Ar'Kendrithyst

Chapter 7

Erick Flatt

Human, age 48

Level 5, Class: None

Exp: 241/800

Class: -/-

Points: 5

80/80

150 per day

160/160

466 per day

Strength

[8]

Vitality

[15]

Willpower

[16]

Focus

[20]

Concentration 4

Multiply your base MP regen by 2.33

Requirements: 20 Focus

Exp: 196/500

Mana Shaping 1

Alter spell AOE in subtle ways, 10 MP + spellcost

Requirements: 10 Willpower

Exp: 70/100

Cleanse 4, instant, short range, 10 mana.

Purge an area equal to the level of the spell in meters of all Toxins, Disease, Filth, and Corruption.

Exp: 310/500

Meditation 2

You are at Rest while Meditating.

Afflicted ailments: Immobile, blind, deaf, five minutes to begin.

Requirements: 10 Willpower

Exp: 51/200

Mend 3, instant, touch, 10 mana

Touch a non-magical medium sized object, or small complicated, and restore it to its prime.

Exp: 10/300

He also had:

Ward 1, instant, short range, 24 hours

Create a small ward that can have minor effects, or prevent Z damage from attackers. 10 + Z MP

Minor Effects: Bug Ward, Temperature Ward, Alarm Ward

Exp: 0/100

But he hadn’t used that yet.

“A gain in base level, and a gain in Meditation. Meditation experience is base experience?” Erick said, “Shaping those [Cleanse]s for 20 mana gave 10 experience to Shaping and 10 to [Cleanse]. Is that normal?”

“All of that is normal.” Al smiled. “I find your questions astounding, but then I must remind myself that you are not from around here. You don’t expect to spend 20 mana and get 40 experience, do you?”

“I kinda did. Like, I got base experience for Meditation, and that seems odd. Concentration doesn’t give base experience… Wait. Meditation is active. Concentration is passive. That’s the difference.”

Al smiled. “Meditation is active, that is the difference, yes. Meditation is one of the few skills that gains you resources, too. [Second Wind] is the HP equivalent, though that one is vastly different from Meditation in almost every way.”

“What sort of questions did you expect?”

Al rattled off, “What is the purpose of [Cleanse]ing the pools when they fill up again? Why not have a gate over the intake that you can shut? When do you open the big door in the back? What’s with the river opening being right there? What sort of [Ward]s do you have active so that there’s no smell? Where do the pool outflows lead? Why is the sewer system behind the settling pools’ barred inflows not illuminated? Those and a thousand more smaller questions, constantly.”

Erick smiled. “I might not have been born in this world, but I know enough to guess at all that. Except for the vault door. And the light-behind-the-inflow thing, but honestly I would rather not see what’s in the darkness.” Erick shivered. “No thanks.”

Al laughed, loud and booming. He stood. “Come! You, I will show what’s behind the big door.”

“Uh.” Erick said, “But I really should level up these various—”

“Nonsense!” Al quickly added, “Well. Not nonsense.” He hmm’d. “You’re right. There’s only so many hours in the day. Shape some [Cleanse]s into this room. Experiment with it, dumping all your mana. Then you [Meditate] to full, and do it all over again. I will be across the hall in my office. I expect at least three iterations of the whole process. More will be impressive, less is unacceptable.”

Erick nodded. “Sounds fine.”

Al smiled. “Tell me if you still feel that way at the end.”

“What? So you can increase my quota?”

“Ha!” Al nodded, walking away, “Exactly.”

When he was alone, Erick took in the box shape of the room and imagined his [Cleanse] wrapping around the room without touching the middle contents. As he prepared to cast, he concentrated on altering the flow of mana inside of himself.

Shaped [Cleanse]!

His plan did not work. The spell distorted, for sure. Wisps of thickened air touched areas outside of the basic sphere of the spell, but not far outside the sphere, and not where he imagined them touching.

He kept at it, dumping another 140 mana trying to shape the spell properly. He almost collapsed when he hit 0, but he maintained consciousness. The ‘subtle ways’ part of Mana Shaping’s description showed itself as an ironclad rule. While the specifics of shaping were up to him, it was still just a subtle shift in the spell’s original area of effect.

Meditation.

The darkness returned. Shadows swirled in the abyss. An eye opened like a far-away star, to stare into Erick’s soul. A glowing fang flashed, larger than the teeth beside it. The eye closed. Mana flowed around Erick like a warm river.

The first part of the skill was still terrifying, but the second part was nice. Erick felt more in control of himself this time, too.

He opened his eyes. He was alone in the room. HP and MP were both full.

He dumped another 8 shaped [Cleanse]s into the air, trying to feel how the mana moved. Mana Shaping had gone up a level, but rank 2 read ‘better, subtle ways’, instead of just ‘subtle ways’. With all these new levels, it was easier to feel how the potential power of his personal mana transitioned into magic to act upon the outside world, but he knew he knew nothing. He was a man groping in the darkness, touching an elephant and thinking that rough skin was what made an elephant an elephant.

But Meditation was level 3 now. At level 3 there was no pause before the Rest started. Erick went under and the warm river immediately surrounded him. Mana flowed into his body. And, he could still hear the sewerhouse. The river room sounded up the bottom of the spiral staircase, the churning of dark water a gentle echo to Meditation’s warm stream of mana. Erick stayed under until his mana return to full.

He opened his eyes. He cast another 8 shaped [Cleanses], then began another Meditation.

When he came out, he was still alone. He almost immediately started another round of spells when he read Meditation 4…

Erick Flatt

Human, age 48

Level 6, Class: None

Exp: 401/1300

Class: -/-

Points: 7

80/80

150 per day

160/160

488 per day

Strength

[8]

Vitality

[15]

Willpower

[16]

Focus

[20]

Cleanse 5, instant, short range, 10 mana.

Purge an area equal to the level of the spell in meters of all Toxins, Disease, Filth, and Corruption.

Exp: 50/800

Concentration 5

Multiply your base MP regen by 2.44

Requirements: 20 Focus

Exp: 176/800

Mana Shaping 3

Alter spell AOE in better, subtle ways, 10 MP + spellcost

Alter spell AOE in moderate ways, 30 MP + spellcost

Requirements: 10 Willpower

Exp: 10/300

Meditation 4

You are at Rest while Meditating.

Afflicted ailments: Immobile

Requirements: 10 Willpower

Exp: 31/500

… But he felt like absolute shit. He wanted to lay down and Rest for real, not Meditation's fake Rest. No. He needed an actual nap. He also needed to know what time it was. He tried to stand.

He fell onto the floor.

Hit for 5 HP damage!

“Ughhhh.” He called out, “Little help here.”

“Coming!” A heavy chair scrapped across the floor in the room across the hallway. Heavy footsteps slapped against stone. Al stood in the door. He was smiling. “How many was that?”

“Three,” Erick said, his face still pressed against the ground.

Al lifted Erick up by the shoulders. “You did well.” He laid Erick on the couch. “Faster than I expected you to get there. I forget that you don’t know anything! Most people space the iterations so the mana exhaustion doesn’t ruin them.”

“What time is it?”

“It’s not even midday. Do you want to keep going?”

“Meditation got to 4, so no blindness. I think I can do it with my eyes open.”

Al nodded. “Yes, you can. A high level of Meditation is a crucial part of becoming a mage, for at the highest level and a nod to the skill, you are always at Rest.” He frowned, sitting down on the other couch. “But don’t meditate like that unless you need the mana. I can go several days in Meditation without seeing the hallucinations, but that’s only because I have Scion of Focus.”

Erick leaned back on the couch as he listened. He said, “Irogh said I needed to invest all my extra points in Focus. Is that true?”

“Are you ready to listen to some math?”

“Hit me.”

Al cocked his head. “Hit you? Are you sure? That seems...”

“It’s just an expression. Sorry. I think if you actually hit me I’d die.”

Al laughed, looking away for a moment. When he looked back, he was composed. “Consider this: More focus is necessary to eventually cast a small spell constantly; to have an aura. This is the goal of all aura mages. But if you only run on 16 Willpower, you will never be able to cast any of the larger spells. With [Mana Shaping] 10, you can make ANY spell into an AOE spell. With this, you can transform a high level [Mend] into a very large aura, and rebuild large swaths of… for example: The Human District of Spur. That costs 510 mana a second, though.”

“That’s a lot.”

“Not really. All of the larger effects cost a lot of mana, all at once. Being an aura mage is not cheap, either, but it’s a constant drain.” He said, “[Cleanse Aura] is a base cost of 36000 mana per hour. With [Clarity] 10 for 50% reduced spell costs, but not choosing [Cleanse] as a Favored Spell for 25% more reduced mana cost, that’s 18,000 mana per hour. With 50 focus and the purchase of Scion of Focus —you can only have one Scion skill— for 4 times base MP regen, in addition to Concentration 10 for yet another 3 times base regen, you have 6000 mana per hour. That’s assuming you’re at Rest with Meditation 10, and thus able to cast while you’re at Rest.

“Thinking about this easier, [Cleanse Aura] under the stated conditions costs 5 mana per second, but you only regen 1.6 mana per second. With 160 max mana, you will bottom out to 0 very quickly. But before you do that calculation, you have to keep in mind the cost for the gravity [Ward] which is the only way you’re going to collect the rads in the settling pool fast enough. That [Ward] is level 8 of the skill and costs 35 base mana, but you need to supplement it with Shaping 3, for another 30 mana, for a total of 65.

“So your mana available for your aura is actually only 95. That’s 19 seconds of [Cleanse Aura].

“It takes 30 to 45 seconds for the gravity [Ward] to empty the pool.

“During those 19 seconds you’re regening, though, so that’s another 31.6 mana, meaning another 6 seconds of use, meaning another 10 mana. Meaning another 2 seconds of use, at which point it’s negligible to continue with that math.

“Take it all together, and you only get 27 seconds of a [Cleanse Aura], which is not enough time for the gravity [Ward] to work.

“But if you had 200 base mana, or even 400 base mana with the double base mana skill at 20 Willpower, then whoa!” Al smiled. “You can hold your aura for as long as you need. Almost 100 seconds! Getting the necessary amount of regen to achieve the same thing is much tougher. A balance is necessary.”

Erick said, “I got some of what you just said.”

Al waved him off. “Don’t worry about it. You have lots of time to understand the demands of this job. The sewer system is designed to make it very difficult for the rads to be stolen before a harvest.”

“Oh. I got that part. But...” Erick thought for a second. “It almost seems like being anything but an aura mage would be the mathematically better choice. Am I wrong?”

Al smiled wider. “Yes! You are wrong! Because a good aura mage can choose who is affected by their aura, and because of that, they’re able to explode a [Fireball Aura] out of themselves while their adventuring party is fighting monsters all around. The beauty of being an Aura Mage is not the ability to do this job, but to do almost any mage job you could ever want.”

“… Because an aura mage can turn any AOE spell into an aura.”

“Now you understand!”

“… Why isn’t every mage an Aura Mage?”

“Because they’re stu—!” Al paused. He frowned. “I lost myself to the math. Other mages have told me why they forgo aura magic and Scion of Focus many, many times.” He said, “You need to be in the middle of the fight to use an aura, and most mages have HP in the low hundreds. A personalized [Ward] helps to supplement your low HP, but you will never stack up to the HP of an actual warrior. Add to that, Scion of Focus quadruples your regen, but Scion of Willpower quadruples your base MP, and since you can only pick one Scion skill, many choose to pick the one that lets them cast four times as many spells, or cast a personal [Ward] that absorbs 4 times as much HP.

“Scion of Willpower is a lot flashier than Scion of Focus. For some people, that’s important.

“As an aside: 6000 MP at 50 Willpower for the base version of a Scion of Willpower is equivalent to a warrior’s Scion of Strength that gives 6000 HP. Fights between mages and warriors are complicated, so we won’t talk about those yet, but it’s good to be aware of possible people you’ll encounter in this world.

“Let’s focus on Willpower versus Focus. Even being generous and assuming that the Willpower Scion also has 50 Focus, that’s only 1500 regen per hour.” Al added, “You’re resting in all of these scenarios, of course.”

“Of course.” Erick was catching about half of the numbers thrown at him. “This written down somewhere?”

“Later. As I was saying, here’s the common way to compare the two Mage Scion skills: Will-Scion and Focus-Scion are stuck in Ar'Kendrithyst. Both of them are constantly harried by enemy forces. Both of them kill enough enemies to stay ahead of the horde. This takes about 10 minutes and costs 1000 mana. These numbers are not imaginary; they’re well documented needs for those going inside the Dead City. Will is down to 5000 MP. Focus is down to 500 MP. Looks bad, right? Wrong. During those ten minutes of fighting Focus regenerated 1000 mana, and is still at their mana cap of 1500 MP. Will is at 5250 MP.

“As you can see, Focus never runs out of mana. Will could have dumped 2000 mana and cleared enough enemies for a larger break. Maybe they could have done something else special. Point is, in most scenarios, Scion of Focus is able to cast spells all day long. Scion of Willpower can cast larger spells, but then they’re spent.

“I need that on paper to understand it all.” Erick breathed deep. “But I am feeling better.”

Al smirked. “Scion of Focus also means no Mana Exhaustion. You can spend 1500 mana on a personal regenerating damage [Ward], and don’t feel bad about it. Spend 1530 mana on aurifying a [Mend] for three seconds, restoring houses or repairing the small magical objects of your adventuring party, and then do that four more times in the next hour. Focus is the best choice, but many people don’t feel that way and I don’t understand them.” He got up, stretching. Erick did not stare too much. “But that’s enough talking. Would you like to continue casting? I said the minimum is three iterations, but any more than six and you’ll be puking your guts out for three days.”

“Time for a break, then. I think I’ll go bother Jane, or look into housing in the Human District.”

Al walked away toward his office. “I’ll have some reading for you when you come back.” He paused and turned around. “Will you be spending the night here?”

“Thank you, but I’ll see what Jane wants to do.”

“Dinner will be at the same time, but we won’t wait for you.”

Erick smiled. “Thank you.”

Al walked into his office, muttering, “Of course, of course.”

Erick almost got up to begin the trek to the Adventurer’s Guild. But...

He had a lot of extra points. Was it necessary to get 20 in Willpower, and unlock the extra MP skill, Discipline, and then buy that skill? No. Nothing about this magic seemed strictly necessary. But it was nice. And it would be even more nice to be able to cast more spells before he needed to Rest.

Did he need to buy this right now? No.

Did he want to? Yes.

So he did.

Discipline 1

Multiply your base MP by 2

Requirements: 20 Willpower

Exp: 0/100

His Status looked a lot healthier. He felt healthier, too.

More… expansive. That was probably the correct word. He felt more expansive.

Erick Flatt

Human, age 48

Level 6, Class: None

Exp: 401/1300

Class: -/-

Points: 2

80/80

150 per day

160/400

488 per day

Strength

[8]

Vitality

[15]

Willpower

[20]

Focus

[20]

… And look at that low MP. It would regenerate over a few hours, but his skills would probably end up with odd experience numbers. Should he meditate right now and solve that issue before it becomes a problem? Yes. Yes he should.

So he did.

By the time he was full, a few other things had leveled and destroyed his idea of keeping to nice, even, round numbers. Looking at the last blue box, he really should have seen this coming.

Erick Flatt

Human, age 48

Level 6, Class: None

Exp: 663/1300

Class: -/-

Points: 2

80/80

150 per day

422/422

488 per day

Strength

[8]