After celebrating my 7th year of being in this, my days returned back to normal with minor difference. After I requested that birthday gift from my father, it took about a week for him to find one at a really good price. The name of the book was called " The basics of magic". It was actually just a picture book....
When I checked the contents, it gave a little valuable information. For example it illustrated a clear crystal ball which I will assume represented mana split off into balls of different colours. Analysing the colours, I could roughly guess that there was the basic elements of fire, earth, water, wind and nature.
The thing was... I totally forgot I was just a recently matured 7 year old, I was completely shocked by the fact it was a picture book that I acidentally leaked out an "AH!". "Ah?" (gerald)
Puzzled my father just ignores my cry and asks if I liked it. "Ye.... Yes..." was all I could voiced out. My soul died and I was despairing on the inside when I lost hope in learning magic.
Well it has been a week since then. As usual I would go "play" outside on the weekdays and do "errands" on weekends to change up my excuses. In actuality, I would sneak out of the residential district to the nearby forest. I was thinking of fighting something stronger than a slime so I explored the forest for beast...but to no avail. That was until I discovered the cave today. Doing my usual patrols and cleaning the swarms of slime in one hit, a hole appeared on a nearby hill spontaneously.
At first glance, I recognised this phenomenon as a "minor dungeon spawn", I learned of this when I asked my father where he gathered materials for his products. Adventurers would risk their lives fighting monsters, if they didn't come back the guild would recomoensate their families. If they did come back, my father would pay them for the materials.
Fragile and small dungeons occasionally appear in mana rich areas like the forest I was grinding in. Inside these dungeons would have weak monsters of usually only level 15 - 100.
The mana in the air mutates the bones and flesh of the dead underground and the surrounding animals, these would later form monsters like autonomous skeletons and giant animals that could easily kill people without combat oriented classes.
I didn't have a class yet, but not wanting to waste time, I trained at an early age. Of course, my experience has only come from fighting slimes so far. My mother had also told me that there was some form of a institution to the east side of our residential district thay taught actual magic used for combat. For a fantasy world, there were magic powered lambs, toilets, proper infrastructure, decent education and even a magic powered hologram news system for the latest affairs. Usually my family would watch it at night and work in the morning. It was all so unusual, did some other person come and accelerated the advancement of technology in this world? Anyway the point I was planning to make was that there was a possibility to impress my peers with an unusually high level at the magic institution I was planning to attend. It was quite a large school that had its own dormitory, cafeteria and some other basic facilities for the students to use. Puzzled I asked my mother, "Why does the school have so much stuff? Where do they get their funds on?". Which she replied "The king funds the school, a lot of nobles attend it as well, giving quite a large income." (Mum)
Well, back to the dungeon. Killing slimes became boring extremely fast that I had to find ways to quell my boredom. With my agility, just standing still after running at my maximum speed, touching the slime will make it splatter from the momentum I gathered. I also explored how much I needed to cut the slimes with my starter daggers before they died. Going into the dungeon, a wooshing sound zoomed past me. Tch, long range attackers! Did some bandits try to attack me?
Running into the cave to lose my pursuers, I hid around a corner before trying to catch my breath. The arrow made me subconciously stopped breathing. Guess I need to hone my instincts better.
***
"HAhaha! After that little one dies from the monsters, we can retrieve her dead body and the items on it to sell!"
"Yeah! She could use storage magic right? Remember that pouch?"
"Forget about that, how long do you guys think the body will stay warm after it dies?"
"Eww, what is wrong with you. You are messed up man."
"Like you were any better, shut up and just keep watch. Soon a scream will echo and that's our cue!"
"Fine, but if you want to do "that" you should do it where nobody sees, only you are into that kind of thing."
" Shush you guys! "
***
This time arrows came from the opposite direction. Rolling to my side to dodge the arrows, I questioned in my head. 'How the hell did monsters learn how to use a bow and arrow?!'. In the distant darkness, I could boney footsteps trampling on gravel, creating a lot of noise. Most likely the monsters were shooting towards the guys outside the cave. "ARGH!! MY CHEEK, THERE IS AN ARROW IN MY CHEEK ARGHHHHHH" (Random bandit A)
Naisuuuuuu! Awesome aim skeleton man! Responding to a secondary stimulus, the skeleton shot an arrow towards me, giving me the trouble of dodging again. This time I stayed lying down on the ground. Since the cave was dark, could the skeleton be detecting me through the mana moving in the air?! Mana was a form of energy that existed in any medium, even in the vacuum of space. Technically speaking, there is an infinite amount of mana in the universe, but the amount a human can control at once was extremely little. Making an extremely reliable source of energy in the current technology of this world.
When monsters died, they disperse into mana which further dispersed into the air. Some of the mana is converted to experience and absorbed by the killer, leveling them up. If only I could escape that skeleton and use them against the bandits. Currently, I relied on hearing to avoid the arrows. My agility made up for my awful reflexes and a arrow barely grazed my cheek. Perhaps I should just stand where the bandits are and dodge the arrows. My stats were especially unbalanced, so I should have enough agility.
Frantically standing up, I ran towards the nearest source of light, the exit. Hearing the wooshing sound of the arrow, I dodged and lied ontu the gravel ground of the cave. Due to my short height that the skeleton was aiming for, when I dodged the arrow, it flew and hit a certain lower part of random bandit A. That will teach you for wanting to do "that" to my dead body if I actually died! The arrow was barely stopped by the chain leggings of the bandit, but the tip of the arrow impaled the base of his 'chinchin' and now its barely hanging ontu his body with a small layer of skin that could be compared to a pencil's girth. "GUAHHHHHHHHHH!" *Thud*.