Afterlife 2.0 Chapter 41 — Follow your Story

I looked over a two-dimensional scene in front of me. My depth perception was completely fucked. I genuinely couldn’t tell if something was really big and far away or really small and incredibly close. Trees were lightly blowing in the breeze at some point in the distance. Cherry blossoms were in bloom, suspicious. A notification had taken up a quarter of my vision.

[Zone Quest Obtained]
Name: [Follow your Story]
Tier: [Depends on choices made]
Description: [You have entered Inkbound Vale. This has bound you to the stories unfolding within the Zone. Until you complete an arc, you are forbidden from leaving. Will you be the main character, or will you be drawn into someone else’s story? Once you start a plotline, the Zone will pull you along with the story. It is possible to hop between plotlines. However, this will usually reset your progress unless there is some relation between the two plots (Such as shared characters, goals, etc). This quest cannot be failed unless you die. If you hide, plots will be generated around you.

When you are ON-CAMERA, there are Conditions: 

• Abilities need to be called out. Otherwise, Skills/Spells/Actions will fizzle. This will be painful.

• The theme of your abilities matters more than your application. If you can convince the audience of your absolute power, then you will be more effective at whatever you attempt to do.

• Maintain a consistent character. If you suddenly drop the role you’ve taken, you will be penalized.

• POINTER_FAILURE: F16A32C64B23]

Reward: [Based on choices made. New Abilities gained here are real and will be carried with you into the future.]
Failure: [Death]

That’s just great… Why the fuck did they remove my ability to report bugs again? I’m obviously going to run into a bunch of them out here in the middle of fucking nowhere. Hopefully, the unknown condition wasn’t something I’d ever run into. I had a feeling I won’t be that lucky, though.

I wonder if we can speedrun this somehow. Release the hidden demon early and skedaddle or something. Make an arc that just involved us fucking up and leaving.

Looking around, I realized I might have mistaken something. ‘Us’ was incorrect. The word I should have chosen was ‘I’. Because Autumn seemingly didn’t appear with me, even though I saw them walk through the wall.

This was going to be a headache, wasn’t it? Looking behind me revealed an endless stretch of lightly forested terrain. There was a path cutting through the hillside, which I figured I might as well take. Maybe I can run into a caravan or something and start a Side Quest. But only if it's something I can handle.

I’d prefer not to be attacked by bandits two hundred levels higher than me. If I see a caravan under attack by a group of people moving at hypersonic speeds, I’m walking in the other direction. Unless I can somehow convince whatever ‘audience’ was watching that I had an insanely cool powerset… Maybe it was time to take on my chuunibyou persona?

Whatever the case, I decided to head towards the path at a steady jaunt. I hope Autumn’s okay.

Which led to me tripping and falling flat on my face almost immediately. Walking when everything looked like a flat two-dimensional animation was tricky as hell. Especially when I was also two-dimensional, pulling myself to my feet, I tried to automate my movements and managed to actually walk. All it required was setting a regimented pace and completely ignoring everything my vision was telling me. I can practice moving later, or maybe just use [Natural Enhancement] and cheat my way into walking properly. I’m sure the enhanced precision of movements that the Skill provides would help.

While walking, I thought about what kind of tropes I wanted to embody. I could go for the mysterious stranger type character, they always had cool powers they could unveil. But I’d have to have interesting hidden abilities to really sell it. Also, I needed to determine the typical style of dress around here so I could create an extra stylish version of it.

Actually, don’t I have cool, unique abilities? Looking at a tree by the side of the road, I spoke aloud, “Fall.”

It wobbled a bit, ten percent of my Mana made it slightly wobble... Maybe English isn’t the right language to use for this. Oh, wait a moment. I had to call out my attacks. Mayhaps I can use this to my advantage.

I raised my hand, channeled Mana into creating thorns and threw them at a tree. The thorns merely pierced it, leaving themselves embedded within the tree. Then, towards the same tree, I used both my Authority and a manifestation of thorns around me and called out, “Thorn Barrage,” while I threw them. The thorns absolutely tore a tree to pieces. Shredding the trunk and eviscerating the branches as they fell. The number of thorns seemingly tripled out of nowhere.

Fuck yeah, that’s how we do it! Calling out attack names was a perfect necessity for me right now, it means I can learn to do this without cringing every time, with pain as a punishment if I fuck up! I mean, I’d love to avoid the pain, but the situation just so happened to make it a requirement, so whatever. I just had to never fuck up, easy right?

I bet I won’t even be punished once.

Now, where’s a grandpa in a ring to help me on my quest? Should I try to find a cave with a heaven-wrought artifact within it? Oh, wait, silly me, I'm the heaven-wrought artifact! Could I use that fact to sell a higher power level to the audience?

I decided to try making something to snazzy up my kit. A glowing cloak was good and all, but it was only useful during nighttime, and dawn's light was already cresting the horizon.

Upon reviewing my materials, I realized they were the main thing holding me back at the moment. I couldn’t make a real weapon because I didn't have a material strong enough to handle cutting without breaking.

Maybe I could go with a ranged option. I was a Conduit, so it made sense to focus on something that let me channel Mana through it, while also allowing me to do something I couldn’t inside my own body. The only thing I couldn’t do internally was channel external Mana.

If only Nature Mana weren’t extremely costly to make out of Raw Mana, then I could remain in my element… Oh, wait, I know!

Shaping a rod using [New Growth], I built two separate circuits. One extremely simple, just a straight line to a Wondersprout ball on the end of the stick, with the circuits that mimic how I use [Artificial Aura Control] attached to it.

Luckily, even though it looks two-dimensional, using my Authority, I can feel the shape of it, so this isn’t too hard.

Flicking the wand around, I could control the Authority inside it during the test cases. It required some fine-tuning to achieve an acceptable level of shaping control. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked well enough.

Next… I think I might need a new type of material. I want to use something similar to Energy Absorbent Blood Dew, but it can’t be a liquid.

What if I just mix Runaspriggan Flesh and the Energy Absorbent Dew, with the intent to make all Mana stabilize it while taking on as many properties of the dew as possible? I can throw away the Life Energy Absorbent properties.

I created a ball of spriggan flesh in my hand and disconnected it from my shell. Then, I began channeling Corruptive Mana into it in the same way I did with the other creations, imbuing the effects I want from the Blood Dew.

I was left with a small blue metal ball in my hand, which I swallowed, then checked the natural list to see what it did.

[Stabilized Manavine Alloy]
A metallic-organic material created through the combination of effects carried by Runaspriggan Flesh and Energy Absorbent Dew using a corruptive evolutionary process. Somewhat conductive to all Energy forms, higher Mana levels stored increase the bond strength of Mana-formed lattices within the material as long as the Energy does not inherently oppose cohesion. Change aspect carried within the evolutionary process caused this material to be very good at absorbing environmental Mana. Can be triggered to absorb Mana in contact with the material.

Why do I struggle with channeling any intent other than corruptive? You’d think with how well I do with Skill assistance, I’d be able to figure out the thing Autumn said I should be able to do without Skill assistance. Their seasonal Mana type was ridiculous.

I snickered to myself. Maybe I could do Winter-aligned Nature Mana. Match it up with my last name.

Wait, wouldn’t that be perfect for this Zone, though? Screw the wand… Well maybe not screw it but I’ll have to change its final elemental alignment. Also, it probably won’t work as a wand anymore. It’ll probably have to be bigger.

I dumped the prototype into my Inventory.

I’ll work on it in a moment. I want to create a proper theme for myself in this Zone first. Being a Winter conduit would be perfect for that, because it feels like an advanced element. Focusing on the Mana ejection arrays in my arm, I thought about what Winter was and what I wanted it to be.

I was always fond of Winter, when the nights grew longer and the land became quiet. There was something about the crisp Winter air that made me feel alive. Not the kind of air you’d find in a city or even a small town, I mean the kind you'd see when walking through a forest hundreds of miles from the nearest building in the dead of Winter.

I felt something happen to the Nature Mana in my arm, so I released it. A puff of cold air manifested.

That was underwhelming. 

It was my first try at it. I’m just used to being great at things the first time I try them. Well, either that or I drop the activity entirely and never touch it again. Sometimes I wish people had never insisted I was a smart kid. Maybe I’d have more middling expectations for myself and know how to put effort into things I’m not innately passionate about. Something about Winter feels right. I didn’t know if it was my last name or what. It wouldn’t be the first time I randomly decided I liked something based on a loose association with myself.

Splitting my mind, I pulled out the unfinished staff, part of my mind devoted itself to focusing on actually getting the Winter aspected Nature Mana to work in a simulation. The other was designing the staff I was working on previously.

It took nearly an hour for me to get it to function, or at least the basic aspects. I had plans for future additions as well, but they would have taken too long to implement for a simple project I created while on the road.

Holding the staff by a grip I installed at the centre point, I channelled Nature Mana into a specific wire towards the Wondersprout at the tip to generate an aura for the staff. Along the sides of the staff lay channels of Stabilized Manavine Alloy that I triggered to begin absorbing atmospheric Mana. That Mana was then unattuned and sent down two channels. One converting it into Fire Mana, then using the reversal rune I was given by the puzzle ring to turn it into Cold Mana. The other channel, which was much smaller, converted the Raw Mana into Water Mana, then blended it with part of the Cold Mana within the storage space at the bottom half of the staff, creating Ice Mana. Within the upper half of the staff, I stored extra Cold Mana, which would be stored within whatever Ice was manifested with the staff.

Holding the staff out, I tried a few things. First, I wanted to ensure it actually functioned, so I used a standard targeting array to create shards of ice. Then threw them at a bush. The poor bus froze from the extra Cold Mana packed in the Ice, its leaves crackling slightly as the breeze blew by. Spinning the staff, it felt comfortable in my hands. Since it mostly consisted of an organic metal, it was actually fairly durable. I tested this by whacking a tree with it. The spot where I whacked was almost immediately flash-frozen, and the force of my blow caused it to crack.

I nodded with satisfaction to myself and reconnected with my other half, trying to get Winter Mana working. My mood immediately plummeted as it seemed like they had actually gotten worse at it over time and couldn’t figure out why. They had spent the last ten minutes sulking on the floor of a simulation.

I wasn’t sulking!

Yes, you brat, that’s what you were doing in there.

I paused, cleared my throat, and continued on. Definitely not thinking about the fact that I was talking to myself after rejoining. Even if I was doing that, it’s perfectly healthy behaviour to call yourself a brat.

I stored the staff away and checked its description.

[Glacient Root]
A staff focus that is only wieldable by those already very proficient in natural artifact usage and an ability to generate Nature Mana. Designed to use atmospheric Mana as its main power source, this staff has multiple functions. The primary use of the staff is to create and fling ice shards filled with Cold Mana. This attack will incapacitate organics who have not invested in low-temperature resistance. Secondly, when the staff detects a collision, it will pump Cold Mana into the object it has collided with unless that object is Ellie Winters or their clothes.

That final addition was tricky to add. Essentially, the process works as follows: the staff checks the Mana of the last person who keyed themselves to the staff. The keying function was something only I knew how to do, as it requires someone to use the staff before it keys to them competently. Which should be physically impossible for any non-golemoids, and I have a feeling there are very few golemoids in existence. Also, it seems like I got levels for it… Why haven’t I gotten any for the puzzle?

Profession Level (Greenweaver) Increased +2 (4)

+8 Wit, +4 Spirit, +4 Arcana, +8 Free Stats

After setting out again, I realized that somehow I had figured out how to walk properly in this world while I had been automating it. I must have become accustomed to seeing the environment as an animation or something, I wasn’t quite sure.

There was something that was bugging me, though. Why hadn’t I been pulled into a plotline yet? It felt like I’d been walking for a long time… How big was this place even? Was it a whole planet just stuffed into a Zone? Maybe there was just stuff going on, and I’d just missed it somehow, or it was very far away.

Increasing the Mana sent to my eyes, I began looking off the sides of the road for any landmarks, only jumping in fear a little bit when I blew a circuit. A quick reinforcement of the faulty wire later, and I found I could see the particle density of sand from five hundred metres.

No, oddly glowing objects sitting in craters made from them reentering the atmosphere at high speed. Not even a forgotten ruin lying around, I was beginning to worry that Zone might think I was trying to evade a plotline.

Luckily, just as my worries came to a head, a potential first plotline appeared in the distance. Which I was going to have to approach carefully, given I was in a Zone with a ‘die instantly without knowing why’ level of difficulty.