Готовый перевод Настучать в бубен / Hit the tambourine: Глава 18-7

"I confess that at this moment I am experiencing an unimaginable range of feelings, the most important of which is understanding why you are so emotional about your Tablet," Sylvia said sincerely and a bit shocked as her aura stopped churning and embedding the new elite property of the highest class, the corner of her eye twitching every now and then. "No, I'm glad to have this trump card. It's really worth a lot, not to mention the fact I'm only a few steps away from taking a new step, but I swear to God, it's still... shocking and astonishing, to put it in the mildest possible terms."

Stepan looked at her with an inexpressible mixture of irony and understanding. Like someone who had long ago resigned himself to something that couldn't be changed anyway. Her new gift didn't allow for more powerful or sophisticated brainwashing, but it didn't make it any less colorful. In fact, Sylvia had developed a very specifically working spatial pocket. Not that kind of inventory. The pocket was completely undetectable and not blocked by anything, being a meta-skill, and working on magical principles, but still very badass. Hidden at the level of the shroud, just that characteristics did not add, extremely flexible, able to hold even magically active artifacts and mothballed divine relics, a volume of about two cubic meters. An extremely harsh and flexible thing, the dream of a smuggler or a hardened jailbird. The problem was that the disguise of this pocket was provided by its full integration with subtle bodies and the physical body - to put something into this pocket and then to take it out was possible only through three points on the body.
https://youtu.be/9OaM4kfzQ_M

Yes, yes, that's right, it's not hard to guess, knowing the intrigues of the Autogoddess, what these three points would be - mouth, anus, and cunt, with the last two passages increasing their firmness and elasticity, which the old and old undead creature already had quite good. Well, to be sure to fit everything you want, if you're brave enough. In fact, there were limits to the capacity, and something thicker than, say, a bicep or calf muscle would likely damage the walls of the pocket, causing the thin body to take a long time to regenerate and temporarily seal the pocket with all its contents. That wasn't the worst of it; Sylvia had the rudiments of morphism, and could, with mate and fatigue, widen her mouth to fit a melon, even if she had to soften some of her muscles, loosen or break some of her bones, and tear some of her tendons. Worst of all, it will be possible to remove something from the pocket only by using the entrance that was not used to put the object into the pocket. In other words, if you swallow something, you will have to take it out of some other orifice of the basic three, not from your mouth.

"So, I can smuggle anything I want at any time and then spit it in my opponent's face. An explosive amulet, a hundred vials of poison, or even an enchanted dwarven blade." Slowly and unhurriedly, suppressing her feelings she stretched out with inexpressible intonation. "But if I want to use such a trick, which can really be decisive in any battle, I have to put these vials... I can't believe it's real. And I won't say no, I won't say no, it's too much power, too little price to pay."

"I would also add that you don't have to use vials. You can also pour the liquid into yourself with a pump, the walls of the pocket should be able to withstand it, and then just exhale it into the enemy's face, or pump in the gas at once." With sincere and vindictive pleasure Stepan, spoiled by the earthly Internet, suggests, feeling a little bit like the second Stepan. "How much I fucking love and adore my patroness, there are simply no words. Censored words. And that's why I stay in respectful and admiring silence all the time."

"Hush, please, Pann," Sylvia said a little frightened, but she was not angry or even puzzled by his suggestion, she accepted it with gratitude, but she stopped the hint of blasphemy against the supreme being, because from her point of view Stepan was a high priest for the Autogoddess, and she could easily hear it. "It is better to start the last stage of your training because it is the simplest and does not require additional stimulation of an emotional nature. Frankly speaking, it is a great shame to me that I was not able to complete the Steps, although I have worked as hard as you in many ways."

By the latter term, which was quite common, though not quite academically correct, Sylvia meant the lewd approach, with its emphasis on the humiliating sexualization of loss for the student. And the fact that such a method was not to be used here pleased him to no end. Sylvia had long ago tested the capabilities of her eyes and easily incorporated them into the general framework of mental defense, she just tested them on the servants, some of whom had received additional settings, as well as on her chicks, which not without enthusiasm tried new tricks of their mother and immediately forgot about them, out of harm's way. They were easier to interrogate than Sylvia, and she didn't want to take any chances.

In future plans, a great deal of time will be devoted to eyes and their use. With their help Martel plans to teach Stepan to recognize dormant commands or to uproot commands-activators, like triggers. But this level of mastering the skill is still much higher and more difficult, even for very cool mages it is considered that if at all allowed to put such a thing in his head, then already lost. So this training, which even Sylvia herself does not really understand how to conduct, they will be engaged in much later. It is a very rare situation outside of controlled conditions when the victim knows that she has commands-activators in her head, but she has not been disabled from realizing this fact. The very process of such work and training is closely related to the methods of agent work, which require literally replacing elements of personality in oneself, creating or formatting new images-roles, so that part of the commands, if they happen to leak into the mind, will be directed at the false personality. In essence, this is very advanced mentalistics, a separate branch of it, and even he, even with the system, will have to spend at least a couple of months on it. He doesn't have that kind of time anyway, and it's not that he needs to learn such things at all. They don't go through the brain harmlessly. You practically have to throw off the marbles in a controlled and directed manner.

No, now they would be training exclusively in blocked memory work and a little more direct resistance to the harsh subjugating influences of the higher ranks. Some of the necessary techniques he already knew from his last acquisition. Those derived from agency work. Ways of checking his schedule, finding lacunas and suspicious blurs in memory, being able to pick out strangely past moments of conversation and put things into perspective. Against really high-quality suggestion and amnesiac influence it does not help much, there the mind itself is looking for reasons not to look too deeply or completes the memory by the forces of the victim's mind, adjusting the memory to a convenient version of why everything is perfectly fine. But it's also very difficult to do quality work with the mind and memory, especially if the victim is a senior shaman, and you had to work on it in a hurry and without long preparation. That talent, obviously present, recently appeared, among the available choices, which Stepan and Sylvia were aiming at, would help some of the vulnerabilities and weaknesses of their memory not to close, so to blur, to make not so adamant.

"Oh, you should diminish yourself Sylvia, as if you were a native Odessian at the bazaar." He replied with a phrase that was not quite clear linguistically, but perfectly readable by the context. "You've already been given new knowledge and immediately upgraded it to an advanced base, and at the last stage you will definitely take a level. Think positively. Because if you think negatively, then with such a life the suicide is not far away."

“That's where you're wrong, pet, for all those who walk beneath the scarlet drop are astonishingly life-loving if immersion in our unlife can be considered life-loving.” She objected, either genuinely cheered up or determined not to show her distress too much. “As far as I know, rarely do children of the blood seek oblivion in ultimate doom, if there is any alternative. Exceptions are usually those cases where the alternative would be an exceptionally horrible existence, agonizing and stretching for years. And even then, people like me would rather spend every last drop of blood in an attempt to escape or kill an enemy than cut off their eternity. Anyway, back to business. Ready to begin?”

Stepan only nodded at the last part of her monologue, not commenting on the rest. The willingness to fight to the end and the desire for life was certainly worthy of respect, but in the case of bloodsucking creatures, it came from the very nature of the partially undead, low sensitivity to pain, and atrophy of the emotional sphere in the moments of transition into combat mode. But she, who had received a very advanced and subsidiary block of knowledge to her blood control called “advanced basic methods of complex composite suggestion based on blood control”, at least stopped complaining. He was surprised, but he really hadn't expected Sylvia Malter to start whining to her “pet” about not being able to grind properly! Well, even if she was not whining in the usual sense of the word, if we translate her lofty monologues and broken look into earthly analogs, it was exactly whining.

"Then look me in the eye, pet." With a predatory and sinister grin that made her remind herself that he, before each of the training sessions where she had the power to influence his mind, separately tuned her compulsions. "Watch and sleep. Sleep. S..."

Her eyes, beautiful and deep, though scarlet, seemed to flash with depth, even more scarlet than usual, and then Stepan felt the effect of her influence. He had already had time to analyze it before he took up this training, and knew roughly what spirits to call upon to offset or ward off such a blow. The easiest thing to do was to wear a mask, which would simply reflect the attack with its bubble of emptiness, and if without a mask, then close his eyes and look through the spirits, so that her gaze did not work. But, in a direct eye-to-eye encounter, aura, will, and direct defense with the spiritual body alone were still not enough, even if you are three hundred times a Senior Shaman. He would have liked to say that he fought like a lion and held his ground like Leonidas at Thermopylae, but in reality, there was not even a blow.

Two invisible and intangible needles struck from her eyes, entering Stepan's spiritual body exactly where his own eyes were, entering through all the defense, readiness, and will to resist, instantly pumping Silvia's will under his defenses. A will that was full, complete, and pressing exactly on the right part of the spiritual body responsible for the cognitive functions of perceiving reality. He was able to hear the second command, which for his brain sounded unquestionable and absolute authority, but he could not hear the third “sleep”, rather he guessed it by its meaning. His mind was covered with complete and incredibly cozy darkness, in which he felt only absolute calmness and peace, nothing more. This, by the way, made Sylvia's eyes an excellent soporific and antidepressant, as well as a remedy for intrusive dreams.

"Wake up." It's a short command, but it's like an electric shock, and he opens his eyes in the same chair where her gaze found him, and the first access to the system clock image shows that an hour and another eight and a half minutes have passed. "The whole record is on the crystal if anything, but first try to restore the memory yourself."

And he honestly tried, even starting to make some progress. There was nothing at all in the place of the past hour, as if he had just slept the whole time, but the constant stimulation of aura and spirit, almost drained and then completely spent reserve, which had to be restored by meta-skill, as well as a large knowledge base of how the suggestion worked, and accurate knowledge of the mechanics of her eyes played its role. However, the biggest role was played by the fact that Sylvia didn't even try to hide the fact of her attack and the missing hour of time from him, otherwise, everything would have been, well, different. However, he also didn't call on the spirits-guards, which would have prompted the events, didn't draw a pattern of powerful protection directly on his body, didn't call on any of the specific senior spirits, a lot of things “not”.

The images of the erased time were rather murky, and fuzzy, and he couldn't be sure he'd gotten them completely right and hadn't brought back fragments of some dream. Still, what he was doing had a lot of the same techniques used to correct dreams, only with the difference that now they were being used in reality. It took him three times as long, and he was soaking wet, but he was still able to calculate the fact that he'd been doing mostly one thing for the hour he'd been under control.

“Um... I read you poetry. Love poems. Petrarch and, I guess, Shakespeare. And I've translated them both into Confederate quite well, I can't believe it.” He gives his answer but immediately corrects himself. “But that's obviously not all, just most of the time, the most colorful. There's something else... I told you something, answered your questions... hmmm... no, I can't remember any more, unless I start all over again, and that's not a sure thing.”

"Well, you guessed part of it, I thought it would take a dozen tries, no less, so my surprise is extremely pleasant. And yes, the poems are really good, I don't know if you translated them or not. My lady's eyes do not know the sun - here I felt a note of sympathy, honestly." The shaman only rolled his eyes, for there was nothing to say because Sylvia had instilled in him an unearthly love, which he immediately said, adding to the previous report. "Yes, that's right, love, high and pure. You told me a couple of your little secrets too, but very quickly, and I deliberately hid those memories better than others. It's a shame. You could have recovered everything but fine as it is for a first try. Look through the crystal and see for yourself."

With the help of the summoned entity, displaying the image from the crystal on the surface of the table which was temporarily playing the role of a monitor, the young man made sure that he had mostly correctly restored the erased fragments. From what he still didn't understand, the answers to Sylvia's questions consisted of stories about how he'd lost his innocence and what kind of shameful images he'd preferred to jerking as a boy. He gave the vampiress an angry and annoyed look but didn't speak on the subject, for her smile was an invitation to get into an argument. It was his own fault for not putting in a clear enough restraining compulsion before he'd let her eyes activate, so why be angry when he'd have to be angry on himself?

That's how it goes. She activated her eyes, ordering him to turn off, to sleep, to freeze, not to think, or something else, a piece of time disappeared from his memory, and Stepan restored it with all his might, using his summons, even if not above a strong spirit, and each time different. It took him only three and a half days, which he had not expected, and eleven attempts. Already after the fourth of the attempts he was quite freely restoring his memory in full, but the System was silent. It only continued and continued to add crumbs of experience - development had ceased to be depraved and one of the experience multipliers had brazenly fallen out of the line. There were two things he could do here - to make the task more difficult by starting to mash large chunks of memory and with more imagination, and even more suddenly for the shaman, or to increase the number of ways in which he restores memory. He chose the latter option, trying out and consolidating four, or rather, three and a half approaches - working with dreams, pulling faded memories out of the physical brain, because even though he had been forced to forget, the neurons had not been reset, and working with the senses, making them relive those moments that had fallen from his memory, simply by feeding him a video and audio stream of faded minutes. And he did succeed, as evidenced by a new system message:

Received: “basic methods of work with memory based on shamanism”, “tendency to cognitive recovery”; improved work with memory; increased affinity with spirits of spheres of recollection and memory; increased probability of acquiring knowledge and properties of the branch of agent, suggestor and adept of spiritual practices.

The acquired talents are added to the Player's overall status.

Knowledge and property - not bad for only three days. True, there was a lot of preparatory work and effort before these three days, but the final result is important, isn't it? Even if the knowledge is only basic. In terms of value, it comes from the higher ratings, at the level of remote control of spiritual entities, but significantly lower than spiritual operation. The property was from the simplest, only a little more valuable than the usual mark, not the general mark of the spheres, but the same mark of roots and leaves. It was also the kind of thing that a normal mage would sacrifice his best friend and three mothers-in-law for, even marrying three times for the sake of it, but it wasn't that cool compared to his other higher-ranked properties. All in all, he was satisfied and a little tired, even barely had the strength to bend Sylvia festively right on the desk of her office, almost knocking over one of her inkpots.

He spilled the second one, right at the moment of orgasm, so instead of one more round and going to meditation, he had to help her restore the damaged letters by removing the ink from them, and then, under Malter's accusing gaze, buy a special inkpot with expensive ink with a lot of properties, which were restored in the inkpot over time. And this even though the vampire's level had risen to forty-eighth and she could now buy her own store... Ahem, of course, no, she couldn't, because, in addition to characteristics, she needed the required number of already acquired meta-skills, not less than five. Otherwise, the skill just didn't appear in the list of available to take. In general, he had to give her the ink and a quality enchanted pen, which made Stepan feel quite stupid, actually being forced to make reparations by the forces of a vampire completely subordinate to him - that's what social kung-fu experience means!

It did not take long for the property to grow into the aura and the spiritual body, affecting those parts of the body responsible for thinking, cognitive functions, emotions, and perceptions. It was like putting a bag full of ice on his head and then immersing his head in warm water along with the bag and ice. The property itself did not provide any special mental defenses or innate barriers to suggestion, although such options were on the list of available to take for the free talents. No, the main advantage and effect of this auric modification was to make it much easier to remove any influences on the mental and sensual spheres - simple influences would be broken by willpower, and more complex ones would be easier to uninstall and burn out by direct influence. Not protection, but simplification of those actions that need to be taken in case they do get through the protection. As well as reducing the consequences and leveling of specific traumas, such as disordered emotions after hexes, obsessive desires, attacks of stupor and other delights of poorly or excessively hastily removed mental effect.

Knowledge, on the other hand, was of a rather valuable and advanced type, though it did not focus specifically on its protective role. Yes, it helped restore lost and blocked memories, making it easier to recognize substituted memories, or to tear down bookmarks that prevented one from remembering or thinking about a particular topic. Both in himself and anyone else, clearly, but Stepan's own memory was of far greater concern to him. High synergy with shamanic practices of all kinds and forms, a wide variety of invocations, including even very advanced ones, the ability to rely on witchcraft and totems, and the widest arsenal of working with the memory of not “protective” but “attacking” type.

Creating false memories, up to the complete rewriting of life and personality in several layers, a wide arsenal of work with multifaceted agents, stealing memories and confidential information in dreams, creating complete casts of personality and memory with the ability to modify them and bring them back, layering on the original and rewriting the original. Combining it with the already existing gifts and his own knowledge opened up such broad prospects that it became even a little embarrassing. In principle, if you pump this direction to mastery, getting into his head will be much more difficult, but much more importantly, he will open a sub-school of shamanism, witchcraft, and puppetry, which will be tied to the theft of lives and bodies. The ability to create from scratch puppets with the right set of knowledge and skills, loyalty settings, or activation tabs, and then release them into free-floating.

Catch a dozen vagrant mercenaries, which are not to be pitied at all, and turn them not into puppets possessed by spirits and not into mentally subordinate slaves, but literally create new personalities for them from scratch, in which there would not be the slightest trace of the past so that the tests would not show any traces of mental correction. These new ones can be made obsessive agents introduced into the lower or even middle strata of society, and there will be no fear that something will give them away. The memory of the originals will be stored in a separate folder on the desktop, so to speak. Ideally, and not scare themselves with disguises and past identities, and just take the material to work on the other side of the world and deliver to the right point, as newcomers who came to the big city to seek a better life. And it doesn't matter that the newcomers' aura resembles a living battle totem with a lot of additional functions - disguise from superficial or not-so-superficial checks is not so difficult to screw on his level and with his resources, and then you can send them on a free voyage and let them prepare a base for his possible entry into political and social life.

It was one thing to have an unknown, albeit powerful, lone shaman, but if he had a whole network of agents, a couple of mercenary units, and a lot of people in all places, it was a different matter. The picture was so clear that he was getting a little scared, not for himself, but of himself. He wouldn't want to be like Rumorias and his merry family, but he could just dress a little richer, put on the illusion of a merchant who had wandered into the wrong neighborhood, and simply harvest whoever came after his purse and his life. Thoughts like these, cold and calm and utterly collected made him uneasy. So far he would not be able to pull off such a project, but he would put a lot of effort into each agent. But his strength and knowledge would grow, and the gap that separated Stepan from an ordinary man without a gift and System would only get wider.

He hated to think of what this abyss and alienation might lead him to, what actions would seem normal and fully justified to a future him.

And he can't even get drunk. There's not much time anymore.

* * *

His return to the courtyard was quite successful in the sense that no one noticed his absence as before, not even a routine inspection by the guards. Stepan had time to start working hard, but the matter turned out to be quite mundane. Somebody had filed a complaint against Trabius for dishonestly crushing his competitors by putting some alchemical stuff in their wine barrels, which spoiled the wine and caused the customers to go to Borshakl. Hell knows, maybe it was true, but it ended with a simple conversation and a fine for some minor offense, probably made up on the spot. Just so he could pay the fine and a small amount on top of it, for the worry, to the satisfied guards and send them away. If there are a lot of oaths and ways to check the truth, then at any high level it is necessary to disguise a banal bribe with cunning verbal constructions and acting, so that you can honestly answer any questions so that there is nothing to prove.

However, what really excited Stepan was not the guards and their visit for the money, but something else completely unexpected. So unexpected that at first, he didn't even understand what had happened, and then he couldn't believe that he had understood. The spirits he had sent to track the path of appearance and death of each individual mouse had simply vanished without a trace. That in itself was very, very disturbing news, but what was more disturbing was that Stepan hadn't noticed it at all, absorbed in his training. They hadn't been banished or killed, their shadow-image-presence still indicated that they were fulfilling or trying to fulfill the contract and hadn't violated its terms by running away, leaving the shaman fooled. There was only one option left - sealing or trapping in the form of a spiritual pocket, and not of any type because some of them would definitely cut off the signal-communication. The shaman had a rough idea of how to pull off such a trick, especially if he was in a slightly alternate state of consciousness and couldn't keep track of his contracts to the fullest extent.

But still, what the fuck? This situation, which had not been funny before, was starting to become, if not dangerous, then certainly ominous. There was nothing in the courtyard that could seal the two strong ones and the crowd of minor spirits subordinate to both of them and the ones that could also hide. Stepan had scoured the entire lord's house, the most magical place on the farmstead, early in his career but found only the standard and dull household and protective charms, mostly based on the amulet circuit made personally by Maître Jasper. A quick check of the thoughts of both Trabius and his mage-lover - it took a bit of effort to stealthily cheat the defenses - revealed roughly nothing. They both didn't know that there were spirits here nor did they know the mice were obviously coming from some obscure place, considering them to be mere pests, albeit very annoying.

The enclosing circuit is completely reliable. The mice had not climbed through it since it had been set up, repulsed by the work of the appropriate spirits. There were no tunnels under the ground, none, except for the sewers, which Stepan had also checked, and which did not contain an army of mice. There were no underground caverns. The magical background was within normal limits, only slightly increasing in the main house and the warehouses protected by magic amulets. No curses were observed, and he could certainly recognize the witches' territory, if not level it. Everything was as normal as it could be but the mice kept coming and coming and coming. And the spirits, who were not weak, though not fighting, entities, had also disappeared somewhere, unnoticed by Stepan and before he had time to signal danger. He might have missed such a scream in a state of blood obsession, but the imprint of the cry would have remained in the corresponding totem.

“Nothing. It's fucking nothing. That's it. Like I'm knocking on a concrete wall." Stepan walked around the room assigned to him as if he was ready to dive into the transition at any moment and never come back, and he really was. “Maybe realistically change jobs? Now, with a normal employment history, I could find a better place. Only it's going to be a lot harder to work in a way that's less annoying, yeah.”

The idea of dropping everything and running away, just not staying in a dangerous place, was not the best, but very reasonable. Even if Stepan would come here from time to time, he would prefer to spend the night in the cave or at Sylvia's place. He would pump a hermit and an alphonse brunches at once, ha-ha. Putting humor aside, he wasn't going to stay here, especially now that the unknown something with mouse coloring might well start looking more closely at Stepan. He didn't want to disappear one night just like his spirits had. Something hiding so well might very well stand a chance at a surprise attack on the relaxed Senior Shaman. The thought of how many times he'd already slept here in a completely non-combative state, such as while absorbing new knowledge, made him uncomfortable. The suspicion that it was not normal to find so many adventures in the middle of nowhere! Yes, the shit with the mice had obviously been here for a long time and hadn't done anything sinister, or had done it discreetly, but why the fuck had he gotten a job here out of all of Dantmark? Maybe he's got the probabilities of the “see some shit” option really tweaked in his System?

Unpleasant thoughts, which he didn't want to think about, primarily because realizing them, whether his guesses were true or not, wouldn't change anything for him. Instead of boring theoretical and philosophical reflections, he simply asked Sylvia, figuratively speaking, for a set of bedding and a spare mattress, dragged them to his shelter, and slept there in peace. He went to the courtyard only for a snack and occasional bouts of wanting to talk to the men, since he now had a nest of sexy bloodsuckers to talk to, and they could tell him more and more interesting things. However, the latter was too washed up in the head. Even though it was not visible outwardly. Subconsciously the Earthman realized that this was not exactly the type of conversation he was looking for.

He didn't talk to the vampires much, concentrating on the calls of the anti-demon brigade. His large reserves of system currency, which he'd added after his express training and the completed task, allowed him to buy the rarest reagents, so he didn't skimp, though he probably should have. He spent so much on summons that it would have been enough for another special lot, not reagents, but useful ones. However, there were no useful ones, even the Autogoddess didn't offer any temptations, except for one very funny statuette with a shadow of some divine essence or godlike spirit. The thing could automatically hide itself from view and follow the victim if he decided to move or simply go into the next room. This piece of art in the form of a faceless woman captured in the moment of orgasm, clutching her breasts and spreading her legs wide, gradually made any victim very docile, affectionate, and willing to do anything for whoever put this statuette under her. Wherever she went, that thing would be standing by her side - by her bed, in the corner of her desk, at a table in a restaurant, anywhere. Completely unnoticeable, perceived as a normal part of the interior and beating through any defense impact, but, alas, only disposable. Initially faceless and average statuette gradually takes the features of its victim and, upon completion of the creation of the ideal image, this artifact disappears, dissolving in the streams of ether without the slightest trace.

Such a trick, stretched over a couple of months, no less, could easily pierce even a female master, and even a master, even if with a bias in mentalism or shamanism, with a full guarantee of close to a hundred percent. Well, if by chance some archmagister or divine avatar does not come to visit and start checking, looking for just such a specific influence-presence. It was the most powerful of the toys offered so far, both MILF and System ones, even though it was disposable, it still had the same, not the most pleasant perfume. Stepan did not buy this thing and did not put it on the waiting list for purchase. And the other lots did not arouse enthusiasm and desire to buy them in spite of everything.

Some kind of very evil staff, a crooked and maimed branch stick that works on primitive and damn powerful witchcraft, allowing you to stick that stick into the ground and create a zone of control for yourself at once as if you'd been creating it for decades. Only each activation requires a huge amount of power and, which is a key disadvantage, a bloody sacrifice, and the younger the victim, the more unspent life in it, the longer the zone of power over the land will be. In the forests would be a real imba, the good thing is there is also an emphasis on the dark branches of druidism, but outside them also harsh shit, everywhere except the Underworld. The effect of the ritual needs the sky, even if not open or hidden by the ceiling of the cave, but it is the sky, not the embrace of the Underworld.

Totem with an incredibly strong spirit, on the border between elder and higher, which has just a huge reserve of power and very interesting combat abilities, but fundamentally attacks everyone except those who summoned him immediately after the appearance in the real world. No allies or notions of peaceful neutrals - to use only in the wilderness or if you want to organize the funniest war crime with the sawing of all living things in a considerable radius. It won't piss out a city, of course. The tower of Magister Miller he will not chew up, not immediately for sure, despite the very overpumped combat abilities, even for his rank excellent and very exotic, and the palace too will be repulsed, but the neighborhoods, especially poor and poorly protected, will become a huge burial ground. Spirit, by the way, belongs to the sphere of life and ether, and his attacks will not have any external manifestation at all, he will just tear thin bodies to shreds, partially eating them, like a huge leech-octopus-polyp-hell-knows-what. Outwardly it will look as if the person just fell, started beating in an epileptic fit, and died, that's it.

It seemed all the options were attractive, but in reality, each had some fatal flaw, and he didn't need the reagents yet. He was already growing up to the level where some of these items could be used in theory, but only in theory, because in practice he would not be able to perform such risky rituals for another fifteen or twenty levels. Well, at the current rate of development, if there will not fall another deed for which the System will reward separately and additionally. But, frankly speaking, let it better not fall out. To hell with the reward, the calmer and bloodless his development is, the happier Stepan is.

Returning to the topic of anti-infernal summons, the young man didn't hold back, donating money and summoning the most successful, resilient, and skilled entities specializing in the destruction of infernal creatures. In total, he limited himself to three main groups, independent of each other, but able to support each other. Separately, he tried to summon an elder, also very old and tough, but despite the enormous amount of resources invested, the summoning failed. The entity didn't show up to the call, but a whole bunch of hungry trifles came, from which he had to protect the offerings and defend himself. In the end, he was able to offset the cost a little by giving the offerings to his retinue. Even if not quite suitable, but still very valuable and “tasty”. Such a sudden failure in the middle of nowhere, though not the first in his career and quite expected purely statistically. The spirit didn't always come when called, often choosing not to show up even when called. But it was still frustrating because he'd summoned entities with similar quirks before, but he'd gotten it right then and there, and now he hadn't gotten a good roll of the dice.

However, a single creature, even if it was from a medium division or even a medium-high division, would be enough for the crowd of strong ones he had summoned. No minutiae, just spirits powerful for their rank and perfectly controlled. The first pack consisted of twins, like a trio of piglets. Only if the piggies could literally redirect their wounds and deaths at each other, dividing everything into three, this pack was capable of rising in full strength if even one entity survived. Not in battle and not immediately, but it was difficult to destroy this thing, and even more difficult to destroy it with infernal magic. In fact, it was their resistance to the effects on the soul and deep layers of the spiritual body that made them so invulnerable. It was as if they were hiding their core essence in a kind of spiritual pocket distributed among all of them.

Eight entities that looked like pearls or spheres of nacreous liquid, humming and rippling. Low-vulnerability, high-resistance, easily coordinated, able to shoot particles from their bodies or release blades and tentacles from the same nacreous mass of non-matter. The properties of their bodies allowed them to do more than just damage infernal creatures, any spirits could do that, to some degree or another. No, coming into contact with this viscous energy and spiritual matter broke the connections between layers and sections of subtle bodies. This is unpleasant to anyone, but it is demons, with their multi-fragment entities, which contain a bunch of stolen, taken away or honestly bought souls, from this method suffer the most from this method. Their stock of souls begins to shake like crystal in the closet if a freight train passes near the closet literally a couple of meters away. Up to the point that using these souls, turning to the knowledge and skills of their past owners, feeding from them, or transferring to them part of the damage, becomes difficult, dangerous, if not impossible. This was complemented by excellent skills in setting up general group fields of closed type, which do not allow to get a feed from Inferno and weaken the connection of the demon with the homeland, making it even harder for him to escape back.

As the shaman was sure, this pack could replace several squads of demon fighters quite successfully, and how much for such a contract these demon fighters would pay... depended on how much the world suffered from the demon infestation, but in any case a lot. For the next contract, properly transferred and secured, they would pay more, because the creatures had a very useful property. This pack consisted of six formless entities, whose indistinct images resembled a clump of not even threads, but lines, which stay only and only in 2D format, moving along the planes and with great difficulty chasing the enemy in the air. But these lines could divide into parts and multiply, or even unite into a single entity, which was quite capable of being a weak elder.

The lines easily created barriers, obstacles, cutting fields, and cutoff cells, separating the demon and its power, souls, power, and mind. In fact, under the influence of this pack, demons began to steadily slow down thinking, slowing down and glitching like an operating system that caught an incorrect request. And yes, such lines could well be drawn on the surface of the demonic body, where they would have to burn them literally along with pieces of the body and aura. At the same time, if the pearly eight was weakly vulnerable to infernal influence on behavior and reflexes, then these are almost invulnerable. They are too abstract, too simple, and complex at the same time, only the most skillful creatures will be able to deceive such a defense, and even then not immediately. And such skillful ones were very rare, and Stepan doubted that the scum he was going after would be that dangerous.

The last pack, also a pack, though much less unified, more like the classic hound units of classic spirits, could be lost against the background of the previous two. The combat power is very unimpressive. For a typical strong spirit, everything is quite normal and decent, but they did not have strong bonuses against demons. Bonuses in the form of direct or indirect damage, but their strength was in two not-so-martial properties of their energy. First, these spirits were invisible to demons, especially if they didn't have a human shell or very well-pumped magic eye modifications. Judging from the memories from that ill-fated dream, those that were recovered, the demoness' eyes might not be the easiest to see, but it would still be hard for her to just focus on these spirits. The concept of their aspects made the demons consider them part of the surrounding background, as if the spirits of these spirits, this kind of smoke and fog lumps with a purple cast, fell into the blind spot of their perception.

The second special feature prevented the demon from hiding. A kind of mark, that gave the spirits the ability to always know where exactly located demonic creature, unless it did not go to the native dimension. Most of the hiding or closing abilities will not help to remove such a mark, because it is, figuratively speaking, put on all the souls at once, and the more of those souls the victim of the mark has, the more difficult to remove such a mark, the longer it hangs and the more accurate its readings and transmitted coordinates. Such a dream team was picked up, and he called them all under the most reliable contract, at the highest rate for a dozen separate calls, warning them that they would fight a strong demon, as well as additionally strengthening them through totems, conducting analogs of doping combat rituals, only for spirits.

In addition to these zonder commands, the shaman also summoned a few separate entities, mostly focused on preventing the demon from escaping from the battle, no matter where it went, whether within the realm of Reality or Inferno, as well as on helping Stepan with relaying his commands, monitoring and controlling them. He had also chosen repeaters that would be able to operate from afar - hovering high in the sky and directing the images of the shaman's commands with a narrow beam from an extreme distance and as clearly as possible. He also took care of hiding spirits and special deceptions, though the latter already had the appearance of totems, and they were not volunteers, but victims planted by force, which the Earthman forcibly gave a partial resemblance to his shell. If the creature decided to track the shaman and try to hit the commander instead of his calls, it too would be in for a harsh and unpleasant surprise.

All this together, multiplied by the fact that the shaman himself will also actively assist the spirits, pump up their own strength, sitting in his underground cave, rather than personally on the battlefield, as well as use tokens to replenish the reserve on the spirits, if these tokens can be activated through someone else's vision ... In his head came one obsessive phrase that described Stepan's attitude to the demonic creature and the overall situation.

"That's it, bitch, you're gonna get it."

* * *

There had been a lot of commotion in the courtyard lately. Everyone was running around and even remembered Stepan sometimes, contracting him for small tasks. The excitement was caused by the fact that Trabia had a new prospect of expanding its markets. Some preliminary negotiations had already been held and everyone was waiting for the visit of new supposed partners, for which they were preparing. Fania had changed part of her closet, had some of it tailored, and was preparing to shine, Maître Jasper was recharging his amulets and updating the contours of household charms, and one drinker, who had gotten under the hot hand, had been fired right on the spot.

Stepan didn't get involved in this shit, and he wasn't invited to get involved. Thankfully, his business is small and he does it successfully. He continues to exterminate mice, still not sleeping in the courtyard. And when he comes to it, he is always in partial combat readiness and waiting for a sudden attack or something else. Now, when everyone is waiting for the arrival of Trabius's eldest son and his invited partners, the young man could have been busy with the riddle of the courtyard. and its mice, but he consciously stopped himself. There were still eight more days, less than a decade, until the next summoning and activation of the Star Seeker. And he wasn't going to get involved in anything during that time until he'd dealt with the demoness once and for all. Because he might well find the answer to the riddle of the mouse infestation, but he wouldn't find the answer to what to do with that answer afterward. No, this time he gave himself a clear command - first deal with the infernal threat, and only then turn on Lara-chan Krafstberg mode and plunder mysterious tombs and mushrooms.

“Listen, Pann, you're not busy right now, are you?” He was distracted from his musings by Pirius's question, who was feeling quite enthusiastic and pleased with his life today, which made him feel cognitively dissonant, as the young man had gotten used to his droopy face. "Yeah, you're not busy, I can see it in your eyes. Not as an order, but as a fellow, will you go to one shop where there are some herbs and magical stuff? Еhere's no one to send, everyone is busy. It's not that far, I'll explain how to get there, okay?”

Until now Pirius had never spoken to Stepan in such a patronizing manner, though he was friendlier to Stepan than with most of the other workers. The young man even suspected that his immediate superior and steward was a little nervous, or even smoked some relaxing mix, but a quick reference to the appropriate spirit in the bracelet, which quickly flowed into the eyes of the shaman, showed the complete purity of the aura and only a slightly elevated level of serotonin. He was even surprised that a man who was so young had not accumulated any toxins in his aura over his long life. The mind and agent skills that had caught on to the matter even began to unfold suspicion and in the course of the conversation, the shaman enlightened his “buddy” in several separate modes. There were no traces of magic or cleansing blessings, so they had either been used for a relatively long time, or he was just naturally healthy. The shaman had not checked him so deeply from the healing point of view before.

"Sure, Pirius, I will, but I think there's something you're not telling me right now." Having enlightened the sincerity of his interlocutor's intentions, the shaman, who not so long ago switched to a more conversational form of communication with the man, didn't notice any tricks, but he definitely saw some hidden secret and immediately demanded information. "You do not want to bring me under the attention of the guards?"

"You, boy, are insulting!" The manager was not jokingly indignant, but under the shaman's gaze, he deflated a little and answered calmly. "What, it is so obvious, right? Well, I confess, it's not quite straight there... but you're certainly not in danger of anything, not even a fine. The old apothecary, Gorboz Lapnik, the old fart, has a new shopkeeper in his shop near the Belt Quarter. She's hot. I'd say, even though she's been a mom long ago, and she's from the countryside. Cat-like grip, heh, and the same tongue. Ahem. I mean, able to talk, yeah. She's a goddamn shopkeeper, though I bet half the customers come to see the neckline of her dress. In general, she picks some of the herbs that are thrown away and then sells them herself for a fraction of the price. Gorboz either doesn't know about it or knows about it, but doesn't interfere - she's a good shopkeeper, so it's not a loss to him."

Judging by what the spirits and Stepan had seen, this star of semi-legal shop fraud had a “cat's tongue” not only in terms of the ability to persuade but also in the very thing that decent society does not mention. The shaman didn't care, everything was very clear, as well as the reason for sending him. Wishing to buy good medicinal herbs and preparations for decoctions, Pirius wanted to send a gifted person who would recognize the outright fake, because he did not quite trust his new acquaintance. Stepan can see why he has such a clean aura and a healthy body. The man, it turns out, is a big fan of drinking healthy concoctions regularly. It's a dope, but it's harmless, it just slows down aging and improves the general condition of the body. If you stop abruptly, the age will quickly catch up and overtake you, but in this way, many middle-class or even simple townspeople postpone old age. Medicine and recovery in this world are put on a level unprecedented for the simple Middle Ages, as well as cosmetology.

“Okay, I'll go see what herbs are out there.” The shaman agreed, simply because he wasn't going to do anything else anyway, preparing for the day D, for fear of getting caught up in some shit that would take up a lot of his time and mess up his plans again. “Give me the money then. You say it's in front of the house with the copper cherry bunch weathervane?”

The young man did not get to the right place immediately and slowly. He went to buy a supply of candles, the most ordinary and illuminating, not magical, had a snack of another fast food, watched the performance of a street artist, who played quite well on his stringed instrument a la balalaika, but crossed with a harp, quite a cheerful analog of songs about the plight of a wanderer and his mother's pretty boy, and also missed the right turn and went half a block in the other direction. But still, a noticeable detail of the landscape in the form of a cherry weathercock, in that house, as it seemed, lived one of the students-adepts of the circle of druids, did not let him get lost completely, even if he had to look for it through the eyes of spirits, getting a view from above and orienting himself in space. Well, it was a walk, what else can he say? The sun had just risen, the early morning of the very end of summer had not yet changed to that irritating heat, from which one has to use air-cooling chanting, and the general mood was somewhere near the positive mark. On such a morning, why not go for a walk?

“Hello, honored one, Pirius sent me, regarding herbs.” He said, entering a shop smelling of herbs and spices, and a good one at that, with a separate room for storage, as well as a small room on the second floor of the house, so as not to go far from the workplace. “According to this list.”

The shop was part of a rather large two-story building with an additional half-story like attic, which, according to the stones and the energy trail, had once been a commercial house or an inn. It had been divided into many small rooms, some of which had become living rooms for the townspeople, and some of which had turned into small shops, often combined with the shopkeeper's dwelling. In the latter case, it was possible to save an extra silver piece on night guarding from clever amateurs who liked to take what was lying around. The shop was rather wide, four by four meters, and at least half of it was occupied by a huge counter and shelving. There were no price tags, suggesting bargaining, though some of the goods did have price tags, which was another difference from the Middle Ages.

The windows, with murky but strong panes of glass, and the doors were open, but covered with thin and clean pieces of cloth that let in only the muted rays of the sun. Taking into account the nature of the goods and the probable threat of drying or burning them in the sunlight, the decision is quite understandable at the same time creating a rather pleasant atmosphere of light semi-darkness in pastel colors. The woman standing behind the counter, really beautiful and lush in all places, fit into this atmosphere as if she were a part of it. Dressed in a loose work dress of a typical townswoman, she was outwardly very beautiful, and obviously, the deliberately slightly loose neckline on the lush breasts was bound to attract the eyes of customers like a magnet. It is difficult to bargain with such an opponent. She met his words with a radiant white-toothed smile, another evidence that she looked after herself very well, especially for a villager, and also with a wave of her hand, beckoning him closer.

“Yes, yes, I remember, I remember, we had a deal, I've arranged everything.” The accent was indeed rural, but clear and distinguishable, rather pleasant and causing instinctive favor, rather than the desire to throw the villager out of the city walls, which is also, of course, important in her work. “I'll be Gelda, I've been working here for a while now. And what's your name, young man? Will you wait a little while, I'll gather some herbs. Don't think, they're already marked, but you can't keep them in the wind for long, I've put them in boxes separately. Then you'll check everything, and if there's anything wrong, tell me right away, so there's no offense. All right?”

She spoke quickly and clearly, but she was completely burying herself under the flood of words that she was rattling around like a sewing machine. And then she leaned forward, so that her breasts, resting on the counter, were exposed a little more, and they had not been hidden before. The shaman, especially with the emphasis on his new skills, admired her. And it was clearly not intentional, or rather, not purposefully and deliberately do so, but simply on reflex, accustomed to embarrass others even a little. Involuntarily she was sympathetic, although the shaman did not lose his caution, and her teeth caught his eyes. Even though in this world the local gods did not forbid personal hygiene to their flock, and even on the contrary, they specified some punishments for uncleanliness in their writings, such as clean teeth of a simple villager, which is given out by such a clear speech, were a little embarrassing. A little, but the eye clings. It could be a small favor of the Life-Giver, who often bestows beauty on mothers, or simply a consequence of a healthy diet, moderate consumption of sweets, and regular mouthwash with herbal concoctions, but he noticed the detail.

“Yeah, I'll wait, no problem.” He nodded, heroically averting his gaze from the neckline, which showed the line of the sun's tan, but not so stark a contrast as to make it look like she'd never been topless in the sun. "My name is Pann, and I work at the same courtyard of the honorable Trabius."

"It's a good thing when you're young, but you're already in business and working." Her answer came from the warehouse, where she ducked through the door behind the counter, leaving him alone, which, by the way, could be an unprofessional approach, because nothing prevented him from grabbing something from the counter, a couple of alarms on it were deactivated and turned on, apparently, only at night. "It's always good for the economy, even though the young man has already turned gray. The Giver of Life, you know, loves those who want to live themselves, and they know how to do life better. I wish I'd put anything on the top shelf again until the stepladder is repaired! Pann! I beg your pardon, but help me, or I'll fall at once, and all the shelves will collapse on me."

Stepan froze for a moment before rushing to help, looking through the walls with his spiritual eyes, even though the shop had amulets to scare away small spirits so they wouldn't eat the magic in the herbs. He saw exactly what was said. The old ladder, which allowed one to climb up to the ceiling, where there were enough boxes, reinforced with simple storage charms, in which herbal collections were kept, decided to finally give up right under the bare feet of Gelda, who had taken off her shoes. The lady who had come to conquer the regional capital was now holding on to the shelf with both hands and standing on her fingertips, resting on the ladder that had fallen beneath her and feeling it slowly slipping even lower, forcing her to either hang on her hands or jump, and right onto the ladder, which would then shatter right beneath her. Finding no trace of an ambush or some magical trap, nor a couple or three witnesses who would later confirm it was Stepan who had tried to rob the shop. He shrugged his shoulders, marveling at someone else's bad luck, and in one leap swung over the counter, reducing his weight and not hitting a single blade of grass on the counter.

He'll have to help, although the situation is like something out of a porn movie.

//“'Step Shaman, help, I'm stuck!” - He grumbled to himself as he walked into the nearly dark, lit only by a couple of incense-breathing magical lights in the warehouse. - “Good thing life isn't a porn movie. Although, given this Gelda's tits and legs, it's more of a pity.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxnJcZvuRK8

But if she decided to thank him for saving her, he might agree.

THE STATUS OF STEPAN THE NORMAL AS OF THE END OF CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:

Name: Stepan

Level: 29

Class: Senior Shaman

Specialization: Spirit Master

Characteristics: (free: 0)

Talents (free): 2

Constitution: 3

Sensitivity: 11

Power: 7

Control: 5

Source: 5

Spirit: 13

Resistance: 2

Knowledge acquired: speaking and writing: Free Cities, academic Neirat, Island Kingdom; advanced master level of call practice; advanced 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: advanced fundamentals of fast call; the master level 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; advanced basic methods of tantric practices; advanced 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); proficient methods of undercover work; mastery of puppet-envolt magical practice; developed methods of controlled spiritual indwelling; techniques of eliminating protected targets; advanced basic techniques of achieving sympathetic resonance; practices of mental-sensual processing of protected targets; advanced basic techniques of healing auric and spiritual bodies on the basis of wild magic; advanced practices of spiritual-cognitive confrontation; techniques of mental-sensual defense within the framework of agent training; basic techniques of working with memory on the basis of shamanism

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: Memory Eater; curse of the locking of the paths; exile from reality; contract with an elder spirit: He Who Hides Himself in the Rocks and Opens the Doors; contract with strong spirits: Three Little Pigs; contract with strong spirits: Leaves in Motion; contract with strong spirits: Urkaguarri; contract with strong spirits: Embrace-with-Amber-in-Last-Farewell; contract with strong spirits: Turquoise Left and Aquamarine Right.

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; trust 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; the regeneration of subtle bodies; the marking of free winds and whispering blows; the marking of quiet pools and deep waters; the recognition of the keepers of doors and those who pave the way; strengthened auric nodes; stable stability of the source's absorption properties; tendency towards cognitive restoration

System modifiers: peaceful development IV; issuance of system assignments III; lecherous development IV (GIFT); access to system purchases IV; small system endowment of characteristics; temporal awareness IV; reserve renewal IV; replenishment of life IV; accepting a systemic deal with a patron (Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Giver of Gifts, loyal servant of Innelas Innelay); creation of group I; intensive development II; gift small temporary enhancement of attributes in the name of Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Giver of Gifts, faithful servant of Innelas Innelay (GIFT); a constant inflow of experience I; a regular inflow of system resources III; a doubled minor corrupting gift in the name of Liarat si Merrinal, Lady of Gifts and Gift-giver, faithful servant of Innelas Innelay.

Completed Deals: -

Available Deals: Cute & Innocent; Sweet Attraction; Big & Soft; Tense and Frozen; The Tenderest Buns

Reward Tokens: Awesome Watermelons (100); Indifferent Doll (3); Ignored Orgasm (100); One-time improvement of item quality and properties (1); small artifact repair (3); instant recovery of magic reserve (29): small temporary increase in Constitution attribute (5); Puffy Pies (100); meaningful meta-skill upgrade (10); temporary creation of privacy (15); Persistent Feet (10); Smooth Beauty (48); Mighty Melons (98)

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

THE STATUS OF SYLVIA MALTER AT THE END OF THE EIGHTEENTH CHAPTER (after Stepan Normal finally bothers to accept her into the group):

Name: Sylvia Malter

Level: 48

Race: High Vampire (human)

Class: Bloodchanter

Specialty: Bloodwind.

Characteristics: (free: 0;)

Talents (free): 1

Constitution: 9

Sensitivity: 7

Power: 5

Control: 5

Source: 4

Spirit: 6

Resistance: 8

Knowledge absorbed: spoken and written: [reveal]; advanced developed control of scarlet drop; the advanced practice of blood shaping; advanced blood patronage; mastery techniques of subjugating blood resonance; the advanced developed practice of superimposing delusions; advanced techniques of racial magic; advanced techniques of blood acceleration; advanced basic techniques of scarlet pulse; advanced basic practice of blood magic-based searching effects; advanced developed techniques of scarlet alchemy; advanced basic ritualistic practice; advanced basic barrier-breaking techniques; advanced basic acoustic mental influence practice; advanced seduction and deception techniques; scarlet martial arts (Blood Pact); the art of agency and infiltration (Blood Pact); advanced basic mentoring and nurturing techniques; advanced basic personality reshaping techniques; advanced basic methods of complex suggestions based on bloody control

Minor knowledge: skillful protective crimson cloak; double whip of bloody submission; skillful crimson claws; implosion of bloody resonance

Acquired properties: enhanced saturation of bloody drops; corporeal essence of the supreme bloodsucker; enhanced blood reserve conservation; complex spiritual-energetic modification of the eyes: the supreme gaze of submission; vocal cord modification: enchanting voice; skeletal base modification: strengthening and flexibility; essence modification: Ancient Ichor's Drop; complex spiritual-energetic modification of the organism: compacted three-vector spatial pocket of the hidden type

System modifiers: blood replenishment I

Special: [Empty for now]

* * *

Author's Note:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wUizf5KkATkDXobOFIt1yM1uxnImMGAl/edit - Pictures dedicated to this chapter with small comments. Strictly NSFW!

Well, it was the largest chapter I've ever written, printed, or created. Technically, there was still a prequel almanac on the world before Lust and Magic, which I'd burned out so badly after writing that I didn't want to go back to it, but there were still separate subsections. So, almost seven hundred and fifty thousand characters, one hundred and twelve and a tail thousand words - quite a volume for Author Today, not a chapter. Every day, jokes about thousand-page chapters seem less and less like jokes.

I will send some of the lemon format pictures that fit this chapter to Brinar's mail with a request - not obligatory and only if it is not burdensome - to add them to the general Google doc file. And now, as usual, it's time to think about the great things, that is, Dice. To begin with, I'll tell you at once that not all dice will be given because they are here by pure volume on half of the text of the chapter minimum. Crits were surprisingly many, but most were either indirect and not particularly affecting the overall plot, or automatic, like those that went to the summoning of strong spirits. There were quite often auto crits, the pluses from the bonuses of the resource token, from the marks on the aura, and all of this together gave very significant additions to the final result.

However, in order, well, or in the order that first comes to my mind. Rooting at the place of a new rookery was very successful - expectedly, but still, I will note it separately. There was a branch in which his preparation-ritual would be noticed and from the very beginning would begin to look for traces of strange shamans. Indirectly it is indicated through the mention of Herbert's anxiety about the Horde - they are always around and therefore shamanism in Dantmark is taken very seriously, preferring to track.

No less successful was the unsealing of the token - 84 out of 100 in terms of coolness and three out of five maximum possible elite lots at once. The lots themselves were not so good. Perfectly suitable only one. I had long dreamed of giving something like this to him and long ago, little by little increasing and increasing the probability of falling just like this (not the same, but similar type) reward. Here it is, finally. Very high quality stuff and its most important quality is its durability and resistance to rebuilding and remodeling. In terms of totem building, this stone stuff is analogous to plasticine. You can mold whatever you want, and when you get tired of it, just mold it again. This increased a lot of call throws, almost all of them, except for some specific ones, which was the reason for a large number of auto-hundreds in the scale of the chapter, especially in the work with strong and small spirits.

The first of them was naturally the most harmless of all possible - the meeting with the bird keeper and Stepan's resentment of class inequality. And yes, by the standards of this world, the man with the whip is also over the top, because the gifted, and moreover the townspeople and at the same time with an official job, not quite the bottom. Add to that the fact that he saved a boy who had been hit by a horse, also the son of a respected master-craftsman, and everything is even more fun. No, he wouldn't have been harmed, at most he would have been reprimanded a little, but still he overdid it. In theory, according to the local mentality, Stepan should have gone to Trabius, described the situation, referred to witnesses, and the latter would have spoken to the guards, and those to de Marek. It would have cost compensation, not a big one, but it would have been paid without a second thought - there was almost guaranteed autocrit.

But, since MC still has a D, at best a C- in the local mentality, he bit his teeth and went for revenge. He planned his revenge on 93 with all the bonuses. With the defense fiddled so that there is no chance there. Full readiness and paranoia of Stepan, against not particularly successful throws on the defense of the estate. There are close to a hundred (89, 74, 91). The shields were only on the study, bedroom, and the safe. And these were throws on a defense worthy of the level of one of the de Marek representations, not on the private bedroom of the head of the trading house. There was no chance there, Stepan would have opened it all easily, but he didn't need to. The parrots were also protected. There was even a disguised statuette embedded in the wall (one option out of seven possible, and there could be up to three), but it was not serious. He's outgrown it.

The choice of revenge again brought Yurievich to mind, but it was actually really successful. The hero actually went too far when he sent Armada Inferno straight to Herbert ass, which caused a reaction auto crit and a very serious search for the unknown joker. If only the de Marek's themselves had been defamed, things would have been much milder, but the consequences for the merchants would have been more reputational. And then there's one of the worst anticrits in the story (1 and 2, literally a one and then a two), which Ilhero's kinsman rolls out when he thinks bad things about Grebert. To be fair, Stepan would have suspected such a thing too, but he's forgivable, he's not local. And the local Duke could not think of such a thing, it's such a stain on his honor, if they find out, that it's not even funny. And then the crit fails drops like rain. So de Faler was on the horse, and de Marek was in the ass, and they would not appear in the orbit of Dantmark again in the foreseeable future.

The second of the adventures was just the obvious one - the hunt for the fugitive vampire, aided by Sylvia and his own desire to make the world a cleaner place. Here was such preparation and such an attack, not even cannons and sparrows, but Tomahawk on a mosquito, man. After all the preparation, after all the offerings and re-assurances - the whole scene with the “fight” and the pursuit was one continuous auto-success for the “dog” and auto-fail for Riksar. Well, at the same time managed to look at the rich inner world of this vicious Mr. “bi”. By the way, he really was a man with a very wide view, fucking in general everything that moved and for a long time has not moved.

The third little adventure, on the contrary, shot up quite unexpectedly for me. I made a roll, but there was a low probability, because Stepan had never seen Valdis in person, and at the time of working with his “gift” to the surviving victim, he didn't know how to take aura impressions properly. Still, the meeting with Bastian and the company with the opportunity to quietly help them in one delicate, though not dangerous, case had passed by, but the old moral wound had been stirred up.

And again, again Stepan had problems with proportionality of effort, but that wasn't his problem. The crap he had called against Valdis could be used against any of the masters, or even old Miller. The latter, of course, was paranoid, but if he prepared in advance, studied the defenses, and chose the moment, it could work, it could scratch. Whether such a scratch would kill the magister or just cripple him is another question. But leaving hypothetical plans, after all, MC had success in terms of false traces and all that. Yes, he set the poor old lady up, and she did nothing of the sort. Everyone knew she hadn't done anything wrong, but MC had successfully given out a crit (not a pure one) to damage the anti-swearing and anti-truth ritual that the old woman had been sitting under for the last fifteen or twenty years. Herbert was a little upset, his breeders a little demanded vaseline, and the honorable Augustus, for whom this bitch worked most of the time (and guess who helped him to recruit this agent, whose ears stick out of all this shit), also experienced a range of emotions far from positive. And Stepan just wanted to punish one single sadist and bastard.

After that, there were a couple of episodes of purges in the text, including even the help of vampires in tracking down individuals hiding and laying low. All solely because someone couldn't get hard up until they gave the object of their passion third- or fourth-degree burns to half of their skin. Conclusion - sadism and guro lead to problems of the powerful. Forbid sadism and guro. Stepan must have thought exactly that deep down when he burned an orchid on Valdis's bathroom wall through the spirit. And, by the way, it wasn't the magister or his family that was watching him, but the Secret Guard, who had long ago held him by the throat through his fun and to whom he had sold out almost completely, spying on his kin and the circle of mages. I wanted to display this in the text somehow, but it didn't work, the text grew excessively as it is.

We should not forget about adventure number four, which comes after the Autodivine quest. So Stepan decided to go and do a good deed, unnoticed, without unnecessary risks, without overstretching himself. What does it mean to call an elder spirit without a protective circle? What's with the divine curse and its partial remedy-healing? I don't fucking get what this is all about, huh? For those who, like Stepan, didn't understand anything, I'll give you a direct clue - his clothes and the spirit planted in them. In normal mode, even knowing that the senior spirit in such conditions can not and will not want to harm, Stepan for such thoughts to call chthonic without a protective suit would have kicked himself in the ass, even though it is anatomically difficult. But he wore the literal embodiment of human indifference to the suffering of the poor and weak, the embodiment of the struggle against this indifference and injustice.

The most successful (100, 100, and 46 - but there were a lot of bonuses) attempt to mess with his mind and a near-auto failure at trying to figure it out. He still didn't realize - and couldn't realize without a natural waterfall of krites - that his disguise had such an effect on him. He was lucky it didn't have any lasting effects or ill effects. Well, let's see, maybe he'll take off the not small, but not so much grown up, scum her gift from her ancestors. An ancestor. A very, very funny ancestor.

Very interesting were the rolls on the elder spirits, including a couple of pure crits (well, or it was a stuck key, because it was really two hundred in a row, only for different spirits). The gem of summons can be considered a black dog, but he, being as strong as another superior, albeit only at the moment of receiving the target and sacrifice, is still unsuitable for normal summoning. It does not come to a simple call and automatically attacks anyone offering anything other than the purpose of its existence. The second pearl is a stargazer, for a contract with which the same elven clairvoyant, who, by virtue of specialization, could squeeze much more out of this spirit, even without being a shamaness, would sell the third eye, which is chocolate. Well, at least, leasing it for a couple of years.

And yes, Autogoddess as always with her quests, but now this quest was even quite normal - a generous reward, full supply of materials, morally acceptable processing goals and even the jokes with perversions less than usual, although not completely without them. I wondered why she was so generous, if she was up to something particularly insidious. But okay, she's hardly watching Stepan's adventures to push through any cunning plans. Let's get on with the quest!

The assignment itself, the process of its fulfillment, I started again twice. The first time I didn't like what was written, the second time I lost a bunch of dice somewhere and everything got so confused that it was easier to redo it. On the third try, I still managed, and in the final stage decided to show from the bloodsuckers, each of which got exactly what they deserved. The most normal and honest one was Lemira, but even she earned her years of continuous shooting, not to mention the others.

The reward for the task came out really good, though not the best - but the existing is not bad either. Three freely obtained skill points two of which are even very useful and do not cause a twitching eye. A very badass almost-elite property. The hero now does not really understand how good it is, but some magister for it would have laid the soul of a hundred firstborn children from different mothers without much doubt. Realistically 94 out of a hundred (albeit with bonuses) on the usefulness and awesomeness of the property. Above only crit and there would give an analog of those properties, which at multiples of ten levels can be chosen. Just imagine you are a magister with your tower, source, and enemies. Enemies came to you and started chiseling the tower's shields, and you started feeding off the tower and the source. The enemies hit, and you feed off and hit too. And you hit. And hit. And you keep on hitting, despite the fact that you should have tired your aura long ago and burned out your nodes with the continuous stress. And you haven't. And it's not even to say you're tired. In magical sieges or long rituals, it's such an imba it's just not fair.

Tokens are good, too, though Autoboddesses. And while he increased Sylvia's tits and power almost immediately - and no, he wasn't tempted to accept the Autogoddess's offer to share Bibigul's burden and make Captain Ackbar happy - he'd clearly prefer to keep Persistent Feet on the shelf for a while longer. And yes, if he were to somehow activate that token on Gaia's avatar, it would add at least five levels, three characteristics, and seven or eight free talents. However, Stepan is not the same Stepan, so he will not intentionally and willingly - for the moment - look for suitable candidates to use the token.

It was strange - adding up the bonuses from lewd development, peaceful development, and intensive training had its effect. He often received free promotions, because the bonuses to throws also increased after each failure. However, it was the simple throws, which without taking bonuses into account, were ridiculously low. Especially when he had six failures in a row. And then there was the critical Intelligence roll. That's when he did a “fuck off” simple cycle of randomly activating an in-depth scan and thought Sylvia wouldn't be able to unlock it. Sylvia took real offense, and if it weren't for the suggestion through the doll she would have expressed that offense in a meaningful way - it's been a long time since she's been thought of as such a fool. And yes, she said all the right things. In a normal situation and without the puppet's prohibition, her pupil would have shown great flexibility, if necessary, by planting spirits in his ribs to twist herself into a “zu” and personally reduce his tension. Of course, I wouldn't have originally described such an outcome, it's a demonstration of Sylvia's character, pride, and resentment with vindictiveness. Wow.
Удалить ребра

An incredibly bad series of completely failed rolls to solve the mouse mystery, but this can be explained a little by the fact that in the center of the city and a courtyard full of people, Stepan does not call in full force, which obviously hinders the study of the phenomenon. But he was quite frightened and stopped sleeping at the farmstead. The very fact that something or someone had sealed his spirits was not so alarming, they were not martial and even a couple of strong ones were not too powerful. The problem was that someone had done it all without him noticing, and hadn't been caught by the scans the shaman had run more than once. And how could he not flinch when there was something so wild going on?

The summons to fight the demoness - donation waterfall and crying personal Scrooge by virtue of wasting the system currency. The worst thing here is that the summoning of the elder spirit demon-eater little failed. And despite the bonuses. There the original roll without taking them into account was attention, exactly 3 (three). Yes, the bonuses turned a near disaster, in which spirit would still try to attack, into just an indifferent “I don't want to play with you”, but it's still a shame. And yes, if Stepan had summoned him, trump would have been very harsh. Technically, this elder wasn't a demon fighter, but he specialized in hunting physical and energetic life forms, like very dense elementals or Sub-underworld spawns, which were both flesh and magic at the same time.

Also from the important-funny, you can't miss the moment with the spiritual battle during the summoning of the stargazer. That's where there were a lot of dice. Yes, there were no complex throws, the defense was too cool and even the opponent in the form of Shitmebius Ribbon did not really damage the defense, having penetrated only two layers out of seven. The toughest fighters of the whole mess were two of them at once - Mr. Lizard and Mr. Turtle. Iron Turtle and his retinue, by the way, is the strongest spirit guide in the strongest rank so far, and her retinue is the most powerful. These her axe-knives have such aspects and such strength, and even with mutual support and an aura of reinforcement from the turtle herself, it's a pain to pick. And even a senior and that against the iron shell of this spirit will crush his astral teeth.

I almost missed writing about another attempt to fuck the main character in the brains, and this time it would not be a beautiful girl, but, surprisingly enough, I would not write such crap anyway, and therefore at this point the rolls were only on whether the honorable Fanya would try her strength on Stepan or someone else. If on someone else, then the rolls would be on whether Stepashka would notice with his agent's eye the changes in his behavior and general strangeness. But, what a joy, the lady who had lost her way a little bit chose Stepan as her target. And then he threw a roll on morality as on squeamishness with a touch of pity. So he decided, since she was such a lover of young meat, to help her achieve her goals solely by her own efforts and without alchemy. One thing is certain: when the course of beauty is over, and its effectiveness fell on auto-hundred due to a bunch of bonuses, then love potions this feminine will no longer be so categorically needed, although it is not a fact that she will refuse them. Stepan forgets to put a block on the use of them. Another funny thing about Fanya - her backstory fell on diluted Caliphate blood because her grandfather once took as his wife a Caliphate concubine brought from a trade voyage.

In principle, if the Dice is favorable, we will still see Fanya, and her maid, who suddenly became quite nice to her, without Stepan's help, because Nika also likes girls as much as boys, hentai world and all that, but in what capacity I can't say.

Back to the topic of mission bonuses - the analog of corruption from the Ring of the Uninvited, just without subjugation, was not the coolest by meta-skill standards, but it wasn't useless either. Sylvia's Eyes on the strength of the roll to gain the property was autocrit. Auto because on lovers this skill will always give the maximum boost, it's just not directly stated in the help. And yes, even a hero, if without active defense or the appropriate spirit, loses just by looking into those eyes. Protecting yourself is not so difficult, can help all sorts of magical masks against the look of hypnotic sharpened. The goods are not particularly common, but the range is there. The point is that the eyepieces are not eyepieces, but cameras-illusions, which transmit the image in front of the wearer of the mask, so this effect fails. It'll work against Sylvia, too.

Her second free feature was also as useful as the first, despite its lewdness, and Sylvia, putting that lewdness aside, immediately realized the advantages. The possibility of getting literally two cubic meters of explosives out of her ass at any moment cannot be underestimated. And it's not only explosives, you can carry a lot of useful things there, though, in public, preserving the reputation, it will be possible to take it out of the mouth only. But, as they say, choosing between the checkers and the ride, Sylvia will choose to have a useful and unique type of auric modification, rather than some prejudices and pride. And, I'll note, no MC influence here, she chose everything herself. And yes, I can't speak for Brinar with complete certainty, but something tells me that neither Diantrel, nor Mirael, nor even Sivila would refuse such a free gift. Putting aside the racy and sexualized nature of this property, it remained an extremely stealthy, enormous, and extremely effective personal possession not bullshit of any kind.

T.N. the checkers and the ride,

Taking into account the presence of a token to remove the rollbacks of meta-skills, - a very valuable and rare thing, so, even surprisingly, that came in the reward so early, I myself did not count on it, he may well bestow at once characteristics and properties of all four new subordinates. I even successfully cast the options for these gifts, although, if anything, you can change, but at this point, the rolls are already done. Lemira was the luckiest of the lot, by the way, she doesn't just have auto(crit), she has regular crit and then 69 (yes, yes, that's the number), so her property is very much a property. Stepan, most likely, this gifting will be done, why not, but when exactly is unclear, it can be in the next chapter, or the next chapter, or even unclear when.

If we're talking about the visibility of the GG's activities, it can be described, albeit spoilerishly a bit, with the following phrase: vague suspicions about something unclear. The Secret Chancellery regularly receives all sorts of reports and other crap, and the people there are attentive, especially de Fall, picking up on small details. The summoning of the higher spirit through the contract amulet went unnoticed, the Autogoddess did not fail here, there were only auto hundred, but a couple of other summons, including that episode with the beggar healer, did give a light spotlight. There were also flashes around the city, at the points where MC took out passageways to dump magical energy. All this is not a direct clue. There, throws are not very harsh, but in the head of the head and deputy head of the intelligence deposited a suspicion that there is some oddity, perhaps illegal calls (specialists in spiritual invocation within the framework of classical magic in the city there are, and shamans too, just not strong), you need to look more closely if necessary. About the scale and severity of this illegal practice, no one would dare to think about it, and if they knew about the cave of MC and what this cave allows, they would turn gray with hair on their ass. The actual key and passage directly into the city, at any point, storm in and out, and blocking is unrealistic, as well as the opening.

That's the end of the protracted dice talk because I've already bored myself and others. The chapter came out rather sparse on action, more like routine-pumping, but the preparations are finished and in the next chapter there will be so much action that it will make you sick. Me first, because I'm the one who has to roll it all out. The rough outlines of the chapter are already there, now it's time to bring it all out, there are three main vectors that the situation can go, and three directions from which action can come. I still haven't done the last roll, let it be a bit of a surprise, yeah.

P.S. From the funny moments that appeared after reading the last chapter from the Almighty. I thought that suddenly that demonic mistress would be called in consonance with those jokes that we all joke about in the comments. And so, Stepan is walking down the street, humming a song by Lyapis Trubetskiy translated into the local language, and at the words “my seneschal is Karel'Mark's” a passing priest of Daromar pisses out a mithril brick and starts beating Stepan as hard as he can! In fact, of course, jokes are jokes, but we really weren't told about the emblems on the banners of the cultists who rebelled against the tyranny of the gifted monarchy.

No, of course, they did not rebel for the sake of it, but they made a serious PR campaign. They whitewashed the demons' reputation. whitewashed the demons' reputation, Carl! I can not even imagine what the representatives of the ruling dynasty and the official apparatus that they have fattened up, so that the demons who organized their favorite bloody massacre and massive invasion, managed to improve rather than worsen the reputation of their actions. This is really worthy of respect, this is really the greatest achievement of the Lightning Lord, where there are all sorts of titles of archmage or captured foreseeable Ecumene. This is what one should (not) look up to.

Р.Р.S. Traditionally, I wish everyone frequent updates to their favorite works, a good Internet connection, and a general mood. And I went to exhale and weep bitterly about how I would die when the time came to proofread the PB of my graphomaniacal attack. If only this time the site didn't glitch and eat the chapter with all the edits, because I had enough last time.

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

Переведено на Нотабеноиде
http://notabenoid.org/book/86785/577361

Переводчики: Camrad_RIP