Short-distance teleportation, as the name implied, was a very short leap. It only allowed for a metre. Although, when combined with fleet footwork, she was able to kick off the ground and build momentum. So the combination created a leap effect of sorts, allowing Kurushimi to make good distance in a short amount of time.

‘KREEE EEE-!’ Although, with a screech, the canisfangs sprinted after her new location. Likely due to their lack of hesitation, they also ran faster than before. So it wouldn’t take long for them to get to her. Glaive in hand, Kurushimi held the blade close and concentrated. “I probably should have tried sword aura on this before fighting… But a field test is still good!”

The blade lit up with the crimson aura. A smaller blade all together than her katana, it was harder to compress the aura into the blade. However, the crimson colour of the aura was visibly darker and denser. As she prepared herself for the incoming canisfangs, a sudden ‘ping’ surprised her.

“A system message?” she said. It wasn’t exactly great timing so she didn’t have long to read it before having to wave it away. [Sword aura mastery has increased!] A short but sweet message, Kurushimi smiled before waving away the message with her glaive. “Haha, mastery already. I must be a genius!”

Stepping forward, she swung the glaive forward. The canisfangs were still over five metres away. However, sword aura had more range than the initial swing. When she had tested sword aura on the trees before, the aura went beyond her strike and cut down two trees behind the first one after all. So, logically speaking, Kurushimi came to the conclusion that with the extra range of the pole, wouldn’t that also increase the range of the flying sword aura?

In an arc, the crimson aura flung out from her glaive towards the canisfangs. As the furthermost canisfang was caught by the aura, the majority of the crimson mana ended up passing it by. However… “Huh?” the flying aura didn’t dissipate or stop. It continued flying for a good bit of time until it hit a tree in the back.

“That range is too much, isn’t it?” Kurushimi asked dumbly. Even with her theory of the sword aura having more reach, it had been flung way too far! There was no possible way the pole’s extra range could have produced that result alone. Right?

“It looks like this may be an added effect of the glaive…” Voice-san commented, looking at the range. She guessed that the new aura that had ignited her glaive’s blade probably had this kind of effect added onto it. It was highly likely that that was what she had gained with the system message notifying a new level of mastery.

“Well, I’m not complaining-!” Kurushimi said, once again kicking off the ground and blinking away. As the canisfangs chased her, she continued to swing her glaive and fling flying sword auras at them. The flying sword aura wounds weren’t nearly as deep or strong as the melee katana sword aura but she was able to do all this without them even getting close to her. And, wounding them was all she really needed to do.

Dragging her feet across the ground, she finally came to a stop. The canisfangs in front of her were the last ones and they were all covered in wounds. Even if they hadn’t shown any signs of losing strength, the battle was pretty much over. Kurushimi held her hand up, spreading her fingers out. The lively sprinting of the canisfangs was put to a halt as soon as she closed her hand.

The blood from their wounds suddenly shot out and then rapidly slashed back towards the canisfangs. They quickly crashed to the ground as their bodies were diced up by their own blood and their aggravated eyes grew dull. “Hah… I love blood magic. It’s so damn useful!” Kurushimi shouted in glee at her handiwork. Although there were disadvantages with ending up as a vampire, she was given access to skills like blood magic. If she wasn’t a vampire, it probably would have been locked behind an annoying hidden requirement and she wouldn’t have bothered to get it.

Now that the fight was over, she had some time to rest and take a break. And… “Now for the spoils of war!” Kurushimi shouted out as she desummoned her glaive and pulled out the katana. Sadly, she still had to keep one out and the katana was the easier one to carry around. With the battle ending, a good amount of system messages popped up one after another.

[You have leveled up!]

[You have leveled up!]

[You have leveled up!]

[Skill, ‘Fleet footwork’ has reached Lvl. 2!]

[Skill, ‘Short-distance teleportation’ has reached Lvl. 3!]

[Skill, ‘Spectral magic’ has reached Lvl. 2!]

[Skill, ‘Storage magic’ has reached Lvl. 2!]

Kurushimi viewed all the system messages that popped up after the battle. She had gained a couple levels and some of her skills had leveled up. However, this was only a small bit compared to the amount she wished to level up as she visited this area.

“Now, time to regain my mana and collect my stats~” Kurushimi walked forward towards the canisfangs laid across the ground. Having used sword aura a ton, she had lost a large amount of mana. As she looked at her mana bar, she realised she’ll need to be a lot more careful. Now was an exception as there weren’t that many monsters. However, at her mana now, she would struggle to fight any more of them.

Kurushimi crouched down and looked at the canisfangs body. It was covered in blood, which made her feel hungry. The idea of the taste was still a little off putting, but the taste was something she had dealt with a lot until now. Getting straight to it was the best way to deal with it. Like that, she quickly moved between all the bodies, biting down and drinking their blood.

After finishing, she stood herself up and wiped away any blood that had gotten on her lips. She didn’t want to admit it, but she really was getting used to the taste. The actual tasting part really wasn’t bothering her too much now, it was more the idea of it. “Overall, I got 42 HP, 49 STR, 35 END, 42 SP, 45 AGI, 31 MP and… No skills.” Kurushimi summarised the results from stealing all the stats.

“It says there is a chance of getting a skill, but I still haven’t got one after all this time. How damn rare is it?” Although the stats she had gotten were good, she was still yet to get a skill. Her unique skill, ‘What’s yours is mine’, is supposed to have a chance of stealing a skill. But, even if the description said ‘incredibly low chance’, wasn’t this too long? At this point, Kurushimi felt like she would be happy even if the skill she got was utterly useless!

Kurushimi sighed before looking past the canisfangs. With them out of her way, she could now progress further into the large crystal area. Her current location was only the very entrance, so a lot would be awaiting her. This area wasn’t as open as the scorched land, so she didn’t know what would be ahead except for one area. “Probably won’t be long before I’m there…” she said, as she gripped down onto the handle of her katana.

“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” Kurushimi was suddenly snapped out of her trance as Voice-san asked her a question.

“There will be a lot of them there for sure. But I can handle it. Anyways, I wanna see them again since I can properly fight back now.” Kurushimi grinned as she responded, wiping the solemn look off her face. She had died to Karshak and the rock golems before, but the second run had a different impact. Now, she would be able to make those canisfangs experience what she had.

. . .

The crimson sword aura ripped through the canisfang. Its body flopped to the ground, in a pool of blood along with the other two canisfangs that had already fallen. At this point, Kurushimi had been walking around the large crystal area for a while, killing off canisfangs she came across and stealing their stats/Exp. However, she had been struggling to find the place she was looking for.

“Where in the hell is it?” Kurushimi questioned with annoyance in her voice. When she first came here, she had just run in and gone in any direction. Not to mention, falling asleep immediately after. So finding her location through memory alone… wasn’t going to happen. The large crystal area appeared to be bigger than she thought it was. But shouldn’t she have found it by now? Or at least, the large pack of canisfangs that were so enthusiastic to find her last time?

“Hah… What can I do to find it?” Kurushimi sighed. Killing off the canisfangs and stealing a large amount of stats and Exp was a big part of her plan to get stronger. Although she could just run around like she has been and hunt the odd pack, that would be inefficient compared to her original plan.

“Perhaps you should learn a map skill? It will allow you to see where you have already been and where you haven’t, making it easier to find where you’re looking for.”

“Oh, that’s a good idea!” Kurushimi exclaimed. A map was generally something that you would have in any sort of game. They were simply too useful for navigation. Having not thought about that yet, she felt a little ashamed as a gamer. Opening the menu, she searched the skill list for a map. But as she did so, her finger that was scrolling through the list froze upon hearing Voice-san’s next words.

“Kurushimi, I’m not the one who said that?” Voice-san said.

“Eh?” Hearing Voice-san’s proclamation, not only did her finger freeze but so did her face as her mouth was left wide open. 'You're not the one who spoke? What do you mean? Aren’t we the only ones here? Am I starting to hallucinate a second voice? Have I really gone this far off the deep end?!' Various questions and thoughts ran through Kurushimi’s head until the unfamiliar voice interrupted those.

“Thank you. I’m glad you found my suggestion helpful.” The unfamiliar voice politely thanked Kurushimi, who had initially intended to be replying to Voice-san and not them.

“Uwahhh!!” Kurushimi jumped upon hearing the voice again. This wasn’t a voice in her head. Kurushimi was sure of that! After all, unlike Voice-san, this voice had a direction. And so far, the only living entities she had come across in this forest were monsters. And even worse, the only talking living entity she had come across was Karshak so-!

Kurushimi hastily turned around to meet the owner of the voice, holding her sword between herself and them. Standing directly in front of her was what looked to be a mature-looking woman with vibrant green hair. Her gentle smile along with her arms laid down by her sides gave off a non-threatening aura. But Kurushimi still couldn’t declare the woman harmless, so Kurushimi didn’t loosen her guard any less.

“Hello, nice to meet you.” Despite Kurushimi’s wariness, the woman’s smile only grew deeper as she gave polite greetings. Kurushimi couldn’t understand what was going on. For starters, who was this woman? She had appeared out of nowhere as if it were perfectly natural and spoke to Kurushimi as if it were a completely normal setting to do so in!

Currently, she was located in a forest overrun with monsters where it would be incredibly strange to encounter humans. She really had no clue what was going through this woman’s head. “Nice… to meet you too. I guess…” Kurushimi replied hesitantly as she observed the woman and her surroundings.

Most noticeably, behind the woman stood what looked like a shrine of sorts. The trees parted as it made way for the stone foundation that held the shrine. But what Kurushimi found strange was how she hadn’t seen this shrine until now. Although it wasn’t a massive shrine by any means, it was noticeable enough. It didn’t make sense that she hadn’t noticed it until the woman had revealed herself. And other than that, there was something off about the way the woman looked herself. 'Is it just me, or does she look... sort of see-through?' Kurushimi squinted as she tried to confirm whether she was seeing right.

“Fufu~ No need to be so cautious. My name is Atelier and you…” Kurushimi brought her focus back to the woman as she started talking again. As Atelier gave her name to Kurushimi, she paused mid-sentence and stared deeply into Kurushimi’s eyes, making her gulp involuntarily. “...are not from this world, are you?”