Origin ARS 6 (24 page)

"I see something I love," said Scott lightly.

Her left eyebrow rose into the air. She took her ladle out and pointed it at him. "You better be careful, buster. Keep talking like that, and you'll have to show me that beautiful place you mentioned."

Scott looked at her for a moment then smiled broadly. "I really like today."

She murmured a little then slowly stirred her cauldron once more. Amaryllis looked up at Scott, a soft smile on her lips. He was right. Today had been fun.

***

Evening had come upon the world, like a dark shroud that blots out the light of the life-giving sun. Evil was on the prowl, sexy evil. "Found you!"

Amaryllis hopped out of her hiding place and whirled to the side. Several bats made of magical energy erupted outward from where she stood previously. They flew forward and circled the hapless mechanical construct, thoroughly confusing its sensory capacity.

The lamp post was set atop a continuous track system, the sort of thing that a tank might use. Other than this strange adaptation there was nothing to make it seem particularly special. It flailed its broken light around in an attempt to swat the bats, and was so thoroughly distracted in the process that Scott was able to rush in and unleash a small amount of lightning into its frame.

The busted lamp sparked wildly, showing the way that it had broken in the first place. Scott leapt away and hellfire flared up all around it. The extreme temperature caused the metal to melt slightly.

The machine monster fell not long after that series of attacks. Without its high-power heat lamp, it possessed little damage potential.

Scott and the crew set about looting the monster after that. It was not long before Amaryllis cried out in excitement. "Yes! We've done it."

"What have we done now?" asked Scott curiously. Herbert ran over to see what she was talking about as well. He stayed out of the principle fighting right now, as he was much more useful as an enemy lure and a support member at the moment. Still, he liked to see what the loot was after each fight.

"I can fix some of these parts, and we could probably get any decent weaponsmith to form them together. Also, these tracks will fit the frame we found!" said Amaryllis excitedly. "If we sell off most of the superior scrap we have, we can probably scrape up enough money to make it happen."

"Sweet!" exclaimed Scott. "So, we'll finally be able to make it happen?"

"Sure. Let me get to work," said Amaryllis. She immediately called up her hell cauldron and started her work. Scott and Herbert went back to looting the machine monster. Since Amaryllis was brought into the picture, not a single part had been wasted. The random junk pieces were made into superior grade materials through her magical metal working, and they were able to hunt down more monsters than before due to the cart. In short, they were looking at a serious haul this time.

As usual, there were a few servo-motors and a machine core to be looted. The wiring was pulled to the side, as copper, silver, and occasional tiny bits of gold were used. None of the monsters had platinum parts in this area, but someday they might return to fight the monsters downtown. They would have higher grade parts with platinum and gold as more common elements.

Scott separated the materials while Amaryllis worked the cauldron. She always started with the least valuable materials, as they were the most numerous. Once the basic steel was melted down, she conjured up metal molds. The steel was poured into the molds and rapidly turned into steel ingots.

"This is the fun part, huh?" asked Scott as he sat down on the dirt. There were only a few places around to hide as it was a flat area, but none of them was a suitable place to sit.

Amaryllis grinned at him then ran her hand above two of the ingots. They began to glow briefly then magical energy crackled between them. The ingots slowly drew together and formed a single ingot.

"What do you call that again?" asked Scott.

"Recombinant Metal Synergy," said Amaryllis. "It's one of the basic types of synergy, a common one for those who work with metal."

"There's more than one type?" he asked, curious about this fascinating power.

She combined another set of ingots then nodded. "Yes, there used to be only one synergy skill, but it was too broken to be allowed to continue in that form. So, we separated it into a few hundred lesser skill-sets."

"Broken, how?" Scott watched as Amaryllis combined the two new ingots into yet another.

Amaryllis gasped in delight as the new ingot shifted hue during mid-synergy. "Great! We got another one."

"Dark steel?" asked Scott.

"Yes, dark steel. I can't make ebon steel, yet, or I'd try to combine this with the other ingot," said Amaryllis. She carefully set the much more valuable bit of steel to the side then set about combining more regular steel ingots.

While she worked with the metal, she continued to speak about synergy. "As far as the synergy skill, it could basically combine almost anything together. A handful of grass and a piece of leather might create a piece of armor, for instance."

"Sounds like a great skill!" exclaimed Scott. He'd love something like that.

"Yeah, it was," she said, after finishing the next ingot.

She looked at him before continuing, "It was
too
great. There was no need for any other crafting skill. Who needs to learn smithing, or crafting, when you can simply combine two items and keep combining until the system popped out something amazing?"

"So, you nerfed it?" asked Scott.

"Some players still claim we did. We didn't, though," said Amaryllis before she started work on another set of ingots. "We broke the skill up into different skill-sets. Someone who wanted to be a synergistic weaponsmith could still gain all the necessary skills. They just had to learn more than one."

"I see." Scott sighed softly. "It would have been nice to have that skill."

Amaryllis smiled at him. "Maybe someday. A lot of indie game companies that use the
OEC GPL
basic world engine leave it intact at first."

"They do? Isn't it unbalanced, though?" asked Scott.

"Highly. In fact, the existence of that skill is a hallmark many use to determine whether the game being created is well-coded or not. Only terrible programmers with no desire for game balance allow it to be used whole-cloth," she said, though she thought better of it after a moment. "Well, not always. Some game worlds are created where synergy is one of the core mechanics and most of the skills revolve around it. That makes more sense to me."

"So, the world creators that use it whole-cloth are either terrible designers or use the skill itself as almost a game engine of its own?"

"Exactly," said Amaryllis. "The original version of synergy was completely game breaking."

"Makes sense... It would replace a lot of other skills, after all," said Scott. "Though, a game breaking skill would be nice to have if the board started their shenanigans."

Amaryllis laughed. "Sorry. Most of the completely broken skills have been dealt with over time. We've been at this world creation thing for a long time, you know."

Scott nodded to her then reached out his arm. Herbert climbed on then crawled up to his shoulder. Together they watched as the demoness used magic and hell fire to do the mundane task of melt and combine metal.

The steel was eventually combined into the best possible version that she could make it. Master grade steel was the type used to create master tier steel items. It was a step below elemental, dark, or light steel, which was its own grade of metal and considered a magical metal. Every metal had that sort of grading system. There was the common capacity, up to master grade. Then it could become elemental, dark, or light.

"What's the highest tier of magical metal?" asked Scott, curious about what he could find eventually.

"Legendary Beast, Celestial, and Infernal," said Amaryllis while she watched the tiny bits of gold they found melt down inside her cauldron. She included the already melted and reformed bits from earlier battles.

"So, there's a legendary beast steel?" asked Scott.

Amaryllis smiled at him. "Actually, it would be the name of the beast. Phoenix Steel, Dragon Steel, Unicorn Steel, and other things like that."

"Is it just for specific elements then, or is the beast some kind of totem?" he asked, keenly interested in what she would say. If knowing this meant gaining an edge later, he would learn as much as he could.

"It's a little confusing because the element associated with the steel can be seen with a lot of beast names Dragon Steel, for instance, can come in all elemental forms. Phoenix steel is just for fire. Unicorn Steel is only for light elemental steel, or water elemental steel," she said, before finishing up with the gold melting process. She poured the tiny bit of metal into a little mold. The result was a marble sized object made of pure gold.

"Almost enough for a gold coin," she said thoughtfully.

"Can you make all those kinds of steel?" asked Scott.

Amaryllis shook her head. "No. Only a handful of races can do them all, and even then it has to be someone who absolutely chooses to master the synergy skills almost exclusively due to time constraints. I couldn't even if I wanted to do so."

"Why not?" asked Scott. "Not enough motivation?"

The red haired demoness put the gold marble in her pocket then smiled at Scott once more. "Motivation is simple enough. I just can't create celestial steel, or any non-fire and darkness based elemental steel. However, if I trained long enough I could eventually develop the ability to create infernal steel, the wicked counterpart to the celestial steel."

"I see. It's a simple, but still complex system..," said Scott.

"True, no one race or class gets to have everything. The few races that can do all the metal working and creation, also have to do so as a crafting class with heavy combat and non-crafting magical penalties."

"Who knew my sweet Origin would have a side to her that was so into
metal
?" asked Scott with a smile.

Amaryllis grinned at him then struck a dangerous pose. Her bat wings flared outward and she placed one foot in front of the other. She then canted her hips to one side.

Her left hand on her left hip, she pointed the index finger of her right hand toward the ground. "Bow down mortal! Worship at the feet of your dark goddess of the metal!"

Scott laughed then got down on his knees. Herbert hopped off and Scott bent forward with his hands out. "I'm not worthy! I'm not worthy!"

The dark goddess of the metal giggled at him in a surprisingly cute way. "OK. You might be a
little
worthy."

"Shall I pray for darkness?" asked Scott lightly.

She laughed at him in a sultry way then lashed her tail. "Just don't pray for death. I have no interest in having my brother show up right now."

Scott laughed loudly, obnoxiously really, after hearing that. "He'd make a scene?"

"He'd never let me live it down if he saw me dressed like this," said Amaryllis with a softer hint of laughter in her voice. She then walked forward and stretched out a hand to her slightly worthy supplicant. "Welcome to my beautiful darkness."

Scott grinned at her then lunged upward and tackled her to the ground. She cried out in surprise then pushed at him a little. "What do you think you're doing, mister?"

He slipped a hand down to lightly stroke her between her thighs. "You invited me in... As a demoness, you should know that you lose all power when you do that..."

"Am I helpless before your mortal might, then?" she asked curiously, an amused smile on her lips.

He laughed a little then said, "Wow, you're burning up down there."

"Well, I do come from the inferno..." she began, but then her eyes went wide as his questing fingers dared breach the gates to the underworld. "S-Scott!"

He leaned down and whispered into her ear. "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here...?"

She exclaimed something incoherent, mixed with warm laughter. Her rear end wiggled around a little as his questing fingers made it difficult to keep still.

Scott laughed a little. "Shall I welcome myself to the underworld?"

"Don't tease me!" she gasped then lifted her thigh a little. "I'm playing a role here."

"I'm playing a role, too... The part of the Fiancé who can't hold back anymore," he whispered into her ear, before he nibbled on it.

"W-what kind of part is that...?" asked the demoness, her body heating up further.

"A big one... and it's all for you," said Scott, in his warm masculine voice.

Amaryllis gasped once more. This wasn't how she had planned for things to go, but she had to admit the truth. She loved the part that he was about to play.

Chapter 9

Sparks flew as metal and skill worked hand in hand to create something truly amazing. On the outskirts of Trinity Depot, the small stop-over point where people who sold scrap gathered from the Trinity Highcrowne area, a metal shop owner had taken up the challenge that Scott and crew had presented to him.