Atlas held his spear, leaning against a tree and staring at the still sleeping forms of the knights. He was honestly surprised. He would have expected them to be awake by now, it was getting close to the middle of the day.
He stared at their immoble forms, contemplating what his next action should be. He could just charge in there, and wound both of them, maybe even kill one, but he wasn’t still completely sure if he could take one of them one on one.
Or… He did have his two new abilities… and he wanted to test them…
After a couple more seconds of contemplating, his eyes turned red as he activated Hunter’s Instinct. The middle of the boar's forehead glowed a sickly red, with their undersides a slight shade of red.
Keeping his skill activated, he used Drain, and he watched as green energy shot from his hands, latching onto one of the boars. It started to glow red and Atlas felt his internal wounds close, and other small wounds all over his body started to close. He felt as though there was a mental pool inside of him that was slowly emptying as the spell went on.
Was this his magic? If so, he seemed to have quite a lot of it, was it because of his intelligence and wisdom? As he puzzled this over, the boar that he was stealing life from woke up, squealing as it felt the spell that was sucking the life out of it.
It turned, glaring at Atlas. When it saw him, its eyes narrowed even further. It kicked its buddy, who woke up with a snort.
Atlas just remained calm, making sure that his hold over his spell didn’t break. He kneeled, resting his spear on the ground and aiming it at the boar.
The boar charged forward, before one of its legs buckled, and it collapsed. It looked like Drain had done its work. Its buddy saw, and turned to face Atlas, letting out a loud snort before charging forward.
Atlas narrowed his eyes, shifting the target of Drain to the other boar, and it flinched as its life was taken.
Atlas picked his spear up, deciding to take it into his own hands. He charged the boar, leaping forward and plunging it deep into the creature's forehead.
It squealed, eyes crossing as it tried to shake Atlas loose. Atlas grit his teeth, planting his feet in the ground and shoving the spear deeper into its skull.
It collapsed, letting out a sad keen, before shuddering. It was dead. Atlas wrenched his spear out, falling on his rear as it came out with a *schulk* covering himself with brain matter and blood.
Reaching out, he used Life steal, absorbing 2% of its max health. He felt his wound fully close and took a full breath. He turned and looked at the other boar.
Only to be slammed with its entire body weight.
He had underestimated the boar, thinking it was dead. It most certainly was not.
It looked weak, but it still managed to send Atlas flying, spear flipping a couple of times before coming to rest more than a dozen feet away.
Atlas rose on shaky legs, fists raised. He would die to this, of that, he was certain. But he was mentally beating himself up for not paying attention to his surroundings, he could have gotten out of this fight without taking any damage if he had simply dodged the foul beast.
Sighing, he activated Drain again, and the boar's legs buckled, but it didn’t fall. Atlas felt as though he was starting to run low on magic, so he needed to finish this fight fast, he wanted to have some in reserve in case he was attacked again.
He sprang forward, gray light appearing on his fist as he activated Weakening Punch. Roaring loudly, he thrust his fist forward, hitting the swaying boar with all his might. There was a loud explosion, and the boar was sent flying through the air.
It spun in the air a couple of times before landing in a tree and snapping branches, before coming to a stop on one of the large branches.
Atlas looked at his fist, which was now covered in bruises and bloodied up. He could use Lifesteal and patch it up, but his stomach growled at him loudly, he still needed to eat.
LEVEL UP!!! X6
You have leveled up your skill Weakening Punch(A) to level 3!
You have leveled up your skill Weakening Punch(A) to level 4!
You have leveled up your skill Drain (S) to level 2!
You have leveled up your skill Lifesteal(B) to level 2!
System Message: When you reach level 10 in a skill, it ranks up! Keep this in mind as you fight, as the more intentionally you fight with your skills, the higher the chance of them leveling up! At every rank up, the skill becomes three times harder to level up.
Atlas was happy with his gains. It wasn’t a whole lot compared to what he got for ending the miniboss, but it was definitely a large improvement. He split the free points between intelligence and wisdom again, hoping it would help him us Drain for longer periods of time.
It was nice to know that he could increase the rank of his skills, that just meant he could grow more powerful.
He walked over to the tree that the boar had landed in, and started to climb. When he reached the place where the boar was, he propped himself up against the trunk, and shoved the boar.
The boar toppled out of the tree, landing with a splat and sliding for a couple of feet, leaving a trail of blood in its wake.
Atlas jumped down after it, almost slipping on the blood. He grabbed the boar, dragging it to the middle of the clearing.
Now… how to cook it?
***
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Atlas bumbled around for a while, before finding some dry leaves and a couple of dry sticks. He cleared a spot, putting the dry leaves and sticks into a pile. He took two of the sticks and started to rub them together, using his supernatural speed and strength to ignite them in just a few minutes.
Blowing gently, he watched as the small spark became a roaring fire, adding larger and larger branches into the fire.
Once it was steadily burning, Atlas ripped off the boar's leg, holding it over the fire and turning it slowly. The leg was huge, it took everything he had just to hold it above the fire.
He lost track of time, slowly twisting the meat over the fire. When it looked fully cooked, he took it away, ripping off a piece and tasting it, chewing slowly. It was still pretty hot, and it didn’t have any seasonings, but overall, it was pretty good.
Atlas scarfed down the leg, burning his tongue multiple times, but not really caring. He was starving.
After finishing the entire leg, he ripped off another dangling it over the fire much like the first and slowly turned it, waiting as the skin sizzled and popped.
Atlas started to drool a bit, but he shook his head, snapping out of it. He could wait for it to fully cook before eating, or so he told himself.
After a couple long minutes, the leg was ready. This time when he ate it, he all but scarfed it down, not caring about the immense heat that scorched his lips, tongue, and throat.
Licking his lips, Atlas realized that he was incredibly thirsty, but he hadn’t seen water his entire stay on this strange world, which put him in trouble.
Where would he find water?
Walking over to the tallest tree nearby, Atlas started to climb. Pushing himself up, he steadily climbed the tree until he was over a hundred feet off the ground. Wind brushed up against his skin, and the tree swayed gently.
Atlas held the tree tighter, glancing around at the vast forest. He could see the edges that were closest to him, but he couldn’t see the edge of the forest.
He did however see two things of importance, one exciting, and one terrifying.
He saw a wide river not too far away from where he was now.
He also saw the demonic dino in the distance, and it seemed to be heading in his general direction again.
Atlas climbed back down the tree, panicking. He finally had a full stomach, but the final boss was on its way. Even with the large boosts in power he had recently received, he was still but a pebble beneath its large clawed feet.
He grabbed his spear and set off in the direction he had seen the river, deciding to leave the boar behind, he could just kill another one if he needed more food, and it wasn’t worth the energy to carry it around with him. Best to just leave it here for scavengers.
That made Atlas start to wonder about the ecosystem here, he hadn’t seen any birds or other normal creatures, so how did it function?
Before he could walk too far down that line of thinking, he snapped back, hearing something rustling through the bushes not too far away from him.
Raising his spear, Atlas prepared himself for whatever the new challenge would be.
What came out was not what he expected.
Dread Boar Knight
Lvl: 40
There was a third one?
Atlas and the boar just stared at each other for a couple of seconds. In a surge of motion, Atlas gripped his spear, lifting it over his shoulder and throwing it like a javelin.
It soared through the air, striking the boar in its leg before it could even understand fully what was going on. With a roar of pain, it charged him.
Atlas’s eyes narrowed, glowing red as he activated Hunter’s Instinct. The boar had very similar weaknesses to the other two, with its hind leg also being a light red color.
Atlas jumped out of the way, feeling a surge of power as Moonwalker activated, letting him jump faster and further than he should with his current stats.
The boar stopped almost instantly, swinging its tusks at him in wide, sweeping motions. Atlas avoided all of them without too much trouble, but the boar didn’t let up, snorting at him and continued to keep him on the back foot.
Deciding that it was his turn, Atlas jumped to the side, bounding off of a tree and landing behind the boar. In a flash of motion, his fist covered in gray light smashed into the creature's hind leg, before he leaped out of the way.
Just as he expected, the boar whirled, lashing out again with its tusks, missing Atlas by a pretty large margin. Atlas zoomed forward, smashing his Weakening Punch into the boar's snout, sending it stumbling back.
As it shook its head, trying to shake off the pain, Atlas hit it again, this time aiming for its forehead. The boar surprised him, ducking to the side and lashing out with one of its hooves, hitting him in the stomach.
Atlas stumbled backwards, but stayed on his feet.
He looked at the boar, more wary than he had been at the start of this fight. He had underestimated this boar because he had already killed two of his brethren, but he hadn’t used Drain in this fight, which had been one of the largest reasons that he won the other fight.
He still didn’t want to use Drain yet, but he might be forced to if things started to get worse.
Atlas frowned. Why was he hesitating? He should just kill it and be done with it. He launched forward, starting the boar and slamming his fist into its skull with all his might. It stung badly from his earlier fight, but he powered through, sending the boar flying much like the other knight.
It slammed into a tree, letting out a feeble squeal. Is it still alive? That's surprising. Atlas thought to himself, running forward and slamming his fist into its skull again, killing it for good.
LEVEL UP!!!
Atlas frowned. Only one? It was quite a few levels above him, so why was he getting so few rewards?
(System tip, The closer a fight, the more bonus exp that is provided, the level of the opponent is just the base exp, it is the actual fight that matters more. You only received the base exp because you did not struggle with this opponent. Keep this in mind for future battles.)
Huh, that was good to know, the closer the fight, the more exp he would earn, which translated to levels, which in turn translated to power. And he used that power to fight stronger creatures. It was a brutal and endless cycle.
Atlas smirked, at least it's fun. He thought to himself wryly.
It was true though, the thrill of the fight was the most intense and amazing feeling he had ever experienced. And even that didn’t compare to the adrenaline rush he got from getting more powerful from the aftermath of said fight.
All in all, Atlas was enjoying his time in this new world, it really brought out the best in him.
Or the worst, who could say.
Atlas continued on, only pausing to steal life from the corpse of the boar on his way out.