Chapter 43: Chapter. 43: The Secrets of Piercing, Sort of

Hours passed as I journeyed to the mountains. The forest had grown to feel quiet, though it was simply a feeling. Ever since the star-rain had stopped, things felt much more silent, even though the actual sounds hadn’t really changed. It was a weird feeling. I used my spare time to make arrows, ending up with a total of eleven. I tried to keep my mana full for now, and I didn’t want to transform mana potions into arrows just yet. In the meantime I had made some changes to my status after a lot of deliberation.

Name: Blair | Level: 14

Race: ??? (E-Grade)

Feats: [Lone Survivor], [Bottomless Ambition]

Basic skills: Universal Understanding (NaN),

Universal Inquiry (NaN)

Free attribute points: 0

VIG: 35 | END: 36 |

STR: 30 | AGI: 41 |

PER: 38 | WIS: 34 |

Skills: [Proficient Archery (Passive Uncommon)], [Explosive Shot (Rare)], [Power Draw (Uncommon)], [Penumbral Instinct (Rare Passive)]

Attunements: Dark plants (I)

Prime Currency: 100

My stats were finally looking balanced, though I was unsure if putting all points into wisdom was the right move. But at least for now I could fire five explosive shots instead of four, which was nice. My mana regeneration also seemed to be a bit faster after throwing all my points into it as well. That said, I needed to level up and hit 15 soon.

Recently I realized it, using the second variant of explosive shot for mobility wasn’t cutting it anymore, it wasn't enough. At the same time putting all my points into agility wasn’t going to help ⁠— or at least I didn’t think so. I needed something else, I needed a skill to help me dodge things. That said, I was unsure about what type of skill I wanted aside from the broad definition of mobility. Preferably I wanted something that synergized with my current abilities. At the same time looking at my skills things were a bit, stale? I hadn’t really learned anything as of late aside from Penumbral Instinct, which was a weird skill in my eyes. On one hand it was very useful and on the other it became totally irrelevant depending on the circumstances. It was almost like a skill of forewarning rather than something else. Which might’ve been its true purpose.

I had been messing around with mana a lot and hadn’t gotten a new skill yet. My progress on Piercing Shot had come to a standstill, I needed to get back on that. A skill for every situation. There were a few other things in my mind as well. The top one was my attunement for Dark plants.

What was up with it?

Asking Glim, he simply quoted what he had said before. Something about learning to use it eventually. In short, it wasn’t particularly useful to hear. The Prime currency sort of remained a mystery but Glim simply said it couldn’t be used during the Skirmish and that was that. And that brought me onto one of the things that bothered me the most.

Feats.

They seemed a bit random? Granted I hadn’t done anything spectacular aside from the Knell Boar, but I felt it was a bit lacking. Perhaps it was simply the feeling of getting two relatively quick and then not getting anything. The stat bonuses from them were nice. Though at the same time, as Glim had said, they were hard to get. Which was also the reason for my quests. At this point I had lost count of how many walking quests I had done. And my killing quest was still stuck on the same progress.

[Ecology Dissection III (Uncommon E) ⁠— Progress (5/15)]

Things weren’t going that great. But, the fight with the elves had helped. Even if the demon emperor made me feel skeptical at best.

Let’s just hope I don’t encounter him. I told myself as I made my way through the ever-changing forest.

◇ ◇ ◇

At some point, I remembered the notification that indicated the end of the Prophecy event, or whatever it could be called. The notification itself was weird, and just like the first one was mostly a lot of legends and less so information, that said, the notification this time around had something unique about it. One of the last sentences in it:

Show your worth to the stars when the time comes.

You are reading story Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG at novel35.com

A sigh left me as I took some rest atop a tree. I had been heading north for quite some time, and hadn’t really encountered much. I now had about fifteen arrows after making some extra ones not caring for my mana⁠. I looked down at myself. I was a total mess, and I still had not cleaned myself just yet. My bow sat on my thighs for now, ready to be used at any time, but that was the only thing I had going for me. My waist was almost devoid of things aside from the belt and the little that remained of my pants, which worked more as underwear.

My torso was not much better either. I closed my eyes. I needed to find clothing⁠— couldn’t I have just taken the clothing from a human or one of the elves? The realization brought me a small sense of dread for myself, but in retrospect there were a lot of things in my mind at that point in time. However, I still needed clothing.

My backpack was getting progressively dirtier but it seemed to be holding up quite well. And that brought me to my belt, I had two health potions and one mana potion on it, as well as the vulpe tail wrapped with the knife on it.

The mana knife that I had used exactly one time. I shook my head at myself, it had been a busy day⁠— or days, I didn’t know at this point. My schedule was a total mess and I simply took short naps when I felt too tired to continue, Glim as always serving as an alarm. I didn’t really get to eat until a few hours ago, when I also got to use the mana knife. It was weird.

I took it out remembering the sensation I felt, of course, at the time while I took note of it I focused on eating instead. Making sure to put out the fire and leave after the Loa Vulpe was cooked, or well, thighs were cooked. I was unsure about what was organ and what was muscle after all. That said the skinning was effortless after putting mana onto the knife. A bit too effortless.

The knife itself was unassuming, its grip was made out of some solid smooth material and its blade was blackened, with a sharp-silver edge. It was streamlined with straight cuts rather than something that was made with the hammer of a blacksmith. But the most interesting thing was the mana imbuement for sharpness increase. I pushed my mana onto it, feeling the warmth spread through my fingers.

The blade itself, or rather, the edge of the blade shone in a pale green light, almost white. I moved it to the tree bark, and the simple action of pressing it against it would cut it. Not much pressure, it was as if it were made out of soft mud. It was what I wanted out of the arrows to be honest, but why could the knife do it?

I brought the edge closer to my face, mana still flowing through it. It was a safety hazard, but I had to examine the edge closer. With my utmost focus I managed to see the edge of the edge, the line of infinity that separated the surface of the knife and the beyond of the background. The sharpness itself.

It was… serrated? Not quite, it had pikes akin to the tip of an arrow, but these edges jutted out and moved in an outward motion almost as if they were trying to pierce the material. It was putting resistance rather than trying to make it easier for the cut, it simply dug onto itself and any material put between its teeth would suffer the wrath. It didn’t quite make sense to me, but perhaps it was what I had been looking for all this time.

I just had to replicate it with my mana somehow, and put that onto the arrow. Somehow. To be honest it was much more complex than anything I had tried as of yet. But the thought itself was a bit scary.

Closing my eyes I made an attempt to imagine how the process of modifying my mana in such a way would be like. Each spike seemed to be sharp like a sword⁠— just like the thing I had been doing with my spear, which barely functioned as a spear anymore. It was a weird image to imagine a bunch of sharp pointy waves in my mind, let alone intend for my mana to become like that. Because in the end, even if I intended it, if I didn’t understand the principle of it, it was nothing more than dreaming it.

A sigh escaped me as I watched the sky, the sun was now up, and the time of the day was unknown. The Prophecy night lasted a grand total of twelve hours, needless to say it was impossible to actually have any semblance of time of day. As I thought over my situation, a rustle entered my ears, though I did not panic. First I had to figure out the source of the sound.

My ears twitched as it got closer and closer, its footsteps were careful and light. They were familiar, and soon my thoughts were confirmed. At the edge of my vision it sniffed around a tree, before flagging it⁠ ⁠— its tail shone in an orange light, and in an instant it whipped the tree. A small tremble came along with fallen leaves, though it still sniffed.

[Loa Vulpe. Lvl. 9]

The deeper in the forest I was the higher the level of its monsters, but it didn’t particularly matter to me for as long as I was higher level. I grabbed my bow and nocked an arrow from the quiver at my hip, the Loa Vulpe did not even realize as I charged the string. In the end, it didn’t even realize when I fired. With a gust of wind, the arrow came and hit its temple, nailing it to the ground. It squealed almost reflexively, its fur stood on ends, but it died, withered away just like the fallen leaves it had felled.

[You have killed: (E] Loa Vulpe. Lvl 9.]

I didn’t quite understand why it showed race grade after death, but that was it. The Loa Vulpe had died. I shook my head, I was a bit disappointed. It had been some time since I had a true monster fight. The fire guardian was strong. The snake too, but I was my own downfall on that one.

That said, I had to keep going north.

◇ ◇ ◇

Chatter. Blistering cold. My cloak offered barely any resistance towards the piercing winds of the rocky plains. The mountains were too tall to climb, it was closer to being at the bottom of a precipice than a slope. In the end, I had found a small trail to climb higher, and found myself in rocky plains that led to more mountains, slowly sloping upwards into valleys and deeper regions akin to a spider web. In the distance I saw patches of pitch-black darkness on the faraway ground, but I had no idea what they were. That said, that was everything in my vision.

It wasn’t what I was expecting. Snow was increasingly more common the further into the distance I saw, but at the same time in spite of the high visibility there were no living beings. Simply wind and the solitude of rocks along with the black stuff.

It was strange. How was I supposed to level up without things to kill?

[It appears you need my help!]

 

You can find story with these keywords: Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG, Read Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG, Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG novel, Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG book, Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG story, Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG full, Blair: A Non-Human LitRPG Latest Chapter