“Let’s see, that is 99 chamomile, 99 lavender, 50 basil, and almost 200 of this bluegrass…” Yuki mumbled to herself as she looked at her inventory. She had spent the past hour doing nothing but plucking anything she could put her hands on that looked worth it. She had already cleaned out a small area right down to the dirt with her foraging. “I should probably head into the forest a little ways and see what I can find there. If I can find a few more varieties, it will give me more to work with.”

With this thought in mind, Yuki walked into the tree line and scanned the forest floor. She found a few patches of mushrooms, which she would need to test to see if they were poisonous or not, but even without knowing, she still grabbed all she could. She figured she would have to take some time after classes tomorrow and head to the library at her college and take out some books on botany, forest foraging, and herbs. If there was really anything she was good at, it was studying.

Yuki continued deeper into the forest, lost in her own little world, not realizing she was actually being stalked. While the field outside the city was good for levels 1-5, the forest was a different story. The level of the monsters quickly climbed, and the lowest was level 4. Besides devil rabbits, there were also horror mushrooms that hide under bush type plants and stalk their prey. These mushrooms looked cute at first glance with their big round eyes on top of their mushroom cap and the cute little ‘eep eep’ sound they made as they bounced towards you in a friendly manner. But as soon as you try to reach out and pet one of these things, the cap on their head lifts up, revealing a disgusting mouth with rows of teeth and purple poisonous saliva. On top of that, they have a long tongue that acts like a frog’s tongue that can shoot out of their mouths and grab ahold of you. The name horror mushroom fit them well. In essence, they were the biggest swindlers in the game. That is, if you do not count chest mimics.

Currently, as Yuki was in her own little world foraging away, right behind her was said horror mushroom. It bounced calmly out of the bush towards Yuki. Its soft body hardly made a sound as it did. Its cap raised up, revealing its horrifying mouth, and just as it was about to shoot its tongue out and wrap it around Yuki’s neck, a wooden sword was suddenly shoved into its mouth. “Do you mind? I am busy!” Yuki yelled angrily. She was currently trying to dig out the root of this plant that seemed to be a wild root yam. She had no tools but her sword to work with, and now the tip of her sword was covered in dirt.

“EEEEEEPPPP!!!!” The horror mushroom suddenly let out an ear piercing cry. And before Yuki could even react, she felt five slimy things wrapped around her body. There was a loud cracking sound, and before she knew it, everything went dark. A window appeared in front of her that had a countdown.

[You died! Resurrection in 5…]

Five seconds later, Yuki found herself on a small platform with a bunch of angel looking statues looking down at her. “Ugh… I was careless.” Yukie frowned as she looked at her inventory that was now empty. “Well, I guess I need to go back and get my items… I will be more careful this time.”

Thirty minutes later…

“Damnit!” This time just as she was about to pick up her lost items, a devil rabbit appeared out of nowhere and drilled its horns into her.

Another thirty minutes later….

“Really!? What the hell is this kind of luck! That thing was level 10!” When she returned to her first corpse where her items were, she was extra careful, making sure no monsters were around, but after picking her items up and going back to work on digging up the wild yam root, a treant appeared out of nowhere, and insta killed her.

Yuki scratched her head in frustration before pursing her lips and heading back to the forest. She would not give up all the herbs she had gotten. Most people would have already given up and went on to do something else, but not Yuki. If she worked hard at something, there was no way she was going to give it up. You could say she was a stubborn person at heart. When she got to the edge of the forest, Yuki drew her sword and took a deep breath before slowly letting it out. “Come on, Yuki, get your items and dig up that root. We can do this!”

She had not given up on that root yet. She had almost worked to the bottom of the plant and dug up a big batch of wild yam root, so there was no way she was giving up. Yuki made sure to check every bush she walked by, by stabbing into it. The whole area seemed to be clear this time as she arrived at her digging spot. She picked up the loot bag that had all her herbs in it and stored it away. She looked around carefully once more and even took the time to stab all the bushes again just to be safe before kneeling down and digging as fast as she could using her sword. Ten more minutes went by, and finally, Yuki’s lips curled up into a big smile. “Finally!”

She pulled hard, and a batch of twenty wild yam roots was pulled up out of the ground. But as she cut it away from the main plant and looked down at the hole, something shiny caught her eye. She quickly cleared the dirt away to find a ring with a dim green glow on it. She picked it up and inspected it.

[Ring of Minor Luck]

[Rarity: Uncommon]

[Unique: Automatically bound to whoever picks it up. Only one of its kind.]

[A ring that brings its wearer a little bit of luck.]

[Adds 5 Luck.]

“Not bad!” Yuki raised the ring out in front of her and looked at it. Although slightly dirty from being covered in dirt, it still glistened in the light that passed through the treetops of the forest. She blew off the excess dirt on it and wiped it down with her shirt. When she was done, she quickly equipped it.

[Luck]: 0 → 5

Yuki saw that the item was an uncommon one which made her even happier since uncommon items were already very rare. She looked at the shiny ring on her finger that was nothing more than a silver band and felt all her trouble was well worth it. With her loot in hand, Yuki looked at the clock to see she had about two hours left before she needed to log out. “I guess I will try to kill some monsters or maybe pick up some scraps of loot that people leave behind.”

With this thought in mind, Yuki headed out of the forest towards the entrance of the village.