Готовый перевод Настучать в бубен / Hit the tambourine: Глава 15_2

When he reached the shore, he ordered the Memory Eater to remove the stupor from the crew, and concealed himself, as well as the pile of bodies visible from the boat, with an illusory canopy, spending another contract that, again, would have to be restored later. An hour later, when the boat was finally out of sight and there was no risk of attracting the crew's attention, he began to drag the corpses away irritably and as quickly as possible. Stepan had prudently swam out to a small but dense and dense grove, where he had even once had his own guardian spirit. His footprints remained in the spirit imprint, but old, aged years and years ago.

He wouldn't make self-propelled zombies out of corpses again, even though he could. It would require strength and the summoning of new contracts, and he had used up his old ones. It was easier and more economical to plant another spirit in himself and carry the dead himself. The young man was glad that he hadn't got himself a metaphorical toad, which would have definitely crushed him in response to the fact that he completely ignored all the amulets and artifacts of enemy mages, even wands or protective amulets. What's the matter with that? He didn't even take gold out of his hidden pockets, he just didn't see the need given the availability of the system store. And they didn't take any special riches with them, because why take them with you if you plan to take them yourself, from those who stand in your way?

Only after he had finished with the relocation and wiped off all the traces on the one-and-a-half-meter sandy spit of the wild beach Stepan began to prepare the ritual. He didn't want to call that dark nature thing, but the spirit had accepted sacrifices favorably in the past, especially if he didn't ask for anything in return. He still wouldn't risk activating that Oak Leaf until the balls were in claws, but it was one thing to call to battle, and quite another to ask for gifts, and for those gifts for which you weren't going to ask for anything in return. Again, he will definitely put the defense, and the mark of roots will strengthen the spiritual echo at the expense of the mark of passions which will affect the likelihood of attack.

Reducing that probability.

Probably.

Stepan really wanted to believe that.

It was frustrating that he couldn't use the replenishment, but he couldn't wait five days for a meta-skill refresh. Such a wait would only lead to the corpses becoming stale, a less valuable gift, or even insulting. But no, the latter is definitely not the case, as this shit is too decaying and decomposing to be to her liking. The problem is different. The death of such a powerful mage may well be already known. It must be known, if he, like those Krellbs, has the right amulet, which monitors the state of health. Could it be that right now, one of the patrons of Vizardius the Eel is rushing to the city's necromancer-spiritualist, asking to summon the spirit of the deceased to answer questions? No, no, no, no, and no, Stepan would not wait five days in the company of slowly rotting corpses. He wanted to finish it all as soon as possible.

Everything was ready before lunchtime, right at the moment when another ship, very, very similar to the Beadle, especially the rear part of it, and even in the daytime similar. And the observing spirits pointed out three bright auras at once, matching the full-fledged adepts of magic trying to hide. No comparison with Eel or even his apprentice, more like a mid to low bar, but still an impressively excessive number of gifted aboard a simple merchant ship. So one of the three was the captainess with murky connections and high patrons, and the other two were the adepts she'd been given to reinforce her. The shaman raised the spirits higher into the sky, making them as inconspicuous as possible. The crew walked carefully, someone from the mages had created and all three of them regularly monitored the signaling network, including the bottom.

They passed without noticing anything, but Stepan postponed the ritual until noon, and then, after thinking about it, until nighttime. It wasn't very clever to call a dark spirit at midday, whether you had a root mark or not. However, another outburst of emotion played a part in his procrastination. The assignment from the Autogoddess appeared on time. Stepan, of course, suspected that this Theresa was nicknamed “the Pike” for a reason, and he himself had almost died because of her indirect influence, but this just emotions. The assignment suggested the following action: to put suggestions and persuasions, which will lead the captain to the idea to reward especially distinguished members of the crew with especially nice awards for their dicks - an excellent and quite obviously-normal idea. Successfully tied the sail rigging - grope the captain's tits, took on extra duty - the captain will help to relieve tension with a hand, distinguished yourself in the reflection of boarding - all the holes and slits of the captain's body are at your or yours, if there are many distinguished, disposal. A full-fledged average assignment, and even with such rewards that bitter tears came to his eyes when he pressed the refusal.

Or is it just the sun's rays that started hitting his eyes?

Having covered the already stacked bodies with a stasis field supported by seven alternating spirits, and carefully stepping over the drawn lines of the ritual, he stepped aside, sat down under a tree, banished ticks and other biting critters, sat in a restorative-meditative pose, and began to deal with what the System had bestowed upon him for the battle. First of all, the shaman accepted the level increase, wincing at the phantom sensations of another gift from the Autogoddess that ran through his body with caressing touches. Who would have doubted that Milf, had raised the level of something not useful? Certainly not Stepan, no, he had no such doubts long ago.

This time, Her attention was paid to meta-skills, namely “ lecherous development”, which became “lecherous development IV”, amplified to the maximum at the current characteristics indicators. The result was significant: just as moving from a two to a three gave a qualitative and extremely powerful leap in effectiveness, so too did moving to the next stage support this trend. Even more weighty increases in experience from any debauchery, that own, that provoked by their skills, as well as increased rewards for “special mini-assignments” with the need to conduct some specified sexual practice. And, most importantly - the ability to once every three days once and for all raise any of the fucked up women one unit of characteristic of his choice (of course, if the woman is outwardly sympathetic to the hero-lover). Okay, if she's just ungifted or weakly gifted, it's not a big deal, but a master or a magister in a skirt will jump in and won't get off. If Stepan didn't already have a system endowment of characteristics, he would be fucked up, but he just raised his eyebrows. Well, this gift wasn't the craziest thing the Autogoddess had ever done.

Stepan would have liked to invest a talent point in spiritual dialog, bringing it to the limit allowed by his stats up to advanced mastery. He wanted to, but didn't, because it could be so intense that it would take him until the next morning to recover. But, as a dubious consolation, the next increase in dialog and call practice will be available only after gaining at least twenty-one units of Spirit and sixteen units of Sensitivity. A gentle hint from the System, saying that it won't happen easily. And also hinting at the development of new areas of shamanism, or even not just shamanism. Not to say he's directly so against it, more just glad, but still a little offended. He wanted everything at once, and to bring pizza, with double cheese, even with pineapple. For the sake of remembering the Earth, the young man was ready to do even such a thing. In all seriousness, he was well aware of how overfed he was. Besides, didn't he plan, and for quite a long time, to change the direction of development, striving not only upward, but also sideways? Now he was left with no choice. Even with medium-ranked assignments or adventures that kept happening despite his attempts to avoid them, it would take him a long time to reach the next level of characteristics.

The two meta-skill points given by the Autogoddess were easily learned. Meta-skills are always easily learned, but they don't bring much joy. Only another tired exhalation, with which Stepan got up from the ground, walked to a leafless tree on which buds had not even swollen yet, strengthened himself with a small spirit, and for three minutes beat that tree with his fists as hard as he could. The knuckles on the reinforced hands were not hurt, but the tree lost some of its bark and sagged inward a little. It was good that he had thought to muffle the sounds, or his boxing sparring against the still-living log would have woken the whole forest.

The improvement of the elite meta-skill was quite obvious: “small system endowment of characteristics” became “ minor system endowment of characteristics”. The maximum attribute increase did not increase too much, reaching twelve units, but the minimum attribute increase rose to four units. The rate of renewal of this blessing did not increase, being the same calendar month, but there was a sudden synergy: a fifty percent chance that the charge will not be spent if you apply the gift on a woman right at the moment of intimacy, but only if it is the type of intimacy specified in the mini-quest from the lecherous development. All this was well within the development of the Autogoddess' gifts, Stepan, to be honest, had expected something much more shocking and overwhelming.

Well, he did.

His second elite meta-skill was indeed elite, so cool that it opened up a new column of his status showing the shaman's available “Deals”. And no, it wasn't about a new subtype of contracts with spirits or other entities, not even contracts with demonic entities, no. This status column was for completed deals with Liarat si Merrinal herself, the Lady of Gifts and the Giver of Gifts, a loyal servant of Innelas Innelay. The meta-skill was called “accepting a system deal with a patron (Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Gift-giving, faithful servant of Innelas Innelay)” and was not pumpable by any means, immediately being given in its maximum configuration. And, it should be said, reading the terms of the proposed deals, Stepan caught himself thinking that he was almost ready to agree to these terms simply out of greed, which made him even more annoyed.

The essence of the skill is that the user of the System gives his patroness a certain power over himself for a certain time, in return receiving some rewards, both at the time of acceptance, the deal and on its closure. Eternal bargains, which have eternal influence, were not yet available, but, said the help, they can be added with the growth of levels or other changes in the Status of the character. The Deals are always finite. Their number is added with level growth in a random way, but it may well happen the player will fulfill them all and close them if he sets such a goal. And then either wait for new handouts or enjoy what you already have.

At the moment there were three separate and independent deals available, although you could only execute them one at a time. Learning about each of them caused a fierce desire to get up and once again torture the tree with punches. Stepan read the statements of the certificate, listened to the shades of images, and with every second he was boiling more and more. As his namesake would say now: “At this moment my ass could be confused with the Astronomicon, so it's burning!” - and Stepan Normal was closer than ever to creating the Astronomicon. Three deals, three offers, three titles, “Cute and Innocent”, “Sweet Attraction” and “Big and Soft”, for closing each of the three you can get three free talents and two stat points, and, importantly, without any risk or labor, it was separately noted. Getting under the deal could not cause a life or health-threatening situation, only Stepan's pride would suffer if he decided to agree to such a thing.

The first deal, first of all, will rejuvenate the already youthful-looking and not aged outwardly since the moment of arrival. However, his youthful appearance and the absence of even a hint of mustache and beard were most likely only a consequence of the “blessings of health and long life”, nothing more. After the deal, he would look like himself for the next three months, but in his teens, fourteen or fifteen years old. As a bonus, he will be able to keep this appearance even after the deal is closed, and aging will be slowed down again even more than it was slowed down before by the accepted properties and magical gift. This in itself is not a bad thing. Even if being a small gifted brat in the conditions of this world would attract a lot of attention and probable problems, for three talents and two characteristics Stepan would go for it at a run and ask for more. Young age? It was better to be young, healthy, and strong than weak, old, and sick - that was a truism.

The problem was that this deal was not limited to rejuvenation alone. The will of the insidious Autogoddess would literally erase from the mind the very concept of any form of intimacy, all experience, all knowledge, and even the very concept of sex or at least handwork. A sweet and innocent boy will still be excited by what is happening to him, by the sight of beautiful girls and women, but will not really understand what is so strange is happening to him and what are these unknown feelings. As if at once you turn into an offspring from an incredibly strict monastery with a vow of celibacy and a complete ban on all shameful, and one where all of the above prohibitions are really observed. Again, it's only for three months, but three talents and two points, you can be patient. It could, but She, the Lady of All Milfs, did not stop there again.

The fact that even if the “innocence” of the deal maker is “lost” does not cancel the fact that the memories of how innocence was lost and everything learned in the process will disappear in the morning, will seem like a blurry and obscene dream without clear pictures. Okay, that's not the worst thing either, especially since no one is ordering innocence to be lost at all..... because they don't have to. A twist of fate, similar to the one that already hangs in his status under “Special” allows him to violate the theory of probability in a particularly vulgar way. Something similar will be applied to the bargainer. On Stepan, who is under the effect of the Deal, all sorts of lecherous girls, ladies, and moms will fall from all sides, wanting to seduce the boy and teach him bad things. The boy with no experience in countering seduction and dazing from a completely new sensation. In such a situation, it is very easy to suddenly find yourself declassified, leaked all the information about yourself and the System, as well as signed a dozen contracts, and successfully married some smart lady.

Ah, stop, a slip. It will not be possible to tell about the system, the same influence of fate (for the time of stay under the deal), which will allow this topic in any intimate and not-so-intimate interrogation to bypass. And if not, some quite plausible legend-explanation will come out of subconsciousness. The joke about a harsh grandfather who brought up his grandson to be a senior shaman at such a young age will be brought to its logical conclusion. Ha-ha, very funny, Your Milfeischestvo, but Stepan didn't want to laugh or smile. He didn't want to, because he knew for a fact that he would still agree to such a deal, he would just sit in the deepest corner of the forest, running away from women as if from fire. For three talents and two stat points!

The only thing is that the memory of the deal itself and its terms is blown away from the person who made it first and necessarily. Even looking at the status and seeing there a line with the deal and its description, the person who made it will simply not pay attention to it, immediately forgetting after reading it. No, there may still be a chance to break the Autogoddess, say, to migrate to some maximally remote hole, where the nearest village is just three months away, and then accept the deal, forget about everything, and start thinking about why he came here in the first place. But, remembering the property of fate manipulation, and also knowing the vicious character of the Autogoddess, right there, at the same second, he would fall into the Underworld, and exactly into the personal bath of some drow matriarch.

The other deals differed a little in details but were about the same problems with missing solutions. Sweet Attraction also erased the memory of itself but did not change his appearance, acting a little differently, but for six months at a time. On the one who accepted this deal, there will be random and irresistible desires to lick the pussy of the same random women, any, from the well-known, to just flashed in the crowd, just always beautiful and desirable. This desire will seem absolutely natural and will not cause a single question about the reasons for such desires. A desire and that's it. A mighty shaman has the right to have fun as he wants and not think about any nonsense. As a bonus - the very distortion of fate, thanks to which it will always be possible in one way or another to bewitch, seduce, or banal coax your target and get the opportunity to work with your tongue.

And, importantly, in moments of such compulsion, Stepan would not want anything else, neither normal sex, nor to touch the tits, nor even to undress himself. Just lick, cum without touching himself, maybe several times in a row, and then correct the victim's memory, if at all necessary, say goodbye, and be it. The effect can come once a week or several times a day, that's why it's random. The exact same thought of being able to activate the deal in the middle of some local Sahara desert ran into a similar problem with probability. He'd probably just meet a bunch of hot ladies right the next day without leaving the desert. There's not half a word or half an image about it in the reference, but if the Autogoddess didn't provide for such a trick, Stepan would eat his necklace.

Big and Soft of all three deals might have seemed the most innocuous option. Erasing the memory of the deal, a five-month time limit, and the effect on the mind of the receiver. Roughly speaking and describing everything as briefly as possible: the loss of will in the presence of big-breasted women, and the bigger her breasts, the harder it is to say no, even if she demands something on the level of “sign this contract, drink this potion and put on this collar”. Fulfillment of any request seems right, and correct, even if you subconsciously realize the wrongness of what is happening, you can not resist and do not want to. Oh yes, so Stepan was not bored, all met titty seductresses will instinctively see and understand his weakness. And they will not see anything strange in it, they will set up the necessary purpose of logical conclusions. From simple “the boy likes boobs, but he thinks with a different head,” to “apparently, he once put in his head bookmarks, which he did not know about, but now they will be used by me”. And, of course, the unspecified in the help, but obligatory to be there is a tweak in the probability of meeting a bustier bust bearer in any random situation.

Stepan involuntarily imagined how events would have developed if he had met Truda - who had already left him morally scarred and lowered his faith in humanity - while under the effect of this Deal.

He imagined it.

Stand up.

He went and beat the tree some more.

To distract himself from the urge to shout to the heavens that the heavens were holding him for someone else, Stepan sat down again in a meditative position and accepted the last of the list of awards he had received. Raising a single random knowledge, given his already highly branched Status, could take a very long time, especially when raising an already developed talent. Stepan had good reason to believe that one of the least developed blocks of knowledge would be promoted, simply because it was standard practice for the System, the regular System, not the Autogoddess' gifts - he had noticed this pattern more than once.

He's not wrong now, characteristically.

Received: “advanced fundamentals of spiritual bargaining and contractual agreements with otherworldly entities”.

The acquired talent is added to the overall Player status.

It was definitely not a useless load, which pleased Stepan. Learning a useful and necessary block of knowledge not only increased the shaman's overall efficiency but also helped to calm his nerves after another of Milf's pranks. Damn it! At this rate, he would have to get a magical analog of sedative, otherwise he wouldn't have the nerves to endure all this without changing his class to Berserker, or even changing his race to Demon of Wrath. Jokes were jokes, but every fucking time he was almost ready to accept reality, to come to terms with the whims of the world, the Autogoddess would pull a new trick and he'd flash his ass again as if he had a fuel and lubricant factory in his ass, no other way.

Contracts, as such, were part of a great deal of other knowledge, beginning even with basic call practice. Now the knowledge of contracts had become deeper and more complete. Revealed ways of making stronger, more reliable, more difficult to deceive and break, ways of summoning very specific spirits of deals, including some that were quite cunning. Most of all, agent work, which provided for such games with meanings, turning an ordinary contract into a death trap or a beacon for powerful subjugating and cursing influence by rearranging a couple of commas in the contract, if it was written on paper, or a couple of images in the stream, if the contract was made with a spirit, pleased him the most.

Interesting types of healer spirits that can roll back healing if some part of the deal is not fulfilled, combat spirits that forcibly enforce a contract to prevent escape or evasion, and curses activated by a certain condition, like crossing a door on the wrong foot or trying to sleep with your feet facing north. Very powerful contract spirits for summoning, as well as creating complex contract anchors using multiple type spirits with similar aspects. Without multiplicity of awareness, the latter trick is much harder to pull off, but even with it, it's not a common task. Territory contracts, act on the principle of authority over one territory, imposing rules on visitors at the expense of that authority. From a simple prohibition to litter, be rude, and cut the throat of a sleeping landlord, to those things for which the throat can be cut. To give part of the aura to feed the spirits and anal virginity, not seeing in what is happening nothing strange, for example. Of course, it takes a long time and effort to prepare such a trap, especially against someone gifted and strong, but the very fact of the possibility contributes to the desire to see such a contractor with a second smile on his neck.

Making deals over very considerable distances, using various relays, and ways to save forces in such relays. Totem contracts and contract totems, the creation of full servers to handle multiple oaths of all sorts, and the ability to manipulate parts of the whole within a limited framework. Someone made a contract to supply candle wicks and someone else to sell their beautiful daughter into slavery, but is it so impossible to swap two recipients if the contract was made on the same totem? A whole host of ways to create contracts that affect the mind or body, that make you feel love or pleasure for certain things or for certain individuals. Plenty of ways to turn any aural contact, not necessarily even of a sexual nature, into a basis for further dealing. The ability to hide a contractual influence inside a sly or not-so-sly curse, along the lines of “if you were able to break the curse, you're now obligated to do the following”. The longer Stepan learned his new knowledge, the more he realized that contract types of magical influences, whether shamanic or not, were inherently very sneaky things. They can be used for something good and useful, but there are many more ways to do something immoral or bad with them. And Stepan valued this knowledge many times more. It showed not only how to do a mean thing, but also how to avoid it, and if he could not avoid it - to break it.

On its own, the advanced basics wouldn't give too much, but not when combined with the knowledge and properties already in place, latching onto each of them and opening up from new angles. Yes, initially this knowledge was tuned to spirits, to working with them, to making stronger and more reliable contracts, maybe with a double bottom or an attempt to remove that double bottom. But the same agency work admirably almost doubled the pool of knowledge, stretching the information block to the inhabitants of Reality, too. Especially the denizens of Reality. This only proves once again how much the work of secret agents is actually full of all kinds of dishonor, blood, and betrayals, not like in James Bond movies.

By the time the young man regained consciousness, the last rays of the sun were hiding behind the horizon. The pair of strong spirit suppressors that were supposed to cut off the pile of corpses from the spirit world and prevent their location from being sought by magical means were silent. No one seemed to have tried to summon the shadows of the previously living to ask about the circumstances of their last battle, but he didn't want to delay any further. He had already condemned himself to another hike through bushwhacks, swamps, and other wildernesses, and there was no reason to increase the risk that he would have to run from the search parties of unknown individuals in these bushwhacks.

Now, though, having had another mental catharsis, and having extinguished the butt that had been burning brightly since that unnecessary battle on the ship, he was fully prepared to perform the ritual. The usual fatigue and desire for sleep that followed the increase in knowledge was now gone. He was very lucky in that three of the four status increases were meta-skills in nature. The mood, Stepan was ready to repeat this several times, was not so much uplifted as reached a balance. The Autogoddess's teasing had scorched another portion of his nerves, causing a fit of rage and burnout, and become just another detail of his already frantic existence. The young man was in a calm so deep that he seemed to himself an unbreakable rock in the storm of the world around him. The impression was deceptive and dangerous, but at the same time surprisingly soothing and peaceful.

From the ritual, he expected all sorts of insidious shenanigans or just an attempt to take Stepan and devour him when summoned. For this purpose he had prepared a powerful protective circle, a couple of decoys, which the creature would chase in the first place, and also one funny river spirit, which, if he jumped into the water would take Stepan many kilometers away in a couple of seconds carrying him to other waters of a mighty river. However, not necessarily the same one he had jumped into originally, but that's the details. The barrier, deceptions, and the reinforcing spirit planted in his body should be enough to make it possible for him to win five seconds. In the five seconds, it would take to dive into the water and escape the wrathful entity. Still, Stepan suspected that the Old Root he was summoning was an entity either at the top of the elder hierarchy or, more likely a full-fledged Higher One.

The ritual was so normal and trouble-free that the young man suspected it was compensation from Fate itself for the “successful” outcome of his river sailing trip. The spirit came, appeared at the shaman's call, which had become noticeably stronger, evaluated both his spiritual marks and his increased power, evaluated lazily, calmly, and indifferently. Stepan physically felt how in the depths of this entity there were thoughts full of life and death at the same time, choosing, evaluating, and understanding. They came to the conclusion that it would not be possible to quickly kill the one who had called him, perhaps that was why he had been spared earlier, to leave him to grow, to call him again and again, until the one who had been called decided to take everything. The shaman sensed this readiness, this eternal and fleeting tranquility, in the heavy air filled with the stale odor of decaying leaves, in the tree roots that stirred under the cover of the frozen ground, in the rustling wind that played with the long-fallen leaves.

The spirit evaluated him, weighed him, and recognized him as not light enough to devour with a guarantee and prevent him from escaping from his prepared position. And so, the spirit, as indifferent as before, neither disappointed nor delighted, neither angry nor good-natured, only absolutely calm in its being... accepted his offering. The frozen ground fell down, revealing a huge pit in which an indescribably horrible, disgusting, and at the same time attractive and beautiful mass of mushrooms, moss, roots, and dead leaves was moving. In that movement could be seen jaws and hands, fangs and claws, which in a few moments took all the sacrificial flesh to the last drop, taking back under the ground and away from the phenomenon colossal hole-mouth, leaving just a wide hole half a meter deep. Apparently, he had just witnessed the partial manifestation of a small portion of the summoned spirit.

The aura of the grove had changed, become very different, more sinister, and heavy, as if it were too alive, yet constantly in the process of dying. Now, he was sure, even on the clearest of days, the place would remain in semi-darkness for decades to come, the trees would always look bushy, wild, untended, and old. But not the slightest trace of devoured bodies and flesh, either auric or physical, could be found here. The spirit left, calmly and without emotion as it expressed the last image, reaching for a strange dry leaf lying on the ground nearby, but slightly away from the escape route. The image it sent was succinct and almost identical to the one it had sounded last time, exactly the same frightening and impassioned...

call

I'll be

...as it had sounded in a similar situation before, in that ritual a few hours away from Fantrelle. Only today and now the sacrifice was not alive, but much more abundant and massive, and the sacrificer himself had become unequivocally stronger and more competent while remaining cautious. Now there was a certain addition in the images, a clarification that the one who came to the call would not touch the one who called, only him, but would take all those near him. The young man still had no intention of calling a creature of such power other than to die handsomely and in good company, but he still wouldn't throw the leaf away. Only now he promised himself not just to carry it at the bottom of his backpack but also to put it in some kind of insulating container. The strength and attention of the higher spirit in this leaf was still as tiny as before, but it was bigger than before. Stepan did not want to keep such a thing outside the protected perimeter and without supervision, because no contract of the spirit with the shaman does not bind, no one would forbid him to strike suddenly and meanly. Well, except for the fact that it was not profitable for him and he would spend more energy than he would gain from devouring the shaman.

The Earthman, of course, will not test this theory.

There were no system messages or level increases, but the experience was at least a fifth of the new level, even a little more, though it was still far from a quarter. After looking around and looking at the changed grove through the eyes of his spirits, Stepan clucked his tongue and gathered his belongings, moving to a new place. He was uncomfortable here, despite the reinforced marking of the roots, and he did not want to stay, even if it was all just imagination. He had to carry both backpacks, however, under the reinforcement of the spirit that had possessed his back muscles, otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to lift it all. Although, with a two in his Constitution he would have been able to carry it all, just getting tired and sweating profusely.

The shaman set up three kilometers from the grove and about the same distance from the river, where he managed to find, not without the help of the spirits, a surprisingly convenient place to camp. A small stony hill. On it is a large boulder covered with moss, resembling the letter Л. Inside the embrace of this rock was dry, and improvised stone walls closed on three sides, leaving open only the “entrance” and the top. Quickly expelling all sorts of critters, warming the stone and pseudo-cave, vaporizing the remnants of dampness, as well as the first sensible use of a spear-horn in a long time: he stuck it into the ground in front of the “entrance”, and on the shaft of the cloak hung, covering the “ceiling”. Then put both bags together, cover them with protection from weather and beasts, and put the gift leaf separately, also covered with protection, mainly to prevent the leaf from escaping. He was not going to leave the strengthened beacon next to the valuable totems, as it was possible to be left without totems if the entity of nature decided to eat through such a mediator.

And then, tired and exhausted, he covered himself with a thin blanket, whose reflection in the spiritual world was very thick and fluffy, which made it warm great, closed his eyes, and passed out.

* * *

As always lately, I was dreaming nonsense and amplified nonsense at that. A heavy ritual, a lot of worries, and for dessert, the lack of activated dream catchers, which helped stabilize the visions. The spirits of the dream catchers, caressing and sucking up to the strong senior shaman, only provoked these visions more strongly, filling the dream space with various images, among which no two similar ones could be found. At some moments the young man was aware of himself asleep, watching the dreams as if from the outside, noting details that immediately slipped from memory, at other times there was no awareness, the images buried under themselves, and the sleeper considered himself part of the dream, or did not realize himself at all.

A very expensive and coolly furnished office of some extremely powerful corporation in the style of the cyberpunk elite. Meeting room. An important board meeting. Only instead of people at the table there are humanoid frogs and toads in expensive jackets. The main toad is loudly pounding on the table with his fist, loudly demanding increased efficiency, increased profits, reduced costs, and new money-making projects. All because it's not just any day. It's Wednesday. This is why they all, as proper business dudes, need to be especially efficient. One of the frogs, who had taken off his jacket and loosened his tie a bit, relaxed and said that Wednesday was just Wednesday, so there was no critical reason for them to excel today. The toad-boss looked at the frog for a few seconds, and threw him out of the high-rise with his chair, breaking the panoramic window.

It's a huge stone city on a hill that would make Minas Tirith from Jackson's movie adaptation weep with envy and rewrite itself into small farms, but it's completely empty and dead. Not because it's full of undead, but because there's no one there at all, all the houses are abandoned, all the towers are empty, everything is deserted, and looks as if the inhabitants just up and left one day without taking anything with them. A lone figure walks through the city, tall, stout, and trim, wearing completely earthly clothes and carrying a pistol. The figure looks around nervously but does not stop, as if something is calling her into the depths of a dark and gloomy palace of white stone with red veins. Somehow it seems that it is not a pattern on the material of the walls, but that rivers of blood are flowing down the walls of the palace.

The figure, the city, the castle, and everything else, even heaven, Buddha, and Allah, are swept away by a swath of giant ostriches, saddled with garishly dressed dwarfs. The lead ostrich-horse lunges forward even harder and the dwarf riding it yells something about going to Narnia before crashing into a huge and infinitely tall red brick stone wall. He crashes into the wall like a daredevil driving at full speed into the same wall, only there is not a scratch on the wall, only a bloody, meaty stain, and more and more riders leave such stains. The mountain of minced meat keeps growing and growing, there is no end to it, only the cheerful cries of the carlans and the croaking of the ostriches.

A large and enchanted training hall, in which a combat mage could be prepared to pass his diploma even now, only all the mannequins - a strange mixture of artifacting, druidism, and something else - are deactivated, and the illuminating amulets are turned off. In the middle of the hall stands a short-haired and very utilitarian-martial-dressed elf with a powerfully developed aura and a battle wand in a special holster, beautiful to the point of catching one's breath. In front of her, there is someone else, a woman too, but she seems to blur, it is impossible to focus on her image, and this someone is explaining something to the short-haired combat magician. And she nods, once a second, as if a pendulum, smiling a sincere, slightly ironic smile, continuously and without changing her expression. She nods, nods, nods, and then rolls her eyes, sticking out her tongue and drooling as if she's feeling very good right now, and then takes a normal look, blinking perplexedly, shaking her head, and leaving the room. The second figure disappeared even before the mage stopped rolling her eyes. The magician was already in a hurry, she had a few things to do that she had only just remembered and would soon forget again.

A nightclub, light music, a bunch of people dancing, and in the middle of it a lonely man in a three-piece suit, looking strangely barely forty and a hundred at the same time, lazily sipping a non-alcoholic fruit cocktail. His face has a martyr's “what am I doing here?” look on it, and he's almost ready to leave without waiting for someone he's expecting. But then the expected person appears a young man in glasses, a stylish outfit, and all agitated, and on his hands you can notice traces of badly wiped blood. He almost runs up to the seated man, without even sitting down at the table, breathes in his face, barely audible, but still recognizable: “Architect, let's get the fuck out of here!” But as soon as they stood up and headed for the exit, at least half of those present, including all the guards, stopped abruptly, staring at the departing wax statues with dead eyes. The people who remain moving are perplexed for a moment or even smile, suspecting a flash mob, but the smiles go away when the dead figures of people who are not people start organizing a massacre.

Stepan The Fatty's familiar pimply face grinned in a very anticipatory grin as he looked down from an abandoned observation tower at the squad of demoness succubi playing around the lake. Cute and sexy ladies, draining blood from the slit throats of their captives and human servants right into the water, throwing themselves a beach party, hanging around the guts and entrails of the slain. The captives, like the cultists, literally throat themselves, and some also cut themselves for one look of cuteness. Stepan Normal's namesake, who doesn't remove his grin, pulls out two shining purple blades, one long and one shorter, reminiscent of a dagga, and then jumps up sharply, with a telekinetic impulse through his legs destroying the tower, and then soars into the air and falls down, straight into the lake, like a classic bomb. Only he is burning with purifying flames and shining with the power of exorcising litanies, which makes it seem that he is going to sanctify all the water in the damn lake. And, judging by the intensity of the holy demon-fighting aura, he may well succeed in his plans.

Another demoness, also striking passionate and suffocating lust, only this one just lies and lounges in the sun in the middle of some pastoral village, where, however, no one pays attention to her. The creature, looking barely out of adolescence, seems to be almost the embodiment of mischievousness and innocence at the same time, which is only aided by a sly grin, small horns, and a wagging thin tail with a cliched heart at the end. Only the woman lying at the feet of the demoness, dressed in a dark cloak of a greenish hue, as well as high boots and nothing else. Staring into the void with a smile of bliss on her face, the woman with the palms and fingers of someone more accustomed to knives and shivs than a handbag and nail file shakes in pleasure as she listens to the demoness's ringing voice. The hell creature completes its monologue, receiving an obedient response from the bandit, sharply pressing her forehead with the toe of her foot, and accompanying it all with a flash of magic, going straight to the head of the lying. She moaned, wriggled in a will-crushing orgasm, and then, as if nothing had happened, got up and walked away from the village without even looking back.

Suddenly, the demon girl seems to listen to something with her whole being, relaxedly leaning on her hands placed slightly behind her back, and then wriggling her whole body, looking at the side-image of the sleeping shaman with her eyes...

The dream is replaced by a new one. Stepan already sees a group of white-clad Ku Klux Klan fighters, with the ominous “BEZ BAB” written on their chests, climbing up the walls of the women's dormitory, using hooks, cats, and other ninja tricks, trying to sneak into the dorm and read to its inhabitants a pamphlet about how real men don't need any women. In one of the dark windows there is a girl in a funny anime headband, but not with cat ears, but with devil horns. She suddenly turns sharply to Stepan's point of stay-perception, and he sees that she, looking strangely familiar, not only has a headband with horns but also contact lenses imitating cross-shaped pupils.
Без Баб

Images are replaced by images of Kirov battle airships, falling down, hit by jet cans of sour pickles. The great Optimus Prime, disguised as a Zaporozhets, quietly sneaks up behind Commander Shepard riding a pink tricycle, whistling a song to himself. Three suspicious-looking rat folks kick the fourth, telling him, “Darth Krysian, the Gosmosvorvodokanalya is coming for you!” but he just squeaks a cursing. An ice cream man in a multi-colored van fights off zombie kids with a shotgun pounding with enchanted caramel shrapnel, although, wait, one of the kids is not a zombie, but a devil! A cute little devil with weird cross-pupil eyes, and she's not looking at the ice cream man, but behind her back, looking for someone.

An abandoned tavern by the road, ominous and desolate, around which are lying in an assortment of long decayed corpses, which recently were mobile. Some of the corpses are missing pointed fingers. They are being cut down right now quietly swearing some Oleg man with the aura of a weak gifted. What Oleg did to him and where, after all, the ill-fated model, there is no answer, but near the back entrance to the inn, on the other side of the man collecting fingers, suddenly appears a girl with cute horns, a tail, and eyes, eyes in each of which the pupil has the shape of a cross. Stepan knows it for sure, even though she doesn't even look in his direction, looking in the wrong place, but gradually focuses in the right direction.

Filled with cigarette smoke, the semi-darkness of some cheap pub, a noir atmosphere, and a mixture of boredom and excitement. Three men sitting at a table playing poker. These three are the Joker played by old Ledger, Darth Vader as himself, and the good clown Pennywise. They are playing for the right to get two whole days off, and it seems that they are ready to start killing if the game goes according to a slightly different scenario than they would like. The little devil girl, who had appeared next to the clown, was accosted with an ominous “Shhhh!” and Pennywise, from whom she faltered in apparent terror, handed her a scarlet balloon. The devil looked around, glancing cross-eyed around the smoky and dark room, looking for someone, looking very diligently, but nervous in the presence of the clown, and looked at the balloon as if it were a poisonous viper.

The eyes

The eyes

The eyes

A dark sleeping room plunged into almost total darkness. The only source of light is a small and flickering candle. Stepan is in the center of the room, securely and skillfully tied to a soft armchair. He mooed unhappily and tried to get rid of the rope, which turned out to be enchanted. Not only for its strength and impossibility to untie but also for the comfort of the bound. For some reason his aura doesn't obey, the spiritual call can't be activated, and a couple of shapely blondes, not sisters, but very similar, are pressing him from both sides, rubbing some alchemical stuff on his body dressed in only a rope. And whispering, speaking, asking to look only at the candle, at its light, at its glow, so small, but so warm, as if carrying the warmth of the sun itself. In a moment the shaman stops resisting and then begins to answer questions, with a dreamy smile telling something interesting, while one of the blondes jerks the captive's cock, ready to burst out at any second, and the second one makes the candle's flame more and more warm and bright, tantalizing and soothing with a wave of her palm. Stepan speaks, listens, agrees, nods, and answers questions, under the approving words, stroking, and touching of the couple, but then his eyes fall on the squinting third girl in this dark room, a pretty black girl with a scarlet helium balloon in her hands, but her eyes, strange eyes, are blinded by the candle, which has become a small sun, blind and frightening.

Dream.

Dream.

Dream.

A large and richly furnished house, a bedroom in which Stepan was sitting in an armchair, and in front of him stood, towering at a good two meters and a third of a large beast-maiden with cow horns and huge tits the size of Stepan's head, only at her own size breasts seemed surprisingly organic. Taurus, the description of this subspecies of beast races came to his mind, and a pureblooded one at that. The pureblooded Taurus smiles the warm and affectionate smile of a kindly auntie, tilting her back slightly, thrusting out her enormous tits and moving her shoulders. Her breasts oscillate left and right like a hypnotic pendulum, holding his attention and making him hear but not listen, memorize but forget the words, only the words are not those of the Taurus, but of someone else.

Dreams.

Dreams.

Dreams.

The interior of the same house, but the frame is different. Stepan is not smiling a stupid smile at the huge tits, but is angry and agitated, expressing his thoughts in a very clear way. The woman sitting in the chair and guiltily lowering her head with her strange eyes and pupils, nods, nods and agrees with everything he says. That they are bound by someone else's will, but that doesn't mean he will tolerate her antics. That she is bound to obey and do not harm, and her games could very well harm herself if those games become visible to anyone else. That he has already given her a ban on harvesting “crops” and choosing new targets, and she is obligated to obey it. The girl, the maiden, the woman nods sluggishly, smiling slyly with the corner of her mouth, because Stepan says all this while kneeling on his knees, sitting on top of the Tauren lying on the floor, not stopping to furiously blow her between her tits covered with fragrant oil, while the demoness jerks the beast-maiden's nipples with her toes, until the moment when the shaman, roaring with pleasure, did not spill out onto those legs to prove, to show that he is in charge, that he should be listened to, that he is the one who now commands and licks, licks, licks. ..

Dream.

Dream.
Dream.

Images, vistas, landscapes, scenes, responses, anything imaginable, fused together and apart, going in all directions and time streams.

And eyes.

Strange eyes with pupils in the shape of a cross, searching, waiting, following from dream to dream, from image to image, searching, trying to see something, someone, finding, almost finding...

The eyes.

* * *

Stepan woke up abruptly, very abruptly, so abruptly, as it happens only if you wake him up by force, which, in fact, happened. No sinister creature with a knife was creeping up on him, no beast of prey was hungry for his blood, and even the leaf-gift was lying peacefully by itself, but not released by the hungry presence of a higher spirit that decided to devour the lost prey. All of this occurred to the young man, from which he summoned a dozen battle spirits, taking cover with them and preparing to defend himself. Only a few seconds later, he realizes he was awakened by his loyal and contracted dream spirits, who sensed the threat coming through the same dreams. Again freezing and checking himself with specific spiritual techniques the young man exhaled and sat down tiredly on the ground, wiping away the sweat covering him with his shirt sleeve. He was so wet that he would have to clean himself with spirits, and he had slept well, but he was still tired and felt strange as if he had actually run while he slept.

"I haven't been haunted by evil entities in my dreams yet." His voice sounds confused and hoarse, echoing unpleasantly in the shaman's ears as he recalls all the things that attempting to dream walk can threaten him with. "Let me go, miracle weed, I haven't even smoked you!"

His attempts to recall his dreams resulted in a series of images that quickly floated away from his memory. His attempts to catch them were frankly too late, and he had not made any prepared dream catchers, he did not see the need. The images remained frankly weak, fragmentary: snow-white stone with red veins, sloppily erased blood on the palms of his hands, a large ostrich, an enchanted wooden mannequin, a candle burning in the dark, a scarlet balloon, and also.... boobs, big and oiled boobs. Whether it's the lack of communication with the female gender or another interaction with the Autogoddess through the images received through her gifts, they were the ones that were remembered the best. Tits and... eyes. Yes, that's right, the strange and searching gaze of no human eyes with very oddly shaped pupils. Not like a sharingan from one famous anime, no, it was different, like... a cross?

"Great, I'm having erotic nightmares with Christian themes, just fine." His voice regains its firmness, strength returns to his all-too-rested body. New accomplishments no longer seemed burdensome. -"I'm getting farther away from the gods every day. And that's probably a good thing. Especially if from one particular Milfgoddess."

Shaking himself up, Stepan did some exercises, meditation, training in working with the spirit, as he had been accustomed to during the wintering in Lyady, having got bored with these exertions while sailing on Businka. Yes, there was no sense in hiding it from himself. Even though the young man was frightened and also angry by the unnecessary and very serious risk, but in himself he was even glad that he had returned to solo sailing. Human masses and social interaction, they are like good wine. One should be consumed not too often and with pauses. A couple weeks later he'll no doubt be grumbling again and thinking how nice it would have been to keep sailing the Dantra and arrive at his destination long ago, but right now, right now he's not just fine - he's good. After charging and exercises, he began to count the losses, which were mostly in the form of contracts, which now had to be renewed. It was good if several summons were agreed upon at once, but some spirits agreed only to a single use, others charged a high price when the number of summons was multiplied, and others refused to appear a second time at the call of the same shaman.

Glory in the ages of the system notebook and the memory enhanced by magical attributes, glory indeed! The course of the battle as well as the list of used summons was restored without difficulty, making him sigh wistfully at the thought of the upcoming work. Not so much because of the work as such, but because of the absence of his favorite clearing, without which the task would become more complicated and tedious, not complicated but tedious. And necessary, obligatory to fulfill! He had other sets of summonses, against the background of which the spent ones, though not a drop in the sea, but not even fifteen percent. Indeed! He had not drafted a single one of the permanent contracts. He just didn't have time. To his own surprise, he managed it before such trump cards came up. And this despite the fact they attacked him on their terms, and he himself had only minimally prepared for defense.

But most of the summons he'd used in the battle against Eel and his young team had been those most effective on water, underwater, or river waters. Entities specific and working hard in the right territory. Given how much Dantra and Mlatra dominate the life of an entire region, he has no right not to refresh this part of his arsenal. Simply because this history has a chance to repeat itself again on the river. Moreover, it is on the river, around which the largest cities, the largest number of villages, and the entire local economy with commerce are centered, that this situation has the greatest chance of repeating itself. All in all, the arsenal needs to be rebuilt. This became an obvious fact for Stepan, so he began to fulfill the task. Some of the totems, the smallest and most valuable for the campaign he still brought with him. It will be possible to activate and reinstall them to make the work easier.

Also, a talent point should be invested, although, just with this he can wait: now he does not need talent, especially since the pumping of dialog to the current limit has a chance to turn him off for a couple of days. On the other hand, with the strengthened root skill it will be possible to speed up the recovery of the retinue even more. So many decisions and no saves. Such a disappointment. He wonders if the list of meta-skills has the ability to use this save. Or even spare lives? Somehow it seemed that these fantasies of his had at least a non-zero probability of becoming reality.

The next thirteen days were very tense and full of labor, for which little by little, little by little experience came, but at the same time so routine that if he decided to write a story about what had happened, there would be nothing to say but the report on the work done would be to the delight of any bureaucrat - thick, heavy, written in small handwriting. He silently rejected one small assignment, and the second, also small, was from the Autogoddess and again reduced everything to masturbation. He had not yet become so wild in these forests. He had relatively normal dreams now, because he fell asleep calm and tired and slept next to a couple of catchers taken out of his backpack, and he did not forget to meditate before going to sleep, just for peace of mind.

The System Store had a very large amount of currency, which was only slightly reduced by the purchase of reagents for refreshing summons. This made it possible to cautiously consider buying something from the list of special offers. However, the first of the items was a very black one. It was a bone knife, which should be used to cut the throats of living and breathing victims, preferably intelligent ones. But bypassing the agony of the killed through itself, the artifact so intensified this agony that the specific spirits will caress the owner of the knife, like drug addicts to the dealer. With the same consequences and risks. The sellers of dope become victims of their clients too often, thanks to the criminal chronicles for this information. With such a knife the young man could easily summon and bind even the elder spirits, dark-black and evil, like an anecdotal mother-in-law, but he had seen such artifacts and summons in the grave. And he didn't have enough currency, even if it was just a little, like the amount of money spent on reagents, but he didn't have enough.

The second of the items was from Autogoddess and that said it all. However, he was tempted to buy a small and very elegantly made faceless female doll. It is worth only getting a cast of the aura, or better hair or blood of the victim, as it opens simply incredible space for work. Not only vulgar but exactly all sorts of perversions, fetishes, and body modification through this doll could be conducted with maximum ease and through almost any defense. It was a very harsh thing that made his eyes twitch and his butt burns, even though the young man admitted that this artifact, unlike the bracelet, could be used for something useful, not the usual Autogoddess.

In addition to eying the inaccessible auction items, Stepan worked with his luggage, or rather its volume, which was hard to carry in one person, even with the double of Constitution. And with a spirit planted in the body or luggage relief is simply uncomfortable. The solution was very simple: one of the backpacks, in which Stepan had stuffed almost all the totems and other heavy things, remained here, on the hill near the stone. A small and reinforced pit, worked by the spirits of the earth, with the backpack with the load inside, and a stone slab created by the spirits on top. Inside this storage chamber was a very funny connection, attached to a second, lightened bag, which contained only the most essential of things.

As long as the contract was in effect - that is, at least ten years or until it was canceled - as long as the vault was intact, as long as both bags were intact, he could take out the things and objects from one of the backpacks that were in the other. That's already a cool claim to Artifacting. Stepan was almost certain that the System would finally give him this knowledge, but alas, he didn't get it somewhere, gaining only a certain amount of experience. It wasn't bad, of course, but it was still a shame, but at least the problem with luggage was temporarily solved. Still have to, as soon as you settle in a new place will have to drag everything to the new totem structure, but at the moment the solution is quite working. However, the young man took all three precious artifacts, the usual system artifact and both Autogodess artifacts with him, not taking any chances. It would be foolish and dangerous to leave such magical and dangerous things in a secret place.

Another notable one was a quest from the Autogoddess, which appeared at the end of his marathon and, apparently, out of turn. The young man did not keep track of his quests, but a good memory allowed him to notice that often new quests appeared a day or two earlier or later and for no apparent reason. It was either a lag in the system, or some kind of feature, and the young man was inclined to the latter option. So, the assignment from SuperMilfa! He accepted it and even completed it, as he saw no reason not to. The task was to summon a very powerful strong spirit with a very rare spell specialization, and it had to be summoned with very clear conditions.

Actually, this assignment - only a small one, not even an average one - attracted Stepan because its description-images, if he decided to transfer it to paper, would take up two A4 pages in painstaking handwriting. To make it shorter, he had to use the spirit to create and process a blank sheet of parchment for making deals in the trade business. After that, when the victim - necessarily female and beautiful in Stepan's opinion - would sign even the most ordinary contract, committing to, say, the delivery of a chest of alchemical potions, the contract could be amended. You will have to write them on the same contract, and with your own blood with the maximum investment of magical energy in it, and in legible handwriting (this is where the impossible task for Stepan!), as well as finding a place for this inscription. But if the victim's defense is not paranoid enough, these new additions, which just have to have a vulgar sexual connotation, will become part of the deal.

The norm.

It's like, transferring a chest of cosmetic alchemy in such and such a time, get so so many coins of Morgrave coinage in silver, give to the buyer a titjob, and letting yourself be fucked in the pussy and ass, deducting a percentage to the intermediary, close the contract. A completely ordinary transaction, nothing complicated, you don't even have to remember it. In fact, it was a task on a level comparable to that of the Sleepwalker, though simpler. It's easier to notice and defend. Stepan agreed only because there was no need to use the contract in the assignment, nothing forbade the material anchor to be destroyed. Yes, the anchor did not contain the spirit - the spirit only changed the reflection of parchment, paper, or even a clay tablet, but sailed away on its own after the transaction was completed. A very strong and unusual exotic, minimax, like a Bear or Squidward, only in terms of vulgar mindfucking, yes.

The ritual went so normally and smoothly that the shaman was simply offended. A minimum of necessary offerings, the spirit turned out to be generally unspoiled, not much reserve, very specific images in the dialog, and here, the contract is concluded, and the material contract is already ready. Fulfillment of the quest added a lot of experience, about half the scale, increased affinity with the spheres, increased charm effects, as well as greatly increased the likelihood of all sorts of vulgar talents in the list of available. Oh yes, there was also the promise of a material reward, but there was no hope for it. If it weren't for experience, Stepan wouldn't have bothered.

The spirit came with the rustling of the pages, which made my eyes dark; it had no clear form, it had no form at all, being just a sound, a rustle, but not something tangible. In the spirit world, the entity looked like a pile of all kinds of scribbled paper, on which one could see obscene pictures or pieces of stories and novels of the “not for children” category. As Stepan realized, the entity was born out of the bitterness of unrecognized fiction writers who wrote explicit scenes in someone else's name, actual ghostwriters bound by an unfair contract, which gave rise to their emotions and resentment - THIS. This spirit could be called a true exotic, very few of Stepan's subordinate entities had a comparable unusual root concept history, and none of them were as strong as this contract-writer.

Yes, he had burned that contract in the fire, but all the conditions of conscription remained in his memory. It wasn't hard to be conscripted again, nothing could be changed, and that was why he still felt as if he had been fucked. The unpleasant feeling was somewhat soothed by the warmth of the night fire, burning smokeless flames, - because the smoke was diverted and dispersed by special spirits - cozy and just in case encircled by a powerful magical amulet. The reason for this was not only the mago-erotic contract that had been burned down and had long ago become ashes. It was just that Stepan had finally fulfilled his long-standing dream by burning the Autogoddess's gift, piece by piece. No, he still couldn't bring himself to burn the bracelet and the armored stockings. He was afraid to even touch the first one when he took it out of the box. The second would not even burn in this fire if he threw it into the flames. This was the third gift from All Milfs. The largest and most numerous - a natural box of wooden dicks.

Well, not exactly, the young man exaggerated.

Not dicks, but wands, and of limited combat and very high quality: exactly fifty artifacts of the same type, each with a very convenient “interface”, accessible even to those deprived of the gift, but trained, several modes of fire, built-in protection against interception and detonation. The owner of such a toy wouldn't be able to pull off the trick he'd used to tear Vihras's arm off - he'd run into the defense and get hit back through the magic channel, directly into the aura or, if he had time to react, into the spirit-mediator he'd used to attack.

Why did Stepan burn these wands, which, by the way, colored the flames in all the colors of the rainbow, at the same time sending fireworks into the reinforced magic circle that surrounded the campfire? It was not because the engravings on the wooden surface of the rod depicted scenes from a very adult movie. The reason was the typification of the embedded charms. They were, first, non-lethal, which wasn't even a bad thing, and second, in the style of the Autogoddess. This beautiful, delightful, gorgeous, and stunning woman had given him fifty elite combat Orgasmotrons!

A blow with inserted charms caused an instant and incredibly wild orgasm with the eruption of all possible fluids, as well as the subsequent loss of consciousness, which can be, by repeated activation of the same charms, transferred into a state of complete submission and lethargy, so that the detainee himself in the cell, not otherwise. The ability to hit with separate “arrows of passion”, adjusting the power depending on the type of the opponent, his defense, and the nature of that defense, the ability to use invisible and visible only in the magical spectrum “orgasmic lash”, hitting the opponent at the touch, with the ability to control the lash, to strengthen or weaken, to adjust the length and intensity, to wrap around shields or even hit through them, if properly adjusted and if you know how to handle amulets at the proper level. A cone attack in front of you, or even a continuous closed field around a specified point - all modes are multifunctional and flexible to the extreme.

The picture was completed with absolute reliability and a lot of built-in reinsurances so that these wands would not harm either the victims or the owner. Actually, thanks to these re-assurances, which guaranteed gradual deflation of magic in case of mechanical damage, the young man risked burning them, knowing for sure that no big bang would happen. Moreover, he used these wands as donations to various spirits, mostly of a fiery nature, successfully concluding several contracts, even two with strong spirits, not counting the many small ones. And not just fire spirits, there were a handful of healers and suggestors as well. The charms in the wands were a very skillful combination of pure mentalism and very cunning healing with a slight touch of maleficism, burned and sacrificed they gave a lot, and became a valuable reagent.

He had never been so pleased just to sit by the fire and burn wood! If it weren't for the need to feed the spirits that were begging for a new portion of power and hiding magical emanations, which this fire and fireworks kept within the framework of the hill, without semaphore for tens of kilometers around about the powerful magical duel going on right here, everything would be fine. Alas, the world had never been and would never be perfect, Stepan would have to put up with it. But he would probably accept it, willingly meeting the blows of fate.

“Yes, yes, blaze, good ones, more power, more valuable magic, I'll also summon the spirits of the fires, it'll be perfect for fighting in urban areas, blaze, blaze, blaze!” He chuckled, rubbing his hands together and probably giving a slightly inadequate impression from the outside. “Burn, burn with fire just as my butt burned, burn to ashes and dust!”

But it would only seem so, for Stepan was in complete control of himself and showed no unhealthy tendencies in his behavior.

Yeah, yeah.

After the contract renegotiation process was completed, he had to invest his talents in spiritual dialog, as well as make the long journey through the wild and dangerous territory. But here, where there are either no people at all or almost none, and magical beasts dangerous for the settlers will hardly threaten the senior shaman, who does not forget about caution, he will be able to breathe a little and calmly get to civilization. Yes, another pancake turned out to be lumpy. The trip on the cruise ship from Bastius and Co. turned out to be too extreme, but this moment was heroically passed and crossed, opening the way for a new path and a new adventure. A maximally boring and safe adventure, which will be diluted only by strenuous, but not dangerous training of his gift.

Stepan had no doubt - that's the way it would be.

* * *

THE STATUS OF STEPAN "NORMAL" AT THE END OF CHAPTER FIFTEENTH

Name: Stepan

Level: 22

Class: Senior Shaman

Characteristics: (free: 0)

Talents (free): 1

Constitution: 2

Sensitivity: 11

Power: 6

Control: 5

Source: 5

Spirit: 13

Resistance: 1

Knowledge acquired: speaking and writing: Free Cities, academic Neirat, Island Kingdom; call practice of master level; master level of spiritual dialog; wilderness hermit; advanced basics of working with healing spirits; advanced developed techniques of casting shamanic charms (GIFT); advanced basic techniques of dream-inducing and dream correction (GIFT); the advanced basic practice of combat calls; advanced basic techniques of interaction with magical sources; advanced basic techniques of countering curses: basic fundamentals of fast call; the advanced basic practice of spiritual operation; the mastery of an experienced martial caller; advanced basics of spiritual haggling and contract agreements with otherworldly entities; the advanced basic practice of remote control of spiritual entities; basic methods of teaching magical sciences; basic methods of tantric practices; advanced basic methods of territorial influences; basics of work with totems; advanced basic techniques of building defensive formations; advanced techniques of spiritual wandering; advanced basic skills of spiritual conflict outside the physical body; advanced developed techniques of suggestive influences based on shamanism (GIFT); methods of undercover work

Minor knowledge: contract with an elder spirit: Sleepwalker (GIFT); contract with the elder spirits: The Shroud of Touch and the Creator of Decisions (GIFT); a contract with a strong spirit: The Eater of Diseases; defense by distortion of the anteroom of the spheres; contract with a strong spirit: Cheesh'sh'shuya; contract with a strong spirit: Jolly Milker; contract with a strong spirit: Sneaking Glow; contract with a senior spirit: Joy of the Waves; contract with a senior spirit: Vishpli-Schwalstprachtmatt; contract with a senior spirit: Vishpli-Schwalstprachtmatt; contract with a senior spirit: Memory Eater.

Obtained properties: blessings of health and long life; toughness of spirit; resilience of subtle bodies; small mark of spiritual spheres: spiritual shroud of higher auric concealment (GIFT); flexible transformation of the spiritual body; marking of fallen leaves and black roots; a tantric spiritual hearth; recognition of creators of passions and weavers of feelings (GIFT); heritage in blood and spirit (GIFT); patchwork spiritual echo (GIFT); multiplicity of spiritual awareness; small spiritual and energetic protection

System modifiers: peaceful development III; issuance of system assignments III; lecherous development IV; access to system purchases III; small system endowment of characteristics; temporal awareness III; reserve renewal II; replenishment of life I; accepting a systemic deal with a patron (Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Giver of Gifts, loyal servant of Innelas Innelay)

Completed Deals: -

Available Deals: Cute & Innocent; Sweet Attraction; Big & Soft

Special: Blessing of Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Giver of Gifts, loyal servant of Innelas Innelay: likely to grant additional talents as you level up; grant specific System quests with increased rewards; Mark of Destinies: Singha, daughter of Maega, and Maega, daughter of Maedra; hidden effects

* * *

Author's Note:

Well, I've been robbed of my first comment, no joy in life, only disappointment. :)

Now for the chapter. With your permission, I won't give you most of the dice - the battle underwater alone consumed so much of my strength, as if it was me fighting there and not Stepan. However, not without interesting moments both in the battle and in the chapter in general.

So, the most failed rolls in the whole chapter can be considered Stepan's attempts to give the enemy a quiet and unnoticeable silence of lambs. However, it could not be otherwise, not with such an enemy. There were minuses of almost seventy units, sometimes up to eighty. The chances of a quick and quiet victory were buried almost immediately, and then it was loud and generally bigbadaboom jugga-jugga.

First, a hundred, pure, but without repeated rolls on the “complexity” of the problems encountered along the way, rolled while the last chapter was still in the process of proofreading. Yes, yes, that's right, a clean hundred, no discounts. In order to bring the throwing mechanics into balance with the world, it was necessary to make the Bead ship very similar to another for which there was a real hunt. And then they walked through the wrong door trying to earn their THREE HUNDRED GOLDS because this gym already had its own BIG BOSS. Ahem, sorry. In the end, a certain Teresa the Pike, though she was a pike, was lucky, and she also owed Stepan some money, but he was a polite man and would hardly remind her of this debt.

In addition to the above, the enemy had two very powerful bonus rolls. It's necklace, which was 91 on the strength of the billet but was met with a hundred (with bonuses) on the counteraction from the hero, and the efficiency of the billet gave only 44 - with anger and unstable mental state, Eel lost his trump card. And Stepan redirected the blow, though, even more ruining his disguise.

The second trump card the enemy himself did not expect to see was the intervention of the Sea Lady. And all because MC decided to summon one of the spirits marked by the Master of the Depths to fight. These two gods are traditionally in a relationship between the two Koreas, so the reaction is not surprising. The goddess might not have reacted, she could have, but she reacted in another hundred, albeit with bonuses. Fortunately for the raiders, Calisto, the imprint and echo of her will in the old amulet of Eel, carried since the time of his youth (so it is a full-fledged small relic, not just an analog of a pendant cross), sensed the power of the competitor and fried. Also, at the same time, the elemental was released, but it's still unclear who benefited from it - the hero or the enemy.

Other than that, everything else was pretty even. Two summons of strong spirits, one use of anteroom, a bunch of small rolls, and a successfully rolled curse. That's it, the Eel is ready. Bake it. He was still not a master by local standards, just a very strong adept, but he was closer to that rank than Rumorias, though their auras were about the same intensity.

Then it was more fun when the hero was deciding what to do with the witnesses. He decided. Roll on morals, remaining with a strong, but not the most useful for him personally spirit in the contracts. However, he already has a decent retinue, senior spirits-militants will also appear in it, and the moral image for our shaman - is priceless. There's a system mastercard for everything else.

In general, his reward for the act from the system went to the natural minimum - 14 out of 100, not crit fail, but a shame. But the Autogoddess gifted yeah.. Actually, the graph of deals should have appeared much earlier, but now is not bad. Given all the accumulating resentments of the protagonist to Her Milfeishness, I do not even know how to twist the situation so that the hero at least one deal agreed to accept.

Oh, no, of course I do. :)

The main thing is that it doesn’t happen, as with the rest of the hentai in my works.

And, of course, dreams.

As it is not difficult to understand from these dreams, the hero in his epiphany caught the spirit on the image of one Miss Oglaf, and she, being an ancient, old, and clever creature, noticed this attention and tried to trace it.

Probably the most headache dice rolls in the chapter. She kept getting one step away from success, but the hero already had a good retinue of dreamers and they were taking him away and taking him away. In reality, of course, he was in no particular danger, the creature wouldn't have gotten him through the dreams seriously. But for those who have read Brinar's original work. The commentary is unnecessary. There's such a persona there that her attention in itself is not a good thing. Even a fleeting one. Actually, the nightmare with her participation showed this fact.

Perhaps it is not obvious, I could not normally describe the scene as it appeared in my head, but the demoness lost track of Stepan somewhere in the dream with a candle and the sun. But only the spirit has already latched on to her image and dreamed Stepan those options for the future, in which he will have to get acquainted with this creature closer and not quite for himself successfully. This, of course, was no guarantee that what he saw would happen. Neither are all other dreams... but it's an option.

That's it with the cubic commentary, I think that's it. I'm off to proofread the chapter because it looks like some of the chapter's markup was eaten when it was transferred to Ficbook.

Good morning everyone, tea with honey and peppermint, a message from the bank with your paycheck, and in general, keep your tails up.

Внимание! Этот перевод, возможно, ещё не готов.
Его статус: идёт перевод

Переведено на Нотабеноиде
http://notabenoid.org/book/86785/575311

Переводчики: Camrad_RIP