Night 16
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I woke up feeling tired but then, that was nothing unusual now. I knew it had nothing to do with me or my body; instead, it had everything to do with an incomplete bar of HP that I was sporting most of the time.
Stretching my body, I checked my HP and, of course, it read, [HP: 100/152].
Sighing, I used {Episkey}.
Ting.
[- 20 MP]
Immediately I felt energy rushing into me and the memories of the aches disappear as my HP bar filled up; it now read, [HP: 145/152].
Shaking my head at the absurdity of Hit Points and Mana Points, I crawled out of the hideout and headed towards the spider hunting ground. Even though I had decided to hunt bigger monsters from today, I still had to hunt the spiders if I wanted to level up my sub-skill of poison resistance.
I really had no choice in the matter.
Grimacing at the thought of bored hunting, I activated the skills {Sensor} and {Scent} as I flew. Reaching the spiders, I used the rest 32 of my MP to {Observe} things I had never seen before.
I spent the next four hours killing and eating spiders with the same strategy that I have perfected over the last few days. I carefully landed on the branch from which they were handing and slid towards them. Reaching them I created a puddle of poison which I slowly guided down the thread. After that, the poison did the rest of the work and spider would be dead from the fall that it caused due to all its struggles.
It was as I was hunting my 8th spider that I heard a tell tale sound and looked up with confusion in my eyes; certainly the poison sub-skill couldn't have leveled now, I wasn't even consuming any poison right now. And sure enou-
Ting.
[Skill {Slide Lv.1} has leveled up to {Slide Lv.2}. Slide speed has increased to 2x the speed of {Crawl Lv. Max}.]
Dismissing the notification, I hunted and ate the spiders until I received a very specific notification.
Ting.
[Skill {Poison: Bug: Resistance Lv. 4} has leveled up to {Poison: Bug: Resistance Lv. 5}. Your resistance to this poison has increased. A bit.]
I grimaced. It had taken me 12 spiders to level up the skill; something which had consumed 4 hours and resulted in just 4 level ups. The gain margin from the spiders was decreasing more and more with each passing day.
But that was not all of my worries.
There was another side to all this gorging on spider meat. My moth body was not meant for eating the amount of meat that I was consuming on a daily basis and, as a result, I was growing big, very big. By now, I was already the size of an adult moth and I had not reached even level 50!
It worried me to think about what would have happen as I continued to consume more and more due to this poison related sub-skill.
With a sigh, I checked my MP and HP; while my HP had completely recovered in the 4 hour period, my MP had just recovered 20 points.
With the intention of recovering the rest of my MP, I crawled back in the hole in the hunting ground and closed my eyes to meditate. After having spent approximately three hours in the burrow meditating, I finally opened my eyes and found my MP bar full.
I smiled. At least there were some good things in life; albeit small and inconsequential, but good nonetheless.
Crawling out of the hole, I beat my wings and slowly made my way deeper into the territory that I thought belonged to spiders. But before that, I activated {Stealth} and tried to be as quiet as I could, but, unlike last time, I did not let it distract me from my surroundings.
As I moved deeper and deeper into the spider territory, I kept my eyes sharp and twitched at every disturbance that {Sensor} picked up and at every scent that my antennas detected. I was, also, very careful of the fact this supposedly was the spider territory and thus was filled with spider-nets that I probably might not see.
As I flew, my sensor detected a disturbance and I turned towards it to find a rather small spider, barely half my size. Though what caught my attention were its bright colors of red and blue that glistened brightly amongst the rest of greens and browns.
I flew towards it and my antennas caught hold of its scent, causing me stop dead in my tracks my heart racing.
Its scent was unlike anything that I had encountered before; even the frog that had almost killed me had nothing on this tiny spider. Its scent was alarmingly predatory and poisonous, sending my senses haywire. It was, as if, I was being drowned in a scent that wanted to devour me as it watched me suffer from its poisons in glee.
My heart stuttered; forgetting its beat but I took a deep breath to settle myself.
Carefully, I used {Observe} on it.
Ting.
[Black Mother Spider. Poisonous.]
I frowned. Besides the name, it was the same description as the spider I usually hunted.
I took a deep breath and decided to take a chance; after all, the usual willow spiders weren't any match for me now. Carefully, I made my way towards the branch on which the spider was hanging. I saw it twitch before it continued on with its net building.
Activating the skill {Slide}, I made my way towards the point from where it was hanging, so as to make as less vibrations as possible. I planned on using the same strategy that I always used when hunting spiders. Reaching my destination, I began secreting the poisons and soon there was a puddle beneath me of both the poisons that I could produce.
With a smile, I guided the puddle when it about to overflow and touched the base of the tread. But, as soon as I touched the thread, the spider hanging down from it stopped moving, for a moment, before racing towards me.
It was nothing unusual and I began guiding more and more poison down the thread as the spider continued its race towards me. At that moment, my poison touched the spider and I heard nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
My heart raced as I saw the spider shrug off my poison as if it was nothing but water. I tried to guide more poison down the thread but, in my haste, I touched the actual thread, causing my limb to get stuck. My heart almost stopped as I pulled and pulled on my limb but to no avail.
It would just not get unstuck.
I tried using slide, as my limb was already covered in goo, which provided enough lubrication to get my hand unstuck. By now the spider was almost upon me but I could not let it reach me so I leapt off of the branch and started beating my wings midair.
As I regained my bearings, I felt something hit me and get stuck before I felt a pull. With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I turned around and saw the spider had a thread connecting me with it, which it was pulling.
At that moment, the spider lowered its belly and another thread shot out of it and raced towards me. It hit me in the chest and the pull multiplied! 'Oh fuck!'
I flapped my wings, faster and faster, trying to outdo the spider in strength but I felt myself failing and slowly being dragged towards the spider! 'This will not happen! This will absolutely not happen!'
Without any other plan in my mind, I activated the skill, {Ant's Will}!
Ting.
[- 10 HP]
Ting.
[Skill {Ant's Will Lv.2} has leveled up to {Ant's Will Lv.3}. Multiplier/Time Duration has increased by 1. Total effect: Strength x3. Time Duration: 2 minutes.]
I felt the power run through my veins, more than usual this time, but I ignored that tiny tidbit as I had more pressing matters to deal with; matters such as saving my life!
But all good the skill did was stopping my downward decent! I was still not powerful enough to break off the thread!
At that moment I saw the spider touch its belly down to the bark and attach the thread to it. With both the ends secure, the spider started walking up the thread and I began panicking! My death was literally climbing up to me!
I tried to beat my wings faster but it was all to no avail as it did nothing. And then I remembered the whole reason that I thought I could be relatively safe here! My magic! Which meant the spell {Incendio}!
As quickly as I could, I activated the spell.
Ting.
[- 30 MP]
I ball of fire formed in front of me, its heat uncomfortable yet welcome; this was the only thing that could save my life now! As the ball grew, it spat out a massive flame down the thread and I immediately felt free as the thread, which had been binding me, was burnt off.
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I flew higher and higher, celebrating my freedom, before I dared to turn back to look what was left of the spider.
The branch that I had been on was blackened and singed, yet alive; it hadn't suffered any major damage, even though a few of its leaves were still on fire and most of the rest were nothing but ash. The net that spider was building was nowhere to be seen and same was the case with the spider.
I hadn't received any notification or level up prompt, which meant to me that the spider was still alive somewhere. I do not know how that could be possible. How could that spider survive a massive flame to the face but somehow it had; of that I was sure.
I looked around and searched for the spider with my skills. I felt a disturbance as a familiar scent hit my antennas.
Ting.
[Skill {Scent Lv. 2} has leveled up to {Scent Lv. 3}. Radius for recognition and tracking of a scent has increased to 3 m.]
I dismissed the window without even looking at it. It wasn't a level up notification and that was all I cared about when it came to notifications, at the moment, as that would mean that the spider had died. I followed the directions that my skills were telling me and there it was; hanging down from another branch. Not even a little bit singed from my attack.
It must have let the thread go when it either saw, or felt, the heat from the flame and had then attached itself to another branch, as it fell, with the help if its thread. I turned my eyes around and continued to fly.
I flew back as fast as I could. That had been dangerous! Very, very dangerous! 'FUCK! Why do I do stupid things?! Why!'
If I didn't have my magic or the presence of mind that I had, I would have been spider chow! It was not something I wanted to be! That spider had been strong; way too strong! 'I should have listened to my instincts and my senses! They had been warning me against going after it! But no! I had to be an idiot!'
Finally I was out of the spider territory and I let out a sigh of relief. I was safe. Somehow, and in some way, I was alive.
I flew around until I reached the hole in the hunting ground and crawled in. I took a few deep breaths to settle down my pacing heart. 'That was too much of an adventure and too much of a reckless act. I have lived through it somehow but I will not always. I don't have my friends to help me through my problems here. I am alone, all alone, and I have to be more careful if I want to continue living.'
I took another deep breath and slowly let it out. Now was the time to let out the fear I had been feeling earlier, to let out the panic. And that's what I did. I let out a screech of primal fear and frustration, of feeling out of depth, of feeling like a fish out of water!
"SSSCCCCRRRREEEEEEEE! SCREEEEE! SCREEE! SCCCCRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEE!"
I gasped and tried to breathe. But breathe was not something that was coming. I tried again and again but all felt was emptiness! I struggled and struggled but all I clutched was nothing! My lungs hurt from the lack of air and my chest ached from the struggles of my heart.
But then, at that moment, something changed as my breath began to calm down and my heart began to slow its pace.
I tried again and more and more of my breath continued to come. I continued to try and with each attempt my heart continued to slow its pace and let more air in. My struggles calmed down and finally my heart didn't feel like it would break out of my chest.
I took a deep breath and gently let it out. My panic attack had passed.
I sat there, patiently -and afraid- as I thought about what to do next, after all, I still had 5 hours of night left. With a somewhat racing heart, I decided to try to level up {Observe} but to do that I needed a full bar of MP while I had just 20 points.
This meant that I had to meditate. Something that I decided was a good idea after the near death experience and the panic attack that followed it.
It took me a little more than three hours to fill my MP bar –something which I was glad for as it gave me enough time to recuperate- and soon as that was done, I was out the burrow. I could not hole up and hide myself from the world every time I was attacked. If I did that, I wouldn't survive!
I had to survive.
This was wild. And in wild only the strong prevailed. And strong did not hide in their little hidey-holes, afraid and cowering. They conquered their fears. Thus I was out again; away from the safety of my hideout.
Cautiously, I decided to fly around the area that I hadn't traversed before, as finding unknown things to use observe on, was getting difficult around the spider hunting ground.
I travelled south of my location and came across a clearing. With all my skills active and my senses alert, I landed on a flower and began using {Observe}.
It took me approximately an hour to finish using the skill and by the time I was finished, moon had travelled across the sky and was beginning to finish its nightly journey. With my goal achieved, I headed back to my hideout.
Crawling in, I settled down and used {Molting}.
Ting.
[- 85 HP]
As tiredness rushed in me, I gaped at the number sketched on the floating blue screen. It way more than half of my HP! It wasn't supposed to be that much! It was supposed to be half or less than my HP! Why was it so much? Why had it increa-
Wait.
The cost of {Molting} depended upon my size, if I remembered correctly. Did this mean that if my size continued to increase, it would take more and more of my HP? But if my size increased, then would not my HP?
I sighed; this made no sense. Feeling more than a little frustrated, I closed my eyes and fell asleep.
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Night 17
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I woke up feeling a lot more tired than usual. Frowning, I checked my HP and sure enough, it read, [HP: 61/156].
I scowled, remembering the confusion from the last night regarding the unusually large amount of HP loss for the skill {Molting}, but, then the itch from the exuviate reminded that I had better things to do such as removing the extremely itchy shell that was left behind from the use of the said skill.
With a sigh, I used the spell {Episkey}, which I was very glad to have, as I did not want a repeat of the frog incident.
At the moment, I didn't know what I would have done without it; either I would have gone out hunting with barely more than half of my HP or I would have to just rested on alternate days to completely recover my HP.
I was very glad I didn't have to chose from either of those options.
Ting.
[-20 MP]
As the spell activated, I felt the tiredness leave and the hollow aches disappear. I sighed happily and checked my HP, it read, [HP: 105/156].
Crawling out of the hideout I flew towards the spider hunting ground and began the daily ritual of hunting, eating and screaming in pain to level up the poison sub-skill.
As I continued to hunt and eat, I became more and more full, yet, as I hadn't received the notification which I was waiting for, I continued to eat. The more I ate, the more my body became heavy and the more my stomach felt stressed and stretched.
As I continued to hunt and eat, I began to feel bloated and heavy and yet I hadn't received any notification. I felt my body refuse to move under the strain of how much I had eaten and finally I settled down, unable to hunt.
I barfed.
I didn't know if moths could vomit or not but I sure did want to right now because, no matter what, I had to eat more to get that notification and level up my poison related sub-skill; especially after the encounter with that spider.
And it was not just that spider that was apparently immune to my poison. I hadn't forgotten the scorpion that lived under the tree where I used to feed as a caterpillar; the one that had shrugged off my poison like it was nothing.
I needed stronger stuff. I had to get it if I wanted to survive in this forest.
Which I will.
Crawling out of the hole –which took far more energy than it should have- I slid as far as I could from the hole and vomited. The bile and flesh that came out of my mouth and they tasted just as disgusting, coming up, as it had tasted delicious when it had gone done.
Panting and gasping, I tried to breath and settle myself. When my breath and heart finally settled, I crawled back to the hole and finished the rest of the corpse. How I did that, I did not know. It didn't even taste the damned thing. I just ate.
Feeling more than a little disgusted of my actions –and of me- I continued to hunt and eat until I heard a particular noise.
Ting.
[Skill {Poison: Bug: Resistance Lv.5} has leveled up to {Poison: Bug: Resistance Lv.6}. Your resistance to this poison has increased.]
I sighed. Today it had taken me 18 spiders to level up this little skill, and tomorrow, it would just take me even more spiders; all this loss of life, of those poor spiders, just for the sake of one skill of mine. I grimaced and dropped that line of thought. For I had to survive.
And this was the wild.
The skill level up had taken 5 hours and had resulted in 5 level ups causing me to reach Level 41.
Beating my wings, I took to the air and thought about what to do for the rest of the day. I could, very obviously, not venture deeper into the spider territory; that would just get me killed. I had been extremely lucky to escape unharmed last time.
But if I wanted to level up faster, I would have to find better prey as already the return on my kills was one third; for each three kills I was getting one level, and now, even that seemed to be decreasing.
With nothing better to do, I headed towards the clearing I had found yesterday to level up {Observe}.
Reaching the clearing, I again landed on the same flower as yesterday and began to use the skill. I had barely used one fourth of my MP whe-
Ting.
[Skill {Observe Lv. 4} has leveled up to {Observe Lv. 5}. The level of the Target has been made available.]
I grinned. 'Now this is what I call progression!'
Wanting to test the leveled up skill, I used it on passing Ant.
Ting.
[Soldier Red Ant. Strength.]
[Lv. 68]
'Finally! Finally I can see the levels!' I laughed. 'Maybe at higher levels, I can even see the target's HP and MP!' I laughed in happiness. I couldn't wait for the skill to level up even more!
I read the screen again and wondered what the "Strength" was. 'Usually in its place poisonous is written. Is it the special stat or something? For spiders it is "Poisonous" because they were poisonous. Does the "Strength" here signify that the special stat of this soldier ant is its strength?'
Confused at the possibility, I used the rest of my MP on leveling up {Observe} but, unsurprisingly, I did not get another notification.
Flapping my wings, I took to the air and made my way towards the hideout. I planned on meditating to recover my MP and using that time to come up with something else to do during the rest of the day.
Reaching the hideout, I crawled in and settled comfortably before closing my eyes to meditate.
It took me 6 hours to completely recover the rest of my MP and when I came out of my hidey hole, the moon was almost ready to finish its journey across the sky. Flapping my wings, I made my way towards the clearing.
Reaching my destination, I began using {Observe} and soon enough my MP was over.
Flapping my wings, I again took to air and headed back to the hideout. Reaching the burrow, I settled in and checked my status.
[Name: Unnamed]
[Species: Poisonous Forest Moth]
[Race(s): Insect]
[Level: 41]
[HP: 129/161]
[MP: 0/61]
[Titles: {Sentient}, {Reincarnated}, {Survivor}, {Master of Death}, {Masochist}]
[Skills: {Animagus Lv.1}, {Ant's Will Lv.3}, {Apparate Lv.6}, {Beast Tamer Lv.1}, {Crawl }, {Dig Lv.8}, {Fly Lv.6}, {Invisibility Lv.1}, {Leglimens Lv.2}, {Masochism Lv.3}, {Meditate Lv.6}, {Molting Lv.4}, {Night Vision Lv.3}, {Observe Lv.5}, {Occlumens Lv.7}, {Pain Resistance Lv.6}, {Poison Resistance Lv.7}, {Poison Creation Lv.4}, {Rise Lv.1}, {Scent Lv.3}, {Sensor Lv.5}, {Slide Lv.2}, {Stealth Lv.2}, {Stubborn Lv.3}, {Survive Lv.3}, {Trap Lv.2}]
[Spells: {Lumos Lv. Max}, {Expelliarmus Lv. 10}, {ExpectoPatronum Lv. 10}, {Protego Lv.10}, {Reparo Lv.9}, {Incendio Lv.9}, {Aguamenti Lv.9}, {Stupefy Lv.9}, {Episkey Lv. 9}, {Immobulus Lv.9}, {Lumos Maximus Lv.8}, {Confundo Lv.8}, {Fianto Duri Lv. 8},{Protego Maxima Lv. 8}, {Repello Inimicum Lv.8}, {Accio Lv.7}, {Bombarda Lv.7}, {Petrificus Totalus Lv.6}, {Diffindo Lv.6}, {Reducto Lv.5}, {Wingardium Leviosa Lv. 5}, {Transfugiration Lv.5}, {Silencio Lv.4}, {Glacius Lv.4}, {Confringo Lv.3}, {Alohomora Lv.3}, {Sectum Sempra Lv.2}, {Imperio Lv.2}, {Muffliato Lv.2}, {Crucio Lv.1}]
Glancing at my HP, I sighed and used {Survive}.
Ting.
[-80 HP]
Shaking my head at the 49 HP that was left, I fell asleep.
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P.S. Unbeta'ed but edited to the best of my ability.