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Chapter Four

Bitz: 450

Days in Game: Fifteen

Level: Twelve

Upgrade Available - Level Thirteen!

Masi vanished into the trees next to the trail but I wasn’t worried. I could see his dot traveling beside us, just off the road and hidden.

“I wonder what this creature is,” said Shift.

I shot her a look, but she just shook her head.

“I mean, if it likes travelers, we might as well let it know we're here,” she muttered.

Shift: At least our views are up. I got another subscriber last night. Slowly making my way up!

I wasn’t paying attention to my subscribers or my followers. If people wanted to follow me, great, otherwise I didn’t care. It really only came into play when you left the game, and I wasn’t planning on doing that soon.

Sunlight broke through the mist near the treetops, and beams of bright light pierced the canopy in different areas. The sound of the horses’ steps were a nice background beat as birds sang in the branches of the trees. Now, this was nice. Still, I triggered Visual Sounds to monitor anything that might be out of the ordinary. After all, the quest said travelers were being attacked on the road, it wouldn’t do to be jumped because I was distracted by a pretty day.

“Did you have any trouble on this road last time?” I asked.

Shift shook her head. “Not at all. No bandits, or monsters. It was a walk in the park. I camped under the stars without a problem. It hasn’t been that long since I came through, so the attacks must have been in the last couple of days for a quest to be up already.”

I wondered about that. The timeline was fast for something to move in, attack people, and get a quest established. It’d only been a few days since the boss fight, maybe it was a minion that had gotten away. Or maybe, since the newbie quests were over with, this was a normal quest that rotated through at this time. I wouldn’t voice that aloud but it was totally possible. The caravan quest was for new people, and now this would follow after players had gained a few levels. It didn’t have a recommended level, but this area was way too close to Haven to require more than a level ten player.

Based on the map, this was the direction that the folks from the shuttle headed if they were going directly to Crescent. We’d hit a crossroads that branched off toward the big city, about three days from Boulder according to what I was reading. With the horses, we should get to the crossroads in a few hours.

Hex’s comments about trying to develop new skills came to mind. “Hey Shift, do you think you could throw things at me while we ride?”

“What?”

“I’m trying to figure out how to use my abilities differently. Right now, I can only use my shield in a big circle around me. I’m wondering if I can use it to create small ones that block an arrow or a sword strike. It should use less mana that way.” I did not add that I hadn’t leveled up any of my skills yet and I still was hoarding points. Hex hadn’t checked, and I knew he was multitasking between us and the Guild Hall.

I flipped open my skill tree and just paused. Raising my strength had ripple effects throughout my skill tree that I hadn’t noticed. Somehow it had increased most of my attacks, including the magic ones. “Hex, why did my magic skills increase from strength?”

“Strength is how strong you are, it factors into physical attacks and magical ones. That’s why I recommended you put some points in there. You needed it.”

Something hit my face and bounced off. “What the?”

“You told me to!”

“I wasn’t ready. What’d you throw?”

“An acorn, I’ve collected a few.” I gave Shift a look, and she continued. “When I first got in the game, it amazed me that acorns were real. So I grabbed a few and kept them. I’ve only got a few more though, and I don’t want to give them up. So I don’t know what I’m going to throw at you next.”

Shift collected acorns in-game, while I collected food items and rations. And jumpsuits. I can’t forget the jumpsuits. That brought my mood down a notch.

“We’ll have to grab some small stones or something. I can practice without it for now. Have you come up with any creative skills?”

“I learned how to do some kicking attacks,” she said sheepishly. “Basically I’m trying to figure out what other body parts I can use as weapons. I’m not a boxer, I’m a monk. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it earlier.”

I smirked, but it slid off my face as I triggered Visual Sounds again. Masi had paused and was now a few feet behind us in the trees. Something was moving under the trees on the opposite side of the pathway. The horses didn’t seem bothered by it, but these horses weren’t showing up as NPC’s on the map. Our blue dots were still there. I couldn’t tell what the thing in the trees was.

Mia: Something is to our right, it’s watching us. It's large.

Masi didn’t move, and we were getting further away from the cat. I pulled out my bow and motioned for the horse to stop. Bee, Shift’s horse, stopped as well.

Shift: I wish I was on the ground. At least you have a good viewpoint, right?

Mia: I can’t make out what it is. It might be hesitating since we’re pretty high level.

The sound waves showed it moving closer but I still couldn’t make out what it was. It had to have the same ability as Shift did. Hidden in Plain Sight, or something like it, and it had to be higher level than my Visual Sounds. That worried me. Tension built across my shoulders and the horses shifted nervously. Something smelled like a wet animal and it made my eyes water.

Shift’s horse suddenly darted forward, sending Shift tumbling to the ground. Something shimmered on the trail behind us and I sent a magic bolt its way. As soon as the bold struck, the camouflage dropped.

Wamp Beast, Level 11

The bolt has taken a bit off of its hit points. The creature was a deep gray color with massive paws, and glowing green eyes. It was a cross between a dog and a large cat, like Masi. The face was doglike but with too many teeth in its mouth, and it had a body like a cat with a long tail. It swiped at Shift, who quickly rolled out of the way.

I fired another magic bolt at it. Masi entered the fray, jumping from the shadows, landing on the creature's back with his claws extended. The creature almost buckled under the impact and its health bar flickered into the yellow.

Something slammed into Shift, and she went flying toward the trees.

I triggered Visual Sounds with Insight, then aimed and triggered Double Strike with Magic Bolt. Both darts went flying, hitting the hidden creature and bringing it into view. Its hit health bar showed I’d taken about a tenth of the total.

Wamp Beast, Level 10

My horse snorted and reared up. I barely kept on its back as it took to the air. Honey’s legs landed back on the ground. “Woah, girl. We got this!”

I thankfully didn’t drop my bow, and as soon as Honey’s hooves hit the ground I shot a Force Arrow at the smaller Wamp Beast. The arrow slammed into the side of its head as it stalked toward Shift. The impact knocked it to the side, giving Shift time to attack. My attention switched back to the bigger Wamp Beast that Masi was trying to take down.

The creature was bucking its back legs, trying to get the cat off its back, but Masi was holding on tight. His claws were dug into its fur and his mouth was on the back of its neck. Yet, despite the substantial fangs the cat had, his teeth couldn’t get a good grip through the thick fur at the back of the Beast’s neck. While the cat was doing sustained damage, the monster’s hit points weren’t dropping quickly enough.

The Wamp Beast stopped bucking and suddenly flipped over, slamming onto its back and crushing Masi underneath it.

My horse backed away slowly, and I took aim and focused on its eye that was closest to me. I gathered my force abilities, added it to the aim and triggered a Powerful Shot. Then let it fly.

The arrow flew faster than my normal force arrows and my notifications icon went wild. The arrow hit its target and the Wamp Beast stopped moving, its red dot turning into an X. Masi whimpered, then shoved the creature off of himself. As he dragged himself to his paws I saw that his hit points were about halfway down. Shift gave a victory cry as another X appeared on the map, and I gave a sigh of relief. That smell still lingered in the area.

“Well, that was an adventure,” said Shift. “Shoot, where’s my horse?”

“I hope they’re just down the trail.”

Masi gave a great enormous yawn. He didn’t seem to be overly bothered by his injuries, yet I monitored his hit points as they very slowly recovered. That needed to change.

I hopped down from my horse. “Can you hold Honey?” I asked Shift.

Shift took the reins, and I approached the level 11 Wamp Beast I’d killed.

Do you want to use your harvesting kit?

Yes, please. More items meant I could sell them and get closer to leveling. Lines popped up to cut off the paws. I quickly grabbed out the harvesting set and got to work. I added the 8 paws into my inventory. It then highlighted the head of the creature that didn’t get shot in the eye. It wanted me to cut its eye out. My hand trembled, but I pursued the dotted lines, getting two eyes out of the creature. I added them to my inventory before I could think about it too much.

“Yuck,” I said. Masi approached the creature and used his claws to cut the creature open. I quickly turned away but Shift watched with interest. “He’s eating it, isn’t he?”

“Yep,” she said. Shift held out the reins to me as I approached. “Let’s give him a few to eat.”

I triggered my notifications.

New Skill: Aura Detection. You can detect creatures by the aura generated by life-shattering their illusions and camouflage.

New Skill: Force Precision. You discovered you can use force magic to guide strikes and arrows. This increases the chance of a Critical Hit.

New Achievement: Critical hit, Reward: One Token

Question Complete: Trouble on the Road

Reward: Renown +5

New Skill: Animal Handling

New Skill: Riding

New Skill Level: Harvesting

New Pet Level: Level 7

My experience bar was much closer to level fourteen but we didn’t get as much as I thought we would have. It had to be since both creatures were lower level than us. You got more experience when it was at a higher level, which then made the opposite as true. Masi head-butted my side, getting my attention. His jaws were red, and he licked his lips.

“You did a great job!” I scratched his head, keeping my hand away from the blood. “We’ll need to go over your leveling info later.”

He purred then faced the direction we had been heading.

“You ready?” I asked Shift.

“Yep,” she replied.

I started walking down the road holding onto the reins for Honey. Hopefully, Bee was somewhere up the trail and we didn’t lose the poor horse. I didn’t want to know how much it would cost to replace the horse. The trail curved along a bend, and Bee came into view. Shift approached the horse with her hands out and Masi stayed away from the trembling creature.

“See, they stuck close.” I mounted Honey and pulled up my map to see how far we had to go. The dot for Abraham was past the road that appeared up ahead. Maybe a few more hours on the road and we’d be in the right area. Shift mounted Bee, and we got back on our way. I opened up the guild menu to figure out what renown was good for.

Something small and hard hit my forehead.

“Now I know you weren’t paying attention at all.”

I narrowed my eyes at Shift. “Really?”

“You're the one who asked for it.” She tossed another round object at me.

I caught it in my hand. It was a small round pebble. “Did you grab these from the trail?”

“Of course, I didn’t want to use up all my acorns.”

“Fine,” my voice came out snarky. I barely had a moment before Shift tossed another one at me. I triggered Force Shield but the bigger shield came out. That was not what I wanted. Plus, I still got pinged by the rock. Honey didn’t mind the shield, which was surprising. I ended the spell and waited for my mana to regenerate. I had plenty of mana, but the wait time on Shield was slower than the regeneration. That was one skill I needed to speed up the wait time for, somehow. If I could snap shields out as needed, I’d be much safer.

“Focus on the magic, not the skill,” whispered Hex.

His voice had spooked me since he hadn’t been talkative.

Shift didn’t wait for me and tossed another at me.

I pulled on the magic and shoved it at the pebble as it flew through the air toward me. Something pink flared but missed the stone.

New Skill: Force Block

“That’s more like it,” I muttered to myself.

Shift gave me a smile and tossed another.

This time I knocked the pebble away from hitting me and it only used a small bit of mana, versus the load that Force Shield used. Not to mention the wait time to use it again was negligible.

“Sweet! That’s gonna be useful. Can you catch the pebble?” asked Shift.

“I can try.”

She tossed the next one, and I tried to create a cup but the magic didn’t want to bend that way. With the horse moving underneath me, it was harder to concentrate. Shift tossed stones at me until we hit the crossroads. I had gained another level in Force Block, but hadn’t been able to unlock a catching skill.

The crossroads had a tent-like object set up on one corner. An NPC appeared, exiting the cloth building.

Valto, Camp Host

He raised a hand in welcome. “Hello, Travelers. Welcome to Camp Glacier.” A small campfire burned in front of the tent and it had logs set around it for seating places. He stopped moving forward when Masi came out of the shadows.

“Hello,” I said dismounting. I didn’t want to be talking from the back of the horse, it felt wrong. “We’re traveling north, but I wanted to let you know we took care of two Wamp Beasts on the road from Boulder.”

“Wamp Beasts!” Valto took a shuttering step back, clutching at his chest. “That’d explain the stories from Travelers in that direction. I’m right glad you folks took care of that.” His eyes traced over both of us, then flickered to Masi before moving back to me and my helm. “You’re Paladins? That’s not possible. The Paladins are all dead.”

“Well, we aren’t. Is there anything you need help with?” I asked. I bet I was going to get that response for the next week or so from NPCs, until word spread that we were back in action.

He shook his head, then paused. “No, I offer a safe place to camp for the night and a hot meal for travelers on their way down the roads. I have some items for sale if you’re interested.” The crackle of wood on his campfire made me smile, and I wondered what hot food he had. It was early for food, though, so we would have to pass on pausing for too long.

“Sure, I’ll look at the list,” I said.

The list popped up on my screen and he had two heath potions for 15 Bitz each.

“I’ll take those health potions,” I immediately replied.

Valto smiled and pulled both of them out of a pouch that rested on one hip. I moved forward and grabbed them, sending them both into my inventory. He shook my hand, and the Bitz vanished from my stash. Somehow I needed to get ahead of the Bitz I needed in-game, yet I didn’t know how that was going to happen.

“Thank you for doing business,” said Valto with a smile.

“Of course, if you need anything send word to the Paladins.” I moved back toward my horse. On the way, I held out a health potion to Shift. “Here you go.” She quickly added it to her inventory.

I got back up on Honey and gave Valto a wave. He waved back as we headed down the road headed to Haven. Once we were out of sight, Masi vanished back under the trees, patrolling.

“How do you do that?” asked Shift. “These are full health potions? It's a full heal, no matter your level.”

“It’s the helm, I swear.”

Hex: No it’s not.

Shift: Wait! Do you know what it is?

Hex: I have a few guesses, but nothing solid.

Shift: What guesses?

Hex: Not until I’m sure.

I didn’t think there was anything special about me. I treated everyone with respect and like a good person until they proved otherwise. It didn’t matter if they were an NPC, player, animal or even a monster. Once someone showed their true colors, all bets were off though.

“Should we detour into the woods?” asked Shift.

I paused that train of thought and glanced at my map. This was the closest we could get to where Abraham’s dot was on the road. The rest of the way was going to be under the trees, and these trees were low enough that I wasn’t sure we wanted to ride. I slowed Honey to a stop.

“Yep,” I said dismounting. Masi immediately appeared. “It’s time to cross over.” I pointed to the other side of the trail in the direction of Abraham’s dot. Masi padded across the trail and under the trees, then poked his head out like we were being slow. Shift hopped down, and I led the way with Honey, following the direction Masi went.

Once we got past the first several feet the lowest branches of the trees were above where we would be with the horses, and we remounted. We should stumble on his dot within the hour. It was past noon, but we were making great time. Masi was in the lead with me right behind him, and Shift behind me.

Bee whinnied suddenly and darted forward, just missing the side of me and Honey. Shift lurched sideways in her saddle until a tree branch knocked her down off the saddle. She slammed into the ground hard. Masi barely darted out of the way from getting trampled by Bee. Red dots appeared surrounding us. I spun, trying to see the creatures before the confusion settled just enough for me to recognize them.

Cocktrice, level 4

There were ten of the little buggers, and they must have spooked Bee. Honey danced sideways away from them. Then I spotted the bigger trouble. Two much larger creatures. Probably the parents.

Cocktrice, Level 12

One had bright blue feathers, and the other had green.

I fired a Powerful Force Arrow at the first, who darted after Bee. It slammed into the bird-thing’s back, knocking it sideways several feet. The other large one turned its attention to me. That was too much for Honey, who reared and knocked me off. I went tumbling to the ground, which turned into a quick roll while tossing my bow into my inventory.

I slammed my Force Shield with Lighting in it as several of the smaller Cocktrice jumped at me on the ground. Sparks went flying as a few hit the barrier. Three x’s appeared. A couple of the others hit the ground, but they were only stunned. My mana only dropped to half my bar, to my surprise. I’d expected that to take everything I had.

Two small X’s appeared on the map near Shift, so she must be okay. Masi tackled the one that I had hit with the Force Arrow.

The Green Cocktrice circled around me as I carefully climbed to my feet. I pulled my bow out, and the creature jumped at me, claws extended. I sent a Force Lighting Strike directly at it and Dodged. My remaining mana vanished, along with the little that had recovered. The Strike hit the Cocktrice in the chest and the beast screamed. The sound echoed through the trees and suddenly the Blue Cocktrice was much closer, along with all of the remaining little ones.

I slammed a mana regen potion and grabbed an explosive arrow out of my pack. I should have enough distance. “Fire in the hole!” None of my teammates was in the direction of the rushing mass, and I shot the arrow at the Green Cockatrice, who jumped closer a second before I fired. It was too late. The explosion was almost immediate given the distance. The sound knocked me back against a tree and my head made an impact with the bark. I slammed on my Shield. My ears rang and my vision flickered. I shook my head, trying to clear my sight.

Several more x’s appeared on the map, but my Shield stayed up.

It flickered and fell.

Something dug into my leg, and I screamed. It burned and I couldn’t move. The thing went flying but I couldn’t open my eyes.

“Mia,” said Hex. “You’ve been paralyzed and stunned. It’s okay. You’re okay.”

I couldn’t hear anything but his voice. Yet, my health bar was ticking down. The wound had to have a bleed effect on it. My arrow had been a little too close, and the explosion knocked my health bar down by a quarter. The attack on my leg had knocked it down yet again. Now, it ticked down to 10 HP, then 9.

Holy fuck - I was going to die here. I tried to move again and nothing. I couldn’t even open my eyes. Mentally I tried to click on a health potion. Nothing.

“The bleed will wear off…”

His voice didn’t sound convincing.

I shouldn’t have fired that arrow.

I’m sorry Hex…