Following the mob, Rowan was deep in thought about how to apply his powers.
'Since I can manipulate the melting point of the taffy ball up to a certain extent, while being able to control it within 5 meters. Does that mean I can make it float or throw it at someone? But, how do I activate the skill, maybe I'll have to think of it?' To test that theory, he did so, and saw something forming and hovering above his hand, a chunk of taffy the size of a basketball. It was entirely yellow, and looked like a salt water taffy. He thought back to the noble's baseball sized fireball.
'Mine is bigger, perhaps the man didn't allocate any points in in intellect. Does the constitution or strength stat have something to do with the size as well? I only have a point in strength, so it can't be that.' Rowan remembered that the strength of his abilities were mostly dependent on the strength and constitution stat. He assumed that increasing the strength of his abilities meant that the confections would stick together more or be sturdier, but that can be confirmed later as more stat points are used.
While studying the ball of taffy, he found that he could manipulate it to float around. It smelled like a banana? He took a bite out of it, and it was indeed banana. Resisting the urge to eat more, Rowan looked at his mana points.
[68/70]
'So, each use costs 2 mana points, but what about the regen rate?' Suddenly, he saw his mana go up again.
[69/70]
'It's been about a minute since I used a skill, so an increment of 1 mana per minute? This may be affected by intellect, I'll confirm it later when I add more stat points in intellect' Rowan thought the current increment was slow, a lot could happen in a minute and he wanted to regain mana as fast a possible.
The mob slowly made it's way forward, growing in number by the minute as more and more people joined, spurred on by the self-proclaimed messengers of God. The leader of this ragtag bunch appeared to be the very same person who 'interpreted' God's will, along with some people following him. He was a balding middle aged man, with greasy blonde hair, proclaiming himself to be a messenger of God. The messenger led the mob as they made their way through the city.
Rowan could see that all of the buildings had similar traits: old and battered, just like the very 'house' he woke up in, if it could even be called that.
They were approaching the center of the city, which was also walled off on all sides. The wall was tall and imposing, at least 20 meters tall. There were guards stationed on top of the wall and at the bottom as well, at least several hundred. Crossbows and catapults could be seen set up as well.
"Halt!" A guard from the top of the wall said as he saw the mob, the guards on the wall were trying to figure out what was going, though they would know very soon.
Someone at the bottom of the wall walked forward, clad in armor, and armed with a spear. He appeared to be the leader here, presumably the guard captain.
"Lay down your arms!" he yelled out, and the crowd stopped while whispering among themselves. They all had a dangerous look in their eye. They were out for blood.
'Not again... the situation inside the walls just calmed down, and now this?' He had a solemn expression on his face behind the armor, looking at the crowd wielding weapons of all types. Swords, daggers, axes, could be seen. Everyone in the crowd had a weapon, but that wasn't all...
He waved his hand to signal at the guards on the top of the wall, most of them were archers. They nocked their arrows and took aim, waiting for the signal to fire. Some arrows could be seen glowing, and some archers eyes could be seen glowing. There were some guards with staffs conjuring fireballs, blades of wind, chunks of earth, and other magic.
Though some seemed intimidated among the crowd, many continued to move forward, with hardened resolve. Similar sights could be seen, as some cold weapons started glowing, some vines sprouting out from the ground, the sizzle of lightning shrouding someone almost like armor, a huge chunk of earth in the shape of a human with a sword. With the self proclaimed messenger at the forefront of the peasants' side, conjuring arrows that appeared to be made of light. And Rowan with his ball of taffy.
The two sides faced off, and the tensions were at their peak, almost permeable.
"God wills it!!" the leader of the peasants bellowed out and charged forward, followed by the peasants echoing his words.
"End the tyranny!" someone said as they rushed forward, spear in hand.
The guard captain signaled, and immediately afterwards those on the wall started fire their weapons and magic.
BOOM
With the preemptive strike on the guards' side, hundreds of peasants were slain immediately, with limbs flying, and people falling left and right.
'It's time to test my powers" Rowan thought as he walked forward, albeit a little shakily, as this would be his first time. He manipulated the ball of taffy he conjured earlier forward, throwing it at a guard facing off against a peasant with an sword. With some points in constitution, he felt that he could lower the melting point just enough to where it would cover the man's head and stick, like it had been left in the sun for a while and was starting to melt.
The man saw a yellow ball, with a small hole on the side being thrown towards him. He activated his skill, conjuring a small pillar in front of him, blocking the peasant attacking. The peasant's sword hit the pillar and bounced out of his hand, and he fell back.
The guard sneered seeing this and thought the yellow thing flying towards him would be blocked as well, however... the ball of taffy suddenly turned, going around the pillar and then...
SPLAT
"Mmm... mmf!" whatever he was trying to say wasn't coming through, he could only see yellow, and he couldn't breathe. Trying to use his hands to rip off the taffy, he managed to get a handful in each hand, but the rest were clinging to him, especially his hair. He heard a sound resound in his head.
It was his interface, making a 'ding' sound every time a debuff was stacked. He couldn't see, but he could feel, every time the 'ding' came he felt like he was being infused with a hefty dose of energy each time, his energy felt like it was rising. Little did he know, each stack was like ingesting dozens and dozens of grams, and slowly encroached towards being kilograms. He started feeling sluggish both in body and mind, and fell down. His heart was racing rapidly, and he started spasming as the stacks kept going up. He stopped moving shortly after. Seeing all of this, Rowan only had one thought: 'That's f*cking overpowered... is it one stack per second?' If the person hit with this skill had no way of getting the taffy off or had anyway to deal with it, then being hit was a essentially a death sentence, especially while fighting other people. How could you win without seeing and breathing, added with the fact that the sugar overload debuff ceaselessly stacked, further reducing any chance of escape. He didn't think much about the fact that he just killed someone. Rowan thought that it was a necessity, and nothing more or less. He needed to do so to get stronger and survive. He had a feeling that he would end up being one of the corpses on the ground, becoming someone else's experience, if he didn't get strong enough. 'Did I get any experience?' he opened up his interface and saw something new. ----------------------------------------------- Name: Rowan Race: Human Title: None Class: Confectioner Level: 1 Exp: 50/100% HP: 115/115 MP: 70/70 Stat points: 0 Str: 1 Con: 3 Dex: 1 Int: 4 Traits: Sugar Overload 5★, Abilities: Taffy Ball 1★ ----------------------------------------------- He could hear people screaming and clashing all around him, along with the ceaseless sounds of explosions from people using their abilities wantonly. They will realize how important mana points are shortly... 'One more for a level up...' he thought as another ball of taffy appeared before him.