Chpt. 16) Run, you fools

As they walked through the portal into the fresh air of the outdoors, Ford took in a deep relaxing breath and looked about at the soldiers leveling spears at them. She gave a strained smile and said, “Yep, I knew it.” She then walked forward to the front of her group and silently counted the soldiers. Fifteen in total, and they all wore full plate armor. “Kii, Mizu,” Ford spoke over comms, “What level are they?”

“We don’t know,” one of them responded.

“We slipped out as soon as they came. It’s been nice knowing you all.”

“Check their levels,” Ford ordered.

“Fine,” after a moment of silence, they responded, “the soldiers in front of you have ten levels on everyone. The two just in the woods have a good fifty or so levels. We can’t read them; they’re so high.”

“Get to a spot you can snipe from.”

“Heard.”

After their response, Ford raised her hands in a show of surrender and announced, “Are you just going to hide back there as your men kill us, or will you show your faces?”

A few seconds of silence followed this question, then a laugh came from the shadows of the trees, “Well, well, well, Mrs.Ford,” an all to familiar radio-like voice said, “I was hoping that the mob I made had wounded you enough to kill you, but I guess I was wrong.”

Ford’s heart skipped a beat as she remembered that voice. On her right, she turned to Wrath and said, “I thought you killed Mr.Smith!”

“I didn’t kill him. I thought you did,” Max responded as she stood behind Wrath and thought Ford was talking to her.

Ford leaned back to look directly at Max, “Not you. I know you couldn’t have. I was talking to Wrath.”

“Rude.”

“But accurate,” Wrath said, “And no, I didn’t kill him…apparently.”

“Apparently!”

“Who are you talking to, Mrs.Ford,” Mr.Smith asked as he revealed himself riding a horse.

“None of your concern,” Ford countered, “Who’s the other person?”

“I am general Tse,” an authoritative female voice said as she rode out from the shadows. She was clad in golden armor that looked lighter than the rest of the soldiers, and she wore no helmet. Her beautiful face was tanned from hours in the sun training, and her short black hair tied in a worriers wolf tail. Her eyes were red and cold as she stared at Ford.

Ford raised an eyebrow, “Tell me, is the red your natural eye color, or did you lose someone in the monster surge the other day?”

General Tse curled her nose in a snarl and said, “Both.”

As she spoke, a powerful force fell upon Ford as though a heavy blanket made of fear wrapped around her. Ford looked to either side as quick as she dared to see that everyone else also looked afraid. She then fixed her gaze upon the General and cast psychosis. The two spells collided and canceled each other out. “Well,” Ford said, panting, “That wasn’t very nice of you.”

“How did-”

“It’s a trade secret, darling. Don’t get your panties in a twist,” Ford cut her off.

General Tse looked around the clearing quickly and spotted Ee to their left, “Sargent, why isn’t she in custody yet?” Tse asked rhetorically.

The man holding a spear in front of Ford answered quickly, “Sir, we tried, but when we did, she said that if we lay a hand on her or her carving, she’ll kill us all.”

“Ooo, she’s making a new carving. What is it?” Ford asked a little sarcastically.

Gimble, who stood to her left, turned and said, “It looks like a bird. She’s carving it out of a tree.”

“Is the tree still standing?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh,” Ford then switched to comms to talk to Ee, “As impressive as that carving undoubtedly is could you help us get out of this situation!”

“You… are on…your own, kid,” Ee responded lazily.

“There’s nothing you can do?”

“Nope. Now shut up. I’m in the zone.”

Ford turned her attention back to the General then spoke on comms again, “Do you two have a clean shot?”

The Twins answered immediately, “Oh yeah, we do.”

“Shot the hot general chick in three seconds. Everyone get ready to fight when she drops.”

“Heard,” Everyone responded.

“Enough of this,” Mr.Smith said, “let’s kill them now.”

“Agreed,” General Tse said. A loud bang sounded through the clearing, and in less than a blink of an eye, the General caught a mana bullet in her right hand thirty centimeters from Mr.Smith’s head and one in between her teeth.

Everyone was so stunned by this act of agility and strength that they forgot that the shot was their signal to fight. Ford stared with her jaw wide open and said, “Sooooo…not going to lie, that was hot.”

“Yeah,” Max agreed.

Not impressed, General Tse spat out the bullet and drew her sword. She pointed it in the direction the shot came from and fired a long ray of light essence smashing the side of the mountain where Kii and Mizu most likely hid. Then pointed the sword at Ee and her carving.

Ford’s eyes widened even further, and she yelled, “No, don’t!” but it was too late. Tse fired another beam of light and destroyed the carving Ee was making. Ford quickly got onto comms and said, “Ee! Ee, calm down. It’s just a carving. You can make another one a better one.”

“That,” Ee spoke, barely controlling her anger, “took me seven and a half hours to carve, and I wasn’t done yet.”

“Ee, control the calamity that is your…strong personality. Don’t freak out.”

“Oh, we are well past freaking out.”

Ford turned to the soldiers and yelled, “RUN! YOU FOOLS!!”

“I AM FUCKING PISSED OFF!!” Ee yelled, then appeared in front of Ford instantly, killing all the soldiers with one swipe of her black scythe. Then swung her blade at the General and Mr.Smith. They dodged by jumping off their horses and letting Ee decapitate them.

They landed, and Mr.Smith said, “You take her. I’ll get the children.”

“Kii, Mizu, are you two alright?” Ford asked as she drew her spear and elemental sword.

“Yeah, we’re fine. We just…umm.”

“We need some new underwear.”

“Okay, mind giving us some support,” Ford said as she rushed in and twirled her staff trying to make as many cuts on Mr.Smith as possible. As if he were a blur, Mr.Smith dodged the quick strikes and appeared behind her.

Seven blades planted themselves in her back, Ford screamed, and she swung her sword at him. He disappeared again, and fourteen more blades went into her back, dispelling her essence enforcement. She stumbled forward, and Morgan created a shield around them.

Lilly dashed to her side and pulled out all the knives as quickly as possible. “We can’ figh’ them! They’re too strong.”

“Agreed,” Ford groaned.

“I am much stronger than the rest of you,” Mr.Smith said from directly behind Lilly.

Ford pulled Lilly down and threw her spear at Mr.Smith, who leaned slightly to his right, allowing the spear to glide past him. “Run!” Ford ordered over comms, “I’ll catch up! Just Go!” she then willed the blade to change directions and go down through Mr.Smith’s left calf.

He bit back a scream as he blurred again and appeared on the other side of the shield. Morgan dropped the shield and ran to the east as fast as they could. Ford willed her spear back into her hand and lunged forward at Mr.Smith.

He blocked Ford’s attack with a butter knife he conjured from his sleeve and proceeded to block the subsequent slashes Ford made. Another loud bang resonated in the clearing, not from the Twins. Ee was winning her fight with the General and had just smashed her to the ground with a massive hammer made of shadows. Mr.Smith turned to check on his partner for a split second.

Ford took the opportunity to make a slash of fire with her elemental blade and set his black robes on fire. Mr.Smith didn’t panic and instead used a spell to put out the fires the moment they began then jumped back. Ford noticed a stump where Mr. Smith’s left hand should be for the first time.

Mr.Smith smiled wryly and said, “This was from the last time we met. Took my hand clean off.”

“Well, that sounds like a proper punishment for a thief,” Ford retorted, panting.

“Why don’t we even the-” whatever he was about to say was cut off as Tse gave orders, also over comms. He sighed and said, “Well, Mrs.Ford, we will have this conversation later. By the way, do you happen to have a last name?”

Ford smiled and said, “Not like I’d tell you.”

“Why don’t we have a last name,” Wrath asked.

‘Because I decided not to have one,’ Ford responded.

“I think we should have a last name.”

‘later.’

Wrath blew a puff of air, “Fine.”

Mr.Smith frowned at this and blurred away to just behind. General Tse took her by the arm and disappeared a second before a hail of shadow blades impacted the ground. Ford collapsed to the ground panting, and said, “Nice job, Ee. Now, we can catch up with the others.”

“We already caught up with them,” the Twins said in unison over comms.

“What happened to supporting me?” Ford asked a little hurt.

“Oh, we’re supporting you.”

“From a safe distance.”

“A really safe distance.”

“Enough,” Farah interrupted, “We’re nearly a kilometer away from you. Want us to stop and wait?”

Ford looked at Ee, who shook her head, “No. Keep going. We’ll catch up with you,” Ford answered as she stood to get ready to run after them.

“Heard.”

Ee snapped her fingers, and a portal was created in front of her. “Let’s go,” She ordered as she walked through the portal. Ford shrugged and did as she was told.

***

“I always find that trap card as unfair,” Drake complained, watching the screen, “but the fact that they were able to escape speaks volumes of their abilities.”

“They only escaped because Ee, as she prefers, helped them escape,” Finn clarified.

“Well, the humans shouldn’t have destroyed that beautiful carving,” Shurma defended. Summoning a mug of mead and pouring a little out for the carving before drinking half its contents, “It would have been a masterpiece.”

“But was a good fight after,” Guargen stated.

“The champions didn’t do anything,” Zee countered.

“I think he means the fight with Ee and General Tse,” Tanashi clarified. Samael just sighed and fiddled with a string on her emerald dress. Tanashi looked at her and asked, “What’s wrong?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, just keep the trap cards to a minimum, please, Tanashi.”

“I make no promises,” Tanashi answered, crossing his arms.

***

Ee and Ford emerged from the portal a kilometer ahead of the rest of the team and sat in the middle of the forest waiting. Ford quickly got bored and decided to try and make conversation, “Soooo, I was wondering.”

“Yeah, no shit.”

Ford took a sharp breath and continued, “I was looking through the blacksmith skill tree and found a route called soul forger. What does that class do? Why does it literally cost my SOL to forge with the skills?”

Ee looked at her sidelong, then sighed, “The soul forger route is the highest level of forging any blacksmith could do. There has been precisely one soul forger in the entire history of the seven worlds.”

“One?!” Ford asked disbelievingly.

“One,” Ee confirmed, “They were amongst the first champions. They probably were the first champions. The soul forger allows you to make a weapon born from your soul and will help you achieve victory in almost anything. I say almost because the weapon won’t make up for massive level gaps.”

“Don’t you mean, make weapons out of your soul?”

“No. Weapons born from your soul. These weapons are said to be alive and have a will, stats, and Grimoires of their own. Sadly that is most likely a myth, but the power they held was very real. That is why it costs SOL to forge these weapons and why they’re so rare. SOL for ordinary people is usually difficult to cultivate. A requirement of fifty SOL, which is the maximum amount of SOL you can have, is generally very difficult to acquire.”

“The SOL stat has a limit?”

“Yes, and no one can go past it.”

“Do you know where or what these soul forged weapons are?”

Ee stopped to consider this question a moment, “There is a staff, a bow, a sword, shield, dagger, claymore, and a spear. As for what they do or where they are, I don’t know.”

“Aren’t you-”

“Before you finish that sentence, I am a guide to the dungeons, locations in between, and trainer. Nothing more.”

Ford drooped and asked, “Well, then what is the direction to the next dungeon?”

Ee pointed to her right and said, “That way.”

Ford looked up and tried to figure out the direction but couldn’t because of how thick the canopy was. “No idea what direction that is,” Ford admitted.

“Well, then wait and find out,” Ee stated, now very bored. Ford stuck out her lower lip and started drawing in the dirt with her finger.

***

An hour passed, and Ford had successfully one thirty games of tic tack toe against Wrath. She wasn’t the most patient. Then she heard the stomping of massive footsteps as Gimble ran toward them, closely followed by everyone else. He stopped in surprise and everyone collided with each other and Gimbles enormous butt.

“How did you beat us here?” Gimble asked.

“What do you mean, beat you here?” Ford asked, sarcastically, “I told you guys that you’d catch up with me eventually.”

“No,” Gimble said, “You said that you’d catch up with us.”

“Nonsense, I said you’d catch up with me.”

“No. You said that you’d catch up with us.”

“Balderdash, I said you’d catch up with me.”

“No-.”

“Enough!” Lilly said, “Stop talkin’ now before this goes on forever. And ye did say ye’d catch up with us.”

“Rubbish, I said-”

“STOP!!” Farah and Ee yelled simultaneously.

“Fine, fine,” Ford conceded, “Where do we go now?” Ee didn’t answer and began walking in the direction she pointed. “That wasn’t an answer!” Ford pointed out.

“North!” Ee replied, still walking.

“Well, she answered you,” Max said, giving Ford a half-hearted hug. “Glad you made it,” Max whispered in Ford’s ear.

“Me too,” Ford whispered back, taking Max by the hand and following Ee through the woods.

***

They didn’t stop walking for three hours; once they did, they were out of the forest and in a clearing with only a few sparsely spread trees and many large moss-covered rocks. Ee stopped and said, “We’ll make camp here for tonight,” she then pulled out the cauldron and the tents for everyone. She grabbed one from the top and tossed it at Max, “That one is for you. Don’t lose it.”

Max stammered a moment, then said, “Umm, thank you.” Ee grunted and created two pillars of shadow and a hammock also made of shadows.

Ford grabbed one of the tents and began to get it set up. Once everyone had a tent, they all got to work making stew. This time with venison and herbs, making it taste delicious compared to the Wolpertingers. Once they finished, Ford pulled out her loot bag and opened it while Gimble passed out everyone else’s.

A silvery-white ball of silk the size of her hand plopped onto the ground with the white king and queen coin. Ford ignored the coin for now and picked up the ball of yarn, reading the notification. Item: Silk armor; quality: epic; effect: create your own clothes and design at will; effect: self-repair with mana; effect; plus ten charisma and luck; cost: one-hundred mana per shift, one-hundred mana per repair activation.

She smiled and activated the Silk armor. The ball of silk slowly unraveled itself and crawled up Ford’s arm and around the robes, she was already wearing. Within a minute, her clothes had changed to look just like they did when she arrived on the planet. A black waistcoat, ruby red shirt, and black pants. The armor then pulled the robe she was wearing underneath off and spat it out onto her lap. Ford shrugged and ruffled through the pockets to pull out the five crystal storages she had made. With a slight alteration to the clothes, she was wearing the sword crystal attached itself to her left hip, her knife crystal to her right hip next to her returning dagger, and her bow, spear, and claymore crystals on her back.

Ford set the old martial arts robe to her side, and a shadow snatched it up. She then opened up her stat screen to allocate points. She placed four points into END, then six into INT and WIS. Name: Ford; gender: Female; race: human; Grimoire: wood; class: Ruler/Sin; Level: seventeen. Abilities: STR: thirty plus five; PER: twenty plus ten; END: fifty-two; INT: thirty-four plus ten; AGI: thirty-seven plus ten; CHR: thirty plus ten; LCK: fifteen plus ten; WIS: twenty-six plus ten; SOL: sixteen.

Skills: natural: carry weight: hundred seventy-five kg, quick-witted, resilient, strong-willed, cook. Skills: weapon mastery five/five, crystal heart five/five, blood controller five/five, crystal weapon storage five/five, void storage two/five, crystal battle music two/five, blood weapons five/five, regeneration five/five, embracing pain five/five, psychosis five/five, strategist one/one, party stats five/five, targeted slaughter five/five, self-repair five/five, battle control five/five, essence ball five/five, essence mortar five/five, essence thrower two/five, essence volley three/five, essence manipulation one/one, essence enforcement five/five.

HP: five-hundred seventy-two; STM: five-thousand three-hundred four; MN: sixty-six-thousand five-hundred eighty-six; EXP: zero/four-thousand five-hundred ninety-six. STM recharge: one-hundred sixty-three per second; MN recharge: one-hundred thirty-three per second; Grimoire progression: zero of one-hundred percent. Twenty-four skill points are available.

After rereading her stats, she remembered something that Ee had said, and Ford turned to where she lay in her hammock, “Hey, Ee, you said you’d teach us how to progress our Grimoires when we got out of the dungeon. So, how do we do that?”

Ee waved a hand at them and said, “We’ll discuss that tomorrow.”

“But-”

“Tomorrow!” Ee yelled, and that was the end of it.

Ford sighed and looked around at everyone’s new gear; the only ones who hadn’t opened their bags were Kii and Mizu. Ford walked over and sat next to them, “You going to open them?” Ford asked in a gentle tone.

Mizu shrugged, “We got two of these bags after…after our fight against… we just don’t feel right about opening them.”

Ford bit her lower lip and said, “Well, let’s hypothesis about what might be in the bags. What is your God like?”

“She’s scary,” Kii answered immediately, “she has a permanent giant white smile and unblinking eyes.”

“But she seemed to be nicer than she looked.”

“Well, if she seems nicer than she looked, there should be nothing wrong with looking at the loot.”

The Twins cracked a smile and dumped out the first bags of loot. Two pairs of leather boots and greaves fell to the ground, and the twins picked them up. “Rare greaves helps with climbing,” Kii said.

“Epic leather surface boots walk on any surface for ten mana per second,” Mizu added.

Then they opened up the next bag, and a pair of identical bows hit the ground. Ford took a sharp breath as she recognized the bows were made of red horns. Kii picked up one of the bows with a trembling hand and read the description, “Item…bow of the wise man. Quality legendary.”

Mizu continued for his brother in a quavering voice and said, “When used in tandem, the bows can bend space, closing the distance between the target and the mana arrow. Only one shot can be made this way at a time.”

“When combined, the users can speak to the previous owner,” Kii finished, tears rolling down his face and a sad smile on his lips.

“The previous owner of these bows was the demon known as Frosty,” the twins finished.

Ford couldn’t help but smile, brought the Twins in for a hug, and said, “Why are you waiting? Go see him.”

“We need a little more mana for that to happen,” They explained, whipping away a few tears.

“Oh, well, next time,” Ford conceded and then turned to everyone else, “did you all level up?”

“Yep,” Lilly said enthusiastically, “having double points at level ten is qui’e nice. And now we’re level sixteen.”

“Double what now?” Ford asked.

“Every ten levels, we get double skill and abili’y points,” Lilly explained, “didn’ ye know tha’.”

Ford slowly turned to her left where Wrath was sitting, pretending to be interested in a nearby rock, “No, I didn’t. I also missed out on the double points. You wouldn’t happen to know why that is? Wrath.”

“Nope. No. I haven’t a clue. Maybe you just didn’t notice that you had extra and spent them,” Wrath defended quickly.

“Wrath!” Ford yelled angrily.

“FINE! When you evolved the Grimoire, it required some extra skill points to complete, and well, it’s not that you didn’t get the double up. It’s just that it used six points immediately, and then I was created,” Wraths spoke hastily and became sheepish by the end.

Ford sighed and got up to retrieve her coin. “I’m going to go see an asshole about a question I have,” she announced and flipped the coin. The space around her warped, and she disappeared.

***

“ONE IN SIXTY-FIVE MILLION!” Tanashi announced as Ford appeared in front of him. She didn’t react to this, drew her dagger, and threw it at him. Tanashi deftly lifted two fingers and caught the dagger’s blade between his index and middle finger. The tip of the blade a centimeter from his right eye. “I think you dropped this,” he said as he lazily tossed the blade back at Ford, impacting her right shoulder.

She fought back a scream, pulled out the blade, and sheathed it. “I don’t think I did,” Ford snapped.

Ignoring her, Tanashi continued, “One in sixty-five million against. Those were the odds of you having potential, and as it turns out, you do have potential.”

Ford bit her lip harder and said, “I’m not going to ask.”

“You, Ford, have the potential to become a God.”

“I have- nope. No. Not going to ask.”

Tanashi’s smile widened as Ford turned around, fighting the urge to ask obvious questions. “The first step is the hardest one,” Tanashi continued, “you had to make a new Grimoire, and so you did. The next step is easy; just get it to the divine level. Then you can make your world and its people, and you’ll become a God.”

Ford bit her lip and said, “I’ll ask more about that later. For right now, I need to know all possible essence combinations. What are they?”

Tanashi smiled and snapped his fingers, “All possible essence combinations have been added to your Grimoire. You are welcome.”

Ford rolled her eyes, “Thanks,” she said sarcastically. With another snap of his fingers, Ford was back in her camp. She quickly excused herself from everyone and went into her tent to meditate and read over the essence combinations for the rest of the night till she fell asleep exhausted.