Settling down the thoughts of his master to the bottom of his Heart, Alnea focussed his attention on the little monkey in front of him. Since it had only two tails, it meant that the monkey had yet to reach the advanced phase of Infant Stage. At best, it could use only two Innate Oren Abilities. The solidification of air around him must have been one of those two Oren Abilities.
If not for the fact that he had been running, and that most of his weight was focussed on his front, he would not have managed to break free of its restraints so easily. And this was when it was still at the Infant Stage. As it would grow, it would gain even more Innate Abilities, with the prowess, and effectiveness of those abilities increasing along with his growth. Still, even as the Infant that it was, the Eight Armed Blood Monkey would prove a difficult opponent for him.
The best thing when facing such an opponent, with an unknown ability, was to first probe it, and figure out its second Innate Ability, before charging in to deal with it. Time, unfortunately, was not on his side. More than half of the time he had allotted for himself to complete his Oath had already gone by, and there was still roughly half of the distance left to cover. He could not afford to dawdle. And so, he could only charge in to deal with the monkey as soon as possible. And the best way to do that was through the Oathkeeper Style.
Though his master had taken care of his dreams, making it so that they no longer engraved the memories of the other Alnea in his mind, the memories that had already been engraved were still with him, including the details, and the experiences of the other Alnea with the Oathkeeper Style. In addition to that, with the scroll that his master had given him on his birthday, detailing the different ways that he could improve his Oathkeeper Style, his proficiency with the Martial Style had long surpassed his proficiency of any other Martial Styles that he had mastered.
Furthermore, with the strengthening of his body, even the number of stances that he could use comfortably, without putting pressure on his body, had grown from four to five. The Sixth Stance still was a little too much for his body to bear, but he could use it for a short while, just as he could the Seventh Stance. The Eighth Stance, on the other hand, was far beyond his capabilities at the moment.
However, to deal with the little monkey, Alnea did not need to use something as excessive as the Slaughtering God Stance anyway. The stances that he could use, the first five stances, would be enough. Of those five stances in particular, the form that the little monkey resembled the most was that of a human. Even if there were some differences, they were not many. Besides, it was not like he had any other choice. Only the Oathkeeper Style would allow him to deal with monkey in as short period of time, giving him the time to complete his Oath.
While Alnea was pondering over his choices, and how deal with it, the monkey was doing the same, regarding Alnea as its prey. And so, the moment that it noticed some hesitation within Alnea, it jumped at him without any delay. In such a way, Alnea was finally deprived of his right of making a choice as well. Hurriedly assuming the Human Slaughtering Stance, he faced the Oren Beast lunging at him.
In comparison to Oren Beasts, humans had inherently weak bodies, with many vital points. These were the points, where the defences of humans were the weakest. And it were exactly these vital points which formed the basis of the ‘Human’ part of the Slaughtering Human Stance. And since he was regarding the monkey as a ‘Human’, Alnea aimed his attacks at the monkey’s most obvious vital point, its throat.
However, in the end, the monkey was still different from a human. It was much more agile than him, and faster as well. Directing a feint at the monkey with his kick, Alnea had aimed a chop at its neck, but the monkey wrapped one of its tail around a root on the ground, tugging at the root to pull back it body just enough to dodge the attack.
Consequently, with his one leg in the air, and having committed a significant amount of force to his attack, Alnea ended up losing his balance. He hurriedly brought his leg down, ready to charge at the monkey once again, but before he could do that, the monkey pointed its other tail at him. Right in the next moment, the tail let out a soft green light, following which, the air around him solidified once again, freezing him in place.
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On the other hand, having consecutively used its Innate Ability, the monkey showed signs of exhaustion as well, with fatigue crossing its feral eyes. But it was an Oren Beast. And an overlord at that. Its nature was inherently savage. It would not stop until it had killed its prey. Disregarding everything else, it jumped at him, while he was left defenceless, and unable to dodge the attack.
Fortunately, Alnea’s training over the last month had not been in vain, showing its effect when he needed it the most. Forging his Spirit had not only increased his Spirit Power, but it had also granted him the ability to enter his Spirit at a moment’s notice. At the same time, it had also given him a few, unique ideas. Not all of those ideas were practical, but some of them were.
When Forging his Spirit, he had noticed that making Oren course through his Spirit made him feel like he was being sliced apart with knives of melting iron from the inside. He wondered then, what would happen if he shaped the Oren into an actual knife, and stabbed it into someone else’s Spirit?
Though his control over Oren was not sufficient to find the answer to that question, at the very least, he could shape the Oren into the form a needle. And so he did, creating the very first form his own special attack, ‘Spirit Piercing Needle’. Or so he had named it. Except for the fact that it did not have any Mysteries imbued in it, it was almost like an Arcana... or maybe not. Anyways, it was not the time to consider such things.
Taking advantage of the fact that the monkey was still roughly two metres or so away from him, Alnea hurriedly used the last of his Spirit Power to borrow Oren from the Origin Sea, and shaped it in the form of a thin needle, before directing it to the elbow of his right hand. Though he had failed in his attack, his subsequent actions, as well as the actions of the monkey, had made it so that his elbow was pointing directly at the monkey’s face. And the moment that monkey came close to him, was also the moment that the ‘Spirit Piercing Needle’ was shot out from the tip of his elbow, stabbing directly towards the monkey’s head.
On the monkey’s end, the sudden attack had caught it completely off guard. After all, it was still at the Infant Stage. Though it had a frightening fighting potential, it did not have enough fighting experience to match it. It had never expected such an attack when it was so close to killing its prey, and was not prepared for it. Too late to dodge, it could only take the attack head on, while changing its own attack from a close range, to a long range attack, directing its tail towards its prey.
In the next moment, the monkey’s second tail glowed in a faint red light, before releasing a small ball of fire, that flew directly at Alnea, and hit him in his chest, before erupting in a blast, that turned his shirt into ashes, while also melting nearly half of the skin on his chest. At the same time, the blast of the ‘Fireball’ caused Alnea to be flung back a few metres, and crash into a tree, before sliding down on the ground, further aggravating his injuries. Fortunately, that also made it so that the fire on his chest had been put out by the snow on the ground.
As for the first Innate Ability of the monkey, it had already been lifted the moment the monkey had been hit by the Spirit Piercing Needle. Crying out in a shrieking wail, the monkey rolled around, and kept banging its head on the ground to get rid of the piercing fire in its head. It was clearly in no condition to attack him at the moment. But that was going to change soon.
He was the one who had created the Soul Piercing Needle, and he was the one who knew its effects the best. Especially since before leaving the confines of his Spirit, the Spirit Piercing Needle had hurt him just as badly as it had hurt the little monkey. It was just that he had the experience of Forging his Spirit, and as such, was not affected by such pain anymore. The monkey, on the other hand, was experiencing the pain for the first time, and thus, its reaction.
Still, that pain would last only for a while. After a while, when he the Oren inside its Spirit would dissipate away, its Spirit would begin recovering on its own, with the pain slowly fading away. Once that happened, the monkey was sure to come at him once again, this time, in an even more frenzied manner. And he was in no shape to fight.
Spirit Power aside, the wound on his chest was enough to cripple him, if not kill him, if not taken care of in time. His experience with Forging his Spirit was helping him maintain his consciousness for the moment, but he did not know for how long he could keep that up. If only he could attack the monkey with another Spirit Piercing Needle before it could regain its fighting capabilities…
Unfortunately, in his panic, he had used almost all of his Spirit Power when directing the earlier Spirit Piercing Needle at the monkey. How was he to attack the monkey with a Spirit Piercing Needle, if he could not even form the needle? At this point, the only way for survival he could think of was to recover faster than the monkey, and deal with it before it could recover. Preferably, as soon as possible.
After all, he still had his Oath to keep.