'Alright, back into the game once more... Feels weird playing games for more than four hours...' Soren thought to himself, as he looked at the forest around him to make sure he wouldn't be ambushed by a passing enemy, before asking for his orders. "Alright doc, can you hear me first?"

"Loud and clear. No complications on either side for now." Dr.Vale stated through the microphone, as she got the thumbs up from Nicolas, before continuing. "Seeing as nothing happened before, despite killing dozens of the same critters as before, I've decided to turn up the difficulty a bit. Try going after something stronger this time. No need for the Cutter in particular, but go after anything that's obviously stronger than you, but not necessarily impossible."

"Wait, are you sure? I thought the first day was going to be a day to simply ease me in."

"It is. We won't be doing anything complicated for now. Although we don't have enough data to perform any specific tests for the city, I still want to know some of your current limits and we'll be able to go on from there."

"Got it boss. Speaking of which, is it okay to mention the city in front of Nicolas and Nora?" Soren asked curiously, as he was pretty sure that Nora and Nicolas were listening on their conversation.

"Don't worry Soren, we've been filled on the situation as well. Although I'm not exactly happy to know that the game is capable of getting people killed through sheer bad luck." Nicolas stated somberly, before Dr.Vale stated sternly. "That's enough chit-chat for now. Soren, focus on the current mission for now."

With that final statement, Soren quickly made his way towards the settlement and turned in his kills, which provided him with 3 bronze coins and 80 copper coins, before grabbing again the same quests as before. With that taken care of, he quickly made his way towards the deeper parts of the forest and although he did walk pretty close to the Cutter's lair, he wasn't noticed by it, as it was completely engrossed in its feasting. Going past the lair, Soren still came frequently across the same rabbits and squires as before, but occasionally saw a couple Rollers as well, which were immediately hunted upon sight, as the armor from their shells was extremely valuable and wanted to be fully equipped with shell armor.

It wasn't until nearly an entire hour had passed, that Soren came across a new creature. The creature itself looked like a rabid rat, with foam flowing from its mouth, focused beady eyes that seemed to have locked onto him and a back, covered with long and thick pins, capable of piercing through his skin. The staredown between them lasted for a seconds, before the rat screeched loudly and turned its back towards Soren, shooting a few of its pins towards him. Seeing the pins coming towards him, he quickly rolled away from the incoming barrage, but still got struck by a couple of them, as they were lodged into his left leg.

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Although the pins didn't hurt as much as he expected, he knew he couldn't take a barrage of pins head on and opted for either dodging them or hiding behind cover. Just as he had barely formulated his defensive plan, another barrage of pins came flying towards him, forcing him to roll behind a tree and barely being grazed a couple of them. While hiding behind the tree, Soren quickly pulled out the pins out of his leg and after making sure that his leg was uninhibited, he baited out another barrage by partially exposing half of his body, before dodging it and quickly charging towards the rat and delivering a powerful kick to its body, causing it to roll towards another tree and screaming pain. As it was still screaming in pain, Soren quickly charged and suppressed the rat using Holy Touch and with its back facing the ground, before delivering the killing blow with his sword.

As the rat's motionless body slowly slid out of the sword's blade, Soren let out a tired sigh and let his body collapse on the ground, from the tension drop he was currently experiencing. Seeing the motionless rat in his sword, he pulled it out and started examining the pins on its back, as well as the pins he pulled out of his leg and surprisingly enough, the pins themselves weren't sharp enough to prick his finger with a single touch, as he had to exert a decent amount of force to be able to injure himself a bit with the pins. Although he'd love to examine the pins and the rat in more detail, he knew he was running on a timer, so he stashed them away into his inventory and continued exploring the deeper parts of it.

Aside from the first encounter with the rat, Soren still dealt mostly with the same rabbits, squires and occasional roller, but now his biggest source of trouble came from having to deal with the ranged ambushes from the rats and he'd always get clipped by a pin or two, forcing him to constantly hide to recover, before baiting out its attack and delivering the killing blow. He'd love to be able to completely dodge the initial barrage, but he could tell his Agility stat was just shy of one point to be able to completely dodge the initial barrage and swiftly charge for the kill.

For the most part, that would be the pattern of his grind for the next three hours, as he never came across any new monster species, until the very end of his grind, as he was ambushed by a similarly looking doll, but was able to equally match him in strength, causing each other to be pushed back by a few centimeters. The sudden increase in power certainly surprised him, but after seeing the doll having the same appearance as the other dolls he'd slain previously, Soren relaxed a bit, as it was the same doll and it would have the same attacking patterns, so dealing with it would only take a little bit longer.

Unfortunately for him, rather than expecting the charge as before, the doll suddenly brandished the sword in front of it and a thin wind wave quickly charged towards Soren. Seeing the wind wave coming towards him, Soren desperately tried rolling away, but the wind wave was faster than him and ended up creating a deep gash on right leg, causing him to scream in pain and desperately trying to hide behind a tree and drinking a health potion, the moment he managed to do so. Within seconds, he could see the gash on his leg slowly closing itself, before letting out a sigh of relief, as he was afraid that he'd be unable to move for the rest of the fight.

Unfortunately, he couldn't relax completely, as he was still in combat and the doll swiftly charged towards him once more, while Soren stood his ground and parried its attack, causing each other to be pushed back, before the doll quickly delivered another wind slash. Seeing it come towards him, he quickly twirled around the tree and used the momentum to charge back in retaliation, by giving it a swift kick to its face and sending it flying a few feet. As it was flying in the air, Soren didn't let up on his momentum and quickly followed towards its direction and once the doll fell on the ground, he quickly delivered a downward strike, piercing its torso. As the doll was desperately flailing to free itself, he quickly put his foot on the doll, before pulling the sword out of it and swiftly chopping the head off its body and causing its body to cease all movement.