Meta Gamer in Equestria: Odyssey

by reflective vagrant

Chapter 7. I conversed. (Wilderness, Part 7)

I continued visiting her for two or three weeks, with me getting invited over about every third day or so. We discussed through drawings in dirt about different things that we wanted to know about each other. It turned out that there was a village nearby, but there was a lot of dangerous forest between her hut and civilization, and warned me not to try to cross it. To emphasize this, she showed that the chicken/lizard thing that had attacked her was one of the rare strays from that territory and that there were other dangerous things in that area too.

When I asked her why the hut wasn't built closer to the village, she showed a line going back and forth on the dirt map, indicating she could transverse it easily, but only if she were alone. She had simply been surprised by the creature that had attacked her that day because it was so far away from its territory.

We also spoke of my power and form, explaining that I wasn't exactly in my natural body and that while I had some idea of my magic, it wasn't from my homeland and I didn't know how I had gotten here.

When she asked about my world, I couldn't help but feel bad about my initial hesitation to tell her of it. She had spoken truthfully with me about a town nearby, albeit a bit out of reach at the moment.

I had no idea if others would come from my home world or if the natives of this world would be ready for them. I couldn't help but recall when, in my home world, the people from the developed countries arrived in not as developed regions and ruined the native cultures with lies, half truths and double dealings. I didn't want a repeat of that happening here.

So when I spoke of my old world, I made sure not to sugarcoat it and let her be aware of the bad as well as the good. I seemed to frighten her, but she still listened intently. Naturally, I told of things I knew from history like the items I recalled about the darker meeting of isolated cultures, but also of how our civilization moved from stone to metal and eventually "fake materials" as I could best put synthetics, how we grew in trade, fought disease and learned of new medicines. I left out the concept of religions though, as it seemed to be something I needed to be clearer on before I spoke of it. I'd need to know how to speak with actual words before I even considered touching the religion part of history.

I told of advances in technology that allowed for flight and even the touching of our moon, as well as understandings of how we explore our oceans. The science seemed to hold her interest very little. When I spoke of agriculture and how some of my kind tried to worry about nature and sustainability, I managed to hold her interest well enough. I honestly wondered if she thought I was lying or losing something in picture translation.

When I described politicians and war, however, it looked like she could hardly get herself to blink as she watched me draw. I could tell she was feeling sick from what she saw me draw, but she urged me to continue. I described how in the day of my parent's parent's parent, or three generations past, fought in a massive war and it was heart wrenching for her. When I described our flying machines finally dropped the "King" bomb on another country, for lack of better translation for the word "atomic," she could only put her head to the ground and plant it firmly.

After a few seconds of shaky breath, she picked up her head, fetched a large bowl and drew a stick figure of a human that she had learned from me. She then placed a pebble about the size of a finger nail at the head of the human and pushed the bowl towards me, she was using the method we had established for asking the question "how many," in slightly less crude communication.

She then pointed at the picture of the bomb, asking how many people had died in the blast.

I quickly grabbed another bowl, and placed larger stones on the picture of the bomb and under the bowls to indicate that two bombs had landed, and that each bowl meant each bombs' effects. I then removed the pebble from the human's head and carefully placed a single grain of sand at the center of where the pebble had sat before. Her jaw went slack at this.

When I picked up a double open palm full of sand and put my hands over the first bowl, I saw her collapse. I had to close my eyes as I let the sand pour out into the bowl, and I couldn't stop the pain I felt from her sobs as the sand finished landing.

When I finished the second bowl, I fell to my knees and started sobbing myself. I felt as if I had admitted to the mass murder that I was describing. I knew it wasn't true, but I had just described my home world. I had just described the place I claimed to be from. This tale surely shook the way she or other natives would look at me.

I probably would have bore that sense of guilt until the day I died, had it not been for what she did next.

She embraced me and sobbed with me. I had no idea how long we sat there, but we sobbed together. Before the bellowing we made died down too much, I heard her speak to me. It was the first time she spoke to me with words since the day she walked up to me in the field.

"Vji fievjs ug vji nepy xisi puv yuas geamv, xepfisoph upi. Ov xes csewi ug yua vu efnov xjev yuas qiuqmi jef fupi."

I still had no idea what she was speaking, but I think I understood what she was saying: She didn't blame me.

She did not ask anymore questions about my homeland after that day and only politely listened when I mentioned it. Soon after we had conversed about our homes, she tried to show me the basics of her magics. At first I was puzzled, but she was patient in explaining why. She showed pictures of nature, with mountains, deserts, oceans, plains, and forests. then she showed each of these linked together in a circle, with creatures linked to each other. I could tell this was getting into some deep spiritual stuff, but I decided to hear her out.

In time, she professed herself to be a servant of "life," for lack of better word. She respected death as a part of life, but still did not like having to kill needlessly. She cared deeply about the pictures of plants and animals that represented nature, as I had guessed before, and the pictures of the tool users that I could only guess were the "people" of her world. What seemed a little surprising was how she seemed to draw from the energy tied to every living thing to call upon magic.

When I asked her what kind, she showed pictures of working with creatures, listening to the land, diverting beings of both nature and civilization from impending disasters. This seemed almost like nature scientists of my home world until she also showed me something that almost looked like she was manipulating water, or talking to an elemental. I wasn't sure which.

It was at that time she had my full attention. It was starting to look like druid stuff from D&D.

I must have startled her with my sudden interest, because she didn't draw another picture like that. Instead she moved on, showing how she thought my animal forms also drew from the energy that she tapped into.

I saw her draw her shaman symbol over a picture that looked like herself, meditating. Then I saw her drawing another symbol, albeit incomplete on a second figure that I didn't recognize. When she showed symbols for the passing of days with pictures of her and that figure coming closer each day, I realized that she had a student and that her student would be arriving soon.

She then drew a picture of a humanoid with a bear head, promptly pointed towards me, and drew the smallest start of the shaman symbol over it. With this, she then showed two different lines pointing out from the picture of me one reached the picture of her meditating, and drew the picture of me next to her, with a slightly more filled symbol. The other line branching out from the first picture of me came to a spot where she drew me getting killed by the lizard/chickens and other monstrosities.

She then drew another line branching out from the meditation picture and drew another picture with me hiding from the monstrosities along side her, my symbol a little more finished than before, ultimately leading to another picture with me reaching the nearby village.

And that's when I realized that she wanted to teach me what I needed to know to reach the village safely.

* * *

I packed up what supplies I had at the lakeside den and brought them to the zebra's hut. I then lived in the midway den, waiting for the day that her student rived. She wanted me to move in but, for some reason, not until her student arrived. Well, I suppose her other student, my senior.

And the day finally came when the zebra called me to her hut and prepared three mugs of what I had come to call forest tea. As we sipped, waiting for the user of the third cup to arrive, the zebra looked up to the sky for a while as I looked around the surrounding woods for the expected company.

While I was curious as to what she thought about as she looked up to the sky so frequently, I could never quite figure it out. But when her eyes focused in on something and her head raised, I recalled slight zigzags on the back of her student's stick figure and suddenly had a sinking feeling that her student wasn't another zebra.

Although it was only a speck in the sky at first, I saw something coming down hard and fast. I had to get down and hide under the table as I saw a crow headed griffin land with a resounding thud, shaking the ground and exciting the local wildlife for a moment.

The thing was larger than the zebra, and seemed about my size. But one thing I noticed about it was that it was about as "all muscle" as something that was part bird could get.

It looked straight at me as I stood back up and showed me an intelligence in those solid black eyes that promptly made me shake off the initial impression of a monster and use the proper pronoun, he.

He walked towards me, speaking boldly, "Ot vjot vji tvsehhmy cietv vji Eponat Napfo djuti vu cmitt? Miv't tii katv jux johj op vji djeop ov ot!"

The zebra promptly stepped between us and stared down the griffin that was almost twice her size.

"UL, UL, gopi!" the griffin said, backing up a step. "O xup'v sotl lommoph jon, cav O fu opwuli vji sohjv ug tvepfoph..." The zebra deepened her glare. "...Epf O'mm ci qevoipv xovj jon."

The zebra finally let the griffin pass, while still holding her glare. As soon as he had walked past her, she brought her hoof up and performed a silent snarl in the gesture that meant I needed my bear form.

A quick glance back by the griffin was only met with her even quicker snapping back into a normal position, looking innocent.

With his eyes giving a solid glare at her, he slowly turned his head back towards me, closed the distance and reared up on his hind paws. He then lifted a talon in a somewhat slow fashion, getting ready to slash at me.

Yea, I took this as my cue to call out my inner bear. It made him pause for a moment, but then it only made him grin and pull his talon back a bit further.

The zebra puffed up her chest and gave a brave face to direct me.

I just stood there, and took the strong talon swipe. While I knew it wasn't permanent damage, I still couldn't help but feel like crying like a little punk when my torso got three large gashes in it, it hurt so bad. I didn't call out but my broken posture still gave a similar effect.

And then... oh then the laughing came. The creature was cackling at me. It didn't need translation, he was a bully and he was laughing at someone he just hit. Oh that pissed me off far more than the slash hurt.

I saw him swell up his chest and spread his front talons, leaving himself wide open. The zebra jutted her head hard in his direction in further aid.

I knew what he wanted. He wanted me to give him the hardest blow I could dish out to show he could take it better, that he was dominant. He got irritated standing there, but waited for me to make my move so that he could gloat some more.

'Like hell I'd give him that pleasure without a fight. As good as time as any to try that. If not I've always got plan B,' I thought to myself.

Standing up again, I looked inside and tried to call upon that same instinct that brought me into bear mode, only this time I sought not power and size, but raw stamina. I sought the resilience to shake off this blow and as much as I could get. I had no idea if it would work, it was a test after all, but I figured there was a good chance of this sub power being accessed about the same way, calling it from within.

I knew it worked the moment I saw his eyes practically pop out of his head and the zebra grinning in surprise. Well, that and the reduction in pain I was feeling helped too. I could practically feel the skin being pulled and welded back together as if a healing potion or two had been applied.

I just stared at him and slowly raised a paw as he had raised his talon before. He quickly backed off and spat at me, then at the zebra, defeated.

Before I left bear mode, I searched around again internally for wherever I found that power from, but it alluded me. I could feel I had a chunk less stamina than before overall, but I couldn't quite figure out where it was, unlike with the bear form itself.

"Dang it. I was hoping to find those buggers," I muttered under my breath after I shifted back to my normal form.

I just glared at the griffin for a while after that. Instead of a senpai to look forward to in my senior student under the zebra, I now had a rival and a bully. At least I managed to back him off of me on day one.

Author's Note:

and naturally, translations finally back in the mix for those that are dying to know:

SPOILER ALERT
1) "Vji fievjs ug vji nepy xisi puv yuas geamv, xepfisoph upi. Ov xes csewi ug yua vu efnov xjev yuas qiuqmi jef fupi."
1 translated) "The deaths of the many were not your fault, wandering one. It was brave of you to admit what your people had done."

and as for the new arrival
Details on him: No, he's not actually Zecora's student, those of you accusing me of the blasphemy of making up random characters with no context, rhyme or reason and putting them in good standing with familiar characters. And yes he is in the same career field as her and less experienced. These details are from the sister story, Children of Equis, that tells the other sides of the story not from the view of the HiE. But I will admit it's more for background details for inspiration on this story than a quality story on it's own at this point.
Translation:
2)"Ot vjot vji tvsehhmy cietv vji Eponat Napfo djuti vu cmitt?Miv't tii katv jux johj op vji djeop ov ot!"
2 translation) "Is this the straggly beast the Animus Mundi chose to bless? Let's see just how high in the chain it is!"
3) "UL, UL, gopi!" . . . "O xup'v sotl lommoph jon, cav O fu opwuli vji sohjv ug tvepfoph..." . . . "Epf O'mm ci qevoipv xovj jon."
3) translation: "OK, OK, fine!" . . . "I won't risk killing him, but I do invoke the right of standing..." . . . "...And I'll be patient with him."

Comments

[Blaze the draconic mage]

So is he able to level up and upgrade his stats or will he just get better at what he does the more he does them

[reflective vagrant]

8709199
He knows his character's build and what it should be able to do "in theory" but he's unlocking how to actually USE it step by step. Thus why he still can't do spells but also recognized the tingle on the back of his neck. Those that play D&D 5th edition might recognize some of the mechanics I hint at in the story.

But leveling up isn't an impossibility. He has certainly gained experience since first arriving, despite his bumbling around.