With a distinctively innovative smile on his face, a man stood in the middle of the forest. He looked around in awe, taking in the beauty of the trees and the sounds of the wildlife around him. As he took a deep breath, he felt a sense of peace wash over him.
"Ah! Yeah, what a beautiful forest."
He looked around once more and saw several breathless, ordinary-ranked Crocuta who were even beginning to vanish.
These ordinary-ranked crocutas arrived with the other five pack leaders. Each pack had 10–12 members in it. After finishing this bunch, he heard the level-up notification twice, which meant he had levelled up to level 5.
Hearing the notification and realising that he had already advanced this far made it impossible for him not to see everything in a stunning light.
He could see the pack leaders, who stood there, not attacking him and looking like they were still waiting for something or someone.
Though he didn't mind that because of the way Ignis saw it, they looked to him like they were emitting holy light. If this wasn't a level-up chance, Ignis could have gone to chat with his holy buddies, who provided him with this many experience points.
"Man, these are good leaders." Ignis said this as if he were very, very sad.
"But I'll have to do it; if I don't, then who will?"
"If I don't send them to the afterlife, who will?" Ignis pondered.
If pack leaders knew how he felt and what he was planning, they would surely have to have this human's peaches for dinner. This was the first time in a long while someone has tried to pull such crap in their territory and is still alive to tell the tale.
On a tree, where beauty was sitting and eating, she had a slightly regretful expression.
"I guess I won't gain any experience until I breakthrough."
She stopped gaining experience points from the monsters Ignis killed as soon as she had 90% of the level 2 experience points she needed.
"I suppose the only thing left for me to do is get the new sill and improve my archery."
"But it's fun; he has killed a total of 68 monsters, and I hit most of them." She muttered to herself about how she had hit the majority of the monsters Ignis had killed up to this point with a somewhat smug expression on her face.
As it all happened, the forest briefly went silent before they heard an enraged howl coming from the shadows of the reddish forest.
The howl was so loud that it woke her from her mumbling, and she immediately got into a defensive position, ready to face whatever was coming their way.
She took a proper stance and prepared herself for the unknown creature, which appeared to be the strongest creature they had faced so far.
She then heard a laugh, which till now she had grown used to, but this time it was filled with more lunacy, and when she saw the source, she got the chills down her spine along with peaches.
Because of that moment, the howl from the shadows went off, and Ignis, without waiting for anything, ran towards the group of pack leaders, but the crazy thing was that his kusarigama's iron ball side had increased the temperature of the surrounding area, and soon Ignis jumped, holding chains, and put the iron ball into motion.
Motioning the hot iron ball from over his head, before the pack leaders could even feel secure by the howl from shadows, they were stuck by something very hot or even lava itself, and the rest is history.
The moment the iron ball stuck them, they lost 80% of their HP, and soon the divine effect of the [stinger] took effect, and they were all blasted from the inside out by the concentrated lava.
BOOOOOOM!
_______________
Skill: Stinger
Rank: F+
Proficiency: Beginner
Effect: Allows the user to vertically crash the kusarigama and cause 30% extra damage by the sudden burst of concentrated lava. Killing an enemy with this skill grants the user 50% more experience points.
Mana Required: 10
Cooldown: 5 seconds
_______________
He soon received notifications for gaining a lot of experience points once more, but this time he also heard a different notification: one for loot drops.
The moment he saw this, he jumped with a victory sign and then bowed towards his deceased holy friends.
"You guys were awesome!"
"You even gave me a parting gift." He said this as if he were eternally thankful to them and checked the loot.
_______________
Accessories: Ring
Rank: Bronze
Level: 4
Attributes: Intellect+5, Defense +5
Effect: There is a 10% chance to reflect 20% of the damage taken.
_______________
The ring didn't look fancy but had a good effect and had good attributes. Before equipping it, he used his talent, [Infusion]. The ring flashed brightly, and soon the results of the divinity mark were out.
_______________
Accessories: Ring
Rank: Bronze
Level: 4
Attributes: Intellect+20, Defense +15
Effect: There is a 20% chance to reflect 40% of the damage taken.
_______________
The attributes improved greatly for a bronze-ranked ring. The addition of intellect might not be effective right now as he doesn't have many skills, but when he acquires more skills, it will make a difference, and as for the increase in defense, that was a major boost.
Thinking about all of this, Ignis equipped the ring.
As he equipped the ring, he could hear someone running very fast towards him.
Before he could even turn around, three dark rays struck his back.
-24,-22,-23
"What the..."
Someone's running had continued for a while and was still heading in his direction. He saw that three rays were approaching him once more; however, he did not attempt to avoid them this time and instead experienced the attack head-on.
-22,-24,-21
"Three attacks in a row do deal some damage, I suppose," Ignis said that, as he was looking in a certain direction, he could soon see a tall, black creature standing there.
[ Name: Elder Crocuta ]
[Level: 6]
[ HP: 1300 ]
[ Description: An elder of the most widespread and fastest group of the Misavu hyena clan.]
Ignis and the elder made eye contact; Ignis could see the anger in the elder's eyes, not sure if it was for killing the clan members or that the elder could not kill Ignis with its most powerful attack.
Ignis, who saw all this, started to laugh. His laughter was usual, casual, and proper lunatic, and while he had his signature laugh, he ran towards the elder crocuta and shouted to Ethyn, "It's time for you to get your first skill, be prepared, and land the killing hit."
Ethyn, who was already on edge, realised that now was the perfect opportunity for her to deliver the decisive blow.
Ignis charged straight towards the elder, but the moment he was about to hit it with his sickle, the elder changed positions and attacked with another skill, which was not as powerful as three dark rays but did some damage.
Elder got away with Igni's attack, but soon it was struck with an arrow to the back, and the moment its direction changed, without even thinking twice and taking this as a perfect opportunity, Ignis stuck with skill [stinger], and soon the iron ball crashed into the elder and took away its big chunk of HP, but no lava blast was there.
-221,-233
It let out a painful cry but again changed its place. It's as if the elder could change its place with shadows, but that also didn't help, and soon it was again struck by the arrow.
-12
Ethyn made fun of herself for causing such insignificant damage.
No matter how much the elder crocuta moved around or how much harm it tried to do to Ignis, it was unable to harm him, and it couldn't even get close to the bothersome girl.
Soon there was nowhere to go, and the elder crocuta was shot in his peaches and died a peachy death at the hands of a bothersome girl.