Josh stood in his kitchen, ice cold beer in hand, and thought about his progress in the game so far. It had been such a vivid experience that the world around him felt muted. The colours of reality seemed less vibrant than they had just that morning.
But at least the beer tasted good, Josh thought, as he took another swig. He had been pretty dehydrated after hours sitting in the rig. He considered a drip or some other means of keeping his body sustained. He dismissed the idea immediately though. What? Should he get a catheter and shit in a box too? Josh wasn't that committed. He could always log out of the game as long as he had a safe spot to hide and wasn't going to take damage in the 30 second window he'd need to log out.
There were no quick log outs in Control, else people would use the ability to evade permadeath. You needed 30 seconds, staying perfectly still, without damage or you had to start the entire log out process all over.
Josh picked up the remote from the counter next to him, gulped down the last of the pale ale, and flicked on the TV to check out the day's events.
Climate change, war, famine and an economy in the shitter. Same old, same old, thought Josh. Despite it all, life went on with most people’s heads buried in the sand, or inside virtual reality headsets, as was the case for Josh. He turned the TV off, weary at the thought of it all.
In tales of morality, good and evil were pitted against each other in a battle of ideas. In reality though, those battles were all over, all that was left was people acting against their own best interests.
Sighing to himself, Josh left his empty bottle sitting on the counter, grabbed the remains of last night’s pizza and another bottle of the ale to wash it down, and headed to his bedroom turned lair, to reenter the game.
* * * *
Josh logged back in, his goblin-esque gnome appeared and spun in the air before him, then set down on the ground. As it did, Josh’s perspective shifted, zooming in upon the image of his gnome. He blinked, and he was seeing the world from his tiny gnomish vantage once again.
Josh wasn’t pleased at the idea of having that disorientating experience occur every time he logged in. What if he appeared in the middle of a group of hostiles? Josh quickly opened his game menu and deselected login effects. Hopefully, that would do the trick.
Boots had also materialised next to him upon log in. Apparently pets weren’t left to fend for themselves while their owner was offline. That seemed sensible to Josh.
“Right. Well Boots, we shouldn’t stick around here too long, but I think we can afford to experiment a little before we head off again, what do you say?” Josh asked the cat, who looked at him pointedly, before turning to inspect a nearby tree.
The forest’s canopy was thick here, and the badlands were well out of view. There shouldn’t be a soul for miles here, but, deciding that it's better to be safe than sorry, Josh climbed up the large oak before him. This was no small task for a gnome, but he was light, and nimble enough that he managed it. With the oak’s branches further hiding him, he pulled out his quill, inkwell and parchment. Then, clutching them tight, as he began to attempt the magical art of contemplation.
Josh knew that writing on parchment was somehow involved in the contemplation process, but he didn’t know how. Maybe he needed to write about a thing to gain its power? But that didn’t seem right. Contemplation was all about looking at a thing, wasn’t it? A means of reflection.
Josh looked around, trying to find something to focus on, something he could think about. At first he stared at Boots, watching the cat from above as it slinked around the base of the tree. Unfortunately, the stupid cat kept going in and out of view. That wouldn’t work. Josh looked up, and around, but leaves were shielding his view of, well, everything.
So, Josh stared at the leaves. Then, focusing, Josh focused on one leaf. Oak leaves were supple, seemingly full of moisture. Back in biology class, Josh had always thought it was interesting that leaves had veins. In a person, the veins sent the used up oxygen deprived blood back toward the heart, but in a tree, they were literally soaking in the energy of the world around it.
Still staring at the leaf, Josh noticed something strange about it, an odd pattern, swirling upon it, as if made of a dark mist. For some reason, it reminded Josh of the pumping of blood. The pattern coalesced more, as if sap were pooling out of the leaf to give a form to the pattern.
The essence? Josh wondered, and began to sketch down what he saw. An ebbing swirling pattern had appeared on the leaf, and Josh almost bit his tongue as he tried to recreate it on the parchment. Every time he looked down at the paper though, he lost focus on the leaf before him, and when he looked up at it, the pattern was becoming increasingly blurry.
Aggravated, Josh stopped drawing, and locked his eyes on the leaf. Just staring at it did nothing initially, until he began to pick up his train of thought again. The veins, the ebb and flow of the sap, feeding life into the tree, drawing its energy from the world.
The pattern resurged upon the leaf, almost glowing now with vibrance. Wait thought Josh, when I thought about life... The pattern grew bright again as if to confirm his suspicion. Locking that thought in his mind, he began to draw it, never looking down at the page. Josh hoped that he didn’t run out of ink.
Congratulations! You have discovered the essence of life! You can now use it’s glyph to cast magic upon the world.
Josh stared down at the parchment before him, the swirling glyph of life roiled on the page before him, still, yet appearing to constantly move, according to its nature. Josh knew instinctively that he could recreate this mark, even without the help of his quill.
Josh was ecstatic! He’d done it, he’d learned magic, and it felt all the better that he’d learned it all by himself. Putting his new magic scroll away in his inventory, along with the rest of his writing tools, Josh tried drawing the glyph in the air before him. A spark shot from his finger as he finished, hitting a nearby tree. Your a wizard, Joshy! He couldn’t help but grin.
Right. So he could cast the glyph spell. He’d drawn it on a parchment, which he was sure meant that the resulting glyph he’d drawn had become his first enchanted scroll. What else could he do with this new found power?
Josh pulled out his quill and inkwell, and drew on glyph on his arm.
Buff Status! You have gained a 10 percent buff to Hit Points for a 12 hour duration.
Excellent! Josh quickly began to draw the pattern again. This time however, it didn’t seem to do anything. He tried three more times, just to be sure he wasn’t drawing it wrong.
“Damn, I guess no stacking bonuses.” Josh muttered. Well, it made sense. If Josh drew the things all over his body he’d be near invincible, at least for the 12 hours. Something about that rubbed Josh the wrong way. It was the lack of permanence he realised. 12 hours didn’t seem long for an enchantment.
Maybe it was the tool?
Josh put his quill and inkwell away, and pulled out his knife. It had a sharp 4 inch blade, meant for cutting bread and such. Josh lifted his wrist, then thought better of it, lest he relieve his character of a significant portion of his blood, and began to cut the glyph into the fleshy part of his left arm.
It fucking hurt. A lot.
Josh moaned in pain, and almost fell from his perch in the tree.
Damage taken!
Josh’s life total fell from 22 to 20. He didn’t want to have to start drawing the glyph again though, so gritting his teeth, Josh finished cutting the glyph in to his arm, groaning in pain as he did so. This had better bloody work.
Congratulations! You bare the glyph of life. You have permanently gained 25 Hit Points. Your Hit Point regeneration rate has increased by 1 percent.
Congratulations! You have unlocked the school of blood magic. Through the use of blood, you can bind your magic to you.
Josh looked at the glowing cut on his arm. As he watched, the wound scarred over, the scar seemed to have an ethereal glint to it, but for the most part, the glowing had faded away. He had just doubled his HP with one piece of spellwork. Josh guessed this mark wouldn’t stack either, but he wasn’t quite ready to endure the test to find out if that were true or not just now.
There were two costs that Josh thought he’d need to take account of, when he eventually decided to do this again. Yes, he had gained a bonus, but there was only so much space on his small gnomish body. He had limited real estate to work with, so he would need to carefully pick the magic he wanted to infuse into his body.
The second cost was the pain. Josh knew the game was high immersion, but he’d always thought that pain was limited. Maybe it was because he’d done it to himself? He wondered. He wasn’t in a rush to test that theory out either, but he probably needed to face some kind of opponent sooner or later, and he was damn sure it was going to be on his terms.
Climbing down from his tree, Josh called for Boots. He supposed that this was some kind of an innate pet ability, because who ever heard of a cat listening to its owner unless food was involved?
“Come on Boots, lets go pick a fight.” Josh said, as he climbed onto the cat’s hempen saddle. Together they stalked off, deeper into the dark forest.
* * * *
Josh had ridden through the forest for several hours, but hadn't seen another player once. Creatures on the other hand were abundant, and Josh found himself regularly having to ride around them at some distance before he could continue onward.
He had decided on his destination early on in his journey, when, while cresting a hill, he’d seen a great mountain range far off in the distance. And he decided, that the mountain range would soon become his home. That is, if it were suitable. He needed to find a place that he could safely grow in strength and power, free from the risk of being stumbled upon with his proverbial pants down. Literally, that was impossible in this game.
This wasn’t to say that Josh didn’t want any visitors. Just the ones stupid enough to get themselves killed on their not too friendly route to see him. Josh didn’t plan for them to die in his traps though, he needed them just weak enough to die on his dagger, and thus reward him with much needed experience and loot.
Josh pulled out his map and stared at it. The map’s boundaries had grown, updating to account for the locations he had visited. It was no longer a map of the immediate demesne of Beaufort, instead the map showed grey around its edge, as if Beaufort sat in a field of fog. The exception, was a snail's trail of detail that crawled out toward the map’s edge, and showed the green and blue dots representing the adventurous pairing. The mountains he was working toward weren't yet visible on the map, they were as of yet uncharted.
On the map near Josh there was a scattered group of yellow dots. These represented his prey. Well, at least one of them did. Josh was just now in the process of determining which of the buggers he wanted to try and pick off first.
His prey were slugs. Giant, slimy, translucent and disgusting, slugs.
Video games were filled with this kind of thing. God forbid they have a normal bunny rabbit, or maybe a butterfly? No, unfortunately, if it wasn’t scary in real life, it had to be 100 times the size and have a monstrous pair of fangs. In the case of the slugs, Josh was pretty sure they would have some kind of great maw, with row upon row of teeth jutting out. Still, Josh didn’t plan to let any of them get close enough to him for that.
Josh had passed some impressive creatures on his way here. He'd even seen some kind of bat winged lion on the other side of a clearing. This had evoked a strong reaction from Josh, in the form of an about-face and a swift retreat, it had taken some time before he had found a way to navigate safely around it.
There was no need to run for the hills from these slugs though, and they were perfect for his needs, slow enough that he could make a hasty escape if needed. Josh found a place to get set up by a small stream, that was about 10 feet wide, but flowed gently, barely making a sound. He felt safe beginning his preparations within a stone's throw of the slugs, as their yellow dots on the map indicated that they were not hostile toward, him, and thus wouldn’t become aggressive unless he attacked them first.
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
Josh figured it would work in his favour to limit the directions the slug could come at him from. Place chosen, he pulled out his shovel and got to work, making earthworks. It was back breaking. He ached from the repetitive motion of thrusting his shovel into the ground, slowly digging a trench between him and the slugs. Just as he started to reconsider his strategy though, he dinged.
Congratulations! You have attained level 1 of the Digging skill. As you increase in levels, you will achieve new peaks, and troughs, of digging prowess.
Great. Now the game was making puns. Josh was not sure if he could dig that.
As he continued to dig his earthworks, Josh noticed that it had become easier. Even though he was fatigued, the motion strained him less, and he was flinging the dirt faster and more accurately in the direction he wanted it to go. He wondered what he’d be able to do when he was decently leveled in the skill.
Within twenty minutes, Josh had completed his trench. For about fifty feet, from edge of the river, where he had created an insurmountable hill of dirt on his side of the trench, to the foot of a great holly tree. Josh figured the slugs might try to make their way around the trench and tree, but at their pace, he thought that he could probably afford a brief rest, and maybe eat a three course dinner while he waited.
With food on his mind, Josh pulled out one of his loaves of bread, cut off a heel and began to chew as he headed back over to the tree. He quickly finished his food, climbed up, and got to work chopping off small branches with his knife. This would be easier if he weren’t so little, Josh thought, and if he had an axe.
Slowly but surely, branches fell to the ground, leaving Josh sitting on the remainder of the limb that was left jutting out the trunk. Having collected enough, he climbed down and began cutting the branches into more reasonable segments, and whittled the ends into spikes.
Josh then planted his new holly wood spikes along the edge of his trench, placed at varying angles to hamper, and preferably impale the slugs. He stopped to admire his handiwork, and smiled. Not too shabby, he thought.
Walking down to the river bed, Josh completed his final preparation, and collected a large pile of stones. He placed his pile about a third of the distance from the river toward the tree, and then, taking one of the stones in hand, he took aim at the nearest slug.
Glancing at Boots, who had curled up to watch him work, Josh said “Stay”, before hurling the stone at the slug.
It bounced harmlessly on the ground, nearly five feet away from his target. Josh had to try three more times before one of his disc shaped stones smacked into his target.
The slug’s health bar appeared at the top of Josh’s view in red. It had lost 1 HP. That was 1 out of 400 HP. His own HP was currently sitting at 49, his buff and permanent bonuses included. This could take some work, mused Josh.
Not one to miss out on additional damage, Josh continued to hurl stones at the now oncoming slug. 398/400… 396/400… 395/400. Josh’s arm began to hurt, and the slug had now reached his trench, and began to slide down into it, face first. It made a hissing, squelching sound as it approached. Strange tentacle like appendages stretching from its mouth. Hideous, Josh thought, as he grabbed a handful of wooden stakes and strategically placed them in the slugs path, limiting its access to him.
Josh pulled out his dagger and waited. Unfortunately, the slug didn’t impale itself as it ascended the trench wall, it instead tried to squeeze between a pair of recently placed spikes, and became wedged. The spikes buckled from the force of the oncoming slug, but held. For now.
Josh lunged with his dagger. His small spindly arms giving little reach, while the slug writhed and spewed mucus onto Josh as he impaled his dagger into its exposed underbelly. The mucus stung, and smelled putrid, making Josh gag as the slugs gooey innards spilled out onto his hands.
Damage Taken!
Josh’s HP had fallen by five points from the slugs mucus, but he had done some serious damage to the slug in turn. Its health now sat at 286. Josh must have hit something critical.
Josh pulled back, hoping to attack the slug from a better angle, but the spikes that were keeping the slug from wrapping its slimy mouth around his head, were blocking his access. He could potentially crawl into the trench, but that wouldn’t be much safer. So gripping his dagger tight, Josh yelled before dodging and ducking toward the slug, this time as far to the side as he could go, and stabbed repeatedly.
The slug tried to vomit its mucus at Josh again, but missed, and its life bar quickly fell to zero.
Congratulations! You have learned the combat skill, Dodge. You have an increased chance of avoiding enemy blows.
Congratulations! You have learned the combat skill, Dagger proficiency. You are able to effectively wield your dagger in battle.
Josh wiped his forehead, cleaned his slime covered blade in a nearby patch of grass, and took a moment before checking the beast for loot. He touched the slug and the mob disappeared, while several vials of slime appeared in his inventory.
His first kill in the game. Well, no use standing around. Josh was glad the slugs body had disappeared, he didn't want his trench getting cluttered. He walked down to the river bed, collected another pile of stones, and began the process over once again.
Unlike the first slug, the second kindly impaled itself on one of the spikes, it’s HP quickly draining away. Josh helpfully finished it off with a jerk of his knife, and continued on with his new routine.
As he turned from picking up his next pile of stones from the river bed, a slug launched out of the water, wrapped its facial tentacles around his ankle, and sunk its horrible teeth into him.
Damage Taken!
Josh screamed. “FUCK! YOU SHITTING FUCKER!” Josh dropped his pile of stones, some smacking into the head of the slug, but to no effect, and began to pull out his dagger.
Damage Taken!
Shit! In two ticks of damage, Josh had lost 26 HP. He reached into his inventory with his free hand and pulled out his healing scroll, He opened it and touched the glyph, healing himself back to full health, if only for a second before..
Damage Taken!
Another 13 health lost. Josh dropped the now blank scroll and yelled “Die bitch!” Stabbing down into the slug, again and again.
Damage Taken!
His blows were dealing less and less damage as he went, and the slug was still only down to half health, while Josh was sitting at just 23 hit points. It would be a close fight. Josh looked around quickly for something to help him, and spotted Boots, still curled up where he’d left it, its tail whipping back and forth, watching the fight intently.
“BOOTS ATTACK!”
Damage Taken!
10 HP. Josh quickly drew the healing glyph, aiming it at himself. It healed for 20 HP, just as Boots arrived to join the fray, and began to viciously slice at the slug with its claws. Josh returned to stabbing. Within seconds, the slug was dead.
Congratulations! You have attained level 1 of the Swift Attack Skill. As you increase in levels, your weapon will become but a blur to the eye.
Josh healed himself back up, and dragged himself away from the riverbed. Before saying “Boots, did you know slugs are amphibious?” And collapsed on the ground.
When Josh finally recovered from his trauma, he collected the loot from the slug. More vials. Josh then inspected his dagger. It had progressively dealt less damage throughout the fight, and Josh could now see why. The slug's mucus had eroded the blade, wearing it down to the point that it was now more of a bludgeoning tool than a stabbing weapon. He looked again at the vials of mucus with new respect, they might be useful after all.
Sighing to himself, Josh warily picked up a flat stone and found a spot further away from the river to try and hone the blade.
When his weapon looked serviceable again, though still in dire need of repair, Josh turned to Boots and said “Okay Boots. This time, stay, unless I’m being attacked, in which case kill the bastard.” Boots seemed to purr in agreement, and Josh returned to his task of eradicating slugs.
* * * *
Josh sat in the foothills of the mountain range that had been his destination, leaning against his curled up cat, and stared at his dagger. If it could even be called that at this point. The dagger’s pockmarked surface had no edge to speak of. The final slugs from the night before had ended up dying to bludgeoning attacks and the support of Boots.
The good news was that he and the cat had both levelled. Josh had gained a level in strength, speed, endurance and constitution. Resultantly, he was a much tougher gnome, but with a next to useless metal stick for a weapon, Josh was putting out terrible damage per second.
Boots on the other hand seemed to have grown deadly. The cat was much stronger and faster than it had been before. If they were to fight each other now, Josh thought the cat might be able to kill him, even with his healing.
Josh considered their leveling progression so far. Skills here were acquired by doing any associated activity. If he spent time swinging his weapon around, he would become quicker as swinging his weapon. However, none of the stats Josh could learn would make him an innately better fighter. If he left an opening for his opponent out of stupidity, they could capitalise on it. Gone were the days of pointing and clicking one's way to victory.
Therefore, Josh would need to find a training partner. One who could help him hone the finer points of fighting. Ideally, Josh never wanted to engage in a fair fight, or even lift a finger in battle, if he could help it. However, while he didn't see sense in risking himself, that didn't mean it would never happen, and he would need to prepare for the eventuality.
Maybe this blunt dagger would prove an effective training weapon? Honing the weapon had proven next to useless. While grinding at it with a river stone had helped a little at first, it was now at the point where Josh thought it would need to be reforged. His small cutting knife would prove to be a more effective weapon at this stage.
Josh pulled out the knife and held the items side by side. The short cutting knife’s edge gleamed in the sunlight. The dagger next to it looked more like an pockmarked iron nightstick. Maybe he could tie the knife to the dagger? Or somehow work out how to bind them together magically?
Binding magic… now that was tickling Josh’s memory from the day before.
After killing the slugs, Josh had logged off and gone to bed. It had been the early hours of the morning when he’d finished up, and Josh had slept through to the afternoon. He’d only logged back into the Control world in the early evening after doing some chores and eating half of the contents of his fridge. Going almost 24 hours without food had left him famished.
He was trying to recount the previous day's experiences, trying to remember what he’d learned about binding, when he looked up to see an arrow pointing at him. It sat, nestled against its bow, and the string that guided it was pulled back, threatening to launch the arrow right into Josh’s eye. The green cloaked huntress holding the deadly items was almost an afterthought.
She stood twenty yards away, and had crept up on Josh, silent as the night. So had the great saddled stag that stood a few paces behind her, its eyes piercing into Josh.
“...You’re a player.” Said the huntress.
“Pardon?” Josh asked, trying to buy for time. He had to escape, maybe he could get behind Boots, but where was he going to hide? He wouldn’t get ten feet without being shot, even using his cat as a meat shield.
“You. Are. A. Player.” The huntress enunciated each word slowly, “There’s no sense denying it. I’m not sure how you did it, but it’s the only possible conclusion.” She gave him a piercing blue stare, as if searching his eyes for the answer to the curiosity that his goblin form presented. As their eyes locked, Josh realised that something about the girl seemed strangely familiar to him.
“What makes you so sure I am a player? I was honestly rather counting on people not being able to tell.” Josh said, figuring if he was about to start over, maybe he could gain a clue as to his mistake.
“Two reasons. First off, that’s a Beaufort alley cat, right? It’s a rookie mistake to bind yourself to one. Unlike players, the brown ball of fluff will respawn, meaning you're stuck with him, handsome as he is, until you roll a new character.”
Josh turned his head to glare at the sleeping cat, still curled up behind him.
“The other reason is, well, I just came from the the slug’s spawn, and someone had recently cleared them. It takes a day for them all to respawn. Judging by your...dagger was it? You’ve recently faced them, and NPCs don’t go around killing slugs, certainly not Goblins, and their weapons wouldn’t corrode if they did. So tell me, how did you get to play as a goblin, and how are you hiding your name but not your species?” As if to prove her point, the girl displayed her name and race above her head.
[Lady Roanna of the Glade]
[Human]
Josh responded in kind, by displaying his Race, along with my already visible name.
[Lesser GobIin]
[Gnome]
Her forehead and nose crinkled in confusion, before realisation dawned upon her, and she began to shake with laughter, her red ringlets bouncing as she she did so.
“That’s fantastic!” She exclaimed. Josh noted that despite her laughter, she managed to keep the arrow trained perfectly steady upon him.
“Yes, well, thank you. Could you… not kill me please?” Josh asked awkwardly.
“Well that depends.” The girls face split into a smile. “You need to agree to two things.”
“Yes?” Hope began to envelop Josh. Re-rolling a character cost money, and even though it had only been a day, Josh didn’t want to have to do it all again, even if he could get a better pet.
“First, you don’t try kill me. You can swear that on your blood, thanks.”
Blood! Of course! That’s what had binding properties. He’d bound the glyph to him by cutting his arm.
“Second, you owe me a favour. After all, who knows when a girl might want a supposed NPC to misdirect her enemies. Deal?”
Josh didn’t hesitate. “Deal. Except, I don’t know how to use my blood to swear on it. How is that done exactly?”
“You really are new aren’t you. You don’t need to learn blood oath magic. It’s not contemplation. It’s the same for everyone. Just cut your hand, hold mine, and swear your oath. If you break your oath, the game kills you, easy as that.”
“Oh, so that’s how oaths work.” Josh had read about oaths in the player manual. He knew they were the basis for contracts in the game, including the formation of clans, but he didn’t know about the blood aspect, or how that blood oath magic had anything to do with how he’d bound the glyph to his arm. That wasn’t exactly an oath. He’d have to remember to experiment with that later.
Josh put down his dagger, and slowly stood to his feet, careful not to spook the young lady who could kill him in a instant. He drew the blade across his small gnomish hand, dropped his knife, and held out his now aching hand.
“Don’t try anything stupid.” Lady Roanna said, winking, before relaxing her arrow, and walked toward him slowly.
Josh suddenly realised where he recognised the girl from. Brave! The girl was the grown up version of the protagonist of the movie. She must have painstakingly modeled her character to look just like disney princess.
She reached him and held out her hand “Now hold my hand and swear your oath.”
He took her hand and solemnly said “I swear a blood oath, that I will not try to kill you.”
“Why thank you.” Said Lady Roanna. “I appreciate it.”
“Any chance you’d like to return the favour?” Josh asked hopefully.
The girls grin broadened evilly, her eyes sparkling as she said “No.” She paused, and continued. “Maybe once you repay your favour to me..”
She began to walk away, then stopped and turned to look at Josh again, then she stared at the dagger on the ground. She seemed to think a second and then sighed, seemingly coming to a decision. She reached down to her hip, and began to unbuckle her belt.
What? Thought Josh. Hoped more like.
She tossed the belt at him. Attached to the belt was a sheathed dagger.
“Consider that an investment on my part. You better live long enough to pay me that favour… and repay me for that dagger.”
Josh tenderly picked up the belt. The leather looked more valuable than all of his possessions combined, which wasn’t that great a feat he realised.
He then slowly drew the blade from its sheath, and gaped. It was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, and along the surface of the blade was a beautiful cursive script that was etched in light upon the blade.
“Wait...what’s this writing?” Josh said.
The girl, who had been walking away back to her stag called back. “That’s a taste of my own contemplation magic. Careful, that thing will cut through you like you were a stick of butter.” She jumped on to her buck, and called “Until next time!” and rode off toward the forest.