what I¡¯m guessing were some nasty grenades.


    ¡°My man!¡± Johnny¡¯s hug tackle nearly knocked me over thanks to the muscle he put on since the last time we were together. Genuinely happy to see me, he pushed me back to arm¡¯s length, his voice slightly breaking as he spoke, ¡°Thank god you¡¯re back! It¡¯s been so goddamn boring! You wouldn¡¯t believe the amount of shitty politics going on right now!¡±


    ¡°My lord!¡±


    ¡°And there¡¯s elves and shit too! All kinds of crazy magical creatures and none of them are a good lay!¡±


    ¡°My lord!¡±


    ¡°And I can out arm wrestle a damn Centauri in a mini-mech suit but they won¡¯t let me blow anything up?!¡±


    ¡°MY LORD!¡± To be fair, I didn¡¯t have a choice to disengage from Johnny. In his excitement, his grip was like one of those trash compactors they used to use on cars. I couldn¡¯t freaking move, and with the way that the cultivator was shaking me while telling me about all the cool new things, my brain pan was rattling way too hard to answer Reeanth.


    With a well planned swift kick to the back of the knee, Johnny couldn¡¯t ignore physics and keeled over backwards as his left leg went out. Reeanth caught him as he let go of me and set up nicely while glaring at him. ¡°My apologies SQUIRE!¡± Reeanth¡¯s voice harsh as a Russian winter as his eyes popped out with fear for a split second before returning to his usual happy state. Facing me again, Johnny lightly laughed, ¡°Oh yeah! She¡¯s my teacher now too!¡±


    Taking a deep breath, obviously a calming act that she¡¯d done many times now, Reeanth moved Johnny behind her and then faced me with a look on her face. I knew that look, that¡¯s the ¡®we need to talk anywhere but here¡¯ look. Looking quickly off to the side several times, I got the message even as I kept up the small talk. ¡°Really? Your teacher?¡± I said, moving off to the indicated alley as Reeanth dragged her student.


    ¡°Oh hell yeah man! Staff fighting, shooting classes, workout routines and all kinds of cool shit!¡±


    ¡°And where¡¯s your bear?¡±


    ¡°Out hunti - ACK!¡± I turned to see Reeanth literally forcing his mouth closed so that he would shut up. ¡°Now is NOT the time!¡± she growled. ¡°Silence until I tell you otherwise!¡±


    Whirling towards me, Reeanth spoke in angrily quiet tones. ¡°Why are you here my lord?! Why have you returned now? You know it¡¯s not safe for you here!¡±


    Looking around to make sure that we didn¡¯t have anyone within earshot, I double checked with my senses as well before speaking. ¡°You know my idiot brother right? The one that hates me?¡± Reeanth looked at me with the ¡®duh¡¯ face as Johnny vigorously nodded. ¡°It¡¯s hard to explain the exact details, but that Centauri nanotech did a number on his mind. Whatever configuration they gave you was solid but his is the ¡®invasive, mind-altering¡¯ kind. To my magic, it looked like it had claws shoved in his brain stem.¡±


    Reeanth¡¯s face went white.


    ¡°What?¡± I said as a feeling of dangerously cold wrath began to trickle down my spine.


    ¡°Mindreapers,¡± she whispered. Her eyes were wide with fear as her hands began to shake. ¡°It was a Centauri project headed by a Witch traitor designed to mechanically imitate generational memories so our new soldiers could fight the Hive like veteran Battle Wizards.¡±


    ¡°But?¡±


    She gulped. ¡°But, instead of copying the memories, it stole them. Any memory or neural path that had to do with feeling soft emotions was deadened and the primal side of the brain was overstimulated to grow so that they would be fearless in combat.¡±


    ¡°Make them stupid and unthinking in combat,¡± I said, realizing where she was going with this.


    ¡°Yes, but that was outlawed a long long time ago and is used as a horror story for new cadets about the fallacies of having Witch allies.¡± Letting go of Johnny¡¯s face so that he could breathe, Reeanth hugged her shoulders, shuddering at the thought. ¡°Some of the experiments are still alive in stasis and brought out at trials as proof of their evil end results when anyone experiments with forbidden magics.¡±


    My teeth began grinding together as Reeanth thought furiously. ¡°If what you¡¯ve said is correct, then the one that committed this atrocity to the legion here in this city is dead, the witch you killed,¡± Reeanth said. ¡°I¡¯ve done some digging and she was the one to contract the new ¡®native¡¯ legion from the Centauri and then had them establish a beachhead here for her new lab with them being the planned security. She didn¡¯t want to possibly waste her precious Amazons on a new unexplored world.¡±


    [I don¡¯t like where this is going, boss.] Kraken quickly interjected. [If she put this together right, then the hag that¡¯s here isn¡¯t responsible and you might feel that she is but attacking her would be monumentally stupid. And, that failed programming in your brother¡¯s head also probably drives him to seek out someone in the witch community. Witches hate subordinates that don¡¯t need them and since these people clearly have no leader . . .]


    [Then they¡¯re gettin¡¯ one from a new witch,] I finished. [Look, I halfway listened to that conversation. They didn¡¯t seem too happy with that witch though.]


    [True, but who knows how long it takes for the programming to fully take effect? Could be years? A whole bunch of unknown factors could be altering how resistant or vulnerable these people are to it, and it may even be a new version of that experiment. We just don¡¯t know.]A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    ¡°I say we get em!¡± Johnny loudly whispered, all gung-ho at the idea of some action. ¡°Come on, we can totally fuckin¡¯ do it! Just say the word, pretty please!¡±


    ¡°I advise caution, my lord.¡± Reeanth cut in. ¡°At least wait until the meeting is over unless you are intentionally trying to make a statement as well as cause a massive political mess. Besides, the mindreaper device has been implanted in the legion for some time now. Another few hours of it being there won¡¯t cause as much harm as us acting rashly.¡±


    Pulling both of them deeper into the shadows of the alley, I weighed my options. Shock and awe is definitely the one I usually go with, especially since I could use the root of Yggdrasil in the center of the city to retrieve Spot from Sunstone Castle and have him here in ten minutes. With Spot and Big Bear on my team as well as an overbuffed Centauri warrior and a kitted out cultivator, it¡¯s not enough to take on a city but more than enough to take on that building of people. It¡¯s all about choosing the right target.


    The alternative to my usual harebrained schemes is well-planned sneaky action, which is many times harder due to the amount of patience required. I could wait until the meeting was over and then capture my brother, forcing him to undergo experimental healing with the minor light-centric Chaos crystal. With him on our side, we would have a springboard to possibly free the others if the crystal was still viable and then a whole city where we wouldn¡¯t be considered public enemy number one.


    But still, just the thought of something basically eating my brother¡¯s brain, however slowly, was killing me. The desire to wipe the city off the fucking map raged against the constraints of my will. My own sick imagination spewed idea after idea about how to go about doing so, maybe piss off some gigantic monster from the deep and guide it towards Miami, make my own volcano underneath the city, or even see if I could use the World Tree altered portal to vomit otherworldly monstrosities directly in the heart of the city.


    [Quick reminder as to why we don¡¯t really want to flatten this part of Florida, allies and intelligence. We need both, we need the delicate tools to juxtapose you being a hammer, hence the non-scorched earth approach.]


    [It was just a thought!] I retorted, reeling in my highly graphic visions of mass destruction. [Sheesh.]


    [Uh huh, and I¡¯m just a squid.]


    Reeanth¡¯s poke brought me back from mentally working through my options, something I¡¯m proud to say that I actually do nowadays instead of just bulldozing through. Realizing that I had more time to prepare than I first thought since I had given my brother the protection necklace which would stop anything short of a dragon at least once, I followed Reeanth and Johnny back to where they¡¯d been staying.


    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me that you got an entire pyramid building all to yourselves?¡± The inside was much bigger than it appeared on the outside, complete with futuristic versions of any rich man¡¯s playhouse.


    ¡°Over here is a state of the art gravity gym so I can work out!¡± Johnny geeked. ¡°And the kitchen which will make anything you want as long as you bring the ingredients! Watch!¡± Slapping the shock white countertop, a small transparent stasis cube rose up with a fat sleeping rabbit inside. ¡°Deep fried bunny! And don¡¯t forget to remove the skin, bones, and organs this time!¡±


    The cube slammed back down into the counter and ten seconds later, right next to where the first one sank into the counter another box rose up. Touching the top with his hand, Johnny opened the box and the beautiful smell of fried rabbit on a bed of noodles wafted out.


    ¡°Where¡¯d you get the flour and eggs and all the other stuff to make it?¡± I asked, unsteadily walking forward as this was the first real meal other than Centauri food cubes that I¡¯d seen in months. My stomach was raging, shaking at its cage inside of me, demanding that I devour what was in front of me. My watery eyes looked at Johnny as he grinned without answering my question.


    ¡°Yeah, go ahead, I¡¯ve already eaten today.¡± As I attacked the meal like a ravenous wolf, Johnny laughed. ¡°They got a market here and plenty of people to run it as well. Some of the Centauri legions were on board with letting the ¡®natives¡¯ come back when things settled down, something about refreshing the gene pool and gettin¡¯ new blood. Anyways, with magic, everybody¡¯s been makin¡¯ all kinds of shit. Saw some dude race away from the city on a Harley Davidson hovercycle and another on hovering skateboots. It¡¯s like a new age magic paradise, if you can ignore the monsters.¡±


    I barely heard what he said. The skin of the rabbit was beautifully crisped and the meat was so damn tender. The noodles were cooked in a lovely meat sauce that was just perfectly thick, hitting all the neglected flavor needs of my poor tongue. My moans, I¡¯m sad to say, were a bit too close to actual sex noises that Johnny gave me some space after laughing at me. Forcing myself to take some time to enjoy the meal, I sat in a chair popped out of the ground and molded itself to be perfectly comfortable. After cursing in surprise and almost dropping my food, a crime in and of itself, I rotated in the chair to take in the room. A small garden hung off the wall to my left, the tomatoes, grapes, apples, and berries were relatively easy to identify. A whole bunch of other plants were up there too but I couldn¡¯t identify them leading me to believe that they weren¡¯t native to Earth.


    A long table made out of the same mysterious material as the counters sat in the middle of the room, various weapons and cleaned off large bones from animals strewn across it.


    Reeanth stood by the entryway of the room, one hand holding her mana-maul while the other traced the runes on its shaft. ¡°My lord,¡± she said as I finished. ¡°I need to know what your goals are so that I may know how to best assist you.¡±


    Leaning back in the chair as it automatically adjusted to make the feel more comfortable, I almost fell asleep as I thought about my answer, my body melting into the seat. ¡°It all depends on if I can do what I¡¯m hoping to be able to do.¡±


    ¡°Hey!¡± Johnny yelled. ¡°No wizard double talk! What¡¯s the plan? Puhleeese! I¡¯m dying for some fuckin action! Besides, Fuzzy¡¯s been gettin¡¯ fat and needs a workout.¡±


    Sighing, I pulled the small but very bright Chaos crystal, its white sheen throwing odd shadows around the room. ¡°This is a Chaos crystal, Johnny.¡± I said, carefully setting my hand on the table but not letting go of the crystal. ¡°This thing right here, if it were bigger or more full, would be able to give someone sorcery, an advanced form of magic, to anyone who isn¡¯t a cultivator. It¡¯s up to the discretion of the one using it how it works but it could possibly impart magics related to light, healing, purity, white hot fire or something like that. But this one, there¡¯s only enough in there for a seed of power that could grow over time.¡±


    Johnny¡¯s eyes almost popped out of his face even as Reeanth unsuccessfully tried to keep her own jealousy at bay. ¡°How does this help us my lord?¡± She asked, her foot tapping out an irritating rhythm. ¡°Wouldn¡¯t this be best used by one you trust, such as myself? Your sworn hand?¡±


    Her hungry gaze never left the crystal even as I wrapped my fingers completely around it, covering up the hypnotic glow. ¡°It ain¡¯t for you princess,¡± I said, putting it back in Gungnir where I knew it would be safe. ¡°Trust me, there¡¯s not enough in there for you to get much out of it, but there is a chance I can use it to restore my brother and his band of brainwashed idiots.¡± Breathing the tension in my shoulders away took a few moments, and coming to grips with the fact that I¡¯d have to kidnap my brother only took a few more. This new world was having an effect on me, making me harder, more decisive. It could be argued that growing up also did the same shit but not everyone lives through an apocalypse.


    ¡°So we got some time to kill?¡± Reeanth huffed at Johnny¡¯s question, giving the affirmation he was so desperately hoping for. Scrambling madly at the countertops and yelling random food items, Johnny had various cubes popping up and down with different ingredients that vanished and reappeared in various forms. In less than two minutes, beautiful dishes of pizza, pot roast, lo mein noodles, and steaks adorned countertops.


    ¡°Eat up!¡±


    I take back every bad word, every bad thought I¡¯d ever had about Johnny. In this moment, this heavenly moment of gastrointestinal satisfaction, I loved that man with all of my stomach. Subsisting on Centauri meal cubes, no matter how well they technically met the requirements of sustenance, was no substitute for real food, for FLAVOR. Through it all, Johnny kept trying to tell me about what he and Reeanth had learned, and some of it probably was cool and interesting, but I assure you, it wasn¡¯t as fascinating as the rejuvenation of my soul via real food.


    ¡°My lord! Cease this moaning, it¡¯s not seemly!¡± Ignoring her pleas, I kept going, fully cognizant that my temporary runic tattoos allowed me to eat more than any human, other than a sumo wrestler, should. Today, the sin of gluttony was mine for the taking, even as my flesh sorcery combined with the enhancement runes kept my body from getting instantly fat, added some much needed muscle to my frame, and converted the waste into mana.


    ¡°That was uh, kinda gross.¡± Gingerly handing me a hand towel, I took it from Johnny as I looked over the empty plates. What I couldn¡¯t eat, which wasn¡¯t much compared to what I shoveled down, I had put into Gungnir for later. Conjuring water, I cleaned myself off and lay back in my chair, completely satisfied for the first time in a long time.


    ¡°You want some alone time with yourself and another pizza or are you good?¡± Wagging his eyes and barely keeping his dirty smile off his face, Reeanth let out a disgusted sigh and pulled out a chair in front of me, sitting down and snapping her fingers to get my attention.


    ¡°You¡¯re right, you¡¯re right.¡± I said, consoling my uptight vassal. ¡°I just needed that more than you know. To answer your question, my immediate goal is to carefully extract my brother from the public eye, de-hijack his brain, and if it works, then do the same to his friends. If it doesn¡¯t work, then I¡¯ll stick him in stasis until I can figure out how to do it. Worst comes to worse, I¡¯ll grow him a new body and then do my best to do a mind/soul transfer while leaving the Centauri shit behind. Questions?¡±


    Both of them stared at me, completely unsure about what to say. ¡°What?¡± I snapped. ¡°It¡¯s not like I have flesh and consciousness sorcery, oh wait, I do! The possibility is there, however small. Now, when this whole shit is finished, I need to get as much intelligence as I can outta this damn city and then rework MY poor twisted Yggdrasil that¡¯s tied to a freaking gate. And I¡¯m going to need both of y¡¯alls help to do it.¡±


    ¡°Sure, sure, yeah, easy peasy Japaneesy, or is it Koreaneesy? We¡¯ll just wait till the buttcrack of dawn when everyone¡¯s asleep and nab him. Everything else falls into place after that, right?¡±


    Reeanth cracked her neck before she answered. ¡°He¡¯s not wrong, my lord, at least not this time. All of our future actions here are determined by the success of your initial plan.¡±


    Pulling Gungnir out and placing it on the table in staff form, I waved my hand and sent a mental message. ¡°Lucky for me, we have someone to do the heavy lifting for us.¡±


    Popping out of my weapon, Kraken floated above the table, bowing gracefully and extending his tentacles out to their fullest. ¡°Pleased to meet you both. My given name is Kraxin¡¯eldra, shortened to Kraken. I don¡¯t appreciate the crass allusion to the terrifying abominations that ravage many ocean planets, nasty smelly things that they are. And yet, the name has stuck.¡±


    ¡°You just pulled a squid outta your-¡±


    ¡°Staff.¡± Reeanth said, finishing Johnny¡¯s breathless statement.


    ¡°He¡¯s a Scion of Order, whatever that means, still not exactly sure. But, he is fantastic at making plans, both short and long term as well as information organization. He¡¯s also a badass at magical combat so don¡¯t piss him off.¡±  Technically, he¡¯s a badass when I give him the power and agency to do so but I¡¯m not gonna split hairs here, mainly because I need both Johnny and Reeanth to understand I can bring more resources to bear than I used to.


    ¡°As the simple one said, the best plan is a night raid.¡±


    ¡°Hey!¡±


    ¡°And the bit of sorcery is most likely powerful enough to fully cleanse the defunct mindreaper parasite from my partner¡¯s brother. We just have a bit of waiting to do.¡±

 Chapter 137 - Captured Audience of One (Book 3 Chapter 4)

    While my inner nerd wanted to do a bunch of sight-seeing and exploration, the practical side of me decided to take a nap. Finding a dark room and simply sitting down in a chair wasn¡¯t really doing it for me so I had to use my consciousness and flesh sorceries at the same time to force me to settle down and conk out for about two hours. Being able to hit the hay at the push of a button would have been considered a super power back before the apocalypse, but my ability was so much better. With my powers, I could condense hours of rejuvenating sleep into a smaller time frame, essentially allowing me to live longer and experience more than anyone else due to being able to cut down on non-productive time. With Kraken functioning as a backup alarm clock, I sat in one of the nanotech comfy chairs and lay down, the entire contraption forming a very snug bed. It felt like I had just closed my eyes when Kraken woke me up.


    [Wake the FUCK UP! Yes, it¡¯s been two hours! Yes, this is way too mentally loud for you! And NO! Everything is NOT ok!]


    Seeing as all of my questions were answered at the speed of thought by my screaming spirit familiar, I sprang out of the chair-bed with Gungnir in wicked tri-tip spear form and SAW fully activated with the auto-conjured water arms extending from my back. My magical senses unfurled, taking in the entire room even as no enemies or threats appeared.


    ¡°The fuck?¡± I half whispered, half growled, kicking open the door of my nap room and not believing what my eyes told me. The door to the building was open but plugged up from the outside by a very hairy and yet spiky behind. If I wasn¡¯t mistaken, that was Fuzzy¡¯s butt that I was seeing. Next to it, Reeanth stood firm holding her mana-maul in both hands, her grip tightening and loosening as if she were constantly adjusting her grip, her eyes darting back and forth. Meanwhile, Johnny stood in the middle of the room carrying what appeared to be an oversized rolled up fur rug underneath one arm as he grinned his classic shit-eating smile.


    ¡°Merry Christmas ya filthy animal!¡± Johnny shouted, gleefully letting go of his makeshift rug of holding, a loud oof sound coming out of it followed by a lot of angry unintelligible yelling. The package did its own version of the worm as Johnny put his boot firmly on it to hold it in place. Looking at Reeanth, Johnny asked, ¡°Can I show him? He didn¡¯t even have to lift a finger! Nobody saw nothin¡¯, I swear!¡±


    The bottom fell out of my stomach even as it filled with a feeling of foreboding unease mixed with excitement. ¡°Did you bring me who I think you brought me?¡±


    ¡°Yup! Don¡¯t take me for a complete dummy. Big Bear told me that you¡¯d knocked out the guards to the city not too long ago which meant this had to get done pronto.¡± Giving the rug a swift but not too hard kick, he continued. ¡°And since you were having some beauty sleep, I had Miss Stick-Up-Her-Ass be the lookout as I did the easy part so you could do the hard part. Your brother¡¯s a scrapper too, instead of yelling for help he almost pulled a Mike Tyson and took my ear off.¡±


    Muffled words that sounded very similar to ¡®fuck you¡¯, ¡®lemme out¡¯ and ¡®asshole¡¯ coincided with our human and now that Johnny turned his body, I could see a set of larger than average metallic boots sticking out the other side.


    ¡°Well, snargle fargle to you too butthead.¡± Crouching down, I gave my wrapped up brother a solid smack even though I knew he¡¯d barely feel it through the layers of carpet and slabbed Centauri muscle. ¡°Did you take him down all by yourself?¡± It wasn¡¯t the dumb question that Johnny took it to be. I mean, I knew that my brother has been doing Centauri training and warfare for at least a couple years due to the time distortion even though we¡¯ve only been at this for three-quarters of a year. Besides, I cheat.


    ¡°Well,¡± Johnny said sheepishly. ¡°I might have had a little help. You can meet her when we hightail it outta here.¡±


    ¡°Better tell him now who she is,¡± Kraken said. ¡°I can smell it on you and trust me, he won¡¯t like it.¡±


    ¡°Smell what? Ain¡¯t no nose on you!¡±


    ¡°Tell me what?¡± My face furrowing into a pre-frown as my spirit familiar¡¯s voice hinted that he wasn¡¯t joking.


    ¡°It¡¯s not a big deal. Her minions helped me out.¡±


    I didn¡¯t move.


    ¡°You know, uh, well, she called them revenants.¡±


    ¡°Zombies?!¡± Memories of me being scared shitless when this whole boondoggle started flooded my mind. The first Ripple or two messing with reality as some messed up kid raised the dead, planning some very not good things with his newfound power. This was back when I was still dealing with my own modern sense of morality, the idea that killing wasn¡¯t usually the best way forward. Although I did seal off the graveyards within a few miles of my home, I never followed up on that little shit who hurled literal death magic at me. I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up even as my focus for the past couple months, preparing to wipe out the Hungry Ones, bristled at the fact that I let someone go who was mildly related to the very thing that I was devoted to getting rid of.


    But we have to be clear. I still haven¡¯t seen a ¡®Hungry One¡¯ yet. I don¡¯t know if they¡¯re the run of the mill zombie that people think of from the old show ¡®Walking Dead¡¯ or if they¡¯re the messed up, super-powered, over the top zombies with all kinds of freaky powers. The crazy chick Nicole, her zombies were freaking dinosaurs that she¡¯d reanimated from the Natural Science museum from Phoenix, and the memories that I¡¯d gotten from her companions were too tainted with terror for me to get much information about what necromancers could do. I¡¯m operating in the dark with half-baked assumptions and it may just get me killed.


    Relaxing my grip on Gungnir caused the blazing light in the crystal spear-tip to dim as my emotions also came down from their instinctive reaction. Turning to Reeanth, I asked my question in a tone that brooked no funny business. ¡°I already don¡¯t trust whoever she is. Have you met her? And how is messing with dead bodies allowed by anyone in the city? I thought Centauri were all about rules, and there¡¯s definitely gotta be some rules against that madness.¡±


    ¡°The arts of necromancy are generally reviled and scorned throughout the cosmos, but not everywhere,¡± she clarified. ¡°Necromancers can be just as benevolent or wicked as any other magic user. And to answer your question, yes, I¡¯ve met Judy and she¡¯s a fine warrior. Her take on necromancy is a bit odd. Most raise their revenants and use them as cannon fodder while they function as either long range artillery or support. Judy is actually an accomplished warrior who fights in perfect tandem with her minions.¡±


    ¡°And that¡¯s odd because?¡±


    Kraken scoffed. ¡°Because it¡¯s devastatingly effective. Who would suspect that the controller of the horde would be hidden within the horde?¡± Turning to Reeanth, Kraken asked, ¡°I assume that she goes for quality over quantity?¡±


    Johnny jumped in. ¡°Totally! She has five of them and each one is decked out in layers of bone armor and older Centauri tech. I¡¯ve fought them one at a time and as a group and they kick my ass every time.¡±


    A loud banging on the door interrupted our conversation. Due to my sudden awakening from my nap by Kraken, I was already kitted out and ready for anything. This whole ¡®not every situation requiring combat¡¯ mindset was starting to get in the way. Johnny opened the door as six large humanoid figures stalked through, each covered in impossibly thick bone with wicked spikes coming out at the elbows, knees, shoulders, and backs. All but one had glowing red eyes but each carried a kite shield with a sharp point at the bottom in one hand and a big battleaxe in the other.This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    ¡°I cannot BELIEVE you talked me into this!¡± The one without the glowing eyes took off its intimidating helmet, revealing a beautiful buxom blonde. Walking up to Johnny, she attached her axe to her back and poked him in the chest. ¡°You owe me BIG!¡±  Turning to me and then eyeing the struggling form in the rolled up carpet, she stuck her hand out and sweetly said, ¡°Hi, I¡¯m Judy. And you must be the one that¡¯s got everyone up in arms.¡±


    Shaking her hand firmly, I pulled back instantly and let out a little hiss as her magic almost burned me. My own enchanted gloves were barely strong enough to hold back the cloying blackness that reached for me from inside her hand. My fears were right. This kind of magic is anathema to me, my weakness.


    ¡°Sorry,¡± Judy said quickly, her voice showing genuine regret. ¡°They didn¡¯t tell me much about you except how awesome you are.¡±


    Shaking my hand back and forth to get rid of the tingling feeling, I stood up straight and looked her in the eye. ¡°It¡¯s ok. A friend of Johnny¡¯s is a friend of mine.¡±


    A tension I hadn¡¯t noticed left the room as both Reeanth and Johnny let out huge sighs of relief. Both were eyeing me as if I were a bomb about to explode. ¡°What?¡± I growled. ¡°I got bigger fish to fry than my own insecurities right now.¡± Grabbing my badly packaged brother, I started dragging him towards the room I had taken a nap in. ¡°Heavy ass chunk. Mom always said you needed to lose some weight.¡±


    ¡°My lord! What do you need us to do?¡± Reeanth¡¯s question had more sides to consider than what was on the surface. I had many things I needed to do, but very few of which I could actually delegate. The biggest priority wasn¡¯t actually fixing my brother; disabling the gate at the center of the city was the biggest priority, and in such a way that it could be reactivated easily would be the most prudent course of action. Then, fixing my brother would be the next item on my list and then the rest of his soldiers on down the line. Keeping the mind-controlled Centauri from finding out about us and our plans involved us not doing anything to actually attract their attention.


    ¡°Reeanth, stay near the door in case anyone comes knocking and divert them if possible. Johnny, sit on my brother and make sure he stays put,¡± I ordered. ¡°Judy, if you please since I know you don¡¯t answer to me, if you wouldn¡¯t mind being our quick reaction force backup? If anyone busts in, take them down quickly, quietly, and without bloodshed. We¡¯re gonna need to do this with minimal noise and violence if we want a shot at success.¡±


    To her credit, she simply nodded and placed her overly armored goons in strategic places around the room so that they wouldn¡¯t be instantly noticed by incoming traffic. Reaching down, I placed a quick mental whammy on my brother, knocking him out to make it easier on everyone till I got back.


    ¡°You got a back door I can use?¡± I asked. Reeanth pointed at a small hallway in the back. Following the well lit corridor, I touched the blue button on the side of the door, the portal opening up just like a freaking Star Trek door. ¡°Cool!¡± I muttered as I shut the door and dove into the earth. The direction I wanted to go was even easier to find below ground than above it as the gate gave off an incredible magical signature due to its very nature and the fact that my fucking tree was hooked up to it.


    Within two minutes, I was holding Gungnir in staff-form parallel to the main root of this branch of Yggdrasil, the energies of my main magical tool forming a buffer as I delved into the entwining of my tree and what could be described as a parasitical gate. [Whoever did this is a master of not just portal magic, but also runic and nature as well. It¡¯s like the PHD version of you did this.]


    [Not helping!] I shot back as Kraken scanned the set with wonder. [I¡¯m trying to work here, not geek out over someone else¡¯s masterpiece.] Following the thread of power up the root and into the trunk of the World Tree, the base of the gate¡¯s platform was melded at the molecular level with the part of the trunk just above the surface of the earth. From what I could tell, that was the conduit for powering the portal as well as forming the symbolic stability necessary to rip holes in space. The upper part of Yggdrasil wrapped up along the structural rib bones making up the sides and then joined at the top formed the necessary shape so living things could physically travel through.


    [What you¡¯re looking for is at the tip of the rib bones,] Kraken said, his mental voice sounding very far away. [Each one has an identical rune that functions as entangled particles. Activate one and the other mirrors it, completing the ritual circle and opening up the gateway. The runes going down from there then do the heavy lifting and the ones at the bottom on that stone plate are what make up the coordinates.]


    [Well, I could either disable the activation runes themselves, which would be a pain in the butt from down here, or I could simply persuade the tree to stop sending power to the gate.]


    [Nature sorcery for the win.] Grumbling at me seeing the simple but most effective solution when he didn¡¯t, Kraken sank back into Gungnir as I gently pushed my power into the tree. Twenty minutes of communing later, this offshoot of Yggdrasil was convinced that ¡®a drought¡¯ was upon us and it began cutting off the flow of power to its upper half, directing the flow of mana from the leyline below it into its roots to better weather the rough times ahead.


    [At least my way you didn¡¯t have to lie to a tree.]


    [I do hate to say it, but my little white lie will only make this branch even stronger. Besides, I have a theory,] I mused as I headed back to fix my brother. [I bet that the overall level of planetary mana is determined by how many Yggdrasil roots there are on the planet, and by how strong the trees themselves are. Think about it, while it pulls power from the leylines underneath it, you can¡¯t tell me that you haven¡¯t noticed how the tree somehow pulls more power from inside of itself than from its surroundings?]


    [Duh. It is the World Tree, which means it¡¯s connected to the rest of ITSELF!]


    [Forget I said anything.]


    Sneaking in through the back door, one of Judy¡¯s zombies almost made me crap myself as it popped out of a side door. It was only through Kraken screaming, ¡°WAIT!¡± that I didn¡¯t accidentally blast it to kingdom come with Gungnir. The beefed up monstrosity stayed to guard the door as I jogged to my nap room. Ignoring the fact that my personal creep factor was ratcheting up every couple minutes, I got back to my younger yet much larger brother and carefully unrolled him with a bit of help from Johnny.


    Kraken deposited the small shard of light based Chaos in my hand which lay on the ground next to me. Using my flesh sorcery, I opened up a small cut in my cupped palm and dipped my finger in, swirling it around before I began drawing on his forehead. ¡°Pentagram within a circle to help me focus energy,¡± I muttered, hoping and praying that my fumbling in the dark would not be pointless. I picked up the Chaos shard in my right hand and held my left hand over it, generously squeezing out blood to give it a nice crimson coat. Placing that down on my brother¡¯s forehead inside the small ritual circle, I healed my hand and banished the excess blood.


    Using my earth sorcery, I covered my brother from the neck down in a thick layer of conjured stone, making sure to put an extra bit banded around his chest and arms so that at no point during this procedure he¡¯d be able to screw around.


    [Let¡¯s tilt this a bit more in our favor,] Kraken said from inside Gungnir. [Place the tip of Gungnir over his head and slowly move it down until I tell you to stop.] Pointing the spear downwards with the bladed tip just over the carefully perched crystal, Kraken molded the blade so that it morphed like putty  and covered up the miniature ritual as I slowly moved it closer to Andy¡¯s skin. [There, now you can channel through your staff which will serve as a buffer against the parasite in his head]


    ¡°Thanks.¡± I whispered as I closed my eyes, gripping my staff with both hands as I leaned my head against the cold skin of the wood.


    [Ok, so this ain¡¯t gonna be easy but I do suggest that you let me do the delicate work. If you supply the sorcery and power while letting Gungnir serve as the focus, I¡¯m confident that I can free his mind,] Kraken explained. [Although the biggest part you have to play is that I cannot use the light sorcery at all, it requires a mortal¡¯s will to be activated and that¡¯s all you. Focus on a cleansing light, the symbol of purification, and do NOT stop focusing on that until I tell you. Without that, none of this will work.]


    Trusting my familiar, I let my mind fall into itself as my breathing evened out. He wasn¡¯t wrong, but he wasn¡¯t completely right either. I¡¯m not the only one in this fight, Andy can lend his strength too. Fighting this from both angles would let our chances of success skyrocket, the hard part would be reaching it. Using my mind sorcery, I split my focus, letting one part focus on what Kraken needed to make this work and the other completely devoted towards flavoring this entire working with the memories and good times I¡¯ve shared with my brother. This couldn¡¯t be an attack on his brain because then he might fight it, ruining our chances of bringing him back to himself. If he could get the message, the overwhelming feeling that his blood was fighting for him, then removing the gnarled roots of the banned Centauri experiment wouldn¡¯t stand a chance.


    The little shit, well, big shit now, was tough. When he was younger, I remember us playing out in the snow. Our yard didn¡¯t have a fence back then but the boundary of our yard was marked with trees we¡¯d chopped down with dad and hadn¡¯t yet split and put away. The snow the night before was every child¡¯s dream, glistening white power that blocked every evil schoolbus allowing us to do what kids do best. The problem with days like today is that there¡¯s always something that can make it go wrong, which is where Andy came in.


    I had run inside to use the bathroom real quick, but it¡¯s never really quick when you have to remove eight layers of clothing to do your business and then put it all back on. By the time I had gotten back outside, my little brother had fallen off the logs that were slicked over with ice and broken his arm. But because he didn¡¯t want to ruin the snow day, the rascal had gotten back up on the logs and was still playing even as his right arm was clearly broken at thirty degree angle. The rest of the day was spent at the hospital with him crying, not because of the pain, but because he thought that he¡¯d ruined the entire snow day. Even back then he was tough, and now, now I just needed that toughness one more time.

 Chapter 138 - Uncomfortable Reality (Book 3 Chapter 5)

    Mental visualization is key for working magic, as it is your perceptions that shape your reality allowing your will to actually warp reality itself. Picturing in your head what you want isn¡¯t good enough though as the form without substance effects no change. My ability to manipulate water does me no good unless I can visualize and feel the water doing what I want. Without the will to shape what you see, all of the power in the world will do you no good. But all of that is easy to grasp when you¡¯re working with something physical as it¡¯s easy to imagine water. Everyone knows what that is and what it can do, for the most part. What I¡¯m trying to do now, now that opens up a whole can of worms.


    Mental magic works on the plane of thought and will, where what you picture IS reality. My soul-tree is literally and figuratively a soul-tree because it is what I picture, what I believe it to be. The physical manifestations of my combined powers inside of my head are required though because I¡¯m human, and humans believe what we see. Which makes what I¡¯m doing the hardest thing that I could be doing as my shaping of reality inside of my brother¡¯s brain is clashing with the reality that he¡¯s made inside of his brain. I, personally, view the mind-reaper inside of my brother¡¯s brain in a negative light because duh, it¡¯s not a good thing. The silver cube of nanite magitech that was in Colonel Casparai¡¯s head was the base of what I was seeing in my brother¡¯s head, but due to its inimical nature, my own perceptions allowed me to see its true form.


    The glistening metallic unthinking creature was a horrific mixture of an angry octopus crushing a crab and a many-legged spiny centipede clicking along. The spine of its processors lay on top of Andy¡¯s brain stem while its neurotransmitter legs hooked in all along the sides of the spine and up into various nodes of his gray and white matter. My brother, on the other hand, viewed it as a benign cybernetic enhancement to his brain allowing him to properly facilitate the use of his abilities. But of course he did since the damn thing was adjusting his thoughts at the speed of thought.


    [So this is either going to be really slow or really fast huh?] Kraken murmured as we both scanned the writhing infestation.


    [Yup.] I agreed. [Without the Chaos stone, we¡¯d be looking at months of decoding and dissecting his brain to pry out each and every tendril of that hideous monstrosity. With it, we just might be able to cleanse it, purge the bad programming and allow us to rework it so it¡¯s actually under Andy¡¯s control.]


    [Yes, that¡¯s what I said. Not in so many words but yes.] Kraken grumbled, my own nerves making me go over what we¡¯ve already discussed just to get me used to the idea.


    Gritting my teeth, I knuckled down and pushed my will down through Gungnir, focusing my thoughts and power into the reformed crystal that was covering the blood marked ritual. All I had to do was focus my will and power and let Kraken do the hard stuff. [Breathe in, breathe out.] My focus lasered in on elements of cleansing, healing, restoration, purity; basically, anything that could bleachbit the shit out of the implanted mind-fuckery.


    Total power storage calculated to be insufficient . . . Checking alternative reserves . . . Also insufficient . . .Sufficient reserves of sub-molecular particulates detected below . . . Portable Leyline Siphon Protocol activated . . . Extending feeding staves now . . . Overall stability of the connection confirmed . . . feeding


    Manipulating the conductive willow wands that I had put in my boots a while ago, SAW formed a metallic covering over them and speared them into the earth, making the flowing power of the city available to me as I opened up my own stores of power so that they were available to Kraken as needed. A sharp yank on my gathered power was all I needed to feel as I instinctively drew on the established connection. With SAW providing the initial connection in place of Gungnir as it had another job at the moment, the flow of power traveled up through the willow wands to the feeding channels up the sides and backs of my legs, up the runic channels under my armor and swirling down my arm into Gungnir.


    It felt weird. Magic as I¡¯ve been using it comes from the soul and is then directed out from the body into the world or the other method comes directly from the area around me that my aura or soul has a grip on. Like a wizard generating a fireball, the fireball spell is built outside of his hand and the power, the mana comes from his body to feed the spell hovering several inches or so above his body. But that area above his hand is still within his control due to the mana being wielded.


    What I was doing was a bit different though as I usually channel my power through my focus items or enchantments, giving me a depth of power or control that few have at my level of experience. SAW was doing all the channeling, all the directing of the power just outside of me, freeing me from the mental workout of channeling it through my body itself. My mind started to wander as so many applications of this exercise popped into my head. A quick mental smack from Kraken set me back to rights.


    [Focus. I¡¯m almost done, and that suit of yours is awesome. That thing just cut the amount of stored Chaos required to fix your brother in half cause of the power link . . . . aaand done!]


    Opening my eyes, I gingerly pulled Gungnir off of Andy¡¯s head, the lines of blood perfectly burned into his forehead. With a wave of my hand, I healed the flesh as I blinked away the sudden presence of tears threatening to spill down my face. The heavy feeling in my chest was worse than the burning in my eyes. I barely felt anything fighting the new denizens of the world but knowing that my own brother was one misstep away from being a freaking vegetable tugged on my heart, and it HURT.


    Not trusting my voice at the moment, I mentally communicated with Kraken. [Tell me he¡¯s good, please, for the love of all that is good, tell me my brother is ok?!]


    Waves of confident happiness and comfort flowed down the link. [It¡¯s a bit too soon to tell, but he should be fine,] Kraken said. [I put him under a localized stasis spell which kept him and the mind-reaper unaware, and then pulled it back slowly from the outside in, using the mana filtered by light-based Chaos to burn out the source code. The stone focused the mana in a particular frequency, sort of like how a lens will focus sunlight. All that¡¯s left to do is to figure out what next?]


    [Explain.]


    [Well, aside from making him irresistibly an asshole and a stooge for the Centauri, the parasite did do a lot of essential magical functions,] he explained. [Proper mana channeling and control was governed by the mind-reaper, muscle, bone, and nerve enhancements were controlled by the mind-reaper, the list goes on. We can either let him learn on his own, which he''ll be a bit defenseless until his mind catches up to his body and powers, or, we can put a basic GUI in his brain. Hell, we could even copy a base version of SAW and stick it in there. It would let your brother have the basic functions that he could customize as well as having an A.I. assistant in his brain to handle extra spells or background location monitoring.]


    [My brother would have the nanite version of mind sorcery then, right?]


    Kraken¡¯s light chuckle gave me the answer I was hoping for. With his eyelids curving in his version of a smile, he replied, [Yeah, technically, your brother, given some time to figure it out, could be an epic wizard down the road. That processor would help him use the parts of his brain that humans don¡¯t utilize very well, help him break down spell components and make new ones on the fly. Remember, wizards aren¡¯t sorcerers, but they¡¯re still not pushovers. In fact, given enough time, planning, and preparation, wizards can punch well above their weight class.]


    Just because I had to know, I pulled Kraken into my mindspace just for a bit of extra time. ¡°How does that work again? I know sorcerers are more powerful than wizards, that¡¯s why they tend to hunt down or bargain for sorcery.¡¯


    ¡°Yes, you¡¯re not wrong about the latter part,¡± Kraken said, rolling his eye as he answered my question in lecturer mode. ¡°But wizards are different. Sorcerers use their will and sorcery, which is its cheat affinity for an element, to work raw magic. Wizards have to build their spells. A fire sorcerer just flings fireballs like it¡¯s nothing as his magic does all the work for him. A fire wizard on the other hand, builds his spells bit by bit, then memorizes that combo, and then he uses it. A wizard¡¯s power also grows more over time, which is why all of them tend to be obsessed with any kind of life extension magic. They turn to sorcery to increase their affinity or power over a particular element or when their own research and spell-building hits a plateau.¡±If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    ¡°Sounds like a scaling ability, the smarter you are and the longer you can hide away equals the amount of power you¡¯ll eventually get.¡±


    ¡°True. Wizards do have their weaknesses though. Generally, their bodies are weak and combat experience is hard and dangerous to get. It¡¯s why most sorcerers die young; they let the rush of power go to their head. Wizards value caution above all, with practice, preparation, and proficiency being the three legs propping it up.¡±


    Mulling it over, I drew the parallels in my head. ¡°What if a multi-faceted sorcerer like myself teamed up with a combat wizard, a cultivator, and a unit-centric necromancer? It¡¯s a beautiful kind of symmetry for a team, right? I can heal, throw up walls, and make epic gear while still being able to dish out all kinds of damage. Andy is a Centauri combat wizard with an A.I. implant that will eventually help him out to epic stages of power, and Reeanth could be a goddamn tank or fighter duo with Johnny! And if we add Spot and Fuzzy to the mix, then we¡¯d have ¡®the big guns¡¯ too!¡±


    ¡°Get your head outta the clouds!¡± Kraken admonished. ¡°You got other worries that really should have your attention.¡±


    ¡°Fuck!¡± Returning to myself, I noted with mental sorcery that only ten actual seconds had elapsed. ¡°Sweet!¡±


    Mentally communicating again with Kraken for a second, I ordered him to make a basic A.I. template for Andy with a killswitch so Andy would be able to boot it out of his head at any point in time.


    [Already done.] Kraken chuffed. [It¡¯s been done since about a day you came up with the plan to fix your brother. Your subconscious is teeming with all kinds of nonsense but there are definitely some diamonds in the rough floatin¡¯ around. Just tap his head with Gungnir and I¡¯ll stick it in.]


    Obliging my familiar, I felt a small packet of luminescent power gently seep from the crystal blade into the now cleansed mind-reaper. The leg/tendrils that connected to his brain from its main body retracted into themselves until only the main body of it was left, sitting dimly on his brain stem.


    [Don¡¯t worry, it won¡¯t activate until he puts some mana into it and it comes with a user guide, thanks to yours truly!] Kraken chuckled to himself and then stopped. ¡°Oh, and if we can tap into some not very well secured databases in the main building, we can also pick up spell and grimoire schematics while we¡¯re at it. And uh, side note; I forgot one small detail. He probably won¡¯t wake up for at least a day.]


    That was too much information going too many directions for me to make a perfect plan. We don¡¯t have a day. We have about four more hours and the clock is a¡¯tickin¡¯. Quickly dragging Andy closer to the other side of the room where the bed was, I had to enhance my strength a bit just to lug his big ass up on the high rise bed. With a flick of will, I called Gungnir back to my hand in knife form where I stuck in on my belt as I confidently started to walk out of the room.


    ¡°Is he gonna be ok?¡± Johnny¡¯s question almost made me shit myself as I had forgotten he was there. A couple months ago, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to shut up and now he can halfway vanish into shadow. Turning to see his face, his eyes still wide open with wonder at the magic working, I kinda wished I got to see what it looked like from the outside.


    ¡°Yeah man, he¡¯s good.¡± I answered, a small tired smile showing that I was content with what I¡¯d done. ¡°He¡¯ll wake up in about a day or so and then we can work on some of his squadmates.¡±


    [Quick interruption here boss, but there¡¯s only enough juice left in that stone to fix about three more people. Or, you could just give him the rest of it.] At this point, Kraken¡¯s mental voice was almost directed towards himself. [It¡¯s not enough for a full blown power upgrade but he is a wizard, so maybe it would be enough for a sorcery seed.]


    [A what?] I shot back.


    [Well, a seed of sorcery, just like I said. Think of your brother as a mana rich pot of soil, and the stone, or sorcery seed, as an actual seed for a tree. You have a full-grown soul-tree, but your brother could start at the beginning and grow his. Plant the seed and let his powers manifest over time. It may take years for it to become apparent but as a wizard, he¡¯ll probably find out later that maybe his healing or laser or purification spells are supercharged, growing over time so that he could be a sorcerer of pure light. Not a bad way to go.]


    Whipping around, I ran the two steps back to Andy and used knife-form Gungnir to cut through his armor like butter. After telling Johnny not to worry, I stood over Andy for a bit more work. Agonizing over where to start as perfect placement mattered just as much as guidance, Kraken made it simple for me. Like a coach giving advice quickly and quietly to the star player at halftime, Kraken said, [Putting the seed of power in his brain would make his future abilities more sight based like Reeanth¡¯s, but if you put it in his chest near his sternum or heart, it might give him all kinds of enhancements like never ending energy as if he had a mini-sun inside of him for power. Or if you decide to stick it in his bones, then his marrow might be affected so that disease would never ever be an issue and healing might be his best.]


    Too many options for me to decide off the cuff.


    Continuing with his advice, my familiar¡¯s voice picked up speed. [I say stick it behind his sternum, right in that little pocket between his heart and all those other organs. Don¡¯t stick the stone itself in! Just the damn power! Sheesh, what kind of a flesh sorcerer are you?!]


    Gritting my teeth, I carefully maneuvered the implanted mass of power, a seed of Chaotic light, right in the tiny gap between the organs. Since the Centauri are much bigger than normal humans, there was actually more space to work with than if I was trying to do it to myself. The absolute best part of this operation was my ability to coax his flesh into accepting the insertion as part of itself. With flesh sorcery guiding my will, my brother¡¯s organs gently moved a bit to give it a bit more space as Kraken softly spoke.


    [Ok, good, very good. Now, here¡¯s the really tricky part. You can either put it directly into his soul, or, you can keep the power corporeal and attach it to his body by making it its own organ and connecting it physically to the other organs. If you did the latter, it would be the galaxy¡¯s most beneficial benign tumor, and if you did the former, your brother¡¯s soul would be almost as bright as an angel¡¯s.]


    Going with my gut and half-baked intuition from many, and I mean way too many, novels that I¡¯ve read, I kept gently pushing the seed until it faded from one plane of existence and took root in another. Fully engaging my consciousness/mind/soul sorcery, I faintly saw my brother¡¯s luminescent self with a tiny dot of brightly shining power right in the middle. Instinctively, his soul pushed back at the intrusion like a wave and I let it as my magic pushed back with his own soul. It was fascinating to watch as his unconscious self retreated like a wave going back to the ocean, dragging the implanted seed further into itself to vanish into its own depths.


    [Boy, you got an oddly skilled hand at this kind of thing. I¡¯d highly recommend that you never tell anyone that you have your particular combo of powers, ever.]


    Gulping down a stray thought of fear even as I mentally agreed, I rounded on Johnny as reality reasserted itself. ¡°Hey man, do they let you in the headquarters of this city or anything relatively important?¡±


    Johnny shrugged. ¡°Not really. Reeanth has been called inside the command post a few times by your brother but he hasn¡¯t really allowed either of us to be near him much. Kinda resents you and nothing we say has made a difference.¡±


    ¡°Figures. Nobody fights like brothers. Think of us like Cain and Abel right now even though we¡¯ve had each other¡¯s back all our lives, well, at least before shit hit the fan.¡± We walked out of the room and the door swirled shut behind us. ¡°Just like Star Trek,¡± I muttered, shaking my head. ¡°God, that¡¯s cool.¡±


    As we reached the main room, the sci-fi version of a living room, Judy sat in one of the super comfy chairs, lounging as if we hadn¡¯t just hijacked a soldier in his own city while the kidnapper himself was charged with murder. Great, just great. Forcing myself to relax as I couldn¡¯t hear sounds of an alarm or any indication that the city had caught on to our madness, I plopped in a chair directly across from her.


    ¡°So what¡¯s your story?¡± I asked, pulling out a meal cube from Gungnir and popping it in my mouth. I drank some conjured water as she seemed to chew over her response, her light blue eyes flashed black just for a second before reverting to their original state. ¡°Got any plans for when the fun starts in a couple hours?¡±


    Smirking at my aloof manner of questioning, she lightly picked up a glass of wine and sipped at it. ¡°What you meant to ask is how a woman like me became a Queen of the Dead?¡±


    ¡°Somethin¡¯ like that.¡±


    Her smile left as she looked down at her half-empty glass. ¡°Life is pretty great if everyone thinks you¡¯re good looking, or, at least it used to be. Men bent over backwards to take me on dates and married men certainly had few qualms about it either. Women either hated me or wanted to be my friend so they could have the man I didn¡¯t want. I didn¡¯t want any of that, in fact, I used to be married. Everything changed when I was visiting my husband¡¯s grave in Ohio, the Spring Grove Cemetery. It¡¯s beautiful there, it¡¯s actually an arboretum, filled with trees and gardens to contrast the feeling of melancholy.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m so sorry,¡± I said, knowing the feeling of losing a loved one.


    ¡°Save it,¡± she snapped, her face showing that she instantly regretted her quick outburst. ¡°Sorry, it¡¯s just that it was a bad time and I don¡¯t want your pity. I was there, taking some coke in the shade of one of the big trees so the groundskeeper wouldn¡¯t see me, doing anything to help keep the pain away when the world shook.¡± Her face paled as her next words came out slowly. ¡°The world shook and all I could hear was a loud ringing, and then screaming, and then moans and more screaming. They just started coming out of the ground, skeletons and dead people. Even some of the stone statues came to life, granite men with swords fighting with stone gargoyles with the undead in between them. I¡¯m not sure how it happened, but one of the revenants actually obeyed my hysteric screaming and started ripping the heads off of the others.¡±


    Shuddering at the thought of being in a fucking graveyard when the magic apocalypse kicked off, I didn¡¯t even want to think about how close to death from the start she was. Keeping my poker face on, I didn¡¯t say anything as she continued on, her eyes unfocused as if looking through her memories.


    ¡°You know, they don¡¯t get tired, right? The undead? They just keep comin¡¯, never stoppin¡¯. Just my luck to be stuck in one of the biggest graveyards in the good ol¡¯ US of A. When my first one got torn apart by the others, I had to run for my life while trying to figure out how to get another to listen to me like the first one. It took me even longer to figure out how to make them stronger, more durable so they could stand up to the fighting statues. If not for the river there and magic making fruiting plants grow, I would have either died to dehydration or starvation. For three days, I stayed by the river as my revenants stood guard, and then for months I fought my way to Florida where my family¡¯s home was but they were already gone by the time I got here.¡±


    Her wine had been refilled and drained several times by the time her story ended. Looking at me, the tears in her eyes didn¡¯t fall as she spoke, ¡°That what you wanted to hear?¡±

 Chapter 139 Test Run (Book 3 Chapter 6)

    By the end of her story, Judy¡¯s face had gone through every emotion, and as she blinked away her tears, a stony coldness took their place. I know that expression. It¡¯s the one where you realize that there¡¯s nothing left to do but push on. Complaining about it won¡¯t help, sympathy from others only makes it worse as you know that the pit of life will cave in around you if you do nothing. Only the agency of self backed by an iron will is sufficient to stand the thought of losing your family while fighting for your life and plaguing doubts. I at least had some closure in comparison to Judy. My brother was a room and a hallway away while the rest of my family¡¯s well being was still technically up in the air. She had nobody.


    The human side of me was tugging on my heart strings, begging me to be a white knight to the gorgeous blonde and reassure her that everything would be ok. The other side of me, the post-apocalyptic sorcerer who¡¯s finally learning some lessons, was holding the reins though, reminding me of what I¡¯ve already observed.


    One, she¡¯s a damn necromancer that¡¯s survived as long as me, which means that she¡¯s not weak and does not need anyone¡¯s help. Two, she has five revenants the size of Centauri warriors, each clad in black Centauri armor with an inner layer of bone armor filled with necromantic power underneath that. The scariest thing about her souped-up zombies is that each wielded a shield and a battleaxe, both of which were big enough that a normal man wouldn¡¯t be able handle those. An axe like that would require me to use both hands and that shield was taller than I was.


    And last but not certainly not least, my magic recoiled at the thought of doing battle with her. Something about the very nature of her power made my stomach turn and even my soul-tree on the inside quivered with fear. The more I felt the aura surrounding her and her revenants, the greasier I felt, like my grip over my own magic was slipping. Nothing about being in the same room as her, let alone her with minions, felt ok. The situation to me personally felt even more disgusting as she herself was beautiful but her magic was vile, like meeting a Victoria Secret model in person and she blinds you with her beauty and smile but then starts ranting about wanting to eat children and drown old people. The dichotomy of her existence repulsed me further.


    [If you can¡¯t handle this,] Kraken said, laughing at my discomfort. [Then the Hungry Ones are going to, how do you humans say, fuck you up real good?]


    [Are they worse?] I asked, keeping a straight face. [Her shit feels concentrated, like she managed to condense evil itself and stick it in a corpse AND make it obey her.]


    [Not everyone¡¯s path to power is littered with rose petals. Some climb over mountains of bodies and others swim through oceans of blood. You my friend, are nowhere near the top of the totem pole. Did I say that right?]


    Mentally rolling my eyes at Kraken as he could rustle through my memories himself, I conjured a cup made out of ice and filled it with conjured water, delicately taking a sip as I thought over the instinctive nature of my feelings. For a while, I would have thought that the element of fire was the opposite of my composite of magical abilities, but it seems that I was wrong. The very nature of my sorceries are the basic elements of life, earth and water combined with nature and mind are the foundations for life itself, and enchantments with mana sorcery are simply the next steps that life can take. But death, necromancy, corpse manipulation, the thought of it sends shivers down my spine. Maybe unconsciously, my drive to wage a war against the eventual invasion of the Hungry Ones wasn¡¯t just proactive self-preservation, but my own powers trying to influence me to get rid of my opposite, the one thing I don¡¯t really stand a chance against.


    ¡°Cat got your tongue?¡± A wry smile graced her lips as she joked. ¡°Or did you freeze it solid?¡±


    Downing the water, I banished the ice cup and looked her dead in the eye. Get it, dead? ¡°I¡¯m sorry for your loss,¡± I said, making sure that my voice was sincere even as I ignored her verbal poke. ¡°I do know what it¡¯s like to unfairly lose someone to circumstances you can¡¯t control.¡± Keeping my voice steady really wasn¡¯t that hard. I was honestly sympathetic to her plight, and making sure that I didn¡¯t piss her off or make her an enemy was high on my list of priorities for the moment, regardless of how my magics felt about her.


    Reeanth tensed as she watched our conversation from where she leaned against the wall near the front entrance of the building. Johnny, oblivious to the rising of the oddly natured tension, crashed into a seat next to me, dropping armfuls of food on the table between everyone.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know the crazy science behind it but they got MUTHA¡¯FUCKIN¡¯ HOHOS BABY! Check it!¡±


    A particular whiff of something special tingled my nostrils. ¡°Is that . . . Taco Bell?¡± My eyes zeroed in on a box that must have come straight from Heaven itself. Right in the middle of the assortment of all the worst foods that Ronald McDonalds and the Taco Bell Chihuahua could have dreamed up together on a mushroom trip sat a lovely almost pyramid of Doritos Locos Tacos and Gordita Crunches.


    ¡°Those are mine! You just ate!¡± Johnny thought his posturing and flexing was enough to scare me off, but I¡¯ve fought worse for worse at worse times. The tension of the moment was cut as Judy reached forward and snagged a Double Cheesy Beef Burrito from the side, toppling the pile of food.


    [Kraken, now.]


    [I don¡¯t think this is a good-]


    [NOW!]


    Not a moment too soon, my spirit familiar snatched the Taco Bell from the table as I waved Gungnir over the food.


    ¡°Hey! I was gonna share anyways,¡± Johnny grumbled. Grabbing two Wendy¡¯s Baconators, he leaned back as he pushed two Chick-Fil-A wraps over to Judy and then tossed an Arby¡¯s Roast Beef to Reeanth. ¡°Eat up, shit¡¯s never calm with this asshole in town. Trust me,¡± he said, bits of food crumbling out from the corners of his mouth. ¡°Some douche is about to either kick the door in or nuke us from orbit.¡±


    My moaning was embarrassing even as Judy¡¯s much dirtier version distracted Johnny. ¡°What?¡± she said, glaring at the both of us. ¡°It¡¯s not my fault fast food is this addictive! Besides, the food recombinator is a work of magic in and of itself. Don¡¯t ask me how it works either, I¡¯m just glad it does. Besides, I can¡¯t get fat thanks to magic.¡±


    Lowering her face, she dove in her wraps like a rabid pitbull. [Is that something I can steal?] I asked Kraken while I prayed to anything that would listen.


    [Sorry boss. The size of the storage space is based off of energy put into making it as well as the amount of energy stored. Angel relics plus your batteries PLUS the two generators I basically refurbished, dude, you¡¯re outta room. Besides, it¡¯s that entire left counter in the kitchen that does the work.]


    Cursing a very quiet but very vehement blue streak, I slowly ate as I hunched over my food like a caveman, protecting my meal. When I finished my quick roundabout trip to Heaven, I wiped my mouth and looked back at Judy. Clearing my throat, I repeated what I said before Johnny interrupted us. ¡°Judy, I truly am sorry for your loss.¡±


    Her downcast expression didn¡¯t change as she ate but I did manage to get a nod out of her. Finishing off her meal, she licked her fingers like a cat and looked at me and Johnny, her intense gaze going back and forth. ¡°I assume you both have lost people as well?¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± Johnny answered, his tone oddly a little snide. ¡°But my family sucked. Be a doctor, Johnny! Be a lawyer, Johnny! We found a nice Korean girl for you to marry, Johnny!¡± His face screwed up as he rolled his eyes. ¡°All I wanted to do was skate, smoke, maybe have a bit of a good time before growing up in the business world. Then this shit hit and most of my town was gone.¡±


    Taking a deep breath for part two of his rant, a loud boom and even louder cacophony of roars shook the city. It was an earthquake of sound that rocked every person in it to full attention, completely activating the lizard hindbrain of every human. Even with my flesh sorcery granting me complete control of my body, I couldn¡¯t help the instinctive surge of adrenaline in my body or the mad grab for power that my mind pulled out of my mana batteries.


    The only person not appearing to be affected was Johnny. Quickly downing the last of his burger, he threw his head back and groaned. ¡°Every time! They never attack before I eat, only after!¡±


    Answering the question that had yet to spill from my lips, Reeanth looked at me as she placed her meal back down on the table. ¡°Aqualans, my lord. Oceanic masters of genetic manipulation, renown for creating monster armies that they sell to the highest bidder. They hate technology in all of its forms and lay claim to planets so they can terraform them into breeding zoos. They¡¯ve attacked at least once every ten days for the past two months.¡±


    ¡°Maybe I can add to my posse . . .¡± Judy mused, rolling her shoulders to relieve the tension. Snapping her fingers, her revenants filed out of the Centauri house with her taking up the rear position. ¡°See ya later boys,¡± she said, winking at Johnny who, completely oblivious to her flirting, stuffed another burger down his gullet and grabbed his staff. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    ¡°Fuck that!¡± He yelled. ¡°I¡¯m comin¡¯ to!¡±


    ¡°My lord I-¡±


    ¡°Go Reeanth,¡± I said, making a shooing motion. ¡°I can¡¯t leave my brother here alone. Do what you need to do, and come get me if things get outta hand.¡±


    As soon as I was alone in the room, I had Kraken cast his senses outward, using Gungnir as a focus for my power. My own magical senses were pretty detailed but my range really wasn¡¯t that great. My spirit familiar on the other hand, due to his ethereal makeup, could scry or look around unseen up to two or three miles away. What I saw made my heart sink.


    Colossally enhanced megalodons, prehistoric sharks that ate whales, were slowly swimming right off the coast with hordes of twisted deepwater freaks of nature clinging to their backs, as if the sharks were troop transports. Black armored crocodiles with gnarly serrated scales half the size of the megalodons crashed onto the beach and halted, roaring over and over in a show of intimidation. Other things crawled out as well, octopus people wielding twisting snakes that fired acid, mutant crabs bigger than tanks with claws that shone a hideous green inner light, and even what looked to be a spiny lionfish big enough to swallow an elephant climbed on shore. It wasn¡¯t just a small group, a veritable army had shown up on the beach and was getting bigger every minute.


    [Uh, fuck that.] Returning to myself, I ordered Kraken to keep a lookout as I hauled ass back to my brother.


    [What¡¯s the plan then? I don¡¯t imagine you¡¯re gonna leave the others to die.]


    [They¡¯ll be fine for a few minutes. I should be back in plenty of time] I said, reinforcing my body with magic as I hauled my oversized younger brother off his bed and onto my back. [He¡¯s the only one I¡¯m worried about right now.]


    Plodding heavily, I made it outside to where the threshold of the pyramid shaped building ended and Mother Earth began. Closing my eyes, I and my human backpack sank into the earth and so very carefully traveled to the underground root base of the Centauri portal. Weaving another mind working on my brother so that nothing short of a nuke would wake him, I touched Yggdrasil¡¯s root and cast my mind into it, establishing a connection to what I mentally call Home Base and traveling home.


    Arriving at my clearing in Fredericksburg, I lay my brother on his back and propped him up against one of the trees. Conjuring two stone boxes, each with a lid, I put several Centauri meal cubes and two Taco Bell burritos inside one and inscribed ¡®food¡¯ on the lid, and then conjured water in the other and inscribed ¡®water¡¯ on that one. Placing the boxes at his feet, I then conjured a stone pillar and etched a quick message on it so that it would be the first thing Andy saw when he woke up.


    You¡¯re alive, you¡¯re cured, and yes, that¡¯s Taco Bell in the damn box.


    Feel better and don¡¯t be afraid, this is my home and these are my people.


    The tree lady is either Meliad or Lyra and the big rock dude is Everest.


    I¡¯ll be back hopefully in a day or two.


    Sincerely,


    Your much better looking brother


    P.S. Yes you can have any fruit in the smoothie forest to the east


    With my mind put at ease, I traveled via World Tree to Sunstone Castle and took quick stock of the area. Unfortunately, Spot was nowhere in sight. Remembering that Spot the last time I saw him was in the act of making little Spots, I groaned as I realized that I wasn¡¯t going to have my big gun for this fight. ¡°Test run time it is then.¡±


    Linking my mind to Kraken, I had him send out the activation code I had keyed in to my four elementals that were the captains for my sunstone golem army. It was a beautiful sight as I stood at the top of my castle, looking down at the two hundred strong army of fully charged golems wielding maces and bladed arms. In unison, my soldiers started marching towards my baobab Yggdrasil. As they arrived at the Tree, they put their hands on it one by one and walked into the tree, traveling down the connection I established to the one in Miami. Kraken made sure that my orders were clear, once arriving fifty feet underground in Miami, which wasn¡¯t a problem due to being earth-based golems, travel to the beach outside of the city and kill anything that wasn¡¯t vaguely human.


    Eight minutes of single minded channeling was so boring that I assigned a mental background process to it. Thirty seconds to establish the connection between the tree and stabilize it, each of the two hundred golems then took about two seconds each to touch and step into the tree, and then finally, I went through myself and closed the connection.


    Arriving at the beach was an awe-inspiring sight of absolute bedlam. I almost wiped a tear from my eye as one sunstone golem smashed a crabman from hell while bisecting another with a laser from its other arm. Fighting side by side under the command of their Elemental captains, the unorganized chaos deepsea army came under fire from the march of organized death that was my beautifully crafted elementals. The divisions of my army acted in perfect tandem, splitting into squads of ten to form a frontline dedicated to holding the press of twisted flesh while the backline functioned as laser artillery. And as the inner reserves of power ran dry, the squads switched roles as the other divisions filled in the gaps.


    [Do you even need my help?] I asked Kraken, as I climbed up a tall dune for a better look. My familiar gave me a grunt that I took as a no. Using my magic as a scaffold, Kraken connected with one of the Elemental captains, giving orders for him to connect his division of golems to the city wall of New Miami. Within two minutes, the rearmost group of golems had connected themselves to the wall and begun broadcasting power to the other hundred and fifty golems, using their sunstone bodies as antennas.


    [Watch this!] Kraken said proudly, sending off a quick list of orders to the captains. As one, the forefront line of golems lashed out, creating space for themselves as they beat a quick retreat, running behind the middle of my army. The hundred in the middle were all lined up, and as soon as the front fifty were clear, the air blazed with heat from the laser barrage. Absolute carnage exploded the length of the beach as concentrated magic lasers moved from target to target, making sure that nothing aquatic escaped alive. Watching the connection, I could barely make out the string of commands that Kraken was giving out at the speed of thought, conducting this battle like a symphony, each order leading to absolute decimation of the enemy.


    Seeing this from the outside was humbling. Kraken¡¯s perfect orchestration of the sunstone golem army was so precise that even the Centauri warriors that were out on the beach emerged unscathed from the barrage of lasers as the Aqualan fodder fell into lumps of seared meat around them. As the main body of their army was cut down in the sand turning it blue with their blood, the larger monstrosities started returning to the depths as the diamonds atop the Centauri pyramid formations began to emit a hazy light.


    There was no sound, only a series of bright flashes. Beams of light thick enough to swallow a truck lanced out, each either detonating when touching a monster on the surface of the water or creating an explosion of steam when they missed. The salvo lasted for thirty seconds before the last of the invaders vanished under the Atlantic.


    ¡°They¡¯ll be back.¡± Reeanth said, coming up behind me. ¡°I assume your army-¡± I nodded and she continued. ¡°Your army surprised them. The city¡¯s defense forces have been systematically shaven down. This is the first time they¡¯ve had to use the cannons.¡±


    ¡°Well, that army right there is for the undead, but this was a pretty damn good test run.¡±


    ¡°THAT, WAS, AWESOME!¡± Johnny¡¯s tackle came out of nowhere, plowing me and Reeanth into the sand. ¡°Did you fuckin¡¯ see?! Aw I wanna fight one! Can I?¡±


    Shoving him and banishing the sand that had gotten into the cracks of my armor, I used earth sorcery to blast a barrel full of sand at Johnny knocking him into the dune next to us. I knew that was a love tap to him. Turning around, I watched my currently busy golem army which split in two, one half of it cleaning the beach while the other half was recharging at the city wall. As I watched, I could see visible cracks in their armor seal up and the inner light in their chests started to grow brighter.


    ¡°Go fight with Judy, I bet her soldiers would give you a good run for your money,¡± I said, mesmerized by the amazing sight of my creations. Speaking to Reeanth without turning, I informed her about Andy¡¯s whereabouts and my next plan. Mentally taking a note or two, I put in a reminder to have my Sunstone Castle upgraded with an auto-generate feature for the golem army, so whenever I go off to war, I can have the castle get busy on making and charging new golems if I need it to.


    As my sworn follower broke into a light jog back towards the city while Johnny rough-housed with Judy¡¯s revenants, I closed my eyes and pushed the base of Gungnir into the sand, feeling about for ley lines. The wall of the city shown like a gigantic bonfire behind, its presence palpable in size and intensity even from where I stood. The portal at the center of the city did sit on a ley line, but from what I could tell, it was the genesis point for that river of power, probably from the root of Yggdrasil. That channel of mana spread in a westward direction, as the energy here near the ocean was at the same time more diffuse and yet quantitatively more than what was available up here on shore.


    [Ocean ley lines function differently,] Kraken clarified for me. [Yes, thinking of them as similar to rivers is accurate for up on land, but under the ocean it¡¯s more like pools of power instead of rivers. The Mariana Trench would be one, certain ritualistically important spots such as underwater mountain ranges or buried cities would also probably qualify. Mana is more abundant in the ocean but it¡¯s more spread out. It¡¯s why creatures can be so much bigger there as well, it¡¯s a function of gravity seeming to have less of an effect underwater due to surface tension but also there¡¯s simply more mana.]


    ¡°So what now?¡± I grumbled.


    Turns out, my golem army was good for a number of things, one of which was using them to brazenly secure the building with the highest density of mana I could sense other than the city walls themselves. With overwhelming force comes overwhelming authority. My golem army had broken itself down into various squads and secured chokepoints inside of the building that was disguised to look exactly like all the other buildings. Kraken had ordered that no blood be shed and those orders were taken literally, my brother¡¯s political visitors were all being held in a less than dignified position.


    The witch Sybella was being held down by one golem and the other had its bladed arms on either side of her neck with a laser fully powered up and ready to go. Rolf and his crew were being sat on as five golems were aiming lasers at their faces. I strode in like I owned the place, which for the moment, I did.


    ¡°Thank you all for attending my brief showing for the day,¡± I said as I bowed, smirking at each of my temporary prisoners. ¡°If all goes well, I shall leave your lovely city safer than I found it, and hopefully with no one foolishly losing their lives.¡± Planting Gungnir into the floor, I willed the crystal top to turn into a wicked three-bladed spiral spear. Keeping it pointed up, I communed with Kraken.


    [We¡¯re looking for info here, anything we can find. I don¡¯t know what a futuristic Centauri database or server would look like, shit, I don¡¯t even know what their computers look like. Do you?]


    Lightly scoffing at my lack of forethought, Kraken pointed out, [We may not but I¡¯m sure they do.]


    Walking over to Rolf, I squatted down and asked, ¡°My apologies sir, I do believe I am mistakenly wanted for murder so I¡¯ll make this quick.¡± His eyes squinted. ¡°No, I¡¯m not going to kill you. I just want to know where the information of this city is held, and I¡¯d rather someone just tell me.¡±


    Sybella opened her mouth and spat, ¡°Release me at once swi-¡±. The rest of her tirade was cut by me conjuring dirt and shoving it in her mouth.


    ¡°Ah, sweet blessed silence.¡±


    [Coming off a bit too strong here man, maybe tone down the megalomania?]


    Chuckling internally, I turned back to Rolf. ¡°Seriously,¡± I said, letting my genuine sincerity show through. ¡°I¡¯m a native that doesn¡¯t know shit about shit but definitely has way too much goddamn power, not that I¡¯m complaining. I need knowledge and I know there¡¯s a bunch of it in this city. I want that and only that, I swear it.¡± Making sure that his eyes didn¡¯t waver from mine, I spoke softly. ¡°Andy is my brother, and I¡¯ve got a hunch y¡¯all were friends.¡±


    Appearing to think it over for a minute, Rolf grunted, ¡°In the room behind us, big piece of Aetherium shaped like an obelisk, can¡¯t miss it.¡±

 Chapter 140 - Family Quarrel (Book 3 Chapter 7)

    Dumbass me didn¡¯t even think to ask what ¡®Aetherium¡¯ was, just kind of assumed I¡¯d know it when I or Kraken would tell me like usual. Just for shits and giggles, I did a very surface level mindscan of both Rolf and Sybella to help myself out and what I found was interesting. Metaphorically, beneath her surface thoughts, Sybella¡¯s mind was protected behind a wall composed of a thousand screaming faces, each horribly spewing different concepts and lifetimes in a mind-bending wail. A gloomy steel tower sat behind the wall, wicked spikes coming out of the sides at random. The spikes that twisted to point up had platforms on top of it, each with their own differently colored orb of light floating.


    Rolf¡¯s mind was much simpler but all the more intimidating because of it. It was a giant half dome of blue ice with an uncountable number of thin blades coming out of it. That was it, no details, no scary voices, just ice cold strength. His surface thoughts though had a clear picture of what we were talking about, the Aetherium obelisk. I was looking for a small version of the Washington Monument with stripes of different colors going up and down its length.


    ¡°Thank you,¡± I said, turning and following the directions I¡¯d been given. The door to the room opened as I approached and a quick wisp of fog escaped. The room was cold and mostly dark, the only light available was a soft red light that came from where the floor met the wall. It lit up the room enough for me to see not one, but five different obelisks in front of me set up in a pentagram with one at each of the formation¡¯s points.


    [A Communion Communicator!] Kraken gasped. [Don¡¯t touch it! You don¡¯t know who or what is on the other side!]


    [English dude! Please!]


    [It¡¯s a telephone of death! What the hell are you jonesin¡¯ after anyway?] Kraken asked, pushing us both away slowly from the inside of Gungnir, my weapon pulling me as if it didn¡¯t want to be anywhere near here.


    [Andy is a wizard, not a sorcerer. I need information on them and how they learn, what they need to do to go from wimpy Harry Potter to badass Dumbledore. If I could find a book or document or set of memories conveniently titled, ¡®How to Train Your Wizard¡¯, that would be freaking great.] Taking a deep breath, I steadied myself, gripping Gungnir harder and pointing it at the formation as I took a slow step closer. [I was thinking about taking or copying the witch¡¯s memories since they supposedly have generations worth of them stored away, but that mind fortress of hers looked like an insane asylum on crack.]


    [Ok, ok, I get it. Just wait for a second, you do not know what you¡¯re doing. The crystals do have that information, probably, because there are a bunch of Centauri here and they do need their spell structure downloads, but that¡¯s one TINY piece of info that could be here. In order to do this safely, you need to separate the obelisks from their formation without actually touching them.]


    ¡°That¡¯s it?¡± Reaching down with my senses, I could feel that the dirt below us was only about five feet away. Flipping Gungnir point down, I willed the three-bladed spear into a classic speartip design but a much thinner version of it. Drawing on my power, I stabbed the floor five inches away from the obelisk and Gungnir effortlessly cut through the floor. Working my way around the first obelisk, I copied my efforts and soon had all five from the formation. Conjuring some dirt while also pulling it up from the sandy Miami earth just beneath the floor, I easily moved the Aetherium obelisks away from each other until they were leaning up against the walls.


    [Sometimes it takes a monkey,] Kraken muttered as he extended a tendril of mana to the first one. Working together, our goal didn¡¯t take long to reach as a bit of luck came into play. The first obelisk we worked on actually had all of the information we needed to get my brother spun up on being a proper Wizard, not just a half-assed combat one. [Hold up, don¡¯t disconnect yet, you¡¯re gonna want this!]


    Borrowing my brain power, Kraken crafted a couple mental processes dedicated to searching and parsing different data streams. Five minutes of me sweating from the strain later, we had two of them searched for any kind of useful information. [Centauri SITREP, updated global map, vulnerability classification of the sector, classified spelltech-]


    [THAT ONE!] I yelled, mentally homing in several keywords. [Spelltech! Grab the SITREP and map too!]


    The information slammed into my brain in a three-way punch, two light ones and one heavy Mike Tyson shot. Kraken quickly numbed the pain and wrapped up the information packets, storing it in my brain where it would unravel or distract me for the time being. ¡°We¡¯ll parse through it later,¡± I said aloud, shaking my head and walking back to the main room.


    I ended up being impressed and yet scared as hell when I arrived back in the main room. My butthole puckered something fierce at the sight of big man Rolf in his armor sitting on my shattered golems like a chair. Lucky for me, he hadn¡¯t touched the ones keeping Sybella down but he had taken the time to not only wreck my golems but set up the chunks into an amorphized chair complete with armrests and a cup holder.


    ¡°Guess this means you could¡¯ve gotten out at any time and you were just gathering intel huh?¡±


    ¡°Got it in one boyo!¡± Laughing at my quickly fading shock, Rolf pulled a wide flask from his pocket on his thigh and downed a swigg. ¡°Mighty fine work you done with these here rock fellows but their shatterpoints are too large to miss.¡± Nodding in Sybella¡¯s direction, he continued. ¡°I¡¯d also make nice with her if ya can, she an¡¯ her clan treat humiliation worse than murder.¡±


    Weighing the pros and cons in my mind, I pulled a brick shaped crystal mana battery out of Gungnir and held it out as I squatted in front of her. Her eyes went from laser focused hatred to wonder.


    ¡°I take it you know what this is?¡± She barely nodded as my golems¡¯ blades were still kissing her throat. ¡°Good, you take this and it¡¯s all forgiven? I¡¯ll even make it any shape you want.¡± Another series of very tiny nods.


    Kraken ordered the golems off of her as I conjured a cup made out of ice and filled it with conjured water. Handing it to her as she stood up, she swigged the water and spat, cleaning her mouth out from the dirt I stuck in there. Her hand shot out and I placed the battery on her palm, not letting go. As she gripped it and pulled, I pulled her in close until our noses were touching.


    ¡°Tell no one,¡± I growled ominously. ¡°Show no one, keep it to yourself. I don¡¯t want to make my to-do list any longer than it already is. Got it?¡± A quick, scared nod was all I got, but it was all I needed. I¡¯m glad that her sense of self-preservation and innate greed overrode the current of humiliation long enough for her to think rationally about this. Letting go of the battery, I took a step back and then looked over the mess of shattered golems. Only two of them were still intact from the squad of ten that I led into the building, which means Rolf had taken out the other eight. One fuckin¡¯ scary dude. Making sure that I stayed on his good side, I pulled out another battery and tossed it to him.


    ¡°Same conditions, but I mean it in a nicer way,¡± I said. ¡°My brother might be a bit of a jackass but he tends to make good friends, so I¡¯ll trust him.¡±


    Pulling a block of metal from somewhere, I watch Rolf stand up and magically mold it into a chain link necklace. ¡°Can ya make it smaller, about yea¡¯ big, and round?¡±


    Obliging the much larger, much scarier man, I took the battery back and compressed it slowly, taking great care to remove and re-add the proper runes as I molded it to fit his needs. Handing the crystal disk Rolf, it practically vanished in his much bear sized hand. Fumbling with his necklace, he attached the disk to the ringlet at the bottom and molded the metal to wrap around, covering up every bit of the battery.


    ¡°Perfect!¡± His smile was so wide he could have fit a damn pizza in there. ¡°How does it work?¡±


    Chuckling at his sudden shift in demeanour, I pointed at his necklace. ¡°Two ways, that right there will gather ambient mana and some from you when you¡¯re not using it as well as what you make but don¡¯t use. The other way is you could directly put mana in there through meditation or any kind of mana extraction device. When it''s full, should be enough power in there to split a mountain, be careful.¡±


    ¡°Wait!¡± Turning towards Sybella, she held the mana battery out towards me. ¡°I accept this token as a cessation of any and all hostilities between us, both real and imagined. I agree to the given terms and request per the strictures of said covenant to have this molded in accordance with my desires.¡± A ball of light appeared between us as she closed her eyes and concentrated. A moment later, the light morphed into a pristine 3D model of a large medallion that slowly spun to show both sides. A ritualistic pentagram within a circle adorned with elemental symbols covered one side and the other was an artistic take on Duality. The Yin and Yang Duality carving was edged with a blending of nature giving life and passing into death.


    Taking the battery, I molded it to be just like what Sybella desired, taking care to get the exact details right. Turning it over in my hands to examine my work, I instinctively recognized the worth of this amulet as my own magic seemed to echo with it, a harmony that I didn¡¯t know existed. Looking it over again, I burned the memory of this amulet in my mind before handing it back to her. Seeing the expression of sheer anticipation on her face, I reexamined the circumstances for a second, holding back the battery just before her hand actually touched it. If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    ¡°I dunno,¡± I mused aloud. Anticipation, wonder, anger, and confusion warred for dominance in her eyes as I held back. ¡°Seems like this little doohickey outweighs the little incident we had earlier. I mean, you didn¡¯t get hurt and nobody saw you in your particular state, and this is a gamechanger for you if I¡¯m reading the room correctly.¡±


    ¡°What do you want?¡± she snapped.


    ¡®Well, for one. I still require that we leave on good terms, but I want some insurance too.¡± Sending her a mental packet of information, I watched on the magical side of things as her mental fortress forced the packet to stop outside its walls as her thought-constructs carefully unwrapped it. Scanning it over and over, the message was taken inside as she fully processed not just the words of the message, but also the feelings and sensations mixed within.


    ¡°This is acceptable and the terms are very generous, for the both of us. A month will be required to prepare.¡±


    ¡°Not a problem,¡± I replied, giving over her amulet. She clutched it to her chest as if it were her own newborn, absently tracing the grooves with her finger. ¡°I¡¯ll be back here in thirty days.¡±


    Taking a second to banish the remains of my broken golems, I turned on a heel and walked out with the two earthen survivors and joined the rest of the army, silence greeting me even as I saw the crowd of hundreds of people staring at me and my posse. My golems were armed to the teeth, facing outward and forming a wall of crystal bodies around the building. As far as I could tell there hadn¡¯t been any bloodshed but that could change at any moment. Heeding good sense, I sank into the earth and beat feet to the Yggdrasil root while Kraken made sure that the golems followed. Establishing a connection to Sunstone Castle, I maintained the Way so my army could go back to the desert. Once they were all gone, I headed home.


    My next week didn¡¯t go the way I planned it. Andy didn¡¯t wake up for a couple days, so there was the whole process of making him his own room in the Hole and then I also had to go back and retrieve Reeanth, Johnny, and Fuzzy from Miami, and then take them to Sunstone Castle and give them the tour, and then after that, return with all of them AND Spot in tow. Andy finally woke up from his sorcery induced slumber in the middle of the night five freaking days later! I had gotten so bored that I had actually started making headway on all of the information I snagged from New Miami; I figured that I might as well get something out of it too instead of just Andy. The traveling, while quick, was oddly more taxing on my mind than actually taking the time to fly around to where I needed to.


    **********


    My brother woke up in a fit one night, swinging like he had bugs crawling all over him while getting attacked by a burglar. One smack of sneaky mind magic later and I had him out till at least the morning when normal people greet the day. The table in the main room of my home had a nice hot pot of coffee sitting in the middle, a ring of clean stone mugs around it. Andy angrily walked in from his new room and sat down, slamming the chair as he adjusted it so that he was directly across from me.


    ¡°That¡¯s freaky and don¡¯t do it again.¡± His glare was unsettling but I couldn¡¯t help myself. The sense of innate hostility was gone though which was reassuring. This looked like normal disorientation and morning grumpiness which I could handle. Laughing out loud, I poured some coffee for the both of us and slid his mug over to him.


    ¡°Sorry man,¡± I laughed. ¡°I didn¡¯t want my ugly mug to be the first thing you saw in the morning.¡±


    Lyra walked out coquettishly from his room, grinning like a fat cat with a mouse in its paws even as my brother just kept right on cursing me out even as he grudgingly gripped his coffee mug. ¡°But dearest, you didn¡¯t like me taking care of you? I assure you, I was quite gentle.¡±


    Andy glared at Lyra over his mug, refocusing his grumpiness on her. ¡°My asshole of a brother might not have a problem screwing a plant but I know what y¡¯all can do. We ain¡¯t doin¡¯ that ever.¡±


    Laughing at my brother¡¯s discomfort, Lyra walked out of the Hole. I had asked her to wake him up and maybe give him a bit of a scare but definitely no funny business. It was clear that she deliberately misinterpreted the word ¡®surprise¡¯, but having my little brother chase dryads was not what I had planned for him. As Andy glared at me again, reluctantly sipping his coffee, I figured that I might as well come clean. Copying his posture, I hunched over my coffee and sipped it, making sure that he knew I was mocking him. ¡°So, you want the whole story or just the cliffnotes, dude?¡±


    A grunt was all I got. Luckily, I had prepared for this as well as sheer stubbornness runs in the family. Next to all the mugs was a little quartz cube with the top side covered in granite and the bottom in iron. Pushing it closer to Andy, I took another sip of coffee. ¡°That¡¯s a copy of all of my memories since the world went to hell. Touch the granite side to your forehead and you¡¯ll get it all as if you were in a narrated movie. The iron side will do the same but all of the emotions and thoughts will be filtered out. Your choice but I gotta say, you¡¯re still my brother.¡±


    His eyes narrowed as I pulled out another memory crystal but didn¡¯t push it over to him. ¡°This right here is the carrot. I know you still don¡¯t like me but you have to at least review the memories I¡¯ve given you in that one,¡± I said, pointing at the quartz cube near his mug. ¡°But this one, this holds everything I know about magic in it. All of the information I¡¯ve personally discovered on my own, everything a freaking fire dragon hoarded in his brain as well as what I¡¯ve pulled from what I could get from the Centauri. This right here, it even has the Centauri schematics for runic tattoos that your higher-ups use. And . . . you get this AFTER you look through that.¡±


    I watched as his eyes followed me putting away the latter crystal, the entire thing vanishing as it was deposited in the storage space inside of Gungnir. Still nothing from his side of the table. Realizing that he probably needed a bit more, I continued. ¡°All right fuckstick, I should also probably tell you a couple more things. Let¡¯s see here,¡± I said, finishing off my coffee. ¡°I saved New Miami from a horde of freaky crab things and their cousins, cleaned out the self-destruct software in your brain and put an assistant in there to help you with magic and . . .¡±


    Reaching under the table, I grabbed what I was looking for and set it between my recalcitrant brother. ¡°And last but not least, TA-DAA!¡± Poking it with a finger, the dark grey orb rolled towards my brother. ¡°You get your very own mini-flesh golem! This little guy can help you do way more than you think, like healing wounds, replacing organs, painlessly putting on or removing tattoos. Shoot, you can even use it to heal other people in a pinch. Just feed him some meat when he gets small and he¡¯ll be good to go.¡±


    In the blink of an eye, Andy snatched the grapefruit sized flesh golem and hurled him at my face. As it bounced off my forehead, he grabbed the stone table and heaved upwards, causing it to tilt and slam into me, pining me to the floor under its weight. It would have crushed my legs if not for my armor and the stupid amount of mana pumping through it. Grabbing Gungnir from where it had fallen next to me as I lay there in a bit of shock, Andy pointed my own weapon at my face. As he channeled mana into Gungnir, I started laughing.


    ¡°You think my own weapon is going to let you blast mana at me? It¡¯s just eating it right now!¡±


    His face screwing up in anger, he stabbed the butt end of it at my face, figuring that since magic damage wouldn¡¯t be forthcoming maybe blunt damage would get the job done. Right as his swing reached max velocity, Gungnir blasted Andy with a low level surge of power blasting him backwards. Using earth sorcery, I molded the stone table to flow around me as I stood up, taking my time to fix it back to where it was.


    ¡°Any other stupid things you wanna try? Maybe punch your fully armored brother in the face? Wanna go fight my elementals barehanded? Or maybe whip your dick out and fuck the granite wall in an insane attempt to dig your way out?¡±


    With a wave of my hand, Gungnir returned to me in staff-form, power crackling down its length. As I walked closer to my brother, the snaps and pops of raw mana grew in intensity, almost giving me a supervillain vibe. Standing over his prone form, I nudged my brother in the shoulder. Opening his eyes, Andy rolled over and pivoted, kicking out like a breakdancer to try and take my legs out from under me. SAW engaged the stability protocols, stabbing the leyline wands down into the stone floor even as the stone itself grew up around my legs to take the blow.


    It was pointless, this entire fight. But it was kind of necessary. We actually had been through this before, the whole brother fight brother thing. Before all of this madness and time dilation crap, I had seven years and fifty pounds on my brother. Our fights consisted of him trying to fight me and me holding him down, waiting for the inevitable gasp of exhaustion as he wound himself down. Think of a college aged man holding the kid by the forehead as the kid futilely swings for the moon, hitting nothing. That¡¯s what¡¯s going on, that last gasp of a temper tantrum, that anger just before the wind is completely taken out of his sails. My brother wanted to fight, needed to fight, and my job was to let him wear himself out.


    Ten minutes of shattered stone furniture, livid screaming and yelling, and some magnificent name calling, my brother sat against the wall of my home in absolute exhaustion. Here, in my home, my place of power, I was basically a magical tank. Without his gear, there just wasn¡¯t much that he was able to do other than chuck any loose item, which thanks to his ungodly strength was pretty much anything. The stone table was in much smaller, much more manageable sized chunks and my dishes were also completely destroyed.


    [This is not the sign of a sane individual.] Kraken¡¯s observation was not wrong, but it also wasn¡¯t exactly correct either. And I get it, I kidnapped him, scrubbed his brain, pranked him with a dryad, and then promised explanations of times past and magical knowledge. I¡¯d probably be a bit bonkers after having my head unfucked but a big brother has to do what a big brother has to do.


    [True, but we humans also have our ways of fixing things. Guys can fight over something stupid and then be best friends right after. Brothers, well, we¡¯re just reestablishing who¡¯s the ¡®big brother¡¯ right now. He¡¯s been off on his own for a long time, thinking I was dead, and now that I¡¯m back, he ain¡¯t gonna listen until he¡¯s sure it¡¯s me.]


    [Humans are odd. How in the multiverse did any of you survive?]


    [Brains and balls my friend, brains and balls.]


    Whipping up a quick bit of magic, I used earth sorcery to fix the trashed area. The pieces of stone table and all of the stone dishes simply melted into the floor as another table with new dishes rose from the floor. The cracks in the walls had already repaired themselves as if nothing had ever happened and I sat in my chair.


    ¡°Done yet?¡± I called out. ¡°We can do it again if you want but I might fight back. You remember when we pissed off the copperhead that summer before I left for college? We kept shooting it with squirt guns to get rid of it but we were too dumb to realize that we were in the way? The whole thing was pointless because the snake just wanted to leave but couldn¡¯t because we were too young and dumb to realize that the only way out was behind us?¡±


    Andy looked at me, sweat dripping down his face as his chest heaved up and down. The anger in his eyes was replaced with exhaustion. ¡°Stupid snake almost bit you too,¡± I said, smiling at the memory. ¡°Had to drag you away when I realized we were the freaking problem, hahaha.¡±


    ¡°Right before our boxer Juno came in and ripped its head off,¡± Andy said with a faint smile. Filling up a stone cup with conjured water, I walked over and gave it to him as he held his hand out. ¡°Yeah, I remember. Dad was so pissed. All that blood on his toolbox and it stank up the garage.¡±


    Chuckling to myself, I allowed myself to relax just a bit, the tension flowing out of my shoulders as I sat down on the floor across from my brother whose presence seemed to shrink just a bit. ¡°It really is you.¡±


    ¡°Yeah man, it¡¯s really me.¡±

 Chapter 141 Disputed Paths (Book 3 Chapter 8)

    Five days later . . .


    Eventually, my younger brother is going to kick my ass. Painful as that realization was for me, it almost made me happy. My brother had become Johnny¡¯s new best friend the instant Johnny cracked a joke in my direction and Andy kicked him through a wall. From that moment on they were best friends. The broken and sometimes shattered trees bore testament to burgeoning friendship as they sparred, pitting esoteric martial arts skills against bitterly earned Centauri battlewizard arts.


    Andy had adapted fairly well to having a baby computer in his brain, especially since it did all the hard work of analyzing and predicting movements just as well as it was able to break down and compile spellforms. Every night so far for my brother had ended with a big meaty meal and three hours of communing with his own brain, expanding the A.I. and adding the stolen knowledge piece by piece to his compendium. We didn¡¯t really talk about the rest of the family, it simply motivated us to work even harder.


    [You should tell him.]


    I sighed even though I knew Kraken was right. I had probably overstepped my bounds on this one but damnit, it was for his own good.


    [Still should tell¡¯em.]


    In exchange for Sybella dropping the fact that I had completely and utterly humiliated her by restraining her without breaking a sweat, I had given her a personalized mana battery, but that wasn¡¯t the end of it. Our little mental conversation included a few more relevant pieces of information that would be life-changing, for more than just Andy. I wanted Andy to learn magic, real badass wizardry but I was not the teacher he needed. I am a sorcerer and our methods of magic are inherently incompatible when it comes to learning. Mine is based off of instinct and affinity while his is grounded in understanding and the learned application thereof.


    My bargain was for a bastardized version of a foreign exchange program. Sybella had agreed to take Andy in and teach him everything she and her clan could and then pay for him to go to the oldest magical center of learning. In exchange, she would send me one of her best students, someone that wanted a fresh start. It was weird though, when Sybella and I talked, I could feel her emotions during our conversation. She still thought that she was getting the better end of the deal, that the mana battery was still worth more than my brother¡¯s arcane education and the loss of a student.


    [Duh, you just gave her exactly what she needed to become the head of her clan, her coven. That bitch could fight off a dragon with one hand tied behind her back with that.]


    Ignoring the running commentary, I kept pondering what I had done, working the issue over to better understand the pros and cons. To me, it made so much sense to do this. It¡¯s not like I¡¯ll be sending Andy off into the unknown completely unprepared. By the time Sybella¡¯s protege would be ready, Andy would be too. His A.I. would have a complete and organized log of all of the compiled magical knowledge that I could provide, which was a fuckton considering all of the shit I¡¯d stolen from a dragon¡¯s brain, a minotaur shaman, a couple dwarves, and the Centauri themselves. Not to mention, I was planning on completely pimping out his gear between now and the day he was headed out, and his A.I. combined with his mini flesh golem would be able to make some epic runic tattoos anytime he wanted. Damn, I¡¯m an awesome big brother, well, if you ignore the fact that I¡¯m still making his decisions for him. Meh, it can wait.


    Still ignoring Kraken at this point, I got busy making anything and everything I could think of for Andy and his eventual departure. I had him training with no gear under the guise of ¡®intense training¡¯ sessions so I could take apart his stuff and put it back together without questions. The first thing I worked on was his gun and after an hour of frustrating banging my head against the wall, I scrapped it and just made him one like mine, complete with ammo conjuration and a revolving barrel to fire energized particles, shotgun electro taser bolts, a kinetic blast, and even long range crystal magitech rounds.


    The Centauri tower shield was reworked to have a blackened outer layer of platinum mixed with iridium to shrug off pretty much any kind of direct magical attack but the iridium was there to help divert what couldn¡¯t be absorbed. The back side of the shield was outfitted with overflow mana batteries covered with the platinum/iridium mix as well.


    The suit of armor I crafted was actually made from scratch. Since Andy¡¯s Centauri genetic enhancements gave him ridiculous strength, I went the rugged platemail approach. The idea was to have his usual nanite armor underneath but the plated armor would make him a walking tank. Each piece of armor was made up of layers, the outer being the platinum/iridium mix that I was so fond of with a thin layer of runed quartz forming the bridge to the inner layer of steel. The middle layer would divert the magical or kinetic energy that the upper layer wouldn¡¯t immediately shed and the steel layer was completely devoted to diverting what the other two layers couldn¡¯t. All in all, I basically crafted a suit of armor that I would not stand a chance against.


    The helmet had the same layers as the rest of it but with one addition. A small diamond circlet was set in the layer of steel complete with runes to enhance brain power as well as provide an extra layer of protection against mental attacks or unwanted intrusions. If I did it right, it would also function as an antenna or extra processing power for Andy¡¯s A.I. if necessary.


    With the defense and offense taken care of, the only thing left was utility. I crafted two slender wands for him out of my own weapon Gungnir. Kraken required me to channel absolutely stupid amounts of mana into my staff to allow the perfect wands to grow out of it, which meant I had to take a trip to Sunstone Castle to get the required power. The explanation from my familiar was a bit lacking, something about, ¡®Artifacts don¡¯t grow on trees, and they sure as shit don¡¯t grow more! Does it look like a plant to you?¡¯. Not caring for the rest of his argument which I studiously ignored, I did as he asked and channeled weeks worth of power gathered from the desert sun into Gungnir, coaxing two fledgling wands to pop out complete with star iron tips.


    It almost felt like giving a child away when I put the wands down on my table in the Lab. Andy¡¯s new set of plate armor, his reworked shield, and his brand spankin¡¯ new rifle were laid out and the wands were placed gently next to everything. I had even managed to work in a slot in his armor for the little flesh golem to sit comfortably. Several of my most dense and efficient mana batteries were here as well, fully charged and slotted into the armor in and around the chest and thighs.


    [Not that this isn¡¯t interesting, but it does seem like you¡¯re avoiding him. Shit, you¡¯ve been avoiding me!]


    [Is it me, Kraken? Or do you sound more and more like a human every time you talk?]


    My question sparked a feeling of smugness mixed with a hint of shame that crept down our link from Kraken to me. [Being bonded to a human is odd. Your nature is so malleable and short-lived that we spirits cannot help but be changed. All we are is thought and power and soul but we have no agency. You are the will, the very spark that allows us to exist corporeally. This is what the Scions of Order desire, knowledge in all its forms, which includes what you humans call ¡®emotions¡¯ or ¡®feelings¡¯.]


    [I liked it better when you were silent,] I grumbled, putting the last but most important item next to the ensemble. I had created, with Kraken¡¯s help, a memory crystal with several ¡®builds¡¯ for my brother. Each one was a schematic for a different pattern of runes, one for everyday preparedness and several more for any kind of situation like long term wilderness survival or stealthy missions. My favorite was what I called the ¡®Dense Defense¡¯, and yes, you kinda have to be dense to come up with it. It¡¯s the last ditch defense to channel a mammoth amount of power from anywhere and everywhere to summon a crystal exoskeleton capable of withstanding pretty much anything I can think of, and because of my abilities, making volcanoes is not outside of the realm of possibility. The beauty of the dense druid is that it places the body in an enhanced stasis that still allows your brain to work and the exoskeleton will last for as long as some kind of power can be drawn from to make it, which does include ambient mana from a hypothetical blast of raw power.


    Taking a quick page out of my own book, I quickly reworked my own runic tattoos to include all of these schematics but I left key connecting channels disconnected so they wouldn¡¯t accidentally activate.


    Off to the left, I had an oversized chest comprised of multiple layers which I had dubbed my ¡®Forbidden Artifacts¡¯ chest. It was more an exercise of curiosity and experimentation that I realized maybe would not be so good in the wrong hands. The most dangerous experiment was the Dagger of Rending. The point of that experiment was to test and see if I could put ¡®seeds¡¯ of my own sorcery into tools and make them epic, and the problem was that I actually succeeded beyond my wildest dreams but revealed a key weakness. Doing so, creating a ¡®seed¡¯ of sorcery from my own soul, weakened my own abilities, but not in a cataclysmic kind of way. In making a seed, it was like plucking a fruit, creating the potential for someone or something else to grow in power but it did make me less. The other side of that potentially dangerous avenue to power is that due to the unique nature of my soul tree, my power could actually ¡®grow¡¯ back to where it was.The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    But back to the Dagger. This little experiment was a small dagger made of conjured diamond that I shaped to fit snug inside of a handle of cold iron. The core of the dagger though was a braided wire thread made up of three parts: gold, silver, Yggdrasil wood. The braided tip of the wire came up to the dagger¡¯s tip and protruded just enough so that it would be the first part to make contact if the user made a stabbing motion. When I implanted the ¡®seed¡¯ of sorcery, I acted on some unknown instinct and chose flesh sorcery. Even Kraken couldn¡¯t guess what it did until I cut the tip of my finger with it and the dagger began ravenously devouring my blood and life force, channeling it down the core of the blade and into the handle where it poured right back into me. That little fucker was basically a handy arrow for any Achilles comin¡¯ my way.


    And because I¡¯m a sucker for punishment, I had to try other crazy shit with my sorceries. The ¡®Granite Gauntlets¡¯ had a seed of earth sorcery that I split in two, and if the gloves grabbed anything at the same time, that object became covered in stone. The worst part was that if I held onto that object, it actually became stone as if Medusa herself was glaring at it.


    ¡®Poseidon¡¯s Trident¡¯ was my version of a joke that actually turned out to be incredibly effective. The trident itself was made from conjured bone and grown coral that my water elementals were more than happy to bring me. With the blades of the trident carved from steel from sunken ships and the bone/coral shaft covered in shaped mangrove wood, I stuck the seed of sorcery in it and massaged it so that its influence permeated the entire weapon. Reeanth played with it for a bit, dancing and walking across the Rappahannock as if it were dry land before I took it back to work on the other project.


    The last one I worked on was a bit on the scary side. I called it ¡®Yggdrasil¡¯s Wrath¡¯. It was a mace grown from the root of my offshoot of Yggdrasil and that was it, but with the seed of sorcery it became something more. This test happened about forty miles to the east where a nest of goblins had gotten a bit too comfortable for my taste. Remembering my own run in with the nasty bastards, I sent Johnny and Andy to test it out on them as I held back and observed. Honestly, it was kind of sickening. Every swing of the mace pulverized flesh as if a tree had literally fallen on them, and when the messed up body hit the ground, every bit of plant life ate it. It was as if Mother Nature herself was angry at the target. Weeds would grab at ankles, trees would suddenly swing their branches and roots would spear from below. It was so gory that I almost threw up, watching the monsters get ripped apart from every swing as every bit of flora became the predator for once.


    The results of my experiments were so outside of my expectations that I actually held off on making more with the rest of the sorceries that I hadn¡¯t used, my mana and consciousness. Anything made from those two would be a bit too powerful, in fact, I wouldn¡¯t even trust myself. Visions of me making a mind control helmet or a mana-antimatter bomb, or even some kind of mind melting mana transmitter. Storing those away for later, just in case the world did get a bit too dark, I popped outside to see my dysfunctional family.


    Reeanth was currently in the process of whooping my brother while Johnny was in the gravity training device I made for him a while ago. Fuzzy and Spot were conked out just past the edge of the clearing, both using each other as a pillow and somehow managing to sleep through the intermittent explosions.


    ¡°That was the weakest fireball I¡¯ve ever seen!¡± Reeanth screamed as she swatted aside a particularly weak golf ball sized flame. Her eyes blazed, firing a flash of mana at Andy as he dodged to the side, scooping up a rock and hurling at her head even before he reached the ground. I could see the problem here. Wizardry takes time to work, time to gather the required spell forms or components, time to concentrate and organize them together, time to channel the mana to alter reality, too much time to be effective for combat.


    Apparently, that didn¡¯t seem to apply to Reeanth who simply waved her hand as if lightly back-handing a fly. A fireball the size of a basketball appeared, blazing into existence and launching at my brother. Instinct made me react, honest. A compressed blast of water intercepted the fireball even before I realized that I was the one who shot it. The steam explosion tossed Andy to the side even as I stormed over to Reeanth, preparing to tear her a new one.


    Seeing the danger of big brother on the warpath, Andy screamed out. ¡°WAIT! WAIT!¡± Turning towards him and seeing him unharmed allowed the red tint to leave my eyes. ¡°We¡¯re warded against fire right now, it¡¯s safe! Sheesh.¡±


    My face turning red due to not grasping the obvious nature of the situation, I said a quick apology and stood there awkwardly. ¡°My lord?¡± Reeanth asked, looking at me with a question on her face.


    ¡°Yeah, yeah, I know. It¡¯s just that no one picks on my brother but me.¡±


    ¡°That was a long time ago,¡± Andy cut in. ¡°I¡¯m pretty much twice your size now and if you weren¡¯t so fancy with your magic I¡¯d kick your butt.¡± He was teasing, I could tell that from his smirk but something about the way he said told me that he meant at least part of it. He honestly thought he¡¯d kick my ass.


    ¡°You know what?¡± I said, slowly shucking my armor. ¡°Now¡¯s as good a time as any. I got some news that you may or may not like, but I need you to do it. If I win, you do it without a fuss, and if you don¡¯t, I¡¯ll find a way to get you out of it.¡±


    Andy froze in his tracks like a cat caught stalking a bird. ¡°What did you do?¡± he growled, every oversized muscle of his tensing as he spat the words.


    ¡°Well,¡± I said, nonchalantly continuing to take off my gear. ¡°You have the potential to be great, powerful even, probably more powerful than me given time. The problem is that you have no training, no education, and here, this place is not the most advantageous setting for you to learn what you need to know.¡±


    ¡°Get to the point.¡± Great. Even Reeanth was looking at me curiously now. I figured Kraken would have clued her in by now.


    ¡°I got you a full-ride scholarship to the Poly-Arcane Institute, and a crash course of Interstellar Culture with Sybella¡¯s clan before you go.¡± His knuckles clenched as if he were imagining that it was my throat between his fingers even as I finished putting all of my gear off to the side. ¡°You need an actual education and since I¡¯m rich as fuck by the standards of the multi-verse, then you¡¯re gonna get one. I¡¯ll be sending you off with a kit that any wizard, sorcerer, mage, or warlock would literally sacrifice their child for but I need you to do this, please.¡±


    The problem with little brothers is that they tend not to think about the long-term, the scope of what could be. We big brothers have to look out for them, not because they aren¡¯t intelligent, but because they simply tend to not look down the road when they¡¯re having fun. And I mean that literally; I remember yanking his happy ass out of the road when he was little. A freaking Ford F250 had almost flattened him when he was riding his bike not paying attention and thanks to me he wasn¡¯t a human pancake.


    ¡°Fine,¡± he snarled, kicking off and launching himself at me. With a small kick of my own, I tapped the earth, sending a column of stone to punch him in the gut. As he stumbled back, I kept talking.


    ¡°And to keep it fair, you can use any magic you want and I¡¯ll only be allowed to use one kind, any kind you specify too. No magical weapons and the usual tap out rules.¡±


    ¡°Ten bucks on the little bro!¡± Johnny yelled, sprinting over from his training, sweat dripping everywhere.


    ¡°Money doesn¡¯t exist here anymore dumbass!¡± Andy said, his eyes never leaving me.


    ¡°Lame,¡± Johnny complained, sitting down and chugging some water.


    ¡°And who exactly is the ¡®little bro¡¯?¡± my brother said. ¡°I may be younger but I¡¯m definitely ¡®bigger.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what he said!¡±


    Another flex of magic from me pushed the ground Johnny was sitting on away from us in a less than gentle manner. ¡°Fine, fine, I get it. Shut up Johnny.¡±


    Pointing a finger at me, Andy spoke. ¡°Healing magic. You can only use healing magic.¡±


    ¡°Too easy,¡± I laughed, making the ¡®come on¡¯ motion with my hand. ¡°I thought you at least wanted half a chance.¡± Taking my own interpretation of ¡®healing¡¯ magic, I sped up my reaction time to match Andy¡¯s and then got in a boxing stance, but instead of holding my fists up, I had the pointer and middle finger extended out slightly curved. Focusing a bit, I pushed my flesh sorcery to compact targeted ¡®healing¡¯ energy at the tips of my fingers.


    Andy strode forward and ripped the stone column I had hit him with from the ground and wielded it like a bat, swinging for the hills. Each swing missed with centimeters to spare even though he wielded it as if it were as light as a wiffleball bat. Swinging horizontally forced me to back up, giving him time to mutter, setting the last foot of the bat on fire. As I took another step back, Andy held the bat in one arm and conjured a fireball in his other hand only this time it was about the size of a tennis ball.


    ¡°Fuck,¡± I cursed. Either of those would hurt with the limitations I was currently working with which meant the only option was to stick to the dodgeball philosophy. Andy closed faster than I expected, using the fireball as a melee weapon instead of chucking it at me like I expected. Each swing of the fireball and burning bat left me with second degree burns which made me almost instinctively use conjured water to freaking put it out.


    Finally using his brain, Andy kicked the dirt up at my face which I blocked with an arm which also ended up momentarily blocking my vision. Tossing the fireball at my feet, the explosion knocked me up into the air where Andy met me, bringing the stone column down mercilessly with both hands.


    That split second before the bat hit me, I felt a hint of genuine fear. The split second after the bat hit me, I felt a tsunami of pain and then nothing. My flesh sorcery cut off the pain and instantly began stitching my organ and spine back to the way they were. Laying there on the ground, I saw Andy¡¯s face go from outright horror to outrage as he saw the condition I was in rapidly going away thanks to my healing capabilities. Bring the column up for another swing, I grabbed the earth, pushing off with my right hand while yanking on the grass with the other, moving me awkwardly out of the way.


    The stone column blew a crater in the clearing where my midsection used to be. Overpowering my arms again with ¡®healing¡¯, I army crawled faster than any army dude ever could as my body pulled itself back together. I could hear Reeanth¡¯s muffled shouts as she freaked out, which I was fine with as long as she didn¡¯t interfere.


    ¡°Finally!¡± I yelled as I felt the last of my nerves connect and my bones realign from their shattered fragments. ¡°Fuck you!¡± The anger was from the pain but the joy was from his face. Rolling on my back and springing at Andy as he was bringing the column back for the swing, I stabbed my fingers at his joints, each poke blasting ¡®healing¡¯ energy into the natural hinges of his body. His bones began to grow with each poke, slowing him down and eventually locking his body up so that he couldn¡¯t move. His kneecaps fused his tibia to his femur and his shoulder joint was essentially welded to his humerus.


    ¡°That¡¯s not healing!¡± he yelled as he keeled over, unable to catch himself.


    ¡°Technically it is,¡± I said, kneeling down in front of him, his overgrown bones creaking as his muscles strained against them. ¡°I ¡®healed¡¯ or ¡®encouraged¡¯ your bones to grow just a bit more, to, get a bit closer to their neighbors.¡±


    ¡°Friggin¡¯ cheater.¡±


    ¡°Hey, if you ain¡¯t cheatin-,¡± I said with a smirk.


    Andy finished with a defeated smile. ¡°Then you ain¡¯t competin¡¯.¡±


    Taking the time to numb him from the neck down, I quickly and carefully banished the extra bone mass so he would have normal range of movement. Scanning his body, I injected an overall shot of healing mana just to make sure that he didn¡¯t have any lasting injuries. Reaching out a hand, I helped him get his heavy ass off the ground.


    ¡°So,¡± Andy said. ¡°This college of yours, think maybe they got any weed?¡±

 Chapter 142 Quick Look Around (Book 3 Chapter 9)

    Suffice to say, by the end of the night, I had some quality initial product for my brother. With his memories and my nature sorcery, conjuring marijuana seeds was not a problem. The issue was growing the damn things. Apparently, weed seeds are tempermental little bastards, always trying to be ¡®male¡¯ instead of the preferred ¡®female¡¯ unless you get the temperature of the environment just right and make sure that they don¡¯t cross-pollinate incorrectly. My lack of familiarity wasn¡¯t doing me any favors but the attempts were wearing on my brother.


    It¡¯s not that I have anything against the Devil¡¯s lettuce, the good Lord¡¯s little smoke, but for me, alcohol was my drug of choice back in college. I was always rarin¡¯ to go, wanting¡¯ to play drunk indoor soccer or some body-boxing. For me, sitting down and veggin¡¯ out was not my favorite activity. My lazy brother on the other hand, was a connoisseur of the slower things in life. Concentrating on exactly what he wanted was frustrating as he kept going on about the different kinds and the different kinds of highs. Eventually, I gave up going off of his descriptions and refused to work on it until he provided me the memories of the different kinds of weed he had smoked. Thirty minutes later, I had several different piles of seeds for him, all laid out in different categories. It actually felt good to do something fun for a bit that didn¡¯t have the purpose of general violent mayhem for once.


    ¡°Please tell me you can grow¡¯em like the last ones?¡± Andy¡¯s eyes were bugging out of his skull as he carefully sifted through the piles. ¡°I¡¯m thinking brownies, cheesecake bars-¡±


    ¡°Now just hold on,¡± I said. ¡°Damn, I sound old. Think bigger bro. What if you like this stuff? What if other people like this stuff?¡±


    ¡°Uh uh?¡± Clearly, he didn¡¯t know where I was going with this.


    ¡°Dude, we¡¯re adding experimentation of your favorite pastime to your list of things to do before you go off to Arcane. Guess who else might like to smoke a bit? Who might pay some mighty big bucks in a currency we don¡¯t yet know about down the road?¡±


    Andy¡¯s hands froze for a second, then he gently put down the seeds into their respective piles. ¡°You want me to be an interstellar weed dealer?¡±


    ¡°No, no my friend,¡± I said in the most comforting of tones as I put my arm on his shoulder. ¡°I want you to be an upscale dispensary, providing only the finest and most delicate of all the euphorics. We could call it ¡®Jones¡¯ Jays¡¯.¡±


    ¡°I cannot believe it!¡± Johnny basically busted down the door and stomped over. ¡°You had the good stuff this whole time and didn¡¯t let me have just a bit? Who the fuck showed you new age Taco Bell? A little reciprocity would be nice! See, I can learn big words too!¡±


    Sighing as the last bit of hope for Johnny went down the drain, I turned back to Andy. ¡°I actually have some people I want you to meet. Probably willing to be on board more than anyone else in the world, seeing as how there aren¡¯t many left.¡±


    Raising one eyebrow, my brother replied, ¡°What about my people?¡±


    ¡°Shit!¡± Remembering that I hadn¡¯t gone back to New Miami to fulfill my promise of fixing Andy¡¯s squadmates, I quickly conjured a couple small stone boxes and put the seeds in. ¡°Andy, you¡¯re right, fuck me. Ok, you know how this works, plant half of each box in a nice area. Label the area and I¡¯ll work on this when we get back. Johnny, you¡¯re on sparing duty in the morning. Tell Reeanth that she¡¯s on arcane combat in the afternoon and gardening with meditation is reserved for the evening.¡±


    Grabbing all of my gear, I gave Spot and Fuzzy a quick belly rub and took off for Yggdrasil.


    [What¡¯s the rush?] Kraken asked. [Whoa! Slow down!]


    [Stupid, friggin, good for nothin-]


    Shaking his head at me from inside Gungnir, Kraken rolled his eye. [Fine, don¡¯t answer me, I¡¯ll just have a little peek. Oh, stop worrying about that. It¡¯s all good. Go back to the lab, got a surprise for ya.] Following the directions of my familiar, I headed into the main area of the Lab where I left Andy¡¯s upgraded gear and the chest of Forbidden items. [See?! Easy day my friend!]


    Off to the side on a table I hadn¡¯t noticed before was a sleek wooden rod about three feet long. The bottom of it had two arms ringed with silver and the top was a four-legged stand, the legs were each about three inches long.


    ¡°What am I looking at?¡± I asked aloud as I picked it up. ¡°Definitely not a weapon even though it has good balance.¡±


    [It¡¯s mindreaper hacking device I created just for your kin¡¯s squadmates. Shove the four legged part into the city wall, which is the power supply, and then get those prongs around their necks. And bing badda boom! One good jolt of concentrated mana will overpower the programming and drain the bad juju into the wall, completely getting rid of the problem, and then the backwash combined with the newly emptied space will give way to the new programming I stuck in there.]


    I twirled it around in one hand like a baton, reading the enchantments set into its core. ¡°That bright packet in the center there, the one with three distinct parts, what¡¯s that?¡± I asked, peering at it intently. The weaves of mana were far too dense and the runes too small for a casual glance to reveal its secrets.


    [Thought you might want them to have a chance at being overpowered in the future, so there¡¯s a bunch of rune and tattoo information in there, basic spellforms with the advanced versions set to unlock when they master the easy stuff, a couple schematics for wards, shields, wands, and a basic outline of some of the geography for their internal maps.]


    After making Kraken add in a small info packet about the facts of my actions and future ones, I walked over to Yggdrasil and took a quick trip. The best part about this reprogrammer device, honestly, was the simple fact that I didn¡¯t need to convince anyone of shit. Once I ported over to New Miami the way I did last time, I hunted around the city underground like a sneaky worm, feeling for the auras of my brother¡¯s squadmates. When I had a lock on their position, a quick whammy of overpowered mental magic knocked them the fuck out and then I took them to the wall. Due to the Centauri constitution that allowed them to take more than the usual amount of punishment, I didn¡¯t have to worry about being gentle.


    The process ended up being pretty simple. Step one, slam the metal legs of the reprogrammer to the wall, which ended up sticking with no problem. Step two, use my flesh sorcery enhanced body to hoist the Centauri bodies up to the prongs for a minute while Kraken¡¯s creation worked its magic. Step three, deposit the cleansed and reprogrammed soldiers back where I found them. By the time I was done with the initial fifteen squad members, I dropped in on Santa-esque Rolf who was at the top of the wall and tossed the device to him.


    ¡°I¡¯m tired of this already, your turn!¡± The humongous man caught it without even looking, only turning to look at me when I yawned. I knew he¡¯d look. The man¡¯s nature was bearlike, apex predator in his natural environment, and predators always notice signs of weakness or exhaustion. So, said yawn got his attention more than the responsibility I just dropped in his lap.


    ¡°Explain.¡± His tone was less friendly than I expected but maybe he saw what I had been doing for the past two hours.


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    ¡°Fixed a few of my brother¡¯s friends. Had to get rid of the magic bombs up in there. It¡¯s real easy, just stick the four legged side in the wall and then their neck between the prongs and boom! Good to go. Your city, your problem.¡±


    Before he even had a chance to protest, I hopped off the wall, extending SAW¡¯s wings and gliding down to the earth where I dirt-traveled to the New Miami Yggdrasil, portaling home. By the end of the second week, all four of us had gotten into a pretty good groove, which was just long enough for me to feel comfortable messing it up. New Miami wasn¡¯t the only settlement on the East Coast, there was a little town not too far away that I had provisioned with more than enough supplies and it was high time my little group got to meet their neighbors.


    ******


    Jamal


    The only thing better than having a dragon¡¯s heart beating in your chest is having someone else or elses whos¡¯ sex drives can match that kind of energy. Turns out, there are more than enough dryads in the nearby woods to help a brotha¡¯ when he¡¯s down. Elaine and Kathika¡¯s group of hoity-toity bitches had it in their heads that one man and one woman was the way to go but they can¡¯t even do simple math. It doesn¡¯t work that way when the men outnumber the women on our nice little settlement. Some of us had taken to sampling what Mother Earth had so graciously provided and they certainly were grateful. The fact that they don¡¯t mind groups is another serious plus in their favor, the only downside being the few humans who had solid sticks up their asses.


    Is it any wonder that I¡¯d rather spend my time out in the forest hunting and banging hot nature chicks than argue with people who couldn¡¯t get with the times? No more law man, no cop, no judge, no job, no time clock, no nothin¡¯. As my man Nate said before he left, ¡®Prepare for the worst and hope for the best¡¯. The worst is that all the women vanish and the best is I convince a couple dryads to have their watery nymph friends join in the fun.


    Now Blair and Cassandra, those two could wear a man down, and boy did I make them work for it. When they added their magic to the mix, things got a bit weird but damn I rode that high for days.


    ¡°Jamal! Get your black ass back here! Chow time!¡± Mark called from atop the settlement¡¯s stone walls. They were now at least four stories high now; we had to build up another two stories after the crazed monkey incident, and then up one more after the freaking leopard attacked, using the nearby trees to just bypass our walls.


    Disentangling myself from the pile of ladies in the center of a large oak, I stretched and quietly made my way out. The two story drop was nothin¡¯ for my legs ever since Nate helped me fix my clumsy attempt to reform my heart into a dragon¡¯s. Every day I felt just a bit stronger, a bit tougher. Lately, I¡¯d even noticed that my skin got a lot tougher and my nails got longer when I went out hunting. The night vision alone was worth it and I can¡¯t complain about the package enhancement down below. Grabbing my sack of odd stones that I¡¯d gathered from ranging out, I took off for home.


    ¡°Don¡¯t do that!¡± Mark yelped as I simply hopped the forty yards from the nearest tree branch to the top of the wall. ¡°I almost shot your dick off, and I know you use that thing way too much. Did you even shower?¡±


    ¡°Jealous?¡± I asked, grinning as my friend couldn''t deny it. ¡°I take it Stacy didn¡¯t like the ¡®group¡¯ suggestion?¡±


    ¡°Fuck off,¡± he growled, turning away to the stairs. ¡°Dinner¡¯s in ten and you¡¯re behind on catching meat! And next time, take Scott with you. He¡¯s been making eyes at a dryad for a while now but is too backed up to say anything.¡±


    Ah yes, meat. It¡¯s almost too easy for me to hunt, in fact it¡¯s a chore because anything and everything is scared shitless of me. One whiff and they fall to the ground, basically begging for me to get it over with. Not sure I want Scott to see me in that state. Some of the kids had somehow gotten their hands on mutated rabbits, twisted chicken-like birds, and some ornery warthogs which supplemented the protein intake of the settlement but it was still fend for yourself in certain ways.


    The fact was that too many people were feeding the flesh golem whatever animals they caught so they could have ¡®enhancements¡¯. For a while there, a large chunk of the women looked almost cartoonish with how big their assets had gotten until strained backs and body aches set them straight. A few ladies went full on beast-mode a month back and it took them a while to find a nice middle ground. The most fun out of that group was Cassie and her friends which used to be a volleyball team. Each one of them was now a mixed form of magical beast and they consistently came back to the village with big game.


    Of course, the men couldn¡¯t be outdone. One of the men had hunted down a bear and now a solid chunk of around thirty of them were now bigger, hairer, and thicker than any normal man, even putting the Centauri physique to shame. You couldn¡¯t walk down the middle of the settlement without seeing some giant version of a man with exaggerated masculine features and a woman that was unnaturally beautiful.


    Cassandra¡¯s posse of magic users were at odds with Lovera¡¯s. The first being the group that wanted to expand what they called ¡°New Richmond¡± into a legitimate city, a bastion of altered humanity, and the latter desiring a more primal in touch with magic approach. Cassandra¡¯s group were all in on the magic front, quickly making lights and stone streets with proper run-off on their side of town. Lovera and her crew went the other way, growing trees to be homes and altering the grass to be soft and short, functioning as a sturdy but natural walkway.


    And I loved it, the walk between the modernized forest and magical medieval times was eye-catching to say the least as I walked from the wall to my home. Wearing nothing but a makeshift pair of shorts, I had no issues walking around larger than life, scales going up and down my arms and back, a real life black dragon man. God damn, life is good.


    *******


    Andy


    Life fuckin sucks. My big, I mean older, brother has got me training so hard that farts are literally getting kicked out of me. Just because he can heal me 24/7 so I can fight again does not mean that I SHOULD be fighting 24/7. What makes it worse is that at the end of the day, he fights me with just one magic that I pick and I can¡¯t even touch him. I got so happy when he made the weed seeds so I could maybe relax and have some fun but noooo. One hit of his flesh magic shit later and I¡¯m sober as fuck and it¡¯s time to train.


    ¡°Johnny is here to teach you how to fight without magic. What will you do when you¡¯re all tapped out? What happens when you¡¯re exhausted and the only thing between you and death is your body?¡± Damn, even when my brother¡¯s voice is calm as he oh so nicely explains why he¡¯s doing what he¡¯s doing, there¡¯s still an edge to it. As if Nate has ever had to work without magic. Fighting Johnny is like tangoing with a living hammer. His body is harder than steel and if he gets one grip on you you¡¯re finished. Uhg, what¡¯s up with Nate, pushing me this hard? Probably something he¡¯s not telling me.


    ¡°Reeanth¡¯s job is to teach you how to fight as a whole, blending magic and fighting techniques together in a seamless dance of death. When is a fireball the best response? Can what you¡¯re trying to kill die just as easily with a stab or punch? Thinking while fighting is the hardest thing any warrior can do.¡± This bitch is an exercise in sheer viciousness. I¡¯ve lost count how many times my bones have been broken and if I think that a bit too loudly the stupid A.I. will chime in to remind me. Over two hundred times was the last count I can recall.


    My older brother stood in front of me as sweat dripped down my body. Even though I¡¯ve fought and lost so many times today, I still had energy to spare. The runes of rejuvenation and matter-breakdown efficiency were more than enough to keep me going. Pooping was a rare occurrence now. All of that waste matter was broken down by the runes and turned into actual mana, kicking up my healing factor almost up to the level of a werewolf or vampire. Anything worse than a simple break, one minute of Nate squinting later and I¡¯d be good as new.


    ¡°And I am here to teach about learning when to run.¡± Dick. Me actually getting near him was impossible. If we agreed that he could only use earth sorcery, I either got buried in the ground or had to fight through pools of mud that grabbed me with living arms. If he used water, then he just cut my limbs off or used high-intensity blasts of water to grind away my organs. The last time he just covered the clearing in ice and skated away while my feet kept literally freezing to the ground.


    The one time I asked for him to fight me with his mind sorcery and I just woke up ten minutes later as he was eating some fruit from what he called his ¡®Smoothie Jungle¡¯. Over-powered son of a bitch. It was frustrating to experience this level of helplessness, especially when my body kept telling me that I could easily squash this short, skinny, under two-hundred pound pipsqueak. Sure, he¡¯s around six foot two, but I¡¯m a seven and half foot tall, three hundred and fifty pound Centauri warrior with battle runes and over five years worth of combat experience fighting insane bugs from the Hive!


    ¡°No. I¡¯m not fighting you anymore, this is fucking torture bro.¡± I had had enough. All I wanted to do was relax for the last two weeks before getting shipped off to some magical alien school, even though the weed part of that adventure might not be too bad. Chicks dig weed, and I dig chicks.


    A slow clap interrupted my split-second of internal musing. ¡°Took ya long enough,¡± Nate said with that classic smirk on his face. My brother is a smart man, not always wise but definitely book-smart. ¡°Know when to back off. You¡¯re not always going to meet someone you can take down. This is where you use every other trick in the book, poison, diplomacy, deception, anything to level the playing field.¡±


    ¡°Oh come on! I¡¯ve been giving Johnny and Reeanth decent fights for the past three days!¡± My whining didn¡¯t go over well.


    ¡°Because both of them are in your weight class! What you should have done when fighting me is CHEAT! Bring your armor and weapons! Attack before the match begins, catch me by surprise! Get Reeanth and Johnny to help you out, or maybe Fuzzy!¡± Wow, he¡¯s really gettin¡¯ worked up. ¡°What was the goal this entire time?¡±


    ¡°To beat you in a fight?¡±


    ¡°No dumbass. We never set a goal. It wasn¡¯t to first blood, to first bone break, to get knocked outside of the clearing, it was just a fight. What was to stop you from fighting with a sniper rifle a mile away, or setting up magic bombs in the clearing beforehand?¡±


    Huffing in frustration even as I rolled up a joint and lit it, I planted my butt against a small willow tree. ¡°I get it. Think outside the box, and honor is for losers.¡±


    ¡°Honor is for the dead.¡± Nate¡¯s face was stone. The last time he was this cold is when I was getting bullied in grade school and still it chilled me to the core. ¡°I already have scores to settle with the Centauri for mom and dad. And Heaven and Hell won¡¯t stop me if that school does something to you.¡±


    Yup, still a drama queen.

 Chapter 143 - The Pain of Goodbye (Book 3 Chapter 10)

    *******


    Nate


    Waking up to a new day brought with it all the promise of a fresh start even though time was running out. I had a semblance of a family again for two weeks which hit me right at my core, and even worse, though I hadn''t explained very much to anyone, today was Andy¡¯s birthday, I think? Hard to tell with his own time dilation issues conflicting the un-Veiled Earth and me not having a solid calendar but fuck it! Pulling my much larger but still younger brother down to the Lab, I shoved some fresh coffee into his hands as I turned on a couple well-placed sunstones, illuminating the high-tech spread of gear I¡¯d made for him. Seeing that his responses were too laggy as Andy also was not a morning person, I slapped a bit of wake-up flesh sorcery into him to perk him up.


    Happy Birthday!¡± Shivering the dregs of sleep out of his body, Andy looked over the laid out armor.


    ¡°But I already have armor?¡±


    ¡°This is for when your big bro ain¡¯t around and you¡¯re gettin¡¯ your ass kicked,¡± I said, crossing my arms. ¡°Look, the plate armor is light but can shrug off the equivalent of tank rounds, drain and absorb directed or ambient magic, and it covers every part of you like a turtle shell. Your Centauri nanotech is great but it can be your last hidden layer.¡±


    ¡°And the wands?¡±


    ¡°Fine, skip to the end part,¡± I said gruffly as Andy was ruining the presentation. ¡°Those are for you at the college. Everything I¡¯ve read and researched says that normal wizards need wands and staves to be effective. So, I gave you two wands, but if you end up needing a staff, feed one of the wands blood and mana everyday through the base and it will grow to be a staff.¡±


    Not seeing a reaction, I continued on. ¡°Here¡¯s your upgraded rifle that can take out a pack of wyverns or horde of minotaurs on its own by firing all kinds of munitions. The classic tower shield was upgraded along the lines of what I learned from the dwarves I killed, extra platinum to divert magic, batteries for extra power and energy absorption . . .¡± Still no change in facial expression.


    ¡°AND OVER HERE! Dude? What the fuck is your problem?¡± Seriously. All kinds of epic goodies from a badass sorcerer that happens to be his brother and nothin¡¯? With another scan of flesh sorcery, I checked to make sure he wasn¡¯t having a stroke or something.


    ¡°Nate . . . where¡¯s Sarah?¡± Andy asked, finally looking at me. ¡°Did y¡¯all break up or did she also get taken away? I looked through our databases and couldn¡¯t find her anywhere the same as when I was looking for you.¡±


    That hit harder than any blow. I had gotten so wrapped up in movement and action and planning and fighting that I hadn¡¯t even told my own brother what happened to my woman. For a split second I froze, then put my hands on the table as I took a deep breath. Swallowing my thick queasy ball of pain and guilt, I looked at Andy. ¡°She¡¯s uh, well, not dead but she¡¯s also not really alive either.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand.¡±


    Quickly grabbing my memories, I packaged up the sight of her being forcibly morphed by Chaos into a tree, the memory of planting Yggdrasil and the root of it connecting to her tree form as an influx of mana wrapped her in a cocoon, the talk I had with a deity telling me that she was going to be okay and probably outlive me. The weave of emotions running through me as I fought goblins and night things to keep them away from my vulnerable woman, the raging heat of anger tempering my determination to be there when she woke up in a few millennia, all of it I put into that memory packet, quickly conjuring a small bit of perfectly aligned quartz and sticking the memories into it.


    ¡°I can¡¯t talk about right now,¡± I said, slowly rubbing the small gem between my palms. ¡°It¡¯s all in here but do it later.¡± Pulling my mind from the unfathomable darkness that lurked at the edge of my psyche, the little place that whispered all the horrible, nasty things I would do to stay alive and make sure that I survived, I turned back around to the table before me. ¡°What was I saying? Oh yes, the birthday presents . . . over here if you look inside the helmet, I stuck an enhancement circlet for you and your resident A.I. which is full of goodies and these over here,¡± I said, gesturing to the flat disc of quartz with a carved symbol of Yggdrasil on it.


    ¡°That plate is more than enough to get you started on making and designing your own runic tattoos as it holds lessons on designs as well as a basic, and I mean basic, dictionary for runes, which leads me to this, your very own mini flesh-golem!¡± Pointing at the sack above the armor, I grabbed it and dumped the contents into my hand. ¡°His name is Fleshy, which is stupid but I suck at naming things. This guy will probably save your life down the road. Feed him meat of any kind to make him bigger and stick him on a wound and he¡¯ll fix it. Broken bones, missing eyes or fingers, wicked scars, none of that will pose an issue. He can also change the melanin of your skin to make perfectly natural tattoos or give you an epic tan if you want.¡±


    A set of arms wrapped me up in a hug lifting me off the ground. Quickly setting me back down, Andy looked away as he wiped a tear from his eye. ¡°I get it. I¡¯ve lost plenty of people, good people. Never gets easier.¡±


    Pulling a flask I stole from Scott out of my pocket, I took a swig and handed it to him. ¡°Here. Dwarven stuff, hits like a kiss of fire.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s too early to be drinking,¡± Andy said, pushing it back towards me.


    ¡°This ain¡¯t the Bible belt anymore! It¡¯s for self-fortification, and I don¡¯t have much time to get drunk so this is just to put myself back on the right path, the focused one.¡± The look on his face still had a bit of judgement so I wearily put away the flask, after taking another hit of course. ¡°Anyways! Happy birthday you wet blanket. You have three days to get used to it before we start sparing. Gotta know how it feels so you can fight in it. We go full Spartan in a week.¡±


    Andy put the armor and gathered up the rifle, shield, and all the rest of the stuff and headed down the tunnel to the Hole to show Johnny and Reeanth as I stayed by the table. For a full minute I let myself feel all of the things I had been putting off to the side, allowing my consciousness sorcery to take the lead and wash my soul in the emotions that I had simply worked through by being too busy to actually address. The anger I felt at being alone and the unreasonable irritating thought that I didn¡¯t have to be as I knew Sarah would be ok if I maybe continued on with my life as she was a hundred percent dedicated to be a tree right now. The jealousy of her being completely at peace pricked at my heart while my frustration at being so goddamn busy all the time stabbed from the other side. Sadness of my family being forcibly taken flooded through me and left leading the way for a tidal wave of uncertainty to crash through.


    Am I right? Is the course of action that I¡¯m currently invested in, the myriad plans and decisions to shoulder the burden of basically de-worming my planet of Undead the correct one? Should it even be my burden or should I let the Centauri discover and do it themselves with a bit of help from the witches? I can¡¯t be the only person invested in the existential threat hitting planet Earth from the North and South poles? Can I?


    Reminding myself of my accomplishments so far, I then went over the things that I needed to do which I¡¯ve reviewed many times and am making great progress on. Shit, I even made a freaking fortress out of sunstone, gave it its own army and then demolished an underwater army with it in the past month! That¡¯s not even counting the fact that I¡¯ve saved my brother from a witch-borne mind parasite that could kill him, upgraded him with an A.I. and seriously boosted all of his armor and weapons. Breathe in, breathe out. I¡¯ve come so far and now is not the time to start doubting myself. Letting myself sink back into a focused frame of mind, I used flesh sorcery to reset my hormone levels back to normal and wipe away the traces of exhaustion that emotional trauma can have on a body.


    Emerging from the Hole into the clearing, I saw Johnny and Andy cutting loose and this time Andy was giving Johnny a run for his money. The new armor was easily shrugging off Johnny¡¯s cannon-like attacks. Every smack of the silver snake staff looked like it slipped off of the plate armor as if it had a thick layer of oil on it, causing Johnny to swing harder and faster but yielding the exact same result. I could see Reeanth across the clearing, keeping a close eye on the fighting and taking notes as usual even though she was smiling at the cultivator curse up a storm in his frustration.


    Hopping back twenty feet, Johnny struck a pose, one leg forward and the other behind him bet, giving the impression of spring ready to loose. Johnny held his staff parallel to the earth at ear level, the silvery wood held lightly in the middle by his left hand and tightly at the end furthest from Andy. For a moment, every noise vanished before a soft hiss ventured forth, the warning of a hidden snake about to strike. Johnny closed his eyes and whispered something I couldn¡¯t hear.The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    I didn¡¯t even see what happened next. All I saw was the aftermath and a quickly fading afterimage. My eyes kept showing me an ethereal snake with Johnny inside of it striking at Andy, the blunt edge of its snout that was Johnny¡¯s staff slamming into Andy¡¯s chest plate and retreating, but the clearing showed no evidence of movement. There were no footprints or disturbances in the grass to show the twenty feet of grass that had to be cleared to make physical contact. I know Johnny could leap that distance but he wouldn¡¯t fly back and land in the exact same position he started in without me seeing it.


    Clearing my head, I focused my senses on Andy and his armor. The batteries meant to absorb the kinetic energy made from impacts were completely full, shining like suns to my magical senses. From what I could tell, there were no injuries or bruises which showed that my armor was well made and perfectly designed but my brother looked to be in shock. A slow clap rang out.


    ¡°Well done Johnny,¡± Reeanth said, leaving the tree she was leaning up against. ¡°You learned from the last session. If the enemy is strong of body . . .¡±


    ¡°Then attack the mind,¡± Johnny finished. Leaving his pose, Johnny walked over to Andy and poked him in the forehead, releasing Andy from his stupor.


    ¡°Wanna fill me in?¡± I asked, looking back and forth between Johnny and Reeanth.


    ¡°Cultivators are somewhat limited in how they express their abilities my lord until they reach the peak of their abilities,¡± Reeanth explained. ¡°Martial arts are an extension of internal strength combined with knowledge and understanding to affect the outside world. A simple punch for you and I, while we could alter it or make it deadlier by covering the fist with fire or stone, cultivators can imbue heavier concepts to their abilities. This was a good example. Johnny¡¯s staff is a bonded oak adder whose poison is a well known paralytic. That last strike was mental in nature resulting in an attack that left your brother defenseless.¡±


    ¡°Awesome right?¡± Johnny crowed excitedly. ¡°Andy wasn¡¯t ready for that one!¡±


    Shaking his head, Andy opened his eyes, coming back to himself. ¡°Gonna need a minute man. That helmet enhancer thing you put in bro, it wasn¡¯t set up yet and amplified his attack. Fuck, this headache is brutal.¡±


    ¡°Whoops,¡± I said, walking over and healing his headache. ¡°Yeah, you and your A.I. were supposed to get everything set up. I wouldn¡¯t presume to know how you want your mental defenses built so I left that alone, but the armor is ready for the physical kind of combat.¡±


    Grumbling at Andy¡¯s minor oversight, I half-heartedly muttered under my breath walking to Yggdrasil and taking the arboreal Way to Sunstone Castle. Standing in the center of my fortress, I found the control pedestal and gently slid Gungnir into place. Kraken popped out of my trusty weapon and looked around.


    ¡°The hell are we doing back here?¡± he asked. ¡°The army is prepped and ready to go and the batteries below are . . . lemme check, yup, they¡¯re over ninety percent full. The castle walls themselves are at a solid fifty percent and the tree looks better than expected in this nasty climate.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re upgrading!¡± I answered, grinning ear to ear.


    ¡°Upgrading what?!?¡±


    ¡°Oh come on, with all the stuff we¡¯ve learned? I can reformat the enchantments on the walls so that they mimic the walls in New Miami, giving them a metaphysical current to circulate within themselves. That would give the castle an eighty percent increase in absorption capabilities while staying functional. Also, we could put a kinetic converter in the bottom of the river and link a feed from the river to the castle as a backup power source, and I¡¯m thinking of adding enchanted granite to the flat parts of the sunstone golems like their-¡±


    ¡°Nope. Nope¡± Kraken interrupted, wildly waving his tentacles. ¡°No! That¡¯s all work for me not for you. Redoing the enchantments to the castle walls is beyond insane! They were inscribed INSIDE of the stones as the conjuration was ongoing. The only way to ¡®fix¡¯ it is to take the whole thing down.¡±


    ¡°Fuck. Seriously?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Seriously,¡± he snapped. ¡°Which I will say again, is INSANE. A better use of your time would be going over the intel you got from the Centauri. There¡¯s some cool stuff in there that might be useful later like, the Irish.¡±


    ¡°What about¡¯em?¡±


    ¡°Well for instance, a bit more of humanity got left behind than we were originally told. The Irish got completely left behind, a large chunk of the Nordic countries did as well and are now mead swilling Vikings again but this time with magic. A few mountainous area were completely skipped over and some island nations. You may not want to, but you might need to put New Miami and New Richmond in touch with everyone else or at least let them know that they¡¯re still around so the whole ¡®recolonization¡¯ thing that humans can do can start.¡±


    I didn¡¯t really like that. I¡¯m kind of hitting my cap of human interaction for right now with three of them living in my space. Speaking of, I need to make sure that the high levels of mana aren¡¯t adversely affecting them. I joked about that at New Richmond a while back and used it as an excuse to keep people away but it¡¯s been bugging me and i have to see if it¡¯s true. I know it affects animals in many ways, Kong, Spot, and Norn being classic examples but I can¡¯t be letting my own people mutate uncontrollably.


    Not letting my thoughts meander on even more, Kraken interrupted again. ¡°AND, I know your pets have been keeping the forest around your area clean but I do highly recommend doing a few more purging sprees. The goblins you tested your stuff out on, where there¡¯s one there¡¯s a thousand. They breed like rats and are almost universally hated, well, them and orcs, ogres, feral centaurs and the screaming ferlanx too.¡±


    ¡°Do I want to know?¡± I asked with one raised eyebrow. Kraken shoved an image of a six-legged ferret the size of a horse with the meanness of a rabid squirrel into my head. Kraken made sure to highlight the overlarge teeth and bulging poison sacks behind the jawline as well as the hooked talons on the back of its feet. ¡°So, no, I didn¡¯t want to know.¡±


    My little family and I spent the next two weeks and change fine-tuning Andy and his new gear in brutal training sessions, but I think the greatest help that I was able to give him was the assistance in creating Andy¡¯s own mindscape. The mindscape is that meditative space where you and yourself and anything spiritually connected can go to plan. Mine has the advantage, due to my sorceries, of having the ability to manifest my soul-tree there as well but everyone has to start somewhere. With the assistance of his A.I., my brother¡¯s went from a pale grey void at the beginning to a very bare log cabin with chalkboard on one wall and two chairs. We were still working on the visual manifestation of his A.I. when Kraken reminded me that our deadline was in six hours.


    ¡°Are witches hot?¡± Johnny asked, gleefully bouncing on his toes.


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t matter,¡± I growled for the umpteenth time. ¡°You¡¯re not going. It¡¯s me dropping Andy off and coming back. You and Reeanth are going to meet me at New Richmond by sunset. Bring Spot along and they¡¯ll believe you.¡± Double checking that my little brother had all of his stuff plus some extras, I nabbed one last satchel of surprises before meeting him at the tree.


    ¡°Whazzat?¡± Andy asked as I exited the Hole.


    ¡°Goodies. More seeds than you need for the plan, but if it doesn¡¯t work then it doesn¡¯t work. If it does, we could be rich or trade that stuff for thing we don¡¯t even know we need yet. Second,¡± I said as I pulled out one more pouch. ¡°This is mini-flashbang grenades and trip-vines. Put a bit of mana into them and in three seconds they¡¯ll do what they sound like. Pour three seconds worth of mana into them and then wait three seconds and the results will be far more lethal, trust me.¡±


    Gingerly taking the bag, Andy stuck it in a leg pocket. ¡°It¡¯s like college all over again. I got the jitters and am hopin¡¯ to heaven they got some hot alien chicks.¡±


    Rolling my eyes as Johnny cheered him on, I shoved Andy into the tree and took us to New Miami. Per our agreement, Sybella met us outside of the city walls at the appointed time. Andy and I arrived underground through the Yggdrasil root and traveled via my earth sorcery. I grew chairs out of the undergrowth and made a nice fire pit with dry branches as Andy lit it with his finger.


    ¡°So weird that you¡¯re so damn powerful but you can¡¯t even use fire,¡± he said, carelessly playing with a floating spark over his palm. ¡°I can¡¯t even touch you in a fight but without a lighter what good are ya?¡±


    Playfully putting out the spark with a quick blast of conjured water, I smirked at him. ¡°What need does the ocean have for the flame? Or a mountain for the sun?¡±


    ¡°Okaaay Confucius.¡±


    I laughed. ¡°No, no, you do have a point. I think Kraken explained it best. Sorcerers tend to be more powerful in the beginning. We get the instinct, the lion¡¯s share of the understanding and the power of our elements, but outside of that we aren¡¯t flexible. You, you¡¯re a wizard. Eventually, you will outscale me. It may take you a long time but it will happen. You¡¯ll be able to do things I won¡¯t, like conjure a windstorm or a flaming tornado, or summon otherworldly creatures to help you out. I¡¯m stuck with what I have.¡±


    ¡°Well put.¡± The lighter tones of the feminine voice behind us made us both jump up and grab our weapons. ¡°But I didn¡¯t know you were a sorcerer, Nate, or should I say, my lord?¡±


    Andy looked at me. ¡°What? My lord? The fuck is this?¡±


    Sybella turned to look at him. ¡°You¡¯ve served for six years in the Centauri fleet and still don¡¯t know? My, what a disservice you¡¯ve done him.¡± That last part was aimed at me. ¡°Your great Empire¡¯s original rulers were Sorcerers that were eventually eclipsed by the Wizards and Mages they helped raise up. Sorcerers are still considered royalty in your part of the multiverse, and very useful slaves in other parts.¡±


    ¡°This is not what we discussed,¡± I snarled, tightening my grip on Gungnir.


    ¡°Peace sorcerer. I have dealt with you in good faith and in the best of wishes. Your blood-kin shall go to the institute as promised after a half-years worth of gentle instruction at the hands of my coven. Manners, culture, the political landscape as well as the overarching view of the powers that be shall be included as well as magical tutoring. Your brother shall return with the gift of wytchfire but will not be allowed to teach anyone else its secrets.¡±


    Behind her in the fading light, I could make out an oval of deep purple with black lightning whipping around the edges silently but never leaving. ¡°Without your generous gift, I never would have been able to hold a portal open for that long. It does help that you¡¯ve softened the barriers with another insertion of the Great Vein. A lecture for another time perhaps. Andrew Jones, come.¡± Without another word, Sybella turned and walked through the portal. Even though she was gone, her words clearly came through from the other side like a whispering wind. ¡°Quickly now, if you don¡¯t come now then I¡¯ll have broken my word.¡±


    Giving my much taller brother a hug, I shoved him forward. Holding his tower shield effortlessly in one hand with his rifle in the other propped up on his shoulder, Andy set his jaw and stalked through the portal. He did in fact cut an imposing figure in his black armor and wicked looking gear. Stopping just outside, he waved at me real quick and then turned, diving through.


    [He¡¯s going to raise some hell if he goes to that school looking like that. Sorcerers don¡¯t really make equipment for anyone anymore. People are going to start asking some questions.]


    Grinning like a wolf as a shapely figure stepped through the closing portal, I replied to Kraken, ¡°Can¡¯t wait.¡±

 Chapter 144 - Molding Madness (Book 3 Chapter 11)

    Was there some cosmic law somewhere that stated all women must be unrealistically attractive in the age of magic? I get that magic is a thing but dear lord, at this point what I wouldn¡¯t give to see a normal looking chick, maybe someone whose nose is a bit too long or her eyes a bit too close together. I can¡¯t imagine what this is like for other men who do not have complete control over their hormones, this level of natural distraction is painful. Maybe they just get used to it, maybe the new standard of attractive is freaking gorgeous, maybe the baseline starts at the point where normal models are put to shame. Pre-apocalypse had people of all shapes and sizes which is a good thing cause everyone has a preference, but this is internally off-putting.


    As the portal snapped close and Florida¡¯s dying light cast everything in an orange glow, a woman stood stark naked right in front of me. She stood there proudly with her hands on her hips and bright red hair flowing in beautiful waves. Her face with those green eyes would have been a Irish knockout if it didn¡¯t have that haughty ¡®I¡¯m in charge¡¯ look marring her features. With my hormones firmly in check, I gave her a solid once-over from where I stood noting that she had no tattoos, runic or otherwise, and that she was very short, guessing around five foot one with curves in all the right places. There were no weapons sheathed to her arms or legs and there was no wizard staff. This bitch came to a new planet completely unprepared. Tilting her head up a hair, she asked me something in a language that I didn¡¯t know, which was any of them since I¡¯m a hundred percent ignorant Virginian. Switching languages, she tried again.


    Gungnir, planted in front of me, served as a leaning post as I lazily waited for this woman to get her act together. I expected more, especially considering that Sybella and Rolf seemed to have no issues, although I wasn¡¯t opposed to throwing her a bone. Pulling a dwarven translation amulet from my pocket, I injected a bit of mana into the center rune and tossed it to her.


    ¡°English honey,¡± I said, making sure the southern drawl was apparent in my voice. Not able to resist, I went full Deep South. ¡°Bless yur heart dawlin¡¯! We can¡¯t have no lil¡¯ lady struttin¡¯ around here without so much as a shawl ta¡¯ call yur own! And mercy me! I ain¡¯t got nothin¡¯ ta¡¯ give ya.¡± I couldn¡¯t help it, I had to joke around. This, this is not what I expected. Part of me over the past month was expecting to receive a young but fully trained witch who would assist me with my endeavours. Possibly, that¡¯s what I got but the naked version hadn¡¯t popped up in my mind at all.


    Growling in frustration, the witch lady cursed in yet a different language, curiously flicking her fingers to make a symbol as a wisp of green magic sparked between her hands, the glow resonating with the amulet until her irritation came through in crisp clean English, albeit with a stark English accent. I caught most of it but some of the words didn¡¯t make it through translation.


    ¡°Bat-shite crazy whore of a ferlowzink that screwed a long lost equine grebjii and I hope and pray to all the iengoqnad Icons of Insanity-¡±


    ¡°I can hear ya now, mostly loud and clear.¡± Dropping my affected Southern accent, I looked her dead in the eye as she blushed the deepest red. ¡°Got a name or do I need to give you one? I¡¯m really bad at it by the way.¡±


    ¡°Acantha.¡± Her voice was smooth and pleasant to listen to, a bit on the higher side but she controlled her tone well enough now that we¡¯ve established understandable lines of communication. She looked a lot better without that pre-snarl on her face. ¡°My name is my own but you may call me Acantha.¡±


    That stuck out at me, the way she twisted it to give herself a label instead of giving me her name. And Acantha, that tweaked at a memory from some history class, something about a beloved nymph or dryad of a deity that got turned into a thorny bush? Pushing the thought away, I waved around at the bare area. ¡°As you can see, there ain¡¯t much here around us except for that city. If you are the ¡®best apprentice¡¯,¡± I said, making air quotes at ¡®best apprentice¡¯. ¡°Then acquiring proper clothing shouldn¡¯t be too much of an issue. You have an hour.¡±


    Turning away, I faced the sunset and sat in my underbrush chair. Kicking my feet up, I turned Gungnir into a knife and sheathed it. ¡°Whatcha¡¯ waiting for? We don¡¯t have all night.¡±


    In my mind¡¯s eye, I watched her walk off slowly towards the city, her figure vanishing bit by bit in a flash of blue light. Pulling it out once again, I reviewed the mental packet conversation containing the agreement with Sybella. For the price of one crystal mana battery molded to her specifications, Sybella agreed to catch my brother up to the standard of education required in the space of six months and then enroll him at the Poly-Arcane Institute for no less than five years. Alongside that issue was the problem that Sybella presented, that for at least five and a half years my retinue would be missing a valuable ally. To keep her word intact, Sybella said she was honor bound to provide a suitable temporary replacement. I kept my own specifications light as I personally felt that I was already getting the better end of the deal.


    One, I needed someone who might have a vested interest in staying even after my brother returned. Two, it would be best if that individual was already classically training in the ways of magic and a wielder of wytchfire. Lastly, I needed someone with power, someone already equipped capacity-wise to take on a contested world. Reeanth and Johnny will easily be able to function as front-line fighters with assistance from elementals and Reeanth being able to act in a ranged capacity if need be, but if I¡¯m out of commission we won¡¯t have the chops to fight something with magic very well. Which then leads to this whole mess in the first place. Hubris would be me saying that I am more than enough to take on the Hungry Ones but common sense and a bit of rational fear do say that having someone watch my magical ass in combat and in experimentation might be a good idea.


    Not ten seconds after Acantha faded off into the distance, she sauntered back, wreathed in blue fire. It took everything I had to not laugh my ass off at my own internal dialogue. All I could hear at that moment in my head was Shrek saying, ¡°That¡¯ll do Donkey, that¡¯ll do,¡± and holy cow I wanted to say it just like Mike Myers. Although maybe that wouldn¡¯t be the best of first impressions. Something about my face though must have given it away.


    ¡°Do you find fellfire amusing my lord?¡± The tiny human glaring at me was almost too much. With a whispered word, the blue flames wrapped around and settled into the shape of clothes, forming a lovely thin sky blue dress. The blue dress then turned evaporated and green ones replaced them forming another set of clothing. ¡°Or maybe wytchfire strikes your fancy? I kindle all kinds of flames.¡±


    Sultry words of promise they may be, but I¡¯m thinking with my big head today. ¡°So you don¡¯t need clothing? Cause I can work with that too.¡±


    ¡°It is customary that the liege lord provides for all of his servant¡¯s material needs,¡± she said with a slight bow.


    ¡°I¡¯m definitely not your lord. If that¡¯s what you¡¯ve been led to believe then you should head off to that city right there. Better chance of a-¡±


    ¡°Maybe this is the wrong word,¡± she said, a little uncertainty creeping into her voice. ¡°Teacher? Professor? Owner? The one who is over the apprentice or is it under the apprentice?¡±


    Chuckling at my own dirty mind, I corrected her. ¡°I believe what you¡¯re trying to say is that I¡¯ll be your teacher, although I¡¯m not really sure what you¡¯re supposed to be learning from me. What did Sybella tell you?¡±


    ¡°Simply that I am yours until I am called,¡± Acantha said softly. ¡°Not that I mind. My former lady also said that I could stay if I so wished, but that decision would have to go through you.¡±


    The real answers were frustratingly tucked away inside of Acantha¡¯s mind and a large part of me, back up by Kraken, wanted to go snooping around inside of her head and find out for myself. If Sybella ever wanted to fuck me over, than this is a fairly obvious but effective way to do that. The probability that Acantha is a spy is simply overwhelming, but even if she¡¯s a spy she could still be a big help. Wytchfire for the undead, knowledge and culture for New Richmond, I could get a lot of use outta her. As soon as I thought that Kraken snickered.


    ¡°Fine, time to meet your new family.¡±


    Unfortunately, Acantha¡¯s fire-based clothing was not something that Yggdrasil would allow her to wear so my new partner/apprentice had to be buck naked to get through the Arboreal Way. It was odd that I was complaining about having to hold a hot naked chick close to me to get home but things change, sometimes not for the better. Forcing myself to focus, again, we moved sixteen hundred miles in less than five minutes.


    ¡°Getting better at that everytime!¡± I celebrated, accidentally dumping Acantha to the ground. ¡°Reeanth!¡± I called, ¡°I need clothes for the lady.¡± Rounding on Johnny before his mouth could catch up to his eyes, I sent him off to either find or make dinner real quick. Lyra came out of the woods and helped Acantha to her feet.


    ¡°My lord, is she well?¡± Lyra asked. ¡°She¡¯s much smaller than your knight. Is this what you prefer or is it the larger ones? I cannot tell.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s here to work,¡± I answered, staring the horny dryad down. ¡°You want to get laid, you know where to do it. I¡¯m sure there¡¯s enough men in New Richmond to keep you busy.¡±


    Shuddering languidly, Lyra ran her fingers through her hair. ¡°Ah, yes. Your orphan town has plenty of men willing to ravish me.¡±


    Reeanth returned with a fistful of clothes, coldly eyeing our new addition to the group. ¡°A witch, a young one too.¡± Tossing the bundle of clothing at Acantha¡¯s face, Reeanth looked back at me. ¡°She¡¯s young my lord, probably too young. If I remember our intel correctly, witches don¡¯t get their ancestral memories until they¡¯ve hit their second century. Their minds cannot handle the weight of generations until a solid framework for an individual mind is established. I fear she is defective.¡±


    Angrily pulling the clothes on, Acantha rounded on Reeanth as I barely shook my head no. Now is not the time to test her emotional limits. Reeanth caught my look and stepped back. ¡°Or maybe my youth and power let me overcome the limits of my kind!¡± Small but fiery. Shit. I let the femme fatale politics go for just a minute before breaking it up, citing ¡®team-building¡¯ and ¡®interpersonal trust¡¯, some HR bullshit just to keep my forest from going up in flames. Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    ¡°Reeanth! A word!¡± Quickly telling Acantha to relax and make herself at home, I pulled Reeanth into the Hole. Not giving her a chance to rebut even though she was taking a breath to do just that, I slammed the door to my home and turned around. ¡°Okay, we¡¯re gonna make this clear,¡± I said slowly. ¡°Yes, she¡¯s a witch. Yes, she doesn¡¯t know jack shit about anything here. No, we aren¡¯t going to keep her at arm''s length. Yes, we will make her swear magical oaths to verify that we cannot be betrayed now or in the future. Yes, we do need her. Any questions?¡±


    Reaanth¡¯s mouth snapped shut as she squinted at me. Even though her irritation was clear for anybody lookin¡¯, she wisely nodded and put her hands behind her back standing parade rest. ¡°What are your orders then, my lord?¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re gonna use the lambchop method. It¡¯s like catching flies with honey instead of vinegar but we have a hungry, wily wolf on our hands. You catch them with meat,¡± I declared. ¡°You can even befriend a wolf if you have enough meat and they¡¯re starving enough. Besides, think back. What did Reeanth agree to do for what cost me literally ten minutes of time and a bit of mana? I hold all the cards here.¡±


    Grinning like a cheshire cat, Reeanth bowed her head slightly. ¡°My lord is growing in wisdom.¡±


    ¡°You mean cunning, or deviousness?¡±


    ¡°Po-ta-to, Po-tah-to.¡±


    Snickering internally, I gloated that I¡¯d managed to bend this stiff woman to my eloquent colloquialistic ways. A light knock spooked me out of my reverie. Turning back, I opened the door, Gungnir blazing at the ready. My quick reactions knocked Acantha on her ass to which I quickly put my weapon away and helped her up while yelling at Reeanth to quit her laughing. Showing her to Andy¡¯s quarters, I gave her a meal cube and cup of water since Johnny hadn¡¯t gotten back yet before turning in myself for the night.


    I woke up early after a solid five hours of flesh sorcery enhanced sleep at around four in the morning. Not really knowing what kinds of tools witches required to do their mumbo jumbo, I went for the variety within quantity approach which means I made pretty much everything by the time all the sleepyheads woke up. The table in the Lab that hosted Andy¡¯s armor was bare which made me feel a little sad and I just felt this desire to fill the space up again. This time, I wasn¡¯t going for ¡®overpowered¡¯ madness like I usually do, I went for control and capacity.


    The right side of the granite table was covered in wands, each roughly two feet long and shaped like a pool stick with the butt of it being thicker than the point. Rowan, oak, willow, ash, and baobab wood made up the five top wands with the bottom five consisting of gold, silver, platinum, granite, and iron. The very tips of the wands where I usually put sharp focusing crystals this time around didn¡¯t have the slots for them. Although to cover my bases, I did have an assortment of gems in an organized pile next to the wands for testing.


    Seeing as Acantha was a user of fire and many different kinds at that, I did stay away from any kind of wooden armor. For me that would work but for her, well, it obviously wouldn¡¯t. I also didn¡¯t notice any kind of superhuman strength or dexterity that the Centauri warriors possessed which meant plate armor also wasn¡¯t the best option for her, which left me with leather, skin, bone, or chainmail. To that end, I crafted and grew two sets of bone armor, one with thick skin covered in runes and the other a series of overlapping bone plates also covered in runes. The last one though is the one I figured she would like the best. I fed my backup flesh golem two whole deer for this and it took awhile but I managed to grow a full set of fire dragon armor from Rath¡¯s DNA. Just to make it more badass, I had the flesh golem tattoo the inside and outside of the scales with a few awesome designs as well as making the whole thing black just to make it look cooler.


    ¡°Spoiling the help I see?¡± Reeanth¡¯s sardonic question felt like it would have wrecked the entire process of growing the last set of armor but in reality I was just monitoring the design I had given the flesh golem an hour ago.


    ¡°A knock woulda¡¯ been nice,¡± I growled, straightening my back and letting a few pops out. ¡°What time is it?¡±


    ¡°Well past sunrise. The oaf is showing the witch around and your guardian is keeping an eye on her.¡±


    ¡°Oaf? Guardian?¡± I asked, turning around. ¡°I assume you mean Johnny¡¯s the oaf and maybe Everest or Spot is the guardian.¡±


    ¡°Correct,¡± she answered as she started to fidget. ¡°Although, the purpose of this visit my lord is a bit more selfish.¡±


    ¡°Go on.¡±


    Walking up to the table full of untested experiments, Reeanth ran one hand over the wands, her eyes closed as if she were feeling for something. Turning to me and taking a step back, she asked in a very formal voice, ¡°My lord, I wish to be experimented upon. You need to conduct experiments to test out various tools and runic designs as well as body enhancements and I would like to grow in power. Both can be accomplished simultaneously. I know you¡¯re hesitant to experiment on yourself which I understand, but a vassal such as myself can bear this cost.¡±


    ¡°And I can always return you back to normal with flesh sorcery should you so desire,¡± I finished.


    ¡°That is the hope,¡± Reeanth agreed.


    ¡°You know what?¡± I said, walking over to my industrial sized flesh golem and pulling a grapefruit sized piece off. ¡°We¡¯ll do this the smart way.¡± At my direction, Reeanth put her whole hand into the flesh golems both big and small for a minute and then stepped back. ¡°Ok, this little guy is all yours, your own insurance to heal yourself and to return to me if you ever want your original genetic code. The big guy can keep your genetic code also as a secondary backup but also keep another test version that we can mess with. I can make you a whole new body if you want and modified however you want although I don¡¯t promise exact results.¡±


    Her smile lit up the room, and usually I wouldn¡¯t have noticed but it seriously contrasted with her usual dour attitude. The woman was just too high-strung for her own good. Bowing deeply at the waist she murmured, ¡°I¡¯m deeply honored my lord.¡± Standing back up, she cracked her knuckles. ¡°So how do we proceed?¡±


    Chuckling softly, I walked over to where the stone wall of the Lab¡¯s cavern extended past the work table. ¡°First, gotta tell me whatcha want? You thinking dragon enhancements like Jamal who you haven¡¯t met now that I think about it, or do you want to Hulk out? And you don¡¯t know who that is either . . .¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve always admired the Kasarans, my lord. Few can contest their strength and power although none can determine the source of their abilities, and the Spiratni, their third eye allows them to instantly determine weakness, be it mental or physical.¡±


    My blank stare was all I had to offer that statement. Not needing me to ask the question, Reeanth clarified. ¡°Kasarans are winged forest folk, with light fur that changes to match their surroundings. For the most part, they look like natural humans but even the weres fear their approach. The Spiratni walk the Ways, their third eye allowing them to find the natural rifts of the cosmos to walk from realm to realm the way you and I walk down a hallway. They too look most likely native humans except their skin is a bit more translucent and of course the obvious third eye that sits in their forehead.¡±


    My inner nerd was geeking out at a ten on the Richter scale. I¡¯ve wanted to upgrade my frail body for a long time now but viable options that wouldn¡¯t mess up my magical abilities simply weren¡¯t that plentiful. Pre-magic earth had hundreds of novels of people being part dragon or wolf or bat, but none of them talked about the difficulty of being internally aligned to water and earth and trying to put some fire dragon inside as well. Part of me wanted to wait for a careless earth or water dragon before I started experimenting but Reeanth was providing me an alternate for the time being. The main limiting factor was the fact that I simply didn¡¯t have samples of Spiratni or Kasarans on hand to give the flesh golem.


    ¡°Alas, both of them are rare sentients that haven¡¯t been sighted by us in a while. If you''re lucky you can catch an odd specimen at the slave markets in the dwarven realms.¡±


    Uhg, slavery. Yet another unfortunate result of the mortal condition. Why do drudge work if you can just effortlessly force someone to do it for you? I could see how some sick individuals would go for that but it just doesn¡¯t jive with my internal moral structure. To be fair though, I¡¯m not some crusading moral arbiter of justice willing to go out and hunt down slavers and free the helpless. I got my own problems here on Earth that I need to handle. What is within the realm of possibility is maybe somehow getting passage to a different realm and visiting slave markets and buying what I need, of course freeing the individual as I don¡¯t need them just their genetic code. Who cares if my reasons aren¡¯t purely altruistic?


    It does stand to reason that one of the hidden thrusts of having my brother work the shady side of a magical university is learning the state of otherworldly economics. What do they use for money out there? What do they consider valuable? What is the standard of learning out there? What is the technological standard or the standard for Galactic citizenry? The best piece of info that I do have and still hold very close to my chest is how I make my mana batteries. Five minutes worth of work for me translated into roughly the old world value of three hundred grand, which pre-apocalypse earth would have covered five-ish years of college including food, board, activities, partying, and supplies with some left over, depending on where you went to school. But scarcity and demand determine value which means I¡¯m potentially filthy stinkin¡¯ rich, or, it means that I¡¯m a seriously vulnerable target.


    Wrapping my thoughts back up and turning my attention to the flesh golem, I began playing with the concepts which yielded stunning revelations about my golem. I had my hand on the golem and thought about using it as the first test subject and the golem split into two parts, one the size of a football and hard as a leather and the other morphed into the naked form of Reeanth. ¡°Spooky!¡±


    Reeanth¡¯s shriek didn¡¯t deter me even as I calmly scanned the golem while placing my other hand on the football portion. All of the extracted and catalogued DNA sequences were in the small one but this Reeanth version was the exact biological clone version of my Centauri friend. ¡°Awesome,¡± I whispered, moving the football to touch the clone. A questing sensation touched my mind as the two pieces of the flesh golem connected.


    [It¡¯s asking if you want to perform the test now?] Kraken clarified. [It¡¯s not smart enough to use words but if you do that mental picture thing you were doing just a moment ago it should work.]


    Explaining what Kraken said to Reeanth as I worked, I began following her suggestions to morph the clone body how she wanted it, sort of it being the test mannequin for clothes but one made to Reeanth¡¯s specifications. The funniest reaction we had so far is that apparently Reeanth is slightly allergic to minotaurs. Everytime I put a bit of DNA into the clone, the inert body would start sneezing and raising little hives on its upper arms.


    ¡°This is so COOL! Check it out! I can test this on the dummy version of you and then if you like it and I don¡¯t see any internal issues, we can then try the enhancements out on you!¡±


    She turned a bit green as I added two extra arms and two more boobs to the clone just for the hell of it. Laughing out loud, I returned it to normal and then morphed the Reeanth clone into a dragon-woman hybrid complete with giant claws. As real-Reeanth frowned, I softed the whole concept to make it more human-like but I put minotaur horns on the head, forcefully suppressing the immune system to keep the body still.


    ¡°No horns. I don¡¯t want to give the enemy a convenient handle on my body.¡±


    ¡°Fair,¡± I agreed, taking away the horns. Taking a minute or two, I delved into the clone¡¯s immune system, figuring I might as well solve an annoying issue for Reeanth. Basic allergies is the immune system overcompensating to fight off what it views as an invader even if it¡¯s not, which is why humans tend to hate spring. All that pollen isn¡¯t actually something that would harm your body if your body didn¡¯t view it the way it did. All I needed to do was convince her immune system that minotaur dna wasn¡¯t harmful. Carefully morphing one patch of skin to grow minotaur hair, I watched for a full minute to make sure no reactions popped up. ¡°Good news! I¡¯ve solved one of your problems, maybe one you didn¡¯t even know you had. Your test clone used to be allergic to minotaurs and now it ain¡¯t! Want minotaur skin the same softness as human skin? It¡¯ll give you the same resistance to magic they have?¡±


    Reeanth¡¯s shrug wasn¡¯t really an answer so I kept at it. I had the clone grow fine translucent hairs all over its body that were genetically minotaur in nature. So while the skin might be a bit delicate, the hair covering it might function as an arcane power diverter. Taking it further, the bones of the subject were altered to be more in line with dwarven genetics which would allow it to slowly absorb metals and over time that would result in strengthening the skeletal structure far beyond what normal bone would be able to handle. Playing to whimsy for a moment, I began reverting the body back to normal and then began again.


    Thin scales so red they were almost black grew out to cover most everything from the leg down. Tiny translucent minotaur hairs so fine you could barely make them out grew from the top of the scales and the other places not covered by dragon scales such as her sex, armpits, neck and face. The hair was dark oak brown and also made from minotaur hair and the bones again were dwarven in nature. With another flash of thought, the eyes themselves became a mix between dragon and dwarven with a third nictitating membrane. The scales on the usual contact points such as thighs, knees, elbows and knuckles were molded to be twice as thick just in case and in flipping her over, I then was able to add a dragon¡¯s tail but decided against a set of wings.


    ¡°We can change the color of any part of this if you want but I¡¯m thinkin¡¯ this will be the base model to work off of,¡± I declared proudly. ¡°Mostly fire dragon features with fine-tuned minotaur hair strategically placed at the flexible bits. Dwarven structured bones and a tail to boot! No wings cause the bones will weigh the body down. So, whatcha think?¡±

 Chapter 145 - Burning Binding (Book 3 Chapter 12)

    Poking the thickish but almost prehensile dragon tail with her finger, Reeanth scowled. ¡°What part of me not wanting a ¡®convenient handle¡¯ did you not understand, my lord? Am I to be picked up and hurled by the first troll or ogre that comes my way?¡±


    Narrowing my eyes at the disparagement of my creation, I sighed. ¡°Fine, you¡¯re right. I got a bit carried away. But it¡¯s fun! Come here! When¡¯s the last time you have some fun?¡± Taking her hand and putting it on the clone¡¯s forehead, I put my hand on top of hers and let my flesh sorcery communicate with the golem while taking directions from Reeanth, sort of acting as an interface between her and I and the golem. ¡°Oh, wait!¡± Taking a quick moment, I extended my consciousness to real-Reaanth and fixed her allergies to head off potential problems. ¡°Ok, now. Imagine what you want, how you want to look, how you want to be, pretty much anything at all. The golem has a whole bunch of different kinds of DNA to choose from so go crazy! Literally, I can put you back to normal at any time.¡±


    With less hesitation than I expected, Reeanth¡¯s focused mind with the assistance of my abilities caused a wave of change to ripple out over the clone. The tail faded back into the tailbone as the dark scales and everything went away until it was baseline clone Reeanth on the table, a veritable outside copy of real-Reeanth as if nothing had changed at all. ¡°Well, that¡¯s lame.¡± My comment earned me a quick glare which I simply shrugged at. A moment later, the composition of Reeanth¡¯s skin and hair morphed into minotaur skin and hair, granting the body a great degree of magical resistance. The bones were tuned to be dwarven in nature but the marrow within was altered to be dragon marrow. My vassal showed a lot more consideration for her work than I ever expected as she slowly altered her muscles, ligaments, and tendons to be draconic in nature. Before she got started on the organs, I stopped her.


    ¡°Pause right here. I¡¯m guessing you want to make the rest of the innards mostly draconic, right?¡± She nodded at my assumption. ¡°Ok, I¡¯ll take over for this part.¡± I worked as I talked, giving updates as we went along. ¡°Giving you a dragon stomach will give you odd hunger cravings, like for the flesh of pretty much anything living and maybe for precious metals, so gotta tune that part down. Gotta alter the esophagus a bit so that it is more durable than normal cause dragon stomach acid is insanely powerful, the back muscles may try to instinctively fly even though there are no wings so let¡¯s alter the innate muscle memory here.¡±


    Moving slowly and carefully from system to system, I paid special attention to the heart and lungs, making sure that we wouldn¡¯t have the problem that Jamal had back when he carelessly threw a dragon¡¯s heart into a human body, not prepared at all for the fact that that¡¯s like putting a rocket engine on a kid¡¯s tonka truck. The lungs were several times more efficient than a humans which would certainly grant superhuman endurance and the brain itself had to have some rewiring done. First, to put all of the connections of the body where they should go but also to make sure that the new organs did not send out discordant signals to the brain.


    The eyes were easy, adding the ability to slightly morph into a slit and bring the draconic rods and cones to bear would give Reeanth on-demand dragon vision. And last but not least, I altered the hormones in her brain to make it so that any wound Reeanth sustained would not be healed with scar tissue but with stem cells so that her function would never decrease, meaning that she could always recover from any kind of wound as long as she didn¡¯t die. Strokes and ligament tears, spinal breaks and knee blowouts, given time she would recover back to full strength.


    As the process drew to a close, Kraken peeked through my magical senses to double check my work. [Looking good so far . . . looks like a sixty percent increase in weight but a three hundred percent increase in strength resulting in making a body a little over twice as strong and fast as the original. Test driving would be the real make it or break it and it doesn¡¯t really look different from her original schema. Ok, yup, good neuron change there, allowing for a new set of pathways to update muscle memory at will.] After making a bunch of studious ¡®hmmm¡¯ noises, Kraken highlighted a couple parts of the clone body for me. [I bet if you design the dragonish parts a bit better you¡¯ll make it easier for her soul to channel fire magic. See right there?]


    The tendons and muscles of the clone body formed an incomplete circuit in the body. The dwarven bones were interrupting the overall flow of the design. Making note of it, I carefully wove thin trails of dragon in intricate runes inside and around the dwarven bone so that there were no breaking points in her body for the magic to flow. [Perfect!] Kraken exclaimed. [If I¡¯m right, then she may even be able to use dragon fire itself, especially if you can get her to eat a bit of that lizard. Wizards and mages are more body dependent than sorcerers as a sorcerer¡¯s power is more rooted in the soul than any other magic user.]


    Taking another liberty just because I could, I put thin caps of crystal mana batteries underneath her humeruses and on the backside of her sternum as emergency backups. Following the same concept, I plated the backsides of bones with large-ish surfaces areas with crystal mana battery plating. With another tweak or two, I put runes of impact resistance as well as growth on there so that if necessary, the desire for the batteries allow them to grow bit by bit. Overall, this would help prevent mana overflow issues as well as double her mana capacity.


    Going over the clone body for the last time even as I scoffed at Reeanth¡¯s lack of adventure, the test project was finished. ¡°Whew, fuckin¡¯ damn good job if I do say so myself! Mighty fine work for an up and coming sorcerer!¡± Dusting my shoulder off with a bit of pride, I downed a mug of conjured water and a Centauri ration cube. I looked at Reeanth¡¯s mocking expression and then back at the clone body. ¡°What? It looks just like you!¡± Scanning it again, I turned back to Reeanth. ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m thinking my lord!¡± Staring intently at prone form in front of us, Reeanth walked to the foot of the table and picked up a foot. Slowly examining every inch, she began moving up, running her fingers over it as tiny bits of mana sparked where she touched it. Finishing her look-see, she sat down and sighed. ¡°Is there nothing else we can do my lord? Am I simply to be what you call a ¡®meatshield¡¯ or ¡®tank¡¯ for you?¡±


    ¡°No, the point here was to give you an upgrade, but only if you wanted it,¡± I answered. Gesturing at the body, I slapped the thigh. ¡°I don¡¯t know what your scans told you, but any fire magic would be seriously enhanced due to the fire dragon nature of this body. And the minotaur enhancements mean any kind of wizard fight would be heavily in your favor. Shit, you can try it out and if you don¡¯t like I can put you back the way you are in no time.¡±


    ¡°I need to think on this, my lord. This decision should not be made lightly.¡± Turning on a heel, Reeanth solemnly walked out.


    [What crawled up her butt?] I thought at Kraken. [What part of ¡®I can put you back¡¯ doesn¡¯t she understand?]


    [The Centauri take great pride in their genetic recombination treatments. They went from five foot weaklings to mini-giants with inherent magic in one fell stroke, and now you¡¯re showing the discrepancies of their decisions. Their treatments removed any chance of someone being born with sorcery, removed their chances of having immense power so that most of them could have adequate power.]


    Putting the flesh golem sections back together, I decided to take a step back with the body enhancements. Looking over at the dragonscale armor that I¡¯d made for Acantha, I quickly made another set of similar armors for Reeanth but in her size, one with runed bone, another with runed bone with minotaur leather coverings and then the dragonscale for the last one. There was no point in replacing Reeanth¡¯s mana-maul so I decided against new weaponry for her but I did fill a leather pouch up with flash-bang pebbles and planttrop seeds. Now that my morning work was finished, I rolled the grey refrigerator sized mass of flesh back to the corner of the Lab. After taking a few seconds to make sure that the plans for the Reeanth-clone body were still saved in the genetic storage, I headed back to the clearing to check on my non-human compadres.


    What greeted me was a bit of a shock as I walked outside into the crisp morning air. Johnny, Reeanth, Meliad, Lyra, Everest, Spot and Fuzzy were all relaxing either in the clearing in front of the Hole or in the spaces between the trees ringing the clearing. Acantha was at the center of the gathering, animatedly talking as a floating hologram made up of different colored flames morphed in front of everyone.


    ¡°My lord!¡±


    ¡°Master!¡±


    ¡°Guar-dian.¡±


    Spot¡¯s excited greeting slammed me into the ground, drowning out the rest of the surprised greetings. By the time I¡¯d gotten my mutt off of me and he flopped on the ground to deign to allow me to give him tummy rubs, the rest of the crew started peppering me with questions. The one that grabbed my attention first was from Johnny. ¡°Dude! Have you ever seen a zombie fortress before?!¡±If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    Ignoring the rest of the questions, I honed in on my cultivator friend. ¡°Uh . . . what?¡± My eyes came to rest on the hologram sitting above Acantha¡¯s hand. Ice blue flames formed a pretty good visual of the windswept Arctic landscape, but the scary parts were what towered over the miles of ice. Deeper blue flames skewed upwards in a mad twist of architecture that almost hurt to look at, hooks and spires and sheer walls that jutted out without logic formed a horrifying palace of ice and death. Skulls and bones were either carved or grown out of the ice making up the fortress and there were even small yellow flame incarnations of zombies. As I stared at the hologram, Acantha noticed me trying to parse out the details and zoomed in. Every horizontal surface was covered in frozen undead, everything from human to polar bear and even some skeletal structures that I didn¡¯t recognize.


    ¡°Are those?¡± I stuttered, peering even closer. ¡°Are those dragons? Skeletal dragons and fuckin¡¯ dinosaurs too? And what are those?¡±


    ¡°Bone-topi! What octopi would like if they had bones and were alive again!¡± I couldn¡¯t stand the look of excitement on Johnny¡¯s face. ¡°And look! Zombie giants and zombie wolves! Holy cow! Your new hottie can make her fire look like anything!¡±


    Acantha blushed at Johnny¡¯s gushing, even as he didn¡¯t realize that he was giving her a compliment. ¡°Where did you get this? Is this accurate, as in real time or a snapshot of a while ago?¡±


    ¡°I did prepare for this. Sybella told me of your goals and I gathered sufficient intelligence to assist you. My affinities were part of the reason that I was chosen to be a suitable stand-in for your brother and my preparations were what clinched it. The undead fear fire for its purifying nature and I have that in abundance.¡± Taking a deep breath, Acantha waved her hand through the floating flames. ¡°This was current as of two of your weeks ago, and that fortress is like nothing this planet has ever seen before. It¡¯s at least four times larger than the pyramid structures in Egypt and made directly from the glacial ice and frozen bedrock of the Arctic. Assaulting such a position without a team of fire drakes or fire elementals would be the definition of insanity.¡±


    I raised one eyebrow. ¡°What about an army of sunstone golems with the power of a desert at their beck and call?¡±


    ¡°I, uh, what? You mean to say that-¡±


    ¡°Yup. I have an army of sunstone golems out in the desert.¡± I couldn¡¯t help but gloat a bit. ¡°And I can make a couple more armies in a month or two.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s too dangerous, master! You can¡¯t go! The forest needs you here!¡± Lyra and Meliad were almost in sync with their plea. Everest reached forward and gently pulled them back.


    Hun-gry. Ones. Need. To. Die.¡±


    ¡°Thank you Everest for that stony endorsement.¡± The tension in the air was a bit strained. The forest ladies were instinctively scared of the Hungry Ones even as Everest understood the rock-hard determination I had to get rid of them. Johnny could barely hold his excitement in and Reeanth was still frowning, which hadn¡¯t changed from our conversation earlier about the clone body, and Acantha simply looked intrigued. My guess is that she was wondering what the hell she¡¯d gotten herself into and at the same time, did the crazy sorcerer with a hidden golem army stand a chance against this?


    ¡°Since the fuckin¡¯ cat is out of the bag, might as well get this planning session started. Acantha, you have the floor. Tell us everything you know.¡± Taking a step back, I walked over and propped myself up against Spot who moved his head so that I could scratch behind his ears. Fuzzy lay next to us and nudged me with his nose, wanting some attention as well, which I obliged with a muzzle scratch.


    ¡°The undead known as the Hungry Ones come in as many flavors as the Hive. The most basic of them are simply reanimated corpses, fused with mana and a hunger that drives them to attack anything with a pulse. Some of the usual favorites used as shock troops are the larger creatures who¡¯s bulk can be used at battering rams or to disrupt formations. It¡¯s important to note that the undead do NOT tire and they do NOT need to rest. They also operate on what is called ¡®mana-vision¡¯. Their eyes don¡¯t work but they can sense life, warmth, and mana without error.¡±


    ¡°Do they do crazy shit like Left for Dead?¡± Johnny asked. ¡°We got like spitters and banshees and shit?¡±


    Acantha¡¯s puzzled look prompted me. ¡°Ignore him. It¡¯s a video game from before.¡±


    ¡°If I understand correctly,¡± she mused. ¡°You¡¯re asking if there are special kinds of undead?¡± When we both nodded, she laughed. ¡°Of course! The vilest of the bunch are completely rotten on the inside and split apart easily when attacked, spraying disease and corruption from every orifice and wound. Some of them are experiments like devourers, who eat fresh bodies and spew spiked bones from eye sockets or mouths, growing new limbs to fight from all directions. My least favorite are the bone warriors, magically enhanced skeletons that are infused with incredible amounts of mana. As they do not have any form of soft organics such as muscles or tendons to assist with movement, the vast amounts of mana do the work.¡±


    ¡°Which means that the skeletons will be nigh indestructible, hard to burn and even harder to break,¡± Reeanth added with a scowl. ¡°If left alone for a couple centuries, it is said that some skeleton warriors may even gather enough mana to become sentient, growing in power to be skeleton mages, wielders of death and raisers of the dead.¡±


    ¡°That is correct, my fellow vassal,¡± Acantha agreed with a smile. ¡°Now what your Norse mythology called ¡®Draugr¡¯, we call ¡®Draugen¡¯ but the differences are minor. They are not as hardy as bone warriors but they are more powerful overall. Think of them as empowered zombies but without being as fleshy. They are mummified corpses of warriors imbued with spirits of the dead that hate the living. Equipped with the skills that the body had while it was alive, Draugen can go toe to toe with Centauri warriors without tiring.¡±


    Each part of the lecture came to life or maybe unlife thanks to Acantha¡¯s skill with her flames, flashing between ghosts, poltergeists, exploding skeleton bird bombs, zombie behemoths, and liches. Every new picture made my butthole pucker just a bit tighter as I kept mentally adding how many damn sunstone golems I¡¯d need to make to freaking annihilate what I¡¯m now calling the Northern Fortress. So far, I have gotten up to at least a thousand basic soldier golems which means twenty elemental sergeants to command them, which comes out to about another two months of prep . . .


    ¡°Hey!¡± Johnny called out, interrupting my calculation. ¡°You¡¯re missing the best part!¡±


    The flaming hologram was now showing a massive portal darker than Satan¡¯s butthole, carved out of a stone so black that it appeared to suck in all of the light around it. Green wispy light that evoked the feeling of sickness radiated from the outside of the portal around its frame and was pulled into the blackness.


    ¡°The key to the hordes lies with their very own portal system that allows for constant reinforcements. Any assault on the area will result in this becoming active and spewing uncounted enemies to drown attackers with sheer numbers. We believe that it is drawing power from the Aurora Borealis which is active every twelve hours. From what we¡¯ve detected, the Aurora Borealis is even more active now that the Veil is rent and mana with Chaos from outside the atmosphere is battling with Earth¡¯s natural magnetosphere and ionosphere.¡± The pretty northern lights simulacrum exploded into existence over the holographic portal, which sucked it in and spewed out the flaming mini-zombies for us to see. Acantha continued as the lights vanished. ¡°This means our best shot of a successful assault would be right as the power supply for the portal is waning.¡±


    ********


    After the presentation from hell, I grabbed Acantha and Spot and took all three of us to Sunstone Castle. After telling Spot to go check in on what I assumed was his litter, I gave my new partner the grand tour. Kraken assisted me in the background, pointing out various enchantments and systems we had in place so I could elaborate for her. Placing Gungnir with Kraken inside the golem pedestal, checked in on the giant batteries buried below the fortifications. The overall charge was hovering around eighty percent at the moment which was good enough for now since I had Kraken devote all of the available resources towards making the additions to the golem army. Setting aside enough basic soldier golems to make up the required number of commanding elementals, I got busy summoning earth elementals and placing them inside their sunstone bodies. I had Kraken overlay the basic set of instructions to which he easily set into the sunstone bodies.


    ¡°This is INCREDIBLE!¡± Acantha gasped, running around and looking at everything. ¡°Are these runes INSIDE of the bricks themselves? And it¡¯s not even hot in here even though this is the desert and you¡¯re harnessing heat and light for power?!¡± Turning to me, she saw me point out one of the windows. Rushing over, she watched with her mouth wide open as sunstone golems were slowly conjured by the dozen, each body part slowly coming into view as the castle via Kraken was directing the conjuration process. ¡°You¡¯re conjuring them? Are you a sorcerer? But what kind of a sorcerer would be able to do this? Not just an earth sorcerer . . .¡±


    [Might as well come clean. She¡¯s gonna figure it out eventually but you should get an oath to protect yourself.] Heeding my spirit familiar¡¯s advice, I waited until Acantha was done talking to herself.


    ¡°My secrets are worth more than your life,¡± I said softly as Acantha turned to bombard me with more questions. Gungnir glowed brightly in its pedestal as I reached over and gripped it, power pouring into me as I joined the circuit. ¡°I will need a magically binding oath that you will not ever betray to your clan what you learn from me or about me while you¡¯re here.¡±


    Acantha shivered as she looked around at the majesty of the Yggdrasil baobab tree as it brimmed with raw power, felt the bone deep hum of the solar panel rune work keeping the condensed heat and light at bay, the increasing number of golems being grown piece by conjured piece with their giant stone axes and hammers at their feet. ¡°I would give my life to learn secrets such as this.¡± Pulling an athame from her calf sheath, she lightly cut her palm, smearing it once across her forehead, once across her neck, and twice across the bare skin of her barely exposed chest. ¡°May my flames burn the knowledge from my head and the secrets from my heart if I ever betray what I learn from you. May my fire carve out my throat if I dare utter betrayal in voice or spirit. May my lungs be naught but ash if I breathe what I have learned.¡±


    Crimson fire erupted from the smeared blood as it ran down the streaks across her head, neck, and chest. The flames increased in intensity as they moved downwards, evaporating the blood until the only spot burning was the point just above her sternum. For a moment, it looked like she was going to be drilled through by her own flames and then they abruptly went out and in its place was a small blood red tattoo of a flaming knife pointing upwards at her neck. Fainting where she stood, I was so surprised that I didn¡¯t even catch her.


    [I¡¯d say that¡¯s pretty binding, boss,] Kraken remarked. [Her magic is now actually linked to her brain, throat, heart, and lungs and one wrong action will cause her to go up in some pretty hellish flames. Shit.]


    ¡°Maybe I should¡¯ve gone to school and let Andy mind Earth for a while,¡± I muttered, kneeling down to examine Acantha¡¯s prone form. Poking her with a finger, she groaned and sat up, cursing under her breath. ¡°None of that now,¡± I assured her, pushing her back down as I forced a bit of healing magic into her to block the pain. ¡°Your oath is plenty good enough for me, a bit over enthusiastic but I¡¯ll take it.¡±


    ¡°How, how did you do this? All of this?¡±


    ¡°Well, it all started about the time magic came to town.¡±

 Chapter 146 - Rocky Road to Recovery (Book 3 Chapter 13)

    Acantha made talking easy, no, not in the sappy kind of way, but in the way that time passes by without anyone even noticing. Spot ranged far and wide doing his doggy duty, literally and figuratively, all across the desert as my newest vassal and I traded stories as we monitored Kraken painstakingly creating new additions to my army. I told her my life story which wasn¡¯t that interesting up till the apocalypse kicked off and she told me about her ordeals with her Coven. Turns out, her fire wasn¡¯t something she was born with, rather it was a result of a wild magic experiment that was trying to create something called True Fire. Several dragons, three devils, two fire elementals, and an efreet carrying four phoenix feathers were involved with ritual that had a bit of magical Greek fire in the center. Two explosions and one crazy woman trying to put it out resulted in Acantha being stripped of all of the power she¡¯d gained for the past seventy years but it gave her FIRE. From what she¡¯d gathered so far from her own testing, with her Coven¡¯s approval, was that any kind of flame simply loved her and if she encountered a new kind of fire then hers would eat it and she¡¯d get stronger.


    Whereas my gifts were the result of the intervention of mindless Chaos which was simply less cool than her experience. As we got to talking, I even told her about Sarah and my struggles for the first two months trying to defend the cocoon of my woman, and then the Yggdrasil seed incident where my fiance went from tree lady to THE TREE LADY, from a humble oak to the living spine of the universe, leaving me behind to contend with the rest of this fucking planet. I was rather impressed that I managed to not shed a tear at all but even my flesh sorcery had a hard time with that. What impressed Acantha was the unconscious casual way that I proudly showed off my creations out here in the desert, my desert-ified willow tree overtop the underground cave hideout being powered by the kinetic flow of the Colorado River, the layers of dense solar-powered batteries with the gold and crystal ritual circles concentrating the power of the desert sun.


    Since Acantha¡¯s discretion and loyalty were assured by the power of her own bloodfire, I didn¡¯t even have a problem telling her that I was a sorcerer of not just one, but multiple elements. I even took the time to fix a glaring error in my Sunstone Castle planning. If this position were to ever be assaulted and I had living beings stationed here, then they¡¯d be shit outta luck if I didn¡¯t put a flesh golem here. A quick trip back home allowed me to get to my main flesh golem and separate a fist sized piece of it containing all of the DNA sequences I¡¯d gathered so far. Coming back to the castle, Acantha and I hunted up some bison-sized lizards and had Spot drag them back so I could use the bodies as fuel for the flesh golem.


    ¡°Anything? Just stick your hand on it and change anything I want? It¡¯s that easy?¡±


    ¡°Yup.¡± My answer seemed to barely move the mountain of skepticism that Acantha was workin¡¯ with, even after I¡¯d shown her the process of the mini-flesh golem devouring the lizards to grow to a decent size. The golem, now truck sized, sat there very still even as I could tell that it was converting the dead lizard tissue to blank but full of energy stem cells. ¡°All changes are painless unless you want them to be. We got a bunch of different creatures up in there but there are some limits. I cannot make creatures with intact souls or minds from this thing and the universe is still full of animals I haven¡¯t encountered yet,¡± I continued, smacking the dull grey flesh with my hand. ¡°For instance, I¡¯d like to get my hands on a water and an earth dragon but that¡¯s gonna take a while, but I do have fire dragon DNA in there.¡±


    She just stood there, silent. Her gaze looked like it was going to burn a hole into my golem which made me snap my fingers. ¡°Wha? Hey!¡±


    ¡°Sorry princess,¡± I replied. ¡°Can¡¯t have you lightin¡¯ this baby on fire. Let¡¯s say someone gets pulled off a battlefield with no limbs or face AND is still breathing. All I have to do is shove him onto the golem and less than a minute later he¡¯d be fine. Dead tissue and foreign objects removed and missing pieces put back on with his own DNA sequence so there¡¯s no chance for rejection.¡±


    ¡°You could save so many lives . . .¡±


    ¡°I know. I could also end so many. I have a Doomsday protocol in every single one of these that¡¯s only answerable to me. I call it, Operation Blob.¡± Assuming she hadn¡¯t seen the really old movie, I described the terror that could ensue if an amorphous flesh devouring monster with no real weaknesses and a plethora of time and food got loose.


    ¡°That¡¯s not real but your people came up with that? Why?¡± Acantha exclaimed. ¡°Slimes are real and golems are real. I know, we¡¯ve lost plenty of people in battlefield cleanups due to things feeding on the corpses.¡±


    Laughing out loud, I quickly stifled it as she glared at me. ¡°What? Magic has been real to us for like eight months now. Forgive me if we newbies have wild imaginations. We¡¯ve also thought up artificial intelligences that take over people¡¯s brains, hungry zombies and thirsty vampires, god-like mummies bringing plagues, the craziness goes on and that was before the Ripples hit the fan.¡±


    ¡°But those are real.¡± Her body was giving off a slight heat now and not the intense kind of happy or sexual kind. It was a pressure cooker building up some steam.


    ¡°They¡¯re real now. You know who I¡¯m really afraid of?¡± I asked, even as I looked away and examined Kraken¡¯s latest work. ¡°I¡¯m afraid of the nerds, ya know, the dudes who worked for Microsoft, Apple, or Tesla and then got magic. Those dudes have an IQ, that combined with magic, would wreck some actual hell if they were in my position. My Earth had groups of people that fantasized day in and day out about magic and what it could do. We dreamed of raising the dead or battling monsters with magical lasers or arcane firepower. Now, they can. And THAT¡¯S scary.¡±


    Taking a deep breath, I began moving the flesh golem to the spot where I actually wanted it to be. With a hint of will, it turned its skin touching the floor into a slick membrane that allowed me to push it into place. The center of Sunstone Castle was a large courtyard featuring my altered Yggdrasil baobab tree and in front of it was the control pedestal where Gungnir went. The batteries were underground but the solar panels were on the ritual circle outside the Castle and few up on top of the walls at cardinal points. The golem, I moved that to the back of the castle courtyard where I set up a basic stone building big enough to fit the golem and two large vans. Very basic stone beds lined the walls and there were wooden boxes attached to the walls that were as of yet unfilled. Ideally, I¡¯d have Centauri meal cubes in there along with weapons and armor as medical supplies wouldn¡¯t be needed due to the golem.


    Acantha took the opportunity to steer the conversation in a different direction than native Earth nerds. ¡°What¡¯s the real purpose of the golem? If you have flesh sorcery, you can heal anyone anytime you want, but this seems a bit altruistic for someone on a mission. Was it an experiment that simply went better than you expected or was it for the children of that city . . . New Richmond?¡±


    ¡°Both,¡± I grumbled. ¡°It¡¯s basically a convenient and complete hospital that doesn¡¯t get tired. Feed it and it can do anything you want it too, which means alterations or upgrades are on the menu too if you have the required pound of flesh so to speak. It started as something to help me upgrade my own body but apparently a fire dragon and a sorcerer with water do not mix.¡±


    ¡°The sorcerers of old never did anything like this,¡± she whispered, still staring at the golem in wonder. ¡°Tales say they ruled their sectors with an iron fist sheathed in power. Guilds ruled entire galaxies and their only foes were dragons and cultivators. Magic users of all kinds sought them for their power, as children from sorcerers almost certainly gained most if not all of their sorceries. That¡¯s all we know as the accounts from that far back are locked up in the Coven¡¯s Archives.¡±


    ¡°You mean your ancestral memories, right?¡± I grinned. Acantha whipped around, not even bothering to hide her shock. ¡°Oh I know about them but there¡¯s a cost right? The mind isn¡¯t meant to hold so many lifetimes. The soul can only bear so much weight before it gives out. Maybe that¡¯s the reason you jumped into that ritual fire, not to put it out but to get it over with?¡± My pointed prodding revealed the shame in her eyes even as she turned away, her hands shaking even as she gripped the loose folds of her pants.


    ¡°I did wonder about the downsides of internally bearing generations worth of skills and knowledge but fuckin¡¯ hell dude, suicide?¡± Sometimes, I hate being right. What makes it worse is that we weren¡¯t even drinking, no liquor to take the edge off the sudden rawness of the conversation. What makes it worse was that I was able to see the signs too easily, the slight bit of sick joy coming out in her eyes when she told me about the ritual exploding, that hint of sadness when she mentioned surviving as an afterthought even after gaining god-like control over fire. Before the Ripples, I saw too many of my Army buddies have the same ticks and signs, and even though I was never called to combat, I saw what came home. They weren¡¯t the same guys that left.


    What it boiled down to was that Sybella gave me a ticking time bomb of a witch, maybe not intentionally or spitefully, but the simple fact remains that Acantha is unstable. I don¡¯t really care if it¡¯s her fault or not but as my vassal, my partner, and my ward, I have to at least attempt to keep her in good shape for a couple years. Mentally communicating with Kraken, I had him finish up the golems that were still in-progress and dissolve those that had just started. I figured that I was taking one liberty too many but I couldn¡¯t have my or my team¡¯s safety in jeopardy, which meant sudden and overbearing force was required. Reaching forward, I poked her right in the back of her head with a finger infused with flesh and mind magic, instantly knocking her unconscious.  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    [Seems a little low]. Ignoring Kraken, I caught Acantha and carried her over to Gungnir where I began drawing on the consolidated power of Sunstone Castle. [You can¡¯t fix crazy! I¡¯ve seen all the rom-coms you have in your memories and crazy is the one thing you can¡¯t fix! Well, maybe put stupid in that list too but crazy is worse!]


    [Stupid is always worse than crazy,] I retorted. [But think about it from my perspective. What if she is nuts, certifiably? AND, what if it isn¡¯t her fault? So, if it is from the memories, then it¡¯s possible that I can fix it. I¡¯m picturing her memories like a river that¡¯s been dammed up but there¡¯s either a crack in the dam or the spout where they should be coming through calmly is open a bit too wide. So I need to stem the tide by sealing the crack or screwing the opening to be a bit smaller so she can handle it. But I need to see it to figure it out.]


    [All good points,] Kraken grunted. [But . . . what if she is just plain and simple crazy?]


    [I fuckin¡¯ hope not.] With one hand on Gungnir and the other on Acantha¡¯s forehead, I meditated for a moment and then dove inside. The landscape before me was not what I expected. Every time I¡¯ve entered someone else¡¯s mind, there was some form of building that was the structural concept of that person¡¯s inner self, their consciousness. Mine was my soul-tree and Kraken had been drawing up plans to put the Sunstone Castle design around it as a way of fortifying my own spirit. But Acantha, this was simply raw.


    Volcanoes. Miles and miles of massive volcanoes as far as the soul could see. Each one spewing lava into the air dispersing ash to blacken the sky. Some had gentle lava flows coming out of the sides but those were few and far between as far as I could see. Although, off in the distance I could barely make out almost a bastardized outline of a city between two Mount Everest sized volcanoes, odd.


    ¡°Creepy.¡± I almost jumped out of my skin as Kraken appeared beside me, surveying the area with a calm eye.


    ¡°Where the fuck-¡±


    ¡°Relax. Spirit familiar, remember?¡± Kraken teased, rolling his eye. ¡°Besides, this is a mindscape here which is the gateway to the soul, so I have every right to be here to help your ass out in HER place of power, dreary as it is.¡± Surveying the oozing and exploding volcanoes, I wrapped the both of us in a dense shield of mana and cast my senses out, paying the most attention to what my mind sorcery was telling me. These volcanoes weren¡¯t natural, really, they were a mix of the unending flow of memories from Acantha¡¯s ancestors that had combined with the combination of primal energies of the different kinds of fire from the ritual gone wrong, which resulted in her mind becoming this mess.


    ¡°Whatcha thinkin? Cause Ima¡¯ thinkin¡¯ there ain¡¯t no fixin¡¯ this.¡±


    Glaring at Kraken for his horrible attempt at a southern accent, he gave a shrug to show he wasn¡¯t sorry for being so bad at it. ¡°I¡¯m thinkin¡¯,¡± I mocked, ¡°that we can mold what we can¡¯t fix.¡±


    My thought-projection self with Kraken flew over to the nearest volcano, floating just off to the side of the erupting lava. Shaking my head at what I was planning on doing, I shot up into the ashy sky, forcefully shoving aside the massive layer of ash clouds so I could get a decent picture of the whole area. Floating back down after burning the image into my brain, I closed my eyes, gathering my will to reshape this mental reality. As much as I wanted to forcefully wave a wand and make this all go away, the fact of the matter was that my toolbox had a different answer. Sometimes, that with which you are cursed may in fact be a blessing if the right idea comes along.


    The first volcano did not like my intervention as I forced the base on opposite sides to split open, venting the lava out to the side. Using my sorcery of the mind, mimicking my earth sorcery was a breeze. For the lava, I dug channels for it to travel outwards until it touched another volcano where I again created large vents in the base and then made more channels to flow.


    ¡°Ah, I get it. You¡¯re making a channel connecting the volcanoes to form a river of lava, which will calm down the landscape. Are you going to flatten the volcanoes to ease the landscape, where hopefully that will ease the mental distress?¡± Kraken questioned.


    ¡°Yup.¡± Moving quickly from one volcano to the next, I followed the image in my brain, connecting the volcanoes as if it were a game of connect the dots, forming a giant rune for meekness. Some people view that word as the modern definition of gentle or soft in personality, but the older meaning is what I was going for. The intent of ¡®strength under control¡¯ was the older meaning, the more powerful meaning of the word, which was the powerful intent I was imbuing into the landscape. Inside of the main rune, I connected the inner volcanoes to make two more small runes, one for fire and the other for mind, essentially combining the three to form the concept that the fire of her power with the weight of her ancestor¡¯s memories would be her strength yet completely under her control.


    As the rework of Acantha¡¯s mind landscape was completed, almost instantly it settled down. The eruptions of lava were now perfectly channeled off to the sides into the lava river instead of violently exploding into the air. The sky was no longer constantly getting thicker with ash and the air slowly began to clear. Floating through her mind, I altered a few channels here and there to make them deeper and wider to help offset influxes of power, taking great care to shore up the cracks and slowly shape the volcanoes themselves to have extra pressure vents higher up on the cone if need be.


    Flying over to her soot-covered cityscape, I set Kraken and myself down right outside the walls. ¡°Come on out! I know you¡¯re in there!¡± I roared, using magic to make my voice larger than life. The sound shook the city almost literally, the walls and buildings rippling under the force of my power. ¡°Acantha! We can fix this shit right now!¡±


    Ash and soot and fire coalesced in front of me, flashing brightly before exploding into a humanoid shape. ¡°Wha? Who?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s all right,¡± I soothed. ¡°It¡¯s all right. I promise, I¡¯m here to help. Your mind right now is in a state of flux or constant change. Your damaged psyche is on the mend but it needs you. Your mind-castle needs to be rejuvenated, healed. I can help you with that but first, picture yourself as here. Listen to my voice, be here with me.¡±


    ¡°I don-, I nee-.¡±


    Channeling a thin thread of power to the nascent form in front of me, I kept it stable as the projection became more solid, taking on the feminine form. Over the course of an hour, Acantha¡¯s feature finally filled out. ¡°There we go, well done.¡±


    ¡°Nate, how did this happen, what did you do?¡± she questioned fearfully, looking around and covering her nakedness with her hands.


    ¡°Relax, just will yourself to have clothes. This is your mind, here, you have all the power. I¡¯m just the bandage right now. None of this will stay if you don¡¯t want it to,¡± I reassured. ¡°What you need to do is either make it permanent or fix it yourself.¡±


    ¡°Make what permanent? Fix what?¡±


    ¡°Yourself. Turn around, look at your own mind, covered in ash, a desolate burned out wasteland. It needs life again. I put you back in control of your own mind, but you need to take control. I can¡¯t do that for you.¡±


    Almost hyperventilating, Acantha¡¯s eyes went wide as she looked out at her city and then turned to gaze out over the landscape. ¡°See?¡± I pointed. ¡°The volcanic issue is solved. The memories and fire are combined and channeled in perfect harmony and I¡¯ve made sure that it¡¯s not set in stone unless you want it to be. Here¡¯s your chance. Force, no, will yourself back to yourself. This is your land, your mind, under your power. My work is done.¡±


    Her eyes searched my own, finding the truth in my words. Her shaking slowly gave way to calm strength, the realization that the only thing hurting her now was herself. Raising one hand, she watched in wonder as her mind and her will worked in tandem, fully clothing her. And that simple act was enough to tip off a landslide of progress. Turning around, she blasted herself towards the city wall, slamming her palms into it. A wave of fire radiated outwards, changing the dull grey and black wall to flaming red and then continuing on, completely restoring and reshaping the sad burned-out hulk of a city into a beautiful metropolis of ruby and carved fire. Orange, red, and blue sculptures of mythical creatures adorned the walls and the tops of the buildings, dragons keeping watch over the domain, phoenixes flitting about without a care, efreets faithfully tending their fires.


    The wave of changing flame didn¡¯t stop there. It washed out over the volcanic landscape I¡¯d spent hours fixing. Golden flames smashed into the volcanoes transforming them into solid obsidian fixtures of dragons and gargoyles spewing lava. The channels were changed into volcanic rock to better handle the sheer amount of heat although the overall runic shapes were left untouched. Standing up straight, Acantha looked up and made a hard yanking motion, pulling the clouds of ash out of the sky so that it gathered into a small but very dense ball that floated over her outstretched hand. Flinging it outwards, the ash exploded and took the form of a giant diamond amalgamation of a flaming gryphon and fire salamander. Crowing in newborn excitement, the monster looked around and happily dove into the river of lava, splashing like an otter pup experiencing water for the first time.


    Color me impressed. Even as I looked around in awe of the changes around me, part of me couldn¡¯t help but wonder if witches in general were as messed up as this. And if that was true, no wonder sorcerers of all kinds were sought after. A mind sorcerer could fix mental issues while a flesh sorcerer could help someone live forever, and the list just freaking goes on. Taking one last look at the expression of unburdened joy on Acantha¡¯s face, I quietly extricated myself from her mind leaving her to a psyche on the road to recovery.


    That woman was lights out for the next two days. I did the decent thing and had Kraken hook her up to a minor mana feed as she healed the mental and physical damage she sustained not only from the healing process but also the long term scar tissue from overuse of mana. Checking in every six hours or so, I administered a shot of flesh sorcery to boost the process without overdoing it. Healing the mind takes time, and luckily I had plenty of stuff to do to keep me occupied.


    First and foremost, Kraken kept working on beefing up our golem numbers and I took a look at the geographical issues we were going to face such as the fact when everyone said the Hungry Ones were in the ¡®North¡¯, they meant to say ¡®Greenland¡¯. And of course, ¡®Green¡¯ land is a land of ice and snow, mostly devoid of vegetation. From my memories of elementary school education, they colored Greenland ¡®white¡¯ because of all the fucking snow. Perfect place for zombies to hole up and wait for a couple centuries for people to forget about them. In the winter, their humongous island of a mini-continent would be even harder to penetrate. The Antarctic was exactly what we were expecting though, hard as fuck to get to which is why it was going to be secondary.


    Greenland is located northeast of the North American continent, up past Alaska and Canada and right up Santa¡¯s butthole. It took me three hours of communion with the World Tree to even figure out if there was any flora there and another three to find an area strong enough to host a fledgling World Tree which I could use as a base. The view of the planet is a bit fuzzy in my mind as trees don¡¯t necessarily use English to communicate with us humans. They look at the Earth in terms of fertile soil and nice sunlight, or bad soil and harsh climate. Southern Greenland has just enough of a nature leyline to barely fit my energy-heavy butt and one more person. By the time Acantha came to, I had a plan.

 Chapter 147 - Operation Burning Freedom (Book 3 Chapter 14)

    Of course, Acantha didn¡¯t want to hear any part of my plan even though it was really well thought out. I had the sneaky entrance, the clandestine goal, AND the clever getaway all ready to go and written down for easy presentation, but noooooo. Someone had to have a stick up their butt about ¡®invasion of privacy¡¯ and ¡®boundaries¡¯. The ¡®discussion¡¯ was loud, long, and a bit screechy. And it didn¡¯t help when I waited for the inevitable deep breath for her to continue said rant to poke her in the head saying, ¡°I¡¯ll do it again.¡±


    The subsequent eruption was spectacular. Flames dramatically flying everywhere without actually burning anything, wild epithets that would make a sailor blush and a long eloquent dissertation about a donkey somewhere in my family ancestry. Impressive, really. But the moment did come where I had had enough. Suddenly drawing on my power, I let the aura of my sorceries out as I encased Acantha in a personal pyramid of stone up to her neck. The stone creaked as runes of chains cracked across the surface, further sealing her in. Two conjured masses of water, one ice and the other liquid, appeared above her in the form of giant bladed spears while spear-form Gungnir was an inch away from her nose. With the backing of the Sunstone Castle¡¯s deep mana reserves and my own considerable stores of power, it looked like I was the epicenter of a storm. The thin grass at my feet was blowing away from me in all directions as I very calmly smiled.


    ¡°Feel better yet?¡± I snapped as her eyes went cross-eyed trying to look at the point of my weapon. ¡°I get needing to unload but I did what I did because I had to do it. It¡¯s not your fault that Sybella sent me a suicidal fire witch with a complex, but I can¡¯t have someone like that watching my back. I¡¯m in charge here whether you like it or not, and technically, you¡¯re my charge, my ward. So, I fixed you, or rather helped you fix yourself. At any time you could have said no or reversed it, but you didn¡¯t. Shit, it was and still is your mind, which means you have all the power ALL the time in there. So unload your crap somewhere else.¡±


    Taking a moment to reel my power back in, I cracked my neck and put Gungnir back into its pedestal. ¡°Oh, and get yourself out. You have three days or I¡¯m sending you back to Sybella.¡± Stalking away, I headed back to my house under the willow tree and kept reviewing my plans, making sure to keep a magical eye on Acantha. Kraken timidly knocked on our mental link.


    [Maybe that was a bit harsh?] he questioned.


    [Maybe,] I half-heartedly countered. [But maybe not. I might be misplacing my anger a bit here. Sybella sent me a broken witch, literally broken! What if I hadn¡¯t known? What if I had a suicidal witch as my backup? Yes, she has a ton of potential, especially against freaking zombies but dude, come on. Nuclear reactors are great too if they run well but all hell breaks loose if they pop a screw. Besides, it was a huge red flag that I was able to slip into her mind as easy as I did. There should be some kind of resistance to get to the mindscape.]


    [All I¡¯m saying is that the actions you took against your own ally were possibly out of line, probably skirting the bounds of what you¡¯re allowed to do to your own vassal,] Kraken explained. [It is justifiable however to administer corrective actions in light of being gifted a flawed minion, which is probably how you should frame this issue if it ever comes to light.]


    [Sybella can kiss my skinny ass. Damaged goods! It¡¯s all I ever get!] I ranted, mostly to myself. [Are the hot ones always crazy?]


    Pulling my hoverboard and rifle out of Gungnir who was still on the pedestal, I tossed the hoverboard on the dry desert ground and hopped on, taking off towards the river. I spent the next two hours skating around, doing my best to get proficient at hoverskating at speeds over a hundred miles an hour. I¡¯ll tell you what, misjudging sharp turns is painful without airbags, especially with the hot desert winds fiercely blowing out of nowhere. And since I had time to kill, I decided to go for a quick flight and get a good lay of the land. Putting my hoverboard away back at the castle, I dusted off SAW¡¯s wings and took off.


    Part of me wondered how Fernando and Remy were doing, if they¡¯d made any headway in cleaning up their post-apocalyptic city. The paranoid side was in the midst of arguing if it would be better to harden my Sunstone Castle so no one would ever dream of attacking it but the other part didn¡¯t like the idea of a potential hotspot anywhere near me. The memories about Phoenix that I¡¯d taken from Fernando didn¡¯t bode well for this part of the country. Demons, necromancers, vampiric zombies gone wild and power hungry wizards sounded like a recipe for disaster.


    Noting the safety at which great height affords me, I clutched my rifle to my chest as I turned towards Phoenix and then turned right back around again. No way in hell I was going to go to a place like that without all of my weapons, especially my main one. Gungnir was serving as the power focus for Kraken who was making my golem army at the moment, and heading to a potential firefight without it was basically committing suicide. Putting Phoenix on my to-do list, I winged my way back home and then followed the course of the Colorado River up north. I remember Reeanth telling me that Vegas was bombed out by the Centauri a while ago and the river¡¯s path where I¡¯m at goes right near Vegas.


    Following a roughly northern path, a quick trip at two hundred miles an hour got me there pretty quick. What I had pictured in my mind way back when Reeanth told me that Vegas was bombed, was either one of two things. Either a giant crater that would be almost visible from space, or a landscape speckled with gutted hulks of burned down buildings.


    [Hey! She¡¯s out already!] Kraken wailed through our link. [The witch turned into a flame and then whooshed out?! Now she¡¯s yelling at me and I don¡¯t know what to do! I didn¡¯t stick her in a stone cone, you did!]


    [Is she attacking you?] I wondered.


    [No . . . but her screaming is really loud!]


    Sighing internally since I was going fast enough for the air to catch in my lungs, I hightailed it back to Sunstone Castle, my solar-powered wings allowing me to fly faster than I ever thought I would under my own power. Thank all the Scions in the sky that my base was not in shambles when I returned. The hour it had taken to get back had allowed Acantha to cool her jets even as I stuck a mediocre landing on one of the castle walls.


    ¡°I¡¯m impressed you got out so quick!¡± I yelled from way up high. ¡°I got a job for ya!¡± A glare that powerful from a woman that tiny was not easily missed. It was however, easily ignored. Taking my time, I let the inevitable tide of yelling that I knew was coming buildup as I slowly walked down the stairs, taking my time and stretching as I did so. Her face was almost purple from holding it in. ¡°Before you say anything, I need to know. Can you fly?¡±


    Disbelief flooded her features at the switch of what she wanted to yell at me for versus the seemingly random question perfectly designed to fluster a fountain of fire magic driven rage. ¡°Can you fly?¡±  Her mouth snapped shut as she looked at me like I was insane even as I snapped my fingers. ¡°You know, flight? The ability to move through the air and defy the pull of gravity while moving at speeds faster than running would afford?¡±Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    Small fiery women always respond well to mocking, and thank goodness for my years of hard-earned skill. Each word she spoke sounded like she chewed them up and spit them out. ¡°I don''t know!¡±


    ¡°See? That wasn¡¯t that hard?¡± Smiling like a lunatic just to bring her closer to a boil, I turned around and started conjuring and shaping a whole new-to-her contraption. Ten minutes of working and ignoring her later, I had a brand new hoverboard that I¡¯d modified just for her. ¡°Now you won¡¯t need to fly! Behold! The FireRider 3000!¡±


    My beautiful creation resembled a six-foot surfboard but the front nose of it curved up just a bit. The sides were adorned with sections of foot-long curved crystal batteries that were attached to the bottom, looking sort of like gleaming skids for it to rest on. The rune work allowing it to hover and direct the power was on the bottom of the hoverboard but covered up with a layer of thin steel with imprinted runes of durability. Pushing the board over to Gungnir, I set up a mana feed from my spear to the new board and started the charging process as I made a small memory crystal.


    ¡°Your task, my vassal, is to do something I don¡¯t want to do nor do I have the time to do it. The memory crystal here,¡± I explained as I tossed it to her, ¡°has the location and everything I know about Phoenix, Arizona. I need this place generally cleaned out. All demons, cannibals, evil necromancers, basically any kind of filth that needs to be purged from a good society, I want it gone. Burn it out. Maybe find some allies or make some friends while you¡¯re there. This hoverboard will get you there in under three hours and can be charging in the sun. I¡¯ll be doing sorcerer things and you be doing burny witchy things.¡±


    Pulling out all of the experimental gear I had made for her from Gungnir, I laid them in front of her on a conjured stone table. ¡°Different kinds of wands and staffs with sockets for different kinds of gems, take some or take¡¯em all, just tell me what happens when you use them. This here is a suit of fire dragon armor made by yours truly. Don¡¯t die on me, okay?¡±


    ¡°Yes master!¡± Her overbearing anger flipped way too quick to eager and obedient supplicant. Quickly stuffing herself into the armor and doing that pants dance women do, she grabbed all of the wands and shoved the gems into her pockets. Putting the memory crystal to her head, she absorbed the info and hopped on the hoverboard, blasting out of the castle.


    [You know she¡¯s going to burn the entire city down, right?] Kraken remarked. [That entire place is going to be one big ash heap.]


    [Shouldn¡¯t be that bad,] I replied, returning my focus to Gungnir and the state of my growing army. [Besides, I put all of the memories from Fernando in there, so there¡¯s a solid chance she might seek him out as a starting point for cleaning up Phoenix. And, if that happens, we might establish another neutral city for when Earth becomes populated. Cleaning that place out will also help that lady get used to her abilities and test out my experiments which will be killing three birds with one stone in my book.]


    I get it. Kicking Acantha out like that might be seen as irresponsible by some but I¡¯ve been in her mind. I¡¯ve seen her strengths and weaknesses. That woman is powerful. She has depths of magical power inside of her that I would be a fool to not be afraid of. She lacks experience and discernment though, Sybella¡¯s coven has done a good job of making powerful witches but they do not test them well. The trials of life season a person in a way that nothing else ever truly does. It¡¯s why young people run away from home, why explorers set out to seek their fortune, why men and women live and breathe at horse races and casinos, it¡¯s more than just the rush of winning that gets them going, it¡¯s the experience.


    It also doesn¡¯t help that I might have made a less than great impression on the two residents of Phoenix that I actually knew. I straight up killed Fernando¡¯s and Remy¡¯s friend, even though she enslaved them, and I wrecked the zombie dino army they brought with them. But maybe the sudden intervention of a flaming heroine to save their city might be just what they need in order to say, ¡®hm, maybe he ain¡¯t that bad¡¯.


    While my vassal went off to save a city, I went on a much more important errand, to find my damn dog. Following my mental link, I flew about four hours east where a set of craggy hills overlooked a small lake. There, my faithful canine companion was playing on the shores of that lake with a pile of roly-poly puppies the size of grown warthogs. In hindsight, maybe landing right next to the happy family wasn¡¯t such a good idea. A dark tan blur smashed into me like a runaway train, knocking me clear into the lake. I skipped a couple times there as my mind tried to catch up to my body.


    Checking to make sure that I was still in one piece and saying thankful prayers that my shields kept me conscious and well, I used my water sorcery and stood on top of the water. Mama wolf was standing at the edge of the lake, her growling causing waves in the lake to come towards me. ¡°Spot! Control your woman, dude! Tell her I¡¯m just the absent uncle!¡± Walking slowly across the surface of the lake, my brain kept reminding me that I left Gungnir at Sunstone Castle. I didn¡¯t think I¡¯d need my weapons to see my own damn dog.


    ¡°Hey! Relax . . . mama wanna snack?¡± I called with my hands up to show I meant no harm to her or her pups. Something grabbed a hold of my leg while I wasn¡¯t paying attention and dragged me under. The teeth couldn¡¯t penetrate my shield or my armor but the thrashing kept me from getting a handle on whatever the fuck it was. Grabbing at all of the water surrounding me and it, I used water sorcery to hurl me and my attacker up on shore.


    ¡°Fuck me,¡± I gasped, staring in disbelief. That right there, if my eyes don¡¯t deceive me, is a water dragon! The unlucky bastard probably came through a temporary portal that closed before it could realize that this was a lake surrounded by a desert. It was probably hoping for a much larger body of water to grow up in undisturbed. This is exactly what I need though to start working on upgrading my own body. I already have DNA for the giant sand lizards from a while ago and now the water dragon will give me the other base piece to get this next important step started.


    ¡°And fuck you too!¡± I roared, grasping outwardly with my hands. The earth responded to my call, enveloping the young dragon¡¯s limbs in dirt that hardened into tons of stone. Wishing I had my flesh golem with me, I decided to improvise. Killing the creature was not required to get what I needed. All I needed was a bit of flesh, like maybe a scale with a bit of skin and blood on the end of it should be perfect. Exercising my power again, I erected a giant stone wall behind me to create an obstacle between me and the dragon. I didn¡¯t want mama wolf to get in the way of this.


    The long blue tail of my prisoner was lashing about, frantically slamming into the stone holding it down even as the dragon blasted high pressure water at me to keep me away. Multitasking my ass off, I diverted the water off the side just enough to keep it from actually hitting but not enough for the dragon to realize that it wasn¡¯t affecting me, all the while I was forcing the stone to grow up and around the dragon¡¯s prone body. Ten minutes of intense concentration and manipulation finally had the dragon still and in the position I wanted. Its head was canted off to the side and it¡¯s tail was cemented down so it couldn¡¯t lash out. The only exposed part of the animal was along the ridge of its belly on the right side.


    ¡°That¡¯s a good girl,¡± I cooed, slowly walking forward, projecting calmness and the thought that I wanted us to be friends through my mind sorcery. The young creature was simply gorgeous, and I could tell she was female by her instinctive obsession with finding a good place to nest for eggs. I wish I could examine her without all of this stone to hold her down but she was half a step away from feral fear dictating her actions. With a bit of flesh sorcery, I was able to simultaneously numb the area of extraction while pulling out a scale with a bit of flesh and blood intact. Gently waving my hand over the wound, I sped up her natural healing so that she wouldn¡¯t have a weak spot in her natural armor for any predators to take advantage of. ¡°Good girl,¡± I soothed as I backed off towards the stone wall I¡¯d made. ¡°Go on now, get,¡± I commanded as I transmuted the stone covering her into simple dirt. In a blast of sand, she turned tail and shot towards the lake like a blue missile. Acting quickly to preserve my sample, I conjured a crystal box and put it in, making sure to seal it tight.


    The deep menacing growl behind me told me however that the danger was not yet over. The six inch stone wall so far separated me from Mama wolf but that wasn¡¯t much of a consolation, especially with her babies so close at hand. Clutching my prized sample close to my chest, I decided to leave Spot and his kids for now and come back maybe when they¡¯re a bit more grown. There¡¯s no arguing with protective mom instincts. Taking advantage of the fact that Mama Wolf couldn¡¯t see me or get to me that quick, I took off in an excited sprint and spread SAW¡¯s wings, taking off for Sunstone Castle.

 Chapter 148 - I Dub Thee Mud (Book 3 Chapter 15)

    ¡°Don¡¯t fuck it up, don¡¯t fuck it up, don¡¯t fuck it up.¡± I knew I wasn¡¯t going to but dear god I felt like it was within the realm of possibility. On the way back home I took an opportune moment dive-bombed a lone sand lizard sunning himself on an outcropping of rock and froze him completely to the ground, killing him quickly. This horse-sized gecko would provide more than enough flesh for fuel for my golem. Getting back to my flesh golem at Sunstone Castle, I inserted the water dragon skin and the entire sand lizard into the bulbous mass and waited for it to completely break them down before I cracked my knuckles and chuckled, channeling the mad genius from Pinky and the Brain and the Black Eyed Peas. ¡°Let¡¯s get it started!¡±


    [Are you sure you want to start with this?] Kraken asked as soon as I shoved my greedy fingers into the flesh golem to start playing around with the DNA sequences. [I don¡¯t get the obsession with, as you call it, upgrading your body. Simply due to the undeniable fact that your sorceries and enchanted items more than make up for the fact that you¡¯re a squishy mortal. Why? Why do you want this? There are dangers to the process.]


    [Look, if you know something I don¡¯t then spit it out,] I replied with my eyes closed, mainly concentrating on the golem. [I have my own original DNA set aside in case I fuck this up too badly, I have a flesh golem which can function as a test dummy before I do anything to myself, and I have flesh sorcery as the end-all be-all to fix my own mistakes. So whatcha got?]


    [My advice as your spirit familiar is to first upgrade your armor similar to how you made fire dragon armor for your witch vassal. Combine the water dragon with the sand lizard, grow a set of that, maybe feed a bit of it Svalinn and also see if it¡¯ll combine with SAW. Your body at this point should be your last concern. You¡¯re so much further ahead in regards to your weapons and armor that your body is almost not worth it. According to your memories, you call this ¡®min-maxing¡¯?]


    I chuckled as I explained his misunderstanding about pre-apocalyptic gaming. [Ok, you¡¯re half right on the min-maxing, but that only works in video games. The concept there is to only focus on your strongest stats to make you specialized. Life isn¡¯t as forgiving as a video game. Humans generally don¡¯t get second chances when we die. My abilities are fantastic at keeping me alive, helping me escape, being a veritable magical tank. It would help if I brought a truckload of innate durability to the table, like that of a dragon perhaps. You can¡¯t really one-shot a dragon, can you?]


    [Not unless a deity or Greater Demon gets involved.]


    I groaned. [You get the point. The only thing falling behind at this point is my body, my soft, squishy, mortal human body.] Kraken fell silent as I pulled out a handful of the flesh golem, directing it to only contain a solid packet of my original DNA, just in case. Setting it off to the side and sealing it in a runed stone box, I turned back to my test subject. Within a minute, the original almost house sized flesh golem spit out a human sized version of itself which I picked up and sat on one of the stone benches. Putting my hand on it, the grey flesh rippled until an inert clone of me was  laying there. Pulling another human sized blob from the original golem, I rolled it over till it was next to me, ready to provide extra raw material if need be.


    ¡°Breathe in . . . breathe out.¡± What sucks is that I had honestly thought that I¡¯d never get this far. I did not expect to live this long past the end of the modern world, I mean, I had mild prepping tendencies back before the Ripples but who would have fucking that it would be magic that ended the world? According to the projections of the scientists, we were overdue for a solar flare, which was my personal favorite of all the apocalypses, and the rest of the prepper community that I followed on social media were generally split between an economic collapse or a natural disaster. A significant portion also had their money on a supervirus and the rich preppers prepared for everything by buying fully sealed and stocked renovated nuclear silos.


    Shaking my musings away, I got started on my project that¡¯s been a long time coming. First, I covered the upper-left side of the clone¡¯s chest in blue water dragon scales and the upper right side in sand lizard scales, then I left the lower right portion as normal human skin and the lower-left I altered to be minotaur skin. To keep things organized, between each section of differing alien skins, I made sure that they were separated by human flesh so it kind of looked like a four piece puzzle.


    Putting one hand on the dragon scale part and the other on the lizard part, I pushed them together as my flesh sorcery alongside the golem started to combine the different scales where they met, forming a dark brown line of scales between the two. ¡°So the reptilian scales join together with absolutely no problem,¡± I muttered, concentrating on how seamless the differing elemental scales just meshed. ¡°Makes sense, earth plus water equals mud, hehe. Ok, part two.¡±  Leaving the successful join where it was, I moved down to the lower portions of human and minotaur skin. Repeating the process, the human skin almost seemed to want to bond with the minotaur skin, as if it were a blank template just waiting for some direction.


    [It makes sense. You humans are virile, uncommonly so. You can basically mate with anything and have a half-decent hybrid. Prolific, is that word I¡¯m looking for?]


    I ignored Kraken¡¯s side jab at humanity. So the two two halves bonded no problem and the two bottom halves did as well, which meant that so far so good. The problems started happening when I tried to bond the minotaur skin to the water dragon scales above it, they both kept sliding away from each other like two magnets of the same polarity.


    [Almost correct,] Kraken interjected. [The minotaur skin functions similar to your understanding of duck feathers. They have just the right amount of ¡®oil¡¯, so to speak, to shed the water which in this case is magic. Water dragon scales are chock full of magic, so they¡¯ll pour over anything but the minotaur skin is essentially magic-proof.]


    [All right, makes sense. But for science, we¡¯ll approach this logically. Minotaur skin and dragon scale don¡¯t mesh instantly, which is fine. So, let¡¯s see how minotaur and sand lizard skin works?] I returned the lower half of the clone¡¯s torso back to plain human skin and then turned the portion underneath the sand lizard part into minotaur and attempted joining them together. The same repulsion effect was still there, although noticeably less in power.


    [Minotaur skin on its own seems to be a no-go, but,] I thought, twanging on my mental link to Kraken. [If you¡¯re right about humanity being the blank template that¡¯s compatible with anything, then maybe there¡¯s a workaround here.] Pushing at the flesh golem, I combined the lower half of the torso into the amalgamation of minotaur/human skin and kept the top as water dragon, ¡®mud¡¯ scale, and sand lizard scale. [We have two working combos so far with one being the logical base. I¡¯m going to do this step by step to find the best one, which means finding the worst one first, usually.]


    The experimentation took a while as I tried combining the different sets of DNA into a cohesive whole. The minotaur/human did actually end up joining what I called the ¡®mud dragon¡¯ scales, but it wasn¡¯t a simple combination. What ended up getting it to work was when I used the human/minotaur flesh as a base and attached the mud scales to the inner part of it, forming a solid attempt at scale armor.


    [I still don¡¯t think it¡¯s right,] I grumbled to Kraken, poking and prodding at the golem. [This is more along the lines of what I¡¯d do if I wanted to make some cool armor, not as a replacement for my skin.]


    [Why don¡¯t you just make the scales smaller? More like a slippery snake instead of a thickly armored lizard?]


    Perfect. The KISS method fixes my problems yet again. Keep-it-simple-stupid. Morphing the scales into miniature versions of themselves about half an inch long and wide from the original size of six square inches, it took far less coaxing to get the base skin and the mud scale to bond. My flesh sorcery poked at me as I noticed that while the join was successful, the project was literally starting to die. Where the small scales met the skin, the red blood cells underneath started dying.This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    [MANA! IT NEEDS JUICE!]


    Trusting my partner, I channeled raw power through my flesh sorcery, keeping the scale alive as the innate magical bonds strengthened, finally completing the perfect join. Cursing under my breath again, I dragged the clone body over to the pedestal holding Gungnir. ¡°So I actually have to pull a frankenstein huh?¡± Forming a link between Gungnir, myself, and the batteries below the castle as well as the power-gathering ritual, I funneled the energy into the golem as I screamed, ¡°FOR SCIENCE!¡±


    The clone body spasmed as waves of raw power washed over it, the skin morphing into the minotaur/human base as thousands of tiny brown ¡®mud¡¯ scales sprouted up like opening seeds and then lay down, each draining tons of power to fill up the magical bonds holding it together. Barely holding on to the wave of power, Kraken helped direct the flows so make the changes as seamless as possible, leaving the right parts of the clone body scaleless like the face, palms, armpits, groin and more. The point here was to be enhanced, not to completely remove all traces of humanity from the body.


    Five minutes of intense concentration with mountains of power yielded a result that was scientifically beautiful. I couldn¡¯t help but admire my own damn ingenuity as I hoisted the clone up onto a stone table, examining the placement of the scales, noting the smoothness as well as its durability. Bowing to another whim, I released another wave of power, turning the scales from dark brown to my natural light tan so that it wouldn¡¯t appear to anyone casually looking that the clone was covered in armor-like skin.


    [This is a fine experiment,] Kraken congratulated. [Are you going to work on the insides next or were you thinking of putting runic tattoos on the scales?]


    [Actually, I was going to work on the insides and didn¡¯t even think about that last one. How bout you work on a nice rune schematic for the scales and I¡¯ll get started on the inner workings?]


    [Fine by me.] Kraken agreed, mostly withdrawing from our connection.


    While the minotaur skin was awesome to work as part of the base for the epidermis, the rest of the minotaur DNA didn¡¯t really hold anything else that I¡¯d want as part of my future body. Water dragon and sand lizard innards were simply better in just about every way. The lungs were altered to be partially water dragon so that breathing under water wouldn¡¯t require magic. The sand lizard and water dragon eyes respectively contained the ability to get a thermal reading of the surrounding area, basically they could ¡®see¡¯ heat. The water dragon''s ear canals were perfect for sonar and the blood marrow of both was far more robust in terms of natural healing and red blood cell production. The golem clone¡¯s skeletal structure easily accepted a combination of water dragon and sand lizard bone tissue as well as the combo of muscle, tendon, and ligament tissue. The next three hours were spent painstakingly going over the body, making slight adjustments after the initial inputs of variant DNA.


    [Are you sure you don¡¯t want to put a tail on it? How about natural wings, oooh, ooh! How about retractable fangs or internal poison sacs? Maybe incorporate poison sacs into sweat glands? If we¡¯re going this far we might as well make you full on bizarre!]


    [Great word choice,] I mused, loving how much Kraken was getting into this. [But the goal is to meld the best of humanity with reptilian durability while still maintaining the overall form and function of a human body. SAWs got wings, and Reeanth is right, tails are unnecessary handles. I¡¯m not averse to hidden weapons though. I¡¯m on board with the poison sweat glands and maybe some retractable bone blades, just not really sure where to put the blades, hmmm.]


    With another wave of power, some of the clone¡¯s sweat glands morphed into miniature poison sacs. The issue was that I had no variety in the poison department, only the sand lizard in my DNA collection had poison and it wasn¡¯t very good, simply a mild paralytic to keep prey from struggling too much to help the lizard pack drag it down through force of numbers. [Ok, revisit the poison gland thing later. Blades! Where should they go? Svalinn has the forearm blade part covered, so where?]


    Kraken conceded the point. [Actually, yeah, you¡¯re right. Blades aren¡¯t really necessary for you. Gungnir plus Svalinn covers your bases. Without good poison, there¡¯s no point in making venom glands to spit the stuff. What about a retractable frog tongue?]


    [Human, Kraken! Human! Trying to stay mostly human here. Planning a future body here that children won¡¯t point at and scream. Avoid ¡®monstery¡¯, ok?]


    [Fine,] he grumbled. [Be boring. My part is way less fun. The rune schematics are done. I went with the basic defense rune formation. Since the skin is mostly minotaur, it sort of does most of the magic bleedoff effect which is great in fights against wizards, witches, and sorcerers, but the scales will have a different purpose. Mainly, they will be the last line of physical defense. I have a kinetic-energy diverting rune within the standard defense rune, and I figured out a tricky part. After going through your memories, you read a lot of stories about assassins and how they used a thin sharp blade to puncture vulnerable spots. So, I figured out a way to link all of the scales together to ripple when impacted to turn the point of the blade so that it would divert the puncturing power. Basically, the assassin would have to land a perfectly placed attack with a crapton of power to get through the scaly parts.]


    [Holy shit!] I thought, almost gasping. [I¡¯ll be un-one-shotable?! NICE!]


    [I guess? Not sure that¡¯s proper English . . . moving on. There are also leyline conductor runes on the bottoms of the feet so that if you¡¯re ever without your boots you can top off on power just by standing in the right spot, and the best part is, all of the standard rune tattoos that you have on you right now work just fine on the minotaur skin underneath the scales!]


    Right then and there I almost started the process to make that body my body. [WAIT! Don¡¯t get ahead of yourself. We have to look at the downsides here too.] Kraken warned.


    [What now?] I snapped. [Come on, this is perfect!]


    [Maybe, or maybe it¡¯s got a serious downside. Like maybe this might hinder how you use your magic. I don¡¯t think you noticed but minotaur skin doesn¡¯t really like magic all that much, and covering most of your body in it may hinder how much power you can pull in or push out at any given time. The upside,] Kraken continued before I could object. [The upside is that the dragon scales love magic and may actually be enough to balance it out or enhance your control by a little bit. I¡¯m not sure if they¡¯ll channel the nature sorcery you have that well but your earth and water control may experience a dramatic spike in overall control.]


    [And if that¡¯s all true, then I might have to rely even more on my tools instead of myself, FUCK!] Taking a few minutes off to the side, I relished the feeling of the castle¡¯s mana washing over me as I refilled my personal stores of power from the incoming flow of the solar panels. There¡¯s always another way and every path to self-improvement doesn¡¯t need to have downsides. Maybe the answer wasn¡¯t in completely redoing all of the work, but simply adjusting it a little bit. The minotaur combination with the human skin was right around eighty percent minotaur with twenty percent human, which allowed for great elasticity and incoming magic projectile defense. The one that an enemy wizard would never see coming is if they threw magic at me and it slid off, but even more surprising is if that very same offensive magic was absorbed, right?


    If I could alter the ratio of human to minotaur, it stands to reason that I could hit upon the right proportions where the minotaur part could blunt the incoming mana just enough for my sorcerous human skin to absorb the power instead of it getting deflected by the final product. If I¡¯m right, my future skin could function like that cool modern concrete that is just porous enough to let the water drain right through it but tough enough to withstand cars driving on it. Reading my thoughts, Kraken interjected. [Ok, my projections are that we start with an even fifty-fifty split on the human to minotaur and then go five percent either direction depending on how much you can damage it from a blast of raw mana. If we do it right, then that means your ability to outwardly project mana won¡¯t be hindered at all!]


    I liked it. In fact, I liked it so much that I went about three years ahead of the project. Walking over to the giant body of the main flesh golem, I rolled it over to Gungnir and tossed the upgraded clone body into it and waited a minute while it got absorbed. From there, I channeled stupid amounts of power into the flesh golem so it could make a bunch of clone bodies, each with their own different human to minotaur skin ratio. I had the fifty-fifty, sixty-forty both ways, and then the seventy-thirty both ways as well. Each body, after it had drained enough power to complete the power-intensive cell joining process, I put up a conjured stone wall and shaped the stone to form restraints so that I had clone body targets.


    [This looks so messed up,] I remarked, looking at my courtyard with five targets. The fifty-fifty was in the middle and the sixty-forty and seventy-thirty of the mostly minotaur were on the left and the mirror opposites were on the right. ¡°Again,¡± I called out loud as I pulled Gungnir and leveled it at the clones and blasted each body with a wave of dense, raw mana. ¡°FOR SCIENCE!¡±


    Working my shots from the left to the right and then back again, each clone body took a total of three raw mana blasts before I was satisfied. The stone walls holding the bodies were completely blown away and the bodies themselves were in a bit of a state. [Wasn¡¯t that a bit much?] Kraken yelled inside my brain. [You didn¡¯t need to blow the courtyard away!]


    [Look,] I pointed out gleefully as I sprinted over to the devastated courtyard. [It worked! Plan for the worst and experiment with disaster! BEHOLD!] Holding up the most intact clone body, I swung it around happily. [Forty percent minotaur is the sweet spot! And the best part is, not only do I know the best ratio for mana absorption, but the ratio is super easy to change! Which means if I¡¯m ever getting my ass kicked magically by some godlike wizard, all I gotta do is up the ratio to eighty and I¡¯ll be invincible!]


    Running back over to the main body of the central flesh golem, I pushed the best clone into it and waited for it to be absorbed and saved as a preferred body schematic. Taking another test minutes, I cleaned up the blown away parts of the four failed clones by chucking them into the main golem. Stripping off all of my clothes including Svalinn and SAW, I rolled the central golem just a bit closer to Gungnir.


    ¡°Fuckin¡¯ tight!¡± I celebrated even as I began to sink into a meditative state, my eyes closed as I focused on my state of mind and sorceries. [Kraken, your job is to make sure that the power supply is constant and available. Do some projections real quick, do we have enough power to see this through? I got the feeling that I¡¯ll need more than the clones due to my sorceries.]


    [There¡¯s months worth of stored power in your batteries, let alone what you personally hold and what¡¯s in your freakish staff,] he assured me. [Just take it slow and let me work on the runes and you¡¯ll be a brand new you in less than two hours.]

 Chapter 149 - A New Slog (Book 3 Chapter 16)

    Brand new me took a lot more than two hours. It took Kraken and I nine times longer than we expected, the power requirements for drastically altering my own body skyrocketed as my own flesh sorcery was a bit too at home in the original me. Small changes, healing, minor upgrades were easily within my purview but it seems that the total body makeover should have happened over time. My soul was the real problem, the fact that my soul-tree was a bit too much like how I envisioned it caused me some serious problems like the fact that putting down some metaphysical ¡®roots¡¯ actually meant ROOTS! My soul-tree, my combined enlivened sorceries liked my body, the original and weak one. My earth sorcery was invested in my body, the water in my blood, the flesh in the, well, duh, flesh, and the personified soul-tree was invested in staying.


    The hardest part was convincing it, yes I know that I¡¯m arguing with myself, but apparently if you treat your magic like a part of you that¡¯s just a little bit separate, it actually becomes a little separate. What did the trick was convincing it that the newer model would be more durable and a lot more likely to actually live longer than the homo sapien concept. Dusk had come and gone by the time my body was in fighting shape. I ended up falling asleep outside next to Gungnir as Kraken poured mountains of stored mana into my body, using our internal connection to soothe the angry waves of the process. The problem is that simply changing your body does not instantly result in perfect changes.


    Consider the concept of making yourself taller. It¡¯s not just lengthening the bones so that you are actually taller, there are a million other little details that go into making that change effective. The muscles have to stretch out as well with the ligaments and tendons so that there¡¯s some structure to that bone. The balance centers of your brain have to be recalibrated so that your body knows what to do with being taller so you don¡¯t walk into every door frame you come to. Your eyes have to be used to the new scale of vision in order to properly judge how long your new stride is or how fast you can make it from here to there. Details, it always comes down to the details, and sorcery doesn¡¯t get rid of the process, it just makes it within reach.


    And let¡¯s not even get started on the impacts to my magic itself. My brain has to get used to a new form of channeling power unconsciously. Human skin, for all its flaws, is incredibly adept at taking in and pushing out power. I could use it as easily as a frog spits out his tongue to nab a fly. Now, I have to actually focus on channeling through the million tiny scales on my body and perfectly avoid the minotaur skin that wants to shed the mana instead. Not that it matters where I physically conjure or control my magic from, it¡¯s where my mind perceives that I control my magic from.


    Kraken gave my unconscious mind the rundown as I was sleeping, the entire time of which he was still easing the indignant factors of widespread changes. I spent my unconscious time remaking and remodeling my mind castle and my own vision of myself. I had to, I needed my brain, my self-visualization to be on board with this. It¡¯s the extreme case of that rare brand of psychosis where people believe that the leg on their body isn¡¯t their leg, and they do everything they can to cut it off and we stick them in the psych ward. But instead of a leg, it¡¯s my entire body. My mind had to be brought to heel, perfectly joined to the idea that thanks to my sorcery, my flesh is completely under my control regardless of what it looks or feels like. Malleable, malleable by self and self alone.


    The final piece fell into place when I appeared in my mind in front of my soul-tree and branded its trunk with a vision of myself, a complex series of runes encapsulating the idea that ¡®I can change¡¯ within the greater realization that ¡®I am me¡¯ and that will not change. ¡®Power¡¯, ¡®will¡¯, ¡®strength¡¯ were the three outer runes undergirding the runic envisionings of myself that I carved into my very soul, gently forcing the being of myself to my own will.


    The soul-tree closed its eyes, its face smiling even though there was no mouth. I watched as the ¡®earth¡¯ that was its base turned translucent. Underneath it, its roots curled around two forms, the first which was my original body complete with a hundred percent homo sapien DNA and the other, my new form. As the ¡®earth¡¯ turned opaque again, I did manage to make out that there were two other such spaces in its roots, both blank. [Two more forms huh?] I mused. A light shaking of my soul-tree¡¯s head denoted affirmation. [But I can still alter the two there without taking up the other spaces, right?] A single nod. [Good.]


    The desert¡¯s morning light smacked me back to consciousness as Kraken desperate yells crashed against our link. [YOU¡¯RE DRAINING THE ENTIRE CASTLE!] The cognizant understanding of what he said broke me out of the daze as my flesh sorcery instantly kicked in, making me feel like I was on the tail end of guzzling ten shots of espresso.


    ¡°What?!¡± I screamed, jumping to my feet, letting go of Gungnir in the process.


    [There, oh my Order, what the Seven Realms of Infernation was that?] Kraken freaked. [You just set us back months! Tuck your aura in before some damn dragon pops outta the sky or a demon rips open Hell just for you!]


    My bewildered expression didn¡¯t help. Reaching through our link, Kraken manipulated my personal aura until it was just skin deep. Working for another ten minutes, I carefully watched him work, reeling in the sheer amount of mana that I¡¯d accumulated  so that it didn¡¯t leak out. [There, stupid, ignorant human. Do you not know how dragons work yet? Crystallized mana gives off an incredible amount of power and you¡¯ve got months worth of a desert¡¯s accumulated heat and solar energy as converted mana inside of you!]


    As my familiar raged at my apparent inborn stupidity, I did manage to pick out the relevant parts. Dragons nest near ley lines to help them maintain their stupid amounts of power. The kind of power I have is like a beacon unless I tamp it down via aura control. Having a bit of dragon in me means that I¡¯ll generate more power than usual but it¡¯ll have a different flavor than it used to. And the main reason that my body soaked up all the power was to set the changes within my body as pretty much permanent, the only thing that could alter it at this point would be me, and even then I¡¯d require another couple months to accumulate the required power.


    My metaphorical ears were ringing after that lecture, so I did what any eyes-glazed-over person would do. Ignore the too tightly wound familiar and get some light practice in. For the next two days, I made my own obstacle course out of conjured stone in the nearby Colorado River and ran complete circuits that included lifting humongous rock, leaping fifty feet, climbing in tandem with my earth and water sorcery. Turns out, if you can shape the rock to have handholds or conjure ice to the side of a smooth column, you can climb anything. The endurance test was mentally exhausting because I just got bored before my body tired even after five hours of running from ravenous sand lizards.


    The magic part turned out to be even easier than I thought it would be as dragon scales were several times more mana absorbent than human skin, and the minotaur part was negligible in interfering with my practice. I had no problems conjuring water, stone, metal, or ice. What turned out to be frustrating to do was lightly wounding myself to test my flesh sorcery. Turns out the dragon scale parts are incredibly hard to cut open, so I settled for the bottoms of my feet which were mostly scale free. Gungnir, in knife form, did easily penetrate the skin but the flesh snapped back like a rubber band. ¡°Fuck,¡± I grumbled.


    Since testing on myself wasn¡¯t a very fruitful idea, I captured an outlying sand lizard about two miles away from Sunstone Castle and knocked it out. Making sure to deaden the nerves so it wouldn¡¯t feel a thing, I began making incisions and then repairing them, making sure that my flesh sorcery wasn¡¯t all out of order. Healing cuts, check. Regenerating lost organs, check. Fixing broken bones and regenerating missing ones, check. For the hell of it, I cut all of its limbs off and then let it almost bleed out so I could see if fixing it was within my abilities still. I know that technically this is cruel, but the nerve block made it humane.


    Putting the lizard back together, I made my way back to Sunstone Castle and got started on my new project, creating another couple sets of solar panels and making the gathering ritual larger into order to cover more ground so as to bring in more power. The next month was spent adding another two outer circles of conjured gold and silver to the ritual, keeping it properly aligned and adding the new solar panels so that I wouldn¡¯t run into a situation again where stores of power would be in question. I couldn¡¯t believe that I actually did run into a situation where I blew through months of accumulated power, and it was all related to a personal change. With this in mind, I had Kraken also start the process of doubling the layers of buried conjured batteries and heightening and thickening the castle walls so that they would exponentially cover more ground, deepening the available mana reserves.


    [Or you could just tap into a freaking ley line. Sheesh,] Kraken complained. [All of this hoopla and you don¡¯t even think to just build a damn castle OVER a leyline, you gotta do it the hard way!]


    [There are no freaking ley lines out here!] I snapped. [They¡¯re all too damn far away!]


    [There¡¯s one under the river, dumbass! If you can convert heat and light from the desert into raw mana, you can divert some power from the ley line under the river and then convert it to pure mana for the castle. You don¡¯t even need much, just divert a bit and you¡¯ll have a constant feed of more mana than you¡¯ll ever need.]


    If only my bastard of a familiar had said that at the outset of this journey. Muttering dark and dangerous things under my breath, I traipsed over to the river and dove in making my way to the bottom. Son of a fucking goat lover! Kraken was right. It wasn¡¯t a particularly deep or powerful one, but there was a small ley line that swiftly flowed under the river. The next two hours were spent conjuring a pipeline of braided gold and silver encased in concrete all the way from my castle to the bottom of the river bed. What took the longest was inscribing the proper runes to make a auto-detect power governor so that it would cut off if the flow of power lessened or if the castle was full up on mana. I can¡¯t go completely draining a ley line if I don¡¯t have to.The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°I wonder what Andy¡¯s up to?¡± I questioned later as night fell and the heat of the day broke. Sitting in my stone chair overlooking the desert, I thought about my brother and my keening nugget of jealousy in regards to the fact that he was at freaking magic college right now. What I would have given to go to a grown-up version of Hogwarts, but instead I gotta worry about the fucking undead on my planet. Slapping away the voice of Peter Parker¡¯s uncle in my head, the one warning me that ¡®with great power comes great responsibility¡¯, I grumbled some more as my thoughts turned towards Acantha. I gave her a task but I didn¡¯t really give her a timeline. To me, that meant I¡¯d at least go check on her after a month, of which there was least a week and a half left, but now boredom was my main enemy.


    I thought about popping over to New Richmond and checking on them to see how they¡¯re doing but that would mean leaving Gungnir as Kraken needs the tool as a focus to continue making the golem army. My rifle and Svalinn are more than enough for pretty much any normal enemy but every book had a clear cut lesson inside of it: if weird shit is going down, do not be caught without your best fucking weapon. Harry Potter without a wand, screwed. Harry Dresden without magic, fucked. The badass from the Patriot without a gun, his children die. The list goes on, and if that means I have to be bored until my plans are ready, then I¡¯m just going to have to be bored.


    Two weeks later.


    My golem army is complete! Over a thousand sunstone golems, complete with elemental sergeants, and armed with warhammers and battleaxes stood proudly in the sun. Standing at the top of the north wall, I preened as I surveyed the acres of gleaming stone soldiers. It was almost enough to make me cackle like a mad scientist in the throes of discovery. [We can leave now!] Kraken celebrated. [I¡¯m so done being your 3-D printer! They can charge up on their own, and I¡¯ve installed a dummy processor so that if you need to, you can simply reach out and it¡¯ll conjure replacements for your army, weapons included. I wanna see what Phoenix looks like!]


    Agreeing with my familiar who¡¯d been driving me up the wall with his complaining, I donned SAW and Svalinn, not even checking to see if I had all of my batteries charged as I¡¯d check about a hundred million times in the past few weeks. My rifle was ready to go, I¡¯d practiced flying and hoverboarding, my magic was rockin¡¯ and rollin¡¯ and I had been so bored that I practiced staff forms that Reeanth tried to teach me a while back. Sheathing knife-form Gungnir to my waist, I took one last look around and hopped on my board heading south-east.


    Getting up to speed in the desert flats, I used a hill as an angled takeoff point for me to transition to flying, SAW¡¯s wings effortlessly unfurling and catching the hot desert updrafts. Hitting two hundred miles an hour let me get to what was left of Phoenix in under an hour. I flew over the city very high back and forth a couple times just to get the lay of the land. No wonder Acantha hadn¡¯t returned. I counted at least three portals spewing all kinds of things out, two of which had large groups of humans and maybe humans confronting the stream of invaders. The third portal was vomiting shrieking creatures that tried to flank the other two groups until an explosion of green and purple flame annihilated the shriekers.


    [There¡¯s your vassal,] Kraken commented. [She¡¯s breathing hard and her aura¡¯s dim. Probably can¡¯t keep that up much longer.]


    [So what you¡¯re saying is,] I laughed as I hovered over the battlefield. [Is that it¡¯s time to test this shit?]


    Acantha¡¯s face was priceless, her shocked look as her entire dragonscale outfit was covered in blood and gore. The fire in her hands that roared in sheer surprise died back down to a flicker as she recognized me. ¡°What are you doing here?¡± she exclaimed, seeming to not believe her own eyes.


    ¡°I thought you¡¯d be done by now!¡± I yelled back, hosing her off with conjured water. ¡°Damn, you smell like shit. The fuck happened?¡±


    Turning back to the battle raging around us, Acantha clapped her hands together and started chanting. A wickedly bright green flame sparked to life in her palms which she blew outwards. Like a dragon¡¯s breath, the fire leaped out, consuming all of the horrors in its path. Even as the shrieking things died, they and the ground kept burning.


    [Wytchfire,] Kraken clarified. [Mixed with dragonfire if I¡¯m not mistaken.]


    ¡°Someone or something keeps opening up portals to different realms and we can¡¯t keep up!¡± Acantha explained as color drained out of her face. ¡°The people here aren¡¯t soldiers. They wouldn¡¯t have lasted this long without the Luneks.¡±


    Before I could ask what in the world ¡®Luneks¡¯ were, a wave of silver furred things crashed into the mobs of shriekers. The shriekers looked like a radioactive giant praying mantis had a baby with a lionfish¡¯s bastard with a porcupine. The Luneks though appeared to be the hulked out version of werecreatures, giant wolves and bears and cats that raced around on their back legs like humans while wielding two handed swords of silver light that cut through anything in their way.


    The Luneks raced around myself and Acantha the way a river flows around rock in the middle of the current. Their movements had a sort of incomparable grace that was hypnotizing in nature. Figuring that I might as well make the high ground since there wasn¡¯t any to take, I used earth sorcery to raise Acantha and myself thirty feet into the air.


    ¡°Don¡¯t! No! We¡¯re sitting ducks now!¡± she screamed as she started to dive off the column. Snatching her by the back of the armor, I hauled her out of the path of vomited spines that trailed sickly green acid. Svalinn roared from his place on my arms, generating a forcefield around us, blocking the incoming projectiles. Drawing Gungnir who shifted from a knife to a crystal adorned mace, I pointed it at portal number one. Kraken, obliging my wish, unleashed a barrage of ten overcharged crystal grenades that blew that part of the horde to bits. Before I pulled back, he launched another ten through the portal just to give a bit of love back. Repeating this two more times gave the fighters a breather as the Luneks cleaned up the rest of the stragglers as Acantha provided fire from above.


    I lowered the column as I quietly hummed to myself. ¡°Ain¡¯t no sunshine when she¡¯s gone, it¡¯s not warm when she¡¯s away . . .¡± Facing Acantha who looked at me with a mix of fear and respect, I stamped staff-form Gungnir into the ground. ¡°What¡¯s next? Either introduce me to your friends or let me flatten the city, your call.¡±


    At my last phrase, a concerted roar rang out from the Luneks as a giant one jumped and landed ten feet away, smashing his battleaxe into the earth. ¡°Who dares to steal the honor this day from Severak the Hungry?¡± The massive bear of a man, bearman? I mean the Lunek, glared at me with heated red eyes as two barely smaller catlike Luneks joined his side. As I slowly turned and looked the predator in the eye, Severak bent down to my height and roared. I bared my teeth as Gungnir glowed white hot.


    ¡°Tell your friends,¡± I said to Acantha, gritting my teeth. ¡°To back off. This city should have been cleaned up already. Didn¡¯t I tell you to team up with Remy and Fernando? The three of you had more than enough power to fix this.¡±


    ¡°That was before someone started opening portals to let the Hive through!¡± she clarified, her hands on her hips. ¡°That¡¯s what these things are, the Hive. The spitters and devourers swarm while the sackers suicide acid bomb any kind of magic user. And then we have the insectified wyrms that just wait for us to bunch up and they pop out of the ground like a worm from hell. Magic just slides right off of them so we had to make a deal with the Luneks.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m TALKING to you!¡± Severak roared again, this time his roar generating actual physical force that would have knocked us both down if not for Svalinn.


    ¡°Do that one more time fuzzy and I¡¯ll make a coat outta you,¡± I threatened, whipping around. Raising my left hand, I cracked all of the earth within a hundred yards sending them sprawling. ¡°I don¡¯t take orders from anyone. I¡¯m here for my vassal.¡±


    ¡°No honor!¡± One of Severak¡¯s companions, the cat person, spat. ¡°Never any honor from the tleusant.¡±


    Acantha¡¯s eyes went wide. I looked to her for clarification and she shook her head. ¡°It¡¯s an insult, it translates to ¡®cursed¡¯, but it also means cowards. They view magic as weakness made real because magic users can¡¯t fight ¡®honorably¡¯, as in using a weapon.¡±


    I laughed out loud and let out a deep breath. ¡°I¡¯m not here for honor, cat. Honor is for the dead. It serves no purpose for the living. Just tell me where the evil fuckers are that need killing.¡±


    All of the Luneks spat at the ground. ¡°Life without honor is no life at all, tleusant.¡± Snapping his giant fingers, Severak jutted his chin as his subordinates, growling something I couldn¡¯t make out at them. Our standoff continued for a few minutes as his two cat lieutenants ran off and came back with someone in two. Tossing the mess at my feet, Severak laughed. ¡°To each their own, right, tleusant? Take your coward, he¡¯ll show you the infestation.¡±


    ¡°Fernando!¡± Acantha gasped, leaping down helping him to his feet.


    ¡°And this one too!¡± Another filthy human hit the ground in front of me.


    ¡°Remy!¡±


    My blood started to boil. ¡°What, did you do to them?¡± I snarled, my teeth almost cracking from the force of me gritting them so hard.


    ¡°Their crimes are many, tleusant. First, they fight with cowardice itself, and second,¡± Severak paused, a growl from deep within his throat turned into an angry yowl. ¡°This filth tried to seduce one of our number! As if she were a slave fit for breeding!¡±


    [Do I have to wipe them all out?] I asked Kraken. [What the fuck am I dealing with here?]


    [Luneks are a race that holds honor as their avenue to their afterlife. Great battles are their religion, fighting with tooth, nail, and claw is the only way they know. Magic fits in with neither tooth, nail, or claw. The only way to win their respect is by an honorable duel.]


    [Yeah, no. I don¡¯t have time for that, and neither does this fucking city.]


    Resigning myself to a course of action, I called on the earth and sank every Lunek within sight up to their neck and solidified the stone. ¡°Tried and true,¡± I said to myself as I crouched in front of Severak. ¡°I¡¯ll be real blunt here. I can kill you. I can easily kill you and your entire tribe. But I don¡¯t want to. Is that something you can understand? Either nod or shake your head no because if you insult me one more time I will simply end you.¡±


    Severak barely gave a nod. ¡°Good, thank you. Now, you are going to give me your most trustworthy soldier, packmate or whatever, and that person is going to lead me around the city to whatever needs blowing up. From there, I will personally take care of this fucking mess of a city and give you back your soldier. Again, nod for yes or shake for no.¡±


    Another quick nod. ¡°Good. Thank you. One last question, did you hurt those two over there? The ones you threw at my feet?¡± I asked, my voice as icy as the Grim Reaper¡¯s scythe. Severak¡¯s eyes widened but he didn¡¯t move other than that. ¡°Did . . . you . . . hurt . . . them?¡± I asked slowly, making sure to elongate the syllables.


    ¡°They were cowards!¡± he roared, straining at the stone encasing him. ¡°They retreated from honorable combat! Pain and humiliation to those that run from battle!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s called strategy, you retarded ass!¡± Acantha screamed from where she knelt, doing her best to clean up Fernando¡¯s and Remy¡¯s faces. ¡°Not every charge has to end in death! They¡¯re human! They don¡¯t have natural fur armor like you!¡±

 Chapter 150 - (Book 3 Chapter 17)

    Why does it always come down to responsibility? Humanity has a strange idea that responsibility, the acceptance of that lifelong burden, is what makes you an adult, grants the autonomy of maturity so that you can do more and accept even more responsibility later. It¡¯s the way a man strives for a better job when his wife gets pregnant so he can provide, willingly taking on that responsibility to better meet the demands of the future. An old boss of mine once told me, ¡®the only reward for a job well done is more work¡¯. Of course, that dude was the epitome of doing the perfect amount so that he stayed right where he was, fat and happy in his comfortable management position. Not that I was jealous of him, but his style allowed him to coast through on his laurels in a way that might have peaked my little green monster.


    Which means, in my book, the whole thing¡¯s a racket. Responsibility IS a racket. It is the societal expectation to do more so that other people can do less, at least that¡¯s what it seems like. Helping out New Richmond automatically made a bunch of people there assume that I was in charge, that I was going to stick around and solve all of their problems, willingly putting on blinders to the fact that I had just literally solved most of their problems by properly equipping them with magical gear well beyond their means. And here I was again, about to spit in the eye of some cosmic kick that wanted me to take on the mantle of what was left of Phoenix. Fuck you, is all I have to say. This ain¡¯t my city, these aren¡¯t my people, and I don¡¯t owe any of them jack shit. This decision was strategic in nature, I didn¡¯t want to have a pustule of demons, zombies, necromancers, bugs and any other kind of nastiness anywhere near me when it was time to head up north.


    But Acantha, cunt of witch that she is at the moment, is desperately making big, watery eyes at me, begging me without words to solve the problem that she couldn¡¯t solve. Yes, my kind of power is on the heavy side, allowing me to forcibly adjust the weight class scale so I can wreck it at a time of my choosing, but that doesn¡¯t mean I want to be the savior of this place. The real issue was the mistake I made in my initial judgement call. I figured that this would be a good place for a powerful witch to stretch her wings and raze the bitch to the ground, giving her combat experience and taking care of a long-term problem in one convenient swoop. But no, if you want something done right you have to do it yourself.


    Coming to grips with the fact that my next week was going to be spent magically bleaching this city out of existence, I thought about the other problem at hand several times faster than normal thanks to my mind sorcery. Luneks. From what I can tell from the pitiful amount of time that I¡¯ve spent here already, the Luneks are legitimately retarded. No, not in the medical way, but in the way that their thinking seems to stop, to hit a roadblock, hits something that halts the forward progression of strategic thought along with the value of lives. Like this great question, if the Luneks won¡¯t let anyone retreat because its ¡®cowardice¡¯ and they fight to the death, AND, if they know that they¡¯re fighting undead and necromancers that can raise up their comrades and send them back in to fight their former packmates, then they must be retarded right? Isn¡¯t the first thought when fighting someone that can raise your dead friends and force them to fight you to maybe do your best not to die? Maybe, and I¡¯m just spitballing here, the second thought would be to strategize just a tiny bit and go for the dude RAISING THE DEAD? Idiots. Dumbasses. Stupidity at its finest. The wheel is spinnin¡¯ but the hamster¡¯s dead. I could go on.


    In order to give myself more time to think at superspeed, I walked over to the wretched forms of Remy and Fernando, conjuring large amounts of water to get the majority of grime off of them even as I began injecting healing magic into them. To be clear, my own motivations and feelings were a bit shocking to me. I wasn¡¯t really mad at the condition of the two magic users that I was currently healing, and I was only a bit angry at how they were treated by the Luneks, but what really pissed me off is that the intervention of the Luneks in messing up my plans for Acantha and these two to team up really fucked up my timeline, which has already been constantly getting pushed back. I had shit to do, places to be, zombies to wreck and a land to invade with my epic golem army. I did not have time to be babysitting weak-ass wizards.


    [Your thoughts have taken an unusually dark turn,] Kraken commented. [A Buddhist would say that your chi is all kinds of conflicted.]


    [Monks don¡¯t sound like that, dude.] I replied back, setting a broken arm and knitting the bones back together. Remy and Fernando were completely knocked out thanks to my flesh sorcery, allowing me to work without all of the screams that normally accompanies work like this. [I knew two monks before this craziness, both ended up leaving for various reasons but they were still pretty chill dudes. Tony would tell me right now, ¡®even the broken leaf rides the angry wind as it falls from grace¡¯. Asshole would never tell me what it meant though.]


    Ignoring my momentary reflection, Kraken proposed a new idea which made me grin. Chuckling darkly at the effectiveness of the plan, I finished healing both Remy and Fernando and then turned to Acantha, knocking her out without permission and healing the incredible amount of bruising and numerous cuts. Twenty minutes of healing later with Kraken keeping a watchful eye, I leaned back and sat on my butt. Pivoting, I faced Severak.


    ¡°All right buttmunch, you can talk now, but only to answer my questions.¡± Gungnir lay across my lap in mace form as I pulled out my personal mini-golem from my pocket. Reaching over, I placed the golem on the ground in front of Severak¡¯s face, his body still completely buried up to his neck. ¡°This little dude is a flesh golem, meaning that it can either heal, hurt, or radically change any kind of living flesh. I know you may not respond to torture very well, most barbarian cultures tend not to, but this little fucker can hurt you in other ways.¡±


    Severak sniffed arrogantly. ¡°I¡¯m not done,¡± I chuckled. ¡°I know you¡¯re a warrior, a big strong leader of were-things that likes to rampage. But I can take that away from you. Imagine yourself with the instincts of a predator, an Alpha, but with the body of something you despise, a coward.¡±


    His eyes went wide. ¡°That¡¯s right, a coward. I can make this little ball of golem slowly change your body bit by bit into a human, a pathetic, weak, pink, defenseless human. For that matter, I can even make you female. Give you all of those vulnerable curves, the kind that make men go crazy with desire. I¡¯ll just leave your head though, so you can remember what you used to be every time you look at your reflection.¡±


    The bear-man Lunek looked at me with more fear than he¡¯s ever felt in his entire life. Wide eyes, trembling face, the stench of urine from pissing himself, ears flat back as his pupils shrank. ¡°Do you see? This is strength, this right here. I can make you feel the kind of uncontrollable fear that you¡¯ve always wished you could instill in your enemies. Change, the ability to affect change, both temporary and permanent. That is power, great and terrible power. And right now, I have power over you, but you also have some power, right here right now. If you want me to stay my hand, you will accept a duty from me. Agreed?¡±


    The poor thing was too afraid to agree outloud. All he managed to do was tremble a pathetic nod. Looking around at all of the other Luneks buried up to their necks, they all had the same expression of unrestrained terror. ¡°Good,¡± I said, smiling, making sure to bare my teeth just a bit. ¡°Now, your job, your job as a pack, is going to be rather simple. You will be the peacekeepers here in the city after I clean it out. That¡¯s it, simple guardians of the peace. From this point onward, you are mine and mine alone. And, I will require two of your pack, your best male warrior and best female warrior to accompany on my journey.¡±


    The smell of urine strengthened even as a gentle breeze blew through the street, the stench of dead and rotting bodies carried with it reminding me of what I came here to do. Standing up and dusting myself off, I used earth sorcery to release Severak and then water sorcery to blast him clean from his own mess. ¡°Now, point out the two that are mine, and if they disappoint me, I¡¯ll come back here to fulfill my promise, got it?¡±


    It was disconcerting to hear a bear-man whine like a beaten dog. All the fight had gone out of him, my little soliloquy had broken his spirit, at least for now. Severak padded over to a female whose face looked more human than the rest of the pack and poked her in the head with his claw. ¡°This one, master. She is half Lunek, half elf, but in skill, she is unbeaten by all except for myself.¡± The catlike Lunek also made a strange and pitiful whining sound as I released her from her stony prison and blasted her clean with water.


    Ten feet over, Severak poked a male Lunek whose head was egregiously large. ¡°This mutt can¡¯t talk but he is the biggest and strongest of my tribe. He wields an axe and a hammer with an ease that puts the stone giants to shame.¡±


    As I released the big male and hosed him down as well, he started towards me with a growl, his claws extending like he was reaching for my throat. Severak pivoted towards him and roared, straight up karate kicking the giant mongrel in the chin and instantly dropping to the ground to sweep his feet. As the giant Lunek hit the ground, Severak jumped on top of his face with his clawed hands at his throat and eyes, ferociously growling in their language. After a minute, Severak stood up, his eyes downcast. ¡°He understands that he is yours forever master.¡±


    ¡°Their names?¡± I asked, raising an eyebrow as the female Lunek walked over and stood next to the big one.


    ¡°Versonae, my lord.¡± The cat Lunek¡¯s silky voice took me by surprise. Out of all of the were-creatures here, she seemed to be the only one to quickly come to grips with her fear. Her five foot tall frame no longer trembled as she met my eyes, her palms open and facing me. Her almond eyes were slightly angled but bigger than most humans, that, combined with her finely boned features gave her an exotically attractive look that went well with her white fur. ¡°This,¡± she said softly, pointing at the large Lunek, ¡°is Arglyn.¡±


    You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    Taking a closer look at Arglyn, I noticed that his facial features were an ugly mashup of orc with bear-like and tiger-like characteristics. The long canines were reminiscent of sabertooth tigers but the wide beefy face was definitely that of a bear. The squashed nose with the lack of facial hair is what gave him the orcish features. Taking in Arglyn¡¯s oddly submissive behaviour after Severak putting him in his place, I walked over and stood just outside of his reach.


    ¡°Your job is to guard the two males,¡± I ordered, pointing at Remy and Fernando. Turning to Versonae, I pointed to Acantha. ¡°And your job is her. I¡¯m about to purge this city and if you want to avoid that bit of unpleasantness then you¡¯ll make sure they¡¯re real comfortable.¡± Picking up my little flesh golem and putting him away, I cracked my neck and turned towards the rest of the city.


    Phoenix, Arizona is a pretty big city, at least it appears that way from the air. Some of the skyscrapers still stood like forlorn giants towering over their domain but the majority of the city was comprised of comparatively smaller buildings. [Kraken, make the call,] I ordered as I took to the air to survey the city yet again. Fifteen to twenty large buildings that could have been humongous offices or corporate centers surrounded a set of at least five skyscrapers that must have been almost forty stories tall, leaving me to believe that a decent amount of people might actually be left here. And if I¡¯m right, then that would mean that a chunk of that percentage might be the exceptional few suited for magic and combat. What I don¡¯t know is how many portals were here, how many were still open, and where did they all lead to? Deciding to go with my gut, I figured that the middle of the city would actually be the hardest to take but starting from the outskirts near the suburbs would be way harder in terms of trying to cover ground. The surrounding area was just thousands of square miles of homes and suburbs and all kinds of low level areas that I simply didn¡¯t have the manpower to search, yet


    Flying directly to the middle of the city, I touched down on the highest skyscraper and slammed the butt of Gungnir into the floor and unleashed a wave of raw mana that shook the building. Checking my gear and stores of power, I grinned as I smacked Svalinn with my hand. ¡°Pucker up baby,¡± I grinned. ¡°Hunting time!¡±


    Morphing Gungnir into a mace, I had Svalinn on my left arm shift into a large bladed teardrop shield with the point of the tear facing out as I started walking towards the double doors to the stairs. [SAW, engage Shifting Runes mode, proactive defense intent!] Kraken giddily called out, happy to finally get around to testing some of SAW¡¯s features that I hadn¡¯t really used. The runes on my armor lit up and then began to flow across every surface as SAW, with Kraken¡¯s help and direction, took over. The wings on my back flared out for a second and then settled on my back, folding in on themselves until my back was completely covered in a slimmed down turtle shield.


    Hostile undead and Shifted lifeforms detected. Requesting permission for ambient sub-protonic particulate absorption for extensive durations of combat?


    ¡°Agreed,¡± I snarled as a nightmare creature boiled up the stairway as I opened up the doors. Gungnir cut loose with a salvo of crystal rounds that tore the long limbed thing apart. ¡°Auto-detect and alert for incoming hostiles, notify of deduced weaknesses if available. Activate Angry Octopus protocol.¡±


    Directive received. Automatic updates delivered via personal energy wavelength, incoming.


    [I¡¯ll take that,] Kraken interceded, grasping the incoming flow of data from SAW and carefully feeding it into a background mental process designed to translate the data. [One second, lemme make this a bit more understandable, and THERE!] A shift in my perceptions only threw me off for a second as my mind sorcery overlaid my vision with a more combat friendly version. [Okay boss, I¡¯m feeding your magic senses in through your eyes as well to help out with the immediate surroundings. Enemies will have an outline in red even through walls, bright orange means they¡¯re either magical or high-energy in nature and the blue is for indeterminate organics that might be humans or non-hostiles, but still be cautious.]


    [Roger,] I acknowledged as Gungnir turned into an axe. [I think it¡¯s time to test out this new body of mine. Let¡¯s see what I can do.] SAW started up the Angry Octopus under the guidance of Kraken who was just a tiny bit miffed that I had made this defensive feature.


    [It is a little bit insulting,] he snipped. [Conjuring water limbs and calling it an octopus and then assigning it to me! As if I¡¯m some primitive water denizen from a backwards planet!]


    [Shut up and drive, bitch!] I snapped as a four-armed zombie cranked through the walls, slobber spraying everywhere as it almost bit off its own tongue when I smashed its skull in. The water arms reached out, smacking the dead-again body away and into the other incoming zombie. Rancid flesh came apart like tissue paper between the power of Gungnir and my own newfound strength, making this almost too easy. The Angry Octopus protocol served me well as a defensive feature, the four tendrils quickly alternated between whipping arms tips with ice blades to retracting to become a disk shield that spun like a vortex, fouling the aim of incoming enemies.


    [You know, this is kind of a pain in the ass,] I mentally complained. [Zombies stink, there¡¯s who knows what kind of diseases that they¡¯re sprayin¡¯ everywhere, and here I am fighting like a goddamn barbarian when I should be straight up sinking the entire building into the earth.]


    [How about we do one tower the hard way just to see if you can,] Kraken urged. [Then the rest we can do with magic or just wait until the sunstone golems get here. If they run at twenty miles an hour then they¡¯ll be here in around nine hours.]


    What could only be perceived as vampires tried to swarm me on the next floor down. Giant bats misting out of sight only to reappear as long-fanged humanoids with clawed hands kept popping in only to be smacked away by the water arms. Figuring this was the best time to test it out, I slapped the two pouches on my thighs where I kept the liquid remnants of the Nephilim, the water arms soaking up the holy bits and becoming the flaming holy water arms of death. Each touch of the arms smacking the vampires looked like a goddamn bomb going off, an actinic burst of light with the afterimage like when you look directly at the sun for a few moments. Feral screams sounded out as most of them simply fed while a few larger ones in the corners reached out, snatching the fleeing ones and ripping their heads off, draining the majority of their blood in one go.


    ¡°That¡¯s just sick!¡± I groaned, tossing out a couple enchanted light stones that banished most of the shadows lurking in the building as the evening light faded. Not even giving me the courtesy of introducing themselves, the meathead versions of Hollywood¡¯s Dracula came out to play. The disconcerting part was the way they fought in silence, darting in and out without making a sound, only to withdraw right before my water arms could make contact. Shifting Gungnir into a staff, I planted it into the floor as I focused my magical senses on the shifting pools of light-devouring black. ¡°Light¡¯em up!¡± I yelled, closing my eyes as I linked up to Kraken who manned the staff.


    Even with my eyes closed, the flashes of magically blasted crystal rounds overfilled with mana and light left afterimages. The four pools of black exploded into concentric circles of red and white mixed together before turning into white only. Looking around, I saw the destroyed remnants of this near to the top floor office. ¡°Fuck dude,¡± I whispered, looking at the destruction I¡¯d wrought. ¡°I¡¯m kinda badass right now.¡±


    [BELOW YOU!]


    A skeletal hand the size of a garbage can lid made up of many bone pieces burst through the floor, gripping my leg and yanking me down to the next level. Luckily, I kept ahold of Gungnir with one hand as my other released four more light stones that revealed the ugliest fucking caricature of Halloween¡¯s Bigfoot. Made up of mostly bone, swaths of flesh formed ugly pulsing sacs around its neck and waist and a few other joints, but its mouth was filled with human femurs that were snapped in half, the bone joint as the root of the fangs while the jagged part served as the point of the teeth.


    My back hit a chair and then the floor, smashing the poor sitting device that didn¡¯t give a rat¡¯s ass about my lumbar support. SAW and the water arms absorbed most of the impact as my runes took the rest, converting the kinetic impact into raw mana that channeled down Gungnir and blasted the ugly fucker¡¯s face off. [Get up!] Kraken screamed as things swarmed me. Svalinn let loose a roar that blasted a nice bit of a space for me, giving me a second¡¯s worth of time to get to my feet and lob a couple grenades, clearing out the densest packs of vampiric zombies. A few of them were little more than slithering one armed corpses at this point, maybe that¡¯s what happens when vampires starve for long enough.


    Crystal rounds zinged out, accurately exploding heads and anything behind them as Kraken screamed inside of my head. The vaunted Scion of Order was two disparate parts right now and it kind of scared me. On the one hand, he was completely in control of his actions, perfectly guiding the combined magical efforts of me and my gear while at the same time freaking out like a little girl in a haunted house! The sheer amount of distracting epithets were simply fascinating, or would be if I knew what half of them were.


    Using my holy water arms to clean myself from the tidal wave of gore that had splattered all over me, I set my jaw and expanded my magical senses, noting that the magically densest part of the building was anywhere close to me. The freaking center of stinking blackness was in the basement. [I coulda¡¯ told ya that,] Kraken said drily.


    [Fuck you, squid.] I growled, pulling out a few grenades, altering their runic structure to convert the kinetic explosion part into pure light. [Should have had Acantha gimme some of her wytchfire and then made grenades out of it. Burning this entire city to the ground would have been way easier.]


    A long metal column six inches thick slammed into my back as if I were a baseball and the pole was held by a steroidal Jackie fuckin¡¯ Robinson. It launched me clear out of the twenty-third floor through the panes of ¡®fall-proof¡¯ glass and into the evening sky.


    Engaging ¡®Anti-Human Missile¡¯ protocol . . . powered flight operational.


    As my body sat twenty-three stories up, hanging there for that split second of eternity, I had never been more thankful for Svalinn¡¯s shielding as well as Kraken agreeing with my ever-present paranoia and the myriad insta-activate background protocols I had tucked away. SAW¡¯s wings snapped out, perfectly adjusting to the instant change of environment even as my mind took a few seconds to catch up to the fact that I had been SWATTED. Something had looked at me the same way I glared at mosquitos and took similar action.


    The chant of ¡®fuck you¡¯ repeated itself in my head so many times that it became my mantra for the rest of the evening. Deciding to abandon my plan of clearing the building floor by floor, I settled for the classic American way, bombing the fuck out of it. Flying back up to the top floor, I called Gungnir to my hand from where it rested on floor number twenty-three, my staff hurtling to me under the control of our bond. Snatching it out of the air as I hovered under the power of magical flight, I took out my upgraded Centauri rifle and sighted in on the scumbag who¡¯s day I was about to wreck.


    It was another version of the ugly bone Bigfoot that I destroyed earlier but larger, barely able to work his way on all fours through the confines of the human-sized conference room. Rotating the barrel of the rifle to the penetrating crystal rounds, I opened her up in controlled bursts of three rounds at a time, walking the magically enhanced bullets up and down the fucking monstrosity¡¯s skull. For good measure, Kraken launched an over powered grenade into the floor vaporizing anything and everything.


    [I don¡¯t think there are any humans left in that building,] Kraken said. [All my scans reveal rapidly growing blotches of darkness. Besides, I don¡¯t think either of us want to be out here in the dead of night.]


    Conceding the point, I began pulling out grenades and consciously over charging them, using Gungnir to blast them like a launcher. I had SAW lower us ten feet at a time as I chucked them in, luckily each floor was missing most of its windows so I didn¡¯t have to worry about a grenade bouncing back at me. Twenty-three grenades later, the building was clear of all life and un-life as well even as the other skyscrapers seemed to moan in anger at their dying comrade.


    Swiveling around, I pointed Gungnir at the others. ¡°You¡¯re next bitches!¡± I yelled, chucking a into the darkest of floors of the buildings, completely sickened by the idea that Kraken was right, nothing was worth saving in this part of town. I began walking back towards Acantha, bits of nausea roiling in my stomach as I contemplated what that meant, the simple fact that all I had seen was death, sickness, diseased undead, and I hadn¡¯t even really gotten started.


    [The portal, dumbass! Cry about the rest of it tomorrow!]


    With a snarl, I turned back towards the gutted hulk of a skyscraper, growling and muttering dark curses as I approached the entrance, the frames of the mostly glass doors hanging limply off to the side. Channeling my inner Toby Keith, I started singing ¡®Beer for My Horses¡¯, one of my favorite songs to myself as I set my rifle to the magic flamethrower setting, ¡°Let the long arm of the law, put a few more in the ground!¡±

 Chapter 151 - A Kiss of Thorns (Book 3 Chapter 18)

    Hell hath no fury like a frustrated sorcerer, I¡¯m sure that¡¯s how the saying goes. At least, it does in my post-apocalyptic slice of the back-end desert of America. Be it far from me to actually feel comfortable in a place like this, the darting shadows of the dreary former nightmare that was corporate life making sweet love to all the horrors that concentrated dark magic could bring. The main lobby, where business people used to love to greet their clients with the vaulted ceilings and nice furniture, was scattered with trash and remnants of bodies. A few strategically tossed grenades and shotgun flamethrower blasts cleared that area quite nicely, illuminating the center of the building where the elevator wrapped around the column that used to serve as the elevator.


    ¡°Honey!¡± I called, giving in to the inspiration of the moment, ¡°I¡¯m home!¡± Shadows flitted from their disgusting hidey holes, screaming their rage and wild hunger even as my lovely rifle spoke for me. Bright flares of magically converted fire and force from my Centauri/dwarven rifle kicked harder than a wrecking ball, smashing the fiends even as I laughed, my holy water arms smacking away any of them that got too close.


    [Hurry up! You¡¯re attracting too much attention from the other skyscrapers that are probably in the exact same shape as this one! Besides, you don¡¯t know how to close a portal, do you?]


    I contemplated that question as I continuously lit up the growing horde of zombies, thanking my lucky stars that I had piles upon piles of charged grenades, ammunition, and mana batteries stored in Gungnir. Planting Gungnir next to me, Kraken took that over as well, accurately firing rounds and grenades from the spatial storage like secondary artillery. The last time I dealt with portals, they closed due to a device a dwarf tossed into it, and the first time I saw a portal I just sealed the damn thing with stone so nothing would even be able to come through. So my deductions leave me with a few options within the scope of my abilities, I could seal up the portal with stone, toss a couple seriously overcharged grenades through it and hope it blows up from the other end, or bring the whole building down and just let the thousands of tons worth of rubble serve as a fitting tombstone.


    [We know that the stone-sealing works, right?] Kraken mused, confirming that my train of thought wasn¡¯t completely off base. [And since we don¡¯t have whatever it was the dwarf chucked through the portal to close it, then determining if the other two methods work should be a priority, especially if you have multiple portals to close. Let¡¯s figure out what works if we can. Although, you have to be careful, night has fallen and we don¡¯t know what else is lurking around here.]


    [Fine, divert all extra power from the mana generators that currently aren''t being used into three grenades, charging them up right to the brink.]


    [Roger.]


    The ambient sounds in and of themselves were starting to freak me out, especially since my rifle doesn¡¯t sound like a normal firearm thanks to the magical design. There is no bang, no combustion, no pressurized sound wave that leaves your ears ringing as fear makes your trigger finger squeeze faster than it¡¯s ever done in its poor little life. My rifle when firing the crystal rounds emitted a quiet whoompf and even the shotgun-like blasts of fire sounded like slapping a tight beachball with an open hand. The grenades were the only modern-ish weaponry I used that actually sounded like its pre-apocalyptic counterpart.


    Reaching into a pocket on my thigh, I pulled out a handful of pre-charged planttrop seeds and flung them around the entrance of the building as I stormed in swinging Gungnir with one hand as I fired my rifle with the other. One of my holy water arms stole into my leg pocket and pulled out the rest of the planttrop seeds, firing them at what remained of the doors and hallways after charging them up to help thin out the incoming crowds of feral zombies. Another holy water arm nabbed the cryoshards, my almost forgotten ice bombs in the shape of playing cards out of the other leg¡¯s pocket, and slapped them against any available surface behind me as I descended into the depths of the basement.


    [Just let the damn cards blow the stairwell shut already!] I yelled inside of my head. [I can force my way through the floor of the concrete and earth travel outta here when I¡¯m done.] As soon as I got through four screaming freaks with no eyes and way too many teeth and to the bottom of the stairs, the snap-hiss of ultra-frozen energy exploded behind me, collapsing the stairs and creating a gigantic plug of ice.


    [That won¡¯t last long.] Kraken said, shivering from his very safe space in Gungnir even as he conjured more water, blasting it at the ice cap and freezing it to make it considerably thicker.


    [Do that behind me!] Turning around, Kraken hosed and froze all incoming monster missiles as I covered the prodigious ice cap with a thick layer of conjured stone, easily sealing off the entryway. Not stopping until the stone was at least six feet thick, Kraken covered my ass with the rest of the cryoshards and wildly whipping holy water arms that hissed as they sliced through the living dead.


    The four water arms reacted at the speed of thought, not even slowing down as they whipped like living scythes through the masses. [Hey, you¡¯re gettin¡¯ pretty good at this!] I chuckled inwardly. [Ya think it¡¯s got to something to do with the fact that you have tentacles? Is it just like home for you?]


    [How do you say it, ah yes, I believe the proper term for disparagement is, ¡®fuck you¡¯.]


    Laughing at Kraken even though this certainly neither the time nor the place to do so, especially with exploding bits of dead things flying everywhere. Furiously combating the surging flood of dark things for a solid three minutes, the basement was quiet.


    ¡°Don¡¯t say it.¡± I couldn¡¯t have Kraken fall into the trap that any idiot who tempts fate might do. The dreaded phrases such as, ¡®I¡¯m glad that¡¯s over¡¯, or ¡°It can¡¯t get any worse¡¯, seem to invoke the Higher Powers that be to actually pay attention and send a bit of personal fuckery your way. ¡°Say nothing, absolutely nothing,¡± I ordered, sending a bit of mana down our link to let him know that I wasn¡¯t joking. Extending my senses outward yet again, I pushed to search the hidden dark corners as I conjured light stones and tossed them out five feet or so, slowly working my way to check every room and entryway.


    Keeping at least a solid twenty feet between myself and the portal, I made sure to never turn my back to it. It was a magnificent work of art, as if some urban punk with actual skill grew the damn portal out of the cement flooring and steel rebar to attach it to the ceiling of the basement. The circle of protruding runes framed the mixture of deepest blank and sickly glowing purple that formed the liquid surface of the hole in space even as the stark white of the concrete framed the entire thing like a giant rectangular block. ¡°How are them grenades looking?¡± I asked, still conjuring and placing light stones. The entire room at this point was very well lit even as the shaking in my hands stilled.


    [Need about twenty more minutes before they¡¯re ready,] Kraken answered. [Do you think searching the rest of the basement is a good idea? Why not just seal it up and call it a day after blowing the portal?]


    ¡°Fine.¡± Taking one last magical look around and seeing nothing on my version of radar, I plugged up the two hallways with an immovable amount of stone. ¡°Now to take care of the exit strategy,¡± I grumbled, willing Gungnir to shorten the staff handle while lengthening the blade. It took me longer than twenty minutes to magically charge and sharpen the blade to the point where it effortlessly cut through the concrete until I had reached the dirt and stone underneath. From what I could tell, the concrete went down way further than fifty freaking yards so I dug down about six feet and then tunneled to the side which was way shorter than my original idea. When I hit dirt, I sent a pulse of power through it just to make sure that it would work. ¡°Nothing but good ol¡¯ earth, tight.¡±


    Climbing back up, I pulled out the three grenades and right as I was about to lob them in like the world¡¯s worst carnival game, because who could miss that eight by eight foot target, a lovely lady with blood red eyes and jet black hair sauntered out. I¡¯m not really sure what she found so funny. Maybe it was the way that I had gotten into the bowler¡¯s stance to gently lob the over-charged grenades through or the fact that she considered me and my grenades to be absolutely no threat. Whatever it was, it was annoying, no, condescending, no, irritating. That¡¯s it, it was irritating to watch her look at me and laugh, laugh as if I were a clown who was there just to make her smile. In those alien eyes, I was not a threat, I was less than a threat, I was a joke.


    [Vampire!] Kraken hissed. [Old Blood! I think, if she smells like a dead body then she¡¯s Old Blood. If she¡¯s New Blood then you¡¯re in way less danger. They¡¯re big on honor like the Luneks but they¡¯re not stupid about it! Vampires don¡¯t live long if they¡¯re stupid, and both kinds prune their own family harder than your granddad drank!]


    Pulling just a smidge of mana out of each of my three grenades just to make sure I didn¡¯t blow us all to kingdom come, I slipped them back inside of Gungnir even as I slowly and gracefully stood up straight, conjuring water to clean the gunk and gore off myself and banishing it. [Not sure anyone can do anything harder than how gramps drank but if she means business then crank up the generators. I want them doing double-time while I stall for time,] I explained even as I said nothing out loud.Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.


    The lady said something that I didn¡¯t catch, the syllables more like liquid hissing than anything language I¡¯ve ever heard. Raising an eyebrow, I said nothing even as I examined her. My armor shimmered with barely contained power as Gungnir continued to charge from my two internal mana-generators. I had used an incredible amount of power so far today in crushing the hordes of undead and night terrors. My experiences so far had been quite at odds with the vision in front of me.


    Aside from the blood-red eyes, she could have easily passed for a gymnast moonlighting as a ¡®model¡¯ for some extra cash. At just over six feet tall, she tucked her dark hair behind her pointed ear as she smiled and tried another language. I did manage to catch a glimpse of her elongated canines as she worked through all of the languages she knew. Her brow furled as nothing proved successful to which I held up one finger. As she quieted, I pulled out a dwarven translation amulet that I had saved from my last run-in with them and held it up. I hadn¡¯t had too much time to study it and unravel it to figure out how it worked like I wanted to, but that doesn¡¯t mean my mana sorcery wasn¡¯t more than able to copy the enchantment and paste it on something else. I had ten copies of the damn thing tucked away for times like this.


    Her eyes lit up as she snatched it from my hand. Almost faster than the eye could see, she drew a dagger and stuck her finger with the tip, pushing the amulet into the cut so that it was covered in her blood to which she then stuck the whole thing to her forehead and hummed. Now I was curious, seeing that she so obviously knew what to do with it when I had had it for months and could barely get it to work. A moment later, she put the chain around her neck so that the amulet hung between her generous cleavage.


    Forcefully tamping down on my masculine drive to stare, I could barely pay attention to Kraken as he kept up a running diatribe in the background. [New Blood vamps are blood magic specialists and love doing elaborate rituals on a scale of crazy you can¡¯t imagine. Still roughly alive, New Bloods like a more sensual path to power. The Old Blood on the other hand is basically Superman stuffed into a zombie. They can do magic with the force of a dragon and have no time for bugs, ehr mortals.]


    Keeping our conversation flowing at a higher speed of thought, I asked for more clarification. [New Blood, easy, they still live. They like blood magic because they can have the same activities as standard mortals. You can¡¯t fuck an Old Blood, they have no bloodflow, ergo, no sex. New Blood like to still drink, eat, smoke, fuck, the usual mortal vices. But don¡¯t let her kiss you, they¡¯re made to be your sensual kryptonite. That¡¯s how they lure you in for dinner.]


    Figuring that I¡¯d move this right along, I cocked an eyebrow as I checked my wards and shields. ¡°English,¡± I said softly, looking this Venus flytrap over. ¡°I don¡¯t suppose that trinket has basic-ass English, huh?¡±


    Her instant jerky action of looking at me reminded me of an insect, the motion completely unnatural to the human form even as I watched her chest neither rise nor fall. Creepy. I noticed for science. Taking a deep breath as she fiddled with the amulet, I decided to keep talking as I gently extended a heavily guarded mental tendril towards her. ¡°Anyways, we¡¯re probably not going to get along. You drink blood, I take out undead but you may or may not be one. You don¡¯t smell like one,¡± I continued with a care-free lilt to my voice as if I were explaining to a baby the process of changing its diaper. ¡°You smell rather nice actually, kinda like a beautifully rare steak after the ten minutes of rest. But your portal here, this damn thing has to go so . . .  I got a couple glowy presents here-¡±


    My mental tendril was yanked by an unseen force, pulled and split into two threads, one to the amulet and the other to her forehead as the vampire stared at me. My connection to be her and the amulet began to turn crimson as her control over it began to take over. With a thought, I snapped the connection as I took a step back, readying Gungnir and the grenades.


    ¡°That won¡¯t be necessary, mortal.¡± The silken tones were off putting to say the least, especially with the way that her motions smoothened out to react at a more normal human speed. The insect-like jerkiness was gone and the balance of professional gymnasts was present. ¡°English it is. The idioms took a while to parse through, cat got your tongue? Intriguing wordplay . . . does this mean that I¡¯m the feline that holds your ability to speak or felines are found to be sexually attractive by the way you look at me as if I¡¯m a delicious mouse?¡±


    Fuck. Smart vampires, double fuck. Clearing my throat, I went for the ostentatious route. ¡°Perchance milady, the context of the phrase was lost in translation. Felines are not attractive to humans but they embody a beauty all their own. While I do find you gloriously beautiful, the idiom refers to being rendered unable to speak due to shock, as if a literal cat had grabbed your tongue, rendering you unable to speak due to obstacle and the shock, for what cat goes for a tongue?¡±


    Her laugh was music putting Beethoven and Aerosmith to shame, a haunting melody to the harmony of hormones that she effortlessly put off. Her spell of charisma was unconscious, bleeding off in ways that would have had me on my knees if not for the many layers of control my flesh and mind sorcery had put up. With another cleansing wave of power, I gestured at the portal. ¡°Would you be so kind as to aid me in my quest?¡± I asked graciously. ¡°I have been charged with purging this city for the safety of my comrades and I would rather not harm your person in the pursuit of my goal if necessary.¡± It was already happening. My body was trying to get me to view this creature as less of a threat over time, a weakness borne of flesh that should not be possible and yet here she was and she hadn¡¯t even done anything yet.


    [Careful, fleshling! Remember, PAR-A-SITE! Evil, deadly, not good in the extreme!]


    [I got it, squid!]


    Mirroring my earlier expression perfectly, she cocked an eyebrow at me. ¡°And your quest is, my good wizard?¡±


    ¡°Closing the portals and purging the land.¡±


    Looking me up and down like I was a five course meal at her favorite restaurant, she took a step forward. In the magic spectrum, I could see a cloud of a few million tiny bright red specks floating towards me, her personal hormonal attack. I knew what this meant, the unspoken truce had come to an end. Trusting in my personal defenses to last for at least a minute with Kraken at the wheel, I focused on the portal, conjuring a growing cap of stone to grow up on every side to seal it off. Screeching in fury, the vamp moved so fast that she vanished. A semi hit me multiple times from the back, flinging me forward even as the kinetic runes instantly reacted with a blowback of energy.


    Activating Svalinn¡¯s standard counter, my dragon-infused gauntlets conjured a runed dome of alternating steel and granite that nothing short of a magic nuke would even dent. The portal at this point was completely swallowed up by a column of conjured granite that boasted a radius of six feet. The front side of the rock plug did have a small slanting tunnel where I would still be able to fit my grenades in and roll them down so that I could still deliver the farewell present to the other side. My dome started to shake from all sides as the woman vented her fury, unable to actually get to the soft meat insides, me.


    [Do you see the problem with ¡®turtling¡¯ up? Now where ya gonna go?] Kraken asked even as the vampire screamed for my blood. Thinking fast, I applied my method of sneakily infiltrating New Miami to now. The only difference was that I wasn¡¯t surrounded by stone, but I could be. Leaving Svalinn¡¯s dome up that gave me plenty of room, I willed Gungnir into a small knife that I attached to my belt as I started the world¡¯s slowest escape.


    In hindsight, it was brilliant. In the moment, it was raw, unhindered terror. All I did was divert the flow of power from my generators to my ongoing spell, which was filling up the entire room with conjured stone. Because of my earth sorcery, moving through stone was fairly easy, not exactly fast but it cuts down on multiple problems at the same time, and I¡¯d like to point out that I¡¯m growing. Instead of burying my opponents in the earth, I¡¯m bring the earth to my opponents.


    Ten minutes of concentration yielded several metric tons of stone that completely filled up the main room in the basement as well as the escape tunnel. Here, I was king. Here, I ruled with an earthen fist. Little Miss Bloody Sunshine had nowhere to go thanks to my earlier efforts at sealing off the room and now she was trapped in a little bubble of stone that didn¡¯t even give her room thrash about. Banishing Svalinn¡¯s dome, Kraken and I took a good long magical look around.


    [Well that¡¯s one way to cheat your ass off.]


    [One way to successfully win!] I corrected. Flowing through the stone, I made my way over to the little fist-sized tunnel and pushed the three overcharged grenades down the slanted mini-ramp, watching as they rolled through the liquid portal. As they vanished, I quickly filled in the tunnel and any leftover space with conjured platinum, making sure to etch runes of sealing and anti-tampering as I went.


    Two hours of work left me even more exhausted as my body begged for a rest even though my magic could keep me going. Forcing down a Centauri meal cube, I regarded the trapped vampire. [It would be a mercy to kill her,] I remarked as I contemplated how to do it. [She doesn¡¯t need air so leaving her here just like this won¡¯t kill her. Decapitation, does that work on them? Fuck it, I have holy water arms, burn the bitch.]


    Moving until I had about five feet of solid stone between us, I carefully banished a tiny tunnel of stone from me to her even as I filled the space with Nephilim tainted water. When I finally reached her bubble, the water sprayed through and Kraken and I watched her burn as I manipulated the water to make sure that I properly put her down. First, I cut her in half and then followed that up with decapitation and then burned her heart and brain with the holy water. Even as I wanted to turn away, Kraken reminded me about the nature of this creature. Vampires feast on blood, they live off of the life of others, this very fact means that they are not a part of nature¡¯s cycle. They steal from nature¡¯s cycle making them the antithesis of everything that I am and have been working towards. And so I watched. I watched as she melted. I watched as she burned. I watched because I should, because someone should witness the demise of evil, to remember the fall and tell the tale of evil¡¯s end.


    Extracting the holy water, I made sure to carefully filter it through conjured sand so that it didn¡¯t bring back any particles of the vampire. Sealing her remains in a sphere of stone, I grabbed that and moved through the surrounding stone with the coffin down the escape tunnel, taking the time to bury the coffin several hundred feet below the surface of the earth to make sure it would be undisturbed. [You¡¯re lucky you cheat,] Kraken grumbled. [Anything else would have instantly died to her, whatever her name was. You just trapped, disintegrated, and buried a New Blood vampire that who knows was however many centuries old, I don¡¯t know if I should be shocked or proud at this point.]


    [Just be happy I¡¯m alive!] I snapped, cautiously moving under the earth in the direction of where I left everyone. As I got closer, I could See that the devastated area was completely empty for now even as I sat safely underground. Following the trail of my link to Acantha, I kept going until I hit the outskirts of the city where a low-rise building sat. At least twenty Luneks stood guard at the top and another twenty patrolled at the base. Acantha, Remy, Fernando and my two new vassals were inside. As far as I could tell they were still alive and healthy.


    Deciding to make a statement in front of the Luneks even as I knew I needed to catch some shuteye, I popped out of the ground and began conjuring a squat dome of pure stone. Kraken made sure to include runes on the inside and outside while winding conjured iron throughout the structure to make it even heavier and stronger as I shaped the entire structure around a small bedroom at the very center. This was to be my temporary bomb shelter with no doorway, allowing me to basically be my own key. After an hour¡¯s worth of conjuring and making sure I had enough pinhole tunnels to supply me with fresh air, I washed myself off with conjured water and conked out for a flesh sorcery enhanced power nap.


    The best part of flesh sorcery in the morning is the fact that I can literally program an alarm clock and force my body to be instantly alert, but the best part about flesh sorcery at night is the ability to stuff a full twelve hours of rejuvenating rest into three hours of unconsciousness. With Kraken keeping watch and Gungnir steadily charging, I had nothing to worry about at all until the light of the morning sun bled through the teeny tiny air holes. ¡°Ooooo buddy!¡± I yipped. ¡°My army¡¯s a-comin¡¯ today!¡±

 Chapter 152 - Old Friend (Book 3 Chapter 19)

    The scent of solid oaken pews and the sounds of almost a thousand devoted believers singing their hearts out took up just as much memory as the actual sermons themselves. Parables of properly handling money while giving a tithe to God framed deeper messages of sin, fire and brimstone, and the downfalls of man¡¯s flawed character. None rang out more consistently from that preacher¡¯s pulpit than the vibrant scourging of the sin of pride. ¡®Pride goeth before a fall!¡¯ the old man would rail, fervent belief giving him energy beyond his years. And yet, it was hard not to be prideful as I stood on a pillar of conjured stone in the early desert light just as the brutal sun started ramping up, giving the air an almost liquid quality as the heat seeped into every crevice. Even with the hints of Arizona¡¯s mirages trying to play tricks on my eyes, my army evoked the deepest pride a man could possess . . . success!


    Roughly a thousand strong force of crystalline giants marching towards the gutted hulk of Phoenix, Arizona was enough to bring the tiniest tear to my eye. Glorious, simply glorious. Each one full of enough condensed mana from days in the blazing desert sun to fight for three days without end. [We going with Operation Praise Baby Jesus or Quake and Bake?]


    I laughed just a little, Kraken¡¯s latest obsession was my memory of Talladega Nights had him renaming all of my plans and auto-mental background processes. ¡°Quake and Bake baby!¡± I answered, chuckling even more. ¡°Quake and Bake.¡±


    At my command, Kraken broadcasted the plan to my army, specifically to the earth elemental sergeants in charge of their own mini-platoons. A thousand golems with an elemental sergeant assigned to every group of fifty meant that I had twenty earth elementals ready to do my bidding. This particular plan was the brainchild of forcing myself to come up with a better plan than what I had last night. I could either storm each freaking skyscraper and then seal up the portals and then spend days wasting my time tackling the thousands of square miles of suburbia around Phoenix or . . . I could have my earth elemental sergeants shake the whole thing down for me.


    Two groups of fifty golems, each with their own sergeant, peeled off to the left and right respectively as they began the long task of storming and collapsing all of the suburban housing around Phoenix. They were under orders to capture and bring back anyone that wasn¡¯t some kind of undead or evil creature but everything else was going to be one with Mother Earth. The other nine hundred golems with their sergeants started marching on the city.


    [I wish I could cry! I¡¯d like to be human enough sometimes just to gleek out a bit of eye moisture with what I¡¯ve wrought!]


    Ignoring my over-dramatic familiar, I hopped on the shoulders of the biggest sergeant as we went past the wide eyes of the Luneks staring at my procession. Acantha stood at the corner of a building, scanning the waves of crystalline soldiers. ¡°You too!¡± I called out. ¡°Get your lazy ass on a big one and let¡¯s Quake and Bake!¡±


    The smaller corporate buildings barely put up a fuss. Creatures of the night tend not to be morning people, especially considering the environment of the morning. The shadowy things evaporated under a single salvo of a golem¡¯s solar flare cannon or a charged crystal bullet and the zombies were nothing more than cockroaches beneath their wide plated feet. We took each of the smaller buildings one at a time as the elementals used their own innate abilities to shake and sink the buildings into the ground, conjuring dirt and stone to completely fill up any and all cracks as my minions outside handled any of the fleeing monsters.


    Undead spiders the size of horses tried to run for it only to meet the waiting ranks of stone golems that almost seemed eager to test out their warhammers. With Kraken and the sergeants synchronously keeping everything in line, the silent communication made this entire process creepy. There were no yelled orders, screaming commanders, booms from old-school firearms. The only sounds were screams from the flattened monsters and the squeals of the buildings as their internal structures came apart under the onslaught of magic.


    I watched it all with almost bored, dead eyes. It almost seemed like a joke, an irritating interruption to what I actually wanted to do. I did not want to be out here cleaning up a fucking city. I did not want to be in this godforsaken desert burning and flattening any and all possibilities of future opposition. I wanted to be in my fucking smoothie jungle wiling the time away with roasted catfish from my river and a goddamn smoothie! My simmering rage at this grand waste of time that wasn¡¯t actually a waste of time started to roll to a boil.


    [Quake and Bake part 2,] I ordered. [Speed this shit up Kraken.] Sending my familiar what I had in mind, I felt his excitement spike.


    [Operation Praise Baby Jesus it is!]


    Instead of sinking and taking one building at a time, Operation Praise Baby Jesus took a more scholarly approach. It put physics to work for us. The buildings had been sinking down as we moved through the city but now we were simply going to push the skyscrapers over like a felled tree and let the weight of their concrete and steel frames do most of the work for us. [TIMBER!] Kraken screamed as the first skyscraper shook, its frame rippling from the sheared gash in the bottom put there by the elementals. Thirty stories of mass fell over into the next set of buildings, backfiring all manner of projectiles from the tearing metal that bounced off my and Acantha¡¯s shields. As a cloud of dust exploded into the air from the impact, the portal in the basement came into view in all of its purpley glory.


    Three golems stepped forward and launched a slew of sunstone grenades through it just before two sergeants sealed and buried it two hundred feet deep. Having an army made this easy. Step one, knock over skyscraper with summoned elementals. Two, kill anything that comes out, especially if it resembles anything from a horror movie. Three, grenade/seal/bury otherworldly portal ASAP. Four, sink all debris into the earth and move on. It took all day but the process was easy. I barely had to lift a finger as my army steamrolled all opposition. Turns out, even demons from another plane of existence can be flattened like errant crickets if you hit them with enough mass. Bugs, zombies, demons, skeletal necromancers . . . all fell to Operation Praise Baby Jesus.


    ¡°And that . . . is how you fucking clean up a city!¡± I declared, hopping off my ride and rounding on Acantha as I shielded my eyes from the glare of the setting sun. ¡°Questions? Comments? Concerns?¡±


    ¡°I uh, how the . . .¡± she stuttered. ¡°How did you expect ME to do what you just did? You used an army!? I work with fire but this is a desert! Completely unreasonable!¡±


    ¡°Fine, fine,¡± I conceded, holding my hands up a bit even as I halfheartedly teased. ¡°Not my fault you couldn¡¯t handle one little task. I woulda thought that an alien witch would easily be able to take on one desert pustule.¡±


    The snap-hiss of a down live-wire crackled through the air heralding the opening of a portal. Whipping around as several more opened up off the east towards the suburban part of Phoenix, insane laughter rang out much louder than any human had the right to be.


    ¡°So much light in these morsels! Feast my children! Bring me the shiny one full of power! His soul will fill me for centuries!¡±


    I didn¡¯t know where they came from simply because it didn¡¯t make sense. One second I was reveling in the feeling of accomplishment and the next I was shoulder deep in swarms of feral zombies screaming for blood. Humongous beasts, amalgamations of draconic skeletons, sat at the edge of the city, their clawed feet sunk into the ground as their ribs opened up to form a giant circle where within that format a portal nested. At least fifteen of the portable portal skeletons vomited an unending stream of undead and demons. I tried to get a good look at the freak floating above his rising tide of rancid minions but the horde had my full attention.


    At least half of the zombies were armored and the rest were misshapen as if the necromancer had experimented on them, adding extra layers of dead muscle and bone or combining several bodies together to form a sickly whole.


    My golems really shone in this kind of battle though. The facts simply didn¡¯t work out in the other dude¡¯s favor, but that would change if I couldn¡¯t get those main portals closed. Undead flesh clashed with unyielding, magically reinforced crystal as the backline of golems opened up with crystalline bullets that completely decimated the shrieking hordes. That bought me enough of a reprieve for me to glare at Acantha who overcame her shock at the sudden turn of events and jumped in to assist. As she furiously chanted from the back of the golem she was riding, a ball of eerie green fire raged into existence, spinning and glowing like a miniature star.


    Just before she released it, I pulled on my stores of power and simultaneously softened the hard packed dirt in front of my army with my earth sorcery while conjuring incredible amounts of water, turning the area between the front line and the portals into a thick muck that hampered the undead¡¯s advance. The hundred or so undead that had actually made it into the ranks of my golem army were quickly put down by a few smacks of a hammer or a crystal round but two of the fuckers actually got near me.You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    Swinging Gungnir with my enhanced strength, the first zombie¡¯s chest exploded inward as mace-form Gungnir flashed with power but the second zombie used the first as a springboard to aim for my head. A holy-water arm lashed out and bisected it in mid-air, saving me from the spray of rotting guts. The smell alone was enough to add fuel to the flames of my anger that had been stewing all day. Drawing on my power yet again, I focused on the giant portal skeleton thing and forced the earth beneath and around it to shoot up spikes of pure granite, skewering every part of the abomination and shutting off the portal. Again and again, I focused my magic, slowly cutting off the supply of enemies even as the floating necromancer screamed in rage.


    ¡°Swat him,¡± I growled at Acantha who was still charging her fireball. Reaching out with a tendril of mana, I reinforced her personal stores of energy with my own and the fireball grew to the size of a beachball.


    ¡°Wrath of Sol!¡± Acantha screamed, leaning back and launching the fireball into the sky where it settled about fifty feet above all of us. Opening her eyes, I noticed that they blazed the same color as her floating ball of death. Screaming again, fully in the throes of exercising her power, Acantha pointed and the floating fireball lanced out dense spears of flame that completely incinerated everything it touched. Within the space of five seconds, every portal-bearing skeleton had been torched to ash.


    [Focus!] Kraken reprimanded as I looked around in awe as the destruction my vassal had produced. I had to give her credit, holy fuck that was cool! But Kraken was right. With a mental command, every single golem focused on the necromancer and as one, unerringly blew him out of the sky. As the shattered body pieces fell out of the sky, Acantha leaned forward, screaming and pointing as the fireball rocketed into the falling remains, detonating the pieces out of existence.


    Putting the muck to good use, I had it clean up the battlefield before returning this part of Arizona to its normal dusty scenery. Acantha collapsed as I pulled my mana feed back to myself, her stores of energy completely spent on that apocalyptic display of. Leaving myself an honor guard of a hundred golems and two sergeants, I had the rest of my army join the cleanup crew that was storming all of nearby suburbia while I made my way back to the crowd of Luneks holed up west of here.


    Severak and his group of Luneks were not exactly excited to see me, but their relief was apparent in the complete change of attitude. Apparently, summoning a crystal army that can wipe out a freaking city engenders its own form of respect. Remy and Fernando, on the other hand, were ecstatic to see Acantha, who in all fairness had probably kept them alive and was only barely associated with the person that murdered their friend and unshackled their minds. Keeping my petty thoughts to myself, I kept myself busy off to the side by conjuring stone dishware and putting conjured water in the cups and Centauri meal cubes on the plates. After making sure Acantha saw me pointing at them to let her know that it was available, I walked off to my dome-icile, haha, not domicile.


    Disappointment was all that I found there. This is the spot I had picked out for my golems to bring me people or prisoners that they¡¯d picked up from covering the city and suburban area but nobody was here. Other than the gaggle of people I didn¡¯t recognize in the building with the Luneks, nobody else was alive? Really? Walking into my dome, a voice I hadn¡¯t heard in a long time greeted me.


    ¡°Power agrees with you, mortal.¡± Sitting in my house on my conjured stone chair was Hermes himself, or Himself? Not sure how the pronouns work since deities are fucking real. Last time I saw him, he was an eight foot golden gymnast¡¯s dream whose presence you literally couldn¡¯t feel. This time he was quite a bit shorter and definitely more material around the edges, a bit less godly if you will.


    ¡°I have less to offer in the way of refreshments,¡± I said cautiously, again conjuring stone dishware and filling with water and Centauri meal cubes respectively. One plate in the middle I did put the last bit of my precious Taco Bell that I got from New Miami. ¡°My apologies for the lack of comfort, I wasn¡¯t expecting guests.¡±


    Waving it off as he pulled out a cigar, looking at me for assent before lighting it. Giving a quick nod, I shaped the floor to have another chair and sat across from Hermes as I rested my head on my knuckles. Sitting across from a deity could mean any number of things, although mythos and experience would intonate that most of those possibilities were nothing good. ¡°Worry not,¡± he said, giving the air a good puff of delectable smoke. ¡°I¡¯m not here on business and since you¡¯ve clearly divined, I¡¯m a bit uhm . . . less. But, since that gives me a bit more freedom, I thought I¡¯d check up on the last mortal recipient of a gift from me. What makes you even more interesting is that you¡¯ve survived encounters with both Flamel and Merlin, not to mention a few angels and demons. I¡¯ve so enjoyed watching your tumultuous life but what bothers me is the simple lack of connection you¡¯ve had! Numerous women, most of them incredibly beautiful, have walked in and out of your life and none of them so much as garnered a look from you! Why!¡±


    ¡°Huh?¡±


    The almost incoherent rant continued. ¡°What good is a mortal¡¯s story without romance? Where is the fire of passion to temper the throes of combats? The softness to bend the steel? Adam and Eve, Cleopatra and Marc Antony, Ron Weasley and Hermoine Granger!¡±


    ¡°The last two aren¡¯t even real!¡± I interjected only to get waved off again.


    ¡°Don¡¯t beleaguer the point mortal! Your life is almost boring but would be incredible if you had some damn romance! AND . . . since I¡¯ve been diminished due to my overt helping with one measly acorn, I have even more time to gaze at the temporary fleetings of mortality that come and go like glorious sparks! But you! You¡¯re an ember with a potential for a fire! You can live so much longer than the rest of them!¡±


    The stone cup cracked in my hand. ¡°It was your acorn that ate my woman,¡± I oh so quietly snarled.


    ¡°Another twist to what could be an epic romance for all time! Stolen love! Heartbroken hero finds solace in another, forever pining for his true love!¡± Hermes almost fell out of his chair as he leaned back. ¡°His lovers fading away through the centuries as he endures past their mortal coil! Oh what fire!¡±


    ¡°What you mean to say is that you¡¯re bored!¡± I squinted at the deity in front of me who¡¯s eyes held an unhinged gleam. When Zeus was bored, he raped chicks while in the form of a bull or a swan. I really don¡¯t want to know what a bored messenger deity would do. That desire ran aground on the beach of my don¡¯t-give-a-fuckness right now. Sure, I could bang a couple forest ladies who were more than willing back home, or maybe spark something up with some hot alien gal in New Miami or a freaky one in New Richmond, but I don¡¯t see anyone else getting ready to assault the holds of the undead. My concerns right now are so much greater than getting it on, but for the life of me I couldn¡¯t figure out why it was different for this particular home invader.


    ¡°Look, I¡¯m not here to threaten you mortal, I like you.¡± Hermes paused to examine his cigar and bask in its scent before giving another puff. ¡°But I¡¯m not the only one around here, and you¡¯re turning into a crux point. The more you involve yourself with the broader tapestry, the more you¡¯re going to get noticed. Just a friendly warning from someone who¡¯d like your story to continue, assaulting the Poles will put you on the map. That¡¯s all I can say without another judgment.¡±


    ¡°Did you uh, did you ever watch the show Boston Legal?¡± I calmly asked even as my butthole was quaking in fear. ¡°Not sure how up to date on mortal shows you are.¡±


    ¡°William Shatner is brilliant!¡± Hermes screamed, hopping up and pantomiming. ¡°I object!¡± Sitting back down, he looked at me with an upraised eyebrow. ¡°Why? What are you getting at?¡±


    ¡°Well, let¡¯s talk about this like lawyers do . . . we can talk in hypotheticals,¡± I mused. ¡°Hypothetically, what might happen if I were to hypothetically continue on with my plans to assault the undead fortresses in the North and South? Only hypothetically speaking of course.¡±


    ¡°Oooh, acting! Just like Shatner!¡± Hermes grinned, his cigar smoke framing his features, giving him a smoky trickster god look. ¡°Let¡¯s say, hypothetically speaking of course, if you were to hypothetically continue with your plans, then hypothetically, several hypothetical options might happen. Hypothetical one, you might be drafted into the Judgment Paladin Corps of Hyperion god of Light due to your effectiveness at combating all kinds of evil. Hypothetical two, you might trigger a greater war with the Lich Empire and their Vampiric allies. And third, hypothetically speaking of course, you might become the focus of multiple deities of the different flavors, like the hypothetical deity of love since you¡¯ve lost your own loved one, the hypothetical deity of justice and light, the hypothetical deity of death and the underworld. If you hypothetically continue on your course of action, then the minions of those hypothetical subjects might just turn their eye upon you.¡±


    ¡°Fuck.¡±


    ¡°And what woe would betide the mortal who hypothetically slew a fire dragon by drowning? Or murdered a witch who was within her rights to colonize a scoured planet? Or what might happen if anyone learns that a certain sorcerer with incredible power is building his base on said scoured planet? Especially a sorcerer that is friends with a cultivator? Oh my, the drama!¡±


    ¡°Fuck.¡±


    ¡°What would the Sects think? Their own sorcerer slaves long dead and their enchanted items gone to dust as their own cultivating children grow up without such comforts or trappings of power? What a prize such a powerful sorcerer would be!¡±


    ¡°FUCK.¡±


    ¡°But hypothetically speaking of course, what might they all think if they learned that a sorcerer single-handedly cleansed his world, what power that hypothetical sorcerer must have to be able to take all of that on by himself! Who would dare bring such threats to a mighty being of magic when gifts might turn his benevolence on them with much less pain or loss?¡± Hermes leaned in closer to me, the smoke moving out of the way as his intense eyes locked onto mine. ¡°Hypothetically speaking, mortal sorcerer, do you know why Merlin is untouched? Why does Flamel roam around and nobody dares to come near him except in pure supplication? Fear. Both have immense power and are feared. Wild magic and poisonous alchemy can touch many from afar.¡±


    ¡°Is it better to be loved or feared,¡± I whispered, weighing the hypotheticals in my mind.


    ¡°In your case, feared. Much better to be feared.¡±


    A cold shiver went down my spine as I considered my options even as a small question poked at the back of my mind. ¡°Tell me, hypothetically, what¡¯s in it for you? Why even tell me? What does one such as yourself have to do with a mortal like me? My slice of eternity does not conflict with your own and I can¡¯t see any hypothetical benefits for you?¡±


    ¡°You call it life, but we call it a Game. And what better way to play the game then plan many, many moves ahead.¡± The sound of thousand falling feathers rushed by as Hermes vanished in front of my eyes leaving a small round marble on the plate where my precious Taco Bell used to be.


    A trap. Everything in me screamed that it was a trap. That little green-blue marble that resembled a miniaturized Earth. There wasn¡¯t even a note next to it to explain to me what the fuck I was looking at. After a minute of arguing with Kraken about how to go about figuring this out, I cracked and touched it with a finger.


    I¡¯m not the deity of magic, but sometimes things get lost in the mail, sometimes, things like this.


    The words rang through my skull as a very condensed pack of information shot from the marble up through my arms and into my brain where Kraken caught it, redirecting to a quarantine container of mental sorcery. As we both slowly consumed the packet after many intense scans, it became clear exactly what it was . . . instructions on how to make a real Grimoire.

 Chapter 153 - Calm Before the Storm (Book 3 Chapter 20)

    I was full blown fighting with myself in that moment, so much so that I couldn¡¯t even hear Kraken yelling advice through our mental link. The largest part of me wanted to dive into that little nugget of information and parse through every bit of knowledge for myself. I could feel the compacted swirl of different lives¡¯ worth of memories tucked away in that tempting little marble, begging to be learned and experienced just one more time. The other, somewhat more sensible part of me, understood that real life does not wait for anyone, let alone almost immortal sorcerers. Figuring out that I at least owed it to the people that I¡¯d saved thus far, I managed to secrete the orb full of knowledge away into Gungnir as I stepped out of my stone dome to manage the rabble, barely able to handle ignoring the greenish-blue strands of memories calling out to me, fragments of memories such as a skeletal hand peeling a young girl¡¯s skin off in the shape of a page or a condensed series of images of a young boy growing trees and pulping them in liquid mana.


    My entire next week was spent holding everyone¡¯s hand, irritatingly enough since I had plenty of shit that I actually wanted to do. First, I had my elemental sergeants continue the effort of combing through wrecked suburbia and returning the area to its peaceful, pre-human era by getting rid of any and all buildings that I hadn¡¯t specifically said were exempt from magical bulldozing. Part two consisted of using those same elementals to set up the basics of shelter complete with pre-carved runes for me to empower that allowed for basic air conditioning and water conjuration so people could actually live in this bum ass part of Arizona. The Luneks plus the meager amount of humans from Remy and Fernando¡¯s group ended up settling by the nearby river that nobody could remember the name of and I made a few solar panels for them to experiment with even though the Luneks would probably lose their shit over it. Several large columns of transmuted crystal were planted into the earth so that only about three feet of them were sticking out of the ground, each covered with molded granite and connected to the solar panels so they could be the inhabitants emergency mana batteries for whatever the hell they wanted.


    Part three was me making and following through on the offer to transport any person that didn¡¯t want the desert life to join the group at New Richmond, which pretty much all of the humans did. I left Kraken in Sunstone Castle to repair the sixty or so golems that had been damaged and also to boost production until I was sitting on five thousand golems. The caveat is that after the repairs to the original army, the main priority was to have the underground batteries charged up to full first, just in case I had to deploy to Greenland early.


    Phoenix, Arizona had taken on a very different, more natural look than it sported in the past hundred years. Gone were the metal mountains giving the sky the middle finger in the wretched desert heat and in their places were stone longhouses and a few large barns by the river. As Severak and his group of unstable Luneks wanted to stay in the inhospitable desert, I figured I might as well let them, but giving them the basics of shelter and magic A.C. let my conscience be free and clear.


    By the time I had shaken out ever last straggler and shuttled them to where they needed to be, I finally noticed that Acantha, Remy, Fernando, Versonae, and Arglyn were tiptoeing around like I was some magical giant on a rampage. ¡°What?¡± I cursed, whipping around as I returned to Phoenix from my last trip to New Richmond. ¡°What is it? Is it something I did or said? Did I suddenly get really ugly?¡±


    All five stared at me as if I actually had grown another head. Acantha¡¯s hair glowed with a warm fire¡¯s glow as Remy and Fernando looked at each other, Remy¡¯s dark skin glistening already with sweat even as Fernando¡¯s tanned complexion welcomed the sun. Versonae¡¯s light feline coloring served to deflect the sun¡¯s rays even as the heat was just starting to ramp up which was causing Arglyn to pant.


    ¡°Here.¡± Acantha reached forward a fist, turning it over and opening it to reveal several clumps of fur. ¡°I figured you forgot this for your DNA bank. It¡¯s a chunk of fur from every Lunek here.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s kinda creepy that you let people experiment on themselves, hombre.¡± Fernando cut in, fingering his magical bats. ¡°I mean, I know it¡¯s voluntary but damn, that¡¯s some freaky shit right there.¡±


    Not willing to argue the morals of self-medication or experimentation, I gave a quick thanks and snatched the clumps, feeding them to my little golem as I muttered my thanks. I watched the surreptitious glances they all gave each other, clearly they had more than enough time to talk and get each other up to speed. I wasn¡¯t privy to the details but this group right here was already on the fast track to becoming friends. Irritating, but probably inevitable. I had my own plans that took priority. Arglyn and Versonae were two powerful Luneks, the best of their tribe according to what Severak claimed as well as what Kraken¡¯s and my own magical senses said. These two were going to be bodyguards for Johnny and Reeanth, they just didn¡¯t know it yet.


    Two days later . . .


    ¡°Yo! Quit droppin¡¯ off your damn strays, man!¡± Scott half-hearted growled as he pulled on a beer as Mark downed his own. Night falls very differently in the forest of the Eastern United States. The deciduous landscape heralds its own darkening as the trees do their best to shade the forest floor well before the sun has truly fallen. The desert comes alive at night, but simply can¡¯t compare to the sheer amount of life in the forest. And humanity seems to be dead set on adding to the cacophony.


    ¡°Keep¡¯em comin!¡± Mark countered loudly, glaring at Scott as he slammed his own mug into the tree stump table we were sitting at, wiping off the humidity induced sweat. New Richmond had really come along in the time that I¡¯d been gone, so much so that they easily had more than enough space to accommodate the refugees I¡¯d dumped on their doorstep. Remy and Fernando took to the people here as if it had been home all along for them and Versonae and Arglyn weren¡¯t looked at twice. Johnny and Reeanth were still shooting glares at me as I had told them the night before about my plan for the two Luneks to be their bodyguards but it didn¡¯t faze me at all. Mostly they were pissed that I left them behind to conquer a city without them.


    ¡°Look! Just because you found a way to make ¡®the world¡¯s best magical wood¡¯ from pumping saplings full of mana and trade it to the Conglomerate for alcohol doesn¡¯t mean you should drink it all!¡± Both Cassandra and Lovera were standing in front of the fire as they chewed out the men, the background of flames giving them the ¡®Hell-derived-authority¡¯ look.


    ¡°What?¡± That made my head spin. Just how far into multi-dimensional commerce did this group of idiots get while I was gone? ¡°Who? Didn¡¯t they fuckin¡¯ take a chunk of humanity for all kinds of shit? I have so many questions about this!¡±


    Mark and Scott both let out competing burps as Jamal popped out of the woodline, his dark green and black scales almost making look like an avenging shadow. ¡°Yup! Until the Centauri put the screws to¡¯em to put chunks of us back!¡± Reaching over, he snatched a beer and cracked it as he looked towards the treeline. ¡°Hey! Come on out Lyra!¡±


    As the slinky form of my forest¡¯s secondary guardian unfurled from the shadow, her approach was far more hesitant than the overbearing dragonized man.


    ¡°Something about a witch coven asking politely for the seed humans to be put back for later?¡± Scott mused aloud, not even noticing the womanly figure coming towards the group. ¡°The cyborgs don¡¯t notice how much they talk when you drink with¡¯em.¡±


    ¡°Yes, darling?¡± Lyra asked, flowing through the shadows as if made for them. Time with Jamal had done her good apparently. The squinted line to her brow was completely gone giving her face the much needed softness that served as a dryad¡¯s natural lure. As the moment of hesitation fell away, Lyra willingly sauntered to her nook underneath Jamal¡¯s outstretched arm, planting a wet kiss on his lips as she smoldered in the evening light.


    ¡°Who are you and what have you done with Leafy?¡± I joked, chucking a little acorn at her. ¡°Did he pull that giant stick out of your ass or is that a different process with dryads? Maybe stickin¡¯ one in?¡±


    The little smile let me know that I was most likely on the right track. Good thing I could magically control my sex drive, otherwise I¡¯d never have gotten anything done. The night fell away as I found myself partying as hard as the refugees here, anything to relieve the stress of the past months and I even saw some of the human refugees from Arizona throwin em back. It was weird though, the way I saw myself as different than human. It¡¯s not just about having an upgraded body with magical reptilian vitality, but the mindset itself was different. No longer would my lifespan be limited to the average eighty years. No longer would a bone break set me back in life by a few months, laid up to heal. No longer would I have to deal with the concept of running out of time, because that simply wasn¡¯t the case anymore. My magic, my sorcery, my very course of life altered the little stream that is me. And so for tonight, I partied.


    During the party, I took the opportunity to force my new crew together under the influence of potent alcohol, pouring mugs of the dark brown stuff at a table and dragging people over. Arglyn sat heavily down across from Johnny as Versonae gracefully took her seat across from Reeanth. Acantha delicately sipped at her own mug across from me while Remy and Fernando watched from the other table, curious as to why they weren¡¯t there with us.


    ¡°Everyone,¡± I started, looking at the five sitting around me. ¡°Look at the person across from you. That¡¯s your new partner. Arglyn, meet Johnny. Johnny is a kick-ass cultivator and Arglyn is a giant meat shield. Reeanth, meet Versonae. I¡¯m pretty sure you both will have a good time together. And last but certainly not least, Acantha is the flaming witch over there, my vassal? Partner? Not really sure where you stand other than the fact that you¡¯re the replacement for my brother till he gets back. Anyways, the general idea is that we¡¯ll be in teams in the near future as we are literally almost ready to assault the North fucking Pole. Questions?¡±If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    To be fair, the drunken stupor was to be expected as we were at least three hours into slamming back the alien liquor, or at least I was. ¡°The only one who can say ¡®no¡¯ here is Johnny, just a reminder,¡± I clarified, conjuring ice cups and filling them up with water for the table. ¡°Johnny is my friend but the rest of ya are my ¡®vassals¡¯, voluntarily except for the furries.¡±


    ¡°My lord, I don¡¯t believe a drunken planning session is the best idea,¡± Reeanth cautioned, pulling my mug out of my hand. ¡°Maybe when the sun rises we¡¯ll have fresh minds for planning.¡±


    ¡°Bullshit!¡± Johnny yelled, standing up so fast he knocked over all the cups. ¡°It¡¯s the best time! I always wrote my papers drunk in school! Get¡¯s that creativity goin¡¯!¡±


    ¡°Damn right!¡± I agreed, waving my hand and covering the table in ice, shaping it to form what I remembered of Acantha¡¯s rendition of the Hungry One¡¯s fortress. The simulated ground was mostly flat in stark contrast to the gigantic, zombie and skeleton covered fortress complete with little ice sculptures of dragons, wyverns, dinosaurs, freaky things-BOOM! Reeanth slammed her maul into my sculpture, pulping it without destroying the table.


    ¡°Hell no!¡± Seems like I¡¯m not the only one having a good time. ¡°Have you even tried talking to them?¡± The entire table went silent as Reeanth¡¯s words stumbled out the way my legs were doing.


    ¡°To the who?¡± Johnny asked, his eyes focusing in and out.


    Taking a deep breath and gathering herself, Reeanth sat back down. ¡°If they can build a castle then they can probably listen to reason. They are undead, not unthinking.¡±


    Flames shot up into the sky as Acantha took a swig and melted the ice on the table. ¡°You can¡¯t reason with the undead! They already know what they want . . . you! They want your life, your blood, your soul, they want to drain you dry.¡±


    It wasn¡¯t funny because it was true, it was funny because Reeanth was plastered. Falling down, slur I mean shlurring her words all over the places as Johnny and Versonae did their best to hold her back and sometimes hold her up. Arglyn sat there glumly pounding his own drink as Versonae sipped at hers with wild eyes as she couldn¡¯t help but watch these savage, uncouth humans drink themselves into the ground. We didn¡¯t even notice the Karen-esque group as they moved closer to us with their arms crossed and faces pinched.


    I could tell from their faces that they didn¡¯t learn a goddamn thing from our last conversation, although from last time I distinctly remember three blondes, not four plus a brunette. Burping loudly as I rounded with a full mug, I squinted as their outlines sort of blurred together. ¡°And you fine ladies think we should deal with the Hungry Ones how?¡± My question caught them off guard as their rant, I assumed, was of a different vein.


    ¡°Ignore them!¡± Jamal called out from the side, his hands mysteriously busy below the table as Lyra furiously blushed. ¡°They¡¯re just a little pent up is all . . .¡±


    Two of the five faces went from pinched to livid and the other three simply incorporated the high-browed kind of sneering that you just want to smack it off, as in backwoods Alabama-beat-your-wife kind of smack, the almost comical horrific kind on crime shows.


    ¡°Kathicka, seriously, what now?¡± Mark gasped through his laughter, barely able to handle the ridiculousness of the womens¡¯ faces. ¡°Nobody¡¯s doing anything ¡®odd¡¯ or ¡®weird¡¯ around here.¡± The head blonde lady, so I assume, glared down her pert little nose at him even as Mark made finger quotes. ¡°Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re here for our big bad sorcerer?¡± He turned to make eyes and kissy faces at me.


    I muttered a quick ¡®fuck off¡¯ and shoved Mark into Scott as Jamal snickered while poking a finger in and out of his other hand.


    ¡°So you show up, drink our booze, laugh with the men, and dump refugees on our doorstep?¡± That voice once was irritating, nasal, but now it was smooth and melodious, perfectly wrapped in the kind of scorn that queens would pay good money for. ¡°And then you all have sex with those things!¡±


    Elaine, Kathicka¡¯s seeming number two brunette, cut in. ¡°It isn¡¯t right, it isn¡¯t natural! They¡¯re not even real women! They¡¯re monsters!¡±


    ¡°Thought we discussed this already?¡± I slurred, my eyes half open. ¡°I do whatever the fuck I want, pretty much whenever I want.¡± With a small exertion of will, I rippled the dirt beneath her feet and moved her away from me. ¡°There, that¡¯s much better. The stank of pettiness is beneath me!¡± I laughed, poking my finger onto the tip of my nose as I perked it up, poking fun at her highbrow manner. ¡°And until you can kick my ass or even give it the good old Southern try, then stay over there.¡±


    Petty, yes, I know, so what. Ever met someone who¡¯s face screamed something along the lines of ¡®inherently predisposed to be a bitch due to genetics?¡¯ It¡¯s like the worst kind of bitch face. I don¡¯t know how these freaking apocalypse survivors did it but fuck me man, they¡¯re actually alive! How?! At what point do the attitudes shift, as in, ¡®maybe I shouldn¡¯t be a cunt today?¡¯ Nope. They didn¡¯t learn. The snap-hiss combined with a horrible crackle sound was nothing compared to the long whip of liquid lightning that extended from each of their palms. Oddly hot.


    ¡°Put¡¯em down gals,¡± Mark ordered, his voice light as if ordering another drink. ¡°We¡¯ve been through this already, or have you forgotten your new leg already, Elaine?¡±


    ¡°Huh?¡± I asked, turning to Scott.


    ¡°Yup, they did a coup thing like a month ago but Mark shot Elaine in the leg! Blew the damn thing right off!¡± Scott chortled. ¡°Guns still beat whips even when magic¡¯s in play!¡±


    Jamal laughed, wiping a tear from his eye. ¡°If it weren¡¯t for the flesh golem, we would¡¯ve called her Stumpy!¡±


    The whip lashed out to the side, cutting a sapling neatly in two. ¡°We¡¯ve all learned a trick or two.¡± Kathicka¡¯s grin was nothing short of boiling maliciousness as blue wisps of mana linked together she and her group, her own whips gaining an unnatural solidity as the left one speared forward, slicing the table in half. Drinks and shards of ice were flung everywhere as everyone drunkenly jumped and stumbled back as the table was sliced apart.


    Through the midst of everyone yelling a mix of ¡®what the hell¡¯ and ¡®hey, fuck you¡¯, Jamal didn¡¯t play around. Kicking the largest chunk of shattered table at the whipping witches, he grabbed the next biggest piece and hurled it right right after the first one. Elaine and Blondies One and Two behind Kathicka lashed the projectiles apart as I stood up and yelled.


    ¡°Hold the fucking phone! Ain¡¯t this over the top?¡± Conjuring a swimming pool¡¯s worth of water, I blasted the women and froze them to the ground. ¡°What gives? Am I missing something here?¡±


    It surprised me to find that Kathicka and them weren¡¯t actually glaring at me, but at Jamal. If looks could kill he¡¯d be the cheese grater version of himself plus or minus a dick. ¡°Jamal?¡± I asked, turning to look at him, his sheepish face telling most of the story.


    ¡°They don¡¯t seem to be as open about sharing like me,¡± Lyra tittered from behind Jamal. ¡°Once they had a taste of him they couldn¡¯t seem to get enough.¡±


    ¡°This is a sex problem?! Jealousy?¡± More red faces than I care to believe tell me this is true. I guess my flesh golem really did get rid of one thing, the fact that any violence short of death is pretty much acceptable. If you can just toss your severed arm into a magical healing blob and put your wounded stump on it and it goes away, then what¡¯s the actual cost of violence? They seemed to have figured that one out faster than I did. Kathicka¡¯s group took a step back at my outburst, the sheer incredulousness of the underpinning reason. ¡°Seriously? Use the golem to freaking turn down your sex drives or something . . . sheesh!¡±


    My attempts at drunken reasoning went right over their heads as each of them crackled with lightning that bonded them all together like a web, levitating until they were about six feet off the ground. Each one had a golden necklace inset with a purple stone that hovered just above their chests. A quick look in the magical spectrum showed that there was another stone that the purple one was set into, the purple one linking their minds as the clear one functioned as some kind of elemental transmutation lens. The purplish energy seemed to flow around the crackling strands of lightning connecting them.


    ¡°Well that¡¯s new!¡± I cursed, backing up and reaching for a ton of power, pointedly missing Kraken and Gungnir all the way in Arizona as I scrambled for my rifle.


    ¡°Not really!¡± Mark yelled as he and Scott took cover behind the trees at the edge of the clearing. ¡°We fought them to a standstill last time they tried a coup but the floating shit is new!


    As one, the mini-coven spoke. ¡°Kneel sorcerer! We have borne your derision long enough!¡± The invisible lines of mana connecting their heads with the white sparks of mental energy showed me that they weren¡¯t simply sharing their mana. At this point, they were one entity, jointly compounding their very selves, lifeforce, and brainpower to be a five-part conjunction of power.


    For once, I didn¡¯t have Kraken to basically narrate for me in my own mind at the speed of thought, but it was pretty obvious to me what the hell was right in front of my face. Jamal had basically screwed around on the Karens and they got their panties in a twist. The monkey wrench though was that this society was actually revolving around the concept of ¡®the strong rule¡¯, BUT the huge caveat here is that my flesh golems removed the physical consequences of violence. This means that they can literally fight up and to the point of death because of my gift allowing them to regrow anything that got blown off. As long as they kept the golem full of meat then magic will allow this weird ass society to grow in all kinds of unforeseen ways. I had taken some of the fundamental underpinnings of a community and removed them, accidentally.


    Several bolts of lightning flickered out right as SAW intervened, channeling the energy into the runes of my armor as Svalinn ate most of it.


    Shifting Rune protocol engaged.


    ¡°Not prey, weak.¡± Svalinn grumbled.


    [I¡¯m really glad no one hears what goes on inside my head.]


    But it was funny, truly. For all their power, all of their foresight, planning and whatnot, they had well and truly fucked up. In taking a look at the Karens in the magical spectrum, I noticed a very key fact that their magically uneducated asses had overlooked. Their focus stones were completely unguarded. With a flex of power, I reached forward with my earth sorcery and shattered the cores of their amulets, robbing them of their flowing web of power. As one, they crashed back into the mud at my feet as I laughed, still swaying from the liquor.


    ¡°No wards? No runes?¡± I giggled, kicking up mud with a flick of power and getting them all good and dirty as well as grounding out any and all electrical power. ¡°No brick wall for the big bad wolf? Kneel?¡± Laughing as I pounded them with streams of even more mud. ¡°What kind of medieval bullshit is that? Who the fuck do you think are? Fuck! I made you fucking toilets for Pete¡¯s sake!¡± I would have fallen on my own face in that moment if not for Jamal snatching me by the back of my armor.


    ¡°What in the Sam Hell is goin¡¯ on round¡¯ heya? Can¡¯t a good ole country boy get drunk and pass out without you magic freaks blowin¡¯ shit up every time Jamal fucks a tree?¡±


    I hadn¡¯t heard that voice in months. Turning around, I saw a much slimmer Billy stumble down the dimly lit path between two buildings, his three hick friends behind him. Sally was joining in the scolding as Jimmy and Tommy were holding their heads and moaning. ¡°Someone get these two hair of the dog right quick!¡±


    ¡°How the fuck, where the fuck? For fuck¡¯s sake!¡± I hadn¡¯t seen these four in months or maybe even a year by now, frankly, I¡¯d been so damn busy with everything else that I had completely forgotten to check up on them after I gave them each their own weapons and wished¡¯em luck. I¡¯d been through so much that I¡¯d shoved in the back of my mind: the Ripples were still coming through, a childish deity almost blew me away, Gungnir had a piece of my soul, and Reeanth was a real dick. Thank God for small changes huh?

 Chapter 154 - Pinched Nerves (Book 3 Chapter 21)

    The morning came with its own abominable cost that flesh sorcery so graciously took care of while everyone else hung around the flesh golem to cure their ills whilst I magically sweat out the horrific toxins of dwarven alcohol. Shit, most of last night was fuzzy, in the ¡®did that shit really happen¡¯ kinda way. Wow, what a thought. Figuring that I might as well take advantage of the time that nobody wanted to bother me, I headed off for a self-guided tour around New Richmond. In the few months that I¡¯d been gone, an eclectic blend of buildings had sprung up. A bastardized dreamland of a suburb took up several square miles with some houses being a clear attempt at bringing modern style housing back while others were a clear stylistic welcoming of what magic could do. Large trees had been grown and shaped to be bulbous houses both high up in the trees and others bulbously close together like a mystical nature commune. The largest building dominating another clearing in the deciduous landscape was a stone and tree fortress with overbearing oaks serving as the inner security towers with a high wall of slick, polished stone that almost covered up the treetops.


    Not actually entering any of the buildings, I skipped around towards the east where I remembered the greenhouses were starting to be constructed somewhat close to the river. ¡°Achoo!¡± A loud sneeze proceeded the exodus of a woman in a silver, skintight getup that could have passed for a sci-fi spacesuit. Ripping her helmet off and gasping for breath while slamming the door to a translucent dome, Cassandra didn¡¯t even acknowledge me as she hacked out a lung.


    Conjuring an ice bucket full of water for her to drink even as I childishly imagined blasting her in the face with water, I put it at her feet and waited until she got a hold of herself. ¡°You ok?¡± I asked with an eyebrow cocked. ¡°Guessing that ain¡¯t a normal greenhouse, huh?¡±


    ¡°It used to be!¡± She sputtered, guzzling down the offered water before dumping it over her head, her long black hair glistening as she wrung it out. ¡°Damn building was fine until we added in the extra mana pipeline-¡±


    ¡°Come again?!¡± I interrupted, reaching out with my senses, feeling that pulsing golden threads of power that came from several directions.


    ¡°Well the channel from the sunstone nest in the center of town that you made provides any and all UV light and heat for the greenhouse plus some mana, then we have the other one that pipes in water from the river as well as converted mana from the kinetic flow, and THEN we have the one that connects via crystal tether to the solar panels out near the river. That one gave us more than we expected and BAM! Freaking portal to faerieland in the middle of our garden!¡±


    I barely even noticed the rest of the still in progress city over the dense white fog of almost solidified mana that tapered off as the door sealed shut, the outer lining blending in with the rest of the building. ¡°Faerie what now?¡±


    ¡°Fae! Not Aelves, Fae!¡± she yelled, as if she were talking to herself in a fit of madness as opposed to the actual conversation I was hoping for. ¡°Two different kinds of pointy eared bastards that are freaking night and day! Sprites, firbolgs, brownies, ballybogs, nookles!¡±


    Going with what I wanted to do originally, I blasted her in the face with water, lightly like a kid¡¯s squirtgun level, bringing her back to the here and now instead of ranting at me. ¡°Get a grip! No mam! Not today! This is your fuckin¡¯ problem! Seal the bastards in or get some freaking iron! I hope that works.¡± That last part I muttered to myself, turning on a heel, I cut my way around the nonsense that did not apply directly to me right until I walked a bit too fast straight into the Karens. A blast of lightning at my feet pulled me up short. Cassandra ran into my back, surprising me as I didn¡¯t know she had been right on my heels yelling something about needing silver, iron, and sugar. This unfortunate meeting at the fork in the dirt road was also witnessed by my assorted posse of Acantha, Reeanth, Johnny and the Luneks who were a less disturbing shade of green than they were earlier this morning.


    I couldn¡¯t believe my own lying eyes as I lay there sprawled in the dirt, Cassandra behind me saying some unintelligible apology even as my gaze promised all kinds of torture to the posse of women in front of me. Their smug looks and haughty faces were just begging to be cut down a peg or two. Unluckily for them, mercy was in short supply today as my own evil imagination poked my two struggling brain cells with a wicked idea. I figured I might as well bring them down to my level. Shaking the ground, I violently heaved all the earth within twenty yards of me, a veritable ripple blasting everyone off their feet even as it flung me to my own.


    Before my friends could react, a crack tore up through the greenhouse, a fact that I tucked away till later as I pulled my rifle out and began calmly and carefully firing basic crystal rounds into each discombobulated bitch as I softly sang the fucked up Baby Seal Army cadence to myself. It gave me great pleasure muttering with a crazed smile, ¡°You can hit¡¯em with a bat!¡± Boom! ¡°You can hit¡¯em with a brick!¡± Boom boom! ¡°You can poke¡¯em in the eye with an eye-pokin stick!¡±


    As they screamed from me blowing holes in them, specifically aiming for non-vital parts while plugging up the wounds with conjured mud, I kicked a few of them in the head to shut up the whining. ¡°And that¡¯s how we make our livin¡¯, clubbin¡¯ some baby seals!¡±


    ¡°This is fucked up man!¡± Johnny said, turning a bit green even as Reeanth creepily smiled, nodding in her fanatical approval.


    ¡°They started it,¡± I fake whined, pointing my rifle at the lead bitch¡¯s head. ¡°And I¡¯m finishing it,¡± I growled, firing as another song struck me. ¡°I¡¯m not crazy, I¡¯m just a little unwell . .¡±


    ¡°More like messed up in the head dude!¡±


    ¡°Well done my lord. Vengeance is greater than justice, but the meeting of the two is so sweet.¡±


    Morality. The last dregs of pre-apocalypse virtues were loosening their hold on me spurred on by the infantile behaviour of these grown as women, the lifetime of modern American conditioning, the imprinting of family forced values, the almost thirty years of indoctrination reared their dying instinctive cries as I smashed them. The five wounded, crying, magically empowered women at my feet were completely at my mercy, and it was a shame. It wasn¡¯t like I was executing a child, because a child doesn¡¯t know, a child doesn¡¯t understand, a child possesses the quality of innocence. These women didn¡¯t have that, they had haughtiness in spades, idiocy by the barrel, and decided to swing their non-existent dick at the wrong man in the wrong time of history. God, I didn¡¯t like it, but a little teeny tiny part of me loved it.


    My flesh sorcery is an incredible power, part of what makes it so great is the fact that it brings my instincts closer to the fore, more under my conscious control, and what it was telling me right now as their blood splashed across my skin is that it was delicious.  My own altered body thirsted for power, for mana, and the blood bags in front of me were full of it. My mind sorcery was clearly laying out the pros and cons of it too in that timeless moment as this was a side of my flesh sorcery that I never really indulged. From what I could tell, I could have been the magical version of a vampire, draining living things with my blood magic instead of fangs. Combine that with the upgraded reptilian DNA and some things that used to not be palatable now seemed to be a bit more in the realm of possibly delicious.


    On the one hand, I didn¡¯t need the mana. In fact, I had access to more power than I knew to do with, but it¡¯s like the fat guy at a buffet. He ain¡¯t actually hungry, he just wants more. And in those moments, I wanted more, I wanted to shower in their blood, the embodiment of their lifeforce, their mana made real. I could drain them of everything that makes them living beings if I wanted to, and I almost did. Instill fear into the masses, let them know that this wolf isn¡¯t gelded, that my fangs were long and sharp and hungry. And I deserved it too. I made this town, I made it half a step away from the standards of modernity, and most of the people were decent human beings that were grateful. And let¡¯s not kid ourselves, I mainly did that for the children.


    But the other half of this rotten deal is that the savage cunning that I carefully stowed away acknowledged the simple fact that there is even more strength in numbers, in powerful allies, in having the backing of a group behind you, just in case. I guess, some of those numbers though needed just a bit of pruning. In the half second of mulling over both sides of the issue, I acted.


    Forcing a wave of calm over the five bedraggled women with mind sorcery, I had them all focus on the lead bitch, Kathicka, as I pulled the trigger, completely removing any trace of her face. Grabbing her corpse by the shoulder and lifting it one handed, I shook it in front of the rest of them. ¡°DO NOT FUCK WITH ME!¡± I snarled, placing my gun at my feet as I easily ripped off each limb and threw it at the others, clocking them each in the head with a severed limb, spiking the torso at my own feet. Johnny stepped forward, about to yell and interfere, but Reeanth yanked him back with a glare.


    This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    An example. That¡¯s what Kathicka was. Make an example out of a deserving person and the rest are far more likely to fall in line, especially if that one individual was the instigating factor, and if my instincts were correct, she was definitely the head bitch. ¡°Acantha, burn them clean,¡± I ordered, sending over a series of mental images to make my meaning clear. Shrugging her shoulders, my ward carefully burned the dismembered body to ash while oh so exquisitely burning off the top layers of grime and skin off the other four, slowly torturing them, branding them with the lesson I had in mind. Even though they could go and get completely new, perfectly healed bodies over at the flesh golem, no amount of flesh magic would be able to heal them of the trauma of the kind of torture Acantha was begrudgingly bestowing upon them at my command. The body, in many cases, can heal much better than the mind can.


    As the green flames licked away every bit of grime and epidermis off the four remaining women, Acantha stepped back and vomited as Johnny and Reeanth carried them away, Reeanth looking strangely proud even as Johnny right beside her looked sickened. ¡°He¡¯s right,¡± Scott remarked. ¡°That was fucked up. I mean, I get it. No law and they could have killed you if you weren¡¯t prepared or way overpowered but shit man.¡±


    Scott and Mark both rubbed at the Glyph Blade tattoos curling up their arms, shaking away the scene they¡¯d just witnessed as I banished the flecks of Kathicka¡¯s blood. Ignoring them, I turned and walked away, fully intent on finishing my self-guided tour of New Richmond even as I grappled with my newly established moral foundations or lack thereof. I wasn¡¯t sickened by the sight of what I¡¯d commanded be done even though I had voluntarily set myself against being the leader of this settlement. I wasn¡¯t even bothered by it, in fact, I was still angry, perturbed, pissed off that they were so ignorant to the fact that I could have squashed them with my eyes closed. It wasn¡¯t even a near thing, it was a short Jewish accountant with his shoes tied together trying to dunk on Lebron.


    My own thoughts kept rolling around in my head like pins in a bowling alley with a gorilla chucking the fucking bowling ball at them. War changes people. Apocalypses change people.  Violence changes you. But what does that even mean when strength, when law, are ultimately backed by violence? Does it make it inherently good or bad, or is it simply a fact, and undeniable foundation of existence, like gravity? It exists in the state of ¡®being¡¯ or ¡®is¡¯, as in it will be there long after I¡¯m gone because it¡¯s been there long before I ever was. Or I could simply be way too into my own head and this is all bullshit, probably, maybe, most likely.


    Another thought screamed its annoying opinion even as I pushed it into the recesses of my mind, maybe I went a bit far. But then I mulled over that thought a bit more. What if those bitches had done this to the Centauri diplomatic party down the road, or to some other kind of visitor whose sensibilities were far more delicate than our own? Interstellar war? Dimensional conflict? The consequences of their idiotic actions could have been mind-blowingly worse than me taking one of them out and teaching the rest a lesson. I mean, the other four can be fixed right up thanks to my golem . . . wait . . .


    Sprinting back to the main part of town where my golem sat in its own little house, I got there just in time to see Scott, Mark, Johnny, and Reeanth set the witches down as Acantha reached for the golem to get it going. ¡°Wait!¡± I yelled, running up and slapping the golem with my hand. Quickly locating the four ladies¡¯ DNA sequences in there, I put a set of conditional locks on their access. ¡°All right, now you can heal¡¯em.¡±


    The shivering, moaning burn victims were gently laid on top of the flesh golem, its grey folds enveloping them with ease as its girth could have fit a van. Within five minutes, it spit them all out onto the ground, technically healthy. ¡°What the-¡± Johnny gasped as I snickered.


    Pointing at the discolored red, grey, and purple burn marks covering each of them, I shook my finger as each of them came to. ¡°Yup, punishment part 2! No outer healing, beauty treatments, none of that shit. Since each of you suck as a human being, you can stay looking like this for the next year. No golem enhancements of any kind for any of you. Welcome to looking like a nasty ass swamp hag!¡± Turning to Mark and Scott, I gave a bit more clarification. ¡°Look, I¡¯m not completely heartless. I¡¯ve put a key in the system for both of you. If both of you agree, Mark and Scott, then y¡¯all can commute their sentence to six months of looking like this, but I¡¯ve also made it so that it can be lengthened as well if they don¡¯t learn their lesson. Up to you guys at this point. Pretty sure I ain¡¯t coming back here after this.¡±


    Mark¡¯s queasy expression lightened up at my explanation but Scott was full on frowning. ¡°I don¡¯t want this responsibility either! The hell are we supposed to do with this shit?¡± Scott complained. ¡°I got enough work keeping the damn forest creatures away and keeping the stinkin¡¯ wizards from experimenting us off the face of the earth! Not to mention Jamal screwin¡¯ everything that moves!¡±


    Mark jumped in too. ¡°We¡¯re not saying that we¡¯re ungrateful, dude, but this ain¡¯t no city. We don¡¯t have a government, a police force, a set of laws, nuttin¡¯.¡±


    ¡°Then get rid of them for all I care!¡± I snapped, grabbing the four womens with gigantic hands of conjured ice. ¡°Would you like me to kill them for you? Would that soothe your conscience? It¡¯s that easy, trust me, or I could have Reeanth do it. Maybe Versonae or Arglyn are a bit peckish, let them have a snack. Hell, do what the Amish do and just shun them, kick¡¯em out to deal with life in the New World on their own.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not what I meant-¡±


    ¡°But it is what you meant,¡± I argued, poking Mark in the chest. ¡°You want me to come in and fix your problems, but haven¡¯t I done enough? Haven¡¯t I fixed enough? Who let Kathicka and Elaine get this way? Who let them gather up three other like-minded individuals and create a group of power-hungry freaks that were willing to attack someone just to make a statement? Shit man, what if the children got in their way? You know what? Screw it.¡±


    Turning to Versonae and Arglyn, I gestured at the squealing women who were begging for any semblance of mercy. ¡°And what would the Luneks do with traitors, or attempted murderers?¡±


    ¡°Death,¡± they both growled in unison.


    ¡°And the Centauri would do what?¡± I pointedly asked Reeanth.


    She grimaced. ¡°Tossed out an airlock with no suit or sold to the Witches as slaves.¡±


    I couldn¡¯t help the evil grin. ¡°And what would the Aelves, dwarves, minotaurs, or Fae do in my position.¡±


    Nobody answered but everybody gulped just thinking about it. ¡°So I¡¯m assuming they¡¯d do the same but worse?¡± Silence heralded a grudging assent. ¡°And nobody wants to give me a valid suggestion in apocalyptic justice that doesn¡¯t include kickin¡¯ the bucket?¡± More potent silence.


    The crack in the greenhouse grew even locker, the popping sounds of solid rock snapping under the stress of growing pressure grabbed our attention. ¡°Shit, shit, shit!¡± Cassandra cursed. Rolling my eyes, I walked calmly over to the slowly growing crack and cast my senses past it. It wasn¡¯t just an overpacked area of dense mana, something on the other side was actively pounding away at it like old school miners with picks. Not wanting to meet whatever kind of creature came from a spontaneous portal in a mana-dense greenhouse, I filled in the cracks with conjured granite and patched it up.


    ¡°There, problem solved for the immediate future,¡± I groaned. ¡°But this ones¡¯ on y¡¯all. There are actually things or people or something sentient-ish in there, but I¡¯m getting the fuck outta dodge.¡± I kept complaining/yelling as I walked away, fully intent on leaving this ungoverned batch of crazy.


    ******


    My ability to tolerate people as a general whole was filled up. I desperately needed some time to myself, which is why I left my retinue in New Richmond as I flew back to my glade and then tree-portaled to Sunstone Castle. It also felt weird to be physically separate from Gungnir and Lord knows it¡¯s been too long since I¡¯ve been with Spot. My list of things to do needed tending to as well, I still had to learn about and make a Grimoire, oversee/maintain/upgrade my sunstone golem army, upgrade or redo my own personal armor and armory, and then set up a forward operating base in Greenland.


    [About time you pulled your head out of your ass to get some real work done!]


    [Screw you too!] I happily yelled back at Kraken as I strode up to Gungnir, checking the progress of my projects and yanking it out of its pedestal. The solar panel ritual circles around Sunstone Castle were doing incredible work in filling up the underground siege mana batteries and the river-flow kinetic converter pipeline was also constantly doing its thing. Kraken had partitioned out the flows separately so that the solar panels were filling the batteries only and the river pipeline was dedicated to fixing and charging the golem army. At this rate, in another month, basically everything would be good to go on this side of the house. Five thousand fully charged sunstone golems with a fully charged Sunstone Castle armed with dozens of humongous siege batteries and the eight magitech machine gun emplacements with fitted crystal grenade launchers, but it was pretty much automated, which meant that I didn¡¯t actually have much to do personally.


    So I did what I could, which was mucking around with my armor and my body, doing my best to eke out any kind of extra capability or durability without changing the overall schema. The rune schematics that Kraken helped me with were over my head, but that didn¡¯t stop me from studying them. It also helped me out to study the runic tattoos on my skin and the ones etched into my bones that made me a veritable tank. Combine those concepts together with my armor and I figured that I was close to the idyllic version invincible, at least as much as a human-ish sorcerer could aspire to.


    Also, to ease my mind, I retrieved my secured trunk of Artifacts from the Hole and brought it to Sunstone Castle. The Dagger of Rending, Poseidon¡¯s Trident, the Granite Gauntlets, and Yggdrasil¡¯s Wrath were just as I left them, which was a huge relief. I mean, I knew the glade area was pretty much the most secure place on the planet right now, but just having them closer to me was comforting. There was no way that I wasn¡¯t going into battle with the Hungry Ones anything less than fully prepared. At Kraken¡¯s suggestion, I had SAW scan and attempt to integrate the weapons¡¯ magical signatures with my armor.


    Scanning . . . Dagger of Rending . . . properly identified as Setan Kober . . . inimical to all forms of life . . . borne from the soul of the Wielder . . . optimal use projection: targeting and rendering enemy magical combatants as secondary sources of nutrients/energy. Partially successful in merging with armor substrate . . . relegated to a separate physical entity . . . dagger sheath created alongside the right calf.


    Scanning . . . Poseidon¡¯s Trident . . . properly identified as Neptune¡¯s Shame . . . increased affinity with water-based environments . . . borne from the soul of the Wielder . . . optimal use projection: water-based escape routes . . . confusion generation via fog dispersal . . . crowd control. Unsuccessful in merging with armor substrate . . . relegated to separate entity . . . partially successful in merging with runic substrate . . . tattoo form designated for optimal efficiency . . . target location: left wrist.


    Scanning . . . Granite Gauntlets . . . identified as unique in creation . . . designation accepted . . . borne from the soul of the Wielder . . . optimal use projection: singular target incapacitation . .  . single target capture . . . single target destruction . . . successful in merging with armor substrate . . . successful in merging with runic substrate . . . modified to serve as a base layer for Svalinn . . . protective layer generated for optimal heat dispersal from Svalinn¡¯s prime directive.


    Scanning . . . Yggdrasil¡¯s Wrath . . . identified as unique in creation . . . designation accepted . . . borne from the soul of the Wielder . . . optimal use projection: blunt kinetic damage . . .  mass destruction in the following area types: deciduous, coniferous, evergreen . . . complete destruction in high density plant growth areas: rainforest. Unsuccessful in merging with armor substrate . . .  partially successful in merging with runic substrate . . . . error . . . unsuccessful in merging with runic substrate. Overridden by Source Tree protocol . . . absorbed by Soul Tree as accepted doomsday protocol.


    A lot of painful shit happened at one. The Granite Gauntlets simultaneously turned white hot and melted into Svalinn, only to reform below it and burning my hands to the bone in the process as I screamed, desperately turning off nerves and healing. Poseidon¡¯s Trident melted into ice water and carved itself into the skin of my left wrist even as my freaking soul tree grew an ethereal branch out of my mouth that grabbed Yggdrasil¡¯s Wrath, dragging it into my soul and bonding with it. Ten minutes of shivering on the ground and puking my guts out as my body adjusted to the changes, I took off all of my gear and set it front of me, spraying it down with conjured water as I took the time to get clean, cursing every second as the pain I felt somehow forced its way past the nerve block I put in place.

 Chapter 155 - Assemble? (Book 3 Chapter 22)

    The watery form of Poseidon¡¯s Wrath rippled every time I moved my wrist, as if it were a living serpent tattoo with a mind of its own. The ice blue striations of the three prongs still gleamed even as I rubbed it with my other hand. Every few moments though I still felt the phantom pains of my hands burning from the integration of my Granite Gauntlets with Svalinn, which wasn¡¯t helping me as I searched for Spot in the Arizona desert. My hoverboard allowed me to travel easily but it still required a semblance of concentration as sand lizards and mutated giant condors frequented the area. What almost took my head off an hour ago was a small group of creatures that looked like stacked boulders in the shape of a human. Those twenty foot tall fuckers chucked rocks as I zoomed past their cliffs that I could¡¯ve sworn weren¡¯t there a few months ago. Just how much was the Earth still changing, still shifting?


    I mean, the desert is still the desert, but I¡¯ve flown over this area before and I know for a fact that that creek wasn¡¯t there, those cliffs weren¡¯t there before, there¡¯s a random ass mountain up yonder . . .


    [Yes, your world is shifting, get over it. I didn¡¯t make a program to run your castle without you so you could gripe on a freaking joyride!]


    [Look, I appreciate the automation but you can¡¯t tell me that this doesn¡¯t freak you out a bit?! Seriously? Angry rock golems chucking rocks from mountains that didn¡¯t exist before? Oh look! Sand lizards dueling it out with four-winged condors while eastern dragon-looking velociraptors drool just waiting for the initial fight to be over.]


    Kraken¡¯s laughter rang in my head. [This is just the beginning! Enjoy the ride while it lasts! I mean, you sealed up a Way into Faerie! Earth¡¯s sister is probably merging and then all kinds of fun hell is gonna break loose! That seal won¡¯t last for long and then a whole bunch of super-hot murderous Fae are gonna start claiming land. I suggest you hop on it. Besides, they got monsters for days . . . .]


    My familiar explained the basics of the Fae power structure and economy as my link with Spot showed me that we were getting closer. All in all, basically the Fae center around power, but their power is intrinsically tied to claimed land, which means that when they get out on Earth¡¯s soil, it¡¯ll be a wholesale landgrab that¡¯ll put the Western Expansion to shame. Luckily, the pointy eared bastards were weak to iron, which my earth sorcery was more than happy to supply. Apparently some lore still holds true, which, after making a quick mental note to refortify all of my holdings with iron, we saw Spot tussling at the mouth of a cave with several smaller versions of himself. Spot¡¯s mostly crimson coloring was now streaked with tan, I¡¯m guessing a side effect of his dragon traits taking on the environment as well as the most abundant source of meat, sand lizards.


    [Now, where¡¯s his cunt of a mate?] I wondered, circling the area while deciding not to worry about my dragonized dog. Big floofer can fend for himself now. The oversized mama wolf however,  wasn¡¯t exactly happy to have a human being around her pups last time, even if said person was the master of her pups¡¯ dad which meant that I still had to be careful. Careful in my mind, was hovering via SAW¡¯s wings about a hundred yards off the ground, giving me a good view. From way up here, I could see my dog playing happily with his pile of fuzzy offspring just in front of the mouth of the cave that rested at the bottom of the fifty foot cliffs. The meandering beginnings of a river provided a convenient source of water, and just the idyllic vibe this little place was giving me made it harder to go down and say hi to Spot.


    He just looked so happy, playing with his pups, a magical desert full of new kinds of food with a kick-ass wolf mate . . . fuck. I could see it so easily, the start of another wolf pack, but one made of mythical canines with descendants full of flesh sorcery and dragon characteristics, eventually becoming epic in a way that all nerds would dream of. But it could just as easily go the other way, people coming from far and wide to get an altered wolf companion of their own, one that can get stronger the more it eats, not even fearing dragons or griffins in its quest for eternal ascendance. The pack would be no more, each pup taken far from its home, forced into slavery and sold to the highest bidder. Thanks dour imagination of mine, conjuring horrible ideas that may never, hopefully, come true.


    Even as I flew down and landed on the cliff overlooking the happy crew, I sat on the edge pondering all the ways this upcoming adventure could go wrong, and did I really need Spot for invading Greenland. I mean, he¡¯s a big dog, so big that he could flip a freaking tank with one paw if he wanted too. Think Clifford the Big Red Dog size, but with crimson scales, a flaming bark, and a collar that lets him shrink down to normal dog size but still have the physical strength, weight and mass as if he were huge. That dog could be my ticket in and out of whatever undead army or ice castle the Hungry Ones erected.


    This was my mission though, one that I¡¯d taken on myself and hadn¡¯t actually pushed anyone else to accept. Reeanth would follow me to the ends of the Earth and Acantha is my ward, but Johnny is the closest thing I have to a friend, and Spot would be perfect as backup. Versonae and Arglyn though, would be perfect bodyguards for Johnny and Reeanth, and in a perfect world, that entire group would be my inner circle. Johnny would be the fighter, perfectly equipped to deal out some serious damage and disrupt a concerted attack. Reeanth with her seriously powerful enchanted gear would serve as a perfect frontline tank for me, her maul and tower shield (a copy of what I gave my brother but hadn¡¯t actually given to Reeanth yet) would make her an immovable bulwark. Acantha¡¯s fire magic sets her apart as she is the initial artillery. With her combustion capabilities and the different kinds of fire at her disposal along with the wands I made for her with the mana batteries, the classic horde of undead wouldn¡¯t stand a chance.


    And then, another burst of inspiration struck my daydream, the friends I¡¯d made at New Richmond, the Glyph Blades and Jamal the Dragon Hearted, fearlessly charging the ice castle in gleaming suits of armor specifically enchanted to enhance their fledgling powers as well as protect them from the unending swarm of living dead. But again, I couldn¡¯t do that to the children, they still require constant protection. I didn¡¯t harbor any false impressions, they still live in a forest on a planet undergoing its own violent shift due to the intake of magical energies.


    Which left me with myself to take on whatever Big Badboy was up in that castle and my golem army to take on whatever managed to survive Acantha¡¯s onslaught. For once though, I cursed my choices of sorcery as an idea struck me, a daydream of driving one of the floating islands over the Hungry Ones castle and simply dropping a freaking mountain right on top of it. Do that twice and it would solve my problem, but I didn¡¯t have air or wind sorcery. Other ideas came and went, using mana batteries to power large fans to direct a floating island, or making a pact with air elementals to do it for me, or maybe even spending some time to make a magical version of a hydrogen bomb.


    But curiosity picked at my brain even more than that. I¡¯ve spent all this time preparing, making an army, enchanting boatloads of epic magical gear, and here I was planning on doing something else than actually using what I had prepped! Classic procrastination technique, fill your life with plans that get in the way of the actual work, so you still feel accomplished but haven¡¯t actually done the thing you set out to do. Fuck it. Also, giving them even more time to get dug in will only make my job harder. Popping up to my feet, I let out a shrill whistle and called out through my mental link, ¡°Come¡¯ere Spot! Here boy!¡± Party Time!¡±


    Getting my dog back to Sunstone Castle was actually way easier than I had expected. With a happy yelping howl, Spot sprang to the top of the cliff in two bounds. Waves of elation and pure love bombarded me through our link as he tackled me to the ground, covering me in layers of giant dog slobber. ¡°Ack! Help! Dog spit phffhphph!¡± Immune to my cries for relief, Spot licked me from head to toe, communicating thoughts of, ¡®happy!¡¯, ¡®master!¡¯, ¡®play!¡¯.  And so I did, I played with my dog and his pups while Kraken grumbled about the end of the world, muttering something about not even doing a scouting trip. And that, that caught my attention. Intel. I need more intel, the eyes-on kind of intel.


    [And you might want to check in with Reeanth as well . . .] Kraken¡¯s tone was a bit on the slightly angry father side, the kind where you knew you were in trouble but not exactly what kind of trouble you were in.


    [What¡¯s wrong with her?] I shot back, already planning my trip to Greenland.


    [You upend her worldview of magic, sorcery, and genetic recombination, stick her with the humans at New Richmond, and then run off with a crazy fire witch with legitimate issues and then raze a city to the ground. She¡¯s your sworn vassal and might have some stake in the game.]


    His reasoning wasn¡¯t bad even though the context was a little off. It¡¯s not my fault that my sorcery completely flipped her understanding of why the Centauri do their genetic ¡®fixing¡¯, and it¡¯s also not my fault that she walked away from the opportunity of upgrading her body because of that. This is the problem with being a bit of a loner, or honestly, a legit hermit. Sometimes, most of the time, you don¡¯t really think about other people, you just go ham at whatever goal is at the top of the list. My pre-apocalypse workaholic tendencies were getting in the way of building the bonds that a team or partnership would generally have.


    But I couldn¡¯t let my personal problems distract me from a legitimate issue. I need to put eyes on the problem itself. I need to scout out Greenland, set up a forward operating base, set up and test a Yggdrasil-based portal connection to the area, set up and test the energy tap to sustain my sunstone golem army, and then hopefully capture and experiment on a couple Hungry Ones. I have to know what I¡¯m dealing with, and being over prepared is not going to hurt me, in fact, it¡¯s probably going to keep me alive.


    Since Spot is smart, but not as smart as a human, I essentially sent him broad strokes of feelings and ideas to communicate to him that we were going to be leaving his kids for a while but we¡¯d be bringing them to new friends later, and we could play to his heart¡¯s content at that point in time. And because my dog is literally one of the best creatures in all of existence, he was more than happy to come along. I flew out and returned an hour or so later with a couple paralyzed sand lizards to tide over his pups and we made our way back to Sunstone Castle where I communed with Kraken as Spot set off to re-sniff and re-mark his territory.


    [What you¡¯re proposing isn¡¯t really as insane as you might think it is . . .]


    [Really?] I asked, staring down at the holo-map inside my mind space as Kraken made colorful outlines to the area.


    [Really. Greenland is a land of ice and snow, but there is still a significant presence of tundra with large patches of evergreen trees. And since you made an oak tree as well as a baobab tree into roots of Yggdrasil itself, it stands to reason that there¡¯s no reason you couldn¡¯t do it to a large pine tree. It doesn¡¯t take much energy for you to portal out there, but you would basically have to recreate the same setup over there that you have here, especially if you want to get back. This means you¡¯d need large solar panel rituals with a power containment building at the center attached to the modified Yggdrasil tree/root, and you¡¯d have to be there to make sure it¡¯s defended.] Poking at the map, a bright red dot lit up at the very bottom of the landmass. [That right there, this valley area, that¡¯s the only place left with some sort of plant life. It should serve your purpose well enough.]You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    Grabbing the map with my mental hands, I zoomed in on the area. [You got this from that meditation with the World Tree right?]


    [Yup.]


    [Tight, okay . . . I think we will go with the same approach that I¡¯ve done so far but with a twist. The valley should help in masking the massive amounts of magical energy that¡¯ll be in the area, but I think this time, instead of building up, we¡¯ll be building down. The tree with the main building will be in the center of the valley, but the solar panels will be up the mountain sides and then on the plateaus up there as well. This will spread out the magical signature and make the energy gathering ritual way bigger, which we¡¯ll need as the sunlight will be our main source of power.]


    [Good plan, but remember, don¡¯t rule out finding convenient ley lines. Valleys tend to be where rivers and good soil come together, and where that happens, there¡¯s life . . .]


    [And where there¡¯s life, there¡¯s mana.] I finished.


    ********


    My preparations for my scouting trip took a lot less time to plan than my small but mounting anxiety wanted. In order to tamp down on the magical signature of myself and my armor, I used my flesh golem to make sheets of dry minotaur skin and dried sinew which I then made into a pair of oversized pants, moccasins, and a poncho with a hood. This, combined with my own sorcery-assisted control of my aura, would pretty much get invisible to any kind of magical radar that my as-of-yet-unmet enemy would use. After confirming with Kraken that I was correct in my assessment, I made two more sets, one for Reeanth and another for Acantha, and then a few large blankets of it for pretty much anything else.


    The issue that soon unfolded was not one that I wanted to deal with though. My arrival at New Richmond after flying in from my home at the Hole after portaling in from Sunstone Castle coincided with a formal town meeting that I didn¡¯t know about, nor did I want to know about. Arriving in the town usually meant that Scott and the guys either greeted me with drinks or the kids would run up and want some new magic toy to play with, but the place was a ghost town at first glance.


    Rap! Rap! Rap! Spot¡¯s keen ears caught the sound of wood smacking wood, our mental link allowing me to hear what he did. Following his lead, we arrived at a large, well-built pavilion where the entire population of the burgeoning town was sitting on crudely grown benches while others were leaning up against the pavilion support beams. ¡°Order!¡± Jamal yelled, continuing to bang the gavel. I stayed hidden behind the corner of a longhouse, watching as everyone kept arguing. ¡°ORDER!¡± Jamal¡¯s roar was punctuated with a burst of dragonfire that he spit off to the side, finally succeeding in getting everyone¡¯s attention. ¡°Thank you, now, Cassandra. I believe you were saying something?¡±


    ¡°Thank you.¡± It was interesting to see how calm she was even though I could tell from the body language of the crowd that a large chunk of them were legitimately angry. ¡°I¡¯m not saying we have to do anything. I¡¯m saying that we can do something. We hold leverage here, more than you realize. Look, we already have a codified set of laws, people are starting to get into a normal routine for life, and we have what we need to make a start of a truly great settlement. What we¡¯re missing is more people. The Centauri have already started putting down roots in the Florida area and are willing to help more base humans get here if they so choose. The Aelves and Dwarves would fall over themselves to trade with us in a few years, and there¡¯s a sorcerer with a Messiah complex who¡¯s about to get rid of this world¡¯s greatest threat. I¡¯m saying that it¡¯s time to grow!¡±


    A lady I didn¡¯t recognize stood up in the middle. ¡°That¡¯s good and all, but our children need to go to school, or at least get schooling of some kind. If we¡¯re going to integrate with galactic society, then we¡¯ll need to get them up to galactic standards.¡±


    ¡°Yes, you in the back,¡± Cassandra said, pointing at a well built man in the back who joined in, his scales flexing as he scratched his back.


    ¡°I don¡¯t think it¡¯s a good idea yet, there¡¯s still too much we don¡¯t know. We have a posse of magic users who are learning, teaching, and applying magic but haven¡¯t figured out the best way to use it yet. The men folk are keeping up with the hunting demands and the greenhouses are exploding with food. We¡¯re in a good position to grow right now, but we need our roots to solid before we take in more of anything.¡±


    ¡°Ronald¡¯s right,¡± Mark agreed. ¡°Between the flesh golem letting us get to a new standard of health as well as powerful and what the witch is willing to teach us, we¡¯re doing pretty damn good.¡±


    Acantha frowned at being called ¡®witch¡¯ but Reeanth placed her hand on Acantha¡¯s shoulder, forestalling a complaint. Reeanth shook her head and squeezed. I got it, the Centauri woman wanted to let her know that it wasn¡¯t her place.


    ¡°But we¡¯re missing something crucial, you guys! We need a teacher!¡± Cassandra said, her voice growing more firm as her youthful enthusiasm took over. ¡°There¡¯s so much we don¡¯t know, having an experienced sounding board from a society with thousands of years of experience could revolutionize our progress! Just think about-¡±


    Her voice cut off as Spot bounded into view, barking up a storm. The damn dog just couldn¡¯t contain his enthusiasm as several children caught his eye. ¡°Sorry! Sorry!¡± I called out, running from my hiding spot and grabbing my canine by the collar. He didn¡¯t give a flying fuck as I couldn¡¯t stop the three-quarters of a ton dog¡¯s momentum from taking me along for the ride. ¡°Spot! Bad dog! Hunting mode, remember! Quiet watchfulness!¡±


    ¡°Bad form mate,¡± Scott chuckled, ¡°bad form.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re not British, damn it,¡± Mark growled. ¡°We¡¯ve been over this.¡±


    ¡°I can be whatever I want now!¡± Scott joked, poking Mark in the arm. ¡°The world¡¯s got a fresh start, which means this accent is now the new Southern accent. We¡¯re still in Virginia, right?¡±


    ¡°Fantastic timing!¡± Lovera cut in, the gorgeous women using my clumsy entrance to bring people back on topic. It didn¡¯t help that she was disgustingly hot, or that her voice sounded like smooth chocolate. I don¡¯t care that that doesn¡¯t make sense. My sex drive rebounded off the iron walls of my flesh sorcery induced control, leaving small cracks that I oh so quickly repaired. ¡°And what does our benefactor have in the input?¡±


    I mean, I did have an opinion, but my priorities were so different that I¡¯m sure it shouldn¡¯t have any bearing. Were I them, I would¡¯ve organized a few hunting parties and started clearing out anything that would be a threat to the children, starting with the harpies to east and then working clockwise from there. Then I¡¯d make big ass walls and use the earth elementals to make very secure stone housing and more than a few bunkers while having the water elementals be on fishing duty. Shaking away my thoughts, I stuck them to a mental sticky note for later and grabbed Spot by the collar again. ¡°Nope, don¡¯t mind me. I¡¯m just here for my team,¡± I said, futilely pulling at the dog who was solely concentrating on what he considered ¡®playtime¡¯. ¡°Y¡¯all do your thing and I¡¯ll do mine. Reeanth! Acantha! Johnny, fuck, where¡¯s Johnny?¡±


    Lovera answered. ¡°Your friend said something about harpies being perfect crafting material? He did mention that floating islands might be better cultivation spots then mountain tops too. His Lunek is with him as well, to watch his back.¡±


    ¡°Shit.¡± I cursed. ¡°Ya know when he¡¯ll be back?¡±


    ¡°He did also talk about acquiring a bloodline, my lord,¡± Reeanth responded. ¡°He did say that you¡¯d be the best one to help him after that.¡±


    [He could be gone for a week or ten years,] Kraken remarked internally. [You never know with cultivators. He probably found his way into another dimension by now and will have a difficult time returning.]


    [That can¡¯t be fucking real,] I mentally growled back with a hint of exasperation. [I need another heavy hitter as a backup!]


    ¡°Ok, fine!¡± Throwing my hands up, I walked up to the side of the sitting crowd and conjured a square pillar of light gray stone. Using my finger to spell as my earth sorcery traced with my finger to turn the stone to black, I wrote out a list as I spoke. ¡°My priorities are way different from all of yours, but that doesn¡¯t mean y¡¯all don¡¯t have valid points. Growth is needed just as much as securing your foundations. Your greatest threats though are definitely from the outside. There¡¯s no army or police force to help secure this place from danger, it¡¯s all you guys.¡±


    Still writing, I spelled out a few priorities.


    <ol>


    <li style="font-weight: 400">Secure safety.</li>


    <li style="font-weight: 400">Secure food.</li>


    <li style="font-weight: 400">Gather info.</li>


    </ol>


    ¡°I mean, it¡¯s pretty simple. Jamal, Mark, Scott, all you guys, get together as a team and learn how to work as a cohesive unit, working as a team to clear out anything that you wouldn¡¯t want around the kids. The rest of the town should be focusing on the food production, mainly the greenhouses and fishing while the others who are inclined differently work with learning and experimenting with magic. This includes incorporating the elementals and the weapons I¡¯ve left here. And when the security team gets back from doing their thing in the woods and the surrounding area, they¡¯ll be the ones to go gather info, probably with the Centauri as the first option.¡±


    ¡°What about the Fae?¡± Scott cut in. ¡°They¡¯ve been banging on the main greenhouse from the inside for almost a week now. The hell are we supposed to do with that?¡±


    ¡°I mean,¡± I groaned, shrugging my shoulders. ¡°I don¡¯t fuckin¡¯ know. That¡¯s y¡¯alls fish to fry. Who knows anything about the Fae? Any old tales or myths that might have some truth to¡¯em?¡±


    Cassandra answered that one. ¡°Frankly, there are too many tales for us to come to a singular conclusion on that. They could either be cannibalistic monsters that hunger for children or magic powerhouses that want our land. The only commonality we can find is that they don¡¯t like iron.¡±


    ¡°Well there you go!¡± I yelped, happy about something going right. ¡°You got earth elementals around here, have them find or conjure piles of the stuff and use it to tip the crystal rounds. Easy day.¡±


    ¡°Like this?¡± Sheila, the little girl who I showed how to work the earth wand a few months ago waved her wand at the short elemental next to her. ¡°Come on, Rocky! We did this with pretty stones, now make iron!¡± The three foot tall living pile of rocks put its stubbly hands on the ground, it¡¯s coal eyes unblinking as it conjured a rough sphere of iron. ¡°Lovely!¡± she exclaimed, doing a little dance. ¡°I did good?¡±


    Lovera leaned over and picked up the sphere. ¡°You did perfect, you cutie.¡± Giving Sheila a hug, Lovera handed it to me. ¡°Does this meet our requirements?¡± Her sultry voice almost made me forget what she just said, even as my earth sorcery reached out to confirm.


    ¡°Yup,¡± I gulped. ¡°That little princess and her friend will make this place Fae-proof if you let her. And I recommend you do.¡± Lovera¡¯s hand lingered on my wrist as I handed it back to her.


    [Trouble.] Kraken chortled. [I thank the Scions that I don¡¯t have to contend with biology.]


    Figuring that I¡¯d done enough, I less than politely grabbed Reeanth and Acantha and dragged them off with Spot so we could get going. Versonae followed behind quietly as the three of us argued. ¡°Scouting ¡®party¡¯ doesn¡¯t mean that we scout and party, it means a group of individuals who scout together.¡± Arguing with Acantha and Versonae about the irregularities of the English language wasn¡¯t what I wanted to be doing at this point in time. I had a goal, an achievable goal to help me gather information and avoid certain death by unknowable things. And, it was high time to get moving on said goal.


    It was also time for me to catch on some things. Apparently, Reeanth was invaluable when a small delegation of Centauri visited from New Miami to establish contact and hopefully trading in the future. She had wisely maneuvered the visitors into granting diplomatic gifts, some of which adorned the fingers of the women in front of me.


    ¡°Storage rings? You have spatial magic to store shit and it doesn¡¯t weigh a goddamn thing?¡± Luckily, my outrage didn¡¯t occur as we were portaling through the World Tree¡¯s root from former Fredericksburg to Sunstone Castle. It did pour out afterwards though in the form of constant grumbling as I threw supplies at each of them. Quickly making another set of minotaur skin leather clothing for Versonae, I alternated between grumbling about their good fortune and telling them about my plan.


    ¡°Sounds like a lot of nothing for us to do,¡± Acantha complained as Versonae stuck her hands into my flesh golem. ¡°And that¡¯s not a toy!¡±


    ¡°Do not reprimand my servant,¡± Reeanth snapped. ¡°And as a vassal, it isn¡¯t your place to whine. Simply offering alternatives to the plan is more than sufficient if you have a good idea.¡± Turning to me, Reeanth lightly coughed. ¡°I believe, my lord, that what my fellow vassal is trying to say is that we will not be fully utilized in this particular course of action. Might I suggest using us to scout while the operating base is underway?¡±


    [Their magical signature is actually far less dense than yours, even with your armor doing most of the work,] Kraken commented. [Although, the extra layer of minotaur skin almost does enough to mute it. You¡¯d basically be at their level as long as you aren¡¯t actively using magic.]


    ¡°The spirit seems to agree,¡± Acantha smirked, picking at her nails. The damn woman could tell when I held my internal conversations.


    ¡°Fine, but you¡¯re going to have to take turns. Versonae will be on outer perimeter duty all the time but you and Reeanth are either going to switch off on the sorcerer watching duty or work as a team on the scouting. That¡¯s non-negotiable, besides, I have a few more things to get ready. We leave in three days.¡±

 Chapter 156 - Settling Down (Book 3 Chapter 23)

    In those three days, Versonae had hunted down enough sand lizards to fill up all three of their spatial rings with roasted, dried, and smoked meat while Acantha and Reeanth sparred to their heart''s content. I made the joke that they had some pent up lesbianic energy, and that, that did not go over well. Dirty joke aside, I was busy working on loose, minotaur leather outfits to hide our magical signatures, and then I had to redo it because they weren¡¯t white. And then, I had to make another set for forest camo. With the wardrobe situation finally out of the way, I got busy making enchanted armor for Versonae and then zombie-specific weaponry.


    Reeanth¡¯s mana-maul was altered to have a hexagonal slot, which I stuck a fully charged sunstone in. Activating the enchantment that I called ¡®Sunburst¡¯ would send out a continuous, 360 degree blast of condensed solar power, enough to throw back a horde of zombies and incinerate them. Figuring that that was too good of an idea to skimp on, I added that to my own armor and Acantha¡¯s as well, even though it was almost redundant for the latter.


    Versonae though, her equipment required different specifications. After watching her fight just a bit with Reeanth, it looked like twin axes or twin sabers would serve her best. So, to cover my over preparedness, I made her a set of each. That, combined with dragonscale armor and minotaur leather as the cover, she rounded out the group as a front-ish liner. And then, for good measure, I made minotaur leather sheaths for all the weaponry, especially since they all got the addition of the Sunburst upgrade. The most annoying oversight was me realizing that the others weren¡¯t almost immune to the climate, which resulted in six hours worth of a metabolic enchantment designed to allow the body to produce more heat in exchange for calories. Versonae wouldn¡¯t need it as much in the cold and Acantha was in the same boat, but Reeanth didn¡¯t have the luxury of fire magic or a natural fur coat.


    ¡°My lord, are you sure this is what you desire to do?¡± What a question to ask right as we¡¯re all gathered around the central baobab tree. Fifty sunstone golems with one elemental sergeant surrounded the five of us. Spot chuffed his disappointment and butted Reeanth lightly on the back as Acantha grinned, specks of fire dancing across her fingertips. Versonae held her blades tightly as she centered herself, her eyes closed.


    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m sure,¡± I answered. Sweeping my gaze over my assembled group, I sighed. ¡°I get it, another change in the plan but it should be fine. The one scenario we didn¡¯t plan for is if we get ambushed right as we get there. That would throw the world¡¯s unluckiest wrench into my plans and frankly, we don¡¯t time for that. These guys will get there first and if there are no threats that pop outta the woodwork then they¡¯ll power down. Easy day.¡±


    ¡°Have you ever transported this many people at a time?¡± Acantha asked, her grin fading a bit.


    I scratched my chin. ¡°No, but the elemental has assured me that this sort of travel is nothing for them, so they really won¡¯t be a burden. You three though, I¡¯m going to need all of you to be as calm and as still as possible. The more you struggle, the more likely that I¡¯ll lose my hold on your essence and then who knows where you¡¯ll end up.¡±


    Spot shrank down to the size of a normal wolf, which is still a pretty damn big dog. Standing at my side, he let out a low whine until I scratched his head. ¡°Don¡¯t worry boy, you¡¯re the badass roving tank. And you¡¯ll be our number one hunter out there too.¡± Turning to everyone else, I motioned them to get closer. Putting one hand on the Yggdrasil/baobab tree, I tapped into the flow of calm power as everyone else put their hands on me and Spot. The elementals all linked arms with the sergeant being the point that put one large hand on my back. ¡°And off we go!¡±


    [30% shot at perfection, a 60% chance of partial completion and RIGHT AROUND A 10% SKINNY DIP NEAR THE VOID¡¯S BUTTHOLE!] All in all, what mattered is that Kraken¡¯s rant didn¡¯t mess with his focus, because in reality, I wasn¡¯t doing the heavy lifting. Kraken did the lion¡¯s share, juggling everyone¡¯s de-corporealized essence so that they didn¡¯t mix while smoothing out the discordant waves from their heightened emotions. My focus was on the path that my mind had traveled several times over the last three days, gathering as much info as I could in preparation for this trip. The smoothness of the Earth¡¯s jumbled leylines was deceptive, each vein of power was a deep river with a nasty current, simply uncaring for the mortals that dared brave its use. The only issue I hadn¡¯t figured out was exactly how I was going to jump from the North American landmass to Greenland. The leylines simply do not connect to the ones over there from what I can see. One of the backup plans I had anticipated this, which is why I gathered all of the extra power from the desert batteries so I could either fling us over that stretch of Atlantic Ocean like a skipping stone covered in mana or re-corporealize us in the forest near the ocean.


    With Sunstone Castle serving as the starting point with the baobab tree as the anchor, the condensed stored energy of the batteries beneath my claimed land filled Gungnir and helped to shield us from being completely disintegrated. My nature sorcery was more than enough to shield myself, but a lot more power was required for the size of the group. Following the flows of power, we traveled up through the East Coast, up past what used to be Quebec, and then veered east till we hit the beaches of Newfoundland.


    The roots of Yggdrasil proved my hunch to be correct unfortunately; the insurmountable fact kicking me in the nuts is that Greenland is an island, the largest island, but still an island nonetheless meaning that the frozen waters of the Atlantic stood in the way, cutting off the Earth¡¯s natural river of earthen magic and unceremoniously kicking us out into the open, frozen air. Kraken was fully aware of my guess-timated leyline bump in the road and safely shuffled the golems into a circle around we fleshlings just before our unceremonious nosedive from the thinnest skin of extra-dimensionality to in between a dense copse of trees and its surrounding gnarls of bush. Fifty one earthen soldiers lightly touched down (thanks to Kraken) in the clearing surrounded by dense pine trees, and even Spot managed to stick the landing. But due to the immediate cessation of connected leyline power, I was the last one to get thrown face first into the dirt as I tried to slow our roll.


    The beach itself was barely visible through a hundred yards worth of forest that served as my intended jumping off point, but since the leyline ended right around here, here was as far as our reality-skipping would go. From here on out, it was the hard way, which meant the ¡®slow¡¯ way. ¡°Operation Bumby Skiff is a go!¡± I ordered, pointing spear Gungnir at the lapping waves of the Atlantic. Under the preset instructions logged into the backup plan, Kraken disseminated my wishes to the golems that formed a single line and marched to the edge of waters. The first golem sank down, its form melting in on itself into a rough triangle with its point facing us. The following golems jumped on the first one in sequence, each melting into another oddly shaped piece that eventually formed into a solid crystalline boat reminiscent of a Viking longship.


    Stepping up next to my backup plan, I used my sorcery to force the water underneath the forming boat to freeze, creating what amounted to be another buoyant shell to help keep the insanely heavy crystal structure above water. ¡°Mind filling us in here?¡± Acantha scowled, glaring at me as she dusted herself off.


    ¡°That was most unpleasant,¡± Reeanth added in as she checked on Versonae and Spot. ¡°A little warning next time, my lord.¡±


    ¡°Fine,¡± I agreed, keeping my eyes shut as I multi-tasked, both coating the underside of the boat in ice as well as monitoring the golems forming said boat. ¡°I wasn¡¯t sure if I was going to be able to skip from the North American continent to the Greenland landmass via leylines, so I made a couple backup plans. The golem army is great because they¡¯re made of crystals, which can bend or grow however I need. Traveling via golem boat will take us about two days to get to where we¡¯re going and it has the added benefit of not causing any large mana ripples that might give us away.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but did you have to toss us out of the leyline like that?¡± Acantha adjusted her armor, tossing a fireball up in the air like a baseball while glaring at me. She was giving the impression that one wrong word might mean that me and that fireball were about to get real acquainted.


    ¡°Next time you wanna joyride through the veins of Yggdrasil, I¡¯m punting you out,¡± I joked with a wry grin. ¡°You try holding different essences just the right amount of apart so that you don¡¯t meld with your fellow passengers, or just the right amount of togetherness so that the World Tree doesn¡¯t absorb you. If it weren¡¯t for Kraken holding the golems, we¡¯d have had to do this the real hard way.¡±


    ¡°Which is what?¡± Versonae asked, her voice silkier than I remembered. I looked her up and down. Soft white fur framed her face, her large eyes betraying the intelligence that her calm demeanour never gave away. The tightly fitted, black minotaur skin armor was kinda pushing it, like the hot redhead who played Black Widow in the epic Avengers movies, god I miss movies. Reeanth and Acantha also had excess black minotaur leather on top of their normal getup which covered up their curves.


    Bringing myself back to the present, I snorted. ¡°Make the golems be the boat starting off the coast of Virginia and anchors away until Greenland. Thousands of miles of cold ass saltiness in your face and none of us would have a good time.¡± I could just picture it being worse than a too long road trip with annoying family but again, I had a plan to make this as painless as possible. When in doubt, figure it out. Sticking my foot in the water, I pushed out a bit of mana and called out to the water. Within ten minutes, several smallish water elementals popped out of the ocean and stood on the frame of my boat. The smallest took the form of a dolphin with human legs, the next size up was an octopus with one eye, and the largest was a pufferfish the size of a beach ball. ¡°Mana for movement, who wants it?¡± Sending mana filled with my intent caused the first and third to grow a bit bigger in agreement while cyclopus dove back into the ocean.


    Turning to the team as the boat neared completion, I gestured at the elementals. ¡°And here is one of the said backup plans. Elementals like mana and my sorcery allows me to communicate with them on a level that¡¯s easy enough for both of us to understand. I¡¯ll probably be calling more of them to fight with and for us when we get to where we¡¯re going.¡± Reeanth maintained her staid expression while the fireball went out in Acantha¡¯s hand.


    ¡°You said that this is a scouting mission, correct?¡± Versonae pressed, both hands clenching the hilts of her blades.


    ¡°And how often do those go tits up?¡± Raising an eyebrow, I sighed as I turned back to the boat, scanning it to make sure that I hadn¡¯t missed anything. The elemental sergeants were making up the key parts of the frame while the standard sunstone golems filled in the largest part of the bottom and sides and my ice formed the extra shell for buoyancy, armor, and a place for the two water elementals to stick to. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Bitchin,¡± Acantha growled as she jumped in, using bursts of flame to propel herself up the fifteen or so feet to the boat as Spot followed after, shrinking down to the size of a normal wolf. Man, I was so proud, actually getting these non-Earth humans to learn slang. I couldn¡¯t keep the smile off my face as I conjured a stone gangplank for the rest to climb in. When everything was set, I formed a rough image in my head of a map from where we were kicking off, where the eastern part of Canada used to exist, and then drew a mental line from there to Greenland. Making sure to communicate that our destination was basically a humongous island covered in ice and snow, the elementals nabbed onto that image and started hauling us along at a good clip. With them doing the work, I held on to the ice railing and started trickling mana down the sides where my two magical motors could soak it up from the boat¡¯s ice shell.


    ¡°So how long is this going to take?¡± I considered Reeanth¡¯s question for a moment.


    ¡°Not sure honestly. Not sure how fast elementals can push a boat, or even exactly how many miles we have to travel. Communing with the World Tree for an updated map doesn¡¯t get you all the details, and maps from before the Apocalypse tended to be off scale. Google for instance-¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s Google?¡±


    ¡°A search engine for the internet, basically an information superhighway that allowed pretty much anyone with access to read, watch, or learn anything. Pretty much revolutionized society, a lot of jobs could be done from home, schooling could be done from any location, the list goes on.¡± Just thinking about reality before the shift caused me to go silent for a minute. The mostly green water of the Atlantic as the shoreline started to fade. Seems like the entire day had flown by thanks to leyline traveling as the sun started to set, bright orange and yellow beams mixing in with pink and purple hues over the green landscape rapidly fading off into the distance.


    Acantha snapped her fingers a few times. ¡°Whoa, hey now, come on back to us pilot.¡±


    ¡°Sorry,¡± I muttered. ¡°Just thinking about before.¡± Three days passed in near silence as I brooded. I conjured a stone barrel and filled it with water to keep everyone hydrated and that¡¯s really all I had to worry about other than keeping up the flow of mana for the elementals. I was more than ready to get this shit going and part of me even hoped for some early action. I mean, I wasn¡¯t really sure how this was going to go. For all I know, the entire mini-continent of Greenland was now an undead paradise, crawling with Draugen, undead dragons, mutated zombies and all kinds of disgusting fuckery. Or, we could be unbelievably lucky and find the ice castle completely abandoned. I know which way I¡¯m betting.


    Day three greeted us with a picturesque landscape, a windy river slowly draining into the ocean framed with sheer mountains to the east and west. A thick forest fought the sandy edges of the riverbank for space as the light blue morning sky dominated the view, bringing out the gorgeous mountaintops with their speckled brown and white tops kissing the clouds. But a darker feeling sat just beyond the innocent, initial greeting of the land. A slight tension became immediately obvious as soon as my feet touched the land, an insidious poison had threaded its way to Greenland¡¯s borders infecting anything and everything with a greyish pall. No longer did Mother Earth welcome an earth/water/nature aligned sorcerer with peace, for now, that normal feeling of peace was muddled, shot through with what could only be described as a shortening lifespan. Even the trees and valleys knew that their days were numbered and ever growing shorter.


    Acantha hopped off the boat, her boots making a splash as she scanned the horizon. Reeanth joined her, her maul and tower shield held at the ready as Versonae stood on the prow of the boat sniffing the air. ¡°It smells of decay,¡± Versonae softly growled, pulling out her blades. ¡°Like a fresh kill just starting to rot, or an old hunter as his time draws nigh.¡±


    She wasn¡¯t wrong. Imagine that feeling of comfort from walking through the front door and familiarity greets you. The closeness of family and the smells of dinner just put on the table, the small, simple relief of taking your shoes off at the door and leaving your cares with them. That¡¯s what I feel every single time I¡¯m outside in the woods or the water or deep in the earth, I¡¯m greeted and loved by the elements as if they¡¯re old friends or family. Right now, Greenland, a wondrous, icy wildland, feels like hospice. Nothing looks dead yet, but it feels like death is in the air. Spot joined Versonae at the head of the boat, his own but much deeper growling joining hers.


    ¡°Acantha, Versonae, I want to know everything about everything within twenty miles. Take Spot with you. Worst comes to worst, hop on his back and hightail it back here.¡± Spot licked me and then the three of them headed off quickly disappearing into the woods. Pulling Gungnir and shaping it into spear-form, I walked forward on the beach until the sand turned to dirt and stone, plunging the base of my weapon into the ground. Closing my eyes, I gave instructions to Reeanth. ¡°I need you to scout as well, but closer to here. This area, with the river, ocean, and mountains all coming together, is probably the best place to set up a temporary base. Find naturally clear areas that might be good for solar panel setup, identify natural caves and strategic setups, anything of note. The golems will serve as guards until then.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll stay within two miles,¡± she said with a nod, setting off at a walk, her maul held in both hands and her shield attached to her back. Letting out a sigh, I turned and faced my boat, conjuring two pieces of ice each the size of a baseball. Taking a few minutes, I pumped as much mana into both of them as they could stand without melting and place them at my feet. ¡°All right blobs one and two. If you want these snacks, then help me for the rest of the day and they¡¯re yours.¡±


    The two water elementals popped out of the water as Kraken gave the golems the order to dissemble back to normal. The golems detached one by one and set up a half-circle perimeter with their weapons facing outward, each sinking stability rods of crystal into the sand that grew and branched outwards. Outside of a tsunami or nuke, nothing would move them from their post. Surveying the temporary setup and then turning back to the quivering elementals, I noted that both of them were now a bit bigger than they used to be and shaped differently too. The one on the left was a formless mass that constantly changed and rippled while the other had taken on the shape of my sunstone golems as a form of mockery. Water elementals are playful at their core, flighty too. The first let out an icy sniff and dove back into the ocean while the other placed itself between the two mana offerings, its face looking up at me in hope.


    I laughed. ¡°Yup, I guess one now and the other one later since he took off.¡± A bubbly squeal burbled out as it turned into a mini wave and devoured the ice mana crystal.


    [You shouldn¡¯t tempt the children so.] Kraken scolded. [They¡¯re supposed to grow and survive on their own.]


    ¡°Well, who better to help me build an underwater ice and stone base than a baby ocean elemental?¡± I could feel Kraken¡¯s piercing gaze from inside Gungnir. ¡°Fine, fine, I was kidding. I know that¡¯s stupid. Underwater bases aren¡¯t made from ice!¡± The gaze of ridicule grew stronger. ¡°FINE! I got it, no underwater base!¡±


    [The constant flow of the river with the never-changing cycle of ocean waves will make a portal structure basically impossible for you. Make a stone structure connected to the land, carve a cavern out of a mountain, do something else.]


    Out of habit, I glanced into the spatial storage pocket inside of Gungnir. The consolidated root ball that I separated from Yggdrasil back in Virginia was still there, green pulses of energy letting me that it was still just the way I shaped it. The sunstone golems each grouped in sets of ten around their sergeants that began transmuting sections of the beach into stone columns. Normally, beaches are not considered good places to hole up. They¡¯re naturally indefensible, and I¡¯m simply using the standard of Earth-based military history, but magic has the potential to change that. With earth and water magic at my fingertips, I could turn that very disadvantage to my own terms.


    Wrapping up an idea in my head and banding it together with mana, I shot it to the water elemental to give him something to do and then I got to work. After several hours, each stone column, five in all, were transmuted downwards about fifty yards below the surface of the sand and about three yards above it. My elemental sergeants connected the columns via transmuted stone about thirty yards down for the next part of the plan. The tops of the stone columns were wide enough to comfortably fit a picnic table on top of them with ample room to walk around the imaginary table. On each of these, I assembled and placed five sunstone solar panels and transmuted the core of the stone columns even further into copper, weaving that copper cable into the connecting base of the columns but leaving a little hole facing towards the incoming mount of the river.


    This weird construction model did have a point. Greenland is a land of ice and snow which means that converting heat for mana was a no go and converting light for mana would be far less efficient than it would be in an area like Florida or Nevada, which means that kinetic energy would be the main source of power. So, queue the other parts of the plan. For that hole, I had that facing towards the river for a specific reason, in fact, the idea was to modify a power tap that I¡¯d used both near my home and for New Richmond. The hole in the middle column facing the river was directly in the river¡¯s current and inscribed with runes to convert the kinetic energy of the running water into power, like a slimmed-down version of a hydroelectric dam. After watching it work for a few minutes, I did the same thing on the opposite sides of all the columns, using the ever pounding rhythm of the ocean¡¯s waves for their kinetic force.


    Now the setup isn¡¯t perfect. Frankly, every source of power that I¡¯d been using since the Ripples started upping the ambient mana of the world has been much weaker than the matter to mana powertaps, but these newer powertaps models were inherently less dangerous. I wouldn¡¯t have to worry about accidentally making my own personal Chernobyl and the power constraints of solar and hydroelectric power taps are actually solved due to the revolution of my magic crystal batteries. They don¡¯t lose charge over a couple months like normal batteries, the storage capacity is light-years ahead of modern America could produce, and due to my earth sorcery, making more of them and connecting them to a network is beyond simple. It¡¯s the work of a few minutes and there are no toxic chemicals involved like there would be in batteries.


    But I needed more. More of everything really, that¡¯s what I needed. Powering golems for any serious length of time, especially if combat is involved, would become my Achilles heel unless I could manage to get a serious power supply here in the North. Which is why my team was out scouting. The idea of me being a sorcerer with unique blends of power affords me more in the way of options than most would realize. Reviewing Kraken¡¯s map of Greenland in my head, the one that Acantha seriously updated, postulated that the main encampment of the Hungry Ones was about three hundred miles north of my position. Still going with the basic strategy of ¡®island hopping¡¯, I had my bases strung out starting with my main base in Virginia, then the fortified Sunstone Castle in the desert, and then this would be the last stand of Greenland here on the beach. But this base was going to be BIG.


    Scale always, always, always, is an issue when it comes to construction. It comes right after the slimy sales guy saying ¡®location, location, location¡¯, but the bastard is right, location matters. After setting the multi-intake powertap on the beach, I slowly grew a massive battery crystal coated in a thin layer of runed granite on the sand. Indulging my inner nerd, I shaped it like a pylon from the video game Starcraft, complete with gold rings wrapping around it with runes of containment, channeling, control, and mana signature dispersal. It would serve two purposes in my many layered plan. First, it would legitimately function as a backup battery, but second, it would also be a very large, bright beacon to distract enemies. They would view it as a legitimate target for them to attack when in reality, it would be far less important to me than the area about ten miles further up the river where I would plant the World Tree that would form the base of my portal.


    At about twenty feet high and ten feet wide, it wasn¡¯t really eye-catching yet, but I added runes for ¡®auto-grow when capacity is full¡¯ to the main body of the gem and hooked it up to the mana feed via braided copper wires. As it filled, it would grow up and out until it hit the limit of fifteen hundred feet, putting it the general size of a skyscraper tower.


    Right as I finished getting the beach operation set up, Reeanth returned, planting her shield and maul in the sand. Taking several gulps of water, she wiped her mouth. ¡°Not much to report, my lord. Everything within five miles is practically empty. Minimal signs of life near this location, so much so that I met the others and had them expand their scouting further out. With Spot¡¯s and Versonae¡¯s senses and Acantha¡¯s firepower, they should be fine at least out to forty miles.¡±


    ¡°Very good.¡± I said. ¡°It¡¯s both better and worse than I hoped for. Good in the sense that I can start serious construction here, and bad in the sense that no life around here means that they¡¯ve either fled or been taken or eaten. So, no sleep until I get the good stuff set up, flesh sorcery rejuvenation will have to suffice.¡±


    Not even letting a grimace crease her features, Reeanth gave a sharp nod. ¡°Refresh me first, my lord. I¡¯ll take the watches until the others return. Then I advise you to allow them four hours of rest and then rejuvenate them. I¡¯ll sleep when they start their watch so we can maintain eyes open for twenty four hours. What is the estimated timeframe for the plans to be finished?¡±


    I cringed internally as I sighed just a bit. ¡°I¡¯m not actually sure. With the elemental sergeants on hand, it should honestly go pretty fucking fast, but if we have to contend with hordes of undead every day and night, who knows how slow it¡¯ll go?¡±


    ¡°Well,¡± she started, turning a bit green. ¡°I did find tracks.¡±


    ¡°What kind of tracks?¡±


    ¡°Many kinds, all together and going in every direction, but there is a large trail that probably used to be a road that has them all going North.¡±

 Chapter 157 - Island Hopping (Book 3 Chapter 24)

    That didn¡¯t sit well with me. I just put Reeanth on patrol duty as I worked in tandem with the earth elemental sergeants. Using the steady flow of power from the multivariate power tap, I directed the group as we moved together, conjuring/shaping/transmuting the surrounding area into something resembling defensible. The beach itself I left alone, but the place where the freshwater met the salty ocean I fortified the sides of the river with slick stone and then placed thirty foot falls between the sandy beach and the forest. I wasn¡¯t really worried about fortifying that part of the beach as honestly, I could defend against an army all by myself in that environment if I had to. Two sources of water, a forest, and incalculable amounts of sand to play with? Puhleese, bring it on.


    But as we worked our way upstream using the bright moon to light our way, conjuring walls up the one side of the river and setting down more hydroelectric columns connected to the beach pylon via copper lines, I kept looking for the perfect spot to plant my Yggdrasil seed. That little bugger was the lynchpin of my whole plan, if that went, we all went. About two miles further north and way into the buttcrack of night, Reeanth pointed out a part in the river that I missed due to paying serious attention to detail where the river widened greatly and a decent sized island occupied the center of that lake. It screamed, ¡®plant medieval castle right here¡¯, to me, which I translated in my head to, ¡®grow epic magic castle with even more epic Yggdrasil portal¡¯. It would also be a huge load off my mind if I could get my freaking golem army here, but there were basic steps to tend to before that happened. Steps, unfortunately, that I didn¡¯t have time for.


    The moonlight was cut off by ominous clouds, oddly heralded by the crashing entrance of my scouts. ¡°Undead!¡± Acantha¡¯s mental shriek wasn¡¯t just fear, but a series of pictures of an angry horde heading right this way. They were a couple miles out but the terror of the group didn¡¯t hit me until Spot blew past me like a runaway train. Ordering the golem sergeants to double time back to the beach, I took a few seconds to more closely examine the mental screenshots from Acantha. They had gone out to about forty miles and walked up a large hill, not seeing signs of anything until they hit the top. Down in the valley in front of them was a gruesome sight, milling hordes of undead as roiling fog coursed in and out of the bodies, dissipating and appearing at random. Several black bonfires dotted the valley leading the way to the other end where the horde grew even thicker and more bizarre.


    Some of the bodies were clearly once human but those were the minority. I don¡¯t even have words to describe the horrors of the bodies. Some were several human corpses put together but none of them looked like each other, a few with three heads and five arms, others put together to look like bastardized horses. Getting out of the realm of human physiology were the freaky ones, winged monsters with six foot tongues that oozed oily slime that blazed with grey fire, undead giants fifteen yards tall wielding bone clubs decked with teeth way too large to be anything from Earth. The creepiest of all were what could only have been spellcasters, those had six arms, four of which were clutching books that dripped blood or glowing red wands tipped with black diamond teeth or staves covered in tassels with organs tied in them. Each one of those had at least two heads, one constantly muttering while the other simply shrieked like it was a full time job.


    Somehow, either Versonae or Acantha accidentally kicked over a rock in their haste to back up which caught the attention of the outer horde. At least three hundred of the fuckers started shambling after the disturbance and another two hundred were running at least as fast as a human jogger. Pulling myself away from the jumbled images, I cursed as I ran to catch up. Boosting myself with flesh sorcery, I caught up to Spot faster than I thought I would. Communicating with him directly via our link, I asked him very politely to lead the horde away, up to the East and then directly North. I just needed him to give us at least three but hopefully four-ish days of preparation before heading back.


    With a chuff and a quick headbutt, Spot agreed and took off barking and howling as he kicked up a lot of dirt, both covering up the majority of our tracks and clearly making his own. Using earth sorcery, I easily covered up the rest of our tracks as we sped back to the beach. Our superhuman bodies covered the just over two miles worth of landscape in record time, Reeanth and Acantha sprinting down the shore of the river next to the conjured stone wall as I skated across the top of the river using water sorcery, making sure to cover up the tracks as we fled as quietly as possible.


    ¡°What? There¡¯s nothing here?¡± Acantha scream-whispered as we hit the beach. ¡°And a giant fucking diamond doesn¡¯t count!¡±


    I glared at her as I turned around, part of my mind relaying orders to the elementals through Kraken as they split off and got busy. ¡°Not my fault someone tipped them off! What part of scout or be fucking quiet  did you three not understand?! Spot can buy us a couple days but fucking FUCK I need at least a goddamn week!¡±


    The sandy beach took on a creepy form of new life as the silica of the sand molded before our eyes into a kickass giant¡¯s version of a sand castle. The five pillars slowly grew upwards as the wall in front of them grew just fast enough to keep the pillars from being seen from the vantage point of the land in front of us.


    ¡°If we¡¯re lucky, they¡¯ll think it was just a random beast that knocked the rock over and merrily chase Spot all across Greenland. If we¡¯re not, then say hello to Black Summer.¡± Rubbing my forehead as I communed with Kraken who was busily managing the sergeants, Versonae and Reeanth grimly looked at each other.


    ¡°My lord, is there anything that can be done?¡± Reeanth¡¯s pained expression showed me that she knew how far up shit creek we were.


    ¡°Well, we¡¯re down our best fighter and tank, and y¡¯all have been scouting for a day and most of the night, which means you¡¯re useless to me right now!¡±


    Kraken interceded, speaking mentally to the entire group. [I recommend that Mr. Panic put the rest of you in a condensed sleep state.]


    ¡°Who speaks directly to my mind?¡± Versonae spat, drawing her blades and looking around. ¡°My mind is my own!¡±


    Reeanth shushed her as Acantha explained. ¡°That glowing spear has Nate¡¯s spirit familiar in there. It does most of the real work.¡± She grinned as I glared at her.


    [Although you are correct,] Kraken hopped back in. [We do need to stay on the dangerous task at hand. As I was saying, you¡¯ll each be able to have the restful benefits of a full night¡¯s sleep in just a few hours. He can use flesh sorcery to do this, and he can also easily bring you to full alert if need be. With you three taken care of, he can refresh himself with flesh sorcery and keep working with the elementals to fortify the area.]


    The three women looked at me, Acantha disbelieving as Reeanth nodded in agreement while Versonae thought it over, sheathing her blades. ¡°Who will keep a lookout?¡± Versonae asked pointedly. ¡°And where will we rest?¡±


    Gesturing at the ground next to me, I raised up three pod-like structures out of sand. ¡°Me, Kraken, and a small golem army will be on guard while you three get some accelerated shut-eye. I¡¯m also going to see if I can get a couple sand elementals around here to play guard in exchange for mana.¡±


    ¡°Playing to the combined strength of the land and your affinity. Smart.¡± Reeanth praised as she climbed into the first pod. ¡°Knock me out. When we wake, we shall start guerilla warfare to grant you a week¡¯s worth of time, my lord.¡±


    The other two climbed in their respective pods and shut their eyes, Acantha gripping her two glowing wands as she looked away. After putting my team in a sorcery enhanced sleep, Kraken linked up with the elementals to keep the construction on task as I guided the rest of the mini-army to be at advantageous points around the beach. Having them stand out here on the wide open sand didn¡¯t seem to be that bright. The first three groups of ten I had were marched out to about a mile where they covered themselves up with dirt and mud, hiding behind dense thickets. The other two groups of ten were sent out to the east and west ends of the beach just to make sure that we didn¡¯t get flanked. With Kraken¡¯s embedded programming, they easily accepted the simple orders I gave them, mainly, ¡®Attack anything that does not align with these specific energy signatures, namely, my group¡¯.


    With that complete, the hard part began. My basic plans were fucked, and my next two backup plans were in a bind, which basically left me with the bloody idea of ¡®island hopping¡¯, again. I¡¯m stuck on the beach making a fortification when what I really want to do is be making a base about two miles ahead of me in that perfect spot which is very defensible and almost divinely created to be where the portal should be planted. Twisting the entire scenario up in my head and forcing it to bend in ways that probably edge the boundaries of good sense, I said ¡®fuck it¡¯. It also doesn¡¯t help that one of my mental background processes from forever ago that I forgot about, the one that comes up with backup plan after backup plan, spoke up about a tendency that I had ¡®buried¡¯ (hahahaha) awhile ago. I could simply start building underground.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    [The word you¡¯re looking for is ¡®asinine¡¯. It perfectly describes your plan, going off alone, away from your army so you can build an underground base on a shitty river island so you can then turn said underground base into a fortified island with entrenched walls. Am I, how do you say it, smelling what you¡¯re stepping in?]


    Kraken being my spirit familiar with the innate ability to read the twisting lines of my thoughts is both comforting and irritating. Mainly, because he¡¯s usually right, but sometimes, his perspective just lacks balls.


    [Spot¡¯s risking his life around this icy shithole of an island, the team is unconscious, you¡¯ve got the elementals moving forward with this part of the plan. Exactly what am I going to encounter underground that I can¡¯t handle?] I could tell that he was gathering his thoughts the same way an experienced sailor feels a growing storm just past the horizon, the simple drop in temperature, that crease of pressure flowing over your skin as the air gets thicker. Snickering to myself as I shielded my thoughts from Kraken, I walked over to the large battery pylon, using earth sorcery to make each step on the beach cover twice as much ground. ¡°Sorry dude,¡± I said, not meaning it one bit. Poking the pylon with Gungnir, I pushed Kraken out and into his temporary home.


    [What is the meaning-]


    [Calm your tits, I mean your tentacles.] I soothed, sinking into the sand and moving towards the river. [You can wake the girls up without me and you know it. Just keep things running for a bit and I¡¯ll do my own thing just a bit further up. I¡¯m bettin¡¯ there¡¯s a leyline up there somewhere that can swing this a bit more in our favor. Gimme four hours before you start blowing smoke.]


    Moving underground through the silty mud of the river upstream was not the miserable experience I halfway expected it to be. It¡¯s one thing to know that you don¡¯t really feel the cold from water hovering just above the temperature of freezing your manhood off, but it¡¯s another move through it like you¡¯re made for it. The mud and water welcomed me like the lost sheep finally returning to the fold, happily enveloped by love. Letting my thoughts flow through me as my sorceries carried me to my destination, the river and its banks were more than happy to oblige my curiosity with vague images of what I wanted: a small leyline on the western side of the island, the soil composition of the island itself, a little network of rabbit burrows comfortably chillin¡¯ just below the surface.


    It¡¯s always pitch dark, and I mean blacker than a demon¡¯s butthole, below the surface of the earth. Light simply doesn¡¯t penetrate down here and with my gear all covered up and in stealth mode, I didn¡¯t even give off my usual glow. Gungnir stayed in my hand in knife form, its stored power under wraps even though I knew it would all be ready to go with just a mental flicker. My earth sorcery carried me gently northward in the safety of the earth beneath the river. The few miles of travel was its own experience, similar to one of those sensory deprivation tanks. The only sense worth having down here was that of magic, and I had that in spades. Everything from the tiniest grains of sand to the myriad ocean of pebbles, dirt, and organic matter that made up our concept of ¡®the ground¡¯ parted for me as I finally reached the spot I¡¯d been aiming for.


    From where I sat or floated magically, forty feet underground, I kept about a good twenty feet away from the leyline itself. Calling it a vein of planet Earth is really only describing one facet of the incredible magical pipeline of power that thrummed in front of me. To my magical senses, it glowed a mixture of icy blue and forest green, but the dominant flow of the leyline was solid brown denoting the main concentration of power. All in all, it was perfect for what I wanted to do. Taking a second to make sure my hands were steady, I pulled the Yggdrasil root/seed creation out of Gungnir and held it in my left hand, putting Gungnir away as I held my palm up. Reaching out with my nature sorcery, I located a grove of alder trees above me, their tendency to grow together in dense thickets being exactly what I was looking for. With a twitch of power, I pulled a handful of their seeds down through the soil where I pushed them into the Yggdrasil org.


    My other Yggdrasil creations had the same purpose as the one I was about to make, but in order for this sneaky portal plan to work with the secret island base, I needed a very different approach. Using Sunstone Castle as an example, one big baobab tree served as a perfect central hug, a large pillar of nature capable of holding the mystical presence of the World Tree. But here, I needed it to not stick out, at least not just yet, which if I used a web of alder trees it would diffuse the signature of Yggdrasil while also being able to handle the immense load of power. The idea of not using a central rod to focus and contain the power and instead spreading the load out through a network isn¡¯t one that I¡¯ve worked with before. I¡¯ve used oak, willow, and baobab, which all three are innately large and in charge trees, but those would stick out here. The climate and soil composition up here isn¡¯t suited to trees of that nature, although I¡¯m sure I could fix that for any tree I wanted.


    *********


    Andy¡¯s POV (Somewhere in the Cosmos at the Poly-Arcane Institute)


    ¡°And why are the rules of scrying so important?¡± The slap of my professor¡¯s leg tentacle against the steel floor sounded like an octopus in an open air asian market. His or its bubbly voice still sounded like mashed bubbles even though the translation spell managed to communicate the exact meaning of his ¡®words¡¯. Three feet tall when he normally taught but tended to change his height by further extending his ten eight-foot long tentacles, often using the change in stature to ¡®intimidate¡¯ even though it didn¡¯t work as well as he thought it would. And for me, what was far more interesting was the alien hottie two rows away and a few up in the stadium-like classroom. The Spiratni woman sported long red hair, a banging body, and three slitted eyes with a wicked smile that absolutely washed away any kind of rational male thought. My brother might focus less on the material, softer side of life, but I sure as fuck didn¡¯t. The first thing you learned in the forced training at Centauri boot camp is to enjoy every last moment cause you don¡¯t know when it¡¯ll be your last.


    ¡°Bootlicker!¡± A leg tentacle slammed into the desk in front of me, my professor¡¯s assortment of green eyes glaring at me. Each little slitted bead of an eye was filled with a teeny seed of hatred mixed with fear. ¡°Answer the question for the class or back to humping like a tk¡¯lanta.¡±


    Supposedly, that was a diss on the Centauri warrior culture, the fact that we¡¯re meatheads who wield magic like a battleaxe instead of like a delicate instrument. That might have been actually insulting if it knew that I wasn¡¯t always Centauri. Formerly a hundred percent Earthen stoner, but hell, having a poor excuse for a squid insult me is still something to laugh at, quietly.


    ¡°Scrying rules are important because of exactly how the shamanic aspects of mysticism meet the logical rules of wizardry. The marriage of intent and dream creates a schism where the soul and mind are vulnerable, but in such a way that it is not immediately apparent.¡±


    ¡°Explain.¡±


    I snorted, ¡°Basically, scrying is so basic that people don¡¯t think of how it actually works, and since it uses the mystic aspects of dream magic which is inherently based in the soul, it means the soul is vulnerable. But, because it¡¯s so easy to do generally, people don¡¯t think about the risk. The chances of your scrying getting hijacked is actually much higher than even demonic summoning rituals due to the lack of precision. Summoning rituals for instance are cast with Names, protection circles, and a team to back you up, but scrying can be done with a small mirror by a powerless child.¡±


    Professor N¡¯ganke bubbled unhappily. ¡°Correct. Foreign elements are considered less of a threat based on the scryer¡¯s state since they¡¯re looking for something of which they¡¯re not entirely familiar. You may not know the surroundings of what you¡¯re scrying, the mood of the person you¡¯re scrying, or even the correct dimension that you didn¡¯t know you wanted. Scrying is the essence of casting your will into the Cosmos and hoping for a reflection of a particular facet.¡±


    The Shamanic classes and lectures fit me the best here at the Institute. My inclination towards mind-altering substances gave me a serious leg up against those who went into the teaching with a ¡®purity¡¯ mindset, wanting to accomplish everything by pure will and hard work. My resident A.I. did most of the rote memorization work which made the wizardry classes almost too easy, but, sometimes, talent figures into it too. Reaching into my satchel that sat near my feet, I pulled my latest project out of a pocket. Three little red leaves that looked similar to oak glowed with a soft cherry color. Taking one, I placed it under my tongue and closed my eyes, putting the other two away and grabbing the scrying mirror with both hands.


    ¡°Gaze into the mists of mana and let your will form the shape. Connect with the vibration of life, feel the solar winds take your mind to what you envision.¡±


    The first instinctive image my will pushed me towards was a bit more detail on little miss sexy over there, but her anti-scrying wards gave me the equivalent of a magical black eye. Shaking my head, I figured on a safer target, clueless older brother. I hadn¡¯t seen Nate in a while. For me, it¡¯s been about a year or so here but for him it¡¯s probably been a couple months. Earth is getting back to a normal timescale but who knows how long it¡¯ll take to equalize and settle down.


    Opening my eyes, I looked down as my energy flowed from my soul, twisting through my channels and runes further down into the mirror. Forcing myself to focus on the most recent memories of my brother instead of the shapely distraction, I tied in the image and feelings along with the natural bond between the wands he made for me out of Gungnir, I followed the sympathetic link back to Earth. Swirling crimson flows of power mixed with the deep black of space for a moment before a tiny image of my brother popped up. He had to be somewhere dark, the only thing I could make out really was the barely glowing green bulbous orb in his hands and his face screwed up in concentration, kinda like he was taking a shit.


    ¡°Can you send messages while scrying?¡± Looking up from my hands, I squinted at Professor N¡¯ganke. ¡°Or does the other person have to be actively and knowingly participating?¡±


    The hot chick turned around, her flirtatious look gone and replaced with a condescending one. ¡°How do you not know this? Dream scrying has unprecedented range and depth but communication is unreliable.¡±


    ¡°Remeran wizardry solved this issue with entangled particles combined with silver mirrors!¡± A nerdy looking blue gnome, basically a hairless dwarf with penchants for magitech, squeaked bravely from the back row. ¡°It¡¯s cost in thaums is so low that even the ungifted can use them. Something shaman-based magics can¡¯t even boast about.¡±


    ¡°What did I say about mentioning wizardry in my class?¡± The explosion of bubbles slammed into the gnome. Professor N¡¯ganke slithered up the wave of slimy water until he was grasping his student by the neck. ¡°Opening your mind is the only way to learn the mysteries of shamanry! Never again!¡± With a flick, the gnome was flung through the silvery portal that served as a door.


    ¡°Anyone else want to disparage the wonders of mysticism?¡± Every green eyeball had turned blood red as they swiveled in different directions to take in the entire class at one, except I had three eyeballs pointed at me.


    ¡°Hey now, don¡¯t look at me, was wanting to know if I could send a message this way or not.¡±


    ¡°Have you tried?¡±


    I looked back down at the mirror, unconsciously zooming out. ¡°Uh, no . . .¡± Before I blinked, the dark image had zoomed out to the point that I might as well have been a satellite, surveying the entire Northern Hemisphere, probably. I mean, Alaska was still there but Greenland had gotten a huge upgrade, and the USA had a few more mountain ranges than I remember. Focusing, I zoomed back in to where my brother was, where a much bigger Greenland was? Yeah, some ugly fucks were running around the landmass but a small chunk was heading his way. ¡°Run douche! Run!¡± I didn¡¯t even think, just threw my words and my mana at the mirror, breaking the connection just as his eyes opened. Sweat ran down my hands as the surface of the mirror cracked into a million pieces, blood slowly dripping out.


    ¡°And blood means what, class?¡± The angry Professor was replaced once again with his normally bubbly self. Pitying looks came from all directions except the front of the class. ¡°Yes, imminent doom.¡±

 Chapter 158 - Intervention (Book 3 Chapter 25)

    Greenland - Nate


    Cold fear that wasn¡¯t my own ran down the back of my spine. Concentration almost completely shot, and that¡¯s definitely not good in the midst of handling the mystical equivalent of nuclear power lines. Zombies, wights, ghouls, and many other smelly rotten abominations were coming my way. How I knew that, I don¡¯t really know, but I knew that fact was true from the depths of my soul, almost as if I could see them. I had been completely focused on handling the flows of power and I couldn¡¯t really stop, the process had begun.


    [Think, think, think . . . ] I grimaced, glaring at the seed in front of me. [Stupid, stupid, stupid, so close to being smart that I might be actually stupid! I was close enough to the leyline that it should have hid this working!] Then it hit me, a way out of my fucking mess. Taking one hand off of the Yggdrasil seed while keeping the other there, tamping down on the power flow and turning the energy monitoring process into an auto-mind sorcery background process, I conjured a handful of alder tree seed and covered the Yggdrasil orb in them. Gently imbuing them with life giving mana, they sank in as if the orb were soft playdough. Pulling my hand back off, I grabbed a bunch of bloodthorn seeds from my pocket and then two cryocards from the other pocket. [Vaya con Dios!] I screamed mentally, forcing the ingredients into the orb as I pushed it closer to the leyline.


    Weaving my nature sorcery through the disparate cocktail, I focused on the interplay of energies as they fought with each, the tangly nature of the alder trees fighting the domination factor of the thorny vines that hungered for my flesh or any tang of iron. The compressed frozen energy of the cryocards creeped into the Yggdrasil orb only to be blasted away by the ever increasing volume of raw power of the leyline. [You, will, SUBMIT!]


    My senses via the web of plant life above me alerted me to the incoming horde of undead, their hungry, mindless stampede having no care for stealth, not that it would help. Leaping deer and flitting birds finally made their appearance for the first time as they fled in front of the horde, keeping just out of reach, not knowing that they weren¡¯t the intended prey. My hands vibrated as the Yggdrasil orb almost shook itself to pieces, my sorceries forcing my intent into the orb using Gungnir as a guide. My very first implement, the weapon that let me bat above my weight class, was a product of different energies and substances that found a balance and flowed. This orb, would do the same, by my fucking will.


    Undead hands and shovel-like feet tore downward through the earth like a giant mole on crack, each rotted limb flinging dirt aside and even smaller horde members without a care. Feeling actual fear for the first time, I shoved the orb closer to the intangible leyline line, opening up the temporary channel of power to full blast instead of the initial trickle. Searing plain blazed through me, just under the amount of pain I could handle with flesh sorcery¡¯s help, and about a million times more than what I could handle if I didn¡¯t have Gungir. The earth around me exploded outwards as Yggdrasil erupted, the excess energies flowing upwards as alder trees sporting thorns the size of swords stabbed into the incoming horde, temporarily grabbing their attention as I focused all of my will on manipulating the tree as it grew.


    For these few moments, I would have an unprecedented level of control in this time of birth, hopefully. The cryocard energy altered the nature of the tree to allow it to withstand subarctic levels of cold while the bloodthorn seeds nature fully integrated into the bark structure of the branches. Each alder seed formed into a separate but tangentially attached trunk, spiraling outwards as its fingers grasped and tore the incoming horde, a raging whirlwind shredder borne of magic. Three massive roots speared downwards, two of which wrapped around the leyline and the other kept going downwards as if to form a massively deep anchor. The alder bark turned crimson, forming into the shape of bladed leaves that popped outwards as soon as the tree''s flesh was done growing in that spot.


    Over four hundred Hungry Ones were torn apart, ground up, sliced into bits, and dragged down into the dirt as my latest insane creation experienced its first stretch into fresh air. It wasn¡¯t alive in the sentient meaning of the word, it was still basically a tree, a zombie-crunching magical tree. New alder trunks sprang up, never further than ten feet from each other, their spindly branches bisecting and impaling the zombies, each little branch growing more grasping thorns to hold its prey in place. I stayed safe, or as safe as I could, way down even deeper in the dirt using nature sorcery to ¡®encourage¡¯ more growth, more viciousness from the newborn.


    Old, rotted blood stained the earth, the poison of its uncontained dark magic not even posing the barest threat to the fundamental power of the fledgling World Tree. As the leyline powered the tree from below, the mystical connection of the tree to its main trunk, Yggdrasil itself, fed it from a dimension removed. Five three-headed spellcasters, a bit more controlled than the rest, flung black fire and ghostly silver bolts of malevolent energy at the tree, scarring bleeding wounds into the trunks. With each blast of necromantic power, the two roots wrapped around the leyline pulsed, pulling more and more power upwards. The scarred knots exploded outwards, the bladed bark propelled by the instant expansion of sap freezing as the alder acted like my cryocards would. From the exposed heartwood, more branches lanced out as if they were wolves that caught a scent.


    ¡°SCREEEAAAHHHH! ALSFA¡¯GRAN DECHANZ!¡± The translation amulet attached to my armor didn¡¯t catch enough of the words to give a good ¡®word for word¡¯ translation, but it caught a part of that. One of the sibilant words meant ¡®prey¡¯ and another one meant ¡®down¡¯. Shit. At least I¡¯m in my element.


    Fighting underground isn¡¯t really that exciting, for me, it¡¯s simply an exercise in focus and channeling power. My earth sorcery makes me nigh invincible down here and as long as nothing has earth sorcery or years of practice in living/moving underground, they¡¯ll never win. It¡¯s not like I¡¯m in a cave where there¡¯s room to move around, I¡¯m literally surrounded on all sides by dirt and stone. I myself have half an inch of space which my earth sorcery maintains, but other than that, it¡¯s like easy swimming. Transmuting sections of dirt around me into circular stone blades and other sections into stone spears, I expanded this outward from myself in a full spherical fashion. Keeping one hand on Gungnir as its crystal spear blade was embedded in Yggdrasil, keeping up the will required for its violent, zombie-eating tantrum, the rest of me focused on the sickening invaders. That¡¯s what they are, invaders, scum, pests. Good for nothing except future fertilizer and nothing more. Disgusting.


    [Why do we run, scatter before pests? Are we not stronger? Are we not better?]


    [Shut it!] I growled back, pushing Svalinn down.


    Optimum testing conditions met. Flesh sorcery enhanced body projected to meet this threat level. Artifacts projected to provide more than enough defense/offense for necromantic threat. Recommendation: Dreadnaught Druid.


    Great, SAW¡¯s kickin¡¯ in too. Whoop de fuckin who. And, just to add in, there¡¯s that sorcery/magic enforced anger due to being near my elemental opposite. The unreasonable, or maybe reasonable in this case, schismatic anger flared up, forcing me to consider other options. My instincts screamed at me to run, kite away while using the earth and river to drag the horde far below the surface, and my other, newer instincts screamed for blood. My upgraded body howled for a fight finally worth having. The fight itself had dragged myself a hundred feet deep below the earth but the thrill of combat called to me. Quickly checking my magical senses, less than two hundred freaks were left. My tree had taken out over six hundred zombies on its own, most of which were being dragged down to serve as fertilizer.


    [Why is now a ¡®great time¡¯, huh? They¡¯re real life zombies! Experiment my ass!]


    Speeding up my perceptions for a moment to consider what to do, I looked over the conceptualized plan of ¡®Dreadnaught Druid¡¯. The projected image was myself but a bit scarier looking. The standard black armor was covered in extra plates of black obsidian so that none of the silver runes shone through, and the image of me had me wielding Poseidon¡¯s Trident, or Neptune¡¯s Shame, in one hand while swinging Gungnir in mace form in the other. Svalinn¡¯s bladed shields were partially extended out of both gauntlets, ready to extend further if any blades or more defense was necessary. Honestly, it looked badass, so badass I just had to try it.


    ¡°Fine,¡± I grunted, rocketing out of the earth as my gear shifted and molded around me. The obsidian add-ons barely weighed anything with my upgraded body¡¯s strength and my trident streaked out of its tattoo on my arm, liquid blue light materializing in my hand as I landed in the dirt. Gungnir¡¯s crystal bladed shrank into a thick, pulsing orb that crackled with raw mana. My leap out of the bowels of the earth put me at the edge of the river surrounding the island, the entrance flashy enough to draw the attention of the insane zombies along with their freaky spellcasters.


    Faster than starving cheetahs, they all howled and tore at me, a wave of sickening flesh and rotting stench that I countered with a wave of my own. Pointing Neptune¡¯s Shame forward, I pulled with my water sorcery at a source behind me, adding sheer volume where the trident concentrated lines of compressed water that cut through their lines like lasers. The river water smashed into what wasn¡¯t cut down, pushing them back and grinding them into the dirt.


    [Rip! Tear! Destroy!]


    The next moment, I was in the midst of the horde, smashing with Gungnir and stabbing with the trident. Each stab was punctuated with a blast of rotating water blades to clear the area and each swing of Gungnir was accompanied by kinetic blasts that acted like controlled, mini-grenades. Gore, bits of organs, desiccated flesh, and bone fragments covered me before I had the chance to breathe. Stomping down with my foot, simply to play to my nerdy fantasies, I caused a wave of stone spikes to radiate outwards from me, giving me a bit of breathing room as I conjured a car-sized globe of water above me. Letting go of it, it rained down cleaning me off. Grabbing the runoff, I froze it into icicles that hovered around me, basically a floating porcupine to which the Hungry Ones gladly attacked. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.


    Detecting six separate accumulations of sub-protonic energy. WARNING! WARNING!


    Crap, the spellcasters. For a handful of moments, I¡¯d gotten lost in the mindless joy of swinging power. My body, my human body, never felt this good, this invigorated, this full of endless vitality! And for just a minute, that lack of conscious, in-the-moment thinking, could have been my downfall.


    Diving back down into the earth, I took stock as I fled fifty feet down. My weapons were devastating, leaving me awestruck. Gungnir and Neptune¡¯s Shame enhanced my abilities to the point where I myself was a magic wrecking ball. Less than thirty of the zombies remained, including the shriekers holding their wiggling balls of black mana. Fighting spellcasters is nothing new, although the simple fact that they¡¯re dead means there¡¯s probably an element to them that I¡¯m unfamiliar with, but to be fair, the point of fighting those that use magic is simple, cheat.


    The earth around me began to shake as I struggled with a moment of internal arrogance. That was easy, frankly, too easy. Each swing of my weapons basically caused several zombies to fucking explode, each pulse of magic tore them to shreds, what in the world did I have to fear from them? That¡¯s it? Really? This is what I¡¯ve been afraid of, been working so hard to fight against but it turns out I¡¯m Goliath stomping David into the dirt as his little sling missed? Threads of twitching blackness reached out from the shriekers as I shook my head.


    Focusing on them, I prepared a handful of crystal grenades that I pulled from Gungnir¡¯s storage space, over-filling them with mana. Exploded bits of hungry ones touched by the lingering threads of darkness started to hover, slowly floating up and over to where the shriekers continued to howl and shake their implements. I really didn¡¯t want to see what they had in store, and every nerd knows, never give a magic user time to kick off their show.


    Grabbing all the earth around me within a hundred yards, I shook it, creating my own personal addition to the Richter scale, a nine point break your fucking legs earthquake. Unceremoniously flung off their feet and into each other, tatteried windpipes sounded cries that reached an even higher pitch as four grenades landed between them. Just before they went off, I inverted the dirt they were laying on, flipping them like a pancake, forcing the explosion to concentrate its heat and kinetic energy in a small space under the earth instead of dispersing it. Not knowing what magical defenses they had, if any, I pushed the makeshift coffin deeper as I grabbed a few more grenades.


    KABOOM!  The dirt fountained upwards through the softer sediment from the passing stone coffin and the screams cut off. Not taking any chances, I pushed the grenades towards the filled in pocket below. KABOOM! Sealing the remnants of the only real threat away, I pulled myself back up to the surface and raised Gungnir in the air to finish the last of them. Crystal rounds fired out in an uneven rhythm, dropping the remaining zombies.


    Looking around with both my eyes and my magical senses, a wasteland surrounded me. My earthquakes, tsunamis, water jets and bullets had completely torn up the area. Even the Yggdrasil thicket was looking ragged. ¡°Shit.¡± Sprinting over, I worked my way tree by tree, using my own blood as a healing reagent for the trees, my nature sorcery to closing gashes in the bark, soothing the irritated knots containing embedded necromantic flesh. A soft crack caught my attention, pulling me away from my work.


    Behind me, a greasy horizontal cut hung in midair, an empty blackness that wept green fog at the tips. Clawed hands reached through as screams once again rang out. ¡°Oh hell no! No creepy ass portals on my island!¡± And I do get that there¡¯s no one around to hear me except for myself, but fighting in pure silence just seems wrong. All my real combat experience comes from movies and the last year of my life, so, when in Rome.


    Pointing Gungnir forward, my trusty mace unloaded charged crystal bullets as I conjured SAW¡¯s Nephilim water arms as backup. In my left hand, I held a grenade the size of a soccer ball and topped it off. This particular explosive was a result of Acantha and I putting our heads together, and yes, each one had its own name. This one was Big Bertha, the other ones were Madam MOAB and O-bomber, hehehe. Eerie crimson runes emitted bright green ethereal fire that covered the outside of Big Bertha, mainly Acantha¡¯s work, that allowed mana to be converted into wytchfire. I only had time to make about three of these with her before the shenanigans kicked off but if there¡¯s one thing I¡¯m good at its blowing shit up. And with her help, we¡¯re really good at blowing shit up. The overcharge feature pretty much allows a grenade of this size to be a miniature backpack nuke. After arming it, the estimated radius of instant devastation would be enough to take out six square city blocks.


    As soon as the bullets cleared away enough space from inside the rift, I launched a few standard crystal grenades through for good measure, should be enough to clear the area for my Big Bertha here. Running to the side of the portal so I wouldn¡¯t be directly in front of it, always mind blast zones, I waited for two solid breaths. The initial grenades went off but the portal didn¡¯t close. Turning Gungnir into its knife form, I sheathed it and pulled out a little enchanted light stone.


    ¡°I shouldn¡¯t, I know I shouldn¡¯t, but I really want to.¡± Muttering to myself usually gets me an answer because Kraken¡¯s there to give a yay or nay but right now, he¡¯s two miles away playing babysitter and golem-minder. And what I really wanted to do was get a glimpse of what¡¯s on the other side of the portal. I didn¡¯t do it back in Arizona when Phoenix was shit city, and right now, most everything in the immediate vicinity of the other side of the smelly ass portal should be teeny tiny bits and pieces. Just a glimpse, I can handle a glimpse.


    Alley-ooping the light stone into the wavering portal, I pulled Gungnir back out to full ready and ran around, not quite sticking my head in the portal while holding my breath. The little piece of enchanted marble clattered on what sounded like stone. For all I knew it was stone. The ground within six feet of the light stone was solid black and just beyond the dome of light was solid ink. I couldn¡¯t make out any scuff marks, signs of explosions going off, nothing. Not taking any chances, I backed up and tossed in Big Bertha, my mana flicking the internal enchantment trigger. Five seconds till wytchfire induced hell broke loose.


    Now from my meager understanding of how portals work, something explodes on one side but doesn¡¯t shut it down, then part of that explosion will come back through the opening. Which means that in this case, only one direction is in danger, whichever way the portal is facing. My ass gathered every bit of power at my disposal and fed it into SAW and Svalinn as I sprinted behind the portal and kept going until I hit the river where I dove under. Sitting at the bottom about thirty feet down, a tongue of flame the length of a skyscraper shot out, kissing the sky and abruptly cutting out. After floating to the surface and sticking just my hand out to make sure the air wasn¡¯t nuclear hot, I hopped out onto the island, taking stock of my surroundings again.


    Evil gash looking portal was gone. The wytchfire tongue didn¡¯t kiss anything on this side of the portal, and every bit of zombie was dead, or dead again? Maybe double dead, that works. Mental exhaustion washed through me as my earth sorcery went to work, tilling the soil to erase the evidence of the fight and bury the remnants of the Horde. Internally, I felt happy as I washed away my tiredness with flesh sorcery but I¡¯m sure the stank from that many risen dead would never leave my nose. The next hour was spent finishing the cleanup, fixing the damage to alder-Yggdrasil-thicket and then hauling my butt back to the beach.


    Upon arrival, I found that considerable ground had been covered in regards to the fortification of the beach. The walls were freaking huge and that pylon was just peeking over the tops of the walls. Not really wanting to answer questions that I knew Kraken already had coming, I packaged up a copy of my memories from the past couple hours and shot it to him while I cleaned myself off and hopped into a bed molded out of sand. A quick touch of flesh sorcery put me into a condensed sleep and I was out.


    Three hours of shuteye brought me back to full wakefulness, bright eyed and bushy tailed, can¡¯t really tell since I haven¡¯t had coffee in who knows how long. I substitute the morning rush of caffeine with flesh sorcery but it¡¯s not the same, definitely not the same. Although, I¡¯m pretty sure that I didn¡¯t fall asleep in what looks to be the Amazon rainforest. And I definitely didn¡¯t go to sleep naked.


    *******


    Argentia La¡¯febre was bored. Living for a few thousand years is great but the simple fact is, it¡¯s not really living when you¡¯re undead. The spun tale sounded so glorious, illustrious, just out of reach of where children¡¯s stories tried to take you. Eternal life, no pain, not having to worry about gods in control of your fate when even Death spits you back out. What they didn¡¯t tell her is that the undead don¡¯t have sex either, and by all the powers that be did she miss sex. It was more out of nostalgia that she kept her form young-ish, looking relatively new through advanced necromancy and body stealing rituals, but it was still dead. And then just to shove the stake in a bit more, that evil little twist in the heart, the Lords of Bones and Shadows stuck her on this godforsaken mudball.


    Standing on the precipice of an enormous ice castle, Argentia looked out over what the previous occupants called, ¡°Antarctica¡±. A beautiful but abandoned deathtrap where nothing remotely humanoid lived. Endless miles of ice, windswept and lonely, were most of what she could see. The ocean glimmered at the edge of the horizon, the various Auroras crackling every twelve hours or so, allowing her to play.


    Using her Grand Mirror as a troop dispensary, she entertained herself by sending small packs of Hungry Ones randomly into the world, watching for as long as the Aurora held out. They never lasted long, especially without the constant cloud cover to block the infernal sun, but at least she got to watch some blood fly. It was only by chance that her portal today chanced upon a strange mana surge near the base in the North. Fortune held her hand, keeping her from a true unmaking as the inner blackness of the Mirror Realm kept an strange explosive from entering through her one-way portal. A bit oblong and around the size of three human skulls squished together, the red and green runes exploded, completely destroying the contained tunnel of the Mirror Realm. When you get to be this old, it takes a lot to scare you, but this was a bit more, it was, unsettling.


    Black bones taken from dragons¡¯ thighs formed the side of the Grand Mirror¡¯s frame while well-aged wizard sternums pressed to make a cohesive whole formed the top and bottom. After containing the blast, even the dragon bone was cracked up the side and little flickers of green fire licked at the top-right corner and just wouldn¡¯t go out. She had been ordered to only use the mirror for scrying, but even the Grand Lichs understand boredom . . . she hoped.


    *******


    Merlin


    Stupid boy. Maybe, not really. He didn¡¯t know. Wytchfire had been outlawed in certain kinds of conflicts. The damn flames just don¡¯t go out until there¡¯s nothing left to burn. Earth was still up for grabs and too many players were angling for it, which meant the risk factor was just too damn high. Can¡¯t have anybody else figuring out there¡¯s another sorcerer on the loose, especially one of my blood and that kind power. The witches will want him, the undead are always recruiting, or hungry. The Centauri pissed away their avenues to that kind of power and the freaking Council will have a fit if they find anymore of my offspring.


    Time stood still for an eternity, Merlin¡¯s subjective eternity, as he gazed upon the sleeping figure of his distant descendant. ¡°Too strong, too ignorant, and way too out in the open.¡± With a grunt and a wave of his hand, Merlin¡¯s controlled wave of Chaos washed over the sorcerer, each bit of gear falling off and unmaking itself, folding into small disks each stamped with Merlin¡¯s mark. ¡°At least I redirected the bomb before it went to where it was going to go. Hehehehe, overeager zombie butts. Earth is mine.¡±

 Chapter 159 - Intervention Part 2 (Book 3 Chapter 26)

    Still Merlin


    ******


    Watching Earth grow up without me or mine was an exercise in patience . . . extreme patience. Countless idiotic wars, people falling for politicians¡¯ lies over and over be they kings, priests, presidents or councils. They didn¡¯t really seem to learn, and it wasn¡¯t really their fault. The only way available to them to actually cut through the wall that they call the ¡®bullshit¡¯, was to have a unified rebellion of arms to take over. One man raising himself up from the dirt through strength and killing the bloodsucking rulers and placing himself on the throne didn¡¯t exist on its own merits. That man needed an army, and then he needed the consent of the governed, and the list of idiocies simply continues. Mana, magic, chi, sorcery, magitech, divinities, the very nature of power was different outside the Seal. And my descendant was squandering it!


    Again, not his fault. He thought I was a gods-be-blessed (or damned) legend, a fairy tale in which lessons could be learned. How could they know, especially with their intentionally shortened lifespans? Widespread genetic tampering was being largely corrected by the Centauri or by the simple nature of being inundated by magic. Funnily enough, it was the Aelven and Dwarven slavers fixing the issue in the most efficient way. What''s the point of your workforce dying after thirty, maybe forty productive years, and what good are they if they can¡¯t use magic? At least I got their ruling class to put a limit on a hundred years of slavery. Once that¡¯s over they¡¯ll have a set of skills, be learned in the general mystic/multiverse culture, and probably have a community. Not the best outcome for the masses but it¡¯s better than the other most likely alternative, death by invading Hungry Ones or Hive. They won¡¯t see it that way but who cares? I¡¯m still technically king, especially since I won it from my idiot cousin, Artheur.


    Waving my hand at the wall of ice in front of me, I gazed upon the crucible for the fledgling sorcerer. Oddly enough, the mere whimsy of having an ice castle as a home is turning out to be quite useful. I took the idea from the base humans'' imaginings, their drawings of an alien who was almost a god, the one they called ¡®Superman¡¯. Fortress of Solitude, it has a nice ring. Of course mine is different, Fortress of Power! Better fits the reality of the situation. Anyways, I should probably explain to the runt what¡¯s actually in store. Besides, he could use a playmate.


    Very Freaking Far Away


    Nate       *********


    I¡¯d love to get a glimpse of whatever fucking truck hit me. For once my flesh sorcery didn¡¯t automatically kick in and heal whatever jackhammer was pounding away at the inside of my skull and my freaking rune schema was gone from my skin. Even though it looked like I was butt-naked in a rainforest, a chill ran through me. Every tree radiated hostility and it probably had something to do with the off-color, the purplish tinge that lent a faded, alien look to the forest.


    Sitting cross legged twenty feet in front of me was definitely not something anyone would expect to see in a freaking jungle, a calm, fresh corpse. From what I could see though, there wasn¡¯t really evidence of a cause of death, but a waxy dead body of a redhead with closed eyes and a peaceful demeanour sat back against a twisted tree. As it hadn¡¯t moved a hair, and I¡¯m really wary of dead bodies since ¡®dead¡¯ is now a loose term, I kept my eyes on it and slowly shook out each muscle. After confirming no injuries, I did the same thing with my soul as something felt off. Fuck, everything felt weak. Having good control of your magic is like being well practiced with a gun, you have expectations for how much it weighs both loaded and unloaded, you understand every part of it and how it operates, the consequences of using it as well as leaving it out there for anyone to pick up. Right now, my soul did not feel like my favorite gun, it felt like someone had welded the safety in the safe position, removed the bolt and bolt carrier, and given me the shell of what was rightfully mine.


    ¡°Don¡¯t start hyperventilating!¡± Muscular Santa, i.e. Merlin, stepped into my field of vision from a shadow behind the dead body. ¡°Just relax for a minute, had to stop you from starting an even worse war than what humanity is already embroiled in. Didn¡¯t the hag tell you that wytchfire is a violation of the Accords?¡±


    My glare told him no. ¡°All right, all right, well, at least I saved your life and a few possible futures for Earth. Now, your sorceries are just a step out of phase with you at the moment so we can have a civil conversation, though you aren¡¯t stupid enough to fight me, which is fine.¡±


    My glare continued. ¡°Or close enough to civil,¡± Merlin grunted, lighting a cigar while pulling out a flash from his voluminous cloak. ¡°So, where should we start? Ah yes, the situation back on Earth.¡± Merlin let out a massive sneeze and what should have been a disgusting spray of snot was actually a cloud of steam that stuck to a nearby tree, morphing into a large mirror of pure, reflective ice.


    ¡°It¡¯s probably easier to show you since you may not believe me. Now, what do you remember about your last conversation with an Elevated One, the Mighty Messenger? You know, the One whose gift you still haven¡¯t taken advantage of? The One whose warning you haven¡¯t heeded?!!¡±


    ¡°Her-¡±


    ¡°DON¡¯T say the Name!¡± My mouth snapped shut. Merlin was referring to Hermes, the one who gave me a couple warnings as well as a consolidated knowledge orb about how to make my own grimoire. The meddling deity also warned me against making too big of a splash on the global scene, which means this meetings is probably about me fucking that up. Great.


    Pivoting on my butt and doing a bit of scooting, I put myself in a better spot, a bit further away from the dead body, further away from the creepy trees and a tiny bit closer to Merlin. He might be the scariest thing here but the fact stands that he ¡®rescued¡¯ me which means that he¡¯s invested in keeping me alive, for now. Taking a few deep breaths to center myself and rein in the itching tide of anger, I push for my earth sorcery to shape the dirt into a chair. A few clumps roll underneath my butt and a slight cushion forms, a far cry from the beautiful stone chair I envisioned.


    ¡°Out of phase, young sorcerer. They won¡¯t be in-phase until I purge the untethered Chaos wrapped around your soul-tree, a very inspiring envisioning if I do say so myself. Very, hmmm, utilitarian.¡± Scowling wasn¡¯t helping me do anything but it did make me feel a teeny bit better. Defiance always lifts the mood. ¡°Where was I, ah, yes! Showing you what you¡¯ve missed.¡±


    The view in the mirror panned out to an aerial view, high enough to catch the sight of my five thousand strong army of sunstone golems marching out of the misty portal area of the Yggdrasil-alder thicket. The largest elemental sergeant had spear-form Gungir sticking out of its back, Kraken directing the army towards the ice castle almost a thousand miles away from where Acantha, Reeanth, Versonae with their beach fortification complete with fifty golems waited for the incoming horde of Hungry Ones that Spot had been leading around.


    The humongous pylon tirelessly fed my the four of them as much mana as they could handle while they fought as a team, perfectly engaging for maximum effect and kiting away, using the fifty golem phalanx as the anvil to their hammer. Kraken¡¯s army launched a bombardment of crystal mortars that would have put any modern Earth military to shame, almost leveling the Hungry Ones¡¯ castle in under five minutes. The two undead dragons that reared their heads were cut down by a laser from Gungnir, probably infused with energy from Gav¡¯riel¡¯s feather.


    Time was fast-forwarded as my main army had to retreat due to lack of mana, the environment not containing enough sunlight or raw mana to sustain the attack. Ungainly behemoth undead, each the size of a mansion, tore themselves from ripped portals in the castle walls and chased them to the edge of the mountain range. Strategically placed traps slowed them down enough so that three out of the five thousand were able to escape back to the beachhead. By the time Kraken returned, the group of undead that had chased Spot were already massacred and burning in massive pyres that glowed with an unholy green and red tint.


    After a week without me, the pylon had gathered enough mana to charge up the remainder of the army and a second assault. This time, Reeanth wielded Gungnir with an incredible display of skill, each sweep of the mace-form blew away entire knots of zombies while the spear-form lanced energy blasts that cut clear through all resistance. Acantha used the wands I gave her to devastating effect, setting up lanes of walls made of almost solid fire, funneling in the unthinking horde. Versonae danced with an inhuman grace, her blades flowing faster than a hurricane as she played the most offensive defense for the team, whipping in to clear room around Acantha only to disappear and decapitate the spellcasters aiming for Reeanth or the pylon.


    I was most proud of Spot though. If I didn¡¯t know better, I would have thought a humongous flaming demon was charging through the horde, blue flaming horns adorning his skull and his bulk far thicker than I¡¯d ever seen. Bone armor encrusted his shoulders, legs, head and reptilian tail as he charged and tore through everything like they were toy soldiers made from paper. He took on each behemoth by himself, ripping them to shreds and his howls spats flaming tornadoes that Acantha was only too happy to enhance. For a split second, there was a dark silhouette of a small zombie wizard at the top of the castle whose skull-tipped staff was draining the Aurora Borealis for something, but Spot took the cackling evil midget out with a giant leap and fiery bark. That¡¯s my boy!


    ¡°Uhh yuck, I do so despise gnome lichs.¡± Merlin growled, his beard crackling with miniature bolts of purple lightning. ¡°Bastards grow slow but don¡¯t seem to have a cap on their power. They hide out for a few thousand years and emerge thinking they¡¯re the rulers of the universe. The really smart ones, and I mean the megalomaniac OCD ones, those creeps conquer a small world and use that as a hiding place for a hundred thousand years, feeding on souls and mana fonts.¡±


    If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.


    With Kraken¡¯s assistance and direction, Reeanth used water magic by proxy of Gungnir to bring the remnants of the ice castle to the ground, melting it back to the glacier from whence it sprang. A massive, skinny spire was erected, topped with a very pointy tip of conjured crystal whose one purpose was to disperse the nearby Aurora Borealis energy if it started to condense into anything resembling a portal. ¡°Nice, cover your bases,¡± I commented. ¡°Make sure this shit doesn¡¯t happen again. Close a door and seal the bitch behind you.¡±


    The ice mirror zoomed out of Greenland and then zoomed into New Richmond as I turned to Merlin. ¡°Hold up a second, gnome necromancers? Are those worse than goblin necromancers?¡±


    ¡°Absolutely,¡± Merlin confirmed. ¡°The goblin or hobgoblin necromancers tend not to go the full length of lich transforming that gnomes do. Gnomes are hyper-focused on their goals, ALWAYS. They are the best at whatever they set their minds too, which also means that they¡¯re the scariest enemy to ever have. Think about it, liches are immortal. Which means that gnome liches have eternity to perfect their craft, and that leads to evil and chaos on a scale you¡¯ll rarely ever see.¡±


    ¡°Fuck, at least Spot took that one out.¡±


    ¡°Agreed.¡±


    Merlin and I watched as New Richmond started to grow, the earth elementals and lady wizards setting up a magical version of a modern town, even taking the time to create a massive playground for the children. Mark, Scott and the other Glyph Blades carved out a shooting range and a practice area for training and Cassandra was splitting her time between the greenhouse projects and what looked to be an alchemical laboratory. The few teenagers of the growing town had started making their own mini-settlement just two miles away, a bit downstream. Their buildings were treehouses that hung over the water in magically altered mangrove trees, each complete with hammocks, stashes of food, and kayaks grown from birch trees that were lashed to the lowest branches.


    ¡°The mana fountains you¡¯ve set up, both the hydro-electric converter and the sunstone mana converter, are being put to good use,¡± Merlin commented, waving his hand to move the scene a bit off to the West. ¡°The Sun Aelves have fallen head over heels for both Jamal¡¯s tall, dark, and handsomeness and the abundant donations of mana, both of which contributed to a whole new batch of youngsters for them. Aelves tend to find it hard to get with child and now most of their women are pregnant!¡±


    ¡°So dick won them some allies, huh? Wonder how much fun Jamal had, hehehe.¡± I rubbed my chin, staring at the almost ethereal beauty of the golden skinned Aelves. Sunlight seemed to play around their eyes and pointy ears, flashing as they smiled. Each of them, both men and women, sported slender builds and wavy daggers that almost looked to be more along the lines of jewelry than weaponry.


    ¡°Powerful allies. Their use of illusions, fire, and concentrated light beams make them incredibly dangerous foes. They are just as good at assassinations as their darker cousins.¡±


    The mirror fogged over and I looked at Merlin, confusion and anger warring as I put questions together. ¡°Technically, this time stream is different, so you have not missed any personal time. And I cannot tell you how much time exactly you¡¯ve displaced over there. Earth is still harmonizing now that the Great Seal is broken but it has a ways to go. Besides, there are far better uses of your time here.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not really the point!¡± I argued, pointing at the cloudy mirror. ¡°One base of the Hungry Ones is taken out but there¡¯s one in the Antarctic as well!¡±


    Merlin laughed. ¡°You cannot believe that that¡¯s your greatest foe right now? They¡¯re not even a threat and won¡¯t be for at least another hundred years! Daemons in Europe, drakes in Asia, Beastmasters and Beastmen all over the place! Your world is being invaded by everyone, and the Hive is only barely being held off by your demented Centauri cousins. You had a chance to be king of your area, the lord of the land, unite those under you and go a-conquering! That chance is gone now!¡±


    ¡° I didn¡¯t-¡±


    ¡°Think?! Of course you didn¡¯t think. At least, well, you didn¡¯t really know. What you didn¡¯t know is that I saved you from being placed on the main board well before you¡¯d be ready. Using wytchfire is against the rules, most of which I cannot tell you.¡± Shushing me with an upraised finger, Merlin sighed. ¡°I¡¯m not actually upset with you as it¡¯s not you that has vexed me. I realize how this must have looked to you but my recommendation would have been a much different course of action. Ignore the undead for about fifty years and get yourself situated. The colony south of your home would have been a perfect place to put down some roots, engage in some research, build your GODDAMN GRIMOIRE, and learn the basics of wizardry.¡±


    I thought about it, actually took the time to stop and think about it. Merlin¡¯s got a point. I used to be a reading fanatic, fantasy was my shit, and one of the weird things that stuck in my head about magic users is that they were to be feared in three situations. One, a prepared witch or wizard, one that has had time to scout out the enemy and prepare a plan, those fuckers can go toe to toe with elder beings. Two, a magic user with nothing to lose. I usually tried to be the first one, plan, prep, prepare, in triplicate if I could. But it was the third situation that was the most dangerous for any enemy, and that would be taking on a wizard in his own home, because it basically combined reasons one and two but there was something about claiming the area. A home is claimed, entrenched and saturated with the mana, the essence of the wizard. Every bit of power in the area at his beck and call, every trap, snare, and pit ready for the snap of mental fingers.


    I had halfway done that, a bit less than half-assed it. Claiming an area takes time, it takes blood and sweat and tears, it requires an investment. The Lab, the Hole, the Grove, they were areas that I had lived in but they weren¡¯t really home. Don¡¯t get me wrong, they can be, but it¡¯s simply not there yet. I hadn¡¯t lived there for years. I wasn¡¯t familiar with every inch of the place, hadn¡¯t set up much in the way of preparations and or even sat down and figured out everything that I could do. All in all, I¡¯d say that I¡¯m a pretty good sorcerer but definitely a shit wizard. And what makes this whole thought process worse is the issue really holding me back, my wife. I had been so obsessed with her safety, so angry that she¡¯d been taken from me, so furious that I couldn¡¯t do anything about it, so . . . helpless. I mean, what could I do, really? Someone with far more knowledge assured me she was safe, assured me that she¡¯d probably outlive me in that damn trunk of Universe Tree. But if I spent my life looking back and planning everything around it, I¡¯d never get anywhere let alone accomplish anything.


    ¡°Something struck a chord?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, first, fuck you.¡± Merlin¡¯s smile fell as I slowly and calmly got to my feet. ¡°I¡¯m nobody¡¯s pawn, least of all some old dude who can carbon date dirt. Either send me back to Earth so I can kick some ass or give me a damn good reason as to why I shouldn¡¯t? And before you answer, secondly, thank you. Thank you for saving my ass and helping me not commit the multiverse equivalent of war crimes against the Geneva convention. But whatever game you¡¯re playing, I¡¯m not a piece on that damn board.¡±


    Merlin¡¯s frown gave way to laughter as he smashed the ice mirror. ¡°Good! One last test then for you to prove your spine!¡± Pointing at the dead redhead who was stinking ten feet away, Merlin snapped his fingers. ¡°If you can kill that lich, you can keep her. She¡¯ll teach you more wizardry than that damn school you sent your brother off to.¡±


    ¡°Better give me back my sorceries then . . .¡± I argued, not taking my eyes off the zombie, her milky eyes slowly opening as she bonelessly got to her feet.


    ¡°Nope!¡±


    ¡°A pointy stick perhaps?¡±


    ¡°Nope!¡±


    Not wasting a second, I launched myself at the zombie, my enhanced body easily moving faster than the zombie could react. One palm strike to the chin to snap the head back followed by spearing my hand into its neck, grabbing it by the spine. Yanking it towards me, I pulled the head down as hard as I could while slamming my knee directly into the top of its sternum, completely ripping the head off. Dropping it on the ground, I smashed the head to pulp and turned to Merlin, his eyes wide as I wiped my slimy hands off on the ground.


    ¡°Now give them back!¡± I ordered, glaring at him even as I tried not to vomit. The zombie must have been the fresh kind of rotten because it fucking stank.


    ¡°Uhg,¡± he groaned. ¡°They¡¯ll only make it harder to learn wizardry. You¡¯ve had the easy path to power so far and you need to consolidate what you have. Sorcerers are always too one-sided, never learning outside their inclinations, and wizards tend to never reach their true breadth of power due to simple age. But you¡¯re far ahead of the former and don¡¯t have the concerns of the latter!¡±


    I matched his groan with my own. ¡°Jesus dude, why can¡¯t I just go back home? I got a smoothie jungle and everything!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not a name I¡¯d recommend you take in vain.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s besides the point!¡± I yelled, pointing at the corpse beside me. ¡°What do I have to do to avoid fucked up situations like this? Why do I have to fight a damn zombie in an alternate reality? Why do I have to worry about people like you and Flamel screwing with me? I just wanted the goddamn undead off my world so my tree of a woman wouldn¡¯t get destroyed, that¡¯s it! Fix me and put me back, please!¡±


    He must have been sad, or lonely, or something, because his face fell as if he were actually hurt. As if I reached in and twisted his heartstrings, that¡¯s how he looked, rejected. ¡°What?! Is an eternity of immortality and uncontained power so boring that you just have to do something, mess with something???¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± He roared, spittle flying as he leapt to his feet, purple lightning crackling around his arms, snaking through his beard and his eyes. ¡°By all the damn powers that be, YES! I can¡¯t make a move without destroying a world over there, or sneeze without destabilizing a small reality over here! Every word passed between myself and a mortal is construed to be a message of war and unrest while every thought must be hidden ¡®neath a cloud of deceptions!¡±


    ¡°Your problem,¡± I roared back. ¡°Not mine! I didn¡¯t kick this shit off! I was fucking drunk when shit hit the fan! I¡¯m lucky I survived!¡±


    His sudden shift to a calm demeanour did more to scare me than his outburst. ¡°Lucky, hrmmm. Maybe you were lucky, perhaps that¡¯s all it was.¡±


    ¡°What do you actually want?¡± I questioned, squinting at the madman in front of me. ¡°What is it that drives you to be in my orbit even though I¡¯m basically an ant next to you?¡±


    A massive wave of purple light streaked with black surrounded the both of us, a creepy dome cutting us off from the outside world. ¡°I want to live!¡± Merlin pleaded. ¡°I want a place to live out a life again, BE just Merlin again, for once. I don¡¯t want to have to worry about assasination attempts, power plays, the meddling Council, I just want to BE. I pursued power for the sake of power and now I have nothing that means anything anymore.¡±


    ¡°What does that have to do with me?¡± I shot back, not seeing at all where this was going.


    ¡°If you had just conquered Earth like a normal power hungry human, I could have lived there in peace with you as the benefactor or holder of the throne! Humanity is returning in droves, and with you at the helm as the center of attention, you could have had my burden for a few hundred years!¡±


    ¡°So give me back my woman and I¡¯ll freaking conquer Earth for you,¡± I sassed, rolling my eyes.


    ¡°Can¡¯t do that,¡± he cringed.


    ¡°Send me back in time to do it all over again.¡±


    ¡°Can¡¯t do that either,¡± he said, shrinking in on himself a bit more.


    ¡°Then what good are you?¡± I yelled. ¡°You¡¯re too damn powerful to actually do anything, too important to hide behind the scenes, and too freaking dangerous for me not to worry about! What¡¯s in it for me?¡±


    A sparkle gleamed from the depths of his eye. ¡°Well, I could do two things, one for you and one for your brother.¡±


    ¡°Go on . . .¡±


    ¡°I could find all those little shards of pure Chaos you lost so long ago,¡± he said, his sly grin getting bigger as my eyes got wide. ¡°And . . . I could probably help your brother with bringing his seed of sorcery to the fore or possibly help him get another seed.¡±

 Chapter 160 - Home Sweet Home (Book 3 Chapter 27)

    *******


    It felt like it had been so freaking long to me, honestly, I had simply forgotten about those little shards of Chaos. Just hearing about them shocked me so damn much that I took Merlin up on his offer, with a firm caveat. Yes, I argued with a literal manifestation of a mystical legend, sue me.


    [The basics! My non-existent backside!] Kraken complained. [What else was it? What did you promise him? It had to have been something good for this? A freaking knowledge crystal titled, ¡®The Basics of Irreverent Wizardry¡¯. I mean, what kind of a douchebag even names their work that?]


    I groaned. [I don¡¯t care who freaking wrote it as long as it¡¯s correct! Compound that up with the knowledge we got from the archives in New Miami and get back to me when you¡¯ve got a lesson plan. And besides, I¡¯m freaking gaming the system here, check this out.] I shot Kraken my plan in a tightly wound packet of mental energy down our link as I hustled down the hallway from the Hole into the Lab. Merlin was so happy that I agreed, roughly, to his plea that he sent me back to Earth with my shit and my soul intact and unlocked. Weirdest flex ever, but ancient beings will be dicks on their own schedule. Lyra, Meliad, and Everest didn¡¯t even notice me as I was zapped into my own living room in the Hole. That dude is fucking scary, in the way an ant finds a falling tree scary. If he actually wanted to take me out there would absolutely nothing I could do about it, no ¡®ifs¡¯, ¡®ands¡¯, or ¡®buts¡¯. Turns out though, I lost about three weeks worth of time on my little extra-reality jaunt which probably puts me somewhere in the middle of January.


    Now, Virginia winters were a bit weird before magic made its debut but to me it still looked like fall round here. Maybe the seasonal shift is happening? Eh, who cares. The usual blend of oak, birch, and spruce trees had their mix of leaves turning different colors and the pine trees still basically looked the same. The chill I had been expecting wasn¡¯t really there yet but it could just be my upgraded body not noticing it very well. All I really cared about was snow though, and if snow was coming, because the little kid inside of me would insist on taking a damn snow day to which I would wholeheartedly agree, but I digress.


    [I think this is in between the realm of what you would call ¡®ambitious¡¯ and ¡®the kind of insane that Merlin would be proud of,] Kraken started.


    [I know, right? Kind of proud of myself for thinking of it. But really, wouldn¡¯t it be a game changer?]


    [Well, yes, creating a shrine using the shattered Chaos stones as anchors for a portal so that anybody could get sorceries as long as they meditate long enough near it is very much a ¡®game changer¡¯. This is the kind of move that would cause Galactic empires to start moving their very rusty wheels to get a hold of, let alone power hungry wizards jonesing at the idea of more power.]


    I strolled on clutching my box even harder. [So, mums the word.]


    [So many damn idioms in your head! Yes, keep it silent, secret, swear an order of loyal sorcerers and sorceresses to yourself and take over the multiverse,] he mused. [But it would work, probably, maybe? I mean, who would give the guaranteed chance to gain sorcery on their own and use those ingredients to make what amounts to a portal to the outer dimensional skin of the Sea of Chaos? Few can grasp that kind of delaying self gratification, let alone power hungry humans! Although, y¡¯all aren¡¯t as bad as the gnomes or the Aelves.]


    My carnivorous trees snapped at me as I barged into the lab holding my enchanted stone box with five teeny Chaos stone pieces. Crazy thoughts swirled around in my head, visions of being a benevolent sorcerer king, bestowing powers and knowledge for the best of the best even as I fought to settle the land and bring it under my rule. Wow, my megalomania can really rear its evil little head if I¡¯m not careful, haha . . . fuck. Anyways, shoving that little monster back in its cage, the concept still etched out its own little place in my ego.


    With my work table near the oversized freezer to the left of the cavern that made up the Lab, I hefted the box on top of it, not even worrying about the carnivorous plants growling behind me. ¡°Five shards, the perfect amount for a ritual, right?¡± I mused aloud. ¡°A pentagram to form a ritual? This is all theoretical for me, completely based on fiction from pre-Ripple Earth.¡±


    [Yes, close enough. The materials you have on hand should suffice, although I highly recommend you find something to balance out the nature of the fire dragon, who¡¯s bones you plan on using.] Kraken¡¯s clarification was helpful if a bit snarky. [I do not recommend using minotaur bones as they¡¯ll mainly disperse the influx of mana required to start the portaling process. Water dragon bone and musculature would work best as a counterbalance, but you could skip using animal tissue altogether.]


    ¡°You thinkin¡¯ something crazy?¡± I grinned, a bit of evil coming out in a chuckle. ¡°I could totally do this in a way that would fuck with the Karens . . . the main piece would be a crystal ball ringed by the Chaos shards. Just a bit trippy for the biddies.¡±


    [Or you could do the smart thing and establish control over the closest settlement first and use them as the gateway to taking over New Miami. Once you control the coast, it¡¯s Manifest Destiny all over again.]


    The squid spirit is full of good points, which is why I keep him around. Stashing the shards away in the freezer after covering them in a thin layer of conjured platinum, I settled in for the night so I could start the day off right. After putting my unconscious in full-on organization mode so most of my plans would be made by the time I woke up, I went up to the Hole and let myself have a natural night¡¯s rest.


    Morning greeted me after a solid ten hours of shut-eye caused my stomach to protest my negligence, meal cubes not being the current object of desire. ¡°Rebellious organ.¡± I complained, hopping out of my bed and stripping off all my gear as I went to the wall and started making a bathtub fit for a king. Granite sides, marble steps and handlebars with gold filigree conjured and etched into the side, the setup looked perfect. A quick channel of water sorcery had the tub filled up and I jumped in to get clean, not even caring about the water temperature. Conjured sand, as fine as could be, was all I needed for a good scrub. After a luxurious ten minutes of peace and quiet, I slowly and carefully cleaned each piece of my equipment and put it on. The weaponry didn¡¯t need need sharpening at all but still warranted an inspection.


    Svalinn, my dragon-soul gauntlets, had merged with the Granite Gauntlets, giving the set unique abilities. Svalinn¡¯s normal function was magical armor, able to generate a pure shield of magical energy, but also able to absorb or eat mana and energy in such a way as to be a draining shield. Offensively, Svalinn had teeth, or blades that extended from the outer sides of my forearms which would serve in a pinch. With the Granite Gauntlets merged with Svalinn, simply gripping things could cover them in a shell of conjured stone, and holding anything long enough would actually petrify it.


    Poseidon¡¯s Trident still sat in my arm, a bluish tattoo that held a magical focus for water sorcery that I frankly didn¡¯t really need. Mainly, it would serve as a backup weapon or something to bestow on a valued ally, but I wasn¡¯t really sure if it would function well if it were away from me for too long as its magical signature was partially subsumed by SAW, my Centauri nano-tech armor.


    SAW in and of itself was a bit over the top, as anything would be if it were made from nano-tech. The simple nature of the devices that made up the structure of SAW allowed them to create runic structures or magical tattoos to perfectly shore up my own deficiencies. Usually, the runic patterns were focused on defense, absorbing enemy projections of mana and draining kinetic energy from high powered bullets or physical weapons wielded by brutes stronger than elephants. General blunt trauma is a good way to deal with squishy humans and this was attempt number two to fix that weakness but my upgraded body has a lot more in the way of physical durability. ¡°Kraken, while I¡¯m thinking about it, overhaul SAW¡¯s rune structure to focus more on radar-like capabilities and stealth,¡± I ordered. ¡°Do keep a minimum kinetic and mana draining diagram that can be on a low level circuit but we need to shift the focus as I¡¯m not as weak as a standard human anymore.¡±


    [Done.]


    My internal review of my gear continued as I looked over the Dagger of Rending, or ¡®Setan Kober¡¯ as SAW called it. It was as beautiful as it was deadly, the diamond blade with a wrapped handle of cold iron, braided with gold, silver, and Yggdrasil wood. Its resting place was on my left calf, a sort of backup last-ditch weapon that could probably drain a dragon¡¯s lifeforce dry if given enough time. In my mind, I viewed it as a pseudo vampire fang, perfectly suited for massive enemies if I was on my last leg.


    What blew my mind though was Yggdrasil¡¯s Wrath, a weapon grown from the World Tree itself but one that my soul-tree had grabbed for its own purposes. Looking inward, I could see a tattoo of the mace outlined on the chest of the faux-personage. I remember something about a ¡®Doomsday Protocol¡¯ but SAW didn¡¯t exactly give me a description.


    My wing-hoverboard combo is pretty sweet, the former using solar and heat intake runes as well as anti-gravity to fly and the latter using the same to hover. The wings doubled as extra surface area to recharge batteries on the go as the hoverboard can use leylines to charge and ride at the same time, a pretty ingenious setup for myself, economical and environmentally friendly.


    The last thing I had to check were my extra mana batteries, of which I had almost a literal ton. Most of them were stored in Gungnir¡¯s spatial storage area but my hoverboard had six dedicated extra large batteries attached to them and SAW had a few lining my back and my chest that doubled as armor plates. Those have a nice coating of tungsten to prevent any kind of fracturing.


    ¡°I¡¯m pretty much good to go.¡± I muttered to myself.


    [Yes you are, so stop putting off talking to people,] Kraken admonished, sounding like a parent while folding his tentacles over themselves. [It¡¯s easy, walk in there, take over, and then get busy making yourself a nice house in the woods near the town. They offered it to you last time but you didn¡¯t take it.]


    ¡°They didn¡¯t offer it,¡± I snapped. ¡°I didn¡¯t want it, I didn¡¯t want to deal with administrative bullshit. Fix this, go kill that, my needs and my wants, I can already see an avalanche of shit to do on a freaking list for me if I do that. Fuck!¡±


    Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    Kraken pulled me into the mindscape. ¡°Listen,¡± he bubbled, his voice audible in the mindscape. Kraken¡¯s squid like body floated as he gestured, a homey living room firming out of the fog. I took a seat on the big couch and conjured up a nice cup of coffee for myself, kicking my feet up. Pointing at the floating holographic tv in the center, he started bringing up people¡¯s faces and putting them in groups. ¡°Being a leader in a magical community is less about doing all the shit work yourself and more about delegation.¡±


    ¡°Right, got that.¡± I agreed, pointing at the groups and adding labels. ¡°Jamal hunts and fucks, keeping the dryads happy and near the town, and they double as sentries and scouts. Cassandra and Lovera seem to work well together and probably head up their research department. Mark and Scott are the head of the main fighting force available as well as resource attainment. Remy, Fernando, Tommy¡¯s hick group, and the rest fill in as the ¡®general townspeople¡¯, and Stacy if I remember correctly is in charge of childcare and something else.¡±


    ¡°Logistics,¡± Kraken filled in. ¡°But that role may have been split off by now. Both of those are too time consuming for one mortal.¡±


    ¡°Sure, but they have plenty of people for that. So how¡¯s it going to work with me waltzing in and declaring, ¡®oh hey guys, I¡¯m back and in charge¡¯?¡± I mocked. ¡°Seriously, sounds pretty stupid to me.¡±


    Kraken¡¯s glare only made me chuckle. ¡°What?¡± I laughed. ¡°You look like a grumpy squid, it¡¯s funny.¡± The glare continued. ¡°Fine, just a little walk in the park, declare my supremacy via orders from on High and then have a little homestead. Got it.¡±


    ¡°The flippancy of your attitude is what will make this difficult. One the other hand, if you approach this with the seriousness that this matter deserves, then the pieces will fall into place. Strength is respected now. I¡¯ve seen your memories of how all humans more or less fell into the category of weak and powerless. Weaponry and numbers determined strength, but now true power can shine through. Magic allows you to cut through the facade. Who gave them several sources of power, the generator and the hydro-kinetic converter and the sunstone pyre? Who gave them ammunition facilities and elemental wands? Who summoned and bound elementals and gifted an industrial flesh golem?¡±


    Again, the squid has a point, several in fact. Irritating that I have a Scion of Knowledge serving as my conscience, my butthurt conscience. Whoops, saw the glare from thinking that thought. ¡°Ok, ok, got it. Make peace or kick ass.¡± I grumbled all the way out of my own mindscape, running out of my house into the smoothie jungle. ¡°Oh Meliaaaad!¡±


    ¡°Master! You¡¯ve returned!¡± The gorgeous hamadryad stalked out of the woods, her stature large enough to rest her head on a two story building. Every detail of her flesh was on full display, a veritable supermodel giantess with clothing made from leaves that rather drew more attention to her curves than hid them.


    ¡°Hot damn you¡¯ve gotten tall!¡± I exclaimed, wishing I was two stories tall now. ¡°What the hell has Everest been feeding you?¡± My joking caused her to blush.


    ¡°My lord sorcerer,¡± she whispered. ¡°I have missed you, but it is never a good idea to comment on a woman¡¯s weight. This power is so grand that I cannot diminish myself for at least a decade.¡±


    ¡°Well, you¡¯re almost thirty feet of sexy right now. Kinda like the view.¡± It¡¯s not helpful that her aura was leaking out, tugging on the knots of my own locked up sex drive like a pit bull yanking on a rope. And what makes the banging, hahaha, more insistent is that I¡¯ve started coming to terms with the fact that my woman is basically not my woman anymore. If anything, she¡¯s God¡¯s woman, or the Tree of the Universe¡¯s, kinda like your girlfriend deciding to be a nun for a few years to ¡®find herself¡¯ but promising to marry you after her journey. Really makes you feel kinda shitty even that¡¯s only loosely a parallel. And Meliad, wow, Meliad is easy. Not the cheap way, the drunken chick at the bar trying to make out with everyone, but the kind where she genuinely wanted me because I¡¯ve claimed this land and she¡¯s planted in it. She could quite honestly be my very own forest wife if I wanted.


    ¡°That doesn¡¯t make it right,¡± I muttered to myself. Clearing my throat, I looked back up to her after readjusting my hormones again. ¡°Where¡¯d you and your sisters plant the normal fruits, like bananas, apples, and pears?¡±


    Kneeling in front of me and giving me the world¡¯s largest eyeful of giantess cleavage, Meliad shyly grinned and opened her palm in front of me. ¡°Every part of this forest is connected to me now, my lord sorcerer. Simply ask for any fruit, any dryad, or anything within the reaches of the canopy and it shall be yours.¡± Small piles of apples, bananas, pears, grapes and even berries were grouped in her hand, each giving off their delectable scent with nary a bruise in sight.


    ¡°I could kiss you, but I¡¯ll wait till you¡¯re human sized again.¡± Not giving her a chance to respond, I swiped the fruit into Gungnir and hopped onto my hoverboard. ¡°Thanks gorgeous!¡± I yelled, hauling ass west towards New Richmond. Cowardly, I know, but still, personal progress. I¡¯ll take it.


    Gently gliding my way down the Rappahannock River westward felt like a trip down memory lane, but in the way a child remembers his old home being much bigger than it actually was. The beautiful mini-rapids that once entertained thousands during the mild Virginia summers had now become class five rapids rough enough to take down even experienced kayakers. Gone were the days of gentle paddleboarding and tubing, drinking a cooler full of beers without worrying about elephant sized predators lurking beneath the surface. I mean, I didn¡¯t really worry about them, especially when I¡¯m going about forty miles an hour, my water sorcery giving me the ability to shred like Bethany Hamilton. I was doing fine too, the wind in my face, orange juice droplets streaming off my face as I devoured my snack, right until my senses warned me that I had incoming.


    Small boulders made of acid slammed into the river, just barely missing as I cranked up the power flow to my hoverboard and pulled hard to the left. Bits and pieces of dead fish floated to the surface in the bubbling froth as I kicked my board onto the river bank and dove down into the river. A piercing shriek blasted the water over and over, tearing my eardrums to shreds even as I tamped down on the pain, forcing myself to focus above the surface of the water. Shoving myself to the side even as my flesh sorcery started working overtime from the damage of intense sound waves rocking my body, grey talons that looked eerily similar to a bird of prey slammed into the area I just vacated. Wrapping myself in a shield of dense mana and surging water, I pushed my body until I could grab its leg. Before it could start to bite, Gungnir lanced out ice blades, slicing the Achilles tendons on both legs as I focused on coating the legs with an ever thickening layer of ice to weigh it down.


    Giant jaws filled with yellow teeth slammed down on me, almost hard enough to penetrate my shield fully, and flung me up and out in front of the monster. [Wyvern! Wyvern! Don¡¯t drop your shield!] Kraken freaked. [Anger, acid, and raw strength, wyverns hunt in packs but are generally strong enough to make dragons think twice about attacking them.]


    [Grenades don¡¯t care about their feelings.] I grunted mentally, summoning a few and launching them at the wyvern that glared at me with red-green eyes. Each roar was punctuated with an acid loogie but I countered with upswells of water straight from the river we both fought in.


    [Hurry! Kill it now before its friends join in!]


    Fifteen crystal rounds blasted out, each cratering the massive skull of the beast. Blasting forward on top of the water, I washed its face in water and froze it, holding its maw shut. Gungnir morphed into a mace, humming with power as I sent it straight into the wyvern¡¯s brain. Not waiting for its death throes to subside, I pulled the body down to the river bottom and froze it to a outcropping of rock. Three simultaneous shrieks rang out but quickly were cut off.


    ¡°Who fights with the talon of the flock, hmmm?¡± The raspy voice¡¯s mysteriousness cut off all of the sound in the surrounding area. The playful burble of the river was no more, the wind didn¡¯t whisper and even the usual chatter of the birds was absent.


    ¡°Suck a dick you creepy motherfucker!¡± I yelled, pivoting on the river¡¯s surface, gripping Gungnir and pulling more mana to the fore. ¡°Or come on out so I can give you to the river. Her appetite is never satisfied. If you¡¯re smarter than a zit on a flea, I¡¯d run fast and far.¡± Silence reigned heavy for a moment like a storm cloud holding its breath.


    ¡°Insults from food? Tasty morsels fighting futilely with last breaths? Egg breakers gasping for air?¡±


    The voice came from every direction and even my mental sorcery couldn¡¯t detect where it was coming from. ¡°Humans taste like ass!¡± I snarled. ¡°You¡¯d know that if you weren¡¯t a worthless piece of alien shit.¡± Figured that pissing it off would probably be the best option. Angry enemies are lazy enemies, they make stupid mistakes.


    An airy chuckle shook the leaves on the trees, but only on the north side of the riverbank. Focusing my senses that way, I still kept slowly pivoting in the water as if I didn¡¯t know anything. Gungnir slowly shifted from mace form to spear form, the crystal orb transforming into a wicked three bladed speartip. [I bet the coinage of your choice that it¡¯s harpies.] Kraken sent.


    [I don¡¯t bet against Scions of Knowledge,] I shot back. [The house always gets its due.]


    [Hahaha,] he chuckled, shooting me a little packet of info.


    [Yeah, the voice is more fucked up than I remember but I¡¯m pretty sure we¡¯ve run into these bastards before. Guess this is why I shoulda taken the time to clean out the nest.] The sky began to blacken as the silence lifted. Blades of wind lashed out, pinging off my shields as others sliced through trees on the river banks. ¡°That''s all you got, pussy?!¡± I kept looking around. ¡°You baby-backed bitch! Festering skank that couldn¡¯t fight a chicken! Eggless wonder! I bet your butthole is so rotten that you split in half everytime you sneeze!¡± No response. ¡°You¡¯re a flockless son of a pigeon!"


    That did it. Three more stone grey wyverns the size of a biplane fell out of the sky spewing acid as a tornado materialized right on top of me. The whipping blades of wind carried the infuriated screams of the harpy, or harpies? I''m not foolish enough to believe that only one was in charge of this weather working. Even though I didn''t let me inner musings distract me, the three wyverns were able to land their acid spit in a coordinated assault due to the tornado locking me in position, the rapidly moving air essentially acting as a blender, swirling the acid into a gigantic drill that stripped away at my shield. Giving in to my instincts, I fell back under the surface of the river, fighting quantity with quantity as the rushing roar of the Rappahannock washed away the vile green liquid that smoked even though it hadn''t even managed to touch the edges of my armor. Two massive paws and a spiny tail fished around the river for me as I darted about.


    [Crystal bullets don''t work so well under water!] Kraken cursed.


    [Easy day.] I snarl-bubbled, activating Poseidon''s Trident. My blue fishing spear materialized in a flash of deep blue light, answering my call. Extending my will through the amplifier, the waters of the river grasped back at the wyverns with a ferocity to match their own. Seven pillars of water complete with bladed fingers of ice tore into them as if they were tissue paper, reaping swathes of flesh as the wyverns struggled and flapped uselessly against a foe that couldn''t bleed. In their frenzy, they didn''t notice that my focus was on the smaller bladed arms of water that slashed at various weak spots, wing tendons and veins close to the surface. Three minutes of frenzied thrashing only made them bleed out faster, their struggles only growing weaker as bits of them floated on down the river.


    Waving my trident, the river tossed the carcasses up on the river bank even as I waited near the bottom of the Rappahannock, allowing the current to dilute and wash away the acidic blood. Rising to the top, I stood on conjured ice floes. "I''m pretty sure I can do this longer than you can produce wyverns!" I yelled, shaking Gungnir and Poseidon''s Trident. "I''m still as fresh as a waterfall jumping salmon!"


    Creepy silence one again came and went, unnaturally stilling even the ambient sounds. For a handful of moments, the pressure of unfulfilled rage froze even the carefree burble of the river, before letting it snap back into place. "Odd, yes, creepy, even more so, but you''re just a like a haunted doll in a murder house. Any idiot with a lick of sense wouldn''t be afraid of you." I taunted. "Everybody fear the fucked up child''s toy with a knife! Oh wait, this is America where every household has a gun and there''s a church on every street corner. Hmmm, I wonder if I should shoot the doll that wants to murder me and then drag it to a church for an exorcism."


    "Nonsense will not protect you from me, mortal morsel of meat."


    "Look, if you''re not going to come on out to me, then I will find you!" I promised. "Liam Neeson ain''t got nothing on a determined, pissed off sorcerer with a habit of going above and beyond in the explosives department. I will find you, I will kill you, and then I will use your floating island as my own personal toilet. And if that''s not enough of a threat for you to leave me the fuck alone, I will use my magic to turn your half-alive bird-brain carcass into a flesh golem that can''t move but looks like a female moose rump, and then stick you in Canada for all the boy moose to enjoy. One solid tweak of moose hormones and I guarantee that you will be railed day in and day by every available moose johnson within eight hundred miles. It will be so damn graphic that a new disease will be named after you, ¡®Dicks-lexic¡¯! Now pick up your fucking trash if you get it asshole."


    The world''s fastest tornado descended and scooped up the three dead wyverns, yanking them up into the sky and off to the north. "North huh?" I muttered, making a note for Kraken to follow up on. "Guess I''ll be heading north soon."


    My own grumpiness hung over me like a burgeoning storm, which didn¡¯t go over well when I arrived at New Richmond. The little birds were chirping without a care and the sunlight was making everything glisten as if brand new. Small hordes of children chased their familiars while elementals played and built all around them. Even the adults had expressions of general relaxed contentedness that spoke of a time of ease and growing. Most of the trees were heavy with fruit already and the greenhouses in the distance were literally glowing green even as small, personal gardens were showing their bounty. The houses molded from elemental conjured stone sported decorations even as the houses grown from oak displayed new flowing carvings that I just knew came from the wood shaping wands I¡¯d left. At least someone shared my grouchiness.


    Acantha, Reeanth, and Versonae stalked out of a dwelling, arguing with each other over something, Versonae¡¯s claws sheathing and unsheathing as Acantha pointed flaming fingers at both of them. Reeanth¡¯s imperious bitch face was no less angry, she just showed it with constant glaring and scathing condescension.

 Author Update: Book update for this series

    Howdy. To all who loved and hated this book or who regarded it with a sense of wild mediocrity, I have met with an editor and decided to actually go ahead and slowly proceed with the processing of getting my books published. I AM NOT DOING THIS FOR MONEY. I have a job that pays me well and am living within my means. I am doing this for the creative exercise thereof. It will probably be up on amazon for a buck or put into the Kindle Unlimited section so people can binge my stuff if they like it. I am not defendant at all on sales of my book. If you want to buy it, then go ahead. If you want to leave a solid review when its up, please leave an honest one.


    NOTE - inspiration for this book was originally engendered from a fever dream and parts of how our MC gained his powers came from the beloved Daniel Black series by William E. Brown. TO BE CLEAR, I reworked the entire first half of the first book and subsequent drafts to make sure that I did not do any sort of copyright infringement. I came up with a new method for how the MC gained his powers although the larger story points remain the same.


    Current time - I have commissioned a company to make the front cover of the book as well as some concept art. It''s pretty badass so far, and I had to laugh as the first drafts of the art were of Gungnir (the tri-tipped spear) and of the MC holding Gungnir. The spear itself looks pretty damn cool, better than what I had in my head. On the other hand, I laughed because the MC looked like some dude of a GQ magazine instead of someone barely surviving an apocalypse. My feedback has been given and they''re moving ahead with grungy-ing up the visage of our beloved sorcerer. I have also engaged the services of an editor to check my work for holes, misspellings, and other continuity issues. I will be removing my work from royalroad as I continue this process. Note, for those who hated where I left off, I really did write myself into a hole. I''m either going to completely rewrite the last 40ish pages or pull some sort of "Merlin/WildMagik" switcheroo to make the MC go back in time or repeat that event so the assault on the undead fortress actually happens. Maybe it would keep with Merlin being Bonzo nuts. That part is still up in the air for me.Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    Future time - I am also working on another series, a LITRPG series with two potential titles (Summoned to War or The War of Eternity). For those who have read the ''Reborn Apocalypse'' by L.M. Kerr, you will see some similar elements. I can''t recommend that series enough. I will post it to RoyalRoad when I have the first series completely taken care.


    Personal life - wow, my wife had twins. My life is kinda nuts. Suddenly I have almost no time like I used to and now I''m keeping small humans alive. Also, we''re moving at some point this year and that process has been kicked off.


    Thank yous - for everyone who loved my book and gave solid freaking feedback and fixed my shit, thank you. You all are the best and I wish nothing but the best for you.


    Regrets - For those who left godawful feedback (not the constructive kind), yikes man. wish you a better life than the one you''re living. I wish I had realized on a personal level that some feedback I would just have to let roll off my back. It is part of why I stopped posting so much here, that along with life continuing on.


    Anyways, best of luck!