The Breakthrough

It had been 2 months since the guild walked out of that town. They had been hunting creatures, day-in day-out, to amass material. They were slowly walking in a direction, hoping to get to a village somewhere, so they could sell it all. Once sold, the money they made would go straight into building the guild headquarters.

Kary had opened 1 of her 2 'Special Reward' gift boxes in her inventory and gotten a 10 gold voucher and 5 concentration pills. The concentration pills were meant to help her cultivate her inner strength. She hadn't used any of them yet, seeing on how easily she could cultivate in-game. She wished she could take them out, but that was alas, not possible.

Only, recently, her cultivation had slowed down a lot, almost coming to a standstill. So on this beautiful last day of July, she decided to use one. She started cultivating as usual, but this time, she held a concentration pill in her hand. The instructions on the pill said to wait for full concentration state and then consume it. It would then boost her inner senses a notch higher.

As she reached her meditative state, she looked at her inner energy. In those 2 months, it had passed from a small stream to a calm river. Contemplating this river, she ordered her body to swallow the pill. As it passed her throat, down into her stomach, Kary could feel it dissolve into liquid. As it liquified, her senses heightened. She could feel the air in her lungs, the small wind on her skin. She could hear the small insects, wandering on the nearby trees. She could smell all the flowers in a 20 meters radius. She was on cloud nine. It felt so great, almost like her body weighed nothing and that the world around her was welcoming her.

She focused back on the task at hand. She slowly started rotating her energy, quickening the river. It slowly paced up, until it became almost chaotic. Although it didn't swell, the rotation reached a mind-blowing speed. Kary could feel the river wanting to rush out of its bed, but something was holding it back. So she pushed and pushed harder until it started burning inside her. As she was close to breaking and giving up, something in her mind broke. A sound, like glass shattering, resounded in her head and energy came flowing from her head and into the rest of her body. The river expanded in seconds, becoming 3 times bigger and slowing almost to a halt. Kary body felt like it was burning inside out, so she stopped cultivating before she would do permanent damage.

As she opened her eyes, she could feel the heat coming from inside her. Her body was sweating and her clothes were drenched. She walked up to a basin with water and splashed her face. She also cupped her hands and dropped water onto her head and on the back of her neck. Once she had cooled down, she sat down, putting her back on a tree. She then opened her stats.

~Wandering Hero~

Class: Swordmaster

Level: 17

Strength: 24(+4)

Dexterity: 21(+6)

Intelligence: 10(+3)

Wisdom: 10(+3)

Toughness: 21(+6)

Charm: 3/10

Luck: 7/10

Armor: 21

Attack: 5-15

Bonus Attribute: 5% increase in training and cultivation speed

~Talents~

Emissary of Fire: Player has been chosen by a spirit Phoenix and has acquired a part of its power. With time and effort, Player has managed to make the power his This gives the player a strong resistance to burns and the abilities 'Rise from the ashes' and 'Fire Manipulation lvl1'. This talent can be cultivated to upgrade.

Pet mind-meld: Player has been acknowledged by a spirit pet. Stats of both parties are shared on a 50% base stats basis.

~Abilities~

Rise from the ashes (1 Year Cooldown): Player can die and come back to life without penalties.

Fire Manipulator Lvl 1: With enough practice, the player has gained a new-found control over its inner element, Fire. Gives the player a slight control over fire. This ability can level up. (Don't think you can start throwing fireballs just yet)

Kary was astounded. Not only had her talent upgraded, but she had also gained another ability. And to make it better, the ability was control over fire. She didn't know up to what point she could control it right now, but the fact that it could level up meant that she could get better at it. This was a new string to her bow.

She tried producing flames in her hands. She was quickly snapped back to reality. As much as she tried, she couldn't even produce a flicker in the palm of her hand. She decided to shelve her experiment for later.

One of the hunters from the guild had found a small village this morning. It was a small settlement with only a few hundred NPCs. But that had no impact on the importance of the find. The village meant they could sell all their miscellaneous items. This meant they could gather money for the guild HQ. They needed 30 gold for the building. Kary had promised to use the 10 gold voucher for the guild HQ and thus, the 10 other members needed to fork out 2 gold each to cover the rest.

For sure, with all the creatures and bandits they had killed in the last 2 months, they had amassed at least that much. The plan was that, in the morrow, all the guild members would go to the village and sell their loot, then come back into the woods to wait for the others. When everyone had finished, they would then sit and discuss as to where they would build the guild HQ.

Kary could have chosen the location on her own since she was the guild leader, but she had bigger plans. She wanted this guild to become one of the biggest in the game, so she wanted to treat all these members well. They would become the top officers in the guild later down the road. Therefore, Kary had announced they would all convene together to make this important decision.

Kary relaxed a bit then went hunting. She could sit here all day if she wished, but she wanted to keep her senses sharp and her skills top-notch. She had gone hunting every day until dawn for the last 60 days and had no intention to change that habit. In her best day, she hunted down packs of wolves, in her worst, she caught traces of a big hooved beast, but she could never find it. She swore to herself to find it, so she would stay vigilant every day in the hope of seeing it's tracks again.

Today was a nice day to hunt. There was barely any wind in the forest, and the sun was high in the sky, setting a lot of shadow under the cover of trees. This meant Kary could stay well hidden from any pray she would stalk. After walking for an hour, she finally found tracks of a pack of wild cows. She was happy because a pack of wild cows could be tamed, giving them milk and meat. So she started following those tracks towards what she hoped would be a big haul. She knew that with Nala, she could herd them back to their camp.

After 20 minutes of tracking, she finally heard some lowing in the distance. As she got closer the trees started thinning out. She got to the edge of a clearing, where she finally saw her bounty. A herd of about 40 cows was all gathered in this small clearing. As she was observing them, her senses tingled and she felt a pit in her stomach. Her instinct told her to jump aside. Knowing that her instinct was always right, she jumped to her left. Just as she did, a large shadow dropped from the trees overhead, bringing an ax down where she had stood a second ago. As it got back up, Kary finally got a good look of her assailant. She was horrified.

In front of her, standing on it's 2 hind legs, was a giant bull, wielding a double ax with a handle the size of Kary's arms and a head the size of Nala's body. Speaking of Nala, she came jumping down from behind the bull and landed on it's back. Clawing and biting, she inflicted a lot of pain to the bull before it managed to grab her tail and throw her off in Kary's direction. As Kary looked at Nala, making sure she was okay, she was happy to have her. This fight would be arduous without her. Looking back at the enemy, Kary finally looked at his stats.

~Banished Minotaur Warrior~

Level: 15

Race: Half man/Half bull

Class: Berserker

Strength: 20

Dexterity: 15

Intelligence: 4

Wisdom: 5

Toughness: 25

" What the... " Kary started saying. Only, she wouldn't finish that sentence, as the minotaur dived right at her. It raised it's ax and aimed right for Nala. It was mad for the cuts in his back and wanted revenge.

" Nala dodge! Bait him the best you can but be careful. Don't get hit for no reason! " Kary told Nala, launching towards the mad bull. She was going to give him death by a thousand cuts if she had to. Seeing how tough this minotaur was, she knew there was no way for her to cut him down in one hit. It would be a long fight.