It didn't take long before Bruce could find the first wolf. He had barely walked two hundred meters from the hotel when he saw something approaching through his night vision glasses. The creature was big, as expected; it wasn't an ordinary wolf. The monster was one and a half meters tall and two meters long. Bruce saw the monster's large, red eyes even amidst that darkness. From its mouth, something was falling off. It was hard to tell from a distance if the creature was just drooling after finding a new victim or if it was the blood of a previous one. Either way, it didn't matter. Bruce held his sword firmly and prepared to attack.
Bruce couldn't help but open his eyes widely when the beast charged toward him and ran fifty meters in just three seconds. Despite being large, speed seemed to be the main weapon of the creature. After raising his sword, Bruce activated Bash. Even faster than the monster approached, Bruce's sword was swung downward. The beast noticed Bruce's attempt amidst the darkness and opened its big mouth to stop him.
Wolf – Lv 01
HP: 45/45
MP: 22/22
SP: 53/53
After hearing a 'cling' when his sword and the monster's teeth collided, Bruce saw himself unable to push the beast down. His attack stopped the momentum of the beast, but that was all he could do with his current power. However, Bruce had an idea. After activating Bash again, Bruce finally managed to overpower the beast and make its head touch the could. He didn't lose that chance and tried to force his sword to enter the monster's mouth all the way to its throat. Unfortunately, the beast noticed Bruce's killing intent and retreated faster than he could attack. Despite that, Bruce managed to make the mouth of the beast a bit larger, since his sword cut a big part of its cheek.
"Don't be shy," Bruce smirked. "We need to make your smile on the other side become larger as well. I will make it quick!"
Bruce charged, reaching to stab the monster's face, but the beast swung its right paw toward his sword, no, toward his arm. For some reason, Bruce felt a shiver when he saw that the beast was ready to suffer another wound on its face but willing to attack at the same time. That wasn't good, so Bruce stopped before that could happen. However, his arm was scratched by the monster's claws, and only at that moment, Bruce realized those were quite big and razor-sharp.
"Shit… so this is…" Bruce muttered in pain while feeling his blood flowing from the wound all the way to his hands and sword.
A single scratch made Bruce lose four points of HP, which only showed him how much blood he would lose until he closed that wound. However, despite the pain, Bruce's grim only grew larger. That was the tension he had been looking for.
Noticing that the attack had somewhat worked, the wolf tried to charge the wounded Bruce. This time, it tried to attack Bruce with its left paw. However, he reacted in time to swing his sword toward the monster's paw, not only stopping the attack but also wounding the beast. The monster howled in fury due to the pain, but that didn't work to faze Bruce. Preparing a full horizontal slash, he tried to split the monster's head in two. Since one of its paws was wounded, the beast couldn't fall back fast enough, and so it only did what it could. Used the right paw to block Bruce's attack. However, Bruce activated Bash and cut the monster's paw.
"I see… So, I can activate Bash to power up all types of physical attacks," Bruce smiled devilishly. "That is good to know."
The monster tried to run away while Bruce was recovering from the full swing. Unfortunately, it escaped his range before he could do anything. To make matters worse, even though both paws were wounded, the monster could still run faster than Bruce.
"That is what a gain for not exercising enough," Bruce said and then pointed both hands toward the monster before shooting Fireball.
The monster's ass got hit, and the beast slowed down a little bit, but since he was already at it, Bruce shot another one, and this time, the monster stopped for good.
You obtained 45 experience points.
You obtained 4 spiritual coins.
"Nice," Bruce smiled. "That is a lot of experience and coins. I just have to defeat another wolf, and then I will level up."
After the levels of adrenaline in his body decreased, Bruce felt the wound on his arm tingling increasing. It was really a pain in the ass, so he decided to use the remaining potion that he had. He would obtain ten others by leveling up so that much was fine. In the blink of an eye, the pain disappeared, and the wound closed while Bruce was feeling the strawberry flavor in his mouth. He wished for some lemon-flavored potions but decided not to complain about them. It was great that they didn't taste like normal medicine.
"Time to move on," Bruce said and, this time, equipped his shield on his left arm instead of his back. "I already lost too much time here."
Bruce didn't find any goblins, rats, or bats while he was walking through that dark region of the city. However, after walking for a little more than three hundred meters, he heard another howl. This one coming from behind. Bruce felt the need to move forward, but he stopped right there and waited for a single minute, and then the wolf appeared. His instincts were correct.
Although the adrenaline he would feel after getting wounded was great, Bruce wasn't a masochist, so he didn't repeat the same mistakes. Instead of going for the kill right from the beginning, Bruce faked some large movements, and then the beast tried to catch him by surprise. Thanks to those, he activated Bash and slashed the monster's paws. In just a few seconds, he destroyed the monster's middle-range weapons and, at the same time, decreased its mobility.
After that, the monster lost its ferocity quite a bit since Bruce was more dangerous than he looked like. However, that had been a mistake; by going into the defensive, the monster gave Bruce a chance to go all out. Thus, the beast quickly died.
You obtained 45 experience points.
You obtained 4 spiritual coins.
Congratulations! You leveled up!
You obtained five status points!
Your HP, MP, and SP have increased by one point.
You completed a quest!
You received a new quest!
Reach level ten!
Reward: ten medium mana potions.
"Well, now…" Bruce rubbed his chin. "What should I do?"
Although Bruce was having a fun time putting all his points into strength, he already reached a problem due to that. He found a monster that could outspeed him, and that was dangerous because it was clear that he would find many more. Should he begin to invest some points into agility? Now that he thought about it, a single scratch made him lose almost twenty percent of his HP, so perhaps it was also an excellent time to increase his vitality.