Even here where the poison in the air is weakened enough that we can breathe a little easier, it still invades us. I’m constantly drawing the mana out of the new poison that I draw in with every breath, but more than that the fine dust seeps in through my clothes and skin as well.

Those with weaker mana forms are suffering worse than those with dense mana, which means that far too many of my weaker warriors are suffering. Vii and Nel would be among them, but I give them preferable treatment, protecting them from the worse possible consequences.

Amidst the coughing and wheezing there are a few wailing and mourning mothers and fathers, clutching at the still bodies of their children. Those who are simply too weak to survive the poison.

The kids surviving have been given the same preferential treatment as my lovers. My reach and time is limited, and there’s plenty of other things that need my attention.

“What the hell is this?” I ask, leaning over the body of the healer, touching at his wound as I focus on my mana senses. A long gash nearly bisects the man, and from the scar tissue it’s clear that the worst of it has been healed, but what remains is overflowing with pulsating pus.

That’s not really the big issue, however.

“A more powerful poison was used on him.” The lady, apparently his spouse, says, and she’s not kidding around.

The mana I can feel inside the man, using the same techniques as with my Chip pulling, isn’t so easily drawn out. It’s… stuck. Attached to something deeper, something that I can’t quite make out. I would assume it’s his mana form.

When I try to pull at it, it sinks deeper into that invisible mana form. There are a number of ways I could theoretically deal with it. From a more focused and well directed mana drain, to using annihilation magic, but neither is currently practicable at the moment.

My annihilation magic could be used as a last resort, but thankfully Thresh is insistent that she could make a potion to fix this.

“Why isn’t the poison killing us quicker?” I ask, as I help Thresh set up a space for her alchemy. The sounds of fighting fill up the tunnel behind us, but it quickly quiets as the few gremlins are slaughtered by our stronger fighters. The greatest threat they pose is in the poison they bring with them. Red’s giving me reports when she can as she directs our combat forces, and works to get Thresh her ingredients.

“Poison isn’t a quick weapon.” Green-feet replies working alongside us. “Without a healer it’ll stick around and kill us all. The worst poisons aren’t the ones that kill you quick, it’s the ones the healers can’t fight against.”

It’s clear that he wants to return to the fight, but with our people reinforcing them we’ve set up a rotating battle line. If we all fight at once, we’re going to tire and weaken.

“What about him?” I ask, nodding my head towards the fallen healer. He’s condition has only deteriorated since I last looked.

“He was injured too, and the poison is worse than the stuff in the air. We tried potions, but nothing’s working. That damn insect went after him first, we were too slow to catch it.”

“Paskel?” I ask, thinking back to my own brief encounter with the creature.

“Yeah, that thing.” He replies with grunt. “He’s… he’s done a good job on us.”

“It’ll be fine. Thresh will get us out of this.” I say, watching as she hands a number of potions to a woman tending to the fallen healer. ‘To stabilise, not heal’ she makes clear before rushing back to us.

Adler sits by the dying healer’s side, looking over his injuries before washing away the pus with a blast of controlled water magic.

“I… It might be easier if we cut away the affected flesh.” Thresh and the other woman both give her a quick nod before returning to their tasks.

Adler moves her twitching hands to get to it. After a few seconds of work clearing away the pus, she slides away to empty her stomach. A wave of disgust passes through me, but I barely manage to squeeze it down.

“Water for the alchemist!” Shouts one of my vampiric lizard warriors, carrying a large pot filled with glowing water into the room.

“Here!” Thresh shouts, waving the soldier over.

“Bessy and the twins are out hunting a beast for its liver, it’ll take some time.” He says.

I rush to clear away the poison before letting him go back on his way.

“Thresh, shout if you need anything. We’ll get it done.” I say as she pauses over her bubbling cauldron. She looks over towards the dead children and weeping parents, shaking as she realizes the situation she’s in.

She shakes her head firmly before getting back to her work.

“Concentrated poison.” She says. “I’m working with what’s in the air around us, but… yes. I can do that. I need packets of concentrated poison. This poison.” She waves her hand through the air, before coughing some of it up.

I clear the mana from the poison inside of her, but it doesn’t clear away the dust. If I could better direct my annihilation mana…

“Red. We need concentrated poison. Try to get some packs from the gremlins before they explode.” I send through messaging. The gremlins that she’s been fighting are strapped with more of the poison packages, so it should be easier if we can get some off of them.

“Understood, but I can’t guarantee it’ll work. The poison bombs are on a hair trigger.” She replies.

“I’ll work on an alternative, do your best.” I send back.

The messages don’t seem to cost us much of our focus, as things are my multi-mind Skill has enough spare energy that I still have a few on break, thinking about all the things I’ll do to Paskel when we’re done here.

“The wind mages.” Nel suggests, leading me to the edges of the cleared space where a formation of mages push the poison from the air. They send poison out towards the tunnels that lead to the exit, but it’s almost as if the poison is resisting their attempts.

“Vii?” I ask, as she struggles to assist them.

“I’m fine.” She says, though I clear the poison from her before I move on to the rest of the mages.

I glance at Nel a moment before she nods firmly and pulls aside one of the mages, the one shouting orders to the others.

“This better be important.” He growls, but Nel doesn’t hesitate dealing with the conversation as I continue my work.

“We need you to gather the poison, instead of blowing it away.” She says. “It’s for the alchemist.”

“How are we meant to do that?” He asks, rubbing at his head as he glares around, searching for something that’ll help.

“Greta!” He shouts catching sight of someone in the crowd of coughing people, she’s been handing out small cuts of cloth, forcing the children to use them as masks.

“Is there something I can do?” The woman shouts, rushing to us, though she continues shaping the cloth in her hands.

“We need something that’ll filter the poison from the air. Something strong enough to take the force of our wind blowing through it.”

“Strong as a sail…” She grumbles, wiping a few tears from her eyes as she looks back to a few of the children. Her gaze turns to the alchemist and back to us. “I have something in my room, I’ll go get it.”

“Take some warriors with you.” I say, waving to Green-feet, who happily leaps to his feet and rushes to us with a few of his other soldiers.

“I… yes.” She agrees before she’s escorted out through the thick poison, pressing one of the masks to her face.

“We’ll come back when we need it.” I say, heading back to Thresh while pulling the poison from those that I pass. It’s not enough, barely anything at all really. Even with my efforts I can feel a weight on my lungs from the mana-less poison that has settled inside.

Thresh is stirring at her bubbling cauldron as another few are set up by a few of the locals including the chef that I’m still planning on stealing one of these days.

“I’m going to be cleaning the air.” Thresh says as we join them. “The magic in the cauldron will essentially be a massive potion. It will clear the poison from the air in this room, I can also attach the same magic to satchels of concentrated poison.”

“Okay.” I reply, nodding to her.

“I’m also making a cure for the healer, to get him back to work.” She replies, taking some scraping from the pus that Adler is cleaning from him. “It’s… I can do it.” She shakes the doubt from her expression before continuing.

“What do you need?” I ask.

“I…” She blinks about as she looks over a number of invisible screens, sorting through information with a mad focus.

“Are you using ‘Multi-mind’?” I ask.

“Yes, Nel already told me about it.” She mumbles, still focused on the invisible screens. “I… the poison in the healer is different. It’s… here it is. This will work. The ingredients… crystal mana grade bone marrow, more liver, I need a much more dense potion base, blood from a strong beast might do it.”

“There’ll be some around. It’s fine if it’s stabilised?” Nel asks, her experience trading here giving her an edge in the searching. “Tera!”

“Isn’t that…?” Thresh asks in confusion, before returning her attention back to task with another shake of her head.

“What is it?” The teacher asks, grumpily coming over to us.

“Crystal grade blood suitable for a potion base.” Nel says. “There’s some in the butchery?”

“Suitable for alchemical treatments?” Tera asks, turning her gaze to Thresh. She directs a sour glare back towards us, but doesn’t waste time airing her complaints, leading us over to the butchers.

“We have no livers.” Tera says, “They get used quickly, and quickly lose their value. We might have something that can be used, though. Bone marrow can be stabilised.”

The large praying mantis that owns the shop joins us in our looting, gathering everything fit for purpose while I’m still trying to figure out what’s what.

He helps us to carry it over to Thresh who excitedly dives into the ingredients, pouring a large pot filled with thick blood into her second cauldron, before adding a few leaves and other things to the mix.

“Delivery for the alchemist!” I hear Leai’s voice shouting from behind a walking hunk of meat. Even with the obvious attempts to control the bleeding, it’s still streaming blood out into the hall.

“Here! Bleed it into these pots! Get more pots and cauldrons! Anything!”

“What’s that from?” I ask, as they struggle to hold aloft the massive hunk of meat. I try my best to help, but the thing’s clearly late liquid stage, partially even crystalised. I’m surprised to see the local lord helping to heave the thing, his efforts the most valuable.

“This is from that big-ass catfish. We can’t kill it yet, but stealing a liver? We can manage that.”

“Barely.” Leia, her sister, mutters. “Bessy saved us, and got the liver out of the water.”

“You all have my thanks.” The lord says, super seriously while covered in blood. “This might just save my people.”

“It will.” Thresh says, finally relaxing a little as she gets everything under control. “Red is bringing a few last things, this will be enough.”

I spend a few minutes clearing out the poisons from everyone in reach, as I watch over everyone’s work. Thresh is busy but no longer desperate, the mages have gotten their sail and are gathering the fine poison dust, and Adler is done with cutting the poisoned flesh from the healer.

It’s been some time since I’ve heard any fighting, so it seems that the enemies have been pushed outside of the colony.

Thresh is fast with her brewing but even so alchemy isn’t an instant process. She’s pulled Vii over to assist in keeping the residual poison out of one of the cauldrons that is glowing brighter than the others.

“It’s ready.” Thresh says, the local lord hauling the mana dense pot over to the healer’s side. I can see a strange magic stirring within, more powerful than even my own magics.

“What do we do?” I ask, jumping in to help them.

“We pour it on and hope for the best.” Thresh says. “It’d be better to have him bathe in it, but hopefully this will be enough.”

The lord nods, putting his weight into the effort of pouring the mixture. The liquid washes over his body, while the magic unravels over him. I invest my everything into my mana sight, watching it at work, hoping to find some new revelation about magic.

The spell works its way into his flesh, weaving into the poisoned aspects of his mana form and turning almost invisible as it becomes a part of the man. Large chunks of mana become visible as the poisoned sections of his mana are carved loose and ejected by the dense alchemical magic.

I take a moment to drain the mana from those chunks, giving the magic more room to work, before it fades away, presumably becoming part of his mana form to replace what’s been destroyed.

The healer’s eyes flutter open, and he immediately flinches as the last few poisoned sections of his mana form are severed by the alchemical magic and destroyed by my mana drain.

“You’re new here.” He grumbles, looking up at Thresh before working together a few spells on himself. “Mana potions. I need mana potions.”

“Here’s what we have.” Declares a stranger, dropping a box filled with colourful glowing potions before the large man. The healer nods his head and cracks open the first in reach, throwing it back.

It’s interesting to watch the mana working its way through him, suddenly turning invisible as it becomes part of his mana form.

With his waking, the tides turn in our favour, the worst of the wounded quickly recover, and the poison slowly fades away from the room.

“Done.” Thresh whispers with a smile as her glowing cauldron swirls with complex magical powers.

“Fuck the Unified States.” She mumbles through a smile as the magic bursts out into the room, consuming the poison still in the air and flushing out into the tunnels. The glow slowly fades away, leaving the air clear and clean.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Skills & Stats

~Mana Form:

Current mana density: 2009 units

~Mana distribution:

Catagory Current Max. Defence 0% 97% Offense 0% 68% Mana Sense 97% 97% Recovery 0% 44% Gluttony 0% 34% Misc. 0% 44% Efficiency 97% 100%

~Favourited Skills:

-Chip Shredder

-Multi-mind

-Tag

-Mana surge movement

-Reactive defence

-Fire burst punch

-Annihilation magic

-Charged casting (Annihilation)

-Mana form flow fixer

-Branching magic

-Swimming