The Mayor of Noobtown

by Ryan Rimmel

  As the canine moved to bite again, I swung my staff at his furry body. This managed to only knock him back a pace and further anger him. He snarled and got ready to lunge again but I held my staff at the ready. As he lunged, I began to swing the staff. As, I did so, I could feel my energy flowing into the strike, empowering it somehow. As my Stamina bar drained more than normal, the staff smashed into the wolf. With an audible crunch, the wolf’s spine shattered.

  The wolf thudded to the ground, unmoving. I exhaled and slumped to the ground. Shart said nothing, which was good. If necessary, I had planned on using him as a shield, regardless of his hit points.

  I noticed a pop up in the corner of my vision which I quickly selected.

  Unarmored Defense: 10 SP/100 SP Amateur -> defensive stance, you can expend Stamina while defending to decrease change to be hit and reduce damage.

  Wondering what that exactly meant, I got back to my feet and moved around a bit. At first, nothing seemed to happen. Yet, when I visualized an attacking enemy in front of me, I was able to move backwards with much greater alacrity. I dodged around a bit more and found that I could easily jump in some ways that were nearly physically impossible. However, every time I dodged, my Stamina bar decreased slightly.

  Once I’d gotten the hang of this new skill, I had Shart find me another wolf. It didn’t take long, as the woods were thick with them. Brimming with my newfound self-confidence, a brisk 5 minute walk brought me to my next target.

  This next wolf was about the same size as the last one. Since I was more or less aware of where it was, I did my best to sneak up on it. I wasn’t successful; when I got close enough, the wolf looked up from whatever he was digging. She spun around and snarled at me before charging.

  Focusing my Stamina, I got ready to dodge. However, I noticed that the wolf seemed to slow down as she closed in. Not tremendously, but a useful amount. The wolf totally missed me. She growled and twisted around before lunging again, and again I easily dodged her. I did that a third time, before I started noticing that the world was getting a bit darker. I focused on my Stamina bar and realized that it was getting dangerous low.

  Well, leave it to me to forget that. My wife often told me that I’d forget my head if it wasn’t attached. I had forgotten to see how much dodging drained my Stamina. I didn’t have enough for another dodge, so instead, I swung my staff at the wolf. I scored a weak blow against her as she dodged backwards. As I attacked normally, I realized my Stamina bar dropped even further, just not nearly as much. However, even as I waited a few moments for the wolf to get ready to attack again, my Stamina bar increased by one whole point. Looks like a recovered a point every 8 seconds or so. If I could hold out, my full bar would be recovered in a few minutes.

  Hopefully the wolf would wait.

  The wolf lunged again. I stepped to the side gingerly; I carefully succeeded in not using any Stamina and still managed to avoid the snapping jawed maniac. I smashed her on the way past as well, leaving the wolf battered and bloodied. However, that had expended a few more points of my precious Stamina and the world was starting to become a bit dark. I had gone from feeling normal to seriously winded in a matter of a few moments.

  When I realized I had enough Stamina for one more power strike, I rushed forward, bringing the staff crashing down on the wolf’s shoulders. They snapped, my staff snapped, and I collapsed to the earth, unable to move.

  Winning.

  After about 8 seconds, I had recovered sufficiently to lie there uncomfortably. About a minute and a half later, most of the exhaustion left me and I was able to roll onto my back and sit up.

  “What just happened?” I asked.

  “Oh, you ran out your Stamina bar,” replied Shart., “If you get to zero Stamina you collapse. Try not to do that.”

  “Thanks,” I said. Asshole.

  After several more minutes passed, I felt sufficiently re-energized and stood, my precious loincloth flapping in the breeze. Stumbling over to the wolf’s now permanently abandoned hole, I recognized a small object that did not appear to be a rock. I dug around it a bit more until I found a small orb attached to something. A few more seconds of digging revealed it to be the pommel of a smallish weapon.

  Grasping the hilt of the weapon, I drew it from the earth.

  “Da da da DAAAAA,” I said triumphantly, holding the item above my head for a moment.

  “Don’t do that,” stated Shart.

  You have found Dagger, item class common, durability 22/35, damage 2-5, bonus effects bleeding: Requires Puncture Skill and Savage Wound: Requires Wounding skill.

  Going through my skills sheet Simple Weapons had a new category

  Small Blade: 1/80 Unskilled.

  Looking further, I could see the Puncture Skill under Small Blades, but it was greyed out. Focusing harder upon it, I could tell that it had a level requirement, which I could ignore, and a skill requirement of Small Blades Amateur. I knew my Unbound trait could bypass level restrictions, but I still had to have at least Amateur rank to engage the sub skills.

  Well, that was easy enough, I’ll just go and kill me some more wolves.

  “Hey Shart,” I grinned. The demon said nothing, so I continued, “why does this have durability and the staffs didn’t?”

  “You found the sticks; they are a junk item and have a default durability of 5. You probably have it filtered so not everything you pick up will give you a status update,” chuckled the demon, “Cup of water, durability 4 of 5, cleanliness poor.”

  “Ah,” I considered. That would get annoying really quickly. I guess mundane items would be blocked. Otherwise, you’d just see pop ups everywhere. Curious, I dug into the menu until I found the setting for blocking junk status updates and flicked it off. So many numbers flooded my vision from sticks and rocks that I had difficulty seeing anything else. I reactivated the junk filter and my vision cleared again.

  After I had recovered my sight a moment, I walked over to the wolf, “I’m going to skin the wolf now that I have a knife.”

  “What’s your skinning skill?” asked Shart.

  “Untrained.”

  “I’ll be over there,” gestured the demon, as he walked over to a nearby tree and collapsed again.

  Twenty minutes later, I walked over to where Shart sat, fanning himself with a leaf.

  “Wow, that went as well as I expected,” he stated, “How did you get fur in your teeth and do we need to bury that?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  Chapter 6: Outskirts of the Village

  Name: Jim

  Hit Points: 30/45

  Stamina: 40

  Mana: 20

  Class: Warrior 1 2132/3000

  Strength: Above Average

  Dexterity: Average

  Endurance: Above Average

  Willpower: Average

  Spirit: Average

  Charisma: Average

  Combat Skills:

  Demon Lore (2001 SP) amateur

  Unarmored 15 SP/100 SP Amateur

  Dodge 5 SP Unskilled

  Mitigate 1 SP Unskilled

  Light Armor (100SP) amateur

  Medium Armor (150SP) amateur

  Shields (100 SP) amateur

  Martial Weapons (10 SP) amateur

  Simple Weapons (71 SP) amateur

  Staff (60 SP) Rank 1

  Powerful Blow

  Dagger (1sp) Rank 0

  Non-Combat Skills:

  Hiking (9 sp) unskilled

  Stealth (14 sp) unskilled

  Skinning (1sp) unskilled

  Cooking (4sp) unskilled

  Perception (6 sp) unskilled

  After a very long bath, I spent some time finding a hidden spot and leaving Shart awake as a sentinel. Not that he really slept, per se. He kind of just rested a bit, with a really foul look on his face. Kind of like a constipated baby monkey. Finally, I managed to rest for the night.

  Upon waking the next day, I noticed a prompt. This informed me that my Stealth skill ha
d improved. That was good news and I resolved to sneak up on something and kill it today.

  Casual slaughter of woodland creatures had never been my thing, but when I was getting scored on it, I found the entire concept fascinating.

  So, wearing my loincloth (of which one should not ask the origin) and holding my dagger in one hand and replacement stick number 4 in the other, I began to travel towards the village again. The village was closer and the road was nearby. I wagered that if I showed up with nothing more than what I had now, I’d get a very cold reception. If I could skin a wolf or two with my new dagger, I would be able to sell it for a bit of silver. Then I could buy things, like a better loin cloth.

  With that in mind and a few more hit points restored, I prodded Shart. “You better yet?”

  “You can tell by looking at me that I’m not,” he replied.

  “Wanna go kill more wolves,” I asked?

  “You seriously do not like comfortable beds,” he replied, “I found you one.”

  With that, we were off again. The next wolf was just off the road ahead. We quietly stalked it for well over two skill points, errrr miles, until we got much closer. The trees nearby had thinned out somewhat, making it less of a dense virgin forest and more like a navigable backyard woods. With less underbrush, I was hoping to get closer and sneak attack the wolf.

  I began creeping through the woods, carefully, like a creeping thing. Apparently, I was still untrained in Metaphor skill. My hunting record was getting about 10 feet away before the creature would become aware of my presence. This time, I had confidence. It oozed from me. If this was due to me being at more than half health, or the fact that I’d gotten the best of 4 wolves so far, was anyone's guess.

  My target was resting by an entrance to a cave. It was a man-sized hole into the ground, with several trees nearby masking its presence. I’d have totally missed it without Shart pointing me to the wolf. There wasn’t as much room to maneuver as I’d like, but if I could get the drop on the wolf the fight promised to be over quickly.

  “There aren’t any wolves in that cave?” I checked with Shart.

  “No,” replied Shart sourly.

  Creeping closer, I came in from behind the wolf and downwind. I was moving painfully slowly, but I got into position to pounce on the wolf who still lie there. At this distance I could see the gentle rise and fall of his chest. I could also see a strange pattern on his fur that I didn’t recognize. This wolf was larger than I expected, but still not as large as the first wolf.

  Then, I pounced, leaping through the air in a triumphant arc, dagger first. My blade pierced his back, driving deep into what I hoped were the vital organs. The wolf’s body jerked; the wound was instantly fatal but not silent, as it made the most wrenching yelp as it died.

  Several things happened all at once. I noticed a prompt in the corner of my vision, but instead of a skill notice it showed another golden coin. There was also the sound of feet in the grass behind me. I turned just in time to see what could only be described as a goblin charging me with a club.

  The goblin closed the distance before I had a chance to react and struck me across the chest right as I brought my dagger free. The impact was far out of proportion to the size of the creature; I was physically lifted off my feet and thrown back into a nearby tree. The strike did 10 points of damage, and my Stamina dropped by 6 as I slipped down the trunk to the ground.

  It took the goblin a moment to recover. He was about the size of a 10 year old child but built like a grown man. His body was all muscle and his teeth were all sharp points. He was also screaming at me incoherently.

  Now that I was back on balance, I rushed the goblin. Had it been two human sized opponents, his weapon would have given him a reach advantage. My longer arms were an asset, putting us on more equal footing and I managed to dodge his second strike while I slashed at him. I came out uninjured, but he had a bloody gash to his chest to show for his troubles.

  Screaming, the goblin stumbled back. His eyes went wild, looking first at me and then his open, gaping wound. He grabbed at it, slumping to the ground as his stomach fell out of the cavity. He cried at me hoarsely for a moment, then died.

  I watched the little creature there for a moment. “Well that didn’t feel very heroic.”

  “What, did you expect him to fight to the last hit point?” stated Shart, “he was a feral goblin. You attacked him. If it makes you feel any better, they like to pluck out the eyeballs of human children and eat them as a delicacy before they kill them. Goblins are selfish evil creatures. You won’t be finding any of them that are secretly good. That doesn’t mean they don’t care about anything, though. You killed his dog.”

  “Oh,” I exhaled loudly. The Goblin looked like a little green disgruntled child. I’d just killed him. I’d have to live with that.

  “Let's get to the village,” I said. I hesitated, and then walked into the small cave searchingly. I found a second functional dagger, a not inconsiderable amount of poorly tanned leather, and a small pouch of silver coins. Searching the goblin, I was surprised to find how much blood had poured from his wound. Then, I remembered the skill prompts.

  ● Small blades: Amateur, you do additional damage with small blades. You gain additional sneak attack damage with small blades.

  ○ Puncture: Your attacks with small blades bypass 2 points of armor per small blades rank, doubled during a sneak attack.

  ○ Rupture: Your attacks with small blades cause bleed, based on attack damage, 50% additional bleed over 12 seconds.

  ● Stealth: Amateur (100/2000) You are now able to sneak much more effectively, you make 25% less sound when traveling, if you attack a target that is caught unaware you can perform a sneak attack for additional damage.

  The sub skills didn’t seem to have multiple ranks. There might be a puncture 2 later on down the line, but I couldn’t yet see if it existed. Glancing at my combat log, I’d gained the level in stealth just prior to the attack with my dagger. Apparently, the extra damage was three times the normal value and I’d scored a critical hit, which had doubled the base damage. That had made the base damage 2-5 times 6 and I’d struck well. The attack had done a total of 30 points of damage and had ignored all of the wolf’s defense.

  The goblin didn’t have many hit points and I’d increased the rank in my small blades skill so my base damage had gone up to 3-6. I’d hit him for 4, again ignoring his lower defense, but he’d gained a bleed effect for an additional two. That wouldn’t have killed him if he was healthy, but looking down at him, I could see that he was not. Something had savaged him earlier, so my strike had just pushed him over the limit.

  Finally, I saw why the club hit had caused Stamina damage. I had a mitigate skill that allowed me to expend Stamina to reduce hit point damage. I had ended up spending 6 points to reduce the club’s damage by 2. If I hadn’t, I would have sustained a much worse injury.

  Then, I noticed the level prompt. I hadn’t realized that I was going to level from this, I had been several hundred experience points off. I had been figuring on needing to kill several more wolves to gain the next level.

  “I leveled up,” I stated to Shart.

  “Again? That’s quick,” replied the demon, peering at me questioningly.

  Level UP, Rogue 1

  You have selected the Rogue Class, please chose two stat buffs for yourself at first level!

  You have gained the skills light armor and stealth as well as all simple weapons, and you gain one rank in the sub skill Daggers.

  You already have skill with Simple Weapons, please choose another skill or one will be chosen for you.

  You already have skill with light armor, please choose another skill or one will be chosen for you.

  Your Hit point Total is increased by 10. Your Stamina is increased by 10.

  “Level of Rogue,” I stated.

  “No, you got basic bitch warrior,” Shart argued. “Not that rogue is much better but you don’t get two classes.”

&n
bsp; “Well, I’m looking at the prompt and it says I have a level of rogue,” I replied, “I need to assign these stat bumps.”

  Shart glared at me with a questioning expression, but I didn’t really feel like messing around. I just selected dexterity for both bumps, moving me from average to good. My Stamina increased by another fifteen points from that.

  My body changed instantly. With Strength, I got bigger and more muscular. With Endurance, I got leaner, for lack of a better word. The kind of form you see with marathon runners or Olympic swimmers. With Dexterity, I suddenly got a lot more defined and shorter, I think, if only slightly. My body seemed to respond much more rapidly than it did before and much more exactly how I wanted it to.

  Shart’s eyes went wide as the stat buff hit me. You just couldn’t hide that and after a moment I watched the few precious points of mana he had accumulated over the days vanish as he began mouthing words to a spell.

  “My spell says you are a level one rogue,” he stated, “but I KNOW you were a basic bitch warrior.”

  I brought up my character sheet.

  Name: Jim

  Class: Rogue Level 1

  “When did I stop being a warrior?” I asked.