(Vol 2) Chapter 8: Managing Any Jelly, That's All

She still had a few other alerts. Mirror Sense had been tweaked:

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Mirror Sense (at will): Open mirror faces in the material world are a part of you, your sense of them increasing with their clarity and your deliberate focus. You can see and hear through them. Subjects can be focused on to narrow a search. An enshrouded or hidden mirror can only be very vaguely sensed and provides no input. Level determines versatility and sensitivity.

Level 2: See/hear through mirrors of moderate or better reflection quality and manufactured design, or other not-roughly-disturbed mirrored surfaces at least able to show a 15x15 centimeter square picture (such as a polished shield or reflective water surface). Passive awareness is minor, requiring significant engagement or activity. Familiarity (with a mirror or subject) increases sensitivity.

Avatarhood: You may utilize a tangible mirror in-world to convert into a view portal similar to those within your Demiplane, with all the same restrictions.

You may also levitate (at-will) solid mirror faces that you can view through, within a 3-meter radius of you. You can only support a small amount of weight beyond the mirror itself, equivalent to -2 class levels in [Peasant], roughly the strength of a small child. Speed is 1 meter a second. This is not generally useful for combat.

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More cool stuff, I guess.

The final alert was related to the investiture of additional FE into an Avatar, in the form of enhancements, limited to 1 per deity level. These could vary later in levels in power and cost but were 50 FE initially. However, her first was half-off.

The options were: Toughness, Strength, Quickness, Charisma, Weapon Proficiency, Favored Weapon, Shield Specialist, Magic Resistance, Mental Resistance, Arcane Bursting, and Divine Bursting.

Her mind glazed over a bit in reading through them. Level boosts mostly. The two Bursting effects gave +1 Effective Levels to an attack of the chosen source, up to twice on a 4-hour cooldown. Proficiency was to add something other than Goddess’s Simple list. She wasn’t worried much about that, not being inclined to murder swords and such.

Being a terrible procrastinator, and these things not really being necessary or urgent, Sammy was content to just get the alert shit off of her status sheet and move on with her life.

It is nice to know I can just go about spending my FE now on things. No more need for saving! Unless I lose my Avatar. Hmm, maybe Toughness, after all…

Traveling through the countryside was an absolutely wonderful change for Sammy. It was just on a whole other level compared to the simplified, neutered mindscape realm. The only thing that was missing was Floofa, but she wasn’t exactly keen on endangering a precious pet like her out in the madness of Calrenazzod. She supposed the world could use more cuteness, though.

A new spirit? Lifeform? My Servitors of Fate? Hmm. Quite a few options eventually.

The terrain was lovely, overall, with scattered trees and weedy grasslands full of fleeing insects. They swat at some gnat swarms several times, and Sammy once flicked some kind of black wasp off her arm. It flew off without bothering her further.

Can’t do anything to me anyway, you bitch-ass wasp! I’m a goddess now ha! I laugh at your stings! Ha ha!

The sun beat down from above, quite enjoyably for Sammy, and not so much for Azure, who was sweating it visibly… presumably more used to wearing far less and chilling in the shade with some sort of iced drink.

She looked over at Sammy rather enviously and muttered, “You don’t even sweat? Not so much as a bead? How is that fair?”

With a big, smug smile, Sammy replied, “Oh, it’s definitely not.”

“I highly recommend not being mortal, I must say,” Dart offered helpfully.

Noticing a farm ahead, Sammy tapped Dart’s neck and said, “Do an illusion, would you? This iridescent thing is just too distinctive and unusual. We’re already weird enough.”

“Sure, sure, whatever you say, Your Fabulousness.” Dart The Horse overlaid an illusion to disguise himself as a lustrous black horse. Lovely still, which didn’t surprise her, but much less one-of-a-kind than before.

They went around the farmland. The peasants definitely took notice of them, in a way that let one know they were being accounted for, but when Sammy waved amiably, they waved back just the same.

“Ready to defend themselves if necessary, I see,” Sammy commented.

“Oh definitely, Your Majesty. They can get a quick response from the militia if they send for them, but it doesn’t help if troublemakers show up. This close to the city, there’s less worry of bandits compared to some group of general ne’er-do-wells that happens to be traveling by, perhaps expecting hospitality through intimidation. Doubt it would work on this particular farm.”

“Clearly not. But I bet us hot girls could persuade our way into a stay on a lot of these farms. Just little ole me and you, after all.”

“Oh, certainly. I plan to. I am a musician, storyteller… and entertainer in general. Bard. Just about everyone loves those.”

“Just about everyone loves you, charmer. Except for those that get jelly. That means jealous, by the way.”

“Yes, that does seem to be a common issue… apparently, I’ve become a veritable succubus…” Azure got a sly look suddenly. “Perhaps you could pose as my lover to let jealous wives know their husbands are safe and so on.”

“I, uh-...” Sammy’s throat just sort of stopped working under that violet gaze.

Is that a pass?! Is she coming onto me?! Teasing? No, no, this is just pragmatism! Play it cool, play it cool, Sammy…

“But if you aren’t comfortable with such deception,” Azure continued smoothly, “It’s perfectly alright, of course. We could just invent other lies. That does remind me there are nuns. Rare, but they do exist in the Southlands.”

“No, it’s- I’m” — and she shifted in her saddle, cleared her throat — “I am sure it’ll be… fine… if necessary. It’s not like everyone is overt with affection, right? But wouldn’t I need a constant disguise as a guy? Kinda weird.”

“Why would you need that?” Azure blinked at her. “As you are is perfectly acceptable. Such couples exist.”

“Right, right, of course they do…” Sammy left a long pause as she considered her own obvious misconceptions about the culture she was in. “I guess that would definitely help with any fears of husbandly adultery.”

“Quite so! Though sometimes jealousy is utterly irrational. I’ve certainly seen it firsthand in a partner. But in this hypothetical case, I’m sure we’d just be rejected from even stepping foot in a woman’s home.”

“So you’re thinking of trying a farm if we find one later in the day?”

“It would be safer. And more comfortable. We may even score a bed if this charm you mention pans out.”

Sammy eyed Azure, wondering about her motivations related to a bed. Sammy had certainly shared a bed platonically with other girls throughout her life, but somehow it seemed lurid with Azure… who’d make literally anyone question their sexuality. But as far as she could tell, the Naugite was just being a frou-frou bard who didn’t want to sleep on the ground.

Some pirate! Anyway, I can completely avoid this issue, ha! I don’t sleep. We can put pillows under covers and I can pull a disappearing act to my demiplane.

“Your Majesty,” Azure continued, “can you check our path to Brackenhome? Right now, I’m trying to go north, to keep some distance from the road. I’m sure you can find the hamlet via the mirrors present. There ought to be a concentration at the inn. As I said, it’s about a day’s travel northwest.”

“I’ll see what I can do… in fact, I need to check that in general…”

She experimented with what she could do through her Demiplane while she was in-world with the Avatar. She could not form the conceptual body there without shifting her entire perspective, so she couldn’t sit on her throne and pull portals to her, nor could she go to the other realms. But she could easily sense mirrors still right where she was, or mentally communicate with Followers as normal.

Literally looking through a mirror either required she use one in-world or go into a trance to form a simultaneous, projected conceptual body into her demiplane domain. She did not have to dematerialize nor take more than a moment to do it, but her body would go limp in Calrenazzod. Doing it from horseback was a bit ill-advised, so she needed to use the new method to complete Azure’s request.

Sadly, illusion-crafted mirrors were useless as portals, so she had to procure a real one from Azure.

I’m definitely gonna need to get a few extras for my Avatar…

She fairly quickly noticed the slight concentration of mirrors, as well as bubbles of activity. The main room of the inn had a decorative circular mirror right across the bar, its perspective just above various liquor bottles. It was a large and exceptional inn by all appearances, and bustling with activity. There were more mirrors in some of the rooms — fancier ones for richer folk such as nobility and the like.

After tracking their relative movement to the locale, Sammy looked to Azure and said, “Yep. We’re headed slightly away from it, erring northward.”

“Excellent! I want to wheel around back to it at some point. I know the region only somewhat, but the land guides to habitation in these parts. If we hit thicker forest, we just slant back west. But with your guidance, it should be simpler. Even for finding a farmstead when the time comes.”

“You know,” Dart interjected, “I don’t mind just moseying around doing horse stuff, but I don’t particularly fancy being put in a stable.”

“We’ll stop before,” Sammy said, “And you can turn into something else for a while.”

“Like what?”

“Whatever innocuous thing you want. Depends on if you want inside or outside, right? Inside, maybe a dog. Or a… ferret. I dunno.”

“I’ll pass on that, at least. I’ll leave the two lovers to their privacy.”

Azure smirked without saying anything, as meanwhile Sammy glared down at her horse. Mentally she sent, “Goddamn you, don’t just call it out like that! Instigator.”

“Why not just go for it? The tension is ridiculous. And she is stupidly attractive and experienced, right?”

“Why? Multiple reasons. Big reasons! Even if she was ready to get entangled at all, she’d regard it as casual, and that isn’t my thing. What if I have feelings that blow up from it, then what? I’m her boss! Goddess! It’s just not… appropriate.”

“Yeah, heaven forbid you do something inappropriate. To all those things, I say: pish posh. Maybe you should make an exception. Take a risk.”

“Nope! I shouldn’t. And you should shut the fuck up!”

“Fine. But if you ever want the Straight Dope, you know who to come to. Meaning me, that is. Dart, the straight shooter.”

“Whatever.”

“If you keep staring so hard at him,” Azure said, “you’ll burn a hole through his head.”

“What? Oh, no-no, I wasn’t! I was just lost in thought, hehe…” Sammy tapped a finger to her head. “In fact, I do think I need to do Goddess stuff in here for a while! Don’t mind me!”

“Mmn. As you say, Your Majesty.”

As they continued the journey on their horses, Sammy checked in via the mirror and mental comms with her other Followers. Bast was performing some pleasant melodies for the crew, which also doubled as Devout worship. He’d apparently had a lot of time to come up with such things during his high-speed dash across dozens of territories the prior few days.

Orswyth meanwhile was taking advantage of being aboard a ship to complete yet another quest, this time to consecrate a full day of prayer and fasting. Progress to level 2.

She sent a comm out to all her core Followers: “Friends and members of the order, I have arrived on Calrenazzod in the flesh. I’m among you as an Avatar. I can take many guises, but I will inevitably meet you as I am. I’ll become more than the face behind the mirror and the voice in your head. I’ll be one of you. I look forward to the day you see for yourself.”

Various congratulations came in.

Then an excited Estara, still traveling through the day, sent, “I’m so happy, Your Majesty! When can I meet you?!”

Sammy grimaced because she didn’t know and she’d have to say so.

Damn these limitations!

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