Shrek brought his practice sword down in a powerful overhead stroke in an attempt to cave in the top of my skull. I swung upward with the dagger, deflecting his strike. I swiveled the angle of my arm in the same motion and used the momentum to slash at his throat. He leaned backward, dodging my attack, then stepped forward attempting to catch me with a left hook punch to back of the head. I rolled forward and away from him and his fist swung harmlessly over me. Turning back to gloat, I caught a foot to the stomach. A long woosh of air was pushed out of my body involuntarily as I bent over, clutching my gut and trying to remember how to breathe. Then, I ate an uppercut. I looked up at him from my new position on the flat of my back – a view I’d become entirely too accustomed to in the last week.
“We’re never going to get to that dungeon at this rate,” Juniper said, not even bothering to look up from her book. She’d been studying shamanism with an orc mentor for the past week and was quickly leveling, herself. It was actually a little annoying how quickly she was catching up to me in levels and surpassing me in skills. She was a natural fit for the class, being that shamanism generally required negotiating with spirits. Juniper, being a spirit herself, had a natural leg up in that department. On top of that, she was a very quick study and had more or less infinite attention span to dedicate to any given task.
“Thanks, June. Let me know whenever you want to trade places for a bit.”
“She would prove a more worthy opponent, no doubt,” Shrek said.
I got to my feet and dusted myself off.
“You know, I feel like you two are being a little harsh. Shrek said –”
“Vrk’shryk.”
“That’s what I said. Anyway, Shrek said that as soon as I hit level 10, we’re off and running to go explore that dungeon. I’m at level 8 already, almost level 9.”
“Juniper is level 11.”
“Yeah, well…shut up. Let’s get back to work.”
The dungeon in question was something I had discovered while tinkering around with my Environmental Mapping ability one night. The extended range I’d gained to the ability from Pathfinder Treads’ inherent buff wasn’t the only benefit the boots provided, apparently. I had also noticed a lot of new symbols popping up in places where there previously had been none. This dungeon was one of those new icons. I pressed on it and received a new quest called “Creepy Crawlers.” The message from The System had been characteristically vague, but from the sounds of it, there were few better opportunities to level up and grab some decent loot than scouring the dungeons of the world. The only catch was that this particular dungeon was level 20 and had a minimum level requirement in order to enter.
Juniper was immediately on board with the idea of adventuring. Usually, Eidolon couldn’t leave the Plains but the current working theory was that once an Eidolon gained enough levels and maybe a class, they would be able to break through to the outside world. We weren’t positive it would work, of course, but Juniper was insistent we try. Shrek, on the other hand, was absolutely against the idea. He gave me a whole spiel about how members of a party needed to be able to trust one another’s abilities and count on each other in times of crisis, and he didn’t trust me because I’m a moron and blah, blah, blah. I don’t really remember, I wasn’t actually listening. Anyway, it took a day or two to talk him into the idea and he only really came around when Juniper suggested that he might find a suitable replacement for his proving quest somewhere in the dungeon.
After that, it was just a matter of getting the requisite level. We didn’t know exactly what that level might be, since The System did its whole vague and mysterious “figure it out for yourself” routine in the quest notification. So, Shrek landed on everyone being at least level ten before we even think about attempting the dungeon. He was already level 10 and Juniper had caught and surpassed even him in just the last few hours when she reached level 11…so, of course, everyone was waiting for me to catch up. Juniper appeared to be a prodigy of sorts. She shot up through levels like it was nothing and seemed to be gaining new abilities every day.
Just thinking about where she had been when we first met by the river and where she was now filled me with both a sense of pride and a tinge of jealousy. I was obviously ecstatic for her to be making such great progress, but at the same time, I was choking in the wake of the dust cloud she left behind as she passed me by. Progressing seemed to come so easily and naturally to her while I struggled to take a single step forward. It was just so…frustrating.
“Again,” I snarled, rising from my backside for the hundredth time that day.
Shrek craned his neck skyward and let out an explosive breath.
“We’ve been at this for hours. How much longer are you going to keep up this charade?”
“As long as it takes.”
“Well, you can keep it up on your own. It’s late, I’m hungry.”
He tossed his practice sword at me, then turned and walked away. I caught it, then hurled it at the back of his head. It struck true with a loud THOK! He stopped, his aura flared, and he just stood there with his back to me. I watched the rise and fall of his shoulders as he took deep, rage-filled breaths. He turned his head to look at me over his shoulder, his eyes now glowing an angry red.
“You want me to show you how to be violent?” he asked, his voice lower than I’d ever heard it. “Fine.”
With that, he charged me and swung not the practice sword but that big brutish war axe he carried. Eyes wide, I parried the first swing and the axe slammed into the ground next to me. The shockwave of the impact from that swing nearly knocked me off my feet. I backed up to put space between us, but Shrek pressed the attack. He swung again, an upward strike this time. I leaned to the side and his blade passed by within millimeters of my ear. I likely would have stumbled over some rocks, if not for my Pathfinder Treads “Terrain Adaptation” ability preventing movement penalties from rough terrain. I pivoted and brought the dagger across his arm in a slashing motion, scoring a hit…but it did nothing. He growled at me and raised his axe overhead.
He’s completely lost it. He actually wants to kill me, I thought. In that moment, I knew…I was going to have to strike with intent. Conviction. The Blade of Seredh glowed in my hand.
He brought the axe down and I brought the dagger up to meet it. A wide blue arc trailed my blade and when the two weapons met, Shrek’s axe head was cleaved in two with a thick strip of its middle simply erased from existence. He stumbled forward, falling face first onto the dusty ground of the training arena. He was back up swiftly, holding his axe handle and looking at the broken head that now lay at my feet. He looked at me dumbly. I shrugged. The Blade of Seredh levelled up.
“I think I see what’s going on here,” Juniper said, walking toward us. “We’re holding Rocky back from progressing as quickly as he should.”
“Come again?” Shrek and I asked in unison.
“Rocky is the type that needs actual danger to bring out the best in him. You saw an example of it just now when you were actually trying to hurt him.”
“So, what?” I asked, “Are you suggesting that our training should be live fire cage matches? Two men enter, one man leaves?”
She shook her head.
“No. What I’m saying is that we should just start heading toward the dungeon, already. We’re bound to encounter something along the way that you could fight and level up. You’re really close to level nine – it shouldn’t be that hard for us to get you one more level along the way, should it?”
We both looked at Shrek, who just shrugged.
“It’s possible. Never heard of anyone other than warchiefs and barbarians needing actual combat to level efficiently, though. Might be worth a try. Worst possible outcome is this idiot dies on the way instead of in the dungeon,” he said, jabbing a thumb in my direction.
“Your vote of confidence overwhelms me.”
“My fist is going to overwhelm you if you don’t stop talking to me.”
Juniper pinched the bridge of her nose and groaned.
“So it’s agreed, then?” she asked. “We leave for the dungeon, tomorrow?”
Shrek and I glanced at each other and gave a slight nod.
“Agreed,” we said in stereo.
“Good. Vrk’shryk, you go get dinner. You’ve earned it and you get cranky when you’re hungry. Rocky, you stay here and keep practicing.”
“I thought you said practicing didn’t do me any good?”
“No, what I said was that it’s not an efficient way for you to level. That doesn’t mean you can’t work on your gun skills or your stabby skills.”
“Stabby skills?” I asked with a grin.
“I know. I’ve been in your proximity for too long. The language is apparently infectious.”
Shrek recoiled in disgust and started backing away. He said something about how he’d rather eat a draugr’s deep fried sphincter than to speak like me, so he was going to go have dinner. How he managed to maintain an appetite after conjuring up that visual, I had no idea.
“What about you?” I asked. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to go talk to as many Eidolon as I can for that project you were telling me about the other day. I think I know some who will be interested. I’ll talk to them and have them spread the word.”
“Ok, well…good luck. I guess you know where to find me, if you need me.”
“I know where to find you, if I need you,” she said, and disappeared from sight.
Now that nobody was around to watch me, I decided to dive back into practicing the fighting style I was developing. Back on Earth, I remembered there being a D&D class called “weapon weaver.” The idea was that you could go back and forth between ranged weapons like my handgun and a melee weapon like my dagger. It had merit on its own, for sure, but my handgun wasn’t exactly a long-range weapon, so what I’d planned is to create a melee style that uses both the handgun and the dagger simultaneously. So, I started practicing the movements whenever no one was around to watch me.
This night would be different, however. Up to that point, I had only been doing small practice sessions whenever I could fit them in. This time, I planned to practice all night, using Fade to keep anyone from watching too closely. There wasn’t a lot I could do about the noise of the gun, unfortunately. It would be loud and annoying to everyone within a mile or two of my training. I’d have to speak with Juniper to see if she could hook me up with her mentor. I needed a sound deafening spell, in the worst way. But for one night, I hoped the residents of The Plains would forgive me for a little racket. I left the training grounds and went to the northwestern corner of my safezone. It was the farthest away from Jasmine’s Outpost as I could get.
The entire night, I held the Blade of Seredh in my left hand while wielding the handgun in my right. I swung the blade in the practice arcs that Jasmine and Shrek had taught me, imagining enemies standing against me as I went through the motions. Slowly, I began to integrate my gun into the movements. I theorized, tested, analyzed, over and over again, all without stopping the practice motions for even a moment. As the sun started to creep up over the horizon, I was moving with speed and accuracy. Every swing was refined. Every gun shot was precise. The practice dummies I’d set up were in tatters. I’d entered a flow state I hadn’t even known I was capable of, and the result was something entirely my own.
The skills acquisitions were enough to push me over the edge into Level 9. I smiled, put my weapons away, and headed back to my headquarters. The day had been kicked off in the best way possible and I planned to carry that momentum straight into the dungeon.