The reasonably successful rabbit hunter went full retard.

“What did I say!

What did I say!

Stone throwing for the win!

We’ve glitched the system!

Come on, let’s go grind some more!”

“Heh, calm yourself down four kilos, will you?

Having currency, to Jess, meant one thing right now: Information.

“Do you know what this means to us?” she asked rhetorically.

“Wiiheouw! That it’s finally time to prep our skill trees!”

“... , let’s have a look.” Jess chipped away at the granite ball in front of her.

口Quit 口Skills

口Stats

口Items

口 Time Warp

口Beginners Survival Kit(1g)

口Quit 口Skills Jessica, Hatching Swallow Blunt Weaponry

Finesse Potential lvl 1 Hatching Swallow Barely able to hold a weapon, you've managed to deal significant damage. Overhand Stone Throw

Finesse Potential lvl.3 Hatching Sparrow With skill compareble to a five year old, you send pebbles flying Easily comparable skill! Compared to lvl.1 Hatching: +2 meter range (18+2) -5% throwing spread

“Wait! What? I don’t have any skills like these. I’ve been going stone age manual style all the time!” Jess burst out, confused.

“It’s ok, not everyone notice skill boosts kicking in. What’s weird is how you are the only one to have the skill.”

Jess wouldn’t mind getting some skill related boosts, but she hadn’t felt any. She wasn’t sure if skill boosts could be in effect without one sensing anything.She couldn't draw any conclusions with her headgear still being pretty new though. Maybe she'd see noticable changes if she leveled her skill more. Anyhow, Ben seemed pretty certain on the topic

“How can you know that?”

Ben began talking in a confident and enthusiastic manner. Much like with his rabbit boasting yesterday, once again, there was something to boast about.

And so he began having a boring monologue about his .

“… that’s why most people usually just know me on sight.”

“Okay... So, how does that even apply to anything? “

“Sorry, what was the question again?”

Whilst Ben talked on her, not to, Jess had been thinking. Her having the [Overhand Stone Throw] , but he not, would imply him somehow being better, hitting rabbits anyways. She didn’t like such implications.

With or without boosts, this rabbit hunter couldn’t just go around and claim to be more skilled.

Jess took her gaming skills seriously.

How can you know that I killed my rabbit assisted, but you didn’t?” She said, eyes tensioned.

“I’m a Pro, didn’t I tell you? Knowing skills is basically what I do for living.”

“Really? Let’s check it out”

“What do you mean ‘check it out’?”

“Let’s open your your skill window and see if yours’ any different”

Ben went on, explaining how that wouldn’t be needed and that they could as well check out the other options first, but, there was no way Jess would have him back out of this.

“Crack, Crack, Crack, Crack”

口Quit 口Skills Jerry Fredrikson, Skipping Sparrow Overhand Stone Throw

Finesse Potential lvl.3 Hatching Sparrow With skill compareble to a five year old, you send pebbles flying Easily comparable skill! Compared to lvl.1 Hatching: +1 meter range (18+1) -7% throwing spread Nostril Excavation Finesse Potential lvl.3 Skippiing Sparrow With habit comes result. Your precise finger movements will simultaneously impress and disgust your target. Easily comparable skill! Compared to lvl.1 Hatching: +19% Picking depth +29% Picking speed +7.5% Picking Yield Cord Twining

Finesse Potential lvl.2 Hatching Sparrow With surprisingly precise finger movements, grass reaches beyond its potential. Easily comparable skill! Compared to lvl.1 Hatching: +19% Cord Durability +21% Twining Speed Staff Mastery

Finesse Potential lvl.1 Hatching Sparrow Barely able to hold a weapon, you're performing as expected.

The rabbit hunter chipped away at the “Back” box. He only hit it on his third attempt, not fast neough to hide the [Nostril Excavation]’s many bonuses.

“OMG.” jess giggled before bursting into laughter.

.

.

“..., stop it, will ya?”

“Precise finger movement, plus 7.5% yield, haha! My ass I will!”

Jess continued to laugh. It felt like the first time in ages. And this know it all, this know it all, nose picking rabbit crazy ‘pro’…

“We should check out what else’s hiding in the skill system,” the nose picker said, shifting focus.

“Haha! Hah! Yeah, we should, why don’t you open up your skill window again, so we can… move on from there, haha!

.

.

“Ok, alright, we’ll use my skill menu, then,” Jess finally said, not yet breathing steadily.

口Quit 口Skills Jessica Schultz, Hatching Swallow Blunt Weaponry

Finesse Potential lvl 1 Hatching Swallow Barely able to hold a weapon, you've managed to deal significant damage. Overhand Stone Throw

Finesse Potential lvl.3 Hatching Sparrow With skill compareble to a five year old, you send pebbles flying Easily comparable skill! Compared to lvl.1 Hatching: +2 meter range (18+2) -5% throwing spread

There didn’t seem to be any leveling system, even Ben seemed to agree on that.

What replaced it didn’t bother Jess as much as it did Ben…

He didn’t show any sign of irritation, but she was certain that the ‘pro’ didn’t enjoy being second in a game. A plummeting sparrow ought to be better than a skipping chick. Who cared anyways? The guys highest level skill was nose picking!

Her [Blunt Weaponry] of the [Swallow] grade was probably, more potent than [Overhead Stone Throw] of the [Sparrow] grade. The boar had made that clear as a dead ocean. Jess shuddered, imagining throwing pebbles at the the beast instead of bashing its head in.

“Hmm, dual skill system, right?” the pro nose picker declared, once again confident.

“Yup.”

Dual skill systems had been popular about 30 years ago, Jess parents had made that very clear to her. They were always complaining of how things had been “dumbed down” in the recent wave of retro gaming.

“What are you thinking of, let’s get going,” Ben hurried her to continue check out the [Skills] tab.

Jess made a dent at the “Skill Shop” mark.

Skill Shop Quality: 口+0.1g 口+1g 口+10g 口100g Specificness (None) - Choose Orientation of skill 口x2g 口 Randomize skill

“Wait, what are you doing,” Ben burst out, when Jess started to make a couple of dents in the menu.

Jess wanted to make an experiment. She liked experimenting, and gambling. Having the former as excuse for the other always a hit.

“Chill out, it’s just 0.1 g’ anyways. “

She decided to go all in on quality, and left the rest to her luck.

A paper with the title: [Instructions: Carve Pointy Stick], materialized from an indigo cloud of light.

Ben sighted, as they sat down, analyzing their new merchandise.

The scroll contained a detailed instruction on how to make a pointy end on a stick. Detailed pictures were included, some of them were animated. A sharp knife was recommended.

“You gotta be shitting me! Do you know how hard it was to get that!?” Ben burst out in disappointment.

This guy was overreacting again. Probably because the thing indirectly had to do with rabbits. Had there ever been a game where you could by anything useful with 0.1 of anythihng?

"Well, time to get back to info gathering"

They went on the check out the other options available, but to their dismay, they were once again met by the message:

Earn Glory to access Items

“Back to grinding then,” Ben muttered.

***

Jess and Ben went on rabbit grinding. It was a bit more fun now, knowing that thy leveled their [Overhand Stone Throw] as they went on.

In front of her was a rabbit. They had stalked it for a good hour now. Jess would've gotten vored if it wasn't for the tension of excitement than bubbled up each time they got close to it.

The rabbit’s turned to Ben. Finally, a she had a new chance. She aimed for it’s body, throwing the stone as hard as she could.

The stone made a few skips, three or so meters away from the rabbit. It didn't even panic. It glanced towards the turf of muffled bouncing, then skipped a few relaxed steps away. Was it even recognizing the threat? It could as well have gone for some tastier grass. That’s how far off the stone had been.

“Dammit!.” She had missed again.

The rabbit raised its head, ears in the direction of the swearing. It took two more skips, then commenced eating.

The rabbit ate away at the grass, uncaring of its pursuers. Jess or Ben would never catch it, not with the head start from its buffer distance. The cunning little fluff fucker, it didn't even give the two hunters a thought. Luckily it didn't understand the sneakyness of stones.

They sneaked up on the rabbit again, this time Jess managed to catch its attention. Ben threw a stone and actually hit! Finally! Jess got excited. This was the moment she had waited for for a long while.

The rabbit jumped straight up into the air and landed on its feet. It panicked away, onwards and onwards. Jess and Ben followed it as fast as they could, but the rabbit was slightly quicker than them. Slowly though, its speed declined. It tripped on its unusually low hanging head, and then began running slower. Not too soon after, its flight came to an exhausted halt.

Ben was the first one to catch up, stone ready in his right hand. Jess wasn't far after.

The Rabbit lied on its stomach, its chest spasmed up and down, like a fish out of water. Ben had his hand grasping the skin of its neck, but his stone armed hand hesitated. He jerked his body, freezing one killing attempt after another.

Jess finished things off with a proper head smash. Smashing cute heads felt better now, but not good.

Ben put his sad baby face on and went silent again.

Finally they had made some cash again, but as always, Ben had to make his party-pooping sadface.

Jess held back her inner cheering and tried to focus on their next action.

“Let’s get back and have a look at the rest of the shrine’s options.”

“Yeah.”

“Crack, Crack”

“Crack”

Item Shop Quality: 口+0.1g 口+1g 口+10g 口+100g Specificness (None) - Choose Orientation of item 口x2g 口 Randomize item

“Uh, so, the items and skills are pretty much the same. “

“Wanna test it out?” Jess asked. A little more experimenting was always nice.

“For fucks sake!”

Ben clearly didn’t understand the intricacies of hitting buttons reading ‘randomize’.

The only option left was the “Time Warp” one.

“Ok then.” Jess put a dent into the last check box.

Time Warp 口 Regular Time Warp 0.1g/day 口 Unlimited Respawns 0.2g/day 口 Unlimited Everything 0.4g/day 口 Reduced Pain x2g 口+0.1g 口+1g 口+10g 口+100g 口 Start

“Time to experiment.”

“No, wait!”

“Crack!”

.

.

.

Jess opened her eyes. Ben was still at her side, but the shrine was no longer in front of them.

Bellow her feet, a tatami mat was spread out. Enveloping the mat, was a beautiful dojo. The building was roofless, only having Chinese styled pillars marking its four corners. There was a narrow roof, extending between each pillar. As the tatami mats ended, so did the dojo, beyond was a tenchlike brook. The water, a foot or two deep, flowed with a soothing sound. Inside the water, were rounded stones, piled on top of each other.

The trench around the building was, when noticed, flowing onwards to a new trench with it’s own dojo, connected to another dojo, connected to another. It was mesmerizing and confusing at the same time.

She and Ben walked around for a moment.

Jess took off her shoes and rubbed a foot against the mat, then she saw the sky.

It was beautifully lit with a serene aurora soaring beneath the stars.

“What did you, what options did you choose ?” Ben asked.

“Full regular. I couldn’t use less that 0.1 glory.”

Ben wrinkled his eyebrows and gave off a sigh.

They walked around for a while, checking the place out. Soon, Ben got restless and started to pick up stones from the trench, throwing them at a pillar.

Jess joined in. She threw, and threw. Could as well make sure Ben didn’t beat her at throwing stuff.

.

.

.

Much time had passed. Throwing got more, and more fun the more time they spent at it.

They had soon quit throwing at the pillars. It was hard to see how well you hit if you actually hit it.

Instead, Ben had arranged a bunch of stones at one of the trenches edges, they served as targets. A couple of stones marked distances to throw from as well.

Jess had enjoyed getting better. According to Ben, she implicitly wasn’t as good as him. But that was only because Ben favored precision. She could hit pretty close to the stones from a longer range.

As Ben had finally agreed to give bonus points to hits made from further away, a dull voice sounded: ” One minute left.”

“Really? Did one day pass already?” Ben asked. He was right, It hadn’t felt like an entire day. The Aurora was still lighting the midnight sky. Adding to that, she didn’t even feel hungry yet. “Weird!”

“Fifty nine”

“Fifty eight”

“Fifty seven”

She and Ben grabbed as many of the stones as they could before the countdown ended. They had gotten used to throwing these smooth stones; they were much more comfortable to use than the uneven ones in the grass field.

“Two”

“One”

Jess opened her eyes. She and Ben was back. The sun was pretty much the same as when they had left.

Jess reached for her pockets. None of the rounded stones were there.

“The piggies!” Ben burst out, eyes widened.

They hurried back to the camp. Both carrying one rabbit. The experiment might have been a way too experiential, but that wasn’t something she could’ve known.

.

.

.

***

The day had started twice as irritating as yesterday; Pig cozing minion number one had joined in on the stone tossing bullshit. Irritating. They were yet to understand how important it was for the brightest of them to sleep properly.

Being surprised and all, again, he hadn’t even managed to come up with a good reason for them to stop. On the to-do list: Prepare silly ‘quests’ for silly people to do. He needed ways to avert distractions.

KimZor had been practicing, or rather, trying to practice his fire spell for the whole day. It was awfully plain that he needed another scroll. Silly! What game ever had you get two sets of anything?

He had thought about speeding up the glory collection a bit, gutting the remaining piglets, but that would probably just set him off. Who knew how silly already silly piglet lovers would turn if they lost their walking bacon?

Better not take chances, not when they now knew how to make glory through other means. The others had been surprisingly slow at getting their rabbit game down though. Jessica hadn’t even brought a single one yet!

Taking a tactical break from magic, he had decided to go manual on his bacon project. He had gone to the stash form yesterday, but covering his perfectly butchered carcass was a shitload of ants. "What the fuck! What the fuck!"

Only some meat was left untouched. The rest would have to serve as ‘quest reward’ for the others. Stupid game! Why would ants ever act like that? Disgusting!

Kim sat next to a fire, barbecuing the pieces of meat he hadn’t already eaten. For extra safety, he had removed all piggy looking parts from the excellent cuts of meat. The others were weakly hearted. He sighted a bit. He was too caring about them.

All of a sudden the others ran to him, worrying about the piglets. What was wrong with them? They had been away for like, half a day, and were already worried about the piglets. KimZor couldn’t understand the others’ worry. The bacons already had more mashed potatoes than they deserved.

Anyhow, he noticed that they had brought some rabbits, and with rabbits dead, there ought to be some glory for him to collect. He knew perfectly how to handle the situation. He had been a bit harsh in the morning, but now he was prepared.

“Greetings friends, I see that you have once again succeeded in your adventures. Please come over and share my reward for your endeavors!”

***

Jerry sat next to the others, enjoying the, by far, best meal thus far. He had worried for the NPC’s response, had it figured out that they had used some glory for themselves, but the NPC seemed more forgiving in the later hours of the day.

“I think we’ll need to make some kinda plan for the days to come,” Jessica remarked.

Just what he thought too; she was pretty good for a casual.

They had asked the NPC about hints, but he had only urged them to go hunt more. Something needed to be done in order to unlock the next quest. They probably missed something huge about either the game or the NPC; quests should be easier than this to get.

Without any useful input from the NPC, they continued plan making. Jessica wanted them to get their base going. Prepare for rain or whatever other mean mechanic the game might throw at them. Jerry agreed with her to an extent, but progression was important as well.

He had decided to put his experienced in competitive gaming to use. It was time to boost the new team’s power leveling. He regretted having mentioned the title ”Head of power leveling” to Jess. She had mocked him for it... At least she did agree on his proposed power leveling schedules. So they should be soaring upwards from now.

His skills shouldn’t be second to Jess for much longer. Hopefully new and better skills would display at the top of his skill chart. There was a spell that he’d very much would like to have in the bottom of the granite skill chart. 'Never picking my nose again in-game.'

In the afternoon they had tied a couple of broken saplings to a shoulder high pine branch. They had then covered the saplings with twigs, fern, and needly fir branches. Hopefully that would keep them somewhat dry if rain was to come.

Jerry felt the heat of fire radiate. A scent of smoke hit his nostrils, but it wasn’t intense to the coughing point; thankfully the wind led it away from him. The odd day finally didn’t have many minutes left of it.

Kim took the first watch, that seemed to be his thing. Next up would be Jess. Jerry lied under their rain shelter, hugging his piggy. To his sides lied Jess, already sleeping.

She didn’t look like his kind of girl, probably no one did without the right visual configurations. There was something appealing with her face as she slept though. She was grimacing, mouth open, yet she was kinda cute as she slept. Her face twitched every now and then, tickled by her pig’s bristle.

Jerry enjoyed the view for a minute, then closed his eyes. Thoughts streamed to Ben’s tired mind.There was a lot to think about,and things he didn’t want to think about. Damn, why had he thought that there were thoughts he shouldn’t give a thought. It was too late now anyways. He fell asleep worried. The floating turd would never abandon him.

***

KimZor opened his eyes. For once he hadn’t been disturbed by any stone throwing. This morning was probably going to be the best shitty morning thus far. Then he looked around. Where the fuck was he? And why the fuck were there so many ugly guys and girls around him, staring like idiots?