The Land: Founding (Chaos Seeds Book 1) (2 page)

James covered his eyes against the
sunlight that seemed determined to drive ice picks (
naw
,
I’m better than that… fire picks? yeah, much better he thought sleepily). Yes! Fire
picks through his eyes just because he had slept in! It was Saturday wasn’t it?
He was having trouble remembering the night before. Reaching down, he tried to
pull the covers over his head, except he couldn’t find them. In fact, as his
hand fell back to his mattress everything felt remarkably, well… grassy! Also
his pillow felt surprisingly like a rock jabbing into his back!

Showing bravery on par with
assaulting a horde of giants, or talking to a really hot chick sitting at the
bar, he opened his eyes and took in his surroundings. He was in a small glen
studded with wild flowers and colorful plants. At his back was a large shelf of
stone, and beyond it were the foot hills of mountains rising in the distance.
The trees in front of him formed the other boundary of the glen. They rose tall
and majestic. The scent of pines mingled with the fragrance of the flowers.
Birds of various types could be heard performing call and refrain. The moss
growing on the trees was a brilliant green, and there was a crystal clear pool
several feet in diameter between him and the stone outcropping. It was one of
the most serene and beautiful settings he had ever seen. It evoked in him
feelings of connection and tranquility, and he expressed himself accordingly.

“What the hell!!!”

He sat upright as quickly as he
could, not at all helping the headache that blazed in intensity at his swift
movement. Looking down, he imagined it might have something to do with the
curved rock that had been under his head, and the tender lump he felt as his
fingers searched his scalp. As he took in his surroundings he was interrupted
by a slightly off key, and resigned sounding voice, that spoke from just over
his left shoulder.

“About time you woke up!”

Turning his head, slower this time,
he saw the small form of an imp lazily flapping its wings as it hovered three
feet off the ground! It had gray dusky skin, and pitch black, bat like wings
perched on its back. Its body was humanoid, if only one foot tall. James stared
at it in fascination. The VR module had never produced a creature so lifelike
and unique before. Standing up, he slowly walked closer examining it in wonder
until he was only an inch away. Which was the moment right before it kicked him
in the eye.

“
Ahhhh
, you
dirty little,” James immediately began swatting at it with his right hand while
holding his eye with his left. It lazily floated out of the way of his swing,
and rolled its eyes while sighing heavily.

“Look,” it said. “I’m here to help
you and even if I wasn’t, it would take a lot more than a
friggin
noob to take me out. Now if you don’t want me here, I can always leave.” It
turned its back as it spoke, and started to gain altitude with a faster flap of
its wings.

“No wait!” James said quickly. “I
just don’t know what’s going on. Last thing I remember, I was in this castle,
and then there was just a light, and now I’m here. And who are you calling a
noob?!”

Ignoring his question, the imp faced
him again and regarded him silently for a moment. It was almost like it was
daring him to say something else to offend it. With a small nod to itself
(himself?), it began to speak again.

“Okay noob, you are in The Land. You
are NOT playing a game anymore. I’m going to say it slowly this time. You… Are…
NOT… In… A… Game! Your mind and soul have been transported here and placed in
this body. Let this sink in. If you look around you, you can see that you are
in a small glade. This is a safe haven, but as soon as you leave you can die.
If you die, then you will come back to this point, unless you find another safe
location or town to bind your spawn point to. The good news is that no one else
should be able to find their way here. Even if they did, the enchantments on
this glade should keep them out unless you lead them in.”

James opened his mouth, but stopped
when the imp raised its hand.

“This will go a lot faster if you
just listen. A being a lot stronger, and I’m guessing smarter, than you has
paid me A LOT more than you’re worth to talk to you. Believe me, millions of
those other noob Seeds will not be getting this treatment, so just listen. As I
was saying, you were brought here by some higher being. No, I don’t know who.
I’m here to give you some basic info about this world so you don’t become troll
dung in the first few minutes.”

“The Land is bigger than the world
you came from. You are one of the first of your people to be brought to The
Land, and you were lucky enough to be brought to this little safe haven.
Apparently where most of you will land is random. Some of you might be in towns
or cities, some in forests or mountains, and some will probably be dead on
arrival because they fell into oceans and drowned. Who cares right? You have
landed in the Forest of Nadria, on the Rivers Peninsula. Do you remember
anything about this location?”

“Yeah, it’s near the Kingdom of Yves.
Supposed to be a section of land with a crazy amount of rivers crisscrossing
through it. As far as I know the patch to travel here wasn’t released yet
though.”

“Good, you’re not completely
useless,” the imp said. “The Land is not exactly like the game that you
remember.
 
Your character won’t be
either. Case in point,” the imp snapped his fingers and a hand sized wasp
flashed into existence. The imp casually looked at James and simply said,
“Attack.”

The wasp immediately flew at James
with its stinger extended as it curled its body. He quickly rolled to the side
hearing and feeling a buzzing pass just by his ear. He tried to activate the
HIDE action of his character Silk. The wasp upon missing with its first pass,
immediately turned around and flew at him again. It clearly still saw him. This
time the stinger punctured his left bicep. Red hot agony seared through his
body as he swatted the wasp away, and it flew back into the air.

That pain was worse than anything he
had every felt! What the hell was going on? The pain dampeners were not
supposed to allow ANYTHING to hurt that much, let alone just the sting of a
wasp on steroids! He picked up a rock with his right hand and activated True
Aim, throwing it at the wasp. It easily dodged to the side though, the rock
missing and accomplishing nothing. That was not supposed to happen, he thought.
At his high skill level, there was less than a 1% chance of a projectile
missing when he activated True Aim.

With no apparent thought at all to
the injustice of the situation, the wasp flew in and stung him again in the
other arm. Agony lanced through him a second time, and he noticed a small green
skull and cross bones in the bottom right corner of his vision. Unable to fight
off the wasp as neither arm was working, he fell back seeing the red horizontal
bar in the top left corner of his vision was half gone. When he fell to the
ground, the wasp pulled its stinger out of his arm and flew towards his head.
He screwed his eyes shut as he awaited a poisonous needle to the face!

But nothing happened. He peeked a
glance, opening one eye. He saw the wasp flying lazily around the imp who
looked at him dispassionately.

“Well what have we learned?” the imp
asked putting emphasis on the last word.

“WTF?!?”

“Well I hope you’ve learned more than
that.”

“Why didn’t any of my skills work?
And why did that hurt so much? Why is it still hurting?! And why did that hurt
so much?!?” James’ voice grew louder and shriller with each question.

“I already told you noob, you’re not
your character. I told you twice! You are not a level 167 thief. Those classes
don’t exist the way they did in the game. It requires a lot for you to qualify
for a Profession, and you are nowhere NEAR that powerful yet.  Don’t worry
about it. Right now you are just some guy with two wasp stings in his arms,
drooling on the moss. You have been sent to The Land from your world.  You
are really here! Not…
your
… character. Check out your
status page.”

“How,” James asked. He would deny it
til
his dying day, but there was a bit of a whine in his
voice now.

“Will it,” the imp replied simply.

Shutting the throbbing in his arms
out his mind for a moment, he focused on wanting to see his status page.
Suddenly his vision was blocked by a translucent rectangle.

Willing the window to go away, he focused
back on the imp who started talking again.

“So I guess you now know you’re the
definition of a basic bitch.”

“Excuse me?” Richter was convinced
that he had misheard. The wasp stings had been embarrassing, but this was just
too much!

“I was chosen to speak to you because
I have paid attention to your world. It means there is a slightly higher chance
of an ape like you understanding when an enlightened being like myself deigns
to speak with you. Now seeing as how my wasp has just made you its bitch and
your stats are all basic, ipso facto, my earlier assertion of your status. Any
more questions?”

James just stared at the imp with his
mouth hanging slightly open, swollen arms hanging at his sides, blinking in
disbelief.

“
Annyywayyy
,
you’ll be able to examine your stats in more detail later. Do you know the
difference between abilities and skills?”

Shaking his head at the imp’s
ridiculous attitude, James replied, “Abilities are things you are born with or
are given to you, skills can be learned. But I don’t know what Marks are.”

“That makes sense, they weren’t
included in the game you played. Marks will appear as small tattoos on your
body, they can indicate allegiance or increases in abilities you have picked
up. I’m told technically they can represent religious affiliation as well, but
since there aren’t any gods in The Land, no one knows for sure. Right now I’m
guessing you have nothing in any of these areas. Do you?”

James examined his two abilities more
closely.

LIMITLESS – you can proceed to any
level in any skill with 100% affinity.

GIFT OF TONGUES – you can speak and
understand any language. You cannot speak to lower lifeforms or higher beings.

He related these to the imp whose
face took on a look of surprise.

“So that’s why he’s invested in you,”
the imp said under its breath. “Well Gift of Tongues is pretty
self-explanatory, you can understand humanoids and other sentient beings, but
not animals or beings of higher power like myself. For example,
shi
rine
ka
frine
parul
cha.
Did you understand any of that?”

“No,” he replied. “What did it mean?”

“Don’t worry about it,” the imp said
with a smirk. “Your language ability will definitely be useful, but what’s
truly interesting is your other ability. Every creature born has a predisposition
to being good at some things and bad at others. You might be a natural dancer
so you have an 80% chance to increase your level with practice.  You might
be naturally clumsy, and so only have a 10% chance of increasing as a pick
pocket. In that case you will almost assuredly have a low level no matter how
much you practice. Apparently whatever you try to learn you have the ability to
increase with no cap. You could one day be very powerful,” it said
thoughtfully. “I would keep the knowledge about this ability to myself if I
were you, there are those who would kill you now for fear of what you will
become.”

“But not you,” James asked.