After trying my best to make sure that I wasn’t being followed by that fox, even though I’m sure it can follow me without me knowing a thing, I began making my way to the west side of the lake changing my direction from the east to try and throw off the fox just in case it was following me.

The west side was where the monsters were stronger than on the east side for some reason.

I walk relatively close to the border of the lake because I don’t want to get in to fight anywhere near the territory of that fox.

And since that fox is dominating the northern area I vowed not to go back until I was at a level where I could fight him, even though he said to come for a visit, it's hard to relax while being in front of something that can kill you before you even realize. Looking at the sun, I think it’s around noon, so I’ll spend the rest of the day hunting, and hopefully, I’ll become a high tier hobgoblin, then that will hopefully end my eventful time in this forest and I can go home.

Velora can you bring up my status, please.

[Understood.]

{Name - Rick}

{Age - 20}

{Race - Hobgoblin (Mid)}

{Level - 74 (1890/1920)}

{Health - 73/73}

{Mana - 37/37}

{Strength - 55}

{Agility - 50}

{Intelligence - 47}

{Endurance - 52}

{Stat Points - 15}

{Skills}

{Velora (Unique)}

{Dash (common) (5 Mana)}

{Solidify (common) (10 Mana)}

Over the course of this week, my status has changed greatly, and with all that change came a lot of information with it, and with Veldora here to help me figure things out, I now have a much better understanding of how this leveling up thing works.

First of all the level of experience points required to advance a level goes up by exactly thirty points for each level, but while the experience required only goes up by a seemingly small amount the experience earned or received from killing monsters gets fractionally lower with each level increase.

Currently, it hasn't affected me too much but there will soon come a point where killing normal monsters will mean absolutely nothing regardless of how many I kill.

I also realized that every single one of my stats including health and mana would go up by one point with each level.

And upon reaching a mid-tier hobgoblin at level fifty they received an extra five points on top.

Though becoming a mid-tier hobgoblin can’t be considered an evolution since it doesn’t require me to be unconscious, and my appearance doesn’t really change much, it definitely can’t be compared to my previous self as a low tier hobgoblin.

Another reason for that being the fact I gained a skill called solidify once I made it to mid-tier. Once solidify is activated it will use the required mana to harden my entire body for a period of ten seconds, which is by no means a short time.

And since there isn’t any sort of cooldown on the skill, I could keep it active as long as I had the required amount of mana.

Speaking of mana, it wasn’t until I became a mid-tier that my mana absorption rate finally went up from one mana unit per hour to three mana units per hour. While that's still extremely slow, just having anything higher than one unit is still a million times better.

And after these level-ups and even becoming a mid-tier hobgoblin I have fifteen stat points that I’ve yet to distribute, the reason for that?

I just like knowing I have points to use whenever I want, especially since they're hard to come by.

Since being level thirty-five I’ve only gotten fifteen of them and five of them came once I hit mid-tier. Neither Velora nor I know what exactly causes me to get skill points, so I’ve been a bit reluctant to use them randomly. If possible I think I’ll hold them till I get home.

Throughout this week it wasn’t just me that changed either, even Velora went through some sort of growth.

Her discern skill can now reveal more information than it could initially, except when it comes to things extremely stronger than me like that fox. Forget that fox though, I’ll surpass him soon enough on the way to goblin supremacy.

Anyway, Velora can now also sense when I’m close to reaching my next tier or evolution, so while she doesn’t know the exact level I need to reach, once I get within two or three levels close she is able to tell.

She started telling me I was close at level seventy-two, which is why I think I'll become a high-tier hobgoblin at level seventy-five which is just a measly thirty experience points away. I can almost taste it.

Well, I’ll get there soon enough, the last thing and probably the most important thing Velora can do now is sense an area of forty-five feet in any direction with me as the center, she can't accurately tell what the creature is but she can definitely know if something is in the vicinity or not.

Seeing as though she didn’t sense that fox, or whatever is apparently sleeping in the lake, I can’t solely depend on it. Maybe there are even beings that practice stealth and are below my level of strength that can bypass Velora’s sense. Now that I’ve finally made it to the west side, let's hurry and hunt the first thing I find and everything after that until I become a high tier!

It was after carefully advancing for around five minutes that Velora finally picked on something.

[Stop, there's something close by, and it doesn’t seem to be moving, advance carefully.]

Okay, that experience ain't gonna hunt itself so let's go. So after slowly walking forward for about ten feet I finally spot the monster Velora mentioned. She then instantly uses discern.

{Name - None}

{Age - 4}

{Race - War Hog}

{Level - 55}

{Health - 60/60}

{Mana - 15/15}

{Strength - 60}

{Agility - 20}

{Intelligence - 15}

{Endurance - 25}

So it’s a war hog huh, looks just like a warthog from back home except it's huge, all black and has three massive horns on its head almost like a triceratops.

Killing this should be enough to push me into level seventy-five. Considering that the only real threat this hog poses is its mana unfused charge, it should be a smooth kill, lets do it.