With a sigh, Jonathan started to gather his power, and then started down the nearest ramp. As he went, monsters streamed past him, too weak to bother attacking. On the flip side, they avoided him as well, feeling his aura blossom outwards. As he walked, a stronger beast strode up the ramp towards him, bellowing its challenge. It swept the weaker monsters off the ramp as it began to charge. It was a saurian monster, standing on two legs, clutching a large club. It looked a lot like the Progenitor from Jonathan’s first dungeon run, but far more powerful.
Jonathan picked up the pace, racing to meet it. With a roar, the club met his fist. The strength behind the blow was impressive, but Jonathan had the Void behind his own, and the club was erased from existence. With another strike, he blasted the monster’s head off its shoulders and into the pit. He kicked the corpse out of the way, and continued.
Dozens of such monsters came and went as he descended, but so far, none of them were stronger than he was. It seemed that the mountain sized titans of strength that roamed the world did not die often, and as such, were not respawned as regularly. There were probably less than a thousand peak Tier 2 monsters in the realm, as opposed to millions of weaker ones. The essence from them was weak, but it was steady. He could probably reach his goal after a few days of farming like this. However, that did not suit his mindset. If he found a challenging fight, he would take it.
Eventually, after hours, the canyon started to shudder as something massive emerged from the bottom. A titanic set of shoulders emerged from the darkness, summited by a head the size of a large building. Eyes of burning lava scorched the world with their gaze as a monster the size of a small town emerged from the ground. It was easily over a thousand feet tall, and it emanated an oppressive aura. All around Jonathan, the scurrying monsters picked up the pace, fleeing desperately. He stayed put. He fired off a quick analysis, and smiled at what he saw.
Minor Volcanic Hegemon(Boss)
Level 199
Health: 134123/134123
Status: Healthy
Now this was a challenge worthy of a Nascent God. Jonathan raised one fist, and started to gather the Void to it. It was time to upgrade his projectile skill with his new insights. As the purple spear formed, he started to weave in the pure nothingness of Maw of the Void. The spear began to dim, and soon it winked out altogether. It was still there though, just invisible. Jonathan threw it a moment later, straight towards the Volcanic Hegemon.
As the monster took one earthshaking step onto the ramp nearest to it, the attack stuck home. A sphere of rock was erased from existence, right at the monster’s right knee joint. It stumbled as its massive weight stressed the joint, but it managed to stay put. Its eyes locked onto Jonathan, and it roared.
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The monster reached back, and seized a chunk of rock from behind it, tearing apart one of the ramps. Hundreds of monsters fell to their deaths, but the titan ignored them. It reared back and pitched the building-sized chunk of rock towards Jonathan. He dashed up the ramp, using his stamina to empower his moments. He dodged the attack, but when it hit, the ramp began to shake. If this continued, it would fall apart entirely. Instead, Jonathan decided to lead the monster to the surface. At least there, he would be able to fight properly. Adrenaline coursed through his veins at the thought of this fight. If nothing else, it would be a good warm up for Granath.
Jonathan reached the top before the monster did, and was treated to the absolutely terrifying sight of its obscenely large head poking out over the lip of the canyon. At the sight of this, all of the Uthraki in the area ran, something that Jonathan had never seen before from the proud members of the warrior race. The monster kept rising, and soon it towered over the land.
Despite its massive size, it was more than able to keep track of Jonathan. The monster seemed to be so enraged by Jonathan’s temerity, that it decided to start off the fight with one of its more powerful skills. The creature raised its right arm and summoned so much elemental energy to it that it shone like a star. Then it brought it down. Where its palm hit, the earth cracked, and veins of fiery light coursed outwards. The ground began to bulge for hundreds of feet in every direction, and a geyser of lava burst out. It rose up for over a hundred feet, before slopping down onto the ground, melting the rock into ruin. Out of the lava, dozens of elementals arose, heading towards Jonathan. He smiled and slammed his fists together, ready to battle. Whatever happened, this would be fun.
Over the course of his life in the Ash Heaps, he had slowly begun to think of fighting as something worth doing in and of itself. The thrill of battle, the feeling of triumphing over adversity with your own power. It was something buried deep inside every human, but Jonathan had been liberated in a world where fighting was the norm.
Jonathan raced towards the golems, watching as their glowing eyes flared in the gloom of Tartarus. They were over a mile away, but he could see every last detail on their bodies, with his enhanced senses.
Each of them looked like a blob of lava that had been forced into a humanoid form, and they towered over him. They were relatively low level, but they would be distracting to fight while their progenitor was near. Jonathan reached them in a matter of seconds, and started to send out pulses of nothingness, blasting apart the monsters. The waves of power were somewhat diminished against the profound elemental energy contained within the golems, but it still took them mostly out of commission. Seeing a golem reduced to a one foot tall dwarf made out of lava was not exactly a terrifying sight.
The Volcanic Hegemon stomped its way towards Jonathan all the while, shaking the earth with its strides. It was one of the largest creatures that he had ever seen up close, and it would have filled a lesser man with terror. To Jonathan, it was simply another monster.