Abel was currently taking a much-needed break after two hours of slaughter. He had cleared all 16 burrows along the other 2 paths. He had gone through 5 rolls of bandages and also used a mana incense stick but his gains were much greater than their cost.

He had long reached level 4 and in fact, he was half way to level 5. His usage of Serpents Dance was becoming more natural while his sword proficiency had been slowly but surely increasing.

Just as he expected, there was a single room at the end of the central pathway. So, he was currently taking a break, bringing his satiety and stamina levels to the top before taking care of the last room.

‘Alright, let’s get this over with.’ Abel readied his sword and stepped through the archway.

It was slightly difficult to make out in the darkness ahead of him, but he was sure it was a different rat monster this time. It was actually standing on its hind legs. Not only was it more evolved and obviously higher leveled, it was also surrounded by 6 rat sergeants’.

“Inspect”

Although he knew he’d pull all the aggro with such a move, he had to get more details about the monster before him.

[Stone-toothed Rat Lord] (Normal Monster)

Level: 7

Attack: 34-37

Defense: 25

HP: 300/300

[Stone-toothed Rat Sergeant] (Normal Monster)

Level: 6

Attack: 24-27

Defense: 18

HP:250/250

“Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeech”

Abel barely had a look at the monster’s information before a deafening screech forced him to look away. The Rat Lord seemed to give an order to his henchmen but the Rat Sergeants’ didn’t need the command to jump at the intruder.

‘Serpents’ Dance’

-40

-35

He quickly activated his movement skill and dodged the monsters closest to him. He dealt a quick slash to it before pivoting sideways to dodge another monster then followed up with a stab. Abel thought he’d be able to deal with half the Rat Sergeants’ before their boss jumped in but he was mistaken.

The evolved rat seemed to be eager to eat his flesh as it jumped in to attack right after his screech came to an end.

*Ding*

Rat Lord has used the skill [A Rat’s Pride]. All stats for the same species +10%

‘Damn it! This one can use skills… I doubt it’s the only skill it knows.’

Abel cursed as she slashed and dodged as fast as his own stats could allow. He barely took down 2 Rat Sergeants’ before he got struck by the Rat Lord for the first time. Thankfully, he had leveled up and added an arm bracer to his equipment, bringing his total defense to 29.

-7

-8

-5

-8

The bad news was, the rat lord seemed to have an even faster attack speed then its less evolved brethren! As soon as his Serpent’s Steps got off cooldown he activated it again, barely dodging another attack combo from the Rat Lord.

‘I need to dodge or block the Rat Lord’s attacks’

Having made his game-plan, Abel kept weaving through the 4 remaining Sergeants’ as he slashed and stabbed in quick succession. There was the possibility of friendly fire, whether between monsters or players so Abel was making use of the Rat Sergeants’ to block the Rat Lord.

This was also why he didn’t want to party with random players, if he was “accidentally” hit by friendly fire during a battle and died, he’d be angry at himself more than his killers.

Abel made full use out of the added buffs from his skill to kill the monsters a little quicker. The faster the Sergeants died, the more the Rat Lord could attack him freely. But at the same time, he wouldn’t have to split his focus as much to pay attention to the Rat Lord.

-40

-40

+ 80 EXP

+80 EXP

+80 EXP

Slowly but surely, the Rat Sergeants’ HP started to deplete and they fell one after the other. He had taken another 2 combos from the Rat Lord and blocked half of another. But now that all the henchmen were dead, Abel could fully deal with the remaining monster.

-20

-15

-20

He started circling around the monster and attacking from the flanks as he realized this was the monsters’ weakness. The Rat Lord seemed to be unaccustomed to fighting on 2 legs so his range of movements was hindered when it came to its sides.

Along with its short arms and even shorter neck, its turning radius was quite pitiful. When he whittled the monster down to half HP, he took a quick look at his skill bar and saw Serpents’ Steps was still on cooldown.

In that brief moment, the Rat Lord seemed to activate another skill as brownish-black energy covered its front 2 claws and sharp stone teeth.

‘Ah shit….’ Abel twirled his sword from a slash to a block…

Clang

Clang

-12

-15

-25

He was able to block the first 2 swipes before he failed to block the following attack. After swiping twice more with his claws, the Rat Lord lunged and bit his left arm holding the torch!

If it were in the real world, this strike would have paralyzed him in pain. Thankfully, in-game pain would feel like a light sting at the place he got struck. Otherwise, he would have definitely dropped his torch from sheer agony. He was down to less than half his HP, the same as the Rat Lord and was starting to feel a little anxious inside.

Unconsciously, he switched to the Xiang family breathing technique and felt his mind still before stepping forth to attack the monster that seemed to be reveling in the taste of his blood.

A notification sounded out in his ears but Abel didn’t dare lose an ounce of concentration on his foe. He’d learned his lesson just earlier about looking elsewhere in the middle of a fight.

-25

-20

Clang

-35

He stepped off to the side as he blocked another strike intended to disrupt his rhythm and stabbed at the monsters’ thick neck. When he saw the tell-tale sign of the combo skill activating again, he lunged to the side and swung the sword as strongly as possible. All he had on his mind to deal the most damage he could possibly dish out, nothing less would be acceptable!

-75

+EXP 180

Before he could revel in his victory, the cascade of system notifications quickly consumed Abel’s attention. Although he was still feeling jittery over the last exchange, he was sure the monster was dead as he saw the EXP increase. If he hadn’t acted decisively at the last moment then he could’ve been combo’ed to death!

*Ding*

User has created a new skill; would you like to name it?

Yes/No

*Ding*

User has created a new skill; would you like to name it?

Yes/No

*Ding*

Since user has chosen not to name the skills, randomly generated skill names shall be used.

+New Active Skill: Harmony Breath (Upgradeable)
+10 HP recovery per minute for 30 minutes (must be out of combat)
+10 MP recovered per minute for 30 minutes (must be out of combat)
+10% to all stat for 10 minutes.

Cost: 10% Mana
Cooldown: 1 hour

+New Active Skill: Ecliptic Slash

+150% Damage increase in 3-meter radius

Cost: 30 Mana
Cooldown: 30 seconds

Abel stared at the notifications in bewilderment, he was a little pissed off the damn system kept ringing in his ears when he was in the midst of combat. But his joy over gaining 2 new skills trumped his annoyance at the disturbance. Although he wasn’t able to name his skills, Abel wasn’t one to care about such trivial details.

‘I should look into the panel to see if I can change the settings. I doubt the developers would leave such an obvious problem without addressing it.’

He looked at his HP bar that was slightly less than half and couldn’t help but feel thankful over his decisiveness.

Now that he was out of combat, his HP was actually increasing at a slow pace due to the effects of the active breathing skill. He wasn’t sure if his health would have bottomed out or if he would have had a sliver of HP left after taking another combo attack. Either way, he was thankful he didn’t have to find out the hard way.

‘Open Panel Menu’

The panel opened up and he saw a bunch of tabs he never cared for. There was the tab to log out, the tab for his friends list, a couple of greyed out tabs for a profession advancement tree and another for the guild system and chat.

Finally, he found the tab for system settings at the very end. He spent a few minutes navigating through it until he found an option to mute system notification sounds during combat. The notifications would still pop up but they wouldn’t ring in his ears when he was under combat status.

Abel pulled down the Menu and finally took a look around the chamber he was fighting in. He hadn’t seen a chest like on the floor above. The stairs leading down to the next level were apparent at a hole in the ground at the end of the room.

What grabbed his attention was the many different jutting rocks on the walls. It seemed to be some sort of mine a long time ago, perhaps that was why there were rooms on the sides. Unfortunately, he didn’t have a pickaxe otherwise he would have chiseled them all and sold them in the market.

‘Wait… is it the same?’ Abel took out the “rock” from the chest he got in the floor above and compared it to the rocks on the walls.

‘They’re similar but mine seems…. shinier? I guess it’s some type of material but mine is of a higher grade’

Abel was feeling slightly upset about having to almost lose his life earlier when there was an entire room filled with the same ore. But when he realized the one in his possession had a special luster and apparently of a higher quality, his annoyance eased greatly.

‘If I could mine out these ores… Ugh, no use thinking about it. I should get to skinning the monsters. Let’s start with this big bastard!’

Unfortunately, he didn’t have a pick axe with him. He put aside his sense of regret and figured he’d mine them when he had the time. Finishing the quest was the priority, he could mine out all these rocks when he had a chance in the future.

He crouched down and started skinning the Rat Lord that nearly took his life. Whether it was some light from providence that was shining down on him or the increase in his luck stat, but the system seemed to finally acknowledge his skinning as a skill.

It was mostly likely mere probability after skinning more than a hundred monsters. He was so passionate about skinning the monster that he didn’t even see the notification until he was done.

*Ding*

+New Skill: Skinning [Proficiency level- Greenhorn (0.2%)]

 After skinning many monsters of different types, you have become proficient in understanding the useful parts from the useless. Adds more loot upon skinning.

Cost: 1 MP every 10 seconds
Cooldown: None

*Ding*

+Stone-toothed Rat Lord Meat x2

+Stone-toothed Rat Lord Claws x2

+Stone-toothed Rat Lord Teeth x2

“Finally…” Abel couldn’t help but mutter out loud in obvious glee.

He had expected to get the skill throughout this dungeon run but the more time passed he didn’t get it, the more anxious he was deep down.

‘Perhaps the trick was to happily skin a monster without actively thinking about getting the skill.’ He chuckled inwardly at the thought.

He looked around at the Rat Sergeants’ and thought about all the other burrows holding monster carcasses and he couldn’t help but grin at the thought of all the coins he’d be getting soon.