Orphan [LitRPG Adventure] - Book One Complete!

"You are late," Kali grunted, his voice barely audible over the rush of water.

The sergeant stood in the middle of the ford, where the river cut a shallow line as it weaved around the northern base of Ilvan-Trai's hill. He was bare-chested and steady, a pillar of ivory driven deep into the riverbed that refused to budge. His unnatural skin gleamed in the midday sun; his well-defined muscles reminding Alarion of the covers of some of Nessa's more bawdy tracts.

Alarion had been surprised to find a message telling him to meet Kali so far from the fortress. With Alarion's notoriety and the uncertain times, he rarely strayed outside its walls—especially not alone. Kali clearly had a purpose in mind.

Why else ask him to bring ZEKE?

"Young master Ivor learned of intriguing news, and young master Alarion lost track of time as a result," ZEKE said, his translucent image chipper as ever on Alarion's shoulder despite the unease stewing just beneath the surface.

Alarion had informed his mentor of the substance of their discovery—discussing the 'news' as they walked—but they'd been unable to cover it in depth. ZEKE's artificial home allowed him to detect anyone following them through conventional methods, but it did little to combat magical concealment or eavesdropping. Better to wait for closed doors and proper defenses for something so serious.

"Hmm, a Grand Awakening, is it?" Kali said after ZEKE finished conveying the news. The Godborn was often hard to read, but there was no mistaking the tension in his shoulders at the news. "I will have to ask our new Ordinate if they know anything about that. But for now, we have work to do."

"I was rather curious about that," ZEKE admitted. "It was my understanding that your focus today would be on Lucky Strike and that Inva-Maie nonsense."

Alarion turned his head just far enough to give ZEKE a scathing side-eye. Kali similarly skewered him, and the Steelborn weathered the barrage longer than most before uncrossing his arms in a sign of submission.

"Fine, fine. I retract the tasteless cultural critique. But my overall point still stands."

"I had an epiphany," Kali said, ignoring the apology. When Alarion perked up, Kali quickly clarified. "For your training, not one of my skills. Our issue is time. Fall is coming fast, and even if you're close to an epiphany with Lucky Strike, you still have Ebb and Flow and ideally your masteries as well before you two even start in on the magic side of things."

"I am aware," Alarion said, grumpily.

"I don't doubt it," Kali grinned. "We could narrow our focus, leave some of it out, but I doubt the System would approve. We could try and bully through-"

"Stop beating around the bush, Sergeant," ZEKE said with the voice of a machine that abhorred a sales pitch.

Kali acquiesced, saying simply, "An earned skill."

ZEKE stared blankly for a heartbeat, then looked at Alarion. "Since you have no need of me, I think I would be of more use entertaining Young Mistress Nessa."

"I'm going to need your-"

"No, you will not," ZEKE sternly interjected. "Your solution to our time crunch is to spend months or years trying to invent a skill from whole cloth. I've seldom heard a worse idea."

"No, my solution is to steal the aspects of several."

"That-" Alarion could hear the frown in ZEKE's voice as he stopped cold and crossed his arms once again. His projection gave off a soft tink-tink-tink of metal on metal as his index finger weathered his arm in consideration. When at last he spoke, his tone had softened, though only somewhat. "Lucky Strike and Ebb and Flow?"

"Along with some of my Inva-Maie nonsense," Kali confirmed. "I considered Dimensional Evasion, but-"

"Too many elements, and it is tied to an item." ZEKE dismissed the idea without a second thought. He sounded irritated, but not at Kali. "If he had more mastery over foresight, perhaps, but it will still make an excellent skill circuit. Perhaps if… ah… am I doing it again?"

"You are doing it again." Alarion glowered.

Bound as he was to both Alarion's fate and his wrist, ZEKE had taken an above-average interest in Alarion's progression and his build. Like a parent living vicariously through a child, ZEKE spent his days and weeks thinking about what was best for Alarion, and as a result, he often failed to convey information that seemed 'obvious' to him.

"You have always told me earned skills are a waste of time," the young man pressed.

"They are…" ZEKE explained absently, his mind still focused on the possibility more than the conversation. It wasn't until Alarion cleared his throat, quite pointedly, that ZEKE returned wholly to the here and now. "I'm sorry. They are, as a rule, yes. Creating your own skill, like crafting a new spell, is a difficult, time-intensive process with no guarantee of success. It is a luxury, not a staple. But in this very narrow instance, there could be some value."

"By stealing, I assume you are talking about merging my skills, the same way we hope to do with my classes?"

"Not quite," Kali said. "Skill merging occurs when two skills fill the same niche. One overtakes the other, the rarity increases, but the overall concept remains the same. A general mastery skill being coopted by a class-specific one, for example. What I'm suggesting is more…"

"Skill coitus?" ZEKE did not seem to even realize the faux pas as he leaped from Alarion's shoulder, then from one half-surfaced stone to the next. It was only their silence that alerted him. "Is the analogy not apt?"

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"It is," Kali conceded. "But never say that again."

"I had not thought a soldier would be so prudish, but very well. In any case, what he suggests is to rip aspects from two of your skills to make something entirely new from the sum of their parts." The machine stopped halfway between the two, pacing back and forth on a slippery stone, lecturing as though it were his idea. "The end result will be much more powerful, as all earned skills are, and will come with the associated feat of strength as a bonus."

"If it is so easy-"

Kali stopped him. "It isn't. The only reasons to even suggest it are circumstantial. You have an extreme affinity for Ebb and Flow, you are already on the cusp of an epiphany for Lucky Strike, and I have a concept in mind that will synergize the two. A perfect storm."

Those last words surprised ZEKE, who turned to face the Godborn. "A concept as well. You surprise me, Sergeant. Do tell."

"I'll show you instead. Orphan, get in here."

Alarion had been afraid of that the moment he saw Kali standing in the river.

It wasn't that he hated water. He liked baths. But there was something about large bodies of water that never sat well with Alarion. Yes, he could almost certainly murder any non-Systemborn wildlife that decided to invade his personal space, but that didn't make it feel any less unsettling when they brushed against his bare legs. Nor did he have any recourse at all against stepping on a sharp rock or getting his feet stuck in the mud.

It was just… gross; like drinking a healing potion.

Needless to say, he took his time disrobing down to his underclothes on the riverbank, as if hoping for an interruption. When none arrived, he reluctantly waded out into the river, Echo small in one hand and his mace resting heavy on the opposite shoulder.

It was awkward, even with his superhuman physicality. Alarion could run or even fight, if necessary, but the poor footing and unfamiliar drag of the water would keep him from his best. Somehow, he did not think Kali would take it easy on him.

"Sei," Kali told him as they met just outside arm's reach. It was an order, one that meant 'stop' in the Celesian tongue, the language still commonly spoken in the Principalities, where the Godborn had been raised. Kali was training Alarion the way he had learned, which included difficult lessons in the once-familiar language.

Not that the language itself was especially trickyl Kali was just a terrible language teacher.

"Tai," the big man warned as he slid a wooden dowel from his belt and pressed its tip against Alarion's nose.

Stay.

Alarion had balked at the word exactly once. It felt unpleasant to be treated like a dog. It felt considerably worse to take a three-inch wooden rod to the side of the head.

Kali began to swing. Each swipe came fast and brutal, a full rotation of the arm from left to right, from up to down. He felt the wind of each near miss and the growing animal panic in the back of his head that screamed to dodge, to parry, or to at least close his eyes.

He ignored every instinct because that was the point of the exercise.

One of ZEKE's earliest lessons was that a miss was a miss, regardless of how close it came. Sure, a sword slice that took a few strands of hair on its way past was frightening, but it did just as much damage as an attack that missed by a country mile, and it was a lot easier to counter as well.

Kali's training took that principle to the extreme.

"Imagine a sphere around me," Kali said, ceasing his attacks in favor of drawing an invisible bubble around him with the tip of the rod. "This is the Inva. Within it, I can kill you; outside of it, I cannot harm you."

The Godborn pointed the faux sword toward Alarion once again and stepped forward. Alarion retreated at a similar pace, backpedaling to keep the distance between them the same, even as Kali began to swing with full force.

"Between equals, mastery of the killing distance is all that matters." The words fell from Kali's lips, but Alarion knew they were not his own. They were ancient wisdom, lessons passed down from one warrior to another. Predating the System, they told of a simpler time where skill mattered more than skills. "But men are not equal, and the Inva is not alone."

Alarion threw his head back, the tip of the dowel leaving a rough scrape across the bridge of his nose as it passed by. His footwork had been pristine, even with the river stiffening his movements, but he'd been so focused on Kali's advance that he'd nearly missed the slight rotation of the sergeant's upper body that had added an extra inch to his reach.

The sphere analogy was helpful, but deceptive. Alarion preferred to think of it as a soap bubble floating around his opponent; the overall area never changed, but it could bulge at one end. Kali had about six feet of reach with his dowel, but a change in grip, in posture, or extension could add or subtract a considerable amount.

"The Maie is competitor and mate to the Inva. Neither can exist without the other, for there is no killing distance without someone to be killed, and there can be no refusal of that death without first the threat."

The pressure increased, Kali's once sporadic attacks becoming regular, then persistent. With the exercise graduating from demonstration to an impromptu spar—their first in days—Alarion began to reply with blows of his own, for what little good it did him.

"Perception. Focus. Balance. Timing. Willpower." A new range of attacks punctuated each word. Kali thrust and swept, then feinted and threw a kick that finally caught Alarion in the side and sent him sprawling into the water.

"-and aggression." Kali finished as Alarion emerged from the shallow waters. "These are the facets of your Maie, the living distance that suppresses the enemy's Inva and allows you to impose your will upon them."

Even with water in his ears, Alarion heard ZEKE's snort of derision. The concept was too spiritual for the machine, too abstract. ZEKE's training had no place for the philosophy of combat, only the physicality of it.

"What is your goal?" Kali asked, once again ignoring ZEKE's opinion.

Alarion recited the answer verbatim. "To make my Inva near, and the enemy's far."

"Correct." Kali smiled like a proud father, even as he tried to bludgeon Alarion's skull in. "How?"

"Inva is more than the physical reach of your arm," Alarion continued as he staggered back a few steps, then pivoted away from a thrust. He shoved Kali's outstretched elbow and smiled in satisfaction as the big man stumbled to keep his balance. "My Maie can smother it."

"How?" Kali reiterated.

"I can block or parry, I can push you off balance, or attack from an unexpected angle." Kali was waiting for more, but Alarion's thoughts were disrupted as the rod finally clipped his nose and sent him stumbling back. He came up bleeding, but already in motion, dodging three more attacks before he finally had space to clear the blood from his nose and say, "Or I can intimidate you, pressure you. Force you to draw in the reach of your own Inva, for fear of being caught up in mine."

"And what would you call someone who fights like that? Someone more focused on survival than victory?" The Godborn asked.

"Wise?" ZEKE suggested.

"Someone who fights not to lose," Alarion answered, embodying the opposite as he met Kali's next swing with the hilt of his mace. There was a great clang, then a sudden splash as the sergeant abandoned his weapon to the river mere moments before Alarion was able to stab Echo's dagger form through his exposed forearm.

It was a risky gamble, one that Alarion would have dearly paid for under other circumstances.

Given the sheer difference in size and strength, Alarion had long ago learned the dangers of getting too close to the sergeant. All it took was a single, solid grip for the Godborn to turn Alarion into a pretzel of pain, but getting that grip in the middle of a raging river, with both men soaked to the bone, proved surprisingly difficult. Alarion squirmed and wrenched, dragging his arm free and striking Kali across one shoulder with his mace in the process.

It was the first substantive hit he'd landed in what felt like months.

"Mmph…" Kali grunted, retreating a few steps and raising an open palm to keep Alarion from pushing the offensive. Or seriously hurting him. "There it is. The Vahr-Syl. We can work with this."