We Hunt Monsters 14, page 51
War’s Hammer flashed at the man with Hammerrang, streaking through the air faster than the eye could follow, only to be intercepted by a shield of shimmering blue scales. Though ‘intercepted’ might not have been the right word. ‘Slowed down’ might have been a bit better, as the hammer crashed through the shield, shattering it to millions of tiny pieces, and slammed into The Glutton’s chest, crushing him into the time-locked carriage.
A shimmering veil of red light shone for a moment. It then cracked, and the man howled in pain as the hammer broke something inside his rotund body. Unfortunately, most of the hammer’s power had been used up breaking through his defenses, so the damage was only minor.
“Kill him!” Guzzlarian shouted as he pulled a needle and jammed it into his stomach.
Keith was already on the ground, fist on a collision course with his fat face, when it twisted abruptly to one side. He swept his leg up and used Armageddon Spear alongside Extender, blasting a line of light into the platinum elf who’d saved the fat man’s head. She screamed as she caught the blast on crossed arms and was dragged backward, but that was enough.
Barty crashed into Keith with the full force of an Avatar, blazing with power, catching him around the waist and driving him half a mile back. It wasn’t the smartest move, leaving himself open like this, and Keith took full advantage, drawing his Dragontooth Slayers and using Blade Berserker before driving them both down into the man’s spine, between his outspread wings that were seemingly made of blood.
The blow felt far weaker than it should have, but it still had the intended effect, driving through the man’s bloody aura and armor to pierce into his skin. The additional effects of the blades were muted, thanks to them being of Mythical quality, but the damage was there all the same.
The emperor screamed and released him. Keith flipped back through the air, then used Lightswap to drag himself right back to where The Glutton was and triggered Fallout Fatality. Immediately, his body began radiating green light, the aura dense and powerful around him. He felt some of his weakness leave him, but not all of it. The light spread, covering nearly a quarter mile around him, though he wasn’t paying attention to that as he slammed into Guzzlarian, seizing him by the throat and dragging him up into the sky.
The man thrashed and struggled, slamming his palms into Keith’s chest and doing nothing at all.
“Curse…you,” the man gurgled as he popped something into his mouth.
A blast of power broke his grip, and The Glutton was falling, his hand plunging down his own throat, blood spraying into the air as he ripped it free.
“What’s he holding?” Keith asked as he blasted down after the man, trailing green light in his wake.
The emperor caught up with him before The Glutton hit the ground, a crackling spell of red and black slamming into Keith’s upraised arm. The spell was far weaker than it should have been given the circumstances, but Keith wasn’t feeling quite right. He flashed from the sky, carving up the landscape, but managed to recover quickly, Lightswapping back into the fray.
Shervone was there with her hands extended and veins pulsing in her temples as she unleashed her Mind-Bomb. Keith’s head exploded in pain as the spell slammed into him, his focus shattering as he hit the ground. He lay there for several moments, feeling several impacts, then used Unconquerable Aura and blindly triggered Shard Sponge. There was another scream and a loud crash before the pain in his head subsided.
He was back on his feet in an instant. The forest around them had been leveled, trees vaporized, and the ground churned up for a mile in all directions. His body continued to pulse with the irradiated aura. Shervone lay in a pile of rubble, chunks of stone, and splintered trees nearly three-quarters of a mile away. The emperor floated in the air half a mile from him, a massive spell circle forming in the air around him.
The carriage was on its side, though Chum and The Glutton were pulling it back upright. The man had stopped bleeding, though if Keith wasn’t mistaken, he’d lost a bit of weight. Everyone was keeping their distance, thanks to his aura, and Keith wasn’t going to allow this opportunity to pass. He used Lightswap, reappearing right where The Glutton stood and triggering Field Leveler to slam into the man’s back.
The Glutton didn’t so much as stagger as Keith’s fist bounced off a jelly-like shield, the man whirling in place – apparently having expected him – and slammed a gleaming needle into Keith’s neck. He was surprised when the needle punctured his skin, the burning sensation flooding into his body sending him to his knees in an instant.
“You muscle heads always have the same weakness,” The Glutton said coldly as he pulled a fish from his inventory and shoved it into his mouth. “Always charging in. Thinking your little tricks will keep working. Well, I think I’ve just proven that — freaking hell!”
The Glutton blasted off his feet as Keith’s glowing fist slammed into his gut, obliterating his shield and sending him through two dozen trees. Chum whirled around, only for Keith’s fist, empowered by Ancient’s Fury, to slam into him as well. He felt a similar shield, which was the only thing Keith could think of that would stop the radiation from damaging him.
As it was, the man was blasted off his feet as well. His shield buckled, though no damage was done. Chum was also far more graceful and turned the blow into a spinning roll, cracking the trunk of the first tree he hit feet first and leaping off of it to break his momentum.
He turned in a slow circle and saw that Jared’s spell was nearly complete. Shervone was back on her feet, blood trickling from several cuts and bruises. Her eyes were wide with anger as she doubtlessly activated half a dozen hidden items on her person, while The Glutton struggled back to his feet, swearing loudly as he jammed another needle into himself.
It was still four-on-one, but Keith didn’t mind. These were strong opponents, but so long as he continued to target The Glutton, he was sure he could win inside his self-imposed time window.
76
It took everything in The Glutton to not howl in agony as the horrible burning, twisting sensation of rapidly healing bones, muscle, and tendons tore through him. Over the years, Guzzlarian constantly improved and perfected his injectable repair solution, as his curse prevented the consumption of any type of potion. This was his most potent injection, and along with the healing came excruciating pain.
No numbing worked as the injection focused on stimulating his curse’s ability for improved healing. He shoveled food into his mouth as calories burned quickly to fuel his reforming flesh.
This was not part of his plans.
He could see the man now, standing right next to his personal project that he’d been working toward for a while now. This was the item that would see him through to the end of his mission on Monstros and finally grant him the strength he needed.
He’d known it was a possibility that Keith would discover what he was doing, but the chaos in Humania was supposed to keep him off his back until he was done. And he was so close. The problem was that now that he was here, none of them could focus on finishing the job and had to throw everything into just staying alive.
Barty’s spell was nearly complete, but Guzzlarian doubted it would do much. They were weakened thanks to the rules set forth by the System. The same should have held true for Keith, but given his frankly insane levels of power, he wasn’t quite sure that was the case.
Keith wasn’t supposed to be there, and he wasn’t supposed to be this monstrously powerful. Their most potent attacks hadn’t so much as scratched him. Even Shervone’s Mind-Bomb, accompanied by Jared’s Blood-Needle Hail, hadn’t managed to pierce his armor or skin. The only blood he’d managed to draw was with his empowered needle, strengthened by materials from his benefactor. But even the poison used to bring down the mighty emperor was barely enough to slow Keith down for a couple of seconds.
The Glutton wasn’t a stupid man and had known Keith would be growing stronger, but even he hadn’t guessed the amount of power Keith would be swinging around. He also knew that he was the real target here, while the others were merely a distraction.
Guzzlarian slapped his chest, activating another Jelly Shield. It was the only thing keeping him from puking his guts out and keeling over thanks to that vile aura the man was pumping out. He didn’t have too many of them left, as they were exceedingly difficult to craft and extremely expensive to boot. They were supposed to be able to take hits from World Bosses, yet two attacks from Keith had smashed through it like rice paper.
Keith appeared in front of him, just as Guzzlarian knew he would, and triggered the minefield trap he’d dropped when he landed. The detonation was directed so it wouldn’t so much as touch him. A hand appeared out of the blazing flames, ripping into the Jelly Shield. Guzzlarian began feeling ill almost immediately, his skin starting to form blisters and his lungs beginning to burn.
“Curses,” he growled, activating another life-saving measure.
His body blasted backward, and his Jelly Shield was roughly patched as Keith reappeared, leaping from the flames like some sort of hellish demon. His eyes were different, Guzzlarian noted, glowing brightly with streaks of brighter color shot through. The scar across his face told the story of a man who’d lost and then replaced his eyes.
Guzzlarian threw a small black bead, the item exploding into a cloud of disintegration. He doubted it would kill him, but it might at least slow him down. The cloud disappeared, sucked into an empty void floating before Keith’s face.
“Do something!” he screamed to his entourage, triggering another item that slid beneath his feet, increasing his speed as he wove between trees, and took him back toward his carriage.
Chum slammed into Keith from the side, bowling him over as he leaped back and twisted through the air as he drew his swords. The specialized agent landed as Keith caught himself in midair, only for Barty’s spell to hit him like a ton of bricks, driving him into the ground in a wave of blood and crackling red light.
The Glutton reached his carriage, diving into the open hood and working quickly to finish his connections. He was nearly there. Seven failed tests had shown him all the faults he needed to see. All he had to do was get it working, and then he could leave without the fear of being followed.
“Codex, have you identified any of his potential weaknesses?” The Glutton asked as he worked.
“The being known as Keith has shown few openings in your brief exchange,” the cool female voice said. “Signs show at skills favoring melee combat, though he seems able to fight at range with equal effectiveness. While his full list of skills and abilities is unknown, I have identified a possible imbalance between his Strength and other stats.”
“Great,” Guzzlarian muttered. “Chum! Engage in melee combat!”
His voice echoed through his controlling link with the man, the command issued directly into his mind. It wasn’t wise to engage Keith at melee given that vile aura his body carried, but Chum was hardy and had another Jelly Shield on him, so perhaps he could.
“That’s an interesting toy you’ve got here,” Keith’s voice said from right next to his ear.
Guzzlarian felt his heart leap into his throat as he triggered half a dozen defensive measures as his link with his codex shattered. Keith’s fist drove into his back, and The Glutton was nearly flattened. Thankfully, his order to Chum had come through quickly enough, and the pressure eased as the man drove Keith off of him.
Guzzlarian turned, wincing in pain as he jabbed himself with another needle and used another Jelly Shield. He threw several more barriers up around himself and activated two Spell Scrolls. Now was not the time to conserve resources. He had too much to lose.
He dove back into the carriage, working as quickly as he was able. There was a loud shriek as something impacted with his Dispersion Dome. He tried not to flinch or rush himself, but it was extremely difficult not to. He could admit, even to himself, that he had no chance of winning. All he could do was buy himself time. Even with the aid of his three powerful subordinates, they would all eventually lose, as none were at their full power. If he hadn’t recruited any of them, he would still have had some of his more useful items and might have been able to pull out a win.
“Who am I kidding?” The Glutton muttered to himself, shoving a sandwich into his mouth with one hand while he twisted a couple of wires together with the other.
He was nearly done. He needed just a couple more minutes.
His Dispersion Dome screamed again and then buckled. Keith was through, his summoned back-mirror told him as much as the blazing man ripped through the shield, shrugging off an attack from Shervone, kicking Chum through a boulder and rebounding an attack thrown at him by Barty.
This situation seemed hopeless, but Guzzlarian wasn’t the type to call it quits when things got tough. He activated everything he had in the way of Spell Scrolls, cannons, poisons, and explosions. He deployed every shield and defensive item he had left and laid waste to the landscape behind him. For a moment, it looked like Keith was taken by surprise, the barrage of attacks pushing him back.
Another series of spells from Barty hit him as he was being pushed – lightning, blood and control spells meant to seize an opponent’s body. Shervone attacked as well, overextending the reach of her Mind-Bomb. It seemed they all knew that their only shot of getting out of there was with the carriage. Barty couldn’t teleport something stuck in Chronostasis, and Keith wasn’t going to allow any of them to flee. It was either fighting with everything they had or die trying, not that he was giving them much of a choice in the matter.
He focused back in on his work, making the final connections as Keith was hit by the barrage of spells, items, and attacks.
“There,” he muttered, snapping the last piece into place and slamming the hood.
The carriage had been turned upright, so all he needed to do was get in and see if he’d succeeded. If it were a failure, he’d have no choice but to abandon it, sacrificing months of work and setting his plans back in a major way. The carriage hummed as it came to life. The Chronostasis had another hour before it would run its course, but the carriage – unlike the Avatar of Blood – would be able to make the jump, even with it active.
He spun the wheel, bringing it around and seeing Keith ripping through his defenses once again. He jammed on the pedal without hesitation, the carriage picking up slowly thanks to his weight. The weight limitations were something he’d need to fix when he wasn’t in danger of dying. It felt like it took an hour for the carriage to reach the needed minimum speed of twenty miles per hour, though in reality, it was probably only a few seconds.
He looked back as he flipped the switch, seeing Keith ripping through the last of his defenses and flashing forward in a blur of burning gold and red, looking for all the world like a vengeful Spirit-made-flesh. Guzzlarian punched the activation and heard a searing shriek shuddering through the frame as the world bent around him. One moment, he was surrounded by destruction, a hair’s breadth from death, and the next, he was surrounded by crystalline oceans thousands of miles away.
The carriage came to a screeching halt on the deck of the ship, the smell of smoke and burning metal filling his nostrils.
He sent the mental command of retreat, demanding his subordinates come to him at once as he struggled to free himself of the carriage. His stomach was cloying with hunger as he stepped down onto the swaying deck of the ship. Pulling a couple of sandwiches from his inventory, he stuffed them into his mouth, cursing the curse that hurt him so. He walked around the front, opening the hatch and expecting to see some form of damage there, but to his surprise, he saw nothing.
His indentured servants appeared on deck as he was circling the carriage, looking for the source of the noise and shuddering that had gone through the carriage as he’d leaped through space.
“I thought we were going to die,” Shervone said, hugging herself and looking shellshocked.
Blood and debris were caked all over her body, and her health sat at just over forty percent of her maximum.
“Speak for yourself,” Barty said, flexing his hands as his wounds sealed themselves.
Now that they were somewhere where his higher level wouldn’t impede him, his skills were coming back into effect.
“I would have been fine. I might have even won if we hadn’t been forced to retreat.”
“You can feel free to delude yourself all you like,” Chum said, his face stoic. “There’s only one way that fight could have ended, and that’s with all our heads in a neat little pile.”
The Glutton ignored his bickering servants as he walked around to the rear of the carriage and finally spotted the problem. The entire back half of the carriage was sitting flat on the deck of the ship, the rear axle having been snapped in two and the frame above damaged as well. He knew how well he’d built this carriage, and even the rigors of spatial transport shouldn’t have done a thing to it, as witnessed at the front end of the carriage.
There was only one way it could have been this damaged, and that was by the monster who’d chased them.
Clearly, his Codex had been broken when it had said that Keith’s physical Strength was lacking. It would take a beyond absurd amount of pure, physical power to shatter something like the rear axle through the Chronostasis. This was a definite setback. He knew that the axle wasn’t the only thing that would need to be replaced and reinforced. It would take at least a couple of weeks to get his carriage back in working order, but that was an acceptable holdup considering how much worse things could have been.
Once thing was for certain. He would need to make sure not to have another run-in with Keith before his benefactor held up his end of the deal. As things stood now, even if he were to restock all of his supplies, Guzzlarian the Glutton wouldn’t stand a chance against the monster in human flesh that was Keith.
If he had to find a comparison, the only one the man could think of was the terrifying presence that had ruled his part of the Fourliance with an iron fist, and Keith had killed Alvin the Unconquerable just like everyone else who’d come in his sights. Guzzlarian would have to be exceedingly careful if he wanted to see his plan through all the way to the end.
