Chương 69: Stronger

The horrifying creature known as Wendigo observed its ambushed prey. After all, cornered prey are the most dangerous and it knew that.

Aster with [Hasten thought [EX]], dug up his mind for any information he had about Wendigos.

He got some information from his own memory when he was on Earth, and compared it with some other info he had found from people from this world.

The result was surprisingly, high accuracy.

Sure there were some differences but it was more than what he had hoped for.

'Why do 'fictional' creatures from Earth exist on Gaia? Is there a reason for that or is it a pure, raw coincidence?

Let's put that aside, for now, time to recap about Wendigos.'

The creature sprinted towards him with blinding speed and extended its claws, which Aster dodged by bending his knees and leaning with his upper body backward.

He returned the sudden attack by blasting a few fireballs at its obscured face.

The magic spheres constructed with fire did not explode on impact like they usually do in order to not upset the delicate structure of the tunnel so the damage was minimal.

SLASH

The claw cut through nothing but air as the momentum carried the body forward.

Aster kicked up from the ground and spun in the air 180 degrees, reversing the position of his head and feet.

Then, he pulled his knees to his chest with his legs facing the back of the beast.

He kicked the wendigo with a considerable amount of force, enough to propel both of them.

He straightened his back at the moment of impact so he flew straight like an arrow through the tunnel. The monster, however, was thrown straight at the barrier.

'Glad I made the tunnel straight.' He sighed.

'Let's continue: According to the folklore on Earth, a human transforms because of their greed or by consuming human flesh.

A Wendigo grows proportionally to the human flesh they had consumed. Due to this… rather terrifying trait of theirs, they always grow vertically and never horizontally hence their lanky figure.

The food they consume is always converted to extra mass instantly so wendigos do not feel satisfied no matter how much they eat.

That piece of info is according to the sources I have read back on Earth.

The real Wendigos on Gaia are pretty similar too but with some extra changes.

First of all, the flesh they devour does not become extra mass, but rather attribute points. They still have the cruel eternal starvation side of this ability.

Second, the constant starvation erodes their mind as time goes on and they are constantly in a berserk state. They lose their intelligence as well so they can be outmaneuvered.

The tunnel was considerably long. The pit is the crater of a volcano so the walls surrounding it wouldn't be even.

Aster did a 270-degree flip mid-air and got on his feet where he was more comfortable than being aerial.

This preference of his saved him as he felt something whispering a few meters away and managed to stop before he fell right into their trap.

The shadow lifted and revealed another pair of foggy red eyes.

'There is more than one? Aren't Wendigos supposed to be solo, lone wolf-type entities?

Something about the other Wendigo didn't feel right either. It didn't seem berserk like it was supposed to. It waited… and analyzed me? Maybe it was… tamed? Controlled even? Was it sent by those gluttony demons? Humans get turned by greed, right? So are the greed demons in cahoots with gluttony?

To be honest, those two go hand in hand so it wouldn't be that surprising.

So let's say it is being manually controlled. That would cross out one of its weaknesses and give the advantage of cooperation.

What a hassle.'

The second Wendigo opened its long maw and a smoking red liquid was shot from it.

The wind spun in front of the projectile attack, creating a barrier and intercepting it.

Droplets of it splashed on Aster's face, hissing, and started to melt the skin. Droplets that he could have avoided if his sight wasn't distorted to this degree.

He tore the skin of the area affected and continued to recall information.

'Third, the existence of skills in this world. Wendigos, just like any other being, has the ability to acquire skills through practice and repetition, affinities, etc.

Every wendigo can have different skills depending on how strong it was when it was human its life experiences. This explains the acidic blood from this one which the other didn't have.

Aside from that, every Wendigo shares the same intrinsic capabilities.

One of them is [Madness] as most if not all wendigos succumb to it. It is a representation of their mental and emotional state and inflicts the same pain upon others in their vicinity.'

The haunted whispers emanating from its eyes reached his ears and caused his face to scrunch up.

'It is a mental type of curse that Wendigos passively emit. I have [Curse immunity] and leveled it up to the max so I'm not affected by it but damn is it annoying.'

His blurry eyesight made him slightly nauseous and an unfounded sense of crisis took possession of him as the presence of the previous wendigo sneaked up from behind.

"It's useless to hide, you know? I can differentiate the added whispers."

'The other intrinsic trait of theirs is [Fright]. It inflicts extreme fear on their prey, causing all of their senses to distort.

Their vision will blur, their sense of touch will be confused, taste will be nonexistent and smell and hearing will become unreliable due to the constant whispering and the smell.

…It is said that they smell like death but I don't personally find the difference. Maybe because I got used to the smell of this area?

Severe distortion in perception will make the intruder, the wendigo, unidentifiable and the surroundings indistinguishable.

This makes the victim feel cornered and helpless as they can't recognize their surroundings and their killer. This massively boosts the [Madness] trait's effect, pushing the person over the edge.

In the case a person manages to become mad before they die, they either kill themselves or submit to the wendigo and worship it. The wendigo spares it in that case as it 'alleviates' the hunger for a while.

The worshippers will get a new class and stuff and the wendigo will become a 'King' of sorts after it gathers a number of worshippers.

It seems that [Fright] doesn't me affect that much since my perception is dialed up to more than 600 and the distortion isn't good enough to fully make my senses unreliable so it's okay for now.'

'It's obvious none of these guys are a king. Fighting in a tunnel with several of them should be quite tough but nothing I should worry about. There is no way they can beat me.

They might possess more attribute points than me but I am stronger.