“So,” Akari said after making me fall down for the twentieth time, “what’s this I hear about some guild you’re creating?”
“The Player’s Guild? How’d you hear about that?” I said, climbing back onto my feet.
“Annabelle told me.”
“Where’d she hear about it?”
“City Council, probably. They gave you the Cathedral, didn’t they? And since the Cathedral and the Arena are two of the...” Her voice trailed off at the end and she grimaced like she’d realized she’d said something she shouldn’t have.
“Two of the what?”
“Nothing,” she said, swinging her sword in the air to make it whoosh. She did that sometimes because she liked the whooshing sound, she told me. “They’re just two of the nicer buildings in town, right?”
“That’s not what you were going to say.”
I had an idea what she might have been getting at. The Cathedral and the Arena were on the two medallions I’d been given by Annabelle and the Council, the ones that fit together to form two-thirds of a larger hexagonal object. I decided to take a stab at it.
“What’s the third?” I said.
She opened her mouth to say something, then snapped it shut. “So what are your plans for the Arena?” she said, changing the subject.
Someone else would have probably kept pumping her for information, but I don’t like doing that. If someone doesn’t want to tell me something, I’m not going to make them. So I let it go. The mere fact that she dodged the question told me I was on the right track.
The Arena and the Cathedral were two of the biggest buildings in the city. The third was the city council building itself, which just happened to complete an equilateral triangle with the other two around the exact center of town, and I’d bet my liver that’s what’s on the third piece. I just needed to figure out how to get it, and whatever fit into the round depression in the middle of the completed object.
“My plans?” I said. “I thought I’d ask Annabelle if we can use it for practice and training of guild members.”
Akari’s brow crinkled. “Ask her? Why?”
“Doesn’t she manage the Arena?”
“Y-e-sss,” she said, drawing out the word.
“Yes, but?”
She smiled slightly, as though I’d said something funny. “That’s not for me to say.”
“Actually,” I said, “I was hoping you’d help out. There’s a lot of Players who could benefit from your instruction.”
“I dunno, Daniel. Taking you on as an apprentice was one thing. I don’t know if my methods would work on your average person.”
I thought about the relentless punishment she’d put me through. If I hadn’t been able to heal myself I probably would’ve died under her tutelage. “You make a good point. Still, I think you still have a lot to offer.”
“We’ll see. Get your guild up and running and we’ll see.”
“Fair enough,” I said.
After another hour of her making me fall down over and over, I called it quits and moved on with the day’s agenda. First, I went over to the labyrinth to check in with Alice about how it was going with Maple Leaf. It was obvious she was having a blast running them through their specially-prepared dungeon, and it sounded like the Players were too. I collected a stash of mana crystals the monsters had rounded up for me — the real reason I’d popped in — then disappeared into my Fortress.
I was getting better at crafting. I mean, I should hope so, given the amount of time I’d spent doing it lately. After becoming Great Sage, my increased understanding of Void also helped considerably and enabled me to create things that would have been beyond my Adept level Artifice before. The problem was time.
The act of crafting could take a long time, and that’s not even including the time it took to replenish mana stores so I could keep crafting. That’s why those mana crystals were so important.
I knew I needed to put the brakes on all the crafting, though. I was starting to worry about how long I was spending in the Fortress under time dilation. I didn’t feel any less sane than I used to be, if anything I felt my mental health was better than it had been for many years, but it was still something to keep an eye on.
Nevertheless, crafting had to be done. It would have been nice to make something for the four new Maple Leaf recruits, but I had to take care of myself and my own team first. Namely: Lianna needed better pistols.
The P3 I came up with looked similar to the P2, maybe a bit sleeker, moving past contemporary firearms and into a more futuristic look. Not too futuristic, not the sort of weapon a spaceman would be holding as he protected the shapely alien hanging off his leg on the cover of one of those 1950’s pulp sci fi novels my dad collected. The P3 looked more sleek-sci fi-Glocky than bulbous-astro-raygun.
Cosmetic differences aside, the P3 worked more or less the same as its forebear, with a few improvements. Too many improvements, honestly. It made them impractical for the purposes of mass production.
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Making a few of them for Team Player use was one thing, but churning out magic firearms with so many powers would be too gargantuan a chore. I considered this a stepping stone toward the P4, an experiment to see what the most useful functions would be for a general purpose weapon that could be replicated at scale.
The healing shot and taser were still there along with a power I synthesized that was like an upgraded taser, a proper stunning effect that traded the cost of using more mana for incapacitating the target for a longer period of time. It didn’t fire a projectile but more of a beam. So okay, maybe it was a bit like a raygun.
I also added a new type of shot that used Fire, Air, and Light to create a plasma bolt. It also took more mana for each shot, but the increased damage and ability to literally melt through most armor made up for it.
I’d also replaced the laser targeting and ammo warning light with a heads up display that showed a targeting reticle inside the wielder’s field of vision, as well as an ammo counter, range finder, and info pulled from the target’s Status like name, health, and such. Yes. Like a video game.
P3 Team Player Blaster Phaser
Only Imperial Stormtroopers are so precise; Restriction: Use locked to first wearer – [UNLOCKED]
Powers:
Bang! - Fire a metal projectile
Don’t Tase Me, Bro - Fire a ranged electric shock
Heads Up - Weapon status and targeting display
Healing Shot - Fire an energy projectile that heals instead of hurts; Requires affinity with Life
Pew! - Fire a plasma projectile
Set Phasers To Stun - Fire an incapacitating ray
I also improved the basic Bang bullet by implementing spiral-grooved rifling in the bore and reshaped the metal bullet to be more aerodynamic, which improved its range, accuracy, and damage.
How did I know to do this? And for that matter why did it actually work? I’m glad you asked.
I knew how it worked because I was Adept at Pistol. Simple as that. Along with that skill came an ever-deepening knowledge of how all pistols worked so I knew about the development of Earthly firearms across history, and the helical bore groove and aerodynamically-shaped round were two significant innovations. There were others, but these two could actually affect how my magical pistol worked. Sort of. It was more conceptual than physical.
The insides of my P3’s had nothing to do with how things worked in the real world — there was no action inside my gun, just magic — but that’s how fabricating an item with Artifice worked. The more detailed the idea was in my head, the better the result.
Having the idea of a shaped round and grooved bore in my mind when fabricating the raw pistol item made the actual attack power I added later work better. It really shouldn’t have, but it did, and by this point I was moving beyond questioning things like this and just running with them.
I was curious, however, about how System was able to develop the Pistol skill when I needed it, considering the medieval fantasy milieu we were playing in. I asked System about it, and of course got one of those non-answers back. But that non-answer told me a lot, and it boosted my conviction that I was doing the right thing with the Players Guild.
The reloading process for the P3 had also been streamlined. Now the grip could hold three mana crystals instead of one, and to reload all you had to do was push fresh mana crystals into the bottom of the grip, which automatically ejected and replaced old spent ones.
I also upgraded the holsters to include a stockpile of mana crystals in a sort of Void-fed magazine. Now, all Lianna had to do to reload was slap the butt of the gun’s grip against the holster on her thigh where fresh crystals were always waiting, one slap per crystal to be replaced, a process that took a fraction of a second and could be done one-handed.
I didn’t need a pair of P3s for myself — I could do everything the pistols could do without an external item — but need and want were two different things, and like my redundant shield ring it never hurt to have a backup that didn’t have to rely on my own mana. Besides, I had to test the P3, and once I did it would become locked to my exclusive use, so why not carry a few?
I didn’t want to change where I wore my knives in their thigh sheaths so my holsters were on my belt slightly behind my hips and angled so that I could reach back and draw them quickly without my knives getting in the way.
But wait, there’s more.
Lianna’s utility belt also got an upgrade: each pouch on it was connected to its own tiny pocket dimension, each one with the storage capacity of a large hockey bag, and each one stocked with its own assortment of handy items.
When I finally emerged from crafting all this only a few hours had passed in the real world, and I still had some time before I was due to meet up with Lianna. I nipped into town to pick up a few ingredients, then portaled back to the elf village to make dinner for us.
It was while I was making the curry that the message cube in my pocket vibrated. Dinner would need to be quick; it would be A Bad Thing if Ruka showed up while Lianna was still there. Fortunately, I needn’t have worried.
When Lianna staggered into my tree house she was thoroughly exhausted and looked ready for sleep already. Her comely elven appearance made me do a double take when she came in, and even though she was tired she was radiating happiness.
Petal had clearly put her through the ringer but it had paid off: Lianna was already Competent in Elven Dual Knife Fighting. I knew from experience that it was a skill that punched above its weight class; Competent in it was on par with being Adept in another fighting style.
She was even happier when I showed her the P3s and demonstrated the improvements I’d made. She looked more excited than ever to get into a fight.
I took back the old P2’s with the thought of sending one to Akari and giving the other to Nina. Only someone with Life affinity could use Healing Shot so they were of the most use to her or Jane, and Jane liked getting up close with her rapier. As for Akari, who knew if she could use it or not? But she wanted one, so she’d get one.
What made Lianna happiest, however, was being able to sit down and enjoy a home-cooked meal. Being Adept in Cooking I made a mean curry if I say so myself. While I worked in the kitchen, I opened my Status and shared it with Lianna. She had many unanswered questions and I answered them all as best I could. We talked about the Players Guild while we ate, and made plans to check out the Cathedral tomorrow and begin renovations as soon as possible.
Despite our ambitious plans, I didn’t expect the Cathedral conversion to take too long. We’d use NPCs from our dungeons for a lot of it — I’d created some iron golems who’d be good for heavy lifting, and the elves would be perfect for the detailed woodwork — but I also wanted to give unaffiliated Players the chance to earn some gold by helping with the construction.
Plus, we could use magic. Who needs a crane with telekinesis? Who needs mortar or stonemasons when you can use Earth magic to fuse things together and carve things into whatever shape you want? For that matter, who needs a quarry when you can just create blocks of stone on site?
The original plan had been to hang out with the elves that night, but Lianna just didn’t have it in her and I was expecting a secret guest so we called it an early night. I had just enough time after Lianna excused herself and went next door to her own tree house to sleep for me to clean up from dinner before Ruka arrived.
I felt the usual rush of excitement when I heard her habitual three slow raps on my door that signaled Ruka’s arrival.
Little did I know at the time that this particular secret nighttime visit would be her last.