Peering into the eyes of the gremlin-esque monster, Ben felt frozen in time. As soon as the reality of the situation set in Ben quickly spun on his heel and began running back the way he had come.
Stomping through the thin underbrush as fast as his legs could carry him, Ben began hyperventilating. It was one thing to read about the first encounters in his web novels, but it was an entirely different prospect to live through one.
Looking back over his shoulder as he rushed through the forested area, Ben's eyes widened as he saw the monster chasing after him, and gaining on him.
Shit! I don't think I can outrun this thing as I am! The worry of failure to escape began setting in, before all at once Ben's reality became abundantly clear as he barged out of the tree line and was once again faced with the cliff he had slid down from.
Ben had just enough time to consider what an idiot he was before he felt a sharp pain in the back of his calf, just below his knee. He howled in shock and pain, reflexively twisting at his trunk to assess his situation only to find the demonic koala crouching beneath him, ready to spring toward his face.
Pure instinct through Ben's hands up in front of him, protecting his face like a boxer, or a frightened child confronted with a bully. A sudden impact into his arms nearly sent him sprawling on his back, the weight of the monster gnawing vigorously on his left fist and gripping on his arms with jagged claws was the only thing that kept him on his feet. Ben stared dumbly into the creatures eyes, stuck frozen in shock, as it tried, and failed, to devour his hand.
The monster grew impatient as it clawed at the inside of his forearms, leaving thin scratches across it, much like a common housecat could. Suddenly his situation clicked again, just before the monster shifted it's focus to Ben's torso and neck, causing Ben to lift his arms in front of himself and physically slam the monster into the stony ground beneath him with all his might.
Ben heard a loud pop emanate from the monster, but it didn't stop struggling beneath him. In a panic Ben pinned his left forearm beneath the being's neck, just barely having enough strength to keep it beneath him singlehandedly. Lifting his right fist high in the air he began slamming it down into the creature's ugly head.
*Slam! Slam! Slam!*
Ben's fist slammed down over and over again, his fists reinforced physique the only thing keeping them from turning to hamburger meat against the creature's facial bones and teeth. At some point Ben's eyes squeezed shut and he began screaming, fear driving him forward to destroy like only an adrenaline filled human could.
All at once Ben collapsed atop the still monster beneath him. His body tapped of all he had, ragged sobs slipping from his lips.
"I didn't even make it to the fucking water yet!", he screamed into the matted fur beneath him. Deep down he knew as soon as he awakened on the cliffside what lay before him, violence, pain, and death, either his or those that faced him, but he hadn't expected to face it so soon.
As soon as he opened his eyes a prompt appeared to him at the edge of his vision.
Congratulations! First mana beast (Corrupted Koala) killed! 10 Points rewarded for kill, bonus 50 points for first kill!
Hardened Skin > Level 2
Rolling from atop the confirmed koala, Ben sat up to sit beside it. Looking down he saw the mashed head, like a stomped on tomato, and thought to check the damage he'd undergone.
His arms were covered in shallow cuts from the Koala, and he couldn't see any visible damage to his fists, of course they were covered in quickly darkening blood though, and he could feel they were likely going to be bruised. His calf had an entire chunk missing from it, blood seeping into his khakis, making his eyes go wide.
"Status" he said.
Status
Name: Benjamin October
Core Talent: The Passivist
Level: 2
Grade: 1
Points: 70
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
HP: 85/110
Mana: 110/110
Strength: 10
Fortitude: 12
Dexterity: 11
Wisdom: 10
Intelligence: 11
Willpower: 15
Skills
Actives: N/A
Passives: Hardened Skin 2; Reinforced Fists 1
As he looked at his status Ben saw his HP tick down by a point to 84.
Shit I really need to do something to get this under control. He deduced. He began by taking off his white, stained shirt and ripping the bottom half from it. He then tore it into strips and began wrapping it around his calf where the chunk was missing. It seeped up some blood but didn't seem to turn bright red too quickly, Ben hoped that meant he wouldn't bleed out within the hour.
Right I've gotta figure out some way to heal, and fast. Ben thought.
After a few minutes he found himself debating between buying a health potion, and trying to buy the only decent regeneration passive he could find for the points he could muster currently. The cost of leveling up had climbed to 20 points, and he didn't have enough data yet to deduce the scaling for it. The skill he had found costed 55 points and was called Poor Bovine Regeneration, and he could feel that it would have implications on his physique, causing excess bristly hair to grow across his body, but would boost his regeneration by about 10% at level 1 counting The Passivist's doubling of the value.
Luckily his health hadn't ticked down yet when he checked his status about 10 minutes later, yet he was still feeling frozen from indecision and the sun continued to droop in the sky.
Here we go, all or nothing I guess! He thought as he confirmed another level up.
Level 3 Acquired (2 Stat Points Awarded)
Quickly Ben checked the points requirement for the next level up, and on seeing it now costed 30 points, confirmed another level.
Level 4 Acquired (2 Stat Points Awarded)
I really hope I don't regret this... He thought as he dumped all 4 points he'd just acquired into Fortitude. Immediately he felt a heat echo through his body several times. An itching spreading across the back of his calf, his forearms, and his fists.
Status. He thought.
Status
Name: Benjamin October
Core Talent: The Passivist
Level: 4
Grade: 1
Points: 20
HP: 105/130
Mana: 130/130
Strength: 10
Fortitude: 16
Dexterity: 11
Wisdom: 10
Intelligence: 11
Willpower: 15
Skills
Actives: N/A
Passives: Hardened Skin 2; Reinforced Fists 1
Ben sighed with relief. His HP had gone up to 105, confirming a theory he'd had; leveling up seemed to increase max health and mana by 10 each time, but increased the current values by 10 with them. He felt farther from death, and he had even seemed to regenerate a point of HP since he'd last checked, but had no way of telling if it was the extra Fortitude that put him over the edge to outpace the bleeding on his calf.
He also noted that the level up cost was now 40 points.
So the level up formula seems to be (current level)*10 points. That honestly doesn't seem very expensive. He considered.
Looking around he realized it was now around 5 o'clock in the evening, and the sun was rapidly falling. Ben briefly considered trying to transport the corpse of the corrupted koala for potential food, but dismissed it, considering he was injured and would have a hard enough time carrying himself along to somewhere passably safe for the night.
Sighing to himself and the forest before him, Ben once again began trudging into the forest, a slight shuffle to his gait, hoping to make it to water to slake a growing thirst.