Ms. Gwyn ended up giving me a ride home with my sleeping familiars once everybody was done enjoying themselves and the few messes on the property were cleaned up, which was when I was finally presented with a large box of goodies. Lucinda was a little unhappy when she saw me carrying my unconscious familiars under my arms and became even unhappier after I explained why. However, since I was sober, she did not have much to complain about.
I could only promise to invite her next time with a laugh before taking my familiars upstairs to my room. Since they were already asleep I just put the both of them in my bed as they were. I considered undressing them first since Poniard was still in their training gear but then I decided it best not to risk waking them.
Since I had been asked on the phone the other day about my current MP level I had Lucinda measure me when I went downstairs and, as I had said, I was currently just over two-thirty. Sadly, Lucinda's meter could not measure mages so I could only imagine that my mana pool had made any developments. Si-Pon had even given me a 'magic lesson' in which he basically told me to mediate on the idea or feeling of MP radiation.
However, I only had visual experience with MP radiation such as with my tree or when I first met the director. However, during the lecture about mana and its properties I had remembered what the director told me when he first used the black orb meter. I was supposed to remember the feeling of having my mana drawn.
For the past few days I would commit an hour or two a day to this new meditation since I was pretty experienced at meditating in general but no advances were made. There was a moment lost night when my body felt warm and prickly but then it was gone as soon as I felt it. Tonight, though, Lucinda wanted to have a movie night before bed so I had to wait until later than usual to try meditating.
Lo and behold, I must have been more tired than I thought because I ended up falling asleep sitting upright on the couch. When I woke up it was still dark outside and my legs had fallen asleep underneath me. The only sensations I got from meditating this time was twenty minutes of ticklishly itching and agonizing prickling sensations as the nerves in my legs slowly came back to life after stretching out.
By the time I could easily get off the couch the sky outside was already starting to lighten into morning and I felt more or less rested enough to start my day. So, I made myself a light a quiet breakfast of peanut butter and toast sandwiches before taking a one-pound and two-pound tube of lean ground beef up to my bedroom. There, I received something of a shock.
Glaive was sprawled out on the floor and had somehow managed to get halfway out of their suit in their sleep but she woke up quickly enough when I opened the door. Poniard, though, was lying across the bed under the covers and did not move at all. Even after Glaive finally got off of the floor and out of their suit to rip their breakfast open, Poniard just lay there.
For a moment I was terrified that I had accidentally poisoned Poniard and they were dead but when I ran to the bed a soft, neutral, and melodious voice says, "You may not want to do that."
Looking over my shoulder at where Si-Pon was perched on the headboard, I say, "Is he alive? I gave him booze yesterday, maybe it made him sick?"
"Goblins drink what you people call hooch or shit wine like it is religious," Si-Pon informs me in a bland and bored sort of voice. "Pon-pon is evolving. What you'll find under your blanket is a big blob of flesh while all the insides are being redesigned and enlarged. In a day or two, it will conform to the new body and in another day Pon-pon will wake up. This is how creatures quickly evolve instead of slowly evolve."
"There are different evolutions?" I ask wryly, taking a step back from what was supposedly going to be a big blob of flesh.
"Several," he assures me simply. "If a goblin slowly evolves, it simply grows into a hobgoblin. If it quickly evolves, there is a chance it will slow evolve into an ogre or troll. If it quick evolves twice, it will slow evolve into one of the giant races. Slow evolutions are the last evolutions unless they are forced to evolve or find some natural treasure."
Nodding my head slowly while distracted by the mention of the giant races, who were a C and above grade genus, I cannot help but ask, "Do you know what Poniard is evolving into? There is speculation that goblins don't JUST turn into hobs and so on down the line."
"Hob is mandatory, its ogre and troll and everything else that is defined by lifestyle and environment," Si-Pon argues. "Many evolutions of what your people call 'base' creatures are still not even related to their bases in your… bestiary. It's quite interesting to watch one world try to define another, a once-in-a-lifetime experience."
I could only blankly blink at the bird while holding Poniard's tube of ground beef out to Glaive, wondering how I should approach the bird to get away with slapping it. "You could help, you know!" I say loudly and angrily, making Glaive hesitate in accepting the second helping of breakfast. "Not you," I reassure the kobold quickly, placing the food in her hand.
Just as bored now as he was at the start of the conversation, Si-Pon says, "I did, I really did, but once I got up to C grade I felt like I was just being used so I left. The people in those labs seemed smart, they can figure the rest out for themselves. If they can't, somebody else will sooner or later. Are you going to your property? It is safe to leave Pon-pon here like this."
Wishing I really could just stay home and take pictures or videos of the evolution process, I simply sigh and say, "I don't have a choice, the goblins and kobolds need their training. Let me talk to Lucinda when she wakes up and then we'll head out."
Lucinda was both shocked and excited to hear about Poniard's evolution starting and promised to take pictures every few hours to monitor the process. Then I called up a ride for the rest of us. When the Bureau vehicle arrived, though, it was no longer a van and the driver was a familiar face.
"Good morning, Boss," the man I had tricked into running my deliveries the other day says, wearing a dark and simple suit with a chauffeur hat on his head. He was sitting in the driver's seat of what could have been a small armored vehicle with bulky lower siding and gently angling upper body. It was built like a van but it sat at least six inches taller than the usual Bureau van with a light suspension kit and was six feet longer with an extended trunk space.
"Uh… hi?" I find myself asking as the passenger door opens to reveal four pairs of single seats in front of the tall vehicle. Glaive and Si-Pon just got in like it was business as usual, but I had to stop and ask. "What is this?"
"Well, when I made the first delivery to that lab guy he called your other friend you told me about and then they called my boss," he explains with a bright smile. "I got chewed out for twenty minutes, fired, and then hired back on by Portal Registry to be your personal driver. Hop in, Boss."
On the way to the property the man told me all about how he was happier with this job because he only had to drive one person and make pick-ups or deliveries for me. Which meant he got paid to sit around waiting on work. I was pretty happy for him and somewhat grateful for the personal vehicle, but I was worried.
Would this be written off as part of the kobold deal or did the director want to make me do another job soon? If it was something simple like the first time I don't think it would be a problem. I did not even think about it last time, I just saw the guy reaching and finished the job.
Deciding to put my chauffeur to work for the time being, I spent most of the ride to the property in different online markets running numbers and siphoning currencies. After bringing together the money I had made on multiple slow sales, I ordered some different materials. By the time we parked at the property I already had a list of destinations and people for my driver to visit before taking my things to Johnathan's lab to be processed into raw materials.
Since Poniard was not here today I simply had the goblins run for one hour at a time on level ground with weights before resting for another hour with the artifact. Glaive was still here so the kobolds could continue their combat practice. However, after they were recovered from their running I had them go without the vests so they could work the entire four hours in unarmed practice.
The goblins were more worn out today than I had ever seen them but they had still managed to run the entire hour all five times that they were put on the treadmill. Tomorrow, to keep myself busy, I pretty much had no choice but to advance the mountain goblins to combat practices in the afternoons. Even though today was easy enough, I was starting to miss Poniard.
After visiting the greenhouse to collect a cup of mana water, I briefly watered the warped pine before going around behind the goblin dorm. Buried in a shallow pit behind the dorm was a simple compost system where the hobs dumped everybody's waste every morning and every night. Currently, it was about half full.
Because I was on a forced vacation, I had no choice but to take out my phone and put in a large order with a slime breeder in the state. Thanks to the goblin bodies that had been mulched the day before the greenhouse was installed the soil already had a healthy upper F MP level for five feet of depth before the mana water was added. Now, everything was close to equal to the water and the current compost would be all I should need for a portal crop.
I got to spend that night actually meditating because Lucinda needed to make a trip out of town for work and Glaive was exhausted from manning the training by herself for the first time. The sad part was that I had to go in and not only correct the kobolds but her and a few of her improper corrections as well. She had only been training for few days longer than the lessers, in her defense, but she was still quick on the uptake.
I had never taken a first look at Poniard but Lucinda sent me a picture soon after I left. Poniard had basically become a big mushy egg of goblin-colored flesh that was only a few inches bigger all around than he had been. However, the thickly layered and quilted sparring armor had burst open along one side seam due to the swelling… sac.
Now, the sac had either grown or shifted enough to push the sparing gear open so that one half hung off of the bed. Poniard's position had not changed much through his photos, which I did not think it would. Still, looking at my first familiar in this form with random lines or undercurrents of purplish light flowing within, I was both worried and amazed.
I stayed in the room to meditate that night, asking Si-Pon to drone in the background with his soothing voice once more describing mana's various forms and uses and origins. Every now and then he would reach an aspect or point that seemed familiar or triggered a familiar feeling in some way, making me feel like I could feel the current of something warm and energetic within me. However, these were barely more than brief glances.
Si-Pon kept me company for the entire night, going back over the same introductory lecture again and again with slight changes in commentary and viewpoint. I could tell that he was trying hard to help me find a way to feel my own mana but there were some things about an individual's mana that only the individual could come reach or understand. It sounded like complete garbage at some points but then others would trigger a flash of heat and I would be inspired again.
When I finally noticed light outside my window after being interrupted by Si-Pon musing to himself, I hurriedly checked the time to see that it was already after six in the morning. Since Poniard did not even have a body yet I had no problem leaving him in Si-Pon's care for the day as I hurriedly called a ride for Glaive and I.
Luckily, my new driver was arrived only a few minutes after my call because they had already been on the way.
Not long after I set up the goblins for their three forty-five-minute stages of running to start the day I started receiving notifications across different platforms. Since I was going to be testing the kobolds by having them perform their unarmed routines without the help of a video, I had Glaive lead the group in the first few sets that I had corrected the day yesterday.
Walking off to the side to deal with business on my phone, I soon had to send my driver out to make a few more pick-ups before calling Lucinda to see when she would be home. When it turned out there was a security issue in an E grade territory where D grade creatures were starting to come through I decided to hold off on some plans. Lucinda would not be home any time soon.
After I took Glaive away from the other kobolds so that they were forced to remember their sets on their own or from one another, I set the goblins on their final stretch without weight and left Glaive to 'meditate' by the warped pine. I did not actively exercise her the same way I did the others because she already exceeded most of my strengths. However, I would be a shitty owner if I did not raise her MP whenever possible.
Since I had turned the TV around for the goblins to watch the same training video as the kobolds, which was the same training they had been watching the kobolds doing, the goblins were somewhat restless when I took them down from the treadmills to rest. Usually they would be so tired they just sit or lie around the artifact. Now, they were standing and keeping their limbs active as if this was something they had been waiting for.
Considering that exercising while watching others train was probably a form of torment for these goblins who had experienced my training's effects firsthand, they were probably dying inside every day they were not allowed to practice fighting.
After only an hour of resting and restless pacing the goblins took it upon themselves to begin practicing the open-handed strikes and blocking techniques they had been studying for a week. As much due to their tiredness as their inexperience, the goblins were obviously clumsy in their attempts. However, I did not intervene and just took a few minutes of video.
Posting the video online while talking about how they still had an hour and some change of resting before they were actually supposed to start, I simply let them continue as they were until their healing time was up. After only two-and-a-half hours of healing, I took the artifact away and their movements had picked up some dexterity.
Now, though, I brought out their thirty-pound arm and leg weights and started actively teaching them the strikes and stances. I was probably not as surprised as I should have been when these once dull goblins soaked up my basic teachings like dry new sponges. Mountain goblins were the duller species but only because they were strength based, I had already seen how strategic they could be in certain scales of combat when weak and cautious.
*