Beetles flooded the beach. Skeletons ambled out from the jungle, and they made their way at their constant gait.
“Come on, come on!”
Sand hushed beneath the beetles. Wings flapped with deep fluttering. Thoraxes creaked beneath clattering carapaces. Sand crunched beneath bones that creaked and rattled. Mandibles flexed wetly. The air whooshed as the two hordes conjoined and pressed toward Scott, and it whiffled around Scott’s limbs as he braced into a crouch. He still wasn’t used to a sense so keen. His own sharp inhale startled him as the beetles lunged at his ankles.
As Scott bashed, screaming, he danced back step by step just as mandibles tickled his ankles. Their mandibles clicked together with wet slaps while skelton arms whipped the air. Sand hissed beneath the trampling.
Beetles went still after Scott’s branch broke their carapace and dipped in their guts. They were replaced in a flash by others that leapt upon him. Scott shoved them off as their mandibles snapped at him. They were faster than him, and with as many as there were, they climbed each other and his limbs.
Scott cried out every time he felt biting stings clamp into his legs. The beetles weighed enough to slow his retreating dance, and they swarmed around him. He heard skeleton limbs whipping the air moments before they landed blows to his arm, his shoulders, and his back. Scott could not believe how hard they were hitting him. Where the hell did they get such strength!
Ferocious bites to Scott’s legs, and a savage bite on the skin at his spine brought him to his knees. Knife-like stings peppered his body. Skeletal hands gripped his limbs and squeezed. Skeleton hands rained blows upon his back or pressed him down.
Scott felt like he was being stabbed in every muscle. He felt like he was being beaten by steel rods. Each blow echoed a deep thrum in his chest.
Blood oozed out of his sleeves and over his hands, out of his shirt and over the hem of his pants, out of his jeans and over his socks, out from under his hair and over his face. The pain was bright, blinding, debilitating, but it was not enough to overcome his desire to level to great power. To fuck the system that destroyed his home planet. To fuck the system that made him needlessly suffer for a whole year. A whole fucking year!
So with a mighty rise to standing height and with blood soaking his eyes, Scott swung his branch white-knuckled. With chewing mandibles stapling his flesh, and with bones cracking against his body, Scott shattered the skeletons to heaps. He bashed the beetles, ripped them from his flesh, and stained his branch in their ochre guts. They were no match for him. Pain was nothing next to resilience!
60 level 1 scavenge beetles have been slain.
300 xp gained.
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12 level 2 scavenge beetles have been slain.
240 xp gained.
4 level 3 scavenge beetles have been slain.
120 xp gained.
34 level 1 human skeletons have been slain.
1,700 xp gained.
Level 9 has been reached.
4 stat points have been earned.
In the blood-mud red sand amidst white and black corpses, vapors rose from the stench of beetle guts, and fluids trickled down through wet sand. Scott stood red and stolid. The surf crashed. Blood trickled. His heart thumped at each wound. The rustle of jungle flora belied soft breezes.
“Would be nice if I could use my stat points.”
Scott’s voice, although murmured, still echoed in the jungle. He had enough strength to gaze at the jungle’s edge, and he staggered as he turned.
“Recover.”
With his branch dragging in the sand beside him, he trudged, limping into the jungle. The trees were thicker the farther he staggered. Flies dived in his clothes. They wrestled upon his blood caked skin. Stolidly, Scott paused at the largest trees.
He nodded at one that was covered in several types of woody vines. His branch weapon vanished from his hand, and he gripped one thick vine and pulled.
Scott pulled himself up. He kicked, and he grunted. Often he paused to breathe. He hefted himself onto several close branches, and he rolled to his back with a grunt.
Over his harsh breathing, he listened to every drop of his blood that splashed upon a branch, smacked upon a leaf, or slapped the ground. Dried blood upon his face cracked when he grimaced. Flies found him. Mosquitos buzzed by his ears.
Scott blinked when a mosquito landed upon his eyelashes. Through his anguish he thought of his great battle and his new ability. He’d been able to hear his opponents movements. The air whooshed when something in it moved, and he’d never realized how poor human hearing was until now. Could have fought blindfolded. Perhaps with training?
Scott felt that his Lesser Audial ability was a powerful boon. If he could level it up, how powerful could it be? The fact that it was called lesser had to imply a greater audial.
Scott swallowed which startled the Frenzy of insects at his neck. They landed right again. He had to continue his journey, but for the moment he knew that he needed rest and recovery. He closed his eyes and hoped that he wouldn’t bleed out. Not today.
Pain and sound were all that Scott felt he’d become. His body throbbed. Above the buzz of the insects that swarmed him, a harsh fizz on insects permeated the woods from the site of battle.
Scott realized that the radius of his hearing was much farther than ever. He knew he wasn’t that close to the beach; however, the chaotic fizz still put images in his kind of millions of insects. Good thing he was up in the trees. The energy spent climbing had been worth it.
Scott’s breathing relaxed and evened. His blood ceased dripping. Exhaustion made him feel heavy. Scott clasped his hands over his belly. Branches dug into his back and neck and limbs. He fell asleep.
Scott’s stat sheet:
Level 9
Experience 2862/3000
Stat point (8)
Strength 10
Wisdom 0
Intelligence 1
Dexterity 5
Constitution 4
Abilities:
Lesser Audial: Hearing radius increased by 10%, hearing sensitivity increased by 10%, 10% improved stereo imaging.
Inventory 01/10
Awesome branch