I was sitting in a small passage in the wall, connecting the main cave to the old Keilatrix den. I didn't know how long I had been there, blacked out from the pain. It couldn't have been more than a minute though, since it sounded like the Abitsimus was still right outside the opening.

I could hear it breathing heavily from my location, even though I was far inside the passage. That blast of fire must have taken a lot out of it.

I definitely needed to get as far away from that as possible, even if it thought I was dead. I was absolutely not willing to get hit by another one of those fireballs again.

I tried to quietly crawl down the cave and decided to open my menu and see what had changed.

Previously, I had enabled a setting in options for a few tabs to appear in the corner of my vision that let me see my hp, sp, and mp without having to open my character sheet. Because of that, I hadn't felt a need to check the menu for anything urgent.

Main Menu: Lake Rogers

- Character Profile (1)

- Quests

- Loot Boxes

- Options

It looked like I had some update in my character profile, so I quickly selected that tab.

Lake Rogers

Age: 19

Level: 2 (45/200)

HP: 4/14 (Regen/Day: 6)

SP: 1/13 (Regen/Day: 24)

MP: 0 (Regen/Day: 0)

Power: 13

Endurance: 14

Agility:12

Vitality: 12

Manipulation: 11

Concentration: 10

Willpower: 15

Skills:

Perception - 3, Foresight - 2, Climbing - 1, Contemplation - 1, Punching - 3, Kicking - 3, Jumping - 1, Stomping - 2, Analyze - 1, Demon Killer - 3, Abyss Sanctum; Mastery of Death - 1, Demonic Envelopment - 1, Sprint - 1, Explosive Artist - 1, Grappler - 1, Slayer - 1, Persistence - 1, Stealth - 1, Reflexes - 1, Time Dilation - 1, Deception - 1, Blood Rush - 1, Scavenging - 1, Tracking - 1, Taunt - 1, Regenerate - 1, Quick Feet - 1, Tenacity - 1

Fear Resistance - 1, Heat Resistance - 5, Bludgeoning Resistance - 1, Pain Resistance - 3, Slashing Resistance - 2

Skill Acquisition Period: 43 Minutes Remaining

Heat Resistance Has Reached Level 5. Enable Stat Increase?

Uh, Yes?

A huge amount of energy suddenly swept through me, almost as amazing as the feeling I had when I leveled up. It filled my bones with strength and sturdiness I've never felt before. This time there was no golden light, but the sensation was so good I had to stop myself from making noise.

And then it stopped as suddenly as it arrived.

Looking over my character profile again, I saw that the green text had vanished and my endurance had increased by one. My max SP had also increased by one.

Was I going to feel like that every single time I have a stat increase? Because if so, hell yes.

But let's think about what happened.

I got a notification saying that I had earned a stat increase due to raising heat resistance to level 5. That probably means every time I get a skill to level 5, I'll get another stat increase. I doubt that it will always raise my endurance, so how does it decide which stat to increase? Is it random? If it is random, that's some pretty lazy game design. Where's my customer service, I need to email a complaint to the developers!

Sadly, there was no tab that popped up allowing me to message customer service. Another thing to work on, I guess.

While checking out my character profile and increasing my endurance, I had crawled far enough into the cave that I felt safe. I doubted that the Abitsimus even knew I had survived, and I was sure even if they tried to breathe fire again I was too far away for it to matter.

Now all I had to do was sit there and wait for them to go away.

....

I stayed there for a few minutes before I heard the Abitsimus leave. I didn't exit the passage right away, since I didn't want to run into the gorillas on the way back to the Cirilka nest. That would be tragic.

After sitting for around five minutes and fooling around with my menu, I was about to make my way out when I realized a big problem.

I didn't know where my bag of food had gone.

Oh fuck.

I looked around the small passage feebly, cursing myself. The bag was probably trashed by those Gorillas when they ran in, or maybe it was eaten. Either way, I doubted I would be seeing it again.

That thing had all my food and water in it! I was so screwed!

It had a huge amount of supplies, the only source of them I had.

What was I going to do?

I supposed the only way to fix it would be to get something else from another loot box.

The quest I was about to complete would award me a rare loot box, would that have a source of food and water?

I guess the only thing to do was hope.

The climb up to the cave entrance was pleasantly uneventful. I was still worrying about the outside, though. There might be some kind of ambush at the cave mouth if they thought I was still alive.

Nah, they're just big apes. They aren't smart enough to think about things like that.

I managed to get out of the cave and saw that they had already gone back to the top of the hill. It seemed like they totally thought I was dead.

Ha! Stupid gorillas.

Excited to finally be done with the quest, I walked back to the Cirilka nest. Now that I was familiar with the area, it didn't take me long to get there.

It was a gruesome sight.

Dead Cirilka littered the clearing, crushed into the rocky ground. It looked like the Abitsimuses didn't even stop to fight, simply running over the crabs and killing them with impunity.

Luckily, it seemed like a few of the Cirilka had survived. They were all seriously injured and maimed, but because the Abitsimuses barely gave them any attention some crabs had escaped alive.

It looked like five out of the sixteen I could see were still hanging on.

I smiled. How lucky.

You Have Slain: Cirilka, Level 5

You Have Slain: Cirilka, Level 4

You Have Slain: Cirilka, Level 5

You Have Slain: Cirilka, Level 5

You Have Slain: Cirilka, Level 5

+96 XP Acquired

Stomping: Level 3 Acquired

Slayer: Level 2 Acquired

I went around repetitively smashing their heads in with the bottom of my shoe and was seriously amazed at how much XP I got.

Just for killing five crippled demons, I got nearly one hundred XP!

There's gotta be some exploit here, right? That seems really strong.

If that's such an effective way to get XP, why doesn't everyone try and get stronger monsters to kill each other?

Oh, that's right. I haven't actually met an intelligent person here. I have no idea if that's actually exactly how they level up fast.

And also, I don't think many sane people would want to do what I just did.

But still! The XP!

After making sure I wasn't missing any more living Cirilka, I braced myself and walked towards the nest entrance.

I ducked into the cave and was immediately blasted with cool air.

Oh my god, that feels good.

Although I had become used to the blistering heat outside thanks to my skill, that didn't mean I liked it.

But the temperature in that cave was probably under seventy, and that felt like heaven to me.

After I recovered from how cool the air was, I looked around.

Quest: The Mysterious Cave, Has Been Completed

Rare Loot Box Acquired

It was really bright in there. That blue light the water was giving off was visible from very far away, and right at the source, it was blinding.

The pool of liquid was actually quite small, around the length of a large car. The cave extended into a small room opposite the water, in which I could see a handful of large eggs.

Cirilka eggs?

Sadly, I doubted that I would get any XP from smashing them. The Keilatrix babies I killed earlier hadn't given me any, so why would these things.

Ignoring the eggs, I tried to get a closer look at the liquid.

What the heck was this stuff?

I didn't want to touch it, since it could be acid or something, but I really wanted to know what it was.

There had to have been a reason for a quest to tell me to come in here, right? And the only thing I could see was this blue stuff.

I grabbed a small rock and tossed it into the liquid.

It sank with a plop and nothing else happened.

Okay, so it's around the same consistency as water. Good to know.

Then I walked over and grabbed the smallest Cirilka egg I could see.

There were six of them, veiny and pale. They ranged from pebble-sized to small dog-sized.

I was worried it would explode if I touched it, so I poked it with a rock from far away, just in case.

It didn't react in any noticeable way, so I gently picked it up and brought it over to the liquid.

I tossed it in the same way I did with the rock.

It sank with another plop.

So if this stuff is acid, it doesn't dissolve things very fast.

I felt safe enough to try and cup the liquid with my hands.

Making a bowl by interlocking my fingers, I dipped down below the waterline and brought up the liquid.

I was shocked by how frigid the stuff was, but I didn't feel any real pain or discomfort.

Now, I had just sprinted a long distance in a race for my life. The air was also extremely hot, and the only thing I had to drink for hours was a single swig of water.

When I felt how cold that stuff was, I may have been a little tempted to take a sip.

But don't worry, I'm not that dumb. I quickly dumped the blue liquid back in the pool.

Let's not resort to drinking unknown substances until after we open our new loot box.

"Loot Boxes"

Available Loot Boxes:

Rare Loot Box - 1

"Open the rare loot box."

A small box appeared in my hands, an identical shape to the uncommon loot boxes. This one, however, was a pale shade of blue. The indent at the top was also a copper color.

I peeled open the cap, praying that it would give me more food, and it dissolved into golden light, reshaping to become my reward.

What I ended up holding was a tiny see-through capsule around the size of a shot glass. Inside was about an ounce of sparkling liquid the color of strawberry.

Rare Potion of Healing

A go-to item of adventurers, the potion of healing is the first item off of any alchemist's shelves. Healing potions will restore a varying amount of hp to whoever drinks them, but be careful, if the hp you restore goes over your max health there will be serious backlash! Rare potions will restore 10-20 hp per ounce.

So.

If I use this, there's a good chance there will be "serious backlash", even if I drink it while at 1 hp. My max health is just a little too small for this to be helpful.

Also.

There's a single ounce of this stuff. I don't think that's going to be enough to sate my thirst and hunger.

Conclusion:

That reward was totally useless.