Ebony's Fable

The Guardian Serpent snapped out of its initial shock to Ebony’s sudden increase in power and to all of their surprise, it wrangled free of his grasp at an opportune time. It used its routine gas and killed the Fungalspire Gila that it ‘swam’ towards. It gained a burst of strength almost instantly and shot its tail at him.

He couldn’t dodge it and had no choice but to block it with his arms. Receive the same treatment of wall collision. His eardrums would’ve shattered on impact if he hadn’t protected himself from the impact by settling the vibrations within his body and the metal tower.

“Moly, that sounded like hammering an anvil!” The dwarven crafter commented with nods of agreement from other dwarven individuals in the tower.

‘Ouch. That hurt. My arms are out of commission, movements are slightly affected with a light back injury. I’ll control my body remotely for now.’

The Serpent was still covered in green gas and no one went near it so it was up to him and the mages to limit the Serpent’s movements.

The green gas that stuck on him didn’t dissipate before he rushed back into the Serpent’s area of effect gas. The gas from its body also ate at his mana faster than touching its scales.

He appreciated the crafters' and scholars’ supportive comments more than the spells that were raining on the Serpent. Especially the earth and stone mages who were conjuring spikes from the ground to limit the Serpent’s movements. They also limited his movements.

‘Ice isn’t sticking and my flames somehow dissipate before it could dig past its scales. Vibrations aren’t any different to it than a harder physical impact and my gravity magic is still too weak.

The serpent whipped its head at him and he crashed into a group of people who skedaddled away at the sight of a human cannonball.

“It’ll be out of gas in another minute or so boy!” Someone he didn’t know gave him useful information for once.

‘Do I really look that young? I guess I technically am.’ He skidded on his back and flipped onto his feet in one smooth motion. He Flickered back into the Serpent's range and barely swayed his back fast enough to avoid the wide open mouth. Getting hit by a direct bite of its fangs and rot or venom was the last thing he wanted at the moment.

Ebony wasn’t able to keep up with the buffed Serpent who far exceeded the speed that he could handle. Prediction could only go so far and his body couldn’t keep up even in his Augmented state. His spells didn’t do much damage and neither did his physical attacks.

They were good at protecting him and limiting the Serpent’s motion but a fully compressed shield or wall could take one or two hits before being structurally compromised and needed a refreshment of mana.

Although not perfect, even if he wasn’t standing here and doing the role of drawing attention the mages present seemed capable of keeping the Serpent busy at a range until its biological gas ran out. They only changed their tactics a little thanks to his presence.

He was a little scared at the lack of movement from Ning Xin. Her spells would be embarrassing to show to these full-time mages hence her temporary uninvolvement. This period of time was definitely for her to gather her life force. He hadn’t seen her strongest enhancement after evolution. The spars with Korben hadn’t been to death.

Fireballs and lances did stab and explode on the Serpent but he was unaffected by the heat. The sheer force of spell impact on the other hand was blowing him away.

‘What insane projectile speed and power, extremely high Intelligence stat. There’s merit if they have time to cast it safely.’ Ebony did not blame their change in tactics as they adapted to the situation to do what mages do best. Explode their targets with the highest offensive powers they have.

They might have trusted their support mage that gave people heat protection or the fact that he could withstand the gas and take a direct hit from the Serpent. That or the obvious fact that he was personally covered in light blue flames already.

The rotting gas ran out and diffused before its temporary enhancement did.

Ebony was rather battered from the hits. It was very similar to getting hit by an Apex Ape, except he took far fewer hits.

The first thing he did after the warriors and other close-ranged combats dashed to support him was Flicker towards the last Fungalspire Gila and encased it in ice.

He completed his speedy cast right before the charging Serpent swallowed the lizard whole. He couldn’t even keep up with its current speed and power, he didn’t want it to get buffed or healed. The lizard was already sealed in earth but he didn’t see the harm in adding an extra layer.

“Kill it before it digests the damn lizard!”

The Serpent’s back tingled when a shockwave swept across the tower’s interior.

‘What is her heart made of…’

The next three minutes were simply torture for the Serpent. Its temporary buff ended and it digested the lizard for another buff but it didn’t manage to make use of it for long before it was inevitably slain. In front of over thirty combatants from a wide range of levels, it didn’t stand a chance.

Their contributions to the battle reduced the price by more than half but neither of them cared about the price.

Ebony and Ning Xin gave a nod and bid farewell to the strangers. He had a feeling he would see some of them again if they frequented the Ruins of Verdant Decay.

Some of the crafters and scholars were soliciting their callstone links and names. They made their desire to occasionally hire him as a bodyguard known. He just left the address of the Quest Hall that they frequented and their name thanks to their persistence. These people carried multiple callstones on their myriad bracelets thanks to how many contacts they had but not him and he didn't want the numbers of so many strangers.

“That took so much time.” The masked lady cooled off and her hair gradually dyed itself black as the red in it receded.

“Guess we both failed.” He referred to their self-imposed time limit of seven hours.

“Let’s fly home, I’m all sticky and smelly.” She fiddled with her hair and tried to untangle the part glued together.

“Hmm, you go ahead and use the bathroom. I’ll make a stop at my Class and play around with my Model to see if I can reabsorb them for information.” Ebony didn’t fall into an unknown swamp and had gravity repulsion keeping him clean except for dried snake fluid.

“You’re planning to go like that? You smell like rotten meat.” She pointed at his sunken shoulders that were in the midst of recovering.

“I don’t have slime on me. I can cover the scent with a little mana manipulation and I’m only planning to let my Model attend. I’m already late as it is…maybe not.” Ebony noticed the sun’s position and was confused.

They’ve fought the Serpent of Verdant Decay for over an hour. He should’ve been late even with the difference in perceived time passing.

However, his Lunar Bio-Clock was telling him that not as much time passed as he thought. Despite being a ‘Lunar’ clock, he was pretty sure it worked quite accurately even in the day. He would make it just in time for class if he left now.

“Maybe the time flowed at different speeds in the guardian room, I heard some whispers as I walked through the towns.” Ning Xin added. It appeared that she gained more information than him due to her inability to speed out of towns without causing public disruption and damage.

“Ooo.”

“I guess I’ll go back first, we only have one bathroom and I have to wash my hair. Will you be back in three hours?”

“Mmm. I want to wash up too. I’ll come back after a few short tests with my Models.”

They didn’t even bother walking back partway, he Flickered to school and she extended her cape and used wind magic to flap them.

There were already students in class but he went to the training field to conjure a Model of himself. Using the little bit of Will he recovered, he gave it simple instructions of listening, recording or memorising all sounds and sights for the next minute.

He allowed the Model to walk around the field for a minute before coming before him again.

Ebony tried to recall the Will back to him, unlike mana, it was more receptive to return to him.

‘It really worked! I was just making random guesses. Doesn’t this technically make this a clone? My manual control range is still a little short but it's quickly expanding these days.’ Ebony was genuinely surprised at the audio and mana visuals that were implanted into his head after he retrieved his Will from the Glacial Model.

He was quite certain he was going in the right direction with what he wanted from the skill. He was still very limited with how much Will he had and he was more inclined to use it to train and experiment with his domain at the moment.

With that in mind, he replaced the Will to record for the Classes for the next few hours. It didn’t record sight but it did record gravitational and vibrational data from its immediate surroundings the size of the classroom. Ebony couldn’t give his Models physical sight. It was just a sculpture of ice and the only reason it could record sound was because he could imbue the ability of sensing vibrations the same way he could.

He was sure the amount of Will he imbued was enough to last for more than half a day but he didn’t have enough experimental data to tell if it could memorise half a day’s worth of audio and spatial data through vibrations and gravity. The information recorded might not even be complete. At least the minute of the experiment he did gave him a perfect recording.

He wrote a note to explain his physical absence and that his ice sculpture couldn’t reply to words and put a copy on his desk.

‘Guess I’ll save up my Will to create a few of these student versions. I can listen in on all the other classes this way.’ There were classes for multiple classes of Journeyman and a small class of Masters that he was also interested in listening to now that he had pretty much absorbed the basics that were taught to Unclassed children.

When he reached home, he was sure the bath was still occupied so he stayed outside to check on his pet tree. Conjuring a watering can, he watered the tree with liquid mana extracted straight from the source. Him.

‘How long is she going to take?’ Ebony had already catered to his pet tree for over an hour and he spent less than ten minutes at the Academy. For a woman who did everything with haste and speed, she was taking her own sweet time in the shower. Even the usual bath took more than half an hour a day.

He took off his robe in the garden and started scrubbing it down with water. His boots fared the worst but were still in one piece.

‘Might as well wash my clothes once before putting them in the washing machine. I should upgrade that to include a scrubbing function if I have time.’ He stripped down to his pants and scrubbed the bits of absorbed dried gas that stuck onto him.

‘I didn’t leave any tracks of rot mana behind did I?’ Ebony turned to look at his doorway but nothing was rotting so he nodded in satisfaction. It would be terrible if had rot mana attached to him and he infected his class. Luckily he didn’t even enter his class.

He wasn’t really worried since he would’ve long found out if there was still some foreign mana eating at him.

He heard and saw the windows to his house being opened and the scent of frost plums wafted to his nose. Ning Xin peaked over the window still and tucked some of her moist hair behind her ears. “Your turn, breakfast will be ready in an hour. Muse wrote a note saying she’ll be busy for a few days and won’t be here.”

‘Alright, one of her latest Fortifications must be some charm or mental effect one.’

Needless to say, breakfast was a feast. English style with beans, toast, sausages, bacon, scrambled eggs, grilled mushrooms, and fruit salad galore with honey at the side.

“I’ll be going out to shop later.”

“I can come along.”

“No, you cannot.”

“I can help carry the groceries.”

“I’m buying underwear, burnt through quite a few pairs and I could use more spares. And don’t even suggest making me some, pervert.”

“Wasn’t about to-”

“No, I don’t need you to add heat-resistant runes on them.”

“I didn’t say anything. Have fun shopping and take care. I’ll make a stop at the Academy to visit their library. Will be back before dinner.”

“Mmm, I might have made too much for breakfast. I’ll make something lighter tonight.”

“...” Ebony kept his mouth shut when he was about to ask if she was feeling okay.

“Oh right, Sister Jing called earlier. She’ll visit us in two or three days to drop me a gift.”

“How about me?”

“She said you’ll be interested in the gift but it’s not for you.”

She wiped her mouth clean of the whipped cream from the fruit salad. Their meal ended and he left the dishes for her this time.

“I’ll be leaving first, gonna check if my recording faced any technical difficulties.” Ebony just put on a white shirt, and black pants and left his robe in the laundry.

‘I need a few other pairs of shoes for different occasions, so I guess I should go shopping on the way back.’ Fortunately, his boots went with pretty much any long pants.