Chapter 35

The screen shifted responding to his request. If there were not easily accessible skills that allowed the infused elemental to ignore armour, there was no point in getting this skill.

Options came up, and he relaxed his eyes skimming over them. There was a solution.

Instant Skill. Bypass Armour (tier 4).

Allows spells or skills that require skin touch to bypass personal armour.

Cost 85,000

The cost did not phase Tom for a moment especially as it was classed as instant. That meant there were no skill levels associated with it. You either possessed it at one hundred percent functionality or not at all. That price was eye watering now, but at level fifty it would cost one and a half levels, which was a bargain. The present of this skill in the later tech tree, so to speak elevated Elemental Skin’s long-term potential.

Tom opened his eyes to the real world with a plan.

He would grind wasps till he got the thirty thousand experience to purchase the Elemental Skin skill… And.

He looked at the offensive hive, the discarded hammer and the ice elemental spinning around him.

The simple fact is that he was never in the running to get the more powerful strength buff, but if he had of been on course… Then this hive with its lightning, resistant wasps would probably have stopped him from gaining it.

Then he remembered the pain they had caused when he could not kill them easily.

His elemental spun in front of his eyes.

Wasps went about their business entering and exiting the hive unaware of this presence and the coming confrontation.

And occasionally one would get caught by his enmity. Deviate from their previous route and then attack him and the elemental would destroy them. Not before they stung because it was going for efficiency, but none of them would strike twice.

It didn’t matter.

By the time they reached his skin, they were already dead even if they didn’t know it.

This, and their cousins were responsible for him having to sleep outside.

The ice element spun, weaving death.

The hive remained unaware for now

It would learn.

There would be payback.

Tom walked forward and seized the massive gravity hammer he had used earlier. A wave of wasps assaulted him and over half got through the wisp that was moving so fast it seemed to flicker from spot to spot. They stung him futilely, and he ignored them while courtesy of the lesser elemental experience trickled in. With a grunt, he picked up the shaft and dragged it back to the others. Michael pointed to Thor when he went to pass the weapon over.

Tom smirked at the distaste on the healer’s features.

“Throw it?”

He stared flatly at the bigger man.

Everyone laughed.

Then Tom pointedly put the hammer head on the ground and shaft straight up. He pushed it so the metal shaft fell onto Michael, forcing the healer to grab it.

They all laughed harder.

“So much for gratitude. I’m not an errand boy”

Tom ignored the healer and made eye contact with everyone else. They all stood supporting him. “Wish me luck.”

Everly jiggled on the spot and clapped a hand. “I’ll do better. I’ll give you a kiss for good luck.”

“Sure.” Tom and offered a cheek.

“Happy to.” Sven said suddenly.

“Sven. No!” Everlyn exclaimed.

“What?” Tom turned to see what was happening and saw Sven charging toward him. Deep down he understood exactly what was about to happen, but with the attribute disparity there was nothing he could do to avoid the faster man.

Nevertheless, he attempted to throw himself to the side. But a firm hand snaked around his jaw to prevent the movement and the second clamped on the top of his head.

And Sven leant forward lips puckered.

Tom felt him plant a sloppy kiss on his cheek.

Zap!

A soft glow surrounded Sven as he scrambled away, unaffected.

“I just saved your life!”

Zap!

Lightning arced out and struck the retreating man, but the shield held and all too soon he was four metres away, giggling like a school kid. Tom narrowed his eyes and noticed a slim stern faced brunette standing near where Sven had retreated to. He didn’t know her apart from the fact that she had been number fifty-four and had self-sorted into the ranged magic group.

“Good luck.” Sven called out.

Pointedly, he wiped the cheek where Sven had landed the sloppy kiss. It was more than a little annoying that his second attack had not got through the shield. It was obviously a powerful spell.

“I don’t feel at all lucky.”

“I’ll fix that,” Everlyn offered.

He smiled at her, and then pointedly glared at Sven.

The man raised his hands defensively. “It was a joke.”

“A funny one.” Thor agreed readily enough. Sven began laughing hysterically once more.

“Fine.” he presented a cheek.

Everlyn’s nose wrinkled. “If you don’t mind… maybe your other one.”

He had offered his right cheek like he always had a kid, and it was the same one Sven had taken advantage of. Tom corrected, and Everlyn pranced forward and kissed his cheek.

He froze.

Her lips had caught the corner of his lips.

Accidentally?

He tensed.

She squeezed his bicep. “That was for luck. Be safe.”

Probably not an accident, but fine nevertheless. With a goofy smile, he turned around to knock the hive down and then stopped. He didn’t have a weapon.

“Can I get wished some luck too?” he heard Sven asking.

“Eww.” Everlyn exclaimed.

There was laughter behind him.

They chatted and Michel returned with a smaller weapon.

This one was also a war hammer, but instead of being a two-handed monstrosity it was intended for dual wielding. It was therefore far lighter than the one he had been using. Tom regarded it curiously and tested its balance and weight. If he used it two handed the weight was perfect. “A one handed hammer?”

Michael shrugged. “Part of a set with an axe. I ran a similar setup in the trial.”

“You.” Sven said in surprise. “Next you’ll be telling me you got a dual wield skill over ten.”

Michael didn’t respond. “My preference was to have piercing and blunt available. I know axe’s have an edge but they’re basically blunt force as far as I’m concerned. Bothering to duel wield and combining an axe and hammer seems stupid, but.”

“There’s a Sven born every day.” Everlyn quipped.

“Hey.” Sven mock protested and lunged at Everlyn.

She skipped back, evading him easily and then slipped landing on her bum. She looked in annoyance at her foot and the muddy skid mark that had unbalanced her.

Sven laughed uproariously, and then wiped a tear away. “That’s how you use magic.”

“Not cool,” Michael said seriously. “You don’t use powers in friendly banter.”

“What?” the spell sword looked offended. “Useless does it all the time.”

Tom helped Everlyn up. “Do you want me too?” he whispered to her. Before subtly flicking his eyes at the other man.

Everlyn nodded her neck barely bending.

“Tom, I’m warning you.” Sven took a step back suddenly registering the peril he was in.

ZAP!

Tom winced in sympathy. There was no glow of a shield protecting him.

Sven squealed. His entire body jerking as the spasms rushed through him. With his legs locking up, he fell to the ground.

Smoke was drifting up from multiple spots. Michael looked at him disapprovingly and waved his hand and Tom saw magic settle on the prone man who was still convulsing.

“Appreciate the support.” Everlyn beamed.

“I’m going to get you.” Sven spluttered, rising cautiously to his feet his body smoking slightly.

Thor subtly stepped between the two of them. “You know Tom saved your life earlier.”

“Well yes,” Sven said surly. “But.”

“If someone made your girlfriend fall over.”

“She’s not.”

“We’re not,” Everlyn stopped talking with her cheeks going red. “Umm… I mean.”

His own cheeks matching Everlyn’s Tom headed off to work.

Hammer in hand, Tom settled in to do some demolition.

The six hours before night passed quickly. The new hammer was easier to use and now that he was no longer stressing his body so much he could speed up even with the added complication of replacing the elemental regularly. He had to switch to water and then for an annoying period he had been forced to keep both an ice and water active.

“Good job.” Michael said when he finally retreated an hour after dark. He was not surprised to find his entire team waiting. They had been in continuous contact the whole time. They had worked independently of him to hunt down the different species of wasps and making sure there were no surprises. It was why the transition to water had gone so well. He had known it was coming and when the ice elemental struggled to kill wasps, then he had summoned the water wisp on the fly.

“Poison’s changing too,” Michael told him as they walked back together.

“Yeah, I noticed with the last hive. Nothing major, but they stung more.”

“We caught one that has a wasting poison.”

Tom stopped and looked at him.

“Yep. You’re going to have to be more careful and you may need to go through the process of getting immunity to new blends.”

“At least we know immunity’s possible now.”

Michael nodded. “Of course, immunity would exist.” The other man sounded troubled. “Sort of like saying of course it’s normal to close a wound with a snap of your fingers.”

Tom agreed with him when the miraculous was normal, then the normal was no longer common sense. “It troubles me that I don’t remember getting immunity in the trial.”

“I didn’t either.” Michael agreed. “But never needed to try, because I had various cure spells.”

“Me too.” Tom admitted.

“I’ll ask around. I’m assuming it was a mechanism that we never explored, but the others were probably forced to.”

They settled down for dinner and were served a meat filled stew. Tom poked at it doubtfully, wondering where it had come from. “Meat?”

“Auction house is up and going.” Everlyn told him.

“But we don’t have a teleporter.”

“Yes, the council determined that the purchase was necessary to buoy morale.” She frowned to show she disagreed with the decision. “We’ve sold enough wasp poison and bodies that it was deemed a small cost to splurge for meat.”

“Doesn’t not having a teleporter halve profits and double costs.”

“Nope,” she told informed him happily. “You’re not as knowledgeable as you think. It depends on weight. The meat had an overhead of four hundred percent for transport, but it was dirt cheap. The wasp sales only had an extra twenty percent overhead.”

Once more, he settled down outside to sleep. At his current enmity levels, if he slept in the shelter it would drive the wasps to burrow into the walls and, given their innate strength, that would generate holes. Same with blankets he could put them on, but the wasps would go through them in short order.

While cold, it was not frostbite level.

“Are you going to be okay?”

“Sure.” he told Everlyn brightly.

“I mean I’m already cold.” She was slightly hunched with her hands under her armpits to increase warmth.

“I’ll be good.” he assured.

He saw her glancing at the shelter. “Are you sure? You can’t?”

“We know what will happen.”

“But you’ll freeze out here.”

“I won’t.” He smiled at her. “You look cold. You should go into where it’s warm.”

She shook her head. “You’re wearing less than I am. This unfair.” She looked uncertain. “I’ll be back.” She disappeared into the shelter and a moment later returned with a blanket.

“I can’t use that. The wasps will tear it to bits.”

“It’s not for you.” She said and then, wrapping it around herself she lay down next to him. “Hopefully, my body heat can help you out a little.”

“I can get Sven spoon you from the other side.” Thor suggested. “Then you’ll almost be toasty.”

“Oh fun. Snuggle time.” Sven said cheerfully, exiting the shelter.

“Tom, can you…”

“Sure.” Lightning cracked around his fingers and Sven, with a laugh withdrew hurriedly into the safety of the communal shelter. She shuffled back into him so his arms hugging her and then slept. It felt strange having a someone so close but it did its job and took the bite out of the cold air.

The days blurred together.

Meat was too expensive, so the food supply reverted to larva and fried wasp and occasionally the bigger ones. The chefs worked out a method to season the plates with the insects venom and it made your mouth tingle pleasantly when you ate. While the food was hardly varied, it was abundant. He purchased the elemental skin and rotated the elementals he summoned to match the vulnerabilities that were identified by the others. Then, usually twice a day, he would be forced to spend a couple of hours getting accustomed to a new poison.

Tom returned to the base camp that followed him and stood gratefully in the mana recharge ritual.

Everlyn held up a familiar box. “Another one.”

Internally, he groaned. “Really? Do we know where?” Two days prior the nasty poison had come from the left of they were travelling and so they had adjusted course to avoid it.

Everlyn pointed straight ahead.

“We think it is the next hive.”

Tom looked at the one he had destroyed and the hive beyond it. Usually the wasps would fly in from over up to three hives away. “That’s close.”

“Yeah, I’m surprised you haven’t already noticed.”

Tom shook his head. “Luck or I have already been stung and have struck immediate immunity. If that happened, I might not have even felt it.”

“Hopefully, the second. Same plan as always?”

“Yep.”

He held out a hand, and she grabbed the blue tinged wasp abdomen and plunged the stinger into him.

“Ouch.” He cursed even as with the help of Healing Tranquillity he moved to isolate the poison.

“Stop being a baby.”

“I’m not.” Tom hissed. There was no convenient immunity, and it felt like his finger was being burnt off. He monitored what was happening, and there was a secondary effect beyond the agave. “Two new venoms. A pain venom one and the second I believe is designed to attacks mana channels” he reported after a moment.

“Neither of them triggered automatic immunity?”

“Unfortunately, no.”

“Poor you. Have you turned off the pain?” Everlyn tousled his hair and looked paused at eye level. She grinned lopsidedly. “Stop being stubborn and turn off the pain.”

Tom considered refusing.

“Please. It hurts me to see you suffering.”

“I’ll dull it.” Instantly, agony turned into a quiet throb.

She seemed annoyed at his refusal to remove it totally.

“For me?”

He laughed at her pouting expression. “I’ve dulled it.”

“Boys!” she threw her hands up in the air. “Always so pig headed.” Then she looked over at the hive in question. “You know I need…”

“Do it.”

She stood and picked up the bucket with lids that the crafters had created. “We’re on guys.”

There were mock groans as a large group got up. Everyone of them excluding Everlyn was over rank nine in agility and had been collected before he finished for this purpose.

Naked blades were drawn.

“I hate fighting bugs.” A slight woman with heavy clothes covering her complained, swishing a Katana around.

“Me too…” Tiny rumbled. Holding his massive blade casually. The fact it would be applied to dice tiny insects was hilarious.

With Everlyn in the middle of them, they strode forward. They would kill the insects one by one and then bring the stingers back to be employed on Tom. A simple system to control the flood of deadly venom into him.

Tom sighed. There was a variation in the pain venom. The next hour was going to be hell.