Beware Greeks (which ones??? there are three different polis of the name!) bearing gifts (why???)

Scholastic assignment at Nashville University

There hadn’t been much of a book left after the third parchment, made through Peter and labeled “Perception” and “DetectMetal”. The cover – a modern leather binding replacing the Ancient one, long gone – of the Sights of the Ontario held only a blank sheet from the end of the book.

Catherine had contemplated pensively the ruin of her precious collector item after consuming the third parchment sheet. Johanna had seen her hesitation, but let her. Then, after maybe a minute, she’d looked back at her shelves. She made for one, hesitating once again. She finally fished another book, whose cover was extremely faded.

“I have a… modern copy of that novel,” she said, holding the book on her chest as if it was a thing beyond precious.

Which, Johanna could agree, was the case when it came to originals. She knew old books preserved reasonably well outside of ruins if you were careful about them, but any Ancient book left in ruins was at the whims of mana and the ravages of weather. Mana could slow decay, but any unlucky tome would be gone today, ruined by age and weather. She and her friends had never found any intact one in all the ruins near Valetta.

She looked up to Catherine, silently asking for permission, and the countess acquiesced slowly and reluctantly.

Lines poured out again, as pages flew out of the book into the abstraction floating above. This time, it coalesced into a parchment labeled “Dexterity” and “Fusion”, which sounded strange, almost fire-based to Johanna. But she couldn’t use it, and Catherine’s touch caused it to vanish, so it was a proper parchment for her.

The big surprise was when Tom repeated his book harvesting. The parchment that formed this time was completely different. Instead of the single text or two opposite labels of all the previous ones, it was again a full four-word version. “Guardian”, “Level” – again, – “Authority”, and “Disarm”.

That one was a head-scratcher, notably when Catherine realized she couldn’t use the parchment as she had the others. Laura tried her touch, and the one parchment that formed was labeled just “GaugeEndurance”. There were pages remaining, and the rest vanished under Peter’s touch, creating a final parchment titled “Agility” and “Armored”, leaving maybe twenty pages in the pitiful ruin of a book.

None of those last two parchments lighted as Catherine held them.

“I say… this is intended for someone else. A… guardsman?” Tom finally said.

Catherine slowly contemplated the three heavy sheets, fingering them. They still looked like no paper or skin she’d ever touched. She felt the parchment label fitted them best, although they were… otherworldly.

“I think you’re right.”

She threw a look at the shelves before shaking her head again.

Johanna asked, “Do you have another…”

“Not going to throw my books to the fire, or whatever. Besides, I only have three ancient originals… one now. And the last one is nearly irreplaceable. I know it’s been a Rocastle property since the Fall itself. Not going to destroy it, no matter how much ‘Talents’ you get from it.”

“Assuming it’s only Ancient books that can be made into these,” Johanna said.

“My dear, how many books have you touched? After you encountered that ‘skeleton’ of yours and everything happened?”

“Maybe it was waiting until we met you?” she countered.

Catherine blinked. Then she grabbed a book more or less at random from the nearest shelf and placed it in front of Johanna.

“See?” she said after nothing happened when Johanna placed her hand on it.

“You’ve called, Lady Rocastle?” the first man-at-arms asked vaguely sleepily.

Johanna guessed the two guards that had escorted them had probably retired for the night. Catherine did not have the large staff that the Warden could have. And probably did not need permanent protection.

“Anthony. Valentin. Yes… there is something I wanted to check.”

She held the 4-corners sheet, hesitating.

“Anthony, can you take this?”

“To do what, my Lady?”

“To see if you can use it.”

“Use?”

The guard was obviously surprised. He looked dubiously at the parchment, then extended his hand and took the page from Catherine.

“How do I use it, then?”

The five of them looked at the page, which remained inert.

“Don’t think it works. What do you feel, Anthony?”

The man frowned, thinking.

“I’m not sure I should have this… I think.”

“Valentin?”

The other guard bowed slightly and took the paper page from his colleague.

Ink started glowing, before coalescing into streaks of blue.

“You should be able to accept, somehow,” Catherine said.

“Accept what?” Valentin asked before the paper abruptly burned.

He dropped it, startled, but it was gone before it left his fingers.

“Looks like it’s for you then. Take those two as well,” the countess said.

The guard picked the two parchments, who similarly lighted under his touch, and flash-burned like the previous had done for Catherine. Johanna felt awe. Because, if she was sure – and that could not be anything else - the man was now a Hero, whereas he had been a simple guard. Just like that, he’d entered a new realm that many dreamed about.

And while heroes were less well known than sorcerers, she guessed those did not come with three abilities that often.

Moore found himself slightly disappointed when they stopped after the second book. He’d tried to improvise after exhausting the store of skills for Rocastle. He could have squeezed the last skill point, but if he managed, later, to unlock Metal Shaper, he could replace her specialization and any of the skills he could apply that were invested in either Dexterity or Empathy would be wasted. If he had more XP to work with, he could have raised those and picked some potentially valid choices. Since he had to guess which ones were metal-related, even if they did not have Strength in them, he was cautious.

He’d also been pretty sure Call Lightning was a valid pick for that future specialization, but even if the team seemed to trust Rocastle, he’d limited himself to utility or protective spells.

Call Lightning

Requires: Authority 18/Strength 17/Level 6

Effective: N × Authority + Level (adds mana)

Passive: Increase your regeneration by (Eff/10) mana per hour

Active: Creates a lightning conduit reaching a point up to (Eff×10) feet away. Requires any form of cloud above

Active cost: 1 mana per (Eff×10) vertical feet

Shaper

AUT 16/Lvl 1

N=2

Fusion – a skill to melt metal, probably a combination of fire and metal aspects – was safer. Moore was sure you could use it to melt locks, or maybe even burn someone in their armor. But if it came to combat, it was “safe”.

Fusion

Requires: Authority 17/Strength 16/Dexterity 16/Level 4

Effective: N × Authority + Level (adds mana)

Passive: Grant bodily immunity to fire, up to (300 + 10×Eff) °F

Active: Cause one ounce of metal within (Eff) inches to melt every (Melt point/Eff) second.

Active cost: 1 mana per (Eff) seconds

Fire Shaper

AUT 17/DEX 16/Lvl 5

N=3

Maker

STR 16/DEX 16/Lvl 4

N=3

Shaper

AUT 16/Lvl 1

N=2

Thankfully, one of the guards matched the hypothetical profile he’d built. It would not be very, very obvious, but with the forewarning, that newly-minted Guardian would be a reasonable bodyguard for Rocastle.

He even had inserted Gauge Endurance. The skill had bothered him since he’d read the description. The passive said you’d be able to perceive the level of someone or some creature. How did that work? Did it unlock the interface for that person? Some parts of it?

He still didn’t know how he’d get the results of that experiment, given that he couldn’t listen to discussions. He had never wanted to risk wasting a point for Peter to test, given the cost of removing it, and its lack of grindable utility. But maybe he’d get feedback in some form from the guard’s behavior.

He would have tried something else – a Maker, aka crafter, maybe – if given the occasion, but that was not to be with only two books.

The second disappointment came from the XP. The global pool had increased with each book, but that wasn’t that much, compared to fighting. It had looked as if it was 1 XP per 5 pages, but it was not static. The first book had yielded 38XP on the first scroll, then nothing. And the second book had given him 11XP on the first scroll created, which fit 1-per-5, then a bit more – 25XP – on the second, which wasn’t the entire cost, then nothing.

That looked almost like using a skill with a difficulty gradient, similar to how Mana Sight worked daily, but then, each of them had been involved in the scroll making. And they hadn’t gotten any personal XP or stat XP, just XP in the team pool.

No personal XP.

Moore felt his brain slow down – metaphorically speaking, as the time dilatation was a different thing – as pieces slotted in the puzzle.

The XP from the scrolls scaled to the difficulty of the “action”, with partial applications yielding some XP, then harder ones the difference.

None of the four had any skill in “Setting Scroll Creation” or whatever.

He did. That action was unique to him, even if he channeled it through his windows to reality.

He had just increased personal XP by skill use.

It’s my XP pool. Not the team’s.