It was now the 5th day since entering the Ether forest and Alex had pretty much gotten all of the 1st Ring monsters he needed. There were several dozen in total and he was almost right on schedule. He was missing only 1 more creature but after spending all of the 4th day setting traps and searching on his own, he couldn't seem to find it.
With that, he decided to give up for now and come back to it later. He had now entered deeper into the forest and was currently searching for a place to make his main camp and keeping track of any places for food and water.
He had pretty much run out of all the food that was prepared and was low on water as well. He found signs of water nearby and soon found himself near a river. The river looked clean enough so Alex filled his canteens as he kept an eye on his surroundings. It was eerily peaceful which was never a good sign.
After quickly getting the water he needed, he backed away at the right time as a large figure shot out of the water. It blocked out the sun as it headed in his direction so he rolled out of the way as a razor-sharp claw grazed his cheek.
He gritted his teeth and quickly turned to the creature which had already started charging him again. Alex quickly moved back as he spun his chain weapon around him multiple times before throwing it at the creature.
The creature swatted the blade away but Alex quickly pulled it back before sending the sickle end up high and on top of the creature. The blade sunk into the creature's skin, but it was pretty shallow. The creature easily shook off the weapon that only got a little blood as it stood on its hind legs.
Now that it was blocking out the sun, he could see it clearly. The creature looked like a bear from earth, if that bear had scales instead of fur. The creature in front of him was over 3 meters tall and was called a Merebear.
It was basically a mermaid bear since it lived in the water, was covered in scales, and looked similar to a regular bear. The aquamarine scales reflected the sun making it difficult to see it in direct sunlight. It seemed to use the light to blind its enemies and hardly ever went into the darker parts of the forest.
The Merebear charged him again on all fours as Alex ran around trees to try and confuse it. The bear followed his path but soon found it lost sight. It roared angrily as it lost its prey when it suddenly felt searing pain on its back.
"GRRAAAAHHHHHH!!!" It roared.
Alex had swung himself up into the trees out of its direct sight before coming back down on it with his claw weapons ready. The 4 sharp blades of the claws glistened with blood as Alex waited for the bear to make its move.
Although he hurt it, it wasn't a lot of damage. The scales of this Merebear were extremely tough and its highly reflective surface made it difficult to aim for vital spots. The Merebear roared again and charged. As it did this, its body glowed a pale red color as its speed suddenly increased two notches.
Alex widened his eyes as he dash away using a good chunk of his stamina. He had no active skills like the bear just showed so he could only fight him as is, or wait for the duration to end. He didn't want to wait for the second option since that would take too long so he had to grit his teeth and fight head-on.
He hoped he wouldn't need to fight a tanky monster head-on but he didn't have many choices. He wove between the trees while the bear began to just bulldoze its way through. Its skill basically was like a berserk mode, increasing stats tremendously for a short amount of time.
Unlike humans who thought and strategized, monsters didn't do the same. Not until the higher rings anyways. This monster had a bit of intelligence but it let its rage dictate how it fought so it activated what would have been a lifesaving skill, way too early.
However, this meant that Alex was on the losing end already as the bear had pretty much all of its strength right now. He only gave it a flesh wound so unless he gave it a serious hit, he would end up dead.
Alex made his way up the trees again but the bear followed him this time. It watched its prey jump around before it suddenly found a blade heading straight for it. It quickly ducked its head but still got scratched on the back of its neck.
Alex continued to strike the bear from afar with his weapon only dealing light scratches and drawing little blood. These petty attacks only seemed to anger the bear further and it roared out in frustration before rampaging.
It used its strength to launch itself as high as it could towards Alex, but the latter smirked. This was better than what he was hoping for. He originally wanted to slow the bear down and make it angry in hopes of it getting hit by one of the trees it knocked down.
He then would strike at its belly or another vital spot but now the bear was offering itself to him.
Alex quickly made some weird movements with the Kusarigama before both ends swung out towards the bear. The blade came straight at its face which the bear blocked easily but that was just the distraction.
The bear wasn't able to see the sickle go underneath his line of sight and Alex quickly swung it up to latch itself into its belly. The beast roared in pain and tried to swipe the sickle away but Alex had already capitalized on this and charged at the Merebear that was still in the air.
He swiped wide at its neck with his right hand and went to stab it with his left. He left deep cuts on the bear's neck and took a few scales with it while the stab sunk deep into the bear's belly. His strikes weren't enough to be fatal, but they dealt a lot of damage.
The bear swiped wildly after it got attacked again and managed to get Alex's left arm. It didn't reach his bone, but it was still a very deep flesh wound. He admitted he was a bit hasty and quickly backed up and used the sickle still in its belly to yank it around and deal as much damage as possible.
Eventually, it came loose, but he quickly swung his Kusarigama around again to continue striking the charging bear. When it came close enough, he ducked behind a tree while the bear left deep gash marks in the bark.
The bear suddenly felt another wound form near its shoulder as it saw the blade of the chain weapon tear its flesh. Following the chain, it was wrapped behind the tree the bear once cut. Alex was using the tree to help aim his strikes at odd angles so the bear would still get hit without getting too close.
Alex panted as he drew the blade end back and moved again. They kept playing chase as the wounds on the bear's body grew. Alex also tried aiming for previous wounds to increase the pain the bear felt but the berserk skill the bear seemed to have had a really long duration.
It had been almost 10 minutes since the fight started but it didn't back down. Alex soon began aiming for tendons and ligaments in the shoulders and legs to slow it down. He was up in the trees as he threw the sickle end of his chain into the tree truck of a tree ahead of him, he then jumped off his currently branch and swung himself around that tree and wrapped himself back towards where the bear closely followed.
The bear had watched his movements but lost him when he went behind the tree. Thinking he would still be up there, it glared around the canopy before it felt danger to its right. He threw out a paw on instinct only for his entire paw to be cut off.
It roared in pain and fell to the ground as Alex struggled to stop himself. He ended up hitting another tree trunk before rolling across the ground. He groaned and stood up, feeling his abdomen that had blood coming out. The leather armor he had was shredded and blood spilled out of the ruined armor.
Alex was quickly realizing the importance essence had in this world. He may be a 1st Ring with high stats, but his body had not evolved enough to naturally defend against an attack from a higher Ring. Just grazes from its claws were enough to leave deep gashes in his body.
There was definitely more to evolution that he didn't know about. With his current stats of around 1000 since he was still getting used to the power, he should have been fine against this bear. Yet its attacks still broke through his defenses.
Stats seemed to be just the tip of the iceberg known as evolution.
The wound wasn't deep since the bear hadn't reacted in time, but his own momentum turned the bear's claws into deadly weapons. He was also lucky to have worn armor or his guts would be spilling on the ground right now. He winced in pain but quickly went up to the bear with his claws weapons ready.
The two roared at each other as the bear stood on two hind legs and swung its good front paw at him. Alex rolled to the right, barely dodging it before sending an uppercut to the bear's right side. Deep cuts formed on its scaley body as he rolled again when the bear's right paw came at him from the other side.
Behind the bear, he dealt two quick jabs with his claws leaving four deep wounds in its body. To get it out quickly, Alex retracted the blades and dashed back out of range of the bear. It continued to roar in pain as the close combat continued.
Alex effectively dodged its slowed-down movements and left more and more wounds on its body. Its once pristine clear scales were now dulled by its own blood. The bear couldn't stand on its hind legs for long and crumbled to the ground as it only had one front paw now.
Its roars were less enthusiastic now and no longer charged him. Alex used his Kusarigama and threw the bladed end with incredible speed which dug itself securely into the bear's abdomen. Alex then yanked back with all his strength to pull the bear off its 3 feet.
The blade came out while blood and guts splattered but its job had been done. Alex used the momentum from his yank to spin his body a bit and launch the sickle end in an arch diagonally to the bear's left side.
With the bear on the ground dazed, it didn't see the sickle as it approached the side of its face. When it was close enough to be in its peripheral the bear turned out of instinct, only causing an early death for itself as the blade of the sickle sunk itself deep into the bear's eye and went straight through to the brain.
The Merebear went limp right after as blood poured out of its orifices. Alex sighed in relief as he looked down at his wounds. They were better than his wounds after his fight with Alan, but they were still pretty bad.
The wound on his left upper arm was almost to the bone and the ones on his abdomen were at least an inch deep. He gritted his teeth and quickly went over to the bear and removed the important parts, scales, and claws, before disappearing into the distance.
He wanted to leave the scene of the crime otherwise more monsters would attack him. He was not in good shape right now so he needed to rest a bit. He found out from his talk with Sharla that the health stat also affected the regeneration of skin and broken bones.
Basically the higher the health stat, the faster you heal naturally. Alex hoped that in a few hours to a day at most, he would be good enough to fight again. He made his way into the trees again and cleaned up and sutured his wounds again before slowly making his way back to his base camp farther down the river.
He could hear beast roars in the distance and although he hoped for them to be the ones he needed, he couldn't fight right now.
Alex then spent the rest of the day resting and fell asleep to the howls and growls of the midnight monsters.