章節 110: One Perilous Hour
Due to his Eyes of Hermes, Isaac was able to observe an unusual shape in the distance. While from afar, it looked just like a ridge of snowy hills that was close to 100 meters tall, which was nothing too remarkable in this arctic hell, he had taken note of some breaths being exhaled. They came from two spots that were about ten meters apart and whirled up miniature snow storms that ebbed and flowed following the same rhythm as the breaths.
When he had used his mana to stealthily probe a bit further, he had soon realized that these breaths came from the nostrils of a truly enormous beast. He could have spent some more effort on getting a closer look at it by using his mana to penetrate the massive layers of snow, but simply by relying on these relaxed breaths, he could already tell that this monster's stats far surpassed his. Now, he needed to conserve as much energy as he possibly could. After all, he would get to see the beast soon anyway once the battle commenced, right? A bit of patience would do the trick.
To make sure that he wouldn't have to spend a considerable amount of effort on reclaiming his new servant's soul and fashioning her a usable vessel, he thought it wise to send her to safety. He had never intended for her to be much of a soldier anyway, so why throw her life away futilely?
Once she had left, his heartbeat had already started to quicken, and he could barely contain his excitement. Although he derived a lot of joy from his usual research, from the acquisition of new knowledge and from spending time with his beloved, he also longed for truly challenging battles. What did some people call it again? 'A man's romance'? Well, it was similar - he liked to give his best, and to test his limits. To be forced to improvise and improve.
While he could achieve a similar effect by restraining his stats, the feeling that he got would never be the same as when he truly had to go all out or face dire consequences for his negligence. Admittedly, there was always the option of breaking the shackles that was the system and to overcome any and all difficulties with a simple thought, so in a way, he would never truly be able to experience what others had to endure during life and death moments. Still, what he would be able to feel now was a close second, and the best that he could achieve currently.
In the early days after his arrival, he had still faced actual challenges every now and then, but for a long time since, he had missed this feeling. Now, it had finally returned! And all it took was a Level 7 Monster Rex.
With swift and silent steps, Isaac crept closer to the massive monster, intending to test up to which point he would be able to approach it without blurring his existence - that was yet another 'cheat' that he wouldn't use unless necessary, or unless he just didn't care about what he was doing at the moment. In any case, during a one-on-one battle, he preferred to avoid utilizing it.
When he was less than two kilometers away, close enough to easily make out some details of the snowflakes that covered the small hill ridge, he felt the ground beneath him rumble. The shape that had been hidden underneath the snow finally showed itself, with massive amounts of wintry downpour pelting the surrounding land, causing a small avalanche in all directions.
The monster he saw was both the strongest that he had ever laid his eyes upon - an awe-inspiring figure - as well as one that made him smirk a little in speechlessness. It was a tiger, a white one with black stripes. While it stood on all fours, it was close to 200 meters tall, and about 600 meters long. It was, by far, the biggest creature that he had ever seen. It honestly felt surreal.
But what truly perplexed Isaac was that this Monster Rex looked just like what he had personally always imagined yet another mythological figure from his past world to look like.
'Isn't this just basically Baihu?!'
Well, not exactly. After all, that White Tiger was usually associated with autumn, not winter. This one, apart from the colour of its fur, was therefore simply not the one that had initially come to Isaac's mind.
'Eh, I'll still call it Baihu. It's majestic enough.'
It wasn't like he had all the time in the world to come up with a great name for this floor boss, so he simply went with that first thought of his. Nobody in this world would know who or what Baihu was anyway. Hopefully.
Fully awakened from its pleasant slumber, the mind-bogglingly huge tiger focused its gaze on the incredibly small ant in front of it. Even its pupil's diameter was almost twice the height of this insignificant little thing. If Baihu had been encountered in the wild, then it would have surely ignored Isaac, or only reacted once he had made a ruckus on its body. After all, which animal would rise from its slumber just to squash a little louse? Only when there were many of them would they arouse its vexation. Still, this was the dungeon, so whenever an adventurer got close to a monster, the latter would give in to its inherent bloodlust and try to tear them to pieces, no matter how pathetically weak the prey may be.
In an effort to use the distance between them to guess the white tiger's stats more accurately, Isaac stared back at it without moving, only for it to suddenly roar towards the heavens - not that there were any in this place - and stomp strongly on the ground, shooting in his direction.
The sound of the outcry was so loud that he found it difficult to keep a clear head, and the sound waves rattling his body didn't make things any easier - still, he managed. Its speed was a whole other issue, though. Using his expertise to judge its various movements, he made a bone-chilling judgement - its Agility was at Level 7, at I-50 / 88,250, to be exact. This was more than 20,000 stat points higher than his own. However, it wasn't like he hadn't expected this.
While, yes, this was only around 30 percent higher than his own Agility, a gap that he had easily been able to bridge in the past with sheer skill and prediction… things were a little more difficult now.
An example: If someone was capable of moving at a speed of ten kilometers per hour, and another person managed to be 30 percent faster, they would move at 13 kilometers per hour. All in all, while the difference was 30 percent, it would still be easily bridgeable, and one could effortlessly follow the faster one with one's eyes. But if one person moved at 1,000 kilometers per hour, and another at 1,300 kilometers per hour, then the situation would be very different. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to keep track of the faster one, from the slower one's point of view.
This problem was somewhat alleviated by the vast improvement to all senses that adventurers got blessed with during every rank up. Still, the gap between Isaac and Baihu was far vaster than a measly 300 kilometers per hour - to be exact, Isaac could currently reach top speeds of about 2,500 kilometers per hour, while Baihu… even the tiger's effortless movements allowed it to reach more than 3,100 kilometers per hour.
One thing that had long since baffled Isaac about this world was that none of the fast-moving adventurers or monsters that should have broken through the sound barrier many times, because the speed of sound seemed to be around the same as back in his old world, actually produced any sonic booms.
This seemed highly unscientific at first glance, and he truly had no final explanation for it yet. One of the ways that this could be explained was that someone who was in control of the related laws of this world had simply eradicated the existence of sonic booms. Judging from how weird some of the gods' behaviour was, the ones reigning far above them would undoubtedly have some curious characters amongst their ranks as well. He wouldn't be surprised at all if one such being had suddenly decided to remove sonic booms in their entirety "because they are loud and annoying".
Of course, during this high-speed battle, Isaac had no time whatsoever to actually think about any of this. After he had approximated his enemy's speed, he barely managed to react before the massive tiger barrelled past him. By less than a meter, he had managed to slip through its legs. He had made use of his Anemoi Steps to avoid having to step unto the trembling ground, as his footing would be anything but stable there.
A look of irritation appeared on Baihu's face - it had noticed that the ant was still alive and now buzzing about in the air. Incredibly quickly, it came to a stop, whirling up many tons of snow in the process and shattering the side of the mountain that it landed on. With a powerful lunge, it propelled itself towards Isaac again, this time also making use of its paws to swipe at him.
There were good news and bad news.
The good news was that the tiger had moved for close to ten kilometers before it had come to a standstill, so the distance between the two was now bigger, giving him far more time to react, to feint and to get out of the way.
As for the bad news… well, a blizzard had long since started to batter him. It had appeared when Baihu had first roared - this one sound and its accompanying sound waves had already been enough to stir up a lot of snow. The tiger's movements, which had incredible amounts of force behind them, just stirred it up even more. Isaac was also certain that a little bit of mana manipulation had been at play as well, helping the blizzard to kick off very quickly. But honestly, in the current situation, he would be hard pressed to dispel this massive Magic.
There also weren't many reasons to do so. First of all, he didn't know how many times the tiger could use it, and he needed to keep his Eyes of Hermes active at all times to cover his blind spots and to have a far superior field of view. Wasting mana on an uncertainty with no clear finish line would be a fool's errand. But more importantly, now that the blizzard had already progressed to this point and would only be further invigorated by the many future movements of Baihu, the impact that dispelling the tiger's magic would have would be very minimal. By now, the forces of nature had taken over the wheel, and the white tiger was only occasionally feeding the driver a snack of mana from the passenger seat.
Isaac's body fluttered about like a leaf in a hurricane, and anybody else would have grown nauseous or disoriented. As usual, he had yet again entered the realm of supreme focus, the world akin to a chessboard. This time, his senses were stretched taut, and even though he was multitasking and sweating slightly, he didn't look nervous at all. Almost subconsciously, in his delight, he began to laugh in elation. Maybe it was his way to deal with the last bouts of nervousness that he felt when confronted with this never-before-encountered challenge.
While the tiger got closer in what would feel like the blink of an eye to any observer, Isaac accurately predicted the movements of all the chaotic gusts of wind around him, as well as the plentiful amounts of ice and snow that were mixed within in all shapes and sizes. With what seemed to be ease, he strategically placed short-lived footholds of dense air with his Anemoi Steps and allowed his body to be blown around by exactly the gusts that could help him accelerate in the direction that he wanted to go. It seemed like a random pattern at first glance, but it was one that still afforded him the luxury of not letting any sharp objects harm his body. Due to the timely support of good old mother nature, he evaded the tiger's entire charge - by far more than just a small margin this time.
His laugh grew louder and more unrestrained, and the excitement in his eyes burned hot. It looked as if he was having the time of his life playing with this big cat. But really, it was far from easy. More and more beads of sweat accumulated on his forehead, and most of his muscles were being forced to their limits. Only due to his basically perfect control could he achieve what nobody else with stats like him would be able to do - to seem like a leisurely, playful kid in this apocalyptic scenario.
Once more having been slighted, Baihu grew even angrier this time. It had flattened a more than 500 meter tall hill with its latest attack, razing it to the ground and adding a few more projectiles to Isaac's Touhou-esque bullet hell, one where he had heavily restricted movement opportunities.
Roaring repeatedly in rage, Baihu continued to accelerate further, soon only using its top speed to attempt to knock Isaac out of the air. If it had been a bit smarter, and less influenced by the dungeon, then it would surely have realized that a major reason for its failure was the natural calamity that it had kicked off - it was one of Isaac's greatest assets at the moment.
For a while, the two were at an impasse, as neither of them could hurt the other. Isaac didn't even attempt to get close to Baihu - as that would only lead to a successful death speedrun - and only used the last vestiges of his focus to closely observe the tiger, intending to figure out any weaknesses that it could possibly have. He had put the khopesh back into his inventory even before he had gotten close to the snowy hill ridge, as he had known that it couldn't be of any help at all.
He was well and truly stumped - just how could he possibly harm this tiger? Even if he found some weak point, how could he actually exploit it? He didn't have an elemental enchant type Magic like Ais, which could be used to achieve devastating, large-area effects. He also didn't have any strong Magics at his disposal - at least none that could do noteworthy amounts of damage. Lastly, he was missing equipment which could allow him to bypass the tiger's defenses, and to maximize his own stats.
Nonetheless, he laughed in a carefree manner, while he was forcing his brain to nearly overclock like an expendable hardware component. The amount of simultaneous calculations that it was being subjected to was nearly unfathomable.
When there finally was another lull in the tiger's countless attempts to make Isaac slip up even once, after close to twenty minutes, the laughing madman finally quietened down. Taken aback by the sudden change, Baihu furrowed its brows for a moment, but sadly it wasn't capable of ruminating about what exactly was going on. Still, its beastial instincts told it that its prey had to be weakening.
This couldn't be further from the truth, however. Isaac had only stopped expressing his joy because he truly had to get ahold of all of his available resources now - nothing could be missing.
If he had been a musclehead, he would have charged at the tiger directly, and assaulted it with punches and kicks. While those wouldn't really deal any damage to its hide, the shock waves would still travel through the inside of its body, possibly causing some harm. However, this would likely be very limited in effectiveness, because usually, a Monster Rex' stats were all the same. So, with an Endurance of I-50 / 88,250, could Isaac's measly Strength really put a dent in this thing? The answer was no.
Instead, what he had focused on all this time was a new kind of Magic, one that he had been conceptualizing and occasionally working on for a long while. He had failed countless times, and was still in the middle of fine-tuning it. Its essence wasn't considered to be anything extraordinary - at least in Isaac's old world - laser cutting. Here in this world, a Magic like it may exist, but the principles behind it would surely not be fully understood, neither would the Magic have been created by a member of the sentient races, or even a deity.
By using his mana to affect the environment in a plethora of different ways, he constructed an artificial laser in the air. As the pump source, he made use of electrical discharge, the voltage and frequency of which was already hair-raisingly difficult to control. For the laser's medium, he chose a gas mixture of primarily Carbon Dioxide, but also traces of Helium, Nitrogen, Hydrogen as well as water vapor. He had already confirmed that the air's composition here was basically identical to that of his old world - using his mana to very carefully control its composition was possible, and the most difficult obstacle that he had been faced with ever since he had decided on creating this laser cutting Magic. Thankfully, he had overcome it days ago.
Creating the optical windows, as well as lenses, had successfully been dealt with already. Admittedly, he was simply improvising and putting together a patchwork product - this magical construct would only be capable of lasting for a short bout of attacks. Finally, he arrived at the last step - creating an optical resonator by using his mana. The silvering and optical coatings, especially the high-reflection coating for the high reflector, were the parts that he still had to fine-tune.
Luckily, nobody but him needed to fully understand the broad scientific knowledge necessary for this magical construct to function. If he bombarded anyone else with all of these terms, they wouldn't understand a thing, except for a couple of scientists from his old world. He wouldn't go out of his way to bore any of his new acquaintances with these trivialities, unless they really wanted to endure many years worth of science lectures.
Still, wasn't jumping from something as 'simple' as the mana control required for his Anemoi Steps and his Eyes of Hermes to a feat thousands of times more complex a little rushed? Especially in such a dangerous situation, where he couldn't really fully focus on the task at hand!? Yes. But it wasn't like Isaac had any other cards up his sleeves at the moment, so he would just try his absolute best. Working under pressure could oftentimes produce far greater results compared to what one would be capable of under normal circumstances.
Unsurprisingly, the first attempt of using the laser cutting Magic right above the tiger's neck failed. Not because it noticed that some of the mana in its surroundings acted strangely and disturbed its casting, not at all. While it did realize that something was weird, even Baihu wouldn't have been quick enough to react in time. Isaac had simply messed up at one of the last steps, just like thousands of times before.
Even though he had used a non-negligible amount of his mana reserves, and he was still burdening his brain to its very limit - if not further - he didn't get discouraged in the slightest. After all, he had just eliminated another possibility thanks to this failure. Well, in any case, he didn't even have the energy, time or brain power to spare to feel much at the moment.
The minutes passed by slowly, with Isaac using every single possible opportunity to attempt perfecting his laser cutting Magic. Hundreds of times, he failed, but slowly, he got closer to his goal. In the process of the battle, he had even been grazed by a handful of icicles and rock shrapnel, causing some minor wounds. As he hadn't been in any mortal danger, he had chosen to ignore these particular projectiles, although he was well aware of the comparatively dire circumstances that would be sure to follow.
As Isaac and Baihu were still 'dancing' with each other while being accompanied by a deadly blizzard, the first drop of Ichor dripped upon the dungeon's floor, causing it to tremble in rage. All over the 62nd floor, black variants of the various monster species that inhabited this thematic zone started to spawn. Far in the distance, thousands of kilometers away, one of the mountains trembled, as a massive black tiger with white stripes slowly awakened from its comfortable slumber in the dungeon's floor.
Finally, when Isaac had used up nearly half of all of his available mana, he succeeded at activating the laser cutting Magic - it was fully stable! Using its maximum output without a care, he sliced down upon Baihu's neck, intending to sever it or to at least damage it severely. A cut almost three meters deep appeared on the regal white tiger's neck. The Magic had successfully started to nick one of its vertebrae.
Sadly, at this point, the temporary magical construct grew unstable and fizzled out, but Isaac was undeterred. He completely ignored the Ichor dripping from his cheeks and expressionlessly activated the Magic again. There had been a system notification when he had first successfully used his new Magic, but it simply wasn't possible to pay any attention to it right now.
In quick succession, he assaulted the tiger's exposed vertebrae again and again. Although Baihu seemed to be able to heal from injuries relatively quickly, that only referred to flesh wounds - its bones couldn't get restored nearly as fast. In between Isaac's laser attacks, the tiger didn't even manage to recover its marred tissue by more than ten percent - it could only continuously accumulate the damage. Any monster that wasn't controlled by the dungeon would have long since tried to escape, but the white tiger only had one command in its mind: To slay this annoying ant.
After the 17th cut, the vertebrae was finally severed, and Baihu's head fell downwards against its will, in the process ripping open even more of its neck. After the 19th cut, the head was entirely severed from the body. Still, the tiger didn't die straight away. Its head continued to glare at Isaac with bloodlust. This would have carried on for a few minutes if Isaac hadn't quickly utilized his newly acquired Magic to attack its brain directly, through the hole in its skull that was located right behind its eyes. He had used a similar strategy against the Zimsmoks not too long ago.
To make doubly sure, he also directly cut apart the heart of the massive tiger. In total, he had to cast the laser cutting Magic 24 times before he was awakened from his supremely focused state by a most welcome system notification.
[ Achievement Progress: Kill 1000 Level 7 monsters. (1/1000) ]
創作者的想法 
Shiro_the_Hero
Shiro_the_Hero Disclaimer: I personally have zero interest in laser cutting technology - if you are an expert in the field, please forgive my broad, vague terms and descriptions of it.
I'm glad I don't need to know about everything in detail, and can just leave the rest to Isaac xD A couple of hours of quick research have got to suffice on my end ^^' (I'm more of a philosopher than a scientist myself, in case you were wondering.)
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this first Monster Rex fight! \o/
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