Kurushimi slashed downwards with her blade. A canisfang was split in half during its attempt to rush Kurushimi. As the two pieces of canisfang fell to the ground, it’s blood soared through the air. In the middle of its flight, the blood began to slow down.

《Used skill: 『Evade Lvl. 2』!》

Kurushimi could see and count the individual blood droplets that flew through the air. With her skill ‘Evade’ rapidly increasing her perception, she scanned her peripherals for movement.

To Kurushimi’s right, the movement of something could just about be seen. Kurushimi stepped back, swinging her right leg behind the left. Turned towards the incoming canisfang, she swung her katana diagonally. The canisfangs face was torn through in an instant.

The canisfang yelped as it staggered back. Blood poured out in dozens from its wound.

“That was too shallow I guess”

Kurushimi stood back and lifted her arm up. Her strike hadn’t gone deep enough and the canisfang survived the initial attack. But, she was able to cut it.

《Used skill: 『Blood magic Lvl. 4』!》

In a circular motion, the blood spun around like a saw. The wound instantly was torn open further, slashing into the canisfangs brain.

The canisfang dropped down lifelessly. The ‘Blood magic’ had killed it instantly. By this point, kurushimi had already turned away from the canisfang.

She hovered over the other canisfang before biting into it. It’s blood filled her mouth, making contact with her tongue. Kurushimi grimaced before standing up and heading to the former canisfangs body and repeating the motion.

《Used skill: 『Fangs Lvl. 2』!》

《Used skill: 『What’s yours is mine Lvl. 2』!》

《Gained +2 HP, +2 STR, +2 END, +2 SP, +2 AGI, +2 MP!》

《Gained +2 HP, +2 STR, +2 END, +2 SP, +2 AGI, +2 MP!》

‘’These two were fairly low level… Well it makes sense since I’m pretty much back here.”

Kurushimi looked past the canisfangs bodies. A clearing with a path connected to it stood in front of her. This was the place where Kurushimi always found herself starting at after death.

“Low level monsters seem to like hanging around here. I guess that is one thing I can be thankful about.”

Kurushimi frowned as she looked around. After confirming there were no other canisfangs here or anything else, she moved up.

Kurushimi stood in the centre of the clearing. She stared at the path in front of her, making her feel a little uneasy. Kurushimi knew that the path would split into two. In her very first run, she had chosen to go left. There, she experienced dying for the first time.

And then in her second run, she went to the right. Hoping for a better result, the world has mercilessly betrayed her. Both sides resulted in death. Ultimately her choice didn’t matter. She was dead whether she had gone left or right.

Kurushimi took a deep breath. She at least didn’t have to worry anymore. Now, she could handle what was to come beyond the path. Or at least, Kurushimi felt she could probably take on the left side. To the right, there were simply too many canisfangs. Even with her being stronger, she doubted she could handle those numbers.

But as long as the left side held no more than what she had encountered in the beginning, she could easily handle it. Thinking about it, Kurushimi realised that the left side would be a walk in the park. After all, there were only 5 canisfangs.

Kurushimi had mostly forgotten her grudge against the canisfangs up to this point. But remembering the original five canisfangs, who had made her experience being eaten alive for the first time, got her feeling a mix of anger and excitement.

Visible bloodthirst emanated from Kurushimi. Both figuratively and literally. Kurushimi began leaning forwards to head towards the path but stopped herself. Before heading towards the path, Kurushimi wanted to look at something quickly.

Heading right, she stopped by a single tree. At the bottom of the tree was a crystal along with a puddle of water. Kurushimi hovered over the puddle, looking into it. Her image was reflected back.

“The last time I saw myself was in the first or second run…”

The porcelain-faced doll stared back at Kurushimi. As Kurushimi had confirmed beforehand, the girl in the reflection really was her. Her lustrous silver hair seemed to glisten while her gray eyes looked more like glass than any sort of biological material.

“Even with dirt and blood on my face, I still look stupidly pretty…”

Kurushimi felt envious looking at herself. Her feelings of envy quickly turned to confusion as she realised this face was now hers. Kurushimi found it to be a strange feeling. Being envious of her own face, that is.

The main difference between now and before was that this time, dried blood and dirt sullied her face. Fighting, falling over and many other things had caused her to get dirty. Kurushimi grimaced as she realised showering may be a bit hard here. Not that it was a priority, but she still felt that it was inconvenient to be unable to wash oneself.

“Perhaps I’ll be able to find a lake or something to bathe in later…”

Kurushimi threw out a statement of wishful thinking as she bent down further. Cupping water into her hands, she splashed it onto her face. After thoroughly wiping her face down, she stood up and yawned.

“I can go on for a while more, but I also am going to need to sleep soon~!”

Kurushimi stretched, closing her eyes before turning back to the path. Her grip strengthened on her katana.

“Let’s go then!”

Kurushimi smiled energetically, motivated and ready to slaughter the canisfangs.

. . .

Kurushimi stood at the divide. The path went left and right respectively, both looking identical to one another. The trees appeared to be denser, making the ends of the paths hard to see. Even with farsight, you wouldn’t be able to see where the individual paths lead.

Normally this would mean that you would have to choose a random direction.Kurushimi approached the left path. Having been down here before, she wouldn’t have to blindly choose a direction to head in. Kurushimi knew that there should be about 5 canisfangs hanging out around there.

It was likely that they were using the path as hunting grounds. Waiting in the shadows to catch anything or anyone that they could sink their fangs into. Though, it was possible that there could be more canisfangs or the canisfangs may not even be there anymore.

But if that were the case, Kurushimi felt that she could handle a few more canisfangs. However many they had, there couldn’t be nearly as much as there were on the right path.

“Hm?”

Kurushimi came to an abrupt stop. In the poorly lit surroundings, she could make out some kind of liquid on the ground. Approaching it, Kurushimi looked down to observe what it was. In front of her was a trail of blood. Kurushimi furrowed her brows.

“Voice-san. This wasn’t here last time, right?”

“No, it wasn’t.”

“I wonder if the canisfangs caught something…”

Consulting Voice-san, Kurushimi confirmed the blood was in fact new. Kurushimi guessed that perhaps something had been killed by the canisfangs in the time she hadn’t come here. Perhaps what was supposed to be her, ended up being some other poor creature.

Kurushimi continued forth. The trail of blood ran along the path, as the creature had been dragged, thrown or something else. As the trail got thicker, Kurushimi eventually reached the source.

A canisfang laid dead on the floor. Its side was mangled, its gut spilled out across the ground.

“Uwah, nasty…”

“The way you normally kill them is much worse.”

“Shut up.”

Kurushimi walked around the canisfang after dismissing Voice-san’s comment. The ground around its back looked caved in from some kind of impact. Looking back, Kurushimi saw scraping and marks laden across the dirt by the blood trail.

“Looks like… It was thrown? What could have done that then?”