The flesh in its face was some kind of un-eye for whatever arcane shit allows one to void things. Basically, the cells in its face were like the opposites of retinas, where instead of transferring energy to nerve signals, they were transferring nerve signals to energy. When I hit the flesh, I carved out the retina, and thus gave it a kind of centre eye-loss. The area under the wound was covered with blood, and since the creature evolutionarily needed to be immune to it’s own magic, the covered area stopped functioning.
So, to abuse this information, I simply jumped forward and cut the top of it’s head deeply, and then turned around and ran.
After a few minutes of dodging it was completely covered in it’s own blood.
Now its voiding ability was hampered.
I knew that the blood hadn’t seeped completely, and I could still get HIT and die instantly, but that wasn’t the point.
The point was that it knew this. It was clearly ruled by logic more than emotions.
It knew that I’d crippled it’s main offensive mechanism.
It knew that it could not hit me much.
It knew that I knew its weakness.
And it knew I was smarter than it.
Conclusion? I was too dangerous. How did a wild animal deal with dangerous opponents?
They fled.
That’s why I JUMPED on it.
I felt it’s legs tense. Then it bolted through the forest, our surroundings lost at what seemed like the speed of light.
I smiled inwardly. I’d acquired transportation.
----------------------------------------
As I rode the monster, I began driving my claws deeper and deeper into it’s now-useless head.
It was a slow process: after the initial layer of its face, it’s body became denser.
Once my claws were truly entrenched, I heaved, and forced its head to the left.
Right into a nearby tree.
It hit it with a BANG as all of it’s body crumpled against it.
I wasn’t fazed. I forced it’s head up, then I jumped off it’s back and drove it’s head directly into the ground.
I put my body weight on it’s neck - though it wasn’t much - and began to leverage it in two directions using my claws.
Slowly, with a squelching sound, my claws pushed it’s face open.
I twisted them, so the hooks were pointed down.
Then I pushed.
Again, they drew bloody trenches into it’s face.
I checked on it. Being a hardy bastard, it was still moving.
I did it again and again, carving meat canyons, until it shuddered and died.
I fell back, my body covered in blood, carrion, and viscera.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
I moved away from the corpse of the monster - not sure if I could eat it - and began walking through the forest until I was a good 100 meters away from the corpse.
I kept an ear out to the ambient noises of the jungle, ensuring that it didn’t get too quiet.
Eventually, I came upon a place where the ground was stable.
Nodding, I made sure that I was clear of persuers, then began digging down - my large claws making it very easy. I created a small burrow that barely fit my body. I covered up the other end, leaving only a tiny hole for air.
I focused on the echoes, insinctually forcing the possibilities forward, and ensured that I did not have a high chance of danger.
Then, I delved into my status.
Congratulations! You felled a Hunting Dog of The ABYSS (Tier 2, Level 12).
(For killing something 2 Tiers above you, while yourself being Tier 0, you gain high rewards.)
+500 Evolution Credits
+50 Skill Points
+1 Affinity Points
I pondered that. I’d need to figure out what those do later, after looking through the rest of my notifications.
Congratulations! You have shown eligibility to learn Skills. Due to the fact that knowledge on Skills hasn’t been detected in your brain, you may receive a brief debrief on the nature of skills.
Do you wish to view this de-brief?
I nodded emphatically.
DOC-001234.1k+21
On the Nature and Use of Skills
By Hom, [Last of All Kings]
Ah! Skills. O’er the billions of worlds, there are countless manifestations of magic and the unexplained, with Skills being ours. A [Scholar] would talk about the ‘Abnormality Principle’, and try to couch the explanations that are actually important into why we have skills - all the while making their wording as unnecessarily technical as possible.
It’s…frustrating. Because, in the end, it does not matter.
You’re not here to learn that, and I’m not here to teach that.
No.
You want to know how you can use it.
…probably.
I don’t exactly control who gets this transcript. I’m pretty sure it’s random.
Anyway, let’s get to the meat and potatoes.
You ask the system, spend 10 skill points. and then you can record one action. This could be anything, from swiping a sword, parrying something with a shield, moving your eyeball or even thinking a certain way. Then you name it.
Now you have a skill. It will look something like this on your screen:
Reverse Handed, Sword Swipe
Purity: 18%
Tier: 0
Level: 0
The Purity is a number that refers to how many unnecessary actions have contaminated the skill relative to its name. These can be anything from breathing to your heart beating to your eyeballs moving. Most of the time, you start at 10-20%. The more you record with the skill, the higher the purity goes, as the System finds the average between all your iterations of use. The benefit to a high purity is that your skill will become easier to use, take less energy, and could even be used in tandem with other skills.
The Tier is the amount of times that the skill has gained significance. For example, if you used the Skill during a life-or-death battle, then it will gain more significance. The tier always starts at 0, and on average takes about a decade to get to the first tier. Every tier, you can take an effect from your affinities and add it to your skill.
The level is how good you are at using that skill when the time comes for it. It gets affected by a multitude of factors, but this one doesn’t really have an impact beyond making the other two increase faster.
Those are the very basics.
Anyway, I’d suggest you make your skill something specific and universally useable. The more you use it the higher it’s tier, and level, and the more specific it is, the easier it is to isolate. Other than that, it all really depends on your species to be honest.