by Ryan DeBruyn
Rocky walked to its chest and began using the talon as a makeshift knife to skin the creature. The sharp talon cut through the fur like butter, and he was incredibly thankful he hadn’t had to fight the monstrous creatures. He swallowed back his initial gag reflex as the initial cut spurted blood all over his hands and arms. This was going to be his new normal, and to distract himself as he worked, he decided to multitask and pulled up any remaining notifications from the fight.
Once Rocky thought about the notifications, the annoying, flashing, gold corner seemed to get brighter and pulse more often. He quickly glanced at it to avoid further eye twitching.
You have been offered a quest!
Conquer a Territory (Hidden)
Vanquish a leader, boss, or super spawn, and claim a Territory for yourself.
Reward(s)
Access to Leadership Class
Territory
10,000 Etherience
The hidden nature of this quest meant that it was automatically accepted on your behalf.
Congratulations. You have completed a quest.
Conquer a Territory (Hidden)
Vanquish a leader, boss, or super spawn, and claim a Territory for yourself.
10,000 Etherience Awarded
Territory Awarded
Access to Leadership Class Awarded
You now own Chimera claw.
Chimera Claw
Crafting Component
You now own Chimera Quill x 23
Chimera Quill
Crafting Component
Rocky felt his pulse ramp up a notch, and a large smile crept across his face. Well, that certainly explained the Etherience that had been placed in stasis for him but also brought a leadership class to the table. He made the assumption that it was a good thing. He knew Sela would have more details, and it may be time to suck it up and ask her.
Trying to put off that eventuality, for now, he decided to at least place his skill points and opened his character sheet window.
Rockland Barkclay Level 9
Health Pool: 140/140
Ether Pool: 130/130
Class: Apprentice-(Azrael) Revenant
Level 1 Leader: Class Selection Pending
Class Skills: Revenant Blade
You have 1 stat point and 4 skill points to distribute.
Stamina
14
Strength
12
Agility
20
Dexterity
18
Intelligence
13
Wisdom
6
Charisma
8
Luck
5
Weak Level Skills
Combat Skills (Non Class)
Common Skills
Endurance 3(+2)
Analyze 1
Profession Skills
Would you like to assign stat points now?
Yes
No
As Rocky mentally selected skill points, he thought he felt his testicles climb up into his body. The she-litch floated back from around the wolf as if summoned, and he gulped down the lump in his throat.
Sela pointed an accusing finger at him and spat, “You will not be assigning any stats, skills, or classes without consulting me. You have already proven that you have no brain.”
Rocky’s cheeks flushed red, and his hands clenched, putting a stop to his skinning. In a quick motion, he rounded on Sela with the blood-soaked claw pointing directly at the tiny demeaning witch. His other bloody hand swiped the menu box to the side so he could glare properly at the nightmarish woman.
“You-will-shut-the-pixiedust-up!” The words that came out of his mouth didn’t even sound like him anymore; they were more of a growling hiss of a geyser erupting. “I have had enough of your meaningless attitude. Ever since I have met you, you have been rude and abrasive. What the actual Pharaoh’s cat is your problem?”
Sela visibly flinched at his first words but then began to puff up with every addition, until the last question when he pointed out her issues, which caused her to deflate like a popped balloon. Just as quickly, her tiny arms wrapped around her in a protective gesture, and Rocky began to hear a sound he hadn’t expected.
Sela was crying. Not just crying but bawling.
Goddamnit! Honestly, this tiny ball of emotion who has been haranguing me all day is crying now? I’m not apologizing… nope, sorry not sorry.
Rocky’s hand was still clenched tightly around the claw, but he did lower it and moderated his tone, not wanting to make it worse, “Look, I can tell you are very knowledgeable about this crazy world, and I can really use that, but truthfully, you have been a huge water drinker so far, and I would rather go on alone than listen to you continue to demean me.”
Rocky paused and took a deep breath which allowed him to further moderate his tone. “I was thrown into this world rather abruptly, not even a full day ago! I am doing the best I can, and I’m still alive so I must be doing something right.”
Rocky’s stomach dropped when Sela glanced up at him with ethereal tears rolling down her cheeks. He met her eyes, and the tears broke him. “Look, I am sorry, but I am sure you know very little about the world from before the change. All I ask is that you please teach me about this world, and in return, I can teach you about the world that I knew?”
Sela tried to smile, but it was obvious the smile didn’t reach her eyes. Rocky could tell something was wrong which made his already sinking heart fall under his shoe. With a hiccup and a voice barely audible she started to speak, “I am also sorry for how we started. I just returned and have no memory of the time between my death and now. As soon as I returned, the world felt different–” Sobs racked her tiny body as she fought to control them.
The noise that they had made must have woken the Chimera kitten because it came over and sat on its haunches below Sela. Sela floated down and tried to hug the cute but deadly creature. The act seemed to help her gain some control back, and she continued, “I expected to be summoned into our guild’s castle or a newly conquered Territory. Instead, I find myself in a world where Ether is running wild, and in the entire Territory I searched, there was only one person.” With the last word, she pointed at Rocky.
“And you aren’t even a member of our guild. I can tell this is still Gaia, so I know something is terribly wrong. I am sorry. I have been taking my worries out on you.” She broke into sobs again.
Rocky realized he had let the dagger drop from his hands as the plight of the pixie hit him like a ton of bricks.
It must be just as hard for her as it is for me.
“So no more hell lady act?”
Sela’s sob cracked with a quick grunt of a laugh and amusement tinged her voice, “No, no more hell lady act, halfwit.” The last word was said with a smirk and a wink.
Rocky was amused to find he didn’t mind it when said that way.
To hide the tear that was about to leak from his eye, Rocky turned and began skinning the wolf again.
Yep, you can’t cry when elbow deep in industrial-sized wolf guts.
Rocky smiled to himself, looking back over his shoulder at the pixie. “Any suggestions on the stats, skills, and leadership class?”
Sela floated over and gave him a smile before she said, “Just so you know, only you and others that you grant access to can see your screens. I was granted access to see your screens because of the whole personal guide thing.”
As they worked, Sela began teaching him about what each skill did. She was actually a pretty good teacher once she was no longer a raging crazy-a-saurus.
As she pointed to his skills and explained, Rocky realized just how much he hadn’t understood.
Skills
Revenant Blade
5/5
Soul Blade Class Skill Unlocked
Revenant Bowyer
0/5
Skill gained at 5/5 “Soul Shot.”
Soul Strike
Once you gain five po
ints in this skill, you can use your personal Ether to cast Soul Strike.
Soul Strike increases the damage of your weapon strikes. Unlock the skill to learn more.
Skill gained at 5/5 “Soul Strike.”
Blood Mend
Once you gain five points in this skill, you can use your personal Ether to cast Blood Mend.
Blood Mend will increase your natural regeneration of wounds and damage. Unlock the skill to learn more.
Skill gained at 5/5 “Blood Mend.”
According to Sela, the Revenant Blade skill could create any bladed weapon, and the fact that it had made a sword was because he had been thinking about a sword during creation. Which meant that the bowyer skill could have made any type of ranged weapon. He could have literally created himself a bazooka.
When Sela saw his face fall during that explanation, she quickly chimed in, letting him know about the restrictions and inherent weaknesses of ranged weapons. “Ranged weapons are not the all-powerful items they may seem to be. First, if you make a ballistic weapon, you would need to craft bullets.” She pointed at the creature Rocky was still skinning. “Not many ballistic weapons would be able to pierce this if your sword couldn’t. Secondly, if you had created a laser rifle or the like, you would need to wait for ambient Ether to recharge the weapon between uses.”
Rocky’s raised eyebrow encouraged her to continue.
“Depending on the payload of the weapon and the Ether converter, you may have one shot with a twenty-four-hour recharge rate. So, if that shot missed or was resisted, which again probably would have been the case with something as strong as these creatures. You would have been nothing more than a puddle of blood in the dirt. That’s why most people buy laser rifles and have their soul weapons as something melee related they can rely on.”
Rocky’s stomach unknotted after that description, and he began using her voice as a distraction as he continued with the skinning operation. As for the skills he could choose from now, Sela gave an example, as she couldn’t be sure. The blood path would help him with the ability to heal damage. Essentially, he could increase the healing rate of an injury by a certain percentage based off of his investment of personal Ether; however, it would not be able to heal anything instantly.
The soul strike would most likely add damage to one attack relative to something of the same scale of personal Ether expended. Both had merit, but his gut was telling him self preservation over damage would be the better option.
As Rocky was just finishing skinning the massive creature, Sela informed him that performing an action repeatedly could earn you an ability, but it was much, much more challenging to gain combat related skills. Rocky’s shoulders slumped as he stood from the wolf, realizing he wouldn’t be getting the powerful combat abilities he had been dreaming about.
However, common skills were also quite useful; she gave an example of one: Tracking, for hunting down animals.
Sela also informed him that any and all craft skills could be learned from trial and error. For example, his skinning, which Rocky had done a pretty poor job of. It would get better and much faster once he earned the skill. This was because Ether could translate knowledge into his brain for any of the skills he learned and ensure increased absorption.
Rocky was forced to stop Sela from any more explanations as he began grunting and breathing hard from dragging the large pelt back the way he had come. When Sela found out he was going to a nearby stream he passed, she pointed in another direction and let him know there was a river much closer in another direction. Rocky followed her indicated direction and soon was washing the blood off of himself and the pelt.
Raising an eyebrow, Rocky queried, “How did you know this was here?”
“Well, when I was first summoned to be your ancestral guide, it took me so long because I was scouting our entire Territory. It’s standard for an ancestral guide, so we can help locate anything inside your domain. By the way, there are five other wolf corpses in that direction.” She pointed in a direction that led through a swathe of destroyed trees in the distance.
Sela slapped her hand to her forehead suddenly, which didn’t actually make a sound which made the gesture funny somehow. “I forgot to tell you about your Territorial storage! When you are within the borders of your Territory, you can access your storage vault through Ethereal space. You can store things inside of this storage and access them at any place or time as long as you are still within your Territory!”
She pointed at the bloody, massive, circus tent-sized piece of leather. “Then you can avoid dragging stuff around. Also, you can avoid food spoilage and the like. The storage automatically will slow down decomposition because it is less affected by time.” Putting one finger in the air as a caution she finished, “It won’t accept anything living, and it also will essentially freeze anything you put in there, so if you have something that needs to stay hot, probably avoid putting it in. Just think storage to open it, and if you intend to put something in it that you are touching, it will vanish.”
Rocky tried thinking storage, and a screen opened up in his vision with multiple boxes that seemed to denote something akin to shelves or spaces in the Territorial storage. He used another mental command to store the massive pelt inside, and he nearly fell over from the lack of weight. Instantly, the entire wolf skin was gone.
Once it had vanished, he reeled from the lack of weight and steadied himself. With two raised eyebrows and wide eyes, Rocky looked at the storage space screen.
Territory Storage
“Steel” Wolf Pelt
Access to this space can be granted to anyone the owner chooses. People who can access this Ethereal space:
Rockland Barkclay (owner)
Placing the skinned pelt in the storage confirmed his guess about the squares being spaces in the Territorial storage, and it seemed that the large wolf’s hide had taken up four of the total sixty-four. For ease of use, Rocky thought about adding Sela to the list, and sure enough, she popped up right under his name. He closed the window and shook his head in awe while he continued back to the clearing. The things this new magical era could do were a bit staggering.
When they returned, the tiny Chimera was curled up beside its mother’s corpse, and Rocky’s heart skipped a beat.
The sight brought out an urge to hug the baby Chimera, and Rocky chose not to skin the mother Chimera for the time being. He made a mental note to leave her for last and to try to do it quickly.
Instead, Rocky decided to confirm that the first creature and the crystals he had acquired was quantitative data and that there was indeed loot to be had in this changed world. Touching a lesser wolf awarded him with a single crystal, similar but different than the first two he had acquired.
Looks like loot to me.
Rocky internally celebrated before remembering the two golems back in the opposite direction.
Wait, Sela covered the entire Territory in the thirty minutes after the fight. She must be really fast, or the Territory is small.
His final thought led Rocky to flinch and ask, “Wait how big is my Territory?”
Sela smiled smugly. “Your Territory is one of the largest I have seen. It is about two thousand kilometers squared. As far as I can tell, it is all fertile land and has an abundance of resources already. Once you develop it more, it will be a great producer of materials and resources.”
That new information sent a strange shot of pride through his veins, and with a burst of new energy, Rocky asked Sela to try to explain stats. Then he broached the subject of whether she could fly over and loot the golem corpses. Rocky had begun skinning the lesser wolf when he posed both questions to Sela.
Due to his multitasking, he missed Sela’s eyes narrowing and her slow nod. “Yes, it is possible Rocky, and I can fly much faster than you can hike, but I really don’t want to start being a glorified errand guide.”
The tone of her voice made Rocky turn around, and the look she gave him was utterly earnest, which made Rocky free
ze and consider the question more seriously.
Rocky answered tentatively and slowly, “Sela, I need all the help I can get in this new world. If that means sending you back to get something because it is more efficient.” He paused briefly and didn’t see her getting angry, so he continued, “If you could stay here and skin the rest of the corpses, then start a fire and cook some of the meat, I would run back.”
Sela’s tiny face scrunched up after that before she nodded. “Okay, those points make sense, but before I go, let’s get your leadership class assigned. The skill points I’ll leave up to you now that you will be making an informed decision, but I expect you to have considered that decision by the time I come back.”
That’s how Sela began lecturing Rocky about stats. It would appear it was pretty common knowledge in her world, and because of this, she did a pretty poor job explaining it. At first, he felt his blood boil in irritation, but when he pressed her on it, she shrugged and pointed out that the more complicated equations and effects were taught over years, not in a single conversation.
Stamina increased health, Strength increased power, and they linked together to increase physical endurance as well as health regeneration.
Agility enhanced speed and somehow was related to Dexterity, which was hand-eye coordination, to better accuracy.
Intelligence was a very confusing statistic and increased one’s personal Ether pool and thought processes while also linking to Wisdom.