Chương 136: Chapter 141: Lizard-Man

Flying over the damn forest and mountains was easier than expected. There were some monsters who rose up and tried to take me down, some pterodactyl-like beasts, but with feathers, that I cut down with aura blades. A lot of jumping insects as big as labradors constantly tried to get to me as I flew over the canopy, but they served only as food for my ring. I was starting to amass a great deal of life-force by now. It had been nearly two hours I was flying towards the position on the map that marked the snake den.

My aura was becoming the biggest problem to manage. During the flight I had time to optimize the expenditure as much as possible, but it still took a toll on me. Nonetheless, I had enough after my power-up. Probably the amount of aura one had was tied to stats. If I managed to bump my stats more, I wouldn't have any problem for the return trip. During the flight though, I met many monsters, killed many more, drained some, cursed most, and refined my skills further.

Actually, the forest was so full of creatures that it would be impossible to continue fighting for long if I didn't have skills made to replenish my resources. I would have to stop and wait. But as of now, my mana was still good and my ring was getting a good meal. I just avoided using my aura for projectiles, preferring blades, wires, tethers, or any other form tied to my body that could be reabsorbed to kill the small fry.

Most enemies didn't pass level fifty, but in some zones I killed some approaching level 100, just not really surpassing it. It was another big divide, apparently, and not many could manage that. Still, these monsters proved to be way tougher than usual, requiring me to expend more resources than I wanted. But they still weren't a problem. Not only that, but I used some to try different curse combinations. A kind of big, heavy lizards the size of a van called skamox were the first to experience a combo of curses.

They used their heavy tails as trebuchets, launching boulders at me from the ground. The point was, these boulders were enhanced by their skills or traits. They weren't really found on the ground, no, they grew directly from the end of their tails and then detached when swung. After that, they would plant their tails in the ground and, in seconds, regrow another boulder.

The things could demolish a tank with one strike, but despite the speed and power of the projectiles, flying was too much of an advantage against them. Overcommit, Tyrant Mind, Recoil Rupture, Shatter Feedback, Resonant Suffering. I cursed one to see how it would work, then I readied myself to pump in Malignant Threshold too, but it took only one strike for the beast to start screaming, blood flowing out of its mouth in a small river. It didn't even try to run, the curse making it impossible.

With its body trembling, it attacked again. The projectile went wide, not even close to hitting me, while the monster vomited blood and… organs? Or at least pieces of them. It tried to stand again after it fell, charging another shot. I let it, all the while flying around the others as I tried different combinations on different targets. Sight Tithe, Overexposure, Fractured Focus, Echo Addiction. That particular skamox was absolutely the worst shot.

None of its projectiles had a chance to hit me, and if possible it was getting worse by the second. I killed the terrible shot with a focused lance of mana. Then, after another attempt, the big lizard I first cursed died on its own. I moved the curses between the others, rearranging them to see what worked best in combination. After all except one were dead, I took back the curses into the grimoire.

Now that I had them in ink, I could recreate them, but it took life-force to do so, and I was not willing to test those on these monsters. Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. But I would. Against the snake.

──────────── You killed a Skamox Lv83 You killed a Skamox Lv79 You killed a Skamox Lv83 You killed a Skamox Lv87 You killed a Skamox Lv78 You killed a Skamox Lv90 Curse Absorption – Level Up → Lv13 Passive Casting – Level Up → Lv15 Feast on the Ruined – Level Up → Lv13 Accelerated Processing – Level Up → Lv5 Piercing Eyes – Level Up → Lv10 Aural Manifestation – Level Up → Lv18 Entropic Lance – Level Up → Lv26 Congratulations! Your Piercing Eyes skill has reached Level 10 and is now ready for Evolution.

──────────── Already Piercing Eyes was about to evolve. No, it was too soon, but I'd evolve it in the near future. I wouldn't wait that long anymore, but I had to experiment with it a bit more, pushing the skill past its boundaries before evolving it. Still, it was already proving incredible at identifying weaknesses, and more than that, it was starting to let me see the monsters' internal energy. I was piercing their defenses and seeing beyond the mere surface. There was much to learn there, I was sure.

I proceeded forward. The rough map I got with the letter placed the snake more or less a day's march away. If the proportions were right, I made the comparison with the new safe zone we had to reach. Yeah, it was about right. The snake would be nearby by now. I was proceeding very fast, flying over everything. I met the two mountains in the plains a while ago, and now I should be near the swamp. The snake should be there, but how to find it? Swamps were usually big. I'd have to see first.

It took me fifteen more minutes, during which I killed more and more reptile-like creatures. Even the birds looked like flying lizards now. There were creatures similar to little dinosaurs and lizard-men, living in what looked like tribes, fighting with one another. There was something going on here, too many scaly beasts to be a coincidence. I noticed they hunted anything not lizard-like, and sometimes they hunted each other too. But being the least lizard-like being for kilometers, most were focused on me.

It was actually starting to become absurd. I was getting followed by so many beasts it was incredible, and despite moving too fast for them to catch me, they still came. I could see them in the distance, running, flying, or slithering towards me. I stopped and expanded my aura. You wanted a fight, I'll give you one. I started casting hexes on all the creatures around me, then surrounded myself with a compressed, thick barrier of aura that I reinforced with my new infusion skill.

The aura mixed with the mana and the life-force I was stealing from the creatures all around me. I sent tethers to all the ones in range, draining them, slowing my perception of time and passively casting most of the spells. I wouldn't have been able to keep that many active if not for that skill. It was slowly becoming more and more central to my fighting style. Projectiles, globs of poison and acid, crudely crafted spears, bone spurs, and flying monsters all crashed into my barrier. I constantly reinforced it.

Not a crack formed on its surface, but I wasn't going to take more risks than necessary. I cast more hexes all around. Some monsters fell to the ground, beginning to die from lack of vital energy. Some were just getting exhausted by the stacking hexes, while others were smashed and slashed by my aura when they approached too closely. I was content to wait. Their aggression seemed unending as more and more came to me just to die, but their behavior was working in my favor as I was finally filling up the ring.

A particularly powerful lizard-man managed to throw a spear hard enough to crack my barrier slightly, so I returned the favor. With part of the stolen energy, I formed an Entropic Lance. The construct absorbed more and more energy, seemingly not having the same limitation as the previous skill. It didn't even grow in size, remaining as long as I was tall, maybe slightly more. It shined blue and gold in my monochromatic vision, and it was a bitch to contain.

I felt the skill buckle like a horse, trying to explode, or at least break free from my control, but instead I infused it with more mana, this time with Reinforced Infusion. It helped stabilize it while empowering it at the same time. Yeah, this would do. I launched the spear as the lizard-man was preparing to throw another of his own. A hole appeared in his chest, as big as a head. It didn't even look down. It just fell, dead. ──────────── [You have slain: Lizard-Man Alpha Lv71 — Baron] ──────────── Baron?

That one? I thought it was just a— GRHAAAAA!! A roar like no other resounded from the west. I shouldn't have been worried about finding the snake. I could see it clearly from here. It was rising above the trees. It was rising much taller than the trees... Much taller.