GSA 7&8

Chapter 7:

***Jessica***

A little projectile hummed from Jeb’s hiding place toward the monster, then the three mermaid heads, a good chunk of the water and the monster therin, simply vanished, in a ten-foot sphere.

Crack! The implosion sounded like a gunshot as the air rushed in to fill the void. A moment later, the Siren boss floated to the surface, the oversized body missing the top of its gargantuan skull.

“The fuck was that?” Jessica demanded, scanning the ruined coast.

No answer.

She scanned the shoreline where she expected Jeb to be, and noticed the water level was two feet above the level of the shore and rising, peeking out from the toppled trees and destroyed brush.

Shit, what if he’s trapped under a tree?

Light step

She dropped her mass to next-to-nothing with a thought, skipped forward with a flick of her foot, then brought her mass back to full, generating inertia from nothing.

She crossed the lake with a single step, then, when her foot hit the ground again –

Light step

The wind resistance, and her foot landing on the tree, brought her speed gently down to zero, then she relaxed and allowed her mass to return.

The Class ability drained her stamina pretty quick, but it was just too useful for her to pass up.

“Jeb, are you in there?” Jess asked, peering into the muddy water. “If you’re not stuck under a tree, say something.”

Shit. He’s probably under there.

Jessica braced herself on another log and heaved up on the topmost tree in the pile, using every ounce of her strength to haul the tree up and throw it into the lake.

She felt superhuman, but that didn’t mean her strength was limitless, nor did it mean she could throw around huge objects as she liked. She was still only a hundred and fifty pounds.

She had to carefully brace herself, and haul the tree up on her shoulders, balancing it on top of herself as perfectly as possible, because any little shift in weight could send her stumbling forward or backward.

One….

She threw it into the lake.

Two…

The water level kept going up, now four feet above the shore. Her ankles were getting cold and wet.

What the hell happened? Some kind of underground artesian well? Damnit, I hope I’m not crushing him by moving these trees. But between that and drowning… I’ll take my chances.

It took entirely too long to move each one of these trees…and Jessica wasn’t entirely sure she was looking in the right places.

Jeb, if you die after I let you have those boss solo kills, I will drag your ass back out of hell myself and take those accolades back.

Eight short, and yet horrifyingly long minutes later, the water was beginning to go down again, and Jessica had the last tree exposed.

If this isn’t where he was hiding… he’s probably dead.

A man with ten Body might be able to hold his breath this long, or recover from passing out underwater if he couldn’t hold his breath.

The last tree was the biggest though, as he’d been sheltering behind the biggest one he could find. It was toppled over, partially sticking out of the bloody lakewater, edge resting on its stump.

There’s gotta be room under there, she thought, plopping her feet down into the water, setting her feet on the stump.

She squatted down and grabbed the base of the tree, straining mightily as she lifted the massive hunk of wood.

“FFFFUCK!” Jessica grunted as she tossed the tree off to one side before peering down into the murky water beneath the tree.

She flinched back when a hand erupted out of the drink and Jeb drew himself out of the water, resting his elbow on the stump like someone at a swimming pool.

“Bartender, can I get another mai-tai?” He didn’t even sound out of breath.

Jeb’s face had an insufferable grin as he pulled himself out of the water.

“How are you fine!?”

“Oh, I made a breathing tube out of air held in place with telekinesis.” He plunged his hand underwater, then pulled back up what appeared to be a perfect cylinder of water, held in place by his thumb. He let go of the water, and it slid back out, rendering the tube invisible again.

“…Of course you did.”

“What was the alternative? Not breathing? That would be dumb.”

***Jeb***

Jessica gave him an exasperated head-shake and hopped back up onto ‘dry land’.

“And thanks for the help. I would have had to lie there for an hour or longer waiting for the water to go back down, and let me tell you, Nerve sickness is not a good time to be stuck in a claustrophobic spot.”

Jessica glanced over at him.

“…You’re welcome.”

Ding!

Your party has cleared the southern lakes dungeon! Please take your rewards.

As before, sphincters coalesced out of the ever-present myst, and…released…chests into the lake, where they started bobbing in the water. Jeb couldn’t the image of a big-ass toilet bowl out of his head.

“In the lake? Really?” I’ll handle this.” Jessica said, walking on water over to the chests.

Cool ability.

Jeb could’ve just pulled the chests over with his Myst, but something else was holding his attention.

You may now choose a class! You have met the prerequisites for three classes. Your class grants Abilities and stat bonuses. At higher levels, Classes grant extra abilities (50, 100, 250, 500, 1000)

Soldier (D)

Mystic Trapsmith (B)

Telekinetic Combatant (A)

Oooooh! Jeb’s eyebrows raised at the last two, which were the two most likely to not be foot-dependent. Telekinetic combatant sounded cool, like…exploding people’s heads while riding a whirlwind of telekinetic power. Or wielding a thousand swords with his mind at once.

But I should check them all, see which one I like the best.

He eyed Soldier, and it unfolded for him.

Soldier (D)

+5 Body

You were a soldier in a previous life. Why not this one too?

Passive boost to weapon handling skills.

Ability: It’s worth More Than You Are

User may transfer damage from any magical or nonmagical gear to themselves, repairing the item in the process. Works with Consumables!

Try not to kill yourself.

Hey, that’s not as bad as I thought. I mean, I dunno if anybody would want to take damage to pinch pennies like that, but fixing extremely valuable consumables like the Vivicant Cane might be worth the pain. Next.

Mystic Trapsmith.

You have created a trap with Myst, disarmed a Myst trap, and created an I.E.D. out of a household magic item.

+5 Myst

+5 Nerve

Passive bonus to assembling/disassembling magic items.

Ability: Mystic Trigger

User may bind a reserve of their Myst to an object, creature, or location, with a predefined behavior and trigger. The trigger must be an observable condition within one hundred feet. The behavior of the Myst must be pre-defined and discrete. It cannot interpret your will or the situation. It cannot be instructed to ‘fight’ an individual, but it can, for example, be instructed to seize an object in a specific location and swing it in a specific way until the Myst is consumed. It has no concept of what is going on around it. If there is no item there, it seizes nothing and fails.

*Observable condition* No thought crimes!

That’s…pretty cool. Jeb could already think of two great ways to use that, nope, make that three. Four.

We’ll keep an eye on that one.

Next.

Telekinetic Combatant (B)

Telekinetic Myst Core. You have killed over ten creatures with telekinesis. You have successfully split your attention between two objects.

+5 Myst

+10 Nerve

Passive boost to spacial perception.

Ability: Telekinetic combat (passive)

Greatly enhances the user’s ability to multitask with Telekinesis, allowing many more discrete threads of Myst to be in use simultaneously. This ability pays more dividends the more it is practiced with, as it is a percentage increase, not a flat bonus.

“Woooow…” That’s pretty cool. So it is wielding a thousand swords with my mind and becoming a whirlwind of death.

“I choose Mystic Trapsmith.”

Telekinetic combatant was strong, no doubt, but it also felt like a bit of a one-trick pony. Pick things up and stab/bash people with them.

And that was plenty effective, Jeb wasn’t debating that. It just didn’t seem like brute force was going to get him across the finish line. He’d chosen to dump his stats into Myst with that thought in mind, and he was going to continue that path as far as it took him.

Jeb’s mind tingled from the Ability seemingly spreading its roots in his brain, making itself available to him. It was a little mentally draining, but it seemed like the biggest cost was spending Myst on it.

So, let’s see if this works.

Jeb siphoned a large amount of Myst out of himself, and drew it into a tightly condensed ball above the tip of his index finger.

Mystic trigger

When my right thumb goes from being straight to bent while my right index finger is extended and all other fingers are clasped to my palm, The Myst will grab the air opposite my finger relative to itself, in the form of a narrow spike and push it away from my finger at the highest speed it can manage, following the finger’s trajectory.

The tightly bound Myst compressed down even further, and became invisible.

“Or in other words,” Jeb pointed at a nearby log, index finger extended, the other three clasped to his palm.

He crooked his thumb.

There was a hiss of displaced wind as the hardened air shot forward and put a hole in the tree, burying itself in the ground behind it.

“Finger gun.” Great idea number 3.

I’d call that a successful proof of concept. If that works, the rest of my ideas are likely to work....

It wasn’t that he couldn’t make the same effect manually. The benefit here was doing all the work in advance, so he could be focusing his attention on manually moving something, like the stiletto, for example, and if someone or something got close, he could finger-gun them without having to drop control over his stiletto.

And with his vivicant cane….

Where the hell is my vivicant cane?

He spent the next couple minutes trying to fish his ivory cane out of the water, until the water level went down far enough to reveal the damn thing had rolled further out than he’d expected, halfway stuck under a log.

He pried it out carefully, making sure not to break it. Damn thing was probably worth more than he was.

By the time he was done hopping through the muck of the ruined lakeshore, Jessica was on her way back with the loot in hand, still Jesus-ing over the water.

“What’cha got Jess?” Jeb asked, sitting on a log.

“Permanent stat boosting potions.” She said, showing him two bottles.

“Body,” She held up the red one. “Myst.” She held up the white one. “Which one you want?”

Jeb tapped his fingers on the cane, frowning. He needed to get more Body sooner or later to keep pace with escalating danger, but whenever he was given a choice…

“Myst.”

Jessica snorted. “Dunno why I asked,” She said, tossing him the white one.

Jeb downed it before he could wallow in his poor decision making skills, and Jessica did the same.

+3 Myst

Then he dropped the remaining six points from fighting the sirens, straight into Myst.

Nursing a throbbing headache, Jeb pulled out his map and checked what kind of dungeons might be nearby. They didn’t have much time left until they would be forced out of the forest. They needed to clean up around here, take a rest in the safe zone, then clear out the north.

Jebediah Trapper

Mystic Trapsmith, Level 20

Body 10

Myst 43 +2

Nerve 18 +3

Abilities: Mystic Trigger

***2 days, 10 hours remaining***

“You take a break, I’ll keep watch,” Jeb said, writing on a piece of MRE packaging with a stick of charcoal. “I gotta do some homework anyway.”

Jessica grunted and took off her magic boots, wincing at the smell.

“There’s talc in the survival supplies,” Jeb said, pointing.

Alien bastards didn’t think a pencil and a pad of paper might come in handy, though. Jeb refocused on his piece of ‘paper’ and got back to listing his Great Ideas ™ for how to use Mystic Trigger.

1.         Land Mine

2.         Automate the Vivicant Cane

3.         Finger Gun

4.         Shield

5.         Grenades

6.         Projectile Return

7.         Safety phrases

Jeb tapped the other end of the burnt stick on the ‘paper’ but couldn’t think of any new ideas off the top of his head.

Then he went about defining how they might work.

For the land mine, if a creature larger than x and not him or Jess steps above the object, then boom.

Simple.

For the automated Vivicant cane, he could assign several different triggers to several different reserves of power bound to the cane.

Heart rate substantially below resting rate? Trigger the cane. Blood pressure dropping precipitously? Trigger the cane.

In addition to the passive triggers that could save his ass when he got blindsided, he could assign active triggers to it, such as simply saying a safety phrase such as ‘I’m not wounded, I’m just getting warmed up.’

Jeb chuckled at the thought of saying something that cringy out loud. Still it is an observable event.

Finger gun he’d already done.

Shield was kind of an extension of the finger-gun.

Adopt a ‘shielding’ pose, with his arm curled up, shoulder raised, and head tucked in, and a shield of telekinetically stabilized air would spring to life, following his movements…no, it can’t follow my movements. It can only spring the shield, then let it hang there. It has no idea where I am, nor the ability to follow me.

Still, it provided some interesting utility, and Jeb saw himself using it.

Grenades were another simple extension of the concept. He could either take a  Myst lens, or make several dozen telekinetic arrows bound to a single pebble.

Throw the pebble and shout ‘fire in the hole!’ and boom. People die.

Might want a more obscure command trigger. Easily guessed ones could get me killed on accident. Wait no, if the condition is that I say it, the chances are slim…

Projectile return was simple. He could just bind several dozen triggers to himself, and when an object approached above a certain speed on a trajectory to hit him, the closest trigger leaps out and grabs the object, turns it one hundred and eighty degrees, then returns to sender.

Wait. That one might not work. It needs a way of knowing where the projectile is to reach out and grab it.

I know! I can have it create a bubble around me, and anything that intersects with the bubble gets spat back. It doesn’t need to seek out the projective specifically. I’ll need to create a variety of ranges so they don’t interfere with each other, but that’s not a big fuss.

What had inspired the Projectile Return was the fact that the people to the north used poison darts. Jeb did not want to get hit by one of those.

Let’s say…anything faster than ninety miles per hour. I’m pretty sure I could dodge anything slower than that, even without the foot.

Last but not least, Safety Phrases.

Or as I like to call them, Insurance policies.

Tied up? Wink three times with your right eye, and a blade of telekinetic force will start sawing 2 inches away from your arm, ending flush with the skin. As long as you don’t move.

Bad guys stole your stuff, have you under guard and you need a distraction? Say ‘Scarabs are Scary’ and spawn a swarm of flesh eating scarabs.

“Oh, my god,” Jeb said, resting his forehead in his hand.

“What is it?” Jessica asked, glancing at him.

“I just realized. This is the magical Batman class. I have to prepare for every eventuality.”

“How about the eventuality that I’ve hidden the last bag of M&Ms?” Jess asked.

Jeb deepened his voice to a raspy growl, his face crumpling into a rictus of rage.

“Where are they!?”

Chapter 8: Proof of concept

***2 days 4 hours remaining***

“Okay, let’s double check my list.” Jeb said, ticking off his ‘traps’.

Finger-gun clips: ‘ack’ X10 þ ‘pip’x10 þ ‘kip’ X10 þ  ‘Alpha Strike’ ☠

Cane Auto: x4  BP þ HR þ BD þ OD þ

Cane Manual: x2  ‘just getting started’þ ‘alt blinks’þ

Shield: x4 þ

Armor: head þ torso þ legs þ upper arms þ lower arms þ

Projectile reflection x50 þ

Safety Phrases: restraints ‘3W’ þ ‘Scarabs’ þ ‘Plitskin’ þ ‘no homo’ þ ‘Room full of Charlies’☠

Grenades ‘go boom’: ‘nut’ þ ‘rock’ þ ‘knife’ þ ‘authorize magical girl transformation’☠

Jeb….couldn’t think of anything more. He was absolutely sure there were more useful things he could add, but he simply…wasn’t aware of them yet.

He leaned forward, staring into the sheet, trying to squeeze out more ideas out of his brain. Anything more…

“Come on, you’ve been dicking around for hours! Let’s go!” Jessica cajoled. “Those frog-people aren’t gonna slaughter themselves!”

He considered offering a spar just to see how his ideas worked in reality, but the majority of them were designed to be lethal, the rest were single-use defensive, and resetting them would cost him even more time.

I’m just gonna have to figure out how they handle in the crucible of combat.

He grabbed the pegleg Jessica had carved while she was waiting and slipped it over his stump, the wood fitting snug all the way up to his knee. Once it was on, he pushed himself to his feet – foot – . It hadn’t actually taken her that long to carve, a person with close to thirty strength can basically treat hardwood like a soft cheese.

Jeb rolled up his list – written on a mac and cheese package – and tucked it in his pocket before he started clomping after her, using the Vivicant cane to help keep his balance.

Jeb would for all the world look like your average one-legged LARPer, were it not for the broken spearhead and stiletto orbiting him like satellites.

Stab stab.

***Bubli, Krokker scout***

Ah, another human, Bubli thought, thought, his animalistic senses picking up two humans trekking through their lands. Humans were remarkably tasty. Each of the ones they’d caught thus far had been deliciously fatty.

Drool threatened to leak out of Bubli’s mouth imagining another feast like the one a few nights ago.

No, stay focused, he thought, swallowing. Humans were getting scarcer, and the ones who remained were by necessity more dangerous than the first ones. He couldn’t afford to get complacent.

We’ll wait until they get close to a sticky-tree, then ambush them.

So it went for a good half hour, Bubli silently following the blundering through the woods. As he crept along, he gradually picked up more and more krokker scouts as he went, the frog people silently sharing looks of knowing anticipation as they shadowed the loud humans.

Their skin changed colors to match their hiding spots, waiting patiently for the humans to make a mistake.

Finally it happened. The humans were walking along, when a root-runner from a sticky-tree caught the smaller human on the arm.

“Oh no, I got caught on this sticky piece of wood…”

Unfortunately, the Krokkers weren’t familiar enough with humans to recognize bad acting.

Now! Shoot the unhindered one then we’ll swoop in and take them both!

Bubli drew in a silent breath and raised his blowpipe to his lips, six other krokker following suit.

Phew! With a quiet puff of air, the deadly poisonous darts trailing bright white feathers streaked through the air, aiming for the bigger human’s face and neck.

Bubli thought he saw a flicker in the air, then all the white streaks in the air reversed course. In the blink of an eye, Bubli was staring at a puff of feather hanging below his right cheek.

What!? NO!

Bubli ripped the dart out of his face as quickly as he could, but the rigid paralysis was already setting in.

***Jeb***

You have gained a level!

You are now level 21!

“That works a lot better than I thought,” Jeb said, dropping the point in Myst as Jessica chopped the sticky tree tendril off her arm with a few casual slices of Razorback. The frog-people were too busy trying and failing to run away to launch another attack, their limbs stiffening into horrifying contortions.

The first ‘bubble’ had triggered and caught three of the projectiles and reversed their course, and the second ‘bubble’ had caught the remaining four.

Jeb had expected to have to spend one use on each projectile, but he was happy to learn that tightly packed projectiles that caught the bubble at the same time would all be returned on the same charge. Meaning he had slightly better fuel efficiency than he thought, especially against ambushes. He still had forty-eight layers left.

Make a note to replace those.

Man, those frogs dropped quick. I wonder what would’ve happened if they’d decided to attack Jessica too?

Sudden realization.

“That’s what I was forgetting!” Jeb said, smacking his forehead. “Jess, let me put some shields on you too.”

***Later***

“So you now have a bundle of ten shots of Myst at the tip of your finger.” Jeb said.  “With the keyword ‘pip’ and then the number, you’ll shoot a mind-bullet. Like so.”

Jeb aimed at a nearby tree.

“pip one.”

SSSHHH! Air hissed as the solidified air was pushed through the nearest tree with a crack!

Jessica frowned, and pointed her finger at another tree.

“pip one.”

SSHHH – Crack!

Another hole opened up in another tree.

A sinister smile creeped onto Jessica’s face. It didn’t worry Jeb for himself so much as all the other shmucks out there.

“The ‘trap’” Jeb made air quotes. “Is set only to trigger if you say the keyword. So don’t worry about us setting each other’s off by accident. You can use the fingerbullets at your discretion, but I’d save ‘em for a rainy day if I was you.”

“And how many shields did you give me?” Jessica asked.

“Twelve. I’ve got no way of keeping track of your number in combat so pay attention to how many you’ve got left.”

“Got it.” She nodded. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet. I’m giving you these with the tacit understanding that they will help you watch my back better,” Jeb said, holding out his hand. “Let me reload you.”

She put her hand in his, and Jeb tried to ignore the sensation of her skin against his rough hands as he focused on making another ‘pip one’ bullet on her finger. Even after all that Body, her skin felt soft and delicate, her bones small and frail, despite those impressions being demonstrably not true.

He drew in Myst, increased the size of his core by a miniscule amount, then siphoned off the energy, binding it into a tight little pin head of energy that would only go off if Jessica Stile were to say ‘pip one’.

After that was done, he reloaded his own finger gun, topped off his projectile reflector bubbles, and the two of them sorted through dead frog people.

They didn’t have much in the way of weapons or treasure on them other than the leather clothes they wore, and the blowpipes.

They carried about four darts apiece, coated in a powerful, oily paralytic, and that was what Jeb was most interested in.

Lethal poison darts: I’d rather have one and not need it, than need it and not have one.

He dumped them all into the biggest pouch, being careful not to touch them with his fingers before sealing the pouch up and hanging it from his belt.

Just like that, they made their way to the heart of the krokker territory, stopping every once in a while to lure out the scouts that kept tailing them. There was really no way to tell whether they were being followed by the color-shifting creatures other than to lure them out.

Once they got close to their village, the smell of cooking meat and smoke gave it away, along with the near-invisible thread of smoke above the treetops.

Let’s see, we’ve counter-ambushed some twenty-eight froggos, so hopefully their numbers are low.

He and Jessica dropped low, and crawled forward. Jeb was concerned his pegleg might fall off, but the straps held on surprisingly well as they approached, keeping as low as possible.

Krokkers of every size and coloration were running back and forth in the village, which seemed to house some two hundred of the creatures. Some of them were obviously children, and others were either teenagers, or female. It was hard to get a read on sex, since they didn’t have boobs.

They were peacefully chatting, cooking, kicking balls back and forth in the center of the clearing. They could have been a tribe of humans from the amazon, and it wouldn’t have looked any different.

Except…

Yep, that’s totally a human ribcage over the fire.

“How are we doing this?” Jessica whispered.

“Shock and awe.” Jeb said, reaching into his grenade bag and pulling out something small, heavy and brown. “I’m gonna nut all over these people.”

“Please, stop.”

Jeb hauled back and tossed the nut grenade out into the center of the peaceful village of obviously sapient civilians.

The nut arced high, tumbling in midair until it dropped about seventy feet in, just inside the first row of houses. Several frog-people glanced at it curiously, stepping closer to investigate.

Jeb flattened himself to the earth, and whispered into the ground.

“Nut go boom.”

There was a thunderous explosion, followed by a thrashing sound as telekinetic blades erupted out in every direction, chunking everything and everyone within fifty feet of the grenade. Straw houses collapsed in on themselves.

Frog-people screamed.

…And he was back in the hallway, staring down at his own bloodied corpse, crushed to the bed by the collapsed ceiling, blood leaking from his mouth as he desperately tried to breath.

My chest feels tight. Son of a bitch something’s on top of me, Jeb thought, straining to take off the armor so he could breathe. It took him at least thirty seconds fumbling with his armor until it was loose enough for him to inhale a good lungful of air.

Jesus, I’m still alive, I’m still alive, He chanted, trying to convince himself of it.

Small parts of him thought that maybe…just maybe he was lying there dying, all this craziness he was going through was the last neurons in his brain firing, trying to generate some kind of pattern from the lack of oxygen.

Fuck you, Jacob’s ladder. As if I didn’t have enough reasons to hate that movie anyway.

He envisioned the worming thought as a spike, slowly bursting its way through the ceiling, crushing his rational mind under its weight. Sometimes he didn’t feel the spike for months, but doing this?

This brought it all back.

“You coming?” Jessica asked, frowning down at where he was panting, staring up at the canopy, searching for signs of a collapsed roof while trying to shut out the sounds of screams.

“You’re real right?” Jeb asked, glancing over at her.

“I’ll take that as a maybe,” Jess said, leaping to her feet and diving into the chaos.

That alone gave him the impetus he needed to get to his feet.

You do not leave your team on their own.

That thought brought back the memories, and Jeb looked down at the ugly scar on his hand, where he’d slipped trying to lift the ceiling off of Tyler. He hadn’t gotten around to telling the therapist yet, but sometimes that scar was his only lineline. Proof that he’d survived. That he’d been the lucky one.

Jeb snorted. He didn’t feel like the lucky one, sometimes.

On and on we go, he thought, glancing up at the canopy where he could feel certain doom looming. The trees shook their branches comfortingly, sympathy written on their faces.

Yeah, I know. Gotta get to work.

Jeb walked out into the chaos, clomping forward with his cane, the knife and spear whipping around him like blender blades, puncturing or mauling anyone or anything stupid enough to get close to him.

The frog’s favorite weapons quickly became their undoing as the first round of warriors committed suicide by reflective bubble. After that, things got a little more dicey.

I should use my cane with the left hand, he realized after nearly dropping the ivory stick trying to hold onto it and shoot someone charging him with a claymore at the same time.

The creatures might prefer blowdarts, but that didn’t mean they didn’t have a plethora of alternatives.

I wonder if this is a side effect of the surge of humans in the forest? Otherwise I have no idea where they’re getting so much steel.

They had a tribal society and hut houses that would fit bush tribesmen, but they were armed to the teeth with steel swords and axes, presumably pilfered from unfortunate dead people.

Three more warriors dove out of a nearby hut as he passed by. He pinned two of them to the wall with the Penetrator and his trusty spearhead, the last one, he pointed a finger at.

“Pip six.”

The spike of telekinetically hardened air forced itself through the frogman’s chest. The creature stumbled a few times, looking down at the gushing hole with unmistakable confusion.

Jeb kept clomping along, his two blades pulling themselves out of the frogmen and bouncing along beside him. He kept them in nice and tight, so he could use them to stop more suicide charges if he had to.

He didn’t have a ‘technique’ yet. Nobody had a manual for how to maximize telekinetic combat effectiveness, so he was experimenting. Should I keep one in tight and one roaming? Should I have something defensive like a floating shield? A floating shield with a sharp edge? Well, if that’s the case, why not an oversized circular saw blade? It could do both.

It was with these kinds of thoughts that he and Jessica tore through the remaining krokkers, until they came upon the largest hut, practically a mansion by their standards.

You have gained a level!

You are now level 22!

There was a deep, reverberating croaking sound that rattled the walls of the hut. Then there was a bloom of orange light.

That was their only warning before a swarm of fireflies burst out of the house, spreading like the wings of a majestic – Oh crap, dodge!-

The fireflies weren’t yellow like your typical firefly. These things were Fire Flies, with big old Capital Letters. They were glowing a soft orange, and looked like something like sparks rising from a fire.

Except they were coming after him, closing in from nearly every direction except straight backwards.

Taking discretion as the better part of valor, Jeb flicked his knives backwards, dropped control over them, then telekinetically grabbed his armor and yanked himself backwards, skimming over the muddy center of the village with inhuman speed, barely escaping the swarm engulfing the area he’d just been.

Everywhere a Fire Fly touched caught on fire. Dirt, thatched roof, puddle of unidentified liquid. Nothing was off limits. Not interested in those touching me.

A frog-man waddled out of the hut, but unlike the others, this one was big. He had darker coloration, a huge girth, a mouth that was almost…

He looked like a toad. He was wearing what looked like ceremonial leathers, and wearing a big old hat. Everybody knows the guy with the biggest hat is in charge.

The toad-man was carrying a lantern that burned with inner fire.

Wait, that’s not inner fire, that’s Fire Flies! As he watched, three more fireflies left the Lantern and joined the swarm that was even then trying to engulf him again.

Okay, what do we have that works against flies, Jeb thought, dragging himself around the village, his feet not even touching the ground, all to stay out of the grasp of the buzzing swarm of firestarters.

His bullets weren’t big enough, none of his safety words were any good at fighting swarms.

Grenades, maybe? He would need some way to focus the blast, to make sure the flies felt the full force of the shock.

Yeah, that might work.

Jeb dragged himself in a wide circle, allowing the swarm to clump up on itself as it tried to chase him.

He dropped control over his armor, staggering to a halt before he siphoned Myst out, creating a large dome of telekinetic force around the flies, with a little hole in the front.

He fished out his rock grenade and tossed it through the opening only he could perceive.

“Rock go boom.”

The deafening sound of the explosive wave of force emanating outward, was somewhat muted by the dome of force. He’d designed the grenades to release a thunderclap of force to generate the ‘awe’ whereas the blades generated the ‘shock’.

In this case, the thunderclap was all that was needed, as the tiny bodies of the fireflies were crushed against the wall, with a spray of broken insects pouring out of the hole, setting his armor on fire from their residual heat.

Lucky, Jeb thought, suppressing his panic and tugging the last couple straps of his armor off, allowing it to fall away.

His eyebrows had seen better days, but he’d dealt with the –

“Look out!” Jeb glanced over and saw a sparkling bubble heading his direction at high speeds.

Rule of thumb: don’t let the other guy touch you with something if you can help it.

Jeb dropped to the ground, back splatting in the mud. The scintillating, multihued bubble rocketed over his head before punching a hole through the hut behind him.

But, it’s a bubble?

Jeb scrambled away, watching the toad’s neck expand in a very toad-like manner, before he opened his mouth, revealing…another bubble.

The toad’s tongue lashed out, spinning the bubble and sending it careening forward on a u-shaped path, like a rising fastball.

Jeb rolled to the side, siphoning two new strands of Myst out of himself, taking control of his stiletto and his cane.

The creature’s throat expanded again, and it created another bubble.

How many bubbles is this guy gonna make before he’s satisfied?  He instructed the stiletto to go wide, slipping out of the creature’s field of vision…hopefully. Their eyes were a little wideset. It held up the lantern, and another five Fire Flies flew out, joining the slowly repopulating swarm.

Jeb was instructing the knife to sneak up on the creature’s ankle when it did something unexpected.

The swarm of Fire Flies flew into the bubble, and it caught fire, burning up in an instant like a bit of flash paper.

The fuck?

A bright light came from behind him, followed by a searing pain in his right shoulder.

Jeb glanced over his shoulder and spotted the fastball bubble hovering above him, an orange glow slowly cooling from it.

Oh, so that’s how it is, huh? Jeb thought, his adrenaline drowning out the pain.

Then you won’t mind if I do this.

When the toad’s neck was billowing outward again, Jeb brought the stiletto skimming out from behind the hut closest to the toadman, hugging the ground as much as possible. It managed to avoid detection, striking just as the creature’s eyes were rolling back in its head, about to barf up another bubble.

The stiletto blasted a hole through the creature’s ankle, forcing it down onto its knees. Jeb reversed the knife’s trajectory, plunging through the shaman’s back, then through the top of its skull.

The toad-man collapsed to the ground with wide eyes and a strangled croak.

You have gained a level!

You have gained a level!

You are now level 24!

Congratulations! You have Beaten the Krokker Shaman R-R-RubU, in a one-on-one duel. Your Mastery of Myst is beyond reproach!

R-R-RubU’s Mysteries Accolade Granted!

+5 Myst

As usual, Jeb dropped his extra points into Myst, suffering through a mild headache for his troubles.

Jebediah Trapper

Mystic Trapsmith, Level 24

Body 10

Myst 52 +2

Nerve 18 +3

Abilities: Mystic Trigger

“How’d it go?” Jessica asked, landing beside him.

“My shields can’t observe heat, or light, or Myst. I’m not sure what he was using, there,” Jeb said, pointing at his right shoulder. “On the other hand, the fight was actually a lot easier than the other two. Most of that can be directly attributed to my class ability.”

Jessica stepped behind him and gave a sympathetic hiss.

“That burn doesn’t look great, but you’ve got superhuman healing, so…”

“Barely,” Jeb said with a chuckle, wincing as he headed over to the dead toad shaman. After searing pain in his right every time he moved his right arm, he settled for putting his arm in a makeshift sling.

“You gonna use your cane?” She asked.

“I dunno. How bad was it?”

“Really red and swollen.” She said. “Like the worst sunburn ever.”

“No charred skin?” he asked.

Jessica shook her head.

“Then I should be fine. We’ll save the cane for life threatening emergencies. Thankfully, injuries don’t impact my combat performance that much.”

“Says the guy limping along with a cane and a sling.”

Jeb chuckled as he knelt beside the shaman, setting down the cane to investigate the lantern. It was one of those box-like ones with an opening glass door on the front and three more glass panels topped with a metal ceiling with a brass hoop to hold it by.

Lantern of Fire Flies

Built by the most legendary Krokker artisans who have left their forest homes to study magical design in Marid cities, this lantern is designed to aid weak Myst users by drawing small amounts of the user’s Myst and converting it into controllable Fire Flies.

Against stronger enemies, this is little more than a gimmick, but it’s extremely effective against weaker creatures.

Once the lantern is full, it stops drawing Myst, waiting to be used.

“Me likey.”

Jeb awkwardly tied the lantern to the growing collection of knick knacks in his belt with one hand.

“You need some help with that?” Jess asked, raising a brow.

“Naah, I’m good.” Jeb said, picking up the cane with his left hand and standing up with a grunt. Between his magical girl stick, sacks of darts, grenades, and lenses, he was starting to take on the appearance of a medieval peddler.

Damn Ron and his endless supply of free porters.

Ding!

Your party has cleared the Krokker Village! Please take your rewards.

Jeb didn’t even flinch away from the sphincters anymore. It was just a fact of life at this point. The Myst deposited two chests in the center of the village, which was burning merrily, riddled with frog-people corpses.

Jessica made it to the chests before him, opening both of them before he could even get to the closest one.

“That’s petty,” Jeb muttered, clomping along to catch up, his pain and missing foot slowing him down substantially. “What’d we get?”

“Two Body potions.” She said, frowning.

“Not bad.”

“I get the next boss. You’re caught up,” She said, holding both the potions and eyeing him critically.

“More than fair,” Jeb said, to which she tossed him the potion. He caught it in his left hand, letting the cane fall to the ground in the process, nearly losing his balance.

“I can’t believe you’re more dangerous than I am.” She said, shaking her head.

“That’s subjective,” Jeb said before downing the red liquid. It tasted…silty.

“Doesn’t seem like it to me.” Jess replied with a small smile.

Did she just make a joke? I mean, sure it was a terrible play on words, but still, it’s something.

+3 Body

“Aw man, you drank the potions!” A voice came from the far side of the village, and Jeb glanced over, spotting a group of some fifteen humans emerging from the woods.

Fifteen. That’s a lot.

They were, on average, better equipped than Jeb, but worse off than Jessica.

Their armor was a patchwork of different sources, their weapons running the gamut between heavy tree branches and glowing swords.

“Can we help you?” Jessica asked, eyes narrowing.

“No, no,” the man in the lead said, holding up his hands. “Just, those potions are worth a lot in trade.” He was wielding the glowing sword, of course, and his armor was more cohesive than the others.

That meant he was probably the toughest they had to offer. Jeb made a note of it. If he had to take someone out of the fight first, that would be the guy.

No one says you’ve got to fight anybody. Jeb corrected himself. Still…

The newcomer scanned the burning village. “You guys do all of this one your own?”

“That’s right,” Jessica said with a shrug.

The man whistled in appreciation. “Look, my name’s David,” he said, slowly reaching into his pocket and pulling out a scrap of paper. “We’re forming an army to take down the World Tortoise. This is where our base is.”

He showed them a scrawled image of the forest with an x on it. Jeb oriented on the lake and mountain, estimating their base to be about twenty miles northeast.

“We could use every able body,” He said to Jessica, his gaze flickering to Jeb’s arm and missing leg. “If you guys can beat a miniboss with just the two of you, you’d be more than welcome.”

Jessica glanced at Jeb before looking back at David. “We’ll think about it.”

“Well, don’t take too long, the safe zones expire in two days.” David said with a shrug. “We’re gonna make our attempt before then.”

“Who’s in charge?” Jeb asked.

“Pardon?”

“Who’s running the show?” Jeb asked. “Who’s the one pushing you to kill the tortoise in the next two days?”

“His name’s Freeman, a level forty-two Phantom Brawler.” David said, a huge smile breaking on his face. “Watching him fight makes me glad he’s on our side, you know what I mean?”

Jeb couldn’t really ask any more without seeming nosy, but the big smile on the guy’s face suggesting this Freeman dude wasn’t abusive, at least not to David.

Jessica glanced at Jeb.

“Yeah, I know what you mean.”

“I don’t know what good I’ll be like this,” Jeb said, wiggling his wounded arm. “But if you’ve got stuff to trade, I’d be willing to stop by your safe zone.

“Oh, sure, we’ve got stuff to trade. This husband and wife, Ned and Amy, took the Soldier and Healer classes, and together they can restore people or gear back to full in a matter of seconds. They’ve got a pretty decent stash of stuff as a result.”

“I’m familiar with the soldier class,” Jeb said, nodding.

Buy broken gear off people, fix it up and get healed by the wifey, then trade it for other stuff. Not a bad racket. I’m surprised the fellow didn’t get the Merchant class…Assuming it exists.

“That reminds me, David said, pulling out his sword and brandishing it in front of him. the sword flopped over like a limp dick. “I’m a Swiftblade, I can change the shape of my Weapon. What are your classes?”

“Jessica. I’m a Soldier,” Jessica lied with a straight face.

“Jeb. Beggar,” Jeb followed suit. “I scrounge more treasure than average.” With his numerous pouches and stuff hanging off the rope slung around him, he totally fit the picture, too.

“Jess keeps it in good condition with her Soldier Ability by saccing health.” Jeb offered that to remind Jessica of the Soldier class Ability if she didn’t already know.

“I never heard of the Beggar Class, but I can see how you might have gotten it with that,” David said, nodding at his leg.

“Yeah, a combat Class wasn’t in the cards after this baby,” Jeb said tapping his cane on the peg supporting him.

“Look forward to seeing both of you.” David said, nodding, then the squad turned and left.

“What are you thinking?” Jessica asked him.

“I’m thinking we check in on Ron, see if we can’t score another Boss or two, then do some recon on these people.”

“And then?”

“Well, if they’re not mustache twirling villains, we’ll probably barter with them a bit before leaving them to die.”