Word from Friends

Chapter 45

A week after the ball I spent the morning lazing in the lava pool with the hounds. I'd been trying and failing to avoid thinking about what had happened. It was getting me nowhere fast. I was annoyed with myself. I knew it was best left alone but stuck on it all the same.

He’d tell me more when he was ready. Or not. That was also an option. Even so it was like my persistent curiosity about his other tattoo and where it might be. Persistent and none of my business. I had other questions needing answers and put my mind on those.

Opening my communications interface, I stared at my friend's list and felt like a dick. I hadn’t talked to Steve in a while and now I was getting in touch because I had a question. There was no remedy for regret however, so I wrote my text anyway.

I’d already sent Agony one with a couple questions, hoping for enlightenment. Unfortunately, they fell under the ill-defined list of ones he wasn’t allowed to answer. Now all I could do was go back to my usual work and muse over the possible answers I’d get.

Fortunately, my mood changed. I started exploring my interface looking for changes from the upgrade. The never-ending task of hunting them down was my number three free time activity.

So far, my favorite change aside from the magic panel, was how the monster panel had grown more complex. It offered me a variety of new options. Some cost mana as before, but there were also new ones that cost points.

The point cost options tended to affect an entire type or category of monsters and were expensive. They started at a hundred points and went up from there, but gave significant advantages. What caught my curiosity was the option to edit monsters and create unique units. It would give me a lot of versatility when creating a boss monster.

Unfortunately, the single monster options were too expensive to mess around with. I would have to wait until I had more points and had studied the options in full. My hunt revealed interesting additions to existing features but nothing captivating.

When my interest began to wane, I turned my attention to expansion planning. Thanks to raid league I’d been making small adjustments to the difficulty of the levels on an ongoing basis. Aside from the incomplete final stacks I was happy with my designs. The issue was how fast they could be navigated.

That left me with making their floor plans bigger as the best option. I had sketches already and had been slowly increasing my rough work tiles. With the town complete for now, I started laying out the expansion. Doing walkthroughs and refining aesthetics would take days if not weeks. I finally had something to keep my mind occupied.

Working on the layout a recent gripe came to mind. I hadn’t noticed there was an issue with payouts. The skeletons didn’t get loot like a living adventurer would. I’d still be in the dark if I hadn’t ended up reviewing the footage of Andrea and her party's raid.

What showed up seemed totally random, including environmental drops. Items used to navigate certain sections should show up before they were needed. Not as a reward for success after getting through without them. The light stone dropping in the bat encounter being a good example. Material drop rates were also shit.

I wanted a more granular level of influence over the environment. One that would let me alter things and achieve a more natural look where I wanted it. Though there weren’t any relevant options, I clarified the idea of what I wanted in my head. Once I had it, I started focusing on it.

If I were lucky something similar, if not quite what I wanted, would reveal itself. I wasn’t sure how long I sat and imagined the new controls I wanted access to. All I knew was one moment I was sitting in lava and bored and the next a lance of pain was sliding through my temples.

It wasn’t a steady stream but a pulsing back and forth, as if something were trying to drive me back. My orbs flared in agony, but the sense of opposition left me hanging on. I knew the system wasn’t a static monolith, but this was the first time something had seemed to object to my desire.

In a rational state I’d have backed off. Seized by pain and anger at being assailed I held on and pushed back. Runes flashed before my orbs as the pain reached a crescendo and released in a single burst. Rubbing my head, I half expected blood or ichor to be running out of my ears and nose but found none.

It was the first time I’d seen the runes outside of an upgrade. It took me a couple minutes to calm down and think clearly. When I did, I still felt shaken and took an inventory of myself to ensure all my bits were still in the correct places.

Once I knew I was physically okay I started investigating my interface. It took all of two seconds to find something amiss. Above the year count down in the corner of my vision a string of runes had appeared.

It was formatted like a timer, but I couldn’t even guess what they meant. Looking at it made me feel a ghost of my earlier headache. Looking away I sent a picture and drafted a new text to Steve and Agony. I felt instinctively they wouldn’t be able to comment but still sent the text.

I’d rather hear it from them than give in to the urge to follow some of my more dubious gut instincts. It wasn’t good to dwell.

Soon I was standing up to shake hardening lava from my body. I felt like working in my chamber of machinations. Looking toward the teleport pad I decided to work on a side project on the way.

Rather than glide like usual I concentrated until a pair of legs formed. I was still hovering, and it took a couple moments to get my feet on the ground. Since I didn’t feel much, I had to pay attention to ensure I stayed there.

It was a strange feeling to need to focus so much to move. Despite that I persisted. It was a short walk to the teleport pad for my chamber of machinations. My tail had reformed several times and I’d hovered most of the way despite my efforts.

Even so, if I kept it up, I felt like I was bound to improve. By the next ball I might even be able to keep my feet for more than one dance. Arriving in the antechamber, I noticed a blinking message notice.

I opened it, hoping to find something from Agony or Steve. Instead it was from Mina, which was a surprise. She wasn’t obligated to check-in like Elim was, so I hadn’t been getting anything like regular reports.

[Hey, 42!

I’m still in the desert. It gets wide once I hit the end of your mountain range. I wish I could pin local pics like I could on my old phone's map. Here are some fun ones though!

About your request, I found a temple with friendly people running it. They don’t have any class crystals or relics though. They have the magic scrolls you want and can make more, but they don’t sell them.

Instead they give them to divine castors for free. Since I can’t use them myself, they won’t let me have any. Their religion is kind of nice. They worship a god of water and mercy called Talmor.

They let me refill my water for free. I felt bad about it since they have a shallow well. I didn't need it thanks to you, but I couldn't tell them that.

Here’s a pic of me with the priest. He’s not a hot onii-san, but he’s super nice!]

I was laughing by the time I got to the end. It was a picture of Mina with a wizened but cheerful old man in feather patterned robes. Since she’d been on her own, her messages to me were more like travel diary entries than letters. I didn’t mind. Seeing her have fun was nice.

Since she liked the people of the temple, I pulled up the map of the area. Like she’d said, the desert opened up once you cleared the end of the Laurel mountain range. She was smack in the middle of a small oasis, but the map didn’t denote any surface water.

I found that worrying. I couldn’t see how much of an underground source they had, and she’d mentioned the well was shallow. I didn’t know enough to figure out if it was in danger of drying out. Things like that were well outside my area of expertise. Even so it gave me an idea.

Looking up Talmor I found he seemed like a pretty okay deity to worship. He didn’t deal with weather patterns. Instead he gave omens through birds of good locations to find or dig wells and locate springs.

He also advocated for kindness. If someone broke the peace at a water source he governed, they’d find it too bitter to drink until they made amends. A light punishment as far as divine wrath went.

[Hi Mina,

I’m going to give you a pair of crystals, one to create water and one to keep it clean. Drop them in the well if you get a chance. Should make it so your friends don’t need to worry too much even if it dries up.

As far as the scrolls go, I’ve got an idea so hang out at the temple for a while. I’ll try to work fast.

Thanks,

-42]

Picking out a piece of blue-veined marble, I laid a semi-transparent image over it and started rough cutting. Talmor had three popular ways of being depicted. A man with a flute, a man with wings, and as a very large version of his sacred bird.

I selected the winged version and had him play the flute. The first design was him standing, but I felt it looked boring. It also failed to give a sense of his personality. I changed up the design and had him lounging atop some stones with a spring gushing from them.

The laid-back vibe fit him. I added a couple of his sacred birds relaxing with him. Finally, happy with the composition, I carved a notch for a water crystal. I upgraded the crystal to activate with a command phrase instead of going constantly.

I chose a short verse from Talmors dogma and carved it into the back of the plaque. It was possible for them to figure out the activation from the spell alone but unlikely. At least if they didn't have a dedicated artificer on staff. I went with the assumption they didn't.

It was night by the time I felt like the carving was in an acceptable state. After polishing the surface, I nodded, pleased with my work. It would do for a simple water god's relic.

I sent it to Mina along with a text. My suggestion was saying she found it adventuring. She could offer it up as thanks for their generosity before leaving. I requested she try to get pictures of the temple interior rather than worry about the scrolls.

My interest in the interior was partly pure curiosity but mostly a desire for reference material. I was still working on Laurel's temple. It would be good to have something to compare my own design with. I was particularly interested in how locals did things.

That the scrolls should have been my priority went without saying. I needed them for part of my plans to deal with BM (bloody mana) Fever. I still had time to work on it though, and didn’t want to expose Mina to needless risks.

I didn’t mind “borrowing” things, since I could copy them nondestructively, but the scrolls weren’t out in the open. She’d have to sneak into where they were kept to get access. I’d rather wait to see if the temple's clergy changed their mind after receiving the relic. With luck they might let her buy or have some out of goodwill.

Even if they didn’t, I felt it wasn’t a major hurdle. Other temples sold them for money. I could wait until she came across one or redirect Elim toward one on his way to the valley. Mina sent me a picture of her doing a double thumbs-up as a reply.

The rest of the night passed peacefully. The ominous runic countdown doing its thing in the corner of my vision. Saying I didn’t find it unnerving would have been a lie, but I did grow numb to its presence after a while.

As refresh approached, I spent a third of my mana on surface tiles, but not in the maze or the valley. I’d blocked off the tunnel cutting through the mountain range, but I did plan to open it up for use eventually. That meant buying and developing the land there.

My current side of the mountain range was arid and bordered by a desert. Unlike the valley side, the opposite side of the mountain was forested. Unfortunately, that was all I knew about it. I wanted to have partly developed land on the other side. It would be a good place to clear and cultivate fields to make the town independent. It needed to be surveyed.

I wanted to be more cautious this time. It would be good to figure out where the nearest settlements were and who my neighbors were. The last thing I wanted to deal with was tax collectors brandishing zoning maps.

Despite the unpleasant image in my head I was in a good mood. A mood that seemed bound to get better when I noticed a message from Elim was waiting for me. He’d taken a detour on his way to the valley to handle some business for me. I was looking forward to good news.

My good cheer wasn't destined to last.