"Ugh."

I miss my bed. Random pieces of fur and a bit of soft ground don't make for the most comfortable of sleeping conditions. It's unfortunate that I have other priorities. I probably shouldn't waste a bunch of time making a bed when it's still quite possible I'll get eaten by wolves. I think it's more likely I'll starve to death, which is marginally better I suppose. It's the little things you have to take comfort in.

"Sigh."

Speaking of which, I need to go foraging. I can't survive exclusively on fish, and they'll be hunted to nothing if I try. Plus eating only fish is how you get scurvy. I need to diversify my diet.

I get up and spend some time taking care of myself. Afterward, I grab my spear and head in the direction of the rising sun. I keep an eye out for anything edible-looking. It doesn't take long until I have an epiphany and realise why I haven't seen many animals before now. I'm trodding along when I spot a rabbit on the other side of a long clearing. It munches contentedly for only a second before it freezes, easily hearing me coming from 60 feet away. It bolts away a moment later. I've more or less been bumbling through the woods until now, not bothering to try to be quiet or stealthy. That has to change if I want to do any hunting.

Let's try slinking about for now. That should allow me to get closer without being noticed. It's surprisingly hard to be quiet and maintain any speed when traveling through the forest. I have to be extremely cognizant of where to plant my feet when walking. There's always dead branches and leaves scattered about the undergrowth that snap and crunch when I inevitably step on them without noticing.

While trying to sneak around I come across an oddity. It's a tree completely covered in dense moss. It wouldn't be particularly noteworthy if not for the fact that literally every inch of the tree has a moss covering, to the point where I can't even see any bark. It looks like a shaggy green carpet. I decide to make a detour to check it out.

Further inspection reveals that there is no bark underneath the moss. The roots of the moss disappear into the dark wood grain of the tree. It's some sort of symbiotic relationship, or possibly just a part of the tree itself. The tree also has nuts hanging from it's branches. The nuts look similar to peanuts in structure in that they have multiple seeds in one pod, but they're larger and have a hard brown shell. Cracking one open reveals a very thick shell with a small, soft seed inside. They look edible. I don't think nuts are often poisonous. Not that that necessarily holds true here.

I eat three seeds and start to gather as many pods as I can find. With any luck, if they are poisonous three small seeds won't kill me. If they aren't, I've just secured a new source of food. Plus, since they're nuts, they won't go bad easily. My pockets are quickly filled, and I use my shirt as a makeshift basket to gather more. In the future I'll need some sort of backpack or basket if I want to gather enough for a few meals. After taking as many as I can reasonably carry, I practice being stealthy as I make my way back to camp.

It's a rather short journey back. I didn't make it very far away from camp before running into the moss-tree, which hopefully means they aren't very rare.

I dump the nuts I collected in a corner of my hut. I should really make some proper storage for all my things. Right now all of my possessions are scattered about on the floor. That's not really something I need though, so I'll leave it for now.

This time I head out into the forest in a slightly different direction. I don't encounter anything significant until I spot another rabbit. My efforts to be stealthy have paid off earlier than I expected. This time I'm within 20 feet. It hasn't noticed me yet. I gently get into a throwing stance, and a moment later fling my spear at the rabbit. It misses badly. I managed to hit a bush five feet away from my target, and the rabbit is now long gone.

Hmm.

I retrieve my spear and consider it for a moment. It really isn't efficient as a ranged weapon. It's maximum range is very limited by it's weight, but penetration and the actual damage it does is incresed by the momentum, and by extension it's weight. It'd be mildly effective for hunting larger animals, but with it being so inaccurate it's lousy for small game. It's kind of shoddily made, which doesn't help. It's decent for stabbing and keeping animals away, but a different weapon is necessary if I want to do any hunting from a distance. What I need is a sling. A bow would be preferable, but I haven't a clue as to making one that's any good. For now I'll continue exploring the forest. Making and practicing with a sling comes later.

...

I plop down in my hut to watch the cloudy dusk sky. I did a lot of walking today. I found a fern-like bush that had clusters of berries and brought some home. The berries are purple and look like elongated raspberries. I've decided to call them fernberries. I refrained from eating any because I ate the moss nuts earlier and I've still yet to confirm whether they're poisonous. As of now I'm not feeling any ill-effects, but there's no reason to confound the poison tests. I'll eat one tomorrow if I feel okay in the morning.

Speaking of moss-trees, I encountered two more near to each other, slightly farther away from camp than the first. All three seem to have grown in more swampy areas, so it's mildly safe to assume that's where they grow. It'd be prudent to keep an eye out for more lowlands if the nuts end up being safe.

I saw two other animals while walking, another rabbit and a fox. I attempted to hit them with my spear like I did earlier but it was a fruitless effort. After returning home I set to work on making a sling. I took some of the hide scraps I had and cut them into thin strips that I then braided together. After repeating that a second time, I took some left-over vines and weaved them into a small square patch. Following that, all I had to do was tie the braided hide strips to the patch.

It's kind of ugly, but it is functional. After testing the sling out with some smooth river stones I quickly came to the conclusion that It would take a lot of practice until I was able to reliably hit a target with it. It took me an hour just to get the rock to fling out even vaguely in the direction of my target. In short, I suck at it. The sling can whip out rocks at high speeds easily, so on that front I'd say this was a smashing success. A clean hit could easily take down small game, and with some luck, larger animals as well. A hit to the head could quite possibly even kill me, and more practice is necessary to ensure I don't.

Overall, it's been a tiring day. I think I'll check status for a bit and then go to sleep.

General Information Name: Derrick Finigan Species: Human Sex: Male Age: 24 Titles None Stats Name Value Intelligence 105 Perception 102 Dexterity 109 Endurance 102 Strength 102 Agility 101 Skills Name Level Value Investigation 4 Int +0.5, Per +0.5 Harvesting 8 Dex +1 Woodworking 2 End +0.5, Str +0.5 Mathematics 3 Int +1 Construction 2 End +0.5, Str +0.5 Stealth 2 Dex +0.5, Agi +0.5

Stealth, huh? Agility is new too. I've been wondering for a while what the criteria is for new skills. After all, there must be some reason I haven't gotten skills for walking or breathing or other basic activities. I've certainly done more walking than construction, so why don't I have a skill for it?

After gmulling over the quandry gettgng ready for sleep, I believe it's because walking isn't broad enough. All of the skills I have now can be applied to many different circumstances, but walking has a too narrow a scope to be a skill. It would be silly for the system to individually require leveling skills like "Eating fish on Tuesdays" separately from doing the same on Wednesdays for example. After all, leveling systems in video games are an abstraction of a growth of a specific ability in a character. It doesn't make sense that "Eating fish on Tuesdays" isn't similar enough to "Eating fish on Wednesdays" that the hypothetical character that has these skills wouldn't be able to improve in his general eating fish ability regardless of day. Eating fish on Tuesdays or Wednesdays just simply isn't different enough to justify two different skills. So the skill is made more broad by making the skill "eating fish" or more likely, just "eating." In this case, Stealth and mathematics are different enough that there's no overlap, but broad enough that the experience I learn being stealthy in a forest could also feasibly apply to being stealthy in a city. Which in turn is why I didn't get "Forest stealth" as a skill.

That's my hypothesis anyway. Right now I have a sample size of six skills, so the reality of it may be very different. Though, this was just as much based off of previous experiences with RPG mechanics as it was with this particular system's quirks. It seems I've been rewarded for my musings by the increase of investigation too, which is nice. I wonder if that means I'm right?

Yawning, I resolve to answer that question at another time as I roll over on my makeshift bed.

As I drift away a stray thought comes to me.

I want a goddamn pillow.