What happens if you donÆt find a Toad Lord The Demon Prince had asked
ShualÆs face was grim The Toad Lords control the Feed ItÆs given to spawnlings and those at Academy without any commitment of service but
Soon I will starve Shual thought bleakly There was obviously other sources of food but the Feed contained life energy Without it the Toad Lords wouldnÆt have been able to maintain such an iron grip over the countryside In all the years that the Toad Lords had ruled that number had never shifted from one hundred Toad Lords
Well there were brief variations when one Toad Lord warred with another Or strange incidents like the Demon King arriving and killing two But very soon Shual had no doubt that two more Toad Lords would appear able to harvest and create Feed
As long as these demons donÆt destroy us all
Around them the countryside was a blur as the Demon Prince bounded forward They were moving so fast that the small raindrops that hit them felt like needle pricks Shual crouched lower in the basket to avoid the worst of it but the Demon Prince endured it without comment As they ran it was easy to forget this being was a destructive Demon capable of killing Shual Instead it was easy to be lulled into a strange sort of calmness by the even sound of his breathing
Inhale Exhale
Inhale
And that
The blurring world slowly morphed into something recognizable as the Demon Prince slowed Shual peeked up from out of his basket Then he blinked I DonÆt know what that is ItÆs Level 70
I see that Came the sardonic reply Then Shual yelped as he was dropped into a rather large mud puddle The Demon Prince blurred forward his strange living spear stretching out and keening happily at being used
Shual shuddered Even the Demon PrinceÆs spear is bloodthirsty
The monster raised its head and roared again the sound booming out to the surrounding area Then it lowered its head and stared at the Demon Prince as he approached Above its head there were only question marks and the Level 70 distinction That intrigued Shual He had never seen a label like that before Why was its name hidden
The monster itself looked almost warped So much so that Shual shook his head and checked to make sure he wasnÆt suffering from motion sickness Or some weird extension of traveling too fast for far too long But the monster had a bone exoskeleton and looked like a giant boar that was the size of a small house Long prickling spears of bone spread out from its back almost three meters long Even worse were the four thick tusks that jutted out from just below its snout
Even from this distance Shual could tell how sharp those tusks were They were made to rip and gore the boarÆs prey
The reason that Shual believed it to be warped was twofold first because its body seemed strangely stretched and secondly a large and powerful arm of maroon bone stretched out from the right side of its body That maroon fist smashed the ground spraying mud everywhere Then the beast leapt to meet the Demon Prince
Despite its strange longness and lopsided build the monster moved almost as quickly as the Demon Prince Even Toad Lords would hesitate to challenge a Level 70 monster that they didnÆt fully understand so there was a glimmer of excitement in ShualÆs heart as he watched the two monsters smash into each other
Even if he is evil he possesses strength ShualÆs eyes never wavered from the clash That strength I wonÆt be able to achieve it like this waiting for scraps from a Toad Lord
But then the rest of ShualÆs thoughts were blown away as the Demon Prince crashed into the boar
Even moving at a speed that was impossible for Shual to follow the Demon Prince parried the tusks stabbing toward him and brought his spear crashing down against the skull of the boar There was a screech of spear on exoskeleton and then a moment of strange stillness as the two struggled against each other in close proximity
Growling the boar bunched its body to prepare to overpower the Demon Prince But it was a hair too slow
Before the boar could gather itself on the muddy ground the Demon Prince switched his grip on the spear As he did so the spear wiggled like a serpent and slithered below the monsterÆs jaw With practiced ease the Demon Prince pressed upward with his spear and popped the monsterÆs front half off of the ground
Even as the boar reared back to escape the Demon Prince accelerated toward the monsterÆs revealed belly
The boar was thrown backward from the collision but Shual couldnÆt detect any real wound on its stomach Mostly because the combatants were moving too fast but Shual believe he would see something if the Demon Prince had inflicted a fatal wound
With a grim purpose the Demon Prince chased after the flailing boar But as the monster spun awkwardly down on its legs to the side its maroon arm was finally brought to bear Fully half of the size of the torso of the giant boar by the time Shual recognized the threat it already smashed into the Demon Prince
Despite himself Shual gasped in fear
You want that monster to live Some portion of ShualÆs mind was incredulous at his own natural reaction
But ShualÆs practicality answered in the affirmative If he dies wonÆt that boar eat me next
The Demon Prince was thrown sideways and hit a shallow lagoon like a bomb detonation throwing water everywhere But as the boar took the few seconds of space to right itself the ground beneath it seemed to opened and huge gouts of emerald flame were spat upward
Screaming in pain the boar stumbled to the side even as the rain around it was immediately evaporated into steam by the high heat creating an eerie blanket of fog over the battlefield Suddenly everything was quiet the only thing Shual could hear was his own heart
There was a low growl and then a light splash But everything was covered by that steadily spreading fog Most of it was dispersing but the area where the two were located was thickly draped
Shual could only huddle lower in his basket and hope for the best
Chapter 893
Grimly Randidly peered through his water vapor at the monster that had managed to get a sucker punch in on him I suppose thatÆs what I get for underestimating something that had surmounted Level 70 But what the hell is up with that arm
Being punched had hurt but it wasnÆt to the point where Randidly was seriously injured The reason that Randidly was hesitating now was that his scan with Aether Detection ended in failure When he saw that the name was hidden Randidly initially didnÆt care much But after seeing how quick and powerful that extra arm was as well as how hard its exoskeleton was Randidly was intrigued So he activated his Skill with the monster as the target
Yet he found himself blocked when he attempted to scan it Well blocked was the wrong word
It wasnÆt some runic construct in the way like occurred with Ajax but instead it was somewhat akin to driving on a familiar road home and suddenly encountering a minimall directly in the middle of the road There was clearly something there yet it shouldnÆt be there
Randidly could get some information from it but it was arranged in a format that he didn’t recognize Information was flooding in but he couldnÆt recognize what it was And because the information was arriving at a strange place Randidly wasnÆt sure how to follow the information deeper to its core
To do so he would need to stop fighting it and study the flow of its Aether
The Aether scanning was done mostly by feel and the feeling was strange and unwelcome And with this huge deluge of information screening his way deeper into the monster he couldnÆt find the information he was used to locating
Honestly it seemed like this monster had another entity entirely taking root in its chest
Well it will be much easier to investigate after I kill it Randidly thought
His feet blasted the water in the surrounding area away as he accelerated directly toward the boar monster Surprisingly it seemed to detect him by sound and twisted slightly so the side of its body with the maroon arm was leading So it favored that arm Something to remember