Chapter 625: Terrifying offensive might
Translator: Translation Nation Editor: Translation Nation
This was after all, minimally a freaking ‘A+’ difficulty world!!
The puny vitality of these pesky mutated Arachnidacrabs could only signify one thing.
Their offensive might, or perhaps their strength in numbers, had possibly attained a terrifying stage seemingly impossible for any foe to withstand.
Right now, Sheyan suddenly recalled about Mogensha being trapped in that silk cocoon.
"It seems like my earlier conjecture was completely wrong!! I had always thought AK’s miserable state was the work of the Ndipaya barbarians, cruelly torturing him after they apprehended him.... In hindsight, I mistook the order of events. Darn it, AK had obviously managed to escape but was reduced to such a state after being bitten by these freaks of nature; ones that would venture out to the outer reaches occasionally. That was how he had been captured by those Ndipaya barbarians!"
"But the question lies in this. Why did AK encounter these creatures, when we didn’t? Oh, there’s another possibility. The underground passageway contained traces of these creatures burrowing through holes. Likely, those outer Ndipaya barbarians paid an immense cost to harvest their toxins and smeared it onto their wooden pikes. As such, they could have reserved it as their hidden trump as well….."
While Sheyan was anxiously processing all this information in his mind, the wooden walls suddenly reverberated with chains of repetitive scraping; as though something incomparably sharp was carving inwards.
Within a short span of seconds, wooden splinters and dust exploded out, as a hole was drilled through the solid wooden wall.
All of a sudden, at least 5-6 enormous mutated Arachnidacrabs blasted in, as thin silvery threads dangled behind their buttocks.
After the lesson learned from their predecessor’s death, these freaks of nature shuttled through the air without urgency to attack. Instead, they started spinning their webs.
The spider threads secreted by these fiends were exceedingly sticky and tough. Anyone who touches it would find it excruciatingly difficult to remove, and ones with weak immunity, would even be inflicted with poison.
One of Reef’s servant lurched forward while sweeping horizontally with his pike, instantly smashing one mutated Arachnidacrab flying.
Instead, another mutated Arachnidacrab stealthily pounced onto his chest before chomping down. Releasing a fleeting blood-curdling scream, that servant instantly froze and crashed rigidly to the ground.
Witnessing his own servant receiving such a grievous blow, Reef roared furiously and immediately charged forward in an attempt to lift the siege on his servant. Regrettably, water from afar quenches not fire, as strands of spider threads binding his legs caused him to tumble forward mindlessly.
After climbing back up, the scene of his lifeless servant with rolled back eyes greeted him, while that mutated Arachnidacrab continued insatiably absorbing his vitality. Even though that servant remained silently rigid, his facial muscles convulsed violently with anguish. The skin around his eyes was ruptured with spilling blood.
Watching such a scene, Reef immediately executed a frontward roll with his shield, before slapping it against the mutated Arachnidacrab.
Understanding that his lightsaber held a lesser chance of landing a hit, due to the Arachnidacrab’s outstanding agility, he opted for striking with the larger area of his shield; supplying him a greater chance of landing a strike.
Sensing that its life was under threat, the famished mutated Arachnidacrab twitched its four forelimbs in a panic attempt to dart away. Sadly, its venomous fangs were already deeply hooked into the taut muscular flesh of its prey. Without adequate time, how could it escape so simply?
However, upon seeing Reef’s retaliation, Mbenga howled with fluster.
"Don’t! Don’t hit it!"
Regrettably, the speedy retaliation of a Growth-hunter was amplified manifold that of the response of an ordinary person. Reef’s casual swinging shield had already brutally slapped across, at the same moment where Mbenga had shouted ‘Don’t’!
As it turns out, this mutated Arachnidacrab was truly a peculiar creature.
Though it shared both the distinctive traits of a spider and a crab, its characteristics skewed more towards its spidey side. Their method of consumption was slightly similar to humans. Not only could they chew on solid food, they could inject digestive enzymes and toxins into their prey; slowly dissolving their enemy’s flesh and bones, before leisurely absorbing a skin bag of ‘soda’.
Of the two methods, the mutated Arachnidacrab favoured the latter, as sucking was less taxing than chewing in addition to liquid foods being more digestible...
That also indicated that if one didn’t resist after getting bitten, though unbearable searing agony would still be present, one could still live for a longer duration. Besides, only the Arachnidacrab’s toxins were potent but its digestive enzymes would require a long period to take full effect.
Therefore, the aftermath of Reef slapping his shield down onto the spider was akin to squeezing a syringe filled with venom into his servant’s body.
Within an instant, that servant released an immeasurably melancholic scream before both his eyes ruptured with a ‘Pop’! Two striking streaks of blood spurted out instantaneously.
Following that, his body bloated up like an inflated ball as he turned limp and finally died.
Of course, that mutated Arachnidacrab had pathetically been squished to death on the servant’s chest as well. Its life force and defence wasn’t high to begin with, and after lowering its guard while feasting, it naturally couldn’t withstand Reef’s light smack.
At this moment, Sheyan could finally perceive the category of these creatures.
It was analogous to the suicide bombers of the real world. Killing them was simple, but once they latched onto someone, they could rapidly dispatch their victim with ease as well.
When that mutated Arachnidacrab was squashed, excessive volume of its hormonal fluids had also splattered out; introducing a piercing sour stench into the air.
Upon seeing the death of their comrade and stimulated by the splattered hormonal fluids the other Arachnidacrabs flew into a frenzy.
This wasn’t due to their craving for vengeance. Perhaps, they didn’t even understand what the term ‘revenge’ was. Instead, it belonged to a simple carving to satiate their appetite.
Their originally brown exterior shell turned increasingly red, as their plate-sized bodies swelled into the size of a washbasin. In this state, their shuttling speed had multiplied, as a rustling of skirts echoed through the air!
The faint smell of apricots dispersed into the air. The third lethal weapon of these Arachnidacrabs, ‘Toxic Miasma’ had been activated.
These creatures possessed poison glands at the joints of their hairy long limbs.These poison glands operated in a similar fashion to a nebulizer. Upon sensing danger, their nebulizer-like poison glands would disseminate toxic fumes into the atmosphere, which would impair movement and induce hallucination and other symptoms.
At this instant, Sheyan chopped down with his long saber, he maliciously cut down a mutated Arachnidacrab in mid-air.
Kacha! Greenish sap splashed out from that basin sized fiend.
Still, its scorpion tail continued struggling behind its rear, as it smacked against the blade surface of ‘+7 West’. Its might was truly worthy of being an ‘A+’ difficulty creature, as it managed to thrust a tiny concave depression on the surface of Sheyan’s ‘+7 West’ saber.
Despite eliminating another mutated Arachnidacrab, dodging around wasn’t his forte. With just a fraction of delay, he instantly felt a pain jolting up his spine.
Eyeing him, another Arachnidacrab had pounced on him before violently injecting toxins and digestive enzymes into his back.
A pain that could dim the heavens and the earth instantly plagued Sheyan’s consciousness. He believed that if not for his innate ‘Stronghold’ ability, in addition to having raised his virus immunity at the outer reaches of the Kijuju Marshland, he would’ve inevitably passed out like Brother Black.
Quickly browsing through his stats, he shockingly realized that mutated Arachnidacrab had inflicted a wound, that could deal persisting damages every 3 seconds. Moreover, each damage actually soared to a pinnacle of 300 points! This effect would only cease if one stepped into a near-death state or after 1,500 points of damage had been dealt.
"AHHHHHHHHH!" Sheyan pulled out ‘Ambition’ in his anguish, as he placed the muzzle of this musket straight before this avaricious plunderer and squeezed the trigger!
Blasting the Arachnidacrab into a fountain of greenish sap, limbs and insect chunks scattered in all directions. Still, two venomous fangs remained deeply lodged into Sheyan’s flesh.
Meanwhile, after recovering from his mistake, Reef had unleashed a furious roar – ‘Shattering Cardiac Roar’ activated!
According to theory, such an area of effect ability would be optimal against these queer pesky bugs with astonishing nimbleness but terrible vitality.
In contrast, the most abhorring thing occurred – the major flaw of Reef’s ‘Shattering Cardiac Roar’ was exhibited. It was completely lacking in effect precedence, and thus became suppressed as a result of this world’s difficulty.
Every single mutated Arachnidacrab was unexpectedly immune to its effects, and the notifying reason was…..the Arachnidacrab had no ears. Furthermore, its strange bodily composition had rendered the resonating damaging effect of ‘Shattering Cardiac Roar’ utterly invalid.
On the contrary, although the mutated Arachnidacrabs didn’t suffer any damage, the shockwave vibrations of Reef’s ability had just provoked it, acting as an additional threat. It was the same logic as waving a pair of scissors in front of a man’s crotch.
Seemingly unanimous, these mutated Arachnidacrabs shifted their assaulting target in a flash.
Simultaneously, they lunged towards Reef, who had already assumed a defensive stance with his raised shield.
Dum! Dum! Dum! Within a blink of an eye, chains of colliding sounds echoed out as the mutated Arachnidacrabs tightly encircled around Reef.
Even though the surface area of his dark-gold grade shield wasn’t small, it couldn’t be compared with a tower shield. Moreover, even a tower shield could merely cover a 180 degrees angle at the front. A person’s back would still be left exposed.
Although the ‘Grasp of Pharaoh Welkhahor’ shield managed to fend off the lunging strikes of 3-4 mutated Arachnidacrabs, at least 4 other mutated Arachnidacrabs latched onto Reef’s body in a flash; their incisive venomous fangs puncturing deep into his flesh!
In this moment, one could vividly see the veins on Reef’s forehead bulging up, as the searing pain turned his eyes scarlet red.