13th of December
I'm not religous (religion's faded into a kind of label in the developed countries) but if I was, and was posed with the question of why God didn't come down and make right every wrong, I now know the answer. Because every time he would think of coming down, he'd be overcome with shame.
I went back to the second floor, camping out in the small forests. There are more monsters there, but more cover. It's safer than lying without cover in the plains, and definitely safer than venturing into the so-called "safe zones". I haven't gone into town since then, surviving on just the weaker monsters. The theme of huge animals we've encountered in real life still holds. There were eagles with wingspans that threw me into shadow whenever we fought. They were hard to do deal with, but luckily I didn't have to fight more than one at once. They way in which I found out how to kill them was actually by accident. I was about to run away the first time, I'd taken a couple of scratches and was nowhere near to hitting it. But then its claws stuck into my buckler, and since the buckler was strapped onto my arm I was dragged up painfully, leaving my entire body exposed. As a claw went in I raised my sword and yelled in fear as I parried.
Kudos to Akihiko again for those genius ideas coupled with that attention to detail. Birds had to be light in order to fly, which meant that their bones and everything else had to be extremely light. I struck up at the claw and it gave easily. I dropped and almost sprained my ankle as I landed awkwardly. I threw my buckler at the eagle and hit it in the chest. Even though the buckler was heavy and the eagle was less than a metre from me, the fragility of its bones still astounded me. After I killed one, I immediately levelled up.
After that I decided to steer away from the spawn point of the eagles. I could deal with them, but the damage to my buckler was enormous. The durability was almost halved, and I didn't want my buckler to break. I definitely didn't want to go into the town again. Would I see simulated blood? Just how good was Akihiko? With that resolution, I headed to the dungeon leading to the next floor.
I went in, and there were quite a few beta-testers there they've made a pact between them and are helping each other go up. I don't trust them, the alliance is just temporary and they would betray every single one of their teammates if it would get them further in the game. I'd made a vow to myself never to stick next to another player, and I might as well get started.
Of course, that leaves me in a dilemma. Do I stay with the untrustworthy hardened clearers, or with the unstable, pathetic players. It's never seemed clearer now (yeah, pun intended. Hilarious, right?) that I'm not part of any group. Seeing everything as it is sets me apart from everyone, who are all under some sort of delusion.
I'm going to stick with the players. It's because I'm stronger than the players, and can kill them if any of them try anything towards me. Plus, I don't want to get caught up in the group mentality of rushing into danger for the thrill of it. I'm not going to risk my life along with the rest charging in there just because I'm arrogant.