February ~ 12!

CHAPTER 12

Grant finally calmed down after a solid ten seconds of running—the pain may have had something to do with that—and slowly made his way back to the tree. There were no signs that Snippy had come out into the open, and Sarge had been working to convince him that an ambush predator like that wouldn’t leave the safety of its normal hunting grounds. “Sarge… I gotta ask, during that escape… did that spider use a spell?”

<No.>

“Okay… yeah, I thought that was just my imagination. I saw-”

<It wasn’t a spell, it was a natural ability. Essentially the monster version of a skill.> The full-lecture tone made Grant groan, but that didn’t impede Sarge at all. <How is it, do you think, that weapons and armor can be made with such incredible potency and abilities? Why do you think there is an entire Noble House devoted to hunting monsters and collecting materials?>

Grant took a calculated guess, “Because they can process those and use the natural abilities to enhance the equipment?”

<It’s because they can process—hey! Look at you, using your noggin! Check your status soon, I think you increased your cultivation a little with my methods.> The praise made Grant glow, and he listened closer as Sarge explained, <Creatures naturally cultivate by killing, surviving, laying ambushes, and eating. In fact, most cultivation methods and skills are originally derived from watching nature at work. Any of that remind you of anything?>

“The eating? In use as a physical cultivation method back in January?” Grant was on a roll, so he was making sure to try and get everything correct. He hadn’t realized that getting a few words of praise from Sarge would be so heady. Maybe it was the blood loss? He looked at his foot, but had to look away again quickly. No one wanted to be able to see through parts of their body.

Sarge let his concern shine through, <You better get that looked at soon. Let’s clean it up while we can, battlefield injuries and the resulting sepsis debuff can lead to amputation or death. Only reason you didn’t get a nasty poison debuff was that it went all the way through, but that has its own issues.>

“Amputation?” Grant didn’t know this word, but it didn’t sound fun at all.

<You could lose your foot. Maybe even the leg if you’re unlucky.>

The straightforward answer almost threw Grant into a full-on panic. “I’m going to die out here, killed by a spider with a stupid name!”

<Get a grip! Wash out the wound and dress it.> Now back at his wagon, Grant sat and rummaged through his backpack, almost cutting himself on his newly-earned blade, and plucked out the water skin. Taking off his boot, he was given a perfect view of the hole in his foot. Without anything to keep it held together, blood pumped out of both sides; drenching the grass beneath. He went and poured half of his remaining water reserve over the wound. It provided little relief, as blood continued to pump from the wound, swirling and mixing with the water. He couldn’t help himself from checking his stats, to see just how long he had left.

Name: Grant Monday

Rank: Lord of The Month (January)

Class: Foundation Cultivator

Cultivation Achievement Level: 11

Cultivation Stage: Late Spring

Inherent Abilities: Swirling Seasons Cultivation

Health: 81/184

Mana: 9/9

Characteristics

Physical: 89 (Cultivation Stage Maximized. Gains will be retroactively applied when all stages are aligned.)

Mental: 35

Armor Proficiency: 45

Weapon Proficiency: 67

Debuff: Incised Wound. You have a large, open, untreated wound in a limb. -3 health per second.

<You’re going to have to close the wound. If you don’t, you’ll die! Pay attention to me, you don’t have time to be browsing your stats!>

“How?” Grant grimaced in pain, as the ground spun beneath. He felt himself fading away. “I… don’t have anything to bind it with.”

<Your new ability, Stolen Sunlight! Does it just make light, or heat as well?>

“No idea, Sarge. I just got it!” Despair was setting in as he watched his health trickle away as blood that soaked into the ground.

<Wake up! Focus, there’s a good lad.> The orders were at least kind. <Pull me out, and lay me on that hole. We need to try to cauterize that wound.>

Grant put his foot on his sword, his fuzzy thought trying to help him remember when he had drawn it. With Sarge coaching him, he activated the ability. “Stolen Sunlight?”

The sword lit up, and the world around him dimmed as though the evening light was draining away. He hissed as the blade heated up, but once more it seemed like he was immune to any ill effects from the weapon. Then the edges of his wound started to sizzle.

<I got it. Figured it out. Not much heat produced at your cultivation, but it’s enough if we focus it to the extreme.> Sarge was mumbling frantically. <Designate that as a threat, good thing your cultivation has been increasing… I think that’s… yes!>

Debuff: Heavy Limp. You have a hole in your foot. Movement speed when walking is decreased by 40%.

<That’s not great, but at least you aren’t losing blood anymore.> Sarge sighed and noticed the surroundings. <We should get outta here. The scent of blood might draw in predators, and who knows if Snippy stays indoors after hours?>

“You think it comes out at night?” Grant perked up, and a dark rage started to fill his heart.

<Probably. Not much in the way of prey down there. I don’t know about you, but I don’t know many people that walk into a monsters den and feed themselves to—oh, wa~ait.>

“The sarcasm is strong with this one.” Grant got off the cart and started scooping the bloody dirt into a pile. “I’ve got bait, and I know where at least one exit is for that thing. Let’s see who’s better at laying traps.”

<Snippy is. Guaranteed.> Sarge clearly had no faith in this plan. <Your ability to do anything but run into combat screaming, and run away screaming, is very suspect.>

“You don’t think that thing will come after me in the dark after finding its nest, killing other spiders, and stealing the bait?” Grant scoffed at the mere idea that he’d be left alone. “It’s coming out, and I’m going to be ready.”

He piled as much of his blood-soaked earth in front of the exit to the tree as he could, then washed the blood off him with as much water as he could spare, and climbed up the tree until he was in position above the main entrance into the hollow. Using February Twenty Nine as an axe wasn’t his favorite thing to do, but he spent a good half hour beating apart the rotten wood until he had a small seat that he could remain on with minimal effort.

Then he simply sat there with his blade pointed downward, ready to fall forward and skewer whatever came out.

Sarge had no faith in the success of this plan. <I’ll admit, as far as traps are concerned, I’ve never seen anyone use themselves as the rock in a rockfall trap. This seems like a very Januarian concept… fall on someone and hope they die? Whew.>

“I’ll never feel safe again if I know this thing might be stalking me, Sarge. You want me to have heart demons that impede my cultivation?” Grant was keeping his voice low, focusing on his sword and slowly working his muscles to keep them from falling asleep.

<It’s called trauma, Grant, and you’re going to have it. Then you’ll keep having it, and oh, guess what? You’ll have more.> Though Sarge was being harsh, he wasn’t being unkind. <You’re growing up on the outside, but going through harsh circumstances and experiencing new things is how you grow up on the inside. How you deal with those scars eventually defines you. Are you going to let them define you as someone that is afraid, and angry? Or are you going to define yourself as someone that can overcome the obstacles and help others face them as well?>

“Imma define myself as someone that defeats my heart demons, Sarge.” Grant looked down the length of his blade, which—even without the new ability active—seemed to be drinking in the last of the light. “I’ll overcome them so that other people don’t have to go through this. Just like I saved Leaps in January so they can be free again, I’m going to kill a giant spider so random joggers don’t get eaten. Sure there’s less philosophy in my approach, but I still feel like I'm going to help a lot of people. Quiet now.”

Evening faded into twilight, then true night. Grant stayed where he was, patiently half-seated on the tree. Hours passed, and his thoughts wavered. ‘Lucky’ for him, each time his eyes drifted too far closed, Sarge would bellow abuse into his mind.

Then he heard it.

*Skitter*.

It was quiet, but there was only so silent a giant spider could be in a rotten tree like this. <Hold your breath. Now. Put everything you are into the tip of your sword. You are one with the sword. You are not a human on a tree. Put all of your presence into the tip of your sword.>

Maybe it was the sleep deprivation, maybe it was the blood loss, but for some reason Grant really understood how to make this happen. Just as Snippy’s front legs reached out of the hollow in the tree, the entirety of Grant’s presence faded into nothingness. No bloodlust. No anger or rage. Just a tree, and a piece of metal attached to it.

Nothing to see here.

Skill gained: Stealth (1/9). This skill is the hallmark of the dark, the dastardly, and the desperate. Masters can walk through crowds without being noticed by the people, Saints can walk through walls without being noticed by reality.

Tier one effect: Active concealment allows your presence to fade, and increases critical chance by 10%.

The Spider’s head came out, and a leg touched on the mound of bloody dirt. A heartbeat later, the two front legs stabbed viciously into the ground, just to make sure there wasn’t a body beneath. In that moment of distraction, the tip of a sword fell from the tree above as a gust of wind overbalanced it.

*Skree*!

Critical!

Damage dealt: 19 piercing. (10 mitigated)

In an ironic turn of events, the Snippy was now impaled and nailed to the ground. As it began to thrash, Grant activated Stolen Sunlight and blinded the remaining eyes of the creature. It started to buck in an attempt to throw him off, but his weight combined with the angle of his blade forced the monster to injure itself over and over without being able to get free; finally falling to the side as its health went negative.

“I got it! I did it!” Grant got to his feet, gasping as his body shook from adrenaline and fear. He stood and waited for something to change, but… “Nothing? I feel like I should get a level?”

<It’s big, but it still counts as one kill.> Sarge scoffed at Grant’s disappointment. <That’s right, today you killed three monsters. Two of them you didn’t even notice, and the third took you half a day. If that hadn’t been excellent for your mental cultivation, and the fact that you got a skill out of it, I’d have made you move on by now. There’s a good chance that foot gets infected still. Think you can make it to the next town and get treatment?>

“I faced my heart demons and won, Sarge.” Grant’s eyes were watering as he loaded Snippy up on his wagon. “I can do anything.”