186, 1/2

Erick woke the next morning feeling refreshed and wonderful, and not sore at all. His body seemed to be fully healed from his first foray into accretion, which was normal. All the books said that while there might be an initial weakness after a good accretion cycle, all of that weakness should go away faster than it felt like it should. ‘Such was the power of accretion’, was the refrain in many of the manuals.

One book, though, posited that even here in Ar’Cosmos, where Health did not exist, Vitality still helped to boost healing speed. Erick believed that one more than the others.

Ophiel chirped on the headboard while Yggdrasil’s [Scry] eye lazed by the window, watching the sun come up. As Erick got out of bed, both of his [Familiar]s joined him in the bathroom, and though that was a bit awkward at first, Erick got over it, because when he hopped into the bathing pool to clean himself Ophiel dove right in and splashed around with him. Erick almost would have preferred to [Cleanse] himself than take all these baths, but that spell was not as precise in Ar’Cosmos as it was on Veird, and so he made do with what options he had available. [Cleanse] still worked, but it was more something one did to the water that one used to wash dishes, than to the dishes themselves; you still had to scrub the dishes.

Or in this case, Erick had to scrub his skin.

And the warm water was great, anyway. It constantly cycled and cleaned itself all the time.

Erick got out of the bathing pool after a little while, put on some soft clothes, and felt like it was time to get breakfast. Ophiel alighted on one shoulder while Yggdrasil took the other, as Erick unlocked his door and started walking down the stairs. Fairy Moon and Maid Maria had likely eaten long before now, but he felt he could probably find something to eat, or at least he could find one of those two people and then go from there.

The dining room was empty save for a note left on Erick’s usual spot.

‘Dearest Guest, Erick Flatt. Fairy Moon is indisposed today, so I, Maid Maria, will be attending to your needs. If you have found this note, then I have likely been called to do other duties for a little while, otherwise I would have been doing paperwork here, in this room, while I waited for you with a gift from Fairy Moon, and to attend to your other needs. I should be back soon, but I apologize for my negligence. If you are in need of the kitchen, please look to the end of the dining room and follow the smell of baking bread. Feel free to take anything you wish to take, or make anything you wish to make. There are many items already made and under ward in the pantry, just waiting for someone to eat them. Feel free to eat whatever.’

Erick glanced around, then put the note back down.

A gift from Fairy Moon? Hmm. Erick didn’t know how he felt about that.

But he did know he was hungry, and he actually did want to make his own breakfast now that he knew that was an option. It was fine having breakfast made for him, but… All of this was still uncomfortable for him. He could make his own breakfast.

This was actually great, now that Erick thought of it.

There was a problem, though. Which part of the dining room was the ‘end of the dining room’? It was a rectangular room and everything was ornate, and this place was very much non-euclidean, so… Realistically, Erick had a 50% chance of being right. The correct direction had to be one of the short ends.

He went left, first, and stood at that end of the dining room. He sniffed the air. No bread? No bread.

He went to the other side and sniffed the air—

Erick smiled. “Bread.”

Erick stepped past the archway…

Left or right?

He sniffed the air… And frowned. After a bit of back and forth, Erick eventually decided to go to the right. It was probably the correct decision because the air still smelled of bread. Soon, he hit another branching hallway. He went to the right, again—

The scent of bread held heavy in the air, and beyond a doorway lay a kitchen. Erick triumphantly walked through the archway and marveled a bit at everything in the rather massive room. A grand [Prestidigitation] stove with twenty burners sat against one side of the wall, while large wooden tables for kitchen work filled the center of the room. One of those tables had an organization of bread upon it, with most of the bread seeming to be of the flaky-croissant variety, or the bun kind, and filled with stuff. Nuts and fruits, or gooey red stuff, or… Citrus? Citrus; yes. Erick left the bread alone, for now.

The kitchen’s cold storage lay beyond another archway to the far left. Through the archway Erick saw large racks of frozen beef that hung from organized rafters on one side, while sausage and other cured or frozen meats hung on the other side, or lay in large bins. Eggs and flour and other assorted goods were in a less-cold section of that walk-in freezer. If he wanted to make his own breakfast, then he would have to venture into that space, but…

The pantry on the other side of the room had to be the ‘pantry’, and yet to call such a place a simple ‘pantry’ felt disingenuous. Erick walked over that way, and marveled at the organization.

Shelves upon shelves stretched from floor to way beyond where the ceiling should have ended. Upon those shelves rested fully-cooked meals under shimmering pink bubbles. Erick wanted to explore. But.

There was another note pinned in a prominent location beside the door, on the inside of the room.

‘Dearest Guest: Erick Flatt. If you are reading this, then I have been most lax in my duties as a good maid. Please forgive me, and accept any offering from shelves 1 through 10. Anything on the higher shelves was not made by me, and cannot be remade if you should choose to dine upon it. I will be back as soon as I can, but if you are reading this, then I am likely inevitably delayed.’

Erick left that note alone as he glanced at the shelves. The shelves were labeled from the bottom to the top, starting at 1 and going all the way to 75, and that wasn’t even mentioning how deep the shelves went. A glance at the end of the room proved to be like looking at a horizon; it just kept going, and going, and going.

Back to his local environs, though…

The shelves seemed to be organized by breakfast at shelf 1 and 2, lunch from 4 to 6, dinner at 7 to 9, and 10 was reserved for desserts. All of it was rather easy to see with Ophiel, who flitted up and up and up to give Erick a better view. All the shelves past #10 were disorganized, and labeled with names instead of types of meals. At a guess, Erick thought them all meals made by the previous maids of Fairy Moon.

… This was too much. Erick wanted to make his own breakfast, anyway. There was probably a note pinned inside that door, too; he just had to look for it.

He went to the cold storage and found another note, but this one was on a plaque and set into the wall just inside the cold room. It was not a note from Maid Maria.

‘Truest Traveler: If thou are to dine, then take what thou will, but deliverest no unneeded destruction to this supply space, or to the common cookery.’

Erick scrunched his face a little. Now that was a message from Fairy Moon, herself.

… Erick…

He wasn’t sure he wanted to make his own breakfast anymore. Well. He did. But then again. He did not. And yet…

Cooking could come later.

Erick went back to the prepared food room and glanced around at his options. It all looked really, really good, so it was a bit hard to decide what, exactly, he wanted. There was the Veird equivalent of a full turkey dinner for ten people. Or a hamburger and wine for one. Mashed vegetables for a baby and desserts of all kinds. High-class meals made to serve a king and queen, but also a platter of common cheeses that anyone could nibble from. After ten minutes of walking and searching Erick picked out lunch, instead of breakfast. He got that hamburger-equivalent he had noticed before, but he also picked out a slice of white cake from the dessert menu. If coffee had been an option then he would have settled for just the slice of cake, but back in the main kitchen the only options for drink were teas, sweet tea, wine, or beer, or stronger spirits. Erick grabbed a pitcher of sweet tea, since it complemented his food choices, and that was that.

He ate his meal at a side kitchen table, which looked perfect for just that purpose. It was delicious, and all the proper temperatures; the burger-equivalent started steaming the second he took it out of its bubble, while the cake was actually a bit frosty. All of it was good. Next time, though, he would ask Maid Maria for a proper introduction to the kitchen and he could cook for himself.

When he finished, he took his used dishes to the washing sink, where constantly-cleaning water constantly flowed through the tap. It was like the water in the bathing pool in his room. All he had to do was take the provided sponge and vigorously scrub while under the water, and everything came off perfectly clean. So he did exactly that. It wasn’t [Cleanse], but it worked. The cleaned dishes went back into the cupboards, except for the pitcher of tea and a glass which would go with Erick back up to his room. With another thought toward eating a snack later, Erick grabbed a small plate of cookies that had looked good, too, and brought them all back with him.

Once firmly behind the locked door of his room, Erick picked out the large blue accretion pillow, sat down, and organized some thoughts.

Erick centered himself.

White glows flowed away from his body like a clinging mist. With a strained thought those mists formed a bubble around him. He breathed. He opened his spirit.

Power seeped into his skin, stirring his entire body to soft, white glows on the inside. His heart pumped hard. His mana flowed through his flesh, following paths of his veins, both the bloody ones and the ones made for mana. Briefly, everything was white, like a sudden rush of rain turning a land wet, all at once, and then the white rain abated, slowing, flowing in rivers and streams back to the source that created it, back to the gem in Erick’s chest. The gem flexed. New facets appeared as its surface shifted under Erick’s rain of power.

He breathed, and focused on the flow.

Thick, translucent-white air filled his aura, to then fall inward, to follow paths, to hit the headwaters, and then start again, raining inward. Pitter patter, pitter patter. A water and air cycle unto himself, Erick went slow, and it still was over faster than he expected; he bottomed out on mana after less than a minute; Empty.

The first few times would continue to be like that, but as soon as he acclimated, it would take longer. How much longer till the time when it would take longer? Erick had no idea.

Erick lay back on his pillow, and simply breathed for a while. His body felt like he had had a hard workout, but that would pass soon enough. A lot faster than it would take to regenerate his Mana, actually, since he didn’t have Meditation in this form and couldn’t force himself into Rest.

… He needed to figure out Meditation.

That way he could put himself into Rest whenever he needed to, otherwise it would take three hours to naturally fall into a Restful state to turn his Mana Regen from ‘per day’ to ‘per hour’. He was still tied to the Script in many ways, after all. Everyone was tied to the Script until they proved themselves too much of a Wizard to be allowed access. That much was true even all the way here in Ar’Cosmos.

And Erick was not about to break himself from the Script and take control of all his mana. Not happening. Not yet.

“So.” Erick asked Ophiel, “Do you know how to gain Meditation?”

Ophiel chirped at him.

Erick smiled. “Yeah. I know the basics, but haven’t managed it yet.” He breathed deeply, then said, “No time to try like the present.” He closed his eyes.

Even breaths. Even heartbeats. Slowing down…

Resting—

“… Wait.” Erick looked to Ophiel. Ophiel cocked his head, twisting his feathers and his eyes around as he looked right back at Erick. “Right.” Erick said, “That. Duh.”

Erick had Ophiel cast a rather weak [Prismatic Ward] across his accretion space and a bit more besides. Not his bed, though. Not too large, either, because he didn’t want to weaken Ophiel too much, nor did Erick want to create some sort of problem with Fairy Moon.

But he did want space enough to cycle inside, and for Ophiel to sit and regain his mana, too. The transparent solidness that appeared around him and a bit more of the room was more than enough for his purposes. Erick instantly felt his body, soul, and mind enter a Restful state, which was surprising. The Status effect was very noticeable now that Erick had gone without it for so long.

… He really should have thought of this sooner.

He also wasn’t casting his daily [Personal Ward].

He wasn’t doing a lot of normal things that he usually always did, like talk to Yggdrasil, or talk to other people, or—

Erick frowned, and then he banished those saddening thoughts; he had a lot of shit going on right now. A lot. And besides, it wasn’t like he could —or needed to— protect himself here, in Fairy Moon Manor.

He forgave himself for his inability, relaxed, fell into the moment, and grabbed one of the books of accretion sitting next to him to read for a bit while he waited for his core to refill. He could already tell that his mana was returning to him slowly, but surely, by the small increase in the mana density of his core. Erick was sure that if he could actually see the thing inside his chest, with his eyes instead of with his mana sense, that the process of regenerating mana would make his core look like it was turning from a dull piece of quartz, to polished crystal, to something iridescent white and glowing.

Should take him about 40 minutes to reach full mana, too—

Erick set down his book as a thought crashed into his mind and would not let go.

“How the fuck am I going to cast my usual 13,000 mana [Personal Ward] if my through-put is capped at 500 per second?” Erick frowned. “Fu— No wait!… Shit.” He sighed. “Ritual casting every day, huh?”

He thought for a moment longer, then decided that he did not like the idea of a true ‘morning ritual’ every day, so in that worst case scenario, he could ritually cast [Unbreakable Form] for 7500 mana, and then do that twice. If that spell needed shoring up then some [Renew] could fix it, but that spell was already permanent. With that active, he would have 500 points of absolute defense…

Or he could work on a similar spell that he could start off small, and then add a million mana to it through [Renew], or something, to eventually make a thousand point absolute defense spell… or something. Actually… That sounded good.

But magic was different here than it was in Veird. So how would he make such a spell? And would it translate to Veird? Likely not, unless he made it on Veird and the Script finalized it for him.

Erick glanced over to the textbooks from Inferno Maw about the nuances of magic in Ar’Cosmos.

He kinda wanted to read them—

But nope! Nope. One thing at a time. Accretion first; he hadn’t even finished all of those books, yet.

A bit over half an hour later, or something near that since there were no clocks nearby, Erick’s core seemed full. His soreness from his first cycle had even vanished over ten minutes ago. He was good to go for round two. Which is exactly what he did.

This time, it took him thirteen minutes to accrete all of his mana (he had reached acclimation that fast? Strange.) and then another forty-ish to get it all back.

The third round of accretion also took him fifteen minutes, though it could have been sixteen. Erick wasn’t sure. Accreting inside a Restful space seemed to help a lot with some of his mana issues, if just by virtue of Regenerating more mana while he was also using his current mana. But was this okay? Was this method good? Or bad? Erick searched through the books to find an answer, but didn’t manage to locate anything adequate before his mana returned to full, which was still 30ish minutes after finishing his previous session.

Again, there was no clock, so he was guessing.

He needed a clock.

The fourth time Erick took ten minutes to bottom out; a drastic shift from the direction he thought his accretion time was headed toward. (Was he speeding up again? Strange.) So while he was waiting to regenerate his pool, in addition to looking for answers regarding Restful spaces, he also looked for words to explain his newfound speed at bottoming out.

Twenty minutes later he finally managed to find a few passages that might have explained what was happening to him. Regarding the Restful spaces, he found nothing. But with regard to his speed, either he was getting so much better at accreting that his time to bottom out was cut by a third, at least, or else he was accidentally taking in ambient mana and fucking everything up. While the first was possible, it was not probable.

Erick did not go for a fifth cycle.

Instead, Erick went looking for answers from a professional, or at least to find Maid Maria. Also he wanted more food; it was lunch time and he was hungry again. He took his empty dishes back with him as he left his room once more, with Ophiel on one shoulder and Yggdrasil on the other.

– – – –

Fairy Moon and Maid Maria were sitting at the dining room table, poring over paperwork scattered over half of the large surface. Sandwiches and smaller finger foods sat on the other side of the table, all within easy reach for either person to pick from as they worked.

Maid Maria had been talking about budgets for some place called the docks, but she went silent as Erick walked into the room.

Fairy Moon looked up at Erick, then narrowed her eyes at him, before promptly relaxing, nodding, and turning back to her paperwork as she said, “Your accretion is advancing admirably.” She said to Maid Maria, “Go get the gift.”

Maid Maria bowed a bit and scampered off to a side room, her pink tail swaying behind her as she went.

Erick walked up to the table and set his used dishes to the side, out of the way of all the paperwork, or the other food. “Is it?” he asked. “Because I have no way to measure any of this. My timing for a full cycle is turning weird, too, going from one minute to fifteen to ten, or something close to that. Can I get a clock, or something, to track my measurements?”

Fairy Moon jolted at the mention of weird timing, stared at him, and then relaxed. “Your timing is weird because you are at the beginning. You are not accreting improperly. As for measurements, though. I have a gift!” Fairy Moon stood as tall as her short stature would allow. “It is a tool to tell of accretion and advancement.”

Maid Maria returned to the room carrying a small blue cube, about the size of a hand. She handed it over to Fairy Moon who took it readily.

Fairy Moon held the cube, and announced, “Behold! A crystal counter, tuned for tracking your specific advancement based upon the Script’s lines of power. This here is a demanding bit of demarcation that does not manage much for most, but it is useful for young dragons who produce more mana than they can reliably use in a day.” She handed it off to Erick.

Erick took the tiny thing and scrunched his eyes at it. To his mana senses it seemed like a blue crystal cube; completely solid and without any moving parts… or anything magical about it at all. It did have some small numbers on the upper surface, though, in eight rows, and with ten columns of 0 through 9, which indicated it was… Erick wasn’t sure.

“What… is it?”

“It is a mana crystal grown in a certain way; something that does not happen back on Veird, but which can happen here if the circumstances are correct. This counting crystal is one made for testing people with New Stats, but it is also a plain counting crystal with all the common capability.” Fairy Moon smiled. “Though the circumstances are different, with this: witness some semblance of how we calculated power back in the Old Cosmology.”

Erick eyed the thing in his hands again. Eight rows of numbers corresponded to eight Stats, so that made sense. But… He looked at Fairy Moon; he needed more than what she had given him. “How do I use it?”

“Flood it with at least a hundred mana.” Fairy Moon said, “That’s all it takes. Let me know if you break that one, for though they can measure quite well, they are prone to breaking and rather more esoteric than essential. They are also not precise, with error rates as high as 15%. A much better method is getting back to the Script for a simple survey of your Status.”

Erick raised an eyebrow. “Okay. Good gift. I will use it well. I had another question about accretion, though.”

Fairy Moon nodded. “Do you desire Illustrious to return? Or will my own answer suffice?”

Erick went ahead and just asked his question, “It’s about the thing you brushed over earlier. My accretion time to bottoming out on mana was a single minute, then it was 15, and now it is ten. It is speeding up, I think. Does that mean anything? Am I taking in ambient mana? I also didn’t find anything out about people using Restful spaces to speed up recovery time; does a Restful space cause harm in any way?”

“Your core is correctly curated; I have checked. You will speed up as skill progresses and your body begins to acclimate to accretion,” Fairy Moon said, without worry. “The Restful space thing you’re doing is a nuance to the usual methodology, but there should not be problems with that peculiarity. Most people just Meditate, but your way is by-chance better.” She gestured to the food at the table. “Care to stay for sustenance? Or would you like help handling the kitchen? You are free to make whatever you want, except for any exceptional messes; that would be rude to Maid Maria and I will make you clean up any such catastrophes.”

Erick ignored the casual threat, and said, “I will grab something from the kitchen and leave you to your own work. I appreciate your answers.” He said to Maid Maria, “And your food is excellent. Much appreciated.”

The pink dragonkin lady turned a bit more pink around the cheeks as she smiled politely and did a small curtsy. “Your words of kindness are too kind; I am but a humble Cook. If you desire something in particular, please let me know.”

“I will be sure to do that, then.”

Maid Maria curtsied again.

Fairy Moon nodded, then returned to her work.

Erick went to the kitchen and grabbed something good from the premade options, and then he took it back to his room. If it weren’t for the various circumstances that landed him here, he would have thought it a bit funny to ‘go and eat in his room’, like he was some sort of child staying out of the sight of a disapproving parent.

But his situation was a situation that was not funny at all.

… The food was pretty great, though.

– – – –

The cube worked oddly.

All it had was a 10×8 matrix of numbers 0 through 9 on one side. It could not display a Status at all. It couldn’t even flick through a roll of numbers, or a proper mechanical device, in order to show his actual numbers. What it did, instead, was flicker. None of the lines of numbers were listed as a Stat, either. If this thing worked as Fairy Moon said it would, then it should show that all of his Stats were at least at 10, except for Willpower and Focus, which were both at 20, though those were his numbers from before he started accreting.

And anyway, Erick had no idea what this thing would actually do.

So he put a hundred mana into the thing and hoped for the best. Almost instantly a white glow took hold in the center of the crystal. And then the numbers started flickering, rushing through the entire gamut of numerals before something else flickered inside the crystal and all of the white glow vanished—

The numbers settled. In the first 5 lines, and line 8, the number 1 flickered. In lines 6 and 7, the number 2 flickered instead. One second later the number 0 flickered here and there, but in the other spaces, a 1 flickered instead.

And then the glow died; the counting crystal went inert again.

Erick smiled.

Okay. That was rather simple to understand. Erick wasn’t sure how the creator of the crystal had organized his numbering system, but in Erick’s own Status, it went from top to bottom: Strength, Vitality, Dexterity, Constitution, Perception, Willpower, Focus, Intelligence. It was probably the same for most people, though most people only had one of the New Stats. Therefore, the display here was likely organized to show the whole possible suite of Stats, and Erick suspected that a null-result would just make the 0s flash. Or something like that.

Even though he couldn’t figure out how it worked, exactly, Erick knew enough to understand what it meant, and it meant that he had gained about 4 Points in his ‘Status’.

Calculating out his mana spent to points gained…

“Oh.” Erick said, surprised. “1 point per 250 mana? Is that right? I think it is. That’s… Okay? Wizards cheat, apparently.”

The books had suggested it would take between 1000 mana, to 10,000 mana, to gain a point in a Stat.

… Maybe the first points were easy, though?

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Erick accreted some. When he stopped, he rested, Rested, and read, looking for answers about ‘easy first Stat increases’, or something similar. All he managed to find was that it usually got harder and harder to gain more power, but that a starting point of between 500 mana to 10,000 mana per point was normal.

… The books seemed to have discrepancies with their numbers.

That was frustrating. Was nothing peer-reviewed here? At least Oceanside’s books were peer-reviewed and set in stone by the Headmaster. All of those Oceanside books were meant for the complete layman, though, which was a different sort of problem, Erick supposed.

Erick went for cycle number 7. When he recovered enough from that cycle to put another hundred mana into the counting crystal, he found he had gained another point in what was probably Dexterity. Because of that, Erick was almost 100% sure that for every 250-ish mana he accreted, he would gain 1 point in a stat. So that was good!

Almost the entire day was gone by now, though, and the math did not bode well for the super fast growth that Erick had been expecting. His core was far away from being spherical, while his body was absorbing most of his gains, which meant that it would take quite a while to get anywhere quickly with this methodology.

… And yet.

That sort of thinking was incorrect. Erick would start snowballing hard once he gained enough of a foundation to actually start snowballing; once his Script-delineated regeneration allowed him to tap into anything close to that of his actual mana creation. But that would likely take a while to happen. According to some napkin math…

He required 250 mana to gain a Point in his Status.

His regeneration was currently at 320 mana per hour. This was the combination of his Vitality and his Focus, thanks to Rozeta’s Recovery, which combined those Stats for the purposes of calculating Regeneration.

Every time he gained a point, there was a 25% chance he gained a point in either Focus or Vitality, and since both were beneficial for Regeneration, and they both counted the same, they were effectively identical gains. The other Stats didn’t matter right now. Only Regeneration mattered. If he Remade the Skill, Concentration, for 3 times Mana Regen, or Enduring for 3 times Health Regen, then this would go a lot faster, but Erick felt he did not have enough base mana to do that yet, so those bits of Soul Magic would have to wait. Which was fine; Erick was pretty sure he could Remake those Skills the very second he regained enough of a mana pool to actually make the necessary change to his soul.

But anyway: Erick had a 25% chance, roughly every 47 minutes, to gain a point in a relevant Stat. Therefore, it would take an average of four cycles to gain something relevant.

After four cycles, to get to full mana (which was currently 210 but he pretended it was 200 for the ease of math) it would take him, at first, 45 minutes to reach the next stage, and then 44 minutes, and then 43 minutes, and then 42 minutes. Erick ignored the decimals.

Erick didn’t go much further into the math than that, because once he reached a turnaround time in line with his minimum accretion time, then that would be as fast as he could go. All signs pointed to the snowballing beginning in…

An accretion time of 8 minutes per hour, which translated to a regeneration of 1900, which was combined from both Mana and Health Regeneration, which meant 190 combined Vitality and Focus, which meant 95 in both Stats…

Erick winced.

Ouch.

Okay.

The initial time frame of ‘five days to snowballing’ had some holes.

If he did undirected growth, which would put all his ‘Points’ wherever they felt like going, that would require 650 overall Stat gains. Which meant 162,500 mana accreted, which would mean…

Split the difference and just assume 400 mana per hour for the first third of his total necessary mana to snowballing… Which seemed correct. Erick wasn’t sure. He certainly wasn’t going to be doing any calculus to properly calculate this mess. No thank you. Estimates were good enough.

This meant 135 cycles, each at (once again assuming) 30 minutes per cycle… 67 hours. Divided by 12 hours per day, since he doubted he could cycle continuously—