《Chronicles of the Shifter [Shapeshifter LitRPG]》 Chapter 0 Introiduction + Chapter 1 The Beginning Chronicles of the Shifter:The Forest Chapter 0 - Introduction Alrighty then. This is my Story. I have been called many names on my myriad journeys. ¡®Skinstealer¡¯, ¡®Faceless One¡¯, ¡®Furwalker¡¯, ¡®Randy¡¯, and a lot of times simply ¡®Shifty Bastard¡¯. Although my original name was nothing so pompous. My parents called me James. No last name, because ¡­ mediaeval times, you know? I was born in the then Capital of a kingdom named after some dead bigshot. I frankly can¡¯t remember all the names this piece of land had throughout my childhood. Also I can not be bothered to look it up. It was on like the sixth revolution that decade anyway. Anyway, there was a revolt of some description going on, so my parents fled to the countryside. Or rather, into the middle of bumfuck nowhere deep deep inside a forest. A forest which I have never left before this Story begins Sidenote-On the Situation: At the time of my birth the industrial revolution, as you know it, was just kicking off. Turns out intricate technology and magic don¡¯t mix well. Magic allows mages to change the laws of nature for a short period of time with the help of mana. Technology really needs those laws to stay the same. Example: A wizard wants to ignite a candle with a simple cantrip. He never bothered to learn what the spell actually does, but he knows the candle will ignite. The clock next to the candle starts melting, the spell increased the thermic energy given off by friction in the area, because of this a lot of moving parts in the clock suddenly need water-cooling to funktion. The Wizard didn¡¯t intend this, as he simply communicated his intent to the Mana and let it do the work. The consequence of this in a practical sense is that a mage working with or near tech needs to be skilled in both magic and technology to communicate clearly how he wants to achieve an effect to the mana and to know which kinds of magical effects ruin which kinds of tech. A single misstep usually means death, as most spells aren¡¯t as simple as igniting a candle and most machinery isn¡¯t as forgiving as a clock, when it catastrophically fails. The political consequence of this is that the world has erupted into tech-fanatics, conservative Wizard lords and the crackpots that want to combine both. That last one has proven to be especially deadly for anyone trying it so it isn¡¯t what you would call a well studied field. Anyway, that is broadly why the average ruler in my days had a life expectancy of a decade at most. Usually more like 2-4 years. End of Sidenote The other thing we have to talk about before we start is the System. Apparently some Worlds don¡¯t have one, which is weird to me but I am not one to judge. Now my publisher told me to breeze through this explanation as most people know the gist of this stuff. Weird but OK. So ¡­ The system. Everyone can get classes, classes can level up, leveling up can give you class perks and always give you stat points, some free to distribute, some fixed. You can renounce your class at any time, losing all the stats and class perks associated with that class. Every living animal larger than a bug starts with the [Kid] class until they reach maturity. It varies based on species, in the case of us humans it is around the 16th birthday. Also Classes can evolve. The circumstances for this vary wildly. And I mean wildly I once knew a guy with a Class based on giving misfortune to its enemies. He evolved his class only on multiples of 13. On the other hand any kind of [Cavalry] or [Rider] class can evolve to [Dragon Rider] the moment you get on a dragon''s back and survive. Most classes do multiples of ten or five or 25 though. Oh and you can have as many classes as you like, but the more you have the slower it is to level. Also I wanted to include some different perspectives in my book, so I did some research and asked around among those who were there and are still alive. Everything that isn¡¯t in first person is researched, not remembered. All those bits that aren¡¯t from my Point of View(POW) will be markeds as such Chapter 1 - The Beginning So I had a relatively normal childhood until I turned 17. That is obviously a lie, but I am not going to tell you every detail of my life. Anyway 17 was when I had to start earning my keep, as my Father had just passed away from some mysterious illness (It was stomach cancer, but no one knew that back then). My Mother had died a few years ago in the forest, she was a [Ranger]. Also at that time I finished what we used to call ¡®school¡¯ - basically just some ¡®wise man¡¯ with a [Teaching] skill and two hours of free time every day, talking to us kids about the world - so I joined the local rangers as a trainee. Gaining the [Ranger Trainee] class. I hadn¡¯t planned to be a [Ranger], I was satisfied with doing odd jobs, until I found a trade I liked, but my then Girlfriend broke up with me, because quote: ¡°You are doing nothing with your life and going nowhere.¡± I realise in hindsight she was a bitch for breaking up with me, just after my only remaining parent died, but I didn¡¯t quite get that back then. I joined the [Rangers] to show up my EX.
Congratulations! You just gained a Level in the [Ranger Trainee](lvl 1) class. You have gained the class Perk [Trainee in Training]
[Trainee in Training] As a newly minted Ranger Trainee, Skills related to the [Ranger] class will be easier to learn for you, so that you can get out there quicker and do [Ranger] things.
Agility+3=> 13
Constitution+1=> 12
Endurance+2=> 13
Willpower+1=> 11
Free Points+3=> 3
After distributing my free points my sheet looked like this:
Name: James Race: HumanUnauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. Age: 17 Years Class: [Rainger Trainee](lvl 1)
Statistics:
Strength 10
Agility 13
Constitution 11
Endurance 12
Intelligence 11
Willpower 11
Wisdom 11
Charisma 11
Free Points 0
Perks:
Personal: Class:
[Curious Child] [Trainee in Training]
In a small village the difference between guard, hunter and scout are kind of blurry. In essence we were people with bows going into the woods everyday. Best case: we come back with some fresh game. Worst case we come screaming about an attack/ large monster to rally all capable fighters in the village. One Month later:
Skills:
Archery+2=> 2
Athletics+3=> 6
Forest Movement+4=> 4
Gymnastics+4=> 6
Knives+3=> 3
Perception+6=> 11
Stealth+5=> 7
Tracking +5=> 5
Unarmed Combat+5=> 7
Training went well-ish for the most part. Turns out I am quite capable as a scout, but my aptitude for Bows and Knives was really lacking. Overall my skill growth was within accepted range, so I was allowed to go out in the Forest with the proper [Rangers]. Sidenote-On Skills: Basically Skills are just a numerical representation of how good you are at something. There aren¡¯t really milestones in skills, but they are still categorised in such terms.
0-9 Unskilled
10-19 Novice
20-29 Beginner
30-39 Apprentice
40-49 Adept
50-59 Expert
60-69 Master
70-79 Grandmaster
80-89 Sage
90-99 Savant
There are skill Ranks above 100 but those are Pipedreams for any mortal to achieve. Also after you reach Rank 70 you are probably famous for your skill so an additional name seems moot. Breaking a new tenner doesn¡¯t give any concrete advantage. Each level is progressively harder to achieve, so every rank means more than the last, but the round numbers don¡¯t carry any special importance in themselves. The exception to this is in the requirements. Some Perks/Classes/Evolutions have requirements like ¡®[Horse Riding] in the Apprentice Rank¡¯ or something like that. Now on Evolutions, Mergers, and Supplemental Skills: Skills can evolve e.g. most Knights choose to evolve their [Riding] into [Horse Riding], giving them a bonus to horses, but making them worse at riding Bulls, or Mules or Dragons (Fat chance!). Skills can also merge with one another, making a more general Skill that is much harder to level, but will give you a general instinctive knowledge of the field e.g. Someone skilled with Axes, Swords, and Daggers may Merge them into [Blades]. Someone with [Blades] could pick up a Halberd and know how to use it, because he just understands bladed weapons on an instinctive level thanks to his skill. Finally supplemental skills. They are halfway between a normal skill and an evolution. Like my [Forest Movement] Skill, they help certain actions in certain situations. In this example it helps with my [Athletics], [Gymnastics], and [Stealth] while I am in the Forest. This may sound better than an evolution, but make no mistake. Evolutions make the focus of the skill much, MUCH stronger. If I fight someone with [Boxing] on the level of my [Unarmed Combat] I may technically be better at Kicking and Grappling than her, but I will not be able to land any solid hits with my fists and she would be able to destroy me with a few good punches. Lastly you should know that Skills are a representation of knowledge and training, which goes both ways. You can gain Ranks through study, you can lose ranks through a brain injury or just the passage of time. When the example Guy with the [Blades] skill got it, he actually gained more knowledge on the subject of bladed weapons in general. Similarly the Woman with [Boxing] - assuming she evolved it from [Unarmed Combat] - actually forgot stuff about Kicking and Grapples. One thing to add on the side: Everyone has hundreds of skills at a low level. I am going to ignore those mostly. No one needs to know how good I am at cooking, swimming or arts-and-crafts. End of Sidenote. So there I was with my comrades in Arms. About to go out into the Forest, simultaneously determined and fucking terrified. But I tried to remember that I was surrounded by the best [Rangers] of the Village so I steeled myself. The first 30 minutes of our tour was a very tense kind of boring. I was on edge like crazy, but the Seniors had everything under control. Any threat was identified before I even saw it. I was actually kind of proud of the fact I was the only Trainee who occasionally got to see an animal getting taken out with my Novice [Perception]. About an hour in, it was decided that we were going to split up, one senior with one Trainee. All in all it was rather pleasant, after I got over my terror. She showed me a lot of things and tried to teach me in the field. I actually got a Rank in [Stealth] and [Perception] from it. As we were about to return my Senior apparently heard a Noise somewhere in the distance. She told me to stay put and to wait for her, while she checked it out. As the Idiot I was, I of course tried to see where she was going. We were sitting on a tree when she left and I tried to scooch forward on a branch to get a better view of what was happening. The last thing I heard was the crack of the Branch. The last thing I saw was the pile of leaves on the ground I was headed towards. The last thing I felt was the severe lack of impact as I fell through the leaves. The last thing I thought was Oh fuck everything as I realised the leaves were covering a hole which lead to a cave of utter darkness. In which I was now plummeting seemingly forever. But I didn¡¯t realise that, because apparently my mind decided to shut off as the depth of my fall became redefined. Chapter 2 - Deep down and alone Chapter 2 - Deep down and alone My Publisher has forbidden me from telling you whether or not I am writing this Story from beyond the grave, but I can tell you that I did not die in Chapter one. So¡­ what happened to me? Well, the next thing I remember is that I woke up on sand. I was wet. And cold. And EVERYTHING hurt like a motherfucker. On the bright side the System informed me of some of the recent events.
Congratulations! For surviving a fall from great heights without magical or technological aid you have gained the Perk [Feather Fall] Congratulations! For surviving almost drowning you have gained the Perk [Iron Lungs] Congratulations! For surviving almost freezing to death you gained the Perk [Flexible Insulation] Congratulations! For spending 48 hours in a dangerous Place in complete Darkness you gained the Perk [Lesser Night Vision]
[Feather Fall] You have greater control over your direction while in free fall. Your Body becomes better at distributing the energy of an impact after free fall. +5 Constitution; +3 Endurance; +2 Wisdom
[Iron Lungs] You may hold your breath for twice as long. After oxygen deprivation sets in you have twice as long before damage sets in, both temporary and permanent. +5 Endurance; +3 Constitution; +2 Strength
[Flexible Insulation] You may shift your comfortable, and survivable Temperature Zones down or up by 5 degrees. This triggers instinctively when near death. +5 Willpower; +3 Endurance; +2 Constitution
[Lesser Night Vision] You become slightly better at seeing in Darkness. This is about the level of Night Vision a Dog has.
Congratulations! For surviving three near-death-experiences in one day you gain the Perk [Hard to kill]
[Hard to kill] You are exceptionally resilient. Whenever you would die you instead start draining your Constitution at a rate determined by the severity of your condition. Once your Constitution hits 0 you die for real. Constitution lost this way is permanently gone
Okay¡­ that¡­ is a lot to take in. First I went to check my stats, as I had a suspicion about my latest Perk.
Statistics:
Strength+2=> 12
Constitution+5+3+2-4=> 17
Endurance+3+5+3=> 23
Willpower+5=> 16
Wisdom+2=> 13
Yup, there it was. I should have been dead for however long 4 points of Constitution was. That was a horrifying thought, but I didn¡¯t have time to dwell on that. I needed to move. The question was where? I started by breaking up the task. First: Get away from the deadly water. Second: Find a way to get dry and warm up. Third: Get the basic survival needs. Onto Task One then. I started to crawl because standing is stupid when you are in utter darkness and anything could trip you. After what felt like 15 minutes of crawling I hit what felt like a staircase of smooth-ish stone. Crawling up it I could hear something like a soft humming coming from the front so I crawled toward it. Some time later I saw a purple-ish glow from around a corner. Thanks to that glow I had enough light to actually see so I stood up and walked towards the light. The glow and the humming came from a gem. A gem in the hands of a skeleton. A gem in the hands of a skeleton surrounded by arrow heads. I am sure there is a great story behind this place, but at that moment I couldn¡¯t care less I had a source of light in front of me and it seemed portable. I went to grab the gem when a Message appeared.
[Uncontained, faulty Skill Gem of Karux the Mighty] is being absorbed. Please stand by as Memories and Skills and Perks are being processed. Gained Personal Perk [Magic Shmagic]
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+50=> 50
[Athletics]+15=> 21
[Gymnastics]+10=> 16
I promptly fell unconscious again. So there I was. Unconscious again, which I am sure is super healthy for me. Not that I thought about that or even had any form of medical knowledge to differentiate between unconsciousness and sleep. I am getting off track. I saw the story of a man. Karux the Mighty¡¯s POV: My parents were both mages. And they wanted to pass their passion onto me. I learned about mana and magic day in and day out since I could remember. I could not follow them for the life of me. I wasn¡¯t stupid or anything, I simply could not understand what they meant, when they said anything about ¡®feeling the mana in the air¡¯. I felt squat in the air. My parents were understanding enough about my predicament. Hurt and disappointed, but understanding non the less. They figured I¡¯d just ace the written exam into a proper mage school and then they would know how to make me feel the mana. That was until I unlocked my child perk.
[Magic Shmagic]The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. You cannot feel ambient mana. That¡¯s a fact. But if you somehow learn anyway you could use this: All magic effects produced by you are 20% more potent. Should you manage to cast a 1st Tier Spell with ambient mana the downside of this perk will be removed and the upside will be strengthened
That was it for my magical career. I could have dealt with [Rowdy Child], or [Bookish Child], hells even [Curious Child] would have been better than this. I was embarrassed. I didn¡¯t want to tell my parents about this shame, about their ¡­ our dream that had just died. I wrote down my status screen and left my home in the cloak of night. I was off to find my path. A year later I was a private in the army of some local baron. Nothing fancy, but another two months service and I was guaranteed citizenship in a town of my choosing and enough cash to start a life. One day on the battlefield my best friend was killed. Nothing spectacular, it was war. I became furious and sprinted at his killer. People told me I ran inhumanly fast. I didn¡¯t pay much attention to them. His killer managed to escape, but not without a nasty scar on his cheek and a chopped off hand. A month later I saw him again. I charged him again. He was prepared. With a quick movement of his foot a spear rose from the ground. Perfectly angled to impale me at the last second before I could reach the bastard. I wasn¡¯t having it. I had to kill this bastard. Nothing was going to stop me. The spear pierced my leather armour, but it shattered on my stomach. I couldn¡¯t explain why, but I didn¡¯t care. My friend¡¯s killer lost his head that day and I found my path. I would later realise what I had done. I had used what my parents had taught me to do, but not with ambient mana. I did it with internal mana. That still did result in the kind of splitting headache my parents described. I was finally able to be a mage. Even if it is different than expected. Two years later I had not, in fact, become a mage. I missed the fighting and the adrenaline after my enlistment had ended. On the other hand, I didn¡¯t want back into the military. So I became a Gladiator. I chose the stage-name Karux the Mighty, but soon that became my name, as people would recognise me in the streets. I did well in the arena. A lot of opponents get very confused when they find out that the ¡®exposed flank¡¯ they tried to stab was actually hard as steel and now they had overextended. That one never got old. My life was good after that. I had a ¡­ James¡¯ POV: The memory ended there I regained consciousness with a start. My face was lying directly on the stone which makes for an awful pillow. Somehow everything hurt even more than the last time I awoke. I was once again in utter darkness, but I now had an advantage. I was now a mage! An all-powerfull master over time and space. Or so I thought. Magic is not something you encounter in an isolated forest Village. Everything I knew about magic is from fairy tales and legends. Turns out the ¡®Internal¡¯-Part about my new skill was for real. I could feel a new sensation, a kind of Energy, of limitless potential. And that feeling stopped exactly at the surface of my skin. As I was now a literal expert, at manipulating said energy, I tried to test my skills by makeing my hand shine. I was promptly blinded by the supernova that was my hand. Also¡­Headache. Everything mana does has a mental cost. Think of it in terms of burning a log. Internally it is basically tinder or straw. All it needs is the command and BOOM! Fire. Ambient is like a freshly felt healthy tree. Sure it can burn, but you will need to put some effort into it to make it ignite. Lastly, trying to affect another living being directly with magic, a fireball is very much indirect, I am talking about mental compulsions and the like, that is like trying to ignite a log that someone else is actively trying to keep non-burning. Sure it can work if you use napalm and the other guy has a water pistol (by the way I love how inventive you Guys are when coming up with ways to horrifically murder one another). Anyhow no matter how difficult it is to start the fire it will always need to consume to stay burning. That is Magic eating away at your willpower while it sustains whatever you want it to do. The hotter the Flame, the higher the fuel consumption. The feeling is hard to describe, but let me try anyway. If you overtax on magic it feels like you had to solve complex mathematical equations in your head, but the stress of that process is condensed into a short amount of time. Having reminded myself of this fact that I should have considered since I have known it for all of 10 minutes, I willed specifically my Palm to glow as bright as a sunny day on ground level. That had the desired effect of giving me a flashlight while neither overwhelming my mind nor my eyes. The cave turned out to be some sort of temple or at the very least a structure built by sentient beings. Any kind of decorations were worn down by time, but right angles and the general shape of the hallway make it obvious. Also I was standing in front of a giant pile of rocks floor to ceiling. I am guessing the structure goes further in, but there was a cave in. Presumably whatever killed good old Karux was beyond the cave in as well. I have to admit I couldn¡¯t care less at the time. I just wanted to get out. Outside I found the hole I fell through. It was brighter than before so it had to have turned into daytime by now. Now I only needed a way to climb at least 100m of sheer rock transitioning into dirt at the top. I was almost despairing until I looked at my hand and got an Idea. I walked to a wall and pressed the non-glowing palm to it. I tried to pull it away, but it wouldn¡¯t budge. It worked. I could make my skin sticky. After testing that yes, my palm could hold my weight by itself, I started to climb up. I would like to have a more daring story here, but the truth is that climbing is trivial if you have chameleon hands. About as difficult as ascending a ladder. And with that I finally was above ground for the first time in probably 3 days. Escape the Cave. CHECK Now I only needed to find my way home. And survive the forest. And find something to eat. And probably find shelter ¡­ This was going to be a loooooong day. First things first. Where the fuck is the village? I know we travelled north-ish, like north-north-west. So if I can figure out the Sun and the time of day I should be able to get back. Or at least get close enough, so that I can attract a [Ranger]-Patrol. Judging by the sun it was either morning or evening. I would know more in an hour if it became lighter or darker. To pass that time without being completely useless I searched for something edible. After half an hour of very carefully searching around I found a bush full of berries that I knew weren¡¯t poisonous. Since I have been starving for three days, I immediately started shoving them in my face and uh boy, it was bliss to satiate my hunger. After having had my fill I noticed it was getting dark, which means the sun is in the west. I wasn¡¯t starving anymore and I had my directions cleared. Now I needed a concrete plan of action. The trip took about 4 hours at a pace way faster than I could manage alone, because the seniors dealt with all the dangers before they could slow the group down. So I would assume I was going to take at least twice that to return and not be eaten by something. And since travelling at night was basically suicide, I resolved myself to spending the night right here. Now that Idea may be less stupid than travelling at night, but only by being probably suicide, instead of likely suicide. With some preparation I could downgrade that to just moderately dangerous. First I needed somewhere to sleep. I decided to bury myself under leaves with only my head sticking out, which I layed in my bush of berries. I had hoped the berries would mask my scent. Next I needed something for my skin to not stick out in the bush. I tried doing it with magic, but the colour disappeared when I stopped concentrating, so no good there. I needed some way for the magical effect to become mundane, so that it would stay. After some thinking I tried shifting my intent so that my skin didn¡¯t become green, but that my skin would instantly start sweating green. That seemed to work, even if it felt disgusting. The green sweat stayed on me, and stayed green, even after I stopped maintaining focus. Anyway disguised as I was I tried to go to sleep, luckily I was exhausted and sleep came quickly. The less said about the amount of creepy crawlies I had on me when I woke up, the better. But on the bright side that little hiding trick earned me a rank in [Stealth] so you know? Silver linings and stuff. I awoke pretty much with the sun so I had a good way of telling where east is. My plan was set into motion. I would travel in the direction of the village until dusk, where upon I would find a hidey hole and a source of food. Afterwards I was going to mark any tree in the area so that [Rangers] had to notice something was weird and investigate. Of course within the hour of my departure I heard the howl of a wolf. I did the only rational thing and continued on my path, while praying to any god that would listen for the wolf to find something tasty between me and him, to distract him. The gods had other plans as it seemed. I saw the wolf not 20 minutes later, snarling ¡­ and looking directly at me. This whole experience just keeps getting better and better. Okay, so what are you to do when getting attacked by a wolf? I had no clue. On instinct I tried climbing the nearest tree to move out of its reach. That would probably have been a good Idea, if the wolf wasn¡¯t just so damn fast. Before I was even a metre up, it was already biting my leg. And I don¡¯t mean nibbling. I mean the damn thing tore of half my calf muscle. That however presented a unique opportunity. See I could still feel the mana inside my torn of piece of flesh. The feeling was rapidly diminishing, but I was certain I could give it one command. And so I did. Burn! It was quite the sight to behold. The wolfs mouth seemingly just caught on fire from the inside. It spat out my muscle and ran away. Surprisingly I didn¡¯t have that bad a headache. Apparently I can ignite myself for very cheap. Yay! The calf muscle was obviously ruined, but more important was the wound on my leg. I tried commanding it to heal but it seems that mana doesn¡¯t know what is considered healthy and what is not. Even commands like restore or close didn¡¯t do anything. So I just did the minimum. Told the blood to immediately scab over and left it at that. Now I was going back with a useless left leg. After I found a crutch of some kind. Sometimes I really hate my life.
Congratulations! For punishing an animal that was eating you, by torturing it until it spat you out you have gained the Perk [Unappetizing]
[Unappetizing] Your natural scent, taste and appearance becomes revolting to any beast that considers you a meal.
Well that would help, but it didn¡¯t make me feel any better. That made me sound like the bad guy when I was literally about to be eaten. I opened my mouth to speak for the first time in at least 4 days. ¡°Fuck!¡± that would have to be enough self-expression until I am safe. Let¡¯s not kid ourselves. You know what Adrenalin is and what it does. So do I. I didn¡¯t back then, but I sure as hell could feel it. Or rather the profound lack of its numbing goodness as it started to recede. My leg hurt. A lot. Like, a lot a lot. I could tell my leg to be numb but that was a temporary measure. And I sure as hell couldn¡¯t get any rest like this. The numbing only lasted as long as I concentrated. Welp. Can¡¯t be helped. I got on my crutch and started walking. I didn¡¯t really bother with staying quiet. If my new perk did what it promised there were only two options. Either I got out of this forest unmolested, or I was going to get killed by a beast that considered me a threat but not a meal. One was good and one couldn¡¯t be helped, so I soldered forward. Walking with a crutch is surprisingly exhausting, even at a slower pace. As Dusk set in I was not confident that I came far enough, but I couldn¡¯t go on either. It was dark and I was completely spent. Sadly the world had no intention of letting me rest because I heard a growl behind me. The Wolf was back. That Wolf. The one that just tried to kill me. And this time It didn¡¯t look hungry. Something inside me told me that this beast wasn¡¯t going to make the same mistake as last time. This time it would go for the throat. Lacking any offensive capability I did the one thing I knew from personal experience could do damage at a range. I pointed at the wolf and told the tip of my finger to shine as bright as possible. A lot of things happened at once after that. For one I immediately lost consciousness. Also my Eyes were completely fried. I even looked away and closed my eyes but it was just so damn bright. So what happened? Well basically I just told a child to go wild with a credit card in a toystore. When you tell mana to do something it does it to some degree it can understand. The first time I cast a Spell my hand briefly blinded me, because I didn¡¯t specify how bright I wanted it to be. Now telling it to go all-in was even worse. I was giving the mana permission to confiscate every tiny piece of my brainpower to shine. For a glorious instant my finger was the brightest object this whole forest had ever seen. The next one my brain decided to ¡®nope the fuck out¡¯. I really need to get my Willpower up, I was getting tired of blacking out every few hours. Chapter 3 - Human contact Chapter 3 - Human contact I awoke in a hut, not that I knew that. I couldn¡¯t see. My eyes were covered with cloth. Before I could get that off though I was interrupted by a voice to my right: ¡°You fucking Idiot, how are you alive?¡± Which was followed by someone hugging me from the same side. Judging by the Voice I had a suspicion ¡°Valeria?¡± ¡°Yes, you dolt. You fell of that tree while trying to get a better look at my behind¡± she said accusingly ¡°First of: The branch broke, I didn¡¯t slip like some Idiot¡±. ¡°Hmm. And why were you on that branch in the first place?¡± she asked. I looked down ¡­. well I moved my head downwards and replied ¡°I thought maybe I could see what you were investigating¡± She added: ¡°Like an ¡­¡± ¡°Yes, like an idiot. There I said it. Happy?¡± With some seriousness she said ¡°No, I am pretty fucking far from happy. But I am marginally more amenable now that you admitted your mistake. The next part is difficult though¡­. I am sorry. I let you down. You were under my care and I left you alone. That is not something easily forgiven which is why I offer you this: I can fix the damage you have done to yourself. The Eyes, the leg. Whatever that green gunk was. But you may not speak to anyone about this. If people ask you, then you were just beaten up and malnourished when I found you. Understand? ¡± I accepted of course. She then did some weird chanting in some foreign language and I could feel something affecting the mana in my body. ¡°Is that you, Valeria?¡± ¡°Wait. You can feel that. How?¡± ¡°Can we leave the storytelling for after I can see and walk?¡± ¡°Fair enough.¡± And so she got to work. It was very strange feeling my mana do stuff without me telling it to. Also through the mana I could feel my calf slowly reform itself. I decided to pay extra attention to that, in case I ever need to regrow muscle again. After some time she seemed finished and told me to remove my bandage. I could see perfectly fine with my eyes. Looking at Valeria I said ¡°Hey, you look a lot more pretty now that I have Eyes.¡± She gave me a hearty chuckle and answered ¡°Nice try, little boy. But that¡¯s a hard pass.¡± Welp you miss every shot you don¡¯t take. She was fairly attractive after all. Late 20s, dirty blond hair, about 1,8 metres tall and a typical build for a ranger, athletic and slim. ¡°So, how can you do magic?¡± I asked her. ¡°You know I was going to ask the exact same thing¡± she replied with a small smile ¡°Why would you think I know magic?¡± ¡°How do you think I found you? That flash of light was seen by everybody in a ten mile radius. Most people think it was some kind of silent lightning, but I know magic when I see it. When I found you, you were unconscious and your eyes were completely burned out.¡± ¡°Oh shit. Well, if anyone deserves to know.¡± So I told my rescuer the story of the last few days. ¡°[Internal Mana Manipulation] huh? Hadn¡¯t heard of that one before. So your saying that flash was you trying to scare away a wolf? Overkill, dude. But I commend the quick thinking of burning that wolf''s throat." She commented on my story. ¡°Thanks, I guess? So what now?¡± ¡°Now? Now you get some rest while I arrange for you to have some sick leave from the [Rangers]. Starting tomorrow I will be teaching you about the stuff you fell into ass backwards¡± I took that to mean our conversation was over, so I focused on something different ¡°Oh, fuck all the way off!¡± I yelled ¡°Excuse me?¡± ¡°What? No, not you, I just looked at my notifications.¡±
Congratulations! For having completed your first Patrol with [Rangers] you have gained one level in [Ranger Trainee](lvl 2)
Agility+3=> 16
Constitution+1=> 18
Endurance+2=> 25
Willpower+1=> 17
Free Points +3=> 3
I should not have told her. She has been rolling on the floor, laughing at me for 20 minutes. Everytime she seems to catch herself she looks at me, points at my face and starts up again. It is really frustrating. Although it wouldn¡¯t have stung so bad if I didn¡¯t kind of have a crush on her. Awkward. Very Awkward. Anyway after about 10 more minutes she finally regains her composure and while wiping away a tear she said: ¡°That was the most I¡¯ve laughed in a decade. Man, I forgot how much those Apprentice type classes suck ass.¡± I replied ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m not exactly thrilled either. I¡¯ve spent like 5 days surviving alone in the Forest and I didn¡¯t get didilly fuck. I mean I got more stats out of almost dying than I did out of surviving.¡± Instantly her expression fell into a frown ¡°Also kind of a bummer, cause now I remember that I am responsible for all your hardship over the last week. But seriously you should leave that Trainee shit behind. You can always get better classes, if you just follow your own path.¡± That puzzled me ¡°Aren¡¯t you a [Ranger], also if I just go around without a Class won¡¯t I be defenceless?¡±If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. That seemed to cheer her up somehow. With a slight smirk she said ¡°My situation is a bit different. As for your safety, you best be sure I will not let any serious harm come to you for the foreseeable future.¡± How was this woman suddenly a guardian angel? I asked her as much whereupon she blushed slightly and waved her hand dismissively. Very much not giving me an answer. After that she left to get us some lunch, after which she asked while I was still chewing: ¡°May I ask you a personal question?¡± ¡°May as well oh great savior.¡± ¡°Shut up, first of all! And then tell me what was your childhood perk?¡± Ah yes. The child Perk. You get it once you exit childhood based on ¡­ well¡­ your childhood mine was [Curious Child]. Yes, they were all named that way.
[Curious Child] You never could say no to a secret or something hidden. You will not run out of those any time soon.
Valeria nodded and said: ¡°Yes, that¡¯s what I thought. That one is particularly bothersome.¡± ¡°How so? I could never quite understand the description.¡± She nodded once again ¡°Mhm. The System is seldom less clear than with those perks. There is a culture far away from here where a common insult translates to ¡°May you live in interesting Times¡± you got that pretty much¡±. After I stared at her blankly for a full minute she elaborated ¡°Essentially you are drawn to stuff that is ¡°interesting¡± That is to say you won¡¯t lack opportunity for growth nor for death.¡± I again stared at her ¡°I still don¡¯t really get it.¡± ¡°Look, when we were on patrol there was a chance for you to be assigned to me, there was a chance for us to go in that direction, there was a chance for us to rest in that tree, there was a chance that the branch was going to break in the perfect way to make you fall into that cave. When - let''s call it the ¡®cosmic gambler¡¯ - when said gambler rolls the dice, then your perk makes him roll with loaded dice instead.¡± I was speechless and slack jawed at that so she continued: ¡°Everyone with this perk either dies early or becomes very powerful very fast. Actually most do the first, some do the second and a few do both.¡± After a minute of digesting that I said: ¡°This whole thing sounds like it is really bad for me.¡± ¡°Eh,you should not worry that much. You survived your first ridiculous encounter, so that raises your odds substantially. When I said die early I meant early. Besides you have me in your corner for now, that makes you about a bajillion percent better prepared. For example I can give you great advice like ¡®you should get rid of your class¡¯.¡± I mulled that over for a while: ¡°So you actually want to do what? Mentor me? To atone for your perceived sin of not babysitting me constantly? Why?¡± ¡°Wow, lots of questions. As to the central one: Yes, I think you could use a Mentor, but No, it isn¡¯t because I left you in that tree. I will explain it to you, but not in the village. Tomorrow we go out in the forest. I will explain it there.¡± I can¡¯t really explain it, not even with hindsight, but somehow she seemed trustworthy so I just trusted her.
You have chosen to remove your [Rainger Trainee] class. All associated Stats and Perks will be removed
Strength 12
Agility-6=> 10
Constitution-2=> 16
Endurance-4=> 21
Intelligence-1=> 10
Willpower-2=> 15
Wisdom-1=> 12
Charisma-1=> 10
Free Points-3=> 0
Let¡¯s hope this wasn¡¯t a huge mistake The rest of the day was spent with me eating till I was sick and then falling into a food-coma. Remember that I had been starving for 5 days. The next morning I was awoken at the crack of dawn by Valeria: ¡°Get up, butter cup! We are moving out in 30 minutes so wash up, get dressed and grab a snack for the road. Your backpack is already packed.¡± I blearily opened my eyes. It wasn¡¯t exactly pleasant to be awoken in such a manner, however last week put that into perspective. I got ready to move inside 40 minutes, which Valeria was not shy to remind me of. We moved out of the Village before most people were even awake. I made a point to remember the direction we were moving in, North-West. We travelled for an hour, give or take, until we reached a ¡­ well I wouldn¡¯t call it a clearing, but it was mostly free of vegetation. A look from Valeria confirmed my suspicion. ¡°I did this? How?¡± I asked. ¡°Light carries energy, the light you made was enough to singe every living thing in the radius. You may notice that you now lack whatever amount of stubble you grew over your week in the forest.¡± She replied. I couldn¡¯t help but scratch my, now hairless, chin at that. The next few seconds I examined the area in silence when I heard a wheezing sound. Like someone with a lung-disease after a run. When Valeria tried to continue our conversation I held up a finger to stop her, and tried to locate the sound. It is never exactly quiet in a forest, but it was still enough that I was able to locate the sound after a minute or so. It came from a pile of ash, with an awful stench. Carefully I brushed the ash away to be greeted by scared skin. Scared skin that was rising. Whatever was underneath the ash was alive, even if barely. After I freed the face of the animal I recognized it. It was the Wolf. THE Wolf. The one I basically tortured. I turned to Valeria and asked her ¡°Can you heal a Wolf?¡± She looked at it with pity and said ¡°It is in extreme pain and almost dead. It would be a greater kindness to end its misery.¡± I welled up. This wolf had been an enemy, but this was not how you treat an adversary. It was beaten, but I left it in agony. It wasn¡¯t like it had ever done anything to deserve this. On our first encounter it was hungry and on the second one it was angry. Both understandable emotions for a wolf to have. I can¡¯t really explain why, but I felt a kinship with this creature. Something I had never felt before, not even with any Girlfriend, or my parents. I had to help this creature. I had to. I almost screamed at Val: ¡°I have put this creature through unimaginable pain. Twice. The least I can do is undo the damage. Please?¡± I tried to sound as pleadingly as possible. She sighed and responded: ¡°I can¡¯t heal her when she is writhing like that. And we don¡¯t have any sedatives.¡± I panicked for a second then remembered that I could numb myself. Surely I could do the same for the wolf, which apparently was female, but I didn¡¯t realise that yet, unlike Valeria. I tried to sense the wolf''s mana with all my might, but I couldn¡¯t. I just couldn¡¯t. The guilt over this poor creature''s fate started to wash over me, when I had one last Idea. I had sensed Valeria through my mana before, maybe that process could work in reverse? I grabbed a knife from my Backpack and nicked both my finger and the flank of the wolf. I pushed both wounds together and instructed my blood to flow into her. When my blood made contact with hers I could start to feel the tiniest hint of her mana. It felt very different from mine but still recognizably mana. Now that I knew what to look for, I could feel the energy all through her body. So I took a deep breath and instilled one instruction throughout her. NUMB. I spoke out loud: ¡°She is numb, do it!¡± and closed my eyes and shut off all external stimuli to concentrate on maintaining the magical effect. I don¡¯t know how long it lasted, but after some time I felt a pat on my shoulder. I opened my eyes to see Valeria, looking at me with a warm smile. She said: ¡±It is done. She is all better now.¡± I let go of my concentrated state. The wolf didn¡¯t look scared anymore. She was in fact looking relatively healthy. Naked, but healthy. While I had the opportunity, and was still connected to her mana, I commanded the hair follicles in her skin to Grow. Valeria let out a chuckle and remarked ¡°That was very nice of you, little gentleman!¡±. That was the last thing I heard before I fell unconscious. I really have to stop doing that.
Congratulations! For falling unconscious due to overuse of Magic 3 times in a single week, you gained the Perk [Thickheaded]
[Thickheaded] You really have to stop doing this. Your mind is now more resistant to involuntarily losing consciousness. You can now reach new heights of headache before you pass out. +5 Willpower +2 Intelligence +0 Wisdom
That was just kicking me while I was down. Valeria¡¯s POV: He had to get his constant fainting under control, but otherwise the boy was perfect. Internal Mana Manipulation wasn¡¯t all that rare, most mages did that to not be completely useless in a fight, but actually having a specialised skill for it was something new. Sure, the restrictions were severe, but generalists aren¡¯t known to be at the top of their field. He even understood how to get at another¡¯s mana. Not groundbreaking in and of itself, but ridiculous considering he can¡¯t feel ambient mana. Yes, maybe she had something here. Now she just needed to form him. From a big lump of potential into a true monster. This assignment just turned from the most boring exile into a very promising resurgence. Chapter 4 - Reacquaintance Chapter 4 - Reacquaintance I awoke a few minutes later, still with a raging headache, but at least I was conscious. Weirdly the first thing I saw was the Wolf. Standing over me and growling at Valeria. ¡°What is happening?¡± I asked. ¡°Well it seems you made a new friend. This puppy hasn¡¯t been letting me come near you since you passed out¡±. That was odd. But since I was very much not feeling up to this situation I decided to check my notifications.
Skill increases:
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+1=> 51
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+1=> 1
[Lupine Anatomy]+1=> 1
What the hell was [Infectious Mana Manipulation]? I focused on that Skill to get an explanation.
[Infectious Mana Manipulation] The Ability to control the Internal Mana of another creature by infecting them with your own Mana.
That sounded pretty sinister, but I guess it was an apt description.
Congratulations! For having bonded with an animal through shared pain and recovery you have gained the Perk [Animal Companion(Wolf)]
[Animal Companion(Wolf)] You have bonded with this wolf. Both of you will be aware of each other''s location and general well being. You will have better senses while your companion will be smarter. This Perk will grow as your Bond with your Companion grows. Should you lose your companion this perk will disappear.
Yay, new friend! I actually got the sense that the wolf is healthy, but tense. Interesting.This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.
Congratulations! You have been offered the Class [Wolfman]. Requirements: -Bonded with a wolf or extremely familiar with wolves -Ability to control internal Mana at least at Beginner Rank -Ability to permanently alter your Body -Human
Strength +2
Agility +4
Constitution +5
Endurance +3
Free points +6
Well, Valeria did say that I should get a new Class. This feels like ¡®Following your own path¡¯, right? I accepted the Class.
Congratulations! You have gained the first level of [Wolfman](lvl 1)
Strength+2=> 14
Agility+4=> 14
Constitution+5=> 21
Endurance+3=> 24
Free Points+6=> 6
Congratulations! For starting on the Path of a [Wolfman] you have gained the class Perk [Shifting Warrior]
[Shifting Warrior] Increases the Force of attacks made with altered Body parts such as Claws or Horns. Also increases the durability of such Parts. This effect doubles in strength when concerning Wolf-like body parts.
I was somewhat bewildered at what the class wanted from me, until I brought my hand before my face and gave my Fingertips a command. Grow Claws. Sure enough a hard and sharp Claw started to grow out of each of my fingertips. The mental strain of this was very mild, although it did also somewhat hurt physically, about the level of pain of pricking your finger on a needle. Either my recent experiences have really helped, or I¡¯ve been a dumbass for not noticing I could permanently alter myself or my class is helping me with the strain. Then again Karux never did something like this so who is to say? Once the claws stopped growing, I stopped the effect. The claws stayed. They were now a permanent part of my body. I told them to recede and they did. Fun. As I thought about it more I actually had an Idea about the whole ¡°Ability to permanently alter your Body¡± thing. It was probably the green sweat I produced, when I tried to hide in the forest. I hadn¡¯t washed it off, when I singed myself and Valeria said she would fix it, as she fixed my eyes. That would probably mean that I had permanently altered my sweat glands to produce green and viscous gunk. Now that I write it down it doesn¡¯t feel half as cool a deduction as it did at the time. Anyway, I had a new class and I was excited. Chapter 5 - Old Friends and new Friends Chapter 5 - Old Friends and new Friends ¡°I am guessing that means you got a friend AND a class, right?¡± I heard Valerias voice to my left so I turned to her and said: ¡°Yup. Pretty sweet deal if I do say so myself.¡± ¡°That¡¯s great. Now would you please tell your buddy to ease off and stand up?¡± ¡°Oh, yeah right. Ummm¡± I didn¡¯t really know how to start with that. On a whim I laid my hand on the wolf''s fur, to get her attention. She relaxed a bit and looked at me. I tried to look reassuring and told her: ¡°It¡¯s alright. She¡¯s a friend. She isn¡¯t an enemy.¡± That seemed to do the trick. She became visibly less tense and got off me. I got up, petted her head and said: ¡°Good girl!¡± I didn¡¯t know why, but it felt right. Also she seemed to enjoy that. ¡°You two are really cute and all, but could we get going? I was kinda going to tell you an important secret, but now I feel like a third wheel.¡± ¡°Oh yeah, obviously. Please, do tell, I am all ears.¡± I stood up and turned in Valerias direction, but I still kept a hand on the wolf''s head, giving her the occasional scratch. ¡°All right. So let¡¯s start at the beginning. First of all, I am not human. I am a celestian.¡± I wasn¡¯t overly shocked the village was entirely human, but I knew there were other races of humanoid. Orcs, Elves, Goblins etc. I had not seen them, but there were pictures in some of the books we had. I had never heard of celestians but I never expected my education to be comprehensive. There were probably lots of races I didn¡¯t know about. ¡°OK, you obviously don¡¯t know what that means, since you don¡¯t appear shocked. Celestians are descendants of Angels. Really, really, really far off descendants. Like dozens of generations. However we still live for a really long time, somewhere in the thousands of years. To not go insane over that time period, we started a praxis where everyone should go into the regular world and have at least a dozen different careers. Meaning going from Apprentice to Master or just doing it for so long, that we could reasonably retire. Usually about 40 Years each. I am only 180 years old, which is very young for my people. I only had two careers before I moved to your Village and became a [Ranger]. I was a [Healer] and after that a [Baker]. Now why am I telling you all of this? I kinda hate the other [Rangers] and I don¡¯t find the Job, or the Village very enjoyable. It is frowned upon by my people to quit a Career, unless a unique opportunity presents itself for a new career. So what I am saying is that you are basically my ticket out of this dump. I can justify leaving if I have a unique opportunity to Mentor someone of great potential.¡± I stared at silence for a bit, then said: ¡°What are Angels?¡± She stared back at me for a solid minute and said: ¡°That¡¯s your only question?¡± ¡°I understood most of what you said, but I don¡¯t know what Angels are.¡± Surprisingly she grew a genuine smile and said: ¡°You know what? That is kinda fair. Yeah, so Angels. Are humanoids from a higher Plane of existence. They are agents of the gods and do their bidding on this plane, the mortal plane. I forgot how shoddy the education is in this hick town.¡± ¡°OK so what is the plan? We run away from the village hoping that my [Curious Child] Perk will get me into wacky hijinks, which I would either resolve and gain something or you save me with your ancient power. And then, after however many years, you get to say that you trained me, or that you tried to train me. As you said yourself I am destined for either greatness or an early grave. And your people will say ¡°That boy was one of Valerias¡± or ¡°Whelp you tried your best Valeria¡±. Either way you get to not be a [Ranger] anymore immediately. Did I get that right¡± She looked a bit shocked but she admitted: ¡°Yup. That¡¯s basically what I am about. It sounds kind of exploitative when you condense it like that, but yes. That is the plan. By the way, you can call me Val for short.¡± ¡°OK, Val then. I don¡¯t think it¡¯s exploitation. I do get quite the boon out of this. I mean what is a quasi-immortal personal Mentor worth? And it¡¯s not as if I really had any ties to the Village since my Father died and my Ex left me. So I am up for it. I mean who doesn¡¯t dream of reaching like level 100 and be supremely powerful. It sounds like that is what you¡¯re offering, so I am in.¡± ¡°It¡¯s really adorable that you think 100 is ¡®supremely powerful¡¯.¡± Valeria¡­ sorry, Val said, apparently not intending to explain further. ¡°But to make this clear. I want you to get into messes and to pull yourself out of them and get stronger through that. I have no intention of mothering you. I can train you, heal you after a fight, help you in a general sense, but if I have to save your life, then you have failed to live up to your potential and I am released from my Path as a Mentor. At that point I can leave and try something new.¡± That put a dampener on my mood. However at this point I was sold on the power fantasy. So I still agreed to her proposal. A simple handshake sealed my fate. And that is how my first adventuring party was formed. Val, me and an as of yet unnamed wolf. I know it sounds clishe¨¦, but looking back, that was the moment I rejected having a ¡°normal life¡±. From this point on the three of us were bound together. ¡°By the way, what is your problem with the [Rangers]? They are our protectors, which is somewhat noble and it doesn¡¯t seem much more boring than being a [Baker].¡± ¡°About that, your mum was a [Ranger] so they left you alone, but everyone else hates them. They are the only ones with any combat prowess, so they treated everyone else like servants that owe them their lives. If you ask me then the [Rangers] are as far from noble as you can get. I would bet my left arm that they¡¯d let you all die if something came along that posed an actual threat to them.¡± That was ¡­ not something I expected to hear. My mother had always framed it as a Noble service for the village. Then again, she was likely biassed about that. After this momentous conversation we heroically and dramatically ¡­ had some lunch. Remember that we came to this spot to eat and talk? Me neither, but Val insisted we shouldn¡¯t skip a meal, just because I was excited. While eating we got to talking about my new class and skills. Especially [Infectious Mana Manipulation] got her interested. ¡°Since you seem to be going in a direction of body modification, you could think about a Stinger design.¡± She told me around a mouth full of sandwich. I took a bite out of an Apple and replied: ¡°Stinger? Like a Bee? What do Bees have to do with internal Mana?¡± She sighed, shook her head and replied: ¡°You have to start thinking outside the box. It¡¯s not about a Bee, or even about poison. It is about injecting stuff offensively. If you can poke something with your stinger, or even just a hollow claw, then inject your blood into the target, your Mana gets a foothold inside the enemy. That doesn¡¯t help with overcoming the enemies resistance, but that way you can open up a second front against your opponent. A third considering your furry friend.¡± At that last part she pointed at the wolf. I was thinking along with her explanation, but at that final sentence I started thinking about the Wolf. ¡°She needs a name.¡± I said. ¡°Do you know something fitting?¡± Both females next to me cocked their heads to the side apparently in thought. I tried very hard not to grin at the simultaneous movement. Eventually Val turned her head to me and offered her suggestion: ¡°Skadi. It¡¯s the name of a goddess far to the north. A huntress in the frozen mountains.¡± I liked the name. So I knelt before the Wolf, held her head in my palms and asked her earnestly: ¡°Do you have a name?¡± She cocked her head at that. ¡°I am James.¡± I pointed at my own chest. ¡°She is Valeria.¡± I pointed at Valeria. ¡°Who are you?¡± At that I pointed at the wolf. She cocked her head again, this time to the other side. I took that as a ¡®No, I don¡¯t have a name.¡¯ I looked her in the Eyes and asked: ¡±Do you want to be Skadi?¡± At that she licked my face. Luckily the System cleared up any confusion.
Congratulations! For naming your companion while considering her opinion on the matter, your Bond has increased in Strength. Your [Animal Companion(Wolf)] has grown and changed into [Animal Companion(Skadi)]A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
[Animal Companion(Skadi)] You have bonded with Skadi. Both of you will be aware of each other''s location and general well being. You will have better senses while your companion will be smarter. The connection to Skadi allows you to send simple Emotions telepathically. This Perk will grow as your Bond with your Companion grows. Should you lose your companion this perk will disappear.
That was quite the surprise, as I immediately got a profound sense of Happy from Skadi. Hopefully that would make our conversations a bit less one sided.
Congratulations! For deepening your Bond with your companion, you have gained a level in [Wolfman](lvl 2). You have gained the class Perk [Wolfish].
Strength+2=> 16
Agility+4=> 18
Constitution+5=> 26
Endurance+3=> 27
Free Points+6=> 12
I really needed to get some of those free Points into the Mental stats.
[Wolfish] You find it easier to make your Body more Wolf-like and also to remove said changes.
That seemed interesting. I kept a hand on Skadi¡¯s head and held the other up to my face. I tried to make the Claws appear like before. It was moderately demanding. Not a lasting headache, but something requiring real focus. Not something I was capable of while fighting, or running over uneven terrain. I made them disappear again and next tried to make Wolf-like claws. Sure enough it was almost effortless. Granted they didn¡¯t look particularly sharp or pointy, but that was a rather minor fix with my skill. ¡°If this trend continues, I will be running around as a full wolf in no time.¡± I said to no one in particular ¡°Probably. Though you could do that already given an anatomical crash course and a few days of time to distribute the mental strain.¡± Val answered me ¡°For now don¡¯t do any changes below the skin and definitely no changes in your Torso. Not until you have a good understanding of how your body works and how whatever you¡¯re trying to change into works.¡± It seems the whole ¡®Mentor¡¯-Thing had already started. Still petting Skadi I looked up to Val and asked her: ¡°So what are we doing next?¡± She answered with a sly smile: ¡°You two are going to stay here while I get some stuff to test your new abilities. And this time don¡¯t move a single inch!¡± That last part felt like it had some extra force behind it somehow. Skadi felt similarly, as the both of us immediately sat down next to one another. ¡°Yes, Ma¡¯am!¡± Was all I could say at that moment. Val seemed satisfied with our obedience and disappeared. Not like ¡®left¡¯ I mean properly vanished. I hugged Skadi for comfort and tried not to get too nervous, just because I couldn¡¯t see my babysitter. I was never all that pathetic when it came to independence, but all the revelations Val had dropped, made me feel like a very small fish in a very large ocean. She was gone for a few minutes at most, before she reappeared, and this time I do mean just walked towards us. She held a large, lumpy bag in her hands and said: ¡°Now we are going to train those skills properly.¡± As she was saying that she pulled out an unmoving Rabbit and continued: ¡°You are going to form a stinger, poke these rabbits with it, inject them, wake them up with Mana and then kill them with Mana. No sleep until you get it right.¡± It was like an hour past noon. How was that gonna be a challenge? It was 2 hours past Midnight before I ¡®got it right¡¯. This stuff is hard as *Insert expletive here*. Every part of this process could go wrong. First I had to make a Stinger. I went with a Wolf-Claw, as it was the easiest to form for me, and then made it hollow and then connected it to my bloodstream, so that I could inject something. Turns out my class was helping me with the shapeshifting. Because even modifying the wolf-claws was a lot easier than modifying other forms of claws. Since [Wolfish] didn¡¯t mention anything about this kind of thing, I assumed that it was the class itself that was helping. Still, I fell at this first hurdle about a dozen times. First I made the hole too big, so the claw wasn¡¯t pointy enough to pierce skin. Then I made the hole too tiny, so the blood couldn¡¯t get through properly. Then I made the tunnel too windy, so it would take the blood too long from my finger to the tip of my claw. Then I made a reservoir in the claw, which made the claw too weak and caused it to break very easily. Then I ¡­ you get the point. I struggled for hours just to get the stinger right. In the end I went with the following design: A hole at the very tip, a tunnel connecting the hole to a reservoir along the bottom half of the claw. An opening from a vein in my finger to the tunnel, constantly filling it. And a muscle with three possible positions.
  1. Relaxed: the muscle is shutting the opening in the vein.
  2. Contracted: The muscle is pushing the vein shut, but opening the opening, making my blood pressure fill the claw up in a fraction of a second.
  3. Extended. Flexed the other way the muscle fills the cavity in the claw, pushing the blood out through the hole at the tip.
It was not an elegant, or efficient design, but it was replicable and it consistently worked. Next I had to wake the rabbit up. I didn¡¯t have any knowledge of the brain functions, so I just went with pain. I tried giving them cramps. I understood those well enough. A muscle flexing so hard that it hurts. That worked well enough after only an hour. Killing the things was the real headache. When I did this to Skadi she had given up and didn¡¯t resist anything. Anything actively resisting you is a headache and a half. And then you have to tell mana, that isn¡¯t yours, to do stuff on top of that. It was mental torture. I wasn¡¯t even allowed to put points into willpower to ease my suffering. But after 13 hours of exercise I finally did it. The claw was routine at this point and waking the thing up was getting familiar as well. When I had all the pieces in play for the umpthenth time in a row I told the rabbits heart to stop and focused all my rage and frustration on making sure the heart stayed frozen. After several heartbeats of my own I finally felt the opposition to my efforts waver and then drop entirely. Since I now was in complete control I wanted to make sure, so I told the Rabbit to burn, while throwing it to the side. I looked pleadingly towards Valeria, to which she relented: ¡°A bit over dramatic at the end, but I suppose that¡¯s fair considering your day so far. You may go to¡­¡± And that was as much as I heard, before I fell into the blissful oblivion of sleep. Not unconsciousness, proper sleep. About 6 hours later: I awoke to someone strangling me. As in, the first thing I felt were hands closing around my throat. The next thing was that I couldn¡¯t see due to a blindfold of some sort. And the one after that was that I couldn¡¯t breathe. Obviously I panicked, but I was too close to death too many times for me to freeze up right now. First I sent a thought of DANGER to Skadi. Then I let the Instincts of my class guide me, as I let my arms and legs go completely lupine, including claws. Then I dug my claws into the arms that were strangling me, while frantically kicking and scratching with my legs. At that moment I heard Skadi growl to my left and then jump. Next I dug in my claws deeper into the arms of my assailant, commanding them to grow pointier, longer and more curvy. Finally I commanded my claws to heat up and my fingers to grow numb. That seemed to do the trick. The hands released me and the figure went away from my striking range. Immediately I tore off my blindfold and got a good look at my assailant. She was a pretty Redhead. About 1,8 metres tall and with an athletic build. The smouldering holes in her forearms reminded me to drop the heat and numbness from my fingers and claws. I tried to get up for round two, but wolf legs aren¡¯t the most stable platform, when you¡¯re used to the human variety. I struggled to get up for a few moments, before I reverted my legs. Finally standing I tried to wait for her to make a move while watching out for any signs of spellcasting or allies in the underbrush. After a few heartbeats I noticed that Skadi was calmly lying next to me. That puzzled me, until I heard Vals voice come from the stranger: ¡°Don¡¯t blame her, I explained it to her beforehand. I must say, I am disappointed that you didn¡¯t use your infectious Mana, but those heated Claws were a pretty good idea. Also I did warn you about changing your limbs too much without proper knowledge.¡± I stared at her with a slack jaw. ¡°What in the entire fuck, Val?¡± ¡°Well my little trainee, I wanted to check how prepared you were for a nighttime assault. And your general combat reflexes as well. You did pretty well. Again, next time try infecting your Assailant if you have your claws in them anyway, but otherwise well done. Oh and the appearance is just an illusion spell.¡± At that last part she changed back to the way I knew her. Intellectually I could understand her, but on a personal level I was not in a headspace, where I wanted to deal with all of this. So I decided to just ignore Val and go have breakfast. Looking at the ambient light I gathered that it was just about Dawn. After a good meal and a bit of a calm down I decided to check my notifications.
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+1=> 52
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+4=> 5
[Leporine Anatomy]+3=> 3
[Shapeshifting]+2=> 2
I focused on the new ones
[Leporine Anatomy] Knowledge of the internal workings of Rabbit-like Creatures
[Shapeshifting] The Ability to make permanent alterations to your Body. Supplemental Skill for [Internal Mana Manipulation]
The Bunny one was likely not going to do much for me, but that [Shapeshifting] Skill seemed useful. I mean it is kinda putting a hat on a hat, but a boost is still a boost Chapter 6 - Training Time Chapter 6 - Training Time ¡°So, got some skill increases?¡± I heard Val ask. I looked up confused, still with a mouth full of fruit, to which she responded: ¡°There is a certain look people get, when they look at System messages. Sort of half-Cross Eyed.¡± That made some sense. I told her of my Skill growth and my thoughts about them. She seemed to think about that for a few seconds before she responded: ¡°Don¡¯t underestimate the Anatomy Skills. Your lack of knowledge in that Area is what prevents you from truly unlocking your Potential.¡± At my quizzical look she continued: ¡°You already have the ability to completely change your body. Now you just need to know what you¡¯re changing, what you want to change into, and for safety reasons how to change back. Eyes like an eagle, Claws of a Tiger, Skin like a Rhino, Venom like a Cobra. And that¡¯s just the mundane animals. In your case Knowledge is Power, quite literally.¡± I was somewhat stunned by that, my head started to fill up with Ideas, but Val carried on: ¡°In fact I am going to include Anatomy into your education.¡± She pulled out some paper and a piece of charcoal to write with. After a few scribbles she said: ¡°Here is the plan for the next few days: Wake up around 6am. 1 hour of Breakfast until 7am 2 hours of sparring until 9 am 2 hours of theoretical Anatomy until 11 am 1 hour of rest until noon 1 hour of Lunch until 1pm 1 hours practical Anatomy until 2 pm 4 hours hunting until 6 pm 1 hour of Dinner until 7 pm 2 hours of specialised training until 9 pm 2 hours of general education until 11 pm Rest until morning¡± ¡°So I get one whole hour of free time a day?¡± ¡°No, you get up to five. It is on you, how much you hunt. But Lunch today will be the last time I feed you. All you get from me, from then on, is Bread and Water. If you want to eat properly, you will have to hunt, scavenge or gather.¡± ¡°Allright, so what is ¡®specialised training¡¯?¡± ¡°Oh, stuff like what we did yesterday. Something to specifically train your unique style/ work with your unique abilities.¡± ¡°OK, and what is ¡®practical Anatomy¡¯?¡± ¡°That¡¯s easy. Cutting into stuff and really seeing what is where.¡± That seemed somewhat gruesome, but I guess you can¡¯t really learn about Anatomy without seeing inside of a body. Besides, if I have to hunt my own meals, I might as well learn some butchery. Now I don¡¯t want you to think too badly of my younger self. I was naive and way too trusting, that is true, but I wasn¡¯t an idiot. I believed Val that she was not a sadist, and that she wanted me to grow as fast as possible. But I could also recognise patterns, such as in Val¡¯s teaching style. That is why I had already formed my claws with stingers inside my pant-pockets, when I asked her: ¡°So when is the sparring going to start?¡± She barely got out the ¡®N¡¯ of the word ¡®Now¡¯ before I was rushing at her with claws raised. The smugness on her face didn¡¯t inspire confidence in me, but I had a plan set out for a two pronged attack. I raised my right hand higher as if to strike, while really trying to get her with my left. Additionally I shot blood out of my feinting hand and aimed it right at her eyes. She blocked the blood with one arm, but that was enough of a distraction to get her in the flank with my left. I injected my blood, but before that I told the blood on her Arm to burn. The blood in her flank I used to tell everything around it to stop. I had no real knowledge on anatomy, but I figured that blood needed to flow, so stopping it from doing that seemed effective. The last part of my masterplan was the retreat by jumping backwards and out of her range with all the strength in my legs. This sort of worked. Don¡¯t get me wrong, the jump was well enough executed, however my claws were still in Val¡¯s side. And curved claws don¡¯t really want to let go that easily. Compounding the Issue is the fact that Vals skin was more like leather in its toughness. So on the bright side I did some real damage to Val, on the other hand I landed flat on my face because I got spun around by my stuck claws during the jump. And also said claws weren¡¯t stuck anymore, they broke off in Valerias skin. That hurt. Like a motherfucker. So after my brilliant manoeuvre I lay flat on the forest floor cradling my left hand, which bled profusely. Success? White hot pain is quite disorientating. So much so that I automatically dropped all of the magical effects I was maintaining before. However I still managed to hear Val say: ¡°Don¡¯t numb yourself!¡± I managed to scream out a ¡°WHY?¡± in response. ¡°Because you need to endure it. Body modification always hurts. And on the path you are headed down, you need to be able to shrug off any pain. The earlier you start the better. When you fight with just your body, Pain needs to be an ally.¡± I didn¡¯t quite get the philosophy behind that, but I found a different kind of wisdom in that. If I fix it it will also stop hurting, so don¡¯t just ignore it. I know that wasn¡¯t exactly her reasoning, but it worked for me, so I got to it. I couldn¡¯t just hand the problem over to my class given intuition. There were no wolf-parts to undo, so I couldn¡¯t get back to normal that way. After trying and failing to manually reconstruct my fingertips I got an Idea. My class couldn¡¯t help with undoing something that wasn¡¯t there anymore, but surely it could help with making something new. So instead of healing my human hand, I regrew my wolf-claws. Sure they didn¡¯t have the stinger, but I didn¡¯t care about that right now. After regrowing the claws I undid them and was swiftly back to normal, albeit with some phantom pain lingering. After I was finished and stopped shaking from the pain, Valeria sat down next to me and put a hand on my shoulder. ¡°You know, ending aside, that was an excellent attack. Two pronged, you seized the initiative, used a faint, a distraction and the abilities we worked on yesterday. I really am proud.¡± ¡°Thanks!¡± I said, but I didn¡¯t feel it. I failed, even with all the advantages I ended up wounded and on my face. ¡°If you can continue being that creative in combat, you would be a terrifying opponent. For example: If you had made your claws detachable or with an intended breaking point, you would have had me at a real disadvantage. If they had been heated as well I would have to concede right there to prevent serious injury.¡± ¡°Maybe we could try that for ¡®specialised practice¡¯ this evening?¡± I asked with more confidence, but still not at a hundred percent. ¡°That¡¯s the spirit!¡± Val cheered while giving me a side-hug. Skadi also came to cuddle, which I gladly obliged. ¡°Now then, I¡¯ll give you 5 more minutes, then it¡¯s back at it.¡± Val ordered. ¡°Yes Ma¡¯am!¡± I answered, mood thoroughly restored. The rest of sparring was less eventful. Val explained some things about combat, and then we drilled them until I had them internalised. It wasn¡¯t dull by any means, but it was repetitive, so I¡¯ll skip it for now. Actually I¡¯ll do the same for the rest of the week. Save you the repetitive stuff with one sentence and only talk about the interesting bits. Next on the agenda was ¡®theoretical anatomy¡¯. Not much to say about that honestly, she just taught me which organs exist where in the human body, and what they do. I felt I had a good-ish grasp on the basics by the end. Skadi was also listening in, but I don¡¯t know how much she understood. Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. The rest period I chose to spend with Skadi. I taught her how to fetch inside 5 minutes (that Intelligence is really noticeable), then we spent the rest of the time playing. Lunch was next. I noticed half way through, that I didn¡¯t feel nearly as hungry as all the other meals I had over the last days. I said as much to Val, to which she responded: ¡°When you shapeshift you use the resources of your body. The material for those claws, and the blood you use, needs to come from somewhere. You are not conjuring keratin out of mana. You are instructing, and helping your body to build it. Since you only made two sets of claws since your last meal, your not as hungry, as the other times.¡± She starred in the distance for a moment and continued: ¡°Actually, in the middle- to long-term we should look into shapeshifting into and out of nonorganic material. If you could use metals, that would be awesome.¡± That did indeed sound awesome. I daydreamed about having blades for arms, at a moment''s notice, until lunch was over. ¡®Practical Anatomy¡¯ was a bit disgusting, but extremely educational. We cut up rabbit carcasses and looked inside them. Not only because I got to see how a lot of organs actually looked like, but because I made all the incisions myself, so Val also taught me a bit about butchery. Skadi was also very interested in this subject, but I think she just wanted the carcasses to eat. Hunting was next. Val told me that I was on my own for this one. I tried to do my hunting ambush predator style. I made my skin brown like the local trees, and hung around on a tree, looking for prey. When I saw something in range I climbed down with sticky hands as quietly as I could, then I jumped from the tree onto the animal with claws at the ready. After 3,5 hours I managed to catch something while falling on my face. That is, I fell onto a rabbit and killed it that way. I still thought my Idea was sound, but the execution was going to need a lot more practice. Rolling out of a fall for one thing. Dinner was some roasted rabbit, with bread and water. Not the worst, but it wasn¡¯t a feast either. ¡®Specialised training¡¯ was as I suggested in the morning. I managed to get the break-off claws right by the end, however break-off-claws with stingers were still beyond me. My attempts were just too fragile right now. Lastly ¡®General education¡¯ was just that. She taught me about stuff that the village wise man neglected to mention. In fact a lot of the information in the sidenotes are from those sessions. Speaking of: Sidenote - On Stats: So¡­ the Stats. Strength, Agility, Constitution, Endurance, Intelligence, Willpower, Wisdom, Charisma. Strength and Agility are self explanatory I think. Although it should be said that both Strength and Agility are based on size. A bear with 50 Strength is stronger than a bunny with 50 Strength. A bunny with 50 Agility however is way faster than a bear with the same stats. Constitution is your general hardiness. How easily you fight off diseases, how resistant you are to most poisons, how easily you deal with physical damage. At really high levels it can get to the point where bones become harder than steel and your skin becomes impossible to pierce with mundane weapons. That was why Vals skin was so difficult to cut this morning. Endurance measures your stamina. How long and how much you can exert yourself before going tired. Onto the Mental ones. Intelligence can be understood as the processing power of the brain. High Intelligence doesn¡¯t make you smarter, but you can solve complex equations in your head, or figure out logic puzzles quickly. It is an important stat for mages, as getting mana to produce a specific effect means that you have to give it very specific, and often context sensitive, instructions. Intelligence probably has the least physical combat potential, although at higher levels Intelligence lets you calculate trajectories to dodge more efficiently. Although that is a function of Agility and [Perception] as well Willpower measures your resistance foreign mana manipulation. When I use [Infectious Mana Manipulation], my target uses their Willpower to resist me. The same is true for Mental magic and the like. Willpower also determines how easily you handle pain. That is not to say how much pain you feel. Willpower increases your ability to grit your teeth through stuff, mostly pain. It also improves your defences against magic and your ability to not be distracted and to focus. The only thing that can make you last longer in a torture setting, for example, is experience and personality. Willpower makes you able to function with pain, it doesn¡¯t make it easier to bear. Wisdom improves your senses and memory. Not that flashy, but universally useful. Lastly, Charisma. It is a measure of your ¡®Force of personality¡¯. How willing others are to listen to you just based on the ¡®Vibe¡¯ you give off. For example, the [Negotiation] Skill determines how good you are at haggling someone down/up. Charisma measures how good you need to be to get the price you want. Charisma is relevant for combat in terms of intimidation and taunting and stuff. There are also ways of casting spells through charisma. It¡¯s an oversimplification, but essentially it is convincing mana rather than commanding it. Although at this point in the story Val didn¡¯t talk a lot about this style of casting so neither did I know much about it. End of Sidenote. The last part of the teaching segment was spent discussing my Class and Stats. My Class gave me good physical stats and no mental ones. So to make sure I didn¡¯t develop unbalanced, Val decided that I should put two free points into Willpower and Wisdom, and one each into Intelligence, and Charisma. So my stats ended up like this:
Statistics:
Strength 16
Agility 18
Constitution 26
Endurance 27
Intelligence+2=> 14
Willpower+4=> 24
Wisdom+4=> 16
Charisma+2=> 12
Free Points-12=> 0
That was pretty much how the next five days went by. It was gruelling training for me. But It did pay off in some regards.
[Athletics]+3=> 24
[Forest Movement]+2=> 6
[Gymnastics]+5=> 21
[Human Anatomy]+4=> 4
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+10=> 15
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+3=> 55
[Leporine Anatomy]+10=> 13
[Lupine Anatomy]+6=> 7
[Perception]+4=> 16
[Shapeshifting]+8=> 10
[Stealth]+5=> 14
[Tracking]+6=> 11
[Unarmed Combat]+15=> 22
Not to forget the levels.
Congratulations! For hunting on your own to feed yourself in the forest, you have gained three levels in [Wolfman](lvl 5). At level five you have gained the class Perk [Prepared Form]
Strength+2+2+2=> 22
Agility+4+4+4=> 30
Constitution+5+5+5=> 41
Endurance+3+3+3=> 36
Intelligence+1+1+1=> 17
Willpower+2+2+2=> 30
Wisdom+2+2+2=> 22
Charisma+1+1+1=> 15
Free points+6-6+6-6+6-6=> 0
I didn¡¯t bother changing the stat distribution I agreed on with Val.
[Prepared Form] You may have a Form you currently inhabit saved. At any time you can shapeshift into a saved Form without active concentration. Mental strain still occurs. Wounds are not affected by this skill. You may have one Form saved for every ten points in Wisdom you have. (Currently 0/2 Forms)
I immediately knew what forms I was going to save. First is my normal body. Just in case I mess something up. The other would be me, with sharp claws with a stinger, and that can be saveley and consciously detached. I managed those after five days of training. They were a bitch to get working, however they were also the crowning achievement of my shapeshifting training. Chapter 7 - Return Chapter 7 - Return On the sixth day of Training I got to finish early with the sparring. It was the second time I made Val yield. Obviously she wasn¡¯t using any Spells and I didn¡¯t even know if she was physically going all out, but I still felt pretty damn proud. While we were cooling off Val spoke to me: ¡°We need to talk about [Human Anatomy].¡± I raised an Eyebrow at that. She continued: ¡°You can only learn so much in theory. We need to cut up a person, if we are to get your knowledge to a usable point.¡± ¡°So what? Are we going to rob a graveyard?¡± ¡°Well that would be a start, but those are already decayed. A fresh body would be better. Ideally an alive one.¡± ¡°So we are kidnapping and torturing People now? I mean there were some dicks in the Village but none of them deserve that. Right?¡± Val gave me a handwiggle and an: ¡°Ehhhh. There are some real pieces of shit back there. But I was actually thinking I keep someone comatosed and alive, while you cut them open. We can also do it with them conscious. I don¡¯t really care.¡± That was a side of Val I hadn¡¯t seen so far. ¡°Does life mean so little?¡± ¡°Kind of. The world runs on the rule of the strong. If you can¡¯t defend yourself, you better not draw attention. That is the reality of¡­ well, reality.¡± She took a big drink of water, which gave me the opportunity to place my jaw firmly on the ground. ¡°Look. There are Benevolent kingdoms and stuff, if you want to go in that direction. But the truth of the matter is that protection for the weak is a gift from the strong, not a right. In my estimation you could beat every person in your village, except maybe a [Ranger] that gets the drop on you. That means if you can get in, grab someone and get out, then there is no moral guideline against it. The morals you were taught make sense in a small community with roughly equal power levels. It becomes irrelevant where we are heading.¡± ¡°OK, I do not want to engage with that amount of nihilism this early in the morning. How about a compromise. We go in and look for the most recently deceased body. We grab that one without anyone knowing. Sounds good?¡± Val muttered something that sounded like ¡°Knows the word nihilism for three days¡­¡± I didn¡¯t get the last part. Then she sighed and agreed with my proposal. So the next day we were going back to my home. The next day: We decided to set off right after Breakfast. I shared the leftover Deer with Skadi. I considered adding a few berries I had found, but I wasn¡¯t really in the mood for those. In fact I had been interested almost solely in meat for the last few days. Maybe the Bond with Skadi was influencing me. Or maybe eating something that you killed, butchered and cooked yourself was just immensely satisfying. Anyway, after eating we set off. The trek to the Village was going to take about 4 hours, so we should be there at noon. After about 2,5 hours of travel I stopped, because I heard something. The forest was never silent, but this sounded very distinctly of a woman screaming. A human woman. ¡°Did you hear that?¡± I asked Valeria. ¡°Yeah, something is going on there.¡± She responded. Then I heard another scream. Male this time, but still very much human. ¡°We should speed up.¡± I suggested. ¡°I agree,¡± Val agreed ¡°Go half again your current speed. I¡¯ll scout ahead.¡± I did as I was told. Maybe even a bit faster. After half an hour I started to smell smoke and the screams weren¡¯t abating. I sped up even more. I was just over the edge of what I would consider a full run. With my stats that meant I was moving pretty damn fast. It was not long after that, when I saw the plumes of smoke above the village. It was being torched. At this point I was moving at a dead sprint. I was barely able to stop in time when I saw the [Rangers] at the front gate. They were letting in a horde of small green-ish, humanoid creatures with long, ugly nails, almost like claws. Goblins. I told you before, that I was not overly attached to my home. By that I mean I wouldn¡¯t mind running away and seeing the world. Not seeing them burned alive and kidnapped by goblins. I didn¡¯t know what to do. I couldn¡¯t fight all of them. I had that much rationality left. So I decided to do the smart thing. Look for survivors. Get a headcount of the enemy. Look for an advantage.Stolen story; please report. The first of those was a dud. All the buildings were either rubble or aflame. If there were survivors, they had fled into the forest. The headcount also wasn¡¯t easy, but I could gather there were about 20-30 goblins and 5 or 6 [Rangers]. Those were apparently overseeing the whole effort. Last point was to find an advantage. Honestly I struggled with this one, until I realised that these goblins seemed to be extremely unobservant and unorganised. They were smashing stuff apart and setting things on fire with glee, but only the ones supervised directly by a [Ranger] were tying up and carrying people. That gave me an Idea. If I could find a group without a [Ranger], I could probably take them out pretty quickly. Maybe I could thin them out. Val was nowhere to be seen and Skadi wouldn¡¯t be of much help, if I had to climb the palisades first. I told Skadi to make sure the area was clear, so that I would have a safe area to retreat into, behind the wall. So I climbed over the wall and started my hunt. There was a group of three goblins nearby. They were each smashing up some furniture like a child destroying a sandcastle. I tried to lure one away by throwing a stone near it, but it either didn¡¯t notice or it didn¡¯t care. So I decided to use my hunting strategy. I climbed up the wall with sticky hands and when I was near the goblins, and they weren¡¯t looking at each other, I pushed off the palisade and dove for one of the goblins, claws outstretched. A goblin has the stature of an eleven year old human, so I easily knocked it over, my claws lodged in its chest. The stunt wasn¡¯t quiet, but looting a village is pretty loud by itself, so the other two didn¡¯t hear us. I finished the creature under me with a swipe across its neck and moved on to my next victim. The other two fell easily. They were neither armoured nor aware of me, so I could easily muffle them with my offhand and slit their throats. After I was done I climbed back onto and then over the wall. I held myself at the top, because I wanted to see if anyone was going to notice that goblins were missing. After A few minutes a [Ranger] actually came to investigate. I saw a massive chance in that. When he knelt down to check on the corpses, I climbed back over the wall and lunged at him. He was probably a higher level than me and had a similar build, but he was also unprepared and had his back turned to me. I attack-hugged him to the ground and executed my plan. I held his face in the ground with all my might, while injecting his neck with my claws. Once I felt his mana I gave my all into making him sleep. With 22 Strength it isn¡¯t hard to carry an adult human. It was a struggle to do it one-handed, but it was possible. I carried the [Ranger] over the palisade and down to the ground. Once on firm soil I put the ranger on my shoulders and sprinted off into the forest, Skadi just behind me, watching our backs. After a ten minute sprint I laid the [Ranger] on the ground. Valeria¡¯s POV: She was floating above the burning village, looking at the facsimile of goblins that were ravaging said village. Dungenborn creatures can be somewhat intelligent, but these creatures were barely even capable of walking in a straight line. She had known Goblins. Real Goblins. Fiercely intelligent, whitty, competitive, capable of making incredible contraptions from just a few twigs. These things were not goblins. However disgusted she felt at sight of these creatures, she did enjoy seeing James killing them a bit more. Actually she had to chuckle a bit, because his fighting style reminded her of the terrible Drop-Bears. Fierce little buggers. Anyway, James had cleaned up a small group and was now retreating to look for the next vulnerable target. Good for him. He was internalising the mindset of a predator quite nicely. She had a few targets picked out and was considering giving him a hint, when he didn¡¯t actually move. What was he doing? There wasn¡¯t anything to do within his reach. Was it the [Ranger]? Did James think his sight was based on movement? Strange. No, wait! He attacked the [Ranger]. Smart way to do it too. Now he was carrying him. He wasn¡¯t dead, just sleeping. Valeria was impressed. Taking a hostage in this situation was a great move. He was seriously performing beyond her expectations right now. The raid was supposed to teach a different lesson, but that could be postponed for now. Now she just had to make up a proper excuse for why she had disappeared. She had hoped to say something along the lines of ¡°I had to prevent the others from coming after you¡± but that was moot. He was actually stealthier than she had expected. Actually, maybe she didn¡¯t even have to lie. It would be a delicate balance, but maybe she could put him on a collision course with greatness a lot earlier than she had predicted. Now she only needed to hope that he got angry enough during interrogation. James¡¯s POV: I glued my hand over his mouth and stuck him with my claws. Then I gave him a leg cramp ¡­ I could feel the scream more than I could hear it. ¡°Good, you are awake. You are going to answer my questions, or I will make you experience new levels of pain. Understood?¡± I removed my hand from his mouth, but I kept my claws in him. ¡°James? Is that you?¡± He asked somewhat bewildered. I muffled him again and gave him a cramp in his left bicep. ¡°That was not an answer to my question.¡± After he stopped screaming I removed my hand again. ¡°Yes! I understand!¡± ¡°Good, then tell me. Why are you helping the goblins kidnap people and destroy our home?¡± ¡°We found a dungeon on patrol. There is a mage of some kind inside. He forced us to help him. He controls the goblins somehow. He needs sacrifices for some ritual he is preparing. Please James, he had us at his mercy. He would have killed us all.¡± The [Ranger] - I think his name was Thomas - started sobbing at the last sentence. I can¡¯t say that I didn¡¯t understand his position, but I also didn¡¯t quite buy his story. Also the [Rangers] were the ones who were supposed to defend the village. They have, or rather had, a duty to protect the common people, with their lives as necessary. So no, I couldn¡¯t excuse him. In fact I got rather angry at him. In basic training they hammered into us again and again that we should be prepared to lay down our lives for those who can¡¯t defend themselves. That was what my mother had always told me. That was what my father had admired about her. That was how she died. And now this asshole is trying to wiggle out of his duty? Betray the people he swore to protect? That would not go unpunished. I got a few more details out of him, like where the dungeon was - two days travel from the Village - and how long until the ritual is finished - 25 days. Afterwards I put him to sleep. I was petting Skadi while thinking of a plan of attack for the dungeon. There wasn¡¯t an obvious way for me to get the people of the village back, but one thing was absolutely clear in my mind. I will kill that Mage and the [Rangers] or die trying. From the distance, yet somehow from within my head I heard a voice say: ¡°Oh, no!¡±
Congratulations! For swearing vengeance upon those that have betrayed your people you have gained the personal Perk [Oath of Vengeance].
[Oath of Vengeance] While working towards the target of your Vengeance, you will require only half as much food, water and rest. Should you succeed on your quest, this Perk will evolve. Should you fail to deliver your vengeance within 25 days, this Perk will become negative.
¡°Goddamn! Shitballs! Asshole! Cuntbugger!¡± There was that voice again. ¡°You! With me! Right! Now!¡± I didn¡¯t have time to process that, before everything turned white. Chapter 8 - Meeting Chapter 8 - Meeting I came to in a white ¡­ it wasn¡¯t really a room. More like everything was just white. There was a figure in front of me. I didn¡¯t know it back then, but he looked like a ken doll. No clothes - also no private parts - a static smile on his face. Even when he(?) started talking the face didn¡¯t change, the mouth just mechanically opened and closed. ¡°Hello you annoying piece of shit. I don¡¯t have time for your questions so let me be blunt. You are on a path that would ruin my plans for this century. I am willing to offer you a deal. You get a ¡­ let¡¯s call it a handicap. In the form of a Perk. This would ensure you don¡¯t interfere with my plans too much. Actually you could be an interesting addition to them, but we will see. In return you get another Perk, which will give you a boon roughly at the same power level as your handicap.¡± I went to scratch my head, but that felt weird, because I didn¡¯t have any hair here. In the end I just crossed my arms ¡°Why should I? No offence buddy, but I don¡¯t see how this trade is in my interest. You said yourself that it would equal out. Can¡¯t you offer me something better in return? Or just some details on this ¡®handicap¡¯ would be nice.¡± He(the voice was definitely male) sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. That looked really weird. He didn¡¯t close his eyes during. After a few moments in this pose he removed his hand from his face and started to count on his fingers ¡°First: Fuck you, for demanding I give you stuff. Second: I am trying to be nice here. I have been told that I should try conflict resolution before I send people after you.¡± He took a few deep breaths. Or he made the sounds of deep breathing. Chest didn¡¯t rise or anything. ¡°You are currently making my plans for non-violent resolution seem rather foolish.¡± I don¡¯t know why I didn¡¯t feel any fear of him, but I couldn¡¯t help but satisfy my curiosity: ¡°How do you send people after someone? Do you have assassins at your beck and call?¡± He stared into my eyes for a solid minute, until he spoke with a lot less anger: ¡°You know what, kid? I kind of like how you have no sense of self preservation. It¡¯s refreshing. To answer your question: I ¡®send people¡¯ by pulling them up here and giving them a quest and promising them some perk for their troubles. That¡¯s what I would have done for you, but again, trying to be less violent here. So? Deal?¡± Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. He stared at me expectantly. I still didn¡¯t feel any fear, or really anything. Just cold hard reason without any emotion. In that state I asked what seemed to me to be the obvious solution. ¡°Can¡¯t you just tell me what to avoid instead?¡± ¡°I like how you think, but no. Not since you have that Oath. If you go into that dungeon there is a 40% chance you come out alive. If you come out alive you will be set to disrupt my plans substantially. Believe me the Perk idea is the best solution for the both of us. If you are smart you could even turn the handicap into sort of an advantage. Anyway, no more questions. Yes, or no?¡± Well that wasn¡¯t much of a choice so I tentatively said: ¡°Yes?¡± ¡°Great! Now accept!¡± We stared at each other. ¡°Accept what?¡± He sighed once more ¡°Didn¡¯t you go to school in some form?¡± I chuckled: ¡°I would say ¡®Some form¡¯ is a generous descriptor.¡± ¡°Ok, fuck! Whatever we¡¯ll have to do this quick and dirty then. Although you should really look into accessing your soul one of these days.¡± He took out a little rectangle, you would recognise it as a tablet computer, and started to look intensely into it. After a few moments he cried out triumphantly ¡°Aha! [Internal Mana Manipulation]! That should work in a pinch.¡± He swiped a few times on his tablet. ¡°Alright. I have your verbal consent, now you need to do exactly as I tell you.¡± I nodded my ascent ¡°Good. Now pool your mana into your centre and form them into the word ¡®YES¡¯ all capital letters.¡± I did as he said. And just like that I was back in my Body, being slapped by Val. Repeatedly. ¡°WAKE UP, DAMMIT! WAKE UP!¡± She yelled to emphasise her point. I caught her next slap and told her: ¡°I am awake, ok? Where have you been this whole time?¡± She sighed in relief and let go of me, before answering: ¡°I was busy concealing you. Someone was scrying your whole village and it takes a lot of effort to conceal someone from a scrying spell without the caster knowing something is concealed from them.¡± That was a ¡­ surprisingly reasonable explanation. ¡°OK, that makes sense. Thank you!¡± I paused for a moment and looked at the unconscious [Ranger] on the Floor. ¡°We need to¡­ I need to save my people. They were being kidnapped to act as sacrifices for some ritual in a local dungeon. The mage at the head is presumably the one who was scrying.¡± Val let out a long sigh, like really long. And said: ¡°You made an oath didn¡¯t you?¡± ¡°Yep! [Oath of Vengeance] to be exact.¡± ¡°Oh! Alright. That I can work with. I was afraid you made something like an [Oath of Rescue] or [Oath of Saving]. Those can fail really easily. What do you need to kill?¡± ¡°The mage and the [Rangers] that betrayed the village.¡± ¡°Not the easiest targets, but that¡¯s OK. I am guessing you interrogated this miscreant already, right?¡± She pointed at the downed [Ranger]. Skadi was standing guard over him. Good Girl. ¡°Yeah. The dungeon is two days Travel north-east of the village and the sacrifice is supposed to commence in 25 days. I was thinking we travel in that direction, while you give me intense Anatomy lessons based on our specimen here.¡± ¡°Good Idea. We¡¯ll cut the hunting time to travel 4 hours a day. I¡¯ll give you my food for the next while. But what are you going to do once we reach the dungeon? Just walz in with your claws?¡± ¡°Nope. I will need to get proficient in [Human Anatomy]. Then we grab one of the mages henchmen and I¡¯ll get proficient in [Goblin Anatomy]. Then I will infiltrate the dungeon and launch an attack from the inside.¡± Val gave me one of her rare, genuine smiles. The last time I saw one was when I managed to make my detachable claws. She put a hand on my shoulder, looked me in the eyes and said: ¡°Let¡¯s do it.¡± And with that I set off on my first Quest. Chapter 9 - Training Time 2: This time it’s personal Chapter 9 - Training Time 2: This time it¡¯s personal After setting off towards the dungeon I finally had time to review those mysterious Perks I supposedly have been granted.
You have been granted the personal Perks [Internal Immunity] and [Aura of Decay].
[Internal Immunity] Your insides are impervious to harm. Anything trying to affect you from the inside, like Toxins, Diseases, or shards of glass in your Food, will be broken down, before any harm can occur. This Perk can be turned off and on, it has to be turned off, to enjoy the benefits of things like potions.
[Aura of Decay] You exude an Aura of degradation. Anything within close proximity of you that is not naturally occuring, and/or alive, will suffer from entropy at a vastly increased rate. This Perk grows more impactful, as you grow stronger.
That was quite the news to swallow. I explained that I had new perks to Val. She had questions: ¡°So you met the administrator?¡± I scratched my head(finally hair again): ¡±Puppet looking guy, real bad temper? Yeah I met him¡± She nodded once. ¡°Ah, that would explain it. You know funnily enough, a meeting with him is not that uncommon. Most people meet one of their ilk sooner or later. Granted, not quite as early as you, but still. What did he tell you? What¡¯s the reason for your meeting?¡± I shrugged. ¡°Dunno. He said I was threatening his plans for this century and that I needed to be addressed since I made my oath.¡± She looked into the middle distance for a while, then said: ¡°How exactly did you accept his deal? I know you haven¡¯t had any training with your soul yet.¡± I remembered that particular exercise ¡°Oh yeah, he said something about a quick and dirty solution, then he instructed me to form my internal mana into the letters of the word ¡®yes¡¯. Kinda weird to be honest.¡± Val rolled on the floor laughing. For a good while I couldn¡¯t get her to stop. Eventually she wiped away a tear and responded ¡°I¡¯m sorry, but that¡¯s just perfect. The administrators are known to be inflexible hardasses and you managed to annoy one into a ¡®quick and dirty solution¡¯ I¡¯ll have to remember that one.¡± She took a few more deep breaths to calm herself ¡°the soul business is on my list actually, however the priority is rather low. You wouldn¡¯t normally need it until well into level 50 at least. Also you have a rather unfortunate disadvantage in that particular discipline.¡± I thought for a second then sarcastically responded: ¡°Let me guess: It can¡¯t be taught without external mana, right?¡± She wiggled her hand. ¡°Eh, kind of. Actually this is on me. I don¡¯t know how to teach it without external mana. Celestians are taught to think of it as casting a spell inside ourselves, but you can¡¯t really relate. Or rather you already do that, but that doesn¡¯t help with discovering your soul.¡± Something about that struck me. ¡°Wait! Are all celestians mages? I thought you tried all professions throughout your lives.¡± She was surprised by the question ¡°Yeah, but we only go out into that career hoping thing when we have basic education. That for a celestian is almost a century of magical and mundane education. Also yes, we are all mages. We are an inherently magical race, it¡¯s in our blood. Literally.¡± I was starting to get frustrated. ¡°So how is that in any way fair? At least vampires can¡¯t go out into the sunlight.¡± The last part was murmured, however she still caught it. ¡°In your books maybe, also nothing about this is fair. Being a Celestian is way better than being a human. I can¡¯t digest any of the food here, because I need magic in my diet and I have an extremely low fertility, but still these are small prices to pay. Anyway, let¡¯s leave the ethnological discussions by the wayside and focus on the matter at hand. Tell me about your new perks!¡± It was a blatant attempt to change the subject, however I let it slide, since I didn¡¯t want to talk about this topic anymore. It¡¯s just depressing. Upon explaining what my perks did, Val agreed to test them with me. First she produced two brand new sets of clothing, from whatever magical Inventory she keeps pulling all her stuff from. We would both wear them for a day and compare the decay of both, obviously she would stay 2 metres away at all times. For the [Internal Immunity] Perk I tried to swallow one of my detached claws. I could feel it go into my throat for a few centimetres, but soon the feeling was gone. Neither my mana, nor Val could find it. It had dissolved before the tip could scratch me. Afterwards Val gave me a few poisons to try out. None of them did anything but leave a spicy taste on my tongue. Even the truly dangerous poisons did little more than burn a bit on my tongue. I guess my mouth doesn¡¯t count as ¡®Internal¡¯. After a day Val checked on my shirt. It had become markedly lighter and had gotten a few holes. She concluded that the effect of my Aura is somewhere between 60 and 120 times the decay. As her shirts apparently lasted for at least 2 months before showing signs of wear and tear. Her shirt was still pristine, so 2 metres seemed to be where the effect ended. This would be annoying on the clothes front and I would probably never get to wield any magical gear, or proper armour, but I never really thought I would get to anyway. For a Boy from a forest-village, Flaming swords of Justice, or whatever, are just Fairytales. Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel. After five days we were close enough to the dungeon that Val claimed to be able to feel the change in ambient mana. Apparently she could track the exact location through that. However, that was not important for now. After we arrived and made camp I spent the next two days cutting up Thomas the [Ranger] and studying how a human worked from the inside. I started to find my own organs with internal mana and analyse them in tandem with Thomas¡¯. I must say that Val was invaluable during this time. She kept me fed and Thomas alive and unconscious throughout the whole ordeal. Two days after we made camp I finally looked at my growth, since we set off.
[Athletics]+6=> 30
[Forest Movement]+3=> 9
[Gymnastics]+3=> 24
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+6=> 21
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+2=> 57
[Human Anatomy]+27=> 31
[Perception]+1=> 17
[Shapeshifting]+15=> 23
[Unarmed Combat]+9=> 31
Congratulations! For pursuing your Prey through the Forest with your Pack you have gained a Level in [Wolfman](lvl 6). You have gained the Class Perk [Forest Hunter].
Strength+2=> 24
Agility+4=> 34
Constitution+5=> 45
Endurance+3=> 49
Intelligence+1=> 18
Willpower+2=> 32
Wisdom+2=> 24
Charisma+1=> 16
Free Points+6-6=> 0
[Forest Hunter] When pursuing Prey through in the Forest, you gain a bonus to [Stealth], [Tracking], [Perception] and your senses become sharper.
With [Human Anatomy] in the Apprentice Rank I finally felt confident to try and change myself. I got Val to conjure a mirror and got to work. I tried all kinds of things. Taller, smaller. Thinner, fatter. More muscles, less buff. Hair Color, Nail-length, teeth shape. My body was like wet clay in my hands. I had to take breaks every few minutes, because of the raging headaches, but the proof was right there. With the help of my class I even tried out wolf- muzzle. After getting the silly things out of the way, I tried to go full wolf and surprisingly it was easy. I could walk, run, bite all the things that Skadi could do. I purposefully didn¡¯t use the [Prepared Form] Perk when changing back, but my class still helped so it too was very easy. All in all I was confident in my Abilities to change my human Form. Therefore I didn¡¯t need Thomas anymore. The [Ranger] died quietly. I simply had his heart stop pumping. Next up: Kidnap a goblin and learn their Anatomy. I turned into a Wolf and started off into the direction of my Prey. The same direction as the dungeon. It is really difficult to walk on four legs at first. However I could feel my class helping once again. After a few hours I had it mostly down pat. With Val giving some directions I quickly-ish found the dungeon. It was a hole in the ground in a clearing in the forest. Only remarkable because of the two goblins with spears, standing guard over it. And, after looking at it from the treetops, the fact that the hole has stairs. Definitely neither natural nor goblin made. I was not confident I could simply take the goblins on. The two weren¡¯t a threat, but I didn¡¯t know how fast something could emerge from the dungeon. I tried a few things to lure one away. Howling, growling, yelling with a human voice, throwing stones and a few other things, none worked. These goblins were very good guards. Or horrible ones. Depending on how much you think guards should investigate strange noises. As a last resort I tried showing myself to entice them. Also nothing. Welp can¡¯t be helped. I asked Valeria for some food and settled in for some long term surveillance. One day later: These goblins sure are boring to look at. They change shifts every six hours and that¡¯s about it. No lunch-break, no one goes to the toilet, no nothing. I was just about to pack up and look for a different strategy, when a third goblin walked out of the dungeon carrying two buckets. I was intrigued. The goblin struggled with the, clearly heavy, buckets and went into the opposite direction from me. When he was at the end of the clearing he emptied them into the underbrush, and then took the buckets back into the dungeon. I walked around the clearing to the spot the buckets were emptied at. It was waste. I will save you the details, but I was jubilant. Waste means this has to happen with some regularity, probably once a day. This was my chance. But I must not be overly brash. First things first. Go to camp, tell Val and Skadi what you found, get some rest. I did as much. Val offered to protect Skadi and me from scrying. With that the Plan was set. Skadi and I would watch the dungeon together. The moment a third goblin emerges with buckets I would run into whatever direction the goblin is walking towards. When the goblin was at the edge of the clearing, I would bite it with stinger teeth and put it to sleep. At the same time Skadi would get close to the guards to draw their attention. Then we¡¯d carry the unconscious goblin and run off. The plan went off without a hitch¡­ the second time we tried it. The first time I killed the goblin outright. Hey, I¡¯ve never bitten anyone before, alright? Anyway we learned that a goblin dying in the forest is to be expected, because the next day the routine went off exactly the same. This time I controlled myself and we got a brand new goblin prisoner. The next five days were spent cutting up and learning about goblins. We tried interrogating it, but these goblins are just barely below sentience so that was a dud.
[Goblin Anatomy]+35=> 35
With that I was probably ready to shift into a goblin, but I had a few other things to try. We had ten days left on the clock and I was going to use them. Chapter 10 - Preparations Chapter 10 - Preparations There were three things on my todo list, before I started my mission.
  1. Thin out the goblins with Skadi (and hopefully level up some)
  2. Learn to heal myself
  3. Get a working goblin form
To tackle these three tasks I set up a simple routine. Every six hours Skadi and I would check on the dungeon and kill the guard-goblins simultaneously if possible. Between those attacks I would split my time evenly between learning to heal with Val and getting my goblin form. The attacks on the goblin guards worked flawlessly. I am sure at some point they were going to increase the guards or something like that, but for the first three days Skadi and I basically had a free Buffet. And I have to admit that my bond with Skadi really is changing me, because raw goblin flesh straight off the bone was pretty god damn tasty. Or maybe it¡¯s the class, or both. Who knows? Learning to heal myself was a slow process, because I couldn¡¯t just go ¡°Heal this!¡±I had to know what parts of my body needed to grow in what way for which injury. So basically I was trying to learn the counters to the most likely injuries while hoping that my [Internal Immunity] and my Constitution picked up the slack, when all I could do would be closing the skin and stopping the bleeding. At day three I got so far as to know how to deal with slash wounds and almost all broken bones. Lastly the goblin form. That one was a bitch to train. I shapeshifting inherently hurts, magic or no, you are reshaping your Body while nerves still sense pain. Changing the entire body is radically worse than some claws. Or even my wolf form as that one was helped by my class. The goblin form felt like having all your bones broken and rearranged. I needed about 20 minutes of break for every half hour I spent trying to shapeshift. And that was with an array of recovery potions Val provided me with. On day two I asked her about this: ¡°Not that I¡¯m complaining or anything, but isn¡¯t this a lot more help then ¡®Simply mentoring¡¯?¡± I shook the empty potion bottle for emphasis. She shrugged: ¡°Kinda. I am allowed to provide you with knowledge and resources, if you are training or studying. There isn¡¯t really a limit specified. Also I think your Idea of infiltrating a Dungeon seems entertaining, so I am willing to dip into my personal funds to bankroll your plan¡± ¡°In that case¡­Thank you, I guess?¡± ¡°Your welcome¡± She gave me a kind smile ¡°Ready for the next round?¡± And so I continued. At the end of the third day I managed to get a full, functioning goblin form. As I celebrated this momentous achievement I realised I hadn¡¯t checked my notifications since we started.
[Forest Movement]+1=> 10
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+2=> 59
[Shapeshifting]+8=> 31
[Stealth]+5=> 19
[Unarmed Combat]+2=> 33
Congratulations! For having achieved two different Forms apart from your natural one, at least one of them without any help from a class, you have gained the personal Perk [Transcendance over Form]
[Transcendance over Form] You are no longer bound to the physical form you were born with. Your race is no longer Human, but whatever form you currently inhabit. Any negative effect that is based on race will not affect you, if you have achieved a form that would not be affected. Any positive effect that is based on race will affect you, if you have achieved a form that would be affected. +3 to all Stats
I looked at my personal info to confirm this and sure enough:
Name: JamesThe genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Race: N/A (Currently: Goblin) Age: 17 Years Class: [Wolfman](lvl 8)
Congratulations! For hunting and eating prey with your bond in Wolf form, you have gained two levels in [Wolfman](lvl 8)
Strength+4+3=> 31
Agility+8+3=> 45
Constitution+10+3=> 58
Endurance+6+3=> 48
Intelligence+2+3=> 23
Willpower+4+3=> 39
Wisdom+4+3=> 31
Charisma+2+3=> 21
Free Points+6-6=> 0
Finally [Prepared Form] had a third slot due to my Wisdom reaching 30. I saved my goblin form immediately. Then I asked Val about my new Perk. She looked relieved for some reason. ¡°I was afraid, when you didn¡¯t get it when you transformed into a Wolf. That Perk is one of the few things generally known about shifter Paths. Interesting that it had to be one not helped by your class. I¡¯ve got to record that.¡± She took a deep breath and let out a laugh ¡°Honestly without that, you¡¯d be screwed when we left the forest eventually¡± I raised an inquisitive Eyebrow ¡°Most organised Militaries and Peacekeeping force have some form of ¡®Racist Spells¡¯ stuff like ¡®Heal all Elves¡¯, or ¡®Slow down all non-humanoid¡¯. There are even some detection spells to get through illusions ¡®Make all non-Orks glow¡¯ and the like. With this Perk you¡¯ll be nigh impossible to target with such area spells. And since mana is indiscriminate and most mages don¡¯t have the chops to accurately cast an area spell without hitting friendlies, you¡¯ll be safe from them. Also kind of important, if you ever want to play soldier, else you¡¯d have to mimic getting buffed, which is harder than it sounds.¡± She looked off into the middle distance, presumably lost in memories. ¡°By your dismissive tone, I would guess that you would be able to cast a spell in such a way, right?¡± That took her by surprise: ¡°Pfft, of course I can.¡± Then she started to look somewhat offended: ¡°We learn that kind of stuff before our fourth decade.¡± I cocked my head to the side a bit thinking about what she said: ¡°Who knows? Maybe I¡¯ll learn it before my fourth decade too.¡± We looked each other in the eyes for a few heartbeats. Then we both burst out laughing. After I had gathered myself once more I got back on topic. ¡°OK, enough about that. All this isn¡¯t really important right now. We have seven days left and I don¡¯t want to cut it too short. What can I do to increase my odds?¡± ¡°Get a good meal.¡± I raised an eyebrow at her ¡°I am serious. Your way of healing is reliant on the nutrients in your body. If there is nothing in store the body will start to digest itself to comply with your commands. That is very unpleasant and does more harm than good. So maybe take a big bite out of every goblin you kill or something. By the way that also counts for transformations, shrinking down from human to goblin is easy, but you better be very full if you want to go from goblin to human in one go. Other than that I¡¯d say go in three days before the deadline, until then you could start by poking into the dungeon as a goblin after Skadi kills the guards. The ritual stuff will likely be at the very end of the dungeon, so you may be able to do some preliminary scouting. But stay in reach of the entrance. A quick escape is more valuable than any info you may glean.¡± That was an interesting thought. It was kind of odd that no one had reacted to the killed guards. Maybe no one cared about the upper levels, when the ritual draws near? Only one way to find out. After recovering from the shapeshifting training, I set off with Skadi in the late afternoon. Obviously two goblins with spears were not a threat for her at this point. She quickly dispatched them. I put on the gear of one of them and descended the stairs. Incidentally ¡°Gear¡± is me being incredibly generous. I¡¯ve seen lingerie with more protective properties. The stairs were pretty long. I didn¡¯t have a good measure, especially because my perspective was about a metre lower down now, but I guessed that I was about 20 metres deep, by the time the stairs ended. It was dark down there, but there were enough torches to make everything visible with my [Lesser Night Vision] Perk. At first there wasn¡¯t much more than a dirt corridor. There were a few doorways, though without actual doors, along the corridor. The first doorway I looked into was an armoury of sorts, basically just a room with two weapon racks. One for shortspears and one for bows. Although the bows looked too big for goblins so presumably those were for the [Rangers]. A few more metres in were a bunch of sleeping quarters on both sides. Each contained about 15 hammocks. And there were a total of 6 quarters. So we are looking at about 75-90 giblins, minus the 29 Skadi and I took out. By this time it was night and about 40 goblins were sleeping here. It was tempting to murder them in their sleep, but that would definitely alarm someone. Instead I continued further in, until I found a mess hall. Well ¡­ that may be a bit grandios of a word. It was a room with a counter full of raw meat and a large amount of tables with benches attached. I counted another ten goblins sitting among the tables and eating. Behind the counter stood what looked like a zombie. Most zombies were little more than feral animals, but there were some ways of summoning and/or raising a zombie in service to someone. Basically as an undead slave. I guessed that was what this is. I decided to look at one more room, before leaving. A ruckus could be heard from the next room. It looked like ¡­ it is hard to describe. Like a living room? But without any of the amenities, that make such a room actually comfortable. It was just a bunch of hard wooden benches. Goblins sat on them and were either dozing off, or watching the entertainment. The entertainment in this case was a fourway brawl. No one seemed to be cheering or booing or really reacting at all. They were just looking on as if the brawl was simply the least boring thing in the room. After three minutes the brawl ended. One of the goblins was definitely dead. No one cared. There was a corpse and a pool of blood on the floor. Just as I was about to turn away it happened. The blood and the corpse were absorbed into the floor. The dungeon was reclaiming them. That explained it. These goblins were spawned from the dungeon. That was why no one cared about the dead. And why their behaviour didn¡¯t change when we started killing them. We probably killed less than they themselves did. And with the ritual underway the dungeon master likely wasn¡¯t able or willing to check up on every death. He probably gave the dungeon standing orders to replenish troops and to keep the entrance guarded. The meat in the mess hall was likely also spawned by the dungeon, maybe even the zombie. I retreated after this revelation, but I had some more experiments for tomorrow. I had 6 days left until the ritual. Chapter 11 - A dish best served messy Chapter 11 - A dish best served messy Day 1 of 6: I wanted to test the responses of the goblins. I had a suspicion that maybe Val¡¯s anti-scry ward was the reason I wasn¡¯t noticed yesterday. To check this I casually approached the dungeon in broad daylight and in view of the guards. They didn¡¯t even look at me. I strode down the stairs and looked through the upper floor. No one paid me any attention. Just like no one paid each other any attention. Except for when two goblins bumped into each other. That was apparently enough to trigger a fight to the death. These things truly were stupider than dirt. My next test involved punching the guard out front in the face. In reality it was just a light slap, but sure enough the goblin started attacking me. Interestingly his comrade didn¡¯t interfere. He just watched on in mild interest. Whatever the dungeon, or the mage did to keep goblins this docile, it had really weird side effects. In conclusion, these goblins were not a threat in any way, shape, or form to me currently. Next I had to test out why this is. I had Skadi move into view of the guards. At this they drew their weapon, but were not aggressive yet. When she came closer the goblins charged her. Of course They were not even close to being able to keep up with Skadi, so she wasn¡¯t in danger, but interestingly about 15 other goblins came out of the dungeon and frantically looked around. All of them had spears. So the Ward is not the problem. They just really see me as a fellow goblin. Also the dungeon seems to have some kind of silent alarm. I would have to factor this into my planning. Day 2 of 6: For day two I had planned on a bit of sabotage. During my goblin anatomy training we had also determined that a goblin spear would be rendered unusable by my aura in about 15 hours. So for this day I walked into the armoury and ¡­ well I stood there. I arranged the weapons racks so that My aura would encompass them all. But otherwise it was an uneventful day. Although I could confirm that the Goblins aren¡¯t complete morons. When they went to get or deposit a spear they would notice the rearrangement of the room and act accordingly. With how braindead they seemed, you couldn¡¯t be sure they would realise that much. Day 3 of 6: On the third day I wanted to check on my sabotage and test another Idea I had the day before. I went into the armoury and sure enough. The spears I sabotaged yesterday were still one touch away from disintegrating into splinters. Next I thought about a bit of biological warfare. I walked into the mess hall and injected all the meat with my blood. It was dead, but still organic, so I told the meat to rot. These goblins ate the obviously mouldy food. I shook my head as I walked out of that place. This had been the last day of preparations. I would rest during the next day. Then Skadi and I would strike in the night. That way we still had two full days to clear the whole thing. Day 4 of 6: I approached the entrance and simply slit both the guards throats. They didn¡¯t have time to scream. Once inside I could smell that my plan had worked. There was a stench of vomit in the air. Most of the goblins were sick. This would be a bloodbath. First I went through the sleeping quarters one by one killing every goblin while asleep. In an hour I murdered 60 beings. 42 sleeping and another 18 clutching their stomach and moaning. Next was the Mess hall and living room. For those I started with the living room. There I stuck two goblins with my claws and made them go blind. They registered the attack, but without their sight all they could do was flail wildly around. This caused a chain reaction that soon had the entire room in a brawl. I did the same thing in the mess hall. The zombie did not care one bit, but for safety reasons I still stayed out of that thing¡¯s line of sight. All said and done I killed - or rather was responsible for the deaths of - 83 goblins. In two hours. That went suspiciously well. After the carnage I followed Val¡¯s advice and took a bite out of the goblins, until I felt full, then I got outside and told Skadi to come. We started heading deeper into the dungeon. Skadi was walking a few dozen metres behind me, so I could keep my disguise. It was not long until we arrived at a spiral staircase. We followed it downward for what felt like an eternity. Day 5 of 6: Although it was probably just a bit after midnight, when we arrived at the bottom. Sadly what we found was the entrance to a gigantic fucking maze. I can not stress enough how annoying and huge this thing was. Obviously it was filled with traps. All the hits, from spinning saws and spike pits, to flamethrowers and poison darts. I went into the maze with Skadi. I was burned 12 times, sliced 19 times, and I lost count how often I got impaled. I didn¡¯t count Skadi¡¯s injuries, but there were substantially fewer than mine. After every injury I had to take a break to heal myself and/or Skadi. The reserve I built from the other goblins was almost gone by the end. Of course the maze sans traps wasn¡¯t hard in any way. You just pick a wall and follow it. That¡¯s how you can brute force any maze. All in all it took almost 30 hours to complete the maze, including brakes, which means it was alreadyStolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. Day 6 of 6: The last day. Luckily I saw a dark green glow after exiting the maze. It looked eerie, but since I was looking for a Blood-Ritual, eerie meant I was on the right path. Even more so, when I spied what looked like 6 humanoid figures standing in a circle around another humanoid. In all likelihood the mage and the [Rangers] my target. Served on a silver platter. I was excited, but I was not going to blow this, by rushing in. I was going to use my disguise to its fullest. The closer I could come the better my chances, was my rationale. So I walked forward in the braindead way the goblins here preferred. I told Skadi to stay behind, but to be ready to attack at a moment¡¯s notice. As I was approaching the ritual chamber I could make out the other villagers inside the circle. Rage welled up inside of me. There they were. The People I had known for all my life. Bound, gagged, most of them bleeding, but alive. They looked terrified. Around them were seven figures. The mage and six [Rangers]. I almost spat on the floor in frustration. ¡°We were forced¡± my ass. I recognized their faces, but they weren¡¯t wearing the usual leather armour. They were wearing the same weird robes the Mage was. They were also chanting alongside him. So this is why they betrayed us. For some ritual. For what? A new class? Some powerful Perk? Whatever it was, they would not succeed. I had a mission and I would not fail. There was a shimmering field engulfing the whole circle. Cryptic sigils were drawn onto the floor and the blood of the villagers seemed to follow those sigils, rather than pool naturally. I poked the field with a finger. It felt like pushing two magnets together. The closer I got, the harder something was pushing against me. No sound escaped the barrier, but I could see the mage yelling at the [Rangers]. One of them stepped out of the field as if it was nothing. She yelled at me: ¡°What the hell are you doing here, you little shit? Get away, go up top! Right now!¡± As she was pulling her leg back to kick me, I pounced on her. The black robes they were wearing may have looked rather snazzy, but they didn¡¯t offer much, if any protection from my claws.I dug my claws deep into her leg and injected her with my blood. Gods that felt satisfying. She was stunned at the situation. She was also still standing on one leg. When I commanded all of her muscles to stiffen the unbalanced [Ranger] fell back into the barrier, however her feet were still with me, or rather my claws were still in her legs, on the outside. I saw an opportunity and took it. I commanded the [Rangers] head to shine. I closed my Eyes and buried my face in the robe I was holding on to. The others took no such precautions. It wasn¡¯t quite the supernova I had burned Skadi and myself with, but it was more than enough to blind even a level 20 [Ranger] for a minute or more. More importantly the mage lost his concentration and the barrier fell, just as I had hoped. The next part is not as epic as I would like, or as exciting, but it is the truth. Skadi and I slaughtered all our targets. Imagine fighting against something the size of a child, but with the strength of three men and the speed of four and the robustness of six. Oh and also the child has claws that are hot as fire. And you can¡¯t see. And there is a Wolf also attacking you. Frankly they were all fucked from the start. I won¡¯t even pretend otherwise. That doesn¡¯t mean I didn¡¯t get hurt at all, one of the bastards managed to break my nose, but that was all they could do, until they fell before our combined assault. The only problem was one that was rather obvious in retrospect. If you want to stop a blood ritual you shouldn¡¯t fight people to the death with claws on top of the ritual circle. Also you especially shouldn¡¯t bleed on it yourself. After I eviscerated the last [Ranger] I noticed that the green glow had intensified severalfold. The next thing I noticed was two giant tentacles with eyeballs and fangs emerging from the centre of the circle. One approached Skadi, the other did me. We were both transfixed and at least I felt like I couldn¡¯t move, nor that I should. Whatever this was, my best bet was to hope it would be in a good mood G????????????????????o???????????????????????????o?????????????????????????????????????d????????????????????????????????????? ????????????????????????m?????????????o?????????????????????????????????????o?????????????????????????????????????d???????????????????????????? ??????????????????i??????????????????????n?????????????????????????????d?????????????????????????????e????????????????????????????e???????????????????????????????????????????d??????????????????????.?????????????????? ????????????????????????????????????Y???????????????????o?????????????????????????????u???????????????????????? ????????????????????????????????????????????a????????????????r????????????????????????????????e???????????? ???????????????????????????e????????????????????n???????????????????????t???????????????e???????????????????????????????????????????????r????????????t??????????????a??????????????????????????????????????????????i??????????????????????????????????????????????n??????????i??????????????????????????????????????????n???????????????????????????????????????????????????g????????????????????????????????????????,??????????????????????????????????????????? ???????????y????????????????????????????????????????????o??????????????????????????????????????????????????u???????????????????????????????n??????????????????????????????????????????g????????????????????????? ?????????????????????????????????????????????o???????????n???????????????????????????????e??????????????????????????????????????s??????????????????????????????.?????????????????????????????????? ????????????H??????e???????????????????????????r?????????????????????????????????e?????????????? ???????????????????????????????h????????????????????????????a????????????????????????v????????????????????????????e?????????????????????????????????????????? ?????????????????????????????????a??????????????????????????? ????c??????????????????????o???????????????????o?????????????????????k?????????????????????????i??????????????????????????e????????????????????????????????????????????.??????????????? ????????????????????????? I heard ¡­ something. Maybe there was some form of language in there. Among a thousand other sounds. Next the tentacle rammed itself into my mouth and down my throat into my stomach. It felt like it was dropping something in there. I couldn¡¯t say for sure, but there was a round, flat object of foreign mana in my stomach. The tentacle immediately retreated out of me. Much to my relief. And to my chagrin the other tentacle just calmly stroked Skadis fur. Sometimes everything was just unfair. B????????????????????????????????y????????????????????????????????????????????e??????????????????????????????????????????????????!????????????????????????????????????????????????????? ?????????????????????????????????????????????????????H?????????????????????a?????????????????????????????v??????????????????????????????e???????????????????????????????????????????????? ?????????????????a?????????????????? ???????????????????????????????????????b?????????????????????????e?????????????????????????a?????????????????????????????????????????????u????????????????????????????????????????t?????????????????????i?????????????????????????????f????????????????????????????????????????????u?????????????????????????????????????l?????????????????????? ?????????????????????d???????????????????a?????????????????????????????y??????????????????????????????????!?????????????????????????????????????? ??????????????????????????????????????:??????????????????????????????)??????????????????????? ????????????????????????????????? Again that alien cacophony. And just as suddenly as the tentacles appeared, they disappeared again. And the moment my stomach tried to digest whatever was in there I lost consciousness. Chapter 12 - Interlude 1 (Valeria) Chapter 12 - Interlude 1 (Valeria) Valeria was impressed as she observed the slaughter from her invisibility. James was a terrifying force when up close. And Skadi was as scary as any high level and highly intelligent Wolf. That is: very. When the green glow of the room intensified, Val was as surprised as James was. This kind of ritual should fail the moment the leader is killed. Instead all the extra bloodshed seemed to have attracted something greater than what had been intended. The moment a tentacle came out of the ground she drew on one of her emergency measures. The protective soul chrysalis. In a moment, after she cast the spell, Val was encased in an invisible crystal. It should block her completely from the outside world. Soul, thoughts, light, nothing can escape, or be detected through the chrysalis. She can¡¯t move or act either, but this thing was perfect for weathering a storm. After an hour the crystal faded. Val emerged to see Skadi peacefully sleeping and James completely knocked out sprawled on his back, as usual. Val breathed a sigh of release, until she realised something. ¡°Where is the dungeon heart?¡± she asked herself out loud. Normally a dungeon heart would manifest over the slain dungeon master between five and ten minutes after their death. It had been an hour. She looked at James¡¯s unconscious form. Did he? No sense in speculating. She used a 6th level divination spell to replay the last hour in this room. She started right after the tentacles retreated. Even in a recording great old ones were not to be trifled with. After they went away Skadi went to sleep, while James stood still, staring into the distance. Then he said: H?????u????n?????????g??????r????????y??????? He had a green-ish glow in his eyes. And he promptly started to devour the corpses around him. Not ¡®eat¡¯, devour. Hair, clothes, bones. Everything. He even licked all the blood off the floor. At this point in the recording Val had to admit that she didn¡¯t even recognize the lack of corpses when she emerged from her chrysalis. After the floor was spotless, James stood up and another noise escaped from his mouth. S??????t?????????i???l??????l????????????? ?????????????s?????????o??????? ??????h????????????u???????????n????????g????????r?????y???????????? Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. Now he turned to the terrified villagers. They only saw a terrifying goblin, so naturally they had tried to run when James had started the feast. They didn¡¯t get far enough. His flesh undulated for a moment, then a massive tentacle shot out of his chest. It flew through the hallway for dozens of metres, until it reached the terrified villagers, as they tried to escape through the maze. The tip of the tentacle opened up, to reveal rows upon rows of jagged teeth. It then opened wider and wider, the villagers were frozen, as they gazed upon the bizarre appendage. Then it attacked. Without mercy or even a second thought it ate them up. Swallowing them whole. Within three minutes the remnants of James¡¯ Village had disappeared down his tentacle gullet. Val didn¡¯t know how she would tell him of what happened here. He likely wasn¡¯t conscious during these scenes and would hopefully not remember them, but he still would have to be informed somehow. Now the tentacle was retreating, leaving James just as he was before, green eyes and all. Although his next move terrified Val. James was standing in front of where her chrysalis had been. Somehow he could sense her. That should be impossible. He liked his lips and raised a claw to strike, the claw glowing with that same green glow, but luckily something tastier emerged. At this point the dungeon heart started to manifest above the point where the dungeon master¡¯s corpse used to be. The thing was as big as a human head and was softly glowing blue with spots of green. James swallowed it in one bite. He must have used [Shapeshifting] to get that thing in his mouth. When he swallowed the dungeon heart he finally looked satisfied and collapsed right where Val found him 50 minutes later. A quick diagnostic spell showed her that James was still alive, not only that, but he was actually filled to the brim with vital energy. More than some trolls she had seen. Valeria really needed to prepare her poker face for the story James was about to tell her, when he woke up. But first she would have to drag him out of here. Good thing this wasn¡¯t technically a dungeon anymore. That made opening a portal a lot easier. She quickly transported the three of them outside to a nearby clearing, which they had used as a makeshift camp. After she made sure Skadi and James were actually knocked out, she conjured a bubble of silence around her face and had a good old scream. An old one. A fucking great old one had apparently taking a liking to James. How the everliving shit-fuck am I supposed to deal with that? I can¡¯t scry on them. Fuck, I can¡¯t even begin to comprehend their motives. She screamed a bit more for the droplets of catharsis that would bring. Then she tried to steady herself. On the other hand, if he gets powers connected to the eldritch, then this could be so much more than just a distraction in exile. This could be my ticket. I just have to rework all my plans and contingencies ¡­ and make twice as many to be sure. But I can do this. I¡¯ve spent centuries looking for exactly this. I am not going to let this opportunity slip through my fingers. If those eldritch bastards think they can steal my little monster away from me, then they have another thing coming. Val knelt next to James, sensing his mana, sensing that his body was digesting whatever the eldritch tentacle had deposited AND the dungeon heart. Oh yes! I will make you magnificent and terrifying. With all this you can be so much more than a distraction. Together we will achieve so much. She looked James right in the face. The face of a goblin. The face he had adopted without hesitation. No doubt he would become a true-shifter in a matter of weeks. Yes, under my wing it won¡¯t be long until you will not have a face. Valeria laughed into her bubble of silence. But you will wield them all! Chapter 13 - Gains Chapter 13 - Gains When I woke up, I didn¡¯t remember anything after the tentacle receded. I opened my eyes and saw a tree canopy. Skadi was sleeping next to me, while Val was reading a book. Once she noticed that I was awake she smiled and said: ¡°Congratulations! You finished your first Quest, cleared your first Dungeon, and met your first extra dimensional entity.¡± The tentacle thing I presumed. ¡°Now go on and look at your notifications. I didn¡¯t pull you out of there to not hear about the juicy rewards.¡± I was happy to oblige.
[Athletics]+5=> 35
[Gymnastics]+8=> 32
[Impersonation]+7=> 7
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+4=> 25
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+2=> 61
[Shapeshifting]+5=> 36
[Stealth]+2=> 21
[Unarmed Combat]+6=> 39
Congratulations! For tracking, hunting and eating your prey with your Companion you have gained two levels in [Wolfperson](lvl 10). You have gained the class Perk [Face of Kin] Stats have been distributed Your class is ready to evolve.
[Face of Kin] The more you resemble a species, the more members of that species will consider you as kin.
I asked Val about the name change of my class. She chuckled and said: ¡°You can change your species. That means you could also change your biological sex if you want to. We¡¯ll if you ever cut up a female and learned how the opposite side of naughty bits function. At this point the system considers you to not have an inherent race or sex, so it uses gender neutral language. I am pretty sure you can change that if you focus on it.¡± That made some sense, although I really didn¡¯t know how to change genitals, and I really didn¡¯t want to kidnap and cut up a woman just to find out. Anyway, my ego wasn¡¯t fragile enough to be rattled by the revelation that the system didn¡¯t consider me as ¡®male¡¯ anymore. I knew who I was, so I continued.
Congratulations! You have fulfilled your Oath, therefore [Oath of Vengeance] has evolved into [Avenger of Betrayal]
[Avenger of Betrayal] Whenever someone betrays you or someone you are close to, you may mark them as a Traitor. You will always know where a Traitor is relative to you. The traitor will know they are hunted. While pursuing a Traitor you will require only half as much food, water, or rest. Every slain Traitor grants +2 in every Stat (Currently +16)
So that perk works retroactively. But why 16? One Mage and six [Rangers] that is only ¡­ oh ¡­ It must also count the [Ranger] I kidnapped from the Village. I killed him after my Oath that¡¯s right.
Congratulations! You have been given a gift by an eldritch being beyond your comprehension. You have been given the personal Perk [Touched by the Eldritch]
[Touched by the Eldritch] We expect great entertainment from you. Do not disappoint us
That was ominous as all hell. But at least it wasn¡¯t obviously negative.
You have consumed a dungeon heart. The mana is ravaging your body, you will die in¡­ Error. [Touched by the Eldritch] is absorbing the Mana. New Perk is being created. You have gained the personal Perk [Biomass]
[Biomass] Nutrients, Digestion, Excretion these are concepts for Mortals. You have transcended the need for such petty considerations. All you need is Biomass. Raw, undiluted Biomass. If it is organic and made of matter, you can devour it to fuel yourself and your Abilities.
Woah. That was not expected. When did I eat a dungeon heart? I should ask Val after this.
Congratulations! You have hunted, fought, killed, survived and met an eldritch being together with Skadi. Your bond has strengthened
[Animal Companion(Skadi)] You have bonded with Skadi. Both of you will be aware of each other''s location and general well being. You will have better senses while your companion will be smarter. The connection to Skadi allows you to send simple Emotions and very short sentences to one another telepathically. This Perk will grow as your Bond with your Companion grows. Should you lose your companion this perk will disappear.
Your Class is ready for Evolution. Please select an option.
Class: Requirements:
[Greater Wolfperson]
  • [Wolfperson] at level 10
[Abomination of Flesh]
  • Shapeshifting class ready to evolve
  • [Transcendence over Form]
  • [Touched by the Eldritch]
[Internal Mana Expert]
  • Internal Mana class ready to evolve
  • [Internal Mana Manipulation] at least at Adept Rank
[Aspiring Apex]
  • Shapeshifting class ready to evolve
  • [Transcendance over Form]
  • [Biomass]
  • [Shapeshifting] at least at Apprentice Rank
  • One combat Skill at least at Apprentice Rank
  • Is unchallenged as dominant creature in its territory
I looked the offerings over. [Greater Wolfperson] was just boring. Also general wisdom is that more and harder Requirements means a better class. [Internal Mana Expert] was also out. That was just not where I wanted to go. I pulled up the descriptions for the other two
[Abomination of Flesh] Give your Sanity for unimaginable power. Bring fear into the hearts of every living being. Become the end
Strength +N/A
Agility +N/A
Constitution +N/A
Endurance +N/A
Intelligence +N/A
Willpower +N/A
Wisdom +N/A
Charisma +N/A
Free Points +0
[Aspiring Apex] You have tasted power and you will not be denied your next fix. Every enemy slain will fuel you. Every weapon used against you will be a new tool for your ascension. You will not be stopped, you will not be contained. Follow this path and every attempt to hinder your rise will only make it even more unavoidable. Challenge everything to claim your place at the top of the food chain. Should you survive that is¡­
Strength +5
Agility +5
Constitution +6
Endurance +5
Intelligence +3
Willpower +6
Wisdom +4
Charisma +3
Free Points +4
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Now that was not a hard decision. I very much preferred to keep my sanity. Thank you very much. I chose [Aspiring Apex].
You have chosen the [Aspiring Apex] class. [Shifting Warrior] has strengthened. [Wolfish] has evolved into [Ever Improving]. [Forest Hunter] has evolved into [Sense of the Apex]. [Unappetizing] has evolved into [Challenge of the Apex]
[Shifting Warrior] Increases the Force of attacks made with altered Body parts such as Claws or Horns. Also increases the durability of such Parts. This effect doubles in strength when concerning Parts of Creatures you have faced in Combat Wolf-like Body parts
[Wolfish] You find it easier to make your Body more Wolf-like and also to remove said changes.
[Ever Improving] You find it easier to shift your Body into Body parts of creatures you have faced in combat.
[Forest Hunter] When pursuing Prey through in the Forest, you gain a bonus to [Stealth], [Tracking], [Perception] and your senses become sharper.
[Sense of the Apex] When pursuing Prey or fighting a challenger to your supremacy, you gain a bonus to [Stealth], [Tracking], [Perception] and your senses become sharper.
[Unappetizing] Your natural scent, taste and appearance becomes revolting to any beast that considers you a meal.
[Challenge of the Apex] No beast would consider attacking you for a meal. Any beast in your presence has to make a decision. Bow, flee or fight
Due to previous achievements [Aspiring Apex](lvl 12) immediately gains two levels. You have gained the Class Perks [Body of the Apex] and [Armoury of the Apex]
[Body of the Apex] Due to [Biomass] you don¡¯t need most Organs to survive. A Brain, Heart, Lungs and a Stomach is all you need. You have an instinctive knowledge of how you can remove redundancies and useless organs in forms you adopt. You also have an instinctive knowledge of how much space a form has for new additions.
[Armoury of the Apex] You have an instinctive knowledge of how and where to fit offensive or defensive parts in a given form, such as poison glands, carapace, or retractable weaponry.
Stats:
Strength+2+2+5+5+16=> 61
Agility+4+4+5+5+16=> 79
Constitution+5+5-15+6+6+16=> 81
Endurance+3+3+5+5+16=> 80
Intelligence+1+1+3+3+16=> 47
Willpower+2+2+6+6+16=> 71
Wisdom+2+2+4+4+16=> 59
Charisma+1+1+3+3+16=> 45
Free Points+6-6+6-6+4+4=> 8
I was almost drooling on the floor when I finished reading all that. My Stats were insane. And these new Perks. I never have to shit again. I can dedicate almost all of my body to combat, because I don¡¯t need most organs anymore. I was like an overexcited child while telling Val all this. She gave me a patronising smile and said: ¡°Yep that¡¯s how everyone reacts when they first evolve their class. Quick word of advice. Everyone gets promised the world by their class. The description doesn¡¯t guarantee anything. What it says is what the class wants and/or expects of you. It is not a guarantee. In your case especially. You are given amazing tools to shape yourself into that ¡®Apex¡¯ but it is on you how to use those tools.¡± I didn¡¯t let her negativity get me down. Although I calmed down somewhat and looked at my Stats again. -15 Constitution meant I had died after eating the dungeon heart. Or I was supposed to be dead, but my [Hard to kill] Perk kept me alive. That. Left a bad taste in my mouth. I should be dead, yet I gained more than I lost. But I died, but I grew, but I died ¡­ That argument rattled around my head for a while. It wasn¡¯t very productive, but as existential crises go I would rate it a solid 7/10. Decent subject, lacking in depth. And believe me, I¡¯ve had a few. Anyway after about five minutes of fruitlessly trying to rationalise the fact that I should have been twice over now - and that¡¯s just the stuff I had in writing - I finally stabilised, so that I could continue with my life. I gave my Character Sheet another once over before I started experimenting with my new powers.
Name: James Race: N/A Age: 17 Years Class: [Aspiring Apex](lvl 12)
Statistics:
Strength 61
Agility 79
Constitution 81
Endurance 80
Intelligence 47
Willpower 71
Wisdom 59
Charisma 45
Free Points 8
[Aspiring Apex]:
Strength +5
Agility +5
Constitution +6
Endurance +5
Intelligence +3
Willpower +6
Wisdom +4
Charisma +3
Free Points +4
Personal Perks:
[Curious Child] You never could say no to a secret or something hidden. You will not run out of those any time soon.
[Magic Shmagic] You cannot feel ambient mana. That¡¯s a fact. But if you somehow learn anyway you could use this: All magic effects produced by you are 20% more potent. Should you manage to cast a 1st Tier Spell with ambient mana the downside of this perk will be removed and the upside will be strengthened
[Feather Fall] You have greater control over your direction while in free fall. Your Body becomes better at distributing the energy of an impact after free fall. +5 Constitution; +3 Endurance; +2 Wisdom
[Iron Lungs] You may hold your breath for twice as long. After oxygen deprivation sets in you have twice as long before damage sets in, both temporary and permanent. +5 Endurance; +3 Constitution; +2 Strength
[Flexible Insulation] You may shift your comfortable, and survivable Temperature Zones down or up by 5 degrees. This triggers instinctively when near death. +5 Willpower; +3 Endurance; +2 Constitution
[Hard to kill] You are exceptionally resilient. Whenever you would die you instead start draining your Constitution at a rate determined by the severity of your condition. Once your Constitution hits 0 you die for real. Constitution lost this way is permanently gone
[Lesser Night Vision] You become slightly better at seeing in Darkness. This is about the level of Night Vision a Dog has.
[Thickheaded] You really have to stop doing this. Your mind is now more resistant to involuntarily losing consciousness. You can now reach new heights of headache before you pass out. +5 Willpower +2 Intelligence +0 Wisdom
[Animal Companion(Skadi)] You have bonded with Skadi. Both of you will be aware of each other''s location and general well being. You will have better senses while your companion will be smarter. The connection to Skadi allows you to send simple Emotions and very short sentences to one another telepathically. This Perk will grow as your Bond with your Companion grows. Should you lose your companion this perk will disappear.
[Avenger of Betrayal] Whenever someone betrays you or someone you are close to, you may mark them as a Traitor. You will always know where a Traitor is relative to you. The traitor will know they are hunted. While pursuing a Traitor you will require only half as much food, water, or rest. Every slain Traitor grants +2 in every Stat (Currently +16)
[Internal Immunity] Your insides are impervious to harm. Anything trying to affect you from the inside, like Toxins, Diseases, or shards of glass in your Food, will be broken down, before any harm can occur. This Perk can be turned off and on, it has to be turned off, to enjoy the benefits of things like potions.
[Aura of Decay] You exude an Aura of degradation. Anything within close proximity of you that is not naturally occuring, and/or alive, will suffer from entropy at a vastly increased rate. This Perk grows more impactful, as you grow stronger.
[Transcendance over Form] You are no longer bound to the physical form you were born with. Your race is no longer Human, but whatever form you currently inhabit. Any negative effect that is based on race will not affect you, if you have achieved a form that would not be affected. Any positive effect that is based on race will affect you, if you have achieved a form that would be affected. +3 to all Stats
[Touched by the Eldritch] We expect great entertainment from you. Do not disappoint us
[Biomass] Nutrients, Digestion, Excretion these are concepts for Mortals. You have transcended the need for such petty considerations. All you need is Biomass. Raw, undiluted Biomass. If it is organic and made of matter, you can devour it to fuel yourself and your Abilities.
Class Perks:
[Shifting Warrior] Increases the Force of attacks made with altered Body parts such as Claws or Horns. Also increases the durability of such Parts. This effect doubles in strength when concerning Parts of Creatures you have faced in Combat
[Ever Improving] You find it easier to shift your Body into Body parts of creatures you have faced in combat.
[Challenge of the Apex] No beast would consider attacking you for a meal. Any beast in your presence has to make a decision. Bow, flee or fight
[Prepared Form] You may have a Form you currently inhabit saved. At any time you can shapeshift into a saved Form without active concentration. Mental strain still occurs. Wounds are not affected by this skill. You may have one Form saved for every ten points in Wisdom you have. (Currently 3/3 Forms)
[Sense of the Apex] When pursuing Prey or fighting a challenger to your supremacy, you gain a bonus to [Stealth], [Tracking], [Perception] and your senses become sharper.
[Face of Kin] The more you resemble a species, the more members of that species will consider you as kin.
[Body of the Apex] Due to [Biomass] you don¡¯t need most Organs to survive. A Brain, Heart, Lungs and a Stomach is all you need. You have an instinctive knowledge of how you can remove redundancies and useless organs in forms you adopt. You also have an instinctive knowledge of how much space a form has for new additions.
[Armoury of the Apex] You have an instinctive knowledge of how and where to fit offensive or defensive parts in a given form, such as poison glands, carapace, or retractable weaponry.
Skills:
[Archery] 2
[Athletics] 35
[Forest Movement] 10
[Gymnastics] 32
[Impersonation] 7
[Infectious Mana Manipulation] 25
[Internal Mana Manipulation] 61
[Goblin Anatomy] 35
[Human Anatomy] 31
[Knives] 3
[Leporine Anatomy] 13
[Lupine Anatomy] 7
[Perception] 17
[Shapeshifting] 36
[Stealth] 21
[Tracking] 11
[Unarmed Combat] 39
Chapter 14 - New Toys Chapter 14 - New Toys There was something I had wanted for a long while, but I hadn¡¯t had the time, so now I was going to get it. I was going to get myself some god damn Wolverine claws. Ok ¡­ Really I wanted something akin to ¡®Sword-Hands¡¯, or the like. Something with a bit of range, that can actually block or parry an attack and that can cut through something, not just scratch it. Anyway I wanted some blades on my arms and dammit I was going to get them. While I was trying to make my new weapons I noticed several things. First I noticed that the shapeshifting was a lot lighter on my mind. The strain of the activity itself wasn¡¯t lessened, but it felt like I wouldn¡¯t need to think as much about it. Shapeshifting just became a lot more natural for me, but I could also feel something inside myself diminish while I changed back into human-James. After a bit of thinking I realised it was the [Biomass] Perk. It said it ¡®fueled my abilities¡¯. Apparently it was making shapeshifting a lot easier at the cost of my biomass reserves. At least that was what I had concluded. Val disagreed: ¡°The System isn¡¯t that vague. Fuel means fuel, not ¡®makes it less strenuous to perform¡¯. [Biomass] most likely fuels you in terms of nutrients. You won¡¯t fear collapsing from malnutrition when going up in mass, like you normally would.¡± That made sense, but it didn¡¯t show the whole picture. ¡°Why is Shapeshifting easier then?¡± I crossed my arms in smug triumph Gotcha! She facepalmed: ¡°You just evolved your class into one specifically more suited to Shapeshifting. Classes aren¡¯t just about Stats and Perks, Idiot!¡± Damn, she got me there. Didn¡¯t think about that. Back on topic: The second thing I noticed was that I suddenly had lots of ideas for how to fit the blades in my arm, in a way that didn¡¯t necessitate me having to shapeshift every time. In fact not only did I know where to store the blades, I also knew how to make muscles to extend and retract them. Making tunnels and holes in my skin for them was also easy. I even managed to make a bit of Skin cover the holes in my knuckles when they weren¡¯t extended, however getting them to open and close in tune with the blades was almost an hour of work. That was still low, when compared to the time it took me to make my first claws, however the rest of the blades only took half an hour in total. [Armoury of the Apex] and [Body of the Apex] were already pulling their weight. The blades were about 35cm long from knuckle to tip. I spent another half hour recreating the design in my other arm and started to practise with them against no one in particular. Two flaws were pretty apparent soon after. First I had no injector. That was swiftly solved by flooding the resting space of my blades with blood. When they came out they would be coated in the stuff and any wound I scored would be an entry for my [Infectious Mana Manipulation]. Granted in a protracted fight they would eventually dry up, but I could just resheathe them. The second problem was one of design. If I sheath the blade in my arm, then my wrist is going to be stiff when they are extended, as I basically had an internal splint in my arm. The solution to this problem took another hour, as I designed a joint of sorts within the blade. It would slot in with the joints connecting my arms to my wrists. It wasn¡¯t perfect, but it allowed me about as much freedom of movement as a sword fighter had. Next I sparred with Val to test out my new toys. It may have been wishful thinking, but Val seemed somewhat proud of me for making the Blades inside of one morning. Now I needed to get familiar with them. Claws aren¡¯t that far off from punching, but wrist blades are something entirely different. Not to mention how having three footlong blades of bone attached to your knuckles unbalances you. With 61 Strength I could wield them no problem, but the feel of them took some getting used to. My work would soon pay off though.
[Unarmed Combat]+1=> 40Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
Your Skill [Unarmed Combat] can evolve into [Natural Weapons]. Do you Accept?
I pulled up the descriptions for both.
[Unarmed Combat] The Ability to fight without any weaponry, using only your body.
[Natural Weapons] The Ability to fight with weapons that are part of your body, including Claws, Fists, Teeth, Spikes, Tails, etc.
Hmmm. That seemed very close to one another. However [Natural Weapons] seemed like a straight upgrade for my purposes. I may lose some proficiency with grappling, but that was never my style anyway. I chose that evolution. In the following sparring session I could feel the difference. I was way more in tune with my blades and I had an instinctual sense for how to move them correctly. Val disengaged after a clash and gave me a grin ¡°Finally got a skill for those blades?¡± I nodded ¡°Great! Now I don¡¯t have to hold back as much. Ready for round two?¡± She didn¡¯t wait for my answer. However I didn¡¯t bother to give one either. We charged each other simultaneously. That was a really fun day. Our sparring ended several hours later. Val wasn¡¯t kidding when she said she was holding back before. She was stronger, faster and more perceptive than me, even after my gains. I was on the losing foot for most of it, barely holding on with my blades, claws and some creative usage of my blood-shooting. The end came when I opened myself up too wide in an attempt to stab her right side with my blades. She punched my arm, making it fly downwards, and then stomped on my blades, severing them. However I planned on that. I told my Blades to shatter and burn just before her foot connected. When she was unbalanced, because she expected resistance from my blades I drove my off hand blades into her upper thigh and wrenched them in the direction of her bone with all my might. Like I hoped, her bones were strong enough to withstand this, which means my Blades snapped off my knuckles. With the blades lodged in her thigh I told them to shatter and burn as well. Next I rolled away from her injured side and stood back up with my claws at the ready. My arms were in agony, but at this point pain was becoming a companion more than anything. Val however slowly stood up and declared: ¡°Yield! I yield! That was nicely done. The shattering especially. It is going to be a bitch getting all those bits out. Also deliberately ripping blades from your body is a ballsy move if I¡¯ve ever seen one. How did you know you could handle the pain?¡± My face was swollen beyond recognition and I had blood all over me, but I still like to think I did an admirable job at a shit eating grin: ¡°I didn¡¯t.¡± That was the exact moment the adrenalin left my body and I fell over howling in pain. I knew pain well, but that didn¡¯t mean a good scream isn¡¯t cathartic as hell. Two hours later we settled in for a little talk about the future. I had remade my blades and hunted my dinner in the meantime, Val offered some of her own, but that just wasn¡¯t satisfying anymore I wanted something fresh, also fresh meat seemed to give more biomass than plants or preserved meat, Val said something about ¡®Vital Energy¡¯ but it sounded like magic mumbo jumbo to me. Being alive is more important than Volume when it comes to biomass, simple as that. Anyway, at that point Val was still busy removing my charred up splinters from her leg, although I suspected she was giving me a bit of a performance. So while I waited on her I laid my hand on Skadis flank and closed my Eyes. Val looked up from her auto-surgery: ¡°What are you doing?¡± ¡°I am trying to figure out how her fur works. Since our bond last strengthened I can sort of feel her internal mana a bit when we are near.¡± ¡°And why are you looking at her fur?¡± ¡°Because I am sick of borrowing a set of clothes every few days. I want to grow a coat of fur so that I can always make myself decent.¡± The clothes situation was becoming a real pain. ¡°Not a bad Idea. Especially because of where we are going next.¡± ¡°Don¡¯t I have a say in that?¡± ¡°Do you know anything about the world outside this forest?¡± That was fair. I sheepishly looked away from Val. ¡°There we go. We are going to the north next. Shifter tribes live there, you could use their expertise with animals at the very least. Probably not the shapeshifting itself though.¡± I cooked my head at that. Why wouldn¡¯t they have something to teach me? ¡°Why not?¡± ¡°They specialise in one animal per tribe and they seek to make a hybrid form between the animal and a human for combat. You are more in the direction of altering your standard body with animal bits. You would learn more from fighting the tougher beasts up north. The environment here is very much the easy stuff.¡± ¡°Do we have to go right now?¡± ¡°Nah, there is no time pressure right now.¡± I continued to inspect Skadi¡¯s fur, when I had a sudden realisation: ¡°Wait, where are the Villagers we rescued? Are they still in the dungeon?¡± I was breathing hard, adrenalin flooding my body. Had I forgotten them down there? Would they have made it past the Maze? Val let out a heavy sigh: ¡°I had hoped to distract you a bit longer. I have to show you something.¡± And she did show me. How I wish she didn¡¯t. Chapter 15 - Strings Chapter 15 - Strings I was in shock after watching the recording through her illusory screen. I had killed them. All that was left of my Village had been killed. Or rather slaughtered. Everyone I¡¯ve ever known was dead. Except Val and Skadi. I took a few calming breaths. They weren¡¯t all that calming, but I had to compartmentalise here. I couldn¡¯t fall into despair. I knew I didn¡¯t deserve to be the survivor of this ordeal. I should be dead with the rest of my people. But I couldn¡¯t surrender to this line of thinking. I couldn¡¯t betray Skadi. Yes, that¡¯s right. I had to keep going. For Skadi¡¯s sake. Yes, James just think about Skadi, instead of the Monster outside forces have turned you into, don¡¯t think about the dead how needed you, think of the one being in the world, who needs you and is still alive. That line of thinking got me through the next few days. That and keeping myself busy with miscellaneous projects It took the rest of the day for me to get the fur covering down. Then we went to sleep
[Lupine Anatomy]+5=> 12
The next morning I started to deal with the remaining tasks. First we had to set off in the direction of the village. During transit I started on my other project. [Biomass] told me that most organs in my body were now redundant. I wanted to check that, so I told Val to keep an eye on my health, while I started to remove said organs. Intestines, liver, kidneys, spleen, obviously the appendix. All could go. Or at least I hoped so. The trip should take a few days so we had enough time to check. Long story short: The Perk was correct. I was perfectly fine without the aforementioned organs. That meant my body had a lot of space to work with. Since I didn¡¯t have anything to fill the holes with, I just filled them with biomass. It didn¡¯t take up any real space inside me, but I could make it take solid form. In essence I was just filling the Void with generic ¡®Flesh¡¯. Anyway, we arrived at the Village and the darkness threatened to take over. I didn¡¯t particularly like it but it was my home. Everyone I ever knew was from here. The village didn¡¯t deserve to be abandoned because of some demented mage, and a bunch of traitorous [Rangers]. And the people didn¡¯t deserve to be sacrificed for some ritual. Or to be slaughtered by some idiot that thought he could save everyone. I knew it wouldn¡¯t help anyone, or really mean anything, but I wanted to do something symbolic. For closure at the very least. The custom for burials in the village had been to incinerate the corpse inside a ring of water, to prevent the fire from spreading. I took a deep breath. I guess the Village as a whole could be counted as dead. I asked Val if she could summon a lot of water. She affirmed, so I started my work. I took a shovel from among the ruins and started digging. It took two days and six shovels to finish. I didn¡¯t mind hard work at this point, but my [Aura of Decay] destroying the tools was annoying. Anyway, at the end I had dug a trench around the whole Village. Next I dismantled every building, as well as the wall to make a giant pile in the middle. After all was ready, I asked Val if she had anything to say about the Village. She declined. That was fair, she didn¡¯t really have any connection to it.If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. I sat on my knees in front of the Pyre for a good hour. Thoughts were racing in my head. In the end I couldn¡¯t bring myself to mourn, not really. I felt guilty, I felt disappointed in myself, I felt hatred for the [Rangers], but I didn¡¯t feel sad. I had always dreamt about having a life filled with adventure. I had it. At least the beginnings of it. And everybody I knew paid the price. The ultimate price. However something inside me told me that I hadn¡¯t really lost anything. I wanted to leave anyway. I wanted to feel sadness, I wanted to mourn, but I didn¡¯t. Something had changed in me. I was no longer from the Village. In all honesty, and to my great shame, a tiny bit deep inside of me was glad. I had lost the strings that had bound me to this place. I was free. Free to do what I wanted, where I wanted, when I wanted. Free to fail and to succeed based on my own merit. Wasn¡¯t this what I wanted? Then why do my brain and my heart still war over whether or not I am a terrible person? Why can¡¯t anyone give me an answer? The System said I had done nothing wrong. [Avenger of Betrayal] nothing in there about rescuing or protecting someone. Skadi went in a similar direction. When I asked her she pointed at the unlit Pyre and telepathically spoke ¡®Home¡¯ and shook her head ¡®no¡¯, then she looked down and stomped on the ground between us with her paw ¡®Pack¡¯. Val just repeated her spiel about ¡®Might makes Right¡¯ and about how the weak only count, if the strong let them. Not helpful. And me? I wanted to care, I really, really did. I was pretty sure I used to care, before my life became that insane adventure. But what could I say? Was it my fault the village was destroyed? I honestly didn¡¯t know. I had the chance to rescue them, but I blew it, but I also wasn¡¯t conscious for all the murder. Maybe I am simultaneously at fault and not? I couldn''t get my head around the guilt-question, but in the end it didn¡¯t matter. Skadi has said it. Pack. Skadi and I were alone in the World. Val was there too, but she clearly is indifferent to our lives, and has ulterior motives. No, it was just Skadi and me, against the world now. I decided then and there that I would protect Skadi, whatever it may take. Not at least because I knew, if anything happened to her, then I wouldn¡¯t have to ask myself how to feel. In the end I didn¡¯t have anything to say about the Village, not for lack of trying. I asked Val to fill the trench and ignite the pyre, which she did. I stared in the flames for a long while. This felt like the right thing to do, but something was missing. I couldn¡¯t quite put my finger on it, until I looked at my hands. With the inhuman claws. With bone blades hidden in the lower arm. This body had very little to do with the James that went off with Val, to go on adventures. And even less with the hopeful [Ranger Trainee]. Then I looked into the trench, filled with water. My face ¡­ James¡¯ face looked back at me. Somehow it didn¡¯t feel like my face anymore. That boy has died somewhere along the way. I was someone different. I knew what was missing. The last person missing from the funeral. I used a claw to cut into my face. I wanted to numb myself at first, but I decided against it. After I cut a full circle I ripped my face off. It hurt worse than anything I felt before. Worse than my first transformation into a goblin, worse than my first light-explosion against Skadi. But I endured. I looked at my¡­ at the face in my hand. It was just a slab of meat. No cosmic significance, no epiphany, nothing. Still I was going to do this, whether or not it felt like it was significant to the world. It was significant to me. I threw the face on the pyre. Before I healed myself I changed my face. A mashup of all the male faces I knew. As the face began to be consumed by the flame I said: ¡°I think somewhere between falling into that cave and now, James died.¡± As I knelt there in the dirt I could feel Val wanting to say something, but she decided against it. Instead she simply rested a hand on my shoulder. On my other side Skadi snuggled under my arm. She sent a telepathic message ¡®Home¡¯ I scratched behind her ear. ¡°Yeah, this was my home.¡± She responded ¡®No. Pack is Home¡¯ for the first time in quite a while I looked away from the flame, to find Skadi looking up at me. And then I broke out into tears. All the feelings I tried to push down since my Father died started to flow out. All my training, my vengeance, my running away. It was all just a delay until this moment. It isn¡¯t cool to admit this, but I was a 17 year old boy, who just lost his home, his last parent, everyone he ever knew. Before me were endless opportunities, because behind me was nothing but ash. That was the first time I destroyed my home. That was the first time I forsook a face. That was the first time I swore that I was going to protect those closest to me, because they were all I had. Valeria to my left, Skadi to my right and the future ahead of us. I continued crying until I passed out Chapter 16 - The long trek north Chapter 16 - The long trek north When I awoke I felt a lot better. I wasn¡¯t really ¡®fine¡¯ emotionally, but our views on mental health back then were pretty backwards, so I thought better equals fixed. Anyway, I was ready to start on the next leg of my journey, in my opinion. I woke up, before Val, for once, so I decided to blow off some steam. Blowing off steam meant killing everything bigger than an insect in a two kilometre radius. I used my wolf form and I must say the hunting spree worked wonders. Nothing here posed a threat to me, in fact between my Stats and my sharpened senses from my Companion-Bond, nothing could hide or run from me either. I hunted on autopilot, letting my mind wander a bit. Obviously I didn¡¯t allow myself to think about any of the heavy topics that were weighing me down. Repression was the name of the game, so I thought about Shapeshifting stuff. I settled on the topic of how to integrate blades in a quadrupedal form. If I let them come out straight, I would just be stabbing the ground. There wasn¡¯t really a way to do this properly, but I did think of a workaround. The main weapon of a wolf is its head, well teeth, so why not enhance that? I started by making blades along my spine and channels up to the sides of my head, ending just before the jaw starts. I was essentially designing tusks. Wolf-tusks. To be honest I didn¡¯t really think of any practical application for this. Maybe some kind of full frontal charge? But even then a bite would probably be superior. Welp. That¡¯s why it¡¯s called experimentation. Also the whole process occupied my mind wonderfully. After a few hours of playing death incarnate, I returned to the pyre. Val and Skadi were awake now and already packing. Well ¡­ Val was, Skadi was standing around, observing Val. Without looking away from her packing, Val greeted me: ¡°Got your head clear?¡± ¡°Somewhat. Anyway, I am ready to head north. How long will that take us?¡± I replied, after changing back into a furry human. I was down to two minutes. I mean, I could do it in an instant, but that was excruciating. Not that the normal way was pleasant. ¡°Somewhere around two weeks. It depends really, there are a few things I want us to do during the trip.¡± ¡°Like what?¡± I asked while handing Skadi a rabbit I kept for her. She happily dug into the carcass. ¡°Well for one I think you should start to get some poison in your repertoire, I know a place en route that is teeming with venomous snakes, so that would be the perfect place for that. Especially since you are immune to poison. The other thing would just be to take things slowly, when we start to get into the more dangerous areas. I would advise only leaving an area, if nothing can challenge you in it. Especially since that should be really to your classes liking.¡± She was probably onto something there, since¡­
Congratulations! For having established absolute dominance over an area, you have gained a level in [Aspiring Apex](lvl 13). Stats have been distributed
¡°Hey speaking of. How should I distribute my free points?¡± I asked, since I now had twelve of the buggers. ¡°Keep ten in reserve for an emergency, or if you NEED to break through some threshold. The rest should go to your lowest stats. Make sure you aren¡¯t too unbalanced. Every stat is important for everyone.¡± That advice was easy enough to follow.
Statistics:
Strength+5=> 66
Agility+5=> 84
Constitution+6=> 87
Endurance+5=> 85
Intelligence+3=> 50
Willpower+6=>Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. 77
Wisdom+4=> 63
Charisma+3+2=> 50
Free Points+4-2=> 10
Now I was officially five times the man I was two months ago. I chuckled at the situation for a bit, then I started helping Val with the packing. At the end Val made all the luggage disappear into her whatever-it-is. She wouldn¡¯t tell me. It took about three days to reach the snake area, obviously it wasn¡¯t an area full of snakes, that is not how an ecological system works, but there were venomous snakes here. Snakes aren¡¯t particularly fast and venom was of no matter to me, so the only challenging thing was actually finding the things. My [Perception] got quite the workout. In any case the outcome was inevitable. After two days and 30-something dead snakes I finally managed to replicate the Venom, or rather the Venom gland. The positioning for them was somewhat difficult, since arms don¡¯t have a lot of space for organs, so I decided to put them in my shoulders and connect them to my claws via my blades. Essentially I flooded the resting place of my blades with venom, and then connected that sheath with my claws further down. Venom I create is just as susceptible to my mana manipulation as my blood is, so I didn¡¯t lose anything by not shooting my blood everywhere. I had the following realisation only when I had been back on the road for a few days, but I am going to share it now. Blood has one advantage over Venome. Namely that blood isn¡¯t venomous. Yeah, I know. Great revelation over here. But seriously, if I wanted to not kill my target, I would need to go back to blood somehow. For simplicity¡¯s sake I just had my left hand remain the blood hand, while the claws on my right got the new venom. In my wolf form I simply pumped venom in my mouth. I was immune to it, and if I bit something it would definitely get into the wound. Of course I got the perfect help for this cause, just as I was clearing out the last nest, I wanted to hit for the day.
Congratulations! For proving your dominance to an entire species, you have gained a level in [Aspiring Apex](lvl 14). You have gained the Class Perk [Hunger of the Apex]. Stats have been distributed
[Hunger of the Apex] The Apex grows more versatile with each consumed foe. You gain knowledge of the internal workings of a creature whenever you consume it. Once you have sufficient knowledge, there is a small chance to absorb a racial Perk of your target.
Statistics:
Strength+5=> 71
Agility+5=> 89
Constitution+6=> 93
Endurance+5=> 90
Intelligence+3+3=> 55
Willpower+6=> 83
Wisdom+4=> 67
Charisma+3+2=> 55
Free Points+4-4=> 10
As I said that would have been useful, but no sense in crying over spilt milk.
[Perception]+8=> 25
[Serpentine Anatomy]+15=> 15
[Stealth]+4=> 25
[Tracking]+5=> 16
This Perk did change the plan a bit. Val agreed to postpone our departure, until I was able to assume a new form. The threshold for the goblin form was somewhere in the 30s. On the other hand, my wolf form took almost nothing, thanks to my class. That was all useless speculation, so I decided to hunt for one more day and attempt the new form in the evening.
[Serpentine Anatomy]+6=> 21
That would have to be enough. I tried to turn into a snake, and sure enough it worked. I took my time and spread the transformation out over 30 minutes that way the pain was not that bad. Once I was finished I noticed that I had more biomass than before. The [Biomass] Perk did indeed make it so that mass is no longer lost upon changing into something lighter. I spent the next three hours changing back and forth between human and snake. The conversion wasn¡¯t perfect, after the third transformation I noticed that my reserves were dwindling over all. Dwindling faster than the usual upkeep that is. Still I was elated. I had unlocked a new form, I had a new design for fangs, and I now had confirmation that I didn¡¯t necessarily have to keep in the same weight category thanks to [Biomass]. Say what you want, about eldritch beings, their power sure was handy. It is a shame I didn¡¯t get a racial perk from the Snakes, but we couldn¡¯t stall forever. We set off the next day, the first half of which I spent riding on Skadi¡¯s head as the great Snek-Lord Wolfrider. Until Skadi became annoyed with me and I turned back into a human. The next interesting thing happened on day nine of our journey. A bear attacked me. Chapter 17 - The Bar has been raised Chapter 17 - The Bar has been raised I was walking along in human form to chat with Val, I hadn¡¯t yet figured out how to talk with a wolf head. It started when I heard the sound of distressed wood, that creaking sound, when wood moves in a way it really doesn¡¯t want to. Before I could turn towards the source of the sound, I could feel distress and pain from Skadi through our telepathic bond. Then I heard what sounded like a giant clapping his hands. I just barely managed to catch a Brown bear, the size of a carriage swatting Skadi away like I would a fly. She flew away into the forest, only the fact our connection was still ongoing reassured me that she wasn¡¯t dead. Luckily I had started extending my blades the moment I felt distress from Skadi, that way I barely managed to stop the giant paw coming down on me, by stabbing through it and bracing my fists against the bear¡¯s strength. I actually managed to hold the paw. We were in a stalemate. After a few tense seconds I decided to dump my ten free points into Strength, giving me 81. I started to overpower the bear with this newfound boost, but then a red mist started to form around the beast''s eyes and I couldn¡¯t hold it anymore. My legs began to buckle, so I decided to flee forward. I commanded my blades to break at the knuckle and burn. In the precise moment I was no longer connected to the blades I attempted a dive forward underneath the bear. I managed to not be flattened, but the bear still got my right foot with its descending paw. There was nothing to do, the foot was gone, my lower leg bone broken off and sticking out of my flesh. Now that I was underneath this monster I needed to think fast. First I spun 180¡ã to face upwards, then I sunk my claws into the bear''s belly and pulled myself up from the ground. Next I started to pump as much blood and venom into this thing, as I could. Simultaneously I tried to close the wounds on my leg, while sharpening the protruding bone to a point. I used said bone as a help when climbing between the beast''s hind legs, up its butt and onto its back. The only reason I wasn¡¯t immediately squished was because I caused the hind legs to cramp, forcing them to stand straight, instead of belly-flopping me into mush. Even that was a struggle. This was one of the few creatures I had encountered so far that I couldn¡¯t disable through [Infectious Mana Manipulation]. Even the little trick I was doing right now didn¡¯t have a chance, if the bear wasn¡¯t distracted by the burning thing in its paw and the poison running through its veins. Once I was on its - his, after a trip through the legs I can say that with certainty, his - back I started hacking away at him with abandon, tearing flesh where I could, and freely pouring blood and venom into the open wounds. I even shapeshifted my head into a wolven one, so I could bite the bastard. This one-sidedness, of the battle didn¡¯t last long. The bear pushed off the ground with his front paws, with such force that I could barely react before the bear was finished making a sandwich out of him, me and the ground by way of slamming onto his back. I managed to mostly get out before that, but the bear got my left arm. It was torn off at the shoulder due to the bear''s raw mass, ripping at my appendage. That thing weighed half a metric tonne on the low end. I was losing this fight, by attrition alone, but the bear had made a mistake, because it was now on its back. I was too, but I was a lot more flexible. I swung my right arm to my left side and my claws into the bear¡¯s flank, to pull myself up with the bear as leverage. Then I pushed off the ground with my left foot to jump onto the bear. When I landed, I impaled the bear''s right shoulder with my sharpened leg bone. Once I was secured that way, I shoved my entire right arm down the bear''s throat, making sure to scratch all of his mouth open on the way down. Once my hand hit the back of the bear¡¯s throat, I turned my claws towards the roof of his mouth and tried to pierce it. It took all my strength, but eventually my claws were stuck in something. I just hoped they were actually through the bone, because I pumped as much venom out of my claws as I could. Once they were about halfway empty, I could feel the pressure on my arm increasing. The bear was realising what was going on and trying to bite my arm off. The bastard could have it. I commanded everything in my arm to heat. Not ¡®burn¡¯, mind you. That was fire and forget. Heating something was a continuous process, and more importantly, could get way, way, WAY hotter than fire. When the bear finally severed my arm, I was already using my newfound freedom of movement to bite at the bear¡¯s skull. I wasn¡¯t doing much more than tearing off skin, but with the venom in my saliva, every open wound made a significant difference. It took the bear almost three seconds after I shoved my fist in his mouth, until it started to bite down, so my venom was definitely having some effect. My arm trick also seemed to have been effective, as I got the distinct impression that the bear is in unimaginable pain, not to forget that I could see smoke escaping from his mouth and nostrils. Speaking of which, the red mist around his eyes had disappeared. So I should be stronger than him again. If that truly was the cause of his increase in strength. Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. I couldn¡¯t do much without arms, even if I were technically stronger once again. As the bear once again tried to move, I jumped away from him and shapeshifted into a snake to hide, and give the venom time to work. That didn¡¯t quite pan out, as I couldn¡¯t hide. That isn¡¯t a commentary on the bear¡¯s senses. I simply became paralysed by the mental and physical anguish of what I was trying to do. Turning into a snake from a human inside one second is bad enough, if you aren¡¯t simultaneously sustaining a heating effect on an arm, which is rapidly fading from your control. And ¡­ you know ¡­ already in immense physical pain. So I lay there, my little snake body unable to move, because my reality is replaced with pain. After minutes of anguish, and very noticeably not being eaten, I was finally able to perceive my surroundings once more. The Bear was still on its back, breathing shallowly. It was finished. I had done enough damage that the bear was beaten. It was only a question of time, until the venom gave him the rest. I took my sweet time, turning back into a human. And almost as much time, to reconstruct my arms and right leg. Then I walked up to the bear and pierced his brain with my blades. It didn¡¯t need to suffer any more than it already had. I didn¡¯t have any remorse, as I once had with Skadi. Skadi attacked me, because she was hungry and scared. Also I attacked first, when I burned her. This bear hurt Skadi, which should be enough for me to end him, and attacked me unprovoked. This thing had wanted a fight to the death and I had given it to him. Thinking of Skadi, I sent her a telepathic message, asking how she is. She responded with Fine, coming. On her way back then. As I was pulling my blades out of the bear¡¯s skull, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I was still twitchy from the fight, so I turned around and tried to stab whatever was behind me with my blades, still covered in flesh and blood. Luckily Val caught my attack. She was of course behind me. The strength with which she held my arm broke no discussion, whether or not I could really hurt her. Valeria gave me a reassuring smile and said: ¡°Congratulations, you just defeated your first actual challenge.¡± I wanted to object, but she beat me to it: ¡°No a bunch of [Rangers], barely in the double digit levels and some braindead goblins don¡¯t count. We are out of that sheltered zone now. This is where the real fun begins.¡± ¡°Wait, how exactly was the village a ¡®sheltered zone¡¯? What makes this place so different?¡± ¡°Well, for one: anything really powerful would have to move out of there, because the creatures around wouldn¡¯t have enough vital energy to sustain it. Also for two: life begets more life. Things breed, things compete. Natural selection will ensure the powerful and the adaptable get to breed, then their children have an advantage. Then they die, they seep into the soil, the plants get stronger from that, and eventually the power increase will reach even the prey animals, when they consume stronger plants. It is a cycle that ensures power is continuously increasing in an area, without foreign intervention, like a forest fire, or humans controlling the population. If something gets too strong too fast, then they must leave, or starve. That way you don¡¯t have a ¡®king of the forest type situation¡®. That is also why your class talks about ¡®dominating Areas/ Species¡¯ instead of ruling them. In the wild there are no kings, only beasts you try to not draw attention from.¡± I thought about that for a moment. I went to cut off a piece of the bear, when I thought of a question: ¡°So are beasts like this common around here? Is this the new version of those rabbits I used to hunt?¡± Val wiggled her hand in a so-so-motion. ¡°Kinda. There are still prey animals around, of course. But this bear isn¡¯t anything out of the ordinary. Like top five species in the region for sure, but this one wasn¡¯t out of the ordinary. Also the question about common isn¡¯t that easy. There is no abundance of them, or anything, but with your [Challenge of the Apex] any of them will charge you, the minute they sense you in any way. Bears aren¡¯t known for fleeing or bowing. So essentially, you will see quite a few of them even if they are rare-ish.¡± That meant I should be a lot more vigilant. Can¡¯t be on my back foot, or lack thereof, next time a fur tank charges me. I still had the piece of bear meat on my claw, so I took a bite. It was the best thing I had ever tasted. I could feel the vital energy flowing into me and it was ecstasy. In half an hour I had devoured almost the entire thing. Skadi managed to get one leg, when she returned. Skadi was actually still chewing on her meal, when I was entirely finished. Thanks to [Biomass] I apparently couldn¡¯t really be full anymore. Or at least an entire bear wasn¡¯t enough to fill me up. Sure I wasn¡¯t hungry anymore, but I could definitely go for even more of that delicious stuff. Maybe attracting those bears wouldn¡¯t just be a dangerous chore. Chapter 18 - Routine fights to the death Chapter 18 - Routine fights to the death The second time a Bear charged us, we were lucky. It did so in plain sight. From the front. That was when I realised why we didn¡¯t notice the last one until it was almost too late. These things can apparently project an area of silence around themselves. That¡¯s why we couldn¡¯t hear the last one¡¯s charge. Since we could brace for this bear, the fight went a lot differently. Skadi and I rolled out of the bear''s way and proceeded to hit-and-run it to death. Skadi would feint an attack, prompting the bear to defend. Then I would try to get in one good slash or stab with my venom coated blades. When we weren¡¯t actively attacking we would keep our distance and use the uneven terrain to our advantage, to stay out of the bear¡¯s reach. In hindsight it was very dumb of me to try and have a strength contest with a literal bear. Anyway we dispatched of this specimen with minimal losses, just a few scrapes and near-misses, really. My venom is quite potent, when we actually give it time to work. Although I sadly couldn¡¯t really get a grip on the bears internal Mana, until it was almost dead from the Venom anyways. From then on we knew to keep our heads on a swivel the moment we noticed a lack of sound. A forest isn¡¯t ever quiet, usually. Skadi and I killed and devoured ten bears over the next seven days. It was hard work, but the rewards were pretty great.
[Athletics]+4=> 39
[Gymnastics]+3=> 35
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+2=> 27
[Perception]+4=> 29
[Natural Weapons]+3=> 43
[Ursine Anatomy]+22=> 22
[Hunger of the Apex] seemed to scale with mass, or maybe ¡®vital energy¡¯. I needed a lot more than ten snakes to get my [Serpentine Anatomy] to the 15 it currently stands.
Congratulations! For repeatedly fending off challengers to your supremacy you have gained a level in [Aspiring Apex](lvl 15). You have gained the class Perk [Challenge of the Apex]. Error ¡­ Perk already present. Searching for replacement ¡­ searching ¡­ searching ¡­ no replacement found. Unprecedented problem. Forwarding to Administrator.
¡°You little shit!¡± I heard a familiar voice yell. As expected, the next time I blinked I found myself in the white void with the Ken-doll in front of me. ¡°Hi, there!¡± I gave him a little wave. ¡°Oh, shove it up your ass.¡± He took a deep breath ¡°I am sorry. That was uncalled for, I don¡¯t even know if this was your fault. Just try to understand that I am under a lot of stress right now. You making contact with an elder god was not PART OF MY PLAN, GODDAMMIT.¡± He was shouting the last bit. He took another deep breath. And another. And then three more, until with something approaching calm, he told me ¡°Please, in your own words, tell me how and why you are here. I make a point out of hearing every case, before I go through the logs.¡± I had no Idea what trees had to do with anything, but I told him my story. ¡°I reached level 15 in [Aspiring Apex] and it tried to give me the Perk [Challenge of the Apex], but I already had that Perk. Then it said something about searching for a replacement but it didn¡¯t find one. Something about an ¡®Unprecedented Problem¡¯. Then it said ¡®Forwarding to administrator¡¯ I guess that¡¯s you?¡± ¡°Yes, that is me. How did you already have the Perk exactly?¡± ¡°Oh, it used to be called [Unappetizing] a personal Perk. It evolved when I chose my new class.¡± ¡°Alright, thank you. Now wait a minute.¡± He looked as If he were reading a book, but his hands were empty. He even turned an imaginary page every now and then. After a minute or two he closed the ¡®Book¡¯ with one hand and looked at me. ¡°OK, I have the facts now. [Challenge of the Apex] is what we call a Milestone-Perk. It is awarded to every [Aspiring Apex] at level 15. Unlike other class Perks it isn¡¯t dependent on how you reached that level, so there wasn¡¯t an easy candidate for replacement. It shouldn¡¯t be possible for you to gain a milestone-Perk from a personal one, but that would be the influence of that eldritch cunt. Anyway we need a solution here.¡± He looked me up and down, before he said: ¡°You know what? Even though you are a pain in my side, I can respect the fact that you have in no way intended to be this annoying. Also you accepted my deal without being a major annoyance before, so I am willing to cut you some slack. What would you like to have for a perk? Be reasonable though.¡± I thought about that for a second. The one thing I really needed was some way to heal myself in a fight. I was pretty hardy by this point, but I couldn¡¯t spare the mental energy to restore an arm, for example, when it gets ripped off. That almost killed me during my first encounter with a bear. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it I told the administrator as much. He stroked his chin for a few seconds, then he said ¡°How about this?¡±
You have been offered the personal Perk [Regeneration]. Do you accept?
[Regeneration] You may spend stored up Biomass to undo injuries and wounds upon your body.
¡°Yes, that would be perfect, thank you!¡± the administrator gave me a surprisingly honest smile at my exclamation. Then that smile started to sour as we stared at each other. Finally the administrator said: ¡°Hey buddy, are you going to accept or what?¡± ¡°Oh yeah, I forgot about that.¡± I tried to pass it off with a laugh, but he seemed unamused. I remembered the procedure from last time, so I started with that. I shaped my Internal mana to spell out ¡®YES¡¯. And then nothing happened. ¡°Are you going to do it or not?¡± He asked, barley constraining the anger in his voice ¡°I am doing it! I don¡¯t know why it doesn¡¯t work.¡± I shuffled the mana around, to imitate different fonts, but still nothing. The administrator pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers. ¡°Last time was a shortcut that worked because you already gave verbal acknowledgement.¡± He breathed deeply ¡°Say that you accept out loud, then do the mana thing!¡± ¡°I accept the perk.¡± I was suddenly back in the forest. Now I could finally finish my notifications.
Statistics:
Strength+5=> 86
Agility+5=> 94
Constitution+6=> 99
Endurance+5=> 95
Intelligence+3=> 58
Willpower+6=> 89
Wisdom+4=> 71
Charisma+3=> 58
Free Points+4=> 4
[Regeneration] has been absorbed by [Touched by the Eldritch]. New Perk is being created. You have gained the personal Perk [The Flesh obeys]
[The Flesh obeys] Your flesh yearns for its form. Biomass will be continuously consumed towards regaining your chosen form, while your Body does not match it.
I had no idea what the difference was. Also I was somewhat distracted at the time, because the administrator was continuously screaming obscenities in my ear. 30 minutes later: I learned a few interesting things. For one the word for Cunt in sixteen different languages. And for two that my new perk is very passionate about the whole ¡°chosen Form¡± thing. I start to think about a Form and I immediately have to stop myself, as my flesh and bones start to shift. This does not hurt any less than the usual method by the way. At my prompting Val cut off an arm, and sure enough my flesh started to fill out the silhouette until it was complete. Including my blades, claws and venom interestingly enough. All of that took like five seconds at most. I would like to have experimented a bit more with that, but after a very brief excitement my flesh started to grow my ears shut. Sadly this did not silence the administrator. I decided not to give him the satisfaction, so I started eating the bear while humming a happy tune. I am not even sure whether he is really mad at me. The expletives cycled through at least a dozen languages and the one I understood included pretty much every living thing in the forest in his vitriol. According to Val, he took exactly 31 minutes and 52 seconds until he finally stopped. For fucks sake, I couldn¡¯t be much more annoying to him, then he was to me. But that didn¡¯t matter, I finally had some peace and quiet. Wait! Too quiet! And like that, I was thrown by a bear paw, just like Skadi had been the first time, only she hadn¡¯t been impaled on a tree branch. I don¡¯t mean a twig, I am talking about a 30 centimetre diameter hole in my abdomen. I was severely pissed off, until I thought about Skadi. I had to help her. I had to get off this tree branch and onto the floor. Oh shit! I was like 5 metres in the air. Nothing about this was going to be pleasant. First and foremost I started to fall right after looking down. [The Flesh obeys] had tried to heal through the tree, while [Internal Immunity] dissolved the wood as it was ¡®inside me¡¯. Great, I had that covered. Now I was in freefall. I needed to think about recovering from the imminent impact and ¡­ fuck! The rest of the tree branch was right above me! I tried to change my trajectory mid-fall, but only succeeded in landing on my shoulder, rather than my back. The damage was moderate, but the falling branch would not be. At least I managed to push off the ground enough to where the branch wouldn¡¯t immediately flatten me. Instead it just flattened my legs. I think at this point I don¡¯t have to tell you that this hurts like a bitch and a half. However the Flesh does indeed obey. I was up and running inside ten seconds. Oh and I was also furious. In retrospect I almost feel bad for the bear, since it had really come at a bad time for me. Or I would feel bad for it, if it weren¡¯t dead already. How the hell was it dead already? ¡°Surprise!¡± I heard Val yell, accompanied by a low howl from Skadi ¡°What the fuck is happening right now? I am so goddamn confused.¡± I asked with an exasperated sigh. Val had a goofy grin on her face ¡°I have been coaching Skadi on the side. Your bond makes it easier for her to learn stuff, you already know. So this¡± she pointed at the dead bear, lying in a pool of its own blood ¡°is her first major kill using [Infectious Mana Manipulation].¡± I stared at the girl for a second before asking: ¡°How did she manage that? I can barely affect them after like half a litre of venom.¡± ¡°Yes, that actually is a teachable moment. You should really go for the weak points more. Those offer the most damage potential. In some cases even emotional damage.¡± ¡°What do you mean like the throat? The Eyes?¡± I was puzzled by this. Val shook her head no, and pointed down with her finger ¡°Lower.¡± she said. It took me a few seconds until it clicked. And sure enough the pool of blood seemed to be centred around the bear¡¯s hind legs. Ok, Skadi was getting extra cuddles for the foreseeable future. One could never be reminded often enough to NEVER DO THAT TO MY BITS. I am pretty sure they shrank in fear, because of [The Flesh obeys]. I really needed to get a grip on that Perk. Chapter 19 - Calm Chapter 19 - Calm After the big revelations of the last day, we finally started to reach a somewhat stable state. We were still attacked by bears at least once a day, but at this point, they didn¡¯t really pose a threat. They kept us on our toes, but we weren¡¯t seriously hurt in any of the altercations. To be fair, with [The Flesh obeys] and all the stored up biomass, I would have to have my head smashed, or be in battle for hours on end to really get hurt. Speaking of that Perk, we did some more experimenting with it. For one it seriously increased my biomass upkeep, since it would always adjust some minor thing. Originally I had thought it Interacted with [Prepared Form], but that wasn¡¯t quite right. It was more like subconscious shapeshifting. I would think about how Val¡¯s nose looked a little sharper than mine, then my nose would hurt, and then I would have a nose just like hers. It was actually really annoying. For two it also reacted to my emotions. Val cast some manipulation spells, to induce emotions in me. Anger made me bigger, sadness made me smaller, fear wasn¡¯t actually what made my bits shrink yesterday. It was terror. Fear made my muscles grow in my legs. All of these effects were somewhat containable, but they were noticeable ¡®mood-indicators¡¯ when you knew what to look for. The really freaky thing was when I became hungry though. Not in the empty stomach way. The ¡®Oh that looks delicious¡¯ way. I once didn¡¯t immediately start to eat a dead bear, because Val wanted to talk about something - the bear had rudely interrupted us - but she didn¡¯t get to finish a single sentence, because she noticed my Flesh was reaching for the carcass. Literally. Patches of my skin would form a mini-limb, stretching in the direction of the feast. Again, I could contain this, if I made a conscious effort, but it was weird. That brings me to the next point we discussed. That whole eldritch thing, which apparently was the same as an ¡®elder god¡¯, the administrator and Val used both terms for the tentacle thing. The Administrator seemed incredibly annoyed with them, Val however was much more relaxed: ¡°They are incomprehensible beings from beyond time and space. Worrying about them is like worrying about a meteor hitting your head. Granted in your case you should watch out about interacting with them, since you seem to have their interest. They could break your mind out of boredom, or because they overestimate how much you can handle, or just by accident. You never know how much they are involved with anything. It could be one of them is invested in you specifically and has carefully crafted a story you should play through. Or maybe some of them thought it would be funny to give you a perk, that messes with the system and watch what happens next, or maybe someone is just using you to mess with the administrator. I really don¡¯t know. No one CAN know, really. Maybe some Perks you get ¡®changed¡¯ in the future have a clue in their description? Although even that could be misdirection. In truth it is just impossible to know. For now I would suggest you don¡¯t think about it. You can¡¯t possibly know what the ¡®Entertainment¡¯ in your Perk is supposed to refer to, so don¡¯t try to fulfil it. You are either entertaining or you are not. You can¡¯t know or influence which one.¡± Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit. Not really a satisfying answer, but I understood that Val couldn¡¯t know everything. At least she wasn¡¯t mad at me for consorting with elder gods, or anything similar. All in all I enjoyed the time being. We fought, but it wasn¡¯t really life and death, I mean it was, a few missed steps and we would end up dead, I didn¡¯t want to test my Perk against a bear¡¯s digestion, but it was a relaxing kind of life and death fight. Am I making sense? No? Anyway that¡¯s how I felt at the time. I knew I was in mortal danger, but I never felt in mortal danger. Also Skadi and I got into a rhythm when fighting together. I devoured several metric tonnes of delicious meat. It was fun. In a weird way, but I had given up on normalcy when I cut off my own face. At the very latest. Things started to change, when we reached the ¡®True North¡¯, as Val called it. The border was marked by snow. It started to snow when Valeria said we were in the north. It should only be early Autumn, so the weather had to be connected to the location. The other change was when the secondary effect of my [Hunger of the Apex] Perk finally triggered on bear 25.
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+3=> 28
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+1=> 62
[Perception]+3=> 28
[Shapeshifting]+2=> 38
[Natural Weapons]+2=> 42
[Ursine Anatomy]+14=> 36
[Hunger of the Apex] has absorbed a racial Perk from this creature. You are granted the personal Perk [Berserk Rage]
[Berserk Rage] You may go into a berserk Rage. In this state you are filled with anger and your Strength Stat is doubled. In return all your other Stats are reduced by half. This Perk may be turned on and off at will. Going into or out of a berserk Rage takes five seconds. The bonuses and maluses linearly grow/diminish over those five seconds.
I was very excited for this Perk, but after a few fights I realised that having all your Stats halved wasn¡¯t really a thing you wanted in a fight. On the other hand, the Perk was free and I was sure I was going to get some use out of it. Once we were deep enough in the north to actually have a snow covering on the floor I spied another interesting thing. Human footprints. We had found some form of Civilization. Chapter 20 - Before Chapter 20 - Before It was time to give my [Ranger] training to some use. I followed the tracks carefully. It looked like about five humans and three or four quadrupeds. After following the tracks for about two hours I heard what sounded like a bear in battle. I made sure I wasn¡¯t being charged and kept moving forward. As I suspected five humans and four wolves were fighting a bear. I made sure to hide behind a tree and observe the fight from a distance. The wolves were in the front, keeping the bear back, while the humans were using ranged attacks. That is three humans were throwing spears, while the other two were just strangely staring at the bear. I presumed they were casting spells. What was sort of weird was that the humans were wearing clothes made from wolf pelts. I guessed there was a number of wolves that would die anyway and using their skin seemed practical, however the thought of wearing wolf skin while hunting with wolves gave me the shivers. It just seemed so wrong on a gut level. Anyway, the group managed to put down the bear swiftly and efficiently. Whatever the spellcasters did must have been very effective, as the bear was even more sluggish, than after being filled with my venom. After the bear was downed they started to cut up and skin the animal. After they finished, one of them yelled in my direction, making a cone with his hands: ¡°You can come out of hiding, we see you.¡± So much for stealth. Everything being stronger here also applied to [Perception] as it seemed. Sheepishly I stepped out from behind the tree. Skadi also came around from her hiding place. One of the humans, a man with wild hair and a scraggly beard, gave a short whistle and said: ¡°What a beautiful creature. How much?¡± I didn¡¯t get what he was asking ¡°How much what?¡± ¡°I wanna buy your wolf. How much for her?¡± ¡°She isn¡¯t my property. I am not selling her.¡± I crossed my arms, as I was getting kind of pissed at this guy. He put on a fake looking smile and told me ¡°Listen kid! This here is our part of the forest. Any Wolf here is our property. I am being nice by offering some compensation. We could just take her.¡± This guy wanted it. I extended my blades and said: ¡°Try.¡± His smile became wider as he said ¡°OK.¡± and snapped his finger. Instantly I felt pain. More pain than ever before. It is hard to describe, but imagine red hot needles with fish hooks being repeatedly stabbed and withdrawn from your genitals. Only it is all over your body, mind and (somehow) soul. I crumbled to the floor. I couldn¡¯t feel, or hear, or see, or think anything but the pain. It was all encompassing. There was nothing but pain. I had felt pain before, but not only was it never this harsh, but it was never this holistic. Everything hurt. EVERYTHING. There was no point in differentiating the kind of pain I was feeling, because pain had stopped being a sensation, and started being my only reality. It was that bad.
You have been beaten. [Aspiring Apex] will not level up, until you have defeated those that defeated you. Should you get beaten again, without remedying your loss, you will lose your class.
I awoke an indeterminate amount of time later. I was lying on the floor with tears on my face. If I had still been capable of such things I am sure I would have soiled myself and thrown up. Val was standing over me. ¡°Before you do anything stupid. They took Skadi, but she is alive and well-ish. They won¡¯t kill her, they will be trying to tame her. That gives you quite a lot of time.¡± I hadn¡¯t even thought about that. I needed to rescue Skadi. I let the encounter pass through my mind once again. I couldn¡¯t hide from them, they had seen me from far off, while I was trying to hide. They obviously weren¡¯t going to be persuaded by me, so that was also a dud. Could I have fought them? No. Actually, now that I think of it, why am I still alive? They could have killed me. Even with [The Flesh obeys], I was going to run out of Biomass eventually and since I couldn¡¯t defend myself, so it would have been a matter of time. I could have died. I could have died. My life was in their hands. Stolen story; please report. This was the first time I truly grappled with my own mortality. Ironically at the point I thought I had become unbeatable. I spent a long time lying on the floor just thinking about death. How it was luck, or mercy that made me still take a breath right now. I had ¡®died¡¯ twice before, according to [Hard to kill], but that didn¡¯t feel that bad. In those cases I would have died, if I didn¡¯t have that perk, but since I do have it I wasn¡¯t really at death¡¯s door. Now though? Now I may as well be dead right now. I thought about death. And I realised something. I was absolutely terrified of death. Real honest terror was washing through me in increasing waves. I couldn¡¯t stop thinking about the cold oblivion of death. My Village used to believe, that the dead souls merged with the forest. I never really bought that. Now my lack of faith proved to be a real handicap. My thoughts kept on spiralling. The terror now visible, as [The Flesh obeys] shrunk my body more and more, which fed the vicious cycle even more. The pain of shapeshifting, even involuntary, reminded me of my helpless state, which made me shrink more. I was locked in a spiral of existential terror. Luckily I had a mentor with me. Val slapped my face and said: ¡°You need to get your shit together! Skadi is in danger!¡± That woke me up. She was right. Skadi was in danger and I had sworn to protect her. My terror slowly changed into anger. These lesser beasts have attacked me. How dare they? I will not let this stand. Every one of those five will be put to death. I will see to it. This disrespect will not stand. Not before the APEX. Then my thoughts continued onwards, my anger turning into white hot rage. They attacked my pack, my family! They will not be put to death, that would be far too merciful. I swore to protect Skadi, so I will make all of them pay. If Skadi is held in a settlement, then all residents are guilty of not releasing her. I will not rest, until all of them are erased from history. Lastly the practical side of me chimed in and my hot rage turned into cold hatred. There will be no sacrifice to great. Skadi will be free, her captors will wish for death. I thought about the next steps. I had to overcome this pain, they could inflict. But how? Well, I know a bit about how the System operates. I resolved myself to the fact that the next part was going to suck. ¡°Val, how much can you hurt someone?¡± ¡°Are you asking, what I am thinking you¡¯re asking?¡± ¡°Valeria, I need you to torture me, until I can withstand what they did.¡± With a resigned expression she gave me a sigh and said: ¡°This is going to suck. But at least I know I chose right with you.¡± Valerias POV: Val was ecstatic. She couldn¡¯t show it, of course, but she was overjoyed. James had a near miss, with existential dread there, but he had pulled through and the journey of his thoughts she could read in his eyes was perfect. The arrogance of thinking you could take on an entire village by yourself, combined with the pragmatism to first seek immunity from their main source of control, was just the mixture Val was looking for. Monstrous in attitude, reasonable in thinking. Perfect. Val agreed with James¡¯ plan to torture him while sparring. It was the quickest way to raise your tolerance, if you can withstand it, that is. She was also glad that James was too filled with hatred to even think about Stealth. Sure, they had good [Perception], but a tiny snake in the snow was still basically invisible. Her little monster didn¡¯t consider any of that. He just wanted to slaughter them too much. She would have to teach some proper stealth skills at a later date, but right now it was more important for James to continue his path toward a shapeshifting engine of destruction and carnage. Subtlety could be added to his repertoire later. Val was somewhat sympathetic towards James¡¯ priorities that being:
  1. Save Skadi
  2. Kill
  3. Sleep?
Val chuckled internally at her own joke. In reality though, she may be cold, but she would still regret it if Skadi died. She had grown to like that pup. Anyway, onto training. The kind of spell the Tribesmen had used was easy enough for her to replicate. A third tier illusion spell that flooded the senses of a target with pain. Crude but effective. Valeria could literally cast such a spell all day without stopping. So she did. She slowly increased the spells power. Always just above the threshold where James could handle the pain. They were sparing during this whole process, as James wanted to be able to fight under such amounts of pain. Val allowed James a one hour break every eight hours to communicate with Skadi, making sure she was still safe. She was. The tribe was trying to make themselves seem like allies. Luckley Skadi was way too smart for such an approach. It took over a week. Nine days to be exact. At the end of the ninth day James suddenly stood up straight during the torture-sparing. Then his eyes glowed green, his flesh rippled and he fell over. James¡¯ POV:
Congratulations! For enduring enough pain to break a normal person¡¯s mind several dozen times over you have gained the personal Perk [The Pain stops]
[The Pain stops] The torture is over. You may now numb yourself to any kind of pain ¡­Oh no. That would be boring. You get something more fun.
[Touched by the Eldritch] has absorbed [The Pain stops]. You have gained the personal Perk [The Pain ebbs]
[The Pain ebbs] Pain has become an old friend. You are unable to numb yourself to pain, but you may store it. Stored pain need not be felt immediately, instead you can exert a mental effort to contain it. The more pain, the harder the effort. The pain will be felt when the mental effort drops, it will be magnified by 20% for every hour delayed.
Now go forth and slaughter them, Apex.
I could delay the pain? That wasn¡¯t perfect, but it would allow me to slaughter my enemies. I would take it. I wasn¡¯t even mad at the eldritch ones. Who knows? Maybe the rest of [The Pain stops]¡¯s description would have included some caveat that would have prevented my rescue operation. I didn¡¯t know and I didn¡¯t care. I had my tools, and now I was going to go to work. I stood up and looked at Val. She had a questioning expression on her face. I told her: ¡°I am ready.¡± Chapter 21 - The Chapter 21 - The Val made me prove that I had conquered pain. A quick sparring session later she dropped the spell. Finally! ¡°Now, how are you going to rescue Skadi? I want to hear a plan of attack.¡± I thought about it for a moment. Just because I could stand pain didn¡¯t mean I could defeat the entire tribe. ¡°I¡¯ll stalk their hunting parties, thin them out.¡± Val nodded ¡°Good start. But at some point they will hunker down. At best they¡¯ll think some ravenous monster is in the area and wait for it to pass. At worst they¡¯ll figure out it is you.¡± ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll get a bear form down and hunt as a wolf, snake or bear. No human traces.¡± ¡°Good. And after they hunker down?¡± I went with the first idea that popped into my head ¡°Use the forest against them. Maybe cause a stampede somehow?¡± I wasn¡¯t entirely sure how. I should be able to get a lot of animals moving in one direction by making a lot of noise. I was confident wild animals would break around the resistance eventually, but it would serve as an explosive opening. The question was how I could get them to actually attack the tribe and not move around it. As I was pondering this, Val already had a solution: ¡°I can give you illusory instructions on herding them. Your plan has a decent chance of succeeding. I approve.¡± Great. Now for step one. Bear form. I had enough knowledge of bears, I just hadn¡¯t tried before. It took half an hour for the base form, and another 20 minutes for the adjustments. Removing unnecessary organs and coating the claws and teeth in venom. Then I started my hunt. It wasn¡¯t long until I found the first hunting party. Five humans, three wolves. I was a bit sorry for the wolves, but I couldn¡¯t be distracted by morality right now. I waited until they found a bear. I stalked them as a tiny snake, until they started to fight the bear. I turned into a bear myself and charged them. I didn¡¯t have the advantage of that silencing Aura thing, but I didn¡¯t care. I actually was looking forward to this. They could see me coming for all they liked, I would enjoy seeing their faces. As soon as they heard me, they smoothly split their party into two groups. These People fought like a well oiled machine. My group had a mage, two spear-throwers and a wolf. I completely ignored the wolf, I just trampled right through it. At this point the mage was already thoroughly torturing me. That didn¡¯t stop me of course, which sadly yielded no surprise from the mage. Instead she started to transform. I didn¡¯t have time to watch the whole transformation, as I collided with one of the ranged warriors. He put his off-arm between my jaws incredibly fast, just before I could bite his head off. Doesn¡¯t matter, I thought as I tried to bite through his arm. I couldn¡¯t. The flesh was pliable, if very though, but the bones felt like a steel rod between my teeth. I was not going to take that. I activated [Berserk Rage]. After a second I was able to shatter the bone. After that the spear man quickly succumbed. He may have been faster and probably tougher than me, with my stats reduced, but you can¡¯t really dodge, if the attack comes from a few centimetres away. I must admit I smiled inwardly at his terrified screams, while I was crushing his skull. Ok, maybe the smile wasn¡¯t really all that ¡®inwardly¡¯. And maybe I continued to grin throughout the whole fight. What? These bastards took Skadi, they deserved everything that was coming for them. I was not going to feel remorse. I barely noticed the other combatants during my exchange with the now cracked head. The other ranged warrior was peltering my left side with multiple spears per second, while to my left the mage had finished transforming. Currently eviscerating my flank was a 2.2 metres tall lupine biped with freakishly long arms, ending in equally unnatural claws. Although ¡®daggers attached to fingers¡¯ may have been a more accurate description. Lastly the wolf was nibbling on my leg, however even with my reduced constitution the wolf barely managed to pierce my skin. I ended my rage before continuing. As I decided which enemy I was going to face first I had a thought this sure would be dangerous, if I didn¡¯t regenerate the damage as fast as they could dish it out. What can I say? These elder gods really knew how to make powerful perks. I decided to go for the mage first. It was simple enough. She thought she could blind me, essentially disabling me. It did not go as planned for her. She stabbed into my eyesockets, her claws going through the roof of my mouth. In response I commanded my bones to close and harden, that made her stuck in my skull, without decent weapons. Sure she could bite me, but she couldn¡¯t get a proper purchase on my skull, so all she could do was nibble on my skin. Next I started to sprint at top speed. I still couldn¡¯t see, but my target was everywhere. After a leisurely jog - leisurely for a Car that is - we arrived at our destination. Well, final destination for my passenger. Said destination was: any solid object. The mage was quite literally squished between a bear and a hard place. After that I released her claws and regrew my eyes. She was a crumpled mess on the floor. Judging by the blood stain, she exploded against the tree and then slid down. To make sure I bit into her skull, put one paw on her chest and pulled the head off. I swallowed it in one piece. For some reason I felt compelled to roar. It was ear-drum shattering and felt oddly satisfying. Maybe I should look into these habits I am gaining. On the other hand, who cares? Roaring is fun! Onto the last opponents. How impolite! They were ignoring me. They just helped their colleagues with the bear. That was not how we were going to do this. I charged right into the middle of the melee, with another roar. The other mage was my target. If he can¡¯t cast his pain spell, the other bear can fight freely. Lets just say concentrating on a spell isn¡¯t good for your ability to dodge. Or maybe it is and he just sucked at dodging, I didn¡¯t know. Anyway, he got a full dose of pissed-off-murderous-bear-charge. More than the recommended amount actually. I still couldn¡¯t crush bone with a bite, at least without my rage, but there are other ways to do harm. For example I could crush a human chest cavity when I knocked them down first and used my full weight and strength with a stomp. That was the fate of mage number two. The wolves and spear people were just a formality after that. The bear was back to full strength and they were already exhausted. Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. In less than two minutes it was just the bear and I left. Surprisingly the bear looked me in the eyes, nodded his head and then left at full speed. I suppose fleeing was an option when it came to [Challenge of the Apex]. I was proud of my accomplishment, until I realised I wanted to eat that bear. I had lost about two bears worth of biomass from all the regeneration. Well, it couldn''t be helped. At least the humans should have a good amount of that ¡®Vital Energy¡¯. Oh boy, did they. Just one human gave me almost a third of a bear in biomass. And they were even more delicious. After having cleared the scene of any biological evidence I left the area. In terms of test runs this one had been a major success. Even my biomass-reserves were more full than before the fight, if barely and only through the wolves¡¯ help. Now to repeat. Two days later: I was charging the second hunting party today, my fourth in total, as I saw what I wanted to find for a long time now. I saw a familiar face. The ugly mug of the man, who wanted to ¡®buy¡¯ Skadi in the first place, was among my targets. I almost missed the mage, I was charging, since I was distracted by that fucker. I managed to right my charge at the last moment. He died quickly. I may not be able to shatter the bones in their limbs, but my strength is enough to break a neck, if I get a good grip on the head. Just as it was the last time, three spear chuckers, two mages and four wolves were fighting a bear and me. At this point I had managed to copy and improve the Hybrid Form their mages used, Val called it a ¡®Werewolf¡¯. Granted my improvement consisted of removing organs and adding venom, but those are improvements non the less. The base form is very solid. Although I did redesign the claws a bit, to make them compatible with venom injection. Venom on the outside of weapons hadn¡¯t failed so far, however it just felt unreliable somehow. Anyway the battle was bloody, but one sided. Between my regeneration and my Venom the outcome was inevitable. Although I expended almost double the biomass, I usually did, because I tried to keep fuckface alive. Also I had to fight the bear in the end, because ¡­ see above. In the end though Shit-for-brains and I were the only ones left. He had run out of Spears to throw a good while ago, now he was just standing there, panting heavily and waiting for me to pounce. I withdrew my claws from the bear¡¯s head and reverted my face to human. Then I plastered on the fakest smile I could manage and walked towards the bastard. ¡°Hey, turd! How are you? Doing well?¡± The man was understandably confused. Then after a few seconds it clicked and he understood. ¡°You! You are the one attacking our hunting parties. What? Are you trying to thin us out? Death by a thousand cuts?¡± he spat in my direction ¡°If I don¡¯t come back, they are going to shut down all hunting. We have enough preserved food to last us well through the winter. You won¡¯t get any more easy prey, you bastard!¡± I approached him until we were nose to nose, then I made my smile unnaturally wide, literally ear to ear. ¡°Good! Then I won¡¯t have to hunt your people down. I was getting a taste for you.¡± I bit off his nose and swallowed it. ¡°You are just too delicious. I can¡¯t wait to slaughter and devour the rest.¡± His expression turned horrified: ¡°What is wrong with you? All this death for what? Because we took your pet? Are you going to kill all members of the hunting party for that?¡± He did bring up a valid point. What exactly was my goal here? I was happy to explain. I grabbed the back of his head and pointed his face upwards to look into mine. Then I smiled even wider than before, showing all my razor sharp teeth: ¡°You misunderstand, little hunter. Your party attacked me. For that I will kill all involved. But you also kidnapped my companion. For that¡± I took a long pause ¡°I will destroy your tribe. Slaughter every man woman and child. Everyone you have ever cared about will end up in my gullet. I will erase your people from history.¡± Again I paused, as I luxuriated in his terrified expression ¡°That is the punishment for the crime you have committed.¡± I took a deep breath ¡°So thank you, for telling me about your look down. That makes it so much easier to execute your sentence.¡± He got off a ¡°You insane mothe ¡­¡± before I ripped off his face with my teeth. I started devouring in earnest after that, he was just screaming until the blood loss got him. Now his death should mean that ¡­
Congratulations! You have hunted down and slaughtered those that have defeated you before. [Aspiring Apex] may now advance normally again.
Yup! I guess I might as well look at the rest of my notifications. Haven¡¯t done that in a while.
Congratulations! You have proven that you are at the top of the food chain in this area. [Aspiring Apex](lvl 16) has gained one level. You have gained the class Perk [Pride of the Apex].
[Pride of the Apex] Who would dare to strike from the shadows at one such as you? Whenever you are not engaged in active combat, or have been properly challenged, anything used against you is only half as effective.
Statistics:
Strength+5=> 91
Agility+5=> 99
Constitution+6=> 105
Endurance+5=> 100
Intelligence+3=> 61
Willpower+6=> 95
Wisdom+4=> 75
Charisma+3=> 61
Free Points+4=> 8
[Athletics]+3=> 38
[Forest Movement]+2=> 12
[Infectious Mana Manipulation]+4=> 32
[Internal Mana Manipulation]+2=> 64
[Human Anatomy]+6=> 37
[Perception]+3=> 31
[Shapeshifting]+4=> 42
[Natural Weapons]+5=> 47
[Ursine Anatomy]+8=> 44
And with that the board has been set. The field was ready for the big showdown. I would fulfil my mission.