Shiar watched the very bizarre foxkin use his Ability and disappear right before her. She stayed there for several minutes, not even bothering to try and follow the trail out of a lack of interest. She finally moved and traveled back to where she left her companions.

The walk wasn't very far, and she soon heard someone shouting to her. The familiar voice was extremely deep, more like a low growl than anything.

"Shiar, finally. What in Baz's Boughs took you so long? And where's the food?!"

The Alfei looked towards her friend, a rare reptile Beastkin with the form of an alligator. Many weapons adorn them, mostly throwing spears and javelins.

Shiar had to mentally slap herself. In the talk with that foolish fox, she completely forgot the reason she went out.

"My apologies, Darin. I was distracted."

"That's unusual for you. What could possibly distract an iron mind like yours?" he said after a moment of silence.

"I know. Let's go back to Stroven and Eriss, there's something I want to tell you three."

Darin didn't say anything and just nodded, leading her back to where the others were waiting.

Trevor finally arrived back to his camp, exhausted from overusing his Forest Pathfinder Ability. He had a lot to both think and worry about. What did Shiar mean exactly by ‘monsters’, and why hasn’t he encountered any of them in the last few days? Regardless, he didn’t think that she was lying to him.

If a monster were to come for Trevor, he would need to be readied and prepared for it. One thing he liked about this System is the numerical values assigned to its various aspects. He does like seeing them go up, but he is also assured of his own competence to see them become higher.

Trevor lets himself rest to regain his stamina and mana. Meanwhile, he thinks of ways to improve himself quickly. He’s usually a patient person, but the fact he could possibly be attacked at any moment puts a rush on things. Creating physical weapons could take too long, not that Trevor knows anything about that anyway. The best he could do was create another wooden knife or wooden spear.

That got him to think of another way for him to make a weapon. Something that he didn’t even need physical materials for.

“Wha’ if I can make a mana spear?”

The concept is good. When he was experimenting with Mana Sphere, he discovered that it was holding its shape with a thin but tough film-like field. It was something Trevor had created subconsciously, but thanks to that the sphere could touch and even damage physical objects. And the higher-leveled the Skill became, the more damage it could do before dispersing.

He started practicing and experimenting with the mana itself, gathering it into one hand in sphere form first and then attempting to elongate it into a pool. The first try immediately failed and the pole popped and dispersed. The same happened on the second, third, and even fourth try. He at least gained a few levels in Mana Sphere, and several more in Mana Element Control. The sixth attempt allowed him to form the pole, but it wasn’t until attempt number 20 and reaching level 10 when he finally got the prompt, and one he didn’t expect.

Skill Gained!

Mana Weapon - Level 1

Attributes Increased!

+2 Charisma, +2 Mind

It was a glorious message, and Trevor would appreciate it for the rest of his life. But right now, he just let out a breath of relief and laid down in the grass. The spear was a typical version, at around 1.5 meters and ending in a sharp point. It wouldn’t win any contests for craftsmanship, but it was efficient and practical.

That had exhausted almost all of his mana, and he felt worn out in a spiritual way. The increase to both his Mind and Charisma helped slightly, but he still felt tired. It was still around mid-morning or noon, but he couldn’t blame himself for closing his eyes and taking a nap.

As the snap of a twig resounded through the area, Trevor’s eyes snapped open and he quickly stood up into a readied combat stance. The sky had turned a slight orange and purple, signifying that the sun was lowering down for dusk. He felt a little guilty for that nap now.

He slowly turned in a circle where he was standing, searching for whatever made the sound. The warning about monsters had made Trevor hyper-wary of the forest now, and he was practically paranoid about something coming out and eating him. After doing two full rotations and not seeing any monsters or animals, Trevor began to relax…

But then he heard several low growls coming from just beyond the underbrush. They didn’t sound monstrous, but they were aggressive. And then out came five wolves, all growling and stalking straight towards Trevor. They looked like wolves from his old world, but they were all skinny and looked incredibly starved, to the point where their ribs were sticking from their chests.

He didn’t know how these wolves could have become so starved, since Trevor had found lots of food in the forest. Regardless, it seemed like they had finally found a meal in probably weeks, and it was a juicy and plump foxkin. He looked at their levels and saw they varied from 5 to 8.

All of his bars were full, so Trevor took the initiative and summoned both the spear and Mana Sphere, getting back in a defensive position. The wolves hesitated at the feeling of magic, but one regained their senses and rushed forward. Instead of rushing to meet them, Trevor sent the orb hurtling at the wolf. He needed to end this quickly, as his spells consumed a lot of mana.

Mana Sphere takes up around 10 mana every other second, and he could already see that Mana Weapon takes twice that amount in the same amount of time. With a new max capacity of 590 mana, and a recharge of around 0.4 every second, he has around a minute before he becomes depleted. He was betting on the sphere distracting or even hurting the wolf, but it managed to easily dodge and continued.

“Shite, need to be faster.” Trevor dismissed the orb, focussing on his spear and dodging the wolf’s attack. The wolf launched itself with its mouth wide open, its sharp teeth ready to bite down deeply. Trevor leaped to his left, managing to barely evade the bite. But the wolf followed up by slashing at him with its claws, drawing a bloody wound in his upper thigh. Even with Trevor’s high Ability and Dodging Skill, they were about even in terms of speed.

Trevor put the pain in the back of his mind and retaliated with his spear. He’s never held a spear nor most other weapons besides a gun and knife in his life, but he still managed to embed the point into the wolf’s shoulder. With a spark of brilliance that came from new instincts, Trevor followed up by swiping his own fox claws. The wolf, still reeling from the pain, barely managed to dodge but still got scratched in the flank.

Skills Gained!

Spear Combat Proficiency - Level 1

Natural Weapon Proficiency - Level 1

Skill Levels Gained!

Mana Weapon increased by 3

Spear Combat Proficiency increased by 1

The exchange finished, Trevor took several steps back and dismissed the spear before resummoning it. The wolf looked a lot worse for wear, its shoulder bleeding heavily but not severely from the strike. It seemed just one or two hits away from falling dead.

“How do ye like that now, ye fuckin’ canine!”

As if emboldened by the smell of blood and his taunting, the other four wolves came out of their fear and ran to enter the fight. Trevor panicked and, on instinct, conjured two small spires of stone, costing forty-five mana each. He got lucky with one and the tip pierced a wolf right beneath the jaw, skewering all the way to its brain and then flipping it over backwards to land lifeless. Two of the other wolves just slammed head first into the second pillar, becoming disoriented but not dead.

Skill Levels Gained!

Earth Spike increased by 4

Element Control Efficiency: Earth increased by 3

The spikes soon crumbled into regular dirt as the mana left. When Trevor was experimenting with Mana Conversion, he found out that if he stopped supplying mana to whatever element he was using, it dispersed or crumbled, as is the case here. He also couldn’t directly control or manipulate the element, just provide it mana and let it act according to its nature.

The attack from the other wolves distracted him, allowing the first wolf to sneak up behind Trevor and attack. It was only from his high Perception and Agility, as well as his hunting knowledge that allowed him to dodge by side stepping it. He earned another wound on his side, as well as a level in Dodging. He wasn’t able to counterattack as the fifth wolf, which he accidentally forgot about, came around and tried to bite at his ankle.

In a cunning use of magic and strategy, Trevor summoned both a Mana Sphere and Earth Spike simultaneously, with the attacking wolf right in the middle. He hurled the orb into the side of the wolf, diverting its momentum to crash right into the Earth Spike. The wolf crashed to the ground as the new spike crumbled, and Trevor rushed to stab at where he knew the heart and lungs would be. The wolf tried to get up and away, but it was too hurt from the huge blow. The foxkin accurately struck and killed the wolf, earning two Skill levels each for his spear combat and spells, and surprisingly one in both his mana Abilities.

Trevor didn’t allow himself to become distracted again and turned to face the remaining wolves. The other two managed to get out of their disorientation and grouped up with the injured wolf. It had lost a lot of blood now, and it looked close to fainting. These wolves had a lot of willpower, or just high Attributes, to be able to keep standing in their condition, much less fight.

Trevor took a glance at his mana bar, seeing he was down to 117 mana now. After a thought and a deep sigh, he dismissed both the mana spear and mana orb to conserve his remaining mana. He raised his hand, claws outstretched in preparation for another attack. Now was time to use his highest Skills.

All at once, the starved wolves came at him. He waited till the last moment before jumping high over them and raking his claws over their backs. Normally, he probably would’ve done this move rather clumsily, but with the System’s help his Unarmed Combat Proficiency and Natural Weapon Proficiency combined to cut deeply into the wolves. It earned him an astonishing five levels in the latter Skill.

Two of the wolves fell down, one of them the injured wolf, which quickly bled out and died. Trevor rolled on the ground and quickly got back up, starting to pant heavily from the continuing battle. It has been a very long time since he last fought, and never this fiercely before. Even with good Constitution and Strength, he was beginning to tire out.

The two remaining wolves started backing away from Trevor. Three of their allies were dead, and their opponent was obviously stronger and smarter than them. Even with them starving and the enemy obviously becoming tired, they sensed when something was too dangerous. The wolves limply ran away, to Trevor’s immense relief.

He limped over to the stone pillar he used as his main form of shelter and sat down. He noticed another message saying he increased more of his Attributes and several Skills, which he smiled and laughed at. Both his mana and stamina bars were near-drained, and his health was down by about 27%. Trevor quickly took some leaves and wrapped them around his injuries, earning the Field Medicine Skill and gaining a few levels in it. His health started recovering a bit more quickly, but it was barely noticeable. It was a temporary fix, anyway.

He went over the battle and his earnings in his head. It was obvious that fighting was a quick way to increase the levels of his Skills and even Abilities, and to increase his Attributes as well. It was definitely very dangerous, but rewarding. The only other problem was that Trevor would rather not get into fights, especially ones like that. He grew up as a hunter and scholar, not a fighter. The only violence he would ever want to do was the patient tracking and ambush killing of prey, not a life-or-death situation like the one he was just in.

It was then that Trevor realized the full width of what happened, and proceeded to go behind the rock he was sitting at and vomit in the bushes. He had just almost lost his life to a pack of starved wolves, had come close to dying again. He wasn’t completely sure he could keep doing this. At least, not alone. He needed to go to the town and find a group to be with, maybe even find Shiar and join up with her. Trevor sighed, weary from the fight and what’s to come.

“Grand. Now how am I goin’ convince them to let an almost naked eejit like me go with them?”

A loud and monstrous howl echoed through the forest, too close for Trevor to feel comfortable. The sound of trees cracking and falling over, and the feeling of the earth rumbling more and more didn’t paint a good picture either. The last trees leading to his place parted like they had a will of their own, and Trevor’s first monster showed itself.

It was another wolf, taller than the others, around Trevor’s height at the shoulders, and obviously well-fed. Its fur and eyes were a fiery crimson, bark sprouted from various parts of its body, acting as armor, and a pair of branches came out of its head in a pair of bull horns. It looked and snarled directly at Trevor, intelligence glinting in its eyes. Scared and fearful, Trevor used The Sight on it.

Species: Ember-Root Alpha Wolf / Level: 23