While Leo and Morgana were busy bringing people back from soul death, one of their BETA players was standing before a dense line of great oaks which he was told back in town was the entrance to the Dark Forest.
Black Howler gazed up at the dense foliage of trees and exhaled the breath he'd been holding in for some time now. "Alright, I'm convinced. Leonardo Dante is a god..."
His gaze lowered to his shaking right hand.
"I've never felt fear inside VR before…" he realized. This realization only caused him to smirk at himself. "Heh, I'm going on an adventure."
With that self-encouragement, Black Howler stepped through the gap between the trees and crossed into the Dark Forest.
The first thing he noticed was how dark it was inside the forest. The canopy of leaves above him seemed to block out even the meager illumination born from the flashes of lightning in the sky above.
He glanced down at the black bag slung across his shoulders. It was the Abyssalweave Bag of Holding given to all substitute reapers which served as a physical representation of a player's [INVENTORY].
Black Howler recalled Maestro's words when he'd given him this bag.
"It has an interior space of two feet in diameter at the mouth and five feet deep. That size could hold roughly five-hundred pounds worth of stuff... just the right amount for beginners," Maestro winked.
Remembering Maestro's instructions for how to use it, Black Howler opened the bag's flap and then pulled out the item he imagined in his mind's eye. Out came a two-foot wooden rod with a wet rag wrapped around one end.
Black Howler raised this rod high and then spoke the command word Maestro had given him, "Lux."
A burst of flames engulfed the rag and brought with it both light and warmth, two things Black Howler desperately needed. For while the first would help to guide his way, the second would help to stave off the biting cold that had arrived with the creeping fog that floated two feet off the forest floor.
"Torch equipped," he said to himself. "Let's go, Howler."
Black Howler hiked deeper into the forest, and for a long time, his only companion was the eerie silence that made the hairs on the back of his arms stand on end.
At some point, he began to notice that the fog snaking around his legs was rising higher and higher.
"Feels like something's about to start," he whispered.
How right he was. For no sooner had these words escaped his lips than the sound of crunching leaves reached his ears.
Black Howler faced forward and felt the presence of something approaching him from just beyond the reach of his torch's light.
"Looks like my adventure's about to begin," he said aloud.
Black Howler reached behind to his back and pulled out the weapon strapped there. It was very heavy to hold with just one hand but he endured the strain because he couldn't let go of the torch in his other hand as it was his only source of light.
"Maybe I should have chosen a regular sword instead," he wondered aloud just before shaking his head. "No, that would be uncool… This Claymore fits Black Howler's image more."
The [Rusted Iron Claymore] in his right hand was a wide, double-edged longsword with a cross hilt. It had a length of fifty-five inches and weighed roughly two-point-five kilograms.
Despite the claymore's weight, Black Howler managed to raise it forward with one hand. It was an impressive show of strength for a substitute reaper who hadn't awakened or evolved yet.
The thing stalking him in the shadows, however, was not impressed. It stepped into the light, the dark-furred paw of a beast whose red eyes were now visible even in the darkness. The canine head came next, then the huge hairy torso, and finally, as its rear paws appeared, the sight of a wagging tail that was so sharp it might as well have been a sword came into view.
A nametag appeared above the shadow beast's head. [Sword Tail Dire Wolf] was written on its tag in bright red.
Within the space reserved in his mind for gaming knowledge, Black Howler understood the meaning of that red color — danger!
"Damn, you're not even the shadow beast Maestro told me to hunt and you're getting me all excited," Black Howler's grip shook slightly. "I guess I'm a little worried."
With no warning, the dire wolf pounced, its jaws wide open as it lunged for Black Howler's neck.
He reacted instantly and jumped back, narrowly avoiding the dire wolf's jaws.
At the same time, he swung his claymore forward. But the force of his swing threatened to unbalance him, leaving him no choice but to let go of his torch so that he could grip his weapon with both hands.
The torch fell to the forest floor, its light suddenly dimming because of the fog. It left him with barely enough light to watch his enemy creep ever closer.
As his eyes searched the dire wolf for openings, Black Howler quickly realized that it had none. "Can I even win against this thing?"
The dire wolf growled, but it didn't have the desired effect on this player as it would have with others. In fact, the obvious threat only served to embolden Black Howler.
"It's not a question of if… I just gotta do it," he reasoned.
In the next instant, both shadow beast and player pounced on each other. The dire wolf with its jaws opened wide and Black Howler with his claymore raised high.
Unfortunately for the player, the wolf was faster, and it was only thanks to a combination of reflex and instinct that Black Howler managed to dodge the jaws that snapped to a close within an inch of his face.
He sent his claymore crashing down on the dire wolf's head, but its sword-tail snaked forward to parry his attack. This caused him to lose his footing, which the dire wolf didn't fail to capitalize on.
It pushed forward and would have ripped into Black Howler's shoulder if he hadn't bent back at the last second. With one hand letting go of the claymore's hilt, he pulled off a one-handed backward summersault that moved him away from the dire wolf's range.
And it was only after the danger had been averted that he let out the breath he'd been holding in. "My body's moving exactly how I want it to… the way it used to before the accident… Maybe I really can do this."
The dire wolf's howl assaulted his ears, but Black Howler's growing confidence had armored him from giving in to the cold fear threatening to trickle up his spine.
The dire wolf pounced a third time, and while its head aimed for Black Howler's neck, its sword-tail snapped forward, a piercing blow aimed at Black Howler's chest.
"You think I'm just a regular gamer, huh!" Black Howler raised his own voice to match the wolf's howl. "Well, you're wrong…"
Wielding his claymore with his right hand, Black Howler blocked the sword-tail that snaked toward his chest. At the same time, he formed a fist with his left hand, and as the dire wolf's head came into range, he launched an uppercut that smacked the bottom of the shadow beast's mouth.
The force of his unarmed strike knocked the dire wolf's head back. And in that window of disorientation, Black Howler raised his claymore high and roared, "Don't go underestimating a former athlete, dumb*ss!"
He swung his blade down, and in that one swing, decapitated the wolf's head.
As a result, the shadow beast's form shattered into a thousand tiny pieces of glass that coalesced together on the forest floor to form a lesser soul stone whose turquoise light penetrated through the thick fog.
Black Howler picked up the lesser soul stone and inspected it.
"So this is the thing that's supposed to make me strong?" he wondered aloud.
He recalled the instructions Maestro had given him concerning the soul stone, and how it could be used as currency in town or for evolving his own soul core.
"The accident killed my chances in reality, but in this world… in this world I can become the strongest," he whispered to himself.
Black Howler raised the soul stone to his lips and breathed in its essence. After he'd consumed the slivers of blue fire from the now lifeless crystal between his fingers, a teal-colored window appeared before him.
[CONGRATULATIONS, SUBSTITUTE REAPER, YOU HAVE ATTAINED ENOUGH ENERGY TO AWAKEN THE POWER HIDING WITHIN YOUR SOUL.]
This window vanished seconds later and was replaced by another one.
[USE OF A HEAVY WEAPON HAS SIGNIFICANTLY AUGMENTED YOUR STRENGTH. YOUR [STR] ATTRIBUTE HAS INCREASED BY 1.]
This teal window was also replaced by a violet window, the first one to ever appear for a player in the game.
[HELP: CONTINUED USE OF ITEM [CLAYMORE] MAY INCREASE YOUR [STR] ATTRIBUTE MORE.]
"Ath3na wrote in her blog that awakenings gave players new abilities… but I guess that's not always the case," Black Howler shrugged. "Besides, increasing my strength doesn't sound so bad either."
His strength increase had come just in time too. For while his attention was focused on the floating notification, six pairs of glowing red eyes appeared in the darkness beyond the light of his torch.
A chorus of wolf howls pierced the eerie silence of the forest and alerted Black Howler to uninvited guests. He swiped the help window out of existence and then draped his claymore over his shoulders.
"You guys are just in time." He sent an icy glare at the presences hiding in the shadows. "I'm going to test my strength out on you!"
Six [Sword Tail Dire Wolves] stepped into the light, signaling the beginning of round two. Then, with canine swiftness, they charged.
---
Black Howler was bleeding from bite wounds on both his arms, his left shoulder, and his right leg but the sight of the twenty-second lesser soul stone in his hand filled him with the calming warmth of self-accomplishment which helped to mute the throbbing of his many wounds.
The first six [Sword Tail Dire Wolves] were easy enough to deal with because he'd used the densely packed trees to keep the shadow beasts from surrounding him. This tactic had also allowed Black Howler to fight them one at a time.
Plus, thanks to his strength increase, swinging his claymore had become as easy as swinging a baseball bat around. This proved a fantastic boon as dispatching one beast after another slowly got easier over time.
The sixth dire wolf finally fell, but it had barely howled its last when four more wolves appeared to take its place.
Black Howler didn't miss the fact that their nametags had changed color from red to yellow. It was just more proof that he was definitely getting stronger.
After his tenth kill, the Awakening system finally granted Black Howler with his first ability. [ABILITY: WOLF'S HOWL ACQUIRED]
"The sound of your howl instills fear into the hearts of your enemies leaving them panicked and too shaken to defend themselves for a short period of time," Black Howler read the text written on the ability's status window. "I can make good use of this."
After Black Howler had absorbed his eighteenth soul stone, his continued use of the claymore awarded him a second strength increase.
[USE OF A HEAVY WEAPON HAS SIGNIFICANTLY AUGMENTED YOUR STRENGTH. YOUR [STR] ATTRIBUTE HAS INCREASED BY 1.]
Black Howler formed a triumphant fist with his hand. "Now we're talking."
After this last strength increase, he decided to stop inhaling the essence of the remaining soul stones he acquired from slaying the next four dire wolves to appear before him. He chose to keep them instead for he'd noticed the negative effect essence had on his mind. He knew it well for he'd experienced these drug-like symptoms that messed with the body and mind before. It was right after the accident that altered the course of his life.
"I've had enough morphine to last me a lifetime," he frowned.
Suddenly, the rumbling earth beneath him sent Black Howler's mind back to the present, and he gazed forward and toward the shadows beyond the light of his dwindling torch.
His eyes widened at the sight of the slender oaks bending backward to accommodate whatever it was pushing past them. The canopy above swayed violently, causing a great many leaves to fall on the forest floor.
The earth continued to shake as whatever disturbed it moved with deliberate steps toward Black Howler. And through the veil of shadows, he thought he saw a pair of feline eyes gazing hungrily back at him.
Black Howler raised his bloody arm to his nose and sniffed at the iron scent drifting out of it.
"I get it… my blood drew you to me," he realized. "I guess all those dying dire wolves helped too…"
The shadow beast's head popped into the light. It had a golden mane surrounding an enormous feline face whose mouth was filled with rows of sharp fangs. As more of it came forward, a second head protruded from out of the shadow beast's back, a long-necked creature with a hairy snout and twin horns snaking out the back of its head.
The rest of the creature stepped into the light, revealing a muscular feline form that was roughly the size of a minivan. Even more terrifying, the thick, scaly tail whipping behind it ended in the head of a great snake.
"So this is the beast with many faces…" Black Howler draped his claymore over his right shoulder. "I've met your kind before in other games."
Above its bulky form, a nametag floated in the bright red color of danger, [Chimaera].
The Chimaera's lion head let out a beastly roar that shook the trees around it.
But the BETA player stood his ground for his earlier battles in this forest had helped to steel his resolve. It was then that Black Howler let out his own roar, "Bring it on!"