* * *

  Raising the spiritual dialog to the current maximum took almost a day and a half, which disrupted Stepan's pns for a quick start to his hike. He deliberately left this task for st, when there was nothing important or time-consuming to do. That's why he could afford to take such a massive package of knowledge as rexed and unhurried as possible. The transition to “advanced master practices of spiritual dialog” was one of the longest processes of assimition. It was longer and more complicated than closing a whole branch of suggestive knowledge he had once been given by the Autogoddess. He even took a break for the first time in his life, getting up for a drink of water or rinse his face right during the assimition, simply unable to stand the constant immobility, the continuous load on his consciousness.

  The transition to the master level was a qualitative leap but advanced mastery raised the bar even higher containing the experience of months and years of constant development, bor and work on oneself without sleep and rest, with the best teachers and no shortage of the rarest resources. Here we were literally talking about decades of exactly the same bor, only with even better mentors, with even greater investment of resources, with constant personal practice and their research, and, again, always successful and with the full support of the whole world. It's not even about knowledge and time, it's about the fact that it's almost unrealistic to get it in such a way as to be engaged in this knowledge alone. You will have to provide practice, patronage, work on orders, and just get everything you need for a step higher.

  He needed to, but not Stepan, who got everything for nothing. That's why every time he was startled and had a slight attack of impostor's syndrome, which, in fact, he was, having found himself in the pce of his unlucky namesake.

  The increased knowledge strengthened everything making it easier to communicate with spirits to the extent that one began to understand them even better than humans. However, Stepan had been haunted by this misfortune since his first contact with the natives, so it was nothing new. Improved understanding, the ability to give more subtle or grouped instructions in terms of meaning, - combined with the multiplicity of awareness coming to some kind of ultimate efficiency - a full-fledged opportunity to to form multi-step instructions without having to correct the spirit's actions every time the environment changes. Certainly not programming, we're still talking about possessors of completely illogical thinking, unless you specifically conjure the spirits of a machine with binary code, but it's still nice. Being able to give the spirits at least a few scripted instructions with variable solutions within a script is very powerful indeed. The young man has done exactly the same thing before, even with the same clearing, but there in the control of whole masses of guardian spirits and just the inhabitants of totems and totems helped, acting as a kind of spiritual anchors-servers-books, through which the spirits read the will of the shaman.

  And now he could do something simir, albeit weaker, without a totem, even if only when summoning protective spirits for a night vigil. Not to mention that this approach was quite multiplied if used simultaneously with those very totems. New types of negotiation, the ability to pressure, coerce, deceive, or even subjugate and brainwash an unruly spirit into obedience and service. True, with all the risks of sudden upheaval or breaking the subjugating chains of images. Methods of dialog with elders or even higher entities, and the former can be seriously called upon, even with high chances that it will be possible to agree and with an almost complete guarantee that it will be possible to part peacefully, even without an agreement. Ideally, it would also be possible to move the practice of calls up, so that you know not only how to say, but also what to say, give and demand, but it is still impressive. Making a separate deal with the same Sleepwalker is possible, especially reinforcing the Mark of Passions with a Patchwork Echo. Well, after Stepan had built himself a better clearing than the previous one, created a lot of protective circles, and also thought hard about whether he was crazy to summon this thing at all.

  Even the process of spiritual dialog itself is no longer exclusively shamanic knowledge. No, it was not. It has long since not been it in full measure, helping and in the directions of territorial magic, and the work of his own spirit, not called: in the same charms and suggestion, in healing and working with curses, in disguise and manipution of the aura. For the shaman, the spiritual dialog is, in essence, an analog of the control of magical energies, the same basic knowledge of high and cssical magic, with the help of it, too, you can control your magical energy. And in a way that is almost diametrically opposite - not by directing and weaving the energy itself, using nods and lines of the aura, but by spiritual dialog. Body pushing the aura, its nodes, and the magical power itself. It is difficult to weave charms in this way, although, it is possible: too different approach, loss of efficiency, but when working within the framework of wild magic everything is different. For a shaman, cssical spell weaving is like trying to type on a keyboard with the help of legs - it is possible, feasible, and with practice and quite effective, but why? Characteristically, the same pure witches can weave much easier, though more difficult, than wizards.

  Stepan did not suddenly become a great witch, a specialist in spiritual practices, a monk, or a spiritual chimeroid-chupacabra. He didn't suddenly become one. All sorts of little things, which are shamanism only partially, and sometimes even formally, he skillfully used in his favor since about the time of obtaining the tenth level and the transformation of the spirit, but now the little things not only ceased to be little things but merged into a monolithic block of understanding. Working with one's own spiritual body, through which one exerts influence through the reflection of reality in the images of High Spheres: on the world, on other people, on a certain territory or biome, or even on pure magic.energy - this is witchcraft in its essence. Stepan just uses it on the basis of shamanic practices, as if, yes, yes, typing the text with his feet, and it still works and works very successfully, to the envy of many adepts of witchcraft! He had not yet become a spellcaster or anything else, nor had he ceased to be a shaman, but, at the current level, it was simply impossible not to touch joint or close directions of development. Let the prism of control have exactly a shamanic paradigm and methods in the basis, but the fact itself is indicative - it is from this, as Stepan believed, and will arise the ability to choose a secondary css.

  Again repeating, this promotion did not reveal something completely new and unexplored, it brought to a new level all that he knew how to do before, only slightly diluting the increased basis with some individual techniques or methods. As usual, the charms pleased, especially those that can now be created without the call of spirits, trivially performing those tasks that used to do small or even strong spirits of the sensual sphere with aspects of passions. Curses and healing, which complement each other and are often the same action, are only performed in different ways and different types of implementation. Transmission of their images to the maximum distance, up to sending a message with spirits that will carry your words for hundreds of kilometers and directly into the ear of the person to whom he needs to say them. Or directly into the head, without using the ears or any other senses, exclusively ready-made images. Perhaps, even disguising your words as the thoughts of the person to whom you say them, as his or her own opinion.

  Obviously, he could also hide something unpleasant in such a message - preferably, of course, a charm or compulsion, given the shaman's specialization. Or he could simply open the transmission of the message to the outside, covering the whole city with it. And then it didn't matter whether the whole city would have a photographically accurate picture of the tits of the ruler's favorite wife, whether the evening breeze would whisper to them that they were all sodomites or whether their own shadows would come to life, and start making obscene gestures. In fact, jokes are jokes, but such a technique, amazingly useful for solving logistical or command crises and providing communication for an entire army, cannot be underestimated. Enemies of that army will surely appreciate it, trying to nail such a walking radio station first of all, if they are not idiots. And if they find out about the station. And if they survive the attempt to eliminate the station, which may well actively shoot back with a rge caliber and will hardly walk without a security entourage. However, there's no way Stepan will be forced to participate in hostilities with whole armies from both sides. This world, after all, was not his native home and city to be involved in local battles.

  He allowed himself to recover from the promotion for another twenty-four hours, just lying there, chewing dried berries bought from Kirik for the road, and doing nothing else. Only when the thought of getting up and walking, as in that biblical quote, did not make him sick and twitch in a fit of hysterics, did he set off. The forest in this region was, as Bastius and Cherz had told him, very rugged, interspersed with hills, rocky areas, brambles, swamps, and sometimes all of these at once. A rge number of small brooks, either flowing or going into underground caves, made navigation and routing even more difficult. Roads were absent as a css, and even animal paths were cut off every now and then near the next obstacle. This was supplemented by the regur occurrence of beasts, either very fattened and evil, or a little magical and therefore even more evil, as well as traces of the activities of green-skinned natives.

  Stepan deliberately chose safe paths using spirits to guide the way and thorough multi-component reconnaissance of the terrain with different types of sensors, so most of the likely opponents simply did not meet preferring to bypass them even if he lost some of the possible experience for the destruction of the predator. The few beasts that did encounter him would quickly retreat when they received a wave of terror and a desire to get the hell away from the man. With his current abilities and involuntary specialization in working with brains and feelings, such tricks were not only more effective but trivially more profitable than direct combat in terms of reserve costs. And yes, there was also the experience of turning the enemy into a shameful fleeing with feces dumping instead of heat traps, by the way.

  Stepan made an exception only for the one and only creature he met, which was some very unpleasant shit with the bloodthirst option pumped to maximum. Resembling an anteater but the size of a bison the creature even had a characteristic jaw, but the long, several-meter-long tongue with many spikes and hooks the creature was not used for eating ants. With this hose this creature drank blood, lymph, cerebrospinal fluid, and life itself from its victims and not only life, but also pain, because of which it deliberately prolonged the pleasure, pulling out the suffering on a tiny drop, savoring like a sweet treat. Paralyzed from a single touch of its tongue, living creatures died for a long time, sometimes for days, while the creature satiated itself or simply pyed if it was fed. It wasn't a vampire, not even undead, just a magical mutant with a body and aura like this, either created by a sick mind or a random mutation.

  Stepan sicced a specially summoned spirit-taxidermist on this stuff, pnting the summoned something directly into the half-corpse of the deer being finished by this natural sadist. The fight was bloody and quick. The body of the deer, driven by the will of an immaterial entity, was no longer afraid of paralyzing poisons, nor pain and ignored the already existing injuries of the physical body rapidly sughtering the creature with its horns and hooves, breaking both in the process. And then, having thrown off the deer's body and taking a semi-material form, the spirit, having the look-form of a skinless chimpanzee which instead of hands has paws like Freddy Krueger began to pull the skin off the still agonizing beast. The creature summoned by the shaman, which in fact was not dangerous to humans and did not hunt them at all, and did not fight with reasonable prey, having chosen unreasonable beasts as its target, pulled this skin over itself, covering itself in a bloody bnket, still oozing with scraps of poorly peeled meat.

  Right before the eyes of Stepan, who was half a kilometer away and who was looking at what was happening through the spy spirits, the material skin began to lose its materiality, stretching over the spirit that howled in delight, becoming part of its spiritual body and power, making it a little stronger. The howl, audible both in reality and in the spirit world, would have scared away all the animals in the neighborhood, but the sadistic beast had scared them away even earlier while he was eating a deer screaming in pain which even paralysis did not prevent it from screaming. And then the image of the skinned chimpanzee changed to the same skinned mutant anteater: this image would remain until a new summoning, until a new beast, which this entity would skin at the will and order of the summoner, taking the skin oozing with the remnants of life and spirit as a reward.

  This ugly csh which gave a crumb of experience and only wasted time was the only moment during which Stepan fought with the local fauna. And it was only because the clearly unnatural nastiness simply disgusted him and made him not want to see it again. Another thing, if you encounter not with fauna, but with inhabitants more reasonable, even if the mind is not very pleasant: the very traces of life activity of green-skinned goblins. The young man watched an anime dedicated to a specialist in neutralizing green and small threats, so he was not going to underestimate such an opponent. That's why he stayed away from them and did not forget to hide his footprints, both with spirits and proper movement. The combination of knowledge of the hermit and the agent allowed him to move carefully without leaving physical marks, even if he didn't use magic. It wasn't on the level of a tracker-raider with sharp ears and many hundreds of years of experience, but in combination with trail-mending spirits, who could even put broken twigs back in pce and splice them together the result was good enough.

  But he, as, had come upon these traces a couple of times. As a result, he acquired a strong antipathy to goblins, though not at the same level as that specialist in the extermination of the bearers of high culture. The gutted corpses hanging on the trees belonged to the same goblins as those who hung them. Three individuals were unrecognizable due to the ck of undamaged space on whatever skin they had not been stripped of. Cut out entrails and meat parts, which, most likely, were used for fodder, traces of diligent and very sophisticated torture, ears, teeth, and genitals cut off for ornaments - high culture, yes, yes. Stepan, who had learned too much about this culture while asking the spirits of the pce and the shadows of the murdered about the course of events and the reasons for such actions, was filled with this culture in his awareness.

  No mysticism, drama, thriller, or anything else unusual, just a competitive struggle between two medium-sized tribes of goblins, who had been conducting such forest maneuvers for not the first and not the tenth generation, and not even the goblin generation. The young man could try to avenge the cruelty against the sin if the sin didn't do the same when they managed to get a visiting hunter or a small group of them under the thumb of their hunters. No, they would have killed humans too, but there were no humans in this region, it was a "blind arm", nobody wanted to settle down, at most to set up a camp near the shore, while the leaky bottom of the boat was being repaired. And those who did settle could hunt goblins themselves, and sometimes they did.

  Stepan would have looked at it, suppressing the urge to vomit the spirit pnted in his body, and then left, but he had an assignment. A small one, not from the Autogoddess. It was even somehow honorable. To create three vengeful spirits out of three tortured and partially eaten individuals, which then will follow their executioners and killers, tormenting them with nightmares and sleep deprivation until the first new moon, and only the killers themselves and no one else. And when the moon disappears, having completely vanished from the heavens and not protecting with its radiance from the appearance of very specific and specifically specified entities these murderers-executioners-cannibals will be chewed. The assignment promised an increase in one random property to a new level, as well as an increase in affinity with the sphere of death and non-life, aspects of revenge and persecution. Experience, again, although it was promised to be a little, crumbs on the background of a possible increase in the property.

  The young man stopped at the meat clearing for two days. He carried a couple of totems from his buried rucksack, used some of the reagents he'd collected along the way, bought some from the store, and made a few protective circles - he was going to summon entities that were, to put it mildly, creepy - and then performed a careful and tense call, despite the simplicity of the ritual. The still-hanging, decomposing, and stinking goblins were the perfect medium for the invocation. Before the shaman's eyes the ritual and call during which the young man calling the spirits simply stood motionless pulsing with his spiritual body entered its final stage. A grayish-silver haze flowed from the bodies of the creatures hanging on the tree, forming into ghostly figures of sin and tortured goblins. Exactly the same gutted, tortured, and tormented, but in their empty eye sockets bzing with attention and malice, they twitched like puppets with cut strings, moving more and more vigorously, literally tearing themselves from the invisible chain, seeking to catch up, to tear, to torment just as they had been tormented.

  A trio of strong spirits, quite specific and very strong in the battle against those who have mortally offended their "bases". Even if there is a shaman or witch doctor in the tribe of goblins, and they can be found among goblins, he will hardly be able to fight off the guilty tribesmen, even if the hypothetical green callers notice their presence. The spirits drifted away into the darkness of the night, not paying attention to the exhaled shaman, who only after their disappearance allowed himself to leave the protective circle and begin to clean up their tracks. In a way, for any competent gifted person, such energetic cleaning is analogous to the rules of good manners, like cleaning up after oneself after a picnic. Then again, if you leave trash and beer cans behind, there's always the possibility that someone will cut their feet on a shard of gss or the sharp edge of a can of sprats. Or that the trashing freak will be found, if not by receipts for beer and chips, then by genetic analysis, and then shove the trash so deep into the throat that the proctologist will take it out. Stepan wouldn't be in much danger of the tter, the spiritual echo didn't leave traces, but he didn't want to become the cause of someone's death or injury after contact with aggressive energies, even if some goblin would be injured and then die ignominiously. There was a good chance that someone innocent and undeserving of death would get into trouble.

  Received: "a small spiritual-energy protection"; increased affinity with the spheres of death and non-life; increased probability of gaining knowledge and properties of the branches of spiritualism and necromancy.

  Acquired talents are added to the Pyer's overall Status.

  The aura twisted noticeably. It twisted as if shot in the back, but instead of pain the sensation of hundreds of prickly and rough cat tongues on thin bodies, on the naked spirit, and then as if drying from a hair dryer working at full power, simultaneously with a cooling fan, slight tingles of static electricity and who knows what else. Fortunately, the aura rearrangement was over faster than the shaman's patience, as he y on the damp and cool earth for a bit before he began to analyze the change in himself. The improved property made the young man less susceptible to various non-magical attacks of elemental and elemental nature: fmes, frostbite, steel cuts, thorns, and storm wind blows. All of these will become less threatening to life and health. Reduced risk of disease, reduced probability of getting struck by lightning, even if caused by magic, but not directed at Stepan, the ability to chase away evil spirits and small devils simply by their presence, even without the active influence of magic gift and with a completely empty reserve.

  The improved property was unimpressive, but the reason for that was definitely the low Resistance. Funny thing. To increase this property requires a high Spirit so Stepan could increase this protection to the third rank, at this moment. He could if he had a talent point and no pce to spend it. But the factor of strengthening the protection is not only Spirit but also Resistance and one without the second almost does not help. If he had at least five units of Resistance, then the protection, at the current level, would be no less useful than the same mark of the high spheres, and in several directions. As a defense, the passive property of covering from the anger of spirits, and the ability to rely on this protection when call, letting the spirit closer and not afraid of his blow. If the spirit is not too strong, of course.

  Stepan would have thought it was a hint from fate that he needed to pump up his resistance, but no, Resistance was still a low priority, along with Constitution. The bonuses of high Spirit simply override any benefits from a single property, which enters into a powerful synergy with Resistance. What interested the shaman much more was the very example of a property that requires one attribute to develop, but a completely different one to work effectively. Perhaps there were others like it among the choices in the list of talents, but Stepan hadn't checked the help on this particur topic tely, so he'd have to spend an evening working on the Status. It seemed to him, albeit unsubstantiated, that the very property of the amulet was calcuted on hybrid pumping of a warrior shaman, or even a warrior witch, a battle priest, or a very specific druid-werewolf, but there was obviously nothing to prove this idea. Only one's intuition and reliance on knowledge that did not give a clear answer were not considered as proof, as.

  The further road was not interrupted by any serious tasks or problems. If there were any, the shaman's skill of reconnaissance was enough for him to bypass them in a wide arc. The more problematic the problems the wider the arc was. Two System assignments were quite ordinary, one of which, a small one, he completed, receiving as a reward a sprig of some particurly funny and rare wood, and the second, a small one, had to be rejected. It was necessary to kill three members of the Bead's crew with three different types of curses of his choice, using only images of their auras and guiding spirits from memory. After raising the spiritual dialog to the current limit Stepan could perform this assignment, and it didn't even seem hard, but he, as before, preferred to reject immoral assignments from the System.

  Unlike Milf, system quests with the brown coloring of fresh shit didn't piss him off or annoy him. There was a sense of strict neutrality here, offering all bckness as only one of the choices while allowing for the other paths as well. Do you want to kill and curse those who did nothing to you for the sake of an extra boost to a random meta-skill? Well, you're your judge, and you'll have to answer to yourself and the world for what you do for the sake of power. The Autogoddess with mocking superiority offered no other options for obtaining her favor and at the same time paid much more generously. Perhaps it was because of his constant greed and attacks of doubt, because of the fact that sometimes he sincerely wanted to agree to her assignment, that Stepan was so angry. He realized that if she offered him more, even if it wasn't clear how much, but more, he would hesitate.

  He rejected two assignments from the Autogoddess, both small, with a light heart, not even reading too much into the rewards, only the conditions were enough. Stepan did not know or understand why the dy was so attracted to her chosen ones wonking on different parts of her body and did not want to know. It was not for nothing that Lovecraft wrote about the terrible truths the human mind could not bear. So he did not look for an answer to his questions, afraid to learn such truth and not to find what to do with this knowledge ter. And even more afraid of finding out that she was doing it for fun. Despite all her strength, power, and power over fate and the System. The tter, perhaps, would not be more frightening, but certainly more offensive. However, all the knowledge of the shaman, who could make sure of the competence of the System and those who interacted with it, said otherwise. No matter how strange such an entity was, no matter what its quirks were - it was useless to evaluate it by the standards of the human mind. A whale couldn't get into the skin of an ant, and a mortal was unable to realize the will of such an entity.

  The road was calm, even if tense, and once he even walked through a small swamp, crossing a long but narrow strip of mire, not without the help of several spirit guides looking for a normal path through the swamp. And where there was no path through the swamp, he simply deprived himself of weight and put the animal spirit of the water viper into his body, stepping calmly through the mire as if on road asphalt. The second swamp, also narrow and long, but much deeper, he crossed differently, calling the guardian spirit of this particur swamp and asking him for the right of way. One step, and he was at the opposite end of the swamp, stepping calmly and confidently. Without a third of his reserve, though, and having spent at least two hours preparing the ritual of passage with all the reinsurances. He didn't regret it. No, it wasn't an assignment from the System, he just wanted to experiment with controlled conditions, to feel what it was like to be pulled through the spirit world with his body, even if it was someone else's will.

  The sensations were extraordinary, indescribable, and completely "UH, BLEEP", and due to working with the spirit outside the body and the specific skills already acquired from this branch, I was able to understand much more than just a gifted or even not too experienced shaman. Not in vain for the transition itself gave the experience an order of magnitude more than the call and contract with the spirit. The bar moved forward, stopping at the border at three-quarters of full. Standing and wobbling a little on his toes, assessing the experience, Stepan suppressed the irrational desire to repeat the procedure two or three more times, intuitively realizing there would be no more such a big increase. At the very least, he would need to summon another spirit and teleport to other coordinates to avoid repeating, because the system doesn't like repetition without creativity.

  The third bog was no less revealing. He did not walk straight through it, for its location allowed him to walk along its edge without getting his feet wet. It was just that this mire was inhabited by very special inhabitants, dangerous and frightening. No, there were such in the st two, how could they not be, but the third time the Krakozabras differed in the fact that they were not alive. Undead, and quite numerous. Spirits scouts, spirits readers, and a few combat guards took up the task. Stepan summoned them not by contract, but from his own neckce, choosing the best avaible without the need to spend scarce contracts, and even stonewalling the summons on the fly with the possibility of stirring up the undead with his procmations. Of course, the reserve had to be drained to feed the spirits in the permanent retinue, but it wasn't much of a waste. The spirits collected images, talked to their swamp kin, and tried to see what had been here beforeю They being the elite of the elite in their rank of power and typification of aspects, they extracted answers quite confidently.

  Some retively rge caravan expedition had lost its way here long ago, many hundreds of years ago, no less, having wandered into these wildernesses, lost in the fog, and drowned in the swamp. Not without someone's help, because in the images the spirits captured there was a night battle, flying arrows, battle cries, and battle magic. The corpses of the sin were stripped, but not to the end, they stopped being just corpses at the beginning of the looting process, because the dying mage, definitely not the weakest, and also far from the light directions, being mortally wounded, put all of himself into the st exhation of the necromancer. The victors retreated, leaving some of those who had not had time to retreat and their dead to join the army of the dead, but the army went nowhere either.

  The mage must have messed something up or, most likely, did not have time, because the undead came out of him strong, but dumb, sluggish, and cking initiative, as well as the desire to leave the pce of death. And so, the undead fell into sleep stasis, only occasionally awakening from their slumber when they were visited. In time, the swampy lownd on which they had taken the st battle had sunk even lower, the shitty quality of the dirt road had given up under the pressure of time, and the swamp had taken its pce by the right of the one who came st. The creatures y there, gradually losing strength and becoming more and more lethargic, more and more sleepless. Some of them, most of them, were finally at rest. Some of them could still be awakened if they were awakened very diligently and deliberately. Some continued to wait for the occasional visitor, alive, breathing, and oozing blood. Sometimes they showed up. Sometimes the local natives, short and green, would bring in prisoners for a special execution. Most of the undead were either the strongest and now barely surviving ancient dead, led by those creatures that had risen from the gifted, or retively fresh goblins, which had not been completely eaten away and which had risen to join the ancient dead at the will of the undead mage.

  In fact, this small, but treacherous and deep swamp of four kilometers in diameter, contained about fifty constantly active creatures and twice as many creatures, which will awaken only if you literally fall on them. And an undead mage, who even now had lost almost none of his evil power and was still very dangerous. If it wasn't the ideal pce to gain experience and get more levels, Stepan didn't even know what that ideal was. Crification: an ideal for a cssic hero of isekai fantasy, who can't live without going where he is not asked and not called. The young man only scratched his head, cut out a small totem mark, cleverly disguising it, leaving it a kilometer away from the swamp, pcing it in an empty and abandoned hollow, and covering the hollow with a distracting ligature of signs from the inside.

  When he was done with his preparations, he picked up his backpack and went on his way, not even turning around and certainly not thinking of staging an epic battle here. Especially since he hadn't even been given an assignment. If anything, he would send a cohort of shock spirits against the undead with a whole host of supporting small things, when he would move far away and create a new clearing. Because he has no desire to go there now. It is unnecessary and useless risk. The undead is sitting quietly, does not go anywhere, and does not attack the shaman. Yes, he was almost certain that if he did his best and didn't skimp on the summons of powerful spirits and called Squidward, he could tear the enemy into a small British fg, but it was still a risk against an ancient and strong, albeit dumb, creature. A risk because he's not prepared to fight the undead in such an unpleasant biome. It's not a game to get into a conflict where there's a chance to die, even if it's not too big.

  Whistling a merry tune, the young shaman left the ominous swamp behind.

  * * *

  The chance to use the Mark and py with the swamp dead in Left to Die came about the sixth day after he had left the swamp. During this time Stepan completed another quest, that granted him a powerful and high-quality potion of aura restoration, which will be able to correct the consequences of very strong overstrained shells. He went around another goblin camp, seeing for the first time representatives of another race with his own eyes, albeit by means of a contracted spirit, and remained in the opinion that he would have been fine without this spectacle. He scared away some magical bird - a woodpecker, either naturally so gifted that magic in it was like in a good apprentice, or once shared a body with a spirit, which has long since merged with the occupied body. He almost drowned his spear in the mire, sticking it into the ground to wipe the sweat pouring down his forehead, not noticing how it went down. He had put the weight relief on himself and his burden, and the spear, no longer held in his hand, ceased to be perceived as a burden.

  The spring warmth was gradually being repced by the same spring heat, which made him want to strip down to his shirt or go for a swim. In one of the retively clean streams, the young man did just that, because cleansing from dirt and stench with the help of summoned entities was not refreshing and brain-clearing enough. The first buds were swelling on the trees, the first shy sprouts of grass continued to green up, and the cold earth was warming up more and more during the day. At such a rate, Stepan thought, he would soon have to not warm up his surroundings before going to bed but arrange ventition and cooling, a full-fledged air conditioner. The warming brought back the necessity to remember about all kinds of bites, which suddenly came to life and began to buzz around the shaman. In the sense of remembering that the spirit, which was engaged in the extermination of those who attempted on the young blood, asked to increase the rate a little. When he renegotiated the contract with this summoner, he came across such a remarkable pce.

  The hill was high, steep, and rugged on three sides, more like a rocky peak about fifteen meters high, except that on the fourth side, the north side, there was a convenient, though abandoned, path to the top. On the same peak there was a small shrine, also abandoned, but still bearing echoes of an old and powerful force, standing on a source of magic that was not too strong, but not weak either. The same Killer Moose's source was noticeably thinner. Actually, the source was not too strong only by the standards of the system's knowledge, being the most powerful one Stepan had ever met. The source had been abandoned for decades, perhaps a hundred and fifty years since this pce had been strengthened and pacified. The previously stabilized and cultivated stream was now polluted and became useful for magical practices, but nowhere near harmless.

  And also cursed, as evidenced not only by the characteristic energy pattern, as if powdered with ash and bck sand in spiritual perception, but also by the many bones of small animals, both on the hill-peak and around it. A pce of power wild, untamed, and far from high magic had once belonged not to shamans, but to witches. In the remnants of the former greatness, there was a feminine essence, closely intertwined with druidism and curses, even if there were no longer those who had provided it. Well, what greatness? Even when this pce was at the height of its power, hardly a single equivalent of a master magician had cast sorceries and spells here, the marks and imprints were too crude. More likely this pce was created and maintained by several generations of apprentices and adepts, maybe even two or three families. Five, at most six generations, deeper than that the young man and his scanning spirits could find no traces of the work of an intelligent gifted person.

  Before human witches came here this pce belonged to a typical guardian beast, powered by a source. No need to summon seer spirits here to recognize the long past. Still, the bones of this beast, something bear-like, were buried in the base of the shrine, and a skull, whitened and cracked, was perched on the altar's dais even after all these decades. Apparently, the same witches who had finally decided to move away from the inhospitable nd a hundred and fifty years ago had cursed their source. So no one else would have it, and also so something dangerous would not breed in this pce. Maybe they hoped to come back in five or ten years and continue practicing, but obviously, something went wrong and no one came here anymore. The curse grew and took root, becoming from a simple block preventing the use of the shrine to a really dangerous one even for the gifted who had created it, and the shrine lost the remnants of the powers and spells invested in it. Today, the foundation of the altar and the shrine only kept the source in check, preventing it from going completely feral, and also served as the basis for the curse that kept the remnants of the circuit from falling under its weight.

  The curse had a fairly standard structure. Staying in the affected area or connecting to a source infected with it caused the drain of power from the aura reserves and nodes, degradation of these nodes, as well as degeneration of the spiritual body. The approach is complex, genuine, and time-tested, just very strong due to so many years spent unattended and fueled by the shrine. Witchcraft tends to grow stronger with age, without the need to supplement or renew it, a kind of payoff for a coarser and more clumsy influence. Judging by the fact that the spirit watchers found several goblins and even one human skeleton among the tall and lush grass at the top of the hill, attempts to cultivate the pce by the local tribes had been abandoned long ago, but were regurly repeated. The st corpse had even retained the remnants of its clothes and a nice enchanted bronze dagger, even now shining in the spirit's eyes with a decent charge of magic.

  Stepan had no reason to go there, not even the slightest one. But the System was generous on the assignment and, what is very important, the assignment was average, not Autogoddess, and also quite feasible even without risks. The time limit of two weeks could be a problem, but not at the third level of System Quests, when the quest can be safely put on hold and properly prepared for its resolution. Nothing immoral, nothing guaranteed to be fatal, although with the risk of getting hurt if you are careless. Although, the young man was not going to go straight through in a paroxysm of pathos demolishing the billet long ago left this pce witches. This is the kind of assignment he likes, this is the kind of assignment he loves, this is the kind of assignment that gives him as many as possible.

  System assignment (average): to rid the old witches' shrine and its magical source of the curse, using any avaible means. For sufficient fulfillment, the curse can be dispelled by individual effects and piecemeal, gradually weakening the cursed background; for complete fulfillment, the curse must be removed by a single multi-step ritual on the first attempt; for perfect fulfillment, the curse must not just be removed, but transferred to an anchor in working condition (further use or discharge of the curse does not py a role in accomplishing the assignment).

  Reward: closure of current level, increased affinity with spirits of the spheres of Curses, Darkness, and Doom, increased effectiveness of all witch-type uses of the gift, one minor witch-type knowledge; when fully executed: two random meta-skills from the list of avaible skills will be raised to the current maximum; when perfectly executed: one random knowledge raised immediately to master rank.

  The only frustration is the ck of a chance to raise some stat by one, but even so, they offer a lot. And in this case, he knows exactly what to do and how to perform the task. For basic and complete execution, he could start doing it right now, without preparation, and with some chance of success. But for the perfect execution, he had to think about it properly. To think about which side to approach, because it was a very uncharacteristic request. He knew the base itself. He knew the mechanics of pulling the curse from the area and further use of the curse. To throw it at the enemy or seal it in a cy pot with all the necessary calls. But it is one thing to know the base, but to work with this base immediately at an advanced level, noticeably superior to that base - this is a completely different topic.

  First and foremost, of course, Stepan was concerned with protecting himself. Without a triple enclosing circuit and a couple of lightning rods for the curse that wanted to cling to his aura, he would never get to the active phase of the task. In the second pce, he thought about the process of "pulling the bnket": it wasn't just a curse on the ground, a typical afterthought of witchcraft practices, no. The curse was clinging to the source and the shrine at the same time, at the same time feeding from them and spreading over the hill not as a bnket, which would be so easy to "pull off", but as spiky iron chains-tentacles, spiraling from the center of the shrine and clinging to the world itself with these spikes so tightly that it could only be torn from the root and in pieces. If the young man had been a witch-spellcaster, he might have had an easier time, of course. But if he were, for example, a cssical mage of a high school, he would not even start simultaneous removal, if there is no specialized knowledge in malefic skills at the master level: too many individual elements and influences will need to be carried out at once, synchronously and without pauses, in a clear order.

  Fortunately, he was still a shaman, and therefore, even without highly developed skills of territorial work, he could ensure the synchronization of many influences and compensate for the ck of profile knowledge with a special spirit, even a strong one, or even a couple of them. There was still a question of dragging the curse, of redirecting it away from himself, at this moment, looking at the bones hidden in the grass that had already turned yellow, despite the off-season, the shaman remembered that swamp with the undead slumbering there. He remembered the knowledge that corresponded to the principles of simirity, it became clear that the aspectual connection of death and non-life can attract the curse to itself like a magnet if you try hard enough to push the curse. And the undead unleashed from the chain and put into overdrive would eat the curse at once, and then disintegrate without the support of the source.

  At the same time, and extra experience, and the opportunity to destroy the dangerous stuff, which could destroy a standard traveler if he happens to be in that swamp, and deactivate the curse! With such an approach Stepan would feel like a young hero doing socially useful work. Again, no harm to anyone, but only good. Only the undead will get the rest. But for them, rest can also be considered a positive outcome. Especially if the undead are unintelligent and unable to move, sticking in their swamp for centuries, unable to leave it even for a moment.

  "Well, we'll be dealing with the toxic waste disposal." The shaman stands up from his meditative stance, calling back the scouting spirits, and begins to look for a pce near the hill, but not within the curse. There he would erect a full-fledged call circle, albeit a small one, sharpened for one specific task. "It will even be possible to make a fortune out of it in the future. Do you have problems with the cursed nd? Then I'm coming to you! Hmmm, no, that sounds a bit too ominous... we'll need to hire a marketing person."

  The first thing he did, even before he started working on the shrine, was to make a beacon for redirecting the curse from the marker totem still lying in a hollow tree six days away from the shrine. He created several new totems, as many as five, from scratch by purchasing reagents through the Store, and then he transferred two of the finished pieces through the spirit world to the hollow tree. The method of transfer and the spirit transmitter were the same as during his vengeful visit to old Rumorias, only now the young man was not leaning on his clearing, which was too far away from this pce. But the earthling had become noticeably stronger, so it turned out to be just as difficult, but still doable, and the spiritual arms ached as if the bones absent in the phantom body were aching.

  In addition to pying with the hollow tree - and yes, Stepan understood exactly how it sounded even in his thoughts, and for a moment he was afraid that he was turning into a second Stepan - he was also engaged in the creation of a very rge-scale protection circle and call pce. He bought various types of materials for totems, mostly wood, but also stone and bone, and a lot of cy. Of course, he didn't order a full trunk of a hundred-year-old white birch tree growing on a magical source with rare characteristics, although the stock was enough for several of them, but he didn't take cheap ones either. If everything worked out, the successful closing of the quest would not only return his expenses, but also multiply them, up to the point where he could start buying not just anything, but items from special offers.

  The basis for his future interaction with the hill was a small circle at the foot of the hill right on the border with the curse line, securely fenced in four yers, with a diversion for a possible curse attack if it turned out to be more difficult than it seemed, as well as an evacuation half a kilometer away in case of emergencies. Equally important was a molded model of the original shrine made of a special liquid stone, the rapidly cooling va that nearly burned his eyebrows. Luckily, it was not complicated in appearance. Just a ft stone altar the size of a school desk, with an elevation wall at one end, where the sinister bear skull, whitened by centuries of sinister bear skulls, still y, and a simple circle of stones. The usual spell-bound cobblestones the size of soccer balls that had previously served as homes for the entities summoned by the witches. They were lousy shamans if you compared it to witchcraft, but they could do something, except that there weren't any spirits living in those stones anymore. Either they had been banished by the curse, or they had left on their own, or, more likely, they had been taken away with them when the altar was being preserved, because spirits, unlike a temple or a witch's control over the nd, could be transported to a new pce of work.

  The model was gradually becoming more powerful, changing its reflection, becoming identical to the original, and allowing not only to influence the original but also to observe its structure and reflection in the spirit world up close and without having to walk the cursed hill. The shaman's defenses effectively cut off the curse's attempts to cross over to the copy, extending its influence. It was also a test to see if the curse was based on some invisibly sleeping spirit deep within the temple. That one would have acted smarter, if only by instinct, but here there was neither instinct nor intelligence, only the primitive algorithm of the self-sustaining structure of witchcraft, analogous to the principle of combined vessels. This calmed the paranoia, though not completely, and also finally determined the methodology of further actions, the very approach to the process of deactivation of the shrine.

  The next move on Stepan's part was another powerful protection, only much rger, surrounding the entire hill, that is, about two hundred meters in diameter, stacked and outlined strictly along the curse line. It was a bit more expensive in terms of resources and required activating the reserve refresh twice to power the circuit at once, without leaving any weak points and sck in the construction. The young man was tired, but now he could activate a special circuit at any time, pure witchcraft, albeit done by summoning fifty lesser spirits of simir specialty. This circuit allowed him to walk freely on the hill without disturbing the curse or being perceived by it, without having to renew his defenses or the corresponding summoning time after time. He would still use and update it, of course, but this move would simplify his task by allowing him to allocate his strength, reserve, and concentration to other areas.

  During this time, the young man in passing completed a small assignment to summon spirits of a certain specialization, without even bothering to pick up the material reward, immediately ordering the spirits to throw a bundle of magic tobacco into one of the sacrificial fires, supporting the main summon, which also liked such a gift. The contract was concluded several times faster and with less waste of reserve, so it was not in vain that he accepted this task. In fact, he had started the summon a little earlier than pnned because he knew how much the spirit would like the reward for the assignment. Stepan also had to save himself the trouble with a small goblin group that had gotten too close to the cursed hill. The sent suggestors told him they had simply decided to cut through the dry and hard ground as there was a rainfront in the forest, but the young man didn't need that kind of neighborhood. The same suggestors convinced the goblins that it would be better to go through the rain, but it would be faster to get home, and they took the new route without even thinking about the reasons for such an action.

  Having seen off the ugly and ugly as the inner world of the deputy with the eyes of his spirits, the young man continued his work without paying any attention to the rain. The protective circuits diverted the drops, thunder, and wind, creating a small eye of the storm with the shaman and his target in the center. About an hour and a half after the end of the storm, in the middle of the night, when the young man had completed the first of the call, which was exactly the final stage of the curse removal, the System obligingly told him that if he continued in the same vein it would automatically remove the quest from the waiting list and start counting down. The young man shrugged recognizing the fairness of such a question, but he had already made the most of the pause. He decided to start the main spurt with a good night's sleep, so he covered himself with a dream diverter and fell asleep, soundly and peacefully.

  He had already forgotten that strange moment with an incomprehensible awakening, after which he dreamed of tits and strange eyes for another half an hour, and bmed it on some aggressive spirit of dreams trying to give him a wet fantasy, or a nightmare, or a wet fantasy nightmare. He had forgotten, but he kept the precautions he had set for himself without fail, and so he hardly dreamed at all during those nights, and if he did, they were just dreams, almost as dull and monotonous as his life on earth.

  The morning started not with coffee, but with a new batch of hard and demanding work. Pulling a quest from the waiting list, he activates it, and next, he starts working on its finale. First comes the summoning of the whole pack, just not together, but one by one, the younger spirits supported by a separately summoned strong leader. Actually, the main one was summoned first, after helping to pick his team and drag them into reality as quickly and cost-effectively as possible for both the shaman and the foreman himself. Their joint call really did save lots and lots of time, and all it took was sacrificing some pure dwarven vodka to the spirit. In general, any strong drink would do, but the stronger the drink was, the better it suited him, and the store's certificate stated that in the concentrated and undiluted state, this dwarven vodka was stronger than even pure and one hundred percent alcohol. Some form of magic-alchemy if he understood everything correctly.

  The spirits belonged to the animal sphere, looking like a mixture of worms and caterpilrs, like silkworms. They were indeed silkworms, damn them. Covered by the huge circle and protected from the curse and the shrine, they began to weave their threads. The curse, as the shaman had already noted, resembled not a weightless shroud, but spiraling spiky chains or ominous tentacles embedded in the earth and stone of the hill, in the very fabric of Reality, refusing to be torn away. This is where the caterpilr threads came into py. Seeing the reflection of the curse through the spheres, they braided each tentacle with their threads, wove a whole cocoon, and fastened the ends of the threads in the center of the call point, hung on the central totem. As tall as Stepan's neck, as thick as a log, but made of cy, like a giant pot without a neck, all in patterns on spider and thread themes, the totem was ideal for this task, because it was created for it. The only disadvantage was that it was disposable, but he believed it would never need a second time.

  The next move was to work at the top of the hill. Here he had to call a full-fledged team of masters of working with curses used to working in a coherent structure. There was no prior agreement or even acquaintance with them, so he had to call them on the spot reinforcing the call with additional offerings and hoping for his protection. Two shapeless blots, capable of absorbing the manifested curses feeding on the distorted energy of such influences, showed themselves quite normally without problems making a deal, but the st of the three, the strongest, began to be expectedly weird. The young man knew he was going to freak, he had prepared for it, but he was still angry. In his spiritual vision, the asshole seemed to be a small legless dwarf with seven arms of five joints each, each with many fingers, but their number could not be counted, as if it was constantly changing. And to each finger was attached a thread, also silk, and each thread could be a whip, a noose, or a guide for suggestion.

  The spirit haggled fiercely and fascinatingly, showing in every possible way that he was already ready, already agreed, just charging the price, while he quietly braided the shaman standing in the protective circle with a multitude of threads invisible even in the spiritual vision (if it was not strengthened in advance and properly adjusted), climbing into the ears, nostrils, even eye sockets, into the very brains. So in the end the most favorable deal seemed to be giving half of the body of a newborn offspring ter, half of the gift and a hand now, and the task became one big nothing. Actually, the essence had accomplished its task, braided the shaman and bound him, began to suggest and suggest... only to see the shaman crumble to the ground in a pile of st year's leaves and clumps of web binding it, revealing the real shaman stood in the shadow of his image, literally in the spatial fold created by the activated anteroom.

  To the credit of the multi-armed, multi-fingered creature, it immediately tried to flee, howling angrily in spiritual dialog, feeling cheated of its best feelings by such a dishonorable approach to call. Stepan was unimpressed, restraining, binding, entangling the creature in its own threads, which it fed to the created spirit of the dark side of nature - the usual strong entities, not That One - in the guise of a deception, quickly and reliably swaddling the overly cunning freak, and then shackling him with the most rigid contract of obedience. Stepan did not hesitate to use his own dirty tricks. The very images-communication, which actually wash the spirit's brains, yes, combined with rigid for the subordinate and maximally streamlined for the subjugator contracts... the Multiarmed spirit got in trouble.

  To be honest, the young man deliberately showed himself a little weaker than he really was and hid most of his protective circles in the same Anteroom. Without such games, the spirit would also agree to the deal, but he was frankly disgusted to overpay the creature, which necessarily demanded a broth extract from boiled children's fingers, and preferably children, who could not even walk yet. Yes, he would have easily bought such a specific reagent through the System. He would not have had to dirty his hands and engage in a very difficult process of cooking, but he did not even think in this direction. There is a limit to the flexibility of his character and principles, at least for the time being. He'd rather start performing the assignment of the Autogoddess. And so all decency is observed and all his retinue was a witness to the fact that he was the first to be attacked, and he only self-defended. Again, the task of this spirit would be the most risky, very likely to guarantee disembodiment in the process, so he would still have to py unfairly, subduing the spirit so at the crucial moment he could not refuse to fulfill even almost suicidal orders.

  Or even without almost.

  Stepan does everything possible to achieve this “without almost”.

  For the third stage, he also summoned a spirit. Only one. It was a very strange spirit, strong but not particurly strong, far from an elder, but with a very good combination of aspects, exotic properties, and the ability to do what he was told. He was also a popur spirit, often called upon to fight curses. He specialized in them. And not just any kind of curses, no, this exotic was able to cleanse not just the territory or a single person, but magical sources. For such a contract he could come to the same Angry Tit and ask her mother to rent her daughter's ass for six months. A Senior Shamaness on the verge of higher would have understood the value of the contract perfectly well. And he wouldn't have been sent and killed immediately, but simply asked to discount the price or at least agree to two dozen sve girls. Well, he's predicting, not certain. He has no idea anything about the family retions of that stupid degenerate, just ironic, not to mention a bunch of ways to pressure and force him to share the contract without paying anything at all.

  The fact is that for a shaman such a contract is not that valuable, given his nomadic lifestyle and ck of his source. He can't get this bird to serve him permanently due to the ck of offerings and authority. It is a very free-spirited spirit, who, like the Fugitive, comes only for one-time deals, even if he always fulfills them perfectly and understands what is wanted from him very easily. Stepan, since he had taken to calling it and knew a suitable call, managed to agree on two calls, but the waiting period was only two years, and then, even if the second call was not spent, the spirit would consider itself no longer obliged to anything and owed no one. And yes, the entity looked small, miniature even, a bird like a hummingbird, only with the difference that the wings left behind a luminous line in the air, and so not distinguishable from an ordinary bird: the spirit is so dense that visible even by ordinary sight and can be felt by physical touch. He, by the way, loves those touches too. It is the inheritance of the essence of a real bird, not otherwise, because why else would a spirit like to have its feathers scratched?

  The st stage required another summoning of a strong entity reted to paths, roads, and distance, as well as curses and doom, accommodating very diverse aspects into a single entity. All it takes are pieces of road signs from nine crossroads of roads where no one has walked for years because those who have always passed there die from fangs, bdes, charms, or curses. Without the presence of a store, you couldn't call such an individual, unless there is a whole network of agents who are constantly engaged in the search, as well as the purchase of such specific reagents as well as expeditions to the Dead Lands. Any strong Shaman, Senior Shaman, has such a network of miners by default, but the earthling is still a System case. And yes, the spirit could be pcated with more direct offerings, pure reserve, and dialog skill, but with difficulty and the risk that he would get bored at any moment and leave without saying goodbye. Maintaining the correctness of summoning and sacrifice, it was possible to almost effortlessly pay for a dozen indefinite summons, one for each piece of the pointer and one more on top of it managed to bargain away. And it seems that the shaman and the spirit thought that they favored each other with the payment, while their opponent cheaped out.

  It's fun.

  The System gave him two weeks to complete the assignment, but Stepan got to the curse removal on the ninth day, having had time to admire the next wonking assignment from Milf, as well as to estimate the special lot offered by her. A small vial, inside of which sat a completely transparent spider of a very strange material, in fact, ether acquired the physical form and weight, which had to drink a drop of his blood to bind to himself. This spider, completely magically inert, able to completely ignore even extremely exotic top-level defenses, was nevertheless very fragile physically. So, having gone through all the traps in the private chambers of some elven queen, it could die if stepped on with a slipper.

  The crap gets into the ear, nostril, or any other part of the body, loses materiality, and connects to the brain and aura, and then through it, you can broadcast your thoughts and desires so that the victim considers them her own and finds no reason to think otherwise. It is almost unreal to detect the intruder, unless you organize deep magical scanning of the victim, literally by a thread through the entire aura and body, and the victim will certainly not be able to cope, will not even look for it, and if it does, it will forget-not-notice the found at the same moment as it finds even a shadow of the spider's trace. In fact, a ready ticket to the head of even a magister, but only of the opposite sex to that of the spider's controller. Strangely enough, but here Stepan thought for a couple of moments, because the idea of getting his own female magister at his disposal, and really with a guarantee and almost complete control... tempted him. It was not the idea itself, or the Autogoddess, but both at once.

  The only thing that stopped was the immorality of the approach and the unwillingness to spend all the resources on purchases until the mission on the quest was over because everything could go wrong leaving the young man with an empty account and at a broken trough. The control from the spider was still not absolute, especially over the strong gifted. It was necessary to influence gradually and carefully, little by little germinating this control to complete submission. And simply, wouldn't the doctrine of pumping of the Autogoddess go where it put his, Stepan's, nerves and faith in the divine pn?

  In any case, by the time he started, he was fully prepared and enthusiastic. Meditative tranquility enveloped the shaman sitting in lotus posture, stripped to the waist, wearing only light cloth pants, with a spiritual imprint bubbling up and down around him. All this is covered with its radiance by the st rays of the setting sun. And so, when the darkness had taken its toll, hiding the world in its embrace, Stepan abruptly and decisively left the chat room. That is, out of the body. He left, but kept control over his body, allowing him to get to his feet and with a wave of his hand - just reflexively, he didn't need it - to light twelve fires, closing them around the hill. The st one, the thirteenth one, is lit above the shrine, three meters above the top of the hill, rising a little higher, somehow burning even without wood, without smoke, without anything, only there, in the depths of that fire, you can see burning bones, many, unbelievably many bones. The bones of the sin beasts, birds, goblins, and a lone man also fly upward, rushing toward the fme hanging in the air, instantly burning in it, taking on a ghostly form, and increasing the brightness, size, and number of fming bones, at the same time binding, restraining, exhausting the manifestation of the curse on the old shrine.

  A few more spirits of night darkness, true eaters of light itself, circle the hill, consuming the light of fires so half the region won't be pleased with the night's fireworks. Still, one of the highest points in the county, everyone can be seen from here, and everyone will see the illumination as well. The summoned spirits of other specialties do not sit idle. They dampen the magical echoes, hiding the ritual and its properties. Just in case. There seems to be no one here, but isn't the best hiding pce for those who don't want to be found? The whole world is looking for some poor guy, let them keep looking, but not here because Stepan is here. Again, goblin tribes have their own shamans, and there, no matter how weak they are, a powerful ritual can be sensed, if not by them, then by one of their contracted spirits, simply due to the theory of probability.

  The young man controls his body like a marionette pyer, guiding his feet up the hill. He is inaudible, barely audible issuing a deep throaty chant. In reality, it is almost inaudible, but in the spirit world, on the contrary, one has to keep this call-order from being released too far away, to hide it and redirect it toward the center of the shrine rather than outward. He is unhurried, even slow, as he treads carefully along the wind-scraped stone path, which in some pces becomes a stone staircase, climbing to the top, to the shrine he knows so well, seeing it for the first time up close, but knowing it, perhaps, even better than those who created this pce.

  The decisive stage. His first step begins at the same time as he freezes in front of the altar stepping inside the stone circle and pcing his hands on its rough and unnaturally cold surface staring with the sightless eyes of a discarded body into the empty eye sockets of the monster bear's skull. The curse is at its peak here. It's trying to push through the defenses the young man had put on himself and the entire hill at once, trying to no avail, but still eating away at the drop of strength. Sensing the cold tentacles of old witchcraft cwing at the protections raised by the pair of spirits the shaman smiles a stingy grin activating the central totem. A multitude of images of spiders on it. Spiders go through countless threads and strings and begin to come to life, running in circles, attracting more and more already quite visible threads that a second earlier existed only in the spiritual image. A moment, a second, a third, and then a sharp jerk, with which the hollow totem begins to crack, but now in the light of the fires and the darkness of the night even darker areas are visible as if hooked long tentacles of many meters, chains with mangled spiky links, dozens of them, only a little less than a hundred.

  The outward manifestations of the curse have been taken away. They hovered in precarious real estate, ready to either snap and cling to the ground and stone again, or to burn in active defense, or... or to follow whatever pn the young man had in mind, striving for the perfect fulfillment of his task. A second move and two ghostly lumps of energy dive into the stone circle, crawling from one stone to another, isoting the altar of the abandoned shrine, cutting it off from its power over the hill and its nd, cutting it off from the main body of the curse, causing a conflict, a resonance, an imbance that worsens with each passing moment. Had the young man not prepared properly, this moment could have been a dangerous one. The detonation of the curse would not cause an explosion, but the energy riot would be loud and powerful. It would seriously hurt if it were not for the thunderbolt defense, which would transfer the flow of cursed witch power from the "explosion" directly to two more small totems, in which he caught many small evil spirits, which are certainly not sorry.

  However, this precaution has not been of any use so far. The tiny Multiarmed spirit bursts forward giggling, seeing there, in the depths of the altar, his salvation and revenge, all he needs to do is to touch the curse, touch it, and tear it out, tear it out, tear it out, tear it out! The spirit, shackled and deceived by the cunning chains of images, does not realize that he is doing someone else's will, that all his pns and designs are cut short at the very " tear it out", because there is nothing further for him. A multitude of fingers and seven hands seize the core of the curse, which seems to the spirit's gaze to be a solid lump of bck dirt and press it against itself. The spirit did not realize that it was gone, enjoying the accomplished goal, enjoying revenge on the vile shaman-deceiver who had allowed himself to be stronger than he appeared to the spirit, falling into this lump and only feeding it with his spiritual body, which instantly disintegrated into the same bck filth.

  The two blotches abruptly stopped their clockwise circling and began circling counterclockwise, still within the stone circle, causing a well-directed and powerful surge of power, forcing the hovering core of the curse to fly upward, in company with the tentacles still held in the silkworm cocoon. Two of the three anchors have been removed, but there remains the most important, the st one. The one that sits in the very source of magic, that will revive the curse, albeit in a weak and incomplete version, if left so, that will repeat this revival a dozen, and a hundred times, if the root of the evil is not removed. But Stepan, who wishes to maximize success, cannot allow such an outcome, therefore he does not. From his phantom hand, not fleshly, because both real hands are still pressed into not just cold, but literally icy surface of the altar, no, from the phantom-spiritual palm flies a bird, scarlet even in the darkness of the night, not glowing but still incredibly colored.

  The hummingbird goes down to the base of the stone peak, where the source of magic is hidden, full of the stone's power, the winds, and, perhaps, the darkness of the night. That's why the ritual is happening now. That's why he purifies this foulness precisely on nights, to give some percentage of the effectiveness. The shaman does not see this battle, he only senses the echoes, helping the bird with the infusion of the reserve, activating the replenishment, spending strength to keep the tentacles and the core on weight, and only when the bird, shining even brighter than before, flies out of the stone altar, singing something cheerfully and immediately disappearing when he felt how freed and began for the first time in these decades to ignite not cursed source of magic, he makes the st order.

  The skull of the bear, as if looking at the shaman, who was almost lying on the altar, burst into sparks, also ascending to the bone fire bzing over the hill, burning and releasing not the spirit, but the shadow of the presence of the past guardian of this pce, which, at st, finds the long-awaited, if not peace, then vacation. And then, another moment ter, at the pce where the skull was, it is as if an invisible magic door opens. This door isn't there. It can't be seen by ordinary eyes, it can't be discerned by the standard spectrum of magical vision, but even an ungifted moron would understand - it's there. It was there. It led, but only something cursed and damning could pass through it, and the shaman, having used the replenishment for the second time, literally threw the tentacles and core through this door, almost falling on the altar, which is no longer ice-cold, becoming back a simple stone. This throw was supplemented by the patiently awaiting spirits, which corrected the flow of resonance, directing the core to the door, and the silkworms sitting in the disposable totem, pulling the threads and pushing the tentacles into the passage, and even the shaman himself with spiritual limbs wrapped in protection and amulets.

  two points

  two doors

  two connections

  In an instant, the curse in all its splendor, even becoming stronger, absorbing some of the power of the shaman, his spirits, and source, is six days away from the hill, right next to a swamp with a sinister secret. And at that moment, a white rag flew out of the hollow totem, as if covered in blood stains: a spirit with aspects of bait, permission, purity, and even innocence, but like a magnet for all evil witchcraft. The whole mass of the curse rushed after the bait, diving into the swamp and merging with that swamp. There, deprived of nourishment, the curse begins to look for new sources of power for itself, and very ancient, extremely stupid, but still active or at least hibernating undead for this curse is also fodder, only worse.

  The spirit watchers see the epic battle took pce beneath the bubbling mire: the dead mage was the only creature in the swamp that could have resisted the curse, but he was critically cking in brains. He just started hitting in all directions with primitive necrochars until he used up his reserve, and then he died. By that time the rest of the undead, as well as the few living creatures that still lived in the dead swamp, had, by some misunderstanding, successfully become just perfectly preserved meat from centuries ago in the swamp sludge. That was the end of it, and Stepan admitted to himself that he really could have safely cleaned this pce back then, the first time, nothing dangerous threatened him, except for his stupidity. On the other hand, an over-insurer could be frustrated by his excessive over-insurance only if he stayed alive.

  The level closed at the expense of the task, giving him the twenty-third step, and the destruction of the undead immediately raised the experience bar on the twenty-fourth level to two-thirds. He'd expected the Autogoddess to be silent, but no. She'd given him something he didn't understand yet. It wasn't bad, although some part of Stepanov, some part greedy and hungry for freebies, was hoping for another " act", but, on common sense, there was nothing extraordinary in what he did in this situation. Yes, lots and lots of undead, that was a fact, but they were all tied to the pce, old, slow, without a normal guide so they couldn't leave the swamp. He could shoot them from the very beginning as if in a shooting gallery, only that instead of bullets there would be summoned spirits, and except for the magical dead there was no opponent for him.

  The young man, who had left himself about a third of the reserve, turned over tiredly on his back, lying down right on the ancient shrine, where they must have slit the throats of hapless victims more than once, smiling and almost ughing. In the darkness of the night, the fmes that hung in the air were extinguished, the bone fire died with the curse, the curse disintegrated with the st undead that fed it, and then the other twelve fires went out in one second. The young man allowed himself a few hours of not even meditation, but simply lying on the altar, insuting himself with the lone spirit of the fme, warming the stone, and protecting himself from the night frost. Then he got up and began to do his work.

  First of all, he paid off the contracts released the spirits that were not useful, cleaned up the traces of the ritual, and even summoned again the woolen ball, to clean up all traces of the environment from the spiritual world. The second summoning, no longer a full contract, but just a few individual jobs he took on, cleaned up the traces of purely magical ones. The spirit also looked funny, a kind of very small elephant, greenish in color, and not just a beast, no, it was made of bread crumbs and chocote, and the spirit itself was amazing. And he did not shut up while he was working, literally spamming around his images, completely meaningless and fucking unnecessary. But he worked hard, making the pce noticeably cleaner in an hour and a half, even if he didn't clean everything completely, but for a rural area where no one had met anyone for years, it would do. Stepan would also summon a couple of spirits ter so the brightest afterbears of his duel with ancient magic would be eaten. At this the young man let himself exhale, breathe again, and then sat down under the hill, connecting to the source. Not seriously, but in a small way, only slightly speeding up the replenishment of forces, not pumping them into himself. He would do it in earnest ter after he had accepted the rewards for his accomplishments.

  Closing his eyes, the young man goes deep into himself, accepting another gift from the Autogoddess, already guessing what exactly she saw fit to reinforce to him.

  Received: "masterful techniques of shamanism-based suggestive influences".

  Received talent is added to the overall Pyer Status.

  To be honest, he'd expected the charms to pump first, but what did it matter in the end? Although, alright, it was worth admitting that he regurly and extensively used Suggestors in his various endeavors. Also a considerable part of the spirits of his retinue and temporary contracts, of those that can influence brains and confuse thoughts, still revealed to him part of the blocks of knowledge precisely due to the work with suggestive directions. The already amazingly developed knowledge at once reached a new level, reaching mastery, comparing with call practice, giving out new and new possibilities, a considerable part of which is worth seeing in a coffin, but a part, a part can be used. And a lot of it, yes.

  The list of contracts and contacts had been updated with a whole plethora of spirits, including even the elder ones, who could now come at his call with almost complete assurance. A perfect flow of images and a list of offerings, a method of feeding them and bargaining. Of course, the Autogoddess did not do without the representatives of the spheres of feelings, passions, desires, and other vulgarities specific to the Autogoddess, like that strange call that could make a woman (or a man, but let's not talk about that) behave in a way that is considered in the generally accepted rumor concerning the intimate affairs of the representatives of her profession, css, race, species or rank. It is believed in the territory of some cities that cat dies are amazingly lustful and at the same time dream of getting into the pants of a rich man, having settled down as a trophy girl (this is for example, because Stepan himself did not have such knowledge), and the victim of this spirit will start behaving like that. Literally, the more she can't stand such rumors, opinions, snted gnces, and everything simir, the more happily she will fall into the enclosed image. Exotic and rather imperceptible influence, quite on the level of the same Sleepwalker, though lower, and also more obvious, more noticeable simply by the behavior of the changed one.

  Or, for example, that call of the spirit, which covers a whole house, a mansion, or a small castle, but not a pace or a fortress, and not belonging to a person of royal or ducal blood, after which everyone in the building begins to loosen up, to experience and express their most secret desires, and at the same time to feel on the level of intuition the same desires of all those who are nearby. Of course, this is not intuition, but the spirit broadcasts into the heads of all its victims simultaneously and live. The victims not only readily express their fantasies to those with whom they would like to realize these fantasies, but also readily help to realize the fantasies of those who see them as an ideal partner. The shaman, however, by summoning this spirit and setting the entity upon the victims, can, in a way, indicate the general course of events and fantasies. Arrange a lesbian orgy, where men will only watch, hard BDSM, with women in a sve position, the same, only with a change of gender roles or in a dark dungeon of increased depth and strong male friendship. A terrible power, also imperceptible and gradual, which is the easiest to resist and generally possible only in the initial stages of influence... well, unless you are a Magister under protection in medium paranoia mode. A Master is likely to be affected, although a Shaman or a Witch might be able to resist, the attack goes through the spirit world in his base, and also through the walls of the subordinate structure.

  There were also combat summons, though they were less than vulgar ones - all kinds of brain burners, both individual and square, selective, fast and slow. The involuntary g between combat practice and charms was affecting. Specialists in interrogation, both impetuous and harmful to the interrogated, and long, thorough, on the fixed captive, to prevent him from killing himself, deceiving, or concealing anything. Methods of discreetly influencing the victim through power over his territory and equally discreetly influencing the witch through the territory imbued with her essence. Agent tricks with brainwashing and traps, summoning creatures that attack the mentalist's mind when trying to read the host in which the entity is pnted. Specific branches of totems, creating entire structures of such, disguising them as ordinary totems, making quite decent contract amulets with spirit-servants that will become a loophole into the brains of the owner.

  Improvement of influences on brains from a distance, as well as work along the chain, when one subordinate victim becomes a beacon for calling spirits directly into her body, and then these spirits begin to influence the brains of the new target. The ability to turn the above scheme not only with suggestive spirits but also with the same entities-healers or cursers. Summoning of entities that will prevent the enemy from affecting the mind of the summoner, methods of bypassing enemy mental defenses, the main paradigms of the hack - a quick jab or methodical siege, piercing shields before the victim understands the danger of the situation or a long search for gaps in the defense, which is never absolutely monolithic. Methods of the effective combination of charms and suggestion, the dualism of control over the Mind and Passion, although here, of course, it would be worth for full understanding to finish to mastery and charms too. Numerous methods of direct spiritual influence on the victim, using their spiritual transformation, repeating those tricks that can make spirits of those that are easier and not only. Mass calls of entities to correct perception and memory, relying on the plurality of awareness, due to which these effects can be corrected and synchronized for several victims in real-time. Creation of false memories and rewriting of memory without affecting the personality, both personally and through summoning or even witchcraft control.

  Stepan exhaled only when his mind stopped drowning in images and masses of information, but instead of sleeping or resting he just continued meditating and contacting the source gradually becoming more and more attuned to it. For several hours he literally did nothing but meditate and eat the raisins purchased through the System Store. According to the prices, it turned out to be silver, if not gold. However, it was not just raisins from the market, but a very sweet and exotic dessert, created from magically charged grapes, which grew on a specific neutral source, was quite good at restoring strength and, most importantly, could help to overcome the results of prolonged mental strain, absorption of rge amounts of information, and also had no side effects which was compensated by a retively weak effect.

  Eating dried grapes and thinking about buying no less valuable and useful cherries, which accelerate the recovery of vitality and provoke the growth of the source reserve, the guy evaluated his increased meta-skills. Not dried, but fresh, but also magical. The system didn't lie, having raised two system chits to the current maximum, i.e. to the fourth stage, and both of them were from those that were useful. It was especially reassuring to not be able to raise the meta-skills from Autogoddess because they were all already at max. That is, the fact that they were at the maximum was not consoling, but consoling was the inability to "spoil" the reward for the assignment. The Status now showed "Peaceful Development IV" and "Reserves Renewal IV" maxed out - the former was only one talent away from that four, but the renewal, which was showing itself to be more and more valuable every day, was raised by two at once.

  Peaceful development once again made the methodology and paradigm of unhurried pumping in safe conditions even more valuable. If on the three, in addition to the experience gain, it also increased the probability of obtaining or upgrading a free talent due to this very peaceful development, then on the fourth it was even better. Yes, the increase in probability was nice, but it wasn't that crazy significant, although it was useful, he had increased his talents more than once through hard practice. Rank four allowed one random talent every tenth level to be upgraded pin and simple. Exactly one of the knowledge he already had, and only knowledge, not traits or meta-skills. It's not comparable to the elite properties gained at multiples of the tenth level, but it's still very useful. It is a guaranteed plus to the overall combat effectiveness even if you do not pump with special bor, and zily gain experience with quite tedious routine.

  Replenishment, having reached the three, added plus one charge, reducing the rollback to three days, and allowing up to one hundred percent of the reserve to be restored each time it was used, as long as at least five minutes epsed between uses. Further development will not reduce this rollback unless you take a separate meta-skill to reduce the rollback period. If less, the second use in a row will only restore seventy-five percent, and the third use only half of that. A special property obtained at the third rank allowed you to use replenishment not only on yourself but also on someone else, albeit with penalties. Only one replenishment per person, you can't repeat it until the three-day rollback expires. If Stepan didn't have the possibility of endowment with system characteristics, he would have immediately imagined himself as a pet dog of some archmagister (preferably, after all, a magistress), who would need and use such a walking generator. But against the background of the same endowment, this cheat did not seem to be a terrifying cheat.

  The fourth stage of renewal didn't fix the situation either. At this stage, the young man could apply the restoration of magical gas tanks to an entire group, within a radius of up to five meters, but with the same limitation - only once every three days. When ying siege to a city or other hostilities, the owner of such a trick becomes a truly invaluable individual, and the first in line to eliminate the enemy side. In general, another reason to stay away from mass conflicts. By the way, the help suggested that when taking the meta-skill "group creation" this trick will work on the entire group in the same way as on the pyer, that is, up to three times. No, the skill is really good, but only intelligent material beings can take a pce in the group. Otherwise, Stepan would have first of all included his contracts or retinue in this group, starting to pump them up.

  And in normal conditions, the skill, which opened to take just after the st level increase and pumping meta-skills, for Stepan is of little use, despite all its coolness. Well, or to do as Stepan That One, and first brainwash beautiful girls, and then make them part of the group and pump himself a battle harem of bodyguards. The method with his current abilities is quite feasible, but at the same time it is excessively immoral, even if it is amazingly effective, so Stepan will wait with it, not for nothing he was nicknamed on Earth with the proud nickname "Normal". He would rather invest the free point per level in call practice, as he had originally pnned, bringing it to the maximum with his current attributes. Or he would wait with investing talents until he reached level twenty-five and chose a specialization.

  After a few minutes of analyzing his meta-skills, Stepan took a minor knowledge, because he was very interested in what his System would give him, promising not simply knowledge, but also from the section of witchcraft on a shamanic basis, not pure shamanism. Something like an Anteroom would not be superfluous, but now it would be necessary to add attack to the defense... but okay, fuck attack, better give Stepan an additional shield of high rank, compatible with the Anteroom. He could attack himself. As, the System seemed to hear only the first part of his request, giving out knowledge, which is a very serious point attack curse suitable for a single, but even very, very defensive target, including particurly powerful creatures and strong mages. A weapon that is guaranteed to kill an Adept unless he has a very lucky ass and very specific defenses. A Master, if in the back and unexpectedly, can also be killed, but not everyone, and in battle it's much easier to protect yourself, as from any curse. The basic pumping of forces through the aura and active use of the reserve protects quite well by itself. Also specific shields, amulets, and passed rituals remain, both long-sting and specially arranged before the fight.

  The knowledge was called “the curse of locking paths.” At first gnce, it seemed like something an average young witch would use in battle, not a Senior Shaman with a System and a lot of knowledge within and outside of css specialization. However, it only seemed so, because here the difference is like between a single-shot pistol in the hand of an inept and a heavy sniper rifle in the hands of a pro. Technically speaking, both of them are firearms, and both of them kill with a blow of a lead ball, which flies out of the barrel at the ignition of powder gases, but the result is still somewhat different. If to be quite modest, a pistol can be repced by an old and worn-out TT, while in comparison it is still the same rifle.

  SpoilerT.N. TT it's TT pistol

  After the war, the Tokarev pistol was popur in criminal circles due to its avaibility, rge stockpiles in military warehouses, and, accordingly, low price on the bck market, as well as due to the fact that many units of this weapon were not included in the bullet and cartridge case library, which made it difficult to identify a weapon and trace the history of its use. The tactics of contract killers, widely described in literature and the media, when a specially purchased TT pistol was used to carry out an order, which the killer left at the scene of the crime after use, created the TT's image as a "pistol for killers". In the 1990s, homemade silencers were produced for the pistols.

  [colpse]The essence of a curse, a spiritual distortion of the reflection of reality, an attack through the spirit world that is performed with the help of a spiritual body, albeit in a shamanistic manner, is ridiculously simple. It's exactly like locking the way for anything: any witch, Shera had told him, sharing her life experience, could do something like that, could steal breath, make the throat shrink as if Darth Vader had grabbed it, blocking the air. The iconic attack of any adept of witchcraft, on the level of the same magical arrow of cssical high school mages, was not exactly a chokehold. It was an interdiction of movement, an insertion not even of stasis, but an obstruction in the flow of something that should not be stopped. In the case of the basic execution by a barely trained witch, the locking blocked the breath, but in the same way, it could stop the blood in the veins or thoughts in the head, the main thing is to know how to direct a rather flexible and versatile structure.

  Stepan could have done it before, he just didn't see the point. Invocations or a direct blow with a spiritual cw was a much more effective means of influence. But now that he had not just a low-ranked knowledge, but one that was based on the gift and knowledge of a Senior Shaman, it was impossible to call such a trick a low-level basic attack. A very flexible and growing tool with Stepan at this point could do a lot of things, exactly in battle, exactly in killing some particurly problematic enemy. If he only put maximum strength and concentration into this attack, the result would amaze anyone, especially the victim. The tracheas, nostrils, and even the mouth will overgrow and stick together, the vessels will be sealed, stopping the blood flow, and the nervous activity will stop because neurons will stop passing and conducting signals through synapses, even auric nodes, and flows will freeze and fade away, blocked by energy clots, the spiritual body will lose mobility and flexibility, will freeze and die.

  All of this could be combined in different variations and approaches, from simple disconnection with loss of consciousness to a lethal blow with the expectation of a variety of opponents and various defenses. Standard shields don't help, barriers are ignored. You need at least a full field, covering not a film, but a cocoon, saturated with power even inside. Also working with your own aura and spirit can help. If manually, by direct control, to break through the resulting blockade. The problem here is that the locking acts, if not instantaneously, then very quickly, making it extremely difficult to have time to at least think about how to act before thoughts disappear due to the twisting of the nervous system. You need to know exactly how to counteract this or that supreme combat witchcraft to start reacting even before the attack happens, at the stage of its design. Well, or simply be very, very strong, talented, and wrapped in a paranoid dense defense, which provides for even such an exotic approach to killing the protected.

  The shaman admitted this little knowledge was no weaker than the same Anteroom, maybe even a little stronger, especially if it came not to a duel, but to a quick kill preferably in the back. And to attack first. However, with his skills, he could shoot this curse from a distance aiming at the image of aura, a part of the body, and a drop of blood, or even just send a spirit-retransmitter, through which he would hit with all his might. In general, if he had this trick in underwater combat if he was able to hit in this way, then the experienced Eel, with a probability of about eighty-five percent, would have fallen from the first blow, and if not, then certainly would have slowed down and spent a lot of energy to survive. His team would have been blown away... but he wouldn't have enough reserve for all of them, even with replenishment. The trick was even more voracious than the pre-dawn, and at full strength, with no more power to infuse without compromising the subtlety and penetrability of the effect, it would easily consume two-thirds of Stepan's current reserve. If he had better control by even one point, he could fit three-quarters of it into a single blow. Deadly stuff, yes, but for one hit, and then hope it's enough or you'll be caught pantsless. Well, unless you're the owner of a System with a cheating ability to replenish the reserve.

  Frankly speaking, the young man would have agreed to the whole thing with curse elimination and source purification even if it was the only reward for his bors, though he would not have refused the rest. There was also an unprovable suspicion in him that if he had done the assignment not for perfect fulfillment, but had limited himself to minimal or complete fulfillment, he would have received a much more moderate knowledge than he had received for the ideal. Still, ++locking, as well as the Anteroom, was among the strongest of the currently avaible options. There were more than fifty variants of minor knowledge in the Status, not counting about one and a half times as many contracts-calls, but comparable power, flexibility, and usefulness, even if not in combat, demonstrated well if a dozen and a half variants. There was only one thing comparable to++ locking: a kind of "Touch of spiritual decay", only it hit mainly the subtle body, not in a complex way, and was much closer to shamanism than to witchcraft while ++locking had the opposite - a witchcraft base with the essence and heart of shamanism.

  The Decay attacked the spirit exclusively, not even the aura, digging into it with a small needle and igniting it, causing it to self-destruct and die off within minutes. One simply had to hold out under the blows of a weakening foe. Stepan would have considered acquiring the Decay, but it worked best against enemy spirits, ghosts, or even partially energetic entities like elementals or demons of all kinds. The arsenal of shamanic tricks against such creatures was not poor, but for humans or other inhabitants of Reality, it's much easier to repel this blow. Strong barriers and defense fields are triggered, which Stepan will need to weaken somehow before the blow. On the positive side can be considered the fact the blow of Decay is much more economical: there it is all about the right concentration and proper use of the spiritual body, control, and subtlety of work with it. That's why it is important not to release this murderous blow into yourself by mistake, discharging it too early, or even not being able to finish it at all and spshing the decay right inside your spirit. A double-edged bde, far more dangerous to a shaman than a lock, though it too could maim and kill if used incorrectly.

  No, he would not choose the Decay if he was going to choose a minor knowledge, ignoring the more complex pumping, but he would prefer something from the category of support or defense. His attack was fine as it was, and after completing the assignment, which was probably the most difficult one he had encountered so far, it became even better. It was just such a powerful point attack against someone well-protected that he cked, because he could destroy a crowd of unprotected little things, well, the whole crowd at once. Stepan allowed himself a few long minutes of doing nothing, enjoying the approaching dawn, and then returned his attention to his Status, activating the st and biggest reward - random knowledge raised to the rank of mastery.

  Received: 'fundamentals of puppetry magical practice'; 'advanced fundamentals of puppetry magical practice'; 'advanced puppetry magical practice'; 'advanced developed puppetry magical practice'; 'mastery of puppetry magical practice'.

  Received talents are added to the Pyer's overall Status.

  Stepan uttered something unintelligible, the half-suffocated squeak of a camel that had a single straw pced on its back and a new and shiny tank dropped on top of it. Knowledge was not only developed to mastery and extremely concentrated, it was also "root" knowledge. Thus, each css, if you believe the help, had a couple of basic knowledge, which were awarded at the start, regardless of what to spend five free points on. In the same Spellcasters, it would be weaving charms and controlling auric flows, well, or something like that, because the young man did not know the exact name, having chosen a different css specialization. The point is that if the same shamanic charms were primarily a shamanic skill, designed for the shaman, based on spiritual dialogue and call practice, then the puppet magick was the basis for a completely different specialty. More exotic and standing at the intersection of Witchcraft, Shamanism, and Maleficism, not so much more advanced as simply unconventional and unusual, and also quite narrow in application, but exactly a full-fledged school of magic.

  Fortunately for the young man, the second "root" skill of this school was the familiar and well-studied Spiritual Dialog, which could py the role of the main support. The essence is to work with the spirit, to change the reflection of reality in the world of the high spheres, as it should be with Witchcraft. Therefore, the Spiritual Dialog was only supplemented, albeit with a very massive block of information, but it was supplemented. Puppetry was considered and perceived as a separate, if not direction, then a sub-direction of the application of the gift and therefore gave so much of this very knowledge. The knowledge perfectly synergized with the other lines of his Status, first of all with the same basic Shamanism. The young man was not maimed, the System did not allow such things, but it still strained him very qualitatively, forcing him to wrinkle his face in anticipation of a couple more days spent on assimition.

  So, Puppet Magic.

  It was that cssic voodoo thing where you make a doll of the enemy and stick needles in it. Or, if you recall the contents of the non-kids video folders, not a needle, and not quite sticking it in. To create a good doll, you need materials, you need time, you need preparation, you need casts of auric bodies, and better still, you need samples of fabrics of the "mirror" of the doll that have not been cleaned from those images. You need a lot, a lot of everything. But getting this shit gives amazing opportunities, and opens up the most unrealistic paths. Stepan perfectly understood why he was credited this skill to the css of shaman. Because it combined perfectly with it, even a little better than the same territorial witchcraft! The puppet is allowed to strengthen any impact on the selected target in times, and even by an order of magnitude or even orders of magnitude if you properly prepare this impact and the puppet is made by all the rules. If to kill, then through all protection, if to curse, so that will not be removed, if to subjugate, despite any resistance, if to heal, even from clinical death, if to bless, even to become a rva of one Kryptonian - multiplier, amplifier, extender of contact and all this with the ability to act covertly, without attracting attention and without leaving traces, because the contact comes from within, from the connection of the puppet with the base.

  All sorts of vulgar and brainwashing influences fell on this practice as if it were in one piece, with the help of a prepared doll it was possible not only to bewitch, to inspire passion or submission, to erase memory or change memories, to distort perception or change priorities. With the help of the doll it was possible to do all this together, simultaneously with a dozen other tasks, and also very invisibly, practically not marked in the aura or on the signaling charms even during the direct impact, not that after their completion and wiping traces. To notice the impact through the doll after it has already happened and the doll itself is not used? Only a full-fledged complex examination by a Malefic, a Healer, and a Mentalist, with memory and personality tests, with attempts to find traces of influence by sharp distortions of thinking or worn-out voids, and all the above-mentioned specialists should be those pros and act extremely well coordinated.

  Curses that cannot be averted, transferred to something else, removed or at least weakened, because the "mirror" is cursed, which must either be cut off, which is very difficult and requires titanic work - if the anchor is correctly created and prepared - or imposes the need to get the doll in your hands and carefully deactivate it, with the risk of running into protection or simply killing the victim. Or you can not curse, but literally protect from it, actually giving your well-being to the master-creator of the sinister toy, after which you can cospy Dorian Gray in magical style. You can heal any wound, you can even create an active defense when any attacks will harm the doll - which can also be covered with protection and tank these attacks - and not her image. No way! You can pull out the victim's spirit, put it in the doll, and control it in this way, both turning it into a submissive tool with empty eyes and head, and leaving it a normal person, not even realizing that her spirit is now the hell where it is, and she does not even own herself. Or realizing. Many would take such a risk if it gave them protection and superpowers.

  Oh yes, Stepan had already seen this synergy, though not perfect, but extremely promising. Such a meat "doll" deprived of a spiritual body could take amplification very well. From the banal traumatic removal of physical restrictions to the imposition of powerful shields and barriers over the body, to what gives synergy with a shaman: the pnting of a spirit in an empty shell. An ordinary human or non-human, without proper training, even if gifted, still will not withstand a long neighborhood with a guest of the high spheres. The victim's spirit and aura will be involuntarily mutited by the guest, even if the spirit sincerely tries not to harm. With few exceptions, spirits are too different, it is extremely difficult for them to protect their host themselves. You need to study to compensate for its influence. Even for masters, it can be difficult.

  And if the human spirit is removed from the body, pcing its contract in the empty space of an ownerless body so as not to conflict with the native inhabitant? With such an approach even some random vagrant can be turned for a while into something dangerous even for an adept, especially an unprepared one. And, if you don't overreact and order the spirit to be careful, the vagrant will even survive. Retention of memories of the transfer of the body is optional, as well as the degree of traumatization of such a transfer. Gone is the main problem that does not give the unrewarded, who did not pass many years of training (such even unrewarded help, even though there is a slightly different approach, from which there is a whole direction of development of the spirit and body in company with some spirit), which spends a lot of resources, to use such settlement to the fullest extent. A strong spirit will simply tear the unready body, a weak one will not be able to control it because of the instinctive agony of the victim. Special spirits suitable for violent indoctrination and subsequent sughter are both expensive and still not particurly strong for the most part. Combining shamanism and puppetry... this is an opportunity to take and activate a dormant army at any moment, giving your enemies the silence of mbs.

  And it's not just dolls, really, because the doll form is, of course, the most basic and conceptually correct, but it's not necessary. You can make portraits or statues, you can create an envolt of a separate room, a building, even a city, though here a young man would be exhausted or spend months and years of bor to complete such a work. Reinforce barriers on a house, provide control over an area, or suppress alien and unauthorized magic? A thousand and one ways to pull off an agency mission using this approach and a lot of ruthless cynicism? Intercepting someone else's puppet, or being able to scorch your own if someone tries to make one? Putting up defenses just for such an approach and designed for such an approach? Working from a great distance, which can be literally half the world and without loss of effectiveness, as if you are hitting someone who is standing three steps away from you? Stealthy spying and peeping at the victim through the victim's eyes? Using the victim as a mediator and conductor of your rituals? Creating a puppet of yourself and transferring part of your protection and support to it (with the risk of losing the puppet or missing the moment it falls into someone else's greedy hands)?

  And all this went well with spirits, any spirits, their summoning inside dolls, their influence on dolls, their work with the same dolls. The same Jolly Milkman that can't operate outside the house. If a doll is left within Milker's zone of control, he can amplify the doll's "mirror" through the envolt. Moreover, in this way, it is possible to strengthen one recipient with several spirits at once, which in the usual order will refuse to work together, will not for one reason or another, up to the fact that their blessings or enhancements are not combined. But if you make a dozen dolls, work on them well, and build in the filtering effect to extinguish spiritual conflict, it will work very well, all at once. Agent methods will allow you to change many, many approaches. For example, creating not just a transmitter-repeater, but a whole series of them, a full-fledged chain of a dozen links, on which still try to pass and get to the shaman, hidden at one end of the chain, or even in the middle. Especially if all this is secured with appropriate totems, and on top of it sprinkle control of the territory. It will be possible to negotiate with the masters, staying in the body of a temporary puppet, having serious, even excellent chances to remain anonymous! Maybe even to their tower... no, okay, that's definitely overkill. And just communicating with the magisters was also too much, Stepan was overthinking

  The Earthman's suspicions were not justified; instead of two days, he had been lying for only sixty hours, all the while zily circuting power through his aura, sucking on the source at the same time. Since he still had some remnants of his former cultivation, and due to Stepan's caution in dosing the power and keeping the flow under control, no harm came from such a boost. But I didn't want to eat, nor did I want to drink or go to the toilet. Meditation, trance, and almost catatonia combined with the transfer of the body to an energy diet. However, as soon as he woke up, Stepan was simultaneously thirsty, and hungry and urged to go to the bathroom, or at least to the nearest bush.

  After he cleaned himself up and did some self-diagnostics, assessing the new knowledge and how it would affect the general formu of his further development it was not so difficult to increase the st gifts from the generous System. Two pieces of knowledge at once: “advanced techniques of countering curses” and “advanced techniques of territorial influences” were revealed to him not as a reward for the assignment, but as a consequence of his bors to work with this curse. There was the interception of control over the area, the curse more complex than anything he had had the misfortune to encounter before, and the conflict with someone else's witchcraft. To be honest, he thought that if he set his mind to it, he could take working with magical sources up a notch, but that knowledge wasn't all that important to him. He wasn't going to stay here, on this hill, for a week or two at most, while he mastered his new knowledge and created a few simple and not-so-simple dolls, just to have some experience. After that, he would be on his way again and saw no point in tearing himself for another promotion.

  But it's still frustrating.

  In terms of masses of knowledge, he had certainly gained a lot. A lot of it involved already existing areas of development that would have made him grimace in pain before. After the recent champion's jump in leveling, he no longer had the energy to wonder or suffer. Against the background of the experience, this dual mass wasn't even particurly problematic, not that it was really easier, not that it was just getting used to it gradually, making it easier and easier to reduce the assimition of the system's knowledge to a mere routine rather than an almost holy sacrament. Still the same reinforcement of the general direction of each of the knowledge, still the same familiar cascade of synergies. A few very promising contracts and methods of calls. More advanced witchcraft tricks for area work, bundles with combat applications and agency doctrines. The tter delighted both with methods of connecting to the territory as stealthily as possible and with rather clever tricks to gradually and little by little snatch control from the already existing owner.

  Combined with puppet mastery, he could already try to grab a piece of nd a couple of hundred kilometers away: just send a victim there, whatever puppet you have, and then call through it. Of course, the young man was not going to just grab the first poor guy, but with his life, he had no doubt that he would have no shortage of candidates for the upcoming experiments. At the very least, he could just hire someone willing to be a puppet for money or favors. It was hard to believe, but unless Cherz was lying in a particurly brazen and cynical way, there were such individuals, especially those who had nowhere else to go and no one to be with. The officially accredited mages of the cssical school of Mind didn't recruit their servants only from sves. There were also those who agreed to the risk of being fucked in the brain voluntarily. There were also those who agreed not even to the risk, but to the full guarantee that their brains would be rewired for the duration of the contract or forever.

  Another assimition took less than a day, and he finished it in the afternoon, the bright and hot sun, already seriously warming the world around him, would have burned the pale skin of the shaman, if one of his spirits was smart enough to cover him with its shadow and take the sunlight. Thanking the clever one with a portion of the reserve, and making a note in his notebook that this spirit could be reinforced with gifting ter since it was so useful, Stepan began to warm up. He wanted to sleep, really, but he wanted to wait until the evening, or better yet, the night, and it was necessary to run the power through the subtle bodies. So much immobility and constant connection with the source was not particurly useful either. The young man was extremely cautious, the degradation of his source was definitely not happening, and he didn't even move in that direction, but if he didn't watch himself, even just a sudden attack of dizziness during a fierce battle could be fatal.

  He habitually dismissed the assignment from the Autogoddess and checked his System Store account and the new special item. Not a gift from Her, of course, but not something he would be buying either. He suspected that a live seed of the ancient Mellorn blessed with the very concept of Life and Forest was not only an excellent offering, but a ticket to high society if sold. It was certainly not a seedling that had already begun to take root. It would still need a long and diligent germination with a lot of effort, but it was still a great thing. Especially considering the aforementioned blessing. Considering the rarity of even ordinary seeds, because giant living sources of magic do not scatter them in all directions like an oak tree with acorns. The thing is very useful. Knowledge from the System gave enough erudition to know for sure. If one, the already mature tree gives at least five live seeds once every fifty years, it is not just a Mellorne it is a heroine mother from the world of magical trees. Ordinary empty seeds are also excellent material and offering. They also give, about a few pieces a year, but only already grown up, not less than a thousand years growing.

  Stepan had just enough for a living seed, but what would he do with it? Go to the elven embassy? To say, "So and so, his grandfather grew seedlings, here, I sent him some canned food, he ate what was good, and left the seeds, he didn't need them." At this rate, not only will they get him from the other side of the world, no, they can get Stepan's grandfather from the other side of the world too... poor bastards. So he'd better not joke like that, or he'll get into real trouble.

  Instead of a seed, Stepan bought a certain amount of materials, not the most expensive, of medium-low - by the standards of the system - price segment, which would be used to create dolls. He prepared these materials, began to stuff them with his power and spiritual will, and then he thought about whose doll to make. At first, he made three simple bnks in the style of "whose characteristics you enter here, that's the doll", but it is so, though strong and good work, but from the category of consumer goods, the efficiency falls, the leakage of forces occurs. The very essence of this sub-school is aimed at the fact that dolls should be made differently, perfectly fitting to the purpose, even at the stage of preparation of the material knowing from whom and for what purpose the doll is created. He began to make the doll, which was already of better quality, using a drop of blood and a couple of hairs from Tahira, plunging the rest of the stock back into preservation.

  I felt like a compulsive stalker or just a pervert. But he wasn't in it for the vulgarities, he was in it for the science! He would disconnect the puppet and deactivate it ter, when he had finished his work and was sure of its effectiveness. At the very least, he could still put some kind of useful blessing on it, as payment for being a training dummy. Tahira, he was sure, would not refuse, well, if she could not kill the insolent shaman for such an offer and if she knew for sure that he would only do what he said to her doll. Hmm. Okay, that sounded even more creepy, which made Stepan uncomfortable.

  After finishing with the first dolls, he managed to make a second batch of them, having gained a little bit of experience, crumbs, and throwing both toys into his backpack, and from there into the storage. Things were more complicated with Tahira's doll. The art of the puppeteer in general does not tolerate haste, and with speedy use loses up to ninety percent of the useful load. He finished the first, preparatory so to speak, stage te at night, having managed to spend his reserve twice. And at the same time, he finally expelled from his mind the remnants of unnatural vigor provoked by the contact with the source.

  Feeling very tired, but satisfied and realizing the benefits of such work, he waddled to the improvised sleeping pce covered by the protective circle and fell face down into the straw pillow. In fact, of course, it was not just straw, but one of the very inexpensive donations for the ring of fires, which he had procured with a reserve and had not spent all of it. Sleeping on the equivalent of about eight gold florens was pleasant, but a little prickly, because the spare shirt pced on top didn't fully protect him. On the other hand, in such a state Stepan would have fallen asleep either on a stone surface, in the middle of a noisy highway, or Rodisv Gastoldovich Yanin's css... well, he was overreacting to the st one, he wasn't that tired.

  I didn't give an order to the dream spirits, It came into his head at the very st moment, as his eye sockets closed and a sleepy apathy came over him. Gotta order it, yeah. Just for one more second now...lie down.

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