Chapter 1-18: It’s not True! (2/2)

His eyes widened slightly. Getting the Karma as a Three would go a lot further than as a Five...

“Good. Here’s the very first thing you need to do right now.” He leaned in conspiratorially to me. “First, take a Level in Bard.”

“Bard?” He blinked. “”

“You like to dance, and you like being around people.” I wagged my finger at him. I had his Assay, after all. I knew all his Skills, Feats, and even Spells Known. “Do you know what a Bard is, and can do?” He hesitated, and shook his head. “They are Charisma-based prepared Casters with access to the whole Druidic spell list.” He blinked. “That means they can change their spells every day. It’s a whole new Matrix getting added to your own. And,” my voice dropped again, and he leaned in even closer, “If you don’t do it, you’ll never make Eight.”

“<How do I do it?>” he blurted out instantly.

“It’s magic. Push the magic in the direction of the Heartsong. You’ve heard them sing, right? Push all your Karma in the direction of that magical song, and let it know you want to sing!”

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and began to concentrate.

It actually wasn’t that hard, once you knew you could do it. But realizing you could do it, and how to go about it, could actually be quite the pisser to figure out. But I was sending him down the road of Charisma-based magic again, and so this wouldn’t be nearly as hard as he thought.

He was humming something under his breath when I felt the tug of magic moving. Power was coming to him, and that hum was starting to thrum. Power was building in his throat, and his aura was circling and cycling in a new and rhythmic manner.

The magically-sensitive all noticed the feeling of someone breaking through, and turned to look at him in interest, wondering exactly what he’d just done.

He looked around, grinned rather foolishly and proudly, then hurriedly tamped it down and looked at me. “<It worked!>” he exclaimed in a stage whisper. “<Wow! I never knew this was possible!>”

“Listen up.” He focused quickly. “Now that we’ve done that, any Karma we spend is tied to the new Bard Level, instead of your Sorcerer Level. Feat: Druidic Domain, Weather!”

He pursed his lips and focused, following the same Heartsong flow, and despite himself, almost jumped as a wind blew past and swirled about him. “<Holy Shit!>” he said excitedly, almost hopping. “<This is so cool!>”

“Take Mastery Advance, Basic Metamagic Mastery, Extend Spell.”

He nodded urgently, focused again, and popped them back open in delight. “<Oh, ho! I can double the length of my Buffs now!>” he almost squealed in delight.

“Put Karma towards +1 Soak towards your maximum.”

He blinked. “<You can do that?!>” He closed his eyes, focused, and popped them open. “<You can!>”

“Assign your Bardic bonus language to Elven. It should automatically bonus you Human.” Elven cause musical romantic bullshit language tear-droppy all over the girls.

He looked at me strangely, but did as I directed, and his eyes snapped open again. “How do you know all this stuff?” he asked me, totally unaware he’d just switched languages.

I tapped my head. “Assign six Skill Points, three to Singing, three to Sense Motive. You’re going to be much better at reading people in the future, Helix.”

His face fell as he was reminded of what he’d done, and he sighed as he closed his eyes, opening them a moment later with a weird look on his face. “I can recall the words to every one of my favorite songs... and the notes to go with them!”

“Slot your four Cantrips. Pick Assay, Light, Visual File, and Detect Time. Your Domain should have given you Protection from Rain.” He blinked, closed his eyes, and his eyeballs ran back and forth inside his eyelids. “Those are changeable. Activate your Visual File.”

He hummed a pair of notes, and nodded at me, kind of starting when the mental file came up in his head. “Hey, this is like a computer screen!” he hissed.

“Exactly, running off your brain. This is the list of Valence I Druid Spells I know of. Copy it to your Visual File. These are the important ones. You should only get two, so I suggest Cure Light Wounds and Detect I for now. You can change them at Renewal as you wish.”

He stared at the list of spells he could potentially Cast now, and started to drool a little bit. Sorcerers had a very restricted set of spells, after all. “I can be a healer...” he said, as if it was the strangest thing in the world.

“And you definitely should. Healing Reserve is one of the very best Reserves to get, and it requires you to cast five hundred levels of healing spells on others without payment.” He blinked. “So, heal away, and give it away.”

“I-I will remember that,” he nodded. I stared at him, and he began to fidget.

“If you want to make Eight, you have to apply that Human Racial Level bonus to Bard when it is time.”

“Not Sorcerer?” He was shocked.

“Not Sorcerer.”

“Why?” He couldn’t figure that out.

“Because your Bard Levels have to push your Sorcerer Levels past Six.”

“Oh.” He blinked. “I didn’t know that, either...”

“Understandable.”

“So...” he cleared his throat. “Do we get ready for the big moment?...” He glanced at the almost-vanished sun in the distance.