A few hours had passed as Jake meditated, healing some of his injuries. He decided to try something he didn't believe would work, but he had to try. He decided to take Erica back to the cottage where Matt and Jess were. Jake let out a long breath as he asked, “If I can take you out of this system, would you want to go with me?”
“I don't get what you're saying,” Erica replied.
“Well, I can't explain it until I see if we can do it. If we can, I will explain what happened. But if I can't, there's no point in saying anything. So, it's your choice.”
“Okay, I've trusted you so far. Why not just a little more? Let's do this then.”
Jake pulled out the token and willed Erica to come with him for a moment. There was a bit of rejection from the token, but Jake willed it to happen, and the next moment, Jake was standing in the cottage.
“I guess it didn't wor–.” A flash of light happened, and before Jake was Erica.
“Ha, It worked. I can't believe it.”
“What happened? That felt really odd. It was like my whole body was torn asunder and then remade. What did you do?”
“I said I would explain if it worked, so here it is. I'm new to the universal system. We were just in a tutorial set up by the system, and you were, from what I could figure out, a part of the scenario. But now we are outside of the tutorial. We are on a planet that was the home of the wandering arcane smith Aaliyah La Flame.”
“So, does that mean I am not real?”
“No, you are real. I have a theory about the tutorial. I believe that it was based on an event that happened in the past, and the moment I got involved with it, the old timeline changed, at least in the tutorial. In reality, I believe that the real battle happened, and, well, you... well, you can guess that. As for what I did, I forcefully pulled you out of the scenario and into reality. You could think that you have been given a second chance to do whatever you want.”
“So, if I am outside of the tutorial that you mentioned, what does that mean? If I try re-entering, will I be just a simulation again? And the knowledge I gained here is gone? Or will I be initiated into the system with your universe?”
“I'm sorry, I don't know.”
Jake sat on the ground beside Erica for a good day before Matt walked in through the door. Jake was in a state of meditation, unresponsive to any outside influences.
“How and what are you? And what happened to Jake?”
“My name is Erica, and what happened to Jake was a mix of bad luck and this.” Erica pulled out her axe and placed it beside her.
“What do you mean, this?” Matt said before jumping back, pulling out a wizard-style staff, and summoning a mana shield in front of himself.
“Okay, I'm not your enemy, young man,” Erica said as she put her hands up. Erica let out a long breath. “We were in a fight with a lot of bugs, and Jake was stuck under one. We were being overwhelmed, so I chopped his leg off so we could escape, and then he brought me here.”
Matt was still on guard as he said, “Can you wake him up to verify your story?”
“Sadly, no. He entered this state after he dropped a bombshell on me. That would have been about a day ago now.”
“That sounds like him. Did you know after bringing us here, he just turned around and left?” Jess said as she walked in.
“My name is Jess, and this fool is Matt. It's nice to meet you. Can you tell us about yourself?” Jess said as she sat down beside Erica. Hours passed before Jess decided to take Erica to her study as she wanted to show her a book she had found.
“So, that's how we lost. I wonder if we can use this to complete your objectives.”
“I think we should bring this up with Jake when he is healthy again.”
“What do you mean, healthy again? I chopped off his leg. He will need healing potions to heal from that much damage.”
“I read a book that explains what is happening to Jake. Just know that he will heal, and in time, he will be stronger than anyone out there in the universe.” Jess said with absolute certainty.
Matt came into the study later that day with three bottles, one of each Stamina, Mana, and Health, for them to try. Matt was lucky; he was well-adept at alchemy. Jess, on the other hand, didn't have such a good grasp of her profession. She was stuck, as she needed to use the objects she made to gain a better understanding, but so far, the only thing she could make was a bayonet for her rifle. To use it, she would have to go out and hunt, but she couldn't hunt alone, and Matt had no intention of hunting when everything he needed was here. She told this to Erica, and the two of them came up with a plan. Matt would make potions to get Erica back up to full, on all three stats, then the two of them would go out and have a look around.
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Erica and Jess were hiding in the forest about two kilometers away from the cottage. Erica looked over at Jess with a slight grin and gestured to a single spider. Its level was only at level 5. Erica gestured for Jess to move to the right and down behind a rock that led out of the valley while Erica left. Once Erica and Jess were in position, Erica jumped down towards the spider, swinging her axe just missing the spider, making it flee in Jess's direction. Jess was shaking with excitement as the spider closed in on her position. Erica and she had used this same tactic five times already.
The spider's front legs had just passed the rock as Jess lunged her rifle straight up into its head before pulling the trigger, splitting open the spider's head, colorful brain matter covering the forest. Erica walked over to Jess and said, “I don't think we can keep doing this. We're having more issues finding isolated spiders for you to kill.”
“What do you think we should do?” Jess said.
“I don't know, but what if we try to take on a bigger group? I know the whole point of coming out here is to help you level up your understanding of smithing, but with a bit more combat, you should start being able to take some of these without me watching your back. Then you can start tasting your creations by yourself.”
“I think we probably should do that. After all, what will happen when you're not around?”
The two ladies set off deeper into the forest, stalking their next prey. Jess was now in the lead, using the knowledge Erica had taught her, following the slight remnant trace of mana signatures left behind by the spiders. As they followed, Jess was on high alert, as this was the first time she was meant to do it all by herself. Jess stepped as quietly as she could, making sure not to step on any leaf litter. As Jess got closer to the prey, she started to notice that the traces of mana started to separate—a group of five separated from the main group. She decided to follow the group of five. She followed for about ten minutes before giving the signal to stop. As she did, Erica moved up beside her.
“What's your plan?” Erica asked.
Looking a little further down the path, Jess saw the five spiders spread out in the trees. “I will handle this. I'm going to draw them in and confuse them into fighting each other as I pick them off one by one.”
The next moment, Jess was gone. Then, a flash of light came from behind one of the spiders before a knife hit a web. Jess moved to a different location, repeating the same actions three more times before she hit one of the spiders with a knife, hitting it in the abdomen. The spider went nuts and charged the spider in front of it. The three others were just watching until Jess fired her rifle, killing two in quick succession before disappearing again. The two spiders that were fighting each other stopped and looked at the two dead spiders and then at the third one standing over the other two and charged it. The three remaining spiders were in a group when a loud bang rang out from one of the corpses, and all three spiders were blown apart by Jess's new creation, a timed explosive charge. A moment later, Jess walked out of the tree line and stood beside Erica.
“How did I do? Was I good enough to pass? Can I come back with you and Jake?”
“You have passed; you are now a true huntress. But as for if you can come back, that's up to Jake, not me.”
Back in the cottage, Jake was sitting at his cauldron. He had been working on this new item for a long time. The item he was working on was the F88 broomstick. Jake had almost got it right with his last try, but there was a major problem with it; he couldn't attach his under-barrel grenade launcher called Room Shaker 1.0.
New item: Room Shaker 1.0 (common) - Throws a small arcane bomb to a maximum distance of 30 meters. Will explode on impact with any target. Splash damage multiplier 20%. Damage radius 10 meters.
Jake pushed the last bit of his energy into the cauldron, hoping for it to work. The cauldron started to crackle. This was the sign that the item was as good as it was going to get. Jake removed it from the cauldron and assembled all the parts, using Identify on it.
New item: Broomstick 1.0 (rare) - This item has a self-loading function. Item will gather ammo off of the operator and store them directly into a magazine. Impact damage multiplier 5%. Has the ability to have under-barrel attachments.
Ding! Profession level increased +200 points.
Ding! Grade level increased +160 points.
Jake looked at his new creation. “I think I need to test this out,” Jake said with a grin. He walked out the front door and loaded an arcane-infused grenade into Room Shaker 1.0, then loaded Broomstick 1.0.
“Matt, come out, I've got a new test item,” Jake called out, and a moment later, Matt came out, standing beside Jake. “Are we going with the same test scenario as last time?”
“Yes,” Matt replied.
Matt walked about 30 meters away and formed a bubble shield around a bush, then walked back. “Is that the strongest shield you can make?”
“Yes and no. The bubble shield only has the amount of mana that the caster puts into it when it is made. But the good news is I have a good amount of mana, so I put about half of what I've got in it.”
“Nice,” Jake said.
Jake raised his rifle, lining it up with the target. “Clear the range, test in progress,” Matt yelled at the top of his voice.
Thump! Bang!
“Holy fuck,” Matt exclaimed. “That was powerful. How did your shield hold up?”
“It didn't. It blew apart the moment the grenade hit.”
Jess and Erica were on their way back to the cottage. They were just about to leave the tree line when a voice could be heard coming from the cottage.
“Clear the range, test in progress.”
Jess and Erica were processing the words when...
Bang!
Both of them were blown off their feet, landing on the ground as the air was sucked out of their lungs. As they gasped for breath, a ball of blue and black flames blew over their heads. Luckily, they were outside the 10-meter range, but unlucky for them, they were 3 meters outside of it. All of the ground in front of them was burnt black, not a single bit of life remaining within a 10-meter radius around ground zero.
“What the fuck was that?” Jess screamed.