Goodman sat on a small hill a short way from the mountain town. From this vantage point he could just about see Crown city, the citadel reaching like a single pointed finger up at the Strom that raged above it. He heard the bang of the blue sphere exploding from the top of this hill. He hadn’t moved from the hill since getting back into the game after the patch notes. He sat quietly, watching the vortex swirl, and the lighting strike. The rain was so thick he could see it from the hill. Like the whole city was wearing a dark grey veil. Goodman drummed his fingers on his leg. He wore new full plate armour which had been easier to get in the mountain town since it sat on top of a large iron mine. The village was surround on two sides by mountains and one by foot hills, the last side was thick woodlands. Goodman had managed to source enough green dye from the woodlands to die his full set of ‘Mountain steel plate’ armour an emerald green. He had also visited the Guild hall in the village and resisted a guild which he called, ‘travellers’ Red had joked about it not being original or very interesting. Goodman had grinned and said “the same could be said about you.” She had rolled her eyes and disappeared after that. He hadn’t seen her since.
Amok had been practicing his magic in the mountains and was getting pretty good. He had discovered several new spells and only caused two rock slides. Jaks had been restless since the patch and had rallied a party around him, they spent a lot of time exploring the wilderness or in the abandoned sections of the mine fighting monsters and looking for loot. The other two were, Ammy and Brett. Two players who had made them selves as ugly as possible, who wore the same plate armour as Goodman. They spent a lot of time looking for and trying to kill the biggest monsters they could find. Goodman often went on the these hunts with them. behind the village a mountain range loomed. And behind that if you were standing in the right place. You could just see the edge of the infinity gate for this corner of the map. Goodman spent a lot time looking at that gate, and wondering were Red had gotten too. He could use a scout.
Red hung of the side of a cliff. Climbing claw firmly embedded in the surface. She hung causally and unworried her climbing skill have increased dramatically since coming to the mountains. Below her was a cave mouth, the black maw of the mountain. Red had set up camp nearby after she saw the monsters that came out of the cave. She dug into one of the pockets of her cloak and pulled out a small dead rabbit. Holding it by it’s ears she half dropped half tossed it down in from of the cave. As it flew past the entrance a roar came from inside. 10 giant black bat like creatures launched them selves out of the cave and dived after the falling rabbit. Red kicked of the wall and dived after them her cloak flapping as she fell. The cave mouth flew past and she saw the bats starting to level out their flight as the front one caught the falling rabbit. Red extended her hand with the climbing hook in front of her as she fell. Just as the last Monster was about to level out she caught it’s hide with the hook. It screeched and was yanked down by the sudden weight and away from it’s friends.
Together they fell spinning towards the ground. The monster screeching and thrashing as Red tried to get a better grip on it. They bounced of the wall. Reds climbing hook became unstuck and for a brief moment she was free falling. She made a wild grab at the monster with her other hand and just managed to get a grip on it’s furry back. Red swung her climbing hook and embedded it into the monsters chest just below the collar bone. Then she pulled upwards. The bat screeched but flapped its wings pulling them out of the spiral. She pulled harder on the hook and grabbed a tuft of the hair on the back of the giants bats neck. The monster frantically flapped its wings and they leveled out. They flew like that in a smooth glide, the bats wings didn’t flap but they still flew fast.
Red Grinned and looked around, from her vantage point on the back of the Giant monstrous bat she could see the many valleys and hills. She could see the mountain town a few miles away, it’s heavy forges spitting out huge gufts of smoke and on her other side she could see Crown city. The Magic storm event in full force, the vortex spinning wildly above it. Red let go of the Bats neck and through her fist into the air yelling in celebration. The bat did a quick spin and a short thrash, the climbing hook came lose and Red went was suddenly tumbling though the air with a vicious cut across her chest trailing blood. She watched the bat spin around in the air and dive for her. She watched it in horror her world dissolving into the sensation of falling and the bat, coming right at her. The world slowed down, she could feel every strand of her hair and cloak in the wind. The world slowed down further. A Glance at her health bar showed that the bats attack combined with the initial struggle to mount it had left her just over half hp.
Even in slow motion the bat was closing the distance fast. Red Reached for one of her throwing knives and found that even her movements were slowed to a crawl. Slowly she gripped the handle of one of the throwing knives in her cloak and equally slowly she started the motion to throw it at the bat. The knife left her hand and shot gracefully upwards. She watched it as it flew towards the bat. At the last moment the bat saw it and started to move to the side but it was too late and the dagger crashed into it’s wing. Then the world sped up, and Red was falling fast, she heard the monster screech for a second and saw it spiraling of, but then she was the tops of tree branches the the small ones whipping at her and drawing small lines of blood across any exposed skin. The trees broke her fall and she landed with a thump on the ground. Checking her health she saw she had about 10% left. Two prompts appeared in her vision. And she read them, ‘skill up, beast riding. As this skill ranks up you will be able to better control beats while riding them.’ ‘New skill, Focus, after a lot of practice you are able to enter a focused state, the world will seem to slow down around you.’
Red dismissed the two prompts and lay on the ground staring up at the hole in the canopy her fall had created, waiting for the ‘fallen’ status to wear off. She could hear wild life moving around her, her health firmly in the red meant she probably couldn’t fight off any hostile monsters. The fallen status wore off and she stood up. Thick woods surrounded her on all sides. Checking her map she found she was in an unexplored part of the forest close to the village. Very close to the mountain range that led to the infinity gate. “Damn it.” She muttered the walk back to her campsite or even town would likely take all night, and it would be through unexplored territory that was probably filled with all sorts off horrifying monsters. She was also low on health and only had a few health potions with her, which she drank. Chastening herself for leaving camp without restocking again Red started walking in the direction of town.
The health potion restored her to 85% health. She walked with her hood up and cloaked wrapped around her. The darkness in the forest was giving her a stealth buff and her stealth skill was already pretty high. She still had both hands clutched around her daggers and watched where she put her feet. After an hour of walking she came to a small clearing. In the clearing was a small cottage, thatch roof and sturdy wooden walls, a stable was nestled against one wall, and a horse was grazing nearby. Red ducked against a tree and watched the house. The sun was setting behind it and the sky was a bright and fiery Orange. As Red watched the cottage an old woman wearing a dark brown dress came out. She was caring a cauldron over her shoulder and a basket of leaves and herbs in her other arm. The old woman set the cauldron and basket down on a fire pit and went to fetch water to fill it. Obviously she was some kind of witch, but that didn’t mean she was bad, Red thought to herself, the horse wasn’t tethered or in any sort of pen. It just stood near the house grazing. The witch came back with a big metal jug of water carried over her shoulder. She tipped the water into the cauldron and set about lighting a fire. Red wondered if she should intervene, then decided that watching wasn’t going to get her anywhere and worse case scenario she could steal the horse and try to ride it back.
The tree she was stood behind had a wide truck so she had plenty of room to make sure she was combat ready should things go poorly. The witch didn’t notice her right after she stepped out from behind the tree. So Red started to walk slowly forwards. She had gotten a new cloak and dyed it after they arrived in town. She walked with it pulled tight around her, hood up and hands on daggers, ready for anything.
When the witch noticed her she smiled at her, Red stopped walking and prepared to leap out of the way of an attack. The witch smiled wider, she didn’t have a lot of teeth and the ones she did have were rotten, “you’re just in time for tea dear,” said the witch.
Red was a little taken aback,
“Sit down, sit down,” the witch went on measuring to a stone near the fire pit, “I’ll just get it lit.” She produced a flint and steel from somewhere Red didn’t see and expertly lit the fire, then the flint and steel disappeared in her hands, “what brings you all the way out here dear?” the witch asked.
“Erm, I was… riding bats.” Red said she moved slowly round to the rock the old woman had indicated and sat down.
At first the witch said nothing the pause in the conversation went on slightly longer than it should have, then The old woman nodded, “terrible those bats, don’t make good mounts, and they are awfully uncooperative even if you can talk to animals.”
“You can talk to animals in this?” Red said surprised.
Again there was a long pause before the witch replied, “if you have the right teacher you’ll find many things are possible dear.” The witch started to put the herbs and leaves in the now boiling pot cauldron.
“Is there someone I can talk to, to learn ‘beast riding’”
The old woman slowly turned her head and stared at Red, she had a vacant look in her eyes, it was the look a lot of npcs had when they weren’t directly related to a main quest line, “if you wish to ride the beasts of the world, then ‘beast riding is only half the picture.”
“What does that mean?”
Another long pause and the witch kept staring at Red but her hands picked up a large wooden spoon and started stirring the tea, “to ride the beasts of the world you will first need to calm them, this can be achieved with the skill ‘beast taming’ the early levels of ‘beast taming’ will only allow the user to calm the beasts for a brief time. In later levels the user will be able to fully tame the beasts making them into a companion.”
“Thats cool,” Red said, she leaned forward and looked into the cauldron the leaves and herbs were clumped together around the wooden pole the old woman was using to stir, Red frowned, “do you normally stir tea?” she asked
The old woman paused longer than usual this time then finally said, “I’m afraid I don’t know what your saying.”
Red waved it off, “don’t worry, where can I learn beast taming? Can you teach me?”
This time the witch replied quickly, “yes dear would you like to learn how to tame the beasts of the world?”
A prompt appeared in front of Red ‘New Quest: you have asked the witch of the mountain forests to train you in the way of beast taming, she has agreed.’ “Kind of wish it wasn’t a quest and just a free skill but okay.” Red muttered, then to the witch she said, “where do we start?”
The witch stood apparently forgetting the tea and said, “follow me dear,”
Red followed the witch over to the horse, on the way the witch said, “Every beast is different and requires different things to tame although the core principle is the same. You must first discover what the animal likes, whether that is food, or play, or hunting, or something else. Then you must provide the animal with that thing. This is how you will level up the ‘beast taming’ skill. Once you have a level the skill will provide you with more skills, related to the ‘beast taming’ skill tree, the first of these will be ‘calm’”
“Alright” said Red
They arrived at the grazing horse which didn’t look up at them. The witch spoke again, “what do you think horses like dear?”
Red shrugged, “sugar cubes? Salt licks? I don’t know a lot about horses.”
“Horses do like sugar cubes, do you have any?”
“No”
“Well what else do you think horses would like”
The horse grunted and shook its head. But otherwise seemed unbothered by their presence
Red looked around the clearing her eyes eventually resting on the stable, “hay?” she said
The witch nodded, “yes hay would work”
So Red jogged over to the stable and grabbed a few handfuls out of the feeder there. Then she came back and offered it to the horse. The horse looked up at her for the first time, it looked at her then at the hay, then at her again. Then it opened its mouth and ate the hay right out of her hand.
“Good work,” said the witch, “now pat it,”
Red reached out with a hand, the horse stood passively, she gently patted the creatures nose. two prompt appeared in front of her, “skill tree unlocked: Beast taming’ ‘new skill: calm, you are able to calm beasts of the world, however at such a low level you can only do it to already domesticated animals.’ “Bet it’s not this easy in the real world,” she said, patting the horse while reading the prompts.
“So how do I ride it?” Red asked.
The old woman paused for a long moment before speaking, Red waited patiently she was used to talking to npcs and they all needed time to process what you said to them, “you mount the horse and if it panics you use ‘calm’ and if your calm skill is high enough the horse or other ridable beast will calm down, from there you can try and ride it, usually this is done with a light tap of your heels against it’s hide.”
Red nodded her head and moved around to the side of the horse. She reread the calm skill description in preparation. The horse wasn’t wearing a saddle, it just had an old blanket across its back. It was quite tall so Red had to jump to get onto it’s back. As soon as she landed the horse started to whinnie and kick with it’s feet. Red put one hand on the side of it’s neck and used the ‘calm’ skill immediately the horse calmed down. It stood perfectly still underneath her looking forward and awaiting orders. Red took a deep breath and gently tapped the horses sides with the heels of her feet. The horse started to walk forward slowly. Red lost her balance almost immediately and fell off. The horse stopped moving a few feet away. The woman watched passively with vacant eyes. A prompt appeared in her vision, it was long one. ‘Riding tutorial,’ it said, ‘you’ve ridden your first animal, not just landed on it an been thrown off. To ride beasts and other animals in Shattered Worlds you require a combination of skills, from two different skill trees. The first skill tree is…’ the tutorial went on going over what the old woman had already told her. Red guess this part was for people that didn’t find or use a trainer and discovered the skill naturally through gameplay, she skimmed through it till she came to a part she hadn’t heard before, ‘commands: once mounted you will want to take a grip of something. Usually a the reins, however if your mount doesn’t have them then just grabbing whatever is to hand will help you keep balance. Gently pull the reins or whatever left of right to make the beast turn, the harder you pull the sharper the best will turn, however if your skill isn’t high enough you may get thrown off for pulling to hard.’ Red continued to read through the tutorial while sitting in the dirt. The old woman deciding she was no longer needed went back to the cauldron and her strange tea. The horse continued to graze a few feet away.
When Red was done reading the tutorial, she got up and brushed the dust and dirt of herself, then went over to the horse. She hopped on and before getting thrown off used ‘calm’ the horse stood still, she grabbed it’s mane in one hand and used her other to balance. Then gently tapped the horse on the sides again the horse started to walk slowly forward. This time however Red held on, riding the horse forward at a slow walk, she gently tugged the horses mane to the left and it turned it’s head and they went round in a wide circle.
“Awesome,” Red grinned, she tapped the horse again lightly with her heels and it picked up the pace, now walking at a steady trot. The horses stamina bar appeared under her own, horses only had the one bar that acted as both health and stamina meaning you could ride one to death if you weren’t careful. At the steady trot they were going at they the bar was barely going down at all. She tugged the horses hair right and steered it back towards the witches house. She tapped the horse with her heels again and couldn’t stop a delighted laugh as the trot changed to a canter. Red steered the horse around the house a few time, before stopping in front of the witch and dismounting. A few prompts appeared informing her that her ‘beast riding’ and ‘beast taming’ skill had levelled up. ‘Beast riding’ was now level 5 which meant she could pick a skill of it’s skill tree. She opened it up and scanned through the options. She only had access to the tier one skills, ‘Riding expertise’ improved her basic riding ability making beasts more responsive and lowering their stamina drain a small amount. ‘Sprint’ gave the horse a short speed boost. And ‘offencive techniques’ which gave the mount and attack which you could use while riding it. Red dismissed the passive ‘riding expertise’ and hovered over ‘offencive techniques’ before deciding getting sprint early would probably be a good investment.
The old woman sat next to the cauldron sipping tea out of a chipped cup, “did you enjoy your ride dear?” she said,
Red sat down across from her, “yeah, so your a trainer right?”
The old woman replied quickly, “yes dear,”
“Do you only train the riding skill?”
A short pause then, “no,” shaking her head, “I have much knowledge to pass on if you are interested.”
“And it doesn’t cost me anything?” Red asked,
Again a short pause, “no dear, what would I do with gold all the way out here, however I can only train each person in two skills.”
Red frowned, she guessed that made sense from a balance stand point but she couldn’t figure out what the in game reason would be. Nor could she be bothered to ask the old woman why, the conversation would likely take several hours with all the pausing the npcs did, instead she said, “what other skill can you teach me.”
A quick reply, “I know the secrets of, herbalism, nature magic, riding, and brewing.”
“Can I learn nature magic?” Red asked
The old woman peered at her the usual vacant look leaving her eyes for a few moments, “I’m afraid you lack the talent to learn that dear,”
“Harsh,” said Red, “but yeah makes sense, haven’t speced wizard. What about…” she considered her options, brewing would likely be useful in making consumables like beer and tea which had a wide variety of benefits. Herbalism was likely picking useful plants and turning them into ingredients. Red had been planning to ask Amok to teach her some basic alchemy and herbalism would probably compliment that quite well.
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“Alright,” she said, “teach me herbalism.”
The old woman nodded and smiled, and began explaining the basics. She pulled her basket closer and starting picking herbs and leafs from it explaining what they did. As she explained prompts appeared in Red vision, ‘herbalism skill tree unlocked,’ ‘plant journal unlocked,the plant journal can be accessed from the inventory screen’ smaller prompts appeared in the corner of her vision as the woman picked up each leaf from the basket and told her what it was, ‘dres leaf, added to journal’ ‘hold root, added to journal,’ and on they went.
An hour went by, and then another. The witch had gone back into her house her more plants at one point. Red had long since discovered that she didn't actually have to listen to what the old woman was saying. She had spent some time flicking through the information as of the different plants before that got boring too. Now she stared off into the woods. The sun was setting and the trees were casting long shadows. The horse had returned to its stable, and a thin trail of smoke had started to come out of the chimney on the old womans house dispite there not being anyone inside to light a fire. In the mountains the sun sets were a fiery red, and that red light shone down casting the house in an ominous light. A faint wind was brushing the grass in the clearing and it brought with it the smell off the burnt wood.
Red frowned and stiffed the air, the woman kept droning on plant, after planet, after plant. She could defiantly smell fire. She scanned the tree line but couldn’t see anything. She glanced at the old woman once, then leapt up onto the top of her house. The plant prompts stopped and she heard the old woman stop speaking and utter something along the lines of “how rude,”
Atop the house Red could see more of the horizon, to one side heavy mountains, a little further along were thing wisps of white smoke, likely the Mountain town. She kept scanning, then she saw it. Thick black smoke rising from the forest nearby trees had been knocked over and there was something moving in the forest, something big enough to have to shove past the trees causing the canopy to shift and move unnaturally. Whatever it was it was making its way towards the witches house. Red looked back down at the witch and wondered if she would notice if her horse suddenly went missing.
Before she could act on this new plan, the thing in the forest roared, it sounded like lions roar deep and throaty. Then with a rush of air the creature leapt out of the forest using two great dragon wings. A Chimera, the four headed monster leapt through the air right towards the witches house. Red leapt away grateful for her high dexterity stat, she landed just before the monster crashed through the house destroying it. It landed awkwardly apparently not expecting a house to be there and had to haul it’s self up. Red took the opportunity to look for the horse and saw it bolting into the forest.
“Damn it” she said, and she turned to look at the monster. As it got up and targeted her. Four heads, on the left a dragon head, the middle a huge lion head lion head with a great mane surrounding it, on the right a rams head, with characteristic crazy looking eyes and and huge horns. Lastly instead of a tail the monster had a snake which hung above its body swaying and waiting for the chance to strike. Deadly venom leaked from its jaw and ran down the monsters lion like body. The chimera stretched out its huge dragon wings and prepared to pounce. The lion and dragon head let of a low growl while the snake watched from above. The Rams heads crazy eyes locked onto her and it bleated. The snake started to sway back and forth, once, twice, Red ready herself, on the third sway the monster pounced. Pushing down with it’s wings and pushing off with it’s back legs it launched itself into the air. Front lion claws outstretched to either side. Instead of diving to either side or back Red launched her self forward into a roll. She went right under the monsters belly before it landed, it let out a roar of frustration the dragon head tried to turn and spit fire at her but all it succeeded in doing was shooting a short jet of flame at the ruined house setting it ablaze thick black smoke belched into the air. The snake head lashed out at her, Red barely dodged it, with a second scrambling dive. The monster took a step backwards and the snake wound up for another lunch. Red started to frantically crawl away on her belly while rolling and throwing herself out the way of the snakes attacks.
She grabbed a dagger out of her cloak in between attacks and took a deep breath. The ‘focus’ skill activated and the world slowed down she rolled onto her back in slow motion as the snake head began it’s next lunge this time she could see it coming. It might have been Serene if not for the snake lunching towards her huge mouth open with venom dripping from it’s fangs. In focus mode Red was able to start her to swing the dagger so it would intercept the snake. The dagger slashed across the snakes head leaving a long bloody line down it’s face. Every single head on the monster screeched, Red was unable to keep the focus mode on any longer and the world sped up. The snake head flew to the side trailing blood while the other heads screeched. The monster spun around one great lion claw outstretched to catch her. Now That Red was on her back and not desperately avoiding the snake she just had time to launch herself backwards into a somersault dodging the claw by inches. She landed on her feet in a crouch as the monster faced her. There was silence for a moment then the dragon head thrashed and opened it’s mouth. Red knew what to expect and readied herself to leap out the way. But before the dragon head could spit any fire. Plants burst out the ground around the monsters feet and began wrapping themselves around it. Pulling it to the ground the chimera let of a frustrated scream which was cut short as vines began wrapping themselves around the monsters snouts.
Red looked behind her and saw the old witch, waving her arms about and chanting. Her hands glowed a deep forest green, runes circled her on the ground.
Should of specced wizard, thought Red before leaping into action. It was unlikely she could kill the monster but if she could cripple its wings she might be able to escape. Red landed on the lion head and kicked off again before she was thrown of as it thrashed against the vines holding it. She flipped onto the monsters back and slashed at the beasts left wing. Blood fountained out and the monster screeched as best it could and pulled against the restraints. Red heard a few vines snap. She swung again using a basic dagger combo she had leaned while doing the thieves guild quests back at crown city. She hit the wing 6 times each time drawing another bloody line across it. The monster shook and then collapsed to the ground the wing she was attacking went limp. “Hah,” Red said.
Then the chimera jerked upward, snapping vines as it did. The snake head got lose and took a bite at her. Sinking its teeth deep into her shoulder, and lifting her into the air. All the while Red could feel the deadly poison pumping into her veins, the status ‘poisoned’ appeared under her health bar. Then the snake head wound up and tossed her towards the burning house. She cartwheeled in the air and landed in a bloody lump groaning. Even without the snakes teeth in her the poison was draining her remaining 50% health, that one attack taking half her hp.
Red stared at the upwards for a second and watched her Hp bar drain steadily. She wondered if maybe dying would be easier, she would respawn on a different shard, and she could pick one of her stats which would only be lowered by half and not reset to zero. She would also retain all knowledge of the skill trees she had unlocked so far but would have to meet the perquisites to start using the skill again. She turned her head to the side and saw the old woman conjuring what looked like Venus fly traps which were spitting glops of purple mucus at the chimera. The dragon head opened its mouth and a jet of flame burst out with a roar burning the plants and the old woman both. The goat head turned and looked at the Red lying on the ground, it bleated and the rest of the heads turned their attention to her as well. Slowly the beast moved towards her. Red stared up at the four headed monstrosity, only the goat head wasn’t drooling, it was thrashing about like it was trying to get a look over the other side of the monster and bleating wildly..
The lion head opened its jaws preparing to bite, Red readied herself to try and roll out of the way. Activating Focus she watched as the Lion began it’s attack, and started to roll but even as she did she knew it was too late. She was dead for sure. Then the something exploded against the chimeras flank tossing it to one side. Red heard wooping and yells and saw a small axe fly over her head, and she heard the monster screech. The chimera jumped right over her to engage these new attackers and from where she was lying she could hear the sounds of laughing, shouting, and fighting.
Not today then, Red thought, and sat up. She looked over at the fighting and saw two heavily armoured figures fighting the monster, one had a huge two handed sword and the other a great axe, which normally was held in two hands this player however held it in one and had a small spiked shield strapped to the other arm. Ammy and Brett, Red thought. They must have been hunting nearby and heard the commotion. Red stood up and jogged over to the old womans charred corpse. She patted her down and found what she needed, a green potion with a hand written label, antidote. It tasted like mint and had a texture like thick wet sand, Red gagged as she swallowed it. The poison status disappeared with a ping and her health stopped draining, then she drank one of her own potions which tasted like tomato juice but were very watery. Her health stopped going down at just below a quarter and started so Regen quickly.
She turned back to the fight and saw that Brett and Ammy were holding their own. They stood to either side of the and just far enough down that the monster had to turn to attack them if with anything other than the snake head. Whenever the monster turned the person it turned towards would move forward and attack at the base of the nearest heads neck. While the other would throw a small throwing axe or swing at the snake head if it lunged at them. With the crippled wing the monster couldn’t effectively leap to give itself room. Ammy and Brett worked together and were slowly whittling down the chimeras health. Red did a quick inventory check to make sure she had all her various daggers and throwing knives she straightened her cloak and looked for an opening to enter the fight, if they were gonna kill I then she was gonna have a piece.
Before she could move the chimera wrapped both it’s good wing and crippled one around it’s head and then it jumped a few feet into the air and threw it’s good wing out. Causing the monster to spin around very fast. The snake tale stretched out to it’s full length and whipped both Ammy and Brett throwing them backwards. One of them landed right near were Red was standing and she ran over to them.
“Are you good?” Red said as she got there.
The player lifted their visor and revealed the horror underneath. Normally players made themselves look beautiful and handsome in the character creator. But there were a few people that went the other way. Ammy and Brett were two of these people. Ammys face was a result of pushing all the different customisation sliders all the way. Her jaw was crooked her nose was tiny and pushed upwards making it look like a small pig nose. One of her eyes was unrealistically large and the other was small and almost pressed shut by the brow that hung over it like a awning, it was actually large enough to create shade on that side of her face. Her hair was neon purple and in scatted little tufts all over her head. Ammy grinned revealing her complete lack of teeth, and black gums.
“Red!” she said in perfect English despite the disfigured jaw, “it’s great to see you we were wondering where you got too.”
Ammy reached up and grabbed Reds arm to pull her self up from in the process she nearly pulled Red over. Ammy went on, “we’ve been hunting lesser chimera all day, and then we found this one but it kept flying off or tossing us into the forest. I suppose you did that to it’s wing?” before Red could say anything Ammy went on, “That is great work we’ve got it now for sure. We are going to be the best beast hunters in the game. First to kill a real chimera not one of those lesser ones, that are always hanging about.”
They heard a roar and looked over. Brett had already engaged the monster again swinging his huge axe one handed across the monsters hide leaving a huge Red gash, the dragon head turned and spurred fire in a wide arc. Brett held his shield up but still took a firm hit. However it didn’t slow him down and before the fire had even fully gone past him he was charging again.
Ammy held up her hand and and yelled, “Brett it’s Red!” she screamed, Brett swung his axe and the chimera deflected it with its front claws Brett spun away and glanced at the other two, he gave a thumbs up and then launched into another attack.
“Right then,” said Ammy, “standard formation, we’ll draw aggro you hop on it’s back and try and cut of that snake, then we’ll have it for sure.” Without waiting for her to rely Ammy pulled her great sword out of the ground and started to run back into the fight,
“But what about the fire breath?” Red called after her,
Without stopping Ammy looked over her shoulder, “what about it?” she laughed and threw herself into the fray with a delighted shriek.
Red sighed and watch Ammy charge forward. When she was close enough she leaped into the air and singing her sword downward, the chimera flexed its good wing batting her away and blunting her charge. Ammy rolled sprung back onto her feet and attacked again. Red drew her own daggers spun them in her hands and ran towards the battle. The other two saw her and pressed their attacks drawing the monsters full attention. Red leaped into the air flipping forward she landed with a thump between the two wings on the creatures back. It reared up on it’s back legs in an attempt to throw her off, the other two used this opportunity and attacked the monsters belly. They swung at the same time, hitting and causing to huge bloody gashes to appear. The monster was thrown backwards and Red dug one of her daggers into the creatures back in order to stay on it. Ammy and Brett wooped and continued to attack while the monster reeled backwards swatting at them with it’s huge lion paws. Red got herself together in time to see the snake head targeting her. She yanked her main dagger out the chimeras back and swung her off hand dagger up just in time to deflect the snakes lunge. The snakes fangs slid along the dagger with a noise like drawing a sword out a sheath. Red swung her main dagger at the snake head hitting where its head met its body. It hissed and and spat, leaking venom. The main body of the chimera rolled underneath Red in response to the Ammys and Bretts assault. She flipped forward and landed again just at he base of the snake tail. The head hissed loudly and lunged downwards at her this time instead of deflecting the attack she threw her off hand upwards pointing the dagger at the snakes open mouth. The snake didn’t flinch away and rammed its head down onto the dagger swallowing it and Red arm up to the elbow. The dagger cut through the snakes skin from the inside and the tip of it poked out through the snakes body a short way down. The snakes jaw clamped shut around Red elbow and she felt the venom pumping into her again, the poison status popping up under her now depleting health bar. Red used her off hand dagger to frantically stab at the snakes body, jamming the blade in and out again and again. The chimera started to screech and buck but the snake clamped around her arm kept her in a position to keep stabbing it.
Her vision started to blur and she heard shouting from somewhere near by. She just kept slashing and cutting at the snake tail. The chimera moved underneath her, a sharp jerk and then it was rolling and Red was rolling with it, her mouth all of a sudden full of dirt and then fresh air and then dirt again. She lost her off hand dagger, and was pulled by the snake head still gripping her arm pulled her under again. This time however something came lose there was a tear of flesh and a 3 voiced screech. Red was left staring at a wobbling sky gasping for breath, her health dropping below 5% a shadow appeared over her then something was being poured onto her face she coughed as it went into her mouth and swallowed and choked. Then the poison was gone, the sky cleared and the shadow resolved into heavily armoured figure uncorking a bottle of red liquid which he then proceed to pour on her face. Red coughed again and her health started to regenerate.
Through coughs she said “stop that!”
“I’m helping,” said a voice, it sounded metal and echo though the helmet but still like their was a grin behind it.
The liquid continued to rain down, and Red began to flail as feeling returned to her body, “just give it to me,” she said through coughs.
The figure which she now realised was Brett laughed and tossed her a second potion as she stood up, “that was badass,” he said then he picked up his axe and charged back towards the chimera. Which was now stumbling and trying to spin around as it tried to catch Ammy who was doing her best to stay behind it. The dragon head was spitting fire in every direction in a hope that one sprout of flame might catch her somehow. Red went to uncork the new potion and finish regaining her health when she noticed her left arm was still caught in the snakes mouth. It took some effort to force the jaws open and pull it out, It was soaked in the snakes blood and she wiped it on the grass to get the worst of it off. Red stood up to properly while she drank the health potion and watched the fight.
Ammy and Brett were standing close to the chimeras hind legs on either side, now that the snake head was gone there was little it could do to attack them there. And they were taking full advantage attacking the monster with big swings. The chimera itself was looking in bad shape, and seemed to barely be able to stand up.
Red cracked her neck then dug out her dagger from the inside of the snake. Then she leapt back into the fray. Landing squarely on the chimeras back just behind the lion head, something occurred to her. She laid a hand against the lion heads neck and used clam, for a second she thought it worked, then the the lion roared and thrashed, almost dislodging her.
Oh well, she thought. And spun her dagger in her hand and brought it down onto the lions head. The whole monster stuttered for a second. Ammy and Brett again seized the opportunity and launched a deviating blow against the monsters body Ammy with a big over head swing and Brett with spun around with his axe. The monster let out one last pitiful roar, and fell to the side. Red rolled of it and then heard the tell tale ding of a level up.
“WOOO, WE DID IT” Brett said,
Ammy was throwing her fists in the air and shouting something similar.
Red looked at them both and laughed. Their armour was looking a little tattered and she could tell they had suffered some damage.
They each popped a potion and drank it, before strolling over to the monster to start picking at its remains. To get loot of wildlife in Shattered Worlds you needed to have the ‘butchery’ skill tree unlocked. It was an easy one to learn, and near enough everyone had it. Most of the players were unsure of why it was in the game at all.