Rank: Competent. Level 8
Note: This spell was imprinted upon you in the realm between, as you reshaped your soul.
Bounce: (Modulated) A burst of energy used for blasting away objects.
Rank: Expert. Level 2.
Skills:
Hand To Hand: The use of the body as a weapon. Though you may use hand weapons in battle your main weapon is your body.
Martial Arts Rank: Skilled. Level 4.
Claws Rank: Skilled. Level 6.
I unsummoned the book and told Larry I was ready. He nodded eagerly and started off on his own.
I left Larry to his part of the plan, hoping I wasn't being tricked. That would be just my luck.
Or worse, I go to rescue her and find my princess in another castle. Or the worstest, end up the one being princessed and needing to be rescued.
It was getting dark again too, but that would help with my sneaking.
“Call me Valentine,” I whispered to myself as I slunk through the bushes. "I shall slip unnoticed through the darkness, like a dark, unnoticed, slippy thing. Who steals quotes and corrupts them for his own nefariously, nefarious purposes. Muh ha ha…”
I heard a rustle of leaves and a snap of a twig beside me. I froze, knowing my whole “action plan of nonviolence by sneaking” just imploded.
I turned and at first I couldn't see anything through the bushes. Then I looked up and up, and up. And found myself looking at the biggest, widest, most massive Orc I had seen so far.
I opened my mouth to say something, I had no idea what, but then I noticed that his eyes were closed. His head was tilted back and for a split second I wondered if he was praying.
Then he let out a relieved “aaah” and I heard the trickle of water.
I learned then that I had the surprising ability to run rather well on all fours. You learn all sorts of things about yourself when absolute terror suffuses your entire being.
I resolved that in the future, when I told this story, this would be yet another thing to leave out. I eventually stopped shivering with the horror of what almost happened and continued toward the camp.
Cautiously circling around to the back. I saw Orcs, not just male and female but old and young as well.
I saw grey haired elders walking with simple canes, children running and playing with each other while holding wooden swords and shields.
I saw a young orc carrying a clay pot and following a female I presumed to be his mother. It was a scene out of some historical documentary. Except for the fact that all the people there were of various shades of grayish green.
The Orc child stumbled and fumbled with the pot, almost but not quite catching it. It slipped from his hands and hit the ground with a crack.
The female Orc whirled around and glared down at the pot. She let out a string of snarled sounds and started towards the boy with a hand raised.
I instinctively moved forward, to do what I don't know, but stopped when she put her hand on the top of the boys head. She used it to move the boys head around, not sharply or roughly but firmly. She pointed his head down to the broken pot, then back up to her.
All the while she continued in that same complicated snarl of sounds that I assumed was the Orcish language.
I watched her gently shake the boys head in a gesture that seemed as affectionate as it was irritated before picking up the cracked pot and handing it back to the boy.
She's pointed back the way they came and he ran off with it, causing her to yell something that made him slow to a walk.
It occurred to me then that maybe the Orcs weren't as unintelligent as people assumed. Judging from the sheer amount of words the female had just used, their language certainly seemed able to convey complicated concepts.
Either that or she just said several variations of "You dropped the pot. Be more careful. Pots don't grow on trees. Take pot back."
Now that I thought about it, maybe the structure of their mouths would make it difficult to speak other languages. I know I would have had some trouble speaking English, or whatever they call it here, if I had to contend with three inch tusks.
Just getting used to fangs had been difficult and I already spoke the language.
Then, a call went through the Orc camp and everyone started talking and moving in the same direction. I waited until the last elder hobbled out of sight and went in the opposite direction.
Still wary of being discovered, I stayed low as I moved through the brush and learned that I was surprisingly agile on my feet and knuckles. (Side note: Not on the punching knuckles but the knuckles on the back of the fingers between the first and second knuckles from fingertips. That's now Savage Kin are designed, according to the flavor text from Midians Lore.)
I kept moving forward as quietly as possible, cringing at every crackle of leaves and snap of wood. Then I saw it, a sturdy looking cage of wood being guarded by a single Orc with a spear.
A ball of fear boiled in my belly before lifting as a lump in my throat. I crept closer and closer, trying to make out the figure in the cage.
My heart sped up, the beat of it like the slow build at the beginning of a rock song before the explosion of screaming guitars. I knew it had to be her. But what if it wasn't? What if I'd been too late?
Then I heard it. And I grinned.
A high pitched, girlish voice rose up. It was a voice you expected to be dripping with innocence rather than the enraged vindictiveness currently being spat out. A voice I had once described as, “Being blindfolded and beaten to death with a pink silk pillow stuffed with feathers, chocolate chip cookies and broken glass while screaming "What's happening! WHAT IS HAPPENING?!”.
I loved that voice.
Buoyant joy burst from my heart and rushed to my head so fast, so hard, that the top of my skull popped off and sprayed gooey rainbows and sparkling glitter everywhere.
Okay, not really but it felt like that.
“... no idea the mythic level of pain you are in for! When I get out of this cage. Oh, and I will get out! When I escape or when someone gets brave enough to pull me out! I'm coming for you! I am going to rip your soul out of your mouth! From your still living and permanently crippled body and eat it! Then! I am going to excrete it, and shove it right back up inside you from the opposite direction!”
By this point I was having difficulty choking back my laughter. I persevered however, and got close enough to see the deeply disturbed look the Orc kept casting back over his shoulder.
I was just in time to see his expression turn to "You know what? I think it's break time. I'm going to see what all the fuss is about on the other side of the camp. The far, far side of camp."
Or maybe he was just going to ask for permission to execute the prisoner. Whatever. The point is, he started walking away, glancing back over his shoulder at the cage’s occupant as he did.
“Hey! Don't walk away from me!” He walked faster. "Come back here! I'm not done! I want you to know exactly what's gonna happen when I come for you!”
She was too busy thinking up anatomically unlikely threats to notice me creep up to the cage, cast ghost fire on my hand and cut through the leather strips holding it together.
“... defenestrate you! No windows?! I’ll find one! I’ll find the smallest and I’ll make you fit! You...”
When that was done, I dismissed the spell, took a deep breath and said one word.
"Malice?"
“...with rusty… scissors?” She trailed off mid rant and went still.
I felt… frozen. I couldn’t breath. Couldn’t move. Or even think. The wind was still, not a bird sang or a bug buzzed. The abrupt silence was deafening. Terrifying.
Then she looked over her shoulder and a small, quavering, questioning word broke the silence.
"Ruin?"
To be continued.
And don’t worry. Malice has a tendency to be just an itty bitty bit excessively violent. Which will probably mean less talking and more screams of rage and howls of joyous carnag
e as they level and loot their way towards their goals. Maybe.
Honestly? It's less like I’m writing a story and more like this is all actually happening in an alternate dimension and I’m just channelling the story through my imagination. My characters just seem to do whatever they want. If I try to turn the story in a direction it doesn’t want to go I lose all control and it crashes into a wall. Splattering gibberish and inconsistencies everywhere.
This is my first book and I wrote the vast majority of it on my phone while at work (But only when I had nothing else to do!) with most editing done while stuck in traffic (Don’t do this!) and even more editing on the computer at home (A phones autocorrect is a double edged sword.).
So what I’m getting at is: When you write a review for this book, be gentle! And more importantly, be constructive! And most importantly, WRITE A REVIEW!
It helps incredibly. Any feedback is useful. Even if its not gentle or even constructive, I can learn something from your personal opinion.
Alright, that's it. Its 1:42 a.m. and I have to get up for work at 5:00 a.m.
Thanks for reading.
Gamer Terms In the Book That May Or May Not Be Completely Accurate.
Achievement (Title): In recognition of doing stuff like "Collected 100 things you don't actually need!" or "Killed the unkillable world destroying thing and saved the world!" or "Swam in the ocean and ended up slaughtered by fish!" or "Learned how to fish without dying!".
AFK: Means "Away From Keyboard" or “still at keyboard but hands are occupied” or “you see your ex-girlfriend in game and want to pretend you don't see her because SHE BROKE MY HEART! … Or, um, some variation of that...
Aggro (Hate): Achieving aggro or pulling aggro is; Traditionally: Outside aggro range you don't exist. Inside aggro range YOU MUST DIE!!! Short for Aggravation or aggression. Non Traditionally: Making someone mad.
Avatar: (Toon) (Character) (Char) The player's representation in the game world. Or a God incarnating into a physical form. Or a sock puppet someone made to role play with and resolve emotional issues. Okay, maybe not that last one..
Buff: To buff up something with something or to add some sort of positive effect to something.
Example 1: Enhanced speed so you can steal your neighbors garden flowers because you forgot your girlfriends birthday.
Example 2: To strengthen the armor of a codpiece before breaking up with your soon to be ex girlfriend on her birthday.
Build: How you designed your Character. Are you a stamina based Ballerina Dance Fighter or a magic based Breakdance Martial Artist?
Carebear: There is a Carebear spectrum. Going from "I don't do PVP, only PVE because (insert various reasons here) to the "I'm not here for the violence and no, I don't care about leveling."
Note: Beware the Carebear stare, when you call a Carebear a Carebear. Their stare, it stings.
Caster: Someone who casts magic. Duh.
Class: The multitudes of living, fighting, dying and creating, all shoved into labeled boxes for the sake of convenience.
Crafting: Like arts and crafts. But useful.
Crowd Control: Controlling others, whether they be in a crowd or not with magic (usually). So you can keep them from immediately doing bad things to you and (hopefully) so you can do bad things to them later.
DPS: Damage. Per. Second. Once used as a metric to determine offensive power. It is now usually used to describe those who just want to kill things as quickly and as effectively as possible. Up close and personal.
Debuff: To weaken something with something or to add some sort of negative effect to something.
Example 1: Enhanced speed so you can chase down your ex boyfriend who dumped you on your birthday.
Example 2: To weaken the armor of a codpiece before equating your emotional pain with his soon to be physical pain.
Dungeon: Why are Dungeons called dungeons? Dungeons are not dungeons! They prisons. How did that translate into “Places with monsters you kill and stuffed with treasure hidden in inexplicable places (including inside the monsters)”?
Emotes: Other than AFK Idle Emotes, I'm not sure why we still have these. I mean, in the olden days before immersive VR they had a use. They were basically like emoticons, but now?
Escort Quest: The most hated of all quest types. Why are they so hated? Because they suck. They suck soooo muuuuch. The escorted are always either too slow, too fragile, unable to avoid danger and think they are tougher than they are then die! And! there is usually some sort of time limit for some freakin reason!
Experience Points: (XP) This is what it's all about. This is what makes us do all things no sane or decent people would ever do. We fight terrifying horrific monsters, we grind away hours and hours of our life, we sacrifice our morals, turn on our friends, do escort quests. The list goes on. All to get XP. All to get to that next level.
Fast Travel: Whether it be a magic portal, a fade to black wagon ride, flying hippogryphs or deliberately dying to respawn somewhere else. It’s all done in the name of getting somewhere fast. Because. Laziness.
FPS: First-Person Shooter. A game where you shoot people, not-people and sorta-people. In first person.
Flavor Text: Used to add depth, context or background to a person, place or thing. Usually this has little or no effect on game mechanics. Though, there are always exceptions.
Game Mechanics: The mechanics of how the game operates. Do I really need to break it down further? Hopefully not.
Grinding: Grinding. Sucks. Unless it's fun. Then it's fun until it sucks. That's why you need to alternate what you grind.
Hmm, there's an inappropriate joke in there somewhere...
Group Up: See party.
Hate: I already explained this. If you forgot, go back to Aggro.
Hit Points: How many times can you get hit until you die? Depends on how many hit points each hit takes.
Kiting: Letting something or someone chase you without making them dead or you getting dead. Usually used to separate mobs for easier kills.
Loot: The good stuff left over after you murder something.
Loot Ninja: Someone who steals all that good stuff left over after you murder something.
Mana: A built in limit to how much magic you can do at a time because of game balance. No limit would mean things would be either awesome or awesomely sucky depending on which end of the fireball you were on.
Mob: (Pronounced like the gangster mob) Short for Mobile Unit. Yes, I know, but it made sense at the time. Probably.
One Shoting: One. Shot. Then. Dead. Can be done with any weapon (swords, axes, pick axes, knives, clubs, baseball bats, cricket bats, chairs, spells, hammers, nunchucks, punches, kicks, knees, elbows, claws, horns, hooves, fangs, bows, crossbows, guns, bazookas, cars, tanks, pianos, the kitchen sink).
You get the idea.
OOM: Out. Of. Mana. Which means your temporarily useless unless you want to be slightly less useless and try your hand at getting your hands bloody. Or you can just wait to regenerate. You get one guess as to which way Casters usually go. You’ll only need one.
OP: OVER! POWERED!
NPC: Non-player Character. Once in common use, it is now considered insulting and stands for Non-person Character. You shouldn’t call someone a non person just because they aren’t human or intelligent or self aware… or… alive or… real…
You know what? Nevermind.
Noob: A newb.
Party: See Group Up.
Permadeath: Permanently dead. Do not pass go (You can’t, you’re dead) do not collect two hundred dollars (You can’t take it with you) do not haunt your ex (Have some decency! Why would you even think to do that!).
Quest: An adventure! Deeds done for glory! For truth! For justice! For loot! Yes, good sir! I shall… oh… ten rats? … really… okay. Sure. Why not.
Race: Each of the major divisions of personkind, having distinct physical characteristics. (Yes. I totally copied and pasted that from the dictionary then replaced “human” with
“person”.)
Race Change: I’m not explaining this. I have faith that you can figure it out yourself.
Respawn: Its alllliiiiiivee… sort of. Well, its eating, moving and trying to kill things anyway.
Revive (Resurrection): See respawning. It's pretty much the exact same thing except for all the differences in the details.
Screenshot: Take a picture. It will last longer.
Spawn: Its alllliiiiiivee… oh. Wait, I said that already.
Stats: Attributes that… Okay I’m having a hard time explaining this. I’m just going to copy, past and… Stats: Short for statistics, is a discipline that concerns the collection, organization, displaying, analysis, interpretation and presentation of data.
Okay, that's not right. Whatever. Stats are Strength, Speed, Agility, Dexterity, Endurance, Vitality, Health, Intelligence, Wisdom, Willpower, Charisma, Attractiveness, Luck, Alertness, Perception, Finesse, Flexibility and any others people have come up with.
Stat Points: Points. You put into stats. To raise stats.
Tank: Also known as “Mobile Meat Shield”.
Trash Mob: A once fearsome creature full of goodies that is now an annoying nuisance filled with trash.
Zerging: Overwhelming cannon fodder that makes you wish for an actual cannon.
Other Terms. Feel Free to Skip.
Overseers: Controllers of the Grey Hell.
Punishers: To the rest of the world they were called “Orderlies” or “Guards” or “Councilors” or “Temporarily Guardians” but to us, they were always Punishers.
They do not help, did not teach, did not give comfort or safety. They punished you with their words, with direct and indirect actions.
Subadults (Subs): Those who stopped ageing during puberty.
The Grey Hell: Facilities created by Gray Hall Enterprises. Designed to break down, control and use Subadults as labor.
The Outside: The world outside the Grey Hell.
Runaways: Runaways would rather run the risks inherent in freedom than be constrained with safety.
Throwaways: Rejected and unwanted. Throwaways don't have the choice Runways do but regardless, they are in the same situation.
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