Готовый перевод Настучать в бубен / Hit the tambourine: Глава 14

Chapter 14

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Stepan did not take the promotion by investing the free points the next morning or even the very next day. He decided to take a little rest, to relax his buns after the hardest tension. It even seemed a little strange to him at first, but the revenge he had experienced was more mentally draining in many ways than the battle with a horde of evil spirits. There was something ironic about it, but also understandable. That fight had been forced upon him, but here he'd come himself, and killed people, even if many of them didn't deserve to be called such. Why not give himself some positive emotions, since he had closed the most important cases anyway? Torture Meld with tasks to develop his mind, drink wine in the inn, chat with Kirik, just lie in the snow at night, and look at the stars. All this was of no avail, but Stepan felt the vise of stress slowly releasing him, loosening its merciless grip. No one, but he should keep an eye on his cuckoo and not let it fly away to warm lands. This world will survive a simple young psycho, a magically gifted one, in general, too, but a magically gifted psycho with a System is not a sure thing.

However, he had been doing nothing, blessed and holy, for exactly forty-eight hours, and he couldn't stand it any longer, starting to put back the load he had reduced. This was primarily a test of his increased abilities, and this test in itself lifted his spirits and made him forget some of his worries. The young man had noticed before that his abilities were limited not only by his knowledge but also by the lack of development of his magical potential. A too shallow reserve, insufficient power of auric nodes, weak control, and, of course, lack of Spirit and Sensitivity, are his two main characteristics, the heart of the shaman class itself. The sudden upward spurt had an expectedly positive effect. It was felt precisely in the fact that those tricks for which he had had to fiddle around with intensified chanting, more preparation, and a lot of precautions, now worked without them. Well, at least without some of those preparatory precautions.

There was another important circumstance: since Stepan didn't mind either preparation or caution, he could jump even higher now, using the same preparation and cunning tricks. The work was not less, but it was much easier. What used to take half a day to accomplish before he had two elite properties at once was now done in a couple of hours, and what took hours was done in minutes. The Spirit was the key to understanding the high realms, and this very spirit in his performance reached twelve units, which even for a master was a lot. And he rose to three divisions at once, where each was much more significant than the previous one, and the higher he went, the brighter the gap became. In many ways, that was why he did nothing for the first few days. He was getting used to how the world around him had opened up in a new way, how the universe had embraced him as if bestowing a drop of grace on its child.

The high Spirit allowed him to draw power from the world, compensating for the relatively modest reserve, allowing him to work more closely with the spheres, pushing their laws with his own will, allowed him to order weak and small entities without calls, with a single wish. It was impossible to tell how much it allowed, both the things he had noticed earlier, just to a greater extent and something completely new! Stepan was simply lost in these changes, habitually cautious, not wishing to injure himself. But the intensity had also grown. That allowed him to understand what exactly had changed in him and his surroundings! The young man caught himself thinking that he could switch to magic or spiritual vision almost effortlessly and without the need to concentrate, very confidently adjusting the clarity and depth of each type of perception, their intersection with each other. And without magic, the world was opening up from new sides to the point that he slowly learned to look through walls, or just around him, as if perceiving the world not with separate senses, but as a whole, creating a circle with himself in the center, where he just knew. He knew that the boot had rolled under the bed without even looking under it, he knew that one of the threshold steps was loose and might crack, he knew that the threads of the seam on his shirt sleeve were slightly separated, he knew, he knew, he knew, he knew.

That's why he didn't hurry, bringing himself in full order with pleasure and calmness, at the same time testing the limits of his abilities. He intuitively, even without the help of the help, understood that he was on the verge when the System would recognize him as a senior shaman, it was only necessary to put in the last points, and it gave him a kind of pride. Mastering the new took almost a week and a couple of small quests from the System with a penny reward, which he undertook to do to test himself. Tested, mastered, and assured, began the intended remodeling of the clearing into something more comprehensible, and even made some progress before he decided to raise his attributes. He had been thinking about what exactly to raise, where to invest the invaluable two points, and what to spend them on, for a long time, and after the spurt that had happened, he was only more convinced of his rightness.

There were many things he wanted to increase. No path would be useless. Everything would have its use. Constitution, which would increase survivability and reveal more fully the aspects of working with one's life force. Source, which determines the giftedness of an individual and increases the reserve. Power, which will increase the value and nourishment of his strength, strengthens the spiritual form and the nodes of the auric sheath. Control, which will work well in conjunction with the newly taken awareness of multiplicity. Even the Resistance, which was frozen at a dismal one and, once raised, would make him more dangerous and less vulnerable in spirit form. There wasn't a characteristic that couldn't benefit, it wasn't a game after all, no matter how much the System made you think otherwise. Not a game at all, but a reflection of the real properties and characteristics of subtle bodies. All the options remained archipotent, each of them could move him forward, diversify the doctrine of development and approach to it, but in fact, the options were still obvious, like Stepan's class, chosen on the first day.

He is a shaman. The essence of his nature is Spirit, which gives power over spheres, strengthens that power, and imposes it on reality, on its underside, on its inhabitants, as well as Sensitivity, which makes it possible to apply this Spirit in the right way, to understand what it allows you to see, to reveal the hidden and highlight the obvious. Yes, any option is available and any of them are useful, but it is not for nothing that these two attributes are called class attributes for him, is it? There would come a time when he would raise the lagging stats as well if he couldn't raise them through quests, but that time would not come now. Stepan spent the next three days investing three free characteristic points, even if it was technically two. The additional free point received for taking a ten in an attribute hinted very strongly about investing one in the Sensitivity, bringing it up to the same ten.

He put it in, and then another, bringing the Sensitivity to eleven, and the Spirit to thirteen, each time taking a pause and spending at least a dozen hours in continuous meditation, trying to see and understand as much as possible, as best he could adapt to the changes. He was doing quite well, combining rather lazy calls with a gradual exploration of new horizons, and he was not surprised when another message from the System caught up with him. This time it was of a completely unfamiliar hue, the images had a different interpretation, and in general, it seemed to him as if this message-image was even a little solemn.

The Shaman class has reached a developmental milestone.

New Class: "Senior Shaman."

Class features have changed: every tenth level you gain one more talent point; bonus talent point can only be spent in the meta-skills section; unique elite-type meta-skills will be available for selection. One of the main class skills can be upgraded by one level without spending free talent points.

The choice of advanced class specialization will become available at the twenty-fifth level; available options for advanced specialization will be granted based on status modifications already in place.

Subclass choices will become available at the thirtieth level; available subclass options will be provided based on status modifications already in place.

Stepan smiled a tired but satisfied smile, complaining mentally about the way the System evaluated its adepts. He'd been in the senior shaman class for quite some time now, not to mention his knowledge. But no, he was recognized only now, though he should have been recognized a long time ago. On the other hand, such indignation is like complaining that his pearls are small and his diamonds are not cut well enough. The manner of the system to take into account any ranks and the degree of understanding of individual knowledge on the highest of the planks, on the contrary, should be a sacred cow to him! What did he care that the system did not recognize him as a senior, if he could consider himself one in fact? Well, a little bit, just a little bit, in certain directions? Now, now he could do more than a little, but it was still better to stay away from battle mages of the same rank and not to piss off the powerful assholes.

He was more excited by the mention of the possibility of choosing a subclass and specialization of the main class, but a slight resentment and irritation quickly replaced this excitement. Taking into account that status modifications would be considered for specialization and subclassing, he already guessed what options would be offered to him, as well as understood that the Autogoddess could give some gifts herself, without asking. He could only hope that he would not be handed some "Caller of Passions" by force, but would be allowed to choose one himself. They had allowed it before. He had the option of not picking that special class. Moreover, Stepan did not doubt that he would be able to choose himself. But they would just start waving a suspiciously shaped carrot in front of his face again, showing what cool development options were available to him out of the goodness of Milf heart. It seems that nothing of this kind has happened yet, but his ass is burning already now as if his ass suddenly acquired prophetic abilities!

The possibility to choose not only a property but also a meta-skill of high awesomeness at a multiple of ten levels was certainly appealing to him, especially since this choice would be a normal one, not an Autogoddess one. And even if she added something of her own, it wouldn't change the fact that Stepan would choose at least one meta-skill himself. The hell knows what option he will choose and what kind of options will be available, but he already likes it a priori very much, give him more, and you can do it right away, without waiting for thirty level.

The last in order of priority, but not in importance, he was occupied with increasing the basic class knowledge: either calls or dialog, up to a new level. It was possible to choose only one of the two, the usefulness of both areas was undeniable. They were not in vain considered the backbone of the class power of the shaman. In principle, Stepan intended to invest in the dialog, as he always did. He was accustomed to not rushing into the higher level calls without being allowed to speak intelligibly to what he summoned. Yes, the Spirit that had grown to thirteen and the Sensitivity that had crossed ten, would allow him to compensate for the lag through high stats, but it would still be an unnecessary risk. So Stepan, having finished preparing for the creation of another cloaking boundary in the clearing, - channeled excess power and spiritual reflections into an additional totem and from there into the deeper layers of the spheres, so as not to shine either in reality or in the near layers of the spiritual world - returned to the house, had dinner, played a little with the transfer of the training chair from the world of spirits to reality, and raised "advanced developed practices of spiritual dialog" to a new level, receiving "master practices of spiritual dialog".

As always with this pair of knowledge, the wave of information touched all aspects bit by bit, equally enhancing the interaction with whatever knowledge was available. The spiritual dialog of the new rank was revealed not only by an increase in the quality of understanding or the transmission of images as before, no. The change was noticeably deeper, as was the transition to mastery itself. Images acquired multiple shades. It became much easier to play with halftones, partial truth, or blatant lies, to disguise one thing as another or another as one thing disguised by another. Different and branched methods appeared, which would help to recognize such attempts on the part of the interlocutor or opponent. The skill of dialog is not only to confuse or deceive but also to subdue, to transfer the will of the spirit not only by the power of the spirit itself but by the subtlety of its use, to confuse and confuse, to change the accents of the contract to almost opposite. Here is a very significant synergy with the skills of suggestive, spiritual form and its use, as well as patchwork echo.

Methods of interaction with different spirits within different dialog paradigms. Some tricks and types of communication for combat summons, are quite different for healing ones, even if the same spirit is summoned, just for different tasks. Combat use isn't monolithic either. Calling a spirit to attack or defense. Against sentient or beasts. Against mindless creatures, or quite intelligent bastards. Work with the concepts of debt and promises to pay later, ways to persuade to work on credit, delay payments or get rid of them altogether, convincing the spirit that he has already been paid, that he has already received the necessary payment, or that he is still owed. Precise instructions to the spirits-healers, cursers, or masters of the curse to remove the curse, to charmers and suggestors, guiding them even in the smallest details, leaving nothing to chance and thus increasing the effectiveness of the work of spirits with subtle specialties, while also reducing costs.

Dosage of power when investing images or feeding the spirit, which is also a form of dialog. The ability to force spirits to do more for the same or less pay, so they are not angry or angry but still do the work. Strengthening the resonance of images through totems, spell territory, the use of the resonator as part of the overall defense array, reliance on the source, and turning it into a de facto beacon-semaphore for a variety of purposes. Up to summoning a huge crowd of hungry scum in order to organize a small and pocket magical apocalypse in a small or not-so-small town. Although, okay, just in the cities magical sources protect very well, including from such an approach to organize the destruction.

Stepan learned all this with a satisfied smile and understanding that he had not made a mistake in his choice, especially when he began to analyze the pluses to combat skills and agent work. It all ended with an unscheduled trip to the beach, to sit on the bank of the ice-covered river and throw pebbles into the river. The fact that the ice covered the river completely did not prevent him from doing this important work. Small pebbles in Stepan's hands acquired a strange shimmering and with a slight movement of his finger were sent into flight at a distance of up to a hundred meters, on the way glowing red-hot, or even white-hot. So that by the time the pebble fell on the surface of the ice shell, it pierced the shell like a red-hot butter knife, quickly cooling down in the icy water.

Further plans for the next levels were slowly emerging. It would be necessary to increase the сфдд practice, as well as to strengthen the dialog again, up to the maximum on the current characteristics. Then it would be worthwhile to take up spiritual transformation and maybe the same agency work, which could be increased to the available maximum one more time. Paranoia said that the latter should be raised right at this very moment, but he, thank the gods, has not yet so legacy, and the worldwide search for the ass of one owner of the System, modest and not arranging world cataclysms, is not yet conducted. From this thought for some reason a wave of cold drops ran down his back, as if he slipped into the river, at the bank of which he sat down on a stone warmed by spirits, making him shiver and shrug his shoulders. Trying to listen to the sudden chill, or the flash of strange intuition - for the owner of high indicators of Spirit and Sensitivity, such omens and flashes of intuitive sense of threat are not so unusual - the young man with some excitement moved the prospect of increasing the agent work a little higher in the list of priorities.

He finished his reflections by tossing into the air the same boulder, the size of a watermelon and a half, on which he had been sitting all this time, also warming it up with the spirit of the fiery and hot sphere, and accelerating it and directing it into flight with the aspects of feather and lightness. It was only when there was a resounding smack in the middle of the river, a muffled pop, and the hiss of boiling water, that he realized he had overdone it a bit. The village was asleep, and no one seemed to be wandering by the river in the middle of the night, so there shouldn't be any witnesses, especially given the brightness of the red-hot cobblestones in the near-darkness. The shaman laughed quietly, even embarrassed and ashamed, and looked at the village from a bird's-eye view, took stock of the disgruntled boatman's face - the same one who had finally recognized Meld as a nice guy - and looked out the window to see the source of the noise and went back to his place with a quick step, covering his tracks with another call. Well, in childhood many children liked to play with matches, so he, apparently, is falling into that very childhood. Although, if anything, he will tell everyone that it was he who patented a new method of killing fish with simultaneous boiling of fish soup, right in the river.

Early in the morning, after hearing new rumors from Meld that some beast had fallen through the ice on the river that night. Nodding with a deep thoughtfulness on his face, Stepan said he could go to the forest again for a while, so there was no need to worry if anything, and began to create new lines of defense. Now, with an approximate understanding of the concept of the final version of his works, the work went more cheerfully, and he was interested, himself interested, and such an attitude was always the best incentive to work, along with salary and bonuses. Since no one paid him any money, except for the System that issued currency for the store, Stepan had to compensate for everything with the pleasure of his labor. On the other hand, even if he were given a million dollars in cash every week, he wouldn't be able to do anything with those papers, except sell them as funny pictures or use them instead of kindling and toilet paper.

So, pondering whether the burning of several million eternally green monetary units would be considered a valuable sacrifice if the shaman-sacrificer knows their value, but the offering itself is worthless in this world, he finished another call. Six spirits, all strong, albeit on the border of the usual trifle, rose above the clearing in a strict circle, creating a rainbow barely recognizable even at close range, but quite a real rainbow, and then began to circle around the clearing, raising a light breeze-vortex, as well as putting their changes in the surrounding reality. Their influence created an artificial whirlpool in the magical currents, masking from the sensors of both classical magic and witchcraft. This vortex should not just appear to be a natural fluctuation of the magic field, slightly enhanced by the calls of a young shaman in the rank of apprentice, it should become such without arousing suspicion. To hide the second and much more amusing fact behind the first layer. At any moment, this vortex could be put on the afterburner, destabilizing the work of amulets, shields, or simply weaves of supposedly unkind guests, the spirits and totems in the center, on the contrary, feeding additional infusions of power, which do not need to be pumped out by force, which themselves flow into the reserves and spiritual bodies.

It will also strengthen the other spirits, but that's what totems are for, to determine by marking those to whom this strengthening will go, to unfocus the vortex into small streams and direct them not anywhere, but exactly to the right place. The same witchcraft practices had to be countered by the same witchcraft change of the surrounding earth, its reflection in the spheres: this earth was tightly bound to totems, making them, in fact, removable altars. The totems themselves were still transportable and portable, as totems should be, even if large, but as long as they were in that place, their resonance with the terrain served as both shield and amplification. Of course, such a bridge could be used two ways, and a strong spellcaster could attempt to subdue or damage totems through this same connection to the land and terrain. Only it would have to be a very strong caster, not much weaker than Stepan's shaman, and there was a defense there - simple, not refined, based on guardian spirits sleeping in the ground, on cunning traps and self-locking circles, but also very powerful. Banal poured with power to the most wow-oh-oh, so longer to take off, even if you take off. And beneath the bright and powerful protection, which a master, a true master, could simply bypass or intercept, were as thin signal webs as Stepan could make them thin with the help of his ghostly grasp and the summoned spirit-silkworm.

The six creators of the rainbow continued to irradiate the clearing and the shaman standing in its center with rainbow rays, who from the flashed association barely kept the whole connection under control, not destroying the chains of sent images only due to his super-property for simultaneous control of spirits. Yes, that's what a real magic rainbow is, only without gay radiation. Thoughtful shaman even calculated what spirits he should call to create not just a rainbow, but really changing the orientation of all under its light caught. It should not be a simple suggestor or charmer, which will rewrite the preferences of one victim, no. Area impact with reference to non-material light radiation - such a straightforward he will not even tell how to pull off, and even if he did, he would not dare to take on more levels ... many levels ... many levels. If anything, it would be his most terrible weapon, his last argument in case of a decisive battle with his own common sense!

Returning to the subject of changes installed in the structure of the clearing. Most were still related to masking and diverting attention, turning this "laboratory" into something inconspicuous and perfectly merging with the surrounding background. Specialized spirits covered the outer barrier with another barrier, blocking parasitic effluents, and masking them under the natural background, some of the specific suggestors created the effect of wandering, not confusing traces, but literally turning the brain to find nothing and "naturally" bypassing the uninteresting place. Here the second layer of the same suggestion was just set up to break the sense of distance, to change the consciousness, to deprive the will and drive insane, or even simply, to make one lie down, fall asleep, and not wake up. Dark nature spirits in the roots of trees, which will braid the persistent sleeper, drag the dying body under the ground, and feed the guardian spirits, were included in the package. He had to ensure he didn't let his inner and deadly defenses overstep the line of ordinary and non-lethal disguise, and he didn't want mushroom pickers to disappear in the forest.

A strong, very strong, and unpleasant spirit of the same suggestive type was summoned and settled in a small totem that Stepan hung on the tallest tree in his clearing. He had to deprive himself of almost all his weight, like a feather or a leaf, and then blow a stream of wind up his ass, controlling his flight and correcting his course. The totem was housed in an old hollow tree, deliberately expanded from the inside, and properly treated both by the spirits and Stepan himself through his spirit body. The store-bought wood dust of an old and very magical tree from the far north, even in the bitter cold, made his hands even stronger, but the spirit wanted just such bedding for the totem. He could demand it because it was an excellent and extremely rare specialist who created not just a deafening barrier to consciousness, but carefully diverted other people's attention in another direction. So as not to arouse suspicion or trigger protective amulets, which, in standard and even advanced equipment, are almost useless against its effects.

In addition to the main property, which only strengthened the already imposed effects, this summoning had another, much larger one. The essence did not allow itself and the protected by its will to be seen by any fortune-tellers. Of course, a good fortune-teller or clairvoyant, who can with sufficient confidence to find the right person or place, not in every state can find, and to stop such a spirit it will not work, only slightly confused. But more simple specialists, and from indirect search and without reliance on the auric-spiritual impression - he almost bit his tongue when he thanked Milfosaurus for the spiritual echo on reflex - such an essence will protect and shelter. It was not that Stepan didn't need more, it was just that he couldn't achieve more at once. Unless he binds himself to a place. If he doesn't buy insanely expensive supplies. If he doesn't stoop to blackness, hiding himself and his place behind the fate of a slaughtered victim. If he doesn't take crazy risks in summoning elder spirits.

Another call was no longer a Suggestor or Charmer - oh, Stepan smiled at Mr. Burns from The Simpsons every time he called up brainiacs for normal, not Autogoddess, work - referring to spirits without a clear sphere, but he was just amazingly good at working with methods of installing barriers from the spirit world. He put up these barriers one after another, while Stepan only had time to throw offerings into the blazing greenish flames, and with his phantom hand to throw the most primitive chunks of totems into the spirit world. The spirit itself helped to summon younger brethren, also without sphere and clear specialization, generally useless trifles, but it charged it with a part of itself. Not even "he", but "she", for this entity felt as if it had become a mother marked by it. And the children of such a mother acquired part of the properties of the one who had forcibly and without asking, strengthened this totem, creating a cellular and self-fueled barrier. Totems, having disappeared from reality were not carried away by the currents in the world of spheres, but as if to grow into it, exactly on the places where the necessary sign-symbol was carved or hollowed out on trees or stones. Such rooted points of support will exist as long as there continues to be a central structure feeding the cells.

The symbols, by the way, had to be cut not even with daggers for rituals, which, frankly speaking, were too small and weak for him, but with his fingernail, which had lengthened and strengthened like a beast claw and was also red-hot. The essence did not like obsidian or bones, so its children would also go to such signs reluctantly, so I had to twist it with the sub-settlement of the spirit of the beast in myself at the same time, and without a clear beast, this clawed and predatory something, and then polish it with a second sub-settlement, only already fiery essence. The sensations from the partially spirit-like flesh and therefore able to morph into a clawed grasp on his arm were indescribable, but they were not particularly disgusting either. The simultaneous presence of two different entities in the same body caused more problems, because they involuntarily conflicted because of the difference in perception, and Stepan had to keep both of them in check. Also, we can not forget the annoying need to remove all his clothes and climb through the forest naked, otherwise, the contact with the skin fabric began to smoke. And the clothes themselves were wearing out a bit during his stay in the new world, though he tried to take care of them, and at this rate, he would have to renew them. Well, or to buy in the store, there, as it seemed, were appropriate sections, both ordinary and armored, and even enchanted (and, optionally, armored) clothes.

The spirit was too much death and necrotic presence to leave it unattended, but he preferred to eat the offerings only after they had passed through a mixture of flame and death, like another ghost. Strangely, the spirit had no connection to death but preferred to eat the offerings only after they had passed through a mixture of flame and death, like another ghost. An unusual creature, but compliant and, more importantly, one that had nothing against complex and punishing contracts to ensure that no one would then use the bond of "mother" and "children" to bypass the barriers. Apparently, the entity didn't give a sneeze about such peculiar offspring at all, let alone remember them, connect to them, use them to merge with the defenses and make a treacherous strike against the shaman. However, this did not prevent Stepan, after the transaction was over and the sun had set, from crawling through the same snow drifts and sprinkling the signs and beacons of the totems absent in reality with a mixture of the power-saturated blood of several gifted ones, strongest alcohol and a couple of herbs to finally break the bond of "parent and child", preserving the other effects.

He had to drink the rest of the reagent, about one shot and exhaled a cloud of flame from his mouth in response. He still hadn't let go of the fire spirit, simply because he had to keep himself warm all this time. And no, he drank not to warm himself, but to close the ritual knots on himself, beginning to feel them fully, not just through his reliance on the totemic base of the clearing. Actually, Stepan's own blood would have been suitable here, not the substrate bought in the system store. But here it was already calmer for him to make additional efforts and spend than to leave his blood here and the connection on this blood with a bunch of totems. That was obvious even without the knowledge of agency work, but with them, it was triply so. Stepan never would have thought there were so many different ways to use such a connection and misstep against an isekai.

The young man sat for a while longer, resting, sipping on a mixture of wine, honey, and strengthening herbs, glancing at the next offer of the week and wrinkling his face with an involuntary toothache. No, not because it was an item from Autogoddess, oddly enough. It was a contract anchor-totem to connect with a very powerful spirit, not even an elder spirit, but a full-fledged higher spirit, albeit a weak one, who specialized in curses, large-scale and area curses that penetrated even through standard defenses and were very difficult to remove. It was not worth it to call against individual and experienced sorcerers, there are many better specialists even among the lower-ranked representatives, but against armies, besieged cities, and large units it was a cheat, imba, and perdition.

The spirit inflicted tooth decay and tooth rot, which only seems frivolous, but not when the whole army and even the weak gifted in a cluster become toothless. And not when, without full-fledged magical treatment, tooth decay and bite marks turn into rotting bones of the jaw and face, necrosis, gangrene, brain damage, and mass death. A very classy and reliable way to take beautiful revenge on a city you personally dislike and make the whole world go after you alone, nothing to say. Stepan wasn't sure that if he had had enough purchasing power - about a third of the asking price was missing - he would have held back from buying it. Because to buy this sinister shit was very much wanted, as well as carefully and well prepared to burn this totem together with the inhabitant. The price, common sense, and the understanding that even with such a treacherous blow there was a risk of getting the death kicks from the offended spirit. He already dislikes dentists from childhood and reacts to the sound of the drill with Vietnamese flashbacks.

Nothing, tomorrow this lot will change to a new one and, I have a hunch, it will be something from the Big Milfs category, so today's cause of irritation will be safely forgotten behind the new one.

* * *

The work on the clearing was not suddenly completed, but for a moment Stepan felt a slight surprise that there was no need to do anything else, no need to redo anything, no need to urgently search for a replacement for the spirit that had gotten restless, no need to send a second batch of hounds after the restless and bribe-taking smart guy, because he had managed to fend off the first one by some miracle, or anything else. It was a good time, filled with bold decisions, original use of familiar techniques, and a lot of mental swearing, which in the most difficult moments ceased to be mental. Stepan had covered the central clearing and its totems with such a dense layer of territorial and spiritual influences that the clearing was partly a world of spheres, not a boring reality. This was an idea he'd picked up from his little knowledge of the protective distorting shield dubbed the preternatural. Of course, it was impossible to drag all the totems to the spirit world, as well as the clearing, but he had created something close to the spatial lacuna, where the metric of space became a little alien. Now it was impossible to find the clearing with totems by purely physical search, even if you threw searchers with a catapult.

Received: "advanced basic techniques of territorial influences"; increased affinity with higher spheres; increased probability of acquiring knowledge and properties of the branch of witchcraft; facilitated the process of gaining control over the territory.

The acquired talent is added to the overall Player Status.

Stepan hoped a little that his work with totems would increase. But in the end, he was too much carried away by territorial spells. He did not make new totems, only improved and modified the old ones. In any case, now all he had to do was shake off his hands and make a sham, a kind of place where an ordinary apprentice shaman could call for the whole winter and part of the fall. And the young man would definitely do it, as soon as he learned new knowledge and habitually took a short day off. He deserved it. The increased talent is direct evidence. It was not surprising that he had improved, for he did a lot of work with an emphasis on the very basis of the necessary knowledge, which was always lacking, and had to be compensated for by calls of the necessary spirits, or by direct influence through the ghostly body, or, yes, yes, by relying on totems. The latter really helped and Stepan was tempted to start a new cycle of improvements, but now to develop these totems to a new level of system skill. The only thing that stopped him was the camouflage, which was perfect now, and the work with new elements would start to undermine it, especially if it was done immediately and without preliminary calculations.

He had learned his new knowledge in the clearing, laying on the ground warmed by the spirits and falling into a trance. Much of it he'd used in one way or another over the weeks, on one side or the other. Different tasks, different goals, different skills, but it was enough to let the System fill in the blanks and increase Stepan's magical erudition some more and some more. As in the last time, the main synergy came from the connection with totem shamanism, because the totem in its essence is often associated with the territory and therefore the newest knowledge is close to it. However, other directions were also not left out, including the techniques of remote influences, which unexpectedly revealed a new side. The ability to pull a part of the power over a piece of land and space to the place where the thread of control over the spirit, could be an extremely pleasant addition to the already familiar methods of supporting the retinue at a distance.

Countering curses and their imposition with emphasis on the territory, spell tricks with the same support or against it, methods to confuse traces, minds, consciousness, and perception, creating enchanted forests or other "labyrinths" in which it is possible to lose attackers or simply enemies. Using the support in the form of territory for powerful calls of the proper type, hiding these calls or in general any interaction with spirits in order to maximize the sudden impact or other impact. Accelerating gaining power over the territory by infusing reserve, reagents, one's own life, or whatever. Especially memorable was not even a ritual, but a whole methodology of how to quickly gain power over a castle, palace, or large mansion, if you sleep with its female owner (or the owner's wife), using specific tantric practices.

Healing yourself or someone else while they are within the power of territorial control, imposing mass blessings and mass curses. Methods of powerful calls, especially with the use of a full-fledged magical source, when you call at once a swarm of all sorts of crap binding them together with a common will, and the rollback from the load dumped on the subordinate territory. This often results in the fact that the earth literally drinks dry, killing plants, expelling or also killing animals and insects, mutilating or destabilizing sources, but you can for some time call as if you have, figuratively speaking, infinite ammunition.

There were many such tricks, many new recipes for summoning, and even some interesting charmers, though not the kind Stepan would have summoned. He wouldn't have summoned them, but it was possible to evaluate the approach and look for someone similar, with a different role and specialization. For example, a funny spirit and a description of the necessary ritual that allowed a vampire or a vampiress drunk with his or someone else's blood, to immerse him or her in forced sleep in a special grave where the power over the earth was extremely high, and then to start fixing the victim's brains ignoring the defense of consciousness and the natural resistance of the inanimate essence tied to blood magic. Yes, you can't bend a strong bloodsucker like that, and yes, you have to catch the victim first, - although there were ways to do it all without being noticed by the not quite-alive recipient, - yes, it's still a bit hard, but it's a fact! And no, Stepan didn't want to get a pale and gothic beauty of a couple of centuries of age and with hands covered in blood up to the top of her head, thank you, because it was somehow dangerous to get involved in gothic.

But it is a great idea for a ritual trap against the undead or even a specific exorcism, just change the mediator, remove the charmer, and call an aspectnik of the same light or life with purity, supplement it with an anchor, not on blood, but based on a curse and the remains of one of the drunken victims and it's done! If not kill the bloodsucker, then at least localize and weaken it before the battle, which is a lot, especially if it is an old and experienced creature. Yes, a mighty ancient or experienced supreme will not make such a mistake, he will clean up all traces of his meal, making the body of the drunk a useless piece of meat, and most likely not leaving the body in a visible place at all. And so, yes, even the higher ones, from the younger ones, could be picked off by such tactics, especially if they don't know about such tactics or have never encountered them.

"Call me Stepan van Helsing." The young man said a little pompously into the darkness of the night, but immediately thought back and corrected his hasty phrase. "No, it's better not to call. Don't call at all. Not at all. I don't want to get hooked on hunting deadly filth."

He ate a dinner of cold porridge and fried fish with a wild amount of horseradish as if Kirik's wife had accidentally thrown his entire stock into the dish. Tears flowed even more profusely than those of female students after watching Titanic, and his breath, already without the presence of a fire spirit in his body, was ready to start setting fire to the furniture in the house. Having breathed and resolutely told himself that it was a clear overdoing with spices, but he would definitely try it again, - and what to do if any spices are very expensive, since the Middle Ages, albeit magical, and you want to eat spicy food, - Stepan... no, he didn't go to bed, he didn't feel like it. Instead of sleeping, he played with the protection on the house until the morning, modifying it and making it as imperceptible and durable as possible. He'd still have to leave this house for Meld, so he'd let the little shit live better here, his health would be better, and his dreams would be more pleasant. Nothing outstanding, but still a decent job, on par with the older man he'd become, even in the eyes of the picky system.

He fell asleep only in the afternoon, literally drowsy, thanks to his completely disrupted sleep schedule. The young man did not resist, covered the window with the very spirit that he liked to eat light, creating a cozy darkness for himself, and turned off. He dreamed, as he always did lately, of some fierce nonsense, the kind of nonsense that one would have to try to think up on purpose. Pepe's battle toads, casting fiery Inferno on the squares, leaving only one complete ash heap, Pinocchio covered with prison tattoos, asking something about "with nose in the eye or in the ass once". Stepan poured flames from a flamethrower on him, but the flames fell powerlessly from the shining magical protection of magic partakes. The male Commander Shepard, sobbing desperately, dropped his hands into his palms and screamed that he didn't sign up for this, while the female Commander Shepard comfortingly clapped him on the shoulder of his armored suit and told him that he was strong and therefore he could handle it.

Some elements were less memorable than others, like a fantasy town where a seductive female figure in a tight black shinobi costume was quietly sneaking forward, dragging an unconscious body on her back. Others, on the contrary, were memorized even too clearly, imprinting in the head with persistent images. Here Stepan, out of breath and tired of fighting off vaguely from whom, jumps into an inconspicuous wooden door, but behind the door awaits him only half-darkness, torch lights, and an athletically built elf in a spiky gachi harness and with a whip in his hands, and this elf's face is naturally old, like that of a man under fifty. And this man says: "Looks like you've come to the wrong Forest, friend-pie. Do you know what Uncle One here does to people like you?" Stepan naturally didn't know, but he guessed, and so with the battle cry of a castrated saiga, he ran in the opposite direction, leaving the strange gachi-elf behind.

It was a dream in which Stepan had to fight off a whole crowd of people, of different races, professions, and specialties, but he only had to look at the empty faces of the assholes attacking him, and it began to seem to him that he was being attacked by some mannequins with the faces of rag dolls. And from each of them stretched invisible threads leading to the spider puppet, but he could not see it clearly, and there was no point. At some point Stepan realized that was dreaming, though he never stopped running, still trying to see his main opponent, as if it had become very important. But the image of the enemy was double, changing from an old and scary negro with an indifferent face to a sexy black-skinned elf, dressed only in silk ribbons and nothing else, with a predatory and confident grin, full of thirst to possess everything and take everything. With a shriek, a battle cry even, into which Stepan put all his strength and will, the young man yells: "Black magic! Fucking sorcerer!" and a huge and equally black piano falls on the image of a spider breaking and crushing the enemy.

He was dreaming again, but now Stepan was sneaking around the territory of the confectionery factory, covering himself with every possible perfume at his disposal. The tension is growing, his nerves are fraying, and it seems to him that he is about to be caught and will be doomed, but it is not clear to whom he will be caught and to what exactly he will be doomed, and now the moment has come. The tension is such that Stepan feels his heart ready to burst out of his chest. Fear chains him with steel chains, and then comes a sharp sound, as if the hermetic doors were locked and a whole avalanche of lustily laughing female voices of cupcakes rushed into the shop of the confectionery factory, burying the sleeping shaman under them.
кексики

Stepan woke up and gave himself a vow - to follow the sleep regime and not to break it even more, because it would be better if he had not slept till the evening, than if he had dozed off like this and almost lost his mind under the avalanche of murky images.

* * *

In general, villagers rarely celebrated weddings in the spring, at its very beginning, at least locally. It was the hungriest period when the supplies for winter had already been eaten, and the new harvest had not even been planted yet. Only in Upper Lyady the barns were literally bursting with grain, the cattle were fat and numerous, fishing was permanent and allowed not to be too afraid for a hungry stomach, and therefore the wedding was decided to be. It was the same couple who had not had time to get married last time because the unfortunate Barrel of Doom had turned the celebration into mourning. Well, and also, of course, the morons. Without the morons who decided to open that barrel, there would have been no mourning, but here, what luck, there is no need to judge anyone because both morons were the first to die from their moronic behavior. And now the village has to celebrate a new. Even if a couple of newlyweds have already lived all winter under one roof, and in general, the daughter of the blacksmith is said to be pregnant already, but the traditions should be kept.

You cannot be without tradition, for it is above all things, including reason, logic, common sense, and divine authority.

In general, they prepared for the first day of spring thoroughly, it was a festive occasion in itself, and with such a successful winter, when no one not only died of hunger but even did not lose weight, it would be a sin not to meet the appearance of Gaia in her aspect of Youth, thanking her properly for letting the Old Woman-Winter survive without any trouble. Also, there was something nervous about the villagers. Everyone remembered how the last wedding had ended, so they felt uncomfortable. And, of course, they called the honorable magician Pann to the celebration, because how could they not, since he had treated them all last time. Of course, no one was going to catch anything in Dantra. It seems even suspending fishing for a couple of days wouldn't be a bad idea. And according to local traditions, not inviting him to the wedding table would be rude, even a vagrant would be given a cup and a place at the edge of the table. And a gifted man, who had been living nearby all winter, was teaching Meld and had really taught him something.... you couldn't not invite him, people wouldn't understand.

Also, they would not understand if Pann refused to come, because he is certainly gifted, but not noble enough to express such disrespect directly. That is, they wouldn't kick him out or spit in his back, but they just wouldn't understand, they would consider him a little bit of an asshole. This the young man, who didn't care much what the villagers thought he was, realized from his conversation with Kirik. The headman, of course, said nothing of the sort, but Stepan had been given the spirits of words planted in his body for a reason. The man looked a little tired, and it was evident that he had made a lot of effort to organize this wedding, for it was his sister's son who was to be married, not strangers. Stepan, of course, had seen noisy village festivities and intrusive conversationalists in his grave, but there was no reason to refuse her categorically.

"I'll come in, Kirik. I'll raise a drink to the health of the young." From a young man, who had not even begun to shave his beard, it sounded particularly funny, and the headman caught the humor, grinning too. "I'll come by for a little while, just to congratulate you and give you a gift, and then I'll train. The night will be important and the morning, the first day of spring is not only a holiday for you, but for the spirits too, you can do a lot of things on this day. I have to make it."

Kirik listened attentively. He only nodded at the mention of the importance of the change of seasons. He already knew it from his turbulent life. Stepan was not the first to share such information with him, but the others reduced everything to "stay out of it, I'm too busy this day" rather than full explanations. But he dared to speak, choosing his words as carefully as possible, smoothing his wording and showing his diplomacy. He had this ability to find an approach to the interlocutor and not to pester him more than necessary while getting what he wanted.

"You, your magic, don't think that they are waiting for a gift from you, it will be considered a bad deed, and whoever says otherwise is a complete bastard." That is, they will wait for a gift, but silently, with hope, not demands, because it is very risky to demand something from the gifted. "You are a guest at a paid feeding, not our own. From each house, from each neighbor, everyone will bring what they can. If there is enmity between you and the relatives of young people, you can just symbolically put a coin, but without offensive connotations, like stale goose feathers, or get a beating from the whole village. A guest's attention is enough, especially from you, honorable. Everyone remembers, and I don't let the dumbest people forget who saved their lives from a shitty death."

Stepan listened to the lecture on village traditions of gift-giving with interest, and even asked a couple of clarifying questions because it was a funny topic. There were no complicated games with meanings or clear rankings of gifts, for they were not aristocrats with stable and verified etiquette. Those who can, give more, especially relatives, there is a direct competition, who outdoes whom. Those who can not or do not want, there and a trifle is enough, especially if really dislike each other. Not coming at all is a demonstration of the level of hostility, when you should be wary of walking alone at night, or else. In many cases, long-standing feuds between stubborn villagers at such events involuntarily cease when everyone gets drunk and swears to be each other's brothers forever. Well, such feuds are born at such festivities, which is also not uncommon.

The shaman didn't want to give something to the newlyweds, but he had no reason not to make some student crafts. It wouldn't be difficult for him. He would have some experience, and he would also have a chance to practice. All this could be done even before D-Day, and on the first day of spring, he could meet the dawn in the shaman's circle and meet the sunset there as well. Between these two states, he would have nothing to do, there was nothing planned, and the necessary rituals would eat up all the reserve and durability of the clearing's totems, so there was nothing special to do. It was not in the honor of a real senior shaman to be bothered for the sake of a measly crumb of experience.

Stepan successfully made the totem gift. He carved it literally from scratch, carefully, deliberately rough movements of the ritual knife from obsidian, drawing on the chump cubic patterns, merging into some vague and as if constantly moving picture. For good health and warding off random curses or no less random diseases, for warding off evil spirits, undead, beasts or even humans, for counteracting fires or carbon monoxide, if something happens to the stove, for quality heating of the house, for strong and always sharpened steel in the house and not spoiling food on the glacier. Separately screwed the block of blood communication, so that the gift could take only the descendant, guaranteeing the free transfer of the totem to a new place of residence. A little thought and built in a mechanism that would make the totem useless in the hands of a thief or robber. A little more thought and added a mechanism that would make the totem useless in the hands of a thief or robber. He thought about it a bit more and refined it, the first time he used, by the way, a rather amusing structure - actually inverting the totem in case of theft.

In normal conditions there were guardian spirits, hearth warmers, a few air blowers for air filtration, a powerful firefly-clean to disinfect and counteract diseases, and a couple of iron-workers on top, which help with working tools, stealthily sharpening or even fixing things. But this is in a normal state, as long as the totem belongs to those to whom it was given. But if the thing is to steal or just take away in an orderly manner by the will of an important boss, the spirits in the totem will be released and dismissed. But the totem will automatically attract all kinds of evil-doers and other bad guys, even strong ones, who will want to take advantage of the new owner's connection with the totem, only the thief will not like the consequence of such a connection. Then he began to modify and negotiate more gentle contracts, so without an infusion of reserves or life force, without complicated rituals, without any blackness, and with safety locks. If you don't fulfill the requirements for taking care of the totem, then the spirits in it just go into hibernation, not start viciously attacking the owners who forgot about the deal.

In the end, he reduced all the requirements only to the necessity to expose the totem to the sunlight every morning, preferably dawn, but it could be just morning, as well as to the necessity to water the totem with a few drops of wine every full moon, and a few drops of clean water from Dantra during the new moon. Yes, moving farther away where there wouldn't be a river nearby wasn't best, but as a last resort, he did make arrangements with the spirit cleaner to replace the river water with well water. Grinning proudly Stepan looked at his work and added protection against the rotting strengthening the wood and adding the ability to heal serious wounds if you put the totem on the chest of a wounded patient. He evaluated his work, thought about how to improve it, finalized the contractual basis a bit, and even thought about adding the ability to take oaths and promises on this totem, so they really work like a contractual assurance. He thought about it, prepared new reagents with a little extra from the store, and then it came to him that he had, to put it delicately, overdone it a bit.

After scratching the back of his head, looking around as if looking for someone to ask for advice, Stepan exhaled tiredly, cursed a little, and then began to work on disguising the totem as something simpler. He couldn't break the work he'd already done. The disguise was much more complicated, the spirit with aspects of mystery and illusion also settled in the totem, choosing to limit the number and quality of spirits living there, smudging their imprints and making the auric representation of the totem dimmer, so that in true vision it looked like a simple craft of "some talented apprentice". The latter took about the same amount of effort as creating the totem and all the previous modifications, but the thing was really good, and if he had plans to live in Lyadya for a long time, he would have made one for himself. Come on, he would have made a much better one for himself.

And so, two days later, having had time to perform the first part of the ritual in the morning, having caught the first rays of the spring-winter sun in the outlined circle, he closed these rays in the circle, making them wander and fly in a looped loop, leaving the caught light to infuse until evening while the necessary spirits fed these rays with new shades of spiritual meanings, dimension understanding. And then, after all, he went to the wedding and without pomp, though out of turn, handed the newlyweds, directly to the groom in the hands of a very beautiful looking totem, certifying at the same time the transfer of rights and contracts.

"Own it, Sniro, it's yours now. It will protect the house from disease and fire, keep it warm in winter, even if the stove is burning down a log and a half, and if it's bad and you hurt yourself or someone else in the house, put it on the sick person's chest, but not too often. It's not a healer, but it will do something." Yes, it will do something, and much better than a standard healer, because there are two healer spirits on the border between strong and small, but he won't say so, and he seems to have overdone it, judging by the newlyweds' faces, that's why Stepan decided to spoil their mood a little. "But be warned, the spirits need to meet the first rays of dawn or at least morning every day, they need a few drops of wine or other liquor on the full moon in the morning and the same drops of river water, from Dantra, on the night when the moon is not in the sky. If such a ritual is not observed, nothing will happen, but my gift will also be lost, the spirits will not help those who do not show them respect."

And yet he overdid it because they thanked him as if he had given them a new car in a premium configuration and the keys to an apartment in the center of the capital on top. Having somehow got rid of all this crowd and their attempts to hug him - it was enough to get a frantic look from the shaman who didn't like contacts without asking and an equally frantic slap from Kirik to the most daring - he drank a huge shot of fierce wheat vodka, which here was considered to be elite alcohol and expensive because nobody would transfer so much wheat to drink in normal conditions. The drink, which also had horseradish added for heat, almost burned the throat of the young man, who forgot for a moment that he needed to breathe and on reflex planted a healer's spirit in his body. But the poison catchers, more out of habit than out of real fear, had not noticed anything dangerous.

The crowd of villagers, who saw how the magician, who was bulging his eyes, swallowed his scream and with an indifferent look, but with the same bulging eyes, ate a piece of well-cooked pork on freshly baked bread, murmured something approving and persistently continued their attempts to drag the guy into the circle of festivities. The situation was saved by Kirik, who saw the process of transformation of the already slightly irritated face of the shaman into a very infernal mask of rage and with the grace of an experienced counter-abortionist took the allied magician out of the hostile environment before the blood flowed.

"You'll have to excuse us, of course, but, you know, it's good to have a couple of amulets for the village. We have five of them, and this is such a gift, there are no words, ugh." Stepan made a note to himself to look at Kirik's thoughts this night through dreams and, if necessary, to send those suggestors who would correct these thoughts if he had blundered too obviously. "Remember my word, you will be remembered by the grandchildren of these two, with such a gift. I feel really uncomfortable now, and they probably do too. But yes, I'm sorry for them, they're all used to it, if you're happy, then embrace them, they're all their own. But I can see it's uncomfortable for you."

So Kirik, chatting away the others who wanted to communicate, sat Stepan on the place of honor almost at the head of the table, closer only father and mother on both sides and Kirik himself, as the headman. Judging by the man's slightly nervous demeanor, he noticed something in the shaman's gaze and decided to take him away before these morons brought him to sin and blood. Stepan was very grateful to him and did not make excuses, though, in fact, he was not his namesake, physical contacts of this kind were not really pleasant to him, especially taking into account the dubious odors of some huggers, but he did not want to kill anyone and was not going to. The reason that caused his ass to flame up and the anger of his absent Scandinavian ancestors to awaken was exactly the same as before: Her Milf-hood, or rather her next assignment.

System assignment (small): to suggest to Baika, Lopra's daughter, and her husband that the best way to thank him for the gift for their wedding feast is to have oral and anal sex with the giver and then enjoy the grateful girl's body; at the end of the thank you, both victims should be completely sure that nothing strange happened, because the bride's pussy still belongs to her husband. It is acceptable to use the gifts of Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Giver of Gifts, loyal servant of Innelas Innelay.

Reward: one-fifth of the current level's experience scale; the gift of one random knowledge from previously undiscovered knowledge; a random material reward from the special collection of Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Giver of Gifts, loyal servant of Innelas Innelay.

He even wondered if there was a limit to the cynicism and some kind of cynical way of perceiving the world that this lady pissed him off with. However, he realized there was no limit to the Autogoddess's weirdness and there could not be. But the suspicion was growing stronger and stronger that no one could thank him, but the whole world owed Stepan Normal a very serious debt for the fact the originally planned Stepan had not been brought here. Because the fat one would have accepted the assignment, Stepan was ready to bet his left kidney on it. He wouldn't just accept it, he'd do it with a great margin of safety and a happy smile, and if the assignment didn't exist, he'd think of something of his own. It couldn't be said that the Earthman was somehow angry or reacting aggressively to the memories of his namesake. It was silly to blame a young man, already hurt by life, for something he hadn't done and, thank the admins, wouldn't seem to do anyway. There would be no place for him to expand on Earth, and no one would give him a System to expand.

Probably.

Stepan wanted to believe it.

After a little talk with Kirik, receiving thanks from the relatives of the newlyweds, as well as eating a few more pieces of all kinds of tasty things, albeit bland due to the lack of spices, if you do not count the village horseradish and some other spicy-salty root, the analog of which in the earthly spices Stepan did not find, the young man left the feast in the English way. Having covered himself with a light attention-diverting dome, he calmly reached home, where he changed into clean clothes and washed his face and hands in a specially prepared bucket with very cold, literally cold, water, which was strangely colder than zero degrees but did not freeze. The final stage of preparations was a very specific meditation, attunement to his spirit, and even a partial exit from the body. He seemed to be hovering over himself, still connected with his body, but with most of his spiritual essence out of it, looking at the world with material and not-so-material eyes at the same time.

Stepan steered his body like a character from a third-person video game and walked toward the clearing, there was nothing unusual about him, except that someone gifted would have noticed the ghost hovering over the partially devastated body, but there were no gifted people here. And if there were, the shaman who covered the area with tracking nets and patrolling spirits would know about it. Unless the real pros, who have nothing to do here in Lyady, were to oppose him because an hour of work of such pros costs more than the whole village with its inhabitants.

The clearing was still illuminated not only by the evening sun but also by ribbons of pure light wandering in a circle, the first rays of sunrise caught in a ring and conjured in that ring. Specific spirits slowly flew along with the ribbons along the same route, transferring their energy and part of their aspects to the light. Stepan assessed the processes taking place, analyzed everything he could, then undressed and entered the circle, letting the ribbons ovate themselves like mummies before returning to the same route. The quiet throat chanting kept gaining and gaining strength, as did the trembling of the spiritual body. Stepan the Spirit acted with his two ordinary arms, having lengthened them a little and added joints to the same elongated fingers, and with two extra limbs, turning them into multitools, which he used to work both with the outlined circle and with the ribbons that flashed brighter and brighter.

The singing reaches its limit the moment the sun begins to set over the horizon, and the moment the last rays of sunset fall into the same trap as the first of the dawn's rays it falls silent, leaving the body and allowing it to slowly settle to the ground. A special air spirit with an aspect of, hard to believe, feathers and pillows was useless in combat. However, it was surprisingly good at using his elemental sphere in all sorts of mundane details, like having to pick up a fallen man and gently lay him on the ground. Stepan in his spiritual form doesn't even look at that. He tries his best not to let the merging light of dusk and dawn ruin the ritual and deprive him of the well-deserved contract he had spent so long preparing.

The chanting was gone, but the reserve was running out even faster, forcing him to use the system's cheater replenishment in an instant when he had less than a third of it left. It was absolutely impossible to feed on totems right now, the power for the ritual had to be infused from his reserve, to remain exceptionally pure. Still, the young man underestimated his gifted meta-skill realizing how much this thing could be useful in such specific conditions. The very, very hard hours expired minute by minute, demanding more and more attention, but the infusion of power had temporarily stopped, all that was left was to keep concentration and not to spoil everything at the last moment, because it would not be possible to make a second attempt until next fall. The sky was as clear as Stepan's contract with a couple of strong weathermen, which had dispersed the already sparse clouds so the moon was visible and shining brightly.

His personal Lunar and two others, contracted with considerable effort for this particular ritual, helped with the rays of moonlight, just as the Solar Spirits helped with sunrise and sunset. He had divided the solar spirits into groups, those who helped with the sunrise and those who helped with the sunset, and they helped keep the rays caught in the right state, and now the threads of white-gold and red-violet were joined by the light blue rays of the moon. A new infusion of the reserve, generous, to empty his aura, and then, before he felt sick with exhaustion, before ill health interrupted the ritual, he reapplied the meta-skill. It had been well over an hour now, the skill had replenished the reserve fully, not three quarters, so the shaman who'd been stoning his invocation felt reasonably confident.

But his reserve had increased by two characteristics. And these two units added up to a total of so much that the reserve was not multiplied by three, but by two for sure... But still, it was not enough, this ritual was very demanding to his own magic, it did not accept neither accumulators nor feeding from totems or sources, only you, only your own light, which you let through yourself and make yourself. That is why few of the shamans, even of his current rank, confirmed by the elders, can successfully summon what he is summoning now - the shamans grow the sources' reserves much more slowly and reluctantly. They have all their training and development methods set up in such a way that the amount of reserve is quite secondary to them. Of course, the world is not a game, the System here is only Stepan's, and the volume of forces still evaluates any gifted person. But the brightness of the Spirit serves as no less powerful "certificate", but it is useful to a shaman not to mention the fact that his reserve is already quite developed, as a full-fledged adept of a classical and energy-intensive school of magic, like Pyromancy.

So, praising himself and trying to convince himself that he was not a bottomless bottom, but a man, almost an alpha male, especially with the gifts of the Autogoddess, the young man waited for the key moment. All the ray-tapes are tied together, twisted into a Moebius spiral, freezing in this form, and the Solar and Lunar spirits go away. In front of what will come now to the call, it is better not to shine them in every sense of the word. The call, the final part of it, goes nowhere, but from nowhere, this call is answered. The light of the moon and stars, any light at all, disappears, and absolute darkness comes, not darkness as a concept, but the physical absence of light, any of its manifestations, and this darkness comes even in the spiritual world, where colors and radiance are much more than usual. Complete blindness is not only visual but also magical, even magic vision sees nothing, as if the shaman was placed in space. Well, or in some black box. Stepan reflexively suppresses the desire to strike towards, break through the veil with his spiritual body, and call the guardian spirits, which are quietly waiting for their moment but do not do anything stupid. He would fight back, and he would tear the veil, moreover, having prepared for it in advance, he could even kill him with his support and at his place of power, but he called his interlocutor not for that.

The shaman mobilizes his will and slightly presses the still invisible luminous ribbons, shifts them closer to his essence, saturates them with himself, and, behold, their light becomes visible to the eyes. His guest in this light is also visible, showing himself in all his splendor, revealing to the spiritual eye his ghostly body, reminiscent of a sea octopus from the deepest hole of the Mariana Trench. A strong spirit, almost on the very border with the elder, and at the same time very, very powerful and dangerous, the closest analog of which can be considered that terrible bear, which Stepan once tried to eat. Only the sprut was more contractual and not even particularly evil, just whimsical and thinking so that without a developed spiritual dialog he would not understand Stepan, and Stepan would not understand him.

This entity was still weaker than the notorious Creep Bear in a direct confrontation, not as ultimate, but also very strong, both against spirits and when working in the real world. A set of exotic abilities based on the animal and water spheres made him very dangerous, but his main strength was his contact with the sphere of light. Yes, yes, that's right, not darkness, but light, which this something fed on and the absence of which it used to create its blinding field, which turned off both vision and magical analogs of perception, and a lot of other ways to perceive the world, except that only hearing and smell only muted, and everything else, including the sense of touch, top-bottom, and perception of vibrations was also muted. To see this miracle is possible only in the light of the moon, sunrise, and sunset at the same time, and the maximum pure light, no recordings, pulled from memory, or created illusions will not help, you will have to seriously strain as Stepan, or bypass blindness with skill and sheer force. The young man had achieved his goal, after all, with a slight smirk at the phantom form extending a looped ribbon of light toward the guest. The entity was not evil, not even dangerous, they had both made preliminary non-aggression pacts, but still, the young man was nervous, too memorable was that fight with the bear and the rest of the gang.

for you

accept

conclude

The images on Stepan's side hang in the void as if the spirit is thinking one last time about whether it needs a contract like this, but then it makes its decision. A pair of tentacles gently close the ribbon around itself, and then the light seems to be drawn into the perfectly black surface of the entity's body, as far as it is possible to perceive color in the spirit world. In reality, it would indeed appear as a black octopus, only no one would be able to see it clearly anyway. The spirit absorbs the last drops of light, but it does not disappear from view, on the contrary, it becomes much clearer and therefore more intimidating, in size and perception it is even larger than a bear, although not so armor-dense. Stepan exhales with relief. Since he could see this spirit and would always see it. The most important part of the transaction had been successful. The triple light had been assimilated by the entity and only formalities remained.

accept

The sprue slowly and leisurely leaves reality and the layers close to it, going back to where it came from. Powerful, tenacious, able to use some pretty serious tricks, extremely confident in manipulating its spirit flesh, able to poison its victims, very stealthy, and able to penetrate defenses. That already makes him deadly. But the most important thing that he could do, even to an older spirit like the one protecting Evil Tit, was his cloud of darkness. It extinguished any perception, and almost all opponents of a comparable level, except for very specific and, often, no less cheaters, became almost defenseless. Of course, Stepan had to wait for the day of the change of seasons, try very hard with the ritual and preparation for it, buy some consumables in the store, and lay himself out to the bottom twice, which would have been unrealistic without the meta-skill, but it was worth it.

After all, it wasn't just a one-time deal for one or two summons. The spirit was very fond of this kind of triple light, the kind that couldn't just be made, and the recipe for its creation was not known to anyone in this world except the system's bearer. No, the contract was not an ordinary deal, as Stepan had made, even with powerful entities, quite confidently and without such a mess.

Received: "Strong Spirit Contract: Sneaking Reflection"; increased affinity with animal, water, and light spheres; slightly increased resistance to blinding attempts.

The acquired talent is added to the overall Player Status.

Thirty summons per year, lifetime service with the possibility of transferring the service to descendants, once every ten years it is necessary to repeat the ritual of the gift of light, but if it is not carried out, no penalties are not introduced, just freezes the contract until the ritual is not renewed or the shaman dies. Of course, this is not a system cheater contract, which can not be updated at all and does not feed, you need to make some effort, but still very good, powerful, cool, and a lot of epithets. A legitimate reason to be proud of himself, yes, but he also beat out in the contract terms for a more complex ritual with the same rays of light, but much more diverse. He couldn't gather that light from several points of the world, preserve it, blend it together, and only then present it to this gourmet, but he would do it in the future.

And will receive eternal service without further obligation from the spirit as well.

In general, he had been very "lucky" with minor knowledge contracts during the winter, which remained after the class rank increase and the completion of work on the clearing. Well, he deliberately dealt with them, simply and safely transferring some of the strongest elements of his retinue from one-time contracts to full-fledged service. The kind of service displayed in the system status shows the awesomeness of one particular shaman. And this Sneaking was the third permanent contract he had received, but both of the previous ones, with the Lizard and the Milker, had been so simple and trouble-free that Stepan wondered why he hadn't done it before. He concluded that it was only because he didn't need it before, he had enough to do, to grow in breadth, not to replenish the status lines, but now, winter began to end, it was time to think about leaving for new places, and so Stepan began to gather a loyal squad.

Minor knowledge: contract with an elder spirit: Sleepwalker (DAR); contract with elder spirits: Shroud of Touch and Creator of Decisions (DAR); contract with strong spirit: Eater of Diseases; protection by distortion of the antechamber of spheres; contract with strong spirit: Cheesh'sh'shuya; contract with strong spirit: Jolly Milker; contract with strong spirit: Sneaking Reflection

The Lizard, whose real name-image was impossible to pronounce or even to write down if not to use the system images hinted from the very beginning that he was ready to serve with a permanent contract. Stepan had to go broke again on reagents, which were purchased through the System Store - that's why he didn't look at the elite offers of the week at all, so as not to get upset - and also recognized the spirit's right not to make any deals for the blood of his descendants, only for the summoner himself as if that was a problem for Stepan, honestly.

The summoning is every five days, not more often, and unused summoning is burned, but additional payment by the reserve will allow summoning a lizard outside the contract, and it is much cheaper and very quick, with the most simplified call. The contract is renewed once every five years, and the conditions are the same. If there are no necessary gifts, which are enough just to throw into the fire and accompanied by a minimal call, the contract is simply frozen until a new offering or the death of the shaman. In principle, Stepan had enough skill and currency to buy eternal service without additional complications and upgrades, but, damn, it was expensive. And the earthling didn't need this particular lizard that much, because he had every reason to believe that in five years he would find more necessary and powerful summons, so there was no reason to overpay now.

It was a funny thing with the spirit of coziness. A completely unspoiled thing was surprisingly happy to sign such a contract, and it cost the shaman much cheaper than expected, though not for free. The spirit did not have a name, the entity simply did not realize the need to have a name, so the Ыystem named the new contract as it caught in Stepan's subconscious. This contract was eternal until the death of the shaman and his descendants without the hassle of regular offerings. But restrictions were also in the assortment. The spirit could be summoned only in the place Stepan considered home, and the spirit itself served the place, the house, but not the shaman. It could not be summoned while moving through the world, nor could it be invoked in battle if the enemy did not come home. But for such an entity with such a great talent for mass reinforcement of small and point strengthening of strong spirits, such trifles could be considered a normal payment. Especially, since Stepan had no intention of taking the fight where he had no fortified position and no prepared line of defense. Unless he attacked from ambush first.

Actually, the work of concluding and certifying such eternal contracts, of drafting the letter of the coming agreement, is no less complicated than the process of call and summoning, frankly speaking. Spirits are still bastards, at least a significant percentage of them, and if you make a mistake in the formulation of the flow of images, the creature may well count ... stuff. Like the fact that if the shaman dies, then his descendants who do not bring new gifts, and use the old contract, can die too, to relieve the burden of responsibility. And some of them will help the shaman to disappear in their free time. The most advanced ones will even be hired by the enemies of the shaman, will leak all the data about the tricks and cunning of the employer, will get paid, and then will, figuratively speaking, eat popcorn, while the loser will be cut in his sleep, having passed through all the protection.

In addition to the small knowledge tied to the contracts, Stepan managed to raise one full-fledged knowledge and got a boost to a random meta-skill. A consequence of completed quests, of course, not from the Autogoddess, but the usual ones. Milf also offered all sorts of things, including one average assignment to organize a real orgy between all the pretty women of Lyady and Stepan, and the orgy had to be arranged right in the middle of the village, in front of everyone, paralyzing the men and then, when they finished watching, erasing their memories (optionally, it was possible not to erase, just banned telling). Stepan habitually sent this task away, although the maximum closure offered as many as five items from the elite list of the store, with a choice of twenty options, and a point of characteristics on top, in the most underdeveloped stat.

The two normal quests were both small but quite challenging, he thought. The first one required a permanent contract with a powerful spirit. It was closing after the contract with the Lizard, but the second one... The second one required summoning a very powerful beast spirit at the maximum distance from the clearing without leaving the clearing. The summoning was really difficult, although the spirit could be chosen by himself, it had to be of the beast sphere and not below a certain level of power. He had to sweat, but he did it, watching a cheerful and bloodthirsty ferret tearing out the throats of a slightly mutated pack of some kind of wolf-like creatures, or just wolves, but very large and strange. And then put even more effort into getting the satisfied ferret to scramble back and not turn a piece of forest into his hunting grounds, having taken up residence in the corpse of a beast dying from his spiritual fangs. He managed it, though not without spending zero reserves and having to renew it with the power of his meta-skill.

From the knowledge, the "basic foundations of fast calls" increased, becoming an advanced foundation, making the shaman chuckle merrily. Long ago, when he first came to this world, he had taken this talent to enhance his combat abilities and had even used it quite successfully, but that was then. Now, when he had such a powerful retinue that he was ready to come to reality at the snap of his fingers, this talent was used mainly to simplify long ritual chanting, at the cost of pouring more reserve or overconsumption of reagents. In fact, this was one of the main uses of this knowledge. Although the original combat knowledge was not to be forgotten, especially with the acquired property of multiple awareness: with it, the idea of summoning mass and fast with the simultaneous shuffling of newly summoned people, who would become a shield and mass for the normal retinue, took on new features.

In terms of synergy, the knowledge turned out to be quite compatible with that facet of healing which requires immediate reaction and stabilization of the patient, when everything is decided not in seconds, but by fractions of seconds. And it is possible - even necessary! - calmly spend a large share of the reserve, completely inefficiently, but effectively stopping the dying process in order to heal oneself later with specialized entities of high rank. The response when working at a distance was also greatly reduced, the method of rapid call itself allowing to send the necessary images without accompanying delays or reducing them to a minimum, especially with the support of totems and terrain. The same support could also drastically accelerate any action at the expense of large expenditures of not even the reserve, but the resource of the totem and the subordinate territory. It was a risk of damaging his creations, but usually in situations where such techniques were employed, such problems would be the last thing on the shaman's mind.

In terms of brainwashing, it revealed a methodology for the accelerated creation of slaves. Combined with undercover work, this approach unfolded in a whole bunch of combinations using disposable involuntary agents, decoys, and traps, which was still figurative cannibalism, but effective. The skill of combat call, for which knowledge opened up a lot of tricks and techniques, but, however, much less than expected. With his current retinue and skills, almost any battle would begin with the summoning of an already contracted and always retained retinue, rather than an instant summoning of something worse.

It is necessary to either speed up the fast calls to mastery or not to show off, because this knowledge, the further, the less it resembles the knowledge of combat, approaching a universal amplifier of certain directions. However, Stepan had studied a number of techniques created for the quick search of the enemy's vulnerability and the equally quick summoning of a suitable spirit to strike that vulnerability very carefully. Of course, his retinue was growing and growing, and it would eventually become difficult to find an enemy against whom he would not have a suitable summoner, but all sorts of things happen, and one should be prepared for them.

The meta-skill had failed him this time. Stepan was very upset then, because the assignment was nowhere near Autodivine, but raised to a III the damn lecherous development. Even, maybe, he would have gotten drunk, if he had time for it with his schedule. The " lecherous development III" that had been increased to a new level had not only increased the amount of experience gained from any lewd and lascivious actions, including even thoughts, fantasies, looking at pretty girls, and the use of spell magic for lewd purposes. No, at rank three there was an additional feature. Now, having sex with a partner, the young man received a kind of vision-understanding of what to do, to play out fantasy. For example, to spank his lover's buttocks or to take her in a certain position, and in return for this he could get some small reward. A little experience in addition to the already received or some material reward with characteristic features, and the latter will not appear in mid-air during the process, but only when the will of the player "manifests" it in reality, even after a couple of days, but not later than a week.

No, if he ever got into a full-fledged relationship and there was nothing excessive in the assignment, he wouldn't mind it in principle. But he had a suspicion that the conditions of such micro-assignments would also be in the style of Milfosaurus, - at this moment, for some reason, the same Autogoddess presented herself, only in the concept of a giant lizardцщman, not a human woman, which made Stepan chuckle mentally, - so he would not want to accept and fulfill them. Otherwise... well, a wasted point, where from the pleasant only that the line in the status was missing the mark "GIFT", which slightly raised the mood. Of course, he wanted to get a boost to the same reserve replenishment, bringing it up to a three, or transferring something from the one he'd already gotten to a fourth level. Yes, now he could increase meta-skills by another rank, there were enough characteristics. Even the gifting could be pumped to a new level. This made him think and wonder about how to further develop himself, whether to sacrifice a couple of knowledge to raise the same "system assignment" or "peaceful development", which are bound to become even more powerful at the fourth rank. On the other hand, too difficult tasks can become a danger to the good, even definitely become such if there is something impossible or excessively difficult to perform.

Thoughts, doubts, and decisions, and he can only ask for system help.

At times like this, you can't help but think that the idea of going to some dwarf king and elf queen with the proposal "Take me to work, just so that I have a cozy bedroom with a soft bed and unlimited access to the library" is not so stupid. It's not stillborn, that's for sure, yes. But Stepan couldn't predict how anyone would react to such an offer, but he assumed that he would either be fucked or killed out of precaution. It's in a fun manga from the inventive Japanese elven women, including queens, can be fucked by a random pack of goblins because she took their word for it, but in the real world such an elf, even if she was a queen, would rather fuck a fellow isekai. And not in the way he would like it.... involuntarily recalled images of half-forgotten dreams, where long ears also flashed in various qualities. No other way, the subconscious mind was playing tricks on him, and Stepan had consumed too much literature, cinema, and samples of the game industry.

Or, as his namesake would say, offensively few.

* * *

The contract with Squidward Plus, as Stepan called the battle octopus, brought his experience to five-sixths of the new twenty-first level. It was the slowdown in experience gain, which came without warning after crossing the twentieth level. With such a limitation, even the "peaceful development" that had been brought up to three was a bit slow. But that could be assessed on the downside. He had almost taken the twenty-first level. Spring was coming more and more often, and Stepan had to deliberately dry the ground on the path between the clearing and the house, so that he wouldn't fall into the slush and mud. Quite quickly and, this time, without unnecessary excesses, having created a fake call place, the young man took this breakthrough seriously, concluding many contracts with small and a few strong spirits, even a couple of suggestors called and brought to the contract, already beginning to think about charmers. Experience for the call of some senior spirits of this sphere will give a lot, and to call another senior, the guy is not yet able to.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the barrier had been broken in just four days. Noticeably sooner than he would have had to go to extreme measures. And, as had become a tradition: one more regular training session, two summons of exotic small spirits from the shadow realm with aspects of stealth, communication, and sight - spy-watchers that could become a beacon for sending strong fighting spirits to their coordinates - and then the system signaled the acquisition of a new level. Stepan successfully finished the call, made deals, sending one of the spirits to the common totem, and the other to one of the elements of the bracelet, and only then sat down on a specially installed for this purpose and warmed by the spirits stone, which before that had to be lifted from the depths of the earth by the will of the spirits. Only then he accept everything the System gave him as a reward, including also...

//gift of mine

...that he could do without.

Received: "Contract with a Senior Spirit: Joy of the Waves".

The acquired talent is added to the overall Player Status.

It had been a long time since Her Preomilfeischestvo had "pleased" Stepan with free and very useful contracts of the highest class, which were so multifunctional that they were like a human-Swiss knife, only three times cooler. Putting aside irritated sarcasm and no less irritated attitude to another surprisingly high-quality contract with no less surprisingly strong spirit, which is still useless a little more than completely, the young man began to deal with another suitcase without a handle. Only the Autogoddess has these suitcases covered with spiky dildos, and it's not a pity to throw them away, but it's still unrealistic if you don't tear your spirit and aura with traumatic means.

The new contracted entity was a little stronger than the aforementioned Sleepwalker, a mix of water and animal spheres and a very strange suggetor with non-ordinary aspects. You couldn't even tell what kind of animal it was, but it was very professional within the contract, and there was no point in arguing about it. The image of the spirit had a clear form, as already mentioned, in contrast to the same Sleepwalker, and this form belonged to a fish beast. This creature could very discreetly and skillfully raise its rod upward, to the smaller layers of the spheres, or even directly into Reality, affecting the chosen victims.

Three drafts a month. Unused ones are burned off. The draft itself is extremely simple. The contract is as reliable and precise as possible, as the system usually is. This essence could kill another spherical in a vacuum master of combat magic, or even a young magister if it struck suddenly. But a fish of someone else's dreams doesn't attack otherwise, only on its own terms and always ready to get away from a full-fledged battle if it becomes even slightly dangerous. Alas, - here's the odd thing, it never happened! - but a new contract could only be called into battle on the same terms as past gift contracts. That is, only if you were able to summon them yourself with a full-fledged summon, not a contract call, and in the same standard way of contracting. Having once again evaluated the "fish", its images, and the character following these images, Stepan clearly realized that he would not call this shit even if he could - he would eat it. He would find a way to bypass the protection and devour it, he couldn't help but devour it, because that was its nature, which made it strange that the system and the Autogoddess had been able to draw up such a contract with maximum protection for the summoner. Although, "impossible for Stepan" is one thing. "Impossible for the Omnipotent System and Omnipresent Goddess Milf" is a bit different.

Returning to the contract: the spirit can be given a target, as usual, female and beautiful-sympathetic by the standards of the shaman, after which the sinister fish, figuratively speaking, gave a salute and crawled to fulfill the mission. With its fishing rod, the creature connects to the subtle bodies and mental field and then begins to change them slightly, barely noticeable. As a result of this change, the female victim begins, how to put it mildly, to cum under unusual conditions. Involuntary and very powerful orgasms are always sudden for the victim and are not realized by her. The victim realizes that she has just cum and it is nowhere normal, but immediately brushes this thought aside, not forgetting, but ceasing to remember. Also, during orgasm and for about a minute afterward, the victim's mind is in a softened, relaxed state in which she is likely to agree to any proposal, as long as it is properly phrased and does not go against key aspects of her personality.

In the basic form of the contract, the pleasure always comes when it will not threaten the victim's life, even in public. However if in a public place or during a conversation the victim rolls her eyes, tenses up, and breathes heavily, twitching a couple of times, then in private everything will be much louder, wetter, and more obvious. The default effect is random, activated from two to a dozen or so times a day, guided by the algorithm embedded in the victim's subconscious. But it is possible to put specific settings: by some word, phrase, or sound, by a visual image, or even by a thought of the victim, so just thinking, say, about a particular person, immediately causes a reaction in the mental body, the transition of this reaction to the aura and the victim's aura itself will be distorted to cause the release of the physical body.

Well, with some hesitation, Stepan recognized this contract as zero point one-hundredth of a percent more effective and useful than the previous ones. In a purely theoretical case. If he lost all the marbles, this contract could be used to create not a submissive slave, but a window of influence on a powerful woman, condemning her to spontaneous orgasms, which would become less and less frequent if the influence was not renewed. Well, or initially put a hard trigger to activate the invested non-curse strictly in the given conditions. In general, everything was clear with this spirit. It was immoral, but at least it was useful, and it didn't even piss him off so much, as if a little bit of sense in the circle of madness gave him a chance to stand firmly on his feet.

After wiping away the sweat of labor and returning to the house, Stepan cleaned his mud-covered boots and the rest of his clothes, ate dinner, and thought about how he would spend the rest of the day and evening, but he began to slumber again. His attempts to restore his sleep patterns had been quite successful, but sometimes he still had to sacrifice that sleep and its patterns, which resulted in such bouts of drowsiness. Too tired and having decided in advance not to invest his talent for at least a couple of weeks, or even to wait for a new level, Stepan lay down on the bed, closed his eyes, and gave himself a vow to sleep for at least five minutes, immersing himself in a whirlpool of strange dreams.

He dreamed of the three pigs, taking up a fortified firing position and firing off a pack of sinister werewolves with machine guns, automatic weapons, even a mortar hidden under the roof of their stone house, and who knows what else. The well-coordinated trio even managed to inflict losses on the werewolves - not just werewolves, but werewolves in epaulets, though the insignia could not be recognized - but then the armored vehicles pulled up to the werewolves and the circus reached a new level. Another dream transported Stepan to a huge, gigantic multi-story building, not some self-assembled megakhrushch, but a real paradise on earth, only without land. Spa salons, health zones, parks with artificial sky and sun, numerous restaurants, and live music, but the young man felt superfluous at this celebration of life, being dressed in a gray uniform with lead inserts and armed with a strange mixture of rake and automatic shotgun - they looked at him like an idiot, that's for sure.
Оборотнив погонах

I dreamt of a huge and pompously decorated hall, in which a no less pompous man was awarding some young and much less pompous man with an aura of giftedness, and somewhere there, in the crowd, but perfectly visible, a pretty girl, not a Yakut or something like that, was looking at him. The surroundings reeked of classic elements of "five o'clock in the fog" and Victorian style, and there were guards, both obvious and not so obvious, armed with quiet firearms, albeit outdated. Mentally wished the guy success in the service and in his family life, and Stepan mentally blessed him for his exploits, his wife for her patience, and her child for becoming an archmage at least, and simply wished him to leave. It worked - the strange place immediately disappeared, and dozens of cats armed with markers started running after the dreamer, who, he knew for sure, wanted to draw Charlie Chaplin's whiskers on him, so that he turned into a cat too, but not just a cat, but a real Catler!

The young man ran. He made deceptive maneuvers. He called for heavenly punishments and a troop of pink ponies on drop-pods under the command of the rainbow generaless-unicorn. But he was still driven, deprived of maneuvering, and closer and closer the markers reached his face, he still fought back and yelled, shouted with a battle cry of anger "Nein! Nein! Nein! Nein! Nein! NEEEEEEEEEEEIN!", feeling himself being dragged somewhere. The hammer already pounding into the wood, which would be used to hammer the nails in the box in which he would be stuffed for some unknown purpose. Stepan strained his last strength, rushed forward, and... woke up falling from the bed and hitting the hard floor with his knee. He didn't have time to utter his favorite remark about the nonsense of the dream when he realized that there was a real knock at the door, and a rather insistent knock, which was the reason why he had dreamed it in his dream, the images of which were already fading into the oblivion of unconsciousness. Having thrown on his pants and shirt, the young man barefooted went to the door and opened it with such a righteous and angry face that Kirik, who was behind the door, even stepped back a little when he saw this anger and righteousness. However, the headman quickly pulled himself together, and Stepan regained control over his emotions, realizing that this man would not have made him angry just like that, because he was understanding and polite, especially with those who could punch him, and Stepan was exactly what he thought he was.

"Your Magic, forgive me for interrupted sleep, but there's trouble in the village. A boat has docked, and with them a wounded man, that is, a wounded woman. Seriously. It's not just a bruised finger, we need a healer." Kirik said in one breath and somewhat hastily, and then in a slightly different tone he added what he had said. "The girl is gifted, honorable Pann, from the crew of Schirm the Gulash. Their boat has docked. The sub-deckers go under it, good rafting on the river between Brosm and Kvar-Imalt. The piece is not the tastiest, but the man is respected, and most importantly normal, without a demon in his head. He keeps his men from doing mayhem, and he keeps others in line. He's not a wave-cutter, nor a humanbuyer. For that, I can vouch, but under him is only sub-deck merchandise, that is, contraband, no more. His river-knowledge woman, who makes routes and catches currents, is dying, and half the village knows you are a healer."

Stepan grew more and more gloomy with each word, and he had already managed to reflexively summon the spirits of the words directly into himself, understanding much more from what he had said than the headman had time to say. Even more than he wanted to say. Subdeckers were really smugglers because of their well-known and long gone beyond the narrow circle of the initiated manners of hiding valuable and undeclared goods in special hiding places between the deck and the hold. Wave-cutters, by the way, were called river pirates, for their characteristic manner of swimming out on small and fast dinghies from a cozy backwater against the waves and river current, taking a heavy and much more massive merchant ship in pincers. Humanbuyer was the name of the local river version of slave traders for the fact that they formally bought people on the shore, both from any criminal element - which caught the goods - and from parents, if they give up the extra kids. According to the local "thieves' river code", as Kirik once told him, they sold debtors, rats, losers and other "deserving, guilty" people as slaves, but in reality, of course, they caught whoever they had to, covering themselves with tales of their nobility only in front of the morons who eager to hear it. No one would refuse to catch a solitary traveler or a girl who had gone out to wash her laundry, because that was their job - Kirik didn't like these types, he truly hated them.

Now the headman found himself in an uncomfortable position. Despite what he had said, he did not have much faith in the honor and integrity of the honest and decent smuggler, nicknamed Schirm the Gulash. Rather, he knew for a fact that this scoundrel categorically disliked to shit where he worked and on his sector of the river kept the illegal freedmen in check and prevented them from robbing the riverside villages, raping the maidens, and burning the huts... too often and too obviously. But only how this type would behave with a young and therefore, as he would think, not particularly experienced magician - a big, big question. This headman has already ensured that the outwardly juvenile boy is in fact very competent, just very low self-esteem. After Stepan had gifted them that ill-fated self-made totem for the wedding, he had been convinced of that opinion. And the smuggler had no such experience of communication. They could start to be insolent, and the headman was also convinced that Pann could respond to insolence. And how could he together with the whole village not get into trouble?

The Reader of the Backwaters is a very important person. Especially for the river trade. Especially if one holds some small piece of the river. Their team, as soon as the ice cracked and freed the center of Dantra - and spring came quickly this year and was warm, as if in compensation for the cold and very frosty winter - the first thing they did was to walk along their section of the river, checking the backwaters, habitual places and other things that only sea (river) wolves (otters) pay attention to, not for themselves alone, but for those who walk under them too. In one of such raids, the navigator fell overboard one quiet night and hit her head unluckily. And those who came to the first village in their control zone, where they could wrap her in blankets and put her to bed, were very surprised that there was a healer there. And judging by how uncomfortable Kirik felt, the first thing they had been told about it was a certain Taram, Kirik's son.

After the conflict that never happened, during which Stepan had become disillusioned with the boy and never thought of him again. Kirik had kept his word, and the young Social Darwinist, who slightly pissed Stepan off, never even came in sight of him, only a couple of times, but he didn't even come close. But here, he decided to show off in front of the visiting guests, maybe even sincerely considering himself a favor to the magician. It's advertising. But his father understood better that there was no point in talking and communicating with dangerous people, even if it was at the bare minimum, even if they were not the most dangerous.

"Will you give this brat a spanking?" Stepan only specified, knowing perfectly well that Kirik would understand him, and he did, apparently believing that Stepan saw everything in his face. "Then let's go, I'll just get dressed."

He also quickly summoned the spirit already in the necklace and a couple of his colleagues, looking at the riverboat moored at the village dock, which was massive and weakly enchanted. It was as if a gifted person had lived there for a long time, and had mastered the basics - not systemic basics, but basics in general - of both working with material, a la primitive amulet construction, and working with territory. It was as if this gifted one had made the ship an extension of his will, and thus had become much better at it. Became. Because the spirits quickly found the victim's aura simultaneously bright and dim from her injuries. She had been broken really badly, both legs and one of her arms, and it seemed that she had suffered a severe traumatic brain injury: through the spirit's perception, one could clearly see how the sheaths in the area of her head were somehow unpleasantly shimmering and thinning.

"He seems smart, but he's such a fool, eh." The headman confessed, waving his hand as if to ward off a pesky fly. "Honestly, I would not even be so upset, if he had done it out of malice, to make you, honorable, under the interest of sub-deckers, but no, just a fool!"

If Stepan had doubted for a moment that the boy wished him harm, he would not hesitate to do something. To put a ban on meanness in his brain. A kind of horror attack at the first thought of messing with a certain Pann. But no, visits to his dreams and later memories showed that Taram was upset and offended by his father's blows and the magician's attitude, but there was also a clear understanding that he was not going to fight further. Magik had forgotten about Taram's existence. That was fine, he wouldn't remind him of himself! And here, no other way, he saw a great opportunity to reconcile relations and, perhaps, even get a percentage for mediation. Kirik's son was impudent like his father, but stupid not like his father, he could ask for it later.

The young man dressed and put on a cloak over his shirt, warming himself only with spirits, and followed the headman, who was walking as fast as possible so as not to run. The headman mentally exhaled and praised himself that he had gone to talk, having persuaded the local captain Redbeard not to go himself and prevented a conflict. By the way, the smuggler's beard was indeed red with a slight graying. He took care of it and even lovingly braided it.

"All right, magik, you pull the patient out, I'll give you gold, and if you don't... you'd better get her out, gotcha, damn?" This individual asked very politely and practically going straight to the point trying to take the healer by the balls. "Why are you staring like a child at your grandfather?"

Stepan looked at him a little tired and more and more irritated every second, because he had hidden his aura to the level of a gifted student again. But this river Viking, who had a gift that was literally a tiny crumb, which did not even make him a gifted current, should have seen that the keyword in the phrase "strong apprentice" was "strong". Or did he see, but confused taciturnity and pallor with fear and absent-mindedness? Or did he have a reflex, like any gangster, to test the strength of anyone he dealt with?

"Man, if you go on like this, you might meet my grandfather early." He said with an extremely calm and really tired expression on his face. "I didn't find myself in a cesspool, and I came here to save a person, not to listen to shit about myself. Yeah, there's a lot of you, but I'm the healer here. So be fucking polite, because politeness doesn't cost anybody shit, but it fucking dampens any conflicts. You know what I'm saying, or should I be a little more clear?"

Actually, in response to such a thing you could have caught a punch in the teeth in the middle of the phrase, but then the man backed off a little when two small fire spirits appeared over Stepan's shoulders, right in the middle of the phrase, as if lumps of translucent fire, and the smuggler himself turned to his gift and got a normal look at the shaman up close. The spirits of untold words and the catcher of thoughts, called by a one-time contract allowed him to realize that the man did not expect something significant from the village magician. Especially if this magician came at the first call of the usual headman, and Kirik's precautions considered that the old rascal was padding the price and decided to tell the boy in private how much to take and demand. Schirm immediately started to knock down the pride and cut the price, and suddenly it turned out that it was possible to get in trouble.

"Quiet, for fuck's sake." He stopped his men from reacting in any way, and they, characteristically, shut up. "I fucking admit it. I jerked the rod like a bottom-feeding catfish, my bad. There, on the recliner is my adopted daughter, dearer to me than my own family, however many I left behind, gyh. I'm a nervous shaman, I'm stressed out. Let's start over, so to speak, with a new flight, okay?"

"No problem, I'm a very non-conflictive person, and I understand other people's anxiety." Stepan didn't forgive everything, but the man didn't lie, and he appreciated the wounded girl and even loved her almost with fatherly love. He also needed her for his illegal affairs, and it was impossible to lose her at all. "I'll name the price after the inspection, but I won't haggle, I don't know how. It's either yes or no. I don't twist anyone's arm, if you want, you can compare it with the rates of guild healers."

He knew them well, thank the gods, or rather one particular Life-Giving Goddess, thanks to Shera and her science, so he could demand as much as his service was worth. But he would still ask for less, or it would be hard to explain how an illiterate shaman from the Shithole had managed to cure all his injuries.

"You, shaman, are right, of course, I know the rates, but you are not a guild healer with a patent either." Although the shaman was already on his way to Kirik's house, where the wounded woman was laid on the master's bed, the man did not forget to bargain. "Or do you have one?"

"No, of course not, why else would I be sitting here?" The young man answered laconically and without even arguing leaning over the patient and taking her cold palm between his beginning to scan her body. "But I'm not practicing freely, I'm doing a one-time favor in return for help. No, of course not, why else would I be sitting here? - The young man answered laconically and without even arguing, leaning over the patient and taking her cold palm between his own, beginning to scan her body. - But I'm not practicing freely, I'm doing a one-time favor in return for help. The Edict of the Three Temples applies everywhere, of course, but only if it's not abused directly. I don't. What did you give her to drink, from potions, I mean?

The girl hadn't died yet only because she was sustained by some pretty good alchemical brew, literally increasing her vitality to the limit of biological possibilities and a little beyond that. But it didn't heal her by itself. Schirm didn't see it. He used his magic vision in a frankly clumsy way, but Stepan realized that without his influence the girl wouldn't survive the night. The fractured skull and the blood that poured into her brain didn't kill her only due to the residual effects of the potion. And also, probably, the support of the ship, which she instinctively and on the crumbs of knowledge turned into her place of power, a kind of wandering territory, which is probably very popular among those adepts of witchcraft that prefer to connect their lives with the fleet. The first thing he had to do was to unnoticeably plant the spirit in himself, and then, through the touch, to transfer the healer into the patient's body, assisted by a ghostly grasp that he also slipped into the patient.

//"This is definitely not the kind of fisting the Autogoddess was expecting from me, but you're welcome." - It goes through his head and he has to suppress his laughter as well.

"I can handle it. It's not as bad as it looked. The fractures are not dangerous, the blow to the head is more serious, but the worst is over." The young man lies blatantly without saying a word of untruth. For now, that he has taken up arms with this gift at the level of a weak apprentice girl, the worst for her is really over. "I'll stabilize her overnight, and tomorrow morning we'll take her to the riverbank and conduct a call. I have one contract, if it comes to the call, she'll be jumping in a week. Twenty in silver or, if there is nugget copper, iron ore that has never known a forge, a handful of good burning pepper, and the same salt, then only ten. I will have to get it myself later to renew the contract with the spirit."

"Shamaaaaaaans, you always have some fucking obscure shit, not like normal magic. - The man thoughtfully stretched out, trying to hide how relieved he felt. If the boy was asking for that amount of money, then probably it really wasn't as bad as he thought, otherwise, he would have twisted his arms harder, right "I'll have pepper, as well as fucking salt, and other spices, cinnamon, if necessary. Unforged copper or iron, sorry, we don't carry such, the less weight we have under the deck the better, the calmer it is. Twelve?"

"Fifteen." Stepan corrected him, pretending he was counting something in his mind rather than saying the number out of thin air. "Kirik, make me something to chew on, something I can quickly stuff in my stomach. I'll be calling all night long, I shouldn't do it hungry."

The headman nodded silently and jabbed his finger at his son, and the latter went off on his errand while his father wiped the sweat from his face. He had been so nervous when Stepan and the river Moriarty had nearly at each other's throats. Schirm jabbed a finger at one of his own. He ran faster than Taram, apparently to get spices.

"I've heard that your brethren, before your bullshit, start fasting on the contrary, afraid to eat anything but breadcrumbs and water." The relaxed man had clearly become more good-natured. It was as if a rod had been pulled out of him. Even though he tried not to show how much he was pissed off, so as not to drop his honest authority. "No, I'm not going into the hold, I've no pretensions, I'm just interested. And let's get on with the names. My name is Schirm, they call me Gulash (*). Not for boarding, they won't lie, I've been a cook on a ship since I was a boy, until I became a helmsman myself, and then I got a piece of our Dantra-chan under my eyes and ears."

"Well, call me Pann, then. I never got a nickname, except for the ones my grandfather used to call me when I was too stupid, but I wouldn't repeat them." Stepan was not deceived by his friendliness and watched the smuggler even more attentively than he did the patient's gradually stabilizing condition. "To answer your question, it depends on who is called. They mostly fast either by calling the extremely light so be as pure as possible in front of them, and by this purity incline them to the contract. Or calling to dark shit to harden the body and will a little, and not to shit themselves too."

The joke finally defused the situation, the quickly brought and still warm food satisfied the hunger and finally improved the mood of both interlocutors, but Stepan could not help noting the fact that Schirm drank only herbal decoction, holding his hand with the amulet over it, and also did not send his men away. Nor did he miss the fact that there were no women in sight at all, only boys and men, and everyone was kind of nervous. Yes, Gulash's smugglers knew the limits, and in general, they are good guys, they don't let the real scum go wild.... but somehow they were not in a hurry to welcome them with great joy either, they were nervous. Stepan, who had long ago covered himself with a couple of protective contracts, waiting for a traitorous attack, was not particularly worried. Some amulets had only a couple of fighters and Gulash. He could not be pierced by such amulets unless he was too dumb.

He really started calls in the evening, lit candles, his own, by the way, brought with him, and in fact quickly purchased, drew a small circle with a special chalk, sheltering the sick from all the crap that could come to the shaman's call just to look, and then rush, seeing the weak aura of the sick gifted. Everything was just according to the recipe: throat singing, pinches of herbs and powders burned in the fire of candles, the pale face of the shaman swaying and still holding the hand of the maiden. He himself had already repaired the worst of the damage, pumped the blood from the brain, and normalized the condition of the vessels, both by himself, literally with a spiritual limb, and by summoning several spirits working alternately. The task was not the easiest, especially with the need to hide all his actions within the confines of a mere strong and burly apprentice. But tomorrow's ritual was not a profanation because the girl's personality was quite damaged by the outpouring of blood. If he wanted to bring her back from her vegetable state, the spirit he had already mentioned should be summoned, and the easiest and cheapest way to call him was near the river.

He'd worked on the fractures, too, but not so diligently, only preventing muscle damage from bone fragments and relieving swelling, and fixing the bones with special perfume. If she could get up now, she might even be able to walk. It was as if both of her legs had been broken - one below the knee, the other above, but she wouldn't get up now, so there would be no questions. He extracted bone particles that could get into the bloodstream or damage soft tissue with his spiritual limb, feeding one specific healing spirit that could restore some of the body's tissues if fed to him, and the easiest way to do that was to shave his head and trim his fingernails, which also counted. He would restore her brain physically by morning, but memory and personality, which suffered physically, would have to be written on the renewed brain from the subtle and spiritual body. The basics of working with subtle bodies in general, no matter whether through shamanism, witchcraft, or classical healing with high magic.

And while the night went on he had only to call, sing, and work at saving other people's lives. However, the reason for this was not only humanity and unwillingness to let a very beautiful girl die, albeit flat, with a boyish haircut and probably with a bad temper. The reason for that was another system assignment that popped up as soon as Stepan's eyes found the victim.

Received system assignment (small): to ensure the healing and full recovery of Taira, the adopted daughter of Schirm Gulash, to heal her body, and to maintain her cognitive abilities after her head injury.

Reward: some increase in affinity with the spheres of Life and Regeneration; one-seventh of the remaining experience until the next level; one random meta-skill from those not yet unlocked.

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Переведено на Нотабеноиде
http://notabenoid.org/book/86785/574498

Переводчики: Camrad_RIP