BECMI Chapter 327 – Eternal Status
The assassin swung around the corner, his knife in the perfect position to thrust forward into a throat, dead magic about the blade and not about to be stopped by a silken dress or robe or pale flesh.
It could, however, be batted aside by a waiting hand.
The assassin’s breath caught in his throat, mostly because his tongue was impaled and nailed to his brain by the foot-long spear point that had popped out of Dread’s surface, red as the bloody star which sat at the center of the Black Star Sapphire topping him.
I looked at the assassin’s dark eyes coldly, watching as the life drained out of them. There was a moment of delay, then cracks in his skin opened up, bloody red Human Banefire lashed forth to cut and lacerate his flesh, opening everything up for the vivus to blow through his skull and set it on misting, bloody flames with feeling, turgid and dripping crimson flames that would horrify any human that looked upon them.
Wasn’t human, didn’t bother me, although what looked like burning blood stripped flesh from bone as the corpse was shoved aside and fell down, a blade of null-metal designed to kill spellcasters, edged with a poison so lethal the stone it scored began to hiss and melt in reaction, falling from its ready hand.
The necromantic energies boiling within the assassin, ready to flare to life and reanimate him as one kind of horrific undead thing or another, instead ignited like throwing gas onto a fire, ripping open the corpse and starting the annihilation of it and its clothing that was going to result in a big bloody white smear on the ground and not much else left of this fellow.
“The Lady Edge is coming, remember what you said.
Your words a lie and boasting, lips bragging she was dead.
She heard and now is roving, harvesting your many lies,
Your guild now falls in shadows, how long before it dies?
“Agnacio has just found out!” I Sang out in Magevoice, and every damn soul within three miles heard me very clearly, indeed.
This bunch of thieves from Iberon had managed to flee the capital before the tsunamis came and washed most of it was away. They had started to build a new home for themselves by taking over a lesser city and starting the normal method of rule by fear and murder for power that was part of the Iberese charm.
Except I was killing them. Stalking them through the night and tunnels and safehouses, digging them out of their holes, and leaving blood-streaked spots of whiteness behind me, which in the morning sprouted sharp-thorned bushes of ornate black and red roses. If you bent close, you could hear the faint screams of those who had died echoing among the petals.
Their skulls provided me all the information I needed for my hunting, Scrying had found out their network, and, well, I still had Sims running around, making sure none got away as my Detects ferreted them out of their holes.
Twenty Sims, helping me do what needed to be done, and making sure the Immortals and their propaganda machine reaped what it sowed as Truth made a mockery of their blame game and lies.
Punished by the Immortals, for Darkmoor gave mortals better lives than ever any of the Immortals ever had. I made sure the stories of the technology and lifestyles of Darkmoor spread, putting copies of its histories in troves of books and libraries, made with archival paper that was far stronger and clearer, with many pictures, than any hand-made documents.
Manufactured AFTER the Doom, they completely escaped the attention of Immortals attempting to wipe away most things of Darkmoor’s technology that had existed before the Fall, and which these stories and tales and tomes I was dispersing were replacing smoothly and evenly, undoing the rewriting of history.
These bastards weren’t going to be able to establish their little kingdom of shadows and fear, and they weren’t going to be allowed to run away, either. If they wanted to show what the worst of men and mortals could do to one another in pursuit of their goals, I was perfectly happy to show what the best of mortals would do to them to stop their fucktard selves and their plans of power and manipulation in this time of chaos.
Behold the Heart of Darkness reached out and measured the world, and these twats did not have personal div Wards high enough in Valence to defy it.
They also tended to be the highest-Level people around.
Primus brought me and my bright scarlet attire in and out of visibility and shadows, and I glided along, hunting the hunters in the dark as they looked for me.
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The changes of becoming Eternal were deep and immediate, but they all had to be paid for and processed with Karma, some of which made immediate changes, some of which had to be accumulated.
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All Immortals progressed the same, their differences were in how they could use Immortal Power and their Sphere of affinity, which governed how easily they could emulate certain kinds of magic.
They had to buy additional permanent Immortal Power, and they had to buy their additional Stats. Once they reached certain cumulative stages of combined Stats, required minimum Stats for their Sphere, and accumulated enough Immortal Power, they could advance in tier and potential.
Likewise, spending Immortal Power permanently on their projects, or losing it to waxing or waning influence in the mortal world, or being penalized for endangering the mortal world, could rapidly affect their Ranking and true power, something experienced Immortals just took as the vagaries of life.
They had the option to largely walk away from dealing with mortals, and thus losing the ‘free’ Immortal Power that came with their mortal followers accomplishing deeds in their name and thwarting the plans and projects of other Immortals in a great game of influence and power which had no lasting repercussions for themselves.
The mortal limits on ability scores were removed as an Eternal, but advancing them was difficult. On the principle that Karma could buy Feats, Feats could buy Spell Slots, and Spell Slots could buy permanent Ability Scores increases, Karma could buy Ability Score increases.
Eternals were defined by Class, not by Sphere. Class Levels continued past 36, and were redefined all the way through mortal Levels, too. Per-level increases were removed, and Hit Dice came in at all Class Levels, along with Constitution bonuses, resulting in potentially massive hit point increases.
But all such new hit points had to be purchased with Karma.
Potential combat ability increased without limit, and for warrior-types, increased at every level. The potential +24 Attack Bonus maximum of mortals had to be advanced to +36 for warriors, and that had to be paid for.
No new spells or spell levels were opened, maxing out at the 9-9 limits of a 36th level Caster, which meant I had to purchase a lot of additional Spell Slots as an elf.
Valences above Ten were Eternal Magic Valences, rivaling the power of Immortal magic. Each had to be purchased, and could only be purchased when you maxed out your mortal limits, AND you hit the requirements to advance beyond 36.
Your original Mortal Hit Die were all turned into Health, which was affected by the likes of Fast Healing and Regeneration, representing physical damage, putting humans on par with elves, dwarves, gnomes, and hyn in that respect. All Levels above that were in Soak, which represented metaphysical and magical defenses, putting demihumans on par with humans that way.
To advance beyond 36, you had to:
Pay all your hit points to your new maximum by Level, both Health and Soak. Constitution Hit Points only increased your potential cap as an Eternal, you still had to pay for each increase.
Increase your Saves to base 2. Buy your Eternal Saves against post-mortal magic to 16.
Increase your Attack bonus to the highest permitted by Class, +1. +36 for warriors, +27 for Clerics and Thieves, +18 for Wizards (and Sorcerers), +1.
If you were a spellcaster, increase your base Caster level to 36, +1.
Increase your Prime Requisite for your Class to 36, +1, and 31 for the Secondary Requisite. This was Strength or Dexterity for warriors, and either Wisdom or Charisma for mental. Thieves it was Dexterity, and either Intellect or Charisma. Clerics was Wisdom, and then Constitution. Wizards was Intellect, and then Dexterity.
This meant… I had a lot of work to do.
Which, you know, was fine. I was the frontrunner, I was opening the way and treading the ground. I specifically was forging a new way for Wizards, Sorcerers, all Divine Casters (including Druids and Ur-priests), and for martial combatants, as strange as that might be. It only made sense that I had a lot to do.
I also had the time to do it in, and damn, but there were a lot of fucktards to unleash upon.
Happily, nifloids were not part of the paradigm, for some strange reason, so it was existing mortal races being arseholes to one another.
I had to add 26 Elven hit dice as Soak, d6’s all, and all the Constitution bonuses to go with them (+6 per die), plus my Toughness bonuses and Favored Class bonuses. So, 14 x 26, adding in 364 Soak.
It was a lot to add, slowly and patiently, at a point a day.
I had to up my Attack Bonus from the current +30 to +36.
Thankfully, my Caster Level was already at 36, but I couldn’t advance it an inch without first maxing out my mortal standards.
My Wizardry was at the apex of Elven Wizardry, 8/8/8/7/6/5/4/3/3. I had to get to all 9’s, the equal of a human Overmagus.
My Sorcery Spell Slots were at 10/10/10/9/8/7/6/6/6, and had to get to nine 11’s. That was going to take a lot of time and Karma, too. My Spells Known were at 5/5/5/5/5/5/5/5/4, and had to get to all 7 per Valence.
More expenses.
Lastly was my Ur-Priest, which was different from the default Clerical Progression, but because of that, was held to the exact same standard. It was at 5/5/4/4/4/4/3/2/1, the maximum for the ten-Level Ur Class, and I would have to get them to all 9’s.
Given that I received Intellect bonuses for my Ur Levels and normal Clerics here did NOT receive bonuses, that was actually a very, very good thing for me, as I still received my Intellect bonuses, and I would continue to do so when I finally opened up my X’s.
I would have literally double the spells of a normal Cleric, in addition to my Wizardry and the hidden benefits of my Sorcery!
Of course, Ur-Priest had stopped at Twenty, keeping pace with my Elven Racial Levels. To achieve this, I basically had to advance it to 36, so I had to gain the same level of Clerical power that a single-classer human would, on top of all my other stuff!
A single-classer, even an elf, would have nowhere near the crushing Karmic costs that I did… but the fact of the matter was that it would give me an incredibly good foundation, and as the First Eternal, I was going to need that foundation to survive what was going to be coming for me.
I just had to attain foundational fighting skill that rivaled that of Briggs and Sama, all the while vastly increasing the depth of my spellcasting abilities, and that was before I moved onto true Eternal Levels.
Being the first to change the world in this way was going to be such a bloody pain. It was good that I’d been getting a head start on everything… and had so much time to work with to do it right as I paved so many roads concurrently for others.