Tier 3+ - Accidental Champion (Book 8) - Chapter 2 - Do You Grant Permission for These Adjustments to Be Made?

The way Xavier saw the space in front of him shifted instantly. A faint glow only he could perceive fell over Palini. That wasn’t the only thing that changed. It was as though there were another dozen Palinis standing in the exact same spot, striking out at Xavier in several different ways.

Each of these Palini’s had a varying level of transparency to show they weren’t the man himself.

At first it was disorientating, but his brain adapted inhumanly fast to the change.

I thought you said foresight couldn’t be relied on?

Xavier integrated the new way of seeing into the fight more seamlessly than he thought should have been possible. His own movements felt smoother as he was able to block the other man with an ease he’d lacked a split second before.

It can’t, but it helps. And then there’s this…

Combat Assistance Overlay has identified 154 minor and major possible adjustments to your combat style to aid you against this opponent.

Do you grant permission for these adjustments to be made?

Xavier hadn’t made it a practice to split his mind while sparring Palini, but in this case, he made an exception.

What adjustments? How?

You have discovered an exceptionally efficient way to reinforce your muscle memory with mental practice. There are, however, more direct paths. I can not only observe your every neuron, with permission I can alter, reinforce, or dismantle existing connections. But that’s not all I can do—I can create new ones.

Xavier let that sink in.

Create new ones…

In a way, it was similar to what the System could do when one purchased a weapon mastery skill with a Skill Point—something Xavier hadn’t needed to do for a long time—except that had always been very limited. There were other ways the System granted things like that. On occasion, a Denizen could be awarded more skill ranks. He’d experienced this gaining of skill on more than one occasion. Suddenly knowing how to move a weapon and his body in ways he hadn’t before. But something about the process had always felt awfully artificial. At first, he’d found the new movements he learned to come naturally—until he realised what they actually felt like when they did come naturally.

When it came to acquiring a skill through the help of the System or through personal practice—whether physical or mental—Xavier always preferred doing it himself.

That was the reason he hesitated.

Oh, it won’t be like that, Xavier. This System, though a powerful one, only offers such a thing in a rudimentary way. It implants muscle and sense memories from sources deep within its memory banks, sources long dead, likely only providing minor adjustments along the way. That is why when you gain a skill through the System it has that artificial flavour—like Neo downloading Jujitsu into his brain.

Wait… You’ve seen the Matrix? Xavier couldn’t help but be thrown by the dead Wanderer’s reference.

I know your mind, your memories—part of speaking in another’s language is adapting to their cultural references, of which it appears you have a deep connection to. If you wish me to help you, trust in what I’m about to do.

This feels like cheating, was the strongest thought that ran through Xavier’s mind as he inwardly sighed and accepted the Combat Assistance Overlay’s adjustments.

Part of him expected a jolt of electricity to run through his brain. Though he wasn’t sure why. The System had never done that to him when learning a new skill.

What he felt wasn’t so dramatic as an electric shock. He didn’t “feel” anything in his brain at all. There was, however, an odd sensation that ran through his body. A shiver that ran through every muscle. As it did, he was blocking a strike from Palini—something that had become a lot easier since that Combat Assistance Overlay had kicked into gear. The little bit of foresight he’d gained, seeing a dozen transparent images of the man moving about, helped him more than he’d expected. He’d read about foresight abilities and contemplated gaining them, but it was always something he put on the backburner.

He had the Spirit of Time for such things if he truly needed it. Her level of foresight, what she could do with unfoldings, always felt far more powerful than the other abilities he’d encountered in his research.

As the shiver ran through his skin and muscles, the part of his mind that had split couldn’t help but notice something the mental construct had said about the System, and how specific it was—as though the man had an intimate knowledge of it.

Of course he does. He must have an intimate knowledge of… just about everything.

Palini’s face had become more and more focused, his movements faster and sharper. It was clear the man had noticed the shift when the overlay began functioning. He noticed the shiver that ran through Xavier, too—it wasn’t something he was able to mask.

Xavier didn’t feel any different once that shiver ended. No new knowledge had found its way into his mind. But once he’d finished blocking Palini’s strike, he found himself moving in ways his mental functions didn’t anticipate. Ways that came naturally and yet were unfamiliar. While it was similar to when he learnt a skill through the System, it was like the effect had been enhanced a million-fold.

The tide of the sparring match shifted dramatically. Palini had increasingly put Xavier on the backfoot until that overlay kicked in. Then, Xavier been able to hold his ground but still found it difficult to gain the upper hand.

Now, Palini’s sword was flying through the air, yanked out of his grip by a swift and incredibly precise movement that had come out of nowhere for both the Denizens. The look of shock on the B Grade’s face was palpable. Xavier’s spearpoint rested at the skin of Palini’s neck. Sweat dotted the man’s forehead. Despite all the sparring matches they’d been in, with Xavier progressively becoming a better swordsman until he was able to beat Palini every match, he hadn’t seen him this shocked since their first encounter.

“What the hell was that?” Palini stepped back. He glanced at the tip of Xavier’s spear then abruptly marched over to grab his sword. He straightened, ran a loving hand across the flat of the blade, then stared at the man he’d chosen to follow to another sector. “I’ve been watching you move, as closely as I can, these past few weeks and I’ve never seen you move like that before. If you can do that with a spear, why in the System’s name would you ever wield anything else? Have you been hiding the fact that you’re a damned genius with the spear on top of everything else?”

“You sound angry,” Xavier replied.

Palini shut his eyes. Sighed. “I’m not angry.” He shook his head. “Just feels like you’ve been hiding something, especially the way you shifted abilities as we fought… I’ve seen how rapidly you improve, but the shift has never been that dramatic.”

Xavier inclined his head. “You’re right. It hasn’t. But I wasn’t hiding anything from you. I’ve simply learnt how to adapt more quickly.” It wasn’t the whole truth, but it was enough for now.

Palini narrowed his eyes. “I’ve never known anyone capable of adapting that fast.” He raised his chin, glanced at The Collector’s corpse, its halves in two different places. “Then again, it is you we’re talking about.”

Xavier turned his attention toward the spear in his hands. Something about the weapon felt different. When he’d come out of his mental training trance, the weapon had felt like an extension of his body. Turning the spear in his hands, gently touching the butt to the marble floor, then sweeping it through the air… it no longer felt like an extension of his body.

It felt like it was a part of him.

The distinction sounded small, but the change was not.

Nothing about his connection with his soul bound weapon had been altered. Xavier had grown a strong sense for that connection and was able to detect even the most subtle of differences within it, so he was quite sure it remained the same.

And yet…

He swung the spear left, right, up, down. He twirled it in a figure eight with one hand, then the other, then interchanging hands. As he did, something entirely alien to his memory, and yet apparently familiar to his sensory system, was happening.

The spear whipping through the air made the shaft vibrate. Where the spearhead moved through the air this felt and sounded different, giving him a strong sense of the spearhead’s position without seeing or thinking about it. This was something he’d always had a sense for. Being able to feel where his weapon—whatever type of weapon he happened to be wielding at the time—was in space was a valuable asset to any fighter. He’d looked into it and discovered it changed the sensitivity in the nerve fibres of his hands and fingers to the point where his brain activated more neurons for those areas. This was something known before the integration of the System—that the more finely a body part was used and the more aware of it the person was, the more a person’s brain dedicated to it. A single finger took up far more “space” in a brain than thigh muscles did, despite the disparity in size. A blind man using a cane became so sensitive to where his cane brushed that the use of one ultimately altered their brain. Not just their sense of touch, but their spatial sense as well.

Xavier had felt those very same things when he held a weapon that he was adept at using. Eyes open or closed, the weapon expanded his physical spatial sense, a sense that felt markedly different to the one given to him by his Farscope lens.

This… This was not the same. It was more.

Xavier pointed the spear forward, holding it loosely near the butt, extending it to its full reach. He closed his eyes. The young dragonkin was still, not a single muscle fibre twitching, and so the spear didn’t move. Casting Wind Manipulation, Xavier created a breeze so gentle it wouldn’t be detectable even by the tiny hairs on the body of a fly. As the current of air touched his spear, it felt as though it was touching his own skin.

As though the spear was made from his own flesh—except the spear hadn’t been altered in any way.

What in the world…

Xavier opened his eyes and stared at the spear. Palini was ten steps away, standing with his sword loosely gripped by his side, peering at him with his eyebrows drawn together. Xavier, ignoring the other man’s attention, knelt and placed the spear on the marble floor then repeated his use of Wind Manipulation.

He didn’t feel a thing. That was exactly what he’d expected, but he couldn’t have been sure.

“What, exactly, are you doing?” Palini asked with a quizzical look.

Considering how little Xavier understood of what was happening, he wasn’t ready to have a conversation about it with the other man. “Testing unexpected abilities,” Xavier muttered. Xavier picked the spear back up. “One moment.” Without looking at Palini, Xavier snapped the time dilation field around only himself.

Roln appeared a few feet away.

“What… What did you do?” Xavier asked.

The mental construct smiled. “It’s rather complicated. How detailed do you want me to go?”

“Just tell me.”

“I did exactly what I told you I would—I made both minor and major adjustments to your fighting style.”

Xavier ran a finger along the shaft of his spear. “This is more than an alteration to my fighting style.” It was as though he were running his finger along one of his limbs. The sense of touch in his finger picked up the minute details in the grain of the shaft—a shaft made from bone—but he also felt his finger touching the spear from the perspective of the spear.

What should have been mind bending felt perfectly natural.

“I altered your body image,” Roln said simply.

Xavier looked down at himself with a frown. “My… body image?”

“Not in that sense. It’s not exactly orthodox.” The man glanced around with a slightly upturned nose. “Not in these parts, certainly. I created a connection between you and the spear. Technically you are no more connected than before. Nothing I did will be perceived or felt by your soul bound weapon—a being that is, rather interestingly, conscious. The alterations I made are confined to your somatosensory system, which governs your sense of—”

“Touch, pressure, pain, among other things.” Xavier gestured with a hand. “You know I know that.”

“Yes, however your knowledge is rather rudimentary. Suffice to say, what felt like an extension to your body before now literally is—at least to your brain. I did, however, stop short of involving any pain receptors.” Roln inspected his fingernails. “That just seemed like a torturous thing to include.”

Xavier looked at the spear. He knew exactly what the man was talking about in terms of how it felt, but he still had trouble grasping how it worked. He supposed it was similar, in a way, to having a phantom limb. He could feel sensations that weren’t actually happening inside of him.

This alteration to his perception wasn’t the only thing the mental construct had done. The way he’d moved had improved dramatically, and the techniques he’d performed… They weren’t just things he hadn’t done before—they were things he’d never heard of before. His body moved that spear in ways he didn’t know it could move.

“This definitely feels like cheating…” Xavier looked at the mental construct, feeling increasingly unsure about this whole arrangement. “I thought…” He frowned. “I thought working hard for everything I have was part of how I’ll get where I want to go. I thought I had to figure it all out myself. Well, not everything, but… I suppose I’ve taken what some would call shortcuts before, but this feels—”

“Dirty?” Roln grinned.

Xavier cringed. “Yes, I suppose that would be the right word for it.”

“I thought you weren’t worried about my help taking you down the wrong path?”

Xavier pursed his lips. Perhaps it was wise not to look a gift horse in the mouth. He’d benefitted from a vast number of “cheats” in his time.

What was one more?

And what, exactly, was he cheating at? Saving the universe? He’d break any rules he needed to achieve that goal. As for taking down the System… well, that seemed like the ultimate rule breaking. The ultimate cheat.

Xavier looked at his spear once more, then over at Roln with a smile. “What else have you got in your bag of tricks?”