My mind might have felt that the skirmish had been hours ago and that I had a long physically restful meeting with May, but in CORA dying and being resurrected didn’t seem to eliminate the need for sleep. Which was extra weird considering I didn't really have a body to really get tired, well I supposedly had a simulation of one for now. Maybe I should ask May about that when I see her next…

Anyway last night I fell asleep almost as soon as I had straightened out and climbed into my trampled and dirt strewn bed roll.

Then everything changed the morning the maidarchy attacked. Before the sun had even peeked above the horizon, I was savagely awakened. Suddenly grabbed by the armpits while I was still sleeping and torn from my warm bedroll and dreams of electric sheep. 

And then…

Spun around until awake with my blood pounding in my ears and no hope of falling asleep thanks to the feardrenaline that was now coursing through my veins. Awake, dizzy, nauseous and somehow still thankful she didn’t release me mid spin and send me flying. Small cat-type alrec Gael may be, but she was definitely not weak.

And she definitely did not know mercy.

The next bit was a dizzy blur, but I managed to somehow pack and shovel down some cold rations, despite my lingering nausea, before the sun had risen. At dawn’s first light we were gone, walking away from the ruins and the refugee camp with the sound and smell of the corpse bonfire behind us.

Our plans had changed, instead of going southeast and continuing towards the coast while cutting through the forest to the road, we turned north and deeper into the forest. 

We had originally entered the forest to avoid patrols and checkpoints until we were deeper within the Baron’s territory where security would be less, but that only worked if they didn’t know that was what we were doing. We might have won last night’s skirmish, but survivors got away to probably warn the rest. 

They might be NPCs, but I couldn’t imagine what the refugees would do now. They had entered the forest for similar reasons to us, but I seriously doubted they would be able to slip out of the forest again unnoticed.

Not that our options were much better.

I had complained about the terrain during yesterday's hike, but today the terrain got worse the further north we traveled. More hills, more rocks, more dense forest, more brambles, more loose leaf litter waiting to slide away underfoot and more sharp hanging branches waiting to take an eye out.

I could only describe it as hiking hell. 

It was taking all my concentration to follow Gael and keep myself from slipping, tripping or getting myself perforated by a branch. I couldn’t imagine the refugees following.

And it didn’t get better until about three, four hours in when we reached a wide and shallow stream traveling east between two steep hills. It was only then that we turned east again, walking down the middle of the stream following its path. Even with the water ranging from an inch to a foot deep, the river’s bed of soft sand and smooth river stones made a far easier path than anything of the terrain we had crossed so far today.

I finally had the freedom to let myself think of anything other than focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. I could now address the notification that had been flashing in the corner of my AR UI since I’d woken up.

Flicking the strobing icon caused lines of text to fill a portion of my vision.

[Event Defend Camp Successfully Completed

Though you died valiantly in the attempt, you managed to successfully drive off the attacking soldiers and defend the camp and its inhabitants.

Rewards:

Bonus experience

Title: Hero of the Masses. Your legend grows, unaligned NPCs within the common folk of the Duchy of Parcosia will respond towards you more favorably. NPCs of this description are more likely to aid you in your quests and journeys.]

Wow.

Those were some rewards. The bonus experience on top of the experience I'd received from all my kills and assists while protecting the camp had been enough to level me a total of five times and I could already see some of the potential implications of the title effect. And they ranged from com convenient to ominous. 

Unaffiliated and common folk were big limiters on how useful the title’s buff would be in normal times. It basically ruled out it affecting nobles or their servants, knights or men at arms, it ruled out affecting any foreigners in the region and it potentially ruled out it affecting the merchant class depending on how common class was defined. 

I could see that there were definite uses and benefits to having it. Potentially including commoners or farmers being willing to carry a message for you, pass along useful information to you in conversation or even allowing you to stay in their houses for the night, offering you a meal or a warm fire.

But based on the civil war going on in the Duchy, where the local narrative was leading us and the events in the refugee camp, I could see the title buff being a flag for some very ominous implications concerning where our quest was leading us. Were we going to build a peasant underground resistance or lead a peasant uprising against the Baron?

Ceres was definitely plotting something. 

And just how big a something it was, was only now starting to dawn on me. I just hoped we would be ready when it happened. On that thought I switched to my stat screen and started assigning my newly acquired gains. I didn’t deviate much from how I had been assigning them in the past, so far it had been working for me.

Well aside from one problem, my tendency to collect arrows and quarrels. Which wasn’t a huge problem related to my build or stats when you got down to it. Both times it had been due to me lowering my guard in the moment of victory. 

Not a smart decision, even if it was one I could reasonably try to correct. But, it had proven that a sufficiently well aimed projectile from an opponent that wasn’t significantly weaker than me could fatally wound me if it hit me in the right spot. 

The first time had been a crossbow quarrel and it had gone in between my armpit and breast piercing my arm and probably damaging my heart or one of the major vessels surrounding it. At the range it had been fired from it would have as likely as not still killed me even with boiled leather cuirass I now use. The second time I had taken an arrow through the neck and then suffocated as it had destroyed my windpipe, my armor didn’t protect my neck so that remained a weak point.

I could totally see another advantage players, blessed, had in both gameplay and lore. They could learn from their own deaths.

Unless I started wearing full mail over leather and made sure to cover all potential vitals, this would remain a potential threat even if I didn’t let my guard down. I needed an alternative and without going on a shopping spree in another major town or city, I would have to rely on magic or an ability.

Looking at my ability trees, the nodes I had already purchased and the nodes I could potentially purchase with the skill points I had been saving, I began searching for a solution. I had several ideas, one of which was possibly making illusionary armor and then combining it with the substantiation node I’d used for the Eldritch Phantasms spell to make the illusions real. That wasn’t the idea I went with though.

Rather than illusions, I wanted to make the arcane tree do the heavy lifting this time. Searching the arcane tree, I grabbed the defense, deflect, leech, battery, charge, discharge and energy nodes in hopes my plan would work. 

Switching to the ability constructor window, I started constructing my most complex spell yet. Well spells plural, actually. The first started with the basic self-cast node that came with elemental nodes and used the defense, deflect, leech, energy, charge and battery nodes. The second utilized the cast, discharge, battery, arcane energy and blast nodes.

Finally getting the correct order and arrangement right to make them work, I labeled them and moved them to my active spell slots.

And then promptly tripped on a larger than normal river stone. The rapidly approaching river bed with its shallow covering of water flashed before my eyes. Flinching I shut my eyes.

“Woah there!” a voice exclaimed.

With a sudden jerk my fall was halted by the straps of my pack. 

Opening my eyes I found myself almost horizontal and barely inches from face planting into the stream-bed. Still hanging from my pack, I twisted my neck as far to the side as I could to look behind me. 

Holding onto my pack and by extension me was an amused Roxi. “Playing with your UI again?” she asked, smirking, before hoisting me back to my feet.

“Didn’t I tell you to watch where you’re treading the last time you tripped like this?”