Tim let out a low groan as he sat up, bringing his hands up to his head. It felt as if he was on the tail end of a hangover but he didn't remember drinking anything. Thinking about it, his eyes shot open. looking around surrounded by trees.
He faced forward again, letting out a sigh, dropping his sight to his legs and noticed he wasn't looking at his regular extended gut. Hell he wasn't in his khakis he was in more like a worn leather pair of pants, the shirt was gray with three holes on the sides of the v cut with a string through it.
Bringing his attention back to his gut he pressed a hand on it, it was pretty firm. But that escaped him for a second as he realized his hand, his arm, had a green tint to it. Looking at his other arm, it was the same. “Did I get a bad body? Am I sick? Is my mind, soul or whatever not taking well to the new body?” Tim asked himself till he froze hearing a voice behind him.
“Tim. Tim, you need to breathe.” Tim looked over to where it was coming from and saw a tall skinny dark elf in similar clothes as himself. His hand was out in one of those situations where you are walking to a frightened animal.
“Simon?” Tim asked deep down hoping it was him.
“Yeah it’s me.” He put down his hands. “I woke up a bit ago near you, I was a bit shell shocked too at the body but I tried opening the character page like Glean told us and it all became clear, I assumed you was the body next to me, and tried shaking you awake and you snored at me so I thought I would take a quick look around.”
“So when he said new bodies, he really meant it.” Tim said, eyeing his hairy green tinted arms.
“Yeah. I am what this world calls a moon elf, a sub race of dark elf, apparently some decided to leave the underground together and make a living on the surface, like the famous one in those books back on earth, but since more than one did it they was able to continue to breed and evolve, I don't have complete dark vision but I have night vision I guess so I can stand the sun as well. It's kinda cool. My stats changed around as well, so I suggest you take a look at your page.” Simon said, walking over taking off his bag and starting to dig through it a bit.
Tim watched him as he moved, looked around again taking everything in, the fresh air, tall trees, and soft grass underneath him, he could hear birds off in the distance. He was really in a new world, no more day in and day out regular routine, no more stupid jobs working for someone else building their dreams. He also had a new body, one he instantly vowed not to take for granted as he did his last. Deep down this had always been something he wanted.
After all that running through his mind, he looked back at Simon, before taking a deep breath and willing his status page into his view.
Name: Cromus
Age:22
Level: 1
Exp: 0/400
Health: 120/120
Mana: 100/100
Stamina: 100/100
Stats
Strength: 12
Dexterity: 10
Constitution: 12
Intelligence: 10
Wisdom: 12
Charisma: 8
Race: Half-Orc: A race of an orc and human mix. Being a descendant of a violent race, and possibly the spawn of another being taken against their will, other races shy away from you, and it is harder for you to break the stigma, you will receive a negative two percent to any charisma checks with other races. Though there is not only bad news with this race, you gain a plus two percent in strength and constitution, thanks to your orc heritage you are more sturdy than most other races, able to face terrors others wouldn't dare, and able to stomach things that would sicken most. You also have night vision, in areas of low light you are able to see normally.
Path: Gaia's Warrior: A warrior for the planet, friend to the forest and beasts alike, this path allows you to cast spells of nature and use equipment modified from the earth, as well as allows you to improve your own capabilities from stats of animals, and have animals assist you later in levels. Gain bonuses when interacting with animals.
Abilities
Animal Empathy: From a easy glance you are able to determine an animal's demeanor to you, as well as having a better understanding of how to improve the demeanor.
Animal Link: Once a day you are able to choose an animal who is neutral with you and create a telepathic link with the chosen animal for twenty four hours or until you sever the link.
Universal Translate: No worrying about language barrier, anything spoken, or read will be translated to a language you understand.
Spells
Heal (inferior): You are able to spend Ten mana to heal you or a willing target for ten hit points.
Nature's Assistant: You can spend four mana to help a plant grow a stage in its growth or remove any harmful effect it may have. The bigger the growth or larger effect consumes more mana.
Animal Affinity: You are able to spend fifty mana to manifest one animal body part on your body for ten minutes.
Skills
Identify (inferior): The basic ability that most intelligent being, can be used to identify items, creatures, and other humanoids.
After taking all that in, he willed the character information away. “It seems my stats dropped to be worse.” Tim said not very excited from what he saw, yes his dexterity had not changed but all his other stats seem to have taken a loss.
“I honestly thought the same thing but then I started to think, what if this is because these bodies are new, and we just received the base stats and our race stats? Thanks to mine I got a bonus to my intelligence, and charisma, but I took a hit to my constitution. When back home I had a fourteen con, here I have a eight. So it dropped horribly for me.” Simon replied standing back up from his bag.
“Yeah I guess so.'' Seeing Simon have a bag made Tim look around and noticed one laying on the ground near where he woke up, overlooking it in his first few minutes of panic.
“Well I guess I can't complain too much, I had a feeling something like this would happen. Most things have a balance, so class and race played a part.” Simon continued as Tim picked up his bag.
Tim looked up from his bag to Simon. “That's right you got to hear what I chose but I never got to know what you chose.”
He smiled wide. “Well like you I received three options.” He held up his fingers as he said them.
Putting two fingers down only holding up one finger said. “One. Rogue, which is nice but I like to have more options than just sneaking around and getting the drop on someone, which would be nice but if we practice and train these bodies we can sneak just fine.”
Holding up a second finger. “Two. Cleric, which would be nice but I didn't know if that meant I answered to an all mighty or not, and not knowing that, I did not want to be controlled by another like a puppet.”
Holding up his last finger and his smile couldn't get any bigger. “Third, and my choice.” He paused for added effect. “Clockwork summoner.”
Tim looked at him, his excitement not landing as Simon had hoped. “Clockwork summoner?” Tim asked, confused. “I know what a summoner is, but Clockworks?”
“I was confused at first as well because the description was a bit vague. Though I still gambled on it, and oh man did it pay off.” He said smiling like a kid in a candy store. “Gained all the abilities of a summoner I believe as well as clockwork crafter. Tim, at one point I should be able to build up guns, grappling hooks, flame throwers, and other things of the like!”
“The idea of guns in a world like this could be overpowered.” Tim said thinking about it out loud.
“That's not all. My spells, all seem to be support, or a summoning of some kind. Summon familiar, Summon clockwork defender, haste, enhance strength, clocked and minor heal. This is great, I was hoping for a way to improve you, or summon help since it's just the two of us and it paid off!” He said excitedly. Like a guy at the casino who just bet everything on red and won.
Tim started digging through his bag again, it was what you would expect in an adventure bag, rope, canteen pulling the stopper and sniffing then taking a drink of fresh water, putting the the stopper back on he continued to look in the bag. three clear containers with a red liquid in them, three more clear containers with blue liquid, and three more with green, three torches, some food that looked like beef jerky and crackers, and laying down where his bag was, are a longbow with some arrows, and a scimitar.
“Hey what all did you get in your bag?” Tim asked over to Simon.
Simon listed off pretty much identical items as his except “I got a crossbow with bolts.”
“Huh, I wonder why you were given a crossbow instead of just a longbow?” Tim asked, Simon just kind of shrugged, without a verbal response coming Tim started to look around again, just seeing woods. “We will have to find more of a civilization.” He pointed out.
Simon following suit at the comment looked around, “Maybe, but also being in the middle of nowhere could be a nice little boon, maybe no one has explored here, we find some secrets or a rare race to befriend and get a big jump in our progression!”
Tim chuckled “Maybe. If somehow you learn guns, if it isn’t common that would be game breaking in itself. Not to mention those spells do sound useful.” Tim stood up looking around the area, at the trees and small open glade they were in. Tim started thinking to himself maybe this was a good time to test our spells when Simon stood up.
“Well I think we should test out our spells, before we do anything, at least find out how they work, so we can plan and react in combat.” he said.
Well mother fucker beat me too it Tim thought to himself. “Aye, Aye, Captain.” Tim said, giving Simon a solute.
Simon narrowed his eyes then shook his head. “You know you can be such an ass.”
Dropping his hand. “Yes, I was going to say the same thing about the spells but you beat me to it.”
“You know you could have said, Hey I was just thinking the same thing, or great minds think alike Simon, let's get to it! You catch more flies with honey.” He said.
“True but I am at a negative Charisma, you the people person, and I am the crazy animal person you found in the woods.” Tim said, beaming a smile at him.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“Yeah, yeah. Ok jungle man, well lets see you go first cause most of my spells are support spells.” Simon said.
“Right.” Tim considered his spells, there wasn't anything to heal. So two of his spells were a no go. Animal Affinity it is. Reading back over the spell Tim can turn a part of his body into a body part of another creature. “Well let's start simple I guess.”
Tim concentrated on his right arm and willed it to turn into a grizzly bear’s front leg. Tim felt something leave his body, his hand blurred under a light brown glow, around it was a grizzly bear's forearm. It was fuzzy to see through but Tim could see his hand and arm inside it.
Reaching up with his left hand he felt the fur, and on his right hand he felt the fur move. He stretched his fingers, the paw stretched, curling his fingers and the paw mimicked his movement, making a tight fist the paw closed as well. looking at Simon he smiled. Tim's eyes wide with excitement.
“Holy shit, this is so unreal.” Tim said his gaze going back to his arm, then holding it out to Simon.
Simon reached out to the bear arm, feeling the fur as if he was touching the real thing, “Yeah definitely, you are really here moment.” Simon said as he pulled his hand back.
Tim walked over to the nearest tree, and swiped leaving five deep claw marks in the tree. Tim was in awe at how powerful these claws were but something took him back a bit from the awesomeness as he felt sad for what he just did to the tree. While eyeing the tree his other spell came to mind. Nature's Assistant.
He reached out his left hand placing his palm on the scars he just made, closing his eyes. Willing the spell to life. Again he felt the energy drain from himself, he opened his eyes to see his hand glowing green and it spreading over the claw marks. He started to believe that feeling of something leaving his body is his mana. Less than a minute later the tree was restored. He opened up his character info and saw his mana was at forty out of one hundred. Healing the tree cost him ten mana instead of four, so it took four and then sapped six more to finish the job. Not too bad he thought. A female voice popped back up in his head.
“For healing damage to nature, your mana regeneration is going to double for twenty minutes. regenerating at twenty percent per minute instead of the regular ten percent per minute. Thank you warrior for healing the damaged nature.”
He was taken back a second because he healed Gaia, she granted him a small boon, “I guess an incentive for my class choice?” He thought as he turned back to Simon, noticing he was watching him intensely.
“So that was two of your spells? What did it leave you at, mana wise?” He asked as Tim walked back to him.
“Forty out of a hundred, but because I healed the damage I did I was granted a twenty percent mana regeneration per minute, while the base is ten percent. So that is nice, I should have my mana back up in five minutes.” Tim said happily.
“So if you have a base mana of a hundred, what is your intelligence modifier?” Simon asked Tim could see the wheels turning.
“Ten.” Tim replied.
“Alright if I am correct, every point in intelligence ups your mana by ten points. Cause I have twelve intelligence giving me a one hundred and twenty mana pool.” Simon said
It clicked. “You are right cause my constitution is at twelve and I have a health pool of a hundred and twenty. But that also sucks.” Tim said. “That means I am going to have to try and build up four stats and we don't know how hard that will be in this world.” Tim’s shoulders slumping a bit as his excitement faded a bit.
“True but instead of looking at it like that, try to think of the good. If it isn't too hard then we can increase all our stats a bit if we want too. I mean hell I got an eight constitution leaving me with eighty hp. But if I can fix that up you won’t have to be in the front lines without me.” Simon said with a smile.
That hit Tim a bit differently than Simon intended. as he started frowning a bit harder.
“Tim!” Simon said sternly. “ I know that look you are already planning on babying me. Well, not going to happen. Plus I got awesome spells able to help keep myself out of combat as well as help you, so don't you dare act like an almighty hero and me the damsel you hear me! I am not some weakling you have to protect, watch!”
He started to concentrate then there was a tear in the air, opening up in a circle showing Tim something very different from the landscape around them, Gears, clocks, cogs, clicking and clacking, but standing closest to the portal was a no faced human shaped clockwork person. It stepped out of the tear with a clang.
The portal vanished and standing eye to eye with Tim was a bronze no face, metal clockwork golem. None of his gears showed from his front covered in more solid material, but on his sides under his arms they were visible. Its left arm was a shield and its right a blade. This thing will not be assisting by picking anything up though it definitely looked like it could take a beating.
“Well how long will this thing last and what did it cost you?” Tim asked
“It will last as long as it isn't defeated or dismissed. It cost me thirty mana. A lot of mana, but I think he will help out in a bind.” Simon said happily.
That happiness fled as his eyes caught onto something, Tim heard a screech that pierced both their ears, forcing them to close their eyes from the pain both physically shaking. When tim was able to correct himself he turned locking eyes with a giant monstrosity of a creature!
Its head resembled that of a predatory bird from earth, but it walked on all four legs. Its eyes were red, with white pupils, its face was covered in white feathers, except above both eyes was black lines that ran down to a large sharp black beak. It opened its mouth for another screech forcing Tim to cover his ears, but he saw with its beak opened wide the thing had razor sharp teeth! Behind its white feather face they started to turn red. Running back to its shoulders, and down its chest tipping near its underbelly, where the feathers stopped, dark brown fur began, its build reminding him of a grizzly bear but twice the size. Tim being six foot one, and standing up to the creature’s shoulders. It took a step closer to them and Tim’s eyes looked at its front feet; there were not paws, but talons with some very large claws. Its back feet were those of bear paws. On its front legs, running down the back side of them were large black feathers.
While Tim was looking at the creature words appeared in his vision.
Bearded vulture bear
Temperament: Hatred
Ways to improve temperament: None at this time.
That same female voice echoed in his head. “NONE AT THIS TIME!?” Tim thought back to it.
“Uh Tim? Your Gaia's warrior, go on play nice with it.” Simon said
“That is not an option it seems.” He said “We got to fight it, damn thing hates us.” Looking around Tim saw his scimitar a couple feet away. “Send your nice new friend at it, grab your crossbow and I’ll grab my scimitar.”
Without another word Simon's defender ran forward. The Vulture bear replied with its own charge, Tim dove for his scimitar rolling to his feet, holding it in his left hand, reaching inside himself he cast Animal Affinity, turning his right arm into the grizzly bear arm again.
Simon, not trying to be fancy, ran over picking up his crossbow turning to aim at the fearsome creature.
Tim started running for the Vulture Bear as it collided with the defender, its shield caught the swiping attack with its left talon, forcing the defender to take several steps to its left. But putting the creatures back to Tim.
Running in he slashed at its knee hoping to give it movement issues, but the blade barely nicked the thing. Its fur and hide far thicker than he anticipated. It didn't even flinch at the attack, growling Tim lashed out to claw the backside of its right knee with his bear claws. He smiled as he felt them break skin and bring forth blood. Quickly he followed up with the scimitar aiming to cut in one of the slices he just dug in with his claws, making it a bit deeper. the leg moved causing him to hit just below the mark.
The Vulture bear screeched in pain whipping around faster than Tim thought the thing could do. Its full body swinging at him with its right talon, slapping under his left arm. He felt the claws dig into his skin, a burning sensation erupted through his nerves as skins and meat were sliced like butter, claws stopping as they hit bone, the force of the blow flung Tim ten feet away. Dropping to the ground he thought he heard something snap. Through all the pain, he couldn’t hear himself scream, all his senses just focused on the pain. Till words appeared in his vision.
You have been savaged!!!
You have taken severe damage, Bearded Vulture Bears talons have done seventy damage to you.
You are bleeding!!!
The attack that just landed on you, has applied the bleed effect on you, you will continue to bleed losing three hit points every second for ten seconds or until you are healed.
Tim’s eyes went wide and he did the math as quickly as his brain would allow. While in pain I dropped from one hundred and twenty hp to fifty in one hit, and now if he doesn't heal he will be taking thirty more points of damage.
“This would be a lot easier to multitask if I had bars or something to see.” he thought to himself
As soon as he thought about it, in the bottom right of his vision three bars appeared with numbers in them. Health under half showing 50/120, Mana just ticked up to 55/100, Stamina 75/100. A big red drop next to it with x3 on it blinking at him, assuming it stood for his bleeding condition. He placed his hand on his wound, groaning but forcing himself to suck in air, as he willed minor heal to work. He felt his mana leave him dropping from 55 to 45/100, his health going up from 50 to 60/100 as well as seeing the blood drop fade away. He cast it again. Leaving him 35 mana left but he was at a more comfortable 70hp. Pain fading away as he heard his name.
“TIM! Can you hear me? TIM!” Simon yelled as he let loose another bolt.
Tim heard the Vulture bear screech again, and he heard a sound of metal hitting ground, he could only assume was the defender getting knocked to the ground. He got up, slowly turning around to see the defender on the ground but hearing more crashing.
Taking in the sight, it would appear the defender was beaten up pretty badly, it is now in two, cut in half its legs lay useless away from its top, It appeared to tim that when the Vulture bear attacked the defender as a last ditch effort it stabbed its sword arm threw the things front left leg.
The Vulture bear was snapping its huge black beak at the now limp defender, but only pulling away small pieces of the thing, while every time it took a step it stepped on the defender's torso. Slowly but surely starting to flatten it. This thing had to weigh close to seven hundred pounds. Tim saw that it also had three crossbow bolts in its shoulder but one in an eye socket. Tim let a weak but devilish smile start to show on his face.
You have activated your hidden racial trait.
Boiling blood: Thanks to your Orc ancestors you have a hidden beastial rage within you, which improves your stamina, and strength for a small duration.
He began breathing faster and felt his entire body start to heat up, he could not help but let out a war cry at this creature that caused him so much pain, and threatened not only his life, but Simon’s as well.
“I AM GOING TO MAKE KFC OUT OF YOUR ASS!” He screamed as he ran at this monstrosity of a creature. He felt more power rush into him, as an emblem appeared in his vision next to his status bars. It was an arm flexing with x2 on it.
He realized as he was running at this thing yelling at it was not the best strategy. It turned to him and began to swipe at him with the leg with the defender stuck on it, but another emblem appeared in his vision, this one of a man running with three lines behind it. As soon as it appeared the creature's movements seemed to slow as if it was moving through water, ducking the attack by dropping down to his knees sliding under past it but with the claws racked at the spot where the defender was stuck cutting deep.
The Vulture Bear landed on the leg and it buckled letting out a screech. Surprisingly it got up starting to push itself up on its hind legs, and with it so slow and Tim’s blood pumping he ran in, it was just starting to leave the ground when he was under its neck.
Tim slashed out with his bear claws, then again with the scimitar, this time it scored deep. With seeing that and his confidence growing Tim struck once, twice, three times, four times! Five times! SIX TIMES! Before the beast stood fully upright.
As it reached its peak height on its hind legs, the emblem of the running man, flexing arm with x2 in it, vanished and a man on his hands and knees appeared in red. Tim lost all his strength and energy. His stamina showed 1/100.
His eyes went wide, legs buckled and was suddenly covered in sweat, struggling to catch his breath, all the while looking up in horror at this gigantic monster towering over him, he felt as small as a mouse.
The Vulture bear's neck extended, it gave it another foot in height easily. Tim’s mind started racing “I just got here to this planet and had my first battle and it was all going to end right here.” As his fear for his life grew he watched as the creature's neck started to show red lines start to appear on its neck, growing thicker.
Blood erupted from the wounds, to rain over Tim, it went to do another intimidating screech but only a gargle as it choked on its own blood before falling backwards in front of him.
“TIM! TIM!” Simon yelled running over to him, dropping down to his knees next to Tim. “Come on brother, are you good?” He asked, looking Tim over.
Simon is having a hard time discerning where the creature's blood ended and Tim’s began.
With a quiet voice and still trying to catch his breath. “Ye....Yeah. I'm. Just ti. Tired.” taking in a few more breaths before collapsing.