The sun was well past its zenith by the time Arthur had finished with all the other animal enclosures. He’d started the difficult task early in the morning and it was now late midday. Looking down at his trusty tranquillizer gun, Arthur smiled. It had served him well over the past few hours and it was the only reason his task had gone so smoothly.

There had, however, been a few close calls.

VERY CLOSE.

Arthur grimaced as he remembered the weird lizard in the water that had ambushed him as soon as he tried to kill the rest of its family; having hidden from Arthur's initial inspection of its enclosure by submerging itself in a small pond.

I mean talk about overreacting. I was thinning out its competition. Arthur internally joked with himself to ease some of the tension he was feeling at the recalled memory. It didn't help much. That had been seriously close. Arthur had almost lost his leg before he was able to kill it. The injury had put him out of commission for nearly an hour before his healing blood gel had finally managed to work its miracles and he would have been long dead without it.

Arthur had checked out of curiosity to see if the blood he now bled was still the same as the rare blood-gel he had collected when he first revived but sadly that wasn’t the case. That wasn’t to say that Arthur was disappointed with the results, however. Quite the opposite actually.

The rare rating his blood had held had now changed to unique which Arthur guessed meant that only he possessed something like it within the entire universe, which made sense to him. After all, it was his blood. The rest of the liquid’s description was a little strange though.

??? Infused Blood (Unique)- A strange red liquid containing healing affinity ether along with traces of something currently undetectable. A great catalyst in elixirs and alchemical creations.

That's where it stopped. Identify didn’t tell him what that something was and it was also the first time he had seen a question mark appear in the results it provided. But after comparing his unique variant with the rare blood-gel he'd collected with some carefully self-inflicted injuries, courtesy to his trusty katana, of course, Arthur was happy with the results.

Whilst not as fast-acting as the gel, his blood still managed to get the job done miraculously. Without the debilitating side effects caused by the former, which was a huge plus in Arthur's books. No magma ingesting, diarrhoea inducing stomach problems caused by drinking the blood that flowed through him, thankfully.

So why don't I feel any different even though that stuff's flowing through my veins? It didn't make any sense. The least Arthur would expect was a minor increase in his regeneration but he'd seen nothing of that effect. 'Or maybe my natural healing speeds so slow that even augmented, it doesn't make a noticeable difference.

All in all, it had been a productive day and his ether progression counter could attest to that.

Current progression 8470/42,000.

That was the combined result of killing over fifty innocent animals. Well, maybe not so innocent; at least not that crafty lizard fucker. The little bastard had got him good, and he briefly nursed the phantom pain he felt where his leg had almost been severed. Crocodiles weren’t said to have the strongest bite in the animal kingdom for no reason, which Arthur had unfortunately found out the hard way.

Arthur only had one enclosure left before he’d have to find a new hunting ground. Maybe I should hit up a few pet stores next. It'll definitely be safer. He’d saved the most dangerous animals for last, thinking it’d be best to get as much experience as possible before challenging them.

The lions were waiting for him.

It almost seemed almost poetic how he’d be finishing his genocide today with the bigger versions of the animal that had nearly killed him just under a day ago. Sadly, however, Arthur’s caution had backfired on him for once. There was just one teeny, tiny problem. He had exactly ten bullets left for his tranquillizer. No matter how hard he had searched the zoo, he couldn't find more.

There were eleven lions.

One more than he was adequately prepared to handle. Fuck! I shouldn't have used two on the Iron tusk. Well, he still had the anaesthetic he’d liberated from the university's surgical department, but he’d been wanting to save that for later.

Arthur also wasn’t too sure on how best to administer the sleeping agent. The anaesthetics on the tranquillizer darts were unfortunately not replaceable. Plagued by indecision, he couldn’t decide whether or not he should go through with this last enclosure or call it quits while he was still ahead. Why tempt fate? He could just find easier prey.

And besides, the lions looked famished and they were eyeing him as if he looked like a particularly tasty treat.

Wait, that was it, Arthur realised. The pride was hungry. All he had to do was just feed them a delicious meal laced with the chemical sleeping agent. Whilst nowhere near as potent as his tranquillizer would be, he hoped that it would be adequate to serve his plans. Beggars couldn't be choosers, after all.

Finally deciding on his course of action, Arthur rushed to find himself some good lion dinner for the hungry pride. In the end, Arthur settled on a baby deer he’d killed not too long ago. Its body was still warm from its recent death and it was the closest flesh to what the lions regularly consumed.

Probably?

He wasn’t an expert on this stuff.

Using his katana, Arthur cut deep slashes into the carcass and liberally slathered the anaesthetics into the bloodied wounds. Cutting open the animal's stomach, he also generously poured the liquid onto its guts. He remembered watching a nature documentary where it said that lions enjoyed eating the innards of their prey. Arthur prayed that the fact still held with these post-system variants. Finally, Arthur coated his katana in the remaining anaesthetics in a last-ditch effort, hoping that he wouldn’t have to put its effectiveness to the test.

Satisfied with his preparations, Arthur approached the lion enclosure, dragging the deer carcass behind him. The majestic beasts all looked up at him in unison as they noticed the food he had with him, or maybe the food that he was now identified as, their noses twitching at the scent of freshly spilt blood. Their eyes were filled with hunger and he saw their sharp claws digging into the ground as they growled menacingly, the deep sound a reminder that he was a prey amongst predators.

Identifying them, Arthur quickly found the highest level beast amongst them as well as the only evolved specimen.

Silver fanged lion level 7- Evolved from a normal lion, this deadly predator can be found across the universe on many planets. Possessing a paralysing bite, its lethal teeth should be avoided at all costs.

Ether 540.

It was the first animal that Arthur had seen that didn’t include a description of it being an indigenous species of Earth. Arthur didn’t know if that was because it had evolved and therefore become more in line with the animals that lived on other ether rich planets, or that lions were in fact just a really common species across the universe. Frankly, he didn’t care.

Bracing himself, he hurled the deer over the fence into the enclosure, for the first time fully appreciating just how strong he’d gotten after collecting so much ether. This was a feat he would never have been able to do with such ease two days ago, irrespective of all the weights he used to lift. Arthur was now almost twice as strong as he used to be. Still nowhere near strong enough to fight a group of lions with only a blade he couldn’t even use properly, sadly.

They growled and fought to tear and rip into the carcass, spraying blood everywhere. It was a gruesome sight and Arthur knew he wouldn’t survive those vicious wounds, system magic be damned. At least not yet.

Arthur sighed in relief that the beasts hadn’t noticed the special ingredient that had been added to their meal. They were done in a matter of minutes, leaving behind a pile of cracked bones covered in some slips of deerskin. It seemed that absorbing ether had also made them ravenous in addition to enhancing their considerable predatory prowess.

Arthur sat and waited the long minutes it took before the lions began to drift off to sleep. He wasn’t sure how effective his trap had been as lions generally went to sleep after feeding, so he could only pray that the anaesthetic had at least been partially successful. It's supposed to be directly injected into the bloodstream, not ingested orally. Hopefully, it does something at least. Finally deciding that the lions had been asleep for a sufficiently long enough time, Arthur brought up the tranquillizer to aim at his first target.

The evolved lion. It was by far the biggest threat to his current plans and Arthur couldn't be too sure whether or not the paralysing trait of its own silver teeth had given it immunity to similar ailments being inflicted upon it.

Pulling the trigger, he saw a small spray of blood from the puncture wound on its legs. Thankfully, none of the other lions reacted, not even the one he had attacked. Speeding up, Arthur quickly shot the remaining lions, leaving the lowest level one the only remaining beast without a tranquillizer dart in it.

At a measly level two, Arthur didn't think that it’d be much trouble to deal with, even if it attacked him at an inopportune moment.

How wrong he was?

As soon as Arthur entered the enclosure, it sprang to its feet, growling at the intruder that had foolishly entered its den. Shit! was it faking sleep all this time? When none of its brethren woke up to attack their new prey, it looked around in confusion. Why were they not waking up? Arthur considered running for it, but he’d already committed to this plan of his.

How hard could it be to deal with a single lion?

Very hard, Arthur came to find out in the next few minutes. They weren’t known to rule the savannas of Africa for no reason. When the lone lion realised none of its family was going to help, the large cat suddenly leapt at Arthur and only his reflexes honed through Muay Thai training saved him from a deadly wound. It had still managed to scratch him, though, a long cut on his left arm the result of their first exchange. Things weren’t looking very promising.

Arthur circled the lion, trying to bait it into making another preemptive attack, but the beast had grown cautious after observing its prey's reflexes. This strange, new animal was dangerous, the lion decided. Seeing as it wouldn't take the initiative to attack, Arthur suddenly jumped forward, trying to surprise the big cat. He was only partially successful, as his blade scored a shallow cut on its back leg instead of bisecting it as he’d hoped. It did however serve the purpose of injecting anaesthetics directly into its bloodstream, which was the proper way of administering the drug instead of foolheartedly trying to get someone to eat it.

After that, the fight was practically decided. With its already sluggish reflexes further slowed down, Arthur was able to whittle the injured lion's remaining life away over the next few minutes.

Breathless and hurting, Arthur stood over its corpse. This was his first-ever real fight since the system had come and he had won. He didn’t count the cat, nor the crocodile as those experiences were more him flailing around than fighting.

Elated, Arthur decided to quickly kill the sleeping lions before they decided to wake up and end his little party. Finishing the job quickly, Arthur felt a rush of strength as his ether collection passed the 10,000 mark. This could get very addicting, he realised which opened the door to a whole host of problems that might crop up once humanity returned to Earth. Nope, not thinking of that now. Arthur closed the door to the issue. He didn’t have the time to be worrying about potential problems right now. Arthur had plenty enough real ones to deal with on the present.

Ether collected 10,950/42,000.

He was now a little over a quarter of the way there and he was only halfway through the second day since the system’s arrival. At this rate, he’d be done in another three, far sooner than he’d initially expected.

Suddenly, Arthur felt the hairs rise on his arms and goosebumps cover his skin.

Something was wrong.

Something was very, very wrong.

A low growl from behind him made Arthur's blood run cold, similar in sound to the lions, yet infinitely more terrifying.

This was a real monster.

He shivered in fear. Although quieter than the big cats had been, it somehow seemed far more menacing; the sound of a true predator. The day suddenly seemed a lot darker and the temperature had dropped enough that Arthur was shivering in the middle of the day. That couldn’t just be his imagination.

Sweat began to pour down his back as Arthur realised he was well and truly out of his depth. Turning around slowly, he gulped when he saw the monster in front of him. Jet black, powerful muscles rippled under its velvety skin, its fur shiny and sleek, appearing to absorb light itself, its existence an absence of life; the antipathy to all but itself. It looked like darkness given form, beautiful and deadly.

ohhh shit! I'm fucked!

It was level 11.