Overpowered Wizard

Diamond light struck down with a thunderous force around Zarian and his fellow Floridians. The impact shook the floor and nearly knocked Zarian off his feet.

Stumbling, Zarian bent under the deluge of systemized power. The diamond light blinded him to the circumstances of the others. Then the racing, roaring deluge of power crystalized into a shiny half-energy, half-solid plasma tube.

The force suddenly reversed, and Zarian’s stomach lurched. His body launched upward with a powerful suction, moving at speeds already dizzying.

The beam transmission only sped up from there, never slowing down, never equalizing, only accelerating. Zarian could feel the immense g-forces while leaving the Corma’s atmosphere and going further beyond.

Eyes straining left and right, Zarian saw gaps in the diamond tube around him. He saw worlds and stars blur past him as streaks that grew longer and longer.

Then all the streaks froze.

Zarian felt a sensation similar to time stopping. He had the foggiest idea how he could know this. He could point a finger at two culprits for keeping him updated: Overwhelming Darkness and Lion Prince.

Is this the Star System’s version of FTL travel?

Zarian could hardly believe it. Faster than light travel seemed more far-fetched than all the magic he could do.

The deceleration wasn’t apparent at first until the streaking lights shortened and shortened. Then the roaring force around him became more turbulent, more rowdy, with more flickering gaps appearing around Zarian’s diamond-lit beam transmission.

He glimpsed through the gaps and saw something black and dark sailing past him – a darkened sun. Then he shifted over to another flickering viewing port to see more.

Something hurtled toward him he could barely describe at first. Not without leaning on his Dark Affinity and magnifying the shaded details engulfing a strange world, one that was very different compared to the World of Castles and Caverns.

He saw darkened, misshapen landmasses. Each one laid in a skewed, half-sunken angle in an ocean with rainbow colors that glistened like the edge of an oily puddle under sunlight.

He saw immense and nightmarish creatures bend and stalk about, sometimes smashing aside landmasses that were the size of entire countries or bigger. Without even identifying them, Zarian knew each of those behemoth, landmass-smashing creatures ranged beyond Master Rank. They had to be Champion Rank.

Why did a Lesser World have Champion Monsters?

Zarian felt a chill pass through him. He watched the titanic, spindly monsters stalk with long-legged strides through the oil ocean below.

Thankfully, his beam tube, along with the four others next to him, moved away from the titanic monstrosities. The tubes moved away from the half sunken land masses in an oily ocean.

The Floridians flew toward a single light source that welcomed them like a beacon on the decayed world.

The beam transmissions slowed down further. The roaring grew louder. The turbulence grew more violent, bouncing Zarian around back and forth.

The diamond tube made keening noises. Pieces flaked off, small at first. Then large fragments ripped and shattered away.

A seeping coldness took over, emptying all air.

Zarian didn’t need his free evil +7 to realize he and the others were still in the vacuum of space. They were barely skimming across the upper atmosphere of Somnigrav.

More of his tube shattered from around him like a vessel getting blasted away by the elements. Each falling piece left twinkling trails far behind him. More and more holes appeared, making his transport rattle harder with further atmospheric turbulence.

Then the inevitable happened. His beam transmission broke, shattering like one giant glass fixture hitting a hard surface. The systemized transport magic drizzled behind him almost like raining jewels or the tail end of a shooting star.

It would’ve been a beautiful sight from afar if Zarian didn’t have to experience the horror of magic and physics agreeing to burn his ass alive.

Without Para’s body enhancement, Zarian only had his unusually high vitality from earning levels through adversity and his 135 Strength. Neither was enough to make him impervious, so the skin on his bare torso and face roasted, his flesh flying off.

The experience sucked ass, but his vitality kept him from disintegrating completely.

He barely noticed the other beam transmissions breaking like his, throwing their occupants into harsh atmospheric reentry. Granted, they all had direct body boosters and could endure better than Zarian.

Zarian’s suffering didn’t last too long. Gilbert’s Mega Healing Force reached out, taking care of him and the others, overcharging vitality, fixing up burns.

With the Rescue Ranger’s help, the Conquest Wizard could think clearly even while he flipped through the air wildly.

Something was deeply wrong about Somnigrav other than its appearance.

The Star System calling it a dying world was the first giveaway of the main issue. The lack of control Zarian had over himself, as he whipped head over heels, struggling to correct his flight, gave prominence to the most pressing issue of this damn place.

The aura density was low.

“Fuck!” Zarian shouted into the roaring wind and burning friction, his Aura Mastery failing him in this dying world.

He had known this was a thing. He’d studied about it while under Ruvaria’s tutelage.

But it had seemed like a distant concept that his teacher had successfully avoided for ten thousand years. She had no first-hand experience of entering a dying world with low aura density.

They’d brushed past the concept plenty of times, since it was the least interesting.

So as Zarian kept flipping around while he and the others made their way from the vacuum of space to a world on the verge of death, he made a quick judgement call.

Either he would cast Void Parade and cost himself some seriously precious inner aura. Or he would stop crying, take the challenge head on, and figure it the fuck out.

Zarian clenched his jaw. He ignored the roaring rush of noise and atmosphere around him. He heard his friends shout or scream out at each other and semi-ignored them, too. He tried to focus until he saw one of them responding the fastest – Gilbert to the rescue once again.

Still dressed like a door-knocking Jehovah’s Witness, the Rescue Ranger summoned his Lasso of Hope and snapped it out.

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He caught Hannah and yanked her over to him first, as she failed to get her magitek stuff to work properly. Then he caught Bianca with his lasso and yanked her in, her freedom wings gone from her back. He whirled around his lasso overhead, aiming for Zarian.

But Naomi – no – Para interjected herself with a jetting blast of psionic energy from her feet.

Zarian watched as Para scooped him up from behind, her arms under his shoulders. She then emitted a stronger pulse of psychic power that pushed back the burning air friction and slowed everyone down all at once. Then she used another pulse to pull Gilbert, Hannah, and Bianca in close.

Grouped together with everyone behind Zarian, the Conquest Wizard focused on reworking what he knew about aura. There was literal science and math involved based on the range of aura density that the other Lesser World would normally have compared to the Dying World.

With Somnigrav of Gravity and Dreams falling far short of that specific density range, Zarian had to rebuild all of his aura techniques from the ground up, starting with manipulating air for basic wind cushions or for flight.

Beneath them, a small landmass floating above the oily ocean waited with glittering clouds, spherical structures, glossy plantlife, and cotton-candy fields. Unlike the rest of Somnigrav, this one floating island remained a bastion of life and magic.

Zarian sensed a condensed pool of aura surrounding the island like a bubble. Once they crossed through the threshold, then Zarian’s usual abilities would kick into proper gear.

“Slow us down, Para,” Zarian requested. “Might as well get some practice with low aura density now. We’ll have to face it again later.”

“Understood,” Para chirped.

“We really are a glutton for punishment, huh?” Gilbert grumbled.

“I would rather be in the Forgotten Kingdom right now, but sure, let’s train some more,” Hannah muttered.

“This place is so sad! I don’t like it!” Bianca screeched.

Para took some time to figure out how to slow everyone down further with pure psychic energy. Zarian could feel how Naomi’s body tensed, hummed, and wobbled with so much power there was a real threat that Para might trigger the wrong thing and blast them apart.

No such complications occurred. Para successfully slowed them down while keeping them in a bubble of psychic energy that held them together.

“I’m going out on a limb here but I’m guessing Possessed Naomi’s whole psychic shtick works better than the rest of y’all’d shtick,” Gilbert said. “I’m sort of fine, but I can tell I can’t recover my aura like I did before being sent on a Sci-Fi journey.”

Zarian looked behind Gilbert and past Para. Zarian’s eyes connected with Hannah’s and Bianca’s eyes.

With one look, the three most aura-technical members of the Floridians sympathized with each other.

Then they got to work while Para kept them outside of the one shining bastion in a darkened and mostly dead world. Above them, the Somnigrav Sun remained black while the light from the second sun – the Star Core – shone upon them weakly.

Zarian, Hannah, and Bianca practiced as quickly and efficiently as they could. They kept each other updated verbally.

“My aura range is screwed. My aura recovery isn’t so bad, but it’s much harder on its own. Higher Mysticism helps there. But my Aura Mastery is having difficulties. It’s like I have to work twenty times as hard to do a simple trick,” Zarian explained. “I would’ve been royally fucked if I didn’t have Aura Transcendence.”

“My connection with all of my crafts is delayed because my Aura Mechanic is heavily affected. My aura recovery isn’t so bad thanks to Aura Generator, but you’ll need to stick close to me to have the same benefits. And my Aura Generator isn’t as strong as it was before, too,” Hannah explained.

“My Aura Transcendence should help there,” Zarian said. “Should help you as well, Bianca.”

“Si, por favor. It costs so much for me to generate light now. Everything costs so much aura! I’m expensive! I’m going to cry,” Bianca complained.

“So this is where the Wonder stat becomes a detriment,” Para said curiously. “For quite some time, I thought Bianca’s path was without many flaws, perhaps the best for mortals. But in environments like these, the more Wonder you have, the more costly your magic ends up being. Without enough Mysticism to act as a balancing anchor, your high power output will become a detriment.”

“Yeah, I’m affected by that, too,” Gilbert added. “Wonder is my highest, followed by Strength. And my skills can guzzle aura quickly, especially Mega Healing Force. I can manage alright personally because of my physical stats and physical buffs, but we’re going to have to think smarter with our magic stuff.”

“I’m sorry, Zarian,” Hannah said.

“My host, we will protect you with everything we have,” Para said.

Gilbert and Bianca fell silent, coming to terms with their concern for Zarian like the others. Everyone had issues with the low aura density of a dying world, but Zarian had it the worst.

He was a wizard, specifically the Conquest Wizard. A lot of his spells were extremely expensive, more expensive than even Bianca’s wondrous skills in many cases.

“The plan doesn’t change,” Zarian grouched, extending a hand forward. Wisps of aura and wind whirled in front of him. “We’re going to hit the ground running. Get a layout of what we’re defending. And take the fight to the motherfucking enslavers!”

Zarian focused with all of his might. He relied on his Aura Transcendence and Hannah’s Aura Generator. He kept testing and measuring his Aura Mastery in the low aura density of Somnigrav.

He used prior lessons under Ruvaria’s tutelage to search for the right frequency for proper manipulation. The lower the density, the harder it was to find that sweet spot, but Zarian was not one to turn down a challenge.

So Zarian struggled. But he kept trying. The whirling aura wind in front of him expanded slowly at first. Then its growth in size sped until Zarian efficiently created a respectable funnel around him and the others.

Para stopped using Naomi’s psychic abilities and left things to Zarian. Everyone entered the whirling ride around the edge of the descending twister. Zarian got as much practice as he could before they finally breached the bubble surrounding the last bastion of a Dying Lesser World.

Immediately, Zarian felt like he could breathe clearly, as if he’d used a straw the moment his beam tube broke.

His aura vortex beefed up. Bianca burst with intense light, becoming a queen-shaped supernova. Hannah had green scrolling text and cube-shaped orbital golems flying around her with fine-tuned controls.

Zarian sighed with pleasure at feeling the proper aura density. He manipulated the vortex so they could simply float inside.

They lowered comfortably down to a cotton-candy shaped field. With a wave of his hand, Zarian unraveled the twister, the gusting aura winds making the strange and colorful plantlife waver.

Other than Para/Naomi, everyone finished changing into their adventure outfits with a magical swap – adorning something sleek, elvish, black. They all had a red insignia of a gator’s head surrounded by the cursive words ‘Fuck Around and Find Out.’

Zarian remained shirtless. His dark bottoms and boots looked like someone wove them out smoke and shadows.

Gilbert wore a leather-based armor set that was harder than any plate armor found in the World of Castles and Caverns. Bianca wore a midnight dress with a skirt that reached down to her ankles, her feet remaining bare, at least for now.

Hannah moved comfortably in her bodysuit, her round mirror-like spectacles reflecting the dreamy surroundings as she turned her head left and right. Para wore Naomi’s body while Naomi remained in the white and silver runic cloth bands, owl mask, and coins left on her by Ruvaria.

Zarian let Hannah collect information – a dozen flying cubic golems the size of shoe boxes whizzed out of her bodysuit.

Everyone’s outfits had spatial storage enchantments placed into them because of Hannah’s rigorous studies and growth. Not all of their conversation from the breakfast prior surrounded big worldly news and Zarian.

They’d started off the nerd jam session about Hannah’s strives, such as how she could blend common runes, elvish runes, dwarven runes, infernal runes, and even gnomish runes together. She could make complex, multicultural enchantments that were greater than the sum of their parts.

There was more that Hannah had worked on, but Zarian could think about the other magical artificing advancements later or when it pertained to their current mission.

First, he noted the humanoid person running toward them across a bouncy road made of rubbery yellow bricks. He glanced to the side where past the edge of the island and the aura bubble, the dying world stretched on from horizon to horizon.

An idea came to mind, leading to Zarian palming his face. He remembered he had something that would become a great benefit to them in a dying world.

“Hannah, I forgot to show you a gift,” Zarian said as the humanoid inhabitant drew closer.

“What is it, Zarian?” Hannah asked, studying the strange humanoid approaching them.

The others looked about for danger or anything that looked like enslavers. They still paid close attention to the conversation, Para especially.

“Aura Crystals. Para, hand her one.”

Para flicked Naomi’s arm, throwing from the cultivator’s palm a crystal in Hannah’s direction.

The Runic Artificer grabbed the crystal and gave it a curious look. Her mirror-like spectacles reflected the oblong and aura-filled blue object that was the size of an eggplant.

A wide smile crossed Hannah’s face. “Well, hello there, beautiful.”

Zarian cracked a grin before he turned to face their welcoming party.

No enslavers yet. But Zarian’s twitchy wizard fingers felt the itch for combat. He had to hold himself back as he looked up at the strange and tall Somnolite.