M.D.Syl
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Chapter 65 colorless
🕑 Added 2023-03-25 17:01:34 +0000 UTCAuthor notes:
Originally I planned to only do 7 chapter dedications for my first 7 patreon supporters. But it feels wrong, so I’ll now dedicate chapter for each of my patreon supporters until further notice.
I doubt I’ll ever grow that big for it to be a hustle… xD But who knows.
Regardless, I’m not going to skim on gratitude, not if I can help it. A thank you where a thank you is due.
So…
This chapter is dedicated to UndeadCellar for supporting me on Patreon.
Thank you for your support! <3
Chapter 65 Let's Survive with Eggs and Venom.
Saving a life isn’t easy.
Nothing worthy of admiration is easy.
If it was easy, everyone would do it.
But will you truly let hardship stop you?
Brigit, the Keeper of Life.
“Wait! We need to find that little boy!” Kolag tugs my arm after I close the door behind us.
“Who Ryon? He can take care of himself. He’s very capable,” I answer in annoyance. He’s part of the reason we’re in this mess in the first place, I am not going to risk anyone looking out for him. He’ll be the most difficult person to control around here…
So I should just leave him to die?
“The healing potion isn’t helping! I still see her die. Do something!” Jerro still holds Sharla’s head in his hands, his voice breaking, despite his expressionless face.
The strange girl with the dark blue hair is still unconscious. Her delicate round face is covered in large beads of sweat, and her body trembles in Jerro’s arms. I have to save the ones I can first… She must be poisoned… a healing potion won’t help with that… at least not the simple healing potions… but how can I heal her?
I take a deep breath. "I don't know if I can heal her Jerro, I know nothing about healing magic. But I'll try my best."
"You heal her! I see you heal her!" He exclaims. Sharla whimpers, and he's back to wiping the sweat off her forehead.
I need to learn a healing spell to detoxify a person fast enough before she dies. It's not going to be easy.
“I’ll do my best!” I shout and hurry to Loyal’s saddlebag. I fish out the large grimoire. Even lifting this book with both of my hands, I stumble. In addition to the staggering weight, it’s quite large too. The binding is made out of a silvery metal. There’s a carving of a tall crane-like bird with spiky feathers on the front.
The metallic carving of the large bird moves as if the creature is alive within the metal. The Egret’s eye flashes gold, and she gives me a brief glance. It almost feels like the hag herself is looking at me. I have to admit… when the hag shifts to her birdlike face it’s somewhat similar to this bird… does she have something with Egrets?
I don’t have time for this… I have to find a spell to nullify toxins! I open the first page.
To my dear daughter Inara
May my work watch over you
May you find your path to power
May your resolve never falter
May your ambition guide you
The Maven of Mysteries
I’m more touched than I should be… I move the page. This one contains a short explanation of how to use the grimoire, it’s rather simple. The next page is empty.
I place my hand on the parchment. It’s not made out of sheepskin or any paper I’ve ever encountered. The thick leathery page is hard, almost metallic, yet flexible enough to fold like the highest quality paper. I put my hand on the page. I need a healing spell to deal with poisons! I imagine magic that would purge venom from the bloodstream, and channel the mana into the page.
I hope this will work… I have no idea how magic can purge poison from somebody’s blood… I… The book sucks my mana directly from my necklace. It stops after thirty gems or so. Words appear on the page.
Brigit’s Antidote
Names: Brigit’s Antidote. Antidote. Lesser Cure Poison. Brigit’s Lesser Cure Poison. Brigit's Right Hand. Detox. Detoxify.
Element: Life. (advanced element 18.)
Sub element: Medicine (Wood).
Level: 1
Language: Rod’e <wood>
Words: Sefius, rod’e, mo’ento sho rod’eshil xsi si to sha sus mo’ento xsias. Sals si to xalias.
Translation: Life, wood, focus all poison in this one’s body and force it out. Heed this one’s plea.
Quicken: Sefius, rod’e, mo’ento sho rod’eshil xsias. <Life, wood, focus all poison out.>
Patterns: 11
Gestures: 1: Dip the ring fingers in blood and connect the tips of both ring fingers for a brief moment. 2: Attach the tip of the ring fingers to the palms separating the hands. 3: Cross hands keeping the ring fingers close to the palm. 4: touch the target’s chest/back (heart) with both ring fingers.
Offering: 0.2 liters of blood from the caster or the target.
Requirement: X
Range: Touch.
Target: Poisoned creatures. Limited to grade 2 venoms and below. Cannot be applied to curses, particle poisoning, or mana poisoning.
Duration: Instant.
Effect: The spell will purge a target from any toxins below the 2nd grade.
Cost: 20 wood gems, 15 light gems.
Bound cost: 15 wood gems, 10 light gems.
Altered cost: 10 wood and 5 light gems.
This is followed by the depictions of patterns I have to weave. They glow and form a life-like illusion above the book all 11 of them. They are followed by an illusion of each and every hand gestures.
Ok… wow… I wonder what the limits on this grimoire are… I hope the venom from these spiders isn’t considered grade 2 whatever grade 2 is… I’ll have to cast this and hope for the best… For now, let’s learn this… And wait… what is this?
I stare as more words appear on the page below the spell.
A warning from the Maven of Mysteries.
Brigit’s Antidote is a healing spell of the advanced Life Element.
Should you cast a spell of the Life Element, you shall be unable to cast necromantic spells of the advanced Death Element.
The elementals of Life and Death are at war, they reject casters who deal with the other side.
While elemental-less cantrips of these elements can still be cast without angering the other side, should you summon an elemental for your spell, you shall be rejected by all elementals of the opposing element.
Life Magic has an association to the Light Element, and Light Affinity may influence it.
Death Magic has an association to the Wood Element, and Wood Affinity may influence it.
I shall recommend that you choose the Life Element due to your very poor Wood Affinity.
But.
The choice between Life or Death is yours to make.
So if I learn life magic spells, I won’t be able to use necromancy magic? Who cares! I need to save Sharla’s life… and healing people and myself sounds more useful than whatever that death magic is. Why would I want to raise gross zombies? It’s disgusting! And people are buried under trees to prevent that from happening in the first place…
I focus on the strange patterns. A mixture of life and wood, both are foreign to me. The way the two elements are combined into one is even stranger. Patterns aren't designed to mix with different elements, but in the case of the life patterns, it seems like the opposite is true. They're designed to mix with all the other basic elements.
But it makes it complicated, more complicated than the 'Weightless Body' spell, and the fact I've never cast a spell with 11 patterns just makes it worse.
Snakes... this spell is complicated… Venomous rotten snakes! How the hell am I supposed to cast this?! And what the snake is this language?! Rod’e? <wood?> How does the language of wood control light mana too? It doesn’t make any sense….
I go back to Loyal saddlebag and pull out my rod’e dictionary. I sit on the dusty floor with my books, and wipe the sweat off my face.
Let’s see… I need to practice some words to get the feel of how this language works… I have no idea how to pronounce this…
I wipe the sweat off my face again in annoyance, then look at my hand with a frown. Spider goo… yuck… I need to wash…
I’m nearly out of mana anyway… might as well get some rest and recover…
“Jerro, this is going to take me a little while to learn. I’m also nearly out of mana and I need to recover.”
He frowns. “How long is a little while?”
“Couple of hours, a day at most. I’ve never cast this spell before, and it’s way more complicated than anything I’ve ever done,” I reply honestly.
Lezere snorts. “Why are we saving that useless kitten anyway? She can’t help us fight our way out of here. Let her die.”
“She may not last for a day!” Jerro gives Lezere a deadly glare, a hint of fear in his voice.
Let’s hope she survives… spiders shouldn’t have fast active venoms… they aren’t snakes… they rely on their webs to hunt… venom is only a secondary weapon to them…
“We need to find Ryon and get him over here.” Kolag approaches Salik and Berthold, ignoring me and Jerro. “He’s going to die out there on his own!”
“I don’t see why you should help that dumb cat, metal man. If the chief says he can take care of himself, then he can take care of himself. Just sit and rest, or you’ll collapse again.” Lezere sits in the corner, bandaging her wounded arm and thigh.
“You should listen to your friend, sir knight, there’s no use going out there again,” Salik supports Lezere’s opinion. “If he’s not good enough, he might be dead already. And if he is, then he can survive for a bit longer while we recover. Sit, take off your helmet, and gather your strength.”
Kolag grunts and sits down with the sound of clattering metal. “Take off your helmet he says…” his voice echoes with sarcasm.
I close my books and pack them up on Loyal. I move my hand above my head and weave my mana patterns. “Nimuwal.” <water boundless.>
The water isn’t hot, but at least it isn’t cold. Washing all of the green goo from my hair is refreshing.
“Kaka water! Hit me with that, chief.” Lezere grins happily. I aim my hand at her, washing her clean.
“Didn’t you say you’re out of mana?!” Jerro demands to know.
I keep on washing Lezere with a shrug. “The spell to heal Sharla needs light and wood mana. This is water mana, two different things.” I’m quite weak at both wood and light mana so I’ll be mostly relying on my necklace which is mostly empty right now. Does he really expect me to work covered in this goo?!
“Is she a fairy?” Berthold approaches Jerro. He looks closely at Sharla who’s trembling in Jerro’s arms, her head leaned on Jerro's chest, hands clenching his gray tunic.
“Yes,” Jerro replies stiffly.
“Do you know her well?” Berthold’s voice is gentle. He can’t move his eyes from the unconscious fae.
“Yes.”
“When did you meet her for the first time? Was it in a forest? Why did she come to you?”
“We've met today,” Jerro replies in the same stiff tone.
“Then how do you know her so well?” Berthold frowns, still looking at Sharla’s inhuman facial features.
“She’s my soul mate.”
Berthold pats Jerro’s shoulder in a friendly manner. “I know what you mean, but man… women can be weird, and she might not feel the same.”
“She will.”
“Good luck!” He pats Jerro’s shoulder again and wanders over to Lezere.
“Ti-a’ark,” Berthold says in his high voice.
“Yoma’ari!” she replies in a dismissive low growl. He winces and backs off, then takes his seat by Salik’s side.
Salik ignores him and approaches me instead. “Inara? Did you pack some food on that horse?” he asks in a low voice.
“Far felul.” <hot wind.> I exhale and the warm wind dries me off. “No… I did not.” Great… I packed all of my books but not food… “I didn’t have much time to prepare, and I didn’t know we’d end up in this place…” I excuse myself.
He nods. “It’s ok, kid, I have some snacks, and I’m sure Berthold carries some on him too. We’ll make do. We just have to ration what we have.”
“I can skip eating for now.” The blond bard from Salik's company was right, I need a spell that creates or summons food... I open my grimoire again and move to a new empty page. I need the simplest magic that summons food.
Kolosu’s Vegetable Summoning.
Names: Kolosu’s Vegetable Summoning, Vegetable Summoning, Vegtable Creation, Potato spell.
Element: Wood
Sub element: Growth
Level: 0
Words: Shaentoxa
Translation: Vegetable
Quicken: X
Patterns: 4/*2
Gestures: open hand
Offering: X
Requirement: *A seed/A root
Range: self
Target: self
Duration: Instant
Effect: The spell will summon a vegetable or root at the caster’s hand. The vegetable summoned is up to the caster’s choice. It can be anything that grows on the ground or on a bush. A single oat or bean pod can be summoned, as well as a watermelon, but not a fruit. *Having a seed or root of the desired vegetable will lower the cost and patterns required, but the vegetable summoned will be the same as the seed’s.
Cost: 8/*3 wood gems.
Bound cost: X
Altered cost: 5/*2 wood gems.
Great… a wood spell… that one will have to wait then but I imagine it’d be useful down the line…
“Nonsense, kid, we’ll get you your share.”
“I’m sorry Salik, I could summon some vegetables, but I’m afraid it uses up the same type of mana I need to heal Sharla and she comes first.”
The man nods. “Of course, kid.” He turns to Berthold and together they go around and ask the others about food.
I shake my head and focus on my grimoire and dictionary again. I do my best to ignore the noise from the others. This spell is complicated, the incantation alone is hard. Sefius, rod’e, mo’ento sho rod’eshil xsi si to sha sus mo’ento xsias. Sals si to xalias.
How am I supposed to say these words?! At least the hag used both Toml’a and Sinteo letters to describe how to say this incantation, it's quite helpful… She’s surprisingly thoughtful… Let’s get the feel for Rod’e, speak some of its words, might help me with this. I reach for my Rod’e dictionary. It takes me a little while of tongue twisting for me to get the incantation right.
Let’s see… the material is blood… it has to come from the caster or the patient… I can manage that…
Now mana… twenty gems of wood and fifteen gems of light mana… Let’s convert some… I can try it once… it’ll most likely fail… I should probably rest to fully recover my mana first… This is going to drain me…
She might die if I won’t try it now… but it’s going to leave me fully drained if I do…
It’s not worth it… my likelihood of success without actually training it first is near zero… and even if I succeed, the elementals might not do what I want them to… Better to practice and recover my mana… it’s best to take it slow and get it right. Than panic, rush this, and fail…
I begin my training. I Move my hands in the series of hand gestures and say the unfamiliar syllables which do not roll off my tongue. I keep looking at the book, correcting myself, and trying again. I shut out the others and their chatter. I have to focus if I want to save my friend’s or pawn’s life.
The night is falling. The light from the small windows near the ceiling is dwindling, and the room soon turns dark.
I can conjure light and continue… No… this isn’t like a few seconds of water… I’ll have to keep it on for a while and it’ll drain one gem per minute… my necklace is nearly empty, and if I convert that means six gems per minute… It’s much better if I recover my mana…
Besides, everyone is probably tired… we could use the sleep… and I should be able to concentrate and cast a complex spell better after a full night’s rest… As long as she survives… What if she dies? Shouldn’t I at least give it a shot?
I haven’t managed to summon a single elemental for this spell yet, I don’t even get the patterns right. This spell is supposed to summon two elementals at once! I can’t just expect myself to get it right from the get go. Slow and steady. And if she doesn’t survive until tomorrow then there’s nothing I can do about it. For now, I should get my rest…
I close my books and pack them in Loyal’s saddlebags. Tomorrow will be the true test, and Sharla’s life depends on it.
I huddle with my blankets in the corner.
I don’t know whether I even want to save her life or not… She was my friend for a year yet she lied to me, spied on me, and manipulated me. She’s the reason I ended up with that hag…
And the reason I’m alive… I’d die if she hadn’t treated me… I’d die if I didn’t end up at the hag’s place… the hag has enough influence to rival the tower’s authority and cancel the bounty on my head after I’ve killed two mages… where else could I find such a convenient way out?
Yet, Sharla is still my friend. Someone I turned out to talk to, someone I enjoyed spending idle time with. We have a lot in common, we came from the same place and… or I thought we have a lot in common… we clearly didn’t come from the same place… I don’t know the real her… Then I should get to know the real her!
Either way. Even if I don’t want to be on good terms with her… a shapeshifter is too much of a useful pawn to throw her life away. I’ll do my best to heal her tomorrow…
*~*~*
Interlude 65.1
Kolag.
No matter what Inara says, no one should be left alone in a nest of monsters! Once Lezere lets down her guard, Kolag removes the rotting barricade before she can stop him, and hurry out of the room.
He scurries along the broken keep. He keeps his claymore at the ready, prepared to swing should the spiders attack. But they do not. Maybe they don’t see him as a meal due to being covered in metal. Or maybe they can feel the demon inside him.
Kolag keeps wondering, tracing the steps the boy must’ve taken when he climbed to that window. He finds Ryon in a room full of eggs and spiderwebs. The odd boy breaks one of the green head-sized eggs and drinks its content. Kolag note a few broken eggs by Ryon's side.
“Come.” Kolag extends his hand.
“Ah you. Ya try this! Da’ eggs are so tasty! Just need some cookin’!” The ebony skinned boy wipes the green substance off his mouth.
Kolags tries to keep himself from vomiting in his helmet. Where did Inara find such a bizarre person? “Come. It’s not safe here.”
The boy cocks his head. “Dat true. Thanks for comin’ to save mah skinny ass. Monsters gone?”
As if they heard him, the giant spiders crawl down the open ceiling of this tower, red eyes glowing. They screech, white hairy legs climb down at a rapid speed. One of them pounces at Ryon. Kolag pushes the boy aside and impales the spider.
The boy uses Kolag's push to catapult himself. Kolag turns to see him somersaults above another hairy monster, he lands on its head and stabs a pair of long daggers into the creatures' eyes. "We gota go! Monsters come to eat da tasty eggs! Come!" Ryon declares, running toward the door.
Kolag shakes his head. It's going to be a long night.
*~*~*
Power level: 3rd stage apprentice.
Mana pools status:
Crown-knot: Affinity 10: formed: 1 gem replenished per five minutes.
Neck-Bridge: Affinity 6: formed: max amount of gems drained per day: 66
Abdomen-storage: Affinity 5: formed: 6 gems. Conversion ratio: 6:1
Air: Affinity 4: formed: 18 gems
Fire: Affinity 2: formed: 9 gems
Light: Affinity 3: formed: 14 gems
Water: Affinity 6: formed: 27 gems
Earth: Affinity 1: formed: 4 gems
Wood: Affinity 2: formed: 9 gems
Gravity: Affinity 9: formed: 40/41 gems
Cantrip known:
Air: Shavi’s Breeze, Shavi’s Sword. Shavi’s Hair Dryer, Aria’s Enhanced Hearing.
Fire: Nuriss’ Flame. Effrat’s Firefly, Effrat’s Fire Breath. Sorladika's Lesser Heating.
Light: Noxi’s Light, Lako’s Blinding Light.
Water: Water Evocation, Water to Ice, Ice to Water, Water to Vapor, Vapor to Water, Mayan’s Icy Spike, Ayla’s Water Jet.
Earth:
Wood:
Gravity: Lumina’s Kinetic Burst. Tukado’s Repulse. Tukado’s lesser shield. Imari’s Minor Telekinesis. Imari’s Jump. Leo’s Pull. Leo’s Grounding. Alino’s Light Body. Alino’s Heavy Body.
Spells known:
Gravity: Alino’s weightless bodyb.
Focus capability: 12 patterns
Social status: Inara, Daughter of Mysteries. Apprentice to the Maven of Mysteries.
Wealth: 1854 gems. 1421 golden peas, 7 silver scales, 37 copper bits.
Items:
Magical necklace. Contain a 100 gems of general mana, can be drained like a mana pool. It’ll recharge by itself at the rate of five gems an hour.
1 potion of lightning body.
1 potion of mana, medium grade.
An enchanted belt with eight pouches, the enchantment keep the pouches’ content fresh.
Fresh rose petals, 25g
10 empty soul bottles. Glass with a diamond stopper, put in scaled leather wrapping.
The Great White Egret grimoire. Dedicated by the Maven of mysteries to Inara. 2/100
Companions:
Lezere of the black fang tribe.
Salik.
Berthold.
Jerro.
Sharla?
Loyal
Languages:
Toml’a <People’s tongue> Fluent
Sinteo <Speech> Fluent
Myrsha <Gravity> 6/10
Felul <Wind> 1/10
Injuries and scars:
