Lying in the middle of a meadow under a blue sky in a light breeze was pleasant. No noise, no people, no assassins, no masters, just calm and murderous rabbits. What a beautiful place.
One such beast lay a few feet away from me, dead.
It was my first fight, first kill. I entered the labyrinth, stood up to the beast, and didn't chicken out. It wasn't the epic fight I imagined, I wasn't the fearless heroine I thought I would be, nor was the beast I stood up to an ancient dragon, but I didn't piss my pants as I looked into its mouth.
I hesitated, though.
Now I felt proud of what I had accomplished and calmed down, but I hesitated when I had to kill the rabbit. I cried and fought my conscience. It startled me at how unprepared I was to end the fight, how hard it was to take a life. I wondered if it would be easier in time and if I can do it a second time at all, hoping it didn't make me a monster, a blood-thirsty killer.
Time will tell. Time and another fight!
It was a fight which I didn't know how to approach. As I found out, I can prepare as I want, plan what I want, but I can't predict what will happen and how I will react. It was frustrating!
What was certain, though, was that I gained a few levels in my skills.
(ding) Painless Agony reaches lvl 8
(ding) Tireless Machine reaches lvl 11
(ding) Swift as a Whip reaches lvl 9
...
(ding) Master's Shield reaches lvl 7
...
(ding) Perfect Equilibrium reaches lvl 7
(ding) Space Domain reaches lvl 8
(ding) Never-Dying reaches lvl 27
...
(ding) Tail of Poison Empress reaches lvl 6
(ding) Tail of Poison Empress reaches lvl 7
...
(ding) Inner Perception reaches lvl 7
Unfortunately, no new tier-up, but a bunch of skills weren't far from it, even [Never-Dying], which was approaching tier three at level thirty. Just a few more levels and a damn lot of pain.
It was an incredible gain for a few minutes of fighting, and it would be great if it was like this all the time. Though, I knew it was just my wishful thinking. I gained so much because, with skills below level ten, I fought a beast of level thirty-eight. It was beyond the level of my skills, and I had to try harder because of that.
Due to these low-level skills and my non-existent experience, the fight turned out as it turned out.
I sighed aloud at the memory of how badly I had done in combat and looked at my stats.
Name: Korra Grey
Race: Human
Gender: Female
Age: 29
Class: Slave (Master - none)
Level: 92
Constitution: 64 (39)
Strength: 32 (21)
Endurance: 31 (25)
Dexterity: 23 (23)
Intelligence: 19 (11)
Wisdom: 17 (10)
Class Skills (6/6):
Indomitable Will (Passive V): lvl 115
Painless Agony (Passive I): lvl 7 -> lvl 8
Tireless Machine (Passive II): lvl 10 -> lvl 11
Swift as a Whip (Active I): lvl 8 -> lvl 9
Master's Lover (Passive I): lvl 6
Master's Shield (Active I): lvl 6 -> lvl 7
General Skills (8/8):
Eleaden Standard Language (Passive I): lvl 9
Perfect Equilibrium (Passive I): lvl 6 -> lvl 7
Spatial Domain (Passive I): lvl 7 -> lvl 8
Beast (Passive I): lvl 5 -> lvl 8
Never-Dying (Passive II): lvl 26 -> lvl 27
Tail of Poison Empress (Active I): lvl 5 -> lvl 7
Heart of Magic (Passive I): lvl 3
Inner Perception (Active I): lvl 6 -> lvl 7
"Not bad!!" I muttered, satisfied even though I knew the level of my skills was very low. But I was just getting started!
Lying in the grass, I wondered what to do next. First, I wanted to wait a while longer for the poison to disappear from my body. But what then? Find another horned rabbit or return?
"Shit!!" I cursed and immediately sat up, looking around.
In a panic, I searched for where I came from. During the fight, I lost my orientation, and the hills and meadows around looked exactly the same to me. So the question was, where was the fucking platform?!
I jumped to my feet, ignoring that I was still poisoned. Though as I was about to set out to find the platform I came from, I stopped when a frightening thought crossed my mind.
What if I couldn't find it? What then?!
How would I get back up to the city? Nobody told me about another way! So did that mean I was trapped here until I found the platform I came from or the way to the second floor?! Just with the equipment I had, which was nothing, the latter seemed impossible.
"I'm fucked!" I swore aloud, expressing my thoughts.
My mind was swirling with questions. If I survived, where would I sleep, what would I drink, and what would I eat? I looked back at the rabbit's corpse and shuddered at the thought of raw meat. I may have had fangs, claws, and skills [Beast], but I wasn't one.
Has this happened to anyone before? Did any seeker, or a group of seekers stay trapped in the labyrinth because they could not find their way back? The labyrinths were thousands of years old, it had to happen! But no one told me, no one warned me!
And, it looked like I could be another poor soul.
Trying not to panic and think logically, I went back to the corpse. It was a pity, but it was beyond my means to take my catch back and sell it. My spatial storage was tiny, I had no knife to slice the beast, and despite my increased strength, to drag the quarter-ton beast was beyond my power.
So more frightened by the thought of being trapped here than losing a profit, I started tracking back our fight. The rabbit jumped to this place, but even my inexperienced eyes did not miss the traces of where I had tumbled down the grassy hill. I found many more tracks up there, where my barrier withstood a proper attack for the first time. The rabbit left much clearer tracks to follow. Trampled grass, torn sod, and the remnants of poison gas resembling an orange mist got me to where the battle began, to the place where I made my decision to fight.
From there, it was much harder to follow the tracks. The trampled grass path that I had left behind as I carefully crawled through the meadows from the platform was not very visible. Unusually fast, the grass straightened, and my tracks almost disappeared.
For a moment, my insides clenched in fear! I felt like the labyrinth was trying to trap me, making it impossible for me to find my way back, to find the platform. As I took a deep breath and this spike of panic passed, I dashed forward, following the barely visible tracks of trampled grass.
If anyone on Earth asked me how I imagined a labyrinth, I would tell him that as an elaborate structure of underground passages full of traps designed to confuse and disorient whoever enters it. I read a few books and myths.
These hilly meadows were very far from the idea, but their function was the same, to confuse and disorient. Though I dare say that my sense of direction is decent, it was difficult for me to find my way around in this place. Without some form of navigation, it seemed impossible.
If the entrance to the second floor was a platform of the same size as the one I appeared on, I was afraid I would never get to see the second floor. What's more, I was in danger of being trapped here forever!
As I lamented in my mind the consequences of my hasty decisions, I followed in my footsteps or, more precisely, a barely visible track of trampled grass.
My heart skipped a beat when I finally saw a dark circle in the grass a few meters in front of me.
"Yes!!!" I shouted loudly, with joy, and almost dashed the distance to the platform. My ears twitched, though.
A rustle of grass to my left caught my attention, and I turned just to see a massive rabbit rushing at me. The sneaky bastard made no squeak-roar before the attack, stepped lightly as it dashed toward me, and caught me unprepared!
Okay, maybe I gave the beast too much credit. It was my fear that the labyrinth was attempting to trap me, which forced me not to pay attention to my surroundings and to be careless. Subconsciously, I thought that if there was no rabbit around the platform before, it wouldn't be here now. That was a mistake, a beginner's mistake!
Now it was too late for a barrier that couldn't withstand a full strength attack of the rabbit, too late to jump aside, so I did the only thing that my little brain could think of at the moment.
I leaned forward, jumped up with the help of my wings and flick of the tail, resting my hands on the top of the beast's head, skipping it with a forward roll. In my mind, after somersaulting, I would ideally fall on my feet with a rating of 10/10. The reality was different. The rabbit ran under me as I had hoped, but the rest didn't go as I had imagined. The beast was not a stationary object, it was not a table that I was jumping over, it was moving! So my hands, which I rested on his head, moved with the rabbit. As a result, my somersault ended up as a strange dive over its massive rear, and I was glad I landed on my ass and not on my head.
In the movies, it looked so simple, elegant. The reality was disorienting and painful, especially when you land on a rock.
Seriously, though!! Did I have such bad luck?
However, I didn't have time to argue about whether it was a rabbit's skill, nor to rub my bruised left butt cheek. Ignoring the pain, I jumped to my feet, facing the rabbit. It stopped, blowing with rage that it had missed its prey.
Little did it know that I was not prey but a hunter.
The horned rabbit fixed its red eyes on me, and roared, trying to prove the opposite to me. My answer to its challenge was my own battle cry, and this time it was the roar of a real beast and not the pathetic whining of a frightened puppy, like before.
The rabbit was not amused like the one in my first fight but froze in fear. It was the reaction I hoped for. Though I had no idea how long it would last.
That's why I run to the rabbit, crossing the distance in a few steps, getting behind it, and striking it in the back of the neck with all the strength I could muster.
Unfortunately for me, at this very moment, the rabbit chose to wake up from its trance and moved before I could break its neck. My fist missed its mark by mere centimeters.
Cursing my luck, I wondered if the reason this massive rodent had recovered from the shock before I hit it, was because I retracted my claws. That because I learned my lesson and deactivated [Beast] before I punched the rabbit, not wanting to pierce my palm again, my presence disappeared. Unfortunately, I had no way to feel my presence, and the only way I knew how to channel it was with my roar. I did not know if it was just the moment I expressed my emotions, the duration of my war cry, or if my strengthened presence lasted a little longer than that.
I knew too little!
My control over [Beast] was very inadequate, but it applied to all my skills, and [Tail of Poison Empress] was no exception. For some time now, the glands in my tale had been full of poison, ready for release.
Not discouraged by another failure, I created a barrier around my head and let Sage do his job while keeping close to the horned rabbit. My idea was not to give it a reason to rush at me and let it slowly get poisoned.
My lack of experience was evident as I tried to avoid its bite or its attempts to pounce on me. I sidestepped, dodged back, jumped aside, and even punched the rabbit in its snout to deflect its attack. At the moment, I was really happy for [Swift as a Whip], because without this skill, I wouldn't be able to keep up with the beast. But even with this skill, I knew I had no chance of hitting its eyes, cutting off its ears, or breaking its neck, not while the beast was attacking me.
I was too inexperienced, and I wasn't afraid to admit it. After all, a year ago, I made a living as a florist.
So I won't pretend that I was not afraid that I was sure of my steps and attacks. No, on the contrary, I was frightened, weak in my knees, and hesitant with my attacks.
But this was why I went to the labyrinth. Find out my determination, my resolve. See if I have the courage to become a seeker and ascertain if I'm a coward or not.
It was the training that I needed so badly, and to my delight, everything went well. The beast was trapped in clouds of poisonous gas, to which I lured it. I never moved more than a few steps away from the rabbit, so it couldn't rush at me or had a reason to jump. I made up for the reduced vision in the poisoned clouds with [Space Domain]. Though the distance of two meters was not much, it helped a lot.
But I focused too much on the rabbit. It was a mistake! A rock hidden in the grass escaped my attention, and I tripped over it, giving the beast a chance to bite me. Of course, I did not fall and lay down waiting for the rabbit to attack. I immediately rolled aside, escaping by a hair's breadth from its mouth full of sharp teeth.
But I was too slow to avoid its claws!
Never before had the rabbit used its front paws to attack me. That's why I didn't pay attention to them, thinking it was incapable of such an attack. It was another painful mistake on my part! I shouldn't have assumed that, and instead, I should have expected such an attack.
Though I wasn't entirely sure the creature intended to attack me with its front paws. I'd rather say I wasn't fast enough and in the wrong place at the wrong time. So the beast was lucky enough to hit me in the thigh, causing three deep lacerations on it.
I groaned in pain, cursing my luck and the rocks hidden in the grass. It was possible that I overlooked it on the leaflet, but nothing like "Beware of rocks in the grass" was written on it. It could only be in my mind, but I suspected rabbits of owning a skill. What skill? I had no idea! Curse Luck, Summon Inconvenient Rock, Fuck You skill? Anyway, these rocks really pissed me off!
Bleeding, I jumped to my feet, facing the rabbit. The pain I felt was nothing compared to the pain of a torn-off wing or a pierced chest. In addition, the skill that I did not have at that time dampened my agony.
Even so, it hurt a lot!
The horned rabbit squeak-roared with pleasure at my failure, but I wasn't going to give him the joy. Licking the fangs that grew in my mouth, I roared back, and the rabbit froze in fear again. Its smirk was gone.
This time I was closer than in my previous attempt and dashed to the beast even before I stopped my roar. Since I had no idea how my presence worked, this time I did not reverse the bestial change. But my goal was the same.
In my mind, I was still hesitant to take the beast's life, but it was not reflected in my actions. I jumped up and, with both hands, pushed my elbow into the back of the beast's neck as I landed on it.
Like the system notification, I heard spine crunching clearly and distinctly.
(ding) You have defeated [Horned Rabbit: lvl 37]
The rabbit didn't even squeak before its death, and as it collapsed to the ground, I fell with it.
Even though the beast was dead, I quickly created a distance between us. Just to be sure and to get out of the cloud of orange gas. I was already breathing hard in my sphere. Besides, I needed to wipe away the tears that flowed down my cheeks again, and with the barrier around my head, it was impossible. Moreover, the tears dripping from my cheeks began to accumulate at the bottom.
As I inhaled the fresh air and wiped the tears with my wings, I wondered if I really was such a crybaby or if this was a function of the labyrinth. After all, its name was Fallen's Cry, and just the sight of a statue of Traiana made me cry. So what if the sight of a "fallen" beast did the same to me? It made me cry.
The idea of experienced seekers crying after each time they killed a beast seemed ridiculous to me, though. Nor could I imagine Razso or Tenderfire crying after taking the life of one. If so, seekers were a bunch of whiners.
It was much more likely that I was the crybaby, and it wouldn't be weird either. The first time killing was so hard for me I almost didn't do it. At the second, I did a bit better, but internally ... not so much.
To divert my attention from these depressing thoughts, I looked at the notifications, and it was not a bad read.
(ding) Swift as a Whip reaches lvl 10
(ding) Swift as a Whip reaches Tier II
...
(ding) Perfect Equilibrium reaches lvl 8
(ding) Space Domain reaches lvl 9
(ding) Beast reaches lvl 9
(ding) Tail of Poison Empress reaches lvl 8
Not as big a harvest as after the first fight, but not bad at all nonetheless. What's more, [Swift as a Whip] tier-up!
Swift as a Whip: lvl 10
Active II
To be able to adapt to the pace indicated by the whip in the hands of the master, your speed will increase, and it will increase by 22%(20%) → 33%(30%). However, it is at the expense of your endurance.
II - The speed of the tip of the whip may be out of reach for you, but as long as your endurance allows, you can double your speed. But even a slave's body has its limits, and you will have to face the consequences of exceeding them.
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