Aariv felt blood dripping down from his body.

He ducks behind a tree to protect himself from the feathers that the razor steel hawk was firing at him.

Aariv felt the tree begin tilting down and flown away from the tree as it fell down. He saw that hawk was chasing him with its wings cutting down trees.

The owl had been trying to bait the hawk to slam into a tree or was trying to get close in the hawk's personal space in order to secure a guaranteed fireball, however, the hawk learned and refused to play into his hands.

It has been firing its own feathers at him in order to keep him at a distance and to not slam into a tree. It also activates the skill that allows it to screech to cause Aariv to flinch and freeze.

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 1 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 2

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 2 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 3

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 3 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 4

With the increase in levels in his [Fear Resistance], Aariv has not been able to resist it and now only flinch a bit when the skill was activated.

However, the damn hawk couldn't fire its feathers all the time, or else it will be out of feathers and can't fly. Right now, small parts of the hawk's flesh could be seen as Aariv decided to try and make the hawk fire most of its feathers.

Occasionally, Aariv would try to get close to the hawk and the bird of prey would fire its feathers to keep him away losing more of its feathers.

They have been repeating this for several hours.

The hawk has now lost most of its feathers and now struggle to fly. Also, the hawk's fleshly, ugly and vulnerable body was now exposed without its hard feathers protecting it.

The hawk looks at its naked body, before looking at Aariv with fear and tried to flap away but fell to the ground.

The grounded bird got up and now tried to run away, occasionally looking behind it to see if Aariv was behind it. Even if it was unable to fly anymore, its high agility stats allow it to run very quickly.

However, flying is faster than running.

"Now who's the one being chased," Aariv said as he dove toward the naked hawk. He pecked at the hawk, leaving a wound and causing it to screeches in pain while slashing it and dodging its attempts to peck and scratch at it.

After all, It still has high strength and agility stats. However, the hawk was panicked since it never had its feathers not being there to protect it and was not able to think straight.

Aariv slashes at the hawk's legs tendon making it unable to walk and flew away from it.

He points his talon at the hawk and began casting a fireball and shot it at the hawk, covering it in fire and causing it to screeches in pain.

After the fire was gone, Aariv got the nonfiction for the razor steel hawk's death.

Defeated [Razor Steel Hawk] - Lv. 22

Experience is awarded.

[Fire Manipulation] - Lv. 4 ---> [Fire Manipulation] - Lv. 5

"It's finally dead," Aariv said as he lands on a branch. The hawk's body was charred with most of its flesh gone with bones showing. "HA! That's what you get!" Aariv yells at the corpse.

He then looks up. The sky was getting dark since they had been fighting each other without rest and during that time, Aariv had lost track of time.

"I should go to sleep," Aariv said as he found a tree hollow and slept in it, not before checking for nearby monsters.

...

...

...

Aariv woke up.

He walks out of the tree hollow and looks up. The sun was starting to rise up and realize that the sky was quite pretty.

It was crisp and clear. The sun shines a rosy hue across the early morning sky.

Aariv looks at the sky for a short while before taking his eyes away from it and began scanning the area around him.

There were horned rabbits nibbling on grasses, thunder cat prowling the ground in search of prey.

Snakes slithering out of their home forking their tongue to smell for prey. Trolls and goblins woke up drowsy and stumbling over themselves.

Aariv's stomach growls.

He dove and grab a rabbit, and crush its neck. He landed and proceed to light a fire.

After devouring the rabbit, Aariv's danger sense begins going coming off, ringing on and on in his head as he looks around for danger.

Then, he spotted it.

In a circle of blood and corpses of what seem to be humans, with candles of fires, one person was standing amidst it and was chanting in a language that he could not understand.

Dozens of questions went through Aariv's head, such as who were they? How did the corpses get here? What were they doing? What are they doing?

He notices that other monsters stop and were watching the person chanting.

Black mists appear as it surrounds the person as they began to chants even louder. The blood began to move into a pattern, avoid appear in the middle like a pair of arms appear out of the void.

Now his danger sense was ringing even louder, Aariv tried to move but found himself stuck in place, he tried and tried to flew away but could not move from the spot he was at.

Why was he stuck?

Then...He realizes why.

He was frozen in fear and was unable to move because of the fear. This only causes him to struggle even more.

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 4 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 5

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 5 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 6

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 6 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 7

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 5 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 8

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 8 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. 9

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. 9 ---> [Fear Resistance] - Lv. MAX

[Fear Resistance] - Lv. MAX ---> [Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 1

[Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 1 ---> [Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 2

[Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 2 ---> [Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 3

[Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 3 ---> [Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 4

[Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 4 ---> [Moderate Fear Resistance] - Lv. 5

Aariv finally was able to move and flew away from the scene without looking back. He flew and flew, he lost track of how long he had flew but didn't dare to stop.

After he was all out of energy, Aariv collapse on the ground. His whole body was sore and he was out of breath, he was gasping for air as he looks back.

He could see black mists flow through the wall, as loud screams could be heard, the wind blows through the forest, ruffling all of his feathers as he felt himself being blown away.

After a while, the wind stops. Aariv ignores how tired he was and began to fly away again.

He didn't want to see what sort of nightmare was there.