Species Updated:
Human to Hell-Touched Human
Before Jaco could even fully process the newest notification, an almost overwhelming sensation overcame him. Even as the equipment for his new Class materialized out of thin air, he paid the items little heed. For a few moments, the entirety of his attention was forced elsewhere.
Jaco’s senses were expanded beyond his actual body. He felt a sense of oneness with the mold in the house’s basement. A kinship with the oldest and now rotting bits of wood underneath the floor. Brotherhood with the long-dead flowers in a pot by the front door. He was the decay, and the decay was him.
But from deeper inside his being, that sense of oneness with decay was rejected by waves of pure disgust. Love towards the rot, hate toward the rot. Both feelings were equally true and powerful as they clashed inside him. Like oil and water, they’d never be able to mix while within the shared space known as Jaco’s very soul.
What the Hell?! Jaco cursed as he was suddenly hit by a wave of pain. The young man’s arms began to shake as it felt like someone had taken a cheese grater to his hands. At the same time, the gauntlets of his wooden armor started to blacken around his fingers.
He hurriedly worked to pull the gauntlets off. Yet as soon as the first one was removed, his eyes widened with panic. Everything past the first knuckle of each finger had turned a dark purple. They had even wilted somewhat, becoming thinner and losing some of the flesh that surrounded the bone. Only jagged fragments were left of what used to be his fingernails. From them, there was a putrid pus that seemed to be oozing out without any signs of stopping.
However, while his fingers appeared to be completely dead, it seemed to have no impact on their functionality. Jaco’s sense of touch through them still felt normal, and they moved correctly when he flexed them. But it was just as he had assumed from the wording in the Class’s description. It said that the first Blight Warlock had been blessed with the Devil’s rotting fingers, and now he’d received the same so-called blessing.
Fortunately, the pain that came with the change was only temporary. So after another minute or so passed, he felt fine again. Yet while physically okay now, Jaco’s thoughts were still racing with mental distress. Not just due to what happened to his fingers, but also from the earlier notification that he was currently reading.
Hell-Touched Human… fuck me. That’s no small thing if it’s actually enough for the System to adjust my Species like that. I don’t know if it’ll change beyond that as I advance this Secondary Class. But for now I still feel like me in terms of my thoughts and feelings. So as long as I’m still concerned about these changes that’s a good sign, right? Jaco asked himself.
With that thought, he decided to pull up his Sheet and take a look at it.
General Info:
Species: Hell-Touched Human
Level: 40
Class: Druid
Evolution: True Shifter
Secondary Class: Blight Warlock
Level: 1
Stats:
Strength: 139
Agility: 90
Endurance: 132
Will: 108
Spell Power: 149
Unspent Points: 0
Class Abilities:
Passive: Animal Instincts
Passive: One With Nature
Passive: Permanent Aspect One
Passive: Wild Constitution
Active: Lesser Elemental Offense
Active: Minor Plant Control
Active: Lesser Beast Transformation
Active: Minor Primal Ferocity
Active: Lesser Manifestation of the Wild Elemental
Secondary Class Abilities:
Active: Lesser Pestilent Swarm
Active: Lesser Zone of Blight
Active: Lesser Rotting Summon
Holy shit! This new Class actually has a separate Level listed under it. Does that mean what I think it means? Jaco’s eyes practically sparkled as he realized the possibilities.
Before any Modifications were applied, each Level Up brought a humble increase of one Point to each of his Stats. So his Secondary Class started at Level 1 and had its progression separate from that of the Druid, then just how big of a boost could he gain from basically speedrunning its Levels?
And that was still before the bonus to Will and Spell Power he’d get from each Level. He assumed that the Stat Modifications from for his Druid Class wouldn’t be applied since they were so directly separated in his Sheet. But the System would be more than welcome to prove that assumption wrong.
After dismissing his Sheet, Jaco then turned toward the two new pieces of equipment that had come from the Secondary Class. He first decided to try something, and spent some Mana on Minor Plant Control on reversing the rot to his wooden gauntlets. But as soon as he put one of them back on, the wood quickly began to turn black and soften once again. He then grabbed onto his old staff, and watched as it too started to blacken in the area under his grip.
Jaco realized that this could prove to be something of an issue for him. It’d be no good if his Druid equipment was just completely incompatible with just his very touch. Yet he also didn’t want to just abandon the items that had faithfully served him all this time in the Apocalypse.
He eventually decided to do something that could be called a compromise. Jaco put the gauntlets of the wooden armor away inside his Bag of Holding. Since the Fungal Armor came with its own pair of what were more like gloves, he put them on.
Pressed against his rotten fingers, they brought a feeling of rightness, like they were perfectly made for his hands. That feeling was of course quickly followed up by a twist in his stomach, making him worried that he might potentially vomit.
The two very different kinds of equipment would probably look a bit funny with how much they contrasted in both color and texture. But as long as it functionally worked fine, appearance was a lesser concern.
Jaco hoped that with the fungal gloves acting as the more appropriate item, they’d also act as a barrier to protect his wooden staff. Yet when he tried to grab it again, the same result as before once again played itself out. But before he resigned himself to swapping over to the Decayed Staff, he remembered something. Rather than a weapon that strictly was aligned with being a Druid or a Blight Warlock, there was another option that was fully separate from his opposing Classes.
Jaco put both staffs away into his bag, and pulled something else out in their stead.
Hell Staff (Infernal, Artifact)
This artifact has been enhanced to be both tougher and harder than most staffs. When damaged, it will automatically begin to self-repair up to a certain degree. Striking any object with the artifact will siphon off some extra, which can then build-up to be released as a blast of concussive force.
Restriction: Can only be properly wielded by those who carry the Devil’s Essence. Otherwise this artifact will feel supremely heavy to those without it.
Current charge: 0/100
As expected now that he had the Devil’s Essence, the artifact’s cumbersome weight was no longer a concern. Now alongside it, all the other artifacts that he’d righteously plundered for himself were fully his to freely use. As far as compensation went for losing a piece of his humanity, having access to his own personal armory wasn’t bad at all.
But using the Hell Staff felt like a good solution. It was an Infernal artifact, so it wasn’t truly neutral in terms of its affinity like the regular ones. But now he wouldn’t have to worry about compatibility for either Class when it came to potentially using it as a conduit for their Abilities. Plus the enchantment it came with for its own kind of special attack certainly wouldn’t hurt.
Jaco threw a glance at the woman on the other side of the room. She still seemed to be completely out cold. And over the last few minutes, he still hadn’t heard her shift around or noticed any sudden changes in breathing. So since it appeared like she’d remain unconscious for now, he decided to take the chance to step outside for a bit.
After all, the Blight Warlock came with three new Class Abilities that still needed to be tried out.
With soft steps, he made his way out of the room. And then it was only a minute later that Jaco found himself out of the house. He decided to climb back up to the top of the nearby hill. That would serve as a vantage point to see if there were any monsters that happened to have recently wandered by.
When he then made his way to the top, the young man turned toward the ruined city in the distance. Yet as he stared at it, his brows furrowed at what he saw. It looked like some kind of red, almost slime-like aura encased the entire city. That had definitely not ever been there before. Yet more than just seeing it now, Jaco could practically feel that it was resonating with something inside him.
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He closed his eyes to concentrate and try to feel out just exactly what was going on here. A little while later, he felt something. And the moment the idea came to mind, a gut feeling quickly made him feel that it was correct.
This wasn’t just any aura covering city, but the Devil’s Essence. It was exactly the same kind of energy as that currently inside his body. Now that he was focusing on it, Jaco soon realized a few more things. The first was that the Devil’s Essence wasn’t just in the city, but that it was simply the area with the highest density. Even from where he stood, he could feel it around him to a lesser degree.
The second thing was that like Mana, Jaco sensed that this essence could act as fuel to him. However, that would only be true for the Class Abilities that came from the Blight Warlock. The third was that the comparison to Mana was surprisingly appropriate. While the two energies themselves were widely different, the closest way to relate them was that it was like they occupied a similar wavelength.
It was actually quite an interesting idea to think about. Just how Mana and the Devil’s Essence acted quite similarly as an ambient source of energy. Though Jaco didn’t know of any instances where Mana could concentrate so much over just a single area, so there was that as one major difference.
Yet just then, Jaco was pulled out of his thoughts by the noise of rustling. It sounded like multiple beings were currently moving through some bushes not far from the hill. And if his hearing served him correctly, he believed that this time it actually was a group of shambling Skeletons.
His lips twisting upward into a smirk, he made his way down the hill. He didn’t even bother to activate One With Nature, since there’d be no need to be hidden from mere Skeletons. From there, it didn’t take long at all before he came across them.
Skeleton (Undead)
Level: 3
Skeleton (Undead)
Level: 4
Skeleton (Undead)
Level: 3
There were only three of them in total. But even for basic Skeletons they were rather low Level, as the strongest one was only Level 4. With how weak they were as an average, these undead would barely count as meaningful test subjects. But without anything else around, they would just have to do.
Upon seeing him, the undead did their good old silent warcry and immediately charged him. But Jaco was a being that was long past the point of even being scratched by them. Just the membrane across his eyeball would be tough enough to not feel their attacks. So as they failed to tickle him, he was busy deciding which of his new Abilities to try first.
Summoning magic is always interesting in terms of games. So let’s start with Lesser Rotting Summon, Jaco eventually thought to himself. He focused on the Ability, and his powerful gut instincts helped him quickly get a general grasp on what it could do.
Jaco sensed that this Ability was actually a bit variable. In that the power of the summon scaled with how much Devil’s Essence he spent on it. There did seem to be both a minimum and maximum amount he could spend a time, however.
So he couldn’t just spend it all at the opening of a battle and let a super strong summon do all the work for him. Since the current opponents were super weak, he decided to just settle with the minimum spending for now. He could also sense that he could pick where it’d be summoned from, within a range of about thirty feet or so.
A moment later, the ground just a few feet away from him started to shift. The dried-up dirt turned into a swirling mass of what almost seemed like mud, but was much darker. A truly horrible order wafted out from the spot, as if a fish had been left out for days and was then tossed into a microwave.
Once again there was a contrast between the two sides of Jaco as the stench hit him. One part that enjoyed it like the smell of an old book, and the other that wanted to set that entire area on fire to cleanse it. But this dichotomy was something he had consciously chosen for himself. So even if it threw his brain for a loop, he still didn’t regret his decision.
Then from the dark whirlpool, a figure climbed its way out. And it could accurately be described as a somewhat humanoid mushroom monster. It was bipedal and approximately the size of a large dog. With its main body being the stem, the brown cap at the top almost looked like an oversized hat.
It didn't appear to have a face or any other distinctive features. But as it stepped out of the now disappearing pool, the grass under its root-like feet rapidly started to wilt away. Out of curiosity, Jaco wanted to see if this creature was something recognized by the System.
Rotshroom (Summon)
Level: 10
Jaco was somewhat amused by the name, but even more so by the Level. Since even at the minimum amount of Devil’s Essence spent, this thing was still quite a bit stronger than the highest Level Skeleton present. He felt that the summon was mentally connected to him, and would only act as he commanded. There was currently only one order wanted to give: attack.
The Rotshroom immediately acted and ran toward the trio of Skeletons. Its arms were more like tendrils, which is used as a whip as it slammed one into the back of an undead’s leg. The bone was easily broken by the strike, but more interesting was what happened right after.
A wave of rot spread both up and down where the summon had attacked. The ashen bone affected was darkened before crumbling into a fine powder. When a second leg was destroyed, the targeted Skeleton came tumbling down like a chopped tree. Where it only took one last strike for its skull to be crushed.
EXP Earned!
Secondary Class Level Up!
Level 1 to Level 2
With how truly mindless they were, the remaining pair of Skeletons didn’t even react. They were just locked onto Jaco and wouldn’t stop attacking him for anything. So it was because of that the Rotshroom encountered no resistance as it quickly killed the second one in the same manner.
EXP Earned!
Secondary Class Level Up!
Level 2 to Level 3
Yet before it finished the last one off, Jaco willed for it to stop. He felt it had done enough for now, and so decided to unsummon it. Just a second later, the Rotshroom melted back into a small puddle of dark gunk.
As for the Skeleton, he had something else in mind for it. Jaco probably should have intervened after the first one was killed. But what’s done was done. For now he would try Pestilent Swarm next and just test the last Ability later. So that’s exactly what he did.
Jaco felt out the Ability for a moment and then held his hand directly above the Skeleton. Then a second later, what had to be hundreds of tiny insects flew out from his glove. The moment they touched the undead’s skull, they immediately began to destroy it.
Some left just chewed through bone, other bugs sprayed powerful acids, others left behind a trail of mold wherever they crawled. It didn’t take long until the Skeleton was so overwhelmed that it fell to the ground just from the combined mass of the many bugs on its head. Then just another few seconds later, Jaco stopped the Ability. The swarm immediately disappeared, leaving just a ruined stump at the top of the Skeleton’s neck.
EXP Earned!
Secondary Class Level Up!
Level 3 to Level 4
Oh the feeling of rapidly progressing through the early Levels. How he had missed it and would be more than happy to experience it again.
But it was then that he heard something else coming his way. An undead whose shambling was both familiar and distinctly different from that of a Skeleton. He turned and saw it slowly coming making its way through the brush.
Ghoul (Undead)
Level: 18
A lone Ghoul outside the city? Now that was a first for him. He wondered if perhaps it was just a straggler from one of the hordes that were leaving the city en masse. That would at least make the most sense for how it ended up all the way out here. If Jaco had to bet, it was probably coming over due to being attracted by the sound of his “battle” against the Skeletons.
When it actually noticed him, Jaco decided to activate the last of his new Abilities: Zone of Blight. All he had to do was focus before it quickly went into effect.
Within a 50 feet sphere around the target, death filled both the ground and very air. The smaller vegetation wilted away until there was practically no sign left of them ever existing. There was a loud groaning as the trees caught within the area of the effect also weren’t spared. Parts of their trunks cracked as the bark rapidly dried out. Dozens of leaves fell at a time, but none ever reached the ground before turning into dust and being blown away.
The Ghoul started its charge through the zone. But all it took was a single thought for Jaco to move the central point of the sphere alongside it. Even the undead wasn’t spared from the fate of death that befell everything within the Ability’s range.
Its already rotten flesh took on a new cycle of rapid decay as hunks of old meat began to almost melt before sliding off its body. Yet while it was starting to slow the Ghoul down, it wasn’t quite enough to fully impede its charge. A living person would probably have passed out from just the sheer agony already. But until its head fell off or was destroyed, the mindless undead would keep moving forward.
At this rate, Jaco believed that it’d probably take a while for the Ability to actually kill his target. But now that he understood what it did, there was no need to drag things out. The Druid raised a finger and shot out a beam of fire. The flames easily pierced through the Ghoul’s skull, dropping it dead on the spot.
EXP Earned!
Secondary Class Level Up!
Level 4 to Level 7
Jaco frowned as he saw the notification. That should have easily been enough Experience to shoot the Class’s Level into the teens at the very least. Yet the System was really claiming that the Ghoul wasn’t enough to get it past the single digits?
Unless… is it being slowed down because my main Level is so much higher? Or because I did the finishing blow with a Druid Ability? It might be both, if I’m being honest. I don’t know if having two Classes is a circumstance the System was even made to be prepared for. But it makes sense that there’d be some kind of limit set in place so you can’t so easily exploit a Secondary Class for free Levels.
He still wasn’t quite sure why the System would have even been made with logic like video game balance in mind. It didn’t quite make sense for something that was meant to be a tool of war for humanity to have a fighting chance. But that was just another thing on the very long list of questions for the Guardian Angel. At least it was nice to know that he could someday speak again with someone that actually had answers for him.
But for the time being, he was done here. Jaco felt ready to go back to the house now. He’d take the opportunity to just rest up and see how long it’d take to restore the Devil’s Essence he just spent.
Soon, Jaco walked back into the building. Yet just as he was about to make his way toward the bedroom, he heard something. From the direction he was about to go toward, there was the creaking of a bed. He opened the door with narrowed eyes, and there he saw her.
The woman he had rescued was now awake.