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A well placed straight punch right into the face of the monster rabbit and it was enough. My punch carried the same amount of force as the rock that I used to defeat the rabbits before.

The life left its body as the other rabbits watched. Of course they didn’t watch for long, they too turned to attack immediately.

Now, I would’ve preferred to have taken them on one by one if this was a few hours ago, but now was different.

With the HP being around eighty, my physical strength had doubled already and it was clearly visible.

This nest that I’m fighting right now is already the second one, with the help of a huge amount of Qi, it is quite easy to move around in the forest.

Even if I run out of Qi, with the regeneration speed of 0.1/sec, I can easily recover enough to sprint all the way back to the cave. I, at first naively thought that I would be able to keep this up for a long time, but I soon noticed the penalty that came with it.

Sure, the first two round trips were normal, I would run to the nest, hunt the rabbit and then make maybe two trips to carry all the bodies back to the cave.

I wasn’t worried about some beast taking these away from here.

First the problem that aroused was pretty easy to notice, it was that my HP was slowly decreasing even though I wasn’t really taking any damage from the rabbits.

It turns out that I may have been overexerting my skill quite a lot and my body has taken quite the toll, evident by my heavy breathing that has slowly increased by the time.

I can guess that this overexertion is similar to the fatigue that also reduces my health over time.

So even though my Qi increased and my body changed due to it, it is still way behind the Qi which is only going to increase with time.

I also finally figured out how DEF works, the higher the number, the more the damage needs to be done to overcome it. If someone wanted to hurt me, then they will have to deal damage more than the DEF stat only then would it have any effect. Otherwise everything would feel like a gentle tap.

The last thing I figured out was EXP, apparently every enemy I fight will give me different kinds of EXP depending on how I fought and used a skill. I already guessed this as I was fighting the rabbit yesterday, but I was able to confirm it now.

So, for example, if I defeated a rabbit using nothing but a simple fist, then I would’ve learned nothing and because of this the EXP received would also be miniscule.

This was the reason why I was taking so much time even though I have the power to blow them away in one punch.

Right now, I’m surrounded by a bunch of rabbits who have circled around me and won’t give even an inch to get out. Unfortunately for them, I don’t want to get out.

[Sprint]

With the skill activated, I jumped back to dodge the sudden head butt of the rabbit in front of me.

The reason I used [Sprint] wasn’t to run but move quickly, this skill allowed me to take precise and sharp moves despite being meant for just running away.

Using this skills not only makes me faster, it even makes my reaction speed faster. The attack that I wouldn’t be able to dodge normally, I can easily dodge being in the effect of the skill.

Since the activation only takes 10 Qi, I can afford to use it in such quick succession.

A few others try to keep up but they are unable to and very quickly I make quick work of the 10 or so rabbits surrounding me. It was a pretty good number as I didn’t find that many rabbits in the previous nest.

[Sprint has reached level 4]

[Qi has increased by 10]

[30 EXP gained.]

[20 EXP gained.]

[40 EXP gained.]

[10 EXP gained.]

[1 EXP gained.]

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[5 EXP gained.]

…

This continued for a few more seconds and then a familiar screen greeted me.

Name: Grant Steele

Lv.3 [94/300]

HP: 87/87

MP: 0/0

BA: 0/0

QI: 36/130 [0.1/sec]

DEF: 35

Skills: Sprint Lv.4, Cold Resistance Lv.2, Qi Manipulation Lv.1, Qi Regeneration Lv.1

Looks like the levelling of my skills also depends on the way I use it, I guess I can’t just repeatedly use a skill to level it up.

Looking at my stats, even though I’m happy looking at it, I also worry if my Qi is moving too far ahead of my HP.

I think I really need to find a better way of increasing my HP without the help of a level up. That painful experience, no matter how useful it was, was still fresh in my mind.

There was still one more nest remaining but the sun was about to set and since I had no intention of going rabbit hunting in the middle of the night, I ran back to my cave, I needed two rounds to carry the bodies as well.

I don’t know how many days it has been since I came here but I’ve already run out of the food I had with me, with my sprinting here and there I had no choice.

So for a while now, no matter how disgusting, I’ll had to make do with the rabbit meat. I guess my body just got used to it.

I could only regrettably look at the lake, if it weren’t frozen over, I could’ve fished and if not fished, many beasts would’ve visited this place for water as well, I would’ve had more choices in terms of food.

Of course, all of this is nothing but my frustrated thoughts, if I had been in a clear state of mind then I would’ve noticed it, the faint shadow moving under the thin sheet of ice.

…

The next day, I was ready to take on the last nest of rabbits that I had found but when I reached the location I didn’t expect to see what was waiting for me there.

With the size of an ox, claws bigger than my own hand and blood-red eyes similar to the rabbits. Something hideous was already waiting for me.

Its fur was a different shade than the other rabbits, most of them had light brown fur, but this one had purple. Looks like it was the leader of this nest.

If this beast wasn’t enough, it had surrounded itself with almost 20 or more of the smaller rabbits. Clearly they have been waiting for me.

Although I’m confident in defeating the smaller ones, I don’t think the purple boss would let me do that.

While I backed away a little and gave myself some space to think of a strategy, the boss didn’t do that, seeing me back away it must have assumed that I was trying to run away.

Since he didn’t want that, he made his move as fast as possible, which was very fast considering it was right in front of my face in the time it took for me to take a step back.

Thankfully, I got used to using my [Sprint] in small spaces. I jumped to the side and let the beast pass me barely missing me by a few millimetres.

I felt my hair stand on end on how close it was.

I didn’t want to daze out and give this beast another chance, so with the fact that it was behind me right now, I used my leg which was still in the effect of [Sprint] and kicked the back of its head as hard as I could.

As it stumbled forward, the smaller rabbits all came together to attack me all at once. Unfortunately for them, they can’t do anything.

Knowing how fast the beast is and how many rabbits there are, I quickly defeated the smaller ones without caring much about the EXP that I was getting.

I also had to dodge the attacks of the beast but its attack did little to hurt me but it did accidently hurt a few of its own.

Clearly, the beast didn’t care about its peers as well.

Now that I was constantly dodging its attacks, I started to see a pattern in it. It wasn’t a smart animal by any chance, so the fact that it would try to use the same technique again and again despite seeing that it wasn’t working was good for me.

This was also a very good chance to improve myself, I was making far less movement than I had started with as I was purposefully letting the fight drag out.

The smaller rabbits had finally moved away from our fight as multiple of them had fallen victims to their leader’s failed attacks.

I stopped using [Sprint] a while ago as well, there was no need to. More than anything, I wanted my actual body to get used to its speed. When I started getting the hang of the movements I use during [Sprint], although not perfectly, it was then when I decided to stop dragging this out.

It was exhausted and fatigue was visible on its hideous face.

It had stopped charging at me, so for the first time since this fight began, I attacked.

[Sprint]!

With the full force of the skill, coupled with the strength of my body pushing down on the ground, I leaped forwards, almost flying towards its face.

It must’ve had the same face as I did when I was first attacked.

With my right leg performing a round house kick, I kicked the side of its head and a loud cracking sound was heard.

My leg didn’t stop even after that, it made a full round as my body spun around in mid-air and I barely stopped myself from falling over after landing.

The beast’s neck had twisted in a way that wasn’t anatomically possible, so it was probably dead.

To confirm this, its limp body fell down to the ground.

[250 EXP gained.]

[Skill: Qi Regeneration is now level 2.]

Name: Grant Steele

Lv.4 [44/600]

HP: 96/96

MP: 0/0

BA: 0/0

QI: 75/143 [0.2/sec]

DEF: 35

Skills: Sprint Lv.4, Cold Resistance Lv.2, Qi Manipulation Lv.1, Qi Regeneration Lv.2

I had quite the satisfied smile looking at my status. I suddenly remembered the way I was when I first come here.

“I think I’ve made good progress.”

But it was sad knowing that DEF doesn’t increase with level. Looks like I’ll really have to think of a way to increase my only resistance skills level.

“Should I just sleep outside?”