“Alright, so the blue bar is mana, the little body is health and the yellow bar is… something?”
Current stamina: 64%
“Okay, stamina. I think I’m getting a handle on this. I don’t seem to have a lot of mana, though.”
Help: Mana
Mana is a resource required for many essence abilities. Low mana will lead to mental exhaustion.
Maximum mana is based on the [Spirit] attribute. Bind an essence to the [Spirit] attribute to increase maximum mana.
Mana recovery is based on the [Recovery] attribute. Bind an essence to the [Recovery] attribute to increase mana recovery rate.
Jason let out a yawn. He had gone through a lot and his time unconscious was hardly restful.
“One last thing,” he said, pulling one of the skill books out of his inventory. He walked over to the comfy chair and fell into it.
Item: [Ritual Magic I] (iron rank, common)
A magical book that can impart the fundamentals of performing magic rituals. (consumable, skill book).
Requirements: Ability to use skill books.
Effect: Imparts basic ritual magic theory.
You are able to use skill book [Ritual Magic I]. Use Y/N?
“Yes.”
The book floated out of his hand and into the air. The cover flung itself open and the writing on it started removing itself from the page, changing from black to gold as the disembodied text floated into the air. The pages started turning, faster and faster, gold text pouring into the air. Turning pages flicked over in a rush as the golden text formed a corona around the floating book. Then the flutter of pages started slowing, until the last page turned and the book fell to the ground, every page blank.
The cloud of golden text swarmed over Jason like angry fireflies, disappearing into his body as it landed on his flesh with stinging bites. His mind was bombarded with information too quickly to process, leaving it lost and adrift. The pain and disorientation finally passed, leaving him in general control of his faculties, but dizzy and confused. He had no idea if seconds or hours had passed. He was weary to the bone, limbs as heavy as his eyelids.
Your stamina has been exhausted.
Unable to keep his head up, he slumped over in the chair, fast asleep. After what felt like no time at all, he was jolted awake by a loud hammering. His head was still hazy, and he shook it clear in time to see two men storm through the now-broken double doors. The one in the lead was holding a hammer, the one behind, a shovel.
“Uh… g’day blokes. I don’t suppose there’s any chance you’re not cannibals?”
The pair scowled; the one with the shovel moved forwards and hoisted it menacingly. Jason scrambled to pull the curved dagger from his inventory. He used all his knife fighting expertise, which was none, and the shovel slammed into his face.
Jason dropped the dagger, staggering back with his hands over his nose, blooding spilling between his fingers. The shovel came down a second time and everything went black.
9
Escape
The circumstances in which Jason regained consciousness were unpleasant. He was cramped up in some kind of tight space, forced into a foetal position. His head was spinning; there seemed to be a little man inside it, trying to pickaxe his way out. His nose was congested with what felt like a fistful of bees, and to top it off, he had an urge to vomit. He lay curled up in the constricted space, throwing up on himself. As the vomiting subsided, he noticed the head section of his health silhouette was now a warning orange.
“I am getting knocked out way too much.”
He heard a male voice.
“He’s woken up.”
Jason’s eyes swam into focus, although they felt puffy and didn’t seem to open properly. He was in what looked like a dog cage, too small to stretch out his limbs. His new ability to see in the dark was intact, allowing him to make out that his cage was on a dirt floor in some kind of cellar. The roof and walls were rough timber, and there was a pervasive smell of damp earth. There were four more cages in the cellar with him, each containing a person. One had a black guy, two had white girls. The last cage was bigger than the others, with thicker bars. Inside was an enormous, impossibly hairy man.
“A Wookiee?” Jason asked deliriously.
“What’s a Wookiee?” the hairy man growled.
“Hey,” the black guy called out to him. “Did they put a collar on you?”
“Wha…?”
Jason’s thoughts refused to walk in a straight line.
“Try and focus,” the man said. “Looks like you were hit rather hard.”
Jason ran his fingers over his face, feeling the dried blood thickly caked onto it. He yelled in pain as his fingers brushed against what turned out to be his very delicate nose.
“Did they put a collar on you?” the man asked again.
Confused, Jason reached up and patted his neck.
“No,” he croaked. “Why would they put a collar on me?”
“To suppress your essence abilities. You can still use them?”
Jason nodded, which annoyed the man in his head who went on a pickaxe frenzy.
“Ow. Yeah, I can use them, but I only have two.”
“Can they get you out of that cage?”
“One lets me see in the dark and the other makes me sparkle, so probably not.”
“Sparkle?”
“I’d show you, but I think I might throw up again. Actually…”
Jason vomited, ending in a coughing fit, after which he passed out again.
Jason swam at the edge of consciousness, hearing two people talk.
“He was in the underground ritual chamber?” a woman said, in a controlled, elegant voice.
“Yes, milady,” a gruff male voice replied.
“You left him in quite a state.”
“Actually, milady, that’s not much worse than how we found him.”
“You didn’t put a collar on him?” she asked.
“Mr Caruthers only procured the four, milady. For the ones we were warned about.”
“It doesn’t matter,” said the woman. “Feel how weak his aura is. I doubt he has more than two or three abilities at most. Do you really think he’s the one that killed Landemere?”
“That would be my guess, milady. He had more blood on him than wounds to produce it. He was also locked in the room with the young master’s body.”
“How could he even do it?” the woman asked. “He’s so weak.”
“It seems the young master had mostly done himself in, milady. Summoning spell gone awry, from the looks of it.”
“Is that why all those little monsters are running around?”
“It would seem so, milady.”
Quest: [No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service]
Objective complete: Discover the reason lesser monsters have infested the area 1/1.
[Simple Shirt] has been added to your inventory.
Quest complete.
100 [Iron Spirit Coins] have been added to your inventory.
Jason stifled a yelp. He had been pretending to be unconscious when a bright blue screen appeared in front of him and his whole body went tense. The pair continued talking, however, as if nothing had happened.
“So whoever this is got lucky and killed my son when he was at his most vulnerable?”
“Not that lucky, milady. He met me.”
“Just so, Dougall,” she acknowledged. “Do we know what Landemere was trying to summon?”
“I had a bit of a potter through his notes, milady. It was one of them entities from beyond the void.”
Jason heard the woman sigh.
“Astral beings,” she muttered unhappily. “I told that boy it would be the death of him. We’re a nice, traditional blood cult family. This nonsense about ineffable ancients from outside reality was never going to work out. What did you do with Landemere’s body?”