8 Raiding the chickens’ Lair (1)

Huo Ling faced seven chickens, of which one was a Guardian Chicken and was a Knight Beast. Huo Ling currently only had a little more than three mana points, 3.2 Mana.

The difference between an Ordinary and a Knight beast was that the Knight could notice if its magic was changed. As such, Huo Ling could unfortunately not directly send it backwards instead of forward or make it explode while it was charging in its beak. Unless he had amazing timing, but he wouldn't bet on it.

Huo Ling would first have to finish off a few of the Ordinary Chickens, as it would be a pain in the ass to dodge six or seven fireballs every time.

All seven chickens fired a fireball towards him at roughly the same time. Huo Ling dodged five, including the one the Guardian Chicken fired. For the last two Huo Ling, both changed their Direction Runes causing them to fire to two of the Ordinary Chickens.

These Chickens, who were just charging a second one, instantly died by flames outside and inside their bodies. However, Huo Ling also faced another five fireballs. In the blink of an eye, Huo Ling came up with his plan. He fired three shots, two toward the fireballs coming from both the chickens on the left side of the Guardian Chicken and one toward the fireball of the Guardian Chicken itself. Both these chickens died under their own attack. The Guardian Chicken's fireball didn't fly anywhere though, it was instead flying in the air aimlessly.

Huo Ling easily dodged the last fireballs and sped forward to slay the last two Ordinary Chickens. The first one died under the claw, but the last one needed another shot in order to kill it quickly. Without hesitation, Huo Ling did so.

Huo Ling was standing five meters from the Guardian Chicken away. It wasn't as tall as the rooster, being only about Huo Ling's height, 1.6 meters. The chicken had white feathers, glowing with a little red. Obviously, it had a high resistance to fire. Its beak was golden, just like its claws. Those claws looked slightly less sharp than the rooster's claw, but it would definitely be enough to cut through Huo Ling.

The Guardian Chicken glared at Huo Ling, it started producing another fireball. Huo Ling, however, didn't dodge nor shoot with his Mana Gun like he usually did. Instead, he charged straight at the Guardian chicken. Behind him, a Rune was being formed as he charged.

In response to the human charging at it, the Guardian Chicken charged another fireball. However, before it could fully charge it, the chicken had to turn 45 degrees and fire it at another fireball, which was aimed straight at his head.

Huo Ling, happy with the distraction, was merely two meters away. The chicken would now have no time to cast its fireballs accurately. The Guardian Chicken also recognizes this and starts pecking at Huo Ling. Huo Ling tried to block an attack with his claw, but immediately a tingling sensation ran through his arm. For once, he was stuck. He would need at the least three fireballs to simultaneously fire at the chicken to do substantial damage.

As he thought this, it struck him. He could simply wait for the Guardian Chicken to spit its fireball, freeze it and do so three times. However, the mana cost made him sweat. Luckily, this one was alone, what if it were four or five at once?

Next, he put his plan in action. He backed away, out of range of the chicken's pecking and waited for fireballs. His plan worked fairly well for the first two times, but the third time the chicken actually didn't want to start charging a fireball while two of its own fireballs had no effect and froze in mid-air. Fortunately, it was still a chicken and had little to no brains.

Huo Ling simply circled around it and the chicken spat another fireball. Huo Ling froze it again. Then, Huo Ling started his attack. In all three fireballs, a new Rune appeared, causing them to fly at the chicken. Huo Ling himself also charged at the chicken from the side.

The chicken now had to face one fireball from the front, two fireballs from the back and one Godslayer from its left side. Obviously, the chicken wasn't intelligent enough to face this kind of situation. It fired a fireball at the fireball coming from the front and wanted to peck at Huo Ling when a scorching heat neared its head. Two powerful impacts landed on its head and neck leaving it momentarily stunned. Huo Ling didn't give it a chance and started furiously scratching its neck until he was sure it was dead.

He was a little hurried, though it wasn't because he was angry and wanted to let off some steam or because he was scared of leaving it alive. No rather, a new threat was approaching quickly. From the corner of his eye, he could see another four chickens, of which one was again a Guardian Chicken.

When the chickens were fifteen meters away they all spat a fireball. Not wasting any time, Huo Ling aimed and shot at the one from the Guardian Chicken, choosing to explode it to buy time. This explosion made the other three fireballs not stable enough and they soon disappeared.

Huo Ling made a run for it. He spent two whole mana points on one Guardian Chicken and now he wanted to take on one with only 1.2 mana?

As Huo Ling ran, slowly his mana bar was replenished. Mana was regenerated fairly fast. One hundred minutes to replenish everything. This came in exceptionally handy when in war. In theory, a magician could join the war every one hundred minutes, use all his mana on an epic spell and then retreat. Or when someone tried to chase a mage -or if that someone was a chicken- they'd have to finish it as fast as possible, as a mage with plenty of mana was no joke.

As Huo Ling had already been running for a full three and a half minutes, filing his mana bar to 1.4 again. Huo Ling was approximately seventy meters from the edge of the valley.