His sudden celebration was cut short by splashing behind them. The crocodiles that he had seen earlier were pulling themselves up onto the bank in all of their massive glory.
They had to have been every bit of 15 feet at the shortest. Despite the enormity of the herd of monsters meandering their way to the pair and the dead turtle, Drew was not very concerned.
The heads were shaped more like salamanders and their legs were smaller than his hand. They could barely crawl onto land to take this new found kill from them.
Despite the dichotomy of intimidation and stupidity, Drew decided to cut their losses and head back up to the dungeon. Dying to an overgrown salamander that Nurgle insisted on fighting was not on the top of his list of things to do by any stretch of the imagination.
“Lets get out of here Nurgle.” The crocodiles had already swallowed most of the leg that Drew chopped off and they continued to approach the dead stilter with their stumbling gate and glossy eyes. The indifference of the monsters to the living pair allowed Drew to scoop up the significantly bulkier cyclops and make their way away from certain death.
The journey home was uneventful and they returned to the cliffside in short order to prepare for their plans going ahead.
“You bulked up Nurgle. That's crazy.” The not so diminutive cyclops preened at his master's attention. He previously looked like he would break if he was grabbed too hard, but now he looked like a baby on SARMS.
Despite the immense muscle gain that came with the last level up, he did not gain any height which gave the baby weight lifter appearance more credibility.
The weird clopping noise that Nurgle made in happiness refused to stop as he felt the new strength in his muscles. If he was already deceptively strong, how much stronger was “significantly”? Drew needed to test his little friends new limits.
“Here, push my hand down with everything you have.” He was all too happy to follow the command and sat his thick hand into his masters. Drew tensed up in anticipation of the struggle before the little guy put his all into slamming his hand down. They both tensed up upon making contact and Drew felt his muscle strain under Nurgles force.
Even with the new strength increase from the system, the cyclops was not as strong as his master which bummed out the smaller creature according to his slouch over posture. Despite this, Drew felt the strain in his muscles from their match and was surprised by how close he was at pushing his hand down. He withdrew his hand to take his ring off for another round of the game to test him without the strength boosting artifact.
He motioned for Nurgle to try again and the previously close match was a landslide victory for Nurgle. The creature jumped up and down with joy as Drew sat back astounded at the power to weight ratio. If he was human sized, he could probably pull a tree out of the ground. It was ludicrous, but definitely in a good way.
“Well Nurgle, are you ready for a new friend?” The creature looked confused at the question. He might have been confused about what his future might mean with a new friend or he had no idea what was going on in the first place. Drew had no clue, but he was not going to wait for him to make a decision.
“Summon small monster!” A magic circle whirled to life and where he threw his hands and a light slowly forced his eyes close. After a few seconds of silence and the light dying down, he uncovered his eyes and stared down at their new companion.
https%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FJALv3sL.jpg [https://i.imgur.com/JALv3sL.jpg]
“What! You don’t even have arms and what's coming out of your trunk? Why do you look like a plushy? Just give me a win, you stupid system!” He planted his face in his hands and groaned in frustrations.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“Hello master, I am sorry I do not meet your expectations. I shall kill my self post haste.”
Drew’s jaw dropped when the weird elephant thing spoke to him.
“You know English?” The sudden introduction of a talking doll was enough to floor him into inaction.
“Of course. This cliff might do it.” The doll started to waddle over to the side of the walkway with its stubby legs.
“Hold on hold on hold on. You can completely understand me? Like perfectly?” His astonishment only lasted so long before he recovered in time to stop the suicidal creature.
“Of course, master. I would be quite remiss to not understand your native tongue. It is rather simple, all things accounted for. Shall I kill myself now?” The plushy tilted its head slightly, waiting for a response.
“No, I'm sorry about that. I just wasn’t expecting something like you when I used my ability.”
“I assure you master, I am completely capable of achieving my main tasks.” The smug response did very little to assuage Drew's concerns.
“And what would that be?”
“I have some light healing capabilities, tactical analysis, ranged attacks, and other mental tasks” The listed abilities perfectly suited their current needs though he had some doubts.
“Oh that's awesome. We can’t do any of that stuff beyond that tactical analysis thing I guess.” The elephant creature walked back from the cliff and stood near Drew’s legs.
“I am sure you believe you understand the tactical shortcomings and successes you have achieved in your tenure as a combatant, but I would be pleased to take over that role.”
Drew felt as though he heard some snarkiness in her tone, but he was not about to argue with a creature willing to die for criticism.
“Well uh… welcome to the team. Do you have a name?”
“I do not, Master.” The button eyes of the creature stared up at Drew and seemed intent on a fast response. He did not want to name the first thing he could interact with something stupid and felt the creature leaning into the question more and more as the seconds ticked by.
“Do you want me to come up with one?”
“Please do. I have wanted one since I gained consciousness!” The pressure was definitely on now that it set the importance of it so high.
“How about Eyeore…”The plushy looked drained of all life as the words left his mouth.” Sorry sorry, that was a bad joke hahaha.” The awkward laugh trailed on as he fought with himself to think of a good name.
Drew struggled to think of something that would fit the creature. Maybe another elephant, but what famous elephants would he know? The name of the disney elephant sat on the tip of his tongue as he stared at the pleading button eyes. That was probably not the best of names.
“How about…… Sapphire?”
Half expecting the creature to throw itself off the cliff, Drew shut his eyes close and waited for a few seconds waiting for a reply before opening his eyes. Sapphire stood in front of him with a smile half hidden by her trunk.
“That is incredibly pleasant to the ears! Thank you Master. May I ask your name?” She responded with immense joy at the new name and swayed her trunk back and forth.
“Glad you like it. I had to think really hard about what name truly fit you, ya know. My name’s Drew.” Lying out of his ass, Drew smiled down as she changed her attention to her small brother in arms.
“And what might your name be, fellow compatriot?” Nurgle looked back with a blank stare that could only be done by something without many thoughts going on. “Hello?”
“Um. I don’t think he can speak.”
“Not to be rude, but I am quite sure he would love to have a conversation with me.” Sapphire’s trunk was slightly lifted and she looked pleased with herself as she seemed to motion for Nurgle to respond. After five seconds of silence, Nurgle slumped on the ground waiting for something to happen.
“I told you. I've been with him for nearly a week and he hasn’t said a single word. Just whines and groans really. He does this little leg slapping thing too, but only when he’s really happy.”
Sapphire seemed stunned at this new information, unsure how to react.
“But Master, how can you communicate with something if it is completely unable to communicate except once in distress. That is wildly inconvenient.”
“You’re telling me.” Drew said with a chuckle. He was happy that someone else saw the utter inconvenience that is the lack of language.
“We must fix this at once!” The elephant thing seemed distraught at best with the new information and began thinking intensely, presumably at ways to fix Nurgle’s muteness.
“Nurgle doesn’t really seem to think too hard on much, so I would save the effort if I were you.”