Be careful what you wish for

Interesting was not what John found as he sat bored in Latin class, listening to Mr. Carlson drone on about verb tenses and conjugation. This period and the one before it, Mathematics, hadn’t gotten any better with the appearance of his powers.

‘Maybe if I had enough points to pick up a skill, I’d get something from my Latin text,’ John mused. ‘Most of the spells in fantasy books are in Latin so maybe I could have learned some kind of spell creation skill.’

He hummed as he idly flipped through his text book, his mind wandering back to the last, really unproductive, two class periods. His uses of Observe in the last hour and change hadn’t revealed anything that hinted towards the supernatural and that left him a bit disappointed.

‘Really hope that quest wasn’t a big waste of time,’ John griped, pulling up his character sheet out of sheer boredom. His eyes gravitated to his mana bar.

‘78 out of 82. That’s most of it regenerated,’ John thought, using his pen to quickly work out the math, ‘With the drain from Craftsmanship, it’ll take me about twenty five minutes to reach full.’

John frowned as he noticed that his pen seemed to be running out of ink. A few strokes later saw the end of the writing implement's life. With nothing better to do, John threw an Observe at the depleted pen.

John studied the display and the pen in his hand. ‘It’s out of ink, but still has a point of durability. Is that because the pen is out of ink, but still intact? I wonder if I can use it with Craftsmanship? It had a breakdown option, right?’

Curiosity began to plague John’s mind as he toyed with the depleted pen with his fingers. And with no interesting subject matter or attractive classmates to subtly ogle, John was unable to resist the temptation to fiddle with Craftsmanship.

‘If making something with the pen is too expensive, I just won’t do it,’ John reasoned, and with his hand obscuring the pen from view, used Craftsmanship upon it.

The pen vanished like the steel and wood from before and the popup for Craftsmanship formed.

Select the item you wish to convert to into its raw material:
Black Ink Pen - 1 Small Unit of Plastic. Cost 10MP.

John held back a grimace. He hadn’t thought about conversion costs and ten mana was a bit of a steep cost, especially since it was only the first cost in the potential chain. On top of that, the yield was only plastic, and a small unit of that. But he couldn’t just abandon the experiment and leave what he could make from a simple pen be undiscovered.

‘Ten mana isn’t that much to see what I can use that plastic for,’ John reasoned as he selected the pen.

The item has been converted. Do you wish to use it?
Yes / No

‘Well that’s a nice feature,’ John thought as he pressed ‘Yes’.

Select a crafting option:
Craft
Improve
Repair
Enchant
Breakdown

‘Guess since I only have raw material right now, ‘Craft’ is the only one I can use,’ John noted, seeing the crossed out options. He selected ‘Craft’.

No known Recipe for selected materials. Craftsmanship level limits creations to simple shapes (sphere, cube, cone, etc). Do you wish to continue?
Yes / No

‘Looks like I can’t just make anything out of it,’ John internally sighed as he saw that he was limited by his level without a recipe. Still determined to make something, he clicked ‘Yes’.

Select Form:
Sphere, Cube, Cone.

With no real preference, John hit the first option, which brought up a new screen.

Select Crafting Method:
Instant Craft: Create selected item instantly for 10 mana.

Slow Craft: Create selected item over time. Spend 1 mana every 4 minutes for 40 minutes. Total Cost 10 mana.

‘Can I afford to spend another ten mana?’ John questioned, eyes flashing over to the clock mounted over the classroom door. He had five minutes left in this period and lunch followed right after. By the end of his lunch period, the knife would be done, restoring his mana regen to full for the remainder of the school day.

‘Using up ten mana now isn’t that much of a loss,’ John rationalized, his finger hovering over the Instant Craft option. ‘That’ll still leave me with over fifty to use Observe with. Hopefully I’ll find someone or something for the quest.’

His mind made up, John hit the button. The screen blinked away, being replaced by a simple notification:

Crafting complete. Useless Bauble added to inventory.

John dismissed the display and opened up his inventory, pulling the bauble into his hand. It was a lumpy sphere of plastic the same white color of the pen that had been sacrificed to create it.

‘Well, it is what it is,’ John thought, dismissing the popup and stowing the bauble. It wasn’t all bad; at least he’d successfully used Craftsmanship, gaining some experience for it.

‘And maybe I could try enchanting it. Better to ruin that then something more useful.’

The ringing bell broke John out of his thoughts and he joined his classmates in rushing out of the boring and stuffy classroom. He slipped into the hallway and began to trudge his way towards the cafeteria, hunger beginning to creep in.

‘Hopefully lunch won’t be too expensive,’ John thought, reflecting on how he acquired his funds for his meal. ‘I wonder if I can use my powers to make money. I guess I could make stuff with Craftsmanship and sell them.’

Lost in his thoughts as he moved through the throngs of people, John was unprepared as he was bumped into by a fast moving figure.

-1 HP

His eyes only caught a glimpse of brown hair atop the head of a slender figured woman before she quickly ducked around a corner.

John rubbed his arm where the hurried young woman had hit him.

‘Maybe I should focus on upping Strength or Endurance,’ John thought wryly, a little embarrassed that getting knocked into by a girl had actually damaged him. ‘It can’t be that hard to raise them, right? Leveling up should give me stat points, but none of the stuff I’ve done has given me any experience.’

Deciding he could ponder on that while eating, John resumed his trek towards the cafeteria. He had only gone a few steps towards the stairwell when suddenly the world jolted, a sudden shift that caused John to nearly fall over.

You have been pulled into a Trap Barrier. You may only leave once all hostile entities are defeated.

John stared at the popup as he righted himself, dismissing it after a moment. His head pivoted around, eyes wide as he looked for any sign of the indicated ‘hostile entities’. There was nothing in the hall with him, no enemies, no classmates, nothing.

“Well, this is creepy,” John said aloud, his voice oddly loud in the vacant hall. “What the hell is going on?”

Cautiously, John made his way through the empty corridor. His steps echoed far too loudly for his liking and John was beginning to feel his neck strain as he kept twisting it expecting an attack to come from wherever he wasn’t looking.

Several minutes of walking in isolation with only his paranoia for company ramped John’s anxiety up, which brought with it a raise of his irritation.

“Maybe this is some kind of early level training dungeon thing,” John said aloud, grasping on to any line of logic to calm his mind, “and the enemies are some kind of low damage slimes for me to get used to combat with.”

Any further half-panicked musings were cut off when the sound of breaking glass cut through the eerie silence and John whirled around to see a winged figure land upon the hard floor at the far end of the corridor, the clank of taloned feet joining the chorus of raining glass.

She had an undeniable bird-like appearance; her wings and the matching feathered dress and boots reminiscent of an owl, a comparison furthered by her yellow eyes that bore an angry expression when she leveled her gaze at him from behind a fringe of white hair. And then she pointed her glaive at him.

She leapt at him, wings flapping to propel herself forward. John froze for a second, before his mind kicked into gear and tried to find an out.

‘I don’t have any attacking skills,’ John’s thoughts raced as the flying warrior woman drew closer, ‘and I don’t think Hex is going to do anything. Maybe Charm can work?’

With no real other option, John raised his hand and cast Charm at the charging bird woman. There was no visible effect; no glowing ball of light or pulsing aura shot from his outstretched hand nor was there any visible change to his target. She kept charging, and John had two thoughts: one, that he just wasted fifteen mana, and two, that he was most likely going to die.

Contrary to his fatalistic thoughts, the bird woman’s wings folded in, and she landed upon the tiled floor, skidding to a stop a few meters away from him. Her yellow eyes didn’t show any sign of diminished anger, though her brow had furrowed as if in thought, and those striking eyes focused on her non-armed hand.

It was then John noted three things: First, that hand held a green gem that pulsed like a beacon, the light that was stronger on the right side of the gem. Second, she was short, her head coming level to his chest, though her wings peaked above that. And third, she wasn’t in the best shape. Numerous wounds were visible on her arms and face, none of them overly severe, but taken as a whole painted a somewhat gruesome picture.

With her approach halted and John’s brain no longer trying to process impending ****, he realized that Observe might give him information that he could use to ensure he wasn’t mutilated by her very sharp glaive.

‘I guess that plus six is from Charm,’ John thought, grasping on to the most mundane part of his Observe of the winged woman. ‘But is that bringing the score up from negative forty-six to forty, or is the effective score negative thirty-four?’

“Where are they?” Aeolia spoke, her low voice cutting through John’s ruminations before he could process the more weighty information. “I know they made this Barrier, so tell me where they are.”

John stared at the wounded woman for a moment, trying to work out how to respond. When her weapon bearing hand twitched, John threw up his hands in a placating manner in front of him. “Hey, um, hi. I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’ve had these powers for, like, six hours and all I know is that I can only get out of this Trap Barrier thing once all the hostiles are dealt with. Hell, I don’t even have any attack skills.”

Aeolia narrowed her eyes as she suspiciously studied John. She opened her mouth to say something when a sound reminiscent of sharp nails running across the tiled floor began to echo through the halls. A few seconds later, a trio of hound-like creatures rounded the corner behind Aeolia, their movement unimpeded by the shards of broken glass coating the floor.

The hounds were not beings of flesh and blood, but appeared to have been crafted from vines shaped into canine form, with teeth and claws made of wood. Yellow, sap-like saliva dripped from their verdant jaws as they honed in on their targets and they began to growl and advance.

Before John could cast Observe to find out just what was attacking them, Aeolia spun to face them, her face contorting with fury.

“So the Tracer Crystal was right,” she snarled, dropping what John assumed was said crystal to grab her weapon with both hands, then kicked off the floor in a forward lunge, her wings spreading out to turn her lunge into a glide.

Her aggressive move was met by a trio of howls that signaled the counter charge of the three vine hounds.

With his vision unblocked, John quickly cast Observe on the lead hound.

Before John could dismiss the display, another popped up.

New Quest: Gamer’s First Combat

Time to lace up those bootstraps and get down to business.

Reward: You get to continue living. What, that’s not enough? Fine. $1000.

Bonus Objective: Keep your HP above 50%.

Bonus Reward: Lightweight Combat Attire.

John dismissed the popups, not letting the content of them distract him as Aeolia neared the alpha of the pack. John’s eyes widened when he saw the blade of her glaive begin to glow with a wispy green aura as she hefted it over her right shoulder.

She let out a harsh battle cry and swung her weapon in a downward arc. The green aura grew during the swing, growing nearly a meter in length and filling the corridor with an ear piercing whistling cry. The extended blade met the alpha and tore into its viney head straight on, cleaving right through the hound’s skull.

Aeolia flapped her wings to gain altitude and vaulted over the downed beast. She flew over the other two and twisted in midair to strike one of them. However, as she performed her maneuver, John noticed her left wing twitch in an odd way. A second later he heard her fail to **** down a pained grunt as she swung at one of the remaining hounds. He watched as the glow of her glaive faded and the strike missed her target.

Aeolia landed and skidded to a stop near where she had entered, teeth bared in both pain and frustration as the two remaining hounds drew closer to her, circling her just outside of her range.

John watched as the hounds and the bird woman began their standoff; Aeolia pivoted slowly in an effort to keep both of the creatures in view and the hounds gradually tightened their circle waiting to make an attack.

‘Am I really just going to stand here?’ The thought burned in his mind as he swallowed a lump that developed in his throat. While the logical side of him knew he had no skills to fight with, and his low physical stats wouldn’t help much either, the rest of his being hated just staying in the same spot while the obviously injured Aeolia squared off against their assailants.

‘There has to be something I can do,’ John thought, his mind racing as he reviewed his skills. ‘I don’t think Charm will work. Same with Hex, they don’t look like they're using any magic. Amplify might work, but I don’t think I can use Observe on her glaive from this distance…’

John’s train of thought broke when he saw the downed alpha stir and pull itself to its feet. John watched in horror as the hound’s split head began to glow a sickly purple as small vines sprouted from both halves and began to stitch the severed pieces back together.

The alpha turned its healing body towards Aeolia, whose back was now turned to it. John was about to shout a warning, but a horrible realization struck him that caught the words in his throat.

‘If I yell to warn her, it’ll give those other two the chance to attack her,’ John thought, his imagination playing out the scene. ‘But if I don’t, then that one will….’

John’s fist clenched as he wrestled with the dilemma he found himself in.

‘I have to draw its attention,’ John thought, the idea somehow not driving him into a panic. The day before, he couldn’t even fathom standing up to Frank or any other bully. But in the moment, the choice to not just stand by and let someone, especially an exotic bird woman, fall without trying to help was not a path John wanted to tread.

The alpha’s head had fully healed and it moved as silently as possible, ready to strike at **** Fae’s exposed back. Then, something hit it in the back of its head. A lumpy sphere of plastic fell to the floor with a dull clank. The hound turned to see John, his arm still extended and his breathing heavy as sweat built up on his brow.

The hound’s eyes flashed and yellow sappy drool dripped from its maw.