'Shit!'

Adrenaline exploded in Theo's veins.

This time, however, he didn't panic.

'Let's wait a little bit more…'

Standing at the bottom of his three-block hole, Theo merely needed to squat down a little to fully disappear amidst the grass.

Just to be sure, however, he quickly dug his shovel at his feet, removing just one more block while already switching over to the building vision.

Ready to drop down the roof and hurry up down, Theo leaned over the hole's edge, using the slight nighttime vision effect of the building overlay to scour the nearby woods.

Thankfully, the threat level didn't change, even as Theo's stillness and perfect silence stretched into nearly half a minute.

'…!'

Theo squinted his eyes, locking in on the distant presence.

Just like with his necklace, he could somewhat… feel something vague but in a rather clear direction. And by following this feeling, Theo's eyes quickly made out the boss's silhouette amidst the thick, high grasses of the forest's undergrowth.

'There you are.'

All of Theo's excitement died now in a single instant, his mind muting out all the spare details.

For several seconds, he just… observed everything there was to observe about this hog-sized rat with distinct, yellow sacks growing all over its back. The length of its claws, the structure of its skull, the size and likely sensitivity of its various senses…

Merely fifteen seconds into Theo's observation, however, the Oilrat stopped.

It sniffed the ground before raising its long, gray face and then locking its burning-red eyes in Theo's general direction.

'Don't you dare to move.'

Back on Earth, animals would be more attracted to movement than presence. And while Theo never had the chance to verify whether that was the case in this world or not…

The rat had yet to move.

For a few more tense moments, this weird, thickly shaped monster remained vigilant.

Neither the threat level nor the name of the area changed, though, providing Theo with just enough confidence to remain still.

Then, after what felt like a century, the monster slowly turned its head away, picking its pace as it lost interest.

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'Stay fucking still!'

Theo's instincts paralyzed all his muscles, stopping him from retreating to the safety of his hole to wait out the boss's patrol.

Swish!

The Oilrat nearly broke its neck, swinging its long head with such speed and force, the shockwave of this move sent several nearby trees falling.

Theo, however, kept perfectly still.

Finally, the Oilrat turned its head and started to walk off again, no longer bothering with the pretended retreat.

'Now, to time out its patrol…'

Slowly sliding down into his hole, Theo then turned his attention up and sealed the entrance. With his shovel at the ready, he then froze still with his eyes drawn to but one element of his interface.

[Threat level: Low]

'And now we wait.'

As valuable as the remaining daylight was, knowing the limits of his ability came first.

And so, Theo just waited, desperate to breathe as silently as he could.

There was no telling how the Oilrat could sense his presence. And so, until the threat notification would clear, Theo didn't dare to move a muscle.

In the end, the notification closed down on its own roughly five minutes after the boss left, giving Theo some deeper understanding of this ability's range.

Previously, the Oilrat took but a few seconds to cross from beyond the skill's detection range and get almost on top of Theo. Now, it took nearly five minutes for it to leave the skill's range.

'Judging by how I watched it walk away and assuming it kept that leisurely pace…'

Theo attempted to crack the information he obtained, turning it into something he could actually use…

'But who is there to tell it moves in a straight line?'

I closed my eyes and then started to dig directly down, moving one block to the side every two vertical blocks.

This made for quite the narrow passage, impossible for the Oilrat to dig through with ease while just spacious enough for Theo to easily climb through. A few moments later, he suddenly lost footing, falling roughly a meter only to land on the steps of the mineshaft he excavated before.

Safely deep underground, Theo could finally breathe a sigh of relief, only to look up the way he came.

"It would be best to measure how long it will take to loop its patrol route," I thought, only to grit my teeth and then start climbing straight back up, eager to make the most of the quite likely limited time I had.

Yet, even upon returning to the surface, Theo dared not to just… dart out to gather as much as he could before the Oilrat would return.

No.

Once near the surface enough, Theo descended a bit lower only to then dig an additional tunnel heading deeper into the forest - right where the Oilrat attempted to rat him out.

Those fallen trees were too much of a game changer for the young man to just ignore!

'Felling the trees is loud. I wouldn't be surprised if that's what initially alerted it before,' Theo thought, grinning as he mined through the calculated distance, only to then start digging up through the dirt.

And just like that, with one direct connection, Theo found himself at a spot where three trees conveniently fell, turning into a complicated maze of what parts of those trees to remove first, not to cause the entire thing to make a loud noise by collapsing.

But with the Oilrat out on patrol and his plan in need of quite a lot more wood than what Theo still had on himself, it was an opportunity he simply couldn't afford to waste!

'Now, let's start with this part here,' Theo thought, taking out his axe from the inventory before starting to lightly tap it against the trunk of the fallen tree.

The first cube of wood vanished into thin air. And right after, the top-most trunk heaved, the stress of the structure it was a part of now redistributing only to quickly settle… with the whole thing still in one piece!

'Phew,' resisting the desire to wipe the sweat off his face, Theo looked through the puzzle only to pinpoint another vulnerable part that he could safely remove.

'This might be scary, but the sooner I get this over with, the sooner I can go back to the safety of the mines!'