The Grind

Kaito opened his eyes "Time for round two!"

He looked around him, he was still the only player hunting rabbits at this time.

Others might show up later if they receive any rabbit or forest related quests. As Kaito looked around his eyes fell upon his next victim-

〚GreenWood Rabbit Lvl.1 HP: 30/30〛

The small creature was hopping around, minding it's own business, looking incredibly cute. But this time Kaito knew that this wasn't the true face of the creature.

There was no need to hide this time, the creature would stay and fight, Kaito quickly summoned his undead, dark energy flowing around him accompanied by bones to form a eerie skeleton in front of him.

〈Ability: Raise undead used! Mana: 25 > 0〉

〚Insane's Undead Lvl.1 HP: 40/40〛

"Attack!", Kaito pointed on the rabbit and the skeleton followed his command, charging into battle.

-4!

This time the skeleton got the first hit against the unsuspecting victim. And a red number flashed above the rabbit's head.

The rabbits screeched and pounced onto the skeleton. A flurry of blows were exchanged, the rabbit only doing a tiny amount of damage

-2

-1

-2

-1

-2

But it was much faster than the skeleton and dodged most attacks coming it's way.

-0

-0

-4

-0

-4

Unlike last battle, this time the skeleton killed the rabbit and was standing at the end of the battle, victorious.

The corpse of the rabbit was starting to disappear, a soft light of pixels flowing up into the sky.

〈Killed GreenWood Rabbit Lvl.1!〉

〈acquired 1 rabbit pelt〉

〈Gained 3 Experience!〉

Kaito heard the unearthly groans of the skeleton and saw that it was barely able to stand, bones were cracked and one of it's arms were missing.

〚Insane's Undead Lvl.1 HP: 3/40〛

Kaito looked at this summon, 'well, i can't fight another rabbit with this guy'. He looked around to see if any other players saw him, Kaito was still alone in this field.

He reached out his arm towards the undead and spoke "Your service is over".

The skeleton bowed towards Kaito and the bones crumbled until it became dust, 'it worked!' he thought as the dark energy seeped into him.

〈Insane's Undead Lvl.1 released! Receiving a 1/3 of the energy back. Mana 0 > 8〉

A heavy sigh left Kaito as he sat down 'time to repeat'.

A few players had received quests regarding the south gate, these quests could be to kill rabbits, find herbs in the forest, or to scout the perimeter of the town, along with a heap of other different quests.

All these players had one thing in common; they had all stopped for a moment as they reached the south gate.

Not because of the beautiful forest trees that were swaying in the wind, nor the snow covered mountain rising over the clouds in the distance.

No, they all stopped when they were met by the sight of a man standing with his arms crossed in the middle of the field, in front of him there was a skeleton and a rabbit fighting for their lives.

The eyes of the man were cold, looking away from the fight, uninterested.

The spectators saw the bloodied rabbit and the broken skeleton get ready to charge at each other for one last time.

A stream of pixels flowed upwards from corpse of the rabbit, and the skeleton bones disintegrated into a purple mist.

All the players stood there silent, one feeling could be shared between all of them "excitement".

The battle looked so fierce, so real!

It also looked challenging, 'are the rabbits that hard to kill?' They all wanted to try it for themselves and therefore they all made their way to the field.

〈Killed GreenWood Rabbit Lvl.1!〉

〈acquired 1 rabbit pelt〉

〈Gained 3 Experience!〉

Kaito looked at the notifications and pondered, 'how many more pelts did he need to collect?'.

A message popped up in front of him-

〈Current Quest : Pelts for Baldrum! Rabbit Pelts (8/10)〉

"Two more to go, shouldn't take too long" Kaito softly spoke as he sat down to regain his mana.

He saw that a few players had showed up to the field. He was curious to see how they would handle the rabbits.

He watched two players with swords gang up on one rabbit, the fight was short lived as the rabbit died after only a few swings from both players.

The two warriors looked at Kaito, a bit shocked, they had seen his epic fight against the rabbit and how his skeleton had barely defeated it.

The players weren't new to games and understood that Kaito had chosen Necromancer as his class.

The few players that had seen Kaito's battle with the rabbit and had now defeated a rabbit on their own were thankful that they hadn't chosen the necromancer class.

There could be heard whispers and murmurs among the players.

"But he should be able to summon more skeletons, right? if one skeleton is that weak?" one player asked openly

Another player answered "I don't think that's the case, he's just sitting there, probably waiting for enough mana to summon his skeleton"

One player smirked "Don't be silly, i'm a mage and i can cast fireball for 4 mana, all players start with 25 mana, there's no way that a weak skeleton costs that much"

"So... why is he just sitting there?" One player remarked.

Silence spread across players before one of them piped up "He's probably Insane, right?"

Kaito saw as the other players quite easily dispatched the rabbits, a few of them got cocky and got damaged but most of the time the rabbits weren't even a threat to these players.

'Is the necromancer class this bad?' Kaito stared up at the clouds slowly drifting by.

The game was more than 'realistic', it was even hard to tell apart from real life. But beyond all it was stunning, the world in which Kaito found himself was beautiful.

He would probably loose himself watching the clouds if not for the notification waking him up.

〈Mana full! 25/25〉

Kaito stood up, ready to finish this quest once and for all. He summoned his trusty skeleton

〈Ability: Raise undead used! Mana: 25 > 0〉

〚Insane's Undead Lvl.1 HP: 40/40〛

He spotted a rabbit and uttered the magic word- "attack".

The skeleton did exactly what it always did: ran towards the creature, uprooting tufts of grass with it's sharp boney toes.

The usual clash took place and Kaito watched over the fight. Just as the skeleton was about to deal the final blow to rabbit there came a surprise attack from the side.

Another rabbit showed up and joined the fray! It had killed the skeleton that was now a pile of bones fading away into purple particles.

Both the rabbits then turned their eyes onto Kaito:

〚GreenWood Rabbit(Enraged) Lvl.1 HP: 4/30〛

〚GreenWood Rabbit(Enraged) Lvl.1 HP: 30/30〛

'Shit' was all that Kaito could think before the two rabbits stormed towards him.

Kaito started to think about possible ideas on how to solve the situation, 'Run to other players? No, it was too far away, these rabbits were fast'.

He had to give up, he was dead.

Just has Kaito saw the end drawing near in the shape of two furry creatures, a figure with broad shoulders stepped in front of him.

Kaito saw the name tag over the player's head: WarriorDude