I was still resting in my dark world. I wasn’t really sure how long I was resting here, but if my time perception wasn’t wrong, It was around three hours. From time to time I was checking my status to see if my stamina was full. “*Self Awareness*.”
***
Experience: 13/30
Health: 3/6
Mana: 11/12
Stamina: 4/4
***
“Oh it’s full, looks like I get one stamina in an hour and a half, as well I get one mana per hour, this information will really be useful in the future.” Until I raise my *Self Awareness* skill to a higher level, this information should not be easily obtained, so it was best for my interests to learn it sooner.
“I should start moving, I need to find a more secure place to stay for the night.” The location where I stayed near the two blunders was not that bad, but it was in a relatively open area and potentially dangerous for me.
“It's better if I could find some kind of a cave for now and make it my temporary home.” Of course, I knew that a cave won’t be the most suitable for a plant, but at least it should protect me from the elements and monsters if they come.
With all that in mind, I reactivated my magic perception.
“*Magic Perception*.”
The view that appeared in front of my eyes wasn’t of the forest, but of a white hairy ball of fur, that was really really close to me. I was startled when I saw it because it was the horned bunny that I saw from before.
I didn’t have much time to react when I started to feel a small pinching here and there.
“Ouch, ouch… Eh stop it, it tickles!” I mumbled to myself as I started to feel a tingling sensation as the bunny was eating the berries. Half of my undamaged body was almost entirely clear from berries. To my great luck, the bunny didn’t damage me, and carefully picked the berries one by one.
I didn’t know how to react to that at all, “What should I do? Should I attack him? Should I wait for it to finish? Will it attack me if I just leave?” Currently, I wasn’t in such a great situation, if the bunny wanted he could kill me at any moment, but it didn’t have any reason to do so, not like the stupid bug who wanted to eat me whole, the bunny wanted to eat only my berries. Not only that he saw me as a food source as well, so it did its best not to damage me for future harvest.
“Ouch… If I attack him I surely find myself dead, if I show signs of intelligence it can attack me as well from fear. Eh… I guess my best choice is to let it finish eating and then see what to do.” I really didn’t want to anger the hungry bunny, for a normal person the bunny would look like a cute little animal, but for me, it looked like a scary red-eyed horned monster and for my best interest I wanted not to anger the little monster in any way possible.
”It's better for the future as well, if I don't have the berries on my body, I will not attract any more monsters.” I was trying to get the best from the situation, funny that I didn’t know how I was wrong. A few more minutes passed by, and the bunny had already finished eating most of the berries.
“I feel abused.” I cried as an imaginary tear dropped from my face.
Suddenly the bunny smelled the air, raised its ears, and moved his head to the left looking at the bushes not far away from us. I looked at the bushes as well with a puzzled face, trying to concentrate on the bush with full power.
*Skill learned “Detection”*
As I learned the skill, I could feel some kind of presence coming from the bush. It was really faint but I was one hundred percent sure that something was inside it. Then suddenly a rustling sound could be heard from those bushes, just as the sound was emitted from them the bunny sprinted like crazy in the other direction.
A moment later a grovel could be heard, then a big shadow could be seen flying from the bushes. It was a wolf with dark black fur and silver eyes. It flew out of the bushes like an arrow and gave chase to the bunny. Without a single thought, I inspected it. “Inspect *wolf*.”
***
-Silver Eyed Wolf-
Health: 41/45
Mana: 14/20
Stamina: 15/23
***
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The wolf didn’t even look in my direction and continued to rush after the bunny. “Ehhh...” I felt really lucky that I didn’t need to face that monster face to face. As the wolf disappeared from my view one of my skills leveled up.
*”Stealth” leveled up to Lv2*
I still was a little shocked, “Haha, I guess it leveled up from my great acting as a bush… I better leave before that wolf returns, *Dig*.” I used the *Dig* skill that I got from before, to get myself out of the ground more easily and started to move in another direction away from the scary duo.
The sun was still high in the sky, so I had a few more hours before it would get dark, but it still bugged me, because I still didn’t find even one safe place to stay the night. As I walked through the forest looking around I inspected the detection skill that I got early.
***
*Detection* - Let the user detect the presence of other living creatures around him.
***
“This skill will be really useful as well in the future, I should use it more often.” I walked and walked, I would say that I walked around for more than four hours, but I still couldn't find a safe place to stay.
Don’t get me wrong I did find a few caves but after using my detection skill on the caves I ran away without looking back, because I could feel a faint presence coming from inside each cave and their numbers always weren't that low.
The same happened when I found a close plain surrounded by mountains. I didn’t even have to enter it, because from afar I could see a huge green lizard warming in the sun. When I looked around a little more I could see two more lizards behind it.
“Packs, packs of monsters everywhere! Goddamit!” Before leaving I inspected the lizard.
*”Inspect” leveled up to Lv3*
***
-Kodo Lizard Lv8-
Health: 33/33
Mana: 6/6
Stamina: 16/16
***
“At last my *Inspect* skill leveled up, maybe now I can get some real information.” After lots and lots of useless inspections, the *Inspect* skill leveled up, for now, the skill is really useless but surely it’s something I really need. “Inspect *Kodo Lizard*”. I said assuming that now it won’t tell me that it was just a lizard.
***
*Kodo Lizard* - Low-tier monster that has a weak poison in its saliva, the monster loves to bathe in the sunlight.
***
“Haha progress!” I shouted with a happy imaginary face. “At last this useless crap is getting better.” As I finished the inspection I started to stumble away.
“I need to hurry up, it's going to be nighttime in a few hours.” I mumbled as I continued on my way.
I continued to walk around the forest for another hour, but I still couldn’t find anywhere safe to stay.
“This is getting ridiculous.” As I said that a yellow flower entered my vision. “Isn’t that the… Ehh Qapi flower? Now that my *Inspect* skill leveled up, I should inspect it again. Inspect *Qapi flower*”
***
*Quni flower* - A yellow flower that grows in the shadows of trees, mostly used for low-grade healing medicine.
***
My eyes sparked for a moment, “Healing, I need healing!” I ran to the flower and plucked it with delight.
“Now that I have this I can heal my injuries... But how?” I found a healing plant but I couldn’t consume it. I just stared at the flower for a while, then shook my shoulders and said. “For now I just keep it around, I will think about a way of consuming it later.” I said as I held the beautiful flower in my hand.
I looked up for a second and said, “Shit… it's already getting dark.” I started to panic a little and quickly continued walking.
I walked through trees and bushes looking for a good resting place, sometimes I heard some noises from bushes and used my detection ability to check if it was a monster. When it was, I changed direction and moved further away into the forest.
Till now I almost encountered five creatures, but I just ran away without even bothering to inspect them. One of them was really easy to spot because he was huge, not thinking twice, I just ran away from fear. From one point of view, I was really disappointed that I didn’t inspect him, but from another, I was just happy not getting near it.
After walking another hour it became really dark, a few of the trees started to glow and then even my leaves started to illuminate.
“The night arrived...” Scary howls could be heard from afar, the monsters of the night slowly woke up and I really started to feel cornered. When I was near the cliff most of the monsters had no reason to go there, so I was kinda safe. As what happened to the brother bush was most likely an unlucky accident but now I am in the open area it was a guarantee that I meet a monster that would eat me.
I looked around a few more times in a hurry and to my surprise, I saw a small cave not that far away. With haste, I ran to it with hopes of salvation I came in front of the cave and just stood there. The cave was not that big, if I stretched my hands above my body I could touch the ceiling.
As I was standing in front of the cave my hope slowly started to vanish. Because I used the detection skill to see if there was someone inside, and to my great “surprise” indeed there was.
“I didn't expect otherwise, at least if there were one I could think of something, but in this case, I can just do nothing.” Yep, it was a dead end, I felt a few weak presences coming from inside the cave.
I knew that even if they are the weakest kind of monster I couldn’t win, I turned around to look at the forest.
“I can go back there and gamble with my life with those demons, or I can enter the cave and hope for them to not attack me.” Just as that thought ran through my head a howl could be heard from nearby. It startled me and with fear I turned to the cave with a sprint and shouted, “Hell no!”
As I entered the cave, only one light could be seen radiating inside it and it was coming from me. Entering deeper and deeper inside, fear slowly accumulated in my mind.
“Please be bunnies, please don’t kill me, please be bunnies...” As I prayed a small shadow appeared in front of me and it immediately attacked me.