Vikram moved and saw that the wand was in the hands of the caster.
[Abhorring Wand(Class: Mage)]
Vikram looked at the notification and tried to pick up the wand. Before he could touch the wand, an invisible force stopped him from touching the wand and alerted him of his choice.
[Do you wish to store or equip (Abhorring Wand)]
Vikram made up his mind to equip the ominous thing, and the moment Vikram's hand touched the wand, tendrils of black smoke attacked Vikram and invaded Vikram's body, and Vikram exploded on the spot.
[You have been slain.]
Vikram cursed and cut the corpses and the stones that surrounded the cave to relieve his frustration. A single piece of equipment could make you die. If that wasn't hell difficulty, Vikram didn't know what was. But complaining was never Vikram's thing.
So, Vikram went into grinding again.
"Damning Hell!"
[You have been slain.]
"Damn to all hell!"
[You have been slain.]
"Finally!" But sadly, the wand didn't drop another time.
It was hard to pass the caster part, and it took an additional two tires to clear that section. It was just a sad part that Vikram didn't see any save point.
He didn't even want to think that this whole theatrics of a game didn't have a save point.
After Vikram passed the caster part, Vikram saw a couple of zombies, he even saw that the zombies were appearing in groups. But it was quite easy to kill these rotting corpses because they didn't have any prominent intelligence.
They had situational awareness, but that was all. After one or two tires, Vikram grasped the rhythm of battle.
[+55 Soul Fragments]
Vikram finally came into another clearing, and Vikram felt that it was going to be another frustration-inducing part.
The clearing was a dilapidated village, with run-down houses and rooftops and broken wooden fences. Vikram was about to enter the village, but he paused when he saw that there was a statue of a nun that had both hands outstretched.
It was not that the statue was anything great. It was that held our arms called to his soul. He felt a primal calling towards the hand when he looked at it. But when he looked away from it, the feeling was gone.
Only when he focused on the held-out hand did he receive the calling.
He moved forward to inspect the statue, but when he was close, his chest glowed a luminescent blue. Vikram thought that this statue was some kind of boss, and moved back to create distance.
The statue remained utterly still, its cold, lifeless demeanor unchanging. Its stone features were frozen in an eternal pose, unresponsive to any stimuli.
Yet, as Vikram cautiously approached it, something strange happened. A soft, radiant blue glow began to pulse faintly from within his chest. The light throbbed in rhythm with his heartbeat, growing brighter the closer he got to the statue.
Frustrated by the lack of answers, Vikram decided to push forward. His curiosity, tempered with a hint of defiance, urged him closer to the enigmatic statue.
As soon as he stepped within arm's reach, it felt as though an invisible force had been triggered—like a time bomb silently detonating.
Blue motes of light seeped from Vikram's chest, swirling around him before encircling the statue. As they settled, the cracks and wear on the statue vanished, restoring it to its "supposed" original, pristine state. The statue now gleamed with life, its intricate details shining anew, leaving Vikram staring in stunned silence.
[You have been blessed by the Saint.]
[Save point has been registered.]
[Would you like to use the Souls?]
Vikram knew the basic functions by observing and willed to use the souls he had.
[Level: 1]
[Realm: Blood Refining Realm(Early)]
[Strength: 1-->2](200 Souls)
[Agility: 0-->1](100 Souls)
[Vitality: 0-->1](100 Souls)
[Muscle and Bone Density: 0-->1](100 Souls)
[Blood Beast Energy: 0-->1](100 Souls)
[Stat Points: 0]
[Souls: 200]
An immense energy coursed through his body, his muscles tensed and forged ferociously under this energy at breakneck speed.
Vikram paid 200 souls to increase Agility and Muscle and Bone Density to 1. Vikram saw that the blue motes of light all condensed around the hand of the 'saint', and a pulse passed through Vikram's body, and he felt the changes all across the body.
Vikram's bones, muscles, and nerves twitched and writhed, sending waves of pain through him. He gritted his teeth, feeling as if his body was shedding its skin, metaphorically, transforming under an unseen force.
When the torturous process finally ended, Vikram felt reborn. His movements were quicker, his grip on the axe steadier, and each swing seemed to stir the air with newfound force. He was stronger, sharper, a transformed version of himself.
It was an exhilarating process to see your body grow stronger with minimum period of intervals.
Vikram now understood the importance of souls, and he was already wanting to restart the whole thing just to acquire all the souls again and increase his stats.
But he resisted the urge, dying to someone else was one thing, and dying to yourself was another matter altogether. He had to keep a fine line of restrain, otherwise, he would devolve into an animal that didn't treat his life with care.
Even though he hadn't felt the burden of dying and resurrecting multiple times, Vikram couldn't just shrug it away.
Vikram looked at the village, and entered it.
[The Adthal Village.]
Vikram looked at his surroundings, and all he felt was all kinds of wrongness. There was something about the village that screamed death.
As Vikram edged cautiously along the narrow village road, his gaze fell on a small lump lying ahead. He halted, his curiosity piqued, before stepping forward with measured care. As the details came into focus, his eyes widened in shock.
It wasn't a lump at all, it was a small child, curled up into a ball and silently sobbing. The child's tattered clothes blended so perfectly with the dusty road that Vikram had mistaken it for an inanimate object.
Vikram shook his head and moved forward. He was not stupid enough to believe that this child would be normal. If he remembered most of the entertainment industry, then this child would probably have turned into a zombie.
Vikram slowly inched forward, and the sobbing stopped, Vikram looked at the notification hovering above the child's head.
[Neurotic Halfing]
Vikram frowned and let out a weary sigh. As if sensing his presence, the child slowly turned its head. The sight that met Vikram's eyes made him clench his jaw in horror. The child had no eyes; its sockets were filled with impenetrable darkness. Its mouth, if it could still be called that, was a grotesque ruin, melted and deformed, unable to fully open, as if something unspeakable had erased its humanity.
Vikram gritted his teeth and readied his axe. He looked at the halfling and hesitated. This was a child at first...
[You have been slain.]
[Please select a respawn point.]
[The Cave has been selected]
Vikram respawned in the cave and sat cross legged for a moment to digest and process what was happening. The halfling was so agile that it only took a single moment of carelessness from Vikram to capitalize on it.
It had stabbed a knife into Vikram's throat, and Vikram couldn't react to it. No, it was not that Vikram couldn't react to the speed, but that Vikram was distracted.
Vikram felt as though he had learned a big lesson. If this was in the real world, there would be no respawns, and he would have been dead, with no one knowing him, and not even people around him knowing in what pathetic way he had died.
Vikram was doubtful that people would remember him after a month or so, and that scared the shit out of him. Vikram wanted to be relevant, he wanted to be known, and he wanted to be recognized, and dying like that was just the opposite of what he wanted.
Vikram took his axe and rushed through zombies and the caster, finally reaching the statue. When he came close to the statue, the blue phenomenon happened again, but this time, the statue was already repaired.