"FUCK!"
Cloverheart isn't having a good time. After telling him we finally found the exit, he's been venting his frustrations to nothing in particular.
The logistics around moving the entire village to the mountains is challenging, sure, but finding a safe/manageable way to get everyone down and into the volcano without dying from fumes, the heat, or the giant S-ranked dragon that lives too close for comfort to the volcano's entrance seems to be an issue.
"FUCK!"
"Why are you so mad?"
"Ellis. I'm having difficulties coming to terms with the fact that we will have to kill that thing down there. I don't think the nineteen of us have the capabilities."
"...Why not?"
"Did you not see it roar? It would send us all to the graves before our arrows could pierce its hide!"
"The trench works well. Hiding down there when it does an aoe and popping up to pelt it with long-range attacks should do it."
"I don't know what aoe means, but that's the problem. For that plan to be feasible, someone will distract it and be its target. No point in cowering in holes just to get ripped out like worms."
"Yeah. I could do it. Distract it, I mean."
"...honestly"
"I'll need a day to rest and a large meal, but I honestly believe I can live long enough so that the eighteen of you can deal enough damage to it."
"...you would be risking your life. Directly."
"I don't see it that way, but let me be arrogant here. What's the other option here? Leading the rest of the village through the territories will be dangerous enough. If the big boy over there spots us, it's not like you would be willing to abandon the rest."
"..."
"If you are confident that you can ensure that no one is spotted by that boss, then we wouldn't need to kill it."
"That's not possible. Getting here unnoticed is feasible and manageable, but having a village here when we prepare a safe way down is not. We will get spotted if we are forced to live around here. One day, people will die because of that beast."
"Then we kill it."
~~~
I could abandon the elves and leave on my own. But I'm not a psychopath... but if there isn't another option for my survival, I'm swan-diving for the exit. And there is an option, although it isn't a good one.
But I believe I can do it.
It's been a little under a month since leaving the village, and I've grown significantly.
Name / Nickname
Ellis Vincere / The Last Winner
Race
Human
Class
Monarch Master (Rank A)
Level
468 (4.3b/31.8b)
Titles
Proud Owner of a Rock, Fell the Mighty, Heptad Attuner, Indulger, Resilience Incarnate… ▽
~
~
Health Points
33,476/33,476 (+295% bonus)
Mana Points
5,525/5,525
Armor Points
0
Might
1100 (800 > 1000 + 10%)
Agility
1110 (800 > 1000 + 10% + 10)
Vigor (P)
1695* (1000 > 1500 + 10% + 45)
Mind
1105 (800 > 1000 + 75 + 30)
Spirit
1163 (725 > 961 + 20% + 10)
Perception
150 > 300
Charisma
100 (45 + 15 + 40)
Attunement
100
Luck
2
Unused 30 > 1092 > 92
Slashing
999 (999 + 468)
Ice
967 (499 + 468)
Piercing
999 (999 + 468)
Acid
999 (999 + 468)
Blunt
999 (999 + 468)
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Poison
999 (999 + 468)
Fire
999 (650 + 468)
Lightning
999 (699 + 468)
Necrotic
967 (499 + 468)
Radiant
967 (499 + 468)
Force
679 (499 + 468)
Exhaustion
968 (500 + 468)
Body
469 (1 + 468)
Mental
260
Spirit
10
Curse
105
V@#%
6
~
~
We only killed when necessary. When we couldn't outrun something or when our rations got low. The things here are pretty big, so we rarely ran out of food. Our hunting tactics were strange since they involved me getting thrashed while the others peppered it with arrows.
I'm confident because it's less than half my level. I've always been punching up, and that won't stop 'till nothing is above me.
Also, my resistance refuses to go above 999. I'll most likely have to suffer something extreme to breach this bottleneck.
But before we commit to something that, in hindsight, might be foolish, the hunting party and I decided to do some minor probing.
First, we tested how far the Land-Tyrant would be willing to travel to kill beings significantly smaller than it. We accomplished this by abducting a person-sized dragon and injecting it with a specific amount of hallucinogenic toxins.
It took some trial and error, but we found the point where it was on the edge of sobering up.
Once we got as close as possible, we threw the creature as far as possible. It yelped as it hit the ground, alerting the land Tyrant.
It turned slowly to look at the creature, who still hadn't realized its current predicament. The Land-Tyrant charges, and the quaking stomps sober the other dragon completely. It tries to run, but the Land-Tyrant's stride and power are too much.
It cries and yelps as it runs. The rumbling growls briefly drown out the loud footsteps.
The creature is killed and consumed within seconds of being noticed. Imagine sprinting to eat an unpopped popcorn kernel you found on the ground. Damn.
Goddamn.
Now, we have a dilemma. Do we continue with the second test? To test how good the Land-Tyrant's perception is. If it isn't great, we won't need to kill it. All the elves are graceful enough to keep quiet and hide behind rocks.
But is it enough?
If one gets noticed, that's game over for everyone in that area. The nearest trees are hours away on foot, so stashing people to lead smaller groups isn't feasible.
I mean, we could hide them behind rocks... But dangerous creatures still lurk around unless we are in the Land-Tyrant's 'territory.'
Maybe we can try something while it's sleeping. That's an advantage elves have over other creatures here.
But you don't get to be the big boss of this place by not sleeping with one eye open. Plus, we need a method to let everyone down into the volcano safely, so it would have to sleep for days.
~~~
I really want to kill the Land-Tyrant. I've been making excuses why it needs to die, but I realized, deep down, I want to do it.
I want it dead, and I want to be the reason. The elves can make that process faster, but regardless.
The majority of my time in this fracture consisted of nothing but running, fighting, training, and eating meat. When we stopped running to make plans, my body felt like it was about to burst.
I slept for the first time in a long time. It feels like I'm overflowing with energy like I've been dosed with caffeine. I'm the healthiest and strongest I've ever been, and I need to bleed this vigor somewhere, metaphorically.
We sent three elves to alert the village of what we were doing. If we all die (I will jump into the exit before that), they will know why. That leaves fifteen elves to cycle their attacks and me, the star of this operation.
If the elves don't hear from us in the time we give them, those three are tasked to lead the other 30-ish elves here. They'll hope and pray that the Land-Tyrant is either dead or too busy recuperating to notice their existence and improvise from there.
I'm ready. My arm isn't finished regrowing, and although we can wait it out, it will probably take over a week at this rate.
Since I rarely slept, my mana regeneration was slower than I wanted. I needed to stockpile mana to heal grievous injuries if they came up. I used [Broken Blood] to regain mana whenever possible, but still.
Also, regrowing my bone, muscle, and nerve tissue is excruciatingly slow. As level, stats, and resistances grow, more and more mana is needed to regrow my arm from scratch.
Stimulating hair follicles to regrow, fixing scarred tissue, and healing burns and breaks are much more straightforward. If only I were a troll or an axolotl... this wouldn't have been an issue.
I'm up to my elbow. My shoulder is flesh and blood, and I can move my half-arm as well as I can move my other one. My 'new' arm isn't atrophied either. It's as muscular and "powerful" as my other one, regardless of the compensation my one arm has been undergoing throughout the two months.
The rest of the hunting party is in place. I'll need to bring the Land-Tyrant a few thousand feet away to where the elves are hiding. The elves will pepper the tyrant with arrows from most sides while I work my magic.
I stand in the open with my blade in one hand. The Land-Tyrant is standing thousands of feet away. It's as tall as a fifty-story building. It's about twice as long as it's tall. It's obnoxiously big.
I take a deep breath, not to steady myself, and yell for its attention.
It immediately notices my existence and slowly turns around. It starts charging at me, and suddenly, the floor isn't stable enough for me to run on it... if I sucked at running, that is.
It roars, and I jump and tank the shockwave, riding it slightly, giving me an additional headstart.
My organs hurt, and my ears are bleeding, but that goes away with time.
It catches up to me before I can get to the designated position, but that's fine. It reaches its long head down to bite me, but I use [Battered Bones] in both legs and use the additional momentum to dive forward.
The Land-Tyrant didn't want a mouth full of rocks and dirt, so it tried to bite me from my top half. Its massive head helps me dive forward as the wind pressure it creates by just moving is insane.
It seems angry that something as tiny and insolent as I lived after it tried to kill me. It roars again, but I manage to get behind a large boulder. It shatters as it pushes against me, and my ears start bleeding harder.
Ah. I can't hear anything. I fix that with some healing while continuing the run. It doesn't take long for the Land-Tyrant to get in range. It's a big target, after all.
Arrows fly in barrages. Hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands blot out the sky. The elves were very conservative with their mana the entire journey here, but now they are letting loose. We aren’t going for a battle of attrition.
Flashes of elements light up the artificial darkness. Fire, lighting, ice, and even grasping vines explode against the hide of the massive beast. An arrow, better described as a ballista bolt, is the first to deal any critical damage. It pierces one of the Land-Tyrant's eyes and pops it. Blood gushes the ground like a literal waterfall.
Cloverheart had the time to flash me a thumbs-up before loading another massive arrow in his big, but not big enough, bow. I don't know where he keeps those things or why he would expose himself for the thumbs-up.
The Land-Tyrant is stomping its feet and musters up another roar. My [Scientific Insight+] tells me that these roars are from a skill, so unless it has some bullshit mana thing going on, it should eventually run out.
The arrows momentarily stop as the soundwave blasts all the projections into smithereens. An elf wasn't quick enough to get behind cover and is critically injured.
The elves fire arrows once the roar is over and attempt to relocate - to keep their distance. One elf goes to check on their injured brethren.
During this time, I got closer to it, uncaring of its stomping feet. I time my jump so I'm on its foot and not under it with a hefty jump. I climb its coarse and rough skin like it's a cliff.
Each movement, from big to small, from both it and I, threatened to launch me off. But I climb the fifty stories in record time.
'Look, Ma! No hand,' I think as I stand on the creature's back. I attempted to straddle it, but it's much too big, and the skin isn't textured enough for me to get between the wrinkles. I'm practically supporting my body by gripping the skin with my toes...
I'm getting flashbacks to the worm I killed in the other fracture I was unjustly thrown in. Huh. At least I had shoes.
I crack my neck and start stabbing a hole.
I plunge my sword into the beast's back.
-4,743
With my titles, especially [Colossus Slayer], my damage was mitigated somewhere in the 700s. This fucker isn't more durable than I?
I drag my blade along its back, the flesh parting and growing beyond the initial cut. A hidden feature of my title? I'm not complaining.
The growing cuts obviously get the Land-Tyrant's attention. I did over twenty thousand damage with my blade, and I'm not planning on stopping. It can feel my travel up its back towards its head.
It's typically forward-leaning... even downward-leaning, as most things are smaller than it. But instead, it bends its back to an impossible degree and stands up straight.
I stab my blade into its flesh to keep me grounded, but that doesn't work. Another trail of split flesh follows me as my blade glides down stories worth of flesh. I stab my half-arm into its flesh and stick myself in that way.
I hold my sword in my non-hand hand's armpit and reach into one of the pouches the elves gave me. My hand comes back sticky as the toxins they've given me must have leaked from the containers I kept in the bag.
I dump the whole thing into the wound as deep as I can. To make sure it doesn't fall out before it finishes spreading, I mend the flesh slightly.
The Land-Tyrant stopped trying to stamp out all the creatures' slinging arrows. Instead, it purposely fell on its back to crush me against the mountainous terrain.