original

Unwieldy

นักเขียน: ImSarius

บท 1: Literally the Last

Stereotypical beginner forest, check!

Beginner Villager Class clothes, check!

Wolf monster chasing after you, check!

Amazing. Spontaneous transportation to another world is even more unimaginative than I thought!

But, running for your life five minutes after you 'spawn' isn't exactly appealing. In a game, you would run head on into the gaping maws of a monster and go mad. Punch and kick to your way to a few points of experience and some junk items you'll throw away when you hit level twenty.

But when a wolf is nipping your ass, and you won't get to put a few more bucks into the machine and try again, it's terrifying.

So, I'm running for my goddamn life.

And a God damned life it is. I that think I, and a group of other people, were quite literally damned to whatever this reality is.

God likes the sound of his own voice by the way, he went on and on, and I was too flabbergasted to actually take in any of it. Sounded like a bit of a dick if you ask me. Plus, dimensional teleportation doesn't seem to treat the head kindly.

So here I am, woefully underprepared and oblivious to what I should be doing. Also, did I mention that I was being chased by a wolf with leaves for fur?

I rushed through the trees, adrenalin pumping. I knew it was catching up to me, and I was busy looking down at my feet, trying not to trip and get mauled by Mr. Leafy Green.

I knew that I had to turn around and do something, but I didn't know what exactly. Going at it with fists raised seemed like a good way to get brutalized. So instead I did what I knew wouldn't get me immediately killed.

Question is, why was I placed here? Was everyone placed next to a miscellaneous monster to battle? A rite of passage, or a culling process? So how was I supposed to defeat a monster with my bare hands? Was there a weapon I failed to pick up earlier?

C'mon! There must be something that guy told us, that I'm not remembering. God damn headache! The leafy wolf, though, wasn't interested in giving me time to figure it all out. I felt a set of jaws nip at my pant leg, frightening me into a mad dash.

I ran as fast as I could without tripping, my mind combing through the pieces I remembered from God's speech. I remember some gloating about how all powerful he is, something about a coming magic age. Useless!

Ah wait!

I remember something! Something about a weapon. Souls were involved somewhere, something about weapons that… Oh what was it again…

That's it!

I turned around and gripped the air, as if I were holding a two-handed sword. I swung this imaginary sword as hard as I could, hoping beyond hope that this would work.

And it did.

I felt something tearing from my chest, a horrifying feeling, like having a limb torn off. Yet, as the tearing feeling was starting to subside, I felt my hands begin to fill with a strange liquid metal.

So much happened in such a short period of time that my brain struggled to keep up with all the sensations.

It was like part of me was being reconstructed and repurposed, turning this part of me into a dagger or sword. Actually, exactly like that, except this wasn't a short sword. This was a whole lot bigger than a short sword.

The first thing that formed was the handle. The metal filled my hands, ridged dark wrapping forming beneath my fingers. The leather handle stretched on for a while until it was about as long as my forearm. Soon after, the pommel formed. A small, rounded disk of metal engraved with patterns that connected with me in a way I couldn't quite describe.

There was no lost time as the grip gave way to a long spire of glowing metal, reaching towards the canopy above me. I thought it'd never stop, but at two-and-a-half metres, it stalled.

With the handle completely formed, the metal began to fill an invisible cast at the end of the weapon. A block of metal formed on the tip. The corners of the metal were so defined that I'd swear that they'd be able cut. The other end was not mirrored, forming into a glorious horn, tapering downward.

As I admired this strange weapon that had formed in my hands, it fell onto the leafy wolf and slammed into its head. The hammer connected with force, travelling unimpeded by the wolf's head, decapitating it. The hammer, without a moment of pause, followed through, sending itself and the head into the earth.

I stood in stunned silence and the world seemed to stand still with me for a moment.

[One Hit Kill: You killed your first Monster in one hit! Was it luck? Or was it a taste of what is to come? +1 Might]

[Literally the Last: You were literally the last to form your Soul Weapon. Were you in denial or are you just a bit slow? +1 Might]

"Mocking achievements? Really?" I grumbled.