We stood in front of the door at the top of the steps in the basement ready to fight. We have no idea what's waiting for us on the other side. We only had a couple of things going for us. The Baton I had on my side loosely strapped to my belt by some old rag we found. The knife That Vinnie had and handcuffs that Vinnie had found some surprising uses for. When Vinnie looted the guard turned {Fallen} he got a bulletproof Vest and Vial of Fallen Ichor. With only the bulletproof vest looking to be any use at the moment.
"Here," Vinnie said, putting the bottle of ichor and the vest in my hand before I could say anything. "If that health and mana pool is correct, you're a strong breeze away from singing pop-rock with the greats."He said, eyeing the vest. Not having much of a leg to argue on I take a quick second to {Inspect} it before putting it on.
BulletProof Vest(Common)
Description: Given too just about every Security guard in this place is meant to supply limited chest protection and stop bullets (Hence its name).
Chest Defence: 5
Durability 10/10
Reduces Dmg to by low-level physical projectile by 90% with -1 Durability per projectile
Cool. I'm curious about how defence works but Vinnie is giving me a look that tells me that he's tired of my curiosity in the information that you can get from these things. It's not my fault that he doesn't get how cool this is. Being able to know the base information of anything you look at is awesome and even the uses are going to be staggering.
with the vest on I'm tempted to {Inspect} the vial but I'm afraid that Vinnie will blow something if I do. We look at the door and I think we both stop for a bit to just staring at it.
As sucky this whole experience has been, the simple fact of the matter is that we've been pretty secluded for a lot of the end of the world. We've fought a zombie rip off yes but no one but us has been down here for the last hour and we've gotten the chance to cool off a little bit. We have no idea what to expect once we walk through those doors. It could be nothing but some guards about to storm the basement looking for their missing compadre, or it could be some Independence Day like war zone.
Vinnie who would on any normal situation be cracking some crack about this whole predicament were in, is eerily quiet which just added to my nervousness. all said we needed to get going. So before my nerves left me I opened the door and stepped out Vinnie right behind me.
In front of us was a mixture of what I expected. There were bodies on the floor, some with black blood and eyes indicating that they were{Fallen} some normal blooded people lying dead. The walls to the halls were relativity intact but had the errant hole in them. Small ones that must have been made from guns, others with massive fist-size holes despite being in concrete. I took a step closer to one of the bodies. The vest felt heavy on my chest as I moved the baton in my hand. The body closest to me was one of a brown hair girl, my throat tightened as I got closer thinking about the girl from my trial. As I got closer I used my baton to tilt her over a little more to see her face. I thanked God I haven't eaten anything since breakfast. Her face was burnt and not like a normal tragic fire kind of burnt. no on her face was a handprint covering the entirety of it burnt through her face to the point that I could see parts of her skull.
Almost the entirety of the lower half of her face was gone leaving only buts of burnt flesh and darkened skull parts. I heard Vinnie take a step back and heard him lose his lunch behind me. covering my nose with the hand with the baton I do the only thing I can. I close her eyes still open with shock. I think about seeing if I can loot her but that thought is only there for a second before I am disgusted with myself. She deserved more than that.
I look at the other bodies in the hall. only two of them were human the rest were {Fallen}.
"I'm going to take a quick look around the corner, Loot the {Fallen}," I tell Vinnie, already moving. "The {Fallen} we fought couldn't burn flesh like this. There must be something else here."
We spend the next ten minutes securing the area. Only the hallway in front of the basement door in the back part of the building. I had hoped that we could have just sneaked out of the back door but it has an electric lock and none of the bodies had a key card with them. We leave the humans alone out of respect but loot the {Fallen}. We didn't get much in terms of loot though.
Looted From Fallen x 5
Charred Fallen flesh
5 Small Vials of Fallen Ichor
1 Bulletproof vest
Military boots
100 Meta Coins (100*0.5) = 150 Meta Coins
Vinnie took the extra Vest and I took the boots to replace my dress shoes that weren't what I would call appropriate apocalypse attire, I also grabbed the extra bottles of Fallen Ichor out of curiosity. We did this mostly in silence not having anything to say as we pilfered dead bodies.
"Where is our money anyway. " Vinnie said, breaking the silence. " I mean when I looted the other {Fallen} it said we got some coins, so where are they."
"You didn't use inspect on the Stat menu did you?" I asked exasperated but glad for the conversation.
"No, I mean yes I did use it for the top part of it with the strength and all that other stuff, but it was wordy and I didn't get a lot of it so I figured I just get you to explain it to me once we got the time. You know I'm more of an auditory learner. "
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that last part was just an excuse you used to get out of HW. "
"It can be both." HE said quickly." So, explain if you will."
I smiled but obliged him.
"If you bothered to check your Stat menu a little more you realized that all our money is in the Permanent Party system part. We classify as a group so unless we split up all the money is there evenly split between us. "
"that seems convenient."
"Yeah well, I imagine that carrying a whole bunch of money in our hand might be slightly inconvenient."
nodding his head he looked at the adjacent hallway leading to the main part of the building, the part that will have a whole lot more people in it. "Give me the cliff notes about anything you think I should know then."
scoffing "Where do you want me to start. with the Big Bang or with the bird and the bees."
Rolling his eyes. " I meant about the Menu. I already know about the stats Strength Agility, Intelligence, and the rest of those. Is there anything else I should know? "
nodding my head I motion for us to walk through. "Fine, those stats of ours every being that we meet is going to have those. there no real upper limit to them, but I got the suspicion that focusing on one too much could lead to problems."
Vinnie nods as we pass by a door, both of us ready for a fight but luckily it was empty.
"Skills are the same way," I continue. "No upper limit but they can merge to form new ones. And luckily because we're human the number of skills we can get aren't limited. "
"What about titles? We have two of them. not sure what the first one does though."
"You are committed to not reading these things, aren't you. "
"Not when I have you," he said automatically.
I smile, thank god I have Vinnie I don't know how I do all of this without him.
"The Title {The First} gives us 10% more damage against enemies at the same level or less than ours and 10% more exp for Enemies higher than us.
"That's pretty cool. " He said.
"Cool enough for you to start reading this stuff now."
Turning towards me." Not when you're doing such a great job explaining it to me."
I turned to argue with him some more when we heard a scream.
It wasn't too far from us and sadly it seemed to be coming from the big double doors that led to a big part of the building.
Seeing as though there wasn't another way out of this place. We had to be heroes. Fuck it all.
We walked up towards the doors. Hearing grunts and loud banging from the door I had grabbed the Baton from my waist expectantly. Vinnie had in one of his hands his makeshift brass knuckles handcuffs. The knife was still in his pocket I think as some sort of the last result. Pulling it out and using it earlier was something he did in a panic, stabbing something still feels like an escalation that we're not ready for. Beating someone up is normal and I bet anything that Vinnie kind of wanted to stick to the most normal for right now.
We walked up to the doors and I peeked through them. In the room were 5 people fighting what can only be described as a monster.
Compared to the {Fallen} which was just some old dude who looked creepy and had black blood the thing they were fighting was far from human. First, it was tall, around 6ft tall with skin dark black like night. It had an injury to its legs which seemed to be slowing it down but not by much. Its hands and feet were clawed and sharp and its face was elongated and dog-like. It was unequivocally not human and seemed to be giving the actual humans a hard time.
They were cornered around a desk that was half destroyed in the corner of the room. one of them was laying on the ground bleeding and someone had half-heartedly tried to control the bleeding with a jacket which didn't seem to be working. A girl sat next to him tied up and gagged screaming and shouting a storm with only a couple of things escaping the gag, Most of them being curse words. In front of her was a young man with some kind of leg injury holding onto a makeshift spear to stand. The guy was in no shape to fight off whatever kind of monster in front of them. The only ones capable of fighting were the two in front watching the monster. First was a young security officer maybe ten years older than us with a gun in one hand and a makeshift spear in the other. Beside him was a woman who was probably a lawyer wearing a nice black suit that was slightly tattered holding a pipe in both hands like a baseball bat.
The only thing that probably saved them was the fact that the monster was slightly distracted. And by busy, I mean that the monster was hovering over the body of the person I assumed had screamed. laid on the ground flat on their stomach was the old woman from my trial. I almost didn't recognize her due to the burns. If I had any questions on how a half a face could be burnt off they were answered as the monster raked his hand over this poor old woman face skin burned and blackened the second it touched her flesh. The monster was snarling or smiling depending on your definition as he slowly raked his hand over her face burning it. The young guard was not okay with this and aimed his gun to shoot the thing. At that point, the thing turned and snarled, I was sure that time and leapt off the woman who was now almost certainly dead.
At this point, I ducked back and shut the door so that we could decide what we're doing.
"What was that," Vinnie asked nervously, running his hand through his hair.
"I don't know how I couldn't get close enough to use identify. " I said looking back at the door. "Not that it mattered since we're not getting involved. "
"Hate to point it out to you but they're only one way out of here," Vinnie said putting his arm in front of me. " And there is currently some kind half man half dog monster in between us and it. And as awesome as both of us are, let's not kid ourselves into thinking we could kill that thing before it kills us.
I looked at the back down the hallway we just walked past through. We didn't see a single viable way out of here. Going this way was the only option and I rather fight that thing with four people what two.
"Fine if we're going to do this then we're going to do this right," I said opening the door up slightly. The guard and the lawyer were keeping the monster busy at the moment but they were just barely. The guard must have run out bullets and was using the makeshift spear exclusively. He and the lawyer were trying to pull the monster away from the wounded and the girl that was tied up. The weapons they gave them more reach and they use that to plant superficial wounds all around the monster pulling it slowly away from the others. They were fast and the bullets and whatever they did beforehand seemed to have crippled the monster enough that they had the upper hand when it came to speed. He would swipe at the monster getting it riled up more than she would from a few feet away from him, make a lot of noise and swing at it, missing most of the time before backpedalling away.
That being said they were by no means winning. They were afraid to get close to the monster enough to actually hurt it and anytime the monster got close to them it made them feel it. As we watched we saw the Lawyer make a mistake. She tripped over some debris from who knows where tripped her over as she backpedalled and fell back. By pure luck or skill, she managed to get the pipe out in front of her and block the things from her face. The guard ran over to her and tackled the thing off of her screaming as the thing skin burnt some of his face and part of his hands.
he knocked the Monster a few feet back, and just barely managed to stand up using the spear to hold himself up. The Lawyer was in better condition but they could barely stay ahead of it with the both of them in relatively good shape. If we didn't help them they were dead.
"I'll go first," Vinnie said. " Im faster, I can hit harder, and if the shadow boxing thing is correct the second I start punching it, I'll be faster. "
"And what should I do, sit here and look pretty." I snidely say though I was already looking at that spear with interest. "
"No, your job is to save me before I die. I'm going to be fighting up close and personal with that thing. I like my pretty face and if you can kill that thing before it scars me for life I would appreciate it. '' Vinnie says before pushing the doors open and running towards the thing. Luckily the thing was facing its victim. He rushed forward, used one the overturned desk to leap up and essentially fell into a punch with the thing. The lawyer and the Guard were shocked and not wanting to be left out I rushed out too.
The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Vinnie had managed to finagle his way into punching the thing and rolling when he came down. getting far enough away from the thing so that he doesn't immediately get himself killed.
I ran out taking the long way to avoid the monster and run-up to the guard and lawyer who though hurt weren't without a fight. The guy thought he had a massive burn mark on his face and arm, stood in front of the lawyer's spear in hand ready to stab me if I got too close.
I turn my head to look at my brother who had gained the monster's attention. I took the second to {Inspect} the thing if only to see how much health it had left.
Zhade Lvl 2
Health: 31.85/100
Mana: 0/0
I felt I could get more but now really wasn't the time to look through it.
Vinnie was taking a much different approach than they had. Instead of trying to play keep-away with the Zhade he ran forward and hit it. He stood his ground dodging the Zhade's Attacks while taking the time to hit it whenever it got close.
That being said his hands were taking a big brunt of the damage with every hit.
"I'm going to be needing that. " I told the guard, taking a step towards them only to get a spear pointing to my chest, one thrust away from having a hole in my chest. "My brother needs my help and your weapon has more reach," I explain quickly
The guard seems to be slow to the touchdown, not moving a bit as he glanced at Vinnie still fighting. Getting annoyed and not having the time to play mediator I lash out. using one hand I push the tip of the spear away towards the side. With my other hand, I swing my baton out towards his face letting it go at just the right time to make up for the lack in reach to hit him right in the nose.
To say I was slightly impressed with myself would be an understatement.
Not letting my moment of awesomeness distract me. I grab the spear and run to Vinnie, who was looking worse for wear.
He was breathing raggedy and seemed tired, the Zhade must have caught his side cauterizing as it went so it wasn't bleeding. The vest he was wearing now had a massive scratch on it that made the one on his side seem like a paper cut. I looked at his health and saw that his health was down 20 almost half.
Not wanting to take a chance I rushed forward with a spear in hand. "Vinnie,"
"Busy." He yelled ducking his head to avoid losing it.
"Jenny McCloud."
Vinnie's eyes brightened before nodding his head having got what I meant. backing up a little he fixed his stance and grounded himself. Making himself looking all good and solid. Right before he started making a whole bunch of noise.
"Come and get me, you stupid dog face motherfucker. Your moms a bitch and whatever sad motherfucking dog she fucked to conceive you are both lying in hell. "
Having obtained the intended effect as the Zhade leapt at him, only for Vinnie to thrust up his arm. Now holding the knife is shoves it straight through its mouth too far to hit anything important I think. Not that it mattered the second the knife went through its jaw Vinnie fell on his back and used his knees to lift the body up and into the air. Just as I came from behind them graceful as ever and shoving the spear through the thing's chest.
The things already low health had started going down and plummeted to zero when my spear pierced its chest
-12DMG * 2 (Fatal DMG)
You Have shared in the Defeat of Lvl 2 Zhade
Earned (50 + Killing Blow Bonus(50*.05)) = 52.25
The thing was dead and I had killed it. I stood on top of it staring at its dead body before Vinnie showed up next to me shaking me out of my stupor. He reached down and touched the body for a second before it evaporated and fell to the ground.
"Hey, are you okay," Vinnie asked his face right up to mine but somehow it still felt blurry. I mean Even though the thing was not human and was attacking people that most likely have been no evil.
When Vinnie killed that dude, I'll admit I really didn't get shitty it would be to have someone die by your hands. And for the accumulation of who they are to be a roll of toilet paper a weird cap. I killed something with my bare hands and it sucked. I stayed that way until I was pushed from the back by some ass. Waking me from my stupor I turned to face ..... the guard. Still injured from my awesome barton top his nose red though not bleeding.
"What the Fock," He said, his swollen nose messing with his voice.
Pissed. "Dude what the fuck."
"Yoo broke my nose"
"I also saved your life.
"Any Harder and yoo woold have killed me. yoo left me with two healths left I almost died."
"And you would have died if my brother and me hadn't saved your ass and killed the Zhade."
That stops the guard in his tracks as he looks at me weirdly. "What did you call it."
Rolling my eyes feeling tired of this whole conversation and the whole ordeal. "A Zhade that's the species of the thing or whatever. it was level two by the way." I turn to tell Vinnie who was trying to pick up the loot wincing from his wound. "I hate to meet anything harder," I said looking at him and the rest of the group. I was the only one not injured and frankly if a strong breeze came through here most of them would be dead.
"Hey" The guard yells grabbing my shoulder with his bad arm squeezing me harder than needed to turn me to face him. "Yoo're going to need to start explaining yoorself before I make you." He said holding in a very sharp piece metal in front of him directly at my throat, the lawyer behind him holding the pipe ready to bash my head in, hell the guy that was injured and lying in the corner had somehow managed to stand up to try and look intimidating.
In my haste to kill the Zhade, I had thrown all my weapons. My spear was lying on the ground a couple of feet from me, my baton was lying even farther away on the ground covered in nose blood. Vinnie tried standing up next to me tense and ready to fight, but as he got closer I saw that even if he was at 19 health and the burn/scratch was deep and seemed painful. He was in no position to fight.
So before things could get any more aggro I started talking. "Hey im sorry. My name is Alex and my brother Vinnie. I didn't mean to almost kill you. I needed something sharp to finish the thing and you were more in the mood to talk than to act so I made an executive decision. I didn't think it did that much damage. I'm sorry about that." The apology was not amazing but it did the job cause the guard lowered his makeshift knife from my throat to my chest.
"Im Ryan Dalt, behind me is Ms.Visp and behind her is Jonathan. There were more of us but they." He stopped and glanced at a door that was barricaded with all the furniture and slightly heavy objects you could find in a place like this including a couple of plants toppled over. "They didn't make it."
Note to self. don't go through the double doors.
For some reason that caused a blinking light on the side along with about four others. I wanted to see what I got but considering the guard- I mean Ryan is still threatening to skewer me, I don't feel it was a good time.
"Where did you come from." the guy Jonathon from the back yelled at me " Is there another exit?"
"No, me and my brother were heading to the basement bathroom when the World Break happened. We ended up having to kill something called a Fallen. We figured it would be best if we got out of here," I told them, making sure that my voice was loud enough that they all heard me. I wasn't technically lying.
Ryan didn't seem to be convinced but the woman, Ms Visp seemed to be more tempered now that the thing was dead.
"What happened to the body." She said looking to where the body used to be, only the spear laying there now.
"Oh that, me and my brother just looted the body," I told them a lie already on the tip of my tongue ready.
"Whot. Does. that. mean. " Ryan slowly said over pronouncing each letter in his sentence jabbing his knife at my chest poking my vest pretty
"We don't know." I lied "We just touched the body and it asks us if we want to loot it. You can't" I ask, adding a little bit of innocence to my voice to better set the idea.
"No, we can't." Ms Visp said looking around the room and the bodies. Unlike in the hall before there seemed to be a bunch of bodies on the ground though they seemed to be all Fallen they were burnt or cut up.
"That's okay we can loot them and split the loot, there got to be something of use there," I said trying to ingratiate me and my brother into the group without tipping our hands.
"I don't trost them," Ryan said, his face trying to snarl but was kind of hard with part of the lower jaw. "Where did they come from?" He asks, glaring at the two of us.
Ms Visp from her spot a few feet away from Ryan looked at us. "Yes, why are you here. There are always some non-criminal cases done here but I know there were several criminal proceeding happening today." The implications were obvious. I looked at the group, like really looked at them and sadly though they were beaten they were not broken. Most of the bodies here looked like they were taken out by either the gun, the spear, or bashed to death. Ryan looked like shit and might have been lacking in health right now he was twice my size and holding a knife really close to my face. Vinnie was injured and Ms Visp gave a distinct impression that she could hold her own. This was excluding the possibility that they had a trick up there sleeve like an extra gun or a really good throwing arm when it came to spears. Not only that but they clearly were running from something, the door leading to the other room wouldn't be barricaded that heavily if otherwise. We were going to need them or at least the extra bodies as cannon fodder.
First, though I had to make sure that we weren't tied up and left helpless.
"My brother had a slight vandalism charge we had to take care of. Let all the air out of this jerks car and had to pay to get the rims fixed. We got lucky and I had to go to the bathroom, he followed me and we ended up going to the basement when it all happened. " I said, spinning a web of lies, most unprovable but all believable.
Ryan stared at me unwavering as I talked, He did not indicate that he believed me but didn't stab me in the throat so I took it at a good sign.
Ms Visp, on the other hand, stared at me before she walked up to Ryan and touched his shoulder. Ryan tensed up before taking a deep breath and taking a step back and lowering his knife. I smiled.
"We don't have to trust them, but killing them without probable cause would set a bad precedent. We can watch them and make sure they don't do anything to make the situation worse but at the moment there is a resource we could use. Even if it's just more bodies to help us through the door. " Ms Visp said, lifting her pipe and turned to walk to where the rest of the group was seated. "And if they try and screw us. We can tie them up and send them through the door as a distraction so we can escape."
I stare at the back of the lawyer Ms Visp who I'm now sure is the leader of the merry band of government officials. Ryan smiled before walking back to the group, never taking his eyes off me.
Given that all the general life and death decisions that I had to make are on a temporary reprieve I let myself get the messages that were put on hold.
You have learned Skill Impromptu Planning Lvl 1
Description: Some people make plans with complicated details and steps. You start a fight and survive on your wit and fast thinking.
+1% increase in creativity when trying to come up with a plan while on the fly.
So my fast and loose approach to killing that thing got me a skill. I couldn't help smiling before looking at the rest of them.
You have Learned Throwing Lvl 1
Descriptions: Wow you manage to hit something lets give him a prize
+1% increase in accuracy while throwing
You have Learned Stabbing Lvl 1
Description: You have taken something sharp, whether that was a pencil or mithril blade you have made it go through someone skin like a lunatic
+1% increase in Damage while Stabbing
I liked the Throwing skill the second I saw it. My favourite superhero has always been Gambit and always thought the coolest part of his portfolio was the ability to throw playing cards like a boss. I had tried to learn myself how to throw playing cards but I could barely keep them in a straight line. More than the Kicking and Blunt Weaponry this seems like the type of skill I might actually try and progress to a higher level. Same with the next one.
You Have Learned Lying Lvl 3
Description: When you are asked "Does this look good on me" You're now able to say yes without smiling or bursting into laughter. No one is going to believe you but you're getting there.
Now that was a lie.
+3% chance that people will believe you and ignore signs that you're being less than honest
So I'm becoming an even better liar. That's going to come in handy probably sooner rather than later.
That being said the last two were weird but had an interesting feel about them that felt like they were somewhat more personal
You Have Learned Mental NoteTaking Lvl 1
Description: While most people just get a piece of paper for the random things they want to remember you like to pressure yourself and try and remember every detail. As stupid as that is.
+1% increase in memory recollection. 1% increase in the personal modification of your system.
You Have Learned Dramatic Entrance Lvl 1
Description: While some people like to sneak around and attack from the shadows. You like to do the opposite making sure that everyone and their symbiotic tapeworms know your coming.
+1% damage times Number of Hostile Entities for the 30s after
The first one seemed personal like whatever thing that makes the System work went through my head and saw the jumbled mess of things I was trying to keep track of and wanted to fix it. The second I saw the box I felt... less cluttered. The second one sounded like a reverse of some kind of sneak attack. for 30 seconds depending on how many people saw me the damage was multiplied. Sneak attacks if knowledge from card games are correct sneak attacks are one on one type of damage. This, if you're fast enough isn't, which is just another card in our favour.
How I managed to walk to where the group was without tripping on something was a testament to how much I wanted to examine these boxes.
I got there and immediately Ryan, Ms Visp and the Johnathon kid grouped together. Talking in a low whisper, probably about us. Not letting that deter us I went to Vinnie and the small pile of things he got from the Zhade More than what I noticed originally but still not a lot. He was wearing the hat, The top part had pointed ears, the rest was black leather with yellow eyes on the front and yellow teeth covering the bottom part of the rim. Honestly, it looked pretty good on him hiding his messy blonde hair under it, and the ears on top weirdly worked.
that being said I snatched the hat right off his head the second it got in reach because I'm completely sure he didn't read it.
Zhade Leather Cap(Uncommon)
Description: Made from the skin and bones of a low-level Zhade This cap is both stylish and gives the wearer a slight increase in natural senses.
Effect 1: 10% increase in all senses (Sight, Touch, Smell, Hearing, Smell)
Effect 2: Hat can only be removed by the owner of the hat
Effect 3: 10% increase in aggression
"I bet you didn't even read what the hat does."
Snatching the hat from my hand with one free hand, "No, I didn't explode so I counted it as a good sign."
"And the other stuff."
Dropping it all on the ground. " I figured you'd do it and tell me if there was anything cool in the pile."
Rolling my eyes. I picked up the first thing I saw what looked like a roll of toilet paper and almost immediately dropped it.
FireStarter Spell Scroll (Racial Spell)
Description: While Some people need flint and steel to start a fire all you need is to snap your fingers and think hard.
Effect 1: for every foot away from hand as well as a 5 mana standard cost for Organic matter. can cause a slight fire on an object.
Effect 2: For every foot away from hand as well as a 10 mana standard cost for Inorganic Matter. can be Used to cause a slight fire on an object
The spell gives no control over any fire created by the spell
The spell may cause a fire but longevity and strength depends on the material on fire
Warning
Racial spells have a #% chance of altering user body in small ways
Do you want to read FireStarter Spell and permanently add it to your Skill List
(Y/N)
A Magic spell.
I mean this is actual magic that I could learn and do. The second it was offered to be on my list I clicked yes and the paper turned to dust in my hand. A grin spread on my face as I lifted my hand and pointed and snapped at a small puddle of blood a couple of feet away from me. The top part of the blood lit on fire like it was oil instead of blood.
I had done magic.