The day had started out so well. David had finished work and navigated the clear roads home, and now he could sit down and relax with his own projects. Working at the engineering firm gave him plenty of time to think of new inventions.
Sitting down at his table which was liberally festooned with tools and scrap items scavenged from various broken-down machines, he had everything he needed to start designing and building a new project. Stored under his table was a knapsack full to the brim with even more assorted items, including a bag full of basic tools.
Hours flew by as he designed, prototyped, and redesigned various items and sculptures. His mind locked deep within the current task he absentmindedly reached out for an energy drink. As he brought it to his mouth and tilted his head back to take a drink stunningly bright light stabbed into his eyes.
Reeling back in shock, the chair tipped backwards. Landing on his back, David saw the cause of the shining bright light. It was the light of two suns in a wide and open blue sky. Looking around wildly he stood up and did not see his bedroom walls. An empty savannah stretched away from him in most directions as far as the eye could see.
His table full of scrap was standing on a circular portion of his bedroom floor, completely at odds with the surrounding landscape. Stumbling backwards the breath was knocked out of him as he slammed into a giant pile of boulders festooned with a sparse covering of hardy looking trees and bushes.
Sinking to the ground, he said the first thing that came to his shock addled mind.
“Where is my drink?”
David shut his eyes and vigorously rubbed them with the palm of his hands, hoping against hope that he had just fallen asleep at the table as he had done many times before.
“Shit, not a dream then.”
With that he passed out, slumped against the rock.
A few minutes later he woke with a start and managed to see the unopened can of energy drink sitting on the table. Downing the can he started to feel more like himself and the pragmatic part of his mind began to wake up.
“Ok, so it doesn’t look like a dream, I guess first things first? Let’s see where we are.”
With that he turned around and started looking for ways to climb the giant rock pile. Fortunately for him there were easy foot and hand holds to allow him up. Upon reaching the top his spirits slumped as all that could be seen were more grassland and various rock piles scattered across the landscape.
“Well now what? Wait, what’s that?”
In the distance the sunlight reflected from a silvery fast-moving object that was moving very quickly towards his rocks.
Suddenly a sharp stabbing pain pierced his brain and a screen appeared in his mind’s eye
Low level user warning.
Danger.
Pinwheel Armadillo.
David had to make a split-second decision, should he trust the screen or not?
“Well, it doesn’t hurt to be prepared either way.”
Dashing as quickly as he dared down the rockface, he ran over to his table, grabbed his knapsack, and shovelled as much of the items on the table in as he could. Scampering back up the rockface he ran quickly to one of the few trees adorning it and broke off some of the sturdier looking branches. Finding a flat surface to use as a table items came spilling out of the knapsack and spilled across the rock. Grabbing a few lengths of wire and the sturdiest sharpest bits of metal he could find. Lashing the metal spear heads to the branches with the wire took a bit of figuring out but was completed in a short time. As he completed the last of the spears, he had the resources to make another screen blinked into existence.
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3 x Crude Spears Created
Otherworldly Materials Used Gives
+3 DMG
Causes Bleeding
“Damn! That’s Awesome!”
Standing up and looking in the direction that the armadillo was coming, he got a better look at it. Metal scales reflected the sunlight across the savannah, the light changing at dizzying speeds as the armadillo rolled at high speeds towards the rock. figuring that it would be here very soon based on how fast it was moving David stashed his scrap and tools back into the bag and hid it in a rocky crevice. Before he did that a few toys that he had made at home made their way into his pockets. As prepared as he could be, a hiding spot in some bushes was quickly found.
A thundering sound started to arrive, and the pile of boulders shook as the armadillo slammed into them. Despite what you would expect this didn’t slow down the creature one bit and it used the momentum to bounce up the rockface. Arcing high into the air it landed on all fours with a shocking crash. Sweeping its head back and forth it seemed to be doing its best to scent David. Unfortunately for the armadillo his scent was everywhere as he had spent much of his time dashing around to get the items to make the spears.
“Ok, here goes nothing.” He thought as he slowly reached into a pocket. Waiting for the exact time that the creature was looking away from him, one of the toys arced through the air and when it landed a loud beeping and rattling sound appeared. Spinning around the armadillo pounced swiping madly. Its claws swept through thin air narrowly missing the top of the toy.
Taking his chance, David darted forward and slid under the belly of the car sized creature stabbing upwards as he did with a spear. Leaving it there he got up as quick as he could hearing the swish of claws just miss him and strike the rock that he darted behind.
The Pinwheel armadillo howled in pain as blood poured out of the wound and soaked the spear. More blood fell than you would presume a simple spear wound would cause. Scratching madly at its soft belly it managed to flick away the spear and send it slamming into a rock breaking the haft.
David started sneaking as quietly and as quickly as he could around the rock and into another pile of bushes. Pulling the other toy out of his pockets, it landed on another section of the bloodied rock and started the same beeping and rattling noise.
The armadillo whirled to face the noise once again. Attempting the same attacking method David ran and slid under the beast again stabbing another part of the belly causing another gushing wound. However, it seemed like the armadillo had learnt from the first attack and managed to slice across David’s back opening it up in a spray of blood. With a mangled cry of pain David fell forward and grabbed his last remaining spear and stood with his back against a wall.
The beast prowled forwards blood soaking the rock beneath it. There was deathly silence only broken by the wind whipping through the trees. Rising to its hind legs David knew that he was about to die, but as the armadillo swung its clawed paws towards his face, the world seemed to slow the paw moving inch by inch leaving plenty of time for David to move out of the way and unleash a desperate flurry of attacks to the beasts chest. Wounds appeared at a calamitous rate and then time started again. The paw crashing into the rock behind him. In his shocked calm David saw and opening and took it, slamming his spear home through the creature’s eye and into its brain. Jumping quickly out of the way of the death throes several screens appeared in quick succession.
Pinwheel Armadillo Defeated
220xp
3 Earth Essence
10 Gold
20 Metal Scales of the Armadillo
20 lb Pinwheel Armadillo meat
Level Up!
(No Class) Level 3
Collapsing to the ground in front of the suddenly withered looking creature, he left out a huge breath and as the adrenaline wore off, he felt a stinging sensation on his back from where the armadillo had caught him.
“Luck must be with me today, I lived, and these are not that deep at all.”
Suddenly remembering the screens that flashed in front of his eyes he found that if he concentrated on them that once again came to the forefront of his mind’s eye.
“I levelled up? Is this world a game? It can’t be, surely? And what’s this? Loot?” Looking around he quickly found a plain brown sack that was just big enough to hold the items.
Reaching into the sack he pulled out several scales. Each one of the scales weighed about 2 pounds and the edges were razor sharp, they were made of a reflective metal and had a curved end that came to a point in the shape of a teardrop. The next item that David pulled out of the sack was a ghostly sphere with green and brown particles and light spinning in a never-ending swirl. At the bottom of the sack lying under a huge shank of meat, was the tell-tale shine of gold. Pulling out one of the gold coins David saw that the face of the coin was stamped with what looked like four towers and a string of numbers around the edge.
“Hmm that meat will go off soon, especially in this sunlight. Let’s see what do I have to help with that?”
Rummaging around in his knapsack David pulled out a large folded sheet of aluminium foil.
“Ahh yes I remember, this will do just fine”
Attempting to wrap the meat, David came across the slight problem that he didn’t have enough foil to wrap it all properly.
“Ok, then, too much meat, I guess I’m having a big dinner tonight.”
Building the fire went quickly as there was no shortage of fuel on the top of this pile of rocks. The trees were fairly dry to begin with and there was plenty of kindling to go around. Using his lighter got the fire going pretty quickly and shaving down some sticks made for a perfectly serviceable spit.
Using a spare knife that was in his tool bag, he quickly cleaned it in the fire and then cut off a large portion of the Armadillo meat and set that to roasting slowly over the fire. Now that the shank of meat was cut down the aluminium foil could easily wrap around the rest. By this time, the suns had begun to set.
The suns setting opened up the heavens for David to gaze at. The lack of light pollution lets the stars twinkle with unbridled glee down upon the planet. Nevertheless, the beautiful galaxy put a damper on David’s spirit. None of the constellations matched up with the ones he learnt as child.
After a quick meal, David stocked up the fire so it would burn through the night and tried to not let his anxiety about this strange new world keep him awake. Soon he drifted off to sleep. What seemed like only minutes later he was jolted roughly from sleep by a piercing whistle.
“Hey, anyone alive up there?”