The Kings of Khergit, Sarranid, Swadia, Rhodok and Vaegir look at a map with their war council, all following much the same pattern:
The King points out a town which was once theirs. It is theirs by right, and they will use force to make it theirs once more.
Armies are dependent on food, weaken your foe now, so that the next war finds them weaker. Sack the enemy's villages whenever you can. Flee larger armies, and while they are besieging your castle or town, your armies are scattered, one to each lord. Villages on both sides burn.
Someone wins, or the will to fight becomes low. Food becomes scarce.
Many farmers who survived the war find their crops destroyed, or even home and field destroyed. These are the fuel that lights the next fire.
1. Some are recruited into the armies of the one of the Lords.
2. Others start a new group of brigands, or join an existing group.
3. Some few join the hunters to hunt down and punish brigands.
The Lords burned down villages for political and military advantage.
The bandits raid and burn villages to steal all their food and supplies, capturing men and women, for their own purposes.
Larger groups of bandits grow slow on the move. They may decide to build a camp to store supplies and keep prisoners. But they are now tethered to the camp, and the hunters and even noble's armies will fight them if they see them.
Some nobles actually are so poorly equipped and outmanned, and lose fights. Soldiers of the five kingdoms are kept prisoner and sometimes ransomed for money.
Sometimes raiders lose, but generally they keep a pretty even fight against the hunters. Brigand groups don't fight against each other, they've got easier prey.
Some are just looters, with stones and crude clubs to fight with. Others have acquired armor and weapons to challenge soldiers. In some regions, horses are abundant, and the brigands fight on horseback, in other regions they fight and move on foot.
As brigands find success and swell to large sizes, soldiers who find their situation undesirable plot to leave their noble's army and become a brigand force of their own. These are often the most fearsome brigands, equipped with powerful armor and weapons, and well trained by wars and disciplined to fight in a group.
Because of the way they leave, these are often all the same type of soldiers. A group of archers will abandon their lord, or a group of knights or men at arms, or whatever.
They join the brigands with a much greater success, still raiding villages and accosting any who travel afield.
Farmers can't travel to get their farming supplies. Travelling without an army to accompany you becomes foolish. Either great speed, or great strength is required to go from place to place.
Villages aren't safe, but none of the brigands find any desire to try to besiege towns or castles. They have no use for siegeing equipment, and they are designed to be on the move.
Traders move in caravans, guarded by hunters and other paid soldiers. Even then, they can be accosted by bandits, or by their Kingdom's enemies.
Many caravans travel to and from Sarranid, for the kingdom has many goods rarely found elsewhere.
Attack caravans can provide a brigand group a lot of funds, if they can handle the strong guards, but it also puts the brigands on the owning Kingdom's radar in a whole new way. Raiding villages causes upset, but raiding caravans leads to open hostility against the brigands.
When Lords aren't at war, they are busy hosting and going to tournaments, and feasting afterwards. A tournament and feast is often a chance to renew relations with other lords.
There are potential challengers and claimants to all the thrones, but who could hold onto the throne but the duly authorized king without a ton of smackdowns being issued. Only a slow approach would give a noble enough respect of his peers to try to press for such a title.
What is it that makes our little band of Lockshorn Bandits effective at fighting other bandits/
The women haven't been trained in fighting. They don't have money or supplies or equipment.
Starting out, all they have is clever and desperate survival, and the element of surprise, as well as a perspective different from anyone else in the raiding scene.
The bandits haven't been fighting each other. The bandits saw them as men since they had cut off their hair.
How did the Lockshorn Bandits get started?
After being assaulted by Brigands, they were enslaved and brought along with the Brigand group. The brigands were attacked by hunters, and all that was left after the battle were a few hunters who bled out, leaving the women alone. They rummaged through the supplies the brigands and hunters had with them.
They decided to take the fight to the brigands rather than dying on their burned out farms. They cut off their hair at that time, and wore men's clothing and armor to try to fit in with the wandering armies and brigands.
They lost half of the women in a fight with the fearsome Sea Raiders, but were able to hone their craft against a bunch of penniless starving looters, who only had stones to throw and knives to hack at them with.
With time, they wandered from sea raiders territory to Taiga Bandits territory where they had more luck. They found women captured by the Taiga bandits and offered the proposition of joining them. Any men they rescued they released without answering any questions.
What was the Lords' reaction to this?
Lords counted any raided village as lost, so they didn't even notice or have any trouble with the Lockshorn. They didn't have any tolerance for them but also no desire to attack. The situation was already chaotic enough with the ex-soldier brigand groups about, and the wars going on.
With less food available, the Kings were more inclined to find their food from raiding other kingdoms' villages, or taking castles and making the nearby villages part of their lands.
As the number of Taiga Bandits in the northeastern Vaegir lands dropped off, villages were reestablished and people were more often able to travel in safety. But the Sea Raiders continued to occasionally make forays that far out.
The Raiders path forward?
They continued to slowly gain more fighting women, and more of them were skilled. It was mix of losing women to the sword and illness, and recruiting more of them as they defeated brigand groups.
Then, they were attacked by a group of young inexperienced Men at Arms. Not yet fully trained heavy cavalry, and only a dozen of them were in the band.
Nonetheless, Lockshorn Bandits came close to be wiped out in the attack.
A few of the most experienced women were able to form up a decent square, and six of them survived.
A few of the horses of the ex-soldiers were recovered. This began the period of Lady Blacksaddle's leadership.
While the other women took to the horses eventually, Marie Black, aka Blacksaddle, had already rode with her husband before the destruction of the original village. She was one of the original women who started the group.
With a lance taken from one of the Men of War, she became the first Sword Sister, and leader of the Lockshorn bandits.
Then what?
The Taiga bandits were no longer numerous enough to sustain their presence in Vaegir, so they crossed into Swadian territory, and ran into a small region of forest bandits.
Friday, August 9, 2019
Tuesday, July 23, 2019
Realmshift
[ENTERING FOREST GROVE - PALACE OF THE DEDICATED PRINCE]
Gloriamur would have to find another realm to pursue, he was done with Forest Grove, both literally and metaphorically.
He respawned in the hidden creche beneath the statue built depicting him in battle. The status displayed him swinging the true-mythril Truth-revealer longsword, with Elven woven chainmail in silver and blue highlights, with his pixie companion Quilisiel hovering overhead. The pixie was suspended from the ceiling so that it rested where it usually had during his later adventuring days. Even the steps leading up from the hidden creche were plated in mythril.
Gloriamur Dauntless, fourth of his name, the Dedicated Prince, bearer of the 5th piece of the Ring of the Stars, Risen, having passed through death back into life through the Elven door. Breaker of the gates of Armordin. He, having been inside his own hidden creche, was shocked to see two others there also.
Upon inspection, Gloriamur saw that the first one's title read: Ialophos Steelheart, Ranger-Champion, keeper of the 7th fragment of the Living Thunder diadem, envoy accompanying the Dedicated Prince.
The second one's title card read: Odeimos ???, Unknown Guardsman, envoy accompanying the Dedicated Prince.
"What the heck?" said Ialophos. "Where am I?"
"The Dedicated Prince's secret creche," Gloriamur said.
"What realm is this," asked Odeimos. "And why #$#@@$, did I get realm kicked?"
"Come on, we are better off here than. in public," Gloriamur said, climbing the mythril lined steps to the Throne room.
"You have to tell us later, what's going on," Ialophos said.
"Don't know myself, I left this place when I joined the Invincible Heroes."
It was late in local realm time. Maybe 2 bells after midnight.
There were 3 people milling around the site of my statue. One of them was kneeling. For the love of Elves, this was ridiculous. People hadn't treated him like this when he was still in Forest Grove.
Something actually flashed between the statue and the kneeling one. She was High Elven in origin, but equipped in a style more similar to Gloriamur himself.
Forest Grove tended to be heavy on rangers, and heavy on druidic mage types. Gloriamur had been told many times that focusing on swords was foolish, but he went ahead anyway. Maybe it was slower going at first, but it was his personal style.
Aesrillosuir Gladeheart, Sergeant - Dauntless 3rd Heroic Command Unit, bearer of the third shard of the broken blade Onimthus,
The other two milling around were low level earth and storm druids, respectively.
"Just go with the flow," Gloriamur privately messaged Ialophos and Odeimos. "Follow behind me to my left and my right. No Ialo, you take the right."
Aesrillosuir was just standing up as Gloriamur approached.
He wasn't sure what he expected, but it wasn't for the Legionnaire to just start walking away. Perhaps she thought he was a npc mockery of the real Gloriamur. Or maybe she just saw him as someone coming to pester her for one reason or another.
Should he chase her, or merely proceed to his ready room. No chasing. he simply took his time, and existed the throne room.
Eerily, he passed others in the hall, and no one noticed or mentioned anything. He grinned, this was going to be fun. He actually took joy in not being noticed, because he knew they would wish they had noticed him later.
Finally he accessed his Forest Grove realm inventory, and retried his ready room key. This room was the nerve center where he had relaxed while reviewing the situation with his armies, and whether he needed or desired to personally go forth and do some sword fighting of his own.
The key turned after a longer delay than he remembered, and then the ready room was as it was before. His piece of the Ring of the stars displayed in an ornate jewel-case. His pixie friend in suspended animation, as she had requested before he left.
A collection of swords that were no longer combat-relevant but were sentimental to him. Two sets of armor, similarly. Ialophos and Odeimos were able to enter the ready room since they were in his party.
He sat down behind his desk made of true glass and the finest of lumber worked by glass and woodworking artisans in unison, it made a beautiful fusion of the two arts.
There was a few signs of electronics here, with his pad, which displayed notifications and messages, as well as detailed status information.
"Let me check my messages real quick," he said to the other two.
Messages
26,798 messages waiting.
Filter: Important Messages
7,220 messages waiting.
Filter: System Messages
1,780 messages waiting.
Skip that tab for now.
Dauntless Prince's Army
1st Heroic Command Unit
2nd Heroic Commnd Unit
3rd Heroic Command Unit
<--->
(skip)
<--->
50th Heroic Command Unit
1st Elven Infantry Division
2nd Elven Infantry Division
3rd Elven Infantry Division
1st Elven Cavalry Division
2nd Elven Cavalry Division
1st Elven Recon Division
1st Elven Rangers Division
2nd Elven Rangers Division
1st Druidic Division
2nd Druidic Division
At the very end, he had actually been able to form up a Heroic Command Unit, with other Heroes serving under his command. But now somehow he had 50 of these?
Personal Combat
Crickets. No challenges, no missions.
Action Menu
(Actions can be discovered by opening the relevant message and selecting Send to Ready Room).
Declare a Grand Melee Tournament of the Order of Dauntless Blades
Declare a Grand Demonstration Battle Royale between the Chromas of the Dauntless Kingdom
Declare a Grand Feast of the Dauntless King
Declare a new Holiday with its associated traditions
Announce a Successor
Announce an Engagement
Adopt someone into the Dauntless Prince's family.
And on and on they went. Perhaps, if he cared, he would pick the Grand Melee tournament.
"You've been here before Ialophos?" Gloriamur asked.
"Level 70, ranger-champion when I left. Never been to the Dauntless region. But wait, you're the Dauntless Prince? I thought that was a NPC? How come you have all this, all around you?"
"When I started in this realm, everyone was becoming knights and the counts and dukes. I mean not everyone, some people preferred to spend their time training their spirit friends and familiars. I guess a few more dropped out over time, but I wouldn't call me especially high up there.
"I'm fairly skilled in surviving in sticky situations, so the Dauntless name kinda stuck. There were fifty kingdoms with princes as leveled up as I was. Level 230."
"The Fifty Kingdoms of Glory?" Ialophos laughed, "I've been walking around with a guildess Mur, and he turns out to be that Gloriamur. There's so many copycats and lookalikes of you in Forest Grove. That's why everyone ignores you."
"OK, but why did we all end up here? I'm level 1 now. But I have this cool mystery aspect, like I'm some kind of long lost cousin of the Dauntless Prince."
Gloriamur laughed, "I would walk with you through the early levels here, but the phasing is--- a lot. Every story event phases. Let me get through these messages, and see if there is anything showing our Realmshift. Ialophos, I can summon some food or other fun things if you want, or you can go quest also."
"I'll go quest, and work my way towards the Dauntless area."
Soon two spheres of translocation took both of Gloriamur's companions away to their respective questing areas.
Elven cake was the best in Forest Grove. At the very bottom of his actions menu was a food menu. It was an NPC who served him the delicious cake, so he didn't have to worry about a hubbub from the Ready Room being open for the first time in over a year.
Time to go through those messages. First the System ones, and then the Important ones.
Subject: Dauntless Blades becomes Playable Order
Subject: Auction of 7th fragment of Moonsteel dagger expired
Subject: Dauntless army composition, week of Harvest 16th, 961
Subject: Dauntless Blades Order, summary of week of Harvest 16th, 961
....
On and on they went, from oldest to newest. He just read the subject line of most of them.
ooo==
Meanwhile, Ialophos had gone back to his last questing zone, and done what you usually do after long time away, which is pick up the pieces of what he had last done. Identify his abilities and their characteristics again. Identify what he had been doing before.
A few people took one look at him, and then a second look while walking by. The fact that his title said Envoy accompanying the Dauntless Prince, was no doubt the cause of it. How did he get such a title, they may have wondered.
Ialophos simple moved on. He had joined the realm some time after Gloriamur joined, and the opportunities for extraordinary achievement were much reduced by all the competition and popularity that realm began to have. He had done well to be ranger champion.
His task was to obtain another piece of the Wheel of Nature's balance in the tomb of lost revelers. The undead were numerous, and his ammo was depleted. He bought what he could, but the market had shifted since he'd left for another realm, before going to Guildlands.
Now he remembered. This was where he had been stuck. So many fails in a row meant his resources were depleted.
Titles often conferred benefits, especially those gained by controlling part of a broken artifact. It was the gimmick of Forest Grove that everyone had a piece of some broken ancient and powerful artifact. The question was what piece, and how powerful was the artifact it came from.
If even Gloriamur only had a piece of an artifact, than that aspect filled the entire realm. The ring of the stars made whole, would be ridiculously powerful. Celestial energies in a near infinite extent.
Ialophos' equipment was nothing special amongst his fellow 70th circlers. Not better, and not worse.
A ranger-champion was better and taking down individual strong foes from range, not so good at handling wave after wave of unending undead.
Being an envoy of the Dauntless seemed to give him the boost he needed, even when he ran out of ammo and had to use his bo staff. He risked his own quest to save a surrounded High Elven bladeswoman.
Though they each had to fulfill the quest seperately, they were able to help each other out when it got hairy. The piece of the Wheel was in the hands of an Undead Sorcerer who was once a reveler.
He danced in mockery of the once fun loving man. Ialophos first helped the blade-wielding to defeat him for her quest, and then she helped for his quest.
With the piece recovered, they were both able to go back to the local grove and entreat the winds to reveal more about where the remaining pieces were. There was one lost in an old battleground in the fight against the undead, and another in the cloudlands above the zone he was in.
Ialophos finally realized it was the same woman fighting alongside him as who had been at Gloriamur's palace. It was Aesrillosuir Gladeheart again.
They had decided to go to the Cloudlands.
"How did you get that title? I've never heard of a Dauntless envoy before. At least not one of us. Maybe there's an NPC envoy?" Aesrillosuir asked.
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," he said.
"That crazy? System bug crazy?"
"Maybe," he admitted, "but not intentionally."
"You'll be banned. Hmm, now I wonder, should I stick around, and get banned with you, or not stick around and not figure out what is going on with that title? You're a ranger-champion, wielding a Bo-staff with 60k crit damage, criting, what, 22% chance? That's not normal with your pedestrian shard and gear. Forgive me, but it's gotta be that title."
"You might be right," he said. "So the true story is I just met Gloriamur a few weeks ago."
"Bullshit. You met a fake. He isn't around here anymore, except in the story sense. His Kingdom is still active, but the prince himself isn't there. I'm sorry, but I've been fooled by one to many cons to buy it. I'm selling your stock."
"He's not in Forest Grove anymore, at least he wasn't. I met him in Guildlands. He was a Recon soldier for a powerful Guild there, until their guild decided to kick him out. I was lost and way out of my element in Guildlands. It's a harsh world compared to here. No nice quests and storylines. Not unless you're part of a guild. He went by just Mur there. He helped me go back and optimize the starting zone and get every reward out of it, so I could take on the next zone. And we were helping another person in the Highlands there, when suddenly my view just was white, wispy smoky white. And all three of us were realmshift to Forest Grove. Into a hidden creche beneath the throne room.
"We saw you there, at his statue, but you looked right past us and left as we climbed up out of the creche."
"You were the creepers approaching me, with that fake Gloriamur costume? Creep! Tell me why I shouldn't report you right now."
Ialophos shrugged, "I'm not lying. Report me if you want, but I'm somehow part of Mur's group, even though I didn't know who he was."
She really did hit the report button, and filed one.
[REPORT ACTION: SHIFTING INVOLVED PARTIES TO THE AUTHORIZED REVIEWER]
The courtroom which Ialophos showed up in was lined in gold laced, the chairs removed except for the front row for the concerned parties' and the Judge's seat, of course.
"Ranger-Champion, Sergeant Gladeheart. I know of you Aesrillosuir, but I have not heard of you Ialophos. What cause do you have to report, Sergeant?"
"Falsely claiming closeness to the Dauntless Prince, and stalking. He followed me from the Palace shrine, all the way to the Tomb of the Last Revelers."
"Ahem, excuse me, Sergeant, it appears. Hmm, well this is odd. I've been preempted from my role," the Judge in black robes said.
"By who?" Aesrillosuir said plaintively.
"By the Dauntless Prince himself. With his coded identity locket. Thankfully that was established before he left. He never said where he was going, or whether he would come back."
The judge excused himself, shifting away, and Ialophos saw Gloriamur once more, in a new light. Wearing his formal attire, with his true-mithril blade attached to the sheath at his hip, the Prince in white seemed to be an entirely different person from Mur.
"My apologies, Sergeant, might you repeat the report given to Judge Eodasu?"
"Your highness, I apologize for bringing this before you, but I have been hounded by false claimants, and those who claim a false connection to your person. I believe that this Ranger-champion falsely claims to know you, and stalked me to your Palace room, and far across the realm into the Tomb of Revelers, for what scheme or concoction I know not."
Ialophos saw the slightly smile or smirk from the Prince, who turned to him.
"And your account of the events. Did you pursue the Sergeant in the Tomb of Revelers?"
'I was merely pursuing the pieces of the Wheel of Nature's balance. Following a task the local grove had asked me to pursue. Before that, I accompanied you from Guildland to your Palace, and then to your ready room. I followed you on your own instructions, to approach the Sergeant so you could introduce yourself."
"Is that true?" the Sergeant asked.
"It is not commonly known, but I left this realm for a mission of great importance in Guildlands. That mission failed due to treachery from the Guild I was in an alliance with. I tried to restore what was lost, and begin again the mission, but it will require far more of an effort this time. I intended to pursue this one alone after the Guild betrayed me, but Ialophos and another, Odeimos were also struggling due to the injustices of the Guild's control of those lands. I decided to help them have some kind of chance of moving forward.
"There was some kind of dimensional fault or activity, however, which I originally thought was the guild who kicked me continuing to also evict me, but now I doubt that. Odeimos has never even been to Forest Grove. An eviction would have sent him somewhere else. So the mystery remains.
"I must return to Guildlands, but perhaps with some backup this time. This case is dismissed on the basis of harmless confusion and lack of knowledge on both sides. I apologize also, as I did not realize my image was being desecration by such fakes and pretenders. I will establish an order of integrity to ensure thus does not continue after I return to guildlands."
"I can get my commander, and organize the 3rd heroic command unit," Aesrillosuir said. "If that's what you want me to do.
"Let's discuss this, in my ready room," Gloriamur said.
All three of them shifted into the room, Ialophos and Aesrillosuir into chairs ready, and Gloriamur behind his desk.
"The thing is, Guildlands is a ruthless place. Guild training groups routinely kill anyone getting in their way, even if they were just questing on their own. And questing on your own is nearly impossible outside of your rookie zone.
To establish a Guild, you need a Guild charter, and enough funds to provide good weapons to your members. Ideally a full arm of the guild for craftsmen. You need auctioneers to sell all the stuff looted by your guild members, and a currency issuance system to give them guild scrip in return. Healers or medics, recon soldiers, military rangers, front line soldiers and commanders.
The grace and maneuver systems demand impeccable skill to unleash the full might and flurry of your chosen combat style. Your statistics are not under your control but are instead modified, up or down, by the way you fight and the way you socialize, fraternize, et cetera.
This can only be a volunteer thing. And it has to stay small enough that we stay under the radar. If you are willing, I'll add you to the team, as a front-line soldier. We will need people willing to learn the crafting system, and several willing to learn grace and manuever.
Ialophos is our first ranger, and Odeimos is also a front-line soldier, leaning more towards guardsman.
ooo==
Gloriamur was exhausted when he finally found a System message that was cryptic enough to make sense. It was from Guildlands, from the Dwarven Highlands, from the Adjutant. Ialophos had gone to get some rest. Odeimos had not returned from questing yet.
"You may be confused. An Out of Bounds situation was detected when your diplomatic status in Forest Grove triggered a diplomatic subroutine. However, without any paperwork, you and your envoys couldn't be fully received here in Guildland. So you will sent back with instructions to reacquire diplomatic papers. Those instructions have been sent as another message. The Shift back will occur in 3 days. We hope that's enough time."
The other message was after: "Realm of the Forest Grove extends authorization of Ambassadorship and Amity for the following persons: Prince Gloriamur Dauntless, Ambassador to Guildlands (Highlands). Ranger-Champion Ialophos Steelheart, Envoy to Guildlands (Highlands), Forestwalker Odeimos Entwroten, Envoy to Guildlands (Highlands)."
Odeimos's title seemed to be wrong, but whatever.
Gloriamur would have to find another realm to pursue, he was done with Forest Grove, both literally and metaphorically.
He respawned in the hidden creche beneath the statue built depicting him in battle. The status displayed him swinging the true-mythril Truth-revealer longsword, with Elven woven chainmail in silver and blue highlights, with his pixie companion Quilisiel hovering overhead. The pixie was suspended from the ceiling so that it rested where it usually had during his later adventuring days. Even the steps leading up from the hidden creche were plated in mythril.
Gloriamur Dauntless, fourth of his name, the Dedicated Prince, bearer of the 5th piece of the Ring of the Stars, Risen, having passed through death back into life through the Elven door. Breaker of the gates of Armordin. He, having been inside his own hidden creche, was shocked to see two others there also.
Upon inspection, Gloriamur saw that the first one's title read: Ialophos Steelheart, Ranger-Champion, keeper of the 7th fragment of the Living Thunder diadem, envoy accompanying the Dedicated Prince.
The second one's title card read: Odeimos ???, Unknown Guardsman, envoy accompanying the Dedicated Prince.
"What the heck?" said Ialophos. "Where am I?"
"The Dedicated Prince's secret creche," Gloriamur said.
"What realm is this," asked Odeimos. "And why #$#@@$, did I get realm kicked?"
"Come on, we are better off here than. in public," Gloriamur said, climbing the mythril lined steps to the Throne room.
"You have to tell us later, what's going on," Ialophos said.
"Don't know myself, I left this place when I joined the Invincible Heroes."
It was late in local realm time. Maybe 2 bells after midnight.
There were 3 people milling around the site of my statue. One of them was kneeling. For the love of Elves, this was ridiculous. People hadn't treated him like this when he was still in Forest Grove.
Something actually flashed between the statue and the kneeling one. She was High Elven in origin, but equipped in a style more similar to Gloriamur himself.
Forest Grove tended to be heavy on rangers, and heavy on druidic mage types. Gloriamur had been told many times that focusing on swords was foolish, but he went ahead anyway. Maybe it was slower going at first, but it was his personal style.
Aesrillosuir Gladeheart, Sergeant - Dauntless 3rd Heroic Command Unit, bearer of the third shard of the broken blade Onimthus,
The other two milling around were low level earth and storm druids, respectively.
"Just go with the flow," Gloriamur privately messaged Ialophos and Odeimos. "Follow behind me to my left and my right. No Ialo, you take the right."
Aesrillosuir was just standing up as Gloriamur approached.
He wasn't sure what he expected, but it wasn't for the Legionnaire to just start walking away. Perhaps she thought he was a npc mockery of the real Gloriamur. Or maybe she just saw him as someone coming to pester her for one reason or another.
Should he chase her, or merely proceed to his ready room. No chasing. he simply took his time, and existed the throne room.
Eerily, he passed others in the hall, and no one noticed or mentioned anything. He grinned, this was going to be fun. He actually took joy in not being noticed, because he knew they would wish they had noticed him later.
Finally he accessed his Forest Grove realm inventory, and retried his ready room key. This room was the nerve center where he had relaxed while reviewing the situation with his armies, and whether he needed or desired to personally go forth and do some sword fighting of his own.
The key turned after a longer delay than he remembered, and then the ready room was as it was before. His piece of the Ring of the stars displayed in an ornate jewel-case. His pixie friend in suspended animation, as she had requested before he left.
A collection of swords that were no longer combat-relevant but were sentimental to him. Two sets of armor, similarly. Ialophos and Odeimos were able to enter the ready room since they were in his party.
He sat down behind his desk made of true glass and the finest of lumber worked by glass and woodworking artisans in unison, it made a beautiful fusion of the two arts.
There was a few signs of electronics here, with his pad, which displayed notifications and messages, as well as detailed status information.
"Let me check my messages real quick," he said to the other two.
Messages
26,798 messages waiting.
Filter: Important Messages
7,220 messages waiting.
Filter: System Messages
1,780 messages waiting.
Skip that tab for now.
Dauntless Prince's Army
1st Heroic Command Unit
2nd Heroic Commnd Unit
3rd Heroic Command Unit
<--->
(skip)
<--->
50th Heroic Command Unit
1st Elven Infantry Division
2nd Elven Infantry Division
3rd Elven Infantry Division
1st Elven Cavalry Division
2nd Elven Cavalry Division
1st Elven Recon Division
1st Elven Rangers Division
2nd Elven Rangers Division
1st Druidic Division
2nd Druidic Division
At the very end, he had actually been able to form up a Heroic Command Unit, with other Heroes serving under his command. But now somehow he had 50 of these?
Personal Combat
Crickets. No challenges, no missions.
Action Menu
(Actions can be discovered by opening the relevant message and selecting Send to Ready Room).
Declare a Grand Melee Tournament of the Order of Dauntless Blades
Declare a Grand Demonstration Battle Royale between the Chromas of the Dauntless Kingdom
Declare a Grand Feast of the Dauntless King
Declare a new Holiday with its associated traditions
Announce a Successor
Announce an Engagement
Adopt someone into the Dauntless Prince's family.
And on and on they went. Perhaps, if he cared, he would pick the Grand Melee tournament.
"You've been here before Ialophos?" Gloriamur asked.
"Level 70, ranger-champion when I left. Never been to the Dauntless region. But wait, you're the Dauntless Prince? I thought that was a NPC? How come you have all this, all around you?"
"When I started in this realm, everyone was becoming knights and the counts and dukes. I mean not everyone, some people preferred to spend their time training their spirit friends and familiars. I guess a few more dropped out over time, but I wouldn't call me especially high up there.
"I'm fairly skilled in surviving in sticky situations, so the Dauntless name kinda stuck. There were fifty kingdoms with princes as leveled up as I was. Level 230."
"The Fifty Kingdoms of Glory?" Ialophos laughed, "I've been walking around with a guildess Mur, and he turns out to be that Gloriamur. There's so many copycats and lookalikes of you in Forest Grove. That's why everyone ignores you."
"OK, but why did we all end up here? I'm level 1 now. But I have this cool mystery aspect, like I'm some kind of long lost cousin of the Dauntless Prince."
Gloriamur laughed, "I would walk with you through the early levels here, but the phasing is--- a lot. Every story event phases. Let me get through these messages, and see if there is anything showing our Realmshift. Ialophos, I can summon some food or other fun things if you want, or you can go quest also."
"I'll go quest, and work my way towards the Dauntless area."
Soon two spheres of translocation took both of Gloriamur's companions away to their respective questing areas.
Elven cake was the best in Forest Grove. At the very bottom of his actions menu was a food menu. It was an NPC who served him the delicious cake, so he didn't have to worry about a hubbub from the Ready Room being open for the first time in over a year.
Time to go through those messages. First the System ones, and then the Important ones.
Subject: Dauntless Blades becomes Playable Order
Subject: Auction of 7th fragment of Moonsteel dagger expired
Subject: Dauntless army composition, week of Harvest 16th, 961
Subject: Dauntless Blades Order, summary of week of Harvest 16th, 961
....
On and on they went, from oldest to newest. He just read the subject line of most of them.
ooo==
Meanwhile, Ialophos had gone back to his last questing zone, and done what you usually do after long time away, which is pick up the pieces of what he had last done. Identify his abilities and their characteristics again. Identify what he had been doing before.
A few people took one look at him, and then a second look while walking by. The fact that his title said Envoy accompanying the Dauntless Prince, was no doubt the cause of it. How did he get such a title, they may have wondered.
Ialophos simple moved on. He had joined the realm some time after Gloriamur joined, and the opportunities for extraordinary achievement were much reduced by all the competition and popularity that realm began to have. He had done well to be ranger champion.
His task was to obtain another piece of the Wheel of Nature's balance in the tomb of lost revelers. The undead were numerous, and his ammo was depleted. He bought what he could, but the market had shifted since he'd left for another realm, before going to Guildlands.
Now he remembered. This was where he had been stuck. So many fails in a row meant his resources were depleted.
Titles often conferred benefits, especially those gained by controlling part of a broken artifact. It was the gimmick of Forest Grove that everyone had a piece of some broken ancient and powerful artifact. The question was what piece, and how powerful was the artifact it came from.
If even Gloriamur only had a piece of an artifact, than that aspect filled the entire realm. The ring of the stars made whole, would be ridiculously powerful. Celestial energies in a near infinite extent.
Ialophos' equipment was nothing special amongst his fellow 70th circlers. Not better, and not worse.
A ranger-champion was better and taking down individual strong foes from range, not so good at handling wave after wave of unending undead.
Being an envoy of the Dauntless seemed to give him the boost he needed, even when he ran out of ammo and had to use his bo staff. He risked his own quest to save a surrounded High Elven bladeswoman.
Though they each had to fulfill the quest seperately, they were able to help each other out when it got hairy. The piece of the Wheel was in the hands of an Undead Sorcerer who was once a reveler.
He danced in mockery of the once fun loving man. Ialophos first helped the blade-wielding to defeat him for her quest, and then she helped for his quest.
With the piece recovered, they were both able to go back to the local grove and entreat the winds to reveal more about where the remaining pieces were. There was one lost in an old battleground in the fight against the undead, and another in the cloudlands above the zone he was in.
Ialophos finally realized it was the same woman fighting alongside him as who had been at Gloriamur's palace. It was Aesrillosuir Gladeheart again.
They had decided to go to the Cloudlands.
"How did you get that title? I've never heard of a Dauntless envoy before. At least not one of us. Maybe there's an NPC envoy?" Aesrillosuir asked.
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," he said.
"That crazy? System bug crazy?"
"Maybe," he admitted, "but not intentionally."
"You'll be banned. Hmm, now I wonder, should I stick around, and get banned with you, or not stick around and not figure out what is going on with that title? You're a ranger-champion, wielding a Bo-staff with 60k crit damage, criting, what, 22% chance? That's not normal with your pedestrian shard and gear. Forgive me, but it's gotta be that title."
"You might be right," he said. "So the true story is I just met Gloriamur a few weeks ago."
"Bullshit. You met a fake. He isn't around here anymore, except in the story sense. His Kingdom is still active, but the prince himself isn't there. I'm sorry, but I've been fooled by one to many cons to buy it. I'm selling your stock."
"He's not in Forest Grove anymore, at least he wasn't. I met him in Guildlands. He was a Recon soldier for a powerful Guild there, until their guild decided to kick him out. I was lost and way out of my element in Guildlands. It's a harsh world compared to here. No nice quests and storylines. Not unless you're part of a guild. He went by just Mur there. He helped me go back and optimize the starting zone and get every reward out of it, so I could take on the next zone. And we were helping another person in the Highlands there, when suddenly my view just was white, wispy smoky white. And all three of us were realmshift to Forest Grove. Into a hidden creche beneath the throne room.
"We saw you there, at his statue, but you looked right past us and left as we climbed up out of the creche."
"You were the creepers approaching me, with that fake Gloriamur costume? Creep! Tell me why I shouldn't report you right now."
Ialophos shrugged, "I'm not lying. Report me if you want, but I'm somehow part of Mur's group, even though I didn't know who he was."
She really did hit the report button, and filed one.
[REPORT ACTION: SHIFTING INVOLVED PARTIES TO THE AUTHORIZED REVIEWER]
The courtroom which Ialophos showed up in was lined in gold laced, the chairs removed except for the front row for the concerned parties' and the Judge's seat, of course.
"Ranger-Champion, Sergeant Gladeheart. I know of you Aesrillosuir, but I have not heard of you Ialophos. What cause do you have to report, Sergeant?"
"Falsely claiming closeness to the Dauntless Prince, and stalking. He followed me from the Palace shrine, all the way to the Tomb of the Last Revelers."
"Ahem, excuse me, Sergeant, it appears. Hmm, well this is odd. I've been preempted from my role," the Judge in black robes said.
"By who?" Aesrillosuir said plaintively.
"By the Dauntless Prince himself. With his coded identity locket. Thankfully that was established before he left. He never said where he was going, or whether he would come back."
The judge excused himself, shifting away, and Ialophos saw Gloriamur once more, in a new light. Wearing his formal attire, with his true-mithril blade attached to the sheath at his hip, the Prince in white seemed to be an entirely different person from Mur.
"My apologies, Sergeant, might you repeat the report given to Judge Eodasu?"
"Your highness, I apologize for bringing this before you, but I have been hounded by false claimants, and those who claim a false connection to your person. I believe that this Ranger-champion falsely claims to know you, and stalked me to your Palace room, and far across the realm into the Tomb of Revelers, for what scheme or concoction I know not."
Ialophos saw the slightly smile or smirk from the Prince, who turned to him.
"And your account of the events. Did you pursue the Sergeant in the Tomb of Revelers?"
'I was merely pursuing the pieces of the Wheel of Nature's balance. Following a task the local grove had asked me to pursue. Before that, I accompanied you from Guildland to your Palace, and then to your ready room. I followed you on your own instructions, to approach the Sergeant so you could introduce yourself."
"Is that true?" the Sergeant asked.
"It is not commonly known, but I left this realm for a mission of great importance in Guildlands. That mission failed due to treachery from the Guild I was in an alliance with. I tried to restore what was lost, and begin again the mission, but it will require far more of an effort this time. I intended to pursue this one alone after the Guild betrayed me, but Ialophos and another, Odeimos were also struggling due to the injustices of the Guild's control of those lands. I decided to help them have some kind of chance of moving forward.
"There was some kind of dimensional fault or activity, however, which I originally thought was the guild who kicked me continuing to also evict me, but now I doubt that. Odeimos has never even been to Forest Grove. An eviction would have sent him somewhere else. So the mystery remains.
"I must return to Guildlands, but perhaps with some backup this time. This case is dismissed on the basis of harmless confusion and lack of knowledge on both sides. I apologize also, as I did not realize my image was being desecration by such fakes and pretenders. I will establish an order of integrity to ensure thus does not continue after I return to guildlands."
"I can get my commander, and organize the 3rd heroic command unit," Aesrillosuir said. "If that's what you want me to do.
"Let's discuss this, in my ready room," Gloriamur said.
All three of them shifted into the room, Ialophos and Aesrillosuir into chairs ready, and Gloriamur behind his desk.
"The thing is, Guildlands is a ruthless place. Guild training groups routinely kill anyone getting in their way, even if they were just questing on their own. And questing on your own is nearly impossible outside of your rookie zone.
To establish a Guild, you need a Guild charter, and enough funds to provide good weapons to your members. Ideally a full arm of the guild for craftsmen. You need auctioneers to sell all the stuff looted by your guild members, and a currency issuance system to give them guild scrip in return. Healers or medics, recon soldiers, military rangers, front line soldiers and commanders.
The grace and maneuver systems demand impeccable skill to unleash the full might and flurry of your chosen combat style. Your statistics are not under your control but are instead modified, up or down, by the way you fight and the way you socialize, fraternize, et cetera.
This can only be a volunteer thing. And it has to stay small enough that we stay under the radar. If you are willing, I'll add you to the team, as a front-line soldier. We will need people willing to learn the crafting system, and several willing to learn grace and manuever.
Ialophos is our first ranger, and Odeimos is also a front-line soldier, leaning more towards guardsman.
ooo==
Gloriamur was exhausted when he finally found a System message that was cryptic enough to make sense. It was from Guildlands, from the Dwarven Highlands, from the Adjutant. Ialophos had gone to get some rest. Odeimos had not returned from questing yet.
"You may be confused. An Out of Bounds situation was detected when your diplomatic status in Forest Grove triggered a diplomatic subroutine. However, without any paperwork, you and your envoys couldn't be fully received here in Guildland. So you will sent back with instructions to reacquire diplomatic papers. Those instructions have been sent as another message. The Shift back will occur in 3 days. We hope that's enough time."
The other message was after: "Realm of the Forest Grove extends authorization of Ambassadorship and Amity for the following persons: Prince Gloriamur Dauntless, Ambassador to Guildlands (Highlands). Ranger-Champion Ialophos Steelheart, Envoy to Guildlands (Highlands), Forestwalker Odeimos Entwroten, Envoy to Guildlands (Highlands)."
Odeimos's title seemed to be wrong, but whatever.
Guildless
[Mosage] (Invincible Heroes): I'm sorry, but the Hero Council has decided to revoke your Hero status. Unfortunately, that means, I have to unguild you.
[Gloriamur]: But you have veto power over the council! You are the Arch-hero Immortal, Mosage the Mighty Mountain! You can save me right?
[Mosage] (Invincible Heroes): You used to follow the Hero ways. You were on my path. Now...
YOU HAVE BEEN REMOVE FROM THE GUILD: Invincible Heroes
JOINING NPC GUILD (Human Townspeople 17)
<NPC GUILD CHAT SCROLL OMITTED PER YOUR FILTER RULES>
[Gloriamur]: <whispering Mosage>: Why do this? What guild will ever accept me after the Heroes banish me?
DETAILED CHARACTER REPORT
Name: Gloriamur
Level: 31 [Recon Soldier]
Role History: Rookie -> Trainee -> Recon Soldier Trainee -> Recon Soldier
Neighboring Roles: Military Ranger, Front-Line Soldier, Marine, Paratrooper
Attributes:
Resil: 16
Resolve: 15
Steadfastness: 20
Courage: 13
Charisma: 12
Camaraderie: 12
Charm: 7
Pluck: 17
Battle: 16 2/3
Strength: 19
Grace: 13
Maneuver: 18
Mind: 15
Wits: 21
Sense: 9
Wisdom: 15
Magic: 3 2/3
Aura: 4
Magical Control: 1
Magical Awareness: 6
Equipment:
Modern Weapon:
Rookie Submachine Gun
Heroic Weapon:
Mark 2 Broadsword
Accessories:
Rookie Rusty Chainmail
Currency:
1,512 Kronars
Vault Access:
1 tab
END DETAILED REPORT
<> * <> * <> * +~
Mur (or Gloriamur for long) trudged through the swampy zone that was home to level 10-15 teams of adventurers. The best weapon he had was a mark 2 broadsword, because he had been part of Invincible Heroes from the beginning, and never bothered to use non-Guild funded weapons. Those were all gone, so he used the last weapon he got before switching his compensation plan to Guild tokens.
The Guild took in all of the loot he collected, sold it on the public markets and provided him with Guild Reward Tokens, which were worthless in the event of not being part of the guild. It was a risky plan, but Guilds like Mur's old Invincible Heroes provided incredible benefits in the form of better equipment, and better storyline missions.
The whole guild combined in different roles and pieces to participate in War Story Missions. And specific units, like the 3rd Recon Platoon he had been a part of, participated in Unit Story Missions often 2 or 3 times a week.
And whenever he had time to spare, he would join in Targets of Opportunity, Story Mssions that would pop up and were size-flexible to include whomever was available.
For Invincible Heroes, the Front-Line fighters were the most desirable posting, and most prestigious, earned for service in other roles.
Mur had thought he was within a few months of earning a Mainline posting. He served in a still decent role, as Recon Soldier. There were Logistics roles, and Militant Ranger roles, as well as the traditional trainee, acolyte, etc roles for the lower levels.
The game didn’t provide any magical classes or abilities instead emphasizing Modern guns and Medieval swords/hammers/axes in their army setups. They used medics, not healer mages. There were a variety of specialty tracks, for those who didn't or couldn't pursue a mainline fighter role, like Mur had been chasing.
The Lemon Law proved that because Mur had been kicked out a guild, any other guild would assume something was wrong with him.
The best thing Mur knew to do with the rest of his time in the game, was rebuild his equipment, by hunting much lower enemies by himself, and gradually refine a solo style. He knew he would never be able to fight at level enemies, or get involved in story missions again.
NPC guilds were filled with people who didn't know how to work together, or didn't have the capacity to be a strong combatant or helpful auxilliary. What Guild would want to kick out a useful member?
He didn't intend to work with any of the members of this putative Human Townspoeple 17 guild.
There were other games, where Soloing was possible and prosperous, but Mur loved this one, and the cooperation and camaraderie of his ex-Guild.
He killed another frognurt with his tier 2 broadsword. 22 frognurt corpses gives you one Swamp merit. 150 swamp merits gives you a roll on an equipment chart, which includes, possibly a decent Tier 3 weapon. His level helped him do better, but his SMG was worthless even against level 12 frognurts. The broadsword was good enough to handle them, but not much better.
Good Equipment was made by crafting specialists, acceptable equipment could be found by a lot of grinding. There was a public market in loot and therefore a public market in acceptable equipment, but good crafters needed extensive time and resources, they therefore belonged to the guilds, rather than being market freelancers.
He had to chase the frognurts all over the Swamp zone, because he could easily deplete populations with his frognurt killing rate.
30 swamp merits and 11 more frognurt corpses in, and a Guild team confronted him.
"Clear the Area! The Awesome Mountees are conducting trainee operations in the area. Our Guild charter authorizes wiping any unguilded mooches from the area."
Mur had to leave for a few hours. He researched his map of zones by level while he waited for the Guild op to disperse.
The next day he ran into a level 10 unguilded. He was a magical ranger trainee. Mur knew because the unguilded told him.
With Rookie equipment, Ialophos was sure to die if he faced any of the swamp's mobs.
"I thought I'd check out what mobs there are to fight here. Elvenhome is full of boring fights. I can kill them all in two shots, or one mystic shot."
"You need guild equipment to make it here. Or you need to get all the upgrade grinds in Elvenhome before coming here, and then be very careful."
"Why do you think that, I mean, maybe it will be hard, but I'm level 10, ready for the zone, sergeant!"
"I'm not a sergeant. I'll tell you what, what level do you see me as?" Mur asked the Elf.
"??? way above me."
Mur fought another frognurt, using all of his hard-won grace, manuevering, strength and courage. He killed the frognurt quickly but didn't insta-kill.
"I guess you're level 21?" Ialophos said.
"You're off by 10. I'm level 31, but my gear is only Tier 2, instead of tier 5-6-7, like it was. I was kicked out of my guild, and now I'm hunting 18 levels down and not being as fast as a should. You'd be hunting 3 levels up, and with Rookie equipment."
"Oh. So I guess I need to sign up with a guild?"
Mur laughed. "Kid, how much do you know about this place?"
"Swamplands? I know it's the 1st zone after home for Elves, and Humans too I guess?"
"First zone for Elves and Lizardkin. I just came here because my calculations showed it was the least used by Guild training teams. But by here, I mean here."
"Oh, well I heard there was some big wars, and that sounded cool."
"Did you get Foreign Legion papers?" Mur said.
"Uh, what's that?"
"Someone from our land likes you enough to give you a commission to join their guild here, become part of their army. Often with a specialty role, sometimes, as with me, with a long-term goal authorization of front-line soldier."
"Oh..."
Mur felt sorry for the kid, completely unaware of the Guild-centric style of his homeland.
"Comeon, I'll show you how to milk the Elven king for all his rewards."
"Really?"
Characterization!
Camaraderie + 1 (13)
Pluck + 1 (18)
Mur left his swamp merits in limbo, and his frognurt corpses in item exile, the place where you put things you might never want to see again. Weird quest chains with their weird items, off to item exile.
The Elven homeland was quite picturesque, if you hadn't already grown jaded by years of over-exposure, like Mur had in his old games. Mur knew about the Elven homeland noob-quests and rewards from his time before he came to this game. He studied the Prima guide and all the supplemantal books and webpages before he got his Foreign Legion letter.
It was 6 months of dying from Elf overexposure before he moved over. Being a human soldier was a refreshing contrast, once he had gotten here.
Sure, nominally, it was the sort of thing he wouldn’t be caught dead doing before, but Mur kinda enjoyed teaching Ialophos the basics of squeezing out maximum rewards, while also teaching him grace and manuever. It wasn't neccesary against these rookie foes, but it did lead to interesting and epic death blow combos with the Bow + Spell style Ialo had.
The bow had to be a special rarer type of bow: a spell bow or magic bow, so that his magic locus could be the bow while also using it as a weapon to fire arrows.
The final Elven home challenge noob-quest was for a spell bow or compound bow depending on role choice. The noob-quest had phasing which meant Mur couldn't accompany Ialo for this one.
Ialo had to fight a boss which was quite tough by Rookie standards. He had to work his way through waves of mobs in the forest until he reached a temple at the peak of a forested hill area. Fighting through several different kinds of lieutenants, he reached the Dark Druid herself, and battled his way to victory.
Wtih all the minor awards, resources, and especially training in grace and manuever, Ialo defeated the whole challenge in 25 minutes, surprising even Mur.
Ialo got his spell bow, and a Tier 1 woodsman armor. He still would need a Tier one melee weapon soon enough, but the two of them together could begin to take on the Swamplands.
Realization!
Sense +1 (10)
Mur wrested with the chasm of boredom through all of this, but didn't show it. By comparison, the Swamplands actually required him to use his battle skills. With Ialo's bow and his melee prowess, they became 3 to 4 times more effective at clearing out frognurts.
Ialo had his first wipe when an especially large cluster of frognurts swarmed them, and Mur couldn't do anything to direct their attention. He wasn't especially good at front line combat, because he hadn't earned that role in Invincible Heroes yet.
A role change would require Mur to level up:
LEVEL 31 PROGRESS
[******* ] : 23.3%
A frognurt was about 0.01% of a level.
The wipe was just a temporary setback, but their clear rate was a bigger one. They had to move on to other stuff in the swamp, which meant Mur's first wipe in the zone, as he took on too many Big Buggers with his chintzy chainmail armor.
A wipe here, a wipe there, but their broader hunting pattern meant level 17 for Ialo, and a merit turn in.
Zone Merit rewards could be sold at the public market or traded to other players directly.
Mur waited as Ialo rolled on a Merit item reward. Tier 3 Massive Plate Armor. Usable only by Front-Line Soldier or Guardian roles. It was primarily a Guardian role as they had reductions to Massive Armor penalty.
So it was fortuitous to see a Lizardkin in Rookie tier Massive Plate Armor, being confused.
Mur had a conversation first.
"Are you part of a guild?"
"No. I wanted a Foreign Legion invite, but I never got one. I was going to look for a guild, but I figured I'd better get to level 10 and get out of the Newb-zone. Are you guys part of a guild?"
"We're guildless. Ialo didn't really know he needed a guild, and I got kicked out of mine."
"Oh, well I have to go find some guild recruiters. Is there some kind of channel for Guild recruiters?"
"Invite-only, supposedly. I've heard if you are a huge deal in your guild, and they can you, you can connect with some Guild Headhunters. I'm hearing its level 80 demis and up. And commanders."
"Oh, well I can't just go around and find a bunch of recruiters here?" the Lizardkin aka Odeimos, asked.
"Nope. Unless you have a foreign legion letter, you won't get in a guild as a low-level."
"Are you guys just teaming up, can I join your group, at least?"
"You've got to go through the gauntlet, just like Ialo did. In order to have the equipment you need, you'll have to complete all the extra challenge quests, you probably don't even have many of them discovered. Ialo was a ranger in a ranger friendly zone, you're a guardian-trainee in a zone more specced for berserker type equipment."
"How do we get him the right equipment?" Ialo asked.
"It's going to suck, but Odeimos, you need to run the whole Dwarf holdings intro zone with us, including the challenge quests," Mur said.
"Yuck, what if I just go fight some guys here?" Odeimos said.
Ialo responded first, "You'll die. I've wipes four times, with Mur's help. We have some Tier 3 Massive Plate, but you need to get to level 15 first. Mur's a level 31 recon. I'm a level 17 magic ranger".
"Hmm. I guess I can do that. How are you going to run it with me, if you're so high level?"
"The Dwarflands doesn't have any phasing, so we can run it together, and help out. Plus there is the epic Dark Dwarf incursion challenge, which can result in a Tier 2 Massive Armor right out of the rookie zone."
From the Swamplands, they had to pass through the Iron Mountain Pass, a level 15-20 zone, staying on the mountain road, and tag teaming the few mobs they did encounter. Mur had to use up the last of his coin on buying a few grenades to add to their punch against level 15 mobs.
From there it was on to the Highlands, the level 10-15 junction zone connecting to the Dwarflands, and Frostlands, which were the Giants starting zone.
As Highlands were a favored guild training zone, they stayed away from groups of guilders, skirting around the edges of the zone until they reached the threshold of the rookie zone, where guild powers could not be used, nor abused on the newbies therein.
The trek into the Dwarflands Rookie zone starting spot was quick, as the rookie zones were smaller than all the others.
The beginning of the noob-quest chain was a solid stone dinning room table in the Dwarfking's Palace. The Dwarfking's adjutant was sitting at the far end.
Odeimos sat down in the opposite chair.
"Well, I was to tell you you about the current sit'ation with them Dark Dwarves and the Trolls coming out of the Deep roads? But first, be seated. This'on will take a while."
Odeimos looked around for another chair.
"All of you, please sit, if'n you would."
Mur shrugged, he'd never played Dwarflands, but the Prima guide never mentioned this. He sat down next to Odeimos, and Iola followed, sitting next to them.
"We welcome you, travelers, to the Dwarven Highlands, home to the Highland Kingdom, ruled by our illustrious and wise Dwarfking. His axe blade is sharp, and his shield protects the Dwarven and free folk of these lands from all threats foreign and domestic."
This didn't match what Mur remembered of the guide. Maybe it had changed since release.
The adjutant twisted a mechanical lever, which spun a gear which released a projection of the Dwarflands zone.
"My stonesense finds something different in you three. An Ambassador from lands far perhaps?"
Mur blinked, and pondered whether something had broken in the dialogue.
"We are just guildless, milord Dwarf. Never been an ambassador, I don't think any of us has, though I just met Gloriamur and Odeimos today," Ialo said.
"Hmm," the adjutant npc pondered. Light flared over the three of them, smoke filled the room.
REALM PORTAL CHARGING. PREPARE YOURSELF.
He was being evicted! Mur realized with a groan. Since when did the Invincible Heroes have that much power. What had he done! He didn't even get an appeal.
All around him was only the white fog of a realm transfer.
50% CHARGED.
Where would he going back to?
75% CHARGED.
Forest Grove, of course.
90% CHARGED.
He had completed every solo accomplishment of Forest Grove, and even lead teams, and full on combat in the best of the Elven graceful fighting style. He had spent time on the command aspects of the realm while he was waiting to get a Foreign Legion invite into Guildlands.
100% CHARGED
[LEAVING GUILDLANDS - HIGHLANDS]
...
...
...
...
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Wednesday, June 12, 2019
Forge of Tech moved
I'm moving Forge of Tech to github, because of some of the code formatting issues. And that way I can actually include the source code Li Suyin writes in the github repository.
The chapters will be markdown files at: https://github.com/apeterson-BFI/forgeoftech
The chapters will be markdown files at: https://github.com/apeterson-BFI/forgeoftech
Monday, June 10, 2019
Forge of Tech, pt 2
(This is a Forge of Destiny alt-fic which replaces the Xianxia
cultivation system with a super-powered programming and hacking and
cyborgs and drones setting transplanted within the imperial system &
culture of FoD. All credit to yrsillar for writing Forge of Destiny
& Threads of Destiny: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/21188/forge-of-destiny, https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/threads-of-destiny-eastern-fantasy-sequel-to-forge-of-destiny.51431/)
Li Suyin's phone didn't have an alarm app, she would have to program something up once she learned more about python. She found herself sleeping in fits and starts until it was time to get up, have breakfast and head to her first class.
Li Suyin knew she would have to get into cybernetic enhancements before long, but first she wanted to establish her bonafides in programming, to get a firm foundation which would help her move forward in algorithms, flow and enhancements.
Elder Hua Su taught the programming class. Li Suyin got there early, but even after the smaller classroom filled in, it was only about 30 people.
"New programmers on the left, those familiar with the basics on the right," Elder Su said.
Li Suyin moved over to the right side of the room.
A few more students trickled in over the next few minutes until at last, the matronly elder made a sharp gesture with her right hand and the door snapped shut.
“Consider this my first lesson. Lateness will not be tolerated,” she said crisply, sweeping the room with an intimidating stare. “If you are late, you will not receive my instruction that day. There will be no exceptions. Nor will I allow interruptions. Any purposeful disruption of my lesson will result in your immediate expulsion from this room. You will not be allowed back.”
The few whispers and sounds from the students presented ended immediately. The Elder regarded them silently for a beat. “Good. You can follow instructions,” she said with a small amount of satisfaction.
“I am Elder Hua Su. I am the Head of our Programming department. You will refer to me as Elder Su, Programmer Su, or Instructor, and nothing else. You are here because you have had no instruction in programming for whatever reason.” There was no judgement in the Elder’s words, only a statement of fact.
Li Suyin resented that statement, she wanted to learn more and especially get some early pointers for learning python.
“Or because you desire expert advice in setting your foundation. In that case, I applaud your humility. Everything you will learn here at the Sect is founded in your familiarity with programs and algorithms, which you will learn the beginning notes of here."
Expert advice, that sounded right to Li Suyin.
"I will not waste time on command lines and syntax errors, for it is the substance that you need to learn. If you do not strive and push past minor obstacles such as those, you will never make it in the sect. To avoid wasting time I will divide the classroom as I intended."
A shimmering glass pane mirror slid down from the ceiling dividing the class into two, and Li Suyin suspected it allowed two separate holograms of the Elder to be displayed in the two halves of the room.
"Good. Now after the very first steps of your programmer's art, progress is made more effective by self directed learning. I will teach you a few things, but most of our class time will be spent working on assignments where I will come alongside and offer one on one feedback. My focus is on your problem solving process. The Programmer's art, qua programming, is a slow art, taking time and conscious direction to solve the big problems. Your problem solving skills are much more important than your typing skills in this area.
"As a test, I'd like you to start with writing a python program which both pretty prints the current date and time, and also displays a number indicating the number of milliseconds since the emperor took the throne. You may be unfamiliar with python, so you can also use any other language available in our environment. However, I want you to actually calculate the milliseconds number from the parts of the current date and time, not rely on a language facility which directly looks at the linux time.
"I will offer points as you work through this."
Li Suyin was determined to figure it out in Python, especially since C# and F# didn't seem to be available. Father had spoken of Ocaml, a pre-cursor language to F#. Maybe that was available, but she wasn't familiar with the libraries of Ocaml, so she went with python instead.
The first part was finding out what sort of datetime library python had:
Source code: Lib/datetime.py The datetime module supplies classes for manipulating dates and times in both simple and complex ways. While date and time arithmetic is supported, the focus of the implementation is on efficient attribute extraction for output formatting and manipulation. For related functionality, see also the time and calendar modules.classmethod datetime.today()
Return the current local datetime, with tzinfo None. This is equivalent to datetime.fromtimestamp(time.time()). See also now(), fromtimestamp().She started coding up the simple part of the test: displaying the current datetime in a readable format:
The Sect didn't provide access to the empire's internet, but it did replace the normal Multitudes searchmasters' sect with a local search of sect resources available to her. So her normal search query (multitude -luckymode "python datetime") was redirected to sect-hunt -topn 1 "python datetime"
[pytest1.py]
from datetime import datetime
print (datetime.today())
Pretty easy once the docs are available.
$ python pytest1.py
43-01-1 20:25:41.372618Now the hard part. There's some off by one issues since year 1 is the first one (add 0 years), week 1 is the first one, day 1 is the first one. etc.
01-01-1 01:01:01.000001 would be the first moment of the current emperor's reign, so Li Suyin thought by subtracting by one from them all, she could get the correct offsets, and then divide micros by 1000 to get millis.
Instance attributes (read-only):
datetime.emperor
String value of the reigning emperor/empress of the current date
datetime.year
Between 1 and 1000 inclusive.
datetime.week
Between 1 and 52 inclusive. s:
datetime.day
Between 1 and 7 inclusive.
datetime.hour
In range(24).
datetime.minute
In range(60).
datetime.second
In range(60).
datetime.microsecond
In range(1000000).
$ vim pytest1.py
:saveas su_test1.py
[su_test1.py]
from datetime import datetime
dt = datetime.today()
print(datetime.today())
year = dt.year - 1
week = dt.week - 1
day = dt.day - 1
hour = dt.hour - 1
minute = dt.minute - 1
second = dt.second - 1
milliseconds = (dt.microsecond - 1) / 1000
week = week + year * 52
day = day + week * 7
hour = hour + day * 24
minute = minute + hour * 60
second = second + minute * 60
milliseconds = milliseconds + second * 1000
print(milliseconds)
$ python3 su_test1.py
43-01-1 20:25:41.372618
1320953080372.618
Li Suyin raised her hand, passing her phone to the Elder after she had checked a few other disciple's results.
"Another correct result. You may want to consider creating an offset helping function, and in a larger program you'd want to model unit conversions explicitly, but in a quick classroom setting it's good."
Other disciples rapidly finished the assignment, a few of them weren't done yet after 20 minutes, 40% had forgot the off-by-one issue, and had to fix their code, and 50% had correct results.
"Those of you who can't figure out the basics of this test, keep working on it. The rest of you, let's commence the instructional portion of this class."
Elder Su's "instructional" material was largely preparatory. She spoke on the need for slow, deliberate thinking, required all students to come to class with paper, and extolled the benefits of thinking on paper, make some funny comments and comparisons with Elder Qiu's flow classes, and began expounding on a first challenge problem involving sect rankings.
She also offered up an extended version of the datetime problem: "The emperors class in the datetime module contains the years of each emperor's reign. You can access all the emperors and their corresponding reign duration as a dict. Using this feature, and considering year 1 in your system to be the start of the Empress' reign, calculate the milliseconds from year 1 of the Empress' reign to 22-50-1 00:00:00 of Emperor's An's reign. This will be a negative number."
Li Suyin had hoped they would get something better than these phones in class, but it wasn't to be, so she went back to the house after class, had lunch, and spent some time investigating cybernetics.
CYBERNETIC ENHANCEMENT ASSESSMENT: Li Suyin
INSTALLED: None
Status:
BRAIN
-- Conscious - unqualified
(suitedness requirement met, preconditions: heart / lungs not met)
-- Subconscious - unqualified
-- Autonomic - unqualified
Lungs : unqualified
Heart : unqualified
Legs : unqualified
Hands : unqualified
Arms : unqualified
Spine : unqualified
Eyes : unqualified
Face : unqualified
Other : unknown
HELP ENHANCEMENTS
Argent Sect Enhancements:
Micro, Minor and Modest enhancements are general enhancers provided by the sect. Significant, substantial, large enhancements are specialized for specific effect and available for advanced disciples based on progression in sect challenges and opportunities.
Brain enhancements require blood flow improvement from the lungs and heart, guaranteeing an amplified brain will have the fuel it needs.
Micro - 2 argent coins
Minor - 10 argent coins
Modest - 25 argent coins
HELP QUALIFICATIONS
As every part of the body and brain is inter-related, greatly improving one part of the body has an impact on the connected parts. By strengthening the body first, the shock to the system caused by cybernetics will be lessened.
There are training exercises for every part of the body to help you reach the qualification standard for safe cybernetic enhancements.
In addition there are dependent conditions for development, because of the inter-related nature of the body and mind (+1 means one level higher in tier of enhancement).
HEART <= LUNGS + 1
LEGS <= HEART + 1
HANDS <= ARMS + 1
ARMS <= HEART + 1
ARMS <= SPINE + 1
EYES <= FACE + 1
FACE <= HEART + 1
Autonomic <= SPINE + 1
Autonomic <= HEART
Subconscious <= HEART
Conscious <= HEART
There are additional specialized parts of the body and mind that can be enhanced as an advanced cyberneticist.
Li Suyin didn't see Su Ling all day, though she was in the computer room all afternoon completing Elder Su's two challenges and making up some additional ones of her own.
She went to the dispensary to eat something quick (and hacker-friendly), unwind and get ready for Elder Qui's class.
Thursday, June 6, 2019
Forge of Tech, brainstormings and Pt 1.
(This is a Forge of Destiny alt-fic which replaces the Xianxia cultivation system with a super-powered programming and hacking and cyborgs and drones setting transplanted within the imperial system & culture of FoD. All credit to yrsillar for writing Forge of Destiny & Threads of Destiny: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/21188/forge-of-destiny, https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/threads-of-destiny-eastern-fantasy-sequel-to-forge-of-destiny.51431/
Xianxia / Cyberpunk fusion (with real programming languages and realistic software tools and possible equipment)
[Brainstorming:]
Li Suyin's a more spiritually focussed cultivator, and her father is in the Imperial bureaucracy. Imagine instead that much of the bureaucracy was programmers, and that programmer / hacker is parallel to the spiritual / physical divide.
Li Suyin would be exploring the hacker side of things for the first time, with some level of familiarity of progamming.
Augmentation - layering cybernetic enhancements onto body and mind.
Flow - through steady instictive hacking, cultivating the hacker's art.
Formations - firewalls, honeypots, anti-viruses,etc.
Production - programming & writing new software and tools, can be sold to other disciples and/or developed into an art used in family or licensed.
Gear Production - Making a hacker's equipment. The empire controls the most essential semiconductor production lines, which maintain the imperial grip over society.
Argent Peak Sect toolset - Python and an initial set of Argent Peak sect libraries available by pip. Argent Peak Sect augmentation toolkit, and hacking toolkit.
Su Ling, Li Suyin's housemate
---
Cai Shenhua - An AI that seeks to bring order to the chaos of Emerald Seas. Came into power a few hundred years ago.
Cai Renxiang - An experimental child AI that Shenua made to evolve on and improve her own design. Even for AI, it takes time to soak in the supernatural hacker's art, and no AI lasts forever.
Ling Qi - homeless person pulled off the street as a result of an deep learning algorithm identifying her as a talent. Knows nothing about computers beyond the cheapest flip phone. She knows how to root a cheap mortal phone and made her living buying, repairing and selling crappy phones and available accessories. Her mother made her money on online porn sites.
Golden Fields Gang
Han Jian - team leader, scrum master.
Gu Xiulan - suave hacker & programmer. Fierce perl programmer with intense hacks
Fan Yu -
Han Fang - ?
Bai Meizhen - cold & offputting aura coming from this Bai main branch scion. Lisp programmer and hacker with many family arts and toolsets. Has a snake algorithm-spirit.
Sun Liling - C programming / Sun computers hacker. The battle between C and Lisp ended in the Sun family (C) and the emperor dealing a heavy blow to the Bai family (Lisp). Has family arts and trickery, and very direct.
Bao Qinglinig - gear medic in the inner sect. Versatile in a wide variety of languages and styles, so that she can unwind bad code in every situation. Expert in unraveling the chains of malicious code, and demands excellence for Li Suyin when she joins the cause.
~ ~ ~
Li Suyin thought she found an empty row, but then a cyborg with an artificial fox-like face sat down next to her. It was the Argent Peak sect's orientation for new members.
She was nervous around the cyborg, who seemed to have human parts and cyborg parts alternating by no design she could figure out.
"Li Suyin," she said.
The girl (fox? cyborg?) grunted. "Su Ling." and turned back to the front of the classroom.
The large room was filling up quickly. Li Suyin looked towards the Bai lady, and noticed an huge area around that one which was empty. She couldn't bear to look at the woman for a moment longer. The Bai's poise and posture screamed hostility, she looked away.
After while, during which Li Suyin wrote her name and a topic header for the orientation in her journal, the Sect elder appeared, as if by magic. Li Suyin knew better, the Imperial bureau, and presumably the sects, had access to advanced holographic projection equipment.
"I am Sect Elder Sima Jiao, head of the Gear department at the Argent Peak Sect. It is unfortunately my turn in the rotation to greet you. I am terribly busy on the best of days so I will not ramble on. To be honest, it is likely that the majority of you will never amount to anything beyond the outer sect where you stand now, and are thus... not particularly worthy of my time.
"Many of you will never know the subtle delight of code flying from your fingertips, never achieve the heights of flow as you shape your hackers' art. Mere coders, filling the endless maw of the imperial computing bureau, or perhaps serving in an army unit at the computing frontier, defending against the relentless drive of the horde, defending against intrusions by the weight of sheer numbers.
"In any case, your first years here will serve the purpose of separating those with only minor potential from those with true talent. This is why no one will be allowed to leave the sect grounds during the first year, nor will any correspondence be allowed in or out in the first three months.”
Li Suyin was disappointed that she wouldn't get the chance to stay in touch with her family, but she supposed it wasn't that surprising.
“The only other rule is that you may not kill or permanently maim your fellow disciples nor may you damage or steal sect property. In addition, there is to be absolutely no violence between you newcomers for the first three months. Conflict is important for your growth, but it would not do to allow potential to be cut off before it can even begin to bloom.”
How could learning take place in a violent environment. Her breath caught in her throat, she felt a fit of fear in her. She had never fought with fists or weapons or any other thing.
Su Ling shifted in her seat and muttered, "figures."
"Each of you will be granted an allowance of five argent coins a month. If you didn't know, these coins are our Argent Sect cryptocurrency, usable within the sect. You may find yourself earning specialized Sect coins, such as Archive coins or Elder instruction coins, but only the argent coins will be given to you freely. I will be handing out phones for your first piece of gear, a simple hackable cell phone, of Argent Sect make, at the end of class.
"This phone will have your 5 argent coins as well as the Argent Peak beginners' toolset, which is installed on the cli. Click on the terminal app to begin your training. You will find and earn much more gear as you progress through these first years, but a true Immortal will find that they progress faster by customizing everything to their unique way."
"Cultivating your hacker art will require several aspects. First programming: our Argent Peak toolset comes with the Python programming language, a good foundation for beginners to learn, and a common language that comes with many tools, some provided by the empire and many specific sect libraries and tools which you can get by running the command: pip.
"There are also secret libraries you may come across through completing special challenges and tribulations. Secondly, you must learn to augment your frail bodies with cybernetic enhancements. You will learn a lot about this in our Cybernetics classes taught by Elder Guan Zhou, he will show you both how to enhance your body in this way, and how to put these enhancements to the test.
"The third aspect you will need to learn is Flow. Flow is the way a hacker supernaturally operates, dealing with trials and situations with speed, precision, understanding beyond the mortal ken, all these things together can be reached with you step outside of the moment by moment awareness of unnecessary every day details and enter into a hyperfocused state. You will learn to enter flow more easily and reach greater heights of flow through daily practice and quick exercises.
"You need both long and detailed tests in order to refine your programming art, and quick tests in order to refine your flow art. Cybernetics enhances both of these in differing ways. You will hear much more about all of this from Sect Elder Hua Su, who will teach a Programming Course, and Sect Elder Qiu Yong, who will instruct you in Flow."
After that, the elder mentioned mundane details, like that they would have their everyday necessities provided for, that they would have to pick out their own housing and should be rooming with at least one other. The Elder's classes would be offered for three months, which was a rare luxury, to have such expert wise instructors.
They lined up to get their coins and phone. After a long wait, she took the phone Elder Sima offered. It was a large green phone, with a slide out keyboard. She put the phone away and headed out of the classroom.
Soon they had segregated by gender, and Li Suyin was surrounded by other girls making their way up to the housing mountain for them.
Li Suyin didn't know who to room with. She didn't know any of the other students. So it happeneed by default that she made her way up the mountain path next to Su Ling.
Another new sect member was make a disturbance. She was very tall, and she had approached that Sun family scion in red, who rebuffed her. There were murmurs from the talking girls.
"I heard she asked the Bai witch and Sun Liling to room together with her, completely air-headed of her," said someone walking by.
"What kind of house do you want to look for?" Li Suyin asked her fox-minded "friend".
"Nothin' much. Won't be there anyway."
They settled on a small house with a bedroom and a room for working on the computer. The computer room didn't have any gear in it, but it did have a four port switch with three ethernet cables in the 2nd through 4th ports that were available for use, with a patch cable coming from the wall into the 1st port.
She would have to get a computer with a bigger screen for any serious programming.
"Are you planning on using the computer room tonight?" she asked Su Ling as they decided which side of the room they wanted. There were two small twin sized beds on the two sides of the room, and they took up almost half the small rooms' space.
"I'm headed out on a hunt."
"How can you know anything about this place yet? Isn't that dangerous," she asked concerned for the person she didn't even know. Conspicuous modifications like Su Ling had were out of style these days, at least amongst the Imperial bureaucrats that she saw ocassionally visiting father at their house."
"I'll find out," Su Ling said gruffly. "S' too stuffy here."
"I'll be getting familiar with the Argent toolset, and I'll get some food, if you still eat normal food?"
"Greenboard, if you find any waste greenboard," Su Ling said and left.
Any circuitry she did find would likely be either part of a complete system she could work with, or something more electriconics and electrics, too low level for her taste.
Li Suyin first went to the storehouse to get food. There were plenty of more traditional staples like rice or stuff for simple soups and stews, but also hacker friendly things like pizza and pizza rolls which could be cooked in microwaves that were at the storehouse.
She went for the traditional first, and made some rice and beans for a light meal before a night of programming on the little phone keyboard. Then she went into the computer room and sat at the rustic oak desk. The slab desk was weighty enough to support a supercomputer's weight, she was almost sure of it.
With just her phone, it was comical. She turned the phone on with a flick of it's power button on the side, and she slide the keyboard out.
It had a row of numbers and punctuation (as shift-alternates) along the top, as well as the usual letters and shift/control/alt, enter and meta keys, as well as braces, brackets and slash. Li Suyin hadn't seen the meta key used, but she heard the Lisp community (particular the Bai family) used it with their Lisp based editor.
The phone, once it completes its boot (showing a flash screen of Linux, Argent Peak Distribution, all rights reserved. Man page COPYRIGHT for further information on your rights and responsibilities as a sect member), shows a tile screen with six apps: Currency Manager, CYNet and Terminal, Calendar, SMessage and Email. The email icon showed a faded out appearance, and she couldn't open it when she clicked on it.
Li Suyin stopped playing around and entered the terminal. The same Argent Peak Distribution message showed up, plus there was a new message: "man intro to get started."
Then a standard Linux terminal appeared.
Li Suyin yawned. This is baby level basics, stuff her father had taught her on her knee. Maybe it wasn't python and this particular distribution but the commands came easy.
She watched the roll of text from apt get. Then she restarted intro.
Li Suyin yawned again and suppressed her desire to push past this. She was used to compiled languages, so she needed to pay attention.
She whirred through the introduction to python interactive mode, and then the vim tutorial was stuff she mostly knew already. She ran python3 in file mode in a couple of examples, after editing new files in vim.
The tutorial continued with installing git and setting up a repository by sshing into the Argent Sect's student provisioning server.
The server identified her as a student and walked her through creating and initializing a practice gitlab repository on the Sect's hosted gitlab installation.
Neither the Intro nor the server's help functions showed her what ssh or any other commands were but they merely gave verbatim commands to enter.
Soon Li Suyin had the practice repository set up on her lsuyin132 account. She didn't expect there to be so many lsuyins, but that could be any last name starting with an l and suyin was fairly common.
Following the intro, she cloned the cloud repository to her phone and went through some examples combining pip3 libraries, vim editing and git commits and manipulations.
She tried to set up her favorite Fsharp programming language on the terminal, but it was generating some error messages, generating weird executables that didn't run. Father mentioned Fsharp was related to another language called Ocaml which might be more available in a non imperial-bureau environment. She would check that out later.
Instead Li Suyin switched to creating a simple "Hello Sect"! program in python. First in interactive mode, and then in file mode.
Looking at the calendar, she saw that both the Cybernetics class and the Programming class started at 9 am tomorrow morning. The Flow class was listed as Flex (8 pm - 10 pm) start, with an undefined end time.
She checked Currency Manager and saw that it listed the 5 Argent Sect coins under her account.
She poked around the system, checking man pages and all of the applications available on the phone. She didn't find any hidden challenges or oppoortunities yet, but maybe she would get some hints after classes tommorrow.
Eventually she went back to the main room and drifted off to sleep. She never heard Su Ling come back to the small house.
Xianxia / Cyberpunk fusion (with real programming languages and realistic software tools and possible equipment)
[Brainstorming:]
Li Suyin's a more spiritually focussed cultivator, and her father is in the Imperial bureaucracy. Imagine instead that much of the bureaucracy was programmers, and that programmer / hacker is parallel to the spiritual / physical divide.
Li Suyin would be exploring the hacker side of things for the first time, with some level of familiarity of progamming.
Augmentation - layering cybernetic enhancements onto body and mind.
Flow - through steady instictive hacking, cultivating the hacker's art.
Formations - firewalls, honeypots, anti-viruses,etc.
Production - programming & writing new software and tools, can be sold to other disciples and/or developed into an art used in family or licensed.
Gear Production - Making a hacker's equipment. The empire controls the most essential semiconductor production lines, which maintain the imperial grip over society.
Argent Peak Sect toolset - Python and an initial set of Argent Peak sect libraries available by pip. Argent Peak Sect augmentation toolkit, and hacking toolkit.
Su Ling, Li Suyin's housemate
---
Cyborg
Part human, part AI - damaged and mad at her motherCai Shenhua - An AI that seeks to bring order to the chaos of Emerald Seas. Came into power a few hundred years ago.
Cai Renxiang - An experimental child AI that Shenua made to evolve on and improve her own design. Even for AI, it takes time to soak in the supernatural hacker's art, and no AI lasts forever.
Ling Qi - homeless person pulled off the street as a result of an deep learning algorithm identifying her as a talent. Knows nothing about computers beyond the cheapest flip phone. She knows how to root a cheap mortal phone and made her living buying, repairing and selling crappy phones and available accessories. Her mother made her money on online porn sites.
Golden Fields Gang
Han Jian - team leader, scrum master.
Gu Xiulan - suave hacker & programmer. Fierce perl programmer with intense hacks
Fan Yu -
Han Fang - ?
Bai Meizhen - cold & offputting aura coming from this Bai main branch scion. Lisp programmer and hacker with many family arts and toolsets. Has a snake algorithm-spirit.
Sun Liling - C programming / Sun computers hacker. The battle between C and Lisp ended in the Sun family (C) and the emperor dealing a heavy blow to the Bai family (Lisp). Has family arts and trickery, and very direct.
Bao Qinglinig - gear medic in the inner sect. Versatile in a wide variety of languages and styles, so that she can unwind bad code in every situation. Expert in unraveling the chains of malicious code, and demands excellence for Li Suyin when she joins the cause.
~ ~ ~
Li Suyin thought she found an empty row, but then a cyborg with an artificial fox-like face sat down next to her. It was the Argent Peak sect's orientation for new members.
She was nervous around the cyborg, who seemed to have human parts and cyborg parts alternating by no design she could figure out.
"Li Suyin," she said.
The girl (fox? cyborg?) grunted. "Su Ling." and turned back to the front of the classroom.
The large room was filling up quickly. Li Suyin looked towards the Bai lady, and noticed an huge area around that one which was empty. She couldn't bear to look at the woman for a moment longer. The Bai's poise and posture screamed hostility, she looked away.
After while, during which Li Suyin wrote her name and a topic header for the orientation in her journal, the Sect elder appeared, as if by magic. Li Suyin knew better, the Imperial bureau, and presumably the sects, had access to advanced holographic projection equipment.
"I am Sect Elder Sima Jiao, head of the Gear department at the Argent Peak Sect. It is unfortunately my turn in the rotation to greet you. I am terribly busy on the best of days so I will not ramble on. To be honest, it is likely that the majority of you will never amount to anything beyond the outer sect where you stand now, and are thus... not particularly worthy of my time.
"Many of you will never know the subtle delight of code flying from your fingertips, never achieve the heights of flow as you shape your hackers' art. Mere coders, filling the endless maw of the imperial computing bureau, or perhaps serving in an army unit at the computing frontier, defending against the relentless drive of the horde, defending against intrusions by the weight of sheer numbers.
"In any case, your first years here will serve the purpose of separating those with only minor potential from those with true talent. This is why no one will be allowed to leave the sect grounds during the first year, nor will any correspondence be allowed in or out in the first three months.”
Li Suyin was disappointed that she wouldn't get the chance to stay in touch with her family, but she supposed it wasn't that surprising.
“The only other rule is that you may not kill or permanently maim your fellow disciples nor may you damage or steal sect property. In addition, there is to be absolutely no violence between you newcomers for the first three months. Conflict is important for your growth, but it would not do to allow potential to be cut off before it can even begin to bloom.”
How could learning take place in a violent environment. Her breath caught in her throat, she felt a fit of fear in her. She had never fought with fists or weapons or any other thing.
Su Ling shifted in her seat and muttered, "figures."
"Each of you will be granted an allowance of five argent coins a month. If you didn't know, these coins are our Argent Sect cryptocurrency, usable within the sect. You may find yourself earning specialized Sect coins, such as Archive coins or Elder instruction coins, but only the argent coins will be given to you freely. I will be handing out phones for your first piece of gear, a simple hackable cell phone, of Argent Sect make, at the end of class.
"This phone will have your 5 argent coins as well as the Argent Peak beginners' toolset, which is installed on the cli. Click on the terminal app to begin your training. You will find and earn much more gear as you progress through these first years, but a true Immortal will find that they progress faster by customizing everything to their unique way."
"Cultivating your hacker art will require several aspects. First programming: our Argent Peak toolset comes with the Python programming language, a good foundation for beginners to learn, and a common language that comes with many tools, some provided by the empire and many specific sect libraries and tools which you can get by running the command: pip.
"There are also secret libraries you may come across through completing special challenges and tribulations. Secondly, you must learn to augment your frail bodies with cybernetic enhancements. You will learn a lot about this in our Cybernetics classes taught by Elder Guan Zhou, he will show you both how to enhance your body in this way, and how to put these enhancements to the test.
"The third aspect you will need to learn is Flow. Flow is the way a hacker supernaturally operates, dealing with trials and situations with speed, precision, understanding beyond the mortal ken, all these things together can be reached with you step outside of the moment by moment awareness of unnecessary every day details and enter into a hyperfocused state. You will learn to enter flow more easily and reach greater heights of flow through daily practice and quick exercises.
"You need both long and detailed tests in order to refine your programming art, and quick tests in order to refine your flow art. Cybernetics enhances both of these in differing ways. You will hear much more about all of this from Sect Elder Hua Su, who will teach a Programming Course, and Sect Elder Qiu Yong, who will instruct you in Flow."
After that, the elder mentioned mundane details, like that they would have their everyday necessities provided for, that they would have to pick out their own housing and should be rooming with at least one other. The Elder's classes would be offered for three months, which was a rare luxury, to have such expert wise instructors.
They lined up to get their coins and phone. After a long wait, she took the phone Elder Sima offered. It was a large green phone, with a slide out keyboard. She put the phone away and headed out of the classroom.
Soon they had segregated by gender, and Li Suyin was surrounded by other girls making their way up to the housing mountain for them.
Li Suyin didn't know who to room with. She didn't know any of the other students. So it happeneed by default that she made her way up the mountain path next to Su Ling.
Another new sect member was make a disturbance. She was very tall, and she had approached that Sun family scion in red, who rebuffed her. There were murmurs from the talking girls.
"I heard she asked the Bai witch and Sun Liling to room together with her, completely air-headed of her," said someone walking by.
"What kind of house do you want to look for?" Li Suyin asked her fox-minded "friend".
"Nothin' much. Won't be there anyway."
They settled on a small house with a bedroom and a room for working on the computer. The computer room didn't have any gear in it, but it did have a four port switch with three ethernet cables in the 2nd through 4th ports that were available for use, with a patch cable coming from the wall into the 1st port.
She would have to get a computer with a bigger screen for any serious programming.
"Are you planning on using the computer room tonight?" she asked Su Ling as they decided which side of the room they wanted. There were two small twin sized beds on the two sides of the room, and they took up almost half the small rooms' space.
"I'm headed out on a hunt."
"How can you know anything about this place yet? Isn't that dangerous," she asked concerned for the person she didn't even know. Conspicuous modifications like Su Ling had were out of style these days, at least amongst the Imperial bureaucrats that she saw ocassionally visiting father at their house."
"I'll find out," Su Ling said gruffly. "S' too stuffy here."
"I'll be getting familiar with the Argent toolset, and I'll get some food, if you still eat normal food?"
"Greenboard, if you find any waste greenboard," Su Ling said and left.
Any circuitry she did find would likely be either part of a complete system she could work with, or something more electriconics and electrics, too low level for her taste.
Li Suyin first went to the storehouse to get food. There were plenty of more traditional staples like rice or stuff for simple soups and stews, but also hacker friendly things like pizza and pizza rolls which could be cooked in microwaves that were at the storehouse.
She went for the traditional first, and made some rice and beans for a light meal before a night of programming on the little phone keyboard. Then she went into the computer room and sat at the rustic oak desk. The slab desk was weighty enough to support a supercomputer's weight, she was almost sure of it.
With just her phone, it was comical. She turned the phone on with a flick of it's power button on the side, and she slide the keyboard out.
It had a row of numbers and punctuation (as shift-alternates) along the top, as well as the usual letters and shift/control/alt, enter and meta keys, as well as braces, brackets and slash. Li Suyin hadn't seen the meta key used, but she heard the Lisp community (particular the Bai family) used it with their Lisp based editor.
The phone, once it completes its boot (showing a flash screen of Linux, Argent Peak Distribution, all rights reserved. Man page COPYRIGHT for further information on your rights and responsibilities as a sect member), shows a tile screen with six apps: Currency Manager, CYNet and Terminal, Calendar, SMessage and Email. The email icon showed a faded out appearance, and she couldn't open it when she clicked on it.
Li Suyin stopped playing around and entered the terminal. The same Argent Peak Distribution message showed up, plus there was a new message: "man intro to get started."
Then a standard Linux terminal appeared.
lsuyin132@argent.sect:~$ man intro
Intro (1)
Name - Intro - a command providing an introductory tutorial experience
SYNOPSIS
Intro
Intro resume
Intro restart
DESCRIPTION
A command providing a tutorial experience for new members of the Argent Peak sect, first being introduced to the sect's language and toolset. This command will provide a quick start of commands for navigating Linux and Python
Intro and Intro resume are the same, they will resume execution of the tutorial from where it left off in the last session.
Intro restart will begin again at the start of the tutorial.
Intro DOES NOT provide an exhaustion education, as that is the purpose of the Outer disciple's time at the Sect, and no tool could provide such.
lsuyin132@argent.sect:~$ Intro
Intro
PT1 - Introduction to Argent Sect terminal operations
This tutorial is not intended to hold your hand, but instead to give you the basics that will get any disciple of the outer sect started.
At a rudimentary level of training, you should know the following commands: apt, pip3, python3, vim, git. There are multitudes of other commands, tools and utilities that you will want to learn and use, but that is a matter of your choice what to learn.
With these five tools, you can obtain many of these other tools you may want to use. Of course many tools are hidden and only available by completing challenges and showing an impressive performance. You will find the imperial standard set of tools is already available through apt.
APT
apt, is your package management system for Argent Peak linux. Packages can be libraries supporting code you desire to write (although usually that is through pip3).
We will use apt in order to obtain pip3, which is Python's package management system.
Type in the following command and hit enter: sudo apt get python3-pip [for now, consider sudo to be just a little prefix to your apt command, always run sudo apt instead of just apt].
You will see a whir of text flashing across your terminal screen, then it will let you know that after this operation 555 kw of additional data will be downloaded, do you want to continue?
Type in the letter y and enter.
Try this now. Intro will exit and allow you to try this command.
lsuyin132@argent.sect:~$ sudo apt install python3-pip
Li Suyin yawned. This is baby level basics, stuff her father had taught her on her knee. Maybe it wasn't python and this particular distribution but the commands came easy.
She watched the roll of text from apt get. Then she restarted intro.
Throughout this intro and for your first few years in the sect, you will be prompted to show initiative and learn by try/fail cycles. This is a trivial first example problem in this vein.Li Suyin quickly typed in the same command, but with vim in place of python3-pip. This package was using 8 mw of additional space. She said yes, and then when vim was installed, she ran the df command to see how much space she had on the phone. There was only 2 gw of space on the phone, so she would have to be careful.
Install the vim package using what you already know.
To find out more information about apt or any other command, just put man in front of the command to receive the manual page for the command.
With both pip3 installed and vim installed, we can proceed. Python3 can be run either in interactive or file mode, and is already installed on all Sect computers. In interactive mode you can run code and quickly see the result. File mode allows you to run python programs.
Enter the command: python3 to enter interactive mode.
Li Suyin yawned again and suppressed her desire to push past this. She was used to compiled languages, so she needed to pay attention.
She whirred through the introduction to python interactive mode, and then the vim tutorial was stuff she mostly knew already. She ran python3 in file mode in a couple of examples, after editing new files in vim.
The tutorial continued with installing git and setting up a repository by sshing into the Argent Sect's student provisioning server.
The server identified her as a student and walked her through creating and initializing a practice gitlab repository on the Sect's hosted gitlab installation.
Neither the Intro nor the server's help functions showed her what ssh or any other commands were but they merely gave verbatim commands to enter.
Soon Li Suyin had the practice repository set up on her lsuyin132 account. She didn't expect there to be so many lsuyins, but that could be any last name starting with an l and suyin was fairly common.
Following the intro, she cloned the cloud repository to her phone and went through some examples combining pip3 libraries, vim editing and git commits and manipulations.
She tried to set up her favorite Fsharp programming language on the terminal, but it was generating some error messages, generating weird executables that didn't run. Father mentioned Fsharp was related to another language called Ocaml which might be more available in a non imperial-bureau environment. She would check that out later.
Instead Li Suyin switched to creating a simple "Hello Sect"! program in python. First in interactive mode, and then in file mode.
$ mkdir pythonShe hid the terminal app, and clicked on SMessage.
$ python3
Python 3.6.7
>>> print("Hello Sect!")
Hello Sect!
>>> quit()
$ vim hello.pyu
[file: hello.py]
print("Hello Sect!")
:wq
$ python3 hello.pv
Hello Sect!
SMessage v2.8, licensed for use by the Argent Peak Sect
lsuyin132...
Conversations --
Conversation with Sect Staff5. The calendar app is pre-loaded with class schedules and important sect dates. Classes are voluntary but recommended.
4. Email is locked until after the first three months are up. You may email outside sources after that time, however no algorithms may be transfered by email until after your first year at the sect.
3. Your disciple account comes in two forms: name@argent.sect is your safe account. All data and programs in the user folder of an argent.sect user is off limits from hacking and exploits. You will have your starter phone and gear available with this argent.sect account for your first three months. You may choose to join the hacker's battleground and obtain a device with your second account: name@argent.unsafe.sect. All unsafe domain accounts are fair game for hacking, social engineering, manipulation et all. After the first three months, all gear with the argent.sect accounts will be confiscated and you will be thrown into the pool to sink or swim.
2. We encourage you to explore the mountain and express your curiosity when interacting with Outer Sect systems. Many features and opportunities are not in plain view, but through risk taking and curiosity you may find them. No disciple is expected to find and unlock everything.
1. Welcome to the Argent Peak Sect. Please follow the rules as indicated in the message from Sect Rules.
Looking at the calendar, she saw that both the Cybernetics class and the Programming class started at 9 am tomorrow morning. The Flow class was listed as Flex (8 pm - 10 pm) start, with an undefined end time.
She checked Currency Manager and saw that it listed the 5 Argent Sect coins under her account.
She poked around the system, checking man pages and all of the applications available on the phone. She didn't find any hidden challenges or oppoortunities yet, but maybe she would get some hints after classes tommorrow.
Eventually she went back to the main room and drifted off to sleep. She never heard Su Ling come back to the small house.
Thursday, October 25, 2018
Alrisiel: rp set 1
A corner booth in the tavern. Alrisiel, an unemployed cleric of Hod-hera was sitting with Grokwud, a giant spellsworder. A massive warhammer was leaning against the booth, as was Alrisiel's cleric's staff with circular motifs of Hod-hera's two symbols: healing herbs and hearths / fireplaces.
"Grokwud has never heard of clerics for job. Teef yes, warrior - yah. Even ranger, mage or tribal mans. Cleric has tribe already, working for God yes?"
"They sent me a notice, written on purple vellum. It said: Alrisiel Carefore, 2nd sphere Cleric of Hod-hera. Notice of termination of employment, pursuant to City Charter 16 - Bankruptcy of Religious Organization."
"Lots Clerics then, to be found, why should Grokwud hire you?" he said, leaning against his warhammer.
A late arrival spoke up: "Most other Clerics are starting their own all-cleric groups. I was over at Holy Hops and every cleric in town was taking up the tables. Clerics of Aph-Evril, Urrem-Mortem and Damar-Herm were definitely forming up new charters."
It was dual-sword wielding man of war Dirk Gadron. Human, wearing a feathered cap. He removed it.
"Milady Alrisiel of Hod-hera, the Redguard Auxilliary Company would love to have your services. I told Grokwud here to keep the drifters out, and he got a little enthusiastic."
"Grokwud will zap you, you watch out sword-boy."
"Ha Ha, oh Grokwud you slay me. Anyway, come on Alrisiel, come see our company hall!"'
"Grokwud thinks hall is just room in tavern."
The giant lead them on into an adjoining room, where there were three rows of benches around a central dais.
"Who else is in the Redguard?" Alrisiel asked. She sat down on one of the benches
"We're here!" cackled a high pitched, but clearly male, voice.
"Ah, the Gnome in question," Dirk laughed, "and our favorite bardess."
The gnome was wearing spike studded pauldrons, light chainmail and two daggers sheathed at his sides.
The other arrival was a dark elf playing a haunting melody on her flute. It was dissonant, odd, not like Alrisiel's experience of the Church's musicians.
"Kneegash Bop at your service, milady," the gnome said. "And this lady is Nuhoksa del Graven-Cinder."
The dark elf placed her flute in the exquisite case attached to her pack, and acknowledged their greeting with two fingers.
"So Redguard has a dual-wielding fighter, dual wielding gnomish berserker, spellsword and bardess? And now me? No archer or conventional wizard or sorcerer. No rogue?"
Dirk smiled, "Redguard is known as a strong bunch of front line fighters. Nuhoksa wields a wicked Ilyuvan bow, plucks it's strings with mastery. With you in the mix, we'll be a versatile crew. Sure we're not going to take a job to weave through a trapped manor or a lockpicking guild job, but we'll find plenty of work."
"Grokwud say Huddle up."
"I'm in charge, Grok--- Huddle up Redguard Company!" Dirk said.
"We didn't find any more recruits," Kneegash said.
Nuhoksa shrugged.
"Better than last season's opening day," Dirk said. "I took the liberty of jotting down the Army's job board. Most of it is for larger Merc Companies. But I think there's a few we should consider."
"Killian's Killers is 50 strong now. That's not a Merc Company, that's an army!" Kneegash shouted.
"Shh, listen up!" Dirk answered. "Option #1: Patrol the Eastern Graveyards while the army holds funeral services for its fallen commander Marlon Kale. Stop any necromancers trying to reanimate in the graveyard, and destroy anyone or anything they manage to raise up."
"East Graves huge! Need many men. Not good."
Nuhoksa gestured 'thumbs down'.
"Com' mon," Dirk said. "Its 50, fifty, K. We've got a cleric now. What do you think Alrisiel?"
"I understand bards can use wide area debuffing magics through their enchantes. What kind of range do you have on that, Lady Graven-Cinder?"
"She prefers not to talk whenever possible, saves her voice. Call her Nuhoksa, and she's got a bit shy of 50 yards of range."
"And how big is the graveyard?" Alrisiel asked.
"Maybe 600 yards long by 200 yards deep," Dirk answered. "So what do you think?"
"We can do it. I'll bless your weapons, to make them more effective against the undead. We can set up a detection radius, and whatever debuffs Nuhoksa can lay down. The bardess and I can take up a central position, and you guys can roam and pounce on any threats that rise up. I've got Hod's healing magics to keep you going."
"The other job is escorting a merchant to Ale Bay. Its only paying 2.5 k and it would take us 6 days and leave us having to work our way back into the city after. We should really take this. What do you think?"
"It's early season. The dark companies will be very well stocked with the dark professions. But I guess, Kneegash can't resist a big monster bash. I'll do it!"
Nuhoksa was still and silent, and after an awkward moment nodded.
"The job's tomorrow. The funeral is at High-Noon but we need to be there by 10 I figure. Here's your inn tokens. Alrisiel, just talk to Earl, and he'll set you up with a room, that's what the token is for."
"I'll need a half hour with all of your weapons tommorrow to bless them. And Nuhoksa, I have to bless your arrows, so that'll take the longest," Alrisiel said. "Usually I work with Holy Hammers which I can quick recharge on. This will be dfiferent, unless you've had your weapons blessed before."
"We've never had a cleric. What cleric would have joined a Merc company before? With the church out of commission, I expect everyone to be hiring for all kinds of undead --- situations." Dirk said.
With that the group dispersed, each taking a inn token.
Alrisiel talked to Earl and got her room key, and went in to relax.
Dinner was still hours away. The whole dissolution of the Church organizational structure was still too new, and shocking. She took a long bath and then spent a half-hour praying to Hod-Hera while still in her bath robes.
There was a knock on the door. Alrisiel blushed, she didn't want to greet anyone in just a bathrobe. She cracked open the door.
It was a city official. Something with taxes or the charter division.
"Alrisiel Carefore?" asked the official.
"Yes," she said, awkwardly, opening the door the rest of the way.
"2nd Sphere Cleric of Hod-Hera?" he asked.
"Yes."
The man in gold lined uniform took out a pouch from his satchel, opening it up, and starting at it, before nodding. He turned back to her.
"As a 2nd sphere cleric of the Church of San-Clare-Osco, defunct, you are entitled to compensation for lost seniority and retirement investiture."
He handed over the small pouch which jingled as it moved.
Alrisiel took the pouch, and briefly looked into it. It was filled with gold coins. The region's currency was based on coppers, bronze, silver and gold coins. These gold coins were worth 1000 credits each.
The official made his exit immediately, and she closed the door, placing the pouch of coins on the small bed while she got dressed.
She had a dozen similar Cleric outfits back at the church, but all of them but the one she had been wearing when she got the bankruptcy notice were considered assets of the church, and were liquidated as part of the proceedings.
So she had no option but to put back on the same outfit she had worn earlier. It was a white blouse with Hod-Hera symbols embossed, a pale blue skirt and a cloth sash which marked her as a 2nd sphere cleric with its two tassels wrapped in black leather cords.
She put the Hod-heran focusing amulet back around her neck. The amulet itself was white in parts, but mirror-like on four of the cubic faces. The necklace that bore it was delicate silver woven in small chain loops.
Her boots were well-polished, black and only went up to a bit above her ankle.
Her hair was golden and curly. She tied it back in a pony tail.
She eyed the pouch of coins. Must be at least 40k. There was actually a note inside, she didn't get a chance to unfold and read it though.
Another knock knock knock sounded on her inn room door.
"Alri," the gnome Kneegash shouted, as she opened the door. "Can I call you Alri?"
"Only if I can call you Knee," Alrisiel said dryly.
"Call me Gash, Alri. Hoksa and I are going to practice our skills at the training range. Wanna come/?"
She shrugged, and then turned, grabbing her staff and proceeded to follow them.
The "training range" was just down to the street from the tavern / inn.
Past a 24-hour Adventu-Bite, fast food joint, and past the Hammer and Blunt Weapons Emporium.
The sidewalk was full of every type of adventurer in every type of garb. They were all shopping or out and about for some reason.
Every type of vaguely or supposedly heroic adventurer that was. The dark professions had their own shopping and tavern districts on the other side of the city.
Thieves with a heart of gold, berserkers with a pint-sized pun-ferocity, and also clerics, paladins, rangers, warriors and wizards.
The training yard was packed full as well, but there were hundreds of dummies, and plenty of targets and other training equipment.
"We'll find an area with dummies and bullseyes," 'Gash said, mostly talking to Nuhoksa.
They walked through the huge building, and after several false starts, they found an area in the corner of the first floor.
"I can't use a lot of my spells in training. Orbs in particular," Alrisiel said.
Kneegash started attacking his training dummy from every angle, with acrobatic leaps and manuevers to move around the dummy and attack if from every angle. She almost thought the gnome was going to crash into her as she whaled on her dummy with her staff.
Nuhoksa took the training at a more leisurely pace, slowly drawing an arrow from her black quiver. The arrow seemed very long and barbed on the end. Her bow was no where to be found until it shimmered into existence, and she pulled back its string, nocking the arrow in place.
Alri stopped and watched the Dark Elf hold the bow with arrow taut for a long pause, following the arrow in flight as it embedded into the bullseye.
She focused back on her own dummy, casting the simple Centering spell with intention and a slight motion of her staff. Now she wouldn't be distracted by the wild gnome.
Fighting with staves allowed for extensive parrying and striking with both ends of the staff. The top of her stave was crowned with the enchantment sigils that give it magical power for use with spells.
There were a few spells she could cast without the staff, but mostly she was out of luck without it.
She focused on her footwork and parried blows that obviously didn't come from the dummy.
Small blades like what the gnome used were a lot harder to deal with, whereas she was quite adept at defending against two-hand swords and large blunt weapons with her staff.
After a while she stopped sparring with the dummy, noticing the wooden dummy was dented and scuffed up in many places where she commonly struck.
Gash and Hoksa were watching her curiously.
"I always figured it was the Hammer wielding ones to watch out for," Gash said. Hoksa nodded
"Most of my spells are either healing, blesses,.buffs or orbs. As long as no one needs any of that, I let my orbs do their work and switch to my stave," she said.
"When you say orb..." Gash asked.
"It's like a buffered attack spell. Its an orb of Holy fire, or Holy water that hovers above, and when it spots vileness it will use up that stored up power to attack whatever triggered it.
"If we had a thief in the company, I would worry about my orbs triggering on them, its not specifically targeted at my enemy. More like the Goddess it inhabiting the orb and deciding who and when to strike."
"Wowsa. Well, you are a cleric of wonders and surprises. I've got a few flying daggers that will attack my enemies and protect me. Hoksa has a lot of clever tools though."
"Well, let's get back," Alri said.
Hoksa nodded, and lead them through the human (elven, gnomish, giant) wave of adventurers.
The street was utterly empty. That is, empty of sentients. Things were on fire, Zombies were shambling around, and spells were flying around, but people were concealed.
"Back inside, we need to gather up everyone!" Gash shouted.
Hoksa started to sing.
Fight, fight, fight.
My friends, join our cause,
The vile ones come again,
As they have been,
Fight, fight, fight
Gather your courage,
Gather your friends,
Rally the banners,
Purify the hearts,
Bring forth righteous fury,
Upon this wicked night.
Alrisiel was transfixed by Nuhoksa's song. She hadn't said a word until she started singing.
People everywhere swarmed to her. Company leaders started to shout and talk with the others, and put together a plan.
Gash finally told her, "We'll be going out in the middle. There's some durable groups going out first, and then the bulk will get out there. If you can start blessing our weapons, that'd be great."
Alrisiel waved her staff carefully in the crowded hallway, focusing on Gash's first dagger.
Others started to charge out there. She worked on Gash's second dagger.
"I'll only have time to bless a few of your arrows, Nuhoksa," she said.
The dark elf handed three silver tipped arrows to her, drawing them out of the quiver with a long pull. They were each easily three feet long.
She focused on each one, handing them back after several minutes.
Slash and gnash and bash and crash,
Blitz and kick and bite and dash,
Hold back your mercy,
Release your hound,
Unleash the battle cry,
Plunge the blade down.
While Hoksa's war chant was going on, Alrisiel took a moment to perceive the undead that were outside. She couldn't use her orbs yet, but she could stun a half dozen of the mindless sorts for a few minutes.
"Now!" Gash shouted.
They ran out with a crowd of others, into the street where necromancers and sorcerers, evil rogues and other evil sorts were now fighting the heroes.
Alrisiel focused on her orb spells, triple-casting Orb of Holy Fire, and casting Orb of Holy Water once.
The orbs started to strike after the targeting period, which was only five seconds because of the undead around.
She saved the rest of her mana for healing and resurrection spells.
Kneegash had spotted a rogue trying to sneak attack someone, and the two of them were caught in a tango of daggers.
Nuhoksa was using her magical shouts to disrupt dark mages, while firing her bow at strategic targets.
Several of the buildings nearby were on fire.
She heard someone shout, "The inn's on fire!"
Alrisiel healed Hoksa from a gouge inflicted by a Tribal Barbarian, stepping into the fray, and smashing her staff at the barb.
It was a whir of staff and healing spell, and fighting music and no undead minions. Those who went before them must have swept the undead from the fray.
"Gash! Protect me!" she shouted, as she came to a dead woman's body.
"This seems like a bad idea," he said, but he threatened several attackers with quick dagger movements.
Alrisiel focused only on Hod-Hera.
"Do not let your enemy, oh Goddess, tear away life from those who protect your hearth. Let life ring out, let death be defeated. Jan-sara-kei, la so do marick Ludop Ra Sectum har Var Lasiter Medra Cell dran! Dimos! Dimos! Let your champion show your favor, so it may be revealed to the world, the name of Hod-Hera, protector of hearth, healer of all! Rise in the light of new Hope -- Eora Samarkin."
The Goddess revealed the woman's name for her as she asked for it.
As the woman coughed, Alrisiel's focus returned to the battle, and Gash, who was dashing from place to place in the circle around her and Eora. He was cutting, dodging, throwing sharpened stones, leaping, growling and winning, inexplicable against a torrent of bigger, meaner looking foes.
Eora picked up the wand that was beside her, and raised up off the ground, swirling the wand in a circle around them.
A great torrent of fire blasted in every direction away from them, inflicting grievous wounds on many of their foes.
Gash fell backward and Alrisiel caught him. He had a vacant expression on his face.
"His berserk is over," Eora said. "Now its our turn to protect him."
The Dark professions had an advantage in surprise, ferocity and willingness to abandon any scruples to get a win.
But they had a resilience in the face of danger, making many of the big scraps between the two groups all about time. The Dark folk needed to cause grievous harm before too long, and the Light folk needed to hold on, until their greater durability, persistence and mana would enable them to win the day.
The Dark Folk started to fall apart after Gash's stunt. The fighting continued at a fierce pace for a little while, but then their attackers began to flee.
The fighting had pushed Hoksa quite some distance from them.
"That was a near perfect resurrection. I had quite a lot of mana," Eora said.
The quality of your resurrection depending on your magical skill, but also your pure heartedness and skill in communicating with Hod-Hera. Clerics of other Gods would talk to theirs in a different way that Alrisiel did with Hod-Hera.
"Usually I can manage half mana," Alrisiel said.
"Wow, second sphere, and I'm sure you restored 80-90% of mine. That spell is a one use affect before I'm out of juice."
"What else do we need to do now?" Alrisiel asked.
"The rangers and sneaks will pursue and hunt down whomever they can. Help with the fire fighting."
It was late when she laid her head down in one of the temporary tents that had been set up while the inn was repaired.
She had been casting Orb of Holy Water near the fires until her mana ran out, and then waiting to recover mana, casting it again, and so on. And coughing at the smoke.
"Grokwud has never heard of clerics for job. Teef yes, warrior - yah. Even ranger, mage or tribal mans. Cleric has tribe already, working for God yes?"
"They sent me a notice, written on purple vellum. It said: Alrisiel Carefore, 2nd sphere Cleric of Hod-hera. Notice of termination of employment, pursuant to City Charter 16 - Bankruptcy of Religious Organization."
"Lots Clerics then, to be found, why should Grokwud hire you?" he said, leaning against his warhammer.
A late arrival spoke up: "Most other Clerics are starting their own all-cleric groups. I was over at Holy Hops and every cleric in town was taking up the tables. Clerics of Aph-Evril, Urrem-Mortem and Damar-Herm were definitely forming up new charters."
It was dual-sword wielding man of war Dirk Gadron. Human, wearing a feathered cap. He removed it.
"Milady Alrisiel of Hod-hera, the Redguard Auxilliary Company would love to have your services. I told Grokwud here to keep the drifters out, and he got a little enthusiastic."
"Grokwud will zap you, you watch out sword-boy."
"Ha Ha, oh Grokwud you slay me. Anyway, come on Alrisiel, come see our company hall!"'
"Grokwud thinks hall is just room in tavern."
The giant lead them on into an adjoining room, where there were three rows of benches around a central dais.
"Who else is in the Redguard?" Alrisiel asked. She sat down on one of the benches
"We're here!" cackled a high pitched, but clearly male, voice.
"Ah, the Gnome in question," Dirk laughed, "and our favorite bardess."
The gnome was wearing spike studded pauldrons, light chainmail and two daggers sheathed at his sides.
The other arrival was a dark elf playing a haunting melody on her flute. It was dissonant, odd, not like Alrisiel's experience of the Church's musicians.
"Kneegash Bop at your service, milady," the gnome said. "And this lady is Nuhoksa del Graven-Cinder."
The dark elf placed her flute in the exquisite case attached to her pack, and acknowledged their greeting with two fingers.
"So Redguard has a dual-wielding fighter, dual wielding gnomish berserker, spellsword and bardess? And now me? No archer or conventional wizard or sorcerer. No rogue?"
Dirk smiled, "Redguard is known as a strong bunch of front line fighters. Nuhoksa wields a wicked Ilyuvan bow, plucks it's strings with mastery. With you in the mix, we'll be a versatile crew. Sure we're not going to take a job to weave through a trapped manor or a lockpicking guild job, but we'll find plenty of work."
"Grokwud say Huddle up."
"I'm in charge, Grok--- Huddle up Redguard Company!" Dirk said.
"We didn't find any more recruits," Kneegash said.
Nuhoksa shrugged.
"Better than last season's opening day," Dirk said. "I took the liberty of jotting down the Army's job board. Most of it is for larger Merc Companies. But I think there's a few we should consider."
"Killian's Killers is 50 strong now. That's not a Merc Company, that's an army!" Kneegash shouted.
"Shh, listen up!" Dirk answered. "Option #1: Patrol the Eastern Graveyards while the army holds funeral services for its fallen commander Marlon Kale. Stop any necromancers trying to reanimate in the graveyard, and destroy anyone or anything they manage to raise up."
"East Graves huge! Need many men. Not good."
Nuhoksa gestured 'thumbs down'.
"Com' mon," Dirk said. "Its 50, fifty, K. We've got a cleric now. What do you think Alrisiel?"
"I understand bards can use wide area debuffing magics through their enchantes. What kind of range do you have on that, Lady Graven-Cinder?"
"She prefers not to talk whenever possible, saves her voice. Call her Nuhoksa, and she's got a bit shy of 50 yards of range."
"And how big is the graveyard?" Alrisiel asked.
"Maybe 600 yards long by 200 yards deep," Dirk answered. "So what do you think?"
"We can do it. I'll bless your weapons, to make them more effective against the undead. We can set up a detection radius, and whatever debuffs Nuhoksa can lay down. The bardess and I can take up a central position, and you guys can roam and pounce on any threats that rise up. I've got Hod's healing magics to keep you going."
"The other job is escorting a merchant to Ale Bay. Its only paying 2.5 k and it would take us 6 days and leave us having to work our way back into the city after. We should really take this. What do you think?"
"It's early season. The dark companies will be very well stocked with the dark professions. But I guess, Kneegash can't resist a big monster bash. I'll do it!"
Nuhoksa was still and silent, and after an awkward moment nodded.
"The job's tomorrow. The funeral is at High-Noon but we need to be there by 10 I figure. Here's your inn tokens. Alrisiel, just talk to Earl, and he'll set you up with a room, that's what the token is for."
"I'll need a half hour with all of your weapons tommorrow to bless them. And Nuhoksa, I have to bless your arrows, so that'll take the longest," Alrisiel said. "Usually I work with Holy Hammers which I can quick recharge on. This will be dfiferent, unless you've had your weapons blessed before."
"We've never had a cleric. What cleric would have joined a Merc company before? With the church out of commission, I expect everyone to be hiring for all kinds of undead --- situations." Dirk said.
With that the group dispersed, each taking a inn token.
Alrisiel talked to Earl and got her room key, and went in to relax.
Dinner was still hours away. The whole dissolution of the Church organizational structure was still too new, and shocking. She took a long bath and then spent a half-hour praying to Hod-Hera while still in her bath robes.
There was a knock on the door. Alrisiel blushed, she didn't want to greet anyone in just a bathrobe. She cracked open the door.
It was a city official. Something with taxes or the charter division.
"Alrisiel Carefore?" asked the official.
"Yes," she said, awkwardly, opening the door the rest of the way.
"2nd Sphere Cleric of Hod-Hera?" he asked.
"Yes."
The man in gold lined uniform took out a pouch from his satchel, opening it up, and starting at it, before nodding. He turned back to her.
"As a 2nd sphere cleric of the Church of San-Clare-Osco, defunct, you are entitled to compensation for lost seniority and retirement investiture."
He handed over the small pouch which jingled as it moved.
Alrisiel took the pouch, and briefly looked into it. It was filled with gold coins. The region's currency was based on coppers, bronze, silver and gold coins. These gold coins were worth 1000 credits each.
The official made his exit immediately, and she closed the door, placing the pouch of coins on the small bed while she got dressed.
She had a dozen similar Cleric outfits back at the church, but all of them but the one she had been wearing when she got the bankruptcy notice were considered assets of the church, and were liquidated as part of the proceedings.
So she had no option but to put back on the same outfit she had worn earlier. It was a white blouse with Hod-Hera symbols embossed, a pale blue skirt and a cloth sash which marked her as a 2nd sphere cleric with its two tassels wrapped in black leather cords.
She put the Hod-heran focusing amulet back around her neck. The amulet itself was white in parts, but mirror-like on four of the cubic faces. The necklace that bore it was delicate silver woven in small chain loops.
Her boots were well-polished, black and only went up to a bit above her ankle.
Her hair was golden and curly. She tied it back in a pony tail.
She eyed the pouch of coins. Must be at least 40k. There was actually a note inside, she didn't get a chance to unfold and read it though.
Another knock knock knock sounded on her inn room door.
"Alri," the gnome Kneegash shouted, as she opened the door. "Can I call you Alri?"
"Only if I can call you Knee," Alrisiel said dryly.
"Call me Gash, Alri. Hoksa and I are going to practice our skills at the training range. Wanna come/?"
She shrugged, and then turned, grabbing her staff and proceeded to follow them.
The "training range" was just down to the street from the tavern / inn.
Past a 24-hour Adventu-Bite, fast food joint, and past the Hammer and Blunt Weapons Emporium.
The sidewalk was full of every type of adventurer in every type of garb. They were all shopping or out and about for some reason.
Every type of vaguely or supposedly heroic adventurer that was. The dark professions had their own shopping and tavern districts on the other side of the city.
Thieves with a heart of gold, berserkers with a pint-sized pun-ferocity, and also clerics, paladins, rangers, warriors and wizards.
The training yard was packed full as well, but there were hundreds of dummies, and plenty of targets and other training equipment.
"We'll find an area with dummies and bullseyes," 'Gash said, mostly talking to Nuhoksa.
They walked through the huge building, and after several false starts, they found an area in the corner of the first floor.
"I can't use a lot of my spells in training. Orbs in particular," Alrisiel said.
Kneegash started attacking his training dummy from every angle, with acrobatic leaps and manuevers to move around the dummy and attack if from every angle. She almost thought the gnome was going to crash into her as she whaled on her dummy with her staff.
Nuhoksa took the training at a more leisurely pace, slowly drawing an arrow from her black quiver. The arrow seemed very long and barbed on the end. Her bow was no where to be found until it shimmered into existence, and she pulled back its string, nocking the arrow in place.
Alri stopped and watched the Dark Elf hold the bow with arrow taut for a long pause, following the arrow in flight as it embedded into the bullseye.
She focused back on her own dummy, casting the simple Centering spell with intention and a slight motion of her staff. Now she wouldn't be distracted by the wild gnome.
Fighting with staves allowed for extensive parrying and striking with both ends of the staff. The top of her stave was crowned with the enchantment sigils that give it magical power for use with spells.
There were a few spells she could cast without the staff, but mostly she was out of luck without it.
She focused on her footwork and parried blows that obviously didn't come from the dummy.
Small blades like what the gnome used were a lot harder to deal with, whereas she was quite adept at defending against two-hand swords and large blunt weapons with her staff.
After a while she stopped sparring with the dummy, noticing the wooden dummy was dented and scuffed up in many places where she commonly struck.
Gash and Hoksa were watching her curiously.
"I always figured it was the Hammer wielding ones to watch out for," Gash said. Hoksa nodded
"Most of my spells are either healing, blesses,.buffs or orbs. As long as no one needs any of that, I let my orbs do their work and switch to my stave," she said.
"When you say orb..." Gash asked.
"It's like a buffered attack spell. Its an orb of Holy fire, or Holy water that hovers above, and when it spots vileness it will use up that stored up power to attack whatever triggered it.
"If we had a thief in the company, I would worry about my orbs triggering on them, its not specifically targeted at my enemy. More like the Goddess it inhabiting the orb and deciding who and when to strike."
"Wowsa. Well, you are a cleric of wonders and surprises. I've got a few flying daggers that will attack my enemies and protect me. Hoksa has a lot of clever tools though."
"Well, let's get back," Alri said.
Hoksa nodded, and lead them through the human (elven, gnomish, giant) wave of adventurers.
The street was utterly empty. That is, empty of sentients. Things were on fire, Zombies were shambling around, and spells were flying around, but people were concealed.
"Back inside, we need to gather up everyone!" Gash shouted.
Hoksa started to sing.
Fight, fight, fight.
My friends, join our cause,
The vile ones come again,
As they have been,
Fight, fight, fight
Gather your courage,
Gather your friends,
Rally the banners,
Purify the hearts,
Bring forth righteous fury,
Upon this wicked night.
Alrisiel was transfixed by Nuhoksa's song. She hadn't said a word until she started singing.
People everywhere swarmed to her. Company leaders started to shout and talk with the others, and put together a plan.
Gash finally told her, "We'll be going out in the middle. There's some durable groups going out first, and then the bulk will get out there. If you can start blessing our weapons, that'd be great."
Alrisiel waved her staff carefully in the crowded hallway, focusing on Gash's first dagger.
Others started to charge out there. She worked on Gash's second dagger.
"I'll only have time to bless a few of your arrows, Nuhoksa," she said.
The dark elf handed three silver tipped arrows to her, drawing them out of the quiver with a long pull. They were each easily three feet long.
She focused on each one, handing them back after several minutes.
Slash and gnash and bash and crash,
Blitz and kick and bite and dash,
Hold back your mercy,
Release your hound,
Unleash the battle cry,
Plunge the blade down.
While Hoksa's war chant was going on, Alrisiel took a moment to perceive the undead that were outside. She couldn't use her orbs yet, but she could stun a half dozen of the mindless sorts for a few minutes.
"Now!" Gash shouted.
They ran out with a crowd of others, into the street where necromancers and sorcerers, evil rogues and other evil sorts were now fighting the heroes.
Alrisiel focused on her orb spells, triple-casting Orb of Holy Fire, and casting Orb of Holy Water once.
The orbs started to strike after the targeting period, which was only five seconds because of the undead around.
She saved the rest of her mana for healing and resurrection spells.
Kneegash had spotted a rogue trying to sneak attack someone, and the two of them were caught in a tango of daggers.
Nuhoksa was using her magical shouts to disrupt dark mages, while firing her bow at strategic targets.
Several of the buildings nearby were on fire.
She heard someone shout, "The inn's on fire!"
Alrisiel healed Hoksa from a gouge inflicted by a Tribal Barbarian, stepping into the fray, and smashing her staff at the barb.
It was a whir of staff and healing spell, and fighting music and no undead minions. Those who went before them must have swept the undead from the fray.
"Gash! Protect me!" she shouted, as she came to a dead woman's body.
"This seems like a bad idea," he said, but he threatened several attackers with quick dagger movements.
Alrisiel focused only on Hod-Hera.
"Do not let your enemy, oh Goddess, tear away life from those who protect your hearth. Let life ring out, let death be defeated. Jan-sara-kei, la so do marick Ludop Ra Sectum har Var Lasiter Medra Cell dran! Dimos! Dimos! Let your champion show your favor, so it may be revealed to the world, the name of Hod-Hera, protector of hearth, healer of all! Rise in the light of new Hope -- Eora Samarkin."
The Goddess revealed the woman's name for her as she asked for it.
As the woman coughed, Alrisiel's focus returned to the battle, and Gash, who was dashing from place to place in the circle around her and Eora. He was cutting, dodging, throwing sharpened stones, leaping, growling and winning, inexplicable against a torrent of bigger, meaner looking foes.
Eora picked up the wand that was beside her, and raised up off the ground, swirling the wand in a circle around them.
A great torrent of fire blasted in every direction away from them, inflicting grievous wounds on many of their foes.
Gash fell backward and Alrisiel caught him. He had a vacant expression on his face.
"His berserk is over," Eora said. "Now its our turn to protect him."
The Dark professions had an advantage in surprise, ferocity and willingness to abandon any scruples to get a win.
But they had a resilience in the face of danger, making many of the big scraps between the two groups all about time. The Dark folk needed to cause grievous harm before too long, and the Light folk needed to hold on, until their greater durability, persistence and mana would enable them to win the day.
The Dark Folk started to fall apart after Gash's stunt. The fighting continued at a fierce pace for a little while, but then their attackers began to flee.
The fighting had pushed Hoksa quite some distance from them.
"That was a near perfect resurrection. I had quite a lot of mana," Eora said.
The quality of your resurrection depending on your magical skill, but also your pure heartedness and skill in communicating with Hod-Hera. Clerics of other Gods would talk to theirs in a different way that Alrisiel did with Hod-Hera.
"Usually I can manage half mana," Alrisiel said.
"Wow, second sphere, and I'm sure you restored 80-90% of mine. That spell is a one use affect before I'm out of juice."
"What else do we need to do now?" Alrisiel asked.
"The rangers and sneaks will pursue and hunt down whomever they can. Help with the fire fighting."
It was late when she laid her head down in one of the temporary tents that had been set up while the inn was repaired.
She had been casting Orb of Holy Water near the fires until her mana ran out, and then waiting to recover mana, casting it again, and so on. And coughing at the smoke.
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