The damage done was strange to witness. The first attack, one that partially missed, tore away thirty-four points of the creature's health. The second strike, despite scoring completely on the beast, only delivered twenty-five points of damage. The difference in damage when power cleave was involved could not be denied. Even a partial miss might do more damage than a full hit!
Scott was greatly surprised that the monster was not killed by such fierce attacks, however. It was badly hurt, that much was obvious. The second strike had torn a massive gouge across its chest, but that was still not quite enough to bring it down.
His turn ended and the monsters made their moves. The other two ghouls moved in the background while the stronger ghoul attacked viciously. Scott managed to redirect the first attack slightly, but the ghoul followed up with a second clawing strike that came at an angle that he was not quite prepared for at the time. He was able to reduce less of the damage from that second strike than the first and paid heavily for it.
Scott's already badly torn coat was shredded further along with his flesh. Bright red blood spurted outward as more than half of his hit points were torn from him in a single exchange. He cried out in agony just as his turn came around. All of his efforts to restore his health were lost in a single moment! The situation was worse than he'd realized, however. A blue message screen popped up to inform him of terrible news.
[Status Affliction]
Moderate Injury
You have taken repeated heavy injuries to your body in a short period of time. Your maximum hit points are reduced temporarily.
[--]
"Fuck!" snarled Scott heatedly. Enraged by the monster's near fatal assault, his next strike tore through the ghoul's neck and neatly popped it off the beast's shoulders. The head of the beast sailed through the air whimsically before landing on the ground with a dull thumping noise.
Scott panted heavily then took a step back before his turn ended. The other ghouls made their move while the background music blared on. Afterward he received several rapid fire blue screen notices.
[Status Affliction]
Severe Physical Strain
You have forced your body through several severely stressful situations over the course of twenty-four hours. When combined with your current heavy exertions, you have developed severe physical strain in your body.
Your ability to heal from injuries is reduced for the duration of the affliction.
[--]
[Status Affliction]
Mental Strain
You have dealt with several near death experiences and undergone mental trauma over the course of twenty-four hours that exceeds your mental fortitude. Your ability to restore mana and to deal with mental status effects is reduced for the duration of the affliction.
[--]
[Status Affliction]
Mental Status Affliction Exacerbation
The effects of the status affliction [Fear of Death] have increased due to your [Mental Strain].
[--]
"Damn, when it rains it pours!" exclaimed Scott as he felt the effects of the afflictions. Just a moment before he had felt only the pain of his wounds. Now he felt like his body was going to fall apart, and he had developed a severe headache on top of his woes.
Burning Soul ended after his next double step backward. Now he waited. He had but nine hit points remaining. There was no choice but to use his back step strategy in the hopes that he would be able to kill the monsters before their comrades joined them.
Several turns passed as the monsters made their way forward. Scott groaned in annoyance when two more ghouls joined the fray. His enemies were now granted a twenty percent boost to their capacity. If it became much higher it would be difficult to survive, and impossible to win.
He reactivated burning soul as one of the ghouls reached his position, and then used his second move to attack with power cleave. Unlike the first ghoul, he neatly cleaved the monster's head from its shoulders. Even as the monster hit the dirt, one of its companions moved into position. A blue screen message alerted him to a worsening situation.
[Status Affliction]
Physical Status Affliction Exacerbation
Your [Physical Strain] has worsened due to a heavily draining physical activity.
[--]
Scott seethed inwardly as he saw the message. His body actually felt like it was on fire now, and quite sore.
The ghoul seemed ready to pounce on him, but it was not fast enough to attack after moving. It was no longer his turn.
Scott did not dare use power cleave again unless he had to do so. Instead, he unleashed two swift strikes that the ghoul had trouble trying to avoid. The first one had been easy enough to twist away from to some degree, but it left the ghoul in a bad position. Its life was torn away just as its friend's life had been taken.
Ghouls continued to come for him. It seemed for a time that for every ghoul that he felled, another joined the battle. No more of the higher grade ghouls appeared, but the numbers of the ghouls rarely fell below three for a time.
Scott was forced to continually back around the battle field and use his attack and retreat pattern for most of the fight. He saved his mana, and also as much stamina as possible for combat maneuvering and last ditch special attacks.
A ghoul stepped into position then received a brutal slash from Scott’s bush axe for its trouble. Unable to prevent him from retreating, it could only watch as its meal stepped back out of its reach.
In the next exchange it was knocked back and fell hard to the ground. That same scenario played itself out several times as Scott used the system of battle to his advantage as a means to keep the number of oncoming monsters that he had to face down to a minimum.
It was a great strategy. However, it was also loud and a lengthy process as it took many hard strikes to bring even one of the beasts down without his magic.
Scott began to grow tired, even as more of the beasts started to appear. He had overstayed his welcome, that much was certain. Three monsters became five, and then over time became fourteen. The battle continued unabated, as more and more of them appeared.
Of the fourteen ghouls he had fought so far, he had finished off nine. The battle continued as a few started to stagger toward the battle zone. He finished off two more, and dropped the number of current opponents to three. However, the new arrivals chose that moment to enter the battle. His opponents doubled to six. The combat potential of the ghouls increased, at least as far as the damage that they could take mattered. The system and Scott's maneuvering kept them from being too dangerous at the moment when it came to actual attacks.
The fight continued on. Ghouls fell, and more appeared. Scott panted heavily and started to simply walk away from the monsters one step at a time in order to try and recuperate stamina. He had only a little mana left, enough for two rounds of burning soul since he had regained a small amount over time. He put it to use immediately.
The ghouls were staggered across the battlefield in such a way that he would be able to finish most of them off before his mana was lowered to the point that he would be unable to use his attack. Burning soul activated, he moved his way across the battle field like fiery death. Because of the boost to the ghouls from their comrades, he had to always attack twice for the first three encounters.
He had to change his movement patterns after that group so that he could draw the others close enough together to finish them off safely. It took a few minutes, but he managed to defeat the last of the beasts.
A mass of broken ghouls littered the battle field when Scott could finally call it quits. Sweat poured down the side of his face. He felt as though he would pass out at any moment. He lost count of how many ghouls he had killed or crippled, but he needed to take a moment to breathe.
He could not take long, however. He was tired of being outside in the disgusting hell-hole that the world had become. At a glance, he guessed that over two dozen ghouls met their grisly demise on the business end of his bush ax
e from the beginning to the end of the battle. Thankfully, no more monsters popped up to assault him. That had been exhausting mentally and physically. He briefly wondered if he had just killed everyone who had lived on his street.
After the corpses finished with their death ripples and the black blood stopped flowing, another surprising thing occurred. A column of light appeared above five of the bodies. Within each column of light something floated. Three of the floating items were copper coins. One item was a plain looking ring, and the last one was a shiny red treasure chest similar to the one from earlier in the day. “Is this loot?”
Scott stepped among the corpses and collected the items that he found there. He was on the edge of exhaustion when he made it back inside his reinforced home. He immediately went to the bathroom to see if the shower still worked. The electricity and the water were two separate utilities after all. He was overjoyed to see that he had water at least. He used it to rinse off his bush axe. Thick viscous blood spiraled down the drain for a while before he was satisfied.
After his weapon was clean, he took his pants off and checked his wounds. He had a trio of angry red gashes on his leg, and his pants had been torn apart in the same place. His chest and shoulders looked as though he had fought with a wood chipper and lost. Those things hit hard. If he had not increased his level just before facing them, they would have torn him apart.
All across his body he saw angry yellow and blue bruises that made no sense. At least, they made no sense till he recalled his status afflictions. "Stress bruises?" he asked the empty bathroom.
He cleaned his wounds then poured rubbing alcohol on them before bandaging them with gauze. He had no idea if that would do anything for him, but he had to do at least that much. It seemed like something that should be done even if his hit points would regenerate on their own over time.
On the way back to the living room, a status menu popped up to announce that his level had increased. He mused that the things seemed to show up whenever they wanted to, as it had been quite some time since the battle ended.
[Level-Up]
Hit Points: + 14
Mana: + 10
Stamina Points: + 18
Speed: + 2
Counters: + 2
Movement + 2
Load = 30
[--]
The increase was quite a bit higher for his current increase in level, compared to reaching level two. Scott decided to check his status to see if there was a reason for the sudden shift.
[Status]
Scott Keen
Age: 20
Level: 4
[HP: 28][17][8/27]
[MP: 15[14][4/34]
[SP: 63][57][13/67]
COMBAT
[Attack: 2][6] | [Arcane Attack: 0[1][5]
[Defense: 1][3] | [Arcane Defense: 0[1][3]
[Evasion: 1] | [Arcane Evasion: 0[1][2]
ABILITIES
[Strength: 3] | [Agility: 1] | [Vitality: 3]
[Durability: 1] | [Reflexes: 1] | [Arcane: 0][1]
[Intellect: 3] | [Charisma: 1] | [Luck: 1]
MANEUVERING
[Speed: 4]
[Counter: 4]
[Movement: 4]
[Jump: 1]
[Load: 30]
[Mental Strain – 37:36][Physical Strain – 45:15][Moderate Injuries]
[--]
“Hell yeah, level four.” The amount of development seemed great, though he definitely wanted to train more in order to see what would happen.
Scott thought about the battle that he’d just faced. He could fight against two dozen of the things in a prolonged battle, but he’d been exhausted and ended up with a painful wound in the process. Hell, he had serious negative status effects from what he could tell.
He guessed that there were probably a couple of ghouls in the mix that were a level or two higher than the others, but most of them had probably been level one. He needed to be able to do more damage to them, more quickly.
He rubbed his chin. Did that mean that he needed more attack power or more speed? The more he swung his weapon, the more tired he became. Would increasing his strength make it easier to swing his weapon and keep him from getting tired as quickly? There was a lot to consider for the future.
There was nothing else to see as far as his status went. Though, he did notice that his attack stat had increased by one point. That no doubt meant that actions taken in battle could increase combat stats.
He finished up in the bathroom then went to check the peep holes in the front and back doors of the house. There were a few lesser ghouls meandering about at a distance but none of them seemed to realize that he was in the house. He hoped that it stayed that way.
Now, it was time to check the loot! Scott picked up the plain looking ring first.
[Accessory]
Plain Iron Band
A simple ring designed to grant the wearer improved capacity to withstand the rigors of battle.
Defense +2
Vitality +1
Value: 40 Copper Daemons
[--]
Scott wasted no time in putting it on his finger. Extra stats were always welcome. He was surprised it was worth so much, however. His bush axe was not worth much at all. Maybe something that dropped as loot was simply more valuable? It was the only thing that he could see as the reason for the disparity.
Next was the treasure chest. Scott flipped open the lid and saw two items. One was a small bag. He opened it up and found six copper daemons and a new type of coin. It had a silvery sheen to it. He assumed that it was a silver daemon.
The other item was miniature book. It reminded him of the tiny little thumb-sized bibles that some novelty stores sold like keychains. He took the thumb-book out of the little chest and it shimmered in his hands. It was now the size of a normal book. He blinked at twice, but decided not to worry about the strangeness of an expanding book. It was honestly the least strange thing that he had seen that day.
“Big Book of Professions,” said Scott as he read the title aloud. Well, it was bigger than before, but still sort of small. What an oddly named book. Inside the book, he found only a quick blurb that referenced basic professions, such as fighters and mages.
“Well, that’s certainly useful,” said Scott in a deadpan manner. One particular part of the blurb irritated him greatly, however.
[--]
Profession Notice: You have been granted the right to accept a profession. Profession rights are randomized based on your current attributes and initial weapon choice. You are unable to specifically choose what you will become at start. It is best to accept professional assignment early in order to minimize poor decision making during development. You will be unable to develop stronger abilities, or learn more than your basic starting skills, until you do so.
Choose to begin professional assignment by holding up the [Big Book of Professions] and firmly requesting professional assignment.
[--]
“So, the world has turned into some sort of horrible videogame, and I can’t even choose my own profession?” Scott snorted. Well, whatever. He had a chance to survive, but given the way the world was now it was still going to be a serious difficulty to do so.
Scott held up the Big Book of Professions and said, “I request professional assignment.”
The book flared brightly with a soft green light then transformed into arcs of electrical energy that raced up Scott’s arms. He started to cry out, but there was no pain, only the awakening of new knowledge.
His body began to glow with the green light of professional knowledge, or whatever it was supposed to be. When it died down, he patted his chest and twisted left and right. He felt no different. Though his ring did glow brightly for a moment.
[Status]
Scott Keen
Age: 20
Profession: Arcane Slayer
Level: 4
[HP: 48][37][16/47]
[MP: 55[54][6/74]
[SP: 83][78][23/88]
COMBAT
/>
[Attack: 6][10] | [Arcane Attack: 10[14]
[Defense: 4][8] | [Arcane Defense: 7[9]
[Evasion: 3] | [Arcane Evasion: 5[7]
ABILITIES
[Strength: 7] | [Agility: 4] | [Vitality: 7]
[Durability: 6] | [Reflexes: 4] | [Arcane: 10]
[Intellect: 7] | [Charisma: 4] | [Luck: 4]
MANEUVERING
[Speed: 6]
[Counter: 4]
[Movement: 7]
[Jump: 2]
[Load: 40]
[Mental Strain – 35:24][Physical Strain – 43:12][Moderate Injuries]
[--]
“Arcane Slayer? My stats rose a lot.” He said. What kind of profession was that anyway? Did he slay the arcane, or did he use arcane abilities to slay things? It was probably the latter, but he might be some sort of witch hunter or something. Curious, he checked his skills and found that he was given five more of them in combination with his original abilities.
Earth Tactics Advance: Volume 1 Page 7