Lilly walked further into the cave, hoping to dear god (or gods (or goddesses, we’re not sexist in these parts)) that there weren’t any ginormous insects crawling around. Thankfully, what showed up wasn’t an overgrown spider, but a rat that was simply too big to be real.

[Cave Rat - 5]

What is with this world and it’s stupidly large earth equivalents? Or am I just smaller than I should be? Are there going to be 10 ft tall humans as the norm? She desperately hoped that she wouldn’t have to suddenly suffer through being the short one since she could barely be considered average at 5’4 on Earth. Assuming she’s not on Earth anymore and this isn’t some elaborate Virtual Reality prank.

Lilly realized that she had been stalling for too long; the rat saw her and was skittering in her direction. Holding out her newly obtained dagger in a, what she hoped to be, proper fighting stance, she prepared herself as the rat leaped into the air and tried to claw at her face. She leaned back out of range of the claws and to the side as the rat flew past her face and landed behind her. She turned to face it in time to see it doing another leap, only this time she wasn’t as prepared and could only cover her face with her right arm, getting herself bitten as the monster’s jaw locked onto her arm. Blood dripped from her arm as pain coursed through her.

“Fuck, that hurts!” Lilly screamed when she stabbed down into the rat with her dagger, earning a satisfying squeak as the rat let go and skittered away a few feet from her. Oh no, you fucking don’t. She jumped onto the huge rat and wrapped her heavily bleeding arm around it despite the rat scratching and biting her. Lilly stabbed the dagger into the rat over and over, more blood pooled under the two as they struggled for their lives. The rat started resisting less and less as Lilly’s arms burned from exhaustion and her body protested against holding onto the beast. Finally, the rat died and a satisfying ding! sounded in her head.

[Cave Rat - Defeated!]

[Daggers (Passive) - Skill Unlocked!]

Didn’t your mother teach you not to play with sharp objects? At least, you didn’t cut yourself, and with this skill, you’ll maybe cut others.

Level Up!

I’m going to cut you if you keep talking like that. Lilly thought as she lied down in her pool of blood and a warm glow enveloped her body, healing her wounds. This fight didn’t last as long as the last, with the help of her new weapon, and she could feel the difference that the Vitality gave her in helping her stay conscious despite having taken so much more damage this time around. Before, she probably would’ve passed out before finishing off the rat, so she was happy with her choices thus far.

Still laid out on the ground, Lilly pulled up her status screen and considered her options.

Name: Lilly Nightingale - Level 3

Race: Human

Mana: 100/100

Class: None

Active Skills:

Identify (Common) - 1

Inventory (Special, 1/100, 3 COP) - 1

Passive Skills:

Unarmed Combat (Common) - 2

Dodging (Common) - 1

Daggers (Common) - 1

Stats (5 points remaining):

Vitality - 18(+)

Strength - 14(+)

Intellect - 11(+)

Wisdom - 10(+)

Dexterity - 17(+)

Perception - 11(+)

This time, she thought a little more seriously about what her stats meant. Vitality seemed obvious, being physical health and resistance to physical damage being the probable main points, Strength being overall body strength and physical damage dealt. Intellect was a little iffy, did it literally impact her level of intelligence or perhaps it did something like boost her magical attack power, assuming there was magic, which there likely was if the mana bar was any indication. Same with wisdom, but if she was going to guess anything, Intellect would contribute to her magical attack damage and wisdom would contribute to her mana capacity and regen (the rate at which her mana refilled). Dexterity was most likely something related to how fast her body moved and how flexible/acrobatic her body could be. Finally, there was Perception, which could honestly be anything from boosting her five senses to acting as a sixth sense for sensing danger, but she couldn’t be sure as to what until she asked someone.

There was no real need for her to put anything into Wisdom or Intellect as of right now since she didn’t actually know any magic, but it would certainly be an important stat in the future. Dexterity was already high enough as it was, and she didn’t know in what way Perception would benefit her. So following that logic, she put two more points into Vitality, rounding it out to an even twenty, and the remaining three points into Strength, hopefully letting her close out fights a little faster.

Come to think of it, I wonder why this place is called the Cave of Trials. Seems awfully auspicious for a random opening at the foot of a mountain. She laid there for a moment thinking about it, but coming to no more conclusions, she got up and looked at where the body of the rat had been.

She only realized it now, but the bodies of each monster she killed dissolved after a few minutes of their death, leaving not even a speck of blood, only the loot that magically appeared where they died. This time, there was no weapon, only four more copper coins on the ground and what looked like wrapped meat. She picked up the coins and stored them into her inventory, which seemed to keep money without taking up space. Meanwhile, she inspected the meat, wrapped in large leaves and tied with a string.

[Rat Meat - Common]

So... the fact that coins and items drop from mobs is weird enough, but for some reason, having the meat wrapped up for me too is on a whole nother level. Lilly sighed tiredly, and put the meat into her inventory, taking up another slot.

Without further pondering, she wandered deeper into the cave. It wasn’t long until she reached what suspiciously looked like a door shaped hole at the end of the cave. Approaching it quietly, she saw a very plain stairway carved from the same stone as the cave, leading downwards, dimly lit by more of the same blue grass found in the previous tunnel.

“Well, that’s just fucking creepy…” Lilly muttered as she slowly descended the stairs as quietly as she could manage. She made it about twenty meters down the stairs before a ding! nearly made her squeal loudly.

[Stealth (Passive) - Skill Unlocked!]

What are you sneaking around for? Well, with this skill, you’ll sneak just a little quieter.

For fuck’s sakes, don’t scare me like that. Lilly fumed before proceeding further down the stairs. It's only been a few hours since she had woken up in the forest, and she's already been attacked by a drake, seen what could be dragons in the distance, and fought both a ginormous rat and overly stuffed bat. At this point, she was ready for anything, at least she thought she was.

She reached the bottom of the stairs and saw what she could only describe as a neglected tavern. On the right was a bar. Lots of wine barrels (probably empty) lined up on the wall behind the bar, stools lining the near side. Various rectangular tables are strewn around the place, everything looked like the people who once used this place simply got up and left; no signs of a struggle and nor was anything really broken except for the occasional moldy wooden chairs with broken legs. There were even mugs left on the tables like the inhabitants had planned to be back within minutes, but obviously that never happened, looking at all the spiderwebs scattered around the place. There was another door tucked in the back right corner, next to the bar.

It's like a ghost town in here. Or is it ghost bar? Better be no actual ghosts, as if this place isn't creepy enough. Looking around, Lilly found the mugs empty, the barrels dry and nothing of real interest to be found in the gods forsaken bar. Taking one more look around, she headed over to the door she noticed earlier, checking it over. There wasn't anything special about it, a plain wooden door with a brass doorknob. As she twisted the knob, a loud noise came from the stairway. She whipped her head back to see that there was a large stone slab sliding down to block the way back out. She scrambled over as quickly as she could but didn't make it in time before the slab closed down. She slammed her fist against the stone, but to no avail.

Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck. There's no way I just got stuck down here to starve, right? RIGHT? She frantically checked the seams of the stone to see if there was any way to open it, but it was airtight, and looking all over the tavern revealed to her no buttons or switches meant to open it back up. She backed up slowly and stared at the wall for a moment, arms limp at her side, thinking about how much shit she probably got herself into.

After a minute of deliberation, she walked back to the only door leading out of the tavern. Welp, pretty sure this is my only option now. It'd be kind of embarrassing to die on the first day, but I'll put all the blame on whoever threw me in front of that damn lizard. She took a long, deep breath, braced herself, and opened the door.

"I'm not sure what I expected, but it definitely wasn't this..." She said to herself as she looked around the place. What Lilly had found was probably some kind of secret hideout. The bar in the front most likely served as some kind of front or hangout place for whoever used to reside here, but in front of her was a medium-sized room with archways leading out in three directions. In the center of the room was something similar to a planning table, with a relatively faded map, hopefully of whatever continent or planet she found herself on. To her left, through the archway was an armory with various sets of rusted gear lying around and a couple of chests, one of which was opened and empty. On her right was a small room with a few bunks set into the walls, and another door on the far wall that hopefully led to a kitchen, because she was finding herself a little hungry.

Let's hope the rat meat doesn't taste too gross cooked, too bad I'm not sure how to season it. I guess watching Masterchef doesn't qualify me for a cooking skill? She thought pensively, before looking straight ahead into the room in front of her. She walked around the meeting table, headed through the archway and looked around.

Lilly found herself in a study of sorts, with bookshelves lining all the walls and a desk at the end with a few books stacked on the desk and a dusty chair behind it. All the bookshelves were filled to the brim, with a few missing slots here or there where the books had fallen out. The whole room had a blue sheen to it, due to the grass lighting up the room, just as it had been everywhere else.

"Wow... whoever these people were, they sure were decked out..." She said absentmindedly as she walked around reading various titles. The Art of Assassination Part IV, The Act of Creating Poisons Third Edition, The Legacy of the Arkon Society, were but a few that she could read.

"All of this stuff sounds so sinister." Lilly smiled widely. Exactly my kind of people. She'd been hoping to get some kind of rogue/assassin class, and this looks exactly like the place she'd find one.

She turned back and headed to the doorway on the far side of the bunks, and found a somewhat expansive kitchen, complete with a stove, a metal box that looked like a refrigerator, pots, pans, and other cooking/eating implements hung up on the walls. The floor was tiled, made of the same stone as everything else and unlike any other room, this one was lit up by glowing runes lining the walls. On the stove, there were four runes, each where the flame would normally be found. When she opened up the fridge, it wasn't cold, but she could see some runes lining the inside of the container as well, presumably for cooling the food. Incidentally, there was no food to be found, but there were a few barrels of water that she found in the pantry located in the back left corner of the room.

"At least, this solves the food and water issue for a little bit. Now I just need to learn how to turn on this damn stove. Am I a boomer now?" She asked herself before going back out to the main room.

Looking at the door leading into the tavern, she noticed a lever that she hadn't seen on her way in. She walked over to it, pantomimed pulling the lever, and made a kaboom! sound with her mouth.

That would be fucking hilarious. She thought to herself laughing before pulling the lever, hearing the loud grating noise coming from where the stone slab had closed down. She sighed in relief, popped her head into the tavern, and saw the stairway open again. She pushed the lever back and watched the stone slab close again, keeping any potential intruders out.

Turning back around, she scanned over what had suddenly and unexpectedly become her hideout.

Home sweet home, I guess. Lilly walked over to one of the cots, promptly laid down, and went straight to sleep.