Still irritated because of the interrupted fight, I pouted. "Too bothersome."
My consciousness wouldn't allow me to just murder the urchin. Especially now that he was both intelligent and guarding the trench's opening against this Carcinodon, whatever it was. Considering my luck, it was a giant shark with tentacles.
I felt the urchin appraising me.
Lacking eyes, I couldn't glare at the urchin efficiently. "Are you sure that if we were to fight now, you'd lose?"
"Then you need to forfeit the duel. Submit to me."
For the first time, I felt emotion from the urchin. Confusion.
"Contract?"
The surprise distracted me. I looked around and noticed we still had hundreds of dead fish floating around us. And hundreds more eating them, happy to avoid both urchin and mermaid.
But I had a hunch what the urchin said. It was possible to make a contract, a bond between a powerful entity and a mortal, granting power to both through the bond. Nenandil and I had a contract of sorts, though ours were on a more profound level.
"What would you offer?"
Something told me it was a bad trade. That I should just grab the Exp I reasonably could and go on with my life. Leave the urchin to do his job.
"Put the contract idea on hold. What is this carcinodon? Is it a shark? A squid?"
It had 'bad news, terrible idea' written all over it. "Tell me more, please."
Run Forrest, run.
"What level is it?"
Time out. A creature born of the first iteration of the System, that actually lived all this time. The first iteration of the System, when weird shit Perks were tossed left and right. I doubted this guy had an update to its Status in ages. Worse, it was over level two hundred. I had no idea it was even possible. My greedy self drove me to calculate how much Exp such a creature would give me.
I set this issue aside for a moment. Let's solve the easy problems before taking on impossible-TPK-wipe-ress-reroll tasks.
"First things first, sir urchin guardian. Do you have a name I can call you?"
I focused my thoughts inward.
"Rude!" I went back to glare at it.
I covered my left chest with my hands. "You can't have her."
The urchin made the mental equivalent of deadpanning.
I used the silence - broken only by the ravenous chomping of the fishes feeding around us - to think of a name for this spike ball. One came to mind right away.
"You shall be called..." I froze as the world stopped around us.
"... Bit."
He wasn't a digital construct but now that I could see it floating, it did resemble the critter. It could say more than "yes" or "no", that was true. Bit was a fast learner for a creature that old. The next time it spoke in my mind, it had inflection and transmitted the idea of deep respect.
> Duel won. Peaceful resolution reached.
>
> For defeating level 178 Elder Urchin Guardian, you gained 1.2T Exp ( base 316,840 x8 size x3.05 duel x3,05 Exp Boost x3.05 Monster x32,768 Fast Learner x0.5 Peaceful Resolution).
> You reached Arcane Diva level 19.
>
> [...]
>
> Ultimate Surpasser granted you 3 Attribute points.
> Bit, the Elder Urchin Guardian is now your subject.
The urchin shivered, sending waves across its twitching tentacles.
"Stop reading my mind, that's a {Royal Order}!" I commanded it. "Nenandil's as well."
The tentacles limped.
I dumped three Perks to max out {Psychic Resistance}.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
> You purchased the Perk: Psychic Resistance V (very rare) - Reduce psychic damage by 97%. Reduce the duration of all mind-affecting debuffs by 76%.
It unlocked another set of Perks regarding mental defense. I browsed the list quickly and picked another two.
> Mind Shield (very rare): Your mind cannot be read unless the attacker wins a psychic contest.
>
> Mental Feedback (very rare): The PP cost of psychic attacks on you is tripled. Attackers take psychic damage equal to the extra PP spent.
The urchin hummed in approval.
Damn, the murder-ball learned how to be smug before I shut the connection. I swam to touch it and healed some of their HP. If a third abyssal monster was nearby, it'd be killed.
"I'm going to investigate this Carcinodon. No promises, though. Are you okay to get back to your duties? And please don't kill any other mermaids, ever. Talk to them."
it sent along with the mental image of bowing. It seemed mere communication wasn't considered an attack or reading.
I was curious about whom made him guardian but that could wait. I wanted to dive down and partake in the kill-feast that was going on before too late. We swam back, the urchin killing some large sharks and other predatory fish. I noticed I earned my tithe from their Exp kills. Another reason to leave it where it belongs.
----------------------------------------
I was nowhere near the depth I’d found that rare Kerberos-anglerfish. The haze of the urchin's beam-induced feeding frenzy lied well above me, the small fry of mid-trench monsters barely worth the effort of dispatching them.
Deeper I went. Into the darkness.
In the depths of the abyss, "light" was a bygone concept. Usually, one that enticed a creature’s curiosity exactly once: when the damn predator that was emitting it devoured them. I swam around, using {Water Jet} to increase my already boosted swim speed four-fold. It used eighty MP per second out of the almost three hundred I regenerated, so it was basically free. Submerged as I was, my water elemental form was as good as invisible. Even at these neck-breaking speeds, I left barely ripples behind my passing.
Once I fully adapted to the darkness, I noticed there were pinpricks of light. The water wasn’t clear, the sea snow from above and the water pressure caused several less dense particulate debris to stop falling at different heights. Bits of flesh, fluids, and organic matter fed a microscopic ecosystem. Plankton and bacteria feasted on this bountiful buffet. I too sampled the local cuisine with my pseudopods. There was a kind of microscopic shrimp-like krill that I found delicious.
Yeah, weird I could feel taste from stuff I was eating out of projections of my flesh that never touched my tongue. I wouldn't dare question the System's wisdom. Although at the end of the day, I should. Both its and mine.
Only the real dense stuff would reach the bottom, like bone fragments. Filtering through this organic mess, I went around this hazy and mysterious world underneath the world in search of prey. Despite what common sense told me not to do, I followed the lights.
Finally, I found an anglerfish. It wasn’t a Kerberos variant, though. This one had only one terrible mouth and an elongated body, more like an eel than a fish. It looked as sleek as it was gigantic. I was unsettled by its milky white eyes that seemed to nostalgically stare into the horizon.
> Dark Serpent Steel-finned Anglerfish
>
> Level 133 fish monster
>
> HP ~ 60M
>
> Size: Huge (x4 HP)
The creature was elongated like an eel but covered in a snake-scale-like pattern. Its mouth was comically oversized for its slender body, with the needle-like teeth characteristic of the anglerfish. I couldn’t get as many details from {appraising} it. {Death Contract} didn’t work on it, proof the monster was irrational. Should've tried this on the urchin out front. Would save a lot of time.
“Hey, stupid fish, I’ll be your opponent,” I taunted and tossed a {Champion’s Duel} on it. Gotta stack the Exp multipliers where I can.
It spun the horrendous mouth my way and gawked as wide as it could. Its body swelled as the creature started to suck as if it wanted to dry the ocean. Its once sleek and serpentine body widened up like a balloon. Instead of fighting it, I let it take me in and propelled myself directly through its teeth with {Water Jet}.
Once I was past the jagged teeth, I pondered my options. The dangling fin turned light organ had to stay intact at all costs and I wanted to preserve the monster’s hide as much as I could. Some options were more destructive than others. For example, killing it with {Drain Longevity} would give me an old and decrepit monster body. Inside it, an idea came to mind.
Using elven vocal cords and {Second Melody}, I could use as many as eight voices. I started humming acapella the classic theme for Green Hills Zone. Anyone could guess where this is going. I made bands of {Force Blades} spin in different directions around the {Force Sphere} I surrounded myself with for that extra grinding effect.
> Allegro
>
> Minuet
>
> Major Chord [Force Blade] [Force Sphere] [Water Burst]
>
> Overcharge Magic [Force Blade]
>
> Fortissimo
>
> Falsetto
Spin-dash and aim for the ceiling of the mouth. Thank goodness I was inside the sphere, or I would be soaked in fish brain bits. The blades attached to the outside went wild as they shredded through the monster’s palate and into its skull cavity. With Falsetto granting critical hits, the fish's insides were shredded to bits before it died.
> You killed level 133 Dark Serpent Steel-finned Anglerfish. You gained 20.5B Exp (Base 176,890 x3.05 Monster Hunter x3.05 Champion’s Duel x4,096 Fast Learner x3.05 Exp Boost).
The assassin’s curse of laziness struck me again. I found 20.5 billion too little for a kill of that level. Well, at least I got another glowing illicium to turn into a [Sunrod]. Let’s keep hunting for more anglerfish. Although I couldn’t see anything outside, because pulling a Blue Hedgehog on the monster created a dust cloud of blood and chum floating around me which quickly spread out as the monster’s corpse vanished into the item box.
I focused on my detection and found something big coming my way. Like "your momma" big. Not willing to expose my delicate flesh to either the gross gore or the newcomer, I kept singing and spinning my bladed sphere around me.
A huge mouth covered in rows of triangular teeth came and chomped down on my sphere as if I were a tic-tac. It didn't swallow. Instead, whichever fish decided to chew on the Force blades. I felt the drain on my MP from the monster’s pressure, and teeth fragments the size of a halberd’s head shot everywhere, propelled by the rotating blades.
The creature shook my sphere from side to side, its teeth regrowing as fast as the blades shredded them. {Appraise} told me its HP wasn’t dropping - or wasn’t dropping noticeably. Upon closer inspection, it went up and down minutely as the monster regenerated as much or more damage than my spell inflicted.
> Carcinodon
>
> Level 251 fish abomination
>
> HP ~ 1B
>
> Size: Massive (x16 HP)
Two hundred, fifty-one. Damn. The guy broke the level cap. Bit's information was outdated.
Sharing the item box with the fairy may have led to the depletion of my food stores but it had its advantages.
After reviewing my memories, the fairy groused, unamused,
She giggled,
Our protective {Force Sphere} shook. It seemed “Mr. Monstrous Regeneration Shark” had his pride wounded by our banter. I felt the Force spell falter.
> Your spell is suffering interference. Collapse imminent.
That's where I found out why this megalodon had the "carcino-" prefix to its moniker. Yes, a cancer shark. The monster's gums were rotten and putrid, with lumps and cysts everywhere. Checking the spell through the interface, I found it gave my magic cancer. That was a terrible joke. This insidious disease was something I didn't wish on my worst enemy.
I remembered what Bit told me. This shark was one of the first ten creatures to activate the System. I didn't know if I was one of them, but pretty damn close. It meant this guy had Perks and Skills that he shouldn't have. If the System transformed amebiasis into that death aura, I loathed to find out what it did with cancer.
Warts and cysts started to form on my [Force Sphere] spell. A big bag of nope for it. I had to escape somehow and I doubted it wouldn't affect me if I slipped incorporeally. I didn't have a teleportation spell or ability I could use right now and vowed to find one. Cycling my options, I found one.
> Pierce the Veil (very rare): You can create a rend in the veil between this world and the ethereal plane. This allows you to cross over to the immaterial world and back.
Another world looked like heaven. I cracked reality, a metaphorical rend appearing in front of me as I immediately went through, flipping the bird at the enraged assailant. Fuck you, cancer. Shark.