BLAIR | Chapter. 17: Interlude: Dark Elf (Patreon)

Chapter. 17: Interlude: Dark Elf

The dark elf had left, Dante breathed a sigh of relief, relief that he didn’t need to deal with her anymore. He didn’t even know whether to call her dark elf or just elf, thankfully the volatile lady didn’t seem to mind. All he could do was hate his damned luck, who would’ve thought that on a dreary monday he’d be thrown into fantasy land. Sure, he had read his fair bit of fantasy books, but he barely understood what was going on. The bare minimum to keep him sane anyway. It didn’t help that the elf had torn clothes, if she didn’t look like a hobo perhaps he would have averted his eyes from her figure. But just like a rose⁠—a mud-filled rose⁠—she was dangerous.

He thought it was a nightmare, he thought he’d wake up as soon as things were going bad. He thought it would feel as if resurfacing from a pool in panic, but it never came. He couldn’t help but tentatively hold onto the hand-gun at his waist, unfortunately he had no bullets. To begin with, he was just at a shooting range when it happened. When the light came and the whole world snuffed.

He shook his head remembering the gruesome scene that he had just witnessed. He enjoyed his survivalist hobby of going into the wild and trying to camp with nearly nothing, but he never thought he’d actually use it to stay alive. And even then, he barely knew what he was doing. Just barely. The first thing he did when he came here was encounter a fox thing that he promptly shot dead with all his bullets. Next thing he knew he was level 1. And now? He was completely out. Even then, the pooling blood of the fox did not compare to the scene he had just witnessed.

She ⁠— the dark elf lady ⁠— had come out of nowhere. She stole Matt’s arrows and then, the moose with its infinite intelligence decided to attack her. Dante was secretly relieved that the moose had turned to her, but when the green light came, when it bloomed, when the explosion occurred, his perception changed. He saw a glimpse of her face, but it was different to when she stole the arrows, attractive yes, but she also scoffed at the moose.

Next thing he knew, the moose fell to the ground; snipped right out of the air, half of its skull blown off, and what seemed like brain matter dripping. He could’ve sworn that she had shot it with some sort of railgun and not a compound bow. But then there was something horrifying, she stared at it as if it was pitiful and charged another shot with the same green light, this time it simply nailed it in the head as she grinned.

Sadistic. A shiver shot through his spine at that moment. However what he did next, he regretted it the instant the words left his mouth. The girl savored the victory before turning to Matt.

“Stop!” he called towards her, hoping to spare his friend from whatever she was going to do. However, what came next horrified him.

His companions angered her, and when she pointed the spring-loaded death machine at them he couldn’t help but freeze. Had they not seen her blow its head off? In the end he couldn’t help but bellow and chastise his companions, and request some form to quell her anger.

She told in a sweet but danger filled voice that she wanted all their arrows. Dante was going to ponder over it before yet someone else tried to get themselves killed, in the end he had to make a hasty counter-offer to keep the negotiating going. This however displeased her, and elicited a frown before she spoke with a frost filled voice, one that had no trace of humanity or any form of emotion.

“I want one potion from each of you then, that is my compromise.” No one breathed at that moment, not even herself. Dante had to quickly agree, but not before another person butted in.

Not daring to make her upset any longer, he had to speak up to shut his companion’s stupidity. He had to show her that they in fact feared her, that he in fact didn’t want to be nailed dead. His statement seemed to please her, so much so that she drank all of it with her gaze, savoring every word. Dante hurried to gather the the potions that she requested on one of the bags from earth, and it wasn’t until then that she stopped thinking about killing them⁠— putting her bow away.

He made sure to thank her and do some form of what he assumed was a respectful approach in fantasy land before she allowed him to give her the bag. Noticing she was calm now, he made a presumptuous request, one that he felt was risky but necessary.

“I am sorry to request this, miss… Elf, but could you… leave us?”

“Sure,” she smiled. “I only came for arrows anyway.”

After that she left and chuckled at their patheticness. He barely heard her say No way, in a happiness filled voice as she left.

Dante took a deep breath as he made sure she had left, before turning to his team. He met them just a few hours ago, but they all stuck to him like glue since he was the highest leveled person. Because of course, knowing how to shoot a bow suddenly made you important, that and the fact that The System had said they all represented Earth ⁠— if they were all from the same planet, didn’t that make them be in the same team? ⁠Also, two of his team members could use magic, what was up with that? Apparently when getting a kit option they just selected mage and they could just use magic after some practice? Dante frowned, he still regretted his messy kill on the fox, but his shaky aim and his panic made him waste bullets, alas he had no real advantages now.

“You people are unreasonable,” he reprimanded in a low tone, afraid of the elf even catching a wisp of their conversation. “Don’t you all see that she killed a moose in a single shot?”

Everyone stared at him with guilt as he continued unloading his anger at them. Perhaps he would’ve still lost half of his arrows, and he would’ve still felt humiliated after she chuckled at his patheticness, but at least he wouldn’t have felt so scared. Dante couldn’t understand how they did not see her predatory gaze as she aimed the bow at the entire group.

It was a goddamned flying moose she killed. He had been careful of the flying mooses since seeing them for the first time, the so-called Everwood Moose. Thankfully they were incredibly stupid and could only fly about once before they simply recurred to primal charges. The first time he encountered one he couldn’t help but curse and climb a tree, he had been happily killing foxes before the fucker showed up and tried to impale him. Dante honestly cursed his rotten luck at that moment, he was adapting to the new world after fainting from The System information, he was one happy fucker killing foxes for levels.

He made it to level 3 before he had to hide away in a tree for three hours until the moose got tired of staring at him and left. Shooting arrows at it did not do much, it seemed that the bow’s draw strength would scale with his strength stat to some extent, but it did not help. The moose was just resilient to pain, moreover after shooting six or so arrows he gave up, even if it was bleeding⁠ the thing had a near infinite blood supply. It was twice bigger than a normal moose from earth after all.

After that, and a bit more fox killing he met his current team. They were already gathered and all of them seemed to be friends for the most part; coworkers it appeared. But they decided to trust him because he was the highest level? It didn’t make sense to him, but they reasoned that as humans they should stay together.

Dante however, wasn’t optimistic. In the end he had to teach them a bit of fight tactics, with the help of Matt who was an avid gamer and swore for the composition they used. Which surprisingly proved to be effective; in the end he wasted the rest of the day doing that instead of trying to kill some foxes.

He still couldn’t believe the elf had just killed it like that. If she was even an elf, he recalled the inquiry results with a frown.

[??? Lvl. 6]

Dante couldn’t help but wonder if he’d be as strong as her when he reached level 6, he sure hoped so. He had a feeling something waited for him at level 5, perhaps a skill. The System knowledge included a bit of that. With that said, he couldn’t help but wonder if it was alright to stick with these people.

He lived in the land of nowhere, Wyoming. But them? They were from elsewhere. He doubted he would see any of his friends considering the situation, though he hadn’t seen more humans aside from his current team. At the same time he had only seen signs of smoke and the elf so far in the non-human department, so he held hope. Hope that at least his friends were safe.

That said, the image of the elf was ingrained in his mind, not her beauty, but her power. He knew for a fact that she too was from one of the grafted planets, though he did not understand what ‘Great Equilibrium’ was, he figured he’d understand soon enough. With all of that in mind, he made his decision, emotionally checking out in the process. It wasn’t earth but a new world, if he wanted to survive he had to leave his morals behind, if he wanted power he had to chase it⁠— go after it and struggle with all his might.

He walked to all of the people he met in the past eight or so hours, they argued in a circle before they noticed him approaching.

“I am leaving the group.”

Matt was still unconscious, so all Dante got to hear were protests from the warrior and one of the girls, and some pleas of insecurity. But after a bellow, they left him alone as he walked to the moose, dug through the skull for the arrow of the elf and left into the forest. The arrow was chaffed and damaged, and the other arrow was nothing but metal fragments inside its skull.

Stowing the blood filled arrow, he advanced in the damp forest. He had to get stronger if he wanted to survive, he couldn’t keep running away. He had to be like the elf girl, more ferocious, more confident, more extreme. Dante looked at the moonlight before closing his eyes with resolution. If he ever crossed paths with her again, he would definitely be stronger than her.

But for now he couldn’t dwell on things, for now he had to get to killing. The elf was just a mountain to surpass, and surpass her he would. He recalled her clothes and how damaged they were, he was sure the only reason she requested potions was because she herself had used them all, and by the looks of it, it had paid off. However, he couldn’t confirm with her, nor would he dare to. All Dante knew was that he had to put more effort in, struggle more, at least if he was going to surpass her. He looked at his status for a reference point.

Name: Dante Pierce | Level: 4

Race: Human (F-Grade)

Feats: NaN

Basic skills: Universal Understanding (NaN),

Universal Inquiry (NaN)

Free attribute points: 0

VIG: 18 | END: 15 |

STR: 21 | AGI:  25 |

INT: 10 | WIS: 10 |

Prime Currency: 100

He didn’t know how far the elf’s stats were, but they couldn’t have been that far away. He just needed to grind.