The Achievement Junkie

"SKARYN'S VENGEANCE!"

Both Jack and Zariff were spiritually shaken after discovering what type of curse it was. Zariff had only heard of that terrifying curse in legend and that it was irreversible. Jack had seen it before in-game and witnessed not only the curse's strength but the aftereffect, and that's what scared him the most.

"Was there anything unusual about Yellow Jacket or the cave? Like any strange symbols, item, something?" Jack began to scramble for more information. He understood the real purpose behind the curse known as Skaryn's vengeance. That kind of curse wouldn't just appear in the hands of someone, the curse had a very specific purpose that Jack wanted to stop at all costs.

"Umm…" Zariff tried to gather his thoughts and emotions. "There were symbols of countless curses drawn in the entrance of the cave, not even Halmut himself would know which one caused this."

Jack remembered a special event from "A Hero's Tale." It seemed to come out of nowhere and didn't follow the usual course of events. Most people wouldn't notice that, but to someone who was achievement hunting 24/7, it was easy to see. That event went on longer than any event should, and it didn't follow the logic of the game's purpose either.

The purpose of "A Hero's Tale" was to band together and face the forces of Skaryn and try to abolish all forces of chaos, or join the forces of chaos and eventually take over the world.

But that event had you face any kind of beast, monster, or character within the game in random assortments and levels, and they would attack you regardless of whether your alignment was good, evil, or neutral.

The only similarity was that every enemy from the event carried the same curse, which was named after that event, "Skaryn's Vengeance."

"Is there a chance that Yellow Jacket placed the curse on you while you fought?" asked Jack.

"That's impossible. I know the toxin came from when we fought, but I'm pretty sure the curse was from the traps. If he could cast such a curse easily in battle, he wouldn't be dead right now," answered Zariff.

Jack stewed in thought. It made sense for such a powerful curse to take a lot of energy and time, but he couldn't help but think back to the game and how the players got around that. "Did Yellow Jacket use any items while you were in the cave?"

"I thought the same thing, but I never saw him do anything like that. He was busy meditating in the center of a large pentagram until I finally broke through the traps. But before I could enter the pentagram and attack him, he jumped at me fought head-on," said Zariff.

"What? I thought he was a shaman, why would he fight you head-on?"

Zariff shook his head in disbelief saying, "That's the weirdest thing, but it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. He may have only been a shaman, but he was as strong as a swordsman. I would've loved to investigate the cave, but I had to exit immediately after finishing that trash of a human and get healed." They were silent for a time, disregarding the world as they tried to narrow their thoughts into a conclusion.

"Let's head back. I'm not sure how to remove the curse yet, but there has to be something that can help. I'll write a list of ingredients for the walking death antidote and give you a copy tomorrow. Oh, and why didn't you mention this to Rydel? I get that you don't want to worry anyone, but if it's this bad why not just tell him?" stated Jack.

"Well… I couldn't understand the curse at all, so I figured it was pointless to tell him until he noticed my level drop and I couldn't avoid it. As for the poison… it's too embarrassing..." Zariff's weird explanation left Jack with doubts until Zariff mentioned one last thing. "I realized the poison could cripple me after it already had. It's hard to admit this but… my manliness might be crippled forever."

Jack stiffened and gave out a muffled groan involuntarily. Shaking himself from such a horrible thought, he picked up the small bag of coins on the ground, turned his back towards the old Giant, and said, "I'll take my leave, don't stay out too late and catch a cold you old fart."

Seeing Jack walk away, Zariff didn't say or do anything. Instead, he waited for Jack to disappear into the distance and walked back accompanied by only his thoughts.

That night, neither of them could sleep well. The cold and dark night was swept away with the rise of the morning sun.

While Jack was too preoccupied to sleep or notice the sunrise, Rydel sat up casually and saw the mentally exhausted Jack. He took a guess and asked, "So, what's the real problem?"

Jack leaned his head to the side and answered bluntly with sunken eyes, "Two things, walking death toxin and Skaryn's Vengeance."

The cool and collected Rydel quickly became shaken and anxious. "What!? And he couldn't tell me that much? That idiot! If he waited too long, it would be too late to do anything."

"He had good reason to not say anything," said Jack. He was certain Rydel would've held Zariff's circumstances over his head. "Also, he didn't know until last night when I diagnosed him."

Rydel's anxiousness was replaced with confusion and he asked, "You diagnosed him? How could a newbie like you do that?"

"That's cause before I was summoned here I was already familiar with ancient Kartonia. Don't ask how, but I honestly might be the most knowledgeable person in the entire kingdom when it comes to ancient Kartonia," answered Jack. "Need me to prove it?"

"Yeah, I do," said Rydel without hesitation.

"Fine," Jack sat up on his bottom bunk and looked Rydel in the eyes. "Ask me anything you want about ancient Kartonia."

Squinting his eyes, Rydel thought for a moment before he asked, "Legends say that back then summoned heroes roamed the continent in droves, but once Skaryn was sealed away they disappeared. Why is that?"

Jack was startled and didn't know what to say. Hearing this only caused him to create more theories so he simply said, "I can't answer that question, ask me another."

"Why? You said any question would—"

"I can't answer that question because I think I was one of those summoned heroes that disappeared. Only, things were very different back then and it would take too long to explain right now," rephrased Jack, stopping Rydel from prodding further.

Rydel coughed and stammered, "Fine… we'll talk about that later. If you were an ancient hero, you probably have a title, what was it? Tell me that, I can search for the title and prove you're right."

"Umm… I'm not sure," said Jack as he shrugged his shoulders. "Among us heroes, we used different titles than what the ancient people gave us, so we didn't pay attention to the titles we were given. Actually, you already know the title the other heroes gave me; it's the name of my subclass."

"Really?" Rydel didn't know how to take that. It would explain the weird class and subclass but that was the second question that Jack couldn't answer so he wasn't 100% convinced.

The hunter then asked, "Answer this, and if you can't answer this third question then it's impossible to believe you. Most everyone has forgotten the ancient gods, other than Halmut and Skaryn. Only someone who's had time to study and explore the world will know their names."

"That's it, you want me to name the ancient gods? That's easy. There's Halmut, Skaryn, Lyrun, Perchet, Choron, Tyres, Sterfen, Moranti, Naparn, and the list goes on. Do I need to name all twenty-seven?" said Jack without wasting a breath.

"Twenty-seven?" Rydel's face twisted in confusion.

"What? Don't tell me there are more than that, cause I know for a fact there aren't," stated Jack.

"There are were that many?" Rydel's voiced silently rang out and surprised Jack.

"There are less? Wow, you guys really have forgotten about the gods," joked Jack.

"It's not like we forgot, we lost a lot of records during the war of the gods," said Rydel, getting Jack to shut up and listen. "Halmut sealing Skaryn was only the climax of that war. All the other gods fought for their two leaders until many of them disappeared. But the ancient text only mentioned twenty gods, why do you say twenty-seven?"

"Cause not all twenty-seven fought in the war, duh. Seven neutral gods always stayed out of trouble. They didn't want to tip the balance of power and did as they wanted without interfering," Jack explained like it was common knowledge.

"It was even typical for a hero back then to swear loyalty to a god of their choice and receive their blessing to level up quicker. The neutral gods weren't too popular because their benefits rarely involved getting stronger for the war's sake. That could explain why they were eventually forgotten amidst something like a war of the gods."

"Wait, those old stories were true?" suddenly Rydel stood up in excitement. "It's possible to swear loyalty to a god and get stronger?"

"Yeah, that's what everyone did back then. Wait, that doesn't happen nowadays?" asked Jack.

"Never, at least I haven't heard of it," said Rydel. "What god did you swear loyalty to?"

Jack chuckled, "You wouldn't know him, I'm certain he's been long forgotten. We can continue this conversation later now that you believe me, besides don't we need to get going?"