The Curse of Hurlig Ridge_World Tree Online_1st Dive
Page 19
Before I knew it, it was nearly time for dinner and I still hadn’t bothered looking at the overwhelming number of system messages, I would no doubt be inundated with as soon as I hit the button. And still, I was going to put it off until have my evening bath. I had the perfect bathtub reading material and was not going to let it go to waste.
Instead, I went back to my room and sat down with my journal and started writing about my day, parts of it in painful detail, adding drawings to bring life to the memories I couldn’t adequately describe in words. I have to say journaling in this manner proved to be very therapeutic.
When I returned downstairs, I was greeted by the sight of Micaela and Olaf seated comfortably on the couch, waiting for me. Both of them looked exhausted and tired too.
“Evening,” I greeted the pair, taking a seat in the same large chair I had sat and read in earlier.
“Hey Bye-bye,” grumbled Micaela, her head resting on Olaf’s shoulder.
“What’s up with you two? Why so exhausted?” I asked, looking at Olaf as he seemed to be a little more awake than Micaela did at the moment.
“Too many books,” they grumbled in one voice.
I tried not to grin but couldn’t hold back. “Oh, do tell.”
“Met the mayor, he came out a few minutes after you left and gave us a few books, he said they were worth reading. I learned ‘Beast Tracking’ while Mic read a book that gave her a ‘Scavenging’ skill. It allows her to get meat and trophies from animals or parts from machines. It’s not a gathering skill so she can’t use it to get leather or metals or even herbs. I think it’s mostly just a way to loot things without pockets or some kind of magic. Still, a good skill to have. Then we traded books.”
“What book did you read for the ‘Scavenging’ skill?” I asked. That one would actually be useful out in the wilds.
“The book is called ‘Let NO-Thing Go to Waste’. Mayor said you might want it and asked us to give you the book when we were done, so here you go,” added Olaf, tossing the book to me. I added it to my ever-growing list of books.
“Then Micaela found a book called ‘Way of the Spirits’, which she just had to read.”
Micaela perked up for a moment to cheer loudly, pumping one of her massive arms in the air, “Worth it!” Only to slump back over again.
“She’s a Shaman now, which is exactly what she wanted to be,” explained Olaf.
“Not yet I’m not,” protested Micaela. “Not until I carve my first totem and enter the spirit realm.”
“You have the class babe, you’re a shaman, stop sweating the details,” Olaf attempted to reassure his wife.
“While she read through that, I picked up a book called ‘Steady Hands’, which turns out is the name of the skill. It’s a dexterity training skill which is awesome, ‘cause that is an important stat for me, you know, for aiming,” he continued, smirking.
“Nice, so I take it you both had a productive afternoon?” I confirmed.
“Yeah, just mentally wiped I think. Still, +5-Intellect and +5-Wisdom each,” he smiled happily at the end. I could see he felt a real sense of accomplishment.
“Congratulations,” I said, honestly happy for the pair to have proven to everyone that ‘knew’ ogres were a crap class, they didn’t know what they were talking about.
“We owe you Bye-bye,” said Olaf seriously.
“And I’ll be sure to collect one day, but that day is not today. Today we celebrate, so wake up. We’re gonna party tonight!” I cheered, attempting to rouse them both from their brain stupor.
“Fine,” groaned Micaela. “I suppose I can muster up a little enthusiasm, but only because it’s you asking.”
“Right then, Dogson,” I called looking toward the bar. “Three Delger Dwarven Stouts if you please!”
Dogson quirked an eyebrow, surprised by the loud request, but nodded anyway.
“Are you two working in the mine tomorrow?” I asked, looking back at my friends as an idea came to mind.
“I think we can miss a day in the mines,” said Olaf.
“Yay!” cheered Micaela.
So, we celebrated, the booze restoring life and animation to both Olaf and Micaela, as they started to have a little fun.
“I’ve been meaning to ask,” I started, trying to change the subject away from my flirtations with Trish, the barmaid. “You guys mentioned you financed your pods, right? I’m sure you weren’t the only ones. So how come I don’t see a whole bunch of ogres and sprites running around all over the place?”
“Day one, mate,” answered Olaf, as if that would make everything clear.
I waited a moment for him to expand but he didn’t. “Please, tell me more,” I prompted him, a little sarcasm leaking through.
“As it was explained to me us by Maggie, the ogre was designed to be the best mining class and the sprite the best herbalism class. I guess the high up mucky-mucks predicted there would be a high demand for resources and as such, a very lucrative opportunity. Lucrative to them especially, the percentage our broker keeps and the percentage the auction house keeps, goes straight into Seed Inc’s pockets, as pure profit. Because of that, they reserved 20% of the first wave of pods for those who were willing to finance their pods. After our first month, we did a little research during the mandatory seven-day break. We found out they did the same for the second and planned to do the same for the third wave. They’ll probably do the same for every wave of pod shipments. Keeps a workforce providing supplies, while they pay off their pods, and keeps bringing in a new labor pool as we pay off our pods. Anyway, back to the original question. Most of the miners are idiots. They figure that since they’ve leveled, they would move provinces, so they can mine higher level ores which theoretically should sell for more, except most ores don’t sell well because there is still such a high number of people choosing professions, only to drop them to try something different. Demand on the low-end ore stays high while high-end ore stays low, for now at least. So, there are plenty of ogre miners and sprite herbalist running all over, but most of them have stupidly moved on to the higher-level provinces,” explained Olaf.
“I also read they were going to open up two more races,” added Micaela. “Treant Herbalists and Knocker Miners. I get the Treant Herbalist, you’re basically a walking tree but Knockers are tiny little blighters, how can they be any good at mining?”
“What’s a knocker?” I asked. I’d never heard of such a creature.
“It’s a little cave gremlin with a pointy head and razor-sharp teeth,” answered Olaf.
“Huh, how about that?” I was genuinely curious. I’d have to look them up when my first month of emersion ended. Still, playing a treant sounded fun.
“It was only a rumor, probably not true,” added Micaela. “But yeah, it could be fun.”
“Time for another round, I think,” said Olaf, staring the bottom of the keg he called a beer mug.
I signaled Trish for another round of beer getting a wave and smile in return which I took to mean ‘yes’.
“Oi!” shouted a voice from the entrance, calling everyone’s attention. There stood Guard Gavin Davies pointing a finger at me.
“Who? Me?” I asked, surprised by the pointed finger. I guess I shouldn’t have been too surprised, given everything I’d done that day. Still, I’m not sure what exactly I could have done to get Gavin this worked up.
“You, what did you do?” demanded Gavin as he marched straight for me.
“I have no idea, but I’ll bet it was something awesome,” I replied, feeling rather gregarious. Clearly, the beer was going straight to my head.
I could see I threw Gavin with my reply, but it didn’t last. “What did you do to the sergeant?”
“David? Nothing, why? Did he say I did something?” I asked. I had no idea what I could have done to the sergeant, but I had a feeling it would affect me more than I would want it to.
“He is smiling,” answered Gavin.
“And that’s bad?” asked Micaela.<
br />
“Yes!” shouted Gavin. “But that is not the worst of it. He was humming . . . I think he might have been . . . I think he is . . . happy. What in the name of all the gods and goddesses did you do?”
“Nothing, I swear. I had tea with him and Priestess Trinico,” I replied, slightly perplexed, first by Gavin’s pale complexion and what I could only guess was panic. Second by the sergeant’s odd behavior.
“What was this sergeant doing while he was smiling and humming?” asked Micaela, she seemed to be as curious as I was.
“He was building something by the training area. He had all of the guards cutting back the forest near the barracks all the way to the mote. We had to cut them down to the root too and burn out what we could of the stumps,” complained Gavin.
“Did anyone bother to ask him why?” asked Micaela.
“Ours is not to reason why ours is to do or die,” replied Gavin automatically.
“So, what is Sergeant Butters building?” I asked.
“Would not say,” answered Gavin. “But he did say, and I am quoting here, ‘Bye-bye is gonna love this’.”
Suddenly I was regretting sharing anything with Sergeant Butters about my class. I was suddenly terrified and had no idea what to expect.
“So, I ask again, what did you do?” asked Gavin again.
“We talked about training, that’s all,” I replied. I had my secrets to keep.
“Fine, do not tell me, but I swear, if I get pulled into any crazy training because of this I will feed you to the wolves myself, understand?”
Thankfully any further conversation was forestalled by Trish bringing our next round of beers, which also seemed to make Gavin forget any anger he may have had for me.
I stayed with them for a while, chatting, drinking and flirting with Trish at every opportunity, but called it an early night but not before eliciting a promise from Olaf and Micaela to meet me at 8:00 in front of the barracks.
Once I had finally sat in the bath and let the stresses of the day fade away. I opened the many system messages, I hadn’t bothered with yet. First, between the shopping, talking with David and Trinico and finally, drinking with Olaf, Micaela, and Gavin I had gained +10 Charisma. That made today’s adventures alone completely worthwhile. I did gain +5 Intellect and +5 Wisdom from reading the two books today. After tallying my stat increases the remaining messages were all related to skills. First, regarding the two books I read today, my ‘Track Humanoid’ skill gained a few levels but the ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ yielded an amazing skill called ‘Influence’.
Influence
Level: 5
Experience: 16.77%
Skill Effect (Passive): Increases your Charisma by 0.50%
Skill Effect (Passive): Increases your Charisma Experience Gain for successful interactions by 5.00%
I’m not sure if it was what Trinico had in mind when she gave me the book, but I was not going to complain at all. While the boost to Charisma was terrible right now, it would eventually get much better. But to go along with ‘Influence’ I picked up a skill ‘Barter’ from when I was haggling with Giggle-Ana in the weapon shop.
Barter
Level: 3
Experience: 19.54%
Skill Effect (Passive): Reduce purchase cost by 0.04% (0.15% of Charisma)
Skill Effect (Passive): Increases your Charisma Experience Gain for successful transactions by 3.00%
Once again, not very strong to start, but will improve with time and practice. I also got the ‘Maintenance’ skill from Giggle-Ana.
Maintenance
Level: 5
Experience: 0.54%
Skill Effect (Active): Allows basic repair of equipment restoring 3 points of durability at the cost of 2 durability capacity.
My favorite by far was the next skill I learned, probably from trying to reconstruct the crime scene earlier that day.
You have learned the skill ‘Eye for Detail’
Eye for Detail
Level: 1
Experience: 0.00%
Skill Effect (Passive): Enables you to see details that would be missed otherwise.
Skill Range: 10 yards
Chance to See: 10.00%
Chance to Identify: 10.00%
Congratulations! Having learned a third ocular skill, you have unlocked the Advanced Skill ‘Perception’. ‘Beast Tracking’, ‘Humanoid Tracking’ & ‘Eye for Detail’ have become subskills of ‘Perception’.
Perception
Level: 5
Experience: 18.90%
Skill Range: 10.50 yards
Chance to See: 11.25%
Chance to Identify/Track: 13.00%
Subskill: Beast Tracking
Skill Effect (Passive): Enables you to see animal tracks to better hunt them.
Subskill: Humanoid Tracking
Skill Effect (Passive): Enables you to track humanoids.
Subskill: Eye for Detail
Skill Effect (Passive): Enables you to see details that would be missed otherwise.
It was awesome. And it combined all of my other skill levels for ‘Beast Tracking’ and ‘Humanoid Tracking’, making it start at level 5. And as an added bonus all three of my professions had leveled up.
Lore
Level: 4
Experience: 87.50%
Professional Skill: Lore is the study of the history of the World Tree and its denizens.
That must have been from hearing David and Trinico’s story, at least the parts regarding the Demon Incursion and Sergeant Butters family history.
Writing
Level: 11
Experience: 45.35%
Professional Skill: Writing is the ability to communicate through the written word.
From journaling.
Drawing
Level: 11
Experience: 38.65%
Professional Skill: Drawing is the ability to communicate through drawn images.
And drawing the images to go with my journal.
I was most excited about the last two. I only needed level 10 to get a specialization in ‘Writing’ and ‘Drawing’. I just needed to see the mayor tomorrow, to speak to him about the books for it.
Eventually, I hit a point where I knew it was time to leave the tub and go to bed. One last check of my stats and I was off to sleep off the beer and mentally prepare myself for the days ahead.
Level:
4
Experience:
23.75%
Class:
Novice Warrior Priest of Issara
HP (Health Points):
780/780
MP (Mana Points):
230/230
SP (Stamina Points):
520/520
Strength:
40
- Melee Damage Modifier
+40
Dexterity:
40
- Melee Critical Strike Chance
4.00%
- Hit Chance
62.00%
- Dodge Chance
4.00%
Endurance:
78
Stamina:
52
Intellect:
23
- Spell Critical Strike Chance
2.30%
Wisdom:
19
Charisma:
26
Health Regeneration per minute:
39
Mana Regeneration per minute:
10
Stamina Regeneration per minute:
30
Holy Spell Damage Bonus:
18
Holy Spell Healing Bonus:
13
Carrying Capacity in Lbs.:
200
Chapter 11
New day, same dead fowl clucking . . . if only. Breakfast and hair of the dog, at Dogson’s insistence, had me out of the inn a little before 8:00 am. Thankfully it was a short walk to the barracks and to meet the waiting Olaf and Micaela.
“Morning you two,”
I greeted them, cheerfully.
“What did you make us drink?” moaned Olaf, looking more than a little pale.
“Dwarven Stout. I suppose I should take you back to the inn for the cure,” I volunteered.
“Cure?” the pair asked in a singular and still creepy voice.
“Yeah, come on,” I motioned for them to follow me back to the inn.
Thirty minutes later all three of us were on our way back to the barracks.
“I still can’t believe we went back to the Dog House Inn for Dogson’s cure, which happened to be hair of the dog,” joked Micaela, more pep back in her step.
“Is she going to keep saying that?” I asked looking to Olaf for some kind of relief. The woman must have repeated the same statement at least a dozen times in the last ten minutes.
“She’ll get it out of her system when something new distracts her,” offered Olaf, chagrin clear on his face.
Once around the back of the barracks, I found the Sergeant going through some weapon routine or other, but beyond the training circle he was using, I saw the construction Gavin had mentioned the previous day. It appeared the man had built some kind of training equipment, it looked familiar to me, but I couldn’t exactly place where I’d seen it before.
“Ooh, gymnastics equipment,” cooed Micaela excitedly.
Now I recognized the equipment from the now defunct Olympics. The games used to represent the best in athletics the world had to offer, until it became far too expensive to maintain, combined with a huge number of scandals involving bribery of judges and performance-enhancing drugs. Eventually, no country in the world wanted to host them, so they went the way of the dinosaur and the desktop PC. There were still sporting events, but most of them were now digital and actual sports like gymnastics were scarce.