Chapter 3 – Water and Escape

Night had come, and everything quietened down. There were no more birds chirping, only some annoying bugs screaming into the night.

He waited patiently, being parched made it difficult for him to focus, but the fear of being hunted the moment he approached that river kept his desires in check.

This proved to be the right call, as not long after, carnivorous animals walked out of the bushes and hydrated themselves on the river water. He nearly went pale after seeing the amount of animals. There was an entire pack of wolves sipping on the moving water!

He waited inside his bush, breathing as quietly as possible. Soon he heard a rumble and the earth shook. Again and Again.

He was startled and looked around only to find a sleuth of bears. There were only a few large bears, but many small cubs trodding along the rocky path.

Their eyes met and the wolves growled towards the bears while the bears growled lowly back.

Both groups stopped and tried to intimidate each other, neither of them backing out. The wolves got more aggressive as they howled and barked while snapping their mouths at the bears. Bears thumped and slapped their paws on the ground huffing at them.

Finally, one of the wolves couldn't take it anymore and dashed towards the bear. The bear scoffed at the wolf and slammed his paw onto the wolf, instantly putting him in a near death state. The injured wolf whined, but couldn't move. The bear [Howled] at the wolves and they finally ran away with their tails between their legs.

Satisfied, the mama bear guided their young towards the river to let them drink. She was alert in case the wolves returned. It took a good 2 hours for them to leave this place because her young loved to play inside the water and hunt for the moving fish.

The forest quietened down again, but he was still sceptical. He waited again to see if something or someone would try to approach the river. Fortunately, his ears didn't pick up any sound for a while.

He approached the river to have a drink. The water hurt his throat, since his throat was too dry and sandy. He ignored that feeling gulping down the river water awkwardly as he couldn't just take a cup and drink it. It was also impossible for him to slurp it, so the only thing he could think of was to burrow his whole head into the water and 'suck' the water.

It was a mild success as he was choking quite a lot when it went inside the wrong pipe, but eventually, he got the hang of it and sated his thirst. He could feel eyes on him, but since he didn't know from where and who, he didn't know what to make of them. Should he treat every gaze as hostile? Or should he wait until they make some kind of move? But what if they are faster than he is and he is just a sitting duck?

He didn't know the answers to these questions, so he sneaked around towards the still not dead wolf. He lowered himself to approach the wolf, the wolf growled at him, attempting to scare Aiko away as he was too injured to move. That didn't discourage him and he stared at his prey. He needed to eat, but considering how dangerous the bounties of the forest were... He couldn't risk getting poisoned again, it would be much safer if he preyed on the injured wolf's meat.

Aiko was careful with his approach, the wolf was snapping at him, trying to scare him or bite him to death. He started timing the wolf's snaps and jumped at his throat to kill him. Unfortunately, as he was a weak little Fox Cub, he was unable to kill him or mortally wound him. This scared him and made him jumped away quickly as the wolf's sharp teeth approached his spine.

-5HP

The teeth grazed and injured him, bringing him back down to a low HP... yet again. He was upset at the dying wolf's tenacity, but since he was weak and now also injured, he couldn't really do much about it...

Aiko found a place nearby between the rocks that could barely fit him and he just stared at the wolf without blinking.

This attitude pissed off the wolf. He couldn't accept that his corpse would be feasted upon by an insolent fox cub! In a fit of rage, he had a stupor of low howling and growling towards Aiko, only to be ignored until he breathe his last, which took several grueling hours...

[Congratulations on your first kill!]

He was... shocked? He couldn't understand how this would be considered killing someone.

[If killing could be done only with strength and power, then most snakes and other venomous creatures wouldn't be able to survive in this plane.]

Suddenly, the system flatly answered his question, as if she was conversing with an idiot.

Ignoring the fact that the system could read his mind, he was greatly upset by this. Shouldn't all systems be helpful and useful for their owners?! This was the first time he had some kind of system, but it felt way different than the ones he had seen in his previous life's... games? What's a game? Either way, he also wasn't the greatest when it came to the animal kingdom...

[You have gained a Level.][You have gained a Level.][You have gained a Level.]...

The system resumed its rewards and bestowed everything upon him.

[You have demonstrated a courageous feat above your grade!][System has rewarded you with Title: [Courageous]][Would you like to acquire [Courageous]?]

He naturally said yes after checking the effects.

[You have acquired [Courageous]!][Title: Courageous][Gives the User a flat 1 Vitality, Strength, Agility and 1 Vitality, Strength, and Agility per level.][####]

[You have gained access to [Skill Shop]!]

[

Name: AikoSpecies: [Ordinary Red Fox Cub(Female)]Age: 0.08Beast Rank: AnimalLevel: 3 -> 9Title: [Foul-mouthed], [Agile], [Brave], [Courageous]

Stats:

HP: 1/10 -> 29/38ST: 3/6 -> 15/18

Vitality: 2/7 -> 2/29Vigour: 3 -> 9Toughness: 7 -> 19Strength: 7 -> 29Agility: 11 -> 33Dexterity: 3 -> 9Mind: 3 -> 9Insight: -Beauty: -Luck: -

Stat Points: 2 -> 8Skill Points: 2 -> 8

Skills: [Dig: Lv.1], [Bite: Lv.1], [Scratch: Lv.1],

Blessings: [Blessing of the Ancestral Nine-Tailed Fox], [Blessing of the Ancestral Phoenix],

Items: [Introduction to the Mortal Realm]

]

He felt like his mind got clearer than before and he could think much better now. This was unfortunately not the time to dilly-dally and he returned to the wolf to munch on him.

He had a hard time going through his fur pelt, but once he activated [Bite] it felt like chewing on very tough skin. Eventually, he managed to expose a bit of meat.

[Bite: Lv.1 -> 2]

His bite increased in level and he tried to bite again, it was noticeably easier to bite through the fur pelt this time, but he also noticed his Stamina decreasing faster. However, it didn't quite feel like a linear increase, the effectiveness was a lot greater, while the stamina usage only increased gently.

He munched on the pink meat. He was worried that it would taste bland since it's a raw meat, but surprisingly it was quite... no, very delicious.

[EXP gained.]

It definitely was not because he got experience, definitely not!

[Level: 9 -> 10]

[Newbie protection disabled.][Your HP won't regenerate through increasing your Max HP.][Your ST won't regenerate through increasing your Max ST.][Your presence suppression was removed.][You are eligible for [Evolution Tree].][You have reached Level 10! [Welcome Package] obtained.][You can now evolve into different species.]

Aiko felt a chill down his spine as many eyes focused on him. He could hear owls and other nocturnal birds singing in the night with eyes on him.

Aiko immediately dashed away, ignoring his stamina usage, since he got quite a bit of it. He dashed towards the river, feeling something approaching him from behind and he dived inside it.

The presence disappeared soon after, but he still felt eyes on him. He dove under the water and let the current wash him away, only sometimes floating above the water level to take a breather. Noticing that his stamina would decrease greatly after being underwater for a certain period, so he timed his submerging and floating with this, reducing his stamina usage.

Aiko was like this until the sun was emerging on the horizon and he finally felt like he was not being hunted.

The river washed him onto a sandy beach. Well, it wasn't really a beach, since this wasn't a true sea. Not to mention, it was so small that nobody would mistake it for a beach. But Aiko was so small that it looked like a large beach.

Aiko was weak and shivering. He spent too much time inside the water to avoid his predators, causing his body to cool down too much. Fortunately, there was an air drift of hot and dry air coming from the downstream.

He lay there letting the sun and air dry him as he was too weak to walk. He spent all his stamina during his 'swimming' so he was too exhausted to do anything.

Aiko looked at his system. Pleased with the increase in stats. He could also open [Skill Shop] and [Evolution Tree]

He opened [Skill Shop] first to properly check it.

[Skill Shop;Page 1/94637218Number of items per page: 50

[Passive Skill: Acrobatics]Price: 1 Skill Point[Skill: Dash]Price: 1 Skill Point[Skill: Jump]Price: 1 Skill Point[Skill: Dig]Price: 1 Skill Point...

You can [Hide] already owned Active/Passive Skills.]

He looked at the shop, his mind hurt, seeing so many pages. He naturally hid those that he already had, but still clicked on the last page, wondering what he might find there. It was his habit when visiting forums on... on what? What was the forum again?

[Skill Shop;Page 94637218/94637218Number of items per page: 50

[####]Price: ####[####]Price: ####[####]Price: ####

You can [Hide] already owned Active/Passive Skills.]

A disappointment. He wished he could see what those things were, but it didn't seem like the system would allow it. He got back on the first page, revising his options and scrutinizing them.

Aiko currently had 10 Skill points. It seemed like every 10th Level he would get 2 points instead of one, which was nice.

Aiko found quite a lot of them that he could purchase. He guessed that there were thousands of pages that he could pick from, but he needed Insight and Mind for that book and some kind of skills to make him less visible...

His mind was overheating from the number of information he tried to process. Aiko cursed in his mind that he couldn't think that much further ahead and closed the store with a frown.

He clicked on the [Evolution Tree] next.[Bengal Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 20 Vigour to see more]

[Blanford's Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 50 Agility to see more]

[Cape Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 50 Agility to see more]

[Corsac Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 20 Vigour and Toughness to see more]

[Tibetan Sand Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 30 Vigour and Toughness to see more]

[Arctic Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 30 Vigour and Agility to see more]

[Kit Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 15 Vigour to see more]

[Pale Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 20 Vigour to see more]

[Rüppell's Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 20 Vigour and Agility to see more]

[Swift Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Need 25 Vigour and Agility to see more]

[Fennec Fox][Rarity: Worthless][Beast Rank: Animal][Click to see more]