Kapitel 290: Sanguine challenge
Slaughtering all those beasts is quite boring since I am not doing it myself. The fighting style was interesting at first but I prefer to just follow my instincts.
Finally, the hordes of beasts are dealt with and the final challenge awaits. To my disappointment, it's neither a sea beasts nor a tree.
I am met with a honey badger whose skin is red and crystalline. Is the entire monster made out of crystal? Biting that… might be painful.
Regardless of the obvious toughness my opponent presents, whatever is controlling my body attacks without a moment's hesitation. The strike is quick and true but as I feared, the crystalline skin isn't easy to breach.
My fangs clink against the crystal skin and scrape along it with a screeching sound. The crystalline surface reveals only a light scratch after being met with my fangs. The honey badger roars and begins to glow. The red crystal skin refracts the light and I swear I hear cracking noises coming from that monster's body.
My body retreats a short distance away and launches seven energy fangs at the honey badger. The energy fangs hit it and the monster roars even louder as the light intensifies.
A few seconds later, the light dies down again and the honey badger charges at me while continuing to roar furiously. I try to find the scratch my bite left behind but it seems to have disappeared. Can it heal itself?
That's nothing like what Navi suggested!
Also, is it just me or did that honey badger get bigger? It definitely wasn't that tall before…
At any rate, this honey badger is clearly a defense oriented monster. It's crystalline skin makes it almost impervious to most attacks and if it can really heal, it is effectively impossible to kill. Unless you can get through all that crystal in one fell swoop. At that point, it's ability to recover won't matter.
Luckily, I have such an ability. My skill, shatter can… well, shatter almost anything. It only failed me once so far and that was against Navi, a much stronger opponent. My slaughter sense is telling me that this honey badger is not of that caliber.
Now, will whatever controls my body use that skill?
The honey badger suddenly leaps and tries to claw at me with its front paws. My body coils up and launches forward like a loaded spring. It dives under the honey badger's claws and bites at its abdomen.
I feel myself use the shatter skill and under the skill's powerful destructive force, the crystal skin relents as my fangs sink deep into it. I taste blood as it slowly trickles down my fangs from inside the honey badger's abdomen.
Knowing it bleeds, the crystalline skin is most likely just a shell around the real, fleshy body. And now that my sanguine venom is inside that monster, this fight will get a lot easier.
The honey badger shrieks madly and claws at my back. Reluctantly, my body pulls back its fangs and seems to be retreating.
However,y body suddenly speeds up again and coils itself around the honey badger. With my thickness being disproportionate to my length, I become a thick and inescapable band of muscle around the poor crystal monster.
In an ingenious move, my shatter skill is applied all along the length of my body that is coiled around the honey badger. Simultaneously, blood-stealing constriction is used to apply a terrifying amount of pressure that accompanies the shattering force. The crystalline skin is slowly shattered and, once it weakens, crushed under my mighty constricting body.
The honey badger releases a cacophony of enraged noises as it scratches and claws at everything in range. The monster is delirious with rage and its crystal skin is madly refracting light as it attempts to resist me crushing it.
I realize that the more enraged the honey badger becomes, the harder it's skin becomes too. Every flash of light signifies another increase in defense as the crystal structure strengthens and increases in size, refracting the light differently and thereby appearing to flash. By the end of it, my crushing force is nearly halted. The only thing that allows me to kill it, is that my shatter skill seems to be an effective counter to this skill.
Since it destroys the internal structure of things, the strengthening of the honey badger's skill is broken apart, layer by layer. Once one layer of strengthen crystal is shattered, my body can then crush it with easy.
The honey badger struggles and attacks with seemingly infinite furry until it draws its past breath. Even once its body is nothing but a lifeless broken and crushed husk, its paws twitch from time to time as if ready to lash out once again.
A unwanted satisfaction rises within me and I mentally recoil in disgust. Yes, I do get satisfaction from killing a powerful opponent, a great deal of it actually. However, it wasn't me who killed this honey badger. It was whatever controls my body that got the kill, there's no satisfaction for me to be had. The fact that I feel it through my body pisses me the hell of.
Still, my body won the fight and according to Navi, that will gain me a few restful nights without coming to this darned place. Suddenly, I notice that I am covered in the honey badger's blood that was squeezed out by my constriction. Since the crystal skin hindered my scales from piercing its body and stealing its blood, the sanguine liquid splattered all across my body instead.
My body is baptized by the dead honey badger's lifeblood. My sanguine boost explodes through my veins and I feel like a barrier has been breached.
The dreamland around me fades and I wake up. What was that feeling in the end.
<Congratulations, your sanguine boost has reached level 4!>
So the was the level up process?
<Yes. Now, tell me all about what you encountered. Actually, I'll guide you to the lab so we can scan your memories. It will be very nice to have another stage for the sanguine VR program.>
The laboratory? Do you want to cut my head open? Do I have to meet Darwin again?
<No, we will use a short range scanner to analyze and copy part of your memory. All the parameters of your fight will be copied and used to train sanguine swordsmen. Now, get going or I'll come to get you.>
After reaching the laboratory, I meet a timid guy who asks me to again lie down on a bed. Well, more of a metal plate with beding on top of it but I probably won't feel the difference.
The process is near instantaneous and I notice none of it. Navi just tells me that it is done and I can leave. My question is, what now?
Wöchentlicher Energiestatus
-- Power-
Rangliste 
-- Power-
Stein