After the game.

Itniza: Body: 8, Skills: 7, Mind: 6, Luck: 3, Future potential: 8. I saw him running in the alley, and Viper used his brain to avoid the dogs. Still, he didn't get much to show. Also, he found the dog before others.

Uncle_404: Body & Skills: 7, Mind & Luck: 4, Future Potential: 8.

Itniza: Even with such a low mind, you're giving him an 8 on potential?

Uncle_404: After that last struggle, this guy's a fighter, you know.

Zombie_432: …

…

After 6–7 members finished rating the Viper, Armon concluded.

Armon_002: Well, I think everyone agrees Viper has an 8 in potential for the next trial.

Itniza: Yup, I am going to see if he will do something in his next fight.

Others wrote the same thing.

After reading everyone's comments, Ethan understood they were rating hunters for future games for gambling. Mainly, Armon would share these ratings on social media as the chat moderator.

Ethan was about to ask more in the chat when he saw everyone spamming "tag team" in the game chat.

He looked at the screen. After Viper left the game, he was back to the small screen section. Now, the number of remaining screens was 9.

He scanned all of them and saw most were about to meet the orange dots. He checked the central combined screen, where the tag team had already surrounded the dog.

Ethan stopped thinking about everything and switched the pov to one of the tag players. He got immersed in the new fight.

…

Outside the game, Alex mindlessly walked through the market with unfocused eyes.

Even though he felt no physical fatigue, his mind was a mess.

He still could not believe how short his first trial run was. From time to time, he looked down at his leg and rubbed his shoulder.

There was nothing there, but the pain he felt in the game irked him from time to time.

Alex saw an empty table on the roadside. Not caring, he sat there to collect himself. He covered his face with both hands and closed his eyes.

All the scenes inside the game continued to flash through his mind.

Now that he thought about it, going inside the alley was a terrible decision. He was lucky he didn't get surrounded by street dogs; if that had happened, everything would have been over by now.

Alex pressed his hands hard on his face in frustration. This silly mistake almost ended everything, and what if rabies did not affect that dog that attacked him? In that situation, he would've just died failing the game. 

Alex clicked his tongue and slammed his hand on the table in frustration. Even with luck going in his favor, he knew that if he had been just a second late in stepping back, that dog would have slashed both his eyes.

Just thinking about all of it made him feel ashamed. He was so confident before the game. Ready to conquer the hunt. 'Fck it, is this how I conquer the game? Almost losing both my eyes to a fcking dog. Haha, pathetic.'

Alex wanted to scream at himself, but no words came out of his mouth. He just opened his eyes and stared at the road from between his fingers.

He said in a defeated, tired tone, "Play the recent recording."

A gray screen appeared in front of him, and the video of him fighting against the dog started playing.

After five minutes, he replayed the video, then again, and again, and more...

For hours, Alex sat there like a corpse, staring down with no movement. His eyes went red and started hurting a little, so he stopped at that point.

Now he knew that even with the limit on recording time, there was no such limit while viewing the stored data.

It was just that after a certain time, he felt a sting around his eyes, like he had been staring at a screen for too long.

He sighed and closed his eyes to relax them. For four hours, he had been reviewing his fight against the dog.

At first, he thought the initial bite to his left leg was unavoidable, but after reviewing the clip more than 50 times, he concluded that stepping back had been a mistake.

Instead, a better option would have been to turn. That way, he could've been on the dog's side, leaving it no chance to cling to him.

If he had been a little faster in doing that, he could have even landed a hit on the dog's side. A solid kick or punch should have sent it flying into the wall.

If he had any weapon, he could've ended the fight right there, but even without a weapon, he could've landed a couple more kicks on its legs, immobilizing the dog.

From that point on, he could've taken things slowly. With how injured the dog already was, it wouldn't have been able to threaten him much longer.

It was a risky plan, but he was sure he would have suffered fewer injuries that way. This wasn't the only option—if he had been more prepared for the dog, he could've even used that chance to punch the dog in the jaw.

It was only because he let his guard down that he did not notice any sign of the dog attacking beforehand.

He also realized another mistake was to not search for any weapons. When he knew that street dogs weren't the target, the safer option should've been to back down and find something to deal with bigger dogs.

If the rabid dog had been a large dog, he would've been seeking death for sure. It's just that having large dogs as pets in the city was super rare, so that hadn't crossed his mind during the game, but now that he thought about it, it was the most stupid thing he'd missed.

The trial game wasn't the real world, and anything could be possible there. Alex realized he needed to work more on his reflexes and planning. From the next game onward, he needed to remain calm.

This time, being trapped in the alley blocked all ways to gather information, and he panicked because of that. He couldn't afford to make a similar mistake in future games.

Well, it wasn't like everything was bad in the game.