บท 18: Chapter 17
The creatures circled around Elizabeth, wary of her and the other nearby creatures. However, unlike before, now they seemed to have decided not to attack each other.
Running ferociously through the darkness, a wolf leaped, flying towards her with its large fangs bared.
Elizabeth, holding one of its front paws with one hand and placing the other under its large belly covered in white fur, changed the direction the wolf was moving and hurled it onto the wendigo coming at her from behind.
The wendigo's claws easily sliced the large wolf in half. Seeing this, the other wolves growled at the nearby wendigos.
"Oh, what a shame, I thought you were working as a team."
The creatures eyed each other, but refrained from attacking; "Strange... they don't seem to be acting the same way as they were earlier today... Are they getting smarter at night...? No, just now they were mutilating themselves, so what changed?"
The creatures distanced themselves from each other, grouping into species-specific clusters, even the yetis followed this peculiar behavior.
Dragging their feet through the snow, the wolves prepared themselves. Their teeth gleamed in the moonlight, and their white eyes burned with fury. Saliva dripping from their mouths showed how hungry they were.
The wendigos spread out nearby, circling around Elizabeth slowly. At times, their claws seemed to catch the faint moonlight.
Following a strategy similar to the wendigos, the yetis also separated, but stayed even further apart, forming a huge circle around Elizabeth. Unlike the other creatures, they didn't seem to be planning to engage her in hand-to-hand combat. Filling their mouths with air, each yeti seemed to be waiting for the perfect moment to unleash their freezing breath.
"These creatures are... scheming? Having awareness is one thing, but this...? I wonder, how far will they go?"
The wolves began to run swiftly in circles, obstructing Elizabeth's view, which was already poor due to the lack of light.
One of them leaped towards her, making a small cut on one of her arms with its claws and quickly returning to formation, before Elizabeth could react.
Leaping, eight wendigos entered the circle and started to approach Elizabeth slowly. One of them charged at her, but before Elizabeth could do anything, one of the wolves broke formation and slashed its back, followed by the wendigo who tried to do the same, but failed.
With her own hands, Elizabeth grabbed the creature's claws and then delivered a precise punch to its stomach, which, like the yeti's head she had hit before, seemed to be made of stone.
Amplifying the flames far beyond her body was indeed a problem; the amount of mana expended was too great, and the accuracy of the strike wasn't guaranteed, especially against such intelligent opponents. However, if the flame were transferred directly to the enemy's body through a direct blow, there would be no issue with accuracy.
Moreover, the mana expenditure would be extremely reduced, as Elizabeth wouldn't be using mana to create new flames, but merely transferring parts of the ones already surrounding her body. Following this line of thought, she promptly put the idea into practice.
As she flew away, starting from her belly, flames began to emerge and consume her entire body. The creature screamed in agony as the flames intensified.
"Argh...!" something seemed to be tearing her throat apart, and while listening to those screams, Elizabeth, for a moment, covered her ears. "The theory was correct, but... maybe the screams are also an issue.."
As Elizabeth covered her ears, one of the wolves leaped towards her, and two other wendigos took the lead in the fight.
She couldn't evade the wolf. They were swift, and thanks to the formation, their movements became quite unpredictable. Moreover, even if she tried, Elizabeth could hardly see them.
Against the wendigos, it was different. They were fast, but not comparable to the wolves, mainly because, like her, their feet sank into the snow as they moved. However... there wasn't as much snow in that place anymore.
Elizabeth moved quickly, throwing herself to the side and rolling on the ground; "Did they pretend to be slower just to catch me off guard? Was the other creature just bait? No, it can't be... They can't be that smart.. right?"
The wendigo continued its relentless attacks, causing Elizabeth, in a spontaneous reflex, to leap backward to evade its strikes.
"Ah, darn it, you've got to be kidding me..."
Several freezing breaths came at her all synchronously.
Repeating the fireball upwards immediately crossed her mind. However, looking down, Elizabeth realized that wasn't a viable option. No, that couldn't even be considered an option. Waiting for her patiently on the ground were not only the wendigos with their claws, but also the wolves with their fangs.
"This is ridiculous! It's like they know what I'm going to do next. Did they learn after seeing it once? No, that doesn't make sense. These damn things weren't here when I did it last time, so how?"
Descending wasn't an option, but the freezing breaths were rapidly closing in at an impressive speed; "Isn't the range of these breaths a bit too much? What kind of lungs do they have?"
Elizabeth raised her hands, causing the creatures on the ground to gather around her. The wolves poised to leap at the slightest hint of approach. However, slowly lowering her hands, she hurled a fireball at the beasts and then created an explosion to propel her body even higher.
[Congratulations]
[You leveled up]
[Congratulations]
[You leveled up]
[Congratulations]
[You leveled up]
[Congratulations]
[You leveled up]
[Congratulations]
[You leveled up]
The freezing breaths collided, generating a large freezing airball.
"Argh! Darn it!"
Most of her body was saved, but due to her delay in making a decision, Elizabeth ended up having one of her feet hit by the freezing airball's area of effect, and because of that, it instantly froze.
Healing it was possible, she knew that. All she had to do was the same thing she did to defrost her hand earlier, focus intense heat on the area to melt the ice. However, there wasn't enough time for that to be done.
Another freezing breath came her way, and to avoid making the same mistake as before, Elizabeth didn't take long to make her decision. Raising her right hand and moving it to the side, the explosion created caused her body to change direction, flying to the left.
The attacks followed, with freezing breaths constantly coming her way. She had used explosions so many times to dodge the yetis' attacks in mid-air that Elizabeth had become accustomed to using explosions in that strange way.
Directing both of her hands downwards, Elizabeth created the first explosion, causing her body to tilt slightly to the left, dodging the first freezing breath. And then the second explosion followed, causing her body to spin in mid-air, avoiding two more consecutive breaths, and after a few spins, she was upside down, looking at the two yetis below her, on the ground.
Her arms moved, both towards her legs, and after two simultaneous explosions, each created by one of her hands, Elizabeth descended rapidly towards the creatures. The breaths coming at her from the sides passed by her like white blurs as she confidently approached the ground.
The yetis attacked, filling their mouths with air and then launching it towards Elizabeth.
The heroine was quicker. Moving her left hand in advance and preparing an explosion strong enough just to make her move slightly to the side.
When the first freezing breath was launched, the explosion happened. Slightly altering Elizabeth's fall course and rendering the creature's attempt obsolete.
The second one would be accurate, as she was going directly towards it. However, raising one of her hands and creating an explosion in front of her, Elizabeth made her course change again, pushing her body backward.
Turning her body in mid-air so she would land on her feet. Moving her hands towards the ground, Elizabeth created a large explosion even before reaching it.
[Congratulations]
[You leveled up]
"Phew! And once again, that was a close call."
As she walked out of the dust cloud, Elizabeth created the fire barrier around her body again. Her face was already partially frozen, not just one, but both legs and arms too. For someone who doesn't like gambling, Elizabeth certainly is someone who possesses a lot of luck.
The ice on her limbs began to melt as the creatures approached her rapidly.
Elizabeth moved one of her hands towards the creatures, causing them to hesitate in approaching. However, smiling, she raised her arm upwards and launched a huge fireball towards the sky that... didn't explode?
[Name: Elizabeth Berseba
Status
Level: 147
Mana: 725
Strength: 564
Endurance: 561
Agility: 568]
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