Chapter 111: Learner’s Permit

Extensive training has increased your Attributes!

+1 Stability

Calvinian Summoning has reached level 19!

Why can’t you just cut all the sprues at once…

Ugh. Calvin was pissed he hadn’t thought of it.

After some conferring with Elliot and the two levels in drafting, Calvin thought to draw up a design to use as a reference, allowing him to raise the number of swords visualized simultaneously to ten.

Between that and dissolving the sprues all at once at the very end, Calvin was able to lower his Bent required to make a hundred swords down to twenty-one rather than sixty, which left him plenty to help the Abyssians with their basic needs.

For as long as the stream of Bent from Nadia held.

A wordless moan echoed in the distance, followed by another that was decidedly not female. Then Calvin’s Bent ticked up.

16/19 Bent remaining.

“Is she…” Kala asked, frowning as her gaze tracked the sound on the other side of the cave, hidden behind obstructing stalagmites.

“I don’t know, and I don’t need to know.” Calvin said, making a few sawblades and a handful of chisels of different shapes for the craftsmen who needed them, liquid metal dripping off his hands as he pulled them out of the vat.

You think she found a way to make the Lady Killer mutation work on dudes? That would be important to know.

Maybe she makes them feel like women, Calvin thought, fighting off the urge to grin.

Ewww…and yet, I’m strangely intrigued.

Calvin rolled his eyes, then glanced over at the Knick-Knacks making armor for the villagers, as well as the infusion vats the finished products were resting in.

Calvin didn’t want to spend a week customizing each and every piece for armor and working out the kinks, as everyone’s body shape and range of movement was slightly different.

Making full plate with the Abyssal Steel was far too demanding on Calvin’s time and Bent, so he decided to change materials.

Studded Leather was a good option.

Calvin had made a few thousand rings of Abyssal Steel, then assigned a dozen or so extra large Knick-Knacks to fishing up and transporting creatures, while his wasps killed anything they brought up.

Rufe was overseeing the fishing operation just outside the village’s cave, and Calvin checked in with his Knick-knacks every now and then to make sure the old hunter was safe and things were progressing well.

So far they’d caught five Toads, a dozen Querda, a couple more Crystal Lattices, and a Husker that Calvin was eager to tinker with.

Old Salt has reached level 11!

Querda had a lot more surface area than the Toads, there were a lot more of them, and their skins were softer, smoother, and easier to process.

On the other hand, they weren’t nearly as tough as the Toad’s thick hides.

The solution was to boil the toad hides down and filter their glue several times until they made a vat of scintillating concentrate.

Abyssal Alchemy has reached level 3!

The Knick-Knacks, meanwhile, cleaned and dried the silky blueish Querda hide in record time, took measurements and stitched together perfectly fitted suits of soft leather armor. They even took the time to stitch the owner’s name on the collar.

Of course, soft armor was an oxymoron, and the clothes offered little in the way of actual protection, until the Knick knacks sewed the rings into place with strong leather straps.

Still, the actual protection wasn’t great, at least until the whole thing got a bath in concentrated Toad Glue.

They left all the pieces of armor simmering at a temperature well below boiling overnight, allowing them to absorb the concentrated essence of the toad’s force-resistant skin.

Calvin lifted the first piece of armor out of the infusion vat, wiping it down with a cloth to see what it looked like dry. The matte light blue leather had darkened to nearly black with a shimmering blue color underneath that reminded him of a beetle’s carapace, studded with silver rings of Abyssal Steel.

Not a bad look. Ominous, yet pretty.

Calvin rapped his knuckles against the armor. The Toad Glue soak had toughened it up, adding a great deal more rigidity to the armor. Not only that, about three inches away from the armor itself, Calvin felt something absorbing the force of his knock, as if he were forcing his hand through caramel or some kind of thick syrup, absorbing maybe three quarters the force of the blow, resulting in a light, slow tap.

Gods, I could go for some syrup.

Eating foul-tasting meats every day was driving him crazy.

Well, Calvin thought as he turned the cuirass over in his hands, studying the entire thing from top to bottom. It looks like the armor was a success.

Calvin eyed the name on the collar of the armor.

Calvin Gadsint – Wizard King.

Like I wouldn’t make myself some armor too, Calvin thought, setting it aside to cool and dry some more before he put it on.

Calvin raised his eyes, glancing around at the village. More people than usual were out of their tents, quickly overcrowding the cave, what with the Knick-Knacks, and their workspace opposite the Water Press.

They had a reason to be out of their tents, though. Something new was happening.

The villager’s eyes were burning with hope and enthusiasm. Even a day later, they were still marveling at the swords he’d made for them.

“Look at this,” one of them said, motioning to a heavily bandaged hand that was oozing blood. “I got distracted when I was testing the blade and I almost lost my hand! Isn’t that great!?” the man held up his wounded hand with a grin of pride.

“You’re telling me. I set it down wrong and it literally sank into my Unqua’s back. The poor thing’s fine now, but by the gods, I can’t wait to try this on something that deserves it.”

The woman stared down into the silvery metal with a malicious grin that was strangely doubled by the mirror-smooth plane of Abyssal Steel.

The two of them saw Calvin watching them, and straightened, giving Calvin a salute before they walked away, glancing over their shoulders.

Boring.

What’s boring?

Kingdom Building.

The frustration of delayed gratification began bubbling out of Calvin.

I just want to make cool new spells, but being a Wizard King involves so much helping people, I think I’m gonna go crazy.

Hey, most people don’t understand that their dream job is still a job. Nobody ever said it wasn’t work. Learn to live with the boring parts, kid. If you were just developing new spells all day, someone else would be the wizard king and you’d be giving those spells to him. Or her.

I understand you’ve got a one-track mind, and any interruption from that is incredibly irritating. That’s something I had to deal with too. Try compartmentalizing your current obsession, put it on a shelf, and set it aside until you can get back to it.

Calvin took a deep breath. The weapons were done. The armor was progressing nicely, and the fishing was being taken care of by Rufe and the summons. He had time to scratch the itch.

17/18 Bent remaining.

Calvin gave Chained Spirit a mental tug, signaling that Nadia was done for the day. Whether or not she actually stopped pretending to be a demon succubus was up to her, as long as she stopped flooding Calvin with Bent.

Seems like she takes her jobs seriously when she enjoys them.

Giving your minions a job that they enjoy and excel at. What a novel concept.

I’m not that dense.

Calvin let Kala know what he was up to, then went out of the village to join Rufe, where the hunter was watching the Knick-knacks reel in another Toad, which was being swarmed by wasps.

They weren’t using Nadia as bait today, because she didn’t need to be distracted while she was acting as his siphon.

Instead, a disposable wasp was tied up by the knick-knacks between each throw. It worked out just fine, because the mindless creatures replaced themselves, care of Bad Penny.

Calvin climbed out of the Unqua as soon as it was out onto the platform, spotting the hunter standing beside the low stone wall the Knick-knacks had made to replace the railing they’d taken away.

Something about OSHA standards, according to Elliot.

Rufe was standing with his arms crossed, chewing something as he watched the pebble-skinned creature hauled up to the platform, an oozing mound of spell ingredients waiting to happen sitting beside him.

“How do you deal with the Crystal Lattices?” Calvin asked, eyeing the inert lumps of crystal beside the man.

“Carefully. They’re not too much trouble if you’re handy with a sling.” He said, revealing a Toad-skin sling on his waist.

Yeah right.

The man probably had a Sling Ability that was able put the creatures down. Calvin couldn’t imagine them being defeated with a couple marble sized rocks.

As long as Rufe could beat them, Calvin wasn’t going to worry about it.

“Are you worried about overfishing at all?” Calvin asked as the Knick-knacks began prepping the bait again.

“Nope. There’s an entire world on the other side there, so I don’t think our little community could make a dent. Even if we do, Toads and Querdas are basically the bottom of the food chain on the other side, from what I’ve seen. There’s things a lot worst than them down there, and depriving those things of a food source should make them seek prey elsewhere.

“Worse things…like the Brain leeches?” Calvin asked.

“Yeah, like that. We starve those things out, they stop coming up here. I’d happily take less catch in exchange.”

“As long as you don’t run out of water.”

“I don’t think that will be a problem,” He said, giving Calvin a rare grin. “Not with you getting us out of here.”

Calvin was hit by a strange, awful sense of responsibility as the man placed his hopes in him.

“I already told you not to get your hopes up.” Calvin said.

“Too late now. You armed everyone to the teeth. People are clamoring to make groups and go exploring the side-tunnels with their new weapons. You could die right now, and people would still be looking for the exit. You gave them hope. And weapons.”

Ugh.

Calvin distracted himself from the weight of expectation tightening his shoulders by kneeling down and inspecting his new spell component, the Husker.

The creature had six legs, a stinger at the back, and was fat. It looked something like a caterpillar with big, clamping fish-lips at the front.

“Ah, the Husker,” Rufe said, glancing over as Calvin inspected it. “It doesn’t move very fast, or very well, but it’s husks make up for that.”

“How so?” Calvin asked, running his fingers over the rubbery surface.

“It sheds its skin twice a week,” Rufe said. “Creates husks – hence the name – these husks serve as decoys and reinforcements, and they move on their own. If you wander into a nest of them, the husks will pin you down with these big, grabby mouthparts,” Rufe nudged the dead creature’s mouth with his shoe – “While the main body plants its eggs in you.”

“After that –“ Rufe shrugged and blew a raspberry. “Probably better to put you out of your misery.”

“Interesting…” Calvin said, mind awhir with possibilities.

“You think you could make some kinda magic out of that thing?” Rufe asked.

“I know I could.” Calvin said.

Harvester.

16/18 Bent remaining.

The Husker separated into it’s individual organs, and Calvin carefully put each of them in a sealed container, away from this bacteria thing that Elliot kept telling him about.

In the midst of all the familiar guts, there was a dark red organ that looked a bit like a brain, but it was too red, and threaded with blackened Bent veins.

When Calvin picked it up, the floppy pile of skin twitched slightly, as black Bent oozed out of the strange organ, evaporating into the atmosphere.

Interesting… Calvin felt his manic grin coming back as all of his other concerns faded into background noise.

***The One Who Learns***

It came to think of itself as Learner.

Over time Learner identified the natural order inside this strange Matterspace. The Manifold Predator was one of the four-limbed prey creatures that seemed native to this place…or perhaps not native to this place, exactly, but native to somewhere else.

The hints to support this idea were many.

Despite being poor at creating disruptions in other creature’s physical forms, they were adept at taking advantage of the quirks of Matterspace to their advantage, using some kind of strange…energy to often come out on top, despite the disparity in size, or, a new concept Learner had come to understand…Strength.

Strength and size were generally linked, but they were not the same think. Strength was a concept of how much Matterspace a creature could influence at one time with it’s body.

Learner’s strength wasn’t remarkable, because its units weren’t able to handle the stress…another unique concept. Even after adopting a shape similar two the large prey animal with two limbs, Learner wasn’t able to exercise the same amount of Strength. The units simply sloughed off of each other.

Learner absorbed parts of one of the two-legged prey animals until it stopped moving. A strange thing.

In it’s home, creatures only diminished, only gone when they had been completely consumed. For something to stop moving after only a fifteen percent of it’s body ahd been turned into Learner’s units, was something unique to this reality.

It wasn’t resisting any longer, so learner peeled the outer layer of units away from the creature, trying to find the secret of Strength.

There, Learner thought, poking the hard white units at the center. They were rigid, locked together intrinsically…

As a matter of fact, they aren’t even units! These structures were created by units!

Taking in non-unit materials to create porous, rigid internal structures, that Units can live inside, while the structure absorbs the weight.

Learner discovered Bones.

Requires more study.

Applying the concept of specialized units, Learner focused all of its attention on the units in its right limb. It placed the limb on the ground, instructing its units to create a porous latticework out of the materials available and place it inside its body.

This is more difficult than I thought, Learner thought as it’s units were sluggish to respond, making little more than an odd sand inside it’s limbs. It was no stronger than before.

Why?

After a few hours of study, Learner figured out the problem. With nothing to bind the Matterspace together, it wouldn’t form a rigid structure. It needed a way to reattach the grains of matterspace back together inside itself.

How do I solve this? Learner was pondering the solution to this, when the Manifold predator arrived, emerging from one of the squat prey animals and making noises at the Prey Who Pulls.

The Prey Who Pulls made noises back.

Strange, indescipherable bursts of sound that must signify something. In the short time since it had arrived, Learner had seen several four-limbed creatures make those strange hoots at each other, often followed by action.

He’d seen one approach another, make a series of hoots, then one had given the other a piece of Matterspace in response. The hooter had then walked away and used the Matterspace to solve some kind of problem.

It was a strange form of communication, Learner realized, allowing them to express their needs to each other…

Learner softly repeated the hoots to itself. It would have to pay close attention to desipher the meaning. Before Learner had thought it was a simple call, and repeating it would be enough to fool these creatures, but having experienced the breadth of the variety of hoots, it realized it would have to learn all of them to have any chance of using them.

The Manifold Predator’s head raised, and it turned it’s eyes toward Learner’s hiding place. It’s face wrinkled a bit before it put it’s head down again and resumed its task.

The Manifold Predator seemed to have some connection with Sight, and knew when it was being observed…at least, visually.

Learner had taken to observing it, for The Manifold Predator was a veritable font of ideas for Learner’s own self-defence.

Today it was using heat and water to render down a three-tongued prey animal’s organs, mixing them with an odd paste made from a crystal-lattice’s juices, then giving them to Prey Who Pulls.

Did Prey Who Pulls rank higher than the Manifold Predator?

Manifold predator produced a similar blue chunk from nowhere, and used it’s limp to crush it against it’s center.

Almost faster than Learner could see, the Crystal-lattice paste expanded to cover all of The Manifold Predator.

Odd. Very odd.

Learner had no idea what this ritual entailed. Breeding? Dominance? Learner was lost.

Then the Manifold Predator took out a shimmering…stinger-looking thing, and poked itself.

The incredibly thin layer of crystal stopped the stinger, and the Prey Who Pulls looked down at the blue ball in its hand, nodded, then put it into an empty pouch on it’s belly.

Protection! The Manifold Predator offered Protection.

Learner wondered if Learner could do that, too.

Learner changed one appendage into Crystal Lattice, the other into Three-Tounged Prey.

Learner started experimenting.

After a large amount of time, and losing a few chunks of units, Learner hadn’t mastered the protection device, but it had found a way to use Crystal Lattice juices to create bones, raising it’s Strength many-fold.

*Several days later

So many things to learn, Learner thought as it sat there, waiting for The Manifold Predator to arrive again. It had taken to observing it to the exclusion of other things, only eating when it had to.

Learner was starting to understand the reasons behind the creature’s behavior.

It was intelligence. Taking creature’s defence mechanisms and adapting them into tools to make itself a predator. Learner liked it.

Today it had removed an organ from a Husker and was channeling a strange substance through aforementioned organ to make the creature’s outer units twitch, even after death.

Hours went by and Learner watched in awe as The Manifold Predator heated the Husker’s outer units down to a liquid, then strung together a strange little decoration out of bones. It tossed the decoration into the hot liquid, exchanging hooting noises with the Prey Who Pulls for an interminable amount of time, before pulling the decoration back out.

The Manifold Predator held the organ in it’s limb and Learner watched as the decoration began crawling, awkwardly at first, then faster and faster, until it began flying, making itself small and then big, then small again, nearly reaching Learner’s hiding space.

Requires more study.

Learner snapped its fingers together, its units creating a blue paste on its middle finger that was crushed against its palm, dampening the sound.

A fraction of a second later, a thin crystal coating covered its entire body.

***Calvin***

Bent Manipultion has reached level 2!

You’re right, it doesn’t need to stay on the ground. He thought as the bone spider whipped through the air, its body moving in response to the Bent Calvin was circulating through the Husker’s preserved Control Organ. It was delicate work, as the thing was a little too enthusiastic sometimes.

He had to carefully pull bent out and circulate it through the organ and back into himself, in the right spots to get it to do what he wanted. It was like learning to walk over again…with his Bent.

Needless to say it was weird, but it was making something fly around on it’s own, and that was enough to make Calvin happy.

What should we call it? Bone Drone?

It seems to work with living material, not necessarily only bone. Drone, or Golem would be appropriate?

Wood golem?

If we ever see a tree again…

Calvin felt a flash of cautious curiosity as someone spied on him again. As soon as he looked that direction, the gaze was gone.

If they wanted to watch up close, I wouldn’t care that much, Calvin thought, shaking his head. As long as they didn’t distract me.

Honestly, just talking to Rufe around a boiling pot is getting boring.

I know, right? Calvin thought, bringing the bone spider in to land on his arm. The proof of concept was already starting to fray where the leather binding it together was coming undone, but he’d learned everything he could right now about the way the Husker’s magic worked.

Maybe there was a way to make a floating weapon, or a suit of armor that reinforced its wearer’s strength, or even dragged an unconscious user away from the fight. The possibilities were astounding.

I want more.