An attribute, the defining character of one's power. Of course, Aldr had received hundreds of these already. Though he remembered quite clearly that the one he received the first time he came to this world, was one of the most interesting ones he received. But the memory evaded him. It must have been a few hundred years ago at that point.
And of course skills, most of them stemmed from attributes, but sometimes they just don't, as power is sometimes gained by one's self. And now, Aldr had received the only craftsman attribute he had ever received in his life.
[Attribute Name: Craftsman
Description: War once taught even the gods that a forge must not be underestimated. A blade comes naturally to you. Yet they do not recgonize you as their master.]
Aldr frowned.
'Cryptic. But I think I get it. Craftsmen can always make blades, arrows, clothes, armor, yet they never use them for themselves.'
He looked upon the odd statement about the gods.
'Pleasant.'
He swiped at the words, causing them to fade. Before manifesting the description of his skill.
[Skill Name: Forge
Skill description: The basic form of all. Gather an abundance of material and will them into the shape you desire. Though this form is quite shabby...]
Aldr's eyes widened slightly. It made sense for his attribute. But an instant forging ability would be rather useful when he had limited resources. And he knew the black dagger wouldn't be enough for him forever.
He smiled slightly.
'Promising. This time, it'll be promising.'
His peace didn't last very long. As he drifted to sleep. He dreamt of nothing. His mind full of nothingness. But his sleep was broken by a caw.
He wrestled out of his own sleep and looked to his side. The fried corpse of the raven was gone, and a trail of green blood was leaking from where it once was.
'Goddamnit, I knew I saw it twitch! How is it alive?'
He scurried onto his feet and sighed, the trail lead out of the nest and into...
'That...hole.'
Aldr walked towards the hole in the mountain, green blood leaking into it and stopping as he stared into the seemingly bottomless pit. Another choked caw echoed out of it.
For a moment. He almost wanted to dive in. But stopped himself.
'The ring...'
He could hear it again. Not on the edge of the mountain, nowhere even near the fog. Rather, the ring was echoing from the pit.
He stared at the green blood for a few moments. He felt he was missing something, a piece in his head, everything, all the answers were right there in his memory. But they evaded him when he called upon them.
He grit his teeth. Walking away from the pit.
'If I succumb to that damn ringing, I might as well be dead.'
He walked back to the nest and sighed. His eyes were heavy, and he didn't have enough will to stand anymore.
'I'll worry tomorrow...'
He slumped back into the nest and rested peacefully throughout the night. Uninterrupted by the ominous ringing. Which had stopped by morning.
Across the continent a woman with long silver hair stood in her room. Her golden eyes moving swiftly across a map laid across her table. She let out an absentminded hum. Her eyes stopped on the mountain range to the east of the city. And then towards the desert that lay beyond it.
'Troubling. If we want to expand further...we have to deal with whatever the hell is lurking in those mountains.'
She let out a grumble and summoned the sparks, watching them manifest.
"Are you even going to give me a hint on where he is?"
The sparks danced playfully and formed into words.
[Where he is going you will go too.]
She grumbled and dismissed the sparks. Staring at the maps' depiction of the Stone Mountains.
Aldr woke up on the nest, feeling refreshed despite the sticks poking and prodding his back.
The dagger felt a bit heavier in his hand. For some reason, the words of the sparks resounded oddly in his head. The tools would not see him as their master.
'If that's literal. This might be worse than I thought.'
Every attribute usually had a slight downside. Sometimes none. That was just how it was most of the time.
His thoughts were interrupted by a pungent rotten smell in the air. The green blood on the ground had dried, but was giving off an awful odor. The smell of death. Rotting.
He looked towards the trail.
'Right. That.'
He walked out of the nest and to the other end of the peak. Feeling refreshing air return to his nostrils, he sat on the damp moss and sighed.
He felt the dagger in his hands. Dragging his finger across it's obsidian surface. Smooth, polished.
He stopped himself.
'Since when the hell did I care this much about a weapon's material?'
He shifted his gaze from the dagger and looked into the fog. As the ringing slowly started to resound in his head.
'That thing. I'm gonna kill it.'
He stood up. Not sure if he was driven by the ambition given to him by the ringing noise, or simply he had a few screws loose, but he knew what he needed to do.
'Strength. That's all I need.'
He walked over to the pit and gazed down it. And let a small smile creep up onto his face. Feeling the gaze of Stone Monkey, who was sitting on the branch of a tree.
"Now just what in the world are you doing?"
"It's there."
Stone Monkey raised an eyebrow and leaped from the branch. Landing near the pit.
"Don't tell me..."
Aldr smiled. And then let himself fall back into the pit. Being consumed by its darkness.