Slowly the darkness that envelops my eyes disappears.

Regaining my sense of sight I find myself laying in the center of what looks like a forest clearing, a small hill some distance away from me. I can see a waterfall originating from a cave inside it. The waterfall fills up a pond about 20 meters in diameter. It's even decorated by a rainbow. Nice starting area.

A panel pops up in from of me

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well... this is interesting, I didn't expect the tutorial area to have a difficuly setting.

"Control panel" - I say

Unsurprisingly, the control panel pops up in front of me. Searching through it I find the tutorial area difficulty setting. There are four difficulties - Easy, Normal, Hard, Veteran. There is a message next to veteran that says not to play it unless you want to suffer, or you have completed the tutorial before.

Thinking for a minute I decide to set the difficulty to [Hard]. Normally I like to play all my games on the hardest reasonable difficuly possible. This time is an exception though, something tells me that I will have a mighty 'Good' time if I pick veteran. I like things to be challenging not frustrating.

Looking at myself I can only say that I'm dressed in rags, torn up and muddy. If I'm not mistaking their condition just worsened when the difficulty changed...

Meh... Whatever.

Picking up a rock from nearby to use as a weapon when needed, I slowly enter the forest.

---

 

I've been wandering around for about 10 minutes now. Grass, Bushes, Trees, a stream of water originating from the pond in the spawning area. Everything you'd expect from a forest honestly. Nothing interesting found for now. Well if you don't count the reddish purple berries I just ate as 'interesting'. It was probably not my brightest idea to eat them. Seconds after eating them I started feeling numbness in my stomach area - probably pain but changed to numbness because I've set pain to 0%. I don't even know why I ate them to be honest. Hunger is turned off so I have no reason to care. I probably wanted to find out whether they're poisonous or not, and if they are , Can they kill me?

The answer is?.... well , yes.

Yes they can. The numbness slowly spreads to the rest of my body. From my stomach to the rest of my torso. From my torso to my limbs and head, the numbness begins enveloping my entire body. Slowly I start losing my mobility, movement becomes gradually harder. About 2 minutes after eating the berries I get 'Paralyzed' and can't move anymore. About 3 minutes after eating the berries I black out. Just to find myself back in the forest clearing. Quite obviously the berries paralyze you, if I had to guess my rib muscles and diafragm got paralyzed as well and I suffocated to death.

Welp.. Those are some scary ass berries alright. Though they are most likely that dangerous because I've set the difficulty to [Hard].

Picking up another rock, a sharp one this time, I go in the same direction. An interesting idea inside of my head.

Tracing back the tracks I left and finding the berries again I collect some of them and smudge their juices on the blade of the rock. What you get at the end is a weapon that is probably more efficient than the last one I had - a Paralysis poison coated rock. I don't know how good it will be in an actual fight though.

---

Continuing on my forest travels by following the water stream, after a while I encounter my first animal. And OH GOD, how absolutely digusting it looks. It's probably a rabbit?... probably. About one meter in length and half that in height, a with two sharp straight horns about 30 centimeters long. Its black fur is completely covered with blood stains and mud. Its teeth resemble a bear trap more than anything and the thing is absolutely DROOLING, looking at me with its veiny blood red eyes.

Well ... Shit. I've fought human sized spiders, zombies, even the Alien itself in other games, but this doesn't really feel like a game all right. I'm ashamed to say that I'm scared a bit.

Obviously it doesn't give me much time to think. It charges at me.

Dodging , I go forwards at full speed stopping right in front of a tree, a plan to fight the rabbit already formed in my head.

It turns around, obviously a bit pissed that I managed to dodge it. Growling and screeching. It charges towards me with almost twice its previous speed. Ready. I dodge it again, however this time the rabbit nailed itself on the tree with its horns, about half their length stabbed inside the tree. Jumping right on top of it to restrict its movement with my weight and grabbing its neck with one hand, with a rock in the other hand I start whacking again and again with full force on skull.

It starts struggling violently, scratching and screaming. I get some scratches on my legs from its claws but nothing too serious. After some good smacking I crack into the inside of its skull, whacking inside with the rock it suddenly stops moving.

After beating it some more to make sure it's dead for good I try and get off of it. Only to bend my legs halfway up and fall. The reason for my fall are the injures inflicted on my legs.

Examining myself I notice that the rags I had for clothes are slowly repairing themselves.

Suddenly a Panel pops up in front of me. 

Huh... neat.

So I can heal faster by eating food and my clothes repair. Good stuff.

Removing my pants I examine the scratches I recieved more closely.A whole lot of scratches, some scratches are more than 2 centimeters deep in my flesh. They are actually closing at a visible pace though. Getting fully healed should take about 10 to 15 minutes. It's like watching a timelapse of a healing wound.

Putting on my pants again I turn to the hell spawn of a rabbit. It has a somewhat fluffy rabbit tail so it is actually is a rabbit.

I have the feeling like I could have used the poison on the rock and waited it out to get paralyzed but whatever.

Breaking off both its horns with the rock I take them and go find a good, sturdy stick and a tree with a peelable elastic bark. After a solid 20 minutes of wandering around I find the stuff required. Could have been attacked by another one of those rabbits but I can just trace myself back from the spawning area if I get killed.

I peel off a bit of the bark into long strands and make a 'rope' out of it. If you could call it that. Tying the horn safely to the stick with the 'rope' I create a makeshift spear. YouChube tutorials on making makeshift spears is lyfe. Thank you Primitive Technologies.

The other horn I put inside the single pocket I have on the rags. To use as a piercing knife

"I'd Like to make a shield but I dont think I can make anything that will be capable of resisting the attack of these hell-spawn rabbits." - I say out loud

"Oh well~ lets continue this little adventure."

---

 

Relatively an hour later .My kill count is 5 rabbits. My strategy is to basically make them nail themselves on a tree, and I stab them on the side with the spear. They start struggling violently, injuring themselves more and more on with the spear inside of them until they die. They can't really get to me since the spear keeps them at a safe enough distance away from me.

I did actually make a small campfire to test out how much cooked hell rabbit meat heals you. Scratching myself with one their claws I waited and counted how much time it will take for the wound to heal. The answer is 4 minutes. Eating a bit of rabbit meat. The same wound heals for 3 and a half minutes. Eating a whole bunch of rabbit meat, the wound heals for about 3 minutes.

In conclusion. The amount you heal depends on how much you eat. But it caps out at a certain point. I don't know if the type of food changes how much you heal though... I'll find out eventually I guess. Oh yeah the rabbit meat was surprisingly good, I love it. Would try again. Good thing that I know how to butcher animals, random YouChube videos saving the day once again.

Continuing walking down the small stream of water from the spawn area I notice that it enters a small cave. The cave has a somewhat big entrance. About two meters in height and three in width. Also, I discover something very worrying - foot prints. More precisely prints that are twice as big as the palm of my hand. Again my bountiful experience proves useful, since it helps me identify what kind of creature they're from.

Wolves... I think I just walked myself right up to a wolf den. I don't like that I prove right as well. Immediatly after, an absolutely massive creature jumps out of the cave. It's in fact so big that it has to crouch down just to get out of the cave. It has a grayish - white fur and a pair of mean yellow eyes. Fangs as big as those of a sabertooth, its hind legs are probably thicker than my waist.

Luckily though immediatly after coming out of the cave it leaves in the opposite direction. It somehow didn't notice me hiding in the bushes and did not manage to pick up my scent - to my fortune. Would have been really bummed out If I died after walking for so long.

 

"...."

 

Yeaaaaaaaaaaah...... how about no? No way I'm fighting that thing, atleast for now I guess. I need to at the very least find how to cast magic first.

Not wanting to stick around and get my neck snapped by the jaws of an angry wolf I slowly leave in the very opposite direction of where the 'King of the forest' went.

---

 

I resume my cycle of exploring and killing hell - spawn rabbits. I'd take their horns since I can probably sell them for good money. But I have nowhere to store them so I just leave them there. Atleast fighting them is good practice. Its actually surprising that the only creature i've discovered up to this point is this rabbit creature... and that massive wolf of course.

Continuing forwards on my way I actually discover a small dirt road. Its somewhat large - enough for a carriage travel along it. Examining the road closer I try to find some footprints or anything that can point to whether I'm supposed to go left or right. I do examine it but fail to find anything. much to my displeasure.

Leaving my fate to luck I pick a direction and start walking....

 

Not even a minute after the direction is chosen I hear a scream. Startled I break from the road and hide to the side.

Inside the foilage I advance forwards, only to notice a family - woman and a man with a kid all from the draconian race getting circled around by three wolves. The man has some kind of an axe and is swinging it around to scare the wolves, while the woman is hugging the child.

 

So.. I have the choice of saving them and probably failing, miserably dying. These are three wolves after all probably stronger than the rabbits, and it doesn't look like the farmer dude is gonna be of help. Even If I don't save them the wolves are still gonna pick up my scent, follow me and kill me anyways. At least they look like regular wolves unlike the other one.

Maybe I can sneak attack them and scare them into running away. I cannot really think of a better plan at the moment.

I slowly advance forwards, being careful not to step on a tree branch or something similar - stereotypical fuck up. The wolves seem to try and slowly bite into the villagers one at a time and slowly wear them out. They haven't noticed me yet.

I burst forward at full speed and stab my spear deeply into the thigh of the wolf in front of me. Its startled and jumps up and away from me. Not wanting to give it time and realize whats going on I remove the horn located inside of my pocket and lunge forwards and stab it directly into its eye. To my surprise, and much to my fortune the horn sinks in deeply into the eye, and reaches the brain, killing the wolf.

The time it took from the start of the attack to me killing it is about 3 seconds, not really giving a lot of time to the other two wolves to react. The family also seems a bit stunned by my act though probably not because I'm so good as for me just scaring them. Quickly removing my spear from the wolf I turn to face the other two. It appears I wasn't fast enough though as one of them bites into my leg. The farmer does a good job of keeping the second one at bay for now though.

"You two run forwads! We'll deal with these" - I hear him say. He has a deep, macho voice.

The woman and the kid start runing away from us after his words. I remember the direction In case I die.

Picking the berry juice covered rock that was also in my pocket I start smacking the wolf into the eyes. That causes it to let go of my leg and make some distance between us. Only giving me a chance to stab it with the spear into the chest area. The wolf starts struggling, though he shares the same fate as the hell - spawn rabbits and dies after grinding down his organs with the spear.

"GRaaaaaaAAAAAAAh" - I hear the villager's cry of pain. Looks like thats as long as this guy can hold out.

He's fallen over and the wolf is crunching into his hand, creating some not very nice sounds. Looks like he dropped his axe to the side.

"AaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaAHHHHgHHHH"

Going forwards as much as my injured leg will allow me I unleash an autistic battle cry to try and get it to back off. Grabbing the Axe on the ground I go forwards and....

The wolf actually backs off. Observing me for a couple of seconds the It runs off and dissapears into the forest.

"Is that thing gone?" I hear the voice of the villager behind me.

"Yea, I think the wolf got scared and left. I'm not eager to stay and find out though. Can you walk?" - I respond

"Yes I can, come on lets return to the village"

"Wait a second let me get back my spear"

I hand him back his axe and go retrieve back my spear and horn from the corpes of the dead wolves. The spear is a quite worn out but it's better to have it rather than being unarmed.

"Here, eat this bread. It will heal your wounds faster"

The guy hands me a piece of bread which I eat, the wound should heal In about 15 minutes.

"Whats your name? I don't think I've seen you before around these parts."

Actually now that I think about it I haven't really decided what name I want to go by with the NPCs.

"The name is Ragnar, Yours?"

"Names Philip, I'm a carpenter and lumberer. Thank you for helping us out, I don't want to imagine what would have happened if you didn't"

"No proplem, can you give me a shoulder and help me walk until the wound heals"

"Sure"

---

 

After the wound heals and I am capable of walking by myself we start running on the road, trying to catch up with the guys family.

I mention "Why would you be walking on the road when there are wolves that can attack you?" - slightly panting.

Philip says "The problem is that this is the first time I've heard of wolves attacking the people walking on the roads. Normally when you meet a wolf they'd just avoid you and continue on their way." - damn dude , such a long phrase and you haven't even started breathing heavily.

He continues "What troubles me however is how skinny and weak those wolves were."

"They were skinny?"

"Yes, they were very skinny. Normally they should have about twice as much muscle as they had today. And someone of our strength shouldn't be capable of defeating even one of them."

"..."

I don't know what to say honestly, what kind of wolves are these, Body builder wolves?! Holy hell!

Philips continues "We should ask the village magician he'd probably know what's going on, come on we're almost there"

After a bit more running we encounter some armed men going the opposite direction of us. They all happen to be of the draconian race.

One of them shouts - "HALT!"

The two of us stop in place.

"Philip is that you?" - one of the armed men calls out

"I am, George, did my family manage to reach the village?"

This 'George' guy Is a man thats stands at about 2 meters in height with so much muscle you'd think his armor might rip apart. He has brown eyes and short chestnut colored hair with thick ram horns of the same color.

"They did alright, you have absolutely no idea how freaked out your wife was, she started screaming at us to save you before she even entered the village"

Philips expression seems to relax, after hearing these words.

"And who's your friend?" - The man called George points his chin at me.

"Aye, he helped me out of my predicament with the wolves. His name is Ragnar."

George looks me up and down then asks 

"What's up with your clothes, you look like you rolled in the mud for a full day"

"To be honest those words are probably closer to the truth than not, I've been lost in this damn forest for about a week now" - I say that while "nervously" scratching the back of my head

Of course what I just said is absolute bullshit, but it's not like he can find out I have lied can he? I think it's a good enough story to cover my background for now.

"Is that so?"

George raises an eyebrow, he comes closer to me and towers over me, trying to intimidate me. He gives me the same feeling Ira Gamagori from an interesting old anime is supposed to give me.

I just act 'meekly' for a bit.

Now that I think about it I probably look like an escaped criminal don't I?

"Well whatever, come on lets get you two to the village. You can tell the village chief your story."

He steps back, away from me.

At least he will let me enter the village. For a moment I thought he'd just tell me to turn around and leave. At worse even chain me up.

"MEN!" - George shouts at the top of his lungs

"WE'RE GOING BACK TO THE VILLAGE, SQUARE FORMATION OFFER THESE GUYS PROTECTION"

The soldiers surround us and form the shape of a square around us, at a surprising speed for some random village.

"FORWARDS!" George yells.

...........................

............

.....

..

After walking down the road for some time we reach the village.

It has solid stone walls. By solid I mean SOLID. Its like they've been carved out from a single piece of stone, there arent bricks or anything of the sort, just a smooth three meter tall wall.

By looking at It from a far I can guess there are about enough buildings for ~200 families, thats around 500 to 1500 people, though that would depend on the birth rates of the draconians, which I am not too sure are like those of humans.

We approach the gates of the village

 

........ Nice!