I blinked my eyes open in the darkness. I wasn't sure if I was rested, or I just hurt less. My ears were awake before my eyes were, there was a small pitter of feet. I looked around blind, trying my eyes against the darkness only to inevitably fail. The green light the reached my cell was at a minimum, absorbed by the black rock it was made of.
It was the red light of a pair of eyes that helped me locate the sound, rather than any green light. Another large rat, it's silhouette barely traceable once I had the reference of its eyes.
[Trait]: [Creature Study]: [Large Rat] Friendly Disposition
[Trait]: [Creature Study]
You have studied countless creatures throughout your life, now being able to infer certain behaviors, natural defenses, offensive implements, and capabilities. Some creatures sense this and do not see you as a threat.
Effects:
1% Chance to Tame a Creature
3% Chance to be seen as Friendly
10% Chance to Ascertain an Aspect of a Creature
40% Chance to be seen as Neutral
"Not too often that should be happening." I whispered, blinking bleariness away and peering at the stalactites of my cell. Were there tunnels between them, large enough for a rat to squeeze through or had this one come through my cell's bars?
I sat myself up from my padded bed. Nothing more than dirty sheets that barely hid the floor. My eyes adjusted. "No, you're much too big to fit through aren't you, pal?" The rat approached closer, coming into the green light. "How many of you passed by me while sleeping before one of you saw me as a friend?"
I whistled lowly, perhaps finding the reason this one took a chance on me as its form became clearer. Its small steps echoed unevenly. It was limping, favoring its right side and lifting its left as it approached me. I wasn't intimidated, no matter the red eyes and relative size. It's little whiskers seemed to glide across the ground between us before it limped forth again.
"Injured, are you?" I said softly.
My hand reached out and the rat was stock still. Red eyes stared at my hand, its mouth gnawing at something invisible to me. It did not bite me, instead allowing me to feel coarse, unpleasant fur. Wet. Cold.
I exhaled while my hand rested on the creature. My knowledge of [Flesh Magic] allowed me a simple diagnosis provided I had time to do so up close. Much simpler and rudimentary compared to what I could gather of myself in a similar manner.
For this reason, I did not need to see or even touch the rat's body directly so long as I was near enough. Physical contact anywhere helped though. I needed nothing more to judge its wounds. It had a ripped tendon in the major muscles of its left front leg. It was a blessing she, for she was a she, seemed capable of walking on two legs if the need arises.
There was a panicked flinch as I began my magic. "Shh, little lady. You'll have to come by a few more times if you want that leg completely working again." I calmed the creature, speaking softly, my voice traveling only as far as my cell's bars.
Meanwhile, my magic pulled softly, encouraged the healing of the rat's own body. Despite my gentle working, I knew it had to be slightly uncomfortable if my own experience removing cancerous cells was any indication. The tendon, I felt began to repair itself more efficiently.
I removed my hand.
The rat scurried away, looking back at me with red beady eyes, before impressively climbing my wall three-legged and disappearing between the stalactites above.
Healed [Large Rat] 4 HP
[Flesh Magic]: [Ability] Acquired: [Mend]
[Flesh Magic]: [Ability] Level up [Mend] 1
[Flesh Magic]: [Ability]: [Mend] 1
Through gentle encouragement, the healing of all wounds can be minutely accelerated, both physically and magically. Affecting the flesh directly offers a measure of control degrees above mundane treatment.
Effects:
Healing to the target based on injury and treatment
1% increase in healing efficiency
[Skill] Level Up [Flesh Magic] 2
[Skill]: [Flesh Magic] 2
You possess the innate ability to understand the workings of the flesh on a mystical level. Workings of magic upon the body are your specialty, flesh your canvas. Healing, altering, modifying, destroying, all fall within your purview.
Effects:
2% increase in efficiency of [Flesh Magic] related tasks
I blinked at all the numbers before trying to go to sleep. It was almost too soon that the Jailor, as I mentally referred to him as, starting banging the bars. The noise was the absolute worst thing to wake up to. Despite this, my rest was better than how I arrived here, bruised and cut. I had healed a little through the night.
He yanked the gate open, still painfully obviously a male. This time, I didn't hesitate and walked through immediately before any threats made themselves.
The morning, or rather the start of the day as I had no idea of the actual time, began as yesterday. I sat at the same table and was ignored. I was content to listen, learning the context of this prison, of the world sometimes too.
I nearly gagged on my slop, but I followed the lead of everyone else. It was vile, but the stomach didn't hurt for it. The Cook, as I had come to know her, was simply a terrible one, with worse ingredients. Likely, whatever might be dead down here.
"Have you heard?" Kisz spoke first. "My neighbor says there is a punishment today. Someone struck one of the wardens. Tried to escape."
It was only Kisz, the scaled one, myself, and Muse, the one with glowing inscriptions on his skin. Our table was void of other people this time. They still ignored me. It happened that the other prisoners were concentrated on the other side of our seating area.
"I can see that." Muse' eyes became hard and the runes on his skin dimmed. "So early?"
"The warden had to go to the medical ward." Kisz said, eliciting a raised eyebrow from Muse. He failed to hide his interest. I'd imagine it got quite boring in this place.
"Fat luck he'll live then. We're all dead." Muse grumbled. "Even them."
"Not for the wardens, Muse." Kisz replied at a low hiss. "You know they save the good stuff for them."
I finished my slop and made my way to the empty bowls. Neither Muse nor Kisz spared me a second glance. My attention was diverted the second I placed down my bowl.
Our seating area was centered nearby a deep hole, railed off by haphazard wooden pikes. You simply walked around it to get to the mines. I did it yesterday. I did not know its origin, only that it was there, deeper and darker than anything in this forsaken place. I didn't question it, but then I saw the person on his knees, being dragged by the Overseer, the one who had watched over the mines.
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"Should've saw it coming." A furred person growled. "Why'd you do it Gral?" He whispered, eyes focused on the spectacle.
"He's going to throw him in the Pit." Another added, numb.
A fearful voice trembled. "Not before... that." At his comment, nearly everyone shivered.
The Overseer was the greedy large dark-skinned... pig-person that took my crystals when I returned. His steps were heavy, fat jiggling with every one. He held up the victim by the scruff of his neck. "You think you will all have learned already! How many of you already down there?" He yelled. "This one, you've been here a long time, haven't you? Always so little shinies from you, too little. Good to be rid of you, good example for the rest. They need one every once in a while."
He reached into a pouch by his side, pulling a syringe of all things. The liquid that filled it was the same color of the crystal glow, except it was concentrated. It didn't glow. It shined against the horror in the victim, Gral's, eyes. It shined a promise so vile and disgusting Gral did nothing but tremble. He broke, before my very eyes, that man, in front of all to see, shattered like glass, his will broken. His dignity, everything by that serum.
"Stop! Please, please! I know where there are more shinies! I have a lot, saved up! In the tunnel! Gah!" He choked as the syringe went brutally into his neck, pumping the liquid in a manner of seconds. "Anything!" He gurgled.
"Too late, scum." Overseer responded, a feral grin as he stared into Gral's eyes, hand still pressing the syringe deep in his throat.
Gral's motions became less struggling against Overseer, and more uncomfortable jerking. Blood exploded from his shoulder, black chitin-like growth spurt forth out of the wound. Gral screamed, screamed as parts of his body underwent similar processes. His eyes imploded in bloody viscera, leaking fluid, but this time, nothing seemed to come of it. His hand deformed, his spine realigned, bones popped and shifted under the skin, ripping it in some places, stretching it too thin in others.
Gral's screams were horrendous, true fear, desperate and stinking. The pleas from his mouth were anything but a voice. Fluctuating, too deep, too high. Unintelligible. Save for the only words that came up in his moments of clarity. A monster spoke. "Kill me!" It begged, between the sounds of ripping flesh. "Kill me, someone. Please. Melfo. Kill me!" He screamed a blood-curdling scream, in immeasurable agony.
The furred person sitting at the table banged the wood. "Gral you goddamn fool." He whispered, tears flowing freely. I could hear his teeth grinding against each other. "If I had my bow, Gral. If I had an arrow, even. I would do it. I swear I would do it." His eyes never left his friend. His fingers twitched for string or wood. "No one deserves this hell." He whispered, quiet grim nods all around.
Melfo twitched in his seat when the Overseer kicked Gral into the Pit. His eyes traced his arc like an archer might an arrow. The others had their hands on him, calm, to prevent anything stupid from happening. They tightened when he flinched.
I stared in absolute terror. My hand slipped, knocking the bowls over and causing a commotion right in the silence of grief that followed the spectacle. The Cook yelled at me, beat me with her disgusting slop spoon. The rest stared in silent empathy.
The Overseer spared me a nasty glance, took in the sight of Melfo, and nodded in pure evil satisfaction. Gral's screams echoed up from the Pit for five minutes. They were a constant reminder, my heart raced. I began sweating, fear overtook me.
I had mining duty again. Passing the Overseer he barely spared me a second glance as I reached for my pickaxe, rucksack, and lantern. But then he commented as I passed, sending a cold shock down my spine. I felt his grin more than I heard it in his voice or saw it on his face. "There's always room for more in the Pit. Find his stash for me. You always know where to look, you always bring me extra shinies." He said it so casually, so offhand, I could do nothing but nod and keep walking. He didn't look to see if I said yes, he didn't need to. I was afraid.
New [Quest]: [Locate Gral's Stash]
The Overseer has tasked you with finding the crystal stash of the recently mutated Gral. He's hidden his crystals somewhere in an offshoot tunnel.
Rewards:
+10 [Reputation] with the Overseer
+100 [EXP]
Penalty:
The Pit
I darted into the caves and immediately began combing through the tunnels. I spent hours in a desperate frenzy. My feet began to ache and cuts began to form, blisters popped. I sat down, and cast [Mend] on my injuries, feeling a rush of small bliss as the pain left me.
"A [Quest]?" I said in thought. "[EXP] and [Reputation]?" The terms weren't familiar to me in this context. Reputation I could've guessed, and perhaps a [Quest] was like a mission. But [EXP] escaped me.
I sighed in relief as my feet began to feel better in earnest, checking my body once again for odd cancerous cells. There was a concentration of them near my waist, where I had kept my crystal shard where I slept. "Dangerous things." I whispered, purging myself uncomfortably. "I'll have to tuck it somewhere else when I sleep."
I sat in the damp and stared around, the light of my lantern showing me the tunnel I was in. I remembered the way back, almost perfectly. The route came to me easily, and I thought about the other candidates for where I would've hidden my own stash.
[Racial Trait]: [Higher Functioning]: Gral's Stash
My mind shot off and suddenly I remembered an overturned pile of rocks with crystal clarity. On my way back from mining, it was inevitable you saw the glow of another lantern another person returning, but this was one that emerged from a tunnel that was long excavated by my judgment. One such tunnel I myself had considered for my own stash.
I mined my share of crystal, retreating higher into the tunnels where more [Large Rats] lived. They left me alone, and in return, I mined away the crystals that they seemed so intent to avoid. Likely, they had realized its effects on them. They were a rapidly developing species after all. They stuck to the shadows, hissing at the light.
Many red eyes seemed to regard me, and most left me alone. There were a few, a vast majority that reacted aggressively, but the already neutral [Large Rats] held back and the others followed. Interest was piqued when I mined away the crystal, but nothing came of it. It was disconcerting, the audience I had.
I returned to the site of Gral's stash and sat there, waiting. It wouldn't do to steal from another's stash if it didn't happen to be Gral's. Sitting in the green light, it wasn't long before there were footsteps and another light coming into the tunnel. It was unsurprising, it was nearly time to leave as evidenced by the resounding bellow that echoed through the caves. The Overseer was calling us back.
The furred man that walked in was bathed by ghastly light. He only paused at the sight of me, not two feet away from Gral's stash. It was Melfo. He looked terrible. "You." He said. "What's the mute doing here?" He said to himself more than me.
"Me." I responded, speaking for the very first time in my days here.
Melfo jerked back and stared at me. "What? You talk now?" He said in genuine surprise. He seemed to calm down and stare into my eyes, judging my sanity. "You're awake, again. I recognize the light in your eyes. I thought you'd stay broken ever since that first day." He sounded tired, defeated.
I nodded, somehow some faint memory bubbling to the surface. "Melfo, right?"
His eyes drifted to my side. "Yes. You found Gral's stash, then." He sat down on the other side of the tunnel, we had plenty time to talk.
"The Overseer wants it. Asked me to find it for him." I said carefully.
"Overseer? Ah, the fat trogg that watches the mine. No choice for you then." I noticed Melfo's rucksack was full. "You always knew how to find things the best, even broken." He stood up and shouldered his things. "It's more than just crystals though, some of Gral's, " He hesitated, "things. Personal things are in there, if I may?" He was being needlessly polite, he could've shoved me into the ground if he wanted to.
I moved over and gestured. "He was your friend." I said simply. "Please."
Melfo regarded me for a moment, but sifted through the rocks revealing all manner of things. Things I had seen throughout the prison, but could never guess how he could've gotten them all the way out here. A metal plate I was sure only the wardens, the troggs, used, one of the prisoner bowls, a chair leg. Those were the most mundane. Wrapped in cloth, almost certainly the very same cloth we called beds, were a metal knife that might've once been a plate, and a syringe. Of the very same kind that Gral had been injected with. The very same kind which the sight of broke the man in front of us.
"Oh, Gral. You damned fool, Gods take you." Melfo muttered. He reached for the one thing in the whole pile that wasn't scavenged, a necklace. A pendant that opened up, a family of furred people, not unlike Gral.
My heart wrenched.
He pulled the necklace away and stared at the family in it. He looked to me. "I'm sorry you had to wake up to this hell. The rest of this trash is yours. Fuck all it did for him." And then he walked away, his lantern light fading into the tunnels.
I moved some more rocks and found his crystals, making sure to cover everything else. I come back and inspect it all when I had time.
When I returned, the Overseer, the trogg, turned to me with shaking jowls, slobbering over himself. "Shinies! You found them. So many. So many." He whispered to himself, the light in his eyes as sick as the green that surrounded us. I dropped Gral's crystals along with mine, placing my pickaxe and lantern down.
The Overseer let me go, preoccupied.
[Quest] Complete: [Locate Gral's Stash]
The Overseer has tasked you with finding the crystal stash of the recently mutated Gral. He's hidden his crystals somewhere in an offshoot tunnel.
Rewards:
+10 [Reputation] with the Overseer
+100 [EXP]
Level Up! You are now Level 1
3 Unallocated [Stat Points] to Distribute
I sat quietly eating my slop and meditated on the information I'd just gotten. I'd leveled up? Myself, not my [Skills], to be clear. What were [Stat Points] exactly? And then I remembered the bonus [INT] to my [Race] the 10 [INT] I should've gotten by default. Where did I check those numbers?
I returned my bowl, Muse and Kisz seemed to notice me this time after glancing at Melfo. They didn't say anything, however, and preferred to keep their conversation as casual as it always was.
"The mute's lucky he never has to do rat duty." Muse griped. Myself being brought up for the first time in their conversation. "Three of them are too much now. The slop's barely enough fuel to kill one of them. Let alone the five that are usually with it."
Muse ate his slop despite the complaints and Kisz dipped his tongue in his.
"You know the story. He never bothered with the rats unless they attacked him. And not that much did." Kisz hissed. "Besides, the warden at the mines loves him. So the ratter lets him have him. He won't see another day of rat duty to the day he catches the green glow." They stared at me.
I stared back.
"Melfo says he woke up." Kisz said, aiming it at Muse rather than me.
"Melfo just watched his brother die." Muse said back.
I got up and returned my bowl. We were herded back into our cells by the Jailor and there, I managed to see the effects of my first level.