Soul Caller 1 - Chapter 27 (Patreon)

Thankfully, Warrior’s Knowledge: Tactics could be disregarded at the moment as Merrick was by himself. He knew the value of teamwork, but given his circumstances, it didn’t have the value of the other two skills. That left Warrior’s Knowledge: Manatech and Warrior’s Observation as options for his skill point and after a moment of consideration, Merrick chose Warrior’s Observation.

STATUS

NAME: Merric

SOUL PATH: Warrior

LEVEL: 2

EXP: 4/40

SKILLS: [3]

Warrior’s Observation [3]

Warrior’s Knowledge: Manatech [1]

Warrior’s Knowledge: Tactics [1]

Unspent Skill Points: 0

Major Blessings: 0

Minor Blessings: 0

A cool feeling trickled through Merric’s head and he found that his memories had suddenly become incredibly clear. As he closed his eyes and examined them, they felt almost as if they were happening to him once again. The same was true for the Warrior’s memories, and Merrick knew that he had chosen correctly. Immediately he recalled the memory of the mana circuit ceremony, trying to get a better understanding of it. Like a thousand needles being shoved into his skin, he felt a sharp pain in his hand, and his forehead broke out in a cold sweat as he watched his hand being sliced open and a silvery powder being poured into the open wounds.

With a gasp, the memory broke and he collapsed backward, lying on the amassed clothing he had been using as a bed. Even after the memory was gone, he could feel his hand trembling with phantom pains as his mind and body tried to process what he had just experienced. It was clear to him that if he waited, he would lose his courage, so Merrick forced himself up. Taking his spears, he fashioned a simple belt to hold them and strapped them to his waist, and then picked up all of his containers to make a trip to the underground river.

Running helped him clear his head, so he ran the whole way there, immersing himself in the rhythm of his pounding feet. By the time he arrived at the edge of the river, the pain was largely gone and he was filled with excitement. The river was filled with manastones, and he pulled out handfuls of them, stuffing them into his bag. These stones would allow him to create the powder he would need for the ceremony, and even better, he had the water to help his body heal once he made the incisions. While he was at the stream, he bathed the scrapes he had gotten during his fight with the centipede and winced happily as they healed up completely.

After his containers were filled, he returned to his camp, adding the water to his makeshift basin, and got to work trying to crush the manastones. First he attempted to smash them with other rocks, but the manastones were impossibly hard, and no matter how he hit them, they refused to crack. Frowning, Merrick tried to slam two manastones together, but neither one wanted to give way, and after a few dozen attempts, he realized that he had a major problem. He had no memory of how the manastone powder had been created, and if he wasn’t able to create it, there was no way for him to implant it into his skin.

Scraping the stones didn’t work either, and even when he used his knife and the stone blades on his spears, he got nothing. Afraid he would dull or damage the spear, he stopped and put it away, staring in frustration at the stone in his palm. He could feel the energy it contained, but unlike the soft water, the power in the manastones was all locked up tight. With a sigh, he put it down and considered his options. He needed the crushed manastone to make the symbol on his palm, but with no way to process the hard manastones, he was at an impasse.

While he tried to come up with a solution he decided to work on something else, and switched his attention to creating a better winter garment. The entrance to the cave was completely blocked by thick snow, which meant that it was getting quite deep outside, so he had plenty of time to kill before he could leave the cave. First, he needed to process the hides that he had brought into the cave, and using some of the metal wire, he formed a basic drying rack by running it around the edge of the deer hide and looping it over a few heavy rocks. Scraping the hide again, he used a mixture of deer brain and glowing water to make a tanning agent and spread it evenly over the hide.

Once that was done, he began preparing the two boar hides, getting them ready by scraping and cleaning the bristles off. Rather than use his water basin to clean them, he jogged back to the river and washed the hides in the fast flowing water. As it washed over his hand, he felt the prickle of energy in it and suddenly paused. In his memory, the reason that the manastone was crushed up was to create a vein of sorts that integrated with the Warrior’s body while allowing him to tap into the manastone on the device he wanted to use.

With his hands still glowing from the water, Merrick sat down beside the river and put the sopping wet hides to the side. He could feel the energy evaporating as the water began to dry, a tiny bit of it entering his skin, and the rest escaping into the air, but as he closed his eyes and began to breathe, he felt it even more clearly. In the wet cavern where the water rushed past, he found that he could sense incredible power in the air all around him. Beginning to breathe in, he tried to focus his mind in meditation, calling upon the Song of the World. Like a rushing storm, the song swelled in his awareness until it seemed to echo through him, amplified by the thick energy in the air.

Instantly, memories that had been hazy began to grow sharper as the water, air, and earth that surrounded him danced in concert with the flame of his heart. His awareness of the song grew clear as he realized that what surrounded him was mana. The reason the Warrior in his dreams could tap into the Song of the World was because he was able to access the mana around him to power his steps and his strikes. At the same time, the Spirit Warriors who kept themselves warm with meditation were simply feeding the mana from the world around them into fire that burned bright inside them.

With his new awareness of the Song of the World, Merrick focused on his hands, flipping his palms up and calling the song to them. His memory had never been clearer, and the only sound beside the playful splash of the river was his careful breathing. He called to the mana in the song, focusing it tighter and sharper above his palm until a burning ecstasy tore into his right hand. The pain was so fierce that it shocked him out of his meditation and he felt his mind jolt as the song faded from his gasp. Still, he let out a shout of excitement as he looked at his palm where a tiny glowing line curved ever so slightly.

He didn’t need crushed manastone to create a mana circuit for himself and could instead use the thick mana of the underground river. The realization was beyond exciting, and it was with a singing heart that Merrick returned to his camp to make his plan. What he came up with was simple. He would work on the mana circuit on his hand and at the same time, continue creating clothes that would allow him to travel out into the intense cold that shrouded the canyon outside.

After setting out the boar hides to dry, Merrick tried to meditate again, eager to work on his new mana circuit. He sat down, placing his palm in front of his chest, and began to focus once more. Strangely, he found the Song of the World was not nearly as distinct as it had been in the cave where the underground river ran. At first, he was confused by this, but then quickly realized what was going on. Though the Song of the World could be clearly heard in the cavern, thanks to the manastones that filled it, the glowing water of the river possessed a clear amplifying force that allowed the Song of the World to be manipulated.

He knew that it was possible to control the song even when not in an area magically amplified like the underground river because the other spirit warriors were able to do it. But until he figured out how to make that possible, he knew he was going to need to spend his days sitting next to the river. That was fine with him, however, and after getting some food and checking to make sure that the meat he had laid out was drying properly, he returned to the underground river, intending to do some meditation.

Soon, however, he ran into another issue. Though he could manipulate the mana surrounding him into his palm through the Song of the World, creating part of the pattern that he had seen in his memories of the Warrior’s mana circuit ceremony, the pain was simply too much for him to stand, and after a bare few minutes, he found he was unable to continue. Disappointed, he could only give up and return to his camp, figuring that he would try again the next day. It was as if his body only had a certain capacity for the excruciating feeling, and beyond that, he simply could not force himself to continue.

Once back at camp, he set his mind to work on his other task, creating clothing that would allow him to range out into the freezing temperatures outside of the cave once it stopped snowing. He already had the hides drying, which would take a few days in the underground cavern, and so he focused on the cloth components that he would put inside of it. Using one of his metal knives, he began to pull apart some of the clothing, tearing it at the seams. Taking a shirt made of a thin woven material that he didn't recognize, he began pulling it apart, turning it into strips that he then rolled tightly to make a thread of sorts. All of the shirts were too small for him to fit into, so he cut them at the seams, laying them out, and beginning to attach them together. Using the tip of his dagger, he made small holes along the edge of each of the pieces of cloth, and layering them over each other, wove his makeshift thread through, creating larger pieces that would wrap all the way around his body. He lacked any sort of precision in his attempts, and he found his fingers quite clumsy when it came to creating garments, but something was better than nothing, and so he persisted.

It took him nearly ten hours before he was done with the first shirt, and even then, it fit poorly. It was baggy in some places and too tight in others, causing it to be quite uncomfortable. Pulling it off and holding it up, he stared at it and laughed. It was terrible, and his sister would have been mortified to see him wear it, but she was far away, across a snow covered mountain range so it would have to do. Taking a break to eat some food, he checked on his hides, which were still drying out. They were coming along nicely so he added a bit more of the tanning liquid, flexing his hand after spreading it on. He could feel the pain in his palm was still there, and knew that any further attempts to meditate before the pain had faded completely would be futile, so instead, he lay down to sleep.

His fire had been burning for almost two days, and when he awoke, the coals had nearly extinguished themselves. There was very little wood left for him to burn, and he knew that unless he ventured out into the snow, he would soon run out of fuel. While he wouldn't freeze to death thanks to the new clothing he was making and the magical water he was drinking, allowing the fire to go out would slow him down considerably, as it would take significantly longer for his food and hides to dry. Heading to the cavern’s entrance, he saw that the way was blocked by a thick wall of snow, making it impossible to tell if the storm was still raging outside from inside the cave, and so Merrick took the small passage that he had crawled through before to try to circle around Vale.

He had discovered the passage when he had been trapped in the cave the first time, and despite knowing what was at the other end, not seeing any light at the end of the narrow passage caused his heart to drop in his chest. It wasn’t until he realized that he couldn't see light because it was dark outside that he managed to stabilize his emotions. The sky was covered by thick clouds that completely blocked the moon and stars which should have been out, and the thick blanket of snow that covered the ground deadened every sound, producing an absolute quiet. It was as if Merrick was floating in a sea of gray, with sky above and below. Staring out over the canyon, Merrick was relieved to see only a few small flakes flurrying this way and that as the wind picked them up and threw them into the air. The first snow storm had stopped dumping its deluge on the mountains, and the worst of the winter had passed.

Crawling to the edge of the entrance, Merrick looked down the wall and saw that it was completely covered in ice. There were no good hand holds, and the entire side of the canyon had been painted white with ice and snow. Though he could always hang on the edge of the opening and let himself down slowly, it was quite a drop to the ground, and Merrick remembered there being rocks below. They were covered in a deep layer of snow, but he didn’t know how well packed it was, or how high the snow had piled up. Plus, he could feel the bitter cold of the wind that whipped into the crack where he lay, causing Merrick to decide his best bet was to dig a way out of the main entrance.