Aura Farming (Apocalypse LitRPG) [BOOK ONE COMPLETE]

Long before the apocalypse and the system, John had got really good at telling when people were staring at him. It wasn't anything supernatural, really. He didn't gain some magic instinct that told him when people were glaring daggers at the back of his head. He merely developed his awareness of his peripheral vision to such a degree that he could always just tell that someone's eyes were on him, as long as they were in the corner of his eye for even an instant.

It had been a survival mechanism, back in school. The ability to know when he'd caught his bullies' attention had been vital so he could make a quick escape. This oh-so pathetic superpower of his had dulled over the years since he'd left the hellish halls of education behind, but it was still there, to a degree, a muscle that had simply been out of use for a while.

Point was, he knew the others had been staring at him. It wasn't consistent; anyone with social sense wouldn't stand there ogling at someone crying. But they had looked. They'd seen him in this awkward position.

John felt sweat beading on the back of his neck. He didn't know how long he'd been sitting here with his arms around Lily and her arms around him. It probably wasn't more than a few minutes, but it felt like an eternity.

All he could do was endure it. Even if he wasn't sure how long a hug could go on before it would be considered awkward by polite society, being the one to break the hug seemed like it would be a bigger faux pas, somehow. Like everyone would see him as callous and cruel, trying to hurry along Lily's recovery from her distress.

+400 Aura

John tried not to grimace. The Aura was the weirdest thing about it all. Why was the System rewarding him for awkwardly holding a crying woman? What the fuck was cool about this?

Thankfully, nothing lasts forever, even if uncomfortable events sometimes felt like they did.

Doug and Alissa finished whatever quiet conversation they'd been having in the corner, their voices too low for John to make out the words. Doug said something that made Alissa shake her head, though it seemed more exasperated than disagreeing. They moved to sit on the sofas across from John and Lily.

Seeing this, Chester and Jade seemed to take it as their cue to reconvene. They gravitated to another sofa, positioning themselves so they formed a loose semicircle with the others. Chester looked relieved to have somewhere to put himself, dropping onto the cushions with a soft exhale. Jade settled beside him with more composure.

At the change in atmosphere, Lily finally pulled away. John's arms dropped to his sides immediately, perhaps too quickly, but he couldn't help it. The absence of contact felt like being released from a vice, even if it had been a vice he'd put himself in willingly. Or mostly willingly. The lines got blurry when you were trying to be a good person while also farming Aura for survival.

Lily's face was blotchy with tears, red splotches across her cheeks and nose, her eyes puffy and rimmed with pink. Her freckles stood out starkly against the flush. A few stray strands of strawberry blonde hair had escaped her ponytail and stuck to her damp cheeks.

But she was smiling, at least. That was good. It seemed like a real smile, too. Not the polite, performative kind people put on when they wanted you to think they were fine. Her lips curved upward genuinely, reaching her eyes despite the redness, and there was something lighter in her expression.

"Thanks again," she said.

Before John could formulate a response—something cool and collected, ideally, maybe a casual "anytime" or "don't mention it"—Lily leaned over and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

The world narrowed to the point of contact, the warmth of her lips against his skin, the faint scent of sweat and dust and something underneath that might have been her shampoo from days ago. It lasted maybe a second, probably less, but it felt like time had hiccuped, skipping forward and backward simultaneously.

Lily pulled back, still smiling, clearly thinking nothing of the gesture beyond friendly gratitude.

John, meanwhile, had stopped functioning as a person.

His face felt hot. His heart was hammering in his chest in an accelerating drum beat that was building for the drop. Every nerve ending in his body had lit up like a Christmas tree, sending alarm signals to his brain that it was utterly unprepared to process.

He needed say something. Anything. Literally any combination of words that would make him seem like a normal human being capable of receiving a simple platonic gesture of gratitude without having a complete internal meltdown.

Nothing came out. He just sat there, frozen, while his brain screamed at him to react, to do something, to not just sit there like a wooden plank. No, that wasn't fair. A wooden plank had more social grace than him.

Biomancy, he thought desperately, and reached for the Spell with the mental equivalent of a drowning man grabbing for a lifeline. Awareness of his body flooded through him, that strange three-dimensional map materialising in his mind's eye. He could see his cardiovascular system lit up like a neon sign, his heart working overtime, blood rushing to his face in a pattern that would absolutely result in him turning bright red if he didn't intervene immediately.

He rushed to force his heart rate down, manually overriding the sympathetic nervous system's panicked response. Redirected blood flow away from his face. Relaxed the muscles in his jaw that had gone rigid.

Then, he moved his chin down, and then up, puppeting his own body into a nod, which was probably the most he could manage without risking his voice cracking or saying something monumentally stupid.

Externally, he must have looked completely composed. Internally, he was screaming.

+800 Aura

John had to resist the urge to laugh hysterically.

Lily seemed satisfied with that, turning her attention back to her crossbow, fingers resuming their fidgeting with the bowstring. Meanwhile, John risked a glance at the others.

No one said anything. No one commented on the long hug, or the kiss on the cheek, or any of it. Doug was leaning back into the sofa, his expression neutral, though there might have been the faintest hint of amusement in his eyes. Alissa was examining her fingernails with studied disinterest. Chester was pointedly looking at the ceiling. Jade was staring at a spot on the wall with intense focus.

But their affected indifference couldn't escape the power of his peripheral vision. John knew they'd all seen. And even though no one was making a thing of it, even though everyone was being perfectly polite and giving him space, he felt judged anyway.

Anxiety clawed at the back of his mind, that familiar old friend whispering all the ways this could go wrong, all the ways they might be thinking of him now.

Stop it, he told himself, almost angry at his own stupid mind. They have accepted you. You know they've accepted you. Fucking stop it.

He tamped down on it hard, using Biomancy again to regulate the cascade of stress hormones trying to flood his system. It felt wrong, somehow. Like he was drugging himself into a forced calm, chemically inducing a state of equilibrium that he hadn't actually earned.

But the alternative was becoming a blushing, stammering mess. So forced calm it was.

He crossed his arms and leaned back slightly, aiming for a posture that read as casual and unbothered. His face remained carefully neutral, his breathing even and controlled. Inside, his thoughts were still racing, but at least his body couldn't betray him like this.

What I would have given for Biomancy in school, he thought wistfully.

With everything under control, he realised a conversation had already started.

"Not saying it's the smart play," said Doug. "But it needs doing, and we're in a position to."

"I still feel you should put that shithole of a town out of your minds and head west immediately," Alissa countered, sounding tired more than anything. "How many innocent people can still be alive in there, even?"

Doug shrugged. "Even if there's no one worth saving, we can at least make sure the bastards don't go roaming the countryside like those five earlier. And we'll get stronger from it. Which is needed at this point." He glanced at John. "It would feel… wrong, to leave this job undone."

"Don't want to leave it after all we've been through for it," Chester mumbled, eyes flicking to Jade.

"Have you ever heard of the sunk cost fallacy?" Alissa challenged him.

"We're going to have to fight back in a big way eventually, if we want humanity to survive. Liberate places from the monsters' control," Lily said. Her voice still sounded a little hoarse from her earlier tears. "Watford seems like a good place to start as any."

Jade sighed. "We've pretty much already agreed we're going to go back. We promised."

John would have raised his eyebrows if he didn't have his face locked down with Biomancy. They were talking about Watford. About going back.

That realisation came with a huge measure of relief. Part of him had been expecting he'd have to make some grand speech to convince everyone, even after his displays of power and whatnot. But they were committed to the plan, and arguing for it on his behalf. Doug even caught John's eye and gave him a small nod, as if to say, See? We're with you on this one.

The gratitude John felt was complicated by the guilt of knowing he was responsible for dragging them all back into danger. But Watford needed to be dealt with.

Or, perhaps it was more accurate to say John needed to deal with it. He had too many regrets on his shoulders to add one of this magnitude.

"If it would make you feel better about getting involved, I can outfit you with gear," John spoke up for the first time since Lily had pulled away from the hug. His voice came out satisfyingly steady. "Enchant it with stuff that doesn't feel so unpleasant to use. I can do it for everyone."

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"Enchanted gear," Alissa repeated, giving him a look.

"I can imbue objects with any Spell or Skill I have access to. Give you equipment that can do what I can do, more or less."

Alissa's look turned contemplative. "That's… tempting, I suppose."

Doug, however, was frowning. "Appreciate the offer, lad. Really, I do. But aren't you just shifting the burden from our shoulders to yours?"

John blinked. "What do you mean?"

"If we're relying on your magic toys to do the heavy lifting, then that would leave you as the only one suffering under your System," Doug said bluntly. "That's not fair to you, and it's not going to help us in the long run. We need to be able to stand on our own two feet."

Jade shifted uncomfortably beside Chester, her arms tightening across her chest. John saw it, and so did Doug.

"That wasn't a jab at you, kiddo," he said, his voice gentling. "Your situation isn't your fault. You've been left with no choice but to rely on John's help. Can't put the blame on you for that. I'm just saying, in general terms, it's better if we develop our own strength, in the long run."

"I guess," John said slowly. "But we should use every advantage we can get."

"Absolutely," Doug agreed. "But this is about sustainability. What happens if you're not around? What if you get separated from us again, and we've spent all that time relying on the crutches you gave us? We'd be way too far behind the curve and unpracticed with our abilities, vulnerable. The gear would only be as strong as you made it, unable to grow."

"There's another angle to this," Lily interjected, her fingers still working absently at her bowstring. "The System chose the themes for our powers for a reason, right? Like, it picked up on something about each of us, something we struggle with, and made that the core of how we gain strength."

Chester grimaced. "It's a real bastard about it, too."

"My point is," Lily continued, "maybe there's value in confronting those things head-on. In coming to terms with whatever the System saw in us. Using John's enchantments to completely avoid our issues might... I don't know. It might mean we never grow past them."

The room fell silent again, everyone digesting that.

Alissa was the one who broke it. "So what are you suggesting? That we all torture ourselves to satisfy some cosmic horror's idea of character development?"

"No," Lily said firmly. "I'm saying there might be a middle ground. Use John's enchantments to take the edge off, to make things more bearable, but don't use them as a replacement for developing our own abilities. They're tools to help us survive while we get stronger, not a permanent solution."

Doug nodded slowly. "Now that I can get behind. Enchanted gear that complements what we can already do and makes us more versatile, rather than replacing it entirely. Takes some of the pressure off without making us dependent."

"It's a good compromise," Jade agreed quietly.

Chester looked between them all, then shrugged. "Works for me. I'll take any help I can get if it means I'm less likely to die horribly."

John felt something unclench in his chest. "Alright then," he said. "Let me tell you what I've got available."

He opened his Enchantment menu, scanning through the full list of Spells and Skills he'd unlocked during his rise through Arcane and Talent. There were a whole ninety-five to choose from in each at this point.

His relatively unrestricted access to abilities was one of the things that made his System so powerful, even if it came with the psychological torture of having to act cool all the time. Everything on the list was cool as hell in its own way, made for style over substance—though none of it truly lacked on the substance side of things.

John talked them through his options, taking it level-by-level, alternating between Spells and Skills. With each ability he listed, he could see the others' expressions change, cycling through interest, envy, and calculation.

+100 Aura

+200 Aura

+400 Aura

The notifications kept coming, rewards for showcasing his versatility, for reminding everyone just how many options he had at his disposal, and the points rose as he went through the list and the names of his Spells and Skills grew steadily more impressive. By the time he was listing out the Level 9 stuff, he was getting 1000 points each just for reading the names. It felt a bit like showing off, which made him uncomfortable, but he pushed through it.

"I don't know what all of them do, though," he admitted once he was done. "Only the ones I've actually unlocked and used. The names give hints, obviously, but I can't guarantee how they'll function in practice until we test them."

"Still," Chester said, his eyes wide. "That's... that's a lot of options."

"It's absurd is what it is," Alissa muttered, though there was no real rancour in her tone. Just weary resignation. "The rest of us are stuck with such narrow power sets, and you've got the whole bloody catalogue to work with, mon."

She descended into a muttered tirade in another language that was vaguely French-sounding. John was sure, somehow, that there were a lot of curses in there.

John didn't have a good response to that. It did seem unfair, when he thought about it objectively. From his perspective, though… Well, complaining about how his repertoire of badass abilities felt plenty torturous to him probably wouldn't be received the way he wanted, so he kept his mouth shut.

"Let's talk specifics," Doug said, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "What would work best for each of us?"

That opened the floodgates.

Jade was the first to speak up, her voice tentative at first but growing more confident as she talked. "John and I talked about this while we were searching for Alissa, actually. Now that I don't have a combat-focused System anymore…" She paused, seeming to gather herself. "I want to take up healing. First Aid and Medic would work for that. And I could use other support stuff, the cheap, low-level ones like Purify Water or whatever. Make myself useful as support for the group."

"You're already useful," Chester said immediately, with an earnestness that made Jade's lips quirk into a small smile.

"Thank you, Chester. But I'd like to be useful in a way that doesn't require me to…" She trailed off, and John could fill in the blanks. In a way that doesn't require me to hurt anyone. "Being able to patch people up, keep everyone alive, that feels like something I could actually commit to. I was… There was nothing I could do, when we first found Sam. If one of you ends up in a situation where you can't heal again, or anyone else we find is injured, I want to be able to act."

John nodded. "I can do that. Bracelet or pendant, probably, something you can wear constantly. It won't be as fast as a level-up, but it'll work."

Lily was next, frowning thoughtfully. "Marksman would be useful for me. Better aim means more efficient kills, which means less time lining up shots, which means less time to... think about what I'm doing." She smiled wryly. "And Accelerate would be good too. If I could slow down my perception of time, I'd have longer to aim without actually taking longer in real-time. Both of those would help me be more effective."

"That's… No close combat abilities? No armour? In case something gets in close, I mean."

"If any of that stuff's on offer, I'll take it, but I should know my place in the group and focus on that," Lily said with a shrug.

"Well, I guess Accelerate could help you get out of sticky situations. I'll make sure it's a higher Level, so it lasts longer."

"That would be perfect," Lily said, and there was genuine warmth in her smile that made John's carefully regulated heart rate try to spike again.

He clamped down on it with Biomancy before it could get out of hand.

Chester had been fidgeting with the hem of his shirt the entire time Lily was speaking, clearly wanting to say something but hesitating. Eventually, he managed, "I'd like... protection, I guess? Things that would make me feel safer while my abilities are drawing all the attention to me. Steel Skin, maybe, or something that increases durability. And maybe something that would help me not freeze up when I'm scared."

"Danger Sense might help with that last one," John mused. "It's not a cure for fear, but it gives you a heads-up before threats materialise, which might make you feel more in control."

Chester's face brightened. "Yeah, yeah that sounds good. Thanks."

All these sincere positive emotions coming John's way were going to give him an aneurysm at this rate. He managed a thumbs up in reply.

Doug was grinning, and there was something wolfish in the expression. "Biomancy for me, if you don't mind. The ability to alter my appearance, make myself look younger." He caught John's questioning look and elaborated. "My System wants me to act like I did in my youth. Doug the Thug, the arrogant boxer who thought he was God's gift to the world." He shook his head ruefully. "If I look younger, it might satisfy the System enough that I don't have to lean so hard into behaviour I despise. Gives me a bit of wiggle room to be myself while still getting points."

That was... actually a clever way to approach it. John had done the same thing, giving himself a makeover to look more badass with an edgy hairstyle and rippling muscles, but hadn't thought about others using Biomancy that way. It made sense. Appearance was part of persona, after all, and there was more to it than just coolness factor.

"I can do that," John said.

Everyone turned to Alissa, who had been conspicuously quiet during the discussion.

She met their gazes with a flat expression, then sighed. "At the very least, I believe I can tolerate the Level 0 abilities. Utility, you called them. Basic things like Purify Water, Mana Sense, and Rest, simple abilities that I can use for day-to-day survival. That's just practical."

Doug nodded, eyeing her. "Those should probably be distributed widely."

"I can do that," John said after a moment when it became clear no one else was going to fill the silence that had descended. "I'll make some basic utility items for the whole group. First Aid, Navigation, Forage, Build Fire, Find Water, Sense Mana, Soul Vision, Sparks, Purify Water, and Rest."

"Mana Sense and Soul Vision alone would be game changers," Lily said.

"They've been useful," John admitted, understating it severely.

+400 Aura

The conversation continued after that, but it had shifted from debate to logistics. They discussed timing and strategy, resource allocation and contingency plans. Hours passed in this fashion, the group bouncing ideas off each other, refining their approach, working through problems before they could manifest.

John found himself impressed by their thoroughness, their willingness to think several steps ahead. He hadn't had much of a plan at all before this, beyond "go to Watford and keep killing monsters until there aren't any left, then beat up any remaining humans who act like dicks."

Through it all, John felt a strange sense of... contentment wasn't the right word. Maybe belonging? These people were trusting him, relying on his abilities, treating him as an essential part of the team rather than a weird outsider they grudgingly tolerated.

It was almost enough to make him forget that he was constantly drugging himself with Biomancy to maintain his composure in their presence, manually regulating his hormones and nervous system to project an image of calm confidence he didn't actually feel.

The planning session stretched on, animated discussions giving way to quieter strategising, until eventually the group began to wind down. Jade was yawning, Chester's eyes were drooping, and even Doug's boundless energy seemed to be flagging.

They decided, collectively, that it would be ideal to overpower one item with a high-level Rest enchantment so they could all take turns to get a supercharged sleep. He did so, bringing a sleep mask Lily found in one of the farmhouse's bedrooms up to Level 5, where it would knock the user out for only fifteen minutes while making them feel as rested as a full night's sleep.

They dispersed slowly, taking turns with the sleep mask. John intended to go last, relying on his own Rest Spell, so didn't bother moving from the sofa.

Lily paused as she rose next to him, her hand briefly touching his arm. "Thanks again for earlier," she said. "I know it would have… Umm. Probably shouldn't say… Uh." Her brows furrowed, and she chuckled to herself. "Damn, it can be hard to talk to you without messing up the whole thing you have going on. Just… It meant a lot, that you went to the effort."

Before John's brain could complete the long and arduous process of formulating words, she'd moved on with one last smile, leaving him sitting there with the ghost of her touch on his arm and the phantom sensation of her kiss still burning on his cheek despite the hours that had passed.

He sat there for a while longer after everyone had settled, staring at nothing in particular, using Biomancy to keep his thoughts from spiralling too far in any direction. It was a mercy when his turn to Rest finally came, and he could vent in the comfort of his own mind.