The Fusionist Book 3 -- Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The basic structure of the formation was fairly simple, thankfully.  Larek had originally thought that it might have to be complicated in order to negate the effects that had been seen in the injured rats, but once his visualization of the Effect he wanted to produce crystalized in his mind, all of the extraneous components of the Fusion didn’t really matter to produce the effect he wanted.

But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to add some custom elements, anyway.

First, he started with a 3 by 6 grid formation and added a Mana Cost to the bottom left and right sections, with a Splitter settled in between them. Above the Mana Costs were Amplifiers, which would help to boost the amount of ambient Mana being absorbed by the Fusion dependent on certain factors. In between the Amplifiers was a Reactive Activation Method, as he didn’t want this to be the same as his Healing Surge Fusion, where it could be activated and accidentally left on too long.

To help alleviate that possibility, above the Reactive section was a row of 3 Variables followed by row with 2 Variables and a single Input in the center. The Input was focused on evaluating the state of the living being that the Fusion was in physical contact with; in other words, it basically looked at how injured they were. This information was passed to the 5 Variables, which all hit different thresholds.

The first threshold was a state of relative perfect health; basically, if it didn’t detect any injuries, nothing would activate. The second was for minor cuts, scrapes, or bruises; the third was for large cuts and serious bruises, as well as minor internal bleeding. The fourth was for heavy internal bleeding, bone fractures, and minor damage to vital organs. The fifth and final threshold was for any injuries up to what could be considered fatal, including broken bones, heavily damaged vital organs, and even severe blood loss. What wasn’t included in any of the thresholds were injuries that even the best healers in the SIC could fix, which were things such as the destruction of the heart, extensive damage to the brain, or amputation. It couldn’t grow back any extremities that were lost or even parts removed from their insides; if they were disemboweled, for instance, and all of their guts spilled out and were lost, the Fusion wouldn’t replace them. Until he was able to grasp some more powerful healing spells, it was a limitation that he couldn’t get around.

Above the Input and Variables was a row of 3 Magnitudes, as well as a single one in the center of the top row. Each of these 4 Magnitudes were different and corresponded with the different Thresholds; for the first threshold – no injuries – there was no Magnitude associated with it, as it would simply not cause the Reactive Activation Method to activate. For the subsequent thresholds, the Magnitudes were at 1, 3, 5, and 7 – in that order.

Lastly, in the top left and right corners of the formation were the Effects. The left corner was the actual “healing” Effect based on Lesser Restoration, which looked like a series of wavy-looking concentric circles; it was one of the symbols used in the spell’s pattern, which he assumed was supposed to represent something growing or being restored. Either way, his focus on the Effect would be the results of seeing it in action while in the ward, as the memories of seeing wounds miraculously sealed up and even minor bone breaks being mended was vivid in his mind. What he saw happened slowly, of course, because he was watching students perform the spells, and the effectiveness of the spell was rather limited in scope; when it was added to his Fusion, however, the Magnitudes would speed up the process considerably.

In the top right corner of the formation was the Effect that he was basing on Localized Anesthesia. He’d already tried this previously, of course, but this time there was something different when he focused on the effect he wanted to accomplish. What he had learned the night before, when he was paralyzed by Vivienne in the bathtub, was that he had been thinking about the effect of Localized Anesthesia all wrong. He had originally only thought about its ability to block out pain and stabilize a wound, which was naturally an excellent effect to have in the Fusion; but it didn’t help the main issue with the other Effect, which was that the body couldn’t handle the influx of healing energy as it was infused.  It responded to the energy violently, mainly because it wasn’t directed by a conscious mind like it would be when used in a spell, and therefore it simply tried to do too much – causing severe reactions such as explosions and implosions in the body as a result. While he doubted it would do quite the same thing on a larger person, as it was likely concentrated in the small figure of a rat, none of them wanted to experiment with a volunteer to see what it would really do.

But with his epiphany last night followed the fake assassination attempt, his comprehension of both the Localized Anesthesia and problems he was having with the healing energies was altered. He now understood that the issue with the healing energy wasn’t that it was overloading the body; rather, it was the body’s overreaction to it that was causing the problem. But how was he to correct that? Well, by essentially shutting the body down and not allowing it to overreact.

In addition to stabilizing the injury and blocking the pain in a targeted, localized area, he also focused on adding paralysis to the second Effect.  It was essentially an extension of what it already did by blocking off the pain, but in this case he wanted it to essentially block everything off; that meant no muscle movement, no blood circulation, and no way for the body to react negatively to the energy doing its job.  It sounded counterintuitive, and he had to admit that it was, but it also strangely made sense once the thought of it got into his head.

As Larek put all of these different components together into the grid formation he was creating, he locked it into place as he routed the different energy streams through Fusion. While the Variables essentially activated different Magnitudes depending on the threshold reached, he still had to ensure that the Mana Cost routes were kept separate for each Effect, as he didn’t want the same amount of Mana running through paralysis and healing effects. Though he didn’t know for sure what might happen if someone was hit with a paralysis using the same amount of energy contained in the healing portion of the Fusion, he had a feeling that it might be counterproductive and potentially harmful; it might even end up killing someone as the localized area expanded enough to include all of their body, which wasn’t what the Fusion was designed to do.

When it was all in place, he focused on the different components, ensuring that the Input, Variables, and Effects reflected what he wanted them to do – and then he started to funnel his Mana into the formation.

Hundreds of points of Mana quickly flowed into the two Mana Costs over the next few minutes, regulated by Larek to ensure that everything was dispersing correctly and that he didn’t see any instability in the structure. In less than 10 minutes, the flow of Mana reduced to a trickle before it stopped completely.

Looking at the fully infused Fusion, he checked one more time over everything before he let it fully descend into the steel plate, letting it *click* into place without any issues.

As he sat back and looked at it, he was happy to see that he had actually learned and created a new Fusion; the other ones he had made, despite them not falling apart or anything, hadn’t actually awarded him with a new Fusion to add to his repertoire. He supposed that meant that it would actually work, though the others technically did – even if it wasn’t the way he intended.

New Fusion Learned!

Graduated Parahealing +7

Activation Method: Reactive

Effect: Numbs and paralyzes injured areas and sends graduated waves of healing energy through nearby organisms, repairing wounds and non-fatal injuries

Magnitude(s): 10%, 30%, 50%, and 70% of full-strength healing energy

Mana Cost: 36,000

Pattern Cohesion: 600

Fusion Time: 99 hours

Graduated Parahealing +7 was an odd name, but he supposed it made sense – especially when he described what it did to his Professor.

“Finished already?” Shinpai asked with a gentle smile.

Larek nodded before he got up from his comfortable spot in the privacy alcove, nodding to his bodyguard in the process. “Yes. I’m absolutely confident this will finally work. Penelope, if you wouldn’t mind?”

It was a little cruel to watch the Martial trainee reach into the cage sitting on the floor next to the Professor and punch the rat inside, breaking it back and tearing a wound in its side from the force of the punch – but he supposed it was for the best. The pests had been caught attempting to eat through some of the underground storage areas, and it was better to test these types of Fusions on them rather than a person in case something went wrong.

The rat was screeching piteously in the cage as it couldn’t move due to its injuries, but Larek blocked out the sound; if everything went the way he expected it to, the animal wouldn’t be suffering for long. Sliding the steel plate through the side of the metal cage so that it ended up gliding under the horribly injured rodent, he stepped back and observed his Fusion come to life.

Just a few seconds before, the area of ambience around the Fusion was almost nothing, as it hadn’t been activated; almost as soon as it touched the rat, however, large funnels appeared above the two Mana Costs, the one hooked up to the paralyzing Effect only about a third of the size of the other. As the Mana was routed through the formation, he began to see a change in the rat’s state almost immediately.

“It’s… working? Tell me, what is the Fusion doing and how did you get it to work?” Shinpai asked.

Larek briefly explained what he had come up with concerning the paralysis effect, but he also went into more detail on the healing process itself. “Ideally, I would love to create something that could heal someone within seconds like my Healing Surge Fusion, but that was only possible thanks to its reliance on, uh, other factors,” he said, not wanting to accidentally be overheard mentioning the Body Regeneration Skill. “Therefore, I needed a way to heal a little bit slower without overwhelming the body; the paralysis negates the negative effects of the healing energy, but infusing the entire body with too much energy for long periods of time could still be harmful.

“Which is how I came up with the graduated healing process, utilizing multiple Variables and Magnitudes with a Reactive Input. For example, as you can see with the rat, the extreme nature of its injuries would be detected by the Input and would trigger a Magnitude 7 healing and paralysis Effect over the affected areas; it nearly looks as though it is dead, but most of its body seems to be paralyzed because of the damage Penelope did to it.”

Eventually, there was a hollow click that came from inside of the rat as its back seemed to snap into place, and additional movement in the rodent could be seen. “Once the worst of the injuries are healed, the Input would recognize this and a different Variable would trigger, switching the Magnitude to 5, lessening the healing energy flowing through while also reducing the area that is paralyzed and numb to pain.” The process was slow compared to his Healing Surge Fusion, which only took seconds; in comparison, it took nearly a minute for the first stage to be done, followed by another minute as even more of the internal injuries were repaired in the next threshold. “As the wounds and other damage is gradually healed, the intensity of the healing energy and paralysis is reduced. The entire process is around 4 to 5 minutes, as the slower healing is necessary so that the body isn’t overwhelmed, and so that full-strength healing energy isn’t forced into a tiny cut or bruise.”

Shortly after the rat’s back was healed, it moved around the cage slowly, incrementally picking up speed as it rushed around in a panic at what was happening to it. Less than 5 minutes later, it seemed to be fully healed and eventually calmed down – before practically throwing itself on the small bowl of seeds and cut fruit in the cage.

“While the natural resources of the body are used during the healing process, similarly to how most of the healing spells I observed work, most of the work was done by the healing energy that passed through the body by the Fusion. Anyone healed by this is going to be hungry afterward, but hopefully not starving; in addition, it shouldn’t have any of the coma-inducing side effects that my other Fusion creates in certain people, as it is primarily using Mana over an extended period of time instead of consuming the body from the inside.”

“Amazing,” Shinpai said, getting up and kneeling by the cage to look at the rat, who had gorged itself a bit with its food, but didn’t even empty the bowl before it stopped. “Strong lines in the formation, too. I wish it was something that could be reproduced by other Fusionists, but there would be no way normal formations could handle the rapid influxes of Mana channeled through the Mana Costs.”

That was certainly disappointing, but there wasn’t really anything Larek could do about that. He’d thought about simpler healing Fusions that didn’t use as much Mana and would heal much slower, but while he could make them, anyone else would end up with a Fusion that was only good for one or perhaps two uses before the pattern would break from the channeled Mana running through it.

“That is definitely unfortunate, but at least it works… or at least it should. Should we test it on some other rats?”

The Grandmaster Fusionist shook his head. “No. I think it might be ready for a volunteer; I’m sure we can find someone who would be willing to test it for us.”

Larek shrugged.  He was confident in his Fusion now that he figured it out, so he didn’t see any problems with it. He could even test it on his own body, but he didn’t feel like hurting himself if he didn’t have to; that, and he wasn’t sure if his Body Regeneration Skill would skew the results somehow.

“Do you think you can make one a little smaller?” Shinpai asked.  “Lugging this large plate around isn’t the most convenient, after all.”

“Absolutely. Give me a few minutes and I’ll have that right up for you.”

As he sat down again to create another Graduated Parahealing Fusion on a much smaller, round, steel medallion attached to a leather thong, his mind was already moving past the healing Fusion now that he had finally solved the issues that had been plaguing him in its formation. He was absolutely certain that tests on actual people would be successful, so that meant that he would be able to start making more of them to distribute to whoever the Dean and Shinpai thought needed them. Not only that, but he could also make Healing Surge Fusions specifically made for the Martials, as they would be able to use them even in combat without too many issues, and there weren’t too many risks of them succumbing to a coma afterward.

That alone would hopefully allay suspicion of his origins and any other secrets that he didn’t want to share with anyone other than who already knew, but it would also open up a whole new avenue of Fusions that he could work on without fear of getting in trouble. The Dean’s announcement of Larek being a Fusions prodigy might have made his life a bit more socially confined, but he couldn’t deny that it was essentially what he wanted as far as being able to create and experiment with Fusions.

If only he could figure out what was holding him back from breaking through certain Skill levels, keeping him from creating using his knowledge of Advanced Fusions, then he would be able to design even more wondrous things. He might even be able to dictate what Fusions he created for others and decide on who would get them, instead of simply settling for what the Dean and Shinpai told him to create.  Because, unfortunately, despite all of the opportunities he had been given by the two important faculty members, he was beginning to feel as if he had fallen into the very same trap he had hoped to avoid when he first discovered his ability to create Fusions. It wasn’t some deep, dark basement where he was chained to a wall and forced to create Fusion after Fusion or else he wouldn’t be fed the bare minimum to keep him alive, of course; but did good food, a pleasant environment, and friends nearby mean that he wasn’t shackled in a prison of his own achievements?

He didn’t know for sure, but he was starting to suspect that all of this was too good to be true.