NOVEL WEB 10 – Bad omen
Olivia told me that the most important thing in battle is assessing your opponent. Due to her harsh training I am sure that I'm stronger than I was in the game. But being overconfident is no good.
Olivia put a big emphasis on this over and over to the fact that I developed something I call "Perfect Vision". Don't let the name fool you. It doesn't mean I can see perfectly. It means I can read the enemy perfectly and adapt to any situation.
What me and Mother call boar… I think in the game it was called Giant Fur Tusk. This particular one I am stalking is probably 3 times the size of a grizzly bear. It has six strong looking legs, and large fur across its body. On its face there were two large tusks curved upwards, and on the other end of its body a long thick tail similar to a cow. The centerpiece of it all were the red eyeballs.
It opened its wide mouth, revealing that its jaw was packed full of fangs, and let out a weird cry.
“kurororororooooooooo!”
This was a monster in the level range of 65-70. The devs sure liked using these things as trash mobs guarding boss entrance rooms. For beginner players, the ability to stun on a charge attack, combined with his poison attributes could prove fatal. However, in my case… I soloed runts like these with no effort.
"Analysis on the enemy complete. Threat level: minimal. Taking surprise elements into consideration, chance of victory: 94%."
I picked up a pebble and threw it straight at his butt. At that moment the boar turned towards me and its eyes were glowing strongly. Without a delay it charged towards me. Something like that can be dodged easily, but there's something I wanted to test. So I hold my dark Holy Sword Aetherius in a defensive manner. It can be used as a shield.
The next moment, the “paan” sound of a sonic boom is heard through the whole area as dull shock waves run through the shield. The boar didn't manage to make me flinch a single step. Looks like the stun and poison status that this thing can inflict were also successfully negated.
"Yosh. Time for you to back off, buddy."
I forcefully pushed the boar away, lifting it from the ground and sending him flying a few meters backwards. Despite its size this monster is quite light. Either that or I am too strong. It's kinda nice admiring my own muscles flex like this.
Anyway, in the game there was a cool-down time for the attack, but I can’t depend on that here. Olivia proved that to me time and time again. In addition, it is impossible to take advantage of enemy attack patterns. Everything has a mind of its own here.
"Well, I would play around more, but I need to get back to Mother soon. So I'll have to end this here."
It was the perfect opportunity to use some magic. In the game, unless you were a support, generally you either wanted to go full strength or full magic. Making a hybrid character was generally a bad idea if you wanted to be competitive. But I played my waifu as a tank and a support, so having access to magic works wonders for me.
"Let's do this. [Ice Smite]!"
My sword began to shine with purple light as I swung it down onto the ground. Immediately, a magic formation appeared above the boar and a large giant ice sword made from particles of light came slamming down on it.
“guroroororooooooo!!!”
The 5 meter long sword pierced the thick layer of fur and separated the head from the body in one slice. Afterwards, a sound like shattering metal rings in the area, as the light sword started to crumble.
As calmness returned to the area, the bulky body of the giant boar hits the ground with a thud. I did not move an inch, as I observed the surroundings still in the downward swing position.
Did [Ice Smite] always create such a massive light sword? Did the strain of the situation cause me to apply more power to the skill than normal? Or was it the same as before, just with the power increased in reality? Or maybe this is due to Olivia's training.
Regardless, with this, the boar is mine. Now it's time to get this quickly back to Mother. She never liked eating the heads, so I'll just leave it here for someone else to snack on it. I grabbed the body and raised it above my head. This thing is way too light. And now… it's time to hop back to the nest.
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Something feels totally wrong here. I was only gone for an hour. But this isn't right. It's like the atmosphere changed too much. And this air… wait…
*Sniff**Sniff*
I don't have the nose of a dragon, but something isn't right. I smell blood. And it's not coming from the boar. That chill in my spine I had earlier is kicking again. So I dropped the boar and ran as fast as I could back.
I even deployed [Rift Walk]. Ever heard of the anime Bleach? [Rift Walk] is similar to the Flash Step of the soul reapers. Although instead of a burst of speed it's actually closer to short distance teleportation. It's used to gain position over an enemy, confuse it, or simply an iframe panic button. But since the mana cost is low as hell, in game I always used it for transportation when mounts weren't available.
With this, getting back to the nest took seconds. And what I found inside, left me speechless. My heart wasn't prepared for something like this. My mind also wasn't able to process the scene before me. Was this some form of illusion? Was I dreaming? Did I hit my fucking head or something? But this was all real in the end.
Yet even so, the image before me is something that I never thought I could see. Even if I pinched myself, there was no waking up, because this was reality. The blood in the air I smelled earlier, the chill in my spine, my instincts screaming at me… all of them were trying to point out this moment.
"You have to be fucking kidding me… This… can't be!!? Mother… is that really you?"