Born a Monster

Good.

Gods.

Quick experimentation showed that not every cultivation method would pay for every ability or trait, and none of them could be used to improve my System. But still...

It wasn’t unusual for a single action to advance one or more cultivation methods. But if they counted as development points...

If anyone with my System type could gain XP like that, they should quickly rise to the Hero level, and beyond. They would stride the world, like...

Well, like Titans.

My System was far from perfect; it still had its own hidden list of things to buy. And it meddled with my list of things to buy when I slept. AND I had proof that it just swiped those points whenever it wanted to.

How many points did I have spread among those cultivation XP pools? It must be hundreds.

.....

I’m supposed to say my vision swam, but it did no such thing. All my senses seemed sharp, clear, and alert.

Slowly, carefully, I set the bread stuffing on a table. Okay, stir and mix. I knew this.

Not that my System was perfect, far from it. It was clunky, and unresponsive, and sneaky. But there was no denying that it was a powerful tool.

The Legendary Weapons must provide a similar system...

Oh.

Right, weren’t the original Legendary weapons built from parts harvested from the most powerful creatures the First Men could find? I’d need to check that with Adara, or maybe Gustavian. When I had the Dream mana to reach out to them.

If I ever had the mana to reach out to them, I chided myself.

[Dreamwalker:0, 75/100 XP to level 1.]

I put together a list of cultivation methods to pull from.

[Dreamwalker is now level 1. You have 100/300 XP to level 2.]

[You have received 10 development points.]

[Default ability already unlocked: Lucid Dreaming.]

[Cultivation methods unlocked: Channeling, Dream Warrior, Dream Weaver, Wisdom]

Okay, breathe. Breathe In. Breathe Out.

I queried my System for the next nearest class to completion.

[Naturalist: 0, 72/100 XP to level 1.]

Gah! The rice needed stirring!

Okay, there was time. I wasn’t dying of old age anytime soon. Right now, I needed to finish this final round of dishes so that everyone defending the Rice Gate would be fully fed, taking no penalties. Then, I could turn my attention to the bale of hay that would help keep me fed.

I was almost too tired to plug my Exploration methods into my Naturalist, and get that to level 1. It granted me a +1 to uses of the Naturalist skill, once per day, provided I had the correct tools. No clue what those tools were.

It seemed I had barely fallen asleep when Captain Feng was waking everyone. “Be ready!” he ordered. “If Shi Xinyi gets past the soldiers on the roof, we need to be ready to make a valiant last stand.”

“What? Don’t we have archers?” I asked.

“They can’t fire into a wild melee.” He said.

“But... doesn’t Shi Xinyi stand a full head above the other men? If our archers can shoot through those tiny machicolations, they ought to be able...”

“To fire ABOVE the combat!” Captain Feng said. “No. No, not tonight. That’s the sort of maneuver to practice before using. And we have to make certain the two groups of archers don’t fire into each other. But YES, it could at least force him to fight in a lower stance than he’s used to.”

Goblin thinking. Just scaled up to human size. Something the Daurians, who regarded goblins as beasts, just wouldn’t think of on their own. Or at least, they hadn’t.

“What other ideas do you have?” he asked.

The caltrops were deployed before Shi Xinyi announced his arrival. If he even noticed them, he said nothing.

Five people were added to the roster of those healing. Gao Jin and Cheng Heng didn’t survive. But after taking more damage than any two other men should have been able to endure, he used Flash Step into mid-air, falling to safety while twirling his spear to help deflect arrows.

Chi abilities combined with warrior abilities sure seemed to be a potent combination.

Captain Feng struck the wall. “If we could only trap him, keep him from using that Flash Step power, I’m certain we could end him once and for all.”

I thought about what I knew about wards. I thought of a fish-net, warded, that could be raised. Except, wards didn’t work that way, at least the wards I could use. They took at least ten minutes to cast, and the battle would be won or lost by the time it could be put up. Besides, the people casting the ward would be exposed to that deadly spear.

“The more I put my mind to it,” I said, “the more I think that magic alone is not the solution to this problem.”

“Well, everything we’ve done so far is only slowing his progress. Martial abilities, chi powers, accessories that grant abilities, sigils on armor and weapons... none of it stands up to his sheer power.”

“And those with the ability to support magically have to do so from within combat range, lest they accidentally hit defending soldiers?”

“Just so. We’re doing everything we can think of, but for all his bluster, he actually has the ability to back it up.”

“A pity you can’t destroy the siege engines that are throwing him to the top of the wall.”

“We managed that once, but it is only a day or two before they have another set ready. We tried, once, to use a magical wind to push him from the wall, but it had no effect. We massed arrow fire, but that damn Spear Shield ability seems to just... it’s not a perfect shield. If we could keep him suspended in the air, we might be able to finish him.”

“Hrm. A pity that Taunt can’t keep him on the wall.” I suggested.

Leng Li had joined us by that time, sporting a new bandage on his left arm that was already soaking through. “We tried that, but when he focuses his attacks on a single target, they go down too quickly.”

I blinked. “But he doesn’t?”

The captain shook his head. “He tries to injure each person at least once, and then when he has three or more, he uses a sweep attack that seems to target those wounded people.”

Wait. Where had I heard of that before?

Ugh. Even with the extra point in Insight, my brainpower dropped to near nothing when I was tired.

But if it were important, I needed to kill Kumanchu the Fu Dog. What? True, I did want to do that, vengeance or no. I’d rather have been dead than subjected to what I had been.

Whatever his powers were, as long as the wall held, I was safe. I thought. I was pretty sure.

I rubbed my face with the heel of my hand. “I need sleep. My brain is running in circles, and jumping at shadows.”

“Ah-ah, this is a time of darkness. There is no shortage of shadows about.” Captain Feng said.

“I will want to spend part of tomorrow tapping sources of power for mana.” I said.

“Heh, unlikely. Our own wu-hien are draining every magical source of power within the walls. Even with the wards, it is not easy to protect a long stretch of wall from magical attacks. Just use fatigue to imbue the food.”

I twisted a crick in my neck. “I suppose I’ll have more health, and thus more fatigue, tomorrow. I’ll see what I can make work and what I can’t.”

“Hrm. Leng Li, go back to Sister Yoshi. You’re no good to me if you bleed out and die.”

“Even as a dead spirit, I will serve you loyally sir.”

“Dismissed.”

“Captain, have we tried using spirits to help against Shi Xinyi?”

“Of course not. A chi user of his ability would just cleave them apart.”

“Iron chains.” I said. “I recall when being tortured in the enemy camp that iron chains hinder the flow of chi.”

“The specific iron required would also impede our chi abilities.” He said.

“So have soldiers without chi abilities train with them.”

“That sounds like a waste of good soldiers, and more importantly, they would need to train with our champions so as not to be underfoot. But please, keep coming up with ideas. That was another one we hadn’t considered. Go. Get sleep. Enough for a night’s healing.”

Everything probably WOULD look better in the morning. If nothing else, the healing rate of Might 5 was an even twelve points a day. Little as that seemed, it would more than double my health total.

I should have known that such a positive attitude would cause things to go wrong.

I would learn later that Shi Xinyi had big feet, and thus bigger sandals, complete with thicker wooden soles. We never deployed caltrops again, but slicking down sections of the roof with flammable oil later would have more success.

Yet another pronunciation for the arcane casters.