The Path of Ascension

The following day, Matt hand-fed Aster a select package of rabbit that Aunt Helen had prepared. He could tell that she would be coming out of her stupor by the end of the day, and wanted to see what changes she would experience.

Once his bond was fed, he knocked on Liz's door, and they made their way up to the train car with a breakfast bar. They sat down and watched the plains turn into deserts. The hills slowly transitioned to more sand than dirt.

It made a nice addition to their breakfast view. His relaxed state of mind was short lived, as Matt felt a hovering presence a few moments later. When he looked, he found Camilla standing there with a plate of her own food.

To give an overture of peace, he kneed the swivel chair next to him, causing it to spin towards her. She sat down, but perched at the edge, ready to bolt at any moment.

Matt played with his omelet. The cook wasn't very skilled, and had charred the egg on one side, while the other side was barely cooked. He plopped a forkful into his mouth. At least it was hard to mess up pre-cooked ham and mushrooms.

"I'm sorry."

The apology was whispered out, and he and Liz turned to face their breakfast companion.

The dark-haired woman was gripping her fork with white knuckles that shook slightly.

"I was told that I wasn't ready to come out, and needed more time. By my therapist and..." She looked around. "Others."

Matt filled in the blank. Duke Waters had wanted her to stay and heal more. The mind was harder to heal than the body.

"I couldn't sit around anymore, though. So we made a deal where I could feel you two out. I..." Camilla swallowed hard and squeaked out, "Assumed the worst. I know intellectually that not everyone is like that, but it's hard."

She finished with a half-hearted shrug. "I'm sorry for my actions and assumptions."

Liz spoke up. "Thank you for apologizing. If you want to..." The blood mage twirled her spoon around. "Join us... even if it’s just for a while, you have a lot of ground to make up. You gave us one hell of an interesting introduction, but it wasn't a good one."

Camilla opened her mouth to say something, but Matt jumped in. "Look. We get you've not had it easy or have ever really seen the good in people, but we don't want to fight or delve with an unknown."

Liz finished up, "So we figure we should try and spend time together. At least while we travel. We can all make a better decision when we reach the vassal kingdom. What my uncle wants is irrelevant."

That ended the conversation, and they finished up their food in a more companionable silence. Camilla walked to the front of the train, while Matt and Liz returned to their rooms. They needed to start the process of learning their new skills. They had a short window to do it, if they wanted to expand the skill before the end of this train ride.

Matt sat with Aster as the veil of grogginess started to lift away from their bond. He threw Liz a message saying that Aster was waking up. A moment later, she entered the room, only to find the fox scratching at her neck where the AI was implanted.

From their bond, Matt got much more feedback. More emotion, and even the start of what felt almost like words. It was like a pipe that had been replaced with a much larger one, letting more of who Aster was in. Her small form repeated what she did when she had first hatched, and explored everything around her.

Matt got the sense that new ideas were forming from the old scents and objects. Liz talked to her in the yips and clicks that made the beast language. Aster flicked her ears, and her tail poofed as if she was startled.

Matt patted her and ran her tail through a hand until she defluffed.

It's not like she hasn't heard this before. She uses Liz to ask for ice cream all the time.

The idle thought was the wrong thing to say, as the fox perked back up when he thought the word ice cream. The fox was at the door in a flash after a moment of stillness. Matt felt her push 'Ice cream!' through their bond.

Liz simply laughed while he sat there and contemplated pounding his head against the wall.

"The first thought you have is of ice cream? I feel betrayed."

Aster cocked her head and yipped at him. Liz’s giggled continued while a picture of a heart and a questioning color was pushed through to him from his bond.

"I don't have a heart for you to eat either. You’re a glutton. But ok, let's go see what they have."

They made their way back to the food car. Walking through the halls made Matt feel exposed, as though someone would try to steal the skill shard in its bracelet. He knew it was locked down tight, but the lingering fear still remained.

When they arrived at the food car, they found Camilla sitting at a table on her own. She didn't have a plate, so Matt wasn't sure what she was doing, but she glanced at the opening door and smiled at the bounding white fox. Camilla’s gaze rose from the small fox, up to the accompanying humans, and she saw Matt and Liz. Her face froze, and the smile became brittle and she didn't meet either of their eyes.

At Aster's instance, they all got bars of various kinds of ice cream. On a whim, Matt snagged a bar for Camilla. She took it, but was more entertained at Aster's antics. She devoured her own bar, then tried to steal pieces of Matt and Liz’s ice cream too.

They let her have a bite or two, but Camilla's slow pace was her undoing. Aster saw the bar with only one nibble, and gave the dark-haired woman a pleading look. It won the woman over. She ran her hand over the fox's fluff, and only had to give her entire bar of ice cream to win her over.

The smile Camilla gave Aster made Matt feel like there was still someone in there that could be helped. It was a pure and innocent smile.

Aster was no help, as she just discovered a new best friend, and didn't seem at all biased when pushing Matt to keep the woman around. He probed their bond, and found that she had no idea that the woman was trying to come with them, so he tried to hide that particular fact from the fox.

Having Aster seemed to break the tension, and Matt felt Camilla open up during the interaction. She even chimed in with a few interjections of her own while he and Liz bickered.

***

Two days later, as the train was approaching the station, Matt and Liz sat next to each other in their room. Their [Endurance] skills were about to breach their core spirits, and fill the third and final skill slot. They would be immediately removing the skill, and putting it back to their inner spirits to free up the slot. The skill would be expanded upon as much as it could be, so it was more efficient to free the slot up and use it to work on expanding another skill.

Matt wanted to improve [Mage's Retreat]. According to Madam Delver’s guide, he could improve the Durability boost to half as strong as the Strength boost. It was a nice adaptation that could make him very hard to kill.

He wasn't that happy with being forced into a pure tank and support role, but he didn't have a viable ranged attack skill that he could use.

At Tier 10, I'll potentially be a better mage than Liz and Aster. Let's see how they like it when I kill everything in the rifts myself, and they’re the ones left trying to scramble and catch up.

Matt brought his attention back into his spirit. The skill was about to cross the dividing line, and when it did, he moved.

He had practiced this so many times that it was second nature, but he was still nervous.

The skill structure was an incredibly complex 3D lattice formation that interwove itself in hundreds of places. Matt started grabbing and expanding spots of the skill with strands that channeled mana. In his mind's eye, they were pipes that handled water. The junctions where more than one pipe met up each had incredibly complex functions. Without knowing exactly what the final result was meant to be, and without hours of repetition, he would have ruined the skill. He would have either crippled its functionality, or shattered the skill completely.

Matt tweaked the pipes, and while his muscle memory took over, he examined the skill as a whole.

Skills came in four main categories.

Cost up front was the first, where the skill was instantly formed in the mana pool and immediately cast. That instant forming was why he couldn't trickle feed a normal skill, like [Fireball], the 10 mana it needed to cast. It was the same reason he needed to fill his mana pool to cast [Hail]. It needed the initial cost to be paid in one shot.

Channel skills were the second type of skill. They came in two different versions, one was like [Mage's Retreat] and functioned like an expanding balloon. That was why they scaled exponentially instead of linearly. It took more and more mana to double the size of the balloon, and double the benefits.

The other type of channel skills were like [Hail]. Most had an initial cost, but needed a continuous mana input to maintain the effect. They had malleable ‘pipes’ that could expand to handle more mana. They couldn't expand infinitely, like the ballooning effects of the other type of channel spells, but they could increase their throughput. Unlike a standard [Fireball].

The third type of skills were reserve skills. They took a chunk of mana, and locked it away. They created fake essence to buff an aspect of cultivation, or some other effect. The normal [Mana Strength] that melee fighters used worked like that.

There was a rarer version of reserve skills that precharged the skill, and the missing mana could be regenerated. They held the mana directly inside the spirit of the skill structure. That had its advantages, but it also meant that the caster needed to recast the skill every so often. The main drawback was that the mana was prone to leaking out. It was slow enough, but differed for every skill.

[Phantom Amor] also worked like the third type. Mana was reserved to protect the caster against one strike. His [Cracked Phantom armor] was a cracked skill, and had more of the properties of the second type of reserve skill. The pipes could expand, but they weren't like [Hail]’s where they expanded freely. The pipes of [Cracked Phantom Armor] were like steel. He had to slowly expand them through long meditation, or advancing his cultivation.

The final type of skills were the entirety of manipulation skills. They were similar to the second type of channel skills, but were considered a separate category. The main factor that set them apart was that normal buffing or debuffing skills and Talents did not work on them. A skill or item enchantment that would buff a ranged skill did nothing to enhance manipulation skills, even though they were able to be used at range.

The final moment came, and Matt brought his attention back to the task at hand. With a mental effort, he mentally ‘blew’ into the skill, expanding all the pipes. That final bit was at Aunt Helen's suggestion, and would help the skill handle more mana from the onset. She figured that he'd be spending a lot of time getting his type two channel skills to handle his absurd mana input. Especially at the higher Tiers.

This way, the skill would start out a step ahead.

[Endurance] settled down after the agitation caused by the manipulation, and he opened his eyes. When he pushed mana through the newly adjusted skill, he felt rejuvenated. All of his aches and pains disappeared with a cool, refreshing wave.

The original skill, [Endurance], was only good for muscle fatigue, as that was a subset of the cultivation aspect, Regeneration. The skill [Regeneration] could regrow limbs with enough mana, and when upgraded, wouldn't cause strain on the body like normal healing spells. Overhealth was amazing like that.

Still, when expanded upon like he and Liz had, [Endurance] bolstered the body's natural healing. It was the best self heal that was available at Tier 8. Traditional healing spells didn't start dropping until Tier 14, after all, and were incredibly rare at that. This was still amazing, and with Matt keeping them full of mana, they could in theory, go for days without sleep. It wasn't recommended, but it could be done.

Liz finally opened her eyes, and from her sitting position, lunged into a hug, knocking the napping fox off her lap.

"Ha! [Endurance] changed with my Talent into [Blood Endurance]. HA!"

From over her shoulder, he asked, "How can you figure out what that does?"

She let go, and scooped up the fox and fell back on the bed, wrapping her up in another hug. "Uncle Manny had a message queued for me. I got a report of what it does from him. I get all the normal benefits from the expanded [Endurance], but it also boosts my blood regeneration through the roof."

Matt was going to ask how she knew that, but realized that the Emperor must have taken her Talent and tested many skills for compatibility issues.

"Did he test other skills?"

"Yup! He said that he tested anything that could change. Apparently some skills just won't change at all. And there’s others that could actively harm me. He said that he updated my AI with preloaded messages for skills that will hurt me."

Matt was shocked. He understood that she grew up with the man, but that meant that he had absorbed each skill with Liz's Talent active. He had to have had better things to do with his time.

With [Endurance] running at a small trickle, Matt felt ready to move. Their train was about to reach their stop, and the three of them met up with Camilla. They found her shuffling around their common room.

"I'm not sure how you want to handle rooms."

Matt thought about it, but Liz just charged ahead. "We might as well just get a three room suite. That way we can spend time together and work past this rough start."

"We usually watch a movie or something most nights. It would be good if you join us. I also cook for us when we have time." Matt added that last bit to try and get the clearly conflicted woman to agree.

"Ok. That..." She swallowed hard. "Sounds nice I guess."

As they exited the train, Matt looked to her and asked, "Wait are you on The Path?"

Camilla shook her head, "No."

Matt shot a concerned glance to Liz, while looking up the information. "It's fine. We just need to have her verify her relative strength. As long as she stays within a Tier of us, and isn't much stronger, it's fine. We actually might be stronger than her with full Concepts."

With Liz saying that, he probed Camilla for the first time with his spiritual sense. He found that she had a different type of fake Concept. It was one he hadn't felt before. As much as he wanted to ask, he didn't. It was far too soon to ask, and he assumed that she had gotten something good from Duke Waters. It just felt like it was more real than the others he had felt.

Matt turned and said, "Well, I need to go see TrueMind. I'll grab some fresh ingredients on the way back. Camilla, are you allergic to anything?"

With her no, Matt and Liz went to TrueMind, while Aster went with Camilla. Matt was slightly hesitant at letting his bond go with her, but Aster clearly wanted to, so he didn't push. Aster said that she smelled nice, and therefore was a good person. Matt wasn't sure that was how it worked, but he trusted her combat prowess.

He was suspicious that the greedy fox was trying to get the new addition to the party to buy her ice cream.

Arriving at TrueMind, Matt was quickly escorted into the lab, and had his AI linked into their testing. They started with the usual mundane checks, but the techs were much nicer this time. The man, Oliver, was chatting with Matt while the results came in.

Feeling much better about the environment, Matt asked, "So why were the other Technicians at the last test tutting all over their pads?"

Oliver spun his pad, and showed a screen with more data and charts than Matt could quickly read. "So, your AI is a rewrite of the older, original AI's."

He peered at Matt and asked, "You know how AI's were made, right?"

"Not a clue. Someone smart?"

Oliver smirked. "No... Well yes. But also no. AI's are actually a Tier 25 rift reward. They were originally a skill like any other. They were special in being a channeled skill that had no initial cost. It was a huge advantage for rich people to give their kids. Still is, to be honest."

Matt cocked an eyebrow at Liz, who was looking bored. She shook her head, so he made a note to ask her later.

"But, they took the skill structure and made it simple. Simple enough that they could recreate it, but that came with losses. You know the saying: good, fast, or cheap. You can only have two. Our AI's go for fast and cheap. Yours is throwing cheap out the window and doing fast and good. But it's not doing it well. Or... it is for its Tier, but it's doing it in an extremely inefficient way. Sometimes it’s trying to get to step three by going from step one to step seven, and doing calculus to get back down."

Oliver shrugged. "It's great for its Tier. Your search function is indexing in a very interesting way. Also, the way it's locating special identifiable features is great. I can't tell you why they were acting like that, but your AI is a great low Tier data point."

That raised a question Matt hadn't thought of. "Am I not the only one with it? At my Tier, at least?"

Oliver waved him off, "Of course not. But you are the only one I know of that isn't being supported by TrueMind. Most need mana to keep the AI running, so they’re focused on making them more effective. Your AI hasn't decreased usage in the slightest. That's why it's such a great data point. Your testing of our simulations is going at more than twice the speed we thought it would."

"So how is my AI different? I never got an answer for that when I got it."

"Easy, your AI is just a rewrite of the original skill. A reset to zero, if you will. The new AI's are so many generations old that we started using two letters. Your AI is closer to the skill itself. But it's still based on a Tier 25 skill. That one can run on nearly 0 mana, but we can't replicate that."

Matt questioned the helpful tech, "Is there anything else I could work towards? I never got any of the extra modules like the ID function, and I felt kinda dumb that I didn't even think to buy that."

Oliver waved his hands around wildly. "No! No. Don't do that. If you use the premade modules, your AI will change them for sure, but it won't be as interesting for us as your AI recreating them from scratch. If you want some suggestions on what to make, have it start learning about whatever profession you like."

"Yeah, I was looking into an enchanting module, but they are way too expensive."

Oliver looked aghast. "Noooo! I can't stop you from doing that, but just buy and download the books, then have your AI simulate the results from the lessons. I'm sure you’ll learn a lot, and so will your AI. This is a really unique data point here. Please don't ruin it with the store-bought stuff. And if it doesn't work well, you can always buy the module later."

Oliver then launched into a tirade about how a different approach could revolutionize the computing fields.

Matt thought it over while tuning the man out. The idea had merit. The AI modules would help someone enchant with overlays, and show where to carve or embed mana. But they were restricted and ruinously expensive.. None were on the open market, and they were all made by various companies, organizations, noble families, or guilds. They each were said to work differently, and have their own advantages.

Some were better at weapons enchantments, and others were better at larger defensive formations. Each was made for the guilds that used them, which led to them being jealousy guarded. Rivals could glean a lot from knowing what their AI guides did.

Smithing techniques and other professions were mostly open at Tier 5 and below, as it was mostly mundane materials being used. But the higher the Tier, the more exotic the materials were, and the more ways there were to use them.

Not a single power wanted to give all of their hard-earned secrets away. Matt could understand that, but he really didn't care about the intricacies of enchanting. He would love to automate it with his AI, and only provide the mana.

He would never get a cooking one. He had talked to Aunt Helen about it. She wasn't as dismissive as he thought she would be, but she pointed out that a lot of cooking was doing things to taste. You could measure and be perfect all day, but then everything would come out the same.

Each piece of meat, vegetable, or other ingredient was different, and should be treated as such. He knew the same applied to enchanting, but he really didn't enjoy it. Everything in his life was about producing mana. It was nice to have something not dependent on it for once.

"Oliver, is there anything else?"

While the man was rambling and Matt ruminating, the chair was beeping at him to get up and leave.

The technician coughed slightly. "Ah. Go ahead. Sorry. Your AI is so fascinating, I could talk about it all day."

Saying their goodbyes, they left TrueMind and meandered back to their suite for the night.

"So what was that about not getting the AI skill?"

Liz shrugged. "One. I was on the path. Two, I and most other kids born from higher Tiers get special AI's made from our parents' AI's. The AIs become very unique, and better at the higher Tiers, when there’s been time for them to grow and evolve. Over Tier 25, maybe up to Tier 30ish, no one sells that info like you did. Too much can be gleaned by the shape of the AIs structure. My parents had an AI made for me when I was conceived. I had it implanted from birth. It was just inactive."

Matt thought it over. "This isn't a mark on you, but that feels like such bullshit. Isn't the whole point of The Path to stop that?"

Liz looked awkward, and Matt had to tamp down on his anger. She didn't choose who her parents were, and he couldn't say that he wouldn't try to do the best for any future children. Ascenders knew that his parents tried their best.

It still grated the wrong way to find out that there was yet another advantage from having higher Tier parents.

"Is there anything else that comes from having higher Tier parents?"

Liz looked wronged, so he rubbed his face. "Sorry that was accusing. I just don't like finding out that I'm starting even lower."

He gave her a smile, and the tension disappeared.

"Not really. The only other thing is really just the basis of knowledge that I have. Also, having parents over Tier 15 means that the child will be perfect. No genetic imperfections at all. The same will happen when you reach Tier 15, and the mind takes control over the body. So it is a temporary advantage at best."

Matt wanted to snark back that it was an advantage at the lowest Tiers, where it would make the largest difference.

He stopped himself. That really wouldn't be fair to Liz.

"Sorry. I guess now that we talked about dating, I really feel our different social statuses."

Liz hooked his arm and they turned into a produce store.

"Well, please don't take it out on me. I didn't choose it. And don't put yourself down. I might have started higher, but we both know that with your skillset, you'll be there eventually. And on your own merit."

As he pulled items for a pasta dish, he thought over his response. "I don't want to be like that. It's something I'll need to work on. And I would never leave you and Aster behind."

They chatted, and when they made it back to their rooms, Matt cooked, while Liz and Camilla half watched him and half-watched an action movie.

Matt served them, and they watched the movie in a pleasant silence. He noticed Camilla looking at her cleared plate and said, "Don't hold back, there’s enough for more than two platefuls per person."

She murmured quietly, "Thanks, you are a really good cook."

He wouldn't say that she was a friend by the end of dinner, but the hard, jaded image he had of her was replaced with a woman who had issues. She seemed like a skittish animal who was expecting the next blow to come from anywhere.

Matt supposed that was close enough to the truth, at least with what he understood of her background. He just wasn't sure if this was the true her, or an act to get back into their good graces. He wasn't set on her joining them to explore the new world. An unknown at their back, especially in a rift, could spell disaster.

The only upshot was that they weren't just there for the rifts, but more so the natural treasures that existed on a planet that didn't have humans curating it. Best case, Matt found a Tier 5 treasure that would boost his Mana Concentration, so he could save the potions that Aunt Helen had given him.

He was laying in bed after Aster left him to join one of the others, when Liz slipped into his room. His confusion turned to shock when Liz flopped onto his bed.

"Uncle Waters sent me a message."

"How did it get to him and back so fast?"

"Oh, I paid for the message to be instantly transmitted instead of waiting. Well, I charged him for it. He answered back, and I thought we could watch together."

The Duke’s face appeared on the pad she held. He looked tired, with slight bags under his eyes.

"Hey, BethBeth. Sorry Cammie approached you like that. Matt, if you are watching, I'm sorry. I knew she wasn't ready to go out, but she demanded it. I couldn't stop her without being exactly like who broke her. I'm sorry she took that course of action, and said what she did. I couldn't do much without taking away her freedom again, and shattering what little of herself she's put back together."

The Duke was rambling and seemed to notice, "So I sent her to you guys. It was the best I could do in a shitty situation, she was determined to progress on her own no matter what her therapist’s and I suggested. I'm sorry you got splattered. Cammie asked me not to warn you as she wanted your true reaction. I'm sorry she did that. I didn't think." He sighed, "I didn't think she would try and bait Matt into something..."

The man rubbed at his eyes for a moment. "Liz, you’re right. A favor from me really doesn't mean much, as I would do anything for you anyway. I just don't have anything else I can give. Can you just try for my sake? I hate what happened to her, and the others with her. I visited that piece of shit Cumulus’ estate more than once, and never noticed anything wrong. If I had, I could have stopped this long before dozens were killed, and Cammie was caught up in it."

"Just do this for me please? I don't want to see her turn all that anger on everyone else. She thinks the world is out to get her. And she's mostly right. After I killed that monster, the Empire looked into his duchy. She grew up in a half legal brothel that he was keeping under wraps. The man had dozens that he would pull young girls from, so they could be dispatched if they made too much of a fuss, which is exactly what her mother did. He burned the whole place down with everyone inside."

The last bit hit Matt hard. Duke Cumulus was a beast. But none of that excused her actions. Still, they did give him a framework to understand her.

The message ended with, "I'm sending her a message as well, and paying for her to talk with her therapist with video, not just slow messages. Just do what you can, please. But don't break yourselves doing it."

Matt looked at Liz. "Well, I guess we have to help."

She sighed and said, "I want to say Uncle Waters is only good at fighting or something, but he's good with people, and Camilla is stressing him out."

A few minutes later, she left to go back to her room. They had talked, but didn't know what to do. They weren't the girl's therapist, after all. The thing was, Matt didn't know what else the Duke could have done either. You had to want to be helped, and Camilla clearly wanted to go out and increase her power. Whether or not that involved wanting help for her clearly fragile mental state, remained to be seen.

Still, he could understand wanting to be stronger. It was close to his own goals, after all.