Believe you can and you’re halfway there. –Theodore Roosevelt

Because half of the ability to fly is the belief that gravity doesn't affect you. The other half is a remarkable jumping ability.

I woke up on the third day, instantly wondering why this place wasn't burning yet. It wasn't that I even hated this place specifically, but it held too much collective emotion within. It had to be purified.

Klaudia was still snoozing lightly from just outside my visual radius, and I wondered what had made me wake up now. It was likely the rising heat in the classroom. The windows were all shut to try and preserve some heat in the cold night, but the morning light was starting to stream in through the windows.

I eased myself up into a sitting position, limbs aching. I still felt worn from dealing with that abomination, but it reminded me of the reward. If I had to get an occupation, one that would give me another edge over the monsters I faced would be ideal. And due to the suggested difficulty of the event, I guessed monster Hunter was either a very rare occupation, or one that had a lot of potential.

"What occupations can I get right now?"

Available occupations:

• Survivalist (D)

• Monster Hunter (B)

• Hunter ©

• Teacher ©

• Reaper (A)

• Soul Seeker (A)

The last occupation was an intriguing one. I pushed it for more information.

Soul Seeker (occupation):

Requirements: met

Granted with a costly affinity, you may choose to scour the earth for unique and powerful souls. Assists with spectral manipulation and navigation through the soul realm.

Though it looked mysterious and attractive, nothing it offered was something I didn't think I could get through my reaper class and the skill store. I guessed this was something offered as a consolation prize to those who rejected the offer of the council but still kept the spectral affinity.

It seemed rather lacklustre considering what I would be able to do with enough essence, so I paid no more attention to it and selected the Monster Hunter occupation.

Occupation gained: Monster Hunter

Skills gained:

• Vitalis vision (B)

• Trackers sense ©

• Monster Carving (B)

• Critical Weakness (B)

Stats gained:

• STR +7

• END +4

• VIT +8

• AGI +8

• SPE +9

• INT +1

• WIS +2

• LCK +4

Hunter related skills: (Rapid Step, Silent Step, Corpse Identification) have been reassigned as occupational skills. 50% of current skill exp will be added to the occupation level

Occupation levelled up. Monster Hunter is now level 2.

STR +2

END +2

I felt an incredible burst of strength and my breath caught in my throat as my stats were boosted massively. While my already high strength was only increased by 50%, my endurance and vitality stats were almost doubled. Problems I had had the day before wouldn't have occurred if I had this occupation available.

The stats gained from a mere occupation only excited me as I imagined the rewards for getting a class a rank higher.

I looked through the new skills I had received, and they were all fairly customary for someone hunting monsters. Vitalis vision let me see living things through solid walls and stuff in a small range. It would overlap with my normal sight like spectral sight but without skewing the colours.

Trackers sense let me notice tracks and hints to a monsters whereabouts. It was closely tied in with luck, and I was welcome I had received a lot of luck with the occupation.

The Monster Carving skill was a passive skill that wouldn't level. It just let me extract certain parts of a monster in one piece at a higher success rate. It also helped me know where these parts were. Useful for a gathering quest.

The last skill was the one with the most combat potential. Critical Weakness increased the damage that a critical hit would do to a vulnerable area of monster. It currently only increased the damage by 1%, but if I continued to get more critical hits, the power would increase with the level.

The skills were useful and all, but I was already bored of reading through my status information and reluctantly got up.

I had only spent a minute or two dealing with the occupation in my morning daze, but when I got so many stat points at once, the adrenaline rush woke me up completely. The only problem I had was an empty stomach. Despite all the energy I had expended previously, I hadn't eaten the night before. Neither had Klaudia. She would probably be hungry too when she woke up.

I checked in my bag, but to my horror, there was only enough food for one person.

Though I wasn't ever one to care about the patriarchy that I was apparently a part of, I decided it was better for Klaudia to take the food. She had a slighter build than me and had probably slept less too. It only made sense in survival terms for her to take them.

Luckily, we had plenty of water, which was packed in with the vampire blood. While Klaudia was distracted by being asleep, I took out one of the bottles. The blood still seemed to be in a completely liquid condition and made the bottle feel much colder than it should have been overnight. There should have been some condensation on the bottle, but it remained ice cold and completely dry.

I could only guess the vampire blood was still alive in some sense and was feeding off the ambient heat to sustain itself. But that was good. It reinforced the idea that I could turn people into vampires with this. An army of the undead would be incredible. I would also be able to tick it off my bucket list.

Klaudia broke me from my nerdy daydreams by turning in her sleep and murmering in polish. Part of her shirt had ridden up in her sleep, and I was momentarily captivated by the thin strip of toned midriff that had been exposed.

She mumbled again, and I realised the situation I was in. If there was ever a time to try out a personal storage spell, it was now.

"Spa-Spacial inventory."

I switched to whispering quickly when I saw how close Klaudia was to waking. It wouldn't look good at all if she woke up and I was holding a bottle of blood. Multiple bottles. Of blood.

I needn't have worried for long though, as a white spell circle grew in the space in front of me. It started as a small circle which branched out with geometric shaped and strange runes until a square filled with shifting shapes hovered at an angle in front of me. The shapes stopped moving and faded into a plain white.

I put my finger through the white light, and instantly became aware of it entering the space, almost like it was something that I was observing happening, just not through any conventional senses.

The space I was aware of was exactly half a meter cubed. More than enough space to store three bottles of blood. I also poured all the count me I had collected so far into it, as they had become annoyingly heavy and loud as my collection grew.

Even after I deactivated the spell, I could still tell what was in the space, even count it if I focused.

There was a litre and a half of blood, but of course, I already knew that. There was also five gold coins, fifty-two silver coins, and two hundred and seven copper coins.

That was more than I remembered picking up, but then again, I did kill a lot of lizards maybe I somehow auto-looted them after I killed them?

I also put the shotgun in there for good measure. It was heavy and I didn't want to carry it in my bag or even in my hand. It was an ugly inneficient weapon, and only it's high power kept me from discarding it. I couldn't let my taste in weapons be my downfall.

A punch of hunger was thrown at me again and I stood properly to assess the food situation. There were only two bottles of water left and another five that were empty and compressed. That wouldn't keep us until midday. It was far too hot during the day to try and ration water, so that was next on the list. Also, a bathroom trip. But the water in the taps was still running and was more than clean enough.

Two birds, huh.

That left food. I had effectively burnt the bridge that was the cafeteria, leaving only two potential sources in the building. Another vending machine, or the monsters themselves. I had no idea if the meat of them was edible, as it was composed of something that dissolved into the air when there wasn't a soul to hold it together.

But the Carver skill I got from my occupation suggested that parts would keep if they were extracted from the Monster before it decayed. I hoped meat from lizards would be included in that because I was eager to bite into something more substantial than a vegan cereal bar.

30 minutes and one argument with a half asleep teenager later, we were on the move with my bag full of freshly filled water bottles. Klaudia was quiet as we walked the halls. She was probably curious about what I had planned past immediate food concerns, as was I.

I wasn't sure where to try and look for the lizard queen, as the top floor had only contained the abominations and patrols. There was nothing more powerful than the corpse of the bigger lizard I had found. I briefly considered that the corpse I had found in the workshop was the queen, but dismissed that as the regulated behaviour of the patrols had continued even past when I had found it.

Any considerations had to go as we rounded the long corner and almost walked straight into a patrol. We were currently on the second floor, so the patrol consisted of two black lizards which were being led by the longer slim one.

I reached for the ankh in my pocket and froze when I encountered no resistance.

Where?

It came to me in a flash. I had given the ankh back to Nephthys. I was almost defenceless. Almost.

The lizards had sensed my hesitation and were attempting to charge me.

I had hoped to leave my penultimate trump card to later, but fate was pushing my hand. I cast Personal Storage behind my back as I crouched into a runners position.

"Um... Sam?"

Klaudia threw a concerned call to me, but I ignored it. She likely only held one more knife, so I couldn't let anything get past her that I wouldn't be confident against in a similar situation.

The largest lizard leapt at me as I drew the shotgun from behind me, and I pulled the trigger aiming all the barrels at its head.

Nothing happened, and the lizard continued forwards, it's mouth temporarily finding purchase on the rusted metal.

It knocked me down as its momentum met me, and I struggled to keep the gun in its mouth and away from me. I ended up keeping the lizard's mouth from nearing me by shoving it sideways into its mouth and pushing on it with one hand. With the other, I was desperately trying to punch away one of the black lizards that had approached my left flank.

But this left me defenceless on my right side, and as soon as the third lizard caught up, I felt it immediately clamp its jaws onto my hip.

-17hp

Status effect received: Bleeding (01:24)

I cried out in agony as I felt fire lance through my bones and muscles. The pressure was almost alleviated and I saw a knife sticking out of its eye.

Klaudia had distracted it enough to make her it's new target but had left the knife behind for some reason.

I had to finish this. Quickly. But by using as little spirit energy as possible. To give myself some breathing room, I grabbed the soul of the lizard that had mounted me, causing it to freeze for a few seconds.

I kicked it off while holding onto the shotgun, launching it several feet down the hallway, earning a measly -2hp as it landed.

I swung the heavy gun down onto the head of the lizard next to me, attempting to crush its skull.

-23hp

Dazed (0:37)

It wasn't long, but it was enough. I glanced back to Klaudia and saw she was mostly dodging the lizard as it ran into lockers and walls alike. She was exhausting it. A risky but rewarding tactic.

Given a moment to look closer at the gun, I noticed it had a safety catch above the trigger. I damn near sighed at my own mistake and flipped it up.

Almost casually, I aimed the top barrel at the lizards head and pulled the trigger. The end of the barrel exploded into light and sound that blinded and deaffened me for a second.

Monster killed:

Damage dealt: 238

Exp earnt: 348

I hadn't even seen the damage that the shotgun had done, but as soon as the smoke had cleared, and the front half of the gun had inexplicably rotated 60°, I saw the destruction it had done.

The top half of the lizard was gone, turned to dust by the decaying nature of the shotgun. The wall behind it was littered with impact sites as well. I could count at least twenty, but closer to the centre of the blast, they all just melded into one.

It didn't even make sense that that much damage had been done to it. I hadn't done enough damage with my physical crush that the 180 maximum damage of the shotgun could have killed it. Unless each pellet could have done this. And each pellet had the 8% modifier...

Well well well...

I immediately held more respect for the weapon, merely wishing it wasn't so bloody loud.

I looked around and saw the bigger lizard fleeing. I almost tore its soul apart but hesitated for two reasons. The first was that I cared more about saving energy than earning the relatively low exp I would gain. The second was that I could follow it now. Back to its nest.

"SAM!"

I received the warning too late and felt more claws digging deep into my back, catching on bone.

-7hp

-5hp

Neither was particularly bad, but they both hurt a ridiculous amount, even with pain resistance.

I flailed wildly and knowing I wouldn't be able to get a clean shot, used spectral empowering to power up my back, where the lizard was clinging.

As I had hoped, the lizard fell from the flesh that phased between dimensions and I simply fell back onto it, squashing its body partially, and it's soul completely. I had expected it to look cool but realised I had a lot of lizard blood creeping up my spine and a lot of my own still leaking out of the bite wound on my hip.

I was in no danger of bleeding out from it, as it just slower than my natural regen and my health only dropped by one every few seconds. It still hurt like a bitch though, and I wondered why pain resistance wasn't levelling up.

Probably a steep curve. Need to feel a lot of pain to level it.

That was going to suck in the future but was thankfully a problem for the future too. For now, I needed to catch up to the lizard that had escaped. It was fast and I was injured, so I was hoping that Trackers Sense was decent.

I eased myself up into a squat and grimaced as the rapidly cooling blood seeped down my spine. I stood carefully, focusing my weight on my uninjured leg. I gently applied weight to the other one, stopping only when the pain got great enough that it threatened to collapse.

"Klaudia, a hand please."

She had been busy attempting to ease the knife from the dead lizard's eye as gently as possible, but seeing my pain, yanked it out pulling clear jelly and blood with it.

"Ugh. You're covered in blood."

"I know, but that was the fastest way to do it."

While I was still close enough, I absorbed the soul of the lizard that I had shot. A large part of its spine was visible, and I was seriously concerned about the potential damage this gun could do. It was immensely powerful for a shotgun that could have potentially been acquired on the second day.

Lizard soul absorbed at 3% efficiency.

3.4 spectral essence absorbed.

The individual lizard souls were becoming more powerful too, so maybe there was a steep power curve. I hoped it levelled out more in the future, or any semblance of order in the world could be eliminated by the whim of a particularly lucky child.

Klaudia tucked her shoulder under my own, and lifted slightly, taking some of my weight.

Mental Resistance has levelled up. Mental Resistance is now level 2.

Odd... wonder why.

We started stumbling down the hall, and I periodically activated and deactivated Hunters Sense. When active, it drained my limited stamina but highlighted the footsteps of the lizards with green particles. It was confusing at first due to every track made in the last few hours being visible, but as I focused on the particular image of the one I wanted to chase, I found it easier to pick out its tracks.

Afer almost half an hour of tracking, I was able to walk on my own again and my health was almost completely regenerated. My stamina was another story and I knew it was due to hunger. We had yet to encounter a vending machine that had any food in it. There were a few with some sweet drinks in which I hastily drank. They didn't do anything to help my long-term problem but alleviated the aching for a few minutes at a time.

I managed to ignore my hunger though, as I noticed the lizard I was tracking was making some odd movements.

It wasn't sticking to the halls and stairs but occasionally ducked in and out of various classrooms. It didn't appear to have done anything in any of them but did a quick circuit of the room before leaving again.

"Is it looking for something?"

Klaudia asked when I voiced my own observations.

"I have no idea. Maybe it's trying to find backup?"

Klaudia shrugged and left the classroom we were in to continue down the general path of the lizard.

I followed her and directed us towards yet another classroom. I noticed though that the tracks showed it entering the room, but not leaving again.

"Be careful," I said as I took the shotgun from my storage and flicked the safety up. "It hasn't left the room."

I kicked open the door and stood face to face with a fresh patrol of four lizards that were about to leave. There were two of the bigger lizards and two smaller black ones.

So it did go for reinforcements.

Both the lizards and I stood still for a second, waiting for the other group to initiate the combat. Never wanting to give up an opportunity, I hip fired the shotgun, slightly more prepared for the explosion it caused.

The two leading lizards were shredded and knocked back into the centre of the classroom. I noticed one of the bloodied and dusted bodies fell down a large hole in the floor surrounded by scraps of scaly skin and cloth. The other lizard slid to a stop near the edge and stayed where it was.

I had dealt over 200 damage to both in the one shot, so wasn't sure if they were dead, but they certainly looked like it. I then noticed the lack of notification boxes, signifying they were clinging to life.

Regardless, they were no longer an immediate threat, so I shifted my aim slightly and fired point blank at the black lizard to my right.

Past the explosion of light and dust, the lower half of the lizard emerged, blown apart but still moving.

Monster killed:

Damage dealt: 295

Exp earnt: 395

Skill learnt: Shotgun Mastery (B)

Weapon skill is now available: Resupply.

Whatever the skill did, and I had a pretty good idea, I didn't need it now, and reacted quickly to the final lizard about to leap at me.

I still had two shots left in the gun and wanted to level up my mastery of it, so I saved the last two shells for finishing the bigger lizards.

Instead, I put the shotgun back in my storage and ran to meet the lizard as it jumped.

I ducked under it and grabbed it by a back leg, remembering my earlier error of targeting the tail. It's clawed foot swung dangerously close to my face, but with my vastly increased health, I managed to keep it away and push the lizard to the ground.

It struggled as soon as I forced it down onto its back, twisting in an attempt to get itself the right way up. I clamped a hand over its exposed throat and punched the tip of its lower jaw. Hard.

-15hp

Dazed (0:26)

The damage was surprising, but the dazed effect was useful. It went completely limp so I lifted my hand off its throat and landed a foot there instead.

There was a satisfying crunch of cartilage snapping and an even more satisfying status effect applied on top of the daze.

Asphyxiated (4:18)

It stopped breathing and instead it started gasping in its dazed state. It was fascinating to look at. I had seen films with this action in, but it was different when it happened to an animal. Even if it was a monster.

I heard a small gasp behind me and was rapidly reminded of the vegan in the room. I sighed and realised I would probably ruin any semblance of a relationship I had with Klaudia, however friendly, if I tortured this lizard anymore for my own gross curiosity.

"Look away. And cover your ears."

I offered the warning only once and with no emotion in my voice. I heard the door close behind me, and without checking to see if she had left herself in or out the room, I flipped the lizard over and snapped its neck.

Monster killed:

Damage dealt: 302

Exp earnt: 329

Skill learnt: Brutality (B)

The new skill was curious, but I shifted my attention again to the still living lizards. The one remaining next to the hole had slowly been shifting its way closer to the edge, and I watched as it slid silently over.

Well, there's the nest.

I quickly absorbed the soul of the two dead lizards, earning 7.2 essence in total. It was meagre now but would help in the long run. That's what I had to keep telling myself as I absorbed another useless handful of units.

The door opened again and Klaudia walked in sheepishly. I guessed she couldn't handle such a hands on approach to killing.

"You ok?"

I looked over at her and she nodded slightly while looking down. It was fair enough. She had used a cut and run strategy to get by where mine was an overwhelming force. Seeing animals killed so readily must have been hard on her. I couldn't begin to imagine how she must have felt as sympathy was something I had never been able to even pretend to do. But she needed to become hardened to this kind of experience.

In a world of death and destruction, it wasn't healthy to pretend everything was fine.

I surveyed the area around the hole, expecting to find at least one bag of food in it. Instead, I spotted a scabbard buried under a pile of shattered desk wood.

I pulled it out and found it was far shorter than I had expected. It was half the length of a normal sword and also contained a second knife.

It was a double scabbard made to be worn around someone's waist. I had no use for it as I decided firearms was the way forwards.

"Here, I'm not asking you to kill down there, but if you want to come with me, you have to be able to defend yourself."

I offered the scabbard behind me while looking at my feet. I knew Klaudia well enough that a reluctant offer was far more likely to be accepted than a straight up gift. I felt her take it from me wordlessly and heard her attach it to her waist and thigh. I turned and awkwardly stared. The strap made to go around her thigh was higher than I had expected and it had caused her skirt to ride up further than usual displaying some supple...

STOP!

I shook my head and dismissed the sexual thoughts as much as I could. Now was not the time. At all.

I instead focused on the lizard hole again. It was dark and went further down than the sunlight in the room penetrated. It went down at an angle towards the outside edge of the building, but I could see it progressed further than the limit of the walls allowed.

Spacial fuckery again?

I inwardly scolded myself for the immediate innuendos I had subconsciously formulated and started looking through the scraps of uniform for what I would need. I picked up a discarded table leg still bolted to scraps of wood and wrapped it as much as I could with the scraps of clothes that surrounded me. I tied them as tightly as I could, as setting myself on fire by accident would just be a really shit way to die.

It took a further minute of searching before I found a lighter in amongst the other useless possessions.

I put the torch and started to slowly slide down the hole on my butt, clawing at the hard ground that made up the walls.

I turned back and saw Klaudia hesitantly standing at the edge of the hole.

"You coming!?"

I shouted back up the hole, and she reluctantly started shuffling down the tunnel after me.

I turned back towards the depths that we were singing our way towards with a savage grin on my face. My heart was pounding hard enough to hear it in my ears. This was the scariest thing I had ever done in my life, and I relished every second that I felt alive.