《The Rise of The Emperor of The Dreadlands》 Chapter 1: The Incident I wake up with a throbbing headache, everywhere I look I see nothing but complete darkness, except for the blue flames that were illuminating a path of some sort. It was pitch-black everywhere else, and not even a single speck of light could be seen when I looked to the edge of the path and peered past the illuminated area. I held the side of my head in pain, "This goddamn headache is killing me" is all I manage to say while struggling to get up. It was like gravity suddenly got ten times stronger the millisecond I got up. The headache kept on getting worse and worse, getting more unbearable as each second passed. "Gah! This fucking headache!" I say while holding my head. It felt like my head was going to pop, kind of like a zit. It was so unbearable that I couldn''t stay on my feet, making me drop to the ground. As my knees hit the rocky surface, the pain starts spreading throughout my body, from my head to my feet. As I''m about to fall unconscious from the pain, it''s suddenly gone. Just gone like snapping my fingers. "Man, I wish I was still alive. Being dead sucks. Well, I guess I''m technically not dead anymore. Oh right, you guys probably don''t have a clue on what''s going on. let''s go back a bit. I woke up as a baby-okay maybe not that far. "Finally, no more exams, and no more school," I said out of tiredness. I spent almost all of my spare time studying for the exams I had, barely letting me get any sleep at all. More importantly, I don''t have to deal with any of Harvey''s annoying pranks anymore. "Hey, Dane! Wait for me!" I heard a familiar voice call behind me. "Speak of the devil," I mutter under my breath. "Jeez, you sure walk fast" I hear him puff out. "Seriously, was there a need to ditch me like that? That textbook you threw at me hurt you know!" he said while rubbing his nose. We walked towards the school doors, and I notice that everyone is practically gone, with only a few stragglers left behind at school. As we were talking and laughing outside I hear a loud HONK HONK. "Will you two stop yapping and get going already!" yells my dad. "Your dad sure is impatient. Seriously, it hasn''t been that long," Harvey says. " Look around us. Everyone is gone already. I''d say he''s been plenty patient. Well, I guess I''ll see you tomorrow or something. Bye!" I say while walking towards the car. As I''m walking there I hear "Hurry the hell up and get in," says my dad so I jog over and get into the car. We drive home and chat for a while about random things, then my dad says "By the way all 4 of us are going to be going out to a restaurant I know of, it''ll be great" says my dad with his goofy grin plastered on. I just sigh and shake my head knowing he''s probably going to blow $500 on this family dinner, like usual. ~~~ "Howard, we have got to go there again, It was such a nice place!" I hear my mom say as we are driving home, but I hear her grumble "If only these darned bodyguards you got driving us everywhere and following us in their fancy armoured SUV''s". My dad smiles awkwardly and says "Its not something I can change hun, the company forced them onto me since I''m rather important, you know being the lead robotic engineer as well as being a ''genius''. They wouldn''t let me leave without them no matter what I said". My dad looked at the driver who was a big beefy and burly hulk of a man and said "No offence pal, but It''s true-" He couldn''t finish his sentence as we hear a loud honking from a truck, an turn to see a large truck charging towards us. Before it could hit us though, one of the 3 armoured SUV''s following us rammed into the truck, driving it off course from us, but we still got hit by the trailer that wildly swung from the impact, sending us careening into a tree. Everyone screams as we go flying, but it doesn''t end there, as my dad was looking around asking if we were alright, the trailer from the truck swings open, revealing a whole platoon of armoured men, all wielding various rifles or shotguns. "Is it just me or are they all aiming their guns at us?" I say a split second before the deafening RATATATATATATATA noise fills our ears. Sparks fly as they hit our bulletproof car, the windows cracking from the shots slamming into them. The 3 armoured SUV''s drive up, one trying to plow through the gunmen, taking 3 out as it drove past and covered our car with itself, to prevent the bullets from doing any further damage to the car. I hear more gunshots coming from the bodyguards followed by the screams of several people as they got shot. "What the shits going on dad?!" I yell as I hold my head and duck in the car. He looks at us and says "All we need to do is get the hell out of here, I''ve already speed-dialled the company''s private security force, they will be here within 3 to 6 minutes!" The car rocks and is jolted heavily as we hear an explosion. The bodyguard then yells "They have grenades! Get to that SUV over there! They are trying to blow you up!" I was going to say ''no shit sherlock'' but held back, seeing as it wasn''t the time or place to do so. My dad looks at him incredulously as if to say ''You expect us to run through a literal battlefield?'' but the guard simply death stares my dad and pulls out an Uzi from somewhere. The car shakes from another explosion and this time the windows shatter, and the roof is torn partially open, revealing the night sky. My dad finally gives in because he sees that we aren''t safe in the car anymore. The bodyguard gets out and shields my dad with his own body as he gets out of the car. Shortly afterwards several other bodyguards make their ways over to where we are to protect my dad but some are held down by gunfire.This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. We make a break for it and I look behind me as we sprint to the SUV that is our destination. Fires are burning everywhere on the streets and an SUV is blown up, the one that was covering our car from the bullets and explosions. There''s dead men everywhere, a large mix of bodyguards and the unnamed gunmen. Off in the distance I see 8 more armoured SUV''s and 3 helicopters with guns on them making a beeline for us but are caught in a gunfight with what seems to be reinforcements for the unnamed gunmen, who were driving in jeeps. The fighting intensifies and I just stop looking behind me. We are pretty close to the SUV now and my dad tells my mom to get in first, practically shoving her inside, followed by my younger brother, then me. I was about to get in but saw a red dot on my dad''s head and so did the bodyguard, who leapt in front of my dad, taking a bullet to the chest to save my dad. He yelled at my dad to get in and shoves him towards the car, but before he can get any closer there''s another loud bang, ending the guard''s life. He slumped to the ground lifeless, leaving a blood streak on the SUV as he slid down the side. I was about to scream but saw a second red dot on my dad. I didn''t think, just tore towards my dad and dove into him, shoving him out of the way. What followed was the most intense headache I''ve ever felt, followed by a slow-motion look at my dad''s horrified face. I tried saying ''why do you look so horrified? I just have a headache dad I''m fine'' but the words wouldn''t come out, just a burbling sound. My life flashed before my eyes as my vision faded and the sounds became more and more muffled. Near the end I swear I heard a muffled cry from my mom screaming "DAANE!" but I was too tired to think about it. ''Mom I''ll go take the trash out after I sleep'' I try saying, not really thinking about what I''m saying due being so damn tired. This freaking headache won''t go away though. ~~~ I wake up in a strange and very spacious room filled with hundreds of confused looking people, ranging from elderly men and women on their deathbeds to adults. There were loads of teenagers and even several toddlers and what looked like infants, some looking no more than a newborn baby. The room has a blue carpet with yellow lines on it, as well as some weird blue torches everywhere. I had this killer headache, and while holding my head between both hands I asked the question which was on everyone''s mind, "Where the hell am I?" As I walked forward, I got the same look as I always walked from the guys and girls. I still don''t understand why I get those hateful looks from the boys, and from the girls...I don''t know what those looks mean with their blushing cheeks, but I wish I stopped getting them. From the front, I see some movement at the stage and see a tiny dwarf-sized grey ball of hair moving. "Is that a mini Chewbacca..?" I wonder out loud. As if the grey ball of hair heard me it zooms towards me and I hear "I''LL HAVE YOU KNOW THAT I AM NOT A CHEWBACCA! I DON''T LOOK THAT HAIRY OK, I FINELY GROOM MY BEARD HAIR!! IT IS A MASTERPIECE!". I was left utterly stunned. "Did the Mini Chewbacca speak? Since when did the world have talking Mini Chewbaccas?" I could hear snickering from those around me, with some murmuring and pointing at the hairball calling it a mini Chewbacca, much to the hairballs annoyance. It seemed positively livid with being called a Mini Chewbacca, and snapped his fingers, making everyone silent. I was about to say something but found that Icouldn''t.It was pretty shocking and just a little scary. A tiny furball silenced everyone here with a mere snap of its fingers, using some method unknown to me to silence us all. I''m not really sure what to call him, so, for now, I''m going to continue calling him mini-Chewbacca. Mini-Chewbacca flew back to what looked like a stage. On his way there, he was mumbling something under his breath. ''What is this sorcery, how can he fly?!...I''m and idiot, it''s probably strings.'' He reached the stage, which was when he started his welcoming speech. "Hello everyone and welcome! You''re all probably confused as to where you are and what''s happening right now. The reason you''re all hear is well...you''re dead!" I''m dead? How can I be dead? Unless there''s been some sort of spell on me shouldn''t I at least remember how I died? This guy needs to find a better excuse for kidnapping people. Just in case, I pinched myself. Damnit I''m not dreaming. There were only two entrances/exits in the room. One had two giant doors which were being guarded by 2 giant men with...horns? Weird that they want to cosplay as demons but alright then. It would be impossible to escape from there, and the other was a black door covered in scratches and numerous dents. It looked like nobody touched it in years. Although I''m pretty sure it might just be a storage room, it was the only possible way out. The only problem was that it was near the stage, meaning I would have to wait for an opening or cause a distraction. What could I do to cause a distraction though? While I continued to think of any possible distractions, the speech carried on. "I know what you''re all thinking. ''How can I be dead?'' The answer is simple." The mini chewbacca looked at one of the guards and said "Stab one of them." People panicked at that but there was nowhere to run. The taller guard grabbed some old man by the neck, and stabbed a knife into his arm, and severed his arm from his body. The body didn''t spurt blood or anything like we expected, but grew a new arm, which shocked more than just a few people. The mini chewbacca clapped his hands and went "Bravo bravo, what a show! Now, you see? He clearly had his arm severed but he just grew another one! So, is that enough proof that you are dead or do we need to have a few more performances?" The way he said performances made me shudder and I backed up a little bit. It seems others found him just as creepy and looked afraid as well. Seeing that no one was replying, he continued with his speech. "Fantastic! Now we can get onto the juicy bit! Observe! Wheeee!" He flew over to a curtain, which he promptly gave a yank to and had them open to reveal what was hidden behind them. Chapter 2: Into The Dreadlands The mini went and unveiled a giant machine. It had a large blue crystal that was the size of a soccer ball. The machine also had a backboard with dials and numbers, some in a foreign language. He then proceeded to dust it off before talking to everyone here. "Now then, let''s measure your potentials, shall we? Line up and we can get this done quickly!" He floated over to the first person near the machine and snapped his fingers. Instantly everyone was in a neat single file line. The first in line was a buff guy who looked like a bodybuilder. He stepped up to the machine and put his hand on the machine like he was told to do. The crystal started glowing before the glow faded and the numbers on the backboard changed, eventually stopping at 12. "Hmm you are... Weaker than a baby! INTO THE DREADLANDS WITH YOU!! HEHEHE" The door that was all banged up and marked with damage flung open and black hands that looked like they were made of shadows flew out, grabbed the bodybuilder and dragged him into the door, with him screaming "NO! Please give me a second chance! Nooooo-" The doors flung shut as he was dragged in, cutting off his screams for help. Everyone was shocked into silence after they witnessed what happened to the first guy. "Next. Next! I said next! We don''t have all century you know. Oh wait we do...well hurry up regardless." The old man that was next was frozen to the spot and looked like he was going to piss himself, as did the others. He started slowly walking to where the machine was. The mini then spoke as if he realized something. "Oh right, I didn''t introduce myself, how rude of me! I am a Demon Lord from a different planet! My name is Avrin Fornace, and you would do well to remember that!" He flew over to the guy that had finally made it to the machine and yanked the guy''s hand, placing it on the crystal before the man could say anything. The numbers kept flying upwards before stopping at 430. "430! You, old man are one hell of a powerhouse! Walk through the gates to the left to claim your prize!" Avrin then smiled a rather creepy smile as if he was plotting something, but kept shoving the old man to the door while saying "Go on, shoo shoo!" then he went towards the rest of us and said "Alright, let''s get this show on the road! You better hope you have good numbers or its to the Dreadlands for you!" ~~~ It had been who knows how long, probably hours or was it days? It was my turn finally so I walked up and pressed my hand on the crystal just like the thousands of other people that had gone ahead of me. The crystal glowed very brightly and then the numbers started to go up. "Wha? The hell is wrong with this thing?" Avrin said as he stared at the machine just like everyone else was. The numbers kept rising and rising until they hit 1000, then dropped back down to 1 and kept increasing again. They did this 4 times before stopping at 1. Avrin stared at the machine and started checking dials and buttons to see if anything was wrong. "Hmm the mana capacitor is fine, so is the energy crystal battery. I cant find anything wrong... whatever lets do it again!" So I placed my hand on the crystal again and the same thing happened again with the number eventually stopping at one. I paled as I realized what that meant for me. I looked at Avrin and his creepy freaking smile said it all. "INTO THE DREADLANDS WITH YOU! HEHEHAHA!" I couldn''t even scream as the hands grabbed me and yanked me into the door before I even got the chance to scream. After the door shut Avrin checked the machine for any errors before dusting off a particular section, revealing a screen that said "4000+Number on screen." Avrin looked at the machine, then at the door before realizing what just happened. "That guy had 4001 Potential?!?!?! And I just threw him into the Dreadlands?! Noooo!" He then started throwing a hissy fit, flinging magic spells randomly before calming down. "Haah, haah. Go and get him..." He said to the 2 guards at the door who had the names Dumb and Dumber. They looked at Avrin hesitantly but he then screamed "AFTER HIM YOU DUMBASSES!" and they scrambled to get into the door to the Dreadlands. ~~~ I wake up with a throbbing headache, everywhere I look I see nothing but complete darkness, except for the blue flames that were illuminating a path of some sort. It was pitch-black everywhere else, and not even a single speck of light could be seen when I looked to the edge of the path and peered past the illuminated area. I held the side of my head in pain, "This goddamn headache is killing me" is all I manage to say while struggling to get up. It was like gravity suddenly got ten times stronger the millisecond I got up. The headache kept on getting worse and worse, getting more unbearable as each second passed. "Gah! This fucking headache!" I say while holding my head. It felt like my head was going to pop, kind of like a zit. It was so unbearable that I couldn''t stay on my feet, making me drop to the ground. As my knees hit the rocky surface, the pain starts spreading throughout my body, from my head to my feet. As I''m about to fall unconscious from the pain, it''s suddenly gone. Just gone like snapping my fingers. "Man, I wish I was still alive. Being dead sucks. Well, I guess I''m technically not dead anymore."This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. I started walking down the path after I saw that there was nothing here for me to look at. I kept walking for a while and started to get that damn headache again. The farther I walked the bigger it got until eventually I reached a breaking point. It was like a dam had broken open, with memories flooding in. What happened when I was alive and other details were coming back to me. They stopped coming when I stopped walking. I continued walking forward and more memories came back. I decided I would continue forward to remember what happened when I was alive and how I died because at the moment I didn''t remember anything. I kept walking even as the headache felt like my head was about to burst. I kept walking even as my head literally burst, pain flooding me as my head grew back. I kept walking even as parts of my body exploded one by one. I was determined to get my god damn memories and a bit of pain wouldn''t stop me from remembering. Although the pain was far less than what I expected it still hurt like hell. The pain got less and less as more and more body parts regrew themselves. After what felt like hours I had finally regained all of my memories and was gasping for breath as the last toe on my left foot regrew itself. "Well, that was...something. I would rather never have to experience that ever again." I said as I started to feel upset. I was upset at the fact that someone had tried to kill my family. Why couldn''t they leave us alone. " I just hope dad and the rest got out alive, unlike me." There was a light up ahead so I decided to pick up the pace and head over as quickly as possible. What I saw when I got to the light was a empty battlefield with hundreds of dead bodies in various states of decay. Some fresh and some partially decayed while others were mere skeletons that were crumbling do dust. I walked forward through the bright circle of light onto the battlefield and the black tunnel disappeared as if I walked through a portal. "That probably was a portal if i''m being honest. That was one hell of an introduction to the Dreadlands. The pain sure makes you feel the ''Dread'' part of the name." I chuckled at my own bad joke and kept walking forward.before I started to have a bad feeling about something. I mean the battlefield was bad enough but this was a whole new feeling of bad. Like I was going to die this instant if I didn''t do anything. "Shit. I need to hide." I ran over to a broken horse carriage and hid inside it, grabbing some old sword from a dead corpse along the way. I didn''t know why I would need a sword but I held onto it tightly as I hid. No sooner had I hidden that I heard loud roars from some unearthly beast. I peeked out of the carriage and saw 2 large creatures that looked like ogres except on steroids, each carrying large clubs made of wood. One of them grabbed a fresher corpse and tossed it into its mouth whole. They kept growling and making odd noises as they looked for more corpses to eat. I scrambled farther into the broken carriage to hide. I then saw something that surpised me quite a bit. I saw a blue window appear in front of me.
Danger Sense Level 1 acquired
"The hell? how''d this window get in front of me?" I moved my body and the window kept following me. I eventually just gave up and waved my hand at the window and to my surprise it disappeared." I wonder what will happen if I do something super cliche and say ''Status''?". To my surprise a new window popped up giving me an even bigger surprise. One that made me forget about the ogre like creatures gobbling dead humans. "Are you freaking kidding me? You have got to be kidding me." Chapter 3: Breaking Something Important In front of me was another blue window, but this one apparently showed my status. "Why is there a freaking status screen for dead people?! Also why does it remind me of a video game?" I was so damn confused but decided to read all the information on the status screen before continuing my rant.
Name Dane Carter
Current Potential 4001
Race Soul Body [Human Type]
Soul Cores Remaining 6/6
Level 1 [0 exp/100]
Health 300/300
Mana 50/50
Other Menus Available Titles,Skills, Attributes
I stared at the menu and was even more confused. "What the heck are soul cores?" As I said that I saw another menu pop up.
Soul Cores: Soul Cores are cores inside of all soul bodies. Soul bodies do not age. As long as a single soul core is intact inside a soul body, they will be unkillable. When a soul core is destroyed, it takes 24 hours to regrow starting from the time it was destroyed. If all soul cores are destroyed the soul body will become mortal and is subject to all mortal problems. Ex. Bleeding to death, hunger or being unable to regrow limbs until they regrow a soul core. Soul cores are located in each limb, the chest and the head/neck area. Soul cores will not heal minor injuries quickly, only life threatening injuries such as loss of a limb. Having an entire limb cut off WILL cause you to lose the soul core in that limb. Monsters in the Dreadlands don''t have soul cores. WARNING: If your health reaches 0 you will lose a single soul core and your health will be refilled.
I was trying to take in all the information I had just read. "So because of these soul core things, I''m basically immortal until all 6 get destroyed. It also seems I have super regeneration or something when I have soul cores. Either way I don''t like pain so I won''t be running around like a maniac just because I am harder to kill. Those ogre''s on steriods look like they would me. A lot.". I was still thinking over the information that I had just recieved about me being a soul body but my thoughts were cut off by a loud roar followed by a sickening crunch of bones being broken. In my excitement it seems I was too loud and the ogre creatures started heading towards my broken carriage to examine the source of the noise. "This ain''t good. How am I going to get out of this situation. Think Dane, think." The footsteps were getting louder and when I peeked out I saw that the ogre things were around 10 metres away now. I looked around for anything I could use and remembered I was holding a sword. There was also some bags filled with some red powder, so I grabbed 2 bags and waited. When the ogre things got 2 metres away I saw that they were far bigger up close than far away. The things were around 2 to 2.5 metres tall with arms as thick as tree trunks. They were leaning down to look into the carriage when I threw the 2 bags of powder into their faces. They both screamed and held their faces. I jumped out and swung the sword with all my might, sending careening towards the arm of one of them, but it simply embedded itself into the things arm with a THWAK. I tried yanking it out but to no avail. By now they were done rubbing the powder out of their eyes and were looking at me angrily. "Hey guys, real sorry bout the whole surprise powder attack. My bad. How about we call it even and I just yknow..RUN!". I turned around and started to sprint away but didn''t even get 2 feet away before something impacted my left side, sending me flying over a dozen metres. What I felt was pain, several broken bones probably as well as a few broken ribs. I hit the ground and bounced a few times before coming to a stop. I couldn''t breathe. It was painful, and all that came out was a gurgle. But all of a sudden the pain was gone but a new pain replaced the old pain. Something in my left leg broke. It felt like the broken bones I had a few seconds ago but with the pain amplified to 11. I writhed in pain for a few seconds before the pain dissapeared and I got a pop up.A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Health has reached 0! A soul core has been broken to refil health back to maximum Remaining Soul Cores: 5/6
I had just lost a soul core, meaning I had just died by having my health hit 0. I shuddered at the thought but the roar of the creatures behind me made me realize I needed to get out of here and fast. I started to sprint away from the monsters that had just killed me once. I kept running for god knows how long, with my lungs begging for air. I wonder how this body works. I mean I am techincally not a mortal, so why am I still getting tired. It made no sense. Was I just a different race and not a semi-immortal being? I continued with these random thoughts to keep my mind off of the fact that I had literally died once and was escaping from creatures that could kill me 5 more times just as easily. Off in the distance I saw the outlines of a large tower, or the remains of one anyways. Along with the tower there was ruins of a small town which looked like it was from the middle ages."Let''s just hope those things can''t break buildings as easily as me. Heh." I increased my pace and made it into the ruins. I quickly ran towards some random building nearby and dipped inside, quickly slamming the old wooden door shut. I collapsed on the ground and tried to catch my breath. Off in the distance I heard crashing and the sound of walls being broken. "Guess they can break walls down." I said to myself as I laid flat on my back still unable to move after that mad dash I had just made. As I lay there panting and listening to the crumbing of buildings I heard a loud howl from some creature, followed by the roars of the ogre things. Apparently something else lived in these ruins and those big guys disturbed it. "As long as I get to live I really don''t care. Ugh my sides hurt from all that sprinting. I really wish these soul core things made the pain go away for minor things as well. It would really help out." I got up and wiped the sweat off of my forehead and hobbled over to the window. I saw a large ball of dust off in the distance from the scuffle of the monsters and it was getting farther away, which was good. I looked over to my right and saw a skeleton in armour with a sword, which scared the shit out of me. "WHAT THE HELL?!"I screamed as I backed up as fast as I could, forgetting that I was in a place called the Dreadlands, and for good reason. I looked around to see if anything heard me but thankfully nothing seemed to have. "Whew. Hey what the hells your problem scaring me like that. Go die somewhere else, like cmon man." I said to the skeleton who lay there and said nothing in response. I was about to leave the building but remembered that I just died cause of a monster. Who knows what else is out there. "I might as well take your armour and equipment. It''s doing no good sitting here to be honest." I walked over and started to remove the sword from the skeleton''s grip when the skeleton''s hand shot up and grabbed my left wrist, and the skull moved to look at me. It had blue orbs floating in it''s eye sockets. I barely registered this as I screamed like a little girl and punched the skull of the skeleton, turning the old cracked bones into bone powder. The skeleton let go of me and I made a break for it to another room in the building I was in. I was met face to face with another skeleton that was standing this time, looking right at me. I screamed like a little girl again and punched it in the face, turning this skull into dust a well and made a break for it to the outside. I finally escaped that house and made it to a building across the street. "T-T-T-T-Theres Undead?! I mean it should be reasonable in this whacko fantasy type of world that I am in, but still. Not.Cool." I smoothed out my clothes and started walking back to the building I not so manly escaped from. "Come on skele bros. It''s time for round tw-" I was face to face with another skeleton the second I turned the corner into the building. This time I didn''t scream as much and dealt with it like a man. Ok not really but what would you do when a literal skeleton gets up from the ground and tries to impale you with a spear?! I dodged the spear from the skeleton and punched it in the skull. This skeleton didn''t seem as brittle as the other ones as it didn''t turn to dust, it merely had a crack in its jaw. It backed up and swung it''s spear sideways trying to slice my gut open, so I jumped backwards and looked for something to use as a weapon. I saw a large dagger shaped rock on the ground and leapt for it, dodging yet another thrust from the skeleton. I grabbed it and leapt to my feet again and spun around to the point of a spear. It missed but cut my cheek, causing me to bleed. "That hurt you piece of shit!" I lunged forward and stabbed with my rock dagger, aiming for its skull. I missed and instead hit it''s jaw, shattering the jaw. It backed up and stared at me with its blue orbs, before lunging at me again. I managed to stab my rock dagger into it''s skull, shattering it but not before the blasted creature stabbed its spear through my right arm. The blue orbs dimmed and finally winked out of existence as the skeleton died and collapsed back into a corpse. I grabbed my arm in pain but the wound was already slowly closing up. It wasn''t as fast as I would have liked it but the wound was closing far faster than it should have normally, for which I was thankful. "I''m glad that I heal stupidly fast, or this hole in my arm would have been very painful to deal with. Now, time to loot the corpses." As I was looting the corpses a pop up appeared saying I had gained 10 exp. "Seriously? Experience? What else is in this world?" I mumbled to myself as I worked on removing the armour from the skeleton. Chapter 4: Survivors I looked at the notification in confusion as I reread what it said. "Experience? The hell? Why does something like that even ex-.... I guess i''m technically in hell or something so it doesn''t really matter why it exists or how it exists... so yay me for earning experience??" I said to no one in particular as I finished putting on the leather armour from the skeleton. It was ful or holes and was very old. I also took the spear, which was surprisingly well maintained. Who would have known that a skeleton would take care of its weapon. "I also got this pouch filled with these weird coins. Wonder what I can buy with them? But for real though, the picture on them is weird" I stared at one side of the coin, which had the skull of a dragon on it with its jaws wide open in a fierce pose with snakes wriggling out of its eye sockets. Looking at the picture made me feel creeped out, like it was actually staring back at me so I put the coin away. The coin itself was black but the dragon skull was white and the snakes were green with black eyes. "I just hope i can use this spear well enough to scare away any would-be murderers. I really don''t want to get punted like back then." I shivered at the memory of the steroid ogres that punted me like a golf ball. Leaving the building with my spear in tow, ready to stab anyone. I saw no one near so I continued my skulking down the street of this abandoned medieval town. I encountered another skeleton after a couple of minutes, but this one was standing near a dead body. I recognized this body as one of the people that was sent into the dreadlands with me. It was the bodybuilder who was supposedly weaker than a baby. I felt sick to my stomach when I realized he was dead but I didn''t want to end up like him so I swallowed back my fear and nausea as I swiped my spear diagonally trying to destroy the skeletons head or chest area but ended up missing terribly and lopped the skeletons left arm off. Unfortunately it wasn''t the arm holding the sword. "God damn its a lot harder to use a spear than animes make it seem to be. This thing is so damn hard to u- Woah man watch where you''re swinging that thing!" I stopped my rambling and scrambled backwards after nearly having my head cleaved off by the skeleton who didn''t seem to care about my plight, but I could have sworn the blue flames in its eye sockets were mocking me. For some reason having a dead guy mocking me made me rather angry. "I''ll show you! Damn pile of rotting bones!" This time the skeletons blue flames started burning brighter, as if it was pissed off at me for calling it a pile of rotting bones. "Guess you don''t like that huh? Pile of rotting bones! Haha!" I laughed at the skeleton, which seemed to anger it even further somehow as its attacks came at me far more fiercly than before. I barely dodged a swing that literally cleaved into a stone wall, embedding the sword into it and getting it stuck. The now disarmed skeleton looked at me as if this was my fault. I simply swung my spear as wildly as I could and got a lucky blow against its neck, severing its head from the rest of its body.
Aweful Spearmanship Level 1 gained!
.... "Why does it feel like this notification system is making fun of me for how I use my spear? I would like to see you use a spear for the first time and kill an undead skeleton in the same hour! Huh?! I thought so!" I was smirking at my victory of the noticiation system when I heard the sound of footsteps nearby. I quickly scrambled off towards a nearby building and hopped over the windowsill and hid inside. A few seconds later I saw a group of several people armed with a mishmash of equipment. Some had swords, daggers, spears as well as random bits of armour. Someone had a dagger and a leather helmet, while another dude had an iron chainmail set with a sword. It was a pretty weird group. But they seemed to be looking for something, or someone. "Hey, you said that screaming was coming from this way right? I don''t see anything here other than a dead skeleton." said some guy off in the middle of the group. I then saw someone at the front, a person wielding a broadsword with a full set of leather armour, as well as iron gauntlets who I recognized as someone else sent into the dreadlands. He kept looking around with a sharp glare, and I felt like he found me numerous times. I don''t know why but I really didn''t want to be found by him. I also recognized a couple of other people from the group as being from the people that were sent into the dreadlands with me, but obviously couldn''t remember all of the faces as there were thousands of people sent here. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. They kept mumbling amongst themselves while looking for me when I heard the man wielding the broadsword, who was probably the leader, yell something. "Alright he probably killed the skeleton but had his friend here die in the fight, so he can''t be that well armed. The other guy here looked like he was fighting with a dagger.so lets sweep the area for him and take out any undead while we move. Careful you don''t run into any of those freakishly muscly ogre monsters. They killed over a dozen of the people in my previous group before we managed to kill it and escape with our lives." His warning seemed to have done its job as everyone shut up and looked far more alert than before as they scanned the surroundings. They moved on away from where I was but I didn''t leave until what felt like 15 minutes had passed. I was always terrible at keeping track of time so more time probably passed than that but whatever. I peeked out and saw no one was there, so I carefully hopped over the window sill, making sure to not make any noise as I did so. Once I was over I started to look around I kept moving at a brisk but silent pace for a couple of minutes as I walked down the street. All of a sudden I felt something grab the back of my neck and drag me towards an alleyway. I tried screaming but felt a knife pressed against my neck so I quickly shut up. I then heard "Hey boss, you were right! He was still hiding out around here! I found him trying to escape after he thought we had left for good! The damn fool revealed himself so quickly." I then heard more footsteps quickly approaching our location. I didn''t want to face the leader of the group because he scared me for some reason so I started to think in overdrive. ''Think Dane, how can I get out of this situation? Can I kick the guy? He''ll end up slitting my throat if I do that. That''s no good. What else? Cmon cmon the footsteps are getting closer.'' I was panicking more since the footsteps were nearly at us at this point. I made my decision at that point. "Screw it! I won''t die anyways!" I decided to struggle as much as possible because I remembered the whole soul core deal and tried to make a break for it. The man holding me had a solid grip on my neck and refused to let go. He cut into my neck and I started to bleed quite a lot. It hurt like hell and I was feeling like I was drowning but I kept fighting. I almost made it out but the group came around the corner and I had another idea. I went limp and stopped struggling and acted as if I had died, because I looked like that to anyone else. The dude holding me said "Aw shit....boss is going to be real pissed at me for this. Hey bro wake up! Cmon man the boss is approaching me! Cmon dude I know you''re alive. Bro the boss is coming towards me and has his broadsword out!" I could hear the panic in his voice at this point and felt like giggling at his plight but couldn''t. Both due to me pretending to be dead and the fact that I was still in extreme pain and could barely breath as my weird soul body started to regenerate the wound. I then heard the dude practically screaming in my ear."B-b-boss I swear it wasn''t my fault! The dude simply struggled and wouldn''t stop, cutting himself against my knife! I swear I didn''t do it on purpose!" I heard the boss stop walking and I was dropped on the ground with a loud thud as the dude probably backed up away from the boss in an attempt to explain the situation and out of fear. I just hoped my wound didn''t heal too fast for me to make a plan and escape. I heard the deep voice of the boss from my left, "Didn''t he heal his wounds like several other people we found? Several people are able to do that ressurection type thing at least once. He might be one of them" The boss then kicked me and I held in the scream I wanted to yell out due to the pain, although I wouldn''t have been able to scream anyways. Damn asshole is going to pay for that, one way or another. I vowed to myself that I would get revenge somehow. but my thoughts were cut short as something stabbed my gut. I didn''t scream out because my throat was still too damaged to make sound, but I sure as hell wanted to scream. I wanted to scream, cry or just plain make noise to get rid of the tearing pain in my gut. I couldn''t think straight from the pain but I managed to not move my body and go into a fetal positon clutching my gut. That would show I was still alive, and I wanted to be as dead as possible if I wanted to live. That somehow seemed backwards but I didn''t care at the time as I was in agonizing pain. After what felt like hours but was probably only a minute the boss took my spear and the pouch from my pocket and said "Let''s go, he has nothing else of value on him. The armour he''s wearing is too damn full of holes but this spear is rather good. Jennie you take the spear for now and hand that piece of junk to some newbie." I then heard more talking and footsteps as they left. I waited for another minute or so until the footsteps were very far away before moving into action. I clutched my now healed stomach and sat there holding it for another few minutes before the pain subsided. I then got up and hobbled away, now penniless and without a weapon, as well as in pain. "Freaking asshole stabbed my gut and just left me here in pain. Also what the hell did he mean by ''several other people''? Arn''t they all able to come back to life using soul cores? Or are only some of them able to do that? If so why am I able to come to life so many times if most people are not even able to do that once." I kept mumbling to myself as I hobbled away in pain. What I didn''t notice was the 2 horned figures on a rooftop staring down at me leaving the group. They kept staring with predatory eyes looking at prey, but I didn''t notice any of this and obliviously let out complaints as I wobbled down the street and looked for a place to hide and recover. Chapter 5: Dumb and Dumber Pain kept hitting me as I walked. It was reduced to a dull burning sensation now, but it still hurt. I was searching a building for any weapons to use because as I have learned the hard way...multiple times might I add, this place is not friendly towards the weak. I was searching through a chest in a house but it was mainly filled with very old clothes that were unusable, and other bits and bobs. I did find an old kitchen knife and was now armed with that. "It might not be the best weapon for a place as dangerous as this, but it''s better than being unarmed and getting robbed. Now that I got a weapon, next is food. "I don''t know how many hours have passed, but I will start getting hungry soon. Not going to lie, I really don''t want to lose a precious soul core due to starving to death... That''d be a real waste of a soul core. After searching non-stop for the past three hours, all I had to show for myself was some moldy bread, a piece of purple and orange glowing mystery meat, and several apples form an apple tree I found somewhere. "What the hell am I supposed to do with this crap? The bread is a no go" I tossed the moldy bread away and moved on. "This funky glowing meat is also a no go as fun as it would be to eat it, I don''t want to die." That was also tossed out. "Guess that leaves these apples. I''m glad that there was apple trees in this weird place. I''ve got like 43 apples now. How the hell am I going to lug these things around? Might as well start eating some here." I started to munch on an apple and was looking through the menu for skills and saw something rather interesting. "Is Spacial Folding what I think it is?" I put an apple down on the ground and tried using spacial folding on it and the apple just disappeared. I then noticed another menu I could call up and saw exactly what I was looking for. There was a menu for items that folded them with spacial magic and stored them. "Perfect, I now have an inventory of sorts, guess that solves my storage problem." I tossed all of my apples into the spacial fold and threw out the apple core as I got up. I then heard an "Ow, that hurt. Dumber did you do that?" I was rather confused and looked behind me to see those same 2 guys that were guarding that door in the weird place I woke up! "What the hell are you 2 doing here? Shouldn''t you guys be oh I don''t know, guarding that door?" They looked at me and one of them spoke saying "Dumb, look. Target found!" The one I hit with the apple core then said "But Dumber..food!" He held up my apple core and looked at it rather sadly, but Dumber just grabbed me and said "No, Target first, food later." I didn''t really want to be dragged away by 2 giant morons so I punched and kicked trying to get rid of his vice like grip but to no avail. "Hey what gives?! Lemmie go you big pile of dumb!" The one grabbing me said "Me no dumb, me Dumber! He Dumb!" I stared at him in confusion but he looked dead serious as he said that. I tried stabbing my kitchen knife into his arm but it just harmlessly slid off of his skin. What the hell is his skin made of?! Freaking iron?! It even cracked my knife! By now they had dragged me far from where I was originally found. I do''nt really want to know what these big guys would want with me and was scratching my brain for any and all ideas. "Hey Dumb, want more food?! Look, apple!" I pulled an apple from my inventory, that was what I was going to call it, and held it with my free hand. Dumb looked my way with a drooling mouth and said "FOOD! Gimmie! Food please! Dumber, gimmie food!" Guess Dumb really likes food. I tossed the apple at Dumb and pulled out another and said "Dumb, make him let me go and I will give you a lot more apples. You want food right? Me free means more food. Got it?" I saw Dumber look at the food as well but he simply wiped his hungry look off of his face and said "Food later, target first. Bad Dumb Dumb" and smacked the apple out of Dumb''s hand, making Dumb look real sad.This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report. That wasted a lot of time but got me nowhere. How the hell am I going to get out of this dudes grip? He''s freaking Strong. He won''t budge no matter what. I tried smacking my knife into him a couple more times and even kicked him in the balls once. The big guy just didn''t move an inch and took it all without even bothering to look at me. I just pulled out several apples and tossed them at his head trying to vent my anger at this point. Dumb caught all of the apples and shoveled them into his mouth with a gleeful expression, which creeped me the hell out, but I got an idea from him. "Hey, I need to take a dump. Mind letting me go so I can do my business?" Dumber looked at me and said "Wait", before pulling out some type of handcuffs, which he slapped one end onto my left hand and the other onto him. At least the chain was rather long so that was good. "Go there. Hurry. Boss get angry for being late" I just scrambled to the building he pointed at and hid out of view. The second I was out of view I tried to get the hand cuff off while wondering just why the hell were those guys here and why were they after me? I couldn''t think of any reason for them wanting to catch me and bring me to their boss, who i''m guessing is the dude named Avrin. "Why.wont.this.thing.come.off!!" I yelled as I tumbled into a wall from trying to tear it apart. No dice. "The hell am I going to do now? I don''t want to go with them and find out what they are going to do to me cause it probably isn''t anything good." I heard "Finished??" from Dumb so I yelled back "Uhh, no not yet! I''m really backed up so gimmie a minute!" I heard grumbling but it then went silent so I went back to getting the cuff off and tried to use my knife to cut if off or something. It didn''t really work other than leaving a small dent on the cuff when I hit it with full force. "Guess i''m going to be here a while." I said as I started swinging at the cuff with my knife." ~~~ Fast forward around 20 minutes and I was nearly through the metal on the cuffs but was having trouble keeping the Dumb Duo from walking over and yanking me away. "Done?! Been too long!" I just yelled at the top of my lungs "I ate taco hell! I''m going to be a while!" The 2 started to ask each other in confusion "What''s Taco hell?" "No idea, seems bad place." I swung down one last time and saw the cuff break finally. I then pried my hand out of the cuff but they made a squeaking noise which made the 2 look my way and ask "What doing over there?" I quickly made up some bullshit excuse and said "Taco hell makes me do that, Don''t worry!" I prayed they wouldn''t come over but Dumb just said "Taco hell seems very bad place. Me don''t go there." I can''t believe that worked. I shrugged it off as their stupidity and crawled out of the building without making too much noise. Once I was outside and out of view, I got up and made a break for it. "I''m free at least! Time to get as far away as possible from here before they notice." When I had gotten far enough to feel safe I stopped to catch my breath and checked my inventory to see I had chucked around 12 apples at that moron and now had 30 apples left. It would keep me going for a little while but wouldn''t last long. "Great, now I need to find more food. Oh and an actual weapon. Double great." I heard someone yell "Taco hell man Gone!" and booked it. I was several kilometres away but I still didn''t feel safe. I kept sprinting for who knows how long and eventually heard the 2 morons get into a fight with some giant monster. The fight was far away so I kept sprinting to make more distance between us. ~~~ It had been several hours since I had started running and was just walking around while eating an apple when I saw a run down blacksmith''s shop. I could only tell by the fading sign of an anvil and hammer with some faded out writing above it. I just walked in while holding my knife, looking out for some skeletons lurking in the dark. "I really hope this place has something of value in it, I could really use a weapon or at least something better than my cracked knife." Chapter 6: The Terror of the Smithys Guards I was walking towards the blacksmith and noticed how god damn big the place was up close. The place was around 9 stories tall and was as big as a baseball field at the least. I stopped walking towards it when I saw some skeletons outside the blacksmith''s shop. They looked very different compared to your average skeletons, other than the fact that they were undead. They were wearing iron armour, although it looked rather old and was worn out with some spots having gaping holes showing the bones underneath. They were carrying rusted iron swords with a dagger sheathed on their hips. They looked rather menacing to be honest. "What the hell are those skeletons and where can I get myself one? They look scary and deadly." I muttered to myself as I thought of a way to get around them. Obviously I wasn''t going to bum rush them without any weapons or this shitty armour. That would get me killed....again. "I still don''t know how this whole soul core stuff works to be honest but all I need to know is even with them I still die with a simple stab in the head. Charging them is a real bad idea then." I reconfirmed my own thoughts outloud, solidifying the plan to NOT include rushing the skeletons. I would need some weapon at least if I would want to stand a chance. I was looting a house and looking for weapons or something when I saw a wooden window frame hanging loosely. The wood was rotting and looked rather bad but I got an idea. I walked over and tore the long stick of wood out of the frame and held it. I then started to sharpen the top as much as I could into a sharp tip. After several minutes of hard work I held up my masterpiece. It was a rotting pole of wood with a sharp point. "Damn this thing looks like shit. It might not even withstand 5 attacks." I was startled when I got a notification confirming my suspicions.
Appraisal learned! Used appraisal on "Rotting wooden spear" This ''spear'' was made by Dane Carter and was made with an amateur level of knowledge. The spear is made of rotting wood that may fall apart at any moment and splinter into useless firewood. The spear has no value.
I read the notification and felt like someone just insulted me as weird as that sounded. "I felt like I did a real good job to be honest. Screw you system, or whatever it is you are."
Delusional Lvl 1 Acquired!
"Listen here you blue screen of death! I ain''t delutional! This is some quality work ya hear?!"
Delutional increased to Lvl 2!
I was rather angry at the system now and wanted to punch it in its nonexistent face. I was about to argue some more when I heard something clunking. I turned to see one of the skeletons at the smithy had walked over to inspect the building. I was probably making a crap ton of noise now that I think about it. I stopped arguing with the system and pulled my rotting wooden spear in front of me. I aimed it at the skeleton that was approaching, but it seemed like it didn''t notice me yet, just heard the noise. "How does a skeleton hear stuff anyways? Like it has no ears to hear with..." I silenced my own thoughts and waited for the skeleton to get close. It had gotten within arms reach when I decided to strike. I struck my spear towards its skull, the point flying towards the revealed skull of the skeleton. I was expecting the skull to crack or something but what happened shouldn''t have surprised me to be honest. The spear exploded into wooden splinters, sending pieces of wood flying. The skull was totally unharmed besides a small scratch on the white surface. "Ah, well....shit this aint good." I said as the skeleton turned to stare at me while raising its sword. I backed up and looked around for anything to use as a weapon. I didn''t see anything and decided to make a break for it out of the window. I turned and ran, hearing the clunking following close behind. When I got close to the window I saw a sword pop out from the other side, going straight for my neck. I stumbled and fell on the ground face first, barely dodging the strike at my neck.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. The bastard skeleton lured me over to the window trying to get me decapitated by its friendo on the other side. "I gotta give you guys credit, you''re smarter than you look for brainless skeletons." The skeleton didn''t reply and simply kept walking towards me while brandishing its weapon. The other skeleton had appeared behind the window and was now climbing through. I got back up and scrambled away from the 2 killers approaching me. I saw another rotting piece of wood and picked it up. I swung it like a club at the first skeleton and it predictably exploded into splinters of wood. "Oh come on! That one looked solid." I kept looking around frantically and then noticed something out of the corner of my eye. It was the appraisal skill, appraising something. I seemed to have used it without knowing. It was appraising a jagged rock on the ground.
Dagger shaped rock: This rock is in the shape of a rock and will function as a dagger, although it''s cutting power is not as strong as most daggers, It will get the job done.
I didn''t know how to feel when I read that. Some random rock was a better weapon than my wooden spear. I didn''t think too much about it though as the skeleton was fast approaching. I swiped it off of the ground and held my new weapon firmly. I stabbed at the skeletons face with my dagger but the skeleton used its arm to block, sending my dagger skidding off of the armour. I scrambledd backwards to get out of the way of the sword that was sent swinging at me. I could feel the wind whooshing past me from the sword. I started to back up as I looked for an exit. Clearly I was unprepared for this fight and I didn''t want to test my luck. I may have those soul core things but dying hurt and not to mention was scary as hell. I ran towards the skeletons and when I was nearby I veered off to the side, making them miss me with their swings. I swung my stone dagger at the nearest skeletons face, but missed. The dagger got lodged into an armour joint and I lost my grip on it. I stumbled forward and kept running past them as I made a break for it to the door. I felt something pierce my back, straight through my armour. It felt like a sharp burning pain. I didn''t stop and kept running forwards out of the door and into an alleyway nearby. I kept sprinting for a minute or so before I stopped to look behind me. I didn''t see the skeletons chasing me so I sat down to rest. I then remembered the thing that stabbed my back and the pain struck me once more. I stretched my arm and felt my back until I found the thing lodged into my back. It was the dagger of one of the skeletons. It was also made of iron. "Hell yeah, free weapon!" I then winced in pain as my back felt like it was on fire. "Ok maybe not necesarily ''free'' but still it''s a weapon. Thats all I care about. I''m not unarmed anymore atleast." I spent the next few minutes sitting there in pain trying to bandage my back up. By the time I finished bandaging it up the wound had all but closed and I felt annoyed. "Why couldn''t you heal before I finished bandaging you up?!" Feeling like I was insane for yelling at a hole in my back, I pulled out an apple and munched on it as I tried to de-stress. The whole situation I was in had me on edge the entire time and I felt like I was a bow taught, ready to fire an arrow at any moment. I needed to unwind somehow and eating apples was apparently the only way I had at the moment. I got up and looked at where I was and noticed an inn nearby. It wasn''t in the best of condition but It looked usuable. I got an idea at that moment. "I wonder if they have any beds that arn''t demolished? I could really use a nap. I trekked over and peeked inside, seeing there was no skeletons inside. I cautiously crept througout the building checking doors, seeing that they were all locked, I looked for a key and found on at the receptionist desk. It was for a room on the third floor. I walked over and checked the room, seeing that it was clear I walked in and locked the door. I saw 2 beds. One was collapsed and completely useless while the other had several tears in it and was leaking whatever the stuffing was out. It looked usable though. I spent some time fixing the place up and when it was good enough I got in bed and pulled the covers up, with my dagger on the bedside table right next to me. I then turned onto my side and promptly fell asleep in this hell hole. Chapter 7: Menu Surfing and A Painful Discovery I wake up to loud screaming and someone yelling "Retreat!". I shot upwards and grabbed the stone dagger, looking around in a panic. Seeing that no one was near me trying to murder me I got up and cautiously walked towards the window where the sound was coming from. I opened the shutters and looked outside to a trainwreck of a fight. The group that mugged me before was in front of the inn, only now they were mid retreat. "Did those morons really try assaulting the blacksmith? Fighting those skeletons with sheer numbers won''t cut it." I said to myself as I shook my head in disbelief. There was 4 dead bodies littering the entrance to the blacksmith. I also saw some chick with a spear get stabbed through the throat, but simply pull the sword out and scramble backwards. Her wound closed quickly after and she screamed "Hey boss, my only soul core just shattered! We need to dip. These armoured boneys are too much for us." I saw the boss look at the woman and click his tongue before raising his voice to say "Alright lets back off for now! We''re heading back to base. Anyone left behind won''t be helped so keep pace!" He then turned around and dashed off into some alleyway with the rest of the group following. I looked and saw that the skeletons chased for a few seconds before turning around and returning to their posts in front of the blacksmith. They ignored the corpses and did little else with them other than move them out of the way from the entrance. I had an idea come to me at that moment so I snuck downstairs after waiting for several minutes to make sure they really left and some nasty monster didn''t come out of nowhere. Once I got outside I cautiously walked to the bodies while keeping a close eye on the skeletons. They followed my every move but didn''t approach me yet. I grabbed the closest body and dragged it away and into a house nearby as quickly as I could. The skeletons didn''t follow so I breathed a sigh of relief while wondering why they didn''t chase. "Was it cause I wasn''t near the blacksmith this time? Or was it for some other reason? This is confusing." I shook my head to clear my thoughts and turned to the body. It was wearing better armour than me but it was still leather so I tried putting it on. The armour was slightly loose for me but it fit well enough so I didn''t complain. The body didn''t have anything much of value other than the armour. Even the weapon it had was a broken shortsword. Useless to say the least. It didnt even have a handle, it was all blade so grabbing the thing would cut my hands open not to mention using it. I found some of the coins in a pouch and took that bag for myself. Who doesn''t like shinies? I turned to look at the other bodies and saw that some bird monster had snatched 2 of them away and was flying away with them in its talons. I cursed the bird thing for stealing my loot before turning to the last body. Again I dragged the body into the house as fast as possible. I was scared for a second when a skeleton guard walked over to me. I dropped the body and dashed towards the house as fast as I could. "The hell does it want? It didn''t bother me last time I took a body so why is it pissed now?" I kept watching and saw the skeleton grab the dropped coins from the bag and put them in its own pouch on its belt and walk back to its post. "Those things also collect money? The hell?" I creeped back over to the body and dragged it off and this time the skeleton didn''t bother me. It didn''t have much in the ways of armour except for a leather chestplate, which I didn''t want anyways. While searching I found an iron dagger in a sheath on his belt. I took the sheath and dagger and tossed my stone away. "Thank god I have an actual weapon again. Now i''m not some homeless bum with a sharp rock, but a homeless bum with a dagger." I checked my pouch of money and saw I had 31 coins in it. "The hell are these coins? Freaking creepy ass coins give me the jitters looking at them." I put the coins back in the pouch and closed it as a notification appeared. Great, the sarcastic jerk is back, not that it left.
Drachma: The currency of the Dreadlands. Made from an ancient and long lost forging technique, these coins are the standard money here, traded for various goods and services. That is, if the being you meet is willing to trade. Most encounters result in death in the Dreadlands.
"Alright, so these coins are the actual currency of this place. Didn''t know a place like this even had an economy. Might as well start saving up for the future. I was getting up and was abut to leave when I remembered something. "I have some other menues I havent checked. Might as well check my skills menu out. With a thought I pulled out my skills menu from the system or whatever it is that let me see these blue boxes.
Skill Name Level
Aweful Spearmanship 1
Danger Sense 1
Appraisal 1
Rift Portal 1
??? [Locked]
??? [Locked]
??? [Locked]
I was dissapointed by my skills to say the least but when I saw the 3 ??? skills I was confused. I was even more confused when I saw that the level of the skills was [Locked]. "Do I have to somehow unlock them? But how the hell am I going to do that without knowing what to do to unlock them? This is rigged! Rigged I say! The system is freaking borked!"If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.
Delusional Lvl 3 Acquired!
"...'' I sat there and stared at the god damn system''s notification. "Why is my highest leveled thing freaking Delusional?" I decided to pull up my titles menu and take a look at them. The skeletons weren''t coming near me and I might as well check everything at my disposal.
Title Name Level
Delusional 3
Monstrous Potential 1
??? [Locked]
I sighed as I saw that yes, Delusional was in fact, my highest leveled thing in my entire status. I looked at the second title and looked in confusion. "Monstrous Potential? Why do I have that? Doesn''t that imply that I have a lot of potential? You sure your not glitching out system? You saw my potential back when it was first revealed. Also what is up with all of these damn Locked ??? items in my status?! Like sheesh!" I kicked a rock in frustration and started heading back to the inn with my new prizes. I also decided to check the Rift Portal skill''s description.
Rift Portal: A skill to create portals at predetermined locations. The amount of locations a user can save is determined by the level of the skill. Saving a location and activating the portal consumes mana. Current Save slots 0/2
"Thats one handy skill. Finally some good fortune." I was glad I had an actually useful skill I could use and instantly tried to activate it. "Wait...How do I activate it?? That''s going to be a problem." I had gotten back to the inn at this point and was sitting on a couch in the reception area of the inn while thinking and wracking my brain on how to use the Rift Skill. "Would it just open if I thought of using it like my menu''s?" I tried just that and had no luck. Nothing happened so I tried something else. I kept looking with my menu and examined the description, looking for as much info as possible. ~~~ After what felt like an hour had passed. I had finally succeeded in using my Rift Skill. I had stumbled upon the word mana and gotten a description for it. It seemed that mana was in everything, including the very air. It went on into some lecture about what mana could be used for and other junk but I just looked for the info on how to use mana. I then saw a section telling me how to activate mana. It said some weird mumbo jumbo about feeling deep within myself for some foreign energy, so I closed my eyes and tried doing that exactly. I felt like a moron doing that for 20 minutes straight but eventually managed to get a hang of it. It felt like I had some ice cold but energetic fluid coursing through me. How I hadn''t noticed it before baffled me. I then went on to try and use the mana but met with some...explosive results. I ended up blowing up the couch I was sitting on. It hurt like hell and I didn''t want to destroy my current home so I had walked outside and went to a random clearing a few buildings away to continue. I had continued trying to use my mana in any meaningful fashion but almost all of the experiments resulted in a glorious explosion, deepening the crater where I stood every time. After 30 minutes of constant explosions and failures I had attracted some skeletons so I had fought them with my dagger, killing the 3 skeletons that attacked me. I was rather pissed with my failures and blew some steam on the skeletons, leaving them as nothing other than broken piles of bones. Not even the armour was worth using anymore when I was done with them. I had finally had a breakthrough when I just dumped all of my mana out and squashed it into a ball. I had ended up gaining the skill Mana Manipulation Lvl 1. It took an hours worth of explosions and effort but I had done it. What happened after was simply me manipulating mana into a circle in front of me and imagining it was water on a lake. The knowledge just came to me once I got mana manipulation. I had just chalked it up to me having the skill and just needing the manipilation skill to be able to make use of it. The whole ordeal had left me dead tired and in a lot of pain. Lots and Lots of pain. I wanted to try using the mana as a ranged attack like some fantasy mage but I was just in too much pain to bother. "I''ll do that tomorrow. Who knew using mana would be so painful?" I mumbled as I flopped into bed and fell asleep. Chapter 8: God damn Rabbit! I woke up and ate an apple even though I didn''t feel hungry. "I really haven''t felt much hunger since coming to this weird place. Hope I''m not getting sick or anything" I finished the apple and decided to continue experimenting with the mana. I had been able to make a ball of mana so logically I would want to try and lob it at something. I checked out of the windows for any signs of something murdererous lurking and when I saw that there was nothing I breathed a sigh of relief. Everyday you are alive is a miracle in this damn place. I wanted to check my status page again since it had been a while so I opened it up while I finished munching on the apple.
Name Dane Carter
Current Potential 4001
Race Soul Body [Human Type]
Soul Cores Remaining 5/6 2 hours 25 minutes till next core regenerated
Level 3 [30% exp until next level]
Health 900/900
Mana 200/200
Other Menus Available Titles,Skills, Attributes
"When did I level up? Must''ve killed more skeletons than I thought I did." I also noticed the fact that there was a timer saying when my next soul core regenerated. "That''s good. My core''s will be back at max in 2 and a half hours." It was still a bid weird to get around the fact that in 2 hours and 25 minutes I would literally grow an extra life but I''ll get over it. I chucked the apple core into my inventory and opened a description of the Rift Portal skill again to get a refresher on what it did.
Rift Portal: A skill to create portals at predetermined locations. The amount of locations a user can save is determined by the level of the skill. Saving a location and activating the portal consumes mana. Current Save slots 0/2
I finished reading the decription and decided that I might as well save my location here since this was going to become my home for the time being. I tried to weild mana like before but it was damn difficult to use. It felt like trying to pour syrup out of a bottle. It took time and effort to get enough out to be of any use. I was slowly getting better as I used mana but it wasn''t a very large difference. After several minutes of gathering mana and preventing a massive explosion from occuring, I finally managed to create the blue water like portal. It appeared in front of me and was slightly taller than me. I didn''t get any notification so I tried to think of saving this as my home to portal to. Instantly after doing that I got a notification.
Rift Portal Save Slot used! Current location has been saved My Home! Save slots used: 1/2
"So it saved as whatever I was thinking of at the time huh? Gotta be careful or I''ll end up saving a location as ''Damn Hellhole!'' or something dumb like that. Anyways back to experimenting with mana." I finished walking out of the inn and got outside. I saw that the skeletons were still standing there guarding the inn so I gave them a salute and walked off to my practice grounds, laughing at the absurdity of the situation. To my surprise the skeletons saluted back, scaring the ever living crap out of me. I sped up my pace, looking behind me the entire way. "What the frick? Those things actually saluted me back. Alright, not going to think about it. Time to become a wizard Dane. Lets do this." I started using mana again and tried to focus it into a ball shape like I had yesterday, only this time without shoving my entire mana pool into it. I was successful after a few failed attempts. Making a small ball of mana the size of a tennis ball. The next step was trying send it flying like in video games. My first attempt ended up with the blueish white ball of mana slowly peeling off of my hand and plopping onto the ground followed by an unsatisfying Bloop as it splatted onto the ground. "This is going to be harder than I thought."You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. I kept working on it but was met with limited success. I had tried to chuck it but the thing stuck to my hand like glue. I had tried to make it smaller but that was practically impossible for me. The mana would scatter all over the place after a few seconds of it forming. I had spend around 12 minutes of just trying different solutions when I felt like I a headache coming on. "Great, just great! First all this failure and now a headache!" I tried to make another mana ball but I got a notification saying I had 0 mana and was suffering from the backlash of using it all, aka the headache. "Oh piss off you damn blue nightmare." I waved the notification away, feeling thoroughly irritated at myself wasting time and getting nowhere. I sat down on the side of the practice yard and ate an apple when I felt something odd. I felt like there was something nearby as weird and crazy as that sounds. It was like I had a radar in my head. I turned around and saw nothing there. I felt like a crazy person but then the small blip on my radar in my head moved a bit. It seemed to be behind a large rock. I pulled out my bone dagger and held it tightly as I crept up on where this feeling was coming from. I jumped out from behind the rock holding my bone dagger and saw a...rabbit? "Wait...why''s the rabbit have a god damn horn? WTF?" I got a notification right after asking that question to no one.
Being Appraised! Horned Rabbit: Horned Rabbits are very weak???????. They usually eat grass and????? and are docile????. They are cowards but??? have ????? and horns that can be sold or used for?????? ??????? ?????? ????? ???? ????? ????????.
The appraisal wasn''t the most useful with all of those weird symbols I couldn''t understand but I understood enough to know that the thing in front of me was a Horned Rabbit. I just hope that appraisal gets rid of those symbols the higher it''s level gets. The rabbit noticed me and stared at me and my bone dagger. It then slowly walked over to me. "You look cute when I get a good loo-"Shink."AAgh you go damn piece of-"Shink.I screamed in pain again and hobbled backwards while holding my leg in pain. The son of a gun had just stabbed my leg with its horn! "Docile creature my ass! The thing just attacked me! Screw you ya damn notification system. You got my leg stabbed!" I kept complaining as I hobbled backwards staring at the creature. I swear I saw a smirk in that grubby little face of its but I''m probably hallucinating. "Why you little piece of shit. Imma tear you a new one. C''mere you!" I proceeded to spend longer than I care to admit chasing the infernal creature around with my bleeding leg. It healed up quickly so I barely noticed the pain apart from the initial stab and just chased the thing with a burning hatred. Every time I got close to catching it the thing would hop onto some ledge I couldn''t reach or somewhere else and look at me with its damn face. I swear I saw the thing smirk at me every time. After I had gotten fed up with the thing I lost control of myself in anger and wildly pumped mana into a mana ball while I thought about sending this flying at the rabbit and blowing the thing to kingdom come. The ball of mana surprisingly flew forwards using mana as a sort of fuel to fly forwards. The ball of mana flew straight at a rapid pace, slamming right next to where the rabbit was. The horned rabbit hopped away but the ball of mana blew up, causing the thing to go flying while crying out in pain. The horned rabbit slammed into a wall horn first and hung there limply while bleeding. I huffed out a breath and calmed myself down. I had just used mana to make a projectile and wanted to try and replicate it. I calmed down enough and started to think about what I had done. I had made a mana ball and thought about sending it flying forwards and blowing up, so I tried to do that exactly. I made a ball of mana and then thought about sending it flying forwards really fast and blowing up afterwards. I pumped a small stream of mana into the ball while thinking about this, which made it harder to control but I managed to keep it from going nuclear on me. The ball of mana then flew forwards without me doing anything and flew forwards. It struck a nearby wall and blew up, sending some clumps of dirt flying into the air but otherwise not doing any damage to the wall. I was pretty excited about this, since I finally had a ranged attack. "Hell yeah! Booya! Finally, all of this damn boring practice paid off. Oh frick, there aren''t any skele''s nearby from that noise are there?" I looked around in a sudden panic but relaxed after I saw nothing. The weird radar feeling came back as well and I felt nothing from it other than a weak signal from the dying rabbit hanging from the wall. I was surprised when I got a notification.
Danger Sense has become Level 2!
Chapter 9: Teleportation "The heck? Danger sense level 2? Was that the radar feeling that let me know where the rabbit is? Why didn''t it appear back when I needed it." I kept trying to use danger sense and I felt nothing nearby. The Horned rabbit imbedded into the wall had died so I yanked it out of the wall and stuffed it in my inventory. I then proceeded to try and replicate what I had done earlier. After a minute of struggling I finally managed to create another ball of mana, although it wasn''t as stable as I wanted it to be. The thing was pulsing like mad and looked like it was going to burst at any second. I just shot it towards a wall to see how much damage it would do. The ball of pulsing mana slammed into the wall and violently exploded, sending chunks of rock flying everywhere. One even whacked my hand, causing it to bleed. "Alright that did a lot more damage than I expected it too but hoo boy does it slurp mana." I said as I stared at my menu in shock. The single attack had taken 10 mana meaning I could fire a max of 20 with my current mana. My experience had gone up a decent chunk from that one rabbit and I was now at 45% experience. "Why is a freaking rabbit worth more experience than some deadly skeletons?!? Makes no sense!" I then saw my health and noticed that I was at 700 hp left. I was a looking with my mouth agape at the stats I saw. "That rabbit stabbing me 2 times with its horn did 200 damage?! How is that even remotely fair! Thats broken as hell! GM! I demand you fix this borked rabbit and nerf its damage!" I was real shocked and angry at the fact a rabbit could kill me in a few stabs. I was reading the description of the rabbit in my inventory and it seemed that the fucking piece of shit used mana when it stabbed you, tearing your body up internally. "Thats a nasty rabbit. How the hell are the other people surviving with these little buggers running rampant. Then again, I only saw one for the first time today so they might be rare." I shook my head and started feeling excited again when I remembered that I could use magic now. "Time to wreck some skeles from a distance! Hehehehe." I walked away from my training area after I had mostly healed my wounds and ate an apple.My mouth started watering thinking about eating cooked rabbit meat, I ignored the fact that I for the most part didn''t know how to prepare a rabbit and just went on to hunt skeletons. I kept my new danger sense ability active and noticed the telltalle signs of Horned Rabbits running around but they usually stayed hidden and ran away when I got too close. After several minutes of searching I noticed a different blip. This one felt a lot colder and sinister. I started heading there while cautiosly looking around in case something snuck up on me and somehow avoided my danger sense. I got to where the blip was and sure enough it was a skeleton. It was armed with some shoddy leather armour and a small half broken knife. I started forming a ball of mana and this time it was slightly less shaky and pulsing less. The skeleton noticed me and started to come in my direction. I focused on the ball of mana and eventually managed to get it ready. I aimed my hand at the skeleton and fired the attack at it. The skeleton tried to dodge it but it still hit its arm. The ball of mana erupted into a blue explosion of mana. The cloud of mana dissipated and the skeleton was now lying on the ground without an arm and the armour on its chest was looking worse than before with several scorch marks on it. The skeleton tried to get up with one hand but I ran forwards and stabbed my bone dagger into its skull, sending a massive crack through the skull and leaving a large hole where I pierced it. The blue fires it had for eyes soon died out. "Hell yeah! That was the fastest I''ve killed a skeleton yet! Although the spell takes a while to charge up and prep. I need to practice moving while making the mana ball or I''ll be a sitting duck whenever I attack." Satisfied with my results I picked up the few Drachma the skeleton had in its pouch and started walking home. I then realized I had a new skill to let me travel home quickly. "Right the Rift Portal! Who needs to walk when I can teleport!" I started rubbing my hands together in excitement and then started using the spell. Instantly I felt the mana being almost visibly torn from my body. It left me at such a rapid pace I got worried. It eventually stopped and formed the blue mirror like portal from last time but I was more worried with how much mana it had consumed.The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. I saw in my stats that it had used 100 mana to make the portal. "Holy hell thats a lot of mana! That means I can only use 10 mana balls and leave at least 100 if I want to use the portal as an escape route." I walked towards the blue portal and stuck my hand into it, sending ripples along the surface of it like ripples on water. Taking a deep breath I said "Here goes nothing." and walked straight into the portal. A cold sensation washed over me but it was almost instantly gone as I stepped through the other side of the portal. Once I passed through it the portal started to waver and splashed onto the ground like water. The glowing blue liquid slowly evaporated and dissapeared but it was cool to see nonetheless. I looked at where I was and saw that I had indeed ended up at my current home. I sat down on my bed feeling an extremely painful headache. It felt like someone was smashing my skull in with a hammer. I could barely move now and simply flopped onto my bed trying to endure the pain. After what felt like an eternity had passed, the headache went from skull smashing to skull cracking. That might not sound like a big difference, but you really noticed the difference. "Haah, I wonder if thats because I used too much mana or if its cause I''m just not used to using mana in the first place? Or is it a backlash from using the spell? God I hope its not that, or this spell will become a last ditch effort I will rarely use." I got up after the headache was small enough for me to stand without collapsing. I checked my stats and saw that my health was back at max but my mana was at 12. "I won''t be able to do much with that, I guess I''ll try and search buildings nearby until I can practice some more. I really want to become a cool mage who can fire dozens of mana bullets like a machine gun." I walked outside of the inn as I daydreamed of the time when I would become some magician from a fantasy who could obliterate dragons with millions of mana bullets the size of buildings. I made it to a building I hadn''t searched yet and started the task of scouring the area for anything useless while kicking the butts of any lurking skeletons. I made sure to keep danger sense activated as it didn''t seem to use mana to keep active. I had been searching buildings for half an hour and was rather bored as I had found nothing but skeletons. I had managed to get 3 rusty iron daggers. They were worse than my bone dagger but I kept them as backup weapons in case I ever lost my current one. While searching I felt several blips in the distance. 1 was rather strong and made me wary but 3 of them were just slightly stronger than the skeletons. I checked my mana and saw that I now had 174 mana. I could make a quick getaway if need be. "Alright lets see what these blips are shall we? With cautious steps I moved in their direction and eventually heard voices. The voices got louder and louder until I heard them clearly. A male voice spoke up saying "The boss says that theres some weird rabbits with horns hiding around. We need to hunt them but apparently they can kill you in 2 or 3 stabs usually." Another voice spoke up, sounding a lot gruffer than the first one. It said "Yeah, just dont let the little bastards charge at you and you are fine. They can''t turn well when they charge so keep moving or hit em from a distance." The voices continued to chat and from what I heard they were part of the gang of thugs that had robbed and killed me once. "Man thinking that is weird. ''they killed me once''. Whatever, I best leave now. I can''t exactly kill them all and have no reason to." I had turned around to leave when I heard one of them say something that made me pause. "We also need to find that bastard that escaped once. The chick with the tracking ability says hes living somewhere nearby and apparently has quite a lot of goodies on him. What the goodies are we don''t know but we might as well kill him a second time and steal em. Only this time he''ll stay dead." I heard several laughs but I had started running from there as fast as possible, leaving the vocies behind. "Shit, this ain''t good. This ain''t good at all." Chapter 10: First Blood I started to back up and get away from the thugs looking around. My mind was running on overdrive while I was sneaking away quickly. Apparently I wasn''t being sneaky enough as the thugs heard me. I heard someone say "Oi, you hear that? Something made a sound over there in that house over there." I heard someone else say "Might be a skeleton but let''s check it out. Damn place is infested with the bloody things." I heard footsteps coming in my direction and started to sprint away into a nearby building away from where I was heard. The thugs chased after my sound as I ran. I hid in the second floor of an abandoned house. As I was catching my breath 3 thugs rounded a corner with weapons drawn, looking around for something. They were catching their breath and one of them said "What the hell just ran away? Nothing in this damn place runs away. It either kills you or ignores you." A thug weilding an axe nearby said "I just hope it''s edible. Dude you don''t know how long it''s been since I ate anything. I mean yeah we don''t need to eat anymore because we are Soul Bodies now, whatever the hell that is. But meat still tastes great!" I saw the axe thug drool over the prospect of cooked meat while a third whacked him on the back of the head saying "Focus you moron, first we need to catch the thing before eating it. If even the rabbits here can kil us quickly then whatever just ran away is probably something nasty and weak like a mutated rat or something." They all shuddered as they seemed to remember something and then with renewed vigor they started to look around. Unfortunately they went towards my building. I started to think of what to do and realized "Why don''t I just snipe the fools? I have magic now, might as well use it. I just need to be careful with my shots and not miss." I peeked back out the window and concentrated. Mana formed into a blue ball floating in the air. I aimed at the one who seemed like a leader and fired my mana ball. The mana ball flew at the leader rapidly and..PIERCED THROUGH HIS HEAD?! I sat there like a fish out of water with my mouth agape staring at the damage but that was the wrong move. The 2 thugs that were alive panicked and one screamed "Dude hes dead! What the hell was that?! All I saw was a blue streak fly through the air before punching a hole through him and blowing up on the ground. What the hell?!" The axe wielder looked around and found me staring at them. He promptly screamed "Over there! Somethings up on the second floor sniping! Let''s get it!" He started running towards my building while the other one panicked and stared at the dead body, still proccessing what was going on and trying to figure out what to do. I shook my head, getting out of my stupor and formed another ball of mana and fired it at that guy that had stopped responding. His friend turned around and yelled "What are you doing?! Move before you get-!" A hole the size of a basketball appeared in his head, bringing him down just like the leader. Blood poured out of the hole but that didn''t bother me at all. I had seen way more gory stuff in video games and vr lately is rather realistic so I wasn''t bothered by the sight. I was just glad my experiment had worked out. Why did I try and experiment with magic during a battlefield you ask? I don''t know, I didn''t bother to think of the consequences as I could always run away with magic and I literally had 6 lives to spare. Anyways my experiment was changing the size of the mana ball. I had first changed the size of my mana ball to be as small as I could make it with the first person. It seemed that the mana ball was the size of a tennisball and could go to a basketball at biggest. It seemed that it consumed the same amount of mana to shrink or grow the mana ball for some reason which confused me but I chalked it up to magic logic and went on with my day.You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. While I was lost in thought I heard footsteps coming up the stairs behind me. "Oh shit there was one more person. Right." I turned around and saw the person running up the stairs while screaming. He screamed "You bastard! I''m going to kill you! You slaughtered my friends! You MONSTER!" A vein on my head bulged. "Oh so I''m the monster now?! You guys are the ones killing and looting other people! Screw you!" I poured mana into a mana ball and fired the spell at the axe wielder. He dodged to the left and the mana ball sailed past and blew up on the wall. It left a small crater there but otherwise did nothing. The thug started to close the distance while screaming random profanities. I started to back up and fired a second mana ball, this one a tennisball size, lets call it a mini mana ball for now. The mini mana ball flew straight at the man but he still managed to avoid dying to it. It slammed into his left arm and pierced through while blowing up after passing through. "I was right! The mini version is faster than the big version! Alright, say goodnight you bastard!" I took another step back but there was nothing there. I looked behind me and saw I had stepped out of a hole in the wall and out of the second floor...into the air. I screamed in panic as I plummeted from the second floor to the first floor. I landed on the ground and it hurt a lot less than I imagined it would. It still hurt a shit ton but I didnt have any broken bones or anything. I opened my status and saw that I went from 900 hp to 820. "Why the hell does falling to the ground from the second floor cause less damage than those rabbits?! What the hell?!" I got up and saw the thug staring down at me in shock. His face turned into one of horror as he yelled "What the hell are you?! You should have broken a few bones with that fall or even died! How are you ok?!" He looked on in horror as I just looked rather confused. So this wasn''t normal? Or did I just have way more health than that loser? I just shrugged it off and fired a mana ball at the dude. He dodged it but like a moron he dodged to the left...off the roof. Just like me he fell off the second floor but unlike me he crumpled in a heap and didnt get up. I walked up and he looked like he had broken a bone in his good arm without a hole in it. Other than that he was coughing blood and not looking too hot. Just how little hp does this guy have? I pulled out my bone dagger and prepared to finish the job but froze. Wait. What the hell was I just about to do? Was I about to kill someone? ... Hold on... I technically already killed 2 people already. I was just adding to the pile at this point. I started to have an internal dilemma about what to do while the poor guy moaned in pain at my feet. I spent a minute or 2, I don''t really know how long it was but once I was done contemplating I had decided on something and resolved myself. This world wasn''t going to be kind. It was going to be ruthless and cruel. It was going to rip me to pieces the second I showed weakness. So I was going to become the monster that ate monsters, the thing that people fear. If I was powerful enough that no one messed with me I would be safe. I wasn''t going to run around slaughtering and looting like these bandits were doing, but I wasn''t going to shy away from anymore fights. I had already killed 2 people so there was no turning back, not when I killed the first person out of cold blood. "Alright then, I''ve sorted out my mind. Man that makes me feel a lot better. Sorry pal but you arn''t going to live through this encounter." I said as I looked down at the bandit who was laying on the ground with both arms useless and in a lot of pain. He looked at me with fear but I didn''t let it get to me. I just reminded myself of the submerged vr games I had played and the fact that I had to do this to live. Besides he wasn''t going to live even if I left him here. He was dead either way. "God damnit stop stalling!" I smacked my self on the side of my head and gripped my bone dagger tightly. My grip on it was so tight my hand hurt from gripping it too hard. I looked at the dying man infront of me and stared at him dead in the eyes as I plunged the dagger into his throat and pulled it out. I pulled it out and gripped my slightly shaking hand. This place wasn''t a fantasy funland. No...this place was hell, and I was going to survive and even thrive here. Chapter 11: Horned Rabbit Den I cleaned the bone dagger and put it away and looted the dead corpses. I took their armour and weapons, both of which were in bad shape but hey, it was better to have some form of replacement I guess. I also found a couple Drachma on them, around 24 Drachma, bringing my total amount to over 50 Drachma. "I''m starting to get quite a stash to be honest. Though what these are even good for I don''t know. Nothing here even sells things, but meh I might find someone who actually wants to sell me something so I''ll store em for now." I put the coins back into my inventory and took one last look at the corpses for anything useful and when I found nothing I dragged the corpses into some house nearby and dumped em in a corner. I decided that was good enough to hide the bodies and used the rift home since I had saved enough mana to use it. I stepped through the blue mirror like portal and wound up back at my home in the inn. I cleaned the blood off of my clothes and equipment and then just sat in bed and thought about whatever. I probably spent over half an hour just sitting there mulling over what had happened. Was it the right thing to do to kill them? Was there another way? I kept thinking things like this but again my mind settled onto the point that had made me commit the act back there in the first place. This place wasn''t kind and it was either kill or be killed.I was going to have to do this sort of stuff to live whether I liked it or not but I decided I wouldn''t become some raving lunatic that killed everyone for fun like those bastards. That said they were planning to attack my home so I was trying to figure out what to do. "Why do they want me dead so badly? It''s not like I have much good stuff on me in the first place. I barely have any good equipment so why did they say I had good loot? Is that ability they talked about talking about my Drachma or is it talking about something else?" I sat there in confusion and couldn''t think about what I had that was worth something other than my Drachma. I gave up and decided to think about what to do. I didn''t want to move but they seemed to have a tracking ability user so they would find me eventually regardless of where I was. "Hmm, should I just attack them first? If I repeatedly raid their camp, kill a few people, and then portal out several times they should probably give up or I will end up whittling enough people away that they scatter. But where do they even live??" Just as I had gotten a plan the fact that I didn''t know where they lived smacked me in the face. I really should have kept one of them alive to ask questions, but then again I''m no good at interrogations so whatever. I got out of bed and sat at the table, eating an apple while I thought about my game plan. I had decided that I would do the following. I would continue hunting skeletons and possibly the odd rabbit thing here and there to continue levelling up. I needed the strength and power. Next I would try and find more of the bandits while out and about, or even their base if I could find it. They probably don''t live too far away as they need to walk everywhere so they are somewhere closeby which was something I wasn''t sure was a good thing. "Alright, that''s my current game plan settled, how much mana do I have now? Oh I''m almost fully regenerated. Sweet. Hot damn I also gained a level?! Wait...does that mean you get Exp from killing people?" I didn''t know how to feel about the last fact I just found out but I wasn''t complaining. I was now level 4 and my mana had increased to 250 and my health was now 1200. The more mana the more ranged attacks so I was glad and more hp meant I was less likely to die so I wasn''t going to complain. "Alright, lets get this show on the road and start hunting some more skeletons and exp- I mean bandits. Right, bandits not Exp." I shook my head and reminded myself once again to not become a crazy killing lunatic as much as it paid in Exp I had my own standards to abide by, as small as they might be. With renewed vigor I went outside and began hunting for more skeletons and strained my senses to catch a whiff of some bandits.I was calling those bastards bandits as that''s what they were essentially. They killed, looted and pillaged whoever they wanted and didn''t care about the consequences so Bandits it was. Made it easier on my mind that way as well if I thought of them as criminals and not people. Leaving my internal dilemma alone , I went out and continued searching buildings, fighting the odd skeleton here and there but not finding much in terms of loot. I had only gotten some Drachma and a couple bone daggers from the remains of the skeletons. One of them was using his own rib as a god damn weapon!You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. "How are you just going to rip out your ribs and use them as weapons?! That sure scared the hell out of me but for real tho! That''s not normal, I swear!" I was grumbling about my latest encounter as I was walking through a small clearing when I saw a Horned rabbit. Urgh, not those again. "Alright you shit faced horn demon. I''m going to just walk around and you better not come near me or so help me I''m-" The little shit just charged straight at me after making some weird noises and scratching the ground with its horn. I saw several other horned rabbits coming out of a hole near a wall. I hopped backwards and to the left to avoid the charging rabbit and made a mana ball and then sent it flying at the throng of rabbits. It slammed through one of them and blew up after hitting the ground, effectively killing 6 rabbits with 1 hit. "Booya! Sweet Sweet Exp!" I saw that the horned rabbit charging me was now injured by the blast but still trying to charge me, although it was far slower now and had several burn wounds. I also saw more horned rabbits pouring out of the hole I assumed was their den. "Just how many are there in that damn hole?! Is there some sort of rabbit complex underneath the ground with hundreds of you freaks?! Just die!" I fired another mana ball and it also blew up successfully amidst the throng of horned rabbits, killing several more but I then noticed the initial rabbit getting too close for comfort so I turned my attention to it and fired a mana ball at it. To my surprise the thing dodged the mana ball and kept running at me. I had to dodge again but it managed to nick my leg as it passed by but it only scratched my armour. I kicked at it and stepped back a bit, rethinking my plan. "Should I leave or should I continue to farm the rabbits for Exp? They give a lot more Exp than the skeletons but I don''t fancy the idea of becoming a walking pin cushion." I fired a third mana ball and killed a few more horned rabbits but when I saw their numbers only increasing I decided to book it but made sure to remember where this den was for future use. I ran forward and grabbed as many dead horned rabbits as possible and started chucking them into my inventory. I had tossed over 40 of them into my inventory while firing 2 more mana balls to cover me before deciding I had had enough and started running. I sprinted out of there an kept running, looking back to see a wave of fluffy death chasing me. "Why is there so many of you?! You breed like rabbits!....... wait..they are rabbits...Screw you anyways! Why are there so many of you?!" I rounded a corner and was deciding on whether I should use my rift skill or not. I had fired 2 more mana balls, killing over a dozen more rabbits and increasing in level once again, becoming level 5. I was excited but squashed that down for the moment and kept thinking. I was about to make the rift when I heard voices. They sounded familiar too. I rounded a corner and saw that there was several of the bandits I had met the first time, milling about what looked like several large houses they turned into a fortress of sorts, with shoddily built stone and wood walls surrounding the fort. The guards on duty were chatting but soon noticed me and screamed out, alerting everyone else to my presence. "It''s the bastard we were looking for! He''s charging straight at the base! Wait...what''s that behind him?" Another guard nearby squinted and looked behind me to see what it was before he spoke up, saying "Isn''t that a fluffy blob chasing after him? The hell is it? Some new monster? Wait, those are horns. Oh shit." He looked panicked and screamed as loud as he could. "The bastard brought an army of HORNED RABBITS! I REPEAT! HORNED RABBIT ARMY INCOMING!!" The genuine terror in his voice from the wall of death bunnies was so dumb it made me bust a gut laughing even while I was sprinting. I decided now was a good time as any to dip, so I made the rift and turned to their leader who was now on the wall looking at me. I said "Enjoy the fluff. It''s a house warming present for moving into the neighborhood." With a smirk on my face I dashed through the rift, it closing behind me as I heard someone screaming something. I had made a note of where their base was located and decided to change my gameplan. It was time to introduce operation fluffy doom.