Part 1 - Hellish Training

 

Congratulations! 

Your civilization has reached a population of 100! You are the first of the dwarfs and 30th to reach the milestone! You receive a gold and silver box check your inbox to retrieve the items!

Urist jumped feeling startled with the message that popped into his head. He was glad that it wasn’t a rat aiming for his throat, but he frowned at being woken up in such away. Still, he was thankful that Ubel’s theory had been correct and that the rats hadn’t attacked. 

With the combination of effort, the earth mages had somehow managed to make enough space for people to sleep in thanks to the statue he bought before. They had even started on making the second trench pit a little bit away from the first.

It wasn’t more than a foot deep but it was a good enough start. Dwarfs were awaking and moving to go do their jobs to which he, Ubel, Unicy, and Uria had assigned. The peasants hard at work were making bombs or working on spearmanship. The Warriors were training in their respective weapons and patrolling along the wall. The Earth mages hard at work draining mana to dig the second trench. All while the Combat mages were saving their magic and being useful by doing day to day tasks. 

The crafting and smithing dwarfs were putting their heart into their work. And the new tier 3 mechanic was improving the pulley system one by one with some helpers. The magic swordsman Volt was berating the peasants under him making them learn the art of stabbing.

The only thing that wasn’t going as well, was the final tier-three dwarf who was currently sitting down near the chamber meditating. They didn’t say anything and Urist couldn’t even tell their gender or hair color because of the mask and black robes covering their features. It came off as a little annoying but he figured they would come out eventually. 

And besides, he had enough on his plate. With a sigh, Urist grabbed his spear from the weapon rack and headed outside where Fisherman Mo was already awaiting him holding a short stick and a faint smile. 

“You ready to learn boss?”

Putting on a determined face Urist nodded, “Let's get to it master.”

Giving a light chuckle Mo shook his head, “I am no master just a fisherman. Now let us begin. Take up the stance.”

…

Smack, “Your feet placement is too wide.”

Smack, “Your arms are too tense.”

Smack, “Your back isn’t in the correct position.”

Smack, “Your holding the spear too tight. Loosen it.”

Smack. “Too loose. Do you want your opponent to smack your spear out of your hand?”

Feeling the welts all over his body Urist wanted to cry but held his tears in, “Do you have to hi- OW!”

“No talking back. Since you called me master I must be strict, even if you’re my boss. Your stance is barely passable, continue to hold that stance while I talk about the next steps. If you move without my order I’ll smack you again. Now look straight ahead focus on the target. Breath from your nose and exhale from your mouth slowly. 

Make sure to breathe from the stomach and not the chest. Now hold that position no matter what for half an hour. We will beat this stance into you. Each time you move out of place I shall hit you and you better not use your strength skill or I’ll double the time. Now begin.”

For the next thirty minutes, Urist was hit repeatedly trying his hardest to not cry or make a sound as the welts began to build upon each other. Sweat started to trickle down his body by the five-minute mark. When he finished the thirty-minutes his whole body was sweating beads. He ached all over from the welts and his aching muscles.

When Mo told him that he could relax he fell on the dirt floor and gasped for air as the healing mages began to heal his damaged body. Given a few bottles of water to chug he was given only a 3-minute break before he was told to hold the stance once again. This is how Urist’s hellish spartan training began and ended six hours later.

Gasping for air Urist didn’t want to move. Every muscle in his body was screaming fire and bloody murder. He drank and ate food in a frenzy as the healing mages healed his battered body once again. 

Mo rubbed his beard and thought out loud, “Hmm I guess that isn’t bad for the first day of training. If we had another two weeks you could probably fully learn the first strike. Well, at least you can learn the fundamentals of wielding a spear in the last two days.”

Urist wanted to roll his eyes but the fear of getting hit once again coursed through his body, so he remained silent and kept eating.

“Well that's enough for today you are free to go until tomorrow. I’m going to help out the grenade makers.”

With a relieved sigh, Urist thanked Mo and after eating his meal he decided that now was the best time to check out what was inside the boxes he got this morning.

You have received one gold and silver box! May you have good fortune in opening them!

Looking at the message and the two boxes in his hand Urist shrugged and opened the silver box and time seemed to suddenly stop. A silver floating dice appeared in the air and another message appeared before him. On closer inspection, he noticed that the numbers went from 1 to 100.

Ready to Roll?

Y/N

Without thinking much he clicked Yes and watched the message disappear and the dice began to spin at a high speed. As the seconds passed the dice slowed down and he became excited for a moment when the dice was about to land on 100 but ended up on a respectable 85.

Congratulations! You have obtained a tier two Flexible Iron Bow with 100 iron arrows!

The box shined for a moment before transforming into a bow that was made out of iron. While one was appearing with 5 quivers holding twenty arrows each. Time resumed as the bow landed slowly right into his hands. Snapping out of bewilderment he looked around to see if anyone saw what happened only to see his people going around their business.

He sat the iron bow aside for Unicy to test and decided to open the gold box first, before going over to bug Unicy. Like with the silver box time stopped but this dice was different as it glowed with gold.

Ready to Roll?

Y/N

Feeling the gambler spirit Urist pushed the yes button with glee covering his face.

“Come on, give daddy something good.”

 

Part 2 - Binding

 

The golden dice began to spin giving off waves of power that pressured his body. Urist held his breath hoping to be lucky and smiled when the number landed on 95 causing a blinding light. 

Congratulations! You have obtained the unique weapon Greedy Serpent!

Now able to open his eyes, Urist gazed upon the detailed green copper spear filled with tribal markings, inlaid with topaz on the helm and with the spear tip made out of a pale gray bone with a sharp edge.

With a frown, Urist grabbed the floating spear out of midair. He could judge that the spear was at tier-one since it was made of copper. Why is it treated as a unique weapon? The second thing he noticed was how heavy the spear was despite its size.

He had to use a bit of his strength skill to carry it around. Since he opened the boxes he decided to drop off the iron bow to Unicy. Then he would make a trip to the runesmiths to ask what kind of weapon it was since he had no other information besides the name.

Unicy’s eyes sparkled at receiving her gift and thanked him, saying she would be able to put this weapon too good use. Giving a nod Urist left and headed over to the smiths who were still creating weapons with their dwindling amount of metal. By tomorrow they would be out, but at least every dwarf would have a spear to use and a knife as a backup.

He spotted Ajan and the other Rune Smith were working together with the smiths to get the spearheads done faster. Pulling Ajan away for a bit Urist asked him nicely, “Can you tell me anything about this spear? I got it as a reward but don’t know what it does.” 

Ajan looked at the spear his boss was holding had his curiosity peaked, “May I study it closer boss? I might have some answers as to what it is.”

“Alright, but be careful it’s heavy.”

“Please, it shouldn’t be that heavy even if it’s a copper sp- holy shit you weren't kidding boss!”

Setting it on a table Ajan looked over the markings of the spear for a good twenty minutes in silence before looking at Urist.

“Do you know the name of the weapon boss?”

“It’s called Greedy Serpent is that important?”

“It is. You see boss words draw power over the world in certain ways. It’s how Rune smithing works. The name of the weapon and the Runes along it complement one another. Thankfully we don’t have to ponder on the name and you can use it right away. You see this spear has a few interesting qualities. It eats the souls of what it slays and consumes metal to become stronger.

“If I’m reading these runes correctly and with the name as the key, I can roughly say this spear can become strong. Very strong. But it’ll be a picky eater as it grows stronger. Exotic gems, souls, metal, special items its demands will be endless. As expected of being dubbed greedy serpent. Do you want to know what it needs to rank up? Because frankly, it’s weak as crap as it stands.”

“What do I need?”

“Well first, what you need to do is bind it. Which will take a few steps first requiring a drop of your blood to start the process. Next, I need to tattoo a part of your body. Tell me, boss, what is your dominant hand.”

“It’s my left. I’m going to guess it’s the one that needs to be a tattoo?”

“Correct. I need to tattoo the rune you see on this spear to allow you to speak with it safely.”

“And if I don’t get the tattoo?”

“Well, there is a high chance you become brain dead from the spear trying to steal your soul.”

“I see how long would this take?”

“Just an hour, if you got the time and the ink it isn’t that big of a tattoo. Oh, I almost forgot it needs to be magic ink or it won’t work. I don’t need much just a single vial. Can you buy it?”

Going to the shop Urist frowned at the cost of 100 points but decided to spend it. He didn’t know how strong he could make it before the final battle of the rats. But he wasn’t about to throw away a potential trump card.

With the vial of ink, a primitive ink pen, a rag and a bottle of alcohol the two entered the cave and Ajan began his work by telling Urist to poke his finger for a drop of blood. He didn’t make much of a fuss and had the blood drop land on the spear which was greedily sucked inside.

Urist could instantly feel a connection with the spear forming but was told by Ajan to not touch it until he finished inking the tattoo on his skin.

Although he was tempted, he held restraint knowing he could lose his soul stupidly by doing that. Ajan touched Urist arm a bit before deciding to place the tattoo under the forearm.

Ajan offhandedly remarked, “It’s the best connection area to mana. Oh yes, this will hurt quite a bit so grit your teeth and don’t move. I got a few helpers to come in case you try.”

One of the earth twins came inside to craft stone restraints locking the confused Urist quite snugly.

Giving a cough Ajan looked to one of his helpers to which the helper pulled out a piece of wood that had leather wrapped around it, “When I say it’ll hurt a lot I mean it. Bite this as to not lose your tongue.”

“Why not just get me plastered then?”

“It’ll ruin the mana connection area. Now bite.”

Begrudgingly Urist bit on wood covered leather.

“Now let’s begin.”

Dipping the pen into the magically infused ink Ajan poked Urist skin and it was then that Urist who had just spent six hours of pain and thought it was pretty bad. Wasn’t ready for the pain brought upon that single poke.

His vision doubled over as the pain throbbed throughout his entire body. He teeth clenched on the leatherwood as he screamed his lungs out.

Pulling the pen out of the skin Ajan gave Urist a look before rolling his eyes, “Oh stop being a pussy we only have a few thousand pokes to do.”

It was right then that Urist sorely wished he was training instead of doing this form of insanity. Or at least looked for another way to be not in such pain as the pen pierced his skin once again.

For the next hour, muffled screams could be heard coming from the cave making the nearby dwarfs move faster to getaway.

 

Part 3 - The Vice Leaders

 

In a cold sweat, Urist awoke to Uria studying his face. The first thing he noticed was his arm not screaming out with the pain of bloody murder. The second being that he wasn’t restrained anymore. Ruffing his hair a bit he sat up from the table and looked at Uria straight in the eye.

“How long was I out?”

“Long enough for the rats to come to attack us and us overpowering them.”

“Any losses?”

“Only one when a commoner fell off the wall into the fire. We were able to retrieve enough of his body. Other than some minor wounds we held the line and slaughtered those that came. Of that Unicy, Ubel, Volt, Acar, and the mysteries person wish to speak to you when you are ready to receive them.”

Finding where he put his shirt, Urist hastily put it on and grabbed his newly bound spear as a walking stick. He still felt sore all over his body but didn’t feel like letting his people wait any longer. Besides he had some ideas he also needed to finish.

“Call them to meet me in the civilization room, I’ll set up more chairs so we can talk.”

“Understood I shall call for them right now.”

Leaving to get those that were invited Urist prepared his thoughts in order of what he wished to get done. He had over 100 people to now look over and felt a little stressed on how to deal with them all. Last night he spent some time on the forums and settings of the administration to figure out how to lighten the load and figured out some nice things.

Checking out the points they had gotten, Urist was quite happy to see they had roughly gathered 2.5k. Which was much needed after spending so many points on other things, they now had 5568 points.

His mind was already thinking of how to use these points as he set up a larger table complemented with chairs. One by one the dwarfs came and took their positions around the table. The final one to sit was the mysterious tier 3 who now revealed her appearance as they had the mask hang to the left of their head. 

Golden curly hair, crimson eyes, and pale skin as if she never spent a day outside. She sat opposite of Urist at this time and was studying him as intensely as he was her. Taking in her mesmerizing looks for a bit longer Urist began to speak.

“I’m sorry that I wasn’t up when the fighting began. I won’t let that happen again.”

Ubel replied in a neutral tone, “It was fine although we had to show off a bit more of our trump cards. This attack was nothing more than a probe since they didn’t send in their heavy hitters. It’s safe to say they might attack later tonight but it won’t be like how you described since we will be ready. My theory is that they won’t attack tomorrow and will throw everything they have instead on the final day.”

“Oh? How can you be so sure?”

“With our show of force, the Rat King will be forced to attack us thanks to the event ending.”

Unicy interrupted, “How would it know of the event?!”

Ubel gave Unicy his usual dead fish-eye stare before returning to Urist, “It’s safe to assume it knows as it’s considered an event. And with what you told me before it tried to steal the civilization stones. We can safely assume that it’s their win condition of this fight.

“Now you might be all thinking so if we give them a civilization stone to the rats and they will leave us alone? Then we wouldn’t have to fight anymore correct?”

Ubel watched no one nod their heads and snorted, “You guys are no fun. As you’re correctly thinking it isn’t known that the rats will leave us alone after gaining it. Number two is that if we lose the stone we might be considered fallen and have our civilization revoked. 

“And if that doesn’t happen, although this move would help us in the short term in the long term we lose two extra working hands a day. We also lose the ability to set up another base with the crystal so it puts us at another disadvantage. No matter how I look at it the cons outweigh the pros at a considerable margin. With that out of the way, I guess it’s time to move to the next part of business correct Urist?”

With eyes turned towards him know Urist gave a nod, “You are correct. Besides making plans for the rats I’ve decided to assign Vice Leaders. Those positions will be concerned with food, water, and military for now. After this war is over, I plan on making more positions, for now, three positions will be assigned. Uria will be in charge of food and water, Ubel you will be in charge of military strategy and Unicy will take over military warfare.  

“For these positions, until the war ends, they will be allowed to spend 500 points a day in their respective fields to allow streamlined work. Don’t worry, I get all the receipts so I know what you buy. Along with these positions you are allowed to take two secondary managers to help you manage your fields. When this war is over, positions might be changed or added as we build infrastructure. Is that clear?”

“Fair.”

“Understood.”

“Acknowledged.”

With everyone in agreement, Urist inwardly sighed with relief. But he knew the night was still young and the topics to discuss and implement was still great.

The next one was figuring out who the mysterious robed person was.

“Now that is out of the way, why don’t you introduce yourself…”

“Helga. Job. Spirit Charmer. Very Impressed. Tell me. You have. Artifacts. Yes?”

“Artifacts? Like things with history or objects of wonder?“

Helga gave a curt nod, “Can’t. Perform… Craft without. Such objects.”

Ubel for once was interested,“ Can you show us a demonstration.”

“If wish. Can show. Here.”

“I’ll allow it as long as it doesn’t break anything.”

With a small smile on the petite girls face. She closed her eyes and held her hands outstretched. And in surprising grace, the girls once cut up words flowed like water.

“Story of old I call you forth from the Alabalsker Records. Heed my call for I require your presence. Awaken, the guardian of Highsky. Angel Balsker.”   

Rat Tide timer activated 1 Day 15 Hours 42 Mins

Beast Swarm timer activated 9 Days 15 Hours 42 Mins

Point Amount:  5568