Several hours now in the heat of the sun Gar could tell he was starting to need some water; it wasn’t as severe as he thought it should be but he could tell it was starting to become something he needed. So he needed to get past these things. With that in mind he set into motion, first he returned cautiously towards the woods. Quickly finding what he was looking for a stick relatively straight sturdy and about as long as he was tall. He was loathed to do it but he cut about a foot of rope off the end and unwound it to get some thinner cords. Using his knife to cut one end of the stick into a point he then used the cord to tie his knife to the other end of the stick, the spare bits of cord went into his pocket. He now had an improvised spear, not the best in the world but it should hopefully do for now. With spear in hand Gar started advancing towards the river again, slow and cautiously, once he got to where he was a few meters from where he believed the creatures where hiding he started swinging his spear back and forth at ground level while moving sideways for a few meters before taking a step forward and repeating the action going in the other direction. This wasn’t cutting much of the grass but in its slightly dry state it was enough to mostly flatten the area he passed. a few more steps forward repeating this behaviour and he saw his first slightly red patch and greener grass, taking care he flatten the grass in front of it while staying back at maximum reach with his spear. Once he had a clear area Gar took a moment to observe the spot he thought one of these creatures was at, and he really couldn’t tell it did look like just a slightly more vibrant patch of grass. Not willing to take a chance he took a good two handed grip on his spear aimed downwards into the base of the tuft of grass and then stabbed forwards, he penetrated, unsure what though he lifted the spear up and was almost surprised when it brought the body of one of those things with it. He had been right and it looked like the one hit had been enough, which wasn’t too surprising as the blade of the large knife had gone almost all the way through the creature. Not wanting to hang around to see what the others did after one of their own was killed Gar grabbed the body off his spear and with creature in one hand and spear in the other ran back to the tree he had been hiding in earlier.

Back up the tree Gar stopped and rested, grabbing one of the strings from his pocket he hung the dead creature by its ankles from a branch. That would hopefully drain the blood from the thing. He didn’t know much about hunting but he was pretty sure that was a thing you did, drain the blood out. With a successful kill and no sign of anything following, Gar allowed the feeling of minor irritation to distract him for a moment, it wasn’t an extreme feeling and he knew it could be easily ignored. It was like that feeling when someone is staring at you from across a room, nothing concrete nothing solid but it was still there all the same and now he was paying attention to it, it responded words appeared before his eyes.

“You have killed a level 3 conrex 6 experience awarded”

So he had got himself his first experience that was exhilarating, also it appeared this thing was called a conrex and was actually level 3. All this was fascinating but it also reminded Gar of another message popping up a message about a skill.

Remembering it now Gar opened his status sheet

Race: Gargoyle

Name: Gar

Level: 1

Experience to next level: 6/100

Health: 126/126

Stamina: 109/109

Mana: 62/62

Constitution: 11 Endurance: 8

Strength: 12 Agility: 5

Dexterity: 5 Willpower: 8

Wisdom: 6 Intelligence: 6

Charisma: 3 Perception: 7

Luck: 5

Abilities

Racial:

* Grotesque: The Grotesque of a gargoyle is its strength, add monster parts to you to truly strike fear into others

* Dark vision: As creatures of the dark born to stand guard in the night you have excellent vision in the dark.

Personal

* Mana sight: Able to see the mana flow inside of objects and beings

Skills

* Observe, Level 1: Allows the user to see details of the world around them

Yes the new skill was right there at the end of his status, it let him see details of his surroundings that could be useful depending on what it meant. Looking at his status also reminded Gar of something else his ability mana sight. He realised then that both of them might help him find these hidden enemy’s. Wait when had these things changed in his mind from creatures blocking his way to enemy’s to be destroyed. It was a subtle difference that Gar almost overlooked in his excitement of testing new skills and abilities. Starting with observe, it was simple for him to activate the knowledge was in his head, with a thought he knew the skill was active; the change was obvious the world suddenly became clearer but that was it. He had expected something, some information maybe popups anything this really wasn’t doing any of that. Deciding maybe he needed to focus on something he looked at the body of the hanging conrex. Then something happened, hanging in text above the body was

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“Dead conrex”

Not much information, but then again the skill was only level one, besides even that much could be useful. Sat in the tree he started looking across the open grassland focusing on where he thought the Conrex were hidden trying to get his new skill to focus on them, pick them out, and make it easier for him. No such luck nothing popped up, for whatever reason it wasn’t going to work. Just another thing he didn’t know, he just hoped in time he would be able to work it out.

Moving on he tried out mana sight, this time it took a moment to activate as he felt something flow up from his centre to his eyes before returning the way it came, the flow subtle but continuous. The change it made though was something else entirely. The world took on a whole new look there were colours and patterns everywhere, it was beautiful this really was opening his eyes to something new. His head was on a swivel trying to take it all in, this was magical, and that wasn’t just hyperbole it was actually magical he was seeing magic, well the magical energy, the mana. This is what he hoped for in coming here the chance to experience things like this. Even with all of his excitement it didn’t take too long before all of the moving and swirling colours became a bit nauseating and overwhelming. Unwilling to turn it off just yet but unable to take it all in, Gar turned and focused on the branch under him.

It helped focusing just on the branch, he was able to ignore all the other mana and just watch the thin stream that flowed through the branch. It was a thin wisp of mana a light green in colour. Despite being so thin, it was still a continuous flow spiralling along the branch. He followed the stream up the branch with his eyes watching how it had split as a branch that grew off the one he sat on, that one a smaller branch of one he only just was able to see the mana flow onto it was so thin. Gar felt he could have sat for hours watching the mana flow, following the patterns throughout the tree. It fascinated him he wanted to take it all in, to understand it all.

But he wasn’t in a place to that he still needed access to the water, a place to stay, survival came first if he could get that sorted he could spend his time exploring the intricacies of the world around him. Taking that into mind Gar turned this new ability to try and do something that would be immediately useful, turning to look towards where the conrex where hiding, he started trying to spot them again. Only this time once he found likely areas he thought they were quite easy to spot, the grass around them held almost no mana so little he couldn’t even tell its colour, but the tufts he suspected to be conrex where vibrant with rich red mana, looking at the dead conrex near him he saw the same rich red mana in it, not as vibrant and not really flowing any more but still the same red kind of mana. As far as Gar was concerned this proved the mana red tufts where the conrex, he had found a way to easily spot them. Having identified the conrex via their mana Gar tried one more thing hoping it would work the way he thought it would. He activated “Observe” while keeping “mana site” active, looking towards one of the hidden conrex and yes it worked exactly as he had hoped. As he looked at the conrex words appeared above its head

“Conrex level 2”

And even better when he stopped focusing on that conrex the text remained floating above its head, a great marker as to where it sat hidden. Then testing another and getting a similar result

“Conrex level 3”

He found the text above the first still remained. Swiftly he marked all the conrex he could see. By the time he was done he had twenty seven conrex marked, all between levels 1 and 4, but those where only the ones closest to him he couldn’t see well enough to mark all of them all the way to the river. With these new found skills and ability’s Gar was much more confident facing these creatures, so thinking he climbed down from the tree, tied the dead conrex to his waist, picked up his spear and moved back to his flattened patch of grass advancing forward in the same manner as before. He was confident he had marked all the conrex in this first part but wasn’t going to take the risk that he might have missed some. It wasn’t much further before he came across his first marked. It was swiftly disposed of with a single strike like the first one.

“You have killed a level 2 conrex 4 experience awarded”

Unlike the first one though Gar left the body where it lay and waited, watching all around him but kept most of his attention on the closest marked Conrex’s. There was no sign of movement, no indication they were going to act at all. So after a couple of minutes with no change Gar retrieved a string from his pocket and slowly picked up the body attaching it next to the first before he moved on.

Things continued like this with Gar advancing slowly, the first level 4 conrex caused him to slow slightly and hesitate, its higher level might mean it could survive his first hit or avoid it, it was slightly anticlimactic as it went down as easily as the rest of them. It didn’t take much longer before the conrex where getting too much to carry and he had run out of marked conrex in front of him. So he dropped the dead conrex in a pile in the middle of his wide flattened path and turned to angle his path towards a tree not too far in front of him. Taking it extra slow mana sight and observe still active Gar headed for the tree, it was taking longer without the pre-marked conrex but he was able to get to the tree safely killing a few more along the way, the area directly under the tree was pretty clear of the tall grass but Gar took the time to flatten it all around for a couple of meters.

He then went back along his path and picked up the dead and returned them to the tree, it took him several trips as he refused to give up one hand on his spear or carry too many so he couldn’t fight. the bodies where all hung from crooks in branches of the tree and cut to bleed, not that many needing cutting having their heads nearly split in half was a good way to bleed them especially when they are mostly head. He then climbed the tree and marked every conrex he could see, there were lots more now, all around him he must be in the middle of their territory Gar spent a good while in the tree even after he thought he had found them all, just to make sure, and if he was honest he was a bit scared by the number of them, way more than he expected covering a massive area.

He did eventually head of again, this time starting towards the next closest tree in the direction of the river. It took a while meandering back and forth from tree to tree, it probably doubled the distance he walked but the advantage of being able to spot and mark the enemy from a safe vantage point was worth the extra walking as far as Gar was concerned. Each time he was getting close to the next tree and he hadn’t been able to mark them that far away slowed him dramatically and raised the tension he felt. It took time but eventually he was on the rocky banks of the river. In total he had needed to kill Forty seven Conrex all but the last six hanging from trees on his route. It had netted him a total of 188 experience he had enough to level up, but Gar was refusing to look at that until he had a place to shelter, with the water from the river and meat from the conrex the only thing he was missing on his survival checklist was shelter.