-Vol 5: A New Life-

-Lava Monster(1)-

Just when Kenshin was preparing for his dick move, the whole dungeon trembled as if a massive earthquake occurred outside. The ground shook violently, cracks and fissures appeared everywhere as the trees were uprooted. The crocodiles’ orgy down there was also disrupted due to this massive shaking.

Some looked discontent while others frustrated, the crocodile chief even stomped on the ground twice to show its anger. But that soon transformed into horror as it sensed something in the air. Addressing the crowd, it gave to a few roars. Kenshin, who felt that these roars were filled with urgency and fear, watched in fascination as the crocodiles started to scurry away from the place, dispersing everywhere like a bunch of ants.

But he, who had a connection with earth due to a certain skill, felt something amiss with this whole situation. That time when the ground shook for a few seconds, his faint connection with the earth warned him about some kind of doom. Even his sixth sense, honed from countless battles and upgraded by his awakened WIL, warned him about the danger that’s yet to appear. This sense had saved his life countless times, and at a time like this, he couldn’t just ignore it. That’s why, when he felt the tingling in his heart and its rapid beating after, he immediately turned around and ran like its nobody’s business.

Just when he passed the two hundred meters mark, the ground beneath where he just stood, cracked open with a booming noise and continued until the whole clearing used by the crocodiles as a breeding ground, sunk several meters deep. For a few seconds, nothing happened. Although nearly all crocodiles fled, a few, who couldn’t in time caught up in a mess and splattered into meat paste by the force of the quake and the sequela. According to Kenshin's estimation, the number that died should be around sixty to seventy crocodiles, not even 10% of the total gathered here for their mating ritual.

Standing a few hundred meters away from the place, he observed the completely destroyed area in anticipation, waiting for the culprit to appear. Although the map wasn’t showing anything, he was sure that his instincts couldn’t be wrong. A few days ago, after the appearance of Axel, Kenshin finally noticed some weakness or more like problems with his map.

Though it seems like omnipresent, it was still affected by certain factors. First of all the distance; unlike satellite maps, it didn’t show the whole world’s map, only the places he had visited and unknown lands up to 100 km. Next, it was affected by certain skills. That is to say, if someone possesses a high leveled sneaking type skills, his map wouldn’t be able to detect it. The living proof of it was Axel, whom he still couldn’t detect even if he were sitting near him. Another one added to that list was, this, yet to appear monster that caused this mass killing and taken Kenshin’s spot for being the cock-blocker.

With bated breath, he waited for its appearance. Although he had a high stat value, he wasn’t the least bit arrogant. That fight with the vicious man had awakened him to the harsh reality of strength. Until that day, he thought that having more stat was everything and he could easily achieve victory. But who would have thought that not only gaining stats, he also has to master them! This realization came to him in the form of a bone spur to his stomach. Thankfully he was strong, and nothing serious happened, or else he would have regretted it for the rest of his life.

He calmly waited for the culprit to appear so that he could gauge its strength. He was also surprised to find a skill similar to Axel’s, that could bypass his system’s detection. One thing he realized though; as he grows stronger, he was slowly starting to discover the various weakness of his system, especially his stats allocation. The demerit of huge stat increase as well the problems associated with it, all these were coming to light with each passing day.

He also realized why the system only offers 4 stat point before level 50 and 8 after. It was so that the user could master the already received points before gaining new.

XXX

From the cracked ground, a huge amount of sulphuric gas emitted as if below it was an active volcano ready to burst any moment. Kenshin waited a few more minutes, but nothing came out except for the gasses. He narrowed his eyes at this, he was sure there was something beyond those high concentrated sulfuric gas, but whether it was his eyes or in the map, he couldn’t see anything.

Kenshin decided to close in a little towards the area since the monster wasn’t coming out and he couldn’t see anything with his map. Obviously, it had some means to bypass detection. With calculated steps, he came even closer to the smoking place. The high concentration of sulfur did nothing to deter him, neither he felt nauseated by it. His PHY was by no means small, he could even shrug off high amount damages. Enduring something of this scale was of no problem to him. In fact, he felt no problem breathing, as if the sulfur wasn’t even there, even his vision wasn’t blocked when he closed on.

Like a cautious rabbit, he watched his every step before going closer. Just as he was about to cross a certain mark, suddenly a tentacle made of boiling, molten lava came at him, aiming at his head and heart.

“This…!” he was so surprised that he couldn’t react at all and allowed the molten lava tentacle to splash on his body.

[-0]

Red colored damage value floated above his head. Kenshin opened his eyes and discreetly wiped sweat from his brows, and then pretend to be calm about it. That time, in surprise, he even let out a strange shout. Eyeing his surroundings, he sighed in relief for not finding anyone to see his shameful act. Fury flashed in his eyes, and he clenched his fist, swearing it in his heart.

Taking an oath to slaughter whoever was involved in this, Kenshin abandoned all pretense and ran forth with his fist held high.

After passing through the coagulated sulfur gas, Kenshin found himself at the edge of a pool like structure filled with molten lava. From within the lava pool, huge bubbles were emerging and bursting every now and then, increasing the temperature of the surrounding by a few more degrees.

His instincts told him its no ordinary lava, but neither his system or his detection skill could catch it. He had a feeling that the so-called special monster of this dungeon should be related to this molten lava, and the attack just now had confirmed his belief.

Hence here he was standing defencelessly at the edge of the molten pool, waiting for the monster to appear…

…and waited for a few minutes.

There was no change to the pool, but Kenshin knew it was watching him from beyond the pool. Although he remained unharmed from that lava splat, taking a deep on the pool was tantamount for asking trouble.

“Okay! If it's not coming out, then I will force it out.” Nodding his head, he channeled his magic through his legs and to the earth. A counter vibrating force was generated and amplified as the seconds ticked. With his Heart of Rhythm, he had already memorized the frequency of the vibration when the earth shifted just now and generated a counterforce to that frequency.

The whole world started to shake again. A quake, many times bigger and vicious than what generated earlier ripped the earth like it’s mere paper.