Chapter 5 - 05. Time To Hunt.

Well, since what had happened had already happened, Ray wasn't going to dwell on such thoughts anymore.

His focus right now was completely on Mira, and he was going to do whatever it took to make her happy.

The two lovebirds smiled and slowly leaned towards each other to kiss once again, but Helen harrumphed loudly, making them jump a bit, before noticing Helen's presence in the doorway.

*Ahem*

"Well, it's about time you two lovebirds acknowledged your feelings for each other. I thought you two would never figure it out. So, should Mommy be expecting babies very soon?" Helen asked teasingly and Mira's cheeks turned beet red.

Yes, they were at the right age to get married.

And yes, Ray and Mira could start their nightly bed exercises. But thinking about such things happening so soon made the cute cow-eared girl blush so hard, she wanted to bury her head in the ground like an ostrich.

Seeing this, Ray smiled and so did, Helen.

"Alright, you two. Breakfast is getting cold. Let's eat now, shall we?" Helen suggested and the two nodded in response.

After breakfast, Ray stepped outside.

Right now, he needed air and he needed to think as well.

Ray lifted his gaze and looked around his late father's farmland.

For generations, his family had been living in this village called Thornsville.

It was a small village with about three hundred people residing in it.

Most of the residents were farmers and they lived in houses that were made of wood and thatched roofs.

Different fields of wheat stretched down to the forest in the distance and this was how the residents had been surviving for generations.

Yes, to the residents, it was a quiet and peaceful village, so peaceful that people often said that nothing ever happened there.

However, Ray knew that their peaceful lives wouldn't last much longer.

And so, Ray, who was currently seated on a fence post, opened his status window once again.

He glanced at the skills he had acquired upon awakening his class and read the details of each skill again.

<> was a short range teleportation skill but Ray had always hated this skill ever since he had acquired it in his last life.

Back then, the skill would leave him dizzy whenever he used it against an opponent, because it consumed a lot of his mana, thereby rendering him useless in the thick of battle.

If he didn't have at least ten mana potions with him, he wouldn't have been able to easily fight or even win against his opponents. However, getting a mana potion was extremely difficult because of how expensive it was.

But, with five years of experience under his belt, Ray felt a bit more confident about using his new skills.

His focus this time around was to train as hard as possible, to adapt quickly to using the <> skill, plus, he knew the full potential and what <> was capable of doing, so he wasn't going to hate it as much as he used to hate it before.

As for his main objective, Ray aimed to enlarge his mana pool as soon as possible, but to do that, he needed to grow stronger and battle against stronger foes as well.

Yes, it would be difficult and nearly impossible for a weakling like himself to accomplish that right now, but Ray wasn't worried or afraid to carry out the difficult task.

In fact, he was confident that he would be able to grow stronger a lot faster than he had during his first lifetime.

Now, one might wonder why Ray was brimming with such confidence, rather than being filled with fear and worry about his future.

However, the answer to that question was quite simple; Ray shifted his gaze to one of the new skills he had acquired.

<>

Looking at this skill, the benefits were unlike anything he had ever seen or heard of, and Ray couldn't wait to try out the skill during battle.

Ray then glanced at the <> skill.

Yes, the skill's name sounded strange and embarrassing, but the effect of the skill was clear.

It needed Ray to share a deep bond with his fellow allies, females to be exact, and he would be able to share some experience and copy some of their skills in return.

It made sense because while he had been in the elite warrior party, Ray had always watched Aldric share his experience with every team member, except Ray.

At first, Ray had wondered why this was the case, but he soon realized that it was simply because of his status which was different from the rest of the party.

In the end, Ray didn't think too much of it because he had concluded that if he could grow stronger on his own, then Aldric would eventually acknowledge him as a member of the elite warrior party. But that didn't happen.

*Sighs*

Ray let out a soft sigh as he recalled how Aldric, Elise, Viktor, and Gareth had worked seamlessly together to grow stronger while he had been left behind.

But Ray waved those memories away.

He wasn't interested in recalling how miserable he had been in his previous timeline, because right now his mind was focused on growing stronger than all four elite warriors combined.

And so, with his mind made up on what he wanted to do, Ray swiftly closed his status window, then looked towards the forest once again

Three months from now, Baron Harvard would come to collect taxes as he had always done every year.

But this time, the villagers wouldn't be able to pay it, then Harvard would pick out a few people to torture and make an example of, before killing them in front of everyone.

Mira had been among the few villagers who were picked out, but Ray wasn't going to let that happen this time around.

However, to prevent the event from happening a second time, Ray knew that he needed gold coins and he had to get his hands on them, as soon as possible.

But this meant that he would have to start hunting monsters and selling their body parts.

Yes, it was easier said than done, but in a way, it could help him kill two birds with one stone.

In other words, he would grow stronger and get richer if everything went according to plan, and it would also help him improve his current pathetic stat which was still at Level 1.

If he were to fight Baron Harvard right now, he'd definitely lose. But if he were to grow stronger first, then his chances of winning would increase as well.

Also, thanks to the knowledge from his last life, Ray knew exactly where the monsters currently were.

He knew where the dungeons in the forest were, and he knew which skills he was interested in absorbing from the monsters he would slay, and this made Ray even more eager to get started.

For five years, Aldric, Elise, Viktor, and Gareth had used him, mocked him, betrayed him, and killed him. But this time, he was going to destroy them, and he was going to do it in the most gruesome way imaginable.

Thinking of this, a smirk appeared on Ray's face and he jumped down from the fence.

"Alright, I've got a lot of work to do."

"But first, it's time to hunt," Ray said to himself as he straightened and began walking in the direction of the forest.