by Ryan Rimmel
I lacked any form of instant, magical healing, and even using the herbs still left me horribly injured for hours in the case of serious wounds. My Strength and Endurance both impacted hit point recovery equally. It seemed that the higher those got, the faster I would recover.
Strength improved my blocking skills. I decided to put one point into Strength and one point into Endurance. My hit points expanded. After leveling, I went up to 145 hit points but, adding in the stat bumps, I’d further increased Health significantly. I was now rocking 175 hit points. Reviewing the numbers, I’d discovered that each rank of a statistic was cumulative; while increasing my Strength to above average only increased my hit points by five, going to good increased them a further ten points. Endurance was even better, as its base was ten points per rank. Good Endurance granted a total of 20 hit points and 20 Stamina, up from my previous rank.
What was even better was that my health regeneration had doubled. Before, I’d estimated 40 hours to fully recover. Now I was looking at 20. Better still, was that the three remaining herbs I had were going to give me an additional minute of healing each. That made them much more effective; I’d recover an additional 27 hit points. I’d already gone through two, which had netted me 14 hit points. That was 41 total, which would at least take care of my leg injuries and start healing me afterwards.
I had two perks. I started with Warrior, looking for anything to do with reducing pain at all. Being stabbed sucked and getting shot with crossbows sucked, so anything that reduced that pain was great. I found Iron Will. It allowed you to use Stamina to reduce injuries and passively caused you to feel less pain. I took it. Breaking out of menu time, the throbbing ache that filled my body diminished into something a mere mortal could stand.
An outside observer might wonder why I ‘wasted’ a perk on Pain Mitigation, when I could have taken Improved Damage or something else…
“Hey, Dipshit, why did you just waste a perk on Pain Mitigation?” Shart asked.
“Because I’m tired of being in agony all the time,” I responded.
“You could have taken something useful, like Improved Damage or something,” argued the bloody bowel stain. I chose to ignore him. He harrumphed but said no more.
The reality was that being in agony for days at a time was starting to really get old quickly. If something wasn’t done soon, I’d probably start finding excuses to stay in the village just to avoid it.
I was still left with a Woodsman perk. That list was a bit more complicated. Lore was very useful in a non-combat sense but, now that I’d gotten my pain managed, I needed to do something that improved my combat ability again. My next level seemed to have more abilities to choose from, but right now I was still locked into the starter perks. Lore was the big Woodsman one, like Mitigate was for Warrior, and Shadow Walking was for Rogue. I flipped through my options.
At this level, there were no more Dual Weapon fighting perks I could take. There was a single sword perk called Blade Works Best Alone, which focused on one-handed weapons. There had been times, such as when perched precariously in trees, when having an open hand would have been nice. Presumably, there was a higher level perk that fit into the other hand like Single Handed Casting or maybe a Hand Crossbow and Sword. However, I didn’t really have a good one handed blade.
I eyeballed Marksman. It had an improved chance to hit and damage, but I still wasn’t really missing my targets very often. Now that I was really paying attention, I noticed that it opened up the Marksman Tree. That sounded like it had potential, but did I really need another talent tree?
Looking through the rest of the perks, I saw one for Woodsman’s Herbalism, which I briefly considered taking. I wasn’t sure it would be worth having though, since I could probably figure out how to harvest herbs on my own. I was assuming it would function like Woodsman’s Lore. Woodsman’s Lore was considerably better than normal Lore. However, if all the perk did was make me harvest faster, what good was it? I had plenty of time to do that on my own.
Selecting Marksman, I saw another tab open up on my character sheet called, unsurprisingly, Marksman. It also removed Bows from my skill sheet and transferred all that experience into Marksman. Apparently, the perk superseded the skill.
The Marksman page showed the Marksman talent in its center, which looked like a glowing gold disk, with a group of other disks around it. As the disks were adjacent to something I knew, I could read all of them. Each disk listed a type of shot. There was: Power Shot, Piercing Shot, Stunning Shot, Pinning Shot, Frost Shot, Fire Shot, Lightning Shot, and Magic Arrow. I had one choice to select which shot I’d like to start with.
Making choices on a talent tree was different than just selecting perks. I could tell instinctually that the only way to improve this talent tree was to do damage with my ranged weapons. If I earned enough of this Marksman’s Experience, I could earn more choices on the Marksman shot tree. With each choice, I could either learn a new shot or improve one I already knew. Unlike my main perk trees, I could see every option in Marksman and there were not that many selections. Most of the shots took Stamina to use. However, some took Stamina and Mana, and Magic Shot took only Mana.
For example, Magic Shot created an arrow made of magic that could be fired towards a target for the cost of 2 Mana, instead of costing Stamina. Its base damage looked like that of my normal arrows, but the fact that it only took Mana was useful. I tended to end a battle with all of my Mana intact, but not much Stamina. Anything that used just Mana would be helpful. I also reviewed Fire Shot, which cost 2 Mana and 5 Stamina to shoot and added 3 points of fire damage to my arrows. Adding elemental damage would also be useful, but that meant that if either my Mana or my Stamina was depleted, the shot was useless.
Normally, shooting my bow took 3 Stamina. With my recover rates, I could fire one shot per five seconds and completely recover my Stamina. I could fire slightly faster, at once every 3 seconds, and still have some degree of accurate fire. Unless I somehow learned to aim more quickly, 3 seconds was going to be my limit.
I was also trying to get to Mage level one. I had attempted several different ways to earn ‘magic’ experience that would level me up in the magical classes, yet nothing so far had worked. Shart was useless, big reveal there, as he didn’t even know why I was able to level in my existing classes. Leveling in a class I absolutely shouldn’t have access to was well outside his understanding. This left me guessing at possible ways to level into the magical classes. Currently, my idea was using Mana in offensive attacks, since just dumping magic into Shart hadn’t done anything. If this didn’t work, I’d have to go find a Wizard somewhere to teach me to cast spells, if that was even possible.
The demon was sitting on my shoulder again, “What are you doing when you are quiet like this?”
“I’ve used my Mana to construct a false reality where I’m surrounded by demon babes,” Shart replied.
“You can’t be serious,” I stated. His hips moved a bit. Oh crap. I tried to prod him off my shoulder but he appeared stuck. Why?!
Finally, I selected Magic Shot, while still attempting to vigorously remove the demon, unsuccessfully.
I ate another herb and drew back my bow without an arrow knocked. Nothing happened. Focusing on the skill Magic Shot, the bowstring suddenly began glowing blue. However, when I pulled back on the bowstring, the effect stopped. Focusing caused the bowstring to glow blue again; this time, I felt it carefully. It gave my fingers a prickly sensation, as they ran over it, but there was definitely something there.
Slightly tightening my fingers onto the blue string, I pulled it back while leaving the real bowstring in place. This time, the string went back and a glowing blue arrow appeared on it. If it had been golden colored, it would have looked much like Hank from the old D&D cartoon. I focused on aiming, and the targeting dot appeared. My Mana depleted by 2. I released the arrow and it flew across the clearing, leaving a bluish trail in its wake. It exploded in a flash of energy against the tree I had targete
d. One thing I noticed was that it flew straight, unimpacted by gravity or wind, unlike a regular arrow.
I walked over to examine it. The damage was remarkably similar to my normal attack. I fired at a different tree three times in rapid succession. Each shot reduced my Mana by 2, but not my Stamina. I noted that even without aiming, I was very accurate with the bow. I only really needed the reticle for longer shots. I tried to do the shot without drawing the bow and was unsuccessful; part of the magic was tied up in the act of properly using the weapon. I could cheat a bit though. I didn’t actually have to release my fingers to loose the arrow, as I could just will it to fire.
Improved Simple Bow Damage 12-16, Durability 27/30 (Durability -10 due to Improvised Tools)
Experimentally, I picked up the goblin crossbow and looked at its mechanism. There was a crank on the end that one had to wind up for firing. I tried to will the shot to activate, and the string actually started glowing. I drew the weapon up to the firing position and activated focus mode, which caused a dot to appear where I would strike. That was far superior to the single wooden pole that served as the crossbow’s actual sight. Targeting a nearby tree, I released the magical bolt, which had two effects. First, it struck the tree in a slightly larger and different magical blast. Second, my mind recoiled and I saw a status effect pop up.
Glancing at the status effect, it read: Science and Magic, you have tried to combine a mechanical object with magic and have suffered the Mana Lock condition for 30 seconds. You cannot spend mana for 30 seconds. All mana costs on mechanical devices is increased by a factor of 5.
Sure enough, my Mana now had an odd locked shape and all 23 points of it were unavailable to me. Mana regeneration was also blocked during that time, so the 30 seconds ended up costing me another 3 points of Mana that didn’t regenerate when it should have. At least the Mana Lock wasn’t painful, just unpleasant. When the effect ceased, I fired another magical crossbow shot with the same effect.
That sounded silly, but I realized I could shoot the crossbow at a target and then follow it up with a Magic Shot a few seconds later. That gave me the ability to use the Magic Shot as sort of a double tap from the crossbow. Of course, switching between the crossbow and my regular bow was going to get clumsy.
Content with my choices, I focused on my quest prompts again. I’d need to go back to the village to heal, considering how badly wounded I was. One would have to be a strong kind of moron to go into battle with wounds from another battle so fresh. Knowing the location of the goblin bosses was useful in that regard. However, when I looked through the prompts, I no longer saw the one to the West.
Mentally cursing, I brought up my map and realized that if those Wargs were running, they could get back to the fortress in 10 minutes. While all the riders had died, it probably wouldn’t be hard to track where they came from. Alternatively, the goblins might just have someone who could speak Warg. It had only taken me about 3 minutes to learn that language, after all. If they did have a fluent Warg speaker, it would take mere seconds for the goblins to know exactly what happened and where.
It had been at least 15 minutes since the attack, probably longer. If the goblins were moving on Wargs, they could be as few as five minutes away. I doubted I could make it back to the village. That was nearly 3 hours east of here on foot. To the South, there was the ocean, but who knew what was in there. Turning north, I decided to trust my sneaking and … I paused.
If the boss had left his fortress, then his fortress was not well guarded. While I didn’t have any healing potions, that didn’t mean that no one did. If anybody did, it would be the goblin boss of a fortress. Sighing inwardly, this strong kind of moron started calculating the best route to get to the fortress. I snuck out of the clearing as carefully as I could while covering my tracks. I activated my Sprint skill and continued on with my zig zagging trail, heading west.
Chapter 18: To the Western Gate Fortress
Jim
HP 69/175
Stamina 160/175
Mana 40
I spent the next 21 minutes ‘sprinting’ towards the fortress. If one wonders how someone sprints with a 50% movement penalty, the answer is poorly. That 21 minutes represented the amount of herbs I had eaten. On top of their recovery, I’d gotten back 2 additional hit points from my improved regeneration. Thus, marked the end of the herb enhanced healing. Fortunately, when I leveled, I just gained the additional hit points; the fifty I’d earned were added to the mix, making me healthier than a horse.
I meant that literally. I could see a horse through the gate and it only had 60 hit points. Her name was Patches.
I’d found a spot on the eastern side of the Western Fortress that appeared unguarded, as if the goblins were unconcerned with the area. I was just outside easy bow shot range and still protected by a cover of trees. The fortress itself was only marginally maintained and was basically surviving on the fact that it was large and made of well-crafted stone. It stood nearly 80 feet tall on the western side, which was a wall with the makings of a portcullis in it. That side looked like it would be a real challenge to assault.
The eastern side, where I was, looked far easier. Whereas the large western wall was both massive and imposing, the far smaller eastern wall was both shorter by about 50 feet, and only half as thick. Both walls were anchored by mountains on each of their sides. The mountains themselves were sheer enough that climbing would have been next to impossible. The area between the walls and mountains was boxed in, making a nice camping area for the goblins. I could see the tower that AvaSophia had described. There was a crack in the wall that I could easily climb. It looked like whatever had damaged the wall had also taken out the walkway to the tower. Presumably, the goblins avoided it. That said, there were still several goblins walking the eastern wall. They seemed attentive enough, however their patrol pattern had gaps. My Lore skill and Tracking abilities told me there would be an opening soon enough.
While I was waiting in my protected patch on the eastern side of the Western Fortress, I’d actually found an herb. I could tell because in my vision it was highlighted with a greenish hue. While I didn’t recognize it, I had gardened before. I carefully went about removing it.
You have found a Blue Moss herb. It has unknown properties. It is raw.
If it grows in nature, it must be good for you, I thought and started chewing on it. I instantly felt my Stamina recover slightly more quickly. Of course, it was nearly full anyway, so that wasn’t all that useful at the moment. I found some more Blue Moss, now highlighted in my vision more clearly, and took another piece.
“What’cha doing?” asked Shoulder Shart.
“Getting ready to charge into a heavily defended enemy fortress,” I replied. “Isn’t that pretty obvious?”
“I was just checking. You seem like the strong kind of moron that would do something like that. Still, I had to check.”
“Any advice?” I asked.
“Beyond don’t go in there, Dum Dum?” replied the demon. He made a show of looking around. “No, you’ll be fine. Just get in there and do hero things and try not to die. I’m surprised. I thought this place would be more heavily defended.”
“Well, I mean,” I started, but then remembered that he was spending most of his time in that demonic spank bank he’d made himself. Who knew how much of the last goblin slaughter Shart was even aware of? “I’m sure it will go fine.”
Finally, I spotted the opening. After checking that the goblin boss was not showing up in my quest menu, I sprinted toward the wall. With my Mobility, climbing the wall was easy. Each hand hold was more secure than any climbing wall I’d ever been on. I could easily lift myself one handed whenever the need arose. I climbed all 30 feet of the wall and ended up on top without any real effort.
I quickly encountered my first problem. As soon as I landed, I saw two goblins sitting within some broken rubble on the wall, playing dice. I could tell from their vantage point that if either had bothered to look, they would have see
n me, too. However, due to the speed of my climb and their involvement with their game, they had failed to notice me.
Throwing both daggers as I landed, I scored two sneak attacks, as both goblins slumped to the ground soundlessly. Checking their pouches, I found two more herbs and assorted trash. Taking the herbs, I threw both bodies over the side, letting them splat to the ground outside the wall.
The interior of the eastern side of the Western Fortress was uncomplicated. There were a number of structures built against the weaker eastern wall, but the barracks and armory were built into the western wall. The western wall had a giant portcullis that looked big enough to easily drive a semi through, much like the semi that killed me. Talk about a sneak attack. NO. I can’t think about that now. I have hero-ing to do. The eastern wall had a similarly sized opening, but it was partially covered by a tattered wooden gate. Between them was a football field sized courtyard strewn in misery.
There were several human bodies tied up to poles, some alive and some dead. There were also several cages full of people against the rough mountain walls in the north and south of the courtyard. The caged people were totally exposed and many looked emaciated. There were several carts, some damaged and some not, in the middle of the courtyard. Goblins were tearing into them, spilling out grains and other foodstuffs while searching for treasures.
I was surprised to only count about 20 goblins and no Wargs. Six of the goblins were in the middle of the camp, searching through the carts. Eight more were on the high western wall; many of those had crossbows. The remaining six I could see were on the eastern wall walkway with me, walking in pairs and looking out into the darkness.
Not really considering whether it was a good idea or not, I got to work. The top of the wall was dark with the moon being mostly obscured. My Shadow Walk perk tied into my Stealth, allowing me to move quickly and quietly behind the nearby wall guards. I went through them like a hot knife through butter. I had them all slain before my first newly found herb ran out.