Chapter 6: Book 1: Chapter 4 (Part 1 of 2)

I lifted my arms up to placate the panicked man in front of me. I noticed straight away that even though my skin colour remained the same as it had been before, my arms had a series of ice-blue rippled bands that traced up both arms. I would check that out later, but right now I was more concerned about getting Victor to shut up.

“Hey Vic, I’m not a monster. I was changed by whatever it was we all just went through,” I implored, in a calm and reasonable tone of voice.

The kind of voice you’d use with a vicious looking stray dog that was growling at you menacingly. I was wasting my breath as Victor wasn’t paying attention to me. He turned to Shana instead and squealed.

“Quick girl, give me your gun. Quickly now, I know you have one,” he demanded.

Shana looked from me to her stepfather, her expression was pure confusion, and she didn’t respond immediately to Victor’s urging. That was promising.

“Whoa there, Victor. There is no need to start pulling out a gun. We can talk this out buddy,” I beseeched and took a few steps towards him at the doorway.

This proved to be a mistake. No longer waiting for Shana to respond he grabbed her handbag and pulled at it roughly. The straps on the bag tore at the rough treatment and the bag came away from Shana’s shoulder. She had been resisting Victor’s grappling and fell backwards to the ground as the handbag came loose.

Victor, not giving a shit about his stepdaughter, crowed with delight that he had her bag.

I had arrested my forward motion when Victor started acting out and hoped that would defuse the situation, but now I shifted back into action. I didn’t want him to get that gun out of the bag.

But I wasn’t quick enough. As I crossed the room he reached into the handbag and pulled out a small gun a moment before I reached him. Being raised in England, I wasn’t a gun guy, but I knew enough to recognise it as a revolver. He brandished the gun in front of me and pointed it at my chest.

“Back!” he yelled. “Get back you fucker or I’ll shoot.”

I put my hands up again and backed up several steps.

“Okay, Victor. I’m backing up. Now, why don’t you lower that gun? You don’t want to shoot someone by accident,” I advised, my voice tightening with a tinge of fear.

I’d been in a fair few tight spots in my life, a couple of them even potentially life-threatening, but I had avoided having a firearm pointed at me up until this point.

“No, I wouldn’t want to shoot someone by accident,” Victor proclaimed, then his eyes narrowed, and his lips twitched upwards in a malicious smirk.

He raised the revolver and cocked the hammer. I tried to yell no, but as I did, time slowed down to a crawl and I found myself, Victor, and Shana frozen.

<Greetings, Torin. I am Quixbix your quest imp. I thought now might be an opportune moment to introduce myself> an unexpected voice remarked in my head.

It didn’t seem like an opportune moment to me.

<Nothing to say? Ah, the Framework did tell me you might not be familiar with imp interactivity. We are currently in Action mode. You won’t be able to speak verbally or move, but if you think about what you want to say I will ‘hear’ you> he advised.

“Okay, is this working?” I thought.

<Yes, Torin, it is. I must say I am very excited to have a new owner and one assigned on merit no less. I was purchased for my last five owners. Rich parents, wanting the best for their offspring. Understandable, I suppose. Sadly, though my owners may have been wealthy this didn’t stop them from being weaklings or wastrels unworthy of my efforts. I have high hopes for our collaboration, we’re going to do great things together, I know it> he avowed.

“Alright, it’s nice to meet you too as well.” I agreed.

This was another bizarre moment that compounded with all the other sanity shaking ones I’d experienced in such a short span of time.

“Quixbix, right? Did you just stop time?” I inquired.

If he had that would be a very impressive feat.

<No, Torin. I am bonded with you at a molecular level. It’s all very complicated, but the gist of it is I can amplify the speed of our mental communication to such a degree that it appears as if time has stopped. This allows us to converse and for me to hand out quests in the heat of the moment. And for you to review those quests at a somewhat leisurely pace. Well within reason, holding you in this state for too long would give you severe brain damage. Don’t worry, though. The Framework literally won’t let me hold you in this state if it would harm you. Typically, my owners get about fifteen minutes before we need to drop back into real-time> he informed me.

“That makes sense. Is that why you are talking to me? To give me a quest?” I asked.

<It is indeed, Torin. There is no time like the present. We will have to work fast to turn you into the greatest Dungeon Corsair Captain to ply the waves. One who is renowned and feared across the galaxy. Spoken of in hushed whispers in every bar, dive, and den of iniquity to grace the Darkwyrlds> he pronounced excitedly.

Although I was impressed with his enthusiasm and getting a quest sounded pretty cool in the circumstances, I couldn’t help but be a little disturbed by his closing remarks. I didn’t have time to think it over as the quest prompt appeared and filled my vision.

Who’s the Boss? (X*)

You have been threatened by another group. You need to assert your authority and show them you are the boss.

Success: Defeat the party of Victor Guberschmidt and Shana Colton by any means necessary.

Rewards: 300 XP and +1 notoriety.

Failure: -1 notoriety and likely death.

The quest was a simple one and the reward seemed a bit underwhelming. Three hundred XP when I needed sixty-eight thousand to level up felt like a drop in the ocean. It didn’t help that the success descriptor was a little vague.

<I’m getting you started with a nice easy one> Quixbix advised.

“Thanks, I suppose. Quixbix what does the asterisk stand for? And what constitutes defeating the party?” I asked.

<The asterisk means this is a repeatable quest. I can give it to you again if you are challenged by another group. The ranking is determined by the strength of the opposition. Defeating the party is fairly obvious isn’t it, you need to kill them> he laughed.

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“Hold on there, kill? That sounds a bit drastic and very illegal,” I warned.

I wasn’t happy with the direction of the conversation at all.

<I’m not sure I understand. You’re a corsair, Torin, breaking laws is what you do> he said, confused.

I sensed, rather than heard, a note of suspicion in Quixbix’s tone. I waited a moment before answering him and internally reviewed what I had learned about the Framework and the imp, as little as that may be. There was still so much I didn’t know about how the world had changed, but any lingering doubts or hopes this was all some drug-fuelled delusion was well and truly gone. This was too real. If I got this wrong, I could be up shit creek without a paddle.

The Framework seemed geared towards violence and rule by the strong. The class I had been given rewarded me for less than ethical actions and would accelerate my progress the more I indulged in darker deeds. Quixbix himself in the very short time we had been conversing had displayed some rather bloodthirsty traits and denigrated previous owners as weak.

From what Dean told me the only way we could be split apart was on my death. My epiphany in that moment was that Quixbix could be a great asset for my survival, but only if he believed I was on the path to be the kind of Corsair he expected. That left the vital question of what could Quixbix do to hasten my demise if he decided I was just another weakling who was wasting his time. I had spoken earlier in haste but had the distinct feeling I needed to keep the little fella in my head happy.

I bullshitted, and hoped it would cover for my earlier lapse.

 “What I mean is there might be times where I need to exercise restraint to further my other nefarious machinations,” I quibbled.

<Thinking about the long game, I get you. Hmmm, I suppose knocking them unconscious or capturing them would meet the requirements too but killing them is far more efficient if you ask me> he remarked.

“Thank you for the information, Quixbix. I will take it under advisement,” I hedged.

Having read the quest prompt, I dismissed it and returned to the scene in front of me. It was a bit odd as I couldn’t physically move my eyes but could still focus on anything currently in my view, which included the smirking Victor and his distressed stepdaughter Shana.

<It’s what I’m here for> Quixbix replied. <One last tidbit of advice, I see that you have an analyse ability. You can use that while in this slowed state. I can also process your combat notifications, so you can read and understand them during the fight without being distracted> he offered.

“Thanks, Quixbix,” I responded.

Processing notifications during the action could be invaluable. It would keep me informed of what was happening. I’d played enough video games to know the people who played seriously downloaded addon’s and set up macros to better handle that side of things. Quixbix seemed to function in that manner. Then I decided to try out this Analyse ability before real-time restarted.

I focused on Victor and my Analyse ability kicked in when I thought about it.

Victor Guberschmidt (Human)
Tax Collector (W) 1
Potential: Low	Value: Very Low
Threat: Low	40 XP

 

Shana Colton (Human)
Civilian (Z) 1
Potential: High	Value: Very Low
Threat: Very Low	10 XP

 

I learned some basic information about them both. As I read the details, I thought about what it meant and was pinged by the equivalent of Framework tooltips.

Potential: An assessment of a candidate’s suitability for Soul Binding. The better the rating the more useful a candidate would prove to the Binder.

Value: The value of the loot a target will drop when slain.

Threat: The relative danger the target poses to you or your party.

XP: The experience a party gains for killing this target.

<Neither of them has combat classes, this should be a breeze. Talk to you in a minute once you polish these two off> Quixbix said.

I tried to tell him to stop but time sped up as I exited Action mode.

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