“Oh, right, you guys didn’t get a tutorial. When you attune your xatherite and they’re linked together, then you can unlock linked powers. The ones I got are fire and ice linked in with the storm and it just increases their damage and changes the damage type to include fire and ice.” Drew explained. “Guess I’ll just tell you all the rest of mine. I have two versions of fireball which is a…ranged explosion, really. Another two versions of a cone spell, the different storm spells I mentioned earlier. Uh, I also have a couple of defensive buffs, a spell called dancing blade, which summons a sword that attacks on its own. Two more reds that are my only individually targeted ones: one is a long-range spell called acid dart, and the other is a short-range one called spark that does electrical damage. Last is a slow recharging buff that gives me the equivalent of a good night’s rest after I cast it. Oh, and I got a green xatherite from the spider queen that I can’t slot yet.”
The four of them just sort of stared at him. “That…is a lot of spells,” Juan spoke for all of them. He looked at the other four and then with a shrug, “I guess I’m next, I’m mostly indigos. There are two spells that might work well with you, one called illusory fire that allows me to pretend to throw fireballs, but they must believe them for it to do any damage, and with you around that might actually work. The other is a fake dart projectile with the same limitation. Another is a buff that well, hulks a guy out, makes him look bigger, and causes their melee attacks to do extra damage. I can also summon a lesser earth elemental, which doesn’t seem to be very effective in combat. My last is a violet that allows me to repair clothing.” He gestures to Drew’s uniform, “I can fix that for you, haven’t really had a chance to use this one yet.”
“Oh, that’s great, does it clean it at the same time?” Drew asked. He was filthy after the fight with the queen. He started to unbutton his blouse so that Juan could fix it.
“Guess we’ll see,” Juan said with a smile, as he took the blouse and holding a hand over the rips in the uniform, began muttering under his breath.
“I’ll go next. You already know about my Knight. I can also create walls; I have a green spell that allows me to move super light stuff with my mind and the glowrock one. The last one I would have killed for before this whole thing, but it’s worthless now. It allows me to cast an illusion on clothing to make it appear to be something else,” Katie said matter of factly.
“Nice. Trust me, you’re worth it for the light alone, these things are gonna be amazing when we get out there,” Drew said, pointing at the glowrock in front of him. His enthusiasm for not being in the dark anymore was obvious.
“I’ll go next, its short. I’ve got a bunch of random colors. The first one is ‘group cure’ which heals all allies within seven meters of my target. The second is a buff called mana jump, which increases the target’s mana charge stat by three. The last is a green called mind sense and it allows me to form connections with up to four people, and I can sense what direction they are from me.” Sarah offered her part, and Drew could tell she was upset about her lack of skills compared to everyone else.
“Well, you just became the most important person in the room,” Drew said with an encouraging smile at the younger woman. “You are going to literally keep us together and alive. What’s the cooldown on your heal spell?”
Sarah seemed to perk up at Drew’s words, “It’s pretty long, 57 seconds.”
“Okay, so once or twice in a fight, unless we get really unlucky.” Drew nodded again and then turned to Mitch.
“Last is me, I’m a red like you…well, except I’m not a spell caster. I have a bunch of reds that allow me to do some interesting things to my melee strikes, but mostly they just make me hit harder. I’ve got an orange buff that redirects some of the force from attacks away from me and a shield that blocks incoming kinetic damage.”
“Alright, so, we have a healer, a tank, a support class, and two ranged damage dealers.” Drew looked around the group, “Honestly, that’s a far more balanced a party than I was expecting. We might have to take it a little slow and heal up between fights, but I think we should be fine.” He looked over at Juan, who had finished mending his uniform, and gladly put it back on, even if it was still covered in blood and gore.
“You guys do look a bit rough though; I want to try casting my refresh spell on someone else… Ma’am, you look like you’ve not slept in a while. Mind if I try it on you?” Drew asked Sarah. She just nodded. So Drew reached a hand out to grab hers, his other hand forming the seals to cast the spell. When it was done, the bags under Sarah’s eyes disappeared, her shoulders relaxed from the invisible tension she had been carrying, and she stood up, stretching.
“Man, I would have killed for THAT back at the academy. That’s better than a dozen cups of coffee. Gosh.” Sarah beamed at Drew, and he realized that a lot of her sourness was just plain being tired. He tried to imagine how she must have felt being responsible for the group, despite being one of the youngest members of it.
“How did you do that? You didn’t say a word,” Juan asked, staring at Drew incredulously.
“Do what? Cast the spell? I just formed the seals for it with my other hand. How do you cast your spells?”
“We all have to say a bunch of weird words,” Katie offered. Drew finally realized that Juan hadn’t been muttering; he’d been casting the spell under his breath. “Even Mitch has to say his xatherite’s name to active them.”
“Oh, well, yeah…the only ones that really need much more than a thought and a point are the buff spells, and maybe the storm spells. Like I said, I haven’t actually tried to cast those…the three longer spells take a couple of hand seals each.”
“Wonder what the difference is. It’d be really nice if I didn’t have to say Illusory Fire when I tried to damage people. I have a feeling they aren’t going to believe that it’s going to hurt them if they understand English.”
“I dunno, try activating them by just pointing and thinking of the spell. That’s what I do with all my attack spells.” Drew hadn’t realized just how individual the system was. Now that he thought about it, they could all have different types of xatherite nodes other than the constellation type he had. “Mitch, try using yours with a thought. Swing your fist around a bit; I don’t want to be throwing imaginary fireballs around in here.”
Mitch adopted a fighting stance and looked away from the rest of the group, then threw a punch his hand crackling with lightning as he did. “Hah! It works,” he crowed, “That’ll help a ton with my breathing while I fight.”
After a few more minutes to sort out the division of labor, Sarah cast her mind link and buff on the four of them. She and Juan would stay back, to let them back into the room and prep all of their things for the trip. Meanwhile, Katie, Mitch, and Drew would go recover the supplies and kill the spider eggs.
Chapter Eight — Storms
Chanting words of power, Katie began the process of summoning the Knight. Drew watched as a dark figure slowly began to appear. The dark shape slowly gained substance; the knight was seamless. The figure was solid, made of a dark metal shaped like a set of full plate, the articulating points defying physics as matter seemed to disappear and reappear to accommodate the change of shape. The entire ritual took just under two minutes.
“Wow, that’s really cool,” Drew exclaimed. Katie grinned back at him.
“Yeah, some perks of living in the end of times, eh?” The brunette reached down and tossed some light rocks at Drew, “Keep a couple of these in your pockets. It might be useful to throw them down a hallway for your long-range stuff.”