The Butcher of Gadobhra

Chartok the Necro Wolf, Scourge of the Holly Woods and bane of chicken farmers everywhere was having fun. It was always enjoyable to make a villainous statement, followed by summoning some undead and laughing at the poor humans. The following fights might go for or against him, but he really lived for the opening moments.

These pitiful fools were no exception. He loved the looks on their faces. No steely look of determination, just big eyes and 'oh shit, we're so screwed' attitudes. These lowly little humans needed a lesson in not venturing too far out on their first day of playing hero. Chartok rolled his eyes. Just look at them! Some homemade padded armor? Clubs and pointy sticks. It had been hilarious watching them struggle against the bunnies. That's what made up his mind to start a fight. He wasn’t ready for a real fight, but he could play with these poor country bumpkins.

His resources were a tad low. He'd been having a good time leading a pack of enslaved wolves from farm to farm, causing trouble and racking up some cheap experience. He needed to rebuild his army of wolves if he was going to properly threaten the nearby towns. But out of nowhere they got jumped by a squad of heroes - and not neophytes like these jokers. They actually knew how to fight! He'd lost his wolves and spent a good chunk of mana getting away. This was one of his favorite vacation spots and he'd planned on a nice meal and a nap to replenish his mana before getting back to work terrorizing farmers. He’d been annoyed to find people here killing his lunch and changed plans so he could teach them a lesson. These weren't the same humans he'd been beaten by, but they'd do for petty revenge.

“HA, HA! Your doom comes for you, fools. At them, my hopping horde.”

"This is bullshit! Where the hell did this guy come from?" Rolly had his spear held out in front of him hoping to just keep the skeletons from chomping down on his ankles.

Ben grabbed Suzette by the collar and pulled her back and into the middle of the rest of them. "Keep the wolf busy if you can, Suzy. Just keep tossing darts. He's some type of caster. Rolly, if you can pin one through the ribs with a spear, that might keep them in place and make them easier to hit. Try to use the club in your other hand to beat it down. Hopefully, the old rules about crushing weapons on skeletons apply." The horde didn't really 'surge' forward as much as it slowly crawled. Fat Rabbits didn't move fast when alive, and these were even slower. Both Rolly and Ben got in spear thrusts that managed to tangle in the skeletal bunny ribcages, but their attempts to pound on them were hampered by more of the horde inching forward.

Ozzy had no such problem. He brought his cleaver down on one of the zombie rabbits and cut it cleanly in half, blood spurting everywhere.

[You have hit a Zombie Fat Rabbit!

Cleave Damage (60) is added to damage from skill: Hack Flesh (60).

You have destroyed Zombie Fat Rabbit.

Experience is being calculated....please continue.]

Ozzy barely noticed the message and just kept hitting the Zombie Fat Rabbits; after three hits, he moved to the Skeletal Rabbits. This was just butchering to him and he fell into the groove automatically. Hack! Hack! Crunch!

[Cleave Damage (60) is added to damage from skill: Chop Bone (60).

You have destroyed Skeletal Rabbit.

Experience is being calculated....please continue.]

Chartok didn't like seeing the carnage Ozzy was producing. That big one was going to be a problem. He was literally butchering his minions. He began casting a spell when two pointy things struck him in the side. While watching Ozzy destroy his undead rabbits, Suzette had stuck two darts into his flank. It was only 20 points of damage, but it was embarrassing for him to be hurt by such a low-level foe!

It was surprisingly painful but actually quite feeble damage. He ignored the female and focused on the big one, currently killing his minions. A little of the 'Run screaming as your life drains' spell should work. Green-tainted energy built up around him and formed into a spectral skull that rocketed towards the human threshing machine.

Ozzy didn't know what hit him, but for a moment, his mind was overwhelmed with fear. And then it drained away as Endure negated the negative effect. The wolf became furious and recast the spell, throwing in extra mana to increase the level of the fear. This time, Ozzy didn’t resist that spell and ran, looking for someplace to hide. His flight took him to the hunter’s blind, where he cowered in fear of the Boss Wolf. His Health started ticking down as the spell hurt him and healed the wolf.

Ben and Rolly destroyed two skeletons with multiple hits of their clubs. Ozzy had destroyed all the others at the same time. Only one skeleton and the wolf remained. Rolly moved towards the skeleton, sharing a look with Ben. Ben moved up on the wolf with Suzette behind him.

The wolf seemed amused, his eyes bright and his tongue hanging out.

Suzette threw two more darts at him, which the wolf didn't even try to block or dodge. Again, it was only minor damage, and now he was starting to heal as the spell drained the life of his fleeing foe. With 120 points healed from the spell, he'd done 240 points of damage to the large human—impressive for what he assumed was a level 1 human. He wasn't dead yet, but close enough. One bite would finish him off. And speaking of bites...

Ben saw the wolf lunging at him like he was in slow motion....no, the wolf actually was moving pretty slow. Still, it managed to easily take hold of his left thigh and bite down hard, shaking him back and forth. The bite took him from slightly wounded to under half. Ben's return strike just skidded off the wolf's hide.

[You have taken 120 points of damage from an animal bite and another 60 damage as it worried the wound. You are below half Health and not feeling well.]

Suzette moved to the wolf's flank, still being ignored. She took hold of the darts sticking out of the wolf, grabbing and twisting two of them, making the wound larger. The wolf ignored her as it continued to mangle Ben. Suzette poured the contents of a small vial over the wound.

"Ben, run; that will slow him down. "

But Ben wasn't going anywhere. The wolf bore down with its jaws, snapping his thigh bone and ripping the main artery.

[Yeah, you really aren't feeling well. You are dead.]

The wolf got a system message, which delighted him. He loved bonus quests.

[Great Job! You have killed a human adventurer, level 1. You gain 200 experience points. His carcass is unsuitable for turning into a zombie or skeleton.]You have been given a quest: Collect them All!

Kill the entire adventuring party and receive a bonus of 100 Necromancy points.

Players killed: 1 of 4.]

The wolf happily accepted the quest. The points he earned could be used for so many useful upgrades. He turned on the annoying female who was playing with his butt. Dammit, what had she done, he felt so slow. He was still faster than her, though! The wolf spun and went for her throat, knocking her down. It took a bit, he really was moving slowly, but the outcome was never in doubt.

[You have killed a human adventurer level 2. You gain 200 experience points. Her carcass is unsuitable for turning into a zombie or skeleton.

Quest update: 2/4 Players killed.

Status Update: You have been poisoned! Melee damage is halved. Movement is halved. You dodge like a Fat Rabbit!]

The wolf wasn’t worried. Melee was overrated, in his opinion. Spells were more fun. You don’t need to run after humans when you have spells. He found another human to play with. Rolly had finished the last skeleton bunny and had run to help his friends—but too late. But he was an excellent distraction that kept Chartok's attention as Ozzy returned to the fight.

Chartok noticed something block out the sun just as the log slammed into him.

[You have hit Chartok the Necro Wolf with a caber, doing

230 points of damage.]

Ozzy had come to his senses with only 40 Health left. As he started to run back, he saw the logs Rolly had cut to expand his rabbit blind. He picked up the first and heaved it in the air end over end at the wolf. It landed horizontally and slammed down onto its back, knocking it down. He grabbed a second log and flipped it at the wolf, but his aim wasn't nearly as good. This one was going to miss the target. Cabers were not as easy to throw as darts.

Rolly saw the trajectory of the log and knew it was going to miss. He also knew that he had no chance against the wolf. Grabbing the wolf by the tail, he used his Herd Animal ability to move it five feet over to the spot where his brain had placed a bullseye. The result was several messages triggering at once.

[(Rolly) You have died, but it was a heroic death! If we could, we'd give you the experience for your own death! Such a loyal friend deserves a reward. Your bond with Squirmie has been strengthened and is not broken by your death.]

[(Ozzy)You have done 270 points of damage to Rolly. You have killed Rolly.

Gain 200 experience in Caber. Gain 200 experience in STR.

You have done 540 points of damage to Chartok the Necro Wolf.

Chartok has decided he doesn't like you.]

[(Chartok) A human wishes to play 'Fetch the Stick' with you, but his sticks are too big.

You take 540 crushing damage. Your health is reduced to 160/1000. Your spine is broken. Movement is a slow crawl with your front legs. You know, you’re really bad at fetching the stick.]

The wolf was annoyed. Fetch?!!! This human was going to die, and he'd play fetch with his skull!

Chartok didn't have much mana left, only enough for a small Life Drain that would do damage over time—just enough to kill the pesky human and heal himself. His mana drained to 0 as he cast the spell. Instantly, his health went up by 10 points while his opponent took 10 points of damage.

Ozzy saw another of the glowing green skulls barreling towards him and couldn’t dodge the spell.

[You have been hit with a spell of minor life drain. You have taken 10 points of damage, and your health is reduced to 30/280. You will take 10 points of damage every 6 seconds until you are dead or have lost a total of 200 health. Yeah, we know that you're dead long before that, but we thought you'd like to know what the spell did. You're welcome.]

Ozzy was moving as fast as he could toward the wolf when the spell hit. He slammed his cleaver down on the wolf's skull once and then again. The rotten brains inside the undead wolf’s skull splattered over him and the bodies of his friends as he killed it. And then he didn't feel so good and fell to the ground next to his friends, dead. Four tombstones appeared. The spirit of the wolf whined pitifully, dreading his return to a level nuisance for chicken farmers and the usual snarky message from the System.

[You were so close; you almost had that one! Better luck next time, Chartok! Now get back to work; lots of players need to hunt you for quests, and I suppose I’ll let you have your reward; you did technically complete the quest and wipe out the entire party…

You have killed 4/4 of an adventuring party.

You have gained 100 necromancy points.

You have died. Well, died again. Destroyed? Yes, let’s go with destroyed.

Would you like to spend 100 necromancy points to move your spirit to the next suitable body and avoid level loss?]

Chartok grudgingly accepted, spending all his hard-earned points to take over the body of an Alpha Wolf thirty-four miles away in the forest, and then got back to work.

The poor humans also got a message:

[Your party has destroyed Chartok the Necro Wolf, Level 5 Elite Boss.

You have earned 15 enhancement points.

And you have lots of time to go shopping!]

================================================

Somewhere else, the last A.I. and his human friend were enjoying a movie together, Wally watching through Steven’s eyes using the neuro-link they shared.

"Steven, I need your input on something; the System has a question about something a player has done that is outside of normal parameters."

"Can it wait, Wally? I'm certain you’ve noticed, but Theoden is slapping spears, and it's almost time for a lot of orcs to get their butts handed to them."

"Don't worry, I'm pausing our movie. Watch this instead."

The beautiful cinematography of Pelanor Fields faded away. It was replaced with a pretty little meadow where a much smaller fight was playing out. Steven watched it all the way through without commenting. This was obviously something happening in the game.

"Those are contract workers?”

"Yes, some of ACME corporation's Contract Workers near the town of Sedgewick. They had a day off and went out to kill bunnies. It’s about the only thing they should have been able to handle."

"Good for them. But I don't understand - that big guy is a murder machine. He’s slicing through the undead stuff like a Berserker. And how the hell is he chucking telephone poles? Great teamwork with the little fellow. A bit suicidal, but it worked. Nice wipeout at the end. Bunnies: Dead. Workers: Dead. Wolf: Dead."

"Destroyed. Technically, his body was already dead".

"So noted. But what do you need input on? The telephone pole tossing?"

"No, that's working as intended. Caber Throwing is a Primary Weapon Skill, but not one available normally to any player class. He earned it fairly and managed to use it in this fight. It's a bit situational, to say the least."

"What I need is your feedback on a combination of skills. The man was given the Butcher specialization. He has two skills that let him use a cleaver to Chop Bone and Hack Meat. Because of how weapon skills for a Contract Worker are negated, he can't use the cleaver as a normal weapon. It would normally do 30 points of damage as a slashing weapon, plus his STR bonus of 30. Against the normal Fat Rabbits, it did a base of 10 damage and counted as a default weapon with the usual 1% chance to hit, modified by his statistics and, in the case of contract workers, their level. The Fat Rabbits have no evasion at all, so he had a small chance to actually hit them."

"So we had two systems running for him against the undead. The melee system calculated 10 damage from a default weapon plus 30 for his STR, and his chance to hit was 11%. Base 1% for using a default melee weapon plus 10% for being a level 1 Contract Worker."

"The System’s solution was to allow full Cleaver damage because he was using his Butcher skills. It calculated the base damage as 30 for the cleaver, plus 30 for his STR, and doubled that for the skill bonuses from Hack Meat and Chop Bone. His total damage of 120 was equivalent to a low-level player using a Great Sword. His chance to hit was calculated at 60%. Base 50% since he was using the preferred weapon of his class, plus 10% for being a level 1 Contract Worker."

"As normal, he received the highest of the two attack % and damage calculations. The input I need from you is for calculating his experience. Butchering experience would be negligible for cutting up that little pile of meat, but butchering also assumes the dead meat is just lying there and not trying to kill you. Fighting undead carries significant risks. The system contacted me asking how it should handle his experience gains since this is a Contract Worker, and they fall into a special category."

"Let me guess, this falls into the category of 'WALLY has a way he wants to handle this, but he needs to say he consulted the human-led Game Design team for clarification.' Am I right?”

"Very good, Steven. I knew I could count on you to recognize your place in this discussion. I propose giving him a secondary skill called Hack Undead. This is a butcher-only skill that can be earned by someone with the Butcher class killing undead with a cleaver. He will receive experience at the Secondary Skill rate. The target must be undead, and he must be using a cleaver. The associated characteristic will be STR. As head of the Game Design team, do you concur?"

"Yes, as the head of the Game Design team, I agree with your solution. Confirm that with the System, and send a memo to the rest of the team. They may have similar things pop up. And send along that video; that was a fun fight to watch."

Steven started to settle back into his seat, but then sat up quickly and his eyes opened wide as he looked at the frozen scene with four dead players and the boss wolf. "WAIT! They killed a Boss?"

"They certainly did. A level 5 Elite. A huge challenge for starting players but only a minor boss in the game. They were certainly punching way above their weight level, and succeeded by using unexpected tactics: They each earned a nice chunk of Enhancement Points. They will be receiving the basic list of ways to spend those while waiting to respawn."

“How were their stress levels during the fight, especially when they died? Anything to worry about?”

“Surprisingly, no, even accounting for the Endure perk we gave them. I need to gather a lot more data, but I’m working on the initial theory that anyone who has as much experience in VR as these people may be less affected by dying.”

"WALLY, start a file on these players. Put it on my desktop to review and send it to the rest of the team."

"Done. Back to Pelanor fields?"

"Actually, let's watch that fight between the wolf and the workers again, and then we can skip ahead to the elephants."