Andrew crawled out of his burrow the next morning and took a good long stretch.

Status

Name: Andrew Neilson

Race: Human

Catalyst: None

Class: Scavenger lvl 1

Profession: None

Titles: Pioneer

Status:

HP: 110/110

SP: 110/110

MP: 120/120

Attribute points: 5

Strength: 12

Dexterity: 13

Vitality: 11

Intelligence: 12

Wisdom: 9

Skills:

-Perception lvl 4

-Camouflage lvl 1

-Mana Control lvl 4

-Woodcarving lvl 3

-Rune Inscription lvl 2

-Adaptive Weapon Mastery lvl 1

-Empower Item lvl 1

His stats had come a long way from the last time he checked them. The day of magic practice really gave him a boost. He decided to put all his attribute points into vitality. It seemed much more difficult to gain vitality points naturally, and if he was going to head out and fight some wolves today he wanted all the durability he could get.

HP: 160/160

SP: 160/160

Vitality: 16

Speaking of durability.

He grabbed a set of the oversized clothes he had scavenged from the caravan and sat down cross legged with them in his lap. He focused first on the shirt, holding it out in front of him and closing his eyes.

He felt the pulses of mana flow through him for a second, focusing on them before pushing them into the shirt with both hands. Instead of flowing the mana through the shirt, he pushed as much as he could into the shirt and tried to keep it there. He could sense it dispersing into the air, pushing back against his skin. He resisted, maintaining control of the mana and trying to keep as much of it as still as possible within the shirt.

You will become stronger. Harder to pierce. Harder to cut. You will protect what is under you. You will still bend, but will not break.

He chanted within himself as he pushed mana into the shirt and after he had held the mana within for as long as he could manage he finally let go. He felt a pulse of mana flow back into him from the shirt as he released his control.

It seems like random cloth shirts are a lot less good at retaining mana than sticks are. Who would've guessed.

[+1 Wisdom for maintaining sustained mana control]

The shirt in front of him seemed a fair bit stronger though. The material had gotten thicker, the threads woven more tightly and in denser layers. He took off his coat and pulled the oversized shirt up onto his body. It was stiff and difficult to force himself into, the sleeves were especially stiff. He imagined it was like working in a new leather jacket, though he had never owned one. He twisted and turned, curling and uncurling his arms, working flexibility back into the material.

He repeated the same infusion with a pair of the oversized trousers as well, pulling those on over his current ones and tying himself a belt made from a strip of cloth harvested from the shirt he had turned to bandages a few days back. He had to do some squats and lunges with these as well to work them into something more comfortable.

He tried pushing his knife through a section of the cloth that he pulled away from his body and felt a surprising amount of resistance before it started to tear the material.

This will work. It'll work a lot better than I was expecting honestly. A little stiff, but it puts up a better fight than the basic cloth would. Not much good against a blunt hit, but will help against teeth or claws I imagine.

Hammer next I suppose. I'll have to wait a for my mana to recharge until I can work on that one. Pants and shirt used up thirty mana each.

MP: 20/120

…

MP 50/120

Good Enough.

He held the hammer in front of him with both hands and began to focus mana into it. Same as with the clothes before he pushed as much mana as he could into it and held it there.

You will become more durable. You will not break. You will feel natural in my hand. Your handle will become longer, your head will become heavier. You will not break.

[Mana control lvl 4-5]

[Empower Item lvl 1-2]

[+1 Wisdom for maintaining sustained mana control]

[+1 Intelligence for pushing the limits of your mana control]

He felt mana backflow into him again as he cut off the skill. It was less feedback than he had gotten from empowering the cloth, but still a fair bit more than the stick.

He opened his eyes and saw that the hammer had grown a little. The handle was slightly thicker and the wood changed from brown to a darker grey. The iron head of the originally mallet shaped hammer slimmed and stretched to a point on one side, the other thinned slightly and developed a rough texture across its head. Little tendrils of metal seemed to grow down from the head of the hammer and flow through the length of the handle, the wood and metal meshing organically until there was no clear distinction from one to the other. The new handle also had little finger grips, which was a nice touch.

MP: 15/130

That took a little more mana than the other ones did. Makes sense given that it felt more conductive. I'll have to use a crystal to power any binding circles I make before my mana recovers though, I still don't know how much juice those guys take.

Andrew waited for his mana to reach 30 points again before gathering his things and heading off into the forest in the same direction as last time. He made it about forty five minutes in the direction he traveled yesterday before he heard movement in the bushes ahead.

Alright same plan. Lets go.

He quickly began throwing down his wooden binding tiles, laying them out in a circle and organizing them so that all of the parts matched up. He was nearly finished lining up the last connecting tile when he heard something rushing through the undergrowth towards him.

He looked up from where he kneeled near the circle to see a grey and white form rushing towards him. It stood taller than his kneeling form, sharp teeth revealed with each pant as it charged towards him.

He shifted the last tile and in desperation pushed as much mana as he could into the circle in one big pulse. The circle glowed and just as the wolf leapt towards him it paused and seemed to float within the circle. Moving slowly but surely towards its edge.

MP: 5/130

And that's even after giving it more time to charge on the walk over. Probably spent a solid seventy mana on that.

Shit that was close.

He stood up and pulled out his hammer. The wolf's eyes darted around the forest, but it's head was just as frozen as the rest of it's body.

[Wolf Lvl 8]

Higher level than the boar as well. Makes sense though if animals also gain levels by killing things. Do wolf cubs start at level 1? Can they pick classes and things too? I wonder-

A vice closed down on his left calf and he felt dull teeth digging into his flesh, not quite piercing through his pant leg. He glanced down to see a second wolf latched on to his leg and only had a moment to register the thought before it pulled him off his feet.

Shit shit shit shit shit.

The wolf unlatched from his leg and leapt forward towards his throat. He lashed out quickly with the hammer feeling it strike home on the side of the wolfs snout with a crack. He flipped over to his hands and knees next to the wolf and swung down.

Once. Twice. The wolf stopped moving.

He heard more movement in the brush behind him and stood in time to see a third wolf rushing at him from behind.

He lashed out with one foot, kicking it in the chest and slowing it's charge before bringing his hammer down on the top of its skull. Once. Twice. The wolf stopped moving.

Shit shit, holy shit. Wolves hunt in packs. No shit. But no that’s fine, just take your time to theorize on mana expenditure and fucking wolf levels.

Stop thinking.

Focus.

Andrew glanced around, scanning the brush around him for any more signs of movement. Nothing. He returned his gaze to the third wolf, still stuck within the binding circle, still breathing, still big and scary.

That whole encounter couldn't have taken more than a few seconds. Thankfully the circle lasts longer than that at least.

His body had moved almost automatically. His hammer went exactly where he aimed, and he had known exactly when to kick to catch the charging wolf.

This weapon mastery skill might be a lot stronger than I had thought. I'm sure my increased dexterity made that easier too, but I've never fought with a weapon before now and that felt downright natural. Creepy.

He stepped up to the third wolf and struck it with his hammer. Once. Twice. The beast was dead. The circle lost it's glow.

Anyways, I clearly can't always rely on the crystal. My mana is almost entirely out. I was almost eaten by wolves, but I guess I know how to aim a good kick now. So that’s pretty neat.

He was only down three HP. The fall to the ground and the bruising on his leg hardly counted for more than the burns he got yesterday. Those burns had already been healed by the time he woke up this morning as well. His heart was pounding though and he had to readjust his grip on the hammer.

When did my hands so sweaty? Did I even need the circle? Sure It felt like I was going to die that whole time but that’s normal right?

No.

If one had my arm the other could've ripped my throat out easily. Just because they couldn't break through my magic pants does not mean they would have any trouble with my skin. What was that fight was worth to the system?

Show log.

[+1 Intelligence for pushing the limits of your mana control]

[Wolf lvl 6 defeated. For defeating an opponent above your level you gain additional experience]

[Wolf lvl 5 defeated. For defeating an opponent above your level you gain additional experience]

[Wolf lvl 8 defeated. For defeating an opponent above your level you gain additional experience]

[Adaptive Weapon Mastery lvl 1-2]

[Scavenger leveled up]

[Scavenger leveled up]

[Scavenger leveled up]

[Scavenger leveled up]

[Scavenger leveled up]

[You have gained enough magic experience to level up]

[Your current skills and achievements allow you to choose from the following catalysts]

[Rune Carver….]

A lot apparently. Five levels from three wolves. All were four to seven levels higher than me though. Interesting.

His options for catalysts were unchanged from yesterday so he ignored them, instead focusing on the stats he gained from his fight with the wolves.

Status

Name: Andrew Neilson

Race: Human

Catalyst: None

Class: Scavenger lvl 6

Profession: None

Titles: Pioneer

Status:

HP: 207/210

SP: 170/210

MP: 6/140

Attribute points: 25

Strength: 12

Dexterity: 18

Vitality: 21

Intelligence: 14

Wisdom: 16

Skills:

-Perception lvl 4

-Camouflage lvl 1

-Mana Control lvl 5

-Woodcarving lvl 3

-Rune Inscription lvl 2

-Adaptive Weapon Mastery lvl 2

-Empower Item lvl 2

His mana was already regenerating. That was good. His attributes had increased significantly from before and he already felt a little lighter on his feet.

That could just be the adrenaline rush though to be fair. Mana doesn't seem to fill in when an attribute increases though. Unfortunate. I'll decide on the attribute increases and new skills later, don't want to get ambushed by more wolves.

Andrew dragged the wolf corpses further into the forest, uphill and away from his camp. The boar he killed earlier was gone and he assumed its body had drawn these wolves. They were much closer to his camp than he had thought they would be and he certainly didn't need them snooping around when he slept, or was working on carving. He left the corpses near where he encountered the boar before and headed back to his camp.

I still need to figure out how to prepare those. Seems like I'll have no shortage of animals to eat, but I don't want to attract more predators by making a mess near my burrow. I certainly don't want to get any kind of food poisoning out here either.

When he returned to camp he laid out his wooden binding squares. He examined them and noticed that the runes were slightly blackened, and ran deeper than before.

I might need to replace these soon. Or at least make a backup set. If they break during a situation like that I could be in a lot of trouble.

That’s enough killing and leveling for the day I think. At least until my mana is back up, and I have backup binding runes. That’s important.

He wanted to experiment a bit more with manipulating the runes today anyways. He was sure there was more to be done with them and if he could build up some achievements there might be better catalyst options available. At the very least if he managed to create a new skill he would be gain some attributes for it. It would be better to create as many skills as possible before gaining a catalyst, in case it gave him a bunch of skills he could've just created on his own.

The first thing he tried was flipping the direction of the heat generating runes. Instead of the triangular shapes pointing inwards he flipped them to point outwards. He carved the circle onto one of his wooden boards to test what it would do. It might just burn up the board anyways, but he needed to be able to compare it to his other attempts. He was getting faster at carving the runes and he was sure that his increased dexterity was related. It only took him a half hour to finish the inverted board without making any mistakes.

MP: 70/140

Carving boards gave him plenty of time to regenerate mana, though it took longer than he had hoped. He wanted to preserve the mana crystals around in case of emergencies. They seemed too valuable to waste on something he could now accomplish by himself.

Maybe throwing some of those points into wisdom is not such a bad idea. If intelligence affects total mana, wisdom probably affects recharge time.

He laid the board in the grass and pushed his mana into it, feeling it dig into the wood and flow around the circle. This time he used his stick to focus mana into the board, wary of crispy fingers.

He passed five MP invested into the circle, enough that normally it would be smoking or browning at the very least. It appeared unchanged.

Six mana.

Seven.

The board continued to soak it up with no notable changes. A warm breeze drifted up to him from the board, but the board itself looked untouched. At eight mana invested he stopped, pulling the stick away and stemming his flow of mana. He reached towards the board, once again noticing the air warming around it. When he touched the board he was surprised to feel that it was cold to the touch.

So the basic rune builds heat into the board. Inverting the runes pulls heat out of the board. Makes sense I guess. Seems to be able to take a lot more mana the other way around, but that probably has a lot to do with the material.

No attribute gains either. It must be harder to increase attributes naturally the higher they are. I'll hold off on putting those points anywhere for as long as I can I guess. Build up the base first. Get as much out of this as I can manage.

He set the cold board aside and pulled out another, this one slightly larger than the ones before and more cumbersome to work with. He had to hunch over on his knees to carve into this one as it didn't fit into his lap. He made the circle with the heat runes pointing inward again. This time though he switched out the wavy connecting runes for the chain like connecting runes used in the binding circle.

It took him time to carve the more complex runes into the wood, and he was conflicted with how to connect the chains to the triangular heat runes. The wavy connectors from before didn't actually touch the heat runes, there was a space left blank in between. For this circle he decided to just connect the chains, figuring that the connector rune layout took precedence over the function runes, though he had no real basis for his theory.

He stood back and pumped 5 mana into the board through his staff.

Nothing.

He reached out and touched the board. No difference.

Did it work?

The circle had a faint blue glow to it. Similar to a powered binding circle.

He moved his finger from inside the circle to outside feeling for differences in temperature. There was something. The inside and outside of the circle felt, disconnected, somehow. He decided to layer another circle of runes on the board this time, surrounding his modified circle. This was just a basic heat generation circle and he finished it quickly.

[Woodcarving lvl 3-4]

[+1 Dexterity for performing precise work]

He pushed mana into that circle and waited for the wood to cook. He watched as the wood within the modified circle browned and blackened much quicker than the wood outside. In fact, there was a clear line starting at the tips of the triangles making up the modified circle where the wood was not browning at all.

The modified circle is making some kind of barrier. Trapping heat inside maybe?

[Rune Inscription lvl 2-3]

[Rune Modification Skill Created]

[+1 Intelligence for the creation of a Rune Based Skill]

He watched as the wood inside the binding circle turned black and small sparks erupted as it began to burn away. He stopped adding mana into the board after he infused about 7 points. More than enough to ignite a normal Fire Starting Circle. He picked up the board and found that outside of the circles the wood was only a little warm. More than usual but not enough to burn him. He continued to push mana into the board directly and watched with fascination as all of the blackened wood within burned and crumbled away, leaving an empty hole in the wood, outlined by the borders of the modified circle.

[+1 Wisdom for sustaining constant mana control]

He pushed more mana into the board. Ten points now. Twelve. At fifteen points a small spark formed in the center of the hole, before a flame grew into existence.

A little fire, just sitting there. Suspended mid air in the center of this wooden circle.

[+1 Wisdom for sustaining constant mana control]

[+1 Intelligence for pushing the limits of your mana control]

Now this is some fucking magic. No idea what to use this for, or if its even useful, but that is the closest thing to a legit fireball I've ever seen.

At the very least I won't have to carve a new board every time I want to start a fire. That’s progress right there.

He blew into the fire, it flickered a little but remained trapped in the center of the binding. He reached his hand out towards the center of the circle. Slowly. A few inches from the board he could feel a distinct change in temperature. It felt like entering an excessively heated room after walking around in the snow all day, or like sticking his fingers in an oven. He pulled away.

Seems like there's a bubble of some kind that accompanies the runes. Extends about an inch out from the circle on both sides of the board. Keeps everything inside. Interesting.

He was out of boards. Time to head back and harvest more of that wagon.

He made his way down the hill and towards the road once again. He was shocked to see that the binding rune was still there. Glowing in the dirt.

That thing has gone a full day, still cookin. That’s some crazy retention. Well, actually I have no idea how this works. That might be normal, but it seems like a lot when my fireboards drain within a minute or two.

It seemed dimmer than before but not by much. He pulled five boards off the wagon and hauled them back up to camp. Then returned for another five. The wagon was little more than wood wheels on a iron frame at this point, he'd have to find something else to carve his runes into soon.

He returned to camp and spent a couple hours carving out another wooden binding circle with the new boards. He was riding the fireball high and wanted to make at least one more trip uphill before the end of the day, but he wasn't about to risk it with a single worn out binding circle.

[+ 1 Dexterity for performing precision work.]

[+ 1 Dexterity for performing precision work.]

It wasn't quite dark when he finished, his mana was full and he was eager to get off his ass and head back up the hill. He gathered his tools and followed the path he took before, slowing down as he approached where he had dumped the wolf bodies before.

He did his best to move quietly, placing his feet as carefully as possible as he pushed his perception skill as far as it could go. He heard movement, rustling of bushes and a dragging, ripping, snapping sound. Quiet growls.

It sounds like there are more wolves over there. Eating the corpses from earlier? Pretty hardcore, but I guess that’s nature.

Andrew backed off a few more paces before finding some clear ground to begin laying his circle. He was making a concentrated effort to stay quiet this time, but nerves kept him moving quickly. He laid both his old circle and his new backup. One In front of him and the other on his right. He powered both of them using his own mana, with a brief pause to allow it to recover just enough.

MP: 10/160

He stood up from his circles and strained to hear the faint sounds of growls coming from the brush ahead of him. He stepped loudly on a few branches and shuffled in place. He knocked his hammer into the tree next to him and made a show of looking around. Well, he was actually looking around, but he exaggerated it. The performance would be important to the wolves. For sure.

[Perception lvl 4-5]

The ferns ahead of him shifted slightly before a wolf leapt out towards him, directly into his first circle. He looked around scanning to his right and left, another wolf was trapped within his other circle on the right, and one more was coming out of the brush to his left. He kicked out at it, but it dodged to the side and gripped his outstretched calf in it's jaws.

Oh shit not again

He resisted for only a second before being pulled to the ground once again. This time his left arm and hammer were trapped awkwardly under him and he had to raise his right to fend off the wolf that leapt from his leg to bite at his throat. The wolf dug it's teeth into his sleeve and he could feel it squeezing. Tighter and tighter, its teeth piercing more and more of the empowered cloth.

He managed to roll slightly, get his arm up from under him and swing his hammer at the creature gripping his arm. One. Two. Three hits this time and the wolf went limp. He heard more bushes rustling to his left again and he rolled over the dead wolf to his right, scanning the left as he rose to a crouch in the dirt. Another wolf was charging him and he met this one head on with a strike to the snout. It went down instantly.

A crack went off to his right, sounding like the pop of a firecracker with a little too much of a hiss at the end. He turned and was greeted by a pair of jaws closing in on his neck. He managed to get his arm up again but this time the wolf bit into his wrist just past his sleeve. He clenched his jaw and hissed through his teeth as he brought his hammer around again. Once. Twice. Three times. He could feel the vibrations of the blows through the teeth in his wrist and they pulled at his skin, ripping it. The fourth hit killed the wolf and he had to pry it's jaws from his wrist and it's teeth out of his skin.

He was bleeding. A lot.

He grabbed a handful of the cloth he kept in his pouch and pressed it messily around the wound. Putting pressure on it awkwardly, hammer now loosely held in his right hand. He scanned the surroundings.

Nothing.

He turned to the his first circle and saw that several of the boards were smoking slightly. There was pleasant wood-burn smell in the air and the runes inscribed in the material looked black and cracked.

The other wolf in his new circle was still trapped.

About two safe uses per wood circle. Then its unreliable, that was like five seconds at most before it failed.

His wrist hurt a lot, and the warm blood pooling down his arm into his sleeve was very distracting. Also his wrist hurt A lot.

HP: 100/210

Took quite a bit more out of me this time than before huh. If this doesn't heal soon carving is going to be a real bitch. Also I might die from infection or something, no big deal. Stay positive. Focus.

He pulled another strip of cloth from his pocket and wrapped it around his wrist, keeping the other bundle of cloths pressed on his wound. He tightened it and tied it off before transferring his hammer back to his left hand.

One. Two good hits and the final wolf was dead. He put his hammer back in the loop and awkwardly collected up both sets of carved boards with one hand before heading back to his camp.

There are more predators around here than I thought, and they're too close to where I'm sleeping. I need to figure out some kind of warding rune, if that’s even possible. Or just find a cave or something to hole up in. Something more secure than a bunch of roots.

Tomorrow will be a time for more exploration, the rest of this afternoon is dedicated to rune experiments. For real this time. No more wolves for me.

Fuck that hurts. I really hope the healing here is as good as I keep assuming it is, otherwise I might just bleed out here. Ancient book of magic and pretty rock collection all lost because of an overconfident idiot. Focus. Not back at camp yet. Think positive.

This time he didn't check his log until he was safely back at camp.

[Wolf lvl 8 defeated. For defeating an opponent above your level you gain additional experience]

[Wolf lvl 4 defeated]

[Wolf lvl 7 defeated. For defeating an opponent above your level you gain additional experience]

[Wolf lvl 6 defeated]

[Scavenger leveled up]

[Scavenger leveled up]

Only two levels this time. Talk about diminishing returns. I even bled for this one.