Realizing that it is futile to attempt to rouse your classmates to practice when you're all drained from the spectacle of last night's dissection, you fall onto your bed and quickly fall into sleep.
You're awoken much more abruptly than usual when, in the morning,
Akar enters the dorm and starts ringing a bell, shocking you all awake. The clamor rouses you from your slumber even all the way down at the end of the dorms.
Akar directs you all in putting on the sparring armor stored in each of your cabinets, and then wordlessly leads you out of the dorms and through the alleys of the complex, taking you all to the sparring grounds.
"Alright, listen up. We will be sparring with real weapons, and practicing on real Creations." Akar points to a row of Sligs, slug-like livestock Creations, chained to stakes hammered into the ground in the middle of the sparring grounds.
"Take this seriously and give it your best or you might end up losing a limb today. Sligs aren't the only creatures you'll be facing today." Akar then points to a group of Creations behind the Sligs, chained to the outer wall of the facility - things that look almost like chitin-covered snake-men with scythe-like pincer-arms. Another new fearsome type of battle creation you've never seen before. Oh boy.
"Those things are called Vernexes, and you'll have the pleasure of fighting them today. You're lucky these are the non-poisonous variety - usually the things have venom on their arms and teeth. Now, let's get started!"Akar starts you all off by handing out short-swords and batons - living lengths of muscle put into metal tubes that spit thorns into your enemies at high speeds - and said thorns are often envenomed or worse.
Akar set you all to using the Sligs as living practice targets, attempting to desensitize you all to killing to some degree, no doubt. You have no problem killing the Creations, and for the most part, you succeed in doing so. Your sword strokes are slow and cumbersome, as you really aren't strong enough to swing a sword around with ease, but the Sligs don't fight back, and you're rather accurate with a baton. Other students find killing the Sligs rather more problematic, however -
Marcus looks like he's going to puke as he shoots a Slig with a baton.
After you and your classmates butcher your way through the Sligs,
Akar sets you to sparring each other - a much different prospect than butchering defenseless livestock. Fighting another student with real swords when you're both completely inexperienced is rather risky - someone gets a leg broken in the first minute, but
Akar simply heals them with Shaping somehow and sets them back at it. You do decently well, and manage to avoid getting much more than bruises. Neither you or your opponent really get a decisive victory, though.
After that bout of sparring, once all of you are completely exhausted -
then Akar sets you against the Vernexes, one at a time, one on one with the Creation. The Vernexes are inhumanly fast, their chitinous armor is thick, and they don't seem to tire. No-one does well against them - almost everyone seems to nearly get mutilated. Whenever it seems a Vernex is about to slay or maim someone horribly, however,
Akar always steps in to make sure the student doesn't die. You don't do very well - the damn Creation would have decapitated you thrice had
Akar not stopped it.
After all of that,
Akar takes you all to the mess hall, then takes you to the library and sets you loose. You take the opportunity to see if you can find any information on the amulets the teachers use to gain access to the various buildings in the facility. You find some useful information on the subject in a book on general enchantment - apparently a common enchantment is to imbue a door or gate with a magical lock of sorts that only opens in response to a certain magical energy signature, and then to imbue a personal item such as a necklace with that signature so that only you can open that door. This is almost certainly how the access amulets here work - but you're far from replicating such a feat of magic yourself.
What else do you do?You:
Health -10/10
Essence - 3/3
Energy - 6/6
XP - 9/10
Inventory - Prospective Robes, A Comprehensive Beginner's Guide to the Shaping Arts, a Skitch
Status - Exhausted
Spells:
Absorb Essence - 1 Energy - Replenish your Essence reserves from a nearby source of Essence
Hold Essence - 0 Energy - Your special training allows you to hold a certain amount of Essence reflexively without it destroying you from the inside out
Boost Essence - 6 Energy - If you focus and have a source of Essence nearby, you can increase you can multiply your Essence reserves by 1.5, but if you lose focus or fall unconscious, the surfeit of Essence will destroy you.
Manipulate Flame - 2 Energy - Manipulate nearby flames to a small degree, or create your own tiny source of flame.
Energy Meditation - 0 Energy - If you meditate and focus on cycling Energy through yourself while doing so, you can gradually increase your Energy reserves. Not as fast as they'll grow naturally through the use of magic, but with this there is no chance of a spell backfiring, and it's something to do when you find yourself without anything else to do.
Control Creation - 0 Energy - By focusing and willing your Creations to do things, you can command them without words, and compel their complete obedience. Unnecessary when a Creation can understand verbal commands, but useful to ensure obedience. If you lose control and are distracted by something, however, the Creation may slip from your control and do as it pleases, possibly even attacking you. You can safely control one small, animalistic Creation at the moment.
Notable Figures:
Marcus - The only person you could possibly call a friend, if that, Marcus possesses a great amount of herbal and alchemical knowledge, due to his parentage. You have also discovered that his mother seemed to prepare him to become a Shaper, and thus he has some basic knowledge of Shaper schools that might prove useful.
Guardian Akar - A fearsome Guardian and your new caretaker, as well as the head of security for Ithlum College.
Sage Bridget - A business-like, non-nonsense mage, and your new teacher in magic.
Shaper Rawal - The Shaper in charge of Ithlum College.
Shaper Genna - Shaper Rawal's timid assistant.
Master Craumpalin - An aging, crotchety alchemist, and your classes alchemy teacher.
Mind Tavros - The Servant Mind who directs the Serviles in charge of maintaining the library.
Shaper Zackary - A harsh, young Shaper, who doesn't seem to want to teach you, and always seems to be hunched over and in pain. Your instructor in Shaping.
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Yeah, I'm still alive. Sorry! Life's busy right now, and I have a really horrible attention span. I find it hard to focus on own project at a time - but I will keep this going. Be pacified by my arting prowess - yep, I made the pixelated monstrosity you see up there. But yeah. Updates are gonna be a while between each other for now.
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Topic: You are a Shaper! (Read 10272 times)