“I’m in,” Braeleigh said. “If the right thing to do was easy, everyone would do it.”
“I was with you up until the last part,” Sira said. “But I can’t in good conscience not help rescue Miriasa, wizard or not.”
Beldrak placed a hand over his heart. “Mine answer hath not altered. Though I am loath to give free roam to such a creature as Kurgath, I shall not stab out mine own eyes for justice over mercy.”
Zeeto put a hand over his eyes. “Someone, please convince me that Miriasa is some sort of uber-treasure that’s worth more than all the stuff we could snag by mugging Nethel and keeping it. Just those magic boots of his would be worth the effort to track him down.”
“And let him get away from us again,” Sira added.
“And again… and again,” Braeleigh said. “Besides. There’s more value in a human life than all the gold a scruffy scoundrel like Nethel could carry. For an elven life, like, double that, at least.”
“Thanks for devaluing our species,” Sira said dryly.
“Fine,” Zeeto grumbled. “I’ll treat this like a business investment. You bleeding hearts are going to pay off in the long run. I’ll keep telling myself that as we blow the last of my poker money on fast horses for the trip back.”
Braeleigh hefted Zeeto out of his chair and spun him in a hug. “I knew you’d come around.”
“Put me down!” Zeeto shrieked, drawing amused chuckles from nearby patrons of the bakery. When Braeleigh complied, he dusted himself off. “I’ve got a condition, though, and it’s a practical one.”
“What condition?” Gary asked, knowing that if anyone were to argue against the halfling’s petty demands, it would be him.
“We all get ourselves to the next step down the Paths of Power before we go barging into any fortresses.”
Sira snickered. “Thought your old man didn’t believe in outrunning the Paths.”
“Well,” Zeeto said with a huff. “The old man’s been wrong before. Maybe this Kurgath chap has hit a dead end somewhere. Either way, rather unlock some of the juicy power I can see coming.”
Gary checked his stats.
Player Name: Gary Burns Character Name: Gary Burns
Level/Path: Bard 1,2,3B, 4A XP: 6,800/8,000 Race: Unknown
STR: 7 DEX: 9 CON: 8 INT: 21 WIS: 17 CHA: 18
To Hit: +2 Weapon: Hair Splitter (1d8+1)
Armor Rating: 11 Armor: Leather (+2)
Path Powers: Inspire (+2), Lullaby, Fascinate, Historian
Skills: Persuade (+8), Music (+8), Study/Search (+8)
Tricks: Fast Talk
Profession: Cook (+1)
Just 1,200 XP more and he’d be there. Whatever the rest of them had in reserve, the amount must have been similar. A few good encounters along the road and they’d be good. If they’d managed to actually catch Nethel, instead of letting him escape, they might have made it. Gary had earned 200 XP just from the failed attempt.
The Path of Arcana beckoned. Gary had taken the wrong side of the Path of Music to cross right over, but if he planned ahead, he could be across to wizardry by level 7. Without Language (arcana) and without all the little bonuses to spell power picked up along the way.
Still, the Path of Music was disappointing thus far, and Gary wasn’t able to adjust the Path balance from inside the game. Until he could get back to Palo Alto and access his binders, he was stuck with the rules as written.
“I can live with that,” Gary said. “But it means we should probably travel overland on the way back.”
Despite grumbles of objection and a general wish not to encounter any more of those undead pieces, they all agreed. With no desire to lose horses to wilderness monsters, they decided to forgo spending the last of their money on the beasts and departed before noon.
49
At times, the party seemed to be Gary’s friends. Not the friends he left back in his kitchen in Palo Alto, but actual in-game friends who liked him for his in-game persona—which, technically, was pretty much the same guy. Some of it might have had to do with his cooking ability, which turned the promise of trail rations and wild game into an expectation of honest-to-the-gods cuisine.
They were easy to impress. None of them were accustomed to properly spiced food or anything that felt outside of a fantasy-generic range from medieval European to Middle Eastern fare. If he could ever find a trader selling ginger, Gary was going to blow their minds.
It was as dusk set in on the second night out of Sillimar that Gary’s mind turned over ideas for how to make burritos. The tortillas were the major problem, as was a good way to grind up the meat or slice it well enough to pass for a filling. His musings were interrupted by a casual comment from Braeleigh.
“Anyone else feel like we’re being stalked?”
Oh, wonderful.
“How long have you noticed this?” Sira asked. “Has it been all day? Because if it’s been all day, we’re going to have another talk about what’s appropriate to keep to ourselves versus sharing immediately.”
“Does Caspian smell anything?” Gary asked.
“We have a headwind,” Braeleigh pointed out. “Nothing with a scent is going to lie in wait for us up ahead. Well, I mean, they might, but we’d know about it. But something trailing us would smell us without us smelling them.”
“This is why intelligent creatures invented cities,” Zeeto said. “Screw this Davey Crockett nonsense.”
“Who?” Gary asked, genuinely curious where Zeeto had gotten that name.
“The famous halfling explorer,” Zeeto replied as if Gary had just asked who Lewis and Clark had been. “Don’t tell me of all the random crap history you’ve learned since getting to Kovia, you’ve never heard of Davey Crockett.”
“Um, real frontiersman, wears a raccoon hat? That the guy?”
Zeeto scoffed. “Should have known better. Figures it’s the foreigner who learns all this stuff. You ask ten humans and eleven of them won’t have any idea who I’m talking about.”
From the shrugs around the party, Gary was indeed the only one, and that meant that the ignorance also dipped a toe into the elven community.
d20: 19 + (Perception +4) + (Friendly Chat -2) = 21
Gary whipped out Hair Splitter just as the howl echoed across the countryside. “Overwolves!” he shouted. For once, his instincts had prickled, warning him of the danger just in time. That’s what had Braeleigh’s hackles up.
d20: 14 + (DEX -1) = 13
Gary had earned the right to act in the ambush turn. He hadn’t, however, out-rolled the wolves.
Black-and-gray tiger-striped canines barreled in among the party, snarling and slavering. If there was a pattern or animal cunning to their attack, it was lost amid the raw fury of the initial assault.
Two of the beasts tore at Gary with their teeth. One sank its fangs deep. The other ripped a shred from his shirtsleeve.
Damage Taken: 5 (sharp)
For sharp damage, it sure felt like fire. Pain seared Gary’s arm where the muscle had torn, but the injury didn’t impair him at all. With jittery fingers, he let the crossbow fall from his hands and plucked the first notes of a song from his lute.
“Rockabye overwolves, ‘neath the treetops; when the song flows, your sleepy heads drop; when the spell breaks, the hammer will fall; and down will go hit points; we’ll take them all.”
Lullaby: Test Willpower against Music check
d20: 10 + (Music +8) + (Classic Lullaby of Your People +2) + (Music Soothes Savage Beasts +4) = 22
Gary wasn’t sure how much of a classic a song about a baby stranded up a tree and falling when the wind picks up should be, but it was true that pretty much everyone knew it. Either way, most of the overwolves’ eyes glazed over. Those affected by the song wobbled on unsteady legs before collapsing into slumber.
“Nice work, twinkle-fingers,” Zeeto cheered. With none of the wolves awake within arm’s reach, the halfling took a free hit on one of the sleeping ones, killing it instantly.
Br
aeleigh yipped. “Don’t kill them! They’re hungry. We can just feed them.”
“A preference for man-flesh doth seem an impasse,” Beldrak said, hacking into one of the beasts still on its feet.
Sira came over and healed Gary’s arm. The warmth of the divine touch was more soothing than any hot tub, more cleansing than his ex-girlfriend’s exfoliating cream.
Damage Healed: 5
“Thanks,” he said to her quickly between verses.
As Gary’s turn came around again, Zeeto’s eyes drooped. This was one of the downsides of the Lullaby skill and a major reason Gary didn’t consider it more often. To his surprise, Braeleigh yawned and collapsed beside a slumbering Caspian.
The rest of the overwolves succumbed as well, however. All but the pain-frenzied beast squaring off with Beldrak. When the paladin finished off his adversary, he turned to the two remaining wake companions.
“I calleth a vote,” Beldrak said. “Whosoever thinketh it prudent to—”
“Finish ‘em off,” Sira said. “Sevius looks after sentient creatures foremost, and these things are a menace.”
Gary’s nod as he continued the song preceded Beldrak’s systemic butchery of the remaining creatures. Then Sira saw to some minor wounds the paladin and Braeleigh had received. Then they woke everyone else up.
Braeleigh put a hand to her mouth. “You… you…”
“’Twas us or them,” Beldrak said. “Betwixt the two, no other way.”
Gary let the white lie pass. Maybe in Beldrak’s black-and-white world, there was truth to what he said. Indeed, even if they got away without killing those overwolves, some other poor travelers might have died to those fangs and seen the insides of those bellies.
Zeeto rubbed his eyes and surveyed the carnage. “Aww, fuck. Missed the good part. OK. Two questions. First, are these things edible? Second, was that enough for anyone to level up?”
Gary counted bodies. Eleven. He rolled his eyes but checked anyway.
Player Name: Gary Burns Character Name: Gary Burns
Level/Path: Bard 1,2,3B, 4A XP: 7,196/8,000 Race: Unknown
STR: 7 DEX: 9 CON: 8 INT: 21 WIS: 17 CHA: 18
To Hit: +2 Weapon: Hair Splitter (1d8+1)
Armor Rating: 11 Armor: Leather (+2)
Path Powers: Inspire (+2), Lullaby, Fascinate, Historian
Skills: Persuade (+8), Music (+8), Study/Search (+8)
Tricks: Fast Talk
Profession: Cook (+1)
“Yeah… not close,” Gary confirmed. 396 XP sounded about right for that mess. Overwolves weren’t individually very dangerous. Even then, packs of low-level monsters never seem to add up to all that much. It would have taken a pack of thirty-four of the beasts for Gary to have leveled up right then, and the odds of them surviving against thirty-four overwolves would have depended heavily on someone cheesing them out, possible cheesing them out more than Gary’s Lullaby.
“Shitcicles,” Zeeto swore. “Nobody?”
They all shook their heads.
“And… edible?”
Braeleigh scrunched her nose. “I mean, I wouldn’t eat them.” She ruffled the fur at Caspian’s neck.
“I’m not cooking them,” Gary said. “We have enough real food. I don’t need to be butchering wolves in the wilderness.”
“Well, so we didn’t level up and this isn’t food, so what are we hanging around this vulture buffet for?” Zeeto asked. He clapped his hands. “Chop, chop. Let’s move.”
Gary fell in as the party moved on. Somehow, his attempts to concentrate on planning the party’s dinner failed to win him an appetite.
50
They’d ended up eating chicken stew that night, then sleeping under the stars with the night sounds free of howling wolves.
The next morning, Zeeto melted a candle over some wadded scraps of cloth to fashion primitive earplugs. “Next time you play your snoozic, I’m ready for it.”
“Snoozic?” Gary asked. He had an idea, but he didn’t want to draw any unflattering conclusions.
“Snooze music,” Zeeto said. “Boring enough to dig a mine. Dull enough to let a toddler play with. So slow it would change 10 gold for a silver if you asked like it weren’t nothing.”
“Ooh,” Braeleigh said. “Make me some. And some bigger ones for Caspian.”
“Sorry,” Zeeto replied a bit too loudly. “I can’t hear you over the super-effective noise-blockers I just invented.”
“You’re not even wearing them,” Gary pointed out.
Zeeto cupped a hand to his ear. “What?”
Braeleigh scowled. “I hope something eats you and you survive long enough to get pooped out the other end.”
Zeeto blinked a few times, then suffered a full-body shudder. “I just had the most vivid image.”
“Serves you right,” Sira said.
Shifting gears so fast he would have burned out a transmission, Zeeto called ahead to Braeleigh at the front of the group. “Hey, can you maybe zigzag us a little? Maybe get us attacked by something. We’re making great time back to Durrotek. Maybe a little too great. I don’t want to risk not having enough oomph when we get there to rescue Miriasa.”
Braeleigh sighed. Even from the back of the group, Gary could tell she was rolling her eyes. “I don’t know where monsters might be, or I’d happily run you into some. Maybe you can just butcher some innocent forest creatures trying to survive.”
“I would, but I don’t see any of those either,” Zeeto shot back.
“What is it you’re so looking forward to?” Gary asked. “It’s got to be something in the fifth Ring of Power that’s caught your eye like a cheap whore at last call.”
Gary knew the rogue skills coming up, but he couldn’t guess which of them was the apple of the halfling’s eye. Was Zeeto looking to dish out damage or protect himself with stealth?
“Throwing Stab,” Zeeto said without hesitation. “I love me a good knifing but damn me if getting close enough to smell the viscera of some nasty bugger isn’t my favorite thing in the world. We start running into more monstrous monsters, and I can only imagine how bad the smells are going to get.”
“Are we really looking for monsters so Zeeto doesn’t have to smell dead people?” Sira asked. “Dead people he kills himself?”
Zeeto heaved a melodramatic sigh as he walked. “Maybe I just need nose plugs.”
“Or… hear me out on this,” Braeleigh said. “A profession where you don’t kill anyone. Maybe you’re just not suited to this line of work.”
Zeeto snarled wordlessly in reply.
“Guys, cut it out,” Gary scolded. “The odds of us making it to Cloudspire Peak without a few more monster attacks are almost nil.”
“Thy expertise cometh whence?” Beldrak asked, pinching his chin between thumb and forefinger. “Shouldst not we suffer a fate akin to most travelers hereabouts? Woodsmen and trappers haunt these lands without their numbers thinned overmuch by strange predations.”
Gary threw up his hands. “It’s just the way the world works. We’re outliers. Get used to it. The gods, fate, or whoever you want to think is running this show is going to make sure our lives are never easy, never safe, and always push us to the very limits of our abilities, endurance, and morals.”
Sira approached gingerly and put a hand on Gary’s shoulder. “Maybe we can help you find a little peace in the grace of the gods.”
Gary clenched his jaw. The gods? Those posers? Those fabrications? Those puffed up healing spell vending machines? He wanted to scream the truth until his lungs turned inside out. He wanted to claim the divinity that Makoy feared in him.
“I’m fine,” he said instead, exhaling a breath he hadn’t noticed he’d been holding. “I just see the world a little more clearly. That’s all.”
He stalked off with the morning sun at his back. “Come on. We’re not going to get attacked by any more or fewer monsters standing around.”
And that much was as plain a truth as he could spare them just now.
It was lunch break by the time Gary’s prediction came true. Not that there was any way to prove that their encounter was independent of all their precautions or desires either to find monsters or avoid them. Gary knew this was random chance because the table of random encounters for the region was the only place they were liable to run into this particular creature.
Name: Dread Badger Hit Points: 35 Damage: 2d6+6
A descendant of a breeding pair of mutant badgers created by wizards circa YG 225. Roughly the size of a horse with fangs like tent stakes.
Caspian’s barking alerted everyone as Gary was struggling to start their camp fire. The dread badger looked just like its non-dreadful cousins but scaled large enough to make meals of humans. It was already in a frenzy when they first caught sight of it.
d20: 19 + (DEX -1) = 18
There were times when Gary wished he had a magical battery that could store good dice rolls. He’d gladly go last in the Initiative queue to have a 19 like that tucked away for an attack roll or Persuade check.
Now, with the crazed behemoth bearing down on Zeeto—the most bite-sized of their contingent—Gary found himself wishing someone else bore the responsibility of saving him. Already in a frenzy, there would be no soothing the beast to slumber or distracting it with Fascinate.
Gary slung Hair Splitter into hand and took aim. He squeezed the trigger. The string release clicked.
d20: 4 + (To Hit +2) + (DEX -1) = 5
The bolt whizzed off into the distance, lost in the forest. A thock seconds later revealed that he’d struck something solidly. Unfortunately, that something was a far-off tree.
The badger got its turn before anyone else could act. Gary’s lone attack registered in the creature’s tiny, addled brain as a threat, and it closed the distance with terrifying speed.
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