Chương 52: The Marsh - 2

WARHOL began his role in the battle by casting on himself a series of basic incantations: [Invisibility] and [Indomitability], mostly. Then, he watched. He had his System scan the monster. Back came the results seconds later: [Name: Anaconda Snapping Turtle] [Level: 200] [Vitals: 1000] It was a basic monster. Nothing more to say about it than that — basic level, basic vital signs. Just normal in every respect. That meant Lance had a fight on his hands!

His son stood in the center of the dry land looking paralyzed from fear; paralysis from fear was better than the alternative, paralysis from monster spores, as one could always snap out of their fear paralysis, assuming one had the proper mental training. Monster Spore paralysis? Very little wiggle room there. He almost incanted a [Protect: From: Status Ailments] but he did not as he felt doing so would've deprived his son of an incredible learning opportunity.

Cupping his hands to his mouth, he shouted, "Come on, son! You gotta get a move on!" That was all it took to break Lance from his stupor. Having realized what was happening, Lance withdrew his sword and transmogrified it into a crossbow. He infused fire-elemental mana into the bolts and let bolt-after-bolt fly at the creature. Each arrow struck true but lacked the force needed to penetrate the creature's thick, and in some places, armored, skin.

"Try electro-mana infusion!" he shouted to his son. For all though he wanted his son to learn combat efficiencies, he also wanted his son to not only survive but do so without taking the whole day experimenting with a thousand-and-one varying tactics. After tangoing with the Horror, time remained of the essence now more than ever. His son listened to his advice and infused electro-mana into his bolts.

Before he got a chance to fire the newly charged bolts off, though, the snake-turtle attacked; first it tried to smoosh Lance to a fine paste by slamming its tail and body segments at him, forcefully hurrying its shell into the earth. Lance leapt to safety but lost his grip on his weapon and had to waste precious seconds retracing his steps in a contested zone. Sloppy. When he recaptured his weapon, the snake-turtle struck once more, this time, it tried to use its fangs to ripe him in twain.

By now, Lance had lit his weapon, now a sword, on fire, and that proved a significant deterrent to the monster. Yet all that bought his son was temporary breathing room back at Square One, proverbially speaking.

"Switch back to electro!" he shouted. Although Lance switched back to electro-mana, he still had time to shout back, "I know!" Kids. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. Then, several bolts in quick succession hit the turtle-snake and clearly struck a nerve; the creature thrashed and roared, tearing down many trees in its wake. Lance smirked, haughty in having exploited the creature's weakness.

He fired more bolts into the creature which saw literal buckets worth of blood to splatter to the ground.

"Watch out for that thing's blood!" Warhol again resisted the urge for him call out the dangers. He had warned his son about the blood; they would have to intuit the rest. If Lance was unsuccessful in his blood navigation, he would be dealing with those nasty 'status ailments,' for the remainder of the battle. That was one of the turtle-snake's nasty evolutionary features, its blood was toxic as the flames of perdition itself, or so many a legend went.

Unfortunately for his son, Lance failed to avoid the blood's pitfalls. So enamored was he in filling the beast with crossbow bolts, he failed to watch his step and stepped in the creature's blood several times. Now the question was, what status ailment would he receive? He could [Scan] his son and find out instantly, but where was the fun in that? He liked to push the limits of his knowledge without the System babysitting him and guiding him by the hand like he was an ignorant baby.

Warhol saw his son stumble, clutching parts of his body. He looked like he was about to puke. All the tell-tale signs of being Poisoned! The beast saw its prey slow and pressed its advantage; instead of using its fangs, as he feared, the turtle-snake trashed its body against his boy. Painful cries came from Lance, then even more agonized ones as he was thrown into trees and rocks by the monster's body.

His son was taking a beating, that was sure, and though his healing factor would go a long way in getting him back on his feet, Warhol decided now would be the first time he intervened: he incanted [Slow] on the Anaconda Snapping turtle. Now, the beast would only be able to launch a fraction as many of its assaults against his son. Lance showed his worth and recovered from the poison once Warhol called to him: "Look for Tinsel Root! It's a natural antidote!"

His schooling evidently taught him basic survivalism, which was good, because he found the Tinsel Root surprisingly fast. He understood how to use the root without being told and chewed up the plant but did not swallow. Swallowing would cause painful stomach cramps. Warhol saw the moment when his son's poison faded.

That was when he moved faster and hit harder, when he had willed his weapon into a war-hammer and smashed away at one part of the creature's shell; sometime after that attack, he activated [Super Charge] and slammed himself into the creature's reinforced point. He must've injected a good amount of his mana into the attack, because a deep crack impressed itself into the creature's shell causing it to roar murder.

Now was where the real fight would begin — Lance had made a rookie mistake and enraged the creature he hunted. Now, would he surmount his mistake and still win? He would see in the next few minutes. Even with their [Slow] incantation forcefully reducing the creature's speed, the agonized Anaconda Snapping Turtle struck at Lance as only a creature in more pain that it ever knew could. Lance was flung about like an old washcloth He guessed it was now or never.

Warhol again intervened and incanted a [Lesser Lightning Bolt] against the swampy beast. He was careful against infusing any mana into his attack beyond the minimum that was needed to incant. His bolts struck the creature and caused huge swathes of skin and scale to bubble and explode.

"Oops! Too much..." His attack was unfortunate. Now, Lance would win too easily. A pity for the serious warrior. Lance recovered and pressed his assault — a boring number of bolts hit the beast before it keeled over, ready for the final blow. A blow which Lance delivered in the form of a war-axe with sharpened edges. The axe flew from his hand and sliced clean through the snakehead, severing it in a single clean blow; the axe continued to fly and shred several tree limbs... but that was irrelevant.

The fight was over. His son won.