Minute Mage: A Time-Traveling LitRPG

Chapter 39: Fighting for New Lands

I sat and rested for a few more minutes, waiting for Erani to finish up, but she never did. It’d been much longer than I’d expected her to take at that point.

“Erani? You good?” I asked to check up on her.

“...No, not really,” she responded while keeping her eyes closed. “I can’t decide on what Spell to take.”

“Still choosing a Spell?”

“Yeah. There’s just too much to take into account, and I can’t take back my decision.”

“Well, what are your options? I’ll help you choose.”

“My three Spell Choices are Ray of Frost, Mana Geyser, and Angelic Shield. You already know what Ray of Frost does, of course. Mana Geyser temporarily allows me to spend additional Mana to have a Spell deal extra damage. It costs 50 Mana up front, and then, for thirty seconds, whenever I cast a Spell, I can spend 1 additional Mana to have the Spell deal 1 additional damage to anything it hits. Normally, Ray of Frost is the most recommended Spell to take at Level 10, but Mana Geyser is generally considered to be the next best choice. It lets me take care of larger groups of enemies more effectively, so I could spend a couple hundred Mana on a single Spell to take them all out with one Explosive Firebolt.”

“Right, but that’s only if you’re attacking multiple enemies. Ray of Frost deals about 2 damage for every 1 Mana you put into it, and this only deals 1. So, it’s only good if you’re hitting multiple enemies with the Spell you’re using it on. But if you’re using it on a single enemy…”

“Right. On a single enemy, it’s borderline useless. Normally, that’s just considered to be the reasonable downside of a generally good Spell, but in our situation, not so much. If we face off against an entire group of Infernals, we’re dead anyway. So, what we really need is the ability to more easily face off against groups of two or three of those Demons.”

“So the Spell’s downside is much more apparent in our situation. What’s your other choice?”

“Angelic Shield. It’s a… not very popular Spell for us Sorcerers. What it does is it prevents damage that would be dealt to you, at a rate of 2 Mana per 1 Damage.”

“So if someone tries to hit you for 40 damage, you just spend 80 Mana instead, and lose no Health? Doesn’t sound bad.”

“Well it has two major downsides. First, at Rank 0, it can only prevent up to 15 damage at a time. So, sure, if something scratches your arm for 14, you’ll be fine, but if something tries to hit you for 40, you’ll spend 30 Mana to prevent 15 of it, and then take the other 25 damage head-on.”

“Ah. That’s less good.”

“There’s more. If you ever do take more than 15 damage, Angelic Shield ‘breaks’ and becomes useless for an entire minute. Can’t use it.”

“Wow. Even for a Rank 0 Spell, that’s…”

“Not great, yeah. That’s why nobody takes it, but it gets much better over time. Each Rank-up increases the maximum damage the Spell can prevent by ten percent. And it reduces the amount of time any ‘break’ lasts by ten percent, too. Of course, it increases the amount of Mana you spend for each point of damage you prevent by two-point-five percent, but that’s pretty negligible.”

“So, after a few Ranks, it’s…” I counted in my head, trying to do the math.

“By the time it gets to Rank 10, it can prevent almost 40 damage, and it’s only offline for 20 seconds after a break.”

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“Well, that’s certainly better. Think it’s worth it at that point?”

“Probably. Plus, the Rank 10 bonus is what really seals the deal. One of the choices is that, upon breaking, the shield goes down like normal, but it prevents all of the damage from the hit that broke it, no matter how much that hit was for.”

“Oh, wow. So if an Infernal tried to hit you for, like, a thousand…”

“Exactly. It’d make me lose all my Mana, but I wouldn’t take any damage at all from the hit. The next one, I would, of course. But it’d buy me some time, at least.”

“Yeah, that sounds great.”

“Right, but until then, it’s basically useless, especially against those heavy-hitting Demons, which is really what we’re trying to fight against in the first place. And we aren’t exactly in the place where we have access to the Spell Crystal necessary to get that Rank 10 benefit. Also, it’s a bitch to practice.”

“Why?”

“Well, it’s not an Active-type Spell. I can’t just cast it when I want to. It’s Passive-Type. So, whenever I take damage, it gets automatically cast, but I can’t cast it if I’m not taking damage.”

“Oh. So, you’d have to figure out a way to constantly get hit?”

“Yeah.”

“Hm,” I paused to think. “So, you’re not sure which of the three to choose? Any that you’ve ruled out?”

“Not really. Originally, I was planning on taking Ray of Frost. In terms of my overall life trajectory, I feel like it’s the best choice, really. And it’s the path I’ve researched the most.” She rubbed her face with her hands. “But now I’m not sure. I mean, in our situation, isn’t Ray of Frost the worst of the three options? If you already have it, me getting it isn’t going to help much – the Spell’s Dexterity debuff doesn’t stack with itself. But then what about after? If I take something other than Ray of Frost, then after we get out of this, am I just going to be permanently crippled because I took a Spell I didn’t want? Taking something other than Ray of Frost is only a good idea for however long I’m with you.”

I nodded, even though she couldn’t see me – she still had her eyes closed to meditate.

“I mean…” she paused. “What’s going to happen after this? What exactly are we?”

“Uh, Humans, presumably.”

“No,” she laughed, then sighed. “Like, what are we, as a unit? Are we only working together because of our circumstances, and the moment this is over, we’re done? Are we friends? Are we, um…”

“Lovers?”

“...Yeah.”

I stopped to think for a moment. I’d liked spending time with her before, sure, and we’d even gone on a date. But at the time, that was mostly me just messing around and having fun. Once the attack happened, any potential serious romance or relationship between me and Erani had pretty much left my head. Sure, I still made small jokes and comments, but my mind was much too occupied with survival to think about that.

“If this ends,” Erani said, “and we’re just done with each other, I don’t want to leave myself with the wrong decision. So… what are your plans?”

“Well, to be honest, I have no idea. I’m kind of thinking short term, right now. I mean, we’re going to an entirely different country, right? I’d imagine we’d want to stick together for at least a bit after that, just so we had someone we were familiar with. But, well… I don’t know you. Not extremely well, at least. We’ve known each other for, what, a week? Even less time? And it’s barely been a day since the Demons invaded. I really just can’t tell you my long-term plans.”

Erani pursed her lips. “I was hoping you’d have a straighter answer for me.”

“Listen. For now, at least, we need to be thinking about what we can do to survive the immediate encounter ahead of us. We don’t have the luxury of long-term plans. We’re going to be struggling more now than we probably ever will for the rest of our lives. We might die here. If you pick the wrong choice and because of that, say, end up losing an arm, your choice will have ruined the rest of your life, anyway. Get yourself killed, and that’ll really ruin the rest of your life.”

Erani groaned. “You’re not helping my stress.”

“No, no. What I’m saying is that we shouldn’t be thinking about that nebulous ‘rest of my life’ stuff right now. All we need to focus on is our current survival. So, when you think about it, we’re really removing variables, not making it more complicated.”

She breathed. “Okay, you’re right. Fewer variables. We need to worry about Infernals, wild monster attacks, food and water. Basic survival. I guess I can eliminate Ray of Frost, since the effect would be redundant, at least for when I’m fighting alongside you. Between the other two…”

“I’d say our main problem is Infernals, right? They’re probably the most likely thing to kill us. Mana Geyser makes your Spells more effective against large groups of enemies, so it would be useful against bigger groups of monsters like those Stripeks, but it feels like that’s the less effective choice for dealing with Infernals.”

“Well, Angelic Shield isn’t very good, either.”

“Right, but you were just talking about how it could get better with time, right? So if we give it a bit of practice as we travel, it’ll become useful.”

“But I was also just talking about how it’s awful to practice. If I, say, practice by using a knife to trigger the Spell, and I swing a bit too hard, it can break the shield and leave me with a blade in my arm. It’s incredibly difficult to practice safely.”

I hummed. “Well, I’m pretty much constantly casting Noxious Grasp, and I can choose exactly how long I cast it for. If I use it on you, I can always make sure I cast below the amount of time it would take to break the shield. And even if I do mess it up, you can just pull away before it hurts you.”

“But what about after–”

“We don’t have the luxury to worry about when this is over, alright? I don’t know what’ll happen. But for now, you have my word that I’ll stick by you. Okay?”

Erani paused. I could tell she was thinking hard about it. “You promise?”

“Yes. We’re stuck in this together, and I need you just as much as you need me. Besides, you make a pretty good fleeing-from-the-Underworld partner.”

Erani smiled. If her eyes weren’t closed, I was sure she’d have rolled them. “Okay. Fine. I think I’ll take Angelic Shield.”

I nodded. “Glad we got that figured out. What else did you get?”

She blinked her eyes open. “I got a Talent, but I already picked it. Primal Might. It makes my projectile Spells have the potential to do more damage, but only as long as you have perfect accuracy. Normally, it’s just okay. If you used it with Ray of Frost, for example, it might make it be able to sometimes deal a bunch of extra damage, but only when you hit spot-on. But when it combines with any explosive Spell, like Explosive Firebolt, almost all of my attacks technically count as hitting ‘perfectly’ since the explosion covers such a large area. So, with that, Primal Might pretty much always triggers and deals the extra damage.”

“Huh. Sounds pretty good.”

“It is,” she grinned and stood up, stretching after such a long meditation session. “I’m feeling confident about the next time we see those Infernals.”

It was getting late, so we decided to camp out in the same general area we killed the Drakelings in. We wandered around until we found a shallow hole in the side of the Drakeling’s crag, and used it as shelter to sleep in. We used dirt and leaves to make the stone hollow as soft as possible so that we could sleep comfortably, but it didn’t do much. Still, after the combat-filled day we’d had, I slept just fine. Erani covered the first watch while I closed my eyes and rested.

When I woke up, I covered the next watch while Erani slept. Judging by the thin layer of smoke that had collected at the top of our shelter, it seemed I’d been practicing Noxious Grasp while I slept, as usual. I’d made sure to warn Erani about it before we lay down so she didn’t accidentally touch me and get zapped. Its Spell XP had risen to 196/355, and that was just halfway through the night; I still had Erani’s turn sleeping to continue my practice.

So I sat, patiently practicing while I kept an eye out for any threats. Of course, it was the middle of the night, so it wasn’t like I was going to see anything, but I kept an ear out, at least.

Once or twice I noticed some smaller animals scurrying through the forest nearby, and I killed them with Ray of Frost for the XP. Considering the constant battle for my life, I would be remiss to let resources such as them go to waste.

You have slain Level 3 Wood Spirit.

You have earned 7 XP. Your XP is 156.

You have slain Level 2 Seeker Owl.

You have earned 6 XP. Your XP is 162.

It’d been some time since we’d seen any of the larger, more dangerous monsters, though. Sure, we’d just got through fights with Drakelings and Stripeks, but those were monsters we’d actively sought out. Other monsters like Wood Wraiths, Dire Bears, or even full-grown Drakes should have been more common.

Perhaps the Demons were simply clearing them out during their search for us? They could just ignore the Rabbits and Wood Spirits and such, but larger monsters like Anacaps would get in their way. So it made sense that such a huge army of Demons would quickly push those monsters out of their territories. The Infernals could easily kill most of those monsters, so they were effectively overhunting them into local extinction. I wasn’t sure whether to be happy or sad about that – we didn’t have to worry about them anymore, but it would also have some incredible consequences down the line.

Though, I wouldn’t be living here much longer, anyway, would I?

I was just glad that our staying away from roads seemed to throw the Demons’ lead on us, at least for now. Who knew how long it would be until we ran into them again.

The hours passed by rather quickly. By the time the sun came up, Noxious Grasp’s Spell XP had risen all the way up to 230/355. It was almost two thirds of the way there by now – only a bit longer to go until it finally reached Rank 10. My Health had also regenerated over the night. I’d gotten back up to 133/210, which was better. At least now I had more Health than I did when I was totally Unclassed.

Erani awoke around then, rubbing her eyes as she sat up. “What’s the plan?” she yawned.

“Well, we’ve found and killed all the high-XP monsters that we know of around here, so it seems like we need to head out. To Kingdom’s Edge, huh?”

“Yep,” she said. “Not like there are many other options than heading out, anyway. For better or worse, our fates are tied together from now on.”

“I guess they are. You aren’t having any second thoughts about Kingdom’s Edge, are you? Because now’s our last chance to change our minds and go somewhere else.”

“No, that’s the best place to go. Now that I’ve seen those Infernals in action, we need to get out of Koinkar as quickly as possible. If I have to choose between a mountain full of highly dangerous monsters that don’t really care about me, and a forest full of highly dangerous Demons that are actively hunting me, I’m picking the apathetic ones.”

I nodded. “Okay. Let’s get going.”

“Which direction is it even in?” she asked as she got to her feet in our makeshift shelter. “I lost my bearings.”

“Pretty sure it’s back the way we came,” I said as we exited the crag. “We just head back to that river with the two Nymphs, and then keep going that direction. Shouldn’t take more than a week or two to get to Kingdom’s Edge, depending on our travel speed.”

She sighed. “I can’t believe we’re doing this. Just… getting up and leaving my home.”

“Yeah. Well, this place stopped being home a while ago. It’s time to fight our way into new lands.”