Chapter 13 - Billy Yearns to See

Farmer Tim brought Billy to the Adventurer’s Guild the next morning. It seemed busier than usual as adventurers streamed in and out of the building constantly. Instead of going to the usual board, the old man brought the boy to another room. The room had giant maps on every wall and on every table. People were hustling about, filling out forms and signing their names on sheets scattered about the room.

Farmer Tim sighed longingly. “Long term expeditions. Do yer’ thing, pick one out if one pops up. These are all missions that take more’n a year to complete, if they’re ever truly completed. Sail the seas, mess up a kingdom, establish an outpost, beat back waves of monsters along a foreign coast til backup arrives. This is where the real magic happens. These are all group missions of sorts and they’ll all have complications. It’s yer’ Gift’s wet dream.”

Billy stared around, half in fascination, half in horror. The Adventurer’s Guild had missions across every continent he knew of and into some he had never heard of. Political assassinations, defense missions, troop reinforcement, battlefield support, temple delving, scouting… He channeled his Gift and took a look around, focusing on finding the right expedition. The reaction was instant. He beelined it to a corner of the room.

On the wall was a giant map named “New Tuskarn.” Most of the map was blacked out, only showing rocky coastline to the East and a few dotted settlements barely inland. The notice next to the map read “Exploration, settlement defense, threat assessment. E-C rank.” Below was a sign-up sheet. Billy read over the names and their roles:

Hustak Firemane - Outpost Commander.

Jack Horsby - Tamer.

Wade Blight - Swordsman.

Alanis Montgomery - Logistics.

Heap - Recon.

Fro Zen - Construction.

Aelin - Ranger.

Marit - Healer.

Rhinus - Tank

Jessum Crowe - Bard.

Miles Twitty - Farmer.

Fred Dunslow - Farmer

Loc Thwain - Gunner.

Nordica - Ranger.

Roland - Alchemist.

---*Blank*---

Billy read the list again one more time before adding his name and role to the page on the last line: Billy - Guide.

Back at Farmer Tim’s, Billy and the old man sat at a table, examining the ability stone. It was, like all ability stones: a small stone disk with strange, glowing glyphs on it. This one pulsed, alternating between black and red.

“The problem,” Farmer Tim explained, “is that it’ll permanently reduce yer’ available mana. That’s why ya don’t see rich brats running ‘round with fifty skills at the ripe ol’ age of fifteen. At your core size, it’ll undoubtedly reduce you to almost nada. And that’s after jump startin’ yer’ core with the portal shenanigans.”

Billy frowned. “So, should I just wait until I grow my core?”

“HA!” Farmer Tim barked out a laugh. “Only if ya wanna be shivved forty-two times and ‘accidentally’ thrown overboard on yer’ way to yer’ expedition.” He shook his head. “Nah, ya best use it now and just deal with havin’ a shit core for a bit instead o’takin’ that chance.”

Billy nodded reluctantly, not wanting to hobble himself, but also not wanting to risk losing the opportunity to gain a rare skill. Sure, the expedition was bound to be profitable, but who knew when he was going to happen upon another ability stone or something similar? It’s not like he was going to be chosen by some old priests as this generation’s next hero. A gangly youth three towns over had gotten that blessing. No, he had to take it now, then just grind his way back. Plus, a dip in power just made for a better underdog story arc, he reasoned.

They discussed the possible outcomes, too. It was obviously some kind of combat-oriented ability stone, but neither of them wanted to spend the time or resources necessary to get it properly identified. Even if they did get it identified, Farmer Tim was unsure how it would interact with Billy’s Gift, considering his Gift seemed to shut off during combat.

The similar ability stone would probably result in an activatable skill if merged with a more physical Gift. It would most likely turn into an offensive spell if merged with a more magical combat oriented Gift. Maybe it would grant a passive buff or an aura, but those were far less common when using obviously combat-related ability stones. Either way, they weren’t going to figure it out by guessing and talking in circles.

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Billy took a deep breath, held the stone and sent mana into it. The stone seemed to melt in his palm. It traveled up his arm, settling right above his heart, where it began to burn. He squirmed and hissed in pain as an image seared itself into his skin.

After the searing stopped, he took off his shirt and looked at his chest. On the left side of his chest was a vertical strip of black cloth adorned with intricate bright green embroidery along the edges, held aloft by a straight shaft of what looked like cracked bone. At the center of the battle standard was an eye with an intense emerald green iris staring back at him. It was beautiful.

Billy held back a gasp as he took in the sight. The war flag almost looked like it was flapping in a soft breeze, the eye seeing everything at once. It was badass. Secretly, he was grateful that it didn’t manifest into something lame like a lion or a statue. Hurriedly, he focused on his Gift to see the updated description.

* Guide: E-rank. Help others find their way. Increased System rewards for guiding others through perils.

Battlefield Commander I: You see the ebb and flow of the battlefield and can adjust accordingly.

“YYYYYYES!” Billy jumped up and punched a fist into the air. He didn’t care how cheesy he looked. It was perfect. “Combat utility, mother fuckers!” He whooped and cheered until Farmer Tim forced him to explain. Afterwards, the old man told him to get combat ready, then disappeared into the woods in a flash.

Billy strapped on his shield, checked his boots and fiddled with his wand, waiting outside of the farmhouse for the old man. Suddenly, a large cat came soaring out from the treeline. It tumbled, flipped twice and then got to its feet, looking more pissed off than a really pissed off person having a bad day.

As their eyes met, Billy hunkered down, readying himself for its attack. As he sent a trickle of mana into his new skill, he knew. The cat raced towards him, all claws, fangs and attitude. It darted from side to side, trying to juke him out.

Billy lazily shot out the smallest spark he could out of his wand, then pivoted and threw his shield, imbuing it with mana as he did. As the cat flinched away from the spark, it ran right into the discus that was the reinforced shield, losing its head in a mere instant. Fell for the ol’ one-two, yet again. Billy ran over and picked up his shield as another beast came flying in from the forest.

This time, it was a winged snake. It skidded once onto the ground before flapping its wings, using the momentum to streak towards Billy. He moved his head slightly and leaned back, narrowly dodging the snake. He could almost count the individual scales as it flew by, centimeters from his nose. Then, he threw his shield into the air as he shot a bolt of fire at the flying beasty.

The firebolt singed one of the snake’s small wings, causing it to crash into the ground. As it skidded to a stop, his shield came down like a guillotine and cleaved the snake neatly in half. Ooooh, Daddy like.

As the third beast came flying out of the forest, Billy realized he had a problem: he was already out of mana. Just the few short bursts had wrung his core dry.

Thankfully, the beast was slow. A turtle bounced and skidded on its shell as it made its way towards Billy. He backed up hastily, wanting to put distance between them to give his core time to regenerate. After it came to a stop, the turtle lay in its shell for a moment before peeking its head out. Spotting its new adversary, the turtle righted itself and started plodding towards the boy in front of it.

Billy, for his part, was widening the gap between himself and the beast with every passing second. He willed his core to churn faster. The turtle advanced. He retreated. The turtle advanced some more. He retreater farther. Then, the turtle threw him a curve ball. No, literally. It stomped a foot - or was it a paw? Did turtles have hooves? Flippers? It stomped its right leg down and a ball of dirt flew into the air. Then, with an effort of will, it sent the dirt fastball hurtling after the cowardly human child.

Billy raised his shield to block the earthen projectile, but then he threw himself to the side at the last second, barely dodging the clump of hardened dirt. He didn’t have the mana to spare to reinforce his shield. The ball obliterated a tree behind him. Rolling to his feet, he sent a small pulse of mana into his Battlefield Commander skill, then groaned. Of course, THAT was the optimal strategy.

Instead of playing keep-away, Billy turned on the turtle and charged it. The turtle - nay, it was far too majestic to be considered a mere turtle. The earthcrag tortoise sent another ball of condensed earth at Billy, which he managed to dodge. As he rolled to his feet, he reeled back and threw his shield as hard as he could at the thing. It flew through the air and clanked off of the beast’s shell, not doing much damage at all. Stunned slightly, however, the tortoise’s concentration faltered. It failed to form its next projectile.

Billy was almost upon it. Panicking, the beast’s next earth bullet was shaky at best. It came out more as a handful of gravel than a cannonball. A dozen stones streaked into his stomach, trying to penetrate clothing and skin. Billy ignored the sting of the dirt buckshot as he was finally upon his foe. With a sweep of his foot, the tortoise was flipped onto its back. Then, it was easy peasy buttcheek squeezy to direct a point blank blast of fire into its shell, instantly vaporizing the monster.

The time between monsters grew longer and longer as Billy needed more and more time to regenerate mana. It was working, though. The constant combat was growing his core noticeably. Then again, it was hard not to notice improvements when his core had shrunk to such a miniscule size. Farmer Tim never gave him enough time to relax, though. Just enough time to regen some mana, then scramble a bit before ultimately defeating each beast.

By the end of the day, Billy was utterly exhausted. His core was spent, his body was aching and his mana channels were raw. He had defeated foe after foe with much more ease than before. The soup he ate for supper had never tasted so good. A chair had never been so comfortable as the one he found himself in, either.

To be fair, the soup was quite the delicacy. A boar, after being flung at Billy by Farmer Tim and subsequently impaled on a pitchfork due to an unfortunately timed charge, dropped some meat when it despawned. Harvested monster meat was iffy depending on the way the monster died. Some Gifts and spells, when used to batter and kill a monster, had unpredictable and often negative effects on the edibility of a monster’s meat. Meat dropped as loot or processed with a Gift or skill, however, was almost always safe to eat.

As such, the boar’s looted meat was used as the star ingredient of the soup. It was a little gamey, but it also had mana infused within it, granting increased mana recovery as well as the potential for a small boost in strength as the mana reinforced the body of whoever ate the meat.

Stuffed to the gills, Billy lay down and fell into a deep, comfortable sleep.