Ash tore through the jungle, branches whipping across his face and vines snagging at his clothes as if the forest itself conspired to slow him down.
Each breath burned his lungs, yet the thunder of paws behind him left no room to falter. The ground was uneven, roots jutting out like hidden snares, while the canopy above shivered with movement—shadows of predators leaping from branch to branch.
His mind was running at its full potential, checking for any opportunity and all the tools he could use to survive.
Though most of the predators had stopped after chasing for a while and stopped close to the tree where he had cleaned his hands with leaves, some of them had taken notice of his running silhouette—three to be precise.
Seeing no other way and having spent his MP, he sought the system's help.
As an assassin, the best thing he knew was to use all resources at best. He could already think of multiple ways to get out of the way, but all of them were related to the system.
Among them, one was to increase his MP cap with 3 stat points, but that wouldn't improve recovery time, thus leaving him defenseless in the future for quite long.
If each kill gave him 10 exp, then a level-up—and more stat points to gamble with—was within reach.
There was another option of putting stats in his agility, but then it took out the option of leveling up.
Deciding on his actions, Ash increased his MP cap to 40, leaving a stat point for emergency.
He felt a soothing feeling running through him, his veins bulging with faint blue color, and then it settled.
[MP : 22/40]
[Stat Points : 1]
Ash halted in his steps, turning his torso, his eyes fixed on a lizard-like creature with dark red scales, but seeing its slow speed he changed his target to a panther-type beast with red glowing eyes.
"Shoot."
A bullet broke the sound barrier, bursting the head of the beast.
Ignoring the blue screen, he readjusted his grip. His body was too weak to handle the recoil and fire multiple shots simultaneously.
It was the reason he didn't want to go all out on the MP stat.
A green boar with two tusks was almost about to hit Ash when he jumped sideways.
It wasn't like he was reckless; it's just that, for some reason, the boar had sped up almost thrice at the last moment, surprising Ash and disrupting his plans.
"Whoa... close call." He shot the bullet, killing the boar in an instant.
Now remained the lizard-like creature, but it wasn't as fast, so he aimed at it comfortably—when it shot a green moss of liquid. The bullet flew through the liquid whilst Ash ran sideways to dodge the unknown green substance.
Despite the bullet passing through the liquid, he was sure to get the kill, but not everything goes as planned.
While the bullet passed through the liquid, its outer layer of metal started getting eroded midair, and as it reached the lizard it barely dug into its scales.
It was nowhere near deadly—at best, injurious.
And as the green liquid fell on sticks, they started getting eroded.
"Oh fuck, that was awesome," Ash said in excitement—a poison so deadly that it worked as an acid.
As an assassin, poison was his best weapon: silent and deadly.
But before that, he had to take the lizard down.
This time he threw two claws at full speed toward the lizard, which was met by another splash of poison.
The claws were just mere distraction, and a bullet struck directly at the beast. This time it wasn't nerfed by obstruction, thus it finished its job.
A bright smile bloomed on his face seeing three dead bodies. He wanted to obtain the crystals, but currently he wasn't sure if he had the luxury of time.
He checked the green liquid and dipped the remaining claws in it. He expected them to dissolve, ready to see them vanish also.
But they didn't. They withstood the poison. Seeing that, he looked around for the two claws he had thrown earlier, unable to find them.
So he quickly cut into the panther's carcass at the position where the heart should be. And he found the crystal, as he expected.
Then he went for the boar. While he was cutting the skin, he saw a horde of boars approaching him. They were almost ten and of the same size.
His hand trembled, but he didn't want to leave the job undone, so his hand quickly grabbed another crystal.
He calculated while running: 20 MP can be recovered from these two crystals, and as I should be leveled up I must have 4 stat points, giving me another 40 MP.
So I should have the resources for firing 12 shots.
Though it was a nice plan, executing it would be hard—seeing their high speed, how they used some sort of dash while attacking, and his inability to fire continuous shots with precision one after another. Taking all these variables in mind, there was only a 20% chance he would win head-on.
Looking behind, he realized their speed was almost twice his, so escaping was also not feasible. But maybe…
He checked his screen while running.
[You have Slain 1 Shadow Fang Lynx]
[You have Slain 1 Brisk Boar]
[You have Slain 1 Venomous Lizard]
[+40 Exp]
[Level Up!]
[+3 Stat Points]
Ash's screen flared brighter than ever.
[ Profession: Modern Assassin ]
[ Level: 3 ]
[ 32/50 Exp ]
[ AGILITY: 3 | ENDURANCE: 2 | STRENGTH: 1 | LUCK: 1 ]
[ MP: 2/40 (Recovery rate: 1 per 600 seconds) ]
[ Stat Points: 4 ]
There were some more notifications down; he just gave a cursory glance. It was something very useful, but that had to wait for later.
His agility was already better than his other stats, and he was planning to use some more stat points for now since it was the need of the hour.
And as an assassin, that was the most important aspect.
[Agility : 5]
Assigning 2 stat points to agility, he felt newfound energy swirling inside.
Unable to understand the true extent of his current speed, he almost tripped. Now his speed was almost doubled.
No, it was more than double, despite increasing it by only two stats.
"So these stats are exponential," Ash deduced by his condition.
If it had been linear, then he would need at least six points to double his speed.
Now he compared his speed with previous-life athletes. His guess about the distance was quite perfect, so he calculated the time and distance—he covered 50 kilometers per hour.
"Oh damn." Ash laughed with newfound confidence.
He was faster than an Olympic gold medalist. In his previous life, the scope of improvement was limited. At his last time, he was already at the peak of what was humanly achievable, but now a new world with new rules and the aspect of constant growth had enticed him.