Origins
Page 5
Name of Monster
Level
Agility
HP
MP
Skills
Goblin
4
4
40
-
-
Ceras said as he strained his eyes to see what was going on in the clearing, and said to Rhef, “It would be good to know how many goblins there are in the cave, but I think our best bet is to try and kill the guards quickly and then we’ll have to go in after them.”
Rhef said with a sigh, “The only range weapon we have is my sling, and it will take about five shots to kill one. So, it will take too long before one runs into the cave and reports.”
Ceras said with to her, “How about this; I’ll sneak around the back of the clearing and attack from the rear to try and prevent them from entering the cave, while you attack from the front when you see me in the clearing.”
Rhef nodded and to two went back to the rest of the adventures who were waiting down the hill. In the small grove of trees, the group was planning their attack on the goblin gang, Rinaldo was looking excited, even when his sister was instruction him.
Rhef said in a commanding voice to her overexcited brother with her eyebrow furrowed in determination, “Listen up stupid, you better keep the plan else I’ve hit the back of your head.” Thinking about it she gave him a hit anyway as he nodded in acceptance of her instructions.
Ceras spent several minutes with Grikius sneaking around the back of the clearing through the dense forest, every now and then they would wait as the not to alert the goblins would look up from their fire with a bored expression. When the two were in striking distance to the goblins, they crouched down for a few seconds and waited for the goblins not to be looking in their direction. Now that Ceras was close to the goblins, the smell was overpowering; it was of unwashed bodies with the scent of rotting meat. Grikius dog had its head out with its nose wrinkled. The goblins were dressed with only loin rags and held wooden spear-like weapons. Now and again, one of the goblins would kick the other and say something in a guttural language as he spat on the dirt ground.
“On the count of three, we’ll attack the one on the left. One, two, three,” Ceras said to Grikius.
The two rushed out from their cover, across the dirt ground with debris laying everywhere, running at the goblin with its back to them. Before Ceras could attack with his staff two things happened at once: one Grikius stood on a sharp bone and screamed in pain, and two the first of Rhef stone hit one of the goblins on the head. The goblin on the left turn toward the two attackers, and put up his spear to block Ceras staff blow. The staff and the flimsy spear connected and the spear broke in half at the impact point. Ceras brought the bottom of his staff up into the goblins groin that knocked him of his feet into the air. The goblin eventually dropping to the ground where he laid dead, show by his depleted health bar. Behind him, Ceras heard the second of Rhef stones, from her sling, hit the second goblin. Turning around to confront the goblin, he saw the goblin trying to spear Grikius in the stomach, who was limping as he was clubbing the goblin again and again to kill the attacking monster.
Rinaldo was running over to help out his friend and arrived just in time to the hit the goblin from the back with his mace. The goblin fell down dead with blood flow from its head. The rest of the adventures arrived, as Symania healed Grikius foot with a blue light.
Rinaldo, with an eager expression, said to the team as they prepared to enter the cave, “I’ll go first.”
“Not this time, Ceras needs to go first!” said Rhef as she pushed him back.
Before the Rinaldo could rush forward, Ceras enter the goblin cave following a spherical ball of light that Symania had cast. The tunnel into the cave was quite short, and soon he found himself in a small cave with about ten goblins sleeping on the floor with a smoldering fire in the center. At the back of the cave on some furs was the larger goblin gang leader:
Name of Monster
Level
Agility
HP
MP
Skills
Goblin gang leader
5
3
60
-
-
Before Ceras could start attacking the goblins, the goblin gang leader, shouted in grunts, causing the goblins to start standing up. The first goblin picked up a spear and tried to impale Ceras through his stomach, but Ceras knocked the spear out of this hand and hit the goblin in the head with his staff.
Ceras move forward into the mist of the goblins swinging he staff around hitting as many as possible, to allow the other to enter the cave. As the other arrived, he had already taken three down with hit to their bodies. Ceras noticed that Rinaldo and his sister were working together to take down a goblin that had gotten past Ceras on his left. As Rinaldo hit the goblin in the head twice, his sister knifed the goblin in the guts, causing him to drop to the ground.
The gang leader rushed toward the twins, swing his club at Rinaldo shoulder, which hit causing him to scream in pain, but his sister managed to stab her knife into the gang leader side and step back to avoid a club aimed at her. Dancing around to the other side, she attacked the gang leader from the back as she plunged her knife in twice. The large goblin was to slow to react to the overhead blow from Rinaldo that caved in his head as he dropped to the floor.
Meanwhile, Ceras had been killing the rest of the goblin with one hit of his staff, and soon the adventures were the only ones standing.
Rinaldo looked at Symania and said through gritted teeth, “Could you please heal me as this is agony.” As he showed her the broken shoulder.
She smiled and said, “That what I’m here for.”
Under the bright light of the healer light, the rest of the team started to search the cave for anything that they could use. Most of the cave was filled with piles of bone and rags that the goblin seemed not have be to bothered to clean out, but they did find several items where the leader had laid.
Equipment Name
Carry
Type
Effect
Worth
Spell book
-
Magic
-
150c
3xSteel dagger
1
Weapon
Always sharp
100c
Simple Bow
1
Weapon
70c
Arrow Quiver (full of arrows)
1
Weapon
10c
Everybody was excited to see the first loot from adventuring, and a discussion broke out about who would get what.
Rhef said at the end of the conversation, “Right then, I get the bow and arrows and Ceras get the spell book, while the rest of you get steel daggers. Let’s get out of here as I can’t stand the smell anymore.”
Grikius dog jumped onto the dirt ground and walked up to one of the goblins and sniffed his body as if it was going to try and eat it, but when it smelt the unwashed body with dark green blood, the dog turned around and trotted out of the cave. Outside as the team exited, they all took a large breath to clear their lung of the rotten smell.
Ceras looked at the sun that was low in the sky and said to the rest of the team, “Its best if we make camp for the night in this clearing and walk into town in the morning.”
Soon the adventure had set up a camp with a large fire blazing away in the goblins fire pit eating the meat they had saved from the pig they had killed yesterday. While the other talked about what they would spend their money on the next day Ceras, opened the spell book and looked at the pages. As he flicked through the magical book with its parchment paper that looked as if it was magically preserved, he was able to read the following spell in the content table:
Spells
Name
Mastery
MP
Effects
Fire touch
Apprentices
25
Burns the target for damage (MP* time in seconds)
Frost touch
Apprentices
25
Freezes the target for damage (MP* time in seconds)
Light
Apprentices
10
Provides light that can be place anywhere (Duration 3 hours)
Heal Touch
Apprentices
25
Heals with touch (half damage point per MP)
Eye in the sky
Apprentices
10
Allow the caster to see up to 100m away (Duration 10 minutes)
The spells only took up the first five pages with the rest of the book empty. Ceras turned to the first page and felt the magic on the paper draw him in as the words seemed to glow with white light, which seemed to dance in his vision. As he started to read the ‘Fire Touch’ spell, he started to feel that his mind was expanding with the information he was gaining. This had never happened to Ceras before; as when he had read any spell when he had not been a wizard, they just seemed confusing to him. This time his mind seemed to be a reaction to the spell as he read it. Continuing to read, he felt like his brain was on fire as the connection was made, allowing him to understand the complex spell magic behind the method of casting the spell.
When he came out of his concentrated stupor, it was fully dark, and the rest of the adventure was sleeping except for Rhef who was on watch.
She looked at the wizard from across the fire and said, “Your first spell learning stupor, you’ve been sitting there fully focus on the book for about an hour. Let see what you leaned then.”
Ceras shock his head to try and clear his head and picked up a large branch of wood that had not been put on the fire. Holding it in his hand, he looked at it and then thought of setting it alight with the spell he had just learnt as he did this the branch completely burnt to ashes, disintegrating into a small particle that blows away in the wind. Ceras just stared at his empty hand with a large smile on his face.
Chapter 6 The Beginning of Magic
Ceras was standing next to Rhef as she said to the woman in the guild behind the counter, "We've finished the quest of killing the goblin gang."
The woman smiled and said, "Put your hand above the magical sphere, please, for confirmation of the quest."
Rhef put her hand over the blue, glowing sphere as it turned to white acknowledging that the quest was completed, the woman then handed Rhef a small bag of coins and said, "Well done for doing the quest so quickly."
As the two walked with the money to the rest of the group of adventures standing by one of the quest shelves Ceras yawned again covering up his mouth with his hand. Rhef said in a none sympathetic voice, "I bet you stayed up all night studying the spells. You're an idiot."
Ceras just nodded as he yawned again, but feeling happy that he now had a few spells he could use. He thought about what was his experience to the next level, and the text appeared:
XP 8 of 11 too level 2 Wizard
Rhef handed the money to Grikius, who was looking keen and excited about being able to be buying some things and said to the group as he counted out the money and handed it out, "That give everybody 290 coppers each. Let me suggest that we have a look around the guild for the next couple of hours and meet back here at noon and all go shopping together. I think that I could get everybody a better deal if with buy what we need together."
"I'm in the money, I'm in the money," Rinaldo started singing before Grikius had finished talking.
His sister elbowed him in the side, saying, "You better not spend it on anything to eat or drink, as we need if for equipment!"
Rinaldo smiled and said, "Of course, dear sister," as he winked at her.
Ceras was looking at the money with open mouth amazement, to see so much in his hands, as he knew the average wage for common labor in the fields, was about ten coppers per day. In his hand was over a months' worth of money that they had learned in a few days of adventuring and he even had a spell book to boot.
Rhef noticed his face and said with a happy smile, "Your need to closes your mouth, big man, else you'll let the fly's in."
Ceras shut his mouth quickly and put the money in his purse as everybody split up to meet back at noon for some shopping. He first wanted to see the guild library to see what information it offered. Going to the wooden desk with the guild serving woman behind the table, he asked her, "Where is the guild library?"
The woman smiled and said with an easy voice, "It's up to the stairs in the south wing, but you need to pay for access on your first visit of fifty copper coins. Do you want to do this now?"
Ceras nodded as he counted out fifty coppers from his purse and placed them on the counter excitedly, and the woman said indicating to the orb, "Please place your hand on the orb, and it will give you access to the library."
The blue light flashed as Ceras felt his hand tingle with the magic granting him access to the library. The woman nodded and said, "All finished, you can enter now."
Ceras with a skip in his step, as if he was a child entering a sweet store, move swiftly to the wooden staircase to the library on the second floor of the building. During his younger years, he had concentrated, with his spare time when he was not working on the farm with his family, on learning how to read and write to the best his ability, with the limited number of books available in the farm. He had even convinced his parents to buy some more book from a traveling tinker to improve his understanding of the magical language. Over the year, he had been able to become literate, which was not as so common in the farming communities and even understood the magical language.
Now at the top of the stairs, he was looking down a light and airy corridor with, large wooden door at the far end with a sign indicating this was the library for the guild in the town. Leading to the library was a carpet in the center of the corridor with the symbol of magic decorating it.
Moving quickly down the corridor towards the large wooden doors to the library, one of the doors on the side of the corridor opened, and a man in a robe of a wizard came out and said to Ceras, "Warrior, the training area is in the courtyard at the back of the guild."
Ceras stopped and looked at the man who was looking at him with an expression of distaste, and said showing his hand, "I'm a wizard and just going into the library for the first time, Sir."
The look of distaste disappeared and was replaced by curiosity as he said, "You don't look at all like a wizard, but your level one so I guess you'll get the correct clothing with a bit of money. Remember to treat the book concerning the young man."
With that the man walked off and disappeared down the stairs, as Ceras looked at him go in his splendid robes, feeling the magical power emanating from them as somehow the colors of the robe changed as if light wave on the water that had been disturbed.
Ceras turned toward the door of the library and pressed his hand against one of the doors, and it open as if pushed by some unknown force. Looking in for the first time, he saw a large room full of bookshelves that were filled to the brim of leather-bound books. In the center of the room was some desks with a chair for people to study in, with ink, quills, and blotting paper in the center. There was only one other wizard in the room at the time who was busy copying out of a book into another book by its side.
From a door in the side of the first room of the library a woman came into the room and saw Ceras gaping at the library and with a smile walked up to him and said, "You look like it the first time in here, can I please see your right hand."
Ceras showed her his right hand, and she said, "As I thought a new level one wizard, also you don't look the part as of yet. Let me show you around and explain everything, so you not to confusion about what is available to your here."
Ceras said in his politest tone of voice, bowing his head slightly to the smaller woman, "Thank you that would be great as this is all new to me."
The woman said in a lecturing tone of voice as she ind
icated to all the book in the library, "The first thing to know is that you can read any book in the library, but none of them must leave the room. You will need your own spell book to write down any spell your study."
Ceras brought out the spell book from his pack and shown it to the lady, as she continued to say, "Well it seems that you are doing better than most level ones. Remember to keep the book on you at all time and protected as it's your link to your magic.
"Most of the books in this room are for the apprentice or journeymen level, we do have some higher-level spell, but the universities in the major cities are where you will have to study higher level spells, but you've got a while to go before that point."
As the woman led Ceras over to box with many draws in the front, she pulled out one of the thin draws and said, "This is the filing system, and each of the cards is a book on the shelves with its location. Don't mess up the cards as it takes me too long to put it back in order. The cards are sorted in subject matter, so for example if you want to know what we have in the fire spell just open the drawer with the letter 'F' on it."
She did this and show him how to use the system to find the location of a book on fire magic with was in one end of the room. Once she had done this, she said, "That's mostly it for now, but if you have any question I'm here during the day. Oh, and its problem better if you come in here a bit cleaner than you are now."
Ceras looked at himself with all the dark green blood stains clothing and all the dust from the road and asked the woman, "Is there any washing facilities in the guild."
The woman said, "Near the training yard out in the courtyard at the back of the guild, you can use them for free as you're a member of the guild."
Ceras taking the hint, left the library to wash up from his days out in the wild, and so soon found himself walking through the back door of the guild building into a courtyard that held a training area. In the training yard was lots of dummy that people were practicing weapons with different instructors helping them. Most of the warriors looked to be about his age, as they all seemed to be beginners. At the back of the yard, Ceras saw the sign to the washroom and made a beeline to it.