Chapter 74, 1/2

Chapter 74, 1/2

Erick woke early. The sun had yet to rise on the other side of Windy Manor. As soon as he got out of bed, Ophiel flitted up to his shoulder, taking his position for however long he could. It wouldn’t be for long. Erick nudged him off of there as he went into the bathroom and closed the door behind him. Ophiel waited outside, scratching the wooden door. When Erick came back outside, he saw Ophiel had left little scratches in the otherwise unmarred wood. The little guy was getting pretty bad about that. A quick [Mend] fixed the scratches, though.

With Ophiel back on his shoulder, Erick stepped downstairs to the kitchen, to start making breakfast. No one had a night shift, anymore; not with [Prismatic Ward] filling the Manor.

Pots and pans and flour, eggs, and milk, hovered around the kitchen under Erick’s Handy Aura’d control. Eggs cracked, flour and milk became batter. Pans heated in the meantime. When it was good and hot, Erick made pancakes while he grilled sausage into patties and made coftea, all at the same time. He didn’t use his flesh and bone hands; he didn’t need to.

Soon enough, others woke. Poi first, as usual. He had trouble sleeping when everyone stirred to wake around him, and his own stomach growled at the smell of breakfast. As he came down the stairs, Erick handed him a cup of coftea with lots of cream and sugar; just how he liked it these days.

Kiri and Teressa came down next, just in time for the first round of pancakes and sausages.

“Did Rats not come in last night?” Erick asked, over his plate of pancakes, as he looked up at Rats’ open door on the third floor. The entire manor was open in the center; it was easy to see everyone’s room from down at the kitchen table.

Teressa yawned, saying, “He was called in a few hours ago. With all the anti-parasiteers gone after Messalina, they needed him.”

Poi offhandedly said, “He’s fine. I just checked. He’s a bit crabby, but he’s fine.”

“How is he doing with that, anyway?” Kiri asked.

Poi said, “They like him. He floats around a lot, but he’s primarily in the Emergency Ward to work on his [Greater Treat Wounds] quest. It’s going faster here than it was back in Spur. It might only take him one year instead of three.”

Erick smiled. “That’s good.”

“We won’t be here for a year, though.” Kiri said, “When are we going back?”

“Soon as I finish this initial light dungeon.”

“I want to help, but...” Kiri said, “I’ve been practicing what you said, but it’s not working for me like you said it would. I don’t understand how a lightwave should look.”

“I’d love your help.” Erick said, “But you still haven’t made a [Familiar], right? I won’t be physically going into the place until after the architecture is all set up. If the walls weren’t so thick, that place should have crashed in on itself years ago. It’s not safe in there.” He added, “And I have to string water through the whole place, too. That’s gonna make it all a lot weaker. Can’t work on the lights until all of that is done.” He said, “And I think... It’s going to take quite a bit longer than 5 days.”

Poi hummed as he sipped his coftea.

“I’m close to a [Familiar],” Kiri said, cutting up a pancake and drizzling syrup over it all. “I was going with [Flameshape], but now I think I should do [Lightshape] instead.”

Ophiel trilled on Erick’s shoulder, as though objecting to Kiri’s choice on a very personal level.

Erick said, “[Airshape] is pretty good, too.”

“Yeah. But...” Kiri said, “[Lightshape]... if everything is actually made out of light...”

“Well that’s not true.” Erick said, “Very little is actually made out of light. I think I might have said some confusing things.”

Teressa smirked, saying, “Very confusing.”

“What’s made out of light, then?” Kiri asked.

“Uh...” Erick thought, just to make sure he was thinking correctly, then said, “Nothing is made of light.”

Kiri dramatically half-collapsed over her pancakes. She lifted her head, asking, “Isn’t light energy? And isn’t everything energy?”

“Oh!” Erick said, “I think I see where I said the wrong thing. Everything is energy. Light has different energy levels. In that way, light is sort of like an energy, but it’s also a particle.”

Kiri sat up, saying, “But how can light be both an energy and a particle! I can understand how a system like a rock, or whatever, can have energy, but it’s not energy itself! Why do you say that matter is energy?”

Erick paused, looking at Kiri. She was stressed, with her shoulders hunched and her face in a grimace. He looked over to Poi. He was stressed, too, but in a much more Poi-sort of way; he was quiet, with fewer thought tendrils around his head than normal. Teressa, with her blond hair and bright green eyes, looked somewhat okay, but maybe she was just better at hiding it than Kiri.

Erick said to Kiri, “I think that you might want to leave all of this stuff alone, Kiri. Maybe work on the wavelength of light stuff I showed you. Maybe try your hand at making some Stat items. You can raid my stash of blank diamond spheres at any time.” He added, “Practical knowledge is better than theoretical, and I honestly do not know enough about all of this stuff to properly answer your questions. Maybe in 50 years, or whatever it takes, other people will be answering all of these questions you’re having.”

Kiri stuck her fork in a slice of pancake, silent.

Erick added, “Besides: there’s not going to be any new basic light spells. No extra points. Rozeta said that the whole system is going under [Ward].”

Poi laughed once, then went back to drinking his coftea. Teressa smiled, saying nothing.

Kiri asked, “Really? No points? No new basic magic?”

“That was my impression. Besides: I was using lightwards and lightmasks to do everything before.” Erick said, “Others have obviously done the same. There’s those Gemslicers and their darklights I keep hearing about; so at least those guys know the secret. If that light dungeon I heard about in Nelboor is real, then those guys must know the secret, too.”

Kiri said, “Maybe.” She added, “I’ve heard about that dungeon, too. The Headmaster investigated that place centuries ago, right? He found nothing?”

Erick said, “There were two instances of Hocnihai searching for it in his journals, too, but he never found it either. That delegation that dropped off his books also mentioned it when they were handing me the man’s last tomes; something about ‘those who want to learn true light magic should find the place’, or something. I think the Wasteland Kingdoms think it exists. Or at least they want it to exist.”

Poi said, “One quest at a time, please.”

Erick agreed, “One thing at a time.” He added, “As soon as this preliminary dungeon is done, we can go back to Spur and help find Messalina. Or at least defend the city from further monsters while everyone else works.”

Teressa said, “Are we all going back to Jane’s room for the day?”The initial instance of this chapter being available happened at N0v3l.Bin.

“I know I am.” Erick said, “Soon as breakfast is done.” He added, “Unless Apell is already at the dungeon. Actually...”

With a thought, Erick conjured another tiny Ophiel, and sent him blipping over to the dungeon, to see through the [Familiar]’s eyes. Apell Calloway, the pale green wrought Professor of Dungeoneering, was not there, but other people were. Five people stood around outside of the dungeon, on a flat plateau of land, in the twilight morning. But that was not the first thing to catch Erick’s attention.

The entire mountainside had been clear cut; every single tree or bush or fern had been ripped out, or burned away, or however they had done it. The mountain now looked like a very, very large staircase, with ten-meter steps, each ten meters deep. The dungeon entrance was at the very top of these steps.

Erick would investigate all of that later, but for now, he turned his attention to the people standing outside of the dungeon. They were standing around a wardlight in the shape of the dungeon; a map. It was colored with blue floors and red intakes and white outlets.

And it wasn’t nearly complex enough. If that was their idea of what Erick needed out of the space then he would need to straighten them out. He didn’t see any waterworks in their design, for one, and they were probably missing other things Erick had put into the first dungeon.

The people standing around the floating map noticed Ophiel as soon as he appeared. One of the people was Calzin, the pale owl shifter from yesterday. He waved. Erick made Ophiel wave back. Erick let go of that Ophiel; he could wander around in the breeze outside of the dungeon entrance until it was go-time.

Erick came back to himself. Barely twenty seconds had passed. He said, “They’re already there.”

Kiri said, “I’m coming with you, this time.”

Erick said, “Of course.”

She added, “I also... want to talk to you about helping me make a [Familiar] of my own... later.”

“Of course, Kiri.” Erick smiled, saying, “We can make a whole production of it, too. Zago told me that Sizzi got her [Familiar] with [Lightshape] by having Zago and Anhelia play some musical instruments while Sizzi sang a whole song at the sky. I haven’t actually seen Sizzi’s blue box, but I’m told it was quite impressive.”

Kiri flushed darker green, bordering on red. She said, “If I must. I primarily want her to have her own mana pool, like yours.”

Teressa smirked, saying, “Then I’m going to Jane’s room on my own?”

Erick said, “Thank you, Teressa. It makes me feel a lot better knowing she’s being watched over. How’s your Mana Sense coming along, anyway?”

“Pretty good.” Teressa said, “I can flip a switch and see the world around me for a good eight meters. Hard to do inside this [Ward], but not impossible.”

“That’s amazing!” Erick said, genuinely happy for her. “Good job!”

“I don’t use a [Personal Ward] like you, so I think that has helped a lot.”

Erick said, “Maybe. Whatever the case, you’ve worked hard for this. I’ve noticed. Are you going to get [Witness]?”

Teressa laughed. “I’m still a long ways away from all of that. But, maybe.”

Poi said, “That’d be really useful, but if you got that skill I don’t think Killzone would let you operate in Ar’Kendrithyst ever again. Merit might even pull for you to join the Guard.”

Teressa lost her grin. After a long moment, she said, “That would be okay with me.”

Erick asked, “Really?”

Poi just looked at Teressa, full of unasked questions.

Teressa said, “Before I was stationed as your guard, I was a wreck. It’s been really nice to get away from that place.” She added, “Rats was even worse than me. But these days, he hardly drops anything when people make a loud noise.” She said, “The Dead City is a poison. It seeps into your bones and you can’t enjoy life anymore, because... Because as soon as you express anything real, a Shade will see that happen, and they’ll work to take it away.”

A long moment passed in silence.

Kiri said, “I don’t know how the veterans do it. I was only in there for a month, and it was awful.”

Poi said, “If you want to go for [Witness], Teressa, you can. I’ll file the paperwork to transfer you to the guard.”

“I don’t know, Poi.” Teressa said, “I hadn’t really thought about it until you brought it up. I’m just talking. Don’t mind me.”

Poi nodded, saying, “The option is there. I doubt your duties will change if you choose to pursue this path, but another person who can [Witness] for the guard is a valuable resource that no one would mind having.”

Teressa ate her pancakes in silent thought.

Erick and Kiri talked of math, and of how long the dungeon would actually take. They knew the rough plans, but actual numbers could be anywhere from 10 days to 25. Poi just nodded; he knew it would take longer than Erick thought it would.

Near the end of breakfast, after talk of dungeons and plans got ironed out, Teressa said, “I’ll think about [Witness], Poi. Thank you.”

Poi nodded.

Apell frowned as she said, “Yeah... Okay?”

“If it’s not too much trouble, I would like three pools, each with a diamond statue standing in their shallow centers, each twice a person sized. Maybe four meters tall. Rozeta, Phagar, and Koyabez.” Erick added, “I’ll make the statues myself, obviously. But if you’re not comfortable making the space for them, then I could do that, too.”

Apell took a moment to say, “I’ll make the space.” She squinted as she asked, “Even with all the diamonds I’ve seen you making up there, it still makes me nervous. You’re really gonna put giant diamonds in here, too?”

“Ophiel makes diamond making easy.” Erick said, “I’ve already started three large diamonds for the statues I want to make, but I’ve also got about two hundred fist-sized diamonds for the main floors already sitting in a pile up there, waiting to be carved into something nicer than jumbled octahedrons. The larger ones will take a day to grow to full size, but the smaller ones only take ten minutes.” He added, “I’ll carve them, too, unless some of your people want to carve some? Just gotta be aware of the diamond dust. It’s very bad to breathe that in, but I’ll be saving as much of the dust as I can. It would make a nice sparkly addition to the floors and the walls and everything. That’s what I did with the original dungeon, too, so it’s not just for the sake of being pretty.” He added, “Just gotta mix it in with white stone, that gets layered over everything, which is also something we’re going to need to do.”

Apell took a moment to respond, saying, “We really are in a new age of magic, aren’t we?” She added, “Got guys like you walking around, churning out new magic monthly, dropping the price of already cheap diamonds into the dirt, upending everything, little by little.” She smirked, mostly to herself, as she turned back to the tunnel she was carving before Erick came along, muttering, “So many new things.” She raised her arms toward the stone. The tunnel began to open, as tons and tons of stone moved out of the way, as Apell walked forward and down at an even pace, saying, “Makes me glad I became a teacher up here on the surface.” She glanced back, saying, “Don’t worry about venting or intakes, or the white rock. That’s already on order. Worry about the lights. You probably don’t even have to worry about the waterworks. That girl, Merith, is a River Mage. It’s a variant Water Mage. Great for dungeons.”

“We talked a little bit about the water. She’s going to work well.” Erick said, “This is going to go well, Apell. I’ll talk to you later.”

Apell waved as she continued to walk forward, and the mountain parted for her.

Having seen all the floors, and gone over the initial plan with everyone, Erick hopped back onto his [Teleporting Platform] along with Kiri and Poi, and one blip later, they were back on floor 1.

While graduate students carved the grey or brown or tan stone of the dungeon into plumbing and pillars and playgrounds for slimes, Erick turned his attention to the arched ceiling. Each dome of that ceiling was about 2 meters across, meaning the open floorplan dungeon was 50 arches by 50, meaning 2500 spaces per floor that each needed a kaleidoscopic lightward, and that didn’t even take into account all the other lights he had to make. The kaleidoscopic lightwards were just visible light. He also needed to work in ultraviolet and infrared at every intersection, which meant another 5200 [Permanent Special Ward]s per floor; they needed to be placed around every kaleidoscopic lightward. But those went fast enough, and were easy enough that Ophiel could do them on his own.

... He wondered if he could do it all in a single kaleidoscopic lightward. It wasn’t how he had done the original dungeon, but he could try to make one, couldn’t he?

But the kaleidoscopic lightwards took skill and a deft hand already. Adding all the other invisible colors would be too much, and each one was already 500-ish mana. That was before Clarity cut that in half, and since Erick had Favored [Ward], that price was further cut down. But that was still something like 312,000 mana for just the kaleidoscopic wardlights. That was Kiri’s math; not Erick’s. They had spoken of math back at Windy Manor, and with the new plan, the numbers were finalized. Kiri had new numbers for him, and those numbers were large.

Erick could make one light every 10 seconds, though, so that meant he wasn’t time-limited, but he was mana limited. Under Mediation, he regained about 340 mana every minute.

... but it was still going to take him 15 hours to do a single floor, because that’s how long it would take him to regenerate that much mana.

And that wasn’t taking into account making Ophiels in order to make the infrared and ultraviolet lights. It took 750 mana to summon one Ophiel, and one Ophiel could create 5000 mana worth of permanent lights, at the full, non-reduced cost of 300 mana per light, meaning 16 lights per Ophiel. Erick could do that much math in his head. But then he had handed the numbers off to Kiri for what came next.

... Erick would need to summon about 315 Ophiel per floor, meaning about 237,000 mana, meaning 12 hours of regeneration per floor. Meaning, if Erick worked himself to the absolute bone, he could do a single dungeon floor in just over 27 hours.

Each Ophiel would expend itself putting up those lightwards, too, unless Erick made a [Prismatic Ward] rest station for them... Aaand that was a good idea. He would do that.

... And that was just the lightwarding! Ophiel was currently still up top, still making diamonds.

‘Holy shit.’ Erick sent to Kiri and Poi, as they were talking of math and mana, ‘This is a lot of mana.’ He looked to the silver rings on his fingers and the ball-bearing of a jewel in the setting, saying, ‘Maybe I need to go put on some of my other rings.’

Kiri sent, ‘Or just put on a crown.’

‘These rings don’t work so well with the other kinds. Already tested that out. There were explosions.’ He added, ‘A belt of these is too much, too. That thing melted.’

‘I didn’t know that.’ Kiri frowned. She sent, ‘I was hoping to make a belt for myself... sometime.’

Poi stepped in to the conversation he was supporting, sending, ‘There should be no changing of defenses out in the field. Your increased Health is necessary in the field, sir, especially if we’re going to be putting in 12 hour days.’

‘Poi is right.’ Kiri sent, ‘Besides. I can help make the warm lightwards. I’ve been adding warmth to [Permanent Special Wards] for a long time. It won’t cut down much of the requirements, but it will help.’

Erick looked up at the grey and tan stone of the dungeon, and sent, ‘There’s also the white stone that needs to be mixed up and layered over everything.’

Kiri sent, ‘That’s what everyone else is for. And it’s not even here, yet.’

Erick gazed around the dungeon floor, at the considerable job he had promised to do, and at the other people walking across the dungeon, sculpting stone into riverbeds, or low walls, or raised walkways. He sent, ‘They’re going to need to make sure the white is real white, too. Not cream-colored. It’s pretty obvious how much the Headmaster likes his barely off-white cream.’

‘... They can handle that, Erick. I think.’ Kiri looked around. ‘White stone is easy, but they sure are gonna need a lot of it.’ She paused. She asked, ‘By the way? Why is it white light, and not green light? Green is in the center of the graph you showed me.’

Erick smiled, channeling his inner Rozeta as he sent, ‘I can’t explain physics. It is what it is.’

Kiri just frowned.

Erick laughed. 'Sorry, Kiri!'

And then he went to work. With a deft touch, Erick molded mana into 2 meter by 2 meter arched sections of the ceiling, crafting a brilliant, ever shifting light made out of cyan, magenta, yellow, blue, green, and red, with hundreds of mixed colors stretching into an ever expanding and collapsing illuminated flower. White light shimmered as colors mixed in the center. Rainbows glittered on the edges, only to mix to white, then separate into jeweled tones, only to mix again in an ever dizzying radiant array.

It took about eleven seconds to make. The next ones came faster. He stopped when he ran out of mana.

The jeweled, multicolor light, remained multicolored as more and more lights went up, but the combination of it all into white was certainly a thing that was happening closer to the dungeon floor. This was normal, though.

A quick checkup on the Ophiel on the surface showed that they had already made a thousand rough diamonds; not including the larger ones that were destined for statues. Those ones had grown to the size of a small torso. It would take them the rest of the day to get to the proper sizes.

But with a thousand fist-sized diamonds done, Erick pulled several Ophiel from their task and set them to hanging up blacklights at the corner of every arched dome and along the walls. They went to work. When they got close to the edge, they went back to the [Prismatic Ward] hanging over the water by the diamonds. Fifteen minutes of hanging in that dense air later, under the enforced Rest of the [Ward], and they were back up to full mana.

Ophiel was a machine. He worked harder than Erick, for sure. It was hard to look up all the time; Erick expected to get a crick in his neck, but that didn’t happen. The benefits of Health were wide and varied, after all.

Hours passed. Breaks came and went. People went for food, or snacks, or water, and came back and kept working. Shaping stone, mainly, but also plotting rivers and calculating water rates, and everything else that it took to make a dungeon. The first floor was slowly but surely changing from a flat, grey and tan underground fortress-like space, into a bright, airy yet strong, grey and tan playground for slimes.

After five hours, Erick must have been doing something right, or maybe something must have changed somewhere else in the Script, because a notification appeared.

Kaleidoscopic Radiance, instant, medium range, permanent, 500 mana

A medium-sized lightward of evershifting brilliance supports the growth of Light Essence creatures.

Erick paused and read the box a few times. Soon enough, he came to the conclusion of, “Huh.”

Kiri stood nearby, casting infrared lightwards into the intersection of every arched alcove of the ceiling. She hadn’t gotten much further than Erick; she hadn’t Favored [Ward] and her regeneration was less than half of his own. She still didn’t have a Class. She stopped when she saw Erick stop. She asked, “What happened?”

“I’m honestly not sure.” He handed the blue box to Kiri. “What do you think?”

Kiri read the spell, silently.

Poi, looking cool as a cucumber in Erick’s ‘sunglasses’, stepped forward. Erick handed him a copy of the spell, too. He read the spell. He dismissed it, saying, “Tell the Headmaster, if you want. It would make the job go faster.”

Kiri dismissed the box, saying, “Yeah. That’s my opinion, too.”

Erick cast one into the air, in front of him. The air sparkled with a much more organic-looking evershifting ‘flower’ than the ones Erick had created against the ceiling. The lines of the lightward were less solid; more ephemeral. It was almost like a kaleidoscope made of fog and rainbows. Almost.

“It’s a little different.” Erick said, “But the costs of using it would make the job take twice as long... Unless I had Ophiel put them up. Then I could automate this whole thing.” He added, “Mostly.”

Kiri said, “I’ve never heard of anyone getting a spell out of a lightward.” She chuckled, adding, “This would be fascinating if not for everything else going on.”

“I’m ready for a break.” Erick said, “And I need to test this to see if it has everything I need. Maybe it has the other lights, too?”

Kiri said, “Let’s go see the Professor? I saw her walking around earlier. She can see blacklights.” She looked up at the lights above, saying, “I can’t tell if it’s giving off warmth in all of this.”

“Me either.” Erick said, “Let’s go find Apell.”

Poi said, “Apell is on the third floor, working with Merith on the waterworks.”

Erick led the way to Apell. As he walked into the second floor, his eyes relaxed from pinpoints to normal; the lights down here were dark compared to up on the first floor. He took off his sunglasses; maybe he needed to make stronger glasses. The dungeon was even darker on the third floor, but there were still enough wardlights to see by, and it was a nice walk. Erick’s legs were apparently getting stiff along with his neck, from constantly looking up.

Apell’s people had finished sculpting and shifting the first and second floor into their proper positions not one hour ago, so they were down here now, working alongside Merith and Apell.

Apell and the young incani woman were in a room set past the northern dungeon wall. Another young person beside the two of them noticed Erick walking toward the water room. He notified Apell, then stepped back. Erick still hadn’t learned most of everyone’s names, and he likely never would.

Apell turned. “Hey? What’s happening?”

He said to the others nearby, “This is gonna get bright. So put on your glasses.”

They all immediately dropped their shades over their eyes, except for Apell. Wrought and dragons apparently didn’t suffer from normal light-blindness like the rest of people.

When everyone nearby had their glasses on, Erick conjured a flower, asking, “Can you tell if this has blacklight in it?”

Apell’s face went still as she gazed upon the churning, brilliant flower. She breathed a little. She said, “Uh. Yeah. Yeah. It does. That casting was instant, too— How did you...? It’s really pretty.” She caught hold of herself, and said, “Yes. It has one of these blacklights in it.” Her tone turned serious, as she said, “But we need permanent lightwards. Not... whatever this art piece is.”

“I got it when I was making permanent lightwards.” Erick brought out the box and handed it over to Apell, saying, “I didn’t know that lightwards could make new spells.”

“It’s rare but it... does... happen...” Apell’s eyes widened as she read the box. She breathed. She sighed. She said, “I’ve got to tell the Headmaster.”

Erick said, “Fair enough.”

Apell nodded, then sent a tendril of thought through the manasphere, like a tiny line of heat coming off of her head and diffracting the light around that line. After a moment, she said, “The Headmaster does not want this spell in his dungeon. Erase all the ones you have put up, and craft the lightwards exactly as you made them in your original location.” She paused a moment, listening to elsewhere. She looked to Erick saying, “But a few around the statues you have planned at the bottom would be nice, just to see what happens.” The thread of thought snapped. Apell spoke for herself, as she said, “Personally, I think you should experiment elsewhere. This dungeon will be better if we treat it like a farm, not like an experiment.”

“There goes that easy idea.” Erick said, “Probably for the best, though. The farmers in Spur are always talking about order versus chaos in the farm; chaos is the enemy, after all.” He added, “You know what my new magics did for them, right? A whole new way of life in the desert.”

Apell smirked, then said, “We’re a lot more conservative, here. No [Kaleidoscopic Radiance], please.”

“Fine fine fine.” Erick changed the subject, “So when is the white stone getting here? That stuff is expensive. It cost me fifteen grandrads to layer my original dungeon in the stuff. This place is going to be a lot more.”

Apell winced, saying, “Maybe tomorrow. Maybe the day after.”

“We’ll have diamond dust to put in all that white stone, too, just so you know.”

“Oh, I know.” Apell said, “This place is going to be the brightest, most expensive, most sterile dungeon I’ve ever made. I hope we can scale your example dungeon up without losing whatever made the first one effective.”

“I do, too.”