Pouncing Practice
notthepenguins
Neither Spherical Nor Frictionless
- Pronouns
- He/She/They
The sun is high overhead, but only a few beams of light penetrate the canopy, giving the forest floor a dim, mysterious quality. A creek burbles quietly beneath you, and the air is filled with the sound of countless living things, chirping and croaking and squeaking and rustling. You, in contrast, are quiet and still, lurking on the branches above. Waiting.
The ⟨Stealth⟩ status sits itself at the corner of your view. You're not sure you like your status list being there, but for now it will do – there isn't much use in agonizing the interface before you know what it's going to be like in serious content. Originally, the
Speaking of infiltration… your ears perk up as one twig after another snaps, and your quarry enters the not-quite-clearing. Bladecrown Elk have proven themselves to be difficult prey thus far. While their dull gray coats are not particularly effective camouflage, they don't need it much; their elaborate antlers are made of what appears to be pure metal, tipped with wicked points and bearing razor sharp edges. Combine that with their size – a meter and a half or more at the shoulder – and their speed, and hunting them was much easier said than done. While your shotgun works, and has saved you from a close encounter already, melee combat does _not_ look to be an ideal proposition, and while you're slightly faster than they are, their endurance significantly exceeds yours. And unfortunately, your current mission requires that you collect undamaged antlers, something the gun is somewhat counterproductive for.
But you've been watching their behavior, and when they come to the stream to drink their guard is down. All you need to do, then, is wait _above_ the stream, and drop down onto one from above. From its back behind the antlers, and coming out of ⟨Stealth⟩, you should be able to get at least one chain of melee attacks off. With those, and a critical location, you _think_ you can finish it before it can turn and gore you, or kick your head off. You haven't let them hit you yet, but judging from the kind of damage they do to trees – and the alchemist's warning – it would be fairly unhealthy.
You creep forward, until you're close enough for an easy leap, and pounce. ⟨Stealth⟩ flickers off as you strike, but it's too late for the elk to stop you. Claws digging into its sides to steady yourself, you're already biting at the highlighted target on the back of its neck. You wince internally, though, as you see the damage value pop up, only 29 when you expected something in the 50s. This one is stronger than the last two you fought. Higher level, maybe?
You don't lose your cool, though, and instead twist your body as the elk bucks, letting it launch you to the side rather than upwards. Your tail stabs back at it as you go, an effort of will forming a fiery blade forming around its tip that you drive into its side, for a more gratifying 43 damage. You land on your feet, turning around, and find the elk already bellowing with rage and charging at you, vicious antlers swinging.
You leap to the side, but don't quite clear the danger zone. The tip of an antler drags along your side, and you hiss. The default pain settings in this game hurt. You don't spare the attention to check your health, though, and instead pivot and leap for its side, claws raking at the weakened, burning part segment of hide. With a bark of pain and one last spasm, thankfully unaimed, it falls, digging a shallow furrow across the ground.
You let out a sigh of relief. The elk are definitely the most dangerous inhabitant of this forest you've encountered thus far, though granted that was only three types. The others are the Furred Serpents, snakelike creatures with vestigial legs and a penchant for burrowing through solid objects (fragile, and mostly annoying because they come from the weirdest places), and the Lurking Ursions, a kind of stalking insect that leapt on victims from above, locking themselves in place and jabbing the prey with a poisonous tail until it falls.
The Ursions are definitely your least favorite of the three, though less dangerous than the elks. It wasn't the ambushes – you can respect that, your ⟨Danger Sense⟩ gives you a head start on dodging them, and it's what gave you the idea to pounce on the elk – but their disguises. The Ursions gained their name from their fur-like coating and camouflage, which makes them look extremely similar to a local variety of small, otherwise-harmless canopy bears. You do not care for murderous insects disguised as fluffy, adorable mammals.
You tilt your head as you regard the body. It skidded to a stop against what looks like a worn-down but unmistakably constructed stone post. You scrape off some of the moss, wondering if it had any writing on it, but whatever was there seems to be worn away. Still an interesting find – there aren't supposed to be any ruins here in these woods, right?
Filing that away, you turn your attention to the problem at hand: harvesting.
While you're capable of harvesting the antlers by hand – you have sharp claws, after all – you're not sure that's a very good idea. Lacking the appropriate gathering skill tends to mean that the materials are downgraded in quality, which could cost you the quest. So what would be the best way to get it harvested… oh. Grumbling to yourself about missing something so obvious, you just place the whole body in one of your free
But you should probably wash the blood of yourself and patch up this gash first. A bloody-mawed and -clawed, bleeding animal walking into town would freak people out, given that you've only been around for a day or so. You'd be bothered if the sheriff chased you out of town so soon, and before you'd even gotten into a proper tea-house brawl.
The sun is setting by the time you get back to Lystin's alchemy shop. Thankfully, she's working late, and you find her in the lab. "Got your antlers," you announce as you pad into the back, walking over to the table where she's sitting, grinding something in a mortar, and fish the items in question out of your bag.
"Oh, hey Saph," she says absently, "just put them on the table, thanks. I'll take a look at them in a bit."
Taking that as an invitation to stay around, you move over to your new favorite place in the lab: your workspace. Taking the opportunity to pick up the ⟮Alchemy⟯ skill has proven to be pretty fun, actually; there's something very rewarding about the process, even if you can't do much more than mix a stamina potion.
Of course, picking up ⟮Alchemy⟯ doesn't make you an alchemist, any more than taking an engineering course makes you an engineer. As with most skills in Eclipse Arc, the most important elements come from having an appropriate Core Node. Core Nodes can increase the skill cap, provide unique abilities, unlock whole new crafting branches, and more, while skills simply enable the basic practice of the profession. That said, Core Nodes for a skill are most likely to be earned while doing quests and performing activities related to said skill, so learning the skill is still one of the best starting points.
You finish brewing the stamina potion with the glum 'poof' of a poor quality result and sigh. Your disappointment, though, is headed off by a notification popping into view.
You resist bouncing up and down excitedly, barely. An Insight meant another point to buy up an ability on one of a Core Node's trees, which meant you would get to see further down the tree, and–
"What the hell? Saph, where did you find these?" Lystin asks, and you dismiss the notification. You want to think over spending your points anyway. "These are huge, and have some strange properties I'll need to analyze."
You turn and find her turning one of the antlers over and waving a device that looked like a tuning fork and a hand saw had a baby over it. "Uh, I waited by a creek and ambushed one that came to drink."
"Hmm… did it seem to have any weird traits or abilities?"
You think about it and shake your head. It felt a bit weird to do as a Felixar, but it seemed to get your meaning across. "It was tougher than the others I've run into, but nothing other than that. I didn't give it much of a chance to showcase what it could do, though, so…." you pad over, looking at them more closely, but they just look like antlers to you. "What's so strange about them?"
"Hm… I'm not sure. This elk was eating something unusual, though, the antler's layers all throughout have a weird elemental composition and are high in magic energy."
"Is that a problem? Can you use them?" You mentally cross your fingers. It would be annoying if you went to all that trouble and didn't fit the quest completion requirements.
"No, no, not a problem at all." She smiles. "The opposite, really, these could be very useful; I'm going to call the initial lessons fully paid for. You're more than welcome to keep working here for a small material donation, of course, but there's not much I can teach you before you have more practical experience under your belt. Nothing that I'd charge for, anyway." She puts the antlers, and the strange tool, down.
"I've still got ongoing work for you, of course, if you want to take it, and…" she hums. "If you find out what this guy was eating or where he grew up, I'll buy that info off you for a fair sum. Worst case, it's more information on getting good quality ingredients here. For now though," she yawns. "I'm gonna kick you out for the night, closing up the shop."
You say your goodbyes and part ways, and a few minutes later you're breathing in the cool night air and trying to decide what to do with your evening.
[ ] [NIGHT] Head back to your inn room, rest, catch up on out-of-game messages. You may not have anything to do in meat-space right now, but you do still have friends outside the game, not to mention family.
[ ] [NIGHT] Head to the tea house. You can hear some kind of music coming from it, and you're pretty sure a few other players are regulars there. Could be a way to meet some folks.
[ ] [NIGHT] Head back into the forest. It's a bit unwise, but you're curious if it's different at night than it is in the day.
[ ] [NIGHT] Something else? Write-in.
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll do some more herb-gathering in the forest. Train your ⟮Alchemy⟯ with what you can use, sell off the rest, rinse and repeat.
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll go deeper into the forest. It's supposed to get more dangerous as you go deeper, but that means more loot! And if Listyn's comments about the antlers weren't a bread crumb you'd eat… something. A chair?
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll see about picking up some more quests. If you've exhausted this questline for now, maybe find a new one?
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll try to find some other players and party up with them. Help them out with their quests, group up to do your own exploration, and so on.
[ ] [MORNING] Something else? Write in
[ ] [INSIGHT] You have 2 Insights to spend. Each Insight buys one of the listed upgrades on the character sheet page. Write-in what you want to do with them, plan-style votes only.
[ ] [MISC] This category is a place for you to put other things that you want to get done in the short term but which either aren't mentioned or aren't big enough to be a vote on their own. Experimenting with specific skills, going shopping for something, investigating something you're curious about, etc. This quest is not going to be super directed, so don't be shy (though I do retain veto power). This isn't a strict vote per se, but rather a formalized place for you to show interest.
The ⟨Stealth⟩ status sits itself at the corner of your view. You're not sure you like your status list being there, but for now it will do – there isn't much use in agonizing the interface before you know what it's going to be like in serious content. Originally, the
Visibility icon floated next to it, but you hid it once you realized how the ability worked – while the icon is usable, there isn't much point when the ability ensures that you would simply be aware of your status. It was an odd sensation, one you couldn't really describe, but it was certainly convenient. It would suck to be having to constantly check your status while trying to infiltrate someplace.Speaking of infiltration… your ears perk up as one twig after another snaps, and your quarry enters the not-quite-clearing. Bladecrown Elk have proven themselves to be difficult prey thus far. While their dull gray coats are not particularly effective camouflage, they don't need it much; their elaborate antlers are made of what appears to be pure metal, tipped with wicked points and bearing razor sharp edges. Combine that with their size – a meter and a half or more at the shoulder – and their speed, and hunting them was much easier said than done. While your shotgun works, and has saved you from a close encounter already, melee combat does _not_ look to be an ideal proposition, and while you're slightly faster than they are, their endurance significantly exceeds yours. And unfortunately, your current mission requires that you collect undamaged antlers, something the gun is somewhat counterproductive for.
But you've been watching their behavior, and when they come to the stream to drink their guard is down. All you need to do, then, is wait _above_ the stream, and drop down onto one from above. From its back behind the antlers, and coming out of ⟨Stealth⟩, you should be able to get at least one chain of melee attacks off. With those, and a critical location, you _think_ you can finish it before it can turn and gore you, or kick your head off. You haven't let them hit you yet, but judging from the kind of damage they do to trees – and the alchemist's warning – it would be fairly unhealthy.
You creep forward, until you're close enough for an easy leap, and pounce. ⟨Stealth⟩ flickers off as you strike, but it's too late for the elk to stop you. Claws digging into its sides to steady yourself, you're already biting at the highlighted target on the back of its neck. You wince internally, though, as you see the damage value pop up, only 29 when you expected something in the 50s. This one is stronger than the last two you fought. Higher level, maybe?
You don't lose your cool, though, and instead twist your body as the elk bucks, letting it launch you to the side rather than upwards. Your tail stabs back at it as you go, an effort of will forming a fiery blade forming around its tip that you drive into its side, for a more gratifying 43 damage. You land on your feet, turning around, and find the elk already bellowing with rage and charging at you, vicious antlers swinging.
You leap to the side, but don't quite clear the danger zone. The tip of an antler drags along your side, and you hiss. The default pain settings in this game hurt. You don't spare the attention to check your health, though, and instead pivot and leap for its side, claws raking at the weakened, burning part segment of hide. With a bark of pain and one last spasm, thankfully unaimed, it falls, digging a shallow furrow across the ground.
You let out a sigh of relief. The elk are definitely the most dangerous inhabitant of this forest you've encountered thus far, though granted that was only three types. The others are the Furred Serpents, snakelike creatures with vestigial legs and a penchant for burrowing through solid objects (fragile, and mostly annoying because they come from the weirdest places), and the Lurking Ursions, a kind of stalking insect that leapt on victims from above, locking themselves in place and jabbing the prey with a poisonous tail until it falls.
The Ursions are definitely your least favorite of the three, though less dangerous than the elks. It wasn't the ambushes – you can respect that, your ⟨Danger Sense⟩ gives you a head start on dodging them, and it's what gave you the idea to pounce on the elk – but their disguises. The Ursions gained their name from their fur-like coating and camouflage, which makes them look extremely similar to a local variety of small, otherwise-harmless canopy bears. You do not care for murderous insects disguised as fluffy, adorable mammals.
You tilt your head as you regard the body. It skidded to a stop against what looks like a worn-down but unmistakably constructed stone post. You scrape off some of the moss, wondering if it had any writing on it, but whatever was there seems to be worn away. Still an interesting find – there aren't supposed to be any ruins here in these woods, right?
Filing that away, you turn your attention to the problem at hand: harvesting.
While you're capable of harvesting the antlers by hand – you have sharp claws, after all – you're not sure that's a very good idea. Lacking the appropriate gathering skill tends to mean that the materials are downgraded in quality, which could cost you the quest. So what would be the best way to get it harvested… oh. Grumbling to yourself about missing something so obvious, you just place the whole body in one of your free
Inventory slots. It wouldn't fit in your bag by any stretch, but the Inventory worked purely on a slot basis. This way, you can bring it back to town, where the butcher should be able to take it apart. Much easier this way.But you should probably wash the blood of yourself and patch up this gash first. A bloody-mawed and -clawed, bleeding animal walking into town would freak people out, given that you've only been around for a day or so. You'd be bothered if the sheriff chased you out of town so soon, and before you'd even gotten into a proper tea-house brawl.
The sun is setting by the time you get back to Lystin's alchemy shop. Thankfully, she's working late, and you find her in the lab. "Got your antlers," you announce as you pad into the back, walking over to the table where she's sitting, grinding something in a mortar, and fish the items in question out of your bag.
"Oh, hey Saph," she says absently, "just put them on the table, thanks. I'll take a look at them in a bit."
Taking that as an invitation to stay around, you move over to your new favorite place in the lab: your workspace. Taking the opportunity to pick up the ⟮Alchemy⟯ skill has proven to be pretty fun, actually; there's something very rewarding about the process, even if you can't do much more than mix a stamina potion.
Of course, picking up ⟮Alchemy⟯ doesn't make you an alchemist, any more than taking an engineering course makes you an engineer. As with most skills in Eclipse Arc, the most important elements come from having an appropriate Core Node. Core Nodes can increase the skill cap, provide unique abilities, unlock whole new crafting branches, and more, while skills simply enable the basic practice of the profession. That said, Core Nodes for a skill are most likely to be earned while doing quests and performing activities related to said skill, so learning the skill is still one of the best starting points.
You finish brewing the stamina potion with the glum 'poof' of a poor quality result and sigh. Your disappointment, though, is headed off by a notification popping into view.
You resist bouncing up and down excitedly, barely. An Insight meant another point to buy up an ability on one of a Core Node's trees, which meant you would get to see further down the tree, and–
"What the hell? Saph, where did you find these?" Lystin asks, and you dismiss the notification. You want to think over spending your points anyway. "These are huge, and have some strange properties I'll need to analyze."
You turn and find her turning one of the antlers over and waving a device that looked like a tuning fork and a hand saw had a baby over it. "Uh, I waited by a creek and ambushed one that came to drink."
"Hmm… did it seem to have any weird traits or abilities?"
You think about it and shake your head. It felt a bit weird to do as a Felixar, but it seemed to get your meaning across. "It was tougher than the others I've run into, but nothing other than that. I didn't give it much of a chance to showcase what it could do, though, so…." you pad over, looking at them more closely, but they just look like antlers to you. "What's so strange about them?"
"Hm… I'm not sure. This elk was eating something unusual, though, the antler's layers all throughout have a weird elemental composition and are high in magic energy."
"Is that a problem? Can you use them?" You mentally cross your fingers. It would be annoying if you went to all that trouble and didn't fit the quest completion requirements.
"No, no, not a problem at all." She smiles. "The opposite, really, these could be very useful; I'm going to call the initial lessons fully paid for. You're more than welcome to keep working here for a small material donation, of course, but there's not much I can teach you before you have more practical experience under your belt. Nothing that I'd charge for, anyway." She puts the antlers, and the strange tool, down.
"I've still got ongoing work for you, of course, if you want to take it, and…" she hums. "If you find out what this guy was eating or where he grew up, I'll buy that info off you for a fair sum. Worst case, it's more information on getting good quality ingredients here. For now though," she yawns. "I'm gonna kick you out for the night, closing up the shop."
You say your goodbyes and part ways, and a few minutes later you're breathing in the cool night air and trying to decide what to do with your evening.
[ ] [NIGHT] Head back to your inn room, rest, catch up on out-of-game messages. You may not have anything to do in meat-space right now, but you do still have friends outside the game, not to mention family.
[ ] [NIGHT] Head to the tea house. You can hear some kind of music coming from it, and you're pretty sure a few other players are regulars there. Could be a way to meet some folks.
[ ] [NIGHT] Head back into the forest. It's a bit unwise, but you're curious if it's different at night than it is in the day.
[ ] [NIGHT] Something else? Write-in.
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll do some more herb-gathering in the forest. Train your ⟮Alchemy⟯ with what you can use, sell off the rest, rinse and repeat.
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll go deeper into the forest. It's supposed to get more dangerous as you go deeper, but that means more loot! And if Listyn's comments about the antlers weren't a bread crumb you'd eat… something. A chair?
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll see about picking up some more quests. If you've exhausted this questline for now, maybe find a new one?
[ ] [MORNING] Tomorrow, you'll try to find some other players and party up with them. Help them out with their quests, group up to do your own exploration, and so on.
[ ] [MORNING] Something else? Write in
[ ] [INSIGHT] You have 2 Insights to spend. Each Insight buys one of the listed upgrades on the character sheet page. Write-in what you want to do with them, plan-style votes only.
[ ] [MISC] This category is a place for you to put other things that you want to get done in the short term but which either aren't mentioned or aren't big enough to be a vote on their own. Experimenting with specific skills, going shopping for something, investigating something you're curious about, etc. This quest is not going to be super directed, so don't be shy (though I do retain veto power). This isn't a strict vote per se, but rather a formalized place for you to show interest.
