Winter smiled as she bounced on her heels. “Do you mind if I watch?”
“Not at all.” Exile chuckled as he eyed her. “You might learn something for your own spells. Besides, it’s not like you can copy this spell I’ll create. It requires my Rune Authority to work.”
“Ah,” Winter said somewhat reluctantly. “Is the process different to creating normal spells?”
Exile nodded his head. “Rune spells are easier for me to create due to my Authority. I’m sure there are some similarities in creating normal spells, but I get the feeling my runes allow more flexibility.”
Winter grumbled as Exile shot her an apologetic smile. “What differences are there?”
“Hm, the runes I create act as a sort of word that contains the meaning and power of the spell. So it’s like crafting a container and giving form to the spell you want to create.” Exile paused to allow Winter to take that in. “However, divine spells using the elements are strange. Think of your body as the container for divine energy. Then the name of the spell acts as the dam that can be opened. The spell’s name gives it shape and meaning.”
“I see, so we’re limited by the meanings of the common words. Whereas you’re creating a fake language of sorts that absorbs the meaning you want the runes to have.” Winter groaned as she considered the implications of that.
“Precisely. This means my runecrafting is more versatile than spell creation. You’ll have to figure out how to increase the output of your spells on your own. Maybe Clay could help you with that.”
“Clay?” Winter asked with some surprise.
“Yeah. Clay’s created a few spells already. It seems like he has a knack for it. So he should be able to help you on that front.” Winter looked thoughtful for a moment. “I’ll ask him once we’re done here. I feel like Mikari would be able to explain it better, but I can’t find him.”
Exile sighed at that as he glanced over his shoulder. “He’s taking the day off today.”
Winter’s eyes widened as she stared at Exile with a ludicrous expression. “Mikari never takes a day off! Is he alright?”
“Yeah, he’s perfectly fine. Better than fine, actually. He’s on a date.” Exile chuckled as Winter’s jaw nearly hit the floor. “With Noslin.”
“How? Does she live that close to our HQ?”
“Nah, they’re on a date in the game. I’ve known for a while that Noslin was interested in him, but it was my brother who made the first move.” Exile couldn’t help but shake his head at the memory. “Noslin looked like she’d pass out when he asked her.”
“Isn’t it a bad idea to date members of other teams?” Winter asked with mild curiosity. “It could cause a lot of problems.”
“That’s true.” Exile sighed again as he wrote some changes to the procedure he was going to attempt. “But my brother is aware of those issues, and so is Noslin. To be honest, if they work out, we’ll probably see an in-game marriage.”
“Noslin is going to merge her Pantheon with ours?” Winter squealed.
“Hm, that’s a possibility. But she could also step down from her position and basically transfer to ours. She’s caught a lot of heat for constantly backing us. It seems a lot of sponsors for the Skardian teams are getting frustrated at us controlling how things go here.”
“But that’s just the way things played out. They can’t be mad about it.”
“You’d be how surprised at how petty sponsors and team owners can be. Especially when their bottom line is being affected.” Exile sighed as he made a few more adjustments. “We’ll probably see some rebels and defectors appearing. They’ll hope that by backing another race, they’ll have the room and opportunity to grow.”
“Why would they do that when you’ve made it peaceful for the Pantheons here? They can easily grow their numbers.”
“You’re right. They can grow their numbers, but the peace will cause their growth in levels to slow down or stagnate. I think you’re forgetting how this game works.”
“Can’t they just grind mobs?”
“Sure, that’s feasible, for a time. But you’ve seen it yourself. Once you grind a certain number of a single species you’ll stop getting quests to kill them. With no experience bar in the game, it makes it pointless. Eventually, players will have exhausted everything the Skardian divine realm has to offer. What then?”
Shock appeared on Winter’s face as she understood where they were headed. “Then every player in Skardia will stagnate. I doubt there are enough mobs for someone to reach Tier 6.”
“Exactly. There may be field bosses we haven’t found yet or a few outlying features to be discovered. However, I doubt the developers would allow someone to reach the pinnacle of power without fighting a lot of wars.”
“I see. It’s going to be difficult to get the balance right.” Winter said as she tapped her chin.
“Yeah. Right now, we’ve been blessed with the number of attacks on us. But as the world calms down and regions come under the control of a single Pantheon, nobody will want to risk what they’ve gained.”
Exile shot a sad smile at Winter before continuing. “We’d be putting our favourite NPCs at risk, our chance to play this game, and our careers. So it’s no wonder everything will calm down at some point. Mikari thinks that’s where these events come in. Like Amari’s Shrouded Moon Festival.”
“If you don’t have strong enough players, then you risk getting wiped out anyway.” Winter quickly replied. “Which forces you to go to war with other Pantheons to strengthen yourself to survive the events.”
“Bingo.” Exile chuckled as he finalised the theory of creating his next spell. “But fighting against other players that chose the same starting race is bad. It means less players to repel an external invasion. So you need a constant state of war, but peace among your home territory’s Pantheons.”
Winter shook her head at the craziness of it all. “What do you think will happen when someone wins the game?”
Exile turned to face her with a stunned expression before seriously considering her question. “Who knows. It all depends on the prize for winning the game. If we don’t make it that far, then it’s none of our concern.”
Exile shrugged, although his heart secretly bled at the thought. ‘If we fail, then Ania, Harik, Bjorn, Thovok, Allyce, Bargrux, Skovi, and Skalla will already be dead.’ The world of Pantheon Online seemed darker to Exile at the thought of losing even one of them.
However, he knew it was foolish to believe they could reach the end without losing anyone. The only question in his mind was who would survive. ‘Then there’s the time skips during maintenance. What if one of them dies while we’re offline? What if a time skip of decades happens?’
Exile shivered at the thought as he glanced at Winter. “I’ll need silence now. I’m going to try and complete the spell.”
Winter nodded as she silently moved to a position where she could watch the entire process. ‘I should start small to avoid a serious fallout if it becomes unstable.’ Exile thought as he remembered Amari’s warnings in his book.
Exile tuned out the world around him as the process began. First, he crafted the shape of the rune using pure divine energy threads. Once he was satisfied that the shape was right, he turned his attention inwards.
‘Amari said he used 60% air with 40% darkness at this stage. He wasn’t capable of stabilising it at a 50-50 ratio until he was a higher tier.’ Exile silently nodded to himself as he reminded himself of Amari’s process.
He reached out with his mind to take control of the fire element inside himself. Exile imagined the size of the joint element as he carefully took more of and removed some of the fire until he was happy he had 60% of the final mass.
With a careful nudge, he urged the fire to flow around his body, keeping it away from his arms that were connected to the rune that would contain the finished spell. ‘Ok, that’s the easy part. Now I need to keep it flowing as I feed the dark element into it.’
The process was agonisingly slow as Exile drip-fed the murky darkness into the flowing fire. Each droplet he added made the fire feel colder and more ethereal. As if it were there, but not there at the same time.
The bright flames slowly darkened, turning a shade of purple as they were corrupted by the darkness. ‘Easy now. We’re almost there.’ Exile panted from the mental exhaustion of keeping so many things going at once.
‘One more drop should do it.’ Exile reached inside and separated another drop from the darkness. As he slowly fed it into the fire, a great change happened!
An icy feeling overtook Exile as the flames burned bright purple. They raged with an intensity that his pure fire had never displayed! Exile swallowed to wet his throat as he felt the power from that element that he thought was impossible at this stage!
‘This should be Tier 3 power!’ Exile exclaimed internally as he studied the element. However, his excitement was short-lived as he remembered he had to complete the spell.
‘Damn! Is my rune going to be strong enough to contain this?’ That was the issue that jumped into his mind as he carefully led the new element down his arms to its container.
Antihero