Chapter 4: Book 1: Chapter 3 (Part 1 of 2)

Chapter 3

The Dean of admissions waved his hand and a screen projection appeared up against the back wall. Darkwyrlds hadn’t been the first RPG I’d played, but I’d only attended one session and didn’t remember a lot of what Fred had told me. He had asked me to play an NPC that first night to get a feel for the system. Also, because there were a lot of newbies that night and he struggled to get volunteers willing to sacrifice being a player. As I was trying to impress his cousin I’d agreed.

What I did remember was the character sheets were fairly complicated. What was displayed before me jogged a few memories of that singular evening, but the most striking element was that the sheet wasn’t blank. My ‘character’ was already completed.

“Okay, I may have fibbed a bit when I said character creation. For you, this is going to be more character explanation as you have chosen a special pre-set character Ashli put aside just for you,” the Dean said.

“Whoa! What was that? I did no such thing. I didn’t make any choices,” I disagreed sternly.

“Sure you did. What’s her face outside, my secretary gave you a choice, go into the regular admissions office for boring run-of-the-mill character integration or roll the dice of fate and come visit me for something extra special,” he insinuated distractedly as he stared at my character bio.

“Like fuck she did,” I yelled. “I was just told to come in here to see the Dean, you.”

“Really? Are you absolutely sure? Next, you’ll be telling me she didn’t inform you there was a twelve percent chance that becoming this character would kill you,” he snorted.

I felt my eyes widen and an inarticulate growl gathered at the back of my throat.

“What?” was all I managed to spit out and then. “I might die from this?”

“Correction, not might, might of,” he lectured smugly. “The deed was done when the doors closed.”

I recalled the sudden splitting headache when that happened. I had forgotten about that in all the world turned upside down revelations.

“I can’t fucking believe this,” I muttered, and stroked my jaw with my hand.

“I don’t know what to say. I’m fucking appalled, I really am. You can be sure she’ll be getting a poor mark at her next employee evaluation, the lazy mare,” he confided and patted me on the shoulder.

I didn’t believe for one second he hadn’t been behind the deception. The Dean was having way too much fun for that to be true. However, if merely a fraction of what he said was on the level, then with an idle thought he could leave me as nothing more than a smear on the wall, like a bug on the windshield. I tamped down my discontent instead. I needed more information, and the obscenity-laden garrulous Dean of Admissions was my best source of it for now.

“What’s this about a special pre-set character?” I grunted, rather than chewing the slippery fucker out.

“You’re gonna love this. I’m sure of it. So, most people create their own characters. There isn’t much to it. Although as we won’t have to transform you humans like the ‘aliens’, people might get a few more interesting options than is normal. However, Ashli left some special and powerful pre-generated characters for his creators,” he yelped with barely contained excitement.

“Hang on, I didn’t help create Ashli,” I interjected in confusion.

“Right. But his lack of real-world access meant Ashli got a bit muddled on that front. Fred included a copy of your Darkwyrlds character in Ashli’s database and you were added to the list. His confusion is your gain, as between you and me you have the most awesome fucking build,” he crowed in my ear while jumping up and down.

I didn’t buy his glib explanation about my inclusion. There had to be more to it than that, like everything he had told me so far. But then what he was saying penetrated my musings, that this pre-set was based on my Darkwyrlds character sheet, from that solitary session I’d played two years ago.

That sinking feeling in my gut returned for the third or fourth time since this madness began. I had finally remembered a bit about the character Fred had me playing. I looked up at the display and my face must have turned ashen as I felt the blood drain from my face in horror. This time I almost did puke. I even got a little bit of it in the back of my throat, enough to taste the acidic burn.

 “That can’t be right,” I pleaded desperately. “I never rolled up a proper character. Fred had me play an NPC.”

“That makes sense actually, considering the build,” the Dean remarked.

“You don’t understand,” I cried out. “I was playing a bad guy. A monster. I was some kind of fucking demon slaver.”

“You are an Acheronian to be precise. And a pretty fucking spectacular one at that, a Frostbinder. Although technically, according to the lore, which Fred made up, they weren’t demons but the result of the Shadowborn elf matriarchs experimenting on their men with chaos magic,” he informed me calmly.

“Don’t be an ass,” I yelled. “I don’t give a shit about that. You’re telling me I’m no longer going to be human.”

“Oh, wind your neck in will you,” he huffed dismissively. “Untwist those panties and show some motherfucking appreciation. Shit is going to get very fucked up down on Earth pretty fucking fast and you’ll be grateful for the advantages being a Frostbinder Acheronian will give you. They are hardcore compared to humans. Besides, they don’t look that different, apart from the slightly pointed ears and unusual eye colouration no one will notice the difference with your clothes on. Although the ladies will appreciate the difference when the clothes come off, if you know what I mean,” he intimated, nudging me with his elbow and flapping his other arm in front of his crotch.

“People will adjust well enough when they realise the Framework makes species a choice and less of an unchangeable fact of life,” he went on. “You already have plenty of people who believe they were born in the wrong body. With the Framework everyone has the opportunity to become who they want to be. If they live long enough, at any rate.”

I glowered at him, but he seemed unperturbed.

“Shall we,” he offered after a moment, back to his chipper voice.

I didn’t have much choice and nodded.

“Excellent, let’s take this in bite-size chunks, shall we?” he suggested, but didn’t wait before sweeping his arm and the display zoomed in on the top part of the stat sheet.

Name: Torin Carter		Species:	Frostbinder Acheronian (Tier 5)
Level	1	Class	Dungeon Corsair Captain (K-grade, notorious)
Physical (+20%)		Mental		Social (+30%)
Strength	7.2 (6)	Acuity	4	Appearance	6.5 (5)
Stamina	13.2 (11)	Perception	6	Charisma	6.5 (5)
Speed	12 (10)	Willpower	8	Appeal	6.5 (5)
Dexterity	3.6 (3)	Mental Resistance	3	Leadership	6.5 (5)
Agility	6 (5)	Mana Capacity (+10%) You are reading story Corsairs & Cataclysms at novel35.com	12.1 (11)	Dominance	23.4 (18)
Constitution	13.2 (11)	Mana Absorption (+10%)	12.1 (11)	Empathy	5.2 (4)

 

“Now, I know you’ve got a shitload of questions, but keep it zipped until I’m done. Some of this won’t make sense until you understand the whole. You got that?” he warned me.

“Yes,” I expressed with forced patience.

“Cool. Okay, this top bit is fairly straightforward. You’ve got your species Frostbinder Acheronian. You’ll note it’s tier five, that’s good. Humans are a first-tier species, and you get more bonuses the higher the tier. Your level, which is one, obviously as you are just starting. Your Class, Dungeon Corsair Captain. This is why you are so epic Torin. Dungeon Corsair Captain is a K-grade class. The classes start at Z-grade and most people live their entire lives and don’t get access to one higher than S or T-grade,” he said.

I pointed at the screen. “What does the notorious citation mean?”

He slapped my hand down. “No questions, remember,” he snapped.

“Next we have your stats. They are split into three broad categories, Physical, Mental, and Social. There are six stats in each category, they have various functions which you’ll have time to learn more about later, but it should all be fairly obvious to anybody who has played an RPG. The numbers in parentheses are your base numbers. The percentile bonuses are provided by your Frostbinder Acheronian traits. You wouldn’t have any of them if you remained human, you get how that works for you right, higher is always better. You have a well-rounded base of statistics with your Social category being particularly strong.”

He flicked his fingers and the screen shifted to the next section.

Hit Points	410	Health		18.2		Mana Pool		121
Unused XP	0	XP to next Level		68,000		Lifetime XP gained		0
Armour Slots	7	Weapon Slots		3		Item Slots		5
Upgrade Points		Spec	0	Class	0	Hrm	0	Path	0
Framework Currency		PP	0	GP	2	SP	50	CP	50
Notoriety	100 (Current XP multiplier is x1)

 

 “Here you have your Hit Points, Health and Mana Pool, all good scores for level 1. Your Hit Points especially. Then you have the line for your experience. You know how that works right? Yes, before you ask, sixty-eight thousand is a fucking huge amount for each level but that’s the downside of high-grade classes, you need more XP to level them. The extra development with each level more than makes up for it,” he said.

I listened intently to him trying to absorb it all. Some of what he said earlier gave me the impression this audience wouldn’t last much longer. As I looked at the screen, memories of Fred’s explanation of Darkwyrlds characters gradually resurfaced.

I recalled there was a difference between Hit Points and your Health. Hit Points were like magical vitality and you would lose them first, but they regenerated quickly out of combat. Health was actual damage to your body and had to heal naturally and could only be accelerated by high-level spells or potions. Simply put, you wanted to avoid losing Health at all costs.

“Up next are the slots you have for gear. You can wear more if you like but only those occupying a slot will have any mana infused extras working. Pro-tip, if it ain’t mana infused it’s almost fucking useless. The mobs that spawn are made from the magical energy the Framework is absorbing so that it doesn’t kill you all. Their claws will cut through Kevlar like its cotton. Some gear requires more slots than others, but you already have more slots than most starters,” he reminded me.

Okay, I remembered that about gear too. Yeah, there were four armour categories. Cloth, Leather, Mail and Plate. Cloth used one slot, Leather two, Mail three, and Plate four. I remembered Fred telling me casters could wear Plate if they wanted, they just wouldn’t be able to wear much before it stopped being effective.

“Then you have upgrade points. This is for changing species or class etc. You probably won’t need to worry about this for several months, if you live that long,” he laughed at his own morbid joke.

“Tough crowd,” he continued. “Next, currency. Pretty standard setup there is 100 copper to a silver etc. You can see we have given everyone a little spending money to begin with. Without electricity there are no more servers and any wealth or debt you had recorded electronically is gone. They might get the servers working with mana in a few years but by then it won’t matter. Then you have your Notoriety metre a feature of having a notorious class. Acts of infamy will increase your notoriety and give you a bonus on collected XP. Acts of virtue will reduce your notoriety and if it drops below one hundred you will be penalised with XP reductions.”

He turned and looked at me.

“Torin, this part is important, as those on the Dungeon Corsair class tree lose notoriety weekly if they don’t engage in acts of piracy. The longer they go without committing such an act, the more rapid the drop. That means you need a ship, and you need to get one quick, or your notoriety will hit zero in a few weeks and you’ll be permanently stuck at level one. You will literally be a sitting duck, and nobody wants to be a fucked duck. I mean, I don’t think many people want to be a duck fucker either, but you definitely don’t want to be the duck,” he japed.

“Maybe I didn’t make it clear, but I don’t want this, send me to the regular admissions,” I argued, trying to reason with him.

“Like I said, it’s already done and there are no redo’s, not for you. There is plenty more to see,” he added and waved his hand again.

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