I dreamed of catacombs and friendship. Of warm rooms, laughter, and cold ale. Shifting scenes that made no sense but made perfect sense at the same time.

  I awoke the next morning feeling refreshed. The sadness was still there, deep down, but it was manageable.

  “Let’s do this!” Katarina bounced from one foot to the other.

  Her mechanical foot squeaked a lot less now that Abernathy was applying oil to it. He said that he would be able to use a special grease he could make at a workbench to fix the problem, but for now, the best he could do was apply oil periodically.

  “You’re sure about this?” I asked for the third time this morning. We stood in the middle of the waystation. The sun crested the horizon, bathing the sky in hues of orange and red.

  “Yes! Yes, for the third time, yes! I’m pumped! Let’s do this!”

  Abernathy watched, sitting and eating a bit of granola.

  Encore stood, looking up at me. “I look forward to hearing this song.”.

  “Alright. Okay, here we go. Encore, please don’t support this time. I don’t want the explosion to be any stronger.”

  “Understood, I will just listen.” He replied, sitting down. He had two tails this morning, which wrapped around him in either direction as he sat.

  I performed Kinetic Overload, pushing aside all errant thoughts and distractions.

  This meditative state of performing had been getting progressively more comfortable and easier to enter the more I practiced. I did something I had never done before – failed on purpose. Just enough to barely succeed, generating the weakest Kinetic Overload possible.

  Energy accumulated within the song, and I felt something different as I focused on Katarina as the recipient. There were multiple possibilities of where I could send the enchantment. Thin golden lines appeared as I finished the song, all leading to different parts.

  One led to Katarina’s mechanical leg. Another led to her chest. Several more lines branched and led to small throwing knives I knew she had hidden on her person.

  We had discussed this at length before exiting the water station and preparing for the test. Katarina had been specific about her desire to have the buff placed on her, and not a part of her gear. She had some idea that she didn’t want to share, just wanted to test.

  With a considerable amount of hesitation, I sent the Kinetic Overload enchantment into Katarina’s chest. Her entire body glowed with a faint, barely recognizable, red aura.

  “Wow,” she said. “I feel it, the potential.” She sprinted down the road, took five steps, and exploded from the ground as she released a charge of kinetic energy through her remaining foot.

  Her foot didn’t explode, nor did the shoe that contained it. She flipped about twenty feet in the air before descending, doing one of her double-jump maneuvers and rolling back to the ground.

  “I can control the direction of the blast!” She laughed. “It’s intuitive. How have you not tried this?”

  “I, uh, don’t punch things,” I replied. “And I didn’t think of using it to jump, but I don’t think I would be as successful as you.”

  “I have watched you for several days,” Encore chimed in, “You would likely break one, if not both, of your legs after attempting something like that.”

  The aura faded around Katarina.

  “Aw, I only used one charge. What gives?” She asked.

  “It only lasts twenty seconds,” I replied. “The timer pauses when I place an item I infuse in my inventory.”

  “Ahh, I was too excited to pay attention to that. Can you buff me with it again?”

  I complied, performing Kinetic Overload and directing the energy into Katarina. She turned, throwing a jab aimed away from everyone. The jab was infused with wind energy, sending a blast of wind out over the plains.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  She jabbed again, and the wind exploded out of her fist, tearing some of the closer tufts of grass out of the ground and sending a maelstrom of swirling energy into the plains. The explosion increased the strength of her wind punch by at least double.

  “Wow,” I said.

  “Yeah, wow,” Abernathy agreed.

  She followed with two more jabs and a kick. The jabs sent two more eddies of explosive wind swirling over the plains. The kick… didn’t.

  She lashed out with the leg that was missing, standing back on her remaining leg. The leg exploded, shards of metal and leather flying in a cone. Thankfully, she had been facing away from us.

  Katarina was blown back by the explosion, landing on her backside and sliding several feet.

  “Well, shit,” she rubbed at the red marks on her leg where the leather straps had torn free, “I didn’t think about that. Blew the new leg right off, sorry about that, Abe.”

  “Are you alright?” I asked. Her health had dropped slightly, but her natural regeneration was already bringing it back.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. Trial and error.” She smiled.

  Abernathy walked over, pulling another leg out of his inventory.

  “Wait, when did you make this?” she asked, taking the leg, “Thank you so much! Wow!”

  “I had a hard time getting to sleep last night. It is easy to make it again. I have the blueprint in my interface. Just had to do some welding, but you two were knocked out. Slept right through it.

  “I don’t have enough supplies to make you a third. I mean, I do, but then I won’t be able to work on a better version once we get back to the Guildhall, so try to be careful?”

  “Understood!” Katarina said. “Hit me with that juice again, bard boy.”

  She winked at me, and I swallowed my retort with a smile.

  “Alright. Does it hurt? When you trigger the kinetic impacts with your body?” I asked.

  “No, not at all. Except the last one when I blew my damn leg off.”

  “What does it feel like?” I asked.

  “Hmm, the… release? Happens just outside of my fist. Or foot. If I use my actual foot. Need to remember not to do that on the metal one.”

  She sat down, retying the leather straps and affixing the replacement prosthetic.

  “I can aim the energy, too,” she continued. “and adjust how many charges I use. I’ve only been using one, but it’s still strong.”

  “Why don’t we start heading back to the city? I can practice the song and you can practice using the enchantment?”

  She smiled, standing and testing the replacement limb. “Sounds good to me! Abe! This is even better than the first! I didn’t even realize the other leg was a little too short until I tried this one!”

  We spent the rest of the day traveling through the grassy plains. I practiced Kinetic Overload, which took about four seconds to perform.

  Katarina practiced different motions and attacks, implementing Kinetic Overload in ways I hadn’t considered. We developed a rhythm as the day progressed. Katarina was able to fire off a series of kinetic-infused jabs as I performed the song, reapplying the enchantment as she burned through the older one. We were able to keep it going nearly indefinitely, limited only by our stamina.

  I performed Radiant Winds as needed, restoring our bodies and maxing out my Stringed Instrument skill, which unlocked two secondary skills and another tier of levels.

  Stringed Instrument skill had increased! (50/50)

  New skill unlocked! Stringed Instrument Mastery (1/100)

  New active skill unlocked! Hastened Song (1/50)

  Hastened Song.

  Quicken song tempo, decreasing performance time while increasing performance difficulty. Increased levels lower the difficulty in relation to speed.

  New active skill unlocked! Extended Song (1/50)

  Extended Song.

  Weave mana points into performances, extending the duration of song effects. Duration increased relies on mana points consumed. Increased levels provide more efficient boost from mana consumption.

  I practiced both skills. I failed the first dozen attempts at hastened song; the rise in difficulty was considerable, impossible until it ranked up a few times. Extended song took a lot of mana, a minimum of five points. With my low pool of only 12, they went fast.

  I ranked up Quicken Song to 5/50 and Extended Song to 2/50.

  Katarina managed to avoid destroying the second leg, though we did have to stop halfway through the day for Abernathy to make some adjustments.

  “I need to account for heavier impacts than I initially thought. I should be able to refine some iron into steel to strengthen the structure…” he continued mumbling under his breath about different theories and ideas he had to improve the design.

  Before the leg caught his attention, I had seen Abernathy looking around, shaking. His eyes were wide, as if he expected an ambush at any second.

  That was a good stance to have while journeying, and at any other time, really, but he was taking it to an unhealthy extreme. It was a relief to see him lost in thoughts of the prosthetic.

  We moved much faster without a cart to escort, arriving at Verdantbrook in the late afternoon. A weight I had forgotten settled back on my shoulders as I recalled what must be done.

  Abernathy’s tense demeanor relaxed as we passed through the city gates.

  “Ahh, it is good to be back in the city,” he breathed out heavily.

  Patreon! 20 advance chapters! And there are still several slots of the Early Birb/Alpha Tester role! Lifetime discount of 50%! Wow!