Critical hit!

The air distorted next to Felix and he stuck his hand in to pull out another sword. His eyes remained on the creatures patiently waiting for one of them to move, and not a second later, when one's tail moved ever so slightly, the battle began!

Felix rushed towards them as they did him. The first attack to come his way was a tail rushing at him at crazy speeds! Threatening to impale him!

"Combustion arrow!"

BOOM!

[-249]

Far back, Jasper had shot an arrow with an active skill that caused an explosion that destroyed the tail of the creature!

The other two launched simultaneous attacks at Felix who was still running at full speed, but he quickly showed them what it meant to have 90 [agility] value!

Using his already-gathered momentum, Felix crouched and slid under the first attack to reach him; a swiping paw. He then jumped with a spin and dodged the second one.

While in midair, the second creature opened its wide mouth to swallow him whole! Seeing this, without any hesitation, Felix threw one of the swords in his grasp into its mouth with as much force as he could use!

~ROAR!!

[Critical hit]

[-630]

The creature threw its head up and released a roar of pain. Although they had tough skins that protected them from certain levels of damage, their insides were incredibly soft. So if one managed to deal them damage there, then it would be by no means a small amount.

And also, these swords Felix wielded had special advantages that weren't specified in the skill description that only the person who used it and the person or creature at the receiving end would know.

The third beast had regenerated its tail and rushed at Felix as well as the other one from behind. Now Felix was getting attacked from both sides!

There was no iota of fear or panic on Felix's face as they both came at him. He crouched and his hand phased into the ground.

Seeing him in that position, the one rushing at him from the front stopped and retreated. It was an intelligent creature. It had seen its companion die when this human had entered this very position so it was cautious.

Unfortunately for the beast, Felix was someone who had played Beltimus online for many years and knew that creatures affected by death energy were not your regular kind so he had expected this outcome.

And that was why his plan was never to perform the same trick he had performed last time!

The corrupted forest tiger rushing from behind at full speed was only about three meters away when Felix uttered the word; "Launch."

Suddenly, Felix was high up in the air as a giant sword launched itself out of the ground! It was so big, the hilt was three times taller than Felix and his hand could not possibly go around it!

The sudden appearance of the sword caught the creature off guard but the margin to avoid it was too narrow and it was moving too fast. Its fate was inevitable.

~PHINK!

[Critical damage!]

[-3488]

[Congratulations! +1 monster defeated!]

A stomach-wrenching sound was heard as the creature was cut in half from its head to its midsection as there wasn't enough force generated to cut it all through. In the end, it didn't matter since it was dead.

"Reduce," Felix muttered and the large sword became normal-sized!

He fell and landed on the corpse of the beast but the moment he did, he launched himself toward the last one!

The creature attempted to cut down Felix with its tail but the former was too fast so he was able to dodge it and find his way underneath the beast.

"Enlarge!" Felix said as he performed a 360 spin and the sword became big enough that by the end of the spin, he had cut all four of the creature's legs!

Felix let go of the sword and it disappeared before he ran away from under the beast before it fell flat on its stomach since it had no legs to support it anymore.

The air distorted and Felix stuck his hand in and pulled out another sword. He then swung both at the creature's neck, uttering the word "enlarge" before they reached it the two swords cut through the creature's head and it fell to the floor with a great thud.

After letting go of the two swords and they disappeared, Felix let out a long sigh before looking back to find the third creature only to see a stiff charred corpse with Jasper sitting on it and looking back at him with a smile on his face.

"Good work," Felix said as he approached Jasper.

"Hmph... I told you not to underestimate me," Jasper beamed.

"I'm sure if you were at full power you would've killed them all on your own. You should start recovering your character skills by now."

"You know, when you praise me, I never know if you're being sarcastic or not," Jasper laughed as he jumped down from the beast's corpse. "By the way, since when can you talk to your swords and make them follow commands? I can't remember there ever being a feature like that on the skill."

"I only found out a while back after I got the skill. It's possible that new features were added to all the skills to increase their power output."

"If that's the case then that must be the only good thing that Galliard bastard gave us," Jasper replied with a scoff.

"But more importantly, why haven't we received a mission complete notification yet?" Felix asked as he looked around.

"Because of that," Jasper pointed with his bow behind Felix. The latter looked back to see a corrupted forest tiger that was way bigger than the ones they'd fought!

[Name: Adult corrupted forest tiger

Level: 60

HP:16,789/16,789]

'Shit, those were its cubs!' Felix thought as he took on a stance. Just from looking at the beast's stats, it was obvious that this fight would be a hard one. There was no way he would get out unscathed.

The beast looked around at the dead body of its cubs and its anger had already capped by the time it faced both of them.

~ROAR! PZZZT! BOOM!

The tiger released a deafening roar and a bolt of red lightning struck down from above on it and created a loud explosion that even echoed in the village and caused panic.

By the time the smoke cleared, the tiger had increased ever so slightly in size and had red bolts appearing on its body frequently.

[Attention! The corrupted forest tiger is enraged!]

"Jasper!"

"I got you!" Jasper raised his loaded bow and aimed at the tiger.

The air distorted around Felix and he stuck his hand in and pulled out two swords before muttering; "Swordsman's battlefield, special skill one..."

~DING!

*******

Mikel stopped in his tracks and looked behind him.

[What is it?]

'I just felt... like something called out to me. I can't explain it. It felt familiar and distant at the same time.'

[The link stat has been unaffected for a long time now so it was most probably your imagination.]

'Probably...'

With that Mikel turned and continued on his journey. The village wasn't so far off now and he should approach it not too long after he

would leave the desert.

Unknowing to him, something lurked underneath these pink sands and was following his every move.