Hazel’s greatsword ricocheted off the plaguefiend’s hide, finding little purchase. His thick arm muscles strained against the rebounding force before coming to bear again in another strike. The creature cared little for the Brute’s peppering blows; its gaze fixed on the village in the distance. Towering over Hazel, who himself stood at an impressive seven feet tall clad in utilitarian plated leather, the fiend’s dark green color seemed to draw in light and hope itself. It contrasted strongly with the vibrant meadow the two combatants found themselves in; a void of exuberance otherwise present. A plaguefiend, Hazel knew, is an amalgamation of noxious fumes and negative energy coalesced to possess an unsuspecting being, consuming them. An abomination of life.
This is a dozen of level over my paygrade, Hazel thought, as he activated his Bloodthirsty Blade skill. His greatsword glowed a subtle scarlet that left afterimages in its wake, thirsting for blood to replenish the user’s vitality. Still, the edge found no purchase and the beast marched on.
Hazel was a veteran of the Keratan kingdom’s royal army and arrived three weeks ago at this deployment site, a small village nestled on one of the many small islands forming the kingdom’s Eastern border. He’s had no shortage of fodder to wreck since arriving. The plaguefiends came like mindless dregs out of murky shores, consuming anything with an ounce of lifeforce to reinforce themselves and bud. A fiend such as this with nigh impenetrable defenses indicated something else entirely: an animal that reached quite a high level investing mostly in STA before being consumed by corruption. Hazel guessed a mammalian species judging by the look of its corrupted fur and the beast’s warped quadrupedal turned bipedal bone structure. Maybe a doe that stood at the rear of its herd to protect the young, Hazel mused, probably around level 70, maybe less if it went full STA. I hope it’s less. He digressed; it mattered not. Hazel was no stranger to cutting down meatshields.
Hazel was a Lumdin build level 58(15) Helion-to-be-Brute, or maybe a Berserker if the little monster inside had its way with him. Lumdin’s build was a 4:1 split STR:STA with a few essential skills, named after the famous independent adventurer that slayed the last cataclysmic level plagueturtle that marched on the capital. What it boiled down to was that Hazel was very good at cutting things that weren’t very good at getting cut.
Enhanced Strength active at all times to increase the amount his STR contributed to muscular contraction force by 20%. Surefooted to ensure his weight remains optimally distributed as he stepped forward with Rush in preparation for his coup de grace. Deft touch as his hands gripped pommel with enough force to crush a chicken’s neck but with the careful dexterity of a master craftsman cutting a priceless jewel. This was his craft.
Sweeping Strikes to spray his attacks in blades of force around him as Furious Roar left his Deep Lungs echoing out the clearing and frightening birds away in the distance while further increasing his and his allies’ STR by a static 43 (=STR*0.15).
The echoing roar finally attract the beast’s attention, along with the rest of the small, quiet island's. It turned and tilted its head quizzically to look at Hazel while reaching out as a child might to grasp a flitting firefly. Hazel knew that if it should make that grasp not much would be left of his planic form. He brought his sword down in a Heartrending Strike that would instantly reap the life of any being whose heart it struck. It was never intended to strike true. His blade cleaved the beast’s arm into ruin and readied Hazel for his follow-up Absolute Reversal.
From directly under the beast’s bulk, with no proper step in or wind-up, with poor grip and footing, Hazel’s blade struck too close to the hilt to deliver a proper strike, but struck with a cutting force equal to his previous attack. That is to say, a force with his highest momentum, perfect footing and hand positioning, the ideal distance on the blade combined with the multiple threads of Sweeping Strikes. Lumdin would be proud.
The blade sunk halfway through the fiend’s torso before hitting bone with a resounding thung that had Hazel’s hands fly off his pommel. He felt the calluses on his hand tear and his bones jar and knew he’d be feeling this tomorrow - and probably for the next few weeks.
In for a copper in for a gold, as the saying goes, he thought as he bared his teeth in a savage grin and threw caution to the wind, activating More Than Not. ‘More than not what?’ you may ask, as have thousands of others who have had the option to pick up this skill. The answer, youngling, is that it depends. A great smith who wields his hammer with ferocious concentration may become more metal than man and know exactly how hard, how often, and where to strike, or may become bent by the ferocity of the beating heat. A hunter may become one with their arrow, loosed over a kilometre away to find its target, or find himself hunted, becoming the prey itself. A thief could find wealth or find their guilt overwhelm them; a general could see into his enemy’s strategy only to find he sympathizes with her cause; a courtier could find the words to profess their love only to be swept away by love’s frivolity, losing themselves.
Inside Hazel was a beast - a monster - and sometimes, he became more so than not.
The plaguebeast stumbled back with a blade wedged halfway through its body as Hazel stepped forward and tore into its side with his hands. Bloodthirsty Blade was still active and the red radiating aura shone around his bloody fingers as he tore chunks of flesh out of the beast. STA increased the strength of connective and epithelial tissue, as Hazel was well aware. That included, for all his intents and purposes, skin, fascia, and bone. It was like peeling an orange or pulling weeds from an intact field, and Hazel had spent half his childhood on a farm. The other half was spent killing.
The next thing Hazel knew he was deactivating his skill and gulping down desperate lungfuls of air as his vision swam. He was kneeling in a puddle of blood and entrails and the pathetic mewling half-skeletonized plaguebeast sounded out beside him. A couple of villagers, including the village chief Bayot who Hazel was staying with, were hesitantly making their way over.
This is what I live for, Hazel thought, as he vomited and passed out.
------------------------------------------
“Da! He’s up!”
It took Hazel a good few seconds to process the words that were being spoken and another few to realize they were pertaining to him. His head was muddled, his body leaden. He was scared to assess the damage.
“I’m up!” Hazel croaked as he gingerly sat up, wincing as his body screamed in protest, and began taking stock of his surroundings. He was in chief Bayot’s homely cabin living room sitting on a comically small but divinely comfortable feather-stuffed futon-turned-cot that creaked as he moved. It was warm and well furnished with a solid oaken table, a few simple chairs, bear fur rugs, and counters that acted as both a craft station and kitchen, with necessary tools strewn about. The room even had a few glass windows inserted into the walls - the height of luxury this far from any major city. It was cramped but not unpleasantly so; cluttered but not untidy. Everything had its place and function. It was well lived in.
A stone hearth blazed and what smelled like chicken and vegetable soup boiled over the fireplace. Hazel’s addled mind registered how hungry he was and was able to grunt, “Food? Water”.
“You’re very grandiloquent in the morning, Hazel” Bayot’s daughter Bea quipped as she made her way to the hearth with a bowl and ladle, “Don't give yourself a brain cramp weaving those lofty words”.
Hazel’s temples pulsed, more at risk at getting a ‘brain cramp’ from Bea’s blabbering than anything. Bea smiled as she handed him a bowl but Hazel was too preoccupied to appreciate her beauty. She was young at 17 years, full of vitality and potential. She was studying to become a government clerk like her father. She was too much for Hazel at the moment. He ignored the offered spoon and hungrily slurped the life-giving broth.
Bayot walked in from an adjacent room, a small office workspace, with ink on his hands. He was well dressed with a black tunic-jacket and matching pants, if a bit disheveled with hair curling haphazardly around his face. He had an air of drive and competency to befit his station.
“Your durability never ceases to amaze me, mister Brute,” he says as he adjusts the spectacles on his nose, leaving ink marks. “I would tell you not to strain yourself but it would fall on deaf ears and I’m not one to commit to futile endeavours”
“Thanks for putting up with me, boss. What’s the damage?”
“You’ve been asleep for two days” Hazel winced at that, “The village healer took a look at you after the encounter. I’ve been told it’s quite severe. Bruises down your arms, shoulders, and chest indicate severe muscle damage. Both your lower arm bones have small cracks in them. The bite mark on your back isn’t deep but needs regular cleaning and poultice application. A few broken ribs where the beast landed a swipe. And of course, your hands.” He listed off how broken Hazel was like the professional pencil-pusher that he is.
Hazel stared at his bandaged hands which were swollen up to twice their normal size as let the words sink in. Altogether, it wasn’t that bad. As high level and durable as the plaguefiend was, it was poorly matched against Hazel; his specialty was cutting down the uncuttable, after all. Hazel was long-used to the broken bones and swelling that came with his fighting style. The irony was overshadowed by the bitterness that most of the damage he sustained was inflicted by himself.
“I didn’t eat any of it, did I?” Haze asked before chugging down a tankard of water Bea passed him.
Bayot adjusted his spectacles again, adding another spot to the first and making them oddly aesthetically symmetrical, “No, no. Well maybe, but you vommitted after the battle. You should be at no risk of corruption. The poultices should take of any contamination through blood on your hands as well”.
Hazel grunted an affirmative. As he lay back down and passed out.
“Exemplary specimen of a Brute, isn’t he Da?”
“Quite. Leave him to rest Bea. Go finish your homework”
—————————————
Hazel was not a young man, relatively speaking. He was forty three years of age, which was impressive enough but for a Fighter like him it was practically unheard of. With all the unpredictable and various dangers pressing in on the kingdom, Hazel already exceeded the average population’s life expectancy.
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Back in the capital, the greys in his hair commanded both respect and skepticism. Those who fought with him respected his prowess, both for his skill and his skills. With age comes experience and levels and Hazel had a decent amount of both. Those that didn’t know of him doubted him and rejected him for his oddity. A wily old-timer like him must have employed more than a few under-handed tricks to keep out of danger, throwing his comrades under the wagon. They assumed Hazel’s relative ‘success’ based on underhanded trickery or nefarious ploys. Hazel’s friends, dead they all are, would have known the truth; Hazel was just fucking lucky. He was a product of probability, the result of making the right decisions at the right moment and being the one in a hundred or thousand that didn’t get screwed over despite everything. Hazel’s fortune was not lost on him, but instead of gratefulness, his luck was just another source of guilt and frustration that lingered in the back of his mind, feeding his monster.
At forty three years of age and 58(15) levels, Hazel had seen some shit. At the ripe old age of twelve years he was assaulted by and had to put down the corrupted remnants of his mother, father, and sister after a pack of crazed and ravenous coyotes ran through their farm. Hazel still experienced nightmares. This defining moment in his life was the start of a long and illustrious career in murder. Twelve year old him elected to join the kingdom’s army because what could a twelve year old realistically accomplish alone without guidance or resources? Not much. The army provided both of those things and some resemblance of stability, or as much as could be had in this world.
Hazel has seen some shit and he knew the drill; a basic routine hammered into his subconscious from weeks, months, to maybe even years marching towards outposts or targets while training. He knew to wake with the sun, to progressively increase the volume and intensity of work his body did, to stretch and mobilize every joint and muscle in his body, to eat and drink like a fastidious pig, and to rest like a corpse. He knew his body like a seamstress knew her weaves; he knew when to push and when to back off; he knew his limits. That was why he was surprised the day after his initial post-battle awakening when he awoke once more feeling a hell of a lot worse.
This is what getting old must be like, was Hazel’s initial reaction, as he panted for breath, drenched in cold sweat, trying to grip his poor cot to make the room stop spinning. Bea the angel sat by his side mopping his face and sponging drinking water into his mouth. He was full of shame for having a woman half his age care for him, full of frustration at not being able to move about and get on with recovery, and utterly powerless to change any of it. So he lay there trying not to let tears leak from his eyes, clenching his broken hands so they wouldn’t shake, and drifted out of consciousness.
The next tine he gained a shred of lucidity, he knew there was something wrong. He felt awful, his thoughts forthcoming like sap dripping down a tree - slowly, like molasses. His lips were cracked and parched and his throat sore as he fought for each breath, his eyes felt sunken in as he looked around the room without seeing. He tried to move but his arm flopped listlessly before falling back onto his deathbed. One thought pervaded his being: it’s finally my time to go.
“Soon Hazel, my beautiful boy. We’ll all be together again soon” a warm female voice whispered in his ear.
“Fuck off, mom” Hazel tried to speak but what came out was garbled nonsense.
“Don’t speak to your mother like that!” A deep raspish male voice snapped, “we raised you better than that” .
“You’re dead, Dad. I killed you”.
“I’m scared, Haze. It hurts, it’s cold. Where were you? They came and came and bit and we couldn’t do anything”.
“‘M sorry Kayte...” Tears leaked out of his eyes.
“Why is he like this Da’? Why isn’t he getting any better? I’ve applied the poultice like the healer said, cleaned the cuts and changed the bandaids. At this rate...” Hazel heard Bea’s tearful concerns and focused his thoughts like a venerable monk examining reality’s nature.
Applied the poultices... Hazel lifted his trembling hands seeing fresh bandages. Cleaned the wounds... he fumbled with pulling the cloth off, revealing his ruined hands. His palms were skinned but instead of fresh scabs and healing skin what he saw was enough to make even his addled mind pause. And gag.
His hands were a tapestry of wheeping, pussy, green, scaly flesh.
His body reacted faster than his mind did, as per usual. His heart beat out the last vestiges of strength his corrupted body had left as he sprang up and began ripping the bandages off his frame.
The other occupants of the room jumped and exclaimed in surprise and Hazel leveled his gaze at them, his pupils contracting like a predator finding prey. One sharp kick sent the cot flying forwards. It was soon followed by Hazel’s fumbling Rush. His hands closed around a throat as Bloodthirsty Blade activated and his nails pierced skin. Five heartbeats passed as his victim’s lifeblood leaked out from ruptured arteries and was absorbed before the other occupants in the room reacted.
Bea, having fallen, uttered a high pitched shreak and began crying, “Oh my Gods, oh my Gods, oh my Gods”. Bayot was a bit more composed.
Bayot stepped forward and said, “Let the man go Hazel. He’s been trying desperately to save you”, as he tried to remove Hazel’s grip around what was apparently the healer’s throat.
“He poisoned me. He poisoned me”, Hazel screamed, rage filling his veins as the seconds of absorbing vitality ticked by, clearing his head. He tightened his grip as he yelled, eliciting a gurgle from the dying man’s mouth.
“It wasn’t him”, Bayot yelled, his glasses askew and sweat dripping his brow, as he desperately pulled at Hazel’s arm. “It was me. The order came from my supervisor’s supervisor. They wanted you gone. I don’t know why”.
Hazel dropped the healer, not really knowing or caring if he lived or died, and punched Bayot in the face, sending him flying.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, Hazel cursed as he stumbled towards the cabin’s exit, grabbing hold of the thick leather belt that acted as his greatsword’s scabbard. He didn’t know where they put his sword.
He kicked the door open and was met with an arrow in his left shoulder. Not even registering the pain, he fixed his gaze on Randol, the other posted army Fighter in this remote village, young buck that he is. Hazel casually took hold of one of the throwing knives in his belt and lobbed it straight into his assailant’s eye, eliciting a grunt of pain.
Before Randol decided to stand in his way and get slaughtered, Hazel limped off, away from this thrice-corrupted village and the cataclysmic level bull shit going on.
-------------------------------------
Bloodthirsty Blade was an intricate skill.
Indeed, most skills had an inordinate amount of research hours invested into understanding their nuances and hidden functions throughout the various laboratories across the Kingdom. Not only did it give academic insight into the nature of skills but applicable knowledge that could aid the skills’ users. A basic example of this is knowing that the enhanced stat skills were multiplicative rather than additive. The benefits of 20% added contribution of a stat is negligeable at low investiture but worth many levels at high investiture into a said stat. A level 50(10) who has fully invested into WIS and picks up Enhanced Wisdom will find their 300 stat points bolstered by 60 functional WIS points. It’s functional because those 60 stat points are not actually there: the individual’s base points are just contributing more. These 60 functional points of WIS are significant, reducing the individual’s necessary sleep time by 15-60 minutes depending on individual characteristics, or increasing the amount of spellstrain they may bear by a similar margin.
For Hazel, the functional STR given by Enhanced Strength scaled well with the actual STR given by Raging Roar (a flat 15% of current str added to the value), further increasing the skill’s allure, especially in Hazel’s desperado build.
Compared to the relatively straightforward enhanced stat skills, orders of magnitude more research time and funding have been invested in Bloodthirsty Blade. This is because this skill was special.
Bloodthirsty Blade made you functionally immortal.
Hazel knew how the skill worked in the abstract and gave no shits about the complex equations meant to describe its absorption of vitality. He knew that the maximum surface of blade he could coat with the skill and allow absorption was equal to his body surface area, that the rate of absorption was directly related to the blade’s surface area in contact with blood, and that the absorption factored in the viscosity of the blood - if new blood didn’t flow to replace the absorbed blood, absorption was negatively impacted. The healing value for blood absorbed was about 122 lauryls per litre, one lauryl being defined as the amount of healing energy needed to replace 0.1 m^2 of human skin. How that unit of measurement came to be used is often not discussed in most respectable social groups.
In any case, to replace an average human’s entire integumentary system one must only absorb about 140mL of blood, or about half a cup, which, if you think about it, is completely broken.
Hazel recalled that regenerating muscle tissue cost about 20% more than skin, bone 50% more, peripheral nervous tissue 100% more, and central nervous tissue 300% more. He didn’t remember all the numbers for different organs, but recalled an Esoteric Principle that limited the conversion of others’ blood to replace one’s own blood. The conversion was always 1:1 though the numbers clearly did not agree.
The fact that absorbing blood allowed for such potent healing carried an irony because blood was highly non-nutritive to humans and ingesting it could actually cause sickness. This discrepancy between the measurable and immeasurable was universally described as the Esoteric Pronciple, in which scholars threw up their hands, shrugged, and said, “fuck it, it works”. This is how Hazel understood it at least, from the hours spent being quizzed by Bayot-like pencil pushers while in the army’s academy.
The cost required to keep such a potent skill active is mostly negigeable at 100 calories/minute. There is a mental burden associated with such a fast energy conversion, qualitatively described as the same one would experience if physically straining to consume 100 calories. Mentally running a couple of kilometres in a minute is tiring, and the longest documented activation of bloodlusting blade before passing out is five minutes thirteen seconds.
Hazel reviewed all this knowledge and relished in the potency of his skill as he enacted one of his most valuable trade secrets: collapsing for a nap.
He dozed under the sun in a glade far away enough from the village that he wasn’t too worried about being found and let his thoughts roam.
Bayot, that bastard. I’ve been living with him for weeks. I’ve fought to keep his village safe... and also because I like fighting. We ate together. You really can’t trust anyone. I would’ve thought I’d known that already. Hazel seethed in anger and betrayal. He was no stranger to being backstabbed but it didn’t matter how many times one was cut, it still hurt the same as the first slash.
He said he was ordered to get rid of me. I wonder whose shit-list I’m on. I really can’t think of anyone in particular. I mean, I’ve stepped on a few toes during my years. And heads. But that’s just life. Hazel recalled that new recruit that literally stepped into his sword swing’s path during a battle and was cleaved in half. He was some noble’s third son or some such but you can’t outteach or outfund stupid, in his humble opinion.
He thought on the handful of catastrophic failures he’s seen and the horrors that have resulted. He didn’t really blame himself for not arriving in time to cull a high-level bear before it’s appetite overshadowed nature’s allowance and it roamed into human villages with intent to widen its palate. Not his fault that a regiment of greenskins got the jump on his patrol at the Northwestern border - hell, Kingdom intelligence supposedly didn’t know there was a green outpost on the continent before that encounter. Not his fault he was the last man alive of that patrol either - goblin traps were just that deadly. He had nothing to do with the new recruits that resigned immediately after the last elfish uprising and subsequent culling. Messy affair it was, and not everyone has the guts to do what needs doing.
Sure, Hazel did shrug off most of the standard military issued respect for leadership but they kept putting kids half his age and level in charge who were greener than an orc. It was no wonder the age expectancy in the kingdom was so low, it was like someone wanted people to die young.
Hazel’s thoughts ground to a halt. It is like someone wants people to die young. He repeated the thought in his head as it occurred and weighed its verity. But who? Why? Hazel didn’t know and had no idea where to begin answering such monumental questions. All he knew was that he couldn’t go back to his old way of life in the army, coasting from battle to battle and living easy. He had to find his own way, a new way.
A cawing interrupted his thoughts and Hazel looked around. He was surrounded by hungry crows waiting for his death to fill their bellies.
About time, Hazel thought, as he lobbed knives through the air. The crows attempted flight but Hazel was well practiced in the art of knife tossing, having had plenty of practe with fellow soldiers after battle he's long forgotten, to pass the time and make levity of atrocious reality. Hazel began bleeding the crows, recovering from the damage Bayot’s poison wreaked on his body as well as most of the lighter damage from the plaguedoe.
Hazel was at another impasse in his life but if there was one thing he was good at, it was cutting through anything that barred his way. And he would do just that.