1: How Does Being Slow Feel?

The girl woke up falling. It was a small fall, but for a newborn sloth, even that would hurt. All of a sudden, she wasn't falling, it was as if time froze, probably because it did.

"User Name Required."

It was the monotone voice of a woman who sounded like she wanted to quit her job. The girl thought, 'What was my name?' She couldn't seem to remember, 'Oh well.' She said to herself in her head without much enthusiasm to think on the subject anymore. But, if she was required to state her name then... "Amy," She suggested half-heartedly, as it was the first thing to come to her mind.

"Is that your final choice, you will be unable to change it. Ever."

That sounded like a threat from the mysterious voice in her head. The girl shook her tiny head, however, due to her being a sloth, it moved at a speed that would eventually become annoying to manage.

She looked around after her head finished tilting back and forth. This time with her eyes that thankfully didn't move at a slow speed. All she saw with the view she had were trees and foliage.

"Ilaina." She remembered reading somewhere that it meant tree. Although, she couldn't quite remember where she had read that, perhaps in some strange book that she read in the school library when she was bored.

"User Name: Ilaina

User ID: 01 09 43 22 81

User's Health: 10

User's Level: 0

User's Skill Points: 0

User's Skills And Genetic Traits:

Claws(Upgradeable): 10 Points Plus x2 Damage

Upper Body Strength

Perception:(5)x10

User Granted Skills:

Speed(Infinitely Upgradeable):(1)x2

Mana:(5)x5

Sin of Sin: Sin of Sloth"

The girl, now called Ilaina, blinked once, then twice. Her mind tried to decipher the screen in front of her, Claws? Speed? Granted Skills? What did all this mean she wondered.

"Now resuming time."

Before she could think any further about the screen that had now just disappeared, time resumed and her body was brought closer and closer to the ground once again. She tried to scream but the ground quickly silenced her.

"User's Health is now (1)."

Ilaina opened her eyes slowly and saw her, what she assumed to be, mother. Mama Sloth had apparently decided against retrieving her newly born daughter and instead opted to give up and slowly climb back to the upper canopy.

"Damn you! You... You... ow..." Her head hurt. It felt like she cracked her skull open, she hoped she didn't, but she shouldn't rule out the possibility.

Slowly and ever so surely she climbed to her feet. With all four appendages on the ground, she was officially taking her first lesson in crawling. And what a first lesson it was, she fell over and over again until eventually, she gave up next to a berry bush full of small red grape-shaped berries.

She was a hungry newborn. And as all hungry newborns would do, she ate anything within sight, that included the berry bush. Her mouth found its way to a branch and she bit a berry from the stem and let it travel down her mouth whole.

"Index: Jorman Berries Added."

"Poison Nullification Added: Level 1."

Ilaina's eyes widened, these were poisonous. Granted, she had never been outdoorsy in her previous life and had never read anything relating to the outdoors or nature in general, but, she did play a lot of MMORPG Games relating to the outdoors. She must have been too hungry to notice the obvious poisonous berries before her. If her mind wasn't still fuzzy from the fall, Ilaina promised herself that she could have totally figured out the berry's effects.

Without questioning it, because why would she, she continued to dig into the berries, slowly though. Her logic was, if it wasn't going to kill her, might as well kill it. It got her through life back on Earth, why not here? 'Wait, my video game life!' She thought to herself after a period of silence in her head, definitely in the life she spent in her games.

"Poison Nullification: Level 2."

When she reached level two, she noticed that, despite her still eating the berries, the bar that tracked her experience did not rise further. Now the berries were useless. No good and rotten, only now meant to satiate her undying hunger.

'If poisonous berries increase the nullification to poison, would me attempting to run increase my speed factor?' It was a thought, one that could only be made by someone who was no longer hungry to the point of wanting to rip her own limbs off anymore.

Ilaina slowly moved her head from the tree and used her eyes to look around. The jungle floor was dark and filled with plants of all kinds, some were probably poisonous, actually, most of them probably were.

The sloth girl prepped herself into a running stance. If she was going to make it anywhere in life, she had to move. Although, moving wasn't the problem anymore, well, it was, but trying to run was the more serious problem at hand. Besides her slow pace, the constant falls and rickety limbs, she had to overcome one more important obstacle: Her endurance, or lack thereof.

For as long as she's lived, in both her lives, she lacked the important aspect of being capable of exercise. So, as a newborn, it was quite tough for her to be able to move.

One minute turned into ten which then turned into an hour. She was so preoccupied that she hadn't even noticed it was turning dark. Darker. The upper canopies prevented her from seeing the sun, but the darkness already seen was definitely getting darker. On the bright side though, she could effectively walk now. She may not have been good at exercising, but she certainly was an extremely quick learner. That's what helped her adapt to school when she first transferred.

'I better find a place to sleep.' She looked around and then up, 'Maybe the trees?'

It was a thought. But, how would she get up there, she had never climbed a tree before. Ilaina steeled her nerve and thought of it as she better learn now or regret it later.

She was pretty far from her Mama by now so they probably wouldn't cross paths in the trees. She didn't want to see that wretched woman anyways, just what kind of mother abandons her own daughter?

Finding the nearest tree, an extremely tall one, she got to work. Surprisingly, she found it to be incredibly easy to climb, was that the perk of being a Sloth she thought to herself with a small smile? If it was, it was pretty cool, but also sad that that was the only good perk about being a Sloth that she had found.

Reaching a point that she thought was high enough, the newly born Sloth had now found a temporary home hanging off of a branch, which she found to be easy, perhaps another good perk she had stumbled across.

Closing her eyes, she hoped for sweet dreams and more food in the morning.