Chapter 9: self-realization

Today’s adventure was short leaving me with better part of sun light. I examined my new claw wounds on my chest, which were just beginning to clot and decided not to drink the potion. I’ll use my cooking skill to see if stamina recovery would work. I needed to get used to some degree of pain. A bath refreshed me, and I used the water in the safe room to wash both the rabbits. When the rabbit corpses came out, they were still bleeding as if they had been in a state of statis while in the inventory. I held them by their feet and drained the blood. I only knew that for butchering you slice the stomach and discard all the innards, but no one told me how difficult, bloody, and stinky this process is. Plus, now I had these stinky innards on my toilet floor with no idea how to deal with them. Next, I had to try and skin the rabbit, which was an utter disaster. I tried to use the knife to create a cavity at the foot of the rabbit and pull the skin. I think it might have been easier if I had a short knife to keep cutting the tendons as I pulled the skin, but with the long knife I had, there were gaping holes in the skin.

Phew! I managed to get the skin off but its unusable, but I still cleaned it, dried it and kept it in my inventory. I wasn’t even going to try and stretch the skin or so on at this point. Depending on the fur drops will have to do for now.

As I was working on cutting out the rabbit legs and ribs, my screen finally took pity on me, and a notification showed up.

Life skill Butchering – basic (Precision cut increase by 5% Perceived anatomy increase by 5%)

I don’t know how many more animals I will have to personally butcher before raising this skill and getting a fur or skin I could use, but it’s encouraging for now.

I had no other choice but to gather all innards in my washing bucket and taking them to the edge of the novice area and throwing them towards the forest, with the hope that they will be eaten by some small-time critters. The bucket still smelled even after a thorough wash. Damn taking a bath is going to be a challenge from now on.

As I lit the firewood and placed the meat in the iron pot with the water (not the fresh water) I chewed on an apple and decided to check my status. I was also curious if I had a new footnote today as they had been the most helpful ‘mystery boxes’ thus far.

Name: Caishen

Age: 16 years

Location: unprotected area

Level: 1 (Exp 175/500)

Attributes:

Physical

Strength – 10 (Physical power and carrying capacity)

Endurance – 8/10 wounded and bleeding (stamina and health)

Agility – 6 (coordination and reflexes)

Mental

Intelligence – 12 (deductive reasoning, memory, logic, and rationality)

Wisdom – 10 (self-awareness, perception, and insight)

Charisma – 8 (persuasiveness, leadership, and planning)

Skill 1: Appraisal level 1 (able to see full profile for anything up to level 2, half profile up to level 5 and basic profile up to level 10)

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Skill 2: Loot level 1 (Additional 10% loot, not applicable to any other source of loots except monster killing)

Skill 3: locked (available at level 5)

Life Skill Collect – Basic (Increase in harvesting speed – 5%, Able to collect loot without touching)

Life Skill Cooking – basic (taste up by 5%, stamina recovery up by 5%)

Life skill Butchering – basic (Precision cut increase by 5% Perceived anatomy increase by 5%)

Map function unlocked – 1 regional fragment.

Inventory - 2 pieces of bread (not dry), 2 medium sausages, 1196 mint leaves, 918 sweet berry, 2 broken branches, 3 small rock, 358 dry branches, 3 tree logs, 1 worn out shirt, 1 worn out pant, 1 katana (level 5), 1 iron pot, 2 packet of matches, 1 rusty water canteen, tarp, rope, one cup of coffee (hot or cold), 1 wolf fang, 1 wolf fur, 4.7 kg wolf meat, 29 dandelion flowers, 11 dandelion plants, 2 mint plants, 2 sweetberry shrubs, 2kg wild spinach, 5 spinach plants, 3 sweet potato roots, 67 apples (sweet and ripe), 1 apple tree, 1 monkey corpse, rabbit fur scraps, 350 ml fresh water, 1 L water, 1 rabbit meat scraps, 1 low recovery potion

“Congratulations on a wonderful start. There is always a benefit in checking simulated places, who knows where the surprises might be awaiting.”

The footnote had not changed causing some disappointment but after a thought I realized I had just foraged this morning so no new items may have spawned yet. I had a variety of things to use which made me sigh in relief. Though I had not reached level 2 it had been a productive day so far.

I washed the boiled rabbit meat pieces, cleaned the iron pot and set the fresh pot of water with the meat on the fire for cooking. Activating my cooking skill, I added some spinach and some berries to it and after a thought, I added slices of the half apple that I had been munching on. With the lack of salt and other aromatics I could only experiment with what I had at hand. Maybe my cooking skill could show some magic.

While the rabbit meat soup was cooking, I went through the day so far and realized that apart from fighting monsters, I will need some kind of exercise regime to increase my strength and agility. I also needed to create some kind of practice routine with the katana to get used to it quickly. Taking a page from the books I had read, I decided to go for a run around the novice area. True running lasted about 10 minutes before I slowed down to a jog and eventually to a walk, while sweating profusely. I wanted to lie down as soon as I was back but by sheer determination did 10 squats and 10 push-ups before I exhausted my energy and realized my wounds were starting to ache again.

Calling it a day, I checked the soup that had been cooking for a while by using 2 small branches as chopsticks and felt it needed some more time before it was ready. I used this time to clean out a proper pair of chop sticks with the knife when I heard the new notification.

Notification

Life Skill Carpenter – basic (increase in proficiency by 5%, increase in sturdiness by 5%)

Creating chopsticks counted as woodwork? I wasn’t complaining on getting a new skill for sure. With increase in levels of these life skills my survival rate would surely rise – right? This gave me an idea. Every action has so far led to a skill so if I practiced with the katana and the knife, does that mean I might be able to get new skills before reaching level 5? I decided to try it after eating as I still had some time before the sun set.

Dinner was unappetizing. Rabbit meat was cooked and sweetened with the berries but adding spinach was a very bad idea as it made the whole concoction bitter without salt. Apple pieces marinated with berries sweetness were probably the best part. I had been eating 2 meals a day including breakfast of berries today, so distasteful or not I ate the whole thing and drank the soup till the pot was all empty. Finally satiated I redeemed my hot cup of coffee and sat outside the room enjoying the fading light as the sun eventually set giving way to darkness. I couldn’t see the moon, but the sky was full of stars.

Did I wish there was a phone to scroll – of course, did I wish I had a book to read – you bet. Even having another person to talk to would have been an enormous luxury.

After a while, in the faint star light, I took out the katana and tried to slash as if hitting an invisible enemy. I didn’t know if my action was right or wrong and I didn’t care, but I kept practicing the same stance until the count reached hundred. That is when the final notification of the day sounded making me gratified and elated.

Combat Skill Slash – basic (increase in damage by 5%, increase in accuracy by 5%)

I didn’t know how these skills were classified but I did know that my sincere actions led to unlocking of these skills. They maybe low level now, but they would grow with practice making me stronger in the practice. I had a smile on my face as I slept with contentment in my heart. So, what, if this was an impossible situation, but doing my best I will create a chance for my survival.