AN: Point out any mistakes please. As always advice is welcome.
In two nights Dwyn managed to change the status of all farm fields in Leeway to both farms and gardens. None of the farmers noticed the change in status, and no one suspected anything of the sort, since he was supposed to be helping out at the farms anyway. They dod not notice the change because it did not affect their work, and could not notice a garden status to begin with.
His planned revenge would be simple. He would leave problematic weeds over all of the villages farms. To be able to blame someone else, he had to limit the possible plants he could use. He chose plants whose seeds spread by getting stuck to clothes or fur and fall off elsewhere. One of the two plants he used was a local weed that could blend easily into the environment of the farms. It would just take nutrients from the land and make the crops grow less. The other one was more interesting. He read about it during his second test. It was grown the same way he had grown the parasitic mushrooms from his class tests.
It was called Baruks and he remembered seeing some in one of the jars in Paeral’s house. This was his first attempt at theft. He went to her mud house, and waited until she was asleep. There were no windows there, so getting in and out was not the problem, the darkness was. The jar with the dried fungus was just above her bed, but he didn’t see which one he was looking for so he took them all out into the moonlight, sweating from nerves he carried two at a time. After finding it and taking a piece of Baruks he returned all the jars in above Paeral’s bed.
He took only a bit so that she would not notice, and without wasting time, stuck it to a tree just outside the village. He tampered with it adding water and doing silly things like poking it so that his green thumb skill would help in the growth of the fungus. And it worked. Barkus was a white fungus that looked like a crystal formation stuck to a tree. It did not shine like crystals though. Once it was grown to some minimum requirement, he got a system message about it.
Baruks - parasitic hallucinogen fungi
-is easily broken in pieces and any one of the pieces can grow a new mushroom
-sticks on rough surfaces and grows on tree barks.
-in fully grown form releases hallucinogenic gas to protect itself
Dwyn made it grow some more before breaking off some pieces and putting them in his inventory. His next challenge is to make this and the common weed grow to full size next to the guards barracks so that Soire and company (the other guards weren't particularly nicer to him) would be blamed. Their patrols made it challenging. It took him three days to make it because of his constant need to hide. Luckily for him, the guards did not think to guard their guardhouse and by the time he succeeded, his sentence ended.
Deciding that such a small detail would not stop his plan, Dwyn talked to some of the elves of the village council and got a job doing the same he did so far. They were impressed by his newfound maturity. He now earned 10 silver a day, but because he was used to the job, his stats did not increase anymore. His new deadline was until the arrival of the caravan he planned to take to the wood elves capital(7 days).
Dwyn used his green thumb skill to speed the growth of the weeds around the guardhouse, and left the ones he planted in the fields to grow normally. The farmers would notice their effects soon after they grew and find them slightly after that.
His last plan was specially dedicated to the elf that passed judgment on him. Dwyn had long since found out where he lives. It was one of the biggest tree houses, and it was at the edge of the upper village walkways making stealth easier. He had still decided not to risk getting caught breaking into his house, one break in was enough for now. Instead he decided to cut the vine bridge connecting that elves tree house to the walkway. The bridge was a simple collection of planks between two vines, and vines in the sides to grab onto in case of wind, or maybe alcohol.
Dwyn decided that to cut the vine without making it a obvious sabotage, he had to make it seem like it wore out. To do this he had to carefully wear down the whole length on both vines that held the planks. For the next 6 days until the caravan came, he used his sabotage skill and trusty rock to wear out the ropes. After the first two days of this he got the sabotage skill to beginner level 6.
Sabotage Beginner lv. 6 - 13%
Allows you to sabotage simple devices and structures you fully understand.
As you gain proficiency, you will be able to sabotage more complex things, and your precision with sabotaging will increase.
Skill informs you of structural integrity of objects you do not fully destroy.
Activate the skill by holding something and saying “sabotage”
With the progress of his plan obvious, Dwyn took his time so that it would appear natural. On the night before the arrival of the caravan, he got the walkway to the point that it barely held his weight. As his target was soundly sleeping home, Dwyn walked to the point the bridge connected to the walkway and started jumping on it and whispering “sabotage”. When his skill showed him it was near breaking, he just got off it and stomped it with one foot some more. The bridge would not support anyone’s weight after that. By the end of it, sabotage was level 8 and he also got
Sadism +1
Dwyn was extremely active during the last two real life days, and could barely stay awake anymore. After a short break (until game time morning), he logged back in still groggy from his short nap. He had to secure passage on the caravan before he could rest properly. He was satisfied with the results of his work and didn’t really care what happened to the fields anymore. How could he not be looking at a heavily bandaged and bruised village elder discussing something with the caravan leaders.
Dwyn was there with the excuse of trying to secure passage on the caravan, and while barely containing his grin he saw the guards running around with weed seeds stuck to their uniforms. That made him snort and try to pass it off as a cough. Except for some strange looks, no one payed him much attention.
Once the village had added it’s own wagon of goods to the caravan, they set off. Dwyn had paid 40 silver for food and a wagon to sleep in until they reached the capital. He didn’t wan’t anything to go wrong because he was “burning bridges” and once he was fed and in position to sleep, he logged off to finally rest.
The trip had been uneventful. Martin had spent most of it outside RR and got to know the Indian twins better. They had agreed to start where he was now going. Two villages and 10 game days later the caravan had reached the forest elves capital Illiserin. It was huge. The city was mostly carved or shaped somehow out of living trees, most of which were over 600 m tall and 50 m wide. Some were straight, and others winding. Like in Leeway there were walkways above the ground level, but the difference was that these seemed naturally grown out of the giant trees themselves, bordered on the sides with smaller branches and leaves.
‘Since becoming a gardener, it seems I notice plants a lot more.’ Dwyn thought.
Illiserin was also obviously magical with all of the static and moving light of all colors lighting it. The treetops were so high and widespread that little light came to the bottom of the city. The city walls were some a seemingly natural cliff in a otherwise flat valley, and a river passed under them. The river was called Illsa and the city was named after it. One of the caravan elves told him so.
They were stopped at one of the entrances to Illiserin by guards who were checking their cargo and people. Soon enough they were let inside. Dwyn had jumped off his wagon and walked beside the caravan while looking around at the city. Though it was a wood elf city, there were all sorts of elves here, with the exception of dark elves. There were plenty of non elves as well. Having separated from the caravan Dwyn headed towards the city plaza.
The plaza was an irregular circle filled with stands and small shops. It had a beginners fountain in the center, and seemed to be a good place to start exploring the city from. Dwyn maneuvered through the crowds to the city map that was glowing on a nearby giant tree. It showed three maps that you could toggle between. The different maps depicted different levels of the city. The ground level was the simplest, and on the other two there seemed to be ways to get to levels 4 and 5. When he asked a nearby person, he was told that those are off limit to the public.
One way to climb to the upper levels was through the very tree the map was on. Dwyn decided to explore the city somewhat, and what better way to do that than from a bird’s eye view. He climbed to the second level and saw that most of the public service buildings were here. There were restaurants, taverns, a few churches, gardens, a library and some shops selling equipment. On the ground level were miscellaneous shops, places where food was grown, storage areas, some crafting shops, animal pens, the main training ground and large roads. On the third level were guilds and training grounds, the main guard barracks, other craftsman workshops, walkways to the surrounding forest for the scouts and a arena of sorts.
Beyond the third level were embassies, dangerous research areas, another library and housing for those in power. There were guardhouses and homes on each level. The quality and price of housing seemed to grow with height, so Dwyn decided he would stay on the ground level where it’s cheap.
‘The twins are logging into the game in two days, so I should find some sort of job.’ ~Sigh~ ‘Probably gardening again. At least it shouldn't be hard to find a gardening job here’
And it was not. He went to the information guild on the third level, and found a job working on the great trees the city was made of. It would start tomorrow, so he logged off for the day.
****
Tomorrow was his first day of work, and he didn’t want to start by leaving a bad impression. He was technically employed by the city, but his boss was one wood elf. His name was Sadron and he showed Dwyn what to do.
“Nice to meet ya Dwyn, I’m Sadron. Ready to work?”
“Sure thing Sadron. What do you need me to do.”
“Since it’s your first day, You’ll be doing the interesting stuff. Our job is to maintain the walkways on the second level, so I’ll be on repairs, and you will be trimming the leaves and branches so that they stay in shape.”
“Ok, do I get scissors or something.” Dwyn asked.
“For now, yes, but first put this harness on” Sadron said and handed Dwyn something that wrapped around him much like a bungee harness, but with normal non stretchy ropes.
“Wha...why do I need this.” Dwyn asked
“Of course to trim the hedges that you can’t reach otherwise. Ha ha ha, don’t make that face kid, you’ll be fine. No one injured themselves using that in years... I told you you’d get the interesting stuff didn’t I?”
Dwyn then equipped the harness and took the trimming scissors from Sadron and got to work. It was simple work, and not tiring like he was used to, but the view hanging around the city made the job much more exciting then his previous ones. He talked with Sadron about the rest of the job, and apparently he was not qualified for it yet.
“It’s simple” Sadron said “to work with the wood itself, you will need woodworking skills. Nothing like a carpenter of course, but the more the better. Some of the people working at the higher levels use magic for all of the work. They are usually druids with high nature affinity and can manipulate the growth of plants. With your class you could probably learn from them.”
“Thanks Sadron, I think I’ll do that”
“No problem”
Partly because of the danger of falling, and partly because of the wealth of Illiserin, Dwyn’s new salary was 20 silver a day. He also had significantly shorter working days. He was done with today’s work and decided to check out the druids.
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
...some time later...
“Yes, we offer lessons, but the cheapest one is 15 gold, and looking at your stats, you lack intelligence anyway.”
“What do you mean I lack intelligence?” Dwyn asked “To even take the classes?”
“No, but to use magic. You need to greatly increase your intelligence before you could use what we can teach you. There is also the possibility that through raising your nature affinity you could use exclusively nature magic sooner, but even that is too low to be of any use right now. You’re welcome to come back when you’re ready.”
“Well, all right.” Dwyn said “But can you tell me how much I need, of either? So I know then to come back.”
“Of course. 250 intelligence, or 125 nature affinity. You can also combine them for example 100 nature affinity and 50 intelligence.”
Dwyn thanked the receptionist and went back to the lower levels to eat.
‘It will take a long time to get that much intelligence stat points, so I’d best find some way to increase my nature affinity...
...
...
...
of course, the library should have answers’
He left that for tomorrow. Kalyana and Narayan would be finally joining then.
*********
Dwyn had described the fountain by which he was waiting for them. That was because beginners could appear at any of the 3 city plaza’s. He saw them coming towards him. Kalyana was a good looking, albeit short wood elf, and Narayan had chosen to be human. Neither had changed their appearance much, although Narayan’s skin looked lighter, and Kalyana had much shorter hair.
“Hey guys, how’s Royal Road feel so far.”
“Oh my god, it’s just so beautiful” Kalyana said “You were right, this is an impressive city.”
“Seems a bit overwhelming” Narayan said “By the way, my name is Rider here”
“Cool name, send friend request to Rider.”
“Ah no fair, I’m Kayla here. Send one to me too.” They all added each other as friends.
“Dwyn, huh” Rider said “Well then what do you suggest we do during our first month.”
“Depends on what classes you want.”
“I want to be a priestess” Kayla said, and her brother added “I want to be a ranger or something of the sort”
“Hmm, well Kayla, you should look around the various churches here and Rider, training grounds. You should start there and see where it takes you.”
“You know it feels strange being called Rider by you, since you know me.”
“You should get used to it” Dwyn said sagely “So that people you get in a fight with aren’t able to find out things about you.”
“Thank you Dwyn, but how will we find those things in such a large place?” Kayla asked
“Easy, I’ll show you where to go on that map, follow me.”
After showing them where to go, they went off to find their own way, while Dwyn told them to leave the food to him since he had a steady job. He went to the Library and bought a limited access library card for 15 silvers. The full access would cost him 1 gold, but he could upgrade when he had the money.
Since he had limited access, he could only read the books inside the first floor of the library and not rent them. The library had three floors. He also wouldn’t get help from the clerks except with returning books. So he wandered around the first floor looking for anything related to nature affinity. He didn’t find anything like that, but he found a book called Illiserin in the miscellaneous section. It seemed interesting so he tried reading it.
This place was among the first populated by the wood elves. After being scattered around the world during the times their ancestral home was destroyed, wood elves lived as nomads for a time. They were back then still considered normal elves, and it was their nomadic way of life that created the first differences between all but the high elves. Naturally drawn to nature the soon to be wood elves gathered around places that made them feel at peace. Over time, even though they were used to the nomadic way of life, the wood elves started settling and building places they could return to. The first built were three settlements of which two still exist Illiserin and Cromiria. Though attacked several times while still undeveloped, Illiserin was never in any true danger. Cromiria lies on another continent, and the third city on yet another, but all other knowledge of it was lost.
Illiserin was named after the great river Illsa by which it has grown. The river serves as the city’s fastest non magical travel and trade route. Seeing how it flows from the dwarven mountains toward human plains it provides the city with very lucrative trade. With the exception of dark elves, the elves of Illiserin have kept good relations with all of their elven brethren. During the growth of the city, it has spread both in width and height until now it spans eight kilometers in diameter, and 5 levels (700 meters) in height. The oldest trees in the center of the city are nearly a kilometer tall, and only the royal clan resides in them. The youngest ones that edge the city are slightly shorter than 600 meters making the fifth level slightly smaller than the others.
The book had plenty of additional information about the locations of things in the city, noble clans and their accomplishments, etc, and once Dwyn was done reading it he got a system notice
~Ding~
Intelligence+1
‘Cool, the book was even kind of interesting. Might even be useful.’
He wanted to look into the lost city but because of his limited access he couldn’t ask any of the clerks, or take books with him outside. He read another book (about some noble clan) without getting any stats and called on his friends. They had agreed to meet in a few hours. With his remaining time he read a third book (neighboring lands) and got
Wisdom +1
When they met and ate together, Raider told his story about meeting a ranger elf at the archery training grounds, and knew the general gist of what he should be doing to get the class and Kayla had been to every church in the city but they would not let her in without donation or good reason.
“What should I do?” asked Kayla
“I don’t know, and that means we should check the internet forums. I’ll look, and you should too. But we’ve done enough for today and I’ll be logging off for now. Will you be back tomorrow?”
“Of course” They both answered.
The most basic information about clerics said that after paying a symbolic donation of, on average, 20 silver, they could become a novice cleric.
‘Shit, I’ll have to pay for this too. I’ll need another job since I’m already broke and I need to get that library access.’
At their school, there was another newcomer, Lucas, and he got friendly with the siblings, but Martin was still wary of people and kept his distance. He was taller than Martin and the siblings and had blonde hair. He introduced himself to them and was playing RR as a barbarian at level 45. He was pretty far away from them though and wouldn’t be joining them anytime soon, but Kaylana was insistent that they should meet sometime in the game.
‘Guess she’s always like that.’ Martin thought.
****
After another shift at his job, his green thumb skill went to beginner level 6, and he got 20 silver. He then messaged Kayla.
“Hey, Kayla, I’ve got the coin for that symbolic donation you need to do.”
Giving her the coin left him broke because his remaining savings went to food. He went again to the information guild, and this time found only jobs for beginners. Quests of F level that would hardly get him even one silver. There was probably something better for him to do, but that would take paying the information guild to learn. He decided to take a quest so that he doesn’t get bored with just reading in the library most of the day.
His quest got him 35 copper for some deliveries to the blacksmith. The blacksmith had his workshop on the ground level, and it was one of the rare structures in this city that was not grown but built. Probably because it was a fire hazard. While he was there Dwyn remembered his job and decided to ask the blacksmith about it.
“Excuse me, but do you have a minute?”
“Hm? Was there something else lad?” The blacksmith asked.
“Just a personal question I’ve got.” Dwyn said
“Ok, go on.”
“I was wondering where I could learn woodworking skills without taking the carpenter class.”
“Eh, woodworking is no big deal if you’re not going to make it into an art. You could ask the carpenters in the craftsman guild, and pay them for lessons...”
‘Gah, even more expenses’ Dwyn thought
“...Or” The smith continued “You could get started on your own. Getting wood in this city is simplicity itself, but if you don’t have the tools, you can’t work. So you’d need to borrow them, and before you ask, I’m sorry but I just don’t know you well enough to let you borrow my tools.”
‘I could borrow them from Sadron at work...probably, and what would I make, whare could I even make it?...’ Dwyn was lost in thought for a few moments when the blacksmith brought him back to the present.
“Well, you could also try reading about it in the library. There’s bound to be something about it in the crafts and arts floor of the library”
Dwyn was surprised they had devoted a whole floor to arts and crafts, but seeing as it was not on the floor he was allowed on, it would have to wait.
“Can I make anything out of the wood, or are there some requirements.”He asked
“The only requirement is that you make something either useful or artsy. I suppose you could do both, but that is usually beyond what complete novices can do”
“Got it, thank you for your help.”
“No problem kid, jut remember me if you need any blacksmithing work done”
Dwyn said his goodbyes and went to the library again. He and the siblings had spent their days training, praying and working to prepare for their next adventures. Meanwhile, the seeds he had planted started to bloom, and the village Leeway was in trouble.
It had started just as a bit of poorer crop yield, but then farmers started noticing the soon overgrown weeds that were hidden here and there in their farms. They were surprised so many had similar problems. Some were now getting visions while in their fields. Once things got that bad they started getting worried they were cursed. The visions were strange colors, creatures that were not there, dead relatives and many other strange things. It took an elf setting himself on fire to get rid of the imaginary insects crawling all over him before the village council decided to call for priests, shamans and druids to rid them of their curse.
The cost of their services could easily leave the village bankrupt, so everyone was asked if they knew someone who could do it cheaper. Paeral knew a druid, and it was decided she would call him. Once her druid friend came he quickly walked around the village, and farms before coming with a bewildered expression back to say there was nothing wrong. No ghosts, spirits, demons or curses of any sort.
This caused no small amount of arguing, but then Paeral took a look at the fields and saw that they also had the garden status confirming her suspicions. She easily found the mushrooms and solved the problems the village was having. Once she explained to them what had happened, they had wanted to place a bounty on Dwyn’s head, but she had managed to convince them that she had a better idea. She was livid that Dwyn had used one of her plants to cause this mess, so she gave another plant to her druid friend and the village payed him to hunt Dwyn down.
Knowing the boy she had decided that annoyances he could not get rid of would be the best weapon against him. Being a freedman death would only serve to make him more of a problem. The plant she gave her friend was a different kind of approach. It would ensure that Dwyn would have to come back here asking for forgiveness to be free of it. Paeral meant to use that time to decide weather he would be forgiven.
Her druid friend set off to Illiserin.