Chapter 1: Chapter 1 The Leveling, Part 1

This story is told from the point of view of the elfesses of wagon one, but mostly from Tira and Etherstaria's prospective.  Everything is determined by dice rolls, although the system will happen in the background for the most part. I will likely respond to most posts. I hope you enjoy the story![/author]

Chapter 1

The Leveling, Part 1

Tira, the heroic Sword Maiden, awoke in her master's bed. It was time to turn the page on a phase of her life. She would miss him after a fashion, even though she was only with Lord Lark as part of a greater destiny. The great oracle speaks, and his maidens obey. She was terrified to have a new mistress. Etherstaria, Lord Lark's daughter, needed her more than her father did. The daughter of a low leveled Scholar, but born under the sign of the Twisting Star, the evening or dawn of a new phase in civilization. She couldn't afford to fail. She would slaughter everything in her way. She would use everything she had for her new mistress—her sword, her sexual appeal, whatever it took!

She extended her hand to her soon-to-be ex-lover, feeling his exulted flesh one last time. Sighing, she showered, got up, got dressed, and started packing the bug-out bags for two of the young elfesses that would be under her care. The new scholar's bag was particularly heavy and expensive. It was the books, of course. She wasn't in charge of the low tier commoner's pack for Alliasaz. She would have to have a servant bring the pack, as she couldn't even pick it up. Not because it was too heavy, but because she couldn't equip low tier commoner items. The system protected kids and innocents. They would provide you with neither experience nor possessions.You couldn't even touch them through their clothing, let alone remove it. Even eating their flesh would not abate your hunger.

It was system day, and it was going to bring as many changes to her as it had to all the other young people who had the misfortune of having this as their system day. Only heroic elves would be spared; it did not matter what their parents thought. This was the Oracle, who sent them off on their journey to being recognized as adults. Non-heroes could not refuse unless they wanted death instead.

Etherstaria Lark, although she normally went by Star, was dreaming. Tomorrow, she would finally meet the system! She would get to see what fate awaited her at the temple! She had waited her entire one hundred and twenty-one years for this moment! Well, not exactly, but still, this was going to be amazing! Would she have more faith powers or arcane powers? Maybe she would even have blended powers, since her body contains both and her class is one of those exotic types like her father!

The Lark family was known for its arcane powers! Zap, zap, she was going to be an air mage and shoot lightning bolts at her foes! It was so exciting that she struggled to get to revelry. Her open blue eyes danced in her head, quickly shifting from one memory to the next about all of her friends getting their classes. Some of them were failures and had been commoners! That won’t happen to me though; I overheard one of the oracles talking about me when I sneaked up after the reading and said that I was going to meet the system next year after my yearly check. It was something about having a strong destiny!

"Star! "You had better get up, or hero or not, you are going to get spanked for being late for the most important day of your life!" screamed Star’s mother, Skayla.

Star jumped up startled out of her revelry, but her body got caught in the bed sheet and she fell in a tangled heap by the side of her bed, so it was sort of a jump that just didn’t go very far. Hopefully, getting out of bed on the wrong side and onto the floor was not an indication of how this was going to go!

"Mother, what if I had injured myself?" screamed Star.

A gentle sputtering laugh leaked out of Skayla Lark as she regarded her daughter, who was trying and failing to extract herself from her bedding. Quite the little heroine, indeed! "Oh, Star, I am so worried for you. You have to understand that only 10 percent of elves are born to be heroes," said Skayla. "I won’t stop loving you even if you are from the lower class. Even if the temple sends you far, far away, I will always answer your call if you need me," said Skaya, as Star finally unwound herself.

“Lets go get you all dolled up!” said Skayla. Suddenly she noticed the change in her daughter. She always had the pre system day look of elven children, but now she was different! Her hair had turned the Lark adult golden yellow shade, and her body had changed as well, she was... gorgeous! “Not that you need it now I guess”, Skayla jealously whispered to herself .

Star stepped into her warmed shower, an elf invention that was paid for by the Lark clan, it was shared with even clan commoner elves like herself, who had a child with one of their heroes. She had changed overnight?  She no longer had the body of a child, it was startling, bumps of a woman had grown on her chest, and hair was growing in places that had none before.  She had been a child for over 121 years!  She wanted this as much as the next child, but it was disorienting. She stepped out of the shower and sat down on a chair. Skyla started drying Star's new hair. It was soft and fluffy, and it was very easy to comb. Since when had her tomboy daughter had such amazing hair? It seemed to flow into whatever hairstyle she tried, each one looking prettier than the last. She decided on a fancy long braid behind her daughter's head, turning it into a fairy tale princess style. Her daughter smelled like fresh strawberries today, and she knew it wasn’t from the bath. The luxury of the shower did not extend to expensive soaps. What was going on? Wait, her ears had never been this long before!

"Mother! "Don’t play with my ears like that!" said Star. "For some reason, they seem sensitive today."

"Today, and every other day," whispered Skayla to her daughter.

"Alright, all done, Star. Let's put you in your ceremonial robes, and a clan member will escort you to the temple."

"Pff, clan member, you just mean my father, Samand," said Star.

"Be careful, my daughter; right now you are still just a little elfess with pretty hair. Don’t upset your father, as you have a high chance of being a commoner. He will be very upset if that is the case; he is under a lot of stress right now, so don’t antagonize the elf that can break you in half with a couple of fingers. He is so very strong, so strong," sighed Skyla, wondering once again what she had done to be born a mid tier common scholar, all brains and no brawn or magic.

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There was a knock on the door, and Star finished the last rope on her ceremonial robes just in time! She hurried to the door and opened it.

"Daddy!" grinned Star, looking at her fully armored father with his magical black blade at his side. He was of an exotic class, having equal amounts of faith and arcane magic, a mystical swordsman type that could funnel magic into his intelligent blade, Crystaldark. "I mean, hello, clansman, and you too, Crystaldark. I present myself for judgment by the system and to see if I qualify, as this is my system day."

Samand, looking at his daughter, thought, This is definitely looking good; she is obviously gaining statistics! Maybe this time he would have better luck, as he had only had common children so far. Surely Star would not break his heart again! "Let us go, for today you will become an adult. You will be judged by the system, and then an oracle will perform a reading, no matter your station. His judgment is final, so be prepared to leave the shield if that is needed. Bring your luggage with you and say goodbye to your mother in case you never see her again," replied Samand.

"Wait! "Never see her again?" wailed Star.

"Indeed, there has been a group forming recently by the oracles to go to the New Kingdom of Mankind called Starwick, to their academy. If you are a commoner, it is likely you will be headed there as well," said Samand.

"Oh, daughter," cried Skyla. "Humans are scary! If you have to leave the shield, some human monster will extinguish my poor little star."

"More likely a monster or mob," corrected Samand. "Humans don’t harm elves that often."

"No, my baby!" sobbed Skyla, holding her daughter.

"Mom, you are embarrassing me!" said Star as she hugged her mom, perhaps for the last time.

Star went up to get her bug-out pack, which every elf child had in case it was needed due to a dragon attack, clan war, or something else. She was sure she had packed almost everything. She grabbed a few more things she might need, including her doll, as she could not bear to lose Elfina! As long as she had her doll, she could be brave! Right, and a pillow to cry into sounded like a good idea too. In fact, she should try this one out and see if it would make a good one. She also brought a towel; she had heard somewhere that they were quite useful on a journey.

Her somewhat red eyes marring her beauty, Star hugged her mom once more and set out with her father, with her hair ornaments jingling, to the temple to face her destiny.

There were about twenty elven children in her year waiting around. Only a few had their packs, and the ones that didn’t looked at the children with packs with alarm. There were a lot of cries from the children who weren't tipped off by their clan as they didn’t have a heroic parent, presumably. Maybe the packs were only given to children that had a better chance to become heroes? She looked at the elves around her and noticed a lot of them looked pretty dull. A high level of charisma was not a common statistic after all. It was a throwaway statistic in most people's builds. Good looks wouldn’t stop a monster from eating you; in fact, it would do the opposite. She had heard stories that dragons would often pick out a comely elfess and fly off with her, and that was that. She was going to be eaten, wasn’t she?

Her inner panic made the oracle call her name more than once before she realized that Etherstaria was actually her name. Slowly, she climbed the 100 steps to the oracle and the screen that would decide her fate! Everyone looked on, mostly thinking how presumptuous she was. Etherstaria was sure. with her pack and fancy clothes and hair and everything. They were just waiting for her to fail so they could laugh at her.

She was going to fail! She knew it in her heart. There is no way she could be one of the elite, one of the chosen. Then she was there. At least she had not fallen down the stairs or something.

"Etherstaria, of clan Lark, just look at the screen and say Status, and your fate in this lifetime will be revealed!" said the oracle, as he gently smiled at her.

"Status!" said Star.

A screen appeared before her and scrolled as she read it.

Your starting statistics are as follows:

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