He looked himself over before he set out. His clothing was bloodstained and ratty- a shredded cotton t-shirt under a similarly worn out and equally thin hoodie. His cotton-blend jeans weren’t holding up much better and somehow he had already worn the soles of his shoes down considerably.

Didn’t RPG heroes always have special gear that never got damaged? He would need to pick that up at the nearest adventurer’s guild.

He started his trek while still contemplating his predicament. The only signs of civilization he had found so far was the writing where the town should have been, and then this campsite. Mason wondered for a moment whether the corpse may have been the one to leave the message, but that couldn’t be. He had watched the letters fade before his eyes, so it had to have been done recently.

That meant there were at least two groups of people worth trying to find: Whoever left that message, and whoever the corpse at the campsite came from.

And there was one more mystery worth looking into, he realized. Why had he appeared in that temple in the first place? Where was that, and could there be more valuable items there if he could find it again?

He shook the thought from his head. A cat or two would be enough to cut his health in half, especially if he was unwilling to use his staff. Whatever would be defending a temple could probably rip him into pieces.

If I’m going to get stronger, I need a way to control where these enemies move. I need to bring them to me so I can fight them safely. If I could capture some of those squirrel-imps, I could probably use them to lure the cats in closer.

It took twenty minutes before a cat appeared though, and there was no sign of any squirrel-imps. This time, however, Mason had the advantage of having seen the cat first. He froze up, deciding quickly between his staff and his dagger, and decided that since the day was still early and he didn’t want mana sickness, that he would try to win with just the dagger for now.

He crept up slowly, closing the distance to a handful of yards, and only a few steps before he was ready to lunge did the cat notice him.

You’ve unlocked the skill: Sneak.

Sneak: Move slowly, step quietly, become one with the shadows. Improves your ability to remain undetected around enemies.

He swore as the cat immediately turned and lunged at him, and slashed wildly with his dagger in the process. He landed a blow but it wasn’t clean enough to cause much damage, though the same wasn’t true for the cat’s claws.

He turned quickly and threw the cat off, but it was up and moving without any hesitation. He pulled up Focus, and even cast an Analyze for information’s sake. He saw Feral Cat: Level 3? above its head, and a vague indicator bar that seemed to show the cat at just a smidge below full health.

With Focus still active he was able to track the cat’s motions, and when it lunged he had his knife at the ready. Its own momentum sent the knife an inch deep into the front of its shoulder, and it yowled and pushed off Mason to retreat again, limping now.

It snarled at Mason as it moved around him, and yowled loudly all the while. In the distance, a matching sound seemed to indicate danger. Mason lunged at the cat, missing, but receiving several scratches as punishment. He swept his blade again toward the beast, and managed a small cut not far from where he had stabbed earlier.

“Fucking kitty, come here!” he shouted as he dived again.

Instead of receiving an attack back, the cat dived away and another cat appeared, jumping on Mason’s back and digging in with tooth and claw. He responded with a noise very much like what the cat had made when injured, and hastily ripped the cat off his back, feeling more skin than he was comfortable with losing get removed in the process.

He slid his knife back into a belt loop and pulled up his staff, realizing quickly that if he didn’t end this fight soon, he was going to suffer some serious injuries. His first swing connected easily with the bloody cat, and he grimaced as the mana coursed into his body. It didn’t hurt any less than before, but rather than fighting it, he focused on it, immediately urging the staff to retaliate.

Black wisps were loosed from the end of the staff as he smashed it down on the body of the bloody cat, and he could see it dry and wither somewhat from the blow. Satisfied that he had won that fight, he turned to the other cat, and charged it quickly.

They traded blows for several rounds, but it was another combo- Mana Vampirism then Life Absorption, that ended the fight.

This time, he really was going to have to crawl back to camp. He dragged both bodies toward him and laid down roughly, hoping not to get too much dirt in his wounds.

His HP was down to a quarter, his stamina was empty, and Mana Sickness was preventing him from activating recovery. At least he had gained a point in Mana Vampirism and Dagger specialization. Plus enough meat to get him through another day or two.

3/15.

He rested there for an hour, enough time for his agony to dull to a subtle suffering, before limping back to his campsite. He gathered some stray nuts and berries on his way back, but hardly enough to supplement his collection.

None of his stamina had returned yet by the time he got back to camp. His health was still dismal. All he could imagine was that he would get attacked while in this state and be completely ruined.

What are these stat gains worth if a level three wild cat can ruin me after a single fight? I wish I had taken some martial arts back home, maybe then I could actually do something useful here.

It was the first time Mason permitted himself to think about where he had come from since he had gotten there. His memories had blurred and become vague after the assessment, not like he had amnesia, but more like they had just become irrelevant. It wasn’t too much different than trying to remember middle school, he figured. You wouldn’t think much of it at all unless it came up, and then you just had to focus to pull up details and snapshots.

He remembered kissing his girlfriend in her apartment during a movie, playing video games with his friends, and admittedly, often by himself. Driving to the beach for a change of scenery. Though the memories were pleasant, his mind resisted lingering on these things, and the dull sense of loss he knew he should feel was smothered by his urgent need to pay attention to his current reality.

What does it matter what I used to do somewhere else? I’m here, and I almost became cat food. I need to get stronger, not nostalgic.

Then a thought occurred to him. He really didn’t even know his own level. Risking the backlash of using a stamina skill while his bar was empty, he channeled Analyze on the thought of his own level.

Mason Nevels:

Magical Hopeful

Health: 16/25 (1/hr)

Mana: 0/20 (0/hr)

Mana (Mardun): 0/20

Stamina: 12/26 (1.1/min)

Strength: 2 (+3)

Agility: 2 (+3)

Intelligence: 3 (+4)

Willpower: 2 (+3)

Vitality: 2 (+3)

Endurance: 4 (+3)

Creativity: 3 (+4)

Great, I have no level, he complained, though he noticed his endurance had risen slightly. His vitality was still painfully low though, which he assumed had a lot to do with why he had gotten so injured, and possibly even why he couldn’t handle mana without extreme agony.

You’ve initialized your level! Congratulations, the Trials reward those who seek to understand their strength and increase it.

Calculating level based on Race Standards...

You have completed seven challenges, and have earned 25 Focus Points. According to your Race, you are level three.

Mason didn’t hesitate, he confirmed this immediately.

Completed Hidden Challenge: Personal Assessment! You are awarded three Focus Points to spend how you would like.

The decision was made harder by the fact that he didn’t know truly how these focus points affected him, but he decided to spread them out to help with his immediate problems. He placed a point into strength, willpower, and vitality.

He’d hit harder, focus better, and hopefully bleed a little less.

Though the prompt had said he’d seen the gains as Focus Points, he felt a change within him immediately. He took a deep breath and tried to remind himself to be grateful for baby-steps. Then he noticed that his health, mana, and stamina had all seen improvements as well.

Mason Nevels:

Magical Hopeful

Level 3 (28FP)

Health: 16/29 (1.2/hr)

Mana: 0/20 (0/hr)

Mana (Mardun): 0/20

Stamina: 12/28 (1.2/min)

Strength: 2 (+4)

Agility: 2 (+3)

Intelligence: 3 (+4)

Willpower: 3 (+3)

Vitality: 3 (+3)

Endurance: 4 (+3)

Creativity: 3 (+4)

He would survive. He had to. But in order to do that, he had a feeling that he’d not be able to escape enduring some more pain.

The bone rested six inches in front of where Mason sat cross-legged beyond his firepit. A strange mixture of trepidation and excitement filled him as he began his experiments. With the two cats he had killed that morning, he had enough food to last him a fair amount of time, although it was hardly a taste he could imagine getting used to. This meant he had an opportunity to experiment with both his focus skills, as well as his Mana Sickness.

He started by activating Mana Sight, and with his stamina bar full, he was pleased to see that he could make out more details of how the mana striated the bones. Seeing was believing, and this was all the evidence he needed that there was once a being that had mana at its very core.

To be fair, he couldn’t guarantee that wasn’t what ultimately killed it. But the risk was worth taking.

With his stamina down by half, he now pulled his staff from his side. This was going to be the real test. He pressed the jewel of the staff and the bone against each other, and immediately watched the blue light fade from the bone, feeling it move into the staff and toward his arm.

He dropped his Mana Sight, and instead channeled Focus as hard as he could, trying to fight the mana’s onslaught, to control it, or contain it, or anything.

His efforts were to no avail, but the torrent of pain rushed through his body, and he knew this was worse even than when he fought the cats.

Mana (Mardun): 7/20 he saw, even as his vision darkened. His last motion before he passed out was to try and cast the mana from the staff using Life Drain.

When Mason woke up, his mana sickness had already faded, and his stamina had regenerated. His intelligence and endurance had both improved a level closer to their potential, and for that he was grateful. He could hear the stream running nearby, and the sounds of insects buzzing and skittering about near the tree line, but beyond that it was pale starlight until he activated Focus for its bonus to low-light vision.

Seven mana was all it took to knock him entirely unconscious. He had played games where a basic mana bolt cost forty. Maybe mana was just that powerful in this world, but he figured it was equally likely that he was just that weak. His human body couldn’t handle such a powerful, foreign force.

Though it was late, he had already gotten a lot of rest, and he couldn’t really think of a better plan than to try another experiment.

The bone he was testing on a moment earlier had turned to dust, so he retrieved another, smaller bone to test with. Rather than picking up his staff, this time he simply concentrated on the idea and feeling of Mana Vampirism, holding the bone directly in his hands. He could have sworn he saw a glint of light in his staff to the side, but the mana passed straight through his skin this time.

The pain wasn’t nearly as intense this time, so he had the presence of mind to check his status.

Mana: 1/20

It was a much more reasonable amount to test with, but as it lingered in his body for several seconds, the pain increased until it wasn’t noticeably any different than when he had consumed more. His breathing quickened, and he tried desperately to cast life drain to release the magic, but for some reason he couldn’t.

He let out a stream of curse words dozens of syllables long, shaking his hands, jumping back and forth, trying anything to assuage the pain or release the mana.

His jaw clenched tightly as the pain increased in his skull, and finally with a spark of insight, he reached down to his staff and pushed with everything he had.

He saw his mana drop to 0, and passed out again from relief.

When Mason woke up, the first thing he did was sit up and rub his head, having landed heavily when he passed out. The second thing he did, an instinct almost, was reach out to his staff. The moment his skin made contact with it, he felt that single point of mana transfer back into his body.

He screamed as the pain returned, as bad as it had ever been, but then swung the staff and cast life drain, releasing a pathetic black puff into the air.

“Can I not win? Seriously? How am I supposed to get stronger if I can’t tame even a single point of mana?” he shouted to the air.

He looked at the bone he had been holding on, and then switched to Mana Sight to see that it had only dulled a small amount. Whoever had died here had more mana in one of the small bones of his body than he could survive for a few minutes.

Taking his mind from it, he cracked open a few of the nuts he had gathered and began nibbling at them, and then moved to make a fire to put off the chill that was coming through the area. Once it was lit, and he had thanked the cache of supplies he had found here, he glanced at his status again. He almost missed it at first, but he noticed something odd.

Mana: 0/20 (0.0/hr)

Why did his mana regen rate have a decimal point? Unless it had improved by an almost inconsequentially small figure, he guessed. It was… interesting, if not the least bit promising. If he was producing mana, in even the tiniest amount, it could be enough to begin conditioning his body.

Mana Vampirism and Recovery had both risen a level, and so had his vitality. With his vitality, he had gained another four points of health. He bit back a smile. He wasn’t going to be raising or razing the heavens anytime soon, but he would be casting magic, and learning to take a hit.

The entire next day was spent alternating between a few training techniques. First, he drilled motions with his staff and dagger so that he could move more comfortably holding them. Then, he’d switch on Focus, Analyze, and Mana Sight to inspect the nearby foliage; including leaves, roots, and flowers. He’d use Recovery to regain his stamina quickly then go sprinting laps around his campsite, further trampling a radius for him to defend.

Then when he had seen some improvement with each of those abilities, he would use Mana Vampirism on the bone to test out a single point of mana on his body, and eventually cast life drain to rid himself of it.

He gained a point in Focus, Analyze, Recovery, and Staff Specialization, and two points in Dagger Specialization.

What he was most proud of though, was the oddity.

You’ve discovered the Focus skill Mana Manipulation. You’ve unlocked the skill category Mana Arts. You do not receive a skill level in Mana Manipulation.