Chapter XI

Alex had just entered the forest and was cautiously observing his surroundings as he proceeded forward. He had an excited grin on his face as he advanced. 'I can't believe this day is finally here! I just need to get an early-stage beginner rank profound beast or monster's Qi core. Once I do, I'll be able to read about all the sects and schools in the kingdom. Then I can choose one of them to join. I can't wait!!' As he was moving forward and thinking, nothing out of the ordinary occurred.

He stopped moving for a moment and thought, 'It's only been a few minutes, but still...Well, guess I should just look around the outskirts of the forest first. I'll go around a few times. If I don't find anything...' He shook his head and started to walk along the edge of the forest.

The Nilyl Forest was a small forest located to the south of the town of Solaris. Its total size was about 8km by 4km. Thus, in only a couple of hours, Alex had already circled around the outskirts of the forest three times. He came to a stop, looked down at the ground and released a disgruntled sigh. 'Seriously?...I've circled around a few times now and haven't found a single profound beast or monster...Just a few critters...'

He raised his head and gazed into the deeper parts of the forest. As he did so, a frown surfaced on his face. 'Guess I need to go further in...' As he finished his thoughts, he rubbed the back of his neck and muttered under his breath, “Just hope my luck holds up...”

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While Alex proceeded deeper into the forest, a figure was hiding in some distant foliage watching him. A woman's familiar aggravated voice was barely audible. “That foolish boy! I specifically told him not to enter the deeper parts of the forest!...” Following an exasperated sigh, she continued to say, “Just what is he thinking!? He should know how dangerous the forest is for him. Has he forgotten the state that Kaesan and I found him in!?” Shortly after her rant, Laylah stealthily followed after Alex.

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An hour had gone by while Alex traversed deeper into the forest. Along his way, he had still yet to see any profound beasts or monsters. As he was walking forward, he suddenly heard a noise. Pausing in his steps, he immediately gripped the hilt of his sword as he surveyed his surroundings with utmost diligence.

Straining his senses, he wasn't able to find anything out of the ordinary. Just as he was about to relax, a couple of chimes rang out startling him.

*Ting*

Congratulations! You have unlocked a new stat [Perception]

*Ting*

You have gained 2 perception (+2 PER)

'Holy crap! That almost gave me a heart attack.' As he thought this, he wiped some cold sweat from his forehead. He looked at his hand that was on the hilt of his sword and wryly smiled. He was gripping it so hard that his knuckles had turned white. 'I need to calm down...' He let go of the hilt and stretched his hand somewhat. 'A new stat though huh?...Perception, if it does what I think it does...Help Perception.' Heeding his mental call, a status window appeared.

Perception (PER) – your ability to notice or become aware of something through your senses. Increasing Perception will allow you to more easily detect/perceive hidden entities.

'So it's just like I thought. That's good. If I can manage to increase that enough, the effects it would have on me would probably be enormous.' A small smile emerged on his face at that thought. He dismissed the windows and continued to move forward. As he did so, he remained vigilant. 'Wonder what made that noise...I can't believe I haven't found a single profound beast or monster yet...What's up with that?' He continued to advance deeper into the forest.

Another hour passed while he trekked along. As he did so, he would continuously scan his surroundings. He was starting to feel dejected. All this time and he had yet to find a profound beast or monster. According to what he knows, the forest should have a decent amount of beginner or novice rank profound beasts and monsters running around.

Just as he was thinking that perhaps he would never find one, he stumbled upon a glade. The moment he noticed it, he hid behind some foliage and carefully observed it. At first sight, he couldn't see anything off about the glade. There were only a few small boulders scattered here and there among the tall grass. But the grass near the boulders was short, as if it couldn't grow any taller. However, right as he was about to step out from behind his hiding place he saw movement in the corner of his eye. The moment he looked to the area where he thought he saw movement, he didn't see anything.

Still hiding behind some foliage, he waited. After about a minute of keeping his eyes on that one spot, he finally discovered what the source of movement was. A brown wolf with grey stripes was hiding among the tall grass and slowly prowling its way forward. Glancing in the direction it was moving in, Alex only saw a few boulders.

'That's a Listra Vikas! Brown with...how many stripes is that?...Six? According to what mom said, based on its color and number of stripes...This one should be a mid-stage beginner rank?...Just what is it doing?' As he thought this, he kept watching the actions of the wolf. Slowly but steadily it drew nearer and nearer to those boulders. When it was about six meters away, Alex noticed that there were patches of grass on the surrounding sides of the boulder that were also moving. Straining his eyes, he was just barely able to see the shape of a wolf in those spots. 'Holy crap, there's more than one.'

He continued to curiously watch just what these wolves were up to. After five minutes of waiting, all of the wolves were within two meters of the largest boulder. 'What's so special about that boulder?' Alex focused on the boulder but couldn't find anything out of the ordinary. The wolves moved closer and were now one meter away. At this point, they all stopped moving.

Then abruptly, as if on a signal, a total of four wolves leapt from the grass towards the boulder with fangs and claws poised to strike. 'They're attacking the boulder? Are they st-' He stopped his thoughts mid-way when he saw a glint of light flash by in the air near one of the wolves. The wolf it was near, was suddenly bisected across the middle of its body. The front section continued to travel through the air and smash into the boulder. While its hind section fell short. When it crashed to the ground blood and viscera spilled forth where it landed, creating a gory scene.

The three other wolves landed near the boulder and swiftly turned to face the direction that their comrade had leapt from. They growled and bared their fangs. 'What's going on!? What happened to that wolf!?' Alex frantically thought. It happened so fast, he didn't even see what caused the wolf to be killed. There was just a glint of light and then the wolf was dead.

Keeping his eyes on what was unfolding, he couldn't help but draw in a breath of cold air. Walking towards the wolves from the tall grass was something akin to a mountain lion. However, this one looked more menacing. Its body was hulking and at least two meters long. Its tail was a little longer than its body. Attached to the tail's surface, almost as if it was growing from it, was an extremely sharp looking blade.

When he saw this mountain lion-like creature, Alex could only exclaim in his mind, 'Shit! Is that a Pala Lew!? According to mom, that thing should be around the early or mid-stage novice rank...' As he thought this, the three remaining wolves jumped into action. They charged towards the Pala Lew. One of the wolves went straight for its neck, intending to bite it. The Pala Lew dodged the attempt and swatted the wolf away with it's claws, slashing its body in the process.

Of the other two wolves, one attempted to bite a chunk out of the Pala Lew's left hind leg, while the other tried to rip a chunk out of its body with its teeth. When the Pala Lew noticed what they were trying to do, it roared in anger and flung its tail out. The wolf that went for the leg dodged the tail but was forced back. The other wolf managed to grab hold of the Pala Lew's body with its teeth.

Where the wolf had grabbed onto was an awkward spot for the Pala Lew. It couldn't reach the wolf with its tail or claws. Spotting an opening, the other two wolves rushed towards the Pala Lew and tried to take bites out of it. But the moment they got close, the Pala Lew furiously retaliated. Its claw managed to slash one of the wolve's snouts off. As it made noises in pain, the Pala Lew swung its body around and managed to cleave off the wolf's head with its tail's blade.

But this came at a cost. When it maneuvered its body to swing its tail, the other wolf managed to rip out a lump of flesh from one of its front legs. The wolf that was hanging from the Pala Lew's back managed to claw deep wounds into its flesh. Blood was flowing off its body. The wolf was fiercely digging away with its claws on the Pala Lew's back. Roaring in pain, the Pala Lew dashed towards the boulder and threw its body into it, back first.

The wolf was smashed against the boulder and yelped in pain. The moment it fell off of its body, the Pala Lew savagely smashed down with its paws. A sicking crunch rang out as it used its body weight to crush the wolf's skull.

The last remaining wolf upon witnessing the deaths of its comrades lifted its head to the sky and let loose an anguished howl. The howl echoed out in the forest before it was cut short. The Pala Lew rushed over and slashed the wolf's neck with its claws, ending its grief stricken cry.

Alex watched all of this happen. The moment the final wolf fell, he couldn't stop himself from trembling. 'That Pala Lew is dangerous...I need to get out of here.' As he finished his thoughts, his eyes were still on the Pala Lew. As if sensing his gaze, it turned its head and glared in his area. 'N-no way.' Right as he was contemplating turning tail and sprinting away, countless howls filled the air.

When the Pala Lew heard them, it quickly scanned the area and turned around. It darted into the forest at the opposite end from where Alex was. He was breathing heavily as he thought, 'Holy shit! That was close!' He clenched his chest with his hand. He could hear his pulse beating in his ears. 'Calm down...If I'm going to be a cultivator, I need to be able to handle this much!' He frowned as he heard more wolf howls.

Alex glanced over towards the corpses of the wolves. 'Four beginner rank cores...From the looks of that battle, they had to be anywhere from mid to late-stage...If I could get one...' Interrupting his thoughts was an earsplitting howl that sounded awfully close to him. 'Shit! Forget it! It's not worth dying over!' He quickly swung his body around and jogged back the way he came.

As he was moving through the forest at a steady pace, he thought to himself, 'From the sounds of things, there has to be a lot of wolves converging towards that glade. If I had stayed, that would have been the same thing as suicide.' He turned his head around as he ran, glancing back towards the direction of the glade. He was still able to hear the howls.

'Alright, I'll go just a little further and wait. Maybe those wolves will move on and chase down that Pala Lew. If I'm lucky, the corpses of those other wolves will still be there and I can dig out their Qi cores. Okay! That's the plan th-' Before he could finish his thoughts, he abruptly had an extremely dreadful feeling and snapped his head back towards the front. When his eyes landed on what was up ahead of him, he felt a slight dismay rise from his heart. He abruptly slid to a halt as a cold sweat started to drench his back.

*Ting*

You have gained 1 Perception (+1 PER)

'NOT THE TIME FOR THAT!!' He yelled in his mind as he dismissed the window. Standing in front of him was a brown wolf with multiple grey stripes. It looked at Alex with a chilling glare, in the way a predator looks at its prey. Alex tried to remain calm and analyze its body. 'Oh shit! Not good...This wolf has nine stripes! Beginner rank, level 9...That's the late-stage...Shit!'

He scanned the area with his eyes, not daring to move his body. 'This seems to be the only wolf around...I don't know if I can handle it...Mom specifically told me to get an early-stage beginner rank Qi Core...So I should be comparable to a early-stage beginner right? Do I have a chance against this wolf!?' A cold sweat slid down the side of his face as he weighed his options.

As his eyes darted about looking for a path of escape, his breathing had become heavy. His hands were trembling. The wolf remained motionless as it stared him down. After a few moments of looking around, he stopped. His eyes focused on the wolf. Sighing mentally, he thought to himself, 'Just what the hell am I doing?...I want to be strong? I want to be a cultivator?...I was looking for a way to escape! How is that being strong!?' His breathing started to return to normal as his hands stopped shaking.

'I will not run!..I will fight or I will die!! There are no other options!' A firm flame of resolution appeared within Alex's eyes as he glared back at the wolf. As he did so, a chime rang out. However, the moment a status window appeared, he thought, 'Not now!' As soon as he thought it, the window minimized off to the side of his view.

As he stared down the wolf, neither of them moved. 'This'll be rough, but there's no other way!...My stats aren't that high, I don't know if I can fight it head to head...Hmm, but there is that...I've yet to actually try it against an opponent...It's worth a shot.' As he thought this, he remembered back to the night in his room when he accidentally activated The Raindrop Sword and his body moved on its own accord.

This standstill between him and the wolf lasted a little over a minute. It finally came to an end once the wolf slowly took a step forward. It started to approach him. The wolf seemed very calm and leisurely as it did so. As if it viewed him as no more than another meal. “Hmph!” Alex snorted as he hastily drew his short-sword from its scabbard and assumed the first stance of The Raindrop Sword.

Although the wolf watched him draw his weapon, it did not react. It continued to approach him. Looking imposing and menacing as it did so. 'This wolf thinks I'm easy prey huh? Fine! I'll make you work for your food!' When he entered into the first stance, he actually activated his skill, The Raindrop Sword Style. 'Let's see what happens! Emit Killing Intent!' He narrowed his eyes at the wolf.

The wolf picked up its pace as it advanced towards Alex unimpaired. 'Okay, so that had no effect...' While he thought this, the wolf was only four meters away. He focused his everything onto the wolf while it charged at him. 'Three meters...Almost here...Two meters...' When the wolf reached one meter, it lunged towards Alex with its fangs bared as it attempted to bite and claw him.

Just as the wolf was about to make contact with him, he sidestepped with haste, narrowly avoiding an injury. The wolf's claws came dangerously close, leaving five tears in his shirt. 'Dangerous!' He immediately thought. Had he been a single moment slower, his shirt wouldn't have been the only thing ripped apart.

As the wolf landed, it rapidly turned around to face Alex and once more pounced towards him. This time, instead of dodging, he raised his blade in an attempt to parry the wolf's claws. The loud sound of something being scraped against metal rang out in the forest as the claws clashed with the blade, creating small sparks. After its attack was parried, the wolf was slightly off-balance. Alex used this chance to swing his blade with all the strength he could muster.

The blade came down towards the wolf's shoulder. Sensing immediate danger, the wolf leapt backwards with utmost urgency. However, it wasn't able to get away scot-free. A shallow cut was left on its right shoulder with a small amount of blood staining its fur.

When Alex noticed the wound he managed to inflict, a jubilant grin spread on his face. 'Haha, I managed to injure it! It's only a small cut, but still...I should be able to kill it!' As he thought this, the wolf started to snarl and growl, clearly enraged at being wounded by what it considered to be prey. Furious, the wolf charged once more at Alex.

Instead of lunging forward with an attack, the wolf began to circle Alex. Seeing the wolf's actions, he entered back into the first stance of The Raindrop Sword and waited for an attack to come his way. The wolf glared at him while it continued moving around him.

After a couple minutes of circling, the wolf dashed towards him with a cold light in its eyes. Once it was within range of him, the wolf lashed out with the claws on its right paw aiming for Alex's legs. The moment that the claws came close to him, he swiftly reacted. He swung his blade downwards intending to parry them.

The short-sword was met with nothing but air. As his blade encountered no resistance, he widened his eyes while he let out a surprised gasp. Just as he realized the wolf's absence, he heard a chilling snarl come from his left side. He only had time to move his eyes towards the direction of the noise before a sharp pain assaulted him as he stumbled backwards and almost fell over.

Tightly gripping the hilt of his short-sword in his right hand, he cursed to himself mentally. 'Shit! That hurts!!' He grimaced as he hastily viewed his left arm. On his forearm laid four grisly gashes. The arm of his shirt was quickly being dyed red as warm blood trickled down to his hand and dripped to the forest floor.

He turned his eyes to the wolf that hadn't pursued to attack. Perhaps it was Alex's imagination, but he could swear that the wolf was grinning as if it was gloating at having inflicted a larger injury on him than he had been able to do to it. Frowning, he flexed his left hand to make sure he could still use it and then gripped the hilt of his sword while ignoring the onslaught of pain.

Lifting his sword and entering into the first stance of The Raindrop Sword once more, he chided himself mentally. 'Foolish! I never should have believed that this wolf was a simple beast. It clearly has some intelligence to perform a feint like that...No matter what, I will defeat this wolf!' A fierce fire of determination ignited in the depths of his eyes as he glared at the wolf.

As if sensing this, the wolf growled and sprinted towards him. The instant it arrived in front of him, it thrashed its claws out towards his chest. A loud clanging rang out as he met the claws with his short-sword. Enraged at having met resistance, the wolf started to launch a barrage of attacks towards Alex.

Suddenly encountering so many attacks Alex became somewhat flustered. He managed to block most of the strikes and was continuously knocked back from their force. However, the wolf did not relent. It pushed the attack and struck with reckless abandon.

As the strikes did not let up and even increased in ferocity, Alex started to become frantic. At first he was able to block or parry most of the attacks. But as they increased in number and savageness he started to have trouble. Being continuously pushed back, he was just barely able to parry and dodge the attacks by a hair's breadth.

He received the wolf's attacks for what felt like an eternity. While his face was drenched in a cold sweat, his thoughts had started to become hectic. 'Crap, crap, crap!! What do I do!? I can't keep going like this! I don't think I'll be able to last much longer...My arms are starting to feel numb...' As his thoughts raced, he was scouring the wolf's entire body with his eyes.

Another strike from the wolf's claws was barely parried by Alex's sword. This strike was heavier than the rest and caused him to take two steps back. Then the wolf lunged forward with its mouth wide, trying to bite him. It only received a mouthful of air and some of his shirt as he dodged to the side by a hair's breadth. The moment he skirted to the side, he immediately jumped backwards in an attempt to put a little more distance between him and the wolf.

The wolf was aware of this but did not pursue. It slowly turned to face him. Growling, it spit out the remnants of his shirt in its mouth and stood in place. Panting heavily and sweating profusely, Alex's thoughts were still running wild as he stared at the wolf. 'What do I do!?...There has to be something!!' As the wolf had been attacking him, he strained himself to the utmost defending against the attacks.

Alex was in a very haggard state as he searched for a way to defeat the wolf. His clothes were torn and drenched in sweat. The left arm of his shirt had been dyed red from his wound. All of the color in his face had left long ago. He felt his eyelids becoming heavy. Hastily shaking his head, he frowned. 'Shit! I need to finish this and take care of my injury!! I've started to lose way too much blood!'

After what felt like an eternity to him, he managed to come to a realization. 'That's it!' Widening his eyes, he grinned and started to chuckle to himself. 'How stupid am I!?...That wolf is exhausted too! That must be why it's not pursuing me right now...I can do this! I can win! The way I originally thought was wrong!' He lowered his sword, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The wolf was perplexed as it witnessed him do this. It raised its guard and was vigilant as it glared at him.

However, it dared not make a move. Prudence could be seen in the wolf's gaze as it glared at him. It was bewildered. Why had this human boy suddenly lowered his weapon and closed his eyes? The wolf couldn't understand it. Just moments ago it had been able to easily wound the boy. Then, stimulated by the smell of fresh blood, it had unleashed a relentless torrent of attacks.

Yet no matter what it tried, it was incapable of inflicting another injury to the human. At first he could barely manage to block or avoid its attacks. Though as time went on, the boy seemed to improve at an astonishing rate and was actually able to evade any further injuries. The wolf felt that something wasn't right. Thus, it choose to err on the side of caution and catch its breath for a moment as it observed the human boy.

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