Dokeshi March ~ 4!

“What should we do?” Grant began pacing up and down the hallway of the abandoned house they had found. The lack of a roof over most of the building, due to some long-ago fire, was probably the main reason why not even the extremely destitute of the small city had moved in. “If they ask around, I’m sure House Tuesday can figure it out. They’ll be tracking us down in no time!”

“We already took the potions to hide our names. Now isn’t the time to worry about things we can’t change.” The name above Suki had changed from Pugilist Friday to Suki Saturday. Grant had changed his from Grant Monday to Grant Friday. He wasn’t very good at coming up with new names. “What we need to figure out now is what to do with this guy.”

The man they had saved was looking pretty rough. He was bleeding from his nose, and the shift to his back had made him spit up more blood from his mouth.

“What else did House Saturday give you before we left?” Grant shuffled through his own pack, gifted to him by the people of District February. He hadn’t had time to look at everything inside it yet. “I think I saw some bandages in here.”

“I can do better than a bandage.” Suki pulled a small wooden box from her much smaller pack. Grant, being the winner of their last battle, had been forced to carry the heavier of the two. She pulled free a light pink vial and held it up for his inspection. “We have ten healing potions, five for each of us. I think we should give him one of the weaker ones.”

Grant nodded his agreement, and she poured it down their prone charge’s throat. The weak man coughed a bit, but he was too damaged to do anything other than drink the thick fluid.

<It’s going to take a few minutes for that to work. No sense in sitting idly by while some stranger you have never met absorbs an extremely valuable item you certainly could have used for yourself later.> An orange-tinted bird dropped from the sky, talons aimed for Grant’s eyes. <Time to train!>

The reflexes drilled into Grant’s muscle memory meant it was almost effortless to dispatch the imaginary bird with the lightning-quick use of Iaijutsu, the quick-draw sword technique which Grant had recently gained a rank in. As the next bird darted for his back, Grant rolled backwards into the room across the hall to give himself some space to maneuver. “Sarge, don’t you think it would be a better idea for me to go outside before you start attacking me?”

A blob of orange slime dropped onto his face, burning his eyes. “Bwharagha!”

<You need to practice fighting in tight quarters. It’s only a matter of time until you get trapped in a confined space and need to defend yourself. Can’t always jump out of trees to impale spiders the size of ex-Lord January.> Sarge continued explaining over Grant’s grunting struggles. <So don’t you worry one little bit; this environment is a great training space!>

Grant knew that the acidic slime trying to crawl down his throat wasn’t corporeal, but that didn’t make the burning on his face feel any less real. While it was still attacking him, a glowing orange man came around the corner and jabbed at him with a spear. Grant managed to interpose his sword between the spear and his body, but that moment of distraction allowed the slime to go straight up his nose. He collapsed to his knees, his sinuses in agony. The shaft of the spear smashing into his head ended his pain.

“By the Regent, what was that?” Grant blinked his eyes open and got up on all fours. He shook his head in an attempt to clear it from the jarring effects of his false death. “How am I supposed to fight a slime with a sword?”

<I guess that fancy new lightning spell you got is just going to sit around and do nothing? Or is using the side of your blade to knock an enemy away too much to ask?> Grant paused in shame when he realized he had completely forgotten about the new spell he had gained after becoming the new Lord February. <You need to remember to use all the tools at your disposal. A true samurai never neglects such a simple thing. Never forget a sword is but a tool, and it can be used for more than just cutting.>

“Sarge, I’m not a samurai.” Grant rubbed at his face, still feeling the phantom sting of the acidic slime. “I never even agreed to becoming a samurai. I’m just a Wielder, and-”

<Just-? Listen here, you’re not a samurai yet. If you want to live to see your next birthday, you had better do your level best to become one.>

“I don’t even know what that means.” Grant had heard Sarge angry before, but his current tone was something different: the sword was truly upset with him. In an attempt to distract himself, Grant pulled up his spell description.

Elemental Spell: Thundering Step

Prerequisites: 65 Mind. Two feet. Metal weapon.

Active Mode: Create a static field in a five foot radius around you that damages others when they move through the area. Does not move from the point it was set. Lasts five seconds.

Mana cost: 10 per use.

Damage (Self): 0% Mental cultivation.

Damage (Other): 100% Mental cultivation per second.

Training Mode: Increase movement speed by 50% while out of combat. Combat is defined as not dealing or taking damage from an opponent for five seconds.

Mana cost: 10% per second. Mana regen halted while active.

“If I had activated that spell, it would have done seventy three damage per second? Isn’t that a little overpowered?” Grant reviewed his stats to verify his calculation. “I could kill all kinds of enemies with this spell!”

<Ha! You wish. It takes ten mana just to activate it, and you only have nineteen. You can only activate this spell once before having to wait to activate it again. Plus, you are completely forgetting that you aren’t the only person with spell damage reduction.> Sarge let out a small sigh, <This is the Late Spring District. Even ‘regular’ clothing provides a slight amount of armor. Our enemies will be harder to kill, even as we become able to kill them more easily. Oh, and it’ll deal just a hair over eighty damage per second. You forgot to add in your ten percent increase from Lightning Attunement.>

“Oh. So I did. Even better. Do you think I shouldn’t use the spell?” Grant forced himself to his feet, spitting to get the residual taste of slime off his tongue. “At least it provides a speed boost when we are training.”

Instead of getting an immediate answer, another orange-tinted slime dropped onto Grant. This time, it was large enough to encase his entire body. <Did I say don’t use it, you foolish mortal? No! All I’m saying is don’t expect to go around blastin’ all your enemies with a thunderstorm like some pansy wizard from bedtime stories! Use your tools!>

Grant couldn’t say anything in reply, otherwise the acidic slime would crawl into his mouth. Instead, he concentrated through the pain and activated Thundering Step in active mode. Power rolled off him, and a five-foot column of brown lightning radiated outward. The effects were immediate, causing the slime to spasm with the electric shock.

Unfortunately for Grant, the ‘zero damage done to the spell caster’ effect didn’t negate the lightning traveling through the slime. He was squeezed, burned, and shocked all at the same time. After the five-second spell timer wore off, the slime collapsed into a puddle, freeing Grant from its embrace. If the slime had been real, and the lightning rebound hadn’t been a simulation from Sarge, Grant would have just turned himself into a charred husk. Even with his armor and cultivation reducing the magical damage by fifty, Grant would have still lost one hundred and fifty health: nearly half his total.

<Lesson understood?>

“Sarge, I have a question for you.” Grant was gasping in a futile attempt to catch his breath. “What day is it today?”

<I believe it’s past midnight, so that would make today a Monday,> Sarge told him after a brief pause to determine where the line of questioning was coming from.

“Well then, it’s official.” He got back to his feet, shaking out his limbs to try to relieve some of the pain from the shocks. “I really hate Mondays.”