“C’mon man, just cut me a discount this once. I’ll pay you back in a few days.” I walked in to see a nearly completely black kobold trying to get a discount from Dharkiss. Good luck with that.

“And I told you already, I don’t trust you. I don’t give discounts.”

“But.”

“NO BUTS! I won’t hear another word of it, Magic Mike. Is there anything else?”

“No.” He sulked, walking away to look at other stuff.

“Hey there Angus! Didn’t see you walk in. What can I do for you?”

“Hey Dharkiss. I need some equipment repaired, and to pick your brain on a few things again.”

“Wonderful! What do we have to kill this time? Manticores? Dragons? The world serpent?”

“Ha, nothing nearly as grand as that. Just a thunder-ram toad.” I replied.

“Oh? Those are good eating, if you can take ‘em down. What have you tried so far?”

“Well, getting splattered by them as they do their ram from jumping off the ceiling didn’t work, I figured I would try a weapon next time.”

“BWAHAHAHAHA! OH, that’s fantastic. The easiest way is to buy some of the temporary paralytic poison from Djarleen. If they can’t move, they can’t smash you with their heads.”

“I should have known there was an easy answer. I’ll think about it, but Khaliss will probably yell at me if I don’t push myself with challenging opponents. It’s too bad I won’t have the time to leave a spear where it is ramming its head. That’ld take it out fairly quick.” As I was talking, I felt the slightest tugging in one of the bags on my waist. “But there is one other thing I need you to look at.” I said, keeping the conversation going while I pulled out my weapon. “[Keen edge]!” I shouted, swiveling my hips and slashing just behind me.

“AAAAH!” I was rewarded with a cry of pain, and saw Magic Mike falling on his ass, blood spurting from the stump where his hand used to be. “YOU CUT OFF MY HAND YOU BASTARD!” Sure enough, there was his hand on the ground, along with one of the magic sensing organs I had found.

“Well, that is what they used to do back in the day with thieves.” I calmly replied, picking up my property and placing it back in my bag along with Mike’s hand.

“I’m a mage, not a thief.” He said.

“Really? That’s probably why you got caught then.” Dharkiss commented.

“Give my hand back! And heal me before I die.” He demanded petulantly. Looking at him, I realized my attack had taken off almost two thirds of his life, and the bleeding wasn’t helping him any.

“Wow, we should really do something about that.” I feigned concern, taking a rope out of my bag and tying it incredibly tightly around his arm. “Dharkiss, do we have anything to cauterize this?” I asked innocently.

“Why I do believe we do Angus. Head on into the back with me.”

To be honest, I’m not entirely proud of what we did to the poor guy, and I have no idea exactly why I went through with it. Maybe I was still pissed that I died yet again, or that some low level shit thought he could steal from me. Either way, the apprentice looked on in horror as we held his bleeding stump to the forge, screaming the whole time. I even force fed him a health potion to make sure he didn’t die.

“Bank the forge and watch the store, we need to see Khaliss.” Dharkiss ordered his apprentice, who still hadn’t said a word. He forced Magic Mike to walk in front of him the whole time, keeping a solid grip on the back of his neck. Once we got down there, Khaliss held a swift trial. I told my side, Dharkiss filled in what he saw, and Magic Mike tried to lie. The most damning evidence was the severed hand with my property in it, and Khaliss was not amused.

“Magic Mike, I find you guilty. You tried to steal from a hero, in the presence of our most respected blacksmith. I truly wish I could exile you, but as you have barely been here long enough to finish your initial three day dungeon stint, my hands are tied in this. I’m stripping you of all your experience, and forcing you to spend two more rounds in the dungeon. You will have to work in groups there, and in the downtime your assigned partners will be explaining how to be a proper kobold.” A flash of light later, and Magic Mike was sent away with two burly guards.

“Now, for you Angus. Next time, simply give him a healing potion. It will heal him enough that the bleeding won’t kill him. Pull something like this again, and I will demote you, got it?”

“Yes sir.” I said, properly chastised. Dharkiss had made himself scarce, and I figured that would be a good idea. I headed out of the city, looking for a rematch with some frogs.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Some time later, I had slain a few more crayclaws and finally found another toad. This time, I wanted to get up close and personal. Sneaking up wasn’t too hard to do, as they were fairly sedentary creatures. I did manage a [Keen edge] to sever the tendon to the foot, crippling the creature and taking out its strongest weapon. A few hammer blows to the other leg and it got ticked off enough to release an area lightning attack. It wasn’t too damaging, but it did manage to stun me long enough for the toad to turn and face me. From there it was a simple battle, as I would dance in and out and side to side to avoid its ramming attack. It managed one more lightning blast and a solid headbutt, before finally dying. The loot was a pair of frog legs and one eye. I pulled out one of the frog legs, and the devs must have done some resizing. Instead of it being the size of my own leg, they had the drop end up being the size of a turkey leg. Smiling, I got a crazy idea and headed back to town.

The first thing that I noticed when I got in to town was an email ping. I opened it up, slightly dreading what it said.

Player Angus_MacG

We have received a complaint that you have engaged in torture of another player. We take all these accusations seriously, and have reviewed the footage of the incident. While your actions would be reasonable in a real life scenario, there were several options you could have taken that didn’t result in another player forcibly having a limb cauterized.

We have decided that this incident wasn’t fully malicious, though we are going to add a note to your file. Should you engage in other behavior that borders on torture, this incident will weigh against you. As a reminder, players that engage in torture of other players will be punished, up to and including character deletion and permanent bans from the game.

Please be mindful of further actions.

Admin reviewer 7225.

At least they were swift with weighing the evidence and decided not to punish me too badly. Slightly bummed, I headed to the inn to discuss some things.

“Alnoss, you around?” I asked hopefully, having come in to an empty dining room for a change.

“Coming!” I heard from the kitchen area. “Angus, you haven’t been avoiding me, have you?” She asked as she came through the doorway.

“Not at all, just been busy with some things. You know how life can sneak up and keep you busy.”

“Yeah, you have no idea on that. So, what can I do for ya?” As she leaned against the bar, I swear I smelled hickory smoke on her. I tried to do a few discreet sniffs, but she caught me at it. “Think very carefully about what you are going to say after sniffing me Angus.”

“Alnoss, I thought I smelled hickory smoke, and was just trying to be sure. I meant no offense.”

“What is hickory smoke? And why wouldn’t it be offensive?”

“Where I’m from, hickory is a type of tree. The smoke from the wood is used to cook meat, and it is delicious.”

“Well it ain’t wood. We have a dry moss that is used to give a bit of flavor to certain dishes.”

“How fast does it burn, and how much can you get? I have a crazy idea brewing and its changing as we talk here.”

“Slow burning, puts off a good bit of smoke. As for how much, you gotta give me a time frame. It takes a bit to dry it out.”

“Say a week.”

“I can get you a few pounds of the dry stuff. That should be enough to smoke for about five or six hours.”

“Perfect, absolutely perfect!” I said, getting excited. “Can you get me a good bit of salt and pepper as well?”

“Sure.” She said a little uncertainly.

“Relax, I have an idea for a, call it a joint venture. I’ll pay for the supplies and cook the food, you decide how to sell it. Sound good?”

“Ok, fine. When are we going to do this?”

“A week from tomorrow.” I said, before heading out the door. I needed to talk to Dharkiss again. Running through the crowds as fast as I could without jostling everyone, I burst into his shop.

“Dharkiss! I need a custom order from you!” I practically yelled.

“Slow down, slow down. When do you need it?”

“A week from tomorrow at the earliest, and can you deliver it to just outside the inn that Alnoss owns?”

“I can probably do that, now show me what you need.” I spent the next few hours describing and drawing what I needed, and Dharkiss looked at me like I was only slightly insane. With a few gold as a down payment, I headed back to the inn and logged out for the night.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

The next week flew by in a blur. I spent most of my days fighting crayclaws and those pain in the butt toads, keeping all the drops. Nights were spent relaxing at the café with the rest of the gang, listening to the madness that they ended up getting in to. Derrick was having a blast wandering around and taking out bandit camps, even if he couldn’t use any of their equipment. I couldn’t think of anything more terrifying than a night raid by a troll.

Three days into grinding week, I met two different creatures that I assumed to be minibosses. The first was an albino crayclaw that was almost seven feet tall. Both of its claws were oversized, and I kept my distance. The second was a variant of the thunder-ram toad. Instead of a pair of bumps on its head that blasted out lightning, it was covered in them. I kept my distance from both, as they were a few levels above me.

Albino Kingclaw

Level 28

The albino kingclaw is born once for every 10,000 crayclaws. It’s a much larger specimen, and can fire their trademark blasts from both claws.

Stormlord toad

Level 27

The stormlord toad is not one to underestimate. Capable of turning the area immediately surrounding it into a swirling mass of electricity, they are best dealt with at a distance.

I kept my distance from the two, wanting to come up with an alternative attack for each one. All the grinding did manage to get me a level, and by the end of the week I had to be close to getting to level 27. I also managed to get a make-up kill for my earlier death, completing my weekly quest for Thanatos and netting another 7 favor. I would also head to the alchemy headquarters and use their transmutation array at the end of the day. By the end of the week I had seventy superior quality mana sensing organs, with three hundred high quality ones sitting in my inventory. That was enough for my needs, which was luckily also the day before Dharkiss was going to deliver my order.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

I woke up the next morning to Alnoss pounding on my door, having decided to sleep in the game for one night. “Damnit Angus, wake up. Dharkiss has an order for you, and I’m telling him to leave if you aren’t out in five minutes!”

“Relax, Alnoss. I’m up.” I said sleepily, as I opened the door. “Besides, that thing is going to bring in a boatload of money for us today.” I headed down, Alnoss following in curiosity. When we exited the inn, Dharkiss had my order sitting there. It was a beautiful barrel smoker, with multiple racks for holding meat. The firebox was low and to one side, and opposite it was a smokestack for ventilation.

“Well, what the heck is this infernal contraption you had me make boy?” Dharkiss asked, apparently irked that he had to get up early in the morning.

“It’s called a smoker. We use it to cook meat. Come by around lunch time and I’ll give you one for free, sound good?”

“But what are ya cookin’?”

“These.” I said, pulling out one of the nearly 700 frog legs I had amassed in the previous week. “You said you liked thunder-ram toad meat, right?”

“Well yeah, but how many you got?”

“Just under 700.” I replied.

“Dear lord!” Both Dharkiss and Alnoss cried out.

“Yep, but first we need to fire this bad boy up. Alnoss, can I get that box of charcoal out here?”

“Coming right up!” She said, much more excited now that she knew my plan.

Dharkiss wandered away after watching me for a bit, and I spent the next several hours in meal prep. Getting the smoker heated up properly, trimming and seasoning the meat, things like that. I decided to go with the drumstick portion of the legs, as they had much more meat on them. Besides, who doesn’t want to feel like a medieval king tearing into a massive drumstick of meat? It ended up taking nearly four hours to cook one batch of drumsticks, and my smoker could only hold 300 at a time. Heh, look at me complaining about cooking 300 pieces of meat at a time. Alnoss did great helping out, advertising to groups of kobolds as they walked around. Many were curious about the ‘cooking contraption’ as they referred to it, but promised to come back for a taste later. We sold them for two silver apiece, or three for five. Djarleen even stopped by for a bit, and I had her take some to the alchemy guild as a bribe to have people finish my transmutations for me. By the end of the day, I was happily exhausted and quite a bit richer. Alnoss even bought the portion of the legs I hadn’t cooked, wanting to try out the smoker on her own over the next several days.

Skill

Initial level

New level

Bonus

Hammerscythe mastery

Intermediate lvl 2

Intermediate lvl 7

Damage increased by 22%, attack speed increased by 9%

Sneak

Intermediate lvl 2

Intermediate lvl 5

Speed increased by 17%, Harder to detect by 8%

Ambush

Intermediate lvl 9

Advanced lvl 2

Attack damage increased by 42%, Critical hit chance increased by 22%