Chapter 3

Unscheming Schemes

Leaving Jay, Hannah ran through the ancient forest, her speed close to ten times as quick as when she had traveled with him; it felt like she was flying through the air. The enormous trees and hill-like roots were perfect for her to train her Fluid Movement Skill. She did her best to just barely touch branches, trunks and roots as propelled herself. As she ran, she vaulted and spun through the air, trying to create a flow in her movement that increased her speed to its maximum; then she tried to go faster. It was something she had come to enjoy almost too much. And every time she did some especially difficult movement she would get a few hundred Experience Points.

The most difficult part of moving quickly was to always keep her eyes from getting overwhelmed. She had to focus deeply and watch the places she was going to place a clawed hand or padded foot to both increase her speed and go in the right direction. Moving her eyes to compensate for her top speed always took a little while for her to get used to, but incrementally it became something instinctual, letting her relax more and more the longer she ran. She wondered where she could get that rope-spell Jay had used to sling from tree to tree; that looked like so much fun.

In less than an hour she was close to Garam's Gorge. She stopped outside the perimeter where forest met the sparse yellow plains of grass spanning a few hundred meters before the town's wall. It was a good place to stop and she decided to take a rest before going back into town. Leaning with her back against a tree, resting, she took out a dark green apple from her Inventory and bit into it; its luscious flavor and slightly sweet, yet tart, taste was beyond belief, she had never eaten anything like it in the real world. She almost couldn't believe anything could taste like this in the real world. Sure, her mother had talked about apples and other fruits, about how they were available to buy at feast-days during her youth, but Hannah had never eaten any. Just being able to eat so many different things, and have them taste just like she imagined they might do in the real world made this game worth its cost.

Suddenly, she got an idea to try doing something a little bit more extreme; it was time to try something she hadn't done before to gain Experience with her Fluid Movement. Tossing the apple's core behind her back, she sprang forward on all fours, then flipped her legs up in the air and started doing cart-wheels across the plains, going faster and faster with every orbit, her hands and paws springing off the ground with en ever increasing pace. In moments her head was flashing through the air so quickly that her vision started to blur, but she did her best to focus her eyes on the wall that was closing in and soon her eyes started to adjust. Ping!

Perception has increased by 1. Through constantly exhausting your eyes you have gained one point of Perception.

That was great; every time her Perception increased the world grew slightly clearer, as if everything was just a bit more real than before. It was marvelous. One of the things she most enjoyed in her feline body was her incredibly enhanced vision. When she focused her vision on something she could see it with extraordinary focus, anything within ten meters could be seen as if she held the thing in her hand. And even during the night it never truly grew dark for her. Truly incredible.

She closed in on the wall with a rotating speed she had never accomplished before, and when she was a few meters away from the wall she pushed off the ground with her feet, using Flash Step to bolster her legs, forcing them to increase in power. Turning in the air, she flew over the wall, flying much higher than she had thought she would. Soon the ground was almost twenty meters below her and she was growing a bit scared; even with her nimble body, it would be difficult to diffuse all the fall damage from this jump. Fortunately, she flew ever further than she had thought too, and just as she was beginning to drop from the sky she saw roof-tiles beneath her. Moments later she was skidding across the roof-tiles, cracking some, displacing others while she rolled over a few times on the clay tiles, finishing her extreme jump with gracefully standing up and making a slight pose, her arms in the air triumphantly.

For jumping more than twenty meters into the air you have earned 5000 Experience Points

For completing a great continuous Fluid Movement you have earned 13891 Experience Points

You have advanced to Level 71

Yes! Finally another Level, she screamed for joy, but only in her head.

Alignment has decreased by 4 (potential) points You have destroyed roof-tiles that do not belong to you. If someone notices that you have done this you will lose 4 Alignment. 30 minutes until you are free of suspicion. If you leave the area before someone sees that you have destroyed the roof-tiles you will be free of suspicion and not lose any Alignment Points.

Damn it, she thought. There was only one way to fix this. She walked to the edge of the roof and looked down from the two-story building. There, a slightly open window. Reaching down beneath the roof's outcrop, she found a wooden beam and clamped her claws into it then lowered her body down to hang from her arms. With a swing of her body she released her grip and closed in on the window, grabbing hold of the wooden window-sill as she was falling past it. Easing her body's fall against the wall, she pulled herself up and pushed up the slightly open wooden panel with one hand as her other hand flung her body into the room, going down to a crouch.

The room was small and had little furnishing. One side of the room was covered with a well-made, but worn, cot with a blanket and a pillow that looked to be filled with straw. On the other side of the room was a chair and a little table with a washbasin on top. There was also a small mirror on the wall by the washbasin. Right before her was the door to the outside.

Too bad this isn't the building-owner's place, she thought as she walked two steps and opened the door, going out into a dimly lit corridor. She had to find wherever whoever owned this place was, it was the easiest way to repent for her destroying property. She had learned this lesson well in the Tribe she started in; if you destroyed something, admit it and pay for it, then you will instead be rewarded Alignment-points, though not many, it was better than trying to get away and gaining nothing.

She walked to the end of the corridor, passing by a couple of doors on either side, and arrived at a staircase going down. She walked down it until she came to the bottom floor. On the bottom floor there was a small entrance-room with a door to exit the place, a door on her left and a door opposite the exit that had a sign saying 'Building Manager'; she went to that door, knocking on it.

A second later came a male voice from the inside. “Come in!” She opened the door and went inside. The room was larger than the room she had entered up above, but not by much, and it only held a large desk, a chair and a black-haired man sitting there, looking through papers as if he was doing something important. “Yes, what is it?” the man asked without looking up.

“Hello,” Hannah said. “Sorry to say this, but I accidentally destroyed some of the roof-tiles on this building. I want to compensate for that and for the work to replace them.” She had gotten used to how to phrase it for greatest success.

“Ehum,” the man said, looking up, touching the right tip of his black mustache, then raking his hand through his hair, taking his time, as if trying to think of what to say. “Yes, well, that can't be helped, I guess..?” He paused again, but not for long. “Give me a silver and all is forgiven.”

Hannah was a bit startled at the price, she had only had to give copper coins or do some trivial gathering quest in the Tribe when she accidentally climbed the Sacred Tree and broke one of its branches, but now she had only broken a few pieces of hardened clay and she had to pay one silver coin. Ridiculous. “Come on, isn't that a bit too much? I didn't mean it, and I came here directly after this mishap.”

“Doesn't matter,” the man said, looking down, this time as if he was not comfortable meeting her eyes. She squinted at him. Was he trying to cheat her? Was that even possible? He continued, “there are regulations for this sort of thing, and the smallest amount I can accept for breaking our property is one silver coin. Or do you want me to go get the guards?”

Go get the guards? She thought, trying not to show the scorn she felt from being threatened by this NPC. She was already high enough Level that the regular city guards could do nothing to her, and even if the elites came out, she could escape from anyone, but she didn't want to go through any trouble because of this. “No no, that's alright. Here.” She flipped a silver coin through the air.

The coin landed in front of the man and he flinched ever so slightly, but never looked up. “Good, thank you for reporting the damage directly. Now, if you don't mind, leave. I'm very busy.”

Hey, where's my increase in Alignment? She asked herself, almost saying it aloud. This was where she normally got an increase in alignment because of her honesty. Thinking about it, she had never done any damage that she needed to pay for since she got to this Human town, and there might be differences between how Humans and the Beast-people treated her. She had never thought of that, but now that it was blatantly pushed in her face, she couldn't ignore that possibility. But she didn't care, because it didn't matter much. She just had to remember to be more careful and not destroy someone's property in the future. That will be difficult to do, she thought about her own reflections, but couldn't do much about that either, so she stopped thinking about it entirely.

Without saying good bye, Hannah walked out from the little office and faintly heard a sigh as she left.

Standing still in the streets outside, she was at a slight loss as to what to do now. She had to find out things about the Magician's Guild she figured they wouldn't tell an outsider, and she couldn't join the Guild and snoop around because she wasn't a Magician. A thought struck her. The Mercenary Alliance might have some information for sale, and if not, they should at least have a map of the Magician's Guild's compound. From a map she could infer many things, and then sneak in to investigate when night came. Only during the night did she feel confident enough in her hiding-skills to sneak into places that were probably off limit to anyone not of the Magician's Guild.

Even though she couldn't run very fast in the streets, it didn't take long before she was outside one of the four-story tall stone buildings that looked so very much like all the other buildings in this part of town. She immediately opened the small wooden door with an ornate iron sign saying 'Mercenary Alliance'.

Inside was a fairly large room, but there were no chairs or tables. On the walls were lots of different-sized slips of paper and to her right, at the far wall, there was a counter of sorts where a Wolf-man with silvery gray ears and hair stood, his eyes were closed as if ignoring everything happening around him.

Besides the man at the counter there were three people looking at the different slips of paper plastered on the wall, choosing some request made to the Mercenary Alliance; anyone could join the Mercenary Alliance, one didn't even have to be in a Guild, Clan, Sect or Mercenary Band, and even if you were a part some of those, it still didn't matter. Anyone and everyone were welcome here as long as you didn't start trouble with someone inside their buildings. Hannah had thought more people would be here though. In the tribe there were always tens and tens of people inside the Mercenary Alliance building, but here there were only three. Well, it didn't matter much to her, she only wanted to use the Mercenary Alliance's services until nightfall.

Walking up the counter, she saw that the man wasn't old as his hair might indicate. And as she was about to knock on the counter to get his attention the man opened his startlingly clear pale blue eyes. “What can I help you with?” the Wolf-man said, his protruding canines showing a glint as he smiled broadly.

“I need some information,” Hannah said, opening her Inventory and taking out a silver badge with the letters MA on it, showing it to the man, proving that she had done some meritorious deeds for the Mercenary Alliance. “What can you tell me about this branch of the Magician's Guild? And do you have any detailed maps of this town?”

“Can't tell you much about the Magician's Guild. They're a secretive lot,” the Wolf-man said. “But if you really want to know some of their secrets, the price is as steep as the information is rare. Three gold coins and I'll tell you three things about the Magician's Guild in Garam's Gorge that few know about. How about it?”

“Three gold coins?” Hannah had to ask, because she could only think she had heard wrong.

“Yes,” the Wolf-man said, not batting an eye, or changing his expression in any way to indicate he was joking.

“Damn,” she said. “That's too expensive for me. I don't want to know that much. I only thought the Magician's Guild here took up a lot of space and was curious about it.” She had to try and hide her interest even if she had revealed some of it. What if this guy told someone in the Magician's Guild that she was asking questions about them? That wouldn't be good. If the Magician's Guild was on alert when she was going to try and sneak into it to investigate what was below ground, then she would have to be even more careful. That wouldn't do at all. She changed the subject. “How about the map? I want the best you have, with details about prominent buildings and things to do and see in this town. And don't tell me that costs a lot, I know those maps only go for a few silvers.”

“14 silvers for the best map,” the Wolf-man said. “But I need some time to have it copied onto a Memory Crystal for your Map-pad. You'll have it in a few hours, okay?”

“Sure,” Hannah said. That wasn't such a bad thing, she had to wait until evening anyway. “Are there any Access-rooms to rent for Meditation here?” There had been such rooms in the Mercenary Alliance building in her tribe, so she figured there was no reason not to ask. “I want to use it to connect to the Arena.”

“Sure,” the Wolf-man said. “It will be five silvers for one day. And before you try and bargain, there are no discounts, and you have to rent a room for at least a day. After that it's twenty coppers per hour. Alright?” he dangled a pale blue octagonal stone from a loop of thick white string attached to it.

Putting five silver coins on the counter, Hannah said “fine,” taking the octagon, slightly frowning at the high price. In the Tribe these rooms had only cost ten copper coins per hour, and you could rent them for an hour at a time. Could it really be that there were some discrimination against her kind here? She dismissed the thought as it came to her since the man before her was of the Beast-tribes; so, she couldn't really believe that. Maybe it was only a difference in location that made prices be more expensive here.

The Wolf-man did something beneath the counter and the wall to his side swung open. It hadn't looked like a door, but it obviously was. How strange that they hid the door in such a way. Beyond the door there was a stone staircase going down below the building. “Just down the stairs and then take any room that has an open door. The room will forcibly expel you when the time imprinted on the room's key is spent. But if you leave earlier, the time will stop too.”

She hadn't known that; in this case, it was a bit better than she had thought. If she could use the time in parts, then it wasn't such a bad price. “Thanks. Could you come and tell me when my map is finished?”

“Sure,” the Wolf-man said, closing his eyes again.

She walked down the stairs, looking around at its bottom to see a slim corridor with smooth white stone walls, at every meter was an open doorway, except the closest doorway, it was closed with a slab of rock. She went into one of the closer rooms and pushed the octagonal stone to the wall, watching as a slab of stone slid up from the floor, closing her off to the outside.

The room was small enough that she could easily touch all four walls with her hands and feet at the same time, and there were no furnishings at all, only an intricate circular silvery pattern covering most of the floor. She sat down in the middle and closed her eyes, Meditating, and everything turned into an almost blinding white.

Everywhere she looked around there was white, no horizons, no walls or floors. She was just floating in the whiteness. “Join the Arena,” she said to the empty air, and the world seemed to flicker, shifting into a transparent room overlooking thousands upon thousands of circles down below; every circle was an arena where two or more people were fighting for practice or gambling. If she wanted, she could point to one and it would enlarge for her viewing pleasure, but she wasn't here to watch others fight, she wanted to test herself against a worthy opponent. It had been to long since she last fought someone.

“Challenge anyone close to my Level,” she said, inputting the command to send a universal challenge to anyone that wanted to fight.

“Please wait,” a feminine crystalline voice said. “There are no combatants close to your Level available at the moment. Would you like to wait?”

Damnit, she thought; she hadn't thought there wouldn't be anyone here close to her Level. “Decrease all my Stats by 10% and send out a challenge at that Level,” she gave another command, hoping that she wouldn't have to lower her Stats too much. She enjoyed how her body was moving right now and she wanted to become ever better at controlling her ever increasing swiftness and agility. The only way she knew to gain fighting experience without actually risking death was in the Arena, but if there really wasn't anyone close to her Level to fight, she might just need to go and find some more dangerous creature to fight with. And that would take time; time she didn't have.

She didn't have to wait long before the world shifted again, and she was now standing on a gravelly floor with ten thick stone pillars jutting out from the ground to a height of about twenty meters. The pillars were equidistant from each other and stood in a circle around her and her opponent. In front of her, about ten meters away, stood a short man with black eyes; he would at most reach her bellybutton.

The man had fairly nice equipment; a blackened chain-mail adorned his torso above a gray shirt; his hands were covered with dark blue leather gloves with some strange brown thread making a jagged, lightning-like, pattern go up each finger and above the gloves, covering his arms, were wrist-guards of a steely white metal; his shins were covered in metallic leg-guards and his feet had black leather boots, but he didn't have any armor covering his thighs, only some cloth pants of a dark green color; and on his head was a purple leather cap, its color going from dark to pale purple in blotches. In the man's hand was a bow made from some golden wood with a silvery white string. The bow wasn't large, but seemed powerful as it emitted a faint glow. “Want to gamble on the fight?” the man asked, overconfidence spewing out of his mouth.

Hannah smiled slightly, her feline features showing a more feral sight than she might wish with her gleaming white canines tugging at her lower lips. “Sure, how about a best of three, and we bet a gold coin per fight. So, three gold to the winner of the best of three, okay?”

The man looked taken aback for a moment, a slight hesitation showing itself on his face, but he soon nodded. Maybe he didn't think she was any good at fighting from her clearly home-made equipment? He soon got over whatever fear or hesitation he felt. “Fine!”

A hovering orb flew out from somewhere and positioned itself in front of Hannah, an arm's reach away. She took out the octagonal stone, pressing it to the orb, and a light shone. “Three gold coins. Free fight. Best of three,” she said in a clear voice and the orb flashed again in a green light, accepting the wager and form of battle. Then the orb flew over the the short man and he did the same.

When they were both finished and had recorded their wager, the orb flew into the air and the crystalline voice sounded out from everywhere. “Fight starts in 5. 4. 3. 2. 1. Now!”

Hannah used Flash Step and jumped with extreme haste through the air toward a stone pillar. Haste. Lacerating Nails. Quick Hands. Hardened Fingers. Extend Claws. Enhance Perception. She thought the commands for all her supportive Skills, making her faster, and more deadly. Her fingernails—better called claws—grew to almost five centimeters and turned black, gleaming with a dark green shimmer.

Just has she arrived at the pillar, an arrow followed, barely missing her as she slapped the stone pillar, shaking it with her forceful hit, pushing her trajectory away from the pillar. She flipped through the air, going down on all four and rolling to the side as another arrow passed by where she had landed. She looked up, feeling more like a Beast than Human at this moment, staring at the short man, she locked her eyes on him and used three quick Flash Steps in a zig-zag pattern to get closer.

The man jumped back slightly when he saw her great speed, but his retreat couldn't come close to her advance. As she arrived right before him, he tried to put up his bow to guard against her slashing right hand, only to miss seeing her left hand going for his stomach with two fingers extended. He took her strengthened finger attack right below the rib-cage and a mouthful of blood flew out of his mouth as his body doubled over, almost falling to the ground from one of her blows. She felt disappointed. This was too easy.

Backing away to give the man some room, she now only felt pity for the little man and was certain she would win the fight without much trouble. She waited two seconds for the man to get his wind back and take up his bow, aiming at her with an ephemeral glowing arrow made out of thin air; it flew towards her, whistling through the air, but she could see it clearly because of her enhanced vision. It didn't move slowly, but she could clearly see the arrow's trajectory through the air, and she slightly moved her body to let it pass her by. The man shot another arrow with the same result, and she walked closer to him and he started backing away. “You can't win against me,” she said, taunting the man, trying to break what little confidence he still had so that the next fight would be quick. She wanted to find some other person to battle with now.

She closed in on him with almost casual steps, gracefully dodging arrow after arrow until the man slumped to the ground, sitting down, his Mana exhausted. At least she had gotten some training in dodging arrows from this guy. She looked down on him, and he opened his mouth to say something, but before he could, she slashed his neck with her claw, slashing quicker than he could react. Blood gushed from his throat and he couldn't talk, a frantic expression overcame his face and he tried backing away again. She quickly stabbed out with her hand, piercing a finger into the man's heart.

“Fight concluded,” the crystalline voice said from everywhere. “Next fight will start in one minute.” Everything flashed around them, flickering lights turning into an arena looking exactly like the one they had been in, both of them standing at an equal distance to the last time.

“You can just concede the next fight and let me win,” Hannah said to the man, hoping he would agree. “This isn't doing much for either you or me. You could say that I'm a bit of your natural enemy since I can see your arrows.”

The man looked down, dejected, but nodding. “I concede,” he said, sorrow clearly evident in his voice.

Everything flashed again and Hannah was back in the observation room, looking down on the massive amounts of Arenas down on the ground. She hoped to find some better fighters in the Arena. Even if she lost, but learned something, it would be worth more than winning coins from people she could beat without effort. “Challenge anyone close to my Level,” she said, once more inputting the command to send a universal challenge to anyone that wanted to fight; this time she would wait for someone at her Level. Maybe that way she would be able to find someone powerful to fight.