Hunter

In the ruined city, the occasional roar of a beast rang out. The air quality was decent, but the place was filled with an indescribable stench. In a city without humans to keep order, the monsters certainly weren't going to bother with hygiene. The smell was easy to imagine.

Walking along a pothole-riddled asphalt road near the city center, Feng Qingmo cautiously surveyed his surroundings, his Spiritual Force spreading in every direction.

Suddenly, his brow twitched, and he whipped around.

From the street corner behind him came a series of snorting grunts. A vast herd of pig-like monsters covered in red scales came charging into view.

"Bloodthirsty Tanks?" Sensing the especially massive one among the hundred or so monsters, he thought, "The leader's probably only Elementary Beast General Level. Hmm, it's got a hundred and three Beast Soldiers with it..."

He used his Spiritual Force to scan the widest area he could, and found no other monster groups nearby. Then he simply took a step sideways and stood in the middle of the road.

The monster leader, walking leisurely in the middle of the herd, stopped and suddenly raised its head to look at him.

"Roar!" It let out a low growl, and dozens of Beast Soldier-level monsters in front of it immediately roared and charged at Feng Qingmo.

"This feels a little familiar..." Feng Qingmo muttered. The scene was so similar to the first level of the Trial Tower, except that the monsters here were pigs instead of bulls.

The pig-like monsters covered the several dozen meters between them in an instant, but Feng Qingmo still had a moment to feel the difference between this and the Trial Tower.

Only his consciousness entered the Trial Tower. Although pain and everything else were simulated with perfect accuracy, deep down, he knew that even if he died, he would simply reset.

In reality, the sensation was far more intense. The pressure of facing down a charging herd made his adrenaline surge involuntarily.

This wasn't a virtual space. If he got injured in a charge like this, he wouldn't recover in an instant. And if he died—there wouldn't be an "if"!

Roars rang out without pause as the ground trembled. One tank-like monster after another charged at him, only to fall one by one beneath a storm of sword light. Each monster took a sword thrust to the eye or to a vital spot behind the ear. Their bodies slid forward under their own momentum after hitting the ground.

With light steps, he easily dodged the bodies, not only refusing to retreat but advancing against the flow.

Seeing its underlings fall one after another, the Elementary Beast General-level Bloodthirsty Tank roared in fury. It stamped the ground with all four hooves, shoved aside the Beast Soldiers around it, and charged at Feng Qingmo.

"Heh, I've been waiting for you to come over!" Feng Qingmo sidestepped twice, cutting down two Beast Soldiers with his sword. Then he flashed toward the side of the Beast General.

The Beast General-level Bloodthirsty Tank was about to turn when a nearly transparent filament shot from the human's hand. Guided by the three-pronged barb at its tip, it swiftly passed beneath the monster's belly. Then the barb turned, looped around its hind legs, and tightened.

"Thump!" The Beast General-level Bloodthirsty Tank's hind legs were bound together, leaving it unable to take a step. It panicked and tried to twist its pig's head around to see what was happening, but its neck was too thick to turn far enough. No matter how hard it tried, it couldn't see.

It felt that its hind legs were bound and tried to break free. But the moment it moved them, the filament pierced through the scales on its legs and cut into the flesh. It immediately stopped struggling.

Feng Qingmo moved his left hand, flicking it once. The middle section of the filament bent in an odd curve, coiled twice around the thick neck of the Beast General-level Bloodthirsty Tank, and tightened. He gave it a pull, and the Beast General fell to the ground.

With a few more movements of his left hand, he bound its two forelegs as well. Finally, the filament coiled twice around its mouth, leaving the Elementary Beast General-level Bloodthirsty Tank trussed up like a dumpling.

The roar in its throat was stifled, leaving it able to make only muffled whimpers.

As Feng Qingmo controlled the Gold-Severing Thread with his left hand, the Beast Soldiers around him kept charging, but not one managed to break through his sword light.

The Beast Soldiers that had been charging so wildly now saw their leader lying on the ground in such a sorry state. Terrified, they scattered in every direction.

Ignoring the blood that covered the ground, Feng Qingmo pulled with his left hand, and the Gold-Severing Thread dragged the Beast General-level Bloodthirsty Tank toward him.

The two eyes on the Bloodthirsty Tank's pig's head were wide open, and they revealed a surprisingly humanlike mixture of anger and fear. It couldn't understand how it had suddenly become completely unable to move.

"It's pretty heavy. Must weigh several tons, right?" Feng Qingmo tried to take the Bloodthirsty Tank with him, but found it difficult to lift such a huge creature.

He shook his head, then thrust his sword in with his right hand and finished it off.

With Feng Qingmo's physical strength, quickly carving up this Elementary Beast General would take quite a while. So he used his Spiritual Force to control a flying knife instead. The S-Grade Flying Knife was razor-sharp, and he quickly carved out the valuable parts and put them in his backpack.

Beneath the setting sun, a human walked slowly away along the long street, leaving behind a field of monster corpses and blood.

After fighting a herd of monsters, Feng Qingmo was in high spirits. Without realizing it, he headed toward the city center.

"Awoo!"

An excited wolf's howl suddenly rang out in the distance, making Feng Qingmo pause. His Spiritual Force spread out, and the image of a giant wolf greedily devouring the flesh of a monster immediately took shape in his mind.

"Is that... a Silver Moon Fierce Wolf?" Looking at the monster, which stood three meters tall and was over five meters long, its body covered in gray fur except for a patch of silver-white fur on its forehead, Feng Qingmo recognized it at once.

"According to what I read online, Silver Moon Fierce Wolves are solitary. Looks like that's true."

He sensed the wolf monster happily gorging itself in the distance. No other monsters were nearby; evidently, they had been driven off by the fierce wolf.

"That's right!" Feng Qingmo thought. "This city isn't far from the Taihang Mountain Range. This must be a Hunter that came out of the mountains to look for food..."

"Judging by its size, it should be an Intermediate Beast General-level Silver Moon Fierce Wolf... What a murderous aura!"

He advanced silently, but when he came within a hundred meters of the Silver Moon Fierce Wolf, it immediately raised its head and stared at the human before it with cold eyes. Bright-red blood still dripped from the corners of its mouth.

As the human drew closer, the fur on the Silver Moon Fierce Wolf's body seemed to fill with some strange energy. Its gray fur instantly turned silver-white, while the patch of white fur on its forehead glowed blood-red.

"Whoosh!"

When the distance between them shrank to fifty meters, the Silver Moon Fierce Wolf moved. It was nearly as fast as sound, and the fifty meters between them seemed to vanish in an instant.

Its claws swiped toward Feng Qingmo's head.

Feng Qingmo retreated one step and tightened his grip on the sword. The tip of the blade struck the claw with a clang, and the Slender Willow Sword immediately bent. Fortunately, it was a weapon made of 7-series alloy, exceptionally tough and nowhere near breaking.

Retreating with the force of the blow, Feng Qingmo jolted his arm and continuously worked to dissipate the tremendous force from the claw with internal energy. Even so, his organs churned, and he nearly spat up blood.

He had already integrated his Force Amplitude into his body's defenses, greatly strengthening them. Otherwise, that single blow might have injured him.