- Fixed: Crit Bonus incorrectly reported for items that don't affect the amount of free hands you have
- Swapped some amulets around to ensure better coverage
- Changed wording of Sanguine Witch gift. Sandwiches are something else, and not part of this change.
- Stopped unaware enemies dodging you
Shhh. This build is a secret. Only you and I know about this. Scarcity is the root of all value, so the more people who know about this build, the less special it is. If it doesn't feel special then... well... you've only yourself to blame.
I mean...
Think about it...
Do you remember that summer?
You know the one.
It was a few years ago.
That particular morning was hot and bright. The humidity hadn't yet turned to sweat. The few bees figure-skating the air seemed more intent on pollinating than ruining your day. Your pack was heavy with that bottle of weird blue fizzy crap you lugged everywhere. You'd already drunk half the bottle and you laughed that your bag didn't feel any lighter.
You asked if I'd carry it for you for a little while. You asked because you'd forgotten that I couldn't. Not any more. When you remembered a shadow crossed your face like a cloud skittering shamefully across the face of the sun. It made me sad to see you look like that again. I knew you didn't mean anything by it. You never did. You were like that; guileless, and honest. It was refreshing to know exactly where I stood with someone. No guessing games. No ulterior motives. No mistrust.
The ravine was further than we thought. It always was. Other walks become shorter with every repetition, the value and specialness dusting to nothing like the magnetic coating wearing off an old cassette tape. But the ravine? It always seemed the same distance away, if not a step longer each time.
You came here to stare down at the dry riverbed like you were scanning a paragraph for a specific word. You'd done the same last summer. You'd watched as they carted out the empty, holy hollow of a body on a flimsy piece of cloth strung between two poles, face covered, one sneaker missing.
The sneaker was still there at the bottom of the ravine, still out of your reach. Just like me. The year before, the rains had turned the packed topsoil to muddy shale. The year before, you'd seen me fall. A tumbling cracking pinwheel. I was deadweight before I reached the bottom. You'd seen my broken form, still and splayed, like a discarded doll. My eyes stared right up into yours, even as a bee came to light on my eyelid to dance for a moment before buzzing away, lazily.
You didn't move for a long time. You let the sun go down before the prick of evening cold on your arms forced your body out of shock and into motion. It was full dark when you got home and gabbled out what had happened through tears and ribbons of snot. You came back with your parents, you'd pointed, and shouted, and cried, and stayed for the rescue vehicles. It was too late, of course. My body was as empty of life as that sneaker. The sneaker you stared at now.
Most other folks wouldn't know why that sneaker was important. And if they ever learned they'd make something cheap out of its existence. They'd treat it as a morbid entertainment. "Look at this!" they'd say. "You know that kid who died in the ravine? This is his sneaker!" And people would coo, and want to touch it as if the proximity to death would offer them something they could fill their own empty souls with.
But you didn't do that. You never did stuff like that. For you, the sneaker was something private, something that only held meaning for the two of us. You'd seen me at my most vulnerable, my most fragile, and ungainly. And you didn’t think less of me. Maybe that's why I'm still here. Maybe that's why I think you're worth being around. You understand the value in something that isn't shared. Something that's a secret.
Like this build.
Enjoy.