Bowen rolled over on his side with a groan and drool covering his face. He looked up to see Tor sitting next to him with a big goofy grin on his face.
“Finally, you have been out for hours, the sun is starting to come up. Take a couple of minutes to get your bearings. I'm not gonna be much use to you anyway, I'm pretty baked!”
Bowen tried to roll his eyes, but even that hurt, so he lay still as the pain slowly drained away.
Five minutes later Bowen was able to sit up. He looked over at his ancestor who seemed to be meditating and said, “Well, have you looked over our class yet?”
Tor grimaced and said, “Yes I have and it is making me very nervous. You shouldn't be able to have these skills until a much higher level. Some of the skills are very overpowered. Someone is pulling strings for you, and trust me this isn't going to be for free. You are going to owe somebody big time, and the only people who have the power to pull this off are on the Galactic council...”
Bowen concentrated and pulled up his class skills tree. It was broken down into a blocked grid, four across. The top headings were the skill sections with choices below each in a column.
Animal Spirit | Elemental Affinity | Mind and Soul |Possession
Animal Spirit had three abilities he could see. The third was greyed out and the skills below were all filled with question marks. The three he could see were:
Spirit of the Beast | Call of the Wild | Beastmaster
Elemental:
Force of Nature | Sun Strike | Earthquake
Mind and Soul:
Psyche Strike | Crowd Control | Total Wipe
Possession:
Enthrall (Abduct Identity) | Mob Rule | Possess
Off to the right side outside of the box were three more choices:
Altered Space | Reservation Recall | Tabula Rasa
Bowen looked down and saw that he had eight points to spend. Without even thinking about it he chose the first of each of the four base choices to open those categories for further advancement.
Class Skill Acquired
Spirit of the Beast (Level 1)
Take on the form of any beast of earth gaining the shape, physical attributes, and skills of each form. +50% Health regeneration while in beast form. +25% Physical Damage while in beast form. No mana requirements while in beast forms.
Class Skill Acquired
Force of Nature
Attuned to the four elements of Earth Water Wind and Fire, The Skin-Walker can call upon the forces of nature. The Elemental All-Weapon may be imbued with one element at a time for additional base damage. Specific elemental skill may be purchased via the galactic shop. +20% Base Damage to All-Weapon when imbued with an element.
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Class Skill Acquired
Psyche Strike
Lash out with the power of the mind to cripple, stun, and damage another mind. The effect is stackable with diminishing returns.
Cost: 50 mana
Class Skill Acquired
Enthrall (Abduct Identity)
Soothe a sentient being’s mind, opening them to suggestion and instruct them to do your bidding. While Enthralled, you may abduct the subject's identity and steal their face and form. It is recommended that you hide the subject when you steal their identity. +100% against mental check when a subject is Enthralled.
Cost: 100 mana
Bowen studied the three abilities outside of the chart and found an extended storage space, an ability to be able to port to Indian reservations across the continent and a skill that made sentient beings forget he existed. The only one of the three that seemed advantageous at this point was the storage. Looking closer he decided to choose that one.
Class Skill Acquired
Altered Space (level 1)
The Skin-Walker now has access to and extra-dimensional storage location of ten cubic feet. Items stored must be willed in and may not include living creatures or items currently affected by aura's that are not the Skin-Walker's. Mana regeneration reduced by 5 mana per minute permanently.
Bowen had three choices left, but wasn't sure if he should save them or use them all right now, he looked at Tor and said, “Tor, I've opened all of the base choices of my class, should I just use all of my choices or save a few? There is a crowd control spell that looks very helpful and a call of the wild spell that brings animals to my aid... That could be useful right? I'm not too sure about the rest.”
His ancestor looked up at him and grinned. “Broheim, ya got to go with whatever packs your pipe, man! We're probably not gonna get out of this park alive anyway, so I say go for it.”
Bowen frowned at the man and said, “Thanks, I can see that your gonna be a lot of help today. Sober up man! We move out in an hour!”
Bowen thought to himself, “Screw it, he might be right.” He tried to take the next skills on the tree but was notified that they couldn't be taken until level 20. Stumped, he looked over the skills and tried dropping another point in Force of Nature. It worked and went up to level 2. He got a notification about being able to use elemental skills with his weapon and the base damage going up another 10%. After staring at the other skills for a moment he figured he should save the two points until he got more information.
Bowen looked over his class noting all the changes to his stats. On top of his info, he saw a blinking red box labeled: Designate Class Title. As he focused on it a drop-down list appeared with classes ranked by what the system thought he should choose. At the top of the list was War Chief. He figured that since he was going to own a city filled with Natives this definitely made the most sense. With a shrug he selected it.
His class was now listed as War Chief (Skin-Walker). A quick glance at his skills showed: Strength 33, Agility 32, Constitution 30, Intelligence 46, Willpower 46, Perception 12, Charisma 50, Luck 20. Bowen, had thirty points to distribute so he asked Tor, “Any idea where I should put these points?
Tor said, “Well, your most important attribute is Charisma, So I would say spend at least five there. You are going to need to use at least two points in Charisma every level from now on. Your perception is really low and situational awareness is important. It's all a relative to what you want to do.”
Bowen thought about what he was going to be doing the next few days, mainly sneaking and running. He put five points right away into Charisma. His Perception was way too low, so he dumped the huge amount of ten points into that. He brought Strength up to 35 and the same with Agility. His last ten all went into Constitution because he figured health was never a bad thing to have a lot of. His stats when he finished were: Str 35, Agi 35, Con 40, Int 46, Wil 46, Per 22, Chr 55, Lck 20.
Bowen could actually feel the changes overtake his body this time and not in a bad way. He concentrated on thinking about Spirit of the Beast and a window popped up with a bunch of drop-down menus and a question of Which class would you like to select?
Bowen thought “Rabbit” and another separate drop-down box opened. He concentrated on this and a list of about thirty Rabbits and thirty Hares opened. He glanced at Tor and said, “This is a pain, am I going to have to go through an animal questionnaire every time I want to become one?”
The ancestor shook his head, “Just the first time thru the list until you choose what species you want to use. I see you looking at Rabbits, Snowshoe would be the obvious choice in snow and Jackrabbit on dirt. Just think Snowshoe Hare in your mind.”
Bowen thought “Snowshoe” in his mind. He felt a slight shimmer go through his body and was instantly brought down to the perspective of about a foot above the ground. He thought “Northern Coyote” and was changed instantly.
In his mind's eye, he went through a list of animals that he had seen lately and then he spoke them out in 2 second intervals. “Red Fox” “Canadian Lynx” “Little Brown Bat” “Tundra Shrew” “Brown Bear”. The Bear was the first one that he felt a marked change. He looked at Tor and tried to say something, “Arrwwrr?” he said.
Tor laughed and said, “You know that you don't have to speak out loud to talk to me right? Just think what you want to say to in your head, we are linked now.”
He thought “Tor can you hear me?” Tor replied “Of course dumbass, I just told you we can communicate telepathically. Now change back to human and quit fooling around, we have things to do!”
Bowen tied thinking “Human” and a box popped up with the text: To return to human form just think, “Bowen” in your mind.
“Bowen...” He was back to his human form wearing clothing and all of the items he had on him. Bowen went through the list marking all of the specific forms he thought could be useful and looked at Tor. “I wonder, do you think the animal forms I can choose extend to the animals that are currently put here by the system?”
The Ancestor looked up at him and said, “Only one way to find out!”
Bowen said, “We're going to need more room!”
Bowen made his way out to the front of the building. He could hear strange howls coming from far off in the distance. He ignored all of the noise and thought of the last Bear that chased him and said “Crazed Dire Grizzly Bear Matron!” There was a delay of a few seconds as the System tried to figure out if what he was trying to do was illegal or not, but then Bowen felt a huge change in his mass as he converted to the enormous Bear.
Brown Bears could get up to around 1300 pounds, but this beast was easily 3 times that size topping over 3000! Bowen thought “Return to Bowen” and stood facing his ancestor with a big grin on his face. “I'm thinking we might make it out of this park after all Gramps!”
Tor shook his head and said, “The fact that there was a delay before the System allowed that transformation makes me once again think that there is someone pulling strings here boy.”
Bowen said, “Oh come on old man! Now your stretching things a bit aren't you?”
Tor replied “Let me tell you something Bowen, there are people galaxies away that have the means to watch your every move, live... right now. I don't know why they are doing it, but if I were you I would give them thanks and hope they can help us out of here.”
Bowen looked up to the sky and said “If someone out there is watching me and lending me a helping hand, thank you! I don't know what you want from me, but I will do my damnedest to help people and not exploit this great power that you have handed me.”