by J. J. Thorn
Current Progress.
Affinity: Weight
Rank 1 – View Weight – 100%
Rank 2 – Increase Weight – 1%
Energy 35/35
I’ll never get used to seeing 100%. It was also odd because I knew there was still so much I could do with the Skill.
Goddess knows how the percentage is determined.
I now stood in front of the inn with my friends. We got up as early as possible so we would be ready to find Gavin and the rest. When I first walked outside, I was surprised to find the town of Borson was fairly rundown. I had spent my whole life in Huag, and had only seen Krader as well.
I was startled to see that the walls were meager and the buildings peeling.
As usual, I looked to Zane for my answers. “Isn’t Borson kind of rundown? Is this normal?”
He grinned. “You really have been sheltered. While traveling I noticed that places like this were more common than places like Huag and Krader. You have to remember that monsters outnumber people. That’s why Dungeoneers are so important. Them travelling between towns to deal with stronger monsters is a necessity for smaller towns like this where they rely on their guards. Sometimes they might have Dungeoneers in town, but when you don’t have a large population it becomes hard.
“Plus, they don’t have a Dungeon and probably aren’t close to any other valuable resource. Dungeoneers stick around where it’s more profitable, which brings in the non-Affinity users, etc. It just makes sense.”
“But what about places like Huag? We didn’t have a dungeon and I don’t think there was anything super valuable.”
“Huag was a bit unique because of people like my father. They prop up the economy in the town and also bankroll the mayor into making improvements to the city. Huag was also in a nice location, with beautiful forests nearby and very little monster activity. Plus, it’s relatively close to the Kingdom. An ideal place for rich-folk to have their second or third home.”
“So, Borson loses out because of luck? What about the people here?”
“They made the choice to stay. You can’t blame nobles for liking a different location. Besides, our world is based on luck. Take our Affinity selection. The Goddess may know who gets an Affinity, but for all of us it’s a toss-up.”
“Just makes me want to help these people out.”
“You can’t help everyone, Ren. You can only be in one place at a time and the continent is huge. Focus on what you can do for now.” Zane grabbed my shoulder as we spent the next few minutes chatting with our friends.
Gavin’s team joined us shortly after. We all started walking out of Borson in the direction of Pinslo. Gavin started to take us through the plan.
“We have ten days. We’ll need two days to return to Krader, two days to get within range of the Skink nests, and two days to return. That leaves us four days to find as many nests as possible.
“We checked yesterday, and we also took a few monster posts from the Guild, but the Skinks are our priority. Barda will be at the front of our procession. John be on the right flank, Quinn on the left flank, Tara will stick close to you, and I’ll stay behind everyone. We’ll be moving at a brisk pace, so keep up. Let’s go.”
We said nothing, as we left the town gates and started to jog.
* * * * *
“Oh, thank the Goddess,” Cassie said as she started to dry heave against a tree.
So far, the jog hadn’t been too strenuous, and had even turned into a fast walk when we reached the trees.
For Britta, Zane, Jen, and I, this wasn’t an issue. We all trained often and also had physical training. Cassie, on the other hand, didn’t have the same level of stamina.
Right now, Gavin was letting us take a quick break while the others scouted the area.
“All clear on the left,” Quinn shouted.
“Clear,” John mimicked from the right.
And Barda also came back and gave Gavin a nod.
So far, I hadn’t heard Barda speak. I didn’t know if that meant he wasn’t able, but his imposing frame made me reluctant to ask.
We had spent the majority of the day like this. We would run for a period of time, stopping sometimes to kill monsters or scout around for anything of note. Sometimes Tara would also stop the group to pick up a plant or flower that she saw. I knew nothing about herbology, but I found she was open to discussing some of what she found as we walked.
She told me how plants weren’t as potent as potions, but they could have just as many uses. In several cases, they were also an ingredient in potions themselves. For the right buyer, this meant another source of income for a Dungeoneer.
She had already used one of the plants to speed up my own healing. She even explained how some non-magical medicines could be very expensive as well, based on the rarity of the herb and the lengths needed to find them.
For monsters, we didn’t have to do anything. For whatever reason, Gavin and his team were now choosing to kill everything themselves. Meaning we had nothing to do, other than keep up.
For the most part, Gavin killed most of the monsters. He commonly used an Ice Shard ability to spear the monsters before we reached them. We mostly saw Serwolves and Monkins, but there were also a few monsters that I didn’t keep track of as the team usually didn’t need to stop when this happened.
He made it seem so easy.
As we got deeper into the forest, we noticed the number of monsters increased. When we first got into the forest, we saw very few monsters, but now we would see a new one every hour. Still a small amount, but the trend was obvious.
And so, the run continued until night came.
Once again, Gavin didn’t even ask us to keep watch. Instead, he gave each of the time slots to his team for the evening. We were reluctant to believe that it was kindness but thankful that we would get to rest.
We took out some of the food we purchased, made our own fire, and set up our tents. The evening was uneventful as we all finally got a decent night’s rest in the tent. The forest was peaceful, and the weather was good. We were fortunate that it hadn’t rained, and hoped that this would continue.
I wondered why we couldn’t have spent more time in the wagon, but Tara let us know that our driver wouldn’t go this deep into unknown or monster-infested territory.
This cycle repeated the next day where we once again spent the majority of our time quickly traversing the landscape and forest. Monsters continued to come, and Gavin’s team even needed to deal with a few Serwolf packs, but he had quickly dispatched of them with a barrage of ice shards.
The trip slowed down considerably when we finally reached a ravine going through the forest. In our research before the trip, we found out that most Skink nests were near water that flowed into large lakes.
The Pinslo Lake was the closest large body of water to Krader, and its water came from several sources. As a result, we knew the Skink nests would be easily accessible if we stayed near one of these ravines.
So, for the rest of the trip, we slowed down and started to walk directly beside the water.
Tara was the primary resource here, as her NATURE Affinity allowed her some inherent tracking abilities.
And it was Tara who noticed the first Skink nest.
She motioned for all of us to stop speaking and slow down.
Barda walked back to the group slowly as Quinn and John also joined in.
As everyone regrouped, I took a look at what Tara was pointing towards with my augmented eyesight.
And there, in the distance, it was possible to see at least one Skink currently drinking some water.
The Monster guides had not done the monster justice as I realized how…cute they looked. I couldn’t think of anything else. Their fur was short, as were their ears. They appeared to be brown, black, and white in some places, with a small fluffy tail that didn’t look longer than my thumb.
The only indication that they were monsters was an odd black sack that fell under their chin. I assumed tha
t this was its gland. The fact that it was visible meant that it was easier to harvest, but it also made it much more difficult to keep undamaged.
So far, I didn’t know how the team would harvest the monsters without damaging the gland, but I knew they probably had a plan.
Gavin said, “I’ll deal with the few that are outside the nest. John, place barriers in front of the students but make sure they can still see around them. The rest, you know what to do.”
My friends and I took out our weapons, but based on the trip so far, I knew we wouldn’t have much to do.
We all edged a bit closer before Gavin signalled for John to make the barriers. We were about fifty feet away.
Gavin started us off as he used his Skill to create a series of Ice Shards above his head. The shards were slimmer than the ones we had previously seen, but also looked very sharp.
A shard was launched at each Skink with a speed difficult to see without the use of my Energy.
The shards were aimed at the bodies of the Skinks directly, intending to kill them right away.
There were three Skinks, and each one was skewered and now stuck to the ground. One Skink had not died immediately, which meant it was now screaming for its life.
It also started to expel its gland contents all around it. From our position, we could smell the liquid and were thankful that we hadn’t been closer.
The squealing monster drew the attention of others in its nest, as they started to stream out of the hole.
From the ground came about thirty Skinks. They were all of varying sizes, but they all looked fairly the same.
By my estimates, I thought they were probably all still G-Rank.
As they came out, Barda started to draw their attention as much as possible. He held a shield in his hand, but also had a short sword at his waist.
While he took on the monsters, Tara used her Skill to snare the monsters. For the first time, I got to see how she had captured the monsters for us to fight during the ‘test’.
“Restrict!”
The Skill accelerated the growth of any grass or leaves nearby which she used to wrap around their bodies.
Afterward, Quinn went around and quickly slashed down any of the monsters that were not captured. His precision was perfect as he tried to dispatch of the monsters without damaging the gland.
Of us all, Quinn was getting hit with the liquid the most. Tara’s vines stopped them from moving but did not stop their ability to expel their liquid. Even Barda, who took the brunt of the monster’s charge, didn’t seem as affected.
John took some out with his daggers when they reached his position, but most of the thirty or so monsters were dealt with quickly by the rest of the team.
At the end, the area was littered with monster corpses, vines, and ice shards. Our group did not need to participate, since Skinks hadn’t even reached the barrier.
“That was a small nest, but good job. Students come!” Gavin yelled, as he started to walk towards the carnage.
I looked at the once-cute monsters and felt somewhat bad about how they had been treated. If not for their valuable glands, they might have been able to stay in peace.
But then I also thought of places like Borson. We were a day away, but what other towns might be closer to the waterway? If the Skinks were allowed to get stronger and more numerous, who knew what damage they might do to a town? Especially a town with no Affinity users.
We all followed Gavin’s direction as he stopped in front of one of the now-dead Skinks.
I got a closer look at its body. Its teeth were sharp, but otherwise, its four feet were padded. The fur looked thin and hard, while its face had a small snout.
“So, as you can see, the gland is directly connected to the bottom of its head. And whenever it attacks with the liquid, half of the contents are lost almost immediately. So, we’ve got twenty-six Skink bodies here. Of that, you’ll probably have five undamaged glands, at most. To harvest the Skink effectively, we will cut off its head, avoiding the gland completely. Then John and I will put ice close to the gland before we place it into the Inventory.
“Jen, you and your team will do the harvesting. You will have to be the one to let Favian know how many glands you ruin during the harvest when we get back to Krader, so be careful. Take off the head and then give everything to either John or me.”
“Why do we need to cut off the head here, sir? Wouldn’t it be better to keep the body intact?” Zane asked.
“For some monsters, yes, but the Skink continues to make liquid even after death. And although it isn’t much, we want to avoid this as much as possible. The death of the monster causes some of the liquid to be tainted. The quicker you isolate the gland from the rest of the body, the better. Let’s go, if they’re all this size, we have at least ten other nests we need to find.”
Gavin shouted out orders and his team started to wipe down their equipment. Quinn, especially, looked unhappy as Tara teased him about how much Skink liquid covered him.
We divided and started to harvest the Skinks. This was a huge part of hunting, so we did not complain as we started the grisly work.
I won’t lie, it was difficult to cut the neck of the monster without cutting the gland. They were very close together. I made a note to make sure I had a sharper knife for future hunting trips. Currently, my sword would have to do. It made me think back to Uncle Tom and his ‘sharpen’ ability. That would have been very useful.
We finished harvesting all of the Skinks. At the end, Gavin told us that we had only damaged six of the twenty-six glands in total. We were thankful it was not more, but were happy to know most were still okay.
We spent the rest of the day looking for Skink nests and harvesting. After looking for the nests, harvesting took the longest amount of time, as we were still getting used to the process.
We made camp as it got darker and went to sleep. The next couple days would have us doing the same thing.
By the end of the day, we had taken down three Skink nests and had procured a little over seventy Skink bodies.
The only thing I could think of as I drifted to sleep was Cassie’s words as she cut off the head of another Skink earlier in the day.
“I don’t know what I expected, but I definitely didn’t think they would be so cute.”
Chapter 17 – Covered
“For Goddess’ sakes, this stuff sticks onto you like you owe it money!” Quinn cried by the river as he once again tried to wash himself off.
Over the last few days, we had continued finding Skink nests. After our first day, we managed to find at least three nests daily. On the second day, we had found two very close to each other, but that had been lucky based on how far apart they were and how much time it would take to harvest.
Gavin knew it might take less time if he and his team participated, but harvesting the monsters was one of the lessons he was trying to teach us. And while the job was a bit gruesome at times, I enjoyed it. We were taking part in an actual monster hunt! Books growing up had always glamourized it, making it seem like a team would walk into a dragon’s lair, beat the dragon, then walk out with all of its gold.
Instead, what I was learning was how Dungeoneering was a job in of itself. One that offered great rewards, but those rewards were sometimes infrequent. We were unlikely to find any orbs hunting G-Rank Skinks, nor were we likely to find any other types of treasure in the hovel of a monster living in the mud.
This wasn’t even an expedition to increase their power. For Gavin and his team, who completely outranked the small furry creatures, this was just a job. One that they had likely been forced into by Gavin.
And it made me realize that I didn’t hate that. We had all been exhausted after travelling through the water and mud every day, but despite it all, we had found the occasional opportunity to laugh. Or joke around. Or even have fun.
Tara had taken to joining our little conversations, and despite my own hesitation, so had John. This involved mostly sitting around the fire
and exchanging stories and theories about Magic or Affinities, but it had been a nice change of pace.
On the second night, after getting into the tent, I even tried to use my Rank 2 Skill for the first time. It did not go well.
I barely felt anything happening as I supposed my body was increasing in weight, and as soon as I started, I noticed that my Energy was completely empty. Like when I first passed out, my Burnout was terrible, to the point of almost passing out.
At that point, I realized that I wouldn’t be able to test it out until at least the wagon, and probably even beyond that. I’d spoken about my new Skill with my friends and we all agreed that I might fall through the back of the wagon altogether if I caused my weight to increase by too much.
Because, for all I knew about the Skill, I really knew nothing at all. Sometimes I wish I had a manual that told me exactly what I could do, but I realized early on with my Rank 1 skill just how limiting that would have been.
If all I did was read a book that told me what my Skill could do, I would only try to do what was in the book. Instead, I planned to forge my own path, practice my Skill my own way, and grow into my abilities.
Throughout the rest of the trip, Gavin still had us protected behind John’s barrier. On one occasion, a Skink got over the ice barriers, but the four of us were able to quickly finish it off.
The worst part of the fight was realizing our lack of finesse in handling the monster. Without even harvesting the gland, we all knew automatically that the gland was both empty and destroyed.
And so, we made do with staying behind the barrier. One, for our overall safety, and two, because their job was literally to bring back the glands safely. Something we didn’t have the practice or finesse to pull off.
The days went on and I started to appreciate how beautiful the forest was. It was difficult to think that the forests surrounding our towns were the homes of dangerous monsters that might attack at any moment.
So far, the team had stayed closer to the waterways leading into Lake Pinslo. The outskirts had several ravines heading into the open water, where we found the majority of the nests. They were usually a few steps away from the water in an alcove they had dug out and all slept in. Some found themselves under tree root systems, while others hid themselves with mud and rock.