I'm not one to get paranoid but I seriously am reconsidering the value in the whole Mana manipulation thing. It seems like every time I try it, something goes wrong. I summoned a crazy girl. She freaked out when I used it to make clothing. She freaked out when I channeled it, to learn how to make her a weapon.

Actually I think I should just try to avoid using it too near Mya she is way too high strung.

I should work on finding her a counseling or something,.

Although she might chill out a bit once we have some shelter, and can get some down time. I think she is on edge and hasn't really had a chance to settle down from the start, I mean from her perspective, her week thus far has got to be some kind of fun mix of shitty and crazy.

Unfortunately I haven't been doing a great job as her 'boss' with assuring her everything is going to be okay either. I don't really feel like I am really at fault on that one, can't exactly help someone else out when you don't know what the hell is going on yourself.

Now, however, was the first step to making things stop sucking, and that was to make some backup. I pressed Infusion and walked over to a nearby patch of plant life which I 'selected' it by placing my hand on it, causing a tiny trickle of mana to flow into it. The descriptor that followed was

'Select the general Archtype of unit to be formed. Then select the subtype from the list. New Archtypes can be accessed by expending mana to unlock. New subtypes require a certain amount of experience with previous units within that Archtype, as well as Mana to unlock. '

The explanation was likely for the second sub-menu that had appeared. This time There where large buttons . The top instructed: Select Unit Type, and below followed a list of options. Only one wasn't gray, and that was [Soldier], however it also listed [Rogue],[Sage],[Warrior], [Holy].

Seeing as it wasn't grayed out I clicked on the [Soldier] button.

A window appeared depicting four tiny models in little boxes. On the far left, was a man and a woman each wearing outfits similar to Mya's, labeled Infantry(M) and Infantry(F) respectively.

A thin black line connected their box to two other boxes, both grayed out. One was labeled Medic and the other to my glee, was listed as a Scout.

The medic gave me pause, I knew we would need a Healer on general principal, however I also recall in Makai Kingdom giving my Medic's using oversized Syringes as weapons, as well as tools to heal. I do not like the idea of getting stabbed by a two foot needle.

'Yea, I'm gonna look into that "Holy" Archtype, and see if I can't get a normal healer instead.'

I'm not sure what each Archtype had, but I had a vague notion. Holy likely had Medics and 'Angelic Host'. The Rogue Srchtype would have Thieves. The Sage was a no brainier, I'd wager my las (and first) HL, It was filled with casters. The warrior threw me off a bit because it was so generalized, are their any non warrior demons? At the moment, i'd guess on it being Male and female, fighters and brawlers. For now though my objective was clear. Unlock scout, Channel scout, see how much Mana I had left over.

I selected the grayed out Scout option.

I felt the Mana being pulled out. It was a fairly large sum too. Though my reserves felt fine, though not nearly as much remained as when I first landed.

The icon de-grayed itself, if that's even a word.

'Well here goes nothing'

I selected the Scout and felt the Mana flow into the weed. The whole area started to glow when, to my surprise, a tiny purple light settled into the glowing form which rapidly morphed into a human shape.

Moments later my hand was hovering just above the goggled forehead of our new scout. He blinked, then sat up.

Mya said something I couldn't understand because, for whatever reason, it sounded very distant.

Actually I hadn't really noticed, but whenever I enter my Magick the whole area gets really quite, like I'm hearing everything through a wall or something

It's not something that really grabbed my attention as much as if where completely silent, which probably explains why I didn't notice. Still it was annoying I couldn't even listen to a conversation when I use my abilities.

The Scout himself was actually pretty short, and to be honest he looked young, late teens most likely. I couldn't see him being old enough to get into a bar.

He wore a orange tank top shirt. A belt with a metal band in the middle, withe flaps coming down from the side, which held up a pair of plain green fatigue pants. He had a pair of high boots that looked like they where made for travel instead of combat. His hands where covered with a pair of fingerless gloves.

The most eye catching features where the large goggles on his rust-blond spiky-haired head, and the giant backpack that was shaped like a bat on his back, on its underside was tied a large rolled up map, if I had to guess.

I considered leaving my meditative state to do introductions, but Mya seemed to have things under control, and actually looked relieved that he was here.

'It would be best to just take care of everything as quickly as possible, Instead of dropping in and out again and again'

I checked our newest recruited stats. About what I expected. Good with guns, tolerable with rifles, shovels, and drills?

Apparently the weird weapons from the games are accounted for here as well.

I noted his highest proficiency was a B with guns, and C's with the rest.

He had mediocre but well rounded stats, Mostly C's,

His Hit was a B, and his Tech and Movement was A however. Mya had a B, so apparently he could really hoof it.

Not that they would be able to take advantage of it as my 'F' movement rating put me at a sedate mosey by comparison.

Letting out a sigh, I clicked the channel option, to see if he could give me any useful forms.

'Click, select, rinse, repeat' It was starting to feel kinda repetitive as I felt my Mana flow away and through our newest recruit.

A rush of information hit me.

I have never been one for camping. The idea that people willingly go out to sleep on the ground when we spent the last thousand years figuring out how to get as far away from doing so, has always mystified me. That being said there is a lot of things that go into making a real camp. Not the kind that you see at a park, but a real frontier camp. Where you put the campfire so the wind doesn't blow the smoke into the sleeping areas, How you set up defenses, How to set up your layout so people can easily find things, It's actually not that hard. Well, not anymore I guess.

A lot of it is sorta obvious,but not forgetting anything would be hard if you haven't done it before and had no idea what to do. Getting this Form was definitely a plus. Particularly the palisade, which is the fancy name for big ass wooden wall.

The moment the knowledge finished processing I wasted no time to see if anyone was advancing on me. I didn't 'think' Mya or our new scout would slug me, but it didn't hurt to check.

He seemed a bit disoriented but had apparently came too about the same time I had, and was asking Mya something which I still couldn't understand. She thumbed over to me which more or less let me guess what was going on. He didn't seem like he was going to attack me out of the blue like a crazy person, so I might as well just keep on going..

Because I the next unit I was planning on making would be female I looked around and found a flower. No particular reason other than I thought it would be be a better fit than a rock or one of the mostly dead looking trees in the area. The only one I could find was on a tiny cactus.

'Eh, beggars being choosers and whatnot'

I put my hand on the plant, to my happy surprise it seems I'm immune to the needles of the plant as they didn't stick me when I brushed my hand against them. If your asking why I poked the needles, what is the first thing you do if presented with something you know is sharp.

'That could just be a me thing though..'

I started the infusion procedure once again, this time however I tapped on the [Sage] option, another pull on my Mana, and it unlocked. The lowest tier in the Sage Archtype was the Skull and Mage. I didn't see any other options at the moment, however I think it was mentioned earlier that I need to make weaker units before getting the stronger ones. At any rate I knew what I wanted.

In a smooth series of motions I unlocked, and selected the Mage.

My master plan was very simple. Damage boost to abilities was awesome, and I wanted to see if I couldn't try and upgrade it off her and give it to myself. SP was the one thing I hand any amount of and I was going to use it.

If the Skull was the class that had it I would have made a Skull. I'm really glad I mentioned it to Mya because it would have been annoying getting the wrong class.

'I could still be getting the wrong class, and Mya just had a experience bias.'

Nothing I could do to fix that though, thus far she had good information and I couldn't really fault her if her personal experience wasn't accurate. To the best of my reasoning she had a better chance of being right about it than I did, despite having played a game version.

Selecting the Mage caused a secondary screen to pop up.

'Select Mage Expertise'

Below it showed three different Types, Fire, Ice, and Wind.

Sticking to my guns I picked Ice.

'Take that Crazy-Knife-Girl' I though happily, and with only a tiny bit of spite.

Mya had skills with a Fire based weapon, and the Mage I picked would be able to cover Ice.

So it might give us some balance later on.

The fact that Mya was weak against Ice, and thus having someone specialized in it would great potential to her future discomfort in no way influenced my decision. Scouts Honor! What's that? Was I ever actually a scout? Well that's besides the point.

Our newest addition coalesced as a tiny purple mote settled into the shifting form, seemingly solidifying it into a blue-outfitted girl with blue hair that was a couple full steps darker than Mya's own electric-blue hue.

Her outfit was essentially a frilly one piece dress. I'm not an expert on dresses, and I have never had any desire to correct this fact, so I don't actually know the type. The entire ensemble looked like someone couldn't decide between a wizard robe, and a french maid costume, and said fuck it. Long and loose frilly arm lengths. The top portion was conservative but the skirt part reveled a respectable amount of leg, and cut off low to mid calf. More than a few bows where tied in, including a large on on her head.

The Mage herself was very cute though, so the end effect worked quite well. Her shoes where buckled high tops, that looked fairly rugged. And she wore some high socks or stockings to finish the outfit off.

I checked her stats while I heard the other two pull her into a conversation in the background.

"Defiantly a caster then'

S rank in Int.

A rank aptitude in SP

B in Speed and Hit,

D in Defense and Hp,

E in Attack

C in everything else

I noted she was more specialized than the others, they where more generalized, but I guess that's bound to happen sooner or later. A mixed bag of generalist and specialist makes a good bit of sense I suppose.

Her only proficiencies where in books and staves, both at A rank.

She only had the basic Ice spell listed in her abilities at the moment.

Not wasting any time I moved on to channel, and tested her to see what Form I might get.

It was an odd feeling this time, instead of the other forms which where fairly straightforward hers had a level of complexity I wasn't expecting. I got the feeling of large rows and rows of books, arranged neatly. However what threw me off was the content of those books, and a feeling associated for how to make them. I don't really have the words to really do it justice, but imagine someone tells you you need to get ready to catch a huge water balloon being thrown from the other side of a house, and you have to catch it in such a way that it will always land in a empty kiddy pool you have available. And it's critical that you not mess up and spill a single drop, and that the kiddy pool will drain or be filled under certain conditions, etc. Yea it wasn't an easy feeling to describe. One thing I for sure though is, weirdness in the 'rules' for the Form aside, I now knew how to generate a library.

By this point I felt a little dry on the Mana end of things and I didn't know what to make next, so I dropped out of my magick.

To the sound of the blue haired Mage crying quietly on Myas shoulder. Our scout looked like he really wanted to hit me, and Mya had a deadpan look that said a great deal more than you'd think.

'Seriously?' I though forlornly.

Some people can't catch a break.

Unfortunately "some people," is me.