Today, the woods were alive with the sounds of labor. Trees were still falling as the woodsman continued their work, and groups of hunters roamed the undergrowth searching for monsters to slay. Leaving them all behind, I rose above the treetops, and started flying south.

After a few miles, I stopped in the air, taking in the surroundings. Pulling my journal out, I started taking note of landmarks and plotting my distance travelled, focusing on roads, clearings, and notable or unique clusters of foliage. Before long, I had a simple map of the area drafted. Turning to one of my older pages, I added any new information to it I thought would be valuable, giving me a slightly scaled up area map.

Examining my journal pages recorded in the last couple of days, I couldn’t help but feel a bit proud. I now had a decent map made of a few square miles surrounding the camp. There was lots of area to cover still if I wanted to map out the entire city, but it would come with time.

Putting away my mapping supplies for now, I continued my southward flight until, finally, I saw the first signs of water, the colorado river coming into view. It was only twelve miles due south of the camp, but was still mostly inaccessible. The woods were dense, and were growing denser as the forests ate the decaying remains of the city piece by piece.

Today my objective was to raise my physical stats to their current maximums, and what better place was there for me to train than by a body of water? I could exercise as much as I needed, then just jump in the river to recharge.

Idly, I wondered how the ranch house was holding up. There were still memories there I didn’t want to lose. I desperately wanted to go find my old house and try and secure it, but I had no way to prevent the forests from taking over.

Forcing my emotions down, I slowly descended until I was only a few feet over the rushing water. The river had widened to close to twice it’s previous width, and water flowed ceaselessly. I hovered over the rapids, enjoying the sound of the rushing river for a while, just taking in the sounds of nature. A slight bubbling sound rose behind me, accompanied by a vauge sense I recognized as my electrorepetivity activiating.

With the sound of a cannon firing something ripped by my head, sending my hair flying forward with its shockwave. Instantly I rocketed upward while twisting around, searching for whatever had attacked me.

There was nothing there. The once beautiful murky waters of the colorado river now had a sinister air. I double checked to be sure, but I couldn’t see anything moving beneath the current.

Unwilling to allow myself to be surprised yet again, I moved to the shoreline near a small clearing, landing to catch my breath. My heart still raced with adrenaline. Mentally, I scolded myslef.

It was stupid of me to lose concentration like that. If whatever that thing was had slighly better aim I would have been dead.

*ding*

Race Skills:

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Electroreceptivity: 2à3!

Current Stats:

Luck: 10->11!

“Figures.”

It was somewhat mortifying that even the system acknowledged that I had just gotten lucky.

Unwilling to give up after one encounter, I set off down river to try and find a good place to train. All the while, I kept a steady eye on the waters for any sign of movement. As I went, the water became shallower and shallower, until eventually large patches of stone rose from the riverbed like islands.

Slowing my speed, I stopped by one of the stone patches, carefully landing among the limestone, worn smooth by the current. As soon as my feet touched the stone, though, I heard a familiar bubbling.

Twisting around instantly, I saw a strange sight; four reptilian heads peeked out of the river. Before each head was a spinning ball of water. I threw myself to the ground, just as four ground-shaking blasts passed through the space I had occupied.

Turtles. They were massive, stone-backed turtles. Checking the waters again, I noticed that the monsters were too large to fully hide beneath the shallow water, and were instead slowly pushing themselves along the stones to approcach me. I quickly identified one of the monsters.

Cannon Turtle: T1

A monter created by infusing dense water mana with a common red-eared slider. Carnivorous.

Pushing mana into my palm, I summoned a storm lance. Lauching myself into the air, I breifly hovered over the cluster of turtles. One of them was more isolated than the rest, and seemed to be hung up on a large rock.

With a flick of my wrist, I sent the lance spinning towards the monsters head. The attack ate through the scales instantly, and the beast collapsed, slowly starting to bleed out into the river. With my right hand, I drew my machete before turning to the rest of the beasts. As I killed their comrade, though, they had not remained idle.

All three monsters had yet another warbling blob of water hovering before their maws, and were ready to strike. This time, though, they were very close. Too close for me to safely dodge. As quick as I could, I lauched my body backward just as the water blasts were released.

The first shot stuck the blade of my machete, shattering the metal and launching it from my hand, wrenching my wrist in the process. The second shot went wide, missing me by only a few inches. The third shot struck the inside of my right calf, cutting a searing gash through my flesh.

The pain in my wrist and calf was white-hot, and instantaneous. I grit my teeth, doing what I could to maintain composure as I summoned two more storm lances, one in each hand. The turtles were incensed, following me with their beady eyes and forcing themselves onwards with as much fury as their slow bodies could muster.

With a growl I sent my spinning attacks towards the closest two monsters. Though my aim was poor and I only struck their shells, the storm magic ate through it like an acid. With a silent scream, two more turtles died.

Killing the last turtle was embarrassingly simple. I flew directly upwards into the air, before coming down right on the back of it’s shell. Instead of hiding within, the monster continued trying to get me, its beak snapping at that air.

Calmly I summoned another lance, sending it right through the top of the turtles skull.

As the mana filled my core, I sunk into the shallow water, letting it wash over my wrist and calf. Instantly I felt relief, and after fourty five minutes of waiting, I felt good enough to move on. A few hundered feet down the river, I came to small spur where a creek fed the colorado.

Following the creek, I came to a gentle pool created by a spring bubbling up from below the ground. On either side of the spring were walls of stone, effectively making this place a dead end. The only way to access it by foot would be to either scale the walls from above, or to get here from the river.

Finding it was quite an ordeal, but it was a perfect place to train.