The first thing I did before any true exploration was check the back of my knee. Sure enough, the tiny cut was still there. It didn’t hurt or bleed much unless I stretched the skin, and luckily there wasn’t any serious damage to the tendons. I really needed to figure out why the injury wasn’t healing like all the other injuries I’d taken.
I pursed my lips in annoyance and walked to the border of my first chunk to look at the new addition. A harsh line marked the boundary. On my side, a healthy forest sprouted from the earth with a dense covering of undergrowth obscuring the raw dirt. On the other side, however, there wasn’t a plant in sight. Packed earth made up the primary tile of the chunk, rising up steeply, with large areas where the earth had melted into a quagmire of sucking mud.
Dominating the hill at the center of the chunk was a rickety fortress composed of wooden pillars supporting various horizontal platforms. While some were supported by stable thick columns, most dangled and creaked in the gentle wind of the morning, held together by little more than frayed rope. The structure rose three floors high, with a maze of ladders and staircases providing passage between the floors. Beneath it on the ground stood an array of cages whose twisted wooden bars attached to the lowest floor to help support the rickety creation.
Three wolves, two large and one small, paced restlessly in the cages while a host of bipedal rats stalked the upper floors. The rat’s beady little eyes gleamed crimson over their hunched shoulders. Universally, they wore tattered rags, layered deep as if cold, with spears or swords in their main hand that they routinely banged against the railings. Huge needle-like incisors jutted out from their jaws as if the rat-human creatures had been hybridized with a venomous snake sometime in the past.
I stood observing for several minutes. The patrols were mostly random, with an increase in density on the higher floors. There were also three smaller, unarmed creatures trudging around in the mud at the edges of the chunk. Two more of the rat creatures sat morosely around a sputtering campfire on the muddy ground floor, presumably to watch the wolves. Speaking of, captivity hadn’t been kind to the family of three wolves. Their fur had gone mangy, with mud and nameless effluvia matting down their once gray fur. The two parents had barely enough room to pace in the tight enclosures while the pup was panting on its side as if sick, starving, or both.
I frowned, not sure what the system wanted from me here. Instead of making a firm decision, I pulled up my status and ran through the obvious changes in this iteration. My status hadn’t changed, but the chunk objectives list had been updated.
1. Hunt a Spined Silverback
2. Craft an Item_0x73636B
3. Craft an Item_0x737074
4. Charge a weapon with an Item_0x6D6F6E
More new items, and I can hunt the silverback now, I grinned to myself. Given the patterns I’d experienced before, it was almost certain that at least one of the crafting requirements was related to hunting the spined silverback. Possibly processing its hide. The other crafting requirement might be related, but it wasn't certain. What was certain, though, was the fourth objective. The format matched the agate requirement from a previous iteration which almost certainly meant that Item_0x6D6F6E was a new gemstone of sorts. Since I’d gotten an agate from copper, I should try to mine iron for the new stone.
So this chunk required leveling hunter, some mining, and more crafting requirements. It almost felt like the system had failed to set up crafting in the beginning properly and now was compensating for it something fierce. I wasn’t complaining. As long as there was a reasonable way to train the skill, I was all for it.
The confusing part was that it didn’t seem like any of the objectives actually required me to step into the new chunk. That wasn’t going to stop me from exploring, but it was confusing. I would need to regear first since the new chunk seemed almost solely combat-focused.
A few rats and some time at the mine saw me in full iron armor and rat leather armor. I kept mining, setting myself a soft goal of three hundred iron ore before I gave up and attempted other methods of acquiring the mysterious gemstone. While I did this, I tried to come up with names for the new species of rat to my east. The wolves were easy. They didn’t have horns, special claws, or laser eyes or anything, so I decided simple was best. Gray Wolves was both descriptive and a quality name for the small trapped pack.
The rats though were harder. I was tempted to do something like Ratkin, as that was descriptive enough, but the creatures were more than mere humanoid rats. Their elongated, snake-like teeth combined with their red eyes reminded me strangely of vampires and bloodsuckers in general.
I toyed with several names as I mined, increasing my mining level up to 42. Before I came to a decision, however, a pearl white gemstone spawned at my feet on the 114th iron ore. I crouched, careful not to aggravate my knee, and picked up the stone. Where the agate had been reddish brown, this stone was as white as the moon. Countless glittering sparkles filled the semi-translucent gemstone and gave the rock a three-dimensional depth that was utterly gorgeous.
“Moonstone,” I stated definitively as I cut the stone. To my surprise, attempting to charge my iron battleaxe with the gemstone failed with an error message.
I chuckled quietly, amused that the system had changed things up. I wondered if I would have preferred reading patch notes instead of discovering it organically.
If gemstones were out for now, my gear was as good as I could get it. To train hunter on Cobalt Admirals, I would need a significant amount of rat tails. I could camp the three level 1 rats at spawn, but I might as well try and battle one of the new creatures. I made my way back to the chunk border and waited for one of the muddy creatures to approach.
Several minutes later, one did. I pounced out of the tree cover and delivered an overhead chop with my battleaxe. The blade crashed into the creature like an avalanche, knocking it over as the axe blade slammed into its collar bone. It whimpered, rolling, then hissing up at me as I prepared to unleash another blow.
Quick as a snake, the five-foot-tall rat lunged and sank its needle-like teeth into my thigh. Sparks flew as its teeth and grimy claws skittered over my iron armor. To my surprise, after a second, its teeth sank right through the iron of the platelegs and into the soft flesh underneath. I winced, kicking at it in a vain attempt to dislodge it before I slashed at it with my battleaxe.
Muffled whimpers resonated into my thigh as the creature suddenly bucked and pulled my knees out from under me. With the heavy iron armor around my shoulders, I fell like a bag of bricks. It twisted its powerful neck, rending my leg like a dog with a chew toy as my weapon hand caught on the hem of my ratty cloak.
Cursing under my breath, I ripped my hand free, grabbed the creature by the ears, and pulled. Its ears felt tough and gristly as if made of sun-dried leather. They easily held, and I ripped the monster off my thigh after a moment of struggle. It thrashed wildly, causing its claws to rake painfully over my chest and forearms.
With a roar, I heaved the creature, twisting around and slamming my considerable weight advantage into its fragile abdomen. Several distinct pops sounded as it wheezed and went still for a second. Taking advantage of its stunned state, I turned, grabbed my fallen battleaxe, and unleashed a flurry of short, brutal chops at the hapless creature's face and neck.
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It groaned, recovering and delivering a couple more superficial cuts, but the battle was over. With over 50 attack and defense due to my gear, there was simply too large of a stat difference for it to achieve anything. With one final blow, it slumped lifeless to the muddy ground before melting into a pile of clear goo.
I huffed, wiping a dollop of cold mud off my face and stuffing a rat steak into my mouth. My wounds ached, mostly due to the puncture wounds the creature favored, though the meat certainly helped alleviate much of the discomfort.
“Hemo...gristle, yeah,” I muttered, finally settling on a name. “You can be a Hemogris Biter.” It felt suitably epic as a name while staying true to their leathery skin and vampire fangs. I tucked the lamp that fell into my lap into my belt before pulling out a pair of curious bronze knives out of the melting gel. The thing was also level 31, which explained its unreasonable toughness compared to anything I'd fought up until now.
Suddenly, I froze as a disturbing chitter silenced the insects of the forest. I spun, looking at the fortress to see the remaining four hemogris biters on the ground floor looking directly at me as they clacked their teeth together like psychotic alarm clocks.
We stared at each other for what felt like an eternity. Then the ice broke as all four creatures howled simultaneously and sprinted at me.
Cursing, I took a half second to peruse my stats. I’d lost 15 health in that fight and recovered five already from eating the rat steak. I could easily take on maybe two at a time, but all four might overwhelm me. There was also a very real danger of the rest of the hemogris in the fortress rushing down and joining in the hunt.
Making a snap decision, I spun back into the forest, away from the biters.
They chased me into the woods, which was somehow surprising. It felt wrong on a deep level that the grungy beasts broke the sanctity of the chunks by crossing them so easily. It bothered me, but ultimately was to my advantage.
Unlike the hemogris, I knew this chunk like the back of my hand. Better even. I’d been stuck in these 50,176 square meters for days. It was a large area, but it took less than ten minutes to walk from one end to the other. I could extend that time by a bit by taking the diagonal, but by and large, I’d memorized the entire chunk.
It was downright trivial to lead the first hemogris into the divot where the river pooled briefly. As it floundered in the water, several blows to the back of the head quickly submerged it such that a heavily armored knee ensured its fate.
The next two weren’t so easily separated, so I spent a moment losing them in the tangled woods before circling around and ambushing the trailing hemogris. Its senses were too keen for a direct approach to work, so I created a distraction by scaring a spotted snuffler toward its position. It spun toward the noise, making it almost too easy to sneak into melee range.
I landed three heavy blows before it even noticed I was behind it. With a howl that echoed through the canopy, it lunged at me, but I’d learned how to deal with these creatures and stepped aside smoothly. It tumbled into a tree, and I delivered a backhand with the axe that colored my weapon red with its blood.
The howling had drawn the last two hemogris to my location, and they stalked around me like wannabe predators as the cooling gel of their comrade melted at my feet. They pounced, but I refused to play their game. I retreated back into the forest. Wild swings kept them barely at arm's reach as I managed to keep them off of me. They landed numerous surface scratches that steadily trickled down my health, but I was inflicting as much as I got.
Dealing with two enemies at a time was far more difficult than I had initially thought, but after losing nearly 22 health, the first one fell. After that, it was a foregone conclusion as my axe ended the second.
The hemogris dropped rat meat and a variety of bronze and copper weapons. Curiously they didn’t drop any armor or tools for some reason. The last one had also dropped a rat tail, which I slipped into my belt for the crafting grind in the future. Hopefully, these creatures would drop them at a higher rate than the level-one rats at spawn.
Regardless, I would need a heap of food to take on the entire fortress, so I spent an hour grinding rats to replenish my food supplies. With three rat spawns, I managed to sustain a blistering pace of almost 500 kills an hour. Satisfied with my food supplies and the large pile of rat tails I’d accrued, I returned to the hemogris fortress only to see that the five biters I’d killed had respawned in my absence.
Blindly charging in would result in the same scenario as last time, so I took some time to collect a small pile of maple logs. Dragging them to the edge of the chunk, I ignited the first pile just as one of the biters wandered close. It spun at the sight of flames and charged me. I braced for impact, prepared for a completely different style of combat than before.
Instead of trying to minimize injuries, I sacrificed all defense in favor of offense. I unleashed powerful roundabout slams that nearly ripped the smaller creature into pieces with each attack while completely ignoring the smaller bites and scrapes it inflicted on me. With 49 defense bolstered, another 11 levels by my armor put me solidly at 60 defense. Recalculating my theoretical combat level put me somewhere between 43 and 44. That was over 12 levels on the hemogris, and it showed.
Each of my blows tore the meat off their thin frames while they struggled even to scratch me. The first soon fell but was replaced by its four friends. They started to make progress together, but instead of panicking or allowing them to restrain me, I pulled out a rat steak and swallowed it whole. With the maple campfire boosting my recovery, the rat meat healed for almost seven points of health. I had a nearly endless supply, and I could swallow them down way faster than four hemogris biters could damage me.
The last one fell moments later, and I stood victorious as all the blood covering me melted into a clear gel. Ignoring the smattering of low-grade weaponry, I approached the structure. The campfire in the center didn't increase my recovery, so I quickly lit another maple campfire. Looking up, I saw the pair of gray wolves staring at me. As one, they snarled. The sound resonated in my chest, and I could feel my stomach drop into my boots just looking at those massive teeth. A second later, I shook my head and reminded myself that this wasn't Earth and that I wasn't some frail human.
"Easy there," I approached the cages cautiously, reaching a hand out. "I'm not going to hurt you. Just need to find this latch--"
Quick as a whip, the wolf snapped out, nearly ripping off my hand before the rickety bars of its cage stopped its lunge. I flinched back, pulling my hand to my chest and stepping out of the danger zone. That seemed to infuriate both wolves, and they went into a frenzy. The cages creaked and groaned continuously as the pair attempted to escape their captivity and get at me.
"Pity," I pursed my lips, slightly sad that all monsters near my level were automatically hostile. I pulled out one of the many iron knives I'd smithed using the many iron ore left over from collecting the moonstone and hurled it at the nearest wolf. It howled, raging more in its cage. I paused for a moment just in case any of the hemogris decided to come down to investigate. When none did, I shrugged and ranged down the two caged animals with my knives.
Nice, I thought as I turned to the remaining wolf. It was clearly a pup and injured to boot. Carefully, I snapped the latch on its cage and stepped into the cage. It barely registered my presence which was a good thing. That meant that it was likely a lower level than me. In fact, maybe I could force the system to tell me its combat level if I focused hard enough.
I leaned down, going slightly cross-eyed as I attempted to exert my will upon the system. A minute passed, and I slowly got an impression. it was vague at first. Then as I focused more, the resolution increased until a small notification popped up in my vision.
Way lower level, I hummed to myself and gently offered it a small sliver of rat meat. The little guy panted, seemingly unaware of me. For a second I didn't think he would respond, but then his nose twitched, and it started blindly licking at my hand. I smiled, cutting some more into small slices and feeding it to the wolf. He recovered slowly, eating more and more until he licked his jowls and awkwardly stumbled to its feet.
"Hey there, little guy," I smiled down at him. I offered him the back of my hand. He sniffed at it curiously for a second, then his tail started wagging like mad, and he headbutted into and under my hand. The little guy tottered up to my chest and started attempting to lick my face. I leaned back, falling onto my butt, then couldn't help but burst into laughter as my new friend slobbered my face in kisses.