Sam ran down the hill after his father catching up to him after just a few seconds of running. As he caught up, he asked his father “Dad what are we going to be doing in the fields today?” Without stopping his father replied, “Pulling some weeds and fertilizing the small field by the barn”. This was the best news Sam had heard all week, the small field was indeed quite small at just about 15 metres by 50 metres, as it was the smallest field his family owned. This meant that they would likely be done by mid-morning. This would allow him to meet up with some of his friends before he had to help his mother at the clinic. With renewed vigor Sam ran ahead of his father towards the barn eager to get started as soon as he could. “That should do it for the weeding. Let’s take a quick break before we start spreading the fertilizer.” His Father said as he pulled up the last of the weeds in the field. As a farmer’s son he had worked on the fields with his father since he could walk. Arnold Holdridge, my father is 36 years old and has been a farmer most of his life. He grew up here in the village of Kait and spent all his early life working alongside his own father on the farm. Eventually when he turned 13, he got the common blood skill “Great Harvest” which he quickly levele. The abilities of “Great Harvest” are increased crop harvests and an ability to more easily harvest the crops using his heart forged construct. Father’s heart forged construct takes the shape of a scythe which he uses in conjunction with his skill to effortlessly harvest the crops growing in the fields. This is one of the reasons we’re better off than the rest of the village. The second is the lesser knight noble title he received during the war.
15 years ago, there was a war between their kingdom, The Kingdom of Keivania and the neighboring kingdom The Kingdom of Vinnria. The Kingdom of Vinnria suddenly attacked Keivania weeks after the coronation of King David thinking they could take them by surprise and believed them to be weakened with the young King at the helm. They were wrong and the war turned into a 3-year slaughter that led to the drastic fall of both populations. More than 2 million men fell on either side with all available hands being conscripted into the nobles’ armies. That is what happened with father. Not long after his 19th birthday he was conscripted to fight in the war under Viscount Nouman our reigning lord. Not long after father married mother, he was taken to the front lines to fight against the Vinnrian’s.
For two years father fought alongside other farmers from the village, and it was just before the end of the war that father earned his title. During one of the final battles after the Vinnrian’s had been pushed out of our lands by the King and his armies my father and his friend Paul saved Viscount Nouman’s life when they caught an assassin sneaking through the camp and enter the Viscounts tent. Father and Paul rushed into the tent and cut down the assassin before he could kill the sleeping Viscount. As a reward for this they were both given the title of Low Class Knight, which is the lowest noble rank in the kingdom normally given out to commoners as a reward for a highly regarded service. While this was the lowest noble title with the others being Middle Class Knight, High Class Knight, Baronet, Baron, Viscount, Count, Marquess, Duke and finally the Royal family in that order the title was a system recognized title and came with benefits befitting it. The Low-Class Knight title gave 5 small silver coins a month and provided a level stat boost of +1 to all stats per level gained. After the war father returned home back to the farm where he discovered his father had passed away and therefore inherited the farm from him. He has worked the fields ever since raising his Blood Skill to a True Skill and maxing out his general level to 250. Level 250 is the level cap for those with common ranked skills. Children have a general level cap equal to however many years old they are with the cap lifting once they have their blood skill. The level cap for common blood skills however is 100 as once you level your blood skill to a true skill the level cap is boosted to 250. Uncommon blood skills have a level cap of 250 with true skills having a cap of 500, rare blood skills level cap is 500 and a rare true skill has a level cap of 1,000, Legendary blood skills have a level cap of 1,000 while a legendary true skill has a level cap of 25,000 which is a massive increase between the two ranks. The Mythic true skill level cap is currently unknown as no one with a Mythic ranked true skill has managed to reach the cap or lived long enough to do so.
Sam was once again brought out of his throughs by his father patting his head. “Go on Sammy, go and grab the fertilizer from the barn. If we keep up this pace, we should be done within an hour”. Sam hopped up onto his feet and jogged over towards the barn. Sam entered the barn and slowed back down to a walk as he eyed the old wooden ladder leading up to the barn’s storage area. He placed his right foot on the first step and put all his weight on it. Satisfied it was still sound he climbed the ladder two steps at a time as he expertly went up into the storage area. Upon reaching the top Sam immediately saw the bags of fertilizer and went over to grab one. As he pulled the fertilizer up a fat brown rat jumped out at him from behind the bag. Sam stepped back dropping the bag and dodged the flying rat by the width of a cat’s tail as he drew the knife from his sheath. The rat ran back behind the bags of fertilizer and out of his line of sight. Sam silently stepped back toward the fertilizer and waited to see if he could see any movement. Suddenly the rat darted back out from the fertilizer heading towards the shadowed back of the storage area. Sam quickly jumped forward plunging his knife down towards the rat. The knife went straight through the back of the rat killing it instantly with the knife embedding itself into the wooden floor below. “Ping, Ping” Sam heard a sound inside his head, the sounds of a system notification. Sam consciously brought up his Status screen.
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Samual Holdridge:
System Date: 24/08/12076 (DD/MM/YYYYY)
Age 12
Level: 12
Status:
Strength: 36
Agility: 12
Intelligence: 24
Wisdom: 24
Perception: 12
Endurance: 12
Luck: 12
Resources:
Health 20/20
Mana 4/4
Stamina 7/10
Natural Skills: Farming (Lv 25), First Aid (Lv25), Cleaning (Lv 20), Cooking (Lv 12), General Identification (Lv 25), Item Identification (Lv 25), Monster Identification (Lv 25) Skill Identification (Lv 25)
Titles: Rodent Killer (Plus 10% damage done when fighting rodent type enemies), condition met 100/100 rodent type enemies slain)
Looking at his level he was still level 12 the highest a 12-year-old could go up to until the level cap break at 13. His stats were also still the same with the base stats gained per level. This was 100% of Level 1 stats gained per level. Resources were also the same as the base level any child without any boosting items would have with resources gained every 5 levels. No new natural skills although his Monster identification had finally hit the level cap a child could level a natural skill. Title’s, that’s new he thought as he continued reading, moving his attention back to the notifications. ~Title gained - title “Rodent Killer” has been gained~. Sam’s heartbeat hammered with excitement seeing the title on his status screen. Quickly he used the general identification skill and an information notification popped up. ~ Rodent Killer (Title) This title gives the holder a plus 10% damage increase to attacks when fighting a Rodent type opponent. Conditions for achieving this title, slay 100 rodent type opponents ~. With a huge smile Sam closed the system window and jumped back up to his feet. Just three more days before I get my blood skill he thought as he bent back down and pulled the knife out of the rat wiping its red sticky blood on a scrap of cloth hanging from a wooden peg in the storage area before putting it back into the sheath on his belt. He kicked the rat off the side of the storage area watching as it fell to the dirt covered stone ground inside the barn. He turned around and picked up a bag of fertilizer and hoisted it onto his shoulder, walking back toward the ladder. He bent his knees slightly as he gently put it down next to it. He grabbed the rope to the right of the ladder and pulled lifting the crate connected to it up to the storage area. He pulled the crate level with the floor and tied the end off to one of the roof beams before he lifted the bag of fertilizer into the crate. Sam untied the rope and slowly lowered it back down to the barn floor. He tied the rope back off and climbed down the ladder. He once again hoisted the bag of fertilizer out of the crate and onto his shoulder as he left the barn and headed back to the field with a smile.
“What took you so long” his father shouted out as Sam walked back into view of the field. “There was a rat hiding amongst the fertilizer. It jumped out at me and I had to kill it” Sam replied as he walked back over to his father. “Just as well, the more rats we can get rid of the better. Also, what’s that big smile for?” His father said as Sam placed the bag of fertilizer down at his feet. “I got the Rat Killer title” Sam said giddily. “I’ll be damned, I didn’t get the Rat Killer title until sometime after my 15th birthday, impressive.” He said as he gave his son a proud smile. “Title or not we need to get the fertilizer down on this field before it reaches noon or we’ll end up cooking in this heat. Pour some into the two buckets by the tree. I’ll start on the left and work my way towards the centre, and you start from the right.” Sam did as his father said and they began spreading the fertilizer over the field.
