But her excitement at finally finding something living within her range dwindled instantly.
'Why isn't my spatial perception picking it up?'
There was one, very big problem that she noticed immediately.
She could see it — its form was clearly there, moving with slow but deliberate movements.
It was a large creature, its green fur blending seamlessly with the foliage, like it was a part of the forest itself.
But despite its size, Mira couldn't detect it at all with her spatial perception.
Mira didn't know it, but if Alex were there, he would recognise that beast instantly.
It was the very first type of beast he had ever encountered when he first made contact with the Primordial Expanse.
A Galephant.
Only this one was a little smaller than the one Alex had encountered.
'I can feel its strength all the way over here, it's at least C rank, and a Variant class at that!'
Her lips curled into a slight, confident smile.
She had faced worse before.
Her mind, however, was still on high alert.
The forest had been eerily quiet since her arrival, and the sudden appearance of a C rank beast right next to her drop pod did indeed seem too convenient to be a coincidence, she knew this.
But she wouldn't find out much about what was going on just by standing back and watching from afar.
She had to do something proactive.
She couldn't let her scepticism and doubts cloud her judgement.
'Focus.' she commanded herself, lightly tapping her cheeks to wake her up from her constantly self questioning state of mind.
If there were other threats in the vicinity, then she would deal with them as they came.
For now, the Galephant was her priority concern.
Mira moved silently, circling around the back of the beast, using the dense foliage as cover.
Her Golden Presence talent had become much stronger than it previously was when she had first obtained it.
Her proficiency in using it had increased its effectiveness.
Though it was still an A- rank talent.
With her golden hair creating a noticeable light source in the dark, shadowed forest floor, the Galephant had noticed the change and was ready to react.
But it was too late, as Mira was already right behind it.
It seemed her hopes that its own extrasensory perceptions were useless here as well had come to fruition.
With her Mutant class C rank sword in hand, Mira launched herself at the rear of the Galephant.
Her body had become a finely tuned weapon of destruction.
The forest around her seemed to slow down as her thoughts sped up and her perception of time slowed.
In a blur of motion, she reached the Galephant in mere milliseconds, and she was on top of it only a moment later.
The Galephant, massive and lumbering, had barely begun to react.
Its keen eyesight might have alerted it to the sudden new light source behind it, but that didn't mean it had time to turn around to inspect what had caused this change.
Mira's sword felt weightless in her hands, and she aimed it at a spot near to where she guessed the Galephant's spine would be.
Whoosh!
She drove it forward with as much strength as she could muster.
The blade struck true.
She wasn't like Alex, where he had some flashy moves with his Phoenix flames like some special effects.
Her attacks looked simple, but they were anything but simple in reality.
There was a brief moment of resistance as the sword met the Galephant's dense hide.
'Yeah, this fight would have been much tougher if I went out without Golden Presence.'
Mira was sure that her decision to use Golden presence from the start was correct when her sword made contact with the Galephant for the first time.
Unlike Alex, with his soul orbs and Phoenix flames, Mira didn't have a super powerful offensive talent backing her up, so fighting against a beast that was not only a whole tier higher than her, but also a higher class than her, was not something that she could take on without activating Golden Presence.