Chapter 95 - Conserving Energy
"Oh, What do we have here?! It seems like Landlord is in a pinch!!"
Marlion instantly noticed Wobbly Web"s ambush and switched the camera focus from those at the lead to them.
Creeped out, the crowd drew a deep breath at the sight of thousands of small red spiderlings crawling all over Felix"s car and entering inside from every hole and opening they found.
"He is doomed! What kind of f*cked up ability is that?! Who can defend against such an army while driving?"
"Sigh, that legendary bloodline is truly wasted on him."
"That"s the peak ability of Queen Harvest Spider! That"s an epic rank Tier 1 Bloodline!"
"Hehe, I guess his luck has been totally consumed when he won that bloodline."
Suddenly, their chatter quietened down a bit as they watched mouth agape, the spiderlings they were just glorifying gets engulfed in an acid green mist. Then, magically disappear after the mist was removed.
Felix"s car kept accelerating forward as nothing happened.
Marlion, the spectators, and more so Wobbly Web stared at Felix"s sparkling clean car with a dumbfounded expressions.
"Are my eyes playing a trick on me? Or did I just watch an epic rank peak ability get dealt with the same way as spraying gas at flies?!"
"Brother, you are missing the point here. His aura switched to another poison like his bombs!!!! Can he do that with all of his abilities?!!" The spectator then added with a slight tremble on his voice, "And how many poisons can he switch to?!"
Everyone near the man felt a s.h.i.+ver in their skin as they imagined the immense possibilities of this overpowered bloodline.
"That"s it; I am focusing only on Landlord from now on! Let"s see how many poison inducements he can use."
"I am with you."
"Count me as well."
"Tsk, I bet he would use at max 5 inducement like the known legendary bloodlines."
Just like a domino effect, the crowd bit by bit began switching their vision from known veterans to Felix after realizing how unique his bloodline was.
Some spectators knew of such an ability to switch inducements since a few legendary poison bloodlines had it as well.
However, the maximum number of inducements they could use never went beyond five. They knew that Felix"s bloodline would be just the same as them, nothing to boast about. Yet, they still switched their focus from the lead to him. They were somewhat curious about what five inducements he unlocked.
....
"Hahahhaha!"
Meanwhile, Felix was laughing his a.s.s out inside the car while watching a small cute spider on top of his hand. It was biting him viciously, trying to penetrate his skin and spew poison inside. Yet, Felix"s defenses were too strong for its little fangs.
"Trying to poison this daddy?! Aren"t you simply asked to be slapped in the face?"
Felix chuckled one last time and smacked the spider away like a fly. He glanced at Wobbly"s car that was speeding away from him in retreat and sneered, "You lucky this was a race format."
Felix ignored him and continued his acceleration to catch up. If this was a different game mode, Felix wouldn"t hesitate for even a second before hunting him down in retaliation.
However, this was sadly a race. And in a race, he should only have one thing in mind, and that was to reach the finish line first and foremost.
Hence, he couldn"t waste any more time dealing with those pests, as his rank was currently 15 from 34 players that were left.
A whopping 12 players were eliminated in the very first minutes of the race. This just showed how dangerous was to remain within the pack. Good thing, the players now somewhat spread out in the wide desert.
There wasn"t really a track to limit their flying s.p.a.ce or such. One could literally go wherever he wanted. However, to reach the 2nd area of the track, then 3rd, and the 4th, one must always fly in a straight line and minimize any type of delay.
This meant those players who spread out, going either left or right, chickened out after seeing players get eliminated constantly. Felix and the rest of the players, who kept on flying in a straight line weren"t really complaining about it.
"Oh, Mystery box?"
After flying for while solo, Felix"s eyes caught the tail of three cars ahead of him. They were rus.h.i.+ng towards a quite large blue box, that had a question mark on it while revolving slowly on itself. They were trying to be the first to obtain it or hinder their compet.i.tors from doing so.
Just because the veterans decided not to rely on those boxes, it didn"t mean they would let those losers get hold of them.
After all, who knows if they managed to get an ability that could turn things around?
"It seems the silver car is going to it."
Felix observed from distance and slowed his speed a bit to not catch up to them. Three players fighting was already a crowd. No need to add himself to the mix.
BOOOOOOOOOM!
Scared s.h.i.+tless, Felix instantly closed his eyes and changed his direction reflexively after he saw a ma.s.sive explosion originating from the blue box.
"Marlion was definitely not bulls.h.i.+ting us." Felix thought with cold sweat in his back.
He didn"t think that the bombs inside the boxes were strong enough to destroy everyone in the vicinity. Heck, if he didn"t slow down, the force would have definitely cracked his front window.
This scene just further reinforced his decision of not touching those mystery boxes.
"More like Mystery scams." He murmured while dodging some alloy scrubs raining from above.
The only ones who enjoyed the fireworks were Marlion, who was hyping it even further, and the spectators who paid to see exactly those brutal deaths.
.....
After 10 minutes of continuous flying, Felix finally saw the great canyon that had thin cracks in it. Those were actually the narrow paths they were supposed to pa.s.s through to reach the underground tunnels.
Felix pushed the acceleration pedal harder and wheezed towards one of them.
"Hopefully, this one is in a straight line." He wished quietly while entering the crack.
Unfortunately, the path turned into a crooked one with multiple turns and narrow chocks that could be entered only by flying horizontally. The path couldn"t get any more messed up.
"F*ck me!"
Irked and irritated, Felix began slowing down his speed in order to weave his way in those steep turns. Each time he reached one, he would drift through them successfully.
Good thing his driving skills were not too shabby, letting him have a smooth journey even inside this crooked path.
Phew, Phew!, Phew!
Out of nowhere, three wind blades approached Felix"s car from behind rapidly. Their loud sound was enough to let Felix know that he was being attacked. (AN: Smooth my a.s.s, talk about jinxing it.)
"Just good, more trouble." Without even glancing at the back mirror, Felix moved sideways, managing to dodge only one blade. He noticed them quite late to maneuver all of them.
Slice, Slice!
The back of his car got cut up, but only slightly, leaving shallow marks behind. The car"s defensive counterparts Felix used, could take a beating of this degree.
"Tsk, No wonder this b.a.s.t.a.r.d didn"t modify his offense too much."
Inside a thin silver car, that had blue clouds paintings on it, a pale handsome man with long diamond-like earnings clicked his tongue in criticism. His name tag was Wind Cloud.
"Whatever, no matter how hard his car defenses are, it won"t survive my wind blades forever." He said, grinning.
He kept summoning long wind blades from his hand and placing them above a wide curvy platform, that was under his seat. That platform was connected to his car"s frontal b.u.mper.
Honestly, it shouldn"t be called as such, since it appeared more like a curvy opened mouth. Felix had two medium-sized launchers, while this dude had a launcher stretching from left to right.
Each player modified his car to fit their bloodline"s abilities perfectly.
Immediately after placing three blades stacking on each other, he clicked a b.u.t.ton and they got projected swiftly from the opening towards Felix"s car, that was drifting stylishly.
However, this time none of them managed to land on Felix"s car, as it suddenly plunged down rapidly like it was pulled down by gravity.
"Works every time." Felix chuckled and turned the engine back on after his successful maneuver.
"What the f*ck! That"s Illegal!"
Furious and somewhat shocked, Wind Cloud slapped his car wheel after seeing Felix"s unique way of dodging.
However, only he thought so, as for the crowd who were focusing their vision on Felix, they cheered and clapped their hands thunderously.
They might have only focused on him due to his unique bloodline, but after spectating his driving skills, they were hooked by him.
Awed and thrilled, they chanted his name while watching him dodge every wind blade thrown at him by either his drifts or spins. Nothing touched his car after the first blade.
Felix kept on driving without making a single counter-attack. He saw that the b.a.s.t.a.r.d had his car"s windows closed, so the poison wouldn"t affect him at all. If he wanted to use his sleepiness aura as a blinding technique, it would consume quite a lot of energy.
His energy tank only had 70% left after his previous battles. So he needed to minimize his consumption as the race still had 2 more laps.
Plus, each hovercar had an automatic navigation system. Thus, even if he used his aura and blinded him, he could just activate automatic driving and he wouldn"t have anything to worry about. Still, his speed would be reduced drastically.
Felix didn"t want him to leave his sight after attacking his car to such a degree. He wanted to kill the b.a.s.t.a.r.d right now and right here.
Shortly after, the path they were driving through, became straight and leading downward gradually.
"Oh, it seems, I am about to reach the tunnels." Felix smirked, "I might get rid of this pest in there."
He accelerated downward at his top speed. The path was straight now. There was no need to worry about steep curves anymore.
Soon, he was followed by the sliver car, sticking to him like glue whenever he went. Felix glanced at the back mirror and saw that no more blades were coming at him.
"Out of gas already?" He sneered at this moron who wasted all of his energy for what? A mere 200 game point if he eliminated him?
He was obviously either an eager newbie or a trash veteran, who still did not understand the concept of pacing his energy based on the game.
Felix had 70% left and was still acting stingy with it. Simply because he had no idea what was going to happen in the rest of the race. Instead of using his abilities recklessly, he would rather first use his brain and find the easiest and cheapest way possible to finish a task.
Elemental energy in the games was a finite source that couldn"t be replanted in the majority of the games.
After a while of driving downward in this kind of stalemate. The tunnels leading to the underground appeared in Felix"s eyesight.
Felix"s eyes brightened up immediately after seeing the tunnel"s entrance that only allowed one vehicle to pa.s.s through with some difficulty. It was more like a choke than an entrance.
"Time to get rid of him." He grinned while creating two white bombs in his hand. Then, he put them each in a tube that was connected to his back row launchers.
He left them inside the tubes and pushed the acceleration peddle to the limit, bolting inside the choke first.
Wind Cloud, who was planning on slowing down his speed to pa.s.s the choke safely, decided to do the exact opposite after seeing Felix"s car put a significant distance between them.
"Better luck in your next life." Felix laughed wickedly and punched the launch b.u.t.ton with the side of his fist.
Whoosh, Poof, Poof!
The white bombs got launched swiftly towards the choke. One exploded exactly on the choke, while the other exploded four meters before it.
The spectators stood from their seats in excitement at the choke that was completely blocked of sight by clouds of white mist. Even they couldn"t see its exact position, don"t even mention Wind Cloud, who was speeding towards it.
"Nooooo!!!!"
Mortified, Wind Cloud screamed at the top of his lung while pulling the wheel to himself, hoping to slow down his speed for even a bit. Sadly, His car still entered the white cloud, blocking his vision from the choke"s exact location.
Everyone knew, even himself, that his fate was decided the moment his vision was blocked. Entering the choke while seeing it in plain sight was already a difficult task. Don"t even mention doing it completely blind.
Boom!
The silver car completely missed the choke and collided with the wall to its right. Felix drove forward with a relieved smile after hearing the antic.i.p.ated sound of the explosion.
Another 200 GP was in the bag!