The leaves rustled behind me, and before I could even blink, something heavy rammed into my back, throwing me to the ground. I flipped over, ready to attack, but my body froze. A sword pointed at me, the sharp edge just inches from my throat. A man in black armor stood a foot away, brandishing the weapon.
About ten more men walked out from behind the trees. They were all muscular and dressed in black too, with spears, swords and bows in their hands.
My eyes darted between the forms. What’s going on here? I frowned.
The man in front of me chuckled. “Welcome to the Kurc Woods, kid.” He lifted my chin up with the tip of his blade. “We hope you enjoy your stay.”
***
CHAPTER SIX
The man’s burly figure loomed over my hunched form. His cold metal blade scraped my jaw, the sharpened edge toying with my skin. I trapped my breath within my lungs, afraid I’d exhale and cut myself.
“Who are you?” I asked. “What do you want with me?”
“You’re going to have to ask our buyer that,” he chuckled. “Although, after we’re done with you, I’m not sure that’s going to be possible.” He sprung at me, his sword midswing.
I leaped back, but not far enough. The sword slashed at my chest, and I went flying. Blood spilled out of the wound and I thudded into the ground, rolling a few times before coming to a stop. My heart thumped hard, and with every beat, more blood seemed to spill out of the cut. I need to stop the bleeding. I grasped my chest, pushing hard on the wound. Pain broke into me, and I gasped.
The man’s form emerged before me. “I was hoping to make it a one-hit kill.” He lifted his sword up. “A two-hit kill doesn’t sound too bad either.”
End him.
The phrase echoed through my mind, wrapping me up in a sudden wave of emotion.
The next moment was a blur. Thoughts emptied out of my head, leaving a clean slate to be drawn on. My arms moved, jerking to my back and sliding out my weapons. A loud clang echoed half a second later.
I held the scimitars in front of me, positioned in a cross in front of my torso. The man’s sword rested against my weapons, the blade unable to break through the intersection. I swung my arms out, pushing the sword away.
He stumbled backward, and the other men immediately surged, surrounding me in a tighter circle. I lowered my body, my blades in front of me, my eyes watching them closely. A flurry of Analyze screens popped up around me, and I took a quick glance at their levels.
An average of Level 16. I grinned. This is going to be interesting.
My eyes picked out an odd man in their ranks. He was not very muscular and wore black robes instead of a tunic.
A mage, I realized. Almost didn’t notice him.
The other men surged to me, swords and spears in their hands. A wave of arrows fired from the archers behind them and dropped down to me. I swiftly charged forward, away from the projectiles’ target and toward the closest man.
I stretched my arms out and flexed my legs, jumping into the air. I released my upper limbs like a spring and slashed sideways at the man. He yelped in pain and dropped to the ground, immobile.
I steadied myself and readied for my next move. The men converged on my position, and arrows, spears, and swords pointed toward me. I hacked and slashed with my scimitars, knocking the projectiles out of the air and defending myself against the strikes from the ground. What the heck is with this speed? I grinned and pushed my Agility even further.
My legs crouched and jumped around as I switched between defense and offense every split second.
The strikes against me increased in speed with each passing moment. Every consecutive swing of metal inched closer toward my vitals, closer to killing me. The bleeding in my chest had stopped, but the pain remained, pulsating through my nerves.
Don’t have time to think about it, I thought as I blocked a strike. My hands swept the air as my blade countered every attack that came against me.
I need to even this battle out, I thought. An image formed in my mind, of an attack that seemed familiar and foreign at the same time. My blade strikes turned faster, and I pushed everyone back a few steps, giving myself an extra split second of time.
And that was all I needed.
I raised my scimitars into the air and closed my eyes, focusing intensely on the presence of my weapons, on the rough touch of the handle, on the weight of the blades in my hand. Footsteps shuffled toward me, and I opened my eyes, only to see the men’s blades mere inches from my chest.
I coiled my arms around my shoulders and released them, my movement too fast to be anything more than a blur. My scimitars lashed out as I swirled at an amazing pace, my arms slashing at anything I caught a glimpse of. Cries came from all around.
And then they were gone.
I stopped myself, my feet bringing me to a sliding halt. Ten men lay dead on the ground, blood soaking their clothes, gashes and cuts all over their body.
Wait. My eyes widened. The mage.
I looked up to notice a man a few yards away from me, with a circular rune drawn in the air above him, the inscription glowing with a dark violet light. A beam of a similar color burst out and struck me before I could even flinch.
DING!
Warning!
You have been poisoned! Health will reduce by −0.5% every second. Stamina will reduce by −0.2% every second. Resistance to poison reduced by −50%.
What? I blinked.
An intense pain struck my already-wounded chest and I collapsed to the ground, heaving for air. Footsteps came toward me, followed by the soft tones of a voice. I craned my neck up for just a second. The mage stood a few yards in front of me, his hands outstretched in the air, with another circular rune of deep violet glowing before him.
Poison Arts, I thought, panicking.
A hum resonated from the rune, and its brightness intensified. I blindly scrambled to my feet and dove for all I was worth. A beam of violet light, much larger than before, blasted out of the circle a split second later and struck the ground I had just been standing on. The grass and plants around the contact point wilted, withering away into dust in mere seconds.
Holy hell. I pushed myself back onto my feet, bearing the pain bursting through my limbs, and brought my scimitars up in front of me. I made a quick leap toward the mage and slashed at him with all my strength. He swept to the side, but I was ready for his next move. Agility isn’t your strength, mage-boy. I rotated around, my other blade now bearing down on my target.
He put his hands forward, but instead of summoning a spell like I’d expected, he stepped in and caught my forearm.
“We’ll come after you, kid.” He spoke with a raspy voice. “Our buyer will get what he wants.”
A flash of violet light burst from him, blinding me for a second. And when I could finally see again, he was gone, along with all the other men I’d taken down.
“Dammit,” I muttered, rubbing my eyes.
What did he mean, their buyer? I wondered. It seemed very clear that someone had hired these men to capture me, and that was not at all comforting to me. Who was after me? Did they know who I was? How had they even been able to find me in the first place?
DING!
A Ga’em prompt popped up, giving me a much-needed distraction from my thoughts.
Congratulations! You have defeated:
Bandit Gang (Lv 17)!
They saw your sword swinging, then they fell. Reward: 13000XP. Reward: 25000 Sol. Reward: Antidote of the Poison Mage.
DING!
Congratulations! Your level has increased thrice!
Level 12!
Feels like you were Level 9 just a few hours ago. Keep at this pace and you might see yourself breaking the 100s soon. You gain 12 stat points to spend on your skills. You also gain a 75% advancement to the skill of your choice.
DING!
Congratulations! You have advanced a skill.
Swordsmanship Level 2!
Swing your swords enough times and yo
u’ll level something up. Good job. Just remember that swinging can sometimes make you hurt yourself too.
Effect 1
Strength will now be increased by +3% when wielding a sword.
DING!
Congratulations! You have learned a new special move.
Bladestorm!
This attack is a combo move that allows you to hit 5 times a second, with each strike causing 50% of the weapon’s max attack damage. Uses a portion of your Mana to hone the attack. Can only be used with lightweight swords or blades.
Mana Cost
10
Casting Time
Null
Cooldown Time
10 minutes
Range
5 yards
Effect 1
Increases critical hit chance by +5%.
Oooh, that’s the move I used to take down those men, I realized, recalling the flurry of blade strikes I’d used. I was quite satisfied that I’d gotten a skill out of using something like that. The name Bladestorm did feel a tad dramatic for what I’d actually done, though. I’ll take the name, either way. I grinned.
A special move was basically what its name implied—a specific kind of move that gave one certain benefits and buffs while actually using it. Each special move was part of a skill, like how Bladestorm was a special move under the Swordsmanship skill. The easiest way to think of special moves was that they were basically like spells, but for skills that weren’t magic-based.
A harsh stroke of pain shot through my chest, and I gasped out in pain. Dammit, the poison. I breathed heavily. The poison was still making its way through my body, hurting me more with every second that passed.
Need the antidote. I panted and slid my shivering finger through the air, opening my Ga’em menu. My pain intensified as I navigated to my Item Inventory, and my body was trembling by the time I selected the icon of a violet vial. An item info screen quickly popped up.
Name
Antidote of the Poison Mage
Rarity
Rare
Special effect
Heals a basic poison status effect caused by Poison Arts
I noticed two options beneath the screen, Use and Trash, and I selected the Use option. Glowing dots of light flowed out of the prompt and condensed onto my hand, forming an uncorked vial of purple liquid.
I put the container to my lips and drained it fast, sucking the drink in. A burning sensation rose from the back of my throat—not a painful one, but noticeable nonetheless. In a few seconds, the pain in my chest eased completely, returning me back to normal.
DING!
You have consumed the Antidote of the Poison Mage! Poison status effect has been healed.
I found it incredibly convenient that the antidote was an item drop from the battle. I had no clue what I’d have done otherwise. Maybe make my own potion using the Herb Lore skill, I thought. But I wasn’t too confident about that.
My fingers ran over my chest. Eh? I blinked. The wound from before had sealed up now, and the only thing left of it was a faded scar. Am I supposed to be able to heal that fast? I touched the scar again. Maybe the antidote healed this as well, I thought. That has to be it.
I focused on the task at hand. I reoriented myself for a second and followed the path toward the city. I opened my Ga’em menu as I walked, sliding toward the Stats screen.
Unassigned Stat Points: 16
Good, I thought to myself. There was quite a bit of stat updating I needed to do, and I’d leveled up at the perfect time.
With my Bladestorm skill and its Mana requirement, one thing had become clear. It wasn’t clever to depend on just my Strength and Agility attributes, even for physical moves. I’d initially hoped I’d be able to go quite a ways before I needed to average out my stats, but the time for that had come faster than I’d expected.
It’s not like it was a big problem, though. In fact, it was good that I was beginning to average my stats out more. There were many skills and subskills I could learn that would depend on all my stats rather than just a few, so it was imperative that I rounded myself out earlier on.
And so, with this stats update, I decided to invest heavily into my Intelligence stat, and then split the rest of the points between my Dexterity, Wisdom, and Endurance.
Name
Zoran
Level
12
Health
60
Constitution
6
Mana
10→100
Intelligence
1→10
Stamina
50→60
Endurance
5→6
Strength
11
Wisdom
3→5
Agility
11
Dexterity
2→6
Charisma
4
Luck
9
Well, I don’t really feel any smarter. I chuckled and tapped on my Mana stat.
Mana Regeneration
0.1% per minute
“That’s slow,” I said. It’d take me about seventeen hours to regenerate my entire Mana, and that was a bit too long. I recalled that my Wisdom attribute determined how fast my Mana regenerated. Should invest more into it the next time, I thought.
I had Skill Advancement points left too, but I wasn’t too keen on using them. It was better to save them up and use them later, on a skill that was important to me. Right now, Swordsmanship was the best skill that I had, but for the moment I was going to take it easy and wait to see what other skills I learned.
It took me a few hours more before I finally reached the ends of the forest. I left the final line of trees and looked ahead of me. A vast flatland expanded to the horizon, dust and sand covering its surface. It seemed fitting that after being in a lively forest and then a half-dead one, I’d finally entered what could only be described as desolate land.
The other end of the spectrum, I chuckled. And then I sighed.
I trudged on, and powdery sand crunched beneath my shoes. My mind drifted back to all my questions, and even though I’d told myself I wouldn’t think about them until I reached Langsdale, I found myself indulging in my curiosity. It was a long journey to the city, and if my weird thoughts were the only thing that could keep me company, then so be it.
The first thing that flashed in my mind was what the Nymph Mother had said, that she’d felt a mysterious aura around me. I thought of the voice I’d heard before I’d first woken up. Did I actually hear that, though? I wondered. It could have just been part of a dream. If it wasn’t, though, were they connected to each other? I couldn’t see how, exactly, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they were.
I recalled what the mage had said, that they would come after me, and that their buyer would get what he wanted. Who is this buyer? I wondered. Maybe he knew something about who I was. A part of me wanted to go meet them, ask them for answers. Yeah, that’s not happening. These men had tried to kill me, so it probably wouldn’t be the best idea to go seek them out, even if I’d been able to defeat them this time.
My journey through the flatland lasted many an hour and was still going on as the sun set and the moon rose into the night. It took more than half a day of silence and pointless thoughts before I found myself a few hundred yards from a tall enclosure—four massive walls arranged in a square.
“Langsdale City,” I whispered. Tall buildings peeked out of the already-high walls, rising into the sky. The enclosure itself was compact, giving one the feeling that the city was a cozy place.
I tried to recall if I knew anything about Langsdale, but I was drawing a blank.
Maybe past me had never been to this city before, I thought. I neared the enclosure and noticed a large door on the wall facing me.
A few guards stood outside it, dressed in white armor and holding spears in their arms. One of them noticed me and walked over. “What do you want, traveler?” he asked.
“Pas
sage into the city,” I said quietly.
“Certainly,” he said. “However, we’ll need to scan you first.”
“What?” I asked.
“Langsdale City scans all the people that enter and exit the walls,” the guard said. “It’s just standard procedure, don’t worry.”
It took me a second to understand, or rather remember, that the word scan referred to how one could scan a person and obtain their Ga’em record. Each person had something called a Ga’em record, which was basically a compilation of all the information present in their Ga’em menu. The record was just an easy, secure form of information that people could access to obtain certain data about the person, like, say, birthdate, or weapon inventory. I vaguely remembered that one could only access info that they were legally licensed to access, but I wasn’t very sure about how enforced that rule was.
Should check up on that, I thought.
“Come along,” the guard said, and I followed him. We walked up to a small tablet that stood on a white pedestal outside the door. It was made entirely out of a greenish-blue crystal and had the faint outline of a hand carved into its surface.
A scanning crystal, I thought. They were the devices most commonly used to scan for a person’s Ga’em record.
“Here you go.” The guard pointed at it.
The Eternal: A Boxed Set (World of Ga'em Book 6) Page 6
