My world started to spin and I got slightly nauseous as I saw greens and browns blur into my vision. When my world came to a rest I was standing in a small clearing at the base of a cliff with woods behind me. I looked up the cliff, it appeared to be about seventy feet tall. I then noticed I could feel where my companions were the farthest from me was called Stoneleaf and appeared to be about three quarters of a mile away from me. I needed to orient myself with the world now that I was finally in it. I thought about opening my status screen and it appeared before me letting me know I had one hundred and forty HP, seventy stamina, and sixty qi. It also showed me my current stats and armor which was…five, that didn’t seem right. I closed my status screen and looked down to see I was wearing gray cloth pants, robes and boots. A sigh escaped my lips as i brought my inventory up i had my clothing, a skinning knife located in a sheathe on the back of my rope belt, a water skin which i could see attached to my waist, and some rations which were stored in a belt pouch on the opposite side from my water skin. Finally I checked my skill screen and found the racial and class skills I had chosen as well as a skill called skinning that was at level one, interesting you must have to actually take parts from the creatures you kill. I noticed all the other members of my party were heading toward a spot roughly in the middle of all of us and decided I should probably start moving.

The only problem was the cliff was in the way I needed to go, suddenly I was very happy I started with the vertical run skill. I took a moment to ponder whether the game took that into account when placing us or not, eventually deciding I had no way to know for sure. I looked at my vertical run skill it took ten qi per second. I hope i can make it up the cliff i thought to myself right before I made a full sprint at the cliff. I made it about two steps up the cliff face before I fell onto my back knocking the wind out of me. I immediately realized I had forgotten to activate the skill after resting for a bit and noticing I had lost one HP to the fall I stood up again. My second attempt went much smoother right before my foot touched the cliff face I mentally activated the skill almost six second later I had reached the top of the cliff with little qi to spare. The skill had felt like my gravity had changed orientation like I was simply running on the ground. When I reached the top I stared forward into a densely packed forest.

I set off into the forest keeping my awareness about myself. I didn't know what was in these woods and I didn’t want to be caught off guard. After about ten minutes of walking I noticed a bush rustle despite a distinct lack of wind. my body naturally fell into a basic taekwondo fighting stance. My fists in front of me with my left fist forward and my weight set on my right leg which was at a ninety degree angle to my body and my left foot forward. A wolf about three foot tall came out of the bush snarling at me, it charged at me and I stepped to the right and planted a straight kick into its side. I felt its ribs crack under the blow and it slid across the ground. I fell back into my fighting stance as it charged me again, this time jumping for my face. My right foot came up into a crescent kick and I activated empowered strike, my foot made contact with its neck and I heard a snap as the corpse flew off into the distance. After a moment my body relaxed and I walked over to the corpse of the beast. I drew my skinning knife and set to work. Soon I had the hide of the beast in my hands. I sat for a moment and thought about what to do with it. Then I had an idea and placed it over the belt pouch and thought about putting it into my inventory, the hide disappeared and i checked my inventory screen sure enough it was in my inventory.

Shortly after that i slammed into the ground as a large weight hit me in the back then i felt teeth sink into my side the pain was bearable but extremely uncomfortable. I pushed with my right hand and spun onto my back and performed a kick up. I saw a large wolf standing at four and a half feet tall with red eyes and a bloody maw. It charged at me and I jumped and rolled to the side coming up in my fighting stance. It slowly circled me this time I charged at it, the wolf tried to bite at me as I came in but my foot came up in a snap kick landing in its throat it backed off making a noise halfway between choking and coughing. After a second it charged at me. I went for a straight punch but at the last moment the wolf skidded to a halt. My punch missed and I felt its teeth sink into my forearm. As my arm was in its mouth I brought my left elbow down onto its skull feeling a satisfying hit. The beast released and tried to jump back, but I pushed off and jumped after it, throwing a crescent kick over its head. The wolf thinking I missed my attack crouched to launch itself into my chest, that’s when my foot came down in an axe kick slamming into the same part of its skull that my elbow had hit but with the power of an empowered strike. Its head slammed into the ground as its front legs gave and there was a sickening crunch as its skull smashed inwards. After collecting myself I noticed I was at eighty three HP after the battle, it hit hard. I pulled my skinning knife again and went to work again, after I was done and had put the hide away I decided to get some of the meat as well. And set to cutting some chunks out of the smaller wolf and putting it away. After I was done cutting meat from the first wolf a notification popped up letting me know I had unlocked the skill harvest (animal). I set to work on the larger wolf putting that meat away as well, afterwards I checked my inventory and found that I had one D rank wolf pelt, one D rank dire wolf pelt, and twelve pounds of D rank wolf meat. My skinning and harvesting jobs seemed pretty shabby. I checked my skill screen and found both my skinning and harvesting skills were at level one. But both were fifty percent to the next level.

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After my battles I set off towards the town again. I was already a third of the way to the meeting spot and I noticed that three of the others were already there and the fourth was closer than me. Great, I'm gonna be the last one there, I thought as I walked on. As I walked I noticed that I could hear the sound of running water to my right. I paused for a second before I decided to check it out and walked for about fifteen minutes before I found a river about twenty feet across with clear water running through it. I crouched down and started to wash the blood off my hands from harvesting the wolves. I was still about half a mile away from the meeting spot and everyone else was already there, midway through my thought I heard an ear deafening roar. I slowly raised my head and found myself staring at a ten foot tall wolf with crimson eyes and crimson spikes growing out of its back. I turned and ran for my life. I was running for half an hour before I had to stop to catch my breath. I looked behind me but there was nothing there. I didn't even know if it followed me but now I was about four miles from the village. I cursed myself for not being smart enough to run towards the village. That's when I noticed the screen saying that the fear effect I was under had ended. That had to be a boss creature, it just had to be. I started on the long hike back towards the town. Along the way I looked up to notice that the sun was still rising in the sky. It must have been about ten in the morning, huh that’s weird I didn’t know how to tell time by looking at the position of the sun. It must be the game's way of letting me know what time it is. As I walked I looked and noticed I was out of qi. After a few more minutes of walking I checked again and noticed it hadn’t gone up. I checked my skill screen and noticed another skill I had missed earlier, meditation. I sat down and started to focus on meditation. I could feel the energy of the world flowing into me. My qi recovered slowly. It took half an hour for my qi to be restored to full, meaning i only got two qi a minute. on my way back after that it was altogether quite boring. I ran into two more wolves on the way back, taking them out relatively easily. I skinned and harvested both of them, gaining two more D rank wolf pelts and seventeen pounds of D rank wolf meat. After forty five minutes I came out into a clearing and could finally see the village in the distance. There was smoke coming from some of the buildings. From what I could see it looked like there were about fifteen buildings in the village. Soon I would see my friends and we could talk about what we had learned.