I awoke to god rays projecting through the window. I'd say yesterday was a pretty good day. I stood and stretched, now what was I supposed to do? I turned towards the door, I'm fairly certain I heard someone knock, and it rang out once more. Yeah that's a person, I stood to open the door. When I opened it, I saw a one of the castle's maid. "I have breakfast, oh and a message, sir." "Oh, sure." I wasn't gonna say no to, VERY, suspiciously timed breakfast, it was free however, that's a definite plus. She brought a platter, inside placed it on the table, and quickly made her exit.
I removed the top, and reveled in something holy, the same order from last night, a joyous occasion indeed. Along with it was some bound parchment, and it could most definitely wait.
After finishing my meal, I removed the binding on the scroll, and began to read it's contents.
(I could give this lovely little world it's own name's for month's, no need to fix something that isn't a problem though, aka, sound's like a waste of time.)
September 1st AA 1487
Dear Kairos
"I'll come fetch you when dawn passes, we'll be heading back through the portal where you'll get to meet the rest of our team, do please forgive them for their exited attitude, we've been trying to get a new dark class for our team since last year, dark classes can not be easily replaced at all. 1 out of Every 31'236 can awaken normally, getting a dark class has a 1/153 chance, not the most common. We have 5 member's in total you would be the 6th btw.
Sincerely Zephyr
Well the elf's nonchalant attitude certainly showed in the way he wrote. So I have to entertain my self till dawn passes. Damn, that kinda sucks, reading it is.
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I heard it, the blessed knock, coming to free my from my torment. I speed walked over too the door. You wouldn't believe who was there! "We leavin?" "You know it." I grabbed my bag I left by the dresser. We started to go back up towards the portal room. "So, where are we going exactly?" Zephyr frowned a little, "Right now we are undeployed. Due to soon to be amended lack of dark we have been stationed at a fairly calm checkpoint that checks any supplies being brought directly to the front line. We need to make sure you can, actually fight. You may have grown up a hunter, but how good are you stabbing shit?"
"Big surprise, I know my way around a bow, and knives, although I've never really used to them to fight anyone, that whole living at a small peaceful Town doesn't help that." At this point we had reached the portal. "That's probably fine, we can get you the basic defense and weapon mastery, so it shouldn't be much of a problem." Zephyr glanced over "Ready?"
"-_-"
"I'll take that as a yes."
It was actually much better this time, since I knew what to expect, still sucked though. We had arrived at a forest that surrounds a canyon pass, we were at the entrance, big surprise, it's a checkpoint. The portal wasn't actually in the camp like last time, rather it was hidden inside an illusory rock in the forest about 200 meters from the checkpoint. "Welcome to our humble checkpoint." zephyr gestured over the small wooden fort that had been built there. And so we set down from the forest towards the checkpoint.
Zephyr and I kept silent the whole walk. Once we had arrived he hailed the gate guard's, they were dressed in simple leather armor, some men with bows sat atop wooden watchtowers. Zephyr didn't even say anything as the gate was already being raised. Soon it had opened fully and we made our way inside. Unlike the road at Bone Field it was a cobble road. Made sense, since carriages were going through, many tent's littered the area, home to the about 150 soldiers that were stationed here, or at least, that's about how many I saw. Soon we arrived at a few tent's, better than his, they had actual pegs so didn't flap in the winds and overall were larger maybe went about 2 meters in the air and about 3 meters long.
Like his they were supported by metal, they also were white like mine. Fair, almost all tent's are. Unlike his he could tell the cloth was oil cloth, making it water proof.
Zephyr sighed "Time I introduced you to our team, he pulled out a gold bell from his inventory, he rang it. I watched as 4 other individuals quickly emerged from their tent's, a Dark Elf, a fellow Human, a Lizard Kin, and lastly, an Insectoid. I would say I would feel intimated, f they could contain they're extreme boredom, Zephyr leaned towards my ear and whispered "They've read your sheet by the way." "Uh huh" I'd say the most notable would be the Insectoid for hopefully obvious reasons. The Dark Elf next since there was none in Leech Wood. The other's he had seen fairly often so they weren't too surprising.
The Dark Elf quickly made her way over, "Damn, were actually done waiting?" Zephyr gave an affirmative nod. Her shoulders relaxed at that, and she let out a long sigh. "Fuckin finally." I would say she sounded exited but she sounded more tired than before somehow. Zephyr gestured to me.
"Meet Kala, our Healer/Offense mage, specifically, she's a B tier Phoenix Healer, pretty much a healer, but instead of having buff's like most healers, deals in flinging flames . I would introduce you to her but yknow, they already know who you are." Zephyr gestured over to the other Human.
"This is our Ranger Quintin, he's an A tier Strider, an Archer with a mix of self sufficiency skill's and movement skills."
"The Lizard Kin is Fink, he's our resident rogue, a B tier War Rogue specifically. A Rogue that can actually handle a straight up fight."
"Lastly is Vex, he's a Spell Blade, a B tier Arcane Spell Blade, pretty much a magic sword's men." Zephyr pointed at himself
"And then theirs me, I'm an A tier Wind Walker, a Warrior/Tank that can use wind magic, I'm not a Spell Blade Though."
In the time it took for Zephyr to finish talking everyone had gotten closer, allowing me to get a better look at them. First was the Dark Elf, Kala, she looked about 6'1, She wore a Dark Leather Armor, She had Toned muscles, that made sense, she was a Soldier after all, like any Elf her skin was flawless, her hair was a dark brown and her eyes were purple as well. Dark Elves looked like Elves, but, purple. Compared to an Elf they were the same in every way but they have +50 mana instead of +25 mana and stamina like an Elf.
Next up was the Lizard Kin, Fink. He stood at an imposing 6'3, He wore a little bit heavier Leather Armor compared to Kala, He had green scales, a fairly common color. As one would expect he looked fairly strong, just as you would expect he also lacked hair, the only one who didn't look strong was Vex, I'd get a better look at him later. Lizardmen had -50 mana +50 stamina and +20 hp.
I had nothing to say about Quentin, he was a just another human. Once more rocking the leather armor that everyone here seemed to love, Zephyr included.
Last and most definitely not least, Vex, the Insectoid. He was massive, standing 6'7 tall, he wore no Armor, he did sport a cloak though, to be fair there was nothing to hide, but I'll get to that in a moment. He was easily the most interesting one of the bunch, his mandibles were about half a foot long, is mouth consisted of 1 flap like structure with 2 more mini mandibles tucked into the side. One more note was that he didn't have compound eyes rather, he sported 2 slit's on his head 2 inches long and about 1'5 inch tall, they tapered off to the left and right respectively in. He sported 4 Insect wings on his back, I could see the ends hidden in his cloak. His Feet ended in 5 claws that kinda looked like toes.
He had claws instead of fingers, as you would expect, still sporting 5 each though. His toe claw thing's kinda looked like blades in a way, they started maybe 1 inch high rose to a peak of 3 where a small crescent hole appeared at the bottom and then went back down. Compared to the claws on his hands they were completely different, they started kinda like normal fingers but at the end they turned into a large yet sleek chitin claw, they converged on a razor sharp point at the back and front, the front looking more dense with the back looking like a sewing needle that arched all the way back to where his knuckles would be, if he had any. His whole body was made of chitin plates, as you would expect, they were sharp and angled downward, spaced about 5 inches apart from one another.
Insectoid's have a very interesting history. They were originally monsters, yet when a dungeon break happened in that same dungeon they ended up separated from the main group of monsters, they weren't found till the dungeon was back under control, and since they had been outside so long without gaining any of the dungeons mana they had their shackles placed on them by the dungeon removed granting them sapience and free will. This means that they weren't intended to really be a sapient species and that shows, first they have +50 hp +100 mana and stamina and of course natural armor, so they have tons of every base stat compared to just about every other sapient, even if you do fight one the natural armor makes them immune to pretty much all but blunt weapons. The only downside they have was 1st population was just about 12 of them, and no more ever became free.
Since they were now able to Awaken as they were considered a Sapient they fell under the systems Jurisdiction, the first of the 2 things it fixed was the fact they weren't meant to reproduce. All Insectoid's are borne already Awakened with a C tier class at minimum, but what does that have to do with reproduction? I'll tell you, they all start with a few ability's unique to their species, one lets them combine mana with another Insectoid to literally magically pop an Insectoid egg into existence, don't question it. As for the other thing it fixed, that would be their lack of speech, they were the ability to project thoughts into audible dialogue. As for the other's these come in the form of their natural armor.
This means just about every Insectoid doesn't wear armor, they don't wear clothes either but that comes later, and their last perk, a perfect digestive system. They have a way to use everything they eat, this also means they don't produce waste. It's definitely worth noting that they have a lifespan of about 400 years, and are all genderless, this is a perk since clothes are easily ripped on their sharp body's, normally being unclothed would be a problem but they packing a whole lota nothin so it's no problem, but they do all sound male.
Compared to most they have a very interesting history. They are also exceptionally rare, as you would expect from such a small species.
"Hello people, it's a pleasure to work with you all." They all responded, "Sure no problem kid." Kara's voice was very smooth. "Don't worry I appreciate you, we can finally stop sitting around and doing jack shit." Quentin sounded fairly exited, I can respect the sentiment as well, I wouldn't wanna sit and do nothing for a year either. "Welcome to our little group friend." Fink was trying to be polite. He spoke with a smile as well so I assumed he was trying to be polite at least, he spoke with a surprisingly light voice for a Lizard Kin. "I welcome you." Vex's "voice" was raspy and slightly deep, and due to that whole thought projecting thing he didn't actually move his mouth.
Zephyr nodded, "Thank you everyone, now I think it's time we talked a little about getting Kairos here set up."
(I'd like to apologize if this chap seemed a bit chaotic, apparently most novels don't have bug people so I had to base my ideas off something terrifying, my own ideas. As a result this chapter might just feel a lil bit confused and chaotic all around. Also 10 - will be used for separation in the system or if we aren't talking about the system it means there has been a time skip, generally a few hours.)