The emu-looking monster had been given no time to react as the wooden surface it had been standing on suddenly surged upwards, and a bolt made out of pure mana flew towards its head small beaked head. Upon impact, the explosion sent the bird monster flying out of the small hole it had dug to try and reach its subterranean prey.
Peter did his best to scramble up and out of his coffin, but his legs were weak, and his arms were atrophied beyond usage – so he more resembled a worm desperately squirming out of the rapidly refilling hole than a human child.
However pathetic he looked swimming up the sand, it proved enough of an effort to get him out of the hole, and he soon was on all fours above the ground – able to breathe good, oxygenated air for the first time in hours.
The monster he had hit with his [Mana Bolt], on the other hand, was not looking good – even if it was clearly still alive. Its feathered head was bloody and cindered, and Peter momentarily admired his own magical power before realising that the monster had noticed that he had now emerged and was running right at him.
Unable to move, Peter did the only thing he could and that was to fire as many bolts of mana as he could until the damn monster died. Thankfully, it had only taken another mana bolt for the monster to drop dead, and Peter felt himself sigh in relief as a system prompt appeared in his vision informing him of his kill.
You have killed [Copper] Baby Fury (Lvl:8)
Reward: 1x [2-hour Upgrade Time Reducer]
Peter felt a grin form out of his chapped, cracked lips. His theory had been right and now all he had to do was kill a few more of the monsters and find some kind of water source – no matter if it was monster meat or not – he now had some kind of food in front of him and he was not currently able to be picky.
Peter crawled over to the Baby Fury and began tearing at its limbs, eventually managing to rip one of its legs off and instantly the sun’s heat began to sear and cook the meat – though quite slowly. Starving and desperate, Peter began pouring the searing hot sand onto the meat – speeding up the process of cooking tremendously.
Barely a few minutes later, Peter bit into the fleshy leg he had in his hand and, ignoring the crunch of the sand he was also heating, he felt complete euphoria as cooked meat slid down his throat. However it was also more than just any old, cooked meat, it was meat from a kill that he had made, which made the meat taste ever so much more delicious.
He was full after only a few bites and didn’t push his body anymore, instead deciding to go hunting for more monsters to kill as well as water to drink. Despite his crippling dehydration, as well as the sun still burning away at his back, Peter felt as though he had been reborn, and that thus this dungeon was his to conquer.
So, with a struggle, he got onto his two feet at last and began stumbling off in a random direction – a hopeful glint burning in his tired dry eyes.
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A few hours of ceaseless walking later, Peter stumbled upon what looked like the ideal picture of an oasis – a lake of pristine, beautiful water surrounded by an ocean of black searing sand; the bank of the oasis home to a number of palm trees.
Why hadn’t he begun slurping up all the water to quench his thirst?
At least a hundred different variants of the Baby Fury monsters were all drinking eagerly from the oasis and there had always been such a group for so long as Peter had watched them, as he saw when one group of the monsters moved on to some unknown new location a new group seemed to arrive seconds later to take their place.
Peter had to drink water, or he would die, but if he just marched up to the lake and initiated a battle with the monsters then he would also die as though he could confidently kill one of the monsters with his mana bolt he doubted that a pack of 100 monsters would charge at him one by one in slow motion, neatly lining up for him to kill them all.
Thus, he needed to come up with some kind of plan. However, thoughts of plans quickly left his head as a ginormous version of the Baby Fury – perhaps an adult fury – appeared at the head of the incoming group that would replace the monsters currently drinking.
Peter didn’t need to possess a scanning skill to know that this monster was the [Bronze] rank boss monster. There was no doubt in his mind as the monster’s mere presence seemed to intensify the scorching heat in its nearby area – almost setting the air around it on fire as it walked, the heat waves visibly denser than everywhere else.
Peter calmly pushed himself away from the dune he’d been hiding behind to gather intel on the monsters drinking from the oasis as no matter how strong he was now or wanted to be in the future, there was no amount of determination that could overcome the difference in strength between him and a [Bronze] rank.
Thus, he came to a harsh conclusion.
In the world he lived in, he had no inherent right to continue living should he remain as weak as he was. As was shown by the fact that at every step the universe had seemingly made his survival extremely difficult by placing absurd obstacles in his way, thus if he wanted to earn the right to drink water again, and thus continue living, he would have to earn it through killing enough monsters to boost his power.
If he wanted to drink, he had to become able to kill hundreds of monsters at a time which meant only one thing – he needed to get started killing as many as possible before he ran out of time.
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The next two days were the most physically strenuous he’d ever experienced. He didn’t exactly know whether it was because of the dehydration, or because he hadn’t slept much, but what he did know was that he had killed exactly 49 Baby Furies since discovering the location of the oasis.
How did he know that? He had received a system title that told him so of course.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
You have gained the [F+] rank title: Trivial Avian Slayer
Description: Slay a total of 50 monsters or more who are categorised as avians.
Effects: +1% more damage dealt to Avian monsters
Peter found the process of killing the Baby Furies to be incredibly simple now that he’d done it more than once. Sure, they liked to hunt in big groups, but the vast majority of their number were focused on besieging the fortress where all the other raid party’s members were, and so Peter had quite the easy time sniping the weaker ones among them who were usually abandoned by the bigger groups if they were just too slow or too weak.
However, even the weakest monster he’d seen so far had been 1 level higher than he currently was – at level 6. Yet, thanks to the dozens of upgrade time reduction tokens he’d farmed over the last two days from all the killing he’d been doing, the bot that was upgrading his level had finally finished a few seconds ago.
He smiled whole heartedly as he felt a surge of nourishing energy fill his body as the level up system prompt restored his body and satiated his hunger and thirst.
You have levelled up!
Reward:
* +10 HP
* +10 MP
* Your HP and MP have been restored!
* You have unlocked a new Class Skill!
* Select a Skill from the List Below:
* Freeze [Target] | Rank: [Inferior] | Skill Type: [Class] | Skill Activation Type: [Active] | Level: 1 | Description: Freeze a specified target in time for a duration of 3 seconds. | Cost: 15 MP | Cooldown: 10 seconds
* Wither | Rank: [Inferior] | Skill Type: [Class] | Skill Activation Type: [Active] | Level: 1 | Description: A target will experience dangerous levels of sped up time in their immediate area – causing whatever is targeted to wither away unless in possession of a sufficiently high [Constitution]. | Cost: 50 MP | Cooldown: 60 seconds
* Combat Foresight | Rank: [Inferior] | Skill Type: [Class] | Skill Activation Type: [Passive] | Level: 1 | Description: You can see 1 second into the future and divine any incoming attacks and or defensive failures.
Peter couldn’t help but laugh out loud as, now fully healthy, he looked through the list of his class skills and realised that for some reason he was only being offered [Time] magic affinity related skills, but he was fine with that if he was being honest – time magic seemed to be his path, especially as it meshed well with his [Idle Progression] perk.
However, the more he thought about each option, the less certain he felt about any one of the choices.
For example, the [Freeze (Target)] skill seemed like it would be very useful in a 1v1 combat scenario and would probably help him out in a major way in the short term against the birds he hunted, but Peter suspected its utility would very quickly reach a ceiling in the later levels.
However, the second option, the [Wither] skill would provide him an incredibly powerful attack skill – but at the cost of almost all of Peter’s mana pool in one go. It would perhaps help him deal with more powerful opponents later on, but as of now he was fighting against monsters and people who mainly focused on boosting their physical stats – so them having a high constitution was likely, which would also likely mean the skill may end up proving pointless in his current situation.
The third option, on the other hand, the [Combat Foresight] skill seemed incredibly useful as well as being cost efficient, but Peter thought that he needed some more firepower as of now, and choosing the skill would not help with that in the slightest.
It was thus only after some internal strife that Peter ended up making his decision – his long-term future having been the deciding factor.
You have gained the [Class] [Passive] skill: [Inferior] Combat Foresight (Lvl:1)
Description: You can see 1 second into the future and divine any incoming attacks and or defensive failures whilst you are in the midst of combat.
With his decision made, Peter decided that now was probably a good time to check on his status page and his progress.
STATUS
Name: Peter Wilver
Titles: [NONE]
Age: 10
Class: Mage
Rank: [Copper]
Level: 6 – Progress: 0/7,000 EXP
HP: 89/89 (85x1.05) – Max HP regen: 0.05
MP: 106/106 (105x1.01) – Max MP regen: 0.075
AFFINITIES:
* [Common]: Air – Grade: [F]
* [Uncommon]: Metal – Grade: [F+]
* [Rare]: Time – Grade: [D], Psychic – Grade: [F]
* [Epic]: Space – Grade: [F+]
TRAITS:
* [E] Survivor - +5% Max HP
* [F+] Determined - +1% Max MP
* [F+] Pain Tolerant – Pain is 1% less physically and mentally debilitating.
* [F+] Dungeoneer - +1% Boost to EXP gain whilst in a dungeon.
* [E] Resistant Mind - +5% chance to completely ignore [Mind]-targeting status effects
* [C] Fire Resistant - 25% more resilient to heat
STATS:
* Physical:
* Strength: [F+]
* Constitution: [F+]
* Endurance: [F+]
* Mental:
* Willpower: [E+]
* Wisdom: [E]
* Intelligence: [E]
* Social:
* Charisma: [E]
* Empathy: [F+]
* Learning: [F+]
* System:
* Luck: [F+]
* Skill: [F+]
* System Compatibility: [D]
PERKS:
* Enhanced Senses | Type: Physical | Rank: [F] | Progress to Next Rank: 0/1 | Description: Your senses are inherently better attuned to the nature of reality than others.
* Genius | Type: Mental | Rank: [F+] | Progress to Next Rank: 0/3 | Description: Far from simple minded, you possess a mind suitably capable of comprehending even the most obscure, inaccessible aspects of reality.
* Shy | Type: Social | Rank: [F] | Progress to Next Rank: 0/1 | Description: [Inferior] grade scanning skills shall not yield up your status to others.
* Idle Progression | Type: System | Rank: [E] | Progress to Next Rank: 0/6 | Description: It is only by you assigning your bot(s) and waiting the designated amount of time for each improvement that you can improve the majority of system-related stats/phenomena. – Current Bots Available: 2/2 – Upgrade Time Reduction: 5% - Chance of Successful Bot Stacking Upon Attempt: 8%
SKILLS:
* General:
* [Inferior] Detect Objects (Lvl:8)
* [Inferior] Mana Manipulation (Lvl:3)
* [Inferior] Mana Sense (Lvl:3)
* [Inferior] Reading (Lvl:5)
* [Inferior] Writing (Lvl:4)
* [Inferior] Arithmetic (Lvl:2)
* Class:
* [Inferior] Freeze [User] (Lvl:4)
* [Inferior] Mana Bolt (Lvl:2)
* [Inferior] Combat Foresight (Lvl:1)