[Killer Horned Rabbit]
[Level: ???]
[Description: Pinnacle of the rabbit species within the Forest of ???. It is a carnivorous species that mutated from Horned Rabbits, distinguished by its white fur and red eyes.]
Si Sheng inspected the rabbit. With his increased Intelligence he could see more information.
When Si Sheng saw the level was '???' his eyes widened slightly. He hadn't encountered anything like this before. Even the owl from his first night in the forest displayed its level, despite it being level 34. If Si Sheng, with his heightened Intelligence, wasn't able to see its level, it meant it had to be unbelievably high, at least greater than level 34, or the other possibility was that it being the pinnacle of its species or a higher race in its evolutionary line afforded it a sort of special status, which resulted in the '???' level.
The level of the Killer Horned Rabbit had to be high, nonetheless, but that was only relative. A bug that had a level of 100 couldn't be compared to a dragon of level 1. It was a matter of species being from higher lineages or not. This rabbit, despite being high leveled, wasn't as strong as its level would suggest. In total, it probably had close to the stat points that Si Sheng had, and he was only level 9.
That said, the Killer Horned Rabbit wasn't an opponent to be taken lightly, at least for the current Si Sheng.
***
Si Sheng was no expert fighter, nor was he experienced in face-to-face confrontations. Most of the fighting he had done up to this point had been assassinations, little did he ever have to continue fighting after the first strike. However, he was now faced with that exact situation and had to quickly adapt or die.
With his quickly-thought-up plan, Si Sheng cautiously moved around the Killer Horned Rabbit, keeping his eyes turned towards it at all times, not showing his back.
The Killer Horned Rabbit just stared at him in an amused manner. Si Sheng couldn't tell if it was confused or looking at him as if he were a cute toy to play with. It didn't attack him however, it just watched him, allowing him to get back to the side he had come from.
As Si Sheng had suspected, the rabbit didn't attack him, for some reason. When the rabbit first looked at him after his attack, it didn't even look hostile, it just looked slightly intrigued. He made a prediction that the rabbit wouldn't attack him even if he moved, a risky gamble, which he'd normally never take, but it was the only way out he could think of besides attacking or fleeing. Either of the last two options would end up in the rabbit attacking him, so he chose to walk back to his starting spot.
When he arrived at his starting area, Si Sheng picked up the spear he had planted in the bushes there. This was the next step in his plan. The rabbit was obviously at a greater advantage when in close combat, thus Si Sheng needed to increase the distance between the two of them when they fought. Fighting at mid-range would provide him a greater advantage than him using his knives. The only downside was, the rabbit was fast and small. It was a hard target to hit, this almost balanced out the advantage Si Sheng gained from attacking at mid-range.
Instead of risking something even further, Si Sheng decided to hide the spear in the bush, stuck in the ground with the tip of the spear pointing towards the rabbit, similar to how he'd done before, only this time in a way that an approaching target wouldn't be able to see the hidden spear until it was too late. Thus, the rabbit would be totally unaware of the hidden spear; this was the next step in Si Sheng's plan.
Grabbing one of his knives by the tip, Si Sheng held it in a form for throwing. With one swift action, Si Sheng threw the knife at the rabbit. The latter of which, dodge the flying knife with utmost swiftness—seemingly teleporting.
The Killer Horned Rabbit looked at the knife sticking into the ground and frowned, actually showing a semblance of emotion on its rabbit face. It never thought this pet would disobey it and try to bite back at it. 'I need to punish this pet to let it know who's the owner in this situation,' thought the rabbit.
The rabbit, slightly annoyed, bolted at the speed of the wind towards Si Sheng. This is what he was hoping for! The spear, lying in wait for the rabbit to get in range, had a cold glint gleam off its knapped edge.
When the rabbit was less than half a meter away from the bush, Si Sheng quickly grabbed the spear and jabbed it through the bush directly at the rabbit.
The rabbit, not expecting its pet to retaliate again, was surprised. Never did it expect this odd creature to have a trap lying in wait, thus, it was caught off guard.
The Killer Horned Rabbit didn't have great intelligence as it was a relatively lower lineage species. It didn't even understand the concept of traps and tools. All the rabbit knew was that it was faster than all the other animals around it, filling it with the arrogance of a superior being, losing caution towards its potential opponents.
Si Sheng, seeing the rabbit almost trip over itself when he lunged forward with the spear, was elated. He believed he'd be able to finish it with this!
The rabbit, unable to avoid completely was stabbed through its back left leg. If it hadn't turned away at that time, it would've been impaled in a spit-roast fashion.
With its disabled back leg, the rabbit's speed was greatly reduced, to the point where Si Sheng could catch up to it if he put in the effort and mana.
With a semi-successful plan, Si Sheng set down the spear that the rabbit had escaped from after being stabbed. He immediately used Sprint, chasing after the rabbit.
***
This area was the rabbit's own backyard, it knew every little turn and twist to the place. Si Sheng had no knowledge of the area and wasn't able to immediately catch the rabbit.
The rabbit used the terrain to its advantage, dodging and weaving through the roots, bushes, and rocks in the forest. Despite this, Si Sheng was right on its heels. The rabbit had been slowed down too much by its wound from earlier. The pierced leg was bleeding profusely and was virtually immobile. The rabbit had only three properly working legs. Even still, the rabbit was slightly outpacing Si Sheng, as it was ahead of him and just out of reach. However, it was slowly losing strength from blood loss.
The rabbit kept glancing back at Si Sheng, hoping the strange creature had given up chasing it. To its despair, the odd creature that had attacked it was still chasing it, determined to not let it go. All it could do was keep running and hope the creature would give up before long or it would be in trouble.
***
After chasing the rabbit through the forest for around half an hour, Si Sheng was getting quite nervous. It wasn't the fact that he hadn't caught up to the rabbit, but the fact that they were heading deeper into the forest. Si Sheng was reminded of the owl again, that had quietly swept down like a reaper and claimed the life of a wyrm as if it were a passing snack. If Si Sheng couldn't catch up to the rabbit soon, he'd have to give up the chase. Adding on to Si Sheng's worries, he knew the rabbit was bleeding out, yet it hadn't slowed down one bit. He had no idea how the little guy could maintain its speed over the duration of the chase, his only worry was that the rabbit had actually healed up while running and its leg was getting better by the second. He didn't know if it had a regenerative skill or not, but he didn't want to let a perfectly good prey escape. Additionally, he had run low on mana multiple times causing him to slow down a few times in fear of mana exhaustion and was currently running out of mana.
Just when Si Sheng was thinking about giving up the chase, he saw something through the tree line ahead. It looked like a wall was ahead. This was exactly what Si Sheng needed! With renewed hope, Si Sheng kept chasing, burning through his remaining mana supply without worry.
The rabbit neared the rock wall, it knew it couldn't run anywhere without going through Si Sheng at this point. Thus, it turned around, putting on a fierce expression, readying itself to fight.
'Perfect!' thought Si Sheng, as this was an opportune situation for him. He had to take it now, it wouldn't present itself again like this.
This time, the Killer Horned Rabbit was too slow. It could barely pose a threat to Si Sheng with its severely reduced Agility. The leg, in fact, had not healed and the rabbit's pure survival instinct allowed it to run at such a speed for so long. This was good news for Si Sheng because he knew it wasn't long before the rabbit died.
With Si Sheng's confidence bolstered, he and the rabbit lunged at each other, as if this were the climax to a world-shaking battle.
Obviously, Si Sheng didn't have to try very hard and easily killed the rabbit. He effortlessly sliced through the side of the rabbit's throat this time, spraying a mist of blood across his face and the ground. The rabbit's speed and energy had fallen to such a level that, even though the rabbit could see and sense the strike coming, it wasn't able to dodge.
[Killer Horned Rabbit killed: 500 experience gained.]
It was done. He had killed the Killer Horned Rabbit and completed his goal of killing a creature of the forest. It was somewhat hard, but it was rewarding. This rabbit would definitely give him some good skills. Not to mention, the experience it gave was great and filled Si Sheng's experience bar to full. The next second, a stream of notifications appeared in front of him.
[!!!]
[Max level reached!]
[★Hidden Skill Unlocked★: Guide]
[The combination between Evolutionary Body and Evil Eye (Eye of Understanding) guides you on the path of evolution.]
[★Guide★ has unlocked the "Evolution Menu"]
[50 Attribute Points Gained.]
Si Sheng was royally shaken. What had happened was like finding a penny on the side of the road and it turned out to be a one of a kind collector's item.
For the most part, Si Sheng had forgotten about his Evolutionary Body skill. It didn't do anything until now, so he had never bothered with it. But now? It had become active and in a big way, giving him access to a new menu and a new skill, a hidden one at that!
Before he could mess with this, he needed to get out of the forest with his kill before night time set in, or else he'd be in deep shit.