by Dakota Krout
Hit Points: 622/622
Mana: 1,129/1,872 (617 Reserved)
Mana regen: 39.44/sec
Stamina: 610/616.5
Stamina regen: 5.88/sec
Characteristic: Raw score (Modifier)
Strength: 61 (2.11)
Dexterity: 70 (2.20)
Constitution: 62 (2.12)
Intelligence: 120 (3.2)
Wisdom: 95 (2.45)
Charisma: 59 (2.09)
Perception: 72 (2.22)
Luck: 45 (1.45)
Karmic Luck: +20
Joe was having a good time going through everything while they leisurely walked toward the main square. Now he had nine unassigned skill points, his stats were looking good, he had apparently done something right if his Karmic Luck were anything to go by, and-
“-that’s why we need everyone we can possibly get if we are going to launch an offensive against a Noble Guild!” The person speaking had drawn a huge crowd, and was standing on top of a statue. “We know for a fact that they have an endless food supply! They have housing, clothes, weapons, and have been funnelling resources into beautification projects while we are starving to death again and again!”
Joe’s party had all stopped to stare at the man. Was he trying to infuriate a mob? Though the densely packed city had thinned as people got used to this reality, it didn’t change the fact that over a billion people had entered Eternium. Though… that thought felt… fuzzy. Joe narrowed his eyes as he realized that he hadn't thought about earth or the destruction there in days, possibly weeks. This place had a way of making you forget your past troubles in order to focus on the future, and the present. For most people, that was only helpful… but here, it was being used against the Wanderer’s Guild to paint them as the true monsters.
“Three days from now, we will march against this repository of ‘elite players’ that are making it impossible for us to better our own lives! Join us now, and we’ll work with you to get ready! Three days, and you will be powerful enough to take everything you need! Once we have seized the means of production, we will all-”
“Let’s go, guys.” Joe started pushing at the crowd. “I think we need to talk to someone about this.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
“Seriously,” Joe complained as he worked to fine-tune a ritual diagram. “I warn them about an incoming attack on our town, and they shrug it off like it doesn't matter that a huge amount of people are coming here to claim the greenhouse and smash up our town. They’re too worried about the Noble Guilds? Who do they think is riling up the masses?”
“They obviously don't know that the time investment on food production is absurd,” Hannah grumbled along with him. “Did you know that a couple deer got in there somehow and totally destroyed the apple trees? The gardener in that area was so mad about it that he killed them as soon as he found them, and now we have deer-men spawning in that wing. Now there is a strict no-killing-new-things rule in there. It's already starting to act like a dungeon, even though they’ve been careful to cut down all the ‘weeds’ that have been popping up.”
Joe nodded along at what she was saying. “This entire world is designed to get the best out of people. You work hard, and you get rewarded in a tangible way for it. Can you imagine how that would have changed our lives back on earth?”
“That would have been interesting to see.” Hannah looked at Joe, opened her mouth, then closed it before she said what she had planned to say. Joe saw, and simply waited quietly. If she had something to say… “I just want to make them see! Seriously, if people would just work as hard as we do, they would have their own ways to become powerful! Abyss, have you seen what that level twelve Janitor was able to do? He can walk into an area, and everything starts to clean itself. He still gets experience for it, too!”
“Wait, really? Does that mean… hold on.” Joe took a step back mentally; Hannah had just said some dangerous things. “It really isn’t our place to tell people how to live their lives, Hannah. If we force people to have our same viewpoints, that becomes a bad day for everyone. I recently had to fight a cult that had the actual same mindset on everything, and they were only used for someone else’s gain. Imagine if a king or something had that kind of power? That’s not a leader anymore, that’s a tyrant that people will fight with everything they have.”
“Huh.” Hannah’s non-answer made Joe sigh. It seemed that she had her own viewpoint on this, and had been hoping for a simple agreement, not a conversation. It had been difficult to find a good conversationalist recently. Joe chuckled at that thought: ‘Conversationalist’ sounded like an upgraded Bard class. In fact, he was almost sure that existed somewhere.
But, Joe had found that once someone had formed their own opinion, they needed to experience something that let them change their mindset. Talking it out or being presented with data had almost no bearing. He connected the final symbol on his ritual and gently blew on the ink to dry it. As far as he could see… perfect. “There we go. Now, here’s the fun part.”
He took out a small ingot of gold, placing it in the center of the ritual diagram. Since he was making a Novice rank enchanted ritual, his personal mana was more than enough to fill the diagram. The diagram lit up and wavered on the paper as it sought an acceptable item to merge with. The gold was detected, and lines started flowing from the paper to the ingot. There were a few more moments where the gold buzzed, but the high purity and density of the material allowed the magical matrix to settle.
Ritual of Remote Activation complete! Select up to four rituals to modify.
“It worked!” Joe lifted the world’s most expensive remote into the air excitedly. The difficulty of this ritual was simply the high barrier to entry: clearly shown by the cost of the materials. He looked closely at the ‘remote’, seeing that it contained a large central button and four smaller ones next to it. After pulling over a ritual diagram and holding the remote next to it, a message appeared.
Rituals selected to be used in the Ritual of Remote Activation must be primed.
“Okay…” Joe searched for a primed version of the flamethrower ritual, one that had already had the mana and activation components stored within it. He only had a single one, but he added it cheerfully. This time, as he moved the ingot close, one of the smaller circles slid off the ingot and added itself to the activation portion of the flamethrower ritual.
Chances of accidental activation, mitigated by spell stability: 8%. Stabilizing… stabilized.
Joe blanched at the line that flew through his vision. There had been a chance that adding the remote activation would have activated the flamethrower while he was standing over it? Not only that, but his spell stability was… Joe checked. “Fifty-eight percent? So there was originally a two-thirds chance that this would have activated by adding in the… abyss!”
He looked at everything that was neatly stacked and organized in the room, and decided that they would no longer be adding effects to primed rituals while surrounded by expensive consumables on all sides. It would be a good chance to play outside. “What if I added a Ritual of Remote Activation to another Ritual of Remote Activation? Would that check against all the spell stabilities that the first one was connected to?”
It had been his plan at the outset to connect four of the remote activation rituals together so that he could activate sixteen flamethrowers at the same time. He wasn't going to give up on that dream, but perhaps the Novice ranked ritual that he was currently using wasn't the best choice to make that happen. It was like connecting a power strip to the wall: one was fine, but if you connected a power strip to another and another; you only created a nasty fire hazard. Actually, in this case it was exactly like that.
Joe got a few members of his Coven together and empowered three more flamethrower rituals, then hooked up the Ritual of Remote Activation. Eight percent chance to have it go off was a risk worth taking, and the remaining circles all settled into place without issue. Joe stored everything into his ring and waved
as he walked to a strategy meeting. His concerns had been mostly ignored, but that didn’t change the fact that they had to get ready for an attack.
As he walked into the war room, Mike looked up, nodded, and waved him over. “Good, you’re here. I want you to take a look at this map and tell me if there is anything that you can do to help us get ready.”
After getting close, Joe raised an eyebrow as he saw the quality of the map on the table. It looked almost like a satellite image, certainly not something hand-drawn. Still, it must have been hand-drawn. Mike pointed out the trouble areas right away. “Here, at the center of the town, we have the Guild Hall. Connected to the hall is a barracks, one at each cardinal direction. In the north-east section, we have the greenhouse. South-east holds the mess areas, also known as the general courtyard. South-west holds the wells where we draw our water when there are no water mages to fill up the cistern in the same area.”
Mike took a sip of water, likely reminded of his thirst as he discussed the wells. “Now, here in the north-west section, we have built nothing yet. Nothing permanent, at least; though there are a few merchants that have set up a small shopping area. They might protest, but they need to move out so that we know that this area is secure. Thoughts?”
“Yes.” Joe waved at the rest of the map of the town. “What about everything else?”
“We’ll get to that,” Mike promised, waving away Joe’s concerns. “Right now, I am looking at the worst-case; if we need all of our guild to be brought in behind the secondary defensive wall.”
“You think you might need to sacrifice the rest of this?” Joe pointed at all the other buildings on the map, lingering over the Pathfinder’s Hall.
“Again… worst-case,” Mike nodded and continued. “Thanks to your magic and our resources, we have an outer wall around the entirety of the town, as well as this core area. What I would like to see in this section to be emptied is either a defensive structure or something that can give us a large-scale defensive boon. Is there anything you can do about that?”
“Mmm,” Joe muttered, closing his eyes. The first thing that came to mind was some kind of altar or the cathedral, but the Pathfinder’s Hall had an attached Temple that gave out no area buffs. Was that only because he didn't know how to make it happen…? Either way, “I can't think of anything that I can add in there right now. Perhaps after I spend some time learning about all the options from my architect instructor?”
“Nothing in the short-term, got it.” Mike turned back, “Keep your eyes open for something. We need to find a way to defend our area without losing people.”
“I can make a ritual that makes people sick if they aren’t supposed to be there.” Joe offered with a shrug. “It won’t hurt them, beyond some embarrassing accidents if they press on, but you can activate it every once in a while to flush people out?”
“Can you make one that hits anyone that comes within, say, fifty meters of our walls?” Mike asked hopefully.
“I… could do one that will do that for one of the walls, but…”Joe’s eyes trailed off, and he thought about his new remote activation ritual. “Yeah, I could do that. It’ll be expensive though, because it is four large, fine-tuned rituals that will be linked by yet another ritual that activates them all at the same time.”
“Make it happen. We’ll cover the costs.” Mike signed a requisition order and handed it over. “Feel free to delegate some of this, as well. I know you have been teaching some people your class abilities. I don’t need you to do it, I just need it done.”
“Fair enough.” Joe grinned at the blank requisition order and waggled his eyebrows at Mike, “It’s a lot more expensive when someone else does it, though. I maxed out my bonuses already.”
“We’ll cover it.” Mike pointed at another few areas. “Here is another section that we need to defend, and the unfortunate part is that the wall that we have will make it hard to hit attackers here, here, and here.”
“I am really glad that you are so invested in all of this. I was originally worried that you were just going to blow off my warning.” With a dark chuckle, Joe pulled out a paper. “Let me ask you something. Would having four massive flamethrowers for those trouble areas interest you?”
Mike took the paper and read it, his face contorting in confusion. “Why are they labeled as ‘Flammenwerfer’?”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Directly after the meeting with Mike, Joe went to the temple area of the Pathfinder’s Hall to inform Tommulus that he had failed his quest. He was sure that the deity already knew, but it was better to be forthright about it. Joe felt that it was a Bad Idea, with intentional capital letters, to ignore a god of wrath.
Joe walked into the odd interior of the temple, moving around the mid-sized Tree Ents that were growing along the edge of the river. Walking directly up to the flaming altar, Joe sighed and spoke. “I’m sorry, Tommulus. I failed to return with the book.”
There was no reply. Joe waited a moment longer, then turned and walked away.
Quest complete: The Golden Tome of Divine Favor. Though you failed to return with the requested item, Tommulus has seen the fire in your heart. You failed, but offered no excuses. You accepted your loss and returned to face a possible punishment. Rewards are halved, but you have not lost reputation with Tommulus. Reward: 250 Gold per participant, 2,500 experience. No bonus rewards are granted.
Even as he blew out a sigh of relief, Joe couldn't help but feel disappointed. He had hoped to find out if the divine buff could be used to trick his way into his next specialization. Still, perhaps it was for the best that he didn't look for a way around the rules. Perhaps there was a reason the prerequisites were that high, and who knew what would happen if he got the specialization and then lost the requirements to keep it?
For now, the best course of action would be to focus on his personal arsenal and the town’s defense. In reality, every time he was able to positively impact the guild by raising a building, he was also increasing his own personal level. In his opinion, having a quest to help boost their power was only a bonus, yet very welcome, addition. Joe pulled open the new town map from Mike and tried to decide what to do next.
In the core guild area, behind the inner wall, there were only seven official buildings. There were a few watersheds in the south-east corner, but while people still used them, they had become redundant thanks to the water purification properties of the greenhouse. Since that building acted both as a sewage system, food source, and a wellspring of clean water, the final choice for the south-east courtyard was to turn it into something more usable.
As for the north-east courtyard, there were currently grumpy merchants being removed from the area and put outside the inner wall. It wouldn't do to have untrustworthy people in the most protected guild area. Not when an attack could come at any time. Still, the question remained about what to do for these freshly vacated areas. Until that was decided, there was still plenty that Joe could work on.
Just by looking at his map, he could see that twenty-three buildings had been built within the walls of Towny McTownface, and eighteen of those had been built by him. Well, if the walls counted, then Joe had built twenty of twenty-five. The other five buildings had been put together by twenty-five-man teams that had been working tirelessly. Joe almost felt bad when he realized that two of the buildings that had needed to be torn down after the attack had not been built by him.
Joe paused just before his gaze slid past those points. “Did… I never explained to most people why we had to tear those down and build new ones. Is that why such a large group was egging on that weaponmaster so he would beat me up?
“Eh… something to look into.” Joe perused the mapped-out sections. There was a fifteen-meter empty space around the entire inside of the wall that was supposed to stay clear for purposes of defense and rapid movement; as well as to provide a clear line-of-sight if any enemies did manage to break through. Even with that requirement, there was enough room in the town to accommo
date another fifty standard-sized buildings.
There would have been room for another seventy-five, but the Artifact-ranked, egg-shaped Pathfinder’s hall took the space of a full twenty-five buildings; it was just that massive. Still, it did contain a medium-sized Temple, so that was another concern alleviated. Though it seemed like there was a massive amount of room for growth, the fact of the matter was that the guild now had close to twenty thousand members, and was still growing daily. Unless they started building Rare or—even better—Unique buildings, they were going to fill the area with structures that would need to be torn down in short order.
While they could expand, and had plans to do so, it was better to take the time to do things correctly. Mike had asked him to start working on a new blueprint that they had purchased: a set of apartment buildings that could be rented with contribution points. Right now, anyone in the guild could either sleep in the barracks or the single tavern in the town, but there was little privacy and no real personal space at all. The apartments were a quality-of-life upgrade, and the boost to morale might be the difference between a powerhouse staying in the guild or abandoning it when a better opportunity came along.
Naturally, team leaders and upper-members of the guild would get first dibs on these rooms as they became available. In other words, being slightly self-serving, Joe wasn't about to put off getting these into place. They had the materials for five of the buildings, but each of them would take three building spaces. That would still leave room for thirty-five more buildings, but would be a significant drain on the available space. Mike had left the placement to Joe, and Joe was currently debating whether to put them side-by-side, or to space them out around the town.
In the end, he chose the second option. While it might be nice to have all the housing clustered together, it would make an enticing target for anyone attacking the town, and slow down deployment of adventuring parties to the remainder of the town. On another note, putting them in one spot would mean that many people would have a much longer commute through the town if they had a job at one of the other buildings. This way, people could live close to their business if they wanted to do so.