Chapter 86: 86: Spitting in a hole.

Calvin was sitting under the eaves of the west wall, out of the sun, at the outdoor mess, fixing himself a sandwich, while around him, chaos reigned. There were glass bolts peppered in the eaves above him, wounded men running back and forth, screams of pain and the occasional explosion.

There were three major Knife-Work Skills he was interested in, and Calvin decided that he could fix himself lunch while he took a minute to think about it.

Arguably the most powerful: Blade dancer.

It was, at its heart, the knife-version of Grant’s Sword floating ability. Calvin remembered Grant using knives as well with his ability, so he must have some kind of enhancement to the ability that made it more versatile.

Calvin pried a clean butter knife out of a dead man’s hand and dipped it in the shattered top of the mayo jar, before spreading it out on his bread.

Pros: It’s higher range than Lotus Shanks the Moon, doesn’t take a hand, works for attack and defense, and synergizes well with Blade body. It’s semi-permanent.

Cons: It costs one Stability per knife kept in flight, reducing both my resistance to Spells, mental stability, and my Maximum Bent.

Calvin took the scraps of meat he’d scavenged off of various plates and loaded them onto his sandwich before slapping the whole thing together and taking a bite.

As it stands, keeping two blades in flight would drop my Stability down to thirteen. While that wouldn’t effect my casting very much, because my regeneration is decent, that would make me much weaker to mind spells. Ah, damnit, I’m already weak to mind spells. I couldn’t resist Nadia when she was alive, and my Stability hasn’t changed since then!

He chewed the mystery meat sandwich slowly, contemplatively.

So while it’s strong, I think I’ll wait until I have Stability to spare. That being said, I should put more effort into Genosian Language for Language barrier, and all my Stability based skills.

That leaves Lotus Shivs the Moon and Sacrificial Blade.

A body landed on the other end of the long table Calvin sat on, jostling the tableware.

So, Sacrificial Blade:

Pro: could theoretically keep me casting spells all day, under the right circumstances.

Con: Requires a ‘specially prepared’ blade, whatever that means. Odds are I don’t have what it takes to prepare one here. Also, unless the enemy is assassinated, or a specially prepared sacrifice, I’ll probably never get more than a small fraction of their Bent, since they most likely spent it during the fight. If not all of it in a last-ditch effort not to get stabbed. Doesn’t help in a fight.

A powerful effect, to be sure. Each Bent gained represents a staggering array of powerful spells. But highly situational.

Now, Lotus Shivs the Moon…. Did you name that?

How did you know?

Just a hunch.

Pro: Solid increase to combat effectiveness. The ability to catch other’s weapons from an increased distance with Beli Ma. It also mentions increased offensive range, so I have to assume the field can be used to stab as well? Get it long enough, and I’d basically be dealing with swords rather than daggers. Synergizes well with Blade Body.

Plus it’ll help you not die to mooks.

Con: Not as powerful/versatile as Blade Dancer. Requires Bent to be present.

Of the three options presented, Lotus Shivs the Moon was the least tempermental, but also the least exciting.

Can you search the System for what the requirements are for Sacrificial Blade’s specially prepared knife?”

Sure, hold on.

A string of text flew by Calvin’s subconscious faster than he could read it, while there was a persistent clacking noise in the back of his mind.

Okay…I ran the skill through an unpacker. It looks like you have to make a pure iron dagger with some optional wavy parts like a flamberge. Iron, not steel. Then you have to prepare a mixture of Nem and your own blood, coat afformentioned dagger in it, then bake it at a couple thousand degrees to create a Nem alloy on the surface.

It also seems like you’d have to make a new dagger every time you Mutate, since the Bond is rather specific.

Can I use the dagger without the skill?

No, it doesn’t look like it.

Pass. I need a much more controlled environment before I start with things like that.

Like a wizard tower.

What?

Every wizard needs a tower, like every pimp needs a chalice. Did you ever hear about the Wizard Pimp? His tower was a giant chalice. Unfortunately the guy didn’t put a place for water to drain, so he wound up with a lake on top of his tower, and everything was soggy all the time.

Are you serious?

Deadly.

Calvin rolled his eyes.

I choose Lotus Shivs the Moon.

Calvin’s mind tingled as the technique settled into his brain.

He took one of the knives out of his palm and ran Bent through it. He could feel his Bent extend invisibly an extra six inches beyond the tip of the blade before looping back, mimicking the rough shape of a knife, whie reinforcing the strength of the blade itself.

On casual observation, it appeared to have the same range as Beli Ma.

And Beli Ma seemed to be about an inch per level.

So if I want a long sword, I’ll need to get Beli Ma to level twenty-five to thirty-five. I’m sure that will happen soon.

Calvin rolled his eyes and put the invisible point down on the table. The Bent portion of the blade cut through the glass table like sea-foam, giving off soft cracking sounds as the table gave way.

Oooh.

Calvin flipped the knife sideways and pressed the flat of the invisible blade into the table, pushing harder and harder until the table once again began to crack.

That felt too easy.

Calvin grabbed the butter knife and pushed it against the Bent emitting from the dagger in his other hand.

Only a fraction of the force felt like it was transmitted back to the handle.

Calvin likes.

Why? You’ve got an extra long, sharp, partially invisible knife. You could get most of those things from using a sword.

Blocking things with short-handled blades, which includes knives and one-handed swords, is next to impossible because of the lever action acting on the failure point: The human wrist. This skill makes it possible.

Well, I’m sorry I wasn’t raised by a battle-maniac.

Well, I’m sorry I was. Calvin put the butter knife down and picked up his half-eaten Mystery Sandwich.

“Kid,” Grant said, landing next to him.

“Yeah?”

“The Storm-Stretch group got the hint and pulled out. Come meet the boys.”

“Can do,” Calvin said, standing and following Grant to where a tight knot of mercenaries was formed behind a single grizzled looking Uleisan with greying hair and beard, missing an eye.

Well, he’s got the look down. Calvin thought, eyeing the fellow.

“Seven wastes. This is the VIP, Caitlyn. Caitlyn, this is the Seven Wastes, they’ll be keeping your work clear. Make sure he doesn’t get killed. He’ll be doing work on the fortress while we try to sell it back to the highest bidder.

That was the cover story. Of course the Seven Wastes weren’t large enough to keep the fortress indefinitely, but they believed their employer intended to sell it back to the highest bidder, which would most likely be the rich nation of Uleis. Bole might be interested as well.

With that kind of money trading hands, they could justify hiring them. Of course the agreement lasted only so long as Uleis didn’t throw the full force of their army at the problem, which they very well might do.

Holy crap, what if they actually agree to buy the fortress back?

Pocket the money and kill them with Carbon monoxide anyway?

Oh yeah, guess I was worried for nothing.

“Caitlyn, huh?” Calvin asked, eyeing Grant from the side. The old man disguised his grin by lighting his pipe, conveniently covering his face. Calvin could still feel the amusement in the man’s eyes.

“Well met, Caitlyn,” The Leader said, towering over Calvin and offering him a bone-crunching handshake. “I’m Veer.”

“Like, to swerve?”

“It means sunrise in Bolesian. My father thought himself a poet.” The beefy mercenary crossed his arms. “You seem like you’re no stranger to combat, friend. Most VIP’s have to be coaxed out of their bedrooms, but watching you scavenge food from the plates of dead men was amusing. You’ve got nerves.”

Calvin took a bite of sandwich.

“The men and I did have a question for the two of you, though. How did the vast majority of the fortress come to be headless only moments before we arrived? Some of the bodies were still pumping out onto the ground. I was under the impression we were going to be responsible for taking the building as well.”

Calvin glanced over at Grant, still chewing.

Deflect, please.

“Caitlyn is a Legend acquisition specialist, Unfortunately, he’s just one man, and he’s used his all the Bent he has available, making him unable to keep the fort. That’s what you gentlemen are for.

“I do need to sleep.” Calvin said.

“Will he be assisting the defense of the Fortress in a week’s time, then?”

“Why all the questions?” Grant asked, brows furrowed.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Veer said. “I appreciate how easy it was to take the fort, But I very much do not like unknowns.” He lightly tapped a sausage finger into Calvin’s breastbone. “They imply that there’s something more than what you’re telling me.”

Ah, Grant did say that mercenaries are a suspicious bunch. The good ones, anyway.

“You don’t need to –“ Grant was interrupted by Calvin quickly spewing out Guar-shit.

“I’m a Transmutation Wizard and alchemist from the capital,” Calvin said with every ounce of confidence he could muster. He needed to sell them on a similar Spell, so they would be able to see the results of his spells without putting together that

“I’m able to change one thing into another, and control its shape. I’m using my magic for our employer in order to create a charge that can potentially bring the fortress down, another bargaining chip as we both know you won’t attempt to hold this place if the royal army were to show itself.”

Veer’s brows rose.

“If need be, I can provide minor support by changing some of the rock I’m excavating into devil powder charges for you and your crew to use, but not much more than that.”

“You planning on blowing us up?” Veer asked, scowling at Calvin.

Calvin glanced at Grant, who picked up the ball.

“I’ll stay here as long as you do.” Grant said, thinking fast. “You can put bodyguards on me, if you like.”

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“Says the Legend who can fly.” Veer growled before pointing a finger at Calvin. “I want someone watching him.”

Hmm...That’s going to be a problem.

“I don’t need some poorly educated mercenary looming over my shoulder with a candle and blowing us up by accident,” Calvin said. “I have corrections for this sort of thing. They don’t. Put guards on every door if you like. I won’t be leaving until the job is finished, and I definitely won’t make the fortress dangerous until I install the detonator on the way out.”

“I’m less than enthusiastic about working in a death trap.”

“Then leave.” Grant said. “You’ve already been given your down payment. That’s probably enough to keep you from resorting to piracy for the next two weeks. If you want an actual payday though, you’ll do the work you were hired to do.”

The two men were standing inches apart, towering over Calvin as they stared each other down.

Calvin ate the last bite of his sandwich.

“Send a letter.” Calvin said once he’d finished.

“What?”

“I’m sure mercenaries share information on reliable employers. Send a letter to your wife or headquarters, or both, that says that if you don’t make it, Grant be blacklisted. Allowing that letter to leave should prove that he’s willing to follow through with his side of the bargain, as long as there’s no mention of the sapping. Can’t let that get into the wrong hands. You could even have him sign an I.O.U. attached to the letter in the event of your death.”

“You up for that?” Veer asked, eye narrowed.

“Of course.” Grant replied.

“I’m tacking an extra thirty percent onto our charge for hazard pay,” Veer said, drawing a growl out of Grant before turning to the watching mercenaries. “Holt! Get the papers! We’re renegotiating the terms of our commission!”

The mercenary presumably named Holt stopped picking at his leather armor, jumped to his feet and sprinted over to a chest the last of the Seven Wastes had hauled into the fortress, retrieving sheets of off-paper, envelopes, an inkwell, and a delicate glass pen.

Veer slid a massive arm along the mess table, knocking a range of tableware to the floor with a clatter, setting the writing utensils down as the two men sat to face each other.

My work here is done…gods, I hope we can afford an extra thirty percent.

Or you could just kill them all.

The letter?

I’m just saying, Grant’s the one who takes the heat if he fails to deliver.

Let’s save the wanton murder for a last resort.

Foo.

In the meantime, let’s go check on the hole, get some Medi-tating done to heal my burns, and then see if we can’t raise the level of Dupdomancy. I get the feeling we’re going to need some heft by the end of this.

Meditation was level seventeen thanks to the botched mutation and the days of meditating while he was recovering, so Calvin could reasonably expect to raise Dupdomancy, Chained Spirit, and Calvinian Summoning to match it as well over the next handful of days by exploiting Shadow-boxing.

You can also use that time to figure out how to make shaped charges and work on your grenade schematic.

True. Calvin also wanted to get Beli Ma up a little higher. He’d like to see how he matched up against Karen now that he’d upgraded his Skills and Body.

Maybe Stealth, as well, for Unseen Affinity.

Ah, fuck it. Everything. I want everything.

Me, too. I want everything too.

Calvin left the two men scowling at each other and limped his way to the hole. As he was about to walk in the door, one of the mercenaries caught his shoulder.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“To do my job.”

“Not until the boss finishes the negotiations.”

“The negotiations,” Calvin said, rounding on him and stifling a grunt of pain as he twisted some burned skin. “Are how much to pay you for staying here while I work. At no point does stopping me ever enter into the agreement. I don’t answer to your boss, and if you don’t want to watch yourself die, you’ll take your hand off me.”

The mercenary flinched away, and Calvin opened the door and began descending the stairs, shutting it behind him as the smell of lamp smoke dominated the air.

Let’s see how far they’ve gotten in two hours, Calvin thought as he limped down the hall and opened the door.

A pair of young men were standing at the edge of the rubble-lined pit that seemingly led into the Abyss, chuckling as they spit into the inky blackness, trying to gauge its depth.

“NOOO!” Calvin roared as he limped toward them, causing one to jump out of his skin while the other slipped and nearly fell in the hole in the stone floor.

Calvin came up beside them as they flinched and reached for their weapons.

“The detonator reacts with water, you fucking simpletons!” Calvin lied. “You could have killed us all! Out! OUT!”

He shooed them away, practically chasing them out of the room.

Freaking mercenaries, man. I’m starting to see why Grant thinks they’re such a handful. At least the Knick-Knacks had stayed hidden, as per their orders.

Calvin limped back to the hole, eyeballing the distance to the ground.

About twenty feet down, and…He could see debris at the bottom of the pit. They hadn’t cleared all the debris yet, but from what he could feel, the Knick-knacks had bored a long, narrow hole to the dump site with the miniature ones, and were slowly widening it while the bigger ones chipped their way through the stone.

In another couple hours, the debris tunnel would be wide enough to support full-scale digging under the Fortress.

The Cobalts were sleeping off their Breaks in the Barracks. All of them only had one or two breaks, and the number of men who’d died today was easily enough to get someone their third.

One more and we’ll have a few Veteran cobalts. Although if we can scrounge up two more, every single one of them will be veterans. That’d be excellent.

With the cobalts sleeping, Orson retreating, and Grant haggling with the leader of the mercenaries, things were starting to settle down enough that Calvin could focus on healing his burns with Medi-tate.

Calvin closed his eyes, set his back against the wall, and attempted to block everything out as he focused on speeding his healing. Two hours until the summons ran out, which would put his wounds solidly into the second day of recovery.

Meditation has reached level 18! 90% Correction.

Oh, nice.

***Orson***

Orson crushed the ransom letter in his fist, his teeth creaking uncomfortably against each other. A thousand Glimmer for the return of Fort Cobalt and everything within.

It was a king’s ransom, practically a Guar’s weight in whole Nem, and Orson still wasn’t sure if he was willing to pay it. A figure like that would cripple him for years, but he needed to get the spines flowing again, and fast. The heart of Uleis’s glass trade was reliant on the refined compounds in Cobalt spines.

That fucking brat.

There was no evidence other than word of mouth and extremely conspicuous timing that Calvin Gadsint had been behind the sand pirate attack, but Orson was sure it was him.

Except the boy’s entire company was traipsing around the city making the Gadverans look like saints, never pausing long enough to track down where he might be.

I wonder if I rounded them up and executed them in front of the fort, would that draw the little bastard out?

He was probably at the fort, somewhere, but there was no evidence of that. There was no evidence Captain Gadsint was anywhere. The Wasp had simply disappeared, and now he had one of the pillars of the Uleisan economy in the hands of sand pirates.

A rather large army of well-armed sand pirates.

“Ussein, who did you say the pirates were?”

“Seven Wastes Mercenaries. I recognize their leader.”

“Think you could find out who hired them?”

“Not really my area of expertise.”

“True,” Orson said, taking a sheet of paper and writing down terse instructions.

“Linnorn!” He shouted, summoning his servant and handing him the orders.

The other eleven members of the Order were sure to lynch him if – when, not if- this travesty came to light, and he needed solutions ready before that time.

“Master Huul?” Linnorn spoke up quietly.

“What?” Orson asked, biting back an outburst.

“Kurawe is waiting for you in the guest room.”

Orson launched to his feet, in a cold sweat. The leader of their order was waiting for him? Not good. Orson didn’t have any loyalty to the man, personally, but the amount of sway the fat bastard had was undeniable.

Orson dismissed Ussein and Linnorn and practically flew down the hall, taking a moment to catch his breath outside the guest room before plastering a smile on his face and bursting into the guest room with enthusiasm.

“My friend, It’s wonderful to see you! What can I do to make your visit wonderful? Please, tell me.” Orson said as the rather large business owner came into view. The man was easily five hundred pounds, and nearly seven feet tall.

He made the sitting chairs look like toy furniture for children.

“Actually, Orson, I was hoping I could do something for you?” Kurawe said, turning to him as he entered, peasant’s longweed in one hand and expensive wine in the other. The man had odd tastes.

“What do you mean? I’m in need of nothing.” Orson asked, the cold sweat returning. He’d sent the majority of his forces up north to the Dalgur oasis for an extra month so they wouldn’t spread the news, so Kurawe shouldn’t have heard a thing!

“You see, it’s this kind of attitude that causes problems. The first rule of the Order is to give help to our members who need it. Didn’t I preach about that exact thing? At length?”

“What help do you think I’m in need of, Kurawe?” Orson asked, sitting down in front of him.

“You’ve got an upstart causing you a lot of trouble. Someone took Fort Cobalt. Am I right?”

“…You are.”

“Well, I for one, don’t intend to give them what they want by crucifying you. They believe we’ll bicker amongst each other while they make off with our money.”

Kurawe sighed and tapped ash out onto Orson’s wooden end table. his wooden end table. From Bole.

“We’re going to help you. I’m going to put forward twenty thousand of my best men, along with ten from Polluq, and a few thousand from each of the others. We’re going to surround the southern mountains, pen these pirates in, then remove them from the face of Marconen. And for this, we ask nothing but your continued loyalty.”

“Thank you,” Orson said, breathing a silent sigh of relief.

“Oh, and bring the Gadveran princess and her bodyguards.” Kurawe said, exhaling a massive plume of smoke..

“What?”

“I want her to see what we do to brigands in our country. And I have the feeling she’ll come in handy.”

Macronomicon

Edit: Whoops, hit publish instead of Schedule.

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