Everlast Online

Within the [Grass Sea] a large cloud of smoke was clearing. In reality it was 3 magic smoke-bombs, each distorting the area around a target to trap them inside; a perfect way to separate and assassinate an enemy.

As the smoke dispersed it revealed 3 women surrounded by dozens of corpses.

The women were wildly different from one another in size, race and stature. A cat-beastfolk panting tiredly as she sits on the corpses of assassins; a knightly woman wiping blood from her tail; and finally a short puppet girl with her stitched mouth spread in a wild grin, pleased with the carnage her summons had caused.

"We should leave, master." Gloria finally spoke, breaking the silence, "It is possible that more assassins are waiting to kill us."

"Got it." Liz smiled, looking over her status page. 

Each of the girls had levelled quite quickly. The dual wielding assassin had been the strongest she had fought, but Liz had still managed to reach level 78; though that wasn't what made her so happy:

====

Name: [Smokey]

Race: [Abandoned Doll] (Attributes)↓

Class: [Necromancer (78)]

Title: <Defy The Odds> <Bandit Killer> <Lizardman Slayer> <D-rank Monster Hunter> <Learned> <Swamp Matriarch> <Sewer Dweller>

[Reputation: 18,100] [Gold: 531,677]

Stats: [STR: 13 (+2)] [END: 40 (+2)] [AGI: 85 (+8)] [INT: 138 (+25)] [SOU: 100/100]

Race Skills: [Voodooist (S)]

Class Skills: [Summon - Skeleton Warrior (3) (F)] [Undead Enhance (5) (F)] [Greater Bone Spear (3) (E-)] [Summon - Golem (3) (E)] [Summon - Skeleton Archers (3) (E)] [Summon - Skeleton Soldier (3) (E+)] [Summon - Undead Beast (2) (E+)] [Soul Sight (9%) (E+)] [Leach Bolt (4) (D-)] [Blood Donor (2) (B+)] [Raise Horde (2) (A)] [Soul String (0%) (S+)]

Soul-Bound: <Gloria (51)>

Other Skills: [Swordsmanship (19%) (F)] [Shieldmanship (13%) (F)] [Archery (10%) (F)] [Dismantle (28) (F+)] [Traveller (19%) (E)] [Dark Fist (2) (D-)] [Dark Claw (4) (D-)] [Dark Slash (4) (D-)] [Multitask (61%) (D+)] [Apothecary (80%) (C)] [World Map (A)] 

[Inventory]↓ [Equipment Menu]↓

[Player Auction]↓ [Currency Conversion]↓

====

She had finally pushed [Puppet Hand] to level 10, gaining her newest skill:

[Soul String (0%) (S+): Allows user to manipulate their soul into the shape of a string (More↓)]

[Soul String (0%) (S+)]

• [Unlocks <SOU> stat]
  • [<SOU> stat cannot be increased using free stat points]
• [Extended soul can only be sensed/damaged by Soul-Type skills]
• [Extended soul can be tethered to soulless components]
  • [Can freely control tethered components]
  • [Soulless components require use of 1 soul point to tether]
• [Extended soul can be tethered to souled components]
  • [Can freely control the body of tethered component]
    • <Tethering does not grant access to component's skills>
  • [Souled components require varying amount of soul points to tether]
  • [Based on following variables:
    • <Resistance to manipulation-type skills>
    • <Resistance to soul-type skills>
    • <Overall soul strength>]

Fucking hell... That's a lot of information. Liz thought, smiling nonetheless. It was clear how powerful this skill was, just from the fact it unlocked another type of stat. Looking over her new [SOU] stat (presumably soul) she found she couldn't interact with it in any way.

It was like it was greyed out, not allowing Liz to add the free stat points she had gained to it.

I suppose there are other ways to increase it. Liz understood, but with another type of stat Liz would have much more variety and open her up to many more soul-type skills in the future - possibly even attacking types.

While Liz immediately wanted to test her newest skill, she felt it would be better to get her quest over with.

The 3 women got onto Liz's hounds and headed out of the [Grass Sea].

Nina spent most of her time trying to figure out the best way to acquire another illusion-type skill; eventually settling on buying one as the best possible way to do so.

Gloria also managed to pass the threshold into level 50, becoming level 51 and gaining her skill:

[Inevitable Demise (1) (A-): Expend your own vitality in order to massively increase all stats. Cooldown - 5 minutes (More↓)]

• [Vitality refers to user's HP]
• [Stat increase scales with amount of vitality expended in the ratio of 2:1]
• [Buffed stats return to normal after skill is deactivated]
• [User inflicted with {Exhaustion} debuff for 5 minutes after skill is deactivated]
• [User cannot be healed while the skill is active]
• [User cannot be healed for 1 minute after skill is deactivated]

(A/N: Gain +2 in all stats per 1 HP spent, this will increase as level of skill does)

(A/N: {Exhaustion} lowers stats by 1/4 temporarily)

Gloria was happy to have this skill, not that she planned on using it often; it was a finisher skill, not one that can be easily put to use - at least not without a regenerative-type skill.

Each of the girls had come out on top in the fight, more so than they had originally expected.

---

After some time the party made it out of the [Grass Sea], not any better off, but much more annoyed.

They had been attacked by monsters 12 more times before they finally got out of the hunting field. The annoying part was a mixture of their numbers and their levels being too low to cause meaningful change to their levels.

"We'll be there soon, master." Gloria spoke, Liz and Nina just nodding; and Gloria was right, the forest Barview had hidden his shack in was now in view.

Right as the first of Liz's two hounds, something unexpected happened, causing Liz and Nina to look up in shock:

Liz was surprised for a moment before she broke out in a grin.

Over time she had come to hate Golden Radiance and for him to be shown up again was enough to be happy for her. Even when he had achieved something, someone else had done something better.

"Is that good or bad?" Nina asked, turning slightly. Liz only shrugged in response.

"It doesn't really matter. Though if you ever want to make a guild then there's how..." Liz said, getting a strange look from Nina as she did.

"You're not going to make a guild?" She asked, slightly bewildered.

"Why bother?"

"Well... For influence." Nina responded.

"Who would even join. You, my sister and her 2 friends are the only people I trust." Liz had a very small circle of people she trusted.

"In most games allow players to make guilds with a minimum of 5 players you know." Liz only shrugged at this, telling Nina she would consider it, but nothing was set in stone.

"We're here." Gloria said, breaking the silence after they had continued deeper into the forest, finding a shack sitting in a small clearing.

Liz's hounds slowed, allowing the women to dismount. Each looked around apprehensively in case of attack before a stoic-looking man exited from the shack, looking at the women with uncomfortable intensity.

"Do you have the package?" The man finally spoke, his voice deep and baritone. Liz just stared at him for a moment, trying to reciprocate the intimidating feeling that was being directed at her, but eventually she spoke as well.

"Gloria." With Liz's command Gloria took the sack from her back and threw it at the man, not closing the distance at all. The bag landed with a thud, the contents grunting in discomfort.

The man walked forward and checked the contents of the bag before tightening it once again; confirming the delivery. With that he put his hand into his pocket to pull out 2 items: A letter and large crate - indicating his pockets had been magically enhanced as there was no way a box as large as the one he had pulled out would ever fit normally. Having delivered the rewards the man turned, sack over his shoulder, and walked into the hut.

After a few moments had passed with the 3 women alone, Liz -as the de facto leader of the group - walked forward and inspected the 2 items:

[Letter (---)]

[A letter addressed to Smokey]

[Crate (---)]

[A box]

That was useless. Liz thought before placing the 2 items in her inventory to bring her quest to its end:

With these rewards, I'd bet the armour and skills are in the box. Liz thought, before dismissing the notification. And the next quest would be... The letter then.

Liz didn't feel the best about perusing through a box in the middle of a forest likely full of monsters, bandits and maybe even players considering how many she had begun to spot in the capital city.

The 3 women rode on the backs of Liz's hounds all the way back to the capital. Each of them got the title: [Noble Kidnapper], with its primary use being a +5 in STR and AGI. The other ability it granted was an increase in stealth when acting against a noble.

The ride was smooth with no interruptions; with the exception of Nina's request:

"Hey Liz, can we stop off at a skill shop before opening the packages?" Nina asked as she leaned forward.

"Why?"

"I managed to find a hidden class, but I need another illusion skill beforehand." Nina explained, telling Liz about her accomplishment. 

Liz laughed at the path of progression Nina was going through. She had started to play the game with the intention of becoming an [Explorer]; instead she became a [Thief] and finally this [Duplicitous Jester] class - not at all the way she wanted to play.

Liz obviously agreed, wanting to see the kind of class [Duplicitous Jester] was.

The 3 women entered the capital's skill shop and began looking around specifically for illusion-type skills.

The trio eventually narrowed down the selection - as underwhelming as it was - to 3 skills:

[Fear Pheromone (D-): Release a cloud of invisible gas that when ingested has a small chance to inflict <Hallucination> debuff. Chance and power of debuff scale with skill level and STR]

(A/N: <Hallucination> is an upgraded version of <Fear>. Basically think scarecrow's fear toxins from batman)

Each of the 3 women recognised this as a powerful skill immediately, an AOE debuff skill was surely hard to come by, but an advanced one. Obviously, the chance was rather low and the duration of the debuff was also likely low as well. Still, this did little to lower the value of the skill however.

[Voice Throwing (E): Allows users to alter the source of their voice. Range scales with skill level. Cooldown - 5 Seconds]

This was a safe choice, it had a single usage and nothing more; but what it did was entirely useful and somewhat foolproof.

[Out of Sync (D-): Alter the perception of a single target to be 0.5 second out of sync for 5 seconds. Power of illusion scales with skill level and INT. Cooldown - 1 minute]

[Out of Sync] was the obvious choice for clear reasons, but only in combat. In a fight, this could literally make or break the fight - allowing Nina the ability to fight should her assassinations go sideways. But it was a strange skill, with both a cooldown and a mana cost. More than that - according to the shopkeeper - at low levels it was incredibly easy to resist its effect and the only thing increasing the level did was making the skill harder to resist; no increase in time.

Nina spent quite a while mulling it over, until she came to a final decision. Having hardly any combat ability did nothing but annoy her, swaying her decision until she fell wildly into [Out of Sync]; desiring to no longer be a burden to her team - not that anyone felt that way about her.

"We good then?" Liz asked as the trio left the shop, "Wait. Don't use the skill yet, let's get to an inn."

This stopped Nina from using the skill immediately as Liz thought it would be better to get all their rewards at once.

The 3 found a discreet inn where they sat looking at the 2 items they had received.

The letter was simple, Liz broke the seal and looked over the contents.

The gist of the letter was that Liz should come and find the Marquise in a week, that being the time when they will likely have gotten and confirmed information from the baron. As Liz finished reading the letter aloud, a screen appeared in front of them; confirming her suspicions:

Liz nodded and obviously accepted the quest before turning to open the crate.

Unfortunately, it was made of wood and sealed shut; so after trying for around 5 minutes, all 3 in silence besides Liz's pathetics grunts and groans, they then asked Gloria to pull it open - who did it with her bare hands in less than 5 seconds.

As Liz panted, feeling bad about her strength before finally looking through the box.

However, as she did Liz received quite a shock. There were 3 sets of items, not 2 like she had expected; meaning Gloria also qualifies for rewards. Externally Liz showed only happiness, but inside she was screaming at herself for not summoning Gloria as she turned in the last quest the Marquise had given her!

She could have gotten even more skill scrolls and weapons.

For a while she only stared at the items with fake joy, until Nina finally coughed forcing Liz to acknowledge the past is not something she can change.

Liz sighed before pulling out the items, handing over each participant's scroll and box - the box containing the armour specific to their class.

"Finally time to move up in the world." Nina laughed, clicking accept on her class upgrade.

Notification after notification ran through Nina's screen as she gained new skills and abilities: But the most surprising addition to her status was one she had not been expecting in any form: 

[Charm (1) (C): Allows user to control/manipulate a single target. Skill scales with skill level and CHA]

I unlocked a new stat! Nina screamed internally, had she not been trying to impress Smokey she would have been jumping with joy all around the room right now.

Nina had acquired the Charisma or [CHA] stat, that increases how other people respond to you and your action. Of course it can't go past a certain point without the use of skills, but someone with a high [CHA] stat is more likely to get away with any illicit behaviour.

THis of course was the magnum opus of Nina's class-up, but her other new skills were nothing to scoff at either. 2 of her illusion skills had merged into one far greater than either had been previously, while 4 others had undergone evolutions:

[Trickster's Performance (1) (A+): User can alter their appearance and create pseudo-clones, drains mana during use. Illusion quality/mana drain scale with skill level and INT]

(A/N: pseudo clones have physical bodies but are incredibly easy to destroy and cannot use skills)

[Acrobatics (0%) (E-): Improve all abilities relating to acrobatics]

[Opportunistic (0%) (D+): Guides the user through all interactions to assist in getting the best possible outcome]

[Knife Juggler (0%) (E): Improves user's ability with knives. Improves user's abilities when throwing knives]

[Deceive (1) (C): Allows user to imbue their voice with mana to make any target who hears it believe what is said, can be resisted. Manipulation potency scales with skill level and CHA]

Each of these skills were extremely useful for Nina, and she was beyond excited to have them. She couldn't help but allow a goofy grin to spread across her face as she looked over how much her abilities had improved; and while she was slightly upset to once again not have received any direct combat skills, she understood not to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Seems your class is good, huh?" Liz said, also smiling.

This seemed to awaken Nina from her daze as she became slightly flustered at the sight of Smokey and Gloria watching them.

"Ahem... Yes. It was very good." Nina replied, trying to regain some dignity after acting like a child on christmas.

"Then shall we look at what else we have?" Liz poked, still enjoying the sight of a flustered Nina.

"Of course..." Nina replied sheepishly.