He trudged himself through the dense and thick woodland area. Not a single ray of light had passed through the canopies ever since he found himself in this world. The forest was really dense too but it didn’t have any of the annoying problems that jungles had. ‘What am thinking, I haven’t even been to a jungle in the first place.’ He said with a sigh.
As he walked on further through blackwoods, he noted one thing in Blackwood. The further he walked towards the plains and eventually to Fellhood Grove, the less dense the forest became and rays of light actuall shone through the canopies. He jumped the moment he saw a large patch of sunlight in one area of Blackwoods. ‘Finally, some sunglight’ he thought. After soaking up for another minute, he further on the road.
It was relatively easy to navigate through Blackwoods, there was a beaten and well-used dirt path that lead outside. It was the only part of the ground that wasn’t overgrown with patches of greenery. He was lucky enough to stumble upon the path. He rolled up the tattered map in his hands since he didn’t have much need for it anymore with the path laid before him.
As he walked on forward, more and more rays of sunlight penetrated the thick forestry. It took him a few hours until he finally found the opening of the forest. With heavy steps, he ran through the opening. Bouts of sunlight bathed him and strong winds had almost pushed him down. His long hair danced around with the tune of the wind. He took a deep breath of the warm and fresh air that he had long sought after. It was a great contrast from the cool and shaded Blackwoods.
He sat himself under a tree to take a rest and admire the view for a bit. It truly was fantasy-like. He expected a darker and far more depressing setting, though he didn’t mind this at all. ‘Though I would be lying if I said I’d rather have this setting than a darker one, ah well, whatever.’ He thought as a small smile crept up his face. While resting, he mulled things over in his head. The abrupt kidnapping case of the Collective, who also probably raped him in his sleep. The huge information that would rival any horrible exposition. The matter with him being a ‘chosen hero’. Het let out a tired sigh as thought of all these, and this all happened within the span of a day. If that wasn’t eventful, he wouldn’t know what is.
As he sat under the shade with the warm air breezing through every so often, he had a thought. He took out the tattered map from his sling bag and held it at arm’s length. He gulped with beads of sweat forming on his furrowed brow. He wanted to try absorbing the map but he feared that it would be just as painful as last time, though he thought that it might not be the case since this was a drawing and not a string of 1s and 0s. ‘Please for the love of god, don’t be as painful as last time’ he cursed his fate. It was do or die time, at least he thought so.
[Abosrb Knowledge] he activated through a voice command and the map shone in a brilliant white and dazzling light that blinded him. This time around, the majority of information wasn’t being sent to his brain, it was being sent to his eyes. “AH FUCK YOU’RE KIDDING ME” He bellowed angrily as he covered his eyes with both hands. The pain was weaker in comparison, but it was still fairly painful since his eyes were being bombarded with geographical information of the land. To him, it felt like an amateur was inking his eyes with a sharp needle, then moving it around the eyeballs because he was a fucking idiot that positioned the syringe wrong and tried to fix it by moving it around. The excruciating pain lasted all about half a minute, yet to him, it still felt like an eternity past.
His arms and body went limp on the tree when the pain subsided. He was breathing as heavily as the last time he absorbed a book. “Jesus fuck” he cursed “Who the hell thought it was a good idea to have an absorb knowledge skill that almost puts the user into an induced coma?” He said in between breaths as he opened up the codex by passing the thought through his head. A skill screen appeared, enumerating the skills he had at the moment. He tapped the [Abosrb Knowledge] link and it opened a new screen.
[Absorb Knowledge forcefully turns the raw data on hand to recordable data. The process is done on the brain in most cases, sometimes a different body part if the brain is not applicable. After the forceful data conversion, the user can use and read the information through the codex or through his data banks in the brain.]
‘Ah... Now I get it. The book of 1s and 0s basically made my brain into a computer. The screens i’m seeing right now are windows of that computer.’ He thought. We was slightly irritated that the Collective didn’t tell him outright about it. Though if they did, he wouldn’t have absorbed the book in the first place. ‘Converting your brain into a computer isn’t exactly a savory choice, is it?’ he thought accompanied with a sigh of his own. ‘So my computer/brain regulated my bodily functions now, that means I could probably tweak how my body works... I’ll do that later on’ he thought ‘so wait, wouldn’t that mean i’m a biological weapon now?’ he entertained the idea in his head, imagining the certain things he could do and laughed about it.
He tapped the screen away only to be greeted with another one.
[Geographical Information Updated] | [Would you like to activate the minimap now?]
[Yes] | [No]
He furrowed his brows and thought for a minute. ‘Minimap? What the hell does that mean? Am I getting a minimap screen now?’ he thought as he pondered the idea over. After seemingly no answer to be thought of, he pushed [Yes] on the screen. The confirmation screen dissapeared and what replaced it was a small minimap on the far right of his vision. He could see the minimap just fine, and the transparency was just right that it wouldn’t impede his vision. The minimap was reminiscent of the video game minimaps he was used to as there was a red dot with a point in the middle. The point was facing northeast to Fellhood Grove, just as his body was.
‘Okay, I have to admit, this is kind of cool. It feels like i’m wearing 76’s visor.’
With that in mind, he thought of inspect his other abilities. Using his head, he opened a previous screen. The skills screen since he wanted to know more about the other two skills granted to him. He tapped the [Heroic Constitution] link and read the entry.
[The Heroic Consitution skill begets the rise of a champion, of a hero. The hero is favored by the Gods. The Hero has increased Vitality Energy, increased Spiritual Energy, increased Durability, Strength, and Agility.]
“Haha, this is almost like a cheat, like seriously!” He said aloud without thinking. He trully did feel like a cheater. It was akin to a feeling of making an account in an MMORPG and finding out that your character is actually a special entity that everyone wanted to be. ‘Hah, I could think of one old MMO in my world that had that system, too bad it went to shit after a certain game released and the devs wanted to cash in on its success.’
“Still, this a pretty useful ability, I had hoped it could at least increase my stamina but I guess i’ll have to develop that as I journey on” he thought aloud and returned to the skill selection screen. The only skill left was his [Inspect Item] skill. He tapped the screen again for information.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
[Inspect Item, well, inspects items. What did you expect, Hero?]
He could feel a brain aneurysm as he read the entry. He gritted his teeth because he expected a serious entry, but who would have thought that even the Collective would have some fun with him. ‘You guys are pretty willfull for your age.’ He thought as he tapped the screen away and held the bridge of his nose. He gave out a long sigh afterwards.
“Well, whatever, let’s try the skills out.” He said before standing up from the ground. He took a few ways off from the place he had sat on and stood there silently, contemplating at how he should try out his [Heroic Constitution]. It didn’t take long when he remembered how people played around with knives and posted it on the internet. He’d always wanted to try those things about because it looked cool, but he was too much of a pussy to actually try it and injure himself.
He inched his hands to grip the old dagger’s handle from behind his hip and took a deep breath. He closed his eyes and started thinking of his [Heroic Constitution] since he wasn’t sure if it was a passive skill or an active skill. It only took a few seconds for him to make up his mind. In a swift motion, he slid it off from its sheath and hacked and sliced the air twice. The first downward cut then the second upward slice. He used the momentum of the second upward cut to throw the dagger in the air. He looked above and readied his hands to catch the handle. As the dagger fell, in a single motion, he catched it before it landed on the ground and slid it cleanly inside its sheath.
He took another deep breath as beads of sweat trickled down his forehead to his nose. He bit his lips and had almost deathly eyes. He trembled in place before going down on all fours and breathing heavily. “Jesus fucking christ that was scary.” He said in between pants. He felt light-headed and queasy after what he did. He didn’t actually expect he would be able to pull it off perfectly. He rolled around and laid on the ground with boths arms and legs outstretched. He laughed in spite of himself. He did it, he was able to do something he wanted to do for a long time now.
He found it odd though that his body reacted quite naturally from using the dagger, almost like he knew how to use it for a long time now. He didn’t think it would be the [Heroic Constitution], it was probably something else. It was akin to a feeling of having used a keyboard for a long time that you didn’t even need to look at the keys to type. It was very similar to that feelings, as if he was a well-trained elite with the dagger. His muscle-memory did all the work. ‘This is really strange... Do I have another ability that gives me dagger proficiency?’ he thought and opened the codex skill screen, though found only the three skills listed. He thought deeply for a minute before closing the codex. ‘I’ll have to ask the Collective later on about skills that don’t appear on the codex.’
He kept resting on the ground as the midday sun’s rays bore down on him. It didn’t feel unpleasant at all, far from it, it felt very refreshing to him. He slid the dagger off from its sheath and looked it over, having it blot out the sun’s rays. “[Inspect Item]” He said as the voice activation system recognized it. A new screen appeared, showing the details of the old dagger.
[Old Hana Family Dagger]
[A very old dagger of the Hana Family. The ‘Fish of Legend’ crest found on the flat of the blade has faded considerably.]
‘So i’m guessing this old dagger once belonged to a noble.’ He didn’t know much of Vanveiss, but he knew what it meant to have a family crest. It meant that the dagger belonged to a noble and the old farts from the Collective probably stole it for him to use. “They seriously are willfull for their old age, weren’t they some kind of warden for the different worlds, what the fuck are they thinking, doing something like this... christ” he thought aloud, he didn’t know for sure, but it was a fun thought.
He slid the Hana Dagger back in its sheath and kicked up, landing on his feet in a clean motion. The [Heroic Constitution] really did increase his agility as he wasn’t even able to do this before in his world, not even close to being able to. He dusted himself off and walked off to the direction of Fellhood Grove.
Since it was the plains, you coudn’t really get lost in it. There was also a brow dirt path that he assumed would take him to Fellhood Grove. There were splits here and there but the minimap helped him sort out the direction of the Grove. Eventually, he grew bored of walking because he thought it was way too easy to get to the city. That was until he saw a group of small human-like creatures with red skin. They were hunchbacked and held wooden clubs, three of them at least. The last goblin held a bow in his hand and a quiver slung behind him.
When he saw these goblin-like creatures, he immediately went prone. If there was something he learned from his video games like that one game with dragon and dogma in its name and the novels from his old world, it would be that goblins were aggressive creatures that will attack anyone on sight. He couldn’t be sure though, since this was Vanveiss, but the Collective did say that this world was similar to the fiction of Earth. He crawled on all-fours to the nearest shrubbery and squinted his eyes to see better. The group of goblins were wearing chest plates, though what material it was, he didn’t know. Upon closer inspection, they really did look like goblins.
“Nothing to it, I guess i’ll be having my first kill” he smiled as he said this. He hasn’t done anything heroic for the past few hours since he’d been here. The forest didn’t have creatures or predatory animals in the first place. Looked like these poor old goblins would be his first kill. Of course, just because he was a hero didn’t mean he wasn’t nervous of fighting against them. First of all, this would be his first fight. He hadn’t had experience fighting before. Secondly, they have number advantage. Thirdly, he didn’t know how powerful these goblins were. He was kind of wary too since in one of his games, he couldn’t even kill a single goblin alone. He had to be cautious.
It seemed as though the goblins were heading towards Blackwoods, so he waited near the shrubbery to strike. He held the dagger’s handle tight and pushed away the branches to get a better look. He bided his time, waiting for the perfect chance to strike.
After a few minutes, the goblins eventually walked past the shrub he hid in. He waited for the archer way behind their group to pass him and drag it inside the bush for a stealth kill. He brandished the dagger and held it backwards so he could easily stab the goblin’s neck. Finally, the archer walked past, he moved fast and silent and covered the goblin’s mouth to keep it from screaming. He then used his foot to kick the back-knee of the goblin to make it easier to bring him inside the bush. After doing so, he held the goblin by the neck and dragged him inside where the blade of his dagger met its throat. Blood gushed forth from his wound and its mouth and slowly, the life vanished from its eyes.
It didn’t take long for the other goblins to realize that their bow companion was gone. They all shouted looking for him. After a while of no response, the leader of their pack seemingly orders the other two to spread out and look for the fourth goblin. One of the goblins ran past the shrub to look, the other walked slowly to the shrub as it thought that it might have knocked itself unconscious, while the leader stood his ground and looked around the area.
The second goblin met its fate the same way the fourth did. Jorn stood from the bush and covered the goblin’s mouth to muffle its scream, then used the dagger on his right hand to push the blade to its gullet. Blood burst forth as he pulled the body back inside the shrub without the leader knowing.
‘Only two left...’ he thought, stifling his breathing. He looked on over again and found that the first and third goblin were conversing in their language, though it seemed like they had an agreement to turn tail and retreat as they ran past the bush he hid himself in and back to the direction of Fellhood Grove. After making sure that the two goblins were out of sight, he heaved a sigh of relief and quickly left his hiding spot.
He expected that he would be nauseous by then since this was the first time he killed someone. But he didn’t, he didn’t feel lightheaded nor queasy at all, and it he found it disturbing himself. ‘This is very, very odd’ he thought. ‘There must be something at work here, what it is, I don’t know.’ He added. He took a deep breath and looted the dead goblins.
The took the dead goblin’s chest plate, bow, and quiver since he needed as much as hecould get for his survival. He didn’t really want to do this, but he had no other choice. Looting bodies shamelessly was a far better alternative to being a dead man, in his honest opinion.
After taking the gear, he wore the chest plate and slung the bow and quiver on his shoulder. He wanted to get through Fellhood Grove as fast as possible and get to the city.