《Damian Dawn in another World》 Chapter 1 Dammit, I thought. I was unusually late for work today. For whatever reason, my alarm clock seemed to have malfunctioned and got stuck at 3:14 am. So lo and behold, at 5 am when it was supposed to ring, it didn¡¯t. So now here I am, rushing to get ready to work despite knowing that being as late as I was at 9 am already, yesterday was probably my last day working at my construction Job. Putting on my boots and grabbing my car keys and my company issued hard hat, I ran out the door. It took me a few seconds to comprehend what was going on. I had rushed out the door slamming it behind me and to my bewilderment, ran right into a densely packed forest. In my shock, I just stood there trying to comprehend what was going on. Without thinking much, still in shock, I turn around to go back inside. But as a growing part of my mind suspected, no matter which way I turned, all I saw was the forest. So for the moment, I just stood there, letting the shock wear off and allowing the gears in my mind to slowly sputter back to life. The first thing I did was pinch myself. Nope. Wasn¡¯t a dream. I probably gave myself a welt for my troubles, but on the bright side, that kinda helped clear my mind a bit. Rubbing my arm , I continued to focus on affirming the reality I suddenly found myself in. So I went up to the nearest tree and put my hand on its rough bark, not sure what to expect. Would It fade away like a hallucination? Or would I suddenly be awoken by my alarm, with enough time to spare for a decent breakfast? Putting my hand against it, I found that it was cool to the touch and very much real. Keeping my hand on the tree, mostly so I don¡¯t suddenly fall over from a sudden bout of dizziness, I took a moment to take in my surroundings. The sound of leaves rustling from a pleasant breeze, the chirping of birds in the distance, the faint light glowing through the thick canopy above. Those things not only felt real, but also gave a welcomed feeling of familiarity. In contrast, the impossibly tall, winding and intertwined trees that I couldn¡¯t even see much beyond a few meters up through, the strangeness of the birds sounds and what seemed like a radius of absolute silence that was surrounding me, were starting to fill me with dread. The mix of the familiar, the unfamiliar and the completely sudden and unexpected was keeping me rooted on the spot in a daze. I stood there, staring blankly up into the trees, fascinated by how I swear that I could see the trees intertwining and tangling into each other far up through the leafy umbrella above. ¡°RAWR¡± The sudden sound, seemingly coming from just around the corner, made my body react violently with a huge shot of adrenaline. On top of my uncontrollably rising dread of my situation, I reacted explosively, bolting in the opposite direction of where I thought the vicious, distorted and completely unfamiliar sound came from. The shock and sudden movement shot questions into my head, each one like a pellet of buckshot. But they could be mostly summed up to: What the hell is going on? Where the fuck am I? With the adrenaline pumping through me, my mind was desperately making up for lost time as I quickly accepted that I sure as hell wasn¡¯t at home anymore. As I was sprinting as fast as I could, without direction, I started to notice some odd things that were feeding an unbidden thought growing in my mind that the rational part of my was fiercely trying to ignore. Why in the world was the forest floor grassy? Where was all the dead underbrush? The forest ground looked almost pristine, grassy and well kept, but everything I knew about plants was telling me that with all the trees taking nutrients from the ground and blocking the sun, grass can¡¯t grow in a forest like this. At least not as perfect as the way this grass looked. The birds had went quite the moment that thing made its snarling roar, leaving the forest eerily silent. ¡°Crash!¡± Being as distracted as I was, I overlooked a root sticking out from the ground, slightly hidden in the grass as it was, causing me to trip and tumble forward and slamming right into the base of a gigantic tree. Don¡¯t ask me how I could have missed the tree, from my perspective, it just popped into being the moment I tripped. I frantically try to get up to continue my escape, but as soon as I stand up, I feel as if my brain is getting squeezed as the blood flows out of my head. I take a shaky step forward before darkness creeps into my vision and I black out. I wake with a start, laying face down in the grass, feeling oddly comfortable and refreshed. I slowly move myself into a sitting position as I look around trying to spot if anything had chased me or if there was any danger in general. I don¡¯t find anything there and everything seems just the way it was when I first got to this strange place. The birds were making their weird chirping noises and even the sun hasn¡¯t seemed to have moved, although it was impossible to really tell, because I couldn¡¯t see the sky. I was just making an assumption based on the amount of light that was filtering through. But now that I think about it, it was oddly bright here anyway, if you consider how dense and tall the trees were here.Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. Noticing this strangeness, I lean back onto the tree to take a moment to think about about what was happening. Was I still asleep? No, the pain from all the bruising I got from tripping was telling me that this wasn¡¯t a dream of any kind I¡¯ve ever heard of. Then what? An alternate reality? That can¡¯t be. That just wouldn¡¯t make sense. Why me? How? But what else could it be? Some newly developed futuristic virtual reality? But that idea also doesn¡¯t make sense. No matter how I twist things, nothing is really making sense anyway though. So I take a deep breath, hold it for a moment, then exhale while letting those questions go, deciding to move on to other matters. This place was very foreign to me. And with how I could still feel pain, and now that things have calmed down, I can even feel the discomfort from my missed breakfast start to set in. And I was thirsty. My mouth was dry, whether from the running or adrenaline or whatever, I was parched. So I turned my mind to those problems, much easier to solve as they were. At least comparatively. I was far from a survival expert. Taking a moment, I thought over how I want to prioritize the three basic needs and what was most important for my situation at the moment. I was in a possible hostile environment, with no knowledge of the wildlife or even the topography. For all I knew, everything alive wanted to eat me, and there won¡¯t be water within the next 100 miles. Or worse, there¡¯s water nearby and everything and anything on the food chain hangs out around that water source waiting for its next meal. I take a shaky breath in an attempt to calm myself down a little. I knew I was being slightly dramatic, but my point still stands. Wandering around would be dangerous in many ways, even if the worst that happens to me, is that I just wander in circles around this seemingly endless forest. Everything looked the same from where I was standing after all. For a moment as my gaze wander, my sight falls on the huge tree I literally ran into. I stare at it blankly for a few moments, before a light goes on in my head and I have to give a face-palm at my sheer stupidity. It seems like my brain still isn¡¯t running at full capacity yet. I had smacked myself into the answer to two of my problems not too long ago. Looking at the tree reminded me strongly of the giant trees in California that I had hear about before. It was more than thick enough for a bus to pass through if you carved a hole through it, maybe even a bus and a small car could pass through, side by side. But other than being so extremely large, it didn¡¯t look like a redwood tree. I don¡¯t really know anything about plants, tree or wildlife in general, the city boy I am, but it twisted and turned, knotted and branched out numerous time along its trunk, far different from what I remember redwood trees are supposed to look like. Good for me though, that¡¯ll make it that much easier to climb. If I climb far up enough, I should be able to scout my surroundings for what I need, without the risks of getting lost more than I was, or running into something dangerous. I slowly stand up, shaky from the fear of my situation and the unknown, and start to make my way around the tree to find a good place to start climbing. I pause, seeing my yellow construction hat laying near where I had tripped and stare at it for a moment feeling incredulous at the obvious fact that I had actually held onto it during my mad rush from earlier. Shrugging off my disbelief, I quickly pick it up and briefly inspect it. Seeing that it was not only fully intact, but the light attached to it was still on it and ¡­ yup, the light still works after I play with the switch a little. Glad to have both a little protection, and even a light for when,¡­ if it got dark, I decided I might forgive my company for working me and my colleagues late into the night. Or not. With a bitter smile at the thought of my job, old job I correct myself, I put the hat on and continue to make my way around the tree. A few moment later, and maybe only a third of the way around the tree, I stop to stare at what appears to be an oddly unnatural cave nestled in between the roots of the tree at its base. It looked almost like the maw of the tree, if you could ignore the skewed proportions. Rock outlined the entrance, in a way that seem both natural and completely unnatural, with how it seemed like the rocks were lifting up on the tree to open itself instead of the tree growing on it. As ominous as it looked, I was excited about a potential place to hide from the elements, albeit wary of anything that might have had the same thought before me. I make my way closer, closing in from the side so that if anything was inside, I could hopefully spot it before it notices me. Peeking around the edge of the entrance, I peer into the cavern, only to see about ten feet into it before it curves off to the side in what seems like a spiraling descent downward. I pause to think about it, but in the end decide I need to at least check if I could use this cavern or if it¡¯s something dangerous that needs to be avoided. With a deep breath I creep into the depths, a feeling of unease sets in. A part of me notices that the cave almost seems to be breathing me in as air suddenly gushes in and without warning, I seem to slip out on something, or maybe I was pulled into something as I slide into a small pathway on the side of the cavern that flushes me into a slippery fall into the darkness with water rushing out from the walls. My only thought as I plunged downward was, At least I found water.. Chapter 2 Honestly, sliding down the slick tunnel at high speeds reminded my of being on a water slide. That might be why I wasn¡¯t panicking. Or I was just in shock. The feeling I had when I entered the cave, definitely felt like I was being pulled in by some force, but that wasn¡¯t as scary as the time that has passed since I started sliding.Enough time to stop flailing around, and start comparing the tunnel with a water slide at least. At least the walls and floor were smooth. Even if it meant I couldn¡¯t stop myself or climb back up this way later, at least I wasn¡¯t going to be shredded to bits by sharp rocks. Feeling a sudden dip in my stomach, I find myself plunged into a free fall. For a short moment it looks like I¡¯m floating in space, stars glittering all around me, twinkling in the darkness. Then I find myself piercing deep into water and the stars that were below me disappear the instant my head goes under. Ah.. It was a reflection. Pushing that thought aside, I immediately and frantically swim towards the now blurry dots of light above me, desperately reaching upwards for air. A few moments pass, as my lungs start to convulse in their need for air, before I practically burst through the surface of the water. Gasping for breath, I look around at the spots of light glinting in the distance. I notice a dense cluster of the lights out in the distance to my right at just above water level. I don¡¯t hesitate to start swimming in that direction. I know I¡¯m underground and that those lights aren¡¯t stars, so I¡¯m hoping whatever they are, that they are attached to the walls of the cavern. Hopefully that cluster of lights indicate land to walk on or possibly even a passage out of here. After a few moments of swimming, a feeling of terror starts to slowly rise within me. The water is pitch black and it must be incredibly deep, considering that I didn¡¯t even touch the bottom of it when I fell into the lake. And everything in the lake was perfectly calm, the entire cavern was absolutely quite. Not being able to see into the dark depths of the water, and the fact that I couldn¡¯t hear or see the water coming out of the hole I fell through¡­ The implications along with my natural instincts were giving me tunnel vision as I swam with increasing urgency to my destination. After what seemed like hours, but in reality was just a few minutes, I reached the shore of the laked, scrambling out of it as fast as I could before collapsing on a very rocky ground. Not wanting to even look at the terrifying but apparently harmless water, I stare blankly at the glowing cavern entrance a few feet away from me. Embedded in the walls were many golf ball sized, glowing crystals. It was those that were giving the illusion of stars in the distance. But oddly enough, despite how bright they seemed to be, they only illuminated a few feet around each of them. I take some time to calm down and catch my breath, hoping I wasn¡¯t already hyperventilating, before I force my weary body back up and stumble toward the light. I go to the wall and gingerly touch one of the light stones. It was cool to the touch and didn¡¯t hurt me as I touched it, which was a plus, so I don¡¯t hesitate to grip at its uneven surface and start tugging at it. I struggle for a moment, noticing that the crystal did shift a little as I clawed at it. But with an idea, I pause to bend over and grab a fist sized rock with a pointed end on one side, and use the pointed end to ¡®gently¡¯ bang at the wall around the crystal. With an imaginary ¡®pop!¡¯ the crystal tumbled out of the wall and into my eager hand as I fumble to catch it. Now I don¡¯t really want to get close to the water in part due to my hyper active imagination, but this might be the solution to at least one of my problems. So after I gather another couple of the gem, I hold one out in front of me and make my way back to the waters edge. Kneeling down I drop one stone into the water, and to my relief, I see that the water is actually crystal clear. So I cup my hands together, and lift some water up to drink. My God! This was the best tasting water I¡¯ve ever had. I know I must have swallowed some after I fell, but I was a little too busy to notice how good it tastes. Now a part of me was still afraid of the water being contaminated in some way, but honestly, I couldn¡¯t afford to be picky right now. Maybe in the future I¡¯ll have the tools to cook it or something, but right now, I¡¯ll have to just cross my fingers and hope it doesn¡¯t kill me. Oddly enough, accomplishing one of my objectives made me feel slightly happy. So with a slight spring in my step, I make my way into the tunnel, shoving most of the crystals into my pocket but keeping one out in case I find myself somewhere dark again. Of course I push away rather forcefully the thoughts of how impractical it¡¯ll be to get back down here to get water, or even if there is a way back up at all.The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Walking down the tunnel, I notice a few holes higher up on the walls, and that the crystals do seem to be growing more sparse the deeper I go. I don¡¯t think I can reach the holes, much less fit into them, so I discard the idea that one of them might lead out. Especially since the thought of being in such a cramped space crawling and climbing for god knows how long. So what feels like an hour, I notice that the cave has been ever so slightly curving to the right and slowly inclining upwards. So with a grin on my face, I start to jog a little hoping to get out of here even just a little faster. I don¡¯t like the feeling of being trapped down here. Of course right after I start jogging, I run right into a fork on the path. One way seems to follow the same direction as the path I¡¯ve been on, but the other turns sharply right and has a very steep incline. So what now? I ask myself. After hesitating for a moment, I make my way to the right and nearly have to climb to walk up the incline. Five minutes or so in, the pathway abruptly evens out and opens up into a small cavern. I can¡¯t really see how high or wide it is, but I do see a large glowing crystal protruding from the opposite wall about 15 feet or so away. The crystals are huge, measuring at what I estimate at two to three feet in length and as thick as my arm, all protruding from a clustered base. They were also glowing a soft, shimmering purple, giving off an almost hypnotic effect. Now I know I should just turn around and leave, this wasn¡¯t the exit and and something deep in my mind was literally screaming at me that this was a trap, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn¡¯t tear my eyes off the crystal cluster. Oddly enough, my first reaction wasn¡¯t fear, but a building irritation at this whole shit show that I¡¯ve been through. Do I really need to recount everything thats happened? Its just been one thing after another, no pause or break to catch my breath and really think about things and what seems like constant danger, but not really. I¡¯ve been running around like a headless chicken, but I honestly haven¡¯t seen anything to really be afraid of. Now I¡¯ve seen a lot of weird shit, yes but nothing that really was a threat. Actually, I haven¡¯t even seen anything alive except plants. I¡¯ve heard birds and that roaring thing, but I haven¡¯t seen anything yet. And now I¡¯m standing here, completely cumpulsed to stare at a freaking glowing ROCK! So with my head pounding with growing and irrational anger, I stomped over to the damn thing that had me in its clutches, intent on venting myself on it until it let me be on my way. I barely make it half way across the room, when I suddenly hear a soft scuttling sound from behind me. With a spike of adrenaline and a healthy dose of fear, I tear my eyes away from the crystal, practically imitating a high speed drill to turn around and look for the source of the noise. Not seeing anything in the darkness, freeze for a moment to listen. Silence. Then I hear it again, a soft scuttling noise from just beyond where I can see with my current light source. So I force my stiffened arm to move, reaching into my pocket and grabbing a few more glow stones. Pulling them out, I scatter them across the room towards where I came from, only to freeze up again before screaming like a little girl at what I saw. In front of me stood two huge fucking spiders. I absolutely hate insects, but I¡¯m not exaggerating when I say they were the size of a freaking dog!! I don¡¯t fucking care that is was ¡°only¡± the size of a medium sized dog, it was still absolutely horrifying. Did I mention that I hate bug? Especially spiders? Of course, the moment I scream, those things start scuttling towards me. With a high pitch whimper, I backpedal as fast as I can before stumbling over my own feet and falling backward. I scramble backward as fast as I can reaching around me for a rock or at least something I could use to keep those things away from me. Skittering towards me and making very disturbing clicking sounds, they get within a few feet of me before one of them jumps right at my face. Again, screaming like a little girl, I reach behind me and grab something. Not having much time to look at what I had grabbed at, I pulled at it and with a crunch, it breaks free from wherever it was before. With incredible luck, I swing something purple across, right onto the head of the that had jumped on me. At this point though the second one had already jumped too and landed on my stomach. After that everything was a blur of me freaking out with limbs flailing everywhere before my vision goes dark again. What seems like only a few moments, I come to my senses only to find myself in all kinds of pain. My whole body hurts and I can see what seems like blood all over me. Before I can even process what is going on, I suddenly have that feeling of ¡®eureka!¡¯ like when you figure something out that has kept your mind busy for a long time, or when you remember something you thought you had forgotten. Along with the feeling, a blue box appeared right in the middle of my vision.
Level Up!
I just stare at it for a moment, then pass out again. Chapter 3 My memories of what happened after that were vague. I remember the pain. The slick feeling of fluids and goo against my hyper sensitive skin. I remember waking a few times, only to throw up all over myself before blacking out again. I remember the scorching heat burning away at my arms and legs and how that heat had seeped up to my head. I can recall the shadows reaching out to me, intent on devouring me, only to disappear right before they touched me. I dreamed of things. Playing with friends as a kid. My parent giving me my first console on Christmas. I dreamt of video games, colored in blue. And then I sat up, gasping for breath and heart pounding in my chest. Bewildered, I thought for a short moment that everything had been a dream. But the stench of decay, the sour smell of old vomit and the coppery smell of blood, the gritty and rough ground along with a disgusting feeling of stickiness covering me from head to toe, quickly destroyed that small surge of hope. Peering ahead, I see two shadowy lumps at my feet, the fuzzy bodies slightly illuminated by a soft blue glow emanating from behind me. Suddenly the memories of what happened after the spider attack rushed into my mind, leaving me desperately but gingerly feeling around my body. But I didn¡¯t find anything. Nothing. But I knew I had been bitten. I remember the pain. But there was nothing. Nothing except thumb sized holes in my clothes. For a moment, I sit there absentmindedly fingering the holes in my pant leg before I do what I always do when I can¡¯t figure something out. I move on to the next thing. Or in this case, the next question. I shuffle around without getting up to inspect the formerly purple crystals. For whatever reason, the crystals were glowing blue. And much brighter than before too. Not to mention that they didn¡¯t seem to have that hypnotizing effect anymore either. On the other hand (literally), the chunk of crystal that I had ripped out for self defense purposes earlier had turned black. Well as far as I could tell in this still mostly dark cave, it was black. And oddly enough it was still glowing. Kinda. It was really weird, and ¡®glowing¡¯ might be the wrong word. When I put the crystal in my shadow cast from the soft glow of the other crystals, it stood out. The darkness from the my crystal seemed to be different from the normal darkness of the cave. Instead of a lack of light that is normal shadows, the crystal¡¯s darkness seemed to have substance and stood out even when placed somewhere without light shining on it. Of course at this point, I just took it as par for the course. I did bang the crystal on the ground to test its durability. And yes, for a moment I did feel like a caveman, but after using it to fend off the eight legged terrors from earlier, I was hoping to continue to use it as a weapon. To my delight, it was very sturdy. And surprisingly light for a three foot long piece of rock. Now that I¡¯ve gone through most of the questions, even though they remain unanswered, I lean against the wall next to the crystals and think back to when I started hallucinating right after the ¡®Attack of the Giant Spiders¡¯ episode. And just as I think of the notification, and it was certainly a game notification, it pops right back into existence. Followed be a whole row of notification.
Level Up!
%ERROR%
Unregestired Entity
%SCANNING% %COMPILING INFORMATION% %LOADING DATA%
Welcome to Body and Soul Core Alteration System Interface
Defeated Immature Stalker Spiders x2 Core Points gained! +12 CP
Level Up!
Minor Venom Immunity Gained!
Status
Name Damian Dawn Age 26
Level 1
Strength 8 Soul 1
Control 4 Spirit 1
Constitution 3 Vitality 2
Intelligence 4 Empathy 1
Memory 5 Willpower 2
Perception 3 Luck 6
Free Attribute Points 5
Locked
Titles
None
Skills
None
Abilities
Foreign Entity Lv.X
Minor Venom Immunity Lv. 1
Maybe it wasn¡¯t a hallucination? I stare at the screens, trying to glean as much information from them as I could. I might be slow on the uptake, but I wasn¡¯t stupid, and I knew that I wasn¡¯t in the same realty anymore. So any piece of info could be vital for my survival. For example, those bastards I had killed earlier, were immature. As in young. I was nearly killed by fucking Baby spiders. The thought that there were large versions of those things did more than just gave me the chills. I was absolutely horrified at this tidbit of information. On the bright side, at least I don¡¯t need to worry about their fucking Poison!! Not like they even really need it to finish me off.Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. I take a deep breath to calm myself down, before looking over the rest of my status. From what I can see, it seems to be a unique mix of video game elements and some dungeon and dragons stuff. I never really got into those kinds of table top games, but there was a short period of my life when I looked into it a bit. As I recall, they were know to have all kinds of attributes, much more than any video game would normally have. The Physical stats seem to be fairly obvious at first glance, but I¡¯m not entirely sure what ¡®constitution¡¯ would mean. The other column however, gives me pause. Metaphysical? Looking at the attributes under it, I assume that means that there might be stuff like magic here. If glowing rocks and giant spiders weren¡¯t obvious signs enough. But figuring out what the stats would do is much harder than in the physical column. Whats the difference between soul and spirit? Why is Empathy a stat and why is Vitality in the metaphysical section? Doesn¡¯t Vitality effect Health? Does that mean that life force is something different than your physical condition? That would help explain constitution a bit, and that also means that Vitality is something else here that might not effect your health. At least not directly. Most of my status screen was self explanatory, but in a way that left me asking how it could effect me in reality. I understood the word like ¡®skill¡¯ or ¡®ability¡¯, but that didn¡¯t explain what they did in context with this world. How would ¡®Titles¡¯ be relevant in real life? I know what all these things would do in video games, but I can¡¯t wrap my head around how that would translate in this new reality. With a sigh, I once again accept that there¡¯s one more thing that I couldn¡¯t find answers for. But one thing that really caught my interest, was the free attribute points. I was making an assumption that by adding those point in strength for example, I would get stronger. With my current situation, being able to quickly get stronger was a godsend. But thinking back on how I ¡®fought¡¯ those spiders, I honestly didn¡¯t think that me being stronger would really make a difference if all I did was freak out every time I encountered something dangerous. That said, I didn¡¯t really understand how much a point was ¡®worth¡¯. What was a lot and what wasn¡¯t. I seemed to have a decent amount of strength, but if I compared myself to others, I wasn¡¯t really that strong. I mean, I was better than the average person, due to working in construction, but it wasn¡¯t as if I worked out or anything. And my intelligence was only half my strength. Did that mean I was a muscle head without muscles? I was pretty sure I wasn¡¯t an idiot though¡­ So if a made the assumption that I wasn¡¯t an idiot, then that would mean that a point in strength didn¡¯t have the same value as a point in intelligence. At the same time, that meant that the quantity of the attribute points in each attribute, had a different meaning in their respective attributes. Now my head was spinning a little. Things got complicated real fast there, and at this point there was no way that I would be able to deduce the specifics of the attributes. Maybe I really was an idiot? I guess I had to give myself some slack, after all, I had no way to compare the attributes. How would a person measure how intelligent they are? Then compare it after spending a point in Intelligence. And then do the same with the rest of the attributes. After that, somehow assign a ¡®worth¡¯ to everything? Putting that aside, of all the attributes, the ¡®Metaphysical¡¯ ones were the most interesting. What if I want gambling after increasing my luck? And what if one of the attributes let me use magic? I was oddly excited to figure it out. But what I had decided on, was investing at least a few points in ¡®Willpower¡¯. Hopefully that would let stay calmer in a situation like earlier. That and the Physical attribute ¡®Control¡¯ were the two I was hoping would be most useful. If I consider the ¡®context¡¯ of ¡®Control¡¯ being in the physical column, then that should mean that Control should be similar to Dexterity. Since it wasn¡¯t hard to do damage to the spiders, then hopefully having more control over my body and the ability to not panic as soon as I see them, I would be much better equipped to fight them. So, now that I¡¯ve decided which attributes I wanted to raise, I decided to spend four points, two on each and save one for if I realize that I¡¯m lacking in some aspect in order to survive. But how do I assign the points? As soon as I had decided to put those point in those attributes, another notification popped up.
+2 Control +2 Willpower Confirm Yes/No
With that, I felt that to use the system, all I had to do was ¡®Decide¡¯. That feeling of making a decision seems to be what triggers the interaction with the status screen. To confirm that theory, I ¡®decided¡¯ on ¡®Yes¡¯. Instantly that screen went away and my status screen came back. And it seemed to have worked, my attributes had gone up. But then I got another notification.
Commencing Upgrade
I felt a weird tightening of my muscles and an odd tingling in throughout my body. At the same time, I felt an invisible ¡®weight¡¯ slowly start to lift off my heart. And I don¡¯t mean my physical heart, but more the place in my chest that feels things. After a few moments, I wouldn¡¯t say that the sensations disappeared, rather it was more like I just got used to it really fast, to the point that I almost didn¡¯t notice it anymore unless I concentrated on the feeling. In order to calm my racing heart, I concentrate on controlling my breathing. I wasn¡¯t sure why this made me feel so excited, especially since it seems to have been a result of me almost dying, but a part of me wanted more. That said, that part of me was really small and I had no intention of risking my life for what could be summed up to a tingling sensation. The only thing of any real importance left on my status, was the ability ''Foreign Entity''. Looking at that, i could only assume it was related to the error messages from earlier. I had no idea why me being from another world counted as an ''Ability'' though. And concentrating on it didn''t suddenly make the screen change to give me a convenient explanation either. So i decided to just leave that be too, and move on. At this point, I¡¯ve run out of reasons to delay myself. I wasn¡¯t wounded and there wasn¡¯t any more information I could glean just by sitting here. Not to mention that I was not only thirsty again, but also really hungry. So summoning my courage, a stand up and make my way out of the cave and into the tunnels, black crystal in one hand, and a stone that had once been glowing in the other. Determined to make it out of here alive, I head back downwards, towards the starry lake. Chapter 4 After my trip down to the lake and back, I had stocked up on more light crystals and filled myself up on the delicious lake water. As I continued up what I have dubbed the ¡®Main Path¡¯, I came across many more ¡®offshoot¡¯ pathways. They all either went sharply upward, or the opposite, sharply downward, but they all seemed to be clearly diverging from the path I was on. My path kept the same curve towards the right and the same upward incline. I was hoping that this was the pathway that connects to the opening at the base of the tree. Thankfully, not only was I right about the pathway being the same, but the few hours it took to reach the entrance were uneventful. Standing in the entrance of the cave, the previous feeling of it being alive and wanting to devour me, was all but gone, like it was all my imagination from the very beginning. Of course I wasn¡¯t buying it. My very existence in this world was beyond natural, much less everything that I¡¯ve seen or experienced here so far. Just because it seemed normal now, doesn¡¯t mean I was imagining things earlier. That said, if the cave had giant spiders, who knows what lived in the forest just out of sight. So now I¡¯m torn. The cave with spiders and who knows what else, or the forest with simply who knows. Honestly, the choice wasn¡¯t that hard. I really hate spiders. But I¡¯ll need to go back down there for water at some point, regardless of dangers. Now that I think of it, I¡¯m getting ahead of myself. What I wanted to do before I got sidetracked by the evil cave, was climb the tree to at least try to scout the area. Thinking back, the little way I walked around the massive tree, there wasn¡¯t ant spot that was particularly easy to climb. Either way, due to the rough and twisted nature of the tree, it should be relatively easy to climb. And at maybe 15 feet high, the trunk became clustered with branches. But no matter how easy it looked, it was a more than large enough drop to injure myself should I slip and fall before reaching the first few branches. It didn¡¯t help that I haven¡¯t climbed a tree in at least over ten years, but with how thick those branches are, twice as thick as my shoulders are broad, and how densely packed they are, I¡¯m at least a little confidant in catching myself on one of those if I slip out above the lowest hanging ones. What gave my a little confidence though, was that I had raised the ¡®Control¡¯ stat. I was still a bit dubious whether or not it had actually changed my body in any way, but I was putting faith in both the weirdness of this world, and my understanding of what ¡®Control¡¯ meant in the first place. So with shaky confidence, I make my to the tree and tentatively start climbing. Oddly enough, it wasn¡¯t even that hard. In what felt like no time at all, I made it up to the lowest branch on my side of the tree. From there I took a small break, sitting on the branch and leaning back against the trunk. It wasn¡¯t that I was really tired, but I can¡¯t see the top of any tree, even from here. So I wanted to conserve my energy a bit. From my vantage point, everything was still just a wall of green. Once my heart rate went back down, I set back out to conquer the tree. Considering its size, I might as well call it Yggdrasil. With that kind of nonsense in my head to keep my mind busy, I kept climbing the tree, taking breaks every now and then to keep myself from overdoing it and falling. I was glad at least that now that there were branches everywhere, it was a lot easier to climb the tree. I want to say it was about 4 or 5 hours before, to both my amazement and relief, I saw patches of blue peeking through the leaves. It seemed like that I my tree to the point where I was already beyond the tops of the rest of the forest. Just then I realized I had a small problem. Do I keep climbing upward, or do I climb along a branch until I could see past all the branches and leaves. After considering for a moment, I think it might be best to go all the way to the top, so I could get a full 360 degree view. It would really suck if I went along a branch now, only to not see anything on this side. It would also be really frustrating if I wasn¡¯t high enough to see very far.This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. But still, it took forever to climb this high, and even if its only because of the immense number of branches, I still couldn¡¯t even begin to see the top of my tree. So I hesitate for a moment, then I harden my resolve and keep going. It doesn¡¯t even take an hour before I start to notice that not only are the branches getting less dense, but they are also starting to look thinner. In my excitement, my breaks become less frequent and shorter as I start to rush my way up. Of course after another hour of that, I¡¯m drenched in sweat and my arms are starting to shake. In rapid succession, I notice the shaking, I choose to ignore it, and right after that, I slip out. With a huge shot of adrenaline, I flail about before I catch a branch moments later. So for a moment I just hang there shivering, as I start to register pain in my arms from what I assume is a mixture of scrapes and bruises. I then slowly get on top of the branch and lean into the tree trunk. As I sit there, taking a break for the first time in awhile, I notice that I can see a lot more of the sky now. But I also realize that the sky has turned from a light blue to a much darker shade. Its getting darker. At least it wasn¡¯t cold. And there wasn¡¯t any wind either. As a matter of fact, I haven¡¯t noticed any wind at all yet. I was grateful that it seemed I wouldn¡¯t freeze overnight, although the fact that there was a night in this world gave me mixed feelings. I didn¡¯t want to think about nighttime predators. But now I probably needed to stay on this branch until daytime again. I just hoped it wasn¡¯t as ridiculous as a year long night or something along those lines. I was in a different world after all. Either way, it was probably a good time for me to get some rest. But now that I think about it, why aren¡¯t I hungry? Thinking back, after I drank water from the lake, I haven¡¯t felt hungry since. Magical water? I don¡¯t know, but the idea of being hungry doesn¡¯t appeal to me, so for now I¡¯ll just hope it is magical water until I figure out my food situation. Shifting around, I get as comfortable as I can without feeling like I was going to fall off. Feeling the exhaustion of the climb and the low of the adrenaline leaving my system creep up to me, I close my eyes and drift off into a light sleep, to tense from the height to sleep deeply. With a start, I wake up. Flailing my arms in panic, I nearly fall of from my perch. Once I get a firm hold on the branch to steady myself, I get another, but more pleasant shock. The world around me was glowing in a soft blue. It was a beautiful and breathtaking sight, so much so that it almost made everything that happened so for worth it. Looking closer, the glow was coming from the leaves and moss that grew on the bark of the tree. The sheer amount of both, set the world awash with the almost shimmering light. Just in that moment, a soft and warm breeze brushed across my face, followed by an almost quiet roar of rustling leaves. Not sure if I should consider the sound loud or not, but the noise was pleasant. For whatever reason, a feeling of peacefulness set in and for a few moments, I just sat there, loosing myself in the surreality and beauty of the world I have found myself in. And for a brief moment, I feel that it wouldn¡¯t be too bad to spend the rest of my life here, in the tranquility of this place. But an accidental glance at my pants set the decision in stone. No way am I going to stay anywhere near a nest of giant spiders. My mood ruined with that thought and nothing else to do, I stretch and work the kinks out of my joints, then continue climbing. Another slow hour of climbing later, I find myself at the top of the tree. The trunk just suddenly ends, branching out and creating a perfect place for the giant nest that was built into the crown of the tree. Of course, a whole day of climbing, just to serve myself on a silver platter to a what might as well be a dragon. That said, I didn¡¯t see any scales, just feathers the size of my arm. As if that made any difference. I just hope the bird prefers bugs of humans. Preferably spiders. Still, I don¡¯t have much of a choice. I could just climb around the tree just below the nest. In the last bit that I had climbed, the branches and leaves exponentially grew more sparse and right up here I still had a mostly clear view¡­ And my god, what a view. It¡¯s hard to give a description that would do it justice. An ocean, complete with waves as the breeze swept through. Even the sound of the leaves in the wind melted together to reproduce the sound of ocean waves. But instead of a deep solid blue, it was an ethereal blue, twinkling and shimmering with the movements of the leaves. I force myself to concentrate on the matter at hand. I need to know whats in the nest and whether there¡¯s something there. It¡¯s always better to know of possible dangers than to blindly ignore it and regret it later. So I slowly and as quietly as I possibly can, creep upward to the edge of the nest. I peek over it, heart throbbing in my chest. With the sparsity of the leaves and moss up here, the glow barely shines into the nest, leaving everything in shadows. With a sharp but small intake of breath that I can¡¯t hold back, my heart nearly jumps up to my throat. There was just enough light to see a large form roughly the size of a car, curled up and moving rhythmically in a way that I take as breathing. So yes, there was some giant bird in the giant nest. There was no way I was going to clamber around, and god forbid, in the nest, not at the risk of waking that thing. So after thinking a bit, the best solution I can come up with at the moment, Is to climb just far enough down to hopefully be safe, but still high enough to notice if the thing leaves. It¡¯s dangerous, but I want to wait until it¡¯s gone and use that opportunity to quickly climb into the nest and use that moment to do a quick survey of the area. I choose to believe that i won¡¯t have much time, so I need to prepare myself in any way I can. On the current branch I¡¯m standing on, I pull the moss off it, marking this branch as both the entrance and exit of my plan, keeping in mind that it was fairly easy to get up to the edge from here and that I don¡¯t even dare try to look for a better spot right now. I stuff the still glowing moss into my pockets, hoping that it¡¯ll still be glowing later for what I had in mind. With just that, my preparations were pretty much complete. Chapter 5 This time, I awake in a very calm way, slowly opening my eyes. I don¡¯t know if its because I didn¡¯t sleep as deeply, or if it¡¯s because of the morning light shining through the now only dimly glowing leaves. I take a deep breath of the now refreshingly cool air, and still wary of whats above me, slowly sit up. Sleeping in a tree like this, is really doing a number on my body. I¡¯m almost too afraid to stretch, worried that the popping of my joints would be loud enough to draw attention. But then I think, if it could hear that, it should¡¯ve heard me breathing while I was still up there. As the wind picks up right then, I risk it, cracking as many joints as I can to loosen my muscles. Suddenly a blast of wind rushed down from above and a powerful piercing cry echoed out followed by another, but more fierce blast of wind. I froze as fear clawed at me. I could hear the loud thumping of enormous wings quickly pick up speed, the wind growing fiercer, leaves flying around after being torn off the branches by the sheer pressure of the wind. With a short pause the length of single heartbeat, came another extremely powerful gust of downward wind and a piercing cry. Then the tree suddenly bent before violently shaking, causing me to finally move, clamping myself around the branch I was on. For a brief moment, a shadow falls over me, blotting out the sunlight before disappearing. The wind then died down and everything once again was calm. Well almost everything. I was absolutely terrified. The size and power of that thing, to create almost typhoon levels of wind and to then proceed to actually force this behemoth of a tree, was beyond my imagination. When I had looked into the nest last night, it hadn¡¯t seemed large enough to cause this kind of reaction from the surroundings, but it might simply be that physics were different in this world. Either way, that thing was a monster in its own right, not something I want to get the attention of. A part of me was getting tired of being afraid of everything and anything. As far as I could tell, I haven¡¯t been in this world for even two days and I can¡¯t even begin to count all the times that I¡¯ve found myself in a situation like this. Getting a little irritated at myself, I try to calm my shaking limbs. I don¡¯t know if I have much time, if that would be back soon or not. So I push myself to hurry, climbing up as fast as I can, like my life depended on it. After what felt like an eternity, I reach the top. I practically throw myself over the edge, tumbling into the nest. I jump to my feet and for a brief moment, I freeze. Sitting snugly in the middle of the nest, were three large eggs, about half as tall as I was. Well shit. I really don¡¯t have much time. I doubt that the mother would leave the eggs alone for long. I run around the edge of the tree, looking into the distance for anything other than the forest and, hopefully, signs of civilization. The nest was large enough that you could fit a house in it and it felt like it took me years just to get half way to the other side. It was then that I noticed two things at roughly the same time. The first thing was a discoloration in the distance and what looked like smoke rising over it. As I came to a full stop, excited about possibly finding civilization, I heard a familiar bird cry out in the distance. It felt like my heart stopped. I panicked. Not even thinking about what I was doing, I threw myself over the edge of the nest. I immediately regret it. Below me is at least 8 feet of empty space before the nearest branch. I barely have a moment to try and position myself to catch the branch. Unfortunately there wasn¡¯t much that I could do. In no time at all, I¡¯m passing by that first branch. I reach out and grasp the branch with my arms, but at the speed I was falling, all that managed to do was swing me in an almost upright position before ripping a layer of skin off my arms and fingers. Suddenly my foot hit a branch, and for a moment, I thought I had managed to land on my feet. But then I hear a sickening snap before my upper body continues going downward, flipping me upside down. For a moment, I look upward at my body before my gaze lands on my left foot. It was sticking out at an almost 90 degree angle to my leg. I feel dizzy at the sight and feel an urge to throw up. That doesn¡¯t last long though, in the next moment I feel my head hit something and pressure builds on my neck. I faintly hear another snap, but I¡¯m already rapidly losing consciousness. My last thought before everything went dark, was more of a feeling of gratitude that I at least didn¡¯t have time to feel the pain. *** I wake up feeling like I got completely shitfaced drunk before getting hit by a truck. My head was throbbing with what felt like the worst migraine of my life and my body was sore in a way that I just can¡¯t compare anything to. Everything felt like it was not only on fire, but also really tense and stiff. I wanted to just not move and hope the pain would go away, but is was getting hard to breath. It seems like I was folded over a branch like a dirty rag and my own weight was pressing my stomach into my chest, squeezing my lungs.This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. With a sound in-between a groan and a whimper, I open my eyes to barely a squint and start to move. I have to clench my jaw as pain flares through me, but I persist. Ever so slowly, I move my leg over the branch, maneuvering myself into a position that would let me sit up. I lean back against the tree and squeeze my eyes shut. I remember what happened and I¡¯m terrified at looking at the state of my body. But despite the amount of pain I¡¯m in, it doesn¡¯t feel as bad as that time. I had broke my arm while messing around on a bicycle. I slowly relax my eye-lids, letting more light seep through the thin layer of skin, trying to allow my eyes to adjust to the light again. I wait, laying there and slowly trying to relax myself without moving too much. I don¡¯t want to jostle my injuries. I doesn¡¯t take long until the throbbing in my head dies down a little and I gingerly open my eyes. With trepidation, I inspect myself. I really don¡¯t want to look at my foot, so I procrastinate by starting on my arms. What I find, slightly confuses me. I didn¡¯t seem to have broken anything in my arms, but they were covered in bruises, cuts and scrapes. What was odd, was that the cuts and scrapes looked like they were a few days old, despite what looked like mostly fresh blood around it. Almost like I was healing really fast. I move my arms around, then continue to check my body, gently rolling my shoulder blades, testing for broken ribs, and pulling my shirt up to see if I had any puncture wounds in my stomach. Other than bruises and half healed scrapes. Looking at myself, I somehow felt both numb and shocked at the same time. I couldn¡¯t resist any longer and glance down at my foot. My surprise grew at the sight of a fully functional looking leg. Just to make sure, I twitched my toes. It was painful, but no more than the rest of my body. Growing braver, I slowly moved my ankle in slow circles. Did I imagine it breaking? Hmm¡­ Something similar happened after I was attacked by the spiders. I thought that they had stabbed me with their fangs, but when I woke up, I wasn¡¯t wounded. Did I really have a similar hallucination in two different situations? Or did I somehow develop some kind of super-human regeneration? If I trusted my status screen, there was nothing indicating that that should be possible. I didn¡¯t have anything that would help me heal like that. Just to make sure, I willed my status to show back up.
Status
Name Damian Dawn Age 26
Level 1
Strength 8 Soul 1
Control 6 Spirit 1
Constitution 3 Vitality 2
Intelligence 4 Empathy 1
Memory 5 Willpower 4
Perception 3 Luck 6
Free Attribute Points 5
Locked
Titles
None
Skills
None
Abilities
Foreign Entity Lv. X
Minor Venom Immunity Lv. 1
Nothing there, just like I had thought. I didn¡¯t feel like I had changed when I got here, so my stats should be representing what I was before I got to this world, so I am pretty sure none of my stats were suddenly effecting my natural healing. So, maybe something else was causing it. But what? The forest? This tree? ¡­Or was it the water I drank? I can¡¯t be sure. I need to verify what was healing me and why. If I could figure it out, it would be a huge benefit to my survival. And in the back of my head, a pretty reckless plan was starting to form. But before that, I should get back down to the water. After seeing that¡­ bird?¡­ the giant owner to the over-sized nest, I not only intend to use my status to get stronger, but felt an incredibly strong need to grow stronger. I¡¯m afraid that if I go back up to reorient myself to find figure out which direction I had seen signs of civilization, that bird would kill me. And not because it thinks I¡¯m some kind of threat, but purely by accident. It was more than powerful enough to send me flying off the tree just by landing or taking off. I heave a sigh before I force my aching body to move. Even without feeling like hell, all this climbing was getting really tedious. But what other choice did I have? There¡¯s nothing I could do about everything here being so ridiculously over-sized. Giant birds, trees and spiders, oh my! But seriously, I haven¡¯t seen anything that I could even remotely consider normal-sized, much less small. I just hope the people here weren¡¯t up to scale. If there even were humans or humanoids at the very least in this world. On my way down, I didn¡¯t have much to do, other than think about my experiences in this world. And honestly, a part of me needed some kind of goal other than just surviving. I know I¡¯m getting ahead of myself, but with how bleak everything seems if I think too deeply about it, having some unrealistic daydreams might help keep me at least somewhat sane. I hope. I honestly didn¡¯t need much time to realize that I probably don¡¯t want to go back home. There wasn¡¯t much there for me, even compared to this world, where in the two or so days I¡¯ve been here, I¡¯ve nearly died more times than the days I¡¯ve been here. At least a part of me was excited about this whole situation. And everything I¡¯ve felt since coming here has made me feel more alive than I¡¯ve felt in like 20 years. Of course I¡¯m sure that at some point I¡¯ll get bored of the near death experiences. Either that or I¡¯ll die. I wonder if using the¡­ what was it called? Body and Soul something Interface? If that would let me surpass the natural limits of a human. Could I become as strong as a superhero? Superpowers would be awesome. But how fast would it get old if I¡¯m the only person in this world? Then again, what are the odds that I¡¯m the only person in the world? I honestly have no clue what to expect. Getting stronger, testing the limits of the Interface, becoming a superhuman and finding out if I¡¯m the only person in this strange world or not. That sounds like a good list of goals to keep me motivated. For now though, I¡¯ll start by climbing down this tree. God, it¡¯s so frustrating that I¡¯ll probably have to go up and down this tree at least a few more times before all is said and done.