Chapter 15: First Rewards

Arin ran through the dense forest, chasing after his raptor, which had disappeared into the underbrush. After several minutes of running, new experience points began to appear: +20 XP, +30 XP, +20 XP. He gained 230 XP in just three minutes. Finally, he reached the spot where his raptor was fighting giant ants.

Worker ants, about 25 cm in size, were easy targets, but warriors, approximately one meter long with massive mandibles, posed a serious threat. There are many types of ants, and most of them are poisonous. Arin felt the poison seeping into the raptor's wounds, slowing its movements. If a large amount of poison got into the raptor, it could be completely paralyzed or killed. Arin remembered learning in school how ants deal with large prey or dangerous attackers: they sacrifice many individuals to paralyze and subsequently kill the attacker, even at the cost of massive losses. Arin was surprised by the influx of information he was receiving from his connection with the raptor.

Arin saw the raptor strategically retreating and taking down warriors one by one, but he knew the raptor probably wouldn't win alone. Moreover, he noticed more ant warriors approaching the battlefield. The number of enemies was rapidly increasing, and Arin realized he had to act quickly if he wanted to save his raptor.

Arin drew his sword and summoned his bear. The bear appeared in a flash of magical light, massive like a cart. Arin estimated it to be at least 4 meters in length and over 2 meters in height, covered in scars. Its fur was a dull black, and its body bore countless deep scars, testifying to the many battles it had survived. The bear roared and charged at the ants without any command from Arin. It was pure rage, intelligence, and willpower that drove it forward.

The bear plunged into the ants and began tearing them apart. Its enormous paws crushed their exoskeletons, claws pierced their bodies with sickening cracks and crunches. Green blood and bodily fluids flew through the air as the bear ripped the warriors to pieces. One by one, they fell under its crushing blows.

The raptor, now less burdened, took advantage of the opportunity and attacked from the shadows. Every warrior that tried to escape the bear was immediately caught by the raptor. Its sharp claws and teeth tore the ants to pieces before they had a chance to defend themselves. The raptor circled the battlefield like a deadly shadow, swift and merciless.

The bear lifted one warrior into the air and crushed it with its powerful jaws while tearing another in half with its claws. Its ferocity was unstoppable. The air was thick with the stench of green blood and death as the battlefield turned into a slaughterhouse.

Arin clutched his sword tightly and watched as the bear mercilessly eliminated one ant after another. Each killed ant brought new experience points: +20 XP for seven workers, +30 XP for three warriors killed by the raptor alone, and +30 XP for fifteen more warriors killed with cooperation with bear. During the battle, Arin felt a pleasant sensation coursing through his body. He leveled up! Arin gained a total of 680 XP.

When the battlefield calmed down, Arin carefully approached the spot where the ant carcasses lay, not seeing any new incoming ants. He began searching them, but at first, it seemed there was nothing valuable. He knew, however, that ants had valuable parts, such as mandibles, carapaces, poison glands, stingers, and eyes. Arin didn't want to bother extracting these parts, so he thought about throwing the bodies into his ring. He tried to fit all the warriors, but he could only collect 14 before his ring was full. This frustrated him a bit, but He decided to process the rest of the carcasses himself. When he tried to cut off a warrior's mandible with his sword, he did it so clumsily that the sword slipped from his hand, and a small amount of sticky green fluid splashed onto him. The fluid began to eat away at parts of his leather armor and, in a few spots, touched his unprotected skin. He hissed in pain, losing 30 health points, and realized he was poisoned. He felt his health slowly decreasing.

He imagined the attribute panel:

Level: 2 (1220/2000)

Summoner

Strength: 10

Agility: 10 (+10)

Intelligence: 40

Willpower: 40 (+10)

Endurance: 25 (+5)

Mana: 400 (+100) Current Mana: 500

Health: 250 (+50) Current Health: 268

Negative effects: Poison

Unassigned attributes: 5

Equipment:

Weapons:

Common short sword of willpower (+7 willpower)

Armor:

Rare gloves of concealment (adding +5 agility and +3 willpower and ability to conceal rings on hand)

Basic leather armor set (helmet, chest armor, belt, greaves, boots) +5 agility, +5 endurance, set bonus: mana regeneration 1 mana per second

Accessories:

??? Ring (???)

Basic Astral Ring (2 cubic meters storage space)

Skills/Spells:

Summon Familiar (+)

Arin noticed that several new columns had appeared in his attribute window, but he had no time to examine them because his health was dropping by 2 every moment. He also felt the poison beginning to make him drowsy, but it was nothing he couldn't endure. His willpower was strong. Just in case, he pulled out a healing potion and prepared to drink it. However, after losing 20 more health points, the poison ended. Arin sighed with relief.

Arin looked at the bodies and said to himself, "Never again! The easiest way is to throw the bodies into the astral ring and then give them to the specialists in the city who will buy them from me. That's what almost all awakened do. Of course, the buyers take a cut, but it's almost always fair. Reputation is most important for these buyers, and they are often members of various guilds, and other organizations with strict rules on how to operate. Sometimes it's an issue with extremely rare monsters, but with the low-level monsters I hunt, it will be fine."

Arin continued searching the dead ants, muttering to himself, "I need to learn from this. If I want to survive, I need to be smarter and more efficient. There's no room for mistakes." He realized that if the poison had been stronger...

With these thoughts, he looked at his astral ring and the carcasses that still hadn't been collected. "This ring is an amazing piece of equipment, but it has its limits."

Arin considered his next steps carefully. He thought that the best course of action would be to recall the injured raptor or send it into battle until it was killed, to understand how the summoning process worked when a familiar died. After pondering for a moment, he decided that sending the slow-moving bear to scout wasn't efficient either. The bear moved relatively slowly, not much faster than Arin himself. Watching the bear move, Arin had an idea. He could recall the bear and summon a wolf instead. The wolf was stronger than the raptor but not as massive as the bear. It was a perfect middle ground. Additionally, one of the reasons for this decision was that he had a larger number of wolves, seventeen in total but only three raptors. Eventually, he dismissed the idea of sending the raptor to its death. Instead, he recalled both the bear and the raptor and summoned a wolf, planning to experiment with them.