Chương 2: Chapter 1

Corin Vess had an Epic Innate, and it was an epic failure. After he received his appraisal two years ago, in the brief time his name was still the envy of the Guild, people had believed he was destined for greatness.' Foresight', an {Epic} Innate, the text bathed in the deep purple of royal cloth.

Corin had assumed that he'd been granted some kind of preternatural combat-predictive power, and he'd rejoiced - he could finally bring his family out of their relative poverty back in Millhollow, once he'd risen through the ranks of the Guild. Instead, he'd found out the hard way - the painful way - that his power did less than fuck all.

His first fight had shown very little predictive power: he certainly didn't predict the giant rat's teeth gnawing through his flesh with such startling efficiency. Any attempt to activate his Foresight ability just left him with a headache, something not particularly useful to be entering combat with when compared to the mound of teeth and claws that would often enter him instead. Whatever his ability actually was, it simply didn't work.

These days, he was the laughing stock of the Guild instead - the man with an 'Epic' Innate that was anything but. The relentless bullying over his heterochromia (a red eye didn't look quite as cool as it sounded) had been replaced with even-more-relentless bullying over his useless skill.

He'd spent the years scrounging for work and coin, barely surviving the messy quests he was forced to procure, while everyone else in the Guild - the actual adventurers, at least - all had skills that could actually help them in combat, anchors to build their entire career around. Fire breath, ethereal daggers, mind control; coming-of-age Innate skills ranging from Common to Legendary, each one at least actually doing something.

Corin wished he had a {Common} Innate like Heavy Strike that could actually help him with the rodents he was usually tasked with clearing, instead of whatever the hell his Innate was supposed to do. His sister, Mira, three years younger and likely twice as sharp, made more cleaning the latrines of the wealthy.

His levels came slowly, if at all; after all this time, he had just reached level 10 after today's sordid quest, and had little to show for it other than the Feat for reaching it - unlocking, at last, the ability to choose a class - and the multitude of scars he couldn't afford to heal. Regardless, he'd received the usual two manual stat points for the level, so put a point into both Strength and Agility, then checked his final stats: [CORIN VESS] Level: 10 Rank: F Class: None (Advancement available!) STR 12 AGI 14 VIT 7 INT 13 WIS 10 LUK 3 HP: 85 / 85 MP: 40 / 40 SKILLS None PROFICIENCIES Hammers – Apprentice [31%] Alchemy – Novice [46%] INNATE Foresight {Epic} [-] He let out a little laugh. Abysmal. He entered the Guild Hall as quietly as he could, ducking beneath the old charter seal hung above the doorway, something that had been there longer than he'd been alive and likely stamped by officials who'd never once set foot in Aldford themselves.

It didn't matter, as he still caught the attention of everyone's favorite - and his least favorite - adventurer: Bran Harrow. The other adventurers simply laughed at him. Bran was the one that made them laugh. His bravado was unfortunately not unearned: he was an accomplished adventurer, at level 26 with a {Rare} Innate < Strongarm > that tripled his Strength stat for a few minutes at a time. A perfect skill for an adventurer - and a bully.

"The great Conqueror of Rats has returned," Bran said behind his mug of beer upon Corin's arrival, holding it up as a mock-cheer to him and garnering a smattering of laughs from the other present adventurers, especially from the frustratingly-handsome Lionel. Aptly named 'Lionel the Loanshark', he'd committed early to a different route of progression through the ranks: financing other adventurers, and profiting obscenely as a result.

Corin put his head down and tried to ignore him, placing the rat tails on the wooden counter in front of Fenn, the Guild's registrar.

'Five in total,' Corin said quietly, and Fenn nodded briskly, putting down 10 copper coins on the table." Five?" Bran exclaimed, his voice mock-shocked.

"My god, man, save some for the rest of us! How will our peers ever support themselves with such a genocidal monopoly on rodent-murder?" Corin smiled at him, with a slight twitch of his lips. He was about to say something, then realized that he had absolutely nothing in him to say - not for about two years now, really. Instead he nodded at him and turned to leave, the lack of engagement seemingly annoying Bran more than if he'd actually confronted him.

"Couldn't 'Foresight' a comeback, eh?" Bran said, something almost frustrated underneath the insult, the way it always was with Bran: like he didn't hate someone for being weak, only for staying weak. With the extra smattering of laughs thereafter, even Corin was forced to concede that it was a decent insult, though he'd heard variations of it for exactly 702 days now. Corin walked out of the Guild, feeling a sudden chill set in as the sun slowly retreated below the horizon. Tonight would be cold.

He hated the cold - especially since with his paltry earnings, he'd be a whole lot more familiar with it. Entering the local tavern, he dropped 8 copper coins on the bar without needing to ask what they'd get him. A small stone alcove sat built into the bar itself, a half-melted candle guttering weakly inside it - nobody quite remembered which god it was meant for anymore, least of all Gus, the tavern's grizzly owner.

He didn't even look up before ladling out the usual: salty water and stale bread, somehow staler than usual. Corin hated that he was actually relieved - the hard bread was at least crunchy in the water, giving him some brief relief of texture in an otherwise abysmal meal.

Trying to do his best to not look at the various other customers enjoying meals and drinks that actually looked like they were made for humans, he stared at his remaining two copper coins instead - just enough for a half-mug of their shittiest ale, but perhaps, after two long years, he'd earned himself the privilege of another drink; he did finally reach level 10, after all.

Not like that would really change anything since he could never afford to pick an actual class, but maybe a little celebration was in order at last.

"One half-mudgrog, please," Corin said, placing his two copper coins - his entire estate at this point - on the table. Gus glanced at the coins, then shook his head.

"It's three coppers now," he replied, gesturing at the messy scrawl of prices behind him.

"The ingredients Turned last week. Had to raise the price." Corin stared at the menu behind Gus in dismay. Of course it had Turned. The world Turned every Sunday midnight, some mostly-small changes that you'd mostly never notice: a spell landing a little softer than last week, a potion with a touch more kick. Things small enough to miss if you weren't looking. The monthly Turns landed harder, and every three months saw completely new things emerge from the world. For better, or often worse.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. The yearly Turn was an entirely different beast. There were festivals and vigils, entire cities shutting down to brace for it, the kind of week people still talked about years later in reverence or regret. Adventurers would compete in deadly battle for gold and glory, the final epic tournament deciding which Guild and God would claim the coming year.

Korrath, God of War, had claimed the current year - though it felt like he claimed every year, the bastard. Men in the capital got rich trying to guess what each Turn would bring; though a broken clock, statistically, would have been a lot more successful. Corin gazed over the rest of the available items, trying his best to hide his relative despair at literally nothing being two copper coins or less, then moved to retract his coins.

Gus sighed, then shoo'd away his hand, scooping up the two coins and moving towards a nearby, ominous-looking barrel.

"Two coppers, just for today," he said, grabbing a mug and filling it halfway, then placing it in front of Corin with a smile hidden somewhere under his massive beard.

"A reward for finally hitting level 10." Corin took the mug carefully with both hands. He was deeply touched, in the specific, altogether pathetic way of a man who hadn't expected anyone to notice at all.

"Thank you. I really, really do appreciate it," he said, nodding his head low. Gus acted like he hadn't heard such an earnest, pitiful statement, and instead busied himself with his other, much more profitable customers. Corin looked down at the mug, noticing the liquid therein sat just a hair above the fill-line etched into it. Whether through mistake or pity, Gus had overpoured.

This left him to slowly sip the foul ale, savoring every mouthful, right down to the dark remains: no doubt the most alcoholic - and thus most desirable - part of the whole drink. He glanced at the small stone alcove built into the bar itself. Gus gave me a little extra, unasked. Only seems fair to pass a little extra along myself.

He tipped the last of it out onto the stone ledge in front of the alcove, some small, half-sincere offering to a god he couldn't even name, and felt the faintest flicker of something behind his red eye. He blinked, and it was gone. Imagined, probably, or just the drink finally, fortuitously catching up to him. He gently slid the empty bowl and mug back towards Gus, and gave him another sincere message of thanks.

Thereafter, he half-trudged, half-swayed up the dusty stairs to his waiting room - an open-air barracks of various old, snoring men; essentially a homeless shelter. He spied Old Tomas, loudest among them as always, fortuitously some distance from his meager lodgings. He lay on his bed of misshapen hay, trying to burrow inside of it like a hamster to try to protect himself from the cold. He was, unfortunately, not a hamster.

The cold quickly became his bed partner, snuggling him like he was the little spoon, and he did his best to fall asleep while the alcohol still kept him warm. Sleep came to him, eventually. Not good sleep, mind you, but technical-rest nevertheless. And in that slumber, something came to him; some garbled smattering of disjointed text that flashed behind his red eye for a semblance of a second: [Gut▒Ho~ Pack Call rad▒] Corin woke up immediately, feeling... different.

Like something profound had happened in a half-remembered dream, but he had no recollection of what it was - other than that strange smattering of text. He forced himself to think, to remember, to see. His red eye began to hurt, then really hurt, then suddenly the text revealed itself to him once more: [Gut▒Ho~ Pack Call rad▒] He suddenly thought of his crazy uncle - particularly in his later years, once his mind had well and truly gone.

He'd utter mad garblings of disjointed speech with no rhyme nor reason, his grip on reality slipping, finger by finger, until there was nothing left to hold onto at all. Corin could never get that image of him out of his mind, no matter how hard he tried to replace it with the man he'd been before he'd gotten so sick. Nobody in the family talked about where he'd ended up, in the end.

Just that one day he wasn't in Millhollow anymore, taken away by some quiet man in black, and asking his mother about it would just end up with her quickly changing the subject. And now, he was seeing disjointed text in his mind, too. Seemed it ran in the family.

'Gut Ho' - what in god's name was 'Gut Ho'? And 'Pack Call rad' - well, it didn't sound particularly rad. The message irked him, like it was some kind of absolutely profound thing that was simultaneously incomprehensible. He'd have written it down if he could afford the tools to do so, but instead he just filed it in the back of his mind, shook his head, then pushed himself upright. He stretched his neck and rolled his shoulders, feeling the ache gradually decay into familiar, chronic discomfort.

The Guild was abuzz with activity, adventurers of every level and rank searching for whatever quests and bounties suited them best before anyone else could grab them. Snatches of conversation drifted past him as the adventurers jostled amongst each other, someone complaining that their favorite dagger enchantment had gone soft after the Turn, someone else insisting a new pathway had opened up in a nearby Dungeon. Corin generally let the hubbub die down before he chose his bounties.

He would invariably get the scraps, since he wasn't capable of much more. He spied the usual suspects of what he could achieve - clearing the ever-present infestation of rats in the harbours (thank god for that), the giant weevils burrowing into the grain mills, some new development of bats that had nested in a royal's aviary. All paid a pittance, but of course, pittance was preferable to poverty.

His eyes drifted, as they always did, toward the postings he had no business even reading: anything with creatures tagged {Uncommon} or above. Only monsters with real magic in them dropped anything worth keeping, not just meat and bone but actual gear, sometimes even skills if you were lucky. {Uncommon} was where that threshold started, and Corin had never taken a bounty for one, not once. He wasn't foolish enough to think an F-rank stood a chance against anything genuinely touched by magic.

One bounty however, above both his paygrade and capability, strangely caught his interest: [BOUNTY: GUTTER HOUND EXTERMINATION] Gutter Hound presence has increased in the distillation fields. Culling required. Often found in packs of 3. Each gutter hound kill: 5 silver coins Doubled rate after 5 kills Recommended minimum level/tier: 20/D Corin stared at the message, practically salivating at the reward. He was completely incapable of it, but a man could dream. Wait. [Gut▒Ho~ Pack Call rad▒] Gut Ho. Gutter Hounds.

Pack Call rad - radius? - that was an ability they had for alerting nearby hounds. What the fuck did that even mean? Corin stared at the bounty, trying his best to comprehend what he was seeing. He gave himself a few more seconds of thought, then eventually shook his head. He didn't have time nor money to waste on inane ramblings; he had to do a quest if he was going to eat at all today, and a single gutter hound could likely be the end of him.

Instead he selected his usual rat-hunting quest; something infinitely preferable to being a hound's chew toy for the day. [Quest Accepted: Rat Culling] [Map updated] The map update was pointless, as he could've walked there with his eyes closed by now. As always, he hoped the rats would be numerous - far too many people hunting after them these days - but not too numerous.

He'd been cornered once before, the swarm of them going from running to all charging at him instantaneously, and he'd been lucky to get out with his life, if not his dignity. He made a mental note to be careful today, as the distillation fields with the gutter hounds were awfully close to the harbors, and set forth to collect as many rat tails as he could. He'd collected three when he heard the screams.

Corin's head snapped toward the source of the noise: men and women were streaming from the distillation fields, a few adventurers he recognized scattered - and scattering - among them. Most of the civilians were screaming their lungs out. Then, the cry of a Pack Call swallowed the screams. Gutter hounds appeared close behind them, charging and snarling and snapping. Their Substrate notifications flashed: [Gutter Hound - Lv. 11 / Lv. 10 / Lv. 11].

Numbers he'd normally never go near, that were currently coming very near him. He didn't fight things that could kill him, not even one of them, not even with a level advantage. There was no use in a bounty if you weren't alive to spend it. One hound launched itself toward an older man that had fallen behind the crowd, teeth clamping onto the back of his leather pants and ripping it, grazing the skin beneath but leaving him free to run away.

Another snapped at a running woman, weighed down by her child in her hands, and a bite tore a chunk out of her flesh. Corin froze as she screamed in pain, the terrified child in her arms looking directly at him. I have to help. Corin moved to run - and realized he was frozen. Not magic. Just fear. There had to be over fifteen of them. How? Gutter hounds usually roamed in threes. A sharp pain in his red eye flared: [Gut▒Ho~ Pack Call rad▒] Pack Call radius... increased?

More hounds slid out from behind the dock, paws and claws scratching against the rotten wood, and two more hounds charged at the woman and her little girl. They're going to tear me apart. But not before they do the same to them. The closest hound leaped toward the child, now falling from her mother's grasp, the hound's jaw wide enough to completely encase the child's torso - then a hand shot out of the crowd and clamped around its skull.

Corin watched in shock as Bran, his < Strongarm > Innate flaring, hauled the hound off its feet, up and out of the throng, and smashed it down hard against the dock. Teeth and bone splattered as the hound's snout was obliterated on impact, its body collapsing on top of it. Another hound attached to the woman's leg tried to leap backwards, but Bran launched himself at it and punched downwards, fist distending the hound's right shoulder and crushing its torso.

He suddenly looked back at Corin as more hounds converged." Get them the fuck out," he snarled at Corin, the force of his words reigniting his ability to move. He ran towards them as Bran turned to face the gathered hounds, over ten in total. His muscles rippled beneath his iron breastplate, Innate still flaring. Corin hefted the woman over his shoulder; he could feel a spreading warmth on his chest as the blood from her thigh seeped into his clothes.

He lifted the child with his free hand as the hounds paced around Bran in a semi-circle, all snarling, drool dripping from their teeth.

"I think it's their Pack Call," Corin whispered to Bran, who didn't look back at him.

"Something's wrong, like it started some kind of chain react-"" Get them OUT!" Corin turned to do just that - and was instead greeted by three more hounds.