Ch004-Starting Somewhere

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Ch004-Starting Somewhere

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The hit to the head brought Sylver down to the floor. Everything was spinning around and he could feel warm blood dripping down onto his face. He watched the wooden floor an inch or so from his face, and the droplets of red already being absorbed by the wood. The second hit was a little better placed and knocked him out cold.

*

“What have you done with Ciege?” Yeva asked calmly, sitting across from Sylver on a small wooden stool.

His consciousness returned slowly and a little hazily, and it took him a couple of seconds to understand what the fuck was going on here. His hands felt numb from how tight the bindings were, and the back of his head was pulsing with pain.

“Who are you? And where is Ciege?” Yeva asked. In the dark room, the only source of light was a small candle. With it, Sylver could barely make out Yeva, dressed from head to toe in leather armor, and holding a long curved blade of some kind.

“I…” Sylver paused to consider what he was about to do. He decided to go against his plan to pretend to be Ciege and instead told her the truth.

“Alright. The short version is, Ciege asked for my help to save you, and as payment, I got his body. And while I initially planned to just kill him, I changed my mind and am now going to make him a new body. Any questions?” Sylver said, speaking softly and making as much eye contact with Yeva as he could. It didn’t appear to have the desired effect on her. In fact she looked slightly more pissed off from it, instead.

Yeva sat still for a while. Just staring at Sylver and not saying or doing anything.

“You’re lying.” She said finally.

“Which part? Because I would love to hear what you think is actually going on.” Sylver answered, looking down at his bindings, and being somewhat impressed with the knotwork.

“He wouldn’t have given up his life for me. He’s not that kind of person.” Yeva said after thinking it over.

“Well… I may have pushed him towards it, ever so slightly. Nudged even, pushed is too strong a word for it. But it was his choice from start to finish. And it honestly hurts me to hear you say that about him. Ciege is the epitome of a man. If everyone acted with the certainty and bravery that he did, the world would be a much better place.” Sylver answered, leaning backwards and forwards and checking how much give the ropes had.

“What are you talking about?” Yeva asked, getting up from her stool and walking over to Sylver. The curved knife in her hand was now evident to be some sort of leatherworking tool. And going by the scratches near the edges, very recently sharpened.

“In his own words ‘A world without Yeva isn’t worth living in’,” Sylver said, mimicking Ciege’s tone and speech pattern perfectly. He scowled at himself for a moment for doing it but regained his composure before Yeva noticed. “It seemed like an easy choice from his perspective. His option was to let you die, in which case life isn’t worth living. Or to try and save you, with a very slim chance of both of you ending up alive. And I was option 3, where you get to live, but he doesn’t. He almost succeeded in rescuing you, if it changes anything. If not for that shaman, he would have succeeded.” Sylver explained.

“What are you?” Yeva asked, pressing the tip of the blade at Sylver’s chest. It was blunt enough that it didn’t pierce his skin, but was only a solid push away from slipping past his ribcage and into his heart. And possibly the needle, that Sylver didn’t know the durability of…

“I’m not too sure if I’m being honest. But I can tell you right now if you kill me, Ciege is never coming back. I had a whole fake story planned to tell you to be honest, but getting knocked out and tied up kind of made me forget what it was. Out of curiosity, what gave me away?” Sylver asked, pulling hard at his hand and getting enough space to move his index and thumb around.

“Your eyes,” Yeva answered coldly, taking the blade off Sylver’s chest.

“Ah. I thought that might be the case. Eyes are the mirror of the soul, so it makes sense they would change, once the soul changes. Do the words cold, calculating, and hungry come to mind when looking into them?” Sylver said, using the awful descriptors people tended to prefer when describing him in their letters. Finally he got the spell going and untied his left hand completely.

“No, I mean… They’re completely black. Like a bird.” Yeva said.

Fuck. Sylver thought, taking her word for it right now. Is it from the spell, or something else?

“Before I knocked you out, you said it’s important I take care of this hammer for you. Is… Is Ciege inside this hammer?” Yeva asked, holding up the hammer containing Ciege’s soul.

Clever. I’m starting to see why Ciege fell for her.

“He is. But I need to collect a few materials before I can make him a proper body. I could make him a temporary one, but it would deteriorate his soul, and ultimately kill him completely in about 3 or 4 weeks. But that’s all the information I’m willing to share. Now untie me, let me go, and make sure his house and workshop are still standing if he comes back.” Sylver said, his tone a lot more relaxed, now that his hand was completely free.

“If he comes back?” Yeva asked, her voice cracking and shaking.

“Of course. The materials might be too difficult for me to obtain. I could die. The hammer could break, you could decide you don’t love him anymore, or you die before the year is over. In all of these cases, he’s not coming back.” Sylver said, flexing his hand, and undoing the bindings on his other hand.

“I’m doing this out of the kindness of my heart, because I want him to live. But at the same time, I’m not willing to kill myself over it. If I gave my word, sure, I’d die before breaking it. But there’s nothing he could offer me and nothing you could offer me, for me to do that. I’m not a selfish person by nature, but I do put my wellbeing and life above most peoples. And I’m sorry to say, as much as I like and respect Ciege, I’d kill him ten times over, if my life depended on it. And this is such a case. Giving him a new body is the only alternative I could think off.” Sylver answered. Yeva during this looked down at her blade and seemed lost in thought. Also, there’s the mystery of the mind-altering woman in white. So two reasons to come back here.

She walked over to Sylver and stared at his face for a long while.

Yeva’s face was a peculiar thing. Looking at it, Sylver could feel an emotion trying to force itself on him. Some left-over reaction in his brain that will be getting overwritten over time. But right now, Yeva looked like the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. He wanted to get down on one knee, swear his life to her, promise her whatever she wished, and kill himself if only to make her happy.

But of course, these were just feelings, that he was with some difficulty, ignoring. A hormone riddled mind of a blacksmith was no match for the soul of an 11th tier necromancer. If she tried anything, he would kill her without hesitating.

Thankfully for both of them, Yeva simply undid his bindings. She didn’t comment on the fact that both of his hands were already unbound.

“Couldn’t you use the new body, and return Ciege’s back to him?” Yeva asked, surprisingly calm given the situation.

“No. There are a few things I can’t recreate, and it will take him a few years to develop them. Nothing major, he’ll just be unable to use magic for roughly 3 years. But considering he doesn’t know any to begin with, neither of you will notice it. Everything else will be fine. You could even have children if you so wished.” Sylver said, getting up from the chair and stretching the numbness from his limbs.

“But don’t tell anyone about me. If you do, you’ll put me in danger, which will put Ciege in danger. Got it?” Sylver asked.

Yeva nodded, but quite quickly started to sob and cry, holding the rune-covered hammer to her chest.

After washing the blood out of his hair, Sylver left Yeva’s house and walked back to the smithy.

*

[Reset accepted!]
[All skills, perks, traits and classes reset.]
[All attributes have been reset to 1.]

[Notice: Due to [???? ????] [Koschei (Unique)] class available!]
-Neither living nor undead. Your life is bound to a silver needle, your greatest strength, as well as your greatest weakness.
-???? ????
-???? ?? ??? ????
-????????? ?? ????
+10VIT
+10INT
+10WIS
+Perk: Living Undead
+Perk: Deathless

[Trait: Living Undead]
-Both the living and the undead will consider you to be one of their own.
-Unless provoked, mindless undead of a lower level than you, will not attack.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
*Recover with negative energy.
*Harmed by positive energy.

[Trait: Deathless]
-Unless the needle is destroyed, you will not die.

[Koschei (Unique) class, added automatically.]

Huh. Since it was added automatically it must be a race class. And unique, on top of that. The highest possible tier a class can be. And it even came with 6 levels worth of attributes. Not to mention that Deathless thing sounds interesting. I’ll need to experiment with it at some point to figure out, what exactly, not dying means in this case. Same with the Living Undead part. It’s the same as when I moved my soul into my phylactery, except I’m a whole lot more alive somehow. Shame about all the support spells I’ll no longer get to use. But it’s a fair trade-off, and I never really used them all that much, anyway.

Did I get the class because of the needle, or did I already have the class, and the needle is the result of it? It’s linked to my soul. So a bloodline class? Soulline? I’ll need to look into it. Also the question marks are concerning me. Is it something I’ll unlock as time goes on, or something already in effect that i don’t get to know until something triggers it?

Walking around the smithy and filling a small bag with some food and a few other tools he thought he would need, Sylver was ready to go in only a few minutes. Once she was done crying Yeva would be moving in here. Hopefully, there will still be a place for Ciege to come back to when he returns.

For armor, Sylver decided not to bother. It would slow him down too much, and if he understood right, the system would penalize him for wearing it eventually. Not right now of course, but once he got a level in a magic casting class, he would start getting debuffs from wearing anything other than fabric clothing. So he might as well get used to it. He took 3 gold coins from Ciege’s hiding spot and hid the remaining 21 a little better. If Yeva finds them, she finds them, it wasn’t his money to decide. He also made a mental note to pay them back to him, when he returned here.