Chapter 713: – Sentries (2) |
Percy had to pick his jaw off the rough floor of the cavern as his fellow aspect brought him up to speed on their new spell. He had yet to fully understand its nuances, but it was clear that it was one of the strongest they’d ever registered.
‘It’s almost worth interrupting me and Nesha over.’
Or maybe not, but that ship had already sailed. Perhaps, Phoebe’s Decree would give him a way of muting notifications the next time it evolved, though he wasn’t going to hold his breath.
The best part about the new spell was that Percy could apparently also tap into Micky’s sentries, since they technically still shared a single mind, with their personalities only separated by a thin film that they could easily and selectively poke holes into. Reaching into the tiny constructs that the Huehuan had scattered around the Fungal Spire, Percy whistled in amazement as his gaze swept over the surrounding fields and grasslands.
Percy had been capable of creating cloaked phantoms to fight alongside him for years, but those were simply attacks with pre-programmed movements. Unlike his friend’s sentries, the phantoms didn’t provide Percy with any sensory information, nor could they survive for very long or too far away from his body.
Micky’s ability wasn’t perfect either, of course. They’d already discovered a few additional drawbacks in the past couple of minutes.
For one, the Huehuan struggled to control more than twenty puppets at the same time. Each critter still functioned like an extension of his limbs, but even a Huehuan wasn’t used to having quite as many limbs. Micky could only examine a handful of Pond-sized regions at once, and he could only move four times as many sentries around, leaving the rest standing still. Percy could help his friend double both of those limits, but over half of Micky’s constructs would still remain immobile at any given time.
“I guess there’s no point in using my own blood for reconnaissance then. Yours is objectively better for this task, we can both control it, and you can produce more sentries than both of us combined can handle,” Percy summarized.
“Agreed. Yours might be better for experimenting with our ingredients, since mine will probably just freeze the herbs to death,” Micky replied.
However, there were too many to pay attention to at once. Focusing on some caused the others to deform into amorphous blobs of grey liquid, making them stick out like sore thumbs and leaving them vulnerable to threats in their surroundings.
“I suppose that you could transform most of them into inanimate objects like pebbles or puddles of water and keep them still, though a perceptive mage might still notice that something is off. The biggest advantage of your sentries is how natural they can look if we put in the effort,” Percy explained.
They would have to practice keeping all the constructs disguised and moving around, even if they couldn’t handle all the sensory information they provided. Ideally, they would concentrate their senses on a few while reserving a modicum of attention to sustain the rest.
Another issue was that Percy and Micky would have to be mindful of the distance between neighbouring sentries once they started moving around en mass, so as to keep the bubbles of information spaced out properly. If a pair drifted too far apart, their Ponds would separate. Due to the way the spell worked, it was more efficient to keep the bubbles linked, since they fed information into one another, allowing Percy and Micky to interpolate between them.
Finally, the constructs didn’t just have to look like unassuming critters. They also had to move like them. Micky would have to study and hone their behavioural patterns as much as he did their shapes and colours.
“Do you want me to work on this project with you?” Percy asked after explaining his thoughts.
Micky hesitated for a couple of seconds before shaking his head. “No need. Spells like this aren’t exactly my area of expertise – you know that I’m more into straightforward fights. But this is an ability tied to my own body, and I know how busy you are with everything else. I guess I’ll just have to figure it out on my own. I didn’t have anything urgent to work on, anyway.”
Percy patted his friend on the shoulder, nodding at him gratefully. “Have you tried making them bigger or stronger?” he asked, switching to a slightly different topic.
Micky raised an eyebrow, having clearly not thought of that. Over the next fifteen or so minutes, he called the constructs back, gathering them on the ground before him. Grabbing the nearest fake rat, he tried to pour more mana into its body, though that only exposed two additional problems.
First, he didn’t seem to have much spiritual blood left inside his main body, and diluting the construct with regular soul-freezing ice appeared to destabilize it. If it had just been that, Micky could have taken a few days to replenish his reserves before trying to supercharge the sentry again.
The second issue was that when he tried to pour the few dregs of spiritual blood that he had left into the icy rodent, his main body and every single sentry in the cavern squirmed violently, just like they had earlier. Even Percy was hit by a wave of vertigo that nearly knocked him off his feet.
“Pouring too much spiritual blood into a single sentry yields the same result as creating too many of the smaller ones. I guess that my capacity also has to do with the amount of spiritual blood I use – not just the number of portions I split it into,” Micky concluded.
Percy nodded. This meant that there was no point in Micky accumulating more spiritual blood, since he wouldn’t be able to use it.
Spiritual blood was an interesting resource because it seemed to automatically compress itself as Micky changed his size, allowing him to always retain roughly the same amount in his body regardless of his form. Or perhaps, it might be more accurate to say that the pieces of his soul residing within the liquid shrank or expanded to fit into the changing volume of magical water.
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“Can you reabsorb them to retrieve the blood you’ve already spent and free up your slots?” Percy asked.
“I can,” the Huehuan confirmed. “I’ve already tested that earlier.”
Percy rubbed his chin, pondering over the implications. “You clearly can’t have a hundred sentries bigger than these, but what if you were to concentrate the same amount of blood on fewer constructs?”
Heeding his friend’s instructions, Micky retrieved the resource before pouring it into ten person-sized sentries that resembled his original Huehuan appearance. The volume of spiritual blood that he had recovered wasn’t quite enough for the much larger constructs, but he was able to dilute them slightly with a modest amount of regular mana without weakening or destabilizing them in any measurable way.
Taking hold of five constructs each, Percy and Micky played around for a few minutes. Each possessed a sensory domain as powerful as before – which wasn’t ideal. It meant that cutting the number of sentries down to a tenth had directly reduced the amount of data they could gather. At least, the person-shaped constructs could still turn invisible and intangible, as well as transform into any humanoid shape that Percy and Micky were familiar with.
“In most situations, it’s an objectively worse option for reconnaissance, though being able to disguise the sentries as people might allow them to sneak into places where a rodent or bird wouldn’t be welcome,” Percy said.
“Do you think they’re strong enough to fight?” Micky asked.
Percy shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”
Micky reabsorbed eight sentries, leaving only a pair behind. He and Percy took control of one each, willing them to shapeshift into their own bodies. Not bothering with pleasantries, the constructs shot at one another, engaging in a brutal fist fight.
A series of loud impacts shook the cavern, the sentries’ figures deforming and regenerating as their strikes pelted each other with short-lived craters. Percy and Micky tried to grant their avatars mana or willpower to give them the edge, though nothing worked. A few minutes later, Percy’s replica was the first to stand down, its handler having seen enough.
“Their physical strength isn’t bad for their size, since they technically possess the flesh of a Blue beast with a second core and an evolved mutation. Unfortunately, they are much smaller and don’t have your cores, beast mana, or willpower to fully reproduce your strength,” Percy said.
“Greens then? Roughly?” Micky asked.
“More or less.” Percy nodded with a frown. “Controlling ten Green-level combatants is frankly… useless to us.”
The combat version of the spell resembled Archibald’s version of the Clone bloodline even more closely. The Huehuan’s sentries were better in some ways, but worse in others.
Percy’s grandfather couldn’t turn his clones invisible or shapeshift them, and they certainly didn’t grant him the kind of sensory information that Micky’s sentries did. However, the patriarch of House Avalon could boost the strength of his minions with life mana, or have them deliver deadly diseases to his opponents.
In terms of raw power, Micky’s constructs were stronger for their grade. They could probably go toe to toe with Archibald’s despite being only at Blue. The problem was that the Huehuan could control much fewer minions than one of Percy’s relatives.
A Blue life mage with Circulation and the Clone bloodline – which was the most reasonable point of comparison to Micky in this case – could command over a hundred and sixty clones, in theory. Granted, Percy’s relatives had to constantly feed them their mana, which Micky didn’t have to do, so they never kept that many around. Still, the Huehuan’s capacity was pitifully low.
Not satisfied with that, Micky and Percy played around with the size of the constructs some more, looking for a more favourable configuration. They weren’t able to find one, since the number and strength of the sentries appeared to scale in weird ways.
If they made them any smaller than rats, the size of their Sage’s Pond shrank rapidly without giving them nearly enough additional slots to compensate. If they made them any larger than a human, the number of slots shrank steeply without making them much stronger.
The only semi-usable configurations seemed to be the vermin-sized scouts and the person-sized combatants, though Percy and Micky confirmed that they could keep around a mixture of the two types – such as four fighters and sixty rats.
“Well, it doesn’t really matter whether they’re better or worse than your family’s bloodline,” Micky said. “The only question is whether they’re of any use to us like this.”
Percy tried to think of an application, though he struggled to come up with anything. Splitting the sentries into two groups, they might be able to keep a couple of Blues busy for a while, but that wasn’t a big deal when Percy could slaughter Blues like chicken.
The main advantage of the constructs was that they could travel far away from his and Micky’s bodies. Maybe they could have them escort a few weaker allies like Owain or Freddy in a dangerous area – if their main bodies were otherwise occupied – though Percy couldn’t think of a situation where that would be necessary. Besides, he had access to enough actual Green subordinates nowadays that he could just send a bunch of them to do it.
“Hmmm… the only possible place where my sentries’ combat strength would be relevant would be our clones’ adventures,” Micky said. “If we had to possess a Red or Orange host, having several Green bodyguards around wouldn’t hurt. It’s a pity that’s not an option…”
Percy raised an eyebrow, taken aback by his friend’s random comment. “Maybe it is.”
Micky frowned. “We can’t store the sentries inside the spatial seals. I’ve already tried. How would we get them to our clones?”
Percy shook his head. “Spiritual blood or not, your sentries are made entirely of a variant of soul-freezing ice. If we liquefy them, we might be able to send them directly through the cords and reform them at the other end.”
Micky’s eyes widened. Not wasting any time, he grabbed one of the remaining sentries, absorbing it into his body. He didn’t let the substance fuse into him completely, pushing it through his soul channels and into the connection instead.
Not even a second later, Percy felt something cold seep into his soul, causing the corner of his lips to curl up. Stretching out his hand, he poured the substance into a shallow but wide puddle by his feet, willing it to transform into a replica of his body like before.
The sentry obliged, rising to Percy’s height in no time!
Micky drew a sharp breath. “This… changes everything.”
Percy grinned, sharing the sentiment. With access to an entourage of Fourth Circle combatants, their clones would never be defenceless again. Granted, the zelesian beads fulfilled a similar purpose, though they were much harder to use, and Percy would much rather hold on to the artifacts until he resolved the situation on Remior.
While the sentries couldn’t compare with a Seventh Circle domain, they were far more disposable and versatile than the transparent marbles. They could hopefully follow the clones around for days instead of expiring after an hour, and it would be much easier to replace them if they got lost or destroyed.
Finally, this went beyond providing the clones with a couple of bodyguards. If Percy and Micky could send the person-sized sentries over, there was no reason why they wouldn’t be able to send them the rat-sized ones too. Their clones would be able to explore their surroundings like never before!
The main bodies would only need to provide each clone with a dozen or so of the smaller sentries for that. It wouldn’t be easy for the clones to control more than that anyway. This would allow them to scan entire forests or mountains in mere minutes!
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Percy warned, trying to calm his racing heart down. “Just because the two of us can share them, it doesn’t mean that we can send them through the regular cords.”
“Try sending it to Nephthys!” Micky suggested.
Percy was already a step ahead, having already pushed the strange liquid through a different cord, along with a brief explanation of what they were trying to do.
The clone wasn’t happy, as he was interrupted in a middle of a rather demanding exercise, wasting several hours or work. But he didn’t complain too much about it, clearly realizing how important this experiment was.
A few seconds later, Percy had his answer, his lips parting into a toothy grin.