The walk back was full of interesting defense strategies for William. Wallace was proving the value of his experience in spades. By the time they reached the village, the two had agreed to plan for a palisade to be set up around the village and a small ditch to be dug in front of the palisades to inconvenience attackers further. Now that they had Woodland to make use of, wooden defenses could be a feasible option and William discovered during that discussion that the tools they found in the village included axes amongst other equipment.
William considered who to leverage for some fantasy world deforestation then realized that he did not know many of the people’s professions from before and also what classes people were either. It was time to take stock of what resources they had available for their upcoming conflicts and survival. William dreaded the oncoming socializing that the task would require so he asked the others to stick with him. He told them it was to represent a stronger position, but it was really to make him feel a little bit reassured. The thought shook William a bit as it then clicked that he didn’t feel uncomfortable with his party any more. Did he...Have real companions?
William snapped out of his thoughts as Wallace patted him on the shoulder and pointed to where the other beasts were laid down, next to a pile of berries now emptied from Jane’s pack. William discarded the two beasts next to their dead kin and stretched his arms. William saw that everyone in the village stopped and gawked at the sight of them. William hoped that the strength he tried to exude in public was now reflected in his allies too. Less people would argue against a group of strong people than a solo person trying the same approach generally.
Wallace offered to gather people at the well which had now becoming the apparent main hub of the village. William accepted the offer instantly and he had a feeling Wallace knew that he wasn’t the strongest socialite that ever was. As William and the rest waited at the well as Wallace got to work, William’s father approached them.
“Good hunting I see,” He said with a faint expression of pride on his face.
“Thanks Dad, yeah we got a good amount of food for now I think. How have things been here?” William replied hoping he hadn’t missed anything important while away.
“Not much really Son, some posturing from the Duncans trying to wield some kind of authority they no longer have. Oh, a few of us working the field got a prompt thingy saying we acquired the Job of Farmer.”
“You got a job? That’s...really really good. It confirms some theories I had on this world.”
William then interrogated his father briefly and found out that Jobs gave out three skills when acquired, related to the Job attained. In a Farmer’s case, they got the skills, Fertilize, Plant, and Harvest. William was curious as to why there was no Grow skill as that is something he had recalled in previous games played, but guessed that the grow process was expected to be natural. Before William could ponder on it more, Wallace and the rest of the villagers had gathered nearby. As Wallace stepped beside William, it was time for some social interaction; his greatest foe.
“Thanks for your time everyone. I wanted to discuss our defenses and plans going forward regarding our upcoming...confrontation.” William said with a tentative start.
He paused speaking for a moment to get a feel for the crowd. Most people looked concerned as he mentioned confrontation, except the Duncans who were on top form of giving William the stink-eye.
William eyed them briefly and gave them a mocking look briefly before continuing, “I have been speaking with Wallace here and we think that with the nearby woodland we found, we can make use of the abundant wood supply to form some defenses. Namely a palisade, and ditch to start with.”
Some murmurs resounded as members of the crowd discussed amongst themselves. William let them, as pauses in speaking were a boon for him.
After a couple moments, something more akin to a living headache happened as Walter spoke up, “And who are you to be making decisions like that?”
William facepalmed at that and turned to look at Walter before saying, “I’m me. We all decided to stay, but no one has discussed how we survive. I took the initiative with Wallace.”
“Why weren’t we consulted first?” Walter said pointing at himself and his parents who were still glaring at William.
“Because you’ve not done anything useful so far for anyone here but yourselves. Who are you to have a say in things when you just consume food and resources for free. You and your family know farming stuff so why haven’t you all been helping with the crops we’ve started growing?” William said, crossing his arms and staring at them with a bored expression.
Allan was the next to speak up, stepping past his son, “We quite frankly don’t appreciate the disrespect everyone has shown us. We looked after everyone before you were forced from your pig sty of an existence.”
William bellowed in laughter at that as he replied, “That was then, this is now. I’m not going to die to incompetency from self entitled pricks like you and yours. Respect is earned, and this world is a clean slate, so get to earning some. I suggest learning civility as a good start.”
William watched as Allan clenched his fists and his face redden in an instant before he stepped back and shut up. William was starting to feel perspiration on his chest and back bead up as his discomfort at the social situation increased. Just as Walter decided to be an annoying bastard and chime in again.
“And where does someone like you get off telling others what to do?” Walter said, with rising heat in his voice as Walter stepped a couple steps closer.
William noticed that the guy had his sword sheathed and buckler on his arm. William could tell a fight was coming. Not much of one as William realized that only his party knew William's full skills and current levels. Oh he was going to humiliate Walter here and send an important message. The simple age old message of not being a cunt.
William took a step forward and smirked before saying, “We're in a world that demands strength from those who live here. As the strongest here, why shouldn’t I work to ensure the survival of those who may not currently be strong enough to do the same? What can you do currently?”
Walter drew his sword, and started approaching William, “I can fucking gut you!”
William laughed mockingly, drawing his own sword before replying, “You can try.”
As the pair reached one another, Walter’s sword was brought down in a cleaving motion towards William. William casually side stepped the strike and in a sweep with his buckler and arm, batted the sword out of Walter’s hand. With a clang, the sword hit the stone wall circling the well.
“Walter, you aren’t even a warm up for me. I'd give up if I was you.” William said, as he watched Walter scurry to collect his sword.
William noticed people including his father and party about to step in to stop the fight. William wanted to educate Walter however so he spoke up, “No one get involved, I don’t intend to kill him, just humble him.”
“You can humble my foot up your ass, bastard!” Walter yelled before charging at William full speed.
William side stepped once more, realizing that differences in dexterity points was significant. What felt simple to him turned into a blindingly quick dodge from Walter’s perspective. A perspective painted red as William’s sword came down on Walter’s sword hand severing it clean off. Walter hit the ground and screamed.
The crowd gasped and Walter’s parents ran over to him as William stepped back. “No bullshit, who here has the Medic class?”
The crowd’s murmuring fell silent as several people raised their hands including Steve and Miss Jones.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
William continued, “Everyone with that class cast a healing spell on Walter here. It hopefully will get you to level two. Levels in your classes are what will keep you from dying to this world, so quickly get to it before he bleeds out.”
A small group of five people stepped forward and all cast the healing spell on Walter. A red amalgamation of muscle grew from Walter’s stump as his hand was reformed. As William watched the Medics stare into space, he knew that they all had just levelled.
William wanted to get back on topic however, “To those who just levelled up, speak to Jane as she is a level five medic currently so you can get the stat allocation for your class from her.”
William noticed that Jane felt slightly uncomfortable at that, but she was more social than he was.
Getting back on topic, William added, “I want to determine who has what classes here so we can form a defense plan at a later point. Mages and Archers for ranged defense, Fighters and Scouts for close combat, Medics and Enchanters for support, and make no mistake, when they attack, you will need to fight as they will be trying to kill you all. As such, I will list the class, and you will step forward if it’s your primary class and group up so we can get firm numbers. That applies to you as well Duncan family.”
The family of three nodded but still gave him looks of pure hatred as the parents held Walter in their arms.
It started with the medics that had stepped up to heal Walter move into a small cluster to the right side of the well. Mages were next and William counted four, excluding his party. Archers were next and four people stepped forward, William’s mother included, though she looked very uncomfortable. Fighters then followed, with William’s father stepping forward, surprising him.
William briefly asked, “Where’s your weapon and shield?”
His father shrugged slightly and said, “Didn’t like carrying them around so I left them in the hut.”
That was something William needed to change later.
William watched his father walk over to an empty space and was then joined by three others including Walter. Scouts were then called up, and they were comprised of Allan, Leanne, Jane’s friend Jill, and one other. Finally were the Enchanters and he watched as the remaining four people formed a group.
William took a mental tally of roles:
Nine supports, eight ranged DPS, eight melee DPS, then his Party of five on top of that.
Not too bad of a split He thought. William considered team structures and counted twenty five others. William split the teams as defense and offence. He committed four ranged and three physical DPS to join six supports as a defensive force. Then formed the offence teams to split into three parties of four with one support per party, which all supports in them would be medics, then three other DPS would make up the remainder of each party. That split came with two mobile teams that consisted of two ranged DPS and one physical DPS being a scout. The final team was the barrier team. The team consisted of one Scout, two Fighters, and a medic. William’s idea was for that team to be the hard hitting and sturdy team that holds enemies in place while the two mobile teams focus on ranged attacks to pick the enemies off from a distance. Everyone outside of those teams would be committed to defense tasks.
William made sure to keep the Duncans on defense as he didn’t want them jeopardizing any teams that would be fighting enemies head on. William kept his mother on the defense team too, knowing she wouldn’t want to actively fight anyone. William also kept his father on defense as he felt that his father wouldn’t want to be away from his mother. William allowed people to volunteer for a specific task on a first come first serve basis. This culminated in Miss Jones, Jill, and Steve all being part of the defense team. Some debates broke out between the people but William emphasized that the point was to avoid as much conflict as possible. This made people settle down slightly.
What felt like an eternity of organizing defenses and classes was in-fact only an hour of time. William called an end to the meeting, leveraging several people to come with him and his party to the forest with axes to do some logging. He was hoping for them to get a job like his father had got. Lumber-Jack, or Logger, or something of the sort. He knew such jobs would be invaluable.
About two hours after the meeting, William’s party and his Job ‘Candidates’ heard and saw the first tree fall down. He then got confirmation that the four people he brought along, including Steve, had all gained the Lumber-jack Job. It came with the Skills; Enhanced Chop, Preparation, and Weak-point Detection. After being told what they did, William had summarized that the skills made the user intuitively know where and how to chop the tree to cut it down safely.
The next two weeks were a blur of activity as William managed to rotate parties to join his own that guarded the Lumber-jacks while they worked, fighting off Lynxes and other beasts in the process. By the end of those weeks, a small ditch encircled the village. The palisade was completed to the North and the East, forming a semi circle of wood around the perimeter. Food supplies were high, and through rotating people out on each expedition, the average level of the village had increased to three. Knowledge of skills and allocations were shared as well. William’s party had also gained some levels, but only when they had to step in if a Lynx or something was about to kill one of the weaker parties.
William wouldn’t have minded more levels overall but felt it was more important to give the designed parties the space to form their own synergies. His party did give advice however, though it was mostly William as he referenced his abundant RPG knowledge. The final tally was that John, Stacey, and Wallace were all level five like Jane, but she was close to level six as she did have to heal a couple people in those weeks, though they were so low level to her that the EXP was minor. William had reached Human Level nine, Fighter Level six, and Enchanter Level four, and now boasted fully enchanted equipment. His Sword was now enchanted with Syphon, Speed, Restoration, and Power Runes, His shield had Restoration, Shield, and Speed Runes, His boots had Speed and Restoration Runes, The Jerkin and Pants he had on were enchanted with Restoration and Shield Runes, and Finally, his daggers were Enchanted with Speed, Syphon, and Power Runes.
William had learned through some magical sense that the amount of runes that could be added to a piece of equipment depended on the material and size of the enchanted item. He could feel that he was at capacity now for his current equipment. William didn’t mind, he had made use of every inch of item he had with his enchantments and now he felt powerful. He consulted his Character Sheet to gauge his progress:
{Ascension_Protocol}
{Character Sheet – William Level 9}
{Attributes:}
- Strength: 44
- Dexterity: 43
- Intelligence: 27
- Wisdom: 27
- Vitality: 28
- Charisma: 17
{Classes:}
[Primary – Fighter Level 6] [Secondary – Enchanter Level 4]
{Class Skills:}
[Fighter Skills:]
- Swift Thrust - Indomitable Parry - Shield Bash - Dagger Toss
- Empty
[Enchanter Skills:]
- Runic Imbuing - Mana Conversion - Mana Investment - Empty - Empty
[Racial Skills:]
- Identify
[General Skills:]
0 out of ∞
{Jobs:}
- Empty - Empty - Empty
{Job Skills:}
Job 1 – 0/5
Job 2 – 0/5
Job 3 – 0/5
{Titles}
Brutal Man-Slayer
Relentless Combatant
{Current Resource Pools:}
HP 280/280
MP 270/270
SP 440/440
{End}
William was feeling satisfied, though he hoped to get a job soon, but he wanted something that wasn’t farming or logging related honestly. He sat on the crest of the Northern hill, looking at the village. The mood was in higher spirits lately, bellies were filled, defenses were growing, people were bonding, and overall, William felt like the village was becoming home. They had decided to call the village Greenwell. A very unoriginal name, but a lot of place names always were. William was relaxing in the midday sun taking some time to be alone. He had become slightly more comfortable in social circumstances, but did enjoy some alone time. He was interrupted however as he had a bad feeling crawl up his spine.
William turned around and at the crest of the next hill, he saw three figures emerge. The worst part was the attire they wore. He knew immediately who they were; The Bandits.