Resurgence: The Rise of Resurgence Book 1 (10 page)

Based on Jason’s excellent suggestion when we were creating our characters, Wayne and I learned that with my 1 point more of Wisdom than his, my skill levels were going up slightly faster. So I put two more points into Wisdom and Wayne put three points into his and the rest into his Constitution. My additional points went to my Dexterity. Dan did the same and added one point to Wisdom, one point to Constitution, and the rest to Agility. Jason stayed with Wisdom at this point. The only other change was that Jason was now able to see his mana bar and had an accounting of how much Mana he had. From his original 13 Wisdom and 10 additional skill points added to it, Jason now had 23 Wisdom, which corresponded to 2300 Mana. Not a shabby number at all.

At this time, we all only had one skill to raise. Dan’s was Archery, Jason’s was Blunt weapons (his mace), Wayne’s was War Hammer, and mine was Dagger. The skill seemed to only raise 5 points per level, and each point gave an additional 1 in attack. It wasn’t substantial, but every bit helped.

I determined that once we hit level 3 the bunnies were only giving us 1.25% per kill. So with our 37 bunnies killed into level 3 we were all at 46.25%. And it was time to return to town, turn in the quest, and find Jason his first spells.

We passed the same group we had seen on our way in and they were still angry over the fact that they had not finished their quest. They had even gotten to the point of blaming each other. “I’m telling you man, the dude said you have to kill it a certain way. So I think we need to have each person try to be the finisher and see how it works. Gordo has a sword, you have a dagger, and I have a staff. We just have to stop attacking so one of us makes sure to get the killing blow!” the man argued.

I didn’t shake my head externally, but internally I was all disappointment. Dan was right, the words were there to decipher, and this group had just chosen to hear the wrong part. I think Dan wanted to help them out, but Wayne grabbed him. Picked him up really, seeing as Dan was just a tiny Wood Elf. And with Dan in tow, we made our way to Sir Kenyon.

I approached the quest giver and said, “Sir Kenyon, my comrades and I have returned with the five venomous sacks.”

“So you have! And in fine shape they are. Thank you for all of your efforts young adventurers! Now the master potion maker should be able to heal those poor children and hopefully have some cure left over for those young souls foolish enough to tussle with this filth. I promised you a reward and you shall have it,” Sir Kenyon said. We all received thirty percent experience, taking us to 76.25%, and two silver each. We were swimming in the money now.

“Thank you Sir Kenyon, and we look forward to being of more help should you need our services,” I replied. Sir Kenyon looked at me with a thoughtfulness like when an old grandfather is assessing his new grandson. I hoped this was the preamble to the next quest.

“Right you are young lad. I do believe I will have more tasks for you. But first you must be prepared. Come return to me when you believe you are ready to begin again,” Sir Kenyon finished and then looked away, signaling the conversation was over.

We entered into the main street of Port Town looking for a vendor that sold spells. Our first goal was to get Jason his first level spells and if we had enough left over, to get Wayne a light source. I knew wouldn’t be fighting outside the gates for the foreseeable future and Wayne’s night blindness was going to hamper us. As we walked through the market area I kept my eye out for a telltale sign, something like a parchment, which would indicate that the vendor sold spells. Well, that or books. But I was betting on spells.

About half way down the road we saw what I thought would be our best bet. I went with Jason into the store while Wayne went off to look at weapons and Dan went to look at Ranger gear.

The store was small, and there were scrolls all along the walls. One would guess that each scroll was a different spell for a different discipline. I wasn’t terribly interested in all the different spells, just the ones we would need for Jason. Approaching the proprietor of the store, an older gnome, Jason said, “Pardon me kind sir, but would you happen to sell spells for a cleric. I am but a novice, just learning my trade and I wish to learn the most basic of my order’s spells.”

“Well then lucky you are lad that you came to me. Port Town hasn’t had a Cleric’s Order for many years. Normally that would be the only place to get your spells. But since I am in good standing with the Order, I happen to have one copy of each basic spell that I could sell to you. Please take a look,” and with that the merchant handed Jason three different scrolls.

“What do you have there Allister?” I asked.

“Not awesome, but they are low level. Link to group. Link to group. Link to group,” Jason said. And just like that, three windows popped up into my screen. The first one, and most important in my opinion, was Jason’s healing spell. For 170 Mana, Jason could heal for 250 hit points. At this point it would take Jason half his mana to heal Wayne completely. The other two spells were an armor buff, granting 50 Armor, and a 3 second stun. The heal had a 4 second casting time with a 2 second recasting time. The armor buff had a casting time of 10 seconds and a recast time of 10, although this was immaterial to the action sequences of the game. Finally, the stun, which Jason could use to stop a mob and get away from it, beneficial when you are the healer, had a casting time of 1 second, but a recasting time of 10 seconds. Meaning if it didn’t work, Jason would have to wait another 10 seconds to cast again. An eternity when you are getting beat on by a mob.

“How much for one?” Jason asked.

“These are set prices my young friend. Each sells for 3 silver. No bargaining,” the merchant said.

Jason looked crestfallen. “Well I have enough for one, guess I will get the heal.”

“Dan, Wayne, get your butts over here,” I said to the group. Ten seconds later both arrived at the shop. “I am making a formal request that we take our money and pool it so we can buy Jason his spells. At some point we will all need to come together like this for each other, and this is just the first time. But Jason’s…sorry, Allister’s spells are going to be crucial to us succeeding at these lower levels.”

There wasn’t even a hint of argument. Damn, I actually did have a good group of guys here.

“Seriously? You guys are willing to do that for me?” Jason asked.

“Hell man, I would buy the healing spell myself seeing as it’s my ass you will be healing,” Wayne said with a big laugh.

With no further questions or arguments, we bought the three spells and were about to leave the shop when the merchant stopped us. “I do love to see young adventurers working together. And you lads are a fine group. I may have some work for you when you are looking for something to do. Just stop by the shop and come see me when you are ready.”

“NICE! Another quest! Should we take it now?” Dan asked.

“Up to you guys, but I found it weird that Sir Kenyon didn’t immediately give us our next quest. Now that Jason has his spells, maybe he will?” I asked the group.

“We can go ask, but I’m betting it is because we aren’t a sufficient level yet. Most of the other groups are level 4 already because they keep fighting the bunnies to get those sacks. Let’s go ask Kenyon and see what he says.” Wayne suggested.

It was as Wayne guessed and we ended up getting the same message from Sir Kenyon, to come back when we were prepared. I agreed with Wayne’s assessment and figured we needed to level up. Since we were pretty close to leveling at this point I suggested we just get it done. Everyone was in agreement.

With Jason’s armor buff, and our level three, we got through the rabbits quickly. When we all heard that wonderful “DING!” sound acknowledging our new levels, we hurried back to the wall so we could distribute our skill points without being attacked by rabbits. I decided to spread my skill points out more evenly and put 1 in Strength, Constitution, Agility, Dexterity, and Chance. Wayne put 1 in Strength, Agility, and Dexterity, and 2 into Constitution. Dan decided to increase his Strength and Constitution by 1 point and put the rest on Agility. And I had to coerce Jason into putting some of his points into Strength with promises of more Armor. I did not want Jason getting overloaded and ending up becoming fatigued.

And as luck would have it, while clearing to level 4, we even found two more sacks. I suggested we sell them at a vendor. But at each vendor we checked, the most we could get was 50 copper pieces. However, the vendors were selling them for 3 silver. Talk about mark up. I had an idea and the group agreed to let me try.

I approached a group near the wall that was killing rabbits nonstop. I asked them if they were trying to finish the venomous sack quest to which they replied they were, eyeing us warily. It was then I made my offer.

“We just finished up out here and are taking some down time. We already finished the quest but I have two venomous sacks in my inventory. I’ll sell them to you for a silver a piece.”

“Forget it man, that’s our whole reward from the first quest!” One of them answered.

“No, that would be half the reward for the first quest if you guys all chipped in fairly. And I have it on good authority, because I finished it already, that you will get 2 silver each upon completion of this quest. So it is a win/win,” I said.

They walked away and started discussing it. I already knew what that meant. We would be getting their silver. In most games there is either yes or no. The no is always met with a violent retort so you wouldn’t ask again. It sometimes took longer to get to yes, but if they weren’t yelling at you, you already won. “Ok, we’ll take em.”

And just like that, the player’s market place was born.

* * *

Interlude

“Sir, Mr. Jolston sir. We just received a bug report from test subject 271 sir,” said a man wearing an AltCon lanyard attached to his identification. He was nondescript in all ways. And he was approaching at a slow and cautious pace. He knew, because he had seen the wrath, that one did not want to anger Mr. Terrence Jolston.

Standing in front of a console and looking out at the numerous screens running Resurgence simultaneously, Jolston barely acknowledged the man approaching him. “Well, send it to IT so they can document the find and check it off from their list. Why are you bothering me?”

“It’s just that, well sir, this isn’t a bug we have programmed into the system, and not one we have seen before. It’s a genuine anomaly sir,” the attendant stuttered through.

“What? An actual bug in the program? That’s impossible, we had all of those taken care of before we set these tests up,” Jolston replied a bit angrily.

“Yes sir, I mean I know sir. But this isn’t something we have seen before,” the attendant said again, this time a bit more fearful.

“Fine, just give it to me,” Jolston said, ripping it out of the attendant’s hand. Jolston read it over and found it to be quite odd indeed. Apparently test subject 271 was not logging in to his log out point, and noted his original spawn point was not at the appropriate location. This was new.

“Run a diagnostic and put it on the main screen. I want to see what happened when 271 logged in that first time and where. And any subsequent log ins and log outs.”

The full diagnostic was run per Jolston’s orders and the information started to filter across the screen. Indeed, it seemed that 271 had logged into Resurgence that first time far outside of his designated origination point. His subsequent log out and log in were in different places, although the second instance was much closer to his log out point. “Did anything occur during 271’s initial log in to account for this?” Jolston asked.

The technician ran a full scan of all of 271’s data entries from the time he closed the RAC on his first download till his last log out. “According to our logs sir, there have been no variations with 271 and everything is running perfectly. There does not seem to be any cause for this anomaly,” the technician droned.

Jolston stood there for a few moments, scratching his chin. He was at a bit of a loss, but he wouldn’t let his underlings see that. “We will monitor the situation. At this time the log in and log out locations for the subject will not affect the overall test parameters. That will be all.”

“Um, sir. Sorry sir, but the report also asked if we could make sure his character stats were registering properly sir. Usually we don’t bother with such things, but given the anomaly, I wanted to bring it to your attention,” the attendant said while taking a couple of steps back.

Jolston turned to the man, giving him the stare that had sent many an employee into a blubbering mess. After a few moments, he took pity on the attendant. It wasn’t the attendants fault after all. “You are right to note that. Bring up his character and tell me if he is still in game.”

“Character routing to main screen, and yes sir, he is still in game.” Before him on the main screen was the following information.