(World of Valdira 01) The Way of the Clan (40 page)

The number of the clan was some hundreds of gamers, and that detachment must be rather a tail feather rather than a flight one. These gamers must be closer to… you know what I mean… a famous joke that could drive any of Red Demons mad. The fact is that the symbol of the clan is a black raven with its wings stretched wide sitting on a bloodstained human skull. A memorable symbol for sure. Not typical like others – a branch of the laurel, axe and sword or even hammer and sickle. But it’s quite different story that became the base of the joke. It happened long time ago. The leader of the clan – a gamer nicknamed Bloody Raven – an appropriate name that’s a given divided his clan into numerous raiding parties that differed from each other by number and so-called specialization. More advanced parties hung out in serious locations, while the others ‘operated’ in easier areas. And Bloody Raven called each of his detachments ‘a feather’. Maybe he wanted to underline that all those feathers were collected, the entire raven could be made. Or maybe that any party was fast and quiet as a feather flying in the air. Who knows…

But once one of Red Demons detachments ran into a hard nut to crack – elite fighters from Runic Order clan. And it wouldn’t be so famous if ended up losing the battle but before starting the fight the leader of the aggrs’ party decided to frighten their enemy saying that we are nothing to sneeze at, we’re ‘the Raven’s Feather’, a kick ass cool unit of Red Demons… The leader of Runic Order detachment listened to him very carefully and then gave his fighters the go-ahead. Soon everybody from the aggrs’ unit died and flew to the respawn location. There was only their talkative leader left, lying paralyzed by a spell like a log not able to move a finger. So at that very moment before cutting off his head the Order’s leader said: ‘you are certainly a feather, no doubt, but not a flight feather rather a small dirty tail feather under the…’ And hacked with his sword. Soon the video record of that battle emerged on the game portal and in a week reached the number of six-digit of views. Bloody Raven is said to be vituperating and kick away the unlucky gamer from the clan. But the joke assimilated into Valdira.          

I came out of the fir-tree wood, I mounted the back of my horse and after noticing its glance of reproof and scorn had o grumble:

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Yes, I hid! But what should I have done?

The horse snorted, shook its mane hair and we continued our journey along the road in the wood.

I couldn’t pass that small clearing. After the single glance over it I directed my horse towards it by a slightly trembling hand. In the middle of the clearing a forest deer was standing. It lowered the head decorated with branchy antlers in an attacking manner while holding its right leg suspended. Like a wounded bird. Just in front of it three grey wolves of level twenty were crouching close to the ground emitting guttural roar and keeping their eyes fixed on the dangerous prey. The wonderful deer was on level twenty-five. But not only their levels attracted me, the health levels of both wolves and deer were decreased. One of the wolves was even limping and his life level was flaring red. I was standing absolutely ignored. And I was happy about that. It’s essential to wait a bit and not to miss the appropriate moment. Fortune doesn’t present such a chance every day.

The largest wolf jerked forward and immediately jumped backward to dodge from the deer’s horns while the second predator managed to come closer to the distracted deer and slit the injured leg by its teeth. At once it paid for that when a powerful hit landed on its side, it was thrown away aside with a mournful shriek. I made Help halt in ten steps behind the wolves I started switching my spells like hell. A slight swing of my hand pointing out at the knee and a tiny grass-snake appeared on my leg. I had to return the ‘obstacle’ spell on its place and make myself comfortable in the saddle. Thus, I was up and running.

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Help, just in case, don’t stand frozen. Knock your hoof on between their ears – I murmured patting the neck of the horse while keeping my frozen eyes fixed on the clearing. The wolf tried to leap forward but at that very moment the deer whopped to land a powerful kick hit by its doubled hoof on the wolf. The predator rolled back and fell down heavily on its side next to its fellows. I didn’t give it a chance to rise. A light green flash and between the wolves ‘thornbush obstacle’ grew up covering their defeated leader. Without wasting a moment I made two more ‘obstacles’ trying to graze the worn-out predators. Minus sixty mana points. And the inactive snake was consuming my points slowly. I raised my right hand, aimed at the convulsing wolves in the blackthorn bushes to dart ‘ice needles’ at the maximum possible firing speed. I chose their leader as my target, its life level was almost zero. ‘Ice needle’ disappeared among thorny branches with a rustle and sank into the wolf roaring in rage. Done! The predator shuddered and vanished. Plenty of information popped up in front of my eyes.

You’ve got a new level!

Current level: 14…

Achievement!

You’ve got a first rank achievement – ‘David and Goliath’!

You can see your achievements in your character’s settings.

Your award for the achievement: +0.5% to the experience gained.

Current bonus: +1%

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Damn it! Get lost – I yelled in fury shaking my head as the message was blocking the view.

The snake sitting on my knee considered my words an order and immediately disappeared with a slight clap. I emitted a new stream of swear words. Damn it… hoping that the horse wouldn’t consider he dirty words as an order to escape…

‘Thornbush obstacles’ dispersed leaving the wolves just in a few steps from me. Swinging my left hand I created a thorny plant stripe on their way but only a half of my plan succeeded. One of the wolves bumped into thorny branches at a run and got stuck in them. But the second managed to detour the blackthorn and leaped towards me grinning angrily to show an impressive set of fangs. Screaming I darted a miserable ‘ice needle’ into it but the wolf managed to dodge from it gracefully, then pushed from the ground it rose in an incredibly high leap… and was thrown aside as Help managed to rear up to land a kick hit on the wolf. We fell down simultaneously. I flew off from the horse’s back and flopped on the grass, the wolf yelling with pain followed me. Still lying on the ground I made a ‘thornbush obstacle’ in front of the wolf. And raising on my elbows finish the dying predator off by three ‘ice needles’ and immediately after that switched to the last wolf. A light flash and there was just a hide instead of the wolf.

  
You’ve got a new level!

Current level: 15…

I waved away the message and stood up while checking my characteristics. There were only eighty miserable mana points. A nice battle. But it wasn’t over yet. I flew on the horse’s back, looked around and caught the sight of the deer’s rear escaping slowly. Sorry dear, but I wasn’t going to let you go. In some second I found myself next to the wounded beast and generously spending my precious mana created two ‘thornbush obstacles’ at the deer’s hooves. Double impact, double adherence of the thorns, double hope that the deer wouldn’t get free and wouldn’t give me the stick. Sounds like an advertisement… But couldn’t resist it! Due to one powerful movement the deer set itself free from my snares, whopped and lowering his antlers closer to the ground started limping towards me. It couldn’t run. And it meant that it was doomed. Finally another stripe of magic plants slowed down the mob mercilessly torturing it by thorns. And I was left with almost no mana points. I waited until the deer escaped from the thorny bushes and darted ‘ice needles’ into its body one by one.  With a slight clink needles sank into its chest and muzzle, its life level slowly reached the bottom as well as my mana scale. When the deer shrugged and heavily fell down on the grass I realized that me energy was enough to dart maximum three miserable needles only. Let alone my nerves that had burnt out during that short but furious fight.

I checked the status data to make sure that had almost reached level sixteen. No wonder. I killed three wolves and the deer that levels were twice higher than mine. But the loot made me even happier. The entire deer hide and hides of three wolves. They would cost much money, ask any trader. It’s not woodchuck or rat hides. Plus meat. I’ll sell the wolf meat and roast the veal. It is very good at recovering health level. The beautiful branchy antlers went into my sack too. I can sell them or decorate my private room and use them as a hanger.

Actually at the moment I was missing plenty of valuable loot since I didn’t have necessary hunting skills. But if I had had them I would have obtained from the wolves  fangs, gall bladders that alchemists needed. From the deer – hooves, back bone tendon that was appropriate for a bow string. And so on. I obtained just a small piece of meat from the huge deer – about five kilos. Another gamer has to kill a couple of animals to make his rucksack full. Hunting skills rule this aspect. Besides not all of them.

I hid my loot into the cantle bags, checked the map and directed the horse in the appropriate way. While shaking in the saddle, I was habitually looking around and analyzing my behavior and results. The fight against the injured monsters showed that I could totally consume my mana points in several minutes. And consequently left almost disarmed. In fact the mobs were of the high levels but still I want to advance fast thus I must hunt for this kind. Otherwise it will take me too much time. By the way has the bracelet progressed?

Soul of the Silver Wolf

Current effects:

+5 strength

+4 stamina

+4 protection

There was a slight increase. Its stamina and protection levels grew up by one point. So I had to decide how to distribute newly gained ten spare points. I wanted to add some points to all attributes but it wasn’t a good idea. Considering the wild expense of mana I distributed five points into my wisdom and intelligence. Thus I managed to increase the amount of mana, calibrated the magic spells hit and on default regeneration of mana points. Due to the legendary bracelet my protection and stamina levels grew up automatically.

I didn’t have any problems during the rest of my way. I was keeping the center of the road ignoring mobs emerging on the roadsides from time to time. If I could keep the same rate that was terribly simple, I would arrive at the required village until the sun-set. As soon as Help recovered, I switched to trotting fast and kept that speed as long as possible. Then slowed down again to let the horse recover. It would be much more difficult to the same in the real world, but I was in the game that had some concessions to many aspects. Much depended on the mount animal ‘class’. My Help was just the middle-of-the-road. It could boast great capacity and the average stroking speed. Anyway I rode three times faster than walking without spending my own efforts. I couldn’t fancy a better alternative.

I halted rather rarely – just to feed and water the horse. At the last rest halt near a streamlet I noticed a small snake of level seventeen sunbathing on a dried stump and killed it without any trouble to gain the necessary amount of experience to level up. I distributed the just obtained five spare points into my intelligence. Grim’s bracelet showed the increase of the strength by one point. The ‘pure attributes of my character looked like that:

Your character’s current level: 16

Your character’s basic attributes:

Strength – 16

Intelligence – 40

Agility – 11

Stamina – 17

Wisdom – 12

Points available for distribution: 0

When both suns started sinking the map showed that I had almost reached my destination. In thirty-minute ride I saw straw roofs of a small village in the distance. That was Mossy Hills. The only thing I couldn’t realize where were the hills covered with either moss or lichen… The valley as firm as a table was drawn into the squares of fields with the village in the center. Wood was surrounding it from all the sides and there was no sign of any hillock. So it was hard to guess why it was called so and what the name derived from. However I could find it out easily by asking talkative villagers. But I wasn’t actually interested in it. I needed only one villager to talk to – old Joglie. I hoped that he was not suffering from sclerosis.

I patted the sweaty side of tired Help and uttered to encourage it:

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You see we’ve almost done it. I’ll leave you in the stable soon, you’ll rest there and eat to your heart’s content.

Dancing in the saddle I was looking at the village slowly approaching and making a plan of our future conversation. I’d better buy some good wine before it. Just in case that the old man likes drinking something stronger than water. I hope we’ll sit, complain about today’s useless young men and talk about older times. And as soon as Father Mushroom is touched and slobber due to the memoires, I’ll use my chance! I’ll talk him out to render me a detailed story! Yup, that’s me! I’m very pernickety!

Ok, that’s a good plan! I feel like I was going to succeed!

The end of the first book.