Trevor walked down the Boulevard, a thousand thoughts running down his mind. His coat was slung over his shoulder and even though the night was cold, he wasn't shivering, a wave of inner anger running through him. Some stuffed patrons sat at his blackjack table and he did everything his boss asked for. It wasn't his fault the guys were using UV ink to mark the cards. It also wasn't his fault that these guys were undercover federal investigators. But the chain always breaks at the weakest link and Trevor was thrown under the bus.
Not only he lost his job but he also spent the last thirty hours answering questions from the feds. He was let go with that "don't leave town" warning. As if. Where would he go? Staying in Vegas was impossible. Leaving town was a necessity now that there wasn't a single casino in town that would hire him.
It seemed his career as a dealer was over. And if he couldn't stay in Vegas, he could forget his loftier dreams. Like doing a trick on Penn & Teller's Fool Us. He was years away though. He was a good magician but as in all things in life, he wasn't good enough to be at the top.
He even met Teller once, heard he talk. From a dozen yards away. Fancy that.
He stopped his derailing train of thought when two speeding cars almost crashed on the Boulevard and ran away, honking angrily at each other. He took his bearings. At his left, the bronze faces of two men and a lion silently judged him. And he failed. Because it wasn't even a lion. Another unreachable dream.
"Maybe the problem was that I was trying to go solo," He mumbled to himself.
He heard the screeching tires and the horns. Frozen in his reverie, he thought it was the tiger roaring at him. He missed the truck that ran over the pickets and crashed on the Siegfried and Roy monument. Trevor was between both.
----------------------------------------
Waking up to the sound of birds chirping and sunlight in his face, Trevor stood up.
"No, really? What the fuck," He cursed as he tried to remember what happened.
He had no idea how he got there. Trees and green grass all around him, the sun shining through the cracks between the leaves. He stood up and jumped to get his blood running.
"Is this some kind of reality show? I don't remember signing up for anything," He mumbled. Straining his ears, he heard sounds on the undergrowth and curiosity won. He moved to check what it was. The forest seemed to be made of a mix of temperate and subtropical vegetation. He could see some fruit and nut trees, at least he could get some food. As he moved near the source of the noise, he wondered if it could be a bear. Trevor crouched near a pass and looked at the trail. He could see some prints, a few days old and heavy. Clawed too. Whatever moved through was big and deadly.
It didn't seem like a reptile. It looked more like a reptile's paw. But this big? What was this, dragon island? Was he in the land of the lost? Like with dinosaurs? Dragons?
The barking, howling and growling resumed. A roar echoed and sounds of combat nearby. Branches breaking, snarls, stomps. Whatever was fighting nearby, he wanted no part in it.
[You have displayed wisdom beyond the norm. +2 Wisdom]
"What the... No, really? Just because I don't want to mess with wildlife?" He threw his arms. "What is this, some sort of game? Floating words, really?"
While Trevor complained, the fighting beasts crashed into the clearing. He saw a pack of wolves fighting what he could only describe as a wingless dragon.
[Drake - Lv ??]
> ‘ding’ ‘Congratulations! You have learned the general skill [Identify]’
"Ah!" Surprised, Trevor shouted and drew the attention of some wolves to himself. Trevor thought he should give up that wisdom bonus when he froze. One wolf growled at him but didn't attack. His pack was focused on taking down the... Drake? Trevor glanced at the wolf again.
[Gray Wolf - Lvl 3]
Okay. He decided to get out of there. He moved slowly as to not draw attention. Subtlety was a magician's best friend after all. Alas, Trevor wasn't a good magician. Two wolves decided that he would be an easier dinner than the drake and ran after him. Trevor jumped over a bush and ran out of the clearing, hearing the growling of the canines closing in behind him.
He knew he couldn't outrun his neighbor's irritating chihuahua, much fewer wolves with level-ups. Trevor took his coat and wrapped it around his arm as he saw in a police dog training video. He turned around and crouched, offering the padded arm for the wolf.
The lead wolf jumped and bit the arm just as Trevor wanted. He buckled under the wolf's weight and moved sideways to put the latched wolf between him and the second one. He could feel that the wolf's jaws would soon break his arm. He kicked the wolf's soft belly under his arm. 'If I only knew kickboxing,' Trevor mused. His distraction gave the second wolf time to circle around and attack him. The bite scraped his thigh but the wolf couldn't find purchase. He winced and almost lost his footing from the pain the large gash left.
Trevor crouched and took the first thing he found. A large yellowed bone. He lowered his arm and drove the bone to the latched wolf's head. He screamed. Like a Viking bashing against his own shield, he mauled the wolf's head. Before dying the wolf bit harder and broke his bones when he struggled to rip the limb off. Trevor pried open the wolf's jaw and tossed the corpse aside. The second wolf was crouching low, growing and wary of the man.
He panted and tried to forget the mangled arm limping by his side.
"C'mon, mutt! Let's dance!" Trevor taunted, swinging the bloodied bone on his hand.
The wolf jumped at the man's throat. He tried to block but all he could do was shift the bite into a headbutt. The human and wolf went down on the ground. Trevor put his foot underneath the wolf and shoved the animal-beast-monster away. The wolf regained its footing at the same time as he. Wobbling, Trevor felt his sight fading. He readied himself for the next inevitable pounce.
Trevor took a step backward and drove the bone club down on the wolf's skull. The animal went down and in a bloodlust, Trevor kept bashing until it stopped moving.
[Your resilience is beyond the norm. +3 Vitality, +3 Endurance]
> ‘ding’ ‘You have killed [Gray Wolf]. Experience denied for not having a class.
> ‘ding’ ‘You have killed [Gray Wolf]. Experience denied for not having a class.
> 'ding' 'You have learned the general skill [Improvised Weapons]'
> In the hands of the experts or the desperate, anything can be a weapon.
> ‘ding’ ‘You have met the requirements for a class change: Wild Barbarian. Reach the brink of death in combat against a higher-leveled foe and win. Defeat an enemy in a natural setting with improvised weapons or unarmed and wearing no armor.
> A bloodthirsty savage, anything can be a weapon in the hands of a Wild Barbarian, anything can be an enemy in front of a Wild Barbarian. Their sturdy bodies are resilient and resistant to damage and they usually eschew armor.
> 'Would you like to change to this class? Bonuses and skills will be applied after doing so.’
Trevor played D&D with his friends every now and then. But Barbarian wasn't the class he liked to play. He loved rogues. The dashing scoundrel was more of his alley. He felt his coat damp under his arm and saw a trickle of blood.
"Better a Barbarian than a corpse," He thought.
‘New Class: Wild Barbarian
Vitality +10
Endurance +5
Strength +10
Dexterity +5
Melee damage improved by 50%
Body enhancement improved by 50%
Natural Health and Stamina regeneration increased by 1% per minute
Category: Warrior
Skills gained in Wild Barbarian:
Active: Pummel lvl 1
You pummel your enemy in melee, dealing damage with a chance to stun. Spending more stamina on this skill increases the chance of stun.
Category: Combat
Active: Berserker Rage lvl 1
Go on a raging spree and attack your enemy. For each successive attack, deal 1% more damage. You cannot stop attacking the enemy until they disengage.
Category: Combat
Passive: Sturdy body lvl 1
Your body is resilient to damage. Increase natural defenses and health regeneration by 50% [after bonuses 75%].
Category: Body Enhancement
Passive: Endless Endurance lvl 1
Your health and stamina recovery interval decreases by 0.5% [after bonuses 0.75%] per each 1% of your maximum health missing.
Category: Body Enhancement
Passive: Deathless Warrior lvl 1
You don't die when you should. If you reach 0 HP, delay death by 1 minute. If at the end of the minute you are still at 0 HP, you die. This skill can only trigger once per hour.
Category: Body Enhancement
Trevor read the description of his skills and class twice and shook his head. He was sure this Barbarian was a very common and easy to obtain class, but at least he felt stronger than before. Maybe he could see if there was a chance to learn another class if he could get out of this forest.
He looked at the two dead wolves and frowned. Maybe he could get their pelts if he had a way to skin them. He didn't. His arm itched and he unwrapped the ruined coat, tossing it aside. He moved his arm and felt the wound closing. He looked at the bone club. It was the leg bone of some huge creature. He decided to walk away from there.
"I should take anger management classes," He mused in derision.
He could hear the wolves nearby feasting on the drake. Trevor shook his head and decided to get away from there. He walked around with his bone club in hand. He saw a broken tree, splintered. The wood wasn't completely dry, meaning this tree was down for a week or so. Next to it, he found more drake bones. He could see the bones were broken and wondered what kind of monster could break drakes like that. He studied the scene and found that the drake crashed into this tree. Scavengers had picked the bones clean already but they were newer than his own. Smaller too.
For the next few hours, he wandered through the forest, seeing even more drake skeletons and critters here and there. [Blood Squirrel - lvl ??], [Deathfang Spider - lv ??], [Worm, lv 3]. Trevor avoided the former two, associating question marks to danger. The worm he found eating the drake's bone marrow, however, he decided to use it as a test for his new Barbarian abilities. He charged and thought "Pummel" as he drove the club down on the worm. He felt some of his energy leave him, getting him tired. But the club created a splatter of worm fluids with two feet of radius.
Stolen story; please report.
> ‘ding’ ‘You have killed lvl 3 [Worm].
"Great," He said. "Of course I wouldn't level up from just one worm. But it is good to know there are things I can kill in one shot." His voice attracted something. Lumbering steps and soon a drake's head appeared inside a bush. "Hello there!" He waved at he drake.
[Drake - lvl ??]
The drake opened his mouth and greeted him with flames. Trevor ducked to the side and rolled, feeling his clothes on fire. He kept rolling for a few more yards and then tried to get back on his foot. He looked around and saw scraps of burnt cloth and his bone club where he dropped it. The drake walked out of the bushes and roared.
Trevor decided to run away. He thought he wasn't acting much like his class but he wasn't going to fight a firebreathing drake at level 1. He ran without looking behind him but he didn't fail to notice that there were dozens of drake and wolf bodies all around the forest. Some broken trees too. Something or someone really went ballistic in this region recently. He found a slope and decided to climb this hill to try and get a view of the surroundings. Sometime later, he came upon a ruined temple.
He found a pile of wolf bones next to the entrance. Some of them still had pelts on. It seemed like someone killed the wolves and put the corpses out here as a warning. He walked into the temple, ducking behind a broken pillar that brought down a part of the ceiling. Sunlight filtered down from several holes and lit up the dust. He looked down and saw footprints. He measured them to his own. Small.
"A woman or a teenager was here recently but not in the last few days. There's dust collecting on the footprints. But if this is a game-like world, there's no reason women aren't as strong as men," He concluded.
He explored the ruined temple. It was more like a monastery than a temple, several rooms, and corridors and not only the main nave he entered through. In one of the rooms, he saw the remnants of a campfire. Maybe someone was using this temple as a base. 'Someone strong enough to kill all these drakes. And break their bones,' Trevor thought. He warily entered the room anyway, intent on searching for any discarded item that might help him. With his clothes burned by the drake, he was down to his shoes and boxers.
There was a statue of a fighting man, eye sockets empty and scratched. He was in a pose similar to kung-fu or some other martial art. Trevor was never the fighting type. 'And here I am, a barbarian. Swell!' He walked around and saw old bloodstains. Someone fought here. He kept searching and then saw the ground glow blue. There was a humming and then he felt disoriented. Trevor blacked out from vertigo.
Trevor came to himself, felt his stomach churn, and retched. There was nothing to throw up though, just the taste of bile on his mouth. He looked up and found himself in a hallway, with a fountain and several statues in fighting poses. The room was illuminated by a blue glow coming from the roof. Feeling thirsty, he moved next to the fountain and drank large gulps. The water was refreshing and tasty, more than it should be.
"Maybe this is like one of those roguelike fountains of health," he thought. Trevor looked at his arm and saw the wounds from the wolf bite disappearing. "Bingo!" He grinned. "Now, how do I get out of this ominous and totally creepy blue-glowing hallway? This place is completely abandoned. And where will I find food?"
He found himself starving after he thought of food. The adrenalin of his monster forest hike made him forget his basic needs. He moved to the end of the hallway and found a door. Behind the door broken bookshelves, the tomes and their bindings on the ground, rotting. He moved around the area the blue light reached, poked some of the ruined tomes but there wasn't a single page intact. Everything was broken and rotten, the moisture from the fountain probably the culprit. He spent an hour looking and poking the walls and shelves but found nothing useful. He went back to the hallway and down the other side.
The room on the other side seemed like some sort of bedroom. He found some fossilized humanoid droppings and more rotten furniture. No food. He went back to the glowing hallway and drank more water from the fountain, hoping the magical properties could stave starvation. He sat next to it and let his body relax. He soon fell asleep on the cold stone floor.
Trevor woke up after a restless sleep, sore from sleeping on the rock. He drank more water and checked the statues. They had gems for eyes, blue gems or just some colorless gem that was reflecting the glow from the... moss on the wall.
He touched the moss, it was soft and indeed it was glowing. The entire wall and roof were covered in this moss-grass hybrid. His stomach rumbled and he considered eating it but decided against. There was no reason to believe it would be edible. He went around, searching for an exit. Two hours later, he found none.
"Trapped in. Not even some stairs to get out of the safe zone," He cursed. His stomach demanded food. "Know what? I have the healing fountain and my class, if this moss is poisonous I'm going to just tank it."
He ate a handful of the moss. It was bitter and tasted like dirt. He felt pain on his whole body and fell down on the ground. There was no way he could reach the fountain to drink. He screamed and writhed in pain. He got angry at himself and involuntarily triggered Berserker Rage.
> ‘ding’ ‘[Sturdy Body] reaches lvl 2’
> 'ding' 'Your current health is zero. You will die in 1 minute unless you recover health.'
He spat blood and felt his insides shrivel. The pain flared and burned, his muscles locked. An eternity passed as he constantly regenerated health and got damaged again by the moss-grass he ate.
> ‘ding’ ‘[Sturdy Body] reaches lvl 3’
> 'ding' '[Endless Endurance] reaches lvl 2'
More time passed. He had no idea. After a while, he stopped watching his notifications.
> ‘ding’ 'You are starving. Health recovery rate halved.’
Trevor couldn't even curse. He just felt his body burn and his skills recovered his health, not fast enough to stave off his incoming demise. He kept recovering health before the minute was over and brought to near-death by the moss.
> ‘ding’ ‘Congratulations! You have learned the general skill [Azarinth magic resistance]
> Shrouded in mystery, the Azarinth is a force commonly mistaken with the Arcane but fundamentally different. The energies of the Azarinth can be used to both heal and harm. You found out your body is incompatible with these energies but you survived it.
Trevor came to himself hours later. Or days. He had no idea. He felt weak, starving. If it weren't for the skills of his class, he'd be dead. That moss was poisonous to him. He looked down and found a dried pool of blue vomit underneath himself. He crawled to the fountain and drank a lot of the water. His health returned but he was still starving.
"I need to eat something."
He searched the rooms, using some of the moss as a light source. Besides ruined furniture and rotten books, nothing. The only edible thing was this moss. Trevor sat next to the fountain and rested. He couldn't fall asleep, his stomach demanded sustenance. He wished to die and glanced at the moss.
He ate it again. His HP reached zero and the pain resumed.
> ‘ding’ ‘[Sturdy Body] reaches lvl 5’
> 'ding' '[Endless Endurance] reaches lvl 5'
> 'ding' '[Azarinth magic resistance] reaches lvl 4'
Trevor recovered his senses and checked. He wasn't dead yet, it seemed. He wasn't out of the blue dungeon too. He drank more water and checked. This time, at least, he didn't throw up. He found he had nothing to do. Searching proved useless. And if he moved, he'd have to burn energy he didn't have. He rested and waited. Soon his body demanded he ate more of the death grass-moss.
> ‘ding’ ‘Congratulations! You have learned the general skill [Pain resistance]
> Being careless with your eating habits, you have learned to ignore some of the stomach pain. Not only stomachaches but also physical pain. You’re feeling a little more numb towards pain but careful... the damage is still being done! You should watch what you eat.
He had no idea how many times this cycle repeated. Each time it was a bit more bearable but deadly just the same. Trevor looked around and found that the patches of moss he ate weren't growing back. How long does a grass-moss hybrid take to grow? Centuries? He wondered if he would get out alive. Days became weeks or months, he lost the notion of time, and when Trevor noticed, he'd eaten half of the moss in the room. His skills kept leveling up and he was sure the only thing keeping him alive was them.
He also noticed he hadn't felt the need to relieve himself. 'The magical moss might dissolve into raw energy or some shit like that.' And the time came, he ate another handful of the moss.
He fell down and writhed in pain. This time, he could keep a modicum of conscience during the process and saw flashes of blue light illuminating the fountain wall and the floor. It followed his sight and was probably coming from his eyes.
> ‘ding’ ‘Congratulations! You have learned the general skill [Diamond Stomach]
> Ignoring the advice of your mom and your own best judgment, you still ate that which could kill you and survived. Your body changed and now you are resistant to damage from ingested substances. You still should eat healthier foods.
He reached [Diamond Stomach] level 4 before something else changed.
> 'ding' '[Azarinth magic resistance] reaches lvl 10'
> ‘ding’ ‘The Bluemoon Grass has changed your body permanently.
> You grow more resilient +10 Vitality.
> The flow of your mana was changed +10 Intelligence +10 Wisdom.
> You recharge Mana at a faster pace +100% mana recovery rate.’
He saw blue light running down his arms and body. He felt energy running in his veins but he was still starving. Curious, he took another handful of moss and ate after he recovered enough strength. He readied himself to another round of intense pain but nothing happened. Trevor jumped and hooted. He devoured whole patches of moss in a vengeance. He filled his belly and finally found restful sleep.
He woke up and it was night. Or at least he thought it was. Looking around after his mind and eyes focused, Trevor found that he ate too much grass-moss. And if this moss was intended to be his food supply, he was in deep trouble. Looking around, he found he had food for one or two weeks at most.
"Now, what should I do?" He wondered.
After some thought, he decided to cultivate the moss. He carefully removed patches of the moss-grass and tried to "plant" it on the walls. Gravity had other ideas. Thinking carefully, he remembered that the water of the fountain had healing properties. Maybe it would restore the broken roots he damaged when he plucked it out. He filled his mouth with healing water and sprayed it on the moss while he kept it pressed against the wall where no more moss was visible. After waiting a few minutes, he let go. The moss dangled but held. After a second mouthful, it stayed attached to the wall.
He repeated the process, spreading patches of the moss across the entire hallway where he ate it. He found that the water lost its healing properties fast after removed from the fountain so he had to hurry up and splash the moss.
He lost all notion of time. Trevor's routine was to eat moss carefully taken as to leave some to grow still attached to the wall, rest, despair, splash water on the growing patches and wait. He was literally watching grass grow. He kept his portions to a minimum and tried to eat the largest leaves so to leave the most moss-grass on the wall. He even learned how to pluck leaves to left the rhizome underneath intact. And he gained another skill.
> ‘ding’ ‘Congratulations! You have learned the general skill [Eldritch Agriculture]
> Planting crops and watching them grow as the seasons go by is easy. All that sunlight and rain... The farmers should try that in a dark dungeon for a change. You learned how to cultivate magical plants and ways to make them grow faster.
"Now if I could get out of here, I would get rich selling this magical weed. As a poison, of course," He scoffed, displaying a hint of madness in his lips. "There must be a way out of here. I bet it was written in these books," He mused.
Trevor went to the library and rummaged through the dust and pieces. He found some leather bindings still readable. "Advanced Azarinth fighting stances II," He heard.
Damn. The clue was right in front of him all this time. After cursing himself, Trevor rummaged and found more bindings. All were about fighting stances and moves. He returned to the hallway and ate the moss he used as light. Looking at the statues, he tried to imitate their stances. He felt ridiculous but just shoved that feeling as the last scrap of sanity leaving his mind. And his routine changed. Now he would eat moss, cultivate moss, and imitate the stances of the statues. He even came up with some that seemed similar to the ones the statues depicted.
He went on for weeks. Or months. Hard to tell. He tried tai-chi, meditation, everything to make time pass. He imitated the statues and felt their gaze finding him wanting. He laughed alone. He found the grass-moss delicious. One time he even tried to eat one of the book bindings. Too chewy for his taste.
He tried to move from one stance to another. He tried to find out what kind of body blows went with each stance. Some were good for kicking, others good for kicking. It was almost as if this fighting style was based on kick-boxing.
If only he trained it before coming here. It would be easier.
----------------------------------------
> 'ding' '[Eldritch Agriculture] reaches lvl 5'
His magical farm was doing good. With each level of his skill, the moss grew a bit faster. He now only plucked some of the leaves, learning to harvest in a way that the moss-grass was mostly preserved. The moisture of the hallway increased to tropical rainforest levels, the magical fountain's water neverending. And he finally got good enough at imitating the statues that the system rewarded him.
> ‘ding’ ‘You have met the requirements for a class change: Azarinth Healer – Knowledge about the basics of Azarinth fighting stances and Azarinth healing, Survived the change invoked by the Bluemoon Grass.’
> ‘The Azarinth Healer is not exactly what the name might portray. A close-quarters fighter that chooses an unarmed style of combat to both heal and destroy. Enhanced by an ancient technique of magic their bodies become resistant to even the strongest of attacks and heal at a rapid pace.’
> ‘Would you like to change to this class. Bonuses and skills will be applied after doing so.’
Trevor did a double-take at the new message. Was the Azarinth an order of assassin monks that forced their victims to eat the deadly grass-moss? If that was true, it made sense to lock the candidates here. They either developed immunity to their own poison or they died. He accepted.
‘New Class: Azarinth Healer
Vitality +10
Strength +5
Dexterity +5
Intelligence +10
Wisdom +10
Body enhancement magic is improved by 100%
All healing magic skills are improved by 100%
Natural regeneration increased by 1% per minute
Skills gained in Azarinth Healer:
Active: Destruction – lvl 1:
Send a destructive pulse of mana into your enemy with every punch or kick. Your Intelligence stat enhances the damage potential.
Category: Healing
Active: Reconstruction – lvl 1:
Send a healing pulse of mana into yourself or your ally with a touch. This skill can be channeled.
Category: Healing
Active: State of Azarinth – lvl 1:
Your body glows with the power of Azarinth, increasing your resilience, speed, and strength by 35% [after bonuses 87.5%].
Category: Aura – Body Enhancement
Passive: Body of Azarinth – lvl 1:
Your body was changed by magic. All pain is reduced by 25% [after bonuses 50%]. You heal even fatal injuries without the help of healing magic. Your natural regeneration is improved by 50% [after bonuses 100%]
Category: Healing
Passive: Azarinth Fighting – lvl 1:
You are familiar with the fighting style of Azarinth. Damage inflicted with your own body and related skills is 75% higher [after bonuses 187.5%]’
Category: Body Enhancement
He read again the bonuses. This class was obviously way better than the first one he got. But did he lose his other class? Since this was a game-like world, it should have a status. "Status", he shouted. Nothing happened. He tried some other words, like 'menu', 'character sheet', and so on. What worked was to think of his own name.
Name: Trevor Smith
Class 1: Wild Barbarian
Unspent statpoints: 0
- Active: Pummel– lvl 1
- Active: Berserker Rage – lvl 1
- Active: Free Slot
- Active: Free Slot
- Active: Free Slot
- Passive: Sturdy body – lvl 1
- Passive: Endless Endurance – lvl 1
- Passive: Deathless Warrior - lvl 1
- Passive: Free Slot
- Passive: Free Slot
Class 2: Azarinth Healer – lvl 1
Unspent statpoints: 0
- Active: Destruction – lvl 1
- Active: Reconstruction – lvl 1
- Active: State of Azarinth – lvl 1
- Active: Free Slot
- Active: Free Slot
- Passive: Body of Azarinth – lvl 1
- Passive: Azarinth Fighting – lvl 1
- Passive: Free Slot
- Passive: Free Slot
- Passive: Free Slot
Class 1: Wild Barbarian
General Skills:
- Elos Standard language - lvl 5
- Identify - lvl 1
- Improvised Weapons - lvl 1
- Eldritch Agriculture - lvl 5
- Diamond Stomach - lvl 4
Resistances:
- Azarinth magic - lvl 10
- Pain - lvl 1
Status:
Vitality: 38
Endurance: 13
Strength 20
Dexterity 15
Intelligence 25
Wisdom 27
Health: 380/380
Stamina: 130/130
Mana: 250/250