The Pursuit

Kyle leaned heavily on the bannister as he made his way down the stairs, he was still weak from using Suppression Aura earlier, but he gritted his teeth and followed Jerald down the stairs to where everyone else was waiting.

“Kyle you’re up!” Sammy exclaimed when he saw him. “How do you feel?”

“I’ve been better, but right now I’ve got better things to do than lie in bed.”

His family and friends exchanged confused glances at his words, surely, he couldn’t mean…

“I’m going with dad.”

“What!?” They all cried.

“That’s insane, you’ve only just regained consciousness and you want to go after people who just attacked their fellow villagers?” Hal said, he knew his friend was reckless, but this was a whole new level.

“This whole thing got out of hand because Ben wanted to fight me,” Kyle replied.

“That’s-”

“The truth and you know it Yuliah,” Kyle snapped.

“You might have made it so that the competition was going to end with the winner fighting me but we all know that Ben wasn’t going to let me leave Farholt without settling thing between us, no matter what happened.”

“…” No one had any reply to that, they knew that the bad blood between Kyle and Ben ran deep, but they had only learned just how deep today when Ben had badly injured two of Kyle’s friends.

“Kyle, tell me you’re not doing this because of me and Ryan,” Sonia said grabbing Kyle by his shoulders and looking into his eyes.

Kyle met her angry gaze calmly, his eyes were only glowing faintly now, letting her know that he was back in control of his emotions.

“I’m doing this because I have to, I’m not saying you guys aren’t a part of it, but I don’t want Ben to make things worse for himself because of me either. He’s already in enough trouble because he believed everything Denzel has been saying about non-humans all these years,” Kyle said.

“Are you sure? There’s nothing we can say to stop you?” Sonia asked desperately, she knew that Jerald would protect Kyle if things got too dangerous, but she knew better than most what people were capable of when they were backed into a corner.

Kyle took her hand in his own, “Sorry but like I said, this is something I have to do.”

Anna gazed gratefully at the young man, “Please bring my son back to me.”

“I’ll do my best,” Kyle wasn’t going to make any promises, he didn’t know what was going to happen when they caught up with Ben and the others, but he trusted his father would be able to handle the guards and Denzel by himself, especially since most of them knew what Jerald was capable of.

Anna nodded, at least he was going to try, which she knew was as much as she could ask for considering the circumstances, “Thank you.”

“We can’t waste any more time son, Dig let’s go,” Jerald said turning to walk out of the inn.

“Eh!? You can’t mean, nononono, I’m not letting both of you ride me,” Digby said. “You’re heavy enough by yourself Boss, if I carry more weight than that even I’m not going to be able to catch up with them.

Dig’s combat form could be used as a mount, he wasn’t as fast as a horse over short distances, but his heightened stats meant that he could keep up his top speed for much longer.

“Ben doesn’t have the Riding Skill, we’ll be fine,” Jerald stated turning back towards his companion with a stern look on his face.

“Are you sure dad, I don’t have the Riding Skill either you know?” Kyle asked causing Digby to nod his head rapidly.

“Kyle’s right Boss, he’ll slow us down too much, there’s no way we’ll catch up to them,” he said quickly.

“You can if Thomas and I cast our best speed buffs on you,” Yuliah disagreed causing Digby to splutter in indignation, he really didn’t like people riding him, being treated like a common horse was demeaning.

“There you have it Digby, now can we get a move on please?” Jerald said with finality as he walked out of the inn.

“Dammit,” Digby muttered as he followed Jerald out the door.

“Be careful man, I’ll let Jess and Ryan know what’s happening when he wakes up,” Hal said.

“Thanks Hal, don’t worry, I’ll be careful,” Kyle said before following the other two out the door.

Hal stared at the door silently for a few seconds, “You’d bloody well better be.”

Outside the inn Kyle was greeted by what remained of the town guard along with Warren, they had all been healed by Thomas who looked very tired as he swallowed a small potion to restore his depleted Mana.

“So, you want to go after them alone, do you?” Warren asked, the mayor of Farholt was normally a cheerful man, well like by the other villagers, but now he just looked angry. He had been stabbed by one of his town guards, the people he was supposed to trust to protect his home so his anger though surprising to most, was understandable.

“I don’t know how long it will take to find them and we can’t leave Farholt undefended to chase after them,” Jerald explained.

Some of the guards muttered angrily at this, they wanted to stop Denzel and the guards he had taken with him themselves.

“That’s enough!” One of the guards shouted, this man was Patrick the highest-ranking guard that had remained behind.

“You know Jerald’s right; besides we’d just slow him down,” Patrick continued. “However, the least we can do is provide a weapon for your boy, Bernard should be back soon, he went to prepare something for you Kyle, it won’t be as good as something made to be used as a weapon, but it should do for now.”

Kyle glanced sideways at his father, he knew they had to be on their way but having a weapon if he had to fight would allow him to be a bit more useful.

“Fine,” Jerald sighed, he had no plans to let his son fight any of the guards and with his power, it was unlikely things wouldn’t go to plan, but there was no point in taking chances, especially when his son seemed set upon fighting with another boy who had already badly injured two of his friends.

A grumbling Digby transformed into his battle form and a small hole opened in space and spat out a saddle which Jerome took and started to strap to his companions back.

As he watched his father prepared Digby to ride Bernard ran over the large man’s face was even ruddier than usual as he closed in on Kyle holding a length of chain in his hands.

“Here you go Kyle,” Bernard gasped handing the chain over to Kyle who quickly asked Fi to examine his new weapon.

Improvised Iron Chain

Item Tier (Rarity): Unusual (Crude)

Weapon type: Chain

Weapon damage: 5-7 Blunt

Durability: 7/7

A weapon made from an old set of long manacles that were used to chain dangerous prisoners to the wall of their cell.

It was an ugly thing, it still had a manacle attached at one end but the at the other end was a misshapen lump of metal made it look like Bernard had ripped it off the wall and melted the manacle on one end down to make a weight as fast as he could, and as it turned out that was exactly what he had done.

“Here’s the key to the cuff as well Kyle,” Bernard said handing it over before continuing. “When I’ve finished making the one you’ve ordered you won’t need one, but this was the best I could do quickly, just be careful, there hasn’t been any maintenance done on these in a while so some of the links are a bit damaged.”

“Thanks Bernard, this should make things easier, I’m sure Ben won’t come back with us without a fight and he’s dangerous with that spear,” Kyle said.

“You got that right kid, I’m quite glad he never got the chance to fight my son, he would’ve been harder to defeat than either Sonia or Ryan so there’s just no telling how far Ben would’ve gone in his current state,” Bernard sighed, he had watched those two grow up and had even been involved in their training. “Anyway, I’ll head inside now, and see how everyone is doing, you take care.”

Kyle nodded at the burly man as he walked over to his father, “Ready when you are dad.”

“Good, you need a hand up?”

“No, I should be right,” Kyle said leaping into the air and easily coming to rest on the saddle.

“Oof, be careful! That’s my back you just jumped on, you aren’t a little kid anymore,” Digby growled.

“Sorry Dig.”

Jerald rolled his eyes as he climbed onto his companions back, “Enough joking around you two, Dig, let’s go.”

“Right Boss!”

The massive muscles in Digby’s back rippled as he prepared to launch himself forwards causing Kyle grab hold with all his might as he realised that this was going to be one hell of a bumpy ride. FI wrapped harder around his neck almost enough to be uncomfortable, but not quite. As he gathered himself Digby was covered with several waves of light as Thomas and Yuliah cast their buffs on him.

“Sorry Kyle, but I get the feeling that if I let go I’m not going to be able to catch up,” Fi said apologetically, knowing that she was holding onto Kyle much tighter than usual.

Kyle couldn’t nod his agreement due to her coils wrapping around his neck, so he opened his mouth to reply just as Digby shot forward, thundering down the street far faster than the few villagers who were watching them get ready would have expected. In his battle form he his legs were even longer than one would expect allowing him to move only slightly slower than a horse, but he was still a Soul Companion with the form of a giant mole, so it was an odd sight seeing him barrelling down the street with two people sitting on his back.

The surprised atmosphere quickly vanished at the sound of Kyle’s voice echoing down the street as he passed.

“Ouch! I bit my tongue!”

Once they were outside the village gates he spat some bloody saliva before glaring down at Digby who ignored him and continued looking ahead.

“Where do you think they’ve gone Boss,” he asked.

“Towards Greenhearth, Denzel will probably be trying to report to the kingdoms knight headquarters and try to make it sound like he’s the victim,” Jerald replied.

Greenhearth was a large town within a few days ride from Farholt, incidentally it was also where the Adventuring School that Kyle had been asked to attend was located, almost a city in it’s own right, it was a little to close to the kingdom’s border with the Empire to attract enough citizens and instead relied upon the ruins of a pre-system city to bring in Adventurers from all over to fight the monsters that roamed both the broken streets above ground as well as the ones in the Dungeon that laid beneath them.

Knowing that they would most likely have to fight Ben, Kyle and Fi started to go over Kyle’s stats, magic and his new Skill to come up with a strategy.

Statistics

Name: Kyle Fergusson

Race: Aethereal Human

Level: 1

Class: Chain Wielder (Unusual)

HP: 85/85

HP regen: 0.8 p/s

MP: 108/108

MP regen: 5.2 p/s

SP: 80/80

SP regen: 4 p/s

Str: 8(7)

Dex: 10(8)

Agi: 11(9)

Con: 8(8)

End: 8(7)

Int: 9(9)

Wis: 9(9)

Will: 7(7)

Exp to next Level: 0%

Unassigned Stat Points: 3

“You didn’t tell me that I had points to distribute Fi,” Kyle complained to his companion who looked away in embarrassment, she had forgotten completely in all the excitement. Kyle glanced at his stats remembering how hard he had trained to increase them as much as he already had, each new point represented the hours of work he had put into his training over the years but now he had another way of increasing them that was far easier, not that he was planning on slacking off now that he had a Class. The stats he received from his training would still be shown in the brackets which would allow him to keep track of how well his training was going.

“Also, what’s up with my Mana Regen, shouldn’t it only be at 4.5?” he asked as he distributed his points. He decided to place one point into Constitution bringing his new total up to nine and his total health up to 95 before putting the rest into Dexterity bringing it up to twelve because he knew the damage his chain could do would be more affected by this stat than it would by putting the points into Strength.

“That’s because of that new Skill you unlocked, here’s the Skill information.” Fi replied as she brought up the Skill information to show Kyle

New Racial Skill Unlocked

Will Made Manifest-Mastery (Rare)

Proficiency Level 1- Can only be upgraded by spending Skill Points

Mastery Skill that provides bonuses based off the Willpower Stat. Related Sub-skills can also be unlocked.

Current Bonuses

Increases Mana Regen by 0.1 per point of Willpower.

Sub-Skills

· Suppression Aura- Creates an Aura of Mental Energy that deals 1% of Willpower as damage and creates a 10% chance that enemy Skills and Spell will fail to activate. Radius of 10m. Cost 20% of total MP and 20% of total SP per second.

“Jeez, I won’t be able to use Suppression Aura for very long,” Kyle grumbled. This was his first Rare ranked Skill, so he wasn’t too surprised at the cost, but it was still higher than he had been expecting. Normal Skills didn’t have a rank, but every now and again a Rarer. Skill had been known to appear, Rare ranked Skills were always powerful and cost a lot to access. Some were even dangerous to the people who accessed them, Will Made Manifest was one of these Skills.

“That just shows how powerful it is, if Will Made Manifest didn’t also have the effect of increasing your Mana regen it would be an even more costly Skill to use even as it is, most magic wielders wouldn’t be able to keep it up for very long due to the SP cost,” Fi replied, she had already seen the Skill’s description but she was still surprised by the massive cost of the Skill, even at high levels Kyle wouldn’t be able to keep using it for very long if he didn’t increase his regeneration for both of the resources that it used by a lot.

“Yeah, I’m willing to bet that most of the people who’ve unlocked this Skill have a true hybrid Class like mum does,” Kyle said.

Emma’s Class was Ice-blade Assassin, a hybrid Class that combined the speed and elusiveness of a rogue-type Class and the control and attack Magics of a high Tier Magic Class known as Snowstorm Enchantress. These sorts of combinations weren’t uncommon to high-levelled Adventurers as they allowed them to create their own specific Skills that were far more powerful than the standard ones offered by the System.

Emma’s title was different from her Class because she hadn’t focussed as much on Rogue-type Skills early on due to the advantages given to her by her Racial Variant, but she was nonetheless skilled enough to train both Jess in magic and Ryan with his short swords.

“Well I suppose I’ll be unlocking the Enchanting School of magic today after all,” Kyle sighed, he had put off unlocking a new magic School for a long time and now that he was going to he was starting to have second thoughts about his decision.

Fi looked at her partner, “The Enchanting School is a good choice Kyle, your Class doesn’t offer much in the way of Intelligence or Wisdom increases, so something with a comparatively low MP cost is the best choice, even with your increased Mana Pool,” she said reassuringly.

“Select it and bring up the School list please,” Kyle said before he changed his mind.

School List-0/2 Slots available

Mana School

Rank - Master 1 Spell to increase Rank

Spells

· Mage Light-Creates a ball of stationary light. MP Cost: variable. Casting time: instant. Duration: variable. Cooldown: 5 seconds. Mastered.

· Mana Bolt (III)- Fires a small orb of Mana at an enemy. Deals 9-12 Magic Damage. Costs 10 MP. Casting time: 1 second. Mastered.

· Mana Barrier (III)- Creates a small barrier of Mana that can be used to block attacks. 4 Damage blocked per 10 MP spent. Casting time: Instant. Cooldown 3 seconds. Mastered.

· Mana Enhancement (III)- Allows the caster to strengthen their physical bodies with Mana. Cost: variable. Strength, Dexterity and Agility increased by 1 stat point each. Cost: 20 MP per second Cooldown: 30 seconds. Mastered.

· Mana Darts (II)- Creates small projectiles made of Mana which can be fired at enemies. Each dart causes 5-6 Magic Damage. Cost: 3 MP per projectile (Max 4). Casting time instant. Cooldown: 1 second. Mastered.

· Mana Orbs- Creates small orbs of Mana that orbit the caster damaging any enemy that touches them. Each orb deals 5 Magic Damage on contact. Cost 15 MP per orb (Max 3). Duration: 1 minute or until enemies touch the orbs. Cast time: 10 seconds. Mastered.

· Mana Skin- Increases Physical Defence by covering the casters body with Mana. Increases Physical defence by 5. Cost 30 MP. Duration: 30 seconds. Spell Mastery 21%

Enchanting School

Rank 1- Master 1 Spell to increase Rank

Spells

· Minor Flame Enchantment. Wreaths a weapon in flames. Adds 2-3 Fire Damage to attacks. Duration: 5 attacks or 1 minute. Cost 20 MP. Cooldown 2 minutes. Spell Mastery 0%

· Minor Physical Defence Enchantment. Strengthens a piece of Armour. Increases Physical Defence of armour by 1. Duration: 30 seconds. Cost 15 MP. Cooldown 1 minute. Spell Mastery 0%

· Minor Soul Syphon. Enchants a weapon with a spell that channels the soul of a slain monster into a crystal to create a Soulstone. Final blow must be struck with active enchantment. Duration: 3 attacks or 30 seconds. Cooldown 3 minutes. Cost: 35 MP. Spell Mastery 0%

Kyle grinned at his new spells, Soul Syphon in particular was an interesting spell, the Soulstones it created were used to make permanent enchantments which he could unlock when he had ranked up both the Magic School itself as well as a related spell; for example, if he increased Minor Enchant Physical Defence to level three he would unlock the permanent enchantment option for that spell. This was like when he had unlocked more Mana Darts which was a more powerful version of Mana Bolt that he unlocked by upgrading Mana Bolt three times. There were different spells that you could unlock when you upgraded a spell like Jess’ Mana Lance which had been accessed the same way giving her a single more powerful attack instead of multiple weaker ones or Hal’s Strength and Agility Enhancement spells which increased a specific stat instead of the three that Kyle’s more basic version did allowing him to increase the affected stat more for less MP.

“Jeez I have a lot of spells,” Kyle groaned as he looked higher, the Mana School only required one spell to be mastered for every Rank which had allowed him to build up many spells, each spell became more difficult to master but it was still the easiest School to gain Ranks in.

“Yeah, they aren’t as powerful as a spell from a school that specialises in the spell type but that is why your mother insisted that you focus on increasing the Rank of the Mana School instead of choosing a new one right away,” Fi explained. “This way you have spells for just about anything.”

“Yeah she was right too, nut can you please decrease the amount of information I have to look at when you bring this screen up, it’s starting to get to be too much to keep track of.”

Fi rolled her eyes at Kyles’ words, he still hadn’t gotten used to the amount of information the system insisted on trying to put on the screens every time she brought them up.

“Fine, I’ll give you the simple version next time you bring up this screen,” she replied, Kyle would still want to know the details when he got a new spell but showing him the same information repeatedly had always been something that would irritate him.

“Thanks, Fi, so how should we handle thing if we have to fight Ben?”

“Well I think we should do this,” she replied and explained her plan.

Kyle nodded his agreement when she had finished, he had been planning something similar.

“That works.”

“Hey, are you two done back there?” Jerald asked quietly. “I think we’re starting to get close, look there’s a cloud of dust up ahead.”

Sure, enough he was right, and Digby increased his speed slightly, he didn’t want to be stuck carrying them any longer than he needed to be.

The look on Kyle’s face turned serious, this would be his first fight since getting his Class and he adjusted his chain which he had attached to his wrist after they had left the village nervously, Ben had been using his spear for a lot longer than he had, but he was still thankful that he wasn’t going to have to face him unarmed.

Fi watched her friend make his final preparations with a calm expression on her face, she wasn’t worried, there was no way Kyle would lose if he had to fight Ben.

He was ready.