The Chronicles of a Scalebound Sage

WM [22] Wendigo Nightmare

There was only a few more hours of sun as Tanisha submerged the sixth blue steel ingot into the basin. So far, she had not successfully infused any of the ingots and her continuous failures were weighing on her. The problem came from her control of the ambient mana after she placed an ingot in the basin. She could hold the mana stable for a few minutes but not the hour or so she would need. The mental strain was getting to her and she knew that continuing would most likely lead to even more failures.

Last one for today. Joel said he could just reforge them so no harm in trying.

Tanisha knew there was something she had to be doing wrong. Infusion was a higher level craft than potion making. Well the skill level for entry was much higher. The two both required decades to become proficient and centuries to master to the highest level. Tanisha knew she was at the very beginning of her journey, but that didn’t stop her from getting more and more frustrated at the continuous failures. 

She licked her lips as she lowered the ingot into the basin. Instantly she felt the ambient mana be drawn into the reaction. She curtailed the flow of power with her Ringularity Sage Core, but the weight of the ambient mana seemed to only grow straining her domination of the ambient flow. She was sweating profusely as the seconds moved slowly by and she felt each and every one take it sweet time. 

A minute past then two, then ten as she struggled to the point she had both hands raised on opposite sides of her body as if she were holding back two walls from crushing her. The mental and magical weight caused her to breathe ragged breaths as the buildup of ambient mana finally collapsed. In moments it flooded into the infusion basin ruining another blue steel ingot. 

“Ah! What the Infernal Planes, really?” Tanisha said between frustrated and labored breaths. “What am I doing wrong? How is anyone supposed to do this?”

Tanisha carefully removed the ruined metal from the basin and began the draining process by manipulating the mana around the object. Once it was fully drained she looked into the bottles of perfectly separated blood and powder. Tanisha was not sure how the basin could separate things so accurately, but she was too irritated to think too long about it. 

She conjured a liquid water construct, the element of her power that solidified mana in a way that acted and looked like water while at the same time being just her mana. It had advantages in combat over actual water in the fact an enemy mage couldn’t seize control of it mid fight and attack her with it. The drawback was the far steeper cost in mana and longer time it took to form. She wasn’t using it for combat right now of course, but it was also superior for cleaning. It would not rust metals, it was totally in her control and would dissipate into the ambient mana once she was done. 

After storing the blood and powder in her necklace storage she disassembled the basin and put it away as well. Frustrated she plucked her maya pipe from the air and smoked the enigmatic energy. The maya interacted with her differently now as she no longer had the traditional maya channels. The maya acted almost as a miner digging new tunnels. Once those tunnels in her body were made seiðr expanded them moving into the new expanse while the maya was assimilated. The progress was slow and the sensation oddly relaxing which is exactly what Tanisha wanted.

Tanisha looked at the now seven ruined ingots that would have to be reforged to be useful. “I don’t want to have to tell Joel I messed up so many times,” she grumbled. “But maybe he has some insight he could share. Tomorrow. I am done for today.”

Tanisha pulled on her bond with Bjorn; she knew he had been in combat a few times thanks to the flare and intensity of his emotions several times throughout the day. She felt he was on the way back which was good since it would be night soon. Hunter animals and familiars could be out past curfew as some monsters were only active at night and skinwalkers didn’t usually target non-humanoids. She was not technically a hunter and she was going to take Joha’s advice about staying away from the skinwalker issue.

Tanisha approached the gate of Birchgrove where town guards checked her and performed a test in which they had to shine lights into her eyes and mouth with a small device. The lights were magical and did something although Tanisha didn’t know what, but she could feel the magic. She was let through without issue as many of them knew of her since she was the only source of potions at the moment and some of them had even bought from her.

“Go straight to your inn, the town will be under curfew in an hour,” a wendigo guard said.

“I will head there without delay,” Tanisha said.

The streets of the town were empty aside for guards and a few lamplighters although the latter were notably hurrying through their jobs lighting the lampposts to get home quickly. It was almost eerie to see the town so empty as the twilight set upon the settlement and the first of the stars twinkled high above.

Tanisha took her wagon to storage outside a street away from her inn which also had a horse stable. She again felt her bond with Bjorn. he was closer and seemed to be in a good mood so she expected to see him soon and with trophies of his hunt. As she closed the stable doors she felt a presence behind her. She immediately spun around and saw a town guard watching her. It was hard to make him out in the low light, but he was definitely human due to the lack of antlers.

“We are on curfew, why are you still outside of your lodging?” the guard asked.

Tanisha recognized the guard's voice; it was the same human she saw at the Apothecary Office. 

“I was on my way and I had to secure my horse first,” Tanisha responded.

“Are you alone? We want everyone inside.” 

“I am alone but the inn is not far.”

“I will escort you to your lodging. It is dangerous at night”

Tanisha nodded in agreement and walked over him. He was shorter than her although most humans and wendigo were shorter than her now. Although the shadows obscured his face he had a rather large build. 

“I am staying at the inn across the street so it won’t be a long wa—” 

Tanisha turned in the direction of Bjorn and she felt distress and pain come from the bond. Something was happening to him and she needed to get there now. Without even thinking her Chain Breaker’s Mantle sprang to life as the tattoos on her body glowed and shifted. She took a step from the guard just for her to feel him tackle her and grab on to her wrists squeezing hard and trying to overpower her. She assumed he thought she was trying to flee or attack him so she needed to clarify her intention.

“I have to go. My familiar is in danger!” Tanisha yelled.

“I have to go. My familiar is in danger,” Herschel said in a perfect imitation of her voice.

Tanisha turned back to him and could see he wasn’t quite right. His eyes were black orbs, his mouth stretched unnaturally wide with needle-like teeth eager to bite into flesh. Tanisha’s eyes opened wide at the realization that this was the skinwalker. This was the monster even the wendigo feared, that haunted the nightmares of children, and shut down entire towns when one was spotted.

Identify
Name: Herschel Calihan
Species: (Human-Disguised) Ascended Skinwalker
Level: 67
Vocation: Eldritch Predator
Highest Stat: Strength: 350

The skinwalker was self-realized, it could speak and blend into society which was bad. That meant that it was strong and given the fact that Tanisha could not get out of its vice-like grip it was physically stronger than her. Tanisha was only momentarily frozen with panic, a reaction to facing one of her nightmares head on coupled with the fact that Bjorn was also in trouble.

She reminded herself she was not some helpless girl and spoke the words of power to summon her water. The two orbs appeared and shot out streams of compressed water capable of rending steel. The skinwalker took both hits to its body and screamed in outrage and pain. It released one of Tanisha’s wrists. She realized it was trying to break them but couldn’t because of her mantle. It immediately tried to grab her neck, but she shifted as more shots of water slammed into the creature. Unfortunately the assault seemed to do only superficial damage.

They tussled on the ground as the creature repeatedly tried to grab her neck or break the wrist it still had. The water orbs expended all of their water and reformed as Tanisha used a second spell in a desperate bid to free herself. She knew if the creature was able to get a good grasp on her she was as good as dead. Luckily the skinwalker didn’t seem to have any combat experience, most likely just attacking a person’s blind spot and using its ridiculous strength to kill them quickly.

Hard Air Constructs:  
Seiðr cost: Variable 
(I) Low cost, two seiðr. Speak the words of power and create seiðr air constructs. Form air constructs into any shape, interacting with the world, acting out the caster’s will. (II) Medium cost, six seiðr. Air constructs with darker aspects of seiðr to burn any that oppose you. (III) High cost, 16 seiðr. Constructs will become invisible and silent.

Wind constructs made from the darker aspects of her power materialized as sparkly green hands. They both latched on to the creature one on the face and the other on its neck. The smell of burning flesh was immediate as the creature felt the heat of Tanisha's magic. It didn’t stop and only grew more desperate. It continuously smashed the hand it had grabbed against the ground until finally Tanisha’s defenses failed and her forearm snapped.

The pain was intense as it shifted its hand to the break in her arm and dug its nails in slowly peeling away flesh as it dug its way to the shattered bone. Tanisha had a slight hesitation due to the pain and the creature managed to grab Tanisha’s collarbone. The skinwalker’s hand pierced her skin with talon-like claws and reached inside of her to grab the bone itself to get a firm grasp. Worse still Tanisha could not tell if she was doing any damage to the monster with either the water or the Hard Air Construct.

“You are not killing me!” Tanisha yelled.

“You are not killing me.” Herschel mimicked Tanisha's voice perfectly.

The skinwalker copying her voice was unsettling. Tanisha was a mage now although she was coming into her power she was far enough along on that journey of power that it would take significant damage to take her out of a fight. She was in pain, but she was no were near down for the count. She grit her teeth and pushed through despite the creature's attempts to silence and pin her down.

There was one final gambit and Tanisha took it without second guessing it. She bit the skinwalker’s arm, her sharp teeth tore into flesh but not as deeply as she would have liked. The skinwalker reared his hand back as Tanisha finally broke its grip and had enough space to strike back with the force of the Way of the Rakshasa. She punched the skinwalker in the neck seiðr exploded out from the impact causing a wound to open which finally forced the skinwalker to release her broken arm. 

Tanisha punched again this time at the creature's side which sent the skinwalker flying into the wall of a building. Tanisha staggered to her feet and took a lesser health potion from her inventory and drank it immediately. She winced as the bone in her broken arm reset and the skin healed. She watched the skinwalker as it rose to its feet from a crumpled mess. Tanisha looked at the arm she had bitten and it was slowly turning black around the bitemarks. The faux flesh it wore over its real form was already rotting away.

Venomous Fang

• You have felt the venom of your Familiar; it now courses through your veins. Your saliva carries a necrotic venom. As this is a shared natural ability you can not level this ability by any means but through communing with your familiar. This ability is tied to your familiar, should your familiar die or reject your bond you will lose this ability.

Venomous Fang was the only ability she got from Bjorn that she managed to unlock. She had no idea when she did it, but she suspected it when he had bit her during their fight with Thyra. She had run a test on her and Bjorn’s venom and found that it was not the same. Bjorn’s was far more potent than hers and seemed to attack the nervous system while hers attacked the flesh.

“Now,” Tanisha said as she rolled her neck. “Payback.”

The sound of their battle had not gone unnoticed and the patterning of metal boots against cobblestone streets was getting closer. Tanisha wasn’t going to wait for rescue however. She pulled her bardiche from her inventory and the weapon immediately glowed as her magic flowed into it. The glow dimmed as the weapon was fully inundated with the power and Tanisha readied herself.

****Author's Note****

Thank you for reading The Chronicles of a Scalebound Sage: Wandmaker! I’m excited to announce that the first book in the series, The Chronicles of a Scalebound Sage: Reincarnated as a Hydra Familiar, is being updated and is now available at the link below. The Second Edition includes significant new scenes, chapters, and characters that expand on the world and plot, though the canon of this book remains unchanged. It’s an exploration of ideas that enriches the overall story. I appreciate your continued support and hope you enjoy the enhanced experience as it continues!