After one hour practising how to walk in his Gorlois still had some trouble with it. He developed a peculiar way of walking, he paired up the legs in groups of two, two pairs became the front legs while the other two became the back legs.
He developed a rhythm; front left, front right, back left, back right and repeat. It was a weird way of walking, especially since it’s wooden spider as big as a human hand.
“It’s not even close to the natural gait of a spider but it’s the best I can do with double the usual limbs…”
Gorlois felt weird, he had gained 4 new limbs, they felt in no way similar to his hands in feet, so while he gained, 4 it felt like 8 different ones. He felt his new grown limbs tingling actually he was tingling in all the unfamiliar spider body parts, so in all his whole body felt as if his whole body went asleep.
Since the past hour he’s been practicing walking, he was confident he could walk some distance as a spider without falling and staring at the floor as he did at the beginning. The comical sight of a spider tripping itself had worn off long ago. He had seen himself trip many times in the mirror in the Room of Strigidus.
While he called it a spider, it couldn’t do things spiders normally did and only looked the part. He’d carved a human face the place where the spider’s eyes usually are. He didn’t create the back of the body specially big. He could only walk on the ground as there were no ways to scale walls, he couldn’t spin webs and couldn’t use venomous attacks. Gorlois hoped he could once make a spider doll that actually could do those things.
(Random knowledge: There are around 40000 different spider species categorized in 109 families. Well almost all spiders have some kind of poison, but only a handful have poisons that can hurt humans more than for example beestings. So it’s actually kind of weird that most spiders in games are portrayed as huge ass venomous monsters… Well we all fear spiders probably and that while they clear our houses from other insects.)
Gorlois went out of the room, back into the maze. Controlling his training puppet so that it walked right behind him. The puppets that had been patrolling through the maze were nowhere to be seen. So as he didn’t even meet them, it was actually unnecessary for him to possess his spider puppet. Backtracking the way he had gone to the room through the maze was fairly easy for Gorlois, you might even call it an innate ability
When he was around ten years old, cook brought him to school as his parents were busy. The school was 18 kilometres from Thomas’ home. The cook did many miscellaneous task by no means was he only a ‘cook’, instead he was more of a butler. The cook would pick up Thomas at the end of school, but it was the first time Cook had taken him so he forgot he had to go again to school.
Thomas didn’t have anything to contact Cook, so by the time it was 3:00 PM, he decided to walk home. His parents, and Cook, only found he wasn’t at home at 8 when it was time for dinner and he didn’t come down. After ten minutes did they realized he hadn’t been picked up from school. Cook was ordered to drive to school to see if Thomas was still there, and when he was about to drive out he found Thomas. He was staggering to the front gate, he was out of breath and his hair dishevelled.
Gorlois had walked a total of 20 kilometres in 4 hours as he had to take the safer route he walked an extra 2 kilometres. After walking those 20 kilometres his feet were full of blisters, after eating dinner he painfully walked to his room, threw himself weakly on the bed and slept.
Gorlois only needed one hour to get back to the living room in the mayors house. Everything in the mayor’s room was left untouched, in the same state and position as when he entered the secret passage. Gorlois wanted to leave the spider puppet behind, Walking was still really bothersome to do for a long time and he hadn’t even needed it to get back through the maze, he hadn’t encountered one guardian puppet at all. But Gorlois couldn’t cancel his possession spell the spider puppet couldn’t talk.
The spider puppet had the same problem as the scarecrow he had possessed, it didn’t have the capability of speech. The rabbit didn’t have that either actually but he could at least produce some sounds, though he didn’t use it while he was sneaking through the maze with it. Gorlois decided he would just sit on the shoulder of the training puppet till the end of the possession spell. Sitting still on the puppet’s shoulder would also increase his control over it as it was easier to concentrate on controlling the puppet when not moving himself.
The bag that Gorlois had left in the room when he went into the maze hadn’t disappeared, probably because it was bound to him in some way. Gorlois made the puppet wear his beginner shirt, as that would give him a bit more to hold onto than the smooth wooden shoulder of the puppet. He also made the puppet carry his bag after making it put the book Strigidus in it.
While sitting on the shoulder of the puppet he maneuvered it to the edge of the village. Gorlois looked for the villagers while walking through Notamotua but there were no villagers at all. He had seen only a few villagers when he arrived in Notamotua, but now he saw no villagers at all and it was awfully quiet as well. It gave the village a creepy, unsettling atmosphere.
It was like he was the only living thing in the whole village. Well he had always been the only living thing in the village, as the villagers were actually lifeless puppets. But those puppets were made to look very humanlike and moved realistically. If Gorlois saw one of the villagers right now he would still think it was a human NPC even though Strigidus had told him otherwise. The village now seemed like it was indeed abandoned and that all its residents had disappeared.
There was at least 150 metres of open ground between the borders of the village and the edge of the forest, it looked darker than when Gorlois first arrived in Notamotua. In the open space there were many tree stumps as the villagers had gained this ground from the forest with their woodcutting business. There were many rabbits and foxes walking around the open space, and no beginners to kill them.
This made the perfect hunting spot. Gorlois wanted to grind till he was lvl 10 before continuing his search for clues through the village. Even if his intelligence and wisdom stats were far above his level, he was still only level 2 and wanted a little bit more power for safety’s sake. When he left the room of Strigidus he had made his training puppet take a carving knife with him and it had held it in his hand since. The knife wasn’t really that bad of a weapon as it gave good enough damage for its requirements.
Carving knife
[p=left]Used to carve wood.
Damage: 10-12
Durability: 50/60
Requirements: level 5, 10 Str.[/p]
It was clearly the requirements didn’t count for the puppet as it had been holding the carving knife without a problem when the puppet didn’t have any stats except for durability, damage and defence because the puppet was counted as an object.
Gorlois believed he could easily kill one rabbit together with his puppet. Gorlois himself had already done that alone, before travelling to Notamotua, and now he had a puppet with him so it should be easier than before.
He was still controlling the puppet from its shoulder. He made the puppet lift the carving knife, only to let it go down as fast as possible. He aimed for the rabbit of course.
The aiming was a little more difficult as Gorlois couldn’t actually move the puppet’s limbs like his own limbs. For his own limbs he only needed to imagine the goal and the brain would do the rest almost unconsciously.
When he possessed his spider puppet he had needed time to accustom with his new limbs. Although he hadn’t truly gotten used to those limbs, he could do some basic movements now.
For the control of the training puppet however he needed to imagine every movement that would lead to the goal and control the puppet with his skill accordingly.
The knife hit the rabbit and the health bar of the beast decreased by one sixth. It was stated on forums that rabbits had 60 Hp so the puppet did approximately 10 damage. This was the same amount as the damage of the carving knife. As a rabbit had virtually no defence, Gorlois could deduce that there were no things that amplified the damage of the weapon.
The rabbit hit back immediately. The attack of the rabbit decreased the durability of the puppet by 7. Gorlois realized that the 15 defence that the doll had, took the brunt of the attack away. The remaining damage decreased the durability of the doll, as this could be seen as its health.
The training puppet now had less durability than before and if the puppet broke Gorlois couldn’t repair it. Gorlois couldn’t make a new one either as he couldn’t wield the woodworking tools himself because he was a spirit. Even when he made the spider he had controlled the puppet to use the tools and carve it.
‘Ah ****, I have a big problem now. I shouldn’t try difficult evasion manoeuvres, I can’t control the puppet good enough yet, and if I fail and the puppet trips it will be destroyed’
Gorlois couldn’t let the puppet be destroyed so he made the puppet walk away from the rabbit. The puppet narrowly avoided hits because of this. The rabbit was faster than the puppet but every time it got close to the puppet and stopped to bite the puppet would be out of its reach again as it didn’t stop.
‘I need to use a spell, Illusion should do the trick, I have mana enough to cast it anyways’
After his class change Gorlois had a big mana pool, namely 700 Mp. That was because his increased Int and Wis stats which had already been far above his lvl. Even if using possession took away 99% of his mana, he had gotten it back by now because his mana recovery rate was quite high. (His mana recovery rate was higher than what controlling his puppet cost.)
“…”
‘Ah ****, Totally forgot I am not able to talk. **** **** ****, Need to cast Illusion but it’s voice activated, like all magic spells.’
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
All spells are normally chanted, thus voice activated, and players often also shout out their fighting skill names but that wasn’t a necessary requirement for activating a fighting skill. Well if a player shouted shield bash for example it would activate but they could also activate it by just doing the action. Some spells could be casted silently by performing rituals by certain classes as well, magic circles of specialized mage classes and hand gestures of ninja classes were examples of this.
“…”
‘****, why can’t I just say “illusion”, I need it so badly’
*ding*
Silent Casting (passive) [beginner lvl 01 00.00%]
[p=left]Due to your strong wish to cast a spell, while being unable to talk because of your body. You can now cast them by concentrating on them.
You can cast spells by concentrating on them
Spells casted silently are 80% weaker then chanted spells
Spells casted silently are casted immediately
Secondary effect: Access to system windows just by concentrating on them[/p]
Most skills were learnt from a tutor (NPC or Player) or gained by repeating a certain action. This skill seemed to be one of the latter but its requirement wasn’t repeating an action. Wishing for something is of course an action, but the requirements for this skill were a little bit to specific, namely wishing to say a spell while in a body that is unable to talk. A mage that was silenced by something wouldn’t get this skill because they would be able to talk in their normal state, a spirit that possessed an object wouldn’t be able to talk in that state which had become their ‘normal’ state until the possession was cancelled.
Gorlois had read that this skill was actually a basic skill for the mages of a certain other race, the Ents, which were living, walking, intelligent trees. These ents communicated with each other by a kind of telepathy and only one or two gifted individuals could talk. But they had a mage class as well, and those automatically learned Silent Casting when converting to this class.
Gorlois was delighted that he got the skill now at exactly the right time but he also wondered why he didn’t get it when he was trapped in the scarecrow. He realized that in the scarecrow he had accepted the fact that he would be trapped for the next 4 hours almost immediately after he realized he couldn’t undo his possession. At that time he just hadn’t wished for it strong and long enough.
‘Well now I can change something about the situation I guess. Illusion’
Gorlois strongly thought of the skill illusion and well he also imagined the illusion he wanted to cast at the same time and it activated immediately.
The attacking rabbit suddenly stood still and then hopped to a spot 50 metres to the left of where Gorlois and his puppet had stopped. This was because the illusion Gorlois had casted erased himself and the puppet from the view of the rabbit while creating a illusionary puppet 50 metres from him.
The duration of his illusion skill wasn’t really specified but it would only last a short while when it was casted normally. It would last even shorter now because of the silent casting, so Gorlois had to act fast.
He made his puppet follow the rabbit, hoping the illusion would last long enough. When the puppet was next to the rabbit, he let it slash the rabbit with the knife continuously, and fast.
One, two…. The illusion lasted.
Three, four…. The illusion broke.
The illusion had lasted long enough, the rabbit had only one sixth of his health left, but now it was broken and the rabbit immediately tried to attack the puppet again. It jumped up to pound the puppet but at the same time the puppet slammed its knife down.
The knife miraculously intercepted the rabbit in midair. Hitting the head and due to the combined speed of both objects, crushing the skull, making at a critical hit. The rabbit had died for sure.
Gorlois now only picked up the part of the rabbit he might need later, not the whole rabbit as he had done before. He took only the rabbit skin as it is something that can be used for many things.
Gorlois could for example try to make clothes with it, there had been tailoring tools in the room of Strigidus. Although Gorlois didn’t have the tailoring skill, he might learn it by doing so and if he didn’t learn it he could try “inventing” the clothes as well.
Gorlois suspected that the inventor skill could be used to get the same results as the other production skills would by “inventing” instead of producing. If that was true he would of course need to learn the method on his own instead of being taught by a tutor.
If he didn’t succeed in making clothes out of the rabbit skins he could still use them for many other things, or sell them to a merchant in a starter town.
He gained 5 exp by killing the rabbit, half the amount of when he was lvl 1. It was only 2.5% of the 200 exp he needed, so he would have to kill 39 more rabbits for lvl 3.
Gorlois now cancelled his possession of his spider puppet as he could do that now and started a long grinding session to get to lvl 10.
He used different techniques to kill the rabbits. For example he threw them very high into the air using telekinesis but when they died from the fall, the damage would be fall damage and not his, so the kills wouldn’t he made that way wouldn’t count. It was the same when he used telekinesis to throw them against trees and rocks.
He then decided to use this strategy: he made the puppet stand 150 metres behind him and used illusion of pain to lure the rabbit back to the puppet. When the rabbit was at the puppet he would let it slash the rabbit three times. For the one third of the hp that was left, the third just to be sure.
The strategy was slow but good as it was a pretty safe way of killing the rabbits. He killed 39 rabbits this way, only taking their skins. Gaining 50% in illusion of pain and a lvl up. This was the start of a grinding session that lasted 4 in-game days (2 in real live) and it was of course boring as hell. Killing rabbits to lvl 5 and then switching over to the stronger foxes of lvl 6. Killing the animals till he was lvl 10. The grinding was of course excessive but he gained proficiency in his skills as well.
Illusion of pain rose three lvls to beginner lvl five, Illusion Mastery two to beginner lvl three and Direct Puppet Control rose four lvls to beginner lvl 5. Gorlois was the happiest with the lvled up Direct Puppet Control as it enabled him to control two puppets simultaneously and made controlling one puppet easier.
Gorlois left distributing the gained stat points for later, being happy with the increases in Health and Mana that came with leveling up. He now went back into the village, looking for signs of life.
He searched through the shacks and found the bodies of the residents there. As the villagers had stopped moving he now clearly saw that they were puppets. The residents weren’t decomposing like dead humans would, although they had probably stopped moving over 2 weeks ago when Strigidus transferred his mind to a book.
The village puppets would eventually rot away of course, being made out of wood, but that would be in the far future. They would rot just like their shacks because there was no one left to maintain them. Nothing lasts for eternity, but Gorlois had to try making the village last longer for his quest.
‘Might as well drop the quest I have clearly failed already it seems, ah well still can search through the church. Haven’t revisited it although I got the Detective skill, it might as well hold a clue’
He walked to the church, making his puppet follow him. If Gorlois didn’t find what he was looking for in the church he could still drop the quest, and take what he already got (and plunder everything out of the room of Strigidus).
The stone church had been the place where Strigidus had professed his belief in his goddess, it even had a small statue of her outside of the building. When Gorlois saw the statue again he realized that he had been stupid. He could have known who the goddess was all along.
The statue was of a beautiful woman in a battle armour and a spear in the hand. A quarter of the scriptures in the library of Strigidus was dedicated to the war between the gods, with special interests in the Olympian ones. There was one Goddess from this Olympian Pantheon whose description fitted the statue.
Athena, the goddess of knowledge, arts and warfare, depicted in full armour most of the time. She was accompanied by spiders, snakes and owls. If puppet masters were her champions that could be explained easily: Puppet Masters were artists, performing with their puppets, but they also had a manipulative aspect, just like the goddess. She had liked Odysseus for his cunning and had protected him more than once as his patron goddess.
In a certain story Athena had indeed been cruel like Strigidus had told him. There once was a woman that misbehaved in the temple of Athena, so Athena transformed her into a monster. Then she made one of her heroes decapitate the monster later on. At the end of the story the monster’s head was strapped upon the shield of Athena. (that had the pleasant side effect that the shield could turn people in stone from then on)
‘I was stupid, that I didn’t realise this earlier. I love the mythology of the Greeks yet I couldn’t even recognize one statue. Even if I take into account that the common gods in this game are the Norse ones.
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Author's Notes: Well it took longer then planned to get this here, rewrote it three times... It was proofread by JelleDeDraak and Altrelo let's thank those for that.
If you still notice a error, consistency or anything else please say so.
and well let's hope you have enjoyed reading