Matthew Nesheim
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Chapter 52: Lefty - Leveling Up
🕑 Added 2023-11-09 18:00:02 +0000 UTCLefty walked over and kicked one of the centipede’s legs. The limb twitched and spasmed. Somewhere inside this thing its brain synapses are still firing. The thought made him uncomfortable and when his eyes met Grumner’s and he could see the dwarf was thinking the same.
“You think it’s still alive?” Grumner asked.
Lefty looked back down at the leg, “I don’t know.”
The ranger hefted his axe, “Hit it again?”
Lefty nodded, “Hit it again.”
Raising his axe over his head, Grumner brought the weapon down in a neat stroke. The axe head struck with a satisfying sound. A row of the legs twitched once, moving in unison like a row of oars, and then were still.
“Sonofabitch,” Lefty breathed.
“Hit it again?” Grumner asked.
Lefty had not taken his eyes from the legs, “I don’t know … sure.”
The axe rose and fell again, but this time the legs refused to twitch.
“What does that mean?” Grumner.
Lefty looked at the dwarf sideways, “I don’t know … hit it again?”
“Sure,” Grumner said as he raised his axe again. This stroke cut clean into the centipede’s head as a splatter of pink fluid decorated the dwarf’s beard. The centipede, however, did not move.
“What do you think?” Lefty asked.
Grumner grumbled, “I don’t know. I try not to most of the time.”
“Same,” Lefty agreed.
They both continued to stare at the carcass. Not moments ago, the centipede had risen up again in a attempt to bite Lefty who had shrieked in terror. As the giant insect lunged, he had lost his footing against the rocks and fell. Only a timely axe blow by Grumner had dropped the monster again and saved Lefty from losing his arm. Now they were standing over the thing in an attempt to discern whether or not the beast had another death throe in it or not.
“What do you think?” Lefty asked.
Grumner chewed his lip for a moment. “I think I’m gonna hit it again.”
“I think that’s a good idea,” Lefty agreed.
The axe rose and fell again and again the centipede did not move. As Grumner wrenched his blade free, Calista called out from behind them. “Are you two done fooling around? Because I really want to see if that thing has any loot.”
Lefty and Grumner exchanged nervous glances.
“It’s the easiest way to tell if something’s dead,” Calista reassured them. “If you can’t loot it, it’s not dead.”
“Oh,” said Lefty.
“Oh,” said Grumner.
“Haven’t you guys played this game before?” the Calista asked. “I mean, those are like the only memories I have.”
Lefty thought about this. He had a vague memory of a family and a house. He could remember that his wife was beautiful but couldn’t remember what she looked like. He remembered nothing else. “If this really all is a game and we’re stuck inside of it, then I honestly think I must have been a new player or something.”
Grumner grunted, “I don’t even like this game. That’s all I remember.”
“Then why were you playing it?” Calista asked.
Grumner shrugged, “Because my friends asked me to show them around, I think. I played it when it first came out, but then lost interest. Too much grinding and the story was boring. They really need to work on their writing.”
“Great,” Calista put her hands on her hips. “So did you guys even notice that we leveled up?”
“Oh, right,” Lefty said.
Grumner said nothing but tabbed to his H.U.D.
Calista continued, “You guys do that and I’ll keep watch. We can open the loot boxes when you’re done.”
Lefty opened his H.U.D and was greeted by a tutorial window informing him that Calista was right. He had leveled up.
As he touched the [Level Up] window with his finger, a female voice entered into his head almost as if he were wearing a headset.
“Congratulations, you have reached level two Wizard in Sable Unlimited. Allow me to guide you through the process of advancing your character. If, however, you should decide you do not need my assistance, you may mute my voice by selecting the ‘options’ tab on your main menu, where you’ll find ‘sound’ and then ‘mute tutorial.’”
Lefty decided to leave the tutorial on since he wanted to make sure he was doing this right. Who knows? Maybe it’s different in this version.
“Advancement in Sable Unlimited is a straight forward process. First, select the tab entitled ‘character sheet’ and you’ll see your character’s skills and abilities listed.”
Lefty did so and with a blink of his H.U.D, all of his attributes, skills, and abilities all came into view.
“Now you’ll notice that you’ve been granted 30 advancement points. These points can be used to buy skill advancement, attribute advancement, and special abilities. You can preview these options by touching the skill, attribute, or special ability you’re thinking of advancing.”
He did so, hovering his hand over his [Spellcraft] skill. Sure enough, as he touched the holographic image before him, a text box appeared.
[Spellcraft: Your ability to identify spells and magical effects. At higher levels, your Spellcraft skill will also grant you a bonus to your Arcane Knowledge skill (and vice versa).]
The voice continued, “Special abilities can be located near the bottom. You’ll notice there are a number of special abilities with subdued text. These are abilities that you do not reach the requirement for, but are available to view as you plan your character’s advancement.”
Lefty glanced at the special abilities and decided to let the tutorial finish before he did anything. After a brief pause, the voice continued.
“Next, you’ll see that skills and attributes can also be advanced using the point buy system. The amount needed to advance each skill or attribute is relative to how high the skill or attribute already is. Attributes cost ten times more to advance than skills as an attribute of 10 means that every skill listed beneath that attribute is also considered a 10, unless otherwise noted.”
Lefty glanced at his [Constitution: 6] attribute where skills like lifting, stamina, and swimming were all listed under the untrained section. Oh great. I can’t swim and I don’t have any stamina. How and why did I pull that off? Remind me to put off any deep water swimming for a while. In fact, I might just be adopting a ‘no boats’ policy for the foreseeable future.
The voice returned, “It is useful to note that most skills can be advanced by training without the use of experience points, but that is a time investment the player must make. Oh, and there are definitive caps to how much a skill can be advanced in such a way.”
A text box then appeared listing the training restrictions, which basically said that a player could only advance one skill via training between each level and then could only advance said skill so far. Sounds like swimming lessons might be in my future, he noted.
“And that’s it!” the voice finished cheerfully. “Congratulations again on your leveling up and we hope you continue to enjoy your Sable Unlimited experience.”
Oh yes, we are all enjoying our Sable Unlimited experience of being trapped in a deadly game world where our lives appear to be at stake and everything is trying to kill us. But other than that, things are going great!
Lefty tabbed back to the [Special Abilities] and watched a long list drop down. Anything from jumping higher, to swimming better, to reacting to combat faster. What was more, many of them interlocked, as some of the early special abilities linked to a tree of abilities that would then be available later on. Of course as he looked at the list, what caught his eye were the special abilities that related to magic.
There were abilities that allowed him to all sorts of neat magical tricks. He could cast spells for free, he could copy spells, he could cast flash spells, he could extend spells, disguise spells, split spells, maximize spells, and counter spells. A whole world was opening up to him as he stared at the list. Possibilities, plans, and strategies had begun running through his mind like unsupervised toddlers. For the first time since waking up in that bush, he was a little bit happy he was a wizard and not something else.
The only downfall of the entire thing was that his list of current options was fairly limited, a fact that was clearly a result of his class and limited physical stats. Many of the more useful physical special abilities required a Constitution score of 8 or 9. Lefty had a 6, which meant he would have to spend roughly two levels worth of experience points to advance his Constitution score within the required minimum. The same went for Speed. But that’s what Grumner and Calista are for, right?
Looking through the special abilities that were available to him now, he noticed a handful that branched upward into other meta-magic abilities that would enhance his spell casting. Reading carefully, he isolated the one he thought best fit what he wanted to do.
[Ancient Lore: You’ve spent many hours studying ancient tomes of magic and history at libraries and universities. As a result, you gain a bonus to your Arcane Knowledge and Historical Knowledge skills whenever you encounter any writing (magical or non-magical) that qualifies as ‘ancient.’
As an added bonus, you’ll be able to more easily discern ancient magics and spells that might be recorded in tomes, on walls, statues, or other methods. Requirements: Intelligence: 12, Spellcraft: 18, Arcane Knowledge: 13, Historical Knowledge: 14.]
While it didn’t look like much now, it would unlock much more powerful abilities like Permanency and Advanced Counter-Spelling later on. And all he had to do now was advance a few skills he was going to advance anyway.
Tabbing back to the skills and attributes page, he advanced spellcraft, his knowledge skills, quarterstaff, and finally dodge. After seeing he still had a few experience points left, he spent the remainder on swimming and stamina.
