Just like I did with the rock, I started examining the stick as soon as Guen gave it to me.

Using [Identify], I got some options on how to use this stick, but most of them did not sound very appealing — using it like a javelin would probably not be any better than throwing a rock. Sword was probably my best option.

I held the branch the same way a seasoned warrior would hold his trusty sword, and something instantly clicked.

It felt familiar. It felt comfortable. Although I had just spawned, it felt as if I had been using swords for years now. It did not feel like a stick in my hands, but more like an extension of my arm. It felt natural.

It was probably my imagination, but I felt a slight aura making a circle on my feet for half a second. A small gust of wind blowing upwards and messing my hair.

I repositioned myself into what I assumed would be a proper fighting stance and tested it out.

A slash to the right. Another one to the left, followed by an upswing.

Fast. Crisp. Precise. Smooth like butter. Every swing felt better than the previous one. The sound of the stick cutting through the air was like music to my ears.

I stopped and looked back at Guen with a confident smile.

"This is my weapon."

"Seems like it," Guen agreed.

"Alright, now that you are not completely dead weight, let's head into the forest. Let's get you your first prey."

My first prey, huh? I liked the sound of it.

"Let's go."

We walked into the forest. I had forgotten how much darker it was in there. I could barely see at first, but my eyes got used to it, eventually.

From the moment we stepped in, I noticed the forest had a diverse wildlife. Birds ranging from pigeons to hawks on the higher tree branches. Squirrels, rabbits, and snakes hiding in tree hollows. And on the ground, though far in the distance, I saw a few different potential threats walking around, like foxes, orangutans and good ol' boars.

"What is the lowest level species? I should probably start from there"

I was eager to fight, to prove to myself that I could do it, but after yesterday's incident, I decided to be a bit more cautious and pick my battles more carefully.

"You see this one over there?" Guen pointed at a red fox with a white neck a few meters away. "These are the weakest ones, almost always level 1 — they are lucky if they get to level 2."

Although foxes mostly hunt other animals like rabbits to eat, this one seemed content with eating the grass from the ground instead, which seemed to confirm what the Elven girl just said.

"You think you got it?" she asked.

"Pretty sure I do," I replied confidently.

I looked at the unsuspecting animal; I held the branch tightly with both my hands and I focused on it. In the current circumstances, going for a hit on the head or under the jaw would be my best bet. I inhaled deeply, then exhaled again. Repeated this for a couple of seconds to make myself calm down.

I started walking towards the fox and slowly building up speed.

Right.

Left.

Right.

Left.

Right, left, right, left, right, leftrightleftrightleft

Before I knew it, I was running full speed. Less than a moment later, I was one breath away from the fox, leaned forward. My face barely an inch from its teeth. My eyes looking straight into its eyes. I could feel its breath on my nose. My arms stretched far back behind, holding the stick parallel to the ground.

With one swift, fluid motion, I lifted my torso back up and swinged my weapon upwards, hitting the fiend straight on the jaw. A current of air blew up towards the sky as I landed a devastating blow at the beast. Before it had any time to react, the fox's jaw was smashed to pieces and detached from the rest of its head, leaving the animal's tongue hanging loosely.

The pain lasted only a couple of seconds as the animal collapsed shortly after, losing its consciousness and later on its life.

I stood straight up and turned back to look at Guen. The few blots of blood on my face made a beautiful contrast with the dark blue color of my hair.

Guen's jaw had also dropped to the ground, this time figuratively.

I grabbed the fox by the back of its neck and dragged it all the way to the outskirts of the forest.

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"I think we can use this for food later," I said, throwing the fox's lifeless body on the ground, barely out of the forest. "Although I could eat it now personally — I'm suddenly starving."

"You are kidding me, right?" Guen said.

"What?"

"What 'what'? You killed that thing with one blow!"

"Well, yeah, I am level 2 and it was only level 1, it makes sense that it would be an easy battle."

"It was a level 10, you idiot!"

"What!? There's no way!"

I used [Identify] on the fox.

[Wild Fox - Lvl. 10 - Dead]

No, this can't be right. Maybe I did not read this correctly. Maybe both of us didn't. I used [Identify] again.

[Wild Fox - Lvl. 10 - Dead]

How was this even possible? Yesterday I almost died from a Level 6 pig and today I took down a Level 10 fox in a single blow? There must had been something wrong.

Well, even if something was wrong, it felt very good. That's what I was craving all this time. Albeit it would be far more interesting if the fight did not end so abruptly, I could not say 'no' to a one-hit kill.

Guen's voice made me snap out of my thoughts.

"Hey, stupid, are you going to keep all your notifications for when you go to sleep at night again?"

She was right; I failed to notice once again, but I had a bunch of different notifications minimized, waiting to pop up.

Defeated [Wild Fox - Lvl. 10]!

Huh, I never noticed this notification. This also shows that the fox was indeed a level 10 creature.

Congratulations! You leveled up!

[Anthir - Lvl. 2] -> [Anthir - Lvl. 3]

Gained 6 Stat Points!

Available Stat Points: 7

Congratulations! You leveled up!

[Anthir - Lvl. 3] -> [Anthir - Lvl. 4]

Gained 6 Stat Points!

Available Stat Points: 13

Congratulations! You leveled up!

[Anthir - Lvl. 4] -> [Anthir - Lvl. 5]

Gained Stat Points!

Available Stat Points: 19

Congratulations!

Learned New Ability: [Gale Slash - Lvl. 1]!

Okay, there's no doubt after that. The fox actually was a Level 10 creature. I wouldn't have gotten a level up by defeating a singular Level 1 creature. And I just got three of them! Plus, I learned a new ability!

"Hey, I got three levels from that!" I said, excited, at Guen. "So many stat points; how do you think I should use them?"

"Put them all in wisdom; maybe you'll finally stop being stupid."

Why did I even ask?

I added two more points in each category and kept the rest for later.

Again, I felt that sudden euphoric feeling of warm stew, starting from my mouth and going to my whole body from there. I felt bigger, better, faster, smarter, stronger. But I also felt annoyed.

"Why did you tell me it was a level 1 fox if you knew it was a level 10?" Now that I was starting to calm down, I realized this could have gone terribly wrong.

"I thought it would be funny," Guen said. "Instead, you went and did whatever that was. You are not supposed to be able to do something like this at level 2. Where did you learn that?"

"I don't know. I just... did it. I did not think much about it. I was looking at the fox, trying to pinpoint its weaknesses, and suddenly everything went black. Next thing I knew, the fox was dead on the ground next to me"

"Well, you better do it again, 'cause there's another one," Guen said and pointed at a fox further down the forest with her head. "This one's weaker, only level 7."

Do it again, huh? Sure, why not. I was definitely up for another round. Eating could wait for later.

I looked at myself, looked back at the fox, and focused.

"One more time"

Same procedure. I ran towards the fox, increasing my speed more and more.

Same attack. This upswing felt really natural to me.

Different result. This time, once the branch hit the fox's face, it broke in two and fell on the ground. The fox barely felt the hit. Didn't even budge. Instead, it turned to me and mauled my face.

I fell on the ground, feeling excruciating pain from the new wounds I just got on my cheeks and forehead. The beast jumped on me and started biting my stomach, ripping my organs out one by one, hungrily devouring everything it could.

Guen was thankfully there to save me... Again...

She unseathed the small blade on her waist and in less than a second she got next to me, slicing the fox's neck open. A mixture of blood and saliva fell on my shirt, followed by the fox itself afterwards.

Defeated [Wild Fox - Lvl. 7]!

It hurt like hell, but at least I was safe now.

I thought of my pouch, which appeared right on top of the fox, which was on top of me, making the potion inside almost fall out and to the ground and break.

I took the glass bottle in my hands, removed the cork and hastily drank the heavenly red juice that was inside. The pain instantly got away and my wounds closed. Hopefully, there would be no scars left, either. I pushed the dead body away and sat up.

"What the fuck!" I said in shock, now that I was able to talk again.

"Guess it was just a fluke," Guen sighed and shrugged as she lifted the second dead fox on her right shoulder. "That's probably enough for today. Let's go back out."

On the bright side, we now had hunted down two foxes. That was pretty nice, since I was starving so much I was pretty sure I could eat a whole one of them by myself

We went back to the place we had camped. The fire had naturally died out and we needed to make a new one. Guen was able to light a new fire with surprising ease — she had probably done it a lot of times before.

The animals were cooked after a while and we were finally able to sit down and relax. A lot of things were going through my mind. A lot of questions I had that made me feel overwhelmed. Plus, I still had my stats to distribute at some point.

The taste of the poorly cooked fox meat felt divine. It was almost as good as the feeling I got when I distributed my stat points and I dug straight in; couldn't lift my head for even a second.

For a few minutes, the only thing that could be heard were the fire burning alongside us and the sound of teeth ripping into flesh, followed by the sound of chewing.

Then, when I had at least slightly satisfied my hunger, I stopped for a moment and asked Guen, who was equally absorbed in the piece of meat in front of her.

"Isn't it weird? I got three levels today from killing a single level 10 fox, but barely got one level from that level 6 boar."

"Well," she said while still having a mouthful of fox thigh. "You would have gotten more levels if you actually did something. I was impressed you even got [Exp] at all. It bumping into the tree when you dodged probably counted as damage you inflicted to it, since it was intentional."

There I had it. And I was starting to think that I did do some damage with my punch after all. Bummer.

"At least we won't have to fight the foxes or the boar again next time we head into the forest," I said trying to break the awkward silence that was starting to form again.

She gave me a confused look, which was then replaced by a look that basically said "Oh right, you were literally born yesterday."

"Of course we will have to face them again. This forest is a dungeon"