Chapter 13: I’m Your Curse

  The whisker flowers had a stench to them, like the inside of someone's unwashed mouth, a weird bacterial smell that made the hairs on his arms spike up. It looked gross too, a yellow goop that stuck to his skin like honey. Millie rubbed the concoction of whisker flowers into all of his wounds, grafting up the skin with hard bony material that was still flexible enough to move. It was similar to having a bug's exoskeleton on parts of his body, especially on his left arm.

  “Thanks.” Fay whispered.

  She didn’t respond, focusing on the fingers next, calcifying them as well. It was a miracle he hadn’t fainted yet, the fight was yet another one that ended with him keeling over towards death but being saved by this woman.

  Marx was already bouncing up and down, his shoulder wound wasn't too deep, and as soon as it stopped bleeding his vitality got to work and he could move both his arms. “Okay okay!” An hour had passed since the fight and he was just about ready to storm into the forest and finish blondie off.

  On the other side of the cabin, was an argument between Jason and Lily, and how she apparently knew that Thomas was coming over and didn’t tell a soul, she was in the corner cowering as Jason was loudly explaining to her that: “when you have an issue! All of us do! You can’t just keep us in the dark when you knew that this would happen!”

  And Lily would respond with: “Aaaaaa aaaa a aaa aaaa aaa a aaa aa aaaaa.”

  So they got nowhere. “Will I lose flexibility?” Fay asked as she fixed his fingers, she was running out of the concoction so she had to stitch up his side with the cabin's tools. Surprisingly they weren't rusty, it's like they were left here just for them.

  “Not entirely… your body will adjust.” She finished up while Fay activated his cloak again, he was a bit embarrassed about being shirtless in front of her. “It will look cool.”

  “Okay?” Fay laughed, “like a scarred warrior kind of way?” He got up and collected his dagger, this one was uncommon, with the same boosts as the mole knife, just the added bonus of an uncommon poison.

  “No.” She replied, putting away some of her materials. Bark was just about ready to finish up his scale armor and give each piece to each person, the boots to Fay, obviously. Apparently all they do is give common poison resistance and one agility each. Fay was hoping to score each piece to have a total of 5 agility but beggars can’t be choosers.

  “Alright… alright, guys I’m going to head out.” Marx opened the front door and let in some birdy noise, the sun was in the 10 AM variety now. “Fay, I’ll be back in an hour with Joey, we want you to join us, seriously.”

  “On what?” Fay scratched the inside of his ear with his pinkie finger.

  “The hunts! We need more tactical people or whatever, Joey’s words not mine.” He sighed, “please? I’ll give you an hour to think about it.” He was giving Fay puppy dog eyes, some sort of bond formed between them from the mutual hatred of that blonde boy. “We work well together.”

  “I'll go.” Jason stood and walked towards Marx, “I need to go.”

  “Oh! I don’t think I know your name.” He giggled, “Marx, yours is?”

  “Jason.” He held his hand out and got shaken, Marx tried squeezing his hand but couldn't squish the muscle, an impressed look formed on his face.

  “Jason… hm are you a tank? A bit short for that class.” He chuckled and moved his hand, “sure, we need someone to take a hit for Joey. I’ll let him know.” He looked over at Fay, “seriously consider it, I saw you out there, whatever happens tonight, we need you.” He left with a few hops down the broken steps, almost tripping before springing into a sprint into the forest.

  “Are you going?” Jason asked, closing the door again.

  “No? I mean… probably not, I don’t work well in team fights.” Fay scratched the back of his neck next, he was so itchy lately, a lot of phantom pain where the bruises healed, “I’ll get up to my own thing.” He needed to practice that blood stopping technique and refine it, he wanted to bring down the mana cost, optimisation with the skill was very important. But just didn’t have the motivation after that fight.

  “Yes!” Bark shouted, “level five! Okay okay I have three skills I can pick…” he looked down at the table where some boots were fitted, “uhhh… Millie?”

  “Yes?” Millie casually meandered over, with her arms behind her back, “what is it Bark?” She said fondly.

  “I have two Uncommon ones and one common.”

  “Tell me about them.” She smiled. “Please?”

  “Uhhh… Burden… common, Graft, uncommon… and then finger heater, uncommon.”

  Her face dropped and her posture returned into the unfriendly usual, “pick graft, it'll make you so you can put stuff together, useful for crafting.”

  “What about burden and finger heater?” Bark asked.

  “Burden is a combat skill, makes it so you can mark someone for a small debuff if you touch them, finger heater heats up your finger, neither of them are good.” She was listing things like her mind was above the clouds, her eyes weren't even looking at him anymore.

  “Go finger heater Bark, best of both worlds, you can use it to wield and as a combat ability.” Fay told him, “it levels up with use so just work on that and you should be able to reach higher temperatures easier, it'll be good.” Fay wished he had a skill like that, it was simple and could be used in a variety of ways, grafting, while useful, was a lot more closed off, though maybe he could use it to stick someone's sword to their hand? He didn’t know.

  “Fine, I'm sorry!” Lily shouted, “I didn’t trust any of you! Can you blame me?!” She cowered yet again in the corner, “nobody listens to me…”

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  Millie looked around the room and focused on Fay, “grafting would be better, he wouldn’t have to wait to craft, it would be a finished skill by level one.”

  “Yeah?” Fay groaned, this team was getting tiring, “Bark pick whatever, if you want to be furniture go for it, if you want to be a person pick the finger heater, I don’t care, I really don't." Fay walked to the table and swiped the boots off it, putting them on, “I’m going on a walk, thanks for the boots Bark.” Fay walked out the door and into the morning air.

  He was irritated, not only was the entire group almost wiped out because of stupidity but the person who could have helped decided to play dead for the entire fight. He stepped down onto the grass and walked in a random direction.

  “Fay!” Lily ran up behind him and caught up to his speed, keeping the pace, “can I walk with you?”

  “Yeah… yeah okay.” Fay felt bad for her, she wasn’t meant to be alive, that was clear, on day three people like her were supposed to be dead and rotting by now. That was just how this place functioned. Next the heroes will go, then people like him would go, the passives, leaving the enigmas like Thomas and Millie.

  Lily wasn’t dumb, he knew that she knew as well that her time was running dry, she chose a bad profession that couldn’t be leveled up unless she fought bigger bugs, she had a one time use skill, she was already locked in as a casualty. “Are you going to hunt with Marx?” She asked, her tone more somber and relaxed than usual.

  “I already said no… I’m too messy, I would ruin other people's coordination.” They took a turn, the forest opened up into some shrubbery and a stream of water that ran down some small pebbles. The water was clear and was likely where Millie was collecting their hydration.

  “Well, if it matters, you should go.” She stopped and dipped her feet into the stream, “ones like us have to leech off the strength of others…” She smiled and kicked her feet in the water, splashing some onto Fay's cloak. “Well, what do I know?” She crouched into the water and wet her orange hair, “ahhhh it’s warm.”

  “Eh… what was your life before all this?” He stepped into the water as well, seeing a fish scurry down the stream in a rush, “on the island?”

  “Uhhhhmmm.” She pressed her finger into her lip and thought long and hard, “I guess… It was fine, i have like… loaaadss of siblings, six brothers and four sisters, so when i got chosen they were like ‘let’s feed you to the wolves.’” She giggled, “but it was fine, loud, I had to scream a lot to get attention, food, water, it was loud. You?”

  “Opposite, quiet.”

  “Lucky!” She reached down and grabbed a smooth pebble from the bottom of the stream and played with it, running her fingers around the surface, “boring though.”

  “Very boring… but nice, I liked it.”

  “Not really living, is it? Being bored?”

  “Who’s to say?” He picked up a stone as well, and threw it at a nearby tree, knocking down a scared squirrel that trotted away. “Life is life, no matter how you spend it.”

  “Well if you spend your life doing nothing then how's that any different from being dead?” She threw her rock as well, “I like living.”

  Fay shrugged, “me too, I’m not sad or nothing… just like the quiet.” He stood up and groaned at his collected damage, almost dying twice in the span of eight hours left him bummed. He scratched at his arm, the itching, now that he was somewhere safe, became more obsessive.

  “Yeah…” She washed the pebble under the water, “I hear some bells in my head, it keeps sayin’ stuff like ‘tonight is your final night’ and stuff.” She groaned, “you ever had that?”

  “No.”

  “Huh…” she dropped the stone into the water, watching it sink to the bottom of the shallow stream. “I like that robe.” She smiled and took off her ring with a soft twisting motion, “anyways, if I’m going to die soon, then you might as well get my things. You know?” She took his hand, the one with the palm wound and put the ring onto Fay’s ring finger, the green one.

  [Ring of Lizard Tongue (UNCOMMON)]

  Made from the tongue of a lizard, this ring has the power of defense.

  +2 defense.

  +1 vitality.

  She put it on the other hand that didn’t have the snake king ring, as you could only have one ring per hand to get the boosts from them. “I have a few more, hold on, I still haven’t accepted my rewards.” A couple more stones fell out of her hand, she disregarded the green ones and kept the orange. She got a common bracelet and threw it into the stream, and also a yellow bracelet that was uncommon.

  “So many bracelets…” She laughed and put it on Fay, on the opposite arm that had the sea urchin bracelet. She saw the white stripes of his wounds, “if we ever get back home, these will make you quite popular.” She whispered intimately.

  [Bracelet of Core Fruit (UNCOMMON)]

  Made from the core of a hard gem fruit, this bracelet has the power of speed.

  +2 agility.

  +1 endurance.

  “And finally.” She took off the amulet and wrapped her arms around his neck, putting it on. “Red looks nice against that cloak.” She spoke into his chest and clicked it on the back of his neck.

  [Amulet of Wart Beast (UNCOMMON)]

  Made from the heart of a wart beast, this amulet has the power of regeneration.

  +2 vitality.

  +1 defense.

  “There you go…” she patted his shoulder and strolled back into the stream. “I don’t want to be looted when I’m dead, I want to be cremated, make sure to remember that silly.”

  Fay stood there, this was good, objectively, good, he just didn’t understand why. “Why?”

  “Because now, Fayyyy.” She put her finger to her mouth and grinned. “You are indebted to me. So keep me alive as long as you can, okay? In return.” She giggled, “I’m officially your curse.”

  “That's mean…” he began to laugh, "that's horrible. That's terrible.” He picked up another stone and threw it at another tree, his stats, especially the physical ones, were accelerated and the pebble broke some bark from the speed it was thrown at, “Why me?”

  “Because you have the likelihood to win, and I know you’ll probably keep to your word. I’m weak, I know that, and I can't catch up anymore.” She wiped her face with some water, “so go on that hunt with Marx? Get stronger, for me. Dummy.”

  Fay didn’t even know the girl all too well, she seemed completely useless. This act was just a final scramble to survive. “Fine.” He groaned, “fine.” He stepped out of the stream and felt the stats wash over him, the vitality and agility were the main ones, defense was also boosted, alongside his boots which gave one agility and one defense.

  He spotted a small rabbit in the bushes, waiting to ambush him. He gripped the knife firmly in his hands and clicked his tongue, making the creature leap out and towards him with rabid ferocity. Fay spun and slid the knife across the neck of the rabbit as it headed towards him, the knife, like going through butter, slid halfway through before the rabbit flung off the blade, hurting it mid air and creating a corpse on the floor where it landed.

  Lily clapped, “there it is!”

  [Slain Blood Rabbit (LVL 1)]

  +5XP

  Lily walked out of the stream and picked up the rabbit, “Oh! And don’t tell anyone about how you would die for me, some would see it as romantic.” She rolled her eyes, “this deal is confidential.” Her eyes twinkled in the bouncing light of the grass. In this light her hair was a very dull ginger, maybe even brown. He mostly only saw her in the cabin so it was hard to tell. But her eyes held a liveliness to them, a will to live that not many others had.

  “You’re staring.” She said, “rude.”

  “You’re just weird looking.” Fay turned around and felt exhausted, the hunting with Marx’s squad was going to be full of pleasantries and then shouting and commands and "don't go that way!”’s to Fay and probably some reprimanding and maybe even some infighting because Fay knew that he wouldn’t listen to whoever “Joey” happened to be. But he guessed it was worth it to remove the debt of these items he had gotten.