Chapter 1-19: Losing a Bit of Your Soul (1/2)

“If you have any long-term spells to Cast, do it now, while you’re at Five. We want to get you Drained as soon as you can, so that all the Karma you earn is while you are at Three.”

His pale eyes flickered. “Do... you want a Fly spell? It should last for about an hour.”

“Sure. It’ll help with our Karma harvesting.”

He had to smile at that, reaching over and touching me on the forehead. Arcane syllables tripped out of his mouth like wind, and flowed over me lightly.

I lifted an inch off the ground and stayed there. He seemed somewhat surprised I didn’t go soaring away in glee.

“Are you Force Armored?” I asked calmly. He sighed and murmured that spell, ripples of rigid force gathering about him in an unseen screen of mild protection. +4, like wearing light mail made of force, better than nothing... and unlike material armor, effective against incorps.

“Here’s what we are going to do.” I elevated over everyone’s head, and he followed as I glided over to stand on the battlements we’d chosen. He looked a bit impressed at how easily I was handling myself, and not getting excited at being able to fly.

“The key part of pulling and killing is the undead getting away. So, we’re going to pull them in from basically point-blank range. The shadows won’t flee if we are that close, so we pull back to hit them again as they close on us. That way, you can use your Lightning Reserve instead of Shards for the follow-up, and have your Rays in reserve.

“If we are quick and have good teamwork, we can totally earn you a whole nuther Level before the sun rises.”

He looked excited at that. “I’ll follow your lead!” he promised.

“Good,” I said, as my third Renewal hit.

I was already at full Valences, so all this did was cleanse them and get them ready. I shifted around my Wizard spells, sighing, and-

Dingding!

Gawdammit...

What had the damn Shroud inflicted on me now?

Blighter/1...

Blighter? BLIGHTER?!

I resisted the urge to spit. Blighter, the anti-druids?!

Blighters were another Evil class, woven around the concept of ripping the power out of the land to use Natural magic, instead of being chosen by the Land as one of its caretakers. It wasn’t harmony, it was looting and pillaging, abusing death magic, cursing the land...

Hells, it couldn’t even gain new spells without devouring the plant life in an area, reducing the greenery to dust and Cursing the place...

Cursing, yeah...

It was ALSO a tie to Druidic magic, probably the only tie I could make... and it was a Charisma-based Prepared Caster, like a Bard, because the people who did this sort of thing certainly weren’t wise...

Four skill points, three of which maxed out Faith, and one of which went into Stealth.

And the Druidic domain of Summer. Or, in the Blighter view of it, Parched.

I eyed the +1 Caster Level bonus to fire magic, the intent being to stimulate drought, famine, and ruination, from a Blighter’s perspective. I was also immune to natural extremes of heat, which increased to actual Fire Resistance with time...

The Ritual of the Burning Heart. The Ceremony of the Frozen Soul...

Despite myself, I had to smile.

I still had the echoes of those grand Druidic ceremonies inside me, and this Blighter Domain had just touched the first one with its Domain.

And what wonderful Feat had it chosen for me today?

Ah, Ghost-Scarred Soul. Almost an Achievement Feat, as taking necroic damage of one kind or another from an undead was a pre-req for the Feat. +2/+2 to hit and damage all incorporeal undead, and +2 to saves against undead.

It was a good feat for an undead hunter, make no mistake. Not what I wanted right now!!!... but whatever.

So I got to choose my Mastery. I picked Spellwarp Mastery/1, 0-I Valences.

Spellwarping was a skill that transformed an attack spell that inflicted damage into a Ray. This was nice because the Ray immediately had medium range, and there were other effects you could use once it was in that form... like, oh, Chain Spell, and especially Split Ray.

So, now I could turn my Valence 0 and I spells into Rays on demand, which would also give them a range boost of over a hundred feet.

Good enough to catch any undead trying to run away...

Tomorrow, tomorrow I could get the Good Domain...

-----------