Getting people status windows had been a brilliant move. Had I half expected it to not work? Yeah. But it did work, so it was fine. It seemed I’d gotten people close enough to my old world to be affected by things. Maybe because the dimensional barriers they put up weren’t for people that already had magic.
Midnight disagreed. “They should have had to pass through!”
I pondered for a moment. “Well, I don’t think we ever had anyone with Portal Powers who went right up to one of the portals and didn’t go through. They were either vaguely in the vicinity or they ended up all the way.”
“Didn’t we do some tests with the current state of things, though?” Midnight asked. I silently agreed, because there had been a bunch. Extra wasn’t too keen on giving people powers, but they did like to be informed. “I think our volunteers were even closer to the barrier.”
I tilted my head. Were they? “I’m not sure about that. We’re talking about two different things. If you stand in the middle of an impenetrable wall a foot thick, a hundred feet wide, and fifty feet tall and deep how far are you from the other side? You could say a foot, but you might say fifty feet. Fifty-one, maybe.”
“No, you’re still one foot away but… I think I get it. If you’re thinking about interacting with some sort of force on the other side. Radiation or something,” Midnight commented. “A magical field, maybe. Because you’re still one foot away for teleportation purposes.”
“I think I meant also dimensionally impenetrable wall. But I don’t know if that’s actually possible. Maybe a spherical zone you’re in?” I shook my head. “That doesn’t matter. You get it, right? The one we have here isn’t like having a wall in the way. It’s more like having a guy pulling you back. I think if we shoved hard enough, they’d come into contact. And they’re ‘closer’ regardless.”
“They might die before getting out of this dimension,” Midnight said. “For the shoving thing.”
“That’s why I didn’t try harder and harder shoving.”
Malaliel was speaking to the teens. Obviously they were quite stressed by now, but having an angel really helped. Didn’t we have an angel the whole time? They didn’t know that. Also, she really wasn’t the soft and happy sort. Rositsa was more angelic than her- and not because Inasyah had contracted lycanthropy. That was unrelated. I still liked having Inasyah as backup, but she didn’t fit neatly into the normal angel bucket.
“... So we’ll really be safe?” Meter said, breathing a sigh of relief.
Malaliel nodded. “I will guarantee your safety with my life.”
Wow. She sure was an angel. Why was it that she wasn’t back home in her angel dimension? I could probably get her back home, and she had to know that. Then again, would they need one more angel more than where we were?
“Extra will not abandon you. And of course, our mercenary compatriots are reliable as well.”
They all looked so relieved. Even Ayat, though she’d seemed quite content with me revealing myself. The others were disappointed I wasn’t a hero though.
As they spoke, some of us had been trying to investigate why they couldn’t leave this world. Those of us who already had magic could, with a pretty clear delineation. It wasn’t origin dimension since Midnight belonged in the same one as Earth. Just far away. Also, I was pretty close to fully naturalized already.
Midnight and I were ready with our personal assessments of why people couldn’t leave, which was pretty close to Lana’s guess of ‘they’re cursed somehow’. The angels might have different assessments, and maybe the other agents Extra sent would have some sort of dimensional insight to provide with their various scanners.
“Don’t worry about the monsters,” Malaliel finished. “We’ll take care of them.”
Technically, we weren’t responsible for the people of this dimension. However, the people of Zuresh were expecting these particular monsters to be dealt with. Even if their leaders were all terrible, the common folk might be fine. Midnight said the castle staff seemed like decent people, but we hadn’t really had opportunities to interact with many others.
I agreed with killing the monsters. However… “We should let them fight,” I said.
Malaliel’s head swiveled. “... What?”
“We don’t need to make them fight,” I said. “But if they want to, our supervision would be a perfect opportunity for them to do so safely.” Meter didn’t look eager to fight, but Ramen wanted to. And I think Ayat needed to. Her hand kept touching the hilt of her rapier. Feeling mostly secure wasn’t the same as feeling entirely secure.
Malaliel just stared at me for a moment, before replying. “We’ll perform a proper assessment first. These monsters might be outside of their capabilities.”
“Agreed,” I said. “But they should have some chance.”
We still had to find the monsters first. And make sure they weren’t people. I was giving it even odds the monsters were some sort of goblins or kobolds. Not orcs, though. I hadn’t gotten sufficiently negative glares for that.
We gave the teen an opportunity to give their opinions. Meter was first. “I don’t think I can fight. I can only carry stuff.”
“Yeah, Yamaha didn’t do you any favors with how he taught,” I said. “You can do way better things even with Storage magic. Like this.” I held out my hand to the side, dropping a sharpened barbell into the ground where it pierced into the dirt with a gritty sound. “If you can do that from a bit higher, it’s a pretty good weapon. Pulling stuff out with your hand is just limiting. We’ll find you some better ways.”
I was going to get some proper instructional tomes for this world’s magic system somehow. And I’d get him a copy. Though maybe he could learn direct mana manipulation. It didn’t seem anyone had points or a listed level though, so clearly they didn’t have everything I would expect. They might be missing… something.
“Uh… thanks…?”
“But you’re right at the moment. I can teach you to swing a staff, but it won’t be amazing. How about the rest of you?” I looked them over.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
Ramen had been more reasonable ever since he bounced off me. He had maybe been getting a bit more confident as he got good with his javelins, but now that he’d seen me do real magic he was kind of subdued. Or maybe it was Malaliel with her sword, even if it wasn’t drawn. “I’d like to try. I don’t have to get close, so I shouldn’t be in too much danger.”
“I want to throw acid at things!” Lana said enthusiastically. If she was right about the curse thing, I’d try to remember her real name. Or maybe it really was Lana.
Malaliel made a face. I thought about it for a moment.
“It will have to depend on what sort of monster it is,” I said. Acid Man had extremely good control of his powers. Vials of magical acid were not going to produce the same results. “Acid can be… exceedingly unpleasant. Even for the observers.”
“Oh.” Lana widened her eyes. “Uh, right. I’d kind of like to test some of these other elixirs, but they’re no good for giving to monsters. If they work.”
Malaliel responded to that one. “That sort of thing is best done away from the battlefield.”
Last of the four, Ayat was cautious. She was the one who would have to go into melee range, after all. I wondered if I should tell her about Stoneskin. “I want to try. If the monsters are something… reasonable.”
I could cast Haste too, but that would make her first real combat encounter… unrealistic. With Stoneskin, she’d still know she got hit.
Other people could have defensive stuff too, obviously. I wasn’t going to leave kids undefended even if they weren’t the best ones.
-----
I was right. Shelter was way better. Even though I had to accommodate more people in a packed barracks situation, it was at least somewhat comfy. We hadn’t exactly completed our proper sleep cycle, so we’d set up in the same place but without knights and with more Martian guns- though only a couple Martians. Most of the people working for Extra were humans, regardless of the ones I commonly interacted with.
New Bay was still majority human, even now.
In the morning, we had a couple ways to track down monsters. First and most relevantly, Malaliel didn’t feel any demons so that one was out. It didn’t mean there wasn’t a demon king over there somewhere, just that there wasn’t any huge mass of stuff like that on the border.
The next options were improvising something with Divination magic… and just letting our werewolf track people down. But we’d have to be close to something before sniffing was good, and Extra might not want to advertise that part of Inasyah to random civilians.
“I guess monsters would be anything that has more than average amounts of mana?” I consulted with Midnight. We had a general idea of what direction things should be in. The knights had been leading us somewhere. In the worst case we could snatch some of them back from Extra’s holding cells, but another Gate or two was an expensive proposition if we were going to be fighting soon. The mana regeneration here was even better than New Bay’s current levels, but it wasn’t that crazy yet.
Midnight agreed on how we should look for things. We were just being pointed towards… something. In the future, I wanted to make a proper magic compass. Once my various other plans stopped getting interrupted by things like having to help out Extra because I got someone powers. I understood Extra had rules to uphold and I thought most of them were reasonable, but we didn’t agree on everything.
With both Midnight and I being pulled towards the same sort of magical phenomenon we could sense, we had some ability to triangulate how far we were. I doubted we had perfect lines, but if we split a couple hundred feet apart we could vaguely pick out that we weren’t pointed in precisely the same way. As we got closer- presumably- the effect grew more pronounced.
It was getting hard to drive the wagons. The horses were fine, but the roads had stopped existing a while ago. There wasn’t undergrowth in the way. Instead, the ground was cracked and barren. Free of impediments, but not precisely level. If we had to we could walk, but we didn’t want to tire people out when we had the option. Inasyah was the one driving the wagon, and I wondered if the horses could sense her wolfiness. They didn’t seem afraid though. They trotted along at an even pace.
Midnight and I split apart once again, and I was certain we were getting close. The feeling we’d given ourselves wasn’t getting stronger, but the angles were becoming more real as we gestured towards where we felt stuff.
Soon enough, something appeared on the horizon. What was it? Most likely, the cause of the barren landscape.
In another context, I would have thought the plant creatures were protectors of the forest… but there wasn’t anything for them to protect. Also, Malaliel had some binoculars and they were absolutely ripping out the few shrubs that managed to sprout in the area and adding them onto their bulk. They were kind of like tumbleweeds and other twigs mixed together in bear sized chunks. They waddled along the ground and were far from sleek, probably being proportionately wider than bears.
“I can see why they’d want to kill these,” I commented. “If they entered Zuresh, they’d devour fertile fields. They’re doing more than eat the plants, too. We’d need Cei- a druid to make better assessments, though.”
“Alright,” Malaliel said. “We’ll make some preparations. We’ll leave the wagons a little bit closer.” There wasn’t anything that could bother the horses other than the monsters, so they would be fine.
I cast Stoneskin on everyone- or rather, Midnight and I did that. It took three casts, which was inefficient and expensive. If we’d cut out a couple Extra guys… but if they got hurt it would be a pain.
“I’ll test them out,” I said. “If I need to retreat, I can cast Haste. Or Fly.” Or both.
I shouldn’t let random civilians know the full extent of my ability, but they maybe weren’t anymore and also people knew most of my spells. Or at least, most of the wrong people probably had that information already. Handface had witnessed quite a bit before I shot him a bunch of times.
Midnight came along with me, but not riding on my shoulder. Once we got into combat, it wasn’t a comfortable place for him to stand most of the time. The ground was better.
“Do you think they’re aggressive?” Midnight asked.
“Hmm. Good question,” I said. “They definitely need to be eliminated though.”
When we got within about five hundred feet- not all that close really- the creatures turned. I was worried they might run away… but instead they began to run at us.
They didn’t have faces. Limbs? Yeah, sort of. Clear masses of denser material that supported their bodies. Probably thorns in various places. Sharp stuff like claws. But no faces or discernable anatomy aside from scrambling limbs. They were pretty fast, though. Not Shockwave fast, but decent.
I estimated their time of impact, gathering a bit of mana as they got close. 6 points of mana should do it. It wasn’t a spell I ever got the opportunity to cast, and I really hadn’t used it. But I knew I could, even if I’d only had Basic Energy Magic. Advanced was more than good enough.
I tossed a Fireball off to one side of them. Normally, fire was a terrible idea against plant creatures. The thing was, most of them were super wet. Leafy green? Yeah, not a chance of ignition.
Barren wasteland scavengers? They were pretty dry. Even if the barrenness was in part because of them. Not that Fireball relied mainly on combustion to do damage. It was an extra along with the concussive force.
I blew up about a third of the twenty or so charging figures. Then I realized that Fireball wasn’t a good test. Well, the fact that it completely annihilated the ones I hit indicated they weren’t unreasonably strong for level 0 guys to face. But a Firebolt would be a better test. Maybe I should have just taken out the middle of the pack.
Multicast Firebolt was technically weaker due to the lesser number of upgrades that ability had, but I could rapidly hit a bunch of foes in the pack and see how it went. I aimed for general center of mass, because precision targeting in five places at once was unreasonable.
They didn’t die to a single Firebolt, which indicated they were sturdier than a standard human… but they did stagger and a couple of them caught on fire. Others staggered about as they lost important limb functionality from the damage.
“Yeah, these should be fine. Obviously we need to split them up, though,” I commented to Midnight. “Maybe let the kids deal with one or two between them. Good news is Lana can absolutely chuck acid at these guys.”
