Staring at my pet rock that happens to be a turtle I contemplate whether to officially adopt him into my household or to feast on his organs and drink his blood. I'm leaning to option number two considering my chances of acquiring a second pet rock whose organs I can feast on and whose blood I can drink.
Twisting the pet rock's head around and getting goose bumps as a result of the gruesome crunch I bite its rough skin between front teeth in order to create a small hole from which I can start tearing its head off. In a similar fashion to opening a bag of chips, instead it is a turtle and it is filled with blue blood, wait blue blood?
Contemplating whether or not blue blood is poisonous I bite the headless neck of the pet rock and hold its body above my head and start sucking. More and more blood floods into my mouth and I swallow as fast as I can. Promptly throwing the pet rock onto the ground before vomiting a mix of half digested pet rock food and blue blood, excuse me, voluntarily regurgitating the delicious pet rock vomit and blood in order to savour the taste before spitting it out in a similar fashion to taste-testing a finely aged wine.
Lying in a puddle of my vomit whilst hyperventilating, I come to the conclusion that I ingested something poisonous, blue blood is definitely poisonous. Making a mental list of the best possible actions to take in a scenario as precarious as this unique situation that has the highest probability of increasing my chances of survival I promptly pass out and completely forget about the list.
I wake up to someone stabbing me in the stomach. I try screaming while flailing my arms around in order to defend myself from this son of a bitch bastard that stabs sleeping people only unceremoniously shit myself and voluntarily regurgitate the left over contents in my stomach, which is mostly stomach acid that immediately starts burning my throat and nose.
I am still crawling and flailing my arms around my splashing around in the vomit and excrement only to discover that there isn’t anybody here, a bit too late as I fall out of my humble abode and belly flop on the solid earth interspersed with roots and rocks.
Might as well, my humble abode isn’t all that habitable any longer. Tainted with a desecrated corpse of a tortoise, copious amounts of vomit and diarrhoea, I’d much rather simply respawn once again. As I come to my senses I realise that I am sick, very sick. Nausea, diarrhoea, abdominal pain, and... Definitely a fever, I think as I start feeling cold and shivering like a newborn lamb. I’m definitely not cold because I am soaked in all kinds of bodily fluids. How the hell did this happen? Is the blue blood poisonous as well as being the home to nasty little pathogen bastards?
I cast mend on myself using half of my mana, relief washes over my like a spring breeze. STAB. Half-way through my relief moan I am treated to even more intense gut pain. Adopting the trusty old foetal position while making dying sounds I continuously heal myself. Apparently mend can’t cure the poison or infection only the effects. Shit world.
Before I manage to die from dehydration, which would release me from my suffering, I hear the all too familiar vibrations of a terrifying juvenile mammoth heading my way.
I roll over in order to peek in the direction of my unwelcome visitor, wait... visitors?
As the mammoth comes into view I see 3 figures casually standing on top of its head, their happy and content facial expressions morph into ones of complete and utter disgust as they spot me.
Elves, it turns out, aren’t a sympathetic, supportive, and kind-hearted people. No, they are uncaring, psychopathic bastards with no humanity in them.
“Demon spawn! How dare you taint our pristine forest with your filth!” is what I’m assuming he/she screeches considering I don’t understand any of what it is saying. He/she makes some random gestures with her/his arms saying something incomprehensible after which the tree starts growing branches that immediately surrounds me, lifts me up and hold me right in front of these extremely effeminate beings. Another branch extends out of my previously humble but now tainted abode holding the remains of one desecrated tortoise corpse. The 2 two adult elves pale upon seeing the state of the tortoise... the little one of the 3 literally goes bat shit crazy. It screeches like a cat getting a haircut with belt sander. Did I kill a little girl’s pet turtle?
One of the adults immediately restrains the raging little one with a bear bug while giving me the death stare. After a short conversation between the two adults the one that cast the wood manipulations spell on me takes action again.
Here I am, impaled against the tree. He took his time with me, the end results of his praiseworthy efforts are two roots through my feet, two roots through my knee caps, two roots through my hands, and one root through my groin. IT WAS JUST A TURTLE. I am never casting regeneration on myself again. Stupid spell lasts 48 hours. The spell stopped me from bleeding out and regenerated my lost blood preventing me from dying due to shock caused by blood loss.
Never mind impaling me on a tree, this elf son of a bitch had to somehow modify my tainted previously humble abode so as to allow a slow trickle of the vomit and excrement to drip out onto my head in slow and constant rhythm.
Worst respawn ever, including all possible future respawns. I don’t know how many hours I lasted but they were not pleasant and do not want to discuss how I managed to drown instead of waiting for dehydration to take my pitiful life.
Relishing in the peace and quiet of the endless void I dread the idea of going back to hell...
Respawning...
Removing experience and stat gains...
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Constructing new mortal body...
Spawning to random location...
Waking up dazed and confused, I am alive... again.
It is different from the previous respawns in that I can hear voices... a lot of voices. Cautiously opening my eyes I see people, a lot of people. They seem to be wearing clothes from earth, full of blood and mud. I think they might just be some of my fellow inhabitants originating from earth.
They have completely surrounded me and are looking at me as if I’m some extraterrestrial species. I gingerly stand up and pat the dust of my basic white robe. “Hello?” I say in English which brings forth another round of hushed whispered, I’m pretty sure I heard an “It speaks”.
“Are you guys from earth?” I ask to no one in particular... a little boy about 5 years old replies with a very pretentious “What is it to you where we are from Mr. Shining bubble?” followed by a collective silence from all parties involved.
It takes a while for my internal GPS to recalculate and a start formulating a mature and calm response... “I’m not a shining bubble, you are a shining bubble! Your mom is a shining bubble!”
“What did you say about my mom!?” Hearing the shining bubble insult his mother the 5 year old immediately charges forward and starts punching the bubble that doesn’t know its place.
Watching the dumpling going psycho on the shield I thought to be transparent, I poked the shield with my index finger and it instantly shattered. Resulting in a little urchin instantly face planting at my feet. Fighting the urge to laugh and loosing, I near instantly burst out laughing uproariously at the little fool.
Face red as a tomato the little urchin slowly gets up, pats the dust off of his clothes and then lifts his head to face me, for the first time in my life I see true rage. The face of Asura, he is going to kill me. Slowly I start stepping back from the little wild animal, almost in sync as I back up he matches me, each time I take a step back he takes a step forward. Oh, and the little 7 year old urchin wild animal is... taller than me.
I could hear the shuffling of feat as the people behind me opened a path as I continued backing up until it I was outside of the encirclement with the wild urchin still doing his creepy slow walk in my direction. “Your mom is a shining bubble!” I landed a perfect metaphorical uppercut before turning around and skipping away, doing my best self satisfied laugh possible.
The crowd of earth’s ex-inhabitants having had their minds dulled because of the fantastical world over the last couple of days since they were transported here just stood there unsure of what to do the entire time... until they heard what can only described as the sound of a cat being gutted with a dull rusted butter knife. When they finally came to their senses they could only see what appeared to be a hobbit lackadaisically skipping away while being chased by a 5 year old urchin in level 9000 berserker mode.
As I skip away from the berserker mode chipmunk I observe the environment around me, which appears to be some form of a refugee camp. I see tents everywhere along with the normal air of hopelessness and despair. Here and there I spot a couple of people who don’t look like they are experiencing the apocalypse. It seems a refugee camp has been built for the Earthlings on an open grass field outside of a city as I can see a gigantic wall at least 25 meters tall in the distance, judging by the size of the people on the wall, unless they are some type of giant or Halfling like I am my guess should be somewhat accurate.
As the screeching stops behind me I turn around to see the little fellow is finally out of breath... still chasing after me at the speed of a brisk walk. It would appear I pushed the wrong button and thoroughly enraged him. Patiently waiting for the little fool I sit down on a nearby patch of comfortable looking grass... well grass that hasn’t been stomped into a muddy mash.
As the exhausted fellow finally arrives near me he falls in my general direction with a fist stretched out. Naturally he misses and just lies there, experiencing what appears to be an existential crisis of apocalyptic proportions. Tentatively I ask “Why so sensitive?”
He lifts his head from the ground and stares at me like I am the one that slaughtered his entire family, which is a guess that is unfortunately probably quite close to the truth considering that no one is behind him, “What are you? Why can you speak English?” apparently he managed to quell his rage just tiny bit...
“Obviously I’m a human just like you and well... about 1 in 10 people on Earth, well from Earth, can speak English so I just happen to be one of the ones of that one in 10. I just happen to have been transformed into a Halfling by a random gift package, obviously. Why so sensitive?”
He stares at me for a while then he starts crying! What the fuck is this! “Stop stop stop, I don’t care why you are so sensitive! Just stop crying!” He starts crying even more! Remembering a jolly mammoth who betrayed me by ratting out on my awesome tree cave to the bastard elves I stretch out my hand and poke him in the face with my index finger whilst saying “Regeneration”, casting regeneration on him.
The moment I cast Regeneration it is as if a nuclear silence bomb exploded. Not only does the little fool go completely silent, even the people in the surrounding area go quiet. Most of the people had already been staring at us from the moment the little fool started crying but now they all seem to be frozen as well.
Shattering the silence the little rat yells “Teach me!” little bastard can’t even say please. “Please?” I stare down at him for a bit to which he responds “Please?”
“Sure! But there isn’t a lot I can teach to be honest, only one skill I can think of. Show me your status.” I would be happy to distract this little shit face from crying again, I hate crying children.
“How?” he answers warily... even going so far as giving me a suspicious look! This is what I get for trying to be a helpful person.
“I don’t know; say ‘show Robert frost status’ or something.” I say with a bit of annoyance.
The little fool says it out load and it works... the system is surprisingly simple.
StatusName:Jeremy HeartLevel: 1Race: HumanClass:-Health:8/8Mana:22/22Stamina:5%StatsStrength:3Intelligence:11Vitality:4Wisdom:12Agility:2Charm:6Dexterity:5Luck:6Distributable Stats: 5Elemental Affinities- FireSkills- Observe
- Growth
“Hoho, you are a clever little fool aren’t you. Fire though, it could work.” Formulating my plan of action I just hope it is possible to teach meditation to the little fool. He is too young to have had any meaningful education though his intelligence and wisdoms indicates he is quite smart, it could work.
“What I am going to try and teach you is a skill I discovered all on my own.” I wait patiently for him to praise my ingenuity... nothing.
“It is called meditation and I think it has something to do with the knowledge we gained from our lives on earth, I have an affinity for the life element so when I meditated on what I knew about biology I gained some nifty skills. You have an affinity for the fire element thus you should meditate while contemplating everything you know about fire.” I once again wait for praise... only to receive none.
As I look around I that quite a number of people have gathered round and were listening to my little speech, some of whom have shining eyes while some of them look like they have been fed some blue blood. I guess they are probably people who do not have an affinity. The ones with the shining eyes quickly turn around and seem to be going back to their tents to meditate.
It is quite hot here, I’m getting all sweaty. It feels like I am standing front of an over... and now it feels like I am standing in front of a camp fire, and now it feels like I am standing next to a FUCKING RIVER OF LAVA. Finally I notice a red glow around the little rat bastard, and soil under him also has a red shine to it. All of a sudden Flames burst out of him completely engulfing me turning me to ash instantaneously.
Floating around in the endless blissful darkness I think back to my unfortunate ending in a heavenly respawn point. Was that enlightenment? Was the kid one of those little geniuses that were doing the high school curriculum in the womb? Well hopefully some of the people who heard what I said about meditation survived giving fellow inhabitants from Earth a better chance at survival. At the very least I hope it makes their lives easier than my experience in this word thus far...