I wasn’t about to wait for the next monster to rush me like the acorn had. I hadn’t missed the fact that the quest said defeat 10 monsters. It had not said they would all be level-1 acorns.
So I sprinted to the nearest trees, opposite from the rustling bushes, and scanned the area. I saw no rabid acorns, or anything living, thankfully.
I did notice that some of the trees behind the initial row encircling the clearing looked a lot less like Earth trees. I had thought the forest was pretty similar to ones I’d seen in cooler states, but most of the trees were taller and thicker. Some of the trees farther back were giants, big enough for a semi to drive through if a tunnel was hollowed out of the center.
The golden or fiery red leaves on some of the bushes were a dead giveaway I’d left Kansas way behind. Some thorns on one thick bush were as long as my forearm.
None of that was important though. I heard a high-pitched growling that set my skin crawling. With a burst of cracking leaves, a small monster erupted from the bushes across the clearing and tore straight toward me. It looked like a cross between a small monkey and a koala bear. No, it was most similar to a marmoset.
Where did that come from? I didn’t remember ever learning about marmosets. Man, superhuman intelligence did weird things sometimes.
With the marmoset closing fast, I scanned the ground again. I didn’t want to fend off that critter’s teeth and claws with my bare hands.
“Ha!” I lunged behind the nearest tree with far better agility than I was used to. Eleven in my agility stat might not seem super high, but I moved like a world-class gymnast. The power and fluid grace of my limbs reinforced my confidence. With some practice, I bet I could do even better.
Was that stat calculated in part from my Intelligence? It seemed insane that suddenly I could do things I’d never imagined before. I needed time to figure all this out, but I couldn’t get distracted.
So I snatched up a heavy branch and snapped off the end. It was about as thick as my forearm and as long as my entire arm. It was heavy enough to make a great club without being too unwieldy.
I spun just as the marmoset launched into the air, chittering in bloodlust, long claws extended to rake at my chest while its fanged mouth gaped wider than should be possible, aimed for my throat.
I swung my club like a baseball bat.
Home run. I caught the little monster mid-jump. The impact made a sickening, wet thunk, and blood sprayed from its mouth as its body crumpled around the club then hurtled sideways and smashed into a nearby tree.
“Congratulations, Lucas! You’ve defeated a level-2 Munchkin Marmoset,” Eva said.
“What’s with the ridiculous names?” I muttered as I approached the dead creature.
My hands shook from adrenaline and I was breathing way harder than I should have from one swing. I needed to pull myself together.
A prompt appeared above the dead creature and Eva read, “Would you like to loot the Munchkin Marmoset?”
I selected yes. The creature dissolved in a flash of bright light, transforming into black smoke that disappeared rapidly. A smell like a compost pit hit me and I grimaced and backed up a step. Thankfully, the scent faded after a few seconds.
“You have received 1 basic marmoset hide, 1 basic flask of water, and 1 tier-0 mana crystal.”
I opened my inventory to confirm the counter on my water flasks had ticked back up to 12. A new item called basic marmoset hide had appeared next to the others, as had a glowing blue circle representing the mana crystal.
I mentally moved the animal hide away from my food. I hoped the inventory kept things fresh and wouldn’t let the hide ruin my food, but why take chances?
“Would you like to activate automatic inventory sorting?” Eva asked.
“Yes.”
A new menu appeared down the side of my inventory. Options included All, Food, Potions, Clothing, Magical Items, Weapons, Animal Parts, and Crafting Materials. When I selected Food, the mana crystal and marmoset hide disappeared, leaving only the meals and water.
I found that some items appeared in more than one inventory sort. Mana crystals appeared as Magical Items and Crafting Materials, while the marmoset hide was in Animal Parts and Crafting Materials.
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I focused on the mana crystal and more information appeared. “Mana Crystal. Can be consumed to replenish mana and grant a temporary power boost to all physical stats. Can be traded at a system store for credits.”
“How do I access a system store?”
Cyrus responded instantly. “You sure like trying to run before you can crawl.”
“So we can trade mana crystals to buy things at this store?”
Instead of answering, he said, “You know, one thing puzzles me. Why do earthlings like to sell so many things for $19.99?”
“What?”
“But only from commercials that air at night, and only if a second item is included at no additional cost. It seems inefficient.”
I chuckled. “Don’t read too much into nighttime advertising.”
He had dodged my question, but I still planned to shove as much as I could into my inventory. If the store wouldn’t take it, I could chuck it later.
Before I could ask another question, a loud quack like an Earth duck spun me around. It was a duck. A large mallard duck with the most resplendent coloring I’d ever seen swooped down between two trees toward me.
It opened its beak and instead of quacking again, it spat a ball of fire bigger than its entire body. At the same time, my top menu screen popped into view, blocking most of my vision.
Cyrus said, “Another item to note with your inventory—“
“Turn it off!” I shouted as I dove blindly aside.
The fireball exploded against the trunk of the tree right behind me and a wash of searing heat blistered the back of my skin. A thick pall of greasy smoke hung heavy in the air.
The window did not disappear.
“That’s rather rude,” Cyrus chided as I mentally clicked the minimize button several times to no avail.
“Can’t we do this later?” I shouted. “Can’t you see I’m being attacked?”
“If we push learning opportunities aside at every random attack, you’ll never grow as a person, Lucas. I spent so much time designing these menus.”
“I appreciate them. Really, I do,” I cried as I blindly scrambled around another tree I remembered nearby. “But when I’m distracted, I can’t appreciate them properly.” With my high perception, I focused on the tiny fringes of my vision around the screen where I could still see the world.
“I suppose,” Cyrus said with a sigh. Finally, the menu winked out and I breathed a huge sigh of relief.
Fireballs from magical death ducks might not threaten Cyrus, but they’d crisp me to cinders. My panic settled to simple fear as I hurried around another tree, scanning the sky for the fire-breathing mallard.
There! The duck was swooping around for another pass. My stick wouldn’t help much against an aerial opponent, so I scanned the ground, hoping for a fist-sized rock.
No luck. A few small sticks and leaves dotted the area, but nothing I could use as a weapon.
The duck fired again and I scurried behind another tree. The second glob of liquid fire splashed across the ground between two trees, igniting the leaves and burning in a wall of purple flame that rose two feet.
If I wasn’t careful, the mallard could box me in with walls of fire. Then it would finish me off. As I spun, searching for a ranged weapon, I spotted more movement across the open meadow.
That was just unfair! The quest hadn’t said I needed to fight more than 1 monster at the same time.
Cursing, I sprinted straight at the second monster. I needed to finish it off before the mallard cornered me. As I burst into the clearing between a couple trees, the new monster came into clear view.
A turtle.
My relief died almost before I felt it.
As soon as it saw me, the psycho turtle jumped into the air, retracted its neck and limbs, and its shell swelled to the size of a bowling ball. Nasty spikes a full three inches long slid out of either side of the shell and the turtle started to spin. When it hit the ground, its forward spin made it shoot toward me like a kamikaze spiked bowling ball.
At the same time, the mallard swooped around the tree to my right. It had dropped lower to get under a big branch and flew barely a dozen feet above the ground. Still too high for me to fight, at least not with my stick.
So I dropped my stick and raced toward the turtle, hoping it didn’t fire those spikes, or spit acid, or anything.
It just tried to ram me. At the last second, it twisted to try to impale me with one of its spikes.
I dodged, leaned down, and snatched the monster off the ground. It was heavier than I had expected, but not too much to handle. Spinning, I launched the spiked turtle shell at the diving mallard just as the duck spat another fireball.
It should have dodged instead.
The fire splashed over the turtle shell, but did not stop it. The flaming turtle bowling ball missile of doom collided with the mallard and they both detonated with an impressive blast.
In that last second, I could have sworn the mallard looked astonished. Not that I’d ever seen a surprised duck before, but that was the impression I got.
I spun away from the explosion and ran into the center of the clearing to avoid getting singed. Fighting in nothing but boxers sucked.
“Congratulations, Lucas! You have defeated a level-3 Crimson Mallard and a level-2 Prickly Turtle. You have reached level 2. Base stat points allocated.”
That was good news. I cautiously returned to the edge of the clearing, snatched up my club, and approached the flaming wreckage of the two monsters. I received the prompt to loot them and I accepted. They disappeared in a flash of compost-stinking smoke, and I checked my inventory.
I received 4 more mana crystals, 2 packages of basic bandages, and a random sock. Just one sock. When I pulled it out of my inventory, I discovered it had a hole in the toe.
I laughed at the insanity of it. Did they just use a random loot generator for most loot boxes? Some of the loot didn’t have much to do with the monster it came from. Thankfully, some of it did make more sense.
I also received a turtle shell bowl, which I could imagine a lot of uses for, as well as one of the spikes, which was listed as a crafting item. I had no idea how to craft anything, so that was useless to me for now.
From the mallard, I received some burn cream that had magical properties to regrow burned flesh over time. Definitely a welcome item.
The loot helped bolster my confidence. I gripped my club and said, “Come on. Who’s next?”