PreCursive

  The tree might but holding up fine, but I wasn’t for how long. The repeated assaults of the bear-rabbit had started to splihe base of the tree. Eventually, I think the monster was going to knock my tree over and then sughter me like a pig. I couldn’t just stay up here forever.

  Making sure to keep a firm hold orunk of the tree so the impacts didn’t knock me off, I gnced around. It didn’t help me much. There wasn’t anything up here but branches and other trees. Unfortunately, the other trees were too far away from me in order to just jump to another one.

  Alright, I thought to myself, doing my best to ighe repeated impacts to the tree. What else do I have? I didn’t have a on; this fug bear had eaten it. I didn’t have two funal arms. I didn’t have any other tools. All I had was my Status, and a few skills that were not applicable in this situation.

  Wait.

  My Status?

  If I had mao kill that pnt mohen maybe I had gotten something for it. Since I had woken up, I hadn’t thought to check my Status…

  Grasping onto that thin thread of hope, I mentally triggered Hidden Amidst the Spheres. I let out an audible sigh of relief at what I found.

  Your Status has ged!Would you like to review your Status? Y/NAlright, here’s hoping for a miracle. I mentally selected yes.

  You have gained four levels!You have forty u Virtue points.gratutions, you have reached level 10! Css sele is now avaible!Would you like to select your css?Y/NI furrowed my brow slightly. Css sele, huh. Azarus and Grey had told me a little about that. Apparently, once you reached level ten, you qualified to select your first css. This arently not just a huge boost in power, but you gained more skills directly reted to bat. Well, I sure as fueed that now, so let’s do it. I mentally selected yes again. This brought up a new menu that I had never seen before in my Status.

  Css Options (Level 10)[Night Owl (on)] (STR/SPR)[Rebellious Beguiler (on)] (Ihornbde Acolyte (Superior)] (INT/DEX)[Rhetorical Fist (Superior)] (STR/WIS)Well. Well, all right. I guess I had to choose from these options then.

  I could strike out two of these right away, I’m guessing. From the expnation about Virtues that Grey had given me, I khat Strength and Spirit were the Virtues of Cultivators. I had already decided to bee a Mage instead, so Night Owl and Rhetorical Fist were right out. I couldn’t deny being curious about what the hell a Rhetorical Fist was supposed to be though.

  I was a little surprised none of the options had indicators if they were for Cultivators i. I suppose I was just supposed to guess based on the Virtues. They only had what I assume were words that indicated their rarity.

  Moving on, that left only two options. Rebellious Beguiler and Thornbde Acolyte. I had no other expnation about how they funed besides their names and the Virtues listed o them. So, let's break it down, even though I had a pretty good idea of what I was going to pick. Best I could tell, Rebellious Beguiler sounded like some kind of illusions css. That sounded kind of useful in this situation. If I picked that, I might be able to lead the monster bap through illusions without ever risking myself at all.

  But I didn’t know that for sure, and I had no guarahat my illusions would be strong enough just after getting them. They might not affect the bear-rabbit enough at such a low level, and then the damn thing would just end up mauling me. Plus, there was the fact that I hadn’t ied a bunch of points into Perception. I’d ied mostly in Intelligend Wisdom. Which, thankfully, one of the csses favored.

  Thornbde Acolyte sounded…fine, I guess? It was an Intelligend Dexterity css, which was fine I suppose. I’d ied enough points into Dexterity so far that I didn’t feel like I was gimping myself. Most of my points had been distributed into Intelligend Wisdom, though. I doubted having points in Wisdom was going to hurt me. But at this point in time, I o sider what could help me survive this situation the best. Besides, I had a weirdly good feeling about it.

  Even beyond that, of my two viable choices, one was a on rarity, and the other erior rarity. I guess that made it just better overall as well.

  Taking a deep breath, and ign the growls of the bear below me, I mentally selected Thornbde Acolyte. A new dialogue popped up.

  You have selected Thornbde Acolyte.Would you like to proceed with this css choice? All choices are final.Y/ing yes, I was caught off guard by the sensation of electricity running up and down my spine. I stiffened, nearly losing my grip oree trunk. A momehe feeling wore off. I resisted the feeling to shake myself like a dog.

  I didn’t…really feel all that different, to be ho. A bit disappointed. I’m guessing that I o check my Status again. I did so.

  You have asded into the css [Thornbde Acolyte]!]You have learhe css skill Thorn Shot!You have learhe css skill Thrapple!You have learhe css skill Thorn Cloak!Okay, I hadn’t expected to get three skills out of g up. her Azarus rey had said anything about it, either. I guess I was just going to have to survive this in order to ask them. All right, let's try these out. I’ll try the cloak one first.

  Thorn Cloak.

  Because I was expeg it, I wasn’t surprised when a literal aterialized over my shoulders. Looking down, I was surprised by what it looked like however. The skill name was literal, as it appeared to be a hooded cloak woven out of literal thorns, hooks, and burrs, blood red in color. Despite that, it wasn’t scratg me at all. Lifting my injured arm slightly to look inside of the cloak with a wince, being careful to maintain my grip oree, I saw that the inside of the cloak was smooth to the touch. Lowing my arm, I took a closer look at the cloak, furrowing my brow slightly. I couldn’t pce it initially in my tired state, but I realized why the cloak looked so familiar to me after a moment.

  All of the thorns and hooks looked like the kind that had been used by the pnt monster from earlier. I was a little weirded out by it, frankly. Were all of these thorn skills like that? Did I somehow only get this css because of my enter with that thorn snake? I guess that was ahing to ask the guys.

  Stopping my examination of my new cloak, I realized that it had been a few minutes sihe rabbit-bear had rammed into the tree I was on. Looking down, I found that the creature was milling around in fusion. It had stopped its assault oree and was sniffing around the base and the general area. It was almost like it had lost trae. Was that because of the cloak? Did it have a magical effect or something? I didn’t have time to think about it, because it seemed like the monster had given up. It turned around and started to leave.

  Fuck that, I his thing. Time to test skill wo. I didn’t know how this skill worked, so I just wi and poihe index finger of my good hand at the beast before activating it.

  Thorn Shot.

  Before my outstretched finger, floating in mid-air, materialized a cruel blood-red thorn the size of my palm. Milliseds afterward, the thorn shot through the air in the dire of the bear-rabbit with a whisper of air. I didn’t see where the thorn hit the creature, but I sure saw its rea. It spun in my dire with a startled grunt, log eyes on my form a moment after. Letting out a furious roar, it charged back to the tree I . Hurriedly, I ed my good arm around the tree trunk again and braced myself.

  Good thing I did, because the impact of the charge this time was the rgest that the monster had do. So much so that impact geed an audible crack from the tree. Dreading what I would see, I looked down at the base.

  Yup, that wasn’t good. The monster had finally mao break the trunk of the tree. It was only held up by a small se of wood at this point. Already, I was hearing the whole tree begin to creak and groan. The bear-rabbit must have known it too, because it was bag up to finish the job with o charge. I only had seds before the whole thing came down.

  Fighting panic, I cast a wild eye around me before the memory of my st new skill peed my arm. I guess I was going to have to spider this shit. Log eyes with the ree to my position, I outstretched my arm again in that dire, palm fag outwards.

  Thrapple.

  Just like st time, a blood-red thorn materialized before my open palm. This one was different than my shot skill though, as attached to the base of my palm was a vine, simir to the vines of the pnt monster from earlier. It shot away from my palm, ging in shape mid-flight, viending behind it. It opened up in a cross shape before it reached the tree branch I had been aiming at. Sinuously, it ed around the rge bran an unnervingly self-directed manner and dug it’s thorns into it. Seds afterward, I was yanked off of my feet when the viached to my palm began to retract at incredible speed. I flew off of the branch I had been standing on, nearly yanking my arm out of its socket. Good thing too, as seds afterward I heard the monster sm into the tree for the final time, followed shortly afterward by the tree itself ing down in an enormous crash.

  I was nearly horizontal in the air as I was reeled in like a fish to the other tree. Reag it, I mao find my footing on a branch below the one my grapple was attached to. Bending over with one hand on the ree’s trunk, I tried to catch my breath and calm my rag heart from the impromptu flight. I managed after a moment and straightened up, still somewhat shaky. Turning around, I found that the tree I had been ging to was now ft on the ground, with the monster sniffing around the top of the tree where I had been standing. I let out a breath of relief. All right, these skills seemed pretty good.

  Yeah, I could work with this.

  In fact…I think I kneas going to lead this huge bastard back to the clearing.

  I felt an unhinged smile grow on my face.

  ……………………………………..

  I panted as I ran through the st stretch of the forest before I reached the clearing.

  I wi the sound of a furious roar behind me.

  The pn that I had settled on was to carefully lead the monster from tree to tree by shooting it with thorns. First, I would grapple to a ree. Then, I would shoot the creature with a thorn in order to grab its attention and make sure that it didn’t start to wander off. I had found that my new cloak had some kind of effect that worked simirly to camoufge, making the monster lose trae once I left its line of sight. It wasn’t foolproof though, as a few times the skill hadn’t affected the beast at all. I was thankful that it did work sometimes though, as it made the whole process less stressful. I didn’t think this monster could catch me out of the air since I hadn’t seen it jump upwards once, but I didn’t like tempting fate.

  Once I had reached the lower-level region of the forest, I had been relieved to be able to track the time of day again. Judging by the light filtering through the trees, it was sometime ie afternoon. I didn’t think it was close to su, and thus death for me, but it was hard to track. I had to hurry. It had been harder to grapple in the lower forest, as well. The trees had been farther apart, and I had o aim more carefully in order to reach a ree.

  I had mao lead the bear-rabbit through the majority of the woods before abandoning my pn once I got close to the clearing, to the best of my memory. I’d defaulted back to the inal pattern of dodging out of its way o did its lunge, made easier by the cloak. I didn’t know how many new levels I had gotten in my Thorn Cloak, but it had started to affect the beast more often after it lost sight of me following its luhen I would get a bit ahead of the monster and then shoot it again.

  Rinse, repeat.

  But now that I was close to the clearing, I had dismissed the cloak. I wasn’t supposed to be able to use any skills with a colr on. If I showed up to the clearing with a very obvious skill-made item of clothing on, Magnus would probably kill me anyway. Good thing my thorns didn’t seem to stick around after being embedded into something, in this case, the bear. They dissipated after a few minutes, leaving behind a hole. I didn’t his asshole looking like a pincushion and giving me away.

  Dodging out of the way of another lunge from the monster, I spied something in the distahat caused my heart to leap into my throat.

  The exit to the clearing.