A Small Grenade ought to be enough to blow that mule's head off, right? No matter how strong it was, it was still flesh and blood... Hm?
That was what Zheng Yichen had thought, but the Unicorn Mule nimbly dodged the Small Grenade fired from his Hand Cannon, as if it had known he would suddenly pull a move like that. The grenade hit the ground and exploded. It didn't hurt the mule, but the noise made it restless.
The Unicorn Mule fixed its green eyes on Zheng Yichen and attacked again. Its nearly half-meter-long Sharp Horn thrust viciously toward him. Zheng Yichen had a Black Gun over two meters long in his hands, so against a straightforward thrust like this, he could surely... miss.
His thrusts had always been effective when he bullied small animals, but against this mule, the creature nimbly dodged them. Zheng Yichen's arm had nearly been pierced by its Sharp Horn, too.
After trying several times in a row, Zheng Yichen realized it was really hard to hit the mule. It seemed able to sense danger and avoid it, while its intermittent hissing kept distracting him and wearing down his nerves.
Although the creature was good at avoiding danger, after several exchanges left a few wounds on its body, it eventually returned to the Backpack. He walked over, picked up the Backpack, and took the shotgun hanging from it.
The mule had been licking the blood off its Sharp Horn with its tongue. It froze, then fixed its green eyes on Zheng Yichen with a reluctant look before turning and running off.
"? What the hell, don't go!!" Zheng Yichen couldn't stand watching the mule run away. He'd taken so many hits, and now the thing wanted to escape? It wasn't going anywhere without leaving him something first!
It ran, he chased... and couldn't catch up.
People in this world were generally pretty fit. To put it this way, Earth's fastest 100-meter sprint was 9.58 seconds, while a normal athlete in this world, without any abnormalities, could run it in 8.8 seconds... Zheng Yichen hadn't paid attention to that before, but a record-breaking run under nine seconds had made the news explode a while ago.
He'd glanced at the story and remembered it. That showed just how formidable the human physique in this world was. Zheng Yichen wasn't sure whether, having been reborn here and grown up from childhood, he counted as one of this world's people or had inherited that physical potential.
But he knew for certain that even if he had, he couldn't outrun a four-legged Abnormal Creature like the Unicorn Mule right now—even though he was an Abnormal Creature himself.
The Birdshot hit the mule in the rump. The thick-skinned creature didn't even look back; it just ran faster, soon disappearing from Zheng Yichen's sight. The forest wasn't a good place to give chase.
On the way out of the forest, Zheng Yichen grumbled to himself as he reloaded his gun. Birdshot was too weak. Slugs would work better against that thing, but he was afraid he'd miss.
The mule never showed up again. Instead, some hunters arrived, drawn by the noise. The nearby hunters had heard the commotion and come over. One look at the traces left behind was enough for the experienced hunters to figure out what had happened.
They didn't let their guard down when they saw Zheng Yichen's injuries. This was still outside the city, after all. It wasn't until Zheng Yichen showed them his Hunter License that the tension eased a little. The license was undeniably useful: it made dealing with the abnormal legal and legitimate, and it was also a great way to prove your identity.
The main reason was that they had internet access here. They could look up the number on the license and find the exact information that had been made public.
That included the registered name and records of the person's completed jobs, along with other information available to the public.
With only one job on record, Zheng Yichen was clearly a Novice Hunter in their eyes, so they weren't too wary of him.
"You're here to catch that... mule too?"
"Mule? Isn't it a horse?"
"That thing's a horse? Looks more like a donkey to me." Zheng Yichen's remark sparked a discussion among the hunters. One of them cleared his throat and stepped forward.
"That's one of the reasons, sure. A lot of people who come here pick up a few jobs like that along the way. But our main purpose is patrol." He stopped there, clearly unwilling to discuss the rest of their assignment.
"That donkey... that Abnormal Creature is cunning. It rarely attacks groups of hunters. It always goes after ordinary people or anyone who's alone. Let's get out of here first."
On the way out, Zheng Yichen noticed that the half-roasted rabbit he'd left on the ground was gone. Some animal had probably picked it up.
The patrol hunters were killing time in the middle of the night, so they casually told him about the mule. It had appeared ten days ago, and compared with other Abnormal Creatures that occasionally wandered out of the Southern Forest, it was particularly cunning.
Even hunters who set traps and used high-quality bait never managed to fool it. It always avoided capture, or simply stayed away from places where an ambush had been set in advance. These hunters had taken the job a week ago, but by now they'd more or less given up.
The main issue was that the mule was strong, too. Hunters who went out alone to lure it in risked being killed themselves. A few days ago, a powerful hunter had come here, and the mule had stopped showing up. That hunter couldn't stay here forever.
He'd left today, and then the mule showed up and attacked Zheng Yichen.
"That thing really is cunning. It even managed to sneak up close to me." Zheng Yichen thought back to the mule's first attack. He hadn't noticed it until it was right beside him. If he'd reacted any slower, he would've had a hole in his head.
"Fine. If you want to take that beast on, you'd better prepare something else. That gear of yours... isn't going to cut it." One of the hunters looked Zheng Yichen over. He wasn't mocking him; it really was true. They didn't stay long, since they still had patrol duty. Escorting a Novice Hunter who'd been attacked was a perfectly reasonable excuse to slack off a little, but they couldn't keep doing it.
Zheng Yichen thought it over and looked at his wounds. A new idea came to him. The mule had rammed him so many times, and he hadn't landed a single counterattack. Both of them had relied on thrusts as their main form of attack, yet he'd been the one who got stuck playing swordsman and ended up injured.
He... he had to prove himself again, didn't he?
"Is this place really open around the clock?"
"It is." At the Twilight Chapel, a nun cleaned Zheng Yichen's wounds. She was the same nun who had examined him earlier, and her milky-white hair had left a deep impression on him. "The injuries aren't serious enough to need stitches. They'll heal soon."
"Your blood attracts Abnormal Creatures. It can be made into bait to lure them."
"? That's possible too?" Zheng Yichen smacked his lips, intrigued. "How do I learn? Does it cost money?"
Before you continue