*Yelp!* Another Kobold fell down but this time I didn’t hide my kill as I wanted the Kobolds to feel fear while I had the advantage, otherwise they would come back at me tomorrow or the next day after that, I just couldn't deal with all of them alone.
I was getting closer and closer to the exit of the field so I didn’t worry even when all of my body started to feel numb, even my roots started to feel sluggish too.
“Looks like the poison broke through the wolf resistance, this will be the last Kobold.” I said as I saw one Kobold all alone looking confused not so far from the main group on the edge of the field.
“This will be the perfect way to enlist fear into their bodies!” I shouted to myself as I started to sprint to it, I was almost done, my plan was almost complete, but just as I was behind the Kobold and was already jumping at him from behind.
I saw two Kobolds crouching near him pointing their spears straight at me. “Goddammit, it was a trap!” I shouted as I did my best to change the trajectory of my movement and used the *Roll* skill mid-air, to my surprise it worked almost perfectly.
Two spears passed near me leaving two bloody marks on the wolf's body but at the same time missed every vital point and didn't stab too deep. As soon as I touched the ground I started to run in the direction of the hideout while I glanced back, there I saw the leader Kobold point to the group that injured me and gave them a bark.
*Woof!*
I didn’t know their language but for some reason, I felt that he said, “Good job.”
“So it was your plan I shouldn't have underestimated you…” I murmured as I left the field of flowers using the *Adrenaline Rush* skill to the maximum of its ability, the leader of the pack saw this and released a short howl and then a long one too.
*Awwwoooo!*
*AAAAAAWWWWWOOOOO!*
At first, I didn't even care what he was screaming about but when I saw two Kobolds jump at me from the woods I understood why there were two howls.
“Fuck!” I dodged one spear to the side but the second one hit me and the wolf, more blood *splashed* to the ground. I once more twisted my branches around the spear as if an octopus while I bit into the Kobold's throat.
I didn’t even bother to finish him as I continued to move forward, to the hideout as I heard howls coming towards my direction.
“The first howl was to tell that I was going back and the second was to let the reminding Kobolds go after me, I thought only I could scheme but I was wrong…” I muttered to myself as I continued running.
Feeling weaker and weaker as I was getting to the limits of my body, “I need to hold down just a little bit more, I am almost there just a bit more!” I encouraged myself while my pace became snail-like, but not all hope was gone as I already saw the entrance to our hideout.
“Almost there, almost there!” I came closer and closer but at the same time, I heard the Kobolds closing in.
“You persisted bastards, wait until I heal I will kill everyone one of you!” I shouted as I was just in front of the entrance, and then I remembered me saying something stupid today.
*...only I can open with my roots, only if I have mana though…” I murmured the last part as I knew that there was a little flaw that could gently fuck me if I would barely survive a battle that was almost to death.*
“Please don’t, please don’t…” I chanted my pleading again and again as I reached the gate and sent my roots to the hole in the wall. I felt weak as they moved so slowly, it meant that I already used most of my mana in the field and I was on my last mana point.
“Come on, just a little bit more…” And just like that I reached the gate lock, at the same time I bit into the gate rope and pulled it towards me. The lock got released and with it, I released the rope of the gate.
*Crash!*
The gate opened but I was barely able to stand and walking forward was almost impossible, “Move goddammit, move!” I shouted at my legs as I dragged them forward scraping the ground as I did, I felt as if I was learning how to walk again.
Step after step it felt as if time was stretching and just like that I passed the gate but I had a new hurdle in front of me.
“How the fuck I am going to raise it back up!” I angrily shouted as I looked at the heavy wooden gate, “It's alright I can do it, I can do it...” I placed the wolf's head under the gate and started to raise it, it barely left the floor when I just couldn't continue.
Howles of the Kobolds were already coming from the entrance as I pushed and pushed but nothing has changed.
“Please just a little bit more just this time!” But no matter how I was pushing it didn’t budge, as I only used the wolf's body as I was out of mana and couldn't use *Wooden Puppet* no more, even *Magical Perspective* skill slowly stopped working as everything around me was getting darker and darker.
“No no no, not like this, it's fine if I died to something like to the devil cat but not to a shitty Kobold ambush…” I felt wronged but couldn't do anything until I saw a message pop up in my head.
*Experience reached the desired quantity “Ontopary bush” leveled up to Lv5*
Suddenly all the light immediately came back as mana breathed into my body once more and with it, the gate slowly continued to rise up in the air, as I regained control of my wooden exoskeleton.
*Thumb!*
I heard the gate shut as I stood there looking at the locking mechanism, thinking to myself, “Wait, how do I close the gate from the inside if I am standing behind the gate…” I was thinking of what to do but just didn't have any time as I heard some footsteps behind the gate.
*Tap* *tap* *tap* *Growl!*
“That sounded like the leader…” I murmured to myself, hoping that he would just go away, “Please go away, please go away…” As I had barely any strength to hold the gate and soon it would fall.
The Kobold started to hit the gate with his club. I felt all the weight of the gate on my body as I held it and knew that I wouldn't be able to hold it much longer.
But then a miracle happened and I started to glow, well it wasn’t really a miracle it happened every night and wasn't that special at all it just meant that the nighttime had arrived.
The Kobold leader must likely noticed it too as his blows suddenly stopped and after a moment of him thinking a long *Growwwlll…!* came from his throat, it most likely meant something like, “Lucky you, you won this time…” And left thinking that he wouldn't be able to break the gate in a short time and choose to return with his group.
From outside I heard many howls coming and going as the Kobolds regrouped and ran back to their base. I continued to hold the gate for as long as possible as I was afraid of it being another of their schemes, but no matter how much I waited no one came.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
I took a sigh of relief as the gate slowly started to fall at me, “Crap crap crap…” It slowly started to crush me but thankfully it wasn’t that heavy.
“*Sigh* Well I guess I will just stay here for a while…” It wasn’t really a choice, it was just that I didn't have the strength to leave even if I wanted to. I closed my perspective for some time to conserve some mana.
Only one thought crossed my mind now, “Why did I level up?” I thought to myself as I suddenly remembered the Kobold that I haven’t finished in the woods. “You bastard should have died faster that way I wouldn’t have struggled so much!” I cursed at my savior.
“*Yawn* I guess I'll sleep here for a little bit before closing the gate once more…” I yawned before falling asleep.
An hour passed and I woke up, I barely had enough strength and mana to raise the gate, then I moved the lock with my roots and jumped above it only that way I could close the door. Then I slowly crawled back to the center of my hideout, walking slowly to the cold room and taking some of the failed jerkies to eat before cleaning and stitching the wolf wounds with my roots.
I fell asleep once more under the tree, completely tired out of my mind. “I never expected the little Kobolds to be such a problem.” I murmured as my eyelids closed on their own and I completely fell into the world of dreams.
*”Increase Mana Regeneration” leveled up to Lv2*
I slept so strongly that I didn’t even see the message that I got. I even passed my usual waking time and slept for twelve hours.
When I woke up the first thing I did was check our status as I was worried about the wolf's injuries, but I was worried for nothing.
***
-Visavil Bush Lv5-
Experience: 8/105
Rarity: Uncommon
Health: 6/15
Mana: 18/49
Stamina: 7/13
Health regen: -0.35/week (-2) + (0.4)
Mana regen: 1.4/hour (-3)
Stamina regen: 0.6/hour (-1.4) + (0.33)
Race: Berry bush.
Damage Resistances:
Slash: 15, Blunt: 34, Piercing: 36, Cold: 20, Heat: 15, Fire: 8
Dark: 88, Light: 45, Mind: 132, Soul: #%($
Status: Intelligent(Unique), Withering(Strong), Symbiosis
Skills:
*Magic Perception Lv5* *Self Awareness Lv4* *Calm Mind Lv6* *Inspect Lv5* *Rage Lv1* *Killing Intent Lv3* *Pain Resistance Lv2* *Mana Manipulating Lv2* *Wood Element Control Lv4* *Dig Lv5* *Stealth Lv5* *Detection Lv3* *Lifesteal Lv2* *Poison Resistance Lv1* *Item Crafting Lv2* *Stamina Storage Lv2* *Throwing Lv3* *Lesser Hand To Hand Combat Lv2* *Grow Lv3* *Increase Mana Regeneration Lv1* *Lesser Spear Mastery Lv1* *Thorns Lv2* *Falling Damage Resistance Lv1* *Roll Lv1* *Fruits Production Lv1* *Mana Storage Lv2* *Overtake Lv2* *Mind Wave Lv1* *Evil Lv1* *Digging Lv1* *Lingua Language Lv4* *Forced Absorption Lv2* *Lesser Sword Mastery Lv1* *Soul Link Lv2* *First Aid Lv2* *Wooden Puppet Lv2* *Taunt Lv2* *Focus Time Lv1*
Titles:
*Clutz* *Novice Trapper* *Guardian* *Pyromaniac*
*****
-Young Wild Wolf Lv11-
Experience: 76/110
Health: 18/43
Mana: 7/7
Stamina: 19/19
Health regen: 2.5/day(-1.5)
Mana regen: 0.8/hour (-0.4)
Stamina regen: 2/hour (-1)
Race: Canine
Damage Resistances:
Slash: 45, Blunt: 37, Piercing: 30, Cold: 86, Heat: 36, Fire: 27, Paralysis: 58
Earth: 63, Mind: 36
Status: Weakened(Medium), Symbiosis
Skills:
*Consume Lv2* *Iron Stomach Lv2* *Adrenaline Rush Lv3* *Enchanted smell Lv4* *Metal Bite Lv2* *Bleeding Resistance Lv1* *Pain Resistance Lv2* *Stealth Lv3* *Detection Lv3* *Killing Intent Lv2* *Cold Resistance Lv2* *Falling Damage Resistance Lv1* *Earth Control Lv1* *Dig Lv1* *Paralyze Resistance Lv1*
***
Not only did the wolf almost get healed from all the injuries that he sustained yesterday he even got a new resistance stat of paralysis, my guess was that it showed resistance only if it gets a lot higher from the norm or lower.
“You cheeky bastard, getting stronger and stronger eh? Soon you will be stronger than this papa over here.” I joked around but in reality, I was happy as his strength was mine at least for now.
“Hmm, this is strange my mana regeneration got higher.” I looked around my skills and found out that my *Increase Mana Regeneration* leveled up.
“Oh, I forgot about this one as it's completely passive.” I said as I continued to look through our other stats just to be sure that I haven’t missed something crucial and stood up.
I walked to the cold room to grab a breakfast snack yeah yeah I know that something heavy as meat isn’t that good for breakfast but I didn’t care.
“I really need to build another door here as almost all the cold air is escaping.” I said as I entered the room there I picked a few slices of meat before stopping in front of the raw meat.
“Shit, it's going bad.” I smelled the meat with the wolf's keen senses. I could already see that it was going bad.
“If I cook this will it be alright?” I asked not sure, but still wanted to do so as this tasty meat didn’t come easy to me, but first I had other things to deal with.
“First I already have an idea how to make the gate lock, a lot better than I did as now it's really hard to lock from the inside. Second of all I need to find out the base of these Kobolds, as sooner or later I will go and say hello to them.” I chose to start with the first as it was that hard, and I needed to upgrade the gate before doing anything else.
I took the old locking mechanism outside and cut the ropes which left me with eight wood poles around a meter across. I went inside the tunnel and dug holes in the wall behind the gate. Eight holes to be precise, every hole would be a little bit more than a meter deep.
I took the remaining ropes that I cut and tied them to the poles' ends leaving a circle of rope at their ends so they will be easier to pull by.
“It will make it kinda longer to open but it's better than what was before… I think.” I mumbled as I started to shove those poles into the holes, they all fitted perfectly, and just to check I closed the gate from the inside and easily pulled the poles with my roots.
“Easy peasy lemon squeezy.” I added another hole from the other side for my roots to the outside and tried to close the gate from the outside too.
“I am a genius! This works like a charm, it is even easier as now the weight is redistributed to eighth instead of me needing to raise that inner barricade with only my roots.” I compliment myself as indeed I was a genius.
And with that, my first mission for the day was finished, now I had to look for those bastards’ base. It wasn’t that hard as I looked in front of my hideout entrance and around twelve shining footprints of dogs went into the forest.
“Heh, they lost half of their group to one little bush, pathetic.” I commented on the Kobolds' stupidity, but at the same time I didn’t overdo it as they still were able to ambush me and I swore that it won’t happen again.
I looked at the entrance of my hideout. I didn’t want to leave it as some of them can come back and try to break in, but I just had to risk it this time. Who knows what would happen if I missed this chance to find their base?
They could come back tomorrow or they could wait for a month before striking once more. I shuddered at the thought of another annoying enemy hanging constantly above my head after dealing with the devil cat.
“And I still have a score to settle with that leader Kobold…” I murmured as I started to follow the footprints, they went towards the area where I hunted the pig but then it took a sudden turn to the west.
“Their base across the river, that's quite far.” I mumbled as I continued following their footprints. Only after walking more than twenty minutes did I stop and looked in horror as the number of Kobolds footprints started to grow.
At first to twenty and then to thirty, I just stood there and shook my head. “I think I have a bigger problem on my hands than I thought, if what I met was only one of their parties I wouldn’t be surprised that there would be at least a hundred of them in their base, I am leaving.”
I just turned around and left. I was already too deep in enemy territory and there were so many fresh Kobold footprints here that it gave me the chills. I continued to walk to the hideout while being the most stealthy I could while sending the *Detection* skill in all directions.
“I will need to create a lot of traps near my base.” I muttered as I continued, there was a big chance that another one of these parties would come to mess with me and I need to be prepared or else.