Chapter 10.42 T

Chapter 10.42 T
Mini-Chapter: Eldavin	Interlude - Vernoue (Pt. 1)
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Chapter 10.42 T is the 84th chapter of Volume 10. The T stands for Toren.

tl;dr edit edit source

Even with the challenge of the lacking mana, Barnethei still plans on expanding The Explorer's Haven with a visit from Larracel and Deniusth.
Inreza refutes the flag land claiming system that was promoted by Relz and Noass on the Wistram News Network by throwing multiple flags all over the New Lands.
Barnethei and the new Haven deal with the results of the many failed expeditions of the New Lands with multiple groups of hungry travels knocking on their doors such as [Bandits].
Toren and the Healing Slime travel through the mana draining New Lands trying to find a safe place before Slimey dies, the both of them get swept up by a stream with the slime being grabbed by Yirr and brought to The Explorer's Haven.
The Explorer's Haven gets raided by the group of Silver-Ranked Adventurers that Deniusth have been hunting, for some reason the inn has a new employee that came out of nowhere.
Barnethei and the rest of the Haven's staff watch on the scrying orb Larracel defend The Adventurer’s Haven from three different Named-Ranked threats.
Toren throughout their time in The Explorer's Haven impresses Barnethei with their hard working performance.
The Adventurer [Bandits] come again for a second raid with Toren killing their leader and scaring off the rest of them.
Toren successfully digs out the source of the mana drain and nearly becomes a Skeleton King but refuses the Voice of Undeath.
Larracel arrives at The Explorer's Haven and after hearing Toren's story accepts their employ at The Explorer's Haven.

A few days after the founding of The Explorer's Haven, the staff was having trouble in utilizing and reaching their full potential in the New Lands of Izril due to the environmental challenges it presents like the lacking mana, even with that Barnethei continues to expand the amenities of the Haven. Two separate groups of pioneering settlers enter the Explorer's Haven and he informs them of the mana-draining situation that plagues the New Lands, the [Vice Innkeeper] hears them say the same thing after learning of this news like the previous folks before them and he begins to regard the New Lands as a trap for all.

During the fourth time Larracel and The Adventurer’s Haven returned to The Explorer's Haven they had to help the newer inn with the massive influx of settlers that are currently migrating through, speaking with the [Wizard], Barnethei learns of Deniusth situation with him continuing to hunt down the traitors in the New Lands and gets introduced to the new staff that Larracel has brought him. During the night, Barnethei and Larracel converse with Deniusth about the dangers in the New Lands and his grudge with the thieving Adventurers from the laboratory in the Ruins of Albez which causes an argument between the two Named-Ranks. Barnethei interjects questioning about what triggered everyone's [Dangersense] at the beginning of the month with Larracel sharing that the news a Goblin King and Goblin Lord appearing with The Wandering Inn somehow being at the center of it all. The next day the two Named-Ranks groups depart from the Explorer's Haven leaving Barnethei and the rest of the inn staff to drink and talk about Larracel's friend group dynamics.

Barnethei is getting used to the eccentricity of his new staff and watches on the Wistram News Network the Drake duo [Commentators] speak on the forms of land claims made on the New Lands such as the Drake manner of planting a flag as ownership of the lands around. Inreza sends a [Message] that refutes the flag-planting idea but the two dismiss it as simple Minotaur aggression, in response Inreza has her people organize an expedition out to the shores of the New Lands so that she can begin throwing multiple flags the size of ballista bolts all throughout the New Lands laying claim to it all. Her point was made after throwing a flag on a hill next to Zeres with the notion of only colonies being honored as a claimant to the lands.

While waiting on Larracel to get a recharge on mana, Barnethei sees Navien block a group of ragged Drakes from leaving the Haven as they haven't paid, before it could come to a fight Barnethei was able to compromise with the Female Drake and her group by having them exchange for anything of value. As they leave he gives them a bread basket for the road, a number of other haggard groups also return back to the inn that face the same issue of poor farmland giving the [Vice Innkeeper] the idea of having herd animals around which he shares with Larracel when she comes by for the regular visit. After swapping around some employees and Larracel leaving, Barnethei was going back to the usual until he hears a clamor from outside the walls. It's group of six settlers that were fleeing from a monster that attacked their group, The Explorer's Haven hunkers down in case of there being a monster about. Seeing that Yirr isn't around like the rest of the staff Barnethei goes around looking for her, he unintentionally finds out about her secret of being a Doombearer, assuming she's from the Plain’s Eye Tribe and promises not to tell anyone of her secret. There was no monster that night and informs Larracel of the dangers on the outskirts of the New Lands, three months into this new venture, The Explorer's Haven faces its first real threat in the shape of bandits with him standing on the ruins of the inn with him wondering how long it was worth trying to continue.

The few remaining bones of Toren are carried by the Healing Slime as it races across the New Lands of Izril, he feels conflicted between if he should've stayed under the employ of Nerrhavia and feeling pride for the Healing Slime. The Healing Slime with it's limited mind goes through its life focusing on it's relationship with Toren now knowing that he is a good, kind person which it will keep on going with until the end. As they travel through the mana-negative environment, Slimey is able to sense circles of mana drain and avoids the worst of it in its travels but is unable to find the source of the mana drain itself, Slimey was absorbing some water when it gets nicked by a crocodile in the waters. After scaring it off, Toren is stunned to tears by the thoughts it hears from Slimey about it just wanting its skeleton to smile, as Toren puts the fear of [Terror] into other creatures but he then senses a group of Adventurers nearby arguing about what they should do. The two stay motionless for a time to preserve mana, they then reach where all of the Undead are stuck in the cycle of resurrection with Toren diplomatically speaking with the undead there to get some bones. The chat with them was convivial even with Toren's refusal into merging with them, he was able to scrounge up enough to make a flimsy, two foot tall body but it put him in the predicament of him not being able to be carried by Slimey. Toren has Slimey contain most of his bones in its slime body so that they can travel albeit slower, Toren reviews the map of the New Lands in his head deciding to go eastwards suffering from the decline in Slimey's condition. He begins to curse the voice of the System for the skill he just gained that doesn't help keep Slimey alive. Trying to cross a shallow river, Toren gets swept up by the stream and gets caught in a net holding on to dear life to the healing slime, becoming desperate he voices out a cry for help. Yirr arrives to the sound and puts the slime in a jar bringing it back to The Explorer's Haven with the bones disappearing from the net.

The staff of The Explorer's Haven have a meeting with Barnethei about wanting to leave, Barnethei too is wringed out by the experience with the [Bandits] and tells them that they'll have an all-staff meeting when Larracel returns. Yirr brings her finding of the near-dead slime to Barnethei with him passing it off to Illic for the Drake boy to feed it, Yirr tells Barnethei of the bones caught as well but they were gone when they checked for them. Two days later, the [Vice Innkeeper] hears the snapping from a [Runner] about her problems and sees that Illic was [Message]-ing less than his current amount, he sees that the [Message Apprentice] again fails the next day to [Message] the amount he would be able to. Confronting Illic, he learns that the boy kept the healing slime as a pet and Barnethei decides to allow it and learns that the slime has an expensive appetite and is able to do magic of a sort.

The next day, the group of Silver-Rank Adventurers commits a raid on The Explorer's Haven, after a tense stand off to not hurt any of the staff with the threat of Larracel looming over them the Adventurers take what they can and leave. They come to learn that the defenses that they've put up were insufficient to handle a simple hammer blow. The next day most of the staff wasn't working with the few cleaning up the mess from the raid, Barnethei thinks on the preparations those in The Wandering Inn have for such an occasion. While Barnethei was making some murder holes, Yirr storms back to tell him that something savaged the corpses by ripping out all of the bones and clothing. After digging the graves for the mangled corpses, Barnethei sees that both himself and Yirr have healed faster than they should've and remembers the slime touching them. Interacting with the slime, Barnethei finds out that it is a healing potion slime and wonders how he can glean from it, he was going to tell Navien about the discovery until she points out the suspicious being that enter while he was away that is currently boarding up the windows. Barnethei has the staff encircle the female intruder and was about to strike until their [Dangersense] was triggered, grasping the danger if they continued Barnethei switches gears and pretends that he was just calling for another team meeting leaving the new girl to carry on with the windows. Conferencing with some of the staff they decide to leave the new girl to do as she pleases as she is a danger to confront, Barnethei remarks that the voice of the new girl sounds exactly like Erin Solstice.

Toren is pleased with her disguise and dumbfounded that it actually worked unsure on if they truly believed it or not, Navien comes by to check on the Toren and gives her a hug for working while the rest of the staff are worn out. Navien returns back to the other staff to share her findings of Toren, they continue to keep up appearances as if nothing was off. Toren finishes in building the wall and gets requested to build the watchtower next, with no real weapon Toren goes into the nearby woods with nothing but a saw and hammer and brings back a few racoon corpses. Toren attempt to build armor for the watchtower fails so Barnethei shows her a [Carpenter]'s trick of interlocking wood joinery, the next morning they come to find over a hundred of bats carcasses and a finished tower that looks like it belongs to a fortress.

Toren digs a moat feeling good from leveling in her old class and knows that those of inn are wary of her, a group from the Trisstral Alliance comes to the inn asking if there's any food with them partaking in the bats and purchasing the racoon meat. After eating and asking about Toren's box getup the Drakes leave, Toren leaves to finish off the moat with Barnethei contacting Larracel about their new resident. Continuing on with the act, Barnethei shows Toren the slime Illic has as a pet finding the reason as to why they're around the inn. The [Vice Innkeeper] goes to where Toren is at and helps her with the digging and shoring of the foundation for the moat, during the night everyone is awoken to screaming alarms from Illic that The Adventurer's Haven is under attack from two Named-Ranked threats with everyone getting the quest <Mythical Quest - Defend the Haven!>. On the scrying orbs they see a school of flying fish and a gigantic centipede compacted into an infested body attacking the inn.

Larracel defends The Adventurer's Haven from the two threats throwing out numerous spells at them yet the two monsters still remain, a third threat arrives that scares off the two other creatures, The Crypt King of the Anguivess Host. Finding the key to seithbone, The Crypt King calls on all of the undead all across Izril to conquer the place of power that is The Adventurer's Haven and to kill the living. Toren feel like it wasn't his fault that this happened as the Explorer's Haven staff watch the horde of undead beat against Larracel's barrier, Mihaela and six more couriers arrive at the scene and are able to make the Agnuivess Host retreat. Toren returns back to beating the bats to death with him and Barnethei realizing that Larra and the Haven wasn't coming by anytime soon.

Barnethei receives a [Message] from Larracel plainly stating that she's unable meet them and for them to either abandon the new inn or to reinforce their defenses, the [Vice Innkeeper] decides to stay and make friendly with Toren as she is the dangerous creature on their side at the moment. Toren was on board to murder everybody but Illic and Barnethei, but Slimey nips that option off as it tells Toren that the Drake boy has been taking care of it. During a time when The Explorer's Haven was having guests, a Drake was requesting services from Illic begin shouting at the boy for a mistake, Toren then reprimands the Drake by slapping the traveller with Barnethei coming by to manage the altercation. Barnethei debriefs with Toren on what just happened and teaches him how he should've handled the situation with Toren soaking it all in. The altercation reframed how Toren sees Illic and takes a closer look at the young boy noticing the resemblance to a certain skeleton back in the day and decides to go out hunting. Toren returns back to the inn with two Corusdeer carcasses, after learning how to cook meat for Navien, Toren gives a nice piece to Illic and is taught many other things such as a more gentler affirmation of affection.

Barnethei has a private staff meeting to discuss about Toren's not monster-like behavior wondering what kind of being they are, he has Yirr teach Toren how to hunt and gut to gather more food pondering on what Toren got out of all of this. With The Explorer's Haven is having clientele again, Barnethei parleys and trades the many goods that are finally coming from the New Lands such as pearls and condensed iron ore, he recieves news from Navien that Larracel has purchased the ground-purification spell from Wistram but becomes dismayed from how stupid looking the dance is. They watch on the scrying orb Drassi giving an interview of Orjin in her segment of 'Class of the Week', The [Fist of the Living World] starts to perform his routine of punches and kicks with a few of in the inn imitating the act. Toren begins to flawlessly copy the movements of Orjin but becomes uninterested as it was too easy until Orjin starts to perform a harder routine, the [Barmaid] copies the strikes and movements but is unable to do it as Orjin does it. Barnethei learns the purification dance ritual with the help of Toren and begins to sell the purified dirt, many from failed expeditions begin to join The Explorer's Haven as it still stands after all this time. Toren has categorized Illic as someone to be nested under his [Carer] class like the Healing Slime, Toren is relieved when the [Bandits] came back for he was here to protect the boy unlike last time.

With the [Bandits] outside the walls, Barnethei has everyone ready with what little magic they have when they break through, but Toren hops over the barricades and requests a sword. Toren walks outside the inn confronting the group of [Bandits], the leader of the [Bandits] runs his sword through the [Barmaid] chest but quickly learns that it was a ploy to trade blows with his dying from a cut to the neck. Toren scares off the rest of the [Bandits] after wounding a second one leaving them to deal with the corpse, Toren then knew that her good time at the inn is coming to an end.

The skeleton mopes about outside the inn thinking on what he can do, with a shovel and a pickaxe he begins to dig fervently for the source of the mana drain. After a whole night of digging Toren brings out two tiny specks of something bright and white and put one piece in his mouth to chew on and the other he tosses aside which causes an explosion that blew up the northern wall. Recovering from the blast, Toren takes the piece in his mouth and actually digest it by inserting the thing in his eye, it contained so much mana and power it begins to change Toren into the [14th Herald of the Breathless Age, Skeleton King Toren]. All he can think about is killing all the living making them into undead until his mind wandering to Illic and the Healing Slime, both Toren, male and female, refuse the call of the roaring death mana as male Toren believes it was stupid orders with no vision and scope. Toren removed the thing out of his eye defeating the Voice of Undeath and offers the piece to the Healing Slime which it accepts, he feels good after receiving the system notifications as if he passed a test beyond all expectations.

A they were cleaning up from the explosion, Larracel arrives at The Explorer's Haven who gathers Barnethei, Toren and some of the other staff to have a chat. Barnethei and Larracel have an argument over the continuation of the new inn and the employment of Toren even if they're a skeleton, She ask Toren a number of questions to see if it's a trick of some sort. Hearing the words of Toren, Larracel brings up the contract and to name his price in the form of his dream, liking what the skeleton has to say Larracel allows Barnethei to hire Toren. After signing the contract the three have a chat about Toren's origins that strangely circles around back to Erin, Larracel plans to follow Mihaela wherever she meets Valceif as he's supposedly alive somehow. With the plan of creating a town around the inn as it has mana again, Barnethei receives a system notification with class advancement and a strange new skill. The next day, the staff was having some coffee that Larracel brought when Illic barges in with a new class and a beautiful, green flame in his eye socket, the sound of an undead skeleton crying can be heard for this was a new beginning for Toren.

Characters edit edit source

( * = First Appearance)

Az’kerash (Mentioned)
Barnethei Levout
Beiknam* (Mentioned)
Caleis Berkesson (Mentioned)
Chokole* (Mentioned)
Citra*
Colthei Lacment (Mentioned)
Crypt King of the Anguivess Host
Deimos (Undead) (Mentioned)
Deniusth
Doren Issk (Mentioned)
Drassi Tewing (Scrying Orb)
Eldertuin Terland (Mentioned)
Elia Arcsinger (Mentioned)
Erin Solstice (Mentioned)
Flos Reimarch (Mentioned)
Gores Caneth (Mentioned)
Healing Slime
Hekusha (Mentioned)
Illic*
Inreza
Ishkr Silverfang (Mentioned)
Khedal (Mentioned)
Laken Godart (Mentioned)
Larracel Delais
Lyonette du Marquin (Mentioned)
Maviola (Undead) (Mentioned)
Menli* (Mentioned)
Mihaela Godfrey
Moore of Raithland (Mentioned)
Mother of Graves (Mentioned)
Navien
Nekhret (Mentioned)
Nerrhavia (Queen) (Mentioned)
Noass (Per Scrying Orb)
Orjin (Per Scrying Orb)
Paveca* (Mentioned)
Perric Reoustinal (Mentioned)
Racnem*
Ragathsi (Mentioned)
Raldred* (Mentioned)
Reissz* (Mentioned)
Relz Hauscale (Per Scrying Orb)
Rena*
Roreen
Rosst*
Salii (Per Scrying Orb)
Saliss Oliwing (Mentioned)
Sheta (Palace of Fates) (Mentioned)
Silvenia Ettertree (Mentioned)
Soloxenethn (Mentioned)
Tanny* (Mentioned)
Teriarch (Mentioned)
Toren
Valceif Godfrey (Mentioned)
Valeterisa Imarris (Mentioned)
Viecel Cohex (Mentioned)
Vons*
Yirr*
Yisame Beziin (Mentioned)
? - [Captain] of the Horn of Maweil
? - [Merchant] Woman
? - Drake Traveller
? - Female Drake
? - Hungry-looking Human
? - Silver-Rank Adventurers [Bandit] Leader (Deceased)
? - Trisstral Alliance Drake Leader
? - Trisstral Alliance Female Drake
? - Unnamed Adventurer
? - Upset Female [Runner]

Groups/Organizations edit edit source

The Adventurer’s Haven
- The Explorer's Haven
Trisstral Alliance
Orchestra
House of Minos
Plain’s Eye Tribe (Mentioned)
Silver Swords (Mentioned)
Silver-Rank Adventurer [Bandits]
Bloodfeast Raiders (Mentioned)
Anguivess Host
Terland Family (Mentioned)
Wistram Academy

Creatures edit edit source

Landsharks
Bat Swarms
Cericel (Mentioned)
Yellow Beetles
Crocodile
Slimes
- Healing Slimes
- Bone Slimes (Mentioned)
- Sewer Slimes (Mentioned)
- Water Slimes (Mentioned)
- Magma Slimes (Mentioned)
- Death Slimes (Mentioned)
Big Racoons
Waisrabbits (Mentioned)
Mimics (Mentioned)
School of Magical Fish
Gigantic Centipede
Bogleraums
Vampyres (Mentioned)
Revenants (Mentioned)
Flesh Golems

Undead edit edit source

Skeletons
Ghosts
Ghouls
Crypt King
Ghoul Soldiers
Crypt Lords

Vehicles edit edit source

Horn of Maweil

Locations edit edit source

Izril
- New Lands of Izril
  - The Explorer's Haven
    - Miniature Mage's Guild
  - Shores of the New Lands
  - Gorgelands
- The Adventurer’s Haven
- Zeres
Isles of Minos
Chandrar
- Pomle (Scrying Orb)

Items edit edit source

Potion of Arcane Energy

Statistics edit edit source

Statistics Revealed edit edit source

Paveca edit edit source

Skills:
- [Sweep the Tables]

Navien edit edit source

Skills:
- [Systematic Warfare: Shared Intelligence (Inn)]

Roreen edit edit source

Class/Levels:
- [Bartender of Delights]

Illic edit edit source

Class/Levels:
- [Magicfriend Mage] Lv. ?
  - [Message Apprentice] Lv. 11
Skills:
- [Message]
- [Repair]

Yirr edit edit source

Class/Levels:
- [Farfield Huntress] Lv. 26

Chokole edit edit source

Skills:
- [Dangersense]

Barnethei Levout edit edit source

Skills:
- [Voice of Persuasion]
- [Convincing Act: False Sincerity]
- [Flamboyant Dive-roll]

Rena edit edit source

Skills:
- [Advanced Dangersense]

Larracel Delais edit edit source

Spells:
- Unknown Tier:
  - [Burst of Dispel Magic]
  - [Triple Continuous Casting: (Spells)]
  - [Grand Lightning]
  - [Bubble of Antimagic]
  - [Reduce Weight]
  - [Jet of Air]
  - [Maximus Forceorb]

Salii edit edit source

Skills:
- [Riveting Presentation]

Statistics Obtained edit edit source