-What are These Boxes?-

“Kehum!! Kehum!! Ouch!”

Muto Kenshin coughed hoarsely as he leaned over one of the walls on the dungeon.

“Looks like I am done this time!” he muttered with his voice breaking due to breathlessness. He sported a big wound on his abdomen, which was bleeding profusely. His every breath was becoming a chore to him, and his body was numbing ever so slowly. He knew his end was near, there was no other way around, people don’t just survive a wound such as his. He then turned his head and looked towards the heap of meat laying not far from him.

It’s a green colored three-eyed monkey, dead, with its head separated from its body. His eyes became expressionless when he saw that thing, a brief second fury flashed on them. It was the reason behind his current status after all. With each passing second, Kenshin could feel that his life was slipping away from him.

While leaning, He reminisced about his life. He thought about those moments he had, the people he met and of course the future he would miss. For a brief second, images of two girls flashed in his eyes. He held them both very close to his heart, sharing many memories with them.

“Mom! Dad! It seems I couldn’t fulfill my promise to you. I hope you will forgive me for that.” With that thought, Kenshin entirely resigned to his fate.

Kenshin lived in a very conflicting world, a world where Dungeons and Monsters exists. A world that had technological advance at the same time uses swords and shield as a weapon. A world where although science was prevalent, magic still exists. A very unique amalgamation of both medieval and advanced society.

In his life until now, most Kenshin could achieve was becoming a low leveled hunter. One who could only challenge Level 1 and Level 2 dungeons. He neither had the talent nor the resources to advance any further. His parents were also low leveled hunters at their prime, as he was now. They were professional hunters, although low leveled ones, who would hunt the dungeon to run their house.

But they died long ago.

When he was 15 years old, a beast tide(when a group formed from various monsters gang up on humans),  struck the dungeon they were in, resulting in their death. This event left him and his sister who was only nine years old at that time as orphans. His sister was very small at that time, forcing him to take care of her. Although some relatives tried to step in, he didn’t allow that to happen.

From that day on he was forced to mature early.

Muto Kenshin did everything in his power to support his sister, who was not a mediocre person that could only amount to small success like him. He dropped out of the school and became a hunter. At the age where he should be playing around with his friends, instead, he risked his life in a dungeon daily.

Alas, like his parents, his potential was not that great. In the end, he only managed to get a low-level hunter license.

Even so, never did Kenshin complained about it. After all, it provided him with a way to support his baby sister.

Unlike him, his sister was a model student, awakening a powerful ability at a very young age and later selected by the government to join a special squad. For that, she received a scholarship to the Hunter’s Academy and was now living in the school dormitory. She was also very talented in all aspects of the study, so not like him who struggled even while doing homework.

After their parent’s death, Kenshin has done everything he could to make sure that she never felt inferior to others. He worked day and night with his life on the line to earn enough money for the purpose. To this day he had never disappointed her in any way.

He was proud of that fact.

In this new age, the threat of monsters was very high. As such the government had set up many schools and universities that teach the students how to fight the monsters under strict environments and strenuous conditions.

In this blight filled time, humanity needs all the skilled hunters that it could produce.

But a Hunter’s Academy didn’t just allow anyone to study there. It had criteria that could only be fulfilled by a special group of people. These people were born with an inherent ‘skill’ which distinguishes them from other hunters. The ability of ‘skill’ is what separates the potential of a hunter. This so-called skill is just a type of supernatural ability that a person was born with. Although people were born with it, there was also a chance of developing one at some point in the future.

His sister was born with a very powerful skill, making her potential very high. Kenshin, who didn’t want to hinder his sister on her way to greatness, always supported her wholeheartedly.

XXX

At the end of the day, he was poor and was barely able to scrape enough money for Akari, his sister’s school’s annual fees before she received the scholarship. A few days ago, when her class teacher called him to inform that she was in desperate need of a new set of battle gear as her old ones were severely damaged, hindering her abilities significantly, for the first time in his life, he felt like he would be disappointing her.

On the online forum, the minimum cost of a full set gear was around 3000 to 5000 gold. For a moment Kenshin felt as if a thunderbolt had struck him on the head. That much gold was not something a simple low-leveled hunter like him could afford instantly. Even while working as a hunter day and night, at most he makes around 500 G a month. It will take him around a year to gather that much money, he can’t just make her wait for that long! 

The standard price used to buy or sell a dungeon related material was Gold. It was universally accepted. Every country had its own currency except when it comes to dungeon related materials. Gold was the primary currency used everywhere.

The conversion rate for Gold was also very high, at a staggering amount of $50 per gold coin.

It was impossible for him to earn that much gold coins from a level 2 dungeon, even if he tries for a month continuously. The only way left was challenging a higher tier dungeon. With no other way left, Kenshin dived into a level 3 dungeon despite knowing that it was way beyond his current capabilities.

At first, everything went smoothly. With his rich fighting experience, he was able to avoid catastrophes to himself while killing low-level monsters and looting item drops. Although he had a skill, it was just as good as not having one.

Those with skills had a high chance of becoming strong, but it also depends on the ability itself. A hunter’s future wasn’t very bright if the ability wasn’t any good.

Kenshin was one of those who had a crappy skill, or at least he thought it was one. All he knew was its name, but he didn’t know how to use it, making him assume that it’s a useless skill.

In the end, Kenshin’s luck finally ran out while he was busy with killing low-level monsters and collecting their materials. Although he was loitering around the first floor, not daring to go any further, a powerful monster on the first floor ambushed him.

It was a level 7 three-eyed ape. This monster was no threat to the strong hunters; for they could intsa-kill it. Unfortunately, to the low-level hunters, this monster was an absolute horror. These monkies were extremely difficult to kill because they had rockhard skin and high vitality.

They also had a skill called Passive Regeneration, causing their stamina to refill almost instantly.

But the most horrifying thing about this monster who attacked Kenshin was its partially awakened intelligence.

The monkey had attacked Kenshin when he was resting after finishing off a goblin archer, fatally wounding him with a single claw strike. Kenshin in desperation and anger, with the help of his rich fighting experience, gave a sword stroke to its neck.

Even though it had a stone like skin and high vitality, the monkey couldn’t stop itself from dying from that one strike. With that one stroke, Kenshin had severed its spinal cord. It was a desperate retaliation from Kenshin, but luckily it had succeeded.

Regrettably, it didn’t change the fact that Kenshin was going to die. That claw strike had injured almost all his internal organs around his stomach.

His blood was showing no sign of stopping and was flowing like a fountain. Slowly he started feeling lightheadedness as his vision swam.

‘Looks like that’s it for my life!’ thinking so, he closed his eyes, waiting for the cold embrace of death. But it seems fate had some other plans for him since at that time he heard three bell-like chimes ringing inside his head.

[Congratulations* You have leveled up]

[Skill Replicate leveled up to Level 1]

[You can now replicate any one skill of an opponent]

Suddenly Kenshin’s head jerked as his eyes opened wide like saucers. Three blue colored, square boxes were floating in front of him with some words written on them.

“What!? Am I hallucinating because I am going to die?” Kenshin asked out loud.

[Please select any one skill of the following]

[1. Stone Skin]

[2. Passive Regeneration]

‘What the hell is going on here? What are these blue boxes?’

Unable to comprehend the situation happening in front of him, Kenshin suspiciously touched his wounds lightly and then screamed as a wave of pain passed through his body.

‘Looks like I am still alive and not hallucinating. Then, what are these boxes?’ Kenshin extended his right hand and touched one of the floating boxes. He was then surprised to find that it had solid texture despite looking like mirages.

[Warning* Health had fallen below 5%]

[Skill* Passive Regeneration was automatically selected] 

[Passive Regeneration Lv 1]

[Regenerates 1 point of Stamina and 2 points of HP every ten seconds]

[Current Status*]

[Muto Kenshin][Human]

[Level 5][1900 Exps for next level up]

[HP 6/150][MP 19/19]

[ATK: 25; DEF: 19; AGI: 31; PHY: 15; LUK: 9]

[Unassigned Attribute points: 4][Unassigned skill points: 0]

 [Lives: 0]

[Skills]

1. Replication Lv1[2000 EXP to next Level up]
2. Passive Regeneration Lv1[2000 EXP to next level up]

[Equipment]

1. Common Iron sword (+10 ATK)

Kenshin became speechless after seeing so many weird details appear in front of him inside a blue box with many familiar worlds written, quite resembling an RPG game screen.

Unable to make head or tails of the situation, he passed out after sometime due to excessive blood loss.