“AUUUUGGGHHH!” Tim screamed, as yet another hole was poked in his skin and his soul, and the spurting Brown light of his Soul Essence streamed forth. He shook and he shuddered, but he didn’t let go of the massive pylons to either side of him, muscles bulging as he fought the pain of having his Chakras opened up for Soul Magic.

  He had already taken the Mark from Kris, and was present in the Markspace. Seeing all those powerful minds and souls there who dwarfed him in mental power was a huge wake-up call for him, especially since the bonus of the Mark was to his Intelligence, and he was now aware of the potential and power of gaining some Matrix Classes.

  Soul Warrior was a decent enough way to get started on that process, especially since it worked off Constitution, of which a Tremendous Monuga had tons.

  “Gor, that is a lot of natural Soul the blighter has,” Lord Mick exclaimed with feeling, watching the process as Kris trotted up Tim’s right arm and over to his left, her Disk following her with her Soul-Tatting supplies. Tim kept very still as she went to work scribing the Philosopher’s Might Tat on his left forearm, bands of alternating long and short whiteness punching into the thick skin of his arms. Her Arakne Arms were out to help with the process, wielding needles twice as long and thick as she used to work on Isparians, tumeroks, or even lugians.

  The list of warriors clamoring for her time in such matters was pretty long and involved. She also had a couple very diligent Aun focused on mastering the Soul Painting technique so that they could start taking some of the load off of her.

  “His natural Con score is almost as high as Kris’s is, and that’s saying something, given she’s a Null and really Con focused,” I agreed, watching the whole process. “Which is important, as he can go right to a Capacity of 5. Without a bunch of Soul to use and move around, multiple Tats is worthless to him.”

  “It be a good thing he’s a friend now, given the upgrades?” the Mick asked, only a little warily.

  “You can see the Yellow starting to pervade him already,” I said calmly, and he hesitated only a moment before nodding at the tint to the Brown. “I have no idea how many years he’s been alone, nothing to talk to, only himself and his own thoughts to keep him company. Longer than Isparians have been here, and longer than the virindi. He might even be from before the olthoi, although I didn’t press on that.”

  “’Tis a long time to have no one to talk to. He’s not much of a chatter, but he’s listening a lot,” the Mick admitted.

  “He’s not used to minds who work so much faster than his, plus he feels small in the Markspace, clumsy and slow compared to so many of us. He’s got brute strength there, but he doesn’t use it well because he’s never had to. His life has been one of moving from one meal to the next, fighting for those meals, and not too much else.

  “That said, he’s eager to learn and he’s having fun, almost like a child discovering new toys. He’s actually not dumb, he’s just never had to exercise his brains.”

  “Well, I got me no respect for the little ones, but a skull that big should have some thoughts to it,” the Mick pointed out.

  “Jotuns in other worlds are often fairly heavy thinkers. Heads in the clouds way up there, not much concerned with basic needs. The more powerful they are, the less they are concerned with stuff mortals think is important. Mostly on the Elemental side of things, not concerned with the Alignments, either.”

  He gave me a weird look. “One o’ these days yer gonna have t’ tell me where you picked up so much weird shite about the greater worlds beyond our own. Sounds even more profound than the Empyrean shite, as they are mostly flailing about messing with shite they shouldn’t be for power an’ knowledge an’ lore an’ bragging rights.”

  “Someday,” I half-smiled. “Tim has Jotun equals and superiors in other times and places, beings that deserve the name of Titans who can contest with some of the lesser gods. Just like Dragons, the Jotuns can grow to be immensely powerful, especially in their spheres of endeavor. The Monugas, for example, are textbook Earth-Aligned, with no nominal affinity for magic at all. But they can get very strong, big, and resistant to magic if they work for it.”

  Tim’s feet chakra had already been opened, and a misty gout of Brown Soul Essence was glowing on the top of the rough hides made from the largest of the Malus Shreths wrapped around his feet. A team of men was hauling in a foot covering made of gleaming silvered metal. There was no need for stealth in this case, so why not silverslake it?

  I eyed the Runework scrolling like delicate, powerful ink across the silvered metal, eye-catching and quite beautiful. The layered shell of metal was brought up and around the top of Tim’s foot, fitting quite snugly around it.

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  “Alright, Bind it to your foot, big guy!” Briggs called out in his commanding voice.

  The sides of Tim’s head furrowed, much like our foreheads would, and there was a swirl across the metal. The black lines lit up with Yellow-Brown light as the Soul Essence suffused them, and there was an audible crink as the metal was sealed into place over top of Tim’s massive foot, bonding right to the skin and leather beneath it.

  “Clever,” the Mick admitted with approval, looking at it. “Can’t strap the thing down, ain’t nothing would stand up to his weight an’ strength without magical reinforcement. Bind it to the Chakra point, hold it there with the magic itself!”

  We both looked at the greave that was coming in behind it, almost ten feet long and made in much the same pattern, with chain links and mesh clearly meant to connect to the solleret top there.

  “Just proper boots are gonna make him a pain in the arse to fight,” the Mick predicted, shaking his head. “Ten feet just to reach his knees!”

  “Briggs isn’t a fool, so he’s going for full lower body and vital points, anything an archer would aim at. Tim is going to look like a titanic shining warrior by the time we’re done here.”

  “Wouldnae it be easier just to use those Bracers and wind some Force Armor about him, as ye do?” the Mick asked.

  “Damage Reduction,” I reminded him, and he grunted. “My Force Armor can bounce some hits, sure, but it doesn’t soak up anything strong enough to punch through it. Your own Way of Water is basically designed to shear right through it. It takes metal and mass to get true Damage Reduction, and stacked onto him, it’s going to take one of his primary vulnerabilities way down. For all his size, his skin really isn’t that thick or durable, you know. He’s actually far more vulnerable than something that size should be, likely due to inefficiencies in the growth process.

  “A true Jotun of his size would have six inches to a foot of skin and fat to cut through before you even got to the muscle or any vitals, and that skin would be as tough as old oak or even stone.”

  “Modifier?” the Mick asked, always curious about the numbers.

  “Jotunblooded True Giants of Earth can hit +20 Natural Armor. The least of them is around +10.”

  “Gor! That be better than the best Enchanted Armor!” the Mick blurted out.

  “He’s only got +3. It’s maybe equal to horsehide from back on Dereth. Stops most of the scraping. His vitality and incredible Fast Healing are basically his strongest points, and the sheer amount of Health Qi he has is incredible. If we can reduce the amount of incoming damage to him, his Fast Healing will take care of everything, and even moreso if we use Life Magic to boost that, too.”

  “So, boosting that Natural Armor be very important,” the Mick nodded slowly. “Life Magic or Barkskin both viable, methinks?”

  “He wasn’t aware that he could invest more in his own Stature effects. How much Karma do you think he’s accumulated over the decades, even centuries, he’s lived?”

  The Mick’s eyes widened. “So, he’s suddenly going to get a whole lot tougher each and every day, an’ he’s already starting on a Matrix Class…”

  “It might be his only Matrix Class. For all his aggression, he’s more Elemental than disciplined, and he doesn’t want to fight just to fight, unlike his little cousins. He might just take Warrior Levels instead of Melee or Archer as Secondary.

  “But he loves Soul Magic, you can see and feel it, and he’s a natural for it. He’ll probably take Soul Warrior as far up as he can go, maybe Soulcaster on the side. It’ll likely become a hallmark of the Tremendous Monugas. They’re just naturals at using it.”

  “Aye, I’m not feeling any spiritual basis for using ki,” the Mick nodded, watching the Greave get levered up into place on Tim’s fur-wrapped shin, connecting chains and mail mesh already linked to the Solleret top. Brown-Yellow light flared up the black Runework, and the unstrapped metal adhered fully without needing straps to keep it in place. “Naturals, you say? That include the kiddies?”

  The back half of that Greave, the Knee Guard, and the Tassets for the upper leg were already on the way, while the left foot’s Solleret was being carted over as well.

  “Probably. Although the only way to test that out is using Charm Magic to Dominate them and keep them docile while we open the Chakras on them. It might be an alternate road to Enlightenment for them. If we can access the Isparian System enough to raise their Focus and Self enough to get above their base instincts, that could be a road to full growth for more of them.”

  “Can the island sustain a bunch o’ Tims?” the Mick had to ask, picturing that situation.

  “No. But it can Sustain more of them than there are now… and Enlightening the monugas would be worth it, regardless. They never stop growing, and eventually die under their own weight, no longer strong enough to keep moving. Soul Magic could alleviate a lot of that, even if it doesn’t bestir the massive evolution to being Tremendous. Being able to Invest in their own Stature would also overcome a lot of problems, but they are too dumb to do so.”

  “These Jotuns ye speak of, they do the same?” the Mick inquired, curious now.

  “No. True Giants that I know of come with Stature active from the moment they are born, and just grow into it. They are more than humans like we Isparians are, or even the Empyreans. They have tremendous amounts of innate Elemental energies within them, and simply inherit all that power and much of the instinctive knowledge they need to survive.

  “The monugas seem more like the gromnies. They can grow to contain the power, but are too dumb and savage to invest in themselves and gain it properly, and so never do. True Dragons in other realms grow into power, but they also take a great deal of time to reach the higher tiers among themselves. It takes a full century for them to reach adulthood in size, for example. I would like to see how old the Summons of the large gromnies in the Valley of Death are, although I suppose just asking the gromnatrosses how long it takes their young to actually become self-aware would be easier.”

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