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Chapter 14: Snapping under tension
🕑 Added 2024-04-14 18:28:05 +0000 UTCAll eyes in the room quickly turned to look at Frank. He felt a moment of rising panic in his chest as he realized why people have nightmares about public speaking.
So much for not being expected to participate. On the plus side, hopefully I can just share what I know and get it over with.
He stood, and walked to the front of the room on slightly wobbly legs. The whole time he felt eyes on him, but none so much as the piercing gaze of Anthony. As he got to the front of the room he turned to face everyone, and glanced at Anthony.
Anthony gave him a short nod. “When fighting against the so-called ‘monsters’ or against the wildlife that we now suspect has been mutated by Aether, Skills are going to be our most valuable method of attack. We’ve seen this already; In the evacuations yesterday and the skirmish last night, a number of brave individuals used the Skills they earned to eliminate threats. At an individual level, offensive Skills are key. At a societal level, crafting Skills can raise all of us up.”
“We already have some folks with basic crafting Skills like [Knitting] and [Woodworking], things they did before everything went to shit. Frank here,” he said, gesturing, “came to us with a slightly more… exotic Skill. Why don’t you give them a demonstration, Frank?”
He glanced back at Anthony, a little incredulous. I volunteered to do a little work for them, and now he’s treating me like some kind of dancing monkey? What the hell?
Out loud he said “Uh, I guess I could enchant something. I need blood to do it though, and something to enchant.” If a little bit of irritation slipped into his voice, well it was early in the morning and he’d been as good as told to cut himself for someone else’s parlor trick.
That didn’t stop him from noticing a subtle mood shift in the room when he said the word ‘enchant’. Curiosity from the crowd became muted excitement, and languid disinterest from council member McIntyre morphed into mild curiosity.
He leaned forward a bit, steepling his fingers. “‘Enchant’, you say? I’ve heard there are some Skills so far that are magical,” he said with air quotes, “but I haven’t seen any myself.” He shifted his attention over to Victor. “Librarian, what do we know about magic Skills? Do we have any that are worth cultivating? I’m sure we could get a few ‘volunteers’ in exchange for such fantastical abilities.”
Victor raised an eyebrow at the comment, but kept a neutral expression otherwise. “We are still researching Skills. There is a lot that we don’t know.”
“Right, but you have [Librarian], don’t you? Doesn’t it…” he gestured around with his hands a bit, searching for the words. “Doesn’t it tell you how the books work?”
Victor shook his head. “No. It gives me an idea what books might synergize with certain people, but I don’t get much insight into what every book does. For all I know, there may be Skill books that have prerequisites to use. There may be some that require active study to get any use out of them. It’s still hard to say.”
Ian stroked his chin consideringly. “Hmm. Keep looking into it, and let me know what you find.” He turned back to Frank. “Now, you had something to show us?”
His eye twitched. “Sure. I just need something to work with.”
Anthony gestured off to the side of the room. The aide that had brought him to the building earlier was back with a friend, bringing in a small pile of items. There were police batons, a baseball bat, a police riot shield, and an assortment of smaller items. “We had a few things gathered up for this. Why don’t you explain a bit about your ability while we get set up?”
He sighed. “Well, it’s pretty simple. With the [Enchanting] Skill, I can use one of my resource pools to ‘imbue intent’ into things. I’ve only figured out how to use health so far, so I just… write words in blood, and it makes an enchantment.”
The grizzled council member grunted in acknowledgment, walking around the table. “And this enchanting is what let you take down a beast on your own?”
Frank nodded.
“Then let’s have a little display of force. My plan for dealing with the new threats against humanity is to start from the ground up. We have folks with ‘crafting’ Skills, like Frank here, make and enhance gear so we can easily outfit a defensive force, and then refine individual Skills as needed.”
He gestured at the aides. “If you would, demonstrate how effective these weapons are when unenhanced.”
The two men nodded. After a quick round of rock, paper, scissors, the loser squared up with the riot shield, a grimace on his face. The winner grabbed up the baseball bat, and took a swing at his colleague. There was a resounding thunk, and the shield wielding aide moved back a step, but that was all.
Silently, Anthony handed Frank a letter opener. He took the blade, annoyed but resigned for the moment. Looking over the bat consideringly, he drew the blade in a quick line across his palm. On the bat, he wrote the word ‘impact’.
The two aides squared up again. The bat swung and there was a crash, followed by clattering as the man holding the shield was thrown back a few feet, losing his balance and tumbling over in the process.
There was a collective gasp from the room. Frank was a little surprised too. I’ve been thinking about this a bit already, but this Skill almost feels too good to be something you can get right off the bat.
Anthony clapped him on the shoulder, and addressed the room. “[Enchanting] can act as a force multiplier for anything we use. It’s versatility is limited only by one’s creativity with words.” He turned back to Frank. “Show them what it can do for armor.”
He grimaced, dipping his finger back into the cut on his hand. This better be counting off my volunteer hours. Quickly, he wrote ‘disperse’ across the front of the riot shield.
The two combatants faced off once more, the one behind the shield turning his face aside and wincing in expectation. The bat swung down once more and… Stopped, tapping almost lightly against the shield. The force of the bat was almost instantly deadened, the energy being distributed across the shield. It pushed the man with the shield back a step or two, but no more.
There was a smattering of applause from the small crowd. Anthony nodded, a grin on his face. “If we can put together a unit of crafters using Skills from the System to outfit our forces, it won’t matter how many beasts threaten us, or how strong they get! We’ll have nothing to fear.”
He gave Frank a quick glance and a tight nod, which he took to be a dismissal. He started walking away, ready to look for bandages, before a voice stopped him.
Ian, the other council member, was leaning forward, a fire in his eyes. “Does it work on people?”
Frank glanced back at him in surprise. “I… don’t know. I haven’t tried that before.”
Ian grinned. “Well, we have two volunteers right here, don’t we? Test it out.”
Beside him, the mayor frowned. “Is that ethical, though? Testing on humans is–”
“It could help make the difference between whether we live or die, Mayor Mindy,” he said, with an emphasis on her title. “Why don’t you weigh the morality of stopping an experiment now, versus the lives that having this technique now could save? Where do you stand on those ethics?”
The mayor shrank into herself a bit, stammering. “Well, I– I’m not sure that…”
Ian turned back to Frank, an intensity in his expression. “Give it a go. See if you can make them stronger.”
He almost rejected out of hand. He didn’t appreciate how either of the council members were treating him, but this man had something in his eyes that set off warning bells in his mind. Still… It would be interesting to know.
He glanced at Victor out of the side of his eye. The punk [Librarian] was studiously neutral, but he flashed Frank a subtle I told you so expression.
He turned hesitantly toward the aides. “If one of you wants me to try that, I can.”
The man swinging the baseball bat stepped forward excitedly. “I’ll do it! You can put it here,” he said, gesturing to his arm. “Make my swings a little stronger!”
Frank shrugged, trying to cast off his trepidations. This is probably fine. He even asked for it! What could go wrong?
Across the man's bicep, he wrote the word ‘strong’.
Excited, he took a few light practice swings. He turned to Frank, grinning. “I can feel it! It feels like it’s working. I think it’s just in this area,” he pointed at the word on his arm, and the muscles immediately near it, “which feels a little odd, but it’s very cool.”
He chuckled giddily, like a child on Christmas, before taking a big swing.
Then he screamed, clutching his arm as his muscles tore themselves apart.
