Life Reset

by Shemer Kuznits

  Glibworm had a small treasure of useful items on him. Two minor mana potions, 10 gold, 62 silver, and two magical items;

  scroll of finding

  Description: plain parchment inscribed with magical writing.

  Type: Single use item.

  Effect: locate an object or person within a 200-meter radius

  Ring of A Sounding Horn

  Description: Runecrafted gold ring

  Type: magical.

  Effect: once per day sounds a powerful horn that can deafen enemies.

  I assumed the scroll was a tool meant to be used if the search parties found evidence of nearby goblins. The ring was nice, nothing special in the magical department itself. But one of the words in the description caused me to inhale sharply.

  Runecrafted. This was a runic made item.

  Perhaps I could study it, and learn a new rune? I thought excitedly. But that would wait until I’m safely home back at Goblin’s Gorge, for now I put the ring on my finger.

  As I pushed myself up to start back to the settlement I felt weighed down by my inventory. I reactivated Mana Infusion, and the strain disappeared as my enhanced strength compensated the burden.

  My desire to test myself in combat was now sated and some of my questions answered, I turned and walked back toward Goblin’s Gorge, my budding settlement.

  ***

  The dawn of a new day was emerging by the time I arrived back to the valley’s entrance. It hadn’t taken me long at all to adjust to the new schedule, meaning I was dead tired. I went to my house, lay down in my occupied furs and embraced Tika, letting sleep take me away.

  ***

  I woke up the next evening, my body and limbs intertwined with Tika's. It was not an unpleasant sensation, her head rested comfortably on my shoulder, allowing me a clear view of her enticing cleavage. It’s goblin cleavage Oren! I berated myself when I realized I was staring. You like human cleavage! Now get a grip, pervert!

  Sleeping every night with Tika next to me was a pleasant and comforting routine now. I just had to keep my guard up, and not let it escalate into anything more.

  Man, I miss female companionship! Human female companionship. I wasn't a 'player' back in the real world, but I hadn't lacked for female companionship either. I liked waking up next to an attractive woman, having breakfast together, traveling.… Without me realizing it, Tika was filling the void I wasn’t aware I had - until now.

  Tika opened her eyes, as I was staring vacantly, away in my thoughts.

  “Morning.” She smiled.

  I forced my thoughts back to the present and smiled back at her. “Good Morning Tika.”

  I started extricating myself from the clingy tangle of goblin limbs, when Tika put a gentle hand to the side my face, making me pause.

  “Don’t go.” She whispered.

  I looked at her, conflicted. “I have to take care of our settlement.”

  “Please?” her big eyes looked at me, imploring while her hand traced a line down to my chest, caressing me softly and pressing her body to me.

  I paused for a moment, Oh what the hell... “Alright, a little while longer then.”

  “I hunt all day, don’t see you. I… Miss… You...“ she admitted in another whisper.

  I looked at her in surprise. “You hardly know me. If it wasn’t for Zuban who sent you to me in the first place…” I shook my head.

  She leisurely stroked my chest. “I want to be here. Zuban only helped. You take care of us, you are good leader. Even Guba say it.”

  I coughed, embarrassed and touched. I didn’t expect such a compliment. Besides, was I imagining things or was her speech more coherent than before?

 

  I grimaced. Vic! Some privacy please?!

 

  I shook my head indignantly and looked back at Tika my expression easing. She was leaning on her elbows, looking at me expectantly.

  “So, do you like hunting?”

  She nodded, “I like to help clan. Bring food, make clan grow. I was only hunter for old clan. Was hard. Not enough of Guba’s stew for everyone. I try hunt more, but… can’t.”

  That was due to her reaching her skill cap. Since we’d met, Tika had leveled up a few times, enabling her to increase her Forage skill and to reach its Apprentice rank.

  We continued talking, Tika told me about spending her days hunting, laying traps, finding exciting new territories and practicing her bowmanship. Her face beamed with excitement whenever she recounted especially exciting occasions.

  Tika spoke earnestly and her company was charming. We talked for almost an hour, and I enjoyed every moment.

  Afterward, I left the house, to join the other late risers for breakfast.

  “Hey Zuban,” I called to my foreman as he passed by. “How’s the construction going?”

  “Amazingly,” He shook his head and approached me. “Bargush gained his Builder’s Apprentice rank yesterday, so I reassigned him to work on the Smithy. It gave a big boost to the building construction’s progress. I think with the extra help the Smithy will now be completed in three days, instead of six.”

  “Excellent!” I beamed at him. “And the mess hall?”

  “Well, since only three Novices are working on it now, construction has slowed a bit, but I’m happy to report that the Builders learn quickly and should complete the building in four days.”

  “Great!” I was ready to give my morning meal all my attention but Zuban’s next response stopped me.

  He shook his head, “Not everything is so good. Unfortunately, now our two Lumberjacks can’t keep up with the demand for wood. We only have enough stocked for another day or so, then we’ll have to wait. At their current rate, it will take the Lumberjacks a week to cut the wood we need to finish both constructions.”

  That was bad news, but luckily, I had a solution and it had nothing to do having to swing an axe on my own. In fact, the solution was right across the fire in front of me, in the form of Vrick and his six warriors. He caught me staring at him and looked back at me questioningly. I grinned at him, miming a motion of cutting trees. His face immediately fell as he took my meaning. Even without the Lumberjack skill, six goblins could produce a decent daily yield.

  “Problem solved,” I declared.

  I opened the clan’s Population Interface to display the full and detailed information of each of my 31 clan members in front of me. It was becoming cumbersome to use in this format, actually it was unmanageable. I looked up and around, searching. Vic was moving about among the eating goblins. He was checking under their feet for some reason. I beckoned him over to me. “Can you add an option to view the work-related skill levels of everyone in the clan, grouped by the skill name?”

  “Sure thing boss,” He waved his hands theatrically, and the display changed.

  “Something like this?” he asked.

  The display changed, information was reorganized, and looked much more manageable now.

  “Good, could you please inventory the food stocks?”

  Vic gave me an annoyed look, which I ignored, and went over to the large main pile, mumbling in irritation.

  I continued reviewing the list:

  Skills and skill levels available in the clan

  ● Builder. Skill levels: 13, 13, 12, 10, 6, 6

  ● Lumberjack. Skill levels: 13, 6, 4, 4

  ● Miner. Skill levels: 11

  ● Fisherman. Skill levels: 12, 5

  ● Gatherer. Skill levels: 10, 8, 5, 5

  ● Stonemason. Skill levels: 10

  ● Cook. Skill levels: 8

  ● Tanner. Skill levels: 5

  ● Chemist. Skill levels: 13

  ● Forager. Skill levels: 12

  ● Inscribe. Skill levels: 4

  ● Armorer. Skill levels: 2

  Not bad for ha
ving started with only a handful of refugees. We were really on our way to creating something amazing.

  Gandork was increasing his Cooking skill at an admirable rate. He’ll reach Apprentice rank soon, and then I’ll finally be able to recruit more Advanced workers.

  Vic returned, a sour expression on his face. “It’s getting way too cluttered to get a proper count. By my estimate, you have about 30 units of each type of raw food and over 200 mushrooms. Overall I make it out to be roughly 400 units of food.”

  I grinned at him.

  “You better do something with it soon though,” he warned. “Looks like a third of the food will spoil within a couple days.”

  “The Mess Hall should take care of that.” I looked at Vic questionably. “Why were you looking at the goblin’s feet earlier?”

  He waved dismissively, “Oh, nothing important.”

  I looked at him pointedly.

  “Oh alright. I just wanted to get a better idea of how to form feet. They are hard to shape, you know.”

  I looked down at his feet. He was double gesturing up at me with middle-fingers... growing out of his feet.

  “Ha Ha! Made you look!” He was laughing madly, occasionally snorting, falling in his amusement and rolling around on the ground.

  Bastard!

  He continued laughing at me from the ground.

  I looked at him, clearly enjoying himself, and tried to come up with a witty retort that would shut him up.

  I was interrupted by someone stepping between us, blocking my view of Vic.

  I looked up, to see Vrick.

  “We need to talk,” he informed me bluntly.

  “Yes?”

  “Per your orders, I assigned all the warriors to cutting trees. But I would like to be excused from that task.”

  “Oh?” I raised an eyebrow at his defiant tone.

  We have a Tanner now” he added seriously. “He’s already produced some workable leather. I would like permission to resume crafting armor. The new warriors especially need more protection. All they have right now is their loincloth.”

  “You make a good point, Vrick. But the wood is kind of a priority. Let me think it over.”

  I juggled numbers in my head. Cutting wood without the Lumberjack skill could produce two tree logs per day. So six warriors would supply 12 logs, 13 actually, with the Nocturnal bonus. Thirteen logs per day were slightly more than what the two proficient Lumberjacks could process into workable timber, so we’d have a surplus of logs. Meaning I could spare Vrick.”

  “Alright, you got it. But I expect to see some glorious new armor covering my warriors.”

  Never one for too many words, he nodded somberly and turned to leave.

  “Oh Vrick, one more thing. I brought two hobgoblin leather armors with me. Maybe you can reduce their size, or use them as raw material.” I suggested. “They’re over there in the pile.”

  “I’ll see what I can do, Dark Totem.” He bowed and left.

  Everything was progressing nicely, I finished my breakfast and visited the Shrine.

  I stepped up the ladder, to the overhanging stone shelf I and approached the stone and bone apparatus, retrieving a level 5 void Crystal from my inventory. The crystal was formed by a religiously significant act of sacrifice. Its description stated it could be used in dark rituals. Those two facts strongly hinted it could interact with the Shrine. I touched the black crystal to the Shrine. I was not disappointed.

  Convert level 5 Void Crystal to 5 energy? Yes /No

  “YES!” I shouted triumphantly, raising my hands into the air as the crystal was absorbed by the Shrine. I was right! One of the uses for a void Crystal was to convert it into Energy Points! I managed to find a way to gather more of the precious resource. This could really boost my development, allow us to build and perform research faster, and increase the levels and skills of my people. A precious commodity indeed!

  I opened the Energy Interface;

  Energy Options

  Available Energy: 227

  Daily gain: 85

  Individuals contributing: 33

  Boss options

  Upgrade options

  Allocate options

  Special

  I was doing well in all aspects of settlement development; I had a good and steady food production chain in place, decent construction rate, and now a respectable looking energy yield.

  That reminded me - the last four goblin warriors I recruited were still level 1. I now had enough to raise them to level 2, so I did just that. I then reviewed the updated interface.

  Energy Options

  Available Energy: 27

  Daily gain: 89

  ...

  I still had three more Void Crystals, their levels totaling to a tidy sum of 25, meaning a potential 25 Energy Points. I briefly considered converting them to energy right away, but decided against it. They might prove useful in other ways, and if I found myself suddenly needing more energy I could always convert them then.

  Done with today’s inspection, I made my way back to my house. It was crafting time!

  ***

  I sat on the floor holding the Sounding Horn ring, looking at it in frustration.

  For the past several hours I’d tried different methods of analyzing the ring I looted from Glibworm, the hobgoblin Adept. I was hoping to learn new runes from it.

  I was felt mentally drained. Despite trying every way I could think of to decipher the ring; inspecting it via Analyze, or through the design mode, I wasn’t even able to glimpse any new runes.

  I sighed morosely. I guess I need to increase my Runecraft level first.

  I placed the ring back on my finger and took a simple dagger out of my inventory.

  Opening the Runecraft design mode, I selected the MaKoTe schema, the one that increased durability and added a socket. I fumbled a bit with the connector rune, restarting the process a few times until I threaded it properly through all the target points. After I finally got it, I channeled mana into the dagger, powering the enchantment.

  Source required to finalize enchantment. Please select one

  - Opal of Healing (heals on contact),

  - Void Shard level 13 (increase effect by 43%)

  - Void Shard level 7 (increase effect by 23%)

  - Void Shard level 5(increase effect by 16%)

  So that’s what they do. I pondered.

  I canceled the process, no sense in wasting a perfectly good Void Crystal on a lousy dagger. But learning that they could increase the enchantment effectiveness was a great discovery. It meant that once I gain access to some more useful rune schemes, I could immediately make it more effective. Seeing as there was no shortage of enemies to sacrifice, it meant I would be able to spend crystals on even the minor stuff. My goal was to eventually equip all my warriors with high-quality enchanted gear.

  The front door opened abruptly, cutting away my train of thought. Tika entered the house. Through the partially opened door, I could see it was morning already. I yawned deeply. No wonder I’m so tired. Time sure flies by when I’m enchanting.

  Tika followed me to the bed, where we fell asleep, cuddled together.

  ***

  Malkyr and Hoshisu materialized in the now familiar meadow. The sun was just starting to appear behind the cliffs, shedding its first light across the still dark valley.

  Malkyr reached with one hand behind his shoulder, retrieving the great-axe strapped across his back. He held it lovingly in his big hands. “Alright, sis, ready for a bit of serious adventuring?”

  Hoshisu scanned the open valley in front of her, no goblins could be seen. “It looks like all our new industrious little friends went to sleep for the day, so we might as well.”

  “Good, my brain still hurts from trying to figure out the Jacobson Conjecture problem, I need to blow off some steam.”

  Hoshisu smiled. It was always the same with Malkyr. Her younger brother was a c
ompletely different person when they played in NEO. His usual gentle and somewhat timid nature in real life didn’t translate into the game world. When he was playing, his persona changed to a boisterous tough-guy. She didn’t mind the change, it was good for him, and it made her laugh.

  The two made their way toward the forest path that led outside the valley. It didn’t take them long yesterday to find out where the exit was located. Malkyr winced as he remembered how he obtained that information. That grouchy old goblin hag was informative, but damn if she isn’t one of the crankiest ladies I’ve ever encountered.

  After a short walk, they made it to the end of the forest path, finding the narrow exit from the valley.

  They waded for hours through dense vegetation, Malkyr often resorting to hacking his way through the foliage.

  After several hours of barely making headway, Hoshisu raised her hand, motioning her brother to stop.

  “What do you see?” he whispered.

  “I’m not sure, it might be some sort of ruins.” She squinted her eyes, “It looks like a stump of an old stone tower.”

  “Awesome, it’s probably filled with nasty mobs,” he reached excitedly for the greataxe on his back.

  Hoshisu loosened her daggers on her belt. “I guess you’re right. Let’s take a look inside?”

  Cautiously, but filled with excitement, the duo approached the ruins.

  ***

  I woke up cuddled with Tika. I gently disengaged from the still sleeping huntress, leaving her still slumbering in the furs. Once she started sleeping over I’d quickly learned she was a late riser.

  Starting my now daily ritual, I was going to have breakfast with a nice side dish of daily progress report.