Path of Darkness

by A P Gore

  It looked good. Now it was time to check the ring he had obtained.

  On first impression, the ring glowed with a dark light, giving it a distinct look. When he touched it, a slightly painful current passed inside his body, like it was the ring’s way of telling him not to wear.

  Was it dark?

  Ring of Darkness

  Class: Unique

  +2 Constitution

  -1 Intelligence

  Shrouds the wearer in a dark mist, rendering others incapable of casting perception on the wearer.

  Generates a drop of Water of Darkness every ten days.

  Water of Darkness grants +20 Wisdom, +20 Constitution for 12 hours. Cooldown period of 24 hours after use. Water of Darkness can boost a darkness type creature to go into a frenzied state, increasing its attack speed and damage by 40%.

  Additional Spell Granted:

  Dark Clone: Create a dark clone of yourself that will explode, dealing 45% of your life as darkness. Clone doesn’t use any skills or effects of the user. Time: 1 hour. Cost: 200 life.

  It looked good, but Jon wasn’t sure about it. He put it on anyway.

  A dark light passed through the ring and enveloped him for a moment, then disappeared. But there was no change in his appearance. It was the same.

  He looked at his character sheet in the delta mode that showed only changes since the last time he saw it.

  Name: Jon (Level 5)

  Class: Arch Druid

  Second Class: Formationist

  Stats:

  Strength 23

  Dexterity 7

  Constitution 17

  Intelligence 4

  Wisdom 31

  Chance 2

  Charisma 2

  Health 495/495

  Stamina 320/320 (7.89/S)

  Mana 40/40 (5.16/S)

  Spirit 310/310 (14.61/S)

  Utility Class: Herbalist (Level 2)

  Stat points available: 0

  Skill points available: 3

  Experience 13200/19000

  Skills:

  Passives:

  Spirit Cycling (Level 8)

  Pain Attunement (Level 9)

  Active:

  Plant Regeneration (Level 1)

  Utility Skills:

  Perception (Level 2)

  It looked good. Finally, his life was near the 500 range. That was a huge plus from the Constitution increase. Next time he leveled, he would focus on Dexterity and Intelligence. As of now, he didn’t find any change in his Intelligence, but he didn’t like it so low. It might impact his character in the future.

  “Master.” Grimish popped his head inside. “We’ve good news, fella.” He flashed his patented yellow-toothed smile.

  Chapter 41

  Grimish stopped when he spotted Kron coming toward him, holding a bunch of smelly stems. Why was he bringing them to the master?

  “Lord, I have the stems you asked.” Kron’s chest heaved.

  “Fella, what are these? What are you planning to do with them, feed them to a cattle? We don’t even have one.” Grimish slipped his arm around Kron’s shoulders. Kron quivered—he didn’t seem to be over what happened between them last year. Not yet. If that foolish fella hadn’t tried to warn Xavier before Grimish got him, he would have left Kron alone. Since he notified Xavier of Grimish’s plans, he’d had to die. Ten times in a row, losing his two levels. If only Kron understood Grimish’s drive to see his family, he would have lived happier around here.

  In reality, Grimish didn’t have bad feelings for Kron. Actually, he thought Kron was a decent fella, consoling the players Grimish conned.

  Jon smiled brilliantly. “We’re preparing a strengthening lotion with earth elemental crystals and this herb, mirath. But we lack a few hundred herbs. So, let’s grow them.” He paused and looked Grimish up and down. “You have plenty of formation flags you conned from others, right?” A smirk appeared on his master’s handsome face.

  Bastard. “Master, we agreed—”

  Jon raised his hand. “I’m not taking them. I’m just asking you to lend them to me for 1 copper each week. Is that too much to ask? Aren’t you supposed to obey my every command?” A wicked smile appeared on that bastard’s handsome face. He was a sly man.

  If he could, Grimish would have slapped Jon’s face ten times. The bastard was using the system against him. And he’d thought he was smarter than the sly man when they made that contract.

  With no choice, he handed the flags to his master. There went his freedom and money for the next six months. And to think he’d thought it was a good thing to be close to his master. “Master, here’s your set of blank flags.” Grimish pulled out the fresh new formation flags. With their silver borders, they were exactly like the flags he had taken from Jon a few days back. At least he’d had Jon’s flags. At that time, he was the bastard in their relationship.

  An impromptu smile played on his lips as he thought about Jon’s face when he respawned.

  Jon’s eyes shove when he took the blank flags. Why did he want blank flags? As far as Grimish knew, only a high level Formationist could turn them into formation flags, and there weren’t many left in the field. Everyone wanted wards, runewords, or rituals to work with. Only Laxania used these flags to grow their crops. Thinking about it, what use did these flags have other than growing crops? They weren’t meant for battle. Even Jon, who had access to that strange Lock formation didn’t have a battle formation. He had those acid-shooting vines.

  Damn. Even the thought of them sent a shiver down Grimish’s spine.

  “Come with me,” Jon said. “I’ll show you a trick.”

  Jon walked to the corner of his land. “Mold Earth!” An area of land, nearly sixty to seventy square meters shifted like a machine had started underground and threw the deeper layer up and pulled the upper layer down. Grimish knew this method. It increased the crop yield because of some cycling science. If he had the desire to dig deep enough, even he could increase his crop yield. But he was lazy, so he stole flags instead.

  As if that wasn’t enough, Jon started planting the stems in the ground like a maniac. He zipped between the soil layers he had made and planted them at an equal distance in parallel rows. Grimish would have thrown them on the ground wherever he deemed necessary.

  “Master, did you work on a farm in real life?”

  Jon smirked. “I owned a Master Farmer title in real life, before I got into...” He sighed—a sad sigh—and halted for a moment.

  God. Jon was the real deal.

  The sector Grimish was from was divided up by specialization, and one of them was industrial planets. Those were government-owned planets, and only a few farming-related industries were allowed to set up their operations on them. On those planets, other than the huge factories, thousands of farmers and their families lived there, farming food and god knew what else. These few planets theoretically fed all 76 planets in their star system.

  So, on these planets, each farmer would get a government salary and farmland to produce a defined quota which they had to give to the government. It was a fixed quota, and those who exceeded that quota by a huge margin for ten consecutive years were eligible for the title of Master Farmer. It was a huge deal. The title came with thirty acres of private land for the Master Farmer’s own use. It was like free money raining from the sky.

  But obtaining the title wasn’t that easy. Extra quota alone wouldn’t cut it. In addition, the candidates had to pass strict social and personal behavior criteria. In reality, many farmers surpassed the quota, but they failed at the extra parameters. So, if Jon was indeed a Master Farmer in real life, it was like earning nobility in an NPC-driven city. Almost impossible.

  Then why did this man come here? And how did he end up in prison?

  “Purify!” Jon’s shout pulled him out of his thoughts. Studying his master’s handsome face, it felt like there was a lot going on behind his innocent demeanor.

  A wave of magic rushed through Jon’s hand and entered few stems.r />
  It really was magic. The stems shed their dark gray color and sprouted with vigor, something Grimish hadn’t seen in his whole game-life. A plant growing like that—it was way better than his formation flags increasing the growth rate. Now he understood why all the master’s crops were of Excellent quality.

  “Master...”

  “Hang on a sec,” Jon said. Raising his hands in the air he shouted, “Land Heal.” A wave of energy shot from his palms and enveloped the five hundred stems.

  Wow! It was marvelous to watch a garden of 500 herbs coming to life. The stems gave birth to tiny green leaves all over their length, and after thirty seconds the leaves were almost one inch long.

  Out of curiosity, Grimish kneeled in front of one stem and cast perception on it.

  Mirath Herb

  Quality: Superior

  Used for hardening nonliving surfaces. Adds 10 Durability when applied as a lotion.

  +2 Durability when applied as it is.

  Turning to his right he cast perception on the stem Jon had purified. For a moment, he couldn’t believe his eyes, so he rubbed them hard.

  The smell. It smelled like fragrant perfume, and it had twice the leaves of the other herbs. Licking his lips, he read the text again.

  Mirath Herb

  Quality: Excellent

  Used for hardening nonliving surfaces. Adds 10 Durability when applied as a lotion.

  +5 Durability when applied as a lotion.

  +2 HP to the structure it is applied to.

  Fucking crazy. It was fucking crazy. An herb that provided an HP bonus to a structure. Grimish had never seen—or even heard of—such a thing.

  Suddenly, he sensed someone moving around him. Instinctively, he pulled out his shovel and swung it.

  As expected, it hit someone before that someone completely vanished. It was an assassin, lurking in the shadows, and a high level one at that.

  Chapter 42

  Jon squinted as Grimish suddenly swung his shovel at his back. A whisper slipped through the air, and someone moved out of that position. A light footprint on the soil was left behind.

  A shiver ran through Jon’s body. Someone was there, but he couldn’t see them. Why? Was that person invisible? Or was he sneaking up on Grimish?

  Damn. Why would someone sneak up on Grimish? Did he make trouble with someone in Chinari? Or his past rivals caught him?

  “What was that?” Jon flicked his narrow eyes around for any hint of disturbance.

  Grimish scratched his knee as he scanned the air around him. “I don’t know, Master, but I think I spotted someone lurking in the shadows. Maybe an assassin on the trail of the gold. While hiring Miss Maggie, I had to flash some gold to attract her attention.”

  “Who is this Maggie”

  “She is an Associate Builder I talked about.” Grimish leaned forward. “Master, don’t tell her that people call me Weedman now a days.”

  “Aha.” Jon remembered Grimish sending a message about hiring a builder from higher level of profession. “Okay. But what is this wee...” He cut his sentence short seeing Grimish’s hardened face. God knows why people called him Weedman.

  “But why would you need to flash gold at her? Didn’t you hire her from some builder organization like the other workers?”

  Grimish’s face paled. “Actually, I hired all of them from the slums. I’m a classless player, so other areas are barred from me.” Pain lurked in his eyes before vanishing.

  Jon had seen the exact same pain in everyone’s eyes here. They lacked a class, and they were sad about it. But barring classless players’ access to town? That was audacious. How could they do that to people in this era? He would have to find a way to get these players a class or get them access to the town. He bet with enough gold he would be able to do that.

  But then why was Maggie in the slums? Didn’t slum mean an unsafe area in this game?

  Anyway, he focused his attention back on the task at hand. Tapping on Grimish’s shoulder, he attracted his attention. “Hand your flags to Kron.” He raised his chin toward Kron. “Kron, use these flags to accelerate the growth of the herbs. You should have them ready for harvest by morning. Until then, ask everyone to apply the lotion to the walls, leaving the front walls near the gate untouched.”

  “But Master,” Grimish said. “The front portion will bear the brunt of the attack. If a village has a wall, sixty percent of the monsters will target the main gate while the others disperse and target random locations.”

  Jon smirked. “Don’t worry, I’m making a special batch for them.” He bent down and started casting Purify on a bunch of plants. With Purify, he could increase the quality of the leaves and thus increase the durability of the front walls with the lotion.

  “A good plan.” A deep womanly voice spoke from behind him.

  Lifting his chin, Jon glanced over his shoulder and found Maggie standing close to him, her blue eyes watching him. She had changed her clothes, and now wore old gray shirt and black trousers that curved around her perfect figure, attracting attention from Kron and Grimish too. Jerks.

  “Master, this is Miss Maggie I talked about. She has agreed to help us in building resident for us.”

  “Miss Maggie, welcome.” He shook her hand.

  She smiled beautifully.

  “Thanks in advance for your help.” he said, tracing his fingers over a leaf, feeling its vigor.

  She blinked, staring at the herbs swaying in the east wind. Indeed, it was a beautiful view. Rays of moonlight fell on the herbs, giving them a faint blue aura. The gentle easterly breeze brought a sweet smell with it. If Kron and Grimish hadn’t been standing there, staring at Maggie like horny dogs, Jon would have considered the atmosphere romantic.

  Her gentle gaze hardened. “I spotted an assassin running away from here.”

  “You spotted one too?” Jon asked, surprised.

  Maggie sneered. “Of course. Though I’m a lifestyle player, I have keen senses, and my secondary class is Paladin, providing me enough protection from those bastards.” Her eyes jumped to Grimish and Kron who shrugged under her intense gaze.

  “I think Grimish attracted the attention of a petty thief in town. But don’t worry, he has a keen eye and can defend himself.”

  Maggie dropped to her knees and touched a purified plant. She bent down and inhaled its fragrant aroma. “This herb, is it used for perfume making?”

  “I’m not sure, but if you want, I can give you some once it’s ready for harvest. I’m sure someone would be able to make perfume out it in town.” He could do that. Perfume would suit her. Suddenly, he had the urge to smell her too. He was crazy about smells, and it had been ages since he’d smelled a woman. Thirty years, to be exact, since his wife died.

  “Thanks. I’ll take ten, if it’s not a nuance.” Her blue eyes blinked rapidly. Jon would swear to god, he could dive into those deep eyes and lose himself.

  “Of course, it’s my pleasure.” Jon tried to conjure the most charming smile he could without displaying his inner thoughts.

  System: +1 to Charisma. You surely have your way with the girls, don’t you?

  Maggie flashed him a cute smile and jumped to her feet. “I’ve laid the foundation for the workers, and with my special spell, the residence will finish by tomorrow morning. When is the beast tide coming?”

  Jon glanced at the small clock in the corner of his vision. “Twenty-two hours. I guess that gives us enough time to create the lotion and harden the walls.” With the residence and the strengthening lotion, he should have enough defense to save his village.

  “Okie dokie. I’ll head off once I finish the work.”

  Jon rose. He’d had a thought running through his mind since he met her. “Miss Maggie. I have a proposal, if you are willing to listen.”

  Chapter 43

  Deathblade swung his dagger at the traitor’s throat. Blood flowed like water from a tap, painting his dagger red. Bringing the dagger to his nose, he sniffed the sweet aroma of the blood.
No matter where he was, in the game or real life, blood smelled like a sweet cake made by his daughter. If only she was alive.

  He sighed and stared at the traitor laying in front of him. If only the traitor had handed him the book, he would have lived a long life. Now Deathblade would have to bind his soul to the little shrine he had in his villa and torture the traitor a few more times to get what he wanted.

  "Boss." Damaged Horse barged in and dropped to one knee, his clothes tattered and face covered with dirt.

  "What happened? Did you fight a demon or something?" Deathblade kicked the corpse out of his way and walked back to his throne. Being the head assassin of the Death March guild's Chinari branch had its own perks, and using the guild leased house as his own house. Too bad this town didn't sell private houses to any guilds yet, so he had to rent a small villa and make it a guild house. But it wasn't that bad. He had worked out a long lease for this villa and had a chair custom made that looked nothing less than a king's throne.

  "Boss, I found the source of the Excellent quality crop. There's a human player with a unique class that can cast spells on plants and make them grow at Excellent quality. I saw him growing a plant from a stem to Excellent quality with my own eyes. It only took him five minutes." His words skidded together.

  Deathblade chuckled. "Excellent. What level is he?" Now he just had to make that player his slave in the game, and money would rain on him. Once he gathered enough money, he would buy his position in the main guild city.

  Damaged Horse stared at the ground. "Sorry boss, but I couldn't cast perception on him."

  Deathblade launched his dagger, aiming for it to miss Damaged's right ear by an inch.

  Damaged Horse shivered as the dagger swooshed past him.

  "You are a level 22 assassin, one of the elite in this backwater disgusting town, and yet you couldn’t cast perception on him? Is he level 30+?" Deathblade shook his head in disappointment. "I can't believe it. I should have given this work to someone else. Someone more competent. The levels you’ve gathered are just useless." Anger smoldered in his chest. One simple task, and this punk failed to complete it. Insolent.