“Fuck,” Rolf Stormcloud announced, “I’m in the Middle Land City Holiday Forest.” He rose to his feet. He sighed. “I need to change my respawn point soon.” It was a manual change, not one he could do on the spot. It would mean he would have to spend some in a meditative state to find the correct setting for the respawn. He kinda wished it would be automatic, but it was a rare skill for anyone in the Holiday Worlds and the surrounding lands to have the ability of respawn.
The wind blew softly over his exposed skin. Rolf glanced down before he let a sigh of relief. He was glad he didn’t respawn, naked. That happened the first three times he died until he managed to get a Bag of Holding, soul bonded. He reached down to his bag of holding, hanging off his waist and pulled out his extra clothes before he dressed. He didn’t worry about a cloak. It was warm enough to go without one. This part of the Holiday Forest was abandoned, since there wasn’t anyone living in the nearby Middle Land City anymore.
He shrugged the shirt over his head and pulled it down his torso. Rolf walked forward, dealing the various prompts he earned in the last couple hours. The first one caused a stream of curse words fly from his mouth and he kicked at the air. He had lost 2 levels, across the board. He had spent months! Months! Working on his level progression as well as his skill progression to achieve the next level. He growled. He was going to get his revenge on the Elven Berserker. He needed to get those 2 levels back soon. He needed to be stronger to defeat his first mortal enemy, again. He watched as his boot soared and hit the side of a tree. He glared at it. He walked over, ignoring how forest debris dug into his socked foot. He grabbed his boot and lend against the tree. He brushed off the bottom of his sock as he tackled the next prompt.
The Second prompt was a red and black rimmed prompt, informing he had gained a mortal enemy. This mortal enemy would chase him until he reached the Final Death.
That wasn’t new. He was familiar with that. He had three other mortal enemies he had to deal with, different worlds. He started to pull up the third prompt when a startled scream echoed off the dead forest. He straightened up in surprise. There shouldn’t be anyone in the forest. Rolf heard another scream and he darted toward where the scream came from. This scream held a painful note in it.
~~
Marie stared in horror, her lips parted, her breath came out in short breaths as she pressed her back against a random tree. One minute, she was walking home from the store, cursing the fact she still didn’t have a car nor the money for one. The next, she discovered she was walking through a slowly decaying forest. She had stopped to gather her bearings when the pack of wolves jumped at her, from half dying brush, causing her to scream in surprise.
‘Run, Marie,’ Hela’s voice whispered through the air, ‘Get off the ground, now.’
Marie had listened to Hela. She darted to the nearest tree and jumped to grab a low branch. A sharp pain rippled up her leg from her lower calf. She screamed in pain as she kicked out, but a crack echoed and she dropped back down, landing on her feet. She winced as her injured leg almost gave out from under her. She blinked, returning back to the present.
The pack of wolves inched closer. She ran her gaze over the pack. Their fur was mangy, and Marie could see their rib cage. They were starving. Her eyes widened in horror. Her heart thundered in her chest. Her breath caught in her throat. She tried to figure a way out, but she couldn’t come up with an idea.
‘Shit,’ Hela stated. Marie agreed with her ghostly companion. ‘Nice knowing you, Marie.’
‘Are you fucking shitting me, Hela!?’ Marie shot back, ‘That’s all you can say after the shit you put me through in the last 3 years?’
Hela hummed. The sound bounced off the inside of Marie’s skull before she replied, ‘Yeah.’ Marie wanted to glare at the ghost. A growl caused her to refocus her attention at hand. The wolves. The starving wolves.
Marie’s eyes darted around for a weapon of some kind. Her eyes settled on the branch she had grabbed in the attempt to pulled herself up, but it had broken off. She slowly bent her knees, shifting her weight to her right leg. Her left calf throbbed with pain which she pushed it to the back of her mind. Her trembling fingers brushed the tree branch and skimmed over the curve of the branch. She kept her eyes on the hungry wolves when a heat spread over her left side. She frowned. It would be a bad idea to look away from the wolves, but she glanced to the left. Her eyes widened to see a fire ball the size of a large, inflated beach ball darting at the closet wolf.
The wolf turned its head and Marie saw its eyes widened with the knowledge of what was coming for it. It tried to jump out of the way, but it either didn’t have the strength to do or didn’t have enough room to get out of the way, standing in a close half circle with the other wolves, facing Marie.
The ground rumbled and shifted. Marie sucked in a breath. Her eyes left the wolves to watch the ground. She had to try to keep her balance as the tumors grew. She fell beside the tree, landing on her right hip and catching herself on her hands, slapping them against the forest debris covered ground. Her red hair fell about her face. She threw her head back, causing her hair to slip over her shoulder. Her gaze went back to the wolves. One of them crept closer to her. She rolled on her back and scrambled backwards. A hand slipped over the branch. The branch rolled causing her hand to move out from under her. She fell backwards. Her wide eyes stared past the empty branches, into gray cloudy sky. She pushed herself up, on to her hands. She glanced around for the wolves.
The pack were a few feet away, attacking something Marie couldn’t see. One wolf jumped, jaw wide opened, but closed on a hidden object, around the height of a person’s waist. Marie watched as the wolf was lifted up then swung downward. The wolf bounced on the ground before it struggled back to its feet. It walked a few feet and slumped down. Marie’s gaze switched to where the wolves fought. Her eyes widened as a stream of shadows spread across the ground. The remaining wolves fell down. She noticed their sides moved up and down. She rolled over and scrambled to her feet. She darted a few feet before she felt her foot hook onto something and tripped over something. She landed on her front side. She winced as the wind blew out of her. A flashing red on the right edge side of her vision caught her attention.
‘What the hell?’ Hela voiced Marie’s thought before Marie felt sleepy. The feeling was similar to pulling an all nighter then spending the day awake and relaxed toward the end of the day - a wide yawn escape, tears rolled down her cheeks. Her head started to fall to the ground and she blinked, shaking her head, trying to clear, and stay awake, but the moment she stopped moving her head, she felt her head slowly tip toward the ground. She shouldn’t be so sleepy. She had got a good night’s rest. A quick nap should help. Just a few seconds then she would get up and handle things. ‘Don’t go to sleep, Marie!’ Hela hollered. ‘You are being spelled.’
‘Silly Hela,’ Marie whispered, ‘Magic doesn’t exists.’ She closed her eyes, drifting away into slumber sweet embrace.
~~
Rolf panted as he watched, invisible, as the woman fell to sleep. She struggled for a bit there. He thought his sleep spell wasn’t strong enough. He had used analyze on her to figure out her level and had been surprised she was a Level 1 with her basic information locked, but the second time she laid her head onto the ground, he knew the spell worked. He sighed, looking around at the clearing. He glanced back at the unknown woman. If he left her out there, especially spelled, she would be wolf chew by nightfall. The wolves of the Holiday Forest were weak compared to him. They were in the range of Level 2 to 10. For her, it would be life or death. He had to take her to a safe place and the only safe place he knew of….he looked toward the ruin city he knew was in the distance. He canceled the invisible spell, walking over to the sleeping woman, and knelt down. A shiver went up his spine, causing him to frown. It felt familiar to the feeling he got while he was visiting the City of Horrors and Spooky, the Capital City of Halloween World. He glanced around, looking for the source. It had to be a weak ghost, he mused.
Rolf shrugged off the feeling and reached out, rolling the woman over. He studied her. Red hair spread out over the ground like a halo. Dark purple half-moons rested below her closed eyes, indicating she had not been sleeping good. Freckles stood out against dirty pale skin. Her nose was straight. Her lips were slightly parted as she breathed evenly. She wore a long silver chain, disappearing under her shirt. She was cute, he mused, but he pushed away thoughts. He placed his arms under her shoulders and knees and picked her up. He stood up. He blinked before he glanced down. She was light for a woman her height and possible age. He resisted the urge to run a hand along her side to see if she wasn’t starving herself.
‘I shouldn’t be caring,’ Rolf scolded himself. He had a revenge plan to execute, not looking into romancing a woman. He walked through the forest to the Middle Land City, not looking forward going back there. He hoped that ghostly bitch wouldn’t be any close to the remaining standing building when he got there or else, he would try to help her move onto the other side, forcibly.
A couple hours passed as Rolf walked along a game path, carrying the mysterious woman. He stopped a few times to recast the sleeping spell. He didn’t want her to wake up while he was carrying her. He reached the last hill and walked up it. He watched what used the Tower of Knowledge come into view. It was a sad sight to see the Tower of Knowledge a third of its height. He crusted the hill, staring at the ruin city with a heavy heart.
Marie sucked in breath and sat up. The room spun and she paused, a hand reaching up to cup her head. A soft groan escaped. She sat up too fast. The blanket covering her fell to her lap, revealing her dark colored tank top. Once the feeling of vertigo faded away, she looked around the room as she sensed something was off. She ignored the feeling at first, studying where she was. The room reminded her of a room from her great-grandma’s cottage.
Colored in various shades of brown, the room was small compared to the rooms Marie had grew up in. The room was big enough allowing an Armoire to sit by the closed door and it sat at the foot of the twin size Marie laid in. Over the foot of the bed, a crocheted afghan hung over the foot board. Marie’s attention was caught by the crocheted afghan. It was crocheted in bright colors, setting off the rest of the darken colored room. It reminded her of her Aunt’s crochet afghan. She used to get a new afghan every year until her Aunt passed away, three years ago. Her Aunt played in various colors of yarn, creating a blending of color that surprisingly worked together. Much like the afghan hanging over the foot board. The afghan was stripped in a bright holly berry red, evergreen, bright silver, and shining gold. It was beautiful. She sighed. She placed her hand on the comforter and she directed her attention to it. The bed’s comfort was a quilt. Marie blinked as she studied the quilt.
It was a Christmas theme quilt, separated in squares. There was a large Christmas trees decorated beautiful in the middle of the quilt. The surrounding squares, in a repeated pattern, showed a snowman with a yellowish moon in the night sky, a pile of presents, a large snowflake, a sleigh with a large closed sack, a snowy ground with a dear grazing, Mr. And Mrs. Santa Claus sitting in front of a fireplace, a Polar bear, group of Carols, mug of hot coco, and a plate of cookies with a glass of mug. On the outer edges, there were pots of the Christmas flowers, or whatever they were called. Marie couldn’t remember the correct name of the flower. She just knew they were always available around Christmas time. Her grandmother used to have a pot of the Christmas Flower as a centerpiece for the Christmas Dinner. Marie pulled on the quilt, gently. It held a nice weight to it. A small smile crossed her lips. Her grandmothers would have approved of the craftsmanship. She pushed the quilt back and spotted the thin sheet separating the quilt and her legs. The sheet was soft to the touch. She turned her attention to the rest of the room
Beside the bed, a dark oak desk sat with a wooden oak chair that had a decorative design on the back rest of the chair. The chair was scouted under the desk. Marie noticed there was several pieces of papers on top of the desk with a pen on top of the papers. There was a old fashion lamp sitting on the edge of the desk with a small flower pot of the Christmas Flower. She frowned. She never seen one of those lamps in person, but she thought it was a gas lamp. It could have been from the late 18th century. She knew from her studies and the various conversations with Hela, the lamp couldn’t be older then that. There were oil lamps for centuries. She argued with herself, thinking the lamp could be an oil lamp instead of a gas lamp, but it would mean a closer look at it. She turned her gaze to the window.
The window opened with two layers of curtain covering the window. Marie couldn’t see what was behind the window from her position on the bed. The inner curtains were a light tan - maybe it was an off white, Marie didn’t know - color and they swayed lightly in the soft breeze while the outer curtain layer appeared to be heavy, colored in a dark brown, and hung unmoving. She tossed back the covers and felt goosebumps raise up over exposed skin. She glanced down. Someone had remove her pants and shoes. She reached up to grab her pendant, over her chest, but grabbed her tank top. Her eyes widened. She jerked her head down. The Pendant was missing.
She pulled the tank top away from her body, peering down her shirt. The pendant wasn’t there. Marie placed her feet on the wooden floor. The floor was cold causing her to shiver. She stood up. She looked over the desk. The Pendant had to be here, in the room, somewhere. It was her only way to talk with Hela.
She never did figured out how the Pendant came into her procession. She almost didn’t want to figure how Hela became trapped in the Pendant. Hela barely remembered how she became trapped within the Pendant, but she did remembered that fact, many years had passed from the point she became trapped in the Pendant to the time she came into Marie’s procession.
Hela used to help Marie with her history lessons while she attended High School and College, often criticizing the History Professors with facts that the Professors claimed that wasn’t true until evidence came out, saying otherwise. Marie used to get a kick out of that until the Professors started to come to her over new evidence about certain events. Hela used to laugh at Marie’s pain of dealing with the Professors.
Marie paused, thinking about what they had been doing before she had woke up in this room. She had been out on an Archeology dig in the middle no where around the small Viking village, several miles away from a major Viking Village called Hedeby. A local university student had managed to find a farm house through various oral tales and started a dig. The dig, sponsored by a local university, was supposed be a season long gig for Marie, but something had happened. Marie frowned as she remembered.
The morning had dawned bright over the dig site as Marie left the car she had managed to rent for the dig season. She grabbed her book bag holding her work supplies, swinging it up over her right shoulder, and walked to the site. From the research she had done, this site was a religious site for one of the Norse Gods, close to an old farm house. So far, they hadn’t been able to find any evidence for which god the site was for, but Marie started to look for clues. Hela had been helping on that front. Guess there were certain benefits of being a member of the Norse Religious Deity.
Hela had informed Marie the night before of the various runes the Norsemen would have used to inform each other and their Gods of what the site was used for. Now, Marie just had to find those clues. She looked around the site before sighing. The site was a small one, compared to the previous sites she had been at, and it was never a religious site. Maybe that’s why Marie had been so excited. Her first religious site. The other sites she worked on were historical sites like the Lost Colony of Roanoke, the Giza Pyramids, the Maya Temple, and other such sites all around the world and Marie helped find evidence that allowed for more interesting discoveries. This site only called for a team of 10 people, not 500+ to work the site.
Marie set her bag down by a base of a nearby tree and looked at the bark before looking at the rocks nearby.
‘Marie,’ Hela started, ‘The Northmen often wrote their runes on the trees, rocks, and hard surface they could find and knew it would last several years.’ She appeared on Marie’s left. She was transparent. Ever since Marie had discovered Hela’s ability to appear from thin air, the older woman was always transparent and appeared only to Marie. Hela had made the comment once before she was able to appear to others, but they had to wear the pendent.
‘At least they thought ahead,’ Marie commented, ‘Their runes has lasted several hundred of years.’ She brushed off some dead leaves off a large rock nearby a tree base, hoping to find some clue of a Northmen rune. She stood up. There was a chance there was a rune up higher. It had been several centuries since the Northmen had lived in this area. She reached above her head, stretching up, and brushed her fingers tips along the bark. She frowned when she couldn’t find anything within arm reach. Maybe one of the taller gentlemen might be able to find something. She placed her weight back on her heels. She moved to another tree, checking around the trunk of the tree and the rock litter around the roots reaching through the ground. She sighed when she couldn’t find any clue and placed a hand on the tree, starting to reach up when she heard the crunch of a branch breaking behind her. She paused and started to turn when a sharp pain rippled through her head. Marie’s eyes rolled up as Hela cursed at someone and Marie saw nothing else, Hela’s voice fading away.
Marie blinked, coming from her memory. She didn’t remembered what happen after she knocked on the head. She did come to in a strange forest then there was the deal with those starving wolves and how they fought someone invisible. She shook her head. There wasn’t wolves fighting someone invisible. She had to be seeing things.
She turned her attention onto the desk. Papers were gathered in a neat pile. She didn’t bother going through them. She reached down and tried to pull open a drawer. It won’t opened. She wiggled the drawer and came to the conclusion it was locked. She repeated the process again with the rest of the drawers. It was the same thing. The drawers were locked. She let out a soft growl. She walked over to the large Armoire at the foot of the bed. She pulled open the doors and spotted her clothes. She got dressed before she went through the Armoire’s drawers, still looking for her pendent. She didn’t find it.
Marie narrowed her eyes, thinking. She had no clue what happened, but she had a few things to go as she shut the doors of the Armoire and walked over to the bed, sitting on the edge. She tossed her right leg over her left knee, crossing her arms over her chest, thinking.
Someone was nearby. Whoever it was took her pendent and managed to undress her half way. Granted Marie was a deep sleeper when she needed sleep, but usually, once she was on a dig site or a new place, she didn’t sleep well. She looked around the room. She did noticed the trunk by the window with a folded blanket over it, earlier, but she studied it, depending if it held her pendent or not.
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The trunk appeared to be a dark oak and skillfully crafted. In a way, the trunk reminded her the craftsmanship of the Amish and how well their items held up over the years. The brackets were a rich gold color, standing out the dark coloring of the oak. It didn’t look like anything was disturbed on the trunk, but Marie didn’t know if it was like that or not.
As for her pendent, Marie changed the directions of her thoughts, she knew from past experience, the person in question would experience a strong sense of discomfort if they tried to leave the room with pendent. Hela would reacted in that way, giving the thief a bad feeling. The last person who tried to sneak away with the pendent complained about discomfort, the unease, being borderline sick until the pendent was returned. Hela may not be powerful enough to manifest a physical room, but she had no problem messing with a person’s emotional sense.
Marie pushed back her red hair over her shoulder before she stood up and walked over to it. She knelt before the trunk and grabbed the bracket. The flip for the bracket where a lock would go raised up and she pushed it opened. Something popped into her vision. Her eyes widened. She jerked backwards, losing her balance and landing on her rear end. Her breath caught in her throat. She stared at a blue box with a grid set up, in the dead center of her vision.
“What the hell,” she breathed. She turned her head to the side. The blue grid box stayed in the center of her vision. She turned her head to the left. The same thing happened. She closed her eyes. To her surprise, the blue grid box became more vivid, but stayed in her vision. She frowned as she noticed there were a few items in the grid box and wondered how could she get information on the items when the grid box shifted in her vision, causing the grid box grow until it was a simple 5x5 box. The first box glowed slightly and the item seemed to raise up from the grid pattern. The item shifted to the left side of her vision.
It was a book of some kind. Another box with a goldish color for the background appeared next to the box and it was divided in two. The left hand box stated:
You have found: Magic Book
Marie blinked. A magic book? Which kind of magic was within this book? She turned her attention to the right hand box.
Durability: 15/15
Item Class: Common
Quality: Masterwork
Weight: 0.3 kg
What the hell? Reading that list, Marie couldn’t help but wonder if she was stuck in some sort game. She really didn’t get into playing games while she was a teenager, but she did get into the book genre called LitRPG, thanks to some of her college buddies who were big into playing games, but they didn’t have the time to sit down and play the RPG anymore so they turned the growing genre to listen to the various adventures they wanted to experience. Of course, overtime, Marie stopped listening to the LitRPG stories because Life got in the way and her coursework became increasingly ever more important.
If she was stuck in a game, that would be an interesting twist on her life. However, it would suck as well. She glanced around the room. In the some of the books she had read, there was a helpful character - it didn’t matter if they were good or evil - to explain a few things, but there wasn’t one available or at least, not yet.
Apparently she was not getting one or they were running late - If that was a possible thing. Marie shrugged she could figure things out as she went along. After all, that was life. There was no instruction manual on how to do things, it was you figure it out on the way or you Bullshit it.
Marie turned her attention back to the box, floating in her vision. She really wanted to know what kind of magic book she had discovered, but the fact the prompt box didn’t inform her on which magic would give her. She paused at that thought. She didn’t know if she would even have an affinity of type magic. The book could be a water spell, but she didn’t have a high enough affinity for it and the book could be useless to her. On the other hand, if she did have high enough affinity for it, and the book could be a fire spell and it turned out to be extremely helpful to her. She frowned, looking at the magic book. She would have to wait to see, once she gathered more information.
She placed the magic book back into the trunk and watched as the large information prompt shrink. She mentally went to the next box, and she felt the item hit her hand. Her fingers closed onto the edge of it. She watched the information prompt grew as she pulled the new item out. It was another box.
You have found: Skill Book.
Whoa! Marie’s eyes widened. A skill book! She didn’t know she could one this early on. She knew Skill books were extremely precious. This book could easily boost her skill to a decent high level. She wondered what was the cost for that.
Durability: 12/12
Item Class: Rare
Quality: Masterwork
Weight: 0.9 kg
This was a Rare item? Good lord. That meant someone could decide to kill her for this kind of item. That would be a very bad thing since she was sure she was a Level 1 Character. Hell, she didn’t even have a chance to look at her stat page, yet. However, the book was another Masterwork quality. Someone put a lot of time and effort in making the book. She wondered if it would be the same concept as the Magic book - the affinity thing. If she had the affinity for the skill, this book could be a game changer while if she didn’t it, she could get a lot of money for it. She wondered if there was a way for her to test her affinities and figure out which areas she would be strongest in and areas she would weak in.
Being a Level 1 character, she may not be able to access this book without having another skill to understand what kind of skill this book would be teaching her. It could be the skill of book for a lame skill she would not find a use for like cauldron making or laundry. Well, she mused, the laundry skill would be helpful since she prefer to have clean clothes to have on hand.
Marie let the book go, watching the prompt shrink down. She kept her hand in the trunk and turned her attention to the next box. The process was the same- the item filled half of her vision as the item touched her hand. This time was different. This time, the item was a weapon. She stood up, pulling the weapon out of the trunk.
You have received: A Sword.
Attack: 20 DP ((+9 CDP, +12 BDP, +16 LDP))
Durability: 30/30
Item Class: UnCommon
Quality: Masterwork
Weight: 10 kg
Description: You have a sword.
Marie’s jaw dropped. 20 DPs? What were DPs, she wondered, then she thought about it. Since she was holding a weapon, she mused the DP could be a reference to damage points. The sword dealt 20 points of damage! Whoa. That could be a killing blow for a weak creature. She kinds wished she had this available to her when she faced those wolves. Even if she just swing it around like a bat, it would have done some damage. The rest of the damage, beside the 20 DPs, information confused her. CDP? BDP? LDP? She hummed. If she used DPs as a base of reference for Damage Points, it could be CDP meant Critical Damage Points and BDP, since this was a sword, would be referencing a Blunt Damage Points. She had no clue what ‘L’ stood for in the last part other then referencing Damage Points. Maybe it was in the description, but she couldn’t see anything in the description, except for the obvious fact of the item being a sword. This sword was damage dealer, no matter how she looked at it.
Her arm shook with the effect of holding the sword up. She placed her other hand on the hilt as she tried to figure out how to dismissed the trunk inventory prompt. From what she had read from the other LitRPGs, it should be a matter of will to dismiss the prompt. So, Marie willed the prompt away and it disappeared. She blinked as the trunk vanished from her vision. She nodded. At least, she was learning something new. She stared at the sword.
Marie would be the first one to admit she didn’t know anything about swords in general, other then, the pointy end was the end she wanted to use against her opponent. The blade held a gold hue while the hilt was simple. She placed the blade on her left hand, studying the hilt. The work reminded her of a middle age sword, perhaps done in 15th century style. The guard was either an oak or cherry wood, separating the hilt from the blade. At either end of the guard, there was a small gold gem, not any bigger then her thumb nail, embedded into the wood. There was a design engraved into the wood. It looked like a tree branch with buds on it. Long leather strips encircled the hilt where her hands had gripped the sword. At the end of the hilt, the pommel if Marie remembered correctly, was a large gold gem. She stared at it in surprise. The gem was almost the same size as her fist. Someone dumped a lot of money into making this sword. She remembered the prompt informing the sword was Masterwork quality. Another item she could be killed for.
Not to mention, the sword was heavy. Her arms shook from the effect of just holding it. She grabbed the grip and slowly angled the sword back into the trunk. She watched in awe as it disappeared into it and vanished from sight.
She knelt back down and stuck her hand into it. She knew there was another item in the trunk. It filled the box beside the sword. The trunk prompt appeared, and it zoomed on the last item she had not reviewed.
You have received: Leather Chest Plate
Now, she was getting somewhere.
Defense: +9
Type: Light Armor
Durability: 50/50
Item Class: Average
Quality: Well Crafted
Weight: 4.1 kg
Traits: Unknown
That didn’t tell her much, other than she had increased 9% chance of living when she was attacked. She dismissed the prompt and looked at the leather chest plate. She knew, from her various college classes, talks with Hela -Marie still needed to find her pendant - and the dig sites she had been on, leather chest plate was the prefer armor of a knight or a member of the military for everyday life. It brought some protection if they ran into trouble on the road while they were traveling. The only time a Knight or a member of the military would wear chain mail was for a war. She hummed. There was no engraving on the leather or any kind of reason for it to stand out. She put it back into the trunk. She would think about which item to take later. Now, where was her pendant?
Marie had the mysterious pendant as long as she could remember. It had been a gift from her grandmother before she passed away when Marie was still young. She wasn’t aware of the mysterious ghostly figure until Marie had gotten into trouble with some neighborhood bullies and blacked out. When she finally came to, she was standing in a fighter’s stance with her fists raised in a defensive position and the neighborhood bullies laid on the ground at her feet, knocked out. She didn’t stick around long enough to figure out what had happened. It had took her several days to reach a possible conclusion when she started to see a transparent figure out of the corner of her eye. Sometime, the figure was more transparent, but as it got closer to Halloween that year, the figure became more solid to reveal a woman with hourglass figure, long black hair held back with a dark crown, and wore a black dress with sparkling black gems. On Halloween, Marie had got the entire story from the mysterious Lady in Black, named Hela.
Hela had explained she didn’t remember how she came to process the pendant or who she was, beside the obviously fact she shared her name with the daughter of the Norse God of Chaos, Loki, before she started to live inside the pendant, but she had been consciousness for a very long time. She had seen Marie’s family tree, being passed down from mother to daughter, sometimes skipping a generation like in Marie’s case - grandmother to granddaughter. However, she did make the comment that Marie was the first one she was able have a strong enough connection to appear to her. The ones in Marie’s bloodline didn’t have the same ability as Marie, but for some strange reason, Hela couldn’t name the ability. It was strange for both of them.
Marie shook her head, coming back to the present. She cursed the fact she had to be holding the pendant to communicate with Hela. She sighed as she looked around the room again. She smelled a fresh scent on the air as the nearby curtains moved, floating away from the window. She walked over to it. Her eyes widened. Her lips parted.
Beyond the window, a piles of wood stood. She paused in front of the window and placed her hands on the window seal. She noticed there wasn’t any glass in the room and she peered over the edge. She didn’t see any reflecting light. It didn’t mean the glass wasn’t there. It could have covered by dirt and other debris over time.
She turned her gaze back at the city. She spotted in the distance a forest with bare limbs. She narrowed her eyes like it would help to increase her eye sight on the forest, but she could have sworn some of the trees were blackened. She moved her hands on the window seal and felt her right hand hit something. She glanced down. She grinned with relief.
Her pendent laid on the window seal. The dark red gem glowed with unearthly glow. In the fading sunlight, the gem seemed to glow brighter with the unearthly glow. Marie frowned. She never seen the pendent to that before. She picked it up. She felt the connection she had with Hela snap back into place as she sensed the older woman nearby like she was standing beside Marie or standing just behind her shoulder.
Marie undid the clasp and placed it around her neck, allowing the gem to rest on her upper back as she re-clasped the pendent before she twisted it around. The pendent rested on her shirt, right above her chest. She got the flicker of movement out of the corner of her left eye and she turned to see the dark haired beauty named Hela, standing beside her.
Hela didn’t turned to Marie right away, staring out the ruin city. Marie returned to stare at the ruin city.
“So,” Marie started, “What happened?”
“We were attacked by wolves after we arrived in this….” Hela’s voice drifted through the air. They both knew Marie was the only one who could hear it. They had found out the hard way, shortly after Marie had inherited the pendent from her grandmother. Marie’s mother had put Marie in the nearly mental hospital until Marie was able to prove she didn’t the mysterious voice which turned out to be Hela’s. Marie glanced up at Hela as the transparent woman frowned. She finally spoke, “World. We were found by a man who spelled you. I, unfortunately, couldn’t do anything since the spell was powerful and I managed to stay awake until we entered this city where the spell worked on me as well.”
“Well, that sucks. I was hoping you could tell me more on where we are at,” She blinked as she mentally went over what Hela said. “World?” Marie echoed, “What on Earth do you mean by that?”
“This world feels different….older….more magical,” Hela tried to explained. Her dark eyes took on a far off long as she stared past the ruin city and the forest. Marie cocked her head to the side, watching the emotions play across the older woman’s face as she felt a faint echo of the emotions. “It feels almost familiar. Like there is some ancient magic I had been exposed to once upon a time ago.”
“Well,” the red head started, “It, being more magical as you put it, would explain why I suddenly got a gamer hub.” Hela cocked an eyebrow at her. “You know the LitRPG books I used to read when I had the free time.” Hela nodded. “I opened that chest over there,” she jerked her thumb over to the chest with the items in it, “And a Blue grid box popped into my vision.” She turned her attention back to the window. “I haven’t explore what it means just yet. I wondered if I have to use a different name.”
Hela didn’t say a word for a long minute, “It might be best. There might powers at work we don’t understand yet and I do remember there are some beings who have power over you if you use….your current name.”
Marie nodded, “Similar to the Fae, right.”
“Yup.”
“Damn.”
Marie sighed as she left the window and went to sit down on the bed. The view was disheartening. A city in ruin from unknown cause. She pulled up her legs and crossed them in front of her. She placed her hands on her knees before she took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She let out the deep breath slowly and repeated the process until she entered a meditative state.
She hoped she could pull up her stat page. That was assuming she had one. In the various LitRPG books she had either listened to or read, the stat page came up in unusual ways. In some books, it was called Outer Sight and worked on limited amount of people who were also forced into the LitRPG world. In other novels, the stat page would appear with a flicker of will power and every character the Main Character interacted with had a stat page to view at will, despite the fact it invaded someone's privacy when doing so.
She frowned. She wondered which she would get. She took a deeper breath and went a bit deeper into her meditative state. She had imaged she was a darken library with a unlit lamp sitting on the side table next to a big soft recliner. Hela had been teaching her how make some sort fortress in her mind to help protect Marie from some unknown enemy. Hela swore up and down it will help when they faced whoever Hela feared was after them. Marie didn't believe her, but she went along with the mysterious woman's request and started working on a mental fortress a few week ago. With a sigh, she walked over to the lamp, intending to flip it on when a blue banner appeared into her mental vision.
Congratulation! You have learned a New Skill!
A New Skill could be the different life and death for a person like you. This new skill called Self-Organization. You have organized your mental state into a fortress and organized your thoughts, memories, and knowledge into different categories easy for you to find, but hard for your enemies who dare to break your mental defenses. Keep up the hard work. Gain new levels in this skill to gain access to new categories to better to organized your mind.
You have 3 Known Categories: Thoughts, Memories, and Knowledge.
Marie blinked as she read the message. She finally spoke up after a long moment, "Huh." The word echoed around the mental library. "That is different." She turned on the light.
"I told you there were some benefits to organizing your mind," Hela's voice drifted from one of the darken rows before she appeared. The older woman waved her hand and another soft looking recliner blinked into existence. "Now, this is new world, you are able to see the benefits of it."
"I guess so," Marie admitted, "It still doesn't explain how we got to this new world."
Hela hummed as she walked over to the new chair and sat down in it. She frowned as she looked at the floor. Marie knew it could be a bit before Hela would answer her question and she sat down in her own chair, bouncing a bit. She turned her thoughts over to the issues of the Stat page. She took a deep breath and willed her stat page into her mind's eye or well, somewhere in front of her. Immediately, she saw something blinking on the side table. She turned her head to look at it. It was a short piece of paper. She reached over and grabbed it, bringing it close to her and her eyes widened as her jaw dropped, slightly.
Name: Unknown
Race: Human
Level: 1
Description: Humans live in the warm climates of the Holiday Worlds and are highly fertile. They live up to 95 years, depending on their health and their environment, but they are some documented cases where humans have lived to be 200 years old. They do have some limiting factors, but they have to discovered by each human. They do not get any benefits to leveling up to their stats, but they do get 10% to apply to a Known Skill of their choice.
Profession: Locked
Health: 100
Mana: 100
Stamina: 100
Constitution: 10
Wisdom: 10
Intelligence: 10
Endurance: 10
Dexterity: 10
Agility: 10
Luck: 10
Charisma: 10
Skills:
Self-Organization: 0% to next level
Marks: None
"Well, then," Marie said, looking over her stat page. Or that was what she assumed to be what she was looking at. It looked like any other stat page she had seen in the various LitRPG novels she had read. She looked up at Hela, "I think I have found my stat page."
Hela hummed as she nodded. Marie noticed the black haired woman held a long piece of paper in her hand. It was a lot longer then what Marie held. Maybe Hela was different then Marie besides the obviously facts and had a lot more skills then Marie currently had. Hella said, "It would appear I have one as well." She paused. "It would appear I am a lot older then I thought I was from this stat page and more skillful as well."
"May I see?" Marie asked. She was curious to what Hela's stat page held. There might be some information on Hela's page to give Marie some sort of idea who or what Hela was. The younger woman scouted to the edge of her seat when Hela finally answered, "I don't think that would be wise." Marie sent her a puzzled look. "I think this stat page is in a language only I can read unless you can read Nacroly."
"Nacroly?" Marie voiced. "I have never heard of that language."
"Neither did I until I lay my eyes upon this page," Hela admitted, "It was like I had forgotten I could speak or read it until now."
Marie frowned. She cocked her head to the side, thinking. Nacroly. Nacro could be short for necromancer and that meant a person with the ability to raise the dead. Nacroly might mean something the lines of Death or dead and since they were talking about languages, Narcoly could be the... "Language of the Dead?" Marie voiced, raising an eyebrow at Hela.
"Maybe," Hela admitted, "I really don't know since I don't have my memories before I got stuck in the pendent." A dark look crossed her face.
"Anyway," Marie decided to change the subject before Hela thought about her before Pendent time too much, "We are going be working the assumption Names have Power wherever we are at." Hela nodded. "So, it would mean I have to change my name to another name. Only one problem - I don't know which name to choose."
"There are tons of good, strong names," Hela said. They looked at each other for a long moment.
"Venus?" Hela suggested.
"The Goddess of Love and Sex?" Marie scoffed, "Nope."
"Xenia?"
"I'm not a warrior or a princess," Marie replied with an eye roll.
"Lily?"
"Too flowery."
"Mary?"
"Too close to my birth name."
"Tina?"
"Not The Chosen Type."
"Ariel?"
"Do I look like a mermaid?"
It went for a while. Hela would provide a name and Marie would shoot it down with a snide comment until...
"Serenity?"
Marie opened her mouth to comment, but she paused, thinking about that name. It sounded familiar like from a far off dream. She opened her mouth, "It has merit." She allowed the name echo in her head for a few moments. "Serenity means peace, right?"
Hela nodded. "It feels right to you."
"Yeah," Marie nodded, " I think I will use it while we are trying to find a way home." She stood up from the chair and walked away from the recliner. She knew Hela did the same, but headed in a different direction. Marie opened her eyes to the room she had woken up in and uncrossed her legs. A series of tingling sensations followed by numbness informed her she had been sitting cross-legged for a while. She slowly stood up on tingling legs. She turned to the window and peered out of it. The scenery hadn't changed, but the sun seemed to dim a bit. She couldn't see where the sun was at in the sky. She figured it was behind the building she was in from the shadows. She sighed. "I will be known as Serenity for now on."
A blue prompt box snapped into the center of her vision - Congratulations on Choosing a Name!
There was nothing else in the box. She glanced skyward. Someone apparently had enough of waiting as she wrestled on what she call herself until she got home. She willed her state page. It appeared in her vision. The Name area now said "Name: Serenity".