Leaves rustled with the wind, the entire forest was quiet, too quiet in truth. No birds were singing, no squirrels were walking across the tree tops; it was like the entire forest had become mute, though that was not the truth.
Something was hunting, and the animals of the forest were smart enough to quiet down and hide themselves in hopes of not becoming the next meal of the beast, or in this case, beasts.
Mack and Leo ran through the thick foliage, evading branches and rocks as much as they could, trying to not lose speed and give their pursuers an advantage.
A long howl, followed by a few others came from behind them making cold sweat ran down their faces. With a sharp turn they reached a clearing in the thick forest, a large tree as its center, her branches casting a large shadow in the area with the occasional beam of light escaping from between her leaves.
The sight would be incredible, and both would have loved to simply sit there and enjoy the view, were it not for the situation they found themselves in.
Another howl came from behind them followed by growls of different tones. Halting slightly in front of the tree, both turned around to face their hunters, a small pack of seven grey furred wolves.
As Mack gazed at the wolves, small lines of text started to appear above their heads depicting their name and level. From the seven wolves, three were level 1 while the other four were level 2.
They were quite low leveled and, where they separated, would be quite the easy target for a gridding session. Together, however, they could tear apart any newbie without a strategy, which Mack wasn't.
Hardening his resolve Mack flung his arm in the wolves' direction, a red card soon appearing in midair before catching fire and hitting right where the wolves stood. A pillar of flame soon rose up from the ground involving the 7 attackers, their pained and angry howls echoing in the clearing.
While hunting a wolf per time would be the ideal method, such a thing wouldn't be useful for Mack due to his current arsenal. Leo was capable of fighting against the wolfs alone, but the experience received would go straight to him, and the spell he had, [Fire Storm], was an AOE type of spell, which was best designed to fight against large groups of enemies.
With these 'weapons' at his disposal Mack had to think of a different way to grind XP, and the current situation was the strategy he came up with.
By luring a pack of wolves to an open field he would reduce the chance of them hiding, then he would use [Fire Storm] which would drain their HP and, hopefully, end them in one go.
Of course, things never really went as we planned, and that was what happened when the pillar of flames was breached by one of the high leveled wolves, his fur still set in ablaze as he made a mad dash towards Mack.
"Leo!" The cub immediately sprang into action, launching himself against the wolf's side before biting him with all his strength. The wolf howled in pain and fell to the ground, shaking and turning in an attempt to throw the cub away from him.
Mack took his chance, bringing the kukri from his Inventory and stabbing the wolf in the stomach. The animal whimpered in pain before falling, his body still spasming as his eyes became dull.
A notification rang on Mack's ears, but he didn't give it any attention, his eyes solely focused on the wolf in front of him.
He knew this was a game, but the degree of reality was too much. He felt nauseous, being able to almost smell the scent of blood from the recently killed animal. He always loved to watch survival documentaries and shows, but he never once harmed a living being, with exception of bugs, until now.
He wanted to stop and just understand what he had just done, but he knew the spell wouldn't last more than 10 seconds, and more wolves could break from its area of effect before running after him or Leo. He would think of what to do later, right now he had to finish what he had started.
Taking the kukri from the wolf's stomach he turned around just in time to see two other wolves coming from the raging storm, both with their furs either burned or on fire.
Leo jumped towards the one at the right while Mack took the one at the left. Crouching down he dug a fistful of dirt before throwing it in the direction of the wolf, landing straight on its face.
< Grey Wolf Lv.1 became [Blinded] >
He ducked to the side and sprang up, driving the blade deep into the chest area and puncturing a lung.
Sliding the blade up he felt it become stuck on one of the ribs, allowing the wolf to bite him in a last desperate attack. Mack felt the teeth dig into his flesh, making him grit his own in pain.
Even with the damage regulator adjusted to half of the pain, he almost felt himself blanking out and screaming, but he endured, well, tried. He still screamed, tears falling from his eyes as he punched the wolf, freeing his hand and knife before burying it on the wolf's neck and slicing it open.
He pulled back and ran, switching the knife from his right hand to the left one, before locking eyes with Leo who had just finished another wolf besides the one from earlier. The storm of flames vanished, leaving behind three charred bodies where it once was.
Leo walked towards Mack, a small limp visible. The boy brought his summon into a hug that lasted too much and too little at the same time. Both looked back at the seven corpses around them, they couldn't leave them on the ground, the smell of blood would attract other predators, and they needed time to heal.
A golden light covered Mack's body before soon vanishing, his injured wrist fully healed. Mack looked in confusion at himself, his eyes wide with shock, just like Leo's before a thought came to mind.
Mack looked at the tree behind them then back at the bodies, the light could wait a little more. If they left the bodies on the ground they would definitely attract more animals, which would in turn attack him and Leo.
Sometime later both were seating on the giant tree's branches, the seven bodies hung around them as Mack checked the System Notifications.
< You have slain a "Grey Wolf"! >
< Your summon has slain a "Grey Wolf"! >
< Your summon has slain a "Grey Wolf"! >
< You have slain a "Grey Wolf"! >
…
He looked at his Status where his XP bar was partly filled; however, there was a difference. Where once was written 1000, now had 3000 on the right side of the bar.
< You have Leveled Up! >
He gazed at the golden notification with the corner of his eyes, his mind racing to remember what the light from before was, besides a signal that he had increased in level.
The answer came with an explanation where 'leveling up' in this world was described as "breaking one's limits" and, as a result, the liberated energy of that process was used to heal the body, erasing any abnormal status the person had, with exception of a few, such as curses.
That explained how his wrist got healed, and was also something that could be very useful in the middle of a battle, but that thought was pushed to the back of his head as his attention turned to the seven bodies hanging from the tree branches, a heavy feeling settling on his shoulders and chest.
Fight for survival was common in the wilderness, he knew that, and he knew humans killed animals for food, pelts and other reasons even in modern days, but he still couldn't shake the feeling that he had committed an atrocity, a crime.
Leo knew what his partner was going through, he had went through the same many centuries ago when he killed for the first time, but he knew he had to make Mack understand that what he did wasn't wrong, it was a part of living.
Moving through the branches with as much dexterity a limp cub could muster he arrived at Mack's side and nuzzled him before climbing on his lap and putting a paw on his chest, catching the young man's attention.
The two stayed there, staring at each other's eyes for what felt hours when tears started falling down from Mack's eyes. He brought the cub into another hug, feeling the warmth from the little lion as his feelings settled down.
He still felt somewhat bad, but he wasn't going to mourn for what he did. If he wanted to grow and enjoy the game then situations where he would need to fight against monsters and NPCs would become common in the future, so he needed to accept it.
He stood up carefully and, using the trunk as support, made way to the closest body.
Resting a hand on top of the carcass a small pop up appeared in front of him.
< Would you like to harvest this body? Yes/No >
Clicking < Yes > a small progress bar with a timer appeared on top of the body showing 5 minutes on it.
One of the other characteristics that separated Archeon from other games was the fact that items did not drop from defeated monsters, at least, not from monsters of the "Beast" category.
In the game there were 2 types of monsters, the Beast-type and the Humanoid-type.
Beast-type monsters did not possess items in their bodies, as such, they could not drop items. In its place, Players could harvest the monster's body for materials that could be used to craft items, eat or sold.
In the case of Humanoid-type monsters the process was the same, with one difference: they had items with them, so it was possible to obtain that item by either killing the monster or stealing it.
The time of harvesting was settled from the start, so it didn't matter the size of the corpse, be it a small rabbit or a giant dragon, the time would be the same, but the Player needed to have his hands on the body the entire time, or else the progress would halt, not only resetting it but also damaging or reducing the final loot.
Knowing that the process would take a while, Mack opened his and Leo's Status again.
Name: Mesphist
Level: 1
Class: Card Mage
HP: 130
MP: 370 (70+300)
Attack: 2 – 4
Defense: 0
World Reputation: 320
Titles: 1
Spell Cards: 1
Summon Cards: 1
Special Blank Card: 1
Normal Blank Cards: 37
His stats had risen by a measly amount of twenty, with his attack value doubling, but it was something he did expect.
Calamity Beast - Leo [Growth Type]
Grade : Unknown
Level : 0
ATK: 5 – 10
PhDEF: 8
MgDEF: 8
Leo's stats, on the other hand, were still the same, with no sign of his health bar anywhere.
That was something that really bugged Mack, how could there be no health bar?
Back in the cave he didn't think much of it, but now he was really suspicious. He knew Leo had suffered damage, but there was nothing in his status that showed such condition.
Another thing that caught his eyes was the XP bar on Leo's card. The bar was filled by one third, and where the needed value should be was the number 2000, showing that Leo needed double the amount of XP Mack received to level up.
Making some quick math he decided to hunt a few more wolves to bring both Leo and himself to level 2, right after he had harvested the other bodies.