As the adrenaline from the fight wore off, Joe decided to check his resources in his statistics screen.

Health: 6/6

Staminia: 0/10

Mana: 1/18

His mana was all spent casting his Lightning Jolt spell 3 times, so the fact that he had 1 point again after just a minute meant his recharge rate wasn't too bad. The stamina regeneration rate was obviously lower as it was still at 0, even though it was spent before the mana.

Not wanting to attract more crabs, Joe grabbed the crab's shell where it wasn't cracked and broken and dragged it off towards the trees. After getting the corpse to a safe distance from the river Joe started to gather large stones and dry wood to make a fire pit. When his electricity cooked parts of the crab Joe noticed he was rather hungry. Since he had no idea when this body he inherited last ate he decided to start getting things ready for when he could cast his Harvest spell.

Setting up the cook fire took Joe back to when his sons were young and loved to go camping. He wasn't a camping master, but at least he knew how to do simple tasks in the wild, so cooking whatever meat came from his spell shouldn't be beyond him.

Now for the tricky part. Before Joe cast his Harvest spell he wanted to get the fire going and ready, but he's never used electricity to start a fire before. He didn't want to throw the full power of his Lightning Jolt into a piece of wood, afraid that it might just char the wood without starting an actual fire. The description of the spell implied that he could put less power into the output of the spell.

The three times he cast the spell on the crab, Joe found that it was rather intuitive, like this CWEST system did the work for him. Joe grabbed a suitable piece of kindling in one hand and put a finger of his other hand on the top of it. He closed his eyes and focused on the feeling of the energy inside him that he had felt moving when he cast the spell before. Joe latched onto the feeling of that flow and tried to throttle it as he cast the spell, aiming for 1/3 of his total output as he channeled it through his finger.

Success!

Joe quickly took his finger off the end of the piece of wood and a small flame caught on the dry wood. He positioned the flame to spread to the other kindling in the fire pit and spent a few minutes getting the fire going. It seemed that even though he only used 1/3 of the power, it still cost the full 6 mana to cast. While not ideal, it was still good to know that it wasn't too difficult to adjust the parameters of his spells within their guidelines.

Once the fire was going and he added a large flat stone as a cooking surface Joe turned towards the remains of the crab and cast his second spell, Harvest. From the description of both the spell and the crab itself, he was anticipating getting some meat out of this. Harvest ended up taking an entire minute to cast, unlike Lightning Jolt which was nearly instantaneous. When it was done the crab disappeared and in its place was a couple of things. One was a package of brown butcher paper, the other was a vial of blue liquid. The familiar CWEST chime prompted Joe to open his new notification screen.

Results of Harvest spell:

2 crab steaks (raw)

1 crab steak (cooked)

4 lumps of crab meat (cooked)

1 vial of crab blood

Sure enough, inside the package of butcher paper was the meat. Fortunately the raw meat was in another layer of butcher paper so it didn't contaminate the cooked portions. Even though he had cooked meat, presumably from his spell cooking the crab in its shell, Joe still decided to cook the raw steaks he had so they'd travel better. Plus, he had no idea when he might not have a convenient place for a firepit next time. Joe sated his hunger on the lumps of crab meat while he cooked the two raw steaks. Since he had finally regained some stamina, Joe decided to Inspect the pre-cooked steaks.

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Crab Steak (Cooked). This meat came from a crab. It is packed full of protein and is tasty to most people, too. Cooking has removed the parasites common in crustaceans and made it safe to eat.

Now he'd be able to compare the ones he's cooking just to be safe. Joe also decided to check out the vial of blood.

Vial of Crab Blood. This blue color is highly popular as an ingredient in colored inks. While it has no unique uses in culinary or alchemy arts, it is blood and as such can be used in dozens of recipes for foods or potions.

The line about culinary and alchemy uses reminded Joe about something he saw earlier. After using a stick to flip the cooking crab steaks over, Joe looked along the forest floor until he found several examples of what he presumed were Bobo nuts.

Bobo Nut. This delightful little nut is quite delicious to most species. Roasted Bobo nuts are a popular street vendor offering in climes that support the deciduous tree. They also have some alchemical purposes.

Joe remembered that his Read Aura ability can add to what he learns from Inspect, so he activated that on the nut. He could see some energy flowing around the nut. It felt like life, but Joe wasn't sure if that was because of the nature of its magic, or if all seeds looked like that due to their potential. Before the aura faded Joe used Inspect once more.

Bobo Nut. This delightful little nut is quite delicious to most species. Roasted Bobo nuts are a popular street vendor offering in climes that support the deciduous tree. They are also an easily accessible ingredient in basic health-related alchemical compounds.

On the advice of the description Joe gathered up several more and tossed them next to the crab meat on the heated stone. He wanted to take more with him for later, but without a bag, all he had were his empty pockets and they'd be stuffed full of his previous harvest.

After everything was cooked Joe ate his fill and crept back to the river to drink up, hoping there were no parasites in the water as he didn't have the capacity to boil it. The food and drink seemed to help his stamina refill quicker, but didn't have any noticeable affect on his mana. Once both were topped off he decided to go exploring. Despite the local source of food and water, this wasn't a long term solution. This body had to have come from somewhere, so maybe he could find someone or something to help him survive.

Joe buried the remnants of his fire then went back to the tree he climbed earlier to get away from the crab. If he could get up higher he could look further up and down the river and see if there are any signs of habitation. It took him a while, but Joe got a good 12 meters off the ground to a strong, sturdy branch with a view of the river. As he got onto the branch itself he heard a new chime.

E- Get a bird's eye view of your local!

You have received CWEST experience for learning more about the local terrain.

And another pop up.

Climbing skill unlocked, +1 to Strength.

Joe decided that 12 meters off the ground was not the best place to get into skills, so he closed the windows for now and looked up and down the river. Down the river were far more trees, most of them looked like the Bobo Nut trees like what he was in now. Up the river the trees thinned out and there were rocky outcroppings jutting out to the water's edge. Some of the rocky areas looked as tall as the trees around him. Off in the distance, just past the rocks he saw what looked like smoke. Several sources of it. There must be a town or something.

The climb down was a little easier, and as before Joe activated his Land on Your Feet ability when dropping off the lowest branch. There were more cutting crustaceans along the river bank. Fortunately they appeared to be solitary creatures, and they were all as dumb as the first one he fought, so Joe was able to repeat his tactics from earlier. After he killed the first crab on his trip upriver he noticed that he only got experience for the kill, he didn't get experience for the tactics he used, perhaps because it's not a new strategy? Joe killed a fourth crab on the trip, his fifth all day, when he got a new notification.

C- enemy defeated!

You have received experience for your successful killing of a Cutting Crustacean.

You have reached level 2 Mage and gained +2 Intelligence, +1 Agility, and +2 Unassigned points.

Please choose 1 new spell to learn from the following list: Flame Burst, Cold Snap, Minor Levitation, Extend Sight, Smoke and Mirrors, Healing Touch, or Deflection Field.

While he still wanted the levitation spell he looked at before, he also wanted to survive this new life of his, so Joe picked the Healing Touch spell.