The giant rat spun around. The tip of its tail caught Amelia, but her shield took the bulk of the impact. She was only flung back a few metres before she bumped into the wall with a grunt. Logan glanced at her and confirmed she wasn’t injured. She shook her head, pushing off the wall and running back to his side.

When he turned back to the rat, it furiously shook its head before opening its eyes and looking straight at him. One of them was glowing blue. Its right eye was normal with a patch of metallic black fur around it. The rat clawed at the left side of its face again, ripping away a chunk of crystal growing on the side of its head, but the bulk of the infestation refused to be removed.

It clung to its fur and skin like a parasite.

Logan swallowed, his mind racing with ideas. Was the crystal some kind of infectious disease? Or was it a symptom of being infected by the bioluminescent fungus? He initially thought everything glowed because of a chemical, but now he saw the truth. The glowing insects and rats were infected with a pathogen that made them crystalline beasts.

Were humans vulnerable? Could the egg save them if they were infected?

Logan opened his mouth to tell Amelia that they were going to retreat, but it was too late. She attacked the rat again and stabbed it in the stomach, her spear skittering over its fur. The rat pushed against the spear, and as she stepped back, the butt of it landed on the wall. Its weight was too much, the beast essentially throwing itself onto the spear.

It became lodged deep in its guts. The rat screeched and stood up on its hind legs. Logan had been hesitating, but now he rushed forward and used Piercing Thrust on its leg. It was too fast if they wanted to escape, meaning he had to slow it down somehow. If the cavern system was full of some mutant fungus, they needed to get far away before confirming if it was even remotely safe to be near.

The rat didn’t notice Logan as he approached. It prepared to swipe at Amelia when his spear cut deep into the tendon he had already damaged. Still, he barely did anything, forcing Logan to duck underneath a deadly swipe before he struck out again. His spear bit into the tendon and managed to get a third of the way through.

Suddenly, a bang echoed throughout the tunnel as its tendon finally snapped. The monster didn’t even notice. It scratched at the crystal infection on its face before screeching, the noise so loud that everyone blocked their ears. A second later, its eyes became clear as it focused on the first living beings it saw: James, Stephanie, and Tom.

They stood tens of metres down the tunnel and had chosen to avoid the fight. None of them had ignited their lifeline yet and were still a notch weaker and less resilient than a Body Tempering cultivator. For instance, if one of them had been launched into the wall instead of Amelia, their skull wouldn’t have cracked open like hers. It would’ve been crushed like a watermelon and instantly killed them.

Logan wasn’t sure if the egg could save them if their brains were turned to mush, and he didn’t want to find out. Now that the rat was staring the three of them down with rage and insanity in its eyes, he realised that he might be finding out whether he liked to or not. They simply wouldn’t survive whatever the rat intended to do.

Pushing off the ground, Logan charged in their direction. The rat immediately overtook him. It lunged forward, crossing metres with a single step. Logan expected it to be slower now that its Achilles was snapped, but it was almost entirely unaffected by the serious injury. How tough was this monster? The Giant Ore Rats were already difficult to kill, making him wonder if this terrifying monster could even be killed in the first place.

Logan wracked his brain for a way to rescue his companions. The rat was nearly ten metres ahead of him, meaning it would tear them all apart by the time he reached them. His mind landed on the only option he could think of, so he decided to slow down and try to use Flash Step.

His heart racing and his mind emptied by stress, Logan didn’t think. He simply allowed his body to move. As his foot came down on the solid rock floor, his muscles flaring to life and his body twisting, everything in his surroundings blurred. He didn’t understand what he was seeing until he suddenly slowed down.

It worked. Logan had successfully pulled off a Flash step, placing him in front and to the side of the giant rat.

He tried to chain another Flash Step and keep going, but he stumbled and almost fell over. It was the same as when he learned Piercing Thrust. He had managed to pull it off by a fluke, but that didn’t mean he knew the technique by heart. He would have to spend days practising. Days that he simply didn’t have right now, meaning he had to do something else instead.

Pulling as much power as he could from the Egg, Logan spun to the side and used Piercing Thrust. The tip raced towards the rat’s eye like a bolt of lightning. It barely managed to tilt its head in time, the spear sliding across its crystal cheek and flying over its head. Despite the massive failure, the rat slowed down as it winced from almost losing an eye, achieving Logan’s primary goal.

He dropped the spear in his hand and pounced on the beast’s back, the flames lighting up the tunnel as they refracted through its crystal fur. The beast immediately roared in pain. It tried to shake him off, but Logan had his arms wrapped around its neck. He felt like he was riding a bull, his legs bouncing around as it tried its best to get him off, but it couldn’t manage to no matter how hard it flung its body around the tunnels.

Logan held on for dear life. With some more struggling, he managed to hook his feet under its shoulders. That made the ride much more smooth. Still, it wasn’t very comfortable to begin with, the crystalline hairs stabbing into his body like needles. The flames couldn’t burn the crystal fur, but the heat was cooking its skin underneath, the smell so horrible that he started breathing through his mouth.

Logan was almost sure that the rat was going to die. It was being cooked alive, its neck muscles weakening as the heat slowly destroyed them. Logan felt his victory was imminent until he felt something touch his back. The rat pushed its head against the rocky wall of the tunnel and began to grind him against it as hard as it could.

Logan’s ribs broke and his skin tore open from being shoved against the uneven surface. He let go and fell to the floor, but the rat didn’t notice. He counted his blessing and stared up at the ceiling. His eyes were full of a mixture of tears and blood, and so were the rest of his orifices.

Everything hurt so much that he blinked and found the rat nearly ten metres away, the beast still rubbing itself against the wall. Logan soon realised that he had lost consciousness for a few seconds. It took a moment for his brain to process, but with the rat being somewhere else and his injuries half-healed, he justified it as the only possible explanation. That made him wonder why the rat hadn’t noticed he was gone.

Pushing himself up off the ground, Logan watched as the rat charged into a stalagmite, the spike digging into its charred neck. Or what was left of it, at least. He had burned so much of its head and neck that it was missing almost all of its skin, the crystal fur having fallen off long ago. No wonder it didn’t feel that there was nothing on it.

He had burned all of its nerves away so that it couldn’t feel anything even if it wanted to.

Logan searched for his spear. He found it about halfway down the tunnel, the shaft snapped in two during the chaos. He also spotted the rest of his group at the end of the tunnel. With a wave, Logan got James to throw his spear over, giving him enough time to fully recover.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

The beast was much too fast for him. It leapt away and forced him to run after it. Trying to close in on the rat with Flash Step, Logan found the technique failing as he expected. It appeared that the pressure of almost dying helped with learning techniques. That was all well and good, but that didn’t help with anything for now, so he shelved the knowledge and prepared to use Piercing Thrust.

Despite Flash Step not working, Logan still barrelled into the rat. His spear flashed out in silence as it pierced through the air. A moment later, it was buried in the rat’s neck. It still didn’t notice him even after he tore into its flesh. That gave Logan a second to step back before engaging again when it inevitably slowed down.

He continually used Piercing Thrust in an attempt to kill the giant rat, but its vitality was simply too great. After more than ten thrusts, he saw that it was barely bleeding at all. That prompted him to aim for its spinal cord in hopes of crippling it.

His spear flashed out again. The rat was rubbing itself on a stalagmite, allowing Logan to get a solid stab in. The weapon pierced through its remaining muscle without issue, but when the crystal tip reached its spine, his spear bounced straight out of its body and skittered over the vertebrae.

Logan tried two more times before he noticed something glimmering in the dull blue light. He attacked again and saw that its spinal cord was not made out of bone. If he was seeing correctly, it was sparkling like a crystal. That made him hesitate to attack again, inadvertently giving the rat enough space to notice him.

It pounced without warning, giving him no chance at all to dodge. Logan still tried to use Flash Step, but the technique failed again, his body moving no faster than usual. That made him give up and use Piercing Thrust. The air folded around the tip, lines of silk appearing in elegant, curling trails that flowed the wind around his body.

The weapon flew straight at the rat’s face. Logan aimed for its snout, but the beast twisted out of the way, causing the tip to bounce off its cheek. He immediately pulled the weapon back in before it could skitter over the beast’s head, causing it to fly out of his hands as it became lodged in some part of the beast he didn’t manage to see.

The next thing he knew, it bit down on Logan’s shoulder and threw him off his feet. He cried out in pain as he was thrown left and right. The rat thrashed him around like a dog with a chew toy. It only released him when his entire shoulder tore open, inadvertently causing him to fly down the tunnel again.

Logan bounced off the ground and only managed to push himself up into a seat position after a few seconds, his head still reeling from the dizziness of being tossed around. That was when he saw his right shoulder hanging open. Holding back the urge to vomit, his entire shoulder blade was held on by a chunk of skin, forcing him to grab his arm and push the two halves back in place.

A burst of flames licked his face as they erupted from his wounds, the golden power sealing the injury in seconds. Still, the phantom pain lingered in his mind for a long time after the fact, but he didn’t have the space to relax just yet. Standing up, Logan searched for his spear and inevitably found it in the last place he expected it to be.

Lodged in the rat’s eye, the beast shook its head left and right to try and dislodge the weapon. It looked like a strange hallucination of a unicorn. Logan wanted to go and ask Amelia for her spear to continue fighting, but it seemed she had a better idea.

She charged at the rat while it was clawing at its face. The beast stopped moving as it tried to pull the spear out with its front paws. With her shield raised, she took that opportunity and slammed her whole body weight into the butt of his spear, the impact so great that she grunted and bounced away. Her legs flew into the air as she was thrown back and onto the ground.

Logan expected the rat to screech or attack her, but it instantly went rigid as the spear sank into its brain. He struggled to believe that such a monster was dead until it went limp and toppled to the ground. He still didn’t believe it until he received a notification less than a second later.

Logan almost didn’t check it until more notifications came in, instantly grabbing his attention.

[You have slain an Uncommon Mortal at the seventh step, Crystal Rat.]

[Feat achieved! You have slain a monster over two tiers above you. While still in the early stages of the Body Tempering realm, you have slain a monster at the late stage. Your privilege level has increased as a reward for this tremendous feat. +60,000 credits]

[Privilege: Level 1 -> 2]

[Congratulations! You have gained increased information access thanks to your raised privilege!]

[Update! The World Core of your planet is slowly activating. This process will require three months and twenty-one days to finish. Once the World Core is fully activated, tremendous changes will occur across the planet, including the evolution of local flora and fauna, expansion of land, and ensuing natural disasters.]

[This process is typically violent enough to end all life. Because there is already a native population, the System has stepped in to provide the necessary materials for expanding the planet and protecting all population centres.]

[You are currently in the seized land of a cult that was attempting to violate the Heavenly Laws. All dangerous items have been removed, but as your current location is far away from a city centre, you will be at significant risk of death the longer you remain outside. Not only will the terrestrial remodelling become more expansive and deadly over time, but the natural disasters caused by those changes will become lethal even to powerful cultivators.]

[You are advised to escape to the nearest population centre before the estimated countdown expires. After this time, the natural disasters will start becoming lethal. You will have an interim period of two weeks to escape to a city centre before death is guaranteed. Anyone who hasn’t reached the late (7-9) stages of Body Tempering will likely perish after this time.]

[Countdown until terraforming is complete: 3 months, 21 days, and 14 hours.]

Logan nodded his head as he read over the new information. His understanding of the timeline improved quite a bit, giving him a better idea of when things would get really bad. They had a little over three and a half months to get back. If they managed to advance their cultivation to the late stages, they could add another two weeks to that counter, but he would much rather get back early than late.

Collapsing to the ground, Logan was silently glad they hadn’t rushed off to find a way to the surface. If they had bumped into the Crystal Rat even a day ago, it would’ve been him alone fighting this terrible monster. The fact that they had prepared themselves beforehand was the only reason they were still alive.

Even better, their rising strength would only speed up the journey ahead of them, especially now that Logan had access to more Shop functions.

[Congratulations! You have gained access to advanced functions in the System Shop.]

Logan almost cried tears of joy, but he held himself back when he read the following prompt.

[Instant sale function is now available. This means that you can sell all of the materials you come across without having to store or carry them. However, be warned that you will incur fees for using teleportation functions. If you do not wish to pay any fees, you may sell the item at a physical System Shop or to local vendors.]

Logan tried to keep reading, but the notifications cut off there. Panic urged him to buy a bottle of water from the Shop. He clicked on the button, and yet no bottle appeared before him. Instead, a new notification did.

[Error: User is not within the vicinity of a designated trading zone. If you wish to purchase an item from the System Shop, please move closer to an outpost or raise your privilege level.]