Chapter 3 – Falling branches
I woke up startled, I couldn’t hear or see anything as usual, as I recalled my yesterday’s fun experience, I asked myself. ”What happened? Should be some kind of rebound from using the Magic Perception skill to its fullest? At the start, It felt so good, but then I entered the purgatory.”
“The senses at that time were so sharp and clear, it gave me the feeling that I could do anything, but I would never dare to do it again.” I took few minutes to collect my thoughts and said “I hope that when I turn the Magic Perception again it will be back to normal… *Magic Perception*”, a small chunk of fear filled my mind but just for a moment.
The view was back to normal, there were no dazzling colors or super clear sounds, I was relieved that I won’t be going back through that nightmare again. “Thank god…” I said with a sigh of relief. After that, I checked my self awareness status, as if it already became a habit “*Self Awareness*.”
*Self Awareness Status*
-Ontopary bush-
Rarity: Common
Health: 4/4
Mana: 8/8
Stamina: 3/3
Race: Berry bush.
Status: Unique-Intelligent
Skills:
*Self Awareness Lv1* *Magic Perception Lv3(Active)* *Calm Mind Lv4*
Titles:
*Clutz Lv1*
“Awesome my Calm Mind skill leveled up by 2 and Magic Perception leveled up as well.” A feeling of reassurance and relaxation filled my mind. “I didn’t go through that hell for nothing… Wait what? why is my mana pool is eight?!”
In just a moment depression filled my mind again. “This rebound is too taxing, it didn’t even gave me a warning, but gave me such a huge backlash! Agh!”, I knew that my mana pool was really small, and if it got even smaller I would find myself in a huge problem.
“Mana pool… that’s sound familiar…” The thought of me knowing how to call my maximum mana somehow gave off a weird feeling but just for a moment. ”I am always falling short with my mana, but now it will be even harder *sigh*.” I was worried that now I will fall unconscious even more frequently.
“Looks like my life will be harder from now on, but if I understand the way how to increase my mana pool like last time, it should fix the problem.” Not sure if it was because of my Calm Mind skill or just because of my optimistic personality, but it still filled me with a little bit of hope.
Suddenly I heard some weird noises coming from behind the golden tree, I looked at the tree with my puzzled imaginary face, but I couldn’t see the source of the sound because the tree blocked most of my view and I couldn’t see behind it. The noise wasn’t loud or strong just some leaves being crushed by something.
Just as I tried to understand what was the source sound it vanished and didn’t continue. “Maybe some branch fell to the ground from the tree?” I guessed but didn’t turn back my view and still tried to look behind the tree. At this moment I wished for an x-ray skill, but this stupid world would never give me something like that on a golden plate.
After a while there was still no respond from the mysterious sound, I didn’t care much and turned back to the forest. I could watch the stupid tree all day long, but that won’t get me anywhere, so I started to level up my inspect skill again.
“Inspect Tree… Inspect Tree… Inspect Tree…”
*Small Tree* – Tree with green leaves.
*Small Orange Tree* – Tree with orange leaves.
*Small Violet Tree* – Tree with violet leaves.
“…still useless as ever, what was the forest name again? Great Forest Of Dusk if I remember correctly, now that I think about it I still don’t know why its called like that. I really didn’t even saw this forest at dusk and with my great luck I will never see…” I started to mock my own luck and fate. ”I don’t have lots of hope but still, Inspect *Great Forest Of Dusk*.” I was still curious why the forest had this mighty name to it.
*Great Forest Of Dusk* – Location.
“Really? I didn’t know…” With mockery tone I said to myself, anger and frustration was filling my head. ”Stupid inspect skill, can’t do shit…” I said to myself as I continued to try and level up my inspect skill.
“Inspect Stupid Tree… Inspect Stupid Tree… Inspect Stupid Tree…”
*Small Purple Tree* – Tree with purple leaves.
*Small Tree* – Tree with green leaves.
*Inspect leveled up to Lv2*
*Small Booku Tree* – The tree covered with red leaves.
“Oh inspect skill leveled up…” My hopes rose but then they were shattered in an instant after I saw the inspect skill information. “At least I know its name…” At that moment I was pretty sure if there a skill for mockery I would have gotten it already.
I heard a sound of leaves being crushed with a *tap* *tap* *tap* sounds of many legs and it was coming straight to me from the side. I was started and moved my view to the direction of the golden tree and as I saw it I screamed.
“A COW!!!” It wasn’t a cow, but it wouldn’t be much worse. What appeared in front of me, was a huge bug, a huge ladybug. But there were few differences from a normal one, first of all it was huge and it wasn’t red with black spots, it was white with black spots, just because of that the first thing that came to my mind that it was a cow.
If a normal person would see a dog size bug running to him, he would be scared shitless. But I am not a normal man, currently I am a defenseless little bush, when I saw that bug approaching me, my heart fell through my pants, through the ground and vanished into the abyss. Shock fear and despair filled my mind.
“I knew this day will come! But I never tough it will be so soon and it’s the day that I will be eaten!” I started to panic. “What to do?! what to do?! I can’t move, I can’t speak, I can’t do nothing to stop that monster!” Meanwhile, when I was in panic the ladybug just stopped a meter away from me and just stood there for some time doing nothing. It gave me a feeling that the ladybug was looking at me with a puzzled look as if I was the weird one.
“It stopped… that’s weird why would someone stop before a plate with cake?” I was puzzled for a moment there “Or maybe it does not eat my kind at all!” I was filled with little hope that I won’t be eaten today, ah I remember how foolish I was that day.
It didn’t take me a long time to come with an understanding of what to do at the moment. “I should inspect it and see what information I can get from it, Inspect ladybug.”
-Boshebug-
Health: 10/10
Mana: 2/2
Stamina: 5/7
“Sadly that’s very little information, it has a lot more hp and stamina than I do, but I have higher mana than it, even so it still does not help me at all.” At that moment I was trying to do my best to confirm my speculations and calm my mind. “I should inspect it name as well, inspect *Boshebug*”
*Boshebug* – A low tier monster, mostly eats fruits berries and leaves.
“…Well shit.” I didn’t have any words at all, the inspect skill showed me that this bug will eat me sooner or later because I am perfectly fit for its diet. “I am confused it should have already started to munch on me, but why does it just stand there looking at me as if I am standing upside down on my hands?” And then it came to me, “Maybe it can sense that I am little different from all the other plants it ate and maybe it even fears me and won’t eat me at all.” I was correct and incorrect at the same time.
The bug really was puzzled because it could sense a presence from a bush, it would give the same feeling as if you look at a chair and think that it’s alive. But at most, the bug was caution of me, because there was a small chance I could be a monster in hiding, but as it looked at me more and more it was almost sure that there would be no danger in eating me.
Just as my confidence was rising it started to approach me again. “What? Why it’s coming over?” From despair to hope and from there back to despair yet again, my mind was in complete turmoil. Not only I didn’t know what to do, I just couldn’t do anything at all, as I saw the bug approach me. It wasn’t that fast but it wasn’t that slow as well, it looked as if it still didn’t completely felt safe coming close me, I guess I gave her a weird feeling.
As it came closer and closer hope was slowly drifting away from me and then the last string of hope was turned to dust, because the ladybug just bit me. It started to chew on my leaves and fruits even damaging my branches. It felt like if my leaves were my skin and they were turned off slowly and my branches were my bones crunching and breaking. I wanted to scream but I held myself together, I had to do something fast or else I would die.
Thanks to Magic Perception I could see and feel ladybug eating me, and I could see myself as well, being slowly eaten by that cow. That monster ate a huge chunk of my leaves and berries leaving only a few broken branches untouched. Getting myself together I said, “I should at least check my status *Self Awareness*”.
-Ontopary bush-
Health: 3/4
Mana: 7/8
Stamina: 3/3
My health slowly was decreasing, I was starting to get more and more frighten, because there nothing I could do, I only could wait and see if the ladybug would lose interest in me, or will it be filled to the fullest and stop eating me.
Fun fact: Ladybug called Ladybird as well, never knew.
One Of Many - Web Novel 
Thanks for the chapter. Keep it coming.
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Sure, thanks.
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