章節 15: Greed
The ground shook, tossing the dust and pebbles that were collected along the cave walls and ceiling onto the ground.
Roman's gaze follow the source of the activity and found that the water at the edge of the large pond that lay in the middle of the cavern floor began to recede.
The water pulled into two halves to reveal a path leading to the islet. The path separated the two rising walls of water on the side looking much like something out of a movie from Earth.
Some forces unknown to Roman were holding the water up, preventing it from spilling onto the path.
Roman got up from his spot to check out the phenomenon but hesitated from entering. He needed to test if everything was safe.
He crouched down to grab a pebble from the ground before tossing it onto the path. After waiting for five minutes, there were still no changes. Roman had no idea how this was possible.
Just to be sure, Roman grabbed a second pebble and repeated his actions. Once again, nothing happened.
However, after the five minute interval that Roman waited out to test for a response, the water began to topple off from the top of the imaginary wall and the path closed on itself.
Roman was deeply puzzled by this but realized that his time was running out. He had to continue to search for a means to cross the water to the islet.
Roman continued combing the shore of the pond in search for other possible means to get across. There had to be a way.
However, after a good twenty minutes of searching, Roman once again came up empty.
Roman then decided to sit down to have some lunch. He grabbed the sandwich that Carl prepared from him from his inventory and took a bite. One couldn't think and fight efficiently on an empty stomach, after all.
As Roman worked through his lunch, the cavern walls began to shake again. Just as Roman had expected after the shake began, the path to the islet on the water formed.
Roman noticed a possible pattern. After a certain period of time, the cavern would reveal a path to the islet, and in half that amount of time, it would close again.
Roman, however, did not have the time to confirm his theory. Now was the time for action.
He rose to his feet, gobbled down his lunch as quickly as possible, grabbed his dagger and rushed towards the path - all while chewing. We all know chewing food properly helps combat indigestion.
Roman hurriedly took his first steps onto the wet, mushy path leading towards the islet. He needed to make it there in time to find the egg and get back. He didn't plan to linger too long on the islet in fear that his theory about the path revealing pattern was wrong, in addition to the unknown risks of the islet itself.
Not too far ahead, Roman could already see the islet with a set of marble stairs intentionally leading from the path to the shore. He rushed forward aiming for the stairs.
However, just as he was about to arrive at the stairs, to his right Roman saw a shadow pass towards him, exiting from the right water wall into the left.
Roman ducked, before holding himself up against the bottom few steps of the stairs. He swirled himself around to face the danger.
This time, Roman could clearly see what was in the water. It was a Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent, a silver ranked beast. This Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent span a length of 4 meters, and could easily wrap itself around Roman.
Apparently the energy that kept the walls of water up would not prevent organisms from passing through it.
The Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent swam back towards the wall and lunged at Roman once again. Fortunately, Roman was already halfway up the stairs at this time and the serpent hit the wrong spot. The serpent quickly shook off the damage it received from the impact on its head before facing Roman once again.
Roman had no where else to go this time. The Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent was known as such due to its innate desire for food consumption. This species of beast often ate beyond their fill before passing out into hibernation. It was also known to grow half a meter from each greedy spurt that it successfully quenched.
The simple fact that the serpent spanned four meters was indicative of the number of greedy spurts that the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent had overcome.
Usually, these Greedy-eyed Mud Serpents grew more ferocious the more spurts it had experienced due to the sheer number of combat situations it would have to face in order to satiate its hunger.
In addition, the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent's dark brown skin usually gave it the ability to linger on the ground unnoticed or in between the floor of water-borne environments such as the large pond.
It appeared that Roman was next on the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent's list of meals. Maybe even an appetizer perhaps.
The Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent focused its efforts and took another lunge towards Roman, hoping to push him to the ground before entangling him. If the beast catches Roman in binds, Roman would never be able to break free.
This was a silver ranked beast. It was easily the toughest beast that Roman had to faced up to this point.
Roman, however, was not dissuaded by his disadvantage. He continued to rush towards the top of the stairs while brandishing his dagger.
Although all his attacks missed, the Greedy-eye Mud Serpent was just as inaccurate. It was still a little dazed from the impact to the head from the stairs. It hadn't expected Roman to dodge so quickly in the initial few bouts of the fight.
Just as the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent neared Roman in increasingly accurate efficiency, Roman had arrived to the top of the stairs and onto the islet.
Just then, the rising head of the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent had emerged from behind Roman. It bared its fangs in intimidation, preparing its next blow before attacking.
All of a sudden, Roman felt two gusts of wind blow from behind both his ears. When he finally realized what was happening, the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent was getting mauled by the claws of the two beasts.
However, Roman was unable to make out what kind of beasts they were as they were moving too quickly for the untrained naked eye to catch.
Feeling happy about getting lucky from avoiding the last blow of the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent,
Roman quickly ran towards the large tree that lay in the middle of the islet. He didn't even have time to take in all that was around him, he just needed to get himself to safety.
Roman quickly mounted himself on the lowest possible branch that he could reach before climbing the tree.
Roman rapidly approached the middle section of the tree before turning around to inspect the situation.
However, what he saw had shocked him. The Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent was getting pushed back by the two beasts. The beasts had already taken out one of the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent's two eyes which elicited immense bleeding.
The Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent was enraged!
This time, the serpent had drawn its tail towards the front, predicting the movements of one of the beasts while distract it with its head. The Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent finally handed a blow with its tail onto the beast before clamping down on it with its mouth.
From the edge of the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent's mouth were tiny grey feathers. It turned out that the creatures that had saved him were birds!
Birds were known for their willingness to approach humans, much like the Grass Rabbit Roman had encountered from before.
In Aeon, some beasts never desired contact with human beings, and many would reject partnership with the human race. On the other hand, there were also beasts in the world that would go out of their way to discover human communities and form bonds with individuals that they had deemed worthy.
Naturally the degree in willingness to cooperate with humans varied from species to species of bird beasts, however, the truth held that birds were the friends of humans. The grey birds must have noticed Roman's presence as he was escaping from the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent and rushed over to aid him.
Upon realizing that its compatriot got nabbed by the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent, the remaining bird let out a shrill cry and threw its claws towards the remaining eye of the enemy snake hoping to take it out.
With renewed confidence in facing its foe, the Greedy-eyed Mud Serpent once again swung its tail towards the bird.
The bird realized what the serpent was trying to do and quickly flew around the serpent, but just then the bird's flight path was altered. It spread its wings and slowed in the air while facing the serpent.
Something huge was about to take place.
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