Kari's cult for today has wrapped up. I say goodbye to April and Sierra, and get ready to head off to the beach again. Coming here in my bikini has definitely become less about dressing revealing and more about getting to the beach faster.
I hurry up to get ready to fly over to the beach so I can play in the waves again. Ahh, I can't wait! I couldn't get enough of that, not in a million years.
"Hey, Azariah! I've been looking for you!" Erika's voice.
What does he want? I turn around, and Erika's walking up to me, waving. He's still in his bikini.
"Hello."
"Ah, Azariah. You own a wind glider, right?"
Huh? Where's this coming from? I just nod, since I do.
"Yeah, I thought you would have, since you could fly. You want to go flying with me? I'll bring mine."
Huh?! Erika actually wants to go flying with me? Uh, well I couldn't say that I didn't want this… Um, well it couldn't hurt right? I nod. Erika seems to be happy.
"Alright, we'll meet up at the closest beachfront to here. See you in a bit." Erika says, before taking off and flying away.
Well, my inn is quite far from here, so I guess I should also get going. I wouldn't really want to keep him waiting.
><><><><
Well, I went and grabbed my wind glider, and I met Erika where he told me to, but… why is his wind glider so much better and cooler than mine?!
His has extremely long and thin wings, is crafted with immense detail, and is painted with an extremely cool looking pattern of orange & light blue.
Mine's just about as boring as you could possibly get! Why does Erika have such a cool one?!
"Eh? Azariah? Is that really your wind glider?"
Ahhh! Stop looking at me so disappointingly like that! My soul's going to shatter!
"Um… I bought the cheapest one." I say.
That's right, that's what I did. It was my decision to buy this thing because it was so cheap, so I don't get to complain. Although, I don't remember seeing one like Erika's in that entire store!
"Eh? Are you that short on money? Well, they are quite expensive. Azariah? What do you do for a job, actually?"
"Adventurer." I say, without missing a beat.
"I see… you are from out of town, after all. I really doubt you could be making any money at all here. Even with you being from further inland, you probably weren't making all that much from that."
I was making a lot of money, actually. I was so good they even looked the other way and promoted me again and again ahead of what they were allowed to. Don't mention that, Azariah. I don't want to sound like a narcissist.
"Mine's custom made too, that would have drastically increased the price already. Most people wouldn't be able to afford that, so I'm sorry for assuming you could."
Custom made? Even more expensive? Is Erika actually rich? How is he making this money? It could be important for maintaining a source of income.
"Erika. What do you do for money?" I ask.
"Oh? Well a lot of things really. There's some party tricks I can do with wind magic that people will pay me a bit for, there's the occasional wind glider race that will pay out a lot for first place, oh, and when I really need money, I'll just sell my used bikini bottom. That usually sells for a whole lot."
Huh?! "Erika… how much… do you sell those for?"
"Oh? Well… usually two gold coins or so."
Excuse me?! Two gold coins?! That's way too expensive! Just who is driving up the market price?! I'm going to give you a piece of my mind!
"Surprised? Well, you're a lot more attractive than me, and also a woman, so if you hone your negotiation skills you could probably secure a price a lot higher than that."
Oh, he thinks I'm interested in selling, rather than the other way around. I really shouldn't be thinking about buying anyway. Boyfriend and all. Well, maybe selling mine wouldn't be a bad way to earn money, there would definitely be a market for that.
Actually no, I'm way too nervous to actually pull that off. Maybe I could have Kiaran sell them instead? No, they'd think he wore them? Maybe I could be standing off to the side, all embarrassed? That would probably attract a market my competitors probably wouldn't be tapping into.
No, then Kiaran might get arrested for sexual harrasment, even though the whole thing was my idea. I also really doubt he'd be OK with any of that, even though the whole thing is my idea.
So that idea's scrapped. What about the other things Erika said? Wind glider races? Right, sports! I never had even the slightest bit of interest in any of them in my old world, but maybe I could do something like that here, except with magic. There must be competitions having to do with magic, right?
Well, I'll start with wind glider races, then I'll broaden my horizons. First thing's first, ask Erika about wind glider races.
"Erika? What about races?"
"Oh, well Kari's cult sometimes has them here in Rose Harbor, but I'm not so sure about everywhere else. They're basically just races done with wind gliders, from one part of the beach to another, and depending on what place you get you can make money off of it."
Amazing! That sounds amazing for me! I know I definitely could get really high up there with a bit of practice. I just need to study the mechanics of flight, get a few more hours of experience under my belt, and I'd definitely be able to take first place in one of those.
"You know, we're holding another one here in two days. You can enroll in that if you want."
"Money?" I say, hoping that Erika gets the point I'm trying to make.
"Uh, yeah. The enrollment fee is two copper coins. The reward for first place is two gold coins, second is one gold coin and four silvers, third is one gold, fourth is four silvers, and fifth is two coppers."
Assuming I get first place, that's two gold coins worth of reward money, but I need to subtract the enrollment fee. That comes out to 1 gold, 7 silver, and 6 copper. Not bad. Oh, but there's clearly going to be a gap in the quality of our equipment. I need to consider how much money another wind glider for this race is going to cost. I guess I could sell my old one, but that most likely won't make much.
"Azariah? You done thinking up in there?" Erika snaps me out of my concentration.
"Yes, I want to join… How do I do that?"
"Oh, well, I'm going to be flying in it too, and I'm a returning champion. Don't get too cocky. I will put your name in though, don't worry about that!"
Erika seems to be more playful competitive than competitive competitive. I think he's more glad to have another competitor than anything. That's an attitude I'd like to emulate, but I don't want to lose to Erika.
I was taught flight by Inell the Dragon Tamer after all, there's no way I can lose this. Well, I can't let myself lose this, I should say. If I do nothing, and don't practice at all, I'm definitely going to lose.
Right, for the beginning of my training, I'll have Mana Detection honed in on Erika the entire time we're flying together. Returning champion, huh? I'll be sure to carefully monitor just how you fly, down to the last, tiniest manipulation of mana. Surely doing a bit of research on your opponents beforehand isn't against the rules, right?
Hahaha, Azariah, you're a mad genius!
><><><><
As it turns out, there are quite a few types of wind gliders, all used for different purposes. After a bit of research, I put them into five main categories.
Simple Gliding: Long, narrow wings, meant for gliding without much mana put into it. This is the type my old one fits into.
Complex Gliding: Long, broad wings, meant for long distance gliding, built to take advantage of wind currents that are already there. This is the rarest type I could find.
Burst: Biggest wings out of all of them, meant to take off as quickly as possible, tight maneuvers, and short bursts of speed. These seem rather mana intensive relative to distance, I don't think I would find these very useful.
Sustained Speed: Narrow wings, but shorter than the gliding types, designed with prolonged high speed in mind. This is the type that Erika's wind glider falls into.
Hovering: Relatively small wings, meant for tight maneuvers, and a very prolonged flight.
The new wind glider I picked out was a hovering type. I picked one for long distance flying over one prioritizing speed, because that's what I'm normally going to be using it for.
Now, this will hamper my speed, but I have a trick in mind to get around this, which requires it to be extremely durable. Like seriously, if I did what I had in mind to my old wind glider, it would practically shatter.
The glider is constructed out of a special wood. It isn't Ulfur Forest strong wood, but it's still a product known for its durability. As for cloth, it was farmed from some sort of spider monster that was woven together extremely finely.
Just as important though, it also has a cool design on it!. Dark blue and black, representing the depths of the ocean, with two white dots that look like staring eyes, on each of the wings. It's an edgy design I'm incredibly fond of. It definitely beats out Erika's, that's for sure.
Unfortunately, it did cost me 20 whole gold coins, so even if I earn first place in this thing, I'm not going to be making my money back. That's fine though. This should help me get even farther while still conserving mana. There's also sure to be a whole lot of other races that I can make money off of. Given enough time, this thing will definitely pay for itself. Even if that is a huge chunk of all the money I got after the monster congregation!
I'm flying over the ocean to try to gauge how much distance I can cover in a day now with my current mana capacity. I might be totally wrong here, but I think that if I get far enough from the beach on the open ocean where I can barely see it any more means I'm six miles away from the shore.
Combining that with Mana Detection placed on my soul, and a bit of math, this wind glider is about… four times as mana efficient as my old one. Of course, if I tried to go faster, this one would still drain more mana than the old one, but this should be more useful.
So, according to that little calculation of mine, I used to be able to cover 80 miles on a day's worth of mana and now I should be able to cover 320 miles on a day's worth of mana. That's a major improvement.
I should be able to get to Heafdes in just seven hours now. I'd still have a sizable chunk of mana left! That'll probably use up most of it, but I should have enough left to fight for a bit. I wonder if I could get there faster by pumping up my speed? Well, duh, but I don't know how much mana that will cost me. I don't know how much mana increased speed with this glider costs yet.
Alright, I should head back to the shore again. Uhh… what direction is the shore? Everything around me is ocean. Ahhhh! Was I so focused on my math that I kept flying in the same direction?! I have a spell to keep me up in the air without any of my input! Why didn't I use that?!
Umm, well this isn't all bad, right? I kept flying a straight line, so I should have to just turn around right? Alright, I'm flying back towards where I think the shore is, but I still hear my heart beating in my chest.
Mana Location! Aim it directly at the horizon! Get its range as high up as I can get it! Oh, that also might still not work… my little mana spears are going to be far too spread out for it to hit that layer of mana around my soul.
Just make Mana Detection's radius go up as high as I can get it, and use that instead! Ah, yes, that worked, and I am going in the direction of the shore. Ahh, what a relief. This means I have basic ocean navigation down, I guess. Not really sure what that would be useful for, since there are no islands around here to my knowledge, but oh well.
><><><><
The day of that wind glider race Erika mentioned is upon us, and I show up in the spot he told me. The starting line is basically a big box drawn in the sand. There are a few Kari's cultists around there to actually start the race but as for actual competitors, including me there are only eleven here in total. Most of their wind gliders do appear to be made for speed though, and Erika's seems to be the best made one.
"Ah! Hey Azariah! You actually came!" Erika notices me.
I just wave as I haul my new wind glider over to the starting area. Erika notices it, and looks a tad bit concerned.
"Um, Azariah? You're going to race with that? That looks even worse than your old one for speed…"
"I have plans."
"Right… Well, good luck. I'll be rooting for you to get 2nd place."
"Me too."
Erika just laughs at that comeback. I'm quite proud of it as well. Honestly it's quite surprising I managed to think of something so good so quickly.
It's not too long before we're all lined up in a straight line and told to get into our wind gliders. We're given the basic rundown of the rules before we begin. There's another box that we have to fly to on the other side of this beach, that should be about 5 or so miles away. We're not allowed to interfere with other competitors with magic, but other than that, anything goes.
That's a bit disappointing, I was kind of hoping I'd have to get into dogfights with other racers, having to come to the split second decision of whether to keep fighting or try and speed ahead. I'm almost certainly better than anyone here at fighting while flying, so there goes a huge advantage. There goes most of my strategies, too.
"Alright! If everybody's ready, we'll start the race soon! If anybody needs to delay this for any reason, please speak up now!" Yells a woman I don't recognize in the usual white dress.
Silence lasts for a bit.
"If no one has any objections, we'll be starting now! Everybody! I will count down from five, and when I say go, you will go! Ready?! 5! 4! 3! 2! 1! Go!"
Huge torrents of air from the other racers go off around me as I start to fly. My strategy for this part is to take advantage of my larger wingspan by jumping onto the ground, and creating two torrents of air under my wings while I fall.
This worked at first, but everyone else caught up with me pretty quickly. I was in first for a good few seconds, but then most of the other racers passed me. First Erika, then five other racers. I use more wind to keep my speed up so I don't get passed again. Right now, I'm in sixth place out of eleven racers, that isn't very good.
This is a five mile race though, I have plenty of time to catch up. I just have to pass five people, and keep that up for another couple miles. It shouldn't be that hard.
Alright, time for my second plan! I create two wind blades beside me, and put a lot of focus into making them as dull as possible. Then I throw them into my wings to propel my self forward and gain a huge boost in speed.
That wasn't enough to pass the person in front of me though, so I do it again. And again. And again. And again. Slowly but surely, I manage to pass 5th and 4th place. Just three more people to pass. Repeating this strategy again and again though doesn't seem like it's enough to be able to get into 3rd place or higher. Oh well, I have other ideas.
Normally, I don't actually go as fast as I can with a wind glider. This is mainly to preserve mana since more speed means more wind which means more mana. So it's rather counterintuitive, but I can cover more distance by going slower.
That's over the course of a few dozen miles though, this is only five. Those are all marathons, this is a sprint. There should be no issue using up every last bit of my mana to get my speed up as high as it should go in this situation. I increase the amount of wind on my wings. It's time for max speed!
Alright, that got me into 3rd! Really easily, too! If I had to guess, I was probably going a good 10 or so miles an hour faster than her. 2nd place is being a crafty little bastard though, and is carefully making sure he's right ahead of me so that I can't pass him. If I go left, he goes left, I go up, he goes up.
I summon another dull wind blade, and hit my left wing in an upwards motion as hard as I can hit it. Aaaaaaand… this sends me into an uncontrollable barrel roll off to the right and towards the ground. Send another burst of wind into my right wing! Due to my experiences in the cave, the force from that correction didn't cause me to black out instantly, but I am extremely dizzy.
Somehow though, the annoying 2nd place racer still managed to keep in front of me after that insane maneuver. If I do that again I'm probably going to crash because I'll be too dizzy to keep myself in the air. I can't have that, so I need another way to get ahead of this idiot. I need it fast too, because Erika's expanding the distance between himself and 2nd place.
I use Beira's connection to form cold air above me. The cold air starts to sink slowly, which helps me gain altitude. I use a mixture of this and blowing up with my winds. The guy ahead of me though is trying to go up using just wind magic. I know this because Mana Detection isn't picking up any other magic from him.
I keep gaining altitude, and keep gaining it. If I'm lucky he might get afraid of the height and stop rising, but he can fly so I kind of doubt that. No, my plan is much smarter than that. I prepare two more dull wind blades and fire them upwards into my legs. This changes me from flying forwards, to directly down in less than a second.
I fly down faster than 2nd place can react, and fly under him, securing second place for myself. If he tries to pass me, I can just use Mana Location to keep myself ahead of him, and keeping Mana Detection on him should make sure he can't surprise me like I just did.
Alright, now just to close the distance between myself and Erika. He already has a whole bunch of distance between us, and his wind glider is meant for sustained speed, while mine is meant for longer distances. Technically, the second place prize isn't all that shabby, but… as Mom always used to say "If you're not aiming for 1st, then what the hell's the point?!"
Screw this stupid 2nd place prize, I'm getting first place on my first try, even if it kills me! Here I come, Erika! Get ready, because here comes Azariah!
I'm already flying at my top speed, but technically if I focused hard enough I could probably throw stronger wind into my wings. Dad made it really clear that trying to get better results by just working harder would burn me out really quickly though. Find a way to increase my speed without exhausting my mind.
Wait, I literally have a connection that lets me keep spells going without any input from me! Hahaha! You're definitely losing now, Erika! Take your stupid second place!
Create another charm with Ctothis' connection, the purpose will be to keep wind blasting into my wings as hard as my current connection with Kari will allow me. That isn't all though! If my wind is limited by the strength of my connection, I'll just make another charm to do the same thing to get around that!
I noticed a bit of a speed boost from the first charm, but after the second one, my speed increased by a lot. So I'll add another one, and then another one. At the fourth one, my wings legitimately start to shake. Much more wind than that and they'd definitely rip themselves into shreds.
If I had to guess, I'm probably going about 120 miles an hour more or less. I also notice my mana capacity getting noticeably smaller. I can only keep this speed up for about 20 minutes, based on a really rough guess. That doesn't matter though, I only have to keep this up for less than five miles.
I'm slowly catching up with Erika, but he noticed me hot on his tail. Mana Detection notices him pushing his connection with Kari to its absolute limits just to keep ahead of me. Hahahaha! Silly little boy! You think that's enough to stay ahead of me?!
What? I don't recognize that connection? He's using a connection other than Kari's to increase his speed? He's still using Kari's connection, but now he's using another one just to generate more wind. That isn't from any of the Archons, or an entity I recognize, what is that?
So this is the champion's trick huh?! I guess this wasn't as easy as I thought it would be! Sorry for doubting you, Erika! You really are a worthy opponent!
I know my wings are about to break, but this isn't about the money anymore, it's about winning! I don't care about that reward money anymore! I just want 1st place!
If my wings break, I should be able to get a healer to fix a few broken bones. If my wind glider breaks, and it nearly kills me, "Thrill on Death's Edge" should activate, and I should be able to keep myself alive with its benefits. That spell would also give me a huge advantage in this race, maybe I should try to deliberately activate it?
I'll do that if necessary, right now I pray to Kari and put as much wind as I can manage onto the wings, on top of what my charms are already doing. It increases my speed tremendously. What else is there I can do? The finish line is coming up, I can see it.
Erika's trying his best to push both of those connections to their absolute limits, but I am going much faster than him.The finish line is getting really close, though! I can't tell who's going to get there first!
Almost there… almost there… the distance between us is closing, but the distance between him and the finish line is closing faster. It's looking like Erika's going to cross before me. Then it looks like I'm going to pass him before he can finish, and then…
Erika suddenly spins out of control, and instead of flying, it looks more like he launched himself at the finish line. I don't know why that happened, but Mana Detection is picking him up not using any mana for some reason. That also slowed him down a bit, this is my chance!
On top of all the wind I'm already using to speed myself up, I start launching more dull air blades into my wings to give me small bursts of speed like from the beginning. The finish line and Erika are so close, and-
Mana Location definitely picks up Erika's frailing body passing it before I do. The difference in time is probably less than a tenth of a second, I doubt anyone other than me could have known it wasn't just a tie.
Wait, I'm going around 135 miles an hour, and not slowing down. Aaaaaaaahhhhhh! Turn the charms off, turn them off! Then blow in the other direction! Slow down! Slow down!
><><><><
I stand by the finish line with the other competitors. Erika has some bandages on him, but other than that, he seems completely fine. Some people from Kari's cult that were watching the race are here to graduate us, and that one gorgeous priest with the lovely voice is here to give us our rewards.
"An amazing development, Erika. To think that there would come a day where you had to use up the last of your mana just to keep up your first place streak, and because of an outsider no less." says the gorgeous priest.
Huh? Ran out of mana? That explains why Mana Detection wasn't picking up any magic from Erika… He was going so fast, though… is he really OK? He seems to be standing and speaking just fine though, so it must not have been totally awful for him…
"As for first place, though… as the judge, I couldn't make out who the winner was. And neither can anyone who was watching. So, for Erika and Azariah, we will be taking the first and second place prizes and split them evenly among them."
Oh, oh no… I actually have to speak… Ughh, let's get this over with quickly.
"Erika won." I say.
"Huh? Azariah? What was that?" She asks me.
"Erika passed the finish line before me… I sensed it with magic… Erika won. It wasn't a tie."
"Huh? Erika, is this true?"
"I don't know what kind of magic Azariah has access to, and I was a bit busy spinning out of control to really pay attention to who won, so I don't know. She definitely doesn't have any reason to lie though."
"W- well if that's the case, then everyone! Erika is the first place winner of this wind gliding race! By a margin that's impossible to tell without the use of magic! Give Azariah a round of applause for having enough sportsmanship to admit her second place finish!"
Everyone starts applauding at me and starts cheering about how amazing I am. Why? Please stop, it's embarrassing. I didn't do it for sportsmanship either. Whether I lied or not, the fact remains that I still lost. Even if it would have been incredibly easy to claim 1st, I still would know I lost, so what's even the point?