Untapped ~ Chapter Four!

Joe walked through the streets, carefully following Mak’s written instructions each time he came to an intersection. He was trying to channel Heartpiercer’s confidence as he walked alone through the streets of the world-spanning city, but his mind was churning with the concerns the cheese merchant had brought up. 

“If the Ritualist Tower has never produced a Sage, that just means there's plenty of room at the top for anyone who wants to get there, right? I'm still so far away that it shouldn't matter, but… the way he said it? Like it was a foregone conclusion that no Sage ever could come out of there?”

He tried to shake off the gnawing concern, telling himself that eventually he’d be good enough to become a Sage, even if no one else had ever managed to in the entire history of Vanaheim. “Gah! Stop it, brain! If nothing else, he said there were more Masters in this tower than any other tower; that has to count for something, right? Plus, what if the only thing they've been waiting for is resources from the other worlds? I might not have any cheese, but there's plenty I'm going to be able to accomplish if they need stuff from elsewhere.”

Taking a deep breath through his nose, he rounded the final corner, steps stuttering as he came to a stop. For the first time since arriving on the planet, he saw something other than endless rows of towers: open space. The nearly suffocating winding streets and monolithic, monochromatic towers gave way in front of him to an immense, circular clearing he could only estimate to be nearly a mile wide. At its center loomed a tower unlike any of the others, at least in size. While it still had the coloration of the others—black, white, and silver—this one was easily three times the width of its lesser counterparts.

“That’s the place?” Letting out a slow exhale, Joe didn't bother trying to squash the smile slowly spreading on his lips. “Now we're talking.”

He took a step forward into the circle, freezing in place immediately as words appeared in the air in front of him—not a system notification, but actual burning lines of energy hovering in the air.

Do you seek entrance, honor, or audience with the Tower of Rituals?

“Entrance.” Joe voiced plainly, half-expecting that would be the end of it. He took another step forward, but the words didn't vanish, instead bursting into a wall of flame that raced into the distance and blocking him from proceeding forward. 

Heat washed over him, and the smell of his arm hair singeing reaching his nose just as his reactivated Neutrality Aura cleared the last traces of the scent from the air. The Ritualist frowned, glancing down at his arms, which were covered with a shimmering, sparkling light. “That’s odd… how did it burn me through my Exquisite Shell? I didn't take any damage, and everything should’ve been blocked. That must mean… an illusion?”

Ignoring the roaring flames, he slowly scanned the ground around him, finding a few chunks of rock and bits of detritus like string and such that had been left on the ground. “Oh look, litter on the surface of a planet that absorbs everything left alone on it for any length of time. That's definitely just randomly strewn-about garbage, yep.”

He leaned down, poking at the sympathetic lines that had been woven with real material, grinning as he felt the silver strand of metal tied to the core of the twine. “There it is. Let's see. I don't have too much experience with illusion rituals; I think I only have the Ritual of the Ghostly Army to go off of here, but do I really need it with a Novice rank circle? Please.”

Shifting one of the rocks an inch to the left, then bending the end of the wire that had been touching it until it poked into the ground, Joe redirected the flow of mana from the ritual into the ground, and in moments, the ‘flames’ had vanished, and his arm hair had reappeared where it was supposed to be. “There we go. I don't exactly have a lot of hair to lose, so I'd like to keep what I've got. Hey, whoever’s watching, do I need to explain my work?”

He looked around, not sure why the gates to the tower in the distance hadn’t sprung open as they had for the rest of his group once they’d solved a challenge. “I can do that! This is a Novice ritual illusion, which means it’s fundamentally different than a spell. The spell version will rely on tricking the senses, but once someone realizes it is an illusion, it’ll lose most of its power. The far superior ritual version keeps reapplying itself unless it’s broken or someone brute forces their way through the flames. I would’ve felt the fire the whole way, only to come out completely unscathed on the other side. Is that good enough?”

There was no response from the tower, so Joe could only shrug and keep moving in a straight line toward the girthy spire in the distance. “No? Then let's see what else you’ve got.”

He kept walking, and after about ten minutes, realized the tower hadn’t come any closer. Squinting at the tower, then the ground around him, the Ritualist began searching for what he’d missed. “Clearly, I got caught in another illusion as soon as I broke the first, but when did it… wait. Did I get caught in it after I broke the first one, or before? This could be the same ritual that asked if I was trying to enter the tower. I bet it is.”

It didn't take long for him to spot the Beginner-ranked ritual, now that he was looking for it: a simple duo of circles innocuously carved into a fire hydrant set next to the road he was trying to walk along. “Look at that. A world filled with magic, where the streets and buildings are all some kind of strange, stone-like material, and somehow I believed they’d have firefighters that needed fire hydrants. Didn't even think about it twice. Sneaky. I think I'm really going to like these guys when I get in there.”

A cursory examination of the ritual circle revealed how the illusion worked. Not knowing the actual name, Joe dubbed it the ‘Rotating Horizon’ ritual. It was easy for him to understand that the ritual subtly curved his vision so that it appeared he was walking straight to the tower when instead he was actively circling it. Instead of attempting to cancel the effect or break the circles, he simply touched a finger to the ground next to the ‘fire hydrant’ and imprinted his mana signature alongside dozens of others—adding himself to the whitelist of people allowed entrance.

Standing back, he glanced to his right, where the tower had appeared to be standing only a moment earlier, only to find that he had to look over his shoulder to find it. Swiping his hands together in the universal gesture of ‘job’s done’, he thought over the concerning fact he’d just learned. “I've never had to combat Ritualists before; would it be just as easy for them to add themselves to my rituals? There's got to be a way to obfuscate the design, somehow. I mean, with high-tier rituals, the complexity alone makes it difficult to add yourself in, but that's not the same as not allowing someone to add themselves in.”

This time, before setting off, he began sweeping the area with a careful gaze. The doors of the tower had still not opened, which meant the trials hadn’t yet ended. “Started with Novice, then Beginner… how high up the tiers am I going to have to climb to gain entry?”

It wasn't long before he found the next ritual circle, this time a trio of circles softly glowing with power, hidden under a layer of dirt in a poor attempt to conceal it. “What do we have here? Apprentice rank, that's clear enough. What do you do? Make it feel like I'm walking forward when I'm moving backward? Make me comfortable walking for hours on end without noticing? Or do you-”

The words died on his lips as his mouth went dry, and Joe slowly looked from the triple circle to the tower, shaking his head slightly. “Oh… it superheats a section of stone under the ground and causes an explosion of lava like a landmine when someone walks over it. That’s a pretty rapid departure from the other rituals, wouldn't you say?”

He didn't bother with being fancy on this one, not trusting the unstable matrix to not detonate when he walked over one just because he was added to the white list. Coating his fingers with mana, he simply pinched two of the circles together, shaking his head as hundreds of lava bursts erupted from the ground across the entirety of the space surrounding the tower as the ritual was forcibly broken. “That would’ve been useful on Jotunheim, if it dealt more damage. Might even copy that one down and try to upgrade it for the next time I go there.”

Now understanding that the test to get into the tower wasn’t as safe as he’d initially thought, Joe moved with far more caution as he searched for the Student-ranked ritual he was certain was waiting for him. “Four circles… if I were setting this up, where would I do it? Probably closer to the tower, where it wouldn't be so difficult to maintain it if needed.”

Taking measured steps, Joe approached the tower, covering nearly half the distance from the outer edge before running into a line of shimmering power. Studying it carefully, he realized he was seeing the active effect—not the actual source of whatever would happen if he tried to cross the line. He circled the tower for about a third of the distance before running into the ritual diagram itself, letting out a sigh of relief as he realized crossing the boundary would have only sent him outside the open area and activated copies of the other rituals he’d already finished with. 

“So it would’ve been time consuming, but not deadly like the last one. I wonder why they’re so wildly varied? Different people setting these up, maybe? They built it in alignment with their specialty?”

Just as he was about to break the ritual, Joe paused as an idea struck him. Reaching out with a strand of mana he manipulated into the circle, he inverted the direction of the transportation. Quickly stepping back, he waited to see if it would work or cause the ritual to catastrophically fail. Happily, Joe had the Ritual Circles skill at Master rank two, and a simple Student-ranked ritual was easy enough for him to take control of or redirect. 

Still, there was always the chance of failure, and he didn't want to walk into the tower after having blown himself up. “Gotta keep that good first impression.”

He crossed the boundary, and as the magic of the ritual collapsed on him, he didn't struggle against it. In an instant, he was just outside the doors of the tower, staring at a floating, rapidly rotating six-circle ritual. “Whoo. What a rush. Is this kinda what happened to Socar? Oh, nice! I got to bypass the Journeyman tier and go straight to the Expert?”

It was far different from the previous defenses, being a singular, elegant ritual with each sigil denoting its purpose precisely woven into its rapidly spinning rings. When the Ritualist had first begun in his craft, this would have appeared as nothing more than a shimmering orb of energy. But between his experience with his class skills and his massively inflated Characteristic points, he was able to easily read along the lines as they spun. After taking a few minutes to carefully study the design, he reached out with a strand of mana…

…only for it to be slapped away as a spark of power shot from the circles and detonated against the questing tendril of mana. Eyebrows shooting up, Joe blinked as he admired the Expert-tier ritual. “How fun. I've never seen a ritual fight back before.”

Even as he spoke, the sigils drawn out along the rings of the circles began to shift, moving up and down and side to side as they rearranged themselves. If he hadn't taken the time to gather all of the information he needed before attempting to alter it, it would’ve been a monumental task to try and even determine its function, let alone shut it down. “Adjusting the sigils in real time to compensate for a hostile presence? Now this is a skill I need to learn.”

Holding both hands out in front of him, Joe extended a string of mana from each fingertip, which then broke into five additional strings each. He reached forward with them, allowing his magic to flow more powerfully as the ritual tried to defend itself, allowing the threads to be as soft and powerless as the gossamer strings of a spider web when they weren't under attack, but as energized as a bolt of lightning were they under attack. 

Any of the strands which managed to attach to the various runes along the outer ring were ignored by the defenses, so he pushed power along them to create additional strands from that point and shifted into the next layer, attaching the extended strands to the sigils there. After only a few minutes, he reached the innermost ring and extended the threads to the activation sequence of the ritual.

Supplying it with his own mana, Joe activated the true ritual contained within the defensive shell puzzle. With a precise application of intent, and a calculated pulse of power, the endlessly spinning ritual diagram came to a sudden stop. Each of the six rings folded until it was parallel with the ground, *clicking* into place one after another. Joe stepped back, expecting a dramatic effect. Some grand invitation inside, a guardian he’d have to fight, or perhaps nothing if the trial required going back and clearing the Journeyman ritual as well.

What he hadn't been expecting was a deep, tolling bell to ring. The sound reverberated only inward, causing a strange, almost suction-like feeling, since one of his ears was outside of the area of effect. For a long few moments, nothing changed. Then, the door swung open. Unlike the previous two towers he’d witnessed opening to invite in the new members, here there was no secrecy.

Instead, dozens of people wearing almost-matching robes were revealed running across the courtyard around the base of the tower itself.

“There's a new Ritualist in the tower!”

“His score! Ninety-eight of a hundred! Prodigy!” 

“Did you see how quickly he broke through the last two layers?”

“What's your specialty?”

“Dibs! Everyone respects dibs, right?”

“Dibs doesn't work when it's been a decade since the last one entered.”

“Look, if dibs isn't sacred, what is?”

“Go to the Tower of Clerics if you want to find something sacred! I only need a handful of merits-”

“You! Let me sponsor you! Looks like you can handle a hammer; I'm the best Ritualistic Forging Master in the tower!”

“Your mother!” Another gasped at the braggadocious shout. “I've been a peak Master in Ritualistic Forging since you entered the tower.”

“Exactly! I've already caught up to you!”

“Those aren't muscles, look at his sleeve! Ink stains! I was a Grandmaster Mathematician before I came here, I'm definitely going to be the first Grandmaster of Magical Matrices, accept my sponsorship and-”

“-Alchemical Rituals!”

“-means nothing if you don't understand Ritual Lore, and you all know it!”

“I'm thirty merits away from being our first Grandmaster of Ritual Circles. I saw the way you interfaced with the final challenge; I have the best chance at refining your skills!”

“Everybody stop!” A single voice cut through the commotion as yet another Ritualist, this one wearing what was clearly a combat version of the same robes the others had donned. “Newcomer! Welcome to the Tower of Rituals. As you might have been able to pick out of that hubbub, you won't be wanting for sponsors now that you're here. To make this as fair as possible, you are, of course, welcome to pick who you would like to sponsor you in the tower, but we can make it easier if you let us know what your base class is.”

Joe’s smile was bright enough to illuminate the darkest night of Jotunheim. “Hello, everyone! I can't tell you how excited I am to meet all of you. Clearly, I have plenty to learn. Before we go much further with this, what does it mean to be sponsored at the tower? I only just arrived on Vanaheim, and I'm not sure of the customs.”

“Oooh.” Came the collective sound from the gathered Ritualists, who looked at him hungrily and glared at the others with dull, red eyes as they sized up their competition.

The man clad in the battle robes spoke again before anyone else could, causing more than one of them to *tsk* in frustration at not being able to capture Joe's attention. “Sponsorship means anything from paying for your room, board, and robes to teaching you their specialties. The reason I ask about your base class is that typically people who come from similar backgrounds are going to have an easier time learning from each other. For instance, if you started as an Alchemist, you will be used to the teaching methods of your previous fellows. Depending on how you want to specialize here, you may not want that, of course. Still…”

He trailed off leadingly as Joe’s thousand-watt smile dimmed slightly. The bald man glanced around at the others, “I'm a ritualist.”

“Yes, we all are,” the spokesman stated in a consoling tone. “But what was your base class?”

“Ritualist.” Joe stated with a touch of frustration. “I’ve specialized twice since then, but-”

Seeing all of the skeptical looks sent his way, Joe shrugged and fiddled with his character sheet for a moment, before displaying the details of his class and first two specializations—choosing to hide the remainder of the sheet.

Name: Joe ‘Monarch of Mana' 

Base Class: Ritualist Level: 30 

Specialization 1: Rituarchitect Level: 13 

Specialization 2: Reductionist Level: 10

Seeing all of the people around him staring at the words with incomprehension on their faces, Joe began to get a little worried. “Is that so strange?”

“Why, yes. Yes it is,” the Battle-Ritualist confirmed for him. “You see, ‘ritualist’ is a prestige class. That means anyone can take it, but it becomes a new class you’ve gained on top of what you started with. It doesn't replace your base class. Frankly, I don't think anyone here qualifies to be your sponsor at the tower.”

“I think the only fair thing for us to do…” The man swept his eyes around the gathered Ritualists, who, though slightly disappointed, seemed even more eager to speak with Joe as soon as they could. “…is to let the Grandmaster have the final say in all of this.”