As I stare into the gnashing jaws filled with razor-sharp pointed teeth, I barely have time to register the long, flat-ended snout and puke green skin. A wild hoglin?! The thought disappears as I duck my head to the left, narrowly avoiding the mouth of the beast.

  “Human! Hold on! I can help! I just need five seconds!”

  Delilah's statement only barely registers as a positive thing, as the situation calls for more expediency than that.

  “I don’t know if I can survive five seconds!”

  Panic laces my internal tone as I duck my head to and fro, the stubby legs of the creature holding me tight against the stump.

  It’s got to weigh a thousand pounds! GAH! My shoulder!

  The hoglin presses one of its two toed front feet into my left shoulder with enough force that I’m pretty sure it dislocates from its socket.

  “Please hurry!”

  Just as I say this, the heavy beast rears up, squealing in pain. I quickly roll out from under it before it has a chance to flatten me.

  It’s a good thing that they’re solitary, territorial creatures, or so I’ve heard. This would be a lot worse if more of them were around to hear it shrieking.

  “Run, Delilah!”

  I turn to begin following my own suggestion, only to freeze with Delilah’s next statement.

  “My mind spike won’t keep it stunned long enough to run! We have to kill it or we. will. die!”

  “Die?! I can’t die yet! I have so much left to accomplish!”

  “Then I would suggest pulling out that useless toy of yours and trying to stab the thing in the eye! That hunk of wood should be able to at least do that!”

  Feeling dumb for not having already drawn my weapon, I fumble it out of my drawstring, brandishing it with uncertainty and no small amount of shaking. I run up to the monster, hoping to take a cheap shot while it’s struggling.

  “Hyah!”

  I drive the point straight into the eye of the beast! Except… It comes to a stop a hair’s breadth from the intended target, just in time for the mind spike to stop affecting it.

  “It won’t go in!”

  The creature slams its head into my hand, knocking the blade to the ground a fair distance away. I have no time to see where it lands as the hoglin rams its whole body into me with enough force to throw me over its back, cracking a few ribs in the process. I cry out in pain as I fall to the ground, scrambling away from the crazed animal.

  What should I do?! Fuck!

  “Delilah, use your mind spike again!”

  “I can’t use it for another four minutes and 37 seconds!”

  “FUCK!”

  The beast’s charge ends about fifteen feet from me, and it turns around to begin another one, swiping its right front foot through the dirt menacingly. It begins to sprint toward me once more, and I start to panic.

  A word keeps popping into my head. One that I’ve been ignoring until now, but I’ve got no other option other than to follow my instincts. I breathe in a deep breath and shout at the top of my lungs.

  “KOA!!!”

  “I am here, Father!” A childish female voice bursts into my mind, bringing with it a calm certainty.

  The soulwood dagger that had been completely useless until now appears in my hand with a flash of blue light, causing the hoglin to close its eyes in pain. I have no time to think, so I just brace myself with the dagger pointed at the enraged animal. I lie fully back, letting the charge pass over me as I thrust the dagger into its right eye.

  It falls to the ground, skidding to a stop a few feet later. I pant, the exhausting fight taking nearly everything out of me, only to cease the ragged breaths after just a few inhalations. The pain of my cracked ribs nearly causes me to black out, but I push through the agony, more worried about whether Delilah was hurt.

  “Is everyone okay? Delilah, where are you?” Following my question, the cat jumps down from the tree she had apparently escaped into.

  “I am fine, Human. You are the only one that was injured.”

  I go to run my hand through my hair, only to nearly poke my eye out with the dagger that has once again appeared in my right hand.

  “Koa… are you okay?”

  My mental projection to my new weapon is laced with uncertainty and worry, even as my own shoulder and chest are screaming at me.

  “I am okay, father. I’m sorry that I was not there for you sooner…”

  There is a distinct tinge of sadness and shame in her tone. I immediately quash that, not wanting to burden the innocent being. I hold her before me, noticing that her color pattern has changed to deep shades of blue and rich purple, with specks of silver and gold throughout, though she is still clearly made of wood. I also note the extremely sharp edges on the front and back of her blade.

  “Koa, you beautiful dagger, you have nothing to apologize for. You came at the exact moment I needed you to.” I smile gingerly, hugging the weapon to my chest, a single tear trailing down my cheek. “You came when I called. That’s all that matters.”

  A feeling of happiness and contentment shimmer through our connection, the warmth of which brings joy to my harried heart.

  “Look at you! New look, I see! I love it!” Changing the subject, I decide flattery is a good way to go.

  She preens through our mental link, clearly happy to be receiving compliments. “You really like it? I adopted your affinity when you woke me up. This is the result!” She beams her words across our bond, loving the attention.

  “Yep, I really like it! Blue and purple are my favorite colors! Especially the darker shades.”

  “Yay! Father likes me!”

  I feel a distinct hint of dissatisfaction coming from another part of my brain.

  “If you’re done buttering up your dagger, which I should add you’ve never said those nice things to me, we should be on our way. We’ve got about two hours and 56 minutes left before you fail your quest.”

  Delilah’s pouting tone sends a bit of shame into my emotions, which I immediately follow up with the only response I can muster.

  “You’re beautiful too, Delilah. No need to get jealous.”

  “Yeah, big sis, you’re really pretty!” Koa’s adorable addition to the conversation helps appease the petulant cat, so I continue.

  “Before we go, I want to get a good look at the hoglin. I’ve never seen one up close before.”

  After standing with a wince of pain, I move over to the corpse. I notice that its skin is green, with large warts scattered here and there. It has four legs, each ending with a two-toed, nearly hooflike foot. Its snout is long, ending in a flattened nose with large nostrils. The mouth is full of razor sharp, half-inch long teeth. With big, bright yellow eyes, the whole creature makes a terrifying sight.

  So much meat going to waste. I hear hoglin is delicious, with various parts being considered delicacies. If only I had some way to harvest it…

  As soon as the word ‘harvest’ passes through my thoughts, the creature bursts into gold and silver motes. I scramble back as they flood toward me, but they harmlessly absorb into my body, disappearing without a trace. The sparkling mist has a sweet smell that, for some reason, makes me really want to go out and explore the world around me. That feeling quickly passes, however, and my head clears.

  I just now notice the buzzing that alerts me to something going on with my Heart Scroll, so I summon it, scanning the page for new information. There are three pages flashing, including one new one.

  Name: Luck Vidadura

  Age: 18

  Race: Half-ald

  Skill: Box - Summon a box to store things in.

  Affinity: Spacial

  Skill Aether: 45%

  Skill Credits: 5

  Credit Level: Level 3 (38 SC allocated)

  [Skill Tree]

  [???]

  [Permissions]

  [Inventory]!

  [Quests]!

  [Bonded Creatures]!

  [Bonded Items]!

  I decide to check my inventory first, as that seems to be the least important page requiring my attention so I might as well get it out of the way.

  Inventory A: 100% Capacity (98% Efficiency)

  20x various hoglin meat cuts

  Inventory B: 5% Capacity

  1x mysterious sealed box

  Inventory C: 89% Capacity

  1x search Resonance

  4x hoglin feet

  32x hoglin warts

  52x hoglin teeth

  2x hoglin ears

  1x hoglin tongue

  1x hoglin eye

  1x hoglin snout

  5x various hoglin meat cuts

  I stare in disbelief, mouth agape as I read the contents of my inventories. “We’re going to make a killing selling this meat! No pun intended.”

  Before I get too excited about the rings I’ll get for this bounty, I check my other pages. Let’s check to see what’s going on with the quest page now. That’s probably just the completion of the first task, but we’ll look at it just to be safe.

  New quest found!

  Category: Surprise

  Aspects: Extremely dangerous

  Level: 2

  Time Limit: Before you die

  Description: Kill the hoglin that performed a sneak attack.

  Quest progress: Completed. 1 of 1 hoglin killed.

  Reward: 5 SC, 2 bronze rings, and 5 copper rings

  Penalty for failure: Death

  New quest found!

  Category: Repeatable

  Aspects: Dangerous, hunting

  Level: 2

  Time Limit: N/A

  Description: Hunt down and kill one hoglin

  Quest progress: Not accepted.

  Reward: 5 SC, 2 bronze rings, and 5 copper rings

  Penalty for failure: N/A

  2x quests completed!

  Claim rewards?

  I’m going to come back to that later, for now we’ll just check on Delilah’s page.

  Name: Delilah

  Age: Unknown

  Skills: Wound Reversal, Telepathy, Mind Spike

  Affinities: Temporal, Mental

  Level: 10

  Aether: 16%

  Disposition: Acquainted

  Not much changed there… Her level went up by one, and she has a new disposition toward me. Only acquainted, though… Oh yeah!

  “Hey, Delilah, your skill Wound Reversal… what exactly does it do?”

  “It reverses wounds, obviously. Sometimes I worry about your mental capacities, Human. This should have been easy to comprehend.”

  “Hey, be nice to Father! He’s doing his best!”

  “It’s okay, Koa. This is just how Delilah is. She can be… difficult to work with at times, but I think deep down she has good intentions.”

  “Alright… if you say so, Father. But I don’t like it!”

  I chuckle at her insistent statement, but soon turn my attention back to the cat in question.

  “More importantly, why haven’t you used your skill to reverse my wounds yet?”

  “Hmph! You never asked!” Delilah turns her head away from me, clearly still jealous over the attention Koa has been getting from me.

  “Well… I’m asking now… Could you reverse my wounds? Pretty please!”

  “I could be amenable, but in order for the skill to properly take effect, you have to be petting me.”

  I highly doubt this is the case, but I still acquiesce, and begin softly stroking her back. She purrs, pressing her face against my hand as it passes over her head. It takes a moment of petting for me to notice that my pain is entirely gone.

  “Not a flashy skill, I see. Thank you, pretty kitty.” I smile at her warmly before turning my attention back to the scroll in my hand.

  “Let’s see what this new page looks like, shall we?”

  Name: Koa

  Skills: Father’s Call

  Affinities: Spacial

  Level: 1

  Aether: 84%

  “Okay, Koa. Your page looks like a simplified version of Delilah’s. We should probably get going now that I’ve reviewed all of the changes.” I drop my scroll and it disappears as soon as it leaves my hand. I assume that Father’s Call is what Koa used to teleport back to me when I needed her, so I don’t ask.

  “Everybody ready to go?” Now that I’m no longer injured, I actually have a slight pep to my step, so my tone is a bit more jovial than it could have been.

  “I’m ready, Father!”

  “Haven’t I already been saying we should leave? You never fail to disappoint me, Human.”

  We all fail to notice the unseen eyes watching us as we go.

  Stolen novel; please report.