A creature approached me from the shadows. She stepped forward from the woods slowly, silent and cautious.
Her head was shaped like an octopus, with glistening skin that shimmered in patches. Her eyes resembled those of a fish, round and eerily reflective, and her ears fanned out like gills on either side of her head. I couldn't make out the rest of her body because her clothes blended with the darkness. And honestly, even I didn't know how I could tell she was female. I just… felt it.
She stopped a few feet away. In her hands, she held five strange fruits, alien in shape but colorful, almost glowing. She extended them toward me and spoke up.
"I'll give you this," she said, her voice soft, low, bubbling, "if you promise to give me something in return."
Her language was strange—not mine—but somehow I understood it. Or maybe I didn't.
Maybe I was just too hungry to care. I took the fruits without arguing, the first bite was sweet, tangy, juicy like a real fruit. Whatever they looked like, they tasted… normal and comforting.
After watching me eat, she turned and beckoned with a gentle wave.
I followed her, didn't ask why or where.
We moved deeper through the trees, until she led me into a cave hidden behind moss and low-hanging vines. I hadn't even known there were caves in this forest.
Inside, the temperature shifted, cool, damp and still. Lying on the cave floor were children, small, curled.
She pointed at them. "I gave you food," she said. "So you would leave my babies alone."
Her tone cracked on the word babies. Like she'd said it too many times before. "But you can take me."
I blinked in confusion, wondering what she was talking about? "I didn't come here to take anyone," I said, shaking my head. "I was just hungry."
She stared at me, those deep, glimmering fish-like eyes not blinking once. "There are others," she said. "Bird-like creatures, they come too close and threaten this place."
That caught my attention. "Where?"
She walked to the mouth of the cave and pointed beyond the trees. "They lair in the caves far east of here. You'll know when you hear them, they have tiny wings, they are flightless."
I nodded slowly. That sounded like XP to me.
Then behind us, a noise, the children began to stir. At first, I thought there were four of them. But one by one, more sat up…
Five… six… seven… until I counted at least ten. They stared at me with wide, frightened eyes.
Not crying. Not speaking. Just watching.
Their mother turned and whispered something I didn't catch, then she looked at me. "They're scared of you." Of course they would be.
I crouched down, slow and calm. "I'm not here to hurt you," I said gently. "If you want… come closer."
I held out one of the remaining fruits from earlier. They hesitated but one of the little ones stepped forward. Cautious. Silent. Then grabbed the fruit and ran back into the circle of siblings. Their round wide eyes reminded me of someone.
The mother approached one last time. "I told you, you can have me but not them." I wondered what she didn't understand from what I had said earlier.
"I don't want you," I said, my voice lower now. "I just wanted directions."
I was on my way out and I told her not to approach anyone randomly, not everyone would accept her offer. She nodded silently. There was no way I could guarantee her children's safety out here. Given the presence of the students. Too many hunters. Too many... unknowns.
I turned back into the forest and asked the system to show me the path toward the eastern side. But the system was still silent. Not even a holograpic display nor a hum. I was on my own now.
I sighed. So far, the system had done everything automatically, guiding me, tracking paths and updating conditions. But now that I needed it most, it had vanished. I tapped my wrist but nothing. How was I supposed to move through the middle of the woods if I didn't even know where I was going? It wouldn't be long before I stumbled into the dungeons.
Still, I kept walking, the fruits she gave me had barely quieted the hunger gnawing at my insides, but I told myself food would come in the morning. I could hold on, I had to.
I'm sure students were told to carry something for the first day, but poor me wasn't paying attention.
By now, it must've been two... maybe three hours since I first entered the woods. That means it was just past lunch, a long wait still ahead.
Suddenly I heard a scream.
Not a human's but a beast's, ragged and sharp. A cross between a dragon's roar and a pained shriek. I moved toward the sound step by step, steady and careful not to make a noise.
And that's when I saw it.
At first, I couldn't believe it, a creature like something torn from a nightmare. It looked like a flightless dragon—but twisted. Its body was massive, but its wings were small, almost comically so. Clinging to its back was a rider cloaked in shadow, his presence wrapped in something darker than the woods.
He looked straight at me, a grin curling on his face like he'd been expecting me. I stood my ground as he said nothing and neither did I.
We just stared at each other—like two strangers meeting at the edge of a cliff, one wrong move and everything falls apart.
I couldn't explain what the creature really was, nothing about it made sense. But this forest… this test… it was all real, we were meeting monsters we wouldn't even dream of seeing in our nightmares.
His entire aura was wrong, heavy, suffocating and malicious. And yet… It didn't scare me. I stepped closer and my eyes flicked toward the dragon-like beast beneath him.
"This must be the bird-like creature she was talking about," I murmured under my breath.
The rider's grin faded, maybe because he didn't expect me to walk toward him and at the same time ignore him.
And that's when the system finally kicked in.
> Target Scan Activated. It was just a notification no sound.
Holographic tags appeared above the heads of the creatures, two names hovering in the air like danger signs painted in blood.
> Liccan Shadow Reaper (Orange Tag)
> Flightless Guardian (Red Tag)
It didn't make sense. The rider—Liccan Shadow Reaper—had an orange tag but the creature he rode… was red.
The dragon didn't stop moving, pacing, shuffling and growling as if it couldn't stand still for even a moment.
My heart beat slower and louder, I didn't know who they were, or what they wanted—but whatever it was, this encounter wasn't by accident.
I looked up at the Liccan Shadow Reaper and said,
"You're a Liccan Shadow Reaper. I wonder what you reap?" As I held my chin. "Do you mind climbing down? We'll make a deal."
But before I could blink, he was already behind me. The speed he used to move from the dragon's back to my blind spot—I hadn't even sensed it. My system went dead silent, as if it had never existed in the first place.
I was too hungry to entertain a fight.
"So this is how you want it." I muttered.
He prepared to vanish again but this time, I moved faster. A single punch landed square across his jaw.
The force knocked his hood clean off.
What fell wasn't skin or flesh—but dry bones, clattering in all directions. No blood. Just the brittle remains of something long dead, barely held together.
I thought it was over.
Then I saw a shadow, slithering across the ground like spilled oil. So this was the truth, it was never a man. Just a shade wearing bones.
I paused time around us for a moment, trying to figure it out. The shadow halted, but I needed it's ears now. "The deal is," I muttered, "give me a little of your Essencia core energy… and I won't destroy you." But that wasn't how it worked, one needed a whole Essencia Core and that meant killing it first.
The Shadow Reaper wasn't interested in my offer. Even inside the frozen second, it began crawling up my legs, coiling, slithering up my body. My limbs locked, I couldn't even twitch.
Then suddenly a crack of thunder burst from my chest, the explosion tore the silence apart and for a moment I thought the entire forest had shattered.
My consciousness slipped and I was lying on the forest floor, staring at my own body from above, like my soul had stepped out to breathe, everything had fallen apart.
I didn't understand a thing of what had just happened but I needed XP. So I rewound time—back to when he still sat on the dragon, grinning like he knew something I didn't. But this time, I didn't give him the chance.
The moment he stirred, I was behind him. THUD— a clean kick to the neck and the bones scattered the same way again.
The shadow crept once more and it had started to frustrate me. Physical attacks did nothing.
I wished the system would just speak—just once—and tell me how to kill a shadow Reaper, but all I had… was hunger.
I rewound time again but if my dad were here, he'd remind me that rewinding time—especially to alter the past and present is forbidden. But right now, I didn't care, I had no other choice. Why give us the ability if forbidden, but if we started to break the rules then the 8th would also break the one that binds them.
I was back under the tree trunk, lying still. Then the system called out my name, snapping me awake. It was active again.
Suddenly, I heard a shuffle from behind. It was her, the same creature from before.
This time something had changed, she had nothing in her hands, no offerings just empty palms and that same nervous glance.
She again offered herself in place of her children, but I made a different offer instead.
"I'll spare you and your kids," I said, "if you show me where I can find some of the poisonous plants, especially one that works on shadows."
She hesitated, I could tell she was afraid—either of the plants, or of the deal itself.
But then… she agreed and gestured for me to follow.
We walked for about twenty minutes, the forest grew darker, thicker. Her steps slowed as we reached a dim, open patch of dirt and she pointed at a bulbous plant growing just beneath the surface—like an onion, only its skin shimmered faintly black and purple.
She wouldn't get any closer, even breathing near it made her uneasy. "That's enough," I said. "I'll handle the rest myself."
But then, something came, a sharp shuffle behind us and a blur of claws aimed straight for her skull. —WHOOSH— But I pulled her back, faster than I thought I could move.
A small flightless guardian with a high speed lunged from the shadows—feral and twitching, but it wasn't as large as the last one. I couldn't see its tag color because the system didn't show anything. No holographic display, no warning.
But still, I reacted.
The instant its claw swiped down—shnk—I pivoted sideways, barely missing the slice. Dirt flew beneath my shoes and my body moved before I could think.—THUD
I drove my fist straight into its side hip, low and precise.—Boom!—A burst of compressed air exploded from the point of contact, rippling outward like something from another dimension, warping the space around us.
The creature's body contorted mid-air, limbs flailing, eyes wide with pain or surprise, I couldn't tell. Then—crash!—it slammed into the far edge of the clearing, tearing through dry branches and landing with a thud that shook the ground.
For a moment, nothing, no growl, no twitch, no second wave. I stood my ground, ready in case it got up but it didn't, it just... lay there.
Then where the body had fallen—a faint shimmer pulsed and rose. From the remains was a crystal core green-bluish with a dark center pulsing softly like it had a heartbeat of its own.
I took a slow breath, either that thing was weak… or I had just gotten stronger. But honestly, I was too hungry to care.
I stared at the crystal for a second, then bent down and picked it up. It was warm, pulsing faintly. "Essencia core," I muttered. "So this is what they look like."
The mother creature watched from a distance, her hand clutching the edge of a nearby root. Her breathing was shallow, but her eyes never left mine. I turned slightly to show her the core. "I didn't kill it because of you," I said. "It attacked both of us."
Not like I knew the exact reason, solo-leveling was boring and none of the creatures I had encountered were worth a good fight. I slipped the core into my backpack, the system was now among the least of my concern.
My stomach still growled but I ignored it. I wiped a bit of sweat from my neck and turned back to the poisonous plant. I dug it up carefully, wrapping it with a strip of cloth. Just handling it made my hand tingle, that was enough proof.
Behind me, the mother creature stepped forward a little. "You'll use it... on the shadow?"
I gave a small nod. "Only if I see it again."
"Don't miss," she said. Then she turned and disappeared between the trees.
If I missed that would mean the end of me, but I had to do something about this solo-leveling.
The forest was now quiet, too quiet even the leaves weren't rustling. I looked around, the CoreLink system was still silent, no voice, no tags. Just empty air and thick trees.
I had lost track of time since no one was allowed to come with a phone or watch. This was clearly a test of survival.