Eternium ~ Chapter 22!

<Hey, Dani. Want to watch Dale fight Manny?> I called over to my lovely Wisp, glad I had remembered; even if the battle had already started. <It’s already started!>

“Feces, Cal!” Dani zipped over as I connected my sight to a viewing screen. “Give a Wisp some warning!”

Dale appeared on the wall just as he was sliding under a paw swing that would have torn him in half before he reached the Mage ranks. There was a collective cheer in the area as a few Bobs clustered closer to see what was happening. As Dale went under the paw, he punched upward into Manny’s wrist and put the Manticore off balance. 

It was an interesting conundrum for me. I knew that Mana increased physical abilities, but it still astounded me to see a human punch a creature ten times his size and make the Beast stumble or go flying. Manny was really hard to keep off balance though, as he had excellent control of his multiple limbs and body. He turned the stumble into a stab, jabbing Dale with a thick spike. Ha! He would have a nasty bruise in the morning if he survived this.

Dale had gone tumbling away, but now he grabbed a rock in his left hand. Was he going to throw it at…? Mana surged into his hands, and he crushed the rock as he brought his hands together. A bolt of eye-searing lightning erupted from his palms, hitting Manny in the wing and causing it to spasm uncontrollably.

<What in the…? He figured out lightning? Watt?> I glanced sidelong at Dani. <This is a shocking development.>

Dani ignored me. Back to the fight.

Manny sat down on the stone floor and glared at Dale. Dale caught his breath, seemed to focus, and stomped. The floor around him collapsed downward, trapping the Manticore tail that was moving through the tunnel beneath him. Manny screeched and pulled on his tail in an attempt to dislodge it from the floor, but it was slow going. Dale took a few deep breaths, focusing inward and building to a crescendo of Mana usage. He stepped forward, punching out and breathing, “Pah!”

If I hadn’t been able to see Mana, I would have had no idea what he had just done. Manny’s head slipped from his body even as the mirrored ceiling above him shattered in a spectacular explosion. Dale had used a technique, he absolutely must have. His Mana had flowed into a pattern and captured a thin line of air. Then his movement had sent the empowered gust at Manny, where it acted as a garrote; a cutting wire of super-compressed air that had broken down after reaching the target and began rapidly expanding.

The cut it had initially made had been small, and possibly not even deadly. But as the air expanded, it had created a cavitation bubble inside Manny that literally tore his head off. Then the leftover energy had continued forward and rebounded off the ceiling, making it look like an explosion. Something I had seen inside Dale had me even more excited than the fight had been. I had never noticed what actually happened when someone activated a technique, because their innards weren’t visible to me. Even Dale’s hadn’t been until recently, but he hadn’t used a technique in my depths since well before then.

<Dale… do you have any idea what you’ve just done?> I slowly asked the human.

“Looks like I won.” Dale smirked even as he sat down to conserve energy. Heat was rolling off of him, a sure sign that the technique he just used wasn’t even close to mastered yet. “So, about that mountain.”

<Yeah, yeah. You’ll get your token.> It can’t actually be that easy… can it? <Hey, Dale? Want to try a new technique?>

“What?” Dale popped to his feet, excitement glowing on his face. Oh wait. That’s body heat from overuse of Mana. “Someone lost a technique in here?”

<Mmm.> I murmured noncommittally. Which one, which one? I’ve been using this a lot, quickly turn it into a memory stone, add in the constraints needed for moving through flesh, and… <Here you go!>

A memory stone dropped out of the air, quickly caught by Dale. He pressed it to his head, looking up in confusion after looking it over. “That’s odd.”

Drat. <What, ah, what’s the matter, Dale?>

“This must have been from a super amazing memory stone crafter. There aren’t any emotions attached to it, no strange memories of the actual creation process. Just… pure information.” Dale looked at the stone in his hand in amazement.

<Why don’t you try it out? Here, I’ll give you a target.> A moment later, a Basher appeared in the room. It hopped around in confusion. <Sorry little guy, you only get to live for about thirty seconds.>

I turned my attention to Dale, who had his hand outstretched. A look of intense concentration was showing on his face, and the air began to distort around his hands. He pressed his hand down, and the Basher squeaked and splattered on the floor. Dale stopped using his Mana, staring at the remains of the Basher in shock. “What just happened?”

<I learned how to make techniques is what happened.> I informed him smugly. <All you have to do is move your Mana through your meridians in a certain pattern, then hold that pattern out in the world, right?>

“Right?”

<What you are actually doing is creating a Rune, and converting Mana into the type of Mana or Essence needed for the Rune to work!> I shouted in excitement. <That’s why not everyone can use every type of technique, why they need to have a certain amount of affinity for it! That must also be why you can’t put Runes on flesh, it distorts the natural meridian pathways below! I’ve just made a massive breakthrough, Dale!>

“I’m happy for you.” Dale looked at his hand and then the Basher once more. “What was that? What did I do?”

<Ah. Gravity… spell? It’s a Rune, not an inborn ability, and ‘technique’ sounds silly after I finally know what they actually are. Since you are spelling out the Rune in your body and pushing out what you ‘spell’, I’m calling it a spell now.> I saw his confusion, and realized that I was getting off on a tangent. <You made the bunny too heavy. It went squish. Do it again to make other things go squish. Add more Mana to make the squish harder and faster.>

“It took so little Mana though.” Dale sat down and crossed his arms. “Why was this so much more effective than the other memory stones and techniques I’ve studied?”

<Spells.> I corrected him, getting an eye roll in return. <If you want to know why things work correctly, use the words I use. The reason it was better, was because I know exactly what needed to be done and this was tailored directly to your meridians. Using someone else’s spell, that they created for themselves, will always be inefficient.>

“Does this mean I can master this… spell really easily?” Dale was excited about that prospect, and for good reason. He had been able to direct his Mana more precisely than with any other tech… spell. Dale could also feel that this was more directly powerful than his other options, and mastering it would mean that he could use it nigh-instantly and with very little cost.

<It should. Gotta warn you, even though it is a high tier spell it isn’t gonna be too useful against other Mages unless you really outclass them. At best you’ll slow to a standstill. I have a floor set up with hundreds of this Rune interlocking and empowering each other. Even then, half the time Mages will survive going through them. The shock lets the Boss finish them pretty easily though.> I could see that Dale had a lot to process and play with, so I figured it was time for me to do other things.

<Here’s the token for a mountain.> A wooden chip dropped down and bounced off his head. <Here’s a keygem for the next floor, I’d go check it out if I were you.>

Oh, hold on. The next floor was all golems. He had seen it before. Eh. Whatever, the portal was in the entryway of that floor. Dale would figure it out. Until then, I had a lot more work to do. My panic… orb… was coming along nicely. I had reinforced it again, but this time with Wards and Cores. Even if the planet were destroyed, my little safe area should now keep me safe, secure, and well-fed for a few decades if I rationed properly. 

All I would need to do then is secure a new source of Essence and hope for the best.