Arcane Apocalypse

18 – Skill Talk

Fighting under the mental pressure of my increased Sensitivity seems to be a good way of training Cognity quickly. Mia mused, deciding to forgo spending her new points just yet. Who knew, maybe she could get another Base Cognity point before nightfall if she kept hunting monsters as she was?

It’s decided. I’ll keep hunting without spending any points and dump them all into Cognity before going to sleep.

Rounding a corner, Mia stepped into the ER hallway and she could already tell this part of the floor was far from deserted. No one was shouting, but her ears still picked up conversations and movement through the closed doors as she passed.

Mia put some speed into her steps. The goblin could run off or something if she didn’t hurry up. It had only been a minute at most since she blocked his first arrow, but still. Speed and time were of the essence.

Reaching the last door facing the street, Mia rapped her knuckles on it and waited anxiously. When no answer came in a few seconds, she went to knock again, but a door opening behind her made her freeze.

“Oh, Mia, right?” Lara asked with a raised eyebrow, leaning out from the door just next to the one she’d knocked on. “You injured? What are you doing here?”

“I- uhm,” Mia took a moment to collect her thoughts. “I was shooting at goblins from the hallway over that way.” She waved her hand in its direction. “But they started shooting back so I thought flanking them from here could be a good idea … ?”

Lara stared at her for a moment, a deep frown on her face before a shout from deeper down the hallway pulled her attention away. “Just don’t put my patients in danger. That last flat is empty, use that one. Gotta go, see you later.”

Mia watched as Lara disappeared into another flat, then turned back to the door with a shrug. Slipping inside, she crept up to the window, trying to keep silent and stealthy.

Goblins had huge floppy ears. Those had to be worth something. Maybe they were just too dumb to use them. Whatever. Being silent couldn’t hurt.

She readied a Blast before peeking out, then took just a brief glance outside before slipping behind the wall again. The goblins were still there, feasting on their mangled kin.

I don’t know why I expected anything else. Even the bigger goblin is still just a goblin. Maybe they have the short-term memory of a goldfish.

Mia psyched herself up, let out a huff of breath, and stepped before the window. Hand raised, gaze locked on the taller goblin hunched over a corpse, fingers alight with mana. The Blast shot off and struck the goblin in the back of the neck.

The monster went down with a gurgle, a head-sized bloody hole gaping where its spine once was. Goblins shrieked again, though a third of them continued eating without paying mind to their fallen boss.

Mia shot off two more Blasts at the twitching big-goblin. Just to make sure it was dead. Then it was cleanup time.

The next two hours flew by as Mia went between the two flats, switching back to Bolt to clear up the much more fragile small goblins. Only when she felt the telltale sign of mana deprivation just a spell away did she stop her killing spree.

Mia took a last glance at the street below. More of it was covered in blood and gore than what was not, and the number of goblins actually increased over the time she spent there instead of going down. It seemed a free feast was an inescapable lure for the wretched greenskins.

I got what I came here for. Mia thought, though her feelings were conflicted. Sure, she wanted to level up fast by hunting goblins, but she also hoped to clear out the streets of monsters so the people in the building would be safer. Maybe I saved other people in other parts of the city who would have been killed by the goblins I attracted here.

It was possible, but still a long shot. Mia decided to keep the goblin-hunting more restrained going forward. She still needed levels, but she didn’t want to put people in undue danger because of her greed.

During those hours, she noticed other people joining her in thinning the crowd of gathered goblins, but thankfully no one came to bite her head off for luring in a horde of the vicious little monsters. Though it might just be that they’d do so later.

Mia reviewed her Notifications while hurrying up the stairs.

[Manifestation: 8 -> 9]

[Cognity: 6 -> 7]

[Level Up!]

[Level: 5 -> 6]

[Free Attribute Points: 3 -> 6]

Would be great if it distinguished between base stats and regular ones. Mia thought and much to her surprise, the system complied.

[Base Manifestation: 4 -> 5]

[Manifestation: 8 -> 9]

[Base Cognity: 6 -> 7]

[Level Up!]

[Level: 5 -> 6]

[Free Attribute Points: 3 -> 6]

Much better. Mia hummed. This hunting spree was both much more rewarding and much less successful than she expected.

On one hand, she gained three base stats. On the other hand, she only got two level-ups despite committing goblin genocide. Hell, her kill count was well into the triple digits after this afternoon.

A glance at her Combat Logs gave an idea of why that was though.

***

[You have killed: Hobgoblin - lvl 7]

[You have killed: Hobgoblin - lvl 8]

[You have killed: Goblin Raider - lvl 3] x 87

[You have killed: Goblin Raider - lvl 4] x 34

[You have killed: Goblin Raider - lvl 5] x 12

[You have killed: Juvenile Goblin Raider - lvl 2] x 32

[You have killed: Juvenile Goblin Raider - lvl 1] x 12

***

Almost every goblin she killed today was below her in level, especially after her first level-up. If the System had some hidden XP mechanic, killing lower levelled monsters from relative safety must have been a huge XP debuff associated with it.

It was a bummer, but oh well. What was she going to do? Write an angry email to the developers?

Mia let out a snort, then hastily looked around the hall. She only breathed a sigh of relief when no-one seemed to be looking at her like a crazy person, chuckling under her breath for nothing. The halls were empty and silent.

Shrugging off her embarrassment, Mia knocked on her flat’s front door — she grew up with a little brother and after some … events, learned to never assume they were not doing stuff she’d rather not see.

Hearing something along the lines of ‘come in’ from the inside, she did so after a moment. Mark was in the process of duct-taping the pieces of the table back together.

“What are you doing?” Mia asked amusedly, slipping by him and heading to her room to change. Goblin hunting and running from one end of the floor to the other were tiring, sweat-inducing exercises and she stank.

“Trying to get this garbage into a halfway usable state,” Mark grumbled. “Also, I got your daily food ration package along with whatever water I could annoy Jeff’s miserly goons into giving us. They didn’t want to give us any, since we still had some. Can you believe them? The only reason they even have something to drink is me, and they are being smart with me. Should have spit in their water.”

Mia gave understanding and affirmative sounds as she listened to Mark’s continued whinings. Another set of clothing gone. I really hope they figure out this water problem before I’m forced to re-wear stinky clothes.

Laziness could be a virtue in some niche situations, and Mia was feeling mighty thankful for her lazy past self. Having more money than she needed in a month, and a severe dislike for chores, Mia bought herself twelve entire sets of comfortable home clothes so she could go for as much time without getting within touching distance of a washing machine as possible.

Some of those sets were much too warm for the warm summer weather, but that still left about eight sets and the rest of her wardrobe. The day she was forced to wear jeans at home would be a sad day, but she much preferred it to stinky clothes.

When she got back to the living room in an identical set of the stuff she wore before, Mark was still rambling on and on about how annoyingly stuck-up everyone under Jeff was.

“You said something about food?” Mia interrupted his tirade, looking around and finding a paper bag on the counter. “Never mind. That’s mine?”

“Yeah,” Mark said, staring at the bag with a scowl. “I already ate mine. School cafeteria was a three Michelin star restaurant compared to that junk.”

“Really?” Mia hummed, peeking inside and catching sight of the contents. There was something she could vaguely recognise as jerky, some fruits, buns and some tomatoes. “They don’t look too bad … aside from that thing that I’m not convinced is not dog food.”

“The jerky?” Mark snorted. “They’ve been making those in a rush out of the rapidly defrosting meat they collected. Since there is still no power, they smoked them all over a Soviet-era industrial smoker Jeff pulled out of the basement.”

“Right,” Mia snatched bit-sized jerky out of the bag and eyed it suspiciously. It looked like someone beat the ever-living hell out of it with a meat mallet and then left it over a campfire for far too long. It was also 80% black and had only the vaguest hint of a salty scent to it. “How bad is it?”

“Yes,” Mark chuckled.

“Thanks for the help,” Mia rolled her eyes and took a tiny nibble out of it, a grimace already flashing across her face. When it finally touched her tongue, it was both worse and better than she expected. It was salty. That was it.

She chewed, then kept on chewing and chewing. Her taste buds went sore before long from the intense salty scent invading every single inch of her mouth. In the end, she swallowed it still only half-chewed up.

“Well, that was an experience,” Mia said, grabbing the bunch of jerkies and dropping them into a bowl on the counter. “I think I’ll be fine with just the rest of the stuff.”

With Mark fiddling with the table, Mia went over to the sofa and slumped down. Thankfully, the rest of the food was good, or even better. The apples and bananas tasted divine and the tomatoes were like the priciest sweet cherry tomatoes she’d never have bought in a grocery store because of their price. All too soon, her bag of delightful treats ran out before Mia had enough to feel anywhere close to full.

“Ah, I forgot to mention it before,” Mark said, glancing over his shoulder. “Stuff works again. We still don’t have power, but my phone and the other gadgets with batteries in them can be turned on again.”

“Wait, really?” Mia jumped up. “Ugh, where did I leave my phone?”

“I don’t know.” Mark shrugged. “But don’t get too excited. There is still no service or mobile data, so at best you can play offline games on it or something.”

“That- “ Mia deflated, but still continued searching. Maybe service would come back, or some backup generator would start up the nearest mobile mast and get mobile data back into working order. “Well, at least magic didn’t fuck with our tech too much.”

“Ah, yeah,” Mark said, turning back to his woodworking. “That damned solar flare was the problem, not magic I think. In time, we could build everything back up. Though I think I heard somewhere that the last solar flare like this cost billions of dollars in property damage to the infrastructure sooooooo I don’t really know.”

“So, anyway, how’s your Class selection going?” Mia asked distractedly, as she looked for her phone in every crevice or little nook she could find. Not between the sofa cushions, not on the counter, not on the shelves … maybe the bathroom? Or in my room?

“Oh, that,” Mark said. “I got it just this morning. Selected it, got the Skill, the Trait and all.”

“That’s cool,” Mia said automatically, before her brain actually processed his answer. “OH! That’s awesome! You got that Spellblade Class?”

“Nope,” Mark said smugly. “Got one better. ‘Earthshadow Sentinel’ it’s called and it apparently incorporates my Minor Darkness affinity into it somehow. But it’s Rare instead of being just an Uncommon one like the Earth Spellblade would have been.”

“Congrats!” Mia exclaimed and hopped over to give a quick hug to the dwarf.

“Yes, yes, thank you.” Mark puffed himself up proudly.

“What can you do?” Mia asked, forgetting her phone search in favour of grilling Mark for information. “Did you get knowledge implanted into your head? Can you cast spells?”

“I can do a lot of stuff,” he said. “Like manipulating earth and making weapons out of rock … not spells though. Nor much knowledge beyond how to use my Skill.”

“Wait,” Mia frowned. “I got two subskills, both with like, three random stuff they did. If both of our Classes are Rare, what’s up with yours?”

“I did get passive stuff,” he shrugged. “Bonus to stats, enhanced earth senses and the like. The two main ones were Earth Manipulation and Dark Earth Armaments.”

“Huh,” Mia squinted at him. “Sounds interesting, what do those do? Just playing with earth mana like you said and shaping dirt into weapons?”

“Not … quite,” Mark shrugged again, looking the slightest bit annoyed. “The Class ate my Greater Earth Mana Manipulation Skill and gave me the basic Earth Manipulation. I mean, sure it’s much easier to use, intuitive even since it hands off all the mana manipulation parts to the Skill itself, but I don’t think I’ll be casting any spells with it. Not even manual ones.”

So his Earth Manipulation skill sort of acts like a static spell circle? One that’s always activated and he can manipulate intuitively? I can see the appeal, but I think I prefer the versatility of a runic model. Even if it takes ages for it to revolve itself into a spell circle.

“Interesting,” Mia hummed, stepping back to give Mark some personal space. “Can’t you just get the Skill back?”

“The damned System never offered it up again,” Mark clicked his tongue. “I don’t know what’s up with that or if it's still sitting in the Obelisk, but I won’t know until I get the opportunity to check.”

“Last time I checked all the secondary skills I slotted were still there in the skill library.”

“Oh, you just got to that quest?” Mark asked, raising a bushy eyebrow.

“That was my last quest reward,” Mia shrugged, unbothered by his down-talking. She was going as fast as she could, plus solving her little Sensitivity problem took precedence. “I should probably check what the next quest is actually.”

“You’re still on the easier quests,” he said. “I have to somehow convince one of the knuckleheads to let me harvest a monster core for my current quest.”

“Good luck with that,” Mia shrugged. “Maybe if you helped out with some of the fighting they’d let you play with a corpse?”

“Maybe,” he shrugged, looking uncertain. “Could you … ?”

“What?” Mia asked. “Introduce you to one of the fighters? I don’t know any of them, and you know how I am with strangers. You’d have better luck by yourself.”

“I wanted to ask you to get me a monster core,” he blurted out quickly. “Just a tiny one, could be from the smallest goblin for all I care.”

“I mean … okay?” Mia hesitated. “But why? You have a Class now, you’ll need to fight monsters eventually if you want to level it.”

“I guess so,” he grimaced, averting his gaze.

Mia recognised it, that shifty body language, the non-existent eye contact and the embarrassment that wrapped around Mark like a coat. It was how she acted before every job interview, every meeting, and every social confrontation she really wanted to avoid.

But it’s not social confrontation he wants to avoid, but fighting? Mia tried guessing, but found herself feeling guilty for trying to poke her nose into Mark’s personal stuff.

“Sure,” Mia said. “Not sure when I can get one though, we can’t collect goblin corpses since they are out on the streets. The birds are all we got and they are a pain to shoot down.”

“Thank you,” Mark deflated, sighing in relief. “I don’t know how to thank you. I know you hate fighting too.”

“It’s … alright.” Mia grimaced. Did she hate fighting? Did she, really? She was afraid and reluctant in the beginning, but seeing those monsters just explode from her magic was … empowering. It made her feel in control. Powerful. “You could thank me by telling me all about your dirt weapons.”

“First of all, they are not ‘dirt weapons’,” he said with mock indignation. “I can turn any material with Earth Mana in it into a weapon that will always be as strong as I am. Fancy stuff. Plus I can manipulate the created weapons with Earth Manipulation and have them float around me.”

“That sounds cool.”

“Right?” Mark smirked. “Though there are problems with the weight, so I can only lift three tiny knives right now and even those hurt my brain to manage individually.”

“Maybe you need some Multitasking,” Mia hummed thoughtfully. “Or maybe a Parallel Mind.”

“I have Multitasking and it still gives me a migraine after five minutes.”

“That might just be a stat issue I guess,” Mia shrugged. “Get to training your Mind stats up. I saw your notes, there is no way we cannot get our Base Stats to max as fast as possible.”

“Right.” Mark rubbed his hands together. “Plus twenty percent in every Mind stat and plus fifty in Strength. I’m going to be damned overpowered.”

“Sure you will,” Mia laughed, settling down for some more chatting. The world as they knew it might have ended, but that didn’t mean every day had to be goblin hunting or stat training 24/7.