The Unified States of Mana

“Enemy attack!” The lookout shouts, but I’m left to wonder who it is the idiot is yelling to. The ship is shaking underneath us as if we were hit by a massive wave, and Red and her flyers are already heading out to intercept the enemy.

Maybe he’s just here to shout his support, if he were a proper scout, he’d have made that call a while before, not after we’ve gotten hit.

This guy would’ve fit in on the Titanic.

“Is the ship supposed to shake this much?” I ask scrambling for handholds to keep from sliding down the deck. Vii beside me has taken to flying slightly above the deck to keep from sliding while the rest of us suffer.

“It’s fine,” Replies the idiot scout as I crawl up to the front of the ship where he’s standing, “It just means that she feels it. She’s still getting warmed up to fight.”

“She? The ship?” He nods happily, and I realize that he’s probably not an idiot scout, but an idiot captain.

In the distance, Red’s warriors engage the new group of enemy flyers, the chaotic melee sending limbs flying even back towards us. A few stray magical spikes strike the reinforced wooden shields that line the handrail, cracking and splitting the wood where they hit.

The ship rocks again as some terrible force crashes into the hull from below.

“What the fuck is that?” I shout.

Feeling brave and stupid, I poke my head over the side to get a look. Below, a force of insects stand in circular formation, a large shard of earth is summoned from the centre of them as I watch. In a flash of movement, it’s fired at us, skimming the hull and flying off into the sky.

“Nice miss!” I shout down at them, before pulling my head back.

“What’s going on?” Vii asks, falling low beside me as another wave of shards are sent our way from another swarm of enemy air walkers.

“Just a small war,” I reply, “Nothing to be concerned about, I’m sure it’ll be over before we know it.”

I watch as the idiot captain shoots some ethereal magic down at the insects below, the magic bursts into dark shifting shapes that tear into the enemy. The insects scatter, but none are killed. They quickly form up again and start their cannon magic right away.

“How can I be expected to learn magic with all these damn distractions. Can’t they just keep it down?” I shake my head and keep working through the two spells that I’m practicing. If I keep procrastinating, I’m never going to figure these things out.

I play with the little bone in my hand while sparking fires with the other. I still don’t quite get either. It feels like learning to program by blindly slamming my hands on the keyboard and hoping something works.

The others have taken to keeping their heads low now that the battle has grown intense. Even Eshya has put aside her practice to cower low beside the rest of us, though she’s clearly interested in watching what she can of the battle.

“Incoming! Maintain course!” The idiot shouts beside us, pointing towards another group of air walkers that seem to be carrying something beneath them. Red and her warriors are a little too slow in breaking off from her battle, leaving us alone to deal with these new forces.

The insects drop large soft packages onto the deck before charging down themselves. The warriors that remain on the ship quickly respond by shooting magic and arrows at the diving enemy.

“Take them down, men! Bessy, maintain course and prepare to cast!” He shouts, and I finally realize that he’s talking to the ship. At his command a mass of power from beneath us starts to warp the mana flow in the air and even within my own body.

The dumbass ships captain then decides it’s a grand idea to leap up at the diving insects, instantly getting bisected by a set of sharp scythe arms.

“Huh,” his upper half falls onto me before I can dodge aside. I throw him aside, but his guts still stain my clothes.

As I recover, the insects and warriors slaughter one another all around. The students, meanwhile, all duck and hide from the heat of the battle knowing that they’re all too weak to even pretend to fight.

After a few more warriors lay dead on the deck, Red finally reappears to deal with the flying insects, but their presents still lie all over the deck. The packages had been still when they first hit, but now they begin to writhe about as something within tries to escape.

A luckless warrior jabs at one of the squirming sacks of alien flesh, and that seems like enough for it to pop, covering him in a wave of black slugs. The fat creatures drown the warrior, biting at him with their round mouths and sharp teeth.

The rest of the packages burst soon after and the deck is covered in a shifting sea of black slugs. They all shine with sickly rainbows like I imagine toxic waste to look like.

Some few slide from the deck as the ship is rocked once again. I look around but all of the warriors are busy, and all of the other students are struggling with the swarming slugs. Even Red is nowhere around.

“Bessy, would you kindly kill something!” I shout, getting to my feet and readying to face the slugs, hoping that she can deal with the cannon bugs below.

The mana building up beneath us finally releases, a brilliant white light shines from below. Unfortunately, it does nothing for the leg sized slugs squirming their way towards us.

“I’ve got this!” Eshya shouts, cutting at the swarm with her sword. Her practice shows itself as her wooden sword slices through them like a hot knife through maggots.

Nel leaps forwards to support, jabbing at the slugs with her staff. She’s more confident today, her stance wider and firmer.

Vii sends waves of wind across the deck to sweep entire swaths of slugs over the side. Watchful of getting dragged into the battle above, she keeps herself close to deck.

It’s nothing like the battle we had before, and in fact a little more like when we were cleaning out the barracks. Move in groups, support one another, and don’t let your allies get drowned in shit. The slugs don’t have any tactics, they just move forwards to try and swarm us, over and over again.

“Gather up!” I shout to the students, “Gather around us!”

I kick a slug that tries to climb up the side of the ship, it squeals as it falls to its death. I sort of want to watch it splatter but I’m too busy slaughtering its siblings and cousins.

Whatever it was Bessy did has stopped the attacks from bellow at least, and Red’s still keeping the enemy air walkers busy.

The students thankfully listen to me and make a loose formation around the front of the ship, killing or pushing back the slugs that try and swarm us. The other warriors don’t seem to be having too much trouble killing them but are still getting slowed down by the swarm.

I stand in the centre of the formation, about as useful as tits on a bull as I watch the battle going on, still practicing my spells. Hoping for a breakthrough.

On accident, while distracted by the little matter of a war going on, I mess up my spells. I swirl the mana in to the bone, and release delayed fire mana with my fingertip.

The fire that spawns atop my fingertip appears a few centimetres above my flesh, leaving it unharmed and undamaged entirely. Meanwhile, the mana in the bone continues to swirl and loses mana far more slowly, though it doesn’t burst into flames as I wanted it to.

Interesting, but not immediately useful.

“Should we get below deck?” Vii asks, her feathers shivering as she swipes more of the creatures overboard.

“I’m not sure there is a below deck.” I say, looking around one more time and still finding no door or hatch.

“That doesn’t make sense.” She shouts back, “What sort of a ship doesn’t have lower decks? Where the heck is the door?”

Another wave of air walkers drop more pods of swarmers onto the deck as Red continues to engage them above us. I watch as one of the dead eye student catches a shard of earth to the head, dropping dead.

I fill the gap in our formation, raise my hand, and force a good burst of mana into my burgeoning fireball spell. The magic passes from my fingertip bursting into swirling flames a little way from my flesh before blasting out and bursting on the waves of oily looking slugs.

They screech and writhe in pain from the flames, and the fires spread to others nearby. They aren’t fading near as quickly as I’d expected them to, sticking around like napalm.

A good fireball, and Chip seems to agree with me.

 

~Skill developed.

~Fire Magic (Grade 1): Fireball

 

Even so, a new wave of slugs climb over the flames and corpses of their siblings to attack. I blast another fireball, but that only buys us a few more seconds before more come rolling over.

“We have to do something.” Nel says, looking over the massive swarm coming for us.

“Hey, Bessy. I don’t quite know where you are, but there are slugs all over the deck, is there something you could do to clean them up?” I ask, hoping for a miracle.

There’s a gentle thumping noise from below the deck, indicating that she heard me and moments later we’re assaulted by a dozen tentacles wrapping up and around the deck like some kraken trying to pull the ship into the deep.

The long thin limbs burn with a black flame as they run along the deck sweeping up dozens of swarmers at a time. The swarmers are pulled together and wrapped up by the limbs before the whirling packages are pulled down the side of the ship.

“What the fuck is that?” I ask, but no one answers.

We all watch in rapt silence as the limbs continue to sweep up the slugs without damaging the ship. A few get close to us but retreat before they touch anyone.

In mere moments most of the slugs are gone and we’re left to clear away the last that remain. It’s now, when the crisis is over that Red decides to join us.

She hits hard on the deck, with a smile rising on her lips.

“Knock, knock, Bessy. Release the seekers!”

I hang over the side to watch as small doors open up on the side of the ship. Some are already busy with the movement of the long, flaming tentacles, but not these new ones.

Swarms of little dark orbs roll out into the skies, wreathed in trailing black flames. From these creatures come the most horrifying blend of hateful screeching and childlike laughter.

The horrors rush out and crash into the enemy air walkers. On impact the flames erupt and consume the insects whose screams are overwhelmed by the chilling laughter of the seekers.

Ghastly.

“Well, that’s that.” Red says, settling back onto the deck. The orbs burn away all the enemies that were surrounding us as they sing like a choir of the damned.

“What the shit?” I ask, watching the remaining orbs circle around us ready to intercept the enemies that come too near.

“Oh, Bessy’s just gotten a little worked up.” She says, kicking the deck lightly. Something beneath the deck taps back.

“Don’t tell me…”

“This ship’s a little different to the one you last flew on.” She says, “Bessy is, well the ship itself. All the rest is really just armour and a saddle.”

After the tentacles, and now the seekers, it’s not at all hard to imagine that we’re riding the sort of monster that would make Lovecraft shit his pants, and a normal person die from shock.

“Bessy is fine with this right?” I wouldn’t like to imagine what it would be like to get thrown from a grumpy eldritch mount.

“That’s right, isn’t it Bessy? She’s not much for talking, but I’ll ask you don’t talk to her like you do me. She’s a little more sensitive.” Red says, and the ground bumps under her feet.

“I’m not criticizing you, this one’s just got a thing for saying mean things.”

It’s a light tap this time.

“So those orbs? That massive blast?”

“Bessy.” Red shrugs, “She’s the most powerful of us here, and technically outranks us all.”

“Huh…” I sigh. Strangely it’s still not the most fucked up thing I’ve experienced these last couple of days. Last night’s meal still takes that award. I fumble with the bone I’ve been practicing with, remembering picking it clean. It could just be from one of the beasts, or it could be from a student.

“Oh, don’t worry about the big one coming, we’ll deal with him, you save your energy.” Red says, kicking lightly at the deck, “You students should pay attention and watch.”

As she talks, I see the creature that she’s talking about. The monster is clearly kin of the insects that we’ve been fighting but it is significantly larger while it has a much smaller abdomen.

It stands taller and its larger scythe arms swing violently about, sending blades of wind at us. They crash against the hull of the ship sending us rocking back and forth for a few moments while Red and her warriors move to intercept. The few smaller insects are intercepted by the remaining orbs.

I look down over my practice while I’ve a few seconds of safety. With my fireball ready, I’d like for my other spell to get some progress.

I press the swirling mana into the bone, which smoothly accepts it. Without disconnecting from the flow, I press on it the idea to burst into flames while trying to hold it back at the same time. The mana quietly swirls about inside for a few seconds before it bursts into to flames.

 

~Skill developed.

~Infusion Techniques (Grade 1): Infused Delayed Casting.

 

It’s enough for Chip to like what I’m doing, and the Skill has made it ridiculously easy to repeat. I focus my efforts into changing the timing and intensity. Looking briefly into Chip’s menu’s I have to say, the classes really are set up rather shittily.

Serious, I’m going to have to track down whoever is responsible for this mess and give them a talking to. I mean, I didn’t even know this class existed until I got the Skill.

Shaking my head I watch Red engage the giant insect.

Red has only just reached the titanic bug, giving perspective on how large it actually is. The bug is about thrice her 2 metres in height and looks like it could eat her whole. It swipes its scythes at her faster than I can properly track with my eyes, but she dodges, throwing some knives at its head as a counterattack.

Her warriors flank the creature, stabbing into its side and back. An unfortunate number of their attacks seem to slide off of its hardened exoskeleton.

The battle nearer to us also heats up as the last of the seekers burn up the larger majority of the air walkers around us. Though the few that still remain are proving troublesome for the warriors shooting at them.

The insects pull shards of earth from the backs of their abdomen and infuse them with enough mana to crack the wooden hull or split the flesh of whoever they hit.

“Argh!” Eshya cries out, “Fuck! They got me!”

“Eshya!” I shout, rushing over to her side. It looks like someone has taken to her with a giant ice cream scoop. A chunk of flesh has been carved out of her thigh, and it’s bleeding badly.

Feeling about as useful a beach ball floating in on the d-day landings, I press my hands on the wound and try to stop the bleeding.

“Goddamn mother-fucking bugs.” I whisper, gritting my teeth.

“Don’t say that now!” Nel hisses and I bite my tongue.

“Shit.” I look up but none of the bugs are focused on us, “It seems they didn’t notice. It’s fine.”

“We were lucky, but there are more coming.”

“Release the seekers!” Cries another of the wounded warriors. Bessy complies, and the sky around is soon swimming with the ghastly creatures.

“Do we have a healer?!” I shout, but I get no response.

“What do we do?” Nel asks, hovering over us and watching the skies as the last of the flyers die.

“Burn it.” Vii says, “We have no healing potions or anything. There are no healers on this trip with us. If we wait, she’ll bleed out, we can’t keep pressure on it right now either. Cauterize it.”

“Fuck, can any of you use fire magic?” I ask desperately.

They shake their heads, and I doubt I’ll get much help from the warriors who are busying themselves trying to support Red.

“Fine. This’ll be perfectly fucking fine.” I put my left hand into the open wound and pull at the ‘fire burst’ skill, trying my best to make it burn closed the wounds rather than make more. I think of every which way this can go wrong as the mana unravels into flames.

Eshya doesn’t scream as the fire burns her wound, rather she releases a low and violent growl. Her eyes promise murder as she grabs my wrist, squeezing it tightly.

I ignore the blisters forming on my left hand as I pull it from her wound.

“You’ll be okay, just rest.” I promise, seeing that the worst of the bleeding has stopped. I have to hope that it doesn’t just reopen and start bleeding again.

“No, I’m not dying on my back.” She says, pulling herself back to her feet. I wish I had something to say back to her, but the battlefield is still alive with enemies, and we still haven’t even reached their base.

Red’s fight has grown more intense, she’s wounded by a long gash along her side, but the beast is injured too, parts of its exoskeleton cracked and a few of its legs lost. Seeing a chance in its weakened movements she jumps for its face. Her daggers sinks into the compound eye as she pries away its carapace surrounding it.

The last remaining scythe lifts to attack at her, but she ignores it, grinning cheerfully as she glares into the bleeding eye.

Her fellow warriors intercept the scythe, a shield-man blocking the blade as the others focus on the joint, tearing at the flesh until it comes loose.

The insect screams, loud and high pitch, if it weren’t for my mana density the sound itself would be enough to burst my eardrums.

Red ignores it all in her continuous assault, and soon enough she tears at the flesh of the neck, pulling its head loose.

She keeps hold of the head as she lets the body fall.

“Bessy, dinner!” she calls to the ship, and we quickly fly over to the bleeding corpse.

I can’t see what’s happening below, but the creaking of wood and the sounds of tearing flesh suggest that Bessy is taking up that offer of a feast. After a few minutes, we continue on, and I can see not a scrap of flesh or chitin left where the corpse had fallen.

“The nest is just ahead. Bessy, get ready to cast!” Red declares, drinking down a potion and healing her wounds.

“Any spare potions?!” I shout to her, but she shakes her head sadly.

“Just stay alive until we get back to the healer.”

“Red, stop fucking around!”

“I don’t have, what I don’t have.” She replies with a shake of the head, before intercepting more of the flyers.

I can soon see the large mound swarming with hundreds of insects. Many artillery mage circles surround the hill, summoning their earthen spears and sending them flying at us. Half a dozen of the spears hit against the hull, but most are deflected by the slope of it.

Though this isn’t a one way shoot out.

The mana builds up under my feet, the air pressure increasing as well, as I feel my own mana flow twisted under the force of the mana twisting beneath my feet.

This time, I take the risk and watch as a massive white river of magical plasma drifts out from Bessy. It scatters out over the mound, blasting away the hundreds of insects gathered there, and taking a massive chunk out of the structure itself.

As the smoke settles from the blast, I see a crater in the place of a mound, and for a few seconds I think that the war might be over already.

“Wait for it. Wait for it.” Red says with a smile, “Wait for it…”

Spikes of earth crash upwards all around us, the empty air soon replaced by a forest of earthen pillars, one strikes the hull sending the ship rocking for a moment before another crashes into the other side. A third strikes the back blocking the ships movement.

“I think we hit a reef…” I mumble.

 A scream erupts from underneath us as a passage forms where the mound once was. The earth trembles with each step as something comes crawling out of the ground.

 

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

 

~Mana Form: Grade 1

Current goal: Develop your mana form.

Current mana density: 199 units

 

~Mana distribution:

Skin: 20%

Muscle: 5%

Mind: 1%

Cardiovascular: 5%

Misc.: 1%

Efficiency: 32%

 

~Fire Magic: Grade 1

Current goal: Develop a Skill for fire manipulation.

-Skill: Flame burst

-Skill: Fireball

 

~Defensive Techniques: Grade 1

Current goal: Develop a Skill for reactive mana skin.

-Skills: Mana skin

 

~Combat Techniques: Grade 1

Current goal: Develop a Skill for mana infusion strikes.

-Skills: Mana shield.

 

~Infusion Techniques: Grade 1

Current goal: Develop a Skill for lasting infused delayed casting.

-Skills: Infused delayed casting

 

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

 

//Author Note

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