With some rest, Noy decided to move again.

“The dagger previously flew out of my hands. This will be a big problem in the future if I meet someone stronger.”

After thinking for a while, “Maybe I should wrap the chains around my forearm. This way the dagger will never go out of my hands and even if it goes far away, I can just recall it using mana.”

He then channeled the mana into the chain of the dagger and it grew large in length, “I need to keep channeling the mana for it to remain its size. I should ask Akriel for the chained dagger with the large chain enough to wrap around my forearm.”

Noy rolled the chains around both of his hands one by one and held the daggers in both of his hands.

“Alright, now I am ready to go.”

This time he stumbled upon a large snake devouring something. It had a mouthful and a bloated neck while the tail still stuck out of its mouth. It looks like it had just swallowed a large creature. He wanted to attack while it was at its weakest. But he didn't want to provoke it either. So he made sure that his body is well hidden by bushes and trees and waited patiently until it was fully preoccupied.

The snake continued digesting its meal as it slowly slithered away. Noy then took the chance and charged at it with its dagger. The snake tried to defend itself but eventually gave up after being stabbed several times as it couldn't do much with its mouth occupied.

If the snake tried to use its tail to hit Noy, he would just back up and strike with his chained daggers propelling him near the snake again.

After his continuous stab, it fell unconscious on the ground.

"It's over! Umbra!!"

The light energy surrounded his dagger and stabbed its body with all his might. It had tough scales but dent by dent, he managed to fully pierce it.

"Phew... this was easy." The blood poured out and it instantly killed the snake. He again felt like he got stronger after he killed that snake. It was weird but he welcomed it.

He moved on but suddenly he could hear the chewing noises behind him. It was coming from where he killed the snake.

There stood a mature human-length rabbit who was eating the dead snake. It was only consuming the insides of the snake.

Noy wanted to kill the rabbit as well when it was eating. So he charged at it but it detected him and quickly jumped away.

He noticed that it had glaring red eyes and stared angrily at Noy. Its head was huge which reminded him of an antelope.

Like previously, he charged toward it with his dagger.

The rabbit was fast and double-jumped in the air. It was like there was a floor in the air from where it jumped.

Noy casted a fireball followed by the lightning spell while it was in the air. Instantaneously, the rabbit again double-jumped and went straight for him.

Panicking, Noy shielded himself with his dagger and narrowly blocked it. From there on, it bombarded Noy with its claws at a very fast rate. He barely kept up with its tremendous speed.

“I should’ve worked on my agility. This isn't good..."

Noy could feel his stamina running low and his mana dropping steadily. He was using up all his strength to block the attacks of the rabbit. His face was getting scratched by its sharp claws with some wounds on his arms and legs.

He quickly healed himself with a healing spell and casted a fireball right after. The rabbit swiftly backed away.

Noy took a deep breath with concentrated eyes and stood in an attacking stance with the dagger aimed right at the rabbit. In a split second, the rabbit's head fell to the ground as Noy stood behind it. Immediately after, blood started pouring out of Noy's mouth.

It appeared as if Noy had teleported behind the rabbit. The dagger slice couldn't even be seen by the average human.

He had used wind slash which was a higher-level dagger technique that he learned from Akriel for dire situations. It takes a heavy toll on his 11-year-old body which was why he didn't use it in earlier fights.

There was hardly any mana left in his body and the chains around his forearm shrank. He had to replenish his mana before he would be able to cast a healing spell.

He closed his eyes and his breathing became more stable as he regained his calmness. He focused on gathering mana from the surrounding.

After enough mana was accumulated, he concealed himself.

“Heal!”

He healed his wounds and rested for a while.

He again felt like he got stronger. He was delighted with this unexpected growth. However, it wasn't the moment to be happy, he was frustrated by his weakness.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Carefully looking back, he thought of how he could have fought better.

"I am not quick enough, I have to work on my agility. Another thing I didn't do was think of the strategy. Why was I just blindly charging in without sizing up the opponent? I should think more carefully from now on. I should also account for all the magic spells that I have learned and make better use of them."

"How did that rabbit double jump through the air? I also want to learn that." Noy became curious, "Akriel said that all the higher spells are derived from basic spells. So, I should be able to replicate it in theory."

What Noy didn't know was that the monsters had their own skills made for their physique. While there were skills like hardening which had been recreated before, unique skills only specific to that monster had never been replicated by humans.

Noy wondered, "It has to be air-related spells. So, maybe I should tweak aerial wave first to see if it works."

He wanted to make it stay still so he could jump up it. This was the most logical conclusion that he could come to.

The aerial wave was a sharp airwave attack spell in a boomerang shape in a designated direction.

After half an hour of trying to make the aerial wave stay still, he stopped doing it and gave up. He thought this wasn't it.

"Since the aerial wave is an attack-specific spell, I don't think it will work. Maybe I should try defense or neutral spell." then a curious smile came to his face, "That's it."

He used steel wind which created a vertical wall of air in front of him. He kicked toward it and it threw him back.

Noy had a smile on his face, "Okay. I am going in the right direction. Now all I need to do is adjust its angle and length where I want it to be."

After altering the spell and practicing it for a couple of hours, he finally managed to create the skill to double jump.

He braced himself and jumped in the air. Then he bent his knee while in the air and made another jump. Afterward, he successfully landed on the ground.

"Yes!!!" Noy jumped with joy, "Now I just need to repeat the process and I can do unlimited double jumps making it triple jump, quadruple jump, and so on hahaha..."

He had succeeded. Noy became the first human to recreate the unique skills of monsters.

"Now I need to master it. I should try it out while fighting a monster next time."

***

Noy was going along the way looking for an opponent to fight when he spotted a pack of wolves sniffing grass like they were searching for something.

He didn't want to run from them anymore. If he did then he would never be able to call himself strong. So he decided to face them head-on and settle it once and for all.

He went up close to them when he noticed a new wolf different from the other wolves. It had red-colored furs with a little larger build compared to other wolves that had dark grey furs.

"It must be a leader of these wolves." Noy thought to himself.

The wolves got suspicious when they saw him coming closer and started growling at him in response. They were ready to tear him apart the moment they get the chance.

One of the wolves tried to attack him, but he easily dodged it and sliced it in half with his dagger. Then another wolf attacked him and he punched one of its eyes out before slicing it like butter.

"Wow!" this was the moment Noy thought to himself that he had really progressed and came a long way from being that weak boy who left his sister and ran away, to the Noy now who was standing here killing these wolves like it was nothing.

The red wolf growled loudly and came face to face with Noy. It looked really pissed off. But this didn't psyche Noy out. He had already resolved his mind to fight them since the beginning.

It charged at full speed toward Noy and lumped in with its large claws set to rip him apart. Its speed was comparable to the rabbit that he faced earlier.

Noy evaded the incoming attack and kicked the wolf in the stomach. It made it drop on its back with a loud thud. The red wolf quickly recovered and backed away.

There were three more wolves behind the red wolf and they pounced at Noy in an attempt to take him down.

" I'm outnumbered," Noy said to himself as he began dodging attacks from those wolves. One of them got too close and he blocked the attack with the dagger and punched it in the face.

The wolf staggered backwards and fell onto its belly. Noy followed it and stabbed it right through its belly. The wolf passed away instantly.

Just then, another one of the wolves charged at Noy from the front. This time, Noy ducked under it and sliced it diagonally.

"I can do this!" Noy thought to himself.

"But there are still a dozen more wolves in front of me excluding the red wolf."

Noy turned around just in time for the other wolf to charge at him from behind. He used this opportunity to evade the attack and rolled under the wolf's body. He grabbed hold of the wolf's neck and pulled it towards him while driving it deeper into the ground.

Wolf cried in pain and was desperately trying to flee from his grasp. But Noy held it hardly by his neck. Soon after, the wolf lost consciousness and died as it was driven to the ground continuously. This created a cracked crater around where the wolf died.

The red wolf became hesitant now that it had seen its brethren be killed mercilessly. As it was contemplating whether to attack or not, Noy jumped in closer by dodging two wolves that simultaneously attacked him with a triple jump.

With a bloodshot eye, Noy imbued his dagger with the light aura and sliced at the red wolf. It couldn't dodge fast enough and lost an eye to that slash.

The red wolf growled again loudly and a ball of what seemed like mana gathered around its mouth. It then shot at Noy with a laser beam at lightning speed like a dragon breath. This was what separated the red wolf from the other wolves around it.

Noy had a bad feeling about that attack. However, it was too late to sidestep it.

"Mana shield!!" Noy shouted as a light barrier formed around him. He wasn't sure if this was enough to defend himself from the attack but it was worth the try.

The attack continuously beamed at Noy and a crack started to appear in his mana shield. It was chipping away the barrier slowly but surely.

Just then, he noticed that the red wolf needed to stay in a single place without moving. He wanted to use this to his advantage.

“Umbra!!!”

Again, a light aura gathered around the dagger in his hand but this time there was a hint of lightning swirling around the sword. He enhanced the length of the dagger’s chain and flung it straight toward the red wolf which eventually stabbed the wolf and the laser beam stopped. The dagger then retracted into his hand.

Noy got closer to it and the blood was continuously flowing through its body. It had died and he had emerged victorious in this battle but there was no room to rest.

There were still quite a few wolves standing alive staring at Noy. So, he continued fighting until there were no more wolves around him.

When he finally got rid of those monsters, he collapsed on the ground and took a deep breath. His body felt heavy, but his mind was calm and cool.

This time he had killed more than a dozen monsters all at the same time. So, he felt an enormous increase in his power both in terms of physical and magical.

“Maybe my power always increases every time I kill a monster but I am not too sure if this is the case. I should ask Akriel about this to be certain."

He felt very pleased that he killed the monsters that he previously ran away from. Thus with a satisfied smile on his face, he continued his journey to fight more monsters and get stronger.