Vincent stood arms crossed, staring at the massive wall of trees that comprised the jungle of its outer layer. He huffed in annoyance, placing his arms once more on one of the colossal, viney trunks.
He thought about being in the jungle and all the times that he had nearly gotten himself decimated because he couldn't find adequate cover in the random layout of the place. His thought process was simple; if he could somehow discover a skill that allowed him to manipulate the plant life around him, then he could create his own places to hide on the fly. He felt the energy in the trees and how it reacted with the physical matter that constituted their genetic composition in order to give shape and durability to the tree that would have been impossible in the old world. The system strengthened everything by altering and adding to its atomic structure. There's no reason Vincent couldn't do the same..
Understanding all this he tried asserting his will in a way such that his own minuscule amount of energy altered the flow of the energy within the tree to something that better suited his needs. It was hours later and the heat of the day coupled with his various efforts would see him drenched in sweat.
He was close to something.. he could feel it. He knew that he probably should have started with something small and less unyielding but the massive amounts of energy in the trees made observing the flows of energy much, much easier.
Multiple times he had been close to giving up. As close as he thought himself to be, it would still be several more hours of watching his tiny, insignificant energy rearrange the structure of the atoms within the tree before he finally heard the familiar 'ding'! signaling that all his efforts and frustrations had finally paid off.
"Jesus.." He panted out between heavy breaths.
Congratulations! Skill: Planta/Plante (Rare) achieved!
Planta/Plante (Rare) Sprout in latin or young tree in old english. Allows the user to manipulate the molecular structure of any and all plant life around him. Due to the 'Rare' rarity, the user gains a small bonus to the speed and strength of manipulation per skill level.Vitality grants a small bonus to this skill. (Active skill)
He would have jumped for joy at the notification but he instantly noticed a problem. His new skill made it a great deal easier to exert his will over the green energies within the tree as the system guided and assisted him with the process now. Even still, the plant life that comprised the jungle was simply too tough for him to manipulate to any meaningful degree. That is, other than pieces that had broken off from the source already, such as his shield. For whatever reason it seemed the detached or broken parts lost a lot of their structural integrity.
After many hours of strenuous effort Vincent had barely managed to grow little more than a sapling and his skill had barely risen at all. He groaned in audible frustration and decided to cut his losses for now. He was leveling it rather quickly compared to most skills, obviously being able to see how the skill worked due to ecology helped tremendously. Even still it wouldn't be any help at this level. He sighed. Another useless skill in the bag. 'Are plants even considered an element?..' He idly wondered while scratching his chin.
Upon returning to his cave he made a very fortunate discovery. With his new skill he could actually manipulate the structure of his soul seed, which was technically plant based, in order to make various small improvements to his companion such as hardening its skin and organs. What this translated into in terms of stats he wasn't sure, but with the increase in functionality he was hoping the thing would be able to keep a better pace in training.
He quickly realized he could also use his ability to help improve the health of his garden. Reaching within the ground Vincent strengthened the various plant roots and caused them to grow longer. He placed them in a way such that they were prohibited from interfering with one another's growth. He would have used it to pull the weeds too, he was sure, but his companion spent an absurd amount of time tending to the thing daily anyways so it hardly mattered.
All in all he supposed the skill wasn't a total waste and would likely become more universal later on. Drinking some juice made from the fruits and veggies in his garden, he hummed contentedly. He had been working hard lately and he figured he might as well relax for a little bit and realign his Ki. He got comfortable in his favorite spot near the stream and entered Complete tranquility.
He thought about his ability to practically create new skills as necessary. Well that technically wasn't correct, he was just discovering and repurposing skills that already existed within the system. He wasn't sure but it certainly felt like his power was rising just as much in response to his desires as it was to his needs. In other words it felt like he had more control over the direction of his development these days as opposed to the earlier months in the system. He wondered exactly what kind of monstrous effects he'd need to produce in order to dominate this wretched place.. He was sure, as it was, that his body currently couldn't handle the type of skills he would need in order to damage even the level 25 creature's he'd run into thus far.
Based on the problematic and strenuous effects that occurred when he produced epic ones, he was sure it would wreak havoc on his insides as well as his mind to produce a 'Legendary' skill. He supposed part of that was probably his level. How many people at level one had not just one or even two, but three Epic skills? Not only that but they seemed unusually complex in nature, despite their rarity.
He supposed there was at least one thing he hadn't thought about trying yet. He could try to raise his attributes directly. In the old world exercises such as the simple act of lifting weight or running long distances would improve overall physical health. Who's to say that anything like that wasn't possible or even something better with the introduction of the system? With that in mind he decided to have his companion construct a pair of heavy weighted clothing while he continued his meditation. He was getting too complacent with the natural atmosphere of this world. He needed to continue challenging himself.
A few hours later Vincent had begun to grow claustrophobic due to his time being spent primarily in his cave. With his increased skill fire resistance he could spend longer periods in the direct heat of the sun and most fiends didn't venture out into the grassy fields anyways. Therefore he decided to train his plante skill by clearing the chest high grass, which was impossibly easier compared to the thick trees of the jungle.
Even still it took a lot of concentration to dissolve the grass on a cellular level. Originally he tried just ripping the plants from the ground or somehow making his own that would replace them but he soon found that vaporizing them entirely by imbalancing their existing genetic structure was far easier. That was mostly because, again, he was working with something that existed already rather than making something new. He focused and fiddled until the soft, pale green energy of the plants began to vibrate and mutate before they began to turn into an acidic, bubbling soup.
'Gross..' He thought, as the substance was reassured by the Earth. He sincerely hoped that by doing things this way, the stupid plants wouldn't grow back within the hour.
Once a large enough area had been cleared the man set up a forge, garden, cooking area and the works. He would probably still spend a fair amount of time in the cave training with his companion but whenever his companion tended the garden or Vincent did any kind of training best done alone he would do it outside in the sun…
A couple of days after finishing his makeshift outdoor workshop, on a particularly warm evening he felt a persistent nagging sensation in the pit of his stomach. It was as if all his instincts were begging him to enter the forest, which was highly suspicious and unusual. At first he figured maybe it was the heat activating his sixth sense but he realized that logically, it would have been far safer to cool off in the cave.
When he finally grew too annoyed with the agitating feeling to work, he cussed, throwing his tools aside and stomping his way into the Forest. He didn't know how far he had gone when he found the source of his anxiety. It was the freshly dead carcass of an extremely powerful creature. He paused and frowned, slowly taking in the scene before him. Slowly scanning left and then right he decided it was relatively safe for now as he bent down to inspect the body. What was left of the large beast was still cooling.
It was missing huge chunks from its torso and head. It looked a lot like the Skullcrawler from the movie Kong: Skull island only it had 4 legs and a barbed tail like a stegosaurus. It was muscular and it's tongue was long and appeared to ooze a poisonous substance.
He quickly stashed the carcass in his inventory, thankful that such things didn't rot any further while stored away and made his way back home before whatever had somehow killed that thing came back. He could feel a massive amount of energy within the dead creature and if it was this powerful when it was dead it must have taken a true monster to best it while it was alive. He wondered why his instincts had been so persistent in demanding he take time out of his day to go harvest this particular bounty..
Upon returning to his safe space he was met by the unfortunate discovery that he lacked the attributes necessary to do any work with the creature's bodily materials.. Even dead it was simply too powerful for him to properly handle. Sighing, he re-deposited the body in his inventory for later use. One thing he could tell for sure was that the beast possessed an incredible toxic affinity.
Without meaning to, he found himself tracing the symbols on the pillar with his finger. It was something he did often out of boredom and habit when contemplating things. He didn't know why but he felt drawn to the symbols. He was sure they once pulsed with an absurd amount of energy but had lost most, damn near all of their potency due to time. He couldn't help but wonder what the intricate engravings had once stood for.
Stolen novel; please report.
What could they possibly have meant? What function did they serve, if any..? So many questions about this place and absolutely no concrete answers.
Vincent stretched, cracking his back. For now he needed to focus on what mattered, grinding and getting the hell out of here. He was contemplating whether or not he should go try and pick a fight with some creature just to push himself to the brink of death again when he noticed his companion jumping around like a fool to get his attention.
Making his way over, Vincent immediately sensed the object of his companions' fascination. It was a sharp, yellow potion brewed from alchemy but it had some peculiar results. It almost seemed to glow slightly. Upon inspecting the object it read;
Elixir of great Endurance! An endurance potion of the highest quality! Made by a master alchemist. Adds a permanent +10 to endurance.
Vincent's eyebrows twitched. He looked at his companion. 'This bumbling idiot.. a master alchemist?' He was baffled. 'No fucking way.'
"Hey show me how you did that." He demanded. The companion happily obliged. Or at least it pretended to. Halfway through a mess of adding random materials it became obvious the thing didn't know what it was doing. "You.. don't remember how you made this.. do you?" He asked the thing accusedly. It raised its hands in mock defense but then shook its head. He sighed. "Yeah that figures doesn't it?.. Oh well.. I suppose that would have been too easy."
He downed the potion, enjoying the feeling of warmth spreading through him as he did so. It was indescribable. A plus 10 in Endurance translated into a plus 1000 in health which wasn't bad at all.
The next couple of days of his time were spent making potions and armor worthy of his current stats and skills. He then recruited the assistance of his companion to help him grow accustomed to the new armor and capabilities. He took a look at his stats, decidingly satisfied with the rate of his growth recently.
Level: 1
XP 0/1000 (0%)
Class: N/A
Health: 3200/3200
Mana: 3000/3000
Stats:
Strength: 15
Endurance: 32
Vitality: 11 (+1%)
Intelligence: 30
Perception: 35
Agility: 15
Skills:
Sixth sense (rare) lvl 30
Ecology (epic) lvl 13
Complete tranquility (epic) lvl 11
Smithing (common) lvl 30
Farming (common) lvl 33
Sneak (uncommon) lvl 28
Improved dash (epic) lvl 9
Cooking (common) lvl 30
Alchemy (uncommon) lvl 30
Acid resistance (uncommon) lvl 7
Fire resistance (uncommon); lvl 15
Sword and shield (common) lvl 25
Planta/Plante (rare) lvl 10
His smithing, cooking and sword/shield skill had all earned him new trials which he had been putting off for different reasons. For the smithing and cooking he simply wanted to wait until after he'd become a bit more proficient from grinding and decided to consolidate his gains. He liked seeing numbers go up also. For the sword and shield he was waiting until one or possibly both of his other trials were completed because he was honestly slightly worried it would be extremely dangerous. Honestly maybe now was a good time to risk it for the biscuit.
He wasn't sure how long he'd been here exactly. Roughly 9 and a half months he figured. And in that time his stats had grown tremendously totaling 138 whereas at first they barely numbered in the twenties. He certainly felt better. His muscles had grown significantly yet they were still compact so that he could move quickly and with unnatural fluidity. He was kind of starting to look like an anime character. He'd grown to roughly 5'6, borderline 5'7 so he was nearly 3 inches taller than when he'd first arrived.
He hoped this wasn't a trend the system continued endlessly. He pictured himself as a 10' tall muscle bound freak who couldn't even scratch his own back as his stats rose and he shivered.
That just didn't sound appealing to him. He preferred to be swift and agile, wearing an enemy down and then finishing them with one ridiculously overpowering blow.
He had only really ever fought against his companion but he instinctively knew which style would suit him best. Vincent's muscles and mind worked together to give him sharp battle instincts in a way that could only be obtained through countless hours of training. Of course, none of this would be possible without his skills, primarily Sixth sense.
That's also the reason he chose to wield a sword and shield rather than, say, a giant claymore. It just felt right while the latter didn't.
That's not to say that he wasn't physically strong. He couldn't be sure but he figured he had to be just slightly beyond what most pre-system human beings could have ever achieved without a lifetime dedicated to strength building. The gravity made it hard to truly push himself even at this level and besides, he usually had to hide or run from everything to survive. He didn't really have a suitable means to measure his abilities.
He was aware that he could comfortably lift two hundred pounds in each hand based on the weight (which was listed in the details) of certain materials he had bought from the shop. As strong as the man was when it came to certain ingots and other such materials Vincent often had to have his companion help him.
With not much else to do he decided to quit putting it off.
Trial(s) available:
Unbendable (smithing lvl 25)
Banquet of kings (cooking lvl 25)
Courage and honor (sword and shield lvl 25)
He selected Unbendable first as it was the first on the list anyways. He shivered at the familiar feeling of the world falling away.
When he came to, he was near the summit of a massive mountain containing a silver forge at the top. The forge was lit and scalding even from this distance of roughly 20 feet. He knew what he needed to do. Prompted forward by the system, it was made clear that he was supposed to craft a sword and shield using this forge but this heat.. he honestly didn't think he'd survive it.
He used his Ecology and Sixth sense to study the energy of the large thing. It was a bright orange and red as one might expect, containing a flaming, spherical core that looked almost malleable if one could reach it. intense mirages of heat rolled off the thing. Liquid bits dripped off the bottom of it as if it were melting but the total mass of the substance never diminished.
He closed his now stinging eyes and grimaced. This was gonna suck. But if he could use Ecology then maybe.. sure enough after standing close enough to take damage, but not close enough for it to be serious or permanent, Vincent got the familiar pulse and ding of a system message.
Congratulations! Skill: fire resistance (Common) has increased by 1!
He laughed. What luck!? The system allowed you to gain levels in even these types of skills while in trials? That really seemed broken if you considered how these places existed outside of time. What if someone was patient enough to train for a million years inside of one? Was that even possible? He shuddered imaging subjecting himself to a million years of torture to grind skill levels enough to survive this place.
It took several levels but he could finally work well enough in the heat with his regenerations just barely eclipsing the damage done to his body. He knew he could exit the trial if things got dicey.
Standing at the forge he grabbed the steel hammer that was provided by the system or trial or whatever. He wasn't exactly sure what to do so just goofing off, he decided to hit the anvil before him as hard as he could with the hammer. As he did so a blinding shower of sparks exploded forth and in its wake a sword and shield appeared simultaneously on the anvil.
The objects were badly damaged, to the point of being shattered. He somehow knew that with each swing the sword and shield would begin to repair themselves but if he didn't know any better it felt as if the heat had risen a bit with that first swing.. the second and third swings confirmed that to be the case. He was thinking about quitting and coming back with a higher level of fire resistance but as if the system read his thoughts a notification appeared.
Warning! You may discontinue the trial at any time but subsequent attempts will see the quality of crafted sword and shield diminished. This is a trial best attempted at an early level.
He growled thinking to himself, 'Oh bullshit that figures.. you're just making stuff up as you go along at this point.' He decided his best bet was to probably just try and finish this quickly and not exit the trial.
He figured most people who got to this point probably didn't have a skill to resist fire in their arsenal when they did such a basic trial. Or maybe they did.. maybe this was common knowledge when you weren't stranded in an end game jungle. He didn't know.
He began hammering like a mad man not really caring for finesse or skill. The heat around him rose rapidly, quickly overcoming his fire resistance and pitiful vitality. His health began to tick away. In seconds he began to rethink his approach as the sword and shield were less than half completed based on what he saw and sensed from the energies inside it.
He tried to use Ecology, specifically the identify portion, on the sword and shield but it yielded no results. He began focusing and timing his blows to the blasts of heat from the furnace. This improved his progress by a bit but not enough to appease his fears as he began to lose health in the double digits every second. He decided to lay the hammer down and back away from the forge but after reaching a safe distance he noticed the energy from the sword and shield evaporating.
"Oh come on, give me a break!" He screamed in frustration rubbing his boiling skin. It seemed he couldn't take a timeout if he wanted to achieve maximum results. The heat hadn't died down at all but nevertheless, he used dash to resubmerge himself in the flames once more.
It was a gruesome and painful endeavor. His skill couldn't rise quickly enough to stop the heat from melting away portions of his unprotected body. Before he knew it his health had dropped down from 3200 to 2100. He was losing 20 points per second st this point. The equipment was nearing three fourths completion but the pain itself was on the verge of overwhelming his senses. There were few pains like slowly being cooked to death especially when it was prolonged by system shenanigans.
He couldn't stop here, though. His stubborn pride wouldn't allow him to finish without completing the task flawlessly. He was confident he would be able to finish the sword and shield in time as long as the pain didn't overwhelm him. Not a second after he'd had the thought the heat suddenly multiplied. He yelped in agony and nearly dropped the hammer, shivering as the heat boiled his insides. He only needed to hit the items 9 or 10 more times but he wasn't sure he could do it.
He was beginning to think he would die, a stubborn slave to his own ambition when suddenly a large portion of his heath pool returned. Nearly half of it. With it came a rush of energy that allowed him to finish out his task. He hammered once.. then twice.. three times and finally after the ninth swing.. the pain receded rapidly. He gasped in relief. Immediately as he did so he was teleported back to the cave where two new items were waiting in his inventory.
"Yes!" He pumped his hands in the air as a show of victory. He wasted no time healing himself to max, marveling as his skin instantly healed itself and his pain began to fade away. Soon it was a dull throb and then it was gone altogether. Where had that last burst of health came from? He looked around and it didn't take him long to find the source. His companion lay soaking pitifully in the stream. He was severely burnt and blackened.
Vincent's smile slowly faded as he made his way over to the creature. For once it wasn't smiling. "You.. saved me.." He whispered. The creature raised its head slightly and whimpered. "I know.. I know how bad it hurts. Let me return the favor for you, little guy." It may have only been 45 percent of Vincent's health but that translated into 90% of his companion's.
Using a combination of his Plante skill and his Ecology he placed a hand on his whimpering companion. He slowly began to infuse his energy with the creature's, healing it and numbing its pain. It sighed in content and relaxed, letting the process do its work.
When he was done the sentient plant jumped for joy much like he had when he arrived. It gave him a big hug and tried to get Vincent to dance with it.
"OK, OK. Calm down. I'm definitely not dancing with you. I appreciate you too buddy." He finished patting its head. It bounded back over to his garden and continued working as if nothing had ever happened. Vincent sighed. His fire resistance had climbed to level 23. The real treasure of the trial however, was in his inventory.
Sword of Anguish (Unique) a Longsword bound to it's user's soul. Item's personality reflects the user's own. Grows stronger with repeated use. Warning Item's evolution is seperate from the user's.
Guardian's Embrace (Unique) a medium sized shield bound to the user's soul. Item's personality reflects the user's own. Grows stronger with repeated use. Warning Item's evolution is seperate from the user's.
Vincent was dumbfounded. A sword and shield they grew stronger the more he used them? That was just too good. The sword and shield materialized from a portal before him, allowing him to grab them and inspect them.
The sword was black with a blood red streak down the middle. It had a curved edge at the end and was quite thick. The shield was shaped like a diamond and painted a metallic gold with a few large portions being red. He smirked, knowing he would enjoy getting used to his new toys.
End of chapter 9