Chapter 47: Ch87. King’s respect - 2
[NAME: Kurt Blake]
[AGE: 15]
[LEVEL: 04]
[CLASS: ???]
[STAMINA: 320]
[HP: 320]
[VP: 120]
[BASIC STATS]
[Strength: 74]
[Agility: 99]
[Dexterity: 100]
[Perception: 101]
[Intelligence: 57]
[Vigor: 125]
[SKILLS]
[Quick fingers LVL 03]
[Copycat]
[Prying eyes LVL 01]
[Proficiency with blades LVL02]
***** **** ** * ******** ****
"One skill remaining to be unlocked." Kurt sighed after checking his stats after leveling up. "I wonder what it’ll take for me to finally unlock that."
He was thinking of the skill [GHOST STEP OF A THOUSAND FEET], the one he found so incredible and useful back in the [HIDDEN ROOM].
He knew nothing about hunting and skinning a dead animal, but after he retrieved his other dagger, he took some time to lay one of the Direwolves’ carcasses down and work on it.
After a few minutes of diligently separating hide from meat, the system beeped in his head.
[THE SKILL - QUICK FINGERS - HAS LEVELED UP]
[THE SKILL – PROFICIENCY WITH BLADES - HAS LEVELED UP]
[YOU HAVE ACQUIRED THE EXCLUSIVE SKILL – HUNTER]
[DESCRIPTION]
[PASSIVE – Allows the user to intensify the retention and assimilation of any hunter-related knowledge]
[Proficiency with blades is 50% higher when hunting/skinning]
[Knowledge of forests is automatically uploaded to the user’s mind]
[PERCEPTION +10]
Kurt smiled, but kept his focus on the task at hand.
Night time was almost over, and he didn’t know how long he would stay in the Nest, so he wanted to be well prepared for any inclement weather.
By the fire he had lit, he kept working on the Direwolf’s carcass, and when he was done skinning it, laying the black hide aside, he understood why Nikolai thought that it could be edible.
The meat was rosy and felt tender to the touch.
The only thing left was to choose a good piece to cook.
He looked at the Direwolf’s hide and thought.
’How am I going to wear it without it rotting all over me...?’
Beep!
[YOU HAVE ACQUIRED 01 DIREWOLF’S HIDE]
[ASSIMILATE?]
"What?" Kurt heard the words and wondered. "Well, let’s see what happens. Yes."
[ASSIMILATING – DIREWOLF’S HIDE]
[3... 2... 1...]
The hide was sucked into the system window, disappearing from Kurt’s hands as he wondered, perplexed, what the result would be, and after a few seconds, the system gave it back to him.
But it looked different than before.
Kurt unfolded the black piece in his hands, and was taken aback by seeing the black leather jacket, finely sewn and cut.
[YOU HAVE ACQUIRED THE ITEM – WULFIR’S SHADOW (1/2)]
[DESCRIPTION – After being cast away from the pack and having something precious to him taken by his king, Groth, the king’s right hand, Wulfir, learned how to live as a pack of one wolf. He struggled and thrived, being killed by a valiant hunter. His hide carries the power to change its shape, but only upon completion of a special requirement.]
[STEALTH SKILLS PROGRESSION +50%]
[UNIQUE SKILL UNLOCKED UPON WEARING THE FULL SET]
Kurt coughed.
He was shocked about two things.
The first was how things seemed to be going strangely smooth for him, despite him almost dying before acquiring the new stats.
The second was the blatant difference in communication that the system was displaying towards him, than it did towards his other version.
He understood that he was making much slower and steadier progress than his other version, but he was always looking over his shoulder, trying not to rely more than he needed on the system.
But he didn’t expect it to give him so many cool things and upgrades in such a short amount of time.
Not to mention the amount of history that everything carried.
It seemed like every little piece of item, every beast, every piece of grass he stepped over, had its own story to tell.
And the system seemed like it was a tool for him to know the vast lore of this unknown world that the Nests were.
[TWO THINGS HAVE CHANGED FOR ME TO DO SO...]
"What the f-" Kurt fell backwards, almost crawling away from the voice, when he understood that it was coming from his head, and it was the familiar voice of the system, only that it seemed to have spoken a complete and... Human... Sentence? "Did you just... Speak directly to me?"
But the system didn’t say a single word after that.
Kurt frowned, waiting a few more seconds.
"System?"
The only thing that happened after he called it out, was the system window appearing in front of him, just like it always did.
And since nothing else happened, he just went back to working on slicing and dicing the meat.
He didn’t need to go find any seasoning because he had checked if Nikolai had left some by the fire at the bottom of the cave and stole some, so his dinner wasn’t just going to be a tasteless piece of meat.
After eating, he climbed to the top of a tree and got ready to get some sleep.
Defeating the Direwolves and the Diwerewolves was a big feat to him, but what made him more surprised, was that not long after he did it, even before he started working on Wulfir’s carcass, life seemed to come back to the Dark Forest.
At first, it was just a single bird.
But now that Kurt was at the forest’s border, the whole forest seemed to be overflowing with life.
Birds, crickets, snakes, insects.
Now that the canine threat had ended, the animals felt like they could once more reclaim their territory.
And Kurt had helped it to happen.
***
Three hours later, Kurt got up and jumped from the tree, yawning.
The sun was already rising on the horizon, and the green plains unfolded ahead of him, with a single, lonely mountain at the end of it.
Kurt wore [WULFIR’S SHADOW], and immediately felt something.
It was like something inside of him was growling, almost purring.
He began to walk towards the mountain and found a river where he drank from, noticing that its current followed towards the mountain, too.
"Good, I won’t get thirsty for a while."
The whole plains looked welcoming, as if there was nothing dangerous there.
But in the map Kurt gained after he completed the emergency quest, the red dot that represented Groth, the Direwolf king, appeared to be outside the mountain.
As if the king already knew that Kurt was coming for him, and wanted to give the hunter a proper welcome.
Kurt grinned as his hands itched from the desire to hold the daggers in battle again.
"Don’t worry, Groth, I’ll meet you in no time."
And with that beastly grin on his face, Kurt kept on his trail, feeling more and more the urge to fight with that powerful boss that was the king of the Direwolves.
The sun was slowly making its way through the sky, and Kurt felt the presence of the Direwolf king.
He wasn’t near.
But he was strong.
