Honestly, Kya wasn’t sure why she was surprised by what she found deeper within the charred territory of the hellhounds.
Sitting comfortably under a blackened tree were three of the smaller 2-Star beasts, with of course, the pack alpha sitting with them.
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*** NEW CREATURE IDENTIFIED ***
- Hellhound Alpha - 1-Star - Rare
- The leader of the pack, an alpha hellhound is a noticeable leap up from its brethren. It has achieved its position through wanton slaughter while simultaneously being a devoted protector of the pack. Basically, it will fuck you up just because it can.
- - - - -
Kya was…conflicted.
That was a rare monster, presumably something on par with the tiger she’d met back in the forest. Of course, there were variants in strength within a rating, considering the differences she’d already seen in the rats, isela, and viper. But nevertheless, it was a rare. Although her identity skill was typically sarcastic to the point of being borderline unhelpful, she did believe this thing would tear her apart if she slipped up in the slightest. To say nothing of the three uncommons lying at its feet.
She observed from a little over a hundred meters away, but even at this distance, she could see the alphas' massive form as it stood and stretched.
It was absolutely massive, no smaller than a black bear, and about the same color. It took all the features of the smaller hounds and turned them up to ten. The six legs were massive and muscular, the white accents now more segmented and spiked. Its tail was long and powerful, at least a couple feet in length, and tipped with twin spikes to look like a pickaxe. The massive horns on its head now jutted forward past its snout, giving it a sleek, angular appearance. All in all, it looked like a true apex predator.
Scooting back, she ducked behind a large stone on which she’d been laying and downed another health potion. She’d been fairly annoyed to find that since advancing her class, they’d apparently fallen in potency. Where before a single one could practically mend her bones themselves, she’d taken three of the potions including the one she took just now and was only just getting to full strength after the previous fight against the majority of the pack. She could only assume it was because she was now a magical creature, so the potions weren’t as effective as they were on a normal person.
She was absolutely going to fight that monster over there; of that she was certain. Both because she was absolutely confident the quest wouldn’t complete without killing the alpha as well, and also because she just really wanted to.
She had found, in the middle of the fight with the hounds, that she genuinely enjoyed the contest. In the forest, she’d been mostly focused on simple survival, and needing to make it out of there. But now, properly suited herself to fight against the forces arrayed against her, she was more than happy. Because this, this was living.
Coming up with a general plan of attack for the monsters, she pulled up her character screen one more time to not only check her gains from the previous fight, but also see what she could anticipate from the upcoming one.
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Character Screen
* Name: Kya Ophelia
* Race: Human/Founder
* Race Benefits: Loot the Corpse, Identify, Translation
* Class: Space - 1-Star - 22%
* Class Abilities: Push and pull - 66%
* Class Benefits: Aura, Inventory
- - - - -
Seven individual uncommon monsters, and only a little over a ten percent increase? “That’s Bullshit” she muttered in dissatisfaction. The curve was definitely increasing more steeply than she had hoped. She still believed her goal of a second star in the next several months was attainable, but she would also have to basically swim in an ocean of blood to get there.
Her rat fang dagger in one hand, and her snake fang dagger in the other, she confirmed that killing monsters and achieving what she wanted as a result was absolutely fine with her.
- - -
The alpha hellhound rose and stretched. She was growing a little restless, and a little hungry. She’d sent her pups out hours ago, and they should have been returning by now with some of their kills.
She curled her lip and huffed loudly, her three eldest snapping to attention the instant they heard it.
With a flick of the tail, she sent them off to figure out what was happening, and where the others were. They had only just gotten to this region, but they hadn’t met anything more powerful than them yet, and she felt reasonably confident that-
In the distance, two of her three pups collapsed dead in an instant, their heads practically torn through by incredibly quick projectiles.
She let out a fierce howl, but before she could take more than even a couple of steps, the final pup was slain when both projectiles reversed course, one catching its leg, the other its stomach.
Flames began to leak out from between her chitinous plates as she bounded towards the small two-leg standing atop the stones.
- - -
Kya was certain she’d been discovered, and her carefully devised plan of how to take out the three supporters before fighting the alpha went out the window.
Without any other options, she threw caution to the wind. At least the alpha was staying back, just sending the three uncommons to confront her first.
They were angled slightly more to her left of her, but she assumed this was just a flanking maneuver. Standing atop the stone, cloak billowing in the wind, she launched both of her daggers simultaneously, and opened the fight with a strong first move.
Seeing a golden opportunity after the third and final uncommon skidded to a stop, she recalled her daggers and took this one out as well.
This wasn’t the plan she’d had in mind, but the results were the same. Now it was just her and the… Holy fuck.
The alpha was, at that moment, bounding towards her like a freight train, complete with flames leaking out of its very body. It was honestly one of the most terrifying sights Kya had ever seen, and it filled her veins with the fight or flight response, causing her muscles to tense in anticipation.
Of course, she chose fight.
A quick thought and her rat fang dagger was stowed away, she’d rather it be there when she needed it without the risk of somehow losing it in the middle of a bad situation. The very next second, she launched her venomous blade at the asteroid on six legs rapidly approaching her.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
The best didn’t even flinch as one if its massive paws swiped the blade out of the air before it used the other five to perform an astronomical leap, as it opened its maw wide, showcasing dozens of radiant white teeth.
Not sticking around to see how that would end, Kya jumped with all her might to the left, landed in a roll, and came up running just as the alpha landed and continued chasing her down.
“Shit. shit, shit, shit. Sh-” she kept cursing to herself in between breaths. She had planned to use her venom dagger to slowly poison the hellhound while evading or stunning it. What she hadn’t counted on was how fucking fast it was, this thing moved like a sentient truck.
She needed to get within range of some of the boulders she’d identified earlier, where she’d initially intended for the fight to take place. The one behind which she’d hidden was enormous and half buried underground, and she wouldn’t count on that to come loose easily. However, there were other stores nearby that were simply laying around, ready for action.
Figuring that the alpha had a lot of forward momentum, Kya began moving in zigzags to stay ahead of it… and almost immediately lost her head.
It had been gaining on her, so when she suddenly took a sharp left turn, it lashed out with its foreclaws, and missed her by inches as she kept moving, forcing it to change directions and follow.
This repeated twice more, with similarly close results, but she got better and better at sensing the beast with her aura and dodging reflexively.
The moment the boulder she had in mind came into her aura, which at this point she had extended to its absolute limit, she pulled as hard as she could.
Instantly, and disturbingly without a single sound, the boulder launched at catastrophic speeds directly at her, while in the same moment, all vision disappeared, and her world became darkness as twin trails of blood rolled down her face.
Summoning every fiber of will she could, she tried to remain lucid, she relied solely on her sphere to dodge both the hurtling boulder and monstrous flaming hound. She found it… almost easier to react than when she’d had her vision.
It was an extraordinary and surreal experience. She was entirely blind, and she knew she was. The world was nothing but a vast, inky darkness, not even light and shadow, just an all-encompassing void. However, similar to how during a power outage in a major city allows one to actually look up and see the stars, she was able to “see” the actions and movements of everything around her with wondrous clarity.
There was, behind her by barely more than a foot, was the blazing star that was the rare hellhound alpha. Her context for what luminous beings were continued to expand further and further now that she was aware of it, and of what she was seeing. A random normal bird had seemed incredible when compared to the worms in the dirt. Then she’d seen the uncommons and had felt true awe at the raw magic and power her aura told her was in their bodies. Now the rare was an even more astronomical jump, like a spark, to a candle, to a raging fire.
In front of her, dark and lifeless by comparison, was the boulder as tall as she was and weighing hundreds of times more. It had no spark, nor a flame that would come with life and magic inherent to its being, but nevertheless, she felt its presence, its speed and weight. Like a new moon in the night sky, it was notable by the shadows it cast.
Feeling trapped, and thinking as quickly as she possibly could, she dropped like a rag doll, laying flat on her back. The absolute moment she dropped, the mass of stone and beast of flames collided head on. She’d felt the alpha start to react, but there was simply no time for it.
She felt stones and dust cover her face as the boulder broke upon the monster, and as it stumbled and teetered, Kya used her last push of the fight: she launched it as hard as she could straight into the sky from where she lay. It had worked on the uncommons, and hey, if it wasn’t broke and all that.
However, this proved to be almost more than she could take. Her limbs became as ice, both her fingers and toes losing all feeling entirely, with her arms and legs violently shaking. The boulder, and the beast right after were probably beyond her normal limits, only possible due to all the amplifiers and her aura lending her strength that wasn’t truly hers.
However, if she was going to finish this fight, she had a little bit more to do yet.
Her stomach in so much pain, she thought her appendix must have burst, her eyes unresponsive and her arms and legs on the brink of detaching themselves, summoned a potion from her inventory, and almost couldn’t get the contents down from fumbling. Ultimately deciding to just tank the pain that would follow, she put the entire glass vile in her mouth and chomped down, breaking the glass.
Pain.
Not just the glass cutting the insides of her mouth, but the liquid suddenly restoring her arms and legs. It was like a thousand needles were all stabbing her repeatedly throughout every square centimeter of her extremities. But at least she could feel them, which meant she could use them.
Nearby, though how far she wasn’t sure as it was outside of her aura’s range, she heard the alpha crash to the ground. What she did not get was the feeling of slight euphoria that came with a confirmed kill, and gain of experience. However injured or damaged, the alpha was still alive.
Good. It was time for some retribution.
Running towards the sound of the crash, she abruptly came into contact with the beast through her aura, and saw it staggering to its feet. From what she could tell, it felt as though two of its legs on one side were crushed and badly injured, as well as missing an entire horn from its head. But it was unquestionably still alive.
To make matters worse, it was collecting energy in its mouth, visible to her senses as every other part of its body dimmed while the snarling jaw glowed like metal in a forge. Covering herself with her cloak, but still attempting to move forwards, she was stopped and pushed abruptly back by the river of molten air that greeted her the next moment.
Her cloak withstood the torrent, but that doesn’t mean it was perfect. She felt as though her world had simply turned to ash, everything consumed by the heat. In an instant, she was drenched in sweat and almost incapable of any coherent thought other than “So this is hell.”
It was, in that moment, color started to return to the world of darkness. And all she was was rippling waves of yellow, orange, and red.
Using the slight boost of strength and morale given by the potion restoring her sight, she rolled to the side, out of the flames, and sprinted towards the hound with everything she was worth. Taking out her rat fang dagger, she leapt up the side with the injured legs, and before it could reac-
It reacted by simply rolling over to that side like a puppy doing a trick. While her right arm maintained its grip on the dagger, the left arm was shredded by the spikes of chiton on the alphas side before it rolled back and brought around its massive head, a single horn pointed straight at her.
In the split second before she was impaled and her life came to an end, a thought occurred. Something she probably should have asked about sooner, and definitely should have practiced. She definitely should have practiced like… at all before coming out here and fighting more monsters, but that was a hindsight issue, not a right now issue.
Kya attempted to, for the first time, push only just a small part of an object, rather than the entire thing as a whole.
To her utter delight, astonishment, joy, and bloodlust, it worked. The single horn of the alpha was blown away like someone had suddenly yanked on it, exposing the soft neck of the alpha mere inches in front of her.
With an absolutely ruthless satisfaction, she of course went for the weak spot, tearing open its throat with her dagger and one good arm.
There it was. That feeling of power, of energy flowing into her body. It still wasn’t as much as she wanted, not nearly as much as it should have been in her opinion, but damn if this didn’t feel amazing.
With a sudden realization, she thought to herself “hang on, am I getting addicted to this feeling?” It was a genuine question, though even if it were to be the case, she didn’t know if that would necessarily be a problem. Just another drive pushing her forward.
- - - - -
- You have defeated Hellhound Alpha - 1-Star - Rare.
- Progress on {Hellhounds on the Farm} updated:
- Kill all hellhounds around the farm, 12/12
- - - - -
- Quest Updated {Hellhounds on the Farm}
- New Objective: Inform the Farmers the hellhounds have been eliminated, and report back to the guild hall.
- - - - -
Laying there, breathing heavily and waiting for her potion period to end before she took another one, she waved away the message as her kill dissolved to shadows.
She was mesmerized by the sight, as the midnight black exterior of the beast was an entirely different black than the shadow that overtook it. In fact, only given the contrast of something so similar, did she notice the shadows almost seemed to have tinges of gold in them. But what happened next was vastly more interesting to her, there was a wave of radiance, dancing with white and red lights.
Presumably, something similar had been around after the death of the Tiger, but she hadn’t been conscious to see it, leaving her to stare wide eyed at the mesmerizing beauty of the lights until eventually they faded into nothingness.
Not sure exactly how long had passed, she downed another potion and got unsteadily to her feet. With a rasping chuckle that turned into a slight cough, she thought “If anything, I’m addicted to these fucking potions.” As she hobbled towards the direction she remembered her venom dagger getting swatted, she made another item on her rapidly growing to-do list: Make/buy better potions.