Forever

Salim woke up the next morning to a pleasant surprise, he hadn't been able to stay up all night, but could see that his trap had proven effective. Sitting inside the hole was a small toad that had fallen asleep because it couldn’t jump high enough to get out of the pit. Salim stared into its beady eyes as it croaked loudly at him.

Hopefully this counts, he thought, reading himself to strike. The frog croaked again as he stabbed into the pit and with a crunch received a system message.

You successfully trapped and killed a ‘Toad’

Event has been Logged.

You have gained a Level!

You have gained your first Level.

Select Class in Menu.

He sighed with relief, thankful that he wouldn’t have to kill a giant monster or do some other insane task. Wiping the muck off the bottom of the stick, Salim set it against a tree before pulling up his menus. Not seeing any changes in the class options, he selected [Wanderer] and considered his stat spread.

Lvl. 1

Stats

Confirm

Might: 9

-/+

Finesse: 9

-/+

Resilience: 10(15)

-/+

Acuity: 12

-/+

Resolve: 14

-/+

Depth:1

-/+

He decided to throw everything into [Resilience], for the simple reason that it was the most helpful overall, improving his stamina and general resilience to the elements. His [Might] had been fairly useless when fighting against the pack of wolf creatures, since he wasn’t strong enough for it to make any meaningful difference.

Instead, he would focus on toughening up, to at least avoid getting as blisters and sores on his feet. Confirming the allocation, Salim was immediately hit with a feeling that his skin was hardening, like his entire body was growing a callus in the timespan of a few seconds. Unlike when he upgraded [Might], the change wasn’t painful, it just felt like his skin was becoming leathery, although not by much.

Shaking off the feeling with a quick twist of the head, Salim attempted to harness [Wayfind], able to use the skill much faster now that he had experience. With a bit of mental prompting, he was off, heading towards the mountain at a quick pace.

Now that he wasn’t freaking out about waking up half-nude in a forest, Salim ran through his skills and their effects in his head. [Wayfind] was the most obvious, there was a mental tug that seemed to pull him in certain directions, although the feeling wasn’t immediately obvious. It did seem to have some large limitations, as broad landscape features he could see or places in the immediate area seemed to be the only thing the skill would respond to.

Trying to get the skill to take him back to the redwood forest didn’t do anything, neither did trying to find a way home. It was wishful thinking, he knew it, but it didn’t hurt to try, he was trying to feel out the skill as he kept getting smaller with what he wanted to find, from trees, to anthills, and eventually singular leaves. He had mixed result, but it did teach him that the smaller the object was, the closer he needed to be to it, and that he couldn’t track living creatures.

The other skills he received were a bit nebulous, and he didn’t pick up that they were having an effect until he focused on his actions. [Forage] was a fifty-fifty on either improvements to his eyesight or a supernatural awareness for useful items such as nuts or berries. It didn’t seem to have any overtly mystical effects, like increasing the amount of things he found, but if it did, then he would have more questions than answers. He wouldn’t have even noticed the effects until he realized just how many berries he had found, the leaf bowl was getting full, so he had to stop himself from grabbing more.

[Safe Travel] was similarly strange, it seemed to be training him to be sneakier while moving through the forest. Training that included stepping over sticks he wasn’t paying attention to and shimmying through branches to avoid breaking them without thinking about it. The weirdness of his actions didn’t register with him until he had noticed the effects of [Forage] and started paying more attention to what his body was doing.

Unlike with [Forage] and [Wayfind], he could actually learn from the skill and feel the influence become stronger as he paid attention to it and followed along with what it wanted him to do. The skills were insidious if he thought about it, influencing his actions without his notice, and he would have been more concerned if the effects weren't benign. The fact that they helped him survive played no small part in giving them leeway with how he perceived them.

By the end of the day, he still hadn’t reached the river, but was able to secure lodging by a rather large tree, whose thicker branches were weighed down with the rest of the branches resting on top. While setting up his hut, he had a small scare when a screen popped up in front of him.

You have wandered for an entire day.

Event has been Logged.

You have gained a Level!

He could level up just by being on the move? Not that he was complaining, but that meant he wouldn’t have to make impromptu traps and be at the mercy of whatever wandered in. It did not escape him that the level up used the same language as his class, maybe the class lets me level up in a way indicative of its description, he mused. Pulling up his stat menu, he decided to go for mental upgrades to see what benefit they provided, even if the stats might be better served in [Resilience].

Lvl. 2

Stats

Confirm

Might: 9

-/+

Finesse: 9

-/+

Resilience: 15

-/+

Acuity: 12(15)

-/+

Resolve: 14(15)

-/+

Depth:1(2)

-/+

Looking at the spread, he nodded to himself, balanced was probably the way to go until he figured out the specifics of each stat.

“Hopefully this is better than last time” he muttered, thinking back to unlocking [Depth] the day before, before deciding that his curiosity was more compelling than temporary discomfort. Hitting confirmed, he doubled over as a headache punched him in the cerebrum, causing his arms to flail uselessly as he tried to get the pain under control.

The itching feeling under his skin wasn’t nearly as bad as it had previously, even feeling slightly cathartic, and as the headache faded, Salim tried to quantify what had changed. The stats were less obvious than their physical counterparts, whose effects could be tangibly tested instead of testing with an impromptu mental evaluation on himself. Spreading the stats out also made him unsure which of the two stats was causing what effect, which was an obvious issue in hindsight and one he would try and remember.

Going back to his self evaluation, he could tell that his thoughts felt clearer, for lack of a better description, zipping around his head with higher bandwidth than before. He also had a strange feeling of importance, like he was simply more of a person and could use the feeling to better isolate the loneliness that had been creeping up on him, not removing it but keeping it away from the forefront of his mind. It was honestly incredible, to feel himself gain more control over his mind that he hadn’t been able to fully deal with, even after working with a therapist for years.

[Depth] was still a dead end though, he didn’t have a clue what it had done, although the itching probably meant that it changed his body in some way. Maybe it improved his nervous system, which would improve him in some way. How? He didn’t know anatomy, so the benefits seemed questionable to him.

Unless the itching is psychosomatic, there's no way to tell what it’s doing, even if I could X-ray myself I wouldn’t know what to look for, Salim thought. Maybe he would be able to figure it out once the stat got high enough, or maybe ten, since that seemed to be the general baseline all his stats originally hovered around. Not bothering with the stat anymore, he opened his skill menu to see if they had leveled up any from his day of use.

Skills

Wayfind (Class)

Lvl. 2

Guides you to where you want to go.

Forage (Class)

Lvl. 2

Improves your ability to find useful items in the wild.

Safe Travel (Class)

Lvl. 3

Reduces your trace while you travel.

He was surprised at the speed of which the skills had leveled up, but it did engage the dopamine in his brain, seeing numbers go up never failed to excite him. Pausing before closing the menu and rereading the descriptions of the skills, Salim thought they were slightly misleading. Although, misleading descriptions and a lack of explanation seemed to be the modus operandi of the floating boxes.

Taking the time to obscure his hut, Salim busied himself till nightfall, gathering brush and leaves to cover him while he slept, just for the benefit of feeling slightly more safe. Not feeling completely exhausted (likely due to his boosted [Resilience]) Salim decided to climb up the tree to watch the stars.

Taking his time climbing in the dark, he eventually peeked out between the leaves at the brilliant sky above. Living in a light-polluted area for his entire life, Salim had never seen the full night sky outside of photos. It looked like he was living on the inside of a snow globe, with vibrant blues, oranges, and greens from exploding nebula painting the sky, the majesty he felt was beyond words. The only thing that was missing was the moon, although he wasn’t sure if the planet was based off of earth or something else entirely.

Salim felt at peace for just a few moments, completely beholden to the vastness of the cosmos.

Eventually, exhaustion crept up on him and as he slid down from the tree and into the hut, he thought about the reality of his situation. He would most likely never get back home, and if he did, it wouldn’t be any time soon. On the first day, he worried about no one finding him, but now he realized that the situation was far beyond what he could comprehend, even if the world was some sort of virtual prison.

Dread gripped him as he fell asleep that night, his dreams filled with the sad faces of everyone he knew and loved as they grew old and died without him.

Dawn came slowly, as soon as the early morning light touched his hair his eyes sprung open, and he jumped to work, scattering his hut to plan his next move. Something had gotten into his bowl last night, some of the nuts and berries looked rotten and had holes in them. He suspected ants, as the bowl itself had several holes in it as well, and grumbled while throwing away all the rotten food.

Fashioning another makeshift bowl, he decided to bite the bullet and chew on the most edible-looking berry. As he sunk his teeth into the skin of the fruit, he recoiled at the bitterness. It wasn’t pleasant to eat, but it would have to do for now until he figured out how to farm, if he ever got to it.

Thinking about how to start the agricultural revolution all by himself, Salim followed [Wayfind]’s instructions while trying to practice [Safe Travel] as much as he could. The path he blazed was slowly getting difficult to hike as the incline increased, and while Salim had gone on plenty of hikes before, doing so without a trail was agonizing.

He had to take great care where he stepped due to a spiny plant that seemed to grow just about everywhere near the mountain, anytime he thought the patches ended, more would appear in font of him. While the thorn bushes didn’t cut if he brushed past them, stepping on them was just asking for a painful injury.

The lack of visible progress was slowly frustrating him, so huffing and puffing he took a seat on a downed tree, the thing looked like it had the entire bottom ripped out by the roots. Resting his legs, Salim sat on an incline, breathing deeply to try and catch his breath. With each breath, he felt slightly more invigorated, his stamina coming back far faster than it ever had before.

While [Resilience] gives me more stamina, does it also improve how fast I can recover? Salim puzzled, If that's the case then would it double when I hit twenty or is it linear in how it scales, this sorta reminds me of the tree sap… His thoughts trailed off, as he stood up and walked over to a smaller tree that was still firmly planted in the ground.

Taking the time to cut into the trunk with a small rock, Salim hesitated slightly as he went to take a sip, his mind flashing back to the wolves trying to tear him apart. But reasoning with himself, he dismissed his fears, since him getting caught had to do with it being dark, so he just needed to make sure he kept track of time.

He was still a tad frustrated at himself not able to fully dismiss his illogical fear, as his hand shook slightly gripping the bark to take a sip. As the dribbling liquid entered his mouth, filling his stomach, Salim began to feel strange. Like before, he felt like he was pumped full of caffeine, but strangely the feeling subsided into a low tailwind of energy that continued to invigorate.

Somehow, he felt like the energy was just sitting inside of him, slowly being used to fuel his recovery. The feeling gradually suffused over his entire body, with a slight itch that made him think of [Depth]. Mulling over the feeling, Salim realized that he could still feel some small part of it pushing into him, like it had been spread throughout the air.

Salim was intrigued, but gave up after feeling embarrassment over his hand signs and magic words failed to do anything, returning to the hike as the sap finished erasing his exhaustion. Lost in thought over the strange find, his stamina slowly depleted as he pushed his body further up the mountain at the insistence of his skill. He was getting closer to water.