The cold light of his monitor flashed in the darkness of his room, his watering eyes glued to the explosion of colors and lights. It was 3 a.m. on a regular Thursday and he wanted to go to sleep after one more game, but this fucking imbecile was too dumb to press one fucking button correctly, how hard could that be?
His fingers attacked the keyboard like it personally had hurt him, his insults racing across the screen in brightly lit letters, cold and unpersonal, not like the rage building up in him. How dare this little shit ruin his game, ruin his night? He would make him understand, he would make him see the mistakes, all of the little misplays the fucker had made. Make him apologize, make him uninstall the game…make him feel bad, at the very least.
That would show him. Wulf relaxed somewhat, the heat of the moment had left him, as always as quick as it had come the moment his message had been sent and he had vented his frustration. That was what it had been about mostly. Focus on the game now, this is still winnable.
Then came the answer. Just a couple of little words, just lights on a screen, and yet...and yet they turned his blood boiling and his vision red.
It is just a game, dude. Calm down.
He grabbed his keyboard and smashed it against the table, unhinged rage consuming him for just a second.
----------------------------------------
Wulf blinked and in the next moment stood in freezing cold, head swimming. Immediately he turned over to vomit, his whole body shaking under some sort of exertion. He felt he had been thrown in a washing machine for a second, but…he blinked again. And again. It was glaringly bright out, so bright his eyes were hurting and he had to cover them with his hands. He stood under a clear sky. His socks were drenched with melting snow. He was freezing.
“What…?” He said, but immediately, along with his realization, reality seem to affect him all of a sudden and he began to shake under the cold, his teeth clattering uncontrollably.
Where was he? Where was his room? His mess? His computer? He must have fallen unconscious, landing in a strange dream.
In a confused daze he turned around and around, seeing but not comprehending. Was he…ill? Obviously, this could not be. Had he lost his mind?
[New Tutorial Quest! Arena of Uhir!
Survive the day. Hint: Hit living things with something sharp or heavy to injure and kill them!]
Blue letters began floating in front of his eyes but stayed only a couple of seconds, while Wulf stared at them without any comprehension. A game text? What the fuck.
What is happening to me?
He made a couple of steps, now for the first time really seeing his surroundings. There was a wooden wall, a palisade, all around him, the ground was covered mostly in snow but…there were bodies, dozens of bodies. And blood, so much blood. It did not seem real. So bright and so red. It had to be a…prank or something. The bodies were mutilated, beaten, disfigured, and maimed. Worse than any haunted house he had been to. And not all of them were human. There were monsters like…from the old Star Trek episodes. Humans with shit on their face, horns, or different ears and stuff like that.
Who would make such an effort to prank him like that? Had his food been spiked?
Then, the stench hit him. The clear smell of the blood, like a hint of rusted iron, still warm, still freshly soaking into the ground muddying the arena. The death, the decay…feces and vomit and…Again, Wulf turned to voimt, dry heaving hard at first, as not much was left in his stomach.
These bodies were real. They were real, despite looking like extras from a filmset. The blood was real.
And one of them moved.
Clad in leather and iron, a man propped himself up on the other side of the battlefield, bulging muscles shaking under the exertion. The man was a giant, in width and height, and clearly very badly wounded. His one arm hang down in bloody tatters, his breast was cut open and a steely grin was plastered in the middle of his hairless face that was covered in blood and soot.
The man made one step, still shaking, dragging behind the grip of an axe that was bigger than Wulf, at least. One more step and it dawned on Wulf. This Conan double was on the way over to him!
“Are you ok?” Wulf asked with more unease in his voice than he had wanted. “You are hurt, you shouldn’t move so much. I had a course in first aid, can you understand me?”
The man just continued, grinning, gripping his axe with knuckles turning white as if he just refused to let go by willpower alone.
“Please, sit down man. You don’t look so good. You are very pale and must have lost a lot of blood and... put down that axe, will you?” Wulf tried hugging himself, but the cold made him shiver as he retreated involuntarily.
The man made one more step, almost in reach. Then, a shudder went through him, his face turned snow-white and he face-planted right in front of Wulf with a very heavy, very unhealthy sounding thud.
“Oh shit.” Wulf shouted, surprised by the sudden action. He hurried over, touching Conan at the shoulder. “Are you ok, man? Say something.” Wolf shook a little bit harder and suddenly every tension left the muscles of the fallen man as if the power cord had been cut on the air pump of an inflatable.
[Uhir Chosen Grom (lvl 12) defeated! Reward: 2218 XP]
[Level up! Lvl 2! Visit a Menhir of Choice to Level up!]
[Level up! Lvl 3! Visit a Menhir of Choice to Level up!]
[New Path unlocked: Unarmed Combat! Forge your body into a weapon fit to tear the world asunder! Prerequisites: Kill a higher leveled enemy with nothing but your hands.]
He wiped away the notification, shocked by the sudden death in front of him. Wulf had never seen a dead body before, let alone was witness to the actual moment of death. But after a while, Wulf forced himself to move.
Because it was cold. Because he was only wearing sweatpants and a fucking Turbodragon shirt in the middle of what he thought to be winter. And he did not want to die.
He came to a hole in the palisade, watching out he could see that he was on the top of a mountain, overlooking smaller mountains, covered in ice and frost, sloping down over many miles to smaller, woody hills and then to fjords, or glistening, beautiful bodies of water boxed in by steep cliffs snaking away into the sea shining brightly in the distance. The sky was blue with not a cloud in sight. This, this view and those fjords, this wild-romantic countryside…must have been the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
[New Path unlocked: Farsight. You have seen a lot and still yearn to see more. Prerequisites: See something new at least a hundred miles away.]
By now, he just had to be close to death, the remaining rational part of his brain told him. He was on the peak of a mountain in a shirt. The cold would get him soon.
But he did not want to die. He let his mind go. It was just a dream after all. He could do what he wanted.
Inside of him a flame awakened, consuming the cold. Consuming his confusion, burning his fears and his indecisiveness. Rage. Pure spite and anger. He. Would. Not. Die. Like. This. Behind him he heard sounds. Steps. Grunts. Metal and leather rubbing together.
Already snarling, he turned, hands curling into fists as he raised them.
Before him stood a leathery thing, not even reaching his waist. Like a badger stripped of all fur and put into armor. The wicked pair of blades the skinless badger brandished was tiny, but no less capable of parting skin for it. Wulf was angry, but seeing this tiny thing marching towards him, screeching in preemptive triumph took him by surprise nonetheless.
“Fuck me.” Wulf spat. “Fuck me if I die to a naked rat with knives.”
The thing was quick, even with his tiny legs, but not quick enough. Before the knives could find his flesh, Wulf punted the animal with all his might all across the arena. With a thud and a tiny squeak, it crashed into the wood on the other side.
Not even a second later the skinless badger recovered and roared in defiance, a sound like a persistently screeching tea kettle, and shot across the battlefield with burning eyes. Literal fire coming out of its eyes. Like little flying coals dragging behind a trail of fire and smoke. Like...Wulf lost a part of his sanity or what was left of it. He met the beast head-on.
Every finesse had been lost, the badger came for Wulf with claws and teeth, the blades lost among the snow and debris. This time, blood flowed, skin parted, and Wulf fell down, rolling with the strange animal-like being, which in turn was climbing the young man's body to reach his jugular.
Now it was Wulfs turn to roar, in fear - naked fear - and the primal desire to smash this thing to a bloody pulp. He grabbed it before the needle sharp teeth could clamp down onto his neck, dragged the claws out of his shoulders, tearing flesh away with them. Then he smashed the leathery creature onto the ground. Again. And Again. Screaming all the way. Until he held nothing more in his hands than a bag of fur filled with mush.
[Uhir Chosen Rawhide (lvl 2) defeated! Reward: 312 XP]
“Fuck this place!” Wulf yelled out, chucking the bloody remains back into the ring with a little too much enthusiasm, his heart hammering in his chest, pumping blood – oh so much blood! – through his wounds, freezing on his skin in seconds - but no one answered him but the howling wind.
He stumbled out of the arena, searching for something, anything to give him warmth. In front of the arena, overlooking the majestic fjords and the woodlands below, was a small plateau right underneath the mountaintop. And there, nestled against the side of the mountain on one end and a curious carved stone tapering to a point at the top on the other, stood a small cabin. There was even a chimney with some smoke curling out of.
Warmth. Shelter. Wulf made the way, despite not feeling any of his arms and legs anymore, throwing the door close with his shoulders alone. The heat hit him like a brick, prickling all over his freezing body, and yet it was the best feeling he ever had experienced. Victory. Survival. He was shaking with the elation and the adrenalin pumping through his veins. A battle! A real battle, life and death, and he had been the one to walk away!
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
As the rest of the adrenalin left him, he felt gravity pulling him down again and he fell onto a bedroll and a pile of furs in the corner, sleeping before he even hit the ground.
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Wulf felt like he had been sleeping in a washing machine thrown down a waterfall, as he dragged his sore body up from the furs he had spent the night on. He stood there, just a man in sweatpants and a Turbodragon shirt, staring at a spot on the wall. Blinking every now and again, when the eyes started to dry up. Time passed.
“Well shit.“ He murmured. He had not awoken in his bed, nor in his city or even his world. He still was in what he had thought to be some form of hyperrealistic dream. He was too tired to think about that and there was nothing he could do against it either way. Because he did not know where to get his coffee from. And coffee was life.
That stopped him from booting up completely. Where should he even go, if there was no coffee machine to aim for? What...what did non coffee-drinkers even do in the mornings?
Finally, he opened the door of his little hut and let the cold wash over him like a crappy shower. The stench of him had become somewhat rancid as he was covered in dried blood still. Cursing he walked into the snow and began the torturous endevour to clean himself with it. His cuts and scrapes had gone away. Had he imagined them to be worse than they were turning out to be?
He ran back into the unnatural warmth of his cabin like the ground was lava, still cursing up a storm. He was awake now, at least. Which brought him back to the original question he had been too tired to try to anwer. Where was he? Why had this dream not ended?
His mind whirled, but after a moment he noticed that he was spiraling towards...something unhealthy.
Stop. He forced himself to move. Keep busy. Do not think. Do.
There was the pile of dead animal hides he had slept on, there was a chair and a rickety table and there was a chest, big enough to crawl into and shut the lid. While that seemed to be the best course of action for a second or two, in the end he just opened it and searched through the contents.
There were two pairs of sturdy leather pants, still with fur on the outside, and heavy leather boots in a very crude style. Very not modern. Then there were a couple of ill-fitting shirts, woven out of linen if he were to guess and a brown cloak with a clasp in front and some very fluffy red fur around the neck and on the shoulders. There were some leather gloves as well, and a belt with a silver buckle, showing an double bladed axe with a couple of droplets around it. He was no idiot. That looked to be some form of medieval or even more ancient winter clothing, still in line with the strange arena battle with swords and axes and shit he had dreamt about. Had he dreamt about that? It seemed so very far away now.
Well, first things first. He put all the clothing on he could find, only ditching the sweatpants who were positively ruined and reeking. His shirt had cleaned well with the snow and he just could not stand the itchy material of the new shirts on his skin. He accepted the smell and the blood on his t-shirt to not have to feel the itching. He found a spacious, furry backpack in the corner filled with meat and waterskins, also with fur on the outside. What was the deal with all the fur?
He felt...silly, at least, since he wore fur around his neck and a cloak around his back. Like a LARPer or someone putting on a Jon Snow costume for Halloween. And yet, the cold did not bite quite as viciously as it had been as he walked out into the cold again to try it out. There also had been dry wood, a couple of bits to make fire - he had seen that flint and steel method on TV and in countless games - and a generous amount of dried meat in the chest. Enough to last him a couple of days, if he...drank snow? Melted it maybe?
The air was so cold that his head instantly cleared, but this time he could stand it after he had pulled his hood deep into his face and learned to breath through the fluffy fur to take the edge of the air. Finally, he understood how to use the clasp correctly so that the fur was always placed in front of his face, roughly from the nose down.
Now though...he stood in front of the exit of the arena and saw the carnage. The bodies, the blood, the weapons...just that the bodies now were frozen in place and fresh snow had somewhat covered the scene. It made it more unreal somehow, like a fading memory. It would not take long for the snow to swallow everything.
“God damn.“ Wulf cursed. “Not a dream, huh?“
Wait...then...had he killed the thing and had the man really died by Wulf shaking his shoulder? Was he ready yet to look for an aswer? No.
There were a lot of weapons in the snow all around the arena, often buried halfways in a frozen body. Swords, spears, and shields he saw a few, but the preferred weapon of choice around here seemed to be the axe. He could respect that.
Would he need a weapon? Well, who knew? Would he need to peel the frozen flesh off one of the few armored...things in there? Damned if he knew. Had he something better to do? No. Would something attack him? The way the last day had been going....definite yes.
Wulf sighed, and, for the first time in his life, pilfered from the dead.
He intensly focussed on forgetting the feeling of breaking away frozen flesh to try and get to the leather armor off somewhat intact. There was also the crunching noise to forget that an axe made, when he pried it loose from the chest it had been buried into. Overall, he decided while he still rubbed snow into the piece of pilfered leather like a maniac to get rid of the blood, he would like to forget the whole hour he had spent in there.
There was a little pile of weapons on one side of his cabin now. He had had so many to choose from that in the end he only had taken those that seemed to be especially well made to his untrained eye and...not chipped, rusty, broken or ugly. The armor he was in the process of cleaning was just two sturdy pieces of engraved and shaped leather, bound with dozens of leather strips. One plate for the front, one for the back, tighten the straps until it fit. Easy enough for him to use and, surprisingly, there had been no armor made out of metal on the whole battlefield anyway - and most of the others did not look like they would fit.
There were the bodies of all kind of creatures freezing in the arena after all, and even the humans were made to fit much larger breasts and shoulders. A lot of Conan-types there, or body builders and whatnot. Wulf was not small in either height or width, but muscles...you had to dig deep to find some muscles. His last athletic achievement had been the 500m run in school. Now 5 years ago. But he had gained some weight -shut up, mom! SOME weight - so he had found something to somewhat fit.
So he had the choice...small axe, big axe, weirdly shaped axe, double bladed axe or the chipped sword? In the end, after shortly entertaining the idea of being a strong and independend adult that needed no help and lifting up a couple of the big axes and finding himself...inadequately trained to hold them for long or even swing them around, he chose two of the smaller axes that looked vaguely like the ones he had thrown on a fair, once. They also looked sturdy enough to hack through a tree or break a neck in a pinch, so he thought to be smart and kill two birds with one axe. Well, two. Another argument was that he could tuck them into his belt and the other axes would have to be carried around all the time.
They were still there if he needed them. He also had a beltknife he had attached to his belt, next to a small pouch filled with dry meat snacks. He also put on some leather wristguards. Why, he could not tell. At the very least he thought they looked somewhat cool.
He looked down the mountain, drinking in the stunning view once more, thinking about where to go now, finding his feet hard to move. Hard to just make the first step. That was a whole mountain sloping down in front of him. and a very unknown wilderness after that. Here he had water and shelter.
He stalled, walked around in circles, looking at this and that, finally finding himself in front of the weird stone next to the exit of the arena. It was tall, sharpening up to a point over three meters in the air. It was covered in runes reminding him of the dwarfen script in his games or the runes of the Vikings on earth. Not ones he recognized, though. As he came closer, he could have sworn that the -what was the word for these things? - was humming like it was filled with electricity.
He touched it, carefully, prepared to jump back at any second - but he never got the chance.
White fog rolled in around him as he had that sickening feeling of loosing his footing and orientation again, finally coming to an end as he was completely surrounded by nothing but the milky white.
[You have touched the Menhir of Choice. Every decision has consequences, so choose wisely and never look back.]
A little window of blue text appeared in front of him, by now he was somewhat used to the phaenomenon.
[You are classless, so at your first time with the Menhir, you will choose your first steps in the Great Game of the Gods. You are Chosen by Uhir and have touched his stone, so your choices will reflect his will. A Class defines what you are, what you can do, but also what potential lies buried within you. Everything you are, everything you do, everything you consume will influence your further choices and evolutions. Remember that this is just the first step, but it is also the most important step, as you choose the direction you will travel in. Touch the statues for more information. Touch the Menhir to finalize your choice.]
Everything you consume? His thoughts got cut short by another window.
[Paths are ways to find strength in the mastery of skills and knowledge. Walking a Path unlocks the wisdom of the Ancients, guiding you towards the next level of mastery. You cannot learn it all. You can never unlearn something you learned. Decisions cannot be taken back. The more narrow your focus, the farther you will walk your Path. There may be ways to learn more in the future, but the more Paths you walk, the less steps you will make in every single one of them. You have to unlock Paths first. To lock in a path forever, to explore it and claim the power for your own, touch the Menhir.]
[If you are a Ruler of a Sphere, you can decide to influence your Perk and Ability choices with that Sphere before you are presented with your choices. You can only choose once and you cannot take it back.]
All around him, statues, or hints of hidden statues covered by the mist, began to appear. Showing him, or a, well, action-hero version of him, in different poses and with different clothes, armor, and weapons. But of all those he could sense around him, only four were right in front of him, like something made him glance over the rest. That must be the influence of this Uhir then, Wulf thought, like the text had warned him.
Hesitatingly, Wulf walked over to the leftmost statue, showing himself proudly presenting a bare chest, way...WAY more muscled and defined than his own. The statue looked into the distance with a hungry look, holding the shaft of an axe he had put on his shoulders with what seemed to be relaxed ease.
[Barbarian: Aligning yourself with the wild Asher tribes of the cold north, you will use the Rage of Uhir to seek supremacy in a society where the strong rule and protect the weak, always aiming for dominance among the warriors and the tribes, to take back what once was yours alone. Violence is your path, and allies fear you even more than your foes.
Increased Attributes Maximum: Strength +1 Vitality +1
Class Ability: Rage, Shout of Anger]
Cold? Barbarians? Violence? No thank you. Whatever this...world...game... was, he did not necessarily wanted to spend it with primitives in tents eating whateverthefuck.
He went on, seeing himself draped in furs and chainmail, wearing weapons and a helm he would have associated with Vikings or some nordic fantasy races.
[Berserker: Aligning yourself with the Jarls of Stormclaw, you wield your curse like a weapon, one carefully drawn and controlled. You are revered and feared at the same time, always standing apart from the rest of the community you do not quite fit into.
Increased Attributes Maximum: Strength +1 Willpower +1
Class Ability: Rage, Raging Blow]
He went on, as he saw the next statue of himself sitting at a desk, wearing some form of robe. The image immediately caught his attention, because it so far resembled what he actually was the closest. A student.
[Akolyth of Blood: Uhir’s gifts allow you to draw on the power of blood, shaping it and the reality that surrounds you to your will. Bloodmagic is forbidden and its practitioners are hunted, but the sacrifice is worth it for the power you could wield.
Increased Attribute Maximum: Intelligence +1 Willpower +1
Bonus Sphere: Blood]
Sighing, because he felt a strong headache coming on, Wulf turned to the last statue, showing himself in tattered clothes, hiding behind a corner of sorts, making a strange gesture with his hands while he simultaneously looked at something in the distance with a hateful sneer on his face.
[Curse Slinger: You are cursed. You embrace the curse. You become the curse. Make them suffer like you do.
Increased Attribute Maximum: Intelligence +1 Agility +1
Class Ability: Bestow Curse]
Really? Really? That was it? A Barbarian, a Berserker, A bloodmage, and a curse dude? Where were the rangers, Paladins, Wizards, and Rogues? All of his choices were cursed, not just the last one. They all sounded horrible. The first one would take him to a place of maniacs, fighting over dominance every second of the day. That sounded awful. The third would make him a target and a forbidden practitioner and that basically ruled out the mage for him he so liked to play in his games. [Curse Slinger] was just…no.
So he chose [Berserker], touching the statue again, mostly because it did not sound too bad to be revered and feared in a somewhat stable society. And it gave him an excuse to be different compared to the ones the class spoke of, so he could attempt to blend in his new surroundings to some extent. Also…he liked the word.
Berserker.