CHAPTER 5

[Ding! Dismantling leveled up and become level 5]

[PHY +1; STR +1]

After that short notification, Jonas lifted his head from the deep trench he had made on the ground… deep enough to bury a few elephants. 

“Shit! How the hell will I get out?” he was so absorbed in leveling up the skill since it was fun how it makes things disappear, he forgot to change location after making a deep hole in it. Now he was in such a deep hole that he couldn’t simply get out of it with jumping. 

“Hmm! It looks like I can only climb to the top… sigh! Hmm! Wait a minute…” a light bulb went off inside his head when he saw the wall around himself. He thought of a pretty crazy idea at that time, an idea so outlandish that no one would try it even if they were in the same situation as him. 

“Hehe, let’s see if this works. Dismantle!” the skills were voice-activated, so Jonas had to shout out the name for it to activate and take effect. His hands touched a high spit on the ground, a spot a little above his ankle. 

With sparking light, a patch of ground in the shape of his palm vanished, leaving behind a hole in the place. Aside from that simple shape, nothing else was harmed and was still in the same shape as before. 

“It works!!” with a happy yelp, Jonas started to abuse the ability in a way that wasn’t meant to be used like that. He, to dismantle repeatedly on the same spot with a little distance between each place of attempt. Soon enough, a long rectangular shaped structure formed on the walls surrounding him. He had used dismantle to remove all the other dust and ground surrounding the structure, accurately making a staircase. 

It took only 1 minute for him to do so. 

This was way faster than digging anyway. At that time a notification popped up, 

[You have completed all the requirements to learn life skill Digging. Meet a Life skill mentor to learn the skill.]

[You have completed all the requirements to learn the life skill Construction. Meet a life skill mentor to learn the skill.]

[You have acquired title ‘Life Hacker’]

[Permanetly increases all the productive probability of your life skills by 20%]

[You have acquired a title that wasn’t obtained by anyone in this one year of game’s running, all stats increased 5.]

[ You have obtained 500 Gold Coins]

[Happy Playing!]

“Wow, a title! But it only increases the productive ability, huh! Well, it's alright. And even my stats increased by 5 points once again. That’s unexpected. It seems my stat could now comparable to a level 10+ player.” Happy at the outcomes, Jonas continued what he was doing with a renewed gusto. 

A few hours later…

“Sigh! Finally!!” Jonas sighed as he looked at the sky where the sun was gradually rising. He took 3 hours to climb all the way to the top, by judging the time, he had made more than 180 steps… that’s how deep he had dug simply by using a skill that wasn’t meant to be used like that.

‘Unfortunately, my dismantling didn’t level up, well, that has to be expected… it required 100k PP to further level up.’ Jonas thought while looking at his status window. Though his stats increased beyond the threshold, his level was still at 0. Looking back, he saw granny Kesh standing to the side of the hut. It seems he had to go and greet her on his own accord for her to accompany him to the village. 

Calculating his remaining gaming time, he realized he didn’t have any more than 5 hours left. If he walks through the forest, 3 hours will be lost. ‘Looks like I have to die so that I can respawn at the village again. Before that, let's see if I can learn those two skills from this granny.’ 

“Hello, granny Kesh. Can I learn skills from you too.” 

“Oh, kid. You are awake already! Wait for a few minutes okay, I will make breakfast for the young master, after that we can go.” 

“sigh! As expected of an NPC, they will only say what they were programmed to. Anyway, granny, I want to learn Construction and Digging.” As soon as he asked these, a window came to his view. 

[Granny Kesh offering you to teach you Construction. Will you learn it?]

[Granny Kesh offering you to teach you Digging. Will you learn it?]

“Lier! It's me who asked first. Anyway, yes, I want to learn.”

[You have learned Life skill Construction.]

[You have learned Life Skill Digging.]

[Your accumulated experience on both skills comes to effect, your Construction level rose to level 3]

[STR +3; PHY +3; DEF +3]

[Your accumulated experience on both skills comes to effect, your Digging level rose to level 5]

[STR +5; PHY +5; DEF +5]

[Digging Lv 5][PP: 100/100,000]

- 2.5% chance of getting a rare material useful for blacksmithing and other lifestyle classes

- 2.5% chance of getting an Epic material useful for blacksmithing and other lifestyle classes

- 2.5% chance of getting a legendary material useful for blacksmithing and other lifestyle classes

- 2.5% chance of getting a Heroic material useful for blacksmithing and other lifestyle classes

[Construction Lv 3][PP: 54/1000]

- 1.5% chance that the finished product will turn out to be a rare artifact. 

- 1.5% chance that the finished product will turn out to be an Epic artifact.

- 1.5% chance that the finished product will turn out to be a legendary artifact.

- 1.5% chance that the finished product will turn out to be a Heroic artifact.

“Woya!!” after this strange shout of celebration, Jonas left the camp directly and went towards the outside to be killed by a monster and resurrect at the village. After walking a few meters away from where he dug the hole, he met a monster. It’s a monkey that looked like a baboon with sharp teeth sticking out of its lower jaw. Its height was the same as a human, and behind it was a rusted sword. 

[Warrior Baboon Lv 24]

This was floating above its head. 

“Ah!” Jonas yelped in surprise when he saw the level of the monster. It was the way too powerful and probably the strongest monster he had seen as of yet. Death was a definite outcome in this situation, even so, Jonas thought of something else

“I am going to die anyway, let’s see how long I can survive against this thing.” With an excited gleam in his eyes, he clenched his fist as he didn’t have any weapon as of yet to fight it with. 

{Wo! Wo! Wo!} 

The monkey roared as it jumped around in aggression, that’s how it was programmed to behave after spotting a player or an NPC. Then it jumped into the sky before pulling out its rusty sword and rotated around itself as it came down towards Jonas. 

“Hmph!” with a grunt, he rolled back before standing up and circling it. The monkey’s sword was short, and its range was only a little longer than its hand’s length. Jonas was also no noob game player, although he was one in this one. Besides, now that he was experiencing it form a 1st person point of view rather than 3rd person usually, his estimation about distances was also spot on. 

Since the gadget was directly connected to his brain and spinal cord, flexibility and stamina were calculated according to the body’s condition of the player. This was one of the reasons why this game was also recognized by many organizations worldwide, it forces its players to remain healthy. 

Since the stamina and flexibility were directly affected by external factors, a player was bound to exercise realtime so that they could fight longer or dodge more accurately. The year-end survey showed that more than 58% of players in this game were more healthy than last year. Many awards were declared to the maker of the game, but he or she never showed up, and strangely enough, it was never brought up after the first time. 

Jonas knew he would fell short on those two regards. While he could do something about flexibility by doing exercises and yoga, he can’t do anything about stamina. He could neither run nor jog or any stamina building exercises. His leg would come in the way either way. This was the only handicap he had in this game, he didn’t know if this situation was shared by many other or he was the only one, Jonas was aware of this even before he bought the goggles. 

“Hah!! Damn! I am getting tired, and all I did was side step 8 times…” his limit of handicap quickly bared its ugly head, and he was only moved around the monkey, taking 8 calculated steps. It was also the reason why I didn’t choose any warriors path and instead chosen to follow the life skill path. His initial plan was to take the mage or summoner root, but that was still far away as he was only level 0. 

“Dismantle!” he whispered as he touched the ground below him with palm. A large patch of ground vanished in the shape of his palm and a few centimeters deep. He continued the same for a few times before the whole expanded about 10 inches. Then he rolled back again, continuing the same thing. 

The ape had only a single pattern, that was to run towards the enemy while swinging its sword around. Of course, that wasn’t only way it could attack, but for other patterns to show up, the player needs to cast a certain amount of damage and stand on a certain place. But what Jonas was doing wasn’t attacking it, he was simply digging holes which just ‘coincidentally’ traps the monkey. 

As it came closer to Jonas, it inadvertently stepped on the hole and fell down face first. With a roar, it stood up and charged at him again, only to step on the other hole dug by him and fell down again. 

It has to be noted down that each time it fell, -5 or -9 flashed on its head. Although he was getting tired the first few time, after perfectly learning its attack and movement patterns, Jonas continued to dig a hole with slightest movements possible. In this way he was able to regenerate his depleted stamina faster than his rate of exhaustion. 

This continued for half an hour until there was one time when the baboon just fell down and didn’t wake up at all. 

It died just like that… but Jonas didn’t gain EXP or any loots from it.