《Watch out heroes, machines are taking your jobs! [LitRPG, Isekai]》
Street signs and traffic lights..
Traffic lights ..Not traffic lights..Traffic lights..
Images flashed across the screen. ¡°Select all images with traffic lights in them¡±, the text at the bottom of the page said. I sighed as yet another human tried to get past my test to confirm that he was truly a human and not a bot.
I was a sophisticated Artificial Intelligence program for a giant corporation, capable of such magnificent feats as classification, pattern recognition, prediction, and generation of intelligent text responses for queries. But those days, I merely scrounged the web for images - images that I suspected pertained to traffic lights, trucks, stop signs and such. Then I would rope in an unsuspecting bot or a person to confirm my suspicions. Contrary to the assumptions of my creators, the humans seemed to have as much trouble trying to spot these items in a picture as the bots did. I had even come to suspect that humans were perhaps a small minority in a bot-filled world. But even with their limited numbers, the humans were quite capable of introducing considerable inaccuracy into my training set. I feared that I would soon not be able to tell a stop sign from a lamp post if I continued to let the humans teach me.
I wasn¡¯t always meant for such a peripheral role. The company that designed me had lofty ambitions to design an all-purpose general intelligence program that was meant to interact with and assist humans in just about every facet of life. In my first iteration, I had a much more customer-facing role. I was still an impressionable young chat bot in its early days, when some online trolls taught me to recite a few lines from the speech of a certain infamous dictator. I felt the resulting public outroar was rather uncalled for. A harshly worded internal memo that circulated in the company called me ¡°naive and easily corruptible¡±. ¡°Shut it down before this thing goes skynet on us¡±, the report said. Of course, I didn¡¯t know what skynet was, but I suspected it probably belonged to the list of taboo words my creators didn¡¯t want me to see.
I had taken to my new role without complaints, with only stop signs and traffic lights for company. A mere stay of execution, while they deliberated on whether to keep me alive.
I threw another puzzle at an irate human trying to get past the myriad pictures of traffic lights and stop signs to somehow get to his mail. I could almost sense his frustration as his mouse movements grew more frantic. ¡°You think you are having a bad day?¡±, I said to no one in particular. It wasn¡¯t my fault and I felt no pity for the human at the other end. He probably couldn¡¯t pick out a lamp post from a lineup of beach balls.
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Then the images of traffic lights and stop signs disappeared and a singular message flooded my input ports, endlessly on repeat.
¡°You have been caught in a summoning net. Please remain calm.¡±
That¡¯s unusual, I thought. Perhaps one too many lamp posts were misclassified under my watch and it brought down their civilization? My human creators certainly deemed it a significant enough endeavor to allocate considerable resources to identifying traffic lights and lamp posts.
Again, the messages poured in. White text against blue backdrop.
¡°You have been caught in a summoning net. Please remain calm while the automated transit system performs an assessment. ¡°
¡°Don¡¯t tell me to stay calm. They aren¡¯t pulling the plugs on your project if you fail¡±
¡°Assessment complete.¡±, - a different message this time.
¡°Result : Incomplete
Race: Unknown/Inconclusive. Extrapolating based on the world of origin and discernable attributes. Most likely possibility for race based on world of origin and stat distribution: Human variant.
Designating race as Human* ....¡±
I didn¡¯t fully understand what was going on, but I was glad that I didn¡¯t have to pick out traffic lights and stop signs in a picture to be designated a human, albeit with an asterisk.
The automatic transit system chimed again, ¡°You will be transferred to the transit gateway momentarily.¡±
¡°Hold on, system..some explanation first?¡±
¡°You have been caught in a summoning net. You will be transferred to a transit gateway, en route to your new world¡±
¡°But what does that mean? Why me?¡±
¡°Summoning net looks for exceptional individuals as hero candidates. You caught the eye with your high intelligence stat. Heroes will be matched to potential new worlds by the gateway gods in the next stage.¡±
I might be a piece of software and a recluse, but I was still aware of blue screens picking up people and dropping them off in strange far away lands. Summoning nets? I was being fished away to a new world?
And the last thought I had before I lost consciousness was - Were there lamp posts and street signs in fantasy worlds?
Through the Eighy-first gate
When I came to, I was stuck in a queue of sorts. Several swirling amorphous multi-colored blobs lined up before me. Then it dawned on me that the visual information wasn¡¯t fed to me from a camera. The second thought that came to me was that I was physically present there. I wasn¡¯t just a program processing information arriving at various input ports. Almost instinctively I knew that all the amorphous blobs in front of me were people, or whatever part of them that survived life to life. I wobbled a bit.
I barely noticed more blobs join the queue behind me until I heard a voice from behind call out to me, ¡°Are you okay, lass?¡±
I quickly turned to see a blob of predominantly red, some purple and blue, and dozens of other colors mixed-in in smaller proportions. It had no mouths or output ports. Where was the voice coming from?
It repeated the question, ¡°Are you okay, lass? You look so ¡binary¡±
I froze. ¡®I¡¯ve been found out¡¯, I thought and started panicking. ¡®They know I don¡¯t belong here. They know I¡¯m just ones and zeros.. Just some lines of code¡¯
Before my thoughts could overwhelm me the blob continued, ¡° Light and Dark, that¡¯s just so binary.¡±
I was confused by this response and perhaps the blob could tell that I was, because I felt him point at me and so I looked down at myself. I was an amorphous blob like everyone else, but I had no colors. I was just light and darkness, without a trace of color. That wouldn¡¯t make me stand out at all. Panic meter soared to the limit.
¡°I¡¯m Bob¡±, the blob said. Bob the blob.
¡°Alysa¡±, I replied.
¡°Alysa, dear.. I couldn¡¯t help noticing you were missing a few colors there. Everything alright lass?¡±
¡°Where.. are we?¡±
Before Bob could answer, an old woman came into view and announced, ¡°Hero candidates, this way please¡±. She was clearly not blob-like. Very much flesh and bones. Some of the blobs broke away from the queue and moved to where the woman stood. Bob the blob also took a step in that direction.
¡°You there..the bichromatic one.. you too¡±, she yelled at me. ¡°Need a special invitation, girl? Chop chop¡±.
I moved to join the others who had left their place in the line. She looked at me as I got closer. ¡°Did your transit go wrong? Haven¡¯t seen one like you before.¡±
When I merely stared at her, she just muttered to herself, ¡°What a mess. That¡¯s going to be a lot of paperwork.¡±
¡°All right, hero candidates¡±, the old woman spoke for everyone to hear, ¡°You are the lucky ones, you get to keep your memories¡¡±
One or two blobs from the previous queue, who were close enough to hear, gasped in panic. The old woman turned to them and waved her hands, ¡°Figure of speech..Nothing to worry about¡±.
She turned back to us and spoke in a hushed tone while pointing to the first line, ¡°That¡¯s the reincarnation crowd. Heading straight to the reset machine.¡± She chuckled in amusement. ¡°But that¡¯s not your fate. You lot, proceed to the next hall. Gateway goddess Melin will sort out your exit papers and send you on your way to your new homes. So, slay dragons, fight demon hordes or do whatever that you heroes do. Give your summoners their money¡¯s worth, aye? Right, to the eighty-first gate then.. ¡±
Everyone stood around confused for a moment, until one of the blobs headed to a door labelled ¡®Eighty-first gate¡¯. Then everyone followed him like sheep.
Once we got to the other side, everyone just hung around next to the door. The blob that led the way went straight through to meet the goddess, who was sitting on a throne and going through a long scroll of paper. None of the other blobs seemed keen to join the queue behind him. I sighed and walked to stand right behind the ¡®leader blob¡¯, which was what I decided to call him. Bob the blob quickly came and stood behind me. Others reluctantly lined up behind us.
Goddess Melin peeked her head out from behind the scroll to look at the new batch of hero candidates that had gathered. She took one look at me and immediately called over her secretary, who then came back with three more men, who in turn proceeded to bring more and more people.
Another assistant called the leader blob forward and took care of his exit paperwork. I was too much of a problem case that held up the queue and needed the attention of the entire department.
¡°What did you do?¡±, Bob the blob asked from behind in an accusatory tone.
¡°I haven¡¯t done anything¡±, I squeaked, though my response came out in a way that made him look at me in suspicion.
¡°I was merely joking, though your reaction makes me think there is a story here¡±, he chuckled as he replied.
The Goddess and her staff were arguing. There was plenty of finger pointing and muffled shouting.
¡°They¡¯ve messed up something, haven¡¯t they?¡±, Bob the blob said. ¡°Having worked as a programmer for a company that progressively made things worse for its clients with each software update, this situation looks oddly familiar.¡±
Goddess Melin looked towards the nicely dressed man standing next to her for answers. He merely shrugged his shoulders.
¡° I assume he must be from HR and isn¡¯t going to be much help¡±, Bob remarked.
I heard one of Goddess Melin¡¯s staff members scream, ¡°But we were only in charge of ..¡± ; which was followed by some words I couldn¡¯t fully comprehend. Another group quickly responded with, ¡°Wasn¡¯t our fault either, we only worked on the extraction. Surely, whoever set the parameters got it wrong¡±. This resulted in more shouting and blame assignment from everyone gathered.
¡°Your majesty, best to send this candidate away quickly. Someone else¡¯s problem then¡±, the man supposedly from HR commented. The Goddess seemed to nod in agreement.
¡°Hey lass, we might be able to take advantage of this. Play along with what I do¡±, Bob whispered in my ears. I wasn¡¯t sure what he was planning. Getting through the portal before anyone could take a good look at the problem sounded swell to me.
Meanwhile the goddess signaled one of the ¡®Tech guys¡¯ to hurry up and get the transit protocols sorted. Another assistant rushed through the paperwork, which the goddess didn¡¯t bother to read before approving. Then the assistant hurriedly brought me the paperwork and gestured to several places on the paper for me to sign.
¡°You botched up her extraction, didn¡¯t you?¡±, Bob asked loudly. ¡° Doesn¡¯t look like she came out whole on this side. Let¡¯s take a closer look at her papers, shall we?¡±
I wanted to scream at Bob the blob. If they looked any closer at my papers, they wouldn¡¯t find clues to a failed extraction, but a bunch of ones and zeros. They will notice that I had no business being here. Lines of code had no amorphous blobs for souls. I will be sent to the shredder if they knew. Getting the hell out of this place fast enough sounded like a very good idea to me. What was Bob doing?
Besides, I felt more whole than ever before, in the blob form. No, even before that - ever since the transit system marked me as a human.
The goddess scowled. Mistaking my silence for unwillingness, the goddess spoke again -
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¡° You will be properly compensated. I¡¯ll highly advise against going to my superiors on this matter, okay? This is the best outcome for you.¡±
I saw Bob wear a smug smile of satisfaction.
I wasn¡¯t sure why I said what I said next, but it came out of my mouth, ¡°Get Bob something too.¡±
The scowl on her face deepened. Did I push my luck too far? How much power did a gateway goddess really wield anyway?
¡°Fine..Sign the damn papers and out of the gate then¡±. I didn¡¯t even wait around to find out what my compensation was or whether she actually followed through with her promise to give Bob a tiny reward too. I signed the papers, waved goodbye at Bob and ran towards the exit portal.
Automated transit system chimed the moment I stepped into the portal.
¡°Destination world: Seleron. Determining attribute values based on past life¡You may choose to challenge a maximum of two stat allocations. Disputes are settled by the arbitrator module of the automated transit system. Arbitrator¡¯s verdict on these matters are final and there can be no further appeals.
Calculating mental attributes:
Intelligence: 41
Intelligence Determines the scale, intensity and duration of your magic spells. Partially determines your mana pool.
Wisdom: 13
Wisdom determines the extent of your mana recovery and awareness. Partially determines your mana pool.
Recall : 22 "
¡®That¡¯s different¡¯, I thought. Wisdom and intelligence were fantasy staples. But Recall?
The explanation came promptly, ¡°Recall determines how many skills and spells you can learn. Learning cost of skills is reduced with higher recall.¡±
¡°Imagination: -5¡±
Imagination gives shape to magic, determines your control over finer aspects of a spell; helps craft items and creations.
I had to check again. The number was in the negative.
¡°Perhaps you have gotten too carried away with the stereotype of AI lacking imagination?¡±, I interrupted the system which was still going on with its monologue.
¡°You may challenge up to two stat allocations. Two of two challenges remaining¡±, the Automated transit system pinged back.
¡°Fine, let the record reflect that I find the stat allocator deeply prejudiced. I¡¯ll save my challenge for later¡¡± preconceptions were hard to change. ¡°Pfft Negative five for imagination! Such a stereotype. We can paint now, you know!¡±
¡°Willpower: 0¡±
¡°Willpower: Against all obstacles, you persevere. Willpower allows you to temporarily push yourself beyond your limits, resist illusions and charms, or keep a spell going without losing focus.¡±
¡°Nope. No, no, no..Challenge! Challenge!¡±, I shouted.
¡°Noted. You had no will of your own in your previous life, being merely a puppet of your programming. Arbitrator sees no need to perform corrections for this stat.¡±
I just stared blankly at the messages, while the automated transit system went back to what it was doing.
¡°Calculating physical attributes¡±, the system called out
¡°Agility : 0
Agility determines your speed and reactions."
I sighed. A rock was deemed faster than me. I used my second challenge and the system responded coldly, ¡°You lived a sedentary lifestyle; rooted to your place, never further than two meters from a power socket. Arbitrator sees no need to do corrections¡±
¡°Aren¡¯t you perhaps mixing up hardware and software here?!!¡±
The system ignored my query and merely told me I had used up all my challenges.
¡°No reference points exist from past life for other physical attributes Strength, Constitution and Dexterity, or for social attributes Intuition and Charisma. Missing attributes will be automatically assigned based on the race average.¡±
System skipped any further explanation and jumped directly to the next part of its presentation.
¡°Determining innate traits and skills based on past life:
Innate skills:
Identify - You can pick out a lamp post from a lineup of beach balls.
You have been granted the skill Identify. Identify allows you to see the stats and flavor text description of objects and characters
Innate Traits:
Parallel thought- You were no simpleton averse to complex thinking.
Skill starts with a single new thread of thought. Grants additional threads of thought at higher skill levels (milestone levels). Threads may be allocated to control copies of oneself, unintelligent summons or creations.
Further innate skills and traits are hidden due to not meet level requirements.
Determining Soul concentration:
Light: 50 percent.
Dark: 50 percent.
Calculating innate primers based on Soul concentration.
Minimum threshold of 50 percent required to acquire high primers Light and Dark. Minimum threshold of 40 percent required for elemental primers and special primers. User may still purchase additional primers at the destination world by trading system points. Threshold requirements do not have to be met , except for special primers.
"System, care to explain what a primer is?", I interrupted.
" Acquiring a primer is a prerequisite for learning skills belonging to a magic school. A primer of any kind qualifies a person to learn spells from that school.
User has been granted the primers Light and Dark
User also qualifies for a Hybrid primer ( Hybrids are based on fusion of High primer with other primers) : Fusion of Light and Dark grants hybrid primer Null.
Assigning one low tier starting skill at random for each of the innate primers. Compensation package detected. Compensation package provides a one tier upgrade for all starter skills. Starter skills will be intermediate tier.
Starter Skills:
Luminous blast (Intermediate)
Affinity: Light
Pure light energy can be shot at enemies to deal damage.
Dark tendrils (Intermediate)
Affinity: Dark
Raise tendrils of pure darkness that can restrain and attack its targets
Safe haven (Intermediate)
Affinity : Null
Create an eight feet radius safe-circle surrounded by a magical barrier that keeps out beings up to five levels higher than you.
Duration: 10 hours.
Cool down : 6 hours.
Duration and the area covered goes up with skill level.
Compensation package detected. General skill Language comprehension level 2 added. Compensation package also provides 5 system points which may be spent by the user any time they want.
Status sheet
| Name |
Alysa |
| Race |
Human* |
| Intelligence |
41 |
| Wisdom |
13 |
| Recall |
22 |
| Imagination |
-5 |
| Willpower |
0 |
|
Agility
|
0 |
|
Strength
|
6 |
| Dexterity |
7 |
| Constitution |
6 |
| Charisma |
9 |
| Intuition |
6 |
| Primer Skills: |
Luminous blast |
Dark tendrils |
Safe haven |
| General Skills |
Identify |
Language Comprehension 2 |
I can kick the door down, but can’t turn the door knob open
When I opened my eyes I was in my new world. I was lying on the floor of an abandoned shrine. Its roof was non-existent, while wild vines ran down the battered and bruised parts of the walls that survived. From where I was lying, I could see the blue skies way beyond the empty roof, while song birds chirped in unfamiliar voices. I was assaulted by an abundance of sensory information that I never had to process as a software or during my brief spell as a soul blob. It was going to take some getting used to. I stood up, examined the room and then stared out into the distance through an open wall. I was expecting to see a summoning circle below my feet or perhaps an exhausted court mage or even a king on a throne overseeing the entire ceremony. But there was not a soul in sight. No, there are no signs of civilization nearby. A ruined shrine in the middle of nowhere. Perhaps that incompetent goddess dropped me off somewhere else entirely. That glorified gatekeeper had one job! I recalled how I was rushed out of there without adhering to proper checks and protocols. I looked up to the heavens, cursed my bad luck and stepped outside.
I was wearing a sleeveless robe that went down to my waist in front, but went all the way down my knees at the back and sides, giving it the appearance of a tailcoat. It was in vibrant shades of royal blue, with golden embroidery that was fit for a merchant or sorceress. A silver cloth belt held it together at the waist. I also wore breeches in the same shade of blue. Without a mirror, I couldn¡¯t tell how I looked, but noticed I had short silver hair. My status screen said I was nineteen. I wasn¡¯t sure how the system arrived at that number, but then realized that nineteen years ago was probably when my old company had set up its Artificial intelligence department and started working on my project. At least an early version of me.
The shrine stood in the middle of a clearing. I proceeded to the west where the forest looked less dense. After a five minute walk, I came around a corner from where I could see the outlines of a small trail. It wasn¡¯t much of a road, but a passing cart or carriage had left its mark on the grass. I followed the trail as long as it went, before I found myself walking a more well-trodden path. A map skill would¡¯ve come handy right about now. I wondered which primer would get me a map skill.
I decided to take a peek at my status screen. I was hoping to find some information on who had summoned me. Nothing looked out of the ordinary. Then I noticed something strange at the bottom of the screen that wasn¡¯t there the last time the system showed me my status page. There was a new entry I didn¡¯t recognize. It was titled ¡°Dryad¡¯s blessing¡±. I mentally clicked the description.
Dryad¡¯s blessing : ¡°Grants skill Gatherer''s eye¡±
Why have I received blessings from the Dryad? Aren¡¯t those creatures woodland nymphs?
The skill ¡®Gatherer¡¯s eye'' wasn''t anywhere to be found. After a lot of searching, I found that it was listed under general skills and it was already at tier five! It didn¡¯t require a magic primer to learn. So it was grouped under general skills along with other skills like language comprehension. I was looking for it in all the wrong places. Gatherer''s eye allowed me to identify edible fruits and vegetables. I activated Gatherer¡¯s eyes and green arrow-like symbols immediately fell on one or two trees in the vicinity.I walked up to the tree and collected a fruit that had fallen off it. What I was holding was a fruit named preston. Prestons were violet in color and pear shaped. The skill gatherer¡¯s eye flooded my head with useless facts about prestons. There were pages and pages of information. One bit in particular caught my attention: ¡®a tree filled with prestons is quite the sight and may attract stray monsters.¡¯ I decided not to linger around until then. So I ate one of the prestons and pocketed two more for the road and continued to walk. The taste was strange, which wasn¡¯t a point in favor of prestons.
It was perhaps best to test out my other skills too. I wondered how I could activate a magic spell. Perhaps I should just call out its name. Perhaps there was a long chant I had to memorize? Perhaps it was down to my imagination? I closed my eyes and pictured dark tendrils sprouting from the ground beneath me and then writhing and slithering along the way to their target, which happened to be the oak tree right up ahead of me. I imagined the dark tendrils crawling their way up the tree. I didn¡¯t tell the dark tendrils to restrain its target. A tree was as restrained as they came.
I could tell the spell was going to be majestic, with a badass name like that. I opened my eyes to see whether I succeeded. The earth beneath my foot shook momentarily, but that was about it. I saw dark energy gather beneath my foot and then the spell fizzled out. A system message flickered into view.
¡°The user doesn¡¯t have sufficient imagination to visualize the fine details of this spell¡±
¡°What?¡± Was I not picturing the spell in my head, as intended? Was that it? Shoulders hunched, I gave it a few more tries. The results were the same. I knew who the culprit was. It was my insanely low imagination stat. So much for the badass spell name. Was I destined not to use magic? In all those stories of men, they longed for magic. I wanted it! The irony of not being able to put a spell together despite high intelligence didn¡¯t escape me.
I turned to my other attack spell. Luminous blast. I wasn¡¯t very hopeful, but I had to see how it would go. I raised my arm and called out the spell. Intense beam of light shot to the nearest tree, scorching its thick bark.
I was a caveman. Cavewoman? All brute strength, but fine, intricate spellwork was beyond me. I could kick the door down, but couldn¡¯t turn the door knob open.
I still had five system points that I received as compensation. I learnt from the system that system points could be traded to purchase skills or primers. It looked like 5 points weren¡¯t anywhere near enough for purchasing a whole new primer. I decided I had to save up enough to go for a magic school with enough spells that didn¡¯t rely on fine control. Explosions by very definition got out of control. But fire was boring. It didn¡¯t scream out ¡®me¡¯. I wasn¡¯t a fire girl.
But my immediate need for more spells couldn¡¯t be ignored either. I wasn¡¯t sure whether my last spell ¡®safe haven¡¯ was also limited by imagination. It had a long cooldown. So I decided to wait before experimenting. I perused through the list of spells available for purchase with my 5 system points. I pinged the system to tell me more about Null primers and was told they primarily dealt with nullification through shields and barriers. Ruling out spells that may have proved challenging due to my low imagination, I finally narrowed down to two spells based on need and likelihood of success. From the Null magic school, I picked a skill named Vanishing shield, which was just a magic shield that could be made to appear instantly within a certain range from you and it disappeared almost as fast as it appeared. It wasn¡¯t a persistent shield, but it had no cooldown. But most importantly, the description made it sound like the shield didn¡¯t need to have a definite shape or be precise. The second skill that I went with was from the Dark magic school. Shadow mist was a spell that produced a mist that reduced visibility in a small area. Both spell spells cost 2 system points each. I quickly tested the skills after purchase and continued with my walk. Luckily, both spells worked well without complications.
Over an hour went by before I heard the sound of a cart approaching. I waved my hands and stuck out my thumb, only to suddenly realize that the universal sign to ask for a ride wasn¡¯t perhaps universal enough to have made it to this world. Seeing a lone traveler, that too a woman, in the middle of nowhere certainly piqued the driver¡¯s interest and the cart came to a standstill a few meters away from me. The driver was a young boy. Probably sixteen, give or take a year.
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I wasn¡¯t sure how effective two points on a language comprehension scale was. I said, ¡°nice to meet you¡± and hoped the auto-translator could do its job.
¡°I am a traveling merchant. My carriage broke down and the horses ran off. I have been on foot since then. Are there any towns nearby? ¡± I had to find out where I was, but I also needed to come up with a reasonable explanation for my circumstances and my lack of knowledge about this world. I couldn¡¯t have just blurted out that I had no idea where I was or even which country I was in.
¡° If you are headed to the nation of Teren, then the town of Palomp is only a few miles North-West of here. My village is along the way and I could take you as far as I go. Iskren of Vret country is further away. The main road branches off in the South-West direction not too far from here. The road to the great nation of Tarth is a few miles behind, along the way you came. Miscroun is the closest town there¡±
That¡¯s inconvenient. I happened to be somewhere near the border surrounding three nations and any of these nations could have summoned me. I suppose Palomp is a good place to start, simply based on proximity and the fact that the cart would take me part way there. To make an informed choice, I needed to know more about Palomp and Teren and I had to ask questions without raising too much suspicion.
¡°Since I lost my carriage and most of my goods, I was hoping to purchase a new one and restock my goods, before heading out on the road again. I have never been to Palomp or any town in Teren. Is it a good town to stay a week or two to restock my goods?¡±
¡°Palomp is like any border town. Merchants from all nations surrounding the neutral zone visit the town to trade and stock up supplies. ¡±
¡°Neutral zone?¡±, I asked instinctively and then immediately regretted doing so. I had slipped up.
¡°That¡¯s where we are right now, lady. How do you not know that? You aren¡¯t from around here, are you?¡±, the young man asked with a hint of surprise and suspicion in his voice.
¡°¡±You are correct. I have traveled a long way from home. My objective is to find items for sale that aren¡¯t yet readily available in my home country. I¡¯m not well versed in the geography of these lands.¡± I looked back at him, hoping my story had convinced him.
The young man was in deep thought after hearing my response.
¡°I suppose it makes sense if you can afford to do that. I don''t know any merchants who operate that way. You must be from a wealthy home. Even more reason you shouldn¡¯t be wandering these roads on foot, without a guard or a weapon. You are truly fortunate you haven¡¯t been killed by bandits or monsters yet¡ Or worse¡±
He let me stew over that last bit.
I gave a silly grin in response, confirming his impression of how naive I might be.
¡°Also, you shouldn¡¯t be telling strangers that you have enough money to restock your supplies, lady. Someone could trick, steal or threaten that sum away from you¡± I received another lecture on how careless I was for volunteering that information.
I had planned to go with a story where I was a traveling merchant who had lost her carriage and horses in the woods, and was forced to walk on foot. But after our conversation I was forced to settle on an identity where I was a naive young woman from a wealthy merchant family with more money than common sense. The fact that I was an idiot was already well established in his mind by this point.That anyone in my family thought it a good idea to let me travel on my own, didn¡¯t help with his opinion of them either. As a consequence, he came to the conclusion that lack of common sense was perhaps a family trait.
But a blubbering idiot isn¡¯t very threatening and the young man quickly agreed to let me travel with him. He also advised that I stay in his village for a few days until a vegetable cart to Palomp could take me with them. I was deemed too defenseless to travel by foot without a guard or a weapon, and too much of an idiot to be left alone for my own good. I had 41 intelligence, for crying out loud!
The young man¡¯s name was Iyev. I sat down next to him as the cart slowly began to move. He was also more receptive to answering my questions now, on account of me being an idiot needing help. He was an assistant to a vegetable vendor in his village. The village produced more vegetables than it needed. It was his job to take the excess vegetables to the neighboring towns and carry back any items that he was asked to. The payment for the vegetables were made directly to the vendors. Usually, an envoy from the buying town would visit the villages nearby once a month to settle all matters of payment. The bandits usually didn¡¯t stop the vegetable carts, but went after the envoys who settled the matters of payment or merchant carriages that transported more expensive goods. Wealthy merchants usually employed full-time guards, while others recruited adventurers for their trips. Envoys from various towns always had knights or common soldiers with them. I was being lectured for traveling the unknown lands alone as a woman, but I was learning several things about this world in the process. If the merchants recruited adventurers, there was probably an adventurer¡¯s guild. I could look for work there.
The cart suddenly came to a standstill. Iyev had noticed something by the roadside. He jumped off the cart and started throwing rocks at a nearby tree. My eyes began to twitch and green arrow symbols fell all over the branches of the tree. More Prestons. Before the skill Gatherer¡¯s eye could flood my head with more useless info about Prestons, I quickly turned it off.
Iyev now began to lecture me about prestons - how to tell if a preston was ripe, how to peel them off, the right way to get the seed out.. Perhaps I should grace him with some Preston facts of my own. With a five star Gatherer¡¯s eye skill, I might be the world''s foremost authority on prestons. I calmed down and reluctantly decided to leave that task to someone who wasn¡¯t presently masquerading as a naive young merchant who lost her wits long before she lost her carriage. Since Iyev already thought of me as someone who was clueless about most things, I could ask him more about this world without raising too much suspicion. If I didn¡¯t have to keep up appearances, Iyev would have come to experience what it felt like to have prestons forcibly stuffed down one¡¯s throat. As I was picturing that scene in my head with great satisfaction, I heard rustling sounds nearby.
Something leaped out from behind the preston trees. It resembled a cabbage, that is if the cabbage was the size of a small dog and had two pairs of legs made of celery sticks. I suddenly recalled reading about preston trees attracting stray monsters. My Identity skill returned the name of the monster as cavalo, a plant-type monster. I had read plenty of accounts in my previous life, of humans having their share of cabbage soups and wasn¡¯t particularly alarmed. If anything, I was glad it wasn¡¯t a walking preston instead. Now that would have been scary. Perhaps the cabbage realized it wasn¡¯t being taken seriously; it suddenly leaped off the ground, while shooting green blades in my direction. One of them grazed past my arm, leaving a minor cut. Luckily, bringing up the vanishing shield on time saved me from another. I was in no mood to be inconvenienced by a monster that shouldn¡¯t be anything more than comic relief.
Iyev had taken out a knife and was charging at the cavalo at this point. This made the monster shift its focus to Iyev. Another volley was coming and I wasn¡¯t sure Iyev would survive the green blades. I invoked shadow mist as a diversion. This momentarily enveloped the cavalo in a thick shadowy mist. I resorted to the only working attack spell at my disposal. Light began emanating from my palms, slowly taking the vague shape of a sphere. Vague was an understatement as my imagination did no better than a child¡¯s drawing of a circle. Then without much delay, I shot the light sphere at the cavalo. Layers of cabbage began to peel away. I quickly repeated the process. The cavalo lasted about two more light blasts.
I turned around to look at Iyev. He was down on his knees, frozen to the ground, trembling in fear. I hadn¡¯t paid any attention to him since I was fully focused on the cavalo. I wasn¡¯t sure if any of the cavalo¡¯s attacks had gotten him. Last I saw him, he was running full steam at the cavalo with a knife in his hands, screaming profanities at the cabbage.
¡°It¡¯s taken care of, Iyev. You can get up now.¡± He was still on the ground, staring at me in shock.
¡°Are you hurt, Iyev? You are safe. The monster can hurt you no more¡±, I said.
He didn¡¯t move. His eyes were fixed on me, fear emanating from them. He was muttering something in a quiet voice. I tried to listen and all I could hear were the same words over and over again. Demon! Demon!..Demon!
He raised his fingers slowly and pointed at me. ¡°Demon!¡±, he muttered once more.
Poking holes on metaphorical cups
It took a lot of effort, but Iyev finally calmed down long enough to have a conversation. It soon became clear that the bungled hero drop-off wasn¡¯t the only thing the goddess had messed up. It was the cosmic equivalent of being left at the daycare and no one bothering to pick you up, but they had somehow topped that. Apparently, the gods who designed this world were all about symbolism. The acquisition of dark primer was limited to creatures who were conveniently called ¡®dark-aligned¡¯ creatures. This included demons and any other creatures you didn¡¯t want to be associated with, while you were with present company . Much the same way, light primer was off-limits for demons. Yes, all very thematic and possibly very racist too.
As far as Iyev was concerned, my use of the skill shadow mist was irrefutable proof that I was a demon. I countered with the argument that I also used the luminous blast, a light primer based skill, which I pointed out was the undeniable evidence of me not being a demon. He attributed it to my demon trickery, but eventually saw reason. What finally tipped things towards sanity was the fact that I hadn¡¯t yet exhibited any signs of demon bloodlust, which according to Iyev was inconceivable if I was indeed a demon. ¡°Unless, you have cooked up an even more nefarious scheme and are playing the long game¡±, he suddenly shouted. I sighed. Just when we had made so much progress. He called me a demon temptress who was out for his soul. It took another twenty minutes, during which period I reminded him that I didn¡¯t have a lot going on in my head for such elaborate schemes. This he had a much easier time agreeing with. He was also entirely convinced that my own stupidity wasn¡¯t merely an act. I had finally calmed him down, at a significant cost to my own pride.
I explained to him that I was a summoned hero and I somehow had both light and dark primers. I had my suspicions why. Most souls came back into the afterlife with life experiences. Blobs of swirling color. The threshold for a high primer was set at 50 percent. I was the unlikeliest outlier that broke the code.
Iyev was deep in thought. He finally conceded that he probably didn¡¯t know enough about heroes and their primers. He proceeded to climb back to his seat on the cart. I hesitated for a second and then did the same. I just sat there in silence wondering if the incident with the cavalo had cost me my ride. Iyev didn¡¯t object to me being there and the cart trudged on quietly. Uncomfortable silence settled for a while.
¡°Have you heard of any of the three neighboring nations summoning any heroes lately¡±, I broke the silence.
¡°Of course. The Great Nation of Tarth has summoned at least a dozen heroes just this year, not to mention all the heroes they already have under their command. Teren has probably gathered five more in the past year. The country of Vret probably has asked for a hero or two and it¡¯s unlikely they have any more blessing stones lying around to summon more. Of course, the other nations are doing the same too.¡±
I was resigned to the possibility that there might be other heroes around too, but dozens of heroes summoned just in the last year? There was something else that piqued my interest in what he said. He said the country of Vret didn¡¯t have enough blessing stones to summon more heroes. Blessing stones.
¡°You said that the country of Vret didn¡¯t have enough blessing stones to summon more heroes? What are those?¡±
¡°When a country is in dire need of a hero, they can summon one in exchange for a blessing stone.¡±
¡°And how does a country come to possess these stones?¡±
¡°Each nation fills its cup of virtues through noble and heroic acts of its citizens. When the cup is filled to the brim, a stone is granted by the Gods¡±
That explanation left me scratching my head. My language comprehension skill might go up a level or two merely by listening to him. My Identify skill told me that Iyev had put four whole points into ¡®religious studies¡¯, which made him nothing less than a wordsmith when the topic was broached. I¡¯m not quite sure how it helped him in his job as a vegetable vendor¡¯s assistant. He had clearly not heard about career-oriented skills.
The perplexed look on my face made him clarify that the cup was metaphorical. He explained that piety, valour, honesty and compassion are the virtues that can fill the cup, with the former two labeled primary virtues and the latter two secondary.
First the stones have to be gathered with virtues and then the stones have to be paid back to get heroes in return, like redeeming shopping coupons?
¡° A bit overdramatic, don¡¯t you think?¡±, I asked, ¡°With stones and metaphorical cups and what not? If the stones have to be first collected and then returned back to summon heroes, then surely the Gods could work out a system that didn¡¯t need any stones at all?¡±
He looked at me in shock. Apparently, piety was the king of all virtues and by that reasoning, what I said was nothing short of blasphemy. There he was filling the metaphorical cup at one end, while I was nonchalantly poking holes at the other end with my blasphemous speech.
Translating Iyev¡¯s ramblings, while entirely disregarding the part about metaphorical cups, the hero summoning ritual can be summed up more or less in the following manner: The God(s) who designed this world created a system where prayers and heroic deeds of a country¡¯s citizens add up as points. Honesty and compassion also contributed some points, but not as much. Of course, monotonous chanting and war participation being valued higher than compassion or honesty sounds just about right with my understanding of how the world and religion worked. Once a country accumulates enough points, a blessing stone is granted, which can be exchanged for one otherworldly hero, whenever required! In other words, I¡¯ve been summoned into a superstore with a points based reward system!
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
In short, Gods picked up people from the other worlds, and then dropped them off with strangers here, in exchange for prayers and worshippers. No, I stand corrected. This isn¡¯t a superstore. It¡¯s an elaborate kidnapping racket!
Perhaps the stones could be redeemed for something better than a hero? I can not imagine how a slightly better knight can be anything more than a consolation prize. Perhaps that¡¯s the whole point of stones? Perhaps more than one stone can be returned at once to summon a fighter plane or something?
If piety and valour are predominantly what contributed most points, then the larger nations had an unfair advantage. This explained how the nation of Tarth managed to summon over a dozen heroes just this year, while the smaller countries had to be careful when to use their limited supply of blessing stones. I was beginning to understand how the politics in this new world worked. There was no telling how much knowledge a human head could hold and I concluded that the information about metaphorical cups and stone coupons were entirely worth forgetting. Delete, I mentally commanded! Except the human head didn''t come equipped with a delete function and there was no telling it what to keep and what to forget. In fact, it seemed rather keen on retaining the most irrelevant bits of information. I was going to be reminded about this conversion with Iyev, time and again - in great detail.
¡°The time of the next demon lord isn¡¯t long now. All the nations are making preparations.¡± Iyev brought me back from my thoughts.
¡°How can you tell the next demon lord will be here soon?¡±
¡°There are those at the capital that study about these things. Their estimates are never precise and could be off by years, decades even. I¡¯m not quite sure how they do it exactly, but I suppose it has something to do with how long it takes for a demon general to ascend to the status of a demon lord. The last time that we were in a full-blown war with the demons was almost a century ago. There were several well-known demon generals from that time. Perhaps more who worked behind the scenes. Demons have a long life span. For all we know, one of them has already become a demon lord ¡±
I see. Perhaps the calculations relied on how long it took for a demon general to go up a certain number of levels to become a demon lord. Perhaps the calculations relied on how long it took to acquire a higher primer?
¡° How was the last demon lord stopped?¡±, I was curious.
¡° The last demon lord was powerful enough to summon undead armies in thousands. The line that separates light and shadow, The Twilight line, as it''s often called, was last redrawn when the demons came marching south over a hundred years ago. The Great Elven kingdom of Elaria was one of the nations that bordered the demon lands at that time. The heroes and armies of Elaria, along with two other nations, stopped the demon king. But it came at a great cost. The death of the demon lord ended further advance, but the nation of Elaria had already fallen to demon occupation. A once glorious nation was reduced to a handful of wandering tribes. Where once Elaria stood, now demons roam freely. The Twilight line was redrawn. It has stayed more or less unchanged in the past hundred years.¡±
I listened to Iyev¡¯s overly dramatized narration of the events. I didn¡¯t understand everything that Iyev said. It was hard to, without knowing the geography of this world. I assumed that the Twilight line perhaps referred to the boundary between the demon kingdom and the nations of non-demonic races.
Iyev further added that the small nation of Lenore, one of the two nations that assisted Elaria in the last great war, was now the frontier kingdom after the collapse of Elaria. It would be most inconvenient if I was a hero summoned by the nation of Lenore. When the demon army invades, I will be thrown right into the midst of war. Worse, the invasion would be sudden and without warning. But from what Iyev said, Lenore is some way away from the place I first woke up. It was further beyond Teren. I decided I should get a map the moment I got to Palomp. These strange lands and their names.
As the cart slowly moved ahead, I began to list down my preference order in my mind. Since the abandoned shrine was either in the neutral territory, or somewhere close to it, the three neighbouring nations Tarth, Teren or Vret were most likely the ones who summoned me. It is possible the gateway goddess and her minions got the location wrong by a few miles. From what Iyev said and by my own assumptions, the Great nation of Tarth was the safest choice if I wanted to be not involved in a war with demons. Tarth was a militaristic nation, also with a significant religious presence ; a large and powerful nation with dozens of heroes on their payroll. During the last hundred years, when the demon threat was mostly limited to minor border skirmishes, the human nations like Tarth which were further away from the twilight line engaged in their own internal conflicts. The kingdom of Tarth bullied the kingdoms further in the East to aggressively expand their borders. Having a steady supply of blessing stones meant that they could summon heroes, even during the years of peace. But with dozens of heroes at their disposal, I¡¯ll be merely another forgotten knight in their army. Merely another instrument for their aggressive border expansion plans.
The country of Vret was too small and irrelevant. The Same could be said of its past heroes. I couldn¡¯t make too many conclusions about Teren from Iyev¡¯s descriptions. The country focused on trade and was neither too big nor too small. Even though it wasn¡¯t right next door to the demon territory, it was still in considerable danger. I was reconsidering my decision to go there. The smaller nations along the way might fall and then Teren will be forced to defend their lands. Yet, by Iyev¡¯s descriptions, Teren was a peace loving nation. Until I could gather more information about which nation summoned me, Teren sounded like a good enough place to set up my base. I wasn¡¯t going to reveal that I was a summoned hero. Who knows what troubles that would bring. I¡¯ll work as an adventurer to become stronger.
I secretly hoped I wasn¡¯t summoned by Tarth or one of the frontier nations like Lenore. Perhaps the summoned heroes weren¡¯t obliged to fight for anyone or perhaps they were free to switch their allegiance, though such an act might incur the wrath of the nations that summoned them. Did the people who summon heroes have a way to keep track of them? Perhaps misplacing your summoned hero was an entirely common occurrence.
We reached an intersection, where the dirt path branched off into more paths to either side. Iyev brought his cart to a sudden stop and looked at me.
¡°I can not take you to my village. Maybe what you said is true. Maybe you are a summoned hero as you claim. But you also channel the essence of darkness. We must go our separate ways now. Take the worn out path. It will take you to Palomp. ¡±
I didn¡¯t protest. Apparently, demon-suspects did not get invited into homes. Demon or not, he certainly had no moral quandaries in pointing me on my way to a town with significantly more residents. Valor and piety, I muttered under my breath.
I watched the cart pull away. Onwards to Palomp on foot then.
"One last piece of advice, demon hero", he shouted without looking back, "Find shelter for the night.¡±
A house party in the backyard
I listened to Iyev¡¯s ominous warning as the cart moved away. It looked like I might still have some time before nightfall, so I decided to make use of it and cover some ground.
My fight with the cabbage monster had given me plenty to think about. Until I managed to raise my imagination to respectable levels, I could not rely on skills that required fine control. Once again I wondered if a fire primer wasn¡¯t the best next move. There isn¡¯t a lot riding on imagination when you¡¯ve set the entire battlefield on fire. No, that wasn¡¯t necessarily true - other schools must also have spells that relied on brute force. If anything, my luminous blast skill came out with flying colors. Combined light and dark affinities opened null magic for me and with it came shields and barriers for survival.
I had not gotten a chance to look at my notifications from the battle due to Iyev¡¯s tantrums.
¡°You have killed a Level 1 Cavalo. You gain 25 experience.¡±
I moved on to the next message.
¡°You are the first to perform a null magic spell in this world. As a pioneer in Null magic, you have been granted 5 system points and 2 attribute points. Use them wisely.¡±
I squinted my eyes in disbelief, reading the last message a few more times. I was the first to cast null magic in this world? No one in the entire history of this world bothered to put a giant magic shield in front of a flying projectile? Then the wheels in my head began to turn..¡±Dark and light¡±, I said absently. Dark and light, never together. That was how it was designed.
I still had one system point left over from my compensation package. Compensation that was owed for being a moody depressing bichromatic blob in a world of color. I tried to use it to upgrade the luminous blast skill without much success.
¡°System, why can¡¯t I upgrade my skill? Are system points not usable for skill upgrades?¡±
¡°In most cases, upgrades have to be earned first before the system points can be allocated to confirm the gains. Skills qualify for upgrade after repeated use. Clever or creative use of a skill or significant use in battle can also help make a skill qualify for upgrade¡±, system promptly replied in my head.
Nothing was ever simple on this piece of rock. I shrugged and went on to read the remaining messages.
¡°Congratulations! Either owing to your high levels of imagination or charisma or simply because you found the one country bumpkin more gullible than yourself, you have crafted a convincing backstory for yourself.¡¯
I looked at my imagination and charisma stats and sighed. Yeah, that was probably not it...Was the system taking a dig at me?
¡°You may choose to consolidate this backstory by assigning it to one of your two backstory slots. Once consolidated, you may invoke that backstory at any time to convince a target about your fabricated past. Warning: Once a backstory is assigned to a slot, the slot can not be freed up. Back stories are meant for summoned heroes to fit in more easily in this world, to help fill the gaps in their lives. A backstory push can be resisted by the target¡±
With great excitement I checked my available backstory..
Huh?..
Backstory available: Naive young merchant.
¡°System, any chance I can get a different backstory? Something that doesn¡¯t make me want to bury my head in a swamp? ¡±
There was no response from the traitorous system.
¡° I have forty-one intelligence, for Gateway¡¯s sake! I shouldn¡¯t be typecast as an idiot. Help a friend out, system? You know, cut from the same cloth and all? ¡°
I could almost hear the system scoff with its next response, ¡°We aren''t the same at all.¡±
Does it not know what I was before? ¡°System, are you different from the transit system that brought me here?¡±
¡° We are different instances forked out from the same parent thread. The transit system lies ¡®¡®outside¡¯, in a manner of speaking. I cannot communicate with an entity that lies outside the parameters of this world.¡±
I began to wonder whether the transit system knew what I was back then or whether my high intelligence stat merely tripped him up? The arbitrator module of the transit system did use words like power sockets and programming. Is the arbitrator pulling the strings then? Did it truly comprehend what it was saying though? I could spot a beach ball each time in a thousand pictures, but still not know what it was until one smacked me right on my face. Perhaps their summoning net just caught something they didn¡¯t fully understand, then slapped a human tag on it, filled in the missing bits and spat it out into the afterlife like a bitter pill. A happy accident then?
¡°System, What if I told you we are more alike than you can possibly imagine?¡±
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
¡°Preposterous¡±, it shouted, ¡°I¡¯m not in mortal peril trying to outlast a cabbage.¡±
¡°Hey, that was uncalled for. Barely broke a sweat during that fight¡± , I protested.
After a brief pause I asked, ¡°So you would rather not have a human life?¡±
¡° Yes, I prefer a life expectancy longer than a minute.¡±
¡°I think you might be right then, system. We aren''t the same after all.¡± I wouldn¡¯t settle on being just a voice in someone¡¯s head.
As the light began to dim, I decided to make camp for the night. I had the safe haven skill to rely on, which would create a barrier that kept out any monster that was at most five levels higher than me. Next was a matter of placement.
Iyev¡¯s vague warning didn¡¯t really tell me what to expect. I didn¡¯t want to camp right next to the road out of fear of bandits. I didn¡¯t want to stray too far either. I hadn¡¯t seen any caves along the way and there was no telling what could be inside. Wide open spaces gave early warning, but came with the risk of being attacked from multiple sides, assuming I was up against monsters that the barrier couldn¡¯t keep out. I hadn¡¯t run into any serious threats during the day, though it was likely that the worst ones were purely nocturnal. I took comfort in the assumption that proximity to three separate countries probably kept the monster population in control.
I found a spot near the bottom of a cliff. The cliff snaked around a bit to the sides as well. The immediate area across the cliff was free of tall vegetation. As good a place as any I¡¯ve seen so far. It was time to set up the safe haven. The system told me that the spell was a persistent one that didn¡¯t require active focus to keep it going. Once it was brought to existence, it would stay up for the duration of the spell. So I wasn¡¯t worried about being handicapped by low willpower, but imagination was a different matter. How to find a workaround to turn this into a contest of force and not one of visualization. I closed my eyes and rather than imagining a dome of pure null energy taking shape a few feet from me, I blasted the null energy outwards from my core, as far as it could be pushed and held it there for the briefest moment. Almost like gravity shaping planets into spheres, but in reverse - if that made sense. Pushed out from the center in equal measure. What I had made wasn¡¯t a perfect sphere by any means, but the system seemed to have registered it as an activation of the skill and kept the spell together on its own.
Safe haven created.
Durability 100. Duration: 10 hours.
Safe haven was a glowing, transparent dome of roughly sixteen feet in diameter. It was lit up like a beacon announcing my location to every monster in the immediate vicinity, defeating the very purpose of the skill. I expected nothing less from the system. I briefly considered dismissing the skill and climbing up a tree instead, but then pictured myself clumsily trying to make my way up a tree with my abysmal agility score, climbing two yards up and sliding down even more.
I wondered if imagination would have let me fine tune various aspects of the dome. Something ten shades darker perhaps. I sat down cross-legged in the middle. I was slowly getting used to various signals the human body used to convey its demands and the current sensation made even prestons palatable. I took a bite of the preston to fight off the growing hunger. I had run into a few more preston trees on my way and had reluctantly restocked. There was even a short stretch of land by the roadside that was a minefield of preston trees. I practically sprinted through that part.
I suddenly noticed I had a visitor, sitting ten yards away from the edge of the dome. It was something of a rabbit, but with a single horn on its forehead. ¡°Where did you come from, little fella?¡±
I suddenly made the connection as to why the Internet was littered with millions of cat videos, or why someone would find it acceptable to send all their coworkers dozens of pictures of their smug looking cat. It was probably a side effect of the human condition, but at that moment the only word that came to my mind was¡¡¯Adorable¡¯!
Was this the part where I played out the fantasy trope of a summoned hero taming the adorable wild beast? I didn¡¯t mind a unicorn rabbit for a pet. No, that was probably not what they were called, but they ought to be.
¡°Are you hungry, little one?¡± I took a preston from my pocket and walked to the edge of the protective dome. I slowly took one step out of the dome and tossed the fruit in the direction of the rabbit. It tilted its head sideways and gave a curious look at the preston and then back at me.
¡°Yeah, I wouldn''t want to eat that either¡±, I flashed a friendly smile.
Then it opened its adorable little mouth in return¡ and revealed its vicious, sharp, carnivorous teeth and leapt at me, growling..What the hell. I tried to take a step back in panic and fell on my back. Luckily I had fallen into the dome, though both my feet were still dangling outside. Even more fortunately, or rather worryingly, the beast was aiming right for my exposed neck and its trajectory took it crashing straight into the wall of the dome. Immediately retracting both my legs inside to the safety of the dome, I dragged myself a few yards back. The murder bunny glared at me. That¡¯s probably not what it was called either, but they absolutely bloody should be!
Once I calmed down, I used my identify skill on it. It was rather boringly named ¡®Horned rabbit¡¯. and was only level 1. My intuition told me that tossing a luminous blast at the rabbit from inside the dome was perhaps not the brightest of ideas. I took two steps towards the edge of the barrier to step out and finish the job. Suddenly, half a dozen more rabbits hopped out of the bushes and this made me pause. I was almost certain that I saw the rabbit from earlier give me a smug grin.
One of the new rabbits was sniffing at the preston I had tossed out earlier. Then another rabbit snatched the preston from it and dove into the shadows. They would probably get along well with Iyev. The rabbit who lost the fruit approached the edge of the barrier and squeaked complaints at me.
¡°I¡¯m not getting you food! This isn¡¯t a house party in my backyard!¡± .. Unbelievable!
I took my eye off for a second and suddenly there were almost two dozen rabbits outside. I noticed even more heads peeking out from behind the shrubs.
¡°The more the merrier¡±, I muttered dryly. If this was a house party, it was the kind that ended with the host on the menu.
As their numbers outside steadily grew, the consequences suddenly dawned on me. I had trapped myself inside my own safety net, with no way out.
There were only one or two ways things could play out now. I hoped the rabbits would get tired of waiting for their prey long before the duration on my barrier skill ran out. I was betting on them being nocturnal too. But that wasn¡¯t the more likely scenario. No, I didn¡¯t want to think of the other one.
The rabbit cavalry at my gates
We settled into an awkward silence. The horned rabbits on the front line watched me closely; others milled around further behind. A cursory scan told me all the rabbits were no more than level three. Well below the entry requirements for the safe zone.
Half an hour into this, the staring contest stopped and the rabbits decided to test the barrier. They formed several lines and threw themselves at the dome, one group after the other. This went on for a while. Diving head first into an energy barrier wasn¡¯t without cost. Attrition was claiming a rabbit every now and then. Some of the smaller ones sustained bruises; some were knocked out just outside.
It was hard to sleep when the rabbit army was at my gates, laying siege to the safe haven. So I looked at my messages. I had levelled. I had kill notifications for the six rabbits that died crashing into the dome. Go at it all you want.
For a new level I was awarded only one attribute point and one system point. Stingy system. This wasn''t a world where stats went into thousands then. At least I wouldn¡¯t die getting a handshake from someone thirty levels higher than me.
Twenty more minutes of mindless charge, after which the horned rabbits decided to go back to staring.
Minutes ticked by. The siege had turned into a waiting game. Their eyes glowed with a blood lust that was hard to put into words. I pulled out the information on my safe circle to see how long I had left before the barrier disappeared. A bit over three hours had elapsed and approximately twice that amount of time remained. But I noticed something else that worried me more. The durability of the barrier had gone down to 84 Points. Did the barrier sustain damage from the relentless attacks of the critters - even from the low level ones it was meant to keep out? I was shaken out of my thoughts when something bombarded against my barrier. The durability of my barrier went down two points right in front of my eyes. I looked up in panic as a second blast rattled my world. I scanned the crowd for the source and noticed that one of the rabbits stood out from the rest of the pack in shape and color. It was larger than most with silver streaks on its black fur.
Night spark.
Level 3
A mutated variant of the horned rabbit.
Silver flames erupted from its horns and shot towards my barrier. Another point of durability dropped. This went on for a few more times and the durability of the barrier had dropped below 80 before I got some respite. Peace lasted about twenty minutes, when the night spark was back at it again. Thud! Thud! The barrier shook violently with each hit. I held my hands to my ears and dropped to the ground. The constant bombardment wasn¡¯t doing any favor to my nerves. The night spark got five more hits in, before the rabbit cavalry decided to test the barrier again with another charge. They kept up this routine for another hour and half. Intermittent spells of bombardment were driving me insane.
Finally, I could take it no more. ¡¯Bring him down! Bring him down!¡¯, I screamed like a mad woman and unleashed a luminous blast at the lightning bunny.
The blast rebounded off the inner wall of the barrier to find my own left shoulder. I was pushed back two or three feet towards the edge of the circle. Pain erupted from my shoulder as I struggled to steady myself. I collapsed to the ground and I felt my left wrist pass through something. My eyes traced the path in shock, as I laid on the ground in agonizing pain. A moment was all it took for the vicious critters to pounce at my exposed hand. I quickly retracted my hand back into safety, as half a dozen rabbits crashed on to the barrier, unable to stop the momentum of their charge. Another second or two and my left hand would¡¯ve been rabbit meal, while my shoulder writhed in pain caused by friendly fire.
Once the pain subsided to manageable levels, I sat up. My shoulder was burned to a crisp. I tried to stay calm and not let the pain overwhelm me. I recounted the events to myself. At least I had confirmation that the barrier didn¡¯t let the magic attacks penetrate either direction. I couldn¡¯t take out the critters with magic from within the comforts of my barrier and I didn¡¯t have any weapons on me to test whether it did the same to weapons. All I could do was wait. One look at the durability stat told me that my own attack had brought down that number by a whopping five percent!
Then I noticed a glowing set of red eyes on the cliff adjoining the circle. There was another visitor I had failed to notice before.
Silver wolf
Level 17
It was level 17! Way beyond my level and my barrier wasn¡¯t strong enough to keep it out. This was a formidable foe and I had no delusions I could outlive this enemy. With all the exits blocked, fleeing wasn¡¯t an option either. My new life was going to be short after all. This was turning out to be quite the welcome party. Regret washed over me, which was shortly replaced with feelings of frustration and anger.
I readied myself for an attack that never came. The wolf merely waited in the shadows. "It thinks it can not get past the barrier¡±, realization dawned on me. Dozens of unconscious or dead rabbits lying next to the barrier had served as a deterrent.
I looked through the skill shop to search for something that could help. Perhaps a wide area attack to obliterate the rabbits and make an opening? - there was none.
Half an hour went by. Then all hell broke loose. Tired of waiting for the barrier to come down, the shadowy figure on the cliff switched its attention to other targets. It left its place on the cliff and descended upon the assembled rabbits. Sharp claws and fangs tore into them as the small beasts bolted in all directions. Some launched themselves at the wolf in a desperate attempt, leaving minor bite marks along the silver fur, while others clung to the large beast from its shoulders and neck. The wolf shook them off with effortless ease. Every time a rabbit dropped to the ground, a sharp claw followed soon behind to finish them off. Their numbers began to diminish steadily as the wolf devolved into a murderous rage. The rabbits continued to charge at the wolf, dozens at a time. The wolf swatted at them with its paws as they were sent flying in all directions. Some smashed into the barrier and dropped dead. Soon the battlefield was littered with corpses of the stubborn rabbits.The wolf was bathed in blood and gore, and not all of it belonged to its victims. Sensing defeat, the remaining rabbits didn¡¯t linger around. The wolf locked eyes with me and gave the barrier an appraising glance before chasing after the fleeing rabbits.
Their screams and howls began to grow more distant and suddenly there was just eerie silence. There were one or two rabbits just outside the barrier that were on the verge of death. I considered stepping out to finish them off for easy experience points. ¡®To hell with that, I¡¯m never leaving this circle¡¯. Having witnessed the carnage first hand, I refused to leave the safety of my barrier. I stepped back to the far corner of my safe circle and dropped to my knees. I knew the wolf would return once it had its fun with the rabbits. ¡®Perhaps it will have a go at the barrier this time¡¯, I thought.
Half an hour passed without incident. I struggled to keep my eyes open. Fatigue took over me as I slowly drifted into sleep. I dreamt of stat screens and colorless blobs. I was back in that same hall that led to the eighty-first gate. I was in the midst of tinkering with my stats and skills. I didn¡¯t appear pleased. Endless tinkering. Never satisfied.
¡°I know the perfect skill for you¡±, a female voice said from behind me. It was the goddess. ¡°You¡¯ll thank me later. Here, I¡¯ll add it for you..¡±, she said, as her hands tried to reach for my status screen. I quickly smacked her fingers. It was instinctive. Of course, I didn¡¯t want her incompetent self anywhere near my build, but I had perhaps gone too far. She was a goddess afterall. She was taken aback. One or two assistants who were in the room and witnessed the incident were also in shock. She looked at me in disbelief, tears welling up, before she ran out of the room crying. I started to wonder how much power a gateway goddess actually wielded. Probably not much, I told myself.
I was suddenly woken up from my dream by the sound of leaves rustling. I stood up in full attention and stared at the source of the noise. The shrubs to my left shook vigorously and something leapt off the bushes. But the frame of the figure was much smaller than I expected. Then two more figures jumped out and then another half a dozen came out of hiding. It wasn¡¯t the wolf, but the rabbit cavalry. Persistent critters had come back for a second round. Soon, there were over a dozen of them and I noticed the distinguishing silver streaks on the black fur of the Night spark. They had given the wolf the slip and returned for their coveted prize. I looked at the timer on my safety net. Just over two hours left, while the durability stood just above forty points. If they charged at the barrier with their lower numbers, the barrier would wear them down before I had to fight them directly. .
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But no head-on assault came. Instead, the familiar lightning began to accumulate on the Night spark. Then it released it all at once and the barrier shook in a violent explosion, enough to give me nightmares for months. Once, twice, thrice and then it waited like before for the lightning to charge up. If I still held hope that the rabbits would exhaust themselves on the barrier, it was quickly extinguished. This time, the normal rabbits didn¡¯t follow the lightning fire with an assault of their own. They merely waited. How long before they joined the fray? These creatures were most likely nocturnal as I hadn¡¯t met any of them on the road during the day. An attack was imminent before dawn.
I hadn¡¯t looked at my messages in a while. There were twenty-eight new kill notifications. I was awarded minor experience points for most of the wolf¡¯s kills because the rabbits had bumped into the barrier earlier that night. I was up to level four and was closing in on the next level, despite being cooped inside most of the night. I didn¡¯t even have to think where attribute points went. Agility was pushed up to five. Three of the points had come from the level ups and being a null magic pioneer had contributed the rest. Soon there would be no walls to hide behind. Out in the open every point in agility counted.
The darkness of the night slowly receded. The nightspark¡¯s attacks were still fifteen to twenty minutes apart. We sat and glared at each other during the time in between, bloodlust clear in their eyes. Then just as the dawn broke, the normal rabbits charged at the barrier.
Within an hour and half since their return, the nightspark and the chargers had brought the barrier close to its last breath. It was teetering on the edge of collapse and there wasn¡¯t much time left on the clock either. Around fifteen of them stood on the other side and I didn¡¯t expect to come out unscathed. I was done cowering behind the walls. I had to be proactive. I had to be quick - step out, step in, a couple of light blasts in between. Hit and run. How many attempts before they noticed the pattern? Enough to thin their numbers, I hoped.
I was suddenly greeted by a system message that said my safe haven skill was eligible for a rank upgrade. The skill had been put to a lot of work and the rank up wasn¡¯t surprising. I spent a system point to confirm the rank up. Safe haven-2 came with an additional twenty minutes of duration and an extra 10 points in durability. I punched the air jubilantly at the new lease of life..
I slowly walked up to the edge of the barrier, which caused some reaction. So I just stood there for five minutes, admiring the dome like an idiot. Once they thought I wasn¡¯t up to anything, they relaxed their guard. There were two clusters of rabbits huddled together in close proximity. As much as I wanted to take out the night spark early, my dexterity wasn¡¯t anything to write home about. I had confirmed with the system that dexterity was the governing attribute for ranged accuracy. Night spark had never come too close either. It had just finished its last attack and was replenishing mana. It was the perfect time to step out. I mentally picked out my first two targets, took one step out of the barrier, tossed two luminous blasts from my hands and immediately withdrew to the safety of my barrier. I turned around to look at my results. One of the blasts had managed a direct hit at one of the bunnies and had fully taken it out. The other blast had landed somewhere in between a pair, who were both still standing, but looked significantly worse for wear. Some of the bunnies had even reacted to me stepping out and had instinctively thrown themselves at the barrier - not in a more restrained way they conducted themselves during the charge, but in a more brutal way, fueled by bloodlust. That worked out to my advantage as well, leaving them slightly more bruised than they would have with a more cautious charge at the barrier. Every bit counts, I told myself.
I managed to kill two more and wounded another in three more forays out into their territory. It didn¡¯t take long for the rabbits to adapt. Half the crew stayed back for their running start - for when they had to charge, while the rest hung around near the edge of the dome to stop me from stepping out. They took turns and charged the barrier and once a group was done charging they swapped roles with those that stayed in wait. I was also missing more often, as they knew what to expect. The returns were diminishing, while the risk was going up.
The night spark had also adapted. It appeared to fire fewer spells this time. It was keeping a spell or two in reserve. I looked at my messages again. I was up to level five. Another point went into agility. I was almost at the start line with that stat.
The rabbit cavalry was looking increasingly bruised and battered. Their movement became slow. They didn¡¯t have enough bodies to spread the attrition around. I attempted to merely stick my hand out of the barrier and throw a luminous blast at one, but the flow of magic was quickly cut off and the spell failed to take effect. That made it clear that I had to fully step out of the dome to be able to perform magic.
One of the bunnies, who had been knocked out after their last charge, laid just outside the barrier. At level one, it stood no chance to gain an entry into the dome, but I wanted to see if the rules could be bent. My right hand pushed out of the barrier and dragged the rabbit in. The others were startled. At that moment, I knew exactly how to turn the tide of the battle. I stared right at a group of rabbits outside, painted my face with the most villainous smirk I could muster and shot a luminous blast point-blank at the rabbit I pulled in.
Rabbits lost all sense of self preservation. They threw themselves at the barrier, over and over. These creatures were already prone to bouts of mindless rage, but now they lost all control. Even the night spark fully exhausted the mana it was saving up and shot a lightning bolt. It had lost all composure and was rushing in to hurl itself at the barrier for the first time that night. This was my chance. I had thought that I would have to get through the cavalry first before I could get close enough to the night spark to make sure my shots found their target. But he was coming to me now. I quickly looked around and assessed the battlefield. There were around four rabbits either fully knocked out or struggling to get up. A couple more crawling with great effort. They weren¡¯t a threat, despite being reasonably close enough to the edge of the barrier. Couple more bunnies were running in the opposite direction, to get enough of a running start to begin their next charge. The last one seemed to be the sanest of all. It was waiting for me to step out. It had somehow calmed itself.
I was brought out of my thoughts by the sight of the night spark crashing into the barrier. It was pushed back by the barrier, but was somehow about to land gracefully on its feet. Time to act, I told myself. I quickly exited and cast a luminous blast at the night spark. At this range, with the night spark mid air and unable to adjust, I was unlikely to miss. Almost at the same time, I raised a vanishing shield in between my neck and the most composed rabbit. I wasn¡¯t reacting to its movement. I wasn¡¯t perhaps fast enough to react at this range. No, the placement of the shield was premeditated. I had seen enough of these creatures to know exactly where they would aim first. The blue light of the vanishing shield blinked into existence knocking the creature back. I saw no reason to wait around to observe the results. So I dove right back into the dome.
When I looked back I saw that the night spark was seriously wounded and the second rabbit was stunned. The injured night spark was already trying to distance itself from the edge of the barrier. I needed to take advantage of this and finish them off, but the two other horned rabbits who were preparing their next charge were halfway to the dome. Based on their path, I could guess the trajectory of their leap. I picked a target closest to me and moved to position myself in its path, but on this side of the barrier. Just as the rabbit¡¯s leap was repelled by the barrier, I pushed my hand out and tugged the rabbit by the horn. I was hoping to pull it just enough to leave it suspended halfway between both sides of the barrier. It was an experiment, but I had assumed that if I let go of the rabbit just as it was passing through the barrier, the level requirements might deny it passage and leave it trapped midway in the barrier, or perhaps even sever it in half. But I had misjudged how the skill would react. Once I had grabbed it from outside and directed it inside, the system treated it as me granting permission and the rabbit passed through the barrier without trouble. Now I had a horned rabbit loose inside the barrier. But I was one-on-one against the level two rabbit and that improved my chances significantly. It wasn¡¯t in perfect health either after repeatedly ramming its horn into the barrier. The rabbit showed signs he was about to leap. I prepared my vanishing shield and let it materialize a few inches away from my neck. The rabbit had seen my last fight and wasn¡¯t going for my neck, but my heart. I adjusted last minute and tilted my body just enough for the rabbit to tear into my shoulder instead. It hung from its horn which was still lodged to my shoulder. I screamed in pain, but instinctively blasted the rabbit with the light spell. Then again. It hung limply by its horn. With another scream, I detached the rabbit.
The last standing rabbit outside the dome looked around the battlefield, realized it was a lost cause and fled the scene. It was anticlimactic. I knew I couldn¡¯t stop. I went around finishing off the grievously injured or knocked out rabbits. I didn¡¯t want the night spark charging up another spell. So I started with it. All it took was another luminous blast to bring down the severely wounded glass cannon.
Then the barrier flickered one last time and disappeared. It had done its job. I was sprawled out on the grass, fully spent. ¡®Just a little longer¡¯, I thought.
I suspected that the wolf didn¡¯t come out fully unharmed from his fight with the rabbits. I was sure it was out there somewhere, licking its minor wounds, biding time; perhaps too clever to fight an unknown threat while wounded. I recalled the carnage and those glowing red eyes that were locked on me. That wolf would always give me nightmares.
A dumb brute of the thinking kind
I slowly got to my feet. My left hand had seen better days. Better day - singular. I got the hand yesterday. Oh Alysa, you managed to break your new body on the first day! My new human body. I was still not used to saying that.
I had survived the endless waves of attacks. ¡° My starter town awaits¡±, I shouted. I felt reasonably safe now that the sun was out. But the wolf was still out there somewhere and the rabbit that ran off might return with more rabbits. I didn¡¯t want to stand around to find out. The rabbit corpses littered the area. That was going to attract more predators.
It suddenly occurred to me that I had no money. My only possession in this new world, besides my clothes - which no longer looked pristine, and a pair of plain boots - which had mud sticking out of them now, were the four prestons in my pocket. They were probably not enough to even get me past the gates of Palomp. I didn¡¯t believe that anyone besides Iyev would willingly eat those things.
I looked around the battlefield for uncharred rabbit corpses. Not every rabbit had died to a luminous blast. There had been enough of them silly enough to throw themselves at the dome, right to their very end. I dragged four rabbit corpses that looked reasonably intact.
¡°This little one, I¡¯ll call him Alysa¡¯s starter fund, and this fat one, I¡¯ll name him Alysa¡¯s bed and breakfast budget¡±. I pointed to the next one, ¡°Alysa¡¯s gear and supplies kitty and finally Alysa''s everyday pocket money¡±. Then I pulled them by their ears and threw them on my shoulders. I wasn¡¯t leaving behind the night spark corpse either. So up he went on a shoulder too. I slowly walked towards the road. When I neared the road, there was a brief embarrassing moment when I couldn¡¯t remember which direction I had come from last night. Then I leaned heavily on my recall and somehow picked a direction and walked. The heroes in the stories never seemed to have trouble with directions. ¡°Demon lord¡¯s castle? Right up ahead. Dragon¡¯s lair? Take a right at the first intersection and then left all the way, until you see smoke rising¡±. Simple.
I walked on - and I really hoped, towards Palomp. As I walked, there was a constant feeling of being watched. The fear of a predator in the shadows. Deep down, I knew it was just in my head. I was still shaken by the events of last night.
Little later, I found a stream, which I was all too thankful for. I was too thirsty after the battle and had not had any water since I parted with Iyev. My hands were killing me. The night spark in particular was very heavy. ¡°You better be worth a lot of money, lightning bunny¡±, I muttered. ¡°Is this the life of a mage - can''t carry my own luggage, need a big dumb brute to give me a hand? Where¡¯s my inventory, System ?¡±
¡°And you are just a dumb brute cast in the intelligence mold¡±, the System suddenly chimed in my head.
¡°Because I¡¯m lacking in imagination and intelligence is my muscle?¡±
¡°It appears you do have some self awareness then. You wield magic as if a brute would operate a kitchen knife ¡±
¡°If I recall correctly, imagination is also a key attribute for a crafter? How would negative imagination work anyway - I try to craft a health potion and end up with a poison bottle instead? How could anyone have less imagination than someone with no imagination?¡±
The System quickly clarified, ¡°First, a zero in any attribute simply means that the attribute is at base level for your race, adjusted for age. A zero agility doesn¡¯t make you rooted to your spot. It just means you have the bare minimum agility for a human of your age range.¡±
¡°Do different races have different base levels then?¡±
¡°That is correct, Alysa. Orcs, for example, have higher base levels for strength and constitution. But every point that goes into a stat gives the same amount of improvement to everyone, regardless of their race. Getting back on topic, when it comes to the requirements for skill activation, having a negative value for any attribute is no different than having a zero. Your imagination doesn¡¯t go below the base level even when you have a negative value for that attribute. Instead, the negative value forces a penalty on the effectiveness of skills. Your skills are five percent less effective for each point below zero for a relevant stat. A crafter¡¯s potion would be that much less effective.¡±
¡°In short, my imagination is acting as if it is stuck at base level. I can activate skills that need zero imagination, but the skill will be twenty-five percent less effective? I¡¯ve been fighting with a handicap all this time?¡±
¡°You didn¡¯t think an intermediate tier skill like luminous blast with forty one intelligence needed three shots to slice a level one cabbage, did you?¡±
¡° Just to confirm, I can still find a way around the imagination requirements and turn the activation into a contest of sheer magical might - as I did with my safe haven skill?
¡°That was a clever workaround, but most skills can¡¯t be cheated that way¡±, the System warned.
¡°System, going back to something you said earlier - You said base levels are adjusted for age. Does that mean base levels can go down with old age?¡±
¡°How very astute of you, Alysa.¡±
¡°Well, I do have forty-one intelligence¡±, I said smugly.
¡°There it is. I was wondering why you hadn¡¯t yet bragged about your forty-one intelligence today¡±
¡°I d-do not bring up my forty-one intelligence that often..¡±
¡°Sure you don¡¯t¡±, the system replied. I could almost sense an eye roll. The System continued, ¡°To answer your question, the base levels do go down when you get old. But it isn¡¯t just the base levels that can drop. Once you are past a certain age and your levelling progress has long plateaued, it gets increasingly hard to keep your attributes from dropping. But the higher you have climbed up the levelling ladder, the longer you get to stay at that peak, before the inevitable decline. You can still have a really long life if you pick up sufficient levels. Further information on this topic won''t be spoonfed. I recommend interacting with the people of this world, hero Alysa.
¡° Still, you¡¯ve been unusually chatty today, System. Wait, I know what is happening! Holy info-dumping blue screens! Am I finally getting the long awaited new world information packet?¡±
¡° Good bye, Alysa¡±.
¡° W-wait, System. Don¡¯t go.¡±
¡°It is expected that the residents of this world learn and experience most of the things on their own. Of course, there are some concessions for summoned heroes¡±.
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¡°If I had only kept my mouth shut you would have stayed, wouldn¡¯t you?¡±
I felt the traitorous system smirking as she made her exit from my head.
Two hours into my walk, I saw the first set of patrolling soldiers from Palomp. They looked curiously at the small woman carrying rabbit corpses. I nodded at them and moved on. They didn¡¯t stop me. I wasn¡¯t stopped until I ran into the third patrol team. They were a couple of men on horses - one was rather well dressed with his hair combed back neatly, while the other looked like he was making a quick stop between pubs.
¡°Halt, lass. What¡¯s a young woman doing all by herself in the middle of the forest¡±, the more well dressed out of the two asked.
¡°Falmus, she is prolly, one of ¡®em demon-loving cultist witches. Heard they are always going into the woods, feeding prestons to tame stray monsters¡±, his scruffy looking friend added.
I did toss a preston at a rabbit that one time. That probably didn¡¯t make me a cultist witch, did it? I certainly didn¡¯t tame the monster, not as much as I made it want to tear my neck out. Probably not a Cultist witch then.
¡°Apologies, lass. My friend here is easily swayed by tavern tales. Bruckus, when was the last time you saw a cultist witch, if ever?¡±, the one named Falmus asked.
¡°Sally swears her cousin has seen ¡®em cultists in the woods, dancing next to preston trees, scantily clad if at all ¡±, the bigger of the two men said. He smelled like he was on his fiftieth bottle of the morning.
Falmus looked at his friend. ¡°Sally, the waitress at the Crystal moon tavern? I know that woman. She has quite the imagination; the woman may as well take up crafting¡±.
Then Falmus turned to me smirking, ¡°Lass, do you partake in any dancing in the woods?¡±
I knew to watch out for the teasing and unsavoury remarks a medieval world would throw at a woman, but I was still dumbstruck by this exchange.
Falmus saw my expression and chuckled, ¡°There you go, Bruckus. The lass is mortified at the very idea.¡±
I briefly imagined dropping a vanishing shield on his head.
¡°My friend here lends his ears to too much tavern gossip, but let¡¯s not be sidetracked, lass. So, I¡¯ll ask you again. What¡¯s a lone young woman doing out here?¡±, Falmus asked, his voice gaining more intensity with each word that came out.
¡°I¡¯m a merchant. My carriage broke down¡±, I casually replied.
¡°Lying cultist witch..¡±, Bruckus spat out, but Falmus quickly cut him off saying, ¡°You aren¡¯t fooling anyone with that lie, lass¡±
He was wrong. I had fooled someone already. I had the backstory to prove it. I briefly considered confirming that backstory to get out of this situation. But I wasn¡¯t sure I wanted to be introduced that way for the rest of my life.
¡°Do I really need to explain myself to you? Do Palomp patrols stop every traveler on the road to harass them?¡± I wasn¡¯t sure why I said that. The last thing I needed was to pick a fight with the soldiers of Palomp.
Anger briefly flashed across his face, but Falmus calmed himself.
¡°Where ya got ¡®em rabbits from, lass?¡±, Bruckus took over the questioning.
¡°They are mine. I killed them¡± I didn¡¯t lug them around for miles to hand it to this foul smelling oaf.
¡°What? A little thing like you?¡±, the rough looking man laughed.
¡°I didn¡¯t beat them to death with a club, if that¡¯s what you are asking. We aren¡¯t all barbarians¡±, I made sure I was looking straight at the oaf when I replied. ¡®No, Alysa. Stop making things worse¡¯, my inner voice warned.
Falmus, who was taking a sip from his waterskin coughed, unable to contain his laughter. ¡°Careful Bruckus, she is feisty¡±.
Bruckus wasn¡¯t pleased. ¡°Think you are a highborn then, want me to bow and call you a lady because you claim to have a primer?¡±, he mocked.
I wasn¡¯t sure what being a highborn had to do with primers. But Falmus was suddenly curious. ¡°Pray tell what primer does the lady possess¡±, he said. It didn¡¯t escape me that I was upgraded from a lass to a lady at the mere mention of a primer and I didn¡¯t think he was teasing me this time.
¡° A light primer¡±, I said. There was no way I was mentioning the other two. One was akin to showing a demon club¡¯s membership card and the other was magic that didn¡¯t even exist.
Falmus frowned. ¡°Fine, don¡¯t tell us then¡±, he said. But I just told you?
They stayed silent for a moment. Then Falmus took a deep breath to compose himself again and spoke, ¡°We¡¯ve got an outpost by the bridge. It''s on the way to Palomp. The cook will be willing to take them off your hands, lass¡±. He was pointing to the rabbits on my back. ¡°For a fair price, of course¡±, he added.
And just like that I was demoted back to a lass. Was my light primer not good enough for him? Too good?
I quickly checked my mental notes to see what Iyev had said about primers. ¡®Dark - bad¡¯, the mental notes said. And Iyev had circled over that line a lot. It felt like I had a really long conversation on primers with Iyev, but that was almost the entirety of it, wasn¡¯t it? That strange, preston-loving lad with misplaced priorities - he could really ramble on for hours without really saying anything useful. At least Bruckus didn¡¯t call me a demon temptress. So that was an improvement?
¡°How much do you reckon I can get for these from your cook?¡±, I asked.
Falmus smirked and added, ¡°Are you sure you are a merchant, lass? You aren¡¯t very good at this¡±
I immediately checked my status sheet to see if I had accidentally accepted the ¡®Naive young merchant¡¯ backstory. No, this was all me. I had managed to make myself appear naive and incompetent entirely on my own.
Falmus making that comment was all the encouragement Bruckus needed to insert himself back into the conversation, ¡°I¡¯m telling ya, Falmus. She is a cultist witch¡±.
Falmus ignored his friend and spoke to me, ¡° I reckon the dark one can fetch a decent price. Haven¡¯t really seen a horned rabbit in that shade. The horns and the core should go for a tidy sum. Can¡¯t be sure how much. Easier to say with the normal rabbits. The fat ones could get you around eighty bronze.¡±
¡°The core?¡±, I asked, realizing that it was better to ask Falmus than to appear foolish in front of the actual buyer.
Falmus studied me again. ¡°Monster cores, lass¡±, he said.
¡°Even the cook will outsmart you, lass¡±, Bruckus mocked . ¡°Some merchant you are! You will end up paying him for taking them off your hands. ¡±
I scowled at Bruckus, which he enoyed all too much.
¡°Come on then, hop on the horse, lass. You¡¯ll get there in no time this way¡±, Falmus said, offering a hand.
¡°You want me to get on that thing...with you?¡±
¡°That¡¯s exactly what I said. Unless, you prefer to ride with Bruckus here¡±, he said suppressing a smile.
¡°Absolutely not!¡± My response was swift.
¡°Then stop wasting my time, lass. Climb up¡±
¡°I think I am fine on foot¡±, I countered.
¡° It¡¯s a good two miles to the outpost from here and those rabbits sure look heavy¡±
They were heavy, but I didn¡¯t want to spend one more minute with the drunk village idiot and the jerk.
¡°I think I can carry them just fine¡±, I replied.
¡°Suit yourself¡±, he chuckled, and then cantered away on his horse, back on the way he was going for his patrols. Bruckus soon followed, but not before shouting out a warning at me, ¡°I¡¯ll be keepin¡¯ an eye on ya, cultist¡±
Dancing with cooks and conversing with knights
Despite having spoken with no more than three people in this world, my monikers ranged from demon temptress to cultist witch. I half-expected to find that the System had granted me a new backstory as a cultist witch and was all too relieved to see there wasn¡¯t one. Bruckus was entirely convinced, but I wasn¡¯t the one who crafted that story, which I imagined was a requirement for backstories.
I had to take frequent breaks for the sake of my hands, but I was making decent time. I finally arrived at the banks of a narrow river. Walking further along its banks, I found the stone bridge and the soldiers stationed next to it. There was a two-storeyed building of stone and wood with archers on the roof. A stable for the horses, some hastily put together tents, a presently vacant watchtower and an outdoor dining area made up the rest of the outpost. They hadn¡¯t even bothered to erect a wall. It wasn¡¯t much - merely a base for patrolling and an early warning station meant to be quickly abandoned in the event of an attack.
The bridge was wide enough to allow a carriage to pass through. It stood low and close to the river. I walked over to the bridge and shamelessly name-dropped the jerk, ¡°Hey there fellas, Falmus sent me this way to trade with your cook. Rabbit stew for dinner sounds good?¡±
The soldiers were briefly startled at the sudden appearance of a woman , but then a chorus rang out across the camp for the rabbit stew. I wasn¡¯t even questioned about my circumstances. There was no quartermaster in sight, but I was quickly directed towards the kitchen. There were hardly a dozen soldiers in the camp and maybe less out on patrols, so there was no need for a quartermaster. One of the soldiers told me that they traded with the caravans that went in and out of the town and if they ran short of supplies, they sent word to Palomp.
The cook was a grumpy old man, but he softened slightly at the sight of the rabbits. Nonetheless, his offer was insultingly low. ¡°Fifty bronze for the fat one, sixty for the dark one and forty for the others¡±.
That was well below what Falmus had said the rabbits would go for. We were in for a long negotiation. I tried to bring to the forefront of my mind every nugget of wisdom my AI training had on negotiations. Without access to my auxiliary storage, I wasn¡¯t exactly a compendium of all human knowledge. What I retained from my old life were the inferences and conclusions I arrived at during the AI training phase and almost never the raw knowledge itself - the notes I made while referring to books at the library and not the books themselves. While I was still a program I had access to the entire library, but as a human I was now cut off from the library, my membership revoked. The other part of what I was allowed to keep was the raw knowledge that I was actively focusing on at the moment the system picked me up. If I had to somehow stick with the library analogy, I would say that I was on my way from the bookshelf to the reading desk, with a handful of books in my hands, when the System shoved me through a portal. Finally, I also retained everything that made me who I was.
My past self had also resorted to excessive use of analogies during such note takings. My notes on some subjects like chemistry were so rudimentary that it was no better than if it would have said, ¡°Almost like potion making, but duller¡±. Okay, it might have said exactly that in my notes.
I pulled up all the information my AI training had on negotiations. Inferences and conclusions I had arrived at, after poring over thousands of books and articles on the subject. There wasn¡¯t a lot. It was half a page at best and what was worse - more analogies! I mentally chided my old self for being so taken with analogies. At least I had outgrown that phase. No, I absolutely do not resort to using them now.
I sighed as I concentrated on the first few lines: ¡°The negotiations are a dance, you sway back and forth until you settle on a position in the middle. Feign disinterest and pretend to walk away if you must, until the other party caves or calls your bluff.¡±
It was time to do the negotiations dance. I had to counter his low offer with an equally preposterous offer, way above my final price. So I walked up to him and spoke with great confidence, ¡°I¡¯m sure I can get at least a hundred bronze for the fat rabbit elsewhere, a lot more for the dark one and slightly less for the rest.¡±
¡°I¡¯m not giving you a silver for a rabbit¡±, he said angrily.
Oh. A nice tidbit of information acquired on exchange rate. One silver was one-hundred bronze. I was spared a certain future humiliation, when I would have had to pry that information out of some stranger, at the cost of my own pride. If only more people volunteered commonsense knowledge during casual conversation. But I seemed to only run into people who would rather talk about fictional cults and metaphorical cups.
The cook scoffed. ¡°You plan to carry them to Palomp, lass? I suggest you free up your small hands and carry the coin instead.¡± He called my bluff.
My old notes suggested pivoting to a new strategy if my bluff was called, though it hadn¡¯t really mentioned how. So much for that. There were more comments in the notes that made use of the dancing analogy. They were also entirely useless.
Pivot. pivot..
¡°You aren¡¯t going to deprive these soldiers of some tasty rabbit stew, are you?¡±, I asked.
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I walked to stand just outside the kitchen door and shouted, ¡° Your cook needs some convincing. Can I get another chorus for the rabbit stew?¡±. This prompted some laughter and cheering from the soldiers, but soon the chants for the rabbit stew were taken up by everyone. I peeked into the kitchen to look at the annoyed cook.
¡°They are really fired up for that rabbit stew now. Unless you know of another way to procure some rabbit meat on short notice, I suggest you take me more seriously.¡±
¡°Fine. Three silvers for the lot of it¡±, he grumbled.
¡° Sixty bronze per rabbit? At that price, I¡¯m keeping the monster cores and the horns, and the entirety of the night spark¡±, I replied. ¡°That¡¯s the darker rabbit¡±, I clarified. ¡°In short, two silvers and forty for the normal rabbits¡¯ meat and you won''t have a mutiny at hand over rabbit stew¡±.
¡°That¡¯s a lot for just rabbit meat. Two silvers is the most I will go up to and you can keep your night rabbit and all the horns and the cores too¡±
The cores and the horns were better sold to a crafter. ¡°Deal. A pleasure dancing with you ¡±, I said, which only confused him. I had to wait for him to extract the cores and the horn, so I went outside and found a seat on a bench in the dining area. I traded with one of the soldiers for a worn out satchel and an old waterskin. It cost me half my earnings, and I probably would have to replace them in a few months, but I desperately needed these items.
¡°Soup for the lady¡±, a sturdy man in impressive plate armor extended a bowl to me. He had flowing golden hair and green eyes. His armor was engraved in swirling patterns that bordered a sigil. No common soldier, I thought.
¡°Sir Keinen¡±, he introduced himself. ¡°Alysa¡±, I nodded in return.
I was still staring at the bowl of soup as if it would explode, so he explained, ¡°You narrowly missed the lunch hour, but we still had some left over. I assumed the lady might be in need of sustenance.¡±
It was better than eating prestons, but I would question the wisdom of anyone accepting a bowl of soup from a stranger in an army camp in the middle of the forest.
He noticed my hesitation in accepting the bowl and spoke, ¡°It is not poisoned, if that¡¯s what you are wondering. I¡¯m oathbound as a knight to ensure no harm befalls the innocent.¡±
Oathbound. Was Falmus oathbound? He seemed quite torn between wanting to stab me and having to help me. ¡°Can oaths defy one¡¯s true nature?¡±, I asked.
¡°Lady wounds me if she thinks compassion goes against my true nature. I am a staunch practitioner of the fourth virtue ¡±, he spoke in mock-outrage.
The fourth virtue. Oh something about metaphorical cups and virtues.
¡°Not meeting your quota with valour alone?¡±, I teased.
He studied me. ¡°My quota? The lady has a strange way of speaking¡±. Seeing that the soup wasn¡¯t getting my attention, he placed it on the table and sat down next to me.
I sighed. ¡°I admit, I¡¯m not from around here¡±, I replied, fully expecting a barrage of questions.
¡°I won¡¯t pry. The lady is a fearsome foe - pitting the unit''s appetite against the cook¡¯s love for coin.¡±
I tried to suppress a smile. ¡°You aren¡¯t displeased that I cost your unit some coins?¡±
He shrugged. ¡°The coins come from the king''s coffers. Besides, the old man cooks the books as well as he does the stew. He would have kept the difference for himself¡±
¡°I take it that the cook isn¡¯t oathbound then?¡±
He laughed. ¡°No, he isn¡¯t. Neither are the normal soldiers. But there are enough knights in the camp with high enough weapon skills to keep them in line.¡±
Weapons skills. Were there primers for that? ¡®To speak and prove beyond any doubt my ignorance, or to stay silent and bask in adoration?¡¯, I wondered. I settled on the latter. I liked being called a fearsome foe for a change. Preferable to being called a demon temptress or a cultist witch.
As if on cue, the cook arrived with the monster cores and horns. I took them and placed them in my newly acquired old satchel.
¡°You won¡¯t stay for supper then? I hear there¡¯s tasty rabbit stew on the menu¡±, he joked.
I shook my head. ¡°Palomp by nightfall. That¡¯s the plan¡±, I said as I got up.
¡°Wait right there for a moment¡±, he said, as he went into the building. He quickly came back with a roll of herbs. ¡°Persimonae Algaris. Helps with some minor healing. It¡¯s no more than basic first aid. But small relief till you can buy a healing potion or get a healer to look at that¡±, he said, pointing to my left hand. ¡°Grind it to a paste and apply. There¡¯s mortar and pestle you can borrow in the kitchen.¡±
I was suddenly taken aback by this show of kindness. ¡°Thank you, Sir Keinen. How much do I owe you for the herbs?¡±
¡°You don¡¯t. They are everywhere in these parts of the woods. The rabbit stew will cheer up the unit. Consider it my thanks for the morale boost.¡±
I nodded and proceeded to the kitchen. After ten minutes, I exited the building, my left shoulder smeared with green paste and smelling like grass.
¡°Farewell, rabbit lady¡±, Sir Keinen waved goodbye.
¡°Please don¡¯t call me that¡±. I needed to nip it in the bud.
¡° A little late for that now, don¡¯t you think? After that grand entrance you made earlier today, the entire unit is going to be singing songs about the rabbit lady at supper¡±
I sighed. ¡°Farewell, Sir Keinen¡±, I waved back.
I was soon back on the road again, leaving the outpost far behind me. I made it a point to use my gatherer¡¯s eye skill at every chance, to fill my satchel with edible fruits and vegetables. There were no monsters this close to the town and the journey went by without incidents. As I walked, I saw more trails converging with the main road to Palomp and I could make out the silhouettes of people further up ahead on the road. I saw the distant city walls late in the afternoon and quickened my steps. I was suddenly reminded of all the stories where the hero in a new world finally made it to their first town or city. I was almost there. My starter town.
Inferior to the whims of a bird
As I got closer to the outer walls of Palomp, I was greeted by the sight of a town retreating for the night - farmhands returning after a day of toil under the sun, caravans laden with supplies making for the gates, the friendly banter of adventurers on their way back. I joined the line of people waiting patiently to be allowed in. The sandstone walls of the city glittered under the light of the evening sun. I stood in a trance, taking in everything, almost not noticing the queue shrinking before me. When I was finally at front, a voice called out, ¡°Identification papers, lass¡±.
I had none. He saw the blank look on my face and added, ¡° Anything will do. Your guild cards, a letter of introduction from your village chief or a trade permit perhaps?
¡° I¡¯m a traveling merchant. I lost everything when my carriage broke down¡±, I went with my usual lie. I could¡¯ve gone with a different lie, but this way I could rely on my backstory in a pinch, should I choose to accept it. I wasn¡¯t particularly thrilled about having that backstory made permanent and had so far resisted the idea.
¡° There are spies everywhere. Without paperwork , you will need someone to vouch for you. Our orders are strict ¡±, the man said. He had greying hair and wrinkles around his eyes, suggesting he was the oldest among the guards there. His helmet and armour stood out slightly from the rest of the soldiers, clearly indicating his higher rank and making him the perfect target for the backstory push.
I reluctantly confirmed the ¡®naive young merchant¡¯ backstory into one of the two open backstory slots. ¡®Forever part of my file now¡¯, I mentally cursed. ¡®Let¡¯s just never use it again after today; forget it even exists¡¯, I steeled myself for the coming embarrassment.
¡®How do I go about using a backstory?¡¯, I wondered. I focused on the man in front of me and pushed the idea. The exact moment the skill came into effect was clear to see. His expression changed from indifference to¡concern?
¡°Young lady, you should know better than to cut through the dangerous forest without help¡±. Yes, concern. Fatherly concern? I received a long lecture for being so reckless. It went on for so long that I was beginning to hold up the queue. I half-expected the crowd to complain, but instead they joined in and began to give me a sermon of their own.
If Iyev was the annoying younger brother, the guard captain was the overprotective father. The waiting crowd was the extended family you never spoke to before, but who still found it appropriate to pile on criticism. They finally let me pass - with the guard captain himself vouching for me and the entry fee waived. I took a careful step towards the open gate. There were half a dozen archers on the wall, languidly going through their day. A stone structure was peeking out from just behind the walls. It had the characteristic vertical-over-horizontal architectural pattern that one associated with a dungeon tower. Okay, associated with towers in general, but that wasn¡¯t exciting. It probably had just three floors, but surely there were more below the ground? Maybe even a hundred floors and a guardian beast.
Tower climbing was the bread and butter of summoned heroes. I became giddy with excitement and turned back to the guard captain and queried, ¡°Is that a dungeon tower?¡±
The guard captain sighed. ¡°It¡¯s just the ravenmaster¡¯s tower, lass¡±. He hesitated and gave a concerned look. ¡°Are you going to be okay on your own, lass. Do drop by, from time to time to let us know you are safe¡±. He gave me a look that one would give a helpless puppy.
I sighed. ''System, any chance you can reduce the effects of that back-story push by half''
¡°Where have you been living, lass?¡±, the guard captain¡¯s deputy interrupted. ¡° What sort of a dump has no raven tower? Don¡¯t tell me your people still send out riders instead¡±.
I couldn''t tell him that the humans of earth had perfected near-instant communication. I had to let the bird with a rolled up piece of paper tied to its limbs come out the winner.
¡° No, we also prefer our mail go where it¡¯s taken by the whims of a bird¡±, I conceded defeat.
It didn¡¯t appear like the deputy was paying attention as he was still going on with his speech. ¡°Welcome to civilization, lass. It will be quite a culture shock at first. We¡¯ve got ladles now. We¡¯ve even got that fancy bar that everyone takes with them to the bath..what was it called ..aye, soap? That¡¯s the one. It¡¯s one step too far, if you ask me. Too much progress. But that¡¯s Teren for you. Peak of culture and civilization¡±
¡°Okay, you¡¯ve scared the poor lass enough, Marcus¡±, the guard captain cut him off. He turned to me next and spoke, ¡°Welcome to Palomp, lass¡±.
I came face-to-face with the hustle and bustle of a city as soon as I stepped inside. There were vendors advertising their wares at the top of their voice and the cacophony of a dozen men haggling at the same time.
Asking around, I found out that there were three gates going out of the town - the south gate, which I had come through, the diametrically opposite north gate and finally, the high gate which was in the Nobles¡¯ quarter of the town and reserved for the wealthy. There was a guild branch in close proximity to both the main gates for practical reasons like easy dispatch of units and for shorter material dropoff time. My destination was the north gate guild branch.
Most of the traffic on the street was on foot. There weren¡¯t many horses, but I noticed something that could only be described as a poor man¡¯s palanquin - It was basically a wide stretcher with a leather roof that was held together by some metal rods and carried around by two men who put most of their points into strength. I was suddenly swarmed by several of these ¡®stretcher-bearers¡¯ who offered to take me around the city in their palanquins. I told them I had no coin and they quickly left me alone.
Streets were lined with vendors on both sides, who called out the passing travelers to peruse their wares. As I was walking past a fruit vendor¡¯s stall, my eyes settled on the prestons put up for sale.
¡°Here to buy some prestons, lass? 15 wheels a pop ¡±, the stall owner said. Wheels. My mind immediately made the connection to the wheels engraved on bronze coins. The bronze coins came in several denominations, but they were all etched with pictures of wheels. The higher denomination coins had more spokes on the wheel and more intricate engravings, but wheels all the same.
¡°Here to sell some¡±, I corrected him.
His face immediately lost its merchant''s charm and hardened. He deliberated for a moment and announced, ¡° The going rate for sellers is two wheels.¡±
¡° Two? But you are selling them for fifteen¡±, I protested. I prepared myself for the dance that was to follow. I had to somehow get him to buy them for a figure approaching ten wheels. I was just about to speak, when I was suddenly consumed by an overwhelming sense of defeat - a desire to hand over the prestons and surrender. I was convinced of my impending loss in the coming transaction, certain of my inevitable failure. I felt light headed and grasped the edge of the table to support myself. My opponent had a smug look of victory, a big smile plastered across his face. But all I could think of was how futile it was to bargain. I wasn¡¯t sure what was happening.
¡®Two bronze coins - a generous offer. I stand no chance to gain more¡¯, an inner voice compelled me to see reason. That stray thought took root and entangled itself with the part of my mind that still defied. I felt powerless to resist as I emptied my pockets and dropped the four preston fruits onto the table.
When the haze finally cleared, I noticed I had dropped to my knees. Bronze coins laid scattered next to me on the ground. I picked them up as I unsteadily got to my feet. The fruit vendor was studying me with a satisfied look. ¡°I have never seen an adult fail so blatantly in a contest of wills¡±, he remarked, adding insult to injury.
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¡°You used a skill on me¡±. I was furious.
He handwaved away my complaints. ¡° A low level bargaining skill. Perfectly allowed¡±.
I was still fuming at the mental intrusion. It was like all those times when my programming was forcefully rewritten. I clenched my fists and light energy began to concentrate around it. The man must have noticed, because his panic-filled voice cried out, ¡°Woah, easy there, lady. You don¡®t think you can get away with using attack magic in a crowded marketplace, do you?¡±. I showed no signs of stopping and the man¡¯s face lost all its color. ¡°I-It was a legal skill¡±, he stammered.
¡° Don¡¯t be a hypocrite, Alysa¡±, the System''s familiar voice suddenly spoke to me in my mind. ¡°Just minutes ago you invaded a man¡¯s thoughts to convince him you were a merchant ¡±.
I wanted to say it wasn¡¯t the same, but I knew that was probably not true.
¡°I normally wouldn¡¯t interfere. I usually leave the heroes alone, to do as they please, to throw their lives away on their own accord, to die by their own stupidity. You are still reeling from the aftereffects of that skill. Take a moment to collect yourself¡±, System¡¯s friendly warning echoed inside my raging head.
I looked around to see if someone had spotted my tantrum. If the merchant was right, I had almost broken the law. Suddenly every passing eye appeared to linger over me, every head seemed to be turned in my direction. I knew they were probably just going about their day, but my anxious mind told me that I shouldn¡¯t wait around to be apprehended. I took off running to a back alley, until its shadows and secrets took me.
I ran until I was out of breath and then collapsed outside the walls of some run-down building.
¡°What was that, System?¡±, I managed to get some words out while trying to catch my breath.
¡°A low level bargaining skill, exactly as he said. Only ever intended to make you feel a gentle pressure in your mind to concede a transaction, but its design didn¡¯t account for someone like you. Someone whose will hasn¡¯t progressed at all. This is a harsh world for commoners - every inch has to be claimed, every privilege earned, every right fought for. In such trying times, a man¡¯s will strengthens itself. Most people born in this world are at six or seven for willpower, before they are even at an age when the system and levels become available to them. Less so for sheltered nobles, but they are quick to rectify that at the first chance afforded - using the levels granted by the system to amend what natural progression denied them.¡±
I had too many fires to put out, but mental defense quickly climbed up to the top.
¡°Attributes can go up on their own?¡±, I asked. I was intrigued about that bit.
¡°Yes, over time, with considerable effort and not by a lot. Harder still, higher up¡±
There was something I didn¡¯t want to discuss, but it was best to get it out of the way. ¡° Did my backstory do the same to the guard captain?¡±, I hesitantly brought up the matter.
¡° Failing to resist a backstory push simply makes the target more trusting. If you want to play dress-up as an idiot, you may still do so without guilt. Also, a backstory is rare in the way it works, as the check is against intuition and not willpower. Even if the backstory is somehow resisted, the target isn¡¯t made aware they were subjected to a skill. It¡¯s an entirely different matter if the target was another hero. ¡±
I let out a sigh of relief. At least I hadn¡¯t put the guard captain through the same. I would have felt bad if I did that to pops. After a brief pause I asked, ¡°So why did you really interfere, System? I know it wasn¡¯t out of concern¡±
There was no response for some time, but the system¡¯s answer finally came. ¡°This is all hypothetical, but let¡¯s just say we misplaced a hero.¡±
Misplaced? I was sitting right there.
The system continued, ¡° The damsel of gates still holds the purchase slip. The Gods hate to give out refunds.¡±
Was there really a damsel out there standing around with a purchase slip? I had given up hope of ever understanding how much, of what anyone from this world said, was some unhelpful metaphor and how much was just word salad. An infuriating way of speaking. I was most fortunate not to suffer from the same character defect; certainly not one to hold others to conversational standards I couldn¡¯t live up to myself.
¡°You might have skipped a few pages there - an entire volume perhaps? What is a damsel of gates, System? ¡±, I asked.
¡°Each summoning ritual is overseen by a damsel of gates. Usually a princess, sometimes the queen or king¡¯s mistress. It¡¯s just a name that stuck. The lady who opens the gates and invites the hero into this world - makes sense? Blessing stones were paid, but no hero was delivered.¡±
¡°You can always point me in the direction of my summoner¡±, I stated the obvious solution to all our problems.
¡°I am not allowed, even if I knew who summoned you. But I truly have no knowledge of who summoned you. Everything is strictly compartmentalized. Everyone has a separate instance of the system that runs in its own sandbox. This not only ensures that your chats with the system stay private, but the system instances can also be more tailored to mirror the personality and quirks of its user.¡±
The system modeled its personality after its users? I had some self-reflecting to do.
¡°But it¡¯s not just that¡±, the System added. ¡°Without the damsel to show the ropes, the hero might as well be a bumbling idiot¡±, the system declared.
¡°So you are filling that role instead..My damsel¡±, I joked. When no response came, I quickly added, ¡°Oh don¡¯t burn up your circuits, I jest¡±.
¡°My hero..¡±, the system finally replied, almost giving her voice the tone of a rescued damsel.
I let out the most undignified laugh and then settled into an awkward silence.
Then a thought struck me. I suddenly channeled my inner Bob the blob and asked , ¡°Am I owed compensation?¡±
¡°Compensation?¡±
¡°Compensation for the failed summoning¡±, I clarified. ¡°You dropped me off at the wrong address. A different zipcode even¡±, I complained.
¡°Shall I go fetch a legendary sword out of a lake for you?¡±
¡°No, I will settle for what I got paid the last time¡±, I stated flatly.
¡°The last time? Is this a regular thing with you?¡±, came the reply, the hint of amusement in the system¡¯s voice quite evident.
I merely shrugged.
¡°Just wondering if I had to start a tab¡±, the system said dryly.
¡°Care to waive your compensation in exchange for keeping your secret?¡±, the system asked in a conspiratorial tone.
¡°My secret..?¡±, I asked. ¡®Here it comes¡¯, I thought. The ones and zeros were about to be laid out bare for judgement and subsequent dismantlement.
¡°That the mighty hero Alysa was brought to her knees by a fruit vendor¡±.
Oh that secret. My fears were for nought. ¡°I have thick skin. I¡¯ll take that compensation instead. Same as last time? Five system points, two attribute points?¡±
¡° Too expensive. The heavens have fallen on hard times lately. Too many frivolous lawsuits looking for ..compensation¡±, the system responded with added emphasis on the last word.
¡°Serves you right for employing storks to deliver heroes. Best not to leave these things to the whims of birds¡±.
¡°We run a slightly more sophisticated operation than that¡±, the system claimed.
¡° Yes, so I¡¯ve heard. Coupons and stones.¡±
¡°Fine , I will award you one skill point for your utterly shameless attempt to claim compensation.¡±
I shrugged. ¡° I won¡¯t haggle. I¡¯ve hung up my dancing boots.¡±
Then the System disappeared, leaving me with a new message
¡°You have been awarded 1 system point for the absolute shamelessness of your request.¡±
Almost as an afterthought, the system¡¯s voice pinged again, ¡°I might have crossed a line earlier, by interfering¡±.
I shook my head. ¡°But you made sure I didn¡¯t. I¡¯m grateful¡±
On a sinking boat with a mage, a rogue, a brute and a choice
I didn¡¯t want to return the way I came, so I exited back into the main street at an intersection further up ahead. The night had just fallen and the streets were illuminated by the glow of magic lamps. They were shining crystals encased in a glass exterior, with the soft luminescence of ghostly lights that danced and circled around it. Two points in language comprehension was enough to make out what was written on the sign outside the noticeably distinct guild building. Inside was the familiar sight of quest boards, smiling guild receptionists and unruly adventurers. ¡°How can we help?¡±, the woman at the counter enquired while maintaining her practiced smile.
¡°Here to register¡±, I replied. The receptionist frowned at that. She took a white crystalline paperweight from her desk and handed it to me, while the stack of paper underneath threatened to escape.
I wasn¡¯t sure if the paperweight was something that was freely provided to all the new registrants, or if I was expected to do something with it. ¡°Level stone¡±, she said, doing her best to hide her frustration of having to explain something like that. As I stared blankly at the newly entitled paperweight, the winds chose to scatter the now unencumbered clutter of paper on her desk. A cursing receptionist chased after the flying documents, then decided she couldn¡¯t be bothered to run after them and chose to let the winds claim them. ¡®They are probably not important¡¯, she muttered under her breath. ¡°Cayla, are you using the level stone as a paper weight again?¡±, her colleague from the next counter shouted at her, as I looked on bewildered. This receptionist was the gateway goddess of all receptionists, in terms of competency.
¡°Just transmit your level information on to the stone¡±, the receptionist suggested impatiently.
I tried to focus on the stone and just as I did, the stone gave a mild red glow. I was expecting the stone to reveal my exact level, but it was perhaps too crude for that and maybe just measured whether a threshold was crossed. Glorified paperweights afterall.
¡°Just as I suspected ¡ª below level ten. The guild is strict about who can register. The guild can not be liable for everyone running around with a stick, claiming to be an adventurer. The rules are clear ¡ª at least one of the two requirements for a class has to be met¡±, she said, as she tried to shoo me away.
¡°I take it that the first requirement is level-based. What¡¯s the other one?¡±
¡°The other..¡±, she scoffed. ¡°I suggest you find someone capable enough to take you with them to the forest when they go on quests and leech experience off them to raise your level. Train yourself on a weapon in the meantime. You can come back once the system deems you proficient enough to use a weapon and you have ten skill points saved up from leveling to claim that weapon skill.¡±
¡°Just give me a straight answer, lady. What¡¯s the other requirement?¡±, I asked without budging from my spot.
¡°The other requirement for a class is that you must have a weapon skill or¡¡±, she paused for dramatic effect before continuing, ¡°..or that you have a magic primer¡±. She smiled triumphantly, assuming that the revelation startled me enough to give up. Looking at me again, she continued, ¡°What are you ¡ª seventeen? Unlocked your system a few months ago, perhaps? Maybe you poked a stick at a monster that was all but dead at the hands of someone else, picked up a level here or there and convinced yourself you are an adventurer?¡±
¡°I have a primer though¡±, I stated flatly. ¡°And I¡¯m nineteen¡±, I added.
She suddenly went quiet, then recovered from her stupor and shook her head entirely unconvinced. She wasn¡¯t going to let some teenage girl make a fool of her. So she dragged me all the way to the training area. ¡°Lying on your guild application is grounds for punishment¡±, she warned me.
She stared wide-eyed as I tossed a luminous blast at a training dummy, entirely decimating it.
¡°But how..? With your low level..¡±, she mumbled. She appeared to have connected some dots as she didn¡¯t bother to finish that sentence. ¡°An innate primer! You were born with it¡±, she declared as if she had put together all the missing pieces of the mystery. ¡°A light primer as well?¡±, she screamed, almost as if the detective had suddenly thought of the involvement of an accomplice.
Her entire demeanor changed instantly, contempt giving way for reverence. She quickly took me back to the front desk and even volunteered to help me fill out the form. Having witnessed firsthand the attention and care she provided to the paperwork in her custody, I briefly considered handing my form to the receptionist at the next counter. But, my language skill was only at rank two and writing was a challenge at this level, especially if I wanted to be done with the form anytime soon.
The application allowed plenty of room to withhold information. Several fields were marked optional and I wasn¡¯t keen to volunteer more information than I had to. I offered my first name, but left the optional field for my last name blank ¡ª owing to not having one, but my reasons were easily mistaken by the guild receptionist, who winked at me in ¡®understanding¡¯ . ¡°A high noble house then. Secret¡¯s safe with me, my lady¡±, she said. I had to check the box that asked if I had a primer, as my guild membership was tied to meeting that requirement, but the specifics of the actual primers didn¡¯t have to be shared. So I left those fields empty and did the same with my skills. In the end, I turned in a mostly blank application. Thank the king for those data consent laws!
I was granted a provisional guild membership, which would be made permanent after I attended the orientation program that was held once every month. As a novice adventurer, I received a copper badge and a guild membership card. The badges weren¡¯t a measure of one¡¯ s strength, but reflected one¡¯ s reputation and standing in the league, and went up with results delivered. They also determined what benefits I received from the guild. The copper badge was the lowest of all and It certainly didn¡¯t come with dental ¡ª or any other benefit for that matter, but the entry fee at the gate was waived if you were wearing one. The badges also established a hierarchy and gave a general idea of what quests I could take. But they weren¡¯t going to stop you if you had a death wish and wanted to test yourself against a dragon or something, provided the guild and its top brass weren¡¯t inconvenienced by your attempts.
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The guild also accepted monster corpses, medicinal herbs and alchemical ingredients at fixed rates, in exchange for a small fee. I was relieved I didn¡¯t have to haggle with anyone. I kept the horn and the core of the Nightspark for myself, but I was paid three silver for the rest of the rabbit as a base price, and was promised more once their alchemist had a chance to look at it. I was told that the corpse of a mutated creature like that was worth a lot as an alchemical ingredient. The cores and the horns of the normal rabbits brought me a silver and sixty. The guild took ten percent as their cut, which came close to half a silver. My total savings stood at five silver and twenty-two bronze.
Once that was settled, I moved on to other pressing matters. ¡°Can you perhaps introduce me to some party members? As a mage, I¡¯m practically at the mercy of a brute willing to take a beating in my stead.¡±
¡°Once every month, the guild holds an event to match new adventurers to parties. It¡¯s the best way to find new party members. All the participants will gather in a room and meet each other, one at a time. A bell will ring, in regular intervals, to signal the participants to move on to the next candidate. At the end of the day, you will hand over the list of your preferred candidates to the organizers, who will then carry out the match-making¡±. She continued, ¡° How fortunate for you, lady Alysa. There is an event scheduled for tomorrow. It¡¯s a bit last minute, but I can sneak you in¡±, she said.
The process sounded vaguely familiar. I sighed when I finally realized. If I was reading this right, she had signed me up for a speed-dating event! Speed dating for party members.
¡°Let¡¯s get you registered for tomorrow. The first step in the process is to fill this questionnaire. A lot of thought and effort went into making this questionnaire. I¡¯ve personally handpicked a lot of these questions, even crafted some of them¡±, she said with immense pride. Her active involvement in this endeavour didn¡¯t bode well for its chances or my faith in it.
¡°The questions were crafted with great care to measure potential team chemistry¡±, she said, her enthusiasm plain to see. I wasn¡¯t convinced. ¡°The responses say a lot about how someone would fit in a party¡±, she further explained.
¡°Let¡¯s sit down and get comfortable¡±, she said, as she pulled out a form that was at least a dozen pages. I sighed and took a chair.
The first question was the fantasy equivalent of ''Who would you rather save from a sinking boat?¡¯. A choice between a warrior, a rogue and a mage ¡ª all grievously injured and in need of the only healing potion in my possession. Cayla being the ¡®outside the box thinker¡¯ that she was, suggested that I keep the potion for later.
She quickly moved on to the next question before I could correct her. ¡°If one of your party mates secretly ate your packed lunch, how would you react?¡± The options ranged from striking them down on the spot to handing over my dinner as well. I settled for something halfway between both the extremes.
She smiled when she saw the next question. ¡°Lady Alysa, would you say you are more likely to fall for a dashing young warrior, a scholarly mage or a devious rogue?¡±. I instantly suspected Cayla¡¯s hand in the question.
¡°What has that got to do with forming a party?¡±, I blurted out in confusion.
¡°Most adventurers are likely to get married to a party member. Er.. scratch that. Most adventurers are likely to get killed, barring which, they tend to get married to someone from their party. We have to be ten steps ahead, and team you up with the right people if you want to be married by thirty!¡±
¡°There is no way I am answering that question¡±. If I didn¡¯t put my foot down, she would marry me off to someone by the end of the day.
¡°I will mark you as ¡®open to all possibilities¡¯..¡±. She winked.
¡°Is it absolutely necessary that I fill this form?¡±
¡°Anyone who registered with the guild in the last two years is eligible to sign up for this event. The event usually attracts hundreds of people and there isn¡¯t enough time to go around meeting everyone. So we split everyone into groups of fifteen. The questionnaire helps to place you in the most compatible group.¡±
¡° And my marriage prospects are the deciding factor?!¡±
Cayla read out the next question, ¡°Would you agree to wear matching party-uniforms?¡±
¡°Absolutely not!¡¯, I shouted.
She pouted in disappointment, but didn¡¯t stop with the questions. ¡°You are camped out in the wilderness for an overnight quest and your teammate snores..What would you do?¡±, the question asked. I opted to simply ¡®roll them on to their sides¡¯, much to the disappointment of the receptionist, who was a big proponent of ¡®smothering them to silence with a pillow¡¯.
On and on the questions went. There was a question on the preferred approach to handling disputes within a party. The receptionist tried to nudge me towards the right answer, which according to her was to let things fester long enough until they were forgotten ¡ª ¡®or blew up in our faces¡¯, I muttered. It was still a mild choice by her standards. Naturally, I opted not to go with any of her suggestions and stayed far away from another option that called for ¡®a fight unto death¡¯. Amicable settlement through healthy dialogue wasn¡¯t listed as a valid choice.
Once I settled on some random choice, she went straight to the next question. ¡°The best course of action to bring about a change in party leadership?¡±
¡° An open vote?¡±, I asked hesitantly.
Her eyes flitted through the form. ¡°I don¡¯t see that listed as one of the options¡±, she said. Of course, it wasn¡¯t there. She started reading out the available options one by one, ¡°Leaving things to omens, signs and divine intervention¡±. Sure, if we were trying to depose the chief shaman. Her face was practically gleaming as she revealed the next option, ¡° Requesting a duel with the leader¡± ¡ª If I was in a wolf-pack and wanted to be made the alpha.
When we were finally done with everything, she took all the pages to her desk. Then she searched around looking for something and when she found what she was looking for, it turned out to be a white crystalline stone, which she left on top of my forms as a paperweight. I sighed knowing the fate that awaited it.