Survival Quest (The Way of the Shaman: Book #1)

by Vasily Mahanenko

  "My local monicker is shitty, so call me Clutzer," said one of the humans that had come up. He was quite thin and not very tall, with shifty eyes and an inconspicuous face. Someone like that had to be playing a Rogue, I thought. All he was missing was a couple of daggers and he'd be ready to go. "That's some pretty shit you're shooting about the mine, Mahan. Rine, the grody orc, the mine, all's there, but I just can't grok ya. What rock did you crawl out from under? We never had you at our mine, for real. And you’re acting like an underboss."

  I was taken aback by this speech. No-one spoke like that at the mine, but here we had a veritable well of gangster lingo. The only non-human in the group put an end to my total bewilderment.

  "I'm Eric, to keep things short," said the dwarf. "I also don't know you, Mahan. I've not seen any of you before either. I was promised that if I mined 20 pieces of Malachite, I'd finally go into the main gameworld. I have another half a year to go until Respect, but I'm fed up with waiting, so I was happy to jump at this proposal. With my level 12 in Mining, getting 20 pieces of Malachite will be a walk in the park."

  "I'm from Pryke too. You can call me Karachun. I was also promised that I'd be released from the mine if I get the Malachite. And, by the way, like the rest it's the first time I've seen you Mahan and you Clutzer..."

  "Hey, Clutzer's my nick!"

  "It's all the same to me," continued Karachun. "It's not like I ever saw you at the mine before. There were two hundred and forty prisoners there and I know each of them. None of you were ever among them. Period."

  "Leite," said the last man. "Same as the rest - not seen anyone and don't know anyone. So, what should we do? I also have 12 in Mining and character level. As far as I see, that's what you need to end up here. I too was promised parole if I gather the Malachite."

  "FALL IN!" the ogre's shout rang through the mine and we started to gather into one big crowd. No ranks formed - everyone stood like a bunch of sheep in front of the ogre, shifting from foot to foot. We needed our sergeant here from boot camp - he'd sort them out fast.

  "Attention everyone! I'll explain the rules of the Dolma Mine for the first and last time," began the ogre.

  "First. From today and for the next two weeks there are no restrictions on food and drink - you can use them any time as much as you want. From tomorrow morning food will be constantly available by the entrance to the mine; whoever needs it can come and use it.

  "Second. Dolma Mine has only one section, about two by two kilometers in size. It contains about three thousand Large Copper Veins, which are renewed daily - so there'll be enough for everyone. Guards have no access to the mining section, so if a Rat attacks you, you either kill it yourself or run out of the mine all the way here. The mages will arrive here tomorrow - they'll provide protection.

  "Third. Rats. Ours are big, fat and have a bite to reckon with. So keep your wits about you. Each Rat has its own habitation zone, about 40 meters in diameter. If you kill the Rat - you’re free to work within a 20-metre radius. There are 1-2 veins in each zone, so you have plenty to work on; and remember - a new Rat appears in about an hour, so don't get carried away with work, and keep your eyes open. If you get eaten, you'll go home to your mummy," a murmur went through the ranks of the prisoners, but the ogre quickly cut it off: "Silence! I'm not finished!

  "Fourth. The territory of the mining section is very well-explored within one kilometer from the entrance. What lies beyond is known only in part, so my advice is: if you want to live, don't go too far. You can work alone or form groups. If you form a group you won't be able to leave the group until the time set for this task runs out; a group has to hand in the sum of the Malachite pieces to be mined by all its members. To make it clear from the start - loners have never survived in the mine for more than two days. About the groups. If anyone dies and leaves the group, the number of Malachite pieces that the others have to mine is reduced by 20. If the deceased had Malachite in his possession, it remains where his body was and can be picked up. And remember: if a group of five people, for instance, gather twenty pieces of Malachite and one of the group dies and is removed, the amount of the gathered Malachite is reduced as well - by the share of the one removed. In the described example, the group will be left with 16 pieces instead of 20.

  "Fifth. If by some miracle you manage to get 20 pieces of Malachite and stay alive, you'll still have to remain here until the two weeks run out. During that time you can mine Malachite for yourself. The countdown starts in the morning; there are no sleeping quarters in Dolma, so you sleep right on the ground. No-one will wake you up, so if you're lazy you'll pay for it in two weeks - your time for mining is limited.

  "And sixth. The Rats drop Skins, meat and there is some chance of various fangs, tails and other items that alchemists need. So if you get lucky you may even make a profit when you leave.

  "Now you're free to go. Next time I want to see you ether with the 20 pieces of Malachite or in two week's time when I'll be personally sending you to the mine as Rat food. Dismissed!"

  There still remained a couple of hours until the evening and so I decided to do some scouting around the mine. I was curious what was out there, what was meant by a common section, how many Rats were running around and, in general, maybe I should try smashing a vein. 'It's true that fools think alike', I noted to myself, because after the ogre's speech almost all the prisoners went to the mining section. Of course: the sooner you start, the sooner you'll finish.

  The section was separated from the rest of the mine by a glimmering veil, beyond which nothing could be seen. 'So here's the veil that the guards cannot cross', I guessed. This means that the mining section itself is like a Dungeon in the main gameworld. But if that's the case, getting together a standard Dungeon group is a must - a tank, a healer and three DDs (damage dealers, fighters specializing in damage). My gut feeling told me that there must have been a reason why there were five of us from our mine, and a good one at that. The dwarf will be the tank - he's small and thus harder to hit, plus he should have some special bonuses for tanking, if I'm not mistaken about dwarves. I'll be the healer, even though I really hate doing that, and the rest of the gang will go at the Rat from the sides while it gnaws on Eric. I’ll have to put this proposal to them. I was walking up to the veil with these thoughts when suddenly some prisoner tumbled out of it with a terrible scream. He immediately got back on his feet and ran towards the guards and then THIS THING appeared from the direction of the mining section.

  The THING was the Rat, but about the size of a small pony, around a meter in height and about 2.5-3 meters in length, tail and all. Is that supposed to be a Rat? It's a Horse! The animal stopped, surprised at seeing so many people, then something seemed to click in its head and it unhurriedly trotted after the prisoner that had just appeared, completely ignoring all the others. 'Ah, the Rat has an aggro-list (a list with the data about each player that enters the mob's perception zone. The mob attacks the player at the top of that list. In order for the mob to switch to a different player, the latter has to re-aggro it: generate a greater amount of threat than the first player on the list).' The thought flashed by, 'this means the others have nothing to worry about.' What happened next I could only explain as an act of subconscious reflexes, since these were by no means conscious actions on my part.

  "Eric, grab it, I'll heal! Clutzer, Karachun, Leite, wait five seconds and then hit it from the sides! Don't come at it from behind or it'll slash you with its tail! Now!" I shouted frantically. I don't know what moved Eric: my shouting, my Charisma, reasons of his own, or Mars moving into Capricorn, but after my cry, he ran up to the Rat, took out his pick and made a good swing at it, shouting: "Aaahh, you bastard!" and hit.

  The Rat made a high-pitched squeal, stopped and immediately reacted to Eric's attack: it made a sharp turn ending in a bite and his Life Bar was diminished by a quarter. That foul vermin - how much damage was it dealing? If Eric is level 12, he must have 60 points in his stats; he's bound to have put some of them into
Stamina to avoid his Energy going down too quickly during mining. So to take off a quarter of hit points just like that was quite a lot. Now it was my move.

  All these thoughts rushed past in less than a moment. Eric barely had time to scream in pain as I got my Tambourine out of the bag. Thanks again, Kart and Sakas, for making me this wonder. Now, to begin.

  I selected Eric and started to hit the Tambourine. I decided to take no notice of how it looked like from outside, my task was to get Eric back up. I started with my usual song:

  The Shaman has three hands...

  Yes! Eric's Hit Points went up.

  "Waste that Squeaker!" shouted Clutzer and attacked. Right, things should get easier now.

  ... and behind his back a wing...

  Yes! Eric's doing a good job too, not screaming from the Rat bites, standing there, teeth clenched, and taking it.

  ... from the heat upon his breath...

  Yes! Why is it just Clutzer hacking at the Rat? Where are the others?

  ... shining candle-fire springs.

  "Karachun, Leite, you need a special invitation?" growled Eric through his teeth. Good: if he has time to look around, he's still with us.

  "Take that, you bastard! Rub out that grey-furred biter! Karachun, away from the tail, or it'll get you!" our shouts echoed through the mine.

  "Eric, turn its head to the mine! The tail!" I shouted when I saw that the Rat was hitting other prisoners with its tail. I wasn't exactly worried for them (it's not like the tail was going to kill them), but I had no intention of sharing the loot. Who knows what the local system for loot allocation was. Things were rather interesting with this in Barliona - in some cases the loot went to the person who hit first, in others to all those who sustained damage. So we shouldn't take the risk - there's not a lot to go around as it is. By this time I had little doubt that we'd bring it down.

  The Rat continued to throw itself at Eric, biting him again and again. It was surprising that the dwarf didn't fall down: when such a mass jumps on you, it takes some skill to stay on your feet. Eric stood there, teeth clenched, and hit the Rat, whose life bar was falling slowly but surely.

  The Rat's sides were flanked by Clutzer, Karachun and Leite, who hacked at the Rat like it was a vein: taking an aim, hitting and looking at the result.

  "Die already!" - Eric screamed wildly, jumped and made a devastating blow to the head. He probably scored a crit, because the Rat fell on its front paws and remained motionless for some moments. It's concussed, a guess hit me, and since Eric's health was at full, I decided to see how I would fare as a fighter. I selected the Rat to summon a Lightning Spirit on it and shuddered. Oh hell: level 14, 1000 Hit Points in total of which around 400 still remained!

  Damage inflicted. 8: 36 (Lightning Spirit Damage)/2(level of opponent /Character level) -10 (Inner resistance to Spirits).

  Dammit! What about all those Strength rings? Why did I ever take off all my gem rings? At least I didn't take the neck-chain off. 'Damn, just hope my mana will last,' I thought angrily, again selecting Eric and summoning another Healing Spirit. The Rat had recovered and started to chew on our tank once again.

  When only 20% of the Rat's Hit Points remained, it suddenly began to increase in size, its eyes started to become bloodshot and its fur took on a bloody tinge.

  "Mahan, give me all you've got, it's going berserk!" Eric's shout filled me with dismay.

  Grey-furred damnation! When berserking, mobs inflict 100% more damage, pain and general unpleasantness. If it scores a critical hit, Eric's had it! And I only have enough mana for 4 more Healing Spirit summonings.

  "Hit it with all you've got! Let's do this!" I shouted and started to summon the Healing Spirits.

  A Rat attack hit = minus 30% to Hit Points, a Healing Spirit on Eric = plus 10% Hit points. A Rat attack hit = minus 30% to Hit Points, a Healing Spirit on Eric! Plus 10% to Hit points...

  Skill increase:

  +1 to Charisma. Total: 5

  The Rat suddenly flickered and disappeared. Yes! We downed it! It took more than a minute to bring down a Rat. Between the five of us! Trying to fight it alone is just pointless. It'd eat you in the blink of an eye. I looked at Eric and saw that he was surrounded by a whirlwind of light. That's right - he's reached level 13! That makes sense, we weren't attacking the Rat as a group and the prisoner it was chasing probably never touched it after seeing all its Hit Points, so all the experience for the Rat went to Eric alone.

  I'll be damned... during the fight my Hit Points went down to just 20! I hardly even noticed! I urgently needed to find a Shaman mentor, or I'll bite it while I'm busy healing others. After getting some water, which was thankfully nearby, I restored my life and mana levels, and then had a look what the Rat left behind. No-one other than Eric was able to pick up the loot, but we could look all we wanted. There wasn't much to look at, though. Rat Skin, 3 pieces of Rat Meat. That's it. Nothing special, really; so much for getting my hopes up that our tank would get something useful. And he was our tank, because I was sure that after a demo of the Rats the number of people wishing to mine Malachite alone would plummet dramatically.

  The majority of the prisoners started to disperse. There were still about two hours left until the end of the day, but no-one else wanted to risk going to the mine. That Rat really did leave an impression on everyone.

  "I'm thinking that we should form a group," said Eric, when there was no-one else around. "I played Barliona before going to prison. I was a tank then and this time round too I fell back into my old habit and started to level up my Warrior as a tank as soon as freedom was on the cards. If each Rat has one thousand Hit Points and they take off fifty with each hit, you won't get far without a healer here. Mahan will heal and you three do the killing. We'll choose a section, kill the Rat, smash the vein together, get the Malachite and move on. This way we'll complete the quest. I don't see any other way."

  "You got it, shorty," agreed Clutzer "Them's some crazy Rats, can eat ya like nuthin', groddy buggers. So I'm in with the group thing."

  "Agreed," nodded Leite, "but let's decide now how we'll share the Malachite we mine. It won't be good if someone splits as soon as he gets the 20 pieces. I can do without any ‘happy surprises’."

  "If you make a group you won't be able to quit it just like that, and the amount of Malachite for the quest would still be based on all of us," replied Karachun. "I'm fine with just one of us lugging this Malachite around, as long as we get the right amount of it. I say we group up too. That Ratling was just too big. If one of these spawns every hour, we'll never get the assignment done by ourselves."

  "What about you, Mahan?" Eric looked at me, "Do you agree? This won't work without your healing. If you're in, then form the group: you were the fastest to react to the Rat and knew what to do, so you'll be the raid-leader. I've got one more question for you now: where did you get such a short name, like NPCs have - just five letters? We're all walking around with half-sentence tongue twisters and have to shorten them to usable nicknames, but when I first saw you I thought you were an administration representative - your name is that different from the rest."

  "I agree that we should form a group and will send you an invite in a minute." I said, "I have an immediate proposal - we've downed the Rat and there's still enough of the day left before dark. There's five of us. I propose we take a walk to the mining section and smash at least one vein. We should start today. As for the name - before I was put into the capsule the operators gave me the chance to choose my own name rather than use a random one. That's why my nick looks like that."

  I selected Eric, Clutzer, Leite and Karachun in turn and sent them each a group invite.

  You have created a group.

  4 people have joined the group.

  Attention! Changes to the 'Bloody Malachite' quest. The amount of Malachite to be obtained has changed. New amount: 100.

  Loot distribution: Each man for himself. The type of loot distribution cannot be changed in this location.


  Well, well. The time had now come, I thought, to allocate the remaining 27 free stat points. Of course it would be nice to save them until I leave the mine, but if a Rat eats me, they'll be of no use anyway. I put on my Intellect rings again and began to increase my stats.

  Let's think. For starters, I need to put about 7 points into Stamina, so I could summon a couple more Spirits. Damn, with this limitation I'll have to allocate my stats in a way that's far from optimal. Total: Base Stamina of 17, with the items going up to 26, thus at level seven this would be enough for 30 or so spells. 'At this rate I'll be a tougher tank than Eric,' I smiled to myself. Right, next - Strength. We'll have to be quick about smashing the veins, so 10 points to Strength would be just right. 10 points remaining. Intellect or Agility? I only need Agility for professions and it's of no use to me right now. So, it's Intellect. Although, stop. Why don't I try to put a couple of points in Charisma? Since I'm a RL - a raid leader - it could be useful.

  Attention, the Charisma stat cannot be increased by addition of stat points!

  I see. Same as Crafting. A pity, would have been good to increase my level of influence over others. I'll have to level up in it as the circumstances permit. Putting the 10 remaining points into Intellect and increasing it to 18 at the base and 82 with items, I opened up the group interface and examined the stats of the rest of the group.

  Eric. Warrior. Level 13. Stamina 40, Agility 15, Strength 30, Rage 8. Yes, I was wrong, the tank overshot me in Hit Points by quite a lot. But that was good: the thicker his hide the easier it'll be.

  Clutzer. Rogue. Level 12. Stamina 25, Agility 15, Strength 40, Rage 6. I guessed the class right with our slang connoisseur. I was also glad to see that he had enough Stamina: a smaller Energy loss meant more time for mining the vein.