But for a Slime

Finally feeling satisfied with some of what he’d learned, he went through the other tabs quickly but found nothing really interesting although he was a bit confused when he noticed a new skill on his current skills tab: find trails. I thought that was… hunter? Or forester… one of those jobs… wait! Where is calculate taxes!? That’s… Joe flashed over to his current job tab and looked with a bit of shock as he realized he had hunter currently equipped. How!? Joe stared for a few moments, then hurriedly swapped to available jobs with a bit of trepidation but then felt relief when he saw all his jobs were still the same and still at the normal levels. Huh! Then how…?

Joe turned to his last and least favorite option and begin trawling through the log list. As he tried to figure out why he’d changed to the hunter job, he blinked with a bit of surprise and increasing worry as he became sidetracked by the last entry in his log: You have bribed three guards. You gain some infamy and increase your criminal status. What! Crap! How… Joe considered a bit, wrestling with this new bit of information and quickly ran through what and how he could ask the help system. But as he began to ask his first question, he had a moment of epiphany and stopped before a large smiled crossed his face and a silent chuckle rumbled his chest. Heh! Help, give me all files on criminals, infamy, criminal status, increasing criminal status, decreasing criminal status, removing criminal status, and the societal effects and consequences of having a criminal status or being a criminal and any differences if different levels of criminal status exist. HA! Let’s see you be unhelpful now!

Joe smiled with some satisfaction as he waited for the help file to respond and as the seconds ticked by, his smile grew more voracious as he hoped that the response would be equally lengthy as the time taken to respond. After about twenty seconds of time, a blue box popped up much larger than normal and Joe felt ecstatic at the size but his grin soured as he read and he soon grimaced in anger. Man, they just piled all the fricken useless information into a single popup!

Criminals: Individuals who have increased criminal status to 100%.

Infamy: A form of fame criminals gain for their unlawful deeds. The greater infamy you have, the more people will know you are a criminal.

Criminal Status: A metric which measures your growth as a criminal. Crimes accrue criminal status at varying rates.

Increasing Criminal Status: Break the laws of the land or of the owner of this cradle.

Decreasing Criminal Status: Obey the laws of the land or the cradle. Preform acts of public good. You cannot remove your criminal status in this way, only reduce it.

Removing Criminal Status: Report to a judge and pay reparations.

Criminal Status Consequences: Amount of criminal status is directly proportional to the chance of arrest and prosecution if criminal status is ever discovered.

Infamy Consequences: Infamy increases chances of everyone knowing you are a criminal.

Joe felt some frustration but as he finished reading, he realized he’d gained quite a bit of valuable information. He started looking through his status but didn’t see any criminal status metric in his status page but then he remembered that there had been another line immediately after it that had stated something about criminal status as well. Flipping open his log, he checked his log and read the line before collapsing back into the bed with some relief: Criminal status is now 7%. Joe took a deep sigh of relief and turned off his status, preparing to go to sleep before he suddenly remembered that he hadn’t looked at why he now had the hunter job.

He flipped open his log once more and began scrolling down searching for any information of what happened. It took him about five minutes but then he found the entries where he’d shot and fought the five bandits. Just above the five entries, he found two very interesting entries. The first entry revealed some information that he’d been looking for very earnestly before.

Log Entry: (SY 55.5 – 3.28) (05:36) :: Lunlarnalane the dryad has heard your cry and changed your job to hunter.

Log Entry: (SY 55.5 – 3.28) (05:37) :: Lunlarnalane the dryad blesses you with the balm of calming.

Log Entry: (SY 55.5 – 3.28) (05:37) :: The great power of nature, Lunlarnalane the dryad, gifts you the greater blessing of Instinctual.

Log Entry: (SY 55.5 – 3.28) (05:37) :: You have taken an amazing shot against an adventurer much greater than your capabilities: Char: Bow skill perfected by ten percent.

Log Entry: (SY 55.5 – 3.28) (05:37) :: You killed an adventurer much greater than you capabilities in a single shot: Char: Bow skill perfected by five percent.

Log Entry: (SY 55.5 – 3.28) (05:38) :: You have killed an adventurer and gained 78 experience.

Well, that answered a lot of questions and that REALLY helped with a lot of things! I’ll need to check the logs a bit more often maybe? Take notes of important data? Anyway, it looks like I got the blessing just before I hit those bandits; only a minute before. But nothing really happened… Dryad! Comes from a tree! The tree! I didn’t even see or feel… Wow! Joe considered the ramifications and what he could do to gratefully thank the dryad. His thoughts ran the gamut of putting it off to returning the next day with a great gift, but then he realized that even if he returned, it would be almost impossible for him to have any form of conversation with a dryad. A dryad! A real life dryad! Joe felt his excitement over such a fantastic reality. He let his mind meander through fantasy worlds as he considered all the creatures that he could end up meeting, but then forced himself to stop dreaming of meeting and conversing with all manner of fantasy creatures. It was very important that he sleep, but the decision he made was that he would definitely return to express thanks to the dryad; it was only right. But he would wait until he could at least communicate with some kind of skill.

Joe flickered across the other log entries afterword and saw that he’d received another ten percent bow skill perfection for the other two amazing shots with an extra five percent each for the insta kill which totaled to forty five percent. He flipped open his note pad and noted the information about the dryad and then calculated his current bow skill perfection so that he could keep it. Flipping to the new ‘skill perfection page’ he’d set aside in a new notebook, he found he’d been able to get forty percent with the bear. Nice. The bows now at eighty five percent perfection. It’s not that hard! This is easy! I’ll soon have permanent access to bow AND I’ll be able to use bow’s char on another skill! Nice! Ha! How were these guys much greater than my capabilities? Joe finally returned his notebook to the bag and closed his status window.

His hand brushed some hard plastic material as he withdrew it and curiosity had him snagging it because plastic wasn’t something he’d felt in a long time. When they came out, he saw they were the IDs of the killers he’d seen out in the wild and he flipped them over in his hands a few times, still unable to really understand what he was looking at. Some of the information seemed easy enough to understand, with attack and defense represented as an iconographic sword and shield, but the other numbers had nothing to identify them as. Just a listing of numbers. Comparing it to his status window, he found them to be the same amount of attributes as his, although he didn’t know which one was which. Huh. These guys don’t really have that impressive of stats, although they do seem a bit higher than most. Some are even close to level thirty, but they still seem… so average or even below. They only have one or two in the low hundreds. Joe was surprised at the poor showing of the combatants, but ultimately turned to what plagued him: what to do with the bounty cards. Joe flipped them in his hands a few more times before dropping them back in his bag. I need more information about this. I don’t know how the law will take me walking in with proof of killing four or five people. I’ll figure it out after I can actually talk with someone! Sleep came quickly with a decision and he fell into a peaceful slumber.

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