by Ryan Rimmel
At this point, the notion of spearmen needed to be addressed. In most video games, when you think of spearmen, you think of soldiers holding spears. That’s not the whole story, though. While a spear certainly was a spearman’s primary weapon, most also carried a spare weapon or two. Lorraine’s spearmen were no exception. They seemed to favor axes and maces as secondary weapons.
While the Hulk was pinned to the ground by Badgelor, Lorraine’s soldiers descended upon it like army ants. The thick seams covering the creature were highly exposed, and they functioned as the soldiers’ targets. The seams split open quite easily when hit with an ax or smashed with a mace.
In short order, they had turned the undead monstrosity into a pile of offal. That, combined with Nick’s army smashing the remaining undead, left us in control of the battlefield. Robin was still riding down stragglers, but nothing threatened our army or the estate.
I walked over to Lorraine. “I think that just about concludes our business.”
She was flat on her back, chuckling. Her cousin and Nick were, likewise, sprawled on the field, ignoring the-inch-deep muck. “I guess so,” she sighed eventually. “Will you help us with Nick’s estate?”
“You guys have this. I believe in you,” I said. Shart groaned.
Lorraine thought about that for a moment. “I went up two ranks in War Leader, so I guess I do. I assume that’s your doing?”
“Probably. I’m also going to promote all the sergeants I breveted up in the battle. That way, you won’t have to pay the double Command Point cost next time,” I said. It would be expensive for her in a monetary sense, as sergeants got paid more. At the same time, it vastly expanded the army she could control. The levity on her face dwindled as she considered that.
“What are you going to do?” asked Jerry, sitting up to look at me. As he did so, a thick mass of muck poured off his armor.
“Save the princess,” I said calmly, looking to the east.
“She killed the king,” stated Nick, likewise sitting up to look at me curiously.
“I’m pretty sure I already fought the woman that killed the king. It wasn’t the princess. His real killer could shape shift,” I replied.
“The king did dote on Julia,” stated Nick, consideringly. “I suppose it does sound believable that a Shapechanger killed the king.”
“I expected more pushback from that idea,” I said.
“Julia, who loved her father to pieces, suddenly pulled knives out and stabbed him full of poison,” said Lorraine, as she, too, realized what she was lying in. “It never made much sense, but Julia wasn’t there to defend herself. Certain elements in the kingdom have spent a great deal of time defaming her character, and she did just up and vanish.”
“The assassin’s party kidnapped her when it happened,” I replied.
“That wouldn’t be the strangest thing I’ve heard today,” stated Jerry. “Heck, I just fought a battle with Badgelor for Wind and Windfall. All we need now is Tomen and …” Jerry trailed off.
“Well, I’ll send you the coordinates to the temple. It's only about half a day’s travel from here,” said Lorraine, slowly rising from the muck. “If she’s alive, we could help. Help us with the rest of the undead, and I’ll party up with you.”
“No time. I’ve got to save her by tomorrow night. The usual timed quest stuff, you know?” I chuckled, signaling Badgelor. He shuffled over, still in his ultimate form. I reached into his folds to pull out a ghoul’s hand.
“Well, then, thank you, Jim,” said Lorraine. Standing up fully, she turned to face me. For a moment, she looked like she was going to shake my hand; however, she stopped herself. Apparently, I still wasn’t important enough. I hopped onto Badgelor and looked around at the army. Everyone, including Lorraine, was kneeling.
“I told you, a man riding a badger gets mad respect,” stated Badgelor, who started shuffling out of the army. “It used to happen to me everywhere I went.”
We were leagues away before I realized that my title had shifted from Jim, the Curious Puppy to Jim, Mayor of Windfall. It had happened when I’d yelled out my war cry.
“Hopefully, that doesn’t come back to bite me in the ass,” I thought.
Chapter 49 – Progression toward the Goal
“So, there is supposed to be a bridge here?” I asked, looking down into the deep, broad crevasse. At the bottom was a small horde of formerly undead. It seemed that the bridge couldn’t handle the crossing of all the creatures that chose to make their pilgrimage to the land of the living.
“I’m guessing that’s what those pillars were for,” said Badgelor, gesturing to the collapsed stone tower that had gone with the bridge. I grumbled. With the sun behind us and mountain peaks all around, light was getting dodgy. I ended up casting Heightened Senses, just to get a good view of everything.
“Amulet of Spider Climbing?” I asked, hoping that magical wonder could help us.
“No,” replied Badgelor. “It only works for a few minutes at a time. It would be at least a solid day’s climb over all those sharp, jagged rocks.”
“That must be nearly a mile across. How did they manage to set a rope bridge?” I asked.
“Miles, Jim? Really? Okay, the Marksman Talent Tree has a ranged shot talent that can hit a third of a league,” stated Badgelor. I glanced through my Marksman talent and found it. Each rank doubled my range, and my base range was 200 logs. I couldn’t hit much at 200 logs, unless the target was enormous. That meant 4 ranks of Extended Range would give me enough range to shoot over a canyon of this size with some degree of accuracy.
All you needed to do was attach a string to the arrow. Once you got the arrow over the crevasse, you could just keep sending thicker and thicker strings across, until you managed a rope. On Earth, I’m guessing the physics would have declared the bridge too long, but that wasn’t as much of a concern on Ordinal. Sometimes magic is wondrous.
“We are going to have to go around,” I shrugged. “Hi Ho!”
“Hi Ho!” replied Shart.
“It's off to work we go,” I confidently stated, as Badgelor groaned.
“It's Heigh-Ho you dimwits,” stated the badger.
“You’d have to be reading it to tell the difference,” I said sarcastically.
We continued to the east, heading through darker and increasingly less hospitable parts of Falcon. This place looked burned out, and the tracks of undead were everywhere. A whole dungeon’s worth of creatures had flooded into the local lands, which was particularly obvious here.
“I guess it's better than nothing,” growled Badgelor. Lorraine’s belated gift of the temple’s coordinates was more or less unnecessary, given the massive tracks of undead that had passed through here.
“Well, it is the thought that counts,” I replied.
“I know you can’t see me, but I’m rolling my eyes right now, Dum Dum,” said Shart, as we continued.
“So, we have until the moon rises tomorrow?” I asked.
“Yes,” confirmed Shart. “Most summonings are tied to one of the moons. The most powerful moon of all heralds my summoning. It is the Blue Moon, or, as it is properly known, the Dragon’s Moon. In spoken Ancient, it is called the Agons-Dray eft-Lay ut-Nay.”
I blinked. “That’s Ancient?”
“Yup, Charles used to use it on occasion. Hardly anyone knows what it means,” stated Badgelor, before he spat onto the ground. “Only a few scholars claimed to understand it, and I’d wager most of them were lying. Charles said it would be easy for someone from Earth to understand.”
I was about to laugh, when I realized I was not speaking English. My mind only interpreted what people said as English. I actually spoke in some strange Ordinal language that probably had virtually nothing to do with English's basic grammatical structure.
Explaining how to translate English Pig Latin into Ordinalese would have made no freaking sense whatsoever. Pig Latin was a language game with strange rules meant for English. I couldn’t even guess at what shovi
ng Ordinalese through it would do.
“Eat-Nay, adgelor-Bay,” I responded.
“That’s my name in Ancient! Hey, Zit, I told you, ya dumbass,” stated Badgelor. Shart groaned.
“How? I can barely translate Ancient,” Shart whined. “That’s not fair!”
Grinning, I checked the area for dangers. I didn’t see any pumas; I also didn’t see any less dangerous creatures. Deciding I was momentarily safe, I brought up my character sheet. There were several icons I recognized for level-ups and skill gains. There was also one I didn’t recognize.
“Any idea on an icon that has two golden circles on a blue, stone head?” I asked Shart.
“No,” replied the demon. “That sounds strange.”
I considered starting off with that but realized I should probably handle everything else first.
● Level up, Cleric 10
● Your Hit Point total is increased by 10. Your Mana is increase by 10.
● Your Hit Points have increased, your maximum Hit Points are now 490
● You Mana has increased, your Maximum Mana is now 180.
● You have learned the litany, Range 1
● You have gained a talent!
“What is a litany?” I asked myself, bringing up the new ability. It didn’t take long to find. Litanies were components of Divine magic. Divine spells operated verbally, unless you had perks. You could say a litany while chanting a spell to further increase the effects.
That was the single biggest difference between Arcane and Divine casting. Arcane casting was Core based. You internalized runes and used a word of power to activate the spell. Divine casting involved mystical chants that I thought of as prayers. They let you invoke your god’s will on the world. Divine vs Arcane amounted to externally activating chants vs the internally activated runes.
● Litany: Range 1: You can boost the range of any spell by (rank) logs.
One log was meaningless to my Holy Blast spell. However, for my healing spells, that was incredibly useful. “Reach out and touch someone,” I chanted. Nothing happened, nor had I expected anything to happen. I hadn’t actually cast a spell.
I focused on a healing spell and said, “Reach out and touch someone, Bub.” The healing spell activated, impacting the wilted bush we were passing. The bush flashed for an instant before returning to its green, leafy glory.
“Wait, healing works on bushes?” I asked.
“They are living things that can be hurt or killed,” stated Shart.
“In video games, it usually only works on creatures,” I said.
“Oh, these are always fun,” replied Shart patiently. “Do tell, how does a video game affect us here in the real world?”
I said nothing. Ordinal was not a video game. I still had fleeting moments where Ordinal didn’t seem like the real world, either, but those were few and far between now. Ordinal was a real place that had bizarre rules. I guessed what Shart was saying made sense. Healing magic used Life energy. It wouldn’t care how you were alive, just that you were alive.
Next, I tried to engage my perk, Empowered Healing, which allowed me to cast healing spells wordlessly. I attempted to use the litany, but it didn’t work. I needed to talk to activate the verbal component. That meant my ability to cast Healing spells silently was useless here. Just another one of those bizarre rules.
Glancing through my talents, I considered my options. I still needed to pick up Fast Regeneration, but it cost 3 Talent Points. I didn’t have enough. From there, I’d need to move up to Combat Regeneration, which would require even more points. I reviewed my other choices in Heightened Senses but decided that I’d have to hold onto my Talent Points for the time being.
● Level up, Duelist 15
● Your Hit Point total is increased by 10. Your Stamina is increase by 10.
● Your Hit Points have increased, your maximum Hit Points are now 500
● You Stamina has increased, your Maximum Stamina is now 385.
● You may now select a Path. Please review your unlocks
● You have gained a perk
I finally had access to my next Path. My third Path was going to be something that helped me fight. Upon reflection, I had improved Badgelor with my first Path and my ability to explore the world with my second. Now, with my third path, I was finally going to do something to improve my chances of survival in combat. I really did get into entirely too much combat.
“Are you going to cry?” asked Shart.
“No,” I replied. “Well, maybe.”
“Don’t cry on my back,” growled Badgelor. “Riding a badger is a wondrous experience, and I’ll not have it marred by you crying on me.”
“People can be so happy that they cry,” I said.
“You sound like an ugly crier,” replied Badgelor.
“I always got that impression,” stated Shart. “Dum Dum would be the kind of guy who would be a snotty mess by the time he was finished.”
“That hurts,” I replied.
“I’ll bet,” scoffed Badgelor, as he continued walking.
I examined my choices for my Path. I had three, which seemed to be the rule of things on Ordinal. Sword Saint was a Divine Path, devoted to the sword as a quasi-religion. Eldritch Warrior was the second option. It appeared to focus on a magical connection to the sword. Finally, there was Weapon Master, the pure martial art of beating the crap out of things with weapons.
“Eldritch Warrior looks like a different version of Mage Knight,” I said, examining the Path options. It used Mana and Stamina for most attacks, but it didn’t seem to utilize any magical Cores.
“That’s accurate,” stated Shart. “An Eldritch Warrior is a decent option, if you have enough Mana but no form of magic. They are allowed to learn a few low-level spells and can channel unformed Mana directly into their sword strikes, increasing the base Damage.”
When I was a Mage Knight, I could channel Mana into my sword strikes, which added an elemental component to the attacks. Basically, as a Mage Knight, I could make a sword strike that inflicted Fire Damage. Eldritch Knight would increase my base attack Damage. Given how armor worked, that had its advantages. In some circumstances, having attacks that did 40 points of Slashing Damage instead of 30 Slashing Damage would be far more effective than having a strike that did 30 Slashing Damage and 30 Fire Damage. Of course, having a strike that did 40 Slashing and 30 Fire would also be useful.
However, that seemed redundant. One of the problems with my unique trait was that I had the opportunity to put a hat on a hat. If I doubled up too closely, abilities could overlap rather than expand my options. An Eldritch Mage Knight seemed dangerously close to that.
The Sword Saint was a similar proposition, except it was from the Divine school of magic. It used prayer and Stances to activate the “true power” of the sword. I had already encountered stances from the elf. They seemed useful, but I wasn’t sure they would be so valuable that I’d want a Path devoted to them.
“Shart, are Stances a skill or an ability?” I asked. If Stances were skills, I could just train.
“Both,” replied Shart. “Some require perks to unlock. However, there are some basic Stances that you can pick up without a class. You would just need to find someone that can teach you.”
“Warriors don’t typically take Stances. Is that because they don’t have enough magic to use them?” I asked.
“Yes,” replied Shart. I could feel him rolling his eyes. It was a habit of his, done every time he had to demonsplain something to me. “A Stance is a magical pattern that you enact with your movements. Stances restrict how you can act in a lot of ways. For example, the Unyielding Stance prevents your feet from moving. That can be highly useful if you need to stand stock-still.”
Getting thrown around by attacks was a problem I’d had to overcome, “That would emulate some aspects of the Mitigate skill.”
“Not everyone has the Mitigate skill,” replied Shart.
I nodded. That explained how the elven
Monk had fought. Several times, I’d hit him, and the elf’s Mana bar, not his Stamina bar, had reduced. I hadn’t seen him casting any spells, so it hadn’t made sense at the time. Now, I understood. He had been changing Stances in response to my attacks, and they were magical enough that my Counterspell skill worked on them.
Finally, I glanced at Weapon Master and knew that it was going to be my choice. It allowed you to apply all ranked skills to any weapon you were using at the time.
Ranked skills were very highly focused skills. In my best estimation, they behaved more like very focused mini perks than anything else. My most commonly used skills were Quick Strike 3 and Powerful Blow 6, which I tended to use whenever I had the Stamina to spare. However, I only had them at that Rank for my sword. My other weapons were at substantially lower ranks.
● Quick Strike (3) (sword): You may expend 6 additional Stamina to make an extra strike. You can make up to 3 extra attacks, total cost 18 Stamina.
● Powerful Blow (6) (sword): You may add +6 Damage to a strike at the cost of 6 Stamina. Each blow will also Knockback your opponent at a base of 6 logs.
I snorted at the Knockback. You could hit someone hard enough with a longsword to knock them back, but, unless you got a tremendous, square blow, your target would never go back that far.
Since I was looking at my Ranked skills, I also took a moment to check out the Skill Points for both. Doing so caused me to wince. As you leveled Ranked skills, they became exponentially more expensive. I was looking at weeks of training to get another Powerful Blow rank and probably months for Quick Strike.
The big problem was how Ordinal did weapon skills in general. I had the Blunt Weapon skill from the Cleric class, as well as the Maces skill from Warrior. Blunt Weapon was a catch all skill that covered every blunt weapon imaginable. In theory, that was a much better skill than Maces, which only covered maces. However, Ordinal balanced the skills out by requiring a massive investment of Skill Points for Blunt Weapons to level up.
