Chapter 1: Ch 1- Blacksmith Apprentice

I blinked awake, the warm sun on my face. It was the horrible smell of wet dog that woke me up. Like when you forgot that the dog went in the backyard in the summer, only to come in with a stink about him. I looked down and saw the smell's source: an exploded dog creature next to me. I looked around at my new surroundings. This new place I found myself in was nothing like I had ever seen before. Trees were huge and densely populated, with colorful bushes and flowers dotting the ground. It smelled damp, like it had just rained. And man, it was hot. To my left, a plant started creeping up my leg. I swatted it away quickly, where it hissed and receded.

[WELCOME TO PRIXA. WE HOPE YOU ENJOYED YOUR TRAVEL THROUGH THE OUTER PLANES. WE HAVE COMPLETED OUR SCAN AND WILL BEGIN THE CLASS ASSIGNMENT PROCESS. PLEASE WAIT]

The voice was loud in my head. A female voice. "Umm, hello?" I said to nobody.

[PLEASE WAIT]

A loud, bitchy female voice. I waited patiently. Moments passed. I didn't remember how I got here, or what the voice was talking about. What travel? And what was an outer plane? The last thing I remembered was being in engineering class making a robotic arm to pretend to paint a wood block as part of a make-believe assembly line. The voice spoke again in my head.

[IT HAS BEEN DETERMINED THAT YOU POSSESS THE ABILITY TO USE MAGIC IN OUR WORLD. A NEW CLASS WAS ASSIGNED. YOUR HIGHEST ATTRIBUTE IS *INTELLIGENCE*, AND YOU WERE AWARDED THE *BLACKSMITH APPRENTICE* CLASS.]

Thanks for the compliment, Prixa! I had always been the smartest guy in the room, almost to a fault. People in my engineering class hated how little I needed to study in order to pass a test, or how creative my builds came out. I could make anything to solve any problem. My future was certainly to work for some corporate giant and patent my way to glory. Out here, though, it appeared I would have to just try not to die, then figure things out later.

A burning startled me, causing me to look down at my arm. Tattoos dotted my skin with various symbols and numbers. A red 15 and a blue 10 were visible.

[PLEASE CHOOSE YOUR NAME AND OUTFIT]

I looked down at the options. Prixa must have studied the history of humans, I thought chuckling to myself, as I explored my options: a toga, a loin cloth, or overalls. "I will choose the overalls. My name is Noah."

My arm changed, putting 'Noah' at the top of the tattoo. My arm looked like a simpler version of a character sheet from the video games I played back home. So red was health and blue was mana? Was this world again tapping into my experience as a human on Earth? I examined my tattoos more closely.

[NOAH]

[LV 1- BLACKSMITH APPRENTICE]

[15]

[10]

The overalls replaced what I wore to school - just simple brown ones with no shirt. A shirt would have been nice. I heard a screeching cawww sound and looked up. Three giant raven-looking birds had gathered on the tree branches. They had much bigger beaks than birds I had ever seen and red eyes. They looked at each other, and with a louder cawww, one dove at me.

I glanced frantically around. The dog monster was gone- all that was left was a massive fang. I grabbed it and dove to the side just in time for the raven-hawk creature to miss me by an inch. Then it was like the fang wanted to turn into a dagger in my mind. I focused on letting the fang choose its shape, and suddenly my hand held a six-inch long white dagger. Works for me!

The crow had retreated to the tree, and another swooped down at me. I swung at it and missed, only to have the creature leave a long gouge down the side of my arm. I turned and took off running through the jungle, batting plants out of the way. Another cawww and a bird swooped at my back, leaving another gouge. Even if I had a shirt, it would have been torn to shreds.

Just ahead, a clearing opened up. I continued sprinting, my huge frame lumbering down the path. I kept my eye on the gap in the enormous trees, ignoring the sound of huge fluttering wings. I stumbled on a fallen log, frantically maintaining my balance. I ran further, branches and leaves whipping me in the face.

When I got near the opening in the jungle, I glanced around but saw no other bird monsters. I stopped, standing there panting with my hands on my head, desperately trying to get my breath back. What the hell were those things? As I dusted my new pants off, I saw a change in my arm. A symbol of an anvil had imprinted itself right below my mana reading, which had decreased to [5/10]. My red number, again assuming health, had gone down as well to [11/15], most likely from the bird attack. A new symbol of an anvil had appeared.

[YOU HAVE UNLOCKED THE *CREATE* SKILL]

I jumped, forgetting a voice would announce things in my head. Create, huh? That sounded exciting, and right up my alley. So the fang wanted to be changed into a dagger? What else could I make? I picked up a random stick on the ground but felt no pull to make anything with it. Well, it must only work for some things here, then. Was the dog monster a living thing, and therefore the fang could be changed?

I continued standing in the clearing wheezing. I was an overweight 20-year-old from New York, not some kind of action hero. I was 6-foot tall and 235 pounds with a long, scraggly beard and short curly hair. Running away from huge raven-hawks was not in my skill set. Where was I anyway? How did I even get here? I barely remembered much. I certainly didn't remember how the dog creature had been destroyed. I appreciated the fang and dagger, though.

I finally took a chance to look around. What I saw was astonishing.

The planet had three moons, one of which was enormous. Two were smaller and looked like a star that you could see during the day. The dense jungle opened up to fields with giant drooping trees everywhere. Between the trees were fields of some kind of red plant that grew about 15 feet high. And in the fields were some humans working. They looked filthy and tired with long, sad faces.

Behind the farms was a large wall made out of a blackish stone hiding a colossal tower made entirely of wood. It had one giant base and branched off in various directions to form buildings and tunnels. It reminded me of an intricate cat tower. Coming out of the gate was a feline creature walking on two legs. It had orange stripes and wore gleaming silver armor across its face and arms. Well, that explains the cat castle.

"Slave! Why are you not working? Get back to work before we have to get the whips!" the large cat yelled at me. I looked wildly around at the other human faces, of whom all looked down away from my gaze. The other humans wore similar outfits to mine, some choosing the toga style and others choosing the overalls. No one chose the loin cloth. Damn voice. Would have made me look like a complete idiot if I picked a loin cloth.

“I…sorry, I…” I stammered.

A boy ran out of the gates. He looked to be about 15 years old. He had tan skin and wore simple pants and a vest. "There you are! Sorry, sir, he is coming back from ingredient duty. He replaced our fallen adventurer for Romas" He winked at me behind the cat's back.

"Uh, right. Ingredients." I said, playing along.

"Alright." the cat said, looking down at me with a scowl. "Take your findings to the smithy then. Can't have you sitting around on the ground out here, now can I? Romas will have my head."

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I looked at the boy, who came over and grabbed my hand, pulling me up. "Thank you, sir. We will be going now." With that, we walked through the gate and into the settlement.

"Keep your head down and follow me." the boy whispered, then scurried ahead, dodging through the busy cat-filled streets. Large, fat cats held wares and trinkets at the various merchant stalls. One even had a plant that resembled catnip. Another was sitting on a platform, meowing to music. I bumped into a cat while I was looking around. "Hey, watch it, slave!"

Bright plant life was everywhere, dotting the sandy walkway. Walking around on dirt while an entire structure seemingly floated above me was strange. The base of the tower was enormous, probably 100 feet around. And the way the arms of the building jutted out made it look like a giant tree. The material of the tower was rough and irregular, which must have been so that cats could grab hold and climb it. As I walked, cats jumped vertically to climb various levels or onto flat transition pieces to change buildings.

At the base of the tower was a ramp, seemingly for humans to use. I followed the boy to the ramp and began passing people as they came and went. Many of the humans carried things like serving trays, objects, and even kittens. Inside the gates, humans wore bright outfits with varying colors. Various work types maybe? I thought.

I kept a brisk pace to keep up with the boy, out of breath once more. It appeared that everyone who lived here was extremely in shape. We finally made it to the top of the ramp, the boy looking back with a disappointed look on his face, but he didn't say anything about my subpar endurance. At the top of the ramp, the paths were made of a beautiful red-streaked stone I had never seen. There were even more trees with various flowers and fruits. Water fountains dotted the level as cats bent over and drank from them during their passing. It was strange to see 6-foot-tall walking tigers and jaguars bent over and drinking from a fountain like their feline counterparts on Earth.

We kept walking through the streets, making a few turns down alleys. Finally, he ducked into a dimly lit building. It looked like a warehouse mixed with a pawn shop. Various weapons hung from shelves, armor glistened on dummies and racks, and jewelry was displayed in cases upon cases.

"Who do we have here, Jasper?" a cat asked from the darkness with a sneer.

"Good day to you, sir. I've found Kepler's replacement. He was the best candidate in the bunch. The other slaves were not as lively as this one."

"The best candidate? Boy, this human is fat and looks out of shape. He's sweating just standing there. How is it possible that he was the best candidate?"

"He..." the boy stammered.

"Ah. Well, come in, come in. No going back now. There's work to do, slave. What do I call you?"

"Noah, sir," I replied, a bit tentatively.

"Fine." the large cat said gruffly. "Begin your cleaning duties immediately. We have our merchant's auction this evening, and many chores are left." Without another word, he left the room.

I looked at Jasper in disbelief. Seriously? Chores?

"Here. Put this on," Jasper said as he handed me a shirt. It had the same anvil logo as my arm did. I complied. "I'm Jasper, as you heard. Pleased to meet you. Who the hell are you?"

"I'm Noah. I don't know exactly how I got here. A voice told me that I was traveling on some plane, and then they picked a blacksmith class for me, and now I'm here. What class do you have?"

Jasper raised his eyebrows almost comically high. "What do you mean by voice? And a class?"

"Yeah," I replied slowly. "Doesn't everyone pick a class? I figured this was some magical world where people all had magic powers or something."

Jasper looked at me like I was crazy. "Only the Feka get classes. And that's only the magical ones. Humans don't get magic. We work for the masters. Servers, litter cleaners, farmers, we even raise their kittens for them if the females go to battle another colony. Sometimes the strongest humans get ingredient duty, but that's it." Jasper sighed. "That's what happened to the guy you're replacing. He never made it back from the jungle." I could see that. After being attacked by bird monsters and surrounded by giant cats, surviving here wouldn't be easy.

"Feka?" I asked. That was a lot to digest.

"Yeah. That's what the masters are called. It's their race. They get classes of either a dexterity-based skillset or a stealth-based skillset. You can tell which ones have it and how high of a level they are from their fur."

"How?" I replied.

"Well, the Feka that come in for daggers and cloaks usually have stripes. And the ones that fight have the spots. The more spots and stripes, the more kills or levels they have. It's pretty easy to tell." Jasper explained.

"The…Feka, who owns the blacksmith. He didn't have stripes or spots, he was all black. What's that all about?"

Jasper nodded his head. "He's different. He's a creator. Creators are very rare. They make all of the items for warriors to use. You have to have a high intelligence for that. Ronas is super smart, and it gets him in trouble."

"And ingredients?" I asked. "What's that mean? Why was I on ingredient duty?"

Jasper eyed me suspiciously. "You really aren't from here, are you? The ingredients are what remain after a kill. We use those ingredients to make items. Sometimes you can get things that grow, like the bow trees where you came in. We usually pick plants or go to the mines to get ore from the nearby cave when we go out. Romas hires adventurers to kill things he needs to make better equipment."

That made sense. So I was right; the fang remained after the dog creature died. Apparently, that was called an ingredient.

We heard a loud clang at the front of the blacksmith, followed by yelling. "I better get to cleaning. You should too, Noah. Let's meet up tonight after the event. I want to hear more about your mysterious past."

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