Otherlife Dreams: The Selfless Hero Trilogy (3 page)

“I’m not alone,” he murmured to the wolf. “Beyond you that is, Yeller.”

With a casual wave of his hand he flagged all seven requests from the unknown user, declined them, and deleted them.

“IT doesn’t just grant privileges all willy nilly. We ask them why they need it…then deny them anyways,” his face twisting into a shit eating grin. Nodding to himself, he typed up a response, then sent it over to user
§┌îτ
and hoped a response would be swift in return. With any luck they were an engineer from the government outside and could help. Help somehow. He really wasn’t even sure what was going on. This of course was all well and good, but didn’t solve his immediate problem Yeller.

Even with the buffs and gear he was quite a bit under the ability to fight the damn mutt one on one.

Murmuring nonsense to no one in particular, he eased his way through the skill list, character sheet, and his abilities one more time. Once more he came to the conclusion that there really wasn’t much more he could do to even the odds. Even with an additional level or two this confrontation would probably be lost through sheer level difference. With a growl of irritation he threw a Fireblast at Yeller. He felt a little better watching it smolder and run around below, but it didn’t accomplish anything. The missing hit points quickly filled back up after a few seconds when the system confirmed Runner was unreachable. Drawing his sword with his right hand he briefly considered hurling it at the animal. No, he’d probably break the damned thing.

He reared back screaming, ready to throw another Fireblast, but almost fell out of the tree as his foot slipped. Wrapping himself around the a large tree limb he hung on for dear life and tried not to stab himself with his own sword. Gripping the trunk, he watched as the Fireblast played over the sword. When his foot slipped his mind had wavered and instead the Fireblast had been launched without a target. Apparently he had come very close to scorching himself…or the tree, but by sheer luck it had struck the sword instead.

“Wouldn’t that be just ironic. Burn yourself to death, with your own fire, and the tree you’re in. Fan-fucking-tastic, really.”

After a few seconds the fire died. The sword seemed unharmed despite its fiery ordeal. It had burned longer than he expected, as metals weren’t the most flammable of substances. The main effect has disappeared almost instantly when it hit Yeller, though the damage over time effect had continued.

Releasing his death grip on the trunk he settled himself on a branch, using it for a bench. He lightly set the sword tip against another limb that was a little lower than his seat. He contemplated the blade as he rotated the hilt slowly.

With a deliberate slowness, he reached down with his left hand, and cast Fireblast with a fingertip against the simple steel. Once more it burned for a few seconds before going out. He would swear that it lasted a moment longer. He cast it three more times, watching as the fire lingered longer each time.

Tuning out the incessant scratching and low growls of Yeller, Runner concentrated on this new found mystery.

Runner let his mana bar refill and then cast Fireblast into the blade five times more, draining his mana bar. He was sure of it now. The blade remained lit longer each time. It was on the third cycle when he received a pop-up notification.

You have developed the ability Enchant.

Simple steel sword gains Fireblast.

Cong-

Thrilled, but concerned at the same time, Runner was overjoyed that something happened. It didn’t feel quite right that creating a unique skill should be this easy, or quick. Unwilling to get lost in it, or to spurn this glorious gift, he wrote it off for later.

“Alright then, let’s do this shit!” he shouted. Minimizing the notification screen he steadied himself and found the right ability in the list. Runner quickly cast Vitality on every piece of equipment he had, other than his sword and shield, and confirmed that all of these enchantments were stacking. They were on a timer. They were actively adding their bonuses one on top of the other. He now had a glorious constitution of one hundred and six. He gave his shield the Stoneskin attribute just for some extra mitigation. Pushing himself to a standing position in the tree he found that he had nothing else he could do.
Well, I could stay in the tree until my food runs out but that just seems cowardly.

“Ok Yeller, I believe I was just commenting that I was going to use your skull as a soup bowl. Going to cook you, turn you into soup, and eat you out of your own damn skull. Love me some soup. Yeller soup in a Yeller soup bowl.”

Taking a firm grip on his sword, he leapt, aiming the point at the damned wolf even as he fell. If he could time it just right he could score a Flank attack and do double damage. The blade struck the wolf’s spine, nearly being wrenched from his grip as he landed awkwardly. Runner took a few steps away from the beast as the Flank attack completed.

Settling himself into an attack position he tried to activate the basic Slash ability as Yeller spun to face him. The ability fired just in time to land before Yeller’s attack. As the ability finished Runner did his best to raise his shield while activating Block, fully expecting a counterattack.

Just as the shield seemed to be in the right place, it impacted into his arm and shoulder. A worried upward glance to his health bar was all Runner could spare before he looked back to Yeller. With a feral grin spreading across his face, Runner addressed the wolf. “Oh puppy, puppy. Baaaaad dog. Bad.”

Yeller’s health was down to ninety percent and his own health had grudgingly shed a few points. Stinking of burnt fur and still smoldering, the Plains Wolf was suffering the after effects from the fire enchanted blade. Runner watched the angry creature even as he went through the normal auto attack process to keep chipping away at its health. Trying to throw in a dodge while pulling his shield in line Runner did his best to mitigate every attack. Over confidence was the straightest path to becoming lunch. Preemptively casting Regeneration had definitely helped to keep his health in the upper green portion of the bar but he was by no means safe.

Whenever Block was off cooldown he instantly used it to take care of the next attack and then immediately weaved his sword in for a Slash. Over time he was able to drag down Yeller’s health, bit by bit. Occasionally he was forced to top himself off with a Regeneration cast, and it took most of his concentration, but he didn’t feel as helpless as he had earlier.

With a final thrust Yeller whimpered and keeled over dead. Runner ended the fight with thirty percent of his health left and only a little bit of mana. Every spell cast had been used to keep pushing his health up as high as possible. From the first attack to finishing blow the ordeal had taken around five minutes. Runner would swear it had been hours; and that it had been a battle between titans.

Runner slammed his sword home into its sheath with a grunt. Tapping open the loot window he sorted through the pickups. Shattered teeth, a ruined wolf pelt, and meat, was all he was able to salvage. After taking everything, he closed the window and looked to the corpse. He briefly he considered hacking away the head to make a proper soup bowl, but found himself growing queasy at the thought. All in all, this was still just a game. A game with only one goal: level up, get his memories back, get the password, and get everyone out.

“Maybe next time Yeller,” he suggested. Turning from the corpse, Runner once more surveyed the landscape and patted his tree. “Nice tree, good foliage. I dub thee Bastion. I’ll come back and cut you down so I can take you with me. Plenty of Wolves to go around. Much soup to make.”

With that said Runner walked out into the field, enjoying the feeling of the warm sun on his face.

Chapter 2 - Blackjack -

07:43am Sovereign Earth time

09/02/43

Runner sat up, his groggy mind struggled to a state of wakefulness. Blinking away his dreams, held up a hand to block the morning light from his eyes. Grumbling, he clambered to his feet and half walked, half stumbled, towards the bathroom to start the day. His bare feet on the grass rattled him back to reality, disappointment stretched his face as he looked down. “Oh.”

Wiggling his toes in the grass Runner, contemplated them. Yesterday was coming back to him like the coming of the dawn, slow, sharp, and almost too bright. After fighting several more wolves, he had quite happened onto a road. Just beyond the road there was a small clearing that promised seclusion and safety. With night coming on quickly, he had been scrambling through the ability list on the hunt for something he swore he had seen earlier. When he found it, he smiled to himself in victory. Also at the prospect of sleeping safely, warm, and soundly. He’d tapped Campsite and Campfire abilities and read their information. One provided a twelve hour safe haven from the monsters of the world. It would warn him if any uninvited players attempted to enter as well. The other would gave him access to a fire pit that gave off warmth, morale, mental security, and a means to cook. Otherlife boasted actual temperature levels to reflect world location, time of day, and actual specific areas. A warm fire sounded sublime at the time, darkness was always a fear.

An icon of an empty stomach dully flashed in his status tray. Next to it a blue thermometer paired its status giving him a lovely morning starting condition. Hungry and chilled. It hadn’t been important to him at first, until he confirmed he was losing fifteen percent of his stats due to hunger. An additional five percent was lost for the cold weather.

He’d found Forage in his quest for the Campsite ability as well. On activating it, it surprisingly came back with a positive result. A root covered in dirt had been the prize, randomly pulled out of the ground.

He had supposed it was edible at the time. Maybe. He really didn’t like the feeling of a virtual empty stomach, resenting the fact that such a large portion of his stats were missing. In the end, he ate it. It tasted exactly like one would expect. Wet dirt.

Activating forage he grunted inarticulately. Once more while reaching down into the grass, he came up with a large twitching beetle. Dangling between thumb and forefinger it made a soft clicking noise, its legs clawing at the air.

With a face full of displeasure he considered the bug. Conflict warred in him as he debated the question.
To eat, or not to eat.

Slowly moving the insect to his mouth, he’d settled on the fact that he wasn’t willing to deal with the stat loss. Tilting his head, he got the beetle in a position he felt he could dispatch it rapidly, and swallow it, without tasting it. Hopefully.

It was a scant inch from his mouth when he heard the crashing of metal. A series of crashes came from up the road, freezing him in place. Hesitating, Runner put his mind through the possible scenarios that this could possibly be. The beetle hung in front of his open mouth, its imminent doom on a brief hold. The staccato of clashing metal continued for a brief time; then an abrupt wail sounded and all noise faded to silence.

Shocked from his contemplation by the sound of a voice, he stuffed the beetle in his mouth. Chewing it to bits, while deactivating the Campsite, he hurriedly got his boots on from his inventory. Swallowing the remains of the beetle, he slipped deeper into the growth beside the road, and made his way towards the commotion. Activating the Stealth function he crept onwards until he found the source of the disturbance. Moving up to the roadbed from the scrub brush, he was able to spot a handful of men spread out across the road. There was also a woman, a horse, and by all appearances, a corpse.

The one closest to him was simply labeled “Thief”. It was level eleven and gave him no cause for concern. The wolves he’d been fighting were higher level.

The Thief was actively rooting through a cluster of packs that were resting on the ground. Two of the other men were going through the belongings of the corpse on the ground who was face down in a pool of what could only be his own blood. Those two jackals were titled “Bandit”, both were flagged as being level thirteen. Rounding out the trio in the road itself was the aptly named “Thug”, who was level fourteen. He stood looming over the woman and was apparently going through her pockets while helping himself to a handful of her figure at the same time.

Runner eased away from the entire ordeal. Creating some distance between himself and situation, Runner felt safe enough to begin casting. Regardless of his choice of acting on this little drama or not, he’d be a fool to not be prepared one way, or the other.

Runner had no delusions that this would be anything but a swift, ugly fight. Preparing with a mindset for caution, he decided he could only afford to enchant two pieces of his gear. His sword and shield, he loaded Fireblast and Stoneskin respectively. Either he would kill them quickly and brutally, or they’d gang up on him and wear him down, drown him in their numbers.

Creeping back to the roadbed, he found only their locations had changed in the thirty seconds he had been away. Both of the bandits and the thug were now circled around the woman, who was now pressed to the ground by Thug’s boot.

Runner scowled, the situation set off a small explosion in the pit of his stomach. Going through the mental gymnastics of the situation, he desperately wished for more time. Mentally calling up the information for Analyze, he confirmed it would provide him with basic information. Hit points, mana, level, name, faction, and level. A quick check with Analyze found that all of them were NPCs. Even the corpse which had been left to rot where it fell.