This feeling.
It was the razor's edge.
Lexel looked up, his golden eyes reflecting the moonlight. The Dark Mantis was already airborne, its obsidian sickles raised high. He knew the math. Every strike the beast made was lethal. A scratch meant a deep wound; a wound meant severed arteries; a direct hit meant instant death.
One mistake, and he ends at Level 4.
But this isn't my first dance.
"Come!"
The Mantis slammed down. Lexel didn't block; he flowed. He twisted his torso, letting the serrated blade miss his nose by a millimeter. The wind pressure alone stung his skin.
The beast followed up—a horizontal decapitation swing. It was fast, faster than his current body could track. But his eyes saw the twitch of the shoulder muscle, and his experience filled in the rest.
Duck.
He dropped low, sweeping his leg. He saw an opening on the foreleg joint.
Strike!
CLANG!
Lexel grimaced. His gauntlet didn't sink into flesh; it sparked against the green chitin like a hammer hitting an anvil. He retreated instantly, skidding back as the beast shrieked and lunged.
Too tough. My Strength isn't high enough to pierce the exoskeleton yet.
Lexel's boot brushed against a loose cobblestone. An idea sparked.
He kicked the stone. It clattered noisily against a nearby wall.
The Dark Mantis's head snapped toward the sound.
Interesting.
Lexel grinned. His body went inverted, handstanding for a split second to grab another pebble, then launching himself off the wall. He threw the stone.
Thwack.
It hit the Mantis's triangular head.
The beast hissed, covering its face with its forelegs in a panic.
It relies on sound and movement. And the sun... is gone.
Dusk had bled into night. The watermill in the distance churned silently. The only light came from the indifferent moon and the stars. The village was plunged into darkness.
Lexel landed on a rooftop, watching his prey. The Dark Mantis was acting strangely. Its confident, predatory movements had shifted. It swung its scythes left and right, screaming at random shadows, unable to focus.
A cold breeze brushed Lexel's skin.
This is the chance.
"Alright then."
Lexel picked up a jagged piece of roof tile. He threw it hard against the wall to the beast's right.
*CRACK.
The Dark Mantis immediately slashed to the right, destroying the wall in a blind panic. It failed to sense Lexel dropping from the roof directly behind it.
*WHAM!
Lexel delivered a heavy kick to the back of its neck. The beast screeched and face-planted into the dirt. Before it could recover, Lexel was already gone, melting back into the shadows.
He threw another stone to the left. The beast attacked the left.
Lexel struck its flank.
"Tempo."
The voice of his mother, Cecile, echoed in his mind. A memory from long ago, back in the golden halls of Empyrean.
"Don't let your opponent think once you hold the tempo, Lexel. That is how your father and I defeated the Eternal Golem. We were outnumbered, but never outclassed. You become the rhythm, and they become the drum."
Lexel's eyes narrowed. The world slowed down. He wasn't fighting a monster anymore; he was conducting a symphony of violence.
Pebble. Strike. Move. Pebble. Strike. Move.
He attacked from the front. From the back. From above.
He made the beast grow restless. He could feel the stress radiating off the predator. It was terrified. The hunter had become the toy.
Lexel vaulted onto the highest roof. He stood there for a second, his back blessed by the silver rays of the moon. No villagers saw him. No guards. It was just him and his prey.
He took a deep breath. The Aether in his blood boiled. He had zero mana, but he had Stamina. He had Intent.
"Die!"
He leaped. Gravity took hold.
[Skill: Tiger Stomp]
His right leg straightened like a pile driver. He didn't aim for the head. He aimed for the edge of the carapace.
*BOOM!
The impact was crushing. It buckled the Mantis's legs, but more importantly, the angle of the force acted like a lever. The massive beast was launched upward, spinning in the air.
It crashed onto its back, legs flailing helplessly.
Its pale, soft, fleshy underside was exposed to the moonlight.
"It's not over yet!"
Lexel was still in the air, rebounding from the first stomp. He flipped his body, channeling every last ounce of his remaining stamina into his left leg.
[Skill: Tiger Stomp]
"BEGONE!"
He plummeted like a meteor.
*SPLAT.
The impact was sickening. His heel drove directly into the soft stomach of the inverted beast. There was no resistance. The entire gut exploded under the pressure, coating the cobblestones—and Lexel—in a shower of neon-green blood and viscera.
The beast twitched once, then went still.
Silence returned to the village square.
At the center of the carnage, Lexel stood on the corpse, heaving. His chest rose and fell. He wiped the slime from his face.
[HP: 100%] [AP: 0/15]
He sat down on the dead monster's chest and started laughing. It started as a chuckle, then grew into a manic roar.
"Haha! Hahaha! Damn, those two won't believe this! Level 4 soloing a Level 15!"
He leaned back, looking at the stars. I did it.
Now then, what is my reward? A rare skill? A title?
He opened the Quest Window.
[Quest: Predators of the Village] Status: In Progress (1/2 Killed)
Lexel's smile froze.
"What?"
Predators? Plural?
A cold shiver, colder than the night wind, shot down his spine.
He didn't hear a sound. No footsteps. No buzzing wings.
Just the wet slide of a serrated blade entering his lower back and exiting through his stomach.
*SHLICK.
"Guha!"
Blood sprayed from his lips, mixing with the green ichor on his chest. Lexel looked down, his eyes wide in disbelief, staring at the black spike protruding from his gut.
"Impossible..."
[HP: 25%] [CRITICAL STATE] [Bleeding Effect Applied]
From the darkness behind him, a second pair of red eyes glowed.
"GHH!"
Lexel gritted his teeth, blood bubbling between his lips. The serrated blade was deep. It had bypassed his spine but skewered his intestines. The pain was blinding, a white-hot poker twisting in his gut.
But as his life drained away, a different sound rang in his ears. The sound of salvation.
*Ding!
[Experience Acquired] [Level Up!] [Level Up!] ... [Current Level: 10]
[Skill Points Available: 12]
Lexel didn't think. He didn't plan. He poured every single point into one attribute.
GIVE. ME. POWER!
[Allocating Skill Points...]
[STR ++]
[STR ++]
[STR ++]
[SP: 0]
A surge of heat exploded in his muscles, overriding the cold chill of death. His veins bulged against his skin, his biceps swelling as the system rewrote his biology in real-time.
The second Dark Mantis, standing behind him, tried to retract its blade to strike again.
It couldn't.
Lexel's hands had clamped onto the serrated foreleg piercing his stomach. His grip was iron.
"You..." Lexel growled, his eyes bloodshot and glowing with manic energy. "Don't... leave... yet!"
*CRACK.
With a roar that tore his throat, Lexel didn't pull the blade out—he twisted it.
He torqued his hips and wrenched the creature's limb with his newfound monstrous Strength. The Mantis screeched in confusion and pain, but it was too late. The chitinous joint at its shoulder snapped like a dry twig.
*RIIIIIP.
Lexel tore the entire scythe-arm out of the monster's socket. Green ichor sprayed over his back, mixing with his own red blood.
The Mantis staggered back, unbalanced, shrieking in agony.
Lexel wasn't done. He ignored the hole in his gut. He spun around, swinging the severed limb like a club, knocking the beast's remaining arm aside.
He lunged.
His hand clamped onto the Mantis's remaining foreleg.
"I prefer my crab..." Lexel wheezed, bracing his boot against the monster's chest. "Cracked!"
He pulled.
*SNAP.
*SQUELCH.
He ripped the second limb clean off the torso like he was dismantling a cooked crustacean at a fine dining table.
The Dark Mantis, now armless and bleeding profusely from both sockets, shrieked in absolute terror. It didn't look at Lexel as a prey anymore; it looked at him as a demon.
It turned and scrambled away on its hind legs, leaping clumsily over the village walls, trailing a river of green blood into the forest.
Lexel watched it go. He tried to chase. He tried to jump.
"Haa... haa..."
His knees buckled.
He collapsed onto the cobblestones, the adrenaline fading instantly. The pain rushed back, ten times worse than before. He looked down at his stomach. The hole was still there. It wasn't closing.
"Shit... Dad..." Lexel coughed, clutching his wound. "Looks like leveling up... doesn't instantly heal you in this shitty system."
His vision began to tunnel. The world turned gray. The silence of the village was deafening.
"Fuck... right... I can't die yet..."
He rolled onto his back, staring at the blurry moon.
"Please don't die... I still need to..." Lexel's eyes rolled back into his head, his consciousness slipping into the dark abyss. "The ladies... haven't even... tasted my... dragon—"
He passed out in a pool of mixed blood.