Just like the past few days, Jude woke up miserably with a groan, though this morning's groan was deeper than usual because of the stinging pain from the wounds of the night before. Had the effect of the ointment worn off?
"Status window."
[Level: 2]
[Point(s): 28]
[Vitality: 13 / Strength: 14 / Agility: 11 / Dexterity: 13 / Perception: 11]
[Unique Ability: Random Teleportation]
[Skill: None]
[Active Buff: Weakened]
His overall stats had dropped because of the Weakened debuff, but it was still much better than the drop he had suffered from Exhausted.
While eating a simple breakfast, he tried to think of a way to keep the ambush of the night before from happening again. The best way would surely be to raise his Perception. When he looked at the calendar, there were still twenty-three days left before the outbreak, which meant he could not rely on items yet, because they would not be available until then.
No, wait. It had definitely been there in the background story. According to his memory, there had been an article about a monster appearing on Mount Velino, and because of that very incident, the government had finally woken from its denial and been spurred into action.
Jude searched his memories. It was supposed to happen in two days. Even though it was extremely dangerous, he would not shy away from it, because it was a rare chance to get an item before the outbreak. The stats on the item would be random, but an item would surely drop, and personally, he wanted one with Perception.
The beta had never been about hunting. It was about survival, about running away and staying alive as long as possible, and for that, Perception served better than Strength or Agility, especially at the beginning. The most important thing was to find them first and run.
Right now, his goal was to unlock the store, which would truly open once he reached level ten.
In the background story, the media had broken the embargo issued by the government and leaked a picture of a monster's corpse lying on the ground. It was a Mountain Ape, and next to it was a giant axe, proof that it had dropped an item.
He might even gain a skill if he killed it. The skill would be Blood Rage. It gave its user the traits of the Mountain Ape, faster recovery of stamina and higher Perception, as well as a fighting spirit that awakened whenever the user was wounded or cornered, making him much harder to kill.
It would be great if he could acquire it. With such traits, a Mountain Ape was certainly not a weak monster. It had superhuman strength and great vitality, and even with its back bent, the monster was at least two meters tall. What made it even scarier was that it could use weapons.
So, to get the item, he would have to kill a two meter tall monster that looked like a gorilla who went to the gym every day, with a fierce killing intent and a weapon in its hands. Looked at from that angle, it seemed unbeatable. But for Jude, it was worth doing.
Since the world was not yet in ruins, and was still a healthy modern country, he would not use the stab-proof vest and the tactical boots he had ordered. He started preparing for the hunt, and because of it, he had to stop work on the cave for a while.
Should he use a bomb? To make the one he knew from the beta, he would have to grind a Boiling Stone into powder and mix it with oil and organic solvents. In other words, it was a firebomb. Because Boiling Stone powder was added to the mix, it would be considerably more powerful than an ordinary one. Even after the monster died, the fire would keep burning fiercely, and a fire extinguisher would be needed to put it out.
Then it struck him. If he threw something like that, the surroundings would catch fire. The voice of a news announcer suddenly played in his head, reporting an arsonist who had burned ten hectares of forest. It was quite possible, since there were always many hikers on Mount Velino.
What would the weather be like in two days? It would be raining. He sighed in relief, because the rain would surely keep many hikers away. If there were many of them that day, he would have to sneak around and watch his surroundings closely so that no one saw him, since the Mountain Ape had been found near the campground at the foot of the mountain. Moreover, the forecast said hundreds of millimeters of rain would fall in two days, and he would not have to worry about the bomb going out, since that much rain was powerless against its fire. The only problem was that he would have to walk around the mountain soaked to the skin.
He simply had to do it. With that determination, he tried to get up from his seat, but when his arms pressed on the armrests, waves of pain swept over him, as if thousands of needles were piercing his arms at once. If things went on like this, he would be the one caught instead of the Mountain Ape.
For now, he would rest for two days and forget about all the work. Thus, he had to recover as quickly as possible, so that he could fight in top condition.
Or should he give up on the hunt? If he did, the Mountain Ape would eventually be killed by the police and its identity would soon be known to the government. When the media broke the embargo just like in the background story, the public would naturally begin to believe the thousands of people online who were talking about the virus and the coming outbreak. And then he would see the van of the men in black parked across from his shop. Even if the government did not have the power to fix the situation, it would be easy for them to find him.
That was why he could not let it happen. For his own safety, he needed to kill the Mountain Ape and erase every trace of it.