I shook his surprisingly strong hands and eyed him up and down. "Ivanhoe. Ivanhoe Darkwolf." I smiled. "I have a a few gems that I need to get an evaluation on."
"Let's see them!" Ben rubbed his hands together and stepped behind the counter.
I fished around in my pack and dumped out my bag of gems. I was going to have him look at the black gem, but now that I knew that it was for something important, I held that back in reserve. I didn't even want him to see it.
I had exactly 8 green gems. I didn't know if they were actual emeralds or not, but I thought it would be worth a try.
Ben took his odd, round necklace and placed it to his eye, then picked up one of the gems and studied it through the glass. He frowned and shook his head.
"What's wrong?"
"I'm sorry to inform you, but these are just baubles. Trinkets for the lesser animal-based intelligence creatures. Where did you find these?"
I explained about the sewers underneath the inn and how I had found them on some rat-men.
He nodded. "Curious." Then he narrowed his eyes and stared at me intently. "You didn't happen to find any other gems on them, did you?"
A chill raced through my spine. "No. Just these. I'll let you know if I do, though." I had no desire to let him know about the black gem. As far as I knew, he was in league with the AI. It was just such an odd question that I couldn't shake it. I was going to have to tell Orge about this. I lifted one of the gems up. "So, how much are you willing to pay for these?"
He frowned, shook his head and mumbled. "Usually, I don't buy these sorts of worthless baubles. But your reputation seems to proceed you. So, I'll tell you what – I'll give you a nominal amount, a silver each just because you've done so much for this town." He peered up at me. "Is that acceptable?"
8 silver for 8 gems? I shrugged. Sure, why not. But… "You sure that's all you can offer me?" My heart beat faster as this was the first time I had ever played hardball with a merchant. I didn't know what to expect.
He peered at me with his beady eyes. "Don't push your luck, boy." With a huge sigh, he added. "I'll give you 10 silver for the lot of them. But not a copper more!"
"Sold!" I said and pushed the bag his way. He counted out 10 silver pieces and placed them in my hand.
"Thank you for doing business with me." He said rather grumpily and watched as I walked out.
I don't think I took a breath until I was outside. Whew! I didn't think I wanted to try that again. Not without some more practice, anyway.
I made my way back to the inn thinking about the way Ben asked me if I had found other gems. Now it could've just been coincidence, but I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that it wasn't. Something was up. Maybe this was what Orge was talking about with the heat and all. Just the way he had peered at me while asking the question. It was almost as if he knew.
I burst into the inn, showed off my new dagger to Patch who thought it was the coolest thing in the world and then raced up to the room. I had a spring in my step that I hadn't had in a long time. I had a new dagger, a shit ton of arrows and a new skill. Now I didn't have to rely on anyone else to make my arrows for me.
The moment I shut and locked the door, Orge clambered out of my pack and jumped onto the bed, startling me.
"Oh I didn't realize you were in there." I smiled. It was kind of fun carrying around a little were-rat in my backpack. I'll give him this, he was a master spy.
He shifted into his half elf form and lay back on the bed, folding his arms behind his head.
"So I take it you heard everything?" I pulled up a chair and sat next to him.
He nodded and furrowed his brow. "This is why we have to play it safe. The AI knows that something is up. She doesn't know what, but she's using her bag of tricks to find out." Orge suddenly looked at me with concern on his face. "She knows about you. Right now, you're just an anomaly. Something to keep an eye on. But when we bring down others, she will start to realize that something is wrong. That may not happen until we have 3 or 5 or even 10. But I promise you this, it will happen."
"What can we do to stop it?" I took out my dagger and began mindlessly playing with it.
Orge shook his head. "Unfortunately, there's not a lot we can do. We need to get these players into the game – and we need to get them here as quickly as possible. But if we play our cards too fast, we risk bringing down the AI's wrath upon our heads."
He took a long, deep breath and slowly let it out. "There is an endgame here, Ivanhoe Darkwolf, and it may not be an easy one. We need to bring these players into the world so that we can build up a sizable army. I'll explain more when the time comes. In a couple of days, we will bring our first player into the world. For now, I suggest you get some sleep and do some quests tomorrow. At least you got some good gear."
With that, he turned back into his rat form and slipped into my pack. I gently moved the pack to the chair and laid down. It took me a while before I was able to nod off. There was so much to take in. I had been right in my assessment about Ben. But if that was the case, then any NPC could act as a spy for the AI.
That could potentially be an issue. But I wasn't going to worry about that right now.
Before I knew it, I had drifted off to sleep. I had another dream about the trapped people. Instead of just nameless faces, I started being able to make them out. I tried to help them, but I seemed to be held back by an invisible wall that neither of us could reach through. I also had a foreboding sense that I was being watched.
The next morning I woke up refreshed. My muscles ached a little, but the healing powers of the bed seemed to work wonders. I had a lot I wanted to accomplish today, but first I wanted to get some grub.
"What's on the menu this morning?" I asked Patch as I fished out a silver from my pouch and flipped it to him. That left me with 24 silver and 37 copper. I wish I could have been able to hang on to the 2 gold pieces, but I was sure that I would be able to get them back in short order.
"How about a hearty vegetable beef stew?" Patch grinned, knowing how much I liked meat.
"Sure!" He started to wave off the silver, but I felt that he had done enough for me and, besides, with the lack of customers I knew he was hurting. I didn't know exactly what that meant for an NPC, but I liked Patch. He was a good guy. Someone I wanted to be friends with.
"You're too kind." He said, his face becoming a bit red.
It felt good to have a bit of coin. But I was eager to get more. These tattered clothes had to go. After devouring the delicious bowl of stew, I filled my canteen with ale and set off toward the Dwarven fisherman. The salted fish should be ready for me and I was hoping he would have some nice quests – or even a bead on a dungeon I could whet my new blade on.
Orge didn't appear on the journey, so I was left alone with my own thoughts. When I was halfway there, I found a nice secluded spot and drank down some of the ale. It felt so good hitting the belly.
The journey was relatively quick and before I knew it, I had made my way to Harold's fishing hut. I smiled when the old dwarf waved me over.
"Howdy stranger! I thought I'd never see you again." He was grinning ear to ear. "I have that salted fish for you. Should make a good trail snack or meal if you were so inclined. Just be sure you have some liquid to chase it down with."
I followed him over to where he had dried out the fish on the racks, took the fish from him, carefully wrapped it up and tossed it in my bag.
"Say, Harold, you don't happen to have any good quests do you?" I asked as I pulled out my fishing rod and cast my reel out into the ocean. It felt good to just be able to do whatever I wanted. While I wasn't what I would consider a high level, I also wasn't a complete noob either. I did want to expand my explored map a bit, too. That would undoubtedly open up new quest opportunities.
Harold stopped what he was doing and turned to me, his eyes lighting up. "Actually... I've been hankering for a bit of turtle stew. I noticed that the lady turtles have been laying their eggs in the sand rec
ently. Why don't you go kill a few turtles and fetch up their eggs for me. I'll make it worth your while."
Turtles, huh? I didn't even know if my arrows could pierce their thick shells. And if these were the ones I thought he was talking about, they were large, snapping turtles. So, not exactly easy to flip over on their back.
"What are their levels?" I asked. I needed more information before I took on the quest.
"Oh, some are level 2, maybe a few 3's. Just aim for their head. But whatever you do, don't let them bite you. They do have a bit of hp, so you'll need to wale on them for a while, but they're not the fastest creatures on earth either."
"Okay, shoot me the quest." I agreed.
New quest: Kill Turtles (optional gather eggs)
Objective: Kill 5 Giant Snapping Turtles (optional: gather 30 eggs)
Reward: 1 gp, 5 sp (2 gp) + Common Leather Boots +1 def
Nice! They might be a bit tough to bring down, but the rewards were certainly worth it.
"Accepted! I'll be back with those eggs as soon as I can. Do you have something to store them in?"
"Sure! Let me grab it." He said, dashed inside his hut and came back with a large gunnysack. "Wrap the meat up separately from the eggs. I can throw in an additional gold piece if you want to bring back the turtle shells. I can certainly find a use for those."
I took the bags from the dwarf and stuffed them in my pack. This quest was starting to get better and better. I opened up my quest map, set a waypoint to the closest area and set off.
With bow in hand I was ready to go, I searched around the highlighted area for my first victim. It took a couple of minutes, but I finally found her. From a distance, she didn't look all that large or menacing, but as I drew closer, all that changed.
The snapping turtle must've weighed at least 1000 pounds and was half as high as a horse. I have no idea what I was thinking when I accepted this quest. I must have had gold in my eyes. Was I really going to be able to take this creature down?
I drew close enough to be able to make out her hit point bar. Even though she was only second level, she still had 40 hp. I didn't want to know what a third level turtle had.
Pulling to just within range of my arrows, I pulled two from my quiver and nocked them. I took a deep breath and made sure that I was mentally ready. This was going to be a tough fight. My only saving grace was that the turtles would be slow.
Closing my eyes, I steadied my breath, then activated both my special abilities. On the count of 3, I released both arrows straight into the turtle's nose. Before they had even landed, I pulled out another arrow and sent it on its way.
Before the overgrown turtle even knew what had hit it, nearly half of its life had been drained away. She had 21 points left and, more importantly, was completely frozen. I nocked another arrow and released it in the same place as the other 3, bringing her down to 18.
The second the freezing arrow trap broke, the enraged turtle turned toward me, bellowed as though she were dying and at a surprisingly fast speed, charged directly at me.
Her ferocity and speed both took me off guard and I nearly stumbled as I backed up. She may have only had 18 hp left, but that didn't slow her down any.
I barely got off another arrow in her face before having to roll out of her way. It was seriously like a boulder coming down a hill. That last hit took 5 hp away, bringing her down to 13.
I had absolutely no idea how fast these big turtles could run. My heart was thundering in my chest and my palms were sweaty. She barely missed me and the sound of her teeth chomping nearly gave me a heart attack. I don't know how much damage she would've done to me, but I really didn't want to find out.
Scrambling away from the monstrosity, who was now turning back in my direction getting ready to charge again, I nocked another arrow and shot it off almost blindly. My hands trembling, I was wide on my mark. Why didn't the dwarf tell me they ran so fucking fast?
That's when I had an idea. Taking a deep, steady breath, I pulled back another arrow and aimed it for one of her front legs. Bingo! She momentarily crashed to the ground and by the time she arose, I had finished her off.
Quest objective 1/5
Experience points 350
Nice! I pump my fist in the air as I strode toward the turtle. I pulled out all of my arrows from her face and leg and set to work cutting up all her meat and shell. With my sharp new dagger, the job was a breeze and within minutes, the formerly aggressive turtle was sliced, diced and bagged. Now all I needed to do was find where she had clutched her eggs and steal them, too.
The shell was too big to fit in my pack, so I dragged it to the base of a large rock and marked it on my map. I'd have to come back for it. It took me a couple of minutes before I located her eggs. I could tell they were just about ready to hatch, so I gathered them all up and tossed them in the bag that he had provided for me.
Taking stock of the situation, I realized that I was going to have to be a little bit more careful around these behemoths. They were nothing to mess with. In fact, if I wasn't careful, I was going to get my ass chewed on – quite literally.
Armed with that information, the next mob went down much easier. I was starting to get antsy for some new spells and wondered what was coming down the pipeline. I knew that at level 10, talents would be coming and I was super excited about that. I had no idea what the talent tree looked like, either. I was hoping for a longer lasting freezing arrow.
The other thing that was nice was having a practically endless supply of arrows. By the time the second turtle was finished off, I had only lost one arrow and was now down to 103.
Quest objective 2/5
Experience points 350
I was now up to 4055 xp. It was just as I had expected. Now that I was a higher level and had better gear, I could take on harder mobs which awarded more xp.
An hour's worth of grinding later and I had killed all 5 turtles and gathered all the eggs that I needed to complete the quest. Only once did I come close to biting the bullet. It was my fourth turtle and she had been a third level with a bit more hit points than the others.
Just as I had feared, one bite and she had taken a full half of my hp. I was in a lot of pain and hobbling around with just 25 hp. That was next on my bucket list, I needed to get myself some bandages and perhaps a potion or 3.
Quest objective 3/5
Experience points 350
Quest objective 4/5
Experience points 350
Quest objective 5/5
Experience points 350
Just polishing off that quest brought me to 5105/6400. Turning them in would no doubt push me to ding level five. I had a sneaking suspicion that I would gain a new ability along with it. I was definitely looking forward to that.
The turtle had bit me in the shoulder and even though it was no longer bleeding, it hurt like hell. Everything I needed to do, it seemed, caused me excruciating pain. Whether it was shooting my bow, cutting up the meat, gathering eggs or carrying the shells.
What should have only taken an hour to clean up, ended up taking three. But it was all worth it in the end. By the time I had brought all of the quest items back to Harold, it was nearly dark. The wind had kicked up, making it a bit difficult to walk.
"Didn't expect it to take you that long, to be honest." Harold said as he took the bags and shells from me. "But I'm glad you made it back in one piece."
"Yeah, why didn't you tell me those bastards ran like the wind?" I was a bit annoyed that he had kept such crucial information from me.
The Dwarven fisherman shrugged. "To be honest, I had never attacked one before." Once he had taken everything from me, he brought out a large, fat coin pouch. "That's 1 gp 5 sp for the meat - thank you! 2 gp for the eggs and another gold piece for the shells. All this should keep me busy for quite a while."
I added the 3 gold and 5 silver to my stash and saw that I was now up to 3 gold, 29 silver and 37 copper. The next time I was in town, I was going to look around for a merchant wh
o sold leather armor. I absolutely had to get out of these rags.
As soon as I turned to leave, the quest completion boxes popped up.
Quest complete: Kill Turtles
Experience gained: 500
New quest objective: none
Quest complete: Gather Turtle Eggs
Experience gained: 500
New quest objective: none
Quest complete: Collect Turtle Shells
Experience gained: 500
New quest objective: none
Messages flew by almost faster than I could read them. Then, once the quest complete messages had finished popping up, I heard a familiar ding that made my heart soar.
"Yes! Finally, level 5!" I jumped up and down and fist pumped the air.
"Congratulations, my boy!" The dwarf patted me on the back. "You've done a fine job. I can think of no one who deserves this more than you. Oh, I almost forgot…" He scrambled inside and grabbed the common boots and brought them back out.
While they weren't the most fashionable boots I could've hoped for, they would provide some protection for my feet and give me a bit of armor. I was sorely lacking in that department.
I slipped off my starter shoes, which were pretty much useless as they were tattered and torn and put on the new boots. It surprised me that the moment I put them on, they form-fitted to my exact size. Then I remembered that the bracers had done exactly the same.
"Nice!" I danced around in my new shoes. They fit perfectly and were extremely comfortable. Now my armor class had a 1 instead of a big fat 0.
My new level pop up scrolled by and I turned my attention to it.
Congratulations! You are now level 5! Your stats have increased and you have a new ability.
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