Lucky Break

After a moment of silence, everyone turned towards me, back to the wolves, and then back to me. I didn't say anything, I was just as shocked as they were! Four wolves all one shot by my [Chain Lightning]? How does that make sense? It's a spell others could have received as well, there is no way its that good and just available from the start.

After collecting himself, Li spoke first. Clearing his throat he said, "I am glad to have you on our side, that's for sure, however how did you manage to do that much damage all at once?" He was still looking at the smoking corpses of the wolves.

Yang had walked over, and tried touching one, when he suddenly exclaimed and pulled his hand back quickly. "They are wolves made of silver! The metal attribute must have conducted his electricity making them roast themselves from the inside out with the electrical current." He said, while turning towards us.

'Ahhhh, that explains it. There was not way I was OP from the start. Although, I wouldn't have minded getting something OP...' Even after that explanation, I kept getting looks from Carla and Li as if I was some sort of monster. It was just an element favored fight for me!

[Gold Gained: 20]

[Exp Gained: 100.]

[Enough Exp accumulated to reach level 2, would you like to level up to level 2?]

[Yes/No]

**************

'Of course, YES!'. I thought, and as I did I felt a warm spread through my very soul. I felt rejuvenated, and even felt like I saw the world a little clearer.

[Congrats on reaching Level 2!

Player Shop now available!]

As I took a look at my status, I noticed I had an increase of 1 to each of my stats, along with five extra attribute points. I thought about what I should distribute them to, when I suddenly received a message about my talent.

[Pick one of three rewards:

1.) Basic Hand to Hand Combat

2.) Basic Bow Combat

3.) Beginner Meditation Lvl. 1

]

As I mulled over my options, I began to weigh the pros and cons of each choice. I leaned more towards the third option, because it was the only one that was really useful to me. I am sure I would have access to learning these techniques later, if they were important to me, but getting meditation early would give me greater returns for later on. I would be able to level it up during my journey and it would become more potent as I leveled it up. Mana recovery would also be much more useful in general.

'I'll pick number 3.' I thought to myself. After I picked that option, I decided I would increase my wisdom. The Wisdom stat correlated with my ability to regenerate mana, along with my cast speed. While [Chain Lightning] was instant, there would be other spells that weren't. Wisdom also reduced the cool down time of spells, meaning I would now be able to cast [Chain Lightning] every 44 seconds. I also took the time to

************

[Name: Ethan Ryder

Level: 2

Class: Novice

Talent: Roguelike System

HP: 110

MP: 110

Strength: 7

Agility: 7

Intelligence: 14

Constitution: 7

Perception: 11

Wisdom: 16

Skills: Chain Lighting

]

************

It was nice seeing my stats go up. As I was doing this, we had put the corpses in Yang's inventory, and been walking deeper into the forest. We were only going around trying to find any important landmarks. Along the way we found a small stream, where we would be able to gather drinking water. We had tasted the water and it was more pure than most tap water. It must have been an effect of the mana purifying the water.

"We will try and mark this area so that we can find our way back. Ethan, can you take this rock and start carving Xs into the trees?" Li began to give out tasks. I was tasked with carving trees, while Carla began to collect water using a few magical flasks I bought in the player shop. The player shop was opened to me once I had hit level 2, and after perusing it I found a few useful items for daily necessities. I only paid two gold per flask, and each flask was able to hold five gallons of water inside.

I had received the most gold because I had directly killed the four wolves, but the rest of the party also received some Exp for being partied with me. They also received gold, however they each only received two. Li told us all to buy a bedroll, which were used for camping outdoors, and a bento box. The bento boxes were reusable items, that acted as a food storage, however it was only able to hold enough food for one meal.

As I was marking the trees, the smell of cooked meat wafted to my nose. Yang had started cooking the wolves, and apparently he had a dismemberment skill included in his cooking talent. The food smelled incredible, and we all wandered back to the temporary campsite. We sat down, and everyone ate in silence. After which we packed our bento, and put it in our inventories. As we were packing up the campsite, and getting ready to scout the area some more, Carla suddenly looked around.

"We're being attacked!" she shouted, but as she shouted an arrow was shot from the nearby thicket piercing her forearm. Our backs were to the stream, and we were facing the thicket that we couldn't see anything through.

I didn't want to sit and do nothing, so I acted quickly.

"Jump over the stream, and take cover behind the trees on the other side! We can't sit here while they have ranged weapons, and we can't let ourselves just get shot at for free!" I shouted, and I hopped over the stream, I turned around and casted [Chain Lightning] into the bushes. I heard a shrill shriek from the bushes, indicating I hit one of them. I didn't receive any exp, so I knew I wasn't able to kill them this time.

As I got behind a tree, I heard an arrow slam into the otherside. As I looked to my sides, I saw that the other three had made it safely. Carla was pale, and she wasn't looking good. I was worried about her, so I reached into my backpack and threw her a long sleeved shirt.

"Tie it around your elbow, turn it into a turnicate, and cut off the blood flow to your arm. They must have hit a few veins, and you're bleeding heavily now. I'll look in the player store for something that can help." I shouted, I was experiencing too much adrenaline to be able to control my tone, but no one questioned it.

As I opened my player shop, a fee more arrows landed around our trees of cover. Making it harder to focus, because everytime they landed all of us flinched. We had just now realized this wasn't a game, and that our lives were on the line for real.

I eventually found a minor health Potion, however it costed 20 gold to buy. I didn't have enough! I only had 12 currently. I had to kill the things attacking us, or else Carla dies!

My brain went into overdrive, trying to figure out a way to attack back. I stared at my surroundings, but we were pinned. 100% pinned. No way to get to other cover, and no way I could rush archers. They would just pepper me with arrows. What could I do?

Biting my fingers I began to look around again. Wait, what about up? I looked up and saw a few lower hanging branches. I grabbed a hold, and started pulling myself higher. I went higher until I was finally able to see over the bushes, I saw them. Those small, green little goblins, were crouched behind the bushes. They were watching, two with bows and four with clubs. I extended my hand, and casted [Chain Lightning], however nothing happened. Huh? Oh! It was still on cool down! I didn't realize this had all happened within the span of less than a minute. I waited for a few more seconds, and casted it again. This time it went off, hitting the one furthest to the right. I had aimed for that one so that my skill would hit all of them, and it did. I saw one of them drop, while twitching. The rest had dropped their weapons, seemingly suffering from a stunned effect.

I shouted down, "RUN OVER. THEY ARE STUNNED AND DROPPED THEIR WEAPONS! GOBLINS, FIVE ALIVE!"

Li and Yang immediately rushed out from behind cover, and ran to the opposite side. When they got there they both picked up a club, and began to hit the goblins with them. The goblins began to recover from their stun, but it was already too late for them.

"Wait! Leave two barely alive. Carla, come here. Kill these two, maybe leveling up will heal you." Li said. Carla came staggering over after, and Yang ran over to assist her. Helping her cross, and giving her his club. We stood close by, just in case something happened, however nothing did. Only the low meat packing sounds rang through the forest. Thud after thud, until the goblins finally died by Carla's hand. When she finished the second one off, a light covered her and she leveled up. The arrow disintegrated from within her arm, and the wound began to close up.

We all blew a sigh of relief. Carla was still pale, but she was breathing much better. She no longer looked injured, but the blood loss definitely took a toll on her. We started to pick up the weapons, and we decided to head back to the town to rest for the night. We were now aware of how dangerous this forest really was. We were not prepared for to fight with our lives on the line. We had over estimated our new powers, currently we were just hatchlings and weren't prepared to defend ourselves.

Humans were too weak biologically, and now we were thrust out into the world without tools. The silver lining of today: we had acquired a few weapons. Yang and I had clubs, two each, while Carla and Li had bows. They would need practice, and we would need to craft arrows, but it was better than our firsts.

As we made our way back, the group was communicating more. We clearly were on guard, however we didn't forget to communicate. We smoothly made it back, with Carla helping us avoid run ins with more goblins. It seemed they were moving out of the forest, which made me believe that they were all coming from a central point, and that we should consider the forest as a type of spawn point for the monsters. The others listened, and nodded in agreement. I was the only one who had experience playing a lot of games, and so they respected my opinion a lot. When we came back, we decided we would all stay in the same building, in the same room. Taking turns being on guard, we barricaded the entrance, and the first night began. It was stressful, and everyone was worried however after a few minutes of silence, everyone began to drift off from exhaustion.

After two hours, my shift was up and I woke up Li. The young Chinese master begrudgingly got up and took his post. As soon as my head hit my bedroll, I fell asleep. Letting everything that happened wash away.