บท 13: Apprenticeship (part 1), enabling a mad scientist
Puchi! Thud
A large mole rat holding a crude spear fell to the ground blood foaming from the throat and mouth, a thrown knife embedded in it's neck.
"that's ten"
I spoke while prying out a large buck tooth from the overgrown rodent's skull.
Ding! quest complete
The mole people!
type: side quest (repeatable)
Clear condition: kill ten mole kin
Failure condition: Leave Muscheln area
description: They're coming!
reward: 100 essence, 100 exp, 1 Tinfoil hat
penalty: none
Tinfoil hat
Grade: F
Type: Apparel/Consumable
Effect: wear this hat for 1 hour to receive a stat point
Description: Prevents government mind control... or maybe that's what they want you to think.
After the incident with the pigs I had started hunting mole men in the coastal caves. Due to the fact that this quest was an unpopular, I was allowed to take an additional two requests.
Thank god I never encountered any other adventurers. It was an unlikely possibility but it could still happen. The guild handled the division of labor so that most adventures could complete their tasks without disturbances. In subjugation missions (especially the lower level ones), adventures were assigned hunting grounds. so unless their were multiple tasks to be taken care of in an area, or someone got lost your chances of encountering an adventurer who is not in your party is almost nil.
Due to the additional requests I was able to take It also meant that I would rotate through several hunting grounds on a daily basis. Thankfully with the isolated nature of the quest location meant I could wear several 'hats' without being disturbed.
The mole people were unpopular subjugation targets for three reasons
one: the tunnels were narrow making it a difficult quest for parties
Two: The mole people often travel in groups meaning you will almost always be outnumbered
Three: The mole people are often not worth the trouble. In addition to being disgusting mole people have nothing of value on or in their bodies, in addition the mole people carry a whole host of diseases
While others might not hunt them, to me the mole people were a treasure trove of stat points, experience and essence. Most of the runes extracted and cataloged into the system were trash but after a few dozen the system was able to complete some fragmented runes for its database. If I had know this ahead of time I would have drained all of those blute boars for fire type runes.
At present the system had created 2 potentially useful blood runes
Trigger of dirt
Type: trigger rune
Function: triggers a rune formation when in contact with dirt
Light enhancement
Type: auxiliary rune
Function: greatly enhances any light produced by the rune formation
because of my current savings in terms of both essence and coin, I decided to take some time away from hunting and see if I could learn some entry level enchantment, The system did offer these skills, but actually learning the skills seemed to be more effective so long as I had a good teacher, the guild occasionally offers basic courses from teaching professionals in an attempt to recruit more people into their labor pool, they also host lectures on beast hunting, survival tactics, and resource procurement. most of these lectures cost money with the exclusion of the occasional mandated 'Safety lecture' a type of PSA for adventures introducing them to new dangers that encroached on the area recently such as high value bounties or beasts.
Due to the guild shops in most major cities and a certain stipulation in the shop masters contracts, most shop masters or resident craftsmen hold a scheduled lecture once a month and select temporary apprentices for the month. an apprenticeship is often guaranteed as the number attending these lectures is often low.
Over a week had passed since the incident with the blute boar and I was still hunting for income and essence while waiting for the lecture
It had been almost a month since I had entered this world, to be exact it had been 26 days
My current stats and assets are as follows
3,800 essence
3,000 experience
6,413 coppers
unallocated stat points 30
STR 8 (+1)
DEX 20 (+3)
AGI 20 (+3)
CON 16 (+3)
WIS 13
INT 11 (+1)
CHA 0
ADP 22 (+6)
My adaptability improved after dealing with all of the strange characters that resided in the guild, owing mostly to a particular 'lady'. The rest of my stat increases were the result of combat and training, they represented my growth over time. I opted not to allocate the stat points until the last possible moment or I naturally reached 120 total. After all as long as I don't complete the quest I have some vacation time so to speak, because wisdom and intellect are incredibly difficult stats to raise without a meditation practice, so I don't need to worry about breaching the limit for the quest any time soon.
Experience points on the other hand can be used to further my practical understanding of things. Depending on how the lecture of enchantment goes and how long it takes me to find a witcher. I might be hard pressed on how to spend what experience I have . I spend it to improve my understanding of half moon freezing, alchemy or enchanting. as long as the mole quest sticks around I should have some options open to me. According to the system all levels of a disciplines tier require the same amount of experience to advance through the final level normally requires breaking through a bottleneck.
Thanks to the system I wont encounter I wont start to encounter bottlenecks until I reach the level of master.
The lecture hall was located on the guilds second floor opposite the training facilities. Paying a fee of 1 gold (about a month's expenses for the average family) I entered the lecture hall
The interior of the room was very simple desks were placed at a raised position surrounding a stage, it was just enough to give a full view of the instructors actions but without being too far away. Aside from me two other people were attending the lecture one of them was a slightly plump woman with a haughty expression, a typical arrogant young miss most likely pursing some frivolous passing interest or trying to impress someone.
The other was a man with somewhat drawn features, with a pale and sickly skin tone, he appeared listless and tired.
Creaaak
SLAM!
the sound of a door opening and then shutting could be heard as a thin aged man walked in. His robe was torn and covered in soot, his hair unkempt, he was even missing a shoe.
"State your names and purposes for attending the lecture"
The woman was the first to speak bolting up from the chair as if she had been sitting on hot coals
"Gertrude, The boy I like, said he would date me if pigs fly"
The instructor had a perturbed look on his face opening his mouth as if about to say something but stopped his mouth hanging open for a second with a hint of astonishment in his eyes.
After taking a moment he assumed a scholarly poise and spoke with a perfectly straight face.
"oh,I believe you happen to be in the wrong class, Chimera studies was yesterday"
"Drat"
The woman hurried out of the room lugging a comically oversize purse
with the woman gone the man introduced himself
" Lentz, I'm looking to further my understanding of the arcana"
The lecturer turned to me
" Blood Hunter, I need to learn enchanting in order to improve my strength"
"Ah, a guild member. tell me are you the one Shansa trained."
"yes..."
The man rushed up to me any poise he might have had vanished, he raced towards my seat a look of pure fanaticism in his eyes
"you have one of those gun things right, give it here"
"I'm not sure if That's a good Idea"
" I'll take you as an apprentice no questions asked, and I'll pay you handsomely"
I realized I had no need for the flintlocks at present, they were slow to reload and I could aquire better guns at any time I quickly opened my coat as if urging an impulsive purchase from the man
"what're you buying , stranger"
The man hurriedly grabbed one of the flintlocks out of my holster and practically flung a large bag of coins at me
"anytime, heh, heh, heh"
chuckling while counting my newfound riches acquired from this strange reverse mugging
The man was already at the desk he hurriedly grabbed a gem and carved some rune arrays into it shoving it in the barrel of the gun and covering his ears.
Shortly after a bang echoed out and a whooshing sound could be heard as a several foot long tongue of flame shot out the barrel of the gun.
All three people in the room watched the events unfold with varying degrees of astonishment and fascination.
The first one to speak was the man who put on the pyrotechnic display
"MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA" The man laughed in a very mad scientist sort of way
"It can be done, I'll show them all, I'll show them they were wrong"
The other man Lentz stood up and spoke and gave a humbling bow
" sir please take me as your apprentice"
"ah you know genius when you see it , fine you can come too"
The professor spoke while practically dragging the both of us up to the third floor where his workshop was located
"and don't call me sir call me professor, I'm a man of science"
the man took us to a study and selected some books, he looked at me
"complete novice, but you want to get started quickly, yes"
I nodded
He dropped some five books into my arms they were:
Arrays for dummies
101 runes you need to know
Science!!!!!!
Rune Compatibility and Spell Interactions: a Compendium
The Art of carving
"read these and come to me if you have any questions"
The professor turned to Lentz with another stack of books
"most of these are theory instead of just practical knowledge"
Lentz was then given a stack of books several times taller than mine
"since both of you are my apprentices now feel free to drop by if you have any questions"
the man spoke while shooing us out the door and closing it tightly as he hung a sign reading 'do not disturb'
Leaving the guild I retired to my room in the black clam and retired for the day for both study and some much needed rest.
For the next three days explosions could be heard coming from the guild at regular intervals, scaring any nearby horses and giving people on the street a fright.
on the fourth day the explosions stopped but an eerie laughter could be heard echoing out from the halls of the guild and stories of a pale man walking the halls at night had started to spread. Many people thought that the professor had died in an explosion and his ghost was haunting the guild.
These rumors were officially put to rest when he reopened his shop for business a week later with some new products called spell slingers a type of device that served to replace most attack and support scrolls, despite being easy to carry most people deemed the spell slinger to be a commercial failure due to its high cost and the volatility of the spell marbles it used
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A_Clever_Monocle
A_Clever_Monocle Please note that the numbers displayed outside of the parentheses are current stats AFTER the increase indicated by the parenthesis
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