Standing in the entryway, well floating really, was what appeared to be a ghost of some kind. This wasn’t one of those ghost hunter TV show ghosts with vague signs of things moving in the dark while running around with poor quality cameras. This was a full glory, spectral white, creature floating half a foot off the floor. It looked like a human woman, but any features were hard to tell with it being partly translucent.
Can’t tell hair color when the whole thing looks a pale white color, Arthur thought to himself.
He looked at it, and the box he expected popped up.
Name: Specter of Delilah
Level: 5
Type: Spirit
Rarity: Uncommon
HP: ???/???
MP: ???/???
Stamina: ???/???
Strength: ?
Agility: ?
Intellect: ?
Wisdom: ?
Endurance: ?
Charisma: ?
Luck: ?
Experience: N/A
Skills
Combat Skills:
Sonic Wail: ? (???/???)
Soul Swipe: ? (???/???)
Well damn, Arthur thought. As usual, there wasn’t much information, but what he saw concerned him. This one had the full range of characteristics and also had MP, which meant it might have command of some type of magic. It was also listed as a spirit type, and he hadn’t encountered one of those yet. The lack of information was rather annoying. If he knew a bit more about where its weaknesses may lie, it could help him. It was at that moment he smiled because he had remembered his new skill.
Arthur focused on the spirit and activated his Scan ability. The result he got back was better.
Name: Specter of Delilah
Level: 5
Type: Spirit
Rarity: Uncommon
HP: 140/140
MP: 100/100
Stamina: 60/60
Strength: 6
Agility: 3
Intellect: 7
Wisdom: 5
Endurance: 3
Charisma: 1
Luck: 1
Experience: N/A
Skills
Combat Skills:
Sonic Wail: ? (???/???)
Soul Swipe: ? (???/???)
He was sure the more he used the skill, the more information he could get from it. It might even be able to show hidden things about people or creatures in the future. All of that aside, though, it did give him a bit more to go on. The amount of HP this monster had was a little higher than he wanted to deal with, but he could make it happen. The trick would be damaging it. Arthur had a suspicion this thing was going to be similar to most RPG style games he had seen before. Ghosts usually couldn’t be damaged by standard weapons and items. He was hoping his new sword would be able to destroy it.
As much as he didn’t want to deal with a ghost, he figured it was time to make his move. He slowly opened the door and started creeping toward the spirit. He didn’t make it more than three steps before the ghost turned and looked directly at him. The woman’s eyes glowed a bright blue with an appearance that looked like they were flames licking upward on her face.
“Oh shit,” Arthur mumbled under his breath.
The specter shrieked at him and then loudly said, “How dare you enter my house without permission. You would dare disturb my son and me in our own house!”.
That statement set him back a bit. If he could take this ghost’s meaning directly, then that meant the murdered child upstairs is the son of this woman. That led to a whole host of questions that he didn’t have the time to answer.
“I will forcibly remove your corpse from this house after I kill you.” The ghost proclaimed.
The apparition darted in his direction, and Arthur quickly dropped his bow. The weapon would be useless in this fight and would only end up tangling him up when he tried to dodge. He pulled his new sword up just in time to block the creatures swing. The skeletal hand bounced back from the flat of the blade, not touching him, but the impact was slightly jarring. The speed of the shade was allowing it to knock Arthur off balance. He took a huge step to his right and brought the sword back between them again. For the next swing, he was better braced, and it didn’t move him or knock him off balance.
The big problem quickly became apparent to Arthur. This spirit could attack him fast enough that he couldn’t get a swing in or risk opening himself up. He had hoped the creature’s low agility would be his key to killing it, but it appeared that the spirit, being incorporeal and having no real resistance to air or gravitational forces, made it able to retain speed with lower agility.
He took five more blows in rapid succession and focused on his health in the same way he did in the fight with the boar. A small box quickly popped up to give him the information.
HP: 145/150
Mana: 100/100
Stamina 115/150
He immediately noticed his health had fallen a bit but figured that had to do with the blow that knocked him off balance. The stamina drain did surprise him, though. He could only imagine that blocking the attacks was draining his stamina. That meant he couldn’t just wait and do nothing. He doubted this creature was going to get tired, so he needed to make a move. After considering the situation for a moment, he decided to change tactics.
Arthur decided he needed to knock the ghost off balance while maintaining his guard, and he could only think of one effective way to do it. He had read about the technique many times being a fan of fantasy novels but never had a chance to try it in real life. What he needed to do was parry the monster. The idea of parrying was pretty simple-sounding, but most people didn’t understand the mechanics behind it. It required the person to catch the edge of the blade at just the right angle to redirect the force. On top of that, the person parrying needed to apply a small amount of power immediately following the attack to push them into the off-balance state while maintaining this angle.
Every time he had read books, they always just glanced over the details of the maneuver and never really stressed the difficulty of doing it correctly. Sure, you could effortlessly block the attack with an angled blade to glance the strike, but if you didn’t successfully apply force to knock them off their swing a little, then you didn’t correctly accomplish a full parry.
With this thought in mind, Arthur decided to try it on the next swing. He saw the strike coming on his left and held the blade in a downward angle across his body. He had the hilt in his right hand slightly above shoulder level, and the blade angled down toward his left hip. The strike hit, and the sword collapsed back toward him, causing the edge of the blade to inflict a small cut on his left arm. The impact had knocked the blade backward, and he couldn’t slide the force effectively.
Luckily the damage it caused was minimal, and he still able to block the blow. He decided he would have to brace the blade with his left hand on the flat during the creature’s next swing. He wanted to wait until the spirit swung with the right again. He didn’t trust his ability to switch his sword to the other hand in the middle of a fight. When the spirit made her move, he was able to catch the attack on the edge of the sword and gave the blade a slight twist and pushed the hand down and across, causing it to slide farther than the spirit wished. This allowed him the chance to take a solid swing right at the creature’s chest. The blade came around in an arc and connected directly with the side of the ribcage.
Arthur wanted to jump and holler in triumph at his success. That feeling lasted all of about half a second when he realized it didn’t appear to damage the monster at all. He used Scan at that moment to see what he had accomplished.
Name: Specter of Delilah
Level: 5
Type: Spirit
Rarity: Uncommon
HP: 130/140
MP: 100/100
Stamina: 60/60
Strength: 6
Agility: 3
Intellect: 7
Wisdom: 5
Endurance: 3
Charisma: 1
<
br /> Luck: 1
Experience: N/A
Skills
Combat Skills:
Sonic Wail: ? (???/???)
Soul Swipe: ? (???/???)
Well, that felt like a complete waste of effort. There was no way he would be able to last long enough to kill it with so little health being taken away. He would run out of stamina before then. Arthur was quickly approaching a state of panic. There was no way he would be able to wear this thing down in time. His thoughts had drawn his attention away from the fight temporarily, and the creature landed a hard blow across his left shoulder, and Arthur fell to the ground. His bag had swung with the impact, and he ended up dropping it on the ground. He quickly scrambled back to his feet and got his blade back up to guard. This constant blocking was never going to end the fight in any way other than his defeat.
Arthur needed to move around a bit more to avoid having to block as often. He took off in a dash to his left, trying to gain some distance from the creature. When he had reached the wall in that direction, he turned to face the spirit. It was quickly approaching him and not far behind. Arthur grinned and decided now was a good time to change things up a bit. He dashed at the spirit and quickly dove to its left. As Arthur passed by, he extended his sword, and it slashed across the shoulder of the creature but yet again appeared to do almost no damage. Arthur wasn’t sure what else he could do. Looking toward his bag, he saw the small jeweled dagger that was used to kill the child. Only now, the knife glowed with some unseen power. Could this be his ticket to freedom? Did the blade itself want revenge for the wrong it was forced to commit? He couldn’t dwell on it at the moment, but he had a strange feeling that he needed to get that dagger quick.
He decided to try another parry as he had before, but this time he needed to use a little more force. It should give him the time he needed to get the dagger. He readied himself for the attack that was coming, and when the spirit connected with his blade, he pushed with much more force and sent the ghost backward a bit. Oddly it almost looked like the ghost had stumbled, although, with its floating, he wasn’t sure how that could happen.
Arthur quickly dashed to the bag and grasped the knife by the hilt, picking it up. It was indeed glowing as he thought it had been. The sight of the dagger in his hand caused the spirit to screech in a fury.
“How dare you disturb my precious boy! I only did what I had to do to protect him. I couldn’t take the beatings his father inflicted on us both, and I had to save him from them. I will make you pay for disturbing him in his sleep.” The ghost said. The fire in its eyes shifted from a deep blue to a dull orange, and Arthur knew things just went from bad to worse.
He had to end this quickly but needed an opening to use the dagger. It would require him to get closer, but that would be hard to do without making himself a large target. A parry was possible but would be hard to do with timing and the knife itself. Arthur decided to put his faith in speed and the blade. Instead of trying to parry, he decided to wait for the ghost to swing with its left hand this time.
When the ghost committed to the swing, Arthur swung backhand with his sword straight for the arm and at the same time, stepped forward and plunged the dagger directly into the chest of the specter. The creature froze instantly and looked at Arthur in shock. White cracks began to form and spread from the blade, like spider webs. A glowing white light shone from the cracks as they spread to cover the entire body.
“I had to do it to save him. I had to do it to save him. He was my little boy. It was my job to save him from the pain. He is no longer in any pain.” The ghost kept mumbling as the cracks spread. The creature finally looked to Arthur, and to his shock, it appeared to smile at him with a look of relief before promptly bursting into tiny fragments of translucent light. Arthur was also surprised to see a small chain fall to the ground that had a key attached to it. Another quiet chime followed.
Chapter 8
Gifts From An Admirer
Arthur looked at the key that had fallen and saw a box pop up.
Item:
Delilah’s Key
Durability: 35/40
Rarity: Uncommon
Quality: Well Crafted
Weight: 0.2 kg
Traits: This key will open Delilah’s Treasure.
Arthur looked it over carefully but didn’t see anything that might give him a hint of where this treasure might be. He didn’t remember seeing anything else in the house that he hadn’t been able to open.
Shortly after that thought, he had a notification appear.
Justice for the Slain I
Requirements: Level 5
Rewards: 800 experience
Description: You have found the skeleton of a murdered child in the abandoned manor. Find someone that can provide details about this murder to help find the culprit.
You have successfully fulfilled the required objectives. Do you wish to complete this quest now? Yes/No
He selected yes, and immediately after another notification came up.
Justice for the Slain II
Requirements: Level 6
Rewards: 400 experience
Description: Delilah’s ghost has been laid to rest but what would drive a woman to murder her own children? Find someone who can provide information for this quest.
Do you wish to accept this quest? Yes/No
Another yes selection, and he decided he had been in this house long enough and wanted out. He put the necklace over his head that held the key and gathered up his bow and bag. The jeweled dagger had exploded with the specter so he couldn’t recover any of it.
He walked to the front door and proceeded back outside. Luckily for him, the sun was still up. It was an immense relief to feel the sun on his face after the rather gloomy manor house. He saw nothing moving in the grass and assumed all the rats were genuinely dealt with. He started walking in the direction of the village and stopped. Looking back over his shoulder, he remembered the garden. When he first saw it, he thought it would be an excellent opportunity to check things out since there appeared to be some plants growing wild. With the sad state of food in the village, it would be a boon for him to find anything.
He decided the short delay would be worth it and walked to the small fenced-off area. He walked through a hole in one area of the fence and into the central part of the garden. Tall grasses had invaded much of the garden, but he did see many plants growing a variety of things. He bent down near one of the plants near him and was sure he recognized the item growing on it. He pulled one of the green vegetables off of the small bush and was pleased he had indeed recognized it.
Item:
Jalapeño
Durability: 20/20
Rarity: Common
Weight: 0.1 kg
Traits: This small vegetable appears spicy.
Arthur heard another small chime that he ignored for now. He was going to need a thorough bit of introspection on his way back to the village.
These jalapeños would give a spicy flavor to anything that was cooked with it. Arthur searched around the immediate area and ended up finding forty jalapeños. From here, he wandered a little farther back into the garden. The knee-high grass made it difficult to spot the hidden vegetable plants buried within. He kept walking by small weeds spaced all over the place, but they didn’t grow nearly as tall. After he walked by a handful of them, he stopped and looked at one more closely.
Once he got down lower and studied the plant, he thought he recognized it. If it was what he thought it was, then he had never grown them himself because the soil where he lived was rather hard. Root type vegetables couldn’t flourish very well in harder soil. He reached down near the base of the plant and pulled carefully. Out of the ground popped a long orange vegetable that he was very familiar with. To his delight, they had been what he suspected. To think he had almost passed over these beauties.
Item:
Carrot
Durability: 20/20
Rarity: Common
Weight: 0
.3 kg
Traits: This orange root can be prepared multiple ways or eaten raw.
After some careful searching for their small leafy stems, he was able to find thirty carrots that got dumped into his bag. Luckily the bag was a rather large affair, but if he kept piling much more in here, it would get a little too heavy to comfortably carry.
From here, he decided to make his way to the last section in the back of the garden. There was a small building in the rear that he assumed had held the gardening tools at one point. Arthur walked toward the shed and stopped when he noticed one final grouping of plants he recognized. This one was a large, green, and leafy one, but unlike the jalapeño plants, this one had nothing growing on it. Mainly because this was another root plant and not only that it was his absolute favorite. He dashed over to the first plant and slowly started pulling it out of the ground. Once he had the main stem out, a few of his prizes fell from the roots.
Item:
Dravincia Page 8
