CHAPTER 14 - Load In, Start Punching Trees
Levan tore over leaves, pressing them into the soft, wet dirt with the flat of the sandal. Cold, damp soil spilled onto the sides of his feet, nestling between his toes.
He ignored it, and kept on running.
He found himself in a clearing, picked a direction, and darted into brush.
“They say Gaius is dead,” came a low voice as one of the soldiers spoke to the other. The other soldier said nothing for a while, crouched low, and Levan remained still as he could as the masked face passed around the edge of the forest clearing.
“Codex, what can you tell me about the forest?” Levan asked, circling the dividing line where the yellow short grass grew slightly longer and took on a mildly lime green tint.
[ Codex > Landscapes > Forest: A forest is an area of dense trees or other foliage. ]
Levan frowned. “Trees?”
[ Codex > Communication Systems > Sarcasm Recognition: Due to its confusing nature, Codex will run a statistical model to determine sarcasm, unless— ]
“Got it, got it, sorry,” Levan muttered. “But you started it.”
[ Noted. ]
Levan took a few careful steps from the scrubland and into the forest line. There was magic in this world, apparently, and by the way the soldiers were eyeing that dividing line, for all Levan knew, simply stepping through would trigger some kind of spell or problem for him.
He took a step, and another, and another. He didn’t catch on fire, didn’t explode, he wasn’t swallowed by the soil, or grabbed by the ankle from sentient tree roots.
Just broad daylight on a sunny day, in a quiet forest, with trees that looked so similar to earth but just slightly, uncannily different, and the calls of birds that were similarly familiar.
Levan took in a deep breath, realizing only then how intensely he’d been holding it while hunted by the soldiers.
Deep breath.
Deep breath.
You’re safe.
You’re safe enough.
You’re in the forest.
And…and it’s a pretty gorgeous one.
He found himself walking on, going deeper into the forest line and farther away from the scrublands.
Though the density of broad, brown and grey-barked trees increased, and the tree canopy thickened, the sunlight never failed to permeate through, and the terrain never got too difficult to move through.
I really like this place, Levan found himself thinking, both to himself and to Codex. Peace came, and tiredness.
He’d been awake for so long.
Wasn’t it…wasn’t it the middle of the night?
In the dorm?
The temple, too. And the blood, and the—
Not worth thinking about right now.
I could just…just focus on my eyelids, he thought, clearing a few rocks from the grass beneath one of the large trees, and lowering himself carefully down. The water in the grass slightly permeated the thin acolytes robes, but he’d get used to the chill, if he didn’t move.
And he didn’t move.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Didn’t plan on it.
I could just focus on my eyelids, and—
------
How long has it been?
It was like he’d blinked—shut his eyes for a second, maybe two or three seconds, and then just opened them again.
He didn’t even have time to imagine it all being a dream. He didn’t have a chance to be confused or disoriented by a brand new world—because the last thing he remembered was clear in his mind: Settling down against the tree and shutting his eyes.
But the light…
The light was different.
He couldn’t exactly place how it was different, but it was, without a doubt, different.
Perhaps it was the refraction of the sun, or the wind and how it rustled the leaves on the branches to flitter their shadows about him like a thousand dancers. Maybe it was the birds—different birds, different bird calls.
It was the quality of the light, though. He knew that for sure. Not the amount. It made the passage of time difficult to gauge.
It was…it was almost as if he’d slept an entire day straight in that moment or two, and had awoken to the same type of midmorning, just a day later.
Had he slept for a day straight?
No way.
That’s crazy.
The sleep had been dreamless. Completely dreamless.
Black.
No omens, no warnings, no messages about being a “Chosen Soul.”
No flashbacks to college, no nightmares about tests he forgot to study for, and no priests slumped against bloody marble columns, either.
Just tiredness, the shutting of his eyes in the midmorning light, and their opening again.
“Codex?” Levan thought to the external presence in his mind.
There was no answer.
Hmmm….
Maybe this was the dream.
Nice try, Levan thought. He held out his palm, pinched the back of his hand with his fingernail, hard.
It hurt enough to make it clear that either this was a dream unlike any other, or he was awake.
I’m awake, just…
Ethereal, he thought.
Aetherial, I should say, maybe.
“Codex?” Levan asked again.
The response came slow, filing in as if churning into wakefulness.
[ C o d e x > O t h e r > I n t e r f e r e n c e > Cer tain condi tio ns can cause de lay s or prob lem s with Cod ex and Cho s en Sou l comm u ni ca tion s. ]
Levan swallowed a lump in his throat. “Great.”
[ This pri m ar ily imp acts new inf or ma tio n. Inter fe r e nce weak en ing ]
This primarily impacts new information. Interference weakening.
Weakening the Codex, or the interference itself is clearing up?
Levan looked around, his eye catching something on the forest floor.
It was emphasized in a way Levan couldn’t explain. It didn’t look physically different, not in any recognizable way. It didn’t glow a different color, it didn’t appear larger, it wasn’t bolder in hue or contrast. Just the normal human trophy of Anthropocene pattern recognition, tuned up 2-3x.
Levan picked up the object.
[ Item: Stick x1 ]
[ Gather Sticks: 9/10 ]
No lag there, Levan noted.
[ Interfe re nce fadin g ] the Codex sent in reply, noticeably faster than earlier.
[ Interference reduced to 10% ], it added a moment later.
“Good to have you back,” Levan said, and felt a small suggestion of emotion—perhaps affirmation or appreciation, from his connection to the external presence.
“I’m ready to rock and roll here,” Levan said, “You ready?”
[ Confusion ]
He picked up the last stick, and the Codex understood.
[ Congratulations! You have finished a Task! ]
[ Task: Gather Sticks (10/10) ]
[ Reward: Unlocks Crafter’s Path, Task 2 ]
The Ability Core interface once more appeared before Levan, this time with a new screen replacing the trio of screens from earlier.
Despite hovering in the air right in front of him, Levan both saw the interface and saw beyond it when it should have completely blocked his view.
In front of him was the same familiar, if eerie clearing.
In front of him was a rectangle of chiseled stone trimmed with polished wood.
Three dimensional bold text on the chiseled stone portrayed the word Crafter’s Path in gold lettering.
Circles and squares in the stone wall were missing, replaced with icons with small images.
A line of polished wood, the same wood that formed the decorative border of the interface, connected the missing chunks of stone to one another in a network leading down, like the nodes of a nervous system branching downward.
Levan whistled, scrolling downward.
The wall moved, showing an ever-expanding network where, like hydra heads, the nodes lead to more and more branches and nodes to follow.
Back at the top, the initial node of missing stone was, like the others, replaced with a small image. Unlike most of the small images though, which were cloudy and unreadable, the circle here was plainly visible and lined with gold.
A green checkmark was ticked off on the top right of the circular image, which was a pair of crossed sticks.
He mentally focused on the circular icon.
[ Task: Gather Sticks, (10/10) | COMPLETE ]
The lines of wood glowed golden for a brief moment, a light like molten metal into a blacksmith’s cast connecting the node with the image of the crossed sticks to another set of nodes.
Levan examined the next tasks as notifications of their unlocking rolled in.
[ You have unlocked a new Task! ]
[ Task | Ability Core (Crafter) | Crafter’s Path ]
[ Gather Stone: 0/3 ]
[ Gather Sticks: 3/3 ]
[ Craft Wooden Haft: 0/1 ]
[ Craft Wooden Axe / Stone Axe, 0/1 ]
Levan looked around the clearing one more time. He hadn’t forgotten the soldier’s apprehension, their frighteningly obvious implication that he’d never be stupid enough to go into the forest. But, as far as he could tell, there were no immediate threats.
Was it finally time?
Time to do some crafting?
I didn’t realize how much I love doing this stuff, he realized, thinking back to countless video games.
His eyes fell on a tree.
Sure, he could craft the axe.
It was his next task, anyway, but…
“I have to start it off right, right?” he asked the Codex rhetorically.
He approached the tree.
Is this a dumb idea?
Nope, he told himself. Some things you have to start right.
Levan clenched his fist, muttered a brief mantra of commitment to give it a good shot.
Then he squared up against the tree, drew his fist back, and started punching.
What days/cadence do you like for Aethercraft?
