A lone rat scurry across the ground before suddenly came to a stop, perking its ears as it scanning it surrounding.

The ground beneath erupt sands flying everywhere as a scorpion, its sandy-colored exoskeleton stained with blood, it grab the rat with its claws, trapping the rodent from escaping.

The scorpion’s tail shot forward, its stinger pierce through the rat’s flesh and skins, and injecting its toxic in the struggling rodent.

The rat spasm for several minutes as the toxic spread throughout its body before it stop and went completely limp.

Congrats, you have slain [Sand Rat - Lv. 6]

You Have Leveled Up! [Common Lesser Sand Scorpion - Lv. 6 —> Lv. 7!]

[Poison Sting - Lv. 7] Leveled Up

[Burrow - Lv. 9] Leveled Up

[Burrow] has achieved the max level. Please choose your desired path for the skill to take.

Path of the Mole: Allow you to sense through the earth itself.

Path of the Digger: Allow you to dig twice as fast.

Hans tosses the dead body of the rat to the ground and stares at the notifications with curiosity. Paths? What the hell was SYSTEM talking about?

“Hey SYSTEM, what are paths?” He asked as he read through the two options that were available to him while simultaneously hoping that they would answer the question.

Paths are the choices that you that make that influence how the skills evolve. The paths that you can choose will sometimes be influenced by how you use said skills.

”I see…” Hans was happy with the fact that the SYSTEM answered the question, he then look over the two options he had once again and quickly made his choice.

He chose the Path of the Mole. In his eyes, this was the most useful of the two as it help him detect dangers both under and above grounds. Path of the Digger just increase his digging speed and [Burrow] already did that.

The notifications disappear and Hans felt something in him surge, filling him with energy before it disappears as well.

Congrats, [Burrow - Lv. MAX] has become [Mole’s Senses - Lv. 1]!

[Mole’s Senses - Lv. 1] - Allow one to sense through the earth itself and increase digging speed.

The moment that the surge in energy in him disappeared, Hans felt his senses expand. The pit-pat of a ray scurry around, a snake slithering, etc, they all produce vibrations and he could feel them. The vibrations were faint and He could barely feel them, but he could feel them. His overall range was around three meters and it increase slightly if he concentrated.

Overall, he was once again pleased with his choice.

“Well, time to go to sleep, wouldn’t want to deal with the hordes of monsters appear once it's nighttime,” Hans said, looking up at the sky, the sun was setting and two moons began to take its place.

It was a surprise for him when he first saw the two moons but now after…How long has it been? Three days? Five days? Five days, it had been five days since he been in this world.

Fuck, he was seriously losing his sense of his time the longer he was here.

At least the moons was pretty to look at.

He stares at the moons for a moment, admiring their pretty before he was interrupted by a bark and some growling. Alarmed, Hans turns toward the noise, stinger ready, expecting danger only to see what seem to be a juvenile jackal growling and barking at him.

“The hell do you want?” He questions.

The jackal flinches, it’s eyes looking before continuing barking at him. Hans turn to see what it was looking and saw the dead rat he had recently killed. He turned back to the jackal and pointed at the dead rat.

“You want the rat, huh?” He said, he grab the deceased rat and threw it at the jackal. “Go on, take it, I want that. I’m not even hungry.”

The jackal glance at him nervously before grabbing the rat and ran.

Hans watched as the jackal disappear out of view before muttering, “At least it letting sonic booms whenever it opens its mouth.” Before crawling back to the hole he made.

On his way back home, Hans hunted some worms that only had one giant hole that was lined with sharp teeth that he dub “Sand Worm.”

He knows that the name was lazy but he didn’t care.

When he nearly arrived back to his home, Hans felt that something was wrong. For one, he could feel a large amount of vibration in the direction of his home and two, he could see the head of a snake poking out the hole that he made as his home.

The snake’ head had dark scales, their pupils were slit, the rest of it was hidden by the darkness.

Most importantly, the fucker was in his fucking house! Granted, it was just a hole in ground but he was the one that dig the dang hole!

“I gonna kill that fucker and turn it into a snakeskin boot,” Hans growls, glaring at the said snake. He burrow underground, following the vibration until the vibrations was at its largest.

Hans open and closes his claws and began digging the dart above, weakening the earth above before he erupt out of ground with the intent to kill.

This surprise the snake and causing it face him, jaws open wide, hissing loudly. Hans managed to grab the snake’s body, holding it in place and preventing it from escaping. He aim his other claw at the snake and snap at its snake’s head, missing.

His stinger was unable to pierce through the snake’s scales, making it useless and leaving him with only one opinion.

Crush the thing into a bloody paste with his claws.

Hans began to tighten his grip on the snake, causing it to thrashing out of pain. This causes him to weaken his grip a bit and it was all it needed with it wrenching itself free and proceeded to whip him with its tail.

He was sent flying out of the hole and slamming to the ground. The scorpion to grunt in pain as the snake slither out of the hole, hissing.

It rear its head, and its mouth began to bulge and the snake spat out a glob of acid at him. It slightly grazed him but ultimately miss.

Hans hiss in pain as the part his exoskeleton melted of, the glob of acid sizzle and began melting the ground below. He glance at his claw before looking at the snake, warily.

“Of course you can spit out acid,” He growls. “I am gonna make your death painful.”

Hans burrow into the ground as another glob of acid flew over his head and disappear. The snake look around warily, readying a glob of acid.

The ground next to it cracks and Hans explode out of the ground, straight at the its head ready to crush its head.

The snake let loose the glob of acid, Hans raise his left claw to block. The acid melt the entire claw of, causing him having to prevent himself from crying out in pain as victory was near.

His other claw clamp down on the snake’s head and began squeezing it. The snake start thrashing in pain and try to whip him with its tail, he bit the tail with his mandible after getting smack in the head a couple of times and hold the tail in place.

He then move his stinger at the snake’s soft underbelly and inject his toxic. Nothing happen and so Hans stab the snake’s underbelly multiple times, injecting more and more toxins into the reptile’s body.

Hans felt the snake spasming and growing weaker every minute that pass, the snake began to compress as his claw start to crush its skull.

Blood and brain bits suddenly spatter all over his face as the snake drop dead.

Snake’s head was completely crushed and all that was left of its head was a bloody paste. Punctured wounds litter all over the snake’s underbelly leaking blood and venom.

You have gained the skill [Acid Resistance - Lv. 1]!

[Acid Resistance - Lv. 1] Leveled Up!

[Acid Resistance - Lv. 2] Leveled Up!

[Acid Resistance - Lv. 3] Leveled Up!

Acid Resistance - Lv. 4] Leveled Up

[Acid Resistance - Lv. 5] - Increase resistance to acid.

You haves gained the skill [Crush - Lv. 1]

[Crush - Lv. 1] - Allowed to strengthen you body parts to crush rocks, bones and even boulders.

[Poison Sting - Lv. 8] Leveled Up!

[Poison Sting - Lv. 9] Leveled Up!

[Poison Sting] has achieved max level. Please choose your desired path for the skill to take.

Path of the Venomous: Increase the potent of your venom]

Path of Blade: Transform stinger into a large sharp blade but lower the potent of your venom.

[Grapple - Lv. 5] Leveled Up!

[Grapple - Lv. 6] Leveled Up!

Congrats, you have slain [Acid Spitter - Lv. 12]! You have Leveled Up! [Common Lesser Sand Scorpion - Lv. 7 —> 8 —> 9 —> 10!].

You have obtained max level, please choose a path.

Path of the Goliath: Increase size, strength, and the hardness of your exoskeleton.

Path of the Ambusher: Increase stealth, increase the chances of you sensing danger and increase the potent of your venom.

Hans look at the notifications and found himself grinning.

After some considering for some time, he chose Path of the Blade as it gave him another weapons and while it weaken his venom, he would have his venom.

Then he without hesitation chose Path of the Ambusher as it suited the way he hunt.

Hans felt a surge of energy going through his body once again going through his body.

Then, light enveloped him.