The ones who screeched were not goats, and that wasn't surprising, but they were still terrified beyond comprehension! The group felt confident that they could handle a single monster, but judging from the screeches, they were about to be attacked by several of them, and this was a lot trickier to handle!
“Does anyone see anything?” Tim asked, as he nursed fireballs on his palm.
Georgie answered, except Georgie couldn't speak the goblin tongue, no. He just barfed out a fireball, which flew right above everyone's heads, and beamed across the tunnel!
The fireball hit something, they could tell, because one of those low-volume screeches, turned into an ear-piercing scream! Everyone had to cover their ears, and all of the dragons were in clear discomfort too.
“Shit… looks like he can see in the dark really well.” Tim muttered, and then he ressummoned the fireballs on his palms, and shot them at the same direction that Georgie did.
They heard another, loud screech afterwards! Everything about this exchange was absolutely deafening, and terrifying, but that's just how it had to turn out.
There was one good thing about it, though, and the system popped up in his head to give the good news. [Congratulations, you just killed a Yellow-bellied Cave Snake, and unfortunately for you, these snakes seem to exist in more than one universe. You've won 500 system points as a reward, and you can assume the snake's abilities if you choose to consume its flesh. Your friends could try and do the same, though it would likely be less effective for them.]
That was a lot of information, though, he could wrap his head around it for once, because he was adept in killing for the sake of power, he wasn’t a beginner in that matter. He understood that animals stole powers from each other all the time, it was natural, but the absorption-rate varied from mage to mage, there were numerous factors to it, but the bottom-line was that some mages stole powers better than others. Arvena may have the best of luck in absorbing the cave snake's powers, but by all odds she may choose to avoid it, in order to protect her degranus heritage which she valued dearly. She was picky.
Only Timothy absorbed anything he could get his hands on, but for now, he didn’t have time to steal. Despite the system’s lengthy announcements, the battle was still ongoing!
Everyone's ears rang badly, so they couldn’t hear the low-pitch screeches that the snakes sang, but they could still feel their horrid presence. The team was alert, and tried to avoid getting pounced on by all necessary!
The battle progressed towards the extremes moments later, when a snake sprung out of the ground, right near Timothy's feet! The snake tried to take him down, and it might as well succeed because this was no small snake, but he spotted it at the last second, and came up with a counter attack! He evaded it.
Fire was a good tool, it could solve everyone's problems, so he used it here once more. He had to get out of the snake's projected direction first, as he couldn’t fight back on the spot, no, because if he tried to fight back now, then he would get pinned down immediately!
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It was best to get out of its way, so he used a little trick that he hadn't used in weeks now. He summoned the Flaming Fins ability, though as a goblin he didn’t have fins, so it was his feet which jolted thanks to the fiery blaze that he had summoned. In other words, this ability made him move faster, but he didn’t depend on this thing alone!
Tim also summoned the Freezing Blood ability, which as a bonus helped him move even faster. However, with this power he also forced the enemy to slow down, because he had been close enough to freeze its blood directly!
All of this happened within a couple of seconds, and he didn't bother turning these couple of abilities off afterwards, no, he didn’t do that even though he had already beamed out of the snake's path. Instead, he used this freedom that he bought, to summon a couple of fireballs too, and then he blasted them against the snake!
His moves were successful! He had worked up the target so efficiently and diabolically, that the target's flesh turned from a frozen meat-steak into a well roasted lunch, all within three seconds! This time he didn’t even hear the snake scream, as perhaps he had frozen its vocal cords too, and this was a really good bonus, because he didn’t want his ears to ring all day. Then, he finally turned all of his summoned abilities off.
[You just killed another Yellow-bellied Cave Snake, and won 500 more system points as a reward, congratulations.] The system announced.
Afterwards, she also cautioned. [You just tri-casted some of your abilities there, though, and I advise you against it, because it's a really expensive decision. You just lost 744 mana points in under three seconds!]
“It was worth it,” He said, and then bent over to tear a bit of roasted meat, right off of the snake's carcass. “I wonder how this tastes?”
Tim took a bite, but little did he know, the battle was not over. His ears were ringing so he could barely hear anything right now, so it wasn’t a surprise how he was completely oblivious of the dangers around him. Another snake leaped at him just then, and he couldn’t see it coming whatsoever!
Everyone shouted at him to get out of the way, but to no result, he was still oblivious! All of a sudden, a blue forcefield appeared out of thin air, and it circled around Timothy, it coated him thoroughly, so the snake ended up just crashing against the forcefield, where it caught his attention afterwards.
Tim turned around, and said. “You sneaky bastard, you're going to be my dinner later on! I'll enjoy frying you.”
Speaking of frying, he then summoned the Electro Nerve Splitter, and fried the snake's brain whole. He fried its electrical receptors!
[Another 500 system points, good. You've accumulated a total of 4,000 points.] The system showed a point-counter in his head.
Looking back at Ortana, he confirmed that it was she who protected him with that forcefield. It was her signature ability, so he was reminded why they kept her in the group to begin with. He was appreciative, and nodded at her in order to thank her quietly.
Timothy then bent down, and grabbed a handful of meat off of that first, fried snake, and ate it. He didn’t learn from his mistakes, as in, he still wasn’t looking around to see if there were any more snakes coming, but this time his negligence didn't matter, because the battle truly was over. He was okay, everyone was okay.
After a few more bites, yet another notification popped up in his head, and it said. [Congratulations, you successfully obtained the Nerve Shaker ability. You can now emit a sonic-like humm, which will leave your opponents disorientated, depending on the intensity of the exchange. It’s a good ability to have.]