Dravincia Page 6

  The northern side of the house had a decent fenced off section that Arthur guessed had been a modest garden for the home. The grass around the home was grown up to Arthur’s thigh and unkempt. At a glance, Arthur didn’t see anything near the house. He waited and observed the house. After five minutes of waiting he had decided to start toward the house but right before he took that first step, he saw something moving in the grass near the outside of the fence to the old garden.

  He watched the same spot and noticed that whatever was moving the grass was too short to see in the thick grass. He kept catching glimpses of black amongst the green but could never get a good enough view of what it was. He wasn’t about to just take a random shot at it because that was plain foolish. He started looking around the area for the grass, moving similarly and found two other places doing the same thing. None of the spots he had seen the grass moving had veered too far from where they had started though.

  Arthur finally decided that sitting there and staring at the same spots was not getting him anywhere, so he decided the best course of action was to get his bow ready and slowly creep toward the closest disturbance. When he got within ten yards, the grass went from its occasional swaying to a quick jerk and then froze. Before Arthur knew it, the grass started rustling again, only this time it headed in his direction. At the five-yard mark, Arthur finally caught a glimpse of what he was facing off against.

  “What the hell is that?” He yelled.

  Chapter 6

  The Manor

  You have got to be fucking kidding me? Someone must be playing some great cosmic joke. What kind of asshole would pin me in a fight against giant rats of all things?

  “There is no way in hell I am dealing with this crap.” He exclaimed as those thoughts rolled through his head.

  Regular rats are bad enough but giant rats the size of a large house cat? Nope, so done for the day. Arthur wasn’t scared of rats, but no one in their right mind liked them. Almost everyone has dealt with mice and rats at some point in their life and even if they are not scared of them the idea of touching one, even on a trap, usually gives people the creeps. They are typically such filthy little creatures. No one wants to take chances.

  Despite all of his misgivings, it was pretty obvious he didn’t have any choice in this matter as the creature was already barreling at him. The rat had already reached him by the time he was ready to fire. He didn’t even have time to aim before the rat leaped into the air at him. Without a target lined up, he just pointed in the general direction and fired the arrow.

  While the arrow didn’t have a solid hit, it did hit the front left shoulder of the rat for a glancing blow and had enough force behind it to push it off of its course. Instead of flying straight into Arthur’s face, it whipped by him on his left. He followed it with his eyes as it passed, and this time enough of it was visible to see some of the creature's information.

  Name: Giant Rat

  Level: 5

  Type: Creature

  Rarity: Common

  HP: ???/???

  Stamina: ???/???

  Strength: ?

  Agility: ?

  Endurance: ?

  Experience: N/A

  Skills

  Combat Skills:

  Scratch: ? (???/???)

  Leaping Bite: ? (???/???)

  Arthur wished he was able to see more details about the creatures he found but had no way to know if that was possible or not. Maybe when he got back into town, he could ask a few questions and learn some more about how this world worked. Doing this without drawing too much attention to his complete lack of knowledge would be the trick.

  He worked to focus on the problem at hand instead of letting his mind wander. The rat that had leaped past him had now turned around and was facing him again. This time it wasn’t in a mad dash at him, but it was close enough where it didn’t need to be. The main problem in the scenario was how to deal with it.

  The rat was already too close for him to have the time to fit another arrow to the string. The only other option was the small dagger he had but, quite honestly, the thought of getting that close to this nasty creature to try and kill it with a knife sent shivers down his spine. The dagger blade itself was around nine inches long, but that thing had some pretty big teeth on it as well.

  He decided there was no helping it, though. He just wasn’t very well equipped for this scenario and was going to have to push through it. He dropped his bow next to him and pulled the dagger out of sit’s sheath. He thought about picking the bow back up to use as a club to push the rat around when needed but didn’t want to take the chance of breaking his only ranged weapon.

  Instead of any more thinking, he decided to just go for it by instinct. The rat ran toward him again and jumped once more. This time Arthur was expecting it and took a step to his left and slashed down as hard as he could against the rat’s side. The blade dug in pretty deep behind the shoulder and blood sprayed out of the new wound.

  It must have hit something significant because the rat collapsed shortly after landing. The rat tried to regain its feet once but just fell back to the ground and this time stopped moving for good. Arthur looked at it for a few moments and was sure it wasn’t getting up again, but it didn’t take long for him to hear some scurrying to his right. He looked over just in time to see one of the other rats that he had forgotten about dashing through the tall grass in his direction. At least he assumed it was another rat since it moved similarly and he hadn’t seen it yet.

  This second rat was already too close to attempt to pick his bow up and get a shot off, so he braced himself for it to come leaping toward him. This time the rat did something different. Instead of getting a running leap at him, it ran straight for his feet and started trying to claw his legs. Arthur jumped backward, but the little furry rodent was relentless and kept pursuing him.

  Arthur was sure he looked like an absolute fool hopping around trying to avoid a giant rat, but at the time it was irrelevant. He kept trying to take quick swings at it but was worried about missing the rat and hitting himself. A different approach was going to be needed. He waited for the rat to get close to his foot again after his last dodge and this time, instead of jumping away again, he kicked it as hard as he could with his right leg. The rat flew back almost ten feet before landing in a bit of a heap.

  The rat got back up, and it also changed tactics. The rat took off in a dash toward Arthur and tried the Leaping Bite attack like the last one he fought. He was hoping for this to happen and decided to try the same strategy he had last time. He sidestepped the leap and brought his dagger down hard toward the side of the creature. Unfortunately, this time he had misjudged the attack and swung just a bit too late. Instead of hitting the rat on its side, he only managed to cut its tail off. The rat landed and hissed in displeasure.

  Now he was at a loss for what to do. The only thing he could think of doing was take the chance to stab at it and hope he didn’t hit himself or leave himself wide open for a counterattack if he missed. He also knew there was one other rat somewhere and didn’t know if it had made its way toward him yet or not. He decided to take the chance, and when the rat closed in the next time, he stabbed straight down at it. His luck must have been working in his favor because he connected directly into the back on the rat’s neck and the creature went limp. A chime sounded, and he ignored it.

  The final rat was in sight, but it was still forty yards away and didn’t appear to be in a hurry to come at him. He dashed the couple steps to his bow and picked it up. Grabbing an arrow from his bag, he put it to the string and sighted on the area where the final rat was. With the grass as tall as it was, he was having a hard time determining exactly where the rat was. He knew the general area but just firing blindly into tall grass seemed like a waste.

  He decided to bait the rat a bit. He released the tension on the bow and crouched down to try and conceal himself a little. He grabbed a nearby rock and threw it to the right of the rat in front of him. This acco
mplished what he had hoped. The rat took off in the direction of the rock, and this gave Arthur the chance to spot it as it moved through the tall grass. Wanting to get the ranged attack on this animal instead of having to fight it off with his short dagger, he decided to aim for the front of the moving grass and judged the depth of the shot into the green blades. He took aim at a slightly less dense patch of grass in front of the moving rat. Hoping the less crowded grass would allow for a better shot, he waited for the rat to reach his chosen spot and let the arrow fly.

  Arthur heard the rat squeal and was delighted he had hit the half-hidden creature. The grass was rustling, but nothing was leaving the area it had landed. Arthur dropped his bow again and drew the knife on his belt. He stalked forward while remaining crouched toward the disturbance in the grass. When he was five feet away, he could see the rat had been hit with the arrow in its back leg and had pinned it to the ground. The rat was struggling to pull itself off of the shaft while clawing at the ground to get free.

  Arthur was happy it wasn’t facing him. This allowed him to take a quick jump and plunge the dagger directly into the side of the rat, and it stopped moving. He heard a chime again but ignored it. Arthur finally let out a heavy sigh and stood up. He grimaced at the ugly creature in disgust.

  Honestly, why would rats this size even exist? Such filthy creatures, Arthur thought to himself.

  He looked around the clearing at the 3 spots with the dead rats. The thought of dealing with any more of these creatures was making his skin crawl. Much less wandering through small hallways and confined spaces in a building. Hopefully, the manor wouldn’t have many of these nasty things in it. He was already here and really couldn’t turn back now though. He walked over to the rat that had its tail removed and chuckled a bit. The thought of that amused him for some reason. He glanced over and looked at the rat tail in the grass near it. He was turning to look back toward the manor when a box popped up.

  Item:

  Giant Rat Tail

  Durability: 5/5

  Rarity: Common

  Quality: Fair

  Weight: 0.2 kg

  Traits: Tail from a Giant Rat.

  Well shit, the stupid tail must be used for something since it registered as a standard item. Since it was still showing as a common rarity, it must not be out of the ordinary. Arthur was rather tired of having little to no information on things like this, though.

  What good are these boxes if they couldn’t tell you anything useful? Arthur thought.

  As much as he hated the idea of it, he decided he might as well gather the tails from all three rats. He wasn’t about to go digging around in these beady-eyed things looking for other useful parts though. He quickly collected the three tails and placed them in his bag. He found the arrows he had used and cleaned them off a bit on the grass. He also wiped his dagger off on the grass and placed it back in its sheath. He grabbed his bow and moved forward toward the house. On his way, he walked near the small enclosure near the manor and was delighted to see it was an old garden, but even better it was growing a few things wild now. He would have to check through the garden a little more thoroughly on his way out to see if anything could be useful.

  He made it to the front door and noticed it was somewhat rotted and looked to be barely hanging on by its hinges. It was going to take a miracle for any kind of paper to still be intact in this place, but he was sure the quest wouldn’t have popped up if there wasn’t something he could use to complete it. On the other hand, for all he knew, this world could just be screwing with him.

  He gave the door a slight nudge with his foot, and it creaked open loudly. Arthur was sure he was about to be that idiot that everyone watched at a movie theater yelling “Don’t go in there,” “It’s haunted,” “You’re going to die,” but there wasn’t much use for it. Arthur decided to get his bow nocked and ready just in case.

  Immediately through the door was a large, open room with an expansive staircase in the center. The staircase was one of those gaudy affairs with an extensive bottom section that branched apart to form a “Y” style leading to the upper floor. There were doors to his right and left as well as one on each side of the staircase. The entire room must have been forty feet across and looked like a lot of wasted space. Now the trick was deciding where to start.

  After thinking about it for a bit, he decided to start on the top floor. The reasoning behind this was rather simple. If he started on the floor he was on now there was a chance of a monster attacking him from an upper level and boxing him somewhere. This would be especially dangerous if the second floor was rotted through anywhere and the beast could jump on him from the top floor. The same logic applied if this place happened to have a basement. Start from the top and work your way down. Maybe it was a habit he picked up from learning how to properly clean? He mused to himself.

  He decided to proceed to the stairs and slowly made his way forward. The necessity of testing his weight on each foot for the stability of the floor slowed his progress considerably. His progress was slow and painstaking, but he made his way to the top of the stairs and discovered that both sections of the stairs ended on the same landing on the second floor. This was further proof it was just for looks and not that way for any functional reason. He crept forward down a hallway on the right of him and came across a door.

  Not knowing what to expect, he slowly nudged the door with his foot, and it glided open. Looking through the doorway, he didn’t see anything of interest. The few pieces of furniture were rotten and falling apart. The bed frame was in three different parts, and all of them were leaning at odd angles. There were some random piles of trash lying around the room that Arthur was not going to mess with. He turned his gaze back on the hall and continued down it.

  The next-door he came across was on his left, and he tried the same process as last time. This time when he nudged the door, the door didn’t move. He reached over and grabbed the handle, and it snapped off due to decay. He decided if it were that weak, he would force the door open. He braced himself directly against the door and gave one solid push. He heard the door cracking, and before he could stop himself, he foolishly fell through the door and into the room.

  To his immense relief, he didn’t see anything moving in the room. That was all he needed, to fall helpless into a place and have a monster bite his face off before he could get himself oriented. It was rather apparent that the door was in much worse shape than he had estimated. He got to his feet and started making his way around the room. There didn’t seem to be any good reason why this room would have been locked although it was hard to tell if it was a lock on the door or just the rot wedging it shut.

  He made a slow pass around the room and found much the same as the last. There was one small end table with a drawer in it that appeared to be somewhat intact. He walked up to it and slowly peeked into the drawer. He managed to find one thing of interest in it.

  Item:

  Silver Hair Pin

  Durability: 25/25

  Rarity: Common

  Quality: Well Crafter

  Weight: 0.05 kg

  Slot: Accessory

  Traits: A decorative silver hair pin.

  Hmm, that item actually could be worn, but it didn’t have any unique properties, so Arthur didn’t bother equipping it. He was sure with it being silver, it could be sold for a reasonable price. Arthur tossed it into his bag and continued his trip around the room. When he made it back to the door, he walked back out into the hall and continued forward. The next room was on the left, and after a quick look, it appeared to be a washroom and possibly what would pass for a restroom in this land. Nothing looked of interest, so he moved to the last room in this hall. When he came near it, he heard faint rustling noises coming from the other side. He got his bow back up and ready.

  This time he had his arrow pulled back and ready to release when he nudged the door open. When the door opened, he saw another giant rat scurrying around the far side of the room. It was walking along
the back wall and appeared to be investigating everything it came across. Without a thought Arthur released his arrow and with a satisfying crunch, followed by a dull thunk, the arrow passed straight through the rat’s eye and into the floor causing the shaft to stand up and quiver. He walked over to the rat and collected its tail as well and tossed it into his bag.

  A quick inspection of this room turned up nothing, so he collected the arrow from the rat. The tip seemed to be in good shape and pretty sharp, so back in the bag, it went. Once again in the hall, he had to backtrack to the staircase. Once back at the stairs, he had two options. He could either take the hallway to his right, which would lead him directly away from the entry door or he could walk straight ahead to the entrance on the other side. He decided to save the middle for last and walked to the other side.

  This hallway appeared to also have four rooms with two on each side. Creeping down the hall, he came to the first on the left and slowly opened the door. Another place of nothing but rotten furniture. The rest in the hall were also empty. Oddly enough when he got to the last room, he again heard noise on the other side of the door. Readying his bow, he opened the door again.

  As soon as it swung open Arthur looked in quickly and saw absolutely nothing. He stuck his head through the doorway cautiously and looked in each direction and saw nothing that could have made the noise. It was at this point he could see the window frame on the left side of the room and noticed a tree had grown up, right to the window. The wind appeared to have been blowing it against the window and causing a scratching type of noise. Relieved, Arthur let the tension go from the bow. He started walking around the room, and when he got to the back of the corner, his footing gave way a bit. Luckily he hadn’t shifted all of his weight yet and was able to backpedal quickly, but a small section of the floor crumbled away, revealing rafters and the room below.