Lyam looked over at the hills that were less than a mile away. A dark silhouette was moving off the mountain and stalking across the red land. He looked back at Aveline. “Can we save him?” he asked.
Aveline closed the book and shook her head. “He is done for,” she said. “The scourge is a tier 15 mutant. All mutants above tier 10 start to develop a higher intelligence. Thus they are capable of purging their bodies of all flaws. One such flaw involves getting rid of an organ that can develop a cure to its poison.”
Lyam clenched his jaw as he looked at the man. The green moss on his neck was now turning slightly blue. “So he'll die even if the scourge doesn't eat him?”
Aveline nodded. Amidst the whistling wind, they heard a distant hiss. The noise was shrill yet silent. The scourge was getting closer.
“It's coming, isn't it?” Lyam asked.
“Closer than before,” Aveline said.
“Seems like we'll be done here quicker than we expected.” The boy stepped forward.
“I'll be right here, just in case you need help.”
“No,” Lyam said. “You should actually teleport yourself somewhere safe. Take the man with you too. We can’t save him but at least we can let him die in peace.”
Aveline frowned. “As long as the man is in this desert, the scourge can find him.”
“Don't worry, I won't let it get past that rock,” the boy said. “Also, if I need help, you'll know about it.” He raised his hand, brandishing the red-stone ring on his finger.
Aveline was still frowning but she seemed a bit more reassured. She took off her crimson amulet and put it in the dying man's hand. Before teleporting the two of them, she turned to the boy and said, “Lyam, be careful of its stinger.”
Lyam nodded. The hissing was growing louder. Aveline and the man disappeared in the red mist.
Then the scourge arrived.
Lyam had been expecting a grisly, grotesque monster like the corpse eagle that stank of death. What he saw instead was a creature draped in a dark crystalline exoskeleton with life dust swirling over its surface like sand. Its pincers, stinger and legs had a metallic sheen to them. It was tall as a horse wagon and about eight metres long. And it kept making that steady hissing sound as it drew closer.
The scourge nearly ignored Lyam, heading in the direction he and Aveline had come from. She had probably taken the dying man close to the portal. The beast was still following the scent of the poison on that man's flesh. Lyam shot [syphon burst] at the scourge in one of its legs to get its attention. It barely did any damage to its metallic appendages.
The creature didn't halt, didn’t turn to attack him. Its tall stinger simply uncoiled. A ray of bright green liquid, as hot as lava shot out of its opening. Lyam leapt out of the way. The green hot liquid splashed onto the ground where he had been standing, melting stone and earth alike. Blue smoke rose out of the scorched portion.
The scourge was still headed in its initial direction before it came to a halt, flared its palps in a gesture that seemed like anger to Lyam. It hissed louder before it turned around and shot its pincered arms at the boy.
Lyam swore under his breath and hopped off the ground before the pincers could bite onto any of his limbs. He managed to dodge one of its arms but the other one was darting straight at him. Lyam activated [dust will] before the pincer grabbed onto his wrist. The metallic arm curved outward and slammed the boy into the ground. He felt the dirt rising around him and his head spun a little. But he felt no pain.
That would be the case for the next three minutes before [dust will] went into cool down. Lyam started to count the seconds before he shot [syphon burst] at the scourge's eyes.
Its other arm shot up to defend against the attack. Lyam pressed his free hand against the scourge’s pincer and shot [syphon burst] again. Its grip on his wrist loosened. He yanked his hand free and rushed at the scourge.
Twenty-seven seconds. He raised a fist and brought it down in a fierce blow on the creature's extended mouth part. [Dust will] didn't add to his strength. It only made him impenetrable against all physical attacks for a short time. That also meant that he couldn't hurt himself punching a metallic mouth part off a creature's maw. His blow obviously wasn't super human. But he had a way to hurt his opponent without hurting himself in the process.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
And its mouth parts were certainly a lot weaker than its pincers. Lyam didn't feel any pain after landing the punch. But the scourge certainly did. Its stinger uncoiled reflexively and darted at the boy.
Lyam wasn't afraid of the sharp metallic hook zipping at him. It clanged into his chest like a spoon hitting an armor breastplate. He grabbed onto the stinger before it could go back to its prior position. It swung into the air, lifting the boy with itself.
Thirty nine seconds. Aveline had told him to be careful of the stinger. She knew about [dust will] yet she had brought his attention to the stinger specifically. It was a hint.
The boy pressed his palm against the bulbous part of the stinger. He used [syphon burst]. Life dust exploded in his face against the metallic surface, scorching it but not burning it.
The scourge grew wild, flailed its tail around, slammed it several times on the ground. The boy didn't budge. He held on like a tick and used [syphon burst] again. The bulbous end took a dent and grew hotter. Lyam kept shooting it with life dust. The scourge was getting desperate to shake him off.
Fifty-one seconds. A crack finally appeared on the stinger's surface. The scourge became desperate. Lyam kicked himself off the stinger and shot at the crack while he was still in the air.
There was an explosion of green and a burst of smoke. The corrosive liquid gushed out of the stinger and dribbled onto its abdomen. Lyam landed a few feet away from the scourge. He charged at the creature and slammed into its side. He planted his hands firmly under the upper segment of its leg and clenched his jaw. Lyam heaved with all his strength. He lifted that side of the creature a third of the way off the ground.
When it tried to shove him off, he used [syphon burst] again, toppling the scourge upside down. One minute and thirteen seconds.
The creature tried to use its tail to push itself back to its feet but Lyam shot it first in the tail, then in one of its legs. He climbed on its fallen form and pressed his palms on its crystal exoskeleton.
Lyam kept using [syphon burst] until he shattered its crystal exterior. There was a spurt of purple blood and a shrill screeching sound. The metallic legs twitched several times, the tail and stinger shivered. Then the scourge went completely still.
Two minutes and nineteen seconds. The boy let out a sigh and slid off the fallen beast, bathed in its ichor and breathing heavily.
Before the system messages could pop up, Lyam closed his eyes. He waited for his heart to stop racing.
###
“All it took was two minutes?” Aveline asked when she arrived after his signal.
“I know it sounds easy,” Lyam called out from behind the rock where the poisoned had been lying. He was changing out of his blood soaked clothes. “But I burnt twelve thousand dust points in those two minutes.”
Aveline looked at the mountain scourge which lay dead on the ground, bleeding into the red, sandy earth. A big hole had been torn into its abdomen and its stinger lay shattered on its tail. The boy had mutilated the damn thing. “You butchered it, Lyam.” She grimaced. “This looks like the work of a savage. Not a marksman.”
Lyam sighed as he wiped the blood off his hands and pulled on a fresh new shirt. His heart was still racing and his fingers still twitched. He could still feel the lightning coursing through his veins.
She was right. He had pushed himself too hard. But he didn't admit it out loud. He put the bloody clothes away and stayed behind the rock.
“You haven’t used dust alchemy yet, have you?” Aveline called out for him.
“I did.”
“Oh? What did you choose?”
Lyam stepped out from behind the rock to tell her.
The [system] had offered him four skills like it had in the previous hunt. [Frozen death], [Iron Clench], [Seize and sting] and [Burrow maker]
He chose [frozen death]. All the other skills the scourge had to offer were physical skills. Lyam was still a marksman. He didn't want to turn himself into a complete brawler by focusing on just the close combat aspects. There had to be a balance in his abilities. So it wasn't as difficult to make the choice he made. [Frozen death] was the scourge's poison attack. It didn't allow him to use poison in his own attacks, of course. But it gave him a new long distance skill.
[Stun flash]: allows the [wielder] to blind and disorient the “enemy” for 15 seconds.
It had borrowed the scourge's paralysing effect that came from the poison. Blinding someone wasn’t obviously as effective as rendering them helpless with paralysis. But what made the new skill an advantage to Lyam was the stat he had unlocked with it–Reflex.
“So the skill and stat can also be complementary and not just perfect reflections of each other,” Aveline said after he explained his rewards. “I didn't know that. Also reflex will heighten your ability to react to things quickly. So you gained a speed based stat anyway.” She gave him a wry smile.
The boy chuckled. He told her about his other rewards. The fight had earned him twenty thousand dust points. And added +2 to all his previous stats. He had also received an additional five thousand dust points from the system as a reward .
Aveline gave him a proud smile before she sighed. “I'd thought we'd take longer to just find the scourge. But you slaughtered the thing in less than five minutes.”
Lyam raised an eyebrow. “That's a bad thing?”
“Yes! It cost me a silver scarab to teleport us this far. All for an adventure that barely lasted ten minutes.” Aveline groaned.
Before Lyam could offer any consolation, a shadow appeared from behind the rock. A little girl. She wore a blue cotton tunic over a pair of trousers and her head was covered by a scarf. “My father came this way looking for water. Did you see him?”