[https://i.imgur.com/VB54kVt.jpg?1]

To think that just a couple of hours ago my interface was completely different from what I’m seeing right now. There’s a huge improvement all across the board but the biggest gains are in my SOUL stats. This is just amazing. It’s only a difference of 2 levels so I can’t get complacent or let up. Need to forge ahead and push myself more. It’s nice that I even got a couple of levels in Analyze but I need to do better. Much better. There are powerful creatures out there and while I’m strong for a level 2, most of the things out there won’t even register me as a threat. Adam was feeling appreciate of his gains before he realized that he was getting too self-satisfied, so he forced himself to be objective and assess himself and the creatures he had seen and the facts brought his rising over confidence to heel.

He couldn’t afford to become complacent or satisfied with what he had, he needed to be cautious but he needed to take risks as well. He had barely survived his first kill but that encounter had gained so much. And I only had less than half the strength I have now. But you’re right Adam. YOU can’t afford to get overconfident but you can’t afford to take it easy either.

Having finished making grand declarations, and chastising himself for those declarations, Adam proceeded to go over his attributes to try and decipher what they actually did. He thought he would have a much better idea after having gone through 2 level ups and for the most he was more or less right. The only attributes that still confused him were the SOUL stats.

Except for the SOUL stats I understand more or less what the rest of the stats do, and honestly speaking these stats aren’t like traditional rpg stats. I can’t just min-max and dump everything into a few stats and expect to live long. Adam felt strongly about this fact. He couldn’t just rely on a few stats and forget about al the rest.

The stats are more or less bound to each other. They depend on one another to bring out their full potential. And that makes a lot of sense since all these stats represent me, my body, mind and soul. Adam thought, I get that BODY and MIND are linked and the stats are dependent on one another but what bugs me is the SOUL stats.

They don’t explain much of what they do. All 3 attributes affect my physical and mental stats and my skills and resistances but the interface doesn’t show the exact numbers. Is it a design flaw of the interface? who am I kidding! This thing is millions of years old at least. SO not a design flaw but a feature. But than why? Adam was fixated on the soul stats. He was sure that there was a mystery there and that solving it would provide him answers which would be beneficial.

After staring at his interface for a few minutes Adam had reached a decision. He decided that he just didn’t have enough information to decide or to make up his mind. So instead, he decided to leave his free points alone until he stopped gaining attributes from the creatures in the forest or until he reached a point where he had no choice but to use his points. Till then he was going to rely on his Devour skill for the stat gains.

With his mind made up, Adam took a long look at himself and observed the physical changes brought about by his stat gains. After having lost nearly half his stats his body had looked thin and frail, like someone suffering anemia but now after having nearly doubled his stats, he had gained extra muscle mass and weight. He didn’t look like a body builder at all but more like a fighter with lean and compact muscles. Even during his tenure in the military, he had never looked as solid as he did now. And I’m probably going to look even more jacked with increased stats. Soon I might even put Greek gods to shame. Hah. The thought made Adam laugh, Now let’s go work off some of this extra energy. And with that thought in his head Adam quickly made some mud and slathered it over himself before heading out in to the woods and towards the pond.

Adam was full of unbridled energy but he reined it in with his will and set up about carefully through the forest. I should have learned a stealth or sneak skill with all the stalking I’ve been doing. Right? Wasn’t that how skills worked? You practice something long enough and you learn it? Adam thought about it and mentally slicked on the skills tab.

SKILLS: Skills refer to system recognized and empowered abilities, techniques and spells which users can learn through a myriad of means. Skills can be active or passive or both and have innumerable variety of uses and effects. Skills are categorized based upon their relative ability compared to other skills of the same type and the classification ranges from Common[C] to Myth[M], there is a direct relation between the rarity of a skill and its classification, with higher tiers being rarer. Effectiveness of skills increase with proficiency. Users can have at most 13 skills. Note that repetition of certain actions with an actual intent can be recognized by the system as a skill and after a certain number of repetitions will endowed upon the user as a system recognized skill. This is the most common method of obtaining skills outside of class skills ad profession skills.

I was right! I should have learned a sneak skill by now. So why haven’t I? Wait, I get it now. It’s because of my class!

Wildling of Hunger: What was left behind after Adam Clément’s aptitude devoured his class Neophyte Wildling. The class like Neophyte Wildling centers around learning creature abilities and skills. Unlike the original this version of the class does so through devouring the remaining essence of slain creatures. The abilities and skills learned this way are modified to suit the user.

- User has gained skill [ devour ]

- User gains +2 to all attributes per level

- User cannot make use of weapons or equipment. User can wear equipment but the bonuses will not apply. User can hold weapons but bonuses will not apply and cannot use skills learned through devour

- Except for class skills user cannot learn skills in any other way other than through devouring.

- Essence requirement needed to reach saturation point has significantly increased.

- Cannot learn or use spells

The beast stirs, its hunger grows

That bit about not being able to learn skills other than through devouring is a letdown. And as soon as I find out what spells can do, that bit about spells is probably going to suck as well. Adam let out a sigh. No point crying over what I can’t have. I guess the system has to balance classes, but the class wasn’t given by the system, my aptitude ate that one and it left me this. So my aptitude doesn’t want me to learn skills outside of the ones I learn through using Devour? Is that it? There was no answer, no confirmation or denial. Adam might as well have been talking to himself, in fact he was talking to himself.

Still, this class was tailor built to use together with my aptitude, regardless of not being able to learn skills or spells, this class this has provided me a way to get stronger and survive the creatures in the trial. As these thoughts were going through Adam’s head, he was still stalking through the underbrush as he made his way towards the pond.

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On one of his stops that he regularly made as stalked through the forest, Adam crouched down behind a trunk covered by a thick bush and observed his surroundings, he saw a beetle latched on to a tree just ahead of him and it was only a few feet up the trunk instead of being meters high.

Armored Black Beetle(7): Black Beetles are usually herbivorous insects that have a preference towards Pine trees for their sap. These insects are usually 1m long and can grow bigger with levels. They are generally docile and would not attack unless provoked. They have evolved their shells to be extremely sturdy and hard to penetrate in order to defend against their natural predators, birds. The Armored Black Beetle variant has an even tougher defense while sacrificing their speed. They possess high endurance, vitality and natural defenses and possess an innate ability to harden their shells even more. They have low speed and reaction.

This is perfect! It’s slow and analyze hasn’t shown me anything that I need to be worried about. It’s just tanky. And it isn’t too high up so I can reach it with my attacks. Thoughts of how to exploit the opportunity the beetle provided raced through Adam’s head as he observed his surroundings one last time to make sure there weren’t any surprises waiting for him before he committed to his plan of action.

He stalked slowly towards the beetle and made sure not do anything give away any of his movements. Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. Don’t focus directly on the beetle and keep focused on a point above it. Adam repeated the chant in his head as he made his way through the bush, keeping his footfalls close together and his body low to the ground and stable. He only had 5 meters left to reach the beetle before he took cover behind a tree and observed.

The creature was still facing up towards the sky and he could hear sounds of bark being chipped away and he could see sap flowing down the spot where the beetle was latched on to. It was feeding. Lucky! Animals were at their most vulnerable either while eating, shitting or mating and this applied to insects as well.

He envisioned what he was going to do and decided to hunt the beetle without his empowerment skill in order to get a sense of what he was capable of without the over powered skill. So he readied himself to use Penetrate and Bolster for the hunt. He slowly took a deep breathe before he exhaled and kicked off the ground with his legs, like a coiled spring being released.

He covered the ground between him and the beetle in less than a second as he activated his skills. Bolster! Penetrate! Adam mentally activated Bolster at full power and formed his right hand into a knife hand and activated Penetrate. When he reached striking distance, he aimed at the joint connecting the beetle’s head to the rest of the body and thrust his hand through the spot, his fingers and then his hand went through the joint with almost no resistance and then went on to penetrate the tree trunk till his wrist before stopping.

The beetle’s head was hanging on to the body by just a thread of muscle before it finally snapped and the head fell down to the forest floor. Adam slowly took a breath and filled his lungs as he stood with his hand through the trunk with a headless beetle attached to it. He was taken by surprise when he had decapitated the beetle so easily and quickly and it hadn’t even managed to react. Pat yourself on the back later, for now Devour. The essence that made up the beetle’s corpse was quickly absorbed into Adam leaving nothing behind but a black sludge that was quickly disappearing as well.

Without waiting to see if the goop had disappeared, Adam made his way towards the pond and hid in the reeds on the far side before he relaxed and went through what had happened.

That kill shouldn’t have been that easy. The thing was an armored variant of a species that’s only gimmick was their defense, so why did I go through it like a hot knife through butter? Adam had questions with how easy the kill had been. Let’s try to crunch the numbers here, Bolster at full power for less than 2 seconds almost boosted my BODY attributes by 30% which meant that including the boost from efficiency I had almost triple my base attributes. If I add the attack boost from penetrate and the ability to ignore 20% defense, it still doesn’t add up. The beetle was level 7 and it had most of its attributes focused on defense and so it still doesn’t add up. Wait. My titles. Fuck I forgot about those.