A basilisk is an eight-legged, fat, lizard-like monster that can grow to be more than 16 feet long. Their scales range from grey to blue, their backs are covered with red spiky scales as sharp as daggers.
Having a bite strength equal to crocodiles, with a tail strong enough to shatter bones, they are extremely dangerous. Their most terrifying weapon is their petrifying gaze! As long as the monster can look at you in the eyes, and as long as you’re no further than 60 feet from it, you will get petrified!
The only saving grace while fighting one is that they are lazy, If you saw one and it didn’t petrify you immediately, you could run away by just jogging the other side. The monster is too lazy to give chase!
Of course, like most lizards, they are cold-blooded and act like crocodiles in their day-to-day life. loving to sunbathe and stick to water.
Unlike how most people believe, a basilisk can’t eat a petrified creature, it can’t eat stone! For that, the monster is very reserved in using its ultimate weapon, only using it in death and life situation!
The monster’s eyes are located on each side of its skull which gives it no blind spots. And yes, the basilisk can petrify two creatures at the same time, as long as they are on different sides of his head.
The basilisk’s bite, while being extremely strong, it’s also extremely poisonous! The poison was known to paralyze, cause extreme exhaustion and pain, and hallucinations at high doses!
Slaying the monster is the only way to break the petrification, having it die of old age (The monster’s life span is from 80~110 years) will cause the petrification to become permanent!
There was one last funny thing that they can do, they can run sideways! And they are fast!
If one of them was agitated enough they can snap and rush, In that state, they are faster than horses, stronger than bulls, and petrify anyone they see!
There was no easy way to kill them besides a sneak attack, but that was hard to execute due to their high senses.
“Aren’t they dangerous?” Sofia asked, looking worried that Cain picked the quest.
“Are they delicious-nya?” Lizard-like monsters were known to be a great source of fresh meat in remote areas. their meat tasted like chicken.
“Shall we take one down?” Cain asked his teammates. He was in an adventuring party now and shouldn’t be the only one giving his opinion.
“I guess so if you think we can!” Sofia replied, being a little bit scared from facing that kind of monster.
“We’re going to hunt-nya!” Selena seemed to be excited about it.
“Don’t ask me, we’re going!” Alice replied, she seemed to just think about going out and exploring the world.
The quest to slay the basilisk was a C-rank as the monster seemed to be alone! when there is more than one it might become even an A-rank quest. This time Cain wasn’t going to let his guard down and is going ready for an A-rank quest!
They quickly submitted the quest to the guild and rushed out, the gate guard seemed to greet Alice as they passed by, the word was already out about the lord’s daughter becoming an adventurer, it haven’t been a day yet!
On their way, Cain explained their strategy, it was a simple search and destroy.
Track the monster down, don’t split up.
Cain and Selena will launch a sneak attack on it.
If the monster survived, Sofia will finish it with magic at range.
IF any unexpected situation happened, Cain will face it while being supported by the other three.
They reached the forest outskirts, Cain looked around for a suitable place to start searching.
“What are we looking for exactly?” Sofia asked, lifting some suspicious-looking bushes.
“Anything unusual, petrified animals, large claw marks, even some feces that I might identify to be that of the basilisk!” It was a normal procedure, slowly tracking and hunting a monster.
“At the guild, they said the basilisk like to stay close to water, can we look for that?” Alice asked, suggesting that instead of searching for the monster directly, they look for its habitat first.
“Not a bad idea, but we might run the risk of finding more than one!” Cain said, pointing out the danger in doing that.
“Just find me a piece of it, If I knew how they smell I can just follow that!” Selena said, pointing at her nose.
They quickly started searching for anything that might guide them, it took some time but it was finally found.
“Cain, I found something that looks like a big claw mark, can we use it?” Alice shouted, calling the others.
Cain took a look at the claw marks imbued in the ground, they were quite deep and ragged, as if the being who left them took his time dragging itself.
There were a lot of them close together, suggesting the creature had more than four legs, The long tail mark following them was also a dead giveaway!
“Nice find, we’re on track! The claw marks are a bit small so it’s either a young male or a female. Considering how fresh the marks are, the basilisk must be close!” Cain said examining the marks.
“It’s my turn-nya!” Selena said as she started sniffing the marks, quickly memorizing the smell and rushing ahead on all four.
“Let’s follow her, I hope she remembers to not get close!” Cain as he started running after her, Sofia and Alice did have trouble keeping up as they weren’t athletic.
Quickly enough, Selena stopped behind a tree. looking at the distance, It was visible. The basilisk, a female as Cain expected.
“Let’s regroup, we have to decide on a plan of attack.” Cain tapped Selena on her back, waiting for the other two to catch up. Alice was refraining from using her link to teleport to Cain to not waste his MP.
As Sofia and Alice caught up, Cain explained his plan. It was simple yet hard to execute!
Selena and Cain will perform a sneak attack on the monster, Alice and Sofia are on stand-by for support in case it goes wrong.
Cain told Selena how they are going to do it, With her bite force, she should be able to crack the basilisk skull open with one bite! Like how Jaguars hunt caimans she is going to kill the basilisk!
The problem was the spikes on the monster’s head, Selena can’t bite through them, they needed to be broken first. Cain will be the one taking care of that, All she needs to focus on was taking that bite.
Killing the monster in one shot so it won’t have time to start flinging its petrifying gaze.
The mission was on, each one of them took his position.
Cain cast both [Soundless] and [Short invisibility] on Selena and himself.
Selena silently crept on the basilisk from the side, using the tall grass for her advantage, quickly her eyes sight was looked at the monster’s skull, she have to crush that brain with one bite!
As she felt it was the perfect moment, she leaped forward with all her strength, about to take a bite of that skull. The spikes were still there, yet she has trusted that Cain could take care of that.
At that moment, Cain stood from the bushes, a rock in hand. [Enchanting: Shockwave] Cain flung that rock at the basilisk’s head, at contact it exploded shattering all the spikes on the monster’s head.
Selena took a deep bite of the basilisk’s skull, grabbing with all her claws, the monster struggled for a second before going limp.
The basilisk was killed in one swipe. Selena stood up bleeding from her leg, it seems that she was stabbed by one of the spikes on the basilisk’s back!
“Are you okay?” Cain asked, [Lesser healing] using his magic to stop her bleeding.
“I’m okay-nya, just grabbed him in the wrong way-nya!” Selena was grabbing her leg, wanting to start licking the wound.
“Let me take a look at her!” Alice teleported directly toward Cain, now that someone was injured she can’t waste time.
[Holy healing] healing Selena’s wound.
Sofia quickly catches up with them, poking the basilisk with her staff, “It’s dead, right?”
“It’s brain tasked like raw egg-nya!” Selena declared, standing up after being fully healed.
“We didn’t need to know that!” Cain said with a smile.
After a quick laugh, Selena suddenly snapped. “There another one-gaw!” She growled, her claw extended at the spot, staring at the distance.
Screeeeeeeeeeeeeech! Cain could see some trees getting toppled down, as the monster screeched.
From the tree it emerged, a male basilisk almost twice the size of the one they just killed. Running to the side like a drifting car at an insane speed, its eyes glowing with eldritch blue light, Its jaws are dripping with poison. It was pissed off, frenzied beyond belief.
“Shit, run away!” Cain screamed!