Normally, yellow reflective eyes would indicate a nocturnal animal. In a biome where night reigned every waking hour, that information was absolutely pointless. The eyes were rather close together, facing forward and staring intently at Oliver, observing his actions.
There seemed to be no other movement. From this distance, the eyes just stared unblinking in the direction of the camp. The light of the camp did not reach far enough into the canopy of the nearby trees to illuminate the rest of the creature.
Since the biology of critters in these woods did not follow traditional logic, Oliver had no idea if this pair of eyes belonged to a squirrel or to a giant man-eating praying mantis. He hoped it wasn't a new type of crab.
Shaking his head to free himself from the blinking contest he had entered with this unknown entity, Oliver began to ready his spear stance in case this creature jumped at him. Using an opponent's momentum to drive the spear further was one of the great advantages of this type of weapon. It had proven effective against the Multipods earlier. Oliver quickly remembered he would have to go scour the beach for any shells that he had to leave behind during the cannibalism episode they exhibited.
Oliver began to edge himself closer to the creature, moving very slowly so as to not spook it. He thought he could easily stab it if he shortened the distance to it by about 30 feet, but that was quite a distance at the speed he was moving. He might try to throw one of his last spears at it if he felt it was getting agitated.
After moving maybe a single meter in what felt like a minute, Oliver accidentally stepped on a twig he did not see. The crack resonated out into the quiet woods and Oliver glanced down quickly to look at his foot placement. He broke field of vision with the creature for less than a half a second and looked up to see that the bright eyes had vanished without a trace.
Confused, he scanned the nearby trees and could not spot the entity. He listened closely and could faintly hear the sound of something scampering through the branches a good distance away from the camp. Oliver did not want to let this mysterious creature get away as it was most likely a good source of experience points and it might come back with friends at a later time.
He cautiously followed the direction where he heard the sound coming from into the woods. Oliver estimated that it must soon be reaching the stone wall that delineated the cavern biome. Knowing this, he increased his speed while trying to remain stealthy and kept pushing further and further into the woods.
After what Oliver could only assume was close to 100 meters in distance traveled he started getting worried. Not only had he not seen the stone wall, but he had also lost the trail of the disappearing creature. He stared back in the direction he had come from, seeing the slightest flicker from the campfire. At the very least he knew what direction to head towards if he got lost, but the question remained of how could he get lost in such a small cavern?
Oliver could pursue a probable direction the creature had taken but he would most likely be wasting his time. This animal seemed extremely sneaky and rapid, there was no hope to catch up with it and Oliver did not know what else crawled around in these woods at night.
He instead veered directly towards where the rock face should have been and made his way in that general area. He kept his uncommon wooden spear up and ready in case anything decided to ambush him, often using it to brush aside shrubs and check them before walking past.
50 meters went by without encountering any additional creatures.
100 meters went by without encountering the stone wall.
By 150 meters, Oliver was so confused as to where he was that he started scratching his head and looking around. This simply did not add up. He was certain that he was further from his camp than he had ever been. Why was the stone face of the cavern not looming before him?
The forest, dark and moody in the twilight biome, continued as far as his eyes could see. Perhaps he was not in the same biome at all. Oliver had previously come to the conclusion that this biome was like a mirror to the sun-lit forest area he inhabited. It seemed that he had grossly underestimated the mystery this cave had hidden for him.
The night biome was not the same. Sure, his buildings and items could be found in both areas, the existence of his campfire and sleeping platform were proof of that. However, this area was much larger and wider, inhabited by all kinds of different creatures that seemed hell bent on eating anything they could find, and it likely contained new sorts of areas that were not available in the daytime biome.
There was no way to confirm the exact size of this twilight forest, other than trying to find the edge somehow. Oliver was up for an adventure and was keen to find any new resources he could use to improve his quality of life at base camp.
He ventured further into the forest, always keeping in a straight line so that he knew which way to run to if things went south. The trees, shrubs, and bushes were relatively the same as the ones he could find in the daytime, perhaps they were slightly larger in some cases. He came across a few babbling brooks that he jumped over casually. Everything seemed to be quite similar until he noticed the trees started growing much further apart.
If he was not paying attention to his surroundings he might have missed this fact. The trees grew sparse and the shrubs and bushes made way for clumpy soil and moss. Most of the ground was moist and numerous puddles could be seen, the terrain was starting to become swampier.
The trees changed from being the common Billow Willows, Paper Mill Birches and Star Gazer Trees into a very thick and veiny tree that loomed high up in the air. These new trees reminded Oliver of the Baobab trees he had seen in geography textbooks when he was in grade school. The only difference being that these trees seemed almost dehydrated due to the wrinkly texture of their bark. Oliver cut off a piece of bark to inspect this new plant.
[Hunched Cypress Bark acquired.]
Interestingly enough, these trees seemed to be extremely old. The information granted by the scavenger skill displayed they had no real good use other than being long-burning firewood. Still, one interesting thing that popped up in all the system's facts about the Hunched Cypresses was that it was only found within something called "The Many Webbed Swamp".
Oliver was puzzled by what the system meant by the many webbed. Swamp he could easily understand as this area fit the description, the ground being soggy and uneven. He took a second to look around for some type of spider web or the equivalent in this world but was unsuccessful.
He decided to explore this new area carefully, he was unfamiliar with what could be living in this neck of the woods.
He had barely walked 30 meters into the woods when he saw wisps of blue light in the distance, maybe 60 meters away. Visibility was beginning to be reduced as he went further into the swamp, a fog blurring his vision to under a hundred meters in every direction.
Alert, he began making his way towards the azure shine. It did not seem to be moving at all and was gradually growing in intensity as he edged closer.
The trees gave way to a small clearing, the twilight crystals of the ceiling were hidden by the sprawling branches of the ring of cypresses around the clearing. The middle of the mossy ground was occupied by an outcrop of dark black rock that reminded Oliver of oceanic basalt. It was smooth and lumpy as if it had been pushed out of a volcanic vent.
The most interesting part of this outcrop was what lay inside the bulbous black rock. Blue light emanated from different crystals that grew in the outcrop. Oliver inched closer to the glowing minerals. Most of the crystals were quite small, growing in clusters of 3-5 and being about 2-3 centimetres in length. There were some exceptions, an exposed crystal radiated brightly from an offset position at the top of the outcrop. This larger crystal must have been the same size as Oliver's fist. There were two other crystals that could also be seen on different areas of the rock, both of which were slightly smaller but still impressive in size.
Oliver wasted no time and pulled out his stone hatchet from his belt. He had no idea what these crystals were but they would most likely be quite interesting to obtain and research. He swung his hatchet at the rocky base of one of the smaller trio of larger crystals. His hatchet barely dented the black rock.
In fact, the shock of hitting this hard rock sent vibrations into his right hand and made it quite numb. He attempted to hit the base of the actual crystal this time, perhaps it would shatter it but it was better than receiving another jackhammer hit to the palm.
The impact this time made a loud clanging noise and sparks flew as the stone hatchet caused cracking in the crystal scepter. The sparks were blue like the light contained in the crystals, as if some little wisps of energy had been beaten out of the mineral. The cracks themselves were minute, but at least it was some progress.
Oliver began bashing the same area over and over again, the cracks eventually reaching the other side of the crystal and causing it to fall out of the rocky outcrop and into the waiting hands of the greedy, human miner.
[Blue Ether Crystal acquired.]
The name of the object popped up on top of it, the text now a light blueish colour, as if to indicate that this item was slightly better than the other items he had previously looted. The information of how to use this crystal was bizarrely fogged in his brain. He must have not unlocked the right skill or a high enough skill level to use this material properly.
With both those hints pointing to the fact that this resource seemed fairly high with his current status, Oliver started breaking off the largest of the three crystals. The clanging was deafening in the stillness of the swampy woods and the sparks caused bright blue flashes to illuminate the nearby area. After two minutes of wailing on the largest piece, it broke off and he put both stones into his backpack.
Oliver re-positioned himself to get a better angle at the final large crystal cluster, preparing his sore arm to start the bashing once again. He took a step back to really get some inertia into his swing and raised his hatchet high in the sky. Before he got a chance to swing down he heard a crunch and a gurgling sound come from directly beneath him.
He looked down and furrowed his brows, unaware of seeing anything that could have caused this noise. He moved the foot he had stepped backward away from where he stood, this caused more crunches to sound out and the subsequent gurgle could also be heard. His footprint was clearly imprinted in the mossy ground, the center of which had a thumb sized oval object flattened and gushing out liquid.
These gray protrusions covered this side of the clearing, but they lay low to the ground and were hard to spot as they blended into the monotone colours of the night. Oliver reached down and plucked an intact sample of one of these growths.
The outer surface was smooth and anchored to the ground by sticky filaments. He turned it over in his hands and found that it was rather soft. Using both hands he pulled the object apart, slimy goo rushing out as he did so, and dumped whatever was inside into his palm.
He looked at a dollar sized hatchling that seemed to have 8 legs. The hair on the back of his neck started to raise slowly and he felt his veins constrict as blood began pumping at an increased rate.
He looked up and finally noticed a pair of red globes staring at him from the tree line in front of him. He blinked and realized it was actually 4 pairs of glowing red spheres. More of these red specks began appearing in the fog around the clearing. Hundreds and hundred of these crimson flashes began to flash into his vision. Skittering could be heard as trees shook from the many legged creatures that began to make their way down.
Ah. This was why it was called The Many Webbed Swamp.