Might as Well

Sam took some time to clean up after himself, with Lucky’s help of course. The company employed people whose job it was to reset the room for the next person to use it, including placing the fresh slabs of rock in the middle and making sure there was nothing in the room that wasn’t supposed to be, but Sam still didn’t want to give them too much work.

Especially after the last time he had ruined that runic circle. Lucy wasn’t pleased with him, even though the gains that came out of that ‘accident’ more than recouped their losses.

He walked up the stairs, hoping Liz would soon finish her work on the elevator. Not that Lucky minded the walky after the ritual where he had to stay in one place.

Arriving in Lucy’s office, he was let in by the secretary, naturally, only after paying the appropriate petting tax to Lucky’s joy.

Opening the door, he was met with the shining red eyes of Lucy’s familiar. The raven was perched on his friend’s shoulder, giving Sam its most judging look.

“I didn’t do it and you can never prove it,” he exclaimed, raising his hands in the air, palms facing toward the raven.

Lucy sent him a queer look. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Nothing!” Sam replied quickly, looking away from the raven. Instead, he walked forward and waved Lucky toward Lucy.

“Look who came to visit you!”

Lucy looked at Lucky, her eyes going wide.

“Cute!”

The next few minutes were spent with Lucy playing with the ecstatic wolf as the raven watched on jealously.

Finally, with the wolf laid out exhausted on the carpet, tongue lolling to the side, Lucy returned to her seat behind her giant desk and began to run her hand over the raven’s feathered back. The bird enjoyed the ministration with closed eyes and a smug aura.

Sam chuckled a little. “Did you do the ritual? I don’t see any changes…” Thanks to her constant work – that is doing political, economic, and logistical quests in service of the company and guild – Lucy also managed to reach the required level for the core forming and evolution ritual.

Lucy just sent him a smug look, made a motion, and soon Sam was reading a system screen.

[Inpenetrable Mana Core: Level 17 (78%) (Passive) You are a firm believer in defending what is yours. Your mana has taken this idea and crystalized it. Decreases the cost of defensive skills (physical, magical, social, etc.) by 30% and increases mana regeneration. Mana Regeneration further increases when defensive (physical, magical, social, etc.) skills are active.

Increases base mana gain by 0,5 per skill level.

The more things are attacking you (physical, magical, social, etc.) the more your defenses are increased.

Grants you the following skills: Physical and Magical Resistance, Basic Elemental Resistance, Mind Control Immunity, Illusion Immunity, Corruption Immunity, Charm Immunity, Mana Body Enhancement.]

It was an impressive Mana Core skill, though one that Sam was familiar with. It was one of the better Mana Core skills for players who dabbled in politics. The top one, according to the researchers, was the opposite of the one Lucy got. It provided bonuses to the players when they went on the offensive.

Most people considered that one as the best of the best. But seeing Lucy’s success and effectiveness, Sam was pretty happy with what she got.

Then he read the second one.

[Your Ritual of Evolution (Modified) was a success!]

[Your familiar, Raven (Level 101) has successfully transformed into The Raven (Level 1)!]

[Raven, due to the evolution gained an Unkind Mana Core, which subsumed the following skills…]

[Raven, due to the evolution, gained the following skills: One Mind, Penetrating Gaze, Unknown Sight, Summon Murder, Summon Murder (Mass), Mana Veil, Advanced Stealth, and Steel Feathers!]

[Unkind Mana Core: Level MAX (Passive) The mana core of the familiar has solidified and stabilized into one uncompromising shape. No matter how many bodies the familiar has, it will only have one mind and one mana core. However, this doesn’t affect it negatively.

For each functional body, the familiar gains increased mana, health, and stamina regeneration.

Maximum number of bodies is limited by the level of the familiar.

For each functional body, the familiar’s sight skills are increased in effectiveness.

Grants the Nevermore skill.]

[Nevermore: Level 1/100 (0%) (Passive) The raven is forevermore part of the world. For every night spent alive, the raven gains one Instant Death Immunity buff. The buff is shared with all the bodies. However, if even one body suffers Instant Death, the raven loses one buff.]

Sam considered the skill and realized that with careful application, it would be a very useful skill. However, the moment people realized what the skill did, they would make sure to kill at least one or two of Lucy’s ravens to prevent her from gaining Instant Death Immunity. Until then, however, it would be very funny…

[Summon Murder: Level 5/100 (9%) (Active) Your familiar has established dominance within the local corvid community, proving its superiority. It can summon with a call a murder of crows to do its bidding.]

[Summon Murder (Mass): Level 2/100 (11%) (Active) Your familiar has established dominance within the local corvid community, proving its superiority. It can temporarily summon several murders of crows that will do their best to murder the enemies of the raven, however, they will vanish after one hit.]

“A little bloodthirsty, but I can see the positives…” Sam told her as she preened under his gaze.

“Right? My little raven is the best!” Lucy declared while she continued to pet that happy bird on her shoulder.

“Still calling it raven?”

She shrugged. “If the name fits…”

“Can’t argue with that…”

They spent some time after that in companionable silence, pampering their respective familiars before Lucy reluctantly spoke up.

“Now that you’re finished with this, what’s next?”

“Well, any issues with the project?”

“Lara and Adam have everything well in hand.”

“Ironwood?”

“The usual, but things have calmed down.”

“Tim?”

“Tim.”

“The guy sometimes scares me.”

“You and half the city…” she said with a proud smile. “Do you think you need to go down south and check out the blood magic thing?”

“Now there is an idea…”

Sam found his team in one of the bigger conference rooms in the headquarters, waiting for him. All of them had their familiars out, either pampering them, feeding them, or in Katie’s case, trying to convince the uninterested Puffball to play with some kind of cat toy.

“Hey, people!” he greeted everyone as he entered the room and closed the door behind him. The workers and servants were trusted, but not this much. “How did the evolution go?”

Instantly, everyone began to speak at once, creating an unintelligible cacophony in the room. Sam created a small air implosion causing the room to plunge into silence.

He pointed to Dan.

“Dan, you first.”

Dan grinned and raised his left hand, which was used by the much bigger and now multicolored Hawky as a perch as it tried to put Dan’s hair in order.

“He evolved into a Thermic Spirit Hawk. I can use him as a conduit to cast my fire or ice magic!” He declared proudly. "Also, check this out!”

Sam looked down at the system screen.

[Absolute Zero: Level 0/7 (Active) The familiar can spend all its life energy and mana to create an area where the temperature becomes absolute zero, stopping the movement of everything in the affected area. The familiar can only do this seven times without consequences. Cooldown: 168 hours.]

“A pretty badass ulti skill, don’t you think?”

Sam just grinned. “Maybe after seven times, it will transform into a phoenix…”

Dan looked at him with big eyes then at the hawk on his hand. “You really think so?”

“I mean that sounds like something a phoenix would do and seven is a pretty magical number…”

“Huh…”

Sam let the fire mage contemplate his idea – which was naturally just a guess – and he turned to Clarissa, ignoring Katie vibrating in the background.

She nodded at him and then simply gestured at the swan that became big enough to be ridden on.

“Praetorian Arcane Swan. It gets stronger when protecting me,” she explained simply.

“Any cool skills?”

She shook her head. “My heal is more effective on him but otherwise nothing that I would call special.” She glanced at the swan, who was standing proudly next to her. “Well, maybe one of them.”

“Oh?”

“Melody. Rain of Iron,” she ordered quietly.

Instantly, the swan honked once, and with a small expenditure of mana, a score of blades and handles shaped like feathers appeared around the bird, aimed directly at Sam’s family jewels.

“Cute,” Sam declared drily while creating a small shield, just in case.

“Isn’t he?” Clarissa replied with a proud voice and a smile directed at the equally proud swan.

Resisting to roll his eyes, he turned to Isabella.

“Izzy? Where is your treant?”

The young woman just grinned and pointed at her circlet, which Sam just now noticed looked like something a Roman emperor would wear. Then the two eyes opened on two of the leaves in the middle, and the familiar blinked at Sam.

He awkwardly waved at it.

“My adorable little Sable is now capable of transforming into items! And casting illusions! So much better than some other familiars…” she told Sam proudly while Katie just blew a raspberry at her.

“What did it transform into?”

“Lesser Nymph Spirit. Isn’t it awesome?”

‘Oh no… that’s very close to fey…’ Sam mused worriedly while outwardly he just gave her a nod and smile.

“Yes, very awesome.”

Then it was time for Katie. The berserker girl stood up and pointed at Puffball, who was currently cleaning ‘himself’.

“My cat turned into a... drumroll please…” Nobody made the drumroll sound, but she just continued. “…a CAT!”

“Makes sense,” Dan said, not even looking up from Hawky.

“Perfectly logical,” added Clarissa.

Katie just gaped at them.

Sam gave her an apologetic look. “You can’t think we would be surprised by your cat, Katie… It’s weird as hell!”

She crossed her arms in front of her and pouted. “You guys are no fun…” Then she grinned and a system screen appeared in front of everybody. “Check this out! Read it and weep!”

[Quantum Cat-like Grace: Level 7/100 (45%) (Active/Passive) It is well known that cats exist in multiple dimensions and quantum states. They can observe and traverse multiple dimensions and even exist in them at the same time. Thanks to your connection to your familiar, you can now do this too, albeit a little more limited.

You can summon ‘clones’ of yourself in alternate states that would do the same action as you do. The clones look and sound the same as you. Only dogs can 100% differentiate them.]

Isabella immediately piped up. “Thank god we have Lucky…”

“Hey!”

Returning to the real world, Sam let out a yawn and stretched.

The game was excellent in recreating all sensations, but there was something special about doing an excellent stretch in the real world.

With the debuff affecting all of them on some level – naturally, he was the most affected – they had to take a little break before doing anything important. They agreed that until the debuff wore off, they would focus on crafting or small quests that didn’t need major mana usage.

Katie had some cooking quests, and Clarissa was close to leveling up her alchemy. Dan just decided to go over to his girlfriend’s construction and haul rocks as training. And Isabella spent the downtime training her pet in illusions and battle strategies.

He went through his usual return to real-world ritual, then with still damp hair, sat down in front of his computer and began to go over his daily correspondence.

Unfortunately, he didn’t get far as he instantly spotted an email in his main account.

Letting out a sigh, he opened it and began to read it.

Dear Mr. Lawrence,

We would like to invite you to the Stelborne Gala and Charity Auction…

As he finished the letter, he only had one thought.

‘Wasn’t that Katie’s family name?’