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MillionNovel > I Have Even Read the Rulebook! > Interlude 2: A Little Wolf from Heye, Part 1

Interlude 2: A Little Wolf from Heye, Part 1

    In the year 36.757 of the Elven Unity, a little half-blood was born in a small village in the Wolfbrown territories.


    Her mother was a Yellow Elf adventurer, and her father was a local Wolfbrown hunter. How and why such a strange couple came together, the newly born Elf of course did not know at the time and for long years later. Such an alliance between two Elven Races was not common but not unheard of either – Elves were very keen on keeping their bloodlines clean. Being a half-blood Elf was better than being a cur, or Grey Elf – a mix of an Elf and some lower species – but not by much.


    This the little wolf learned early on.


    Her acceptance wasn''t helped by the fact either, that her mother left as soon as she was able to, leaving some money for her father to "give her an education". Her father, not a wealthy person himself, did have the grace not to spend the money (that would have been technically illegal since the money was the little half-blood''s, not his) and took care of her to the best of his abilities.


    For around a year.


    Not much after her first birthday, her father found a new mate and she became superfluous. At least her father cared enough to find her a foster parent, as it happened, an old White Elf, who just relocated from the Estate of Haye in Forestdeep to enjoy his retirement. Or was forced out by his replacement, the little wolf was never able to find out. Not that she investigated hard. There are a few things you should leave buried, or else they will bite you like a rabid ghoul.


    Her foster parent taught her how to be a proper Elf. And, because he was from Forestdeep, a lot of other things too. How to fight, to survive, why it was important to be proud and always stand up for her rights, how to lay low and attack, when there are no witnesses, how to have loyalty to only the Estate (or in her case, the Domain) but not to others, how to look out for Number One (that is, herself) and when to discard ideology and loyalty (whenever it was convenient or brought more problems than benefits).


    Being a shunned half-blood in an almost pure Wolfbrown community and with her foster parent being who he was, it was no wonder, that she got herself into fights as soon as she could walk. Having been taught how to fight early on, she actually managed to win more fights than she lost. If and when she lost a fight, she refused to let go or back down – at least for long. Revenge was sometimes tastier if served cold, or so her foster parent taught her.


    For reacting to the slightest provocation and biting even when beaten down, she earned the nickname “The Foxy” (in Bergian: the rabid person) as soon as she turned ten. Her foster parent found it hilarious since he called her Fokssi (in Bergian: Little Wolf) for years already.


    As the years went by, she calmed down somewhat, but with puberty on the way, she had to face another issue. She realized that she liked girls. That in itself wasn''t an insurmountable problem in Elven society, as long as the bloodline continued, everyone turned a blind eye to what other people did discreetly behind closed doors.


    The real problem was twofold. First, as a half-blood, continuing her tainted bloodline was not encouraged, and secondly, because of her upbringing, she was basically incapable of doing things discreetly. Her foster parent just shrugged. In Forestdeep you could do everything with and to everybody and everything if you were strong enough. Of course, she could have left the Domain, but she was a proud Elf, no matter what, and it was her right to be who she was.


    More fights followed.


    More lessons followed. It was hammered home, that her period of grace would end soon with receiving her Character Parchment and being considered an adult, she would not be able to get away with harming other Elves. Being a rabid troublemaker was well and good, but would earn her a banishment in short order. Or an unmarked grave.


    She had to reign in her impulses and learn how to disguise her feelings and intentions.


    In this regard, she was not all that successful, so much so that when she finally received her Character Parchment, it stated her Emotional Stability was a mere 6. Thankfully, her foster parent was a scholar in the field of how the System worked and was able to provide her with a few secrets. Technically, each Stat could have been raised or lowered by one point only, save for the three free points. This little tidbit was mostly known in most places, but there was another way to get around the system.


    Of course, her foster parent shared the secrets with her, but made sure, she did not remember, HOW her Character Parchment was finalized – being a Level 35 and having more than 400% in [Magic: Mental] helped him in that regard. After all, no sane person would entrust important secrets to sixteen-year-old brats.


    This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    In order to get rid of some of her more serious flaws – for example being Rabid, or having multiple Mental Issues on a high level – she had to accept a few other flaws, she regarded as lesser problems. She never tried alcohol and wasn''t planning on drinking anytime (she was told a few stories where high-Level people got killed because they weren''t cautious and got drunk at the wrong time), so selecting Antialcoholic twice wasn’t a problem.


    Even so, she could only lower Rabid to Impatient and she still was Paranoid. That she didn''t mind much, it was not paranoia if there actually were folks after her. In that case, it was only prudence.


    Most of her Chi-powers she had to buy with having Low Life Expectancy. That she also didn''t mind much, even so, she would live for two hundred years or so. One of her foster parent''s favorite sayings was "Live fast, not long!"


    He was past six hundred, so was probably right.


    As for her Skills, the System recommended [Herbology], [Housekeeping], [Observe], and [Intimidation]. She was surprised that [Hand-to-Hand Combat] or other such Skill were not recommended, she was after all fighting more than keeping their house in order or picking herbs. They have planned for her future career already, so changing [Housekeeping] and [Intimidation] to [Chi: Battle] and [Magic: Dream] was done in quick order.


    The last thing she did was to discard her former name. No one called her by her birth name, to begin with, and keeping her old family''s name was out of the question. They did nothing for her all her life, so why cling to some useless collection of sounds?


    And so Foxy Delahaye was born.


    Luckily for her, her foster parent had some friends in certain places who still owed him some favors, so he arranged a job interview for her even before she got her Character Parchment. His reasoning was that with her Skill-set, behavior, attitude, and approach, working for a government agency was probably for the best. Maybe she could make herself useful.


    The office in question was the All-Elven Investigation Bureau for Internal Insurances'' Office for Extra-Arkadian Infiltrations, Intrusions, Influences, Incidents, and Inklings. Of course, the Elven name had the usual secondary and tertiary meanings that a translation could never capture. In day-to-day operations, everyone called the Office and the Agents Little Sisters anyway.


    For the next four years, she was trained and taught for her time as a solo agent.


    She learned, that the Heavenly Game Master allowed Extra-Arkadians to come to his world, but for what purpose, no one knew exactly. The Travellers, as they were called, came in four categories: Crafters, Heroes, and Utter Morons. And there was "Other" for those that could not be put into any of the others. It was also speculated that a few arrived as Dungeons, but with no possibility to converse with the murder holes, the theory was unproven.


    The first category was actually welcomed, they were very eager to pursue their chosen craft and were delighted by all the possibilities. They brought new ideas and techniques with them and were dedicated to bettering themselves and their products. In fact, they were so much welcomed, that every country worth it''s salt tried to find them early on and bind them to themselves. Sometimes literally. On the other hand, capturing or dispatching Crafter Travellers of your enemy was high on the priority list.


    After all, no one wanted to risk that someone invented that famous mythical magical weapon the Travellers always talked about. “Newk” they called it. “Newk” this, “newk” that, “newk” the site from orbit.


    A “newk” in the wrong hands (Greenskins, Lizard, Humans, so technically everyone save the Elves) would be bad, no?


    The Heroes were a mixed lot, but useful in some cases, most having interesting Perks – called Cheat Powers for some reason by the Travellers – that made them formidable warriors. However, most had a compulsion to “save the world” or bring dangerous new ideas to Arkadia. Well, and not a few had collected negative Perks like Ideological Crusader, Delusion, Bombastic, Pompous, Irresponsible, Loudmouth, Idealist just to list a few.


    Having not the faintest idea how Arkadia worked, most managed to get killed in short order (some with certain help from organizations like the Little Sisters) but those who survived became famous warlords, founders of countries or organizations, and such.


    The policy was to observe them closely, and if they were deemed dangerous, dispatch them with utmost prejudice.


    The last category was reserved for the truly useless. They knew nothing about Arkadia, the languages, the customs, the laws, or anything, really. They behaved themselves like they were in some sick game, where it was all right to steal, plunder, ignore the Locals and create as much bloodshed as possible. Most were even found wandering around naked! (Foxy was taught, that being naked in Human society was for some reason frowned upon. Probably because they were ugly, hairy, and threw shit around).


    There was a kill-on-sight policy in effect for those.


    Not that organizations needed to do much, most got themselves killed in the first days because of… utter stupidity.
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