It is known that the Descenders are an insular group; a conservative faith that holds high barriers in place to ensure that only those vested and a part of their elite order may be properly regarded as a knight.
Yet, the Descenders are also warriors of honor, and for all their stubbornness and cultural conservatism, they have accepted some of the most unusual of monsters and individuals as knights of their order.
Among the most well-known is perhaps Tall Ben the Hydra-Knight, who, though once a vicious beast of ravenous appetites and merciless brutality, evolved into a healer and guardian of pilgrim villages in the Deep Abyss. Where once Tall Ben was a scourge to civilization, his evolution into sapience, paired with a life-debt to an elderly Biomancer, changed his nature toward justice and nobility.
In the years after his ascendance to sapience, Tall Ben performed the duties of a roaming hedge knight and healer without the title. He fought off other monsters that sought to devour the weak. He found lost children and vanquished plagues. His chronicles and his crusades against the First Blood are now things of folklore and legend.
And thus was how Tall Ben earned his greatest Skill Evolution and Knight Title. For at the battle of Low Aidenhold where the First Blood sought to seize a gate from weakened Descender forces, the Hydra-Knight intervened. He entered the fray with blades of melded bone, cartilage, and venom and faced a Court Leviathan of his lonesome might. For three days, the noble hydra raged within the colossal beast, slaughtering the court sheathed within. When the leviathan was finally struck from the sky, Tall Ben emerged changed and glorious, clad in an armor composed of magical biomass that resisted and consumed the foul flesh-shaping magics unleashed by the vampire vermin.
And in the aftermath, as Tall Ben slew Third Elder Zeneth of the Utorodi Bloodline, Sir Kenneth the Corpulent gazed upon the noble monsters and proclaimed: “Hark, brothers and sisters. Behold and see—for the measure of a knight is a noble spirit, not bound to boy, girl, or even beast…”
-The Ballad of Tall Ben the Hydra-Knight
He felt like he was the core of some kind of magical beast—a Biomantic hydra, if he was to describe it exactly. And as the evolution continued, he felt his mana grow denser but also strangely fainter around him, cocooning him in a protective cage shielded by winding serpents.
The flesh of the Court Leviathan shifted. The biomass transformed once more. Yet, as it drew Shiv up, its flesh made contact with his Biomancy field. The moment it touched his altered field, his mana came aglow—and it glowed with the very same micro-spells and mana patterns that characterized the Court Leviathan’s Biomancy. The bits of the Court Leviathan’s flesh that passed into his mana were superimposed with a magical rendition of its existing structures. The microspells representing skin, fat, bone, and more were all different. And within those microspells were even smaller crystallizations of mana. Shiv could feel them, but he couldn’t see them.
No wonder Helix was so annoyed with me for lacking a good Practical Metabiology and Awareness Skill Fusion. This Skill Evolution’s capabilities are incomplete without other stuff supporting it. Kind of like having extreme Physicality but no Toughness or something. Maybe a little less extreme than that, but still, skills don’t stand on their own. They need other things to support it.
Other things like Multi-Tasking, Memorization, Practical Metabiology, and more.
Even so, his mana was far more sophisticated than it was before. If the Woundeaters were just transplants capable of shifting injuries from one body to another, this allowed him to affect entire biological architectures. Architectures like the Court Leviathan’s biomass. It had layers of mana embedded in its flesh as well, pressing against Shiv’s coiling mana, but even so, he pulled on the mana-infused parts of the biomass. The microspells there shivered, but remained pinned in place thanks to their mana.
A pocket opened above Shiv. The ground elevated him back onto the bridge. Helix and the orc Biomancers beheld him with rapt attentions and bated breaths. The bespectacled orc frowned for a beat as he regarded Shiv’s Biomancy Skill Evolution. At the same time, Shiv began sapping vitality from orcs around him, bringing his resurrection underway.
“This is most certainly not Chimeric Assimilation,” Helix muttered. “But I have seen this somewhere. I just can’t quite recall…”
Shiv tried moving his new “field” and found that the serpents could extend free from his own body. It wasn’t the cloud-like particulates that the Court Leviathan was composed of, and it was far too thick and obvious to be compared to Uva’s mana strands. Instead, it was like a massive limb he could move, that lit up with it pressed against someone else’s biomass and immediately rendered their organic structure with magical symbology.
The serpent stretched across the entirety of the bridge in an instant. It washed through hundreds of orcs and kept going thereafter. Shiv continued pushing his field out as far as he could, but soon found himself unable to see where it was going as it rushed past the horizon. He guessed his reach now went well beyond a kilometer, though. At the same time, the other hydras shrank as their mana melted into the extending limb. So, my reach isn’t infinite. But still pretty far. Seems to be more for close-quarters, though. They’re naturally coiled around my body.
Streams of Vitae parted around Shiv as he returned to life. He drew his mana back, and the mana serpent slammed against him, splashing against the thin mana membrane just as the other serpents expanded once with mana once more. He stopped trying to move his “hydra field,” and it immediately coiled tight around himself once more.
“Well, I got something to do with assimilation, just not Chimeric Assimilator,” Shiv breathed. “Says it's Aegis of Assimilation.”
All the orc Biomancers responded with astonishment and surprise. A flash of recognition passed across Helix’s face, and he let out a bark of laughter. “Aegis of Assimilation? Is that what you managed to get?”
“Is Tall Ben still alive?” one of the orc Biomancers asked. He looked around. “Where’s Lungthief? He’s the last one that fought the Hydra-Knight.”
“Still missing,” another orc called from the corner of the bridge. The speaking orc sailed across the ceiling on an enamel seat as he raced other orcs in an upside-down tooth-throne race circuit. “Probably in some kind of nightmarish dimension fighting for some stupidly hopeless cause. He’s always doing that.”
“Hm. Shame. He would hate to miss this.”
“Who is Tall Ben?” Shiv asked.
“A Hydra-Knight that serves the Descenders Union,” Helix said as his expression contorted into one of maniacal glee. “And you share his Biomancy Skill Evolution. A Biomancy Skill Evolution meant specifically for someone that walks the cleft between monster and individual. How useful. And fascinating. Your nature is quite the enigma, Insul, for I am certain you are no beast by flesh.”
“Yeah,” Shiv replied. “Me too. I think it might have happened because I saw how the microspells came together. The patterns and all that. The Court Leviathan’s mana is like a cloud, and I saw how it was coloring me with it. Like it was priming its dormant magic using my biology rather than just consuming me. It converted me to magic first.”
“Ah, good,” Helix replied. “This both pleases and amuses me. Mainly because the skill you have is quite novel. I have only faced it in battle once before. Its main power isn't intrusion or influence, but resilience. With the way it reacts with organic materials, I do believe it remains a sibling skill to Chimeric Assimilation, however. Still close enough to serve our interests and needs.”
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
“That’s all fun and nice,” Bonk said, yawning as he stomped closer. He was nearly two heads taller than every last orc Biomancer, and he regarded Shiv with faint interest. “But what’s it do? I heard him say Aegis. Does it let him take a hit better?”
“I can take a hit pretty good on my own,” Shiv said, eyeing Bonk’s tree club.
Bonk followed Shiv's line of sight. “Sure. But how many whacks you think you can eat before—”
“Bonk.” Helix sighed. “Away with you. We are not—” Then, the orc Biomancer stopped talking. He let out a loud hum of consideration as he regarded Shiv once more. “No. No, this will be good for all of us. We should begin field tests soon. You like field tests, don’t you, Insul?”
“Sure,” Shiv said without hesitation. “If by field test you mean trying to figure out what I can do with the Biomancy while Bonk tries to bash me to death.”
Bonk almost teared up at Shiv’s casual willingness to indulge in violence. “The Challenger truly loves us. If all the humans were a bit more like you—” Bonk blinked and chuckled. “Well, we’d probably try to kill you little pink-skins even more. As it stands, many of you put up a good fight, but the whining afterward is such a bore.”
“Yeah, but that’s probably because most humans don’t come back to life,” Shiv said.
“Oh. And that’s my problem.”
“No, you asshole. It’s their problem. You’re complaining about them being traumatized by what you do? Maybe fix the fact that they die first. If all the humans reincarnated like orcs, they’d be more willing to fight you for fun. They would be more like me.” The orc grinned at Shiv with naked doubt in his eyes. The Deathless wilted slightly. “Okay. Maybe not entirely like me. But a lot more willing to do risky shit.”
“Perhaps,” Bonk said slowly. “But for a lot of humans, it’s the pain that breaks them. The loss. Some of them are more than just brave. They’re willing to die with a smile on their face. But war takes things from them. Struggle costs them more than it gives. And I find that to be disgusting.”
Shiv scowled. “You’re really doing your best to make sure I never forget that you’re an orc, huh?”
“Yes,” Bonk replied. “Don’t see why not. See, some of my kind might play with you a bit more socially, but I don’t really care about fucking with you that way. I don’t think it’s necessary. Frankly, you’re kind of a raw, undeveloped lump in terms of Social Skills. Not real battle there. Not struggle. But Physically? That's what you're all about. And personally? Well, I just want to take a few swings at you soon. See how you react, and what fun I might get out of it. I’m gonna be straight about that, and you can be straight with me. We can get bloody over and over this way. Honest enemies and that shit.”
“Honest enemies,” Shiv responded with a slight snort. “Alright. Helix. What do you got in mind? I think I might be able to pull some biomass into my mana field. It rendered the Court Leviathan’s flesh in magic. Your flesh too.”
“Yes, I noticed,” Helix said, squinting at Shiv’s hydra-like field. Though the mana-hydras were coiled tight around Shiv’s form, they still towered over most of the orcs, forming a compacted field of around four meters. “Hm. The representation of your mana also seems to indicate that it was a Hydra Skill to begin with. Makes sense, but I’m quite sure that some Dragon-Knights managed to achieve it as well. Still. Rare. And rare is good.”
“So, how should we start this field test off?” Shiv asked.
“By seeing how your mana interacts with unprotected organic materials, of course,” Helix said.
And before the orc could continue, Shiv was already reacting. He directed his mana into his cape, and one of his mana hydras reached in. He sought a set of his armor, but as his new mana field drew out the bones, Shiv blinked as a full set of bone armor emerged, layered in gleaming patterns. He could still grasp the biological matter that composed his bones, but it felt like his reach went deeper now too. There was the physical organic matter he could move with his field, but there was also the spell patterns themselves.
“Ah. The ability to assimilate still remains. How lovely.” Helix grinned. “Pull the patterns into your field. Let us see if the process mirrors Chimeric Assimilation’s or not.”
The Deathless did just that. He pulled at the constellations of microspells rather than the physical matter itself. At once, the bone armor burst apart in a flash of crimson mana. Its physical matter vanished, and Shiv’s Biomancy field glowed brighter than ever. And there he saw it—the patterns constituting his bone armor trapped within his mana in a crystallized chain of spell patterns. When he cast a laceration spell, that was a single injury trapped inside a cage of glowing mana, contained by his intent and reshaped into a spell.
The conversion of his bone armor wasn’t just a spell. It was a spell made up of spells connected to other spells. There were small spells making up larger spells. There were patterns connected to other patterns to create an overpattern. He was looking at a system of spells working together, something of multiple complexity magnitudes higher than anything he dealt with before.
Shiv’s mind went blank, and more than any of the times before, he realized just how undereducated he was. He thought he would be able to figure out how to recreate all wounds and shape a few viruses, but this was like bearing the blueprint to an entire biological object in his mana, and he hadn’t the slightest clue as to how to properly wield it.
“Quite overwhelming, isn’t it?” Helix asked.
“That’s a lot of spells,” Shiv muttered, nodding. “This is going to take a while.”
“Centuries,” Helix said. “Even if you pursue this magical discipline, it will take centuries upon centuries. More time than you can possibly imagine. But it will give you more power and influence than you ever imagined as well. And insight. Not only into yourself, but the foundational nature and aspects of existence. Such is the great gift of magic. Comprehension.”
A breath escaped Shiv. There were so many moving parts. And there was a weight pressing on him, grinding against his mana. “It feels a little heavy too.”
“Heavy?” Helix asked. “Elaborate. Don’t just spit out the first word to describe your feeling. What kind of heavy? Specifically, what do you feel?”
“It’s like the very beginnings of mana strain,” Shiv said, narrowing his eyes at the spell patterns containing his bone armor. He moved the spell patterns around, and he watched them glide through his mana field. “I can move it without difficulty. The strain’s just there. It’s not really building that much more. Not changing at all. But it’s not going away either.”
“Interesting,” Helix said. “Then, it must be a bit like Chimeric Assimilation. But your mana doesn’t need to be primed. It’s already activated. It just assimilated the material without—Ah! I understand now. Insul. Try pushing a section of the spell patterns out from your field. Don’t try to move it. Try squeezing it out of its current crystallized configuration.”
Shiv focused his intent and squeezed the spell chain representing his bone armor. It burst and from it emerged his leg armor, bone white and perfectly preserved. However, lengths of spells were now missing within his field, and his mana was dimmer than before.
“Very good,” Helix said. “And your field… It’s not directly anchored to your body, is it?”
“No,” Shiv replied, studying the thin layer of separation. That was the only part that resembled his old mana field. Just a faint membrane of redness. “There’s a gap here connected by an inner field. It’s like my old field.”
“Yes. That’s a partitioning layer more commonly used by individuals. I have it. Most orcs have it. But most monsters do not. In fact, most Biomancy-inclined monsters are deeply infused with their own Biomancy mana. As such, a monster’s flesh shifts when they use their magic, as their way of wielding it is instinctive. Individuals, comparatively, are more manipulative. We interface and use the field to move things. Monsters use their bodies and fields in tandem. Most times, they fail to separate the two entirely. As such, they often also fuse Physicality and their favored Magical Skill more often than not.”
Helix’s explanation made a lot of sense to Shiv. But he wasn’t done yet.
“The skill you just evolved, however, is somewhere in between. Not quite individual. Not fully monster. A bit of separation from both. There is a great deal more instinct guiding it. I wanted you to have Chimeric Assimilation for that reason—so you can actively study and interact with the spell chains in your field. This works too and perhaps even better in some ways, though I suspect its mana ceiling is quite a bit lower than Chimeric Assimilation.”
That took Shiv by surprise. “Why?”
“Because your current mana is constantly activated. I suspect you will be able to create entire biological constructs within its expanse if only you knew the specific spells and patterns. Which you don’t, but that can be corrected in time. Comparatively, the Chimeric Assimilation Skill requires you to assimilate a certain amount of biomass before you can even begin casting or altering spell chains. Of course, its main benefit is a lack of mana strain. When you overdraw on mana, the organic structures stored within break, and you can simply replace them, thus accelerating your education without leaving you vulnerable to constant mana exhaustion.”
“Wait,” Shiv said. He blinked rapidly as he connected Chimeric Assimilation’s capabilities with his Strider of the Unbending Path. “My Master-Tier Chronomancy works a bit like that. I don’t get stressed. It doesn’t last long and the field breaks fast, but I don’t get tired at all.”
“Yes. Another difference between monsters and individuals. Monsters usually suffer mana destabilization rather than strain for a reason. That is because they are not thinking beings at baseline—complex thinking, anyway. They are instinct-driven and unleash their power subconsciously. There is little mental exhaustion to their magical lore.”
The Deathless just stared. “You know something I don’t much get, Helix?”
“What?”
“How are the monsters getting this whole magical lore thing if they can’t think?”
Whistles sounded from all around him. Shiv looked around, and he saw every orc mage in the room bouncing a bit on their feet. “What?”
“You asked the question,” Bonk intoned.
“The question,” Mortar echoed.
“The great theory,” Helix said, holding a finger, “is that lore is shaped by gestalt.”