image [https://i.imgur.com/sSsWNVf.jpeg]

Cycle finished!

Gain 200 copper bits.

4 new Crankscouts created.

Crankscout camouflage improved.

All wounds improve by one category.

All “per cycle” abilities refreshed.

Dark Forest

Going deeper into the woods, the harmless herbivores make way for the fiercer predatory species.

Back to the Dark Forest, huh? And it looks like the other guy hadn’t finished a quest here yet, so it’s still at the base tier. Going to be interesting to see how I fare against those wolves, with everything I’ve gotten since the last time I’ve been here.

The Dark Forest hadn’t changed at all since Will’s first turn. Tall trees rose around Will, a mixture of deciduous species, such as beeches and oaks, with evergreen pines and firs. Dense shrubs covered the ground, struggling to catch what little sun was let through by the taller plants.

Will could hear the howling of wolves inside the forest, and for all of his newfound abilities, still had to fight a rising fear as the sound went straight to his herbivorous instincts. Fighting off the fear, Will took a look at the quest message which popped up in front of him.

Main quest

Slay 10 Dark Forest Wolves.

Progress: 1/10

Reward:

Space rank-up

100 XP

1 skill shard

Oh, nice. It saves my quest progress if I don’t finish it, so this should go faster. Although… This could be the perfect place for me to grind some XP and cash, and maybe put a dent in those Crankscouts.

In a complete one-eighty to what he’d done in his first visit to the Dark Forest, Will grinned and started to run in the direction of the howling wolves. With the sound leading him directly to his prey, it only took a minute for Will to locate his first target.

The wolf didn’t even get a chance to defend itself. The running wombat just sped up as soon as he saw a target, and even weighting more than twice as much as Will, the wolf couldn’t even slow the charging marsupial.

Gored by the nose horn, and savaged by bronze-covered talons, the wolf was dead before it even realized it was under attack.

Will, however, didn’t have the time to stop and harvest the corpse, since the rest of the pack was close enough to hear the commotion, and were immediately converging on him.

Four sets of yellow eyes surrounded Will, looking at him balefully. None of them, however, were keen to be the first to attack. Not that Will was in the mood to wait for them. A pair of Thunder Bolts shot out, each targeting a different canine. One of the hit wolves immediately began to stumble about, out of balance and incapable of focusing. The second one managed to avoid the status effects of the skill, but the blast of sound and energy was more than enough to make it flinch.

Will wasn’t paying any attention to those two wolves. As soon as he’d used the skill, he charged one of the remaining wolves, planning a repeat of what he’d done to the first.

This still left one wolf unharmed and un-wombatted, and said wolf wasn’t about to sit idly by while an armored marsupial was savaging its packmate.

Closing in with Will, the fourth wolf leapt at the wombat while he was still busy with the nearly dead canine. The predator’s sharp claws and fangs slid harmlessly off of Will’s armor, but were able to leave shallow wounds on his unarmored, but naturally tough, wom-butt.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Will’s own claws, on the other hand, were boosted by both his Bronze Claws and his Claw Proficiency, and had no trouble at all in slicing into the wolf, and as soon as one target was down, the wombat turned on the other.

Without the higher damage from his charge attack, killing the third wolf took significantly longer than the first two, and by the time that one was dead, the remaining two had shaken off the effects of the Thunder Bolt, and were more than ready to join the fray.

They were not, however, any more successful than their packmates, and it only took a couple of minutes for the wombat to remain alone and victorious.

Albeit, somewhat the worst to wear and sporting a new bunch of least and lesser wounds. Mostly on his not-so-tender behind.

That went rather well, if I do say so myself. Going to have to wait around until I can heal a bit before I go and find any more wolves to play with though.

Harvesting the dead wolves, Will managed to somehow get six good quality pelts out of five wolves. He had no idea how Plenty did that, but he also wasn’t about to argue.

He stayed where he was for a few more hours, regenerating mana and healing both his new wounds and the one he had remaining from the reflection fight, and went looking for more wolves.

As he was looking for more wolves, a glowing patch of ground near one of the trees caught Will’s eye. By that point, Will was familiar with the way his Harvest skill worked, and ten minutes later had a pile of good quality truffles in his inventory.

It didn’t take long to find another pack of wolves. Will had a vague idea about how wolves had territories, and how different packs shouldn’t have been so close together, but the wolves didn’t seem to know that, and Will’s job was to eradicate, rather than educate, them.

The second pack of wolves wasn’t any harder to defeat than the first had been. There were six wolves this time, though one of them was very obviously a Crankscout. They were starting to approach something Will could actually call “camouflage”, with most of the clockwork monster covered in realistic-looking wolf fur.

It still had visible cogs everywhere a joint would have been on a real wolf, making it fairly easy to distinguish.

Will didn’t come out of the fight unscathed. The wombat took some scratches, but no serious wounds, in the process.

At some point, I’m going to have to get some proper armor for my backside. Well-padded as it is, getting wounded is still painful. And the damage still accumulates. Going to have to make a stop at Kevin’s, after I sell off my loot and have some money to spend.

And speaking of loot, Will got six pelts out of five wolves. Again. And two cogs from the Crankscout.

I guess it makes some sense. I should have a twenty percent chance to get an extra drop, which translates directly into one more drop every five harvests, on average. Well, it’s not like I have any limit to what I can carry. I’ll take whatever I can get here.

The second pack was also enough to finish Will’s quest, giving him another hundred XP and a new skill shard.

Skill shard: Light Armor Proficiency

Tier: Basic

Type: Rogue

Level 1

XP 0/100

Reduces the stamina and mana penalties for using skills while wearing light armor by 20% per level.

Yes, it’s still a light armor even if it’s black.

…Though it wasn’t a skill that Will had any use for.

Can’t really complain about it though. I think I’ve gotten more useful skill drops than not, all told. But this one is definitely going on the ‘to sell’ list. OK. I could move on right now, but I think I’d rather keep going for now. After all, next time I get here, there are going to be higher tier enemies and elites around. May as well get more out of it while it’s still easy.

Will spent a few more hours in the Dark Forest, and had a fairly lucrative yield. All told, he’d hunted down four more packs of wolves, for a total of eighteen wolves and one more Crankscout.

Harvesting everything, he got two more Brass Cogs, twenty-one pelts, three of which were of excellent quality, and a pair of fangs. He’d also managed to locate two more truffle patches.

All good things must come to an end, however, and eventually Will started to feel a growing urge to do his business and move on to the next Space. Before he was ready to move, however, he had over four hundred XP to burn.

Let’s see. I can boost Unstoppable Lance Charge to level three. That gets me the reduction in stamina cost back, and another level of armor pierce. Slow is an option, but not sure how much good it’ll do.

I can finally level up Harvester, but that’s probably not going to help me in combat. I’m not even sure it’ll improve my loot. So that’s a fairly big gamble. Plenty will get me more loot, but again, not immediately helpful in combat.

Claws could go up to four. No idea what that gets me, but the previous levels were good. Definitely an option.

Least Cure is a good skill, and the second level was definitely good. I’m still hoping It’ll heal more damage or start working on more serious wounds at some point.

Passive defense would certainly help, especially when I get back to fighting harder enemies. Rock would probably be less useful right now.

The resource pools might be a good direction to go. I could really use more mana, at least. Stamina is good the way it is for now.

Thunder Ball is one of my main skills. Definitely worth leveling. But if I consolidate it up to expert, the cost is going to go up. In fact, I’m fairly sure I’ll lose the second level, unless I push a hundred more XP into it. So that’s a hundred XP that I need to save up for now. Leaves me with just three hundred I’m willing to spend. Which also means not leveling up Passive Defense for now.

Thunder might be a good option.

Darkness Shield isn’t very useful for me as it is. I mostly want it to merge up, and it’ll be sharing in the XP of Thunder Ball anyway.

Damn it. So many options, and not nearly enough XP. OK, Think about it logically. My defenses are decent enough for now, unarmored butt notwithstanding. Offense is good, over all. I think I’m going with mana. Forty extra mana means one more cure or two more Thunder Balls. Yeah, I think that works. Three hundred XP to get Mana Pool to level three, and save a hundred to get Mage, I think? Back up to level two.

Happy, or at least content, with his decisions, Will invested the XP in his skill, and gave in to the urge to roll his dice and move.