All rankings of monsters and adventurers in The New Age are based off of Dungeon Rankings. While dungeons themselves are ranked based on the amount of Wild Mana they control, monsters are ranked based on what level of dungeon they could appear as a floor, area, or dungeon boss for. A rank monsters could appear as a floor boss in an A rank dungeon, A- rank monsters could be an area guardian, while A+ rank monsters could be the overall dungeon boss for an A rank Dungeon. Generally, the average soldiers of a dungeon will be a rank lower than area guardians. This means that an A rank dungeon will normally have B- rank monsters as the most numerous threats. – History of a New Age, pg 38

Over the following weeks, Asher continued her hunt of Anisodrach, Emberwings, and Zalcoa. Thanks to her regional decimation of these creatures, her level quickly grew to four. Unfortunately, at that point she found that Emberwings could no longer increase her experience no matter how many she killed at once. They had stopped giving her Evolution Points at level two, but she had hoped that the experience she could gain from them would continue longer. Still, she persevered in her efforts and continued to raise her level by hunting the less numerous Anisodrach and Zalcoa.

She did not only limit herself to these creature’s, however, and worked to find anything else she could defeat to fuel her growl. An effort that culminated in a fortuitous encounter with a Blazehorn Deer, a creature that ended up being worth far more experience than anything else Asher had defeated. The monster had proven surprisingly difficult to take down, capable of using minor fire magic and physically stronger than its four-foot-tall frame would suggest. Though its spell repertoire had been rather limited, the abilities the red furred creature had shown off made it a dangerous foe.

The first of its spells had been a simple bolt of fire the creature could launch from its eponymous, branching antlers. The deer would stand still for a moment as the fire in its antler’s seemed to concentrate into a small orb right above the creature’s forehead, changing color from a dark red-orange to a far brighter yellow-white. That orb would then be launched at whatever the deer felt was threatening it, flying at a speed that was difficult, but not impossible, for Ashe to dodge. The entire process of gathering and launching the maybe half-inch-wide projectile took the deer about three seconds, though it seemed to need to rest afterward as the fires adorning its antlers would be noticeably smaller after the attack. These embers would slowly regrow back to their normal size over the following thirty seconds or so.

This fire bolt was easily the weakest of the deer’s abilities, but was still powerful enough to leave Asher with a painful second degree burn about an inch in diameter on her arm when she had been forced to block a shot at her face. Not dangerous assuming she avoided being hit in any vulnerable areas, but a good tactic for discouraging aggressors. More importantly, the ability seemed to outrange anything Asher could use. The best she could do was try to keep at maximum range for her Thunderbolt spell, which gave her a reasonable amount of time to get out the way of the projectiles. Dodging at any closer range generally required the use of her Thunderstep ability, something she found to be a heavy drain on her limited amount of mana.

The second of the deer’s abilities had been its midrange attack, and one more reason Asher wanted to maintain as much distance as she could manage. The creature could apparently breathe fire. Well, sort of. The flames on its antlers would blaze up and lighten slightly into a more orange-yellow color. Then the fire would begin to almost spin in the space above and between the antlers, like a blazing whirlpool. As the rotational velocity slowly increased, the center of the spinning disk would gradually push forward until the flames took the shape of a narrow cone.

From the tip of this cone, a plume of fire would be launched for anywhere from ten to twenty seconds, expanding outward to a range of a little over five feet. The plume would follow the direction of the deer’s head, creating a living flamethrower that could easily deter multiple attackers coming from the front of the deer. Thankfully, this ability was easily the most time intensive for the creature to prepare, the buildup taking as much as a minute as the deer was forced to rely on its physical abilities for survival. The attack was also far less dangerous to be hit by, as long as you could quickly get away from it. The one time she had been struck, she had immediately used Thunderstep to escape the fire’s reach and had come out with nothing more than the equivalent of a bad sunburn and some scorched clothing.

The last attack the creature showed off in its fight with her was easily the most devastating. It was both the most powerful and the fastest of the abilities the small ungulate used while fighting her. The fires on the deer’s head would begin to concentrate and take on an almost liquid appearance, dripping down off the antlers in droplets that burned themselves from existence before hitting the ground. At the same time, the fire would brighten into a white-blue glow. This same fire would appear around its hooves as it launched itself forward, leaving small, ashen footprints in its wake. The fires had barely lasted for a five-foot charge, but had been hot enough that despite her dodging to the side the flames had left the skin on her face feeling tight as the moisture evaporated from it and a minor burn developed.

That attack had appeared to have been some kind of last resort, as it almost entirely exhausted the fires the creature carried in its antlers. What remained after the charge was little more than sparks and embers, leaving the deer entirely without magic. This had allowed her to attack freely as long as she kept physical distance from the creature’s sharp horns and hooves. An advantage that had made it possible to quickly wear down the small critter, securing herself food as well as the system’s rewards. The resulting experience and evolution points haul she received for killing it had been enough to let her reach level five, along with increasing her stockpiled evolution points to one hundred seventy-six.

“Oh man, that went great! Kind of weird it was called a Blazehorn deer when those were clearly antlers though.” Calling out cheerfully at the windfall, Asher returned to talking with the mysterious voice of the system, “Well Bob, I haven’t seen the Certilia for a few days. Probably broke off to go hunting. I am sure they will show their faces again soon enough, but I should be clear for a little while.”

“That would seem to be in line with your observations so far, mistress.” Bob’s dry response echoed slightly as it bounced off the large rocks that filled this particular clearing in the ash cloud. She had told him to always respond to her verbally if she was asking out loud, the sound of another voice bringing a small amount of comfort in this lonely place.

“We better take advantage of this moment. I think it’s time to look at what I can buy! Pull up the purchase screen for me.” At her command, the blue rectangle once more made itself known in her vision. As she had leveled up, nothing had really changed in her purchase selection. She had hoped she would unlock some new kind of spell, but that wish had so far been dashed. “Hey Bob, when will I unlock more Abilities in the shop?”

For once, Bob’s response was not immediate. He seemed to take his time analyzing the question before deciding on an answer. “Your question is impossible to answer mistress. Level is not the only factor for when new abilities become available, it is simply the easiest factor to achieve. In most cases you must explore and discover additional aspects of your magic or personal ability. Once you understand the possibility exists, the shop provides a way to gain abilities that emphasize that aspect.”

Thrown by the fact Bob actually seemed to need to think about an answer, Asher took a moment to actually process what he said. When she had she couldn’t help but frown, “But if I discover this additional aspect, couldn’t I simply learn an ability for it myself?”

“Almost everything in the shop can be achieved without the shop, mistress. The shop simply provides a shortcut to achieving these efforts. For example, you could awaken your mana without the shop by finding a Primordial Source to bathe in. In some ways this is even ideal, as you can have greater control of what element you awaken in certain cases. That said, Primordial Sources are incredibly rare, will destroy you if you are not compatible with that particular element, will not grant you any spells when you awaken your mana, and are almost universally owned by powerful individuals. The shop offers an alternative that gives you a solid base to build from.” Asher couldn’t tell if Bob was talking so much because he enjoyed the topic, took an attack against the shop (and therefore the system) as an attack against him, or if the system simply believed that this was the best response. Whatever the reason though, this conversation was alerting her that perhaps she had been to single minded in her understanding of magic.

So far, she had practiced her magic with the belief that she should be working to perfect the spells she had, but now she thought that perhaps a better idea would be to spend some time experimenting with combining different flows from her existing magic. Her understanding had been that the only way for her to learn new spells in her current condition was to purchase them. The alert had mentioned discovering other spells on her own, but she had assumed that meant trading shop purchased spells with other practitioners. Learning spells that were new to her, but not new.

“So Bob, if I wanted to learn say…an Enhanced Mind ability, what advantages does the shop present versus me simply using experimentation to discover the right flows for a spell myself?” Asher could feel herself getting into the topic as she spoke, already imagining creating unique spells that quickly grew her power. Who knew what the normal in this new world was? She hadn’t met a single person since her reincarnation, hadn’t even seen any evidence of intelligent life beyond Bob referring to “locals” when giving her the name of the Certilia race. If creating spells was as easy as it sounded, perhaps she was incredibly weak. Maybe these Certilia that had been chasing her were nothing more than a slight pest for most people.

“There are multiple disadvantages to discovering new abilities through experimentation mistress. The first is the risk of creating an unstable spell flow instead of an actual spell or ability. This can result in any number of unpredictable side effects including total spell failure, a spell that does the opposite of what you intended, or even explosive decompression of the mana. If that happened with an Enhanced Mind ability, it could result in the target of the spells brain exploding.” The response was clinical, but seemed eager to continue the discussion.

“Ok, yeah. That is a pretty major disadvantage, Bob. I assume there is a way to get around it? I don’t see anyone risking creating a spell themselves if there isn’t,” Asher slowly reasoned through the problem, trying to discover a way around the danger. “I bet the first precaution would be to never use any experimental spell on yourself during the first test. That would protect you from a lot of the dangers. Probably putting the target in the equivalent of a magical fume hood would help too.”

“That is generally the case mistress. Experimental spell flows are tested in heavily warded rooms that offer multiple layers of defense for the spell caster. The experimental subject, usually a rat or small monster, will be the target for the spell and the affects recorded based off of observation. The target will be kept in a separate, heavily warded enclosure meant more to protect those outside from any dangers than to protect the subject.”

Sighing to herself as she listened, Asher was sad to discover animal experimentation was still the norm here. “I guess magic can’t fix anything. I hate the idea of using possibly mind exploding spells on innocent animals, but better than using it on people I suppose. What are the other dangers Bob?”

“The second of the dangers is that the spellcaster creates a spell that is beyond their control,” Bob continued. “Essentially, the spell caster over reaches and creates something beyond their ability to handle. This results in spell backlash, which can severely damage one’s mana channels along with causing physical harm through mana decompression. Damaged mana channels result in pain while casting spells, decreased control, decreased amount of mana an individual can use at a given time, decreased spellcasting endurance, and decreased spell power. While generally this is only temporary, continually straining one’s mana channels by either using spells with already damaged mana channels or repeatedly damaging one’s mana channels can result in permanent injury.”

“That’s definitely not ideal Bob. What do people do to avoid permanently injuring their channels while experimenting with new spells? This sounds a lot more difficult to actually do something about.”

“The normal precaution is to only create spells one level below your mastery, mistress. A Master level mage will generally only work to create Expert level spells at their most ambitious. This ensures the spell is very unlikely to exceed their ability to control, unless their new weave of mana is truly genius. The second precaution taken is adding release weaves to their experimental weave. These weaves are specially designed to allow an individual to end a spell early, releasing the accumulated mana in simple, harmless ways. Usually this is a bolt spell. The addition of these releases results in a more inefficient spell, but will allow the caster to end the spell before they entirely lose control. If they find that the weave works and is not a danger to their control, they can then simply remove the release weaves.” Bob’s response was energetic, or at least as energetic as she had ever heard from the generally robotic individual.

Asking quickly, before the lecture could continue, Asher shot out a question, “What do some of these release weaves look like? Any way you could teach me one?”

Breaking from his previous rhythm, Bob responded in the negative. “You have not reached the requisite level of power and control to unlock the Release Spell Weave Ability Option. The shop cannot teach you this at the current point in time.”

“That’s too bad, but I’m not too surprised that is the case.” Bob’s response was aggravating, but pretty much what she had expected when she’d asked. No way the shop would make getting the ability to circumvent itself easy. “Any other risks of creating new spells?”

“There are a few other possible risks in specific circumstances, such as miscalculating the area of effect of offensive spells or, with high level spells, causing different mana packets to poorly react with each other-”

Unable to keep herself from speaking up, Asher shot a question Bob’s way, “What is a mana packet?”

“Ah, a mana packet is the mana sent through an individual spell weave mistress. Higher level spells require multiple packets building multiple weaves simultaneously. As I said, these individual packets can collide if a new spell is constructed poorly and result in loss of control of the mana or unintended effects.”

If being interrupted bothered Bob, there was no sign of it. Soon he was returning to his earlier line of thought. “While these risks exist, they are generally mitigated by the precautions taken for the first two dangers of creating your own spells. The biggest deterrent from creating new spells is something else entirely. The amount of time a new spell can take to create, make efficient, and finalize the spell form of can take decades with anything beyond beginner spells. Many spellcasters are of the opinion that it is simply more efficient to gather evolution points and buy new spells instead.”

Asher couldn’t help but to subconsciously nod her head in agreement. The entire reason for creating a spell instead of buying one was to save the Evolution Points for other things. If it took three weeks to build a bolt spell that cost one hundred Evolution Points, she could have made four hundred evolution points or possibly more meditating instead with that time. Sure, it might give her exactly the spell she wanted, but at four times the cost.

“Of course,” Bob continued as her inner monologue came to an end, probably reading her mind to know when she was paying attention again, “most Beginner level mages can create a supposedly new spell for themselves in mere minutes, especially when under pressure. These aren’t truly new spells generally, simply a new application of an already known spell. A more experienced mage could achieve the same effect by manipulating the original spell. This is generally done by adding additional weaves to an existing spell structure that allow for optional effects, thus complicating the spell and increasing the spells ranking. Many Beginner level spellcasters will take the entirety of their ‘discovered’ spell collection and merge them into the spells they received when they awakened their mana to advance from Beginner to Intermediate rank.”

“So, the difference between Beginner and Intermediate rank of a spell is how much you can manipulate it?” As she spoke, Asher was already planning what she could do to build this spell repertoire that was expected of most Beginner Mages. “What are the ranks for abilities anyway?”

“The ten ability ranks are Untrained, Novice, Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, Practitioner, Journeyman, Expert, Master, and Grandmaster. How these ranks are determined can change depending upon the ability, but you are correct that for most spells the determinant between Beginner and Intermediate level is the versatility of the ability. For example, your Thunderbolt spell at the Beginner level is only capable of firing in a straight line on its own. At the intermediate level, Greater Thunderbolt would allow an individual to set their Thunderbolt to curve around, zig zag, or take some other predetermined path. This would be only the most basic manipulation that the intermediate level would allow for.”

It really was strange to have Bob be so talkative about something, but she definitely wasn’t complaining. This conversation had offered her a glimpse of the many options he had available to become more powerful. To give her a better chance of escaping The Blighted Basin. She only had one more question for him before she started making a plan for her advancement. “Bob, earlier you said that Beginner Mages will merge their spells together. I assume that is what the Fusion option in the shop is for?”

“In part mistress. Combining spells is one of the most popular functions of the Fusion option in the shop. Most Beginner Spellcasters will elect to use this option to combine their spell repertoires. Of course, they can be combined manually. This is inadvisable unless you have an Advanced or higher ranked practitioner available to review your spell flows. Additionally, these higher rank casters should be able to help if anything goes wrong as combining spells yourself has the same risks as attempting to create a new spell.” A bit of the robotic nature had begun to return to Bob’s tone as he spoke this time. Obviously, whatever had been driving his interest in this conversation was no longer there and she couldn’t expect much more from it. That was fine, she had gotten plenty of information as it was.

“Thank you, Bob, your help means a lot to me.” As the words left her mouth, she just hoped they made it through to whatever animating force had made this conversation so much more revealing than she had expected. She wasn’t sure it did though, as all she got back from Bob was his customary response.

“You are welcome, mistress.”

#

The first thing she had to do was decide what spell to begin work on. Sure, the obvious answer was Thunderbolt, but was it the best answer? If she followed that route, she would have the best lead for creating additional spells. Bob had been pretty clear that at least part of upgrading her Thunderbolt spell involved giving it the ability to follow preset paths. There was almost certainly more to it than that, but at least it was a starting point. How many minor paths and variations would she need to turn into different individual spells though? Was it just a set minimum to get the next level of the spell, or would going above and beyond grant her additional benefits down the road?

Her initial thoughts were that any additional effort put into building up her Thunderbolt related spell list would be rewarded. So far, the system had seemed to want her to push herself and had rewarded effort accordingly. Bob had said that new spells came with understanding, so it was probably more important to fully understand Thunderbolt and how to manipulate it as much as possible rather than simply creating a very long spell list of various effects. How much more would she learn about the spell if she made it turn right at forty-five degrees rather than ninety? Probably very little.

Honestly, she’d rather work on continuing to improve Thunderstep, it had been the defining advantage in many of her fights and offered her an extreme advantage in mobility. Unfortunately, the system classified Thunderstep as an ability and not a spell. She could sort of understand that. It had felt more…natural then her spells had. Like it was an inherent ability unique to herself versus a spell that could be taught to anyone with the right affinities. That probably also meant it played by its own rules for improvement though. For now, she’d just have to continue to work on extending the range and decreasing the recovery time by eliminating wasted mana and acclimating, like slowly working up your endurance to be able to run a marathon.

Besides, running away wouldn’t win her any fights. It would just make sure she didn’t lose. No, she needed a better weapon. Shock Grasp was powerful, but at the end of the day was far too limited in their range for her comfort. Thunderbolt wouldn’t be her only focus of course. She did need something to keep herself safe if a monster got too close though. Feedback was probably a far superior option in that regard. It was less powerful, but it hit everything around her and was likely her fastest spell. On top of that she had already had some amount of success with manipulating the effects of the spell. She bet with a little more effort she could turn a few of her modifications into real spells and ease the strain of using those nonstandard versions.

I wonder if specializing how I use the spell will affect what Intermediate version of the spell I unlock when I combine them. I’d be willing to bet that is the case. With that in mind she began brainstorming how, exactly, she wanted to use the spell in the future. The way she saw it, she needed the spell to be able to perform three specific functions: it needed to protect her to at least some degree from unexpected attack, it needed to be useful against swarms of weaker enemies, and it needed to be able to discourage stronger attackers. The existing spell was already good for the second option, but it lacked the power to truly repel a surprise attack or turn away anything that was really a threat on its own. Not without diminishing the range to such a degree that it was practically useless for discouraging attackers.

#

Over the following days, Asher learned a lot about what was and was not possible with her spells. For example, her Thunderbolt spell was capable of rather complex patterns with enough work, but sharp turns consumed an extremely high amount of mana and she needed to be aware that the spell would increasingly try to ground itself the longer the spell ran for. Like laws of physics would slowly grind down the instructions she placed in the spell with her mana. In the end Asher had settled for about a dozen patterns for the spell to follow. These included a pair of spells that would gradually curve to the left and right respectively, along with a pair that utilized a much sharper turn and one spell that would arc her Thunderbolt like an arrow, allowing her to shoot over small barriers.

Not all her changes were directly related to the firing pattern of the spell however. Through repeated trial and error, and more than one unintended explosion of electricity at less than safe ranges, she had managed to create a version of the spell that would slowly charge itself without her actively guiding it. There were a few disadvantages to this spell of course. It was slower and more expensive as the additional complexity when initially casting the spell caused her to waste a lot more mana than the more simplistic version of the spell she had started with.

Additionally, the spell wasn’t smart enough to know when to stop charging, meaning that if she wasn’t careful the spell would exceed her ability to control and spontaneously explode in a burst of mana and sparks. As long as she fired them before forty-five or so seconds had passed, this wasn’t a problem. Any longer than that and she risked injury in addition to disrupting any spells she was currently working on.

Perhaps the worst part was that she couldn’t use Thunderstep or run while the bolts charged around her. While charging, the bolts would anchor themselves to her body, maintaining a distance between three and nine inches from her skin. Attempting to move too quickly would result in the charges either not moving out of the way fast enough, leading to the charges touching against her skin and going off, or being left behind. Utilizing Thunderstep would also result in all her charges being left behind. Once the particles of magic got more than a foot or so away from her, they would begin to break down without her mana stabilizing their forms. This resulted in the spell either fizzling out or exploding based on how much charge they had gained beforehand.

Less impressively, but also less dangerously, she had discovered how to change the specific voltage and amperage of her spell. This allowed her to create a version of Thunderbolt with a very high chance of stunning her target in exchange for being less deadly overall. Asher was of the opinion that while this particular application might not be as useful in her current situation, it would be good to have non-lethal options when she eventually made her way to civilization. Not every conflict required the death of her opponents after all.

Asher’s success with Feedback had been...more limited. She had managed to achieve two of her goals: creating a response to swarms and a way to ward off powerful enemies. Both had actually had a very similar solution. She had changed the effect of Feedback from an area of effect instant hit ability to a wave. This allowed Feedback to deliver almost as powerful oof a shock as when she coated her skin with the spell, in exchange giving enemies a few seconds to escape the range of the spell as the electricity pulsed out of her. She could further up the power by focusing the pulse in one direction rather than exploding it out of her body in a full sphere.

Unfortunately, she had been unable to create a passive defense option using the spell. The best she could do was sacrifice the range of the spell to increase the duration to about ten minutes, resulting in an aura extending about an inch off her skin that would cause a painful shock approximately equal in strength to an electric fence for anything that tried to touch her. It was enough when dealing with the monsters she had seen so far, which mostly relied on biting and other unarmed attacks to hurt her. If she had to deal with more monsters like the Blazehorn Deer though, the spell’s usefulness would rapidly wane.

The experimentation had taught her one important thing however. The primary difference between Shock Grasp and Feedback when reduced to such a low range. It was all in how the lightning was manifested. Shock Grasp manifested the electricity in the process of invading the target’s body, while Feedback manifested the electricity in the environment and allowed it to act more like natural electricity afterwards. Functionally, this meant that Shock Grasp was both more powerful and more capable of ignoring things like alternate methods of grounding, but in exchange it would not harm individuals not specifically targeted by the spell. Feedback had the advantage of still being useful against unnoticed opponents, but could be redirected with a well-placed conductor and would do less overall damage.

She had to wonder though...what would happen if she combined the two. Sure, it was giving up one of her limited number of spells, but it might be worth it. Then again, what if there was no change since they were so similar. Or she gave up a possibly very powerful spell because she simply hadn’t explored it enough to discover its actual strength. She had to admit she had barely thought about the spell since it simply didn’t appeal to her or fit into how she wanted to fight. She had no interest in getting close enough to monsters to practice and she wasn’t particularly interested in putting in the effort to turn it into something more useful at range. Better the master of a few spells then simply passable with a lot of them. I should admit that this is a spell I am not going to do anything with and get the most out of it by enhancing my other options.

So resolved, she called out to Bob and had him open the Fusion menu. The resulting window was…confusing. Unlike her previous interactions with the menu, this pop up was in a constant, ever shifting state. In the background she could see the names of her skills spinning and making connections with little aethereal threads, only to spin away and recombine with new skills. If she focused, she could drag individual abilities and spells to the forefront of the screen, creating glowing connections of gold between those she selected. The entire menu seemed to be heavily intent based, creating a web of the various affects and linking in the ways she desired.

“Mistress, the Fusion menu is indelibly linked to Primordial Chaos, the power of change. You must connect the skills as you see fit and will your intent into the menu so that you might shape power gifted by chaos into the form you desire. You will sacrifice your current skills as a base upon which the chaos may build and restructure. Please make your choice carefully, as the same ingredients combined in different ways can have drastically different results.”

So focused on her task, Asher couldn’t be bothered to respond to Bob’s instructions with more than a simple grunt. She started with Feedback at the center of the formation. Around it she placed the various additional spells she had created based off of Feedback. Feedback Loop, a version of the spell that would gradually concentrate more and more power from the aura onto a single target as they remained in range. Feedback Pulse, the spell which sent a wave of electrical power out from her body. Feedback Overlay, her spell that produced a second skin of electricity. More followed after that. Spells for sending the aura in a specific direction, for increasing the duration at the cost of power, for stunning rather than damaging, and more.

Then she pulled up Shock Grasp. Instinctually, she broke the skill into pieces. Each piece remained connected by a thread of gold, indicating their significance and attachment to each other, but she could will them to move to different areas on the diagram. To make separate connection. The section that produced the charge on the surface of her skin was added to Feedback Overlay. The part that would allow her to continuously feed more power into the spell was connected to Feedback Loop and finally the section of the spell that made the electricity aggressively attempt to invade a targets body, disregarding other paths, was connected to her Feedback Pulse.

Despite this, something felt wrong with her creation. A slight imbalance or missing piece. A base from which to build the rest. Then she saw it in the background. Thundertrap. She could feel is harmonizing with the spell she had created through some unexpected sixth sense. She drew the spell in, connecting it to the aggressive invasion and the charged surface properties of Shock Grasp along with Anchored Feedback, her spell for centering Feedback around a location rather than her body. The result, as she rearranged and smoothed out individual positions, was a pattern like a spoked wheel contained within a diamond. With a final push she willed the box to accept her creation.

Combine Spells: Feedback (+Variants), Shock Grasp, and Thundertrap?

(Cost: 40 Evolution Points)

Yes

No

Holding her breathe, Asher pushed yes. For a brief instant, she was back in the sea of Primordial Chaos. Experiencing everything and nothing. She remembered everything from her last visit beyond reality and quickly applied what tricks she had learned to help guide the pure inspiration and power of the everchanging Primordial source into her new spell. Then she was brought back to reality by a blinking screen.

Congratulations! Through effort, inspiration, and luck you have created a spell that is greater than the sum of its parts. You have sacrificed Shock Grasp, Thundertrap and Feedback to create the Intermediate Spell Electropulse Enchantment. This spell allows you to enchant one object or being with the Electropulse spell. When a living creature comes within range of this enchantment, a pulse of electrical power will be released. This pulse has a chance to stun in addition to dealing damage. If this enchantment is connected to a mana source, it will recharge over the course of thirty seconds. Each pulse electrically charges creatures hit, resulting in future pulses dealing more damage as more of the power is drawn to them. Enchantments within your range of control can be manually activated or suppressed. Enchantment can be modified to be directional.

As she felt the specifics of the spell settle into her mind, she couldn’t help but wince. This spell was significantly more costly than any of her Beginner spells had been. Still, it was definitely worth it. By enchanting herself with this spell, she would have a powerful reactionary defense against surprise attacks. It also greatly increased the power of the traps she could create, allowing her to produce additional defenses against incoming opponents on the fly. Definitely going to need to increase my intelligence though. Can’t be running out of mana in the middle of a fight because Electropulse is draining me dry to recharge.

Soon she had repeated the process with Thunderbolt. As she had not attempted to introduce any other spells beyond her collection of variants, the creation process was far more boring. The resulting image had looked something like a three circle Ven Diagram, with each circle representing a different type of change. Change in flight path, change in spell effect, and change in spell preparation. The fusion had cost her twenty Evolution Points versus the previous spells forty and had resulted in her obtaining Greater Thunderbolt. While not the most exciting change, she greatly appreciated the upgrades afforded to this stronger version of the spell.

For one thing, she could now charge her Thunderbolts to greater power levels and at a faster rate. They also flew noticeably faster, in addition to giving her the option to control their route as they went for a high mana cost. The individual bolts were smaller, sleeker, and wasted less mana for the same effect. She was also now capable of firing up to two normal, unmodified bolts at once. According to Bob that was not a direct benefit of this spell, but rather due to decreasing the concentration required thanks to more efficient spell weaves. Increasing her Acuity would supposedly allow her to increase the number of bolts she could fire as well.

With over one hundred evolution points still remaining, she had decided to address one of her most glaring weaknesses. The biggest advantage the Certilia had shown against her was their speed, resulting in them being able to get close enough to attack while dodging her spells. She needed something to help her keep up. With that in mind, she had decided to purchase an Enhanced Mind ability. The result had been an ability called Overcharge. The ability was passive in nature, but could be enhanced by spending mana. It granted her increased mental, though not physical, reaction times, along with greater hand-eye coordination and allowing her to better follow high speed motions,

Almost all of her remaining points had gone into something she found in the Items menu, a Lightning Struck Alder Staff. When she had asked about Wizard Staffs, Bob had told her that all staffs granted the same base bonus, greater accuracy with certain spell types based on the material used to craft the staff. Often quirks in the material use would grant additional minor benefits. Supposedly this all worked by acting as a focus, kind of similar to a magical tuning rod that helped her achieve the proper “frequency” for controlling an individual element. They could be further enchanted with additional benefits using special materials and runes. Wands provided much the same benefits, though to a lesser degree. Instead, they were cheaper and it was easier to carry a large number of them. This allowed a mage to carry a collection of specialized wands for various purposes.

She wasn’t ready to fight Scarface, not quite yet, but she had the tools she needed for the fight now. She would give herself a day or so to practice and refamiliarize herself with her upgraded and new abilities. A second day to rest and ensure she was in peak condition. Then, she was coming for Scarface and his pack. She’d show them that she was not prey to be hunted. That she was powerful. Strong enough to explore and travel as she pleased without worry.