[Earthborn candidate #254726, Function increase level 5 cluster]

  Name: Finn Race: Human Class: Mage Subclass: None

  Level: 1 Experience Energy: 32% to next level

  Strength: 15

  Stamina: 12

  Endurance: 13

  Dexterity: 20

  Intelligence: 20

  Wisdom: 20

  Charisma: 15

  Health Points: 79/79 Mana Pool: 80/80 Mana Regen: 1 MP per minute

  Carry Weight: 350 lbs Potion Sensitivity: 12.5 (level 2)

  Survivability Index: 1%

  Skills: Tracking level 10, Enchant Item level 2, Craft Spell level 2, ????, ????, ????, ????

  It was mid-afternoon when I reached the turnoff for the Hollowbrook farm; the sign was clear and easy to read. It was nice I didn’t have to puzzle out a new language. “Hey Voice, why is it I can read this sign?”

  There was no answer.

  “Hello, oh disembodied voice. Are you there?” I asked dramatically, spreading my arms. I waited for a moment, digging at a rock in the dirt road with my boot. Still no answer. Had I imagined or offended the voice? There was an odd feeling of loss at its disappearance, as it had been my first contact when I woke up in this place. No matter the reason, there was no answer, and I had a job to do. Likely the first of many,if the cost of beer indicated the economics of this place.

  I tried not to focus on how long I had been away or on my brother being alone. I had to do this job, and do it well. Making my way down the rutted path, I tried not to think of my responsibilities. Soon, some fields came into view, as well as large pens and barns. I saw a group quietly talking outside one pen and made for the people.

  “Excuse me, I heard you had a wolf problem. Who do I talk to about that?” I asked. Some of the crowd turned to look at me, and a middle-aged man stepped forward.

  “You can talk to Pa. He’s in the pen there,” he said. The man ushered me towards the pen where the people were all focused. There was an old man leaning over his cane, looking at a pile of curly fur and offal, what once might have been a sheep. Or a goat. He didn’t look at me until I climbed over the hip-high fence and approached him, my boots squelching with each step.

  “Who the hells are you?” the old man said with a start, looking at me like I had materialized instead of walking through the mud to him.

  “I’m Finn. I heard you needed help with your wolf problem from the bartender in the village south of here. Said a man named Gam–?”

  “Eh? Speak up, boy, no need to whisper!” he snapped at me.

  “Pa’s hard of hearing,” a woman said from the crowd.

  Great, just great. I took a deep breath and raised my voice. “I SAID, I’M FINN! HERE FOR THE WOLF PROBLEM?”

  “Not so loud, boy! I’m not hard of hearing!” he shouted, spittle flying from his lips. He dug a finger into his ear as if there was gold to be found in it.

  “Yes, he is,” another person called from the crowd.

  The deaf old man glared past me before squinting at me. “Finn, is it? Good. I’d hoped Gam would get us some help. And it’s wolves, boy. More than one. Look at this ewe, or what’s left of her. Dead, and nothing to salvage. The wolves have been attacking the farm every night for weeks!”

  “Do you know where they are during the day?” I asked.

  “Eh? In the woods to the east of here.” He replied, pointing.

  I looked at the ewe and back up at the old man. “Do you know where to look in the woods?”

  And he looked at me as if I were an idiot. “Of course, we looked! We used dogs. And we could not find a whiff of the monsters! They’re destroying the livelihood of this family! Of course we’re gonna look, you idiot!” By the end, he was waving his cane and almost hit me. He planted his cane in the mud and leaned on it. “Why do you think I offered to pay someone? Use your brain, boy!”

  Standing there, I let him berate me. And the crotchety old SOB avoided my question. Was he embarrassed? It was stupid, and I didn’t care enough about that. The money, though, I cared about. I really needed the money. “I understand, sir. How many wolves are there?”

  He waved in the general direction of the crowd, done with me. “Go ask one of them.”

  Letting out a deep breath, I nodded and left the muddy pen. After talking to the crowd, the consensus was that there were five wolves. Though one of the younger boys swore up and down that there were seven.

  This wasn’t very helpful, but I needed a better idea of how many there were. A proper count would make finding the wolves a little easier. This would not be a simple task. I would first have to find the wolves by tracking them to their den. Hopefully, I would find them while they were not very active and deal with them quickly. Maybe trap them. Just having a small skinning knife weapon-wise wasn’t working for me.

  If I had a rifle, I could attempt to take them out from a distance. But that would require them to be hanging out in the open, so it was a moot point. I didn’t know the range of my spells or even how to figure it out. And not having the Voice to question was making this difficult. I just had to get close, and that was not the best way to deal with wolves, at least on their home turf. Or home den.

  I got to the woods with about half an hour’s worth of daylight left, which was not ideal. The wood itself was dark and cluttered, like something from one of those horror movies where people ignore the foreshadowing and end up on the wrong end of a chainsaw. But there was enough light for me to see the wolf tracks, the fresh ones overlaying older ones. It was so obvious to me. I couldn’t understand how the farmers had missed it. The trail was just so visible! I didn’t have to get down on hands and knees to check for tufts of fur or even broken plant stalks. The only way this well-traveled wolf highway could be any clearer is if it were glowing.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  There was another, darker possible reason why the farmers couldn’t track the wolves. But that would require paranoia and a willingness to believe the Voice could control certain events or people to set up quests. It was horrifying to think that human autonomy was truly lacking here. I frowned, considering that the Voice could have hidden visual and olfactory clues from the farmers’ dogs to facilitate such a ridiculous farce. Even radically accepting the reality I found myself in, it was pushing the proverbial envelope.

  Maybe my tracking skill really did make a difference somehow. It was almost easier to swallow, and I could just chalk it up to the different rules of this place. Much easier to accept.

  Tracking the beasts through the trees was doable, but sometimes they went through dense thorny bushes that I did not want to crawl through. I damn near lost track of them at a small stream, where the furry bastards had run through the water for about fifty yards. If I had gone upstream, it would have been too dark by the time I found the trail again. As it was, the day faded to twilight before the trail led to a cave opening. A large cave opening. Maybe I should have bought some explosives, cause there is no way I’m blocking that. I no longer had a choice. It was too dark to head back under threat of wolves at my back. And it was too dark to go into the cave.

  Or was it? I tried to cast Enchant Light. Nothing happened. “Fuck me, do I have to aim at my target?” I slapped my forehead, and suddenly I was surrounded by a glowing nimbus. That shouldn’t have worked, but hey, why not? I stepped into the cave and walked carefully down the sloping tunnel. I had noticed the smell as I had approached, but the overpowering stench of concentrated urine and shit hit me like a truck. It took me a moment to adjust, but damn, it was bad.

  I started thinking about what other spells I had. Wasn’t there a shadow spell? I put my hand on my chest and thought about casting Walk in Shadows. I didn’t notice any shadows springing up to hide me, so I kept walking. The gravel underfoot was strangely muted. Running my fingers along the fine dirt of the tunnel wall, I paused, hearing the sounds of movement farther down the tunnel.

  This is as good a place as any other. The tunnel was wide and well-lit, plus there was a turn in sight. I could wait and hit them with my spells as they came around the bend. Even though there were other spells that might work, I really wanted to try the Chain Lightning spell.

  And then, there they were. Six giant wolves came around the corner, and the first one stopped twelve feet from me. It sniffed the air before growling. The sound was deeper than it should have been, and I felt it in my chest. I aimed at it as the other five mirrored the first. The tunnel exploded with light and a loud boom as I cast Chain Lightning.

  Holy cow. I was speechless. The lightning shot through all six wolves and around the corner. They all started seizing up, whining. All six collapsed to the ground, two unmoving. The other four were attempting and failing to get to their feet. I let out a whoop and peppered them with Ice Shards. Javelins of ice nailed them to the ground and the walls. I’d done it. I laughed in relief as I leaned against the tunnel wall.

  Suddenly, six more wolves stumbled shakily around the tunnel bend, and I freaked out, frantically zapping them with chain lightning while I scream-swore at them and backpedaled. “Fuck you! And you! And you! Take this, you furry shit! Fry motherfuckers!”

  Then I ran out of mana. In my flailing attempt for more, I fell on my backside. It wasn’t until the sparks and smoke cleared that I realized I had won. Pushing myself unsteadily to my feet, I looked at myself for any scratches or bites, but saw nothing but a dark outline. No, it was a shadow where my body should have been. A shadow with an oddly glowing nimbus. To my surprise, I’d successfully cast my Walk in Shadows spell. But with my Enchant Light spell still active. “Oh fuck. I should be dead,” I said, horrified at my idiocy.

  ‘Our “hero,” Finn the Mage, is triumphant in his starting quest to save the farm! The wolves are dead, surprisingly, and the people will praise the name of Finn. Though our victorious Mage is out of mana for the time being, he somehow vanquished his low-level foes! Perhaps he should have chosen a nice, rats-in-the-cellar quest, as he will need to take proof back to the farmers if they are to believe him. And maybe look for loot. Hint, hint.’

  “Voice! You’re back! Can you help me out? I have so many questions,” I replied, annoyed and relieved. I waited for an answer, something that would help me survive.

  But there was nothing. Just that brief thing about me completing the…quest? And there had been the option of a quest to kill rats? Whatever. I grudgingly took the Voice’s suggestion and checked the wolves for loot. Using my skinning knife, I skinned the wolves carefully, as my dad taught me on those coyotes at his friend’s ranch on the Western Slope. The time and energy left me slick with sweat, despite the cool air.

  My eyes darted from one end of the tunnel to the other, ears straining for just a hint of danger while rolling up their skins and stuffing them into my backpack. The damn thing acted like it was bigger on the inside. Shaking my head and hoping that I didn’t need a doctor, I wiped my hands on the cool dirt walls to get the worst of the blood off.

  Against my better judgement, I carefully crept farther into the den. It didn’t take long for the tunnel to change the deeper I went. The walls became dank and wet with ooze near the rough stone and dirt floor. I found the gnawed-on corpse of a person, mostly bones and sinew, half-buried in the dirt. Was this what the Voice meant by loot — taking it from bodies? I wasn’t comfortable with the idea of robbing the dead.

  But if the person was dead, what good were money or possessions? I hesitantly reached out to brush some of the dirt off the top of the pile, doing my best not to touch the bones.

  “Sorry about this, whoever you were,” I mumbled softly, imagining the poor guy being ripped open by sharp teeth. There was a piece of leather, so I clenched my jaw and dragged it out of the dirt. “Everything is just so expensive.” It turned out to be a belt, which had survived long enough for me to pull it free of the dirt and partial skeleton. I cringed as it pulled the remains’ pelvis free with a clatter as other bones moved about. The belt wasn’t worth keeping, nor was the rotted leather pouch tied to it. The twenty-five gold and three silver, however, were. I’d at least be able to eat back in the village. “Thank you, I’ll let someone know that you’re here so you can get a proper burial.”

  Guilt twisted my gut at what I had done. The feeling of wrongness added to the sense of exposure, of being watched and judged. Not knowing if there were any more monstrous canines lurking, waiting for their chance to eat my intestines while I screamed, did horrible things to my state of mind and filled me with fear. On top of that, I had to wonder what my justifications said about my morality. This was something I would have to figure out when I was safe. In the meantime, I had to continue practicing radical acceptance.

  I was out of mana, with only a small, though sharp, skinning knife. And there was a stench ahead of me that almost made me turn around right there.

  The smell worsened with each turn until it opened up into what could only be described as the beast’s combination larder and garbage pile all in one. The carcasses of sheep and deer lay with the remains of animals I had never seen before or didn’t recognize. A fresh kill of a woman missing her jaw and half her torso lay over half a dog. Her fluids soaked the fur. Other pieces and corpses were mixed in the pile.

  I’ve never heard of wolves doing anything like this, I thought in shock and disbelief. It’s really over-the-top horror bullshit.

  Then I noticed how everything seemed to move in the light. Crawling over the bodies, in and out of mouths and torsos, were maggots. And beetles. Plus other things that I did not want to think about. The shine of metal caught my eye, and I focused gratefully on it. A dagger, surprisingly clean, lay at the feet of a man whose stomach had been ripped out. Streamers of intestines, now dried and papery, rustled with the movement of devouring insects. Bile rose in my throat. I held my breath while quickly grabbing the dagger and running out, tears running down my face. It didn’t even occur to me to look for a sheath in that horror-filled hell. If I could have cleansed the dead there with fire, I would have burned it all in a heartbeat. No one deserved that!

  The tunnel didn’t seem so frightening compared to that hell as I jogged back up the tunnel and passed the wolf carcasses. I had their skins, and that was proof enough. If the farmers didn’t want all the skins, the hell with them. I’d figure something out.

  The foul air seemed to follow me, and I burst out of the den into the near darkness and clean air to stop panting near the entrance. I spat out the gastric acid and breathed deeply of the fresh air to clear the stench from my lungs.

  Hopefully, this was the grossest shit I would ever have to deal with here.

  Alright, back to it.