The last few weeks of December went by quickly for Helo. With his skills hitting a wall at the bottom of rare tier, he spent most of his time practicing his enchanting and techniques. He still goes into the dungeon with his team and alone, but outside the dungeon most of his focus has been on enchanting.
Before he can learn the next technique for the ‘Moon-Staff’ style he must learn a new set of forms. These forms work to quickly transition from a defensive spin to an offensive slash.
Micah gave Helo a demonstration and from what he saw, Micah was able to have his spear absorb the spinning projections. Then he used that absorbed power to lash out in a blow, it sent the ground in front of him ripping away with a gust of wind.
The next forms of his ‘Twin Fang’ style have to do with increasing attack speed in a flurry of slashes. The next technique focuses on maximizing damage through repetitive attacks.
For his enchanting work Helo has kept up a constant schedule of learning and practicing new runes. Many of the runes are part of the compendium that his father left him. The biggest issue he has with enchanting is his own lack of mana.
Most enchanters will augment their own work with mana cores. They sometimes need the help of other affinities to finalize the enchantment. But while they are creating the runes they use their own mana and regeneration.
Helo doesn’t have that; he goes through hundreds of mana cores a week. He practices each rune in simple and small enchantments. He was told that the most complicated enchantments are so small that normal people can’t even see the lines. So, he practices making them as small as he can.
This work has some unexpected benefits.
Due to your practice in enchanting, you have gained +2 to dex.
Name: Helo
Tier 1
Class: Shaded Predator (Pseudo Tier 3)
Level: 31
Stats: 382
- Str: 25 (+5%)
- Agl: 64 (+15%)
- Dex:42 (+15%)
- Per: 49 (+30%)
- Vit: 76 (+40%)
- End: 25 (+15%)
- Int: 25 (+5%)
- Will: 76 (+40%)
Focusing heavily on his work Helo carefully draws the final lines of the hardening rune. Quickly reaching over Helo grabs three mana cores from the Fire Ants. Holding the fire aligned cores up to a device he made to siphon mana, Helo floods the runes with energy. It is like a man getting shocked by a defibrillator. But he also has a pacemaker, because Helo continues to flood the now active rune with mana until the entire thing has stabilized. Looking over his new item Helo wraps it within his aura. Silent casting ‘Mental Nudge’ the item floats into the air a few inches above his bedroom desk.
Nudging the item up into the air, Helo catches it as it descends. The skill has yet to reach uncommon tier, but it has gotten stronger. His nudges are now like aggressive pokes. Holding the knife up into the air he uses his new non-class skill on it. ‘Appraisal’. As soon as Elder Shelby learned that Helo focused his ‘Identify’ wholly on finding weaknesses, she started having him learn appraisal.
Lava Hardened Dagger
Mid-Tier 1 Dagger.
This dagger’s blade can heat up and stops before combustion.
- Causes and Increases Fire Damage
- The hotter the blade is, the more durable it is.
Helo made this dagger as a test to see what he wanted to do with his kukri.
To his surprise, late one night while he was finding a new rune to study, he stumbled on partially built enchantments.
There were three of them, each with their own affinity; life, fire, plasma. After finding these partially built enchantments he brought them to Elder Shelbey. He told her that they were stored in his storage space. With her help they discovered that they were essentially frames for magic weapons.
“Knowing that you were changed by a curse I would say that your parents assumed you would have an affinity to match each these. So, they set up a framework for you to make powerful and customizable enchantments for these affinities.” The elder says to him.
“So, you think that my parents have these affinities? And put these enchantment frameworks into my necklaces… to help me make a weapon.” He says with a slightly curious lilt to his voice.
“Yes. That is what I think.”
With this new knowledge Helo decides to try enchanting his weapons with fire and plasma-based effects. With his dual knives he is going to enchant each with their own affinity.
To start he decided to work on the fire enchantment. After attempting to make a few plasma runes he found them to be far too volatile for him to work with. Testing the effect of his new blade Helo palms a mana core and starts heating the blade.
The blade heats up faster than the last time and the runes meant enchantment to keep the metal from combusting seem to be working well. Helo wants the blade to continue to grow hotter. The hotter the blade becomes, the more durable it is.
This is the seventeenth blade he has tested. Most of them got destroyed as the durability was weaker than the growing heat. Or the blade didn’t get hot enough.
For this blade he wove the circuit of the durability rune through the outside. Then he used the heat compression rune to focus the heat near the sharpened edge.
His hope is that the center and back of the blade remain cool enough that it doesn’t compromise the stability. The truth is that most of these runes are simple, like the ones that the BrightMoon family already has. But there is one rune that the elder couldn’t read, it was a rune that was very close to his first language.
The rune itself is closest to the word ‘Tenlashea’, which mean ‘tenacious’. But it has a focus on growing stronger the more pain you are in. The rune is a mixture of this word and a few others to create a rune that reinforces a material the more energy is run through it.
From Helo’s practice the rune is a balancing act of forces to make a weapon that can reach extreme level of power, without letting it explode.
Deciding to finish his work for the day Helo sets his tools aside and sets the knife in his ‘sell to the clan’ bin.
About to get to bed Helo checks his tablet and looks at the date ‘DECEMBER 23rd’. “AH… that’s not good.” He says under his breath. Looking at the date the only thing that he can think is. I’m screwed. He had a few ideas for Christmas presents but he never had the chance to make them.
“What isn’t good?” A caring and curious voice asks. Looking up Helo can see a lot of care and concern in Hinata’s eyes.
Not wanting to disappoint her he says. “Ah…. The time. It is almost dinner time and I didn’t quite finish my research.” Helo looks back at his tablet. “I think ill skip dinner.” HE says while rushing out of his room.
Watching him go Hinata tilts her head, “Mhm hope he is okay.”
Rushing off to the other corner of the valley Helo heads to the training and crafting area. He doesn’t spend much time here but he has a few people that make his testing objects like small array plates and the knives he has been enchanting.
Running through the snow Helo is a blur with the snowflakes and wind being picked up around him. It doesn’t take him long to arrive and he does with a small wave of snow flowing behind him.
Entering the door to the crafting area Helo turn around and gets a facefull of cold air and snowflakes. Blinking away the melting snow he watches as the wave of snow he picked up crashes into the now closed door.
Hoping that his favorite blacksmith is in Helo head to the tier 2 blacksmith area. Finding Bannit’s smithy he runs in and to his relief he is greeted by the clanging of metal on mental and a wall of oppressive heat.
Entering the smithy he shouts “BANNIT!!!”
“Clang, clang, clang, BAM” “OWE SHEIT” Helo hears the sound of clanging stop after the sound of metal on flesh.
“Damn you! You little shit licker….” Helo can hear the dwarf yelling before it turns into angry muttering “Waddya want.”
“I need two…” Thinking back to Alli and Hinata he tries to think about jewelry they don’t ware and would be inconspicuous. He already has an idea for their gifts. It is also something that would go along with his ‘counter assassin’ role. “Anklets. Simply but nice.”
“Made from durable metal, black with a silver jewel and black with green.” Helo says to the man. Bannit’s face is a mask of annoyance before turning into a shit eating grin.
“Ohhhhahahahha you sorry fuck! You forgot diddntcha!” The dwarf laughs at Helo and wipes away tears from his eyes.
“Lucky you string bean.” Bannit calls Helo this because he is a classic dwarf. He is short and stout, with thick long hair, a long-braided beard, and dark eyes covered by thick eyebrows.
The first time he saw Helo he said he was too skinny. Helo said he talked like a grandma. After the two stared at one another the dwarf laughed and invited him to his shop. After this they formed a sort of friendship. Bannit knows that Helo is important, he isn’t one to care about politics, but he treats Helo well. He was surprised when Helo started coming in for orders instead of using his tablet.
But now they have a deal. Helo gets some priority orders and Bannit gets Helo to test his enchantments on smithing gear. Any that have some value or might be of use, he keeps in a large storage trunk.
When Helo handed over a hammer that when swung would resist moving. He was testing an enchantment to build momentum. Instead, it just made everything harder to move. The dwarf just said it might be useful for somethin.
Now the dwarf is having a great time laughing at him. “HAhaahha.” He started laughing again after calling him lucky. “I got the month off. No orders. I can get yours done.”
“Thank you… wait do you have any extra plates? I want to test the enchantment before putting it in the anklet.” Helo asks.
Getting his extra enchanting plates, Helo goes to Bannit’s messy desk and makes some room. He is going to make them a tracking anklet. It is innocuous enough that someone would looks over it if they see it. But at the same time can be activated easily and kept on all the time.
The first order of business is to make something that has enough range to reach his own. Next, he needs to make it so the tracking single can defend itself. Once activated it will use all the charged mana to send a burst of energy outward that protects and covers the single. A lot of people might just think that it is a weird defensive item.
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After that he need to make it so that people won’t notice it. A slight camouflage that can be turned on and off. This will be one of the most intricate enchantments he has made, it will have to be created around the form of the anklet and carved very small.
Starting his practice Helo writes on a paper all the runes that he will need. To start the carves all the runes with his ‘Stylus for the Mannaless’. Each new attempt he creates them smaller than the last.
Lost in his work Helo falls into a trance like rhythm that seems to match the clanging of the blacksmith behind him. Some time later he blinks himself back as he hears a “BING”
Checking his notifications he finds.
You have entered a trace like state and your ‘Natural Meditation’ has evolved into ‘Nature’s Flow Meditation’.
Nature’s Flow Meditation (Uncommon): You can enter meditation while moving slowly and with care. This increases your state of focus and your natural energy regeneration.
Happy with his change, Helo smiles to himself and gets back to work. Micah has been working on getting Helo a meditation skill like this. It can help increase the speed he learns things like katas and weapon forms.
Getting back to his work, it is another few hours before Helo is startled awake by a surly dwarf. “Get up Stringbean. No drooling on my papers.”
Looking around with bleary eyes he asks, “Whaaaa?” incoherently. Slowly coming awake Helo looks down and finds that his rune works progressively got better and smaller. It got down to where he thinks he has them ready of the anklets.
He even has a notification waiting.
Entering a state called crafters flow you have made great strides with your efforts. +2 dex.
Gaining another two dexterities so quickly is a huge boon for his crafting. Smiling Helo continues going through the practice plates. Eventually his frown turns a little awkward. His work got way worse, before it just stopped.
“Don’t worry bean. I can’ tell you how many times I’ve fallen asleep at the anvil.” The dwarf says before clapping Helo on the back. “Well here.” He drops a bag on the table. Helo can hear the clinking of jewelry, but it also hit with a much larger thud. “You told me an idea you had for a super-heated knife. I want a hammer.” The dwarf nods before kicking Helo out.
Walking out and into the snowy valley Helo looks at the sky and can tell it is almost sunrise. He is still tired and drowsy, but the cold air is starting to wake him. With the day officially being the 24th the party has a free day. This gives Helo enough time to finish his gifts.
The truth is he already made gifts for everyone. But he wanted to make something else for Alli and Hinata. He unfortunately lost track of time.
Quietly entering the house Helo uses his bloodlines power to sneak up to his room. Closing the door, it makes an “EEEEERRRREEE” noise as he shuts it. “That is why I need to work on using my bloodline energy out of my body. Not to attach to my daggers. But to silence doors.”
Stopping and listening carefully he can hear the quiet breathes of Alli and Hinata from inside his room. He can also hear the sound of a small fox from under his covers. Lelai has her own bed, but she insists on sleeping in his. He doesn’t mind but her fur gets everywhere.
Deciding to finish the hammer first Helo pulls out the smithing hammer for Bannit. Going through his notes he found the one that has the best durability. For assisting in smithing, he doesn’t need something with a super-heated edge. The attempt that had a 2/5th durability and 3/5th mix of heat, that covered the entire item had the greatest efficacy.
The durability runes run off the created heat, so having more heat lets the durability runes feed without taking it all. A 2/5 and 3/5 mix, that covers the entire blade is what worked the best for constant results.
Helo wanted a blade with a hot and powerful edge so he did more testing, but this is what will work best and last for his hammer.
Enchanting it doesn’t take to long, by the time he is finished breakfast has started. Checking his tablet it has been about three hours of work. Adding the last touches of Fire Ant mana Helo sets it aside and uses his tablet to request a runner to deliver something.
Heading down stairs Helo is wearing his soot and stain covered clothes from yesterday. His eyes are dark, hair is a mess, and he is stumbling all over.
“You look like shit!” Gabi yells out with a laugh.
He just gives her a fang filled smile in return.
Holding up her hands in a placating gesture she says. “Nothing wrong with that.”
“After breakfast you are going to bed mister.” Alli adds with her hands on her hips and an overly stern face.
“Yes ma’am.” He says in a mumble. Sitting down at the table he just stares at the spot in front of him. He forgot to grab food, but doesn’t want to get up. To his immense surprise when he slowly blinked his eyes food appeared. He almost wants to check his status to see if he got a skill, but he can hear Hinata sitting down.
“Did you finish what had you all riled up yesterday?” She asks him quietly.
“MHMMM” Is his only response while gorging himself. Without much thought he uses his ‘Mental Nudge’ to lift a bun from the kitchen counter and launch it toward him. Before it reaches him, a hand grabs it from the air.
About to yell he stops as he feels just the slightest of killing intents. Slowly looking over to the right he can see Aiko glaring at him. Her eyes flash with just a small yellow glow. To Helo’s natural dark affinity, it feels dangerous. Waving a spatula at him like an angry teacher she says, “No throwing the food in my kitchen.”
She stares at him until Helo looks away. As he does, he gets a slight instinct to move, but he is to slow and take a bun to the face. Looking at Aiko with shock she just smugly states. “It’s my kitchen.”
“Damn Aiko, your so cool.” Gabi says from her place eating food.
Slowly waking up as he finishes eating Helo knows that he doesn’t have time to sleep. Still wanting to keep what he is up to a secret Helo heads to his room. He has about twenty-four hours to create a new enchantment, design it for an anklet and enchant the jewelry.
Getting to his room Helo puts on some music and dumps out the contents of the bag. As soon as the anklets start to fall out, he uses ‘Mental Nudge’. One of them starts to float six inches off the table and in spin on an axis.
Looking at the jewelry Helo is baffled by how beautiful it is. When he asked Bannit to make them, he was in a rush and he knew Bannit would do it. He just didn’t expect this. The Anklet is made from a flat chain with ridges large enough for a relatively amateurish enchanter like himself to make runes. On one side of the chain there is a fox and the other is a tree. The tree is holding up a green crystal about a half inch in diameter.
Feeling some strain on his skill Helo pushes more energy into it. As the skill destabilize holding the item in the air goes from a skill backed process, to himself using the telekinesis. The truth is he is thankful for Hinata’s advice. Starting early was the correct option. It has been a few weeks and he still struggles to enhance his skill.
When you push a skill to be more or last longer, most of the effort is in pushing your mana into the skill construct and hoping it doesn’t break. But for his telekinesis skill as it breaks the effort of holding the item transfers to him. Helo has found that this is a good way to teach himself telekinesis and strengthen ‘Mental Nudge’.
Training like this is how he has grown his skill. Well, that and his considerable will and control over his mental energy. Holding the anklet up with his own mind Helo can feel the strain. Pushing himself a little further he can feel as sweat starts to gather on his brow. The Anklet might be light, but gathering his mental energy outside his body and using his mental energy to hold the item is a drain on his reserves and will.
It is a muscle that he never knew he had and never knew you would train. From what he has learned all manipulation skills are like that. System guidance helps a lot but from what he read from the system, his father is blocking the system from helping him.
Thinking back on his efforts and his father’s unique parenting he says, “Fine, ill do it myself!” With that he gives one last push and the anklet lifts upward an inch. As it starts to fall, he uses ‘Mental Nudge’ with the last of his mental reserves.
The anklet starts to hover and spin again like nothing happened. But Helo is sitting with his head on his desk and a smile on his face. “BING”
Your skill ‘Mental Nudge’ has evolved into ‘Mental Grasp’.
Mental Grasp (Uncommon): Mental Grasp: Use telekinesis on an object in your sight. You can hold and apply force on an object.
With drained reserves and a goofy smile Helo falls asleep. As he dozes off the anklet that was sitting over his head falls onto him. A few hours later Helo wakes up with a start. Looking around he quickly casts his new, ‘Mental Grasp’ and the jewelry that went flying off his head.
Pulling the jewelry closer he is surprised by how easy it is to hold now. Using ‘Bloodline Awakening’ Helo risks strained channels to get a better looks at his skill. Something he learned about his bloodline is that he can visibly see lifeforce and mental energy. Looking at the way he is holding the jewelry up, he must admit that his attempts were barbaric compared to this.
His skill is drawing out mental energy using a spiral that pulls more energy toward it. It also seems to slightly condense the energy to tighten the grasp. He can see a condensed purple haze surrounding the anklet.
Drawing it back he drops it on his desk and looks at the next one. Picking this one up with ‘Mental Grasp’ as well he can see it is similar. Made from what Helo assumes is Dark Steel and housing a silver gem. The gem is in the center of the moon on one side with a wolf on the other.
Drawing out how he wants to put the enchantment on the anklet Helo can tell with the flat backs and smooth edges on the moon and the tree, they are meant to house a majority of the runes.
While he is focusing his ‘Nature’s Flow Meditation’ activates and his progress slows but also becomes much smoother. His hands are more stable, and his lines are crisper. A few hours later he finishes his practice and studies his work.
He has a desire to show it to Elder Shelby and ask her opinion. But in the end his pride makes him want to succeed on his own. Looking it over he will admit that his increased dexterity and his meditation skill really pulled their weight.
Taking a moment to relax, Helo goes back to his new skill. Pushing his mind to left anklet even an inch made him pass out. He already knows that his bloodline has something to do with enhancing his mental energy. It isn’t the same for his physical and helped a lot when he tried to boost his movement skills. It also helped him use the techniques in his styles.
But he thinks there is more to it. He knows his bloodline’s golden energy is mostly fueled by his physical energy, when he dives into his internal view he can see how large rivers of energy loop out of his channels. At the same time only minor mounts of mental energy enter his golden bloodline. In the same way his dark energy is fueled by his mental reserves and a minor amount of physical energy.
Another thing that he learned today is that his physical energy likes to be moved in his channels and in loops that continue to flow. While his mental energy seems to function, best while being drained in a vortex. That was something he has never done before.
Meditation and pondering on the limits of his abilities he has already learned that he can enhance his body with his physical energy. But it now seems that he can use telekinesis with his mental.
After an hour of meditation Helo gets to crafting the items. He starts by using a pen to mark out his runes and the lines he wants to trace. He has to trace lines through every link in the chain to connect everything together. With each link being its own separate piece, he even has to make the rune of connection on each end where they touch to make it so that the mana can flow uninterrupted.
Around the line and to the wolf and fox he traces the runes of obfuscation. This will help the bracelet hide. Taking small crystals Helo actually hollows out a tiny portion of the wolf and foxes back, with this he has energy storage for the obfuscation enchantment.
On the back of the tree and moon Helo makes an enchantment that he actually has to fuel with his dark energy. His energy’s ability to weaken and pierce will make it easier for the alarm to break past any barriers. When Alli and Hinata push their mana into the enchantment to activate it a portion of their mana will be carried along with his own energy and act as a homing beacon. Using two types of person energy will make it easier to differentiate and track.
The large crystal is enchanted to house the energy and send it out in a burst. When Helo is about to finish enchanting the two, he looks them over and has a little more room. The space is a small circle on the back of the moon and tree.
Not sure what to add he only has room for one more rune. Opening his compendium to find ideas he is about to decide to leave it when he looks at his status. The last line catches his attention.
Styles: 2
- Moon-Staff (Uncommon)
- Moonshines Afterblock (Uncommon)
- Twin Fang of the Beast (Uncommon)
- Attacking from a step behind (Uncommon)
Liking his idea Helo finds a rune to store an aura imprint and connects it to the runes on the side of the moon and tree. The sides are where he added the runes to send out the blast of energy. This is different from the rune that sends the dark shrouded mana to act like a message.
The initial blast is supposed to weaken defenses and shroud the piercing mana beam. Happy with his work Helo is almost done. Setting both enchantments on a small array plate Helo gets to work. The array plate is made to slow down the degradation of the enchantment if it hasn’t been finalized, or if there are any issues.
Picking up a piece he already had prepared Helo starts to enchant a small Dark Steel disk. This disk has two loops on top and a flat gem in the center. It is made to sit behind the fang on his necklace.
He enchants it to act like a receiver. The gem is so that it is always on, and it uses its stored charge to boost the range. He made it so that there is a light projected in front of his chest pointing in the direction of the energy.
Finally done with all the pieces Helo has two last steps. The second to last is to make another array. The final is to add the enchantment into the array.
Not having to be as careful with his one, Helo takes out a large array plate and makes a simple array. This is called a ‘Resonance Array’, it fuels all the items at the same time with the same energy. Cycleing the energy between all the enchantments. To make the array he needs gathering runes under each item, a rune to move the mana, and a rune to help keep the mana stable so the enchantments don’t fail.
A lot of runes are based on intention. This is similar to Alli’s ‘Runic Construct’ skill. But with Helo’s Dark Steel Disk he added a ‘Sense’ rune. Now this rune doesn’t know what to sense for. He can activate it and send it his intentions, or he can build his intention into the enchantment.
Intentionally dampening his dark energy’s ability to strip concepts, Helo grabs the last two pieces. Two crystals that house some of Alli and Hinata’s mana.
Filling the resonance array with pure mana from his stylus Helo waits for the enchantments to stabilize. As the enchantment’s start to fill and the array moves the mana, Helo can feel just the slightest mingling of the three items’ energies.
The items are not tier 3; they don’t have their own projected aura. But they are made with magical materials, Helo’s intentions are baked into the runes, and now they are all sharing the same energy.
“Now.” He says to himself. Pushing his energy and the two crystals into the array, Helo finishes his project. As soon as he is done his head hits the desk and he passes out.