Seeing that even his {Energy Arrow} cannot do anything to the , Alex starts running out of ideas on how to face this creature. He has no way to force the into a melee confrontation. He also only have one method of attacking from long range and it was easily countered by the giant frog. Alex wants to regret that he didn't get other long-ranged skills, but regretting now will not change the current situation.

After another futile attempt on trying to engage the giant frog in a melee battle, Alex decides that he needs to retreat. He should increase his strength before engaging with this frog again. Maybe even learn a strong long-ranged skill to increase his attacking options.

Alex immediately turns back and dashes towards the forest to run away from this . The frog, noticing Alex's intention, leaps into the air and lands not far in front of Alex's retreating path. Alex doesn't want to engage with the opponent in front of him, so he changes his direction to pass it from its left side.

The frog then throws its spit so that it will hit Alex if he doesn't stop. Seeing this, Alex is forced to change his direction once again towards the frog. The frog reacts by extending its tongue towards Alex. Alex counters by swining his katana to cut the frog's tongue.

Alex smirks as he managed to force the frog into this situation where it only has a choice between stopping its tongue attack or get its tongue severed by his katana. Unfortunately for Alex, the scenario he envisioned doesn't happen. When it seems like the tongue will get severed by his {Black-steel Katana}, the tongue starts wiggling and changes direction. The tongue moves to his right side and tries to circle around his waist.

If Alex continues his attack, it will only graze the tongue and in return he will get caught by the frog's tongue. Alex forcefully stops his attack and rolls to his left. Alex didn't manage to dodge in time as the tongue grazes his right upper thigh. To Alex's surprise, the tongue managed to tear the hard {Iron Leather Trousers} and forms a small cut on his thigh.

Alex feels a throbbing sensation from that cut. He can see that the area on his thigh around the wound starts turning black.

"S**t, I've been poisoned."

Alex immediately dashes backwards in retreat and touches the brown {Spatial Pouch} on his right waist. A small vial containing green liquid appears on his right hand. Alex wastes no time in emptying the content of the vial into his mouth. That liquid was the F-ranked {Antidote Potion}.

Against other type of poisons, the antidote would have worked immediately and neutralize it, but Alex knows that this poison from the won't be that easy to neutralize. He needs to rest for the antidote to fully neutralize the giant frog's poison. If he keeps moving the antidote will only delay the effect but eventually the dosage will be wasted and the poison will start acting up. There is also the risk that he will get poisoned on other parts of his body as he continues this fight. Alex only brought a limited amount of {Antidote Potion} with him, so he has to finish this fight fast.

Alex tried to run away into the forest once again, but he can't shake away the persistent frog. It kept pestering him and tried to prevent him from retreating into the forest. Having no other choice, Alex firms up his mind to stake his life in this fight and finish this as quickly as possible. One {Antidote Potion} will be able to suppress the poison for around 5 minutes, so he only has 20 minutes to finish this fight. Alex brought 5 {Antidote Potion} with him, but he has to leave out one to neutralize the poison, not just suppress it.

The problem with facing the is its unpredictable movement. Alex always reacted one step too late. If he can predict its movement, Alex will have an easier time to deal with this frog.

Alex increases his concentration to the maximum and observes every tiny movement the frog makes. The frog waits for Alex to make the next move. Alex dashes forward while observing every tiny changes happening around him. The frog starts a leaping motion to avoid Alex's charge. Alex can see the frog's intent and moves to his left to catch the frog when it lands. Unfortunately, Alex moved one step too fast this time and alerts the frog. The frog changes its leaping motion and instead leaps to Alex's back while throwing its spit towards Alex from the air.

He dodges the spit coming at him and faces the frog once again. Alex keeps maintaining his mana-enhanced state in this fight, so other than the surprise attack that grazed him earlier, he had no problem dodging other attacks from the frog.

Once again, Alex tries to observe the frog and the tiny changes around him, even to the tiny movement of grass swaying. He increases his senses to the maximum in order to catch the in front of him.

After ten minutes, Alex once again drinks his third {Antidote Potion}. In this ten minutes they have exchanged dozens of moves to no avail. Alex could predict the frog's initial movement, but couldn't do it once the frog made adjustments. It was hard for him to keep concentrating in the middle of attacking.

Being pressed for time, Alex once again tries to initiate another attack while trying to increase his senses to feel the changes around him. The frog once again leaps to avoid Alex's attack. Alex predicts its movement and changes his direction to where the frog is going to land at the same time as when the frog made its leap. And once again, the frog extends its tongue to prevent Alex from reaching its landing spot.

But, this time Alex can feel something is changing. Suddenly, his spirit that is circulating around his body extended to a perimeter outside his body with him as the center. Alex can feel the tiniest detail of the world around him. From the movement of the air, the movement of the grass, the movement of energy around him, and the movement of every muscle on the tongue that is reaching for him, everything feels so vivid to him.

Earlier, Alex could only halt his charge to avoid this tongue as it can change its attacking pattern and catch Alex in a bad position. But, this time, Alex swings his sword to meet the moving tongue that feels much slower than earlier. The tongue once again wiggles and changes its attacking pattern, but Alex is able to follow every tiny movement of the tongue. He changes his swing to meet the tongue.

The is the one being surprised this time, but it has no time to retract its tongue. The sword meets the tongue and cuts it clean through.

"CRRROOAAAKKKK!!!"

The giant frog lets out a below due to the pain from its freshly severed tongue.