~Chapter Sixteen: A Good Showing~

"I think my experiments with the limp-- that is, Miss Fenfang, prove that this esoteric cultivation method is a poor substitute for actual training and a proper education."

***

I decided not to act, instead, I stood back and watched the limpet fighting for her life.

Her first two hits against the lesser disciple were fairly effective. Necrotic damage could interfere with healing via a process similar to convection but on the level of a magical weave. I suspect that that same interference would complicate some forms of 'qi' channelling. Not to a great extent, but perhaps enough to give the girl a needed edge.

The moment the young man's mind finally kicked in and he realized that his opponent was the girl standing before him, he started moving at her.

She didn't have a dog to jump between her and her target this time, the creature still frozen out of time like everything else around us.

A brace of darts flung by the boy slowed and stopped in mid-air between them. Another advantage for the limpet.

He ducked around his needles and rushed up to the limpet who was still in the third verse of her incantation. She dropped it to weave out of the way of a straight punch aimed at her face.

The boy's next attack, a sweeping kick, landed hard against the limpet's ribs and she went crashing down to the side, then rolled out of the way of a stomp.

The limpet jumped to her feet, then flung her satchel around in a big arc that smacked the young man hard in the side with the dull thump that came from a few heavy books slapping together.

He grunted, but that didn't stop him from punching the limpet in the side of the head.

She fell again, this time with a weak, mewling scream.

"You, you idiot!" he screamed down at her while swinging his leg back and kicking down at her crumpled form.

Was it done for the limpet?

I sighed. I would need to find another test subject.

The young man kept kicking her, and she failed to react at all, though her lips were moving. Moving to form words.

The limpet spun around, her hand coming up with her fingers set in a wide 'V' pointing right at the young man's face. He glared down at her, leg-pulling back for another kick.

"...And power necrotic

I cast upon thee, Chill Touch!"

A skeletal hand appeared between them. It was the most pitiful Chill Touch I'd ever seen, with some fingers outright missing and the power flowing out of the spell so weak as to be nearly nonexistent. Its fingers, those that were there, were set in the same 'V' as her hand.

They speared out and rammed into the disciple's eyes.

The young man screamed, head twisting back as the spell continued to push into his head. He managed to pry one skeletal finger away from his left eye, but that just had the other digging in deeper until it turned the right side of his face into a bloody, wet mess.

The limpet rammed a heel into the young man's knee, sending him crashing to the ground back first.

And then she was on him, straddling him while raising the heavy spellbook I'd given her.

The book came down with a dull whump, slamming the man's head down.

He started to scramble against her, needles flicking out of his wrists and flopping to the ground. He wasn't nearly as dextrous now than he had been at the start of the fight.

The limpet screamed and brought the book down again.

The young man tried to block it with an arm, but let go of the Chill Touch only made it sink deeper into his head.

Another blow, then another.

The young man went limp under the girl.

She raised her tome one more time and brought it down binding-first atop his head.

"Well done," I said as I noted the man's life ebbing away.

The limpet fell to the side, crashing to the ground with a sighing sob. She lay there for a moment, then kicked away from the body. She seemed weak. "Did, did I do good?"

"Surprisingly, yes," I said. "The modified Chill Touch was a nice... touch, oh ho ho!"

I moved over to the limpet's side. "Can you stand?" I asked.

She made an uncertain noise. "I don't know," she said. "He kicked me a lot."

Her leg was developing some interesting colours. I imagined her back was the same. The disciple was wearing a pair of sturdy boots. No doubt made for the harsh terrain around this area, but suitable for fighting all the same.

"I feel dizzy," she said.

I eyed her, then noticed the needles protruding from her thigh. "It seems you were poisoned," I said. "No doubt nothing impressive, but more than enough to kill someone with a constitution as low as yours."

"Oh," the limpet said. "I'm going to die?"

"Everyone dies," I said.

"Are you going to turn me into a skeleton? I think... that would be neat."

I would have rolled my eyes had I any. Crouching down, I yanked the needles out of her thigh, eliciting a weak hiss, then tossed them aside before pressing my hand against her side.

"Power Word: Heal."

The spell was one so simple that even the limpet should have been able to guess at what it did.

"Minor Restoration."

And that got rid of a few status effects, notably the poisons currently running through her system. The limpet flopped back down, the tension running out of her body and her eyes fluttering closed. "Thank you," she said.

"Think nothing of it," I said as I stood back up. I would need to verify her growth, but that could wait. "Do you think we want to take on a few more of these fools?" I asked.

The limpet's eyes snapped open and she shook her head. I noticed that she wasn't looking in the direction of the body next to her. Was she still squeamish?

"Very well. Alex, please close the time-piece."

"Yes Papa," Alex said.

The stopwatch snapped shut. The world shuddered.

The hundreds of magic missiles hovering above us, locked out of time, burst into luminescence as time recaptured them, and shot out towards their targets. For a moment, there was only the sound of magic finding its mark, some spells drilling into the earth, others snapping through walls.

Then, all at once, the missiles set off their payloads and the air filled with a constant crackling, like an entire box of fire-crackers being set off at once.

Bodies slumped, and I could feel life ebbing away from every last ambusher in the area.

"Now that that's done," I said. "We should be on our way once more."

Alex helped the limpet to her feet, freeing her from the assault of her dog who seemed to be under the impression that its master being on the ground meant that she wanted comfort or some such. "I can fix your outfit," Alex said as he touched a finger to the holes over the limpet's dress.

"Ah, that would be nice," the limpet said. "Thank you, Mister Alex."

Alex beamed. "I must ensure optimal comfort for Bone Papa and his guests."

We continued on our way, the limpet rather quiet except for a gasp when she noticed a few corpses piled up around a corner next to homes with Magic-Missile-sized holes in their walls.

"The merchant's quarter is right there," the limpet said as she gestured off to one side. "And the gate is right over there."

I followed the direction her finger was pointing in and found that there was indeed a gate, one with a decently large courtyard around it with plenty of carts and a few carriages waiting. Men in simple garb were caring for the horses tethered to the carriages, while others were loading up boxes and other cargo for transport.

The merchants were easy enough to make out, they were the ones in nicer garb, though they were generally still quite humbly dressed. I supposed that when travelling you didn't need to wear your best clothes.

The moment we arrived near the area those gathered there went quiet. I didn't know if it was my skeletal appearance, the blood covering the limpet, or the dozen or so undead behind us, but something made the locals nervous. "Limpet. Go find someone who would rent out a carriage or a coach."

"I can do that," the limpet said with likely unearned confidence before she shouldered her bag and ran off.

Alex paused next to me, hands folded over his stomach in the very image of a dutiful maid. He waited until the limpet was out of hearing range before talking. "She's nice," he said.

I considered that. "She has potential," I admitted.

Alex nodded. "I hope Bone Daddy isn't too mean to her."

"Don't get attached," I said. "She's still merely a test subject."

"If Sir Papa says so."

The limpet spoke to first one merchant, then another. There was a lot of waving of her arms as she spoke, and some wild gesturing in our direction. Her growing frustration was rather obvious, but soon enough she returned to us with a proud grin. "I found a carriage that will take us, Master," she said. "It's... a little expensive, but it looks pretty comfortable."

She pointed out a carriage being hitched to a team of two horses. It was a nice enough thing, with open sides and a pagoda-like roof above it. There was room enough within for a good half dozen people. "That will do," I said.

The limpet grinned and I wondered if she expected any more praise than that.

The merchant who owned the carriage was appropriately obsequious as he asked for a price that I suspect was highway robbery, but I didn't blame him. If he was the only one providing something, he could set the price that he wished.

Alex handed him some gold coins from a little purse he hid in the folds of his skirts, and soon we were all aboard the coach.

The nervousness of the merchants around us, especially around the armed skeletons, slowly abated as my little army stood in tight formation around our carriage.

We were accompanied by three rather pale-faced men who sat across from us and who spent a good deal of time trembling.

The limpet placed herself next to me and pulled out the spell tome I'd left her that explained the use of Prestidigitation. I followed her example, pulling out one of the old tomes I'd found in the sect library and that I had yet to finish.

"Master?" the limpet asked.

"Hmm?"

"You can tell if I've improved, right?"

"I can."

The limpet carefully slid a bookmark into place. "Have I?"

I looked her way, then slid my book back into a pocket before removing a notepad. Take note of changes turned random events into scientifically valid observations. "You are aware that two small fights, even against mildly superior opponents, will not turn you into any sort of powerhouse."

"I know that," she said. "I'd need to do that over and over again, right? And I'd need to learn more and meditate a lot."

"That's certainly one way to progress," I agreed. "We'll see how you turn out once your class changes if it does. I'm operating on the hypothesis that you're unable to see the system, but that the system itself is still, essentially, functioning as it once did."

"What's that mean for me?" the limpet asked.

"It means that you're moving and groping about in the dark, with no points of reference to use."

She tilted her head to the side. "And Master doesn't have that problem?"

"No," I said. I didn't see how to further explanation would help anything. I marked down the stats I remembered from the last time in my notebook, then turned to her.

"Observe."

<A Warlock Test Subject of the Archon of Science, Level 16.>

***

Answer to the last riddle: Add the letter 'G' and it becomes Gone.

Today's riddle: The answer I give is yes, but what I mean is no. What was the question?

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