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Fearing the wild boar’s savage charge, Wu Shaochen led it in circles around several large trees. After more than ten seconds, the boar, realizing it couldn’t catch the tiny human ahead, stopped, scraped its front hooves on the ground, and then suddenly lunged at Wu Shaochen.
Staying alert to the boar’s every move, Wu Shaochen swiftly sidestepped just in time to dodge the charge.
“Phew… that was close…” Wu Shaochen exhaled. But it didn’t seem too difficult after all. Before the boar activated its skill, there was a clear wind-up—specifically, it would scrape its front hooves twice. As long as you weren’t directly in front of it and didn’t move too slowly, it was relatively easy to avoid. After all, a high-damage skill with movement and stun would be way too hard to deal with if there were no wind-up.
After charging past Wu Shaochen, the boar quickly came to a stop, paused for about a second, then turned to continue chasing him.
Rubbing his chin, Wu Shaochen’s eyes sparkled with insight. He resumed circling the boar. When the boar used its skill again, Wu Shaochen easily dodged and took advantage of the one-second pause to slash its rear before quickly backing away. By the time the boar turned around, Wu Shaochen was already two body lengths away.
Nice, this way I don’t need to worry about it regenerating when the poison wears off. Every time I reapply the poison, it refreshes the duration. I also don’t have to worry about it suddenly launching a skill when I get close for the last hit.
With that tactic, the boar was nearly dead after a few minutes. Just as he was about to finish it off, another boar suddenly burst out from the bushes and charged straight at Wu Shaochen without hesitation.
“Damn it, are you kidding me?” Wu Shaochen narrowly avoided the charge. He had known this area was full of boars, so he had been careful to kite them around this place, not daring to go too far. But still, another one had found him. Monsters that actively attack on sight are just plain annoying.
Frowning, he knew the smart move now would be to retreat. With two boars, a single hit from each would send him packing. But looking at the nearly-dead one that needed just one more strike, Wu Shaochen was reluctant to give up.
Licking his lips, Wu Shaochen locked his eyes on the two boars chasing him. “Then let’s really dance on the edge of a blade.” His talent ensured he’d be facing thrilling scenarios like this often. Might as well get used to it early.
He continued to kite the two boars. Now wasn’t the time to go in for the final blow—otherwise, both would ram him. He had to wait patiently for the right opportunity.
Suddenly, the nearly-dead boar scraped its hooves and charged. Wu Shaochen dodged effortlessly and was just about to strike when the second boar also activated its skill. He had no choice but to abandon the attack and dodge again.
“Are you kidding me? They’re coordinating now?” Wu Shaochen grumbled. The poison on the nearly-dead boar was about to wear off. If he didn’t act soon, it would start healing.
Watching the two boars approaching side by side, Wu Shaochen analyzed carefully. “My agility is 13, the boar’s is 11. Our attack speeds are the same. If I hit it, it can hit me back—the gap won’t exceed 0.01 seconds. That’s not enough time to strike and escape. But what if I don’t attack first and instead dodge their attack, then counterattack?” He shook his head. “No good. With our current movement speeds, I can’t get in and out of range in one second—just barely a single body length.”
“What if I don’t pull away at all?” Wu Shaochen’s eyes lit up. “If I dodge toward the nearly-dead boar as they attack, I can avoid the full-health one’s strike and only take one hit from the wounded one. Then I counterattack and run. Taking one hit, I can manage that.”
Without hesitation, Wu Shaochen crept closer to the two boars, nerves taut. While it sounded good in theory, the execution had to be perfect. A single misstep meant a free trip back to the respawn point.
He soon entered the boars’ attack range. As the two charged with their sharp tusks, “Now!” Wu Shaochen’s eyes flashed as he darted sideways past the nearly-dead one. Its tusks caught him, but the other boar’s strike missed.
Wu Shaochen immediately spun around and slashed, then dashed away. Before the second wave of attacks could land, he had pulled away by one body length—just barely dodging both hits.
“Phew… so close… damn, this game is about to give me a heart attack. But the control mechanics are insane. Looks like I need to practice more to really master this game.”
Now all he had to do was wait for the poison to finish off the nearly-dead boar—as long as he didn’t get double-charged, he’d be fine.
Soon, the weakened boar let out a reluctant grunt and collapsed to the ground. At the same time, a system notification chimed.
“Ding, you have slain [Wild Boar]. Gained 20 EXP. Bonus: +10 EXP for defeating an enemy 5 levels above you.”
“Ding, talent trait triggered. Poison damage increased by 1.”
“Finally killed it… that was rough.” Wu Shaochen let out a breath and looked at the boar’s corpse. Aside from some copper coins, there was also a boar tusk.
He quickly circled around the other boar and rushed over to collect two copper coins and the boar tusk.
[Tusk] – A material. Might be useful to villagers or sold to the general store for 1 copper coin.
“Tch, that’s it? I thought it was something rare,” Wu Shaochen muttered, tossing it into his backpack. “Still, a coin is a coin. Making money in this game is seriously hard.” Right now, he only had 12 copper coins. Even though he was fighting monsters five levels above him, each only dropped two coins. He’d seen groups farming rabbits for ages without even one coin dropping—clearly, Oracle Online’s drop rate was brutal.
After quickly finishing off the remaining boar, Wu Shaochen started searching for more. He would lure them to this spot to kill them—he really didn’t want a repeat of that two-boar ambush. Thanks to his talent growing stronger, he was killing faster and faster. When he finally killed the eighth wild boar, the system graciously rewarded him with a piece of gear.
[Boarhide Armor]
He quickly swapped out his cloth armor, bringing his HP to 110 and physical defense to 9—his survivability was looking much better now.
Let’s keep going. Just two more and I’ll level up. At this point, Wu Shaochen’s poison damage had stacked up to 14—finally showing how terrifying this talent could become. Fourteen true damage per second meant 840 damage per minute. A wild boar had 2000 HP—he could take it down in just over two minutes, needing only three hits.
Before long, he killed two more boars. The long-awaited glow of leveling up shimmered over him, followed by a system prompt.
“Ding, congratulations on leveling up! +20 HP, +10 MP. You’ve received 5 free attribute points—please allocate them wisely.”
He dumped all five into Agility. His stats updated as follows:
Name: Dustfall
Level: 2
HP: 90 + 40 (from equipment)
MP: 70
Physical Attack: 10 + 2
Magic Attack: 10
Physical Defense: 5 + 4
Magic Defense: 5
Movement Speed: 15 + 3
EXP: 10/500
Strength: 5
Intelligence: 5
Constitution: 5
Root Bone: 5
Spirit: 5
Agility: 15
Skill: Insight (Allows viewing monster info up to 10 levels above your own)
Talent: Source of Deadly Poison– Normal and melee skill attacks apply deadly poison (does not trigger on ranged attacks). The poison deals 16 true damage per second, lasts 60 seconds, and prevents healing while active. Can stack once.
Equipment: