FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Authors note - This ones a bit short i know, brain kinda melted a bit on this part i think xD ill try and get things picked up for the next one, it'll be chapter 10 so ill try and make it a nice big one for yas =3

Rise Of The Mao

Chapter

009

At pressing the accept button a second popup appeared asking once more if he was sure he wished to acquire the trait [Demon God's Blessing] Taking a breath he pressed on 'yes' the windows then closing to open up a new screen.

Congratulations you have acquired the trait

[Demon God's Blessing]

You have gained the favor of the Demon God and received its blessing.

All your stats are increased by 10 permanently

All future GP and Skill gains are increased by 20%

You have gained 2 bonus morph slots

New skill [Demonic Body] has been acquired

New skill [Demonic Aura] has been acquired

Quests are now available from the Demon God

Progressive tasks are now available

"WHOLEY CRAP!!!" Kael's jaw dropped, what he'd gained in an instant was nearly five levels worth of bonuses with only spending a single skill point, two levels worth of stat gains plus five levels worth of new skills and traits. "W...what an overpowered trait..." He was defiantly a league ahead of anyone at the same level as him now but he couldn't let that make him confident.

First thing he wanted to check was the two new skills he'd acquired, flicking to the skill menu he selected the first one.

[Demonic Body]

Skill Level - 0

With the blessing of the Demon God your body has been tempered with Demonic genes and will now grow stronger as long as you continue to appease the Demon God.

Each level of skill in Demonic Body increases your stats permanently by 1

Skill will only rise as you complete the Demon God's quests and perform actions that are seen as favorable in their eyes.

"Man... another overpowered skill... but it's awesome..." Closing the window he then looked at the next skill.

[Demonic Aura]

Skill Level - 1

With the blessing of the Demon God you now give off the presence of a Demon

Other Demons will see you as less of a threat and be friendlier towards you

Holds the opposite effect towards Humans causing them to be more wary and intimidated by your presence

"That... could be problematic...well.. at least I might not have to worry about the other demon races attacking me at first sight at least... maybe..." Flicking back he checked quickly to see that his stats and morph slots had indeed been increased, he now had 3/8 morph slots which he was grateful for, he would have to think about another weapon later on, and his stats now sat a nice even 30. Flexing his arms and stretching his legs he certainly felt as though he was lighter, faster and stronger then a moment ago, He decided that when he finally gets around to using his stat point he'll have to try and test just how much stronger he becomes by lifting some weights of some such before and after the stat increase.

Flicking back to the menu he could see two new icons flashing on the menu, one labelled [Quests (NEW)] obviously meaning a new quest was available, and the other was [Tasks] He decided to check the tasks screen first, This brought up a list of what seemed to be mini quests almost, kind of like trophy missions you get on most console games, Flicking through the list there were things like.

[Train any skill to level 10]

[Create 5 morph weapons]

[Reach level 5]

[Kill 6 Humans]

[Rescue 5 Demons]

It looked like pretty standard type things though his eyes popped once he saw one labelled.

[Fuck 5 Demons]

"Oookay....that's one perverted god." He smirked slightly, not really being put off by the idea, each task had a small description as well as telling him what the reward was, for the most part it seemed he would get some cash and GP from completing each task, he assumed that the money would likely appear in Dee's inventory though he would have to make sure, if it simply appeared and dropped on the ground it could cause problems especially if he completed a task in the middle of a city or some such. <I'll have to have a closer read through that list later.> Closing the Task screen he finally reached down and opened the [Quests] menu, only one quest seemed to be in the list currently the name of which made him laugh a little.

[Quest Rank F - Leave The Forest]

As an introduction to Quests the Demon God has given a simple mission

Objectives - Exit the forest

Rewards - GP, New Quest

"Heh, thanks big guy, basically handing me a bit of free GP for doing something I was already going to do." Readjusting his pack Kael let Dee revert to his slime form and sat him on his shoulder "Ok little buddy, what's say we get moving and get out of this forest finally hey?" Dee let out a squeak of approval and they settled in to continue the trek down the river.

The next few days passed quietly as Kael continued to follow the river, he continued to try and raise his skills by swinging his weapons as he walked, despite the bonus to his skill gains now his skills were rising slower, his weapon handling skills now seemed to be peaked at around level eight barely budging once they reached this point except for his spear skill which he guessed was still increasing steadily as he used it for fishing which also continued to boost his prediction skill, it was faint but he could somehow sense which direction the fish were about to move, though more often than not it felt like he was simply making a guess and getting lucky, but with both his spear and prediction skill he could hit a fish about fifty percent of the time now which was a vast improvement compared to what he was like when he tried it for the first time. The levels of the weapons themselves that Dee made had also leveled a couple more times than slowed down, the spear was no longer bowed or rough to the touch, it had a nice smooth straight pole and a good sharp pointed spear tip rather than the primeval rock spear head it looked like it had before. The walking stick was straighter as well and a bit longer <If it keeps getting longer it might turn into a walking staff rather than being just a walking stick... I wonder if that's possible.. for the weapons to upgrade completely into a different form..> He had spent some time thinking about other weapons he might have Dee take on but in the end he thought it best to wait and see if he could get some training somewhere in different weapon types before making any permanent decisions <A ranged weapon of some kind would be a good idea though... the problem with that though is if I had Dee become a bow or crossbow of some kind I'd then need the arrows, throwing knifes and such would be a bad idea since then I would have to retrieve Dee afterwards.> He lets out a sigh <Another thing to add to what I need to learn once I get to this human city.>

The next day was another peaceful one, the soft chirps of the birds and rumbling of the river as it flowed by felt almost tranquil, Kael's mind though was deep in thought <I need a way to get more practical practice with my weapons, just swinging them isn't enough to get any substantial gains, I could try and copy some fighting techniques and stances from books I've read but without an actual opponent it would be hard to visualize their use in real combat.. a real opponent.. someone I can fight as I travel.. a sparring partner...> Curiously he glanced at Dee sitting on his shoulder as an idea took seed in his mind. "Hey Dee...do you think you can do shape changes that aren't just inanimate objects?" Dee tilted his head slightly at the question "Like, your able to change into different weapons right, but what about taking on the form of a living being... basically I want to know if you can change into a copy of me." Dee seemed to think for a moment before letting out a squeak and nodding. "Really? Go ahead then, I want you to change into a full size copy of myself."

Dee hopped down onto the ground in front of Kael and began to stretch and shift before him, first he became more just a giant version of himself that was just as tall as Kael, then slowly he became thinner arms and legs came into shape followed by a head and torso as the now large Dee shrank down into a black somewhat see through version of Kael "Piku!" Dee grinned and looked down at its new appendages curiously, waving its arms and hopping around curiously on its feet.

Seeing a copy of himself running about felt a bit strange, at least Dee had copied his clothes as well, but it seemed he couldn't take on any color, staying the same black all over as Dee's normal form was. Kael chuckled softly "Looks like my evil shadow self has arisen." Dee turned looked back up from watching his fingers wiggle to stare at Kael curiously "Heh, never mind." He waved off his comment "So Dee, how do you feel about being my sparing buddy?" Stepping over to a tree and placing his hand on it he crafted two basic wooden swords with his magic and passed one to Dee who took hold of it curiously. "Well, for today we'll go slow and get you used to that form." For the rest of the day they both walked along the river, Kael taking Dee through some of the basic stances and combat techniques he'd read about. Dee seemed to pick up controlling his new form quickly enough and once night began to fall Kael was able to send him off to gather some wood for the fire to cook the fish on. <Hmm, it was just a form so I could spar with him for practice.. but there's probably going to be a lot of other useful things he can do now to.>

For the remainder of the trip out of the forest Kael spent his time sparing with Dee which had surprisingly brought up a list of new skills.

[Basic Sword Combat]

[Basic Spear Combat]

[Basic Club Combat]

Kael stared at the screen curiously <So weapon 'handling' is different from weapon 'combat'? I wonder what the difference between them is, I mean obviously combat means the skill to use the weapon against an actual opponent, but then what does handling mean? I've managed to get them to level four pretty quickly thanks to the skill gain bonus, yet again another thing I need to look into..> He sighs "I just keep piling up more and more questions don't i.." He looks to Dee who just looks back at him curiously.

Looking back ahead he could see the sunlight becoming brighter, the air was losing that forest smell and in the distance he could see the trees thin out and finally come to an end "That's it Dee!" Quickly he dashed forward now, eager to get his first glimpse of the world outside the forest he'd awoken in.

Normally he would have been out of breath by the time he reached the tree line <Must be thanks to the extra stats from the blessing.> Stepping out from under the shade of the trees he found himself atop a small hill where the trees came to an end and out before him sprawled endless plains of open grassland. Farms doted along the landscape surrounded by their fields of various crops and following the trail of the river it continued down off into the distance where sat a large walled city on the edge of the ocean, he could faintly make out the large sails of ships up in the air as they approached the city. "Man... that's still like three days walk away... what I'd give for a car..." He looked to Dee a moment then chuckled and shook his head "Better not even try it, I'd be pinned as a demon instantly if I rocked up to the city gates in a four wheel drive." He chuckles again and turns back to the forest for a moment, placing his hand on a tree to quickly have a good dozen apples grow and pop them into his bag <Have to do this now, cant risk being caught using magic as I get closer, this should be enough to get to the city along with anymore fish I can catch.> Slinging his bag back on, now heavier with the apples but thankfully it didn't seem to hinder him too much, he sets off down along the river once more, in the distance he could see a road that went over it as one point, he decided he'd get to there and then follow the road to the city.

The next few days went slowly, perhaps because he could see his actual destination and could see that it was very slow at getting larger as he got closer <Damm.. it might be further then I thought even.> He had finally reached the road and was now following it towards the city.

The road took him straight past some of the farmsteads and already he could see the effect of the blessing as the farmers gave him wary glances before seeming to hurry along with their business. "Oh! That's right." At the thought of the blessing he remembered the quest he had and picked up Dee, having him change into the tablet and selected the quests menu, the quest now had a nice little shiny gold star next to it which he assumed meant it was completed. Selecting the quest brought the quest description up once more followed by a small mini window telling him the quest was complete and showed him the completion rewards which was just some GP, closing the mini window the quest description was now all dulled out and over the top of it were the words [Complete!]

Backing out of the quest description to the main quest menu he found a new quest ready for him <Already?> Curiously he selected it.

[Quest Rank E - Infiltrate The Adventurers Guild]

Journey to Cayten city and seek admittance to the Adventurers Guild

Objectives - Join the adventurer's guild

Rewards - GP, Rezz

<Really now? You want me to actually join them?> Kael stared blankly at the screen. <There's got to be something more to this I bet...well.. it's not a bad idea either though really, I don't have to go hunting with them or anything, ill just find out what information they have about morphs and maybe see if they offer training then I'll take off.> He nods at that and continues his way along the road.

It took another two days before he finally came to stand before the large gates of Cayten city, what seemed to be merchant wagons passed in and out through the gates, now and then some being stopped by the gate guards for an inspection, he knew what was going to happen when he tried to go in, it was almost guaranteed. Taking a breath he started a steady paced walk, making his way to walk past the guards, a brief hope that they would be too distracted by inspecting a nearby wagon.

"Hey you!" A hand came to rest on Kael's shoulder just before he got past the gates.