Scorpion extermination

The fight was so quick one could not even call it a 'fight', the scorpion was killed before it could even retaliate. Sabrina was astounded, Ron's words were indeed true, he was strong enough to easily handle the scorpions but the mother would still be a problem she thought. She stood there thinking as Ron pulled his hand out and began carving out the scorpion as if looking for something. He stopped before looking at the tail and cutting off a section of the tail.

"Do you need that?" Sabrina was a little confused, why cut off the tail?

"There's a task that asks for scorpion venom glands, it's also why I've chosen to go to the scorpions in the first place" Ron explained his actions to Sabrina.

"I-I've never thought of taking multiple tasks like that" Sabrina was a little embarrassed, it was such a simple thing yet it eluded her and probably many others.

Ron didn't comment on her little scatterbrained moment; he was more interested in his fight with the scorpion. He completely dominated the fight and he didn't even give the scorpion a chance to fight back. He killed the scorpion much faster and cleaner than the first time he fought one. He was now much more confident when it came to fighting the mother scorpion, he would be lying if he said he wasn't nervous. Ron also managed to string his unarmed combat together with his whip, something he was struggling with in the beginning.

Going around the territory killing all the scorpions was going to be a very slow process, Ron debated if he should just rush in and attract them all but eventually decided to play it safe for now. He still didn't know if the mother scorpion's prowess and how many scorpions there were in the nest. He could make a wish for information but would that even be worth it?

Sabrina looked at Ron's thoughtful expression before asking "Is something wrong?" Ron was broken out of his thoughts and told his worries to Sabrina. "I can find out how many scorpions there are and where they are, but what would I get out of it?" Sabrina was willing to help however she wasn't willing to help for free.

"I can give you a third of the venom glands, I'm still killing them and the nest so you can't claim credit for that one" Ron made his stance clear, he wasn't mad that she was wanting to get something for her help that's just logical.

"Deal" Sabrina agreed, she also wasn't too greedy for merit points to fight Ron for more compensation. Sabrina started to draw a magical circle with a piece of chalk she got from her pouch, Ron presumed it was also a spatial pouch. "I need some blood from the scorpion" She told Ron who nodded and grabbed some blood from an empty vial he had in his pouch. 

Sabrina finished drawing the circle and put her hands on the circle, she murmured an unknown language to the circle and it began shining brightly. "Pour the blood on there" She told Ron who did as she asked, once the blood was poured on there it floated in the air and slowly turned into a small fog like substance. Sabrina continued her chant and soon the fog split off into multiple different parts. Ron wanted to count them but saw multiple lines splitting off just outside of view, having no idea how many there were he just waited for Sabrina to finish.

"There are 27 scorpions including the mother scorpion, the closest one is 50 metres north. I'm assuming you'll save the mother for last" Sabrina told Ron her findings, Ron was surprised at the efficiency of the spell but quickly found a flaw in her ways.

"Do you have the time to even draw a circle when fighting an enemy?" Ron asked Sabrina, she had told him she used magic circles to cast spells but didn't think she would have to continuously draw them every time.

"Normally no, but I have a way around that" Sabrina told Ron and pulled out a pair of black gloves from her pouch, on the pair of gloves there were magic circles on the back. Seeing those gloves reminded Ron of another person who used the same type of equipment ('So it's similar to Roy Mustang'). Roy Mustang used special gloves with an alchemy circle on them to be able to use flame alchemy making him one of the most powerful humans of the series.

"I see, shall we go to the next one?" Ron didn't pry why she didn't use the gloves or even why she didn't equip them and just wanted to move on. In total there were 28 scorpions including the one that Ron already killed, with help of Sabrina's pointing out where they were it only took 30 minutes to kill the rest of the scorpions excluding the mother. Ron gave 10 glands to Sabrina, technically he only needed to give out 9 but the help sped up his task immensely so he didn't mind the extra one.

Once Ron entered close to the mother scorpion he got the achievement for finding a scorpion nest netting him an extra 1,500 wish points. This confirmed he needed to find the biggest one controlling the nest, next he was going to test another achievement; killing the scorpion on his own. The previous 'leader' he had killed was the goblin paladin with the help of Goblin Slayer, back then he got wish points credited to him but every other leader was killed by Scarlett since then and Ron didn't get a single point. Ron theorised he had to kill them on his own and Goblin Slayer was contracted to him counting towards him.

Sabrina suddenly stopped walking which made Ron turn towards her in confusion. "What's wrong?" He asked her to which she responded with "I'm not getting too close to your fight with it" although Ron was strong, in her eyes she still had a difficult time to believe he could defeat the mother scorpion and was standing back incase things went south. Ron didn't say anything and just walked forward, he still hadn't used the kindling state and was eager to find out how strong he was with it.

While walking to where the scorpion was Ron felt his excitement rising, this was a first. Did the Belmont bloodline do something unexpected to him? Ron had never heard of a Belmont being excited for a tough fight, was the compatibility too low causing a mutation or was this just his true nature? Ron didn't know the answer but set it aside for now, there were ways to get to know it.

Soon Ron was standing alone in the middle of the desert, he couldn't see the mother scorpion but he knew it was here. Rumblings started to appear on the ground, *boom* one big claw exited from the sand followed by another. The mother scorpion was huge, towering over Ron with a size of 3 metres. It clacked its claws at him menacingly, Ron on the other hand took a deep breath and entered the kindling state. 

*boom* A small ripple exited from Ron's feet, he exuded a threatening feeling like never before at first it was chaotic but slowly it honed in on the mother scorpion. Sabrina, who was watching from a distance shivered once Ron entered the kindling state, ('He still had more!? How is it possible? This doesn't feel like a level one being anymore!'). She never heard of someone actually entering another level with a simple boost in power.

Ron on the other hand could feel his body brimming with power that it was almost overflowing, he felt small pulses of pain which caught him a little off guard ('it seems like it's even more volatile than before') Ron realised using it too much would have even severe consequences rather than just weakness and fatigue.

When Ron was about to slash the whip down on the scorpion it suddenly burrowed underground, being caught off guard Ron quickly jumped back only to see a claw reach where he stood a second ago. Seeing its ambush failed the scorpion went up quickly and extended its stinger straight at Ron with blinding speed. By barely twisting his body to the side Ron managed to dodge the stinger only to be surprised when the stinger suddenly made a swiping motion at Ron with the blunt side.

Putting his guard up Ron was flicked to the side by the scorpion's tail, it felt like being hit with a wrecking ball. The scorpion turned to face Ron once more, Ron charged the scorpion and saw a claw heading for his face. He suddenly sank into the sand, this time the scorpion was caught off guard as Ron surfaced under it with a claw heading towards its belly. Its jump was a bit too late and Ron managed to cut off one of its eight legs.

('What you can do I can do too') Ron used his boots that he had obtained from the thief that wanted his pouch to sink in the sand and emerge as a surprise. The first round ended just like that with both bleeding, Ron from his mouth from the impact of the stinger and the scorpion from its missing leg. Sabrina couldn't believe her eyes, they were almost equally matched.

The scorpion hissed at Ron while Ron could feel his body creaking from the strain, he had to finish this fast or else his body would break. Ron ran around the scorpion to its injured side, the scorpion with one less leg would have more turning issues now. The scorpion understood Ron's game plan however and quickly dug into the sand once Ron had it flanked. Ron was not one to let opportunities pass by; he quickly wrapped his whip around another leg and pulled with all his might, ripping the leg off.

Expecting another claw to reach where Ron was he already jumped back however when he didn't see a claw pop out of the sand he had a bad feeling. Looking down he could see the sharp claw poke out the sand at blinding speeds with intent to bisect him, clearly the scorpion predicted Ron would jump back and moved further than the previous time. Ron barely jumped back again but not fast enough causing a large cut from his pelvis to his face.

Having barely enough time to register the cut Ron saw the stinger heading for him once more, having no more time to dodge Ron quickly put his hand in front of him and caught the stinger with mere centimetres from his face. The force of the stinger still pushed him through the sand and Ron felt his insides churn, suddenly Ron sunk into the sand causing the stinger to miss. In the next instant the sand exploded outward as Ron surfaced immediately with another upward claw reaching the tail overhead of him and cutting it off. *crack* *crack* Ron could hear small cracks in his body which were what he assumed were his bones breaking, not wanting to waste more time Ron rushed at the scorpion who also rushed at Ron with fury for cutting off its tail and legs.

Dodging the first claw that came his way by twisting his body Ron couldn't avoid the second claw completely as it clipped his making a deep cut on his arm so deep that bone was visible, the scorpion out of reflex and instinct wanted to stab Ron with its stinger once he was in its face yet no stinger came because it lay behind Ron on the sand. Ron wasn't going to take any chances and jammed both his hands in the face of the scorpion and pulled outwards with all his might ripping open the scorpion killing it completely.

Slumping on the sand once pulled he ended the kindling state and could feel like his body was being electrocuted, every move he made was painful. Gritting his teeth he went for his pouch and pulled out both the healing potion and the rejuvenation potion he had left and chugged them both. A second later both went into effect and Ron instantly felt relieved of his pain and fatigue, then realisation hit him; he had won against a level two beast.