Merlin sighed as he looked at the available guildhalls, frankly making the money was pretty fucking easy when he had Gaius do his thing and murder all the players he could, the bright side is that with their unique ability hound of death they could move faster and track players and monsters with ease, almost like a witcher's sense, he looked through the available buildings in the ten thousand gold range, there were some interesting locations, an abandoned wizards tower being one he was actually looking at the hardest, he marked the page and continued looking, there were quite a few fully furnished houses that could be considered miniature manors right in the city, but the wizards tower was probably the best one of the bunch. "Hey Rezu darling, I need your opinion."
The dark haired woman walked over, she was their guilds artist, she had made plenty of drawings for the guild, many of her character Rezu, and many that were explicitly not safe for work. Though she didn't usually play games with them she did occasionally hop on for guild events. "Yeah, what do you need?"
"Your opinion." The guild leader repeated with humor in his voice. "I need you to tell me if you think we should get this mage tower, or..." He flipped the page to a rather large watchtower. "Or this, these are the two best options I can find. the watchtower has no furnature, but the wizard tower does, only problem is it comes with about twenty different magical traps and defenses that will fry us boil us or turn us into a frog, on the bright side if we clear it up well enough we can turn it into a magical fortress."
"I'd rather not sleep in a bed made of cockroaches again if I can help it, if you buy the tower we might not be able to sleep inside it for a week if not more." Rezu said.
"We can buy some tents." He said.
"With what money, the gold Gaius gave you will all be going to the tower." Rezu argued.
"Alright, I see your point, but that's nothing a little bit of late night hunting can't fix." Merlin said.
"Who would be dumb enough to be fighting monsters at night, you played in the beta, you said it yourself that monsters are like twice as strong at night." She said.
"Hm, true, frankly, frankly I just think the wizard tower's cool and I want to nab it before anyone else, I don't care if I have to sleep on the grass to do it." Merlin said, shrugging.
"And risk being mauled by a wolf in your sleep?" She shot back.
Merlin sighed. "Alright, I'll look elsewhere, Jeez Louise."
"Besides, if all goes wrong, we can just buy the other one as well, what goods a guild if we can't swing our..." She was cut off when the door to the guild hub opened.
"Hey fuckers!" The twenty or so players that marched in all looked like they'd love nothing more than to kick their asses. "Yeah you, in the fucking chair, you're the leader of the crimson cocksleeves right?"
Merlin took a drink of the vodka next to him, before getting up, stumbling a step pretending to be a little drunk. "Yeah, what do you want?"
"Can you call off your jackass subordinate? he's been murdering everyone trying to get back to the city, and what's worse he doesn't give up, we just run and he chases us down with the speed and vigor of some kind of rabid beast!"
"Tell you what, I'll call him off, but.. hic, you'll have to best me in a fight, one on one, let's see how you do." Merlin slurred.
The leader scoffed, and started forward, followed by at least two others. "Riiight, I just lost everything I own and half my fucking levels, including a magic sword, the hell I'm gonna be playing nice with this." He stood nose to nose with Merlin, their anger palpable in his eyes.
The man swung so Merlin dodged and splashed his drink into their face, before grabbing a candle from the table, wax burning his hand as he slammed it up their nose, their body immediately ingulfed into flame, they screamed in panic as they ran toward the others who backed up from him and without anyone to put him out he just crumpled to the floor when his hp hit 0 and exploded into pixels. "Do any of you other fucking tapeworms want to try something?!"
The two people who came with their leader backed up a step before regaining whatever fucked up version of courage allows a man to gang up on a single man and a woman, the first man raised a mace and swung, though Merlin unsheathed an ornate yet charred black scimitar and deflected the blow, before swinging, sending a burning crimson slash through their torso, the explosive force of the blast sent the man sailing back though crimson flames started rapidly eating away the small sliver of hp he had left and he exploded into pixels in midair. The last guy swung his fist at Merlin, though his hand went flying with a flash of silver. "That is more than enough." The guild attendant1 said, sheathing her saber at her side. "Get out, you're all banned from the guild hall." She said, looking at the eighteen remaining players. one who didn't know who they were dealing with decided to pipe up. "An npc can't tell us what to do!" Which was promptly met with a dagger thrown to the throat, she glared. "out, now, or I kill you all."
The now seventeen players ran like they had seen a devil with a pitchfork riding a burning hell beast. She cut a sharp gaze to Merlin. "And you're going to have to pay a fee for the cleanup of this mess."
Merlin looked at the spray of blood on the ground. "Right, might I just clean it myself?"
"Fuck no, this needs to be done professionally." She said.
Merlin decided not to say he was a professional at cleaning bloodstains. "How much then?"
The woman counted in her head for a second before saying. "Five thousand."
Merlin groaned. "There's no fucking way a cleaner costs that much money."
"You can always join the others outside in their ban." She said, with the all too annoying customer service smile. Though she also gestured to the charred and burned floorboards that had somehow been put out.
"Riiiiight... sorry about that, fine, here." He threw a pouch at her. "Don't spend it all in one place."
"I plan not to." She said grinning.
Merlin took a second to process her words before he realized she'd likely be buying more than just cleaning support. "Mother fucking... whatever, Rezu, your choice, roaches or wolves."
She shuddered remembering the creepy way the tiny creatures scuttled on and around her as she slept. "I think I'll take the wolves, better mauled and spend a night in the cathedral than spend a second in that filthy pigsty they call a tavern..."
The guild clerk waved a hand toward the stairs. "I'll let you stay upstairs tonight."
Rezu was about to thank her but she spoke up again. "For two thousand gold."
Rezu gave Merlin a smile that he'd learned the meaning of a long time ago. it was the loathsome look of 'I swear to god if you don't do what the guild lady says I will brutally murder your family in their fucking sleep.'
Merlin just gritted his teeth and set the money on the counter, and she slid a key across the counter. "Try not to break the bed." She said, putting the pouches into her belt and walking to the door. "And hold the fort down for me will ya?"
Merlin would have burned the place down if it wasn't where he planned to sleep. SO he decided to check his menu and see how much xp he got from killing the players, as expected, half of 0 is still 0, they'd lost their xp from dying and Gaius had probably raised his level by a considerable.
Merlin
Class: Mage
Level: 21
Subclass: Spellblade
Special ability: Hell's emissary.
Gear:
Head, none
Chest, noble's reinforced sparring coat,
Hands, leather gloves,
Legs, studded leather grieves,
Undergarments, soft leather shirt and pants,
Necklace, none,
Rings, none,
Cloak, none,
Main weapon, The seventh seal, a sword used by the fallen angel Azariel. ((Legendary, Replica.)
Offhand weapon, none,
Reserve weapon, none.
Stats:
stat points available, 0
Intelligence: 19
Dexterity: 17
Strength: 10
Abilities:
Ability points 0
Emissary of Hell, You are an asset to an archdevil and have been chosen to bring the might of hell to world, You can summon three devils of a level equal to a third of yours once a day, summoning one group does not unsummon the last group, though the maximum amount of devils you may have summoned at a time is 100, devils summoned, 0/100.
Seventh seal. Your sword is a replica of a fallen angel, but is still made in it's image and holds it's power if not to a lesser degree, when you use a sword spell you can add a hellfire effect that burns until the target is dead, healing from holy magic will dispel the hellfire's effect.
Skills:
Battlemage. You've learned to fight and use magic at the same time and are damn good at it, you can embue your weapon with magic causing it to deal 15% extra damage, and no longer take negative effects from using weapons or armor. you can also use your weapon as a catalyst for spellcasting.
Arcane compartmentalization. you've been a studier of the arcane arts, with enough time and research you can solve any problem, problems can be set to automatically be analyzed in the back of your mind while you deal with other things, you can pick a total of 3 problems and after a certain amount of time you may be given an answer on how to solve these problems, this could be anything, a difficult math problem, the analysis of an enemy, the geopolitical state of a kingdom, or the solution for an entire citywide famin, are just examples of how this could be used, but this uses information that you already have, if your information about an item is incomplete it may take longer to get a solid answer, you could get a wrong answer, or even halt the process all together.
Devil's pact. in taking the seventh seal you have entered into a pact with Azariel the fallen angel and archdevil of the seventh level of hell, his terms are simple, bring destruction to the surface world.
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Gaius was having the time of his life, surrounded twenty to one, most levels 5s or 6, though there was one that was level 10, no level restrictions for pvp made the world go round and there weren't guards to try and get in his way, he didn't realize Christmas came early. he blocked a strike from a sword with his spears shaft and slashed with his spears head, before tripping them with his foot as the backed up and impaled them by the throat critical hit, he really enjoyed fighting, it was his bread and butter and whatever the fuck else you put on toast, he threw grabbed someone by the wrist as they swung a war axe and his higher strength stat immobilized it, the punch dealt a whopping total of four damage, slammed the spear up and through his chin and into the skull dealing a critical hit, he turned as they exploded into blue pixels and swung his spear wide slashing the throat of another, it was frankly a dance of death a bonk here a slash there a trip on that guy a stab on that one, it was brutal, especially when their wounds exploded with blood thorns the size of knife blades causing bleed damage, he loved this spear, it was a rather short silver spear with red crystals in the blade and shaft that caused his enemies blood to crystalize and rip through their skin making it look like large thorns erupted from their skin, the shaft was about five feet in length with the blade being a foot in length.
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He leapt back as a player swung their mace. "Can't hit this, neneneneh" He played air guitar a with his spear as the players growled their frustration.
"Is this a fucking game to you?!" A tall man of level eight screamed at him, they rushed at him swinging their sword.
He deflected their strike and gave him two of his own. "This IS a game dumbfuck, despite being dead we still respawn, we still gain levels, and we can still have fucking fun!" He said, finishing them off.
The players backed up. "G- get the loot back to the city!" The first one shouted, as he started running a large backpack on his back, only to be met with a spear to their back.
Gaius smirked, as one of the players took the spear, only to find their hands punctured by the many red gems that went from rounded glassy amber to razor sharp shards of concentrated fuck off. He took his sword and shield from his inventory and smiled. "Ah, a return to form." He said, blocking a strike with his shield before stabbing them, then ripping it to the side in a strike that would have gutted any normal man, though the slash didn't actually leave their guts steaming on the ground, instead they disappeared into pixels, despite that a huge quantity of blood was left behind. he looked around seeing the rest of them running away, he was rather enjoying himself, so when they started running he decided to give them a bit of a head start, they were still about two hours from the city, he took his time taking the loot from the ground.
Then he started tracking them, his senses sharpened and his limbs felt like springs as he followed their tracks which were highlighted, he reclaimed his spear and put his shield and sword away. He gave a bellowing roar that from a distance one would think was a hound, he heard some returning howls from wolves in the distance and grinned. He rushed in lunges, leaps, and bounds, eventually he came upon a split in the tracks, they split into three groups, one group went for the western gate, another toward the southern gate, and the final one went toward the eastern gate, he went for the western one, if he could do this right he could kill them all and take the rest out in a line, they shouldn't be more than a three minute run ahead of him. he bounded forward and followed their tracks, eventually finding their silhouettes glowing red in the sunset lit fields, the guy at their rear looked back and screamed when they saw him, from their point of view he probably looked like a monster, he skewered them and flung their body at the next man running, then stabbed them skewered both of them at with the rather long naginata blade, puncturing both of their bodies at the same time. He turned and started chasing after them again, their rogue was the fastest of them but a thrown spear to their back fixed that problem, the last two turned with their swords, clearly realizing flight was impossible, only to be taught that fighting was probably not the better half of valor.
after slaying the last two players he turned and started back toward the southern gate, but they hardly had any loot only their armor and weapons which he left. He cut the second group off as he leapt from the tall grass and immediately severed the head of the leading player, before swiftly dispatching the rest, he didn't find any coin on this group either, so he was right on his way for the final group of players when a group of wolves got in his way, and were promptly left behind, it took him well over twenty minutes to get to the last group as they'd taken a detour into the forest, it seemed they'd stashed all their gold into one group and split, smart, kinda. He eventually came to find a one of the players, their only level 10 a fighter like himself with a large sword and a shield, he could see the glowing outlines of players hidden in the bushes, he loved ambushes as much as the next guy, so he did what he does and brute forced it, he didn't dance around killing the ambushers, he just immediately went in and stabbed the man in their chest, or he would have, if it wasn't for their shield blocking and their abnormally long sword sweeping toward his neck, he ducked and rolled beneath the attack, coming up on a knee behind him and swiping at their legs with the bladed sword, he saw the first arrow coming at him and quickly smacked it out of the air, another took him in the shoulder and two more in the back, he gritted his teeth and got up as another two shots hit him in the back. the shielder looked at him with a scoff. "Getting mad already?"
Gaius looked at him, a huge grin on his face. "Not even a fucking little!"
He lunged aiming his spear at their head, and they moved their shield to block him but the strikes landed on his legs instead. the notification popped up telling him that their legs were crippled.
Gaius tanked another four arrows as the man fell to his knees, Gaius slammed his spear down as they raised the wooden shield to defend themselves only to find it being torn asid by a hand and the spear tip diven down into the space between their shoulder blade and neck, the blade struck their heart and their hp took a massive hit, Gaius leapt back as the wounds he'd dealt started bleeding, he activated his weapons skill, the blood rapidly crystalizing draining their hp like crazy. Gaius turned to the other players who were starting to run, though it looked like one of the remaining four were already gone.
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Robert was running through the dark forest, he was being chased by that thing, he didn't even want to call it a player, that monster was busy killing his friends, he wasn't about to lose the levels he'd spent six hours grinding for, no fucking way. he wasn't even sure how he'd found their group to begin with, they'd taken a detour and had a headstart, sure he managed to fight and kill the rest of the party, their healthbars all said zero in the party tab, after about two minutes of running he decided to hide underneath a tree whose roots were dug up and a large burrow was made, he activated his rogues sneak skill, in the hopes it would hide him well enough.
eventually he heard footsteps, the man's boots were not a foot away from his nose, the heard the man mumbling. "Where the fuck did that little bastard go."
A rustling sound the man turn and rush away, a loud rustling sound from the tree. "Fucking raccoons..." He heard the man curse, they sounded quiet, far, after about fifteen minutes Robert slowly crept from under the tree, only for his eyes to widen in horror when he looked up and saw the man smiling a feral grin down at him from a perch up on a limb.
You have died a terrible death from an absolute psychopath, I feel for you man, try not to take this next part personally.
You have died outside of a safe zone. You have lost your items.
You have lost half of your levels, rounded down -4 levels.
Your exp has been given to Gaius_the_hound -1562 experience.
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Gaius sighed, he'd gained at least six levels from this absolute slaughter, he'd best give the coins he'd gotten from the level ten player to Merlin, he looked at his new sword, it was abnormally long for a one handed sword and had a red cross in it's pommel that made it look like something a templar would use, it was also light, like it was made of Styrofoam or something. He decided to check his menu and assign his stat points and ability points.
Level up x5.
Congratulations, for your grand efforts of butchering everything that walks on two legs, you've leveled up five times over the course of your merciless hunting of your fellow man. try not to let karma slap your ass too hard on your way back to the city.
Gaius_the_hound.
Class: fighter
Level: 23
Subclass: barbarian.
Special ability: hound of death.
Gear:
Head, wolf leather hood,
Chest, studded leather chest curass,
hands, leather gloves
Legs, studded leather grieves.
Undergarments, Commoner's cloth shirt and pants,
Necklace, none,
Rings, none,
Cloak, wolf leather cape,
Main weapon, Gae Bulga, (epic, replica.)
Offhand weapon, none,
Reserve weapon, none.
Stats:
stat points available, 0
Intelligence: 6
Dexterity: 14
Strength: 20
Abilities:
ability points 0
Hound of death, lv 8: your speed is increased by 25% and you gain the ability to highlight the tracks of players and monsters. and can see their outline if you are within 100ft of them.
Rage, lv2: you take 25% less damage and deal 15% more damage.
Gae Bulga, lv1: the spear of a near forgotten warrior, his rage and spear was feared throughout the plains, the gae bulga was known as a weapon that was far too brutal as it's wicked barbs would rip rip the guts from any one foolish enough to get close, giving it the moniker the belly spear. using this weapon whenever you strike an opponent their blood will crystalize into a jagged blood amber shard and rip through their flesh causing bleeding damage, if the spear should have been shoved in to the point that the smooth blood amber crystals are inside the body they will turn sharp, and removing the spear will cause high bleeding damage as the sharp thorns tear out their insides as it's removed, should anyone but it's wielder try to take hold of it it will react in the same way.
Skills:
animalistic attacker: your attack speed is doubled while you are enraged, but your animalistic urges cause body becomes harder to control making it very dangerous to fight in a group.
Canine affinity. you've become in touch with wolves and dogs in a way only a monstrous barbarian raised by wolves can, and have the ability to tame with canine creatures.
Gaius started back toward the city, his bloodlust sated, he smiled, nothing could possibly ruin his day now, then he exited the forest and saw a massive red boar the size of an elephant with four massive burning tusks and flaming red eyes.
[Miniboss.]
[Porky: the hellfuck nightmare pig! Level 15.]
[Hp: 2500/2500]
Gaius ran all the way back to the capital with a massive angry pig spitting fireballs at him as he ran, the pig didn't give up until he crossed a river, which it didn't cross, the stone bridge was sturdy enough but for some reason the boar wouldn't cross the line of running water, like it signaled some kind of border. though it's continued spitting of fireballs didn't give him time to taunt the creature... much. he ran through the gates to the city about fifteen minutes later, wheezing for breath all the while, his stamina bar was low to the point that it caused damage to his health was what he realized when he opened his status page.
Health: 230/500
Stamina: 0/450
Mana 12/12
He sighed and walked through the city, and a quick message said they would meet in the tavern.