Night fell over the wilderness and Nathan had once again set up camp. His arm was wrapped in bandages, and he had disinfected the wound at the surface level, but he wasn't sure that would prevent infection since the Wampus Cat's claws themselves might also have had plenty of germs.
Additionally, while he could stop the bleeding through bandages and pressure, the wound itself remained to be healed and would only do so when he slept.
Scratching his chin, he looked at his status and then to the points he had collected.
[Name: Nathan Hill
Occupation: Hunter
Earned Titles: None
Perks: Monster Lore; Hunter's Instincts(+); Blessing of Mana-Yood-Sushai
Skills: Swordplay; Archery; Mist(+)
Physical Condition:
Fitness: +
Spirit: 0
Insight: 0]
[Customization Points: 2.7]
I had quite the haul today. But I'm still quite worried about getting infection. Should I modify the Blessing? He furrowed his brows, contemplating his choices. He could spend one point on his two other stats, see how much of an improvement that brought him.
But if 1.7 points weren't enough to modify the skill, he would have to get more points tomorrow while being weak due to disease(assuming he got a disease).
There was also the matter of getting some more protective gear. Kratos' shield from GOW 2018 was one thing he absolutely wanted to get. The look of it was too cool not to. Leviathan Axe and Blades of Chaos were another. But those were still long long ways off.
Thinking of them, he suddenly had a thought.
He opened up the Custom Order and began to draw. Under the glow of the crackling fire, he drew the image of an axe with various star patterns of the blade. The edge was thin and it's back had a small protrusion. The handle was wood and curved and the end of the handle was encased in shimmering metal.
It was a perfect replica of a fully upgrade Leviathan Axe. Of course, the design itself needed to be built using system support. His own drawing skills weren't very good.
After the design was done, Nathan described the qualities of the axe.
[Bearer of Primordial Frozen Flame]
[Indestructible]
[Returns to Wielder]
Putting all those in, Nathan let the system do everything else and watched the finished design. The Leviathan Axe was ready. The cost?
26,000 points.
What in the actual hell.
Nathan felt speechless. Without a word, he opened the description and removed [Indestructible]. Instantly, the price fell from 26,000 to 17,100. Then, he changed [Primordial Frozen Flame] to [Frozen Flame] and the price fell to 9,850.
"Well, that's something." He muttered.
Moving on, he drew the Blades of Chaos and let the system do the rest. He did change the searing into the flesh part but that was the only change. And then he checked the price.
29,000.
"Yep." He said. "I'm never getting the blades. That's goddamn impossible."
Both the Leviathan Axe and Blades of Chaos were weapons capable of slaying gods. They were strong enough on their own; and were later upgraded by Brok and Sindri. In Nathan's eyes, the cost wasn't terribly high to the point of being unfair, but it also wasn't something he could approach any time soon.
Clicking his tongue, he tried the guardian shield next. To his surprise, to get a shield exactly like Kratos' he would need a total of 1,903 points. It seemed fair enough to him, even a steal. The thing was able to take hits from Thor wielding Mjolnir and could block Baldur's hits; the same Baldur whose punches staggered the world serpent and the same Thor who hit Jormungandr so hard he went back in time.
"I guess that's a goal to work towards." He nodded.
And then, he began to edit his perk.
[Blessing of Mana-Yood-Sushai] had an easy enough description. It increased the rate of regeneration when asleep. Adding to it, Nathan only wrote - 'Increases Immune System power when asleep.' And the skill was done.
It cost him 0.6 points, which he was happy to invest.
[Customization Points: 2.1]
[Blessing of Mana-Yood-Sushai: Increases Regeneration and Immune System Power while asleep. Prevents Infection.]
He still had a lot left over and so, upgrades were in order.
He invested 0.5 points each into Spirit and Insight. As he saw the + symbol appear beside them, his senses opened up. His pupils dilated and he felt.. fresher?
There was seemingly no other change apart from that.
"Maybe I'll see the full changes tomorrow like with Fitness. Takes time to adjust I guess."
With 1.1 points left, he thought about upgrading either his skills or his weapon.
Archery had served him well until now. The skill had been used in every one of his hunts, except for the Laestrygonian and well, he preferred to shoot from a safe distance instead of getting up and personal. He wasn't very durable in the first place and most monsters could naturally kill him in a few moves, so Swordplay was secondary at best.
How much would an all-round weapon mastery skill cost?
Feeling curious, he modelled the skill and checked the price.
270 points.
That's an awful lot. He shook his head and focused on the task at hand. There wasn't much he could do with 1.1 points, but upgrades were upgrades. Small ones would add up over time.
As the night lengthened, Nathan thought everything over and quickly came at a decision.
Each of his skills and perks cost a different amount to upgrade.
Monster Lore - 3 points.
Hunter's Instincts(+) - 10 points.
Blessing of Mana-Yood-Sushai - 4 points.
Swordplay - 1 point.
Archery - 1 point.
Mist(+) - 3 points.
There wasn't much to choose from really. In the end, he went through with upgrading Archery. As he invested the point, a + symbol appeared beside the skill and Nathan was done for the day.
[Name: Nathan Hill
Occupation: Hunter
Earned Titles: None
Perks: Monster Lore; Hunter's Instincts(+); Blessing of Mana-Yood-Sushai
Skills: Swordplay; Archery(+); Mist(+)
Physical Condition:
Fitness: +
Spirit: +
Insight: +]
[Customization Points: 0.1]
Getting everything done, he finally went to sleep.
...
Nathan had another dream that night. It was somewhat surreal, almost indescribable. He could vaguely see himself walking through a neighbourhood. Fog hung low on the road and the moon was overhead, shedding silver light onto the world. Frogs croaked somewhere in the distance and the road was completely deserted.
As he was walking, Nathan began to feel a strange weight on his chest. His senses seemed like they were blooming out into the horizon; everything seemed too real. His breathing was uncomfortably loud and took a bit too much effort. His footsteps rang into his ears like a periodic cacophony.
Vaguely, he could even make out his tent in the dream.
My tent... He thought dreamily. Wait, the tent?
He woke up with a start. His body lurched forward, his hand clutching his chest as it heaved up and down in irregular breaths. Sweat poured out from his forehead and temples and his t-shirt was completely soaked. Now, he noticed, that his senses were indeed too sharp. He could hear the forest outside, each rustle of the leaves and each blade of grass brushing against each other.
The input was too large, but strangely, he could digest it now...
Slowly, the sensory overload began to subside and his senses returned to normal.
"Was it a monster?" He wondered. His senses never swelled out of the blue. They only did so when a monster was nearby. "A monster that attacks when you're asleep? Hunter's Instincts really saved my ass huh."
Nathan thought back to the dream. How his chest had felt weighed down and each breath took too much effort.
I remember feeling a similar sensation yesterday, when I dreamt about my parents... His eyes narrowed. That's concerning.
After he had calmed down, he noticed that there was still some lingering pain in his arm but the worst of it had passed. He was also out of energy and felt incredibly thirsty, but it wasn't as bad as it had been the first time.
"Another advantage of Fitness."
He didn't linger for too long. Day had already begun and he would not be missing valuable time he could spend hunting.
There were many mythological monsters that were described to come out during the night and all, but this was the Appalachian wilderness. As he had come to find, it hosted Cherokee, Norse and Greek monsters. Nathan was not ashamed to admit he was somewhat afraid of what type of monsters he might encounter.
After packing everything up, he summoned his bow and quiver. As his hand grasped wood, he felt a strange sensation travel up his arm. It felt as if the bow was a part of him. He pulled out an arrow and nocked it. The bow felt more stable in his hand, the strain more bearable and he felt like he could aim better than he did before. Well, that was all in theory. Practical application still remained to be seen; but the improvement was good enough to be felt.
That was good.
With that, Nathan was on his way. The Appalachian Wilds consisted of many national forests, state parks and national park units. It was spread over multiple thousands of miles and the official trail ran through 14 states.
In such a gigantic stretch of land, monsters and animals were numerous.
Nathan decided to travel towards a mountain he saw in the distance today. He had already lost sight of the Ceryneian Hind and he was not sure if he would come across it again. Seeing that there was nothing he could do, he let the matter rest. He wasn't about going out of his way to target a single mythical creature anyway. It was better to hunt what came his way instead.
The time passed quickly and he saw many monsters on his way.
First and foremost were some more of those Kobaloi. They were laughing amongst themselves, sword fighting with swords atop the tree branches. Nathan, with his increased prowess in the bow shot down 4 of them and watched the rest of them flee. He tried to give chase to the rest, but they were too illusive. Even with all his upgrades, he lost track of them.
Nathan had never felt so free in his life. Each of his senses seemed to have gained a new channel to interact with the world. His mind was clearer, his thoughts faster, his decision making instant. He could accurately guess which target to shoot, level his bow in a split second and the prey would be dead the next moment.
Spirit and Insight had brought that change.
Insight in particular synergized especially well with Hunter's Instincts. He knew insight consisted of the mental aspects of a person. Perception, attention, intelligence, thinking speed, decision making and all came under it.
Spirit was equally important. It increased things like willpower, focus, magical talent and sense, etc.
It was unclear what defined a quality be put into Insight or Spirit as both seemed to govern vaguely the same domains, but an increase in both that completely flipped Nathan's own combat prowess over it's head!
...
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[Customization Points: 0.9]
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A/N: Comment your thoughts so far.
Bonus Chapter at 250 PS!