~Chapter Twelve: A Need To Experiment~

"One of the greatest faults someone can do is accepting the truth as truth, without first testing the potential for untruth."

***

I wanted to begin experimenting upon the limpet immediately, but Alex suggested that we wait.

At first, I was curious as to why, but my butler indicated that the limpet was quite weak and unable to support herself fully at the moment. She, being very much mortal and of a low level, was also extraordinarily pitiful.

A glance at the moonlit night beyond the window gave me a good idea of the time. "Very well," I agreed. The tests I had in mind to conduct would be somewhat stressful. "Limpet, go rest. I'm certain Alex can find a room for you."

"I can still work," the limpet said. She was blinking heavily though, and her shoulders were drooped with exhaustion.

"No, Alex is correct in his assessment of your weakness." I turned to my butler. "Are there any rooms available in this place?" I asked rhetorically.

"The grandmaster's room is just next to the library," Alex said. "It's very comfy looking. I'm certain the young miss will be comfortable there."

I nodded. "That will do." Then I recalled something. "Oh yes, do make sure she's fed."

Alex nodded eagerly, his bonnet bouncing atop his head. "Yes, Bone Papa."

I left them to their tasks and returned to my studies. Though really, calling what I was doing studying was a stretch. The science--methodology would perhaps be a better term--That the locals used was fragmented and poorly explored at best.

When I started diving into their histories, my few initial hypotheses had to be set aside. Their history was full of grandiose statements and long-winded gossip about other sects, some emperor on a jade throne, and some tales about combating the undead and southern barbarians.

It seemed that there were a few key steps to the vague process known as cultivation.

I found paper and pen and took some notes, trying to break down the process into its core components.

Initially, a new cultivator (usually young and yet untrained) would begin to learn a martial art interspersed with training that focused on finding one's 'qi' centres. There were some differences across some of the books I found. Some spoke of nodes, others 'wells of power' and other such verbose terminology for the source of this inner magic.

Essentially, they were speaking of what I commonly referred to as 'mana' in many of my texts. That was a concentrated form of magic. Though the various texts I found ascribed strange impressions to this qi, from elemental aspects to a strange yin/yang system that was never explored fully.

It seemed as if the books relied upon common knowledge to fill in some gaps. An issue no doubt born from my lack of cultural ties with their methods.

The second step to cultivation seemed to revolve around the actual cultivation of strength. This part varied wildly.

Some texts suggested that cultivation be done via the use of alchemical reagents and potions, others through nothing but hard practice and tests of power. Still, others suggested and pointed to methods of cultivating that involved the study of various concepts.

Essentially though, it all seemed to boil down to grinding.

I had never been one to employ that method in my day-to-day, that is, the repetition of a single action to gain a measured and continuous amount of exp to level up. Instead, I always pushed and tried to learn new uses for the arcane arts, and in doing so tended to face increasingly difficult challenges which in turn aided me in levelling up.

Cultivation seemed to push towards grinding one or two specific things and growing strong that way.

It wasn't entirely wrong, but the terminology used, and the methodology highlighted, suggested that it was highly inefficient.

The final step seemed to merely be a repetition of the second but on a grander scale. That was, eventually changing from grinding a simple activity, to doing the same for something more complex.

I snapped a book shut and leaned back into my seat.

This was just normal level progression with a bunch of spiritualist nonsense tacked on!

It was... it was...

Well, truthfully, not the worse thing. There had been plenty of schools and academies back in my youth that had different curriculums and methods of teaching their pupils new skills. And while I found this cultivation method a bit slow and wasteful, it was no worse than some training regimens I had seen.

The so-called 'breakthroughs were merely level-ups, and the different days and skills the cultivators learned were just that, skills and spells and abilities, perhaps with the occasional feat thrown in.

As a cultivator started to experience diminishing returns (really, just a side-effect for greater levels requiring greater investments of exp) they would move on to newer, more difficult challenges.

This all begged the question, why were there no concrete numbers? Where were the change-rolls, the percentages for various skills, the stats requirements to unlock certain abilities?

In all the books I'd read, there wasn't a single reference back to the system.

I flicked my hand and opened my character sheet. Just the simplified version, I didn't need to do a deep dive into my stats just yet.

That still functioned. A flick through a few pages revealed nothing amiss. As far as I could tell, the system still worked. Though I could hardly level-up to test that part of it, at least, not myself.

Perhaps the limpet would be more useful than I had predicted.

A glance out the windows of the library revealed it to be early morning. I still had quite some books to go through, and I had yet to touch those in the more secretive sections. How exciting!

"I'll have to book some time to read the rest later... oh hohoho!"

I set a few off the books I'd finished to one side. Alex could sort them out later, that was why he existed after all. A big stretch had some of the bones in my back--which was all my back was!--cracking and popping most satisfyingly.

Fully unlimbered, I headed out of the library, then out of the administrative building entirely.

The courtyard was currently bathed in a nice orange glow, and would have been entirely quiet were it not for the brushing of a broom across the cobbles.

"What are you doing?" I asked Alex as I took a moment to eye his work. He seemed to be nearly done cleaning the entire courtyard of dirt and dust.

"Good morning, Daddy," Alex said. "I'm practising for my cleaning."

I eyed him some more. His maid's outfit had a few little holes in it, and some tears near the hem. "What happened to your dress?" I asked. Was it a dress or a uniform? I wasn't entirely familiar with the nomenclature.

"Some non-guests came. They wanted to disturb you for bad reasons and were very impolite," Alex said. He gestured to a little shed off to one side. "The bodies are stacked next to the wood."

"Ah," I said. "I appreciate that. Could you bring a few of them here? Or... no, better not. I wouldn't want to dirty the ground after you've cleaned it. I'll raise them in the shack."

Alex beamed at me and resumed his cleaning. "I'm going to go make breakfast for Miss Limpet soon, and then maybe I'll fix my uniform if I have time."

"Hmm," I agreed absently. "If you find any cloth I can probably spare a minute to enchant it."

"Thank you, Papa!" Alex exclaimed.

I ignored Alex and his eccentricities and ambled over to the shack. I noticed the limpet's dog (the limpet's limpet?) and the arm it had in its jaws. Opening the door to the little shed revealed a wall covered in corded wood, some gardening implements and rakes and other such equipment, and about twenty-odd dead bodies all stacked up to one side.

I considered inspecting them one by one to find good candidates for zombification but recalled that the limpet was with us. Zombies, as feral and dangerous as they were, were poor guards when you had living people to care for.

Mostly it was all the exposed, necrotic flesh. They tended to attract flies, ticks, and other small insects. The rotting meat was otherwise perfectly fine. Some people believed that zombies were unclean and dangerous, but those people had never conducted proper research into the matter.

Dead bodies were less likely to spread sickness than living ones. They didn't sneeze on people nearly as much.

That left me looking at other options. Aghast or ghoul would run into similar issues as a zombie. Mummies required materials and time to prepare. The bodies weren't fresh enough to turn into vampires, and they tended to be temperamental. The bigger amalgamations also took time and--frankly--too much effort to make.

"Let's go for a two for one then," I muttered. I could still sense the lingering souls of the recently departed clinging to their bodies.

Raising a hand, I gestured to the four top-most bodies.

"Raise Undead: Will-o'-Wisp."

The four bodies shifted just a little, then, like a gust of wind departing a bloated corpse, four small spheres of faint light formed above the bodies.

Will-o'-Wisps were, in a word, weak. But they had their uses, and they tended to unnerve some people. Also, a lack of corporality made them inexpensive to produce en-masse while still keeping the bodies they had inhabited useful.

"Move these bodies into rows," I said. "There's one I wish to set aside."

The will-o'-wisps began to struggle to lift one body at a time. Their meagre magics were far from impressive. With a sigh, I assisted them with a Mage Hand. I didn't have all day to waste.

Once the one body I wished to study was tossed into a pocket dimension--that of the sect's grandmaster, obviously--I gestured to the rest of the bodies.

"Raise Undead: Shade."

"Raise Undead: Skeletal Warrior."

I carefully stepped back from the puddled flesh-juice that remained as a byproduct of raising skeletons from still-fresh bodies. I didn't want my oxfords getting stained after all. "Right, well come on, gather out in the courtyard."

My little force amounted to nineteen skeletons, fifteen shades, and four will-o'-wisps. Not exactly an intimidating force, but I hardly needed them to be. Most people would think twice about attacking a guarded position, even if it was only guarded by low-level trash such as this.

"New friends?" Alex asked as he stepped up to my side. He was still holding onto his broom. A broom with a blood-stained handle.

"Hardly. Just fodder in case someone wishes to bother us. Can you lead the skeletons to the armoury? I'm certain they have some rare and valuable enchanted weapons tucked away. Armour too, perhaps. Get them geared up and set them on patrols. The shades can wander about, the will-o'-wisps will guide them, they tend to be more cunning than most lesser undead."

"Okay," Alex said before he turned to the skeletons. "Did you hear Papa? You skeleton sword fodder, follow me please!"

That was one thing done. Now I only had the enviable and infinitely amusing task of devising some tests for my only test subject.

***

Answer to the last riddle: Nothing

Today's riddle: What is it that no one wants, but no one wants to lose?

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