XII

  Peck. Peck. Peck… Peck.

  Kaz woke up with a start as a sharp pain went through his forehead. He quickly covered it and his eyes shot open. Staring at him straight in the eyes were red eyes. The bird was quite large for a bird, but it was beautiful. It had a set of feathers that were dark red, almost matching the color of maroon, and had black tips, making it look like it had scales instead of feathers. Startled as he was, he tried to slap the bird out of the way. The bird deftly dodged him and pecked him in the head, an exposed area he wasn’t able to cover with his hand. He winced and swung again at the bird. But this time, he lost his balance and fell out of the tree.

  He yelped as he was falling to the ground, trying to shift himself midair to brace his fall. For some reason, his instincts yelled at him to activate his mana to break his fall. He hit the ground hard, feeling immense pain as he landed straight on his chest. The wind was knocked out of him, again, and he just lay there, slightly imprinted into the not so soft grass. There was no mana cushion waiting for him. At least he didn’t break any bones, or at least it didn’t feel like it.

  Chirping noises came from above him. He slowly looked up, and what he saw made him want to hide in a hole. The bird was looking down on him, red eyes glinting mischievously, as it bobbed up and down, chirping at him. The bird was laughing at him!

  His ears turned red, and he huffed, getting onto his feet. He cast [ Mana Burst ], and the mana projectile shot towards the bird. The bird stopped chirping and merely sidestepped his attack. The ball of mana just flew off into the distance. The bird just tsked at him and turned away from him, disappointed that Kaz tried to attack it with such a weak attack.

  Kaz, with more embarrassment than anger, decided to head back to the road and continue on his journey to Sarus. It took him quite a while, but he managed to find the road, after losing his direction quite a few times. Unsure whether he should head left or right, he waited until someone came along the road.

  Sitting in the grass along the road, he played around with his [ Archive ], trying to find out if he could do anything with it. He would ask it random questions, like what was the best way to find more Abilities? No answer. How to improve his current Abilities? No answer. Could he be given a Quest to find some loot? No answer.

  As he was idling around, a wagon finally appeared in the distance. He waved it down, and the wagon slowed to a halt, a relatively old man guiding his ox to a gentle stop. The wagon had no canvas covering, so he was able to see the small amount of produce he had in the back. He must’ve been a Farmer or maybe just a simple Transporter.

  Kaz spoke first, “Hello sir. Sorry to make you stop for me. My name is Kaz, and I am on my way to Sarus. Could you tell me which direction to head in? I got lost in the woods and I am not so sure on where to go.”

  The old man nodded and simply replied, pointing behind him, “No worries at all. Sarus is back that way. Stay safe now.”

  Thanking the old man, Kaz walked in the direction he pointed. He heard the old man command his ox to go forward, and with reluctance, the wagon creaked out as it got moving again. The poor guy needed to get his wagon checked out.

  As he continued his journey, he kept on attacking whatever he could. He ran into slimes practically all the time. Thankfully, none of them were to the power of the big dark green slime he ran into, but at the same time, he was becoming bored. The slimes provided almost no challenge for him, and the crystals they dropped were so pitiful.

  What also put him in an even worse mood, was that he wasn’t Ranking his [ Mana Burst ]. It seemed as if the Rank had stagnated at Rank 9. Was it possibly because of how easy it was for him now? It would make sense, as he got a massive boost to his Rank when he defeated that wolf, which was undoubtedly quite a few tiers of Resonance ahead of him. It was then that he wondered if there was any way to find out the Resonance of monsters. It would be very helpful to find out the threat level of them, which would help him decide if he should attack them or not.

  In response to this, his [ Archive ] opened. It was the same format as the time it would announce something to him. He waited for the gold lettering to settle and turn black. It read:

  The power of Analyze awakens only after one undergoes their first Revelation, granting them the ability to discern enemies or friendlies through a system of color based on Resonance compared to their tier. More details when Analyze is unlocked.

  So, it did provide answers! But that was an interesting discovery. Would it occupy one of his Passive Abilities, or would it be something separate? It made him even more excited, but unfortunately for him, reaching his first Revelation once he achieved 50 Resonance seemed so far away from him, especially since he was just at 5 Resonance, and he doubted he would have fights that granted him huge progress to his Resonance like last night.

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  After fighting each slime he ran across, he would take a moment to channel his Ability, [ Mana Regeneration ], trying to get it to Rank up. He managed to get it to Rank 5 after many hours that day. And just like that, the sun was setting, and the forest was becoming dark. He was a lot more tired today, as his restless night of sleep and the great distance he traveled added to his fatigue. He found himself a tree, and hoped for a good night of rest.

  Waking up the next morning, he felt fully rested, and thankfully, not being disturbed by any rude birds. He climbed down the tree gracefully and continued on his journey. While he took out his fifth slime of that day, he noticed something in the shrubs. It shifted as out came a greyish brown hedgehog. He read about these in his guide from the Adventurer’s Guild, and they were called Woodspike Hedgehogs, because their quills would often blend into the forest around them, and their quills were as sharp as wooden spikes. They were usually highly dangerous, but only if you walked into their territory.

  Which is what Kaz precisely seemed to do, as the hedgehog tensed his body, raising his quills up in preparation to attack. He backed up slowly and then stood at a distance. The hedgehog seemed to loosen its tension, until a mana projectile hit it straight in the face.

  Kaz cast [ Mana Burst ] while the hedgehog’s defense was low. This angered the hedgehog, who clicked its teeth and started advancing towards him. It wasn’t necessary quick, but it shuffled side to side, trying to keep its spikes pointed toward him. He quickly cast another round of [ Mana Burst ], and to his dismay, the mana seemed to get caught in the quills, and he guessed it didn’t affect the hedgehog, as it didn’t flinch or react to it in any way. He began casting again, this time, trying to shape his mana into more of a sharp pointed shape, in order to increase his accuracy. His mana came out flatter and sightly pointed but calling it a shape was still a compliment.

  It struck the hedgehog in the head, which caused it to stagger a bit from the attack. Something clicked in his head, and something pulsed deep within his mind. He must’ve Ranked up his Ability. He grinned and began his casting again. In the middle of his casting, he heard a whistling noise and felt a slight breeze blow over him. He stopped his casting, wondering what happened. Then he felt many tiny pricks of pain across his body. He looked down, and dozens of quills were stabbed into his body, spread across his chest and legs.

  He tried to shrug it off, but every movement agitated the quills, causing him small pricks of pain. It distracted him enough, where the hedgehog got quite close to him, and his casts were taking double their usual time, as it was hard for him to focus on channeling his mana. He cast and shot another [ Mana Burst ] at the hedgehog, and it being so close, it couldn’t dodge this attack. It hit it straight in the head, causing the hedgehog to roll onto its side. Kaz quickly started his cast again, and shot his mana at the hedgehog, but the hedgehog rolled into a ball, absorbing the hit like it was nothing.

  It remained in that ball for some time, with Kaz panting, waiting for it to come out. Occasionally it would shoot out more quills, but with Kaz waiting quite a distance away, he managed to stay out of those pesky quills. He decided to start removing the quills that impaled him earlier, causing him to yelp as the sharp points cut his skin on the way out.

  The hedgehog finally unraveled itself slightly, scouting the area to see if his enemy had left, but was swiftly struck by a mana projectile, straight into its exposed head. Its body slumped out, and after a few minutes, the body disappeared, leaving behind a relatively large crystal. It was in a greyish brown color, similar to the fur of the hedgehog, but it was rather dull, probably having to do with the lack of strength of the monster. The crystal was slightly larger and heftier than the big slime crystal, but it still paled in comparison to the Timberfang Wolf’s crystal.

  Resting on the grass, he immediately got into his sitting form, to recover his lost Mana Points. He doubted anymore hedgehogs would attack him, as he killed the hedgehog who claimed this piece of territory. Moments later, when he began feeling uncomfortably full, he ended his Ability, and opened his [ Archive ], curious to see what caused the pulsing sensation. His Resonance evolved up to 6, which came with the usual updates to his Health Points and Mana Points, with Health Points now reading 85 and Mana Points up to 65. He was slowly advancing, but it seems like the Woodspike Hedgehog was enough of a challenge to allow him to progress further. Or maybe it was due to him finding a way to improve his technique with [ Mana Burst ]? He quickly opened his [ Skill Abilities ] page, and sure enough, his [ Mana Burst ] reached Rank 10. Ten seemed like a milestone number, so he focused on the Ability to gain more information from it. It read:

  Manifest a pure form of mana and attack an enemy, up to 25 yards. Uses 5 Mana Points per use, dealing 19 damage to Health Points. (Rank 10)

  Disappointment flooded throughout him. Nothing changed to his Ability, besides the usual increase in damage. There was no massive bonus to his damage, the Mana Point consumption didn’t change, the range didn’t increase. He shook his head, at least he managed to get another Rank and continue his progression. He quickly checked on his [ Mana Regeneration ] and it also went up one Rank, now sitting at Rank 6, which granted him a boost of 6% to his mana regeneration.

  This solidified his theory that attacking the slimes was not beneficial anymore, as their lack of strength didn’t pose any challenge for him. He would stop wasting his time on them and maybe step around more shrubs in order to trespass onto more territories.

  Kaz continued on his journey, running into an occasional hedgehog, and even had to fight off two at once, but each time, he managed to take them out without any more risks, as he knew they would shoot out their quills at him once he was close enough. One hedgehog managed to lunge at him from the shrubs and impaled itself with his quills to his stomach area. He spent quite a few minutes after the fight removing the dozens of needles that were sticking out from his robes around his stomach area. He added the crystal to his bag, which was getting filled up from his looting. He decided he should start sorting them out and possibly start replacing the smaller ones. He strolls along the road, as the sun starts to set below the tree line.

  Kaz, exhausted, starts to look around for a tree for him to spend the night on, until he hears a voice coming from the side of him,

  “Look at what we have here, gentlemen! A small mighty Adventurer.”