by G. Akella
"Let's get to the point," I smirked.
"Yes, of course," the elder nodded quickly. "You see, our cattle, we've been keeping them confined for a month now. We've managed to reap the harvest, but the fodder... Our supplies are running low. Some are trying to forage near the village, but it's not enough."
"You want us to clear your communal pastures?"
"You need to train all these louts anyway, don't you? Might as well put their efforts to good use," Gvert spoke animatedly. "And in return, I will tell Skyle to issue whatever gear you may need to your troops..."
You've accessed the quest: Clearing the Communal Pastures.
Quest type: unique.
Cleanse three communal pastures around Ballan of undead.
Reward: experience, reputation increase with the Krajde Princedom, reputation increase with the residents of Ballan and Farot, choice of armor and weapons for your troops.
"I suppose you'll issue the armor and weapons only after we clear the pastures?" I asked, accepting the quest.
"Why would you think that?!" the elder seemed indignant. "How are they supposed to fight those stiffs without equipment? I'll go tell our smith to expect you soon, yes?"
"Thank you," I watched the retreating demon, dumbfounded, having just witnessed an NPC transgress one of the game's fundamental rules... A quest reward, given in advance? Or had I misunderstood something? I'd never heard of anything like it. Unless it was my high reputation...
"Gvert is a good, decent man," Ayim said, appearing beside me. "His brother was a good friend of my father's. He, the brother that is, had an inn in Feator... Ivar is Gvert's nephew," the black-haired demon nodded toward a tall scrawny youth chatting up one of my future priestesses. "Father, Master Hoyle, Gyrt—the elder's brother, Raoh the drunkard... They remained back there, in Feator's breached palisade..." Ayim grounded his glistening eyes and sighed. "Who could've known that a lousy drunk was capable of such heroism..."
"Life sure is strange," I gave a shrug, then gestured the archeress over, and bid them to start getting everyone ready.
I felt a slight stab of panic. Could I have overlooked something? After all, I'd had no more than a few days' experience playing with groups. I gave my notes another lookover, but couldn't spot anything egregiously wrong. Come what may! If I did make a mistake, it could probably be rectified at some point. I'd done a good enough job with my own build... Right? I wouldn't know for sure until after I made it out to the higher plane. In the meantime, let's proceed with the plan.
"Listen up," I got down to business as soon as the demons took their seats on the benches they had dragged out of the house. "We are now a clan. I will not stand for any squabbling or disrespect toward one another. Treat each other like family. Because, essentially, that is what we are."
"I tried telling her that yesterday, but she wouldn't—" Reece shot an sidelong glance in Salta's direction, clearly for show.
"You're going to get for interrupting your superior officer," I made a hand gesture, stopping the archeress just as she was about to unleash her ire.
"What does that mean?"
"It means you'll be cleaning up after and cooking for everyone for one day," I informed him. "It's a common form of discipline in the armed forces for rule-breakers."
"The punishment for this kind of thing is different in a legion," Ayim interjected with his own two cents. "And far more severe. Besides, by putting this one in the kitchen you'd only be punishing the rest of us!"
"You see, dar," the future mage stated with sorrow in his voice. "The people are against seeing me punished. Your heartfelt speech must have affected them deeply—now they see me as family and feel great guilt for having wronged me on several occasions in the past. Of course, you may still exercise your commander's authority against popular opinion," Reece spread his arms mournfully, scanning the faces of the demons as they struggled to hold back laughter. "If you wish to see me punished, cast down to that terrible place."
"Don't worry," I shot back at Ayim. "I know that at least one in our squad will surely appreciate our alchemist's cooking skills," I motioned toward Gloom, puffing merrily to the side. "Besides, there'll be a lot of cooking needed to feed all these mouths. And if anyone is unhappy with their meal, figure it out amongst yourselves. The bottom line is, the next soldier who interrupts me will be deployed to the kitchen until they become a master chef. Understood?"
"Perfectly, sir. Piping down," with those words, Reece stared wide-eyed at Salta, covering his mouth with both hands.
Where do you even find such a loquacious farmer? Then I remembered something in the game's description about certain NPCs possibly linking to additional, reserve AIs when communicating with players. Could this be the manifestation of that very thing?
"Listen carefully," I surveyed my fledging host. "Right now none of you are worth anything—a single skeleton could easily dispatch any one of you into the Flame..." I raised a hand, cutting short growing whispers of discontent. "But there is a way. I can teach you to fight."
"Fight just like you?" asked Ivar, unable to contain himself.
"No, not just yet," I shook my head. "My gear is too good, and that is a major factor. Besides, you will all have separate roles in combat: warrior, tank, mage, healer..."
"We can salvage weapons and armor from the enemy," Ayim stood up. "There'll also be equipment in the pillaged villages. How will you teach us, dar?"
"Since you're so eager, I'll start with you," I put my hand on the black-haired demon's shoulder, forcing him back down. "Sit and focus. Tell me what you feel." I opened his menu and selected the warrior class.
Attention! Farmer Ayim from the Steel Wolves clan is now a warrior! Additional clan bonus: +145 to strength, +145 to constitution. Do you want ti assign Warrior Ayim's talents?
Nice! I totally forgot about the clan bonus—good thing the game's AIs didn't! Moving into the stats menu, I threw 100 points into Ayim's vigor, and the remaining 45 points into strength.
The demon's base vigor was set at 50, with his ordinary leather boots adding another 95. Those boots would soon be switched to plate, which might not come with the same bonus, while vigor was indispensable to a warrior—Vortex of Blades alone consumed 350 energy. This was where I lucked out—since physical attacks didn't make up the core of a mage, their use was dirt cheap. Were I to ever decide to play a mage proper, I would need to start making serious investments into intellect.
For talents, I simply copied everything from my notes. Five points into one-handed weapons, one into Charge, five into Death Blow... Midway through assigning talents I paused and looked away from the menu. It was totally quiet—all I could hear was the clanking of pails carried by the village women, hens clucking in an adjacent coop, and the razorback puffing as he napped. Thirteen pairs of eyes wide with wonder, glued to me as if I'd just pulled a rabbit out of a hat. Ayim was sitting, head resting on his arms. His shoulders had visibly increased in size, and the sign over his head had changed from "Farmer" to "Warrior."
"Hey, man, are you all right?" I gave his shoulder a push.
The demon raised his murky eyes at me. His facial features were rougher now, as if weather-beaten, sweat streaming from his brow, his breaths shallow.
"I'm all right, dar," he wiped the sweat with his sleeve. "I feel a little warm. And sleepy."
"Anything else?"
"Uh, well..." he hesitated. "It's like my body isn't even mine, and somebody's clawing inside my head. I don't know how else to describe it."
"Good, that's the way it should be. Hang in there, it won't be much longer."
For players, the process of assigning talents was much simpler: you simply added a point into a talent, and it was learned. But here you needed to wait for a bar beneath the talent's icon to fill up. It took at least ten minutes to assign Ayim's fourteen remaining talent points. When the final talent's bar was filled at last, I closed the menu and took a good look at my first warrior. Ayim was sound asleep, his head resting on Raina's sho
ulder. Judging by the way his lashes twitched in his sleep, he was dreaming something quite unusual. No matter, it couldn't have been dangerous, and I expected him to wake up a full-fledged warrior.
"Ivar, Hurd. Take him into the house, let him sleep it off. Who's next?"
"Could I go next?" Aritor rose to his feet. "Was a rough night, I could use some sleep..."
The rest was smooth sailing. Each clanmate took around twenty minutes, and it was close to lunchtime by the time I carried Salta, who had been the last, into the common house where my future squad was sleeping. How long has it been since I carried a woman in my arms? I thought as I carried the demoness, her body shuddering in her sleep.
I felt like a lifetime had passed since the day I'd been confined to this Hart-forsaken world. Even my curses had become local. How long was I supposed to keep running? I hadn't known any peace since, aside from perhaps the few days journeying with the caravan and the one evening in Lamorna. It felt like someone—or something—kept prodding me from behind. Nor could I afford to rest now, as the continental event afforded a unique opportunity to raise my reputation in this princedom, and make my clan large and strong enough to take on the level 180 dungeon. Oh, and the twenty percent boost to experience was nothing to scoff at either. Events like this didn't happen more than maybe twice a year, and I suspected that with the latest patch they would be happening less and less.
What would happen at the end of these two months? It was hard to say, but I supposed that if the main fortress wasn't captured, Ahriman's spell would be lifted, and Ashtar would contend with Rualt for these provinces. On the other hand, Ashtar had plenty on its plate, so perhaps Rualt legions would simply walk into the province unopposed. Oh, but I shouldn't forget about the barbarians, for their military might rivaled that of the dominions.
"Father! No! I can't!" the young woman's body convulsed in my arms, and tears streamed from her eyes.
"Easy, girl, it's all right," I laid the demoness on a cot, stroking her hair gently as she cried in her sleep. "It's all over now."
After a few more shudders, the young woman curled up with her knees to her chest, and her breath evened out. I kept standing there a while longer, observing the archeress. Then, with a final gaze at my slumbering army, I shook my head and left.
So, where was I? Right, the barbarians, I thought while walking toward the smithy. In the end, I couldn't care less who would end up contesting these lands. I was pursuing my own interest, and I sincerely hoped to actualize it.
There was just one glaring question: how was I supposed to free all those knights and mages? It would become virtually impossible after the event's completion. What was I going to do: present myself before one of the lords claiming I had some human friends in need of rescuing? Demons and humans were probably natural enemies, but even beyond that, there were too many unknowns. What would be the asking price in exchange for the lives of Altus' people? More than I could pay, no doubt. But then, what were my other options? Level to at least 170-180, sneak into Krajde undetected, open the sealed door, accept all the troops into my party, and evacuate them through a portal? Impossible!
Rounding a group of kids playing in the street, I nodded a greeting to a couple of farmers passing by, and walked into the smithy's front yard. Master Skyle wasn't anywhere in sight, so I took a seat on a nearby billet, sighed and fell into contemplation. First of all, in order to group up with an NPC, they needed to join my clan first, and I doubted that Altus' troops would even consider it. Joining a clan was forever, and they probably had tons of obligations as it was. Besides, who was I to even make such an offer to a celebrated band of heroes? And even if they accepted, it wouldn't do any good, since clan membership maxed out at one hundred NPCs. Right? Or was it a hundred max per party? I pulled up clan options to review the relevant info. Damn it! The description was unequivocal, leaving zero wiggle room for any creative interpretation.
The number of non-player characters in your clan is determined by the clan's level (1), and the clan leader's NPC command rating (100). At present, you can accept 36 more NPCs in your clan.
I probably wouldn't be able to accept into my clan the army's commanders: Kan Shyom, Saverus, Raena, Gerat and the like. I didn't know my place in the local table of ranks, but I sincerely doubted it was superior to knight-commander of the Order of the Red Flame. And I could only imagine how accomplished one had to be to become Altus' deputy or even aide. This was a problem, since you couldn't accept into your clan anyone of a higher rank. But there was a "second of all" as well—if I did manage to recruit one hundred characters after all, the clan would have no room left for new members.
"Greetings, dar," the local smith came out of the nearby house, and started toward me unhurriedly.
"Yes. Greetings, Skyle." I rose to meet him. "Gvert said you might be able to help me."
"I sure will, dar," removing his leather apron and gloves, the demon tossed them on his workbench. "Come with me to the stockroom, we'll talk there. You want a beer?"
The dusk was falling. The day's waning sunlight still frolicked over the tops of trees and rooftops, but twilight was rapidly descending on the village of Ballan as its residents prepared for sleep. I looked up at the star-studded sky, searching yet again for the Big Dipper, and gave a dejected sigh. The remains of the day had flown by, filled with unending bustle. I was sitting on the bench outside the common house, taking the occasional sip of throat-burning moonshine from the flask, and smoking my pipe with pleasure. The evening breeze was cool on my face, carrying familiar scents from the nearby woods. This was my fourth night in the Cursed Princedom. Time certainly wasn't stopping, but at least now I had some degree of certainty.
The elder hadn't lied—the smith had enough equipment in stock for all of us. But it did raise a question: why hadn't the villagers put on plate during the attack? Not enough of a bump to their collective intelligence with the patch? Or a quirk of the governing AIs? Could be they fought in the gear they felt most comfortable in. Whatever the case, I was now in possession of eight sets of plate and six of chainmail, along with corresponding weapons. Sure, the equipment was mostly junk with only seven items of unusual quality, but I hadn't expected even that. All the items were in the 110-145 level range. On top of all that, the smith loaded me with seven hundred arrows of shoddy quality, and two ordinary lances. All in all, it should be enough for at least fifty packs of undead. I placed an order for three more lances and paid the man a couple of hundred gold, since commissioning new orders fell outside of the quest's conditions. As for arrows, we would need to make do by ourselves—thankfully, the clan had members with all the necessary professions.
Salta was right about this bench—it really is wider, I snorted, scratching Gloom behind the ear. I took a drag and tried to exhale the smoke in the shape of rings. Good thing I hadn't forgotten about provisions. The Realm of Arkon differed from the real world in that here you didn't need to travel with a caravan hauling all your things. Back on Earth, especially in the Middle Ages, caravans were indispensable, but here you didn't need to worry about any of that stuff. Nor had I forgotten about my four-legged friend, having stocked up on turnips, carrots and rutabaga—two hundred pounds of each vegetable. That should last the razorback a week. Of course, the manner with which Gloom munched on that rutabaga, one might think he were doing me a huge favor, and the reproach in his eyes was hilarious. I supposed apricots from the magic grove were much more appetizing, but what could I do?
I opened the menu yet again, running some mental calculations as to what my squad might look like once I equipped them with all the gear received from the blacksmith. The conclusion was somewhat encouraging. The archers should deal a little over three thousand damage, and the melee fighters around a thousand less. I wasn't worried though—with time I would outfit everyone in at least unusual quality gear, maybe even rare. Our weakest link were probably the tanks—though they had a few thousand more hit points than me, their armor class really suffered with such poor gear
. Still, they should probably keep aggro of one-two regular mobs around level 160, so it would have to do for now. As for toughness and focus, all my new demon clanmates started with 40% as base. Almost as much as me, which was pretty good. In fact, it not for that, I would have been much less optimistic. All right, that's enough—time to get some shuteye. I stretched out on the bench, slipping an arm under my head to act as a pillow, and began to drift into sleep to the even puffing of my valiant mount.
I awoke to the din of Gloom leaping to his feet and emitting a guttural noise that sounded almost like growling.
"What's with you?" I asked, sitting up on the bench while rubbing my eyes.
It was still dark. The front yard of the common house was only slightly illuminated by faint moonlight. I cast Shield of the Elements on myself, just in case, and looked around.
"I'm sorry for waking you, dar," Ayim appeared in the doorway, arms spread guiltily. "Your board is like a real guard dog."
"No kidding," I snorted while glancing at the clock. Five in the morning—it wouldn't be long before the rooster concerto began. There was no use trying to get any more sleep. Good thing one's basic physical needs weren't as critical in the game—three-four hours was generally enough to function, and you could always accumulate sleep in advance, if need be. "Well, don't just stand there. Have a seat. How do you feel?"
"Hard to say," Ayim shrugged, taking a seat on the bench's edge. "I feel like myself, and not like myself at the same time. All these skills..." the demon gazed at his palms contemplatively. "Turns out I had been holding the sword the wrong way all this time."
"Did you figure out which skill is used for which purpose?"
"Yes, of course. The question I have is when exactly to use them."
"I'll talk about that when everybody's up so as to not repeat myself. In the meantime, here, put this on," I laid a set of armor intended for him on the bench.