Alpha Zero (Alpha LitRPG Book 1) by Arthur Stone (top 5 books to read TXT) 📕

Similarly, once the chi reservoir emptied, my strength would likely suffer a sharp decline. I wasn’t particularly full of vigor even in my present state, incomparable though it was to my previous one. But if I allowed nullification to happen, I would kiss goodbye to all of my present capabilities, along with any chances of enhancing them. I might still be able to move or perform very basic functions, but I wouldn’t be able to recreate the sack of spices rescue mission. I would lack the strength to make the trek to the middle of the ford and back even without a load.

It wouldn’t take long for me to become a useless wreck, and then a corpse. Unless I came up with a solution before that happened.

Wait, let me rephrase that. Coming up with a solution wasn’t the problem—actually implementing it was.

Even with the nice boost to the amulet and my newly discovered reservoir of chi, I was anything but a capable individual, whereas all the methods aimed at quickly raising one’s inner parameters were incredibly demanding and requiring of exceptional prowess on numerous fronts.

I couldn’t begin to imagine how I was going to get out of this, only that I would have to. My only other option was death, but that was no option at all.

It wasn’t long ago that I dreamed of death. Of getting even with a few people, and then of bidding farewell to my wretched existence. But no more. For the first time in years, the glimmer of hope afforded by my new abilities, deplorable as they were, filled me with a thirst for life. And that, in turn, gave hope that somehow things would work themselves out.

That a time would soon come to shed my skin of a cripple, a sponger stuck to the teat of a woman I had loathed yet had been forced to call mother.

A time when I would finally take care of myself.

Chapter 12 Blackriver Trading Station

Degrees of Enlightenment: 0 (60/888)

Attributes: none

Skills: none

States: none

The Wild Wood, also known as the Dark Wood, was commonly used in the north to scare young children. But grownups were likewise rarely enthused at the mention of lands on the left bank of Redriver. Everyone knew that the territories stretching beyond the river were filled with monsters that were the stuff of nightmares, terrible creatures in whom structures of the Order had been intertwined with Chaos’ tentacles in the most grotesque of ways. These lands were no place for humans, but alas, human greed was stronger than any horror, and these parts were plentiful with treasure. Of course, a serious force would be required for even a chance of snatching a morsel of the local riches, and the operation would still be fraught with great risk.

It was the convoy’s second day moving through the Wild Wood, and the only danger it encountered had been yesterday’s trouble at the crossing. Moreover, from a geographical standpoint, the attack had taken place at the border. I had braced myself for worsening conditions as we kept moving north, but so far those fears were proving unfounded.

I hadn’t seen so much as a hare. The only signs indicating that the forest wasn’t fully extinct were tracks of paws and hooves along the edges of puddles lining the road. The sky showed more signs of life: mostly smaller birds but also the occasional crow and magpie, and even some doves. A few times the flapping of wings nearby portended something more serious, and last night Atami had shot down a pretty large bird. Krol had called it by some fanciful name while I registered it in my head as a wood grouse due to its striking resemblance to the latter.

Pines and spruces dominated the landscape, interspersed with some cedars and other leafy trees that resembled oaks, chestnuts and even birches. At least that was what they looked like to my amateur eye. Strips of thick shrubbery often lined the road on either side, but no arrows had flown from there in our direction.

Only once did we encounter signs of danger. This stretch of the road lay uphill, the elevated terrain being poorer in vegetation, with numerous wide meadows dotted with scatterings of rock and large boulders. Several heaps of flame blackened logs stood on the largest meadow, ringed by a crumbling stockade. Whatever structures had stood here several years ago had been so thoroughly devastated by fire that you could no longer ascertain their purpose.

A string of equally fresh graves lined the shoulder of the road, each punctuated with a hastily fashioned stake sporting a cleft to which a round piece of bark was attached. The local equivalent of a cross.

It looked more like a rushed funeral than a cemetery. Visual evidence suggested that the graves were now occupied by the residents of this place, and they likely hadn’t died of natural causes.

The convoy kept the same pace through this stretch, with no apparent interest displayed by anyone. It would seem that the caravanners were well familiar with the road and the attractions. Since they have most likely seen these ruins countless times, the macabre site no longer instilled in them any sense of unease.

* * *

Twilight was falling when Rycer suddenly hung down from the wagon and extended his hand.

“Come on up here, boy.”

Wondering what could be the cause for such a magnanimous offer, I grabbed onto his coarse hand, then tried to catch the side of the wagon, which was moving at walking speed. Before I could fail many times over, the soldier yanked me easily off the road.

Not a moment passed before I was sitting on a bed of hay, and he was offering me a piece of bread overlaid with a chunk of yellow lard.

“Here,