Chapter 11: Upgrades

Chapter 11: Upgrades

Zac woke up with a jerk, which caused a pained groan to escape from his mouth. There was not a single part of his body that didnt feel battered and broken. A quick look around showed that he was halfway down the hill, his whole body full of scratches. The snake lay lifelessly a few meters away from him, seemingly having uncoupled from him somewhere during the tumble downhill.

Not daring to take any chances due to negligence again, he ignored the screaming protests of his body and dragged himself towards the snake. There was a rock roughly the size of a head on the way which he ripped out of the ground. Finally he arrived in front of the beast, and with a snarl grabbed the stone with both hands and slammed with all power he could gather right in the forehead of the snake. The long body convulsed slightly but seemed not to react further than that. Zac wasnt done however, and with guttural grunts from deep within his throat he kept slamming the stone down again and again, each time eliciting a wet thud. After a few hits the bodys death throes stopped, but Zac kept going until the bloodied stone finally slipped out of his hands. By then the head and neck was only a mess of broken flesh and brain matter.

The grunts gave way to sobs as Zac collapsed next to the headless snakes, his whole body shaking. He had messed up, that had been way too close. Not finding any more demons the last two days had made him complacent, barely looking around for threats. The Stargazer had even warned him just yesterday about the world changing due to absorbing cosmic energy, but he hadnt even reflected on what that meant. There shouldnt have been snakes of this size in the woods where he was, but the energy in the world had not only increased its size and strength but made it more aggressive. Had that been a venomous snake instead of a constrictor he would be a bloated corpse by now.

He finally understood that there was simply no such thing as safety in the wild, and he had to start taking things more seriously. Not even the last near-death experience had really woken him up, as the stats and quests made him subconsciously consider it all a game. But this was life and death, and he had to treat it as such.

Zac shakily got on his legs and started to make his way to the top of the hill again. His hatchet was still left in the tree, and he refused to go anywhere without it again. It felt like he had been hit by a truck but he could only grit his teeth and trudge on.

At the crest there were fallen leaves and broken bloodied branches all over the floor. Luckily it seemed that the snake had taken the brunt of the damage from the fall, otherwise, he might not even have survived just from the height. He didnt want to linger at such an exposed location, so he quickly ripped the axe out of the tree and made his way back down the hill.

When he reached the snake once again he hesitated for a few seconds, but then gripped the reptile and wired it around his torso a few turns then put the end up on his shoulder. He had to think like a survivor now, and the snake might both give food and its scales could be fashioned into some sort of protection.

As long as Zac wore the amulet and was within 50 kilometers from the mother-array, cosmic energy would continuously be transferred to the amulet, and from the amulet into Zac. In other words, the array essentially turned him into a cultivator who continuously drew energy into himself, as long as he was on the island.

The downside of this type of array was that the gathering efficiency was far lower compared to a similar F-Grade Gathering array, which would result in a far more sparse concentration of cosmic energy in a town. However, this didnt matter to Zac as he had no citizens that he needed to take into account, at least not for now. He quickly followed the instructions and placed the 12 flags around the camp.

This was Zacs main plan to have a chance to get strong enough to survive against the incursion. He had no experience of combat from his earlier life and needed to gain power from stats and levels to simply be able to overpower his enemies, at least he gained some actual combat experience.

There were more things Zac wanted to buy, but he simply had run out of coins. Finally, Zac Took a look at his status screen once more and saw that even though it had been a harrowing experience, killing the snake had not given him another level.

Name Zachary Atwood Level 16 Race Human Alignment Human (Earth) Titles Born For Carnage, Ultimate Reaper, Luck of the Draw, Giantsbane, Disciple of David, Overpowered, Slayer of Leviathans, Adventurer Strength 31 Dexterity 25 Endurance 27 Vitality 27 Intelligence 29 Wisdom 29 Luck 44 Free Points 30 Nexus Coins 600

After checking out the menu he looked down on his battered and bruised body and felt embarrassed with himself. He had 30 stat points he still hadnt allocated. If he had done that this morning he might not have been in such a precarious situation as he was.

It was time to upgrade.