Wish upon the Stars chapter 115 (Patreon)

Cark took the other Dullahan apart. We literally just sat there and  watched him slowly demolish the thing. The wights were downed fast  enough, and the others just came over to sit with us as we spectated. We  offered to help but Cark seemed pretty into it so we mostly just  enjoyed the show. Zeke hadn't been kidding about undead having a  weakness to fire, and given his high Might Cark was already the optimal  choice to take one of these things down.

As he fought, I  watched how he was moving, and it staggered me to see how different it  was from me. I had a bit of boxing knowledge from one of my minor  skills, but mostly my combat abilities came from tons of DS and  massively overpowered stats. I knew absolutely jack shit about fighting,  and it was never more apparent than when I watched Cark solo that  Dullahan bare handed.

When he finally finished prying the  warped pieces of armor apart with his bare hands we all made our way  over to congratulate him. "Damn man, you crushed that thing. If it was  as strong as the other one you are WAY more powerful than we are." I  hadn't actually asked what Carks stats were, but judging from that  showing I was guessing he really was HIGHLY specialized towards might.

He  just shrugged. "It was weird, I felt like the things were made of  like...concentrated darkness somehow. My flames seemed to weaken them.  But even so yeah, I'm almost positive your Might is way lower than mine.  Still, those things were no joke, glad you took yours down. Scared me a  bit there after you took that hit glad to see you're alright." He  clapped me on the shoulder before the others arrived to congratulate him  on the solo fight. That was fine with me because I still needed to  check in with my girlfriend. She'd been pretty freaked out there.

I  jogged over to where she was standing off to the side, and she fixed a  smile on her face. I just pulled her into a hug. I could see the  adrenaline draining away as she stood there and I wanted her to know I  was there for her. She clung to me for a minute before letting go with a  rueful chuckle. "Sorry, I know it's over but that was just...I've never  worked with a team before really, except people stronger than me, and  ever since we started working together we've been punching down. It's  just kind of a shock to see you take a hit like that."

I  shook me head. "No, I get it. Hell it kind of knocked me for a loop that  it happened too. I think I've been so focused on raw power I haven't  been doing enough actual training. When we spar its always with powers  and between stats and skills I kind of just brute force it. Can you  teach me how to actually fight? Like no skills or tricks just real  combat lessons?" I could have traded her for the memories, but then she  wouldn't have them. I didn't want to make her LESS able to defend  herself.

With skills losing progress didn't rank them down  so a bit of a hit here or there was fine, but losing your combat  ability would make you less able to fight, and while the skill portion  would remain able to synergize with other skills that didn't fix my  problem at all. She nodded, seeming a bit pensive. "Yes, but my actual  combat abilities aren't really that impressive. Much like most  Ascendants I tend to lean on my power way too much. I have an idea  though. I wish for the most in depth mastery of the most suitable  martial art for the two of us to learn."

I blinked. That was...really vague. But to my surprise after I saw the usual Wish Detected. Grant wish? and confirmed I was treated to the sight of. Stat  points sufficient. Requirements: 150 Might, 36 Impact, 104 Focus, 96  Creation, 75 Vitality. Skill name Lesser Balam Mastery. Compensation  required. I was just kind of speechless. That was...so fucking  many points. That was more than five hundred points for a LESSER skill.  "Ok. That actually worked...kind of. It's insanely expensive but...have  you ever heard of a martial art called Balam?"

Some part  of me was expecting her to gasp and put a hand to her chest, telling me  about the forbidden martial art she'd heard whispers of in the  underground when she'd been on the run. Sadly she just shrugged. "No,  sounds weird, but if you power says it's the best style for us to learn  then I guess that works. I assume I still require payment?" I nodded and  she blew out a breath. "Fine. I'm honestly shocked I was even able to  wish for that considering you were involved, I guess since it was my  idea it works. In exchange for the skill I'm willing to do everything in  my power to keep you safe and dedicate my time to training you in both  this martial art and any other combat style I know of until you surpass  me in skill. Does that work?"

I felt the electricity build  on my skin, signalling the beginning of a wish. I guessed that it did,  which was a relief because since I gave her the skill I wasn't sure it  would have value. Luckily as Benny and I had established training could  work, and I supposed the actual time expenditure counted as a payment if  nothing else, or maybe her other combat skills made a difference. It  clearly meant a lot to her that I was safe so that probably played into  things. I reached up and pulled my mask off and she looked confusedly at  me as I leaned forward.

I winced and whispered. "Wishes  like this are incredibly painful and obvious. Most of the team doesn't  know about my power, I figure if I kiss you to trigger it my mouth might  muffle some of the noise so the others don't notice." She looked wary  but didn't stop me as I leaned in and pressed my lips to hers. The  static flowed into her through my mouth and I felt the energy rampaging  through my own body, literally the most powerful wish I'd ever granted.  Callie bit off a strangled scream and bit INTO my tongue by accident, so  I wasn't exactly quiet myself but luckily we were a bit of a distance  away and no one noticed us seizing up in agony.

I  pulled away with a wince. I didn't know why I'd decided that would be a  good idea instead of like...covering her mouth or something, probably  some attempt to be romantic, but it had been a terrible decision and one  I definitely wouldn't make again. I had a big hole in my tongue now,  and I was going to need Jessie to heal it, because while tongue injuries  tended to heal pretty fast, they were also absolutely awful to sit  through and I refused to go through that if I had a choice. I left  Callie to get accustomed to her new skill while I slipped over to have  Jessie heal me up, which thankfully was fast and took relatively little  energy on her part and quietly so no one noticed.

Then  I made my way back over to Callie. I felt the geas on her slip into  place, a self imposed binding that locked her into her promise to train  me for as long as necessary and to keep me safe. The latter was less of  an issue since I believed she would try her best to do that even without  the binding, but still, I could see how this would count as payment for  that huge wish, she was basically my trainer and bodyguard for as long  as it took for me to get better than her at combat, potentially years  given that she was incredibly skilled in Balam now and would be learning  more even as I did.

Luckily  my girlfriend seemed more upset than regretful, I assumed that she  wouldn't have made the offer if it was something she couldn't live with.  I pulled her against me, letting her relax a bit without needing to  worry about standing up. It took her a few minutes to speak. "Ow." I  winced, I'd seen how much that hurt Benny. If anything she got off easy  because she was G rank, but still, I couldn't imagine having all that  information shoved into her head was comfortable. I just held her until  she was feeling better and pulled away gently. "Ok, now I get why you  decided to make sure they couldn't hear me."

I  massaged the roof of my mouth with my tongue, remembered pain making me  wince again. "Yeah, but I picked the dumbest possible way to do it.  Still, glad you're feeling better. So, what exactly is Balam? Is it  anything good? I've never heard of it but then again this is a pretty  small planet. I imagine I haven't heard of most martial arts. Can't tell  much about it from the name though. How does it work?" I was pretty  excited about the fact that this skill came essentially out of nowhere.  We'd just asked for something that would work best and got it. Granted  we'd overpaid a LOT for a Lesser skill, probably for that reason, but  still this was fascinating.

She  chuckled. "I actually have a bit of background info. It's a relatively  prevalent style among the dark elves. Mixes well with stealth. Mostly  striking and holds best used from surprise, though there's a dueling  component that's aimed at dual blades, sword and dagger specifically.  Still, it's definitely something we can get some serious use from. There  are even actual Masters and Grandmasters of Balam among the dark elves,  so the route to advancing it is established if we can get some  instruction later."

That  was a big deal. Skills in general were a pain in the ass to rank up.  Knowing this combat style had a carefully laid out progression was  extremely useful to us. Granted we would need to actually go and FIND  one of those Masters, but still, it meant one more skill we could  definitely rank up. The whole thing was incredibly interesting. I  couldn't wait to actually do some training with Callie and start  learning it. After a few minutes for her head to clear completely she  stood up, stretching a bit and right as rain now.

The  others had been talking to Cark the whole time, I was pretty sure at  least one of them had noticed us and figured they would leave us alone  for some private time. That was...slightly embarrassing given how  everything had just gone down, but better than anyone new figuring out  about my ability I supposed. Callie was blushing slightly, having  obviously picked up on the same thing. When we rejoined everyone else we  all just kind of acted like nothing had happened, and I was pretty  grateful for it.

We  kept walking along the marble corridor the same way we had before.  Callie and I searching for traps and enemies. We hit another few patches  of wights but nothing like the Dullahans again. H rank monsters were  easy enough to clear out without any G rankers to hold our heavy hitters  back. That went on for about two more hours before we finally emerged  from the corridor.We stepped out into a massive underground chamber the  size of the WCP back in Velan and all of us stopped at the entrance to  look around for any undead who might be waiting.

We  didn't see anything nearby, but off in the distance were the  unmistakable forms of lumbering undead. They moved in huge packs along  the floor of the cavern, with tombstones and much smaller crypts  scattered among them. In the middle of all of it was a black stone  fortress that towered above the entire area, barely illuminated by the  ghostly flickers of blue coming from some of the flowers among the  fields. I stared for a second before whispering. "Who wants to bet the  lich is in that fortress?" Oddly, no one took me up on the offer.