The Fusionist Book 2 -- Chapter 42

Chapter 42

Moving at a speed no faster than a walk, the Camouflage Sphere was able to maintain the light-bending Effect of the Fusion around Larek. This allowed him to pass through the park and into the kitchens he had just left a few minutes ago without anyone noticing him; if they did notice anything, it was more of a slight distortion than anything else. He made sure not to come within 5 feet of anyone, because otherwise they would be included in the Effect and see him —which was harder than it sounded when he finally reached the stairway leading down into the storage rooms. A member of the Academy’s staff walked up carrying a bushel of apples from down below, nearly bumping into him, but he was thankfully able to scurry backwards to avoid getting too close to her.

Once Larek was able to get down into the tunnels below, he almost ran into another pair of staff who were scurrying around gathering additional food supplies, but he managed to duck into a storage room a few seconds before they would’ve run straight into him. Looking around the room as he waited for them to pass, he realized that he wasn’t in a food-storage section; instead, he saw bundles of wooden staves sticking upright out of barrels arranged along one side of the room, while on the other held wooden shelves filled with robes of different colors, though the most prevalent were the grey of a non-specialized Academy student.

Ignoring the shelves containing robes, Larek quickly moved to one of the barrels of staves and grabbed a half-dozen of the 5-foot-tall lengths of wood, holding them upright in one of his large hands as he exited the room after the staff members had passed by. These might be useful. They weren’t exactly part of his original plan, but after seeing them available, he made some alterations.

Retracing his steps to the room he was held in was a little more difficult than when he escaped, requiring about 30 minutes to arrive; the problem was finding where he had entered the more-traveled areas of the storage rooms, but once he managed to reach where the lights were non-existent anymore, it was easy enough to follow multiple sets of footprints toward the location. The same Illumination cubes that he had used to find his way to escape provided him with ample light to find his way back.

He wasn’t sure how long he would have once he arrived, so he set down his burdens inside the room. The stack of steel plates was first, and as soon as he put them down he realized that the Fusions on all but the Camouflage Sphere had been degraded by the vast amount of ambient Mana that was being absorbed by the Supreme Intermediate Fusion. That was perfectly fine, however, because he was already planning on clearing them off the plates to repurpose them.

Next were the staves, which he leaned up against the stone wall where he would utilize them later. The only other things he brought with him were the iron cubes with Illumination Fusions on them, which he placed back on the walls where they had been left before, and his axe, which he kept in his hands as he got to work.

The first thing he needed to do was to clean up the door, but he also had a use for it. Utilizing his axe, he used its sharp edge to slice it into dozens of thick rectangular slabs, reminding him of when he had created hundreds of Healing Surge Fusions back at Crystalview. These slabs weren’t going to be used for healing or something beneficial; instead, they would be used for harm.

Ideally, he would’ve preferred to restore the door and place it back where it was so that it would seem like nothing had changed, but he had no way to accomplish that, even with a Fusion – and he didn’t have enough time to figure out a workaround. He was just going to have to rely on the Mage and the Martial trainees moving into the room to investigate despite the door not being there – but he had a plan for that, at least.

Once the door was cleared and he had a few stacks of stone plates, he sat down and began creating Fusions. The first set of Fusions he created were Magnitude 2 Camouflage Spheres, which were essentially the same as the one that had aided in his traveling back to the interrogation room without being seen; the biggest difference was the range of the sphere, which had been reduced from a 5 foot radius around the Fusion to only 2 feet. Each of these Fusions only took Larek about 30 seconds to create and snap into place, as his Mana regeneration was fast enough to fill in the few thousand Mana required and with only 40 Pattern Cohesion per Fusion, he was easily able to keep up the pace without having to slow.

Camouflage Sphere +2

Activation Method(s): Activatable, Reactive

Effect: Bends light in a sphere around Fusion location, camouflaging everything inside from outside visual detection

Input(s): Ambient light detection, movement detection

Variable(s): Light fluctuations of up to 4,000 lumens

Magnitude: Sphere has a 2-foot radius

Mana Cost: 2,250

Pattern Cohesion: 40

Fusion Time: 3.3 hours

After he had made 15 of them, he put them aside and started on the next set of stone plates. These ones were a variation of his Temperature Regulator Fusion Larek had created on one of the steel plates. The biggest change was that, instead of it requiring a physical touch and enveloping a single person, the Inputs now only detected changes in the ambient temperature and enveloped the entire room. He also eliminated the need for a chilling Effect, only heat, and replaced many of the chilling components with Stabilizers and Amplifiers, enhancing the heat Effect significantly. Lastly, he increased the Magnitude from 3 to 5, which increased the overall cost, but not as much as he expected; the removal of the chilling Effect reduced the base Mana and Pattern Cohesion costs, but it was still quite an expensive Fusion – especially when he made 14 of them.

Extreme Heat +5

Activation Method(s): Reactive

Effect: Heats the temperature around a designated space

Input(s): Temperature measurement

Variable(s): Ambient temperature +10 degrees

Magnitude: Envelops one room up to 5,000 cubic feet, increases 50 degrees in temperature

Mana Cost: 15,000

Pattern Cohesion: 300

Fusion Time: 30 hours

Each of them took about 5 minutes to create, if only because they required 300 Pattern Cohesion; he waited a short time for his Pattern Cohesion to regenerate in between, though he still ended up at just over 1,000 out of his maximum by the time he was done. While he let his Pattern Cohesion regenerate, he designed his final variation, which was one that would trigger the others; it had the Inputs detecting the presence of at least 3 living people and would only deactivate afterward if there was no presence of living people within range. It took some delicate arrangements of Inputs and Variables to get that where he thought it would work, though he didn’t want to test it out.

Space Heater +2

Activation Method(s): Reactive

Effect: Heats the temperature around a designated space

Input(s): Presence of people

Variable(s): Presence of 3 or more people, presence of 0 people

Magnitude: Envelops one room up to 5,000 cubic feet, increases 20 degrees in temperature

Mana Cost: 500

Pattern Cohesion: 15

Fusion Time: 75 minutes

Thankfully, it wasn’t nearly as expensive as the others, but it also wasn’t designed to create extreme heat. It was more of a trigger for the others than anything else.

Once that was done, he spaced each of the Camouflage Sphere Fusions around the perimeter of the room where they wouldn’t be stepped upon and discovered; once he activated them, creating a small bubble of what was effectively invisibility, he placed one of the Extreme Heat stone plates inside and out of the Sphere’s area of ambience, ensuring that it wouldn’t destroy the Fusions he had just created. The last one, the trigger, he placed near the back, where it wouldn’t trigger until it detected at least 3 people inside the room, and not outside in the tunnel.

With those taken care of and in place, now came the bait for the trap he had just laid. He left this portion of his plan for last because he hadn’t made anything like this before, but it was based upon the Static Illusion spell he had learned but couldn’t cast. Starting with a 3-by-4 grid, he designed a Minor Intermediate Fusion, making the Effect a static illusion of Larek on the ground, propped up against the far wall of the room with his legs smashed and him unconscious as his head laid on his chest. It was a permanent Activation Method with two different Effects dependent upon Inputs of light level and directional perspective, which created three-dimensional image rather than something on a flat plane. The Variables measured the light level and adjusted through a Diverter depending on whether there was the current light or if it was blocked, such as if someone stood in front of one of the Illumination cubes.

Illusionary Image +3

Activation Method(s): Permanent

Effect: Displays an illusionary image

Input(s): Light level, directional perspective

Variable(s): Lumen level above 1,000, Lumen level below 1,000, 3 different perspectives

Magnitude: Displays 3 different images dependent upon directional perspective

Mana Cost: 2,125

Pattern Cohesion: 20

Fusion Time: 4 hours

It was far from perfect and would be seen through by a number of factors that he could foresee, but it was only designed to initially draw his targets inside the room – not to stand up to scrutiny. Thankfully, it didn’t take long to create and didn’t require many of his resources; the worst part of creating it was holding the illusion of his injured self in his head for the Effect, which was traumatizing to remember.

Once he activated the new Fusion, leaving it on the floor where he wanted the image of himself with his demolished legs to sit, he winced at how gruesome it looked. It also wasn’t exactly right, as the image seemed to float off the ground an inch or two, but he could only hope that no one would notice.

Sighing in relief that he had gotten done what he needed to before his abductors arrived, he took a moment to look at all the notifications he had ignored while he was working, letting his Pattern Cohesion regenerate to full.

Fusion has reached Level 26!

…..

Fusion has reached Level 28!

Pattern Formation has reached Level 26!

…..

Pattern Formation has reached Level 28!

Mana Control has reached Level 24!

Mana Control has reached Level 25!

Spellcasting Focus has reached Level 12!

Spellcasting Focus has reached Level 13!

Multi-Effect Fusion Focus has reached Level 5!

Multi-Effect Fusion Focus has reached Level 6!

Almost every Skill that had to do with creating Fusions had gone up a few Levels, slamming into him once he acknowledged the notifications. The tingling as his Skills improved was nearly unbearable, but he gritted his teeth and rode out the waves of change until it disappeared approximately 30 seconds later. Once he could think straight, the improvements they provided weren’t exactly noticeable, but he could sense that creating the same Fusions he had just produced would be a bit easier next time. His understanding of how they worked and the way the different elements of the Fusion meshed together had deepened, and it all made that much more sense to him.

Not a bad improvement – I even Leveled myself up again, giving me another 15 AP to spend.

As he moved to the tunnel outside for the next step in his plan, now that the inside of the room was as complete as possible, he began adding 1 AP to his Strength, Body, and Agility; at first, it made his entire body twitch and caused him to stumble, but the sensation went away after a few seconds – so he did it again. In total, he added another 8 points to all of his Martial stats, bringing him up to 48 in each, leaving him with 2 AP left over. While he was fairly confident in his trap, he also wanted to ensure he was as strong and fast as possible when his abductors arrived. Not only that, but he needed a backup plan in case it didn’t work the way he hoped it would.

With his steel plates, axe, and staves in hand, he moved a little bit down the tunnel leading deeper into the abandoned storage rooms. Once he was out of direct sight of his interrogation room, he sat down and got to work making more Fusions.

Book 2 Chapter 43: https://www.patreon.com/posts/fusionist-43-84126239