The Lonely Hunter

Chapter 4: Killing Three Birds With One Stone

A few minutes of walking and killing monsters, Kal had finally arrived at the mountain edge and there he saw the same dead tree with now a few branches on it due to the previous event that had happened. He used his binoculars to scope the tree and when he saw the big nest, the hawk seems to be there resting with its eggs.

"It seems like the hawk is being more alert of poachers heading to its nest." Kal said as he observe more of the bird's behavior. When he entered into the hawk's vicinity, it protrude opened its golden eyes and stared at the intruder. As it look at its intruder, it's expression turned grim and the golden eyes turned bloodshot red discovering that the intruder was the same person whom had killed it's child.

"Khiiyyyaah!!!" It squawk in anger and then spread it's wings. Even from afar, the hawk looked intimidating but Kal on the other hand was unmoved. Unlike last time where he'd have to use sneaky tactics just to get near the nest, he was confident to fight it head-on because of his improved physique. 

The hawk flew towards Kal like a dart ready to hit it's target.  Kal immediately opened his inventory and grab his golden knife on his right hand ready to counter the hawk's attack. The hawk retracted the sharp nails on its talons and strike it to Kal's defenseless body. Kal then went on to exchange the incoming attack with his own by putting all his strength to his right hand and smite the wide talons with his golden knife. 

Pang!

Sparks generated from the collision of the attack which caused the hawk to flew backwards a bit and Kal also being pushed back but by only a centimer. This was the difference in the two's overall physique. The hawk may have a higher attack and speed than Kal but it had a weaker defense while Kal had small gap of attack against the hawk but his defense was too high of a margin compared to the hawk.

"Let's dance big bird!" Kal grinned in excitement. He went dashing towards the hawk and in response, the hawk also moved to Kal in rage.

Peng! Pang! Pang! 

They began to exchange blows and each blows cause sparks to spread from the blades of the attack. Kal didn't have any proper education and he only had his own experience to apprehend the bird but he wasn't saddened that he could only perform basic attacks to the bird. With each attack he performed, his speed would increase as so, he could slowly find weak spots of the hawk. As soon as Kal strike his 6th attack, a golden aura covered the blade of the Golden knife.

"Finally! The passive has activated!" Kal delighted exclaimed. From the previous attacks, Kal could only leave shallow marks on its tough talon and sometimes leave a small wound on the hawk's hide. But now that the passive; Swift Attack had activated,  Kal now had an advantage both in speed and attack. 

The hawk swoop down its talons to Kal's body but Kal effortlessly dodge the attack and countered it with his own. He lacerated the abdomen of the hawk showing the wounded muscles and the ribs of the bird. But he didn't stop there, Kal followed up his attack by slicing the same spot which broke the ribs and blood began gushing out of the hawk's abdomen. 

"Khieeeeeaaaakk!" It screeched and cawed in agony. The hawk flew up in the air trying to flee from Kal's assault. When Kal saw that the bird tried to flee from him, he went on to pursuit it but the hawk manage to fly high up that Kal wasnt able to reach it.

"Goddamn you bird! Fight like a real man! (it's a female hawk)" Kal exclaimed. But the hawk was now too far for Kal to pursuit so he decided to climb the steep mountain to get the eggs from the dead tree. With his improved strength, it didn't take that much time for Kal to reach the dead tree.  There he saw the two golden eggs laying on the nest.

"Let's see how you will react to this." Kal etched a creepy grin as he formulated his wicked plan. He grabbed one of the Golden eggs and stood in the edge of the nest, he held the egg with one hand in the direction where the mama hawk had gone hiding to and spoke loudly. 

"Hey  you dumb bird! Do you see this egg in my hand? If you don't show up in 5 seconds , I'll throw this egg to the ground. You don't want to witness your child get the same fate as the last one!" Kal called out the bird in a threatening way. But he didn't get any response so Kal proceed to countdown. He slowly counted to five but he didn't hear a response of the hawk so he decided to throw the egg to the ground.

The egg fell hard on the solid ground and the shell cracked open causing the yolk of the egg to splatter like an exploding pus. Numbers then popped out of Kal's sight accompanied by a loud screech from afar.

+129 EXP

"Khieeeeeaaaakk!" The cry had came from the hawk and eventually showed up from one of the trees of the forest looking at Kal in grief and hatred.

"Hmm..neat." Kal didn't even mind the hawk's cry of agony and just looked at the popping numbers with a sigh. Unlike last time where he was given an item after killing the egg, he didn't obtain one right now other than experience points. 

"Does the item drop rate depend on the rarity and difficulty of the monster or does it affect the player's luck? I've been killing a lot of monsters but it still didn't gave me a single item drop, does that mean I'm just unlucky or its drop rate is just absurdly low?" Kal said to himself with a questioned look. In all of Kal's lifetime, he had been very unlucky, it would only be rare times where luck was in his side but he didn't want to admit that he was unfortunate,  he believe that there will be a time where his luck would boost up and reveal itself and when he got the mysterious gemstone that gave him this mysterious power, he knew that it was the start of his continous luck so he didn't mind the meager unfortunate things that might happen. He wanted to keep a positive mindset even though life would always be against him.

"Oh, you finally showed up mama hawk! Let's see if you'll stand still after I do the same thing to your last child!" Kal called out to the hawk. He then grabbed the last golden egg and threw it down the ground. When the egg was falling in the air, the hawk didn't hesitate to fly towards it. Even though it was suffering in heavy wounds, it's speed wasn't altered a bit so it could catch the egg before it reached the ground. 

"Heh, you dumb bird." Kal chuckled looking at the hawk swooping to the egg. He then jumped down the nest and followed the egg's fall. When the hawk manage to grab the egg safely with its talons, Kal was riding on top of the bird and laughed. 

"Ghahaha! Cherish the final moments with your child as this will be your only memories you'll carry to the afterlife!" He said to the hawk with a creepy laugh. With the golden knife on his right hand, Kal strike the neck of the hawk consecutively  leaving deep lacerations to it. The hawk couldn't do anything to the barrage of attacks because its talons was securely holding its child and it couldn't shake off Kal due to the heavy wound on its body. The only thing it could do right now was screech and cry in pain. 

After the nonstop incision on its thick neck, Kal beheaded the hawk leaving it aimlessly fly in the air like a headless chicken. After it had finally stopped flying, they crashed down on the ground crashing  the egg along with them and Kal safely land uninjured on which was then he was greeted by the numbers and window panel.

Ting~

+700 EXP

+129 EXP

YOU HAVE LEVELLED UP!

YOU HAVE LEVELLED UP!

Ting~

YOU HAVE OBTAINED: Hawk Spring Arrow (E++)

"Wow! I got two levels and an item!" Kal rejoiced happily at his fruit of labor. But the happiness only last a moment after he read the description of the item he obtained. As he was jumping in joy, a window panel suddenly popped up in his view and when he read it, his eyes grew wide.