Berserker: A LitRPG Urban Fantasy Adventure (Apocosmos Book 1) by Dimitrios Gkirgkiris (books for 20 year olds txt) 📗

Once he’d stopped moving his hands, the faint outline of a shield appeared in front of me and disappeared in an instant. It looked like the ones used for noble house crests. Before I was able to pull my new pants up, he had finished casting yet another spell. This time, the outline of a greatsword flashed before me.

“You’re all ready to fight now!” he exclaimed, and I mentally brought forward my Battle Stats screen.

Battle Stats

Max HP : 145

Max MP : 45

Physical Attack : 9

Physical Defense : 99

Accuracy : 34

Critical : 44

Attack Speed : 416

Magic Attack : 3

Magic Defense : 47

Evasion : 34

Speed : 126

Casting Speed : 213

HP Regen. : 3.2/minute

MP Regen. : 1.1/minute

Next to this stats screen was a small extension. I focused my attention on it and a new text window appeared before me, headlined “Active Effects”.

Name : Fortitude

Type : Buff

Level : 1

Effect : Boosts Physical Defense by 8%

Time Left : 19 minutes 57 seconds

Description : A layer of mana envelops the recipient’s body, acting as a dampener for physical blows.

Name : Might

Type : Buff

Level : 1

Effect : Boosts Physical Attack by 8%

Time Left : 19 minutes 59 seconds

Description : The recipient’s muscles are infused with mana, providing a significant strength boost.

“You can buff people too?” I exclaimed, surprised at the renewed vigor flowing through my body. “I thought you were a damage-dealer?”

“Just the basics. Remember, I’m still a generalist until I get my class change.”

“I see. I can probably guess the answer to this question, but buffs don’t stack, right?”

He moved his hands and muttered a few arcane words, and the shield outline flashed before me once more.

“You can see for yourself,” he replied. “Now go find more enemies to kill so you can get to level three.”

When I looked again, the boon granted by his Fortitude buff hadn’t increased but the timer had reset back to twenty minutes, so I did as he had said, running around the outskirts of the forest.

“Why don’t you join me?” I shouted back at him as he followed closely behind with Louie right next to him.

“Let me show you why,” he said, and immediately a flashing dot appeared in the periphery of my vision. I focused on it.

Leonardo DiFiore has invited you to a party.

Party Members : 1/9

Party Leader : Leonardo DiFiore

Do you accept the invitation? Yes No

I accepted his party request and immediately an image of his face, with his HP and MP bars attached to it, appeared in the top left corner of my view.

“Now watch this,” he said and sent his Gale Blast at a snake that had just appeared a couple of dozen feet away from us.

The cobra was killed on impact and since I had an idea what he was trying to show me, I kept an eye on my XP bar. It hadn’t moved at all.

“The Dark Energy would never allow for such shortcuts,” he said as I saw a semi-transparent window appear, informing me that the party had dispersed before disappearing again. “The greater the level gap between party members, the bigger the XP penalty. If the level gap is large enough, no XP is distributed at all.”

“So I guess you can only heal me and buff me while I fight?”

“Exactly. Now go!”

The closer I got to the thick wall of trees, the more I saw the grass rustle with movements that followed my every move. It wasn’t long before another Young King Cobra head rose out of the grass to attack me. This time though, I knew exactly how to fight it.

I raised my sword along the trajectory the snake was taking and managed to move it in time for the snake’s bite to only find my steel. I immediately thrust the sword forward, managing a deep cut in the snake’s mouth. My hit landed a lot harder than before, a sign that Leo’s buff was working.

And when the inevitable bite came, I saw a considerably smaller portion of my HP bar disappear. This only served to motivate me more. I parried and slashed, dodged and pierced the snake until it fell to the ground dead.

“You’re getting better at this!” Leo shouted once he’d cast a spell to purify me of the poison again.

As much as I didn’t want to admit it, it was exhilarating. The thrill of fighting. Actually holding a sword, killing monsters. I tried to suppress my enthusiasm. I wasn’t supposed to be enjoying myself. I was only doing this so that I could pay back the hospital sharks. But how long would I be able to control myself, when only a few days ago I was working on the BF-TCG-7231 Jira bug ticket?

I looked toward the forest and spotted what looked like two foxes heading my way. On closer inspection, they resembled illustrations of gray blink dogs much more than foxes—their ears large and pointy, brown stripes down their backs, and two thick tails behind each of them.

Name : Two-tailed Yandir

Type : Beast

Level : 3

Disposition : Aggressive

HP : 47/47

Physical Attack : 6

Magic Attack : 6

Speed : 120

Attack Range : Melee

XP : 93

Description : Yandirs are native to nature-ruled realms. By themselves, Yandirs are not dangerous predators but they never hunt alone. This particular species has a mutation that gives it two tails, which offers no fighting advantage but is rather a part of yandir mating rituals.

“Careful with these two!” Leo shouted as he cast a healing spell on me.

The yandirs were approaching me from opposite sides, circling around my position to flank me.

“You got another one of these swords?” I asked Leo.

“Sure,” he said and threw another short sword from his pocket inventory dimension. “But it won’t increase your attack. They aren’t balanced as a pair.”

“It’s fine for now,” I said as I grabbed it.

Both beasts attacked at once. I struck one of them with my sword and it yelped in pain while the second bit my leg. The pain was… well, to be honest,