am-books Chapter 517: Test
Chapter 517: Test
The hunting group that left the settlement was much smaller than the previous one. We already knew that my Extinguish was unusually effective against the mist monsters, and we had only managed to create three swords - so, after much discussion, the settlement had decided to create a light, stealthy group for this test. If things went well, we should be able to rip apart a fog bank before things came to a slow, grindy battle of attrition, where the fog cloud would probably win against us. If things went wrong, I was supposed to step in, extinguish it, and then get the rest of the group to flee back to the settlement, so that we could regroup, figure out what went wrong, and make a new plan.If both of those plans failed, or if we got ambushed by a big group of fog banks, then we were probably either dead or we would need to run for our lives. However, if we didn’t find a way to deal with these fog banks, we would have no way to settle here - and I had no doubt that most of the other islands in this vast, underground sea were at least as dangerous as this one, if not more so. So far, we had encountered surprisingly few overwhelmingly powerful monsters for a Tier 9 dimension, which probably meant the plant people city had genuinely tried to find us an island we had a chance to settle. If we went kicking around for random islands, there was a good chance we would just get flattened by some kind of monstrous powerhouse instead.
So we had no choice but to make this work, no matter what it took. Ultimately, our hunting party was a group of ten people. Felix, Me, Sallia, and Anise made up four of the participants in the group, much to my surprise. I was needed as backup, and Sallia had proven her competence with a blade enough times that people were willing to trust her with one of the new swords. Anise slipped into the group because she was a genuinely competent mage, although a lot of the other Mages had spent a great deal of time bickering over who should join the hunting group. Finally, Felix had joined the group because he was one of the few competent craftsmen left alive after the great migration. The town had assessed that we needed at least a few craftsmen to tag along, and see how well the blades worked, what optimizations could be made, if the designs needed to be completely scrapped, or what.
In addition to the four of us, two other craftsmen were tagging along, as well as two other swordsmen, and finally, two [Fire Mages] to serve as last-ditch attempts to extract the [Swordsmen] - and their even more precious swords - if I failed and we needed a way to disengage from the fight.
Even though Anise and two other [Fire Mages] were tagging along, deep in my heart, I knew that I was the real backup plan for this mission. If I failed, things had already gone so wrong that it might be impossible to recover from. If the swords didn’t work, I needed to get everyone back home alive. That wasn’t a responsibility I took lightly. I wanted to keep this settlement safe - both to commemorate those I couldn’t save from the Universal Tree, and for my own, rather more selfish purpose of acquiring more Achievement and upgrades from the Market’s System.
This time, we didn’t have a scout to find our prey, so that fell on me as well. I used my soul sight to start looking for an isolated fog bank as we slowly made our way through the forest.
I spotted two groups of three mist monsters, wandering around together. I definitely didn’t like that. The first mist monster we had encountered had been alone, but many of the other mist monsters we had encountered had been in groups. I also got the feeling that these mist monsters really weren’t as dumb as I would have liked. The fact that they grouped together semi-frequently and travelled in packs meant that they had some kind of communication method. I had never heard them say a word, but there were plenty of other ways to communicate - but there was one thing communication always indicated. These things had at least some degree of intelligence. Intelligent enemies could find countermeasures for our actions, or probe us and find weaknesses.
I shook my head as we slipped past the second group of fog monsters. At least for now, it wasn’t our problem. If we couldn’t even find suitable weapons, we wouldn’t need to worry about the fog monsters being intelligent - because we would be at their mercy either way.
Thankfully, after slipping past our third group of fog monsters, we finally found what we were looking for. A single fog monster sat in the middle of a clearing, with no other nearby enemies. I spent a few minutes just double and triple checking the area, to make sure there were no other nasty surprises - but the only other thing I noticed was a quicksand pit. I pointed it out to everyone else to make sure they knew to avoid that spot, and then, after we confirmed our plan, I grinned.
It was time. We snuck closer to the mist monster. After we got within a hundred meters, it perked up, and started spinning wildly in place. A moment later, it started to create new mist monsters. Stretched out, messy blobs of mist started to spring into existence around us. Misshapen fish, squirrels, rabbits, and other messed up animals appeared out of thin air.
It had noticed us.
“It saw us! No more stealth!” I yelled.
In an instant, our group stopped trying to be sneaky and dashed towards the fog monster. Sallia was the first to reach it. She leapt over the first wave of fog monsters as if they were annoying road blocks, and then cut into the glob of sapient fog with her new wooden sword.
I felt a surge of essence tear out of the sword, before it surged into the fog monster. The layer of essence that I felt emanating from the wooden sword itself grew a bit weaker, which was one of the weaknesses of the enchantment Felix and the other craftsmen had woven into the swords. They essentially had batteries, and once those batteries ran out, they would need to be recharged. The enchantments could store enough essence for a few fights, but after maybe one hundred hits they would need to be returned to the craftsmen and recharged.
I held my breath as the surge of essence tore into the fog monster, and then nearly let out a whoop of excitement.
The fog monster’s life force grew noticeably weaker. It was still nowhere near as efficient as my own extinguishes - but it had clearly done something. During the previous fight, each cut from a swordsman and each blast from a [Fire Mage] had been more like a papercut - we had still clearly been damaging the enemy, but we hadn’t been doing enough damage to kill them in a reasonable time frame. Now, instead of papercuts, it was like we were stabbing the fog monster with a dagger. We weren’t hitting vital points, if the fog monsters even had vital points to begin with - but enough stabs would definitely still kill this thing from blood loss.
After Sallia’s first cut, the misty fog swirled out of the way, and the little horde of foggy monsters leapt at her. Sallia immediately swapped back to her rune sword and began cutting them down, while the other two swordsmen took advantage of the distraction Sallia had provided and delivered their own cuts into the fog monster. The [Fire Mages] also jumped into the fray a moment later, and helped Sallia fend off the hordes of fog minions. Sallia couldn’t quite get free of them for long enough to keep attacking the main body - but with the help of the [Fire Mages], her ability to leap back into the air at a moment’s notice, and her own exceptional swordsmanship, she wasn’t having too hard of a time fending off the horde, either.
The bank of fog tried to whiz away from the swordsmen, but due to their high physical attributes, they didn’t have a very hard time keeping up with it. Stab after stab went into the fog bank’s body, while Sallia and the [Fire Mages] began to coordinate and keep its new summons away from the swordsmen. The fog bank shivered, and a moment later, it started to weave some kind of new monster out of fog. Essence poured out of it - and in the moment it was distracted, Sallia pulled her wooden sword back out and joined the other two swordsmen in stabbing the fog bank.
Before it could finish whatever it had been trying to accomplish, the life force of the fog bank ran out. It slumped over, dead, and then its body started to collapse inwards, like a whirlpool dragging everything towards itself.
A moment later, instead of a large cloud of sapient fog, all that I could see in front of us was a fist sized, ethereal clump of mist, which faintly emanated essence.
A moment later, I got a few System notifications, indicating the end of the fight.
I grinned. The swords that we had created still needed a bit more work, but it was obvious we were on the right track. We had finally found a weapon for the rest of the settlement, and future generations, to establish and hold a position on this island.