The sun had bled out across the horizon, staining the clouds a bruised purple. Kage walked out of Oakhaven's west gate, the murmur of the town dissolving into the cricket-song of the evening fields. The weight of his new sword at his hip felt good, a solid, reassuring presence. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, he had a clear objective and the tools to accomplish it.
Then he heard it.
A sound like a mountain tearing itself in two, followed by a chorus of panicked shouts that rippled through the low-level crowds. Further out in the fields, a maelstrom of light and chaos churned. Players were scattering like startled birds.
At the center of it all was a beast he recognized. A hulking, four-tusked behemoth of muscle and bristling fur.
[Gorefang the Tusker - Lvl 20 (Field Boss)]
He'd seen it on his way to the mines before, a walking disaster zone other players gave a wide berth. Now, it seemed, the server population had swelled to the point of suicidal overconfidence. A zone-wide gathering was forming, a disorganized crusade of dozens, maybe a hundred players, all flinging their pathetic, low-level skills at its thick hide. It was a classic MMO event—a glorious, messy pile-on where fun was the primary goal.
For everyone else, at least.
His eyes narrowed. He saw the beast, the flailing players, the chaos. But his mind, now filtered through the lens of the Architect, parsed it differently. He saw a story. Gorefang was the apex predator of the Whispering Woods, a living landmark. Its tusks were probably mentioned in village legends, its roar a part of the region's soundscape. It was a pillar of the local narrative.
A Narrative Node.
High narrative weight, his mind supplied, the Operator and the Poet for once in perfect agreement. Significant probability of dropping a Conceptual Material. The thought was electric. The concepts that he would drop could be a monumental upgrade to his arsenal, an ingredient for a weapon or armor that could redefine his entire build. The urge to join the fray, to be there when that loot table rolled, was a powerful, gravitational pull.
He took a single step toward the battle before his other, more dominant self slammed on the brakes. The Operator's cold logic flooded his senses, dousing the Poet's flicker of excitement. He analyzed the scene with brutal clarity.
The crowd was a mess. Warriors were face-tanking hits without a healer in sight. Mages were firing off spells that barely singed the beast's fur, drawing aggro at random. Archers were firing into the backs of their own party members. There were no tanks to juggle the aggro, no coordinated DPS burn phase, no strategy beyond "hit it until it dies." It was a symphony of wasted cooldowns and panicked screams.
A meat grinder.
The Tusker stomped its massive hoof, sending a wave of force that tossed a dozen players into the air like ragdolls. Their health bars vanished.
Time-to-kill is abysmal, he calculated.
Resource expenditure: catastrophic.
Player competence: negligible.
The probability of them even succeeding before it despawns or wipes the entire zone is less than twenty percent. And even if they won, what were his odds of getting enough contribution? Of being close enough to use his Quill on the afterimage before it faded? Slim to none. It was a lottery ticket, and he was not a gambling man.
He turned his back on the epic battle without a second's hesitation. The roars of the Tusker and the defiant shouts of the players faded behind him, a chaotic spectacle he was willingly excising from his reality. His objective—the Weeping Wall—was a certainty. Gorefang the Tusker was just a glittering, high-risk distraction.
Let them have their fun. He had work to do.
***
The path to the mines was darker now, the trees forming a canopy that swallowed the last of the twilight. This was the same stretch of looming pines and tangled roots where he'd fought the desperate duels against Gravewood Creepers and Scavengers.
A rustle in the undergrowth. Three pairs of red eyes blinked into existence.
The irony. He cynically noted.
[Vexing Forest Wolf - Lvl 3]
[Vexing Forest Wolf - Lvl 3]
[Vexing Alpha Wolf - Lvl 5]
The alpha snarled, a low, guttural sound that was, now, just noise.
The alpha lunged. Kage's hand was already on his sword. He drew and swung in a single, fluid motion. The Blade of the Self-Styled King, its jagged crossguard glinting, met the wolf's snout.
[-45 HP]
[Fury (Stack 1/5)]
[Attack Speed +3%]
The beast yelped, staggering back. Kage was already moving past it, his blade a blur. A second wolf leaped at him from the side. He pivoted, his kendo footwork instinctive, and drove his pommel into its ribs. The stun was minimal, but it was enough. He spun, bringing the edge of his sword around in a clean arc.
[-45 HP]
[Critical Hit! -90 HP]
The second wolf dissolved into particles before it hit the ground.
The remaining two wolves hesitated, their simple AI processing the sudden, violent deletion of their packmate. That hesitation was all he needed. He flowed forward, his steps eating up the ground between them. Two quick slashes.
[-45 HP]
[-45 HP]
[Fury (Stack 5/5)]
[Attack Speed +15%]
His [Blade of the Self-Styled King] was wreathed in a red outline.
The fight was over in less than ten seconds. Three dissolving corpses littered the path behind him, their loot appearing in his inventory, their EXP now meager. He never stopped moving. The path ahead was clear. The memory of his desperate fight on the same path felt like a lifetime ago. A different character, a different game. The battle was pest control.
He needed a proper test subject. The wolves were trash mobs, unworthy of his Awen. Deeper in the woods, near the rocky approach to the mines, he found one. It was a hulking, moss-covered bear, easily twice his height when it reared on its hind legs, its claws as long as daggers.
[Gravewood Bear - Lvl 7]
HP: 650/650
Perfect. It was tanky enough to withstand a few hits and its level was high enough to provide meaningful data. He wanted to test his new core ability, the Rhyming Couplet. He needed a quick, offensive verse. Something functional.
His mind assembled the components. The core concepts were simple: [Target] and [Strike]. The syntax he'd theorized—two rhyming lines, two keywords. The execution was the question. He settled for a quick-cast.
He focused his will, shaping the verse in his mind, channeling his intent into the structure without giving it voice. He pictured the command-line interface of his mind.
Title: An order of punishment.
Poem: On this target, let my power strike; / a foe of which I have a strong dislike.
[Poet's Lexicon: Keyword [Target] Resonance increased. (3%->4%)]
[Poet's Lexicon: Keyword [Strike] Resonance increased. (1%->3%)]
The prose was atrocious. It was mechanical, soulless, and had all the artistic merit of a technical manual.
It was perfect.
A thin, silvery arc of force, sharp as a razor's edge, materialized in the air and slashed across the bear's flank.
[-100 HP]
A system notification popped up beside it.
[-100 AWN]
The bear roared in pure indignation. It dropped to all fours and began to charge.
Kage felt a thrill that had nothing to do with the impending fight.
One hundred damage.
His first attempt at Verse-Crafting, the single keyword [Strike], had dealt a pathetic two damage. Now, by understanding the hidden rules behind his class and combining two concepts and forming a basic rhyme, the output was fifty times greater. This… this was viable.
The bear was closing fast. He analyzed the numbers. One hundred damage for one hundred Awen. A one-to-one ratio. With his current pool of 420 Awen, he could manage four of those verse-spells from a full bar. Not great. It was a useful opener, a burst of front-loaded damage, but it was far too inefficient for a sustained grind. Still, the potential was undeniable.
The class wasn't garbage; it was just waiting for him to decipher its grammar.
The Gravewood Bear was ten feet away, its maw open, ready to tear him apart. Kage met its charge, his new blade singing as it left its sheath. The grind began.
A few minutes later, standing over the dissipating corpse of a second Gravewood Bear, Kage confirmed his next hypothesis. He checked his surroundings. He was in a small, secluded basin, surrounded by rock faces on three sides. No one was within earshot.
He forced down the hot flush of embarrassment that rose in his throat. This was for data. This was for optimization.
A third bear lumbered into the basin, sniffing at a patch of mushrooms. Kage took a deep breath. He held up his hand, focusing his intent. He was going to perform a "charged-cast."
He started. "An order of punishment."
And spoke the same cringeworthy verse aloud, his voice flat and monotone in the quiet air.
"On this target, let my power strike; a foe of which I have a strong dislike."
The effect was instantaneous and dramatically different.
What materialized was a broad, shimmering scythe. It hummed with power, physically larger and more substantial than the willed version. It carved through the boar with an audible SHIING, like the sound of a sword being drawn. The sheer force of the blow made the half-ton beast stumble backward a step.
And the damage number that floated up was a thing of beauty.
[-150 HP]
[-100 AWN]
Kage's eyes widened. He immediately cross-referenced the data. The Awen cost was identical: 100 points. But the damage output was fifty percent higher.
He had his answer. A clear hierarchy of intent.
The willed verse was a "fast-cast"—silent and quick. It was weaker, but tactically flexible.
The spoken verse was a "charged-cast"—slower, louder, but far more potent. It was raw, concentrated power. The act of giving the verse a physical voice gave it a greater purchase on the world's reality.
As for writing it with the Quill… he dismissed that for now. Utterly unusable in solo combat. A tool for another time, another purpose. He now had a clear tactical choice.
The enraged bear charged, and Kage met it with a new rhythm. He thought, focusing on the concept of frailty.
Title: Let nature's defense be cursed.
Poem:Weaken.
[Weaken applied. Target receives 20% more damage.]
A faint, grey shimmer washed over the bear for a split second. Kage sidestepped, his blade flashing out.
[-55 HP]
[Fury (Stack 1/5)]
The bear roared and swung its massive claws. He parried, the impact jarring but manageable thanks to the debuff. His blade responded instantly.
[-58 HP]
[Fury (Stack 2/5)]
He flowed around the beast, his attack speed climbing with every strike. A silent One-Word Poem, followed by a relentless onslaught of steel fueled by the Blade of the Self-Styled King. The fury stacks climbed, turning his sword into a singing woodchipper.
He was no longer just a swordsman forced to use strange magic. He was a tactical caster weaving spells and steel together. He was grinding his way toward his objective, every mob kill another small deposit in his experience bank, another tiny step toward Level 7.
And for the first time since that disastrous class change, Kage felt completely, utterly in control.