Four hundred years ago, in the kingdom of Avant, the decade long war against their neighboring kingdoms to the north and south were a success. Ever since that day, Avant rose up as the strongest kingdom in the country, famed for their battle hungry warriors and incredible healers. Avant and the country in which it stood were surrounded by giant mountains, so tall no man could leave to see what was on the other side. Until one day, someone finally escaped. Not a fierce warrior or a sacred priest on a pilgrimage, but a simple illusionist.
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Year: 385 AC (Avant Calender)
A group of young children sat in a school house, waiting for their teacher to finish preparing the lesson for today. The youngest was around six, the oldest twelve, and they were all chatting amongst themselves as they waited. All except one young boy. He sat near the back of the class, not actively ignoring everyone else, but it seemed as though everyone understood he didn’t want to talk, and they didn’t particularly want to talk to him. He was about eight years old, yet rather tall and lankey for his age, with jet black hair that was rather well kept and very pale skin. He also had plenty of bruises and cuts all over his body.
He wore simple peasants clothes like most of the other orphan children in the room, separating them from the more wealthy children of the village. The teacher clapped her hands, and everyone looked up towards the front of the class.
“Alright kids, today is a very special day. Today we’re going to talk about exactly how the soldiers of the kingdom get so strong. Now, have any of you ever been outside of the village?
A few of the richer kids raised their hands,and the teacher nodded.
“Good, now i’m sure when you were outside you noticed monsters roaming around the forests near the village. Soldiers will sometimes go into our forests, clearing out monsters to make sure the smaller towns are safe, but something very special happens when they someone kills a monster.” The teacher said, drawing a picture of a slime and a wolf as examples
“Normally I would be the one to explain what happens. But, a traveling mage happened to be passing through our village, and I asked him if he would be willing to speak to the class about it! So everyone, please greet Mr. Zayan!” The teacher said, pointing to a spot next to her. The children were confused, as there was nobody next to her, until the air around the spot shimmered. A man appeared out of thin air, dressed in fine red silk robes. He appeared to be decently old, his brown hair just starting to gray, and he smiled as the children gasped at his entrance.
“Hello there children. I’m sorry if I scared you, invisibility spells can be quite hard to notice! Now, as your teacher said, when you or anyone else kills a monster they get access to an incredibly important resource. Points. These allow us to increase our abilities, and unlock new ones simply by spending points.”
A young girl raised her hand at the front of the class.
“Yes, you at the front?”
“Are they really just called points?”
“Yes, aparently the gods were feeling very uncreative when they created them.”
A wave of laughter broke out over the class and Zayan waited for it to pass before he started talking again.
“Now, what you can buy with these points is incredibly varied. You can increase your physical attributes, learn how to do new things, or even trade these points for money at certain areas in the kingdom. Magic like mine works slightly differently, as us mages still have to study the basic principles of magic. But it is still possible for us to learn new spells through spending points. Would you like to see some of these spells?”
The children excitedly nodded, all except for one boy in the back who seemed indifferent the whole time Zayan was talking.
“Alright then, I mostly focus on illusion spells such as invisibility, as I showed you earlier. With illusion magic you can create things that aren’t actually there.” He said, doing some spellwork and manifesting a fake owl on his shoulder.
“You can appear in two places at once!” He summoned a duplicate of himself, and while it didn’t look perfect, in the heat of a battle it could very easily trick someone.
“Or, you could even change your appearance and voice!” He blocked his face with his hands, and when he moved them the children saw he looked entirely different, now appearing to be a young blond woman. Most of the class clapped at this display, but the boy in the back was simply staring at the mage. Up until this point, the child had been very bored with this whole class, mostly ignoring what was happening and thinking about stealing some food from the local bakery. When he saw the magician use this spell however, he was more then impressed. He was in awe, although he didn’t really understand why.
“Now, who here want’s to be first to try out using points?” Zayan said, and the boy’s hand was the first one up.
“Alright, you in the back, come on up. What’s your name young man?”
“James.” The child said, slightly bitter. He hated his name, it was so boring. Zayan smiled and nodded to the teacher, who walked out of the room for a second. When the door opened again, a town guard walked in, carrying a cage. Inside was a simple green blob, a slime. The mage held a small dagger out in his hand.
“Now, if your not up to the task of killing it I understand, we can take another-“
Before the man could even finish, James had grabbed the knife and stabbed into the creature. As it died and it’s form broke apart, James heard a voice.
“First point gained. Would you like to access the tree?”
“Now James, did you hear a voice just now?” Zayan asked, and he nodded.
“Good, that’s what we call the informant. It will inform you of certain things like how many points you have. Now, all you have to do to respond to it is think.”
James nodded and thought to himself.
“Yes.”
“Understood, unlocking tree.”
Suddenly, in front of Jame’s eyes, a screen appeared. He tried to touch it and felt he could, and he began moving it around looking at it.
“That, little one, is your skill tree. It’s how you unlock most abilities you will ever achieve.”
“How do I get the thing you did earlier?Where you looked different?”
“Oh, that’s an advanced level magic. First you would have to learn the basics of magic, then get a great number of points.” He said, and James sighed. Alright, just study magic and get points, he could do that. As he was looking at the tree, he noticed a section on the left that was filled with question marks.
“What’s with all these question marks?”
“Ah yes, that is one of the few mysteries about the skill tree that is yet to be solved. No one has figured out how to unlock those skills, so we can only assume they are highly powerful. Now, who else want’s to do what James here did?”
As the children all began to raise their hands, and the soldier left to get more slimes, James looked around his skill tree. He looked for any skills that only took one point, which wasn’t hard as he couldn’t gain access to higher level skills without buying smaller ones first. The main one that caught his eye was called Scan. He touched it, but no description popped up. It simply said “Aquire skill?” with a yes and no option. He clicked yes, and he felt odd as the skill unlocked.
He looked around, and didn’t seem to see anything change. So clearly it wasn’t just always working. So instead, he turned his attention to the magician and simply thought the words scan.
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[Zayan Wei]
Notice: Skill level too low to glean any additional information.
These thoughts rushed through James head, as he briefly saw another screen appear, displaying Zayan’s full name. On the one hand, this was interesting, as he had no idea what the magicians last name was. On the other hand, James was currently on the floor because his head felt like exploding. The teacher and Zayan quickly rushed over.
“What’s wrong with him?” The teacher asked worryingly.
“I think I know. Young man, did you happen to unlock a skill called Scan?”
He nodded, and Zayan sighed.
“Well, I forgot to mention, you shouldn’t use that skill. It takes extreme mental fortitude to use such a skill, and as it’s strength rises so to does the pain of using it. Even great mages only use the lower levels of this ability on occasion.”
James sat up, panting. So this skill hurt him, that wasn’t great. But if he used it, he would have a distinct advantage considering no one else wanted to use it. For now, James could only think of one thing.
“Teacher, can I be excused?”
“Of course James, go head back to the orphanage, get something for your head pains.”
James nodded and left. Zayan looked back to the other students, who were gathered around another slime.
“Alright, who’s next? You’ll need- hm? Uh oh, where did my dagger go? Did that young boy keep it?” Zayan asked, looking around the room for his dagger.
James did not end up going back to the orphanage. He went straight for the woods. After all, if he wanted to be a master illusionist to get that spell, he had to start working now. Why did he want that spell? He could think about that later. Or not. He prefered not.
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Year: 395 AC (Avant Calander)
Lian stirred his cauldron, carefully adding the herbs as he did. If he moved too quickly, the mixture wouldn’t come together properly. As the only alchemist in a very small unnamed village, the other villagers relied on for medicines, so he couldn’t afford to mess up. He was an older man at sixty three, his dark skin covered in wrinkles. He was just happy his hair wasn’t going grey, that seemed to be the last part of him that would go. The last step was to add some slime gel. He reached up to his shelve, opening the pot, and realized it was practically empty. It must have been that time of day already.
No sooner had he thought that before the door to his shop slammed open. A young man stood there, extremely tall at nearly six foot seven, with very wild looking black hair. He was wearing some very basic armor, simple leather and padding, and had cuts all over his body. The one place he seemed oddly well kept was his face, which was incredibly well shaven.
“Good to see you James. How was the haul today?”
“Eh, bad luck today. Only got three pots worth.” James said, slightly flinching at his own name. James was… well he wasn’t doing great. Ten years of basically doing nothing but fighting slimes and learning magic would do that to you, especially if you were ignoring all your other problems. He always felt on the brink of giving up, but he forced himself to go out and keep fighting. Anything for that one last spell. At the very least, he could always sell the slime they dropped so he could eat.
“Alright, twelve gold pieces then.”
“Hang on, I thought we agreed three per pot? Why are you throwing me freebies now?”
“Well, I heard about you getting kicked out. Figured it was the least I could do considering you’ve kept me stocked for the last ten years.” Lian said. It was true that while James was supposed to get to stay at the orphanage until he was twenty, they kicked him out early, mainly due to him only being there to sleep and eat anyways.
“Well thanks then. I’ll see you tommorow.” James said, throwing a couple of the gold on the counter and grabbing a healing potion. It wouldn’t work instantly, but the worst of his injuries would be gone by tommorow. As he walked back to the forest, where he was currently camping out, he saw some children playing on the road. Two boys were pushing around a young girl.
“Look at her stupid pigtails, you look so dumb! I heard you can barely even read!” One said, pulling on her hair. James looked at this, remembering his youth. He was quite the figher when he was young, sometimes he was provoked and other times it was the opposite. But at the very least, he never ganged up on someone smaller then him. He walked over to the children.
“Hey, did your parents teach you any manners? You don’t touch people who don’t wanna be touched.”
The kids looked over at him, and all three looked extremely shocked.
“I know you, you’re the freak who lives in the woods!” The first boy said, and the other one punched his friend on the shoulder.
“Don’t make him mad! I heard he studies how to summon zombies or something!” Said the other, and James was slightly offended by that. Necromancy was an entirely different school then illusions. But James had respect for any types of magic users, they were all valid.
“Yeah that’s right, I summon zombies. Now get back home, it’s getting late.”
“Whatever creep, you think we’re scared of you?” The first boy said, walking up to him. Normally, James would just ignore this, but these kids clearly needed to learn a lesson.
“Hey, little girl. Check out that flower over there.” James said, pointing to a field nearby. The girl was confused, but she walked over and looked at it. Good, she wasn’t supposed to see what happens next. He looked down at the young boy in front of him.
“Nah, you aren’t scared of me. You’re probably scared of him though.” He pointed towards the forest. Both boys looked over, and saw something flash behind a tree as they looked.
“Wh-what was that?!” Boy number one (James had decided this was just his name now) said, looking back, only to see he was gone.
“Okay, let’s just go! This is getting freaky!” The second boy said, turning to leave, but when he looked back he saw something duck behind a cart nearby. He yelled, and began running the other way. His friend followed, but as they turned a street corner they saw it again, this time staying in sight for just a tiny bit longer. It was pale and extremely tall, with bone white skin. They turned around again, and this time saw nothing. They looked both ways over and over, and the creature appeared to be gone. The first boy sighed in relief, and looked to his friend.
“Let’s get the hell out of here!” He nodded and they turned back towards their houses. Their view was blocked by the gaping maw of the creature, it’s pitch black eyes staring them down. They screamed incredibly loud, and sprinted off in the other direction. Nearby, James was sitting on the ground laughing, as his invisibility spell wore off. The creature disapeared, and the little girl turned around confused as the two boys ran away screaming. James walked over to her.
“Hey, those boys give you any trouble again, you just tell them the pale man is a good friend of yours, alright?”
The girl nodded, and smiled, handing him the flower. It was a dandelion, his favorite.
“Aww, thanks. Now get on home, it’s getting dark.” He said, and the girl ran back home. James looked at her for a second, oddly jealous. He wasn’t sure why, perhaps he was longing for the days of his youth. He doubted it though, his youth was either terrible or killing slimes. It was more likely the opposite, he wished he could have had a regular childhood. Oh well, no point in worrying about that now. He walked back to his tent in the forest, laying down.
After a quick snack, he opened up his skill tree and moved to the next skill he needed. Blindness, seemed useful enough. He scanned it to see what it could do.
[Blindness]
[Cost: 30 MP]
[Effect: Inflict a foe with blindness, crippling their vision. Full effects will not trigger on especially strong foes.]
[Points Required: 300]
Well, that would be useful if he ever had to fight a challenging enemy. And he needed to take it anyways, so he grabbed the skill. He had finished maxing out the level of scan years ago, so he could actually tell what these skills did. The head pain was awful at first, but he managed to aquire another couple skills called Mental Resistance and Pain Resistance. Those were both at level ten as well, although that was not a fun process. He still didn’t feel amazing using it, but he could scan three or four times before he had to stop for a minute.
He looked back at the skill tree, and his eyes almost burst out of his head. The next skill on the path was called Alter Self. He scanned it as quickly as possible.
[Alter Self]
[Cost: 25% of current MP. This MP cannot be restored while activated.]
[Effect: Allows the user to change their physical appearance, including aspects like vocals. While the user does not physically change, the illusion can alter the feeling of touch, making the user and anyone else feel as though the altered body is real.]
[Points Required: 1000]
He thanked the gods that he had saved so many points, and quickly attempted to use his twelve hundred points to buy the skill. Unfortunately, a warning appeared.
“Error, this skill requires either a spell scroll or tutoring from another mage who already owns this skill to obtain. Please complete the requirements first.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?!” James said, fuming. He leaped out of the tent in frustration, slamming his fist into a nearby tree. Thankfully he remembered to use his basic enhancing magic first, and his fist left a large indent in the trunk.
“After all this fucking time, i’m still not done!” He said, stomping around in circles. He had spent ten years trying to get this spell, ten damn years. Fine, fine. If the system wanted to play him like that, he would deal with it. He went back into his tent, laying down to prepare for the next day.
He barely got any sleep that night, and as soon as he woke up he ran back to the village. He first walked into the bakers shop, and bought a few loaves of bread. He then went to the butchers, then the general store, all across the village buying everything he would need for a long trip. The capital city of the kingdom was only a week long trip walking. There was bound to be someone who could teach him that spell there. Finally, he walked into the alchemy shop. Lian looked over at him, suprised.
“Oh, you’re here early! Did you stay up all night again?”
“Sorry Lian, I got some bad news. I’m just here to get three healing potions. From now on, your gonna have to find someone else to source your slime from.” He said, and Lian looked extremely concerned.
“What the hell do you mean? Are you selling it to someone else now?”
“No Lian, i’m leaving. I need to go to Tristant, find a mage there. I probably won’t be back for a while.”
“Oh my…well, thank you for telling me. I must say i’m sad to see you go, not just for the buisness aspect either. Take care of yourself out there, okay?” Lian said, and James nodded.
“Of course. Thanks for putting up with me for all these years old man. Tell the kids at the orphanage I said goodbye. I’ll be back, no clue when though.” He said, and with a final wave, he walked off on the path into the woods.
Little did they know, they would come back a much different person, in more ways then one.