Chapter 94: To the source
Chapter 94: To the source
It was easier said than done, though. The next few days showed me that as clear as day.
The lizard-cow wasn’t the only one powerful monster in the surroundings. With each step I took up the stream, I met more and more of them. Some of the monsters were actually the same common beasts I’ve seen before—except now they were twice or thrice as fast and strong as before.
When a simple cave spider I tried to kill almost tore my head off, I realised I was deep in a place for which I was too weak. But with a reward like that shining ahead, I knew I couldn’t just stop.
Every day in the vicinity of the rainbow stream already made me stronger. I found, though, that water didn’t hold its magic properties for long. After a day in my flask, it would lose its glow and tingles. Besides that, after the first radical influx in power, my stats didn’t rise even remotely as quickly as they did after the first time I drank the water.
It didn’t help to drink more water, either. With my bottomless stomach I could’ve drunk enormous amounts of it, but after I drank a certain amount, the tingles of power would turn into a vicious stomach ache. A clear warning from my body that I’d better stop before I explode.
So I couldn’t leave the stream if I wanted to use its magic properties, but the caves all around it were filled with monsters who regularly drank magic water and benefited a lot from it from the course of their lives. Much more than I could in a course of a couple of days.
I couldn’t kill them, so I had to avoid them instead, the best I could. I used all my senses to locate monsters and circle around them, even if it took a lot of time, and hid in their presence, even if it meant hours of stillness while the monsters did their monster business nearby.
It was a good thing that most creatures in the caves still relied on hearing, smelling and touch—as long as I kept stone-still and not too close, they usually passed me by. Otherwise, I had to run.
And worst of all, since there was nothing I could hunt that wasn’t stronger and faster than me, I was constantly hungry. I had to eat mushrooms and tiny insects that I found under rocks, and both were neither appetising nor particularly filling. Even that I had to work to find, since I was so often distracted by running for my life.
A few times, it got very close. I thought I was done for when on my run from a giant furrypede (like centipede, but covered in fur) I stumbled upon a giant lizard lying in ambush—or maybe just resting, who knew it. The lizard looked so much like rocks that surrounded it, both in temperature and texture, that I didn’t notice it until I was literally a step away.
The only thing that saved me from the bite that followed was my battle trance—with it, I evaluated the situation quickly enough to let the lizard chomp on my foot. When it did, almost biting it off, I let out my toe claws.
They pierced the lizard’s palate and went out on the top of its head… missing any vital parts. But at least the lizard had to let me go, and none too late, since the furrypede was almost there, too.
I couldn’t run on one leg after that, but I flew away from the furrypede that decided that a lizard was fine too. Thanks to the rainbow water, that injury healed soon enough, but it was only one of them.
I could’ve been injured much worse when a ceiling crawler, as I called these nasty beasts that looked like fleshy spiders the size of a melon, found my sleeping place and jumped on my head while I caught some rare rest.
This time, what saved me was a magic barrier that Pest held on while I was asleep. While the crawler was cracking it open, I woke up and chased the crawler away with my claws. The creatures were cowardly, but lightning-fast. If they were brave enough to attack not only helpless targets, I’d be in big trouble. As it stood, I got off with a slight fright.
Then, on my seventh day of following towards the source of the rainbow water, I witnessed what I could call the battle of giants. Except, neither of the creatures weren’t actual giants—but all were immensely powerful compared to me.
One of them was a furrypede, but much bigger than the one that chased me into a lizard—that one was only five meters long, while this was at least a couple dozen meters long. It was hard to judge, as its massive body was constantly in motion, waving around its opponents and hitting them left and right.
Against the creature fought monsters I dubbed as bugmen. Five of them, they looked most humanoid that I’ve ever seen a monster be since kobolds. Each had skin devoid of chitin or fur and a humanoid build, but four arms and two antennas on top of their heads. They also had something that looked like bone or chitin grows here and there on their bodies. Their faces were flat, without eyes and with only slits for mouths full of needle-sharp teeth.
They had clothes—loincloths—and crude weapons that they used in pair with their claws to break the furrypede’s legs. They worked smoothly in a team, despite not saying a single word to each other.
The furrypede’s casual brushes against the walls made the cave shake. The bugmen’s movements were faster than my eye could see. With their superior speed and teamwork, they separated the furrypede’s attention between its front and its tail, confusing it and leading it towards a narrower cave passage. When it was in place, limited in its motions, they finished it off with five powerful hits made almost in unison.
It was a wonder to watch, and another line in my long list of “creatures I really want to eat”.