The Pinnacle Warrior

Brighid didn’t hesitate to walk towards Astrid, her eyebrows rising as the younger woman smiled.

“Before you do anything, don’t you have a question to answer?”

Astrid sighed but answered, “Gravity Surge is an ability granted by a Skill, Spectre Burst is an active Skill. That good enough for you?”

“It’s good enough for now,” Brighid answered with a little smile that made Astrid chuckle. “I would add that Gravity Surge is somewhat of a more limited ability granted by a Skill as opposed to some Skills like Gale Manipulation as there are directly specified ranges that it is intended to cover, but if you want, I’m sure you could spend the same amount of mana and create a field with a different radius.“

“I’m less interested in the simple change of the area of effect,” Astrid answered. “Instead, I wanted your support as I experiment with making Gravity Surge affect me as well.”

“That’s a fundamental shift in the function of the ability as created by the Great One,” Brighid cautioned. “I would probably caution against having that be your first experiment, though I won’t tell you no. Simply in terms of better familiarizing yourself with the way that your Skill functions, adjusting the distance that the Skill reaches will be much simpler.”

“Why is that?“ Astrid asked. “Both of them are changing the way that the Skill works to be a different effect than the ones offered by the Skill description.”

Brighid made deliberate eye contact with Astrid before she answered. “The Skill, by nature, like everything else that the Great One bestows upon us, is intended to be helpful, not harmful to you. If you aren’t careful, using Gravity Surge while it can affect you as well is potentially very dangerous. Thus, the Skill, in its basic form, exempts you from its effect, and the way that your mana and stamina flow function to make the Skill materialize in a way that it keeps you safe from yourself.

“On the other hand, the distance that the Skill covers isn’t something that’s limited because that poses no threat to you. The Great One has imposed these limits because beyond that, there won’t be any notable effect against anything you’re facing. In that case, these changes are easier to experiment with because the fundamental design of the Skill isn’t contrary to what you’re trying to do.”

Astrid nodded slowly, beginning to understand. “So is it possible that Spectre Burst is… no. There’s no variability to the Skill, so far as I know,” she corrected her line of thought before Brighid could say anything. And then, she shrugged and smiled at her mother. “I still want to try to make it affect me. I have some great ideas with it.”

Bridget chuckled and extended a hand forward towards Astrid. She took the invitation for what it was and immediately started channeling the Skill while mentally commanding it to include her in its area of effect. Then, she activated the Skill.

And a very regular Gravity Surge occurred.

As Astrid’s face fell, her mother couldn’t help but chuckle. Astrid whirled on Brigid, who didn’t apologize or show any embarrassment at how she acted. Instead, she asked, “How were you going to try to adjust the Skill to your will? Did you just mentally command it to be different?”

Astrid opened her mouth to protest then realize just how foolhardy her approach had been. With no forethought, she’d just tried to change the Skill with a mere mental command. There was no way that was how it worked, so, with a sigh, she sunk onto her heels and knuckled the bridge of her nose in self-remonstration.

“I’m going to need to better understand how my Skill works before I can even attempt to change how it functions at a basic level,” Astrid grumbled.

“And that’s going to be especially difficult because, even with your prodigious recovery rate, this is a very resource–demanding Skill,” Brighid added.

Astrid didn’t want to have to respond to that, and thought of how infrequently she would be able to use Gravity Surge as she fought to better understand how the Skill actually functioned. She groaned again, hung her head, and sat comfortably on the ground as she closed her eyes.

With her focus entirely inward, she went through the motions of activating Gravity Surge for the second time in a row. For the first time since she had gotten the Skill, she actually thought about what went into activating and sustaining the Skill’s effect. Instead of just mentally selecting which of the possible effects she would like to create, she instead let the mana and stamina flow through her before it puffed out. The training she had put into controlling the flow of mana until now was entirely focused on the inside of her body. Now that she received a week’s worth of training from people significantly stronger and more intelligent than her, she was pretty sure she could do a nearly perfect impression of Warrior’s Awakening without having the Skill for it.

What would make the Skill a Skill, though, was that she wouldn’t have to think about the specific ways to push mana through her body to do it. As it was, though she could produce a nearly perfect impression of Warrior’s Awakening, it would also take at least half of her focus to maintain that holistic boost, making the more accurate approximation not worth it, compared to the more mana–intensive version she frequently used.

On the other hand, and more to the point, she knew next to nothing about influencing mana that wasn’t actively inside of her. As she thought more about it, Astrid grew more confused about why Skills existed in the first place. After all, if she could control the mana around her to do these things, couldn’t she just study how to use any Skill and then incorporate that into her repertoire?

Benedict’s complaints quickly filled her mind and purged her of that misunderstanding before it could go too far. Her world was being widened right now, but she knew what her magical capabilities were. That being, they were negligible. Regardless of how far she progressed through the tiers, that wasn’t going to change, her path was settled on being a Warrior first and foremost, even as she got shiny Skills. If she dedicated enough time to learn how to use the equivalent of a single Skill that was worth having, and that effort without taking a Skill slot for it, then she would have wasted years of her life that would have been better spent doing literally anything else.

No, instead, her focus needed to be on perhaps broadening her view without overwhelming herself by looking too far and too wide. And with that in mind, she observed the flow of mana that precluded Gravity Surge.

Within her body, the mana and the stamina meshed in a way that made what must have been mana still, but was somehow a higher form than what she’d fed into it. Then, that mana exited her body and seemed to communicate with her surroundings before she lost all impression of what it was doing. Then, a split second later, she could feel as Gravity Surge activated, and she was left more confused than before as the grass all around her pressed to the ground and the few insects that filled the air tumbled down as well.

There was no conscious thought that drove her as she allowed her face to screw up in anger, and Astrid opened her eyes. Her mother looked at her, a smile on her face.

“I have a sneaking suspicion that this won’t come nearly as easily to you as the sling did.”

Despite the displeasure that screamed at her to snap back, Astrid nodded. “I’ll do my best to understand this, and then while I’m recovering my mana and stamina to do it again, I’ll practice at something else.”

“Probably for the best. Would you like some help?” Brighid asked.

“Whatever you have to offer, I’ll take it happily,” Astrid nodded her thanks. Then, the instruction began.

Days passed, blurring together with constant study and waking herself up several times through the night to ensure she didn’t allow her mana reserves to go unexploited. After several days of that, she allowed herself more uninterrupted sleep, only waking up once during the night to ensure she had a clear enough mind to learn and internalize whatever insights she gained. Regardless, the going was slow, and only after a full week of practice was she able to adjust the scale of her Skill.

Astrid maintained a tight control over Gravity Surge as it rushed through her body and then into the surrounding world. While inside her still, she tweaked several small parts of the Skill’s activation to ensure that gravity would only increase within two meters of herself. In this significantly smaller area, the weight of everything would not be quadrupled, but… octupled? Fortunately, Astrid’s brief distraction only came after the Skill had passed the point of no return and Brighid grunted. Then, she met Astrid‘s gaze and smiled broadly.

“Exactly that! Perfect. Was there any change in the mana and stamina cost?“

“Maybe a slight increase of the mana demand, but so small as to be negligible,” Astrid answered with a smile. Then, as she allowed that release of emotion, she began to giggle, simply thrilled at the success she’d experienced. As it was, she knew there was no chance she would be able to make this adjustment to the Skill in the middle of battle, but instead of dwelling on that, she instead focused on something her mother had mentioned would occur when she managed to do this. As such, Astrid pulled up the Skill’s description and wasn’t disappointed.

Gravity Surge (Iron): For a Moderate cost of mana and stamina, creates one of two effects. 1. A gravitational pulse originating at the user’s location with a baseline of a 1600% increase in gravity at a radius of 1 meter from the user for everything except for the user and what they are wielding. This potency is halved for each time the radius is doubled. 2. At a location that the user decides within ten meters, causes everything except for the user and what they are wielding to be drawn to a location that the user decides within five meters of the selected location with thrice that of gravity. Duration of Gravity Surge is dependent upon the user’s Magical Potency.

The Skill’s description had changed, though Astrid understood that the “default“ aspects to the first part of the skill were a radius of five and ten meters, contrary to the current description. There was something about how the Great One adjusted Skills according to what people needed, but Astrid didn’t mind. In order to continue to enjoy the flexibility possible within the Skill, she would have to continue to practice even more, as the idea of making something sixteen times heavier in a meter around her would be more than impressive! For now, she stood and smiled at her mother.

“Thank you.“

“Of course I would help you,” Brighid smiled as she stepped forward and took her daughter into her arms. “When you’re ready to work with Immortal Warrior’s Aura, let me know.”

Astrid nodded in acknowledgment and stretched. She knew she’d neglected to maintain using that Skill after she had her eyes destroyed within her head. She’s grown too confident in her own ability to recover and had gotten herself seriously injured as a result, but she’d learned the wrong lesson from that agony and fear. She couldn’t neglect to use an immensely powerful Skill because there was a potential for over extending herself.

With a sigh, Astrid looked at the rest of the camp. Muti was experimenting with her mana manipulation to strengthen a weapon she threw. Greely had given her a pair of palm–sized blades that the Barbarian was using with increasing skill. Each had a thread about ten meters long tied onto a loop at the bottom of the weapon, and she could throw the blades and pull them back without issue. Right now, she was a whirling, deadly center of a storm, the two blades whipping out around her as the thread sang through the air. The sound of the blade and cord cutting through the air filled the clearing, and Muti threw the blades at thrown stone targets.

Felix served as the thrower of the targets, making sure to protect anybody from the shrapnel of shattered stone as Muti’s blades reduced to the stones to powder. He took inspiration from Astrid‘s own experimentation with her Skills to better understand what he was capable of, but right now, he simply served to assist Muti with her own practice.

The tension that had long existed between the two hadn’t faded, but there was obviously no shortage of awkwardness on Felix’s part at the thought of possibly pursuing or being rejected by a woman in front of his parents. Muti, however, pushed him more than the rest of the party, even Astrid. She showed more initiative in sneaking up on him, in sparring with him, and in pushing his abilities to protect and serve as a frontliner. With his frankly pitiful Acumen, he had no chance of knowing when she was coming through sensing her approach, but he was getting a better appreciation and understanding of her methods, and he was, more and more, able to stave off her attacks. 

With the Boon of the Protector, Felix’s Power largely matched Muti’s, so while she could outmaneuver him without much difficulty, he could leverage his body’s Fortitude with liberal mana usage to ensure that she couldn’t unilaterally deliver a beating on him. In the sparring sessions that followed, despite the speed and ferocity with which they took place, there was an undeniable chemistry that underlined it that had Astrid cocking her head to the side in conflicted understanding.

Regardless, the Guardian continued to allow his hair to grow, and had it braided every day by Muti before they practiced together.

Benedict, for his part, had made very little progress in the way of understanding what Isana had instructed him with. Having made small progress in making very minute adjustments to her own Skill after a week of hard effort, Astrid wasn’t surprised that the much harder undertaking presented in changing the fundamental restrictions of a Skill wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. He was learning more about what his Boon of a Gentle Touch was capable of, making him an ever more potent supporter, while also practicing with a spear.

Greely had taken some steps to create a type of a massive flute, one the size of a spear, to allow Benedict to practice with, but given that his own flute was a piece of magical equipment, he wasn’t doing anything more than occasionally practicing on the larger flute.

Finally, Skandr had been experimenting with various spells. He would, when Muti wasn’t picking his brain, speak with Astrid’s father Savraba about different principles of enchantment, but he largely lost himself in his own thoughts as he considered different possibilities for his spells and enchantments. With Greely’s instruction, he’d made great strides in creating different storms, not merely lightning or wind, though he couldn’t indulge in anything particularly destructive. He, like Astrid, was held back by the party’s need to get the Sanctuary’s permission to stay in the nation for an extended period of time.

Surprisingly, the Wizard wasn’t lost in thought when Astrid looked at him, and he gestured for her to approach. As she stepped closer, he reached into his spatial pouch and offered over a handful of stones. Each of them was to be ammunition for her sling training, and she felt her cheeks rise in a smile as he began to explain each one without preamble.

“Three of these are new iterations of the lightning enchantment. I want each one to hit a different target, so we can see which is the most destructive. Make sure to pay attention to the color at the time of detonation, they’ll vary from a pure blue to a relatively deep red. Then there’s two wind burst variations as well. I don’t think I managed to get the formation on them honed just right, but let me know what they do. Finally, this,“ he said, holding up the sixth stone with his left hand, the rest in his right, “is the one you’ll be most interested in.”

“The ice burst one?“ Astrid asked, almost shaking in excitement.

“I’m calling it a frostbite enchantment,” he corrected with a faux prim attitude before letting it melt away, “but yes.”

Astrid raised her right fist in celebration as she took the stones and placed them in her own spatial pouch. “What kind of report do you want from the frostbite enchantment?”

“It depends on what kind of target you’re being allowed to hit today,“ he answered. “If, for some reason, it’s a live target of sorts, then I want to see how deeply the ice penetrated. In terms of freezing, that’s the most important part, but if you’re hitting a stone or the usual kinds of targets, I just want to see the breadth of the effect.”

Astrid nodded her thanks and patted him on the back as she peered down at his spellbook. “Have you made any progress with whatever you’re doing down there?”

“I’m always making progress,” he answered with a wry smile, “but I also find that the more progress I make the more questions I have. I couldn’t tell you why it is that I have the kinds of cold control that I have, because I’m no ice Wizard or Mage. However, I can’t really cast any spells that create ice exactly but I can create spells that rain and bring the temperature there lower so it becomes sleet. On the other hand, cold-creating enchantments come pretty easily to me, and I can guarantee that, once I get another level and my enchantment Skill becomes Iron tier, even more exotic enchantments will come more easily to me. Then there’s the hundreds of things that I learned from Saul every day, every one of them seeming to grow more complex the deeper I think about it.”

A part of Astrid felt her eyes glaze over as he continued to explain the specifics on why this particular difference between enchantment and spell casting was so interesting to him, but she tried her best to listen to be able to appreciate what he cared about. Before long, though, he cut himself off and apologized. “You’re right, I’m getting off topic. Suffice to say, I’m learning, I’m growing, and I have a sneaking suspicion that if I could, I’d spend more than just a couple weeks locked in a room exploring what exactly I was capable of.”

“I’m sorry,“ Astrid said with a bow of her head. “Sometimes I struggle with paying attention to what you’re saying. However, I do get the ability to lose yourself in inquiry into the depths of what has become possible.”

“Well, let me know what you end up learning,” Skandr waved her off with a smile. “I’ll be over here, thinking about spells and largely banging my head against the wall until I somehow figure out how to turn away from the wall and make progress again.”

Astrid nodded and went off to collect her sling as well as to do her practicing. As always, the brief respite she had in physical activity was far from enough, the six stones very quickly being used before she made her return to practice forms with Benedict. The Bard was making good progress, and Astrid had no doubt that moving was, even if he didn’t end up getting any Skills reliant upon this practice, a good escape from his attempts at changing his own Skills.

And thus, another five weeks passed, when Greely finally returned with terms and conditions from the Verdant Sanctuary.