Wish upon the Stars chapter 349

We didn't try to recruit the Magnificent Fable Forest, mostly because  they were working for a faction that was currently actively pissed at  us. While technically most teams could be part of the WCP or the  Starchaser Palace and whatever faction they were in at the same time,  Callie and I didn't see any upside to trying to recruit someone who had  already admitted they had orders to teach us a lesson.

So  once I finished fixing up Albai's spine, we just left, heading home to  talk without any meetings or networking for a change. Which was a good  thing, because as soon as I got there my first order of business was  tracking down Zeke to find out what the fuck had just happened, and  everyone else came with us.

Zeke, of course, had been  there to watch the match, but had come home right after his own way,  bypassing the hour of travel time with what I assumed was either an  artifact or some stupid broken Skill. Well, or he just flew home. I knew  that traditionally once your Impact passed one hundred (D-rank in other  words) you could literally step on air and fly by manifesting the  Impact onto the air under your feet. At Zeke's level he could probably  fly insanely fast.

Either way, when I found him he was in  the kitchen eating...enchiladas. I glanced down at the take out  container on the counter and raised an eyebrow. "Did you somehow get  down to Doomtown, order enchiladas from the Raving Baby, and then come  back in the time it took us to get home?"

He stared at me  for a second, taking a bite, and pushed the bag off the counter into the  trash. "No." He said through mouthful of food.

Mel  actually giggled at that, while Abel was glaring at my uncle with the  white hot intensity of a thousand suns for picking up his favorite food  and not bringing enough for him (not that I blamed Zeke, given the  amount of those things my mentor could pack away).

Callie  sighed loudly. "Right. Moving on. You saw that fight, so what exactly  happened? We have a basic understanding since Abel knows that Domains  can nullify abilities like his, but it isn't exactly something we've  seen before. Are you allowed to tell us about them?"

He  looked at her with narrowed eyes, chewing as he hummed speculatively,  then swallowed loudly and burped, making all of us grimace. "Sure." He  said casually. "This is considered common knowledge, since so many  people have Domains in some parts of the universe. What do you want to  know?"

I rolled my eyes. "Everything?" I had to hold back a sigh, because of COURSE he had to make things difficult.

"No."  He said firmly. "THAT would be interference. I'll give you the crash  course. Domains are a special type of Skill or Ability that allows a  person to impose their power around themselves in a radius. They're kind  of the opposite of a high level Intermediate combat skill, since you're  offloading a large portion of the stress onto the space around you, so  they don't require quite as much in the way of soul strength."

I  blinked at that. "Wait...then why doesn't everyone use them? If they  can counter a Master Candidate they must be really strong. Shouldn't  they be way more common?"

Zeke shook his head, taking  another bite and talking as he chewed. "Nope. There are downsides.  Domains are kind of complicated, but the basics is that there are two  kinds. Personal and Fable Domains. Fable Domains are based on stories  like that Wonderland Domain. They're well explored, but that comes with  its own issues."

"Oh." Said Callie in understanding.  "Fable Domains aren't unique, so they would be pretty boring to anyone  who knew how they worked. Especially if there's a lot of overlap, that  means you would rank up really slow right?"

He pointed his  fork at her. "Give the girl a cookie. You guessed it. Fable Domains are  incredibly standardized, and unlike the nobility cultivation the Empire  uses, there are enough variations that it dilutes the mass renown that  they might have as a singular concept."

That made sense.  I'd wondered why, say, a Count could funnel belief from the entire  concept of that rank of nobility and it didn't work the same for Fable  Domains. "Ok." I said curiously. "What about the other kind. Personal  Domains? I'm assuming that's a less well known story suited to the  user?"

"Yup." He said cheerfully. "But much like Unique  Skills those are monstrously hard to rank up. They're still based on  stories, but lesser known ones." He paused. "There's...other ways to  apply the concept, but that's higher level stuff. Regardless. Domains  are the nemesis of spatial Skills and abilities, and manifestations  count. It isn't something you'll come across."

That was  vague, but pretty much meant I wasn't getting any more. Luckily I had  another question this whole thing had brought up that I hadn't had a  chance to ask. "I'm curious though. Do you use heroic cultivation? I've  never asked, but I know the Unity is the youngest god, and I don't know  how old you are. Did you come from the Conglomerate?"

He  actually stopped eating to look up at me cooly. "I was wondering when  you would get around to asking that. No. I was born in the Empire,  though I won't tell you how old I am. I use the job system. I'm  currently a Legendary Voltomancer. That's Volto like the style of mask,  not Volt as in electricity. Most people in the Empire use the job  system. After all, if everyone was a noble it wouldn't exactly be  efficient."

I nodded thoughtfully. "Like how some people  in the Fairieland use the nobility system, but some people use Domains? I  guess there's more variety in the other factions."

"Of  course." He agreed. "Heroic cultivation is considered fairly new and  untested. It has limitations and benefits like anything, but Ascendant  culture is old, as are most Ascendants who are in charge of it. Most of  them are taking a wait and see approach and consider the Unity's whole  guild and this entire faction as an experiment."

"An...experiment?"  I said blankly. "The Conglomerate as a whole and the Unity guild has to  be centuries old at this point, how the hell does anyone consider that a  passing trend?"

He just shrugged. "High end Ascendants  have more than three or four hundred Impact, and you know that high  Vitality keeps you in good health for long into the natural lifespan,  while a person only ages a single biological year for the number of  chronological years that equals their current Impact. Since people can  live a hundred to a hundred and twenty or so natural years, multiplying  that by Impact means high ranking Ascendants can live for tens of  thousands of years. On that timescale, a few centuries isn't anything  much."

When he put it like that I could see his point, but  it was still a staggering thing to think about. It also kind of  explained why he didn't want to talk about his own age. Who knew exactly  how long he'd been around. I'd probably avoid thinking about it too.  "Do...do you think we should switch to the job system? Would that cause  me to lose my modifier for the Wish power?"

"Short answer  is no. You CAN switch over if you want, your job would just need to use  Wish as your Base Skill. It's not something I really want to get into  unless you actually go through with it. But the Wishmaster position has  existed since well before this particular cultivation system, and  obviously the original Wishmaster didn't use it. He created the Wish  Skill and then used it to create the Wishmaster job."

That  said some interesting things about how the job system worked to me, not  least of which that the Base Skill probably worked at least a bit like  an inborn ability. I didn't know much about jobs, though from what I did  know they insulated you somewhat from recursion at the expense of some  of the speed you got from heroic cultivation.

I had no  real desire to change my cultivation style though. It might be a bit  safer, but it would also be slower, which would draw attention. Maybe  I'd change my mind later, but at the moment I was fine with the way I  was doing things. Plus I was pretty sure that making Wish my Base Skill  would end up giving me the same limitations as I currently had, so there  wasn't really a point, with the added problem of needing to somehow  TRAIN my Wish Skill, and gods only knew how I'd do that.

This  was the naturals vs. Martial Arts Skill user argument, and I had no  desire to get rid of my free rank ups in Wish out of some misguided  faith in my ability to understand the damn Skill well enough to grind it  past where I currently was.

Zeke didn't seem interested  in talking more though, since he put his head down and focused on his  enchiladas. I knew him well enough not to expect any more from him. I  could see a faint glow from his forehead under his hair, so I suspected  SOMETHING he'd just told me or been about to tell me had been counter to  the geas. Callie must have felt my guilt and also backed off, turning  to Abel.

"So. Did you have fun  during the match? I didn't get a chance to see what you did, but clearly  that caterpillar thing wasn't able to take it."

The  grin that split his face was one of the most ferocious I'd seen on  anyone in my life. "Nope. They made the mistake of assuming hamstringing  my reach made me useless. But Ragam is about pinpoint precision and  focusing force into a small area. Bigger opponents aren't a weakness,  they're a strength. Took me a few dozen blows on the same spot but I  punched through the armor on that summon like an awl. When you dropped  the Domain I was finishing up with the summoner and the metal girl."

Mel  piped up. "The werewolf was surprisingly fun in a fight. Her  regeneration was nuts, some kind of racial trait thing I think. Even  cauterizing the wounds as I made them wasn't enough. Good thing I was  strong enough to muscle her with all my Might. Though she was definitely  a marathon runner and not a sprinter, so the help from Abel at the end  there saved me some serious time."

"What  do you think we'll have to deal with tomorrow?" I asked hesitantly.  "Seems like they're getting tougher and tougher every round as people  are eliminated. Only two more left, so our next opponent will probably  be a monster."

Abel  just shrugged. "Who cares. You got me don't you? You shouldn't worry  about the next two rounds." His grin took on an edge. "You should worry  about the five rounds after that." He paused. "At least unless you get  one of the by spots. But somehow I don't think you have the luck for  that."

I just  shook my head with a laugh. "Well, good to see you don't have  confidence issues." I turned to walk past where Zeke was still eating  quietly. "Now, why don't I make us all something for lunch, since  SOMEONE didn't think to bring enough for everyone else."

Zeke  just flipped me off without stopping his food rampage and I rolled my  eyes as I started taking out a pan to start work. I would have asked  what they wanted, but given Abel was here I didn't need to. He always  picked the same thing if he had the option, and honestly the enchiladas  smelled good anyway. Now, I just had to find out if I could make them as  good as the ones at the Raving Baby. Probably not, but it never hurt to  try.