Welcome to Eden: A LitRPG/Fantasy Gamelit, page 10
Picking up the spear and upon closer examination, William noted that it was indeed an extremely ordinary item with a simple and very ordinary description. He reviewed the information about the spear that presented itself to his field of vision.
Rusted Wydale Spear
This spear once belonged to the Wydale Armoury. Through years of use and neglect, it has fallen into a state of near disrepair.
Damage Type: Piercing.
Damage: 12
Durability: 3 of 25
Quality: Poor
Rarity: Common
Even the description of the item seemed to scream ‘this is garbage’, but a quick scan of the other items strewn across the makeshift armoury led William to the conclusion that this was where old weapons had come to die. Everything was prefixed with ‘old’ or ‘rusted’ and nothing came even close to the ‘Jailor’s Mace of Strength’ that Onas proudly strangled.
That was it, if the weapons were all pretty similar in attributes, then there would be no need to select anything other than the spear, with its small head start and long reach, which William hoped would keep him out of trouble.
Other prisoners started filtering into the room once William was happy with his selections and nodded to Onas to let him know that he was happy with what he had chosen. It had seemed that Onas had done him a little favour in allowing him to have his first pick of the weapons and armour. He was sure that the Jailor had shot him a subtle wink when he had let the rest of the group in.
When everyone else had selected their wares, they were certainly a sight to behold. Seven average sized elves, William and Onas armed to the teeth with a mismatch of weapons and armour. It was like a school nativity play being led out by the teacher in the last-minute costumes that their parents had cobbled together. Helmets lopped lazily to the sides, broken leather straps caused chest plates to skew and hang awkwardly. Upon seeing everyone else, William became even more thankful for his early admission to the room.
Not everyone had selected a different weapon from what was available to them though, two of the other prisoners had also picked up spears, apparently banking on their reach as William had. One had a pair of small rusted one-handed axes that looked as though they were about to snap in half. Two more had picked rusted, blunt-looking swords and round wooden shields that attached to their forearms – again paling in comparison to the arms that the men who had previously saved William’s life had carried. Actually, these small shields looked more like training apparatus than weapons of war. William had to wonder why the real soldiers weren’t going to be sent out to carry out this task, though on second thoughts he realised that what better way to scout an unknown enemy, than to send these budgies down the mineshaft.
One man had found a deadly looking flail - deadly for the user that was. Its chain was so rusted that pieces of browned metal seemed to flake off of it every time it moved and if the chain snapped, there would be no telling where that spiked ball would end up.
The last elf in the room had picked up a bow and a dagger. The bow actually looked fine, the string didn’t seem to be frayed and the curved wood seemed to be without any large splits or cracks. Knowing that none of these items were without their drawbacks though, William regarded the bow thoughtfully. It eventually dawned on him that the bow did indeed have a fatal flaw – it had no arrows with it.
“Right you lot,” Onas spoke commandingly. “You are not prisoners today. You are an elven Warband, and I expect you to behave as one.”
William wondered what that meant for his underclothes and their telltale name coining him very much as a prisoner, but he kept his mouth shut.
The group seemed to straighten with some kind of inherent pride. William followed suit to ensure he didn’t get singled out by the others.
“The city is under a terrible threat from those damn spiders and if you think that doesn’t concern you, one was killed within the prison tunnels just last night.” He looked to further the group’s desire to carry out their mission. As he spoke these words his gaze fell upon William in silent appreciation.
“There are nine of us against the entire nest of those beasts. I know that sounds like an unscalable mountain but hear this: once the city is safe from all threats, you will all be pardoned of all of your crimes – no matter what they are and I promise you that on my honour.”
A cheer erupted from everyone but William as the group pumped their fists into the air. The confidence and camaraderie that William experienced brought an uncontrollable smile to his face and the feeling of absolute purpose and devotion.
You have been rallied by the Warband Leader.
Effect: All of your attacks are increased by 10% damage
Effect: All incoming damage is reduced by 10%
Effect: All experience gained x2
These effects are only active while you are within twenty metres of the Warband Leader. If the Warband Leader falls, these effects are transferred to all enemies within twenty metres.
The notification that had appeared along with his positivity shed light on his new emotions and again William thanked Onas internally for explaining the examine stat which had already become so useful, but now also seemed to give more information about status effects as well. William was very pleased that the huge Jailor would be coming with them into the forthcoming battle or battles, as the man was clearly an indispensable asset to any group of fighters – ‘as long as he didn’t die,’ he thoughtfully added. That would mean a much, much harder fight to be had for whoever was left behind.
“Each of you are brothers today.” Onas declared after the shouting had dissipated and he took hold of William’s forearm and allowed him to return the action. Onas winked at William as he did so and turned him by the shoulder to face the group. One by one the men all carried out this handshake of brotherhood which, to William’s delight had concealed an ulterior motive. Now when he looked across the room at the seven other prisoners – one being a woman on closer inspection, each one had their name and level displayed faintly above their heads. Now behind them, Onas placed a single finger to his lips, silently instructing William not to mention this to the others. ‘Thank you again, Onas,’ he inwardly repeated.
Ronon, level twelve and Nym, level fifteen had been the pair to select spears. Virion, level twelve and Elendir, level thirteen had been the pair to pick up the swords and shields. Rydel at level ten had picked up the hand axes and stood next to Jasyn who, at level fifteen had the honour of wielding the dangerous looking flail. Behind the rest of the group was a female elf who was an easy six inches shorter than the rest. Sara, level six had been the one to pick up the sans-ammunition bow and dagger.
‘Level six?’ William questioned internally before remembering that he himself was only level three, the others must have been internally guffawing at his chances out there in a real battle.
As the group left the tunnel entrance and breached into the sunlight on the far side of the wall, it seemed that they had naturally assembled themselves behind Onas in a two-by-two train ordered from highest level to the lowest. It seemed to William that there were two ways to assemble the group for the road – by level, as they had done, or by weapon to allow for economical attack and defence ranges. As William carried a spear he didn’t much like the idea of having to front the line, so he was content with how things had turned out and again, kept his mouth shut and his ideas to himself.
His pairing in the line was of course the level six Sara, who still didn’t seem to belong in the party, both because she seemed so timid, and also appeared to be under levelled for the situation – though on the second front, William himself was no superhero. As her name suggested, she was indeed a female of the species and could only have been twenty at the most, judging by what William could see of her face whenever he could steal a glance of her. As she walked, she didn’t look up from the dagger in her hands that she seemed to be sharpening or carving something with. When she had finished what she was doing though, it became clear to William that she was actually carving her own arrows from the straightest branches that she could find on the ground, stooping down to pick them up as they presented themselves to her.. They, of course, would not be tipped with arrowheads of stone or iron, but if shot with enough force, they could surely create a subtle diversion or at least piss something off beyond all belief. For the tails, she had grooved a notch into the flat end of the arrow and slotted in two sticks to create a sort of cross that protruded slightly from the arrow’s shaft. To William’s surprise they really did look like they belonged with the bow.
William watched as Sara managed to craft ten arrows before she was either out of appropriate branches, or she just didn’t feel like making any more and she returned to walking with idle hands, eyes front.
“Do you ever make anything?” the question was so out of left-field that William almost thought that he had imagined it coming from Sara.
“Like arrows? No.” William chuckled, “I can make a pretty decent campsite though,” he added as he remembered his first actions in Eden.
“Campsite?” Sara replied thoughtfully. Have you ever made a map?” she continued conversationally.
“Actually, I do happen to have the mapping skill,” he had quickly checked his own list of skills to ensure that his ‘Exploration: Mapping Level 1: Beginner’ was still there.
“Could you, umm, draw us a map in case we get lost and need to find our way back?” She asked sheepishly.
“That sounds like an excellent idea, Sara,” William replied.
Pulling an old piece of paper and a piece of charcoal from within her loose armour, she handed them to William.
“These were in this armour when I picked it up. I was going to keep hold of them but I think they could be more useful as a map.”
“Don’t you worry, none of you will be coming back without me at your head,” Onas called back to the group, apparently able to hear their entire conversation.
“I’ll give it a go anyway if that’s OK?” William said to Sara, ignoring Onas’ warnings.
You have gained a skill point in Exploration: Mapping
Current Level 2: Beginner
William had noticed that the green bar beneath the skill in his personal details was now empty as the experience had been used to complete another level. The green bars below everything else, like ‘spear’ and ‘fire’ had remained stagnant, with one exception – his stamina’s green bar had also been steadily but slowly growing, presumably as a result of the long trek through the forest. Like nearly every game he had ever played, this green bar was obviously used to denote experience or ‘xp’ in each given skill.
Although his drawings of any important features in the surrounding area were crude, after he had levelled up, he instinctively began to see ways in which he could improve them, adding details to the taller trees that he hadn’t seen before, or being able to display accurately rock formations rather than simply adding a generic pile of rocks. He knew he was still no Christopher Columbus on the explorer front, but the progress he had made by simply levelling up just once was both evident and remarkable. It was all too easy to forget that in reality, he was stuck standing inside his VR rig.
After what felt like a lifetime, but in reality was more likely to be a few hours, the forest began slowly to change in very subtle ways. The sunlight didn’t seem to be as warm or bright as it had been previously and dead or browning leaves, branches and trees started to smatter their surroundings as the party walked. The forest that had seemed so vibrant and alive now seemed to be growing progressively sicker, and it was worsening by the minute.
Shimmering white spider webs spanned some of the leaves above them, hanging high above their heads menacingly. The whole party both visibly and audibly tightened their grips on their respective weapons – other than Sara who had pushed her bow over her shoulder and was again furiously carving tips onto any of the straighter branches that now started to litter the ground more abundantly underfoot.
Within minutes, the sun had been almost completely blocked out by the thickening webs overhead and the air had unpleasantly putrefied. The webs themselves had been getting closer and closer to the heads of the party, with Onas being in the most immediate danger, being much taller than the rest of the group, though he didn’t seem to care very much.
Abruptly, the party came to a halt. Peering past the mismatched armour in front of him, William could see the problem that’d stopped them – there was now a solid wall of webs blocking the way onward. Onas ushered Virion and Elendir to his side, both drawing their swords and they began to slice a path through the dead centre of the webs as though it was the most normal thing in the world to do.
Following the path of destruction, William couldn’t help but feel like he was travelling through an aquarium tunnel made entirely of spider webs, that would surely be one dolphin that he certainly didn’t want to experience swimming towards him.
The cutting of the webs had unfortunately not gone unnoticed by their inhabitants and creators though. The webbed tunnel around them began to vibrate, telegraphing the movement of the approaching curious enemy. The two swordsmen as though on instinct quickly cut a perimeter around the group that had huddled together back-to-back in order to prevent any surprise attacks from beyond the near opaque webbed walls.
Onas’ voice boomed above the surrounding silence making William start. “For those of you who don’t have much experience with spiders…” William presumed that this little speech could have been solely for his benefit, “…remember that your strength and defence aren’t as important as they usually are right now.” His voice was tinged with audible disappointment at that revelation. “Once you pass their legs, any meaningful strike to the head of the beasty will down it no matter how strong you are. Don’t underestimate them though, their legs are as sharp as diamond and will easily part your limbs from your body.”
‘So that’s why I was able to kill two of them already, I got lucky?’ William thought. It seemed as though the spiders’ weakness was matched equally with an obvious strength. William was thankful again for his weapon choice before casting a sideways glance at the flail that Jasyn wielded, and Virion and Elendir’s short swords. Their shields would be of little use to the blades that they were intended to deflect either.
All of a sudden, a wooden arrow whistled past William’s ear and through the webbing surrounding the party which was apparently ineffective at slowing the arrow as it had the group. William had flinched at the sound, though it didn’t stop him from following the arrow’s flight. A dull thud and a shrill squeal betrayed the arrow’s impact on its target.
The spider’s final word was followed by a complete silence and absence of movement from the webbed walls. It seemed like the enemy had been caught off guard in assuming that they were safe whilst out of view and reach. It did not last long, however.
Shrill, ear piercing screeches erupted from all around the group, each enemy creature adding their own sound to the chorus as the dome of webs around them positively bounced. The spiders were either all moving towards them as one, or otherwise attempting to inflict fear into their prey – William noted internally that it was not completely ineffective, as his palms began to sweat heavily and his heart rate elevated to the point that he could feel it pounding in his chest. For a moment, he almost brought his hands up to his head to once again attempt removal of his visor, though a part of him remembered the pain of the last attempt, and another part remembered that although this was all still a game, he’d made promises to Cath, who he saw as a good friend more than an artificial intelligence. He knew that he was moving in the right direction and a little spider-fear wasn’t going to stand in his way.
As soon as the tip of the first spider’s leg breached the webbed wall, it was swiftly parted from its owner. This one had emerged closest to Rydel, who took the opportunity to disarm - quite literally - the arachnid. It hadn’t revealed its body but its leg was only a foot long including the bend in the middle. Assuming that it was of normal proportions, this one was a smaller spider of no more than three feet long. It was not alone though - as if egged on by the group’s defence of their perimeter, sharpened legs began to appear slowly through the webs in all directions.
“HOLD!” Onas shouted, “Wait until you can see the red in their eyes!”
The group obeyed their leader’s instruction, however William was unsure if it was due to petrification or by choice.
When no less than eight spiders had emerged from the walls and surrounding the group, they became completely motionless as though baiting the Warband into making the first move. The resolve that Onas had instilled within them had luckily been effective enough to prevent total panic and the group remained stalwart. When the spiders realised that they wouldn’t be able to intimidate the elves into a fool’s rush, the first of them coiled its legs and sprung its oversized body at Onas.
The muscular elf barely moved at all, simply shifting his shoulder to the left to allow the spider to fly harmlessly past him, landing softly on the webbing behind the group. The spider burst as the long heavy mace made contact with its exposed back and thick black blood coated the white webs around the impact site. The act hadn’t seemed to phase Onas at all, as he returned to his readied position as though nothing had happened. It had all happened in the blink of an eye and William appreciated the speed the larger elf could muster. Nonchalance was not the case for William though, whose stomach was desperately trying to escape out of his mouth, his heart beat out of his chest and his legs somehow simultaneously pleaded to carry him as far and as fast as they could in the opposite direction, and lock up entirely.
