Daniel's P.O.V.
Thank you for waiting!
The update 0.5.1a of the 'Gamer' system has been installed!
New features:
Skill upgrades (tap to see upgradable skills)
Elemental affinities visible
Skill screen has been modified (not too much)
More status tabs
Perks added
Options screen added
That's all. We hope you have a happy life!
That's what I woke up to. It didn't seem too bad, but the changed skills… I checked immediately, and these were the changes:
Acheomensis (Active/Passive) Lv: 2/10 (61.5%)
Pervade your body and weapon with the power of the soul.
49 Mp/second
+31% to all stats
+11% damage
Every skill now had a level cap, and the descriptions changed a bit. Nonetheless, I didn't let it bother me too much. The skills I could upgrade were: Fireball, which became faster, Frost, same as before, Thunder, with a bigger effective range, and Aeroblade, with sturdier blades. Sure enough also the others knew of the update by then, if they were awake that is, thus I should've gone to check up on them… but I chose not to.
I stayed in bed, and checked the other news: the affinities and the status tabs. Basically, now the status screen was separated into 4 tabs: the stats, which was still the same, the affinities;
Daniel Samuels
Fire: 21
Ice: 18
Water: 0
Earth: 0
Air: 20
Electricity: 17
Nature: 0
Energy: 2
Undead: 0
Time: 0
Light: 0
Darkness: 1 (Blocked) [0]
Apparently, while I had the aptitude, something was blocking my ability to use darkness. Dammit.
Anyway, the third tab were my relationships;
John Romano: +100 (best friend)
Sora Samuels: +100 (father)
Nox Romano: +90 (uncle)
Pyra Sun: +20 (mysterious hero)
Star Polar: +20 (friendly but scary being)
Frost Polar: +5 (N/A)
And the perks:
Obtained perks:
Small mana capacity
Increases Mp by 50%
Increases Mp regen by 50%
Perk points: 4
Available perks:
Machine mind (1)
Cost:1 Pp
Allows total focus on a task for 5 minutes a day
Demon blood (1)
Cost:5 Pp
Unlocks partially your ? and grants the skill 'Demonic presence'
Unlockable perks:
Machine mind (2)
Unlock: buy "Machine mind (1)"
Allows total focus for 10 minutes a day
In theory, I would gain a perk point every five levels, or maybe two every ten? Whichever, it would be easily understood with some grinding. Having decided that I had been lazing around enough, I slipped out of bed, and made my way downstairs.
In the kitchen, the only one already awake was Nox. Looking out of the window, I noticed that it was actually quite early in the morning. I chose to let the two lazy bums sleep, and proceeded to make breakfast for everyone with the groceries John and I had buyed yesterday. In the meantime, I checked up on what changes Nox had seen from the update: everything was the same with him, but that was expected.
Together, we theorized that affinities were just like stats, so we should better get to training them. Also, I was indeed right, as perk points were awarded every five levels. I chose to grind my ID and level afterwards, unlock Demon blood (1) and see just what were those question marks. Just as I was done with that thought, Sora finally woke up, and started eating his breakfast, falling asleep once more after that.
Nox let out a small sigh, while I shook my head and smiled at Sora's sleepiness. Since it was as good a time as any, I told Nox my plan for the morning, and left a plate with breakfast for John on the table. Slipping in my room, I started spamming empty IDs. Something new came up soon:
*ding*
'ID create/escape' leveled up to 20!
Available dungeons:
* Lycan wolf dungeon (completed X3)
* Ape soldier dungeon (completed X5)
* Grublin dungeon (completed X2)
* Time dilatation (1:2 ratio) [NEW]
'Well… that's useful, I suppose. Right now, though, it's not what I wanted. Give me some stronger enemies!' I was thinking. In the meantime, I still hadn't stopped flipping my ID on and off. It took a good couple hours, but finally I got a new dungeon at level 25, the Small fire golem dungeon. Wandering downstairs again, I finally found John awake in the living room.
"Hey there, Dan! You get any good dungeons?" He waved at me, wearing his usual small grin.
"I actually wanted to ask if you wanted to join me for a test run." I shrugged "Hearing 'golem' isn't too reassuring, you know."
His eyebrow rose a bit at that. "Golem? Now that's new. By the way, I heard you got a perk called 'Demon blood', yeah?" I quietly nodded. " Ok, because I have one called Angel blood. Our mothers got some explaining to do." We both chortled a bit at his joke, but turned serious soon after.
I shook my head a little in thought. "This is suspicious," I muttered "our powers seem to be getting more and more like opposites. And yet, there doesn't seem to be any sort of reason for that. Plus, there's also that blank in the perk description. In the way it's worded, it looks like it just allows us to do something we were supposed to always have the ability to, but what could it be?" Both of us mulled over it for a while, and then a revelation hit John.
"Wait, what if my joke was unintentionally true, and in our families there were demons and angels?"
I shook again my head, much more firmly than before. "I doubt it. Unless it were quite far in our ancestry, we would have seen some sort of proof to that, however small. Nonetheless, we don't have any solid clue about that, so for now it's useless to try and make sense of it."
John jolted out of his semi-trance, and nodded with me. "Yeah, for now let's put our heads to something we can do. Like kicking golem ass, for example."
With no more words to be said, I opened the golem ID, and we both equipped our weapons and armor once more. Outside, no one was in sight, although that was kinda to be expected. As we made our way towards the center of the town, we could hear a lot of stomping gradually getting closer. Finally in sight, we examined our newest enemies.
Their forms varied: some were quadrupedal, others were some sort of insectoid centaurs, while more had a humanoid build. What they had in common though, was the overheated rocks they were made from, and the unbridled hate we could feel coming from them.
A Frost spell killed 2 golems instantaneously, and an explosive arrow between them shot pieces of frozen stone in every direction, staggering the mob long enough for me to jump into the fray. My blade cleaved the air, as more and more golems fell in pieces. They managed to circle me, and everytime one fell, another got a hit on me. My breathing was getting ragged, and even though John's arrows got rid of one enemy or two with every shot, he couldn't use anything too powerful, as he would risk hurting me too.
"Daniel! I have an idea! Buy me a couple seconds, then get outta there!" He shouted from the sidelines.
I did the first thing that popped up in my mind: I activated my Acheomensis, and took a page from Link's book, performing a spin attack. Finally with some space, I began to slash wildly around, sending Aeroblades into anything around me. With only a few stragglers remaining, I pulled back, allowing John a clear shot. When I looked towards him, my eyes almost bugged out of my skull at what he was holding.
"HADOUKEN!" He let loose of the mighty energy sphere, finishing off all the remaining golems. After the smoke dispersed, we saw just how much damage we had caused: the village was completely in ruins.
Battle over!
Killed: 15 Small fire golem lv:20 (Xp: 100×15=1.500)
Killed: 9 Small fire golem lv:21 (Xp: 110×9=990)
Killed: 3 Small fire golem lv:22 (Xp: 120×3=360)
Total Xp: 2.850
G collected: 7.050
Daniel level up!
Nox level up!
Skill level up!
Aeroblade: 16-17
The pop-up made us jump a bit. Scanning it, I realized what it meant.
"Seems like loot now is automatically collected. Good for us, I guess." I shrugged.
John chortled a bit hearing that. "True. Imagine if whenever we killed something gems kept appearing. Now that would be hard to explain."
Checking the effect of the fight on my status, my face blanched.
Lv: 23 (Xp: 750/250.000)
Hp: 410/2.580
Mp: 3.780/4.365
'I was THAT close to death?! Thank whatever gods are out there I bailed when I did!' I immediately called John, and made him use Dia until he ran out of Mp. I was still missing a couple hundred Hp, but those would heal quickly enough. I had definitely learned something from that: while way stronger that a normal human, I was nowhere near invincible.
Thus, one level higher, and several thousand G richer, I made my way to look for another bunch of golems. In the meantime, I did my best to make some crowd control spells, as I was lacking in that department.
Steel-nado lv: 1/100 (70.5%)
Converge wind all around you, then slice n' dice!
150 Mp/s
Requires a sword
Max time: 5 sec. (More will make you dizzy)
Mini meteor lv:1/100 (25%)
Basically an overcharged fireball. BOOM!
100 Mp/shot
Explosion range: 2.5 meters
Blizzard lv:2/100 (10%)
If you like snow, you'll love this! If not… run.
200 Mp/s
High chance of freezing the enemy
Range: 3.25 meters in front of the caster, or 1.1 meters all around.
With some new skills in my arsenal, the golems were much easier to deal with. Three hordes later, and Nox had leveled up again, along with Sora. Too bad that John and I were having some serious trouble leveling up again. At that point, we decided to simply steamroll it, and than going through it all over again at double Xp, thus we simply spammed highly powerful spells at every group of golems we saw, without worrying about Mp.
That attitude rewarded us a bit better, as John's Conjuration and Alteration both hit level 35, and the Hadoukenwent to 6. On my side, Blizzard was level 13, and Mini meteor hit 10. Both were upgraded with enhanced damage.
Once neither of us could find any golems, we returned to the middle of the village, and guess what? There was the boss!
It was something resembling Ifrit from Final Fantasy 11, but completely made of lava, and the head looked more serpentine, around 20 feet tall.
Greater fire golem
Lv: 35
Hp: 4100 (+1000) [5100/5100]
Mp: 3750
STR: 45 (+20) [65]
DEX: 30
VIT: 60 (+30) [90]
INT: 25
WIS: 10
LUK: 10
Perks active: Greater golem (+20 STR, +30 VIT, +1000 Hp)
John glanced at me. "Got a plan for this behemoth?"
"Yep." I nodded. "You pepper it with piercing arrows, I keep him off you, and we can figure the rest as we go."
He shrugged nonchalantly. "You had worse ideas. Let's do this."
I rushed towards the golem, and slashed at its legs. My attack only left a scratch. I jumped back to avoid a kick. One of John's arrows hit it in the chest. It left a hole around 2 inches wide, and 4 inches deep. Its Hp lowered a little bit, so at least that worked somewhat.
I moved in again, and this time used Acheomensis to make my attack stronger. This time, I left a noticeable cut on its leg, Hp dropping a little again. I was about to drop the spell, but a giant fist hurtling towards me changed my mind. The hit chipped away a couple hundred of my Hp, and sent me rolling.
I got up, and saw the golem getting peppered with magical arrows. These ones were different, as they seemed to dig far deeper than the first one. I finally noticed the difference: the tips were spinning like drills. Snapping out of my reverie, I added my spells to the mix, with Blizzard in one hand and spinning Wind spears, which I dubbed Gale drill, in the other. Together, we managed to bring the golem to around a quarter of its health.
It let out a gigantic roar, and summoned a wave of fire in every direction. I did the first thing I could think of, and made the Blizzard vortex all around me, absorbing the heat and protecting me. Once it died down, I let the icy cloak die down, just to leap away the second after.
The golem had advanced towards me while I was distracted, and tried to squash me. Sword up again, I kept avoiding and dealing attacks. The golem disengages when its Hp got dangerously low. It spat a torrent of fire at me, and I countered with the strongest Blizzard I could muster. Our spells kept pushing each other back, but I was losing Mp fast.
Lucky me, John came to my aid, with an overcharged arrow straight in the golem's face. The hit brought its Hp to almost nothing, thus we dealt the final hit. I slashed with all my might its neck, nearly severing the head, when my sword broke. John used me as a spring, and launched himself onto the golem's head, slamming a Hadouken into the crack left by me, completely obliterating its head.
Battle over!
Killed: Greater fire golem lv:35 (Xp: 20.000)
Total Xp: 20.000
G collected: 15.000
Loot: (x1 Infernis claws) (x1 lava ring)
Nox level up!
Sora level up!
Just as I closed the pop-up, another took its place.
Skill level up!
Acheomensis lv: 4 – 6
Blizzard lv: 13 – 14
Gale drill lv: 1 – 3
Due to straining yourself to keep up with a vastly stronger enemy, you gained 1 VIT!
Due to coming up with a semi-decent strategy, you gained 1 WIS!
Due to many close calls, you gained 1 LUK!
Wind affinity +1!
Ice affinity +3!
Closing also that one, I sighed. 'Now I've gotta find a new sword. Woo-hoo! Just what I needed…' Shaking the negativity outta my head, I checked the loot from the boss.
The claws matched my chestplate quite well, and could be used as secondary weapons, due to the small claws on the fingertips, around an inch long. They went down to my elbow, protecting fully my forearms. The ring, instead, seemed made of gold, with flame-like patterns all around, converging to a small ruby.
I looked to John, who was observing the ring just like me. "Who should take it?"
He gave a noncommittal hum. "Depends on what it does, I guess. Let's Observe them."
Lava ring (Rare)
An enchanted gold ring. It has flame-like patterns all over.
-50% damage from fire
Grants medium heat resistance
Infernis claws (Unique)
Clawed gauntlets made of steel infused with darkness. They have claws on the fingertips.
+15% unarmed damage
-10% physical damage
+10% darkness boost
'Whaaaaaat? Darkness boost?' Immediately I checked my chestplate, and of course, it had the same effect, making me facepalm to my idiocy, as I hadn't thought of checking it before. Nonetheless, since my Blizzard could easily counter fire, John took the ring for himself, placing it on his middle finger, under his gauntlet.
It was almost midday, so we returned home for lunch. Not much to be said about that. John decided to go check out the small library they had in town, along with Nox. As such, Sora and I went to get myself a new weapon.
The kid was, understandably enough, very excited, as he seemed to have inherited my own love for weaponry. Through his chatter, an idea for my new weapon sprung to mind. I just had to make sure it would be feasible.
Finally, we reached the forge. It was a stout building, made fully of stone, with smoke slowly rising from the top. We entered, and almost immediately I started sweating from the sheer heat coming from the back, most definitely where the forge was located.
"Be right there with ya!" Yelled a loud and gruff voice from the back. Soon, a bulky dragon made his way to us. He was extremely buff, to the point of it being almost ridiculous. His dark red scales were blackened in some points, his head coming just half a foot higher than mine. He was quite short for a (I assumed) middle-aged dragon, but I stilled my tongue.
"Well, would ya look at dat! The talk of the town, right here in me forge!" He let loose a laugh strong enough to almost topple me, then slammed his paw on his chest. "I'm Vulcan. So, what can I do for ya?"
I took a second to right myself. "Yes, right. I'm Daniel, if you didn't know. And this," I pointed to the small wyvern next to me, "is Sora. Now, then." I leaned a little on the counter. "I find myself in need of a new weapon."
Vulcan smiled widely at hearing that. "Why, of course lad! But first, any preferences?"
I tapped my chin in thought. "Well, assuming you know what I'm talking about, I wanted a naginata with a detachable blade, so that it could be used also as a simple sword. You following?"
He nodded slowly, "Ye, I did see a couple of those things. Never made one, but I can. Still, the detaching mechanism will cost ya a lot, since I need to make it very sturdy." He slid me a piece of parchment and a quill with some ink. "Think ya can make a rough sketch of what ya want? We can go on from that."
I picked up the quill and drew what I wanted: the top part was quite similar to a nondescript 1 and 1/2 handed broadsword, although Vulcan acquiesced to my request to make the blade a fiery orange, with the 5 foot and 10 inch pole black. The mechanism was left to Vulcanus's discretion, as I didn't have much knowledge on the subject. After a good amount of haggling, we came to a deal for 5.700 G for all of it.
Bidding Vulcanus farewell, Sora and I started wandering around town aimlessly, trying to find something to do. Suddenly, a stray thought hit me. 'I forgot to enroll Sora and Nox in school!' Apparently there was one, since I remembered seeing one during that morning's killing spree. Trying to remember where I had noticed it was, I navigated us through the streets, and luckily my 60+ INT helped me remember the way. It was still open, for whatever reason, so we entered.
The structure was fairly easy to navigate, and soon enough we found who could be considered as the 'headmaster' of the school. The discussion was quite uneventful, so I'll spare you the details. In short, John was supposed to swing by later, to deal with Nox's enrolling, while Sora was good to go, and would start the day after. With that dealt with, we finally left to go home.
On the way we met John with Nox, whom were just done with their own studying. I notified John of what he needed to do, so he backtracked to deal with it. Sora and I, on the other hand, had other plans. Sora and Nox were quite weak compared to me and John, thus I wanted to train them some more. Firstly, they'd need a good fighting strategy, something I was more than willing to provide. Plus, Sora relly needed some better DEX to fight effectively. We were going to fix that.
And thus, another training montage begun...
Well, everyone, I'm back with another chapter. I know it's not much in the way of story, but I really needed to get this out of the way. I apologize for the long wait, but I really didn't have it in me to write this, but it had to be done. Plus, I've been woking on some other projects, both personal and for some new plot bunnies that sprung up in my head. And for those of you that think that the thing with angels and demons and crap like that is a huge cliché, and it is a stupid idea, 1) this is MY story; 2) I have this quite planned out, and this story will span many different worlds. This is barely the tip of the iceberg for what I have planned.
Now, thank you for taking time to read this. Please, review to let me know what you think, follow, favorite, and I'll do my best to come back sooner.