The four of them walked through the forest, looking for anything edible. They saw a few other rabbits, but Martin wouldn’t let the others hunt them.
“We need to eat something soon.” John said.
“I’m not letting you kill a rabbit in front of Kenny. You’re gonna traumatize him!” Martin spat, leaving no room for argument. After a bit more walking they finally found some animals they could eat. Three foxes were stalking through the underbrush. Hailey had pointed them out, due to having the highest perception of the group.
They all looked at the foxes, waiting for a chance to sneak up on them. Mike looked at them, noticing how their fur was a bit darker and more brownish than he would have expected. They also seemed to have shorter legs than most foxes, maybe something the system changed. Mike was pondering why that might be when he saw one climb a tree.
“Oh, that makes sense.” He muttered.
“What makes sense?” John asked, confused.
“The foxes have shorter legs, to make it easier to climb the trees.” Mike replied.
“Foxes don’t climb trees.” Martin said, despite clearly seeing it in front of him.
“Bunnies usually don't heal bruises either.” Mike said, pointing towards Kenny.
“Fine, the fox can climb, what does it matter?” John asked.
“It means you and Hailey are the only ones who can reach it, since me and Martin just have big sticks to swing around.”
Looking back to the foxes, he once more tried to closely inspect them, trying to see if there were any other notable differences.
*Skill unlocked. Inspect (Common)*
*Forest Fox (level 2)*
*Fragment obtained*
The notifications appeared in the corner of his vision this time, instead of filling his view with the status screen.
“Nice, just got a skill, and a fragment too!” Mike said in an excited whisper, not wanting to alert the fox. He looked forward to having a moment to rest so he could inspect
the fragment and see what it could do.
“What is it?” Martin asked, also seeming excited.
“It's called Inspect.”
“What does it do?”
“Uh, well,” Mike just knew it let him see the name and level of something, but that seemed kind of lame when comparing it to Martin's skill to give Kenny a boost. “I can look at the name and level of the fox.”
“What does the description say?” Martin asked, seemingly also a bit underwhelmed.
“Description?”
“Yeah, the bit of text that appears when you look at the skill in your status menu.”
“Oh yeah, let me check.” Mike said, pretending like he knew about that the whole time. Opening his status and looking at the skill, he selected it.
Inspect (Common)
Inspect a target, learning their race and level. Affected by perception and level disparity.
“Welp, it's almost exactly what I told you, plus the fact that my perception and the level disparity affect it.”
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
“That's kinda lame.” John said
“It will help us, probably.” Martin reassured, not seeming too convinced himself.
“Oh well it's nice to have anyways.”
They continued watching the foxes for a moment, before deciding they didn't need to worry about the small animals. They ran over, ready to dispatch them and try to cook them. As they began their jog, the foxes noticed them and got into defensive poses. Martin got to them first, cutting one completely in half with his sword. They all paused for a moment, looking at the sheer amount of gore that simple swing had spread. They clearly shouldn’t have lost focus, as the second fox ran over and bit Mike in the calf.
“Damn it!” Mike screamed before caving in the creature's skull. “Damn that sucked.” Mike hissed, clenching his teeth. Kenny hopped over, nuzzling the wound, before it began to close at a visible rate. Seeing the small animal, the fox in the tree took its chance and leapt down, aiming straight for the defenseless rabbit. Mid fall, an arrow and spell missed it by a few feet.
The fox was about to land on Kenny, when the bunny began to glow and sprinted away much faster than the fox could have moved. The fox hit the ground with a squeal before Mike slammed his maul into the foxes side. The group stood there, looking at the blood that now caked the grass around them.
“Well that was unpleasant.” John remarked, avoiding standing in the gore.
“Martin, you have the only sharp thing, which means you get to butcher them.” Hailey said. Her face was pale and she looked like she might hurl.
“Lets just sit for a second, not by all of the fox parts of course.” Mike said a bit shaken himself. They all walked over to a clean patch of ground that was also out of sight of the mess. No one seemed to be in the mood to talk, so Mike saw it as a good time to check his notifications.
*Forest Fox (level 3) slain X2*
*Class level up! Warrior (level 1)*
*Fragments Obtained*
Mike took a look at his status sheet, wanting to see what leveling up had done.
Name: Mike Jones
Race: Human (level 0)
Class: Warrior (level 1)
Profession: N/A
Trait: N/A
Titles: N/A
Health: 172/180
Mana: 80/80
Stamina:84/125
Health Regeneration: 17 Per minute
Mana Regeneration: 6 Per minute
Stamina Regeneration: 18 Per minute
Stats:
Strength: 10
Constitution: 9
Agility: 7
Wisdom: 6
Intelligence: 8
Charisma: 7
Perception: 7
Fortitude: 8
Unspent points: 3
Skills:
Advanced language comprehension (Uncommon)
Basic weapon handling (Common)
Inspect (Common)
He saw a few changes, the most notable being that his stats went up. Quite a bit too. He also noticed the unspent points mentioned in the class description. Taking a guess at what they did, he tried putting them all into strength.
Strength: 13
Next, he wanted to see what all these fragments were about. Trying to put himself in a relaxed state, he found it much easier this time to enter his soul, taking him only a few minutes. As his vision shifted, he saw what he had been looking for right away. In Front of him, glowing dimly, were two white cubes. He moved over to each, trying to see what they were. As he looked, there names and descriptions appeared on a system screen in front of him.
Fragment of skill creation (Common)
Earned for learning or creating a skill without system assistance.
Fragment of a Warrior (level 1) (common)
Earned for being a level 1 Warrior.
They both seemed pretty basic, but Mike was happy to see them nonetheless. He remembered the system had said he could shape them, so he decided to try. He reached out to grab one before remembering he didn't have hands in here. Reaching out with his will, he moved the warrior fragment to rest on top of the skill fragment. Trying a few more things out, he discovered that he could change the shape of them to a limited degree.
He couldn’t change the size, but he could change the shape that they took and how they connected together. After returning them both to a cube shape, he put them back to the position they were in originally before once more exiting his soul.
Emerging from his meditation, he saw that everyone else was sitting around talking.
“Finally you are awake again.” Martin said. “We were waiting for you so we could gather the corpses without leaving you defenseless.”
“Sorry, I was looking at the fragments that I got.” Mike did feel sorry, as he hadn't thought about how the others needed to watch him. They didn't know if there were more foxes in the area. They walked as a group back over to the scene of the fight, only to find each of the bodies missing, with each trail of blood leading in a different direction.
“Crap, should have expected something to take the bodies.” Martin said, frustrated.
“We can just go hunt some more, it wont take that long.” John said, trying to calm Martin down. “Besides, if we follow the blood trails, we can find whatever took them and hunt them instead.”
“Fine, but we need to eat soon, or else we will need to pick berries for several hours, and finding enough to feed four people sounds like hell.”
With that they picked a trail at random and began following it. They stayed silent as they walked, just following the trail of blood that was getting smaller as they walked.
After 10 minutes, Martin motioned for everyone to stop, before crouching behind a bush. Everyone followed him down, not knowing what they were hiding from. Mike peered through his bush, trying to see what the danger was. He spotted a few figures, but through the bush couldn't make them out very well. Just as he was about to give up, he got a notification.
Wolf Alpha (level 5)
“Shit, it's wolves. Level five at that” Mike whispered to the others. Hailey looked like she was struggling not to turn tail and sprint away as fast as she could. They started backing away slowly, trying to leave the wolves alone, when they heard growling coming from all around them. “Damn it, we’re surrounded.” Hailey said, spotting the wolves through the underbrush. Just as the words left her mouth, the first wolf looked at her, then pounced.