by Alston Sleet
The last two months of constant fighting and conflict should have prepared me.
Waking I rolled out of bed, my white night shirt stretching across my torso, and stepped over to the bowl of water which was what consisted of my morning clean up. It was only once a week that we rested and indulged in a warm bath in a tub room below. It was too much effort to have the inn keepers young daughter gather and haul gallons of water just to have a warm bath.
After washing my face I spent a few moment stretching my back, reaching over my shoulders, touching my toes, and generally limbering up. I opened the door and reached for my repaired leather equipment which was resting on the stool in the hall. It had been repaired by the leather worker while I used the set he was now repairing. Slowly the amount of damage I was taking was being reduced. I was slowly gaining capability at the life of conflict I was living.
While I thought the leveling up was a bit annoying, it wasn’t as annoying as being weaker than just about everything around me. Besides, the legend of me being a frightening warrior was growing.
As usual, standing in the middle of the room holding my equipment I made my daily backup.
And…my gear was gone. I wasn’t even wearing my night shirt and shorts.
Eventually I figured it out.
So…
I died.
I wanted to feel upset over the entire thing, but mostly I was a bit befuddled over what was going on, then strangely a small smile curled my lip when I figured it out. I died, but I don’t remember it. Death truly is the land that no one visits, because when you are dead, you are not.
Shrugging I went to my pack and grabbed what I’ve come to think of as my rest and relaxation clothing.
With a feeling of curiosity I dressed then looked out the window, it appeared to be slightly past mid day. Normally we didn’t leave the dungeon until the light started to fade for the day.
Thinking on it I decided to go down stairs and ask the inn keeper to prepare a nice lunch. Today was disrupted and I’m sure this won’t be the end of it.
The innkeeper’s wife, Maddy, seemed confused, her round face slightly red from cooking in the kitchen off to the side of the ale taps. I could see she was curious about why I was back so early compared to my usual routine. Maddy was far too well trained to simply blurt something out though her husband would have. The man was prone to blurting out demands for answers. I think it was from the man’s years as a soldier. He had endless stories about those years, few of which could be true unless dragon attacks are far more regular than I expected, but his wife was far more deferential.
It was about ten minutes before Maddy delivered a plate of meat, cheeses, and breads with a strong mustard for a condiment. The mustard was a local delicacy since the little yellow flower grows wild around the town, harvested by the children for pocket change. I ordered extra, hence the large plate, I was expecting my two companions to arrive shortly.
I was curious if I left a corpse? How about the gear I was wearing?
If it takes an hour or longer before my companions arrive, I would expect that I leave a corpse. To them it would appear like any other death. If, instead, I disappear or my body and my gear disappears, then it will be far less time before I see my companions again.
My main goal has to be to extend my legend, the next most important goal would be to hide the lack of memory of the days events. Legends of me being a wise, helpful, powerful immortal would be useful. Legends of me being a powerful immortal easily fooled through careful killing? Not as much.
I was making every effort to present the image of casual ease. My companions seeing me as relaxed and only slightly put out by the whole dying thing would be helpful. If I can get them to describe how it happened and hide my ignorance, all the better.
I spent roughly half an hour mentally reciting the plan for how I was going to deal with the coming confusion. When my companions entered the inn, Felvers carrying my leather and weapons, I had one answer all ready, my corpse was gone but my gear remained. Useful information for the future I’m sure.
“Over here guys. I got us lunch. Sorry about that. Felvers, mind going over how I could have done better?” I asked as leaned back in my chair.
These chairs where not designed for leaning, but I slumped in as relaxed a repose as I could.
I’ve heard the phrase ‘blanched white’ but had always thought of it as a slight lightening of the face. Lendsers on the other hand had started from a pail complexion and blanched an actual white. For a moment I was afraid he was about to faint.
I had almost a minute of staring from my two team mates before they slowly approached the table and sat. Felvers slowly reached over and tapped my hand. For a second I thought he was trying to get my attention till I realized he was just trying to make sure I was actually there.
“So…the King didn’t tell you I’m immortal? Did he just send for a power leveling team and leave off the entire reason I was here? Rude of him, it’s kind of important for you two in order to understand how to work with me.”
I tried for a casual air, to my untrained ear it seemed over loud and like a child practicing for a play. I didn’t mind if others heard my story, my legend has to grow and it won’t grow only from the top, it needs to spread from the people as well.
“Eat, eat, I know seeing me die must have been troubling. Relax, we can take today off and resume farming tomorrow,” I said as I gestured towards the food. Calling out to Maddy to bring two more ales for my team members. I could see her standing at the door to the kitchen blatantly listening in.
The two sat silently, only occasionally picking at the food. I waited till Maddy came back with the ales before speaking, my hope was to let her hear some tidbits and spread my rumor. My plan so far really did sort of consist of ‘make a lot of people aware of things then watch for opportunities’. Not the best plan for long term survival normally, but that wasn’t actually a concern for me anymore.
“Felvers, I might be immortal and I will be living in this world for a long time, but I’m still at the start of my life here. You are a skilled armsman, a few hints on how I could improve my performance so I die a few less times? It might not actually kill me, but it is annoying and an inconvinence.”
While looking at Felvers I could see Maddy flinch and miss a step as she returned to the kitchen doorway. Right, mission accomplished, people definitely will hear about this. Maddy was a horrible gossip.
Coughing slightly Felvers glanced at me before he visibly composed himself sitting up straighter. With a deep swig of his ale he started.
“Well, I had been told that you might not be a normal wizard. Which we figured to be true shortly after you agreed to start swinging a sword and dagger. Most spell slingers refuse to deal with the likes of us so that was a bit odd just to be startin’.”
I nodded, not what I was worried about, but pretty much as I had figured.
“I’ve only been alive in this world for around four months, I don’t know your culture or the way the world works. I figured that learning a sword and other weapons will serve me well in this world. The plan is that I’ll be spending roughly the next seven hundred thousand years in this world. I figure that sword work will be useful sometime in there.” I said with as much casualness as I could present.
Again with Lendsers’ blanching. Felvers’ just seemed to flounder for a moment not really knowing how to respond.
“It’s why I haven’t really been worried about the games the King has been playing with my power-leveling. He agreed to power-level me, sure he isn’t doing all he can about it, and he isn’t doing things in as straightforward a manner as he implied he would, but he hasn’t lied. I always pay back my debts, make good on my deals, and never lie. He is fulfilling his deal so far, but he is pushing the edges of dealing in bad faith, if it goes further, I’ll make sure he will experience this same in return.”
I tried for casual, but I think a bit of evil grin came through. I didn’t have a plan yet for how to de
al with the King, but I’m hoping this will get back to him and make him think twice about his slight games. I’ve slowly started to come to realize that when you literally have all the time in the world and no fear of dying, it’s easy to start finding ways to take advantage of things and solve problems.
With a shrug Felvers continued, “I don’t know nothing about that. I just know the King wanted you to have a hard time of it while still doing our best to keep you healed and leveling. I’m not getting in a disagreement between royalty and…well…whatever you are.”
“My body is human, my mind is mostly human slowly changing past that. The ones who put me here think of me as an infant, and this world is supposed to be where I grow. This world is basically like an egg in that regard. Like I said, it’s going to take me a long long time before I reach a point where I’m ready to leave. For now you can mostly just think of me as a human who can’t lie, can’t break a deal, and has immortality for now. It’s going to be a few centuries before I change much more than that.”
Lendsers seemed to respond to that comment more than the others, “just a human who is immortal he says.”
Nodding I could see how that would appear to them, ‘just’ immortal. I had made a year long plan, breaking numerous laws, prepared a potential terrorist action, all to avoid death and try for a chance at immortality. ‘Just’ immortal doesn’t cover it.
“So like I said, relax, eat up. We can treat our selves to a nice warm bath soon. Let today sit as you consider it, and if you are still up for it we can go into the dungeon tomorrow and continue.”
Felvers seemed even more confused than before, “What do you mean if we are still up for it?”.
“The King owes me twenty four more levels in power-leveling, my agreement with him says nothing about who will do the power-leveling. I can wait a few weeks for him to get together a new team if you two don’t want to continue. I’m enjoying working with you two, but I’m not in a particular rush as long as the King doesn’t break the agreement. I’m actually a bit tiffed with him that he didn’t warn you two. Seems rude to me.”
My being ‘tiffed’ with the King seemed to surprise them more than the immortality had. I had forgotten that this world was mostly feudal and what ‘King’ actually meant in such a place. In a feudal land ‘King’ was almost always at least one step at most below a god. He commands, others do. The entertaining part of this is that that isn’t how many nobles or merchants see it, but for your average peasant?
Maddy hovered in the background of our discussion, tending the fire, bringing more ales, sweeping up. Oh so casually being there in order to listen in. I think Felvers caught on to her behavior, I wasn’t sure about Lendsers but I’m guessing he did as well, but I tried to give the impression that I just didn’t get it.
I thought back to my worlds stories of wandering trickster gods who seemed foolish until they played tricks on others, who played casual games as they slowly twisted the actions of others into foolish behavior. I wonder if my world was like this one, it seemed the games I had to ultimately play would be similar. Acting more ignorant than I was, being thought a fool until I played ‘tricks’. I could see now how long term those actions made sense if you cared more about future annoyances rather than present ones.
I spent a while wondering if my own world was as artificial as this one was, then remembering the words of the pink fairy, I wondered if the word ‘artificial’ even made sense in this context. I went to bed that night considering weird loops of world travel and stories of ancient prankster gods, wondering if I would have to figure out a way to ‘correct’ the folly of a King.
Chapter 10
You Can’t Always Get What You Want…
Felvers came up with an interesting method to improve my swordsmanship. His idea, since I couldn’t die, seemed to be focused around providing the most amount of difficulty as possible. The idea seemed to boil down to ‘always be fighting two Orcs at the same time’. His reasoning, explained after my outburst of cursing, was that I seemed to develop quickest while under the most stress.
Our first try at this went less than perfectly. Instead of a sword swinging swashbuckler defending myself from spears, the first attempt consisted more of a swish, ‘aaacck’, and gurgle as I tried to defend from a second spear while one was embedded in my left lung.
It took roughly a month before I could consistently fend off two Orcs at the same time. There were only two real tricks involved. One was to essentially to maneuver such that one Orc to was always in the way of another Orc. The second trick was to be aware of the surroundings and be sure to finish off an Orc as soon as a third one spawns, this kept my attention focused the entire time.
When the happy digital sound of leveling happened, I almost took another spear in the leg, but my constant practice saved me on that one. Taking a small break outside the room I tried for a new spell as I had every level before, but unlike every time before, this time it worked.
*ding*
Learned Spell: Mana Shield
I could feel my grin nearly splitting my face wide. I would never get tired of this. Magic. The control of the world around me through pure mental effort. I enjoyed building or creating things, I even found myself reveling in the pure physicality of sword fighting and battle, but I think little compares in the moment to direct mastery of the world itself through pure mental control. Saying to the world ‘do this’ and the world does it.
I made sure Lendsers and Felvers knew that I was about to try the new spell I had just created on the Orcs and to not interfere unless it looks like I’m about to die.
The fact that I now had a new spell, though I didn’t have a spell stone, obviously interested Lendser. Felvers could care less since it was a spell and not some weapon of steel. When I explained I could create spells at level up, almost whatever I wanted as long as I was to focus continually on it, Lendser practically turned green.
I’ll admit, I’m taking a lot of joy in needling Lendser. The guy was sour grapes every moment of the day. I needed him desperately for healing, otherwise, I would level far slower and die far more often, but Felvers was a far more companionable fellow.
Focusing, I forced the mana shield to surround me. Near instantly a semi-transparent bubble, tinted slightly blue, surrounded me. With this, I would be able to fight far more effectively. My greatest hindrance right now is that every heal or regeneration I get, and for a short time afterward, causes Lendser to get a portion of the experience from my fights. With my new shield, I should be able to fight for longer without the need of heals or regeneration which means the experience goes only to me. This should speed up my leveling a lot.
Stepping forward I was glad to see that the shield was tied to some imaginary point in my center as I had envisioned the spell.
That’s when the spell failed.
A bit of experimentation showed me that I had to keep mentally holding on to the idea of the shield existing or the shield disappeared. Annoying, but was what I had signed up for. The goal for me being in this world was for me to mentally develop, holding the shield in my mind while fighting would certainly perform that function. It also made sense from a game mechanic point of view. The day I described how I didn’t have mana, and that all my spells just ran on straight concentration -as many and as often as I wanted- was the day I think Lendser decided I was evil incarnate.
After Felvers cleared out the room again and I prepared myself to fight the next re-spawn I discovered the main problem with my mana shield. I had designed the shield to be invulnerable to anything as long as I could keep my concentration on the shield. This worked apparently as designed. The problem came when I tried to stab forward at the Orc and discovered that my shield was invulnerable…from both sides.
With a sigh, I tried harder to focus the shield into existence and out as I swung my sword or stabbed with my dagger. For the most part, it was mostly effective. I had mentally composed the idea of being able to focus the shield into bulged sections instead of
just a skin held slightly away from my body or a big bubble. Trying to force the shield to change shape and use it to block then dropping and returning it in order to attack was at the moment beyond me.
Using my shield as more than just a bubble surrounding me or the thin skin, the two ‘default’ shapes as I thought of them, while also attacking was just beyond what I could focus on at the moment. It was as if I had a new set of arms and I was trying to battle using all four at once when I had only ever used two before. It worked, in a way, simply because I didn’t have to focus on defense as much and could now simply focus on holding the shield till I planned to attack which is when I could just focus on attack then return to focusing again on defense. It wasn’t perfect, but I finished eight Orcs in a row without a single injury, a new record for me.
At the end of the day I mentioned to Felvers that in a few months, with the help of my new shield if it continued to work as well as it did today, I would need to move on to a new dungeon since as it was he was just training me with weapons while Lendser would soon not need to heal. My agreement with the King called for power leveling, not training me. Soon this won’t count as power leveling, once I can clear the room myself and hold it then I’m just leveling myself.
###
King Melnus felt a fierce bit of joy, though his face didn’t change in the slightest. Unlike any King in the past he had brokered a deal with the Orcs of the south to respect the Kingdom’s southern border. More, he had even opened basic trade agreements for the worked leather and rope that the Orcs had been long known for. While the Orcs were traditionally a brainless and tribal lot, the recent rise of an Orc Lord was uniting the tribes. Unlike in every instance of the past, this Orc Lord wanted to trade with the humans, instead of mindlessly attack.
Rising from his plush velvet covered chair King Melnus slowly paced around his office, glancing at the different titles on his shelves. His eyes slowly slipping past them as he reviewed his worries. Strangely, since everything had started to go his way his pessimism began to rise.
