Otherlife Dreams: The Selfless Hero Trilogy (24 page)

Shaking his head he set the problem aside, it was something he’d have to talk to the group about. It boded poorly for them if a player had Hannah as a quest marker, which would be the only way they’d have seen Hannah on the wall. Now it was his turn to take the plunge off the side.

Rolling his eyes Runner made a parody of the hand gesture Hannah had done and then stepped off the wall.

Immediately he realized there was a problem as he fell. His character screen icon lit up red and his health bar turned a pale green. Trying to pull off the same maneuver he’d advised Hannah of Runner struggled with himself. His body barely responded to the commands he was giving it. He made only the briefest of contact with the wall and didn’t get a good z axis reset. He hit the grass with a ground denting thud. Groaning he curled up into the fetal position. Runner squeezed his eyes shut in a vain bid to block out the pain.

“What the fuck! Runner, what the god damn hell did you do? Shit! Stealth. Activate your stealth, it’s off! We have to go, we have to go now!” Hannah exclaimed angrily, pulling at the collars of his clothes, already dragging him to his feet.

Cracking one eye open, Runner ran it over his status bar. One leg broken, unspecified wounds, and a minor celestial curse. Sighing he tried to activate Stealth but found it refused to engage. The movement impairing effects were preventing it from being utilized.

“I can’t. Too much shit broken inside. Got cursed for throwing up a fake prayer too. Completely zeroed my mana, abilities, and movement speed. Also my natural regeneration for both Health and Mana. Oh, and the ability to use healing potions, either for health or status ailments. Damn me for a fool and my glib actions, I’m sorry Hanners,” Runner groaned. Trying to get his feet under him, he found them unresponsive. Grass greeted him once more as he fell over. Mobility was simply impossible at this point and Runner was now at the mercy of the game itself. No Remedy potion would cure a celestial curse.

“You’re such a childish prick! Can’t you just take this seriously? You fucking idiot! Damn you. Damn you, damn you, damn you,” Hannah panted at him, slapping him about the head and shoulders.

“Hey, hey, stop it. I’m not going to get any health back for a while and potions won’t work. Just…just start pulling me to the tree line over there and then go get the group. We’ll figure out something.”

Muttering hotly to herself, Hannah hooked him under the armpits and dragged him across the grass. Being unable to do anything beyond a perfect imitation of a sack of potatoes he took inventory of the extent of the problems. Many of the status effects would clear up in eight hours, the worst being the curse at twenty-four hours. There was no flavor text to explain just what it was nor was there any indicator who had decided to bestow such a lovely gift on him.

Such a charmed life I lead. Keep making enemies fool. Let’s just hope it isn’t a new god or goddess on top of the one Mr. Personality worships.

Dropping him roughly Hannah growled at him. She slapped him in the back of the head once more for good measure. Before he could respond there was the sound of foliage and bushes being violently forced aside from deeper in the trees.

“Cloak yourself Hannah. Get out of here. Leave me here and get to the group,” Runner growled to her, the pain making him clench his teeth.

Runner’s mind went immediately to the party he saw being assembled back in town the day previous by Mr. Personality. Had they been watching? Waiting? If they were, this was already over. Drawing his weapon free from it’s sheath Runner clutched it in his hand and waited. It wouldn’t be long now, they sounded close indeed.

Katarina cleared the brush, her posture and bearing ready for combat. She came to an abrupt halt as she found Runner and Hannah. Her black eyes, cold and fathomless, locked on his immediately and broke away almost as quickly. She began scanning the area for foes.

“It’s okay, we’re not under attack. We had to leap from the top of the wall to get out of the town. I’m afraid I didn’t land as gracefully as Hanners did. I’m very glad to see you though Kitten. So very glad. Come over here so I can hug you and kiss that beautiful Barbarian face of yours. Or at least try to. I’m not exactly in the best condition right now.”

Katarina’s eyes returned to him when he started talking. As he finished she smirked and shook her head. What had been a pair of dark eyes that were as empty as a pit were now replaced with mild annoyance, humor, and relief.

“Idiot. Do you want me to carry you like a child? If you expect me to carry you in front guess again. Could ask Thana to rig up a harness out of my shield so you could ride like a wee one on my back,” Katarina mercilessly teased him. Sheathing her blade she then clipped her shield to the harness on her back. Once her hands were freed she came towards him. Leaning over to inspect him she pulled at his shirt first and checked his arms and torso. Her red hair fell over her shoulder as she pulled at his pant legs to get a better look underneath.

“Not going anywhere. That’s mangled. Let’s see what Thana thinks.” Katarina said with a bit of disgust. She flipped her hair back over her shoulder as she stood up.

Katarina and Hannah took up a conversation while Runner laid down and closed his eyes. Pain ran at a constant high and probably would be for a while. His brain wouldn’t produce much in the way of chemical relief to compensate for the pain. Perceived pain didn’t get received the same way since it was fed through the medical pod.

Whatever Thana could accomplish to shorten the time he’d be thankful for, but it might simply be more of a matter of making him comfortable as they waited it out.

Pulling up the ships system window Runner loaded up the medical programs attached to his pod. Unfortunately the only options available were the most basic ones, eject from pod, view vitals, and activate/deactivate dream sequencer. Two of those options would invariably end his life and the third would only show him what he already knew. Breathing rate up, blood pressure up, brain activity way up.

Well, against the baseline for suspended animation at least.

“Has anyone told you, you’re an idiot Master Runner?” queried Thana. Runner decided it wasn’t worth responding to since any answer he gave would only be dubbed incorrect.

“Bet his parents did.”

“I think it’s his fucking name sometimes. Idiot, Idiot Norwood.”

“N-n-no. N-not yet, Hannah. But I’m sure it’ll be soon-n. Good even-n-n-ning Idiot.”

Opening his eyes Runner could only laugh. All three women answered Thana’s question for him. Thana was kneeling on the grass before him now, her hands folded in her lap.

“There you have it. I honestly didn’t have a better plan for getting us out unseen within the time frame we needed.”

“Indeed. As you’re well aware I’m sure, you shattered your leg. There’s nothing I can do to fix it, you’ll just have to wait until it corrects naturally, since you can’t drink a potion. Hannah mentioned you managed to get yourself cursed and that was on the list of prevented actions. I assume this is why you’ve yet to fix the damage yourself?”

Runner grit his teeth and frowned at that. Thana merely watched with a quirked eyebrow, waiting for him to confirm it.

“Yes. I’m an idiot, the song of my people is the laughter of others. I get it. I screwed up and did so royally. I’ll make amends to whoever it was I offended at the next town’s temple. Curse itself will be long gone before than but I’d hate to be on the negative side of a religious faction that isn’t Mr. Personality’s. Now, what can we do to get me out of here? We still need to keep moving. I’m almost positive Hanners has a tracker on her that we’ll need to deal with eventually. I also saw Mr. Personality hiring a party and I can only imagine one thing he’d want to do with that.”

“Our list of enemies grows by the hour. You have a real knack for this. And to answer your question, while you were in town I’ve been experimenting. I think this might be the perfect time for an out of the lab trial run. Nadine, could you please unwind some twine from your pack?”

Thana stood up, brushing non-existent grass from her clothes and then held out her hand to the ground beside Runner. With a twist of her fingers a rectangular block of ice appeared. It sat perhaps four inches in height. It was roughly as wide and tall as he was to boot. Pulling her dirk from her belt Thana struck a chip out of the ice in two spots. Holding out her hand once more two holes appeared where she’d struck the ice that went from the top to the ground on the other side.

“Would you help me loop the twine through these holes Nadine? Katarina, would you mind dragging Idiot back to the campsite? Maybe the ice will cool him off and he’ll be less quick to anger everybody within ear shot. After that we can load him into the wagon and be on our way.” Thana paused as she looped the coil of twine through the holes and back again. “Speaking of. Nadine negotiated the purchase of a wagon, a horse team, and some materials to be sold. You owe her the investment costs of course, but I’m sure she’ll make a hefty profit on it to return back to you.”

Nadine took the end of Thana’s line and tied it into a simple knot then clipped it into Katarina’s shield harness. Thana had positioned herself at Runner’s head and Hannah near his feet as Nadine worked with Katarina. Thana reached down and gripped him under the armpits and then lifted him as Hannah did the same for his feet. Depositing him on the ice block Runner said not a word of complaint.

“Many thanks. To all of you. Without all of you, I’d be lost.”

Runner said nothing more after that and internalized his attention instead. Thana had just demonstrated the ability to create custom spells dependent on her need, rather than what was only available to her. They were now breaking the rules of the game world without his assistance.

Chapter 12 - Price of a Life -

11:46am Sovereign Earth time

10/03/43

A sliver of sky happened to be the extent of what Runner could see out the back of the wagon he sat in. Nadine had tied the two sides shut once he’d been settled in amongst the goods she planned on selling. Thana and Nadine were now at the helm, guiding and watching the road. Katarina and Hannah were walking perhaps twenty feet behind in a rear guard action. Hannah was stealthed just in case their pursuers managed to catch up to them without being noticed.

Unfortunately for Runner he remained visible. The curse, nor the broken leg, had yet to time out. He’d attempted to join the conversation Thana and Nadine were having once, but he’d been shushed into silence. Thana had been right of course, it was all too possible his voice would carry further than any of them would like. That left him with precious little to do to keep himself occupied. He’d considered cycling through his abilities to level them further, but at this point, he was pretty sure that it was a waste of time till he could get them upgraded at the trainers. Any effort he put in would be a waste in time. If he managed to find something else to do, providing he found something to do.

Amid the various crafting components Nadine had purchased there were a number of unassembled basic daggers. Wooden handles were in one crate, unsharpened blades in another, jars of epoxy in a third, and a barrel full of brass rods. He’d pulled one of each from their respective containers and now sat with them in his lap. Fitting the handle slabs to the tang of the dagger he rotated it in his hands. Brass rods slid easily through the holes that ran along the length of the tang and the handles. Without adding the epoxy the handle would never stay put, the parts would slip out of each other.

Pulling open his inventory he flipped to the section he’d dumped all of the crafting tools he’d been given to start with. Eventually he found a ball peen hammer and a painters brush. They were pretty rudimentary and wouldn’t be good for anything better than average. If he wanted to even consider crafting he’d need to invest some money and time. One of which he had too much of and the other he would never have enough.

Setting the tools to one side he picked up the blade once more. Casting Fireblast into the unmade weapon he found it could indeed hold an enchantment like anything else. Like any other item he’d enchanted, it had a timer that would eventually expire.

I know there’s a way to permanently Enchant an object. Maybe I’m just missing the according spell?

Grunting he cast Fireblast three more times in rapid succession into the blade, letting his mind harden around the idea that the metal would take up the spell in it’s entirety. Become one with the spell, to the point that it’d not lose it’s bonus effect.

No change.

Rolling his eyes and laughing Runner held the thing to his forehead and made a final attempt. This time he didn’t finish the spell but visualized channeling it, forming the concept in his mind of a spell that would continue until complete or he ran out of mana. In that way Runner held himself still and doggedly pursued his goal. Such was his determination and concentration that it was startling when the spell ended, much like when he ran out of mana. Sighing he gave up, resting his hands in his lap, the incomplete project rattling against his boot.

Blinking a few times as he opened his eyes Runner’s attention was drawn to a blinking indicator on his log.

You have developed the ability Spellbinding.

Unsharpened iron blade gains Minor Fireblast.

Shrugging his shoulders he confirmed the system message by using Analyze on the blade. While it was roughly one third of the power of an Enchant, this would have no need to be refreshed. Tapping the item against his knee he considered how far he’d be able to take this. Could he do the same to the epoxy? The handles? The brass pin? Could he separately enchant each smaller item to create a mixed bag of stat boosts upon completion? In the case of the epoxy, could he do the same for each base item that became the epoxy? How deep could he go?