Wyrmlok awakened. At first, he was confused as to why he was on the ground. Then he remembered. That absolute unit of a woman had buried her fist in his stomach. Olivia, the muscle monster.

  That thought brought a smile to his face.

  “I have risen from the brink of death! Now, what has happened while I was out?”

  The six others in the room gave him odd looks. Olivia especially was looking at him oddly.

  “Sorry for punching you.”

  “A punch? I hardly felt a thing.”

  Now everyone in the room looked confused.

  Polondrun, the obvious leader of the group, spoke up.

  “Didn’t you just say you were on the brink of death?”

  “Did I? Anyways, what did I miss?”

  Polondrun shrugged his shoulders, then filled him in on what had happened. Apparently, there was now a clock on the wall that was timing down, currently sitting at twenty minutes. Class-specific weapons had appeared in an unoccupied corner, and everyone had already equipped themselves.

  “I think this wand is for you. Everybody else is already equipped.”

  Polondrun handed Wyrmlok a plain wooden stick, that apparently was supposed to be a wand. When he grabbed hold of it, the system mist condensed into words hovering over the item.

  //

  [Tutorial wand] (Common) Amplifies spells.

  //

  “How boring.”

  He tossed the “wand” to the side.

  “I’ve already got a wand.”

  Wyrmlok pulled out his own black, white-tipped wand. Unfortunately, no words appeared above it.

  “Sooo, you just carry that around?”

  Jet seemed confused.

  “Of course.”

  Wyrmlok stood and began to stretch. While Wyrmlok did this, Polondrun began to drone on about everybody's classes and skills, just mundane boring things.

  “So, are you just a normal mage, or?..”

  “Me? A mage? Bah! You must be kidding! Did I not introduce myself to all of you? I am a magician, not a mage.”

  “... Is that like an illusion mage or something?”

  “What are you not getting, Polondrun? I am a magician.”

  Sighing, Wyrmlok just shook his head at these people's stupidity.

  “Ok fine, you're a “magician”. What are your skills?”

  Wyrmlok raised an eyebrow. Then tapped his chin, thinking.

  “Since I need to survive this trial, I will tell you. But this is a one-time thing. I have the skill [Sleight of hand] and the spell [Misdirection]. I take it their effects are obvious enough from the names for you to get what they do.”

  Polondrun nodded his head.

  The timer ticked down. When the timer got down to ten minutes, the system sent a message.

  //

  Calming aura removed

  //

  Instantly, those around Wyrmlok began to panic.

  “Oh my god! What is Happening?!”

  “What happened to my body!?”

  “Ahhh!”

  Wyrmlok rubbed his temples, extremely displeased with the noise.

  “Why are you yelling?”

  His comment went unheard, apparently. Everyone continued to lament in loud voices and question “Why”.

  “How are you so calm right now?!”

  Wyrmlok shrugged his shoulders.

  “Is this not exciting? Haven't you ever wondered or hoped this would happen to you? Well, now you get the chance to do something real. To improve yourself. To be whoever you want, to do whatever you want. This is an opportunity! You all should not waste it. Also, the time is almost up.”

  Looking at the clock, it was two minutes left until, something, happened. He waited, twirling his wand around. Finally, the clock ticked down to zero. Then he was surrounded by trees. Big trees. The massive trunks around him were at least ten meters in diameter and rose high into the sky. The forest floor was shaded and moist. Mushrooms sprouted here and there, sporting all the colors of the rainbow.

  His teammates were no longer screaming, but just mumbling gibberish.

  

  Sighing, he walked over to Polondrun.

  

  Wyrmlok pointed with his wand at a spot on the ground and willed the spell [Misdirection] to fire. He felt a sudden slowing of his thoughts and then the spell activated. Wanting the mist to appear, he looked at his MP bar. It ticked steadily down at a rate of one unit per three seconds. Nodding his head, he walked behind Polondrun, who was focused on the random spot on the ground.

  Wyrmlok brought his foot back, then flung it forwards, right between Polondruns’ legs.

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  The man let out a yelp and then crumpled to the ground.

  “Focus up!”

  Wyrmlok gave him an extra slap to the face for good measure.

  “Hahaha!”

  “That's not funny!”

  Polondrun had an angry look on his face.

  “Of course it is! Plus, look who isn't gibbering anymore? You.”

  Wyrmlok jumped back out of the way at the kick aimed at his legs.

  “Now, if you want to survive this, you can deal with the others yourself.”

  Wyrmlok pointed at the still mumbling group of people that had all clumped together like magnets.

  Polondrun picked himself up off the ground, holding his sword and shield. The man looked at the group of people, then at Wyrmlok. Polondrun scowled and then went over to the rest of the team, quickly establishing order.

  Wyrmlok nodded his head, smiling.

  //

  New world trial

  Survive five months

  Optional: Defeat the boss for extra rewards

  //

  “Haha.”

  Wyrmlok chuckled. He looked over at the now fully calm group.

  It consisted of Jet the rogue, wielding a small bow and two very long daggers. Cyra the fire mage, looking like an atypical fire mage with a large hat and wooden staff. Rose the fighting monk, wielding only her fists. Olivia the brute, otherwise known as the muscles monster, wielding an axe. James the healer and the poet, a man of many talents, wielding a chained mace for some reason. And of course, there was Polondrun, the team leader, the knight in no armor currently, wielding the sword and shield.

  “Welp, I changed my mind, I’ll be seeing you! Maybe.”

  The group looked his way as he began walking off.

  “What!? Your leaving!?”

  Polondrun seemed hysterical.

  “Of course! I only chose the team option to introduce the new me to the world. If you could, spread the word. And don’t worry about fighting without me. You’ll all be fine.”

  “Well… What are you planning to do?”

  “I’m gonna go explore, see ya.”

  With that, Wyrmlok waved his wand and fired another [Misdirection] spell at a tree close enough to get all of the people in range this time. All of the people's attention diverted to stare at the tree as he walked away.

  As Wymrlok got further and further away, he noticed that the mana consumption of his spell was increasing.

  Once he thought he was far enough, he let the spell fizzle out, giving him an odd tingling in his brain.

  “So, the spell range is circular with a radius from the target of about five meters. Continuous spells increase the cost of mana based on distance. All fairly interesting. Also pertinent to the situation.”

  Wyrmlok was interrupted from his ramblings by the croak of a frog. A startling deep croak. The ferns to his right rustled, being pushed aside by the biggest frog he had ever seen.

  The frog was half a meter tall with green skin and purple eyes.

  

  Wyrmlok fired his spell at a tree to the frog's left. The frog turned to stare at the tree. Its tongue lashed out, hitting the tree and causing the wood to break and splinters to fly.

  

  Wyrmlok canceled the one spell and cast another one at the ground directly to his right. The frog turned and its tongue lashed out again, burying its pink appendage into the ground, flinging clods of dirt into the air.

  Before the frog could reel its tongue back in, Wyrmlok threw himself at the tongue and tackled it. The frog was obviously not prepared for this turn of events, as it panicked. The tongue began to reel itself back into its mouth at a high speed. Wyrmlok positioned his legs pointed forwards, right toward the frog.

  His two feet smashed into the head of the frog, stunning it. He let go of the tongue and dropped to the ground.

  While the frog stumbled, Wyrmlok did not waste any time. He searched in the area for any sticks, and he found one. It was not as pointy as he would have wanted it to be, but it would do.

  “Guess this will be a beating and not a stabbing.”

  He brought the large end of the stick down on the frog, smashing it in the head again.

  The frog stumbled even more, but Wyrmlok just brought the stick up for another strike. This time, the stick came down on its back leg, and a bone gave way, breaking.

  “Crah!”

  The pain made the frog focus, as it stopped stumbling and turned towards Wyrmlok.

  Wyrmlok fired a spell at the ground, which the frog instantly focused on. Then the stick came down again, bursting an eyeball this time. The pain was enough for the frog to pull itself away from the spell and look at Wyrmlok, only to see the stick descending on its other good eye.

  The other eye burst, sending goo everywhere, splashing across Wyrmloks’ face.

  “Fuck! Haha!”

  Wyrmlok backed away from the frog, going to rest behind a tree. He looked at his mana bar, seeing it was almost empty. He panted and sat down, setting the stick down next to him. Bringing his shirt up to his face, he wiped the goo off.

  

  “Hahaha! Time to finish that froggy fuck off!”

  He pushed himself up and leaned back on the tree. Taking one more breath, he walked back toward the frog.

  Wyrmlok saw the frog. It was blind and hobbled. It tried to jump, only for its leg to give way under it, falling back to the ground. It could still crawl, but with no eyes, it didn't know where it was going.

  He raised his stick and slammed it down with all the strength he could muster.

  Crack!

  The frog fell, blood trickling out of its ear.

  //

  Level up

  You have gained skill [Familiar bond]

  [Familiar bond]: A one-time bond with a creature. If the familiar dies, it can be resummoned at a cost of mana.

  Status

  Name: Wyrmlok

  Lvl: 1

  Class: Magician

  Secondary Class: NA

  HP: 10/11

  MP: 3/40

  SP: 7/11

  VIT: 5

  END: 5

  STR: 3

  SPD: 4

  PER: 4

  DEX: 8

  WIS: 10

  INT: 11

  WLP: 5

  Stat points: 7

  Skill: [Sleight of hand], [Misdirection], [Familiar bond]

  //

  “Level up, booyah!”

  He took his seven stat points and distributed them. He put one in VIT, Two in STR, and the final four he split between WIS and INT.

  “Time to move on.”

  Wyrmlok turned to leave the body behind but was struck in the face by a paw the size of a dinner plate. He spun on his heel, borrowing the momentum of the hit to bring his wooden stick swinging around to slam into the beast's side.

  The beast grunted, but that was it. No breaking of bones like the last enemy.

  When Wyrmloks head turned back around, he got to see the beast that had attacked him. It was a bear, with red fur, and it had some kind of red berry growing off it.

  “God! You fucking beasts! You are not really allowing me to do many magic things here! Actually, this is a good opportunity to test something.”

  While the bear looked at the stick in his hands warily, Wyrmlok squinted at the bear, trying to make the floating box appear. And it did.

  [Berry Bear (Lvl:1)]

  “Haha! A berry bear! That’s hilarious!”

  The vision of his left eye was soon dyed red as blood dripped down his forehead into his eye.

  “Dammit!”

  He closed his left eye and looked at the bear in hatred. Wyrmlok cast his [Misdirection] spell at a tree nearby and the bear instantly focused on the tree.

  Wyrmlok ran away. He ran for as far as he could, then stumbled as his mana bar hit zero. His consciousness flickered, but he managed to stay awake. Laying motionless, hidden by some ferns, he waited for his mana to replenish.

  When the mana ticked up by one, he felt energy rush back into his limbs. He got up, went to the nearest tree, then began to climb using the branches.

  “Fucking berry bear!”

  Wyrmlok got to a height of eight meters then stopped, resting his back against the bark, waiting for his resources to replenish.

  In the distance, but truly not that far away, he heard a roar of frustration.

  Wyrmlok shook his head.

  “Haa. Fucking berry bear.”