Dante took a step back out of instinct, but as his foot landed on an uneven patch of grass, it slipped just enough to make him stumble. His arms waved in the air as he fell, and the boar took that opportunity to bite at his right arm.

Fear swallowed his mind as the boar clenched its jaw down onto his forearm. Dante forgot about everything else, his mind racing for a way to save his arm. Then his half-broken Hidden Blade technique, which was floating between them, expanded to twice its size in under a second before it exploded into a wave of force that caught him square in the chest.

At that very same instant that he was launched into the air, the boar’s teeth sunk into the flesh of his forearm, tearing it away with a sickeningly wet squelch. The boar let out a low, rumbling grunt as the explosion pushed it back, but Dante barely heard it over the wind surging past his ears and the pain swallowing his mind.

As he sailed through the air, screaming in pain, Dante managed to correct his flight so that he soared through the air on his side. When he finally landed, it was with a painful thump on his uninjured arm, leaving him to bounce and roll across the grassy clearing before coming to a stop with the help of a different tree.

Dante scrambled to his feet despite his body’s protests and pulled out a head-sized clump of soul force in less than a second. The rapid extraction of his power gave him a splitting headache behind his eyes, but he gritted his teeth and began to shape the Hidden Blade as quickly as he could. The boar wouldn’t wait for him to be ready.

Even though he did everything right, his proficiency with the Hidden Blade technique wasn’t high enough. The boar was upon him before he could finish shaping the edge of the blade, its massive teeth bearing down on him once again. Feeling the blood streaming down his right arm, the pain making it almost impossible to maintain his focus, Dante felt another surge of fear that he barely managed to squash to keep a hold onto his energy.

With his heart in his throat, Dante fell out of the way more than he dodged, his head narrowly avoiding the teeth of the boar as they crunched down. But the boar didn’t bite down on the air. The boar’s teeth groaned as the half-formed Hidden Blade exploded inside its mouth, some of them even shattering from the point-blank explosion.

A wave of pressure splashed across Dante’s body like before, but unlike the first time he was only pushed a few metres back.

Feeling a sharp pain in his ribs as he sat up, Dante watched the boar jump around and squeal in pain from the shards of soul force embedded into its mouth and face. Blood splashed onto the grass all around him as the boar panicked and charged into a tree, bursting some of the shards and making its wounds larger.

Seeing the shards exploding inside its flesh gave him an idea.

Dante couldn’t see what was happening inside the boar’s mouth, but he could feel the tiny, solid shards of the Hidden Blade in his mind. He hadn’t been rattled enough to lose control, so the already half-formed technique remained in its maw as shards, almost like shrapnel from a sword.

With a flex of his will, the shards dispersed as one inside its mouth and face. A visible ripple in the air spread out from the creature as its wounds were torn open, and a wave of bloody mist spread in the clearing as the sheer force evaporated a small amount of the red liquid. The enraged creature spun around in circles before it squealed and charged into another tree, toppling it over with little effort. Blood poured out of its neck and face, and the drool running out of its mouth was more blood than saliva.

Dante jumped around the tree as the boar continued its rampage, hiding from its line of sight. He slowly formed another Hidden Blade, turning his headache into a crippling migraine. If the boar found him now, he would definitely be too distracted to dodge again.

Luckily for him, it seemed pretty unintelligent to begin with, its flaring anger only making it more stupid.

Dante was thanking his luck as he followed the stupid beast from behind. Despite the migraine distracting him, he managed to hide from the beast for several minutes as it rampaged. He could have easily stabbed it in the stomach as it rose on its hind legs again and again, but the thing was a walking tank. It had five gashes in its neck the size of his forearm – which was still bleeding through a crudely wrapped bandage made from a torn-off piece of his shirt – and still hadn’t died from blood loss. Its neck was practically a fountain, leaving a solid trail of dark red in its wake.

Then it happened. The boar opened its mouth and let out an enraged wail, turned to the closest bush in its vicinity, then bit down on the poor leafy bastard. But as its teeth sunk into the unsuspecting shrub, it also bit down on a Hidden Blade which he had arranged minutes before. A glass-like crunch echoed off the nearby trees as more of its teeth shattered, leaving it to roar with even greater rage as Dante shoved the fragments down its throat.

He couldn’t usually manipulate so many different shards, but this scenario allowed him to barely manage it. That was because he didn’t have to do any precise manipulations or split up his attention to accommodate multiple independent manoeuvres. All of the shards were cloaked in one cloud of his soul force, just like the undamaged Hidden Blade.

That made it impossible to do many things since the shards were no different than being suspended inside of a liquid, floating randomly as he moved the cloak itself, but none of that mattered while it was inside the boar itself.

With a flex of his will, the shards moved as one inside the stomach and mouth of the boar. The enraged creature spun around in circles as spewed blood, the tiny flakes spinning like a hurricane as it cut up the boar. The outside of the beast was tougher than the steel plating on a tank, but the insides were softer than butter.

After many minutes of the boar rampaging, smashing down trees and tearing lines into the ground with its tusks, it let out a muffled groan and fell to the floor. Its insides were practically mush by this point, almost all its internal organs sliced into mince, but that just showed how potent its vitality was.

Then Dante spewed his own mouthful of blood and passed out, letting the shards of soul force disperse inside the boar.

***

Dante tried to open his eyes, only to fail as he groaned. His head throbbed with each and every beat of his heart, and his face was covered in his own dried blood. That was a symptom of using too much soul force. The blood vessels in his head and face would burst from the strain, causing his eyes, ears, and nose to bleed profusely.

Sitting up with a groan, Dante felt that his ribs were bruised and probably broken if it hurt that much. Just sitting up was like having a knife slid in between his ribcage, making him suck in a cold breath of air.

“You did it!” Laurelai shouted, crashing into his chest and giving him the tiniest hug in the world. “I thought you were dead the first time you were launched into a tree! Did you hear me gasp? I was so worried you wouldn’t get back up!”

Dante winced at her flying into his chest, the impact jolting his injuries. “Ah, watch the ribs. I think they’re broken. Bruised if I’m lucky.”

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to!” Laurelai muttered, a blush rising on her cheeks. “That wasn’t appropriate between business associates, was it? I’ll try to keep it more professional in the future.”

“No, it’s fine,” Dante laughed, wincing at the pain in his chest. His entire body was bruised and battered, and his mind wasn’t that well off either. Having his technique shattered, then forcing himself to hold the broken technique was hell on his mind. It felt like someone had punched him in the back of the head when he had a sinus and an ear infection. “I’m pretty sure normal business associates don’t teach each other magic techniques and coach them on how to win deathmatches.”

“Well…” Laurelai muttered, averting her gaze.

“They do that on other worlds?”

“When you’re stuck in a bottleneck or run out of talent, deathmatches against an opponent of similar strength forces you to go above and beyond. It’s an uncommon profession, but far more frequent than you think since everyone eventually runs out of momentum to advance.”

Dante wondered how the economy and logistics of the multiverse worked. Would you be selected for a job based on your class? And if that was true, then did that mean you were stuck in the same profession for the rest of your life? Or did companies as he knew it simply not exist, everything being run by the descendants of the ultra-powerful?

“Ah!” Laurelai shrieked when the boar let out a painfully weak groan, pulling Dante out of his daydream. She buzzed around to hide behind Dante’s shoulder, her head peeking out a moment later. “It’s still alive? Why haven’t you killed it yet?”

Dante burst into laughter, almost falling to the ground. “So much tough talk yesterday for someone so jumpy. What was it you said I should do again? Be cold and cruel for my own benefit, cutting off all my emotions so that I can become stronger through bloodshed?”

“Hmph,” Laurelai muttered, staring daggers at him as she changed the subject. “So, why is the boar still alive?”

“I want to know what to expect when I kill it. Do I need to do anything to enhance the effect of the kill? Will I grow another tail? Stuff like that.”

“There are special items that can help draw out more energy from the kill, but those usually destroy the body of whatever you absorb. The meat and hide of a beast, and any unique organ, can be sold for a decent amount of resources. That means it’s usually more cost-effective to sell the beast and just trade for anything you need instead of using items like that.”

Dante nodded, coming to an understanding. “That’s a shame. It’s not like I can do anything with it, so it would be much better if I could get one of those items.”

“Just finish it off already.”

Dante nodded, slowly creating another Hidden Blade before finishing it off.

It started as a tingle on his skin, soon rushing up his spine and into his muscles as the boar’s power spread throughout him. It was a soothing warmth, almost like taking a sip of hot tea in the snow. It was strangely euphoric to feel his cells greedily absorbing the foreign life essence entering his body. He could even feel other types of power enter into his flesh, but before they could do anything, the egg began to stir.

It began to draw the energy he won from the kill to itself, absorbing almost half of all the power like it was nothing. Dante was immediately enraged, but there was nothing he could do. Despite the rings on its shell lighting up, it only spat out a few drops of its own mutant life essence as payment, barely returning a percent of what it took.

“Greedy bastard,” Dante muttered as his body tingled from the egg’s life essence assimilating with his own, earning a look from Laurelai.

“Did your uninvited guest absorb some of the energy? I can feel it stirring inside you.”

Dante nodded, focussing on the feeling of levelling up. It was like everything clicked into place a little bit, putting it all into perspective. Nothing had actually changed outside of the slight boost that the egg’s life essence provided, but some part of him felt satisfied in a way he didn’t understand.

Name: Dante Alighieri

Race: Primal (Human)

Level: 2

Titles: Prime, Apex Talent, Primal Elite

Strength: 0

Agility: 0

Endurance: 0

Vitality: 0

Perception: 0

Wisdom: 0

Intelligence: 0

Willpower: 0

“Why don’t I have any stats yet?”

“Since you had no class when the boar died, all of its life essence spread equally across every part of you. If you had the worst class possible, meaning it doesn’t give you any extra stats beyond the minimum, you would be getting at least four stat points for every level. Split that across eight stats, and you technically have a little bit more than half of a single point.”

“So only a full stat counts?”

“Yeah, but that should have been a good experience nonetheless, right?” Laurelai asked, a knowing expression on her face. “You’ll be chasing that euphoric feeling for the rest of your life, just so you know. Even gods aren’t immune to the ultimate drug.”

“Drug? I thought you said it was the purified essence of life?”

“It is. The purest, most spiritually enlightening substance in the multiverse. It just so happens to be better than any drug you’ll ever find on a street corner. Every step forward is another refinement in the furnace of the heavens, pushing you ever closer to perfection.”

Laurelai had given Dante a lot to think about. Not the drug addiction part, but the explanation on how absorbing life essence refined the body somehow, even bringing him ‘closer to the heavens. Whatever that meant. He would have to ask her more about it in the next tutorial phase since a timer notification had appeared.

Portal will close in 9 minutes and 53 seconds...

The clock was slowly ticking down, so with a small hug and a new bandage around the missing chunk of flesh in his forearm, Dante stood up and walked over to the portal. The glowing white doorway had changed once the timer began, gaining a certain depth that he couldn’t quite discern.

Dante turned to Laurelai, getting an excited goodbye and a small hug from her. “I’ll see you in the next phase, okay? I don’t know what will be on the other side, so stay out of trouble until I can find you. It should only take me a minute at the very most, so don’t go wandering around.”

“Ah, yeah,” Dante muttered, feeling a bit smothered by her concern. It was almost like she was an overly concerned parent, making him wonder what her deal really was. She kept trying to stay professional, but since they left the cavern, she was slowly showing more and more concern for him. “I’ll make sure to keep my eyes peeled.”

Pushing his headache away, Dante stepped through the portal without looking back.