The Shatterplate War Chapter 23

The Shatterplate War Chapter 23

Kay watched as Tyuah concentrated on the floating ball in front of her. Slowly with multiple jerks and spasms, the amorphous blob of blood turned into a close approximation of a cube. It wobbled in the air for a moment like jello before the shaking suddenly started getting faster and faster, until the lopsided cube ruptured and the blood that had made it up dropped to the ground. Tyuah stared at it with a defeated sigh.

Kay reached out with one hand and gathered the blood back up. He shook his head at her. “Don’t be so hard on yourself; you’ve only been training for a couple of weeks.”

“I feel like I should be able to do this, though!” She snarled, glaring at the collection of blood that was flying up from the floor in clumps to gather above Kay’s hands.

“Why?” Kay gestured with his free hand at the blood. “You’re trying to do this-” He formed the blood into a cube and solidified it into a solid where it slowly rotated in space. “With level seven Blood Manipulation. I got Shape Blood from its Class by hitting level twenty Blood Manipulation. I know getting the Skill early would be great for you, but I don’t think you’re going to be able to do it in only two weeks.”

She sighed as she drooped in her seat, “I get it. It’s just...” She turned and looked at the stump of her leg, then to what was left of her arm.

Kay leaned forward and grabbed her other should. “Don’t worry.” He smiled at her when she looked up. “You’re going to get to that point. All you have to do is keep practicing it.”

“Right,” She nodded with determination flaring up in her eyes. She carefully took control of the blood after Kay turned it back into a liquid, and she started manipulating its shape.

Lauren was on the other end of the training room practicing some Blood Manipulation of her own, although she wasn’t trying to skip to a more difficult Skill, so Kay went over to check on her progress.

Things had changed with Kay’s announcement that he was a Blood Line Progenitor. They hadn’t seen the rush of people that they were expecting yet; communication was still mostly through word of mouth, so the news was only traveling as fast as people could move. Some of his advisers were sure that more powerful groups with access to magical means of communication knew already, but the average citizen that everyone insisted would come to join Avalon hadn’t had time to hear the proclamation and make it back to Avalon themselves yet.

What had changed, though, was the behavior of the people that already lived in Avalon. Most people already treated Kay with a level of respect since he was the noble of their settlement, but in almost all cases, that respect had increased noticeably after he’d told everyone about his other title. There was also a new sense of... well; the only way he could think to describe it was hope.

People were ready and willing to work and face the difficulties of making and growing a new village and town and city, but there wasn’t this much sheer joy in doing it before this. I don’t think anyone was all that unhappy, but people are almost giddy now. I guess the reassurance of my titles is bolstering their spirits or something.

The other thing that had happened was people wanting, and in some cases demanding, to be trained by him in his Skill. It was weird calling it that, at least out loud, but that was the way of things. He’d made it, so it was his. Apparently, every Skill that the Rune Master had created and Class Line they’d started was called theirs. Every person that had wanted to be trained in Blood manipulation was required to go through two tests. The first was technically optional since Kay wasn’t using it to weed people out, but Eleniah had insisted that he at least have it available.

“Affinity testing is important to people,” She had insisted, “And yes, Affinity is just a fancy way of saying talent for something, and people put way too much stock into it, but it’s important on a societal and a personal level.”

“Why is it important? Just because you aren’t as talented at something as someone else doesn’t mean you have to give it up.”

“You don’t have to, but a lot of people choose to,” She’d countered, “There are an insane number of Skills and Classes that exist, and that’s not including the ones we don’t know about, since we don’t know about them. Getting to tier five makes you effectively immortal, but not a lot of people make it to tier five. People don’t want to spend their time working harder at a Skill or Class when they could be spending less time leveling a Skill that they’re talented at.” She’d shrugged while grimacing. “I don’t agree with it, but it is what it is. Giving people the chance to test what their Affinity is will weed out the people looking for an easy path to glory and let you focus on the ones that actually want to learn your Skill for your Skill. The ones just looking for power will leave on their own.”

“What if some of those people looking for an easy path have high Affinity?”

“Lady Eleniah said that two of the people that the Adventurer’s Guild scouted for government positions hitched a ride our caravan! Sir Meten is giving one a tour of the village, and the other is waiting in your office to have a meeting! Lady Eleniah and Miss Ahthia are there as well!”

Kay still wasn’t sure why those particular forms of address had sprung up for those particular people, but he was rolling with it, along with everything else that was happening in his life. This new thing was at least harmless as well as mildly amusing when he was the looks on Meten’s and Eleniah’s faces each time they were called that. Someday he was giving Eleniah a noble title, though, no matter how much she seemed to hate the idea. She’d basically forced him into this position, and he wasn’t above a little bit of petty revenge. Plus, I would probably be good for Avalon once it grew larger. But mostly, it was the vengeance.

“Alright.” He glanced over his shoulder, “Lauren, want to stay and practice some more or come along?”

Lauren glanced over at Tyuah, “We’ll both come. Tyuah can keep practicing while we head over there.”

“Sure, that’s fine.”

They loaded Tyuah up into her wheelchair, which was simple compared to some Kay had seen back on Earth, but effective all the same, and Lauren pushed while they made their way over to Kay’s office. Some people stopped and gave short, respectful bows while others just waved as they walked.

When they got to the government building, Kay took a moment to look it over. They were already getting large enough to need to expand it, and soon enough, they would have to expand it again if they were going to grow as much as was being predicted. Someday they’d have to build Kay some kind of manor that doubled as living space and a workplace, and someday farther than that, a palace. Kay wasn’t really looking forward to that, although most of that was because of the sheer amount of space the word palace made him imagine. What was he supposed to put in that many rooms?

He shook his head and put his thoughts back on track. He left Lauren and Tyuah in one of the downstairs rooms to practice and headed upstairs to his office.

The door to his office was closed, and there was a guard, one of Meten’s adventurers, standing outside the door to the meeting room they’d made when the Adventurer’s Guild had shown up. The guard opened the door for Kay and shut it behind him as he stepped through.

Inside, Eleniah and Ahthia were sitting on each side of one end of the long table, and a non-descript-looking human man sat at the far end.

“Good afternoon,” Kay greeted the man. “I’m Kay, Mayor of Avalon.”

The man smiled and opened his mouth to reply when he was cut off by someone outside shouting loud enough to be heard all the way inside the room they were in.

“Dragon!”

Seconds later, footsteps could be heard pounding down the hall, and someone burst into the room. “There’s a dragon flying towards the village!” One of the adventurers on guard duty downstairs exclaimed.

Kay and Eleniah shared a surprised and hopeful look.

“Please excuse us,” Ahthia said to the man as she started to stand.

Kay and Eleniah almost knocked over the guard as they rushed out of the room and started sprinting outside.