"And it was justified, in a sense. The innovations had slowed down, but the world was still inconceivably different from even a few centuries ago. We could only imagine the wonders millions of years of progress would bring."
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A storm of emotions gripped Alex. His emotional state still hadn’t recovered from the integration, and he never had time to process any of this. Adding to the trauma by losing his first potential ally was the final straw. Alex had never witnessed death firsthand, and to experience it in such a brutal manner was overwhelming. He felt a well of indescribable anger building up in him, waiting to be released. He pushed it down in the moment, realizing that he had to do something before letting it out.
Alex ran to the edge of the clearing and opened his status screen.
Attributes
Physical
Mental
Power
8
8
Resistance
8
8
Speed
8
8
Recovery
8
8
Free points: 4
Everything was the same except for one line:
Energy: 0.6 / 19.0 Lucens (Tier 0)
He had almost died, and he had advanced less than a twentieth of the way to the next level. And getting to the next level probably wasn’t that great, anyway, considering that there were multiple entire tiers. He knew he wasn’t thinking straight, still in emotional flux, but he made a decision. He put all of his free points into Physical Power, bringing it up to 12, and then tapped ‘Confirm’.
A surge of strength rushed into Alex’s body. He had been reasonably fit before the integration, and it seemed that he was slightly stronger and faster in this world anyway, but this was something totally different. New power permeated his muscles and his bones, and he thought that this is what he would feel like if he had worked out every day for the past couple of years in college. The odd part was that his body didn’t physically change or become bigger; it just became more capable of exerting force.
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Alex’s decision wasn’t entirely spur of the moment. He had made several important observations. The first was that the woman chose to stay and fight the ants to the death in a battle in which the odds were massively stacked against her, even though it was possible to flee into the forest. This suggested that whatever was in the forest was probably more dangerous, and he had gotten extremely lucky not to die on his mad dash towards her clearing. She had been able to speak while he couldn’t even walk straight, which showed that she had probably been here for at least a few hours longer and had more experience, so he should take her actions seriously. So he surmised that his only chance of survival was to stay and fight the ants.
As to why he put his points into strength, Alex realized that it would be virtually impossible to kill them without a massive boost to the power of his strikes. He had hit the ant-like creature at least seven times throughout the course of the fight with all of his might, and only then did it die. There was no way he would get the opportunity to land so many strikes without dying against three opponents. If he chose another attribute, he would get hit far more times compared to if he just ended the fight quickly. Even if he increased his Physical Resistance or Recovery, unless the effect of points on different attributes was dramatically different, there would be no way that those improved qualities would offset the difference.
All of these thoughts had been going through his head during the battle, and the allocation of the points was performed in less than two seconds. Even so, the three remaining ant-lizards were almost upon him, and he was backed against the edge of the clearing. It was at this moment, powered up by the newfound strength infusing his body, that Alex let loose his pent-up rage, confusion and frustration at the inexplicable situation that he had been thrust into. His coordination now fully recovered, he weaved his way between two of the charging ants, smashing down on one of them as he passed. He was nicked by a mandible in the process, but the adrenaline coursing through his veins numbed the pain. Unfortunately, despite his increased strength, the ant seemed more infuriated than wounded and let out a low-pitched buzz.
The three ants turned around to face him, but not before he got in another strike. This time, it looked like he had hit the right spot, and the ant buckled beneath his blow. But its brethren charged forward and slashed at his legs, leaving huge gashes where they hit. Alex felt his knees buckling and his vision turn red, and then a primal instinct took hold. He smashed the ant on the right with a force he didn’t know he could muster, and a surge of energy entered his body from the kill. The ant attacking his left leg gouged his torso. A second later, Alex crushed its head with his club, feeling the energy surge into his body and propelling him forward.
He felt himself crawling over to the third ant, which had been incapacitated earlier by his strike. But this time, instead of ending its life, he felt a weird sensation take hold of him. He had essentially lost everything he cared about in the span of less than a day — his home, his studies, his hobbies, and his dreams of the future — and many of his friends and family were likely dead. And to top it all off, he had been forced to fight for his life, sustaining grevious wounds. Something in him snapped. The hard nature of the System was starting to sink in. Life was no longer a cerebral endeavor, working to solve abstract problems on computers. It was now a bitter struggle, red in tooth and claw. And in that moment, he was overcome with an inexplicably strong rage, a desire to inflict pain, far more powerful than anything he had experienced before.
Alex watched himself take his anger out on the hapless ant, breaking its long legs and beating them to a pulp. He was not proud of his actions, but to try to go against this unbelievably strong feeling of rage was nearly impossible. He saw himself crushing the ant-like creature’s exoskeleton, black fluid dripping out. He ripped the limbs off, and then started beating its mandibles, grinding them into paste on the ground. In agony, the ant let out an ear-piercing death rattle, an eerie and unnatural sound that seemed to carry frequencies into other dimensions. Alex felt a chill pass through him and felt sick to his stomach.
A prompt appeared in front of his eyes.
Trial Event: Kaphdor Death Rattle
Expected Number of Occurrences (Hunting Trial, Day 2): ~0.0057
Rating: Tier 0-B.
Primary effect: Access restricted to Tier 1 players and above, or players who have previously obtained at least 1 Kaphdor Death Rattle.
Secondary effect: Gain a Nature’s Rage Pill (Tier 0-C).
The chilling rattle and the cryptic prompt shook him out of his rage. He had somehow managed to trigger an event that, he guessed based on the second line of the prompt, was unlikely to occur at this point in the trial. And he had no idea what the primary effect was.