Swarming Sovereignty

Chapter 16: Testing Things Out

Lia was having a hard time getting used to her new form. It wasn’t that it was hard to move in or uncomfortable or anything like that, but that she kept seeing glances of her fur in the corner of her vision and thinking something else was there.

She had a hard time getting a grasp on how the fur actually looked. It looked pretty enough from her perspective, but she couldn’t help but wonder if that weird color thing looked worse from a distance.

But Rose had seemed to like it, so it was probably fine. And…while she was thinking of Rose, what was up with ? It was starting to sound like Rose had been right, she was someone important. Why did soul get sent into the body of the rat that Lia had enlightened, and not some other soul?

Lia didn’t think it was random chance. No, she to believe it was random chance. If it , then Lia would be one of the luckiest people on the face of the planet – there would have to have been some aide she didn’t know about that died recently enough so as to have not been reincarnated, then that aide in particular would have had to just to be next in line for reincarnation.

But she also didn’t think the gods would have sent her the soul. They had promised non-intervention, yes, but nothing more. And if they doing more, then Lia really wasn’t sure what to make of…anything, really. It seemed far more likely that Amelia had somehow obtained the soul and then reincarnated it like she had with Lia.

All that aside, her new race was shaping up to be pretty good, if the stats were any indication.

Name: Lia Mios

Race: Lesser Swarm Rat Mage-Queen

Level: 1/30, 0/10 EXP, 195 Blood Money

HP: 30/30

Stamina: 30/30

Mana: 40/40

Strength: 10

Defense: 10

Dexterity: 10

Magic: 20

Magic Defense: 20

Mental Fortitude: 20

Title: Conqueror of Death

You have died and lived to tell the tale. Your life signature becomes undetectable by effects that only search for living or undead creatures, though you may still be sensed by effects that sense both. Provides immunity to instant-kill effects, and any blow that would bring you to 0 HP instead brings you to 1 if you had more than 1 HP.

Titles:

List truncated. Open ‘Titles” for more.

Skills:

List truncated. Open “Skills” for more.

She was undoubtedly weaker than she had been directly before evolution, but she was confident that wouldn’t last long. Her Magic, Magic Defense, and Mana were what they had been when she had first become a rat queen, and her other stats were just that bit higher. She just needed some time to level up and she would be ready for action again.

Well…she a base now, so why not send out some “scouting” parties of her own? She could probably capture a few goblins and bring them back for conversion that way. She wouldn’t even need to lift a paw herself, she could spend that time experimenting. The problem was that it was a bit of a risky proposition, and she hesitated to commit any of her strength to it when she was so sorely lacking compared to her opposition.

…Well, there was nothing for it. If she was constantly scared of the risk, she would never get anywhere. She was going to to make decisions like this on larger scales later, so she needed to get used to it now.

Though that didn’t mean she needed to throw caution to the wind and just do everything no matter the risk. It was…probably best to get a second opinion on this, so she stopped in her tracks, turning around and heading back to where Rose was.

As Lia approached, Rose stopped what she was doing and turned around to face Lia. She asked, surprise clearly visible on her face.

Lia said,

Rose said.

Rose thought about that for a moment.

Rose muttered to herself for a moment more before looking back up at Lia.

Lia asked.

Rose replied. way

Rose stopped, blinking. She said. did

Lia said, nodding her head.

Rose said brightly.

Rose said.

Lia replied, and set back off towards the piles of stuff that had been gathered in the center of the fort.

Her first order of business was to try out other magic. She wanted to see just how easy using other types of magic actually was now. So, when she arrived, she set out to do something simple and non-destructive – create a small pile of dirt in front of her.

And, to her delight, it really was just as easy as weaving mental magic had been. Her next step was to try creating a spike of rock, a rather common offensive earth spell. And, while it was easy, it was also drained more Mana than she would have liked, over half her current pool.

But that was fine. She’d level up, and the Mana cost would become less significant. So…next question, could she create modeling wax? It was an odd material that could take on the properties of…a lot of things, so if she tried to make the dirt-like modeling wax that was in the burrow, would that work?

She focused, and found that, while it was harder than focusing on mental magic or on earth magic, it wasn’t something that seemed ; she still felt like she could activate the spell once she had focused properly. But she did have to focus a bit on the exact image she wanted, much like she had had to when she was a foxkin and had to use chants to cast spells.

And, once she did activate the magic, it wasn’t quite what she had hoped; instead of creating more modeling wax out of nothing, it instead seemed to sort of…use the modeling wax inside of her as a catalyst, reforming in equal amounts where she had wanted it.

That was…fine actually. It provided her with a ranged method of applying modeling wax, which was going to be useful. Modeling wax was, in a sense, her trump card – as long as she was able to cover enough of an opponent in it, she could end a fight instantly.

Right, what was next on the list? Was she able to combine her magic types to make composite magic? That type of magic was a thing, she knew, but it was supposedly pretty hard so she wasn’t sure how it would go.

A pretty simple test would be to try light and earth together, to see if she could make a glowing rock out of nothing. She began to focus on that and, while she couldn’t use the combination magic as she intended, there was…something else. She kept focusing and, after a moment, cast her spell.

A pebble appeared on the ground in front of her, and then a moment later it began to glow, and a couple of windows popped up in front of her.

You have gained the Skill Magic Multicast!

You have gained 1 Skill this evolution! Further Skills will require more practice to obtain!

Magic Multicast

Level 1: 0/1000 EXP

Magic Multicast allows the user to cast multiple spells near simultaneously. This is limited by the number of extra brains or processing centers the user has (currently 11), with more complicated spells using more brains or processing centers than simpler spells.

Level 1: Each additional spell costs 100% more Mana

Oh. That would probably end up coming in handy in the future. It was more expensive than Magic Multitarget (Mental), but it was also much more broadly applicable. And…well, it seemed like there was no reason she couldn’t apply Magic Multitarget (Mental) to each individual spell she cast.

Well…unless those two were competing for the ‘extra brains or processing centers’, which was a real possibility. Now…she could try to test that herself, she could just wait until she had enough Mana for Analysis level three, which seemed a lot easier.

Actually, there were a couple of things she wanted to run through Analysis. First and foremost was if she lost traits unique to her race upon evolution – it would be a real bummer if she evolved into something closer to a foxkin and lost her magic as a result. She was hoping that wasn’t the case, since she still had all the innate magic that Swarm Rat Queen gave her, and Swarm Rat Mage-Queen hadn’t mentioned that, but that really wasn’t the best example given how connected they were.

Still, it would be unfortunate if she just…lost something because she accidentally evolved into a race that didn’t have that trait. It wasn’t like – and, suddenly, she was hit with a headache, one that lasted for only a moment before vanishing and leaving another pair of windows in its place.

!#%?@ *!1|1\#)_~ :[+). *%! ?;”$$ ^!*’^ /*>%&.

You have gained the Special Title Preservationist!

Preservationist

You have, through force of will, forced the system to make an exception for you and allow you to keep race-specific benefits after evolution. As a Special Title, the effects of Preservationist are always active.

…Lia was getting tired of doing the impossible. Not because it was particularly difficult, but because it was bad for her heart every time she accidentally did something that should not have ever happened.

Fortunately, Favored of the Gods hadn’t disappeared, so it looked like the gods were willing to overlook yet another instance of “tampering with the fabric of everything”. Though…Amelia had been messing with the system for a while, so perhaps that wasn’t too surprising? Still, Lia was stumped as to she had done it; she hadn’t even been and it just happened.

But…she also felt…drained. She could feel missing, and she wasn’t sure . She tentatively opened her status, and found that of her Blood Money was gone. Every last bit of it had just…vanished into the ether. Had she…accidentally done something similar to whatever the Dimension of Discounts did? If that was a thing she could do, why did she the Dimension of Discounts?

No. That wasn’t it. Lia wasn’t sure why, but she could that that was wrong. It wasn’t just the Blood Money that had vanished, and it wasn’t similar to what the Dimension of Discounts did. Her Mana and Stamina had remained untouched, and physically she felt fine, but was gone. She hadn’t even known it was there until it had vanished, but now it had, and she knew instinctively she wouldn’t be able to do any more tampering until it returned, however long took.

Not that she was to do more tampering. As lenient as the gods had been so far, she wasn’t keen on getting on their bad side. The most she was willing to purposefully do at the moment was to give Rose Preservationist as well, but that would have to wait until she got her whatever-it-was back.

Uh…where had she been? Well, she knew that she kept race-specific benefits after evolution , but what else…

Right, she had been waiting on her Mana to recover enough to use Analysis so she could figure out the brain/processing center thing. She must have taken longer to process doing…whatever she did than she thought, because she actually had enough now. So, she went ahead and activated the Skill and began to read the window in front of her.

Extra brains or processing centers can only aid in the use of one Skill at a time, be it multitargeting, multicasting, or whatever else might use it. Extra brains or processing centers involved in ‘passive’ tasks temporarily cease function of their tasks when required for ‘active’ use, though they are considered the lowest priority for ‘active’ use.

Right. With that question answered, it was time to look through the piles of junk that she had had her swarm gather in the center of the camp, and see if there was anything useful.

Unfortunately, the pile was…large, and Lia didn’t exactly have any hands with which to sift through it. Which meant it was time to make another, sort of embarrassing, trip back to Rose to see if any converted goblins were free to help her out.

As she approached, Rose once again turned to face Lia before she should have been able to hear or see Lia coming, interrupting her talk with a drone.

Lia asked curiously.

Lia replied.

Rose gave her an amused look.

Rose paused for a bit, then nodded.

Lia said quickly. It certainly had nothing to do with the fact that the knight low-key creeped Lia out, not at all.

Rose corrected.

Lia thought about that for a moment.

Lia gave Rose a suspicious look. She accused.

Rose said sternly. She had suddenly adopted the tone of an older sibling lecturing her younger sibling, one that made Lia almost instinctively want to listen to what she had to say.

will

As she finished, Rose blinked, then, a moment later, seemed to realize what she had said.She said quickly. really

Lia replied.

Rose stammered.

didn’t

And with that, Lia turned to leave for the piles for the third time. As she was walking off, she thought better of it, and turned back to Rose.

Lia said.