chapter 2; The darkness

The darkness gave way to chilly mist, Samar saw the world begin to color like dawn breaking over mountains. Ahead of him was a gate, not the pearly one that he might hope for, but there were no demons hanging out on it. There was a bit of an underwhelming feeling honestly, it was just a wooden double door. The feeling that he was not alone caused him to look to his left and right. Beside him were maybe ten or eleven other shades. A whine of protesting doors took his attention, as they opened a dark hooded figure flowed out. By the curves of the robe he knew that it was a woman, a boney hand held a scythe that no farmer would use. Her face was completely veiled in shadows and her hair spilled out of the hood. Hair that looked wet with blood.

Samar could faintly hear someone’s scream of despair and someone else sobbing. More than despair Samar was frankly, rather annoyed at all of this. All the waiting for the greatest game of their generation, and he dies. The hooded figure flowed to a stop in front of them.

As it seemed to watch them the memory of the game's announcement came back to him and he began laughing. The hooded figure turned her attention to him, he explained “at E4 when they announced the games release date, they said it would be a game to die for.” he broke down, laughter turning manic, the stress of being in front of the Reaper flooding out in laughter “I would have never thought of taking that seriously.” from all around him the other shades began laughing as well, even the sobbing turned to a wet chuckle.

The hooded figure inclined its head “indeed, a game to die for.” she said dryly, even with her eyes hidden behind darkness Samar could feel her gaze as it drifted over him “Welcome” the voice was little more than a whisper but it had a **** behind it like a landslide. “You have been Sacrificed, as it has been written ‘The soul of a devout follower, willing for the sacrifice.”

From one of the shades to Samar’s left “is there any way to go back.” **** shook her head with a lot less formality “I will not sugar coat this, your bodies are in your homes, lifeless and soon to rot. Your souls have been sent here for the amusement of The One Above. I am **** and unlike the other Gods I have no schemes, no need for pawns. You are free to act as you see fit so long as you follow my two rules; Never do permanent damage to another’s soul, and Never try and harm an Elder god. I have six siblings, outside of them I do not care what happens to the other gods.”

There was another long pause and Samar felt an odd feeling that time was not flowing as he might expect it too. “You are my champions but I did not choose you, you are the ones that were without a Patron.” that stung Samar’s pride a bit “You will return to the living world, this world and will be placed in the lands you chose, in places that you will thrive in. If you die unlike other champions you will not ‘respawn’ as your people say, in a safe place. You, instead, will return to your corpse as a spirit and will need to repair it. I would recommend learning Vivimancy.” she paused again, and Samar got the impression despite being the goddess of **** she didn’t talk much. She locked eyes with Samar as if reading his thoughts, nodded then sighed “I tire of speaking” she waved a bony hand and Samar felt his mind flood with knowledge. Weirdly enough he now knew that Vivimancy was the magic of life and ****. That most people in polite society ignored the later half of the magic since that's what necromancers often used. There was a whole bit of knowledge about necromancers and your affinity for magic coming front your understanding of the said magic. Samar felt like he was in a deep dive into wikipedia and had to pull himself out before he was there for a week.

***

When he looked up he was staring at a mountain range. Looking at his feet then back up the mountains were still there. His outfit was different as well; Gone were the lucky boxers with hearts on it, gone was the captain planet hoodie. ‘Ahh shit’ Samar thought to himself ‘how long till they found his body.’ He shook his head, that life was over. They would probably find it due to the smell, though the landlord was terrible about following up on things, so it might be a while.

Samar took stock of what he had; he was wearing a dark green travel cloak, an old fashioned oversized leather belt, a pair of cloth pants, a pair of old fashion boots and a leather shirt, almost a vest but it went down past his waist. On his side was a small knife, and on his other side was a satchel. Opening up his satchel he reached in only to have his hand sink into it. A small screen popped up in front of his face showing about twenty inventory slots, taking up four of them was a wooden club, in the others one was a green vial with a 5X next to it and in a different slot a red vial with a similar 5X. ‘Interesting so things stack.’ There was also what looked like a water-skin, A cloth roll and a granola bar 10X. Reaching in he thought about grabbing the items and to his surprise he was able to pull out one of each with ease. He felt an innate ability to use Observe.

Granola and go: a chewy three segmented granola bar. When drunk with water (or any liquid) a single segment is enough for a meal. It will provide a saited feeling while providing the energy that a full meal would provide. Does not hinder one's ability for travel after eating like a normal meal would. Quality; Rare

Skin of water; a water flask that can hold 40 liters of water or 10.5666669 gallons. Quality; Rare/ Magic Quantity: rare

Draught of Healing; able to heal wounds up to level of major Quality; rare/ Magic Quantity: rare

Vial of Vile; potions of concentration, while not the stuff the great wizards use this is not a garden variety mana potion. These both refill your concentration and also increase the recharge rate of it and increase max concentration. It also tastes like if a dog ate some diarrhea then threw it up, creating the perfect storm of revolting smell, taste and difficulty of cleaning. Quality: Rare/ Magic Quantity: rare

Shillaly of wailing; a wooden club that is able to cast shocking touch on contact. Has two charges, each with a 24 hour recharge rate. Quality: uncommon/ Magic. Quantity: uncommon

Sleeping Roll: a rolled up blanket made of cloth Quality: common Quantity: common

Ok so a decent set up, Samar thought to himself then a thought occurred to him. Pulling out the blade at his side he used Observe on the small knife.

Iron utility knife: a multi-function knife. The blade has a small hook at it’s tip for skinning, in combate it would make for a mediocre weapon. Quality: common Quantity: common

He wasn’t sure what he was expecting but that was fine enough. He put away the food and water, slipped the Shillaly into his belt and examined himself.

Traits and abilities

Racial Abilities; Prolific breeder lvl-1, able to procreate with almost anything humanoid. Uses expanded at higher levels.

Not limited; scaled down version of limitless, you are able to learn any ability and have as many abilities as someone with the trait Limitless however your affinity with them vary. Minimum affinity capped at 20%.

Talented of tongues; you can speak and comprehend any language, however you are not completely fluent by default and may have an accent. Language understanding and fluency will improve over time.

Wings: grow a temporary set of wings, level 1-5 only able to glide, high levels controlled flight will be possible.

True Vivimancy; The magic of life, with life so with ****. Ability to use both sides of Vivimancy.

Natural at Vivimancy; in addition to having max affinity for Vivimancy there is no component requirement to use it. While normal healing components magnify its potency they are not required.

Overdrive; when what you have isn’t enough. Enables you to spend extra concentration to increase the power of your spells. (Note** Conversion ratio is not equal, dual casting doubles the cost of a spell, using overdrive triples the cost of a spell.)

Reading through them he had some questions, that in the description of Not Limited it literally said it was the scaled down version of a different trait. Samar got that he should appreciate that he even had a Patron but still, that's like getting the official title Side-piece. Samar shook his head and looked at his spells.

Spells

(Note* Spells can be doubled if both hand are used)

lightning bolt, “ ударная pука ” 1d5 electric damage (30 ft)

shocking touch. “шок” 2d8 electric damage (touch)\

Healing hands. “жизни рука” 1d5 healing (touch)

Necrotic touch “смерти рука” 2d8 necrotic damage (touch)

Samar raised his hand and spoke the word “ ударная pука” and an arc of electricity shot out. He saw his concentration bar take a hit then return to full capacity almost instantly. Using both hands he shouted “ ударная pука ” and true to form the arc was twice as large. If anything it looked like it was more than twice as large. Trying out Overdrive he summoned the mana to his hand to charge it then shouted “ударная pука” the bolt was as strong as the double handed but it took three times of Concentration than just going at it with one hand. With the basics down Samar began to make his way along the mountain game trail he found himself on.

In his previous life, most of his exercise came from hiking so this should be easy.