'Levels. Gain EXP and grow as many as you can.' 'You need to unlock more weapon forms.' 'Your number of Masteries is the key.' 'Awaken the swords and you will gain even greater power.'
"Guys I have no idea what any of you are talking about." Technoblade complained as the voices all tried to advise him on how to processed.
He was in his private room after dinner, laying down on a bed that was just a little too small for him, a large, ceremonial golden bell resting on his chest that he was disinterestedly flicking to help calm his nerves.
He might be different from other Piglins, not having their mindless obsession with gold, but that didn't mean that the ceremonial bell didn't hit something deep within him. For him, having a bell at hand was more important than a sky overhead, so he was glad to find that the oddly weak sword gave him access to the contents of his Ender Chest, where he had ten such bells sitting around.
Sadly, he had given away most of his items before he had died. His Netherite Armor was gone, along with many of his weapons, which he had gifted to friends as his final farewells. All that remained in his Ender Chest was some miscellaneous things.
-10 golden bells.
-A few dozen potions.
-3 netherite scraps.
-The ceremonial golden armor of his people.
-A bit of obsidian.
-1 Tome of the Undying.
-Philza's cane sword, which his friend had gifted to him, saying that if the Ender Chests really were connected to one's soul, he wanted Techno to carry a piece of him with him to the next life.
-The music box that Tommy had once given him… which he never got around to throwing away.
-His faithful netherite pickaxe, 'Toothpick'.
-30 wither skulls, just in case.
-100 golden apples and 100 golden carrots.
-And roughly 160 tons of cut emeralds.
Looking at the short list and thinking about the vast stores of items and equipment that was left at his old home, he couldn't help but to feel like a peasant.
First thing's first, he would need some better armor.
It was night out, but that didn't bother him. Piglins were native to the Nether, which didn't have a natural day/night cycle sleeping pattern. They slept when they felt tired, and Technoblade had been in bed for far too long to be tired anymore. He'd probably be up for another day or two before he needed to sleep again, unless he did something ridiculous even by his standards.
Opening his bedroom window, he brought out a potion of high jump, a potion of slow fall and one of invisibility, and then leapt out into the night sky. He jumped from rooftop to rooftop, his footsteps not making so much as a sound as his heavy form landed on the fragile ciel tiles of the city houses without breaking so much as a single piece.
Technoblade rapidly made his way out of the city before stopping to catch his barrings.
"Hill lands to the north. Probably the best place for finding an abandoned mine shaft." He mumbled to himself.
He wanted an enchanting table and a full set of enchanted iron armor by the end of the night. It wouldn't be much, but it would be a healthy start, and more durable than his ceremonial gold armor. He had the obsidian he would need for the table already, so he just needed to get a little bit of diamond.
Until then, he supposed the gold armor would have to do.
The potions wore off as he entered the forest line and came across his first monster.
It was a large rabbit, about as big as one of Techno's old foxes, and with a sort of horn sticking out of its head. For some reason, Technoblade could see 'Horned Rabbit lvl 2' floating about its head.
"Well aren't you a strange looking guy." Technoblade said looking at the local wildlife with interest. He brought out one of his golden carrots and held it out as an offering. "Hey, want a carrot?"
The rabbit shrieked and lunged at him with its horned pointing towards Technoblade's heart.
Techno grabbed the rabbit by the horn in midflight, stopping it dead and then held the creature up to look into his cold eyes. The rabbit kicked frantically, but it had no leverage to work with. "You shouldn't have done that." Technoblade said, grabbing the rabbit by the neck and twisting its head hard.
*Crack* +3 EXP
The rabbit stopped moving as its neck was snapped like a twig.
"Whelp, guess we got something we can have for breakfast then." Technoblade said cheerfully as he held the rabbit to the blue ender pearl in the middle of the legendary sword, thinking to put it away for later.
But rather than being added to the Ender Chest inventory, the rabbit's body was consumed into nothing.
[New Weapon Form Unlocked: Horned Rabbit Sword]
The Legendary Holy Sword started to shrink and twist into a spiral horn in Technoblade's hand, appearing to become more of a pointy shank than a sword.
"...Hagh?" Techno said, holding up the new weapon for inspection.
[Horned Rabbit Sword (0/5) | Rarity: Very Common | Base Damage: 3.5 | Equip Bonus: (Skill)Sonic Thrust (Unmastered) | Proficiency:0%]
"Well this is new. What happened?" Technoblade said, scratching his head as he looked over the blade.
'The sword gets new forms whenever you feed it something new.' 'E' 'You should kill everything in the forest and feed it to the sword.' 'Yes! Blood! Let's make this forest bleed red!'
"Freaky, but I like it." Technoblade said, grinning as he brought out one of his golden bells and tied it to a tree branch. "I was going to need to get energy for enchantments later anyways."
He rolled his arms, loosening them up and then let his punches rain down on the metal surface of the bell. The sound rang load, echoing all around them and making Technoblade's wild blood sing with it.
Out of all of the ceremonies of the Piglin, the bell was the only one that had ever stirred anything in him.
"One of US! One of US!" His voice boomed with laughter as he indulged in the primal rush of energy through his core. He continued at it, until his ears picked up other noises and he understood that the bell had had its desired effect. "Well well, I rang the dinner bell and you all came running." Techno said as he grinned out at the horde of monsters that had been drawn to him by the power of the bell. "Too bad it isn't you who will be eating tonight."
Strange balloons, monstrous wolves and bears, more of those odd rabbits and other monsters that Technoblade didn't know how to describe. There were hundreds of them, with lvls ranging from 1 to 15.
The monsters never stood a chance.
They all rushed towards him as Technoblade lifted up his potions of strength II and swiftness II and took a strong swig. He felt the rush of power into his arms as he drank and then with a mighty swing, he skewered one of the wolves through the head, pinning it to the ground as its skull cracked into several pieces.
Technoblade grinned as the wolf's body was sucked into the sword and the blade changed once again, this time into a long two handed blade with a wolf's skull pattern for a scabbard.
"Blood! Blood for the blood god!"
Alright, so maybe Technoblade overdid it with the whole killing thing, but in his defense, the monsters had just kept coming and coming, and the more he killed them, the better he felt. He ended up forgetting all about mining for iron in the slaughter.
He didn't even notice when his potions had worn off, as that level of strength had become the norm.
'In this world, you level up by killing monsters for experience, and you grow stronger as you level up.'
"Well that is nice to know." Technoblade said, opening up his status menu. He was now level 19 and all of his stats were around three times higher than before. He felt like he could take on an army.
But he understood that this improvement didn't just apply to him, and there were probably hundreds of sweaty nerds in this world who had milked this advantage far more than he had been able to in just a single night.
If he wanted to bring down the government in the future, he'd have to be sweatier than all of those sweaty nerds put together. He'd need to find a monster spawner and make a monster grinder, the same way Philza had taught him.
'Get a party!' 'Experience gained by one member of a party is shared with all.' 'You can have a party of 8 members before getting experience penalties, so there is no downside to having one!' 'The party menu is under the management folder in your status page!'
Technoblade had no idea how the voices always knew so much stuff, but he wasn't about to complain. Working in a group to bring down the government was better than working alone, so long as they were people he could trust.
…Though they didn't necessarily need to be people.
As he walked through the town in the early morning, heading back towards the castle, he spotted a large circus tent, with a bunch of strange animals in cages, and two people seeming to be haggling over something.
A place where one could purchase beasts? How convenient!
As the store owner finished he dealings and the customer left with his horse-like thing, Technoblade walked up behind the neckless fat man. "Hey!" Technoblade said, getting his attention.
The little man nearly fell over as he bent backwards, trying to see Technoblade's face above him. "Y…Yes."
The man seemed very frightened as he saw Technoblade, which could probably be forgiven. He hadn't had a chance to wash all the blood off of his golden armor, and after feeding a Wither Skull to the Legendary Holy Sword, it had turned into a massive, pitch black, two-handed sword, similar to those used by wither skeletons, only with a skull like design for a hilt. It gave off a black haze that was super cool to look at.
[Wither Knight Sword (0/25) | Rarity: Rare | Base Damage: 17.5 | Equip Bonus: +4 Strength (Mastered) | Passive Effect: Wither Poison | Proficiency:87.4%]
"I'd like to purchase some wolves. Do you have any?" Technoblade asked the man.
"W…We do. Yessir." The man said, rubbing his knuckles nervously.
"Alright! Let's see them then!" Technoblade said with a wide smile before being led back into the tent.
Turns out, the people of this world used a currency called 'coins' rather than emeralds, but the trader didn't seem to mind at all when Technoblade brought out an emerald the size of his head and asked if he could use it as payment.
He was surprised though that he could buy a breeding pair of wolves, a two-tailed fox and an Ursa(a black bear-like monster that gave off a faint blue glow), for just a single five pound emerald. Man, tamed beasts in this world were cheap as dirt! He also got a 'mystery egg' on the house.
"Man! You guys are great! I know you are just trying to butter me up, but consider me a loyal customer!" Technoblade said after having all of the animals bound to him through magic.
"Customer service is our top priority, yes." The fat little man said, rubbing his hands together awkwardly as Techno saw to his new allies.
"Is there anything else you got back there that is interesting?" Technoblade asked, looking back towards the tent.
"Ah… well… not… Sir please don'..." The man tried to stop him, but Technoblade pulled back the fabric and looked into the other section of the tent, a section that was completely full of people in cages.
"...You are a slave trader?" Technoblade asked, giving the short man a look.
"...Yes." He squeaked in response, afraid of what this big, scary and violent looking Demihuman would do about him trading Demihuman slaves.
But to his surprise, Techno started to laugh.
"Well why didn't you say so!? I could use a couple of slaves!" Techno said. looking about with cheerful interest at the broken and hollow faces of the slaves.
"You… You could? I mean, what kind are you looking for?" The man asked. "If you would like, I could suggest some real virgin beauties for you."
"...Are you suggesting that I buy a sex slave?" Technoblade said, his voice going dark as he towered over the man. "Are you insinuating that I am the kind of loser who can't get a girl?"
"Ah… well… I just…" The slave trader didn't know what to say… as Technoblade bent down into the fetal position.
"You don't have to be a jerk about it… it's just really hard to meet a nice girl, you know?" Technoblade mumbled, having had one of his insecurities accidentally poked by the man.
Try as he might, Technoblade's reputation made it really hard for him to make friends, let lone lady friends. Tommy spreading all those rumors about finding him a 'nice man' didn't help matters.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. Honest." The slave trader said, feeling both frightened and confused. "What kind of slaves are you looking for then?"
"...Younger is preferable. I can train them myself, so they don't need to be experienced. Fresh orphans who are still spiritually broken and will be easy to mold into whatever I want. Again, a breeding pair would be preferable." Technoblade said.
His brutality in talking about the slaves, seeing them as nothing more than beasts of labor, sparking wonder in the slave trader.
Now this was a man who knew how to use his slaves.
"I think I have the perfect pair."
R.I.P. Technoblade.