Flame Wolf Scorpion!
2172 Words
When I woke it was to a dark room. I was a little panicked, but my eyes were able to adjust quickly. The symbol that was creating the light seemed to have died down, which means it needed another unit of energy. I had no idea how the transference worked, but at the very least as soon as I touched it, I felt a light tingle on my skin, and the storage room was lit up once again. After that I took my bath from a seemingly endless supply of water that flowed from a wineskin.
I had a change of clothes and then spent the next two hours looking at the ceiling above me, completely clueless about what to do next. Then I decided to ask the system a question, it had given me a mission, but it had not told me how to go about completing it. And though I had some memories of this world, anything that had to do with the system was complete blank to me.
"System how do I stop being a mortal?" I could have phrased the question a little better, but at the very least this should get my meaning across.
{Host must reach the pinnacle of human perfection by achieving 10 in all stats, and once you've done that, you would step on the path of cultivation shedding your mortal coils by increasing any one of your stats to 11. Host has 10 extra stat points, would host like to allocate them.}
"Well I don't see why not. Let's increase strength and body both to 10 by adding 4 stat points each, and increase speed to 7 by adding the remaining 2 points."
{Stats Allocated!} {Host also has 37 skill points, would host like to allocate and increase skill levels.}
I also agreed to that, though I had to make a choice. I had quite a few skills, and I had the feeling that eventually each and every single one of them had the potential to save my life. But I had to prioritize, I did not know much about the system, but there was a sort of instinct to it that I couldn't place my hand upon. I knew the skill points would be an important resource down the line, so it was best for me to choose the most probable and hard to level skills and focus on them, especially if they're important.
"Allocate 9 stat points to cure, 8 to hide, and 8 to Appraisal."
{Cure has reached max level and evolved to Heal. Hide has reached max level and evolved to stealth. Appraisal has reached max level, there are no upgrade options available. You have been given 5 stat points.}
"add 3 stat points to speed, and 2 to energy."
[Leon An Khel: Age 20]
[Bloodline: Ancient Human]
[Cultivation level: 0: Mortal]
[Cultivation Method: Celestial Zodiac Theorem (uninitiated)
[Strength: 10/ Speed: 10/ Body 10/ Energy: (5/6)]
Talents: > >
Skills: > > > >
Stat points:0 | Skill Points:12
{Mission: Explore the ruined grand hall for 1 hour} {Rewards +2 to all stats,}
{Time: 20 minutes 20 seconds} {Penalty: Death!}
I did not really like what this next mission entailed, not when I could very well lose my life, and painfully in fact. But as if that wasn't enough, not completing the mission or at least embarking on it would kill me. The very idea of free will seems to be lost on this system, which means I don't really have a choice but to dance to the tune it plays.
Without a choice in the matter, I searched the storage room for something to use as a weapon. All I could find was a variety of knives and cleaners which I hung precariously on the belt around my waist. the weapons in the room felt really heavy, un-natturaly so; as I couldn't even shake them much less lift them up. For now this was as prepared as I could be, so come rain, come sunshine I had to get on with this.
I made my way towards the trap door that led me here in the first place. It took me a little under five minutes to clear away the pile of skulls and broken bones that had fallen in with me when I first found the storage room. Their presence here was rather garish, and should I survive this new ordeal of mine, I would get rid of them.
I pulled the trap door open, and since it opened inwards, I didn't have to worry about pushing off any sort of weight that might have ended up on top of it. But that also mean that crushed pieces of bones and dust also came flying into the storage room. I didn't really expect that, so I ended up covered in grey dust, and the place I had just cleared got messed up allover again.
But there was no time to whine, not when my life was on the line. So I climbed out of the storage room, and came up into the great hall. The entire place looked like even more of a warzone than when I was here the last time. There were deep claw marks across the pillars and marble floors, the bone pyramid had all been reduced to rubble, and among the dust and bone fragments the thick red of blood could be seen mixed amongst them. And there was a lot of it which spook volumes of animalistic battle that occurred when I ran into the storage room.
There was only one entrance into the great hall, a massive set of thick bronze doors that laid helplessly across the ground, broken and dilapidated. The walls were filled with cracks and ivy and variety of different plants grew on them. But even with all of the destruction and desolation, this great hall still had vestiges of it's former glory hanging around every corner. And while it seems quite a few years has passed, it still had traces of its former glory to share.
The great hall was big, the proper word would be colossal. From north to south and east to west, the great hall seems to be about 3 kilometers long. It wouldn't take me that long to walk from one end to the next, but it was going to take a long ass time none the less. So I just picked a direction and started moving. There were multiple pillars within the great hall, and each of them were evenly spaced from the other, and had banners with the depiction of either one of the twelve zodiac animals, or one of the zodiac constellations.
I knew the constellations had a deeper meaning when cultivation begins, but since I've not done anything of the sort, it's profoundness was lost on me. All they were right now were pretty pictures. I had chosen to walk towards the eastern end of the great hall as this side seemed to have received lesser damage as opposed to the rest of the hall. There was still an odd bone here or there, some of them fully intact skeletons with their clothes on, it gave me the courage that I was going in the most safest possible direction.
Eventually I got a little too tired to carry on and decided to rest my back a bit on one of the pillars. Even with all of my increased stats, my body was still frail. It was still mortal, and after a long time of being starved, I had to get it back into shape to utilize all of the stat increase I've received. For now due to my weak body, I was more like a loaded gun with the safety still on (at least I like to think so anyway).
Resting my back against the pillar made me regret that I hadn't carried any sort of supply with me. All I had with me were three meat cleavers, and four kitchen knives, and even then the whole thing seemed a bit cumbersome to carry around. But I really had no idea how these kind of things are done, so I was going in blind.
*chittering* *chittering* *scuttle*
I was alerted to those sounds, it sounded like someone or something was trying to sneak past or around me, and was failing miserably. I looked around me, shifting my gaze from left to right and from front to back. But there was nothing in sight, I was alert now and the noise was getting closer. So I decided to look up.
*Skreeeeet!* *Whoosh* *Thud*
I dodged and just barely in fact, as a scorpion with bright orange body, and red flame patterns, and also the size of a full grown Rottweiler slammed it's stinger into the pillar. The top of my right shoulder was scratched by it during the attack, and I could feel blood pouring down my shoulder as I fell back on my ass, terrified to the point of petrification. At that moment I instinctively used the appraisal skill.
{Flame Wolf Scorpion: Essence beast level 1: Flame and Poison attributes}
{This essence beast has an incredibly potent poison with fiery corrosive properties, it also has the ability to implement a flame charge ability where it's whole body is covered by fire and it's speed would increased by a factor of three. On it's own this low level essence beast is not that much of a threat, however with the name Flame wolf scorpion, it is obviously this special breed of monster always roams around in packs. And it's pack could be as small as two individuals to as high as a thousand.} {Highest stats: Strength 6/ Speed 12/ Body 9/ Energy 22}
{Weakness: Blunt Damage/ Water element attacks / Earth Element attacks} {Traits: Not very intelligent / Straightforward hunters that rely on numbers/ Slow acting Poison.}
The information I received was detailed, so detailed in fact that it warned me in time to dodge forward as another stinger smashed into the ground at the place where I was helplessly sitting a moment ago. They were pack animals, which means they would probably be a whole lot more of them. And if there was more of them, it meant I had probably wandered into their territory, and leaving would probably get them off my back. At least that is until one of them fell on my back and sent its stinger into my shoulder blades.
"Arrrrggggghhhhhh!"
I was screaming less from the pain, and more from the panic. I turned tailed and ran back the way I came from, and in my fright I stupidly forgot that I still had another one of the Flame Wolf Scorpions hanging on my back. And then it's stinger came down again. I crashed to the ground, and the essence beast was dislodged from my back, skittering across the slick marble floor.
I could feel my blood flowing down my back and out of my shoulder. I was loosing more and more of it every second, and I was slowly beginning to feel the poison take hold of me. I remembered from my appraisal, that the poison was a slow acting one, and while the fear of death scared me, the rapidly approaching pack of flame wolf scorpions behind me scared me even more, because that would mean death by being eaten alive. I would prefer to keep running, but the flame wolf scorpion that had perched on me was blocking the way, so we had ourselves a good old Mexican stand off.
I rushed forward, and so did the scorpion, choosing to leap across the air as its body caught fire. It was only by a miracle that I remembered about this flame charge skill, so I had thrown out one of the meat cleavers the moment I decided to move. I didn't know if it was luck, or if I just had really good aim. But the butcher knife flew through the air and slammed into the skull of the Flame Wolf scorpion.
It's flames fizzled out immediately, and flew past my head, smoldering and smoking only to crash into a comrade of his behind me, very much dead. I didn't even look back to see the c*****e its dead body had cause. I just took to my heels and started running back towards my storage room, ignoring the system message that showed up in front of me.
{You have killed one Flame Wolf Scorpion. Received two of it's highest stat point, +2 energy}
{For killing an essence beast as a mortal you've been given 5 stat points}
{For killing a beast for the first time, you've been given +1 to all stats, and the skill Throwing has been generated.}
But I really didn't care about what gains I may have made, and that was because my body was burning. Everything was burning!
- Writer
