Frostbitten Wayfarer

It was early evening when Ash and Lila went back to their farm, and Zoe decided to go get some food. She was feeling rice, so she made her way to the rice restaurant that she frequented. It was a small wooden building with only a couple tables inside that made most of their business through takeout.

Zoe ordered a wild rice and vegetable meal, paid the fourteen copper and left. She wasn’t sure what else to do, so ended up wandering over to the training facility she had found to get in some more practice.

The rice was tender and soft, not like the wild rice that she was used to. A pile of colourful vegetables sat on the top of it, coated in a somewhat sweet and sticky sauce that dripped down into the rice. It was filling and tasty, especially after the greasy food she had the previous day.

When she arrived, she saw a couple of other people using the facilities. There was another bowman she had seen a few times shooting a large metal compound bow at the targets, each arrow piercing the target before vanishing and reappearing in his quiver that hung by his waist.

A mage stood by the vats of water, pulling the water out and swirling it around them. Steam rose off the water, only to be captured by the mass of water and compressed back down.

There were a couple of people sitting at a table, their swords resting on the bench next to them. They were giving each other pointers as they cooled down from a spar they just had.

Zoe finished up her meal and tossed the container in the garbage bin, then made her way over to the straw dummies and drew her dagger from the sheath resting at her hip.

She held the dagger in her right hand and stabbed at the mass of straw. Her dagger pierced into it, bits of straw falling to the ground around it.

The dagger felt comfortable to her, but that didn’t mean she knew what she was doing. She just didn’t think she’d accidentally stab herself in a freak accident. She knew where the blade was, and she respected it. But she needed something more. There must be a skill available, if there was one for archery, she thought.

Zoe wondered what the difference was between the two. She got the archery skill reasonably quickly, in just a single day. But even after hours and hours across multiple days, there was nothing for her knife.

She slashed her blade across the straw dummy, sending straw flying as the blade made a deep gouge through the straw. This wasn’t accomplishing anything, she needed to understand why.

Maybe there just wasn’t a skill available at all. Why would there be a skill for every little thing anyway? She pushed the thought aside, there was a skill for picking leaves off bushes. There must be a skill for wielding a dagger.

But what was the difference? What did she do differently to get the gathering skill? Why did even that one come so much easier. She sat down on the cold stone ground and pondered it for a while.

The only connection she could find were that Archery and Gathering were both skills for things she already had a little experience with. She kept a lovely garden at her house, and she was given a brief lesson on archery on a field trip back in middle school.

Using a knife, or at least wielding one as a weapon was something she was completely unfamiliar with. There was no history to draw on. No field trip teaching her how to properly stab something, no passion project in her backyard forcing her to learn how to cut a straw dummy in two.

Even if that was the case, she still didn’t know how to use a knife so it didn’t help much. Zoe flipped the knife around, holding it in a reverse grip and stabbed into the straw dummy. The blade dug deep, tearing into the straw.

It felt fruitless to her. She wanted to get the skill, and feel the rush of intuition pressing her to make the right decision, to swing her blade the right way. But it just didn’t come.

She turned her attention to the archery range, walking up a few feet next to the other bowman who was still firing his arrows at one of the targets. Zoe watched him for a minute, seeing how he drew the bow.

He looked confident, each movement smooth. His elbow started high and followed almost a circular pattern as it drew the string and lowered to just below his chin. The string rested up against his face as he aimed for the target. His body seemed to relax for a moment just before he released the arrow. A sharp twang rang out followed by a thud from the arrow impaling the target.

Zoe drew her own bow, nocking an arrow on the string and pulling it back. Her archery skill nudged her arm higher as she did, and the motion felt a lot better than she was used to. It felt stronger, and smoother. The muscles in her back helping a lot more than they did before.

She aimed at the target down the range and released, firing the arrow. A thud rang out as it smashed into the wooden barrier twenty centimetres off from the centre. Not bad Zoe thought, drawing another arrow.

Her archery skill gave her a gentle push, urging her towards better form, pressing her aim a little higher than she would have expected. She released another arrow and it flew down the range, landing a couple centimetres closer to the centre than the last.

Zoe loosed her remaining six arrows at the target, the rest having been destroyed from her practice. With each shot she focused on her form, drawing more power from her back muscles. She kept getting closer and closer to the centre, her last shot only at most twelve centimetres off.

She walked up to the target, the man next to her pausing his practice as she collected her arrows. They were always harder to pull out than she expected them to be, no matter how much time she spent here. And every time she had this unfounded fear of destroying them.

Back at school, the teachers hammered home the importance of grabbing the arrow as close to the target as possible and then pulling it straight out. But they also used much softer, more malleable targets than a wooden wall. And they had nice, comfortable rubber tools to grip the arrow with as well. Zoe didn’t think it mattered what she did back then, the arrows came out like a knife through butter that’s been left out on a warm summer day.

Pulling a slick arrow that’s been embedded into a block of solid wood with your bare hands, on the other hand, was a challenge. And it made her envious of the person next to her with the arrows that returned after they impacted without the need of all this kerfuffling about.

But she managed it after a few minutes. Her fingers were a little sore, and she wasn’t sure whether to be happy her arrows were so smooth or not. It made them a little harder to pull out, but rough wooden shafts sounded like a nightmare full of splinters. They probably flew better being so smooth, too, she supposed.

The man next to her continued his firing when she returned to her spot, and the two fell into a routine for a bit. The man taking a break and watching her every time she had to go pull out her arrows.

“Your form’s getting better,” The man said when she returned to her spot one time.

“Thanks! I’ve kinda just been trying to copy you.” Zoe said, remembering she hadn’t identified the man.

[Warrior - ??]

She was surprised to see him identify as a warrior. She didn’t know what she expected, but part of her thought that an archer would show up differently. Maybe a ranger, or bowman or something.

“Well I’m hardly perfect either so hopefully you don’t pick up my bad habits.” The man said, drawing and firing another arrow down the range.

“So how does that whole arrow vanishing thing work anyway?” Zoe asked.

The man smiled, “It’s one of my skills. They return to me when I fire them.”

“I’m a little envious, honestly. I like archery but pulling the arrows out of the target all day long isn’t very fun.” Zoe said.

The man laughed, “Yeah, it’s really nice. You can get some bows that do similar things though, but they’re quite expensive.”

“Like how expensive, expensive?” Zoe asked.

“Last I checked, which was before I got this skill mind you, at least fifty gold. On top of the normal cost of whatever bow you were buying. And if you’re spending that kind of money you’re going to get a good bow.”

“Damn, that’s out of my price range.” Zoe said.

“Yup,” the man said, firing another arrow.

He didn’t seem to have anything else to say, so Zoe just watched him fire arrow after arrow for a couple more minutes before she left. It was getting late, and she wanted to go relax for a while.

Zoe walked down to the park and sat at her favourite bench. She listened to the night sounds as the moon made its way through the sky, and the morning sun began to rise.

Lynn showed up a couple hours later, coming and sitting next to her.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Good morning,” Zoe said.

“How’d our little bird friend get on after I left?” She asked.

“I’m not sure, I think it went well? He dropped the stick off and then bowed, then she poked at it and bowed. Then he hopped around a bunch and the two flew off. I didn’t see where they went after that though.” Zoe said.

“Good for him,” Lynn giggled.

“What I don’t get though, is that they didn’t take the stick with them when they flew off? He looked around and found the perfect gift, then brought it to her. And then they just abandoned it? What was the point of it all?" Zoe asked.

Lynn giggled some more, “I don’t think we’ll ever know. It must have been a very important stick, though!"

“I guess. It was fun, honestly. I’ve never really bird watched before so thanks for pointing that out to me. I would have totally ignored it normally.” Zoe said.

“Oh you’re welcome, dear. I always keep an eye out for the birds, never know what they might get up to.” Lynn said.

“Anyway I think I’m gonna go say hi to a friend this morning, so I’ll see you around. Enjoy your bird watching.” Zoe stood up and waved her hand.

“Have a nice day dear! I’ll just be here for a while.” Lynn said, smiling.

Zoe started making her way down to Joe’s inn. It had been a little while since she’d really had a good chat with him and she wanted to ask him about Ash and Lila anyway before she jumped into something that might be reckless.

His inn looked the same as it always did, which was a comforting fact for Zoe. She had come to understand what he said about being a place for the less wealthy adventurers and travellers a couple months prior. Knowing there was a place that was always there made everything she did feel just a little bit more comfortable.

Joe was up, standing behind the bar wiping off some of the dishes. Now that she thought about it, why did he spend so much time wiping the dishes when he had magic that could do it for him?

She sat down at one of the stools. “Why do you clean the dishes by hand?”

“I like having something to do while I’m out here. I could just cast a spell but it feels good to do it by hand, and otherwise I’d just be standing here bored anyway.” He answered, putting down the glass he was cleaning and grabbing another.

“Makes sense. Hey, have you heard of an Ash and Lila? Disintegration mage and water mage combo, have a farm east of town?” Zoe asked.

Joe thought for a moment, “Hmm. Ash and Lila, huh? Can’t say I do. Most people who live here don’t come by the inn anyway since they have their own homes.”

“Right, duh. Anyway, I spent some time talking with them yesterday and they offered to help me get a bunch of resistances in the summer when their friends are around. I think I’m gonna do it, they seemed nice enough, but just wanted to see if you knew they happened to be, I dunno, known serial killers or something.” Zoe said.

Joe laughed, “I hope most known serial killers would be in jail, not running a farm outside of town.”

“You know what I mean. Just like, rumours of weirdness or whatever. They seemed nice though, and already helped me get one resistance.” Zoe said.

“Water?" Joe asked.

“Oh right, damn, I should’ve gotten that one too. No, I got disintegration.” Zoe said.

“You found a disintegration mage and water mage and asked to be disintegrated?” Joe raised an eyebrow.

“I met them a few weeks ago actually and Ash explained how his disintegration thing worked and showed me, so it just kinda slipped my mind that I could have also gotten water. Well, maybe not, I only have so much health anyway.” Zoe said.

“I’ve never met somebody who wanted to be disintegrated, you know? Normally people don’t like that.” Joe said, grabbing another glass to wipe down.

“Well I’m not most people. So what do you think about me going out to their farm in the summer?” Zoe said.

“I think you should just take the best class you have now and get some levels so you don’t die to something stupid.” Joe said.

“I mean like the road, too dangerous? Or are the roads pretty safe?” Zoe asked.

“Nothing’s safe for you at level eight, especially outside the walls.” Joe said.

“What if I had them escort me then?”

“What level were they?” Joe asked.

“Ash was dark blue, Lila was dark red.” Zoe answered.

Joe sighed, shaking his head. “It’s probably safe enough. People don’t really get attacked on the main roads anyway but it does happen from time to time.”

“Alright, thanks Joe. I’ll see if I can get them to escort me then, I think they will. Sounded like they had some friends who would be really excited about it so might even be more people.”

“Just don’t be reckless, alright?” Joe said.

“I won’t, I’m being careful,” Zoe said. “I’ve gotta head out though, don’t wanna stay inside too long and throw away all my hard work.” She smiled.

“Have a nice day then, see you around.” He smiled back.

“You too!” Zoe stood and left, thinking about what she should work on next.