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Still slightly befuddled by his experience and confrontation with his own death, Avan sat on his butt on the grass and tried to process what he had experienced.
He ran both hands over his face with slightly trembling hands and exhaustedly rubbed both of his eyes while he let out a long and clear sigh.
What kind of fucked up shit was that? I would have really liked to have been spared that... The death of others is one thing, but to be dismembered in this way? Fuck off...
"And hopefully, Horny is at least okay..." He finished his train of thought quietly, mumbling.
Avan took some time to compose himself and finally stood up, shaking his head, with his hands on his knees, and took a closer look at the surroundings.
The god of death had set him down on a small grassy hill, just high enough to see over the trees in front of him, while behind him a steep rock face seemed to rise into the sky, where a hot sun greeted him.
He squinted into the sun, whose rays stung his eyes mercilessly, and tried to figure out what wasn't quite right here.
Forest, meadow... Hills. Mountain behind me. Sun, sky... Everything normal...? He thought feverishly, while something seemed to gnaw at his subconscious. What is wrong?
He turned his head away from the sun and continued to look around, still searching for the one thing that was different.
A forest stretched out in front of him, fencing him in and leading directly to the mountain to the left and right of the hill, while in the distance in front of him he could see a small clearing with a few wooden huts.
The sun had driven away any clouds far and wide, and the sound of birdsong and a light wind whistling through the trees could be heard from the surrounding area. All in all, an idyllic place and seemingly far and wide nothing unusual to see.
The sun? The sun! How the hell does the sun and a sky come about here underground in the dungeon? THAT'S NOT RIGHT! Avan finally noticed and took a closer look at the sky and the horizon with wide eyes. "But there is even wind! Am I not in the dungeon anymore? WHERE the heck am I?"
Before he could frantically look around, he first calmed down and tried to approach the matter logically.
"God of death. Black portal. Other dimension? A test. Maybe an intermediate dimension?" He muttered to himself while he counted the facts on his fingers. "The fact is that I may not be in the dungeon anymore. On the other hand, the guy also just changed something and interfered with the actual testing of the plane.... So maybe the level is really as I see it, only with a death element? Or this monster has completely changed everything... Who knows. In any case, I have to pass some kind of test to move forward."
Nodding his head, he focused his gaze once again on his surroundings and looked around for the next clue. Turning, Avan let his gaze wander up the steep rock face and shook his head at the sheer height before him. Turning further, his gaze wandered over the forest that surrounded him and finally stopped at the small collection of wooden huts in the distance.
"Obviously, and hopefully correctly, that seems to be the only clue far and wide." He talked to himself once again while analyzing.
"Then... I guess there's only this one direction I can go for now."
Out of habit, he reached for his backpack strap, and was briefly startled to notice once again that it was still missing. At least I'm not completely lost with my dungeon inventory... Puuuuh... he calmed himself down once more and made his way down the hill to the edge of the forest, first with hesitant and then firmer steps.
The entire forest in front of him consisted of maple trees and Avan briefly thought of his similarly named [Golden Meaples]. Again wondering about the similar name, he quickly summoned another of his last six fruits and stared at it admiringly in his right hand.
Why haven't I eaten one in a while? he asked himself, shrugging his shoulders, satisfying his appetite and biting into the fruit heartily as he let his gaze wander into the maple forest.
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[Threshold reached!]
To advance to the next rank of your skill, you lack the required level! The advancement of the skill is currently not possible!
He cursed loudly and scolded himself for his stupidity. Ahhh fuck! Did I waste one of the last fruits now?
With a glance at his character interface and his listed skills, an idea came to him and he slapped his right palm in front of his forehead.
"Of course! I'm an idiot! ALL my skills have stopped at bronze nine! As if that didn't give enough information about it. Damn! And I'm also wasting something so valuable to get to this obvious realization. Just stupid Avan!" He cursed further and rubbed his eyes with the fingers of his right hand, shaking his head slightly.
With a long and annoyed sigh and still gently shaking his head left and right, he finally came to terms with it.
"There's nothing I can do about it now anyway.... At least I know it for the future. Skills are bound to my own level... Great."
Slightly frustrated, he marched off and entered the light forest in front of him, which let many rays of sunlight shine through the maple leaves.
As soon as Avan stepped between the trees, he looked around in amazement and marveled at the rays of light that shone harmoniously and perfectly between the maple leaves on the very lush and green forest floor here and there.
Right on the bark and trunks of the maple trees grew [porcini mushrooms] and the ground was covered with green grass everywhere where the sun's rays could reach.
He could finally rely on his dungeon senses again, and everything within a ten-meter radius was clear and distinct before his inner eye when he concentrated on it.
Except for the mushrooms, the trees and the grass with various weeds in between, nothing could be sensed in his immediate surroundings.
Satisfied and for the moment permanently leaving a mental anchor on his dungeon senses, he continued in the direction of the small village, which he had seen from the hill in this direction.
After barely ten minutes on foot, Avan noticed an inconsistency in his surroundings. His dungeon sense had briefly grasped something new.
Cautiously and with quiet steps he went back a little and there it was again.
A person? No... A child. A girl? Appears human. Hmm... His thoughts flashed through his head as he perceived the young girl at the edge of his sphere of influence.
Still cautious, Avan walked toward the girl and could now see, even within his range of influence, that she was picking mushrooms with a woven rush basket.
The girl was dressed in a simple brown dress, with brown hair tied in a braid at the back of her head with a red bow, and was barely older than nine.
Not five meters he stopped next to a maple tree and saw the girl now also with his own eyes just kneeling in front of another tree just picking a few of the porcini mushrooms on a tree.
With an extra loud clearing of his throat and his right fist in front of his mouth, Avan drew attention to himself, which caused the girl to startle briefly and she drove around in fear, looking for the source of the sound.
Before things got weird, he waved at her placatingly. "Hi, sorry to bother you, but I got lost and was just heading towards that village back there..." He explained himself with a pointing of his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the collection of wooden huts. "I didn't mean to scare you or anything. Sorry."
Still standing there distant, he looked waitingly at the girl, who continued to stare at him with wide eyes. Shaking her head and snapping out of her trance, she then grinned at him with an innocent-looking smile that was only seen in children. "Oh, hello, sir. Ahm... I was just startled!" She explained to him with a squeaky voice.
"I... was just going to pick these mushrooms here and then run back to my grandpa's..." She explained nervously, fiddling with her brown dress.
"If you'd like... I can introduce you to my grandpa! He's the village chief. Or are you a bad man?" She looked at him again momentarily fearful as this frightening thought came to her.
Avan, who saw the reaction and had already wondered about the far too naive and open manner, smiled at her and took a step back. "All is well. No, I am not a bad man. But you should indeed be very careful with strangers! I'll wait over here until you're done, okay?"
She hurriedly nodded at him and seemed to believe him immediately. This is why we were always told as children not to follow strangers.... He laughed inwardly and sat down back-first against the tree he had just been standing by, his dungeon senses focused on hopefully not letting anyone sneak up on him.
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