Han Xi stands up and decides it's time to be productive. ‘Hey System, can you utilize my new [Radar] skill to periodically search for prey for hunting today?’ Han Xi asks, hoping the new skill can be used passively with her system.

  [Yes, I can utilize your [Radar] skill in this manner. With your skill's current level, the current maximum distance is 15 feet (4.57 m).]

  Feeling dejected, she sighs, disappointed her skill cant scan any farther. ‘Is that really the maximum distance right now? That doesn't help me very much with what I was hoping to use it for.’

  [As stated in the skill description, distance will increase with skill level. Your request to run this skill periodically in the background will passively level this skill up. This means you will be able to scan farther distances soon.]

  Han Xi’s eyes widen, and she stands up abruptly, much to Xu Hao’s amusement. ‘You mean you can basically passively level up my skills without me having to consciously use them?! That's incredible! Is there a limit to this?’

  [That is correct, Host. However, this is limited to abilities that do not directly require the user to perform some action, with a few special exceptions. For example, I can maintain invisibility using an invisibility reted skill, but I can not do the same with your [Scratch] skill. In the system's current state, 2 skills can be utilized by the system at a time.]

  ‘That is very useful, thank you, System!’ Han Xi is now wagging her tail happily.

  [You're welcome, Host.]

  “One second you’re sad, the next second you’re happy. I can’t get a read on you, Miss Han Xi. What is making you so excited?” Xu Hao says, while giggling, amused at the little fox’s antics.

  [Host, I am detecting a being at the radius of my searching capabilities. It appears to be just passing by.]

  Surprised, Han Xi looks towards the direction of the being provided by the system. ‘Is there any way to tell what being it is?’

  [No, this skill is not capable of determining what being is being detected alone. It must be used in combination with another skill or ability to do that, or it must be upgraded. Also, at level 5, you will be able to tell the size of the being.]

  Han Xi nods at the system expnation and points her paw in the direction of her prey, trying to get Xu Hao to follow her. The duo stands up and starts walking in the direction Han Xi was pointing at wearily. Xu Hao decided to follow Han Xi with caution, since she appeared to be exercising caution herself.

  While following Han Xi, Xu Hao appears to be lost in thought. ‘I really wish I could understand what is going through her mind and why she was being so expressive.’

  Before Xu Hao had time to fully process his thoughts, he notices a deer in front of both of them.

  “Miss Han Xi, there is a forsthorn deer in front of us. Unfortunately, I do not have the means to sy it. Isn’t it beautiful? I heard its horns can be used as a basic alchemic material to slightly improve one's resistance to ice Qi for a period of time.” Xu Hao looks at the frosthorn deer, admiring its beautiful antlers and horn. Despite being called a forsthorn deer, both its horn and antlers are reminiscent of icicles. Its fur is nearly as white as the surrounding snow, making it somewhat difficult to spot.

  ‘Hey, it's the same kind of deer as I punished before! It's time to show it what I’m made of!’ Wasting no time, Han Xi uses [Sprint], dashing for the frosthorn deer. The deer notices her advance and hastily decides to retreat. But before it has the chance to, Han Xi uses her [Bite] skill on its neck, causing blood to profusely gush from its neck.

  While Han Xi battles the deer, Xu Hao watches in horror, seeing how powerful the little fox cub is. ‘How is she so fierce and yet so small?! It’s a good thing that I am on her good side.’

  The deer struggles to get her off its neck, but with no success. Its body becomes weaker and weaker, until it is no longer able to stand. Letting out a final grunt, the deer falls to the ground limply, perishing from its wounds.

  [EXP gained!][Level Up! You have reached Level 8! +1 to all stats.][You have gained 5 stat points and 2 skill points.]

  Looking at her kill satisfied, Han Xi puts on a smug expression and looks back at Xu Hao, who is conflicted on whether he should be excited, or fearful.

  ‘See! I am amazing, aren’t I? You can praise me now.’ Han Xi says in her mind, wagging her tail, expecting to be praised.

  Struggling to find the words, Xu Hao looks at Han Xi in awe. “You syed that frosthorn deer with no effort at all. Just… how strange are you?”

  Feeling slightly irritated, Han Xi gres back at him. ‘Hey! I’m not strange! Well, I guess I am, but it's rude to say so!’

  [Skill [Radar] has leveled up to level 2!][You can now scan up to 50 feet (15.24 m) around you.][Skill [Radar] is picking up 2 beings running away from the host to the east.]

  ‘The radius of my skill went up by quite a bit! I want to go after those two beings running away, so I don't have time to get irritated at Little Perv.’ She raises her paw in the direction of the running away beings and starts running towards them and activating her [Sprint] skill.

  Surprised at the sudden change in attitude, Xu Hao quickly puts the frosthorn deer into his storage pouch and runs after Han Xi. “Miss Han Xi, wait for me! You’re running too fast!”

  She looks back and sticks her tongue out at Xu Hao teasingly as she continues sprinting towards where the two beings were running away, slowly catching up to them. As she approaches closer, she can see 2 more frosthorn deer running away.

  ‘I bet these two were friends with that st one I took down. I wouldn't want to deprive them of their friend, right? Time to send you both to the same pce!’ She picks up her pace chasing the two deer, now right behind both of them.

  [Skill [Sprint] has leveled up to level 3!]

  ‘Great timing! Now to finish this up quickly, I'm already starting to feel exhausted.’ She quickly jumps at one of the deer, using [Bite] to tch onto and rip into the neck of the deer on the left. She uses [Scratch] at the same time, trying to increase her damage and take it down quicker. The deer’s legs gave out on it, causing it to fall onto the ground. It makes one st desperate attempt to get up and run away, but that attempt is quickly silenced by one st tug on its neck from Han Xi.

  After sying the left deer, Han Xi quickly continues sprinting after the other deer, catching up and dispatching it simirly.

  Han Xi colpses to the ground, panting in extreme exhaustion after defeating 3 deer in a row. Her head feeling dizzy from both the exhaustion, and seemingly never ending system messages.

  ‘What the heck, why so many system messages?! I’m so tired, I can't even understand what my system is saying right now. I think I need to take a nap…’ Her eyes shut peacefully as she rests next to the deer's corpse. This typically would not be a great pce to rest, however, since Han Xi knows Xu Hao is right behind her, she figures it is safe enough to rest.

  “What the hell happened here?!” Xu Hao says in shock, seeing the first corpse on the ground full of bite marks and deep scratches on its neck. He quickly puts the deer into his storage pouch and continues running towards Han Xi. “Miss Han Xi, are you over there?! I’m almost to you!”

  Finally catching up to where Han Xi took down the second deer, Xu Hao notices the little fox on the ground next to the deer, unconscious. Panicking, he quickly picks up Han Xi and inspects her body for injuries. Finding none, he lets out a sigh of relief and determines that she had just passed out from exhaustion.

  He looks at her peacefully with a smile, gently caressing her head. “You better not scare me like that again. But seriously… you're just an animal grade fox, right? Just how strong are you?”

  Xu Hao simirly puts the st deer into his storage pouch and starts walking back towards camp. On the way to camp, he stops at a couple of his traps he pced in the forest. Out of which, 2 of them had a rabbit in them. He finally returns to camp and sits down on the log and pces Han Xi near the campfire.

  Looking down at the little fox, Xu Hao thinks to himself, ‘I’ve never had such a successful hunting trip before, and It's still morning! I really hope this little one chooses to stay with us.’ A gentle smile develops on his face. ‘Not because she is so amazing at hunting! I wouldn’t want her around just for that!’ he shakes his head, trying to dismiss those thoughts. ‘I just really enjoy having her around and petting her fur.’

  After a little while of resting, Han Xi wakes up slowly. As she opens her eyes, she is greeted by the dancing fmes of the campfire, its heat radiating against her body, making her feel rexed. ‘Where am I? Back at camp? Little Perv must have carried me back here.’ she thinks while groggily sitting up.

  “I hope you slept well, Miss Han Xi. Its already afternoon.” Xu Hao says with a smile on his face, greeting her. “Thanks to you, we have already gotten more than enough food to st us nearly a week in a single day! Not just that, but we can eat a lot too!”

  She looks back at Xu Hao and tries to give him a thumbs up to look cool. Though, her attempt at looking cool completely failed as she is cking in the thumbs department, so she just made a cute little smirk while lifting her paw for seemingly no reason. ‘Wait, what was I even trying to do anyway.’

  Putting her paw back down, she recalls that she got a bunch of system messages earlier. ‘Oh yeah, the system gave me a ton of notifications earlier when I was passing out. System, is there a way to review old notifications?’

  [Just as you have before, you can will your notification history to appear in front of you as a list.]

  She does so, and the notifications she missed earlier appears in front of her.

  [Skill [Sprint] has leveled up to level 4!][Skill [Scratch] has leveled up to level 3!][Skill [Bite] has leveled up to level 3!][Skill [Radar] has leveled up to level 3!][You can now scan up to 150 feet (45.72 m) around you.][EXP gained!][EXP gained!][Level Up! You have reached Level 9! +1 to all stats.][Level Up! You have reached Level 10! +1 to all stats.][You have gained 10 stat points and 4 skill points.][Host has reached level 10, therefore, the quest feature has been unlocked. Host can now periodically receive quests.]

  ‘Woah! This is all really great stuff! I also unlocked a quest feature? What does that do?’ she asks her system.

  [The quest feature gives the user rewards for completing system provided quests. These quests are based off of the situation the host is in, or a desire to do something. The difficulty of the quests provided will range from Easy, Medium, Hard, Very Hard, Nightmare, Catastrophe, and Impossible. The higher the difficulty, the better the rewards.]

  Satisfied with her system's response, she smiles and nods. ‘Thank you system~. I can't wait to see what kind of rewards I get.’

  Noticing that Han Xi is acting strange, Xu Hao decides to speak out. “Just what are you smiling at, Miss Han Xi? You’ve been acting a little weird tely.”

  Han Xi recoils at his question. She can’t tell him about her system, not yet at least. It’s not like she could tell him if she wanted to, anyway. She smiles awkwardly, hoping that he will divert his attention elsewhere.

  “Well, it's not like you could tell me, even if you wanted to.” Xu Hao says while giggling at her awkward reaction. “Anyway, let's head back to the vilge. Lei Yue will be thrilled with how much meat we are bringing home! Maybe she’ll be willing to forgive me for yesterday.”

  AnDwHaT5