Born A Monster, Chapter 12 - Scullery Slave

Born A Monster

Chapter 12

Scullery Slave

For a people who are part horse, centaur tribes seemed to move slowly. I mean, yes, individual centaur can move quickly, but the males are often burdened with carts and A-frames and saddlebags.

And some females, although they seemed to have lighter loads.

In other words, lots of stuff, much of which can't fit in System inventories.

It would take a full day for the Clan to reach the wood, during which I was to show my new masters everything I knew about the wood. I don't see why I couldn't just send my map from my System to theirs, but – mind magic.

So I took the daunting ride via centaur back, and began showing them places. Where the Satyr and the feywood were, the sunken area that had been Birimirihiirp's, and much of the eastern part, the bounty of which impressed them.

I did one thing which might have been regarded as a betrayal. When I saw the wolves watching in the distance, I told them to run, sent an image of the Clan's numbers, an image of the bears leaving the wood.

Well, that wolf didn't understand, but he returned with a grey with white spots. She reacted with FEAR, and the two of them ran. I never saw those wolves or their pack in the woods after that, and I like to think they got away.

The centaur took inventory of every food node and creature in the wood that they saw.

They spoke in different languages, I think to keep me confused, but I picked up a few words and was even able to guess others and feed those to the System. Some of those guesses were even right.

They were thrilled to find picked over goblin bones and skulls. They were less thrilled to find stockpiles of goblin equipment.

"They want you to deconstruct these inferior items and turn over any raw materials you get." Sent Lady Chalcopiye, my most direct owner.

What? I knew the System could control my body to make stuff. I suppose –

"What are you doing?"

"I'm preparing to take these items apart."

"In your System inventory. System deconstruction only takes place in a System inventory."

Okay, I pulled everything out of my System inventory.

I was prepared to tell Chalcopiye I didn't see any way to start deconstruction- when suddenly I did.

It produced roughly one fourth the resources needed to build something, never of greater quality, and usually of less. Condition was proportional to that of the source item.

Deconstructing tools, weapons, armor – each seemed to have its own skill. The only advantage that I saw was that the process cleaned the materials.

Nothing dinged, no XP meters changed. But it didn't require me to pay attention to it. I would drop off the source materials, pick up an item, place it into inventory, start the process, and be about my next task. Whenever I reached a break, I'd check, and repeat the cycle if the deconstruction was complete.

And then materials started vanishing from the storage area.

#

I did, that same day, discover who had been taking them. Her name was Theodara (I know, I mistook it for Theodora, also) and she was a young blonde with an eel-like temperament.

I didn't speak the language, she did. Guess who got blamed and threatened with being skinned and turned into boots if it ever happened again.

"They no longer want you anywhere near the storage tents." Chalcopiye told me.

"But that's-"

"I know. Truthspeaker. Now you learn how little that means when you cannot speak the language."

Oh, and I was also flogged. Sure, it's easy to say now. It is less easy to endure. Everyone believes they are brave until the pain starts. I did pass out midway, and survived. Four days later, I was even able to resume my physical training regimen.

It was seven days for the mystic training; turns out that you can't focus on both scarring injuries and the mystic world. Or maybe you can; it could just be my flaw.

"So what do they want me to do, cook?"

"Hm, not exactly. They don't want you near the food, either."

Not only not near the food, but also they didn't let me forage. I was given enough food that I didn't starve, but biomass evolutions were on hold for the foreseeable future.

Washing pots, pans, dishes, laundry – these were tasks they trusted me with. I didn't even initially have a problem with it. Oh, taking loads of clothes from children that they were supposed to wash for their families was a chore, but labor was labor.

Labor was great for draining the fatigue meter down to zero, and it could be automated through the System.

I almost didn't even mind when my work was inevitably interrupted by She Who Bites, although most days she stayed downriver and didn't bother me.

Then, when the trees were void of leaves, I gained proficiency in the Labor class Manservant.

[Congratulations, through training you have unlocked Manservant, a Labor class.

Level 1, 100/300XP

10 Development Points awarded, you now have 12 DP.

Cultivation methods unlocked:

Household, level 0, 0/10 XP

Labor, level 2, 50/60 XP

Service, level 2, 50/60 XP]

What? WHAT? What use could there be for such a class? Why would anyone willingly DO this with their life?

And I almost missed noticing that my divisor was now 20. TWENTY!

I suppose I should have been glad to at least have a hard number. Instead, I noticed two points of serenity and one of sanity missing from my meters.

Just salt to rub into –

[Achievement update, you have reached 75% complete with the following achievement:

Path of the Polymath – achieve level one or above in classes from ten different categories.

This achievement is now 8/10 complete.]

- into the wound.

What was it that Eihtfuhr had said about achievements?

I almost didn't notice that I was washing clothes almost 10% faster. In fact, the power Efficient Cleaner made any use of the Cleaning Skill or any of its subskills 10% quicker. It was an Inherent power, always on, like my Longevity.

Foolishly, I thought I could turn this to my advantage.

#

I'd unlocked a power from Herbalism called Locate Herbs, which allowed me to (sometimes) locate herbs above my normal skill limits. The System called these "critical successes", but they seemed more like bonuses than something important. Maybe it was because my divisor was too high?

I had thought that I could spend the time saved through Efficient Cleaner to find herbs, and turn those over.

No such luck; one child or another reported my "laziness". I was beaten until I passed out, and my life made more miserable. Each day, another child was assigned to keep me busy with various tasks during any time I wasn't cleaning.

Some of them bothered to speak to me, usually to mock my accent or vocabulary. But not all of them.

"What are goblins?" asked Thonalin, son of Parama. Yes, that Parama.

"Goblins are one of the humanoid peoples, the weakest form of the goblinoid race." I had an idea. "Why do you ask, Thonalin?"

"Are they really, really stupid?"

"Compared to Centaurs, they are deficient in many ways, but I wouldn't use really twice as a measure of their stupidity."

"My dad says they must be some special form of stupid to keep coming into the woods."

"Ah, so the goblins haven't gone away."

"Oh, our patrols send them away screaming, but dad says they keep coming back."

"I've noticed that your father always wins against the goblins."

"He says they never have any chance. Our Sagittarii swat down their patrols with ease."

"Then while there are Sagittarii to stop them, it seems you don't need to fear goblins."

"That's not what Maegaria says."

"Your second mother?"

Thonalin nodded eagerly.

"What does she say?"

"She says I need to practice my archery every day, so that I can become a Sagittarius when I grow up."

"Do you wish to be a Sagittarius when you grow up?"

"I guess. I mean, adults are mostly Sagittarii, right? Even those who can do other stuff?"

"I admit, it seems that way to me also."

"Yeah, Sagittarii are cool. I wanna – hey!" he picked up a length of branch. "Get back to chopping firewood!"

"Yes, young master."

The massive amounts of lumber collected by the clan were for something that was to be a longhouse, some kind of structure massive enough to hold the entire clan safe during winter. I was imagining Mother Bear's lair, but built on a massive scale.

The adults did that, and I helped the older children generate firewood.

Just as cooking adds nutrition to food, careful chopping of firewood somehow made the wood last longer. I had discovered that if I focused just right, I could use Nature mana as well as my fatigue meters to empower the crafting.

I know, that seems wasteful, but it let me continue my Mystic Training Regimen without being noticed.

Slowly, my maximum reserves of mana were expanding.

I had even developed my first nature magic spell, One With Nature, which made it harder to spot my life-force with nature magic. Like all magic, it didn't always work, and the Serenity drain on failure was higher than I liked, but at least I'd never sprouted leaves or roots while casting it.

Sadly, it did nothing for my stealth versus other senses, but it was a start. It wasn't like Soothing Waters, which allowed me to regain Sanity, was that great, either.

#

I had a covert reason for asking the children what they wanted to be as adults. It had made visible the Science branch of classes, which in theory made Path of the Polymath accessible.

I had, unknowingly, picked up quite a bit of Anatomy cultivation, which would, hopefully, unlock the Science class Naturalist.

(I think I should put in an appendix with my rants about a System that doesn't tell you things unless you know exactly what to ask for. My magical beast level growth had slowed, but not stopped, and it had gone up one when I discovered the Manservant class. Stupid System.)

But – how the heck did one train for the Psion classes? They seemed to use some manner of energy (psi points) that had sub categories. It was like, but unlike, mana.

The basis of the power seemed to come from a statistic whose name I didn't know, probably because I had it at zero. A greyed out zero, not a black one, but zero nonetheless.

So, barring a miracle, I needed to discover some other category of classes.

The clan children were a fountain of ideas. I could have thought for months and not come up with as many insights as from a week of talking with children.

Well, yes, technically I was also a child. But I had a trait for Curious, not Creative. Maybe I could develop that trait?

Say what you will against a life of drudgery, it gives you plenty of time to think and consider your cultivation.

It also left me surprised the night that goblins actually broke into the camp.

#