Sink Chapter 4 Skill Sheet

Spoiler: Spoiler Classification: Grass Singer

Passive Skills:

Vocalization - Novice Level: 1 / 5

Description: Sounds that are vocalised by the Individual will now be apparent to the Nature of the Grass.

Area Of Effect - [ CHA stat x 1 Centimetre = Centimetres ]

Vibrations - Novice Level: 1 / 5

Description: Vibrations that are sounded by the individual will now be apparent to the Nature of the Grass.

Area Of Effect - [ CHA stat x 1 Centimetre = Centimetres ]

Cognition - Novice Level: 1 / 5

Description: The Individual will now be able to telepathically transmite feeling with the Nature of the Grass, vice versa.

Area Of Effect - [ (CHA stat + INT Stat / 2) x 1 Centimetre = Centimetres ]

Active Skills:

Craft Song - Novice Level: 1 / 5

Description: The Individual will now be able to craft sounds with premade commands in a set amount of time, intended by the Individual.

Crafting - [ (INT Stat + WIS Stat / 2) x 1 second = seconds ]

Invoke Song - Novice Level: 1 / 5

Description: The Individual will now be able to add intentions into sound and melody by audio sounds, chord, verse, bridge and chorus which will then transmit into the targeted plant conveying to following the commands in the song.

Targeted Distant - [ (CHA stat + INT Stat / 2) x 1 Centimetre = Centimetres ]

Resonance - Novice Level: 1 / 5

Description: The Individual will now be able to include multiple sounds concurrent with another in the same tempo into a melody. The active melody will increase the distant effect depending on the amount of sound added into its Resonance.

Area Of Effect - [ (CHA stat + INT Stat / 2) x 1 Centimetre x ( Max Sounds ) = Centimetres ] Max Sounds - [ Sound + ( Novice Level ) = Sounds ]

Chapter 4

A Hidden Truth

The Grass is a flighty audience to my voices and tunes. Granted I am no means a great singer, with a voice such as mine. My mother, A Grass Singer in her own right, can attest to that when I first sang with her as a wee pod, feeling collaborating and curious. I sang along with her when she was singing to the grass for one morning. Oh, and how bad it was. She told me later that I sang beautifully at first, as a mother would do, but should keep my voice a secret to myself, for it was too precious to share. An obvious lie, but she thought of me with the mind of a child, unable to comprehend the underlying message that she had conveyed. Later, she had confided to my father that I sang like the death cries of hummingbirds, and not a natural death cry but a traumatic one. I was huddled in the corner, listening to these words. I would sometimes tear up, remembering how, even in my second life, my musical soul would never express in my voice. It’s been two days since the Classification ceremony had ended. And like the day before, I was confined in my laboratory, trying to tinker with tunes to cater to a capricious crowd. The hickory log laboratory had a plethora of contraptions that I had made for many seasons. And one of the compartments of the laboratory, there was an abundance of unique and varying musical instruments. Which were made from acorns, nuts, grass fibers, and branched wood. I strummed on my banjo, my hands perspiring on its neck. I played a single note, by slamming hard on the fret with my finger. Then I reversed into a pull-off with two fingers on the same string and ended with a slide and a barre chord by holding more than one note with my index. It went on and on, with the rhythm intact, but the goddess be damned grass sprout weren’t joining, like headbanging Pax. Headbanging Pax was a grass sprout I named Pax. Pax was the name of my old family dog in my first life, he would tippy tap when meals come arriving, and tippy tap after. The grass sprout reminded me of my dog, so I named him Pax. Pax was given to me after the Classification Ceremony, he was the trial grass for the new Grass Singers to charm. He was my first hardcore fan. The acoustic I performed, only a few seconds of note. Were restricted by my Active Skill, Craft Song which had limited an amount of time I could convey my orders into command. The command that I integrated by thought into this tune, was carefully researched from tones and sounds. Ages back, when I was still a wee pod in my second life among the muck. I grew again the motivation and drive that was of my first life’s purpose to pilot a mecha. Even with the world’s technology pushed back by human centuries, into stones and huts. I was inspired by the thought of replacing earth science, with magic, which seemed to be the shortcut of this world. Magic and Science, dueling concepts in dances. But in this world I theorized, the two concepts don’t duel, It was never one or the other, but always together. Why can’t science work in a magical world? Why can’t magic work in a scientific world? Or what if they are one of the same? A coin with two faces, the other explains one another. Perspective and perception were always keys. To understand the basic theories and functions of outer concepts beyond the individual. So researching and deliberating, I concluded the options I had to go through to fulfill my life’s purpose in this second life of mine. I had researched with my father and my mother, asking them to tell me their Class. The skills and the stats that were given to them from their Classification Ceremony. I wrote them down and created a theory, which concludes with what path I had to part-take to accomplish my dreams. The language itself is a code, programmable scripts, defined by the civilization that had created it. But the most universal Language was music, which will never alter beyond space and time. Music can be vibrations and echos, sounds, and beats. It was the start of a sentence, in a stanza of beats. It incorporated...and if statements, loops, variables, arrays, and structure. Closing arguments with clauses and rules also defined, music was a fully structured language that spans over time. But that was one factor of this magical world, it might seem like a big revelation, but it was a hidden truth amongst our time. I had to structure musical notes, with statements I had researched. Which were from listening to my mother's songs and analyzing its intentions, actions, and meanings. With the Active Skill, Craft Song, I could code lines that were referenced by my research, from tones, beats, and sounds. Voices were a factor but a factor I had to overcome. By finding the right mimicry and vibrations of sound, these last two days were the most sleepless days I’ve ever had to overcome. My fingers were blistered red from the strumming and pushing. I also had to blow into Acorina flute and grass tube trumpets. The Acorina flute is a bastardization of the Ocarina, but it was made from an acorn, so give me some slack. I did live in the forest after all with woodland critters. I created tables and mathematical tags for each musical note and I had alphabetized them for selection when compiling. I tested a few on the instruments I had on hand, then altered my mechanical centaur’s controllers with said instruments. I used the nature of the grass to be my wires, muscles, and electricity. It was biocentric to my mechas design. The Grass was the most mundane, and important factor of my mechanical contraptions. With the sounds to command it, it was the most natural assumption to cater to my needs. With my Passive Cognition, I could telepathically reinforce my thoughts and commands to the plant with each tune I made. I could also feel if they are unwilling to follow, stubborn in their build to stand stiff. I activated Invoke Song, targeting the plants, to rile up the plants into scripts that I had made. Depending on which script, they would follow its command, but so far grudgingly. But after a while, with minor tweaks and trial and error. I compiled the right lines to create a more active response. Having done my compilement coded through structured research. I headed out towards my Mechanical Centaur. My sidekick Peb was adding the final touches into its frames, by adding different types of elemental rocks. Wind pebbles were inside the huge circular nutted frames. The back analog ball behind and the two small ones riveted in the front to legs. The wind pebbles will add buoyancy to them, making them easy to travel on bumpy woodland terrain. After all, we are of the smallfolk, and what is a small mound to you, is a large hill to us. Doing some final check-ups on the tough grass twirled suspensions on the front two legs and the big one at the back above the analog ball. I headed to the side to climb up the grass ladders to get on Centaur’s back. Peb followed along with headbanging Pax in a basket. I turned to him and Pax. “Let's head to stations.” I nodded at him. This was it, I finally...for 40 years I had waited for this moment. Peb ran to the back tail of the Centaur, where there was a side to side covered station with a harpoon grass gun at its end. It was loaded with a branched harpoon, attached with a sharp stone at the point. It was coiled up grass weed that would spring the harpoon out with tremendous force when it launched. I headed to the front, behind the back of the Centaur. I then lifted the bark armor covering it’s back, into a cockpit at its stomach. It was a modern jet fighter design cockpit, caged by bark frame and grass support. The controls, on the other hand, were different. They were tiny pebbles, all on a wooden frame at the sides and center. Each pebble had a unique coloring and was sanded to a rectangular edge. Under the pebbles, there where grass fibers and strains attached, like stringed instruments bind to keys on a piano's keyboard. But these piano keys were no ordinary piano. Each key was connected to a music box attached with holes punched in scripts that performs a separate function. But that wasn’t the greatest invention I created for this cockpit. It was the joystick at the center, with 8 directional corners where it can be pushed to. Underneath the joystick were 24 fiber grass wires, where 8 of each would be attached to the three limbs of the centaur. 8 each between the two front legs and the strongest 8 fibers going to the back, that is attached to a chained wheeled music box, that would spin downwards and roll the big analog ball at the back, forward into motion... And other directions. “Peb you good to go?” I heard Peb munched something gravelly at the back. I groaned. I was nervous for some reason. I could not explain it, but I was hesitant to turn on this device. I dithered in anxiety as my dreams became real. That prevalent thought in my mind, made me halt, not hoping that this isn't some lucid dream that I was too much involved in. Maybe I had died, and this was just a dream, a fantasy...a world of make-belief, a way for my dead conscious to sate my aspirations. The Goddess, the tree gods, this world...my mother and father...What if this was just all a yearning dream? Crunch! “Ow! I broke a tooth.” Peb yelped out, holding his jaw. “Oh, Peb...Pebbly Peb.” I murmured. Nah, this is real, no dream or conscious thought of mine would have ever made up a character named Peb. Whistling to the tune of ‘The Ants go marching, One by One,’ activated the Grass Mecha into life. All the grasses in the contraption began to fluctuate. I then started pushing some buttons on the side. I then pull some levers at the top, to activate a melancholic vibration throughout the whole machine. Each button playing a multitude of tunes, too quiet and fast to be heard unless you truly listen. I based my scripts from the underlying vibrations of the tunes I had researched and developed. With trial and error, I found the hidden language between the grass. I held the joystick and psyched myself to go. And so I did. I finally had done it. I’m officially a mecha pilot. A huge grin on my face as I moved my Centaurical Mechanical Mecha, built from oak-branches, bark, grass, and nuts.