Ignoring Leesha, I brushed past her and upended the contents of the sack into my hand. A lone item fell out. It was a strange, stone-carved figure roughly the size of a softball. It looked an awful lot like Buddha — if Buddha were a fat minotaur. The bull’s head and horns along with a plump human torso were impossible to imagine as anything else. As I held the figurine up to the light, a prompt appeared.
Quest Updated: The Road Less Traveled
You have eliminated the Blue Hand Raiders, but the only clue to their alliance with the Eedari is this strange totem. Maybe Chief Ugola will be able to speak to the item’s significance?
Objective: Show the stone totem to Chief Ugola.
Leesha and I finished reading the update at the same time. I shrugged. “Better than nothing.”
“You’re taking this way too well,” she said.
Maybe I was. But as long as there was another quest, we had a fighting chance.
The sun was already peeking over the hills by the time we exited the cave. The fire had long since fizzled out. Had we really spent that much time poring over all that useless loot?
Leesha and I remained silent as we made our way back to our mounts. Lost in my thoughts, I almost jumped out of my skin when a universal game alert broke the quiet morning.
Ding! Dong! Ding! Dong!
Luckily, Frank didn’t seem to hear it — the ostrasaur never raised his head from the sagebrush he’d yanked roots and all from the ground. It didn’t take a genius to realize that only players could hear the sound.
“Hello again, dear sweet adventurers!” the familiar voice of the narrator from the opening sequence called out.
“Who’s he calling sweet?” Leesha said, sheathing her blades. When the alert notification rang, she’d been ready to slice and dice. She still looked like she wanted to cut a dude. After an all-nighter with hardly anything to show for our work, no one was in the mood for Mr. Chipper Narrator.
“I’m sure you’ve come a long way since last we spoke,” the voice continued, “and in that time, you’ve surely experienced incredible adventures.”
I thought back to chopping firewood and killing cave ghouls — not exactly glamorous work.
“Some of you have even been fortunate enough to stumble upon highly coveted tournament tokens — items that will give you access to a competition that may change your very lives.”
“Yeah, we know,” I couldn’t help but call out. “Get to the point!”
Realizing this might be a while, both Leesha and I mounted our steeds and got on our way back to the camp as the narrator continued.
“You’ve all been patiently waiting to learn more about the Champions of MythRune Tournament. As we draw nearer to the beginning of competition, more information will be revealed, starting now.
“Each token allows up to three members of the same party to enter the tournament. If your party includes more than three members, you will need to make a very difficult decision about who will be allowed to enter using your party’s token.”
As the narrator spoke, a cinematic window opened up in front of my vision, showing a large square city with massive fortifications and a coliseum-looking stadium at its center.
“This is the city of Mythgard. To be eligible to compete in the Tournament of Champions, you and your party members must be within the walls of the city by noon on the twentieth day of the game. Mythgard is now marked on every player’s map, regardless of your mapmaking capabilities. Each starting race’s spawn points were placed roughly the same distance from the city for fairness. More details on the format of the tournament are to follow. Until then, best of luck, adventurers! And congratulations to the following players who have already secured a token.”
The moving images disappeared, replaced with a long scrollable list of names.
“Holy crap!” Leesha yelled.
I glanced over and saw her swiping through what I assumed was the list of token holders.
“I recognize some of these names. I ripped a couple of these people off! And here I am wandering around with you when I could have already stolen a token…”
I laughed, earning a glare from Leesha. “Is it bad that makes me feel a little bit better about our situation?”
Before she could answer, the narrator cut back in.
“At this time, there have been exactly one hundred and three tokens claimed. The first ten thousand teams who enter Mythgard with their token before the time cutoff will be accepted into the tournament. This means that a token does not guarantee admission. For now, we wish you the best of luck in your continued search. Farewell!”
“You hear that, Z?” Leesha said. “Ten thousand teams. That means there’s at least that many tokens. We still have a chance.”
She was right. We weren’t out by a long shot. But how could we boost our chances of actually getting a token? Not only did we need to get our hands on one, we had to be one of the first ten thousand groups to get to Mythgard with it as well.
“We have fifteen days to make it happen,” I said. “Time to kick it into high gear.” I dug my heels into Frank’s sides, and the ostrasaur reluctantly picked up the pace to a rambling jog. I would find one of those tokens. One way or another.
26
My Friend the Witch Doctor
Chief Ugola stroked his chin as he examined the Buddha-like totem. Resting in the palm of the Urok chief’s hand, the fat jade minotaur appeared to be meditating.
“How long is this going to take?” Leesha whispered.
“Until he’s done, I guess,” I whispered back. I was just as anxious as she was. We were burning daylight.
“He’s been staring at that thing for like forty-five seconds. He’s a computer. Shouldn’t he, like, I dunno, know things instantly?”
“Maybe he’s programmed to stare for a minute.”
“Will it start over if we interrupt?”
“Don’t—” I reached in front of Leesha involuntarily.
“Well, what should we do, then?”
I crossed my arms. I didn’t want to interrupt Chief Ugola, but for all I knew, one of us needed to actually say something to him in order to push the quest along.
After a few more seconds, I grew impatient and decided there was no point in waiting any longer. I cleared my throat. “Chief —”
He held up his hand to silence me.
“Oh, so you can interrupt him?” Leesha whispered.
I just shook my head and continued looking at the chief, who held the totem less than an inch from his face as if hoping to glean the mysteries of the universe from the obese cow-man.
“You know what this is, do you not?” Ugola said, finally breaking the silence.
Leesha shot me a no duh look but was a bit more tactful in her actual response. “We do…not?”
“Should we?” I said.
“This is Skynord Frode,” Ugola said.
Neither Leesha nor I knew what to say to that.
“Sorry, was that Sigmund Freud?”
If Ugola had been programmed to know who Freud was, he chose to ignore Leesha’s bad joke. Meanwhile, realization started to dawn on me.
“You mean the Jotun god?” It was part of the mythology of the game in beta that I’d grown familiar with, but I wasn’t sure if any of that had carried over to this version.
“Correct,” Ugola said. “In spite of his peaceful look, he is known as a trickster deity. But that’s neither here nor there. In the past, the Uroks and the Jotuns have had a troubled history, and some of these…conflicts have revolved around the treatment of our respective gods.”
“I agree,” Leesha said. “Skynord Frode sucks, doesn’t he?”
“I have nothing but the utmost respect for him,” Ugola said, his tone flat. “But there is no circumstance in eighty-seven afterlives that the Jotuns would want this holy relic in our possession.”
“Oh,” I said. “So…is it a bad thing that we brought it to you?”
“It is good that we know it is in Urok
lands,” Ugola said. “In the past, other races have used holy relics like this to encourage war between the Urok and Jotun. If you hadn’t found it, I have a sneaking suspicion its theft would have been used to rekindle old hatreds. It’s clear that the Blue Hand Raiders have been doing much more than attacking caravans. They may have set out to incite a new war between us and the Jotun. Since you’ve eliminated the last of them, we may never know the extent of their intentions, but we can still right this wrong.”
Ugola pried his eyes away from the totem to look at us. “I need the two of you to do another favor, not only for me or the Horuks, but for the entire Urok race. You must return Skynord Frode’s totem to the Jotun tribe from whence it came. Return it and tell them how you came upon it.”
“And where is that?” I asked.
“That I do not know,” Ugola said. “While our races are on friendly terms with each other, we always meet in a neutral place. The Jotuns are exceptionally suspicious of our kind and do not divulge the location of their camps in the Ice Spears. Speak with Raza, our tribe witch. The shamans among both our people communicate more frequently than the rest of the tribe — he may be able to point you in the right direction.”
Quest Complete: The Road Less Traveled
You have eliminated the remaining Blue Hand Raiders and brought the strange totem to Chief Ugola.
Rewards:
- (2) Unassigned Attribute Orbs
- (1) Attack Attribute Orb
- +50 Esteem with the Horuk Tribe — you now have access to any Pursuit Trainers in the tribe.
- Letter of Introduction from Chief Ugola
Quest: Frosty Relations
Chief Ugola believes the theft of the totem is an indication that the Blue Hand Raiders were trying to instigate violence between the Urok and Jotun. He has tasked you with returning the stolen totem. Speak with the tribe’s witch doctor, who may be able to deduce which Jotun temple Skynord Frode’s totem was stolen from.
I tried not to drool at my justly earned dues. Post-beta, they’d handed out Attribute Orbs like hotcakes. And I was all too happy to gobble them up.
Obviously, the Attack Attribute Orb would go into Attack, but what would I do with the two Unassigned Orbs? After thinking it over for a few seconds, the answer was clear. I really had to invest heavily in my health. My success in MythRune depended on my ability to take a hit and keep on getting back up, and with defense shaping up, health was the next component. I cashed in all three orbs and was rewarded with a chime.
Level Up! Congratulations, you have acquired enough Attribute Points to reach level 4. You have received one Unassigned Skill Point that may be used in any Pursuit you have already unlocked.
Character Stats
Name: Zane
Title: None
Race: Urok, male
Level: 4
Total Attribute Points: 22
Attribute Points to next level: 3
Health: 6 (120/120 Hit Points)
Attack: 4
Defense: 6
Speed: 2
Agility: 1
Intelligence: 2
Luck: 1
A quick scan of my current unspent Skill Points revealed I’d have to wait before I could do anything in that area. And now that I had access to the Horuk Pursuit Trainers — whatever that did for me — I didn’t want to spend my hard-earned points willy-nilly.
“You know what a Pursuit Trainer is?” I asked Leesha.
She shrugged. “Beats me. I never heard of them in beta. Must be a way for us to help hone specific or special Skills in our Pursuit Spheres.”
“We’ll have to check it out,” I said, flicking away my menu. This new quest had all the makings of a token drop, and I didn’t want to waste a minute. I turned back to Chief Ugola, who’d been standing there patiently as Leesha and I allocated our orbs and points. “In the meantime, where can we find this Raza dude?”
“He…doesn’t generally conform to some of our ways here in the Horuk tribe,” Ugola said, pointing to the map on the table. “You will find him just to the northeast of camp. It’s…better for everyone if he keeps a little distance. He’s a bit odd.”
Odd seemed to be the right word. At least that was my initial thought as we rode up to Raza’s hut. For the most part, the Horuk tribe was fairly utilitarian with their homes. Their hide tents bore little in terms of flourishes, and colors were mainly restricted to what was derived from nature.
Raza’s hut bore no semblance to that philosophy. Made from sagebrush and hardened mud, the Horuk’s hut looked like a psychedelic beaver dam with its splattered purples, yellows, reds, and greens. I searched for a pattern but found no rhyme or reason to the gaudy abode.
This hut also featured what looked like a clay chimney —a dangerous addition to a structure made almost entirely from highly flammable material. In spite of the warm morning, a steady line of smoke curled out and up into the sky. The clock had just struck eleven a.m., prompting our twenty-one-hour rest mode warning, but Leesha and I wanted to advance the quest before nap time.
Now I was wondering if I wasn’t already dreaming.
Perhaps the strangest thing wasn’t what we saw, but what we heard. Within the hut’s confines I could make out a banging drum followed by an odd chanting better resembling a wail than anything remotely musical. This was highlighted by the fact that the drumming didn’t follow any semblance of a beat or pattern. It was as if a toddler sat inside, banging away with no purpose but to make noise.
“Excuse me,” I said, tapping on the door flap to be heard over the “music” emanating from inside. When the drumming didn’t stop, I called out again, this time a bit louder. “Excuse me!”
Still nothing.
“Exc—”
“IS ANYONE HOME?” Leesha’s scream scared the hell out of me, and I jumped before I realized what was happening. She gave me a grin and a wink as the drumming finally stopped.
“Come in, my fellow brethrenites!” a relaxed, surfer-like voice called from within the hut. “I hear the lovely nectar of the throats reaching mine ears from without.”
Ugola hadn’t quite prepared us for this. It sounded like Tommy Chong in Urok form.
“I’m not going in there,” Leesha said, folding her arms. “What in the hell is nectar of the throats?”
Before I could answer, the same carefree voice drifted out to us.
“Nothing to fear, my fair brethrenites. Nectar of the throats is the lovely voice that carries us through the universe and—”
After an awkward pause, we heard scrambling inside. The hut’s door flap opened, releasing a fire-marshal-code-breaking amount of smoke. The fat Horuk — Raza, I assumed — eyed me with a half-opened set of bloodshot eyes. As his voice had led me to believe, he also looked like Tommy Chong in Urok form, headband and all.
“Welcome to my not-so-humble abode, young brethrenites. How may my radness serve thee?”
“We were told you could — good Lord!” Leesha fanned the air in front of her nose. “Is that piss?”
“Yes!” Raza excitedly pointed at Leesha as if she’d found the cure for cancer. I also noted this Raza fellow appeared to be wearing a diaper. “Yes! Thank you! No one else seems to get it, but you…you get it. You and me, we’re two of a kind.”
“No, I think it’s still just you, bro,” Leesha said.
I decided to bite, only to see if I could make things more embarrassing for Leesha. “What’s with the piss situation, dude?”
“Oh, that!” Raza seemed to think we’d changed the subject at some point but was more than pleased to return to the urine discussion. “Yes…for the longest time, I was trying to figure out the best way to take advantage of this glorious concoction I’d put together. Water worked well enough, but it was missing a sort of zip to it.” He pointed to Leesha. “She knows what I’m talking about.”
Leesha quickly looked at me and shook her head. She was no more in the loop than I was.
“Just add in a little bit of woolly
rhino urine, and you get exactly the what I’m looking for. Nature is…” Raza looked off into the distance. “It’s just beautiful.”
I really wanted to know how this guy managed to get woolly rhino urine without being trampled to a pulp, but he was getting sidetracked enough on his own. And I didn’t want to know what “the what” he was looking for was.
“Those…smaller minds in the tribe just can’t appreciate it. Not just for its recreational purposes, but its medicinal purposes as well. To think of just how much good we can do as a tribe if everyone would partake of —”
“We need your help.”
Raza blinked at me like I’d suddenly changed languages on him. “What?”
“Bless his stoned little heart,” Leesha muttered, shaking her head.
“We spoke with Chief Ugola.” It was one of those times when I started speaking louder and slower, as if that would help anything. “He said you could help us find a certain Jotun tribe?”
“So you’re not interested in the healing properties of woolly rhino urine?”
“We never said we were!” Leesha yelled.
Raza looked like we’d just told him Christmas wasn’t coming that year. Hoping it would cheer him up, I produced the totem from my inventory and held it out.
“But we may have something that may interest you just as much.”
“May I?” Raza’s eyes widened and his lips parted in awe when he saw the little jade minotaur. He cupped the totem in his hands and turned it this way and that to examine every angle.
“Chief Ugola wants us to return it and said you could help us find who it belongs to,” I explained. “Can you help us?”
Raza sighed as if we’d just asked a super annoying or tedious favor from him. “Okay, but it won’t be easy. Observe, brethrenites.”
The Urok witch placed the figure on the ground and sat cross-legged in front of it, closing his eyes. For a heavier guy, he sure was flexible. He lifted his hands and waved them in front of the figure, performing a chant not unlike the one we’d stumbled in on earlier — only this time without the offbeat drums.
God Mode: A LitRPG Adventure (Mythrune Online Book 1) Page 18
