Colorful butterflies floated gracefully in the afternoon air. Dense patches of flowers dotted the ground between gnarly, stunted trees who seemed to have been tied in knots by the wind. The trail they followed cut through the most gorgeous woodland Tori had ever seen, and she was totally enraptured by it.
She watched as a nimble creature like a fox but not quite zipped between brambles and jumped occasionally to nip at bees and butterflies who floated down too low. Pat watched her watch it all and chewed his lip and thought about things.
“Just a little further and there is a spot to rest.” He remarked and prodded her onwards with a gentle pat on the shoulder.
They walked leisurely onward, Tori in awe, Pat in contemplation. As he said, a short ways further up the hillside there was a ring of seats around a fire pit. The seats were chunks of a large log that had been chopped up and embedded in the ground, each was worn to varying degrees of smoothness like the ghosts of wayfaring butts past.
Tori sat down when Pat gestured. He knelt by the fire pit, which seemed to have been stocked by whoever was here last, and did something she couldn’t quite see with his hands. By the time he’d sat down with her, the fire had roared to life.
She focused on the flames as they climbed the dry wood. “Was that magic?”
Pat nodded. “Yes. It can be convenient to know some things outside of your specialty.”
“You specialize in healing, right?” Tori asked.
“Yes, I do. That’s part of what I wanted to talk to you about. Specialties and such, I mean.” Pat said. “I’m not sure how much your world was like ours. I took for granted the way we see things here, and we need to reconcile that and see if you have any questions about the absolute basics.”
She looked away from the fire. “Ok, let’s do it.”
-
You Are - Tori (Human) - Level 4
Tags - You have no tags
Body
Strength - 1
Agility - 2
Vigor - 2
Mind
Cunning - 1
Acuity - 2
Intellect - 2
Soul - 1
Spirit Bonds
[Level 2] - No Spirit Bonded
[Slot Unlocked at Level 6]
-
Tori took it all in. It wasn’t an extremely complex information sheet, but she still had some questions.
“So there are seven attributes,” Pat began, “three Body, three Mind, and Soul. You can think of Soul as your ability to interact with other spirits, as well as a measure of your general ability with magic.”
She nodded and noted it mentally. “What is the difference between the mind stats? Aren’t those all pretty much synonyms?”
“Yes, they are similar words, but the abilities are quite different. I can’t speak to their specific uses, as it depends on your own methodology more so than a hard rule,” he explained.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
That made sense. Even if it almost felt like a cop-out.
“What about the spirit bonds section?”
Pat looked over her sheet again. “It’s not surprising that you don’t have a bond yet, considering you have no tags and had no skills at all until today. Just know that every living thing has a spirit, and spirits can be bound to one another. Binding a spirit to yourself grants you the right to one of its tags and the ability to borrow one of its skills. There are also some non-living things that can have spirits, but that’s a bit beyond the scope of the basics.”
She pondered for a bit, but then spoke up again, “How do you get a spirit to bind to you?”
“I’ll give you a couple of examples.” He summoned his own sheet for her to see.
-
You Are - Pattil Gunnarsson (Irlifolk)(Medic) - Level 9
Tags - [Healer][Bound - Catharsis][Scholar][*][*]
Body
Strength - 2
Agility - 2
Vigor - 4
Mind
Cunning - 2
Acuity - 3
Intellect - 4
Soul - 4
Spirit Bonds
[Level 2] - Bookworm - Level 2 [Scholar][*Ravenous]
Draining Bite
[Level 6] - Hallowed Wisp - Level 7 [Undead][Pure Light][*Lifesaver]
Resurrect
Life Sense
[Slot Unlocked at Level 14]
-
“As you see, I have two bound spirits. The bookworm I captured when I was just a kit, and I kept it in a jar in my bedroom. It was a sort of pet for a time, and I would feed it and occasionally take it out and let it read with me. When it died after a year or so, it willingly offered its spirit to be bound to mine. I bound it and took its scholar tag to help me in my studies, and when I earned that tag for myself, I switched over to its other tag, ravenous.” Pat smiled as he reminisced about his old pet.
Tori cocked her head, “ravenous doesn’t sound like a very useful tag for a doctor.”
He shrugged. “You are right. It isn’t helpful day-to-day, but it’s nostalgic. If I ever have a need for a stronger spirit, I can get another on par with my second without too much difficulty, and overwrite my old one.”
“What happens to the bookworm if you do that?” Tori asked.
“There is some theological debate. Many say they simply fade away. Some say they are released to be reincarnated as a clean slate. Personally, I don’t think it matters that much. Change is natural.” Pat shrugged and continued, “my second spirit, the wisp, I picked up deliberately. I brought a couple friends with combat skills to a nearby marshland where there had occasionally been reports of colorful floating lights at night, and we camped there for a couple of nights until we saw some. Then it was a matter of picking fights until I found one with the tags I wanted. That’s a pretty common way to get stronger spirits.”
“So you can befriend them or… kill them, and then take the spirit?” Tori’s mouth pursed with thought. It kinda felt bad, the idea of killing something and stealing its ghost.
“Those aren’t the only ways, but that’s the gist. Generally the former is preferable for natural creatures and the latter for monsters.”
She processed for a minute, and decided to save the moral quandaries for later and focus on the basics like Pat said. “How about the level? I saw a progress bar once, but I don’t know how far along it is now, or how to look at it again.”
“Most things within your spirit can be called up or expanded simply by thinking about wanting to see them. Try it with the level.” Pat explained.
Progress to Level Five
[+++++++++++++++++-]
“Getting close!” Pat gave a little cheer. “You can pick a class that you meet the prerequisites for at five. Unfortunately for you, they are mostly gated behind gaining certain tags. So you’ll need to do a little work before you can pick anything other than basic classes.”
“Tags seem pretty important. How do I get those?”
“You can gain them for yourself by building certain skills or accomplishing feats of one kind or another. Many tags have benefits beyond simply filling prerequisites for classes, like granting skills or bonuses to stats. Again, a bit beyond our lesson today.” Pat looked up at the sky and saw the colors beginning to shift. “In fact, I think we need to get going so you can meet the others tonight.”
He stood and dusted some ash from his lap, and beckoned her to follow him. “They’ll want to start planning for you to meet Catharsis.”