Sam woke before dawn and ate a healthy breakfast consisting of cold water from her canteen and the extremely bland and dry rations the System had provided. “They are like dry oat cakes I used to bring hiking back on Earth; I wonder if the System designed them for me from one of my memories?" She thought while absently munching. Having slept in her clothes and stored everything else she had in her inventory the previous day, all that was left to do was to store the bedroll and relieve herself before beginning her journey into the forest. Sam didn't bother digging a hole or hiding behind a tree when she heeded nature's call and was grateful for the endless water from the canteen to keep herself at least relatively clean and scent-free before venturing out into the forest, “probably still smell strong enough to paint a rather large target on my back though,” she thought morosely, "well, I've done the best I can I suppose. I'll have to stay vigilant."
Taking one last look at the clearing before she left, Sam took in the scorch marks, blood, and viscera covering the blue grass and felt mixed emotions. A smile finally tugged at the corners of her lips as she looked at the last signs of carnage. This new world may be brutal, but she could see magic and construct blades out of thin air now. Her new powers had allowed her to kill monsters’ way above the level she should have been messing with if Earth RPGs were any point of reference. The explorer in her yearned for more; she wanted, no, she needed to go out and experience all this world had to offer, and she knew it wasn't just because of her class. It was the innate desire to explore she had always felt. Even as a child, Sam had always wanted to explore and experience new places and never stagnated in one location for long throughout her life. One of her favorite memories was when she was only six years old; she had gone missing from the orphanage she grew up in, causing quite the ruckus in the small town where it was located. After frantic searching by the townsfolk, they found her three days later, camping in a forested area just outside town, quite content with her surroundings and seemingly no worse for wear.
Shaking her head at the memory of her youthful shenanigans, Sam oriented herself using her map and set out toward the river. She knew the safe zone timer for the clearing still had several hours remaining, but she wanted to get an early start this morning. The river looked nearly twenty kilometers away by what she could tell from her tree climb the previous day, and she wanted to reach it before dark.
Turning on Mana Sight, Sam began moving quickly through the dense forest, relying on the magical sight to warn her of any danger as she focused on her footing; both the panther and Imp had been plainly visible to her when her sight was active the previous day. She hoped it would be the same for all the creatures this forest had dwelling in it. Traveling through the woods with Mana Sight on was…interesting. With her eyes open, the forest mainly looked normal; most of the trees were inert, that is to say, they didn't have any appreciable mana glow to them, with the only glow being almost invisible lines of green energy slowly traveling up and down the tree from the roots all the way up the trunk to the leaves. Closing her eyes as she walked, however, she found it wasn't only mana her sight could detect but also the absence of it. The ground, some trees, and even the sky were visible with her eyes closed; it was more like walking around in the dark with the outlines of trees faintly visible but not distinct. Sam soon got used to walking in the forest with her eyes closed, relying solely on her Mana Sight. Granted, she did walk into more than one tree while she was adjusting to moving through a dense forest with her eyes closed, but she felt the effort she made was worth it, "I'll be able to move around and, more importantly, fight or flee when it gets dark if I can get good enough at this skill. I am glad no one is around to see me walk into trees like an insane woman, though."
Sam encountered a tiny blue flower glowing so brightly a few kilometers into her hike that Sam had to turn off her Mana Sight to see it. Looking at the little blue flower, Sam was so excited about finding something cool that she instinctively bent to pick the flower. Still, she stopped herself with a jerk, “what am I thinking? Am I trying to get myself killed? Go ahead and pull the glowing blue flower, Sam; what could go wrong?" Sam admonished herself and identified the small flower instead.
Cyan Death Blossom
There was no description other than the name. “Well, that's not helpful, but it does have the word 'death' in it, so… hard pass." Sam thought as she stepped slowly away from the flower.
The only creatures Sam saw were a few packs of small raccoon-like animals with six legs and bushy tails. She tried to identify them, but they seemed to sense her presence when they were at the edge of her Mana Sight and quickly scurried away. Sam did notice once she saw the little creatures, even if it was for the briefest of moments, they would show up on her mini-map, represented by a grey dot, for a short time, even after they were out of her direct line of sight. She also learned she could keep Mana Sight up indefinitely. Even though her mana would slowly creep down as soon as she turned the sight on, her regeneration quickly kicked in and topped her off again. She continued like this for the rest of the morning, making surprisingly good time and thankfully not walking into too many more trees as she traversed the forest with her eyes closed.
Sam arrived at the river quicker than she expected, her enhanced body being much more resilient than it was back on Earth, giving her what seemed like infinite stamina, at least at the medium pace she was moving. In fact, her stamina wouldn't even go down if she was walking, and it barely ticked down when she ran. "Maybe I don’t need to focus too much on stamina, which I believe would be my endurance and maybe agility attributes.”
Making it to the river felt like a personal victory to Sam. She walked to the bank of the slow-moving river and stared at the murky water, turning off her mana sight to better take in the scenery. Looking closer, she could see the water was clear but stained a dark brown, almost black; it reminded her of the 'cypress tea' color of the bayous she had enjoyed canoeing down on occasion. The only thing missing from making it a perfect 'bayou' was Spanish moss hanging off the trees along the river's edge. The river was small, barely twenty meters across at its widest, and moving slowly. Listening to the light gurgle of eddies along the bank, Sam relaxed, realizing how tense she had been hiking through the dark, quiet forest.
Plopping down on a grassy spot at the water's edge with a sigh, Sam examined her surroundings, first with and then without Mana Sight active. There was nothing she could see to suggest the river was traveled by people; no signs of civilization could be seen along the stretch of the river. She hadn't really expected to see any indigenous peoples. Still, she had hoped for some telltale signs, like the remains of campsites or maybe skid marks from canoes or barges where they had been pulled onto the bank. Seeing no indication that sapient life used the river, she decided to follow it south mostly because she wanted to avoid going toward the massive mountains to the north with their snow-covered peaks reaching into the clouds. The mountains looked ominous and too cold for a southerner like her, so south seemed the better choice.
The forest was thinner along the riverbank, so Sam ran for a while instead of walking. She made it two more hours, traveling downstream parallel to the winding waterway without seeing another living creature before the stamina drain finally forced her to stop. "Where are all the animals? Hell, where are the monsters? Were the Imp and Blade Tail only attracted to whatever energy brought me here? Also, why am I disappointed I haven't encountered a monster? Have I lost my freaking mind, what's gotten into me?" Sam shook her head; she had no idea why, but the thought of encountering another Blade Tail or even an Imp excited her more than it should have. "Is it my class craving excitement, or just me craving power?" The thought was sobering; Sam didn't want to become a power-hungry battle maniac who hunted and killed simply to feel the rush of leveling up.
Still lost in thought, Sam wandered up to the bank of the river and absently kicked a small stone into the water, blankly staring as it plunked in with a small splash and drifted out of sight into the murky depths. Her stamina was regenerating rapidly, and she figured she could continue for at least three more hours before stopping for the night. She looked around, "Maybe I should cross the river; the forest seems less dense on the other side. I could make better time if I—”
Sam's thoughts were cut off when a tentacle shot out from the water at the river's edge and wrapped around both of her legs. Before she had time to react, the tentacle yanked her feet out from under her, dragging her toward the river's murky depths. Grasping frantically around her, trying to find anything that she could get a grip on, Sam managed to get one hand on a small sapling at the river's edge, stopping her momentum right before the unseen creature could pull her entirely into the water, with only her legs submerged beneath the cold surface of the river.
Sam's arm muscles bulged from the strain of gripping the sapling; it felt like something had wrapped barbed wire around her legs, tied the loose end to a car, and pushed the car off a cliff. Hooks and barbs from the tentacle dug into the flesh of her legs, threatening to shred her muscles from the strain as she slowly inched her other hand toward the sapling she was holding onto with a death grip, trying desperately to get both hands on the small tree so she could use her newfound strength to pull herself away from whatever it was trying to drag her into the river.
With a primal scream, Sam heaved with all her strength and managed to get both hands on the sapling, her fingers griping so hard she could hear the creak of the wood being stressed as she pulled her body slowly forward, away from the river; dragging herself and the mysterious owner of the tentacle with her. “Just a little bit more!” She thought desperately, pulling her legs out of the water a centimeter at a time; she could hear and feel her muscles and skin tearing as the hooks in the tentacle started to loosen and rip out of her legs one by one. Then the unthinkable happened: the sapling snapped from the strain, and the tentacle's tension slingshot her backward into the river. Sam's fingers dug deep furrows into the Earth of the riverbank, trying to stay out of the water, but she was quickly sucked beneath the river's surface.
The only sign of Sam's frantic struggle against the creature was the broken sapling and deep furrows left by her fingers in the soft sandy soil of the quiet riverbank. The water's surface was once again calm, and the forest resumed its ominous silence; no creature dared venture near the river for fear of meeting the same fate as the foolish Earthling.
***
Feeling the cold water rush around her as she was pulled by the tentacle, Sam struggled, but it was no use; she still felt herself being dragged down quickly, far too quickly, into the darkness of the river by the yet unseen foe. All she could think as she was dragged down was, "At least I took a breath instead of screaming when the damn thing dragged me under; who knows, maybe I am getting the hang of surviving this world? Not panicking and losing my shit every time a monster tries to kill me seems to be a good starting point for survival."
Sam activated Mana Sight doing her best to be logical about what was happening and trying to remain calm. She was already too deep for light to penetrate the murky water, limiting her visibility to nothing. As soon as her sight activated, the outline of the creature attacking her illuminated. It was a massive octopus-like creature with too many tentacles and at least four eyes in the darkness. Yanking her toward its mouth by the tentacle holding her legs, a sizeable wicked beak in the lower part of its bulbous head was open wide to, no doubt, bite her in half. As she watched the creature's open mouth draw closer, Sam relaxed slightly. Instead of terror, she felt calm, calculating how to counter this creature and survive the encounter. "Why am I not afraid? Is it because I have no other choice but to survive? Maybe it is a hidden perk of my class?” Everything currently happening should undoubtedly be terrifying, to be sure, but not to Sam. Even she didn't understand. Looking at the sizeable aquatic creature that was, for all intents and purposes, about to eat her, Sam's only thought was, "You're going to be worth a lot of experience points, you big dumb asshole."
Sam waited until just before the creature would bite down on her legs with its large beaklike mouth before acting. Right before her legs were about to disappear into the creature's mouth, two-meter-long blades of mana shot out from the soles of her boots, where she had conjured them, shooting straight down the creature's throat! Simultaneously, Sam summoned tiny mana spikes around her legs where the tentacle was wrapped, puncturing the soft flesh of the tentacle holding her. The octopus creature released its grip on her legs when her spikes penetrated its flesh and her blades lodged in its throat. The beast's tentacles began thrashing about in all directions as if to ward off any further attacks, and a gout of blood came out of its mouth. The blood from its mouth and bleeding tentacle looked like a cloud of darkness in her magical vision.
Taking advantage of the distraction her attacks had caused, Sam started swimming upward toward the surface; she needed oxygen badly. The light of the river's surface came into her view, and she swam even harder, desperate to get a breath into her starving lungs. Her head had barely breached the surface when a tentacle wrapped around her throat from behind, crushing her windpipe. The breath she desperately needed never came as she was sucked back under the water, disappearing again beneath the surface.
As she was dragged backward through the water by her throat, Sam could not see the monster, which she expertly deduced, was not good. It took a second before she could shut down rising the panic she felt when she couldn't take the much-needed breath. Instead of panicking, she focused on forming short mana spikes in her palms. She grabbed the tentacle around her neck, squeezing with all her strength, forcing the spikes deep into the tentacle, choking her. She felt the grip of the tentacle loosen slightly as her grip tightened, but the damn thing didn't release her throat. Getting more desperate now, she formed mana claws on her fingers. She began raking them across the soft flesh of the tentacle around her throat, cutting deep bloody gashes into the suffocating appendage, forcing it to finally release her. The instant she was free, she turned back toward the surface. Before Sam could start to swim upward, another creature's tentacles wrapped themselves around her chest, crushing out what little air she still had out of her lungs and yanking her back toward the deep black depths of the river.
Desperation clawed at Sam's mind as her body screamed for oxygen. Panic finally took control of her, and not knowing what else to do, she coated her whole body in a thin layer of mana, using most of her reserves, and then pulsed it outward, spending a full sixty percent of her mana pool instantly. The result was worth the mana headache when the tentacle around her chest and another that just latched onto her legs were forcibly blown away from her body. The tentacle around her chest even tore apart into several pieces from the violence of her mana's rapid expansion, creating a circle of torn flesh and blood around her. Sam noted absently in the back of her panicking mind, as she floated suspended in the dark water, that a lot of the flesh floating around her was her own, torn from her body by the wickedly sharp hooks in the monster's tentacle.
Looking up in a daze, Sam could see a pinprick of light; it looked so far away to her oxygen-deprived and pain-addled brain, “just how deep is this freaking river?” Dismissing that thought, she used all her willpower to focus and formed a layer of mana on the soles of her boots. Using every last bit of concentration she had in her oxygen-starved mind, she pushed the mana out from the bottom of her feet in a controlled manner, propelling herself upward through the dark water far faster than she could swim. She wasn't sure she would make it; she was developing tunnel vision, and her lungs involuntarily convulsed, jerking her whole body as she fought herself from taking a breath as she sped toward the river's surface.
Just as she was on the verge of blacking out the darkness closing in on her vision stopped. “What is up with not being able to pass out am I—" Sam finally broke the surface of the river as her momentum propelled her body clear of the river and onto the far bank, opposite where she had begun the dance of death with the monster from the depths. Flying a total of five meters through the air into the forest, there was a loud crack when she landed on a protruding root, followed by a fresh wave of pain. Sam somehow knew she had just broken an arm and at least one rib from the impact.
Not knowing the range of the octopus monster, which she had yet to identify, Sam struggled to her feet and managed to stumble farther into the forest, finally settling behind a large tree and collapsing against it. She slowly slid to her rump, resting her back against the tree's rough bark, and began to gasp in great, painful breaths of air.
Sam was surprised to see her mana was hovering around thirty percent. Apparently, propelling oneself through the water was less mana-intensive than blasting a tentacle off; who knew. She was tempted to drink a mana and health potion just in case the creature pursued her on land. Still, she refrained when she peeked around the tree and saw the monster wasn't coming after her. Once she was certain the creature wouldn't leave the water, she sat against the tree again and activated her meditation skill. Sam began repairing the damage to her body when she felt the boost from Meditation kick in, and using her rapidly regenerating mana to boost her healing ability, she started healing her throat first because it had the worst wound. One of the hooks had apparently torn open her jugular when it was ripped, and only her regeneration had kept her alive. Considering the amount of blood she had lost, she figured she would have died twice if she had still been an average human. Sam wasn't surprised to see her health was at less than two percent…again. "How many times have I been seconds from death since I arrived in this world? It has only been a few days, and it must be at least three now! And why didn’t I pass out from oxygen deprivation?" Dismissing her thoughts and focusing on healing, Sam tried to control her breathing and relax her body and mind as best she could under the circumstances. Once her throat was healed, she started on the rest of her wounds; she winced as each of her broken ribs snapped back into place as they healed. Apparently, she had broken four ribs when she hit the root.
Sam managed to get her health back up above half before her mana dropped to ten percent, and she had to stop actively healing herself to let her reserves refill. As she healed, she thought about the fight, trying to determine what she did right and what she needed to work on in the future, "I don't think the creature was solely responsible for my less than two percent health; I actually think it was when I blasted the tentacles off my body, tearing out all those hooks, and when I launched myself out of the water so high I broke my arm, and my ribs which punctured my lung. All of that pushed my regeneration past its limit, I think,” Sam looked at the wounds on her chest and legs, which were still healing, "I really can't believe I survived this kind of trauma to my body again. I have to get a better handle on my magic abilities soon; they're almost too powerful for my body to handle physically," she sighed at the thought, knowing what she needed to do, “I guess that means I need to focus on building my strength when I level up. I need to, at least, get it to the level so my body can handle the raw power of my magic.”
Sam continued for another hour before she was fully healed and topped off with mana again. She was pissed," Ambush predator, huh? Let's see how you like being ambushed," she had devised a plan as she healed herself and was anxious to put it into motion. There was no way she would let that creature get away with nearly killing and trying to eat her, and it hadn't even been in that order! Plus, she really needed the experience to improve herself to a point where using her skills didn't nearly kill her. Her plan was simple, and once she had confirmed she could indeed see through the water using Mana Sight, observing several tentacles right below the surface of the river waiting motionless for unwary creatures to come by for a drink, she knew her plan would work. "Oh, do I have a surprise for you, asshole.”
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Sam used Identify on the tentacles.
Deep Hunter Level??
‘Bing’ Identify has leveled up to level 3. Additional information may become available depending on the level of the subject being identified.
Taking the notification as a challenge, Sam identified the Deep Hunter a second time.
Deep Hunter Level?? [Hostile]; Affinity: Dark
"No shit, it's hostile, but I suppose I would have thought it had the water affinity, so there's that." Sam mused aloud. She also checked her notifications from the fight. She was surprised her class had gone up a level, "I guess my class can level from using my abilities and skill as well as from the experience I gain from defeating enemies; that stands to reason; how else would a crafter class or healer class level if they don't have any offensive skills or spells?" Continuing through her messages, she found her Mana Crafting and Mana Sight had both leveled up, reducing the mana cost, which was a welcome discovery. She expeditiously distributed all 11 free points she had to spend on strength and vitality, the two attributes that would help her body adapt to her magic power and, hopefully, keep her alive longer. Vowing to herself, she would focus on her endurance and agility next to increase her stamina and reaction speeds. Now, all she had left to do was execute her plan, picking a tree near the river Sam began to climb.
***
Six daggers hovered three meters above the slow-moving water of the river; they looked to be suspended in midair by an invisible force to a casual onlooker. The daggers only hovered above the water's surface for a few moments before each shot into the water with incredible speed, one after another, each barely making a splash as they disappeared beneath the surface. Seconds passed as the water's surface once again became calm and smooth. Then, only moments later, the water began roiling, turning a deep crimson as blood began bubbling to the surface. The water-churning bloody bubbling continued for a full minute, and after another minute passed, part of a tentacle floated to the surface with a dagger protruding from it. The dagger looked like it was trying to pull itself out of the tentacle, jerking back and forth but without success. Then, two daggers that had plunged into the water resurfaced, hovering for a moment before plunging back into the bloody water again. The daggers were followed into the water a moment later by a naked human female with glowing purple lines resembling lines on a circuit board covering her body. "Oh no, you don't!” Sam yelled as she dove headfirst into the roiling mass of blood and flesh leaping from the tree bordering the river. Diving smoothly beneath the surface, she disappeared.
***
Sam hit the water, cutting into its surface with barely a ripple. She formed a spear of mana around her body to help her move through the water more swiftly. Once submerged, Sam didn't waste a second, knowing she was burning mana at a prodigious rate and would need to end this fight swiftly. Sighting in on the Deep Hunter, she used pulses of mana to propel her toward it, aiming for the creature's center mass with the pointed spear surrounding her body, intent on preventing its escape. A tentacle snaked toward her, trying to knock her off course. She stopped it with one of the two remaining free daggers she had control of, stabbing the dagger into the appendage and pushing it out of the way with her mana thread.
“Come on! Only ten meters…eight meters…six meters,” the beast stopped its retreat and started turning toward her, “five meters,” another tentacle tried to block her path but was stopped by her last free dagger, “two meters,” the beast had now fully turned toward her opening its beak preparing to snap her in half.
The instant the creature opened its beak, Sam blasted the spear of mana forward off her body, sending the sharp mana construct down the Deep Hunter's throat. Once she launched the spear into the Deep Hunter's mouth, she used a directed mana blast to change her trajectory, clearing the monster gliding through the water just over its head. Quickly forming a mana blade in her hand, Sam thrust it into the soft tissue of the Deep Hunter's head, cutting a deep gash in its forehead as she went past. The Deep Hunter let out a strange warbling cry she could hear even deep underwater as it released a cloud of black ink around them. The mana spear must have done an incredible amount of damage judging from the obscuring ink it released to cover its escape.
Sam took a deep breath; she had formed a bubble-shaped helmet around her head before diving into the river, trapping a small amount of air inside. The helmet wasn't much, barely enough for a few breaths, but it allowed her to remain in this fight much longer without needing to surface for air. The ink from the Deep Hunter had completely obscured her mana sight by clouding the water with dark mana. The Deep Hunter used the distraction from the ink as a chance to flee and darted away from her hurriedly. Still, it only took seconds for Sam to deselect the mana from the ink to see through the obscuring cloud. She found it much easier to ignore the ink in her mana sight than the blue grass of the clearing. The Deep Hunter was already a few meters away, still trying to flee; plumes of mana-rich blood were pouring out of its body as it swam. It was moving slowly now, with only one unharmed and fully functional tentacle, all the other appendages in various states of mutilation were haphazardly flopping around as it swam away. The damaged limbs were hindering more than helping the Deep Hunter's movement as it fled.
Determined not to lose her advantage, Sam channeled Mana Crafting and formed a two-meter harpoon in her hand, attaching all six of her mana threads to the butt of the harpoon, twisting the threads together, making a mana rope. Using the newly formed mana rope, she launched the harpoon into the Deep Hunter's body as it fled and was yanked forward through the water when the mana rope went taut. The Deep Hunter didn't even acknowledge her as it continued trying to escape, dragging her through the water as it fled.
Hanging on her mana rope with all her strength in the water, Sam realized the Deep Hunter wasn't nearly as exhausted as she had hoped. Desperate to end the fight, which had been going on for far too long, Sam started constructing and firing mana spikes at the monster's back with her left hand while holding on to the mana rope with her right. The spikes cut smoothly through the water with a push from a controlled blast of her mana. "I always knew being ambidextrous would help me defeat a giant octopus monster,” she thought wryly, unable to hide the slightly manic smile that played across her lips despite her situation. Getting serious again, "Okay, big guy, let's see how you like being perforated…repeatedly."
Every mana spike that struck the Deep Hunter slowed it ever so slightly. Still, as they continued their battle of attrition, the spikes started growing smaller and smaller as Sam's mana got lower with each attack. After five minutes of constantly assaulting the Deep Hunter, Sam was out of oxygen and nearly out of mana. She was about to release her mana rope when the sweet sound of victory played in her mind, and a welcome notification popped up in her vision.
‘Bing’ You have defeated Deep Hunter Level 36. Bonus experience earned for defeating an enemy at least thirty levels above your own.
“Level 36! This fucker should have annihilated me!” Sam thought as she propelled herself to the dead creature and, with a thought, put it in her inventory. “Oxygen first, then Loot," with that decision, she swiftly shot to the river's surface, gasping in a deep lungful of air as she breached the water.
Sam didn't immediately swim to shore. Instead, she trod water while she scanned both riverbanks, the river itself, and the surrounding forest. If she had learned anything by now, it was not to trust the relative quiet of the forest, which seemed full of high-level ambush predators all wanting a taste of tender Sam flesh. Finding no apparent threats, none she could tell anyway, Sam swam to the west, the closest riverbank, and crawled out of the water. Flopping to her back and staring into the dusky sky, she was more exhausted than ever. “Definitely have to increase my stamina,” she told the empty air as she got to her feet with a grunt.
Moving farther into the forest, Sam found an open area partially protected from the elements by several large moss-covered boulders that formed a semi-circle around a clearing. She noticed the terrain becoming rockier the farther southwest she traveled, suggesting she was getting closer to the most miniature mountain she could see to the west. Sam could tell that the small mountain signified the beginning of the large mountain range that stretched to the north. She figured the mountain range must be shaped like a crescent, cradling the forest inside its half-moon shape. Moving out sticks and small stones from the clearing she intended to camp in tonight, Sam decided to aim for the small mountain. Sam thought if she couldn't find a village or town along the river tomorrow or the next day, "maybe I'll get lucky and find a mining town. If the river runs close enough to the mountain range to provide transportation, there may be a trade route or something…but that is a worry for tomorrow. Tonight is for rest and recovery."
Sam got to work, in earnest, setting up her campsite. An avid hiker and wilderness camper in her past life of three days ago, she soon had a sturdy lean-to assembled. The lean-to was facing one of the boulders bordering the clearing. She dug a fire pit between her sleeping arrangement and the boulders so heat from her fire would be reflected at her and the light from the campfire would also be partially hidden. Using the flint and steel the System provided, Sam started an ember in the small bundle of kindling she had gathered as she had set up her camp. Placing it in the fire pit she had lined with gathered stones, she carefully added larger and larger sticks until the fire was sufficiently large. Sam watched for a while until she was sure the fire had taken hold and wouldn't go out before moving on with her preparations.
Happy with her setup, Sam walked back toward the river so she wouldn't ruin her campsite with gore when she pulled the Deep Hunter out of her inventory. Once far enough away, she unceremoniously dumped the corpse of the Deep Hunter onto the ground with a giant squishing plop, speedily looted it, and stored it back into her inventory space to avoid attracting the attention of predators with the smell of the carcass. Sam had tried looting it while it was in her inventory, but that try had sadly failed. She reviewed the loot in her inventory.
Deep Hunter Items:
1-Gold; 37-Silver; 28-Copper; Monster Core [Deep Hunter]; Vial of Organic Ink x 2; Deep Hunter Tentacle x 8; Deep Hunter Beak x 2; Iron Dagger x 4; Mana Potion x 1; Health Potion x 1; 200kg Deep Hunter Meat.
"Yay, I got some of my daggers back!" Sam did a little hop with a fist pump. She walked back to her campfire and sat down on the soft moss she used to line the floor of her lean-to. Staring absently into the flames, she wondered if the fire would deter or attract monsters. She worried she had mistakenly built a campsite and fire instead of hiding in a tree. Looking around and hearing no sounds from the dark forest around her, she looked at the dark, creepy shadows of the campfire's light. She thought, “Did I sign my death warrant by building a fire in this forest?” Her question was soon answered when a notification popped up out of nowhere.
'Bing' Temporary Safe Zone recognized. This campsite meets all requirements, albeit barely, to grant the user temporary System protection for 8 hours unless the fire is doused. Protection level: All sound, scent, mana, and light the occupant(s) create inside the perimeter will be obscured from all creatures with hostile intent during the 8-hour period this safe zone is in place. Hostile creature(s) will not be prevented from entering the safe zone accidentally. No System action will be taken if a creature(s) attacks the occupant(s). The occupant(s) will be notified if a hostile creature(s) breaks the border of the safe zone. Attacks inside the safe zone will remove the obscuration effect for 5 minutes, beginning after aggression has ceased. The safe zone diameter is 20 meters.
After reading the message, Sam threw another piece of wood on the fire, "it isn't as good as the blue grass clearing, but at least no hostile predators will be able to see me or my fire, and I will be warned if something accidentally stumbles into my camp." Her dilemma of how to rest peacefully in the forest of doom (as she began calling it) was resolved, and she decided to go over the rest of her notifications from the fight with the Deep Hunter.
‘Bing’ Race Human has leveled up to level 5. 5 free attribute points awarded.
‘Bing’ Race Human has leveled up to level 6. 5 free attribute points awarded.
‘Bing’ Race Human has leveled up to level 7. 5 free attribute points awarded.
‘Bing’ Class Arcane Pathfinder has leveled up to level 6. 10 free attribute points awarded.
‘Bing’ Mana Sight has leveled up to level 4. Mana cost is slightly reduced. Range is increased.
‘Bing’ Mana Crafting has leveled up to level 5. Mana cost is slightly reduced. Your mana constructs can now last slightly longer without your direct contact.
"That makes sense; I did notice my constructs dissipating fast once I stopped infusing them with my mana." Laying back on her bedroll, Sam enjoyed the soft crackling of the fire as she assigned her free attribute points.
Resisting the urge to dump all her free points into wisdom, vitality, and intelligence, she spread them out across all six attributes, making sure not to neglect any of them. She knew if she had just been a little stronger in the fight, she would have been able to pull herself closer to the Deep Hunter along her mana rope when it was dragging her as it tried to escape. She may have been able to end the fight swifter with a decisive blow from another harpoon or spear or something if she had managed to get closer. She thought back to how exhausted she had been. There was no way she would have survived another fight. If another monster had been close enough to hear and investigate the disturbance, there would have been no way she could have fought it, so she needed more endurance. As far as agility was concerned, she could dodge the Deep Hunter's tentacles and beak with her current level in the agility attribute. Still, suppose her agility had been higher during the fight. In that case, she may have found an opening in the Deep Hunter's attacks she could have exploited to make a killing blow. Sam knew what really won the day, though, "Of course, it was my intelligence and wisdom attributes that won out in the end. Without them, I am just a strong, agile human with no real fighting experience or skills," looking at her status window she thought, “Choosing what attributes to increase is hard, I guess I really do need them all though but how awesome would I be if I just dumped everything into intelligence and wisdom?” She knew the answer, though, "I probably would have ripped my body apart trying to do something stupidly powerful with magic by now."
Sam somewhat reluctantly bolstered her strength and endurance, followed by vitality and agility, before shamelessly dumping the rest into intelligence and wisdom. Selecting 'Yes' to finalize her choices, she let the addictive energy surge wash over her. It was like a shot of adrenalin straight to her brain that, even after the initial rush, still had residual effects that lasted for over an hour. "I have to be cognizant of this feeling and how it affects me,” she told herself, but deep down, she already knew she was hooked on this new life and eagerly anticipated growing more powerful each day. Her class and this world catered to all her favorite things: creating, exploring, camping, and the excitement of experiencing new things. The absence of any real responsibility was also a wonderful thing; there were no deadlines, no coworkers to avoid or discipline, no friends showing her endless pictures of their children doing mundane tasks for the first time, and best of all, no one was telling her how to live her life. Being single, successful, and child-free into her late twenties, Sam had been the victim of more than one elderly lady or a stay-at-home mom trying to tell her she was missing out on the wonderful life of servitude and dependence on some man, along with endless the bliss of being a baby factory for said man. “No thanks, and fuck that shit!” Sam valued her freedom above all else and decided that should she ever wind up in a relationship, she would never lose her freedom and be forced to rely on the person to survive. The need for self-reliance is why she got her law degree, to ensure she could always support herself no matter the circumstance. She didn't judge other women for settling down and having kids with a few ex-husbands, so why did they always seem so insistent on judging her for not going that route? Was it a misery loves company thing? Sam smiled, thinking back to the women who looked down on her for not conforming to their ideal societal norms, and thought, “I would like to see some of those stuffy bitches survive what I’ve been through the last few days.”
Enjoying the fire as she let her thoughts wander, Sam checked her reserved energies. Her health was 310, her stamina was 310, and her mana was a whopping 911. She whistled, "Gotta love those crystal mana channels!" Sitting up and after some indecision, Sam pulled out a portion of the panther and octopus' meat. She had been afraid she was going to have to pull the entire amount of each from her inventory to cut off the pieces she wanted. To her relief, the meat had already been sorted into one-kilogram chunks. The cat meat looked like a juicy steak, while the Deep Hunter's meat appeared like a cube of white rubbery meat resembling tofu.
Sam set the octopus meat to boiling in her cookpot with some water from her canteen and skewered the panther meat on a stick she had picked up and sharpened just for this occasion. The smell of delicious meat roasting soon filled the air, making Sam's mouth water and her stomach grumble in anticipation. Taking her first bite of the panther steak, she moaned as the delicious juices dribbled down her chin, "It's so good, and it isn't even seasoned with anything!" She said to no one. The meat was tender and juicy, nothing like what she had expected from a wild animal. Chewing and swallowing the delicious bite of cat meat, Sam stabbed the Deep Hunter meat with a dagger, cutting off a slice of the cube with another dagger she used it to pop the meat into her mouth, "Hmm, not fishy at all. It's kind of like an octopus—” Every muscle in her body stopped responding to her signals; she could not move.
'Bing' You have been poisoned with Deep Hunter toxin: Although Deep Hunters have no toxic attacks or venom glands, their flesh contains a potent toxin. -5hp/sec for 420 seconds; paralysis for 120 seconds.
“Why didn’t I identify that? It’s enough to kill me three times over!” Sam's first instinct was to pour her mana into her natural regeneration. She stopped though, realizing she was panicking, and calmed herself. She could only survive this by carefully regulating how much mana she used to heal herself until the paralysis wore off and she could get to her potions. She still wasn't entirely sure they would be enough, but she hoped they would; she had to stay positive, after all. Unable to close her eyes or even breathe, she was hit with a weird thought, "How is my heart beating? Is it beating?" She quickly checked, "Nope, my heart isn't beating? What the hell, man, how is this even possible? Stop it, Sam!" She admonished herself, “Focus on the immediate problem!” Despite the paralysis, Sam could enter meditation, even though she couldn't control her breathing or relax her muscles. She calmed her mind increasing her regeneration speeds. She then focused all her mana on destroying the foreign toxin from her body as she counted each second until the paralysis wore off.
Sam managed to slow the health loss from five points a second to three; that alone wasn't enough to beat the paralysis timer, though. Fortunately, her regeneration shortened the duration of the paralysis because, with less than 15 health points left after 100 seconds, she could move the tips of her fingers slightly. "Still can't move enough to drink a potion, can I?" She managed to open her mouth slightly and summoned a small health potion directly between her teeth from her inventory. She bit down as soon as she felt it appear in her mouth. Ignoring the glass shards cutting into her gums, she swallowed the red liquid and the broken glass. Her health jumped from 9 to 109 before steadily declining from the still-active poison. This gave her time to think as the paralysis finally wore off.
Able to finally move, Sam pulled all her potions out of her inventory while spitting broken glass out of her mouth. Putting the useless stamina potions to one side, she did some quick math, sketchy at best, as she had no idea how much the regular healing potion from the Deep Hunter loot would recover. Downing her final small health potion to give herself more time, she continued pushing the maximum amount of mana she could into her regeneration. Now her mana was taking a hit, even though Sam was sure she was recovering over four points per second with meditation active. She only had two mana potions left. "Think Sam, think…Identify, it’s leveled up!” Using her ocular skill on her remaining health and mana potions, Sam frowned.
Health Potion: Instantly restores 300hp.
Small Mana Potion: Instantly restores 50mp.
Mana Potion: Instantly restores 300mp.
"So, do my mana channels work on all potions, doubling their effectiveness? Assuming the small health potions I drank restored 50hp normally like the small mana potion does…this will be close." A quick glance at the small stamina potions showed her they also restored 50 points of stamina. “This is going to be close,” Sam thought as she waited until she only had 2hp, the border around her health bar flashing and emergency red, and drank her last health potion, chasing it with her only regular mana potion. All she could do now was focus solely on keeping her mana flowing into her recovery at a near-perfect rate to not waste a single mana point. The countdown timer ended at 238 seconds, her stats apparently reducing the effects of the toxin ever so slightly.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Sam relaxed; her health was at 3 points when the timer stopped; as usual, her health pool was at less than two percent, but at least it was no longer going down. With meditation active, she was recovering quickly. She started putting her remaining potions back into her inventory when she noticed the two vials of black ink next to her. She had only thought 'potions' when she summoned them from her inventory earlier. "Apparently, this is a potion," Sam thought as she picked one up and identified it.
Organic Ink [Uses 12]: The organic compound found in a Deep Hunters ink sack. The Deep Hunter uses its ink primarily in defense to confuse potential predators, allowing the Deep Hunter a chance to escape. Potion Effect: When consumed, the ink negates the toxic effects of the Deep Hunter meat.
Had Sam not been in a System-enforced safe zone, her scream would have woken the entire forest.