As Sylver stared at the lone rat, something just felt off.

There was nothing specific about the rat, its location, or even a sign that Sylver could point to as proof of something being wrong with this situation. The rat was sitting on a floating log and was currently using one of its paws to wipe its face.

Even without using [Arcane Insight] Sylver knew this was the rat that had sent him scurrying away with his tail tucked between his legs.

But Sylver hadn’t lived as long as he did by disregarding something as basic as a bad feeling.

As he informed Ria that they were done hunting for today, and to keep her eyes and ears open, Sylver felt a very familiar disturbance in the water underneath him.

Sylver had mixed feelings about being right, yet again, even as the serpent’s barely visible teeth appeared on either side of Sylver, and tried to tear a chunk out of him, and more importantly, his soul.

On the one hand, as Sylver deftly disappeared into a cloud of fog, and left behind 9 explosives in his place, and promptly detonated them to help him gain height, he was glad he wasn’t losing his touch, and his gut was still just short of foolproof.

On the other hand, as Sylver felt something approaching him from the left, and had to dodge down towards the ground, at the slightly damaged serpent, Sylver was getting tired of being right, when he wished he was wrong.

The bear-shaped claws harmlessly passed through the tree Sylver had been touching a moment prior. He once again used [Fog Form] to get away from the serpent’s toothy maw, and as he felt a fourth presence appear in the direction he had attempted to escape into, Sylver realized he was surrounded.

There was a single moment of silence, as Sylver landed on the ground, and the giant serpent, giant bear, giant rat, giant dog, were joined by a giant bat-like creature. It was a little too wide to be a regular bat but calling it a flying rat would just be confusing.

There was coordination in their movement. The serpent went down, the bear went to block Sylver’s escape left, the rat blocked his escape right, the dog went right at him to force him to go up, and the bat would be above him any second now.

Sylver remained calm, as he allowed himself to get caught by the serpent and ignored his body’s pathetic complaints about being crushed between two incredibly powerful jaws. Sylver’s shoulder shattered, and his left foot bent the wrong way because of the position.

He felt the serpent attempt a sort of tug of war with Sylver’s soul, and instead of playing along, Sylver pointed with his pointer finger towards the actual body of the snake and felt his [Dead Dominion] register with the creature before the notification even showed up.

[Common Otso (Marsh Sentry) Defeated!]

[Due to defeating an enemy 40 levels above you, additional experience will be awarded!]

The snake’s tiny body almost tore into two as it collided with Sylver’s palm, and he gripped the bright green viper tightly enough that it spat blood out onto his robe from the force.

The snake’s body disappeared for a moment, as a puff of smoke momentarily covered it. It was covered in burn marks, but in a very distinct pattern, as if some crazy idiot tried to tattoo a snake, but it didn’t go too well.

Appearance aside, Sylver could feel the remaining monsters react to the presence of their comrade suddenly manifesting protectively around Sylver.

Sylver flicked the floppy dead body, and like a whip, it smashed its overly large translucent tail into the bear’s translucent nose. Sylver left the snake behind, as he traveled up through its translucent gullet, and pointed with his glowing skinless bone finger at the startled bear.

Sylver’s first shot missed, he didn’t even nick the bear, but as the snake flicked its head at the bear, and made an attempt to swallow its head, the bear stopped moving for a moment.

[Common Otso (Marsh Defender) Defeated!]

[Due to defeating an enemy 40 levels above you, additional experience will be awarded!]

[Swamp Lord] has reached level 47!

+5AP

Sylver pulled the bear’s partially decapitated body towards himself, along with the chunk of head his abyss magic had sliced off. Sylver spread his arms out as the bear collided with his body, and in a fraction of a second, reinflated the bear’s soul.

It wasn’t perfect, but it didn’t need to be.

With the giant translucent snake slithering around the giant translucent bear’s feet, Sylver turned to face the remaining dog, rat, and bat.

“NOW WHAT FUCKERS!” Sylver shouted at the trio, as his bear soul balloon swiped its claws at the dog, rat, and bat, and the snake flickered its enormous tongue at them.

“Go for the bat when I say Sylver,” Sylver tapped out to Ria, as he took a defensive position, and his movement was mimicked by the bear corpse he was floating next to.

Right now, Sylver was standing in front of the bear’s corpse, and was inside a giant translucent bear, with the translucent snake down near the bear’s feet.

“DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHO YOU’RE MESSING WITH?” Sylver shouted at the remaining monsters and watched with bated breath as his MP ticked up with every passing second. Abyss magic was effective but very expensive.

“I AM THE ONE! AND THE ONLY!” Sylver shouted at the emotionless animals, as he made the bear shadow box towards the dog and could tell by the shift in their feet that they were about to attack.

“AND YOU IDIOTS HAD THE GALL TO-SYLVER!” Ria tore her way out of Sylver’s robe, and like a released arrow, traveled straight at the bat, and hit a perfect bullseye through the flying rodent’s head.

[Common Otso (Marsh Scout) Defeated!]

[Due to defeating an enemy 40 levels above you, additional experience will be awarded!]

As the snake below tried to go for the dog’s feet, and the bear tried to block the rat’s sharp teeth, Sylver felt both poorly constructed souls deflate from the damage and was only able to save his own soul from being hit by using his previously made bear soul armor.

With all 3 corpses in tow using [Dead Dominion] Sylver jumped up from 1 invisible platform to the next, and only now had enough MP to activate a 2nd tier abyss spell.

Sylver was 2 steps away, 3 steps, 5 steps, and just as he was about to be in the clear, high enough for Will to fly the fuck away, he saw something at the very edge of his vision.

He made an on-the-spot decision, as Ria returned to his hand, and pulled himself towards the three corpses, using them like strings in a crossbow, shot himself at the dog and rat.

Unless Sylver was losing it, he was fairly certain he could feel the person controlling and coordinating these things watching him.