003

I decided to stay and hunt, it still wasn’t dark yet, and I don’t know why but I was filled with the confidence that I could do it if I tried. I had to do it one day or another, so why not now?

With new found confidence in myself, I decided to hide a few metres away behind a fairly large tree that could hide me. Thankfully, I didn’t need to wait for long before I found one of the rabbits, but what can I say, I wasn’t exactly expecting them to look like this..?

“Those don’t look like rabbits…”

With the size of a dog, with razor sharp claws and dark blood red eyes, the creature just happened to be shaped like a rabbit, that’s all.

It wouldn’t be wrong to say that I was starting to regret my decision a little bit.

Even though I can’t see its stats, I can tell that it’s a lot more than mine, I mean, I’m not even level 1.

I slowly back away from the shade of the dried up tree I was hiding in and tried to not make any sound if possible.

But since I couldn’t tell because of the shoes I was wearing and the snow was covering it, I stepped on a twig, a classic horror movie mistake.

‘Shit!’

It perked up its ears and within the span of a second, it had already started running towards me.

I didn’t even get the chance to get back as I stumbled on my own feet and fell down, giving the monster rabbit a way to jump on me.

“Get away!”

I shouted in vain as I was trying to keep the monster away, but it wasn’t effective. I was barely able to keep its claws away from my face, if I didn’t do that it might’ve blinded me.

With one hand holding it back, I used the other hand to look for anything around me, as I was laying on the ground I couldn’t tell that well what was around me, but I did get my hands on what felt like a rock after a few seconds or so.

I used the rock to hit the monster, which only made it angrier.

I continued hitting it which resulted in me getting scratched as well but I continued nonetheless and eventually its body lost the pressure it was exerting on me and limped to the side.

I was exhausted, covered in this disgusting creature’s blood and scared. It was the first time that I’ve been this close to death in my entire life, and the worst thing is that I almost died to a fucking rabbit.

My mind was in a complete mess when a message came snapping me out of it.

[25 EXP gained]

[Level up]

A lot of things had happened and I had no time to check my status. I took the body of the rabbit and made a run for it. I used my skill [Sprint] and dashed back barely in the time that it takes for my total Qi to be exhausted.

The Qi gradually recovers after a little rest though. If I could compare it to something then it would be stamina.

And that is a logical way to think, if I’m running then that totally depends on my body’s stamina. I should really think of a way for increasing my Qi quantity as well.

After I had reached the safety of my cave, I put aside the corpse of the rabbit to bleed out. I didn’t want to do it here, but now that I’ve attracted that much attention to myself during that little fight, I didn’t want to wait and see who or what was going to arrive.

…

After resting a little bit, I have calmed myself down and am ready to look at my new status.

Even after what happened today, I still can’t help but be a little excited for this. For someone like me, this is nothing short of a superpower, if my situation wasn’t this dire then I might’ve been the happiest man alive right now.

I opened my status and checked.

[Status]

Name: Grant Steele

Lv.1 [25/100]

HP: 15/26

MP: 0/0

BA: 0/0

QI: 5/14

Skills: Sprint Lv.1

I was honestly surprised. A lot of things had changed. First, I was finally level 1. There was also an EXP counter near my level which was a pleasant help. I just hope that the EXP requirements for the next levels aren’t that high, or who knows how many horrible things I would’ve to fight with.

Now onto the worrying things, just that little encounter I had lowered my health to 15, I can probably guess that my fatigue also helped play a huge role in this. If I had struggled for a little more then I might’ve seriously died.

Just thinking about it gives me chills. I shook my head to get that thought out of my head and focus on something I didn’t notice the first time.

“Did my Qi increase too?”

It makes sense if it did, but seeing as it only increased by 2 is not that exciting, but seeing as the HP also only increased by 3 is also not good, at this rate it be forever before I get something that is a significantly safe amount of HP.

I can also look at it in another way, maybe this is how fast it grows for everyone else as well. If that is true then my current stats wouldn’t be that bad.

I also confirmed my hunch that my MP and BA aren’t going to increase. I guess I’ll have to live without magic until I find a way around it. Somehow this fact hurts me more than I thought it would.

I guess for the time being, until I figure out how to increase my HP faster, I’ll have to focus on increasing my only skill’s level.

Taking them as my new goals to work towards, I closed my status and started working on the fire, after all, I have to cook the rabbit.

While working on starting the fire, I was immediately startled by another message right in front of my face.

[Skill: Cold Resistance Lv.01 has been acquired.]

[New Stat - DEF has been added to the status.]

Name: Grant Steele

Lv.1 [25/100]

HP: 15/26

MP: 0/0

BA: 0/0

QI: 8/14

DEF: 10

Skills: Sprint Lv.1, Cold Resistance Lv.1

If I’m right then DEF means defence, which is very good to have. I was wondering what kinds of skills this world has, and now I know that at the very least, it also has resistance skills.

I’m hoping that this DEF stat is the more general defence kind of stat and not just the cold type, not that I’m complaining.

I suddenly just noticed though, my body just got a little bit warmer. It was a little miniscule but still noticeable, which was frankly enough to keep me happy.

Although I have been trying to ignore it, I have been walking in a snow covered area for almost two days now, it’s a miracle that I’ve not just died of the cold here.

But now that I think about it, judging by the time it took for me to get this skill, aren’t the requirements to get skills kind of harsh in this world?

I should’ve gotten this skill on the very first day, but I had to live in the cold shivering for two days before I got it.

It was also the same for the Sprint skill, I sprinted for more than an hour out of sheer terror and my legs hurt like every muscle in there had torn apart, only then did I get the skill.

But I really shouldn’t complain, even this much is something good for a situation like this.

I closed the status window again and started my work on the fire. I also brought in the rabbit which had lost a significant amount of its blood.

I used sticks to hold the rabbit that I had to gut the rabbit using a sharp piece of stone that I found. I almost puked while doing that. You don’t know how difficult and messy something is until you do it yourself without proper tools.

Still, I did what I could and I cooked it over the fire holding it up using a few sticks. I cooked it just enough that I didn’t have to consume it raw.

All the gross preparation aside, I eagerly awaited the cooking to be done as I was practically drooling looking at it.

But things don’t really turn out how you want them to.

One bite.

“Fuck!”

That is all it took for me to break out one of the flavouring packets from the instant noodle pack. I had to season the gross tasting and honestly, puke inducing meat of the rabbit.

The moment my teeth bit into it, I had an impulse to gag. Unfortunately, even the flavouring packs did nothing to taste.

If I had anything in my stomach I would’ve vomited, that is how bad it actually was.

Looks like I’ll have to find something else to hunt tomorrow. I can’t keep eating this shit.

I finished eating what I could while constantly consoling myself that this was essential for survival.

I threw out the remaining far, far away from my cave, I didn’t want anything coming here attracted by it, and I actually doubt anything will considering the taste.

I slept without the heat as I put out the fire. I wanted to increase my level of [Cold Resistance] which in turn would increase my DEF.

Even with the gross food and the death encounter, I still gained a lot, so all in all, today was a good day.