Magic Breaker Ch 43-45

Chapter 43: Tunnel Guides

[Level up! 18 > 19]

More mana, fuelling my [Suppression] of the tide. We walk, and walk, and walk on. Behind us, the sound of fighting echoes through the caves, but I hardly care about it. We carve our way through the critters, and eventually, we come out the other side.

There are only so many in each horde, and they’re all rather low level it seems. None of the insects were above level 10. It was, nonetheless, exhausting. My mana is low. I can barely see from my good eye, as my vision is clouded by blood. I pour the rest of my power into [Flesh Restoration], knitting the blood vessels in my face back together.

That also means I feel the horrible ichor in my socks again. It’s terrible. Disgusting. I pull off my shoes and throw them aside, my socks soon following. Then, I turn at the remains of the insects. I look at them for a long moment.

“What are you thinking about?” Jess asks.

“We need to eat,” I note.

Faces twist with disgust. “No,” Amelie protests. “No, absolutely not. Never. Forget it.”

I want to reach down and grab a bit of flesh, but it’s all sticky ichor or tough chitin. Almost nothing that seems… edible. We could make a stew out of it? I can feel my food aversions come up. 

Maybe I would rather starve. 

Slowly, I nod at Amelie. “Yeah. Let’s… see if we can find something more palatable.”

We move on. Kuro delights in the remains. 

- - -

The rocks poke against the soles of my feet. It’s still an uncomfortable experience, but with my toughened up body, they don't really hurt as much. I would prefer shoes, but… well. Not with what happened back there.

The tunnels are boring. Just long stretches of empty grey. Occasionally, they open up into caverns, and occasionally we stumble across other groups, but we never break out into hostilities or fights. Not yet, at least.

Until, of course, we stumble upon a group that’s different from ours.

It’s not hiy’ht, or wulven, or humans. Instead, the members of it are all a species of lanky humanoids, with almost entirely featureless faces. They have six small, circular holes, looking kind of like a mask, each of them dark.

One of them spots us, and my senses brush up against it.

[Pathfinder, lv. 33]

The creature shivers for a moment, then takes a step towards us. A moment later it stands in front of me. Its voice brushes against my senses, and I blink. The way it speaks sounds almost like TV static. A continuous buzzing noise, going up and down in frequency.

“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” I tell the creature, and it pauses. It tilts its head, leaning forward as if appraising me. I feel mana spill forth, brushing against my skin. It’s not painful, just somewhat unpleasant. Then it makes some more noise, in that buzzing speech of its.

A moment later, we’re surrounded. Tall, slender creatures, faceless things with holes in their heads, look at us. They tilt their heads, buzzing and droning ominously as they surround us. I select one of them, a thin grey tether spilling out of me and sticking to it - only to have it cut to ribbons.

The creature waes its arm through the air as if to dispel some smoke. I note that where there once was a hand, its appendage now ends in a knife-like point. I guess this time, I won’t be able to learn the language faster. As if to punish me for my sleight, the creature picks up a small rock, and gently tosses it against my forehead.

I blink. More buzzing noises. One walks a little bit, then turns around and looks at us. More droning. A step, then another look. “I think they want us to follow them,” Inu says.

Slowly, I tilt my head. “Huh,” I hum. “Alright, then.”

If they wanted us dead, I don’t think we would have lasted too long, so they must not be too hostile. All of them keep chatting away, in that same ominous droning noise that they make. I think they might be trying to get our systems to implant the language in us already, so that we can communicate. Do we learn it faster the more we’re exposed to it?

Curious. How curious. 

They lead us down one tunnel after another, taking long, big steps, surrounding us, as if to keep us from escaping. Or to keep us safe. It’s confirmed to be the second, when monsters finally appear.

This time, it’s not the simple horde of insects we’ve dispatched before. It’s a single, large creature, made of glowing chitin and mushrooms growing on it, and rotating teeth for a maw.

[Gloomstalker lv. 46]

Instantly, it lunged towards us, turning into a pale blue blur. One of the grey-skinned tall ones buzzes with loud urgency, then steps in front of me. Briefly, I wonder why the monsters always go for me. Then I realize that all of the more wise people in my party actually stepped back when the monster showed up, instead of stepping forward and sending mana at it, like me.

Ah. That’d do it.

The gloomstalker collides with one of our temporary guides, sending the tall humanoid to the ground in a heap. In exchange, the gloomstalker becomes frozen in the air for a moment. Instantly, the other guides descend like harpies, tearing into it in the brief moment it remains paralyzed. 

A second passes and the stalker thrashes again, chitin limbs stretching from its hide, jabbing at our guides. One of them places a hand on the ground, and earth rises to envelop a leg. Another one draws back an invisible bowstring, manifesting a glowing blue arrow, and shooting it right through the stalker. 

It breaks free, but receives two stabs through its body from floating spears. Then, it strikes the guard it knocked on its butt again, a single bladed foreleg dragging against their body, as they move to shield me. I look at them. I could have dodged, they could have dodged, yet here we are.

After that, the monster freezes again, and a second later, it’s dispatched. The guide who got hurt slowly raises, but I pull on the cloth it’s wrapped in. The creature turns to me, humming and droning, tilting its head. “Let me see that,” I say, pointing at the wound. It tilts its head some more.

I step closer, and the other creatures suddenly come up to me, hovering around. One even holds a sword in front of me, but I push on. “Let me see,” I say. “Inu, project my intent.”

She nods. “Alright. Ready,” she confirms, and I think very hard on the idea of healing them. Those wounds look nasty, and I can close them. It got hurt because of me. That’s needed.

A pause. Very slowly, the sword in front of me gets pulled aside. I step up to the creature, sitting on the floor, staring at me with those six holes in its face. Then, I reach out and channel my mana into a healing spell.

Its biology is different from humans, of course. But that doesn’t matter. My spell already checks the intrinsic blueprint of a person. I don’t quite know how it manages, but it’s malleable enough for this. Well, almost. I do need to push it a little.

[Flesh Restoration 1 > 2]

The wound closes a little. Shocked silence. I cast the spell a few more times, until the grey flesh underneath its strange clothing is entirely intact again. It took three quarters of my mana pool, but it’s done. Then I step back.

Instantly, the party erupts into excited buzzing. 

Chapter 44: Anthropology

It takes another few minutes before the excitement bubbles down. Then a few more minutes after that until I am able to understand the first few words they speak.

“Think… like… city,” one of the creatures hums. Their voices, once translated, sound melodious. Almost musical. There is a rhythm to the way they speak that I cannot quite catch onto. There would have to be, given the fact that the humming seems largely reliant on that, but the way it filters through is kinda nice.

I like it.

“Very. Soon…” 

Bit by bit, the words grow clearer, and they notice we can understand them. Thatch whispers to Bay and one of the creatures replies. “Speak… more… learn!”

Oh. They’d need to learn our language, too, of course. “Start monologuing,” I tell everyone. “They need to understand us.”

A short pause. Opal laughs. “Alright, fine. Silence was wearing on me anyway. Hey, Inu, my shoulder’s tired. Carry Sylves for a while?” 

“Sure thing,” the kind girl replies, picking up the body of our friend as if it weighed nothing. Inu’s build is pretty heavy on the power. She’s been building a chunk of it naturally, too, from walking around in armor, and is able to soon find a spot where Sylves doesn’t get poked by any of the bits of metal. 

People chat a lot more, and I try to pick out some more of the conversations of our guides. “Soup… sleep,” one says. “Food only!” another mocks them. The hungry one grumbles. “Work only,” they hum back, and the group breaks out in a bit of laughter.

One turns to me. “Understand?” they ask.

I blink, and nod. “Mostly,” I say.

“Will be enough. Improve faster when started,” they explain. That makes sense, too. ‘Knowing’ more words would make it easier to figure out what the others meant. It hummed a little bit, something that wasn’t translated, which seemed to mean it was mostly musical or introspective in nature.

“You new here, yes?” they asked.

I nod. “Yes,” I agree readily.

“Expected,” it says. “Unexpected species. New new.”

Slowly, I tilt my head, in what slowly seems to be becoming a universal gesture of confusion. “What?”

“Ah. New to tower, not just new to floor,” they explain.

Huh. “There are people outside the tower that know the tower exists, am I getting that correctly?”

“Yes!” the alien buzzes happily. “Species, once integrated, eventually become part of the general floor 0. Think…” it pauses. “Islands. But bigger.”

I see. “How long until our home planet gets integrated into this overarching floor?”

“Ah. Decades. Half a century,” the creature explains. “Then it will be grafted.”

“Grafted?” I ask.

“Grafted,” the alien confirms. “Bits of it will be included into the floors of the tower. Bits of it refashioned into more islands for the outside, for floor 0. Ascendancy wells will stay, and the tower will be open to all who wish to climb.”

“What about kids? Will people be born with skills?” I ask.

“Maturity scan performed on integration,” the answer comes. “Eligible individuals receive skills. Ineligible are… in stasis, until floor 0 deemed stable enough. Then, the tower establishes spawn points in the major settlements. For new children? Awakening stones.”

“Awakening stone?” I ask.

The alien chirps, humorously. “Curious! Yes, awakening stones. Perform maturity scan. Bestow skills upon adequate personality development. Usually? Eighteen years. Sometimes later.”

“Never earlier?” I ask.

“Sometimes,” it shrugs. “Often in victims of trauma. People whose childhood was robbed from them. It’s deemed a tragedy.”

I nod. “That makes sense,” I say. It nods, too.

“That gesture,” it says, “is one of affirmation, yes?” Then, they tilt their head. “This one. Curiosity, yes?”

Again, I nod. “Yes, and yes.”

The alien hums a tune of happiness. “Very good! Ah. You may brush me with your mana. I shall reveal my job.” My eyes widen a little. You could do that? How curious. I take my mana sense, brushing it against them.

[Anthropologist - 15]

How bizarre. An alien who is an anthropologist. Have they ever even met humans? Most likely not. Does Anthropology then mean the study of general cultures of sapients in this context?

I also note the different formatting. There’s a hyphen in there. That must denote that it’s a job, rather than a class or species. “What’s your species?” I ask. They smile.

“Check again.”

[Sumeen lv. 34]

“And your class?” I ask.

It hums. “Curious! Yes, check again.”

[Ethereal Archer, 19]

Hm. There is no level denominator. No ‘lv.’ sign. And there is a comma. Slowly, the pieces click. “Is the default display a class name and supremacy level?” I ask.

The creature chirps happily. “Yes! That’s exactly right.”

I hum for a moment, and that makes it tilt its head in curiosity. “What was that?” they ask.

“Huh? What was what?” I ask.

“That. You just spoke in Sumeean,” they say. I blink for a moment. 

“Oh, this?” I ask, then hum a little bit again. The alien nods vigorously. “I’m humming. Humans - our species - do it to communicate simple emotions. Thoughtfulness, curiosity, happiness, sometimes annoyance or anger.”

The sumeen tilts its head in curiosity. “I see. It is a supplement to your main language, then? That… clicky string of noises and pauses?” they ask.

I nod again. “Yes. We’re speaking a human language called English. There are loads more, but most of them involve similar sounds.”

“Must be related to your biology?” the alien guesses, and I nod. 

“Do you have the concept of names?” I ask.

“Oh! How rude. I have not yet introduced myself. My name is Paulino,” they say. 

“Great. I’m Ion. Do you… understand what I mean when I say gender?” I ask.

The creature pauses, confused. “... No,” it says, slowly shaking its head. “What is that?”

I take a deep breath. “Humanity requires two members of its species to create new members,” I say, as simply as I can. “These involve some biological differences. From this, there have been societal roles and expectations created for these two different members. These roles are gender roles, because while one may be born as one gender, it is possible to change into the other.”

“You shapeshift?” the alien asks.

I blink. “... Not quite,” I say. “It’s called transitioning. It can be personal, in which case it is only related to an internal sense of identity and belonging. It can also be social, which means asking to be treated differently by one’s friends, peers and associates. It can be legal, in which case it often involves changing the name one’s government uses, and the marked biological characteristics in legal documents. And it can be medical, in which case it involves medical procedures to change one’s body.”

The alien takes this all in. “Fascinating,” it says. “Fascinating! Is there anything outside of these… two options? I do not believe either of them would be well transplanted upon the sumeen.”

“Yeah!” Opal says. “Tell them what being enby is all about, Snow.” They grin at me. Thatch also gives me a smirk, and Sylves winks. They look encouraging, as if asking me to talk about my own experience. 

“Don’t cancel me,” I say, smiling faintly. I’ve lived more than enough of it to get it right. “Yes. Many humans are also not quite happy with this rigid binary - binary meaning something with two options - and thus, it was expanded into a spectrum.”

“Does your species often use such… geometric illustrations for personal identification?” Paulino asks.

“Well, spectrums are quite common in classifying humans, since they can allow identification of similar traits, while allowing personal nuance,” I explain. “They are used in mental assessments as well, in order to determine how typical your thought and behaviour patterns are.”

“Fascinating,” the alien repeats. One of the other ones, the pathfinder, elbows them. 

“Make sure to pay the human for the service,” they say.

Paulino waves them off. “Sure, sure. Now, tell me more, please.”

“Right,” I say. “My friend, Gem,” I point to Opal, “doesn’t identify with this gender binary. They are thus nonbinary, a term for anyone who does not neatly fit into either descriptor or role.”

“Did you just… put a term that generally means ‘to decline’ or ‘to refuse’ in front of the term used to denote the state of things you described to me before?”

I nod. “Exactly.”

“What an efficient way of describing things.”

“Yeah. So, this generally means they do not use binary pronouns. Pronouns are… personal participles that refer to someone without using their name. I. You. He,” I point to Thatch. “She,” I point to Inu. “They,” I point to Opal.

“Some people use ones that are different from those three, but they are the most common ones. ‘They’ is usually used on anyone whose gender you do not know, or anyone who may fall outside of the binary. Not always, but it is usually a safe bet,” I explain.

“I see,” Paulino says, nodding. “Then, since gender does not apply to us, you would use this… ‘they’ for me and my colleagues, correct?”

Slowly I nod. “Yes. Mostly. Sometimes, for nonhuman creatures, we also use ‘it’. This generally denies someone’s personhood, though, so it’s often considered to be unkind to use on sapients.”

Paulino draws in a long breath, walking on. “Is this sort of… two-sex biological reproduction method common where you are from?”

At this point, the conversation moves on from my niche set of interests. Instead, I elbow Inu. “I’m out of people energy,” I say.

She gives me a long look, then a suffering sigh. She turns to Paulino. “Yes and no,” she says. “It is common, but by no means universal. Even for humans it’s not-”

I tune them out. She’s probably going to briefly touch on intersex people, maybe even artificial fertilization, and while the first is cool, I don’t care that much about the second. Plus, I talked enough. Paulino, clearly, is an extrovert. 

Instead of dealing more with them, as my party starts chatting with the aliens, I pull out my twice improved mana maze. My finger traces its side, finding the faint ridges of runes. A small smile spreads on my face. I follow the lines, leaning on the essence packet I got from reaching level five in my job. 

We walk through the tunnels, but my focus on the mana maze almost lets me forget about the discomfort on the soles of my feet.

I love magic.

Chapter 45: City

There is another interruption of my practice, and the mana I’d been channelling through the maze breaks apart into ethereal strands. I look up. It’s yet another one of the sumeen, the one with torn clothing. The one who defended me against the gloomstalker.

“You healed me,” they hum.

I nod. “Sure,” I say.

They take a long break, probably to breathe or something, before they speak again. “Healers are rare,” they say. “Often connected to sponsor lineages and organisations.”

“Okay.”

“Some of those may try to recruit you,” they say.

“Sure.”

The alien huffs. “Thank you for healing me,” they say. “We will keep your secret. Do not spread it lightly. You aren’t strong enough.”

At that, I finally nod. “I see.”

“Good, good. Then with that, and our guidance, I shall consider my debt repaid,” they say.

“That’s fine,” I agree. Then, the alien trots off. I think it over for a bit.

Healing is valuable. That makes sense. Life should be valued. But if it’s so valuable, then why have I not caught someone’s eye for it yet? Are they not watching? I’m curious. Which organisations will try to kidnap me? What do they know? How would they force me to do their bidding? I wanna know, I wanna know.

But, instead of that, I force down my curiosity, and focus on the mana maze. This one, too. I wanna know how it works. The temptation to take it apart is so strong. But I suppress that temptation, too, and instead channel my mana into it again, forming strings of ethereal power, flipping switches, splitting and threading them through the tiny labyrinth. 

I improve, bit by bit, step by step as we keep walking.

- - -

The next time my focus is broken is when Inu taps me on my shoulder. “Snow,” she says, gently. “Look.”

At her request, I raise my head from the task I’ve been focused on. In front of me, there is a city. It’s dug into the cavern, houses carved from stone, some plated with bits of chitin and strange, spongy looking wood. People mill about, mostly sumeen, and some other species, too. Humanoids with large, crystalline wings on their backs, and others who seem to be entirely covered in fur, looking like walking balls of floof. 

Even from outside, it’s impressive looking. There is a small queue in front of the gate, and a few more humans already there. They must have gotten to an ascendancy well that was a little closer to the city. There are guards, most of them sumeen, doing a few routine checks, as well as a very official looking person. 

I know they’re official because they wear fancy robes and carry a fancy clipboard. It’s one of those with the crystalline wings, though theirs are elegantly folded behind their back. Already, the mish-mash of different languages is starting to give me a headache, but my phone’s battery is low, and this seems important.

Luckily, I’m at least curious about what’s happening, which helps me care a little less about the annoyance of the noise. “This is Espiree,” Paulino says. “A city that has stood for a few decades, now. This is rare, due to monster migrations, you see, so Espiree has become a bit of a hub.”

There’s that word again. “Monsters?” I ask.

“Ah, yes. The non-sentient inhabitants of the tunnels,” Paulino says. “They are entirely biologically viable and do reproduce, but they will also be spawned from the tower itself. In the same way that you produce mana, or your heart pumps blood through your veins, the tower spawns creatures. This includes members of integrated species. ‘Monsters’ simply denotes the non sapient ones.” He pauses. “Non sapient. How elegant.”

So Kuro would be a monster, then. I brush my senses against my stealthy companion.

[Living Shadow lv. 12]

That sounds about right. It immediately gave me their species and supremacy, so I’d assume it’s a monster, yeah. How bothersome. Well, not like any other wild animal, right? Docile under the right circumstances and all. Surely Kuro would never eat me.

I look at the little blob of darkness, poking their head out of my shadow. Surely. Right? Right.

We step forward in the queue, and the fancy looking official talks. I already understand the language - the background chatter of the city is just that overwhelming, and people are pointing at us humans with surprise and curiosity. I don’t bother listening, though. The official talks on and on and on… but all I imagine he’s saying is the normal stuff.

Don’t hurt anyone. Don’t steal. Help if there are monster migrations. Classic things.

[The Keeper of the Tunnels watches over you.]

And that marks the backer of those laws. A powerful avatar of an Eye stationed in the city proper. This time, at least, it seems like a standard message, rather than a troublesome one, marking me as an enemy. I get a couple curious glances because of my burned face, but no one approaches me about it.

Luckily, I have the others with me. They get to deal with the stares, the issue of acquiring housing, and how we might make money. Frankly, I’m halfway to suggesting that we could just camp out in the tunnels. Sure, there are gloomstalkers, but well. How could we climb without a little risk?

A small smirk appears on my face, and Inu pokes my side. “No,” she says, smiling. “Absolutely not. We’re not doing that, Snow. I’m going to take a shower. You should get new shoes. And-”

“No, no,” I say, looking at my bare feet. “No need to say anymore. You had me at shoes.”

We’ll stay in the city for a little while. That much should be fine, right? 

- - - 

Newly integrated species get a stipend, apparently. So, we receive some amount of what passes for money in the tower. A pouch of fancy little coins called chits. I like them. They’re flat, unengraved, and have rounded, smooth sides. They feel more like pebbles than actual coins, and if they were a little larger, I think they could be great emotional support.

In short, I already don’t want to spend mine. Yet, I do what I must. A pair of shoes. A shirt and pants that aren’t horribly stained by blood. Room and board for a month at an Inn, me, Opal, Dar and Sylves sharing a room. The meals are mostly cave fungus-based, and I’m pretty okay with that after the first taste. They’re spongy and fun to chew, with a slightly salty taste. 

After about half a day, we are fed, full, and clean. It’s kind of nice, enjoying the benefits of civilization. There really are people with all kinds of jobs. I thought anthropologist was weird, but that was before I knew of the [Archon of the Bathtub].

Still, it’s not entirely pleasant. My bad. Mainly on me, I admit. My mana was full in the city, and it felt like a weight in my chest again, so I started using [Suppression]. On myself, of course. Every movement feels heavy, like I’m wearing a weighted vest. It’s a little weird, the sensation that there is resistance to every movement I make. 

But, with a little luck, this will give me some more power to play with. And, since my mana regenerates in my sleep, when we head to bed for… whatever passes as night in an underground city, I first make sure to empty out my mana. Which means pulling out a knife, going to town on myself, and healing the wounds, as well as spending more healing on my blind eye.

With [Suppression] active, it barely even hurts. Plus, Kuro cleans up all of the blood, so there’s no mess. All I’m left with is feeling sore, hungry, a little tougher, and tired. Oh, and a little better at healing, of course.

[Flesh Restoration 2 > 3]

It’s only on the next day that our secret gets out.