CHAPTER 182
Tom was standing in the middle of the stampede. The vanguard of them, a singular goat, had gone past him and he had drawn first blood by inflicting a minor cut on its legs but the next wave was upon him. Two of the goats split up and struck from each side. Their hooves flashed, and he spotted a gap and rolled under the sudden air bound opponents. His spear vanished seamlessly into his spatial storage so it wouldn’t get in the way.
Then he was rising, and he saw the goat’s head clearly for the first time on a third goat, which was charging into the space left by the two he had dodged.
The face had bulbous eyes that could expand out on two inch long stalks to let it look both in front and behind it simultaneously. Each of the eyes, as he had already noted when it combined with the other face gave the monster full stereo vision around itself. Then, set directly between the two eyes there was a hole the size of his fist. It didn’t resemble a human ear, but it was close enough that its purpose was unmistakable. Then beneath those features was a mouth that ran across the entire torso just above the row of legs. It was half a metre long and currently fully open and ready to bite off his head.
Rows of serrated teeth like a shark dripped saliva.
Tom was not intimidated. His eyes were wide as he monitored fate fluctuations around him. Each of the monsters had just under twenty fate but from what he could tell nothing had been released. Mentally, he checked himself. His feet were firmly planted on the ground with rock underneath. His body crouched down and was ready to explode with power.
Instincts guided his action. Empty hands abruptly felt the welcoming weight of his weapon. The mouth was still heading toward him, but far enough away that he could evade it without too much trouble.
But science…
And murder…
And his training leaving him perfectly positioned.
A nice conflation of events.
He thrust forward with a touch of Power Strike, sharpening the tip. Even as he did so, he sprang backwards. His eyes were wide open, the dust of the creatures’ charge making them sting, but he needed to see with his full senses what was happening.
Fate left the goat.
One point, maybe two. It interacted with his weapon. Tom felt a thrill of excitement and growing anticipation. The purpose of the fate was not clear yet. Would it be limiting his attack? Or take a more aggressive path to trap his spear in that mouth.
The spear cut into the roof mouth for a few centimetres and then skid off the cartilage rather than finding a gap to plunge through.
He yanked the weapon clear just as the teeth slammed shut.
The fate had protected the monster from injury. It was not proof. After all, the mouth might be armoured, but Tom privately doubted that explanation. Out of all the multitude of monsters he had killed, only a handful had armour there. His spear being stopped by limited protection was the first evidence of a defensive fate bias, which was the best possible outcome for him.
His strike was a long way from a mortal blow, but the goat froze, and then screamed out its pain to the wider world. Tom found his balance and then focused. His Spark domain stretched around him and he was surprised to find that somehow the monsters had collectively managed to block themselves from approaching him. The goat whose mouth he had scratched was responsible. It had frozen instead of continuing on and that meant that the gaps that should have been present for other goats to use to close with him had not eventuated.
Nothing was threatening him.
A goat had leapt over the pile up and was exposed.
With the precious half a second of time, he targeted the gap where a leg joined the body. Experience had taught him that there were often key arteries in that location. Blood had to reach the muscles, after all.
The tip of his spear glowed blue and ten fate was actively spent on the attack. All the goat’s fate left its body to protect itself. It was too late for it. He was already in an advantageous position and his own fate had become active first. The two sources of fate clashed, the goat’s larger cloud against his more concentrated one. There was an annihilation reaction, and all was left was him and his thrusting weapon. The spear point bit deep and he drove it forward and then yanked it out.
There was a spray of orange.
A flood of blood that showed no signs of stopping and represented a death blow.
It was an extraordinary stroke of luck to have found a weakness so quickly, and the attack had also proved the point he was trying to make. He was almost positive that the goats used their fate purely defensively. If he leant into a battle of attrition, he could win this fight without wasting anymore of his fate.
The pocket of stillness vanished, and he was forced to roll forward to avoid flashing hooves. Every time his feet hit the ground he had to dodge to evade another attack. Goats were all around him and now that he knew their weak points and had the mana, lightning spears flashed into existence to plunge into the leg joint whenever the goat flexed and opened it up.
His attacks rarely landed perfectly. There were no more beautiful fountains of orange that meant certain death, but each strike did its job and left the goat depleted or nearly depleted of fate and vulnerable to the next engagement.
He ducked under some swinging hooves and landed upon an upthrust of rock. He flopped down the side and Earth Manipulation infused the rock he was on and caused four spikes to shoot out from the top of it.
Three of the incoming goats were promptly impaled, though only the one he had tagged earlier suffered a fatal wound.
Tom was already dodging away. He appreciated how his advanced dodge skill was working. Fate was bubbling up and the massive speed boost it gave was welcome. That component of the Skill let him dance almost like he was a god through the mass of monsters that in raw attributes should have been quicker than him. He was still getting hit. The Black Dodge origin forced that outcome. A series of glancing blows that probably should have broken bones, but protected by his skill they left only minor bruises. The important thing was that he had avoided being bitten, and he was like a wind elemental, twisting and spinning through the herd of braying monsters and clashing teeth at speeds that should have been impossible.
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As he wove in and out of the creatures, hooves attempted to bash him out of existence. Gaping mouths attempted to cut him in half and the swinging tails tried to sneakily trip him up. He avoided them all and each time his mana regenerated to full a pulse of Touch Heal resulted in him being as good as new for the next partial dodge.
His domain registered a hurtling body from behind. Without hesitation, he dived forward. The sound of scrambling from the left gave a warning about approaching bodies. He twisted and spun to the side. A goat went flying past.
Another tried to blindside him. He fell and positioned a hand to throw him back to his feet. The goat flashed overhead, its teeth snapping shut on empty air. He was right next to one of the upthrust of rocks. Earth Manipulation took control of it and the goats having either forgotten or not seen the last time he was in that position leapt at him.
Six of them pounced.
Five spikes exploded out from the rock and all of them scored likely mortal wounds on their targets. Tom didn’t wait to assess. He rolled under them to escape and another quick thrust of his spear opened up an artery on the sixth and sent more orange mucus like blood spurting.
He stood for a moment. He was in a battle lull.
No monsters were coming to kill him.
He quickly checked on his allies.
They were defending the small stone hut that Keikain had raised. Harry was down on his hands and knees scribbling away just in front of the entrance while Thor, Keikain, and Sven defended him. Jingyi had stopped firing arrows and when he glanced in that direction, Tom saw a group of ten goats had gone to corner the scout and he was fighting a skirmishing retreat from them. Everlyn had also been targeted, but only six had split off to investigate her and she had taken them all out before they reached her and was back to shooting arrows through the goats in the main herd.
Then, like it never existed. The brief area of calm that had formed around Tom vanished. Multiple goats charged him. Once more he ducked, weaved and then rolled to the side. Every time he did so, more fate was released. It was like an avalanche. Goats collided with each other, another broke a leg as its foot was caught in a crack.
Instinctively, his hand deflected an incoming hoof. He hardly felt it and his palm was not even scratched even though the hoof had several razor-sharp edges to it. He had timed the strike perfectly to hit the flat part rather than the sharp spots.
Not once when he dodged did his feet slip on a loose piece of gravel or the slimy blood. Visually, the firm footing hazards were everywhere, as demonstrated by the goats who specialised in agility tumbling all over the place.
The impact of his new skill was decisive. As he ducked and wove amongst the goats, he saw the monster’s fate spilling out to counter his retaliatory strikes. Even though collectively the goat’s were expending far more fate than what he was generating, he was winning. All of his was pre-emptive while the emergency fate bursts at the last minute was incredibly wasteful.
Tom kept going with his new Skill shaping the battlefield. It did more than keep him safe. He also often found himself positioned for the perfect counter-attack. An opportunity he always took only to have the emergency fate release of the goat result in its leg twitching, which resulted in his stab being wide.
Tom could have got upset at the unfairness of it all, but they were only doing what he usually did. Though their last-minute release meant they functioned with terrible efficiency. Eventually, their fate would be exhausted and his would not be because of the continual creation that his skill generated.
When that tipping point came, instead of his blows only scratching the enemies, they all became deadly.
He stabbed, and there was a fountain of orange.
A goat nearby completely lost its feet and smacked flat against the ground. One of Everlyn’s arrows flashed overhead, missing it.
Tom came out of a roll. He successfully avoided one of the razor sharp hooves and he stood right above the prone goat.
He thrust his spear down and pulled it out to a flood of blood.
Tom moved on.
In some ways, it was a combined kill even though he had landed the only blow in the fight. Everlyn’s arrow, despite not touching it had exhausted the animal’s fate.
A mouth closed on his pants and failed to penetrate, but the goat was latched onto his leg. He could feel the constriction of the creature’s teeth through the armour. It was not something he could tolerate. He couldn’t afford his mobility to be compromised against this particular type of enemy.
Without hesitation he spent twenty fate.
Two large rocks appeared in his hands, and he launched them down at the body, gripping his leg.
Throw rock was engaged, and the rocks sped up far beyond his capacity to throw them.
The beast gripping his leg was obliterated.
Yet, even as the rocks tore through the animal, its mouth remain latched and he was yanked off his feet, a victim of the power of his own spell.
He tumbled next to an outcrop of rocks and stared down. A large part of the now very dead goat remained attached to him. With a thought and a moment of concentration, the rock that he leaned against sprouted over a dozen metre and a half long spikes.
There were squeals of pain as the monsters that had seen him as vulnerable crashed into the sudden lethal obstacle.
Tom ignored them. His fingers pried open the goat’s mouth and pushed it off him. His pants unsurprisingly remained undamaged even if underneath them he was suffering deep bruises courtesy of the powerful bite. It was like a crocodile with their incredible jaw strength had bitten him.
There was the sound of splintering stone as the too thin stone spikes broke. His protection vanished, and he was open to attacks from multiple angles. He rolled forward and then by hardened battle instinct swayed to the side and then in the other direction his hands snapping out this time. He struck and knocked a hoof that had been trying to kick his chest wide. Then he instinctively formed his hand into a karate chop that slammed the base of a tail that was just about to wrap around his leg. It’s spasmed under the force of his blow. Then he was back flipping away as his spear materialised to take advantage of a gap. More orange sprayed.
There was a creaking behind him and when he looked five, massive spikes of stone had risen and caught all the goats that had been attacking his back.
Tom shot a quick glance towards the hut, and Keikain gave him a wave.
Then Tom sprung back into action. For the next ten minutes, he continued with the same ineffectual dance, landing numerous blows but only opening up slight cuts on the beasts. Then the force of the fate that he’d been continuingly expelling to survive started to overwhelm his opponents.
There was no specific change, but suddenly when he stabbed he got an artery. When he dodged, the goats were more likely to collide with each other. He saw one mouth snap shut, just missing his knee and catching the tail of a secondary goat. That happened not just once, but four times in the span of a minute. Every time his spear lashed out it punched into one of the many vulnerable spots he had mapped and left sprouting orange behind it.
Then he was done.
Tom stood almost thirty metres away from the shelter, panting to recover his breath. Everywhere nearby was covered in wet orange. Tom slid down onto his haunches and struggled to control his breathing and hold the spear straight up.
They were done! They were victorious. Tom considered his new evolved Skill and tested what he thought about it.
Effective for sure, and it had been a fun road test. He looked around at the hundreds of dead goats. They were his rank and if he had been alone here, he would have won. He chuckled to himself. When he had come into Existentia, he had been expecting to go slow and be weaker than everyone else around him.
Now he could fight off hundreds of monsters of his own rank and his build was far from finished. After all, he had experience to spend and couldn’t wait to get a battle teleport skill.