Aster took a curved piece of Castle’s armor and filled it with water and set it on the fire to boil. She’d already done this a few times to get some drinking water for them, but this time was different. She had a plan.
Castle was snoring gently, propped up against the warm wall with a makeshift cushion of brush wrapped in the fabric of a torn off sleeve. Now that she was asleep and Aster wasn’t subject to her judging eyes, she took out the feathers she had retrieved from the raptors.
[Springclaw Raptor Feather (Inferior)] - A feather from a Springclaw Raptor. Has limited uses.
She chose one that was about ten inches in length and let it soak in the boiling water for a quarter hour before picking it out and testing its flexibility. Perfect.
Aster didn’t know what she was doing, to be fair. She’d never made a pen before, let alone ink, though that would be a problem for tomorrow Aster.
She took Castle’s knife and worked at the feather’s tip, realizing too late that it was now too flexible, and it split in her hands like she’d tried to whittle an al dente noodle.
Grabbing a second feather of the same length, she found that she could scrape off the feathery parts toward the base of the quill without ripping the damn thing in half. Then she scraped away the skin-like layer at the bottom of the quill.
After a bit of testing she found the way it felt best to hold and made her first cut, forming a simple nib. Inside the feather was the quick, which she removed.
At this point, finding the nib difficult to work with, she let it boil in the water for a few minutes, testing it regularly until she felt confident she could make adjustments without risking splitting the whole thing in two.
The process was easy enough to repeat in bulk with her remaining feathers, but she found only the longest ones felt like they’d hold up.
She tested the quills with water as the ink, writing on the limestone above the fire with a universally understood symbol.
--
They swapped shifts halfway through the night, granting both of them a bit of well-earned sleep. In the morning they packed up and had to decide what to do.
“Everyone else is going to be making their way toward the center,” Castle said.
“Most likely, yeah,” Aster agreed. “But I was thinking last night. What do you think this challenge is going to be?”
“Not a clue. Why? Got a feeling about it?”
Aster shook her head. “Not a feeling, no. But as much fun as we’re having, I think the point of this tutorial isn’t just going to be getting us used to this ‘System’, but to whittle us down.”
Castle nodded. “Considering an island full of people is going to die at the end of the week, I can’t help but agree.”
“And every week after, I’m guessing. The sixty four days or whatever is enough for nine islands to fall.”
They discussed more for a while before settling on a plan. They’d continue following the stream, but stop before they got too close to the oasis. If it turned out they’d have to Hunger Games their way through the first week, they’d retreat and figure things out. And if it turned out the challenge was something they’d need the whole island for, they could just finish hiking their way in.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
In the meantime? They had one priority they knew would help, regardless of the nature of the challenge.
Getting stronger.
--
Aster learned a lot that morning about how the System worked. Specifically, she learned about the class skills she had gotten.
[Basic Two-Handed Weapons (Inferior)] - The Warrior keeps their enemies at a distance or in the ground when using two-handed weapons. Unlocks basic proficiency with most two-handed weapons and adds a minuscule bonus to the effect of Agility and Strength when using a fitting melee weapon.
Before they left the campsite, Aster asked if they could get a warm up in. The previous day excluded, neither of them had ever wielded a handheld weapon before in their lives. Even in the fight with the springclaw raptors, Aster had barely done anything with the spear besides raise it at one charging dinosaur and stab with it at another downed one.
She knew there had to be more to the use of a spear than simply poking with it, and sparring with Castle proved that to be the case.
It turned out that “basic proficiency” translated to being able to actually fight with a spear to a limited degree. She felt an innate comfort with her chosen weapon, the same way she’d felt with a volleyball in her hands or as she readied up to dive into a pool. The main difference was that she had trained for years at those sports, and wielding a spear was an entirely new venture.
Castle agreed with her assessment, saying that her muscle memory knew how to react to certain movements of Aster’s, though she’d never fought either with a halberd or against a spear before. And more than just muscle memory, she felt like she could demonstrate techniques, like where to hold the halberd along its haft while fighting offensively versus defensively, at longer or shorter ranges, or how to control the weapon in her grip to spin it to land a blow with the axe instead of the hammer.
Aster felt the exact same about how she handled her spear. They sparred for the better part of two hours, changing the distances of their fights, the angles, with one of them climbing atop something in a King of the Hill-type scenario.
Throughout their practice it was clear that Castle had much better defensive stats and stamina, but that mattered little when she was unable to land a hit.
“Is your Agility really that high?” Castle panted out.
“Yes,” Aster grinned. “But your Strength is scary as hell. I’m pretty sure I couldn’t take more than a single hit without some serious internal damage. And chain mail isn’t the best armor for defense.”
“Doesn’t seem to cause you any trouble,” Castle grumbled before they continued their spar.
It was closing in on noon when they wrapped up, and they were running out of shade to practice in. They took turns keeping watch while the other washed off in the stream. While Aster cleaned off the sweat and dust, she reflected on their practice; the way the spear felt as she moved, how she planted her feet and powered through from her base. She considered how it worked like a quarterstaff, letting her close in against Castle’s halberd as she deflected it and giving her options to strike with either the sharp or blunt end. Once, she had driven Castle back and kept herself from being cornered by swinging her spear in a circle around her, letting it slip through her hand until she caught it by the base, effectively trading off control for distance as Castle had to watch out for the blade striking out at her.
The practice and reflection paid off immensely for Aster.
*’DING!’ Class [Warrior (Medium)] has reached Level 4 - Stat points allocated, +1 free point*
*’DING!’ Race Human - G has reached Level 2 - Stat points allocated, +1 free point*
“Oh hell yeah…” Aster smiled as she got the notifications and felt the warmth roll through her as her stats all increased. She was about to tell Castle about her new level ups but stopped when she saw the look on her face. Worried about danger, Aster ran to her clothes and started getting dressed. “What’s wrong?”
“Look at the Tutorial Status screen,” Castle said.
Aster frowned and pulled it up. “It’s too early for the challenge announcement, though. What are you… oh shit.”
It was at the bottom. A number had changed.
Total Survivors Remaining: 986/1200
Not a day had passed yet and more than two hundred were already dead.
“What the hell happened?” Aster asked.
“I don’t know,” Castle said. “I didn’t check it last night. Did you?”
Aster shook her head. “No. Do you think it was the cold?”
“Not a clue. But I think we should keep focusing on getting stronger. Whether it was the weather or something more dangerous like those raptors, being stronger will help us.”
“Yeah,” Aster agreed. “About getting stronger…” She told Castle about how she’d been able to gain another class level by meditating on their sparring match and focusing on how to improve as a warrior. When Aster asked if she wanted to meditate some, Castle shook her head.
“Let’s find something to fight. I’m itching to get moving.”
Aster couldn’t agree more.
“And by the way, did you draw a dick on the wall last night?”