I slept better that night. I didn’t wake up to a snake trying to kill me, and I only woke up once by getting my face jabbed by a branch I was sleeping on. While this spot wasn’t great because it was so small, I figured it was better than being out in the open.

When I got up, it was time to reevaluate what was going on based on my data. While I had no idea what happened to me to get me where I was and that things like HUDs could, in theory, be embedded into a person’s eyes. I needed to think.

“Okay, horned squirrel, sparrow with a single large talon, giant evil yellow jackets… Though evil is redundant to yellow jackets, so giant yellow jackets, and two moons. The HUD could easily be some tech experiment that wasn’t approved yet and I got nabbed for that. The natural stuff however seems just off.”

I sat and thought about what I had just said. The second moon was the true kicker. If that wasn’t there, I could’ve gone on assuming that I was nabbed for some reason and used in experiments. While this could still be the case, it wouldn’t be the case that I was successfully running from the experiments. All the animals could have been other experiments or mutations from radiation or something.

I sighed deep and started talking again, “If this is an experiment, then it is a VR experiment of some sort, which means that I can’t outrun it. The data collection is ongoing because I’m not in a forest but in a lab, and I’m not walking around but strapped to a table. I bet that there’s not a good or direct way to communicate with the people watching…”

I kicked my legs off the ledge and looked down at the river below. “The other option I guess is that this is a real world that I am in. Not some made up place, it all seems to work too well to be man made….”

I laid back till I was looking up at the sky with my legs still dangling off the edge. Then I muttered, “If this is real, why can I read the status that I can’t read?”

I rolled over on my belly and got up and headed downriver. Thinking through the options that I had. On earth but with something stuck in my head, immersion VR, or another planet.

As I jumped onto the ground I started thinking out loud again. “Okay, so it doesn’t matter what the truth of it is. I’ve got to find people. Hate them all but need them. Would rather buy food than catch it and roofs are nice. Living in a cabin in the woods is the dream but that is with a pickup and a short drive to Kroger.”

I got my fire going and started to work on getting breakfast. Stripping down and taking my spear into the cold river to get some fish.

“If I am not on Earth anymore. Which I think is right then I got to learn to read and I need to figure out all this skill crap. I keep getting new info put in my head so I need to figure out how to trigger all that better,” I muttered as I stabbed fish.

I spent the next few hours in the river sans clothes spearing fish. Since I figured out how to fish yesterday, today went much smoother. I was pretty sure that I had learned some techniques when I got the level zero skill, and I think some additional knowledge was added for using a spear for fishing when I got a level in spear as well. I ended up spearing 10 fish. I figured that meant that I had lunch and dinner and perhaps some breakfast.

I got a two-part fire going. I somehow knew how to smoke the fish, and once I set up the fire, I was able to put three of the fish on for smoking while I cooked the rest to be eaten today. It took me about an hour for the fire to be set upright and then another thirty minutes to cook the fish for lunch and dinner. I knew that I’d need to keep an eye for the next twenty minutes or so to finish the smoking, and then I’d take it up to my ledge.

As I waited for it to finish, I figured I’d spend some time looking at my stats and seeing if I could get better at using the interface. It only took me thinking “my stats” this time, and then it popped up for me to see. I saw the changes in my skill levels last night after going to bed. So then I thought about just seeing my skills.

Racial skills

Spear 1**

Survivalist 1**

Tracking 1**

Primary Class

Enchanting 1

Script* NA

Ink Making 1

Etching 1

Power Imbuing 1

Socketing 1

Secondary Class

Ancient Languages* NA

Non class skills

Hiking** 1

Climbing** 2

Primitive tool** 0

Natural Shelter** 1

Snake handling 0

Primitive cooking 0

*Due to Wild Human starting restrictions of being illiterate, this skill can not advance until Intelligence is higher than 12

** Racial Bonus for Wild Human, affect levels of all Survivalist class and warrior class skills plus 2

“Now how do I get just my attributes pulled up?” I muttered as I ate.

Try as I might, I couldn’t figure out a way to just pull up my attributes. I could pull it with stats, but nothing more would pull up. So I figured that I’d try inventory to see if I had one of those cool video game holding areas.

“Well that would have been nice. I guess I can’t have everything.” I sighed.

I then smelled burning fish and saw that one of my three fish on the smoker had fallen down too far and was now charred.

“Crap! Can’t get a break,” I said as I ran to the fire.

I saved the other two and took them up to my bed. I wrapped them in some large leaves that I found so that they wouldn’t get my pack too messy, and I put the dry fish away. I then went back down to my little beach fire and kept working on figuring out my new life.

It took me a while of thinking before I remembered that many games would let you click on a skill to see a game description of the skill. Some would even give you some hint of what to use it on or how to be better. So I fumbled through and found that if I’d skill and just skills pulled up, I could use my eyes to focus on a skill to see more about it. I also was able to see what the categories of skills meant.

Racial Skills

These are skills that you got for being a Wild Human. You just know how to do these great things. Racial skills don’t give you the same level bonuses as class skills. To raise your Racial level to level two, you must reach level 5 in all Racial skills.

“Nice, I can level my race. Wish I knew what it would do or even a skill tree so I know what I need to work on.” I grumbled as I pulled up the next section.

Primary Class skills:

Skills tied to your chosen class. These skills must all raise a single level for you to move to level 2.

Secondary Class skills:

Secondary class skills can function in place of up to 25% of your Primary class skills for level advancement at twice the level requirements. For example, for level two, any replacement skill would need to be leveled to level 4.

When I read that, I sighed heavily. “So I am screwed from the start! I have to raise skills that I don’t have so that I can level or I can raise other skills I don’t have. Got to get someone to teach me how to read here, since I apparently cannot. Then this whole mess should work.”

Sub-Skills:

Sub-skills are derived and practiced skills of a primary skill. All sub-skill practice can provide experience for the primary skill until the sub-skill is equal to or passes the primary skill. If the sub-skill passes the primary skill, it will become its own skill and will not become a sub-skill again if the former primary skill passes the skill level of the new skill.

While a sub-skill, the skilled use of the primary skill will provide knowledge and leveling to the sub-skill at a reduced rate of 1 percent skill experience. Sub-skill usage will provide the primary skill a reduced rate of 5 percent skill experience.

Then it was time to see what the skills said they would do. I hoped that I’d learn a bit about where they would grow and what I could do with them. I needed all the help I could get with being out in the middle of nowhere.

Most of the skill descriptions turned out to be oddly useless to me. Giving information that would be common knowledge to anyone who watched movies. Like spear fighting and spearfishing.

Spear Skill Grouping Combat:

This is the ability to know how to effectively use a standard spear and not drop it. A standard spear is considered a single-pointed pole weapon of about 6 feet in length. Anyone can use the pointy end to poke, but you have learned how to stand and move. This skill lets you use any pole weapon of proper length as a spear and so you’re able to poke with them and block with the shaft.

Higher levels of this skill will let you learn how to slash and use the spear to disarm. Other spear-like weapons default to this skill until they are learned to the same level as the main skill.

This skill doesn’t teach you to throw a spear.

You may use this skill as the base for any sub-skill of spear.

Known sub-skills

Spearfishing

Spearfishing sub-skill Grouping Non-combative:

Spearfishing is a sub-skill of spear. This is for surface spearing of fish. This skill, when developed, will help the user to better aim the spear when jabbed through the water. This skill, when used in conjunction with weapon-making, will provide suggestions to make a better fishing spear.

Then there were the ones that made me ask more questions. Like power imbuing.

Power Imbuing Skill Grouping Magical Craft:

You can imbue your Mana into items. This will grant the item power for the action that you want it to take. Also, you can imbue your Mana into items to hold your Mana for later use.

Take care you don’t over imbue.

The skill showed the same matter-of-fact information, but the idea of magical craft was still something that I was sure about. But I figured I would have to deal with it. The other part was the warning given. None of the others gave a warning.

The only other skill that gave me pause to even think about was the last one. The one that, when I saw it, made my skin crawl just a little.

Snake Handling Skill Grouping Non-Combative:

This is the skill of having fun with a snake. Snakes move in all sorts of directions and, as such, are more fun to hold. Knowing how to hold one and move around it can help reduce the stress a snake is in and increase the chances of it liking you.

“Okay Arn, let’s get this together.” I said, still shaking my head at how wrong my name felt. “There are skills I got to levels and ones I never got to level. I ain’t never leveling Snake Handling! But tool making is going to be important. Better tools, better life and the easier it is to find people, if I have an easier life. Would love to work out all my skills but eating is more important than my class that I can’t level.”

After I read through what all of the skills said, I looked up to see that the sun was going down. I had spent a whole day fishing and thinking about skills. At least I had a better understanding of things now. I felt like I should’ve been taught this stuff, or there should’ve been a readme.txt that I could find. I settled in for another night on my little ledge. Glad that I wasn’t having to worry so much about animals up here.

That night I had one of the most realistic dreams that I’d ever had.

I lived in a cave with several people who all wore fur tunics. I knew when I saw them that they were my family. There were men with fire-hardened spears who had gathered to one side of the cave opening. Each had three spears, two in their left hand and one in their right. When I looked over at them, one of them beckoned me over with a wave of the hand. I felt like this was more a memory than a dream as I didn’t even feel myself choose to go; I just went.

As I got close, the one that waved me over spoke, “Arn, this will be your first hunt with us. Today we are hunting the migrating herd of Thunder Bison. You must stay close with us and throw your spears as you’re told. You’ll scare the whole herd if you throw too soon, and we will not get enough meat. On the other hand, if you throw too late, they might have time to Thunder.”

That last part caused a few of the men to grimace, and a couple of others chuckled.

I nodded my head and grinned at the men. “Hunt leader,” I said, “I’ll follow your lead and throw when you speak. I’ll do well by my father’s memory.”

“If you hunt half as well as he did then today will be a good day indeed,” the hunt leader said. “It is time we leave, we must walk far to reach the point of attack.”

I didn’t remember much more of what was said in the dream. I only remembered that we walked for over an hour to reach a valley. A herd of bison was already in this valley. They looked the same as I’d have expected to see in a zoo. No difference in their body type. Each was large and wooly in the front and smooth in the back, with two short horns on its head that curved up slightly. They were large, but the herd was small. I knew that in the Old West of the US, bison herds could number into the thousands. This one was only around forty.

The hunt leader waved us over and quickly gave out our placement commands. To me, he said, “Arn for this hunt, stand at the front with me. Learn to throw as they pass and don’t run no matter what.”

In my mind, I was confused as I was dreaming; I couldn’t figure out why we were placing people as we did. We were going to get in front of the herd as they moved towards us, and then we would charge. I’d have thought this would have made us get injured more, but it is what we did.

It didn’t take long before we closed on the bison, and when they saw us coming, they kept moving forward at a slow walk. It wasn’t until we started to run at the herd that they seemed to care that we were there. We were less than 100 feet away when I noticed the difference between these bison and those I was used to. As they stamped their feet, I saw sparks. It was then that they started to run at us.

The hunt leader yelled, “Hold your spears till they pass then hit them from behind!”

They ran through our group without hitting anyone, and as the last one passed us, he threw his spear at it. I followed his action and threw my first and then quickly my second one. His spear hit it right behind the front right leg and seemed to go in. Mine both hit but glanced off. Then the rest of the men were all throwing at the same one. Of the twenty spears, only about 4 stuck on the first volley. Yet those that stuck seemed to slow it down. Our next ones came crashing in, and a few more got it. Then the bison mewed and stamped its foot hard. The ground shook, and my knees went weak, and I fell.

Several others fell as well, and as we started to get up, the others closed in on the bison. It was shaking its head around and doing short charges. The men without spears were now trying to get close enough to get one from the ground, and the ones that still had one were charging in to stab it.

I went to charge in when I felt a hand yank me back. The hunt leader said, “Arn your arms are not filled with enough strength to harm it and you don’t know its dance of death. Watch and learn as we hunt. Watch the dance of death so that you’ll know the steps and can dance with it as a partner.”

I felt in my memory or dream that I was mad. I wanted to be part of this. I wanted to charge in, but I did as I was told, and I watched the bison fight us. It was then that I saw that all the ones that would stab would come in from the back after someone in front threw a spear. The thrown spear was towards the face, and the bison would block it with its head. Then the ones from behind would stab it. It would turn to face the ones that stabbed, and the ones now behind would run in and grab spears or would then stab.

The Hunt leader rested his hand on my shoulder and spoke with a joyfully booming voice, “Arn, we hunt like the wolves on the heels of the great beasts. We are too small to fight head to head as they do each other. Yet we can kill this one as a group because we can think and plan. This one by itself will die today and if we are focused then we will not lose anyone.”

The dance of death went on for over an hour before we could bleed it out. Then we started the process of cleaning the bison. First, they bathed me in the blood as it was the first group hunt I’d been on. Then we butchered it with stone tools. It took as long, if not longer than the hunt, to break it down into pieces that we could carry.

When I woke up, I felt like I was starting to understand better what my life would be like. The dream I'd felt to have been memories I'd from this place. If that was the case, there was even more here to worry about. Magical animals with lighting footsteps. I could see my stats and skills, which was odd.

I had food for breakfast, even if it was just two smoked fish from the day before. It seemed like the skill levels were coming easy, which made sense from the few games that I'd played. Of course, I was never one of those great gamers who spent all their time playing, but I did play a few, so I knew what I was looking for. In most games and even in real life, the first part of a skill was easy to master. It was that last part that was hard.

After breakfast, I climbed back down from my ledge.

I verbally planned my day so that it would stick better. “I need to get a stockpile of food so that I can devote time to figuring this place out. Being a hunter gatherer is eating up too much of my time. I got to get my survival skill higher so that it shows me more. It’s likely the base for most of these other skills I am getting.”

I spent the better part of the morning in the forest near the river, the afternoon was spent fishing. I never went more than about 300 yards away from the water. I wanted to be able to find my way back since I liked sleeping on that ledge for now. I dug up about ten pounds of onions and potato-type things. I figured that if I'd five or ten pounds of roots, then I should be doing okay for a bit.

I also found a few nut trees that I felt were the right ones. I got dozens of those nuts; they looked much like a pecan but had a thick shell. I also saw a berry bush that I thought would be good, but I wasn't sure if it was survival kicking in, ink making, or both. So I skipped all of the berries because I didn't want to end up sick or dead.

That night I went to bed happy just to have food and a mostly warm place to sleep. But, as I lay down, I saw the message that I was expecting.

By your actions today

You have increased your level in

Spearfishing sub skill (level 2)

Primitive cooking (level 3)

New knowledge has been granted to you!

Herbalism skill unlocked (level 0)

Then it was time, before sleeping, to take a look at Herbalism.

Herbalism Skill Grouping non-combative:

Herbalism is the skill of knowing which plants can be eaten or used. At low levels, this skill lets you find common food plants. At higher levels, this skill will let you find plants used for other reasons and what those reasons are.

Those odd dreams I had the night before kept going for me.

I was still remembering or dreaming about being with the guys that looked like they were from The Clan of the Cave Bear movie. We were traveling. Each had a pack like mine, and as we walked, we would pick up food. It was the whole group I’d seen before. There were about twenty of us. The hunt leader from my last dream was scouting ahead, and the tribe leader was walking at the front of the main group. I was on the right side. I watched as the women of the group would stop every so often to dig up a few plants and put them in bags they carried. The men all seemed to be on edge about something. I wasn’t sure what it was, but everyone kept looking around.

As the day wore on, it soon became apparent that we weren’t near the cave we had been in before. We were moving someplace else, but we also weren’t sure where we were moving. I could tell because we kept sending scouts out who’d run ahead to look around.

As I walked, the young lady in front of me tripped. I reached down and helped her up and smiled. “Arn, Thank you.” She said as she stood. “When do you think we will make it to the gathering?”

“I’m not sure Lorrie, Clan Master doesn’t seem like he is excited so I’m thinking we are still a ways off,” I replied.

“Will you walk with me?” Lorrie asked.

“If you’ll have me I’ll be here,” I replied

We walked and talked for the rest of the afternoon. As we walked, Lorrie would stop to pick herbs and vegetables. The next day we had the same walk this time; we started in the morning, talking as we walked.

“Lorrie, how is it that you can tell one plant from the next and you know which grass tastes good? They all appear to be the same to me.”

She laughed and said, “I’ll show you as we walk through the other hunters think it is below them to know.”