The Calling of Wrath - Chapter 31 - Preparations (Patreon)

                                                                            Cassandra
                                                           Year 819 | Month 1 | Day 21

Okay.

I look at the bed before stuffing it into the tiny little pouch at my waist – which looks really weird.

“Bed, check,” I mutter with a nod.

I then put my hand into the pouch and pull out the knife, only to put it back into the pouch again.

Knife, check.

And lastly…

I turn my gaze to the frantically quacking hocka-thing I’m holding in my hands.

Safety measure, check.

Although I’m not sure how much use it’ll be against Tier 2 or 3 monsters. But it might help, so there’s no harm in bringing it.

The creature frantically continues quacking as if contradicting my thoughts, so I grab it by the beak instead of its neck, forcing its quacker shut so that it can’t make any more noise.

And that should be everything.

I walk up to the entrance with my hocka-thing in tow before turning back and looking back with a faint smile, all while ignoring the frantic movements of the creature and the terrible smell of the dead heart.

This place will forever be remembered. The place that allowed me to survive many trials and near-death situations.

Even if most of the time it smelled like rot.

I nod my head towards the cave one last time before leaving through the barrier with the still fighting hocka-thing in my hand.

Time to go home.

Assuming I don’t die along the way that is.

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                                                                   A few hours later

Okay, so in hindsight, I probably should have figured out which direction was the shortest distance to the inner ring.

But the center of the forest is just too big, and I couldn’t get too far from my cave before now.

I glance at the hocka-thing, which I think I’m just going to call Thrix 2 for simplicity’s sake, before activating Wrath Infusion and pulling on its wrath to increase my stats.

Then I knock the thing out and begin climbing up the large tree next to me all the way to the top.

Let’s see if I can get a better view from up there…

Once I reach the top of the tree, I look out over the forest around me before narrowing my eyes at the sight of some red mist floating off into the sky several kilometers to the West.

Guess that must be some of the resident gasses let off by the World Tree Vein…

Doesn’t look particularly friendly, but it’s not like I can avoid going through there if I want to get home.

I jump down from the tree and land on my feet, with my knees bending a bit on the landing. After that, I turn to grab the now-unconscious Thrix 2 before smacking it a couple of times in the face to wake it up – because it’s kind of useless if it’s not conscious – and making my way through the Dark Forest’s center towards the inner ring.

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It doesn’t take too long before I find myself at the edge of the inner ring staring at a small amounts of red mist moving across the ground, making all of the dark green grass seemingly take on a reddish shade instead.

At the same time, Thrix 2 started freaking out pretty badly once we started getting closer to the inner ring. And now that we’re at the edge between the two areas of the Dark Forest, it’s practically panicking.

Which is a little irritating, but the thing was already weak before I reached Tier 2, so now it’s like handling a baby.

Right as I’m about to step foot into the red mist, a loud shriek echoes through the Dark Forest from the direction of the inner ring.

Hmm, yeah, that doesn’t sound very welcoming.

I glance at Thrix 2 once before stepping into the red mist.

Almost immediately, the entire atmosphere of the Dark Forest feels as if it’s taken a plunge from dark and silent, to eerie and deadly in a matter of seconds, despite it having only been a single step.

That’s… not a good sign.

But that mission mentioned that the monsters here are Tiers 2 and 3, so I should be fine.

Oh, wait a second…

My eyes widen in surprise.

How could I have almost forgotten to level up?

I step back out of the inner ring into the center of the forest again, making Thrix 2 immediately calm down a lot.

Without any hesitation, I quickly open my status and spend the EXP needed to level up twice, bringing me straight to level 13 in the process.

The very comfortable feeling spreads through my body, but I make sure not to lax my hold on Thrix 2 before it fades again and I open my status to look at my new stats.

Okay, now that’s a much nicer increase in stats than what I got from leveling up at Tier 1.

As for that random skill card thing… I feel like that would be better to use when the skill levels cost more. Even if that also means I’ll have more skills at that point that it could choose from.

Although I’ll go ahead and use that item draw now.

It’s name aside, the item might actually be useful.

I take it out of the item storage before frowning.

This is called a mask of rot?

It just looks like a plain black mask that you’d see in a masquerade party…

I look at it for a few seconds before shaking my head and tossing it into my spatial pouch.

After that, I turn back to the inner ring and begin dragging the very unwilling Thrix 2 along with me into the red mist.

Time to get out of this forest.

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Table of Contents

For those of you who can't see the images:

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Name: Cassandra de Luna

Species: Embodiment of Wrath +

Level: 13

Class: Bringer of Wrath

EXP: 1124

Talent/s: True Body, Attuned(46%)

PHYS: STR – 13.65, DEX – 9.2, RES – 8.6

MENTAL: INT – 6.95, WIS – 8.55, MP – 78

Skills

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[Random Item Draw]

Now selecting a random Tier 2 item. Please wait.

o O o

Congratulations! You have obtained the Mask of Rot

When this item is worn, it will protect whoever is wearing it from bad smells and limited amounts of gaseous poison and will be temporarily stored in your System Item Storage for a period of 72 hours!

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