*Wham*
Zyrus was sent hurtling back like a ragdoll. His wounds that had just healed up began bleeding once again.
However, they were the last of his concerns.
‘Hah, funny, isn’t it?’
Yes, he found the Nidhogg king’s current state funny. Its cicada wings and froglike hands were falling off one by one. The same thing was happening to its tails as well.
He believed that the monster in front of him would become an abomination due to unregulated mutations, but it was quite the opposite.
The laws of life weren’t evolving it towards a new direction. Rather, the Nidhogg king was going back to its ancestry.
Bright green scale grew around its entire body, and even the protruding fangs were pulled back. A vast amount of energy was leaking out from the corpse which was being revived.
‘I’m glad I didn’t take it myself,’
Zyrus shivered as he sensed the potent energy of life. He finally understood why his powers had different reactions towards the fruit.
Too much of anything was bad. He was sure that any being would lose its willpower under the tremendous amount of life energy.
It was the same logic for all laws. A minute amount of fire laws might enhance one’s fire affinity and give them a new skill, but what if they were far beyond one’s reach? Even if the sanctuary preserved their body, nothing can save their sentient will.
Zyrus understood that the corpse in front of him was being assimilated with the laws of life. Even if it became alive, it would no longer be the same creature it used to be.
A mindless puppet, a husk of its former being who could only act according to the laws that re-defined its existence.
‘I discovered something I didn’t expect, but it’s a scary scenario,’
Zyrus calmed his raging heart and thought over the possibilities. What if there were more objects like that fruit? What about different laws?
Take fire for example once again. If a creature was infused with sufficient amount of fire laws, if a creature like that survived the process, then wouldn’t it become a living calamity?
A creature whose sole purpose was to burn everything. A creature that couldn't be stopped without the power of laws.
But how many people can wield the power of laws at such a level? Even he himself wasn’t there yet. In the first place, interacting and manipulating the laws was extremely difficult. It was impossible to create a large group of people who had such power.
*Crack*
But now, right in front of his eyes, such a creature was taking shape. Nothing made sense from the moment he saw the fruit. Why were the laws of life in an active state from the start? Weren’t the laws in nature supposed to be passive?
There are thousands of laws present in every world. What if there was a way to activate them without training step by step? Zyrus felt like such an action should be a taboo.
‘Haaa…whatever. I’ll think about it when the time comes,’
He slapped his face to get rid of the distractions and looked at the emerging creature. His previous fight looked easy at a glance, but only he knew how much preparation he had done to achieve that result.
The players' shield formation, Jacob’s timely attack in the second phase, and his back-to-back stuns which finally killed the field boss. Each and every move was calculated in advance.
Such victory was possible due to his knowledge before the regression. But now, for the first time, he would be fighting against an unknown monster in the sanctuary.
‘Well, the scorpion king was different, but anyway…’
This time, even the administrators shouldn’t know the creature’s abilities. It would be a lie to say that he wasn’t worried about its new abilities.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
But more than anything, Zyrus Wymar was excited at this moment.
Before his regression, before he became the pillar of humanity, he was always in similar conditions.
A lone man fighting against the monsters head-on.
[Avatar]
Zyrus activated his skill from the start. He could tell from a glance that he wasn’t the monster's match without it.
Unlike the time when he summoned the projection of the Azure dragon, or the time when he transformed into the black dragon, he activated the skill in a different manner.
He decided to take on a defensive approach after observing the monster, or rather, the transforming serpent’s bright scales. Colorful things are more likely to be poisonous- it was a rule of nature.
Thus, Zyrus decided to assimilate his poison breath skill with the world around him. The original skill wasn’t able to accomplish that, but his months of training weren’t for nothing.
‘Now that I think about it, this is the exclusive skill of my race,’
His dark blue scales took a shade of poisonous green. And opposite to the giant serpent in front of him, a green wyrm appeared at his back.
It was a pity that while the one staring at him was a revived creature, the one behind him was just a manifestation that buffed his poison resistance and recovery rates.
‘But this is enough,’
Zyrus didn’t wait for the monsters' attack and charged at it from the start.
*Thunk*
-50
His fists hurt as if they had struck a block of metal. Before he could even exclaim at the monsters’ ridiculous defense, he was slammed by its tail.
*Craash*
Zyrus dusted off his armor and stood up from the rubble. He wasn’t that hurt despite being sent flying back twice.
“Form,”
Numerous vortexes began taking shape in the middle of the two. Both Zyrus and the green serpent were staring at the other with calm eyes.
‘Strong defense, sharp reflexes, doesn’t take the initiative to interrupt an attack,’
“Expand,”
Even when the vortexes reached the ceiling, the monster didn’t move.
“Surge,”
But the moment his attack landed; it retaliated with full force. The silhouette of the green serpent blurred by and he was sent flying once again.
‘Cough-, it strikes back harder after receiving an attack, but doesn’t pursue the target,’
Zyrus spat out blood from his mouth and kept attacking the serpent from different angles. This fight was fundamentally different from the ones he had fought since regression.
He had to deal with the unknown transformation phases of the monster, figure out its strengths and weaknesses in those phases, and deal sufficient critical damage on those weak spots to whittle down its hp.
‘Although it’s difficult, it’s easier than fighting against the aliens,’
*Crumble*
Zyrus stood up from the ground once again. The serpent attacked him with a breath attack every third time, and when his vortex hit its eyes, it tried to pierce him with its fangs.
He could tell that the monster was getting more and more aggressive. He ran around the spacious cavern and attacked every inch of its body with either his punches or mana vortex. Even if he took damage to do that, it was worth it.
‘No weakness on tail and head, only 5 times the damage on its eyes,’
[Eye of Annihilation]
Zyrus’s eyes took a red hue, and the serpents’ weakness was laid bare in his eyes. He saw the points where its mana converged when it struck with his tail, he saw the activation of a skill when it released the poison breath…
*Kaboom*
Most importantly, he saw its weakness. One was between its eyes where he had dealt 5 times the damage.
As for the other, it was on top of its head.
Yes, he saw a point where most of its mana and the power of laws was stored. A point that looked empty in his eyes, was in fact its greatest weakness.
[Arcane Lance]
He used 50 mana and hurled dozens of flickering blue spears at the monster’s head.
-50,-50,-50,-250,-250,-50,-250,…
*Hissss*
Half of them struck the place between its eyes, but none of them were close to the invisible weak point.
It wasn’t because Zyrus’s aiming sucked. It was due to his intuition which was built after hundreds of years of fighting against monsters.
‘It is also observing my every movement,’
He didn’t know if it was clever or if it was acting on instinct, but he was sure that the serpent was learning his attack patterns. As such, it would remember the mana fluctuation when he activated his eyes of annihilation.
Even someone with an orc’s intelligence could put two and two together to realize that he had found its weakness after that. What Zyrus was worried about, was then even after taking his attacks, the monster didn’t make any different moves.
His recovery rates allowed him to spam the Arcane lance again and again. After one and a half hours, the total damage dealt by him reached 5 digits.
It was a nerve-wracking fight where neither side revealed their true strength. Zyrus burned through half of his MP while the serpent’s Hp was down by a third.
‘I’ll have to deal more than 70,000 damage to kill it,’
Zyrus analyzed the possibility of him dealing that much damage with the MP and stamina he had.
It was a whopping 0%.
There was no way he could deal that much damage. Maybe the serpent knew that as well, which justified its indifferent eyes.
‘Tch…as I thought, fights like these are boring,’
Zyrus held back the impulse to summon Elsid and Zirnitra. It would feel great to squish the serpent like a bug with those two, but he wanted to train his skills to get an achievement as well.
‘Just get into the second phase already,’
*Skrrrrch*
Maybe the serpent heard his thoughts as well. With metallic scratching sounds, four short limbs grew on the green serpent.
No, it could no longer be called a serpent.
What floated in front of him was a legitimate oriental dragon.
And along with its appearance, Zyrus’s scales started falling off once again. Even Avatar was unable to block off the dragon's corrosive aura.