The horde of gleaming red eyes from the dark shadow reveal themselves as hundreds of rats of various sizes rushing out from the sewer grates at the end of the alley. They seem to devour everything in front of them as the flood out of the shadows, a wave of fur, flesh, and teeth. Joe and the other man step backward motioning for Trystan to begin his work, “We’ll cover for you if things get too bad, but we don’t want to steal your points kid.” Says the one who’s been fairly silent so far.

Trystan nods slowly as he draws his sword. He would need to be careful about this, not reveal too much of his abilities, keep with just using the sword and the Mana Shield, saving the Mana Bolt for if it was indeed the trap that he was assuming it was. He casts Mana Shield quickly, hoping that they would miss the activation as he advances towards the swarm.

His blade flashes through the rats with ease, their main danger seemingly coming from their numbers, not from them being incredibly resilient or damaging. As the rats begin to eat through his Mana Shield he can see his armor’s effectiveness actually coming into play for once, as the rats' teeth try to big into him and the chain shirt negating a small portion of that damage. Still, the amount of damage coming through would overwhelm him eventually, and it would happen well before he would manage to kill the swarm. No, if he wanted to actually take the swarm he would need to start opening up with Mana bolt, but that would leave him far too vulnerable. Maybe now it was time to start trying to use this other group as well.

Slowly he starts pulling back, he stammers out as if already completely overwhelmed and scared, “There’s just too many of them, I, I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up.”

Joe and the other man exchanging looks and nod as they step towards the swarm as well. The one who has remained mostly silent starts chanting, a shimmering red bead beginning to form in front of him as Joe pulls out a massive sword that he begins to swing through entire swaths of the swarm.

Joe speaks as he swings the sword seemingly effortlessly, “Its alright kid, we’ll keep a portion of them off ya, just remember to keep killing them to gain those points, we’re already maxed out so we don’t really need these points as much.”

The man chanting finishes and the bead flies from his hands to the center of the horde, a wave of flame washing out over the incoming rats, many of them falling as the fire burns them away. The rat horde pauses for a moment and then from the rear comes rushing larger rats, rats of unusual size.

“Here they come, Bill.” Shouts Joe as he swings his blade again, but these new rats nimbly dodge the blade and begin to pile onto him and Bill.

Trystan continues to fight with the pair, killing rats and watching as everyone’s health begins to drop further and further. His Mana Shield though seemed to be making a difference, at least for him, saving him far more health than the other two were losing. The appearance of his lost health was still happening though, tiny cits, bites, and scratches, along with the blood of the slain rats causing him to appear to be bloody and battered.

Bill and Joe fought off the larger rats, eventually slaying the larger ones along with help from Trystan. Trystan spots them each swigging from bottles occasionally, likely health potions that they had kept on them, hopefully, they didn’t have too many of those if it ended up going too badly.

As the battle continues Trystan’s Stamina reserves start dipping low, checking his level’s fairly quickly he can see that while he has been successful in conserving Mana, his Stamina, which has not been developed as much, is dipping dangerously low. He takes a step back from the front lines, allowing Bill and Joe to continue fighting as he Stamina recovers. From a quick check of his character sheet, it looks like he’s already nearing the maximum points for this level, which is just as well since he’ll be spending some of these newfound points on better equipment, items which won’t count towards the maximum number of points that he can earn here. On the plus side, he mused, the stat increases he had undergone during his small town quests had really paid off wonders, even for his unoptimized Stamina.

Name

Trystan Hunter

Race

Human

Age

18

Tier

None

New Points

951

Banked Points

6500

Stats

Strength

14

Wisdom

12

Agility

13

Charisma

13

Endurance

19

Willpower

19

Intelligence

14

Luck

--

Derived Traits

Mana

218

HP

190

Mana Regeneration

4.8

HP Regen.

3.4

Spell Power

20.6

Stamina

160

Accuracy

27

Stamina Regeneration

3.8

Defense

32

Awareness

26

Abilities

Mana Manipulation (Initiate)

Mana Affinity*

Meditation (Initiate)

Enhanced Mana Regeneration

Enhanced Mana Pool

Mana Bolt

Mana Shield

Equipment

Copper Sword

Copper Chain Shirt

Trystan watches as the two work together, there’s some conflict between them, they definitely haven’t been working together for more than a week. With the power that Bill was displaying it wouldn’t be surprising to Trystan that he had managed to pass through a bit of the Test before failing out, he also likely jumped straight to some of the more advanced spells, which meant his base was likely weaker, but the power displayed was still fairly impressive.

As the last large rat fell there is a lull in the swarm, as they seem to hold themselves back for a moment. Then a greater surge forward occurs as a massive manlike rat starts coming out from the back. Joe and Bill look at one another and curse, Joe a bit more emphatically, “Okay kid, we’re going to need your help here. We’ve seen this only happen once before, lost a guy during that battle, so be quick on your feet.”

Trystan nods as he sees the new blue box information pop open. Rare encounters occurred sometimes, especially when the System felt that the encounter was getting too easy, and the worst of it was that it normally didn’t give much better of a reward.

Quest Update - Clean the Streets - The Final Wave

Clean the Streets: A Rat King has come up to see what is causing the death of so many of his people. With the King out of the way the streets will be clean again...for a time.

Completion Requirements: Destroy the final wave and defeat the Rat King.

Reward: 50 points. 10 Silver. Increased reputation in Opiales. 1 piece of starter equipment.

The three of them set their feet and prepare for the swarm as it approaches. Bill’s fireballs flash out across the horde, thinning them out slightly, as the huge blade swung by Joe reduces more of the swarm. Trystan’s blade flashes out killing singular rats that make it through the devastation, for a time it looks like they have it handled, then the manlike rat and his assortment of large rats of unusual size hit that front line. Their claws and bites drawing blood and the three men’s health starts dropping quickly.

Trystan dodges the best he can, his health already down below half. His blade continuously flashing out and his Stamina was dangerously low, soon he’d either be completely unable to move or have to start drawing on his mana to attack instead. Bill curses again as the Rat King manages to land a solid blow on his, his arm dangling uselessly from the damage just received. Joe releases a battle cry which seems to stun the surrounding rats for a moment and strikes down with his blade, causing the Rat King significant damage, enough to give it pause.

Trystan raises and hand, gathering mana and starting to shape the Mana Bolt spell in his mind. It was a single target spell, so not much good against swarms, but with just the King and the few large rats to go after not, it might make the difference. It will give away one of the cards he was keeping up his sleeve, but they seemed more dedicated to protecting him than he had imagined, maybe he was completely wrong about them.

Trystan releases the charged mana bolt into the side of a large rat right as it was about to bite through Bill’s other arm. The rat flies off to the side with the force of the impact of the bolt and Bill spares a quick glance towards Trystan, giving a grateful nod as he continues his fight with the other rats. Slowly between Bill’s magic, Joe’s sword, and Trystan’s mana bolts, the larger rats are put down leaving only the Rat King. It looks at the three and growls something that Trystan cannot understand before his size grows in front of them. His already large teeth growing and becoming serrated, his claws enhancing, and his fur seeming to take on a rusting metallic color.

With a roar, it comes down attacking all three of them at once. His claws striking towards Bill, his teeth at Joe, and then his long tail coming down quickly at Trystan like a whip. Trystan stumbles away as a large chunk of his remaining health is drained quickly. Then the rat curls up for a moment and its hair seems to quiver for a moment before it’s hair start shooting out like metal needles around the surrounding area. The stone of the walls and street chip and smoke fills the air as the impact of the raining needles hit everywhere, a few hit Trystan dropping his health to critical levels, while both Bill and Joe seem to struggle with the impacting needles as well.

Bill thrusts a hand forward and a fountain of flame erupts into the body of the Rat King, it screams in agony as Joe slices off one of its arms, and finally a charged Mana Bolt from Trystan puts it down.

Quest Completed - Clean the Streets - The Final Wave

Reward: 50 points. 10 Silver. Increased reputation in Opiales. 1 piece of starter equipment.

Trystan stands trying to regain his breath, Stamina, and Mana when Joe looks over to him with an unnerving smile.

“Good job boy, good job. Now that that’s over, you should be nearly maxed out, right?” He says with a widening grin. “We should be good to go then.”

Joe starts walking towards him, his blade out, and that unnerving smile just staying on his face.

“What equipment did you end up getting?” He asks, his eyes never leaving Trystan’s body, then he shrugs slightly, “Nevermind, don’t answer that, I like surprises.” He says as he draws closer to Trystan. “I’d say sorry, but..you don’t really need apologies where you’re going, so instead, thanks for the points.”

Joe’s smile widens as he raises his blade and takes the last step needed to get into the range of Trystan.

“No!” a surprising voice calls out, Bill’s voice Trystan realizes. “Dammit Joe, he saved me, and I told you I didn’t want to do this shit anymore.”

Trystan blinks for a moment as Joe pauses, and then Trystan scrambles back away from Joe. Joe raises a hand towards Bill and waves him away, “Then go on out of here, I ain’t letting any of those points get away.”

Bill shakes his head, “I told you I wouldn’t be involved, and you know that. The only reason I had told you he was lying about his points was because you had promised me that from now on we’d actually just help them.”

Joe looks with disgust to Bill, “You can shut up, or you can also be one of them, don’t think that us being grouped up by the main man means that you’re gonna be safe out here.” Joe then tilts his head the side and shrugs, “Ya know what, that’s actually a good idea, your lucky day boy,” he says to Trystan as he quickly pivots on Bill, bringing his sword slashing across his chest, “Looks like you murdered my partner for the points and I got revenge for the guild, that story will sell itself.” He grins as his blade digs into Bill’s flesh and Bill goes flying off to the side, a shower of blood from his wound spraying the alley.

Trystan starts charging up a Mana Bolt when his eyes widen and he sees Bill staggering back to his feet, an empty bottle falling to the ground and shattering as he stands, “Consider our partnership done then.” He says simply as a roar of flame washes out and over Joe.

Raising the massive blade in front of him like a shield Joe charges forward and the two begin exchanging sword blow for fire blast, damage slowly building upon both of them. Trystan finishing charging up the bolt releases it and nails Joe in the back, staggering him as he swings the blade into Bill again. Bill on his knees releases another flaming gout into Joe's face blinding him and Trystan follows up with another mana bolt. Then rushing forward as he realizes that his mana is nearly empty Trystan aims his sword and thrusts the blade through Joe’s neck as a bolt of fire erupts into Joe's face again from Bill.

Dropping to the ground panting Trystan looks at the fallen body of Joe and then over to Bill, his clothing bloody and torn. Bill returns the look, “You saved my life kid, now we’re even. Get out of here, while you can, this is no place for a kid like you.” Then Bill slowly drags himself over to the side of the alley and taking out two bottles rolls one over to Trystan and starts drinking the other bottle.

“Thank you,” Trystan says quietly as he starts drinking the healing potion and his regeneration rate increases drastically. “You know,” he starts slowly, “You could come with me? You don’t have to stay here.” Bill lets out a rasping chuckle, “Nah kid, I knew what I was getting into, and there’s no other place for me now. Now get outta here before anyone else shows up.”

Trystan nods, and getting to his feet slowly, he starts the long walk towards the Store, determined now more than ever to get out of here.