Chapter 6: Coins and Combat

Everything is so soft. Nothing pointy or sharp or even scratchy. Ohh, but I have a splitting headache. Ahh I guess I should get up. I think I was up too late last night telling Roth my story. Then… Hmm I think he took us to some guest rooms. No wait he only took me. Zim teleported to his house. He put me to bed at what must have been well after midnight. What time is it now? Got to get up and see the sun. My back is screaming as I stretch and finally sit up. I am still in my same old clothing and cloak. My knife is missing, wait no, here it is on the bedside table. Nice bed by the way. Just a single, but it has a massive wooden headboard and is really soft. The room is pretty plain though. Just stone floor and wood walls.

There is a chest though, at the foot of my bed. I think that warrants a look. Maybe it warrants at take too. Once a street rat always a street rat. I open the chest and immediately a new window pops up in front of my face. It looks just like my inventory save for a few things. For one, the writing on top of the window says: Medium Chest. For another there is no place for clothing, armor or anything else like that. Finally, there is a total of 10 by 15 slots. It is pretty simple to calculate, but just in case your feeling lazy that is one hundred and fifty slots. Unfortunately, none of it is filled.

I make my way out the doorway, which is lacking a door and instead has a thick black pelt hanging on a rod above it. Makes sense I guess, with this guy buying and selling skins.

When I push the “curtain” aside I find a stone hallway which I am at the end of with several other rooms leading off. They also have curtains.

At the end of the hall there is a rating and then empty space. I would guess that I am in the second floor of this shop. It looks like my new friend Roth also runs an inn. I should see how much he charges and if I’ll be able to afford it because that was one amazing night of sleep.

I walk to the railing which is part of some stairs that turn left from where I was looking and go down to the main floor of the shop on the same wall where the counter is. I don’t see Roth so I push open the door to the outside and get a good look at the sun which is just coming up over a mountain in the very far distance. It looks pretty early.

Heading back inside I look around the shop area. My cloths are rather simplistic and I would more than appreciate an upgrade. A nice cloak catches my eye made of a scaly black material. I concentrate and use essence sight on the object.

Cloak of the Night thief: A fine cloak made by a craftsman in Direburn the

Demon capital, this cloak was designed for the pickpockets of the city, but was confiscated when the maker tried to sell to a known criminal. The arresting knight, being an extremely high level paladin, had no need for the cloak and gave it to his friend Roth.

This cloak has the power to make the user blend with shadows and meld with darkness. It gives +6 to the stealth power of the user during the night and gives half that bonus during the day. It has the added benefit of hiding the wearers face and gives an essence shield of 4.

Wow! What an item. It seems like a dream to me and would greatly help my class abilities. I pick up the cloak and examine the price tag. My soaring heart takes a nose dive strait into a cliff. I knew that it would be expensive, but dang… 4 GOLD.

“It’s expensive, but in the end I think you'll find that it is worth it.”

I turn slowly to the voice. I think I am getting better at not looking surprised. Roth is standing there still in his fine clothes. “Well yea, but 4 whole gold. Isn’t that asking a bit much.”

“You might be surprised at how much people will pay to get their hands on the anonymity that cloak can provide, with it hiding the users face and essence. Unfortunately no one who has enough cash to buy it lives in a small village like this.”

“Is there any way that I could convince you to drive the price down. Every little bit helps.”

“Are you mad. I’m a business man. If I gave a discount to every demon to walk in the doors then I’d be broke. I am sorry, but that simply wont be possible. If you wan’t the cloak then you’ll have pay for it in full.”

I hung my head, Ohh well. I do really want that though cloak and I think that I’ll put aside a good chunk of whatever income I make towards buying it. Hey that reminds me of something. I lift my head up again and turn my gaze back onto Roth. “Do you know how you could call Zim down here? He said that he would show me some places where I could earn some money.”

He nods. “Zim told me about that after you went to bed. He paid me for you to stay here for one week. If you want to stay more, it’s 1 silver per night with no meals. He has to try and train another champion back up on his mountain, so he asked me to fulfill that responsibility for him.”

“Which you required payment for of course.” I grin

“Well” he says, grinning back “a man does have to make a living.”

He starts moving toward the door and motions with one hand for me to follow him. As we amble down the street he glances at me and starts talking. “The first place that you should look for money is fighting mobs. They all drop some sort of loot which, if you can’t use for your own purposes, can usually be sold. For example, could you pull out your map for me?”

“map?”

“Just think the word and it’ll appear in your hand. You can buy additional areas for a price from the topography guild and if you want to travel the world then you should get the skill of the same name so you can fill it in on your own.”

“I do want to see the world. Never got to see much of the one I come from.”

Roth suddenly stops walking and pulls my face close to his. “I wouldn’t recommend talking about where we come from” he says is in a low whisper. “I’m ok with it, but most people come here to escape wherever they came from… They don’t like to be reminded of it. He abruptly stands up and starts walking as if nothing had happened. He once again motions for me to follow and speaks normally again. “so as I was saying. Let me mark that monster location on your map. I’ll buy most of what you get and if I don’t want it then I’ll point you in the direction of someone who does”

…

I walk through the last two buildings on the outskirts of the city and find myself faced with a large field with bleached white yellow grass and black rocks. I can see at least ten other champions fighting with various grotesque monsters most of which look like purple and yellow spotted frogs about waist high and with large tusks. Not liking my chances head on with one of those beasts without the slightest idea of how to attack one I decide to sit on a nearby rock and watch some more experienced players. I sit down and look at some other players, but they are really far away and hard to see. My problem is soon answered as a new player with long white hair that looks ridiculous on his demon body comes through the buildings and immediately charges into the field. He barley slows down before slashing his sword -(I think that I remember it from the shop Zim prevented me from mindlessly rushing towards.) - onto a grazing… uh… what are those things. I use my essence sight on a closer one.

level 3 Poisonous high jumper. This beast has deadly tusks that are coated in a poison which will lower your health slowly over time.

Attention. Your essence sight ability has increased by one. New level: 2. You will now be able to use essence sight with greater proficiency which will lead to more information on the target.

Hmm, That’s a nice little bonus. I don’t think that it will yield too much extra information, but hey, you never know right? I should probably refocus on the running guy. He has the beasts health about halfway down while his is only about a quarter gone. He’s just mindlessly slashing at the creature though. Not really giving any thought to defense. It is obvious that it isn’t his first time fighting one of these poisonous high jumpers. As his opponent makes a giant leap into the air he rushes forward to avoid being squashed and lands a devastating overhand blow to a point about a quarter way up the creatures back where the spine is visible. This brings the Jumpers life down to about one third and makes it mad with pain.

The fight last for maybe another 2 minutes before the blond haired player finally puts the High jumper down. The body fades to mist and the champion reaches down for something that I can’t see in the grass. The fight wasn’t very interesting after a little bit and only the bare minimum of experience was displayed. I plan on doing much better.

I think that I have gotten my plan of attack decided too. I’m going to use this as a chance to test my skills as a ghost and hopefully sneak up on one of the poisonous high jumpers. I will then hit the critical point that the blond used earlier and hopefully cause it to rear up exposing it’s legs. I’ll then slash what amounts to the Achilles tendon which will make it unable to jump and slow its movement speed. Then I’ll resort to staying behind it and hitting it as many times as possible with my dagger.

I activate my sneak ability by thinking very hard and almost automatically slip into a low crouch among the grass. Gipping my trusty knife in my hand I slowly and smoothly move towards the nearest frog thing which is only 30 steps away. It doesn’t seem to notice me and as I circle around to the back of it I notice my hand and freak out a little. It’s see through! I wave it in front of my face and stand up which is a major mistake. The poisonous high jumper lifts it’s head and slowly turns towards me having sensed me somehow. Realizing my mistake I quickly drop my head into the grass and

curl into a ball making my cloaked body even harder to detect. I hear snorting sounds and finally the sound of it moving and disgusting chewing sounds. I peak my head up, careful to move very slowly and tensed to fall back into the fetal position should my adversary still be looking this way. He isn’t and is back to chewing with his spine nicely presenting itself. Still creeping extremely slowly I move forward and suddenly strike as hard and fast as I can at the spine. My dagger rips through hide, flesh and then, with a nice shudder, bone. My dagger may be crude, A 4 inch piece of sharp stone attached to a stick covered in a rough wrap, but few new players could argue its effectiveness. A transparent message flashes in front of my vision, informing me that I have dealt a surprise attack and have dealt twenty five percent more damage.

Just as predicted, the creatures life goes down nearly a third and it roars bucking onto it’s strong back legs… one of which receives a Knife to the Achilles tendon.

That should keep it from following me to closely. Or not it would seem. It turns on me surprisingly quickly, though still at a reduced speed and one of it’s tusks slices into my hip. I feel a searing pain and a message appears in front of my vision I can’t spare even the half second necessary to read it while I shoot my wings out and heave them forward violently throwing a super strong wind into my opponents face and shoving me backwards. Equal and opposite force I guess. Wonder who came up with that idea originally?

A new message replaces the old one which morphs into a small yellow drop of liquid on the corner of my vision that flashes every once and a while. I assume that’s the poison from the Poisonous High Jumper, because every time the yellow drop flashes, a white hot pulse of searing pain shoots out from my hip wound. I do stop to read the next message because the beast seems to be stunned. Maybe the message can tell me why.

You have discovered a hidden skill: Wing push. This is a hidden skill which cannot be taught and is unique to the demon and angle races. This skill, involving both wings, will send a blast of air at an opponent possibly stunning it and pushing both the user and target back. The chance of stunning and the distance pushed back will increase with skill level.

Nice that should be really helpful in my climb to the top of Templa’s champion list. I should get ready to fight again though as I don’t know how long the stun will last. I could probably wing push it again, but I feel pretty drained from just than one blast.

The Poisonous High Jumper is shaking its head and appears to be trying to right itself. It finally uses one of the smaller “t-rex” arms to heave itself onto its legs. Seeing me it immediately adopts and aggressive stance and is prepared to defend itself this time. Interestingly enough it appears wary. I had thought that these programed entities would be mindless, but it would seem that the High jumpers have some intelligence. I don’t know, maybe that it is being cautious of an enemy that it had no knowledge of by accident.

Either way, it is waiting to make its move until after I make mine. I’m pretty sure that in order to have any chance of sneaking and the Poisonous High Jumper loosing interest I would have to have the skill at a much much higher level than 1. Therefor I do the only thing I can really think of that will deal damage… I charge.

With a scream of bloodlust I run towards the monster and prepare for battle. The Jumper obliges and, staying true to it’s name, leaps high into the air and prepares to squash me flat. In a flash of inspiration I tuck into a ball and roll away, before springing to my feet and using the momentum from my legs stab directly into the side of the Jumper. Instead of slashing it shoves me away with a forearm dealing 1 damage and leaving me at 6 health when combined with the poison. I stumble back and then duck as a sharp tusk whisks over my head. Stabbing up I get in a nice slice to the face. Before scrambling away. From there I run around it slashing and sometimes taking damage when a stray limb or tusk catches me, but giving more than twice as good as I get. When I’m at 3 life (the poison was very simple and didn’t penetrate very well so over all it only gave me 4 points of damage) one lucky slice through the ribs gets a high damage and the High Jumper finally dies.

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