Chapter 137 - The Circle of Life (Patreon)

As Zeke dashed toward the emerging sand crab, he couldn’t help but marvel at the monster’s size. At least thirty feet across, its scuttling legs were as big around as Zeke’s waist. However, he was far more concerned with the beast’s overlarge claws, which were already darting out to snap at him. The first strike, he blocked with his shield, but it sent him staggering backward, his momentum halted in an instant. Even as he skidded backward, ducking the monster’s second attack, he started activating skills.

First, he toggled [Leech Strike], and a red mist of power erupted from the runes in his hands, enveloping his shield as well as Voromir, his mace. Then, he threw [Mark of Companionship] and [Avatar of the Beast] onto Tucker, enhancing his companion’s stats as well as giving him access to the diluted version of [Leech Strike]. Finally, he activated his newest skill, [Unleash Momentum], and white tendrils of light wove their way through the red mist that had enveloped his weapon.

Zeke had given his new skill a brief test run, and, during that time, he’d figured out how it worked. The skill had two phases, the first of which he’d begun to think of as gathering momentum. When it was active, every single movement he made added a bit of momentum to a gathering pool of power. The faster he moved – especially when swinging his mace, which added its mass to the equation – the more momentum was siphoned into the available reservoir of energy. Then, when he was satisfied with the available power, he could unleash that gathered momentum, enhancing a single attack.

After one swing, it was only slightly more powerful than a [Leech Strike]. However, there didn’t seem to be an upper limit to how much momentum he could gather. After ten swings of his bone-hafted mace, the power of [Unleash Momentum]’s strike doubled the force he could bring to bear. After twenty, it was exponentially more powerful. Thirty, and he could shatter a boulder into dust.

That morning, during his daily spar with Talia, Zeke had left the skill active the entire time, but he hadn’t released it. So, as he gathered his legs under him and darted back toward the giant crab, he had almost an hour’s worth of constant motion stored in his skill, begging to be unleashed. He was eager to see just how powerful of a blow he could muster, now, and the crab was a perfect opponent for experimentation.

I’m so glad Abby’s not here to see this, he thought, leaping into the air. As he did so, he twisted away from the monster’s snapping claw and landed on its hard shell. At first, Zeke had thought it was the color of the sand, but as he planted his feet, he saw iridescent shimmers along the carapace. Thankful for his boots, which kept his footing sure, even as the monster bucked and tried to dislodge him, Zeke stowed his shield with a thought. Then, taking his mace in a two-handed grip, he rose to his full height, stretching his weapon to the sky, and, with every point of strength he possessed, brought Voromir down on the crab’s back. As he did so, he unleashed the stored momentum, which accentuated his strike to unprecedented levels.

When the mace’s head connected with the shell, shallow fissures erupted from the point of impact, and an instant later, a sound like a depth charge going off echoed through the desert. And with that sound came an explosion of force that erupted in every direction. The very air vibrated as Zeke was thrown off the monster’s shell and into a nearby cluster of barren rocks. He tumbled and rolled until he was almost a hundred feet away from the crab, and as his momentum exhausted itself, Zeke was showered with bits of gore. Even as the air was filled with the wet, splattering sound of falling flesh, Zeke shook the cobwebs from his mind. When he finally managed to clear his head, he rose to his knees and beheld the scene before him.

The crab’s legs still twitched, but it was clearly dead – evidenced by the enormous crater in its back. It spanned half the monster’s broad back, and from Zeke’s vantage, it seemed that it went almost the entire way through the meatiest part of its body.  The giant creature had collapsed onto the sand, and its corpse was joined by a host of smaller, cat-sized crabs that had burst from the earth. None of them moved.

Zeke pushed himself to one knee, then to his feet, scanning for Tucker. After a few seconds, his eyes alighted on the big man, who’d probably survived only because he was far enough away from the explosion to minimize the effects. Even so, he definitely looked worse for wear, and as he stood, his stance was wobbly. Zeke rushed toward him, asking, “Are you okay?”

The alchemist produced a potion from his own storage space, which he downed. Making a face, he muttered, “Ugh. Never goes down easy.”

As he spoke, Zeke could see the man’s wounds fading away. They weren’t life-threatening to begin with – unless Tucker had internal injuries – but it was still an impressive display of healing power. Zeke reached out, gripping the man’s shoulder and asking again, “Are you hurt?”

“Not anymore,” Tucker said, shaking his head. He spoke far too-loudly, probably because his eardrums had been all but shattered. For Zeke’s part, his ears were ringing, but his hearing had been protected by his incredible endurance. “Think my spleen had burst or something. Maybe bruised a liver. I don’t know. Something wasn’t right. Potion’s taking care of it, though.”

“Good,” Zeke said, letting out a relieved sigh. He wasn’t as attached to Tucker as he was to his other companions, but the man was still his responsibility. “That’s good.” He looked around, then said, “That was a bit anticlimactic, wasn’t it? I was expecting a tougher fight.”

“Did you identify it?” Tucker asked, brushing dirt and debris from his vest. To Zeke’s surprise, the gore slid right off, like the fabric was coated in Teflon. Perhaps it was – or at least the Radiant Isles’ version of the non-stick coating.

“No. Did you?” Zeke responded.

Tucker nodded, saying, “Level twenty-five elite. So, that was pretty impressive. You got all the babies as well.”

“Oh,” Zeke said, not really knowing what to think. He glanced back at the giant crab, then at the smaller corpses littering the desert floor.

Tucker bent down to pick one of the dog-sized corpses by its pincer; in the old world, it would’ve been a fearsome creature, but in the new one, it didn’t look like much more than a nuisance. “The adult sand crabs will ambush likely prey, and once they’ve killed it, the little ones swarm,” the alchemist stated. “Sometimes, they don’t wait until its dead. So, we dodged a bullet there. I’d hate to get eaten alive by a bunch of crabs.”

He tossed the smaller crab to Zeke, who caught it easily. By reflex, he activated the looting skill which had come with becoming Steward of the Crimson Tower, taking anything valuable from the corpse. It rapidly deflated as bits and pieces disappeared into Zeke’s storage, and he tossed it aside.

“You want to help me out here?” he asked. “Help me gather the little ones so I don’t have to go all over the place to loot them, yeah?”

Tucker shrugged. “Want to get it done pretty quick, though,” the man said, his eyes scanning the horizon. “Scene like this is going to attract predators. And correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think you can repeat that without charging that skill up for a while, right?”

Zeke nodded. “Nope,” he said. “Took me about two hours’ worth of training with Talia to build that much force up.”

“Just keep your head on a swivel,” Tucker said, already starting to gather the crabs into a pile. For his part, Zeke ranged to the other side of the giant crab, where he started looting the ones that had come up behind their parent. Each crab carried a tiny beast core as well as a generous portion of crab meat, but there was no other loot to speak of – just a few claws here and there which might make good chew toys for Pudge. However, his loot spree did tell him how they’d all died – apparently, their insides had been liquified by the shockwave of Zeke’s attack, and they’d died instantly. By the time Zeke finished looting the smaller crabs, the heat of the desert had begun to assert itself, and the smell of the corpses had become almost unbearable. Finally, he approached the giant crab, placed his hand on the shell – it had grown quite warm in the sun – and looted it, gaining an elite beast core as well as a veritable mountain of crab meat. Its giant claws, which were of a size with Pudge, also entered his spatial storage, but the rest of the corpse remained behind.

Then, Zeke went back to Tucker’s pile, which he looted as well. When he’d finished, he said, “I guess that’s all of them. I hope you like crab meat, because we got a ton of it. Like, almost literally.”

“Interesting,” Tucker said, stroking his short beard. “And your spatial storage prevents spoilage, right?”

“It does. Why?”

“Sand crab meat is extremely rich,” he said. “But it spoils very quickly. As you can tell by the smell. If you’d permit me a few pounds, I think I can use it to create something useful.”

Zeke shrugged. “Sure. We have plenty of it,” he said. “Now – you were talking about predators? Should we go? Or do you want to keep looking for herbs and plants out here?”

“I think we should - oh…that’s not good,” he said, his eyes fixed on the horizon. Zeke followed his gaze and saw a host of blurry shapes that were rapidly becoming clearer and clearer by the second.

“What the…”

“We should…w-we should run,” Tucker said.

“What are they?” Zeke asked, pulling his half-melted armor from his spatial storage. It wasn’t in the best shape, but it would still be better than nothing. Even as he held the various pieces in place, slipping a bit of his mana into it, the armor affixed itself into position. More importantly, the creatures on the horizon resolved themselves into creatures that looked as if they’d come from someone’s colorful hallucinations.

At first, Zeke thought he was facing off against a flock of wild turkeys – if said turkeys were four or five feet tall and glittering in every color of the rainbow. However, as they drew closer, his enhanced senses started to show their worth, and he saw them for what they truly were.

For one, they were leaner and more vicious-looking than turkeys, not dissimilar from what he imagined a small dinosaur might look. However, they were covered in glittering feathers that looked like they were coated in gemstones. And instead of the rounded maw he usually associated with landbound dinosaurs, their heads looked more like what he’d expect from a pterodactyl. Their heads were narrow, with long, sharp beaks that were filled with row after row of sharp teeth. The moment they came into his range, he used [Inspect]:

Long-Beaked Raptor – Level 24

Tucker tugged on his arm, saying, “We have to go. Now!”

“There aren’t that many,” Zeke stated. “We can take them. They’re only level twenty-four or so.”

“No. No, we can’t,” Tucker urged. “There’s a world of difference between different monsters. Think of these things like piranha. One’s not a big deal, but when you get the entire school of fish, you’ve got a problem. And there’s blood in the water, so to speak. Our only hope is that they’ll get distracted by the crab’s corpse. Even then…”

“And if I want to fight?” Zeke asked.

“You do it alone.”

Zeke considered just letting the alchemist leave. After all, he’d fought alone often enough that he felt confident in his ability to confront any situation and come out on top. However, the obvious fear in Tucker’s expression cut through his confidence, suggesting that going up against the raptors might be biting off more than he could chew. That supposition was supported when he looked at the horizon again, and he saw that the steady stream of raptors hadn’t lessened. There weren’t just hundreds of the things. There were thousands.

So, Zeke nodded to Tucker, saying, “Then we go back to the tower. Hopefully, they won’t follow.”

Looking relieved, Tucker said, “Good. Glad you’re not completely crazy. Let’s get out of here.”

And with that, the pair took off at a jog that, in the old world, would have been faster than most Olympic sprinters. Zeke probably could’ve run faster, but he didn’t want to leave Tucker behind. After a few minutes, they were more than a mile away from the dead crabs, but they still had a good, long way to go before they were back at the tower. So, picking up the pace a bit, they continued on, and for a while, Zeke thought they’d left the raptors far behind.

Until he heard a strange, high-pitched call coming from behind. Even as he ran, he glanced back the way he’d come, and he was dismayed to see that the host of raptors had actually closed the gap.

“We need to go faster,” he muttered.

“Going…as…fast as…I…can,” panted Tucker.

Zeke rolled his eyes, then said, “Clench up. You’re not going to like this.”

“W-what are you – oh, for God’s sake!”

Zeke didn’t listen to the man, instead throwing him over his shoulder and doubling his pace. He might’ve been able to go a little faster, but not without draining his energy. In any case, he was staying just ahead of the pursuing raptors; when they reached the tower, its protections would kick in, and they’d be safe.

“This is humiliating,” said Tucker.

“At least you’re not raptor food,” replied a panting Zeke. Outside of battle, he hadn’t exerted himself to such an extent in quite some time.  And he’d never been much of a runner, anyway.

“There’s that,” Tucker muttered. Then, he cleared his throat, saying, “Onward, noble steed! Bear me away from danger!”

“Changed your tune pretty quick,” Zeke said.

“Just rolling with it,” Tucker said.

Zeke gave a quick chuckle before hunching over and increasing his pace once again. The quicker he reached the tower, the quicker he could rid himself of his burden.