“Oh, they’re so cute and new!” Rugrat laughed darkly.
“So what if they’re a few levels above us? As long as we keep a low profile, only coming in after them, there shouldn’t be an issue. If they want to fight, well, someone shouldn’t be judged on just their level,” Erik said.
“But first. Let me take a nap.” Rugrat leaned back on the log as if to go to sleep.
“Rack monster.”
“It is a skill and a talent,” Rugrat said, not opening his eyes.
Erik nodded. Truly, the ability to sleep anywhere was a highly rated skill that Erik wished he was able to learn.
Erik took the time to look through the storage rings that they had acquired. There were different kinds of weapons, mostly of the Novice grade. Erik could only look forward to the riches that they would gain from selling all of them.
There were even a number of monster cores inside the storage rings; they weren’t simple either.
Five of them were Grand Mortal grade monster cores, with one being a Fire Variant Mortal Grade Monster Core. Different variant cores could increase the price of the monster cores drastically, doubling or tripling the price that a Grand Mortal grade monster core would cost.
Erik started to organize the loot. Weapons were placed into one ring; cores joined them. Recovery concoctions were stored in the next. Finally, the highest quality cores, the beast weapons and the manuals that were useful to Erik and Rugrat, were placed into the broach that he had taken from the mage in the cave.
Erik took his time to look through the gear. He took out a few pieces of armor. They were simple black bracers that were of the Apprentice level.
==========
Cold Steel Arm Bracers
==========
Defense: 27
Weight: 0.7 kg
Durability: 68/100
Base Value: 2 Gold, 5 Silver
Slot: Takes up forearm slot
Innate Effect: Resist cold damage 5pts
Requirement:
Strength 14
Agility 11
==========
“Requirements?” Erik hadn’t read anything about weapons or armor needing a requisite level or stat to be used, but now the glowing armor seemed to dim in his eyes. “Well, that’s going to make things harder if we can’t use some of it until we increase our stats.” He even had the thought to use his newly acquired stats so that he would be able to wear this gear. He dismissed the thought. Just altering his stats to meet the needs of the weapons and armor would only make him weaker in the future.
“So, probably can’t use half of this and it’ll be hard as hell to sell because it’s high-leveled.” Erik could only sigh as he looked to the armored warrior. “Well, I don’t think you’ll be needing this anymore, sorry.” Erik pulled out the cuirass from the dead warrior.
The armor was called the Golden Fox armor, the entire thing called the Golden Fox Set.
The stats were incredible when compared to the other gear.
==========
Golden Fox Cuirass
==========
Defense: 59
Weight: 45.3 kg
Charge: 23/100
Durability: 47/113
Base Value: 32 Gold, 17 Silver
Slot: Takes up chest slot
Enchanted Ability: Agility increases 2% per hit; can stack a total of 5 times
Innate Ability: Reduce magical attacks effect by 5%
This is a set item. When two or more set items are combined, the abilities of the set items will increase.
Requirement:
Agility 15
Strength 20
==========
The problem was with how low the charge and health were. Erik didn’t know how to charge the armor up more and would need to find out more information about it.
Also, when wearing the armor, it gave off a dull glow, showing that it was a Journeyman piece of armor.
An increase of 10% Agility would increase Erik’s Agility from 70 to 77. It might not seem like much, but it would allow him to move on the openings he saw in a fight, allow him to have greater control over his weapons and increase his ability to dodge attacks. It couldn’t be dismissed.
Erik put the cuirass away. If they were in a life-and-death fight, he would pull it out. Right now, it was more danger than it was a help.
He took out some simple boots. They were really rough compared to the ones that he was wearing but their stats weren’t bad.
==========
Diemar leather boots
==========
Defense: 15
Weight: 0.5 kg
Durability: 78/100
Base Value: 17 Silver, 4 Coppers
Slot: Takes up foot slot
Innate Effect: Move quieter when in stealth
Requirements:
Agility 17
Mana 7
==========
He had to sigh and put them next to Rugrat. With their abilities, they were better suited for him.
Most of the gear that the Willful Institute students had were items that had been given to them by the sect.
They’d found out where they had come from as they all had a manual containing the sect’s rules and the emblem on most of their items and the manual were the same.
Erik might have killed them but he wasn’t going to broadcast that to everyone.
He left those to the side. Maybe Rugrat would get some inspiration when pulling them apart.
Erik pulled out a pair of pants and a helmet to complete his hodgepodge collection.
The greaves were from the warrior again.
==========
Golden Fox Greaves
==========
Defense: 63
Weight: 5.7 kg
Charge: 37/100
Durability: 67/109
Base Value: 36 Gold, 13 Silver
Slot: Takes up leg slot
Enchantment: strength increases 4% (5% when paired with Golden Fox Cuirass)
Innate Effect: Reduce magical attacks effect by 3% (4% when paired with Golden Fox Cuirass)
This is a set item. When two or more set items are combined, the abilities of the set items will increase.
Requirements:
Strength 16
Agility: 21
==========
The greaves were stronger than the cuirass as they’d taken less damage. When they were combined, their immediate strength didn’t shoot up. Erik pulled out a helmet. Although its stats were high, it obstructed his view and he could only put it away when thinking of what it might be like if he shot his weapons while wearing it.
The boots weren’t all that good and they weren’t in the least bit comfortable compared to Erik’s pair.
He turned to the last pile of items. His heart sped up as he got to the manuals and information books.
The four people had been disciples of the Willful Institute. Being students in their own right, they had myriad different training manuals. Not only did they have books that went more in-depth on the subject of Body Cultivation and the Mana Gathering systems, one had a book on the basics of Alchemy, another on formations, and another on smithing. Among these, there were various fighting manuals.
Erik opened up one of the manuals, reading the first page.
===========
Throwing manual
===========
With this manual, one will be able to exert greater force with their body when throwing items, increasing the damage of the throwable object, the distance traveled, and the accuracy at throwing.
===========
Erik looked though the different manuals. They were mainly on training with swords. These manuals looked to increase the effect that a person would have with one given area.
So if it was with a blade, then increase the speed that they would draw with, the accuracy of their hits, the places that they should hit.
&
nbsp; If it was archery, how one could use and work on different muscles, so that they were able to draw more strength out of their body without increasing their level.
“Basically, like any good training, the better you train, the more lethal you will become without having to make any big changes like get a whole new rifle if you’ve got the drills down.” Erik put down the manual. “I just never thought of the specifics that might go into fighting with these kinds of weapons.”
I just naturally thought that because they were blades and arrows that they weren’t worth learning because I had a rifle.
Erik went through the manuals until he found one on hand-to-hand combat.
“Who the hell named this? Growling Tiger Elbow?” Erik could only frown at the title. “Damn. A plus for trying, but it just sounds like the writer was trying to make this sound mystical.”
Shaking his head, Erik opened the manual.
Chapter: Using Mana to Punch?
========
Growling Tiger focuses on channeling one’s inner energy (Mana) through one’s channels, focusing the muscles and unleashing a powerful blow on your enemies.
==========
A bunch of diagrams and explanations showed how one was supposed to move the Mana within their body and the movements in their muscles and body to drive as much power through their body to inflict the greatest damage on their target.
“Vicious little bastards.” Erik sighed as he closed his eyes, studying the movement of power in his body and then tracing it through his Mana channels as the manual told him to.
Erik felt like some kind of ridiculous chicken as he threw his elbows out, as though he were in a football game.
Finally it went right as the timing between the movement of his arm and his Mana matched up. A rushing sound, similar to a growl, could be heard as Erik’s arm moved much faster.
Erik felt the power that jumped upward, as it felt just right to him. He wasn’t satisfied and moved to a tree. He elbowed it.
“Oh, shit, fucking funny bone! God damn!” After rubbing his funny bone and trying to heal it, which was having no effect, Erik finally got feeling back in his elbow.
He looked at the point of impact. There was a patch of the tree that no longer had any bark on it; otherwise the tree looked fine.
Erik changed his point of aim, remembering that right feeling. He practiced a few times, getting it down before he did it against the tree.
He hit the outside of the tree. The bark was cracked as the other side of the tree blew out in a spray of splinters.
Erik pushed on the small tree as it gave way and dropped on the ground. “Well, okay, that’s kind of awesome.” Erik looked at the destruction.
With the information in the book, it simply took what he had already, combined it together and used it in a different way to increase the overall power output he could display.
Erik continued to practice again and again, looking to improve his control until he could do it easily without needing to think about it too much. Mostly it was a lot of him smashing his elbow against trees and hissing out expletives as he struck his funny bone, again and again.
Power from the surrounding area started to gather. Threads of energy started to snake across the ground, entering Rugrat’s body. His aura increased in power as he started to rise in level, his body undergoing changes.
It seemed like everything in a five-meter radius was sucked up into Rugrat’s body.
“What the fuck’s going on?” Rugrat asked blearily as he woke up. The power settled into his bones as he rose up. His bones cracked with new power as he reached out his hand.
“That’s a rush.” Rugrat moved his hands around as if he were grasping the very fabric of the space around him.
Rugrat looked up at Erik rubbing his elbow, his joy turning into a confused look. “What’ve you been up to?”
“Don’t want to talk about it.” Erik leaned against a tree and closed his eyes, willing the screen to appear.
Rugrat didn’t even have time to say anything else as a screen appeared in Erik’s mind.
==========
You have 20 attribute points to use.
==========
Erik was really feeling like he was being held back by his Mana pool. His healing spells from before didn’t require all that much initial Mana to be cast and the output could be varied if he used more or less Mana.
Though it meant that his reserves were extremely low, if he got a stronger spell then he wouldn’t be able to cast it based on his Mana pool. Also, it was a reserve that would allow him to pump out a lot of Mana in short bursts.
He placed seven points into Mana pool by itself, another four went into Mana Regeneration. Then three went into Agility and Strength; three more into Stamina Regeneration.
Erik looked over his character sheet.
==========
Character Sheet
==========
Name: Erik West
==========
Level: 11
==========
Race: Human
==========
Titles: From the Grave
==========
Strength: (Base 7) +9
==========
160
==========
Agility: (Base 6) +11
==========
85
==========
Stamina: (Base 10) +1
==========
165
==========
Mana: (Base 6) +7
==========
130
==========
Mana Regeneration (Base 4) +18
5.15/s
==========
Stamina Regeneration: (Base 7) +14
4.95/s
==========
Erik felt the new energy flood into his body as it changed. Erik’s eyes opened as he let out a breath. The air around him was disturbed with the power of his breath.
“Damn, it feels good to level up in the morning.” Erik got to his feet, looking over to see Rugrat engrossed in his smithing manuals.
“So, what’s the plan? You want to find out where these people are all going, or keep moving from place to place that Tommins has sent us?” Rugrat asked.
“I want to at least see what’s going on. If we can get a few rewards, then that’s even better. All of the stronger ingredients usually have some kind of beast or protector. With all of these high-level characters running about, it will be incredibly hard to try to lure beasts out of their homes,” Erik said.
“I’m curious about what this Beast Mountains trial is all about as well,” Rugrat agreed, putting away the manual. He was already wearing his own mismatched assortment of gear.
They didn’t care how they looked, only that their gear was the strongest.
“You look like a goddamn hobo who went through a tannery,” Erik said.
“You look like you’re trying out for the movie Gladiator and you stepped in gold paint,” Rugrat said.
“Touché,” Erik said.
“You know what that means really?”
“No clue, but you’ve got to make something a little better than this when you can finally smith,” Erik said.
“I haven’t even learned the damn skill and you’re putting an order in? What are you, an officer?”
Noises appeared in the distance. Erik and Rugrat heard them clearly. People were fighting and moving in their direction.
Erik and Rugrat dropped into stealth and moved away from their camp. Using their maps, they moved deeper into the Beast Mountains.
***
Elder Oui looked around. Still, he had not seen his niece even as other youths had made it to the platforms dotted around the Beast Mountains Range.
“Is something wrong, Elder Oui?” Elder Rei asked.
“Nothing, Elder Rei. I heard that your nephew Xi Yan has joined in on the competition?”
; “Yes, though he likes to take his time. He will be here in time. I have faith.” Elder Rei waved off any worries he might have.
“Elders, the formation is ready to accept Mana stones and monster cores,” an array master elder said as he and a group of other elders had been watching the array that was embedded in the platform.
Quickly people started to organize themselves, breaking off their conversations. Those whose disciples hadn’t appeared looked out into the Beast Mountains.
If they hadn’t appeared, then they might be slow or they had run into some trouble. It wasn’t uncommon for people to enter the Beast Mountains and not make it out alive, though this mostly happened once someone entered the actual dungeon, not while they were trying to get to it.
***
“The hell?” Rugrat said as a medallion popped out of the two storage rings that he had got from the people he’d used his napalm bombs on.
The medallion indicated direction. Rugrat looked over to Erik to see that he had two medallions floating in front of him as well.
“Shall we go and check it out?” Erik asked.
“Might as well,” Rugrat said. They didn’t go directly toward whatever the medallions were pointing at but went on an angle to make sure that they weren’t going into come kind of ambush.
The Mana in the Beast Mountains was getting stirred up as people passed overhead, rushing toward where the medallion was pointing.
Erik and Rugrat made sure that no one saw them as groups met one another, getting into fights or fleeing from one another. It looked as if they had all come for the same thing, but they didn’t want others to get it as well.
“All of them feel to be level thirteen and fourteen. Some are a little stronger, but I don’t think that their combat capabilities are any less,” Rugrat said.
“We’ve got to take some chances or else we won’t get anywhere.”
Rugrat looked at Erik. He could see that fire was back in Erik’s eyes. It had scared him seeing how defeated Erik looked in that hospital bed. Since Erik had come to the Ten Realms, he didn’t want to stay back; he wanted to move forward, looking to learn more and experience as much as possible.
The Two Week Curse Page 22