Reaching Level 3
1201 Words
Just as Julius was on the crux of leveling up, a shrill shriek rang in the air and one of his aerial mimics fell from the air, dead even before it had landed.
He quickly looked at his map and didn’t see any noticeable indicator of a strong enemy so he quickly looked around for visual confirmation instead.
With his Metamorphosis, his sight was naturally enhanced so he could see some kind of upheaval happening in the far distance where the undead was coming from. Julius frowned when he saw the numerous undead piling up together and joining as one into a colossus being.
“...What the hell?”
[Undead Chimera
Rank: B
STR: S
AGI: C+
INT: C+
Skills: ---, ---, --- ]
The colossal titan of meat and bone rose from the midst of the undead legion. As it continued to walk towards the fiends, more undead continued to combine with the monster and it grew larger and larger.
By the time it arrived at the frontlines of the battlefield, the monster was nearly 10 feet tall. The dense mass of bones formed a sturdy armor around its large blazing soul fire, protecting it from harm.
Julius tried sending a Wind Arrow at the undead creature but it only bounced off the armor, not scratching it one bit.
“How the hell is this just a B-ranked monster?”
He could understand that the only redeeming feature of this monster was its absurd defense and strength, but just because its overall stats were being pulled down by its AGI and INT, being just a B-ranked monster was underestimating it too much.
[Alert: New protocols have been unlocked!
Commencing scan of B-ranked monster: Undead Chimera]
The semi-transparent red box that appeared caused Julius to stare at it in confusion. The words displayed on it weren't the usual alerts he would receive from the system because this one was new.
“Huh?”
It wasn’t even a second later that Julius found out why this new box appeared.
*DING* [Level Up! 2 → 3]
Julius just received the notification that his level had risen and the system acquired some new perks. The first was its scanning capabilities receiving an upgrade. Now, he could perform an in-depth scan of a target and acquire more information about it.
Just like right now as the system was scanning the Undead Chimera with the purpose of acquiring its weaknesses.
[Alert: Scanning complete. B-rank monster: Undead Chimera’s stats have been updated!]
[Undead Chimera
Rank: B
STR: S
AGI: C+
INT: C+
Skills: ---, ---, [Decay Aura A]
Weakness: Soul Fire, Vertebral Column
Elemental Weakness: Fire, Light ]
It wasn’t only the status screen, but another window appeared next to the screen and this one overlapped itself with the monster Julius just scanned, the Undead Chimera. This thing had continued to combine more undead as he was just waiting around in the air and became even bigger.
It began swatting away the fiends nearby, killing them instantly. Julius grimaced when he saw his fiends bursting into a mist of blood after they were struck by the monster’s powerful blow.
He probably wouldn’t die instantly like that if struck, but he would, at the very least, almost step through death’s door to meet with his father on the other side.
Julius wasn’t ready to die in this kind of place so kept his distance while reading the Undead Chimera’s status and full-body in-depth diagram. The vertebral column was shown on the diagram so Julius was able to see where it was located.
He frowned when he saw that the monster’s weakness was located underneath that thick bone shell. However, unlike the soul fire that was covered in multiple thick layers of bone armor, the vertebrae were located much closer to the outer layers because it was where all the multiple bone armor layers originated from so only a few layers were added on top of it or else it would mess up its balance.
“Well, it beats going through numerous layers of bone armor just to get to its soul fire…”
Obtaining the monster’s soul fire was really a tempting notion for Julius. He wanted to see what kind of upgrades his fiends would obtain if they were able to consume the Undead Chimera’s soul fire.
Devouring a soul fire of such proportions, it would definitely not only give his fiends a few new abilities, but they would immediately undergo an evolution. That evolution was something Julius was looking forward to seeing.
However, before thinking about that, he should deal with the monster first. Since he knew of its weaknesses already and had a full diagram of the monster’s entire body structure, all Julius needed to do was exploit all of these advantages and kill the monster.
“We’ll have to target the back of the monster...but getting close would immediately result in my fiends’ deaths…”
Julius racked his brain for a solution but the thick and strong bone shell armor was just too big of a hindrance. There wasn’t a fiend in his army that was capable of dealing any sort of damage to the creature’s armor.
Just as he was about to give up and call for a retreat, he noticed that whenever the monster absorbed more skeletons into its body, the armor would momentarily soften to the point where his fiends were able to tear away a few of the monster’s thick layers.
Another thing he noticed was that the Undead Chimera would instinctively absorb any of the undead near it to supply itself with energy. Moving such a large body would undoubtedly cost quite a bit of energy.
“We’ll aim for that moment and take advantage of its low intelligence!”
Julius immediately commanded his fiends to grab any undead near them and toss it over to the Undead Chimera. His plan worked when he saw the now colossal titan stop in its tracks as it began to absorb the undead into its body.
“Again!”
Another round of undead was thrown and once more the Undead Chimera did the same thing.
“Attack! Now!”
The fiends immediately began their attacks and the Undead Chimera responded by defending itself.
“!”
Julius smirked when he saw the monster’s reaction. Instead of swapping away his fly-like enemies, the chimera only defended itself. The stupid creature knew that it was vulnerable while absorbing its allies and yet it continued to do so.
“Hah, now I see why it’s only a B-ranked monster!”
Julius swooped down behind its back and plunged his claws into the spot where the monster’s vertebrae were located. He couldn’t claw it out in one attack but he left a long gash on the monster’s back while more and more injuries piled upon the monster as his fiends quickly followed their lord’s methods.
- Writer
