Hemogris Ravagers were the third and highest level variant present in the second revealed chunk. At level 45, Ravagers were dangerous and difficult to put down, with a stat distribution skewed toward defense and health. Like their weaker cousins, Ravagers sported a pair of curved fangs and a ratlike face that appeared perpetually wary with its incessant and shifty sniffing. They stood on their toes, causing their thick back to hunch slightly, but gave their long hairless tail room and leverage to stabilize their lanky frames.
That was where the similarities to the skirmishers and biters ended. Where the former were small at just over four feet tall, Ravagers towered above even me at over six feet. Dense slabs of lean, corded muscle clung desperately to their emaciated frames. Grotesque and impressive in equal measure. Their arms were elongated and enlarged to support the 8-inch claws that curled into razor talons sharp enough to cut through iron.
Only five stalked the third floor of the hemogris fort, but they were still far more dangerous due to their increased levels in conjunction with their incredible size and strength. Stepping forth onto the third floor instantly aggroed all five. The twisted passageways of the second floor were gone, replaced by a large open arena with nowhere to hide from the deceptively quick creatures.
The thing was, hiding wasn’t necessary.
Tanking all five simultaneously was not only possible but trivial. A maple campfire lit at the bottom of the ladder extended up to the third-floor landing, and each slab of cooked boar healed 9 points as a base. With the campfire boosting my recovery, the boar meat healed me 23.4 total health points. And that number only increased as my recovery level skyrocketed.
That increased the total recovery per food to almost 25, which was more than half my health. Perhaps if my defense wasn’t so high, the ravagers would have been more of a threat, but as it stood, I had more than enough time to unleash devastating moonstone-enhanced strikes in between bites.
I’d descended the tower several hours later, utterly disappointed. Sitting beside the edge of the world, I glumly watched the sunset as I palmed the drop I’d acquired from the ravagers. It was a set of hemogris fangs that were 100% the component required to complete the final crafting requirement in the chunk. The thing was, I was loathe to craft it.
I didn’t even fully understand why I was disappointed. It wasn’t like any of the other chunk objectives had been any different. It was just...it felt wrong that a couple of days grinding regular ol’ level 1 rats was enough to get stats high enough to storm a fort of powerful level 30+ warriors. I had been expecting a boss fight, to be honest. A real challenge that would require more than just slamming my back against a wall and spamming food.
The reality was this game was still wildly unbalanced. Recovery — and the firemaking stat by proxy — was the primary offender. There was a reason I was finding it harder to level that particular combat stat despite all the combat I was doing. It was the only stat that directly acted as a multiplier to another aspect of the world.
Weapons were capped in how much they increased attack. Using a copper weapon at level 10 attack gave a 30% boost to the stat. The same was true for upgrading to copper at level 20 and again for iron at 30. This meant that having a level-appropriate weapon capped the boost at around a 30% increase. A significant but not overbearing boost.
When looking at the cooking skill, a similar progression existed. With zero recovery, rat meat healed for 3 points. Upgrading to smoked snuffler and boar meat boosted that to 6 and 9, respectively. On the surface, this was a 2x and 3x multiplier and seemingly greater than weapons for the attack stat. The thing was, it was exactly the same if considering the food as a percentage of expected health. At 10 health, rat meat healed for 30% of my total. At 20 health, smoked snuffler did the same.
On the other hand, recovery broke this pattern by multiplying the existing multipliers inherent to the cooking skill. Without any significant investment, the skill boosted the effect of food by an additional 160%. At my current attack stat of 50, iron weaponry gave me a modest 18% bonus. Without recovery, eating boar meat equated to around 21% of my total health. With the recovery stat, though, that increased to 54% of my total health, or three times the effect I was getting from my adze. And that was with a recovery stat that was technically under-leveled.
The result was a skill that allowed me to heal far more than I should.
Which was the crux of the issue. In the game’s current state, any encounter of equal level would be completely trivial if I could properly prepare for it. Hiding under my shield and chewing on meat while five of the most dangerous beasts in the chunk attacked me wasn’t the kind of game I wanted to play. I didn’t want to beat the chunk objectives with overtuned stats. Sure, it would be easier, but I craved a challenge to test both my skills and my skills.
This world was suspiciously willing to accept my insight. Every notable item had been named by me, and while I hadn’t hand-chosen the challenges, the game had adapted to my difficulties. When I’d died to the rock golem, it had nerfed it. After the rat grind, the world had added two additional spawns to ease future grinds.
This left me with two options if I wanted the hemogris fort to change. Either I could process the hemogris fangs and complete the chunk objective, then hope the system changed things favorably. Or...I could die. Somehow, I didn’t feel like the former would get what I wanted.
Which meant I had to die.
“Don’t forget me when the world resets, ok?” I patted Fang’s back, running my fingers through his thick fur. He lolled happily, oblivious to the potentially dangerous memory wiping that might occur soon. I sighed. I had no intention of never completing any future chunk objectives on the off chance Fang forgot me. If I had my way, the world was going to reset many, many times. I just had to hope the system was merciful. If not, I'd just befriend the little softy again.
“Don’t forget me, ok?” I said again. Then I got up to go die.
I was oddly cheerful as I engaged the hemogris biters in open combat. Making the plans was always the hard part. Once they were made, I felt a great weight lift off my shoulders, and I found it easy to let the biter scrape away my health point by point. It was painful, but the knowledge that once my health hit zero, I would be fully healed made it easier.
Moments later, the world faded to darkness. I instantly burst out in my prerecorded speech on my grievances with the current iteration. Impossible tasks were bad. Trivial tasks just as much. The tasks should incorporate an element of skill, at least for the bosses. That was the general gist.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
The void echoed with my words, mute and silent. Deep in my chest, I felt the system continue its silent whirring. It changed things, moved things around, and updated the chunk objectives. All without any indication that it recognized my words.
The world opened up, and I noticed no immediate change. The wooden chest was still there, so I popped the lid as I got my thoughts in order. To my surprise, the contents of the chest hadn't reset along with the rest of the world. I pulled out the slab of meat curiously, then shook my head and tossed it back in. It was definitely a boon, but one for another day.
The chunk objectives hadn't changed, so I rushed over to the mining camp to collect tier-3 equipment. I forwent spined leather equipment as it would take too long and settled for tier-2 spotted leather. I did go out of my way to craft the adze.
Several level-up notifications buzzed as I mined over a hundred iron ore to find a moonstone.
I then raced across the chunk boundary to the hemogris fort. Instantly, I felt the changes in the system as the smoked snuffler only healed 9.2 health per bite. It was a significant nerf, but it was still more than enough for me to handle the six hemogris biters.
Stepping under the dark awning of the fort revealed Fang pacing restlessly in his cage. He yipped excitedly as I entered, nearly breaking the bars of his cage with his enthusiasm. He had kept his growth from the previous iteration and looked almost as large as the two adult wolves. I sighed in relief as I broke Fang free. He jumped onto me, affectionately licking and nuzzling me. I returned his enthusiasm with my own but frowned when the two adult wolves growled at us. They were more than ten levels below me, so either they were aggroing onto Fang, or the system had changed something about the aggression formula recently.
I put the thought out of my mind and gave Fang another cuddle. Then I ascended the ladder.
The second floor of the fort had gained a more sinister cast and was far more difficult this time. The ravagers had joined their skirmishing brethren, and together, they made the twisting, creaking platforms unreasonably dangerous. Despite none of the mobs increasing in level, every step was met with heavy resistance. I was forced to retreat repeatedly in order to funnel the enraged mobs into choke points. I couldn’t cheese the battles with food anymore, but that only allowed me to get more practice with my moonstone adze.
It took four separate attempts to break past their numbers and find the ladder to the third floor. I killed so many of the hemogris in those attempts that I gained an attack level and several recovery and hunter levels.
Poking my head out into the third floor, I was greeted with a completely different environment. The space was now enclosed with tall walls made of bone that cut off the view of the surrounding landscape. Dozens of chains hung from posts driven at random intervals around the room that clattered quietly in the wind. Spiked iron cages straight out of a fantasy novel hung with moldering skeletons rotting inside. Ravens cawed grimly down from their perches upon the cages.
A throne dominated the back of the floor, upon which a shrunken hemogris rested. The thing was old, with moth-eaten robes and a gnarled wooden staff resting against his knee. Upon my entrance, the creature slowly lifted its head and met my gaze. There was a brief moment as neither of us moved, content to assess each other and the environment before the inevitable conflict began.
I could almost hear boss-music startup.
I lit a maple campfire and hefted my weapon as the old hemogris stood from its throne. It snarled and raised its staff high. Light flared around the staff, and three of the iron cages rattled, depositing their contents on the ground. The bones with pieces of flesh still attached shuddered, pulling together and rising up into the shape of three skeletal hemogris biters. They twisted to face me, opening their mouths in silent screams.
I met their charge with a roar of my own. Swinging violently with my adze triggered the charge-up sequence, and I ducked beneath several clumsy blows. My adze flashed, and I impaled the first undead biter with my it. A whoosh of wind threw my hair back as the biter’s head exploded in fragments of bone and I flicked the adze to trigger the next charge.
A stab of pain at my hip had me twisting away from the grip of the second biter, only for a shard of bone as thick as my wrist to slam right into my collarbone. I staggered, somehow dodging a second wicked projectile from the boss and destroying the second biter’s skull with a lucky strike.
The third biter lunged at me, and I barely fended it off as I saw the boss chant in the background. Another flash of light erupted from his staff, and three more cages rattled with three more undead. I gaped, now faced with four ravening undead. Momentarily distracted, my foot stepped into my campfire, and I tumbled with the third biter chewing on my arm.
I rolled into the fall, shedding sparks and bones as I tanked several hits before exploding to my feet and sprinting at the boss. Killing the minions was pointless if it could just resummon them instantly.
The boss lifted its staff again, muttering a different chant that had a large shard of bone detach from the walls and hurl toward me at breakneck speeds. I grunted as the shard shattered against my shield. I jammed two chunks of smoked snuffler into my mouth as I ran, suppressing the nausea as I swallowed them whole. Wounds all over my body melded shut as I ducked around the summoned undead and charged the boss.
It screeched something unintelligible, and bone shards pelted me. I had closed the distance, however, timing my adze perfectly to deliver a devastating strike right to his temple. The boss was blown against the throne, dazed but not defeated by my powerful strike. Its minions were still far away, so I ripped into it blow after blow as if I were mining ore at the camp. Waiting for the moonstone to charge was not an option. I had to deal as much damage as possible right now.
The first undead reached me, and I leaped onto the throne for a scant few more seconds. I struck the boss again, feeling the sharpened silverback tusk rip into the creature's chest—
A pulse of crimson smoke erupted from the gnarled staff. It slammed into me, and the charging undead behind me with the force of a semi. All five of us were blown into the air and launched across the room. I collided with the far wall, and my breath crashed out of me. A storm of de-animated biter bones pelted me from above as I struggled to regain my bearings. My entire front felt like one massive bruise that even tossing back another piece of smoked snuffler didn't fully repair. Looking up, I saw the boss stand and shed his worn cloak with a contemptuous flick.
The boss screamed in rage, visibly emitting a crimson aura that pulsed darkly in time with some hidden heartbeat. He swiped his staff, speaking again, but this time in a far lighter and gentler language. I blinked, the soft alien words entirely incongruous as the entire arena began to shake.
Bones flew from the walls in a dizzying wave, revealing the mining camp in the distance. They coalesced, combining and attaching to each other in a shell in front of the boss. The boss' voice rose an octave, somehow rough despite the delicately flowing language it spoke. A ribcage formed, then six legs, then an immense tail made of endless vertebrae. I scrambled upright, barely attaining my feet, before I looked up to find the boss gasping triumphantly behind a giant headless bone behemoth.
I couldn’t help it. I grinned.