CHAPTER 45

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CHAPTER 45

This time Kreegan used Ray of Enfeeblement, Expeditious Retreat, Vanish, Corrosive Touch, and lastly, Cat's Grace as his spells. Their plan was still the same; as Lex distracted, Kreegan would once again attempt to injure the beast.

Kreegan used Expeditious Retreat, Cat's Grace, and Vanish. At the same time, Lex used one of the canons from the ship and opened fire on the beast. Carrying one of the smaller cannons wasn't a problem when he was half-tiger. The cannonball hit the beast on its neck, leaving a scorched mark on its carapace.

The beast started charging toward Lex, but its eyes were darting everywhere. It was obvious the beast was not stupid, and it remembered there was one more. But it was not able to find the one from before, the one that took its leg.

This time Kreegan was not going to aim for a leg. He could keep clipping its legs if they had more chances, but this one was it. Lobster's attacks on the village had increased in the last two days. When Kreegan and Lex made it angry, the bastard was taking its anger out on the village.

This time, Kreegan was going to attack the joint of the left giant claw. He began to put all of his focus on the joint. His eyes started to get tunnel vision. The movement of the Lobster was beginning to slow down in his eyes. Kreegan put both of his hands on his sword and was getting ready to draw them, but at that moment, he felt something was wrong, but he couldn't put his finger on it. It just felt wrong to attack; a gut-wrenching feeling was eating him away, so he jumped. As he jumped, Lobster suddenly turned right, and his tail had just passed where Kreegan had been.

For a second, Kreegan thought it did see him, but the beast was only trashing. It didn't see him, but it was on guard against him. That is why the Lobster was attacking blindly. Kreegan somersaulted and started charging at it again. He only had 10 seconds left of his vanish.

"Perfect Strike, Corrosive Touch, Nitoryu Iai: Rashomon."

He boosted himself using the beast's leg to reach its arm joint. The beast felt him when he stepped on it, but it was too late to do anything. His sword energy cut past its arm, like before, not all the way, but the arm was two times thicker than the leg. Kreegan was up in the air and was wide open for a counter-attack. The beast screeched in pain and swung its other claw at Kreegan. There was no way for him to run, but no way in hell he was going to give it a free hit.

He threw Yubashiri at its left eye and used Ray of Enfeeblement on its wound. Before the claw could hit him, the spell hit the beast first, and its claw slowed down a bit, but the giant claw hit Kreegan so fast he flew away like a bullet. Yubashiri sinks into the Lobster's eye but not all the way. The beast released a scream and tried to pry the sword out of its eye.

"Kreegan!"

Lex turned into a full giant tiger and jumped onto the back of the Lobster. The Lobster was moving more sluggishly and trying to throw Lex out of its back while using its other claw to take the sword out of its eye. He charged toward the wound and used his lighting-filled claw to slash the rest of the arm. His claw was powerful enough to sever the muscles but not enough to cut the rest of the arm. But it was certain that arm was dead from now on; it was a limb without any movement.

Beast released another shrill scream and started trashing around, but Lex had already dashed in the direction Kreegan had flown. Kreegan was buried under a lot of debris. Lex turned half-tiger while the beast was trashing in pain and started digging through the rubble.

After leveling up and all that hellish training, Kreegan's skin, muscles, and bones were getting more durable. With every passing day, he was getting close to the whacky superhuman physique of the One Piece universe. Right now, he has 20 AC (armor class), and when it gets to 30, his skin will become bulletproof against small caliber pistols. An average human would have 5 AC.

After Lex pulled some of the big pieces of the rubble, Kreegan emerged from the rubble like a Terminator. He was bleeding down from his head, and an iron bar was sticking out from his right side. Lex's eyes almost popped out of their sockets, and he said while stuttering.

"Kkkreegan, are you alright?"

"Do I look alright to you?"

"No, you look like you will drop dead any second."

Kreegan's body ached all over, he must have broken at least a few ribs, and he couldn't get the iron bar out, or he would bleed more. He held Lex's shirt and ripped it off him.

"Heyyy!"

Ignoring Lex, he tore the ripped shirt into a strip, wrapped it around his waist like a bandage, and fixed the iron bar firmly. The Lobster was trying to run away because it felt so weak; both Kreegan and Lex's debuff were working, and the beast had lost nearly one-third of its power.

"I don't think I can use Baki or Rashomon in this state. What should we do?"

Lex thought for a second and said,

"We have only one option; let's keep attacking its open wounds."

Kreegan had no spell left other than the cantrips, but he still had two arcane pools. Because of the wound on his side, he won't be able to use two sword styles, and he can only use one-sword style.

"Go pull its attention to yourself, and I will strike the open wound on its arm."

"Oh, man, why the hell am I the bait all the time!"

Lex started running toward the Lobster while complaining. The wound on its arm was right at the joint that connected the arm to the body. If Kreegan could send a powerful attack through that wound, he could theoretically damage its internal organs.

Lex managed to pull its attention, and Kreegan started dashing toward the beast and activated his arcane pool.

"Perfect Strike, Arcane accuracy, Jolt, Ittoryu Iai: Shishi Sonson."

Just as Kreegan had reached for his sword to launch his attack, Lobster ignored Lex and did a sharp turn toward Kreegan, but this sharp turn caused the left giant claw, which was only attached to its body by the carapace, to break off and fly towards Kreegan.

"Fuck!"