Jason took a long pull from the pool of water. The metallic, muddy flavor itched the back of his throat. It succeeded in slaking his thirst, however. He wiped away the sweat on his brow as he allowed the bruised and dented chair leg to clatter to the ground at his feet. Rows of broken Grothlit bodies surrounded him in a concave arc where he had beaten them back from the rudimentary wall blocking the cavern-turned-mob-farm from the rest of the temporal rift.
The large cavern was dark but not pitch black. Small clusters of glowing moss were scattered evenly across the ceiling. Transporting the delicate protoplants had been the most difficult aspect of setting up this room. The moss was surprisingly fragile and required extra gentle care when transplanting. The result, however, was that there was enough light to navigate and differentiate shapes, but not so much that he could distinguish color.
Which seemed like a critical mechanic as far as Jason could tell. Monsters definitely spawned in the dark, the threshold being roughly at the point where human cone cells started shutting down. It was a convenient benchmark that meant he could ensure the farm was running optimally at a glance.
It did leave him living in a monochrome haze, however.
Jason sighed in contentment, rolling the stiffness from his shoulders. He wondered idly at the second strange requirement for mob spawning. Observation. Or the lack thereof. Through several failed attempts at resting, Jason had discovered that no monsters would spawn if he was physically there to observe their spawning. Only when he turned away or was otherwise unfocused, did the dark room become flooded with monsters.
It gave Jason quantum mechanics vibes. The benefit was that he could turn off the mob farm whenever he chose, either when he was tired or waiting for his health to recover. Unfortunately, it did mean that there was no way for him to prevent spawns while asleep.
The result had been a relatively sleepless string of hours, during which Jason’s stats shot through the roof as he was forced to continuously clear the Grothlits interrupting his work. Idly, Jason opened his interface and allowed the flood of notifications he’d suppressed to rush in.
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 3 Grothlit. Experience awarded’
...
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 6 Grothlit. Experience awarded
'ding!' 'Congratulations! Your level has increased to 8. 5 stat points awarded'
'ding!' 'Congratulations! Your level has increased to 9. 5 stat points awarded'
He’d gained both levels during the initial rush. As he’d killed more of the eldritch creatures, the notifications had gained a
'ding!' '[Stab Resistance] has reached level 7'
...
'ding!' '[Stab Resistance] has reached level 9'
'ding!' '[Regeneration] has reached level 6'
...
'ding!' '[Regeneration] has reached level 8'
The same was true for his two skills. [Stab Resistance] had seen the most use and had improved accordingly, but paradoxically, every level in [Stab Resistance] made it more challenging to level [Regeneration]. By now, the Grothlit claws felt more like particularly pointy forks rather than the razor-sharp knives they actually were.
It made him wonder what governed damage within the system. Physics couldn’t explain the phenomena he’d observed. Or at least modern physics couldn’t.
Jason's stomach clenched, and he winced as the pang of hunger subsided.
‘ding!’ ‘You have been afflicted with the Starvation I status ailment’
‘ding!’ ‘Starvation I: Your body lacks sustenance and has begun to wither. You take 5% of your health as Flesh damage, and the effectiveness of your attributes is Cursed by 2%’
Jason eyed the notification warily as he felt a tiny ounce of strength and speed leave him. It was...troubling but not a surprise. He’d been neglecting the issue of food up until now, mostly due to a lack of options. With the debuff appearing, it didn’t bode well for the rest of his time in the Tutorial.
He turned and began the lengthy process of unblocking the farm’s exit. It was made of stacked layers of broken stalagmites, which made opening it a pain. Without doors, however, there wasn’t another option. After nearly 20 minutes of hauling stone, he’d successfully made it to the other side and reblocked the tunnel behind him.
His stomach rumbled again as he made his way over to his latest experiment. A fresh Grothlit corpse hung from a fraying rope made from his old bloodstained hoodie and shirt. It gently swung over a pool of nearly dried greenish blood.
Instead of reaching for the meat, Jason turned to the pile of dull moss sitting beside it. He took a clump, gingerly sticking a bit into his mouth and started chewing.
It was...bland and gritty. Tasting like the earthy water with a hint of bitter dirt mixed in. Jason forced himself to swallow and take another bite from the moss clump. The second bite went down easier, though the flavor still left something to be desired.
‘ding!’ ‘You have been cured of the Starvation I status ailment’
Jason dismissed the notification thoughtfully. His most recent meal felt like lead in his stomach, and while it could cure the Starvation ailment, it wouldn’t be pleasant doing so.
He turned to the hanging Grothlit with more hope in his eyes.
“Here’s to hoping you taste better than that,” Jason muttered unenthusiastically as he carefully carved out a slice of meat using a harvested Grothlit claw. Jason held up a ragged slab of meat and eyed it warily. His nose wrinkled at the pungent and faintly acidic aroma rising from the meat. He grimaced, then pinched his nose and took a hesitant bite.
His tongue was immediately assaulted by the delightful flavor of vinegar drenched in aspartame. The faux metallic sweetness and the bitter, acrid sting of acid shot up into his brain like a lightning bolt. Jason wretched, spitting out the meat, and fell to his knees as he heaved up a clump of disgusting moss.
He rushed to one of his designated water pools and drank deeply, rinsing his mouth before suppressing another wave of dry heaves.
Nearly half an hour later, Jason lay sprawled on the ground with his cheek pressed to the cool floor of the cavern.
“Bloody hell,” Jason coughed. “Guess I’m sticking to the moss.”
That was easier said than done. While there was plenty of moss in the cave system, removing some to eat necessarily darkened that part of the cave, which would, in turn, spawn monsters. Lone Grothlits weren’t dangerous to Jason anymore, but getting swarmed could still kill him. It also would prevent him from sleeping if they roamed free. That was why he’d spent so much effort to block up the mob farm in the first place.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
But that didn’t mean it wasn’t possible. Jason had already learned how to move the moss without killing it, courtesy of the mob farm, so he set about building a moss farm without further ado.
The process started slowly and with several failures, but Jason loved the work. It was strange. He had never had a great affinity for plants or gardening, but something about trying to learn everything he could about this alien form of life spoke to him. He found himself deeply engrossed as he examined each fragile organism for hints that would help him grow them better.
Turned out there were several. Unlike any other plant on earth, the moss possessed strange polyp-like structures that coated it like hair. They were only barely visible and periodically scooped up water droplets from the environment and sucked them in. To where? Jason had no clue. The organism was a moss with no vascularization. And yet the polyps existed.
Mechanical motion in a plant wasn’t unheard of on earth, but it was extremely rare, especially since the polyp-like hairs seemed to serve a dual purpose of hydration and respiration.
When the hairs were submerged for too long, the plant wilted and died. If they were left in the air for too long, they stiffened, browned, and caused large chunks of the surrounding moss to dim. It was a fascinating case study that almost felt like an evolutionary misstep, but Jason rolled with it anyway.
Manual watering was impractical, simply due to the scale of the farm he was building. Ultimately, the solution he settled on relied on the steady dripping of water from above. The moss already depended on the stalactites for water. All he did was optimize the flow. Some careful scaffolding and shredding of his already destroyed clothes resulted in dozens of little strings that conducted the dripping water evenly over the entire moss farm.
And that was only one of the challenges. The moss seemed determined to die at the slightest misstep. Crowding seemed to stunt its growth, but measured proximity accelerated it instead. It refused to grow unless placed within a crevice to cozy up into but was more than happy to spread glacially over smooth stone on its own.
It was a perplexing but highly rewarding process that Jason got lost in for hours.
Days passed, and the starvation debuff came and went and came again. Every time it did, Jason swallowed another one of his precious plants. He barely registered the taste as he finished the first room and began expanding into an adjacent chamber.
What he did notice was the steadily ramping Starvation affliction. At first, he could ward them away for hours between meals, but as the days passed, that time grew shorter and shorter.
His body was also deteriorating. At first, it was just an observation that he could suck his stomach in pretty far. Then he started noticing the dense slabs of muscle honed over years in the gym fading away.
The hunger also never subsided. Weakness took him at odd intervals, with sharp spikes of hunger that could only be slaked by drinking enormous quantities of water. He tried increasing the amount of moss he consumed but immediately started noticing the biomass in his farm decreasing.
Jason thought furiously as he burned through the moss. He tried again to eat the Grothlit meat. This time, he spent hours trying to get the dense hardwood of the dorm chair to burn but failed. It was too wet in the caves, and he had no good way of creating a spark. The end result was several short-lived blisters on his palms from trying to start a friction fire.
The math didn’t add up. Moss simply didn’t grow enough calories to sustain an adult man, given the farming space provided. This depressing thought hounded him every time he walked by the swirling white portal containing Corinne and Tyler’s frozen forms.
In a last-ditch effort, Jason didn’t immediately eat upon gaining the Starvation ailment, hoping against hope that maybe he could delay nourishment a bit by doing so. Or something. The condition ate at him. It felt like a faint burning in the pit of his stomach. After barely any time at all, a second notification tinged.
‘ding!’ ‘You have been afflicted with the Starvation II status ailment’
‘ding!’ ‘Starvation II: Your body lacks sustenance and has begun to wither. You take 10% of your health as Flesh damage, and the effectiveness of your attributes is Cursed by 4%’
'ding!' 'Congratulations! You have learned the skill [Flesh Resistance]: You have sought out and survived the clawing hunger of Starvation. This skill will help you resist the withering degradation of the flesh’
'ding!' '[Flesh Resistance] has reached level 1'
“Wait a second...” Jason blinked blearily at the skill. If...If he could gain [Flesh Resistance]. Then, couldn’t he eventually become immune to the starvation debuff? He would still have to contend with the reduction in—
'ding!' 'Congratulations! You have learned the skill [Curse Resistance]: You felt the weakness of starvation and still chose to embrace it. The curse of starvation drains you of attributes. This skill will make you more resistant to such effects'
'ding!' '[Curse Resistance] has reached level 1'
Jason immediately felt his limbs regain a tiny fraction of their strength. He stared at his status for what felt like hours. Thoughts tumbled haphazardly through his mind as an inkling of a new idea came to him. What if the solution to his problem wasn’t building a farm that could sustain him in this cave system but rather...something else?
What if.
He didn’t eat.
'ding!' '[Regeneration] has reached level 9'
That clinched it. Jason let the notification disappear as he settled into a comfortable nook in the wall. Perhaps starving himself wasn’t the wisest idea, but it would allow him to train not one but three separate skills—skills that might even make him completely immune to hunger if he trained them high enough.
The thought was tantalizing. It was the first truly superhuman act the system had shown him. Sure, unnaturally fast healing was cool, and summoning stone spikes from the ground was pretty magical, but...no longer needing food? That wasn’t just an isolated party trick. It was more tangible—a fundamental, permanent improvement to his biology.
What if he could transcend the need for water? What about air? What if, eventually, he went to space and was just fine? There would be no need to worry about crushing decompression, a lack of air, or freezing cold.
The thought burned like a brand in his mind.
He wanted that.
Badly.
Jason crossed his legs as he sank deep into himself. He emptied his mind and let his thoughts drift, focusing on nothing and everything at once. The hunger was still there, cloying and sharp. The Starvation debuff was still there, tiny and burning in his gut. But by letting his mind wander, they faded to the background.
‘ding!’ ‘You have been afflicted with the Starvation III status ailment’
'ding!' '[Curse Resistance] has reached level 2'
'ding!' '[Flesh Resistance] has reached level 2'
He let his dreams come to the fore. His questions regarding the shattering of the conservation laws. The amazing potential of all the strange discoveries he’d made regarding both the moss and the Grothlits. Excitement at what other strange creatures this system might throw at him, and what he could learn from studying them.
Above all else there was hope. Hope that maybe, just maybe, he could prolong this strange magic just a little bit longer.
‘ding!’ ‘You have been afflicted with the Starvation IV status ailment’
‘ding!’ ‘You have been afflicted with the Dehydration I status ailment’
‘ding!’ ‘Dehydration I: Your body lacks the water required for survival. You take 10% of your health as Blood damage, and the effectiveness of your attributes is Cursed by 4%’
Jason gasped as an itching fire sprang to life in his throat. He coughed, momentarily knocked out of his meditation as a fresh pain emerged.
'ding!' 'Congratulations! You have learned the skill [Blood Resistance]: Few creatures chose not to eat. Even fewer abhor the drink. It composes all that you are, and still you refrain. Your blood has changed so that it can flow even when made as thick as sludge’
'ding!' '[Blood Resistance] has reached level 1'
Jason closed his eyes. It felt like he was on fire. As if he was sitting atop a flaming pyre, intent on consuming his life. Every part of his body was burning. It ached and hurt, sapping his strength and attributes in an unbeatable two-pronged attack that demanded his destruction.
Except Jason wasn’t tied to that metaphorical stake. He wasn’t held down against his will to experience this hell. He clung to it. Hungrily. Desperately. He grasped at the pain like it was his last lifeline in the storm. He held on with every scrap of will as the debuffs ravaged his body. Time passed in a blur as they kept mounting minute by minute. Hour by hour.
And his skills continued to rise.
'ding!' '[Blood Resistance] has reached level 2'
...
'ding!' '[Blood Resistance] has reached level 4'
'ding!' '[Curse Resistance] has reached level 3'
...
'ding!' '[Curse Resistance] has reached level 5'
'ding!' '[Flesh Resistance] has reached level 3'
...
'ding!' '[Flesh Resistance] has reached level 5'