The Dao of Magic: Book III Read online

  The third form is activated qi. If I create a flame, I turn normal qi entirely into flame potential. This power then transforms into heat and light, dissipating in the process. This reaction would generate more qi in a qi-rich environment. Here it just creates some heat and light.

  The king can now only bring completely activated qi outside of his body.

  Deciding that I have spied on the poor man long enough, I will myself upwards, floating away from the balcony. I give a small prayer for the poor sap that will have to clean the royal shithouse.

  I look down into the massive pit. As usual, I get shivers. My mind knows that I can fly at my levels of power, but some part of my instinctual brain just really, really doesn’t like endless abysses. The broken, hopeless figures of slaves being marched up and down the long ramps circling the pit don’t help my mood.

  The question of capacity versus responsibility crowds my mind for a moment. Looking away, I decide to not think about it for now. Firming my will, I speed onwards. The wind rushes past my face, so I turn my back to the wind. I cough a single time, infusing qi into my lungs and throat.

  The Capital grows smaller as I speed off, going south. Automating my flight path, I look inside Tree. Rhea seems to be up to something. I observe as she remodels the Library.

  Her speech is finished by the time I arrive. Tower City is now below me, the top of the white spire piercing the clouds hanging in front of me. I start ascending slowly, taking in the sights as I will myself upwards.

  I spread some qi upwards, making sure not to let it touch the Tower. The spinning circle is still in place, gathering the qi that keeps spilling from the jagged top. There is a lot less up here than there should be, though. I sharpen my focus and notice Ket’s distinct metallic depressive aura lingering strongly.

  So that’s where all the qi went and how he suddenly got to the core-forming stage. Well, I did put out a quest for emptying the qi reservoir. I should have added a clause that said releasing the gathered energy inside Tree would reward more points. Ah well.

  Looking into Tree again, I check the production line I set up underground. I grin a bit at how much of a cheat using qi for mundane production is. A large part of mass production comes down to logistics and resource acquisition. I have all these aspects under complete control. I can increase or repurpose the assembly or production lines at will.

  Because I didn’t want any qi seeping in or out of my drones without my say-so, I gave Database orders to keep any finished drone stored inside the moon. The qi stripping effect cleans them of any loose power. There are a couple of drones already done, so I pull at one, forcing it through the portal inside Tree.

  Honestly, I sort of forgot that I was still flying through the power of nothing but my wind affinity gained from Rhea and pure will alone. The massive chunk of metal with a wingspan of two meters is not only rather heavy, but it’s also not aerodynamic when held flat to the wind.

  I fall backwards as the metal object slams against my chest. I consciously don’t slow down time, deciding to rely on my heartcore. My arms snap upwards, grabbing at the smooth drone. I flip backwards and land with a satisfying thud. The small plane under my feet sinks as I command its engines to start.

  Not ten seconds later, I am surfing through the sky on top of a qi-powered triangular delta wing. My grin splits my face even wider.

  Remembering the short period of time I spent skateboarding in my youth long ago, I lean forward and bend down. Stopping all my outgoing powers, the wind ruffles my hair and rushes past my ears as I pick up speed.

  I suddenly twist my upper body, sending myself into a corkscrew. Steering the drone with my feet, I do loops, twists, and a few barrel rolls while gaining speed. My cheeks start to hurt from grinning so widely.

  I even do a fucking three-sixty kick flip.

  Fifteen minutes later, I end my stunt rampage with a melon grab nine hundred. Using my air affinity and foundational will to move in slow motion is a perfectly reasonable way to use such trans human powers.

  Tower City is now in sight, so I sit myself down as the drone works hard to climb the needed distance. I over engineered the drones somewhat but mainly focused on energy efficiency. It can climb vertically on its own, but my added dead weight makes it a slow climber.

  Taking it slow is also nice sometimes. The drone’s two engines are working hard, the soft hum of air being accelerated a nice complement to the view — grasslands, patches of forest, and far-off mountains. Looking northeast, I even catch a glimpse of a mountain that’s just gone halfway, leaving a perfectly smooth circle amid jagged rock.

  I lean back, dangling my legs over the drone’s front edge. Then Rhea pops into existence mere centimetres in front of me. She smacks against me, her stomach pressed against my face and legs dangling to the side.

  “HEEEeeeehahaa! Ho, no tell Ferah no-” Her yell of surprise turns into a sudden laugh. Her panicked voice afterwards stopped by another form smacking against her own back.

  Then another.

  The drone is still fighting hard, but we are starting to fall pretty fast now. I tap the metal housing, forcing a hundred times the normal operating amount of qi through the engines. The drone bucks fiercely as it shoots forwards. I clench my legs, keeping hold of the flying triangle with my knees. I let Rhea slip through my fingers, and she slides over me. I see a fuzzy tail fly overhead as Ket and Tess collide with me.

  I laugh uproariously as I dive down, the sight of Rhea, Ferah, Tess and Ket flailing somehow giving me the giggles. Ferah’s absolute death scream puts a slight damper on my humorous mood, so I pull four more drones out of Tree and send them on intercept courses.

  Rhea looks at the flying hunk of metal with suspicion, the draconic wings that just now burst from her back flapping slowly. Ferah holds her ride with a death grip as it catches her, Tess seems immediately comfortable as she lounges on her ride and Ket is studying it with all his focus.

  Approaching the four, I order the drones to resume the leisurely climb I was executing earlier. “A hundred thousand points, and I will make you a personal flying vehicle.”

  Tess waves disinterestedly as she tries to make it bank side-to-side by shifting her weight. Ferah has literally pissed herself now, and Ket is still only looking at the metal he is sitting on. “What’s up?” I look at Rhea with a shit-eating grin.

  “Okay. This mighty dragon is capable of learning a lesson. I will check what you are doing before stepping through Tree. Now, which direction is this Goodsummer place?”

  “Ah, yes. We were doing that before the beast hordes thing. I am going to the top of the Tower.” She quirks an eyebrow in an unspoken question. I just motion for her to sit as the drones continue to climb slowly.

  I set the flight path to circle the Tower as we climb. Ferah has gained enough courage to look over the edge of her drone while fiercely holding on. Tess starts chatting with Rhea about something I don’t pay attention to. I just keep looking at the lands below.

  chapter three

  Strata

  Ket is absolutely fascinated. He has been staring at the large metal object under his ass for half an hour at this point, and his attention hasn’t wavered a single time. Ket first just ran his hands across the immaculate smooth curved surface, trying to feel for imperfections. For most, feeling the immaculate surface got old relatively fast, but that’s when the real fun (for Ket) began.

  Fighting the wind that was pulling at his hair and clothes, he breathed out some qi. Preventing the inactivated potential from floating off, he forced it into a stream downwards. There he sank it into the metal, distributing it over the entire flying machine.

  Ket felt each curve, from the sharply rounded front edge to the curving cylinders that grow from both wings. His qi of a metallic intent allowed him to feel the material changes and composition. A normal neutral qi user would only be able to feel the shape of the object, but Ket has spent a large amount of his time in the study of metal.

  Slowly, a blueprint a
ppeared in his mind. The metal hull, hollow spaces, insulated silver and copper wires, and intricate formations inlaid on the engine’s insides were scanned and mapped by Ket with utmost patience.

  Done with the visual part of things, he has his eyes closed now. The model in his mind is zooming in on parts that he does not understand yet but finds interesting. The engravings and qi wires are a good example. Ket understands what they should do, but the text is oddly deformed and the mathematical formulas used are nearly illegible.

  Starting at the solid qi crystal core in the centre of the drone, silver and copper wires guide trickles of power towards the various parts and mechanisms in the mechanical vehicle.

  “Hey, we are here, wake up!” The voice coming from a certain black-haired girl fails to pierce his concentration.

  Slowly, he realizes that the metal is formed to guide qi in a specific pattern. Qi forms a stream when it glides through materials. Most flows of power take the path of least resistance. But unlike electricity, qi has a certain momentum and thickness that needs to be accounted for.

  “We are leaving, you dumbass. Teach already jumped.”

  A river does not follow its banks exactly. The main flow carves at the outer edge of each meandering curve. The inner turn of each bend has slower moving water. Qi works similarly, so Teach designed the metal formations in such a manner that the qi stream is guided along the needle path, regardless of the metal shape.

  “Hmmh, he is really out of it. No problem, I will catch up!”

  That mystery solved, Ket follows a bundle of thin wires that go from the core to the front. These wires end up at a complex structure of glass, hollow spaces filled with pure gas and minuscule metallic structures. Ket pumps more qi in that area, trying to get a clear image of what’s going on.

  Only when half of the liquid qi surrounding his forming solid core is evaporated and breathed out does he get a glimpse of the structure’s purpose. Ket senses an incredibly dense metal grid facing the glass covered opening. Incredibly thin wires trail from this rectangle to an ever-denser piece. That one seems to be filled with… sand? Rock?

  Ket has a lot of trouble trying to understand that piece of the drone. Even denser and smaller, the materials are also more difficult for him to understand. What is a piece of transparent stone doing in the middle of all those metal wires?

  Deciding to ask Teach about that later, Ket shifts his focus on a diff…

  A wet sensation? Warmth on his face? Ket is suddenly feeling very confused as a pleasant smell enters his nostrils. A very, very warm feeling is now on his face.

  Opening his eyes, his vision is filled with black hair, pale skin, and closed eyes. Frozen in absolute stupefaction, the boy just sits there as the face in front of his own does funny things to his mouth.

  Tess’ eyes flutter open, and she jerks backwards. Touching her lips, she grins. Then she hides her face, shuffles and turns around while rubbing a shaking leg followed by a deep breath. Ket is still dumbstruck, all thoughts of the wondrous metal object he was exploring blasted out of his head by the smell and taste still lingering on his lips.

  “We are going northeast. The rest is already on their way down. Teach said to throw the drone in the air. You can’t keep it.” Her face now furiously red, Tess escapes by jumping off the Tower. Ket just sits there, the fierce wind that blows at this height cooling his boiling mind and jumbled thoughts.

  ⁂

  We arrived at the Tower’s top after a rather chill and relaxing flight. I had to manhandle Rhea, Tess, and Ferah to get them off the drones when we landed. Their begging eyes and fake tears nearly made me give in, but then I remembered why I made the things in the first place.

  So, I took my drones back from them, programmed a scouting pattern in each one, and threw them into the sky. I took the ones stored inside Tree’s moon out and threw them into the sky as well. Database is keeping an eye on them while processing the data they send back. My map of this planet is getting more accurate and more detailed by the minute.

  A grand total of eleven drones are now slowly climbing into the upper atmosphere, where they will act as my personal spy satellite network. Their black topside will absorb enough sunlight to keep them flying forever. Their blue bottom side will camouflage them against all visual scouting or scanning.

  That’s when I realized that Ket was still sitting on his drone, eyes closed and dead to the world. Seeing Tess shoot him furtive glances, I took Ferah and Rhea by the hand and jumped down from the Tower.

  Now I am enjoying a nice and relaxing bit of free falling, Rhea looking at me weirdly and Ferah screaming the mother-of-all-deaths scream into my ear. I grab the shrieking girl by her armpits and hold the wind around me with my mind.

  Stepping into the foundation realm gave me some insight into this air affinity I managed to snatch from Rhea. I’m still pretty unclear about what it really is or what it represents, but I’m pretty sure it has something to do with gas in general. All types of gas are more susceptible to my commands. This includes water in steam form, though it slips from my grasp the moment it condenses or freezes.

  It also allows me to produce some perfect purity gases simply by splitting the air around me into its constituent parts. The small space between my drone’s photosensitive plate and the camera’s lens is filled with xenon, for example. It’s a rather crude way of preventing oxidation of the sensitive photoreceptive plate, but it’s a neat application of this affinity.

  I reign my wandering thoughts back in and focus on the current moment. Rhea is flapping beside me with her large white draconic wings, the glow that her transformations cause fading rapidly. I breathe some qi out through my nose and shape it into two wings of my own.

  Then I change the mutable area inside my braincore into a tetrahedron made from I-beams. This symbol of construction strength makes my qi construct near unbreakable and rigid. Ferah is silently staring down now, embarrassment and awestruck wonder on her face. I sigh a bit as I notice the water evaporating from near her crotch. She no longer pisses impurities, but she really should stop peeing her pants every time she gets a bit scared.

  I hand the squirming girl over to Rhea, who dips a bit as she catches the additional weight. “Let’s land over there.” I dive down, ignoring the complaining noises of a certain dragon who was just handed a rather damp and stinky problem.

  Another relaxing flight later, I land inside a copse of trees to the east of Tower City. I stretch a bit while waiting for the rest to arrive. I hear rustling in the bushes and soft female murmurs. That should be Ferah and Rhea. Another crashing sound is followed by soft giggles. That must be Tess.

  Then I look upwards and see Ket falling. He throws something towards the ground and I barely dodge a small piece of metal as it shoots into the soft earth beside my feet. I feel the metal fragment dig itself deeper into the ground as Ket uses it to arrest his fall.

  “Something got you distracted? You normally pay attention to what you’re doing.” My comment shakes him from his contemplation and he face plants into the mossy forest ground in front of me.

  “Ow, ow. Sorry, Teach. Got something on my mind.”

  I smirk at him. Ah, to be young… “Let’s get going. You can wrestle with your hormones while we travel.”

  He sputters a bit in protest but then falls silent. Looking into Tree, I see the mounts I need. Big blue bear is casually munching on a mutated deer, Ket’s metal horse is prancing about as some of the female disciples’ fuss over it, and Tess’ black cat is sleeping. I pull them through Tree’s portal. The next minute I spend patting them to calm them down.

  Angeta pops into existence just when the beasties are calmed, her capybara mount following shortly after. “Y’all going somewhere? I missed your previous adventure because I was busy. I want some fresh air.”

  I adjust my blue bear’s saddle straps and jump on. “Sure. We are going to Goodsummer to see if anything is left.”

  Her eyes open wider. “Could we continue to my village aft
erwards?”

  “Sure. I’ve seen what this kingdom has to offer, I think. Let’s tour the beastkin country for a bit.”

  I pretend not to see the very concerned, complicated, and conflicted look that Angeta and Ket share at my comment. I motion them to mount up and call for the trio of females. Minutes later our small group rides out of the forest and onto an empty road.

  We travel silently for a good half hour while I enjoy the peace and quiet. The grasslands around Tower City are pretty flat with few patches of forest here and there. That prompts me to ask a question that has been bothering me. “Where are the grazers?”

  Everyone is now looking at me weirdly. “Grazers?” Rhea asks from behind me.

  “Who keeps the grass short? Aren’t there large packs of herbivores eating all the sprouting trees and grass?”

  Angeta answers me. “Grass stops growing at this length, though? What kind of freaky grass are you used to?”

  I want to answer but don’t really know how to reply to that. I send a strand of augur towards a blade of grass and try to make sense of what I’m seeing. The narrow blade is twenty centimetres long and looks like perfectly normal grass. I check inside Tree and see that the same grass covers its grounds. Every single blade is around twenty centimetres long.

  Why is this fucking world not making any sense? Did someone program a natural limiter inside the flipping grass because they can’t be arsed with mowing the fucking lawn? I feel slender hands rub my shoulders and I let go of this irritating train of thought. I assign Database a task, letting it figure out how the grass does that with any processing power it has to spare.

  “Right, let’s ignore the genetically engineered grass. How can we visit the beastkin lands without drawing attention or kicking up a fuss?”

  “Just do the thing where everyone ignores you.” Angeta waves a careless hand in my direction while lounging on her mount. Ferah is sitting way back, on the flaming capybaras’ butt. She seems uncomfortable, but unwilling to ask Angeta to scoot over.