Born a Monster

Chapter Type: Social, System

Round and round and round, and down. In spite of my reservations, and one incident where Xeng Dai accidentally tried to siphon my life force, instead of the Earth mana I was trying to feed him, the creation of the stairway went much the way bards and playwrights wish magic worked.

“Fires of life, fires of magic, hear me and obey! My name is Do Meng, and I am an adept of the magic that binds you. Summon a ball of light, that I might see my surroundings! Day Globe!”

I had time to throw up an arm. So much for night-time optical evolutions. And although the warmth of the globe was comforting, it really messed with my perception of the ultraviolet spectrum.

“Keep moving.” said Du Jing. “I’m not getting any younger.”

“Does anyone else feel that pressure?” Do Meng asked.

“It’s nothing compared to the deep areas of the ocean.” I said.

Du Jing chuckled. “This is just passive resistance. If mother Earth truly wanted us to not be here, you can be sure we would all be aware of it.”

.....

“Anything under twenty feet or so, you will feel this.” Xeng Dai said. “There are those who learn how to tell how deep they are by how strong this feeling is.”

“When your only way to air is to move earth out of the way,” Du Jing said, “you will not find knowing where the nearest air is to be useless.”

“I find that most abilities my system offers have a large numbers of development points attached.” I said.

Xeng Dai shrugged, “I always use experience points for that. Development points are better spent to replace champion points.”

“Wait until you get to hero points.” Du Jing said. “I hear those are even harder to come by. More useful, though.”

“Don’t look at me.” Do Meng said. “I am learning from both of you, still. I am looking forward to having access to champion points.”

“Pray that your System at least allows you to choose when those get used.” I said.

“Your system doesn’t?” Xeng Dai said. “I find that extremely unlikely.”

“My name is Rhishisikk. I am a Truthspeaker; I literally cannot lie to you.” By now, it was a familiar litany.

“That won’t work on me.” Xeng Dai said.

Du Jing laughed at us. “That isn’t your ex-wife, and if he is already cheating on you, then both of you move fast.”

Xeng Dai looked at me in a creepy way. “I thought you were male.”

“I am male.” I said.

“Du JIIIING!” he screamed, making her laugh all the harder.

Do Meng threw him a hostile glance. “The Worms of the Earth are not nearby, thank you for that confirmation.”

Du Jing’s laughter lasted a full two rotations around the stair.

“Hold.” she said. “This stair goes too deep into the bedrock. Behold.”

“They’ve re-fused this rock.” Xeng Dai said.

Do Meng sighed. “Earthsong?”

“Indeed.” Du Jing said. “It should be easy, since the rock has been recently altered.”

“Wait.” Xeng Dai said. “From below us, I feel... something. Why would they dig deeper here than under other areas of the wall?”

Du Jing shrugged. “There is an open area below. A node of earth power. Presences that make the elementals look minor.”

“If the enemy has access to those...” I said.

“Then they would be employing them, and not mere spirits. Right now, they are ignoring the surface. Let them continue doing so.”

Oh, crap. I could FEEL the power from here. And it was much deeper in the earth than we had come.

“Is that why there are so many elementals in the area?” I asked.

“Heh.” Du Jing said.

“If they made tunnels, they didn’t have a better path to it.” Do Meng said. “Those elementals are new to the area, probably from deeper in the interior. At least most of them.”

“So if the apprentice has asked enough foolish questions, may we now proceed?” Xeng Dai asked. “This will be hard enough without all of us focusing.”

“One question first, for the apprentice. You have access to champion points?”

I shrugged. “My System has access; I’m not certain I do.”

“Get certain.” she said. “Those things can literally save your life.”

“That seems to be the only thing I can currently use them for.” I said.

“Your abilities will expand based on the number of champion points you earn.” Xeng Dai said. “Ask your System what your Champion level is.”

[Champion Level: 0, 3/21 CXP to level 1.]

“Now I have questions.” Xeng Dai said. “There isn’t a champion level zero. That means no access. At all.”

“Xeng Dai, are you focused?” Du Jing asked.

“Focused enough. It’s not my System.” He cracked his knuckles. “Do Meng?”

“Adept, listen well.” Do Meng said. “Have you ever been anchor for another’s ritual?”

“Nothing on the scale of how you make this sound, but yes.” I said.

“Good. I will anchor them, but you will be anchor for me. Set yourself as a distant anchor; if this goes bad, it could easily kill all four of us.”

I blinked. “Distant anchor?”

“There is not time.” Do Meng said. “Anchor me as you have been trained. We will correct your technique ... if there is a later.”

Du Jing chuckled. “I have done this before. Not many times, but before. This plug leads to a tunnel that goes well beyond my ability to sense. If we are to do our job, we must get to the end of it and seal the whole thing.”

Bedrock. Large area. Prolonged precision chanting. What they were planning went well beyond most people’s insanity threshold. And what if there were another tunnel on the other side?

Who was I trying to kid? Of course there was. Spirits could perform repetitive tasks for years; if they wanted to undermine our wall, they had done so completely, thoroughly, and they had not skipped any effort in doing so.

I sat and focused, trying to learn what I could about the earthsong. Song magic is its own category, and with good reason. There are things that can be done with harmony that are impossible without it; there are reasons that mankind relates harmony to music.

Naturally, one XP in the earthsong means nothing. Or rather, it means nothing by itself.

In one sense, my System is swimming with unspent XP from multiple cultivation methods. In another, it nearly drains itself of vital XP any time I make a purchase. Enough times exposed to the earthsong, the woodsong, the deepsong of the ocean, and I’d be able to use those tools.

In theory. Talk to anyone who sings for a living; there is more to singing than just the knowledge of the song and the methods. I had heard enough people with poor singing voices who were convinced they were virtuosos. I didn’t want to include myself into that list.

But, on the other taloned hand, I had surprised myself before on what I could do. As a child... yes, yes, a younger child. As a younger child, I had made the least grade of healing potion. Something which any System will tell you is just not possible. For a child of age one to have the statistics of an adult... well, different species, and as my brother Vashathan demonstrates, we can mature quickly with the proper focus.

And then, about eight feet through the plug, Xeng Dia missed a note. A single note, and the magic tried to undo all their work, with them still inside. It tried. Do Meng supplied energy to them; I supplied energy to him; both of us tapped the deep earth.

Now this is dangerous, to have energy passing in and out at the same time risks magical energy passing THROUGH you. Of making you the target of your own spell. Or rather, of the spell the magic wants to do upon you. I had learned from the four-chambered heart; energy came in, and I purified and processed it, only then letting it pass outward. I’ve no clue the model Do Meng was using.

I saw them, Du Jing and Xeng Dai, wildly get the shrinking walls spinning, doing on a grand scale the same thing I did with mana. That all of us do with mana, because we can’t risk having wild mana loose in our auras.

Mana cannot be tamed, domesticated, or made friendly; doing so would negate the magic, the will to change anything and everything. It would no longer be magic. But it can be cleansed, made ... into a form that is safer to store. Into something that is part magic, and part the magician.

And until I saw that, until I saw it performed upon raw stone, I didn’t understand. Part of the earth would never be normal again. It was part of THEM, now, and forever after.

No wonder magic hates us, hates us all and laughs whenever it can ... get vengeance.

To see it done, to understand what had just happened.

We were all monsters, and we deserved whatever magic did to us.

I didn’t know to capitalize that back then, but yes. Do your study; they are real and very specific creatures. And, for those who care, they are the lower level predators of a very competitive ecosystem. For those who don’t understand those words, the Worms will happily consume your flesh, but even worse things eat them, things which will also happily eat you.