Alex spends the entire morning of his second day in his personal space getting familiar with the {Energy Arrow} skill. Now he can hit the bull's-eye on the moving target 5 out of 10 times. He's also now able to cast the skill every time he tries. After feeling that he has made adequate preparation, Alex gets ready to head out once more. He puts on his leather cloth and trousers and straps his wooden sword on his waist.

....

A young man walks out of the barrier of Beginner Town and heads to the forest that lies to the south of the town. Alex plans to head deeper this time, to the territory of F**-ranked creatures. After walking for a couple hours and getting rid of 5 , Alex finds himself in a denser part of the forest. The trees in front of him are different than the trees behind him, creating a weird sort of line that separates the two parts of the forest. The trees in front of him are taller, thicker, and has denser leaves leaving minimal amount of "sunlight" shining through the gaps between them. Alex heightens his alertness as he knows that he has entered the territory of F-rank 2-star creatures as written in the UDA's information database.

His preparation and training before truly hasn't been for vain. He is now stronger than before. Alex didn't even need 5 minutes to get rid of one now. He also didn't need to enter the mana-enhanced state to get rid of one. An accurate use of {Energy Arrow} was enough to finish off the Forest Wolves.

Gripping the wooden sword with his right hand, Alex starts walking carefully into the unknown forest area in front of him. Alex hasn't even walked for 5 minutes when he hears a screech coming from the sky behind him. Without looking, Alex immediately rolls out of the way. From the corner of his eyes Alex can see a black shadow flying past his original position. The black shadow then slows down and stops on a tree branch. Alex also steadied his position and takes a fighting stance. He can now see that the black shadow is a black bird with a metallic-looking beak. Alex can see its information after using [Observe] to quickly confirm his suspicion.

As he suspected, it's the . This raven's length is around 1 meter, bigger than the common ravens on earth. According to the UDA's database, this bird is adept at sneak attacking, but it's cowardice nature also makes it easy to get spooked. Defenders who are not alert of their surrounding might lose their life to this bird without even realizing what hit them. But, it's also a coward as a small injury will make it flee away in fright. That's why it is very hard to kill this creature.

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The raven once again becomes a black shadow launching itself at Alex's position. Alex can easily see the bird's attack and moves his body to the side to avoid this attack. But this time Alex moves too early as the raven is able to respond and change its flight path midway to chase after Alex. Being surprised by this change, Alex has no time to dodge again. He raises his wooden sword to parry the raven's beak. The raven missed its target as it steered to the right. Alex can feel pain in his right hand that is holding the wooden sword. The force of the raven's charge has been reduced due to it changing direction midway, but it still hurts his palm when trying to directly meet its attack.

After this exchange, the immediately disappears into the dark forest. Alex was surprised to see this as he doesn't feel that the raven has received any injury. He suddenly remembers that in the UDA's database, it's also written that the is a cunning creature capable of tricking Defenders.

Alex keeps his fighting posture, waiting for the raven to launch another sneak attack. After waiting for 5 minutes, there is still no sign of the raven. Alex release his posture and starts walking again meanwhile being alert of his surrounding. A few seconds later the cunning raven launch a sneak attack from behind him. Alex, still alert, dodges this sneak attack by rolling out of the way. Alex can only see its shadow before it disappears again.

This happens a couple more times, driving Alex into frustration. This bird is really not easy to deal with. After thinking of how to fight this raven, Alex gets an idea that he has to try. He starts repeating the same thing, and the raven keeps attacking him sneakily. After a few times, Alex manages to get the timing of its sneak attack.

Alex starts walking again, but this time he's doing something different. Counting the timing, Alex then puts his right hand up in front of his chest, points his index and middle fingers upwards and starts chanting the {Energy Arrow} skill. Immediately after he finished forming the {Energy Arrow} above his two fingers, the bird attacks once more.

This time, being ready, Alex dodges quickly to the side and shoots the {Energy Arrow} into the calculated path of the . The arrow scratches the left wing of the raven and leaves a visible wound. Feeling the pain from its wing, the raven screeches loudly and quickly fly away, disappearing from Alex's sight once more.

Alex does the same thing once more, walking while preparing the {Energy Arrow} skill to try and kill the bird this time. But, even after the {Energy Arrow] disappears the raven doesn't show itself again. It seems like the wound has really frighten it this time.

"This d*mn bird, making me waste energy and time for nothing," Alex mumbles, cursing the raven.

After calming down and resting for a bit, Alex continues his hunt in the forest.