Blessed Time: A LitRPG Adventure

by Cale Plamann

  Will was useless as anything but a target. Obviously, a warhammer wasn’t the ideal weapon for attacking agile and airborne insects, but the way the young man swung it, Micah suspected that he hadn’t even made it through basic training. He certainly wouldn’t have been able to land a blow on Cornell without the instructor literally holding still. Even then, it would be a near thing. Wild and uncontrolled, Will whipped his warhammer back and forth without restraint, making it dangerous for Micah to even approach close enough to heal the young man.

  “Clear!” Drekt shouted from his end of the clearing, wincing slightly as he leaned against the oversized cleaver.

  “Clear,” Sarah responded calmly.

  “Clear,” Micah chimed in as he used the butt of his spear to finish off the nightwasp he’d battered away to get to Will.

  “I think that’s enough patrolling for the day.” Drekt glanced at Will’s unmoving form with some concern. “Let’s set up camp here for the night. Now might be a good time to check your status and reflect on what went wrong and right in those battles so we can make plans to improve.”

  Micah nodded, walking over to his backpack to unload his and Will’s tent. He tried to ignore the Vanguard’s unmoving body, but couldn’t help but frown a little. He knew that the pain from the sting was mostly gone. Augmented Mending used up almost half of his mana, but it was a powerful spell. If anything, the young man was just suffering from the emotional aftershock from getting stung.

  It hurt; Micah knew that from their first encounter, when he’d gotten careless and let a nightwasp get close. Spears were great weapons for keeping an enemy at a distance, but once a wasp got within his guard, all he could do was swing the pole of his spear futilely. He’d been able to fight and cast through the sting with some difficulty, but he didn’t have any desire to repeat the experience.

  He ran a hand through his messy and sweat-slick hair as he glared at the large man, still huddled in the fetal position. Inwardly, he acknowledged that his frustration with Will might be a bit unfair. After all, the main reason he’d been stung was Will’s inability to draw the wasps’ attention. Still, after casting Mending on himself he’d returned to the fight in short order without any of Will’s moping or feeling sorry for himself.

  Pulling out the heavily folded tent, Micah called up his status.

  Micah Silver

  Age 16

  Class/Level Wizard 2

  XP 57/200

  HP 15/15

  Attributes

  Body 5, Agility 5, Mind 9, Spirit 9

  Attunement

  Moon 8, Sun 3, Night 5

  Mana

  Moon 2/27, Sun 9/15, Night 1/19

  Affinities

  Time 10

  Wood 6

  Tier I - Refresh 3, Mending 3

  Tier II - Augmented Mending 2

  Air 5

  Tier I - Gale 2, Air Knife 3

  Tier II - Wind Shield 1

  Blessings

  Mythic Blessing of Mursa - Blessed Return, Ageless Folio

  Skills

  Anatomy 2

  Fishing 1

  Herbalism 1

  Librarian 3

  Spear 3

  Spellcasting 5

  A level, then. Micah could certainly use the extra mana. As far as he could tell, he’d gained points equal to his Spirit upon level-up, hopefully a trend that would stay constant as he developed his class further. Even better, the level-up gave him a point in Spirit, further expanding his mana pools. His mana regeneration still wasn’t exactly where he wanted it to be, but each level reduced his reliance on the spear.

  “I gained a level!” Will shouted excitedly, animated now that Micah had taken the lead in setting up their tent, freeing the portly vanguard up to dawdle. “Guys, I’m level 2 already!”

  “Good!” Drekt smiled, a giant toothy affair. Micah was pretty sure he spotted elongated canines amidst the slightly yellow snaggle of teeth that graced their leader’s mouth. Yet another silent signal of his likely Durgh heritage. “A couple more points in Body and you’ll be able to hold your own. For now, I think a celebration is in order.”

  The big man rummaged around in his backpack and came out with a skin full of some liquid. Drekt took a deep pull, shuddering for a second before throwing the skin to Sarah.

  “Seniority,” he said with a laugh, winking apologetically at Micah.

  She drank briefly, grimacing and coughing as she passed the container on to Jo.

  “Where in the hells do you find this stuff, Drekt?” Her voice was scathing as she smacked her lips in an attempt to clear its acrid flavor from her mouth. “Are you fermenting abandoned monster parts behind the guild hall, or are you just trying to level up your poison skill and using us as test dummies?”

  “It isn’t that bad, Sarah.” Jo tossed the skin to Micah.

  It landed in his open hands with a pleasant slosh, surprisingly heavy for its size. Micah looked at the skin hesitantly. Even from here, he could smell the strong, biting odor of cheap alcohol.

  “It’ll put some hair on your chest, Silver.” Drekt laughed, a slight flush evident on his cheeks. “Think of it as a team-building exercise. Plus, you’ll never get yourself a woman if you don’t know how to cut loose a little.”

  Micah shrugged, lifting the cold metal of the skin’s spigot to his lips. He almost gagged as the liquid splashed into his mouth. It felt like fire in his throat. He’d snuck some of his parents’ wine before, but it tasted nothing like this. He felt himself starting to retch as the rotgut savaged his esophagus. Frantically, he screwed the cap back on the skin.

  He coughed, doing his best to ignore his stomach performing backflips while Drekt laughed at his suffering. Already he could feel warmth rising to his cheeks. Micah was afraid to ask what proof the liquor was, suspecting that he’d actually just drunk their team’s guild-supplied firestarter.

  With feigned casualness, he threw the container on to Will. The young man looked at it dubiously.

  “I don’t think I’m allowed to—” Will began, a slight whining twang to his voice.

  Micah rolled his watering eyes.

  “We’re in the field, so what I say goes,” Drekt boomed, interrupting the younger man. “And I say drink up. After this, we’ll start a bonfire. It’ll ward away most of the unpleasant things that wander the forest at night, and we can tell some stories. Really get to know each other. Think of the drink as an icebreaker.”

  “He has a point,” Jo drawled. “Anything that flammable has to be the natural enemy of ice.”

  Reluctantly, Will drank the vile liquid. Seconds later, Micah found himself using the absolute last of his mana to cast Refresh as the overweight adventurer threw up the entire contents of his stomach on the forest floor, much to Sarah’s disgust and Drekt’s delight.

  “That settles it,” Drekt cackled as he began stacking dry branches from the nearby forest for their upcoming fire. “Team rules; Will has to take the first watch tonight.”

  Micah smiled. He might be new, but he could sense the casual camaraderie from the team. It wasn’t quite the welcome he’d expected, but already they felt like a congenial if dysfunctional family. He might as well get comfy with them. By all expectations, he’d be paired with them for a number of years.

  8

  Bruises and Progress

  Trevor’s spear traced a half-circle through the air at a deceptively casual speed. Micah swore to himself as his Air Knife crashed into the visible distortion left by his brother’s mana. An Uncommon spear martial art wasn’t the most powerful ability Micah had seen at the Lancers, but it was more than enough to aggravate him, especially during a spar.

  Drekt’s cleaver swung down at Trevor, but with a quick sidestep and a tap of his spear haft on the side of the blade, Trevor redirected it safely to the side. With a flash of mana, Trevor’s spear swung sideways faster than his muscles should have been able to propel it, the blunt wooden head smacking against Drekt’s windpipe and stunning the larger man.r />
  “Point,” Zoe called out, gesturing at Drekt with a blue flag. “Throat strike. Drekt is injured beyond the ability of Red Team’s Healer. Remove him from the exercise.”

  “Confirmed,” Cornell responded from the other side of the room. “That spear blow was fatal. Take a seat, Drekt.”

  Micah didn’t have the time to spare their coughing and sputtering leader as he stepped out of the training arena to nurse his injuries next to Sarah. One of the Lancers’ other Healers ran over to help with the bruise, but Drekt gestured dismissively with one hand, the other still massaging his sore throat.

  Glenn, the axe warrior from Trevor’s team, danced just out of reach as Will swung his hammer with enough force to crack the floor. The battle between the two had been a stalemate from the beginning. Glenn couldn’t harm Will in his stone battle form, but Will simply didn’t have the skill to land a clean blow on the more experienced fighter, even when completely neglecting his own defense.

  Unfortunately, Micah knew exactly how their duel would end. Eventually, Will would run out of mana and his transformation would end. Without the boost to his Body attribute, Glenn would easily avoid his hammer and deal blows the judges would find disabling or fatal.

  An arrow bounced off of his Wind Shield, forcing a grimace from Micah. Renee, the opposing archer, alternated between firing training arrows at him and Jo. A lucky arrow to the face had knocked Sarah out of the fight early on, and ever since then, Renee had kept Micah honest and Jo off balance.

  Of course, Jo wasn’t going to be able to bail Micah out of his predicament. She was too busy dodging the wisps of Fox Fire that their Pyromancer, Meredith, coiled around herself. Every time Jo approached, a handful of the balls of blue flame would rush toward her, forcing the Scout to contort her body in an attempt to escape.

  “Renee and Meredith,” Trevor called out as he turned his attention to Micah, “I’ve got their caster.”

  Micah swore under his breath as Trevor threw his spear at him. Jerking to his side, he let the Wind Shield slow and deflect the spear just enough for his frantic movement to carry him past it.

  Trevor reached out, and with a rush of wind, his spear sailed back past Micah and into his brother’s hand. Grimacing, Micah grasped his spear in two hands and held it in the guard position that Trevor had originally taught him years ago. This close, Trevor wouldn’t give him a chance to get off a spell. His brother knew better than that.

  They approached cautiously, circling each other. Distantly, Micah heard the judges announce that Jo was disqualified due to a fatal hit, but he didn’t have an opportunity to look away. His gaze was trained on Trevor’s shoulders, looking for the subtle shift in weight that would precede an attack. Long ago, he’d learned to avoid the eyes—a spearman could feint with his eyes with a simple glance; shoulders didn’t lie.

  Micah was moving before Trevor began his thrust, but it was barely enough. The hafts of their weapons clacked three times as Micah was driven backward. The next stab came too fast for him to block, so Micah dropped to the ground and swung his weapon at knee level, hoping to trip Trevor.

  Instead, Trevor leapt over Micah’s strike and brought his own weapon down overhead on Micah’s exposed shoulder. With a crack, Micah felt his collarbone snap. His left arm went numb and then red-hot pain flooded his body.

  “Yield!” he shouted, trying to forestall a follow-up blow. “Trevor broke a bone; I can’t fight any further!”

  Trevor stepped back while Micah grabbed his shoulder and forced out the words to Augmented Mending. A second and most of his mana later, the pain dropped to more workable levels. He wasn’t at full hit points, but the bone was more or less repaired and he could at least move without tearing up.

  “Good job, everyone,” Cornell called out, clapping his hands together as he walked into the center of the training room. “That went better than expected, but can we have everyone tell me what they did wrong?”

  “You.” Cornell pointed at Sarah where she was sulking in the waiting area. “You were eliminated first, so you get to start. Where did things go wrong?”

  “Things went wrong when you had us spar with a full-blown combat team.” Sarah threw up her hands. “We’ve only gone on a couple missions against low-level opponents. We just don’t have the levels to compete.”

  “Redflower.” Cornell shook his head, frowning at her. “I’m not sure what level you have to be to avoid getting shot in the face by an arrow, but it looked to me like you got careless.”

  “That isn’t fair at all!” Sarah leapt to her feet, shouting at Cornell. “Renee used her blessing to curve her shot. How was I supposed to dodge it?”

  “Shut up and sit down, Redflower,” Cornell growled at her. “We are here for progress rather than excuses. Your Healer immediately cast Wind Shield. Micah took multiple hits from Renee without complaint while casting support spells. If you know you’re fighting an archer, you need to take steps to defend yourself from arrows immediately.”

  “Well then, why didn’t Micah cast Wind Shield on me?” Sarah complained, flopping back into her seat. “If he’d protected me properly, I wouldn’t have been the first person eliminated.”

  “Redflower.” There was a note of warning in Cornell’s voice. “I told you to shut up. When I give you an order, you need to listen to it rather than throwing a tantrum.”

  “Silver.” Cornell gestured to Micah with one of the flags he was carrying. “Tell me why you didn’t cast Wind Shield on Sarah. Then tell me where you went wrong in combat.”

  “Uh.” Micah massaged his still-hurting shoulder while trying to avoid Sarah’s glare. “Wind Shield works both ways. It won’t stop spells, so it’s a good defense for casters, but if I’d cast it on Sarah, she wouldn’t have been able to shoot out of it.”

  “Very good.” Cornell nodded. “I’m glad that at least your lessons on squad tactics weren’t wasted.”

  “Thanks, sir?” Micah responded morosely. Cornell’s compliment sealed his fate. Sarah was going to be snippy with him for at least a week for “showing her up.” “As for what I did wrong? I wasn’t near enough to help Drekt with a healing spell. He was the one holding the team together and my ranged attacks weren’t terribly effective against Trevor. At a minimum, I could have tried to flank Trevor and gotten a couple of spear attacks in.”

  “Drekt.” Cornell nodded his agreement before pointing at the huge man. “What could you have done better?”

  “My attack style is too wild,” Drekt replied immediately and without hesitation. “Trevor is agile enough to dodge my attacks, and I leave myself open to fatal counterattacks. The style is much more suited to smaller foes incapable of seriously harming me with a single attack.”

  “I wouldn’t say it was that bad,” Trevor cut in, a sheepish smile on his face. “A couple of those attacks were close calls. If I’d been a hair slower, it would’ve been you eliminating me out there. That said, I’d be happy to spar with you more one on one. Both of us could stand to sharpen our skills a bit before our next missions.”

  “Save it for the bar,” Cornell replied, rolling his eyes as Drekt nodded slowly, accepting Trevor’s offer. “As for Will? I’ll save us the time. He can’t fight. He’s not at risk due to his blessing, but he’ll need to continue lessons with his hammer. Even if he’s capable of slamming that thing through a brick wall, it hardly means anything if he can’t hit what he’s fighting.”

  “Trevor and Drekt.” Cornell glanced at Zoe, who nodded back at him. “You’ll include Will in your training sessions. Both of you are decent combatants, but right now, Will looks like nothing more than a giant ball of wasted potential to me. He could use more than a little polish, and I expect to see some improvements by the next time we have one of these little get-togethers.”

  “I’m not sure that three people would work that well,” Trevor cut in frantically, his lip curling slightly as he glanced at Will. “We won’t have an even number of sparring partners, and I really don’t know that much a
bout training people in the basics. I don’t really think that the sessions will be much help for Will.”

  “Stow it.” Zoe walked over from where she’d been leaning against the wall to stand next to Cornell. “You agreed to have your squad train with and mentor your younger brother’s team. This is mentoring them. I’m sorry if you don’t like it, but this is where you can help the most.”

  “Thank you, Zoe.” Cornell nodded at her before pointing his flag at Jo. “More reasonable Redflower, tell me what you did wrong.”

  “Honestly?” She smirked slightly at her sister. “I should have used Micah as cover before peppering their caster with throwing daggers. The arrows couldn’t get through his Wind Shield, but I couldn’t see anything similar protecting Meredith. If I’d managed to bring her down before she summoned more than three or four of those Fox Fires, it might have turned the battle around.”

  Cornell opened his mouth to respond before stopping. He gently tapped the side of his face a couple of times with the flag, then smiled.

  “I still don’t think that you guys would have won the fight.” There was some mirth in his voice. “I really don’t think that your team has a proper answer for Glenn and Trevor when they work together, but that certainly would have made things more interesting.”

  “Jo brings up a good point.” Cornell’s voice rose, taking on the tone he adopted while lecturing them. “Meredith’s Fox Fire is powerful, but she needs to cast the spell multiple times before it's terribly useful. Their squad counters that slow start by having Renee pin people down with a barrage of arrows, usually using her gift early in the fight to curve arrows around defenses.