Lewis Key
Annoyed.
Work
was annoying. Working on the day
that Nutrua went live took annoying to a whole new level. To add insult to injury it was busy,
that was annoying. Lewis had
started at 4:30pm, just in time for the end of work rush. On any other day this would not
have been much of a problem. In
many ways Lewis didn’t mind the four to one shift. Two people worked the after work rush and that helped deal
with the rush. For the most part
the customers were all business people and knew the process. Of course today they were all idiots,
annoying idiots. The second
employees was new and also an idiot.
It was annoying to have to answer questions for both customers and the
other employee. Annoying.
After
about two hours of having a line, the rush became a trickle then stopped all
together. At 7:15pm the other
employee left. He tried to talk to
Lewis towards the end of his shift, but Lewis wasn’t interested. The turnover at this branch was so high
that Lewis didn’t bother to learn his name, it had been offered but Lewis chose
to forget it immediately. Then he
called Lewis “Lew” for the third time and Lewis was done. Lewis didn’t bother to return the other
employee’s good-by as he left the store; Lewis doubted he would be back, never
considering that he might be the cause.
. With
the other employee gone the store was empty. Lewis had worked this shift enough to know that it would be
dead now till he left at 1am. This
shift had three regular customers and on average four or five randoms. The desire to play the game gnawed at
him, but he also didn’t want to go into the game and have a customer
interrupt. The regulars who came
in were professionals and they came in at the same time every night, he could
schedule alarms for them. But the
randoms were a problem, one-off customers who just happened to stop by that
night. It was impossible to plan for them. To make it worse this night was shaping up to be a slow one
and time was dragging.
After what most have been at least two hours he looked at the clock and
was shocked to see that it was only 7:45.
How annoying. He had to try
and distract himself from the anticipation and boredom; it already felt like he
had been here for ten hours and there were still five hours left, with a half
hour lunch in two. To distract
himself he started messing with the interface of the TAP, electing to skip the
tutorial. He navigated through the menus and experimented with changing the Sensory Engagement. He was pleased to see that he could
bring up an image and keep it there with his eyes open. This was great he would be able to at
least interact with the menus while working. Now that he could react if someone came in, Lewis felt
comfortable enough to take his time to get to know the menus.
He accessed Internet, which
opened up to Google; he let the page hang in his vision, then went back to the
menus and adjusted the contrast.
This was cool and all, still all he could think about was that damn
game, so annoying. He was very
tempted to just go into the game, the thought of all the other players getting
to know the game while he was working drove Lewis nuts. But even if he could play the game and
keep his eyes open, he really didn’t want to, not for his first time. Maybe there was some program that would
notify him when a customer came in.
Though, he thought, my life is never that easy.
The
clock told him ten minutes had passed.
He closed the search browser and navigated the menus to Applications hoping to find something
to make the time move a little faster.
The list was in alphabetic order, Lewis scrolled through slowly. The list was relatively short, however
with App Builder near the top of the
list he assumed that the list would soon expand. Aces, was a
poker game which allowed you to play against other people. The next was Alarm, an app that offered a verity ways to help you control your
TAP use. This seemed like is would
be worth looking into, even better it was free. He started to download the app and was disappointed to find
that it would take ten minutes. So
he cycled through the rest of the list while he waited. There were a few more games, nothing
fancy mostly mods of old FPSs or board and card games. There was also an app called MovieZ that streamed movies. Lewis knew
that would be a decent way to kill a few hours.
He
opened the Alarm app, and started to
explore the different settings.
There were three possible modes:
Timed, Proximity, and MapZ. Timed was pretty self explanatory, you
could set it for the amount of time you wanted to use the TAP, or for a
specific time of day. Proximity
was exactly what Lewis was looking for.
This mode would interrupt your activity when there was movement within
an adjustable range. The app
had an informational blurb that warned that this used your eyes so someone
could come behind you without being detected. The message continued that this particular program came with
audio detection but that was not a perfect solution. The blurb suggested that you sit with your back to a wall
when using this setting. The small store was empty and the only was that anyone
could get behind Lewis was by walking in the front door, so that was not going
to be a problem.
Lewis
checked the clock again it was almost 8pm and there was a regular who came in
at 8:15. He was about to go into the Alarm
menu, prepared to watch a movie to test out the proximity mode, when his
curiosity about MapZ got the better
off him. He backed out of the menu
he was in and triggered the MapZ information
blub. It told him that this
feature connected the Alarm app to
Google maps and local public transportation. You could sinc up the map of your commute and pick a point
on the map then the TAP would pull you out of your activity when you reached
that point. Lewis walked to work
but he could see how this would be useful for commuters. It would be prefect for when Lewis went
to his grandma’s house three clusters away, a trip that took eight hours and
required four transfers.
Now
that the mystery had been solved he was ready to play with the Proximity feature. He had ten minutes before the regular,
a funky bike messenger, was due to arrive. Navigating through Alarm
to Proximity he set the distance to 30’. With the store being a small 20’ cube would be more then
enough. Then he closed his eyes,
sort of. Black like his eyelids
descended, the store disappeared but the menus remained, shining brightly
against an infinite backdrop. He
quickly flipped over to the MovieZ
and selected the first action movie he came across. He settled back in his chair. Checked the clock, it read 8:08. Then he started the movie.
There
were previews. Normally Lewis
would have found this annoying, but this movie was just a test, what he
actually watched was not important.
He watched the previews without seeing them, waiting for the door to
open. After the first preview he
was concerned that it wasn’t going to work, then he realized that he didn’t
know how to get his eyes open manually.
He fretted about this through the second preview. He didn’t want to open his eyes and
have the messenger come, but he also didn’t want to be stuck without his eyes
for the rest of his life. As the
third preview started Lewis was saved.
The video feed faded from view reveling the small box of a store. This really worked great, not only was
the transition smooth but the door had not even fully opened.
The messenger strode in, he may have introduced himself to Lewis once,
but his name never stuck. Lewis
had always thought of him a White Dreadlock Guy, or WDG. The acronym had stuck, as it was also
an unrelated sticker affixed to the bag of said messenger. It was always the last thing
Lewis saw as the messenger left.
He always wore brightly colored pants and a leather jacket but it was
the WDG sticker and the dreads that stood out.
The dreads were typical white guy dreads, that is to say, gross. He had used some form of wax and maybe
peanut butter to make them. This
mixture had caused three main dreads, much bigger then the rest. One stuck out to the side of his head
at a slight downward angle seeming to deify gravity. Another hung down his back, while the last hung like a dogs
ear. There were five smaller
dreads that perpetually hung in his eyes causing him constantly toss his
head. Lewis couldn’t understand
how he was able to see well enough to ride a bike. Frankly Lewis thought that WDG was annoying.
“Welcome to PPC. My name
is Lewis, how may I provide you with excellent service today?”
“Hey Lewis, why do you always say that, no one is here, I come in
everyday.” WDG looked through his
dreads, and then tossed his head.
“Company
policy.” Lewis shrugged then
gestured for the other man to come close.
He whispered, “They bug the store.”
“No
Way,” WDG whispered back. Lewis
could see his eyes shifting back and forth as if he was trying to spot the
device. Then his eyes locked
with Lewis’ “Ya know, your name tag says Lew.”
“Ha,”
Lewis laughed. “Yeah, I know, it’s
really annoying.”
WDG pulled his messenger bag around and
pulled five boxes and four large letters.
Lewis started to scan them in.
“Hey
Lewis have you heard of this Nutura game?
Everybody is talking about it.”
“I
can’t wait to play. In fact I was
just testing the Proximity app to see if I can play at work.”
“Cool,
does it work?”
“Yeah,
it does, surprisingly well. I am
pretty excited to start the game.”
“I
was messing around with MapZ. It
is off the hook. It allows me to
pre program my favorite delivery routes, and then it displays the route in real
time overlaid on the real world, it’s so cool man. The arrows hang in your eyes showing you where to go.”
“Do
know if you can share the route?”
“Yes!
That’s not the half of it. It
allows you to record a run, and then share it. You can compete against your
friends. Mostly races and tricks,
its pretty basic stuff, but it adds a new level to riding. But the real competition is going to be
Nutura. I already created my
character, have you created yours yet?”
Lewis who was had finished the transaction was going to say something
about how he was going to do it as soon as WDG left, but he wasn’t given the
chance. “I did it on a fifteen
minute brake, I am a Lizard Wizard, I named him LizZard.”
Lewis
was annoyed that the guy wouldn’t leave, but at the same time he wanted to pump
him for information. He curiosity
got the best of his annoyances.
“What was it like, what happened?”
“First
there were tapestries covered with templates to start building on. Then once I had narrowed it down to the
lizard I customized him. He will
control the earth magic, man!”
While
listening Lewis came to his senses having realized that if this guy left he
could just do it. “That sounds
great, I think I should sign in as soon as possible.” He said, not trying to be
rude but hoping the guy would get the idea.
“Oh
I dig, man, I dig.” It seemed that he had. “The packages are all set? Good, I will see you in Nutura. Look for LizZard, The Lizard Wizard.” With that WDG turned on his heel and
walked out the door, the sticker caught the light as he left. The silence hung in the air, almost
ringing. It was time.
Lewis
settled back in his chair and accessed the Proximity
menu, then using the same settings as before he activated it. The infinite black closed in on
him. He maneuvered though the
menus to NUTRUA. Activated
it. The word rushed in on him and
he entered the door nestled in the crux of the R. He stepped through to a world of
wonder. However it was all lost on
Lewis. Quickly shifting through
the myriad of character he quickly picked the standard thief template. Agile and quick that was what he was
looking for. The brown pants and
vest he changed to black, and then added a black short cape. Lewis also kept his weapons simple, with
two small daggers. Lewis had a
greater plan, the weapons were to be his means, and poison was to be his ends.
Lewis evaluated his character; he felt
there was something missing. It
just seemed too generic. So he
started to look for something to add.
Lewis decided to go big and looked at changing the race. There were many options but he quickly
settled on the Feline race. He
liked this as it allowed him to use his claws like weapons and see in the
dark. With the new race, and handy
claws, he decided to mix up his weapons as well. So he switched to a single bigger blade, a machete. This he holstered horizontally
across the small of his back. Held
this way it was easily accessible while being out of the way, functional not
ornamental.
These
changes certainly helped. But
there was still something missing.
Lewis wanted to be fear inspiring.
Being a man-sized cat was threatening, but Lewis wanted to be
chilling. He maneuvered though the
accessory menu seeing if anything jumped out. Then it did, a mask that was the answer. He settled on a light gray, almost
white, mask. It was featureless,
only two slanted black eyeholes.
Lewis then added a red streak that ran from the left eyehole to the
bottom edge of the mask. The
featureless mask with the one red streak certainly added a level of
intimidation. He was ready.
When
he locked in the character Lewis was asked to name it. He had always found naming a video game
character annoying. It always
seemed so useless and time consuming, annoying. Lewis never found that he had that kind of attachment to the
characters that he played. He much preferred games that provided a
named character that had role to play in the story. This game felt different. Maybe it was the detail of the character creation process,
or it could be the message that said that this character would be permanent. Regardless, Lewis thought that he
needed to take this seriously.
He
also was concerned about how much time he had put in now and knew that some
customer could walk in any moment and he wanted to get to the game proper. Unfortunately he had put lots of
thought into how he would fight, but no thought what so ever in a name. Lewis started with names derived from
his tool of choice, poison. After
eliminating names that came from arsenic as lame, then he remembered a plant he
had read about. It was a small
plant with purple flowers called Night Shade. He could do something with that. But first he went back to the image of his character and
added purple highlights to the inside of his cape. This change actually worked better then he thought as the
color helped it blend in with the shadows. It also nicely offset the red strip on his mask.
Lewis entered the name, KnightChade. As if summoned by the Naming, KnightChade leap into the room
and quickly killed Lewis. Which
caught Lewis completely off guard. His surprise turned to satisfaction when he opened his eyes
and saw the world through the eyes of a cat. Then Lewis stood up.
Lewis grinned as he pulled a sword from thin air. His throat had been viciously ripped
open and when he tried to talk, he could only hiss. KnightChade sense that this was the time; this was when he
got to finalize his vision. He
held up a paw and extended his black claws, watched while the black darkened
and took on a purple oily shine.
KnightChade
was ready and looked up from his claw to see that Lewis was leaping to
attack. It was a frantic
attack. Lewis was swinging and
hacking away with his sword viscously and it was all KnightChade could do to
stay ahead of the blade. So far he
had not drawn his blade and was tumbling and leaping trying to somehow get
behind his assailant. He saw
his chance when Lewis made an upward hack. KnightChade went into a feet first slide, slipping below the
blade by a few inches; he reached out and clawed Lewis’ leg as he slid
past. He could feel his claws
scoring the skin, and then leaping up and into a forward handspring as the
sword whistled past.
The attack continued however now it was starting to slow. The change started with the leg that
KnightChade had scratched. It
wasn’t that Lewis started to swing the sword with any less speed or
veracity. However it was as if the
leg was having trouble bending at the knee. As KnightChade dodged away he noticed that he had some time
to pause, as now Lewis was forced to drag the offending leg. Now it seemed to have spread to the
other leg, and though he could still swing the sword Lewis was stuck standing
in the middle of the floor. Soon
the sword stopped as well. Lewis
stood there, gnashing his teeth and twisting his head. KnightChade stepped forward, and with
one blow of his machete he removed Lewis’ head, the only part that Lewis could
still move.
KnightChade was elated the poison worked just like he had hoped. He turned to the tapestry that he had
emerged from and walked to the door that lay behind it. Even better the Proximity app had
worked. It had worked far better
then Lewis could possibly have hoped.
In the middle of the pitched battle a customer had come and gone, one of
the randoms. Lewis had
opened his eyes and dealt with them and returned to the battle seamlessly. He was very pleased with how intuitive
and smooth the whole process was.
Walking through the door he found himself in a wooded glen, KnightChade
paused, and took a deep breath.
The glen was still and peaceful, with a slight breeze, leaves rustling
comfortably. It was on this breeze
that KnightChade’s sensitive ears picked up the clash of weapons. He followed the sounds of war he and
came upon the sign. It was wooden,
with sloppy capital letters, which read.
Every Man for Himself Battle
Level One Only
This
was not was he was looking for, sounded messy. He turned and walked in the opposite direction. It did not take long for him to find a
second sign. This one read.
Nutrua
Nearest
Town
That
seemed more like what he was looking for.
The entry into Nutrua. The
sign was placed before a massive tree trunk. Walking closer KnightChade saw a tear shape door set in the
trunk. He pushed it open and
stepped into a building lobby.
It
was very plain, a window opposite a door and a desk, not even a plant. The wall between the window and the
door were devoid of decoration just bare wooden planks. Opposite the door was a non-descript
desk; a dark figure stood behind the desk in stark relief to the sun streaming
thought the window. KnightChade,
paused waiting to see if the figure was going to attack, he reached for his
machete.
“Hi
there! Wow aren’t You scary looking.”
It was a girl standing behind the desk KnightChade’s sharp eyesight
helped him to see her bow and quiver of arrow sitting in the corner. He had quickly wrote her off as an
immediate theat. He settled into a more relaxed stance keeping his eyes moving
around the room. She was
pretty with long black hair, pulled back in a loose ponytail. She was dressed in the deer skin skirt
and vest of a Native American. The
name DreamCatCher6969 floated above
her head. Looking at her
KnightChade could think of nothing to say. He wanted to be clever or scary, but he was drawing a blank.
So
he decided to be mute, he would never speak. So he looked at her and remained silent. She paused waiting. “Umm…ok.” She said when she realized
that no response was coming.
“So I am a employee of The Bank of Nutrua. It is my job to explain how the bank works and help you get
your accounts set up correctly.”
She paused again, and again he said nothing. “Or you could just read this brochure?” she held it out to
him.
KnightChade
silently accepted and opened the brochure. With a look of relief DreamCatCher69 sat down behind the
desk. It took only a few moments
to absorb the information. The
real problem was that KnightChade had limited access to funds. He was broke. In the World he only had $160, and 100 if it was already
spoken for. He entered his account
number in the required line then indicated $40 to be transferred. Signing on the last line, KnightChade
folded the brochure and handed it back to the customer service rep.
“Great,”
she said as she filed in into a drawer, “Any other questions?” She paused for a moment. “Of course not. Well good luck out there. If you are trying to be scary, you
nailed it.” Not without a feeling
of satisfaction KnightChade turned and left the building. But now it was time to go home,
leave work that is. So he opened
his eyes.
The
shop was as it ever was. Small and
gray, empty. Annoying. Lewis had a few task to do to close up. First he filed the last boxes and
letters. Then he cleaned off the
counters and swept the floor. His
mind was not in the work; no he was scheming of what to do to when he was back
in Nutrua. Locking the door
behind him he started the walk home.
Luckily it was not far, maybe twenty minutes, and on this particular
night it seemed to take no time at all.
All he could think about as he walked, his TAP piping music directly
into his ears, was what he was going to do when he got back into the
world. As he closed his door he
had figured out his strategy.
To
call it an apartment was unfair to other apartments. Even calling it a studio would have been extreme, a
coffin or maybe a closet would be more appropriate. It was just a single room, the width of a twin bed, which is
what Lewis had stuffed into the far corner. At the foot of the bed a cabinet and a dresser faced each
other with a slim walkway between them.
The dresser held a small TV; the rest of the surface was covered with
game containers. If one had looked
in the drawers, they would be surprised to see that only the bottom of the
three drawers was holding clothes.
The top drawer held older games, which Lewis had not played for a long
time, while the middle held books.
The
books had never been opened. Lewis
had bought them from a store that was closing. The old man who sold them to him said they were worth
money on the electronic auction market.
The old man had also said that they would be burned if they were not
sold, so Lewis was pretty sure that they were not worth the paper they were
worth. He had never bothered to
put them online to see if they would sell. The combination of his laziness and the money spent never
failed to annoy him when he accidently opened the drawer.
The
cabinet held a mini fridge and a single table setting. The surface was covered with a
microwave and a hot plate.
Normally he would watch some TV and eat, then play games till he fell
asleep. Tonight he was too excited
to eat. He grabbed and energy bar
from the fridge and consumed it while he stripped off his work clothes. He checked his work schedule while and
was thrilled to be reminded he had the next day off. Naked he flopped down on his bed and closed his eyes, mentally
preparing for an epic session, Lewis TAPed into Nutrua.
KnightChade
entered the bank from the same doorway he had come from before. DreamCatCher69
was gone, replaced by a dwarf or something; KnightChade ignored him as he
exited the building. It was night
in the town. Of the dozen
buildings in town only two had lights on.
The bank that he had just left was one, judging from the noise issuing
from the other he assumed it was a bar or tavern. KnightChade thought for a moment about checking it out and
mingling. Then he considered that
with him playing mute and that he thought that other people were annoying. That would probably be a bad idea. Instead he turned to find the way out
of town.
This
turned out to be easier then expected.
The town consisted of a short main street that turned into paths at
either end. KnightChade flipped a
mental coin, and then headed to the path that lead north. However before he
reached the edge of town he found a third trail running off to a forest roughly
northeasterly. As this was the
path unknown, this was the path he chose.
The path branched off from the main road, between two buildings. The windows on both buildings were
dark, and the doors were open implying that at this point they were
unclaimed. The effect was a dark
valley that once he had entered he realized that he was vulnerable to an
ambush. Already he was please that
his feline eyes allowed him to see in the dark.
He
approached the end of the buildings carefully, seeing that no one was in
waiting started walking down the path.
After the buildings there was a field of thigh high grass the length of
two buildings, whether this was room for expansion or killing ground,
KnightChade was not sure. The field transitioned into forest and far in the
distance mountains rose like shadows on the horizon. The plan had been to find a tree to hide in and then pounce
on any unsuspecting victim who came in range. But the darkened path from which he had just emerged from
presented an opportunity that was too good to pass up.
It
took a moment to climb up one of the buildings and get into position. KnightChade flattened himself on the
edge of the roof. From this
vantage point he could see anybody approaching either direction, and also kept
him out of sight. His sharp vision
could easily see into the valley between the two buildings and this was the
direction that he expected his pray to come. He did not have to wait long, as tall humanoid figure had
found the path and turned to follow it.
When KnightChade focused on the figure the name BrutAl flashed above its head.
BrutAl
seemed to think he was safe as he nonchalantly made his way between the
buildings, from the way he walked with his held his hands out it was clear he
could not see in the dark.
KnightChade waited till BrutAl took his first step out of the shadows to
pounce. He dropped into the
shadows between the building, behind his victim and sinking his claws into both
shoulders as he landed.
BrutAl reacted by squealing in surprise then leaping forward a move
which pulled the claws from his shoulders but leaving deep scores across his
back.
BrutAl
then rolled and struggled to his feet facing his assailant with a long sword in
his hands. Having caught his victim
by surprise, KnightChade was just able to step aside from the first overhead
swing the sword. BrutAl followed
this attack with a horizontal swipe, which KnightChade easily avoided by
leaping back. The down side was
that he found himself backed up against the wall of one of the buildings. BrutAl smiled, thinking that he had
KnightChade trapped then tried to reveres his swing for the killing blow. His smiled turned to a look of
surprised dismay as his arms refused to move, leaving his sword pointing off to
his side at the terminus of his last swing.
Quick
to take advantage of the pause, KnightChade dove to the opposite side of
BrutAl, pulling his machete as he rolled back to his feet. BrutAl turned and lunging sideways
tried to skewer KnightChade with his blade. KnightChade had become tired of the cat and mouse game,
waiting for the poison to take its full effect. He side stepped the awkward lunge and brought his machete
around in an arch that ended in BrutAl’s neck. 1 kill +1 xp, flashed
across his vision immediately after his blade cut into his enemy’s neck. KnightChade pulled his machete free,
and the body dropped to the ground.
It landed sprawled out, KnightChade searched the body, and in the wallet
he found twenty Ngs. These he put
directly into his stash account.
That was the best $20 he had ever made. This game kept getting better and better.
Stepping
back from the body he almost tripped over a small statue that had appeared by
the body. It was a credit to his
cat like reflexes that he was able to catch his balance and not fall on his
face. The statue was about six
inches tall and under closer inspection KnightChade saw that it depicted the
moment at which he had hacked into BrutAl’s neck. He reached out and touched it, suddenly the fight started to
play itself out before his eyes.
The projection of the fight moved faster then it had actually taken
place. It ended when KnightChade withdrew his blade from the then defeated
BrutAl, the image froze, Rate the Fight,
thumb-up and thumb-down hung in KnightChade’s vision. KnightChade reached out and touched the thumb-up symbol,
which flashed once and then the image dissipated as if sucked back into the
statue, which grew about a half an inch taller. The implications were clear; first every fight would be
recorded and visible to anyone who stopped to look. Second, once watched the fight could be voted on and if more
people like it the statue would grow, hence attracting more attention. If it was disliked the statue would
shrink eventually disappearing.
KnightChade
was just thinking that he had spent too much time with the statue when he heard
voices.
“Be
careful! He was on the roof before
that was how he got the drop on me.”
This must be BrutAl, back from the dead.
“What
a sneak.” A second voice implied
that BrutAl had gone, most likely to the bar to find help.
“Not
only that,” BrutAl continued, “he uses poison, it induces some kind of
paralysis. So make sure that he
can’t get you with his claws.”
KnightChade
had dived into the grass at the first sound, waiting to see how many of them
there were. As they passed he saw
that there were only two. If he
was careful he thought that he might be able to take them both out. That would really show that pissant BrutAl. The two shadows paused at the edge of
the clearing.
“Well
it seems that he has moved on.”
BrutAl said, “Look there is
a small statue? Did he leave that?”
“No,”
the second voice said, “I have seen one before, they appear after a fight, you
can watch the fight and then rate them.
Its actually a pretty cool system.”
“Ok,”
BrutAl replied, “Let’s go find the bastard and then we can come back and check
it out. I bet that he is in the
woods over there, waiting for someone to sneak upon. I think that we should come up with a strategy so that he
doesn’t get the jump on us again.”
“I’ll
hit him with my fireballs, he wont get the jump on them. What more strategy do you need?”
“Can
you still hit him if you are being paralyzed?”
“You
said that it took a few minutes to set in, right? Well I think that I can get off three or so fireballs in that
time. So no matter how agile he is
I will hit him with at least one.
Then you can finish him off, if he’s still alive. So the strategy should be that I’ll head
into the woods first, and you follow a little way back. But you can’t be too far back, because
if I do miss I don’t want to be left hanging in the wind.”
This
had all been said as they tromped along the path towards the forest. KnightChade tracked them silently, eavesdropping
to there conversation. When his
new pray put their plan in action KnightChade was also ready. He pulled his machete out of its
holster. The first time that he
had attacked BrutAl he had used his poison to test how it worked in game. This time he wanted to see how quickly
he could dispatch both adversaries.
After listening to their plan he knew that speed would be the difference
in this fight. Speed and surprise.
His
first move was to pounce on BrutAl, driving the machete straight down into the
triangle between collarbone, shoulder blade and neck. 1 kill +1 xp. He left the machete hilt deep as he sprinted the few
yards to the owner of the second voice. This was the first opportunity KnightChade had to see
who he was attacking, as he had been hiding in the grass till the right moment
to make his move. It was a tall
pale elf wearing the dark robes of a mage, with black hair pulled back in a
tall topknot. His face and hands
were covered in tribal tattoos.
Tattoos that turned red as he began throwing fireballs towards KnightChade. Unfortunately for him KnightChade was
expecting them.
When
talking before the mage, whose name was ZephEr32, had said that he would be
able to get off three fireballs.
However under the direct attack he was only able to get off two, and
both missed. KnightChade was on
him as the second fireball left his hand.
KnightChade lunged forward and with one swipe of a claw he tore out
ZephEr32’s throat. 1 kill +1 xp, Double kill +2 xp.
ZephEr32’s body crumpled to the ground.
This
took KnightChade by surprise he had not expected that this would be considered
a double kill. However when
he turned he saw a statue rising from the ground. This one was different from the statue from his first
battle. That one had been small
and had depicted the final moments of the battle. This one was significantly bigger; the scene depicted
a completed battle with one figure standing vigorous. The three figures rested on a pedestal, two on the knees
heads down back to back. The hilt
of a blade jutted from the shoulder of one, the others head hung much lower
then it should. Between them stood
a statute representing the victor.
In it’s out stretched paws a scroll sat as if being offered to
KnightChade. First he looted the
bodies, collecting another $60. Then he took the scroll and unrolled it on the
pedestals, reveling two columns of writing on either side of an empty
field.
You have gained a level
!
Or
create a new Skill now [
]
You have reached Level 2
Once KnightChade checked this
You can build on your SK
box, new writing
appeared.
Check here to build [ ]
Illustrate skill with stick figure
KnightChade
did this quickly, using two stick figures with arrows showing directional
movement from one to the other. He
then labeled this new skill, Shadow step. After the skill had been named, the image shifted. The empty field was replaced with two
images, one was a smaller diagram of what he had just completed. The other was a stick figure swiping
with claws; this one was labeled Poisoned Claw. New writing appeared below the two
skills. To finish return scroll
to statue. DON”T FORGET TOKEN.
This
last sentence was flashing. He
twisted the scroll together and placed it in the paw from whence it came. When it had settled in its proper
indentation, the scroll changed to match the color, and material of the
statue. KnightChade heard a “click”
and noticed that there was disk of gold, nestled among decorative ivy, front
and center on the side of the pedestal upon which the figures stood. This must be the Token. Reaching out he gingerly took it; he
also took a scroll that was hidden behind. This scroll was directed to the mind behind his eyes.
This is your Token, protect it, because you only get one. Place the Token anywhere to create a
safe place for your character to save and recover. Experience gained through fighting will only be credited if
you have your Token during the battle.
KnightChade
looked at his Token. There were
two spaces on the Token, one above the other below a picture of his face. The top was a bar divided into five
units, two of which were filled.
The filled boxes glowed lightly.
Below was an empty space; reaching out with a claw he saw that it was a
dial that he could spin to the left or right. Poisoned Claw appeared in the space when spun to the
left, the new skill Shadow Step appeared when spun to the right. He guessed that the skill that was
displayed in this space would be improved by leveling up. He wondered that if he left it blank
would he be able create a new skill.
He wanted his poison to work faster so he set the dial to Poisoned
Claw.
With
that set up KnightChade was ready to find what it meant “to place it
anywhere.” He carefully placed it
on the ground. He was almost
afraid to let it go, the scroll had said to protect it. However he did let it go and as soon as
it touched the ground it began to grow.
It continued to expand till it was about three feet in diameter. When it had stopped growing a light
rose from it. KnightChade stepped
into the light.
Lewis
opened his eyes. Back in his small stuffy apartment, clocked in gray shadows.
Annoying. So the Token was the exit point from the game, that made sense, he
thought. He looked at the clock;
he had been in the game for about and hour and a half. He had so much more time to explore
Nutrua. Lewis felt something that
he had not felt in a long time; excitement and maybe he was a little
happy. Just a little. He closed his eyes and re-entered the
game.
KnightChade
stepped out of the light. The
night air was clean and sharp, the wind played with his fur. He breathed deeply, feeling alive. He picked up his Token, and then placed
it in his wallet. He looked to the
looming shadow of the forest up ahead.
BrutAl had though that he would be hiding in the trees, which was really
a pretty good idea. The statue now that he had leveled up and taken his Token from
had shrunk to about a foot tall.
The figures making it up had also shifted, showing a miniature
KnightChade nearly decapitating ZephEr32 as he lunged past him.
Turning
his back on the statue, not bothering to watch or rate the battle, KnightChade
started towards the forest. He was
surprised to find that he was grinning behind his mask, contemplating his next
ambush. His next kill.
