Chapter 19: Marked

Damien screamed as the goblins pressed the red hot branding iron against the side of his neck. The sound and stench of sizzling flesh and the blinding pain were overwhelming.

“Holdem still! Holdem!” one of the captors squealed.

Several goblins braced Damien against the branding block until the cruel procedure was over. The brutes were all smaller than he, but they had every advantage. Half-starved, sleep deprived, outnumbered, and catching who-knows-what illness from the unhygienic living conditions, Damien could hardly resist.

But his nearly emaciated physical state did not prevent the goblins from putting him in shackles and placing a pickaxe in his hand. Now branded as forced labor for this goblin crew, he was put to work in the mines, though he scarcely had the strength to swing the pick against the stubborn gray stone.

“No sign of that stinking Ork! Meanwhiles we got quotas to fill,” one of the overseers had grumbled.

“Man or no man, Slaggmaw isn’t going to be pleased unless we dig every speck of gold from this vein!” the other had agreed.

“Put a mark on him and get him to work! No free meals here, prisoner or not!”

And so Damien was led deeper into the dark, suffocating mine, and back to his cage after untold hours of toil, under near constant verbal harassment and threat of beatings from the goblins’ wooden clubs.

The only respite between was a meager portion of, for lack of a better word, gruel. A pasty sort of foul-smelling stew that had the consistency of snot. More often than not, Damien had to flick away a maggot or two squirming up the rim of the shallow dish. The first two meals left him retching, but eventually his desperate hunger forced him to keep some of the stuff down.

Still no sign of the large one’s return–the ‘Ork.’

Damien was kept separate from the other workers and forbidden to speak to any of them in passing, and vice versa. Some of the workers were smaller in size, not unlike the goblins, and Damien noticed at least one had a similar brand on its neck. And all wore shackles as they were marched back and forth from their tasks.

But in his downtime in the cage, Damien had finally started paying attention to the notifications flashing in his peripheral vision. He had something called an Ability Point to spend, a way to gain a new Assassin class skill in addition to the Realm Transgressor ‘conceal’ ability he started with. He also was able to study the ins and outs of his Character Record, becoming more familiar with the strange system that governed this world.

There were only two Ability options to unlock at first: Sneak Attack and Deathmark.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Sneak Attack

If attacking while successfully concealed from your target, deal extra damage. Damage scales with level.

Ability Level: 1 (Initiate)

Requires: 5 Focus Points

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Deathmark

If you possess a personal belonging or effigy of your target, you can sense what direction they are in.

Ability Level: 1 (Initiate)

Requires: 5 Focus Points

No longer bound by ropes while locked in his makeshift cell, Damien had fished a small scrap out of a pocket in his clothing–something the guards hadn’t noticed when they confiscated the rest of his equipment. It was, or had been, a newspaper scrap–torn from an article in the student newspaper years ago. Chastity Kristiansen posing for a picture after placing first in a regional javelin throw event.

But now, much like Damien’s own transformation, the scrap of newspaper had become a piece of parchment, and the black and white photograph of Chastity the student athlete had become a small painted portrait, or some such likeness. She looked different, regal–as if she were a high-end cosplayer at a Renaissance Faire. But it was unmistakably her.

(Can you guess which Ability he took?)

Later, as he was being marched back to work in a dim alcove, flanked on either side by armed goblin guards, Damien nervously glanced down at the large key ring hanging from one of his captors’ belt. Concentrating on that key ring, Damien whispered a command.

“Conceal.”

ꭘ

Some hours later, there was an uproar in the mine. One of the two goblins that had first captured Damien searched frantically through the storage chests and tattered cloth sacks scattered about the goblin encampment.

“The keys! I can’t find the keys!”

His search was interrupted when the other goblin burst into the torchlit space, looking stricken. The sounds of commotion could be heard in the passage beyond.

“He’s gone! The man’s gone!” he said, trying to catch his breath. The clatter of boots and muffled shouts echoed in the background.

“Whatdoyamean he’s gone?!” snarled the first, turning to face him.

“The human! The lock is off, the door is open, the cage is empty, and his gear is missing too!”

The first goblin went wide-eyed, first with surprise, and then with growing unease. He began to pace back and forth over the stone floor, cursing and muttering.

“Nonononono. When Urlug hears about this, he’ll roast us alive! He’ll flay the flesh off our backs! Even if we catch that filthy manchild and drag him back, we’re done for!”

The other goblin narrowed his eyes. Quietly reaching behind his back he produced a crooked knife and, twitching nervously, held it at the ready.

“What are you doing!?” the first goblin demanded.

“This is all your fault. In your stupidity you let the human escape! That’s what I’ll tell Urlug when he returns. He won’t have to punish me if you’ve already paid the price!”

Without a second’s hesitation, the goblin lunged at his companion, thrusting the blade into his green belly.