Shiny
A switch was flipped. In less than a split second, a decision was made. Before I even had a chance to think about what I was doing, I was using reposition to move through space and time, instantly draining each target, before delivering a killing blow. My experienced time felt like several minutes of non-stop killing. But for everybody else, all of it took place in nearly the same split second. Before they even had a chance to register what was happening, it was all done.
When it was over, somebody who wasn't me found himself standing amidst a field of death, warily scanning the edges of the clearing for new enemies. The nearly instantaneous devastation my body had wrought was shocking. I had never fought like this before... However, I had seen somebody who did... in the recorded memories of the version of me from the doomed future. The way I had just slaughtered these foes was pretty much the same as how that other version of me fought.
The sensations, coupled with the thought, unsettled me more than I could have imagined. Sending chills down my spine as if somebody had walked on my grave. During the battle, my mind was totally blank. My body was seemingly running on auto-pilot, every movement pre-ordained by a fierce machine-like killing efficiency. It moved as if I had done this exact same dance of death thousands of times, burning the knowledge of what, when, and how to do it into my very muscle and bones.
Seeing no new enemies and registering a shocked noise from above, my body relaxed its guard slightly. The corpse of the ogre I was currently standing on, growing cold already. Its tough hide not enough to stop the multiple gaping wounds created by mana-enhanced punches, opening the way for my sword to shred its vulnerable internal organs. As I looked it over, some part of me that wasn't precisely myself felt the grim satisfaction of a job well done. Meanwhile, the rest of me was silently panicking over what the hell had just happened.
Before I could get too far down that line of thought, my mind was distracted when there was suddenly a rush of new notifications.
My mind was wandering in confusion as I skimmed the notifications before Arthur regained his ability to speak coherently.
"Ahem. What in the world was that? One moment I was sure we were properly done for, and the next, it was like you were suddenly everywhere at once. A veritable explosion of death."
I didn't really have answers to his questions. If anything, I had more questions myself. I knew exactly how I did what I did. It was a dirt-simple strategy. Great for taking down large groups of enemies. However, that was all in theory. I had never actually done anything like that before myself. I was still trying to wrap my head around what exactly happened too. I felt both totally out of control and, at the same time, utterly confident that I was absolutely in complete control.
This didn't seem like a result of mind control, so much as it was a part of me kept hidden, expressing itself in the most explosive and unexpected way possible. But as soon as it came on, it stopped... and I was left to deal with the aftermath. I had never experienced being afraid of myself before, and the new sensation chilled me to the bone. However, I didn't really know what to say to Arthur either, so I just mumbled an excuse.
"The situation seemed kinda dangerous, so I... um, used some skills I hadn't before."
At that, Arthur snorted through his nose.
"I would wager the only thing truly dangerous around here is you, my good man."
I couldn't deny it. Not surrounded by dozens of corpses that I created in what would seem to everybody else, only a split second.
"Maybe so... Maybe so."
Arthur seemed tired from his part in the fight, but I felt fine. Better than that, really. I checked my stats and saw I was nearly topped off on mana due to my Drain skill being used after each instance of Relocate. That fighting style was dirt-simple but devastating. Each enemy functioned as a battery, recharging me before I finished it off. The tactic was perfectly suited to fighting many enemies. The more enemies there were, the better it worked. By using that simple skill sequence, somebody could take out an army singlehandedly.
"Ah, well, let us just say I am very glad we are on the same side... Bloody hell! I leveled twice from that cock-up."
Happy for the temporary distraction Arthur provided, I moved our focus on Arthur's skill options.
Current skills:
Dark Magic 1 - allows you to learn basic dark magic skills.
Mind Magic 1 - allows you to learn basic mind magic skills.
Summon Magic 1 - allows you to learn basic summon magic skills.
Mind Enhancement 1 - allows you to learn basic intelligence enhancement skills.
Space Magic 1 - allows you to learn basic space magic skills.
Trickster - create illusions to fool your enemies.
Shadow Stealth - disappear into shadows.
Summon Minion - create duplicates of yourself, which obey your will.
Languages - learn to read and speak languages.
Inventory - store up to 10 items in a personal subspace attached to your soul.
Available Tier 1 skills (1 skill point each):
Wind Magic 1 - allows you to learn basic wind magic skills.
Earth Magic 1 - allows you to learn basic earth magic skills.
Body Enhancement 1 - allows you to learn basic body enhancement skills.
Razor Beak - enhance the penetration power of all beak attacks (requires Wind Magic 1).
Steel Talons - enhance the hardness and sharpness of your talons (requires Earth Magic 1).
Accelerate - enhance your speed in flight (requires Wind Magic 1).
Eagle Eye - your vision becomes clearer, enabling you to perceive more and further (requires Body Enhancement 1).
Feather Armor - automatically harden your feathers on impact, providing a natural form of armor (requires Earth Magic 1).
Available Tier 2 skills (2 skill points each):
An Unkindness 1 - boosts all stats by 1% for every additional minion currently under your control (requires Summon Magic 1 and Summon Minion).
One More Shiny - Increases the storage space of your inventory by one for every shiny object stored inside (Requires Space Magic 1 and Inventory).
Nest 1 - Teleport once per day to a single location you mark as your nest (requires Space Magic 1).
Slipshadow - Allow attacks to pass through by temporarily becoming as intangible as a shadow (Requires Dark Magic 1).
Bad Omen 1 - Inspire irrational fear in weak-minded targets (Requires Mind Magic 1).
Without hesitation, he took the One More Shiny skill. Given that skill points were harder to come by than we had assumed, I felt like a wasteful choice. But I also knew that ravens loved their shiny objects. There was no way I would try to tell him to deny his own instincts and nature, just because I would have made a different decision. We all had to be true to ourselves. I know I had made tons of decisions other folks wouldn't have, and I wouldn't have liked it if somebody lectured me about them.
After that, Arthur used his remaining four points to get the tier two An Unkindness 1 skill and Nest 1 skill. An Unkindness 1 allowed him to increase his own stats by simply using skills he already favored anyway. Whereas Nest 1 seemed to be an obvious choice for him, given he was concerned about his mate, who he had left behind to discover more about where they were before raising children.
Checking my own stats, I saw I was nearing a level up myself. The ogre was worth a crazy 1400 points, and I got all of them since I killed it by myself. That also meant the creature was considered a higher level than me.
On the one hand, I was happy with the points, but on the other, I was shocked that something I had dismantled without much fuss was considered a higher level than me. Then again, the way I just fought felt like it came from a level of experience that I didn't actually possess. Which got me thinking again about what was really going on. My best guess was that some of those future memories were still inside me somewhere and were triggered by the tense situation. As I was mulling all that over, a loud Arthur happily interrupted my thoughts.
"Sir William! It works! One More Shiny allows me to store as many daggers as I want."
The loony bird was dancing around amid the death and destruction in barely contained glee. Maybe he was actually way more clever than me. As silly as it was in retrospect, I hadn't even considered the idea that metal weapons could be categorized as shiny objects. I was only thinking of the typical useless stuff ravens were known to hoard as their personal treasures. Now, I felt real stupid for dismissing his first choice of skills as just the frivolous instincts of a raven overriding common sense.
"Holy crap... there must be dozens of daggers here. I'm guessing that means you won't be running out of ammo again for a long, long time."
But then, he actually exceeded my expectations again when he tried storing a sword and flying up before dropping it directly out of his storage, without even touching it. It worked so well that he took every weapon left on the battlefield, except the massive wooden club the ogre used since that wasn't shiny.
His eyes were glittering as he told me of his plan to pour down a veritable avalanche of sharp shinies upon the heads of his enemies. I found myself in awe of how such a simple non-combat skill could be abused to create a terrifying attack. Silently, I wondered if there wasn't some sort of hidden upper limit to the number of shiny objects that he could store. However, I kept that thought to myself since I didn't want to jinx it for Arthur.
