[Copperplate Leggings] = 40 Copper (Bar, 0.1-0.12m) + 160 Copper (Rivet, 0.02-0.025m) + 4 Leather (level 15+, 0.5-0.75m) + 10 Twine (Hemp+1, 0.15-0.2m) + [Knife] (Copper) + [Hammer] (Copper) + [Workbench] (Any)
----------------------------------------
Jay opened his eyes, embracing this new era.
His insanity had cleared quickly after finishing the final pieces of his Cursed craft, and though his body was on fire from Wounds that would take time to clear, he could still eke out a smile.
He’d won today, in more ways than one.
But even before he could think all that through, the sun still moved, and he had so much work left.
He checked his Stats first.
Name: Jay Reis (Copper Age)
Vitality – 10/99 (Wounded+7 (Treated+7))
Hunger – 22/72
Thirst – 9/24
Fatigue – 38/48
Sanity – 87/100
He needed to satiate himself first. Now that he was back home, water could be gained aplenty, but his choice of nutrition made for his newest power.
He studied the strange object sitting on his workbench. A single long bone sat perfectly upright on the table, black and gnarled, yet with nothing to give it balance. Three more bones split off from various points at the midsection, each as twisted and dark as the trunk. But where those bones ended, a bright scarlet berry grew. Perfectly round in shape, with an oily, bloated texture that looked like an infected pustule.
I’m supposed to be able to eat that? Jay swallowed his vomit at the sight of his new cursed item, the Vitaberry Bush. Supposedly, each of these berries would be able to satiate his needs for a day without compromising his dietary balance, but damn, did he not want to test that.
His stomach grumbled, reminding him that regardless of its appearance, this was the tool he’d struggled to bring about, including the murder of another man. Another decision he’d made in a panic without thinking through.
Don’t worry about that now. Jay had gotten his reward, and no one could undo how it came about.
For better or worse.
Jay plucked one of the strange blood-berries free. It was somehow even grosser in hand, with a liquid core covered by a thin membrane. He almost thought it would explode the second he gripped it, but the damn thing simply congealed where the pressure was applied.
“Here goes nothing,” Jay said aloud before tossing it into his mouth.
His teeth mashed against the film without thought, bursting the gelatinous interior out, and for a fraction of a second, Jay thought he would retch at once.
But the vitaberry didn’t taste like some oozing boil. If anything, it was the opposite! A sweet, luscious syrup clung to his tongue where the vitaberry burst, coating his tongue and gums in an explosion of flavor. There wasn’t a single thing he could ever describe it with, but all he knew was that he wanted more of this sense. The gelatinous center slid down his throat a few seconds later, and the pain in his stomach lessened at once.
Jay felt refreshed… No, invigorated with this berry’s taste, and he swallowed the other a moment later.
Even as a metallic aftertaste hung after the vitaberry vanished, that only seemed to further compliment the sweetness that came before. Like a cup of cappuccino after a bowl of ice cream, Jay was ready to take on the world!
And his Stats showed as much.
Hunger – 72/72
Incredible. After a mere three bites, his body had absorbed enough food to stave off natural hunger for the next three days. Were it not for the fact that hunger loss accelerated with regeneration and calories burned, he would never have to worry about starving again.
There was more to the Vitaberry Bush, as well. This was a cursed item, not a plant, and didn’t need light, soil, or anything else to function. It could be easily stuffed into a backpack with plenty of room to spare, and would never wear out, making it the ideal tool to always have on hand.
It could also be stolen, making this another object he’d have to be careful with using.
Jay stroked his chin, considering that possibility. Perhaps this was how Viktor got by. Maybe he had once maxed out his vitality to some impossibly high state, and he’d been using an item like this to keep himself there ever since. That would explain why he’d be able to survive so long in a place like this. Hell, if Jay had the strength he had, why not find an easy island to coast on?
Not everything needed to be a struggle.
And yet, there was still something missing. Jay couldn’t put his finger on it, but somehow, this explanation still felt off. Why assert any supremacy at all? Why even bother to subjugate the others?
What really was this guy up to?
He rubbed his head. Too much had been happening these past few days, and he had more to get finished before night hit.
No, today was far from over.
Jay had lost everything to reach this point. Not once, but twice now, with his full set of armor and weapons destroyed, and half the cores lost. Even if he tried to upscale the needed mats, he wouldn’t be anywhere as strong as before.
Unless he tried this new alternative.
Right across the plateau, little more than a hundred yards from his base, a pile of dead monstrosities still sat. Their shadowy forms fluctuated under the light of the sun, vapor coalescing and dissipating in equal measure around their ghostly forms. Though the creep had turned back into mud, the field of tentacles still jutted from the earth, some still twitching.
And at the center, the corpse of the strange creature that commanded these appendages still remained, its chitinous body coated in blackened ooze. Jay’s nostrils wrinkled as he drew near the killing field, the taste of death and brine thick in the air.
Still got a few hours before these things despawn, he guessed. Give and take.
He raised his copper knife and went to work. Hacking into the dead monsters, slicing their flesh away, harvesting the inner organs and placing them onto a cart to be resolved later. And most importantly, collecting the cores found in their hearts.
These were Nightrealm creatures he’d defeated, after all, and there was no telling when he’d get another shot.
His Guide buzzed with all the new entries, hungry to share everything it knew about this nightmarish plane.
Strange… Despite these monsters having a form that constantly changed the more he looked at them, their anatomy appeared similar to most normal creatures he encountered. Flesh, blood, bones, chitin, feathers. They all had associated levels for the monsters killed, varying wildly from 1 to the high 30s, and could be used as a substitute for materials for weapons and armor.
Jay took the first batch of raw flesh and began curing it on his tannery, letting the magic of the crafting table hone it into leather. He’d see just how well these things could hold up.
The cores were what grabbed him most though. He examined the pile that he’d received from that murderous bout.
[Vaporous Phantasm Nightrealm Core (level 11)] – The core of a vaporous phantasm that once flew through the upper Nightrealm planes.
[Vaporous Phantasm Nightrealm Core (level 27)] – The core of a vaporous phantasm that once flew through the upper Nightrealm planes.
[Vaporous Phantasm Nightrealm Core (level 21)] – The core of a vaporous phantasm that once flew through the upper Nightrealm planes.
[Vaporous Phantasm Nightrealm Core (level 34)] – The core of a vaporous phantasm that once flew through the upper Nightrealm planes.
[Shadowraven Nightrealm Core (level 36)] – The core of a shadowraven, hatred coalesced into form.
[Enigmatic Ooze Nightrealm Core (level 31)] – The core of an enigmatic ooze and all its intraspacial folds.
[Chaos Hatchling (level 47)] – The core of a chaos hatchling, its soul still tinged with madness.
His eyes narrowed on the last monster’s level. To think that Jay had once struggled against an owlbear around this level, and had needed a partner to handle it. This chaotic monster was so easy.
No, it was more than that.
Chaos Hatchling (level 47) – A coalescence of madness, spawned from a chaotic Interstice between the Nightrealm’s upper planes. This creature is known for growing stronger whenever it suffers damage.
Contains a Nightrealm core.
Even more perplexing. The only way he would have stood a chance was by killing this creature in a single hit, but he could have never known that. Instead, he’d relied on something else… And it had paid off.
What was this sense that took him at the height of his Cursed fever dream? It wasn’t his rational mind, but it wasn’t Tül’Rah’s influence either. It was like the moment he realized he was trapped, something else screamed out from the pit of his stomach with a fury of its own.
Something that he’d never experienced before, yet somehow he still knew was always there…
He rubbed his scalp, his head still killing him. What am I doing with these cores?
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
They weren’t even normal cores.
Nightrealm core – A core from monsters found in the Nightrealm. This monster core variant will enhance physical attributes for equipment beyond their normal infusion levels, but they cannot be used to draw upon for crafting level ups, and contain a reduced skill energy well.
He took the cores inside and collected his next set of gear, intent on experimenting with these new cores. With all the craziness of the past few days, he’d burned through more pig iron than he’d been able to smelt. Thankfully, his stores for copper were still holding strong, and he’d been hoarding in case of an emergency like this one.
He fired up the furnaces, collected the appropriate casts, and went to work…
His first batch of Nightrealm leather finished curing, pulled from the highest level phantasm. Even though its base had clearly cured into leather, a layer of vaporous ichor continued to ooze across its surface, appearing and disappearing as it bled down. Yet, Jay could touch it and feel nothing but a cold, hard piece of leather.
He shuddered and brought it back instead, an armful of upscaled copper+3 plates and rivets in the other, with more hemp+3 beside.
This part of the craft was second nature. Jay first trimmed holes in the four pieces of leather, tightening them along the major seams where they would curl back together, leaving enough room for his legs and torso to slip through. The plates came next, with Jay having to hammer each one in place with four individual rivets. There were forty total for this piece alone, but after so much practice and the power of his workbench, he’d been able to streamline the process to take less than an hour.
But before finishing the final plate, he took the level 33 phantasm core and whacked it into place.
He expected the craft to reject this plan. Monster cores required that each core be built upon the strength of the one before in order to scale effectively, so the same logic should have held for the Nightrealm variants as well.
And yet… The moment he hammered the last piece in place, wisps of black shadow suddenly enveloped his new copperplate leggings, transforming its design. The leather formed a more sleek design, the copper turned duller and more jagged, and the hemp turned gray and dead. Even the shape became altered, hanging longer than the mass that supported it, with a frayed bottom as if it had been torn.
He blinked at the new pair of copperplate leggings, the Guide open beside.
[Copperplate Leggings+3] (Nightmarish+6), (Hardened+2), (Reinforced+2) – A pair of leather leggings reinforced by copper plates. This [Copperplate Leggings] has been modified for extra strength, insanity resistance, hardness, durability, and reduced skill energy.
Jay gaped. He could have gear that resisted insanity drops without swapping for an amethyst!? He’d always held off with armor jewel socketing because it reduced its physical power in exchange for the elemental boost gained, but this circumvented that. More than that, as he delved deeper into the Guide, he realized the power that had been acquired through this one craft alone.
Nightrealm cores enhanced physical attributes, but they also did so in a way that provided greater benefits. The +3 core modifier was as strong as a regular core and didn’t require tiers placed before, but the real boost came from its “Nightmarish” modifier, which provided an additional flat boost in strength. Unlike regular modifiers that worked on each component individually, the sum total of all Nightrealm mats worked with the core, raising its infusion level by a formula of the core level plus half the level of each associated material included. By using a level 34 Nightrealm core and level 34 leather from the same plane, it counted as if it were a level 51 infusion level for the purpose of calculating how Nightmarish it was, or +6 above its Copper Age base.
In other words, Jay realized, the more mats a piece of Nightrealm gear is made from, the stronger its multiplier becomes.
This was uncharted territory. Jay had always done his best to follow the logical path of progression. Kill monsters, collect cores, fuse into gear, level up, repeat. The Nightrealm was a place he’d only entered by force, and he’d never considered what value could be gained from there. His last escapade ended when Naomi saved him, and he’d ceded all the loot to her after, a subconscious “thank you” for staving off his death.
But this opened up even more possibilities. Stacking Nightrealm cores with copper gear might not raise his skill levels, but it would make his gear objectively stronger, and since it seemed to reduce insanity gained, he could go so far as to more reliably raid cairns in the search of more mats.
An entire alternate leveling system, ready to be exploited.
You’re getting ahead of himself, Jay reminded himself. He’d only made a single piece of gear, not conquered the world.
He stroked his chin in thought. We’ll see just how good this new set is tonight.
* * *
Night swallowed the jungle yet again. Beneath the brilliant mosaic of starlit skies, the darkened canopies swayed above a blackened sea, shadowy crags jutting out like dark islands, and it was within this crucible that Natura spawned its army again, manufacturing its soldiers for another attack.
Jay watched patiently from the clearing, cloaked in shadow himself. His full suit of copperplate armor had been balanced by all the Nightrealm cores he’d gained, perverting their sleek design into one that looked worn and ragged from the outside. His coat hung like a tattered cloak, his gloves had sharp spikes on the knuckles, and his helmet shrouded his eyes in perpetual shade.
And those eyes now watched the night anew. With the power of night owl in his system, he stared unblinking as Natura’s manifestations coalesced in the grayscale jungle. For the first time since arriving in Annwyn, his brain didn’t short-circuit to the sight, nor did he suddenly feel a compulsion to treat everything as if it were a video game.
He simply watched on with the cold calculus that only darkness could gift him.
That’s one question out of the way. He wasn’t sure how powerful nightmarish gear could resist the insanity drop, but as Jay scanned his Guide, he estimated the loss to be little more than half of a normal night.
Well within the confines of acceptable.
The monsters marched forth next. A phalanx, it seemed, with a bulk of clay hulks protected by mossmooses and granite bears, and a second muddy tortoise to aid the first.
Show time, Jay supposed. He gripped his copper scimitar tight, the curved copper blade darker and more chipped than normal, ready to swallow its enemies whole.
He rushed forth, right into the center of the mass.
Muddy tortoises fired their first salvo, but Jay [Quickstepped] aside. Another came for him, but he batted it away with a [Shirk]. A last one came before he hit the horde. He merely leaned into it, his copperplate holding firm, even as the boulder shattered.
A mossmoose reared its head and charged. Jay rushed the monster as well and swung his sword like a bat, right into its face.
Despite the lack of a skill, the +4 Sharpened blade was enhanced by the +6 core taken from the chaos hatchling, the added nightmarish strength compounding it ever more to carve a line made of shadowed essence where the blade swung.
The mossmoose’s body paused in place, even as its head tumbled onward. It fell without a sound, smoke sizzling from its wound.
And the rest of the manifestations shrieked, their pale green eyes brightening in shock. Natura might have performed no shortage of tactics against him and always grown in strength, but it had never seen him pull a trick like this.
Because there was no trick needed. Only pure, corrupted strength, harnessed into this new type of weapon.
Jay continued the sortie from there. His armor quaked against hits but held firm. His sword cut through everything with ease, even the tougher enemies he’d been struggling against. His body crumpled when applicable, blood exploding out.
It was no matter. He’d done enough of these fights to know when they would be desperate, and tonight was not one of them.
Jay smirked below his helmet. Just as he was getting comfortable with a skill-based set of pig iron gear, he’d uncovered a new path that would let him rely on nothing more than raw power. As if he’d developed a new build completely.
Would he even need to use pig iron anymore?
Yes, it would still be foolish not to. Jay still needed regular level ups to proceed, and though this Nightrealm gear was stronger, the greatly reduced skill well was already taking its toll. His muscles ached before long, and he tanked a torrent of hits that he’d normally avoid.
But as another smack knocked him back a foot, another thought crossed his mind, one that he had never considered until now.
Why not use both?
Yes, that would work.
Ever since first waking up, Jay had been beaten, bruised, and subjugated by forces larger than himself. He’d been put under insurmountable pressure in the hopes that he’d shatter. But he never did. He merely found the most efficient path forward, always assuming the best strategy to win the day. Even Viktor had not broken him completely. He’d only been another element in this chaotic world.
And despite it all, Jay had not only avoided an early death, but grown more powerful through all this adversary. Like a diamond in a volcano, he could feel himself becoming sharper. Becoming stronger. Becoming a more lethal machine.
He saw the face of Amadi in one of Natura’s manifestations and shattered it. He saw Viktor’s grizzled cheeks in another and brought the same fate. He saw Tül’Rah last, his dark eyes an unbeatable adversary.
And Jay killed this monster too.
Nothing would get in his way.
Name: Jay Reis (Copper Age)
Vitality – 99/99
Hunger – 53/72
Thirst – 18/24
Fatigue – 32/48
Sanity – 78/100
Main Crafts: Alchemy 2, Armor Crafting 2, Base Building 3, Cooking 2, Jewelry 2, Medicine 2, Tailoring 2, Tool Crafting 3, Vehicles 1, Weapon Crafting 2.
Weapon Crafts: Axes 5, Bows 6, Clubs 5, Daggers 5, Spears 5, Swords 11.
Armor Crafts: Heavy Armor 5, Light Armor 5, Medium Armor 8, Shields 6.
Sub-Crafts: Curved Swords 5.
Character Skills:
[Forbidden Knowledge]
Armor Skills:
Heavy Armor: [Push], [Stampede]
Medium Armor: [Recover], [Leap], [Waterform], [Quickstep]
Light Armor: [Dash], [Feather Fall]
Shield: [Brace], [Track], [Break]
Weapon Skills:
Axes: [Chop], [Whirlwind]
Bows: [Sharpshooter], [Longshot], [Scattershot Arrow]
Clubs: [Bash], [Paralyze]
Daggers: [Slice], [Flourish]
Spears: [Thrust], [Sweep]
Swords: [Power Attack], [Slash], [Rend], [Shirk], [Violent Storm]
Armor:
[Copperplated Hat+3] (Nightmarish+5), (Buttressed+2), (Hardened+2), (Reinforced+1)
[Copperplated Coat+4] (Nightmarish+6), (Buttressed+2), (Hardened+2), (Reinforced+1)
[Copperplated Leggings+3] (Nightmarish+6), (Buttressed+2), (Hardened+2), (Reinforced+1)
[Copperplated Shoes+2] (Nightmarish+3), (Buttressed+2), (Hardened+1), (Reinforced)
[Copperplated Gloves+1] (Nightmarish+2), (Buttressed+2), (Hardened+1), (Reinforced)
[Silver Amulet]: Socketed with [Chipped Tourmaline] (Tempus)
[Silver Ring]: Socketed with [Chipped Ruby] (Ignis)
[Silver Ring]: Socketed with [Chipped Ruby] (Ignis)
Weapons:
[Copper Scimitar+6] (Nightmarish+8), (Sharpened+4), (Hardened+4), (Reinforced+2), (Stable+2)
[Treated Bow] (Hardened+1): Socketed with [Chipped Ruby] (Ignis)
[Basic Leather Quiver]: Contains 5 [Silver-tipped Arrows] (Elemental+2), (Stability+3)
Tools:
[Copper Knife+3]
[Copper Axe+3]
[Copper Hammer+3]
[Copper Pickaxe+3]
[Copper Shovel+3]
Boons:
[[Minor (Speed)] (x3)