Chapter 7 – Caves (3)

Chapter 7 – Caves (3)

Rowan wandered out of the tomb, heart pounding. He’d been through the tunnels before, but he hadn’t seen a thing.

This time, he had the glow of the spectral chains to illuminate his path. He’d considered selecting a weapon before exploring the caverns, but ultimately decided against it.

He’d survived it while poisoned and completely in the dark, so he doubted it was too dangerous. Of course, he would still pick a weapon, but he wanted to get an idea of the terrain before he chose one.

The chamber immediately outside the sarcophagus’ room was massive. With the light provided by the chains, he could see a lot of it, but not everything. Cautiously, he moved around the cavern until he had a good sense of the cave’s size. It was easily thirty meters across, and at least twice as long.

As for its height, he didn’t know, but he could just barely make out the tips of stalactites hanging from the ceiling.

While most of the walls were rough and natural, some portions of them had the same unnatural smoothness as those within the tomb. And upon those smooth patches were more carvings of chains.

If he was being honest, Rowan found it all extremely unnerving, especially with how the chains depicted on the walls were currently wrapped around him.

He had a good sense of the chamber, but he couldn’t assume that all the parts of the cave system were going to be as large. After all, the tunnel he’d found himself in after landing in the lake was far smaller than this. Looking around the cavern, he found several smaller side tunnels connecting to it.

As he moved to check them, Rowan thought. He’d somehow survived and recovered from the poison, but he wanted to know why.

He knew it was because of his stats, since they’d gained three points each after he received his class. But stats were still something of an abstract concept to him. Sure, he understood that they represented strength or speed, but how did they actually translate physically?

With the three-point boost, his strength and toughness had both doubled, but did that mean he was twice as strong as before? And how did it work for toughness? Was his skin harder to break?

He tilted his head. Had toughness had anything to do with his recovery from the poison? Or had it only been vitality? Speaking of vitality, how did it work? Was it a boost to his immune system? Or did he regenerate faster?

Rowan shook his head, rubbing his temples. He’d left the tomb because all of the new information was making his brain hurt, but the second he got out, he’d started doing it again.

After a moment of consideration, he decided to actually test how the new stats affected his body.

There were still three side passages to check, but Rowan had already taken a look around all the ones on his side of the cave. So he decided to test dexterity. He assumed that it didn’t just apply to hand-eye coordination and actually boosted his speed, but it didn’t hurt to test it out.

The cave ground was flat enough, so he began to sprint. He darted across the cavern, pulling to an abrupt stop before he hit the wall.

He was definitely faster, but he didn’t know by how much. Not having anything to compare his speed to, Rowan moved on to his other stats. He was confident he knew what toughness and vitality did, or at least the basic picture.

Even if he wanted to learn more, he wasn’t willing to cut and bruise himself just to test them. That left strength and…mana?

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That stat confused him. He thought he understood the general idea of mana from the games he’d played, but did the stat mean that he had it? Shouldn’t he feel it? He’d also gained [Mana Manipulation] as a skill after he got his class, but he wasn’t sure how to use it.

Rowan sighed. He had so many questions and so few answers. Pushing his thoughts of mana and skills aside, he focused on strength. For a second, he considered lifting and throwing the rocks scattered around the cavern to measure his strength, but after a moment of thinking, he decided it would make too much noise.