Unchosen Champion

Coop had been mesmerized by the Coral Forest. He hopped from ledge to ledge, just taking it all in.

It was beautiful and surreal, unlike anything he had ever seen but also sometimes familiar. He spotted a purple brain coral the size of a house and blue-green sea fans swaying in the open air that were large enough to fit into any old growth forest. When Coop realized that all the corals were living despite not being submerged he was even more awed.

The coral polyps appeared to still be their normal tiny size, it was the calcium carbonate exoskeletons that experienced such incredible growth. It seemed like an entire ecosystem had sprung up around the concentrated mana, allowing these tiny creatures to build incredible structures.

Gradually, Coop started to realize he had made a mistake. The unfamiliar Coral Forest, lack of a horizon, and constantly changing elevation depending on which ledge he was on had turned him around. He wasn’t sure which way was home.

Coop truly realized he was in trouble when he spotted his first monster. He noticed it before he dropped onto the ledge that it was occupying. It seemed like it stared back at him, daring him to continue.

It was a hermit crab-like creature, with six pointed legs underneath a round, bulbous, blue-metallic body that hung all the way to the floor. Two scissor-like claws were held out in a challenge that Coop wouldn’t accept. Where the Ancient Defenders and Primal Kites were smaller than Coop, this thing was the size of a van.

[One That Waits (Elite Level ??)]

Identify only confirmed Coop’s hesitance. He had never seen question marks before, but felt it was safe to assume they meant a dangerous level difference. Coop would have retreated from a regular monster that presented with question marks, and this was an elite, so he turned around and came to terms with his being lost.

Coop decided that he would find his way as long as he went up. He climbed from ledge to ledge, finally understanding that going up would be a lot harder than going down. He confirmed that his ethereal teleport had no line of sight requirements and made liberal use of his spear throws to gain further elevation.

It was going well enough until he saw the ceiling. It was solid coral rock that gave no indication of direction or exits, only adding the occasional stream of seawater that percolated through the stone and joined the other rivers. At least the nearby bioluminescence was a pleasant blue-green with the occasional purple highlights. His downfall would have nice aesthetics.

Coop tried testing the wind and tasting the air, he observed the orientation of different corals and the direction water was flowing, but nothing provided any hints for navigation. He felt like he had no choice but to pick a direction and commit.

Panic set in. He was pretty sure he was going in a straight line, but was beginning to doubt even his ability to not go in circles. He started coming up with backup plans where he would have to live in the Coral Forest forever.

He only got out of his own head when he nearly jumped into another monster, this one even more frightening than the last. He Identified it from a ledge beneath, thankful that it hadn’t noticed him.

[One That Hunts (Elite Level ??)]

The monster was blood red and Coop couldn’t tear his eyes off the teeth. It had the oversized mouth of a deep sea fish with teeth so long the jaw never closed completely. Coop couldn’t see most of its body and was completely unwilling to get any closer. He did not want to tempt it into action.

He was a lot more deliberate after the second monster encounter. He picked his way through the coral carefully until he finally saw something that filled him with hope. Familiar curtains of water that reminded him of the edges of the entrance to this zone.

He made his way to the waterfall and gently peered through. He was thrilled to see the night sky filled with stars instead of the coral rock ceiling. He quickly teleported over the edge to get his bearings.

At least it didn’t seem like monsters would be erupting from the Coral Forest to attack the settlement any time soon. He wasted a lot of time confirming that was the case though.

Coop was forced to fight more Primal Kites as he walked into their hiding places. He was happy to find his teleport cost was down to 48 mana after using it to fight and travel around all day. After the first Primal Kite was defeated he checked his notifications and found that completing the first stage of the Primal Kite chain had granted him 100 Basic Credits and a level, just like the Ancient Defender chain.

[You defeated Primal Kite (Level 10)]

[+6 Basic Credits]

[Quest Complete! Defeat Primal Kites I]

[Congratulations! You have leveled up!]

[You have a new quest!]

[Scavenge Defeated Enemies V (151/1000)]

He was pleased to get a last minute level before the leaderboards unlocked, but the fact that he was wading through the ocean in the middle of the night prevented him from celebrating.

Eventually, no more Primal Kites bothered him. As he approached the lighthouse he noted that Balor had completely repaired the lighthouse already.

The services that were provided through the settlement system had limitations on how many resources they were allotted each day before they needed an upgrade or a supporting building to continue.

At least, Coop was pretty sure Balor wasn’t making up limitations to get out of working around the clock. The dwarf-like alien was really enthusiastic about working on the fort and lighthouse. Still, Coop didn’t think he would be able to make such large repairs in a single session, but he supposed mana was an unknown variable. Balor had probably used his entire day’s allotment to repair the lighthouse for Jett.

As Coop made his way to the fort, he noticed movement in the scrubgrass toward the interior of the island and took a closer look. He expected to find land crabs doing crab things, but instead spotted a new mechanical enemy. It must have been a nocturnal one for him to have never seen it before. He identified it.

[Ancient Prowler (Level 10)]

Coop decided to take his frustrations out on this new enemy. Wielding his spear and shield he approached it aggressively. It held its ground, snapping its elongated jaw in Coop’s direction. It was four feet long and he thought it resembled a mechanical rat, with a single red light in its forehead rather than eyes. And large metallic scales instead of fur. And no tail at all. Maybe not like a rat specifically. Unlike the symmetrical mechanical creatures, this one was oriented like most of the four-legged mammals he was familiar with.

Coop jabbed with his spear only for the Ancient Prowler to evade his attack and lunge at Coop, bearing its jagged razor-like teeth, intent on clamping down on his extended forearm.

Coop yanked his arm back, but the monster was too quick to force back out into the ideal range of his spear. Coop ended up slamming the creature with the shaft of his spear to knock it away.

The Ancient Prowler landed on its feet despite being battered and flung several feet away. Coop took the opportunity to thrust the spear again, using his footwork to keep the creature at a better distance. It took Coop several attempts before he landed a solid hit with the tip of his spear.

Before he defeated the creature with a follow up attack, a second creature lunged at his flank. He barely blocked with his shield, but while he was distracted, the first creature regained its footing.

Coop focused on finishing off the injured Ancient Prowler, but every time he attacked, the other monster retaliated, forcing its way inside of Coop’s attack range. By the time he was able to create enough distance to stab with the spear, it was the other Ancient Prowlers turn to dive inside of Coop’s attack range.

These things were quick and cooperative, covering for each other and taking advantage of Coop’s openings. Coop was also pretty quick and more importantly, was tough. At least stat-wise he thought he was tough. He settled on trading blows with the creatures.

The next time he landed an attack on one creature, he followed through with a finishing blow while allowing the second creature to land its attack. The creature bit his leg, but Coop was unfazed. It dealt a pathetic 10 damage to both his HP and MP after all of his reductions, but also applied a debuff called Vulnerable. The debuff increased the damage Coop would receive from future attacks. As if he would let the lone Ancient Prowler get any more attacks in.

Coop aggressively attacked the remaining monster, unwilling to let the fight last much longer. He landed a solid arcing blow on a backswing when the creature dodged the wrong direction, but before he finished it off, yet another monster lunged at him. Coop ignored the additional monster in favor of ending the previous one. Allowing it to bite his forearm, failing to pierce his bracer.

He bashed the third monster off of his arm with his shield, noting that he had taken 30 damage, despite the attack being blocked, and received a second stack of the Vulnerable debuff. He turned to the bashed monster and thrust his spear into its body, pinning it to the ground.

As he pulled his spear to apply the finishing blow, a fourth monster’s teeth collided with his armored back. Coop plunged the spear into the head of the third monster and whirled at the newest monster. He had taken 50 damage from the surprise attack and another stack of Vulnerable.

Coop swung with arcing swings, keeping the fourth monster at bay. Coop was easing his way back toward the dunes, not wanting to fight these things all night with their escalating damage. As he planted his leg and swung at the creature, a fifth attacked his back leg, dealing 70 damage to both his HP and MP.

Coop kicked it off and stabbed the fourth creature when it predictably lunged at Coop, assuming he was distracted by the fifth monster, then he stomped on the fifth monster and executed it with his spear.

He wasted no time getting back into a combat stance, paranoid that more of the monsters were waiting to attack him, but when none appeared he hustled the rest of the way back to the relative safety of the dunes. He was relieved by the sight of Ancient Defenders milling around. He quit taking detours for the day and headed back to the fort.

When he made it back to the fort he entered the mess hall and took a seat. It was earlier than he usually woke up, but only by about an hour. He prepared to go over the Prowler fight and review his notifications but he noticed Jett strolling through the corridor towards his bedroom so he watched. Jett did a double take when she spotted him outside his bed at this time. She trotted over and rubbed against his shins so he scratched her back before she made her way to the bedroom to go to sleep. Coop chuckled at the cat’s new routine.

Coop finally checked his notifications.

[You defeated Ancient Prowler (Level 10)]

[+4 Basic Credits]

[+1 Jagged Metal Tooth (Uncommon)]

[Congratulations! Your profession has leveled up!]

[You have a new quest!]

[Defeat Ancient Prowlers I (1/5)]

[Congratulations! You have leveled up!]

…

[Quest Complete! Defeat Ancient Prowlers I]

[Congratulations! You have leveled up!]

[You have a new quest!]

[Scavenge Defeated Enemies V (156/1000)]

Yet again, Coop had found himself in a dangerous situation when he fought a new monster. The agile Ancient Prowlers exposed weaknesses in his spear technique and forced him to trade blows. Taking some damage was only something he could do thanks to his layered defenses, but if a fight with a stacking debuff like Vulnerable continued for much longer it would quickly get out of his control. Regenerating health also took too long to sacrifice it willingly while intending to fight for hours at a time.

He thought the problem was with his footwork, he needed to be a lot quicker on his feet if he wanted to maintain a specific distance in combat against a quick foe that wants to get closer. He was especially troubled when they approached from the outside of his spear arm. He couldn’t rotate his hips fast enough to use his shield and was forced to either accept the attack or use a weak backhand attack with his spear shaft below the blade.

The next time he fought those Prowlers he wanted to try with a different weapon. He could have switched mid battle, but he wasn’t that confident in any of his other possible summons yet. He’d have to talk to Jones about his options, though gaining some experience and using the shortsword was the most obvious choice. He thought there might be a polearm that would suit his needs as well.

Coop thought that maybe all five of the Ancient Prowlers he had fought were clones of the same monster, but his notifications credited him with killing all five individually. Either they were some kind of pack monster or they had a sensitive aggro range. Either way, killing five was enough to complete the first stage of their quest chain, earning him yet another last minute level on top of the level he earned naturally.

Plus, his profession leveled after he scavenged the first kill, piling on the attribute points. He smashed the unallocated points into his Mind stat and checked his status for the last time before the leaderboards began.

[Status]

HP - 542/700

MP - 1064/1200

Class - Revenant (Level 14)

Profession - Basic Scavenging (Level 8)

Affinity - Spectral

Race - Human (Rank 1)

Faction - None

Strength - 10 (+120)

Agility - 10 (+60)

Body - 10 (+60)

Mind - 120

Intelligence - 10

Acumen - 10

Unallocated - 0

Titles - Champion, Haunted, Ethereal

Skills (Active) - Identify, Retribution, Salvation

Skills (Passive) - Common Language, Mind Over Matter, Adamance, Practical Application

Quests - Defeat Ancient Prowlers II (0/25), Defeat Primal Kites II (11/25), Defeat Ancient Defenders IV (626/5000), Scavenge Defeated Enemies V (156/1000), Upgrade Camp to Outpost

Basic Credits - 5,431

Coop still felt giddy seeing his attributes go up. Thanks to his passive skills, every 10 attribute points gave him 10 Mind, 5 Body, 5 Agility, and 10 Strength!

His wallet was getting heavier as well. He only needed 1,000 basic credits for the settlement upgrade, which would be ready in three days. The rest he thought he would spend immediately, so he got up and headed to the civilization shard in the courtyard.

Balor and Jones had been busy planning significantly more than a mere camp or outpost. They had used magical implements that look like tiny glow sticks that emitted a dim light to line the streets. Coop wasn’t sure what the different colors were meant to represent, but he guessed it was zoning plans. Balor would slowly make progress as his resources regenerated each day. A Quarry or more laborers would increase his work rate, but they weren’t in that much of a hurry.

He followed the planned main street that went down the middle to the shard and continued to where a bridge would eventually be installed to connect the other half of the fort. A generous circular town square was allotted around the proposed bridge and a road would border the channel that flowed through the fort. The roads were planned to form spokes leading away from the circle to the edges of the fort where an outside ring was also planned.

Coop enabled the relocation of the shard and pushed it to the center of the future town circle. It would make a nice centerpiece for the public area.

Coop accessed the shard and sat down to browse the construction options. Most were still grayed out with unmet requirements, but with his growing wealth, many more were unlocked than before.

There were six categories of buildings: Defense, Housing, Food Production, Food Preparation, Industrial, and Public Buildings.

The available Defense structures were useless with the existing fort, various walls and watch towers dominated the section of affordable options. The more interesting choices were the more expensive options that required higher settlement levels or a larger population. There were options like martial facilities for training, police stations, guard houses, even a spy headquarters. Coop could get an instructor for some of his weapons in the future.

He almost skipped over the Housing options, but thought that maybe it wouldn’t be bad to move out of their simple barracks into mansions. Unfortunately, the prices of the more fancy lodgings were outrageous. They were clearly meant to be luxury items for a more established settlement.

He did skip over the Food Production section, already knowing it would be full of farming and animal husbandry. They didn’t need to mass produce food with a population of four, which included the cat.

Food Preparation was the more interesting section. All of these buildings would generate a minimum amount of resources necessary to operate, so a fancy restaurant would have enough food for a few people a day. Balor’s Stonemasonry already produced its own types of stone at a limited quantity everyday, which is how he conducted repairs on the lighthouse. Coop nearly chose the Bakery at 5,000 Basic Credits but put it aside for now in case he found something in the other sections.

The Industry section was by far the longest, but they had explored the options more extensively when they selected their first building. There were choices that would expand or improve the Stonemason, but he'd rather get the Bakery.

Lastly, the Public Buildings was also a large section, but it was also the most restrictive in terms of requirements. The only ones he could choose with his budget and settlement were the Market and Tavern. He couldn’t see what good a Market would do for them right now, but the Tavern was interesting. It had food, drinks, and lodging all in one.

As he thought about his choices, Jones joined him. The sun had come up while Coop browsed all of the options. They discussed broader city plans and what to prioritize. They didn’t make any progress on deciding until Balor yelled from across the courtyard.

“Get a damn Tavern and a Brewery to upgrade the drinks!”

Jones signed off on the idea with a shrug, and Coop went ahead and selected the Tavern. He scrolled through the many, many variants until he spotted one without a faction and selected it. He built it right on the corner where the main street met the town circle, with the front door on the main street. He imagined adding a second one across the street for some competition.

They watched as the Tavern rapidly constructed itself before their very eyes.