Killing the Hippo's Mother, a Diamond Rank Beast!

When the wind crane heard the order, it soared into the sky and immediately charged at the hippopotamus with its fastest speed. 

As the hippopotamus sensed the danger, it quickly used its skill [Water Armor], and a visible armor formed of water enveloped its entire body.

By the time the wind crane was above the hippopotamus, the water armor had fully formed. Undeterred, the wind crane attacked with its skill [Wings Blade], and its wings were enveloped by the power of the wind, sharpening their edges.

However, when the wind crane's attack struck the hippopotamus's upper body, it only managed to pierce through the water armor, leaving a small cut as the power of the attack was depleted by the armor.

Seeing the hippo tilt its head and open its mouth and form a few small water balls, the wind crane quickly retreated.

The hippopotamus, being an experienced and intelligent beast, only formed a few small water balls that were just enough to injure the wind crane if they hit, because it knew that killing the wind crane in one blow would be difficult due to its incredible speed.

Nevertheless, the wind crane had already retreated into the sky and used its skill [Wind Slash] as it saw the water balls flying toward it.

Whoosh! 

The wind slashes charged forward towards the hippo and directly collided with a few water balls. 

However, since the water balls were formed from only a small amount of the hippo's mana, the wind slashes easily cut them through and continued toward the hippo. 

'Charge towards it and prepare to dodge its attack.' James ordered the wind crane. 

The wind crane immediately used its skill [Wings Blade] again and charged towards the hippo. 

Seeing this, the hippo immediately opened her mouth widely, and this time it used its [Water Blast] at full power as a 1,5-meter water pillar began forming, waiting to be unleashed.

When James saw that, he immediately used his fire skill [Fire Vortex]. 

This time, the magic circle above his head expanded to 3 meters and a 2 meters fire pillar began to form.

The most different thing about when he cast his skill this time was that the edge of the fire pillar started to twist, befitting the skill's name, [Fire Vortex]. 

Though the twist on the edge was small, it was a clear improvement in the skill.

Excited by the enhancement, James released the fire vortex, aiming directly at the hippopotamus.

The huge fire pillar shot towards the hippo, and the hippo, recognizing the real danger, decided to ignore the wind crane and focus on intercepting the fire pillar.

The fire pillar closed in quickly, reaching within 20 meters of the hippopotamus, and when the two skills collided, they were only 10 meters apart. 

Boom! 

The aftermath of the collision was far greater than when James's skill had collided with the Water Blast from the Hippopotamus cub.

A lot of steam was made from the impact, and although the fire pillar's power was greatly reduced, it still charged forward.

The fire pillar struck the hippopotamus, piercing through the water armor and leaving a 2 meters wide, 60 cm deep hole in its body.

The hippopotamus let out a scream, a mix between a groan, a yell, and a cow's moo.

However, the attack didn't stop at that, as the wind crane, who had already been above its head, swung its wings at the hippo's neck, creating a slightly larger cut than before, then immediately retreated as per James's order.

Even though the wind crane's attack didn't injure the hippo as much as James's, it would definitely have a significant effect if the hippo was hit continuously by the wind crane's attack.

As soon as his mana replenished after using the skill, James cast [Fire Vortex] again, while the hippo was still screaming in agony. 

The hippopotamus was surprised to see the second attack that had the same power and immediately used the last of its mana to cast [Water Blast] in an attempt to intercept the approaching fire pillar.

This time, the water pillar was only about 1 meter wide, and it could even be said to be only slightly stronger than the cub's attack.

Therefore, the water pillar was immediately devoured by the fire pillar and continued toward the hippo, blasting its head into ashes as it passed through, setting the surrounding trees and ground ablaze.

James immediately stopped his skill when he heard the system notifications.

[Ding! You have killed the Low-level Diamond Rank Beast.] 

[Ding! The experience at Peak Rank 4 has increased to 30%.] 

When he saw the notifications, James complained as he noticed that the progress, which should have been 50%, was only 30%. 

"As I mentioned before, the higher your rank, the harder it is to advance, as either the system adjusts the difficulty, or it naturally becomes harder as your rank goes higher." Little Fluffy said, after he heard that James was complaining about the percentage that had decreased.

'So, this time I need to kill around three low rank 6 and probably a high or peak rank 5 to reach 100% from 0%.' James sighed. 

James then put the corpse into his inventory and called the wind crane, as he wanted to hunt more beasts so that he could upgrade his rank again as soon as possible. 

However, after the wind crane had only been flying for a minute, James heard Little Lion's call for help and immediately ordered the wind crane to fly towards Mortos City at top speed.