Actually having cooked meat to eat, well, after a couple of days, it was surprisingly tasty. The fish flesh was light and flaky, and when I buried the coals with the veggies, barely an hour later I ate them steaming and tasty. It was good to know that I hadn’t lost any survival skills, and maybe improved them by combining them with quintessence. A fact that was brought home to me when Mnemosyne sent me a message.

After consuming well-prepared wild fish and steamed broiled vegetables, You have gained 10% maximum fatigue and health for the next 4 hours.

Thanks, Mnem. I thought to myself, although I wasn’t sure if she could get messages back yet. Stomping down and dousing the site lowered my chances of being detected, and I was heading south once more.

This time, I had a goal. I needed to get to the bottom of two things. Why someone from this world was importing humans and simulating a game with this world, and why they grabbed me of all people and stuck me in the body of a kobold.

Mnemosyne had implied strongly that gaining strength, in a way that was similar to players, could allow me to grow stronger even if I couldn’t get levels as they could, and Kozmina’s words echoed in my mind. Besides assuring that someday you might be able to become human again. That meant that if I could figure out what these gods wanted, which would probably require me to become stronger, then I could regain my natural form.

I had very little hope of returning home, but those bands might be the key to both. Obviously, She said I couldn’t wear one, which probably meant even touching them was dangerous, but I still needed to find a way to find out more about them. I needed to find people that had them and find a way to probe them somehow.

Right now, a necromancer powerful enough to rip my spirit out of my body and put it into another was working with someone that could open a hole to my reality, kidnap me, and bring me here. Both of those abilities sounded powerful, again bringing my attention to the fact that I was not.

Sindaenaway itself was a non-starter. Not only was I likely to get killed there if I went back before I was powerful enough to protect myself, but that was also where the two monsters were likely stationed. I needed information, which I had no idea how to obtain, but finding a human settlement, and maybe a shrine, sounded like a decent first step in my quest.

Feh, I was alive, in a fantasy gamer world full of monsters, on a quest to become strong enough to vanquish the monsters that brought me here, in hopes that someday I could return home or turn human again. It was almost like one of those translated Japanese books. Now all I had to do was rant endlessly about strength and do weird honor things like healing my enemies before I slaughtered them to make it a fair fight and it would be perfectly in genre.

Heck, I was even finding my martial arts to be by far my best weapon. Of course, if I had a gun I’d happily use that, but when it came to fights I would win them by any means necessary. Honor in a real life and death struggle, to me, meant giving the other guy a chance to surrender or run away. It was like one of my favorite authors once mentioned… If you don’t surrender before my tanks get into firing range, it’s simply too late. I would happily follow the code of chivalry right up until someone tried to stab me, then all bets were off. Eyes, knees, balls, and backs were totally legal targets if someone was trying to end my life, and according to Cassie, without a band, I had only one to lose.

That was another thing. The dwarven lady had stated that if their bands ran out of energy, they ceased to exist. Did that mean that the bands sustained their bodies here? Or did their bodies somehow sustain the bands? I mean, they could resurrect, right? More information I needed.

After about an hour of traveling farther south, I was pretty sure I was closer to where the goblin camp had been. I was on the other side of the stream from the camp, but I had stumbled across a path. I had crossed several deer trails, and once even a set of rabbit trails that sorely tempted me to make a night of it by tracking it to a warren and setting a snare or two, but I still had a full night ahead of me and until I found some way to deal with my sun blindness, night living it would have to be.

There were predators out, but they were surprisingly easy to avoid, probably because of my stealth. I was moving crouched over, but the darkness hid my blue coloration quite well, and my steady diet of healthy food and constant exercise meant that by the time I found the trail, I had already improved my stealth to apprentice superb, and my body type to mediocre.

Enhancing my body type to mediocre was very exciting because, in the end, body, reflexes, and mind were really the only attributes we could find that really fit. Willpower, acrobatics, and physical fitness were all things that could be trained like skills, and your body state, reflexes, and comprehension speed were the only things we could agree you could not directly train, they improved as you worked the skills that used them. That sort of made them base stats since body state was a decent catch-all for health, strength, and appearance, reflexes worked pretty well for dexterity, and comprehension, or mind, covered wisdom and intelligence type stats pretty well.

Yes, some people were unwise but could do complex multiplication in their heads in a heartbeat. Heck, I was one of them, but that was more like a direct handicap than a low attribute of some kind. I had almost argued with the illusionary redhead that in MY world, we knew how to train logic and dialectic, so it certainly should be a skill rather than just a natural feature of the way your brain is made.

Once my stealth was journeyman level, I intended to see what I could do by adding mana to it. Perhaps it would enable ‘super stealth’ or invisibility, or I might have to figure out why certain Draconic verbs were intrinsically linked to quintessence.

I was still acting all sneaky when I found the twin tracks. This looked like a regularly used wagon trail. It was far too crude and was not maintained in any way, but there were many wheel marks and the tracks of some kind of a large, heavy animal like an ox.

Oxen implied heavy goods wagons, meant to send bulk supplies rather than people or valuable goods. This was likely a regular trail for wagoneers, the kind that didn’t want to pay taxes on heavy goods or were perhaps concerned about bandits on better roads.

I started following the path in the direction that the hoofprints were deeper since that suggested heavy goods were being sent to where they could be marketed or stored rather than returning empty. I tried using [observe] on the path, but learned its big shortcoming… it could scan objects and energy, but not things that have arbitrary or observed relevance attached. It could certainly tell me all about the grass and dirt around the wheel marks, but the wheel marks themselves were just misplaced dirt, not something I could get a read on.

So how did [observe] understand the difference between a staff and a stick of wood? Well, [observe] read the essence of an object, and will was supposed to be everything, so if I grabbed a piece of wood intending to use it as a staff, it would read the object like it was a staff. That actually gave me some information about this trail, it was apparently not intended to become any sort of a path or road, and thus was a makeshift result of wagons traveling an unusual route rather than an intentional new trail. I imagine an actual road would probably have registered on [observe].

That told me that whoever took this route probably did not want to be observed, so I maintained my sneaky resolve not to attempt to contact anyone I spotted in the path until it got to some kind of civilization. Bandits usually wouldn’t attack bulk wagons since there was no real profit in heavy lumber or masses of ore, so I figured this would most likely be used by someone avoiding authorities or smuggling. And Mnemosyne wondered why I considered logic important enough to be a separate skill!

Your logic has improved to apprentice good, smartass!

Hehe. Sometimes even minor victories tasted sweet. Of course, this did open up the possibilities of snark or sarcasm, but she DID make that joke about permanent changes earlier.

Twice I had smelled dangerous odors, and heard rustling I wanted to avoid, and I had hidden until whatever predators passed. I had no idea of what power level the area was since it was several days away from Sindaenaway which was a major city and thus presumably a newbie zone. When my hiding spot was passed by what looked a lot like three wolves that were taller at the shoulder than my head, I was glad I went to the trouble. Until I was more confident in my strength, I would have to approach each fight very carefully, like I would in my previous life.

It was almost midnight by my estimation when I finally smelled smoke and caught sight of a palisade. There were torches mounted on top of the log wall, but the gate itself appeared closed, probably a sensible precaution for a settlement deep in the woods. It was not surrounded by fields, so it probably bought its food or farmed it elsewhere, meaning there was some kind of valuable resource here. The area around the wall was cleared to about 50 feet of the encroaching forest, and it looked like large plants and saplings were chopped off regularly, but the stumps of the original trees hadn’t been removed, and except for an actual gravel and dirt road leading out of the gateway, the stumps looked fairly recent. Perhaps 10 years or so since the forest was cleared.

It was probably foolish to approach a defensive settlement at night, but I wanted to be able to see if they turned hostile, so I tried a strategy I hoped would work.

I tried to put on my best roleplaying game persona, and from the treeline itself, I hollered “Ho the gate!” I had only had a quiet conversation with Cassie, and when I spoke inside my zone my voice had sounded normal to me for my human form, so I was caught by surprise at how high and squeaky it sounded, sort of wrecking my assumed persona.

I could see a figure on top of the palisade moving, and then the telltale outline of what looked like a longbow being placed in position for drawing. “Who goes there?” a much louder voice called out.

“A scout, seeking entry to the town and safety from the forest!” I replied, still irritated at how high-pitched and frankly, fearful, my voice sounded. I was, however, immensely grateful for Kozmina’s gift. If I hadn’t been shouting in Rhydian, I imagine the guard’s response would have been much more aggressive.

“Are you human?” the voice called. Ugh. I had hoped that my negative response wouldn’t be followed by an arrow, but letting them know in advance would be better than children throwing rocks. They might turn me aside, but at least I would know if the whole ‘sentient monster adventurer’ thing held water. “No! I am an adventurer!” I replied, my voice almost breaking as I tried to match his volume.

The voice, strangely enough, laughed. Oh, I guess I just kinda said adventurers were not humans. Good enough joke that I wished it had been intentional. “Seriously though, are you Human?” asked the voice. She didn’t seem to need to exactly yell, it was only 50 feet and the evening was fairly quiet, but I still had to shout somewhat.

“No, I am an adventurer, not human, but friendly. I am here to deliver some useful information and perhaps find other adventurers.” I also had a pouch full of what I felt were useful herbs I had gathered and [observed], and was hoping to finish and sell the leather hide I’d snaked and pick up a few essentials, like a better knife or a dutch oven, if they existed.

I used [observe] and got a read on whom I was talking to as I heard her talking to someone else in a voice too low for me to understand

Megan La’aetorian (deadly)

Half-elf

Gate Sergeant

Health: 94%

Pregnant

Distrustful

After a few moments, a sort of strobing light appeared in the middle of the field, some kind of spell that slowly pulsed lighter and dimmer, but did not go out, and had about a ten-foot diameter. “Oh yes, we have had adventurers show up here several times, and some are here this moment.” she almost spat the word adventurers, and I could tell there was no love lost, I had apparently been unwise in my choice of the term.

“Step into the light so we can see you,” she added.

“I am very not human, okay?” I yelled back. “Don’t be scared. I am friendly.”

“I am reasonably certain that I won’t be frightened.” the voice sounded somewhat amused. Considering she registered as ‘deadly’ to me, I was certain she was telling the truth, so I screwed up my courage, readjusted my bundles, and stepped into the lighted patch.

“Oh, shit, it’s just a kobold.” I heard another voice. “I thought it was going to be a half-troll or something.” The light stopped, and I heard the Sergeant say “Stand down, it’s just a kobold.” Then the sounds of several bows I hadn’t noticed being unstrung. “Approach the gate.”

I was almost insulted. Just a kobold. I had already killed two wolves, a giant rat, and a goblin. Kobolds were… okay, they weren’t really a threat to trained warriors. Yet. I walked towards the gate and noticed that there was a small, outwards-opening door that popped open, torchlight framing the figure within as she motioned me to enter.

“What the hell is a kobold doing out here?” The lady, who I could now see was an almost ethereally lovely young woman with green hair, slight epicanthic folds at the corners of her eyes, and the oddest shade of blonde hair with light green highlights. “Did you get lost? I don’t recognize what type of kobold you are, either.”

I sorta scooted into the gate between her and the side of the wooden palisade as I answered, “I was looking for a settlement, I found a goblin camp and wanted to let someone know because they bragged about raiding villages and eating babies while they tried to hunt me.” I fished around for a second and pulled the cloth bundle out of my bag. It wasn’t dripping, but it did reek quite a bit.

“What is that?” She asked as I noted that the inside of the settlement looked more like a military town than a village. There was the town square and trading post like I had hoped. But there were also buildings that looked very much like training salles, barracks, and stables. I was not really sure, but there seemed to also be no less than two buildings that looked like pubs or hotels. They were done in very Tudor, or half-timber, construction style, raising the estimated age of this settlement in my opinion. The walls may have been newer, but the town itself looked like it had been around for a generation, at least. Recent military occupation?

I placed the bundle on the ground, and carefully unwrapped it, revealing the goblin’s head. The young lady almost gagged, putting a hand over her mouth. “Ugh. Why didn’t you just get the quest for Twofell? They only require ears, not a whole head. I mean, I will talk to the captain, he’ll pay you a bounty, I think. You said you know where they camped?” she motioned for me to re-wrap the head, which I did promptly. I didn’t like it any more than she did, but even a couple of days spoiled it was better than removing the thing.

She motioned to one of the other soldiers, a human dressed in leather, and pointed at the bundle. The man, a younger guy with a carefully trimmed goatee, gave a long-suffering look and fetched the bundle by the less bloody knot and started carrying it away.

“You are amazingly well-spoken for a kobold. They usually have trouble with stringing words together in Rhydian.” She said, looking curious. “Are you a familus or something? Or one of those trading tribes?” she nodded towards my armor, “Your armor is both crude and sophisticated at the same time, but it looks like it was made for you.”

I shrugged, remembering Cassie’s using the term ‘abomination’ which, no matter how you use it, added up to something bad. “Oh, my people like trading, and I was schooled in my language quite heavily. I made the armor myself but was sort of forced to use local materials because I was on the move and didn’t have a workshop. I wouldn’t even know where to look for grommets, rivets, or the other items I would normally use to finish a set of armor like this, so I had to make do when I headed out. My people do not usually become adventurers, but I was looking for a way to improve myself, so I left when I came of age.” Sure, I was carefully temporizing, but I didn’t want them thinking I was an escaped slave or whatever a familus was, or an abomination. Healthy and smart young kobold, out to find his way in the world on his own terms, that was me.

I noticed that she wasn’t wearing a band. “You are not wearing a band, but you seem powerful. How does that work?” I asked her curiously.

She shook her head. “In civilized areas, dungeons either don’t form or are destroyed almost as soon as they are formed, because the amount of life and mana in a civilized area often makes them grow out of control and incredibly dangerous.”

“But out here, non-adventurers can still get plenty of experience and improve themselves in dungeons, which often do not grow that big because except in essence-rich areas, they aren’t as easily corrupted. Most people can also grow with skill training, but we don’t level up as adventurers do. Why would a blacksmith, for instance, want to go fight monsters when he could much more easily and safely simply improve his abilities through hard work and using and training his blacksmith skills?”

“A lot of adventurers, and some of the races in general, think that leveling and becoming temporarily immortal is the best thing in existence, but there are huge prices you pay. Adventurers cannot have children, are constantly called on to run around doing quests, and to be honest, they attract monsters. The magic in their bands makes them dangerous for anyone to have around, especially since the random quests that they get might encourage or reward them for doing something bad.” She smiled a little, “How many adventurers do you know would control themselves if they got irritated at a city guard, and suddenly got a quest to kill him with a huge reward?”

I started to answer and then stopped. Yeah, I remember hordes of players that would literally sit in front of a city and farm the guards over and over for easy experience. In this world, guards didn’t respawn, they were born and had lives and joined the guard with high hopes of making a difference or supporting a family, just like everyone else. I had a sneaking suspicion, based on her dislike for adventurers, Megan had seen something like that.

“How many of your friends did they kill?” I asked her simply.

She sighed a little. “Perceptive little thing, aren’t you?” she muttered, “Twelve before I got there. They kept laughing, like they were cutting down trees instead of people, and making jokes about the funny faces and screams as they died. Gods damned immortals might stop big threats, but if you turn your back long enough they make invading demons look like toddlers throwing tantrums. I have heard of entire villages getting slaughtered because of one adventurer who was caught and confronted about stealing apples from a Farmer’s house. Apples! He basically murdered an entire town so he wouldn’t have to pay a copper to the farmer for his apples.”

She shrugged, “We have had some problems with adventurers here before. I guess being able to get reborn as long as your band has energy makes them incautious. They seem to make a game of getting into deadly fights in pubs, shops, and occasionally the streets, especially the immortals. You are lucky you don’t have an adventurer’s glow because if you had, I might have just taken you out to get rid of a potential threat. Why are you calling yourself an adventurer, anyway?”

I decided to level with her. She had seemed to be a straight shooter so far. “Because some people hurt me and are hurting my people. I need to get strong enough to stop them, and to find out why, and maybe stop the ones behind them.” I brushed at one of my ludicrous little horns with a fingertip, “us kobolds are not exactly deadly to encounter alone. I guess, not unless we have time to prepare. So whatever I have to do to get more effective, dangerous, or threatening, is what I will do.”

Megan looked a little surprised at that. “You could visit the shrine and get a band. That would allow you to join their groups, do that weird thing where you pull treasures out of thin air when you kill something and join their quests. They grow powerful insanely quickly. I have been in the guard for forty years, and an adventurer could probably shoot past me in less than a month.”

I wondered how she knew I didn’t have a band, since my wrists were covered with armor. Maybe it was that adventurer glow she talked about? Was there some way to notice immortals or Adventurers that didn’t involve the band or using a spell?