They set out without too muning except to go south, where the test pukwudgies had been seen. Even so, there had been a brief discussion about what to look out for. The established greatest threats were, in asding order, pukwudgie ambushes, mountain lion ambushes, rge numbers of recklessly charging anything, especially javelinas, a wendigo, then anything that had overe the barrier to level 10. Though nobody had seen anything even especially close to that benchmark, they could instinctively uand how terrible it could be to enter something so far beyond their capabilities. It wasn’t long before they agreed to get moving before night actually fell.
The sun hadn’t quite gotten to the point of setting behind the mountains, but dark wasn’t too far off. Even so, with so many people who had gai least their first additional Skill around, the group was fident in doing something to the mohat surrouheir current home. Even so, they walked carefully, Zig and Stanton calling warnings for the slightest suspicious thing in their surroundings. The Acolytes, TJ had learned, were the best Css for scouting. All Acolytes’ Perception growth was +2 per level, and if they had an Occupation, as both Zig and Stanton did, they would gain additional Racial levels and whatever other attributes they could.
When he’d finally gotten around to asking, TJ learhat a Bloodline provided, beyond any additional attributes gai the time of Iion, two additional attribute points upon every Racial level acquired. For him, it was Vitality and Fixation, while he’d learhat for Stanton (after an unnecessarily long period of asking) it was Strength and Agility. Zig, from her Bloodline id the Celtic goddess, gained Wisdom and Perception. TJ hadn’t yet found a purpose for the Wisdom attribute, but Zig said that her Occupation’s, Huntmaster, base Skill gave a bonus to the damage dealt in proportion to her Wisdom attribute. Supposedly, it was negligible at this point, but what that would mean and do long term wasn’t lost on him.
Regardless of what each person’s Skills may be in the party, TJ felt secure in their vengeful endeavor. The fact that they called it vengeful was important, he supposed, sih had vowed to avehe loss of Peter’s eye and could thus feel where the guilty party was, in a general sense.
“I just know it’s that way.” The skinny man said, pointing. “How far or if it’s moving or anything, I don’t know. But it’s there.” His hand didn’t waver, though it shifted slightly as they all stood still.
“Want to start there?” TJ asked. “We see if we recover that Lifebloom too, while we’re at it.”
Stanton didn’t even deign to grunt in response, merely turning to look at TJ before his grey eyebrow rose in a disbelieving denial.
“The hell’s a Lifebloom?” Zig asked, though she only watched their surroundings.
“We’re not sure.” TJ responded. “Just that it was a magical pnt of some sort, and the pukwudgies stole it when they nearly killed Stanton.”
“Then we’ll find it and see if it’ll help everyone who’s hurt.” Zig decred. The rest of the hunting party made various sounds of approval, and TJ refocused himself on the forest. Shrouded by trees at least 50 feet tall, the shadows were long and everyone’s breaths fogged the chilling air. Some shivered lightly, but it was obvious that everyohere wearing ill-fitting or insuffit winter clothes had gained enough levels and Vitality to, if not be unbothered by the moderate southern winter, at least ok. TJ’s feet in the mostly destroyed mocs stepped cautiously, the crag of dead pine needles underfoot apanying their passage.
“Ining, above!” Zig shouted as she loosed a shot without taking more than a quarter of a sed to draw, aim, and fire. A pukwudgie corpse dropped, arrow in its eye, but the ambushers were far from done. A hail of spears fell, at least as many as there were hunters on the ground.
“I got it!” TJ shouted as, without activating Diving Transformation, he swirled a 15 foot wide weak vortex into being above them with Wind Manipution. Though most didn’t e all the way to where he’d anticipated, each spear ulled from its intearget and instead struck either pletely harmlessly against the ground, or merely gnced off of the shoulders of the hunters. TJ celebrated to himself as he saw that his MP was reduced only by 28 instead of if he’d forced every spear to e to him with the Copper tiered Skill after activating Diviransformation, as that would have exhausted at least double that.
The hunters all leapt into a, with the exception of Angelo, the Disciple with a Zealot dedicated to proteg him. Skills bzed into being, javelins, arrows, bullets, and more shredded through each pukwudgie they could see. None of the Zealots seemed to have Skills dedicated to any sort ed bat, but there were plenty of things to throw. The hail of things flying to the pukwudgies quickly knocked many of the creatures out of the trees, and TJ led the charge to kill those that had fallen. The flurry of kill notificatio unheeded, TJ seeing more than just those he’d directly participated in.
Overhead, the few pukwudgies that survived tried to flee. Only one was able to escape the final volley, its screaming warning its fellows of the hunters’ hostile presence. When the fourteen bodies sprawled on the ground were firmed dead by the System, TJ checked the notifications to see whatever cssification each pukwudgie had. Ranging from level 4 to 6, the test pukwudgies were nothing he hadn’t seen, and it was no surprise that there were ioned riders or the more melee focused types.
“Anything else?” Zig asked, her own eyes focused on their surroundings.
“No.” Charlie firmed. “It looks like it was just an opportunity they saw and decided to seize. Nothing on the ground that I see, and no more enemies approag.”
Stanton grunted his agreement as he held his hand to Suzie, the gun glowing a faint blue as his MP created and chambered more bullets.
“Good job on slowing that initial attack.” Charlie said as he walked up to TJ. “How much MP did it take, though?”
“Less than 30, so less than 10%. More like a twelfth of my total.”
“Good. Keeping people preemptively healthy when we’ve only got the one Disciple is key, even if we do have Stantoo help as well.”
Zig’s and cut through the quiet sounds of the more idle chatting.
“Listen up! Who’s lost at least 10% of their HP?”
Nobody respohough TJ wondered if one of the Zealots was lying, a faiain c the shoulder of his armor.
“Great. We’re moving forward, let me know if you drop below 50% of MP, HP, or Stamina. This isn’t some desperate, st ditch activity where we’ll o sacrifice ourselves, so don’t you even dream of keeping it hidden, however you’re feeling. I’m not letting this be some zombie B-movie where a mets themselves dead because they’re not talking.” As Zig finished her little spiel, she made eye tact with the same Zealot who TJ’d mentally he man, to his credit, didn’t seem fazed at her words, and TJ supposed it ossible that the cut looked worse than it seemed.
“We keep following me?” Seth asked, his vision tunneled on the pukwudgie he’d sworn vengean.
“Yeah.” Zig said after looking around the group. Her red hair seemed almost to glow in the dying light of su and she led the group from the ter of the massed body of hunters. TJ sidered activating Diviransformation, but he o trust in the people surrounding him. Traveling in the group still somewhat grated on him, needing to worry about everyone else’s safety as he worried about himself, but TJ reminded himself that he needed only to look out for himself for now. Whether he himself actually believed that statement was something he refused to fully front himself about.
The hunters tinued forward, their path clear enough under Seth’s guidahat nobody questioned wheh veered to the right, deeper into the forest and away from s and roads and even game trails.
“How far will we go before we decide to go bae, even if we find nothing?” Farid asked.
“Three hundred yards at most.” Stanton directly answered. “We ’t be out here in true dark. It’s their territory and we’ll be SOL if we’re stumbling through bushes during an ambush.”
Nobody disagreed with the old man’s stance, and the group decided to go only a set distance further. Thri that distance, a pair of coyotes lunged out of the brush and snapped with svering jaws at the humans, but there was never any true threat. Irospect, TJ realized they’d been lulled into a false sense of security. There hadn’t been any true threats, and so they’d begun to believe that there wouldn’t be any creatures intelligent enough to sacrifie of their o draw them further in.
When they’d nearly reached the point where they’d decided was the point of no trespassing, the wendigo appeared. Its eerie jaed in a ugh, and the pained gasping of air through its teeth set TJ on edge.
“You. e. Feed. Me.”
Without any further words, the wendigo luowards the hunting party. TJ Appraised it, and had to swallow past the sudden lump in his throat.
Wendigo, 7
The level had been increased by two, and though TJ couldn’t say exactly what that would mean for this individual, it wasn’t good.
“Strohan the one I killed st night!” He called. The chorus of aowledgement was interrupted by the sound of cws tearing through metal with a dist shriek. As or hoisted up his shield, the wendigo easily tore through the Zealot’s shield’s magically reinforced material. With a hiss of pain, it took less than a sed before or pulled bad shouted to the rest of the party, “Burned me! Iy shield!”
TJ rushed to ehe creature, but quickly realized he was just about the worst person to have do sht now. He had no armor beyond what his body and Diviransformation offered him, and he’d quickly learhat the chill of a wendigo’s cws easily bypassed his Toughness. For now, though it ainful for them, it was better to pit the wendigo’s attacks against the Zealots’ prote that wasn’t merely their bodies. Just as he sidered utilizing the whole of his MP to create a bde of wind to weaken or even kill the wendigo ht, a shuffle of sound in the nearby bushes reminded him of the other aspect of what made a wendigo so dangerous.
Three pukwudgies mounted on coyotes approached, their spears held high, and behind the wendigo, five more pukwudgies materialized.
Pukwudgie, 7
Pukwudgie, 7
Pukwudgie, 7
Pukwudgie, 7
Pukwudgie, 7
Coyote, 6
Coyote, 6
Coyote, 6
Pukwudgie, 6
Pukwudgie, 6
Pukwudgie, 6
ting the wendigo, the two groups were matched in numbers, and TJ wasn’t fident in matg up in quality. The wendigo’s voice, somehow soundi despite its desiccated nature, ughed out again, and TJ’s Wind Manipution seemed to scream that even the monster’s mere voice was a desecration to life itself.
“Feed. Good. Taste. Good.”
Without another word, the ehered host of enemies rushed forward, and there was no ce open to the hunters except to stand and fight. The idea of fleeing appealed to everyo seemed, but they’d have to sacrifice several of their panions to do so. TJ nearly did, but Stanton stepped forward and shouldered him towards the pukwudgies.
“Time to get to work.”
Cursing his cowardice, TJ did just that.
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