Chapter 07 Hippo Craftgood
I dismissed the notifications, the world announcement would probably have ramifications and consequences I could not yet foresee, but right now there was nothing to do about it.
I stared down at my mangled arm, which hurt like hell, but at least my HP weren’t plummeting from bleed effects anymore. The gnawed off Stygian Octodile head enveloped my arm, a very primitive and painful gauntlet of sorts.
Scooter woofed at me, and then paddled right next to me, and licked my face, depositing viscera on in the process.
“Yeah good Scooter” I said while patting him with my free arm.
“I’m just gonna sit down over at the bank, pry this thing off, and maybe faint for a while”.
I slowly walked back to the bank while cradling the croc head like a baby, as it hurt just a bit eveytime the head was jolted.
Sitting down on the bank, I took a few breaths to collect my thoughts.
Then concentrated on my inventory and the crochead, which promptly disappeared.
The pain had been a kind of dull pain, but as the pressure was released it instantly sharpened, and I keeled over and whimpered.
After a while I gently moved myself to sit with my back against a tree, and pulled a piece of wood from my inventory to woodgnaw. A couple of hours and my arm would be a lot better. The natural healing of this world was a boon, also my high constitution was probably showing itself.
The sun began to set, another magnificent sunset, and another day where I didn’t progress towards my main goal of finding my first Hipponian tribe, and presumably subsequently enslaving them in the chains of religion.
Perhaps Shikman was right, we could ill afford delays. Still if we could arm ourselves better, our chances of surviving against other swamp beasts would increase.
I sat down with Scooter, and tried to explain that I wanted him to dive into the water, and gnaw the Octodile corpse into 2 parts, so I could salvage it.
After some trial and error, we settled on a model, where I grabbed scooter by the neck, then used him as a gnawing powertool to carve through the Octodile. Scooter had to get up and get new air quite frequently.
I was working him hard and finally hit paydirt when he wrenched through the Octodilian spine. Then I got to work with my scalpel, sawing through tendons and meat. Perhaps octodile steak tonight ?
I sawed at the 2 halves of the corpse, dumping all meat pieces into my inventory, finally they were reduced to a level where they could also fit into my inventory.
Scooter was lying on the bank, stomach bloated from working through the Octodile.
I gently poked him, and said “Scooter time for a little walk to aid your digestion, oh and lets get your gorget on”.
I fished it out of my inventory, shaking it a bit to get a feel for it.
If I understood it correctly a small hood would go over Scooters head, with big holes for the ears, this would keep the overlapping segments of the gorget up, and protect throat and partially flanks and chest with leather plates ending up in 2 hoops for Scooters forelimbs.
It took some tries, until we tried putting the forelimb hoops on first, and then Scooter wriggled his head through the whole thing, and I strapped it tight with several leather straps with small bone fasteners.
I stepped back and looked at Scooter. The little head cap with ear holes made him look ridiculous. But the leather segments could maybe deflect an improvised spear, which could otherwise skewer Scooter.
I thought the overall result was quite pleasing, it also had the effect of immediately differentiating Scooter from a wild beast. But it needed a little oomph, well I would have time for that back in the camp.
On my way back, I walked on a small hillock and could see a thin wisp of smoke coming in the direction of my companions camp.
As the camp came into visual range, I marveled at the difference.
A small rickety scaffolding structure, 2 A-frames with a pole in between over a low fire. On the pole 5 gutted fishfrogs were being smoked or slowcooked.
Kerthax and Shikman were fiddling with a bundle of de-barked sticks of various length tied together with vines. They were working quietly but stopped when they noticed me and Scooter.
Then Shikman stood “So while we have been working according to our mutually agreed plan, you seem to have made the Glenhalla world news, what with your little lunch world announcement. Maybe you would share such ideas with your closest allies in the future, BEFORE executing said ideas !”. The last bit was shouted in hysteric rage, he had obviously worked himself up a lot.
“The plan was for me to deliver materials or a tamed creature. As such I have followed our plan”.
I began to pile the mangled Octodile parts up in front of him, lastly presenting him with the impressive, if messed up, head of the lizard.
As the parts had appeared, Shikman had focused on them, and was inspecting the teeth and the eye.
I activated my electro-metavision and could see the coloured webs inside the Octodile, green dominating the other colors.
[You have inspected 81/500 lifeforms with Electro-Metavision]
Shikman looked at me. “This could make great leather armor, but with no skinning knife, we cannot do this properly”.
I looked at him, then fished my Peryton Scalpel out of my inventory and gave it to him.
He looked down at his hand at the tiny knife, but more fitting his hand, since that was tiny as well.
“You had this all along, and didn’t present it to I, Shikman Obad the Creator ! what an affront, I have been sitting for hours banging rocks together to get a sharp flake to use for sharpening our makeshift spears, and you have this iron knife all the time ?” Shikman asked rhetorically as he went back into hysteria mode, only now he also seemed somewhat ecstatic with the knife in his hand.
“I have 5 more claws, everybody can have 2 blades, we can be the Iron Eagle Double Blade Cub Club together, nobody needs to get left out. But let me try woodgnawing some handles for these, and then you can maybe figure out a way to mount them”. I said trying to console the little guy.
I was too tired to argue, and also too tired to woodgnaw handles for him at the moment, but if it could stop the anxiety issue and let me get some rest then no problem.
Shikman seemed to cool down a just a bit, probably in no small way the 5 more blade materials contributed to this.
Shikman replied “You know some gods will try to entrap us, and have our quest timer for godhood run out. You have an iron weapon already, even if its just an undersized exceedingly crappy made blade, people will kill for that. And that Ironblood talent you got, what is that even ?”
I shrugged, and said “I don’t know what it does, maybe I will know when I meet with my first tribe”.
Shikman looked at me, then said “But you do have the talent now ?”
I summoned my character sheet, and confirmed “yes, I have Excessive Force, Semi-Aquatic, Militaristic, Sweet Luck and now also Ironblood”.
Shikman’s eyes bulged, and a vein stood out on his forehed. He opened and closed his mouth a few times.
Then started talking “So you have some Luck talent, and now also Ironblood, you have racial talents, but you have no idea what either of them does. You really are a bumbling fool, with a powerful patron.” He started laughing.
I looked on coldly. When his laughter abated I started speaking.
“Maybe you are mistaking lack of knowledge with stupidity. Something you should know if you are a so-called Creator, it takes knowledge and experimentation to create. “
“With no magic my people were able to build machines beyond your imagination, one machine doing the work of hundreds of men, we could even build machines traveling beyond the heavens.”
“But all of this required much work, and patience. “
“So you will either have to explain the concepts of the system to me with patience, or handle situations like these with a little more grace, or we will have problems down the line”.
Everybody held their breath.
Shikman opened his mouth then closed it again. Then held his hand up in apology.
“I’m sorry, I'm not used to all this stress, I was hoping to get quickly to one of my favoured tribes, and then setup my powerbase, and try making the foundations for an arcane-industrial trading empire.”
“But right now it seems I'm stuck in a dangerous place, and the only way I really can contribute is by crafting gear for you, my companions. I will accompany you to the hive, and into it if need be.
But my skills and godhead are not built towards direct confrontation, In a fight I won’t mean much difference, most assuredly I am less of a combatant than your fierce pet.”
Shikman motioned at Scooter then continued.
“To give you some helpful advice, you can concentrate on elements on your character sheet, and also on the other tables and menus which the system will display to you as a god, then an explanation of certain things may be given.
Also you should never reveal your talents or other details about your character sheet to anyone. Especially don’t mention if you have any secret aces, which a Luck talent definitely is.”
“Thank you Shikman, now I would love to talk more, but I need to go to sleep now, my arm is killing me.”.
I laid back, Peryton hoodie and everything on, closed my eyes, and the world started spinning. Octodiles attacking me, Shikman droning on about something, it all wishwashed over me as I fell asleep.
Age of the Godlings - Year 0 - Kroonensnoob - Day 4
As I woke up the next day, I saw Shikman working in a furious tempo, but with the jerky motions of an extremely tired person.
“Shikman have you been working, all night ?”
“Yes, I must work tirelessly to provide my companions and myself with the most rudimentary of equipment” he answered.
“But won’t the quality of the work be bad if you are super-tired when you are crafting ?” I asked.
Shikman looked at me, then grinned sheepishly. “You really are too smart for your face you know that. I will take but a short nap and then continue on my tireless endeavor to garb us all in matching Stygian Octodile outfits.”
Shikman then went on to fiddle around our crafting camp, displaying three knives he had made during the night out of some of the Peryton claws I had found.
I had to admit they looked a lot better than mine, and the 3 had different angled handles, so could be used for a variety of tasks.
He also called out a rock in our camp, this rock was apparently designated the camp’s Toolhome, which I think was just a fancy way of having people remember where they put the tools, and remember to put it back.
“I will take care of what we wear, you can make your weapons and other equipment yourself, and if I have time I will craft superior versions of your weapons, oh and don’t touch my pile of selected materials” Shikman said while at the end of his lecture pointing to a corner of a camp, with sticks crudely marking his designated area of materials storage mostly the pieces of Octodile..
I shook my head at the little man, and said ok. Shikman proceeded to a little leaf cot and promptly dozed off.
This was in some ways turning out to be a good morning, coffee would have been nice though.
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Kerthax was arranging some long, nearly straight branches next to the fire.
The A-frame had been moved to the side of the camp, and Kerthax started to rummage with the bundles of debarked sticks.
I looked at my hand, it was bruised and discolored, and had plenty of scabs from quite deep wounds. But again the insane regeneration on this world, or this systems or whatever. Back home I would have been bleeding to dead, or would have been infected in this swamp morass.
I had 74 HP now, little over half. If my character sheet could be trusted, I would continue to heal 2 HP per hour, so in about 30 hours I would be fully healed, simply amazing.
I wonder what this means for warfare in this world, field hospitals are not really needed. As long as the soldiers can survive, they can fight again at full strength next week.
It must make it even more important to minimize casualties in own ranks, and prioritize casualties in enemy ranks over wounded, to put simply better kill 1 enemy, than wound two or three enemies.
That went straight against Earth modern military doctrine, interesting.
Maybe a good idea to chat with someone about this at some point and get a 2’nd opinion, before I found myself with blood to the knees, in a holy crusade, if that however were to happen, I was going to make sure it wouldn't be Hipponian blood that would used as army foot lotion.
I looked back at Kerthax, he had selected himself a stick and was eyeballing down the length of it. Then heating it briefly in the fire and then straightening it in some small tool.
I went over to have a look.
The tool was a small stone with a straight groove worked into it. In the straight groove went the wooden stick, and Kerthax concentrated on straightening the kink in the stick.
Oh well, I took a leftover piece of wood and stuffed it in my mouth and gnawed away.
I wasn't really in the mood for any handicrafts involving both hands right now. Nevertheless I sat down next to Kerthax, and mostly using my feet, I could fixate on one end of a stick, and Kerthax could concentrate more on the kinks.
We went at it together and quickly got into a rhythm. After 40 minutes or so, Kerthax stood up. “I need a break from this” he said while stretching his back and extending his arms into the air. Then he sauntered over to a nearby mudhole and sloshed around in it for 10 minutes before coming back to stick straightening.
We went on for a couple of hours, only stopping to snack half a fishfrog each, and taking turns skinny dipping in a nearby mudhole. Someone had to stay in the camp, and make sure no untamed predators would come into the camp and gulp down Shikman.
Shikman eventually woke up, and we had a lunch meal together, while discussing priorities.
“No, in an ideal situation I could cure the hide, then shape it, then make holes and sew it together, and have the crafting skills for it.
We don’t have either time or skills for magnificence to manifest, so we will have to improvise a fair bit. To that end my herbalist skill, which I have already considerably leveled, has identified a possible source of glue, as we lack the time and manpower to fabricate a quality string for sewing and a needle.
I should be able to craft glue with the bark of the Flornwrungle tree, there are plenty around, I will show you one later.
“Ok, I will get my hippo ass out there and wrangle bark”
“No, let Kerthax do that, you still have an injured arm, but I will also need your woodgnawing skill, which we will now challenge. For making the glue and another magnificent idea of mine we will need a vessel. Anything you can make which can hold some amount of liquid the more the better, and preferably a flat bottom, so its stable.
“Uh, i’m pretty sure I can't make a concave shape with woodgnawing”.
“Yes, well I think that it will indeed challenge your skill more than gnawing at stakes. But find a lot of bark, more firewood. Oh and, Perun please take that stinky feather outfit off, I will need to get your measurements, then I guide Kerthax to whick bark I want”.
After having my hippo ass measured, I went out and found a large branch. I prepared it for snapping by gnawing a bit into it it, which then turned into a fair bit of gnawing, as it was difficult snapping it with only one hippo crazy strength arm.
I brought the stump back to camp, and started gnawing it. My first result was a large branch with 4 depressions in it, which could perhaps hold 2 vodka shots each, not impressive. I dubbed it the Vodka-bench.
I then allied myself with Scooter, and again used the powertool trick with him, grabbing him by the neck and having him gnaw down on a larger branch. After we got it hacked off, I proceeded to use a combination of wood gnawing and one of our knives, which had a much better result, and I ended up with a sort of bowl, which could hold an amount equal to a vending cup of coffee.
Shikman however, was a relentless taskmaster.
“Yes, 6 of those should be adequate, a bit larger if you can make them, but don’t skimp on the thickness, we still want a quality product.”
I looked doubtfully at the bowl in my hand.
Woodgnawed Ebbelpron tree bowl - Quality : Meager , Durability 7/7
Well at least Meager was maybe better than exceedingly low. Shikman confirmed that it indeed was one tier better.
I sighed then went out with Scooter to cut more of the thick branches.
On our way we met Kerthax coming back with a full load of bark and a sullen expression on his face.
“ho, Kerthax, whats biting you ?” I said
“It’s 2 days in a row now where I don’t get my afternoon sunning. The Whispering Wind clan holds this time sacred for conducting meetings and transactions, which are best done when one's physical form is relaxed and heated by the sun.”
“Kerthax, we may be going into battle soon against feral ant-men, the preparations we do now may save our lives in the future. I know a saying that goes something like better sweat in training than bleed in battle. I’m sure you understand my meaning.
“Stormlord, I didn’t mean any disrespect, and your counsel is both sound and wise, but that little god, he has ordered me around for the last 2 days, he is constantly correcting the work I do. And embellishing his own work, and superiorness. It's so frustrating.”
“I get it Kerthax, sometimes I wish you and your friends ate him as well” that got a little laugh from Kerthax and I went on “But we need to have good relations with Shikman, and I need whatever rewards I can get from this risky adventure.
My understanding of magic and monsters may not be as good as the other godlings, but I know that we cannot just sit on our asses, we have to act and take risks. We have another saying, Fortes Fortuna Juvat, Fortune favours the bold.
There will be a time for diplomatic discussions while basking in the sun, but not right now. Shikman is right, the clock is ticking both for me and him.
I need your help for this, both as my chief diplomat, but also as a warrior and right now a crafter.”
Kerthax sighed “I will craft away Stormlord, and keep my peace with the little god, even if I want to chew him into little pieces”
“That's what I want to hear from my chief diplomat. Now let's get this job done” I said and me and Scooter went off to get more branches for Shikman’s cups.
Coming back to camp with 5 gnawed off branches, I found that Kerthax had not eaten Shikman, which I considered a good start, though a part of me had hoped for it, why did he have to be such an obnoxious little fellow.
Shikman stood up from the mess of the Stygian Octodile carcass sections in his materials area, and while talking dropped the piece he was working on, and left the knife on the Toolhome rock.
“Ah there you are, you need to hurry up and make those bowls, so we still have some daylight left. Now Kerthax, start handing me the pieces of bark” Shikman sat down and started feeding a corner of the fire with Flornwrungle bark.
Kerthax came over to him and without any cues, dumped a load of bark besides Shikman, who was too busy building some bark structure in the fire to notice, the unceremonious dumping of his materials.
Kerthax stood next to me, but said nothing, and we both looked at the little god.
He only noticed after several minutes. “Don’t just stand there, make 5 more bowls, and Kerthax more bark, I clearly said we don't have time for idling”.
We both rolled our eyes, and began our tasks.
When I had made 2 more bowls, and was inspecting the knife, I had applied excessive force and had almost ruined the part of the handle which held the clawblade. Shikman interrupted thoughs with his babbling “no, we will have to make due with 3 for tonight, there is not much daylight left, and you need your sight for this.
Each of you take a bowl, and a small stake, and Kerthax also bring 3 knives from the Toolhome.” And as he took the knife from my hand, and looked disapprovingly at it he said “Leave this at the Toolhome overnight, it needs rest”.
We shook our heads but otherwise did as instructed and sat down next to him.
He took some big leaves from his inventory, laid them on the ground, and spread out some seeds on one leaf, and some berries on another.
“Now first take a small amount of the seeds, and crush them in the bowl, after that mash the berries, take care and have patience, crush all seeds completely, and pulp the berries completely.”
Again we did as instructed. After a while Shikman examined our work, and had Kerthax ground his bowl some more. Kerthax ground away with a bit of a strained look.
Then Shikman took out a dripping organ from his inventory, put in on the remaining leaf, and carved a slice, which was then carved into little cubes, and went into the bowl.
I looked at him and said “Shikman, is this dinner or something, because I’m not really sure if we shouldnt cook this before eating it.”
He shushed me almost immediately and instructed “carve into even cubes, and then gently massage cubes with poultice.” As he very gently stroked one of the cubes with the juicy end of his small stake.
“Try to be silent and concentrate on applying it evenly, and with a gentle touch”
Me and Kerthax both sighed, and went on with him, this had to be more than just Shikman reliving a past life as a TV chef.
We sat and gently massaged our fleshy cubes, and it was getting hard to see what was going on in the bowl, when something happened.
[Abundance awaits ! , through hard work you have learned a skill.
Skills are the butter of civilizations!]
[Your skill in “Alchemy” is now 1.07]
You have crafted a batch of 6 Cubes of Skulkweed preserved Stygian Octodile Liver - +2 HP regeneration per hour - duration 4 hours - Quality : Downright shitty
Oh my god, Shikman you wonderful little bastard you are teaching us all to be alchemists, I thought, and then pondered if there was any catch. I idly stroked at my meat with the now juicy stake.
Shikman had stopped and seemed to await our reaction. Both me and Shikman glanced at Kerthax’s bowl, and of course Shikman immediately admonished “Gently Kerthax, you don’t want to ruin the delicate structure of the Stygian Octodile liver”.
Kerthax looked up at him, briefly, then down at the pulp and only few intact cubes.Muttered, then sighed and gently massaged the cubes.
Shikman and me both hold our breath, until Kerthax finally spluttered.
“Wait this is not dinner, I just got a skill from this”
Kerthax looked at Shikman in wonder “Is this your magic ?”
Shikman chuckled “No, this is just the rules of the system, and some luck on our part.
The liver component is of Excellent rarity, which my vision skill has shown me. So many combinations are possible, and we just want to have just a little bit more.
But put these cubes in your inventory, and we will have them for later. Go clean our bowls, we have more to do.
Kerthax and I went to our bathing spot. Kerthax broke the silence.
“If that little guy had only spoken up that he could teach us a skill for making magical meats, and that was his plan, I could have tolerated all his erratic behavior.”
“I think our little friend is not too good with other people, and he is probably trying his best. Maybe this is also hard for him. Good job keeping your patience, now let's see what next in Shikman’s Show” I said as we walked back.
I now asked Shikman to explain what the next scene was about, and he explained that now that we all had the alchemy skill, he was pretty sure we would be able to make a glue out of the ashes of the Flornwrungle tree bark.
Crafting the Flornwrungle glue was actually simpler, it just required patience.
You have crafted a medium dose of Flornwrungle glue - Quality : Downright shitty
Well, still not an epic result, but it was made with tools carved with my mouth, so not too bad.
Kerthax started to fry some of the Octodilian meat, and we soon enjoyed a good meal.
As we ate I told them about the fight with the Octodile, and they were both thrilled to hear it.
We stared into the crackling fire then Shikman asked “Actually using inventory for direct offense has been a trick on many worlds, but it tends to have unpredictable results, so even with your luck talent you may end up hurting yourself as well.
I shrugged.
“At that point my arm was locked inside its jaws, and the battle didn't seem in my favor, I wasn’t sure it would work, but had I known that it could have somehow backfired on me, I would probably still have done it.”.
We sat in silence for a few moments. Then I asked “Shikman, can I borrow another slice of that Octodilian liver ?”
He looked at me in surprise “why would you want that ?”
“Oh you know, we all have our ideas” I said mysteriously.
As the sun slowly set, I sat and grounded the liver slice into pulp with the ashes of the tree.
I used my initial little vodka shot bench for this, and thus had 4 little compartments to work with. After the stars appeared I was rewarded with a result.
You have crafted a batch of 4 small doses of weak Regenerative Glue - Can stop bleeding effects when applied - +1 HP regeneration per hour - duration 8 hours - Quality : Exceedingly low
Bam, and there I had my troops first aid bandages, Flornwrungle plantation and Stygian Octodile ranch added to Nice to Have list.
Kerthax and I took turns sleeping. Shikman got too preoccupied to keep attention to anything not immediately in front of his eyeballs, we could have kept him in the rotation, but it made no sense.
Kerthax was just relieving me, and I sat down on my little makeshift campbed.
With a little guilty look at the sleeping Shikman, I went to inspect my character sheet.
Learn a bit every day.
- Excessive Force - the hippokin would always be true believers to their true god; excessive force. Luck based chance to double magnitude of action.
- Militaristic - Gain a small bonus to military units tactics in combat, and a general bonus for militaristic society.
- Ironblood - Blood quickly coagulates quckly, defense vs. bleeding effects.
- Semi-Aquatic - Allows for movement and passage under water for longer durations than most humanoid.
- Sweet Luck - Small bonus to Luck outcome rolls
Avatar of Perun (7)
Species : Hipponian
Level: 1
Sex : Male
Age : 32 years
Renown : 1 (Your name kinda rings a bell...)
XP: 2799 (3000 to next level)
HP : 131/133
(2 HP/hour)
STA : 200
MP : 155/160
(+6 MP/hour)
Holy energy 160/160
(+6 HE/hour)
Attributes
Strength 20
Wisdom 16
Charisma 16
N/A
Dexterity 13
Intelligence 16
Luck 20
N/A
Constitution 20
Spirit 16
N/A
N/A
Classes :
Stormlord Avatar - Lvl 1
Combat Skills
Clubs 1.02
Short Spears 1.27
Unarmed 1.34
Small blades 1.04
General Skills
Alchemy 1.07
Woodgnawing 2.08
Diplomacy 1.84
Woodworking 1.16
Leatherworking 1.34
Skinning 1.09
Magical Skills
Electro Metamagic 4.92 (#)
Lightning Magic 1.07 (/)
Holy Skills
Perunian Clerical Magic 1.00 (@)
Beast Shamanism 1.32(¤)
Talents
Excessive Force
Semi-Aquatic
Militaristic
Sweet Luck
Ironblood
Abilities
# Electro Metavision 7.89
/ Stun 1.16
@ Consecration 1.00
¤ Soothe the Beast 1.23
Inventory
Perythorax : Armor: 7 Durability : 14/14 Quality : Exceedingly low
Peryton antlers : Durability 49/64 Quality : High
Peryton Scalpel : Durability 4/11 Quality : Exceedingly low
5 Peryton claws
2 Clubs
9 Stakes
3 Wood spears
Head of a Stygian Octodile with plenty of grisly lacerations
Beastmasters furry undies : +2% to interacting with Beasts, Armor 4, Durability 90/90, Quality : Wellmade, Part of a set, Beastmasters Alpine Garb
Hyena Leather Gorget, Armor :7 Durability 30/30 Quality : Meager
Cubes of Skulkweed preserved Stygian Octodile Liver
The Lightning Masters left Sandal : Mana regeneration x1.09 Arrmor 2: Durability 40/40 Quality : Wellmade - Part of a set : Lightning Masters Tropical Vestments
4 small doses of weak Regenerative Glue