Ling Xu could only see sixteen meters before the light faded completely and he couldn't see anymore.
As he was reaching the end of the path, Ling Xu saw a beast that looked similar to the ferocious rabbit and the adult ferocious rabbit.
"Is it guarding the door?"
He asked himself, seeing it blocked the path to a door which stood just behind the beast.
What Ling Xu had in front of him was a beast bigger than the ones he had met before. It even had a horn in its forehead making him feel insecure.
He didn't want to experience being pierced by it as he knew he would die on the spot.
Ling Xu then looked again at the wooden door which it was guarding.
It wasn't that big as only one person could enter at a time.
Ling Xu still had his eyes from the beast as he never left it out of his eyesight when he noticed something that took his attention from it.
"There is a countdown on it!" he noticed something that made him anxious.
[Time ends in 1 minute 30 seconds.]
[Time ends in 1 minute 29 seconds.]
[Time ends in 1 minute 28 seconds.]
Ling Xu didn't know its purpose but he felt the need to cross that door before the time ended.
He looked again at the horned beast and charged forward using his maximum speed.
He even activated his skill to move flexible and enhance his speed even further as he felt it was strong.
Still, he didn't feel an ounce of intimidation from the big beast he had in front. Although its horn seemed dangerous, Ling Xu realized he didn't feel the same gap he felt compared to when he fought in the first stage of blood qi against the first adult ferocious rabbit.
So, he went for the kill right away as he felt the need to enter that door before the time ended.
Noticing Ling Xu's footsteps while running which couldn't be concealed, the horned beast realized someone was coming before it could see him entering his field of vision.
So, once it saw Ling Xu charging at full speed it charged forth too, aiming its horn directly at him.
Ling Xu didn't waver even when he was only a meter apart from it, he dodged the attack easily having his skill Enhanced Synapsis which allowed it to see the beast way slower than it was.
After his body was washed away of any impurity he had been able to process even faster the speed at which he perceived his surroundings, helping him see the big rabbit in front much slower than the adult ferocious rabbit when he was in the first stage of Blood Qi and he had fought his first one.
And without decreasing in speed, he made use of his flexible movements to move to its side.
The next second, he aimed at its thick neck.
Sadly, the beast reacted and moved its head to defend with its horn that suddenly brimmed with light.
But Ling Xu could easily see at slow motion the rabbits try to defend so he redirected his attack.
Following closely behind the necks position.
"Kiiiik!"
Chirred the beast.
It tried to turn to look at Ling Xu to attack once more but couldn't muster the strength.
Ling Xu's slash had left a deep wound on its neck that cut through its bones.
"This beast has such strong vitality that it doesn't die even after I almost cut its head."
He was stunned at the beast as it kept struggling to move, he knew that if he had such a wound on his neck he would have instantly died.
It showed a strong will to fight for its life as its eyes looked ferocious.
Ling Xu landed another blow to it, managing to end its miserable state.
The whole process seemed effortless but Ling Xu had to spend quite the effort to concentrate his vision on the beast's movement, considering that it surpassed him by a stage.
Ling Xu saw the kill confirmation.
[You have killed a Horned Rabbit (3rd stage of Blood Qi).]
Being distracted by the notification he looked at the countdown still decreasing.
He now had a minute remaining.
He was about to reach the door when he saw the beast's corpse.
He noticed the shiny horn on the corpse even after it was dead.
He wanted to take it but he didn't have a way of transporting so many items with him.
Right now, he had his small dagger between his pants and belt, having no other place to put it.
He didn't have an inventory like those from a game.
And the extra luminous stone he had was in one of his pockets, while the other was torn from accidents while fighting.
"I need to find a way to save my items. I don't know if that horn would be helpful, but I need to resolve it before I have to leave something vital behind."
Ling Xu continued with a bit of reluctance as he opened the door.
[You have cleared the 1st floor of the Dark Cave before the time ended.]
[Conditions met.]
[You have obtained a Random Box (middle grade) as a reward.]
What he met inside was a small room with its walls made of stone.
The first thing he noticed was a stairway leading down. But before he decided to go through it, his attention was swept by a table emerging from the stone floor.
It looked the same as the ones before but this one looked to be made of stone too, just like the walls.
It was against the wall and had an inconspicuous box above it.
"It must be my reward" he didn't wait for a second and opened it as he saw a pair of shoes which looked quite robust.
But when he took the pair to his hands he was surprised as he realized the pair of shoes was weightless.
[You have obtained Wind Blood Shoes (middle grade semi-treasure).]
"Wow!"
He put on the shoes as he was eager to see which ability they had.
"I feel so light, with this I will be even faster than before."
He said as he moved around a bit and felt how the pair of shoes not only were weightless but they even made his weight decrease, helping him become faster.
Feeling excited, Ling Xu's blood qi circulated in his legs as it was suddenly absorbed by his shoes while he tried jumping again.
"Aghhh!"
The shoes took a considerable amount of his blood qi as he flew up.
Fortunately, he was fast enough to protect his head from crashing into the ceiling.
Ling Xu wasn't used to the usage of the shoes yet and didn't know that it could even absorb blood qi to increase his movement speed even more by decreasing the weight of his body.
They seemed to require a considerable amount of it as he felt the blood qi that was in his legs was almost used up in that instance.
It was quite shocking that he could reach it, as the room had a height of five meters.
Before he had entered the first stage of blood qi, he knew he could barely jump a little more than a meter.
But with the shoes plus him being in the second stage of blood qi, his jumping strength had increased to a little over five meters.
Ling Xu then remained in place as he tried to recover from the shock.
A minute later he went down the stairs, seeing there was nothing left to do in the stone room.
It took less than a minute as he entered a similar scene to the first floor of the cave.
Ling Xu observed the room, wary of the presence of any beast or human that might attack him.
He became very careful as he didn't know how it would be after descending and he was even more afraid to find another person with bad intentions.
As there was no other presence apart from his he checked the time on the mission status.
He became wary of the time as he didn't want to lose any reward he could gain.