If I wanted a new shadow skill, and that seemed to be the only way I could, maybe, get something for the morning. I needed to take stock of where I was at. I brought up my Status sheet.

Tabitha Carter

Class

Thief

Merch Total

Type

Attribute

Level

10

4

Constitution

Physical

Strength (PS)

9

0

1

10

62.0

Agility (PA)

12

2

10 24

Perception (PP)

11

3

10

4 28

Mental

Strength (MS)

8

0

2

10

53.0

Agility (MA)

12

1

1

4 18

Perception (MP)

10

1

10

4 25

Spiritual

Strength (SS)

9

0

4

2

15

50.0

Agility (SA)

10

0

5

2 17

Perception (SP)

10

1

5

2 18

Totals

91

8

48

18

165 Free points 2

2

Skills:

Novice: Cooking 1, Sewing 4, Detect Spiritual Traps 4, Disarm Spiritual Traps 2, Blunt Weapons 4, Knockout Strike3, Parry 4, Confuse Status3, Shadows Embrace 2.

Apprentice: Dark Sight 9, Identify 8, Distract 8, Appraise 6, Bargain 7, Lock Pick 7, Sense Spiritual5, Unarmed Combat 5, Detect Physical Traps 6, Disarm Physical Traps 5.

Journeyman: Stealth 12

Affinity: Shadow

I figured with Shadow that I was looking at illusion type skills. Illusions were usually strong on Mental with secondary focus in Spiritual. My Thief class focused on Perception, both Physical and Mental, and Physical Agility. My Merchant Class doubled up on the Physical and Mental Perception but also gave me Mental Agility. I had already focussed my free points into Spiritual Perception and Spiritual Agility as this enabled me to see and disarm Spiritual Traps. I was weak in all three Strengths.

I had a mental manipulation skill, but I wasn’t sure how well it would mix with illusions as it was Distract, and not the common Persuade or even the more impressive Intimidate. I wouldn't have swapped it for anything as I am sure it is the only reason I am alive after the last debacle. Actually Distract might be better on beasts than the others. I had used it on guard animals as well as guards in the past, sometimes it is hard to tell the difference.

Scary illusion shadows, was what I was thinking, to frighten and distract. These were beasts, so if I could convince them a scarier predator was present to frighten them, or a juicy prey so they would go off chasing shadows. Sight in the form of Shadows and sounds from the Distract Skill were what I could aim at for now. Distract lets me cast sound to an area, with a small mental push. But only small sounds. Branches breaking, small animal noises, up to about the level of a dog's growl was what I had done in the past.

Anyway I was getting ahead of myself. I first need to make shadow images, before I can even start adding in sound. One thing I did learn from that conniving bastard Longstrider was how to learn a Skill by focussing on one primary attribute. Illusion skills mainly used Mental Agility, often supplemented with Spiritual Agility. Start simple. What is a simple animal shape that might scare others? Snake. I hate snakes.

Let's start with a long thin shape. I focussed on Mental Agility imagining the shape of a snake and channelling it through the Shadow Affinity. Phissft. Again. Again. Again! Rest for some food Warren brought in. Again. The last hour and a half was wasted. It was not working, I could barely get the shadows to twitch. I could get the shadows to spread a bit, but I needed shapes. Reasonably convincing shapes. I had set the room up with lanterns on one side of the room creating shadows of the furniture and other objects, which was what I was trying to shape. Warren came back and watched for a bit. I think it was obvious how frustrated I was getting. Then he announced he was going out to observe the meeting between Longstrider and Rock Brain, although he called him Wiremu for some reason.

As he was leaving Warren said that as I had had some success in expanding the shadows, maybe I should concentrate on that for a bit and see if that leads me anywhere. Fucking hell. I hate it when he comes up with sensible ideas. I am supposed to be the smart one here with the Mental Agility. He is just a dumb warrior. He had left immediately after making his suggestion so I couldn't snap at him. Maybe he wasn’t so dumb.

Expanding the shadows. Let's see how far I can expand them. They expanded about a centimetre, then snapped back as I lost control. Then it occurred to me that I was still primarily using my Mental Agility and there was nothing here to create or imagine. This was just expansion, probably mostly Spiritual Strength with maybe some Spiritual Agility. The shadows expanded a lot easier, and started to fill the room when I switched abilities. I pushed more and the lanterns started to darken, it was like fighting against the light. I could feel my Spiritual Agility defining the shape of the shadow, but it was the Spiritual Strength that was fighting the light. Then I ran out of energy and the shadow snapped back and the light brightened and I had a Skill notification waiting.

Engulfing Shadows 1. Darken an area with shadows. The size of the area is managed by my Spiritual Agility and the density of the shadow was a function of Spiritual Strength, which was harder depending on the amount of light around. I had four unallocated attribute points from the recent level ups. I needed to experiment with the Skill in different areas and lighting and see which attributes I needed more. I went to fetch some more lanterns. I also needed to practise some scarier sounds to use in my Distract Skill in the Engulfing Shadows. I knew it was still not going to be that useful in broad daylight until at least the Journeyman Level, but it was the best I could do and if the Bitch wasn’t happy I guess we weren’t going. I thought it was a pretty amazing Skill and I was very happy.