Chapter 17

Serval days had passed since James first battle in the forest with the powerful creature known as a rabbit and due to the results of the fight has been taking it easy. During that time [Poison Resistance] leveled up twice and even more impressively [Digging] five levels from expanding his underground home (cave). So much had been dug out that that the clay wall surrounding home tree had been completed.

Good job me, really great job for a gold star day. At first it seemed silly to dig out that much but to have all this free time is a gift that must not be wasted!

The expansion had been quite extensive, from a truly humble hole just large enough to sin to his own home. The original chamber had been expanded to slightly less than the diameter of the tree stopping at the roots. A corridor sloping downwards until he estimated a depth of fifteen feet leading to a room more than twice the size of the original. To impress himself for the week and opening up his shoulder wound once again in the process an emergency tunnel just wide enough for himself in case whatever has been attacking him got through. It opened a foot above the water in the direction of where he originally came from.

Coming back up to the surface to unload clay for the last time once again his eyes had to get use to blinding light from almost complete darkness. Given how many times this had happened over the last few days James had lost count but the process had given him a number of idea to improve things.

Finally having a home of my own makes me realize how shitty I still live and the need of self-improvement. How can a house have no doors? First thing to do: invent doors. Not just any kind of doors but sliding ones because only those with no imagination could live with doors that open in or out, after that comes lighting

If James had been truthful with himself he wanted lights because the dark scared him and sleeping in a wide room was making things worse. The original idea for a deeper section was to drown out the noise of those things trying to kill him and had evolved into this. Digging through so much dirt landed him a number of sharp rocks like the one he used for digging but these would be used to defend himself better.

Gaining the skill [Crafting] from making a pick and bringing together another rock with a wooden handle wrapped in his old cape resulted in a stone sword. Given how the just acquired the crafting skill and it being so vague unlike [Two Weapon Fighting] or [Weapon smith] making any sort of help coming from the skill little. Conditions of the weapon were so fragile that he had to be careful with the swinging and try to stab at whoever he was fighting instead.

There was one thing that came out fairly well compared to the others: his new hide armor of the white rabbit. The entire bottom half was wrapped around his chest, given that the rabbit did not have arms like him the leg section of its fur was but together and encased his sword arm while the other had a slightly thicker bark shield. Finally his head was covered at the top by the upper jaw of the white rabbit, it greatly resembled how the lion skin was worn on Hercules.

I have evolved from a simple baby to a caveman baby, the dawn of the baby is at hand!

Ready to go after pumping himself up James made the short trip to the edge where the earth ramp is but this time walking slowly down. Completely uneventful but safe journey down he began the process of going deeper inside the forest. For all the dangers that was around him James could not help but admire the beauty of it all on a more sentimental day he guess he would say that this was his reward for surviving up until this point. Around him every so often James would catch the sight of a white rabbit watching from the distance but then they would notice what he was wearing and move on.

Humm so just seeing me where one of their own makes them step back… good to know James: 1 White Rabbits: 0

Smiling now James started to skip slightly enjoying the sight of not being in danger if only it was a little inside the forest. This happiness that had been building over the last few days was crushed when he heard the sounds of a man and women yelling nearby. Picking up the pace to his new top speed James waddled to the location of the sounds and could only stare in disbelief.

RATS!!!

What laid before him was a scale unlike anything he had seen before as hundreds of rats surrounded and attacked the two. He watched from a vantage point next to a tree with tall grass above all of them.

[Arc Slash]!

[Shock]!

From the man, almost a hulking beast with a face completely covered with long black hair wearing real leather armor with some sort of tribal tattoos peeking out from underneath, came the [Arc Slash]. His oversized great ax shined with a bright red light as it swung over the rats directly in front of him but the red aura extended out and cut through a good number of them then into the ground.

The Women, an intense redhead in more ways than one with the same armor and tattoos for the most part, was no less impressive. Her left arm was tightly hugging the bundle on her back while her right hand had static arcing around her fingers before she slammed her palm onto the ground. Five lines of thin electricity each coming out of the tips of her fingers shot out and killed whatever rats it touched.

To say that what James was seeing impressed him would be a massive understatement of awe. Clearly these people had gone beyond his level of skills, second rank clearly and maybe close to being able to get a [Class]. If James had heard his mother correctly then something like [Arc Slash] could only happen at the minimum two level 10 skills combined.

For something so great it was not enough still out of either of them, the both of them would do their attacks but other rats would just take their place. So slowly it hurt James to watch the rats were gaining the upper hand and from this distance he could not hear them “speak.” From what he could see the brown hair rat clan was there along with a dozen other looking ones. Larger than usual orange ones there were ramming the couple’s ankles, green seemed longer and faster as they bite then dashed away.

Colors of the rat rainbow mixing together in a disgusting pile but out of all of them a small handful stood out. Those black rats looked to be directing the others around them, their mere presence surging the attack forward. They were ones James was not sure could be beat even one on one currently. The fight was reaching its end as the rats started to climb up their bodies until you could hardly make out the people.

Seeing the man and women die before his eyes hurt to watch and made his plan to escape with them disappear. Even from this distance the sound of the rats eating could be heard by James forcing him to cover his ears but unable to look away. Something different seemed to be happening on the women so James used [Perception] to notice what was happening.

The bundle the women was protecting earlier was taken off and carried away by a large group directly under it. All the rumbling caused part of the cloth bundle to unwrap to reveal a babies face.

There collecting babies, but why? And this explains why that rat came at me in my crib but not the larger picture. Whatever this is about this is my chance to find out by retracing the path all these rats will take back to their base

Waiting a full hour after they left to go down there he went over to what was left of the bodies but it was nearly just bones and their weapons. After trying to just pick up the great ax in vain to James disappointment he instead rounded up as many rats as he could carry and headed back.

That night while he skinned the rats and the creatures clawed at the chest trying to kill him James could not spot thinking of what happened to the man and women who were much more powerful than him and yet eaten alive. That night he remembered to fear the things he had not seen yet.