Chương 200: Farming Frogs

I had a theory, but I needed to test it first. Honestly, I had a lot of theories, but at the moment I didn't have the resources to try them. I had to resolve the money problem, and I had to improve my skills. I needed to synergize them better. But first I needed the right target. I left the territory of the fire kors. They were opponents that didn't benefit me, they didn't possess mana, they were quite strong individually, and not that high-levelled.

I gained less than seven hundred points for facing that dozen, along with three of their fiery cores. They would be worth some points, but I needed more, much more. I considered returning to the mosquitoes. They would be much better opponents, and I probably would, given their relatively low level but incredible numbers. Now though, my target was something that hunted those mosquitoes: frogs. Frogs was the wrong term, actually.

These things resembled frogs, but were as big as boulders and covered in heavy slabs of stone. Every jump made the soft ground near the banks of the lake quake. They weren't actually aggressive monsters for some reason. Contrary to all the others we met until now, these were happy to snack on the few mosquitoes stupid enough to come close, their long tongues travelling as much as fifty yards to snatch one from the air and then happily chomp on it. The sight was actually disgusting, but I had to check on something.

Veiled Marionette. The skill was definitely underdeveloped, as were many others. I used it to great effect in the past, but now maybe it could solve my money issue, if my theory had ground, and that wasn't at all sure. I was feeling a deep exhaustion at this point. The curses were draining me so fast it was incredible, and standing to what Miflin said, it would only get worse. That was… worrying. It was another reason why I felt like I needed a system for gaining points.

Probably I could go and hunt some baron while snatching its treasure somewhere, if Adrian left some. With his knowledge and early arrival, he probably already cleaned the place out, but there was always the option of travelling far and doing it. But I didn't want to. I had to power-level my guild, take lessons from Miflin on aura, and instead of chasing a potential reward, I could spend that time honing my skills. That's why I thought of Veiled Marionette, and Malignant Threshold.

I think I made a grave mistake in choosing Malignant Threshold over Malignant Feeding. The latter would have allowed me to improve my curses permanently over time, while the former allowed me to mutate curses and hexes on the spot. Now though, I believe I found a synergy worth exploiting. Veiled Marionette at its base is a curse, one that takes time to grow into a being's shadow and then allows me a command or to passively influence said being. I asked myself, what if I mutate the curse?

And here I am, with a great target and a potential source of points in front of me. This would require some work though. I took my grimoire. The evil book opened by itself onto a page, but I didn't activate it just now, I simply used it as a medium to cast my curse. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings. I targeted a frog, or toad, whatever it was, nearby. And cast Veiled Marionette, the influence was simple: eat.

Nothing happened, the monster croaked something deep, then stood exactly where it was. Well, it was expected. Now, Malignant Threshold. I fed the hidden curse my mana, making it swell and distort. I could feel the curse in the shadow grow and push against the edge. It took me nearly a minute, then the curse mutated. It gripped the shadow of the monster and infiltrated its body like a hungry parasite. For a moment nothing happened, then I could see the frog monster's eyes becoming darker, shadowed.

Something took hold of it and gnawed at its insides. It jumped out of the lake, a little depression forming as it landed with a splash outside of the water, then it started jumping away. I followed at a distance, trying not to make myself visible, then- Ding! ──────────── Through indirect means you have killed a Great Culicidae Lv 34 Tutorial Points Earned: 17 ──────────── I can't fucking believe it. The frog ate the first mosquito it saw and I got awarded for it…

It was a long shot, the System didn't reward based on shared contribution. If Quinn and I attacked the same monster and he killed it, he would gain everything, and I nothing, but I supposed affecting other monsters fell under a different set of rules. I got a couple other messages as the frog started a mosquito massacre. The points were halved, but still… Wait, didn't I have the perfect curse for this? I opened my grimoire again, the pages flipped by themselves, the book was linked to me, it knew what I wanted.

It stopped at one page, Heightened Hunger, then at another, Hunger Coil. The two curses were perfect for this occasion, one would inflict the need to consume, the other made the recipient consume more calories for basically everything they did. Yeah, this could work. I looked as many mosquitoes attacked at the same time, only for the rock plating of the toad to resist the attacks effortlessly, then one by one it ate the monsters. The points started flowing, they were little, but it was only one frog…

what if there were many? I cast the two curses on the monster, then retreated. If it noticed, it didn't show it, but simply went forward in search of more prey. This was awesome. I went back to the lake. I was looking at the toads in a different light right now, they weren't disgusting monsters anymore, no, they were the solution to my problem, a new source of passive income, everyone loves passive income. Ok, let's do this. I targeted another toad, first with Veiled Marionette, then with the two curses.

Having the Liber Maledictionum recreate the curses used a ton of my mana, and these were some of the less powerful ones, but still, I had a ring full of life-force, so I started siphoning that instead after expending half my mana pool. The precious resource was way more efficient in creating the curses anew. Then, after three toads were cursed with the set, I activated Malignant Threshold. I did three at a time as an experiment.

I wanted to see how these curses would mutate despite being the same and in the same type of monster. It took more this time, more time and more mana. As I reached critical levels, I started using life-force again. This was getting annoying, but the result made itself known. Three curses fused together, to create something that even I would deem an abomination.

I could feel the three individual curses were no more, now they had become something else, something that needed to consume, to feed, and the target was only one: mosquitoes. Thank God I sicced them on the annoying insects, if I left Veiled Marionette's command out of the equation, they would have attacked their kin for sure. A series of snapping sounds started from one of the three toads, its rocky plates splintered, and a black, tar-like liquid seeped out.

The monster screeched before quickly jumping out, bounding towards the mosquitoes. The others' reaction was no less intense, but I didn't notice any physical alteration on them. What was that? Well, honestly, now I didn't care. My exhilaration was fighting with the exhaustion of the curses and having really low mana, something that didn't happen to me that much. It was awful, and I just wanted to lay down and sleep.

But I soldiered on and started applying more curses, until my stockpile of life-force was nearly consumed. I left some for emergencies, later I would have to replenish it, but my work here was complete, for now. Nine frogs total would be my personal point-generating machines. Until they died or until they burst after eating too much, I checked my points. I was just shy of 180000, by tomorrow I would see how well this went, for now, I needed to rest a moment and find another hunting ground.

I looked up at the sunny sky, it was barely four in the afternoon, and damn, I was so tired.