All The Skills

"Quickly!" Brixaby handed out the bars of metal. They were about the length of Arthur's forearm and roughly an inch thick. Taking his, Arthur spared a moment to wonder what other kinds of crafting materials Brixaby had hidden in his Personal Space. Also, these were likely stolen. He… should probably ask where his dragon kept getting his crafting supplies.

That thought was wiped away as his fingers brushed over the metal bar. It was warm, almost uncomfortably so. As if it were heated from within.

Joy waved hers around like a sword, though in her large hand, it looked more like a baton. "I like it. What does it do?"

Brixaby hesitated for a moment, and Arthur caught a flash of embarrassment from the dragon. "It should work best with Cressida, seeing as she has a fire-type card in her heart deck. I was able to transfer the element of fire and the concept of fire from your card to this object. Chances are, it will act differently for each person. I tried to make them all summon flame bears, but I think, with testing, it reflects on your own cards instead. Observe." With visible effort, he pushed a trickle of mana into the metal bar. Pure orange flame raced up from the handle to the blunt end... though as they got closer to the end, the fire took on a black quality. As if it were some kind of void fire.

"It should work off your existing mana, even if you don’t have a fire-type card," Brixaby said. "Though, I can't speak for its efficiency."

"You did great, Brixaby," Arthur said.

The dark dragon huffed. "Of course I did! Wait, why do you people keep saying that? Was there any doubt?”

"Not from me," Joy said. "I never doubted that you couldn't do it. Well… I was a little worried that you might destroy Cressida’s heart card, and then I would be angry at you. And I hate being angry at my friends—”

"You would have been angry with me?" Brixaby sounded shocked. "But naturally, you would have forgiven me in time."

"Watch the trees," Cressida broke in. She had been turned to the forest. Many of the dark, haunted-looking trees were shaking as if large animals were passing through them and not caring too much about bumping into the foliage along the way. Or, more likely there were so many that they simply couldn't help themselves.

Arthur clenched his jaw.

This is worth it, he reminded himself. A library full of combat cards was waiting for them at the end.

Besides, it wasn't like they had a choice.

Cressida was the next to push mana into her enchanted weapon. It lit up brilliantly, shining so bright that it was hard to look at. "This doesn’t use much mana at all! But… Brixaby, why didn't you enchant us swords?" she asked.

"Because I didn't have swords in my Personal Space."

"You could have asked me," Arthur said, "I have a couple of sharp pieces that might have acted as swords in a pinch. Or daggers.”

"Why?" Brixaby asked, "You don't have a skill for them."

"Because Arthur is a pack rat," Cressida said with exasperation.

Arthur turned to her. "No, I'm not." He paused. "Am I?"

"You sure are." Joy nodded happily. "Have you seen your side of the cave? There's all sorts of bits and bobs in there."

"I see nothing wrong with that," Brixaby said.

"Thank you, Brix—" Arthur started.

"You should see his Personal Space. It is many times worse."

Arthur threw a glance at his dragon, the traitor.

But the little side conversation helped ease his nerves. He realized that he had been clutching the bar of metal so hard his knuckles had been standing out white.

No more hesitating. Arthur pushed mana into the metal bar. Brixaby had mentioned that the bar tailored itself to the user, so naturally, he was unsure how — or if — a fire-type enchantment would compliment him. As he pushed mana into the roughly made weapon, he felt something push back. Right into his heart deck.

Arthur flinched spiritually and physically, but he didn't let up for a moment. It felt like the power was combing through his heart deck, trying to find the perfect match. This was... much more advanced than he thought was possible. Especially for a beginning enchanter.

With a flash of shame, he realized he hadn't given Brixaby enough credit. The dragon had been working diligently over the last few weeks with his crafting. Yes, it had been at making chainmail shirts and whatnot, but he had been both focused and dedicated. Some of that skill had obviously translated here.

Naturally, Arthur assumed that the enchantment would find a partnership with his Metal Shot card, since it was his only combat ability. Maybe even Phase In, Phase Out. That would be interesting. So he was completely taken aback when it latched on to his Master of Body Enhancement card.

Flames erupted up and down Arthur's arms. He cried out in surprise, waving them around to put out the fire. It took a few seconds to realize... there was no pain.

"Arthur!" Cressida yelled. Brixaby and Joy roared in shock.

"I'm okay! It doesn't hurt," Arthur said, slowing and staring at his arm. "The flames are above my skin."

Indeed, the base of the flames danced half an inch over his chainmail shirt. It wasn't even hot. Just a pleasant warmth that would be nice on a chilly fall day.

“Huh.” He flexed his arm and waved it around, watching the flames burn merrily.

"Here they come," Joy called out, having kept an eye on the dark forest. Sure enough, with the sounds of shrieking whistles, the scourgelings emerged, clacked their pincers, and charged.

Grimly, Arthur did a swift head count and came up with thirty.

His mathematics skill hopefully informed him that it was seven and a half scourgelings for each person. A tall order.

We don't have a choice, he reminded himself yet again. It's kill or be killed.

With that in mind, he had seconds left to get ready.

Through the connection of the enchantment, he knew that the flames would work as long as he was touching the metal bar. But it was kind of a bad weapon. Arthur reached into his Personal Space and grabbed a bandage that he kept in his first aid kit. Then he knelt, rolled up his pant leg, and wrapped the metal bar so it lay flat against his calf.

The fire wanted to travel to his legs, but with an effort of will, he kept it to his arms.

"What are you doing?" Cressida asked, glancing at him.

He shrugged. "I have a better weapon." Then he re-grabbed his shovel from his Personal Space. It was a little battered from the last several waves, but it still functioned as a good bludgeoning tool. Unfortunately, the spade of the shovel didn't light on fire, too. That would have been a nice effect.

Everybody else reactivated their enchantments. As they had different cards, the effects varied widely. Cressida's was the most straightforward. Three flame bears, each identical to Wicker, circled her.

Brixaby’s menacingly black flames coated his enchanted metal bar.

Joy didn't have a visible effect, not until Arthur noticed that all of her claws on her front and back limbs, even her green poisoning arm, were now fire-bright orange.

The charging scourgelings hit the bottom of the hill and started climbing.

Cressida's three bears roared out crackling challenges and galloped down to meet them.

"Why do you have three Wickers?" Arthur asked. He knew that they would shortly be in battle, but he just couldn't help himself. "If the flame enchantment reinforces your fire card... Shouldn't you only have two bears? One for your card, one from the enchantment?"

"I don't know,” she said. “It just happened. And my mana consumption is way down."

"Franklin's law," Brixaby said.

Arthur turned to him. "What?"

His dragon gave him a disparaging look. "You did read through the books, yes?"

"I read through one, and halfway through the second," Arthur said. "I didn't want to get hit with mental strain."

Brixaby snorted. “You are my rider. You must finish what you start. When you do read through it, pay attention to how elemental enchantments reinforce cards. There is an echoing effect that gives an additional boost to similar elements. That is Franklin's law."

Arthur had no time to be embarrassed by getting shown up by his own dragon. The first of the scourgelings had crested the hill.

Clutching his shovel in one hand, his arms still aflame, Arthur raised his other arm, and focused on unlinking the chainmail rivets on the sleeve. Bathed in fire, they glowed red-hot. Arthur shot one in experimentation, and the sizzle and whistling scream he heard from the scourgeling he hit was satisfying. So satisfying that he quickly reversed his grip on the shovel and began bathing the spade-end in fire, too.

Meanwhile, Joy had dropped down on the first of the scourgelings. Her bite didn't only poison it — now it burned. And all of her claws left cauterized wounds behind. It was as if the protective chitin was not there. Some of her slashes cleaved right through to the bone.

Brixaby was finally finding real success, too. Only... his black fire was odd. Instead of burning, it seemed to remove whatever it touched.

"Void fire!" Arthur heard Brixaby roar in triumph.

Shortly thereafter, more scourgelings crested the hill, and Arthur found that whatever he touched with his hands also burned.

This next wave was... well, not easy, but they weren't on the back foot as they had been during the fifth wave. Instead of being almost bowled over by the sheer amount of scourgelings, the new addition of fire enchantments let them hold their ground.

The one exception was Cressida whose only power-up was to increase the number of bears. But the decrease in the cost of mana meant that the three Wickers could fight longer. The bears fought as an effective team, circling one scourgeling and ripping it apart with claws of flame before heading to the next.

In the end, Arthur and Brixaby struck the same last scourgeling standing at the same time. Arthur smacked it in the ribs with his shovel hard enough to send it reeling backward before he pelted it with more burning rivets. Before the scourgeling could recover, Brixaby landed directly on top of its head and pressed the metal bar to its skull. The void fire burned away the top of the skull within moments, and the scourgeling’s body fell to the side, already starting to disintegrate before it hit the ground.

Panting, they all looked at each other, identical, almost manic grins on their faces. "I think we have this," Arthur said. "Only three more waves to go."

Then, finally, they’d have their prize.

Granted, Cressida was scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of raw mana, and he was getting low, too. But, he had hope. Judging by everyone else's expressions, they did too.

The next, seventh, wave started.

Arthur expected forty-five, perhaps fifty scourgelings since that had been the pattern of increase so far.

They got seventy.

And that was only an estimate because once the wave started, the true number began to make itself clear... It was a frantic race to begin killing them from a distance before the mob could reach them on top of the hill and swamp over them all. No one had time to count.

Arthur put his Metal Shot card to maximum use. His chainmail sleeves were looking ragged, but he didn't have a moment to spare for vanity. Only the fact that he could heat the small pointed rivets gave him an edge. His throwing accuracy had gained several more levels, and that allowed him to hit the vulnerable eye and nose slits, too.

Cressida scraped together the last of her fading mana, and her three bears bowled down the hill and into the mass of scourgelings, leaving bodies in their wake.

Joy and Brixaby were both terrors from above, but... it was close. Too close, especially when Cressida's mana shield fell at the end with ten more scourgelings to go.

In desperation, Arthur stood in front of her and deployed his flour bombs on the scourgelings, which gave the dragons a few extra seconds to reach them.

"Take her into the sky," Arthur yelled at Joy.

Cressida objected, but Joy hooked her arms under her rider — being careful that her claws didn't touch skin — and heaved upward, flapping to gain height.

Brixaby let out a mighty roar, and buzzed around in a dizzying pattern, his black flames burning merrily. No scourgeling could touch him without losing parts of themselves. They might have still overwhelmed Arthur and Brixaby, if not for their Phase In, Phase Out ability that allowed them to duck out at a moment's notice.

But it was close. So close that neither one of them thought about saving one last scourgeling for a break between the waves. When it was over, Arthur looked down in despair at the disintegrating scourgelings in front of him, knowing that they had won, but Cressida was effectively out of the fight. And the next wave, the eighth, would surely be worse.

And that was when a bright light erupted at the top of the hill: a line that stretched from the grass twenty feet up.

It flashed, and when the light dimmed, Laird and Shadow stood there, looking around.

Laird spotted Arthur.

"Oh. You're all still alive. I didn't expect that."

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