75. New Spell New Me

  [REVOLVER Spell: HARVEST]

  [MP Cost: 20]

  [Satiety Cost (PRETJORD alternative resource): 5]

  [Spell Description: Chamber Two imbuement. Deal half of REVOLVER Base Attack Value in Zealous damage. When it hits a mob-class Aberrant, the target becomes [Earmarked].

  [Addendum [EARMARKED]: When the target is smited, it leaves behind a unique body part as a consumable ingredient.]

  ***

  “What’s wrong, Princess? Why’d you stop walking?”

  Serac tuned out of Pathsight to rejoin the land of the honestly living. Deeper into the Hevnerskog, the pine trees grew thick and tall, all but shutting out the daylight. A faint gleam remained in Serac’s eyes as she hurried to catch up with Zacko and Petter.

  “Sorry! Finally remembered to read up on my new spell, and I gotta say, it does sound pretty interesting.”

  “Yeah? How so?”

  “Says here I can [Harvest] ‘consumable ingredients’ from the critters we smite. That can only mean one thing, right? We could cook our own food!”

  “Yeah?” Zacko said mildly, never one to count his chickens before they hatched. “Assuming you’re right, that only makes it more imperative we find these Aberrants soon. If all goes well, maybe we could fill our stomachs before we head back to town for our reward.”

  “Hm. I really hope the Aberrants in Pretjord are… more appetizing than the ones from Naraka. I mean, Jailer steaks and Flesh-fiend skewers? Can you even imagine?”

  “Hey, don’t threaten me with a good time. Right now, I’m so hungry I could eat a ghost.”

  Serac managed a distracted chuckle, still thinking about [Harvest] and its implications.

  “Alternative resource,” she murmured, honing in on the most ambiguous part of the description. “What could that mean?”

  “This is new to me as well,” Trippy took it up, unprompted, “but if I were to guess, it means you could choose which of two resources to spend. Either 20 points of Mana or 5 points of [Satiety].”

  “Huh, I guess that makes sense. 20 MP is a little on the expensive side, but 5 points of [Satiety] doesn’t sound too bad, so long as I manage my [Hunger] carefully. It’s a bonus perk while I’m in Pretjord; I could make myself hungrier in exchange for casting a spell. Once I’ve moved on, though, would I have no choice but to spend MP? Would I even have any use for [Harvest] in the other Realms?”

  “It’s a good question, Wayfarer, one I don’t have an answer to. I suppose it’s something we’ll have to learn along the way. Together.”

  Serac nodded, oddly serene. Since their encounter with Sublimity the Deva, Trippy had been Shriven of his former self’s intimate knowledge of REVOLVER and its complex magic. It saddened Serac to think of all that her sentient six-shooter had lost. Yet she was also—selfishly, perhaps—heartened by the knowledge they were in this together, learning along the way.

  Presently, however, it was Petter Svensen who led the way. The mackerel now halted mid-skip and put a fist up next to his head, the universal signal for: stop and listen.

  Or, in the Yaksha’s case, it was to stop and read. Serac couldn’t hear anything, but she saw the scales upon Petter’s skin writhe and vibrate ever so slightly. Not with fear, but with heightened perception.

  “Is this what you meant by ripple-reading?” Serac asked in a whisper. She didn’t know if she needed to whisper, but it certainly felt appropriate.

  “Exactly right, Miss Serac!” Petter answered, cheerfully loud. “We Yakshas, and most of Pretjord’s aquatic creatures too, can detect nearby threats or opportunities from the subtle shifts in the medium we occupy. Right now, that medium is damp forest air, and this particular set of signals tells me we’re close.”

  “Close to?”

  “Ulvknalls, Miss. Nasty beasts, them. I’d almost always call them a ‘threat’, but right now, I’m with you”—Petter grinned, revealing a set of surprisingly sharp teeth—“so I’d say this is more an opportunity. Ready?”

  Serac nodded solemnly, then followed her mackerel guide as he waded through to the end of the thicket. This time, Petter did so with slow, careful steps, taking obvious care to avoid disturbing the surrounding vegetation. The trio eventually came upon a clearing, one with a mossy pond in its center. No doubt a watering hole for the local inhabitants, as demonstrated by a dainty doe deer presently lapping at its contents.

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  Petter halted again at the clearing’s edge. Serac followed suit, not to copy her guide, but simply because she’d been struck by the deer’s beauty. Her meeting Bea Sattva had led her to believe all deer to be muscular and boulder-like. Here was her first gander at a bona fide specimen, proving her assumptions way off the mark.

  “Oh no,” she blurted next to Petter’s earhole, again dropping her voice to a whisper, “don’t tell me this is an Aberrant. I don’t want to smite anything so pretty!”

  “I’ve got good news and bad news, miss.” Now Petter too spoke in a whisper, in an apparent effort to avoid agitating the ripples. “The good news is no, this isn’t an Aberrant, and you won’t have to smite it.”

  “And the bad news?”

  Before Petter could answer, ‘bad news’ descended from the canopy above, taking the form of a large, furry shadow. Faster than a mackerel could warn of its arrival, and faster still than a startled prey could gallop to safety, the shadow engulfed the deer in its entirety. A brief cacophony of gnashing teeth, tearing flesh, and strangled yelps… then the forest quieted.

  Just like that, the deer was gone. In its place stood—nay, crouched—an abomination of slavering jaws, bloodied fur, and bulbous muscles. The thing was huge and imposing, yet it also had a strangely ‘liquid’ appearance—its jaws, muscles, and fur seemingly moments away from bursting, melting, and falling apart. In short, it looked like a wolf stuffed with water balloons, designated by Pathsight as: [Ulvknall].

  Serac postponed her grief for the deer and unholstered REVOLVER, ready and eager to get back into the swing of things after her short vacation. That was when a loud, animalistic growl filled her senses, issued not from the wolf-like Aberrant but from Zacko, who now flung himself into the clearing with unbridled vigor.

  Hungry Zacko is like a different person! Startled as Serac was by her partner’s blind charge, she took it as the learning opportunity it was. How will the Ulvknall react to a front-on assault? Sidestep? Block? Some kind of counterattack?

  The answer was none of the above. Just as a human entered its line of sight, the wolf monster dug itself lower into the ground, to then drive a bulbous paw and its sharpened claws toward the sky. The ground at the Ulvknall’s feet exploded, sending up conal sprays of dirt, grass, and muddied water. Hungry Zacko took the full brunt of the elemental shower, which forced him to brake mid-charge and protect his face.

  “Ptoop! Thpfft!” Zacko spat out mouthfuls of dirt, tightly shut eyes streaming with tears. “Pocket sand? Are you for real right now?”

  “Watch out!”

  The Ulvknall’s shadow emerged from the remnants of its ‘pocket sand’. It now rose to its full height, puffing out its blood-soaked chest and bearing all of its claws to engulf its latest prey.

  As Zacko struggled, Serac reacted for him. She shot from the hip—a self-taught technique she’d learned to trust more and more. The unimbued bullet failed to hit the mark, but it didn’t need to. Its flight—and the threat it carried—had forced the Ulvknall to check its attack.

  That was the delay Zacko needed to get back in the fight. Eyes still red and streaming, he settled himself into a wide stance, from which to unleash his trademark DPS Dao: [Cestus]. The NINEFOLD fist buried itself into the tuft upon the Ulvknall’s chest. The impact produced an oddly muffled sound, as if the combatants were submerged in water.

  Zacko seemed put off by the lack of feedback, but he nevertheless followed through with his combo: [Fan] under the chin, then [Cudgel] to knock the beast back down to earth. Poise-break! The whole forest shook as the Ulvknall’s towering frame dropped to the floor. It’d gone back into its crouching position, absent any menace and waiting to receive its smiting blow. Zacko raised his fist to oblige.

  “Wait!” Serac shouted again… then flinched as her partner spun toward her with wild-eyed rage. “Sorry! It’s just I happen to be on Chamber Two right now, and I really wanna try out my new spell!”

  Zacko let out the snarl of an animal denied its kill. Despite it all, he held his fist in check and jerked his head toward the beast at his feet, as if to say: hurry the fuck up!

  Serac didn’t need to be told twice (or even once!). She took the briefest of Ksanas to attune to her own [Hunger], concentrating on its desperate, obsessive, and zealous energy as she squeezed the trigger.

  [Chamber Two: HARVEST]

  [196!]

  [ULVKNALL Status Effect: EARMARKED]

  REVOLVER’s Base Attack, converted to Zealous damage, then reduced by half, then amplified again by the critical multiplier on a Poise-broken opponent. Serac was happy to let Pathsight police its own math. This latest hit brought the Ulvknall’s beefy HP down to its last chunk.

  Serac checked her Mana bar to see it was still full. So, that’s how I opt to spend [Satiety] instead of MP, eh? Better get used to it so I can replicate it every time. Finally, she turned her attention back onto her partner.

  “Okay, thanks, you can go ahead now!”

  Zacko’s impatient fist shot forth before Serac could get her words out. The wolf monster went limp, then dissolved into Souldust.

  [560 ?]

  Not too shabby for two bullets’ worth of work, one of which dealt half-damage and the other didn’t even find its mark. Yet, on this occasion, Serac was far more interested in the physical fruits of her labor.

  The cloud of Souldust lifted, leaving in its wake a piece of the Ulvknall for a gunslinger to harvest. As for actually identifying the ‘unique body part’, Serac was left scratching her head.

  “Eugh,” she uttered her honest reaction to the bloody, rubbery, fleshy blob that hovered in the space previously occupied by an Ulvknall. “What even is that?”

  “By Tyr’s jaws!” A colorful swear, courtesy of a mackerel who’d suddenly jumped into the frame. Petter hovered over the hovering blob, waving his hands about like he didn’t know what to do with them. “That, Miss Serac, is an Ulvknall liver. I’ve only seen it once in my life. This’ll fetch a king’s ransom at the marketplace; I’d stake my life on it!”

  “Really?” Serac eyed the so-called treasure with more than passing skepticism, then turned her dubious gaze onto her even less remarkable six-shooter. “I knew I could count on REVOLVER to keep me safe, but I never thought it’d let me eat like a king, too!”

  “Less chatting, more smiting!” Zacko cut in, mood barely improved since his latest smite. He jerked his head again, this time toward the far end of the clearing, where more furry shadows emerged from the thicket. “However rare or valuable that thing is, looks like there’s more where it came from.”

  “Perfect!” Serac’s face split into an eager grin as she turned to face the mob. “I’ve been itching to test out my other new spell!”

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