Gathering Strength

by Aaron Jay

  Tarrasquito

  The Tarasquito is a type of dragon with a lion’s head, six short legs like a bear’s, an ox-like body covered with a turtle shell, and a massive tail. If this beastly monster was 70 feet long and 50 feet tall it would be a one-of-a-kind wonder able to destroy cities.

  Thankfully this little guy is only a few feet long. He will still kill you.

  You would think that someone taking all those different animals and putting them in a blender would make something hideous, but the thing just looked dangerous.

  Stumbling backwards I triggered my spell ring. The three blasts unerringly flew toward the monster like Magic Missile’s spell description promised. After that things went to hell.

  The Tarrasquito was still covered in dust and dirt which the magic missiles blasted clean, revealing how polished and reflective its natural armor actually was. It was so reflective that the missiles ricocheted in random directions. Actually, it wasn’t random. The geometry of its spiked carapace bounced things back where they came from. One of my own missiles caromed back at me, clipped me in the shoulder and knocked me even further backwards.

  My instincts said sliding down the hillside away from the monster was a good idea after this thing took my best punch and shot it back into my face. Good thinking, instincts. Let’s follow your plan because I got nothing.

  On the loose dirt of the hillside, six legs seemed a whole heck of a lot more stable than my two. Thankfully, stability isn’t the same as speed. Despite the monster having more legs than I did, I fled like my life depended on it. My feet barely touched the ground as I skimmed down and away from that thing. Generally, the desire to live gives more running motivation than the desire to eat someone for lunch.

  I sped and clambered my way back through the area I had previously cleared. I could hear it coming after me, but as long as I kept my best pace up, I kept increasing my lead. Finally, it slowed and then came to a stop. It was unwilling to leave its herb unprotected for very long. Shooting glances back at me, it turned and trundled back.

  My breath wheezed in my ears as I sat down on the loose scree. After a few moments I caught my breath. That had been close.

  As with most combat notifications, I had ignored the damage notice from the magic missile I had eaten. This is because evolution had already provided me with an amazing damage notification system. You may have heard of it, it is called pain. My shoulder still felt like I had been kicked by a mule where my magic missile had clipped me. The pain eased as I rested out of combat.

  My momentary retreat had me off my gathering schedule, which might have bothered me if the schedule wasn’t screwed to begin with. Let’s see if hunting more powerful mobs will get me some better math.

  The mob had strong magic resistance. So strong that it could reflect it back onto me. Therefore, instead of casting magic at it, lets cast some on me. What a clever player I am. I rested and refilled my spell ring. Then I rested some more and cast my old friend invisibility on myself.

  The Tarrasquito was where I had found him. Now that I knew to look for him I could see where he had buried himself right by his plant, guarding it from all comers. I crept forward.

  It turns out the little bastard had really keen senses and being invisible didn’t work at all. It sensed me stepping on the loose material of the hillside from farther than it had reacted to my last attempt at the licorice plant. Thank goodness it came for me before I got too close. It made running away much easier.

  I didn’t bother unleashing my stored spell while the Tarrasquito and I did this next round of me fleeing for my life and it trying to grab a bite of lunch. It would come for me slow and steady. I’d sprint to gain some distance and then rest as it kept after me. It took four rounds of flee and rest before it finally gave up. We were about halfway back to the cliffs that had the mine entrance at its top before it gave up.

  Sneaking up on the thing was clearly out. I sat in meditation, recharging my mana and thinking of what else to try. Being clever wasn’t working. I decided to just buff myself and go full frontal assault. With my spell ring I could run two buffs at the same time. Strength of a bull and grace of a cat, here we come. A boost to both Strength and Dex should make me hit like a train and hard to hit in return.

  The Tarrasquito was clearly getting annoyed with its lunch being delivered and then running away over and over. It didn’t charge at me as soon as it saw me this time but slowly approached, carefully keeping itself between me and the young licorice plant.

  The extra dexterity and strength made traversing the hillside a snap as I rushed it. Power coursed through my limbs as it hissed in defiance.

  The thing’s open mouth seemed like a better target than the armored carapace. It didn’t retreat or flinch or anything as I swung my blade right toward its face. It just calmly closed its mouth on the blade.

  My strength was boosted. My enhanced dexterity allowed me to strike what had to be a weak spot, at least compared to a spiked shell. None of that mattered. It was like putting my sword into a vice.

  I put all my strength into jerking my blade back and forth. Despite the leverage the sword’s length gave me, I couldn’t even make its head twist. The blade didn’t shift an inch in any direction. After that it looked at me and I saw its jaw muscles bunch as it ratcheted its bite down. There was a high-pitched shriek of metal, a twanging sound, and my sword snapped in two.

  My instincts offered the same plan it suggested the first time I fought this thing: flee.

  Beating feet for the fifth time wasn’t going well. If I hadn’t had the strength and dexterity boost it would have run me down by now. Unfortunately, the clock was ticking on those buffs. The monster was keeping after me like Pepe Le Pew after the female cat in some of the classic folktale videos my father shared with me. I was running for my life and it just calmly kept after me.

  Not too far ahead I saw the mine entrance at the top of the cliff from where I had dropped into the valley. If it followed me much farther, either my endurance would drop and it would eat me or I’d end up encountering something in the area past where I had already explored and I’d get eaten by either the new creature, the tarrasquito, or maybe they’d share my corpse. I think I had maybe two more sprint and rests left in me.

  It stopped. Thankfully it stopped. It gave me a serious look and began trundling back. Take that, Tarrasquito. No lunch for you… yet. I had the feeling that if I engaged it one more time the thing wouldn’t give up until I was dead and eaten. Once I was sure it was truly heading back, I flopped to the ground and rested.

  I pulled the second best sword out of the trash loot in my inventory. It had the same stats as the one the Tarrasquito had bitten in two but lower durability. Although I have no idea why I bothered. The thing could eat any weapon I swung at it.

  If you wish for higher-level mobs and items, you just might get what you wish for—and then what? I had burned a ton of time on the thing with nothing to show for it but losing a weapon that, without access to a store or blacksmith for repairs, I couldn’t afford to lose. Should I just give up on that Full Grown licorice and start exploring in another direction? Discretion being the better part of valor, etc? Except I already knew that if I just cleared the easy stuff in this valley I’d never fulfill the gathering quest and would thereby lose my bet. If I was worse at math I might have at least had some months of self-deception and hope.

  It had magic resistance. It was physically invulnerable to the pain I could bring to bear. It might be particularly vulnerable to some specific element or spell type but what were the odds that my next spell cast would be the silver bullet I needed to bring it down? My local knowledge gave me nothing more on the creature.

  You have probably already figured out at least five solutions to dealing with the Tarrasquito. Let me just say that figuring these things out when you are living through it all is different. When you are the one watching your sword snapping in a monster’s jaws, or running out of steam as it implacably runs you down, or eatin
g your own magic missile, the solutions to these problems aren’t as easy to see. Adrenaline isn’t great for thinking outside of the box. It tends to concentrate your mind on the here and now. My first attempts flamed out and I was pretty sure that I was only going to get one more try without ending up first in its stomach and then back at my spawn point.

  Magic on me didn’t work. Magic on it didn’t work. It was stronger than me. This must have been what it was like when my great great great who knows how many great grandfathers had to take out mastodons or tigers. It’s sort of amazing we didn’t all starve as cavemen or end up in sabertooths’ bellies. Once I thought of it like that, the solution was obvious. Proper preparation prevents piss poor performance. Hunting around to find a good spot, I started my preparations.

  It was hard work, which kept me warm as the desert started to cool down with the coming evening. Finishing up what I could do with the last gasps of light from the sun already below the horizon, I was only about half finished. Dirt and sweat covered me. A shower would have felt great but I didn’t want to log out until after having something to eat. Cooking and eating in-game was cheaper than similar quality food IRL.

  Just outside the mines I made a camp and roasted a few spider legs I hadn’t offered to the gathering quest. Wouldn’t you know, Remus showed up as soon as the food starting cooking. It was pretty good. Imagine Chinese spare ribs where the bone is a few feet long. The game was pretty amusing in how the monstrous ingredients turned into relatively conventional tasting food. Eating in the game was way better than out and much cheaper. Maddie the Brujo and Quartzite had done ok by me with recipes and beginner skills.

  “Where have you been?” I inquired.

  He gave me a few sniffs and a quick lick and flopped down next to me, waiting for me to finish cooking our dinner. Eating by a campfire with Remus was a little bit of alright. For the moment I had company I liked and a plan that might let me not just kill the Tarrasquito but also, depending on how much the loot from it was worth, finish off another beginner quest in time to escape slavery. Hope and a full belly were a great combo. Screw the shower. I’d rather sleep here with Remus and hit it hard as soon as I woke up. The Tarrasquito would get his tomorrow. Or maybe I’d get mine.

  It was late morning by the time I had finished getting everything set. It is a wonder how much manual labor you can accomplish with strength and constitution buffs and the tools from the clan package beginner quests. Remus was interested in my task until he figured out what I was doing, at which point he gave me a little yip and took off on his own again. Sure, he had the excuse of having no opposable thumbs, but we both knew even if he had hands he wouldn’t have helped. I wiped the sweat from my brow and put my equipment back in my bag of holding and headed back towards the young licorice plant and its guardian.

  With the new day a few spiders I had cleared had respawned and there were even some seedlings sprouting along the now familiar route. Other than that, there were no surprises. Having run back and forth across this ground so many times already, familiarity granted me good speed. I was learning which stones to step on and which might shift.

  The Tarrasquito’s location was just over the next rise. I replaced the spell in my ring, rested, and then cast a spell giving me the endurance of a bear. It would take a lot of endurance to kite the Tarrasquito all the way back.

  A few more steps and there he was. Or maybe she. I didn’t plan to get to know the beast that intimately. It clearly held a grudge from yesterday so forgive me if I now decided it was female. It looked down at me and I could see it decide that today it was going to follow me till it killed me. It started after me and I started running back. Due to the endurance buff, today I didn’t much bother with the sprint and rest formula but just kept it chasing after me.

  We both kept a steady pace back up the valley. If it wasn’t set on killing and eating me, we could have been just out for a nice jog together. It kept after me, confident that at some point it would outlast me and I’d be forced to fight it, and that fighting it meant death for me and lunch for it. The endurance buff ran out eventually but it took me far enough in good enough shape that I knew my plan would have a chance of working.

  The mine entrance was coming up. I was almost back. Keeping my eyes peeled, I looked for a marker. There was a small cairn of rocks that looked like it might have been made naturally which I had in fact piled up the night before. Just as I passed the cairn I triggered my spell ring. Energy surged into my legs. Arms pinwheeling, I leaped into a long jump that cleared a good fifteen feet. Landing, I spun my head around to see if the Tarrasquito did anything other than come after me given my odd jump. Nope. Thank god. I could believe this juggernaut had massive physical resistance. I could believe it had incredible magical resistance. I could believe it had endless endurance. If it was smart enough to figure out my plan too, that would be a bridge too far. Why would it need to be smart with all the other gifts nature--well not nature but the Game--had given it?

  It trundled tirelessly toward me. The thing didn’t bother to look surprised as the blanket that I had jumped past, and which was covered with sand, dirt and a few small rocks, gave way and the creature fell into the pit I had dug.

  I looked down at it. It looked up at me. It hissed once and dug into the side of the pit. This was my cue to start climbing back up the cliff. We entered another kind of race. Could I climb up the cliff face faster than it could dig its way up and out of the pit I had excavated?

  Clambering over the lip of the cliff, I was pretty tired. The boulder I had managed to drag, roll, tip and lever over to the edge of the cliff was just where I had left it. Looking down, I could see that the Tarrasquito had made some pretty decent progress itself. In another few minutes it might not be dug out, but I wouldn’t make a direct hit with my boulder.

  I had been clever--or at least I thought I had been clever. I had wedged the boulder in place with another smaller stone. Dropping down I slammed my boot into the wedging block once and then again. On the third kick it tumbled out and off the edge of the cliff. The boulder teetered for a moment and then slowly tipped forward and over.

  Scrambling to the edge, I was able to look down just in time to see the boulder hit with a deep thud. In my father’s cultural vernacular, the Road Runner couldn’t have done any better. Or maybe I am Wile E. Coyote. I made the semi-elaborate trap after all. Something about that thought prepped me for the fact that I failed to receive a death notice from the game. No blue box telling me that I just gotten a ton of experience.

  Instead, I saw this:

  Tarrasaquito has received 87 hp of damage from:

  Stone boulder

  (Boulder size: large 74 lbs x Height 42 feet)-

  (Natural Damage Reduction of 25%)

  116 base damage - 29 Damage reduction = 87 hp damage

  The tarrasquito has 13 hp left.

  It didn’t die. How the heck didn’t this thing die? Ok. It only has 13 hp left. I would climb back down and finish it off. This is when the message blurred and changed.

  Tarrasaquito has recieved 87 hp of damage from:

  Stone boulder

  (Boulder size: large 74 lbs x Height 42 feet)-

  (Natural Damage Reduction of 25%)

  116 base damage - 29 Damage reduction = 87 hp damage

  Regeneration initiated

  The tarrasquito has 14 hp left.

  Oh my god. I am Wile E. Coyote. Why couldn’t I be the Road Runner?

  I clambered down the cliff face. The Tarrasquito’s last four legs and back half were pinned under my boulder. It had been driven partially into the ground. A small bit of blood was leaking from its mouth. Despite this, the damned monster didn’t look like it had had even one ounce of fight squished out of it. Its front legs were digging at a decent clip and it looked at me with eyes that were confident it would be eating me in just a little while. It had reason to feel good about its chances.

  The Tarrasquito has 16 hp left.

  At this rate it would
once again have more hit points than me.

  I had zero interest in jumping into the pit and trying to finish it off with my sword. It had shrugged off 25% of the damage from a boulder dropped from forty feet up. My previous experiences with it made me believe that melee should be my last move. Magic it was.

  It would have been a lot easier mentally to meditate back at the top of the cliff. Instead I had to try to keep calm and control my breathing as I sat at the edge of the pit where I could hear its front legs digging and its angry hisses. It also didn’t help that scarily often I received another notice about how it was regenerating.

  By the time I had recharged my mana it had 24 hit points rolling and one of its crushed legs was back in action helping to dig itself out from under the boulder.

  I made the Agni Mudra and fire shot from my hands blasting the creature. I waved the fire across all of the creature I could see. A notice came up.

  The Tarrasquito has 25 hp left.

  Goddamn it. Its hp just went up. Obviously this thing is immune to fire damage. My mana was full so I had a few other spells I could try before I needed to meditate again. In the event you ever find yourself in a battle with a Tarrasquito, I can inform you that it is also immune to poison damage and anything from the death school of magic. I had one more spell I could cast before I was empty of mana again. Acid! It actually worked. Well, it worked a bit. I created small orbs of magical acid that splashed on the thing. Its hp dropped but not by huge amounts. It was at 28 hp when I found out that acid had some effect. With my remaining mana I was able to knock six hp off of it. By the time I meditated It would be right back at 28 hp. I could win this battle of attrition if the beast wasn’t going to be out from under the boulder before I killed it. On that point, the boulder was now rocking and shifting quite a bit.