" An earthquake??"
The cave was trembling hard, and blood-red runes started to glow on the inside.
Ray was terrified at the things happening right now, he had been into many Dungeons exploration, but this shit was straight off from horror movies.
The thing worsened when Ray started to hear voices coming from the cave.
< Do you desire power?>
< Do you desire power?>
< Do you desire power?>
< Do you desire power?>
The words kept repeating, and Ray has gone mad from it. He tried to find the exit, but strangely there was none in it. Ray was pretty sure that the exit was right next to him. Even so, it just vanished as it has never been here before.
< If you desire the power, Place your hand on the altar.>
The next thing Ray knew was an altar suddenly appeared before him, and the voice was nowhere to be heard again.
" Am I Imagining things.."
Ray hesitated a bit, but he has no other choices. The escape route has vanished, and he could only walk forward into the altar.
He climbed the altar and placed his hand on it.
Then, a voice resounded within his head.
[ DING!!! Detecting the presence of an awakener. Commencing the test of a dungeon master.]
Test? Dungeon master? Ray couldn't understand what those words mean.
Was he still dreaming? Why did it sound like a system update?
Actually, the presence of a system was nothing strange to Ray. All humans could access their own system, but those systems could only be used to assess their own status and nothing more.
So hearing the system saying words like dungeon or test made Ray a bit confused.
RUMBLE!!!
Ray woke up from his daydream because of the violent tremor that shook his entire body.
RUMBLE!!!!
The shaking kept getting worse, and as time slowly passed, it happened then.
Ray's consciousness was sucked into the altar, and when he opened his eyes, he was already in an unfamiliar place.
****
*Chirp-Chirp*
Birds chirping at his surrounding.
Where am I !!??
He looked around and found that this was not the forest in the outskirt of Jakarta. The trees there were at most 3 meters tall, while Ray was now surrounded by Gigantic trees more than 10 meters tall.
The vast area was surrounded by giant trees. Clouds and fog were in the sky, tens of meters away from the top of the trees. Lightning flashed amid the cloud and mist. Purple lights flickered as if dragons were there riding the clouds.
This couldn't be real.
Until a few moments ago, he was still lying down in the cave, but now he was suddenly in the middle of this gigantic forest.
He tried to remember what's been happening before, but all he could think was that strange voice.
Was this the doing of that strange voice? If he remembered correctly, the voice said something about a test or dungeon.
Ray picked up his phone and tried to find information about the dungeon test, but there was no signal here.
' What should I do now? Strolling around without any destination is surely not the best idea.'
He then tried to climb one of the giant trees. From what he read in the book, it was always better to understand the area before deciding to do something.
However, just when his hand touched the trunk of the giant trees.
*Swoosh*
Ray suddenly found the world turned upside down, and when he realized it. His head has been rolling on the floor, separated from his body. Blood splurting everywhere, and now, his consciousness started to get blurry.
.
[ DING!!! You have died.]
[ Congratulations on unlocking the hidden mission, dead for the first time.]
[ Rewards: Universal attributes points +5]
.
A few moments later, Ray opened his eyes, and he was surprised that he got back into the first place when he was teleported into the gigantic forest with his head intact.
' What happened then? Hasn't I…."
Bluergghh!!!
His memory at the time when his head was separated from his body started to play inside his head, and Ray couldn't hold back his urge to vomit.
' What the heck was that.'
Luckily for Ray, this time, the voice was back and resounded again on his head.
[ DING!!! The test of a dungeon master has begun.]
Wait, what…
Suddenly, a panel like where usually his status was displayed appeared before Ray.
.
[ Find your boss monster ]
[ As a Wannabe Dungeon-master, you need to find your boss-monster to protect the dungeon core.]
[ Recruit the boss monster before the time limits end.]
[ Time limit: 1 day, 23 hours, 58 minutes.]
[ Plane: Purple Sky forest]
[ Death Count: 1/10000]
[ Rewards will be issued accordingly to the host's progress in this plane.]
.
Ray was in disbelief at what he saw. He rubbed his eyes a few more times, but the mission panel was still there.
Now he needed to think rationally. He took a deep breath and read the mission description carefully.
Hmm… One per ten thousand death count. That somehow explains the bizarre accident he had before.
Even if those things didn't really make sense to Ray, he was forced to believe in it now. His only hope to escape from this forest was to finish the mission.
"*Sigh* Let's do this."
******
[ DING!!! You have died for the tenth time. Unlock a hidden achievement.]
[ Suicide maniac ]
[ Rewards: +10 stats point ]
.
Ray opened up his eyes again and found that he has returned back to the first place he visited when he got teleported for the test.
It was only 1 hour from the start of the test, but Ray had died for ten times. He was shocked and vomited a lot during his first few death, but now he could accept death like it was nothing.
' *Sigh* Another dead end.'
He felt pretty strange that he was able to stay calm even after his death. It seems human's ability to adapting really couldn't be underestimated.
In the past hour, Ray had spent most of his death count exploring the plane. Which he came to know that touching the Giant tree was a big taboo in this plane.
He got five death because he was interested in seeing what was in the tree, but after a repeated death without result, he decided to stop and just labeled it as a not-to-touch place.
Now he was back in the initial place, Ray continued his planning for the mission.
" The route of south and west gives a dead end, while the north has a high-level danger beast guarding it. Thus my only choice is to go east. Luckily the death was not wasted at all. With the 10 bonus attributes points, my strength should almost reach an lv 8 apprentice awakener."
.
[ Ray Sanjaja ]
[ Lv 3 apprentice Awakener ]
[ Exp: 230/3000]
[ Energy: 100%]
[ Strength: 10 / Vitality: 11]
[ Agility: 14 / Dexterity: 12]
[ Intelligence: 10 / Sense: 15]
[ Special skill: F-rank Danger sense]
[ Universal attributes point: 15]
.
Even with his 2 years of experience as an awakener, Ray's level could be said as one of the lowest. He was too weak to fight a danger beast and only useful as bait. Therefore his levels didn't increase much, and he was stuck at lv. 3
Currently, he was pondering on what stats he should increase. His Sense was his highest stat because of his special skill, but it didn't really help him much in the battlefield. His reasoning told him that he should either increase his Agility or Strength to increase his chance of recruiting a boss monster here.
Oh, wait. By the way, he never knew how he should recruit a boss monster.
[ DING!!! The host could recruit boss-monster by gaining its allegiance through defeating it or some other ways.]
Fiuh… Fortunately, his system wasn't a troll or shameless one.
With that statement, Ray was getting more confident in increasing either his agility or his strength.
'Hmm, this should do it.'
.
[ Ray Sanjaja ]
[ Lv 3 apprentice Awakener ]
[ Exp: 230/3000]
[ Energy: 100%]
[ Strength: 16 / Vitality: 11]
[ Agility: 20 / Dexterity: 12]
[ Intelligence: 10 / Sense: 18]
[ Special skill: F-rank Danger sense]
[ Universal attributes point: 0]
.
His agility increased to 20, and Ray could feel a quality change in his speed. He felt that he now could run at least twice faster than before.
' Now everything is ready. Hopefully, the east will give me a good spoil.'
And thus, Ray began his journey to the east side of the forest.
------
A.N : There was a mistake where i wrongly place the dex and sense stats