[JOHNNY…]

It took Johnny a few seconds to shake off the effects of Luke’s last attack. He had been confused at the sight of the flying coins, and doubly so at the light show that had followed, overpowering his ocular senses. He’d then closed his eyes in response to the blinding lights, only to be exposed to the sound attack that came immediately after.

The combination had been enough to overwhelm both he and his familiar, and they’d been stunned for a few seconds as a consequence. The Gob Smacker had been the first to recover, with Johnny recovering a second later. They both assessed the situation and upon noticing the flying coins, Johnny communicated his intent to collect them, and the Gob Smacker obliged him, firing a huge, sticky glob below them.

The coins fell onto the gooey blob, sticking fast without much of a bounce. They were silver and numbered a 100, making for 1 Gold in equivalency. Johnny held a leather pouch mouth-open as the Gob Smacker used its ears to wring the coins out of the blob and into the waiting pouch, and once the coins were all collected, it tossed the now-empty gob into the air, swallowing it on its way down.

“Gross,” came Johnny’s verbalized opinion on his familiar’s actions. Although he knew those actions to be practical since it could break down expelled gobs for reuse, he still couldn’t get over the fact it was swallowing what it had spitted out. The Gob Smacker stared at Johnny after that remark, levying him an assessing look before expressing its thoughts for the remark with a burp.

Johnny threw a disapproving glare at his familiar, which stuck out its tongue in response before turning to wave its tail in his face. The gesture didn’t have quite the effect it had envisioned, given how its majestic tail had now been reduced to a stump at the base. Johnny laughed at this, but the Gob Smacker continued wiggling the stump unabated. It was as if it couldn’t feel the difference between having and not having a tail when it did so, although he knew it had to know, given how it had chosen to use its ears for the wringing instead.

Lulled into a lighter mood, Johnny had almost forgotten about his prey and how it had evaded him. He supposed he could give chase, but considering the reward for Luke’s capture matched, it wouldn’t be fair to continue. When tallied against the 2 gold the mayor had been offering, he’d just had the best battle of his life, to date, and he’d also gained one gold’s worth of silver for his trouble. That was more than enough to offset the 2 gold, even considering the hit his reputation would take for failing to capture a debilitated Wind Sword.

Future investments, was his response to that trek of thought, Today’s hit will be tomorrow’s windfall.

Far from just consoling himself, that line of thinking was backed by proper logic, seeing as the fact Wind Sword could still escape from the town in his state meant he’d be quite the force to contend with once he’d recovered. More mercs would take the quest, and fail, raising the price for his head with every attempt.

Even if Luke’s capabilities eventually proved to be beyond any bounty the mayor could field, the Adherents of Radiance would take over the bounties, albeit clandestinely, having antagonized Luke with their cover up. Luke might not be foolish enough to take on such a large organization over a slight he’d lived through, but the Adherents were another matter. They feared vengeful elements, especially those who might shed light on their darker side.

This he knew from his days with them, as a prospective adherent. Their offer had come at his most vulnerable moments, having just lost his brother to their commander’s negligence, as they’d put it. He’d taken fast to his training, so intent on drowning his sorrows in blood and sweat that their brainwashing hadn’t managed to take hold. It was because of this that he hadn’t chosen to take the cloth himself.

Although he’d initially been prime for whatever stories they wanted to peddle regarding the Hatchery Incident, time had brought with it perspectives, and his current one made him question if even Jimmy’s death could be blamed on Luke. His answer had placed most of the blame on those of them who’d pushed for the quest despite Luke’s misgivings, and the last bit on Luke for being too weak-willed to stand against them. But if he were to blame Luke for his weakness, he’d also have to blame himself for the same, given how he hadn’t voiced a contrary direction to the one that had led them here.

That last thought had served as motivation to get stronger so that he would never find himself pointing fingers after the fact.

If I were strong enough, no one else’s weakness would’ve mattered.

Already the skeptic, he couldn’t ignore the implications of the hushed whispers of the more senior amongst the adherents now stationed in Rammzton, who voiced their wariness over Luke recovering and challenging the narrative they’d doctored. What had started out as a simple curiosity towards how far the doctoring had gone had ended up being a deep dive into Zuck, his field of expertise and the Adherent’s interest in it.

What he’d turned up had shaken him to his core, melting the facade of his so-called benefactors and revealing them as the treacherous schemers they really were. So jarring was this reveal that he’d bucked at the thought of accepting it as the truth, reaching for as much evidence to the contrary as he could; but the deeper he dug, the more certain he became that the answer wouldn’t change.

As his last resort he’d sort out tangible evidence, and that is how he’d met Goby. His investigation had led him to a site a day away from the town-proper, its entrance a literal hall in the wall, if cliff-face could be called such. He’d used his stealth skills to gain access to the compound and he’d immediately found himself in the Adherents’ hatchery.

It was sectioned into known and unknown, with the former being subject to further sub-sectioning under certain, questionable, and improbable. The improbable section had contained the highest security presence, and it was because of this that he’d chosen to investigate it.

A brief perusal of the tags and descriptions revealed the criteria for the classifications. They were based on the utility of the features expected in the hatchlings, the rarity of such features and how likely it would be for a tamable organism to successfully exhibit those features without passively eating into their longevity to maintain a stable day-to-day form.

The nests’ conditions were maintained artificially by way of inscriptions and sustained emission spells, and the configurations depended on the type of terrain the source organisms preferred, and this was made known through notes of the environments the hatchlings were expected to thrive in.

For most of those details he’d had to sneak peeks at the labels from a distance since guards patrolled the rows religiously. There however seemed to be a large gap in their patrol path at the eastern end, where the long, lighted rows fed into a darker corridor of unknown length. That area seemed eerily quiet, and Johnny chose that as his next destination despite the possibility the unknown might lead to being discovered, or his end.

What he found there was the actualized proof of what Zuck’s work had actually been, and the indictment to the Adherents he’d been fearing he’d find. No eggs were to be found in the shadowed corridor, but actual dragonoids, all labelled and described save for one.

That one seemed very shy, and it cloaked itself in shadows, making it hard to see or guess what it looked like in the open. Its only distinguishable feature were the huge eyes that stared curiously at him. ‘Perplexor,’ read its nameplate, with nothing but dots in the description, and this jumped at Johnny. Had this been deliberate, or did they really not know anything about this Perplexor?

He’d been too engrossed in viewing this shadowy dragonoid that he hadn’t seen or heard one of the guards deviate from their routine to check up on the dragonoids of the dark corridor. By the time he’d heard the footfalls, it had already been too late for any evasive measures he could manage at his current capabilities, but surprisingly, the dragonoid had his back.

It smacked the glass to gain his attention and the moment he made eye contact with it, a weird understanding was borne between them, allowing for the dragonoid to spirit him away, or at least away from his current predicament and into its shadowy body, for that’s where he seemed to be staring at the perplexed guard from.

The guard had that confused look in his eyes whilst staring at the position Johnny had been standing a split-second ago. After chalking it up to his own confusion and seeing things, he’d chosen to avoid a second-opinion on the matter and instead he went back to patrolling the clear corridors.

Johnny had thanked his lucky stars for this chance meeting, and considering it fate, he’d chosen to break out of the hatchery with it, whilst freeing a few of the other dragonoids in the dim light as a diversion.

He’d eventually earned an egg from the Adherents the hard way, through clandestine service, but instead of hatching this one, he’d fed it to his familiar, now named Goby for its habits. He’d presented Goby as his hatchling, now in its tailed-frog-like form; and though there’d been questions on why the variant was different from what they’d expected, those questions had died with every act of service the duo performed successfully.

They’d continued that streak until this day, and now that it had been broken, the Adherents would afford him and Goby even less scrutiny whilst focusing their attentions on the one that had broken it. Luke.

◆◆◆

[LUKE…]

Luke materialized briefly during his descent. He looked around and assessed the conditions of the passage he’d blinked into. The smell assailed his nostrils before his eyes could catch a glimpse of anything in the darkness, causing his eyes to mist over. He blinked twice in efforts of clearing his view, only managing to produce a blurred view of the sludge below.

Having little time to think much on it, he stretched his hands up into the air and straightened the rest of his form, presenting the narrowest possible surface for resistance to attack, thereby increasing his rate of acceleration. Once he was set, he blinked again and waited for contact, and the slightest at that.

On contact, he bent his knees and used the force from his phase bomb to lift off into the air again, blinking to ignore the sludge that rose with his ascent, materializing to spin in the air before blinking and bracing for the next contact. Two more rounds of this triggered a notification, putting name to his latest improvisation.

+---------------+

|Auxiliary Alert|

+------------+--+

|“Phase Step”|

+------------+----------------+

|Class: Sub-Skill Notification|

+---------------------------+-+

|Base: Phase Blink (Level I)|

+-------------------------+-+

|Sub: Phase Step (Level I)|

+-----------+-------------+

|Limitations|

+-----------+---------------------+

|Maximum traversable distance is -|

|determined by the amount of force|

|- - - accumulated in Blinks. - - |

+---------------------------------+

|Level I: Each invocation covers -|

|- - - - - a single hop/step. - - |

+-----------+---------------------+

|Description|

+-----------+---------------------+

|“Use phase momentum to propel - -|

|- - - your movements.” - - - - - |

+---------------------------------+

A few more phase steps found him a hop away from his exit, a sieved metallic cap encircling the passage from the outside. Having failed to phase through a wall last time, but now having a working theory on how the phasing worked, and how it could be made to function in any direction; he chose to bet everything on that one hop and hope for the best.

He braced for the next contact, digging deep into the bomb once he’d landed before spring into his next hop, head-first into the thick mesh. As he’d hypothesized, the momentum of that leap managed to breach the barrier, resulting in him phasing through to the opposite end of the mesh.

+---------------+

|Auxiliary Alert|

+------------+--+

|“Phase Blink”|

+--------------------+

|Class: Skill rank-up|

+-----------+--------+

|Limitations|

+-----------+--------------------+

|Intangibility Timer (23 seconds)|

+----------------+---------------+

|Vertically Bound|

+----------------+

|Phase Boundaries|

+----------------+----------------+

|“Allows the user to Phase-shift -|

|- - through certain surfaces.” - |

+---------------------------------+

+---------------+

|Auxiliary Alert|

+---------------+----+

|“Barrier Traversal”|

+--------------------+--------+

|Class: Sub-Skill Notification|

+----------------------------++

|Base: Phase Blink (Level II)|

+----------------------------+----+

|Sub: Barrier Traversal (Level II)|

+-----------+---------------------+

|Limitations|

+-----------+---------------------+

|Barrier Thickness is restrictive.|

|- - Effectiveness depends on - - |

|- - - - - orientation. - - - - - |

+---------------------------------+

|Vertical (down) → - - |

|Diagonal (downward) → |

|- - - Horizontal → - -|

|- Diagonal (upward) → |

|- - Vertical (up)- - -|

+-----------+----------+

|Description|

+-----------+---------------------+

|“Traverse through barriers - - - |

|- that are not thick enough to - |

|constitute Phase Boundaries, - - |

|- - using phase momentum.” - - - |

+---------------------------------+

That notification confirmed his suspicions, the first being the propagation of momentum generated outside a blink into one, and the variability of phase boundaries given different conditions. Whatever constituted certain phase boundaries wasn’t always fixed, except for instances when those boundaries were connected to living entities like familiars and other beings.

In the case of the wall in Gertie’s room, his failure could be explained by the single step, which hadn’t generated enough momentum to phase through a horizontal boundary, which ranked third in difficulty of breaching; but when he’d attempted the same with the sieve cap, he’d managed to phase through due to the momentum he’d accumulated in his hops.

Now that he knew a bit more about exploiting barrier traversal, he would make sure to use it as much as possible, revealing its weaknesses and other exploitable hacks for the highest efficiency. Next would be the ‘orientation’ part, but that would be a problem for another day, seeing as he now had to navigate the swampy area the outlet pipe fed into.

As he plunged into the swampy valley, he appraised the cliff faces to his left and right for wide-enough crevices to admit his form. He ignored the guidelines which he knew would lead him to the female mercenary and focused on his search instead, finding a suitable crevice a minute in. It was 7 hops forward and 15 meters below his current altitude, so he made the much-needed adjustments, using phase steps to dampen his plunge speed whilst propelling himself towards the crevice.

He arrived 2 meters above the cave and appraised it for extra measure before making his way in. He stopped just a step in and now that he was finally stationary, he could now smell himself, and from the pungent odor rising from his clothes waist-down, it seemed he hadn’t managed to dodge all the waste matter rising during his sewer hops. He rectified the issue quickly by drenching himself in tomato juice before rinsing and applying soap to wash away any and all residues. This time around he did not collect the wastewater into his inventory, having no use for a thin, fecal soup with tomatoey overtones.

A repeat of the inventory exclusion tactic had him in the same set of clothes, albeit now clean and wrinkly. With matters of hygiene taken care of, all that was left before assessing his gains was for him to make himself at home in the temporary shelter, which he cordoned off with the help of loose rocks.

Now seated on a protruding rock in the small cave, he brought up his notifications for closer inspection, noting the level gains, all limitations, and descriptions as he went along. Done with skill notifications, he jumped across the rest, picking which to assess based on his own thoughts on priority, which placed completion above all else.

+--------------+

|Personal Alert|

+--------------+--------+

|“Two souls, one escape”|

+-----------------------+--+

|Class: Quest Notification |

|- - - - (Completion) - - -|

+--------------------------+

|“Escape the town and bring|

|- - a passenger with you.”|

+--------------------------+

Rewards: Escape Sequences, batch I – Tab-Step (travel longer distances in shorter amounts of time)

– Boundary Feed (Instantly blink to a spot one phase boundary away when enough information about the target spot is available)

– Return-Step (Blink back to a designated start spot) ^C – Commandus Interruptus (Forcibly abort ongoing skills/effects) Necklace of Gertie’s Soul – A necklace housing Gertrude Harrow’s soul. Expose to moonlight on a clear night to release Gertie’s soul from its binds. + 75XP

Gertie’s necklace was by far his most priced item from that reward list, and not wanting to risk losing it, he intended to store it in his inventory whenever he was around other people, but today he could wear it, seeing as he was alone in the cave. It glowed rhythmically, like a heartbeat, whilst emitting a light that managed to effortlessly illuminate the whole cave whilst maintaining a friendly-enough intensity so as not to overpower his senses.

Though not by much, the experience went some way in covering his deficit from the Hatchery Incident. The escape sequences were quite the reward, with three being mobility oriented whilst the fourth seemed to be applicable in any instance a sustained effect was involved.

This can include cancelling AOE effects early to limit their range and overall mana expenditure, or to allow feints through quick-cancelling, or… the possible utilities were endless, so Luke would just have to find out what was actually feasible through trial and error.

Next on completions was the one linked to the Gob Smacker’s tail, which he’d cleaved and absconded with.

+--------------+

|Personal Alert|

+--------------+-----+

|“Gob-smacking Sample”|

+--------------------+-----+

|Class: Quest Notification |

|- - - - (Completion) - - -|

+--------------------------+

|Retrieve a sample from/of |

|- - - a Gob-smacker. - - -|

+--------------------------+

Basic Rewards Sequencer’s Language (basics): GATTACA Manual 1.0 – A manual for the genealogically-inclined. Bonus Rewards (Spare Prey) Incubator Gel: Wring the fluid from the sample into a container. Place the incubation target inside. Add a droplet of blood and the fragment of a cherished possession for the soul bond. Subject the fluid to high-enough effects.

Luke retrieved the wriggling tail from his inventory, which seemed to be waving at him for some weird reason. He also retrieved an empty clear bottle and his carving knife, which he used to fashion a miniature incubation tank that had more than enough space to house the calcified egg he’d stored away during the hatchery incident. Once he’d wrung enough fluid into the container, he retrieved the calcified egg and dropped it in before clipping his index finger and forcing out a droplet by pressing onto it with his thumb.

He didn’t have to consider what priced possession to scrap for a fragment, for soon after he’d added the droplet of blood, the necklace around his neck swung toward the container’s mouth and briefly bobbed above it before swinging back to rest at his chest. There had been no visual exchange, but the drop in intensity of the lighting told him the necklace had contributed something of its own accord, and Luke was happy to accept whatever that was.

With everything else in place, all that was left was for Luke to run some current through the container, and as for how much, he assumed ‘high-enough’ would be relative. He was intent on giving it all his best, and as such replaced the expended stamina capsule before moving forward. He then retrieved some wire from his inventory and fashioned coils around both his hands before placing the ends from each hand into the container. He started with a doubly-amplified current, and revved it up to 4-fold over the next 2 minutes. By the third minute, he’d managed to hit 5-fold and the hairs on his hands and head now stood on ends as testimony to the currents he was channeling. Hitting 6-fold took him the greater part of the next 3 minutes, but the moment he managed it, a sudden change occurred in the tank.

The sap-like fluid started swirling, taking with it the calcified color of the egg inside and leaving a gelatinous, see-through egg. That was not the extent of the changes though, since a few seconds in he could feel the current being sucked from, rather than being delivered by his sustained spell. Suspecting this to be the case, he tried shutting off the current and as he’d feared, the swirling solution demanded more and more of the current regardless of Luke’s intent.

The demand kept on ramping up to a point he thought he might just collapse under it, but the stamina capsule managed to keep him in the game. Unfortunately, the solution seemed insatiable, and his stamina capsule was fast running out. He feared a mishap if he wasn’t fast enough with the capsule switch after it was fully expended, and he wouldn’t take that gamble, so he decided to put one of his latest escape sequences to the test. Commandus Interruptus.

His stamina capsule ran out a moment before he’d managed to invoke the interrupt, and because of this, he’d suffered a little. There was no permanent damage, but the demands of the solution had taxed his unaugmented body to the point he’d need a solid hour of natural rest to recover. Once he’d placed the incubator on stable ground, Luke didn’t fight the overwhelming fatigue, but instead he leaned into it, letting sleep take him on his slide to the floor.