Chapter 84: Muf.a.g
84 84 - Muf.a.g
Along the way, they tried to talk to Muf.a.g through Noah, but he seemed to know only about as much as they did. The most important thing they discovered was that this train took them from one city in this kingdom on the dwarven planet to another. Unfortunately, little Muf.a.g did not know the coordinates of the planet since he was just a 13 year old child, but knowing that this dwarf had a much deeper background than was normally presented by the Fortress monsters was something that expanded the team"s horizons in terms of invasion.
Before, they had only seen monsters as a way to earn money and a threat to protect the land against, but now they saw that it didn"t seem as simple as they initially imagined. Muf.a.g, for example, even described what his family was like: how they lived in the city, how much the currency cost in their economy (in a simple way from a child"s perspective). But that alone was enough for the humans to understand that through this portal, it was not just a random "dungeon" they were supposed to destroy, but apparently a much bigger world than they had imagined. They just didn"t know if it was all created by the Fortress just to be more realistic, or if it really was what it seemed to be.
Unfortunately, they had no more time to talk to Muf.a.g, as they had reached the door that led to the next car. Noah asked Muf.a.g to stay behind everyone along with the magicians so that he could be protected from any monsters they might encounter. The little dwarf obeyed him without question.
When they opened the door, a very familiar smell of strong rust lashed out at their noses. Instinctively, they held their weapons tighter, while Noah was on guard in case he needed to teleport at any time. He still hadn"t conjured up a fireball so as not to draw unnecessary attention if the car was dark, and when they realized that it was very difficult to see inside because of the darkness, Noah"s choice proved correct.
Unfortunately they did not want to walk straight into the carriage that smelled so strongly that they a.s.sumed it was blood without any method of visually confirming it. So for the sake of the group, Noah conjured up a small but potent fireball and launched it in the direction he imagined the next door was.
Jasper ran alongside Noah, which made Noah also run forward to take control of the situation. Even if this was something dangerous, that was the role of the two in the group, they could not just hide behind the other Blessed and only appear when it was safe. No, their task was to create the safest and most advantageous situation for the companions of their team, even if it meant that they should take more chances than the others.
"It"s not like this is the first time," Noah said in a low voice before starting to teleport down the path to reach the monsters before Jasper. Noah took advantage of the situation to light up the area and gain sight of the place with the flames that would leak whenever he opened a tunnel to h.e.l.l.
These small blasts of flame were enough for the archers and wizards to find targets and start shooting at the seemingly 8 creatures that were paying attention to Noah. Jasper was taking advantage of his agility and no monsters were paying attention to him. With the Rank C dagger he had, he used every moment to focus his eyes and try to get an opening in the monsters" bellies.
Wizards rained magic while archers rained arrows. This time, half of the warriors stayed behind to protect the rear while the other half approached the group and tried to separate a monster from Noah and Jasper to try to lighten the load of the two.
* Bamf * * Bamf * * Bamf * * Bamf * * Bamf * * Bamf * * Bamf *
In the meantime, Noah had not stopped teleporting to dodge so many attacks. Since he hadn"t set any monsters on fire, his energy reserves were going down much faster than they normally should. If he continued at this rate, even though he was teleporting for short distances, he would not have enough energy for more than 100 teleports. Since he needed to teleport more than 100 times against just two monsters, now that he had to deal with 8, those 100 times were far from enough.
But Noah had something he didn"t have in the past battle: his [h.e.l.l Flames] ability had risen to level 03. In addition to getting hotter and more deadly, Noah"s control had also gotten much greater than before. And that control was reflected in Noah"s list of ideas for applications for his skill in battle.
With each teleportation, Noah discovered that he had some control over the flames that leaked through [h.e.l.l Tunneling], that is, he was able to control a little those flames that leaked through the portal as if they were his own. Unfortunately he was only able to control about 2% of the flames that left the portals, but that was enough for Noah to order them that instead of dissipating, they would be floating in the air where he had teleported. This strategy was causing Noah"s energy consumption to rise abnormally.
But in a short time, because of the large number of tunnels he had used to teleport, the area that had been as dark as pitch, now it was as if it were being lit by dozens of invisible candles that floated in the air and kept the area nearby illuminated enough to make the figures of the monsters in that place distinguishable.
Unfortunately for Noah, after capturing the 53rd small flame generated by his teleportation, he felt that his energy reserve had dropped below 20%. It was now time to act.
The monsters were completely enraged; they couldn"t understand why every time this human was bitten, it turned into flames and appeared elsewhere. And each time it happened, they got more angry and the urge to bite this human grew even more. This made the adrenaline in the monsters" bodies rise to a point where they practically did not feel any more pain from medium-sized injuries, that is, even if lightning struck them, if they could still walk they would not even have noticed the attack. This made the monsters careless because of excessive anger, and allowed the other Blessed to hit more attacks on them each time, greatly decreasing the monsters" resistance in the long run.
Seeing that some of the monsters were still okay, but others were already getting into a desperate situation, Noah knew it was time to start the second stage of his plan and with a mental order, the flames that before apparently were harmless and that served just to illuminate the area had now started to move.
Noah had mentally marked which monsters were closest to death and sent his flames flying towards these monsters in the hope that they would die faster. The flames had to dodge the monsters who were in perfect health and the Blessed Ones, both the warriors and Jasper, but with Noah"s high control, controlling small flames like these were not his limit.
When the flames. .h.i.t the monsters, Noah felt his energy reserve start to fill up again at a fast pace, but not as fast as his current consumption from teleporting. So Noah also used the idea he had when burning the monsters in the previous wagon and decreased the size of the flames on the monsters" skin, but increased the contact surface by doing something like a web of flames that curled around the monsters" bodies.
As soon as the monsters were hit by the flames, their screams went from angry screams to screams of fear, pain, and despair. Some could not even manage to stand before throwing themselves on the floor to try to put out these strange flames. But that just made Noah no longer need to teleport so much,?and allowed him to invest more energy into the flames to go into their bodies to burn more and generate even more energy for him, creating an endless loop of energy expenditure and recharge.
"I think I can call this [h.e.l.l Trap]... My sense of naming is terrible; I need to think of something better..." Noah thought, dissatisfied with the name but satisfied with the result as he watched the monsters rolling in pain on the ground.
The Blessed were momentarily stunned to see such a large-scale attack from a single Blessed One. Noah, alone in front of them, had managed to deal with 4 monsters at once. Of course, they had done a lot of damage to those monsters before Noah finished them, but even so, those monsters were all running and attacking a second ago, and now they were rolling on the ground, unable to attack or even think correctly.
This one move, that Noah apparently planned from the start of the battle, actually made a big opening for the warriors and Jasper to quickly kill those 4 monsters and help Noah to take care of the remaining 4 monsters who hadn"t even noticed that their companions had been incapacitated as they continued to run toward Noah, frantically trying to bite him.
(Author Note: Please, better name suggestions are welcome in the comments. Suggest as many as you like! ^^)
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Please read the author"s notes down here! :3 ↓↓↓