Zoe let out a long sigh of relief, exhaustion washing over his body.
With this brief moment of deflation and relaxation, his talent, [Diligence Compensates for Lack of Talent], deactivated.
Zoe felt as though he had suddenly become much stupider.
What a great talent, it's just such a grind.
“A D-grade skill... A D-grade skill I developed myself!”
Zoe looked at [Corrosive Gas Slash] in his skill list, liking it more and more the longer he stared.
In his previous life, D-grade skills had been far beyond his reach. Even after spending all his savings, he had only managed to learn two of the Adventurers' Guild's cheapest E-grade resistance skills.
Now, he had actually developed one himself.
This was the payoff of nineteen years of hard work and accumulation in his past life, now realized in this one.
“My mind is too exhausted. I need to rest.”
Zoe gnawed on the wolf carcass for a bit, then squeezed back into the crevice in the wall to rest.
This sleep skipped right past the afternoon and lasted until the dead of night.
Squeezing out of the crevice, Zoe resumed his practice.
Although [Corrosive Gas Slash] was powerful, it consumed too much Mana. A single slash cost 60 Mana, making it an ultimate-tier skill. With his current Mana pool, it was difficult to practice it efficiently.
He would continue practicing [High-speed Regeneration] instead.
In a familiar spot, Zoe condensed a stream of Dragon Flame and began his endless practice...
Just like that, he practiced for four consecutive days until the wolf carcasses were entirely depleted.
[Spray Lv.2 (F-grade)] Proficiency: 324/500 (Mastered)
[Elemental Resistance Lv.2 (F-grade)] Proficiency: 9/500
[Acid Lv.2 (E-grade)] Proficiency: 34/500 (Mastered)
[Precision Lv.1 (E-grade)] Proficiency: 39/100 (Beginner)
[Devour Lv.2 (D-grade)] Proficiency: 131/500 (Mastered)
[Digest Lv.2 (D-grade)] Proficiency: 234/500 (Mastered)
[High-speed Regeneration Lv.2 (C-grade)] Proficiency: 186/500 (Mastered)
[Mana] 286
The higher the skill level, the harder it was to raise its proficiency.
The higher a skill's quality, the more difficult it was to level up.
Huddled in his cave these past few days, Zoe had spent all his time grinding these skills, yet had only managed to squeeze out this much proficiency.
“For now, I'll head out and find some more emergency food.”
Zoe crawled out of his nest, slipped through the vine-covered area, and stealthily glided through the forest.
At this moment, he actually found himself looking forward to encountering shadow wolves. The large pack from last time had fed him incredibly well.
“Hmm, actually, never mind. I probably still can't take on too many at once.”
[Corrosive Gas Slash] was indeed formidable, but all in all, Zoe could only unleash four and a half slashes with his current Mana pool.
“Speaking of which, I didn't see any goblins this time either.”
“Could it be that the goblins have marked this area as a danger zone?”
Zoe decided to search for the goblin nest.
Although he had no intention of dealing with the goblins right now, he needed to pinpoint where the threats in this area lay to be prepared.
Following the clues in the forest, Zoe searched for signs of goblins.
Leaving his usual hunting grounds and venturing deeper into the forest, Zoe found two stray goblins.
The two goblins were carrying a wild boar pierced by an arrow, grunting as they trudged along.
“They really did classify my area as a restricted zone. They're only active outside my territory.”
Zoe silently shadowed the two goblins.
The goblin in the rear scratched its butt, completely oblivious to Zoe sneaking behind them.
Without traveling too far, the two goblins reached their destination.
It was a goblin nest hidden in a river valley. Just looking at the goblins active on the riverbed, there were about forty or fifty of them.
When factoring in the goblins inside the caves and those out hunting, this was a goblin tribe composed of several hundred goblins.
A goblin group of this size was bound to have special variants.
Goblin priests, goblin warriors, or even a goblin king.
In his past life, a mission to subjugate a goblin tribe of this scale would likely require several D-rank adventurer parties.
As a side note, Zoe had been an E-rank adventurer in his previous life.
Goblins were like cockroaches, lacking reproductive isolation with other species. They could breed with anything to produce more goblins, possessing highly invasive genetics.
Furthermore, the stronger the mother, the higher the probability of breeding elite or robust goblins.
Because of this, even though there were female goblins, they would still capture powerful females of other species to serve as breeding beds.
Human female adventurers were often the goblins' preferred choices.
To prevent these female adventurers from resisting, goblins typically broke their limbs.
Since severing limbs carried a high risk of death from blood loss, and goblin medical technology was poor, breaking them was the preferred method.
“I'll have to find a way to wipe this place out later.”
Zoe carefully retraced his steps, returning to his own territory.
There, he was pleasantly surprised to discover a wandering bearman, whose size was even larger than the one he had hunted last time.
Without any hesitation, he opened with [Corrosive Gas Slash].
The fully charged [Corrosive Gas Slash] instantly tore through the air, severing the arm the bearman had raised to defend itself.
“Roar!!”
With a painful and furious roar, the bearman swung its wooden club, smashing it down toward Zoe.
Zoe agilely dodged the club and leapt onto the bearman's other arm.
Activating [Devour], Zoe's body rapidly spread out, wrapping around the bearman's arm and beginning to corrode it.
Wincing in agony, the bearman dropped its club and violently shook its arm. Zoe took the opportunity to aim at its neck.
“Corrosive Gas Slash!”
The sharp blade of gas struck the bearman's neck with pinpoint accuracy.
Flesh and skin were instantly corroded and sliced open. The hard spine emitted only a crisp snapping sound before the bearman's head was severed clean off.
[Killed Bearman Lv.9, EXP +130]
[EXP bar filled. Level increased to Lv.7]
[Strength +1, Free Stat Point +1]
As its head fell, the bearman's massive body crashed heavily to the ground.
Monsters that relied solely on physical attacks were simply too powerless against a High Slime.
Zoe then hopped off the bearman's body, dragging the massive corpse and its severed parts back to his cave.
“Surrounded by powerful enemies, I can't let my guard down. I need to keep leveling up.”
Just like that, Zoe stayed cooped up in his cave. He went out to hunt for food in the mornings, locked himself away for training in the afternoons, gorged on food to recover whenever his Mana ran dry, and rested at night. He spent an incredibly productive month this way.
...
“If my reincarnation didn't waste any time, it should now be the end of the Month of Blooming in the year 640 of the Sacred Circle Calendar (late May).”
By this point, Zoe's level had reached Lv.16, and his body size had doubled compared to before.
He had also managed to grind several of his main skills to Lv.3. However, once a skill reached Lv.3, the difficulty of obtaining proficiency scaled up, and the progress bar grew significantly larger.
[Devour Lv.3 (D-grade)] Proficiency: 91/2000 (Proficient)
[Digest Lv.3 (D-grade)] Proficiency: 216/2000 (Proficient)
[High-speed Regeneration Lv.3 (C-grade)] Proficiency: 137/2000 (Proficient)
[Spray Lv.3 (F-grade)] Proficiency: 512/2000 (Proficient)
Among them, Spray had required almost no practice but had caught up from behind. Except for Dragon Flame, all his other remaining skills had also been upgraded to Lv.2.
Each skill upgraded to Lv.3 had boosted one of his stats by a point, and High-speed Regeneration had additionally rewarded him with 100 extra Mana.
On top of that, his skills' power had also increased. The F-grade skill [Spray] brought Zoe the greatest surprise; as long as he had enough Mana, he could spit acid in various shapes, greatly expanding his combat capabilities.
His personal stats had also improved along with his level.
[Strength] 11
[Agility] 9
[Constitution] 20
[Intelligence] 24
[Mana] 930
Rate on N.U.
