Chapter 143 – Mutated Red-Legged Spider
“Grai?”
Everyone gawked before hearing a soft ‘boom’.
“Water Rippling Cover! Everyone, scatter!”
Hymin’s voice rang out to the others. Regardless of all her teasing and joking, when danger appeared her reaction was extremely fast.
Her Water Rippling Cover carried with it a clean and fresh air as it rapidly expanded outward with her shout. It was like a clear spring falling on everyone’s head.
Wang Zhong’s heart violently thumped. It was as though he’d just been shocked awake and was still in a dazed, hallucinatory state.
In fact, he should have been the most vigilant one after discovering the issues with their skylink signal. But while everyone had become a bit dazed after walking to this point, his own reaction speed shouldn’t have been so delayed.
“It’s a hallucinatory flower toxin! There’s definitely a madora flower nearby!” said Hymin. Not even Wang Zhong was safe from the toxin. Only she, a water special ability user that was immune to many toxins, stayed unaffected. If she hadn’t seen Grai collapse and remember that he had a pollen allergy, she wouldn’t have snapped out of it that quickly. Of all the mutated lifeforms the most disgusting of them all were mutated plants. There was simply no effective defense against them.
Hymin’s specialization within the special abilities department was as a person with varied auxiliary support capabilities. She was one of the rarely seen water attributed special ability users and her specialty was eliminating various kinds of psychological and physiological toxins, especially those that affected one’s soul sea. Currently, Hymin’s ever-present smile had long since disappeared.
Everyone had unknowingly ingested the toxin. Their skylinks had also been jammed and there was a madora flower close-by. All of them felt that the situation was bleak.
The madora flower was a kind of mutated symbiotic plant. Its pollen could scatter in all directions and fill its surroundings to cause all life around to be affected and move toward it. The pollen itself didn’t really have a negative impact on its victim’s bodies, but the madora flower would definitely be accompanied by strong, powerful mutated beasts. The mutated beasts would charge and attack those confused lifeforms and the corpses would be eaten by them and the madora flower. This was how they formed a symbiotic relationship.
This meant that the lack of lifeforms around them was due to the fact that they had already been consumed by the madora flower and its accompanying mutated beast.
All of this was information included in their mutated biology class curriculum. Wang Zhong patiently explained all this and by the end both Emily and Barran felt a cold shiver run down their spines.
Right now their surroundings had turned dusky. The feeling of danger had quickly crawled up to the crowns of their heads. Hymin’s water cover gave off a faint light-blue colour as it enveloped everyone within it. The threat of the madora flower toxin was quickly dispelled. But then, everyone discovered many pairs of oily green eyes concealed within the forest!
A wave of scuttling noises soon rang out as several large-sized spiders rushed out. The faint glow of the moonlight shone down upon them and reflected off the yellow crystals on their foreheads that represented their status as Level 2 mutated beasts. Everyone’s heart sank at the sight.
Over a dozen mutated red-legged spiders! All of them at Level 2!
Hymin and the rest’s faces turned extremely pale. How could this be. Although they were just Level 2 mutated lifeforms, this kind of spider had astonishing combat capabilities.
The attacks of this dozen-plus group of red-legged spiders was extremely quick. Without giving the group time to think, three to four spiders at the front already launched forward toward them.
They were enormous with each of them as large a millstone. Eight hairy legs sparkled with a bewitching faint-golden ruby colour. These spiders were very strong and resilient and were harder to pierce than steel! They didn’t possess the usual needle-like mandibles of ordinary spiders but had four sharp sickle-shaped fangs. When the mouth opened and closed it created a high-pitch ‘snik snik’.
The first of the red-legged spiders had already smashed over like a cannon ball!
With an explosive roar, Barran welcomed its arrival.
Heavy soldiers were the core of the group during group battles. Only by relying on their high resilience as they held the front lines could the group maintain the most basic of formations and reveal their strongest combat capabilities.
But at this moment Barran was clearly a bit nervous. The largest mutated creature he’d killed in his entire life had just been a ground mice at his previous village. Also, the only fight he’d ever been in was that time with Saint Judgement’s Terrence. Even that fight had finished in an instant.
This ferocious mutated spider before him emitted an imposing aura completely dissimilar from Terrence’s. It was bare and unadorned killing intent that could intimidate the hearts of others.
Could he stop it by himself? This was a Level 2 mutated creature and he was only a freshmen with poor basics, poor talent, and poor comprehension. He had to rely on his connection with the Prodigy Society to luckily enter the group training. Even with that one month of group training only his strength could be considered acceptable. His skills, techniques, and other aspects were too inferior compared to other students. In fact, over the last two months he still hadn’t managed to master that single technique Senior Wang Zhong had racked his brains to teach him.
He had to stop it! But… could he?
A mess of thoughts surfaced in Barran’s brain. He became restless and flustered, but the instincts ingrained into a heavy soldier made him dash forward. In the end, however, he lost his balance and collapsed, flipping over onto the ground.
Mutated red-legged spiders were very powerful and classified as a pure-strength type of mutated insect. A heavy spider leg was like a miniature mountain as it smashed itself against Barran’s shield.
Four sharp claws snapped at Barran’s neck. He was scared and anxious as he tried to struggle, but he was unable to muster up his strength. His hands and legs had no strength left in them.
Then he watched as a red streak broke through the dusky night environment. Barran suddenly felt the weight on him lighten.
The reaction speed of the red-legged spider exceeded everyone’s espectations. An immense threat pressed against it and it wasn’t able to attend to its prey as it leapt up. Its ruby hair-covered legs promptly extended and blocked the incoming attack. With a ‘dang’, Emily’s attack that was backed by her fire special ability was unexpectedly blocked as it couldn’t chop through the spider’s leg.
Sparks flew in all directions as an ear-piercing screech sounded out. The red-legged spider whined in pain as it retreated a few steps. While the dagger’s attack hadn’t been especially threatening, the flames coating it had roasted its entire leg. The spider was actually unable to move properly as fire special ability users had flames that were very effective against mutated life forms.
Even so, Emily shook as her hands grew numb. Her goal had been to chop that leg off.
People would commonly state that humans at the Cast Soul stage were on par with Level 1 to 3 mutated life forms. In reality, however, purely in terms of attack and defense mutated lifeforms were stronger by quite a bit compared to similarly classified humans. When natural capabilities and strength was discussed humans never once stood at the top.
Emily’s attack had obviously angered the mutated red-legged spider. It lunged forward just as a few rune arrows shot toward it like meteors. They were fired in succession and were aimed at the spider’s compound eyes.
Those few arrows had been too quick and swift. The red-legged spider at the front felt an intense danger and hurriedly tried to stop. It moved two of its legs up to block its eyes.
Ding, ding, ding, ding.
Four sounds rang out. The tremendous power contained within those arrows directly smashed apart the two front legs and allowed the final arrow to slip through that unimaginable crack. It slid right into an eye and penetrated through its entire brain!
The red-legged spider felt inconceivable pain as it was shot and fell to the floor. Its eight legs flailed about wildly as it struggled before it rapidly curled up.
Killed with a single arrow!
“Emily, you have to attack their compound eyes and joints! Your attack power is sufficient for that! Barran, lift up your shield. You have to protect Grai and Senior Sister Hymin!”
Wang Zhong shouted out his orders in a deep voice. Only Hymin had some slight combat response. Emily was strong enough, but her combat experience was simply too shallow.