Name:
Fiona
Level:
1
Dexterity
11
Race:
Orc
Strength
8
Job:
Bard
Constitution
15
Experience:
115/200
Intelligence
11
Mana:
40/50
Charisma
16
Soulbound weapon:
Modified lute
Wisdom
11
Soulbound armor:
Shaped chest piece
Skills
Healing
9
Martial arts
5
Modified lute
12
Acrobatics
6
Archery
15
Singing
3
Drawing
13
Cooking
17
Swimming
11
Tinkering
19
Fencing
7
Map reading
9
Sleight-of-hand
30
Mana manipulation
3
Perk
Imbue weapon
Utilize magic to briefly imbue your weapon with a variety of effects. Make it harder than its base materials would otherwise be. Make it radiate cold. Make it lengthen or widen as needed. It's magic, its limitations are entirely up to you (and your mana pool).
Prank magic
Hey kid, you are not what any of us were expecting, and I dig that. I had to bend the rules a bit, but here’s an extra point for making things interesting. Think of Prank Magic like Roger Rabbit rules, you can do just about anything you want, but only if it’s funny.
Inspect
If Erious can bend the rules a bit, it seems orderly that I would be able to restore order and balance by ALSO providing a perk. Inspect will allow you to visualize characteristics of the world around you. While you are the only one who has "levels," Inspect will also estimate the level of your enemies and allies.
An increase to both healing and mana manipulation indicated that Colton was at least doing something. Whatever he had managed to do was far removed from the classic “cure wounds” or “heal” spells most gamers would be familiar with, but he was pretty sure he did feel some improvement to his back. He really hoped the improvement he felt was not entirely in his head, but somehow, he doubted it. He realized that if he could not come up with some way, however slow, of healing himself from the wounds that he was no doubt going to receive from the battles he would inevitably fight, this would be one of the shortest adventures ever.
The one thing he did notice was definitely mostly repaired was his guitar. While there was still a decent sized crack in the body, it was in a state where it was mostly playable again. Thinking for a bit, Colton racked is brain for all the fantasy and video game knowledge he possibly could.
Grabbing the guitar, he started plucking some random strings, while again visualizing the flow of magic into his guitar to shape it. He then visualized that energy flowing into his guitar, back into himself, and into his back, and then out again in a loop. In the little he had played iterations of Dungeons and Dragons over the years, Colton knew that bards were perhaps one of the most inconsistent classes in how they operated and what they could do, but he was pretty sure the fact that playing music for effects was very much implied in the job.
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Continuing the visualization, his plucking on the strings started to approach something a little bit more organized, and he found himself slowly singing the only song he could think of that referenced healing:
“And when I get that feeling, I want, sexual healing,
Sexual healing, oh baby, makes me feel so fine,
Helps to relieve my mind,
Sexual healing, is good for me
Sexual healing is something that’s good for us.”
Colton continued to sing, realizing he did not know much more than the chorus, so he just kept looping it over and over. Whatever notes he was playing were probably far from accurate to the actual song, and even if he was playing the right notes on his guitar, the notes that he was singing to accompany them were rarely the same. Thankfully, no one was around to hear him butcher the song, although he was a little concerned that if he kept it up, the system might deduct a point from his singing skill. As bad of a singer he was before, he found that singing around tusks added a degree of difficulty one had to feel to appreciate.
All things considered, with the meadow he was in free of any more rabbits in the immediate area, it was pretty peaceful. If not for his atrocious performance, he could easily see young couples bringing blankets and food for a leisurely picnic, college students playing ultimate frisbee, or young kids running about trying to tag each other.
Between the calm meadow, the bodily exhaustion from several bouts of flight-or-fight, and the slow breathing he was maintaining in order to keep us his zen state, Colton felt his eyes start closing a little bit. He even switched up the playing to a song that, while more difficult, was much more familiar to him:
“I close my eyes
Only for a moment and the moment's gone
All my dreams
Pass before my eyes, a curiosity”
While by no means ready to play it on stage, he had managed to learn to play a very passable version of the intro. As his fingers starting to pick up, some of the muscle memory from his other body managed to make itself present in his new body, and he relaxed into the repetition even further. As he continued playing his head eyes closed and his head fell further as Colton managed to put himself to sleep.
Unsure of how much time had passed, two things did become apparent when he was suddenly jolted awake.
The first was the he had fallen asleep long enough for the sun to nearly go all the way down.
The second was that apparently the rabbits moved around enough to stumble across his sleeping location, as he opened his eyes and saw one of the little menaces about ten feet away, sizing him up.
Realizing that maybe this particular enemy was not immediately hostile, Colton slowly raised himself off the ground, not taking his eyes off the rabbit. He also noticed that the hole in his back felt almost completely healed, although there was still a bit of residual pain. Another series of blue boxes also popped up in front of his eyes.
Skill gained: +1 Modified lute
Skill gained: +1 Singing
Skill gained: +1 Healing
‘Yay, line go up.’ Colton thought to himself as he kept the little horned beast in sight at all times.
There were several ways he could approach this. Running would be an option, and was honestly incredibly tempting; however, he did not know if running would break whatever stalemate the two were in. More importantly, there was a voice in the back of his mind informing him that at some point he was going to have to fight. Not only more of these rabbits, but more of many different enemy types, and running was not going to be a winning strategy in the long run. Facing off against a single rabbit in a mostly fresh condition in a peaceful open meadow was probably the absolute best scenario he could ask for.
The first thing he did was try and repeat his stunt with the anvil, to no avail. Realizing that an anvil suddenly appearing out of thin air and squashing a rabbit was pretty funny once, but in most cases, jokes do not get funnier with repetition. Deciding to save his prank magic for future battles so he didn’t burn any more physical comedy set-ups, Colton decided to just provoke the rabbit into attacking him.
“Hey you fuzzy bastard! Why don’t you call a friend so I’ll have enough of you to make some slippers!” He shouted in the rabbit’s direction. The rabbit continued to stare at him, and then lowered its head to nibble on some grass.
Looking around, he found a small rock about five feet away, and keeping the rabbit in his vision at all times, scooted over and picked the rock up. Winding back in his best approximation of a major league pitcher, the threw the rock his all the power and coordination his 8 strength and 11 dexterity supplied him. The rock then proceeded to sail about three feet to the right and two feet above the unphased rabbit.
“Well, if throwing is a skill, mine is definitely at zero.”
Looking around, he spotted another rock, and repeated the process of keeping the rabbit visible at all times, and scooping up the rock. Less focused on power this time, he focused on throwing as accurately as possible. This time, the rock sailed close enough to rustle the rabbit’s hair, but do not damage. It was enough to finally get its attention, and Colton saw it prepare for another of its standard leaps.
Deciding it was worth risk breaking his guitar again, he repeated the process of imbuing it with magic, and winding back into a batter’s stance. Squinting at it, he saw the blue box pop-up again, confirming the rabbit had the same basic make-up as the previous three:
Horned Rabbit – Level 0
Fodder for adventurers just starting out, these tiny pests have a single attack the consists of large jumps that try to puncture their opponents with their small horns. Weak against nearly everything.
The rabbit then proceeded to leap at him, this time not quite close enough to have smashed against Colton’s chest armor. Instead, the leap caused it to careen directly towards his unarmored midsection, which probably would have been a much worse injury he had not managed to swing at just the right time.
*SMASH* the guitar collided with the rabbit and, once again despite reinforcing it with magic, smashed into an unplayable state. As poor of a shape as the guitar was in, at least it would repair itself before too long, something that could not be said of the rabbit he was sent flying at least 30 feet.
Colton checked his status again:
Name:
Fiona
Level:
1
Dexterity
11
Race:
Orc
Strength
8
Job:
Bard
Constitution
15
Experience:
120/200
Intelligence
11
Mana:
32/50
Charisma
16
Soulbound weapon:
Modified lute
Wisdom
11
Soulbound armor:
Shaped chest piece
Skills
Healing
10
Martial arts
5
Modified lute
13
Acrobatics
6
Archery
15
Singing
4
Drawing
13
Cooking
17
Swimming
11
Tinkering
19
Fencing
7
Map reading
9
Sleight-of-hand
30
Mana manipulation
3
Perk
Imbue weapon
Utilize magic to briefly imbue your weapon with a variety of effects. Make it harder than its base materials would otherwise be. Make it radiate cold. Make it lengthen or widen as needed. It's magic, its limitations are entirely up to you (and your mana pool).
Prank magic
Hey kid, you are not what any of us were expecting, and I dig that. I had to bend the rules a bit, but here’s an extra point for making things interesting. Think of Prank Magic like Roger Rabbit rules, you can do just about anything you want, but only if it’s funny.
Inspect
If Erious can bend the rules a bit, it seems orderly that I would be able to restore order and balance by also providing a perk. Inspect will allow you to visualize characteristics of the world around you. While you are the only one who has "levels," Inspect will also estimate the level of your enemies and allies.
‘Okay, I can take a single rabbit without too much difficulty, assuming I do not mind destroying my only weapon every time. Hopefully I can find something else that works as a weapon in case I have to fight more than one rabbit at a time again, and can’t count on pulling a Looney Tunes joke directly out of my ass. My mana is definitely a limited resource as well, although it seems to be regenerating at a decent enough speed for now.’ Colton’s summation of his recent fight and chances of his future fights was hardly optimistic, but it feels realistic.
He paused, contemplating his next steps, before finally realizing that what he needed to do more than anything was to find some sort of hopefully peaceful settlement where he could get some sort of support. Looking around, he tried to see anything of note beyond the large meadow, and seemingly impenetrable forest of trees surrounding it. Squinting his eyes, he was pretty sure he saw a plume of smoke in the distance, so decided to walk in that direction.