by Sergei Katz
The tear-stained face of the young fairy appeared before the mentor’s eyes.
— Will I ... be ... deprived ... of my magic ... wand? — Leah sobbed, barely able to get the words out and not even trying to hide her fear.
Neurel shook his head to indicate that it wouldn’t be the case.
The fairy’s eyes widened in horror. She started shaking, and swallowing the air for a while, trying to say something. Finally, she asked in a plaintive voice:
— Will my magical wings be taken away from me then?
At first, the mentor wanted to shake his head again in the negative, but then decided that the negligent fairy’s fantasy would come up with something even more terrible next. He felt sorry for her, and told his pupil that they had been instructed to protect the Newcomer by the name of Dee from any danger. Terrified Leah, not understanding the meaning of what had been said, listened in silence, and only a couple of minutes later she collapsed on the grass, realizing that her own personal danger had passed.
— Stop wasting time! We need to start watching over him, — said Neurel sternly. Without even checking to see if his pupil was following him, he flew to where Dee’s footsteps could be heard.
— Good Lord! How can anybody make so much noise? Even Trolls walk through the forest quieter than that ... — he grumbled, knowing that his pupil couldn’t hear him, but was about to catch up with him at any moment.
Leah had finally caught up with her mentor and was watching how the Newcomer was walking through the forest.
— Mentor, why does he get caught up on every tree branch he passes? Is this a part of his training?
— No, it's not a training session, he’s just brainless, — Neurel sighed.
— Well yes, I see, — the pupil agreed. — His intellect has not even reached level 10.
— I do not think that even an intellect of level 10 will help here. Although ... — Neurel observed that the Newcomer was already pushing through the branches more confidently, and was watching his feet too. Then he added, — It's not all that bad! It seems that my ward had simply been in a state of euphoria from this new world. After learning “Easy Pace”, he immediately realized that his movement could be quieter. Well done my boy!
— Oh, mentor, why didn’t he pick up the serpent’s skin? It’s incredibly expensive! — Leah was surprised. — Also, we are so close to him, and he doesn’t even suspect that someone is nearby ...
— If not for the actions of one negligent fairy, he would only have gone out into the forest when he got stronger, so his attentiveness is almost zero! It is clear that he doesn’t see anything, the serpent’s skin included, — the mentor sighed reproachfully.
— Hooray! — The young fairy suddenly exclaimed in delight, apparently missing the reproach.
— Stay quiet! — Neurel looked at Dee with concern, but the latter was extremely busy examining the lead acorn he had found, and hadn’t heard the negligent fairy’s squeal.
— At last, — the mentor sighed, — he has started to notice things. Wow, he has even discovered the yellow fruit! Still, how can you not notice a bright yellow fruit in the middle of all that green foliage? Lord help us! He’s struggling to knock it down.
Both representatives of the Fairies watched the Newcomer’s awkward attempts to bring the large yellow fruit down, with bated breath.
— Let’s have a wager: is he going to lose all the acorns, or will he end up knocking the yellow fruit down? — The pupil offered excitedly. — I think…
Neurel did not let her finish.
— I swear I will take your magic wand away!
The fairy’s excitement evaporated like a hare at the sight of a predator. Although she couldn’t remain silent for long:
— Hooray, he’s knocked it down!
— I’m pleased that he managed to do it himself. Without food his Stamina level would become dangerously low. If he couldn’t do it by himself, then we would have to come up with a plan to discreetly drop the yellow fruit in front of him. He’s off to sleep now. Great idea! He has even climbed a tree and made himself a bed. Fantastic! Perhaps, he just might achieve something in the future. Although the fact that he is up on the tree is not going to be an obstacle to the night predators of this forest, and being so low down on the tree wouldn’t prove a hindrance to any predator in any forest. However, even though there are no predators nearby ... we’re still going to have to watch over him at night.
Neurel decided to put a magical alarm around the tree, and then he sent his pupil off to rest until the morning.
The magical alarm went off in the middle of the night. The mentor, who was still half asleep, picked up his wand charged with magic, and prepared a couple of combat spells just in case. Finally waking up, he looked around: there was no danger nearby, but his ward was moving through the forest like a sleepwalker.
Neurel started following him, grumbling to himself: — Have a rest, will you! Why can’t you sleep? You will be here for some time. Oh lord, where is he off to now? Straight to the moonlit clearing. What does he expect to do there, under the full moon? You don’t really know anything yet my boy, and you have no magic of your own. How strange; he moves like he has a purpose. Can he really feel that the Moon Flower will open soon? No, that can’t be. His intuition is weak, and his chances are almost zero, but he definitely senses something. Definitely. With his strange, slightly springy gait, the Newcomer is walking directly to the Moon Flower. What a beauty! To see the Moon Flower blossom is miraculous even by the Fairies’ standards!...
The mentor became emotional and almost cried out, groaning quietly instead:
— What are you doing now? Ah, whatever!
Neurel kept watching as Dee's hand reached for the flower and the flower jumped into the palm of the Newcomer’s hand.
— That’s impossible! — Neurel was in shock.
The Moon was one of the truly powerful forces in nature, and it arrived in this world in the form of the Moon Flower. No one was expecting this to happen so soon, as the world wasn’t ready for the coming of the True Ones just yet. Instead, the Newcomer woke up in the middle of his sleep, did what he did, and calmly went back to bed.
— Leah! — Neurel created an alarm bell over the head of the sleeping fairy and mentally urged his pupil to return to the forest.
— Watch over him while I am gone. If anything urgent happens, summon me immediately. I have put up all sorts of protection fields around him, but now I have to convene another Council of the Celestial Fairies, devoted to the Newcomer by the name of Dee, — Neurel said, and then disappeared into the air.
Leah slept safely for the remainder of the night. The Newcomer didn’t wake up until morning either. The mentor returned in the morning, and they continued to watch over the Newcomer together. When asked what the Council had decided, the tired and exhausted mentor grumbled in response that a decision would be made by the Supreme Council.
In the morning, the Newcomer returned to the moonlit clearing again.
— Why on earth has he gone back there? — The tutor sighed. — He’s peculiar is this one. He only just learned how to hide ...
There was a loud creaking noise all around the area.
— This just can’t be! — Neurel was filled with rage, thinking, — How is that possible? Of all the trees in the forest, the Newcomer has chosen the only one in the forest where noisy mushrooms grow, and decided to hide there! Does he do it on purpose? Thanks be given to the protectors of the Glade of the Moon, the Alphiners – they are lovely creatures ... as long as no one offends them, they will not harm anyone. And he has tried to tame an Alphiner, even with his lack of abilities, and even without the charisma and talents of a trainer? This Newcomer is naive and over-confident. Hmm. Wow, what can I say? He managed to stroke an Alphiner, and even made a small positive impact on the attitude of the pack. This young man is full of surprises ... — and the mentor shook his head thoughtfully.
CHAPTER 6:
THE FIRST ENCOUNTER<
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I really enjoyed walking through the woods. My growing “Attentiveness” ability made it possible to see many things that I had never noticed before. Observing more closely, I could see insects and all sorts of interesting grasses and flowers. I picked some of them, studying their properties, and I even tried to taste some of them. I didn’t come across anything special until I found the so called “Little Dark Blue Bloom”, and the Moon Flower exhibited strange behavior: if I understood correctly, it was trying to persuade me not to throw the bloom away. So far, the properties of this particular flower were unknown to me, so I trusted the opinion of my lunar partner and decided to collect more of the Dark Blue Blooms. After putting the blooms in my bag, I had the sensation that I had accomplished something very important.
Your “Intuition” ability has increased: +2% (4%).
That was strange. Last time my Intuition had increased by one percent, but this time it was two. I decided to keep that in mind, and I continued to search for the Blue Blooms.
Today I had decided to take a different approach to my movement through the forest. I decided to absorb what was useful. I combined “Easy step” and “Quiet step” abilities, and every thousand steps I referred to my “Internal Body Clock”. After a little more experimentation, I hung bundles of different colored grasses over my body and camouflaged myself with leaves that gave off a strong scent. All this gave me a permanent bonus of +25% for camouflage, and that’s how I was moving through the forest.
The level of my abilities was gradually increasing, which slightly brightened the monotony of the forest. Suddenly I felt a searing pain, my leg buckled, but miraculously, I managed to catch the trunk of a nearby tree and avoid falling into the bushes. My life points immediately dropped from 110 to 47. At the same time, I could see nothing around me that could be responsible for such a powerful blow. I looked at my leg: part of my trousers looked like they had been cut with a razor, and there was a cut on my leg about 10 centimeters long. Looking back, I saw a plant that looked like a liana, a type of woody tree vine, with a 2-3 cm wide trunk. I tore off a piece, and looked up the name: “Wildleaf”. From the description the only properties of the plant that I could ascertain were that it was used in alchemy and herbalism. I bandaged the wound, hoping that the plant would heal and not poison me, or in the worst case it would make no difference to the wound either way. The bleeding stopped, but there was no discernible impact on my health.
To replenish my life points, before looking for the root cause of the problem, my much-loved body indicated a desire to be fed. So I ate a whole yellow fruit, which raised my life level to 63 points, and also raised my satisfaction level to 89%. Of course, a standard bonus was added to my level of Fatigue.
— Well, what do we have here? — I carefully parted the leaves of the bushes. You could imagine my surprise when I saw a flower, incredibly similar to an iris. Looking closer, I was able to read the name: “Slicing Iris”. The creators of this world shared a strange sense of humor. The leaf resembled a blade of a sword, and I could still see my blood right on it, but the plant was sucking it in, drop by drop, right before my eyes. The red flower changed its shade to a bright scarlet.
— Ah, you bleep, damn, what's going on here! This sign of friendship and chastity has just pumped out more than half of my life force for the sake of preserving its color!
It wasn’t in my nature to leave bloodsuckers unpunished, by the way. Not a single mosquito has escaped my righteous anger. I began to look around in search of means to educate this beautiful flower. The search took 20-30 minutes, but in the end I found a stone the size of my palm with a rather sharp edge on one side. Not the best option, but, as they say, you have to work with what you’ve got.
My next task was to protect my hands somehow, and using cloth was clearly not an option, as I had already seen what this plant had done to my trousers. I got to thinking, if there were plants that could cut, then there must be other plants that were impervious to being cut. So, I came up with an idea, and keeping that in mind, I proceeded to systematically study all the flowers and plants in the surrounding area. As a result, I came across another dozen such plants, but since I knew exactly what I was looking for and understanding how the plants behaved, it was quite easy to avoid getting cut again. I wandered around for about an hour and a half, or maybe two, and then I discovered an emerald green moss.
“Riccardia” - this species is resistant to piercing-cutting action, and is used in alchemy.
I also stripped a dwarf tree down, with the strange name of “Robacha” to the last leaf. To my delight, and to my great regret for the tree, because its leaves were very pleasant to the touch. However, in its description it was listed as being a plant that “wasn’t possible to strip the leaves from”. I had just torn off two more leaves from the poor old Wildleaf plant.
My new task was to do something with the plant materials that I had collected, namely to protect my hands. I covered my left hand with the moss, and I stuck the leaves from the dwarf tree over it with help of my saliva, and wrapped all this ugliness with the Wildleaf leaves. It turned out quite well, although my hand couldn’t grip so well afterwards. It didn’t matter though, as it would be of little concern when it came to teaching that nasty plant a lesson. I did the same thing with my right hand.
You have created a pair of Cumbersome Forester's Gloves.
You have attained the “Craftsman” ability: +1 (1).
I wondered what kind of gloves had I made?
Cumbersome Forester's Gloves: protection level 15, protection from stabbing injury 15%, protection against cutting injury 15%.
Not what I had expected, but it was better than nothing. Time to commence my retribution! I parted the bushes, carefully grabbed the leaf that had cut me (it was easy to recognize, as it had a slightly brighter color and there still was a small drip of my blood on it). I took the stone out and began to cut it: I did it quickly, trying not to pay attention to the pain in my hand. The flower didn’t want to part with its leaf, so it tried to twist the leaf in my hand to cause as much damage as possible. My life points started depleting with incredible speed, and even the gloves didn’t help much. At the time that my life points had already fallen down to the red sector and were showing less than 20 points, I quickly jumped away from the plant and ate some yellow fruit. This time the fruit gave me as much as 57 life points, and I continued cutting the plant as fast as possible.
I had to eat eight more fruits before I finally managed to tear off the leaf with its stalk. I held an 80 centimeters long leaf in my hand on a thick stalk of around 15 centimeters in length, which looked badly damaged, but that didn’t affect my good mood in any way. I could honestly say that it was my first combat trophy in the game. It didn’t matter that my opponent was merely a flower; the damage done to the plant was pretty substantial. So, even if I hadn’t actually destroyed the plant, it was still a trophy. The gloves had withstood the test. They had small cuts here and there, but since the parameters for quality control in this world were nonexistent, they were still serviceable.
— What if I were to ... — The mechanism of data analysis kick started in my mind.
— Why didn’t I think about this before? Any fool could have figured it out from such a big hint! Why didn’t I work it out earlier? I practically had a ready-made weapon in my hands. I already had all the technology that I needed to do this again: the moss, the stalk, and the leaves stripped from the tree ...
— Forgive me, honestly, I didn’t do this on purpose, — I prayed mentally. — Well, actually I did mean it, but there was no alternative.
I felt some emotion inside briefly, but it disappeared in an instant. I didn’t pay any special attention to this, as I fastened a Wildleaf leaf around the stem of the new weapon I had made.
You have created a “Leaf Sword” with a cutting damage of 25-40 points, a 10% chance to inflict a bleeding wound of 10-20 points of damage per second for 5 seconds, additional properties (unavailable).
You have received the “Item Identification” agility: +1 (1).
My spirits were lifted. I didn’t expect things to work out so well, but why was so much information unavailable to me? Of course, I understood that I had very little knowledge and not that many abilities so far, but I still found this annoying! I felt like I was nothing more than a bewildered hedgehog wandering around in the fog.
I had never stayed upset for long. My “internal body clock”, which had increased to 14 points today, informed me that the evening came already, which of course I knew myself, because the Sun was going down and the forest was very quickly becoming impenetrable. I quickly paid a visit to a clump of my favorite “burdocks” to create a new bed. I still hadn’t found out their official name or purpose, which aroused my curiosity. I collected enough for my needs, and went over to a tree I had already chosen beforehand. After building another rough bed, I received +1% to the “Scout” ability (2%) and, having settled down in bed comfortably enough, I began to review the increase in my abilities for the day. My “Herbalist” ability had increased to 68%, my “Intuition” had somehow managed to increase by as much as 3% and now was 7%, “Easy step” and “Silent step” had climbed 10 points and reached 13 points and 10% respectively. The “Camouflage” agility had increased to 7 points, however there was almost no change in my other abilities: “Strength” was 9 points, “Agility” - 11 points, and “Stamina” had risen to 14 points. All of this was because of sawing off the leaf from that flower. Even my “Attentiveness” had only increased by 2 points, reaching 14 points, and this was the case despite the fact that I had focused on almost everything.