A Soldier's Life
chapter-90

I proceeded through the woods using the sun and a blue moss to guide my direction of travel. The blue moss, Konstantin told me, only grows on the north side of rocks and trees because it needs the light of the blue moon, Poseidon’s Tear, to grow. I did not understand how the moon could only appear in the north sky at night, but I took him for his word as it seemed to work as a navigation tool.

Mid-morning, I took a few moments to bury the Bartiradian elf woodsman. I removed a section of earth, placed him in the grave, and then added the earth back on top of him. I was not sure of his customs, but I hoped my efforts would at least end one of my disturbing dreams.

I tried to practice my skill at moving silently in the woods, but the effort and the slower pace made it frustrating, so I focused sporadically. With my armor left in Maveith’s stone abode, I tried to head in its direction. It was not like anything at all looked familiar as I walked. I did pause to harvest mushrooms. They were quick and easy and did not slow me down much. I ate one of the ration bars and used the leaf wrapping afterward.

It was late afternoon when I thought I was close to Maveith’s home by the distance I had traveled. At least I found some areas where blood grass had been harvested. It might not have been me who gathered this particular grass, but it tickled my memory. Every tree looked the same, but it felt like I was close. I soon found a heavily trodden path made by a large man. It did not take me long to follow it to Maveith’s small, hidden home. I was quite proud of myself for finding it.

Lifting the bar on his door took some effort, but I managed. I entered his home, looking forward to a night’s rest in the silky weasel pelts. I could reach the city in a few hours in the morning. My armor was still in the spare room; next time, I would just store it and not leave it behind. It might have prevented my shoulder from being injured by the manticore’s quill.

I ate from Maveith stores. I used the bacon fat to fry onions, potatoes, and salted meat. I was sure he wouldn’t mind. I ate well and cleaned up after. It was night outside, and I went into the guest room after ensuring the front door was secure. I lay in bed and opened the time affinity book for spell forms. I finally had time to review my options so I could work on a new spell form.

Time Affinity Lesser Spell Forms (10-25) Compress Sleep (10) Hasten Mind (10) Seize Momentum (20) Echo in Time (25) Time Affinity Major Spell Forms (25-40) Hasten Self (30) Slow Aging (40) Age Target (40) Probable Future (40) Time Apex Major Spell Forms (40-70) Slow Bubble (50) Flashback (60) Ageless (70) Stasis (70)

I read the descriptions of the lesser spell forms first. The first most commonly selected spell form was hasten sleep. This allowed you to rest while using your aether to recover your mental state. It did not affect your body, only your mind. Each aether invested gave you about four hours of rest in a single hour. So you could get a complete rest and mental recovery in just two hours. It also doubled your aether recovery while you slept, getting four hours of aether recovery for two hours of sleep.

Hasten mind was very interesting as it allowed me to think faster. It did not make me smarter, time just passed much faster in my head. At the lowest affinity of ten, you would get to think about five times faster. The text noted that every ten points in affinity that time doubled. So, with my ninty affinity, I could get ten minutes for every second in real-time. The problem was it only affected my thinking and not my body. It would make reading books a breeze.

Seize momentum was even more intriguing. This required you to touch an object and steal all its inertia. So, if you timed it right, you could stop a sword before it cut you. Then again, you could lose some fingers if you were even a half a breath too late. The amount of aether depended on the size of the object affected. The only interesting thing about this spell was that the object would be frozen momentarily based on a person’s affinity. The only reference I had was someone with an affinity of thirty in time could hold an object just over a heartbeat after stealing its momentum. Did that mean the object would remain in place for a minute with my ninety affinity?

The final lesser spell form was echo in time. This spell form allowed the castor to focus on an area and replay what happened in the past. How far back they could view depended on the person’s affinity. At a twenty-five affinity, they could look back as far as a month. They had an entire reference book for using this specific spell form. It was also a common spell clairvoyance castor’s learned. The time version was slightly more powerful, being able to look further into the past. If the affinity scaling power held, then my ninty affinity could look back almost eight years ago.

The middle tier listed in the book started with hasten self. Unlike hasten mind, hasten self affected your entire body. At a thirty affinity, you moved fifty percent faster. At forty affinity, it became twice as fast. According to research, you could go more quickly, but the world still worked on the body normally. It noted an example of a mage with a fifty affinity in time who went blind every time he used hasten self. So it was a useful spell, especially in combat, but it had a ceiling. I kept thinking back to a bug being splattered on a windshield.

We were definitely getting to some good spell forms. Slow aging sounded promising. I read it three times to make sure I understood the description. There was a similar spell, but you would need to keep it active all the time to get its benefit. The spell form was much more effective as it required either your aether core to be full or trickle aether through it if your core was not full. Your aging slowed to a tenth of its normal at a forty affinity in time. If it scaled up like other spell forms, then my aging would be 1/320th normal.

Getting three hundred years for every one year was appealing. I could live to be twenty-thousand…or even older. Of course, the spell form required aether all the time, but there were exercises to train yourself to direct aether constantly to a spell form, even while sleeping. So only when my aether bottomed out would it stop. I laughed aloud, as that was a common occurrence for me.

The next spell form was age target, and it did not work well on living things. I knew that was due to object’s aether resistance, but I should be able to overcome those defenses with a ninty affinity as I did with my space affinity. I did the conversation, and each aether I invested would age a target of about eight years. I did not see how that would help me in combat or life. Maybe growing plants, but there were probably better spells in the nature affinity for that. It had to have applications if the spell was in this book.

A little more reading, and it was used mostly in alchemy. Potions that required brewing times of days could be done in minutes. I did not think I was destined to be an alchemist.

Probable future was almost completely combat-focused. The spell form gave the mage a quick view of the next twenty seconds. In a large-scale battle, they would know troop movements before they occurred and know if a defense failed. It was all experienced from the mage’s view and left them with a sizable headache afterward. Using it multiple times in succession could make the mage go unconscious. It was an incredible power, but it did not fit me.

The higher spell forms had to be incredible. The first did not disappoint. It created a bubble of time around the caster. Anything entering the bubble was slowed down, giving the caster time to react. The size of the bubble was fixed at ten feet. How slowly the people and items in the bubble moved was related to the caster’s affinity in time. At sixty, that was 80% of their normal speed. With my ninty affinity, it would be 40% of their normal speed, and the best part was there was no aether resistance to overcome. The bubble was fixed!

The cost in aether was a problem, and each second required a relative aether point. The bubble was also fixed in space once activated. If the caster left the bubble, it would end. Still, I could imagine being a terror on the battlefield with this or fighting monsters with ease.

Flashback was even more powerful. It sent the caster back in time with the knowledge of the future. It was related to how much aether was invested in the spell form when activated. With my available aether, I could go back about—10 seconds if my core was full. In battle, this was immense, especially if I was avoiding a killing blow. But you would still need to realize you were about to die to activate it.

The next spell form was called ageless. It worked similarly to slow aging, except when you channeled aether, you did not age at all. It did have some drawbacks. It kept your body in the same state. That meant you could not alter your physical attributes through anything but essences. You could always stop aether channeling to the spell form to age. The second drawback was it took more aether to maintain than slow aging—almost five times as much. This meant I would recover my aether slower when it was active. Slow aging only used a trickle of aether.

Stasis, listed last in the text, was an interesting spell form. It created a bubble of stilled time around an object or the caster. Time halted in the bubble based on how much aether was invested. The bubble size was also limited by the amount of aether invested. The stasis could be broken if the object was moved. I was not interested in becoming Sleeping Beauty, so I did not bother puzzling out the math based on my affinity and available aether.

I did not know if these were all the spell forms available to the time affinity, but they were the most popular. My ninety affinity might have more powerful versions of these, but I did not have time to wait. I needed to start working on something now.

I reduced my choices to time bubble or slow aging. Ageless was better than aging, but with my high affinity, they were about the same. And if I increased my time affinity with essence, I could slow my aging even further. Time bubble was incredible, too. It could be a lifesaver against a powerful foe or against multiple opponents. Then again, I had my dimensional space for one-on-one combat.

I was very tempted to live forever. But could I watch friends and family age and die around me? Also, just because I aged extremely slowly did not mean I couldn’t die. It seemed like almost every week, I was almost getting myself killed. Time bubble could be learned as a normal spell. Of course, I couldn’t cast it yet. But I had been hearted to get my first essences to improve my magic attributes. I could get my magic attributes high enough to cast spells effectively with enough time. I needed the time…slow aging was my choice.

I had spent hours reading and examining the book and only got a few hours of sleep. I would have to ask Maveith if I could have these giant weasel pelts. They were too comfortable a bed. I put on my armor and exited Maveith’s home. It should only be a few hours to the city, and I would see if they missed me.