A few hours had passed, and I had grown… not confident, but at least competent at flying.
I now hovered about twenty meters above ground, high enough to see over the forest but low enough that I wouldn't be a smudge on the ground if something went wrong... probably.
The wind pushed back my hair, brushed along the cloak making it flutter inna way that made me feel far cooler than I probably looked.
My eyebrows were pulled together in a level of concentration I hadn't used since math exams, because at the moment, every single point of my ten MP capacity was doing something important.
One MP a second to the cloak kept me suspended in the air.
And the rest of my mana was split between two other tasks: feeding Precognition and creating the little assassin hovering in front of me.
The spell looked like an Ice Pebble, but it wasn't the flimsy version I'd been rapid-firing earlier.
This one had a glint like that of a cut diamond.
After some experimentation, I found I could funnel extra MP to change the spell's density instead of just size.
And the Ice Pebble floating in front of me was of the same size, shape, and ballistics. The only difference being this one was denser.
I started calling it the Armor Piercing Ice Pebble, because frankly, the name slapped.
But the real star of this setup was Precognition.
Running at triple optimal power, the skill was chewing through 6 MP a second, which was a terrifying rate unless you happened to have infinite MP Regen.
And everything I focused on came with a soft echo of what it would be three seconds from now.
And most importantly, when I aimed the AP Ice Pebble at a specific point on the ground with every intention to shoot the next second, Precognition showed me the result of releasing that shot.
If firing at that point would give me that little system ding followed by EXP, then I'd see it in the three-second preview.
If not? The timeline stayed blank.
A cosmic version of "if it dings, it dies."
Though it did put a lot of cognitive load on my head.
I swept my gaze across the forest canopy, letting the futures ripple through my head.
Leaves shifted; branches bent; shadows rolled. For several seconds, nothing interesting showed up.
Then… a flicker.
A tiny notification flashed in the timeline.
Three seconds from now, releasing the pebble would result in a kill.
I exhaled, lined up the spell, and let it go.
-Swish!
The AP pebble ripped through the air so cleanly it didn't even disturb anything.
And a moment later, a loud thump shook the underbrush, kicking up dust and something that sounded suspiciously like a death-squeal.
–Ding!
{Tier 1, Mid-Stage Magic Beast: Giant Hog Slain. 200 EXP Received.}
–Ding!
{Host has levelled up.}
A slow grin stretched across my face as I began drifting forward.
Yeah.
High-ground? Check.
Precognition sniper system? Check.
Zero risk? Check.
This... was cheating.
Full-on, unapologetic cheating.
And it was beautiful.
I lowered Precognition back down to its normal level, reducing its drain to just 2 MP a second, and poured the rest straight into the cloak.
The mana-ocean thickened around me, and I shot forward through the air toward where the hog had fallen.
And when I reached the spot, I killed the mana feed instantly, letting gravity grab me by the collar.
And I dropped.
"WOOOO!" The wind slapped my face as I plummeted between the trees while the world rushes upward with enough speed to make my stomach flip and my hair whip wildly behind me.
I couldn't help it, I laughed like I was on a theme park free-fall ride.
The ground raced up to meet me, and just before impact, the cloak flared by itself.
The mana-ocean surged upward, catching my fall as though I'd flopped into a pool.
My descent slowed to nothing as I touched down on my bare feet with a gentle thap.
"This will never get old," I grinned.
–Ding!
{Wonderful. The Host has mastered recreational suicide.}
"Man, you keep getting grumpier…" I muttered as I stepped toward the fallen hog.
And it was huge, easily the size of a car with two gaping wounds punched clean through its chest.
Ice shards glittered in the blood-soaked grass like someone had spilled a bucket of glass with a small hole blasted up on the ground in the middle of it.
I crouched down, trying not to stare too long at the mess.
–Ding!
{Do you know why I am 'grumpier'?}
"Probably cuz I'm getting stronger faster than you thought I would…" I chuckled.
-Ding!
{Because you kill from above like a sadistic child, all for cheap EXP.
You even dump their corpses into the shop for credits. All so you can "level up."
Worse, you don't even look your prey in the eye as you take its life.
Nor do you have the conviction to do it.
Warning, Host: The path you walk is that of a selfish, spineless coward.}
"I-" My throat closed up before the rest of the sentence arrived.
When it finally forced its way out, my voice was much quieter than I intended. "I'm not a coward…"
–Ding!
{That's what you focus on? Very well then, act like it.}
A twig snapped, snapping my head to its direction.
And from the bushes, a cluster of tiny hogs emerged, no bigger than puppies.
They rushed past me while desperately squealing, crowding around the fallen beast.
One of them, trembling, broke from the group and charged me.
Before I could react, its tiny jaws clamped onto my leg.
"Ah!"
I froze, staring down as its teeth sank into my calf, drawing thin lines of blood.
The bite itself wasn't strong.
But it carried the conviction to make the monster that had killed its parent bleed.
While I… just couldn't bring myself to shove it away.
It held on until its jaw trembled, until its body shook, until its breath hitched…
Then it let go, stumbling back toward the larger hog's head and pressing its face against the fur as soft little squeals bubbled from its throat.
My hands curled into fists as a tremor ran down my spine.
"Can… we adopt them?" I whispered, voice shaking despite myself.
–Ding!
{No. Let nature take its course. You've done enough here.}
I swallowed before walking a single step closer and bowed. A small, awkward bend that felt too little and too late.
"I'm… sorry," I murmured.
To the hog, the little ones.
And to every beast I'd shot from above without thinking.
And maybe… a little to the system too.
Then I turned around and walked away.