Chapter 152 - Days CDLIII - CDLV

After waking up, I felt terrible. Probably because the environment was so damn annoying to me because my body was actually perfectly fine. Still, I was pissed, and after learning that my shoes and pants are still wet, I got even angrier.

I ate breakfast, put the pants on, and started walking, leafing shoes to eventually dry on the cart. After around an hour, I decided to yet again put my shadows to use, to pull the cart for me.

I started to like those savages. They were useful. Contrary to my first opinion about the Shadow baron class, now I thought the points were actually well spent.

The whole day was filled mainly with walking, but sometime before night, I reached the city, and then headed to my house, to sleep in my own bed. It felt amazing after the previous night.

The next day, at dawn, I was already on my way, heading to wolves. My shoes were finally dry enough to wear them, which made me happy.

I tried to avoid going straight into their territory, and instead get around, but I misjudged how big of an area it is, which ended with few wolves trying to get me. I killed them quickly and did my best to add some distance before more of them came.

With all of this, I ended up not getting as far as I wanted, before the third night came. I had to set up the camp, and call it a day.

The next morning I started moving as soon as I could and even ate while walking. With help from my shadows, it was way less annoying than ever before.

A couple of hours later I noticed that the environment is changing slowly. Trees became taller and taller. A bit later I noticed the first enemy. Big, brown, furry bear. It was alone, slowly walking through the forest.

I stopped my shadows, and send them to get it. As you probably are thinking right now, they got massacred. The animal was very strong and stood up on two feet to slammed them with heavy paws. The two that managed to get close enough to attack couldn't actually do anything to the natural armor of the beast.

I sighed seeing how pathetic that attempt was, and created pudao, to do the job myself. Bear noticed me and started charging, roaring in fury. I did the same. The running part. I didn't roar. Not at all.

As we were about to clash, I used Shadow walk, to instead appear on its side, and slash it open with a powerful swing. My face probably looked very funny when my weapon turned to smoke, unable to make it through the heavy fur.

- Fuck - escaped my mouth.

I used the Shadow walk, to make some distance before the beast managed to make its move.

Bear tried to follow but was way too slow for me. Dodging was incredibly easy, so I kept doing it trying to tire the beast down, and thinking how to actually kill it. Smacking its head with my fists was an option, although not the greatest one.

After a solid minute of annoying the bear, I finally got a decent idea. I made a pickaxe and tried stabbing. It worked, but not as good as I would want it to, and could only withstand two strikes. So taking the bear down took several of those.

Beast turned to smoke, leaving crystal behind. A bigger one than what lizards did.

The surroundings seemed way more pleasant than the swamp, so I decided to spend more time hunting, exploring, and looking for different types of enemies on this side.

After encountering the second bear I deemed the pickaxe's useless, and just boosted my fists with the Ki, and started punching. One clean hit to the head was enough to kill them, but it was not that easy to get it. Bears were way taller than me while standing, and on all fours, I had to punch down, which was not always an option while trying to avoid sharp claws.

Eventually, I got the hang of it, but my Ki was all drained, and my hand hurt like hell. I could easily heal it, as it seemed no bones are broken, so I did and took around an hour of break, to eat and also to replenish my Ki reserves. I did so by focusing on breathing, applying my Breathing technique skill.

I could feel the energy returning to my body and knew when it reached my full capacity. The very moment it did, I resumed the hunt. This time though I tried to keep up the skill active, to replenish what I was using during fights.

It was possible because there was actually more walking than action. On this part, orcs were way better enemies.

A full day of work got me 21 bear crystals. I had no idea how much in points that was, so couldn't judge if the place was good or bad. One thing I was sure of, I needed a way to get more efficient if this spot was going to be the one for me. I also needed a damn weapon I could actually infuse with ki. I regretted not throwing at least one pudao on the cart.

With my ability to create weapons good enough for actually anything I encountered before, I stopped doing that, because it was just unnecessary weight, and also a waste of space that could be filled with food or crystals.

With those thoughts, I called it a day and began setting up my camp. I put some barriers around, and ate, then finally went to sleep.

There was hope for this spot, I just needed to find a proper way of gathering bears in the vicinity, or just find their lair. It made me happy.

The day came to an end with 3 066 421 points remaining on my account, 74 lizard crystals, and 21 bear ones on the cart.