Boxing With A Cat?

The Enlightened Tier monster, or at least what Grant assumed to be Enlightened Tier based on the aura it was exuding, turned out to be a mutated cat. Unlike the first mutated cat that Grant had faced, this cat was about three times the size. It had long claws protruding from its oversized paws that looked extremely lethal. Since it was growling in his direction he could also see teeth sticking out of its mouth very similar to that of a Sabre-Toothed Tiger.

The irony that the first monster he fought, other than a zombie, and the last monster he fought before reaching level 25 would be the same made him laugh.

It was time for another fun fight.

Grant knew that the kids stood no chance against the cat so he told them to wait a safe distance away and pick off any monsters that wandered too close to the fight.

Since Richard and Robin had leveled up quite significantly over the past few days from the sheer number of monsters they had managed to kill, they were able to roughly estimate the level of strength of an enemy based on the aura similar to Grant.

However, unlike Grant who had spent a majority of his time fighting monsters much stronger than himself, their ability to sense the enemies strength wasn't as refined as his was.

Once the kids had reached a safe distance, Grant charged directly at the cat. He knew he should be cautious but he also knew that with the intelligence that higher leveled monsters displayed, the cat was probably trying to formulate an attack strategy so Grant wanted to disrupt whatever its strategy was as well as reduce the amount of time it had to think.

Grant managed to reach the cat within a fraction of a second and immediately engaged it in a melee of sorts. Rather than call it a true melee it was more accurate to call it a series of punches and slips.

Grant would constantly lunge at the cat trying to strike it with his fists, to which the cat would immediately dodge, and then return the favor by throwing its oversized claws in his direction. The presence of the cats claws made it much more dangerous for Grant to be engaged in close combat than it was for the cat.

Since he had been unable to make solid contact with the cat, Grant wasn't sure exactly how tough its body would be, but he hoped that his sheer strength would be enough to at least damage it.

After going back and forth for a short while, it seemed like they had come to an agreement in the moment because both the cat and Grant took a leap backwards at the exact same time to break from the back and forth so that they could take in the situation and decide on each of their respective next moves.

The cat just stood there growling loudly at Grant while he eyed it in quiet contemplation. No matter how he racked his brain, he couldn't come up with a viable strategy to catch the cat off guard.

Up until now, whenever he fought a stronger monster he had used a skill or some sort of gimmick to catch the enemy unawares before he killed it. But he just couldn't come up with a strategy that made sense for fighting the cat.

He wasn't even sure what Path the cat was on and what skills it possessed so he couldn't attack it with reckless abandon without running the risk of being caught off guard himself.

After a few more seconds of trying to figure out a viable strategy, Grant decided to try and brute force it just to see what would happen. So he once again charged directly at the cat, but instead of trying to feel out the cats strength he went on the offensive.

He was only just barely managing to dodge the claws and an occasional bite from the cat but he was finally able to start making significant contact.

He knew that one moment of lapsed judgement would be enough to lead to his death but he was starting to enjoy the fight more and more as it went on.

He was beginning to find pleasure in walking the thin line between life and death. When Grant had originally started finding thrills in the throws of battle, he thought that he might just be going crazy, but he realized there was something cathartic about knowing that in the heat of battle, he was holding his own fate in his hands and he was the one who would decide what the outcome would be.

Of course, if he faced a monster far stronger than he was, that choice would be taken from him, but he had not had to face such a situation yet.

The more punches that Grant managed the land on the cat, the more ferocious it became in its attacks. It tried to attack him from all sorts of different angles but they all ultimately ended the same as the ones that came before it, in a brisk breeze and a loud bang of a paw hitting pavement.

After about a minute of Grant unloading punches on the cat, he once again separated himself from close contact with the cat. He hadn't backed off because he was tired or because he was alarmed by something the cat had done. He had backed off because he was alarmed that the cat hadn't done anything up to that point.

The cat hadn't used any skills whatsoever and that fact was what was setting off alarms.

For a few more minutes, Grant just patiently dove in and out of range of the cats attacks while returning as many of his own as he could manage in the short moments he was close enough to unleash punches.

The longer they fought, the more confused Grant became. He was starting to think that the cat might not actually have any skills. If it did, why wouldn't it have used them already? The wolf spider had immediately used its skills when their fight began and had not hesitated to use skills whenever an opportunity presented itself.

That was when an idea struck Grant. Maybe the cat had been using its skills from the very beginning but he just hadn't noticed. If the cat had self enhancing skills or only strengthening passive skills then it would make sense that he hadn't seen any outward projection of a skill.

With that thought, Grant decided to throw caution to the wind and put everything he had into the next few exchanges.

The more they exchanged blows back and forth the more Grant became convinced of his theory. The cat was gradually becoming bruised, battered, and cut all over but never once did it look like it was trying to load up a skill.

For the final time, Grant separated from melee range with the cat, but unlike every time before, he ran towards Richard and told him to lend him Peacekeeper, which Richard readily agreed too.

Grant had expected the Peacekeeper to slow him down a little bit but he managed to remain unhindered by the size of it. He figured this was attributed to the way The Path dealt with items or the stats that the hammer provided were enough to offset the weight of it. But he would have to think on that later and ask Sherlock for his opinion.

So with Peacekeeper in hand, Grant charged at the exhausted and beaten cat, leaped into the air above the cats head, and swung down in an attempt to crush its head. While he was in mid swing, Grant activated the hammers skill, Hammer Fall, and the strength behind his swing was instantaneously doubled.

The cat had been attempting to open its mouth to try and bite Grant out of mid air but with the increased strength behind the weapon, he managed make land the hammer directly between the eyes of the cat before it could raise its head high enough. Immediately following the impact the cats head shot straight into the ground creating a massive impact crater with the point of contact as the epicenter. Between the ground and the hammer was a now flattened head with two eyes that had been forced out of their sockets by the impact barely hanging on by some tissue. In those eyes, Grant could see the light of life slowly fading away.

He knew this was the moment. And sure enough, the notification came a moment later.