Chapter 024 (Rewrite) (Proofread)
------------------------------------------
‘ ‘ for thoughts.
“ “ for speech.
* * for actions.
Please point out any mistakes/inconsistencies you find and feel free to comment on anything regarding this FF.
If you enjoy reading this FF, please Rate & Review!
Warning: May contain mature content (18+) of an adult nature. Read at your own risk.
Just to be safe:
https%3a%2f%2flicensebuttons.net%2fl%2fby-nc-sa%2f4.0%2f88x31.png [https://licensebuttons.net/l/by-nc-sa/4.0/88x31.png]
Asunder Online (and all its chapters) by fidelc123 is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Google Drive Link
I have added the next section to this chapter, as the rewrite reduced its length. There is some additional content near the end...and it is quite lengthy!
Full Thanks to Mecani for Proofreading this Chapter!
------------------------------------------
~~~~Rewrite Edit starts~~~~~
Jacob completed an agonizing Monday at work. He was feeling very frustrated at having to interrupt his playtime of Asunder Online with his boring day job. He browsed through the notifications on his phone as he waited for the lift to take him to the parking level. As he exited the lift, he received a call which made him pause in his tracks.
Jacob: ‘Oh shit. I completely forgot about Valeria. I haven’t called her for more than three weeks, since I started playing Asunder Online. I am getting addicted to that stuff. Thanks for ruining my social life VDI! Valeria is sure to be extremely butthurt. Best not provoke her.’
Thinking about how to appease Valeria, he made his way near the security guard. After flashing his ID, instead of proceeding to his car, he received Valeria’s call on his cellphone.
(A/N: The following conversation takes place in Spanish.)
Jacob: “Hi mami! So how is—”
(A/N: mami: common Spanish slang, similar to babe in English… indicating a sexually desirable young female.)
Valeria: “So what was up with you asshole. You didn’t even call me for a month! Are you cheating on me?”
Jacob: “It isn’t like that babe! I was just too obsessed with Asunder Online. It’s the first Virtual Reality game, it’s quite something.”
Valeria: “A game? A GAME?? What are you…some kind of immature man-child? You didn’t call me in almost a month because you were too busy with a childish GAME?”
Jacob: “You should try it mami, it is hard to explain unless you experience it firsthand.”
Valeria: “Well have fun with your game, asshole. We are done.”
Jacob: “Wait babe. How about a proper date? Give me a chance to explain about Asunder On--” *Valeria cancels the call*
Jacob: ‘She seemed jealous I was spending so much time with Asunder Online. I didn’t even get an opportunity to explain.’
The Hispanic security guard was looking apologetically at him and muttered something along the lines of unreasonable women. Jacob just smiled and drove home from work. He took a quick shower, and was browsing the Asunder Online forums, while pondering his sudden breakup.
Jacob: ‘I will miss the sex, that’s for sure. If she was missing me, why didn’t she give me a booty call eh? I would have been glad to service her. We have been together almost a year. I thought we were beyond the dating ritual bullshit.’
Jacob: ‘But No. She called me just to throw a hissy fit and dump me. I bet she is expecting me to repeatedly call her and beg her forgiveness. That is not going to happen! I have my pride as a man too!’
Jacob: ‘All the airs about gender equality, but when it comes to dating they still expect traditional treatment eh. The man must approach the woman; the man must call first…bah. Women are more trouble than they are worth. Oh well, what is done is done. I will call her next week once, if she is reasonable then, good. Else it just means more time for Asunder Online.’
~~~~Rewrite Edit ends~~~~~
Resolving to work out the recent developments in his relationship by killing some mobs in Asunder Online, Jacob prepared a quick dinner. He sautéed some shrimps with carrots and peas in a buttered pan. He then prepared a sandwich with it and added some cheese. After having his dinner, Jacob stripped to his underwear, and waited to log into Asunder Online using FuDi mode as he fell asleep.
He regained consciousness in Asunder Online. He was somewhere in the wilderness, perched up a tree. He consulted his map. The mysterious clearing of the druids would require quite a bit of traveling. He noticed that his map didn’t give many details about the terrain, beyond that it was in the wilderness. He sighed, climbed down the trees and proceeded to travel towards the mysterious clearing.
Jack: ‘If one thing sucks about this game…it is all the fucking traveling. Couldn’t the AI have compressed the landscape a bit? Really shitty decision there Overlord AI, you hear me?’
As he travelled through the wilderness, most of the low-leveled predators like wolves and bears were avoiding him. He was getting itchy trigger fingers and was looking for something to kill, but didn’t want to chase after the fleeing wildlife. After a couple of hours of jogging, his danger sense alerted him to a hostile encounter ahead.
Jack slowed down and cautiously scouted ahead. He saw a trio of humanoids patrolling. They were around seven feet tall, muscular but lightly armored in animal pelts. Instead of hair, they had light brown shaggy fur, with dark spots on the exposed parts of their body. However, their most notable feature was their canine heads. It resembled that of a hyena, and their red eyes looked absolutely sinister!
Jack: ‘Gnolls? They look strong, but I probably should be able to handle them. Two of them look like hard hitting melee warriors with their big two handed axes. The last one is an archer, with its longbow. I should get close as possible and take out the archer ASAP, before I deal with the remaining two Gnoll warriors.’
He then activated entropic leech, force claws on both his hands and mana fists on both his legs. As he stealthily approached them, the direction of the wind suddenly changed, and the gnolls sniffed the air in his direction.
Jack: ‘Looks like the walking doggies sniffed me. Oh well might as well start nuking them now.’
He then fired a couple of soul strikes in quick succession at the gnoll archer and prepared a fire breath as he rushed at them. Each soul strike damaged the gnoll archer for around 18% HP. The gnoll archer fired an arrow towards him. He was able to predict its trajectory accurately and dodged preemptively as the two gnoll warriors engaged him in melee. The warriors were surprisingly agile.
Even in the AoE of entropic leech, he had difficulty keeping up with them. They swung their axes at him, and he dodged one cleanly but the other great-axe grazed him damaging him for around 5% HP. Jack then unleashed the fire breath he had prepared. All the three gnolls were caught in its AoE.
The warrior gnolls lost around 30% HP each, whereas the gnoll archer was damaged for almost 40% HP, leaving it with barely a third of its HP remaining. While the burning DoT took effect and the gnolls were distracted, he took this opportunity to evade the warriors and rolled into melee range of the gnoll archer.
He then used his force claw enhanced right hand to stab at the gnoll archer’s crotch. It howled in pain and lost almost 20% HP, leaving it with around 15% HP. He then got on his feet, and took advantage of the gnoll in pain to stab at its neck with his other hand. The archer gnoll’s throat ruptured and it fell dead, bleeding from its crotch and throat.
The warrior gnolls had recovered and one of them managed to land a clean hit on Jack’s shoulder. Jack lost a whopping 15% HP, leaving him with around 80%. He staggered and rolled sideways, successfully avoiding another smash of a great axe.
Jack: ‘These doggies should be pretty high leveled. They are quite agile, even in the AoE of entropic leech and hit quite hard! They seem to have obscene HP too. Fortunately their magic defense is low and my breath hits them for around a third of their HP.’
He then unleashed a soul scream, which combined with his entropic leech gave him a few seconds to create some distance. He fired a couple of soul strikes at one of the gnolls and prepared a fire breath. As the gnolls recovered and charged at him, he released his prepared fire breath and lunged at the gnoll with lower HP.
His breath attack, combined with his earlier soul strikes left the gnoll with barely 5% of HP. A single slash from his force claw enhanced hand ended its life. The last remaining gnoll swung its axe at him, and grazed him for another 5% HP, leaving him with around three fourths of his HP.
He engaged the last gnoll in melee and activated mana gloves in his left hand. As the gnoll swung it’s two handed axe at him, he used his left hand to parry it and fired a force blast. The axe’s trajectory had changed and the gnoll was rendered vulnerable. He took this opportunity to smash his knees into the gnoll’s crotch, damaging it for almost 10% HP and it howled in pain, dropping its weapon and crouching.
Jack was in grappling range of the unarmed gnoll, and could smell its foul breath. He used his force claw enhanced forefinger and middle fingers to stab the gnoll’s eyes. His fingers sunk almost to his knuckle and the gnoll lost near a quarter of its HP, leaving it with a third. The blinded gnoll recovered and bit his arm, causing him to lose another 10% of HP.
Jack gritted his teeth, endured the pain, and used his free arm to stab the gnoll’s exposed throat with force claws. The gnoll let go of his arm and had barely 15% HP left. He then backtracked and fired a void bolt, finally killing it. He then collected their weapons and armor. They were sturdy, but of poor craftsmanship. The group of gnolls in total had given him around 10% exp. However, the battle with the gnolls had been intense and he had around 65% HP left.
Jack: ‘These gnolls provided me a lot more exp than those lizards. However, these are a lot tougher even with entropic leech and my HP loss isn’t sustainable for multiple battles with them. I will nuke the next gnoll group from range, and avoid melee. I guess I will need Charlie’s help to deal with larger groups of gnolls. But the cool-down… he might be unavailable when I REALLY need him.’
He then hacked off a forearm of the gnoll archer and roasted it, using his sword as a skewer. The constant jogging had depleted quite a bit of his satiety and he intended to recover it before moving on. After the skin was charred and the meat cooked, he took a bite from it.
Jack: ‘This tastes something between pork and goat meat. It is quite a bit tougher and smells like matted fur though. Not bad, not bad at all! I might as well roast a few gnoll limbs for the road.’
After he finished his grisly meal, he collected a couple of arms and roasted it before storing them in his inventory. He then shoddily buried the corpses, so as to not attract more of its kin and other wild animals, after looting their fangs and claws. He climbed up a nearby tree. He sat on one of the sturdier branches. He meditated for around five minutes to recover his lost HP and PP before proceeding further into the wilderness.
As he travelled, he encountered larger gnoll groups with increasing frequency. Having witnessed the melee prowess of the gnolls firsthand, he refrained from engaging in melee. He relied on his ranged spells to damage them. He used force blasts in conjunction with his parkour skills to evade the gnolls and keep himself at a distance, often overhead from the gnolls in the forest canopy.
The dense distribution of trees actually hindered the gnoll’s mobility, while aiding his evasive maneuvers and providing him cover from their archers. Fortunately, he hadn’t encountered any gnoll caster yet. Using these ranged tactics, he was able to deal with the gnolls in relative safety without having to summon Charlie, with the tradeoff being that the battles were more PP intensive and took a lot longer.
~~~~Additional part after rewrite starts~~~~~
After a few hours of travelling, with intermittent killing of groups of gnolls, he encountered an exceptionally large group of gnolls. There were around ten of them. Most were warriors with two handed weapons, but three of them were archers and one of them looked like a caster wielding a staff with a crude gem on top.
Jack: ‘I think that’s the first gnoll caster. Is it a healer/buffer or a nuker? Either way if the group catches me I am screwed. I could avoid them… but might as well use Charlie. I will never level up his skill, if I am always afraid of his cooldown.’
He then stealthily circled the group of gnolls. He got as close as he dared to the caster. Then he mentally imagined Charlie materializing a couple of meters from the caster and using his Soulfire Breath. Charlie wasn’t summoned and nothing happened.
Jack: ‘Oh great. How the fuck should I summon Charlie now? I don’t want to shout out the skill name like those system-assist reliant idiots and alert all the fucking gnolls about my position. I modeled Charlie on a Pokemon. Meh might as well try it.’
Jack then concentrated intensely on the mental image of the child form of Charlie. As he did so he tried to simultaneously channel soul and fire mana. Channeling one element for a new spell was difficult enough, so he expected his first attempt to channel soulfire in failure.
However, to his surprise the soul and fire mana combined easily, as if he had repeated the process a hundred times. He channeled the soulfire mana into his right hand and formed it into the shape of a ball, a few inches in diameter. It looked like a translucent light orange cricket ball. He then threw the soulfire ball in an overhead arc, aiming for it to land a couple of meters from the gnoll caster.
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
(A/N: Cricket is a sport played by Britain and some of its former colonies. A cricket ball looks like this )
Jack: ‘Child Charlie! I choose you! Use soulfire breath and fuck up that caster!!’
As the soulfire ball landed near the gnoll caster, Jack felt a mild wave of dizziness. The soulfire ball flashed in his spirit senses and Charlie materialized. He opened with a soulfire breath. Visually it was like a fire breath, but the flames were of a lighter shade and transparent, almost translucent. The surprise attack caught the gnoll caster, a gnoll archer and a couple of gnoll warriors. The warriors lost around 20% HP each, the archer lost slightly more while the caster gnoll lost a little over a fourth of its HP.
Jack: *visualizing Charlie stabbing the gnoll caster in its throat* ‘Good work Charlie! Now quickly activate Fiery Claws, Blazing Swiftness and focus on the caster! I will join you shortly’
There seemed to be a telepathic link between Jack and his summon, as Charlie executed his mental instructions and he felt a wave of emotion from Charlie. His summon seemed pleased at his praise and redoubled his efforts. Charlie was coated in a shimmering translucent orange field and his claws were on fire. Charlie performed a short jump and stabbed the gnoll caster in its throat, interrupting its spell-casting and damaging almost a third of its HP!
The gnoll caster had around 40% HP left and Jack prepared a mana breath, tapping into his soul and fire affinities. And like his earlier act of summoning Charlie, he could instinctively balance the amount of soul and fire mana without any difficulties. The warrior gnolls nearest to Charlie were readying for an attack, while the archer gnoll was retreating.
He unleashed a soulfire breath, catching the gnoll caster, retreating gnoll archer, around three gnoll warriors and Charlie in its AoE and activated Entropic Leech. His soulfire breath was more potent than Charlie’s and it finished off the caster, but Charlie was unaffected. The warrior gnolls and the archer gnoll lost around a third of their HP. The archer gnoll barely had a third of its HP left, a couple of warrior gnolls had around 50% HP left.
These were the enemies Charlie had hit with his sneak breath attack. The other warrior gnoll Jack had managed to hit had around 70% HP left. As they were about to get swarmed, Jack utilized a soul scream and retreated preparing another soulfire breath.
Jack: ‘Retreat Charlie, retreat! Use another soulfire breath and target the doggies I am targeting.’
He then unleashed another soulfire breath, taking care to aim it at the gnoll archers and mentally imagined them roasting. His summon seemed to get the idea and aimed his soulfire breath so that its AoE overlapped with his. The combined breath reduced the two gnoll archers from full health to around 45% and finished off the previously weakened archer! A couple of gnoll warriors were also caught in the crossfire and their health was reduced to around 40% and 70%.
Jack:’you are faster than me Charlie. Rely on your speed, blazing swiftness and fiery claws for hit and run tactics.’
He mentally instructed his summon as he fired off soul strikes at one of the remaining archers, retreating with the aid of force blast enhanced jumps. Each of his soul strikes damaged the gnoll archer for a little less than 20% HP, reducing its HP to under a tenth. Meanwhile Charlie was harassing the gnoll warriors with slashes from his fiery claw and using his tail whip to trip them.
Though his summon had lower magic damage potential than him, his physical attributes more than made up for it. That combined with his blazing swiftness, enabled him to dodge most of the two handed attacks of the gnoll warriors. His summon was grazed multiple times however, and had lost around 10% of his HP.
While Charlie was dealing with a trio of Gnoll warriors, three other gnoll warriors charged at him howling in rage. Two of them were at full health and the last one was a little under 40% HP. He used a force blast enhanced jump to reach an overhanging tree branch. As he swung like a monkey from branch to branch, he prepared a soulfire breath and unleashed it at the pursuing warriors as he performed a backflip to face them.
Two of the pursuing warriors had their HP reduced to around 70% and the last one was almost dead, with barely 7% HP left. As he was falling, he aimed a void bolt at the gnoll warrior in critical condition, finishing it off. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed three additional bars on the left-center of his field of view. The topmost bar was red in color and was down to 60%. It was the HP/MP/STA bars of his summon.
Jack: ‘Looks like Charlie is in trouble. I need to aid him. Charlie, focus on evasion, I am coming!!’
He mentally instructed his summon to focus on evasion and ran towards him, unleashing a soul scream to disorient the pursuing gnoll warriors. His summon had managed to dispose of a gnoll archer and warrior. His summon was currently engaged in melee with two gnoll warriors while the last remaining archer was taking potshots at his pet. He fired a couple of soul strikes in quick succession, willing them to home in on the gnoll archer. The gnoll archer lost a little more than third of its HP, still left with around 10% HP.
The couple of gnoll warriors pursuing Jack had almost caught up to him. He jumped to a nearby tree branch, narrowly dodging a running overhead chop from one of them them, as he did an impressive pullup and balanced his weight on it. He fired a void bolt at the gnoll archer finishing it off. He then prepared a fire breath and jumped at the warriors engaged in melee with his summon.
He released his fire breath catching Charlie and both the gnoll warriors in its AoE. He used force blasts to slow his fall, and landed on all fours, rolling with the impact. One of the gnoll warriors engaged with Charlie had its HP reduced to a little less than a fifth, while the other had around 40% HP left. To Jack’s surprise, Charlie had regenerated around 13% of HP!
Jack: ‘That was a fire breath, not a soulfire breath! And it healed you! Finish the weakened warrior Charlie!’
He the lunged from his crouching position towards the gnoll warrior with higher HP as Charlie slashed the other gnoll warrior a couple of times and finished it. He was able to stab the other gnoll warrior in its neck with his mana claw enhanced hand, causing it to lose almost 20 % HP. Preoccupied with the safety of Charlie, he had failed to notice that the two warrior gnolls pursuing him had caught up to him.
He received two, almost simultaneous, two handed blows, one in each thigh. This combination attack caused him to scream in pain and fall down, losing almost half of his HP! Hearing his verbal and mental scream, Charlie rushed towards him. Through his pain jack noticed that something was different about him.
The translucent orange field around Charlie, which indicated that Blazing swiftness was active, had changed. It had compressed, and the field was dark red. The scales of his summon had shifted from their usual glittering copper color to a deep vermilion. His whole body seemed to be dimming the nearby light. The eyes of his summon were entirely black, and he was unable to distinguish the whites and the pupils.
Charlie was constantly losing HP, as if he were under a DoT poison effect. However, he seemed a lost faster and stronger. With one casual swipe of his claws, he finished off the gnoll warrior Jack was attacking, taking almost 20% HP in one slash! He then jumped over Jack and headbutted one of the gnoll warriors who had attacked him.
Jack turned on his back and saw that his summon was disregarding his defense, and seemed to be berserk! He was biting and slashing one of the gnoll warriors, reducing its HP rapidly. However, the other gnoll warrior had managed to land two clean hits with his two handed axe, and his summon disregarded any attempts to dodge. In the short time that took Jack to prepare a fire breath, Charlie’s HP had reduced to half, and he had finished off one of the gnoll warriors, and leapt like a wild beast on the other gnoll warrior.
His summon received an overhead slash head on losing around 10% HP, and wrapped its tail around the gnoll warriors arm. Using the momentum of the gnoll’s slash and his wrapped tail as a support, Charlie swung his body like a pendulum and embedded all four of his claws on the gnoll’s body.
His summon was upside down and bit the gnoll warrior’s crotch, while simultaneously stabbing the gnoll’s body with all four of his limbs alternatively. The gnoll warrior was howling in pain and was desperately trying to dislodge Charlie. However, its massive two handed weapon was acting as a deterrent and the best it could manage was weak stabs with its hilt.
Charlie’s berserk attack had reduced the last remaining gnoll warrior to around 10% HP, and he himself had around a third of his HP left. Jack released his fire breath, finishing off the last gnoll warrior and healing Charlie to around 45% HP. However, Charlie seemed to be lost in his rampage, and he continued mutilating the gnoll’s corpse, splattering gore everywhere and steadily losing his HP.
Jack: *mentally reinforces his command* “Charlie, calm down. All enemies are dead.”
Hearing his master’s voice and mental command, Charlie slowly reduced his assault on the gnoll corpse. The dark red layer of fire surrounding him slowly dimmed. His scales returned to its usual copper color and his eyes returned to his usual electric green, with the whites distinguishable once again. Charlie seemed tired, and he approached Jack.
Jack: “You got angry when the doggies hurt me?”
Jack heard a low hiss, as his summon conveyed an affirmative via their mental bond. Jack was touched, and hugged his summon. He was pleased at the attachment his summon had with him, but at the same time was worried for his summon. Another minute of its rampage, and Charlie would have depleted his entire HP, unless Jack used fire attacks to heal him.
He praised Charlie, but also instructed him not to enter a rampage unless absolutely necessary. Charlie understood his intentions struggled to convey something. Still being in child form, their telepathic link wasn’t too well developed. He consoled his summon, and told him not to worry.
Jack: “You are hurt badly aren’t you Charlie? I need to heal you up. Now open your mouth.”
Charlie obediently opened his mouth. He rubbed Charlie’s neck with one hand affectionately, while he shot a fire bolt in his mouth with his other hand. Each fire bolt from him healed his summon for around 8% HP. Charlie seemed content eating his firebolts, and conveyed his gratitude through their telepathic link.
After Charlie was fully healed, it turned and licked the most severe wounds on Jack’s left thigh. He was touched at the behavior of his summon. While Charlie’s licking wasn’t helping him to regenerate the lost HP, it did dull the pain somewhat. And his summon seemed happy, so jack let it continue as he browsed his notifications.
Jack: ‘Ohh so Charlie learned a new skill “Berserk Spirit”? Summon Charlie spell seems to have leveled up a couple of times. Is it because Charlie learned a new skill? Hmm Charlie also unlocked a new special stat “Brutality”. Wonder what its effects are, other than the gory massacre of course.”
Jack: “Hey Charlie, you want to eat something? I dunno whether you like meat or no…but try this.”
Jack withdrew a roasted gnoll arm from his inventory. His summon was looking at it curiously. As he held the arm in his right hand and channeled fire mana to reheat it, Charlie approached his left arm. He started licking the flames and completely ignored the gnoll arm kebab.
Jack: “So you like eating fire? Well makes sense since you are a fire spirit originally. Wait let me peel the fur and skin of this gnoll arm then I will feed you more fire mana!”
Jack then stripped off the burnt skin and fur of the gnoll arm. He chomped on it like a chicken drumstick, while he constantly channeled fire mana from his left hand, which his summon lapped up. Soon it was time for Charlie to leave, and Jack felt sadness at having to part with his summon, which Charlie reciprocated.
Jack: “Don’t worry Charlie; I will call you for more fighting soon! We will burn all our foes!”
As his summon shimmered away, he began looting the gnolls. He collected their weapons along with a few gold coins the gnoll caster had. He decided to dump the crude animal pelt armor the gnolls were using as his inventory would have been overloaded, and they weren’t worth much. He then extracted their fangs and claws and buried their bodies. However, he was reeking of gnoll gore. He went a little distance and created slurry of mud and water from his canteen.
After having a drink of water to quench his thirst, he stored his canteen in his inventory. He also stored his sword and dagger in his inventory. He then rolled around on the mud. He took a mud bath to wash away the gore and mask his scent. It may seem disgusting, but many animals in nature took mud baths to keep cool and keep away parasites. Once he deemed himself ready, he noticed that he still had around a third of HP to recover. He meditated on a tree for a few minutes and then proceeded traveling towards the mysterious clearing of the druids.
(A/N: About the mud baths, I am not bullshitting. Although Jack preferred to be coated in mud rather than the gnoll gore Charlie had covered him with in his rampage. It also provided a bonus to his stealth tactics when foes depend on scent. )
----------------------------------
A/N: So in the rewrite, Valeria gets butthurt and dumps our MC. Our MC inturn gets butthurt, and refuses to beg back into the arrangement they had which most guys would usually do.
Since the chapter length was reduced after cutting the unnecessary drama, I added the next segment focusing on Charlie and the length of this chapter approached my absolute maximum of 5k words.
I will remove the old draft of chapter 24 and the Announcement/ Reader Interactivity thread, when I post the next chapter. Hope you enjoyed the rewrite of this chapter.
---------------------------------