The pair poled across the shallow lake mostly in silence. Joe found himself lost in wonder as he took in the beauty around him. In the last few years, he could have someone take him outside on good days. The hospital had a Serenity Garden, which was nice but it was a small spot of carefully tended nature, amidst tall clinical buildings, saturated by city air. He found some peace there but there was no way it could compare to what was around him now. They were sliding the raft across smooth, still waters. Below the surface, Joe could clearly see the waving streamers of lake grass. Fish and turtles would flicker away from their poles, disappearing into the floating vegetation. On the surface, the fiery-looking birds picked their way through the water on their long stilted legs. Above that, a panorama of pastoral trees and fields stretched beautifully away from the edges of the mere. Even further up, a bright blue sky slid fluffy clouds from one horizon towards the other. This was a stage for true peace. Joe blocked out the fact they were heading into danger to let stillness fill him as he lived in that moment.
Kaid’s silence was the result of his normal surly nature around adults.
They had been aiming for a spot of shore on the grassy side of where a large field met a thick copse of trees and underbrush. The Dourfore was definitely dour-looking. The trees were packed together blocking out the light, creating a lair of tangled shadows. The border was marked by woven patches of deep red brambles.
“Don’t get near that stuff,” Kaid said breaking his muteness when he saw Joe looking at the crimson briars. “That’s Blood Thorn. It’ll drain you dry in under a minute.”
“Good to know,” Joe replied as he stepped off the raft onto the muddy edge lake. Thankfully his new boots were water-tight, Joe hated having wet feet. “Anything else we need to watch out for?”
“Gnaw Rats. They’re big and mean. Worst part is their coats are mottled yellows and greens. Makes them almost impossible to spot in the grass. They are fast too. They can burrow into your gut in seconds. Get them off you as fast as you can but if they dig in then you gotta stab em before they burrow too deep, even if it means stabbing yourself. Keep that goblin knife handy.” Kaid hopped over the marshy edge and stood at the edge of the tall grass.
“This is not at all sounding like a terrible idea,” Joe huffed sarcastically. “So what does saddleleaf looks like? I know big and dark green, anything else?”
“It’s pretty common stuff so you shouldn’t have to look too hard. The leaves look like mittens about the size of a platter.” The gnome held his hands about two feet apart.
“Oh wow. That big. That should make it easier.”
“Yeah. If we find some leaves, one of us harvests while the other one stays on lookout. This should be a skip on the lawn. Just don’t be an idiot and go into the trees even if you think you see some saddleleaf in there. It won’t be. It will be a wisp. Willow-wisps mess with your head. They show you what you are looking for. If you follow one, you’re toast. So don’t,” the short scoundrel ordered. “Let’s go.”
Kaid pushed aside the long grass stalks that were taller than he was. Joe followed into the waist-high vegetation. Unable to see Kaid, he watched the stalks sway indicating the gnome's path through the high grass. They were making a loop toward the woods, around an area filled by a wall of deep scarlet brambles. Once they had moved past the Blood Thorn patch, they could start looking for the SaddleLeaf. Kaid would appear periodically when an occasional bush thinned the grass enough for him to be spotted. The rest of the time Joe was following the unseen swishing sounds in front of him.
Finally, they reached the border of the trees. Joe stuck to the grassy edge and began to look for the large leaves. When he heard a rustling to his left, Joe figured it was Kaid, until the stalks parted revealing a large glossy black shape a few feet away. It was a beetle. A really big beetle. One about the size of a labrador retriever. Green highlights allowed it to partially blend into the tall weeds. Once in plain sight, there was no mistaking its hard chitin and massive mandibles. Joe had time to quickly assess the creature before it charged.
Grassward Stag Scarab: Level 1: Vermin: Brute: Vigor: 22/22
Without thinking Joe stabbed the end of his staff towards the beetle, more like a spear than a quarterstaff. The creature crashed into the tip of the pole, sending a shockwave through Joe’s arms and nearly knocking him on his ass. There was a loud crack that Joe feared was his weapon breaking but a screech from the massive insect indicated the sound was its chitin breaking, not the wood. A spatter of pale goop ran down from under its eye as it shifted its head, sliding the staff away from the wound. It continued to shove forward, pushing Joe back through the grass. Joe tried to dig in his feet only to have the bug-propelled staff in his hands start to lift him upward. Knowing he would be off-balance any second, Joe was not sure what to do.
Going on instinct, Joe kicked off the ground, attempting to vault himself up over the beetle. He found out why pole-vaulter poles are flexible, not rigid. The unbending staff skid off the hard shell of the creature and onto the ground. The giant scarab shoved the bottom backward as Joe jumped. He managed to get a couple of feet off the ground but no higher. He would have come down on his back had the creature not plowed straight onward, sweeping the staff from the ground and placing itself under Joe’s feet. Joe managed to plant a foot on the creature’s back, and even take a second step forward before his boots slid along the hard shell. He came down hard, right on the back of the beetle. Landing painfully on his butt, Joe was basically riding the stag scarab backward.
Groaning, he half-jumped half-shoved himself off the carapace, more on instinct than by plan. At the same time as the stag beetle spun around in a lightning-fast whirl. Joe's knee-jerk reaction saved him. Had he still been seated on the bug’s back, he would have been thrown into the weeds and probably fallen in a heap. As the stag reoriented on him, Joe jumped again, sideways this time. He came down on a segmented leg, inflicting a few points of damage. He leapt once more as quickly as he could, this time spinning himself. The beetle skittered in a circle, trying to find Joe. Just as it locked onto him, it took a second staff blow to the face. This one Joe used as much of his twirling momentum as he could. He felt the jar of the staff against his palms but the attack managed to stun the insect long enough for a final blow to kill it.
Panting, Joe glanced at the stack of windows waiting for him at the corner of his eye. After glancing around and not spotting any more bugs, Joe quickly gave the screens his attention. The first one was a blow-by-blow of the fight. It was very short, only consisting of his three swings and one kick, as well as two of points of damage to his butt. [Staff Expertise] went up two levels, while [Parry] went up one. The best of the alerts was gaining a new achievement.
Achievement: You have just soloed your first monster. Your actions have awarded you the following choice of Traits:
[Dancer]: That was some pretty fancy foot work. +5% to combat evasion skills.
[Exterminator]: Ugg bugs! +5% damage to vermin.
Anything that would help Joe’s terrible damage output was something to consider but a small bonus to a single creature type was not worth it. Joe took Dancer and increased his evasion skills bonus to 15%. He looted the corpse and came away with a few copper pieces and some beetle chitin. As the adrenaline flushed out of his system, Joe felt himself slumping with weariness. He burned some mana, perking himself back up with [Efferous Endurance].
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Standing alone on the grass, it hit Joe that Kaid had not shown up during the fight. Worried, Joe jumped up trying to see more over the waist-high grass. He couldn’t see anything that caught his eye. Walking in the direction the exacerbating gnome had gone, Joe debated calling out to Kaid. He was afraid that would attract monsters though. Being alone, calling enemies was the last thing he wanted. He crept forward for a few minutes, keeping his eyes peeled for beetles, rats, or Kaid. He did not find any of those but he did manage to stumble across a patch of fat-leaved plants. The leaves were just as they had been described them. The dark fans looked a bit like Elephant Ear Hosta, but the big leaves had a pair of mismatched lobes that made them look like mittens.
He was about to grab the goblin knife off of his backpack and cut them free. Joe had used a bit of goblin hair and leather hide to fashion a rudimentary sheath, which he tucked into a strap on the outside of his pack. Putting the keen blade on his belt in such a makeshift scabbard felt like he was asking to stab himself.
Just as he was going to slip the pack off his shoulder, Joe was hit with a weird wave of vertigo. He felt his mind get muddy and his vision blur. Rubbing a hand across his face, he tried to drive away the sensation. When he opened his eyes, it was to see a second stag beetle charging out of the weeds at him. With his head swimming Joe tried to block as well as he could. Dropping to one knee, he barely managed to plant the stout quarterstaff into the ground right in front of him and brace.
Like the first scarab, this one too smashed into the staff, damaging itself. Unlike the prior beetle, this one snapped its pincers closed and yanked the weapon from Joe’s unsteady grasp. Joe stumbled back up onto his feet, realizing he was in real trouble. He kicked himself for not having a decent backup weapon on hand. Other than the goblin knife, all he had was the handaxe that came with the Standard Adventure Kit. Of course, not thinking like an actual adventurer, that weapon was somewhere inside the middle of his backpack, instead of hooked to the outside where he could get at it quickly. Joe was afraid his old knife would break on the creature’s hard shell but he could not think of any other options, other than trying to recover his staff. He looked quickly but did not see where the stave had landed. 'Knife it is.' Being keen, maybe the blade would have an advantage against the thick carapace coving the scarab beetles. The question was how to get it, avoid the beetle, and clear his head all at the same time.
He activated [Efferous Endurance] for no other reason than ‘why not’ and found it helped. The burst of energy brought him a moment of clarity. He jumped to the side and slid off his pack, just hanging onto one shoulder strap. He didn’t even try and grab the knife yet but watched the beetle. He knew how fast they could spin around. Sure enough, it twirled back at him instantly. Joe dodged again. Even though he did not have the Dodge skill, his traits did seem to be helping him stay out of the way of the scarab’s attacks.
Joe swung away from the beetle charging by him and noticed that he had something stuck to the sleeve of his gambeson. It was a large spiny burr, about the size of a grapefruit. He tried to rip it off only to find it stuck to his hand. He had to jump again, now with one hand holding his backpack and the other full of the prickly seed pod. Still lightheaded for some reason, he was not able to get completely out of the way of the sharp mandibles in time. The sharp, blade-like jaws sliced across his shin. Joe managed to avoid being trapped in the beetle’s mandibles by awkwardly stumbling away from the creature. The fogginess was making him clumsy. Joe’s staggering dodge turned into full-fledged tumble onto the ground. The pain of the fall, as well as the bite, knocked some of the haze away.
Knowing he was doomed on the ground, Joe made a wobbly jump back up onto his feet. He glanced down at the bleeding tear in his pants and he saw more burrs on his legs. Sticky burrs were common enough where he grew up, though clearly none ever this big. Wondering if these burrs were related to his confusion, Joe tried to assess one.
Siren Seeds of the Beguilburr: Strong cumulative Domination effect.
‘Cumulative. That is not good.’ His [Iron Mind] trait was probably helping but if each burr added to the strength of the domination effect, it is no wonder they were overwhelming the powerful dwarven trait. Strangely enough, after so many years of heavy doses of painkillers, Joe was no stranger to trying to function in a fog. Granted it had never been in a fight for his life before.
Joe dropped his pack and grabbed as many burrs off him as he could, making one big sticky mass. He wasn’t sure if he could get them to stick to the beetle, but at least maybe he could scrape them off against it. He would love to try and do this without getting wounded again but just moving his arms took all his concentration. When the insect rushed out of the weeds at him, he knew this was going to hurt. As the bug chomped down on Joe’s leg, he jammed his hands right up against the creature's forehead and dragged his hands over the ridge between its head and back armor. The gambit worked. His hitpoints dropped to single digits, but he was able to detach the sticky mass onto the vermin. The Grassward Scarab stopped almost instantly as Joe’s head unfogged.
The creature's jaws lazily opened, allowing Joe to hobble back from it. He pulled off any other burrs he saw and added them to the stupified arthropod. He hit himself with a [Healing Touch]. Limping on his newly healed leg, he walked until he spotted his quarterstaff.
The whole time the beetle barely moved. It shuddered a bit. As Joe stepped close it finally seemed to become aware of him again. The monster shuffled to face him, though much more slowly than any of their previously rapid turns. This was not one of the speedy-dashing beetles he had been fighting. It trudged towards him methodically. Joe slipped around to its side and smacked its head. The huge bug continued to move in a zombie-like waddle, like it was on autopilot. It relentlessly kept after Joe but it lacked all the fighting skills it had shown so far. Joe, easily staying out of its reach, cracked it on the head enough times to kill it.
Joe leaned on his staff and sighed. He had gained more combat skills but he closed those windows with barely a care. He checked himself again for burrs and found one more hiding on his lower back. When it was off, he looted the beetle corpse, gaining more small round pieces of carapace shell. He tried to loot the burrs but found [Coin Collector] did not work on them, even if he smashed them into bits. All that he found in the hooked pods was some light purple pollen which his assessment skill could not identify.
Cracking his neck and stretching away the soreness, Joe was hit by two utterly separate ideas at once. The first had him take out the looted chitin pieces from his pack. He took any that were small enough and slipped them into some of the empty pockets in his gambeson. They would not keep him cool but they could help block an attack. His other idea was that the burrs must somehow be connected to a main plant.
It made sense when he worked through the idea. The burrs were what the main plant would use to feed. The pods would cause the beguiled creatures to go back to the main plant and feed it. The dominated creatures would either die there or bring with them whatever food they could kill and bring back. It also explained why he only saw beetles around here. Kaid had mentioned rats but Joe had seen none of them. The burrs would not naturally catch on the bug’s smooth carapaces. Any furred predators in the area would easily be burred and enslaved.
Once Joe took a few minutes getting himself resettled. He put away any of the shell pieces too big for the gambeson. He took out the hand axe and hung it on his hip. There was not a lot he could do for his torn pants so he ignored the long rip. After scanning the area between him and the SaddleLeaf for any other dangers, Joe used the goblin knife and cut free the mass of leaves. Once they were stowed, Joe knew he had to go find Kaid.
A shiver ran up his back. Even dominated, Joe was pretty sure facing Kaid was going to be much more dangerous than any other beetles he might stumble across. Joe reached into his healing satchel and grabbed hold of the little bottle of ivory liquid. He wanted any advantage he could get.
Item [BiteBark] (Common - Consumable): This potion will thicken your skin, giving it the toughness of tree bark. You will gain moderate resistance to Piercing, Slashing, and Bleed physical attacks for 1 minute. One use.
A one minute duration was not long enough to drink it now. Joe prayed he would have the second he needed to chug the potion in the moment between finding Kaid and before the little cutthroat started taking him apart. Taking a deep breath, Joe crept along the edge of the Dourfore, plucking burrs and watching for movement hidden by the expanse of waist-high grasses.