Bold=Character speaking.
Italics=Character's thoughts.
[_]=Item/Spell/Ability.
Only Cut Once
There's an old saying. "Measure twice, cut once."
Though the tool of choice would be something a bit sharper than a pair of scissors, this saying rang true in Kalman's said, and it guided his thought process for the next ten minutes.
Kalman proceeded to carefully examine himself one final time.
On his feet, were the [Boots of True Freedom], crafted from the hide of a [True Griffin Lord] which provided him with a small agility boost, in addition to granting him the ability to always be able to walk and run securely, whether he be on mud, lava, water, snow, or just about anything else, and they also gave him complete immunity to mobility restriction spells. They had a beige color, reminiscent of a pair of military boots, but much more stylish, with an added pair of black greaves detailing a gentle but powerful flowing engraving as an added little vanity. The bonus on top was the once per hour active that would give whoever wore them, a short movement boost and the ability to phase through units, not a game breaking ability, but useful all the same. In addition, they appeared to be completely clean, with not a speck of dust, mud, blood or water on them, due to the extra room for an enchantment, which was filled up with one that would always keep them clean and free of wear and tear. Plus, it made them very comfortable, though this could be applied to all the other pieces of equipment.
On his legs, were a pair of pants, called [Ze'Prix Slayer's Greaves]. Another crafted item, these were from the hide of the King of the Netherdragons, the penultimate raid boss from the [Void Lord's Folly] quest-chain in Vanaheim, which concerned how the Vanir gods, jealous of the Aesir gods and their success, proceeded to summon dragons to tame and ride from another dimension with the purpose of using them as beasts of war against the Aesir. As expected, this turned out to be a disaster, and the Vanir gods, with the exception of two, were all turned into tasty morsel, and the realm itself became infested by nearly-immortal dragons from another dimension. At any rate, these greaves provided the wielder with a massive amount of elemental resists, enough that merely by themselves, they would halve the damage from even a 9th tier spell like Vermillion Nova, and they provided the same level of resistances against every other element. They were also good protection against any physical damage dealers, though there was better equipment if you wanted to specify your defense to be against purely physical damage characters. At any rate, they were of a dark brown/blackish leathery color, with the faint marking of the scales still being visible alongside cloth streaks of red and white on the side, where the threads met.
On his belt, was a relatively simple item, yet that did not diminish its effectiveness. It bore the name of [The Thirteenth Labor], and was a reward from a long and arduous quest chain, which tasked whoever undertook it to hunt down and slay 12 monsters, across the 9 realms. There was a hidden caveat to this though. Not only did one have to fight and defeat these monsters completely solo, but any buffs placed on the person from another player would count as an immediate failure of the entire quest chain and require one to start over from scratch. If one wanted to finish this quest, they had to track their prey over the 9 realms, find their spawn location, and fight and defeat them, completely alone, before anyone else attempted to ruin the hunter's day. Considering the fondness of humanoid players for PK-ing Hetermorphs, this was very time consuming, and Kalman often hunted the beasts in the dead of night, when few were online. But all those hours spent were worth it, for the belt itself massively increased the user's health, agility and physical damage dealt. It was quite unassuming in appearance, being a simple leather belt, with the only distinguishing part being a miniature emblem of a 9 headed hydra, the final boss, on the front.
The shirt was another crafted item, being named [Gift of the Stars]. Forged by a dwarven Guild-mate with a penchant for RP, High Fantasy and classical music, it was a beautiful silver colored shirt, with glorious engravings which made it look high class yet still not tacky. Created from Star Silver, one of the highest quality Prismatic Ores in Yggdrasil, with extra Data Crystals throw in, just in case, it was a shirt which could be described to help with nothing, yet everything. It boosted all the stats by a minor amount, but still noticeable, and it contained three spells which would activate automatically at the same time should the wielder ever drop below 25% hp. The first, was [Greater Starfall], a 7th tier spell which summoned stars to hit everything in a radius around the caster. They dealt damage of the elemental type [Sun], and could not be avoided nor blocked. This spell did not do much damage, but it could finish off someone who was at around 3-5% hp. The second spell was called [Astral Wish], and it provided the user with a full heal and restored all their mana, at the cost of massively diminishing their health and mana regeneration for the next 5 minutes, or until the wielder was out of combat. And the last spell, was called [Cosmic Infusion], which would simply buff the wielder's stats and give them increased minor damage resistance. All in all, it was a beautiful article of clothing, and Kalman believed that even if it had no enchantments at all, and offered no protection, he would still wear it, for it was crafted for him by the dwarf Florischl, a charming and gregarious man, and one of his own Guild Members.
The black armor covering the shirt, was simply called [Dark Triumph], and it boosted mana, magic offence and defense statistics. It also increased the wielder's physical resists, but not by much. By itself, this would not be worth a Divine Class. But this chest piece also reflected a third of the physical damage taken back to the attacker, and also burned the mana of the enemy spellcasters for each spell they cast on Kalman, with more mana being burned for higher tier spells, and dealt arcane damage equal to half the amount of mana burned. In essence, it punished the opponent for trying to kill him. A most effective strategy.
The shoulder pieces and gloves were also Divine Class items, but these were focused purely on offensive bonuses, with the shoulder pieces being named [The Eviscerator's Shoulderpads] and the gloves being named [The Gloves of Belial]. The former provided in addition to offensive statistic boosts, allowed the wielder's attack to ignore a large amount of his enemies' armor, and made it so that any untangibility effects to be ignored, allowing any warrior to always strike his foe. The latter also massively boosted the wielder's weapon skills, in addition to increasing likelihood for the wielder to score a critical hit, ensuring that any fights would be ended quickly. [The Eviscerator's Shoulderpads] were won in PVP a tournament held on Helheim, which Kalman proceeded to win after barely defeating a rather annoying Vampire Tank Player who specialized in defensive abilities and combat sustain, while the [The Gloves of Belial] were acquired by bringing [The Heart of Surtr], a raid boss on Muspelheim, and the feathers of a Player who had at least 25 levels in the Angelic race, to Belial, King of the Flame Hell.
The helmet, which was really more like a mask of ivory, with the face of a demon on the front, was named [Barbatos' Blessing] and it allowed Kalman to pierce through complex illusions, identify traps, and it showed a faint arrow towards the enemies position each time they went invisible or teleported away, allowing one to locate enemies even if they disengaged. In addition, it protected against any visual impairment effects, and it highlighted enemy projectiles coming towards Kalman, which could be evaded, blocked, and if done correctly with [Perfect Parry IV], one of his skills, to be reflected back towards whoever fired it. This could be done without the aid of the helmet, but the projectiles of high-level marksmen travelled so quickly that this was a difficult task, to say the least.
The last piece of clothing was a red scarf, which did nothing, but was enchanted to always sway in the wind.
One must always have time for style.
In addition to these items, there were 10 rings on his fingers, five on the left hand, and five on the right hand, each of them providing various stats, bonuses, immunities and spells.
On the left hand, were the utility rings.
They gave him the following buffs, with each ring having a specific purpose.
Immunity to time-altering effects and movement impairment effects.
Immunity to instant death magic and negative energy resistance.
Protection against attempts at divination and finding out his karma values, level, classes and race.
Protection against attempts at behavior disturbance and mental attacks and domination.
And a ring which allowed one to resurrect at basically no penalties, only losing small amount of EXP and the lowest-quality item of the owner.
Seeing as he had a World Item which took care of the divination aspect, it was replaced by a [Ring of the Blessed Unicorn King], which granted near total immunity to poison and disease, alongside all the buffs of a standard [Ring of Sustenance].
On the right, were the combat rings.
The first being a ring which restored 3% of Kalman's maximum HP every time he dealt damage.
The second giving him a boost to his [Teleportation] and [Dark Blink] spells, with the type of boost depending on the type of gem currently on the front of the ring. There were three gems, and one could swap between them at no cost each day. Currently, the gem was blue, which signified that after teleporting to a location, the owner would have reduced mana cost and increased spell damage for a few moments.
The third ring passively gave bonus damage to Humanoids and Demi-human opponents while reducing the damage taken from them, not by much, but the vast majority of Yggdrasil players were non-Heteromorphs, so it was still helpful.
The fourth was a ring which increased all damage dealt from critical strikes alongside giving Kalman a small window of invulnerability each time he scored one, though there was a cooldown between each activation.
And the last one reduced all his activatable item and spell cooldowns by a twenty-five percent, with the exception of the actives provided by the other rings.
The necklace, which was called [The Cursed Amulet] was of purely utilitarian aspect, inflicting a debuff which reduced all sources of healing by 15%. This debuff lasts for 10 seconds upon inflicting physical damage to the target. It could stack up to five times, reducing all healing received by 75%, and increasing Kalman's own by half that amount. It was purchased from the Auction House after the duel with the Vampiric Tank, when Kalman realized he lacked any healing debuffs to deal with drain-tanks.
And the last piece of apparel, the gift of his friend TeutoNHearT, or William as he was known in real life, was the World Item [Arrogance of the Dragon God].
As far as the lore behind the item went, it was amusing, but not particularly memorable. The item was a small but incredibly powerful bracelet with a black, white and red color scheme and dragon motif, worn by a supposedly undefeated warrior and a student of The First Dragon God, who himself had a deep hatred for all magic casters, which developed after a Lich turned his pile of gold into pure lead. Truly, there could be no greater sacrilege against a Dragon.
As far as the bonuses, there was a large amount. From an all-around stat-boost, to complete immunity to divination magic (with the added bonus of the wielder being notified whenever one attempted to cast a spell on their person), a spell-shield which would not only completely block, but also reflect the effects of any spell back towards the caster every 12 seconds, and a targeted, guaranteed stun that lasted for a whole 10 seconds, which could be used every hour on any target, even those immune to immobilizing and mind-altering effects. This included Automatons, Undead, and various other races which were supposedly immune to mental attacks. However, the spell reflect and stun would not work against those who themselves possessed a World Item, while the other defensive bonuses remained.
This World Item was actually found by accident, by SobreDauphin, a human bard, and a member of The Twilight Horde, while he was off questing in Asgard, and decided to gift half his coins and a large amount of food to a weak old beggar, an NPC which did nothing but beg for food from everyone that passed by, yet was never satisfied. When SobreDauphin donated to the NPC though, he must have passed some sort of hidden checkpoint. Apparently, this prompted an event, and the NPC proceeded to sing praises and compliment the generous bard. The next time he logged on, he found a new World Item in his mailbox, alongside compliments from the developers. Truly, as expected from the shitty devs, to have an NPC which everyone ignored, carry an incredibly powerful World Item.
When it came to weaponry, Kalman had many, though he only had two equipped. A daito, otherwise known as a long katana on his waist, and a claymore on the back. The katana itself was 42 inches long, in a scabbard of pure black and gold, while the blade itself was of a deep yet distinctively metallic crimson color, with the guard being the color of pure silver, and the handle being black, and the pommel being gold. The blade was enchanted to do lightning damage, among other things, with the game's glorious customization options allowing one to even be able to customize the color of elemental enchantments and spell effects, with the exception of a handful of spells, which would always be of a certain color, chief examples being [Brilliant Radiance], [True Dark], [Call Greater Thunder], and [World Break].
Carrying the elemental enchantments of [Lightning] and [Dark], alongside a progressively powerful progressively stacking armor shred which could potentially bring an opponent to negative armor, and an additional amount dealt as additional Pure damage with each attack, this blade focused on delivering a multitude of swift cuts to any enemy to potentially kill them in a single combo. Furthermore, the blade ignored all defensive buffs, which meant that any racial abilities which would reduce the damage of weapons, and any spells which reduced [Slashing] and [Piercing] debuffs were also completely ignored. They would not be removed, but the blade would treat them as if they were never there to begin with. Considering that with the right combination of abilities, one could potentially strike an enemy over 10 times in 2 seconds, this was a truly powerful weapon.
There were many occasions in PVP where Kalman killed undefended casters within a handful of seconds from full-hp, though this speed could never be quite as fast as the DPS of any Assassin players, with Kalman once witnessing a [Halfling Assassin] kill one of his Guildmates, a priest, in just under three seconds. Kalman himself did not craft this item, nor did he get it from a raid, but he acquired it by trading ten rare cash shop items with another guild to have them craft it for him. These two guilds were on very good terms, so such trades were common. It was completely worth it. He himself did not name the weapon, leaving the naming to the people who crafted it, and they gave it the name of [Last Breath].
In contrast to the pure beauty of the katana, the claymore could only be described as terrifying.
A massive chunk of steel, with a demonic skull serving as the pommel, a bone serving as the handle, and a cross-shaped guard, a long blade inscribed with various runes glowing in a faint orange color, this weapon abandoned all subtlety. Named [The Desolator], it lived up to its name, with it being enchanted to deal [Flame] damage in addition to reducing the stats of whoever it hit for up to an hour and feeding them back to the wielder, in addition, the blade passively had a chance to inflict [Fear] with each attack. In other words, relentless offence until the enemy burned to dust or tried to run away.
Seeing that all was as it should, and all his items, with each of them being of Divine Class items were equipped, confidence surged within him. After swinging each of the blades around one or two times just to get a feel for them, before casting minor spells like [Cone of Cold], [Blink] and [Lightning] into the nearby vicinity just to see how the spellcasting system would work, a massive weight was lifted off Kalman's shoulders, as at least the knowledge that all his items would work exactly as they did back in Yggdrasil, for the most part anyways.
After examining all his items, stretching his legs and flexing his muscles, Kalman saw that it was good.
"Fascinating. It feels as though I've been in this body since birth. I wonder how different it'll feel in my other form..."
For just a quick moment, Kalman thought to use [Clear Skies] to dispel the downpour, but decided that it could potentially attract unwarranted attention.
"Seeing as I'm on a road, I should probably try to head towards wherever these people came from. It's entirely possible there may be people still alive over there, and if these imps were an indication of strength, I could easily slaughter them, save the villagers and build a good foundation for friendly relations. Alright, let's go!"
Sadly, this plan would be killed in the crib before it even began. Though the distance was over a kilometer, Kalman ran it in less than half a minute. Sadly, no matter how fast he ran, he would be always be too late. When he arrived, he saw nothing more than flames and ruin. Corpses were strung up and cannibalized everywhere, not just by imps, but by other lesser demons and a pack of Zombies. The well was broken, the horses and other farm animals were slaughtered, houses were broken down and burning, and it seemed like this place would never hear joyous laughter or small children ever again.
Though most of the lesser demons did not pay attention to Kalman, the biggest one, a [Balor], a 4-meter tall, bat-winged and red-skinned monstrosity, with blue eyes and a big metal sword, clearly the boss here, gazed at Kalman the way one might look at a lost puppy. He was twice Kalman's size, and this gave the ugly bastard assuredness that this mortal would die like the rest. They stared at each other in silence , but the silence did not last long, as the demon soon bellowed in a deep and raspy voice, like that of a coal mine haunted by the dead miners, mixed with the very flames of hell.
"Human! You're alive! I wasn't expecting to find any survivors!"
The bat-winged demon spoke true, for there would be no survivors beyond one from this encounter.
That's the second chapter folks! As promised, the action will begin in earnest in the next one. Make sure to follow/favourite the story if you liked it, and leave any reviews in the comment section. Till next time, cheers!