Tyrone took a deep breath as he observed the next batch of tuskupines that he had to take care of. He was lucky in the sense that every time he returned to the safe zone they would follow right behind him and bang on the barrier that separated the safe zone from the rest of the dungeon. However these creatures had a set pattern, from the way they behaved when they noticed him, to chasing him, to their attacks and reaction to their attacks and being attacked.

It took Tyrone three tries, but it was enough for him to be able to tell the mannerisms of the creatures down to a T. but he was nowhere close to clearing the hallway he was in. apart from the fact that it was incredibly long, Tyrone had not gone more than 20 meters away from the entrance to the safe zone. He needed to be able to return there quickly should the need of a safe spot b became required.

So far since he has been down here, if he could trust his internal clock, it has been a little over two days. And in all that time he has been working his hardest and taking the necessary rests within breaks to make sure he doesn’t burn himself out. Within that time eleven members of the (Iri) had come through, heading to various parts of the first floor to harvest some unique materials that could only be found here.

Some of them had been nice to him, others respectful. It was obvious to Tyrone that not all of them knew who he was as some of them downright ignored him, one even cuffed him on the back of his head an d called him a noob…. Perhaps none of them even knew who he was. Either way he had received lots of advice about how to survive and some even gave him supplies, making it so that Tyrone was not surviving on just the Tuskupines bush meat…..that shit was horrible.

Either way for Tyrone today was the day that he would be moving forwards a bit. He would complete the card fragments that the Tuskupines have been dropping. In fact apart from the shards, he had gained a significant amount of the equipment cards, netting up to 6 of them and also reaching halfway to level 9. Which was a lot of significant progress for work of two days killing level 1 creatures. It would have been much faster if he was fighting a level 5 or even a level 8 like himself.

But that would be death, the level 1s to 9s was a foundational level, you accumulated power until level 10 when you can finally have a class and all of the stats you have accrued would be applied. But monsters get all their bonuses right from the get go. Whether they were dungeon spawn or wild born. Which made them a whole lot stronger than people at the same level. Usually the way things like these are done is that a person would spend a significant amount of time killing level 1s or if you’re lucky enough with supervisors! Level 2s to 5s.

Either way Tyrone did not have any of that, the [Perception] skill had helped him with dealing with the level 1 tuskupines. But he needed the attack card they had in order to be able to have any sort of fighting chance against the monsters on the second floor. He had after all decided he was going to aim for higher than level 10, but Tyrone did not want to stay in this dark and gloomy dungeon a lot longer than he needed to be. He called up the tally for the fragments.

[Spike Shot Fragments 92/100]

He was close, there would be no level gained any time soon, but this was still good. It was another ace in the hole, especially as it gave him a means to attack at range, or at the very least that was what he was hoping to get. Even without reaching level 10 his bloodline or talent, if he has any one of they at all would influence what the skill would really look like once he slots it.

The Tuskupines at the barrier gave a few choice growls at his direction and turned around to move away. Tyrone smiled as that was all the signal he needed to move forwards. He jumped out of the safe zone ad twisted his body in the air, the longer reach of his longsword and the use of nimble and slipstream made him faster and more flexible, enabling maneuvers that at one point made him the most elusive of all the street rats in the frontier city he lived….. They called him the Wolf Cat.

He lived up to that name as the longsword slide into the back of the tuskupines neck. Killing one as he landed and flung the short sword in his left hand straight into the mouth of the second, cutting its cry of attack off and bringing its miserable life to an end. Tyrone pirouetted, spinning past a trio of spines shot at him as he flicked the sword and slashed at the last now leaping Tuskupine.

The sword slid into it with little to almost no resistance as its tiny body was sheared in half. Tyrone quickly spun keeping his eyes open in case another group had drawn closer. There was a group, but it was not close enough to him to give him any sort of trouble. He quickly looted the remains of the three that he had slain and rushed back into the safe room.

[You have gained Bush Meatx6, +6 Pieces of Spike Shot Card Fragment (98/100)]

Just two more, he was so close, so damn close. He shifted his gaze back out, his gaze meeting those of another set of tuskupines. His heart frantic, Tyrone took a few steps forward then started running, impatience driving his movements as he felt and could see power waiting for him, and he was at the cusp of being ready to step onto that path….. He was done waiting.