*whistle* "Wow... I think this is the first time I've seen someone take on a beast, the size of a grizzly bear, in such a manner. I've seen complete parties of nearly twenty people barely surviving an encounter with such beasts and here he f*cking soloed the beast like it was nothing." Neil commented incredulously, as both his and Morgan had spectated Soren's fight with the Cutter.
"Soloing the beast... I guess it counts, but what part of stabbing it deeply in the eye while it's asleep and then running away counts as soloing? I think the only time he fought it solo was on the final exchange, where he pushed the sword so deeply in its eye that it ended piercing the brain and even then, he only did that after dodging its initial attack. The rest of the fight was just a game of cat and mouse. Granted, no one on their right mind would even think to try taking a flying tree head on." Morgan added in an analytical manner, as he has taken a seat on a chair, right next to Neil.
"Still, I just don't see anyone else doing the same thing that he did. I can see someone beating this thing solo with a level 10 skill, but still... It takes guts to try and sneak attack a sleeping beast like that. If it wasn't for the fact that the beast wasted its energy early on by throwing all those trees, I highly doubt he would have been able to beat it, if things had gone differently."
"Maybe so... But there are no "what ifs" in life. Things happened this way and we can only accept it. Besides, what do you want to me to say? That he hacked the game or cheated in some way, shape or form? I'm no game developer, but even I know that this game wouldn't have any glitches or vulnerabilities, because the game uses the same base code that is used by our actual Virtual Reality and Full Dive technology we both know and have been dealing with for a long while already."
*sigh* "At least a certain someone will have something to entertain himself with..." Neil muttered under his breath, as he turned attention back to the screen, where Soren was currently trying to pull out the sword from the Cutter's eye.
...
"Urgh... Come... Hrgh... On... Whoooa!" *thud* "F*ck!" Soren cursed out, while rubbing the aching back of his head, as this was his third failed attempt at pulling out the sword out of the Cutter's skull, before falling and crashing down to the ground. As he was getting up from the ground, he decided to store the Cutter's carcass with the blade stuck inside it and take care of it, once he reached back into the settlement and slowly made his way there. Although he would have to deal with the occasional rabbit and doll that charge at him out nowhere, his wooden sword was enough to kill them, even though he had strike them down a couple more times, to make sure they were dead. Thankfully for himself, Soren didn't have any additional surprise encounters with other Cutters or anything around their level of power and within a few minutes managed to arrive back at the settlement safe and sound, before making a beeline towards the Hunter's guild.
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*thud* "Hey, think you can help me out with this?" Soren asked, as he brought out the Cutter's corpse on the ground, while waiting for Stephen to recover from his drowsiness, as he was currently fast sleep on the counter.
"Sure, sure... *groan* Just give me... A minute..." Once he opened his eyes and witnessed the carcass of the cutter in front of him, his eyes and mind were jolted awake from the shock, before turning his attention towards Soren and asking him with a deadpan expression. "What the... Alright, when and how?"
"Um... Around ten minutes ago and I only stabbed it in the eye while it was asleep, before letting it tire itself out and going for the kill by shoving the sword in its eye all the way down to the hilt. There were some close calls here and there, also me climbing it back to try and claw its other eye out, aside from those events though, it was a pretty cut and dry fight..."
"You don't just causally describe a life-threatening experience with one of the more prominent predators in our immediate area and act like it was a simple run to the grocery store." Stephen retorted incredulously, as he couldn't understand Soren's calm demeanor and was expecting him to be somewhat fearful, at the very least.
"Honestly, I was kind of afraid during the fight, since a few trees did come close to me, a bit too close for comfort at times, but I just bade my time until it tired itself out. Granted, it was a bit easier said than done, since I had to constantly run from trees from trees, but... Things worked out in the end. Honestly, the only actual scary part was when the sword was actually stuck in its eye, but that might have been an actual blessing in disguise, since that was what it allowed me to kill it, without having to confront it a lot head on." Soren explained to the best of his ability, as he was never afraid or in any danger in the first place, since it was just a game for him at the end of the day and unless he played on a high realism setting.
"I... I don't even know where or how or... You know what? Let's take care of this carcass first, otherwise this thing will start rotting by tomorrow and I'd rather not have to worry about this thing starting to smell like a garbage pile."
"Wait, don't corpses start to smell after three days?" Soren asked, as he lifted one of the arms, while Stephen took the other one and then the two of them started carrying it towards the back of the building.
"Yes... but that's at the latest. Hoo... Usually a carcass starts smelling at the earliest after a day... Or at the latest, which is after three days... Afterwards, the smell only becomes worse by the day and after an entire week has passed, the smell becomes completely unbearable... Just put on the metallic table over there, quickly..." Stephen explained, before the two of them placed the carcass on top of a metallic table, in a room full of sharp tools.
"Um... this room wouldn't happen to be...?"
"It's the room where all the butchery magic happens... Don't worry, you'll get your sword, once we're done peeling the skin of the meat and the meat of its bones. Also, we'll have to drain it and clean its insides from all of its organs, before we get to peeling it."
"If I didn't know that, I'd think this would be a torture chamber of some kind." Soren commented nervously, as he could recognize some weird metallic devices that looked like contraptions, specifically designed to torture people.
"Oh, it actually functions as one as well. We mostly use it for the more intelligent monster races, like goblins, kobolds, orcs, ogres and a few others as well."
"I see... Wait, what?"