“Awww…why did you have to die? I wasn’t even trying to kill you…”

Maple lamented the bunny’s demise for a while, but eventually, she recovered enough to check out the results of her level-up.

“Oh! I got five more points to spend on stats!”

With these points, she could say good-bye to that row of zeros.

“Hmm…but raising anything besides Vitality now seems like a waste.”

Once spent, there was no getting these points back. Maple had to make them count.

“Okay! My mind’s made up! Vitality it is!”

Maple put all five points into VIT, then set off without a second thought to find another monster.

Given that monsters found deeper in the forest were both stronger and more numerous, it was not surprising that Maple didn’t have long before she encountered another one.

“Ewww…so gross…”

A giant centipede had wrapped itself around her ankle. Surely, there was no one alive who would describe that as anything but gross.

Maple drew the short sword from her hip and stabbed at the monster’s body. The centipede was poisonous and injected venom with each bite, but since every attack had failed to penetrate Maple’s skin, it had been unable to inflict any status effects on her.

Very much unlike the bunny, the centipede was not cute at all. Maple had no interest in goofing around with this monster.

She had no qualms about defeating it.

Sadly, her DPS was so low, she had to stab it a full ten times before it died.

“Seems like I didn’t level up this time…”

Maple considered turning back. She wasn’t the type to lose herself in the joys of grinding, so her main takeaway was that fighting centipedes took an excruciatingly long time. She wondered if she should try looking for some weaker monsters.

Unfortunately, Maple had already ventured too far into the woods, unknowingly stumbling into the area where the strongest monsters lived.

And in a stroke of terrible luck—one of these monsters had just found her.

A Giant Bee, wings abuzz, hurtled right at Maple.

“Augh! Don’t!” she yelled, raising her great shield in an attempt to ward off the bee’s terrifyingly large stinger.

But with AGI: 0, she was no match for the Giant Bee’s speed.

Before she knew it, the bee was on her back, stabbing at her neck—at least that’s what she thought was happening. The flying monster was certainly attacking her, but it was no match for her defense. Maple took no damage!

The Giant Bee kept trying to sting her anyway.

“Ah-ha-ha! That tickles!”

Maple had recovered from her initial fright and had quickly regained her usual good cheer.

After several more unsuccessful attempts, the bee must have decided stinging was pointless. Instead, it tried a different tactic—one that involved spraying venom.

“Hngg…?!”

It didn’t hurt much, but Maple definitely felt a mild burn, almost like getting in the bath with a sunburn.

She checked her status screen and saw that her HP had only gone down by one. Apparently, this poison was a type of damage Maple couldn’t completely nullify. If she was poisoned like this another thirty-nine times, she would die.

“…………Time for a strategic retreat!”

Maple turned and began running away. But the discrepancy in their Agility stats made this impossible.

The Giant Bee kept spitting out poison, and Maple failed to dodge any of it.

“Agh…”

Maple was now at half health.

“Skill: Poison Resist (S) acquired.”

As soon as she heard those words, Maple stopped taking damage. She would normally have been delighted—but not this time. She was too preoccupied with her mild annoyance that this Giant Bee had actually succeeded in hurting her. This was the very first time she took any damage!

“I’m done for…,” she lamented as she collapsed on the ground, making a show of feebly crawling away.

She was acting. Maybe the bee believed her performance, maybe it was just a coincidence—either way, the bee reacted just as Maple had hoped.

It started really laying on the venom, like it had her on the ropes. As Maple continued feigning her deteriorating condition, the bee seemed ready to finish her off with one final spray.

“Skill: Poison Resist (S) has evolved to Poison Resist (M).”

Maple grinned. This had been her goal. A flawless triumph over the only weakness she had discovered thus far.

Maple stopped moving at all, playing dead. Seeing that she was no longer struggling, the bee began charging a powerful attack. It moved closer to her face, ready to feed.

“Heh-heh! Gotcha!” Maple cried. She flipped over, sword in hand, and stabbed the bee right in its open mouth. The soft flesh within its maw offered no resistance as her blade popped out the back of the monster’s head.

Maple twisted her sword, gouging right and left. The HP bar above the bee’s head began slowly shrinking.

The bee frantically stabbed at her with its stinger, but this proved futile.

After a few final shivers, the Giant Bee turned into motes of light.

A silver ring appeared in the space the bee had previously occupied and fell to the ground.

“Heh-heh-heh… I win!”

“Skill: Giant Killing acquired. You are now level eight.”

Maple picked up the ring and decided to investigate it alongside her new skills.

Forest Queen Bee Ring [Rare]

[VIT +6]

Autoheal: 10% of Max HP every ten minutes.

“Ohhhh! This is great! HP recovery! And it’s rare? How lucky!”

Considering how Maple still had the MP of a brand-new character and hadn’t yet learned any spells, a recovery item was an enormous boon. It also boosted her Vitality by six points, which was a nice bonus. And since she had the Absolute Defense skill, that became a twelve-point boost.

She took off one of the gloves she’d started with and slipped the ring on. The gloves were just cosmetic items that didn’t enhance any stats, so she put it back on over the ring.

“Risa’s note did say that if I got any rare items or skills, I should keep them secret.”

The main concern was Player Killers, but of course, it would be very difficult for anyone to kill Maple now.

“What about these skills…?”

Poison Resist (M)

Nullifies strong poison.

Condition

Sustain strong poison attacks forty times.

“Huh…it didn’t seem that strong. But maybe my VIT was reducing the poison damage…”

Her hunch was correct. She would have taken much more damage otherwise.

But without a resist skill, poison attacks did a minimum of one HP.

“Next!”

Giant Killing

If four or more stats (other than HP/MP) are below those of your opponent, double all stats (except HP/MP).

Condition

Solo kill a monster while four or more of your stats (other than HP/MP) are less than half the enemy’s respective stats.

“I’ve got four stats at zero, so…that means my stats will be doubled in almost every fight! And my VIT will be quadrupled!”

Maple was right. Since her other stats were all zero, the only thing this skill did was double her Vitality. This made it very easy for her to activate and incredibly useful for her specialized build.

Moreover, the level-up had given her some more stat points to spend.

“Huh, I only got fifteen stat points… I wonder if you only get more on even numbers…”

This time, Maple didn’t hesitate. She put every point she had into VIT.

Given the nature of Giant Killing, this was the best move.

Maple’s VIT stat was now at a whopping 616.

“Hmm… I’m kinda tired. Maybe I should call it for the day. This took more time than I expected…”

Maple emerged from the forest as she returned to town, where she wandered the streets a little bit before finally logging out and returning to the real world.