Chương 14: -14- Borrowing Wisdom

Calder-Costal Road Calder trotted up the road unsteadily one hand raised in front of his face to shield his poor damn eyes from the midday ocean glare. The other was holding onto the saddle like his life fucking depended on it. He couldn't decide if each jolting step of the horse hurt more or if it was the brewing sunburn he could feel starting to sizzle its way into his skin. The horse was blessedly well-tempered, or lazy. Calder couldn't tell; he didn't know fuck all about horses.

It was doing most of the work for him by staying on the road and heading straight at a slow pace. Which was fantastic because if the horse galloped or decided to be difficult, Calder was going to end up in a ditch; he was not an experienced rider. Horses were expensive, both to purchase and maintain. He and his grandfather hadn't had any need of a workhorse, much less a riding one, so Calder's experience on them was limited to kind adventures, letting him trot around in town to humor him as a child.

Calder figured he would work out the specifics sooner or later. Besides, I couldn't just leave a free fucking horse there to freeze to death.

"Isn't that right, Mr. … Man, I need to name you..." The horse snorted and shook its head slightly at his words like "No, don't bother, you will fall off soon."

"Hey, don't be like that. I'm sure I can come up with something suitably regal, you do look awfully fancy with the grey and white swirling coat." Calder grimaced and gave up on his one-sided conversation to focus back on not falling off and manipulating the tiny mote of tranquility he had regained in the last few hours. He still had a little ways to go before they reached the rest stop and he could spend his essence. A stampede of steps around the next bend in the road brought Calder up short.

"Oh fuck me, what now?" Edmund rushed around the bend in the road, a ragtag group of soldiers trailing behind him, all clad in the dusty blue and white of Frostveild special infantry. Calder relaxed and smiled as he trotted forward. Huh, Edmund, you old shit, you got help and came back for me. Honestly, a lot more than I expect from most folks these days. Edmund stopped short, breathing heavily. The warriors behind him started pulling weapons.

"No, no, that's the town guard that stayed behind! Calder lad! You made it!" He looked like a pall of guilt was washing off his shoulders. They all turned the hell around and started heading back towards the nearby campsite while they conversed. A young but horrifically scarred man in slightly nicer armor than his companions came alongside Edmund and Calder, his disfigured smile showed off the missing portion of his lip and cheek.

"Gods, I haven't run that flat out since the last time I saw a siege mage. Names Pate, commander of this squad, and I was supposed to be your rescuer. You know you could have been a bit less competent. Saving civilians looks fantastic at my promotional reviews." The young commander quipped. Calder shook his head in amusement. He was impressed the young man could still stay so jovial, with everything he must have gone through. He and his men all had noticeable tears and bloodstains in their thick winter wear.

"Ahh, well, damn, sorry, Pate. The buggers practically slipped in the snow and straight on my blade." Pate raised an amused eyebrow. Edmund sighed.

"Didn't know we had a fucking Sword of the Sea hopeful on the cart, or I wouldn't have come into camp hollering quite so desperately. Seriously, lad, are you unharmed? There were three of them... well, four if we count the sneaky shite you busted up in the cart.

"He said with genuine concern as the ring of low stone walls denoting the rest stop came into sight. Pate looked at Calder's bloodstained visage appraisingly; no matter how hard he had tried to clean up, there was only so much he could do with snow and rags. Small rivulets of thawing blood dripped off his horse and down his hands. That plus his overall size and the abomination of a sword probably painted an inaccurate picture of who he was.

"You're a specialist with a commission? Or maybe just an adventurer?" Pate guessed"Town guard sometimes. Normally I just bury people though." That made both of them look at him in concern.

"Tomb keeper! My grandpa and I work at the royal tomb!" They entered into the camp before they could shoot back a follow-up question. The camp was a several hundred stride wide ring of rough-hewn stone melded into a head-high wall by an earth mage years past. It had a pair of equally roughhewn stone towers by each opening in the wall and a dozen metal firepit rings dotted around along with a small centrally located well. One small cottage was nestled near the well.

It was where the handful of Kingdom soldiers stationed here lived and spiraling out from that was an eclectic mix of tents and carts. Mostly rather run-down-looking grey tents from travelers just like Calder. Or refugees hoping to find a safer home closer to the capitol. Calder got a good feeling from both Edmund and Pate, but they were both bound to ask questions he didn't want to have to dance around right now with how bone-tired he was.

He scrounged around camp until he found a stable hand who was willing to help with his horse and give him some basic care pointers for a few silver pieces. Then he unfurled his not-big-enough tent and crawled inside to spend some essence. He shimmed into the center and put up the single tent pole.

"Man, I need to get a better tent if I'm going to be hauling my ass around the countryside." He mumbled quietly while letting his eyes drift shut and his consciousness fall into his sanctuary. He opened his eyes to the whipping, roaring winds of frost and sleet. Claws of ice ran from the base of the stark stone stairs all the way up to the door of the mausoleum. And far above, shapes flickered and drifted through the vast, endless expanse of glimmering domains. He paused, squinting into the distance.

Something that blotted out dozens of glimmering domains was noticeably closer. Its world-ending form shifted and writhed in a way Calder couldn't focus on; he blinked and ripped his eyes back towards the snowy ground.

"Well, I really fucking hope that doesn't have anything to do with my Gaze of the Beyond going up, but with my luck… it probably does." Calder shuffled into the meager protection offered by the mausoleum's roof with a bit more inglorious haste than he meant to and then realized with a sigh that the skill sculpture he wanted to spend essence on was outside. Oh damn it, man, just ignore the reality-bending terror and make some upgrades. You are going to have to get used to this eventually.

He gazed around the bare room briefly, wondering when the mausoleum would gain more detail, stalling for nearly a minute, and then stepped back into the heavy snowstorm. Based on how frozen over everything was and the almost knee-high snow filling his sanctuary, he had plenty of essence to spend. He laid a hand firmly upon Make Materials' sculpture and began willing the torrent of snow drifting around him to gather.

The sanctuary slowly stilled, the snow freezing midair before drifting towards him, coalescing into shimmering white streamers. Then he closed his eyes and pictured the changes he wanted to make. Calder struggled for a moment with visualizing how the change would work. He wanted Dectus to be able to use his grasp to make himself material. His ham-fisted make-ghost-be-solid method was both laughably inefficient and not taking advantage of Dectus's century of experience.

If the ghost could choose the instant to strike, the moment to parry. Calder would have a damned invisible arbiter of death with him wherever he fought. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. And he really doubted Dectus would be the last ghost he allied himself with if he survived for the long haul. All the difficulty in timing stemmed from Calder having to use the skill himself mid combat.

It would certainly be years before he could do that effectively and manage to use his shaping talent simultaneously. If he could offload the thinking part of that skill, his lethality and defense would skyrocket. Calder finally settled on an image in his mind, a small mote of tranquility held separate from the roiling mass of the rest of his grasp of the beyond. One that Dectus or others could call upon with Calder's permission.

The snow around him surged forward in a wall blanketing the sculpture, wrapping around it and being subsumed as the changes took effect. Calder gasped; he could metaphysically feel a second orb of swirling darkness splitting off from the first, creating a wellspring that Dectus or others could use with Make Material. Calder looked around the snow-strewn sanctuary; the winds had died down, and the spires had receded into a simple thick layer of ice that crept around at his feet. He still had some essence to spend.

He shook his head towards the Statue of Shepard of Souls. He still hadn't even used it and didn't dare alter a skill he was utterly ignorant of. Calder simply stomped back into the mausoleum towards his core statue. He didn't know what skill he would gain if he surmounted his trial at the twenty-fifth level. But no matter what it ended up being, making yourself harder to kill was never a bad option.

He could try and craft a talent instead of just raising his physical stats, but again, he didn't even know where to begin with that. Crafting talents to give yourself permanent passive boons or effects was infamously difficult. Not to mention almost always took multiple levels of essence. It's why so few people have identify talents. They were hard to make, and the average person really didn't think that sacrificing five or even ten levels of essence to see their enemies' levels was worth it.

That's what items like the spotter or scouting classes in adventuring parties were for. So Calder went with simplicity itself; he gathered the remaining essence in his sanctuary to himself. It crept through windows and across the floor like a living wave of ice greedily pouring into his core statue for a simple purpose. Further increasing Calder's physical defenses. He intended to be an utter bastard to kill between armor and his core upgrades by the time he hit his first trial.

He needed to buy some fucking health potions once he got the funds, however. Calder might not be on the verge of death but between all the bruises, stab marks, scrapes and literal soul attacks he had endured since things escalated a week ago. He was getting thoroughly tired of feeling like he was run over by a horse every time he crawled out of bed in the morning. He rolled his shoulders and chuckled as his sanctuary noticeably warmed now that his essence had been spent.

"Lets see where im at." He opened his full status window. [Calder Loamish Tier-1](lvl9) [Remnant Soul Knight](Unique) [Talents] [Tranquility Shaping] Wield the energies of the domain beyond life, beyond the warmth of the gods, and learn to shape them to your will. [Friend Of The Lost] Allows you to see beyond the material and view souls that have failed to pass on. As well as see creatures that dwell in both the materium and immaterium, preying upon lost souls. [Skills] [Make material.](lvl4) You may utilize your grasp of the beyond to make immaterial entities such as specters and ghosts material. Approved entities may draw on Make Material as they wish. [Drain upon Grasp of the Beyond: Minor] [Shepherd Of Souls] Gain the power to tear the veil and send souls along their path to the godly domain they belong within. Your grasp of the beyond may be quickly restored while the veil is open. Be cautious; nothing is ever taken without notice.

Grasp Of The Beyond: 2/100 Gaze Of Those Beyond: 10/100 Enhanced Attributes Physical Resistance: 2. 3 Strength: 1. 2 Calder grunted appreciatively at the changes. His skin wouldn't be warding off normal sword blows yet, but it was getting there. If someone shot him with a hunting bow right now between his cloak and his resistances, he doubted it would dig in much farther than a finger's width. With Skills or a war bow though, that optimistic estimate went out the window. And almost more importantly.

Calder reread the change to Make material's description. I may not be a fast bugger able to ward off elusive opponents. But Dectus sure as shit is. Alright dungeon im as ready for you as im ever going to be.. well other than almost completely being out of Tranquility… hopefully there will be some wandering souls hanging around the dungeon I would be shocked if there were none considering it's overall haunted nature.

Calder's sanctuary faded away, and he found himself sitting rather awkwardly in his tent, leaned up against the single sad tent pole in the center. His horse was stomping around outside where it was tied off the stable hand had wiped it down of all the sweat and blood coating the creature as well as leaving a small feed bag for it.

Calder peeked his head out and looked around it was nearly nightfall only the glimmer of a sun was still visible on the horizon and the camp walls were starting to cast eerie shadows across the ground. Intead of going to bed just yet he wandered the camp trying to pick up any bits of information he could from overheard conversations. News back in town was sparse and less than accurate. Mostly hearsay from sailors or merchants. News on the war front from passing soldiers if they were lucky.

Calder found himself at the edge of one of the larger camps; a trio of canvas grey-blue tents ringed a crackling fire with men spread around nearby. Most were either nursing cups of steaming soup or tending to arms and armor. Pate saw him immediately and waved him over; he patted a log he was sitting on, and Calder obliged, sitting heavily and awkwardly adjusting his sword. Pate gestured around at his men.

"Hey guys! Those of you who didn't go on the world's shortest rescue mission earlier, this guy is Calder." One very wiry man who was sharpening a small brace of daggers and then dipping them in something that looked uncomfortably like poison squinted in disbelief at Calder.

"The cart driver was worried about him. Why? No offense, but if I saw you on the other side of the battlefield, I'd go the fuck around." The stringy fellow finished with a chuckle and shake of his head.

"Oh, don't be rude; he is a civilian, Roy." Pate paused and corrected himself.

"Sorta…" A man nearly as big as Calder, only a head or so shorter and a bit less broad, sunk his axe into the end of the log and sat down next to it, making sure not to crowd Calder. He had red bushy hair and a beard to match, a rarity in these parts, and looked to be wearing layered scale mail under thick furs. He immediately put out a hand in Calder's direction.

"Put er there. I don't know you yet, but I feel like we have both suffered under the "Gods, the amount ye must eat" or "Boy, did ur mother survive birthing ye" jokes. Calder's face brightened in understanding.

"Right! Like come on now! I don't eat that fucking much!" He shot back with a big grin. Pate looksed at the budding comradery and shakes his head.

"If you eat as much as Tormund, then that's a fucking lie." That got chuckles from all around the campfire. Calder sat at the fireside as the sun set, listening to tales from the warfront and stories of homes people planned to return to. Before he knew it, it was time for him to head back to his tent and get some blessed sleep; he would reach the dungeon tomorrow and was sure he would need it. Pate stepped up next to him as he left, walking with him away from the campfire.

Calder looked at him curiously; he obviously wanted something. Pate held out a small cloth patch that Calder took with a curious look. It was a simple emblem, a blood-soaked snowflake on a sandy beach.

"I don't know when the draft will claim you, but I'm sure they will. You don't seem the type to run from it." Calder nodded cautiously; it didn't take a genius to figure out he had a combat class and was probably approaching the draftable level.

"If that happens, sometimes they let you request where you get assigned, especially if you stand out." He gave Calder a look to impress the importance of standing out from the normal dregs.

"If that happens, the lads like you, and you seem level headed feller, join up with us. The squad name is simple' the Bloody Snow, Or the official name in the damn ledgers is the Crimson Flakes, don't like that one too much though." He gave Calder a pat on his shoulder and headed back to his men. Calder nestled himself down into his tent. He really appreciated the offer; they seemed like decent fellows. And he could understand why pate made it.

Even if he were some fresh-behind-the-ears recruit, at least he had fought bandits without running. Pate was clever, trying to procure talent instead of whatever the kingdom shipped him. Calder tucked the patch into his inner cloak pocket along with the strip of blue cloth. Then he rolled over and closed his eyes. He drifted away to thoughts of sand-strewn beaches and the things that lurked beyond the mortal ken.