He broke camp on a Tuesday and walked out of the valley expecting to leave it behind.
He got about two hundred meters up the mountain before he stopped.
The river was out of range behind him, and the dead pine was gone from his head, but the field hadn't stayed in the basin. It was still there, sitting around him just as wide as it had been down below, filled with grey mountain stone and a different set of birds.
Sage.
[ I am tracking it. ]
It moves.
[ The perimeter anchors to you rather than the geography. In retrospect that is the more logical and favorable configuration, though neither of us accounted for it. ]
Adam stood on the slope, turning slowly, feeling his surroundings like his own skin.
Right.
[ Indeed. ]
He followed the ridgeline south for eleven days and spent the evenings shaving down the teleport intervals.
Three seconds between jumps when he started. Three seconds was fine for crossing a creek, but less useful in a high speed battle. He walked until his boots were grey with dust, and when he stopped, he spent an hour jumping between flat stones, counting under his breath.
By the end of the second week, he had it down near two.
[ Two point one seconds. You are reducing the delay by letting go of the outer boundary during transit. ]
Getting sloppy.
[ Economical. The distinction lies in whether you can still read the entire perimeter upon arrival. ]
Since all his abilities were Hatsu now, they could be molded.
So next he focused on Double. It was by far one of his best abilities.
He'd never bothered to tune it. Back on the wall he'd thrown a hundred Doubles into the breach at once, and they'd done the job until a stray shockwave hit them and turned the whole line into grey slush. It had always been volume over substance.
He sat on a flat stone above a dry lakebed and created ten clones.
The idea is to make them better, stronger, smarter, closer to the original rather than something closer to shadow clones.
"This is weird," one said.
"Yeah."
"No, looking at you from over here," the clone said, squinting. "You look terrible."
Sage, are they supposed to complain?
[ They finally have time to talk. You only created them mid-battle before this. You have a surplus of grievances. ]
It took nine days to set the limitation and vow. Ten was the hard cap he locked in, and what he got back in return was interesting. He drove a punch into one. It took the hit, stumbled, and stayed solid. He sent another off the lip of the ridge; it landed at the bottom without dispersing, and cursed at him.
As long as he willed it, he could summon them anywhere within his domain.
He was worried that now they could not leave his area of influence, but that was not the case.
They're not bound to the ground.
[ Correct. Their anchor is you, not the territory. That is a meaningful distinction. ]
Cool, let's call the new skill HOUSEHOLD.
Adjusting New Order was the part he tackled next.
While this power had the highest ceiling, it was the most inconvenient. It always felt weird to start shouting mid battle.
He spent three nights debating with Sage how to adjust it.
[ A vow only works if the restriction deprives you of a real tactical option. ]
Give me the idea.
[ It cannot target you. No reinforcement, no accelerated healing, no exemptions. You would only be dictating conditions to the environment and others. ]
That is fine.
[ Next we can reduce the range of it to that of the area of Vacancy. One hundred meters. Nothing beyond the line. ]
I fight inside that distance anyway. What else?
[ It is not a small loss. We lose the ability to affect a large area the way we did at Sector 5. ]
He let the kettle sit cold between his feet.
Understood. What's the third?
[ Two rules now reduced to only one. ]
Adam stopped. Huh? Why?
[ The three limitations together allow us to create an absolute rule within the area of Vacancy, and they remove the need to shout the order out loud. ]
Sage paused, letting the wind against the rock fill the silence.
[ Host, this is a big decision. Once we apply the change there is no changing it. Even future Sequence advancements will only strengthen it, but they will never add more rules. ]
He thought about it for a long time.
What about cost and duration?
[ Approximately a week of duration, and minimal cost. The mechanic changes so that you set one rule inside the affected area and it holds for that week. You may disable it whenever you wish, but you cannot replace it until the week is out. ]
I mean, that is fine. The cost of the ability was my biggest issue with it together with announcing the order each time. Let's do it.
[ Restrictions applied. ]
The name for this one will be HOUSE RULES.
[ I see where you are going with this, Host. ]
He set the first rule two days later, just to see the effect, and picked something small on purpose.
Nothing inside this space can lie.
There was no sound, no flash, no sudden drop in the air. It simply became true within the Vacancy area. The cost was negligible.
Since the rules did not work on him, he went to a nearby town and asked people their opinion of his hairstyle.
He didn't like the answers, but he saw the effect. Everyone who tried to lie told the truth without realizing it.
AUTHOR'S NOTE — ABILITY RECORDS
HOUSEHOLD Formerly Double. Changed, not merged.
LIMIT: ten copies. No more, ever. Solid, durable and hard to disperse. Where before they were volume with no substance, they are now much closer to the original.
They may be placed at any point inside the area of Vacancy on creation, and they move inside it as freely as the host does. They are tied to him rather than to the field, so they can leave and exist outside with no time limit.
HOUSE RULES Formerly New Order. Changed.
ONE rule. Not two. Permanently.
It cannot affect the host. No rule may make him stronger, faster, harder to kill, or exempt from anything.
The reach of the ability is limited to the area of Vacancy.
In exchange: absolute inside that space, a fraction of the old cost, and triggered by thought. No declaration. No warning. Nobody knows it's coming.
AN: If we get to 100 power stones, I will release an extra chapter on 300, another one. If you wish to support the story and read ahead, visit [email protected]/skeri123