08 – Rusckan village – Revenge

The lines of text disappeared from his vision, leaving only the white room and nothing else for a moment. The process, this time, felt like it was excruciatingly slow compared to the other times. Maybe because he knew that if he didn’t respawn soon, then the troll would target the village, or maybe because indeed the respawning process was slower now that he was not resetting the timeline.

Finally, David watched the white room disappear from all around him, and his thoughts shifted to how he could use his new enhancement to kill the troll. If time was flowing the same way here and there, maybe the troll was still where it was when he died. If that was the case, however, maybe there would be a bigger problem to deal with. He’d have to survive the pain phase before he could move again.

That was a problem. A problem he had no solution to, and so he tried to formulate a plan with all he had available. If he died every time he respawned, not only would he experience more and more pain with each respawn, but also the village would be eventually attacked.

The upgrade he got from the white room, the increased affinity with mana. Perhaps it was the key. He had been using magic consistently for a while now, so it made sense that his body had been upgraded to better be able to deal with the mana of the world. And maybe he could use it to attack the monster before he got overwhelmed by pain and was rendered useless for a few seconds.

As usual, he reappeared back in the real world without any transition. As soon as the white room was gone, he was back in the land of the living. This time, as he already knew by what he read in the messages from the white room, he did not reset time. The troll was right next to him where he reappeared, already looking at him with wild and hungry eyes.

He had planned to act, to defend himself with all he had before the troll could attack him, but the pain came. His plan had failed without even beginning, and he knew that this could only mean death. He could not even think about how bad it would be if the troll managed to kill him while he was overwhelmed by the pain. It came. It hit him like a truck.

It felt like his skin was melting, like his bones were being crushed all at once while his nerves were set on fire. It felt much worse than his last death, and he knew that soon enough it would no longer be death that he would have to fear, but his return to life.

The troll loomed closer, but he could not move nor react in any way. He watched helplessly, while tiny needles pierced his brain and organs from the inside, as the troll swung his weapon at him. He closed his eyes and accepted his fate. This time he would go to the forest and prepare, because he could not respawn and die like this forever.

The sword hit. The cessation of the pain did not come, however, and he opened his eyes. He was still in one piece, still feeling the harsh and scraping sensation of the respawn as it dwindled slowly. The troll’s sword had broken in two after hitting something, and now the troll was bashing his fists against an invisible wall that surrounded David like a dome.

The respawn protection. Awesome.

As soon as the pain faded enough for him to move and speak, he knew that the dome too had stopped protecting him. It was enough time, however, because right now he felt like he could split open a mountain. The thrill and the high from the respawn was still in his system, and he basked in the afterglow of the sensation. It was this moment that made all the pain worth it.

“Alright, fucker. You did it, you killed me. Are you happy?” He said, mockingly because he knew that all that the troll had accomplished was delaying the inevitable.

“The Hunter is coming for you.” He said, and lunged forward.

The troll was still catching its breath after mindlessly trying to overcome the respawn protection shield, and barely managed to block the incoming onyx knife that was aimed at its throat. After the parry, David bounced back and distanced himself from the monster, making his dented knife disappear back into oblivion.

He readied his new control over the mana. At the same time, another knife appeared in his hand from the aether, summoned by his ability. He gripped the stone handle of the obsidian knife, his favorite, and stepped forward.

The troll roared and it too stepped forward to meet the blade coming for it. It parried it with unexpected mastery, throwing David off balance. He knew that he was not an experienced fighter, but that did not matter at all, because all that he needed was to distract the monster while he prepared the real attack.

Five spears of stone appeared from the ground, piercing the earth and growing upwards rapidly towards the torso of the troll. It snarled and tried to dodge the incoming earthen spears, but they were coming from all directions and had it boxed in.

Three of them pierced its thick skin, and burrowed deep into its flesh. It was immobile now, kept in place by the stone that was still growing from the ground itself and ripping it apart from the inside. David prepared the knife, and swung the blade.

This time he would not commit the same mistake as before. This time he would kill the thing for real.

The knife struck true, and embedded itself into the skull of the monster. David pushed as hard as he could, then turned the blade to maximize the damage. The monster went limp, dead. David stepped away, but did not let the earth magic dissipate. What he did instead, was prepare another magic.

The explosion of the supercharged fireball could be heard from the guild itself.

“I win.” Said David.

He walked, slowly, towards the body of the monster. It was mangled and charred, with an arm detached from the rest of the body and with many holes where the earthen spells were keeping it bound. After the spell was released, the stone dissipated into motes of raw mana, leaving behind the gaping and bleeding holes where it struck. David could have made the stone permanent, but it was not needed.

He stored the dead body in his inventory. It disappeared from the ground, only to appear inside his storage space.

“Are you okay?” The young guy asked, after rushing to David as soon as the fight was over.

“Yeah.”

“I saw you die!” He said, pointing a finger at David.

“Death is not the end, I guess.”

“How. How can you do it? How can you cheat death?” The man asked.

“I don’t know. But I pay the price for it, each and every time.”

The conversation ended there, with David not wanting to go into too much detail about his ability and with the young man looking at him oddly. In truth, David himself had no idea how and why he did what he did. Maybe there was a deity that was interested in him, or it was some sort of very advanced magic, or maybe he was chosen to do something.

It didn’t matter. This was his life, and he had all the intentions to live it. The world had color, purpose, a reason. It was no longer grey all the time now.

They crossed the village in silence, with David contemplating the damaged houses and broken streets. There was rubble everywhere, even in the main road, a testimony of the many close encounters this village had with total annihilation. Something had changed here, and now the village was dying. The few heroes left were defending it with all their might, David included, but it could not go on forever.

And the mission was still active, which meant only one thing. He didn’t only have to defeat monsters; he had to save the village. And the clock was ticking.

The two reached the guild building and entered it, attracting the gaze of everyone inside. The room went silent for a moment, before murmurs began to spread and the whole room became covered in whispers.

Griglir, the guild master, appeared from behind a door. He looked at David, who was still wearing his suit and tie. The clothes were perfect and immaculate, because they reformed along with his body each time he respawned, making them even cleaner than they were when he left the guild.

“You did it. You killed the troll.” The master said in a low voice. “You saved the village!”

The crowd cheered. “Yeah, the Knuckles were just too tired to even stand, let alone fight. You did good, son.” Said one of the elder men at the counter. He was looking at David with a respect that was not there before.

“Thank you.” He replied, quite embarrassed at the praise but at the same time proud of himself. “Where can I put the body?”

“Over there.”

The body appeared out of thin air, a few inches above a long wooden table. It landed with a loud thump, and once again the room fell completely silent.

A loud, cheerful yell interrupted the silence.

“Tonight, we feast!”

The room erupted, with cheers and loud congratulations flying left and right. The guild master laughed along with the other peers, but had a distant look in his eyes. He motioned for David to follow him, and went into a room. He closed the door.

“Procedure says that the body is yours to do whatever you want with it.” He said.

“I thought it was yours. If it’s mine, then why are they talking about a feast and all that?”

The dwarf sighed. “Troll flesh is quite appetizing, you know, especially after spending months with barely enough to eat. Normally, I would make an offer for the corpse but…” He looked down at his feet.

David could not take it much longer, because he had seen the situation of the village and the looks on the people’s faces.

“Don’t worry about money.” He said. He went for the door, before he stopped and turned around with a light smile on his face. “You can pay me back by telling me where I can find a good place to train a bit.”

The dwarf rumbled, his own way of chuckling. The mood had improved significantly, and there was even a smile on his bearded face.

“Over there, to the left. Go straight until you’re out in the backyard.”

David followed the directions into the fenced backyard of the guild. The space was quite big, with a large flat area covered with neatly trimmed grass and a large wooden shack. Inside the shack there were training swords, bows and dummies of various sizes.

Discarding the training equipment for now, he stepped inside the paved area to one side near the fence. He could see the street from over it, a small and deserted narrow street between half destroyed buildings. The sun was shining from over the piles of still smoking rubble, sending its warmth across the untold distances of space and caressing David’s face with its rays of light.

He took a deep breath. The air was crisp and clean, even though much less than in the forest, and had a burnt aftertaste to it. There were fires going on throughout the village, many from the destroyed buildings but also many others that were being made in preparation for tonight’s feast.

Maybe he could really make a difference here. Maybe he could really help save this village. But to do so he had to get much, much stronger. If a monster attacked now, he knew that it would not go much better than the last fight. And, by his recollection, the troll was among the weakest of monsters that could appear over here.

It was a 4E monster, and yet had managed to kill David once before he managed to kill it. And even killing it took a lot of effort on his part, and most of his mana. This meant that maybe, with a good deal of luck, he could manage to kill a single 1D monster alone. The current him was not nearly enough. What if a 2D, 4D, or even 1C monster was to attack? Who could even stand against it?

He summoned his knife, this time going for a standard steel blade with a plastic handle. He conjured the most basic army knife that he could think of, and was grateful that the ability filled in the details following the rough guidelines that he gave.

The knife felt like it belonged as it rested in his hand. It appeared without effort out of nowhere like usual, and the cold steel had a perfect edge to it. He concentrated, trying to conjure another knife while holding onto this one. If he could manage to create more than one, or to make them even permanent, they would prove to be a great asset in his hunts.

Another knife appeared, but not before the first one ceased to exist. Perhaps it was not possible, or he had to train much more than this to obtain that effect. He felt the weight of the new knife in his hand, this time made of something that felt like bone and once again with a perfect and deadly edge to it. It was quite beautiful, primeval in its design but at the same time perfectly balanced and exquisitely made.

He threw it, and it hit the fence with the butt before bouncing off and coming to a stop on the ground. The throw was garbage, but there was one thing to test before training that particular skill. He decided to reconjure the knife again, and watched intently the one on the ground.

As he predicted, it dissipated into nothing before a new one appeared in his hand. Perfect, exactly what he needed.

Next on the list of things to do, he decided to train magic. He had a pretty good handle on what he could do with fire, and he knew that he could dig even deeper into the possible uses of that particular branch of magic. But he also knew that he had very little in the way of mana, or the ability to use it at least, without doing a lot of training.

He had to choose what spells to train very carefully, because he knew that after one big or two small casts he’d have to rest for at least half a day. The number of spells he could cast before needing to rest would increase with practice, without any preference on which spell was casted, but not the proficiency he had with them.

He left fire out, for now, because he wanted to see just what he could do with his affinity with Earth magic. In the fight against the troll, it made the difference in the end, and its use was quite devastating even considering that it was the first time he ever used that kind of magic.

The many possibilities were definitely enticing. And what won the fight was versatility, something that with his unique ability to gain abilities, David should definitely exploit to the fullest. With that decided, he concentrated on the feel of the earth itself as a starting point.

There was no book to follow, nor was there anything that he could ask of other people that could help him. That much was clear from what he had studied of magic theory. Magic was something among the most private things a man could have, different for everyone and very intimate. Only the most basic spells could be learned like a formula from a book, but those were not what he was after.

The earth shook, and for the briefest of moments he felt like he was one with it. When the sensation crumbled, like a sand castle crumbling under the attack of the waves, a new understanding was left in its wake. Raising his hand, slowly, he pushed up some of the stone from deep underground. A small cylinder emerged, breaking the grassy surface like a fish breaking the surface of the water, and rose into the air.

It was thin but quite tall, stopping at two meters high when the stone from deep in the ground felt too far to reach. David knew that he could call onto the soil, the dirt and mud, but he wanted to try something else. With the last of his mental energy, he willed for the mana itself to become stone and add itself to the cylinder.

And so, it grew spikes. Small, tiny needles grew from its smooth surface and transformed it into a deadly weapon. Then, David released the spell, but not before instructing the mana to keep into its form. As the spell dissipated, he felt a hard tug on his mind that tried to draw in energies that weren’t there anymore. He was too spent to give more to the mana, and so most of the needles disappeared into motes of mana and most of the cylinder returned underground.

Most, but not all. There was still a small outcropping of irregular stone that poked out of the ground, which was the confirmation that indeed with enough energy and practice spells could be made permanent. It would also make for a great target to practice throwing knifes.

One after the other, small knives of all shapes but never bigger than a hand were thrown at it and harmlessly bounced back. David found out that he could not make bigger knives, although the size limit was slowly increasing with practice, and that throwing a knife the right way was hard and required a lot of practice.

He felt a hand on his elbow, and a gentle pull. “Here, like this.”

He threw the knife again, keeping the right posture this time. It hit the stone with the blade, not quite the tip but almost.

“Thanks!” David said, turning around.

The other man was one of the three that he had seen in the guild earlier, more specifically the one who defended him by defusing the whole situation with the other two.

He extended a hand, which David took and shook.

“Marcus, archer of the White Knuckles. They told me you killed a 4E troll all alone!”

“David. And yeah, I did.”

“You know, even I would have some trouble with that. And I’m a D rank, have been for a while actually. You did good out there.”

“Thanks. Although I get the feeling that the attack was not something unusual. How long have you been defending the village?

“Months. Did you see the damage? Barely three days ago a 2C monster attacked. We managed to kill it in the end, but not before it took something with it. Most of the village, and the only hero that we had left who could handle such threats. The next one that comes… this village will fall.”