Chapter 108: Escape Plans

In the beginning, the Ravagers were volunteers, patriots who understood the value of adversity. Over time though, the Treatment was considered more of a punishment than a necessary evil, and the core attitude of the Ravagers began to shift. Criminals and political prisoners were used by the Harbingers, rather than those of noble spirit.

Carl Daley was sitting at the Admin terminal, feet up on the desk idly watching the ebb and flow of Warp, Bent and System Users as he twiddled his fidget spinner. Carl had active hands and he concentrated best while doing something else.

Not that he needed to do much. The System took care of most everything. Carl’s job was pretty much just watching the Refined Warp output of Marconen and calling his superiors when something went wrong. A monkey could do his job. Hell, the System could do his job, with a little rewiring.

Which is why he had a subroutine built to bring him interesting news of the face of Marconen, a simple function that called up Skills earned that were unique, incredibly rare, or just sounded like a really bad time.

He always got a kick out of reading them and how they were accomplished. It was the closest he could get to reading his feed while at work.

“Tooth-walking, you know that guy’s probably limbless.” Carl chuckled to himself.

“Yandere magnet. Yanderes are (correction) more attracted to you, and women in love with you are (correction) more likely to become Yandere. Yowch. That poor guy.” Carl hoped for his sake the dude was tough as nails, but it probably wouldn’t help much.

“What are you doing?” the reverberating voice of Carl’s Harbinger boss less than a foot away made Carl flinch violently.

Can’t dismiss the feed, he’s already seen it, but maybe I can bullshit.

“Just, you know, keeping an eye on unusual Skill patterns, make sure nobody gets something like Nuclear Engineer or something like that. The guys on Septon didn’t have any warning before their civ went nuclear, and they blew each other all to hell. Skills can really make the turnaround time short, ya know, so I thought it’d be best…”

Carl’s voice trailed off as the large, red-brown crested alien eyed him speculatively.

“That is not what you have been trained to do, Carl Daley. If you wish to suggest an alteration to the Warp Monitoring System, please submit it in writing.”

“Of course,” Carl said in a cold sweat. Any old Harbinger could tear him to pieces. And although they tended not to, that power dynamic was never far from Carl’s mind. He turned forward, laid his hand on his mouse and began to close the feed.

The Harbinger’s rough hand clamped over his, the unexpected contact with the creature’s pebbly skin making the hair on Carl’s head stand on end. This is it. he – or she – is going to break my hand and tear my head off, and that’ll be the end of the line for Carl Daley.

“Wait.” The Harbinger said.

Carl hesitantly looked up at the Harbinger. He wasn’t paying any attention to Carl at all, instead the alien looming over his shoulder was staring intently at the screen.

Carl glanced up.

Abyssal Alchemy? It sounds kind of spooky I guess. Must have tripped the cool or rare filter. The Harbinger dragged Carl’s hand up and clicked on the X, turning off the feed before he was able to read more than the title.

A growl built in the alien’s throat, not a pathetic human ‘rrarr’, but the sound of a two-hundred pound cat with bones rattling around on the inside.

“Good work.” His boss said, turning and stalking away, anger radiating from the creature’s posture.

I have to pee. Carl suddenly realized.

***Calvin***

Extensive training has increased your Attributes!

+4 Stability

+1 Strength

+2 Endurance

+1 Kinesthetics

You Have Manifested Drafting!

One of the unsung cornerstones of technology. Creating a plan, and sharing that plan with others before work even begins.

Drafting level 1: 5% correction to drawing, designing, mental imaging, note-taking, and pencil sharpening.

^Cuz you can never have a sharp enough pencil, amiright?

You have Manifested Bent Manipulation!

Bent Manipulation level 1: 5% correction to manually manipulating Bent outside the body, and reducing mental strain thereof.

6/8 Warp Remaining.

Hmm… one skill left.

Calvin was meditating in his unqua in the hours of the ‘morning’, before old Sal got up and made the Stringer filament wrapped around the central stalagmite glow with heat. He was considering what came next with his Skills.

After Calvin had mostly healed his leg and recovered his Stability, It had only taken an afternoon to learn Drafting and Bent manipulation, leaving Calvin with one empty slot, and no concrete idea on what he wanted to fill it with.

What am I missing right now? Calvin had several different ways of attacking and defending. Shifting covered his movement skills as well…barely. If nothing else, I might want to investigate phasing, teleportation, or Flying. Floating with Shifting doesn’t really count.

Teleportation was famously difficult to achieve a high enough level to make anything happen.

Do you know what the details on teleportation are?

Oh, yeah, I can look that one up. Gimme a sec.

Looks like mass is level cubed divided by 1000, in pounds, with a range of level cubed feet. You wouldn’t be able to teleport yourself until level fifty-five. Assuming you don’t gain weight in your old age. On the other hand, you could teleport yourself thirty one miles per casting at that level.

As for phasing…I think I know a way to get it without learning the Skill. Calvin thought, the brief glimpse of the Brain leech phasing through the wall replaying in his mind. He couldn’t remember much after that.

The back of his neck twinged with phantom pain.

You sure about that? That thing got you pretty good in Shadowboxing.

Yeah, I’m not going to give it the opportunity this time.

What about Flight? Calvin asked, picturing himself as the Wizard-King, hovering over his subjects, wreathed in crackling energy.

Oh, there’s a handful of ways of getting it from Skills like Wind Control, Weather magic…even some fighting Skills have Air Walk.

So I heard.

Anyway, couldn’t you simulate a Flying Skill by taking the Gradual Split Ability and reducing your mass enough for it to move you around?

How would that work?

You reduce your weight, then summon air on your palms, or feet, or wherever. That air expands, pushing you around. Geez, do I have to explain how flight works or show you the iron man movies?

How does flight work? Calvin thought, blinking.

Oh…you know, sometimes I forget you were homeschooled by a sword-flinging savage. Flying creatures such as insects push air down to generate lift. Larger creatures like birds wrap air around their wings as they fly. The shape of the wing causes air that goes over them to travel a greater distance before it meets again on the other side, and therefore be less dense than the air that goes straight under.

Things want to go from an area of greater density to an area of lesser, so the air under the wing, the dense air, pushes up.

And that’s flying 101.1.1. There’s a whole hell of a lot more to it, but that’s all you get right now.

Huh. Neat.

With the right combination of Abilities, Calvin could indeed fly, in a slapdash sort of way.

Calvin could probably get Teleportation high enough to be useful before he got old and fat, with the Warp Tank paving the way, but that depended on an eighth Break.

Never count on another Break. That was something he intended to keep in mind. Even with the Warp Tank making it easier, he couldn’t be sure it would happen.

If I can make myself fly in a roundabout way, why not Teleport in a roundabout way? Calvin pictured the two bridges linking targets, distinct Characteristics of Sense-grafting, the Gadveran School of Classic magic, and Shifting, the Skill Cobalts used to crush rock, build, and fight.

Calvin picked up a pebble.

Sense Grafting

17/18 Bent Remaining.

He tied his sight to the stone, lurchingly shifting his point of view.

Shifting.

16/18

Calvin linked the stone to himself, and shifted a bit of weight into the stone, straining his arm to lift the suddenly heavy object.. it sat there, in his hand, where he could see every wrinkle in his hand through the stone.

Nothing? Calvin was sure there was some synergy between the two to be had.

If you recall, Calvinian Summoning incorporated the Mass Splitting Ability as it was created. There may be Abilities you have to get for one or both of those skills before you can create a Hybrid, if that’s what you’re going for.

You might be right.

Of course I’m right. I’m me.

Show me my status.

Calvin Gadsint

Body:

8

Strength:

8

Kinesthetics:

8

Endurance:

8

Mind:

45

Intuition:

18

Stability:

18

Will:

33

Bent:

16/18

Warp:

6/8

Skills:

Stealth

7

Playboy

11

Old Salt

10

Sense-Grafting

15

Dupdomancy

18

Meditation

25

Chained Spirit

18

Calvinian Summoning

18

Your Princess is in Another Castle

7

Beli Ma

10

Genosian Language

5

Shifting

12

Abyssal Alchemy

2

Drafting

1

Bent Manipulation

1

So many Skills to raise, so little time.

Calvin had already been stuck in this hole far too long, almost a full week now, and he was finally able to move without a cane.

Let’s focus on Sense-Grafting and Shifting today. Calvin thought. With shadowboxing’s unlimited Bent, he could progress very fast at those skills, up to the limit of Meditation, which had spiked when he raised his Mind during the Break, using Meditation as a gimmicky way to bypass a lack of puzzles to solve.

He might be able to create another Hybrid, and on the other hand, those two spells were woefully behind the others.

Which all need to be raised as well.

Agh. One thing at a time.

Eye of the Tiger

Shadowboxing

Calvin opened his eyes in the village of Deinos.

Calvin began using Shifting to practice his makeshift Air-walk, while simultaneously targeting everything he could see in the environment.

“What the Abyss are you doing, Calvin?” Karen demanded, sticking her head out the window as he flung himself around the sky with barely controlled footsteps.

“Practicing,” Calvin said, creating a tangled web of Mass bridges between objects that he had a hard time even keeping track of. Left foot, right foot, hand, spin, drop mass, switch. It was very demanding on his mind to continue manually switching mass from one limb to another, but he was starting to get the hang of it.

“When did you learn how to do that?”

“Couple weeks ago. This is an imaginary space.”

“Ah. Sparring?”

“No thanks, just trying to get the hang of this technique.”

Karen squinted up at Calvin awkwardly marching through the sky with exaggerated foot movements. “Nothing helps get your technique down like sparring. I’ll go get my cleaver.”

Calvin rolled his eyes. She was usually right.

Why do I recreate Karen every time? Probably because the town felt empty without everyone in it. Even Kort was there, gawking up at him as he strode through the air. And he was dead.

“I always knew you were a fairy!” Kort jeered up at him.

Maybe this isn’t entirely healthy….

I’ll worry about that some other time.

Shifting, Shifting, Shifting, Shifting…..

…Shifting has reached level 15!

Shifting level 15: 75% shift, 15 minutes, targets limited to 3375 pounds in mass.

+1 Will

After Karen began chasing him through the sky with a gigantic cleaver, he improved at his air-walking technique by leaps and bounds, and got ranks in the Shifting skill without even noticing. By the time Kala pinched him, he was already at level fifteen.

Calvin set aside the Ability menu and opened his eyes and saw the princess leaning over him, her soft lips pressing against his forehead.

“The pinch works better, but I appreciate that more,” Calvin said.

“I thought you would,” She said with a smile. “We’re almost out of water again.”

“Again?”

“People drink a lot of water.” She said with a shrug. “At least, ones who don’t have the Water Conservation Skill.” She pointed between the two of them.

“At least we’ve got clean clothes.” Calvin said with a chuckle. Washing clothes with duplicated water and soap was something he’d thought of after his Alchemy experiments. Once the clothes were relatively clean, just dismiss the water and soap. Clean, dry clothes without a trace of soap residue in seconds, and no wasted water.

Clean clothes were a rare commodity in The Filter.

The neighbors were so jealous.

I wonder if I could charge water to wash people’s clothes. That would be less dangerous than…

Calvin reached up and smacked himself, hard, making Kala flinch backward in alarm.

“Why did you do that!?” she asked, her eyes wide.

“I just had a very un-Wizard-Kingly thought.” Calvin said, pushing himself to his feet, careful of his tender leg. “One that would lead to settling into a routine and winding up the old man who washes everyone’s clothes.”

“Ah,” Kala said, nodding. “What should you be thinking instead?”

“Getting out of here,” Calvin said, following her out the door “and conquering Uleis.”

“Conquering it?” Kala asked, brow raised. “By yourself?”

“I’m never by myself.” Calvin said, directing that at Elliot and Nadia. “But yes. By myself. And for that I need new spells, practice with them, a little more time to heal, and a buttload of stats to increase.

Calvin cocked his head to the side. “When’s the Uleisan New Year’s ball?”

“About two weeks, assuming time works the same down here,” Kala said, picking a bit of rock off her dress. The yellow fabric was starting to wear and fade after repeated washings by the Knick-knacks.

“Then we are going to get back to the surface in the next week.” Calvin said, resolute.

“Oh?”

“And we are going to kidnap every female member of Uleisan royalty at the New Year’s Ball.”

“Ah.” Kala nodded, giving him a bit of a cold look, letting the silence hang between them like an accusation.

“I need it for my Warp Tank and Body!” Calvin said.

“You sure you’re not just excited to add a princess to your collection before ravishing them?”

“YOU’RE the one who gave me the Skill!” Calvin exploded with mock anger as Kala giggled, hiding her smile behind her hand.

Calvin grunted and turned away, opening the Ability Menu.

Shifting has reached level 15!

Please choose an Ability or Mutation:

Shift Storage: Adds an extradimensional space Mass can be shifted to. Limits and duration match that of Shifting.

^Does not actually store things, just allows the User to make both objects lighter.

Extended Shift: duration becomes level squared.

Unbound: User may freely swap the targets of the Shifting link for another

Property Shifting. User may transfer one of three simple physical characteristics between targets: Strength, Viscosity, Rigidity. Overwrites the property of the original object. Max amount = Correction%

Mutations:

Center of Mass: User may move their center of mass 2 inches per level of Shifting, at Will.

Xeno-Adaptation: Mass increases or decreases relative to the gravity of the planet to keep the User at the same perceived weight.

F*ck the Square-Cube Law: Endurance and Strength grow proportionally to the User’s mass while using Shifting.

Bound Blades: Temporary Shifting connection between the user and knives stored with Blade Body, for (level) minutes.

Calvin scanned through the list, noting the two new choices that unlocked at level 15.

Bound Blades was interesting, and could save him a bit of Bent, but it only connected him and his knives. At one hundred percent, he could only make his knives weigh a hundred and sixty or seventy pounds. With a normal casting of Shifting, he could make them weigh thousands of pounds.

It was a little superfluous, currently.

Property Shifting on the other hand… Calvin had been intending to take Unbound for it’s inherent versatility, but Property Shifting scratched that itch in the back of his head that demanded crafting skills, and being able to make rock and metal flow temporarily flow like water was very appealing.

I choose Property Shifting.

Calvin’s mind tingled as the techniques settled in.

“So are we going hunting again after fishing?” Kala asked.

“Yep. I have a whole list of creatures I want pieces of.” Calvin glanced up at the dark stone looming over their heads. “We’re not getting out of here without spells, weapons, armor, and practice.”

The thought of more spells nearly caused Calvin to have another manic meltdown. He was practically itching to get out there and discover some new combinations.

“What about after that?” she asked.

“After hunting?”

“Yeah.”

“Stability training.”

“That sounds like fun.”

Macronomicon