novelraw Chapter 469 - 469
Chapter 469 - 469
Even with breaks, Midnight and I had spent a large portion of our mana. For experiments it was really better that I stay above the half threshold, but I could afford to use some mana to carve out rock. I knew where I'd intended to send the vending machine, so we didn't have to go through that much of the quarry wall.
Finally some last bits of rock crumbled away and revealed some of the front of the vending machine. Rather than continuing to dig it out, we were ready to Teleport it back with us. More experiments could be done, but we were finished for the day.
We ended up in Extra's teleportation hall- we couldn't teleport directly back to the Brigade because of the potential risks. We would ask a van to come to the covered parking lot so we didn't show too many people we were messing around with vending machines. Great Girl tried to pick up the vending machine, but actually struggled. "Geez, is this thing filled with rocks?"
"Yes," I said. I was standing at a different angle, so I could see in the front. "It is now."
"Uh…" she set it down, then walked around. "So it is."
I reached my hand out, trying to put the rocks into Storage… but it was too much. No, rather than rocks it was more of 'rock', filling the entire central chamber of the vending machine. Some Energy Magic manipulation later, it was broken up into smaller pieces which I stored in bundles and dumped out before shoving them into secondary Storage.
"How did that happen?" Great Girl asked.
"Well, I teleported it into the side of the quarry," I said. "So it just filled up the empty space with the material that was already there."
"But you didn't teleport any rocks out," she noted. "And it wasn't empty space. There was air in it." She looked at me. "But you didn't consider the air part of what you were moving, did you?"
I shook my head. "Nope." I looked through the messy glass. I hadn't been able to Store all of the dirt left behind clinging to the glass. It was too diffuse for me to focus on, maybe. A Clean spell would handle that. "Looks like the insides got squashed."
"Well," Midnight said. "I suppose we shouldn't be surprised that intentionally bypassing safety features resulted in damage. And unlike that one time on Celmoth, it actually stuck."
The results were worth looking into, but I had better ways to kill most people than teleporting them into the ground. Besides, people would resist magic better than a vending machine. Relatedly, we still had to test forcibly teleporting people.
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Breaks were good, but Midnight and I couldn't spend all day lazing around in our apartments though we were currently near the end of some of that. Midnight was filled with great concern, his tail swishing slowly as he looked at me. "Are you sure?"
"I'm the best candidate," I explained. "And I'd trust you the most. If you want, we can cast Fly on me and you can try to throw me in the air somewhere, but unless we're intentionally putting people into the ground it will be fine."
That was something that could go untested unless we found someone that could breathe with rocks in their lungs. But forcibly teleporting people in general was too useful to pass up. I could put them all sorts of bad places that weren't underground. Straight into a jail cell? Well, it would probably need to be specially prepared if it was worth the effort of teleporting someone, but it might be possible.
We were done with vending machine tests for the moment- I already had far too many squashed energy bars to chew through- but we could get in just a little bit more testing before the next mission tomorrow. So, I was going to have Midnight teleport me. But I wasn't going to let him.
If that was even possible, because I did actually want it to happen. But I also wanted to test whether people could resist, so I should be able to do it.
"Alright, fine," Midnight agreed. I was keeping myself calm to bring his feelings down to a more normal level. I really wasn't nervous, but without any effort on my part we would have moved towards a more in-between state instead of calming. "We are going to do the Fly thing though."
"Deal," I said. "I suppose we can send me off from anywhere… but if you want to be waiting for me, we'll have to go to Extra." They might think it was weird for me to teleport away and directly back, but they still preferred to keep track of people coming and going. I preferred to remain in their good graces right now for the next time I did something that irked them. I was pretty far up after the isekai incident, though, and their leadership liked me, even if they didn't like what I did.
Instead of calling a ride, Midnight and I just made sure we weren't visible outside the apartment and teleported over to Extra. It was actually more efficient, now. Seriously, in the time we would have waited for a car plus the travel, we could recover more mana than we spent teleporting. Perks of the massive efficiency boost we got from Master Spatial magic applying so many upgrades. In fact, we'd even gotten another upgrade after that, totaling 16 now. It was only 1 behind Familiar Bond… but there wasn't much worry even if it did catch up or surpass it. If Midnight only had 17 upgrades worth for a while instead of 18, it really wouldn't make much difference. Though obviously we wanted him to be as effective as possible, individual upgrades usually didn't make or break a spell's effectiveness.
The actual limiting factor was Assistive Familiar Casting for when we combined our mana for a single task. It was unlikely we'd ever fully catch up on upgrades there, but that was fine. We only really needed it for Multicasting anyway, which was also limited to a similar upgrade level. Any individual spell I could handle myself, and if we needed two or three different spells we could split the cost in a different way.
"So luxurious," I commented. "Traveling like this."
Midnight just shrugged. "This is actually more normal for me. Though I'd expect to at least walk down a hallway first."
True. Celmothians did just have the ability to teleport around casually. More or less for free, though the teleportation stations that were accessible by the public were slightly more limited in location and total usage.
"Okay, get ready," Midnight said after we positioned ourselves in the teleportation alcove. He didn't even start gathering mana until after I finished casting Fly. Caution was good, I supposed.
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He gathered mana, and I anticipated something happening. Indeed, it did… but it more felt like someone shoved me than being forcibly teleported. Probably because that didn't happen.
I kept my position. I don't think I would have consciously resisted in the same way if I wasn't ready, but I could compare it to keeping my balance. I would at least subconsciously react. The funny thing was, Midnight could just bring me along with him and it would work without any issues.
I shook my head. "You're going to have to try harder than that," I said. "I know that's more than Teleport currently costs, but you're going to have to maximize. Not just the natural 15, either. Imagine this is a different spell. You're not really going beyond the mana limits."
"Hmm," Midnight nodded seriously. "Alright."
His fatigue limit was currently 18.5 mana. He was only level 32, after all. That was pretty good for just a couple years of growth. Active practice and a lot of combat were good for growth even if you didn't have an aspect that boosted combat growth. It simply turned out that the average person didn't engage in much battle- or the statistics I knew were fake. Maybe a little of both.
This time, Midnight put more weight into it. As he hit me, I tried to hold my position in the universe, but I still found myself in the skies of Kansas. Probably. Midnight didn't actually tell me where he was going to send me. That was another test.
I naturally floated in the air while the Fly spell was active. It was a great view from up here… but I didn't want to make Midnight worry. Anything more than thirty seconds and he would probably wonder if something went wrong. It would take a bit for my cell phone to connect to new towers due to the sudden movement, so it was easier to just return.
Just to make sure I had enough distance, I threw a good 15 mana into my Teleport- the maximum for the standard version. Though I could spend far more than that since I'd broken my magic.
I found myself looking at Midnight again, and I had another theory. "I bet I could go further if you're at the destination," I said.
"Hello to you too," Midnight said.
I shrugged, "You didn't even say bye. Besides, I basically just stepped out the door and came back in."
"Except you were in Ohio."
"Not Kansas?" I asked. "I saw you looking at some maps there. Actually, if you sent me that far it would explain why you failed the first time. Not enough mana."
"According to my calculations it would be more than enough… without resistance," Midnight said. "The spell natively can take a group, so I also intended to gain some efficiency from moving a single target. Just enough to counterbalance the forceful movement."
"Hmm," I crossed my arms. "Well, it's hard to be precise when dealing with new factors. I have another one to test."
"What is it?" Midnight asked.
"I'm going to let you move me this time," I said. "But… my magic isn't." I cast a Dimensional Anchor on myself, using a conservative amount of mana. "Make sure to take into account the fact that moving someone without going with them is already more difficult. Intentionally countering this magic should be easier if you know it's there, though."
I looked around the area, watching strange figures come and go. We were the weirdest, though, for not immediately vacating our little alcove. There were plenty of them that it wouldn't be an issue in the near future, but the guards would probably not want us to loiter too much more. One or two experiments max.
Midnight could bypass a 10 mana Dimensional Anchor, but he couldn't manage much more than 12 mana even when he used his maximum. That was with a willing passenger, to be clear. At somewhere around 14 points, even if Midnight tried to go with me- thus being closer to the base use of Teleport- he couldn't overcome Dimensional Anchor.
I didn't suggest trying to Teleport Midnight forcefully, even if we were to go together. I had enough experience not to pick at sensitive areas especially when the results weren't critical. I was fairly confident that I could bypass proportionately more magic in a Dimensional Anchor, since I wasn't limited to the same amount.
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Clubs really weren't my thing. Too noisy and bright, plus full of people I didn't know. But there wasn't anyone else suited to fill my role. L'Pretentious was once again full of people. Various individuals had been working hard to find where it would pop up next. Until you were a regular customer, it was difficult to get trust. Fortunately for me, I would never be a regular customer.
That was because they were going to get shut down tonight. We already had information from Commissary on where these fakes kept their lair, so we'd be hitting everything we could. Leaving this club going for even one more day wasn't an acceptable result to the city, given the fact that it was peddling super serum. I agreed, but mostly because the serum was laced with addictive drugs. It seemed unnecessary, when powers would already keep people coming back. Assuming they replicated the serum right, which wasn't a guarantee.
It was the same squad here, this time with Thiziri- Anima- intentionally included instead of coincidentally working on the same mission. Heroes and mercs didn't need to butt heads when they could work side by side. It wasn't always possible, though. Some people wanted all the credit… and some were just terrible to work with.
"Heading to the dance floor?" Thiziri asked as I began walking in.
"Nah," I said. "This time we're not being subtle." I turned to Shockwave who was practically vibrating with anticipation. First, I cast Physical Freedom. Then Haste, once I was a bit closer to my target. It didn't last terribly long and it would feel like a relative eternity for Shockwave otherwise.
I reached out my arm to the middle of the vending machine.
A warning began to play. "Do not sha-"
Then it was gone.
A few seconds later, people were being cuffed by Shockwave. Rocker revealed his true form- I'd previously cast Disguise to look more like random civilians than our actual civilian identities. He grabbed the station from the DJ who had just been cuffed by Shockwave- with other workers being grabbed every second. He shut off the music and spoke into the mic.
"Customers of L'Aspect. Party's over. Time to cover your asses and get home. We don't have enough cuffs for all of you, but you can bet your overpriced wallets stuffed full of platinum cards we'll be tracking the worst drugs, so make sure you don't have them later. Also, you're more likely to get cardiac arrest than a decent and extremely temporary power, so probably make better choices in the future."
I was glad that he didn't recommend other recreational drugs. Even legal ones wouldn't be good for the Brigade's image. Or Anima, who had revealed herself and was helping with the arrests.
"Yo, I'm bored," Shockwave said. Presumably, that meant they were done cuffing workers.
"Want me to end the spell?" I asked.
They shrugged. "We should just move on to the next stop."
"Right," I said. I made sure that things weren't too chaotic before we left. Anima had created large glowing arrows pointing people towards the elevators- and stairs. We had a number of lower powered members of the Brigade with us that were helping to herd people- those who were associated with the club being kept further in. Normal cops could try to snag the others as they left, but it wasn't our job to perform mass arrests and investigations. We were here to deal with supervillains.
Too bad for some of the workers who just wanted to get paid, but everyone was a conspirator here. If they were only working the bar or security and properly gave information they could get off pretty clean. Assuming they weren't management.
"Seems things will be fine here," I said. I reached out for Shockwave's shoulder, because we had more places to be. As I thought, teleporting to Midnight was really easy. I didn't even need the picture of the location.
Shockwave would want more Haste in a minute. But it was better for us to make sure Shockwave had access to the building- a large warehouse- first. They could pick locks and stuff, but some doorway designs were secure against speedsters. Shockwave didn't have infinite energy, either.