(Anoobis’ POV)

*Whoosh*

“I have arrived!”

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No one even glances at me…why? Why do they not see my geniusness radiating from me!

Wait! Someone is looking at…oh…not her!

Luckily there’s a whole group of people inbetween her and me…and she’s not coming at me anyways…phew.

Ok, I know I shouldn’t have said that…out loud.

I suddenly feel like everyone is looking at me…

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(Baila’s POV)

He’s here…I’ll kill him later…he’s too visible right now.

Everyone has set their eyes on him…I don’t know why…

Braxel walks over to him and lays a hand on his shoulder

“The spears didn’t work”

Oh! So he must’ve been the one who made all those spears that the other division took out from nowhere?

“Why of course they-what? How? No! The spears should be working just fine!” The black jackal-beastman speaks in a shocked tone as if he couldn’t believe it himself…he was that confident huh.

“We don’t know”

For the past couple of minutes we’ve been talking about why the spears broke so easily, once we got past the fact that some people…including Joat and Tikari are alive.

Zzoid has revived but isn’t telling us anything and Joat has been ignoring all messages from everyone…he must be quite busy. So I’ll cheer him on so that he can live and meet me again…so that I may kill him myself.

Anyways, the spears broke easily for some reason that no one knew…the knowledge(?) we’ve got so far is the fact that there isn’t any durability…on anything actually.

I think most people noticed it once they got their armor, but there was no durability on them…so we have no idea when they’re going to break.

The only theory we’ve gotten to for the spears is that they must have had extremely low durability.

“People…there’s actually something I need to tell you all” The large hippo booms out his deep voice from behind me.

Everyone turns their attention off the shocked Jackal and onto the Hippo.

“Our shields…they break too easy” He holds up his shield which is in tatters “It took 1 hit of a wolf”

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Well that doesn’t sound right at all!

Immediately people start gossiping frantically with one another about their own theories and such about why the shields have extremely low durability…but honestly it doesn’t make sense…they were made just fine and should be able to last quite a few hits!

*BOOM*

“YOU LOT! STOP BLABBING THAT AWFUL LANGUAGE AND F-” This gigantic human with shoulder-length brown curls and a shaggy beard, bursts out from the blacksmith booming at the top of his lungs…but then stops wide-eyed over something

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“WAHAHAH! OH…YOU GUYS CRACK ME UP!” He runs over to Jenna’s “JENNA, COME OUT, YOU HAVE TO, THIS IS HILARIOUS! THE SHITS ACTUALLY TRIED TO MAKE SHIELDS! HAHAHAH” He’s holding the side of the wall as if it’s hard to stay standing…

Well he’s a nice fellow isn’t he…known him for a few seconds and he’s already insulted me and laughed at me…I worked hard to help make those shields you know!

Jenna walks out, takes a look at the dumbfounded us, then at the gigantic human and gives him a chop on the head. Lucky he was bent over or she wouldn’t have reached easily.

“Don’t laugh at their useless efforts! They at least tried” Jenna insulted us aswell…although I think it was unintentional

“HAHAhahah....ahhhhh. Sorry, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen something so hilarious” He straightens up and wipes away the tears of laughter in his eyes.

“Look at them Jarken, they’re all confused…can’t you help them out a little bit?”

He mulls it over for a couple of seconds…before sighing

“I guess I’ll give them a few pointers...as repayment for giving me a good laugh” He turns towards us…and we are still confused as to what they’re talking about and what is happening.

*Cough*

“OK, LISTEN UP YOU MAGGOTS. HAVE A SEAT, BECAUSE I’M GOING TO TELL YOU WHAT YOU DID WRONG…EVERYTHING”

We all sit down under the booming voice of Jarken...I’m scared but I also want to know what we did wrong

“FIRSTLY, DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT SOULS?”

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Souls? Well that’s a bit of a random question…

“Jarken, that’s the reason why you’re telling them this. Remember they’re Orphans…so they probably have no idea what souls are”

“Souls are an incorporal and immortal essence that resides in our body” the raven-beastlady who those 3 men stick by speaks up with an air of confidence

“You see Jenna, they know something”

She waves him off and he turns back to us

“YOU ARE RIGHT; SOULS ARE ENTITIES WITHIN OUR BODY. HOWEVER…” He saunters down

towards the seated crowd and we all make way for him.

He walks over to the hippo and without warning grabs the shield and snaps it in half like a twig

“THIS THING HERE…HAS NO SOUL”

Well…that’s obvious, it’s a shield…it shouldn’t have a soul?

“So things without a soul are naturally weak?” the raven-beastlady speaks pensively

“CORRECT. YOU’RE AN INTELLIGENT MAGGOT AREN’T YOU?”

“But then why is it that our armour can last more…does that have a soul?” The Jackal pipes up before anyone else can speak…well what’s his hurry?

“WHY OF COURSE!”

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What? How does a piece of armor have a soul…though the Jackal looks quite happy with himself?

“But how does our armor have a soul and our shield did not?” The raven-beastlady beats me to the question

“GIVE ME YOUR ARMOR” He booms towards the raven-beastlady…well I would certainly mistake his intentions there…

She takes off a helmet and throws it to him

He inspects it silently with closed eyes(?) for a few seconds

“A HUMAN MADE THIS”

The raven-beastlady nods quite surprised

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Well we’re all quite surprised! How the hell can he find that out? Is it like when you check an item it will tell you who it’s made by?

“HOW?” Quite a few people shout out simultaneously

Jarken grins, because he knows something we don’t.

“HAVE YOU EVER HEARD THAT WHEN YOU ARE TO MAKE SOMETHING, YOU MUST POUR YOUR SOUL INTO IT?”

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Sooo, we put a little of our soul into the armor?...I think either he or we have the wrong idea about what a soul is…

Most people nod, while looking extremely confused.

“GOOD, WELL THEN YOU KNOW HOW TO MAKE THINGS THAT HAVE A SOUL”

“EH?” We basically just pour our soul into it? So we work hard on it? We didn’t half-ass make the shields you know!

“Jarken, you’re confusing the poor Orphans. I’ll take over from here”

“Jenna, come on I’m having fun here”

“…Alright, but don’t make their heads explode…already had two die from that quite recently”

“Oh you didn’t tell me that, you’re going to have to tell me the story sometime!”

“Yeah yeah, just get talking and put them out of their confusion”

“OK, SO YOU’RE WONDERING HOW YOUR SHIELDS DIDN’T HAVE A SOUL…EASY! YOU DIDN’T POUR ANY OF YOUR SOUL IN”

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So there’s a way to…what?

Quite a few people look like they’ve found their way out of the confusion but there’s still quite a few lost in it still.

“Then how do we pour our soul in?” The Jackal just gets his sentence off before the raven-beastlady speaks…do they have some kind of rivalry between them?

Though I get the feeling they both suspect the answer already…

“YOU NEED TO LEARN HOW TO DO IT…IF ONE COULD POUR THEIR SOUL INTO WEAPONS LIKE THIS” He snaps his fingers “THEN THERE WOULD BE NO USE FOR PEOPLE LIKE ME AND JENNA”

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Ohhhhh! I think(?) I understand now.

Most people look like they’re understanding something and the raven-beastlady suddenly jumps up and saunters over to the tavern steps, but is beaten there by the Jackal, who is also hurried to the steps.

He gives her a winning smile before looking at all of us.

“Basically, our ‘soul’ in this game…is our character sheet-”

“And so our leather armor has a sheet saying its defence and such, that is its soul-” The raven-beastlady continues

“And when we make armor and weapons we need to give it this ‘soul’ but we can only do so-” the Jackal interrupts her

“If we have the in-game skill to make it.” She finishes the sentence off for him and she gives him his winning smile back. Haha.

“So therefore unless we know the skill, we’re unable to ‘pour our soul’ into the object-” The Jackal continues on looking mildly sour

“And thus make those shields and spears; we know how bad they are” The raven-beastlady finishes his sentence off once again, earning her a challenging look from him

“This is because this ‘soul pouring’ is a system recognized thing-”The raven-beastlady starts the sentence this time

“So we can make weapons and armor and other things all we like, but if it isn’t system recognized-” He gleefully steals the next words from her mouth

“Then the object will be treated as basically useless” The both finish together…looking happy that neither won

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We all stay silent for a good minute to mull things over.

It makes sense but it’s quite weirdly explained by the NPC’s: So we can technically make everything we want to but without a ‘soul’; so without a proper system acknowledgment, the object is useless...

“Do all objects that you create need a soul?” Someone asks from the crowd, I don’t see who

“YES, EVERYTHING IN THIS WORLD NEEDS A SOUL TO BECOME STRONGER! AND IF THE SOUL IS STRONGER THEN THE CONTAINER BECOMES STRONGER TOO”

That actually makes sense; because as we level up that will mean our ‘soul becomes stronger’ and thus we become stronger.

“ALSO, TO STRENGTHEN A SOUL OF AN OBJECT REQUIRES YOU TO POUR MORE OF YOUR SOUL OUT, AND THAT IS LIMITED BY THE SIZE AND STRENGTH OF YOUR OWN SOUL"

He didn’t understand what the raven-beastlady and the Jackal were telling all of us, since we probably spoke in that strange language…but I’m guessing he thought that they were making sense of what he said

Everyone nods knowingly now…we’ve all finally understood as to why and how we can make objects now. This is a game…I do tend to forget that for some things…so I guess there’s some limitations.

Though, this does stop the making of guns and explosives and other modern things in this medieval world…because undoubtedly someone would do such a thing.

“ANYMORE QUESTIONS?” He looks a bit sad that we no longer look extremely confused, I think

No more questions come…until the Jackal gives a small cough, sending Jarken’s look his way

“Will you teach us how to ‘pour our soul’ into weapons and shields?”

“…WAHAHAH! OH, YOU ARE A FUNNY ONE!...I’LL TEACH YOU…IF YOU CAN SHOW ME THAT YOU CAN GIVE A WEAPON A SOUL. AND THAT APPLIES TO ALL OF YOU. YOU GET 1 TRY”

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It took a few seconds to sink in...

“WE’LL DO IT” Everyone shouts out frantically. A chance at a free skill, a crafting one at that too! Sucks that Joat isn’t here; he’d be ecstatic about this chance…he seems like he does pretty much anything for a skill…the memory of him learning my suicide skill is still fresh.

I do have it still but that’s only for the xp…

“EVERYONE COME COLLECT YOUR IRON ORE” Zzoid shouts at the top of his lungs…oh yeah, the division gave all the ores they mined while we were lazing about to him.

Guess I should join the queue…

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(Joat’s POV)

*Achoo*

“Joat, you alright?” Squirrel whispers in my ear, so that the surrounding goblins can’t hear

“Yeah, I just have the feeling that I’m missing out on a skill” I whisper back

“Joat! Welcome to our home!”

Sooo, end of that mini-arc and hopefully this answers your question Anuubisk and if you ever have anything game breaking, please tell me! H

Anyway, hope you enjoyed it :D

-TRUE NORRRRRD