Wish upon the Stars chapter 44

The first thing I did when I woke up again was take the pill I'd  gotten from Rustle. I had the thing on me and in the excitement of the  whole imminent death thing I'd forgotten about it completely. I'd never  taken Alchemical medicine before, so I was actually really interested to  see what would happen. Ten whole points was a lot, but it was within my  tolerance limit for artificial points even at H rank since I'd never  boosted any stats before. Even the food back at Rantano's had just been a  temporary buff.

I  didn't mind the shortcut here because I was almost done this rank and  probably wouldn't need those potential points for some emergency later  anyway, I figured I might as well try this out. I needed to hit G rank  as fast as possible if I was going to survive whatever the Heartripper  Society was going to throw at me. I stripped out of my clothes just in  case of sweat or thrashing around and tossed back the pill, laying down  on the bed.

Once  the pill hit my stomach I felt a pleasant warmth spread from it to  every part of my body, it was pretty relaxing. A nice soothing feeling  like a warm bubble bath rolled through my muscles and heated up by  bones, and within minutes it had permeated every part of me. I felt like  every cell in my body was being gently warmed. Then the gentle warmth  started to increase. Degree by degree the temperature climbed, rising as  I laid there, and the words gentle and soothing stopped really being  applicable.

The  feeling of every cell in your body slowly overheating was not one I  would recommend, there was no way to stop it or slow it down, I  staggered out of bed and jumped in the shower, pumping cold water onto  my body, but apparently the heat wasn't actually physical, so I had to  deal with the freezing water causing my muscles to cramp up and shiver  while still feeling the horrifying burning. I collapsed into the water  and spent the next five minutes somehow burning and freezing alive at  the same time. When I finished convulsing in agony on the floor of my  shower I dragged myself to my bed and checked my stats from under the  comfort of my blanket.

Wishmaster  candidate status. H-rank. Ability: Lesser Wish- Four times a  day  grant  a  Lesser wish in return for proper compensation. Wish must  be  feasibly achievable by the candidate's own efforts within a three   day  period  with  current statistics.

Might-15

Impact-2

Fantasy-11

Vitality-12

Focus-13

Perception-22

Creation-16

Skills: Lesser Doom Sovereign Mastery,Lesser Enchanting Mastery, Minor Piano Mastery, Minor Cooking Mastery, Minor Gymnastics Mastery,  Minor Swimming Mastery, Minor Guitar Mastery, Minor Singing Mastery,   Minor  Inventing Mastery, Minor Poker Mastery, Minor Archery Mastery,  Minor  Boxing Mastery

I  was torn here. Part of me was excited to be only nine points from G  rank, and part of me was super pissed off by how much it hurt. I pulled  up the local network, which was much more comprehensive than the one in  Velan, and some searching found the issue. That was G rank medicine,  which while still feasible to take at H rank tended to have dramatic  effects. Rustle had mentioned higher ranked pills could hurt you, but  he'd specifically said MUCH higher rank, and I was right on the edge of G  rank.

Still, live and learn.  Aside from some soreness I was fine so I supposed he hadn't been wrong. I  stood up and stretched a bit, trying to loosen up some of my knotted  and cramped muscles. Vitality seemed to help out with stretching and  after ten minutes or so I was feeling much better. I really wanted to  try some more enchanting, but I'd burned through all my daily Impact  pretty much with my earlier enchanting session.

I  decided since it was later in the day and we'd done some stuff earlier I  would do some cooking and work on my cooking skill, maybe spend some  time with my friends. I texted Callie, Jessie, and Benny, and headed out  into the kitchen to sort through ingredients. I was probably only a few  Minor Cooking Mastery payments away from a Lesser Cooking Mastery  Skill, so I wanted to get some practice in. Plus I had to admit part of  me liked how much Callie enjoyed my cooking the one time I'd made food  for her.

Benny  came out covered in small amounts of grease and soot and slumped down  at the table with a groan. "Gods I'm exhausted. You can order pretty  much anything in this city, and since I can't use Ascendant materials  for inventing I was able to pay with credits. That said I didn't realize  how random and insane Inventing could get until I had a decent amount  of materials to play with. It's no wonder they call them Mad Scientists.  This nonsense would drive anyone crazy." I smirked slightly at the  haunted look in his eyes, wondering what exactly he'd made.

A  question that I didn't have to ask because Jessie plopped down next to  him. "Oh wow, I didn't know you had a Minor Inventing Skill. It's crazy  hard to get that one to work without an ability. You must be pretty  close stat wise, maybe you're a late bloomer. What did you make by the  way? Anything interesting?" I noted Jessie's usual level of enthusiasm  was even higher than normal and made the educated guess she'd been  talking to Maria. It was sweet that she wanted to become better friends  with Benny because of her interest in his sister.

He  thumped his head down on the table with a groan. "What DIDN'T I make? A  small frog that turns into a helicopter, a pair of shoes that turn  invisible, a shower head that dispenses water in a vortex, a spatula  that shocks you if you miss the optimal timing on a pancake flip. The  list goes on. I tried to stick to weaker materials because they were  cheaper, and the results were...weird. My new alarm clock  actually  bites if you try to hit the snooze button."

That  was actually really interesting. It sounded like as a trade off for the  randomness Inventing didn't have the same limitations as the other  crafting Skills. I was sure there had to be some limits, but the fact  that Benny had made so many things in just a day was amazing. Plus he  must have started when we got back since he couldn't have done much when  watching Eric.

Callie,  the last to arrive at the table, snickered at that last part. "Yeah, at  Minor it's not as big of a deal, but higher level Mad Scientists  usually do their research at the bottom of a bunker or in a tower out of  range of civilians. There's a reason for the stigma, they can be kind  of a menace if they don't have a cautious and methodical nature. Getting  swept up in a recursion spiral is pretty easy for them if they make a  couple of crazy destructive things by accident. Shouldn't be an issue at  your level mind you, but if you do end up getting an ability be careful  with that."

I  hadn't considered that possibility, that a Skill could effect recursion  as much as an ability if it was blatant enough, but thinking about it I  could see how it would work. I left them to their talking for though,  as I made my way to the kitchen. I decided to go with country fried  steak for the meal. I had just woken up so it felt like breakfast but it  was early evening, and country fried steak could hit both meal  requirements, plus it was delicious.

I  pulled out a ribeye as my base. Most people use cube steak for country  fried steak because the original intent of the dish was to make cheap  meat taste better. The recipe usually called for the mea to be heavily  tenderized too, which kind of mashed out the flavor. Instead of smashing  it with a meat tenderizer though, I just sliced the steak into thinner  sections that were the same size around as the original. I used a  lighter batter for the meat when I breaded it, and set it to fry while I  made the gravy.

I  used come chicken apple sausage for the sausage gravy, which was a bit  sweeter than the usual base for that, but I tweaked it a bit as I was  making it so the apple didn't overpower the taste and it ended up as a  nice undertone to the usual sausage and peppercorn top note. I made  scrambled eggs to go with it, which was admittedly more breakfast than  dinner, and plated for everyone, serving it up and sitting down to eat  with my friends.

Seeing  their groans of approval made the work worth it and I smiled widely at  the obvious appreciation. "Glad you like it, now what were we talking  about? I missed most of that." They'd continued their conversation while  I cooked and I'd been pretty wrapped up in my task, using all my Focus  to maximize the amount I learned from this dish and try to boost my  Cooking Skill a bit higher.

Callie  groaned in approval. "Sweet Revenant that's good. We were talking about  when to head back to the academy. Jessie needs to get some points in to  get herself to G rank, and so do you. I figured she might be able to  find some work doing ranking tasks over in the Creation faculty. The  Alchemists always need people with a knack for plants. As for you, your  normal crafting stuff seems to work well for you, for whatever reason. I  bet you can find plenty of jobs to build your rep a bit."

I  wasn't sure about that actually. Prosthetics were probably less a  common request here considering any lost limbs could probably be regrown  in other ways. Granted I could do other things, but making actual gear  would be taxing enough that I could only do really low end stuff. Still,  four pieces of gear daily would be a hell of an output even if they  were incredibly weak artifacts. Lapis had specifically mentioned  workshops specializing in quantity, and to be able to keep up as a solo  act would be a great way to build my rep.

Benny  rolled his eyes. "Yeah, and I was trying to change the subject because I  still don't have an ability so this conversation is pointless for me."  It actually wasn't, since I was going to be getting him his ability when  I hit G rank, but still, the girls didn't know that, and I was betting  all this talk about the Academy was making him antsy for when he could  actually go there.

I  decided to take pity on him. "He's right guys, talking shop with our  civvie at the table is rude." He flipped me off and I stuck out my  tongue at him, earning a laugh from the others. "Now, to circle back to  an earlier topic, why don't you tell us more about all the crazy  knick-nacks you made today, because it sounds like a laugh, and it's  only been like eight hours. I'm curious how many weird little inventions  you managed."

As  he launched into descriptions of the eight or nine different things he  made, including more detailed rundowns on the stuff he had already  mentioned I just sat back and enjoyed the time with my friends. The  peace and quiet was certainly rare these days and I had a feeling it  would get rarer still in the months to come. I wanted to savor the time I  had free, because tomorrow I was going to be buckling down. It was time  to get back to grinding points, I had a rank up to get through.