As Bharat was lying face down inside the now empty clearing, and waiting for his status ailment to lift up, he couldn’t help but go over the fight against these rabbits once more in his head.

That was a habit he developed, that after every battle, he would go over his actions and strategy once more, try to find any mistakes he made and what could he do to avoid making the same errors again.

All this planning might seem a bit excessive to anyone else but he knew he was only alive till now due to these little sessions of introspection. As someone who had very little experience in fighting in general due to his lax lifestyle before, he had to consider every plan carefully as there was a very real chance that he could fuck up.

Just like he did now, underestimating the rabbits yet again. He thought that with his higher elevation and small bodies of these rabbits, there was very little if any chance that they could reach him in any reasonable amount of time.

His initial strategy towards this fight was not to end it this fast after all. He was prepared for a long fight, killing and regenerating till he killed every one of them.

But who would have thought that these creatures, who were so dumb back in his homeworld, will have such capability to think up a solution that even he himself couldn't come up with in such a short period of time.

Thankfully, it all worked out in the end, otherwise the thought of being neck-deep under a pile of dozens of claw foot rabbit who wanted a piece of him sent shivers down his spine.

Taking help from the stat boost did sting his pride a little bit, but taking external help while facing about 100 bloodthirsty rabbits sounded far better than using them against a single one, so he didn't feel that bad about the whole situation.

He was about to open his status screen to look at the notifications he had gotten before, but before he could do that, he caught sight of a small group composed of three little figures enters the clearing from the left side of his position.

Their shapes were a bit blurry due to the distance but he didn't require a clear picture to knew that they were rabbits. And considering he hadn't encountered a single swift-foot rabbit in this core area as of yet, they were likely Claw-foot rabbits too.

‘Shit! Not now!’, he thought in panic at the poor timing of this event as he couldn't hope to defend himself in his incapacitated state! He hoped that the rabbits would just ignore his presence but that hoped was dashed when the rabbits dashed straight in his direction.

‘Fuck! Am I really going to be done in by 3 rabbits after just decimating dozens of them?!’

The three rabbits wouldn't have noticed him due to the large distance either, but the sight of the burnt path that the fireball created and the burnt bodies of dozens of their ‘comrades’ was too conspicuous to ignore.

As the rabbits reached a distance from Bharat where they could see his condition clearly though, they stopped suddenly and just stood there, staring at him with their red eerie eyes.

He gave what he hoped was a convincing smile while staring at them but due to his panic and discomfort, it only came out as a grimace on his face.

“Good bunny?”

Next instant, to his befuddlement, the rabbits turned tail and ran the way they came from, soon disappearing from his sight and into the forest.

‘What? Did it work?’

Bharat couldn't help but gape at the scene that unfolded before his eyes. These Claw-foot rabbits rarely if ever chose the path of retreat, only doing so when they were sure they couldn't win.

This is why even though he killed many of them back on the branch by using his arrows, they didn't even think about running away as their higher numbers gave them confidence in their certain victory.

But now he was clearly defenceless and likely for a long while, so why didn't they take advantage of this fact and instead chose to run away?

‘Maybe the sight of so many dead rabbits managed to scare them?’, he thought, clearly not knowing that they were attracted to his position due to this very fact in the first place. Feeling as if he found the answer, he thanked his lucky stars and opened his status screen, and the first thing that greeted him was the long list of kill notifications.

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‘Two Levels at once, three if I count the previous one.’, he couldn't help but crack a smile at this sight. It was the first time he had gotten multiple levels at once and he was one step closer to become truly powerful. Of course, his overpowered fireball was a big part of the reason for his success this time, along with the intelligence stat boost he got, which brought him to the second-best notification.

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Description: Numerical indicator of density, power, and amount of mana your body and mana pathways could hold and channel. Increases the flow of mana running through your body exponentially for a small amount of time after manually adding a point. Explore for more functions.

Remarks: Despite popular belief, it doesn't make you any less of an idiot. >>

‘So it was related to mana after all, but instead of increasing my mana capacity, it increases the output of my abilities.’. Increased mana capacity would have been cool, no doubt about that. But it would have been kind of a cheat too, so this made more sense and was aligned with what the other stats provided quite nicely as well.

‘On another note, it isn't related to a person’s intelligence in a literal sense, or is it?’, he thought about it, his gaze shifting to ‘Explore’ part of the description for a second before shaking his head, metaphorically of course, as regardless of these remarks being harsh and leud to a certain extent, they did not contain false info.

Bharat starting dismissing all the remaining kill notifications one by one to reach his status page, but his gaze stopped at the very last notification in the list.

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<< Title Name: Rabbit Slayer

Description: A badge of honour that was attained by massacring a large number of rabbits in a short period of time. Wear it with pride as it represents your distaste for all things cute and cuddly. Puts [Fear] status on all rabbit-like creatures in your vicinity, which are lower level than you.

Remarks: Just pray to any god you believe in that one of them wasn’t ‘his’ pet. >>

‘Is that…?’

“Nah…What are the odds of that. There is no way it means ‘that’”, Bharat shook his head in denial and focused on the description of his title, which explained the weird behaviour of the rabbits from earlier. Next, his gaze went towards his status screen after the recent level-ups.

Status

Name: Bharat Kumar

Race: Human (Tier 0) (Level 8)

Level: 8

Titles: [Pioneer Of World], [Newbie], [Rabbit Slayer]

Health: 182/198

Mana: 55/192 [-Mana Poisoning-]

Stamina: 48/162 [-Exhausted-]

Stats

+Strength: 23

+Perception: 19

+Endurance: 20

+Constitution: 17

+Intelligence: 22

+Agility: 17

+Luck: 3

Unspent Points: 17

Abilities:

General:

[Basic Translate (Common)]

[Appraise (Common)]

Combat:

[Basic Archery (Poor)]

[Concentrated Shot (Common)]

[Basic Light weapon mastery (Poor)]

[Fireball (Uncommon)]

<< Ability [Sneak] available. Would you like to use one of your Unoccupied slots to gain the ability?

Yes/No? >>

<< Ability: Sneak (Poor)

Type: Combat

Description: Conceals your movements and slows down your breathing to prevent others from detecting you to some extent.

Remarks: Far better than hiding under a cardboard box…>>

‘I…uh think I’ll put this on hold for now. I still need to check those loot boxes.’, he frowned in thought. After all, he only had five slots and it will honestly suck if he finds a powerful ability but did have any free slot.

After getting a look at his remaining mana, he knew he was in for a long wait this time. In the meanwhile, he started looking for things to do, or something to make the process faster.

Adding points in intelligence won't work, and consuming another MP potion was not going to work either as what gleaned from the description of ‘mana poisoning’ he needed to wait for his ‘mana pathways’ to heal and forcing more mana into his body was not plausible at all from a logical point of view.

He could only hope that getting rid of his ‘exhaustion’ ailment would let him move about at least. Meanwhile, he closed his eyes and started meditating to see the effects of his level ups on his core.

Just as he reached his core, he could instantly tell that something was different, and not because it took him barely 10 seconds to reach there.

While looking at his core, he could see several root-like protrusions emerging from his core and extending outwards in all direction. A closer inspection further revealed that these ‘roots’ were more like pipes as they were hollow.

With a start, he realized that he was looking at his mana pathways that the system spoke of.

A while later, when his stamina was half-filled, he was able to move his limbs once more but instead of going towards the altars and claiming his prize, he got into a more comfortable position on the ground with his legs crossed and continued to focus inside.

When his mana too eventually reached the required mark, he took out the pyro staff from his ring and held it in his grasp.

He wanted to check something that had been bugging him since he used fireball for the first time back in the cave. From day 1, he had been practising relentlessly to make use of his mana but the existence of this staff basically told him that all his hours of meditation were not worth it. That all he needed all along was the right tool and ability to use the spell.

But what he was observing right now gave him hope that it was not the case this time. As he sat in his meditative state, he injected his mana into the staff and activated the [Fireball] ability, without the stat boost this time, all the while closely observing the movements of his core and the roots.

The moment he activated his ability, some of the threads unwounded from the collective bundle and travelled through the roots and bypassed them to reach his hands, which created a ball of fire in front of him. After shooting the [fireball], he saw that the extended pathways returned to his core, leaving no traces behind of their existence.

And he couldn't help but notice that the roots through which the threads initially travelled were slightly longer and wider than before. The next moment, the sharp sound of system notification sounded in his head, which broke him out of his meditation.

Opening his eyes, he looked at the screen in front of him and the text it contained.

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