Growth Hero

by Brent Tyman

  My pajama bottoms did have some pockets, thankfully, so I absently stuffed the copper coins into one pocket.

  “Jeez! The sword!” I exclaimed, finally remembering that the beast man had also had a sword with him. I looked around and picked it up off the ground where it had fallen under a bush. I could see my own reflection in the steel and despite the beast man turning out to be quite sketchy, his sword seemed surprisingly well maintained.

  There wasn’t a hint of blood on it, just some dirt that clung to one side. The fact that I wouldn’t have to rely upon a stick, or my bare fists again, in the next troublesome encounter that this world threw my way was reassuring.

  I could see my own reflection in the steel, and everything appeared as I expected. My short brown hair was a tad ruffled in places and my hazel eyes looked tired to me but in all honestly, I was relieved.

  Usually, I would try to make my avatars in RPG’s look like myself and would spend an exorbitant amount of time doing so. It helped get me more immersed into the games themselves. The fact that I didn’t look drastically different confirmed that there likely wasn’t any character creation in this world and the Goddess had simply plopped me into it.

  I lowered my sword and trained my eyes on the beast man.

  While I really didn’t want to do it, I rolled the body onto its side and unclipped the man’s belt and the scabbard that hung from it. It was an oddly intricate belt buckle that I adjusted to my own waist before I slipped the sword into its sheath.

  I gave the beast man’s corpse one more level look before turning away and continued along the path I had been going. I had survived my first encounter relatively unscathed and had gotten decent fairly decent loot from it.

  Now that I had a weapon, my chances of survival had markedly improved from a few minutes ago. Although I had absolutely no clue how to use a sword, other than to try poking someone with it and hope it did some damage.

  Now that I thought about it, maybe my fists were the best option after all. They certainly had been with that beast man.

  If there was one thing I would change about the RPG like interface that this world had, it would be to ensure new characters received some kind of tutorial—and if that wasn’t in the budget, then at least make the skills more intuitive!

  That surely wasn’t too much to ask, was it?

  I shook my head to myself and tried not to think about it. I had a sword, a pack and some coin, which was far better than what I had a few minutes ago.

  After some time, another blob appeared in the distance. This time, however, it was coming at me a whole lot faster than before. I became instantly wary when the blurry shape shifted into two distinct ones. I didn’t think my odds in a one versus two battle were very good.

  Unless these guys also went down with one punch, too.

  The reason they were approaching me so fast, was that instead of running figures, the shapes became horses with riders atop them.

  If they happened to be in any kind of LARP competition, these riders would win first place. The armor they wore was intricate, practically glowed in the sunlight, and looked quite authentic. Heck, even the horses were armored with some barding. Talk about overkill.

  The riders turned out to be two men when they got close enough for me to see their features. One appeared to be human, from what I saw, which I was relieved to see. At least I had confirmation the Goddess hadn’t dropped me onto some completely alien world.

  The other guy had fur on his face and the same type of bone structure as the beast man I had fought. I figured he was likely of the same race. Both riders slowed their horses to a walk as they got closer to me, but stayed near the center of the trail.

  I stuck to the grass to avoid all the mud.

  “You there!” the human said. “Have you seen a vagrant race down this path?”

  “A vagrant?” I asked, realizing I could understand him just fine. Although, come to think of it, I’d been able to make out what the beast man had said to me earlier too, even if it wasn’t pleasant.

  “A bandit renegade, last seen headed down this path,” the beast man rider said, a bit of a growl to his words. “Beastkin, like me, but fallen to a life of crime.”

  As the two riders looked at me for answers, it clicked in my head that they were probably chasing after the beast man who had attacked me.

  “Yeah, he’s further down that way, and…” I pointed back the way I had come and was about to explain how he’d attacked me, when both riders bolted down the path.

  I jumped back with a hiss. Their horses kicked up a lot of mud that splattered all around me. Fortunately, most of it missed me. I turned around to watch them speed off and wished they could hear the few choice words I muttered.

  “They didn’t even let me explain. Must have been in a heck of a hurry.”

  While it was tempting to chase after them, since they were the only proof of civilization I had seen thus far—well, living proof, that is—I doubted I could catch up to them.

  I’d hate to have to backtrack. I guess I’d just follow this trail until I got to wherever they’d come from.

  Man, this place really needed a tutorial…

  3

  It was only when the sun was slowly dipping down into the horizon, did I finally see more activity on the path. Though it wasn’t like I could see much of the sun through the thick canopy, but darkness was closing in fast now.

  What looked to be a carriage took up the entirety of the path before me, surrounded by soldiers who looked to be from the same group as those riders. Their armor matched the heavy steel plate that I had seen earlier, and since these soldiers were at the same height as me, I spotted a crest on the breastplate that they all seemed to have.

  The crest looked like some sort of jacked up red minotaur. The beast stood in the center of the crest, its monstrous face twisted in a snarl as it faced forward, with a sunburst as the background.

  At least it was original.

  The armored soldiers in formation surrounding the carriage had additional soldiers on either side of the path, for some reason. Surely they would be more likely to get attacked from the side next to the sprawling forest?

  In any case, since I wanted to stop and ask questions, I halted in front of the soldiers. The only one without a helmet, a fairly grizzled looking man, broke formation to approach me.

  His eyes looked dangerous, but that wasn’t what bothered me. I was more worried about the crazy number of corpses sprawled behind the soldiers.

  Jeez…

  They had done an outstanding job of hiding it from view before, since their formation was fairly robust with no gaps in it, but now that I managed to get a glimpse and was looking at the ground, it gave me some serious pause.

  The corpses all looked exactly like that beast man who’d tried to attack me earlier—at least they all wore the same leather rags. Some appeared to be human though, at least several of the ones I could see with their faces facing upwards looked human to me, before the soldiers had ended them.

  A true massacre. I didn’t really want to know what had happened. Maybe speaking to these people wasn’t such a good idea after all.

  “Ho there,” the grizzled soldier called, directing my attention to him. “You alone there, traveler?”

  I blinked at the question. I thought it was pretty obvious I was alone, but maybe he was just trying to break the ice.

  “Uhh, yeah. Just trying to follow the path to…” I replied, but trailed off when I realized I didn’t actually know where I was going.

  Anywhere but here would probably work.

  “Headed to Tringall too, are you?” he inquired, and I nodded quickly. Tringall was probably the nearest town. Best to keep up appearances that I belonged here.

  “Name’s Doyle,” he said with a nod. “Bandits infest these parts, due to the area’s neutrality and all. As you can see, we were attacked on our way to the city,” he said, a bit less tense than he had been at the start of our conversation.

&n
bsp; So those really had been bandits…

  Judging from the number of bodies scattered here, I had to give these guys credit for taking down so many of them. Around me stood perhaps a group of twenty heavily armed soldiers, with upwards of fifty bandit corpses behind them.

  I was pretty sure that a one and done punch, like I had pulled earlier, wouldn’t cut it, certainly not against any of these troops. Although to be fair, it probably shouldn’t have worked the first time, either. Not with my miserable Strength stat of one.

  The stat scaling here was suspect, though. I’d have to learn what ‘normal’ was supposed to be and remain cautious, at least until I had done more research on it.

  “I got attacked on my way here as well,” I replied. “Some bandit took a swing at me the second he got close. Anyway, Tringall is that way, right?” I pointed the way they had come from and where I was headed. “I’ll just walk around you guys, if you don’t mind.”

  I’d decided my questions could wait until I got to Tringall. Talking to random citizens sounded much more appealing than speaking to this lot of soldiers. Even if this Doyle character seemed to be alright, so far.

  Just as I was about to step back beyond to the edge of the path to walk past these guys, Doyle raised his arm to stop me.

  “Whoa,” he said. “A bandit attacked you earlier? Did you see two riders on the way here?”

  There were a few grumbles from the men at this, mutterings that I wished I could hear. Unfortunately, thanks to their helmets, their voices sounded more like buzzing as they whispered to the soldiers beside them.

  “Oh yeah, they asked about the bandit too, and took off at a gallop back along the way I had come,” I said.

  “What did the bandit look like?” he wanted to know, almost a little too eagerly.

  “Well, he had a fur-covered face and sported an arrow wedged in his back. That was probably why I managed to survive his unprovoked attack,” I explained.

  I half wondered if these men planned to hunt down every single bandit who had attacked them earlier. Was that why Doyle was so interested in the beast man I had encountered? Seemed like a lot of effort for what looked to be professional soldiers.

  “And what happened to him? Were you able to apprehend him?”

  “Uhh,” I mumbled. “Apprehend is probably the wrong word, to be honest…”

  It wasn’t like these guys had ‘apprehended’ the bandits who had attacked them.

  “What happened?” Doyle asked, and I blinked.

  “Well… to cut right to the point, he attacked me and when I fought back, he landed on the arrow in his back, which proved to be fatal,” I replied as diplomatically as I could.

  I didn’t want to claim I had killed the guy outright, even if it had been self-defense. At this point, I couldn’t fathom what sort of strange laws these people had for this sort of stuff.

  The entire column of soldiers on my side of the path who were listening in let out a sigh of relief at the same time and whispered to each other quietly. Doyle gave me an appreciative look, which puzzled me to no end.

  “This is wondrous news. We thought all hope lost, but as long as we retrieve the book when Layman and Sorass return, she might yet live.”

  Honestly, this was at least the third time where I felt that I was missing a few key points about the strange events that had happened around me. First, there was that business with the Goddess and her getting swallowed whole by the black goop. Then, the beast man bandit had attacked me for no reason.

  Now, this guy was going on about a ‘book’ and some mysterious ‘she’. I asked myself if I even wanted to know who ‘she’ was, or if I would be better off simply walking on past, rather than getting myself mixed up in another strange situation.

  I’d had enough of strange situations today and just wanted to explore this world. That started with me getting to this city they claimed was close by.

  “Well, happy to help you guys out,” I said. “But I have to get moving and all.”

  “Of course, friend,” Doyle said, suddenly much more friendly now. “Once we have the book and my Lady is healed, we will be on our way to the city as well.”

  It looked like ‘she’ had become a Lady now.

  The fact that Doyle had been talking about a book in the possession of that beast man suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks. I realized I had the book they sought.

  Since they seemed friendly enough, it was probably best that I hand it back to them. It wasn’t like I could read it, and I might receive a quest that would yield experience points or something. God knows I needed them if I expected to survive with these crappy stats.

  “Speaking of books,” I said as I sifted through the leather bag I had taken from the bandit and pulled it out—fairly easy to find, really, since it was the only thing in the bag. Starting a fantasy adventure with just the clothes on my back was not what I had expected. It definitely wasn’t ideal either.

  “Is this the book you’re looking for?”

  Doyle’s eyes widened as he quickly scooped the book out of my hands and examined its cover meticulously. He was strangely careful not to open it.

  “It is, but…” His eyes became downcast the more he studied the book.

  “There’s no glow anymore,” he muttered. “The book has been used.”

  The surrounding soldiers suddenly became much more vocal.

  “That damn bandit!”

  “Why would he read it, if he was gonna sell it anyway?”

  “What happens to our Lady now?”

  Again, with this Lady?

  The more they talked about her, the more I wanted to learn what the fuss was all about. Part of me wanted to walk away and get to this damn city, but a bigger part was stubbornly curious about this whole affair and wanted to know more.

  I let out a sigh as that part won and looked to Doyle for answers, as he tried to quiet down his soldiers.

  “What do you mean, ‘the book has been used’?” I asked.

  Doyle gave me a long look, then seemed to shrug off any reservations he had about telling me what was going on.

  “This book contained a potent healing spell that was to be used on our Lady by the Clan’s most trusted, senior healer when we get back to the city. It’s the only healing spell we could acquire in the limited time we had. Now that it’s gone, it’s up to the Gods’ will whether or not my Lady will live.”

  So, their Lady needed some magical healing of sorts, and the book had the spell to do it? I still had yet to wrap my head around the idea that this world had magic, even if I couldn’t use any with my crappy stats.

  I hadn’t seen any magic thus far, so I wondered how it applied to this world. If it turned out magic was far more desirable than good old Strength and Speed, then I hoped I wouldn’t be penalized too much when I changed my growth stat to accommodate this fact.

  If their Lady was so ill that they needed this Dynamic Healing spell to help and were now relying on these Gods, then her prospects didn’t look good at all. Reliable wouldn’t be a word I would use to describe the Goddess I’d interacted with, at least.

  I debated with myself whether or not I should tell them that I had used the book, since it seemed they believed the beast man had taken the spell. Either they would be really pissed at me, in which case I would soon be dead with my one defense stat, or they would understand and give me a quest to heal their Lady.

  In my defense, nowhere was it written on the book’s cover that it would grant a one-time spell to the first person who opened it—at least, not in any language I could read.

  I blew out a deep breath and threw caution to the wind.

  If they got pissed at me, then maybe their armor would slow them down enough that I could get away through the forest. I was sure I could outrun the lot of them, and their horses shouldn’t be able to follow very far, due to the undergrowth.

  Guess I would learn whether or not honestly was the best policy in this fantasy world.

  “Yeah, about that,
” I said, raising an arm to absently rub the back of my neck. “After this bandit of yours went down, I went through his things and ended up opening the book myself. I didn’t know it would give me this spell you’re after.”

  The silence that followed my statement was almost deafening. I could feel my legs priming themselves to flee, of their own volition, anticipating a marathon to run away from these soldiers.

  Strangely, Doyle didn’t look the least bit angry.

  “You received the spell? Does this mean you’ll be able to heal our Lady?”

  “Uhh… I suppose I could give it a try?” I said, though my response was more of a question than a statement. I didn’t have a clue how to use magic but there was a first time for everything.

  Immediately, Doyle grabbed me by the arm and dragged me past his soldiers. It took a moment before I could match his fast pace and not just be dragged along, but when he was forced to sidestep around all the bandits’ corpses on the ground, I managed to catch up.

  And there was a heck of a lot of corpses. I wrinkled my nose at the sight.

  I opened my mouth to comment, but it seemed Doyle and the rest of his soldiers were past small talk. He led me up to the carriage they had been protecting all this time and knocked on its door.

  It opened to reveal a pretty blond woman, dressed in white robes. Her eyes were bloodshot, and she looked like she had been crying for the past month, if not year. Sadness radiated from her, almost tangibly.

  “Doyle, did you…?” the woman asked with a hint of resignation, but the man raised an armored hand to interrupt.

  “The book is worthless to us now, but this man may be able to help. He has the spell we need.”

  Just like how Doyle had dragged me here, now this woman practically fell out of the carriage seeking to pull me inside. I suppressed a complaint that it would be nice if somebody asked first—let alone said ‘please’—but these people seemed to have no regard for personal space.

  Once inside, I took a look around and noted that this carriage had enough gold trim on it to make any bandit salivate. No wonder the bandits had sent fifty odd men to loot it.