It's Raining Craguloks

"Ahh, crud," Alesha cursed, having counted seven more Craguloks already, with more still coming. "I can beat one, but how many are there?!"

[Ding! New Quest Available!]

[Quest: Raining Craguloks

Goal: Survive the Cragulok wave, defeating as many of them as possible!

Quest Conditions: Character survives, optional: defeat Craguloks, optional: take no damage

Reward: Dependent on quest completion rating (more Craguloks defeated = better rewards).

Penalty: N/A

Failure Condition(s): Character death]

Breathing deeply, Alesha realized this was a perfect chance to get some XP and, hopefully, figure out what leveling up would be like with the 'Seed of Chaos' System. This quick adaptation to the situation was definitely aided by the fact that she was in a game and not in danger of dying for real.

Two Craguloks nearby chittered and clicked, then leaped towards her in quick succession. Alesha stepped into the path of one, which took her out of the other's trajectory, and drove both daggers towards the base of the Cragulok's neck, aiming in between the layers of shell. 

Her left dagger missed and slid off the top of its shell. The one in her right hand successfully buried itself in the vulnerable flesh by the neck. Momentum carried the wounded Cragulok further onto her blade before it got stuck, then rotated so the flat portion of the monster's shell was perpendicular to how it would stand, thanks to the influence of gravity. Alesha shook the still-twitching corpse off her blade. 

[Critical Hit! 6 damage dealt] 

[First Baby Cragulok Killed! +20 XP]

Alesha spun around to face the one whose path she had avoided, eyes flicking about to keep track of all the Craguloks she could. This wasn't too bad. 

She now stood facing 3 Craguloks that were close enough to attack. Bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet, Alesha waited for them to leap. Now! All three leapt at her simultaneously. She swiped horizontally with her left hand, mostly just to knock the two creatures she'd aimed at aside, and thrust upward with her righthand dagger, managing to skewer the crab-like monster in the softer shell of its underside.

[2 damage dealt, 1 damage dealt, Critical Hit! 5 damage dealt]

Alesha brought in her right hand, the one holding the skewered and panicking monster, and plunged her left dagger down its throat. 

[1 damage dealt]

[Baby Cragulok killed! +10 XP]

She winced at all the blood. Apparently this game had gone a little overboard on the realism… she could feel it oozing across her bare skin on both arms, its subtly tangy scent filling her nose. With a flick of her wrist, the dead Cragulok went flying in the general direction of the others. It began to slowly dissolve into particles of light.

Now she was almost surrounded. Spinning her head to check 360 degrees, she had 5 Craguloks nearly close enough to attack, coming from her 12, 2, 4, 6, and 10 (these directions are based on an analog clock--looking down from a birds-eye view, "12" refers to the direction she faces, with the other numbers referring to directions pointing from the center at the numbers' respective positions on the clock).

Not wanting to risk being surrounded, Alesha dashed towards her 8, taking advantage of the widest opening between the creatures to escape the encroaching group. 

She ran for a good 20 yards before spinning on her heels to face back to where she came. "Haaa, haaa, haa;" she was purposefully taking bigger and deeper breaths than she needed so that she could fully recover before the group of Craguloks caught up. As she had hoped, not all of them could run the exact same speed, so they had spread out somewhat. This would give her additional precious time to act.

The first of the Craguloks leapt at her, meeting her daggers midair. She had dodged one and barely struck two. This time, neither dagger found its mark, instead simply knocking them aside so they didn't slam into her. On an impulse, Alesha jumped and landed on one of them. The shell broke with a satisfying crunch… and her boots sunk into the somewhat goopy innards with a markedly less satisfying squelch.

[Baby Cragulok killed! +10 XP]

[Level Up!]

[...]

Alesha was forced to ignore the other notifications as more Craguloks entered the fray. She slashed and stabbed, taking damage when she couldn't escape the blows, hopping on the crab-like things whenever she could. Such an easy way to end them couldn't be ignored. An onlooker might have described the sight as an unusual dance between blood and knives, humans and shelled beasts, budding strategic skill and purely bestial instincts.

Growing tired now, her body slowing down as her muscles burned from the unusual exertion, Alesha began to regret syncing her real-life stats with the ones in-game. She would never have chosen to keep such low physical values in the game had the System not baited her with such a tempting reason. 

After all, who could resist the chance for progress in VR to affect the real world? It had always been a secret wish of hers, for VR to affect reality in some way. 

Now, though, she wasn't so sure. Her minimal stats and clearly way cranked-up realism settings were making these minimum-level monsters much harder to face. 

Minutes later, she wandered around to double check that all of them were dead. She counted 32 Baby Cragulok corpses spread across a wide area, in some places clustered together, in others, spaced a good distance from one another. None of them moved. All of them were in various stages of decay (into light fragments).

Alesha moved away from the battlefield, first checking her mailbox to see if Dennis had responded. She was determined not to forget about playing with him again. 

… At least for today. She couldn't promise anything about tomorrow, not with her highy distractible brain.

The mailbox had a message! Her brother had seen and responded to her "report" to the Admin.

"Uhhh I don't know why youre not in the castle, I'm glad you found the report button tho. My chat function also disapppeared so I submitted a report to the developers cuz this is weird. For now lets just keep using this. But where you are is bad, very badd, depending on what part of those woods you went to. That soundslike Stranglewood Cove and it has a very specifc safe path that if you leave it youll be swarmed by monsters called Baby Cragulokks, if you manage to beat them youll be tracked down by the momma and shes a level 8 beast, if you run into her youre screwed. So if you find those guys jsut run away, OK? DONT KILL THEM. Also font touchv the vines! I'll come get u stay right there."

"Well, it's too late for that now..."