Lush trees with blue leaves spread out across the snow-covered plains. As the snowstorm raged on and threw even more snow on the icy ground, deep tremors shook the surrounding earth.
*Booom!* *Whoosh*
Sounds of loud explosions were heard in the distance as the wind whipped and thrashed around violently. The explosions continue to rage on, one louder and stronger than the other.
'Tsk, they just keep coming.' A small white fox danced elegantly on the ice-covered battlefield, expertly dodging every attack coming her way.
At the moment, Aurora was fighting a horde of exotic-looking white tigers. Every single one of them was a magical beast of the first rank, so none of them were anything to scoff at. Even Rejoke, who was fighting about five of them at once, seemed to be struggling a bit.
None of that, however, mattered to the annoyed fox, who just wanted to be done with all this. There were probably even a few dozen tigers attacking her, yet she remained completely unfazed.
At first, she was enjoying it. They actually served as a nice exp farm for the first few minutes; however, after reaching level 3, they became worthless. Even after killing like fifty of them, she didn't even feel close to leveling up.
'Urgh, just die already!' Hurling another big fireball at the approaching horde, Aurora continued to skate around the icy floor as she grumbled internally.
It has been about two weeks since she evolved and became a rank 1 magical beast. In this time, Aurora realized that for the current her, there was nothing that could serve as a threat to her in that part of the forest.
Even Rejoke had barely anything, at least decently strong to hunt. Back in that red-leaved forest, rank 1 monsters and magical beasts were scarce, and you would hardly find any of them.
Because of this, the two bid farewell to their temporary base and set out for a new place. And finally, after traveling for about three days straight, the two found a new biome of sorts.
In here, the snow never seemed to cease falling, and the temperature constantly stayed below zero. However, what's more is that there were actually powerful beings in here.
In their week-long stay here, the two never managed to find a single monster that would belong to the null rank. All of them, even the weakest ones, were in the first rank.
This was very good news for Aurora. After evolving and becoming a unique being, she had effectively made it extremely difficult for herself to level up.
Even now, as she killed one rank 1 beast after the other, she had made virtually no progress with her levels. It was as if she wasn't gaining any exp at all! Heck, these tigers were all at least level 5 while she was still level 3, yet even after killing about twenty of them, she had made no progress.
'Jeez, finally.' Aurora sighed in relief as she decapitated the last living tiger. By now, even her head hurt from the sheer amount of kill messages she had received.
'God damn fifty-three tigers!' She exclaimed internally after she counted all the messages.
'If I count all the ones Rejoke killed, there were probably even seventy of these guys! Wait, speaking of Rejoke, how's the wolf doing?' Suddenly remembering about her companion, she looked in the direction she last saw him fighting the tigers.
And sure enough, there he was. And it seems like she turned around at just the right time as the meter and a half high black wolf tore apart the chest of the last remaining white tiger.
Rejoke's body was riddled with small wounds, but none of them were anything serious. Just a few stratches and a bit of burned fur from getting hit by the fireballs cast by the not-so-careful fox.
Actually, while not as absurd as the small white fox, Rejoke was no joke either. In total, he had offed seventeen tigers all on his own. His strength was truly monstrous, even more so when he activated his skill, which boosted it even further.
Turning around to look at his alpha, the intense blood-red eyes of the wolf calmed down a bit as he shrank back down. Still, he was about a meter tall, much bigger than the tiny fox.
Quickly picking up some things from the ground in his mouth, Rejoke walked over to Aurora. Leaning his head down, he released the four small, light blue crystals he held in his mouth.
For a moment, the little fox's eyes sparkled, and without any hesitation, she grabbed the crystals into her paws and crushed them one by one.
As the streaks of light blue energy entered her body one by one, Rejoke watched the entire process with curious eyes. He honestly didn't really know what those strange glowing things were, but his alpha always seemed eager to get them, especially these light blue ones.
That was why he always collected them and brought them over to her. If it made her happy, he wouldn't care and would give the crystals to her without even trying to figure out what they were.
Obviously, these light blue crystals were attribute crystals. The reason Aurora was so excited about these ones in particular was because they were actually ice attribute crystals.
In reality, she really loved this snowy place. Most of the monsters and beasts here were related to the ice attribute, which meant ice crystals. Thanks to these small crystals, Aurora's ice soul vessel was already at level 3, meaning that her ice spells were even deadlier than before.
But the true ace in this place was her fire. Since most of the beings here belonged to the ice attribute, they were naturally weak to fire. And Aurora, as the devil she was, obviously used this to her adventage and bombarded the creatures here with fire any chance she got.
Is a horde of dozens of tigers charging at you? No problem; just throw a few fireballs in their faces.
'Well, you might as well use them when they're dead since they were useless while alive.' After absorbing the four simple ice crystals, Aurora closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and activated a skill.
'Flame of Conversion!'
As deep red flames danced around the small frame of the white fox, a singular white streak of energy began to leave from each corpse of a tiger on the ground. Then, these white streaks began to condense together and slowly took on a light blue hue.
As all the energy and bodies disappeared, all that was left from the about ninety corpses was a small, triangular crystal glowing with a light blue color.
'At least you were useful for something.' Aurora sneered internally and crushed the small crystal, once again absorbing all the energy from it.
'But really, what a strange skill.' She couldn't help but think, remembering the first time she read about the skill some time after evolving.
[Flame of Conversion]
- Level: Max
- Grade: Unique
- Skill type: Active
- Attribute type: Fire
– A strange skill that can harness the power of a very powerful flame with the ability to absord and convert energy.
[On activation:
- Summons the Flame of Conversion, allowing the user to convert any energy into the desired form.
- Due to the user's severe lack of experience and understanding, this skill is currently in a very weakened state.
It was very strange. Even now, Aurora has no idea why she received such a skill. It doesn't really make sense. Yes, she evolved and gained high affinity with fire, but this skill doesn't seem to be exactly linked to her evolution.
Not to mention the absolutely broken ability it had. The system may say that the skill is currently in a severely weakened state, but that seems hard to believe. If a skill that is supposed to be weakened already is broken, just how strong must it be when in its prime state?
'Whatever. No use in thinking about it now.' Aurora shook her head softly, dismissing her thoughts. She already had her doubts before, and although they didn't disappear, she realized that she wouldn't solve anything just by thinking about it.
While still lost in her own thoughts, she climbed onto Rejoke's back and lied down on the wolf's surprisingly warm fur. Without even saying or doing anything, Rejoke understood what his alpha wanted, and so he set off in a random direction.
While it was true that Aurora was now much faster than the wolf, she still preferred to get carried around. Not to mention just how comfortable his fur was. Every time the little fox lay on his back, she immediately felt like falling asleep on that fluffy fur.
Actually, she even started using him as a pillow and a bed when they slept. Once in a while, when they actually needed to sleep, Aurora would lie atop the wolf's back and use him as a bed. Well, he was much more comfortable than a bunch of leaves, that's for sure.
As she let herself get carried, Aurora began to think about what to do next. After her evolution, she became incredibly powerful. However, since she had successfully evolved, she had completed her short-term goal.
'Maybe I shouldn't think so hard. I'll just do what I always did and slowly make my way to the next step. And it's not like my long-term goal really changed.' She chuckled internally, clearing her mind off unnecessary thoughts.
She would continue to get stronger; that wouldn't change no matter what. She needed to get much stronger, somehow regain her memories, and ideally, uncover the truth about her own existence.
Actually, ever since she had evolved, Aurora realized that she knew basically nothing, be it about the world, the system, or herself. She didn't even know what happened in her previous life. What caused her to suddenly appear in this world as a fox? Did she die? Was it an accident that she had fragments of memories of a past life?
She didn't know the answers to even a single question out of these. But she knew one thing. Nothing will happen if she does nothing. She should just focus on getting stronger. And who knows? Maybe the answers to her questions will come naturally.
Aurora didn't even realize, but as she lost herself more and more in thought, her mind slowly began to shut down, and soon enough, she fell asleep.
Rejoke obviously felt the change in his alpha's breathing and realized she was sleeping. And since he didn't want to interrupt her, he made sure that everything would go smoothly, so he began to pay even more attention on the path.
Neither of them knew where they were going, but they didn't care in particular. Aurora because she wasn't worried enough to care, and Rejoke because he would simply follow his alpha's lead no matter what.
And so, as the two wandered around the frozen forest, one walking while the other was asleep, they headed forward, ready to take on anything fate had in store for them.