Save Scumming

Chapter One Hundred and Eighty - By the Balls

I wasn't sure if Sawyer was talking shit or not at first, but then we experimented, and yeah, he was right. Loathing made Dark spells punch harder.

It was strange, but provably, and repeatable.

The experiment was rather simple. He brought in a large tank of water, within which was a rack. That rack had paper targets on it, made of something that felt almost like rice paper. They were easy to poke through, and held taut in place even as they were dropped into the tank. The entire targeting platform was placed on the ground at the far end of the room. It was maybe three yards long, with a slanted opening section.

When I fired a Shadow Bolt into it, aiming at the centre of the first target from across the room, I hit more or less dead centre and punched through the first two pages.

Unlike bullets in water, magic had less of an issue penetrating still water. Something about their lack of physicality. Not that water didn't stop and make the spell break apart eventually, it was just better at pushing through water than a purely physical projectile.

After replacing the paper targets a few times to set a baseline, Sawyer and I walked halfway across the campus to a room in 'his' section of the school. The room had a small plate next to it that just read Hate Room.

I was made to sit inside. The room had grey walls, except for one which was mirrored and very obviously designed to hide observers on the other side.

There was a small, metal chair, speakers in the corners, and a game on a low table. It had a metal track, rings, and a set of long tweezers.

The game was simple. I had to make a ring move across from one end of the game's track to another while avoiding contact with the bars.

Easy.

Then Sawyer left, and the speakers came on.

What played over them was called the Loathing Song. It wasn't in English or French, or maybe no other language, but it had syllables that almost made sense, only these were screeched out. The song had a melody, but only for enough beats to set up a break in the pattern. I wasn't educated in music, but I liked listening to it and playing a little, so I knew enough about musical theory to know that the song was designed--probably in a hateful little lab--to piss people off.

It worked. It was the unholy combination of the Nyan cat song and Baby Shark, interspersed with random gibberish.

And it grew louder and move broken up the closer to the end of the metal hoop game I was. There were twenty hoops to pull through, and if any of them touched the edge, I'd get a low-voltage shock.

"Okay, I get it," I said after ten minutes.

"No, your cortisol and stress indicators are too low," Sawyer said through the same speakers playing the infernal song. "Keep it up for another few minutes."

There was a large clock on the wall. Its timing, I noticed, was off. It wasn't something I would have known without my Orchid Lux overlay giving me the actual time, but yeah, it looked like they wanted to make it seem like I was here for longer than I really was.

I still spent another twenty minutes playing their stupid game, which was clearly designed to just piss me off. If I lost, the game automatically reset itself... at a snail's pace, with the music changing to a downbeat 'you lost' kind of tune that was just as annoying.

The fact that I knew that the entire purpose was to irritate, however, did make it less effective, I think. Like knowing that someone was trolling you or trying to get a rise. It still annoyed me.

Sawyer then had me leave the testing room and walked me all the way back to the room we'd been practicing in.

I fired the same spell into the same water tank, with results so close that it was barely a change at all. Then Sawyer started to play that irritating song from the room's speakers just before I was going to launch another Shadow Bolt and I felt my irritation spike.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from NovelFire. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

My next shot stabbed through twice as many of the paper sheets.

"And there you have it," Sawyer said as he pulled the rack out of the tub. "Somewhat conclusive proof that stress and irritation amplifies magical capabilities. At least with regards to Dark-attuned magic."

"Yeah, I see that," I said.

"Don't be cross with me, I was just taking an hour to prove a point," he said. "You said that all of this was for some sort of fight? Well, consider hating your enemy before getting into the ring. Other magics across the spectrum require different emotional states to get the most impact. Dark is only frustrating in that regard because loathing tends to be targeted. You can be afraid about anything, angry for a long time, in love, or whatever, but hate tends to be focused."

I nodded along, and I supposed it made some sense. "So, what, if I want to win, I need to let the hate fester or something? That sounds like the opposite of every piece of advice I've ever heard."

"The magic had to resonate with you for your core to develop an affinity for Dark magic to begin with," Sawyer said. "Don't be too surprised."

"Right," I replied.

Hate, huh? I could work on that. But my actual core wasn't Dark, it was more something between Dark and Nature, and I wasn't entirely sure if leaning on one powerful emotion was the wisest thing to do.

I had to wonder if there was a branch of magic better suited to me. There had to be, right? But a cursory look didn't reveal anything that I could do when it came to time magic. There were some related spells, both in Dark and Nature. Things like Haste or spells that made wounds recover, even some that messed with a target's perception of time. None of those were at the level where I was anywhere near ready to cast them.

The week ended rather plainly. I spent the last day relaxing. I headed out, explored the more bougie part of the city, and spent money as if I didn't care, because I didn't. I paid some attention to the news and tried to catch up on what Luna Corp was doing in my defence, but it seemed like the most fight they were willing to put up was to wag their finger and post some shit online about Seraph overstepping.

Kinda useless.

I suspected that they'd react a lot more strongly if I made a point. And hey, there was a nice source of mild frustration to feed my spells.

I Reloaded. The next few days, post-Reload, were spent in an upscale hotel a block further from the institute, mostly because... why not? I was taking a taxi over every day anyway, so I might as well splurge for the free meals and massage services.

But a lot of my time was spent focusing. I wasn't the best at that, but I had a goal in mind, and a lot of time to accomplish it. The nightly stuff, chilling and whatnot? That felt... fake? Getting better at magic felt more real. I couldn't quite explain it, and maybe I should poke at a very expensive, very private, therapist for a while to figure it out, but it mostly just felt like as long as I was in a loop I knew I wouldn't be keeping, the world felt a little less permanent.

I think it was normal. I would never stay in a hotel that cost a quarter of my yearly wages as an E-ranker for a night, or eat out every day, or even set foot in a fancy institute for private training, but here I was doing all of that and more and not caring about the consequences.

In any case, I spent another week training. By the end of it, I was a master of Shadow Bolt.

Or... as much of a master as someone could be with two weeks of pretty top-tier training dedicated entirely to learning how to cast one spell very well.

I could make my Shadow Bolt flick to the side, twist around obstacles, and punch with a whole lot more oompf than the default spell started with.

Basically, I was getting to the level where it was a real threat, even if it was still just a measly Level One spell.

And... I think I was ready.

All I needed now was a few attempts, and I'd have Seraph by the balls.

***