The weapon [Infected Thorn] wasn't that great. The thorn could not cause a disease, only infect wounds and ensure that the target would have an exposed and infected wound. That sounds good, but if a target dies 3-4 days or weeks after we hurt them, would we still gain XP? Doesn't letting a target escape just make it easier for the next predator to find it?

I was a little upset with the weapon, the thorn lance could only cause a similar effect to the [Reapers], but a worse version. It wasn't a big deal for me, but the soldier was very happy, but I think it wasn't about getting a powerful weapon, it was just about getting a weapon made directly by me.

Few members could use weapons, Hans had his blades, but they grew directly from his forearms, similar to the wolverine, and Trouble preferred to rely on his muscles rather than a weapon. The only members who used weapons and preferred them were the [lancer] and [Harpoon] who were the evolution of lancers, there were only 2 [Harpoon], who were in Hans' group, and they were skilful and strong bees, with high speed and stingers that were very strong, and could be thrown like harpoons from their abdomens or used as bladed weapons.

I want more, I'm not happy with it... I need to find a way to kill my enemies without putting my family's lives at risk, and my [Life] affinity isn't helping. I can help my boys lick their wounds after a battle, but I can't do real damage. Diseases that seem incredible and lethal are only deadly and dangerous for creatures weaker than me. And my only other way to cause damage was with [life echo] and it wasn't a guaranteed method. They had a lifespan of a few days depending on how much mana I injected into them, and if they touched anything they exploded.

I thought about filling the throne room with bubbles, but it was pointless, if a soldier who was flying touched a bubble by accident it would burst, and start a chain process with all the other bubbles.

I could shoot a jet of tiny bubbles that would pop in seconds, like a Squirtle with a bubble jet. But I could only maintain this jet for 3-4 seconds before running out of my MP reserves. So I was back to the blackboard, how am I going to kill my enemies without sacrificing my children?

---

 

Aurum - Year 1 {5 Weeks later }

 

In the last few days we have been talking a lot with Hilda, Ciel managed to evolve in the meantime that he was with Hilda and became a [Healer].It wasn't a new class, or an amazing one, but it was still something. Ciel also gained unique skills, such as [Friendship] and [Sensory Sharing].

The skill [Friendship] always allowed him to know someone's physical state, in his case Hilda, the skill wasn't that incredible, but I think that in a tag team fight it would be essential for the support to know when their ally is doing poorly.

[Sensory sharing] was more explanatory, it allowed Hilda and Ciel to share basic senses, such as smell and hearing. But it didn't cover things like vision and taste.

The evolution also strengthened Ciel and Hilda's "Servant and Master" bond, allowing Ciel to understand Hilda better.

Hilda was a bit of an asshole, she spoke to Ciel as if he were an idiot or a 2 year old child, but I don't know if it was a good or bad thing. Hilda spoke to us like that because she thought we had a more limited intelligence, "idiots" to be more direct, so she always tried to speak slowly and simply. This helped us discover many things, such as the market concept of this world, where we were, the general situation in the world, etc.

But this also limited us to staying at the "basics". If we asked what the socio-economic situation was in the capital of the beastmen, Hilda would certainly know that we are not as stupid as she thinks.

Sometimes it's good to let your enemy think you're an idiot, they tried to manipulate us from time to time, offering pretty flowers and things with no real value. But we were never fooled, we had a line with the kobolds that we wouldn't cross. We would not provide them with healing from [Healers], protection from soldiers, or any magical resources and things like that. We only provide items that are easy to produce, such as honey, wax, silk and things like that. The most valuable items we ever gave to the kobolds were healing jelly, and some life essence.

And from this we discovered that bees that can heal and produce healing items is not common. In fact, healing items and healing magic were not common, it was usually all monopolized by this so called "church of the morning", or secret items produced by the elves. Healing a wound or granting "disease and immunity boost" was not even close to being common, it was so rare that it could be considered a "divine" gift. 

This was good and bad, with this we kind of "confirmed" our identity as envoys of the kobold God, but on the other hand I can't shake the idea that someone might try to 'domesticate' me, to get healing items for free. 

Ciel's evolution brought a wave of happiness in the Kobol village, Hilda was not allowed to leave the cave, but some friends could still come from time to time, and they were all impressed with Ciel, trying to caress him and even touch. Ciel kind of became a "Living Proof" that we were they saviors. They even started planting flowers, building charms that they hung on doors that reminded us of us, praying more often and even bringing some good offerings!

I didn't really like how we were being treated, like some kind of deity, or guardian, but God! Now I know why all those stories said that the guardians or super devils asked for living sacrifices.

These guys brought us some big lizards, birds, and rodents. All alive but totally tied up and immobilized.

They gave everything to Hilda, who then placed it on a pedestal of stacked stones that she created, and seriously, I finally saw the use of these kobols in these sacrifices. We could kill those sacrifices easily and then gain a large wave of XP, a single kill of these creatures was enough to raise a level 1 soldier to level 5 and make him evolve!

So we made a deal with Hilda, we would provide them with information, like where it's safe to hunt and where it's not, we would provide them more "monetary" help, and more food. But we would require the equivalent of 1 such sacrifice every 3 days, at least.

Hilda was very happy to accept, and now we were kind of collaborating with them, we could indicate when there would be an attack of Orme's coming their way, teach them about herbs and plants. We could even teach them about farming and livestock, about manufacturing and crafts, and we could also learn from them.

Hilda didn't have spells, but her leader did. And he was more than willing to show us his spell, through a group of spell casters surrounded by a swarm of soldiers, I could see Onix's spell. His spell allowed him to control shadows. Literally taking the shadow out of something or creating shadows that defied the light. It didn't seem useful to me. But Hilda explained that Onix couldn't just manipulate shadows, he could also cover himself with them. Becoming imperceptible in the dark. It was very useful in battles in poorly lit places, or to mislead the enemy.

We didn't know how it worked, the spell only seemed to make Onix able to create or make shadows disappear, but he... manipulated it? He made the spell do more than the original purpose of the spell.

We also discovered that magic users were not very common, but still not rare, and depending on their classes they could use more or fewer spells, but specialized and magic-focused classes could cast up to 5 spells at the lowest level. And it seemed like NOBODY cast spells from scratch, everyone just learned how to "cast" the spell and then used the shortcut.

I didn't ask why, but it seemed like people in this world believed that using the system was the only way to do things, trying to get around it or refute it was "idiotism". And to me they were the idiots, I don't think it's possible that anyone in this world ever tried to get around the limit on the number of [Spells], but it seemed like everyone accepted that, and just tried to get more powerful spells, and didn't try to increase its variety.

It could also be that this is exclusive to Kobolds, but it didn't seem like it, they said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, but I still needed to talk to other species to be sure.

---

 

What can mana do? Mana appears to be an infinite energy of mysterious origin, it fills everything in the world, and yet remains stable and pure.

Mana tends to be pure, I can say that at least, the world's mana has a well-defined light blue tone, and it looks like smoke that flies through the world without purpose. I couldn't see with my eyes, but I could draw from the spellcasters memories.

But the thing is: Mana doesn't stay pure forever.

The natural mana of the world does not have any affinity, or purpose, but when the mana acquired an affinity it would become "intelligent", the mana would start to have desires, purposes, functionalities. I can only study my own living mana, but just by looking at it I can see, its natural purpose is to heal, fix and strengthen life. But if she were distorted, commanded to do other things, she could go from a warm and gentle little lady, to a horrible demon.

It could cause you illnesses, deformities, debuffs, suck your vitality and even weaken you. But for that she charged a price, trying to make the mana follow a purpose different from its original purpose was like "making a ball fall upwards", normally it should be impossible for you to do that, but this here is magic, as long you are willing in paying a price you can change it.

I can't make flames appear in the palms of my hands, I can't make stone golems rise from the ground, and I can't create a wave that will sweep my enemies away.

But I can kill you without you even knowing how.

My latest research brought me back to testing with Wappos, I was trying to create a new version of a spell, something that could actually be more useful than [Tainted Touch], at least in the short term.

When I started thinking about some ideas, the concept of life itself came to mind. What is life? You can say that life is the entire process of living, or you can say that life is an energy in our body that keeps us alive. Life could also be an "experience", something that must be lived, appreciated and enjoyed, but everything revolved around Living.

And how do I make someone stop living? Do I stop him from "living"? Making him an invalid? Do I put out this flame that keeps them alive? Or do I make their lives boring and meaningless so they stop 'living?' What does it mean to be dead? Isn't being dead inside almost bad as actually being dead?

With that I started pumping new concepts for life magic, and soon I could see little Wappo turning gray and lifeless, he was still alive, I could see it by his almost static movements, but he seemed... Empty? And I, on the other hand, feel great, as if I had just had a super nutritious breakfast.

 

 

"Damn! Boys, can you keep the [Tainted Touch] spell in your memories? I need to remember the exact way to create it to redo it later."

"Of course mom! This is nothing to us!" Said a historian.

'That is good! Swallow this system! Who told you to give me a gap! If you wanted me to fuck off, you just had to do your job better!'

By choosing to learn the life drain spell, I choose to abandon my other spell, but I wouldn't actually lose it forever, I would just have to recreate it if I wanted to add it back to my spell list. This may be boring and meaningless work for other people, but I have archivists who can remember the smell, touch, sounds, appearance, the feeling and memories that I used to create the spell, they were basically a document that had lots of information that I could use Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V to use what they have!

 

 

'Fuck! That shit is fucking useful! I can kinda use a living being as a "living battery" it's a little scary, but who cares?!?! Now... How can I make good use of this??'

"Bring me another Wappo!"

"Immediately!" Said a guard.

Soon a small Wappo was in front of me, fully tied up and armoured, without wasting much time I put my claws into his head and cast the [Life Drain] spell. I could see the Wappo start to become a pale gray and I was getting toast notifications.

 

 

After sucking Wappo until he turned into a dry mushroom I only got 0.04 mana, the conversion rate was shit, but it was an attack spell!

This spell was somewhere between an ultiliary spell and a combat spell, the only problem was that I would need to touch my target to "suck" its life, but I can also use it to replenish the base's mana sources!

I have hundreds of Wappos at my disposal, larvae and snails, I can use them all as live fuel for my experiments!

'Incredible! Now for the final test.... Boys, send me the [Tainted touch] spell.'

'Clear!'

Soon my head was flooded with the memory of the day I created the [Tainted touch] spell. It felt like I was there, reliving it all over again, but everything had a feeling of deja vú, because I had already felt it. Soon I cast the spell exactly as I cast it the first time, and received the notification I wanted.

 

 

'Suck this system! Who's the idiot now!?'