Gestation by John Gold (love books to read .txt) 📗

to pay. For something like what he had done for me, it was nothing.

“I can’t see it, but I like the effect. Bor, how high is your skill if you can make something like that?”

“A little higher than five hundred. There’s a reason I’m in the guild’s top five.”

“I believe you. If you can do a tattoo like that, you should be number one.”

“No, it’s all about the ink. My skill just boosts the bonus and number of effects.” The master gets up and massages his back.

“You relax for a little while—I want to test the effect.”

Bor starts cleaning his equipment, and I can’t wait to see this thing in action. I decide to “breathe” right out the window.”

“Dragon breath!”

The effect is better than I could have imagined. From below, I hear curses and threats aimed at the bastard who decided to burn everything to a crisp. We’re on the second floor of the port authority building, and the window is charred, the glass is shattered, and the whole room is practically baked. Bor even fell off his chair.

∞ ∞ ∞

Damage taken: 880 (ignored: 0)

20/900

Resistance to fire: +0.02%

Thermal damage ignored up to 36/second

The recoil really hit me hard. A piece of skin is even burned. After the devil’s little joke, I lost almost all of my resistance across the board. I almost just killed myself.

“Idiot! What the hell are you doing?”

“Bor, calm down. I’ll pay for the damage, it’s okay.”

“He thinks it’s okay!”

“Bor! You just got to see what your masterpiece can do.”

“Screw my masterpiece—you’re going to burn down my whole shop! I want no more experiments out of you, and also a thousand gold to pay for the damage.”

“Okay.”

“Lie back down here before you burn the building down.”

Yeah, baby! There was a good reason I wanted to find the best tattoo master in the city. Both the detail and the size of the picture are important, and Bor’s mastery is high enough to keep the tattoo just a quarter of the size of my palm. It’s so small! But the effect is fantastic. The most powerful ingredients for ink are blood and malachite worked over with blood magic, and the craftsman and tattoo skills increase the number of bonuses as well as the size and strength of the effect. Yep, this is going to be my blade. Next, I need a shield.

“Hey, idiot in the underwear, lie down! We’re going to be busy until tonight.”

“You got it, my lord!”

Bor laughs so hard he drops his tools.

Can you describe the joy an achievement like that gives you? For non-mages, tattoos like that are useless. They don’t have skills or high intellect or wisdom. For mages, they’re also useless. What’s the point if you have spells you can use where the only recoil is the time you have to wait to use them again? Otherwise, mages would be killed every time they used a spell.

It takes all day to finish the tattoos on my back. To save space, we make them really small, and I focus on basic spells. Tomorrow, we’re going to get to work on the harder interdisciplinary stuff that costs five thousand gold apiece.

I spend half the night pushing myself to the limit, wanting to try all my new acquisitions. It’s a little piece of heaven where I’m a monster with an ocean of mana. Two more completed contracts give me another five hundred gold when I bring back the crushed, charred bodies of the monsters, though I can’t use my most powerful spells until I boost my stamina and resistance. Tomorrow, I’m going to get something far stronger than anything I have so far.

Morning in the port means hundreds of boats and the hubbub of people working on them. We spend the entire day working on six new tattoos, and we finish with my whole body covered in them. The simple ones are on my back, the more complex are on my chest, and my neck, arms, and legs are clear. It may not look aesthetically pleasing, but it’s awfully effective.

“Attribute window!”

Name: Sagie

Level: 0

Experience: 0/100 (100 left until the next level)

Race: Human

Class: None selected

Basic attributes

Strength: 90

Agility: 90

Stamina: 90

Intellect: 116

Wisdom: 116

Available attribute points: 0

Additional attributes

Speed: 90

Athleticism: 90

Morale: 116

Survivability: 90

Derivative ratings

Physical damage: 45 (strength/2, but no less than 1)

Carrying capacity: 225 kg (strength*10/4)

Mana: 16410 (wisdom*10)

Health: 900 (stamina*10)

Strength: 1000 (stamina*10)

Health restoration: 900/minute (survivability*10)

Mana restoration: 1160/minute (morale*10)

Strength restoration: 900/minute (athleticism*10)

Running speed: 36 km/h (1+speed/10)

Defense: 1

Resistance

Physical damage: 1.72% (damage ignored: up to 421/second)

Poison: 8.66% (damage ignored: up to 25811/second)

Fire: 0.02% (damage ignored: up to 36/second)

Skills

Cooking: 250

Trap setting and disarming: 19

Archery: 250

Swimming: 250

Breath-holding: 250

Stealth: 250

Life Magic: 250

Mind Magic: 250

Space Magic: 250

Earth Magic: 250

Water Magic: 250

Fire Magic: 250

Air Magic: 250

Light Magic: 250

Dark Magic: 250

Meditation: 250

Hand-to-hand combat: 92

Perception: 166

Necromancy: 250

Blood magic: 250

Chimerology: 250

Ritual magic: 250

Artifact creation: 250

Poison-making: 25

Ointment-making: 25

Metal reinforcing: 25

Wood reinforcing: 25

Body enhancement: 25

Professions

Herbalist: 250

Fisherman: 250

Tailor: 250

Blacksmith: 250

Carpenter: 250

Miner: 25

Skills

Imp eye

Undecuple consciousness

One of our own

Shroud of Darkness

Gifts

Meeting deferred

The game limits you to no more than twenty-five tattoos, no matter where or how large they are. The classes have their own specialized tattoos, and even whole sets, all of which offer a particular effect. Currently, I have nineteen ordinary and six complex spells as seals, with each subsequent one boosting the overall effect by 1%. And that’s more than enough for me—the important thing is that it doesn’t influence their secondary effects. I have an ocean of mana! My wisdom, morale, and intellect are all up 29%, and I have access to stronger spells. My blade is forged; now, I need to sharpen it.

To collect all the money I need, I’m going to have to destroy a lot of high-level monsters, and I know a great place where nobody will bother me. It will even give me an excellent chance to work on my resistance. I can’t wait to see what eleven streams of dragon breath looks like! I’m not going to use my strongest spells yet—they would definitely kill me. Hey, I have a meteor!