Proven Honor

"Are you Melpomene?" I ask curiously even though the player by that name was still offline. While offline, I could not see any of their information because we had not partied or done anything together to boost our friendship.

[Congratulations, Life Hack, you found me]

[+100XP]

[Acquired Title: Quick Witted]

[Quick Witted: Passive. Rare. For solving a hidden puzzle with little or no clues, you have proven your ability to speedily gather information and piece it together. +10 Intelligence]

Nodding to myself while writing out a message to my party for everybody available to meet at the usual south gate, I say, "Nice to meet you, Melpomene, I'm Life Hack. My people call me Hack, though, so feel free to call me Hack."

[That line where you immediately place yourself and other people in each others closer circles to force a relationship with NPC characters is genius, but you can do better. Nice to meet you. I am Melpomene, a moderator function for Bygone Era's operating AI. Would you like to receive your to-date quest rewards?]

[YES/NO]

"Yes, please, and thank you once again for all of your help," I say in a purposefully distant and professional manner while vaguely smiling now that the AI had a face. Or, rather, a name.

[+300XP]

[Acquired Gold x100]

[Acquired Unique Title: Proven Honor]

[Proven Honor: Rare. Passive. After having your character questioned you proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that asking was a waste of effort. As a person of priorities, you are now somewhat known for your dignity and strength of character and Non-Player Characters now trust you 10% more. +10 Imperial Reputation]

[Acquired Skill: Persuasion]

[Fusing Skills: Peddling+Persuasion]

[Fused Skill: Mercantile]

[Acquired Title: Honorary Merchant]

[Honorary Merchant: For unlocking the mastery skill of the Merchant class even as a classless you are now an honorary merchant. Sadly, you are not the first to do so. You may now open an AFG store while logged out. Selling prices can be convincingly set five percent higher and buying prices five percent lower until you have acquired your license]

I sent a private message to Go about unlocking the Merchant class mastery skill and that somebody who did not announce it had already claimed it first. He did not reply immediately but after a minute he simply sent the message 'good to know'. He was probably still upset about me unlocking all of these easter eggs while he was still trying to work on raising his level and stats.

When I met up with my team by the gates it was to find the Skooma had already come back online and was at the gate with Agnes. Since he was not in the party, I stopped in the distance and opened the party channel while saying, "Go." Go-Croak stepped off to the side from the group without even saying anything to the others and looked off into the distance. "Skooma and his sister, an off-tank DPS and a Summoner with their own warrior like Lil, what do you think? The others will be here by tonight to enjoy the secondary event I created so even if he spills we'll be the only ones to know the time-frame."

"He's younger and he's already not bad, we can groom him," Go agrees after only a few seconds of thinking. "She and Lil seem like they make a good back row team, we can move Ivana up to a midguard with you in the beginning now that she is using Swordplay as well as Archery. Through the goblins, Agnes and Lil can hold their own with familiars on the sides while everyone else is in front of the tunnel."

"Tell them they're coming to our training field," I inform him briefly before continuing on toward the gate to meet up with everyone. "Swear 'em to secrecy and tell them we might let them enjoy the fringe benefits if they prove reliable. Since I'm late we won't be doing any smithing but tomorrow night will be spent in the smithy. They may come."

When I finally met up with the group Skooma seemed happy to see me and asked, "You guys have a training ground? Did you change the landscape somewhere? I heard that unless you own the land it erodes pretty quickly."

"This one might only last another month or two," I say as if to say that he was right. "We use it becomes goblins appear in the area like crazy. You are good, Agnes had a good head, I like you guys. We're going to see how well you do and if you pull up our average we'll let you in on the goods in the future. Are you interested?"

"Yes," Agnes says before her giant panther person younger brother can respond. "I have an amazing mage as a sidearm thanks to you, she's already up two levels in one day and all she does is throw shadow balls. I watched you tank an attack that might have crisped me and worked in perfect fluidity with your team. What about Skooma's friends."

"Auxiliary," I state simply while meeting the older girl's gaze levelly despite looking down. She was only a little older than I was, I could even probably date her if I played my cards right. So, I bluntly and honestly said, "We'll let them in the clan but you guys have to show your support in a few ways up until the currency change. Afterward, all your loot is yours but until the very day before we take half of what you get from the training ground to fund the clan. So far I only take the special loot from everyone else but we all came to this game together. That's also why I'm letting your friends in on the side."

"They're just fodder as far as I'm concerned," Agnes replies, proving that she was the shadow leader of their outfit. She was probably the person who pushed a physically inclined younger sibling to play a VR game which supported two-way currency conversion. "You lead, we'll follow."

"Go is the leader," I with a quick wink, briefly glancing at the naturally bulky arms of his half-orc character. "I'm just the brains. Ivana is Go's handler, Lil is our main mascot, Papi is the wallet. We also have two more magic characters and a shield guardian. Welcome aboard, follow me," I say at last before briskly walking off while going through my menus and inventories.

The affect of traveling with a team of seven as compared to a team of ten was not that bad, the most enemies like goblins or tree vermin that we would see in a confrontation were around ten. The extra few would pick random targets every time and become a little annoying, but at least it was still daylight. After that was when we might start taking damage as ferecats and dusk imps or nightwings attacked.

When we finally came to the meadow the sun was just starting to set on below the distant horizon at around seven in the evening. Sir Beryl was pleasantly waiting by his fire reading a book to pass the time when we exited the grasses noisily. He and I exchanged a few pleasantries before I pulled him off to the side to inform him that I was testing two people to see if they were good enough for my party.

Afterward I asked him what he knew about Lady Mara and her family to find myself surprised when he says he was once married into the family until his wife and child died during birthing. I informed him of what had taken place with Lana's part of the family and he immediately went to his stuff by the fire. Then he started writing letters.

Bringing three wax-sealed envelopes to me, he says, "Bring these to anybody in a guard's uniform in the city and tell them to deliver them on my orders. If they question it then ask them if they're questioning these seals and if they say anything besides 'no, sir' then tell them you have permission to slap them until the straighten up. They'll know."

"Yes… sir," I say hesitantly, unsure of whether or not I should go through with this but unwilling to argue with the traces of anger in the older knight's eyes. "I'll be sure to exhaust all other means before actually placing my hands on law enforcement. Will you be okay?"

Looking at me with a hint of surprise, Sir Beryl suddenly steps forward and flicks me in the middle of my armored chest with his index finger coming off of his thumb. That one flick packed enough punch to make me take a step-and-a-half back before regaining my balance.

"See that?" Sir Beryl asks with an almost proud smile. "The average bloke would have been on their ass after that, you're still on your feet and looking me in the eye. You're going to be that girl's right hand? Why wouldn't I be alright? Their family has a little me watching over them!"

"Aside from the bruised sternum, I actually appreciate you're confidence," I say while using First-Aid to recover half of the health I had just lost before making my way toward the fire. "None of these letters seem to be for the family, though… is that okay?"

"Since I no longer have a proper connection, it would tarnish their reputation for me to step in and help their situation at this point," he says while shaking his head. "These people are people I know. The young lady you've told me about likes to go hunting and training with you? Once of them is a Master-Of-Arms who can train her in anything she wants. The next one is a merchant group I have some relation with, they can work together to help them get on their feet again."

"Who is the third letter for?" I ask curiously when Sir Beryl simply stops talking, taking out a stack of goblin and dusk imp materials. "Everybody, armor session! Get to work!"

Even though what my team was used to doing at a command like that was stockpiling pre-cut pieces of material to develop their skills slowly before bulking their experience gain in the next session, I could only hope that Skooma and his sister got the hint from their actions.

"The third letter is for the various city watch captains to familiarize themselves with," he says pointedly but still slightly vaguely. "What are you guys up to, now?"

Working on cutting out the pieces of goblin and dusk imp skin to make a 'savage' style belt, I say, "Last time with our 'basic' equipment sets we made it more than halfway through the second set of waves. Now, we have more people and more familiars and I'm going to make armored accessories to increase everybody's stats. We're running one big test to see how far we can push things in smaller numbers before my entire group gets together."

Watching as I seamlessly switch to spitting sticks of meat to cook over his fire after preparing the materials for numerous belts, Sir Beryl asks, "How big, exactly, is this group of yours?"

Smiling as Cweeper comes up to watch the cooking meat for me, I say, "Originally, it was a full party of twelve on this continent but two are distant so I pulled in the panther and his halfling friend and their friends will be my porters. I'm building a clan, my friend. I think I've mentioned this before."

"Why does this make me feel as though I am responsible for training a rebel army," Sir Beryl sighs tiredly before walking off to talking with my friends.

Left alone I just went back to putting together more belts the same way I made the Survival Belt prototype. The difference was that instead of ferecat skin there were two layers of thicker goblin and dusk imp hides used to make the belt and simply braided weaving. Not surprisingly, between my titles and skills the armor actually came out really good.

[Successfully Created: Shadow Hunter's Belt]

[Saved Quick Crafting Recipe: Shadow Hunter's Belt]

[+55XP]

[+55 Primitive Crafting XP]

[Primitive Crafting Leveled]

[+12XP]

[+55 Leather Work XP]

This new belt came out with a whopping fifteen defense and three-percent resistances to fire element, darkness element, and magic in general. In a five-piece suit that would give me fifteen percent, adding this belt would be eighteen percent resistances that probably compounded together. On top of this, the others would probably receive thirteen defense from this and the other pieces of the suit should have the same.

NOW I started adding the extra bits, working dusk imp and goblin claws into the outer weaving of the main front pad of the belt as well as in between the goblin and dusk imp layers. When I was done, the defense rating had gone up to eighteen for me which would probably become sixteen or seventeen for the others. Once again, the rest of the suit would match.

My hope was that a body coverage item like a coat would not only offer more defense for the amount of material used but also more resistance because of the amount of material used. However, I was not going to take the time to make one to find out just yet.

After only an hour-and-a-half I had completed a full set of belts for the team and called an end to everybody's crafting time before handing them out. As I thought, everybody without a light armor related skill received sixteen defense from the belts but unlike my thoughts our druid, summoner, and once-pure archer received the full eighteen from the belt. Until I started incorporating metal into my armors I would need to get myself a light armor skill somehow.

Even though there were two more people who would end up exponentially increasing our enemies, one was a heavy melee user like Go and Papi while the other was basically another druid who used temporary familiars and multi-target attacks. As their skills and levels grew, they would even start doing causing status affects to support their familiars. The others were all due for new skills soon, too, if they had not gotten them already.

"What, exactly, are we doing?" Skooma asks after I had put everyone in their positions and Sir Beryl started walking away.

Lil and Agnes were both placed off to either side of the tunnel entrance with their imp familiars- all in armor- and a burning wolf nearby. Papi was standing directly ahead of the tunnel where I would usually be while Go and Skooma were standing a little less than ten yards away to either side. Ivana and I were both placed to behind and to either side of Papi with our bows at the ready.

"You'll see, just be ready to fight for a REALLY long time," I warn him quickly while the back row of everyone else' dusk imp familiars formed a back row of lesser mages Then my vision flashed. "The event is starting! Hold your ground!"

Even though I was still using the same bow as last time I did not worry about killing my the enemies for loot like last time. This time I simply spread the few arrows I got to fire across multiple bodies. After dropping their damage by half, the front line only needed to land a finishing blow before I received my party share of the experience.

*