Chapter 25 - Forest Hunt

In a lush forested area, four men stood around, facing a tree that was riddled with scratch marks. The scratches weren't deep, however, they were still dangerous nevertheless. These scratches came from Zheng, who stood next to Niko. Zheng's hand was hairier than Candreva's chest and his nails expanded out with a purple color. The fur-like hair on his hands and forearm was also shaded with a purple color making it look strange. Niko could also feel an acute aura emitting from the claws of Zheng, however, it was too little to make him feel anything else.

"I'm next!" Candreva walked forward with big strides as he faced the thick brown tree, but strangely, Candreva slowly turned and faced the others and pointed towards Zheng, "Zheng, my skill doesn't kill, but it's very manly! Let me test it out on you!"

Niko looked at Zheng who walked back facing Candreva as well and stood to face Candreva.

"Charge at me!" Candreva took a stance as he said this.

Zheng tilted his head and grinned. His purple nails were raised as he rushed towards Candreva, however, something strange happened.

[Powerful Beast Roar]

"ROAR!!!" Candreva gave a powerful roar that sent visible sound waves from his mouth towards Zheng.

The rushing Zheng saw the sound waves coming towards him, however, he was too slow to evade it. As the sound wave hit him, he was completely stopped in his tracks as if he was paralyzed and began to fall forward due to momentum. As he was about to fall face first towards the ground, he was able to snap out of it to pick himself up.

"What just happened?" Ivanic asked with a tilted head confused.

Zheng shook his head as he shrugged, "I don't know… As soon as I heard the roar my body became paralyzed and my mind went blank for a slight second…"

"Hahaha!! Manly! Truly manly! All monsters will be paralyzed for a second in front of this man!" Candreva pumped up his hairy chest as he gave a huge grin.

"That's a unique skill! I have only seen a skill like that once and it was one of those protectors. If used properly your skill will heavily aid us in combat!" Ivanic spoke with excitement.

"Aid!? That's what the weak do! I'm manly! I fight!" Candreva protested, making ivanic annoyed.

Ivanic then said, "It's smart. We are here to live and prosper, I hope you are smart when dealing with monsters and do not bring us down." As if he had just realized who he was talking to, he said, "... And it would be manly to not bring the team down!"

Candreva's eyes shined as if he had just understood something and nodded, making everyone in the group sigh in relief. Candreva was a muscular man and surely would be able to hold his own in a fight, however, many things in this world were unnatural, and relying on just his human body was suicide.

The four have been in this forest for a few hours now and Ivanic has been informing them about many things. Missions are acquired from a certain place within the settlement and they are usually posted up by other people, which was interesting. They had also formed a party with their watches and when a monster was killed, everyone would receive a bit of the experience, however, those who contributed more would receive much more.

As time went on they learned more about each other's skills. Niko hasn't yet revealed his other spirit as he kept it invisible, however, Ivanic suggested, distracting monsters and assisting the battles with the weak spirit. Ivanic was the kind of person in the group to stay far away and give them intel on the situation without getting hurt. Candreva was able to paralyze the enemy for a second giving Zheng enough time to scratch the monster with his claws.

"We have something here guys! What do you think about testing this out?" Ivanic said looking at the others.

Everyone else nodded and ivanic continued, "This place is known for easy monsters to kill, such as the Roughback Boar. These boars are easy to kill when facing against a group as their movements are extremely sluggish, however, do not underestimate them."

"Roughback boar? Let's go kill!" Zheng looked excited as he spoke. Niko has noticed the personality change that Zheng went through. From the time he has been with Zheng he seemed like a normal person with nothing ordinary, however, whenever he used his skill he would transform into a blood-hungry beast. Niko took note of this and decided to be wary of Zheng,

"How come there are monsters in an unranked layer?" Niko asked as he was told for sure that monsters should be appearing here.

"No one knows, we still know too little about this world, our guess is that they migrated here from elsewhere, there has been more of them each day. Follow me." Ivanic signaled them to follow with his hand as he walked farther into the forest.

After walking for a few minutes, Ivanic came to a stop and raised his hand. He moved behind a thick tree and others followed suit.

"Let's speak like this now, we don't want to disturb that thing right there…" A voice sounded within their minds as Ivanic pointed towards a beast that stood behind the thick tree.

As they peeked they noticed a boar that had a height up to a human waist. The boar looked like a normal boar seen on earth with a few significant differences. The boar had a small horn on their forehead and a strange back that possessed weird mountain-like bumps that almost looked like glossy calluses. The boar itself was dark brown in color and as it stood there on the grassy ground it would look way too frightening to a normal person.

"That thing is huge…" Niko was taken back by the size and looks of the beast.

"Let's kill it!" Zheng's voice echoed throughout the minds of everyone and Ivanic added.

"Let's try out what we came up with! Be careful, it's our first time doing this, therefore there might be errors." Ivanix said and everyone agreed.