Yawning Jaycee stretched as he pushed himself from his wood sleeping board. Sleeping wasn't too hard despite the hard conditions. It seemed the system made sleeping easier.
It had been another two weeks since the defeat of the dungeon meaning they were almost at a month of being in the tutorial. A new update screen appeared in front of his face.
'27 days have passed in the tutorial.
15,978/20,000 participants remaining.
Currently watching: Incinerator, Knight Tybost, Wise Yoran, Mage Poca'
Jaycee shrugged the hide blanket he slept under off as he rolled off the wood. The last two weeks had come with some change but Jaycee had mostly been in a role. The whole camp had merged with Farrah's group in the temple.
Half of their population resided outside the temple in a bunch of small cabins. Jaycee was out there and lived with Olaf in their little group of teepees. The other half were in the temple. They now had about 7 thousand people in their camp all under Percy's leadership.
Now most people knew that Jaycee was valued by Percy but they didn't really treat him with respect. That was fine by him. Percy would take his group out to kill beasts or push further into the forest to the giant castle they see in the distance. Sometimes Jaycee joined with Olaf so they could go hunt those stronger beasts for their profession. The common population was unsure why this seemingly normal kid was so popular among the talented.
Although Jaycee was a higher level he had never been seen doing anything. He just seemed like an awkward college kid bumbling his way around the grouchy Olaf. They knew now that in this giant circle with a castle in the middle, there were only 4 groups remaining.
One was a relatively neutral party that kept to themselves mostly and occasionally traded with Percy's group. They had about 2.5 thousand members. The next group was made of 5 thousand members and had an aggressive leader, Abram, and an aggressive mindset behind their view of the tutorial. There were many messages exchanged between Percy's group and them.
Their tone made it clear that they would strive for as much power as possible. And if they decided Percy's group is worth fighting to strengthen themselves, or use the area's resources themselves, then they would do what they deemed necessary. There have been scuffles between small groups that encountered eachother in the forest but no official deaths.
The last group was the remnants of about a 1.5 thousand group of people who escaped from death. Abram's camp had destroyed the camp and taken the valuables. Although this power driven group was smaller than Percy's, they had reduced their own numbers by pushing deeper into the forest faster than they could.
So everyone remaining were veterans who had seen more than a few battles. Jaycee had encountered one of their groups but they just left when they saw his level. He had also participated in a couple beast waves that threatened the camp. Percy had always given him the role of hunting down particularly strong beasts in the armies of beasts.
Each time the whole camp united to contribute resources and create traps and things to kill as many as they could. Jaycee would just dive through the back lines and find the two or three beast commanders and have a decent battle. Once he killed them he would escape and let the group do the rest. Most people never saw Jaycees actions way in the back of giant armies.
Each time he assassinated a beast commander he would escape by going up the trees which the beasts could do, but not very fast. The beasts were now coming in numbers of up to 15 thousand. The best part was that Jaycee could skin and harvest the materials from the high quality targets he had just killed himself.
It was perfect seeing as the average beast carver couldn't operate on such a powerful rare beast. He had gained at least 5 levels from just the beast wave harvestings. He had learned how to hang, stretch, and prepare all the beast hides and he was also shown all kinds of ways to preserve the horns, hearts and blood and things.
In fact his own skill and intuition to the profession had deepened greatly. Now he was at least confident enough to teach himself more. He had decided he needed to go explore away from Olaf for a while. Him and the older man had grown a lot closer. They had started to have similar mannerisms and Jaycee had adopted a style in harvesting that was very similar to the man's.
Yet still the man was a higher professional level at level 26. Jaycees' profession level was only at 22. A lot of things power wise had changed with Jaycee. He had triggered his class evolution and chose his new class a small bit after arriving back at camp.
His new class was called, Prodigious Veteran Mage. Now that he had passed level 25 the amount of stats the class gave was much higher. He didn't have a super different type of class as they didn't suit what he wanted. He didn't wanna be tied to one kind of magic. Now the class gave him +5 Int +4 Wis +3 Will +3 Per +4 FP. It was an upgrade but nothing serious.
His profession had evolved to no longer an apprentice beast harvester but a full fledged one. He had gathered many stats throughout all the profession levels. Now his class and profession looked like this
'Prodigious Veteran Mage: Your experience grows at great rates with each passing day. As you explore different mana and understand the world your magic grows.+5 Int +4 Wis +3 Will +3 Per +4 FP'
'Beast Harvester: You'll decide the quality of materials from beasts and amount of usable material. With your quality materials you stand to make lots of money. You are no longer a beginner, but the beast harvester path is not easy. +2 Agi +2 Per +2 Will +2 Vit +2 FP
Now his stats looked like this
Strength: 31
Agility: 79
Endurance: 42
Vitality: 74
Toughness: 41
Wisdom: 89
Intelligence: 150
Perception: 133
Willpower: 127
Free points: 70
Class Level:30
Race Level: 26
Profession Level: 22
His stats have gone up by a huge margin. He hasn't realized how much profession stats mattered to his over strength. His biggest numbers had increased more than a third just by Jaycee going through the many trials and tribulations set by Olaf.
The man had shown him his own craft at a startling speed. They worked 18 hours a day and only stopped to sleep and scarf down a quick meal. They were both deeply embroiled in their work and had created several high quality items to sell to the crafters and forgers for gear pieces of their own.
So Jaycee now had fully geared himself in light mage armor that gave him some extra stats on top of his own. The average level requirement for each of them was about level 20 so they were pretty much the best he could get without risking things deeper in the forest where he could discover rare gear.
Still this armor was crafted from generally high quality material. Jaycee still had a bunch of Free Points left from leveling up so he decided to put 50 of them into his stats before he set out on his little adventure. So quickly he put 30 into wisdom as it was seeming a little low for his class.
And then he put 10 into both toughness and endurance. He saved the remaining 20 for a rainy day. His arms were more toned now after the days of physical work and he felt as though the higher his stats got the better his body looked.
He didn't look buff but like he was decently healthy. Daily runs amount of healthy. He put a shirt on as he picked up a satchel. Opening it he checked to make sure he had his tools and gear. Then he checked to make sure his emergency three of each potion was in there as well. The satchel actually held much more than what it looked like. The outside was the size of a laptop. But all of Jaycees' things took up only a third of the space available inside.
To the side his air staff leaned against his teepee. He had moved on from it after he had become proficient in wielding air magic. Of course Jaycee had his own special interest in mastering the four elements but he found himself to be too corny. So for now he moved on to a different conduit, which just slightly strengthened his magic, but also gave him the ability to teleport a few feet every few seconds.
He had to trade some of the best things he had harvested for the glove like conduit. One of the things had been the heart stone of a creature made of plants. Jaycee and Olaf had tracked it down to an underground cavern where they had preserved as much life energy as possible in the heart crystal, raising its quality a stage higher than the already high quality beast.
He had performed almost surgical-like actions on the beast in the middle of the collapsing cave. The life of a beast harvester was not easy. Jaycee had gotten a lot of experience with manipulating mana in more intricate ways because of his experiences with preserving the quality records in the beasts materials.
He had, in the few minutes he wasn't actively doing anything for Olaf, been practicing with a new movement technique. His old one was simply not going to work. And he thought with this upgrade token it would be a good place to increase his survivability. The upgrade had specific instructions when Jaycee inspected it.
It needed to be a skill that at least had the basics to build on. But if the token was used on a dead end skill then it would be nearly useless. But with some good ideas it could create a useful skill. And the higher quality the production of the skill the higher quality the upgrade token will end up making it.
So Jaycee was taking his time developing the skill. He greeted Olaf with a tired grunt as he grabbed some dried meat they had around. There was also the technique of beast harvesting that was about harvesting the best cuts of meat for cooking and eating. "So now you're leaving for your little expedition. Young kids and they're inability to settle down." He muttered before rummaging through his quality chest. It was the chest that Jaycee always saw the experienced man go through when he was pulling out something valuable. He had a full set of pristine ivory harvesting tools. Special carving knives and specially designed brushes for treating the hides.
Jaycee waddled up to the tools excitedly. "Ooo are these for me?" He asked excitedly.
"Hmph. Yeah. I just got them because I assumed you'd be going off now. Thought you could use some good stuff until you're back." Olaf said, simply handing him the leather holdings of the tools. Jaycee gently placed them into his satchel and hugged the older man. A gruff hand pushed him away by his face. "Get the hell out of here. Be careful, I know how dumb and risky you can be." Olaf said while pushing the boy out of his area.
Jaycee smiled to himself before looking at his hand. It had been a minute since he had been alone and able to show off his newfound power. The first thing he did was dash out of the camp with a wide smile plastered on his face.