A few hours pass. As I move through the woods, I can tell that I’m in a different part of them. The trees have a darker bark, and the leaves look like needles. I pause. Something is off, but I can't tell what. I look around me, but everything seems fine. The grass is swaying in the wind, and the needles of the trees are slightly moving. I can smell the intense scent of nature, even if it is slightly different due to the syrupy scent of pine trees. Even the birds were still chirping.

Wait. No they aren't. Is that what's wrong? I look around again, except this time, I focus on my hearing, rather than my sight. The area around me is nearly silent. Where are the birds? That’s suspicious. Should I keep moving through this part of the forest? The birds being silent probably means that something strong is nearby.

I stand still, considering my options while keeping an eye on the area surrounding me. I think I should still go through this stretch of the woods. I have no idea how long a detour might take and, who knows, if I try to look for another area, I might only find one that is more dangerous. I gather my resolve, keep a wary eye on my surroundings, and then continue onwards.

. . .

After another hour, I start hearing the echoes of chirping birds. I stop, and then begin to look around, trying to pinpoint the direction of the sound. Not left, not behind me, and not in front of me. Is it to the right? I turn my head to look right, and I see it. There is a large boulder sitting in the middle of a clearing, and a small hole that looks like I could access it pretty easily. What is that? I start moving a bit closer, when the echoes abruptly stop.

I immediately stop moving, freezing because of the sudden lack of sound. Some kind of danger sense tells me to jump into a bush and that if I don't, I'm dead. I start to jump into it, and almost make it before something happens. I feel a sharp cutting sensation in my tail, and I let out a squeak of pain. Luckily, whatever did that seems to have only grazed me, so I’m able to make it into the bush.

Inside the bush, I slowly turn around to see what attacked me, and to see what damage was done to my tail. I look at the tip, and am shocked. There’s a gash that goes right through my scales and skin. It doesn’t hurt much, and there’s almost no bleeding, so I don’t think it’ll kill me. However, something else has my attention. What comes out of the wound is a viscous, black substance. It quickly becomes congealed, sealing the wound. What was that? Was that… my blood? I shake my head a little. I need to pay attention to what attacked me. I look up from my tail.

A massive vulture has its claws dug into the ground, exactly where I was standing previously. It has raven black feathers, and a bald neck and head. Its head and neck are colored an ugly pink. Its claws are massive, each much larger than even my horns. It looks like it could swallow me whole. The creature reeks of death and decay. Its piercing gaze fixed on the ground where it's standing, and where I was just a couple of seconds earlier.

It looks up abruptly, and starts examining the area around it, seemingly looking for me. I shiver. If that vulture finds me, I don't think I'll survive. I start to turn around, and crawl away from it, when my foot lands on a stick. *Snap!* The vulture turns its head near instantaneously, and sees me. I feel its piercing gaze land on me, and then a rush of wind. I have to run. It’s my only chance at survival. I only make it a dozen or so feet, before whatever warned me before does it again, making me feel like I need to jump forward. I do, and then keep running. Behind me, I hear a loud thump, and then a shriek. I cast a quick glance behind me, and see the vulture's claws stuck in the ground, and it shrieking furiously about me escaping its grasp again. I hear another whoosh of air. It’s in the sky again! I have to be ready to dodge at any moment.

I look forward, only to see a tree just a few feet in front of me. I swerve around it, putting the tree between me and the vulture. I feel another blast of warning, and I know that the vulture is going to dive again. I start weaving, moving in more of a zig-zag pattern than in a straight line. This time, whatever kind of danger sense that I have gives me significantly less of a warning, and I only barely move out of the way of the vulture's dive. What? Why did it give me less warning? Maybe my weaving made it so that the damage wouldn’t be lethal? Still, this most certainly won’t work for much longer. I have to find someplace to hide.

I scan the areas I'm running past, looking for somewhere that I can hide from the malicious vulture. It only takes me a minute before I see a fallen tree with a hole in its side. It looks like I could only barely squeeze past the hole. This is it! It’s exactly what I need! I turn around, and dash through some dense undergrowth, before diving into the tree trunk. I push myself in as quickly as I can, before coiling myself as far from the entrance as I can get.

Stolen story; please report.

I didn’t notice an important fact while I was running. My heart was, and still is, beating quickly and loudly. It was irrelevant when running, since the vulture already had eyes on me. But now that I’m trying to hide, I can only hope that the bird doesn’t hear my heartbeat, and use it to find me.

After what feels like an eternity, I hear loud whooshes of air, and then a loud thump. It’s probably the vulture. I go completely still and hold my breath. If I don't, then I might be found. And if I am found, then I’m dead. Only a second later, I start hearing a series of quieter thumps. Is that the vulture looking for me?

Sometimes it's closer, and sometimes it's farther away. At this point, my heartbeat feels like it is almost as loud as the massive bird. Can’t it hear my heart? If feels like it’s so loud that there’s no way that the bird can’t hear it.

After what feels like an eternity, the thumps stop. A couple of seconds later, I hear a loud whoosh of air, which, I assume, means the vulture took off. I wait a minute more, just to make sure it isn't returning, and then I let out the breath I was holding. My heartbeat starts quieting down, and only then do I hear the notifications.

Learned General skill [Danger Sense]. Experience is awarded for the learning of a General skill.

1 level gained. Level advanced from 4 --> 5

The moment I open my notifications, something changes. I don't know what, but I can tell it's something big. I try to figure out what happened, but nothing I do, from flexing, to focusing on all my senses, reveals anything abnormal. I start moving, and I notice it is slightly easier, but that is likely due to the level rather than this new 'General skill.'

It’s also probably the endurance and vitality boost. Wait, why did I even gain more of those stats? I got a separate notification for them… I try to think about why, before a lightbulb goes off. Maybe it’s because I was wounded. Vitality is recovery, and Endurance is resistance, after all. Surviving and having the wound heal naturally are probably the reasons both of those stats increased. But that still doesn’t address the ‘General skill.’ Maybe my status will explain? [Status]

Razag

Level: 5

Species: Dragon Hatchling

General Skills:

[Passive - Dragon Scales] lvl 1

[Passive - Danger Sense] lvl 1

Skills:

[Spark] lvl 1

[Slash] lvl 1

Unused skill slots x 3

Stats:

STR: 18

END: 18

VIT: 26

WIS: 25

INT: 25

Wait. I didn't assign danger sense. Why is it already assigned? How is it already assigned? Also, how is it not taking up a skill slot? How do I even use it? I’m not being shown what to do. Does it have something to do with that strange feeling? I try again to figure out what that strange feeling is.

Except, unlike last time, I actually feel something.The feeling I get is like being in a dark room, or in complete silence. I know that it is there, but there are no stimuli for it. I try one last thing. It’s called danger sense, maybe it tells me when something is about to harm me? Well, there’s only one way to test that. I bring my claw to my scale, and try to pierce it. That's when I get something from this new sense. It’s a soft ping, not a sound, but a feeling.

So that's what it is. It probably feels louder and more eye-catching, so to speak, when I'm in more danger. This could be useful. Hold on, is this the skill version of what I was feeling while running from that vulture? If so, that makes this skill really useful. It would probably alert me right before I get ambushed, or maybe tell me when to dodge an attack.

I pull my claw away from my front paw and start crawling forward, leaving the hollowed out log. Right before I do, I check the clearing to make sure that there isn't anything that will attack me. There isn't, probably because that vulture scared everything away. I finish crawling out of the fallen tree trunk, and then look up. The sun is still pretty high in the sky, so I think that I can still make some progress to the mountain.

I orient myself towards it once more. I start splitting my attention by focusing on my surroundings, and paying attention to danger sense. It’s hard, but not impossible. I have to practice for a minute until I can reliably do both. That’s when I start walking. Walking breaks my focus again, so I have to practice some more until I can do all three at once. Then I start walking again.