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Limitless Path Chapter Two Hundred Thirty
🕑 Added 2024-05-28 17:00:05 +0000 UTCThe next morning came fairly quickly, at least for Beth, who hadn't really expended much effort. Killing the bandits had been a grim, but easy, job that they had finished fairly quickly before returning to the Hall, and their morning efforts at training hadn't been overly taxing. She held Sabs close as the smaller woman slept, gently caressing her as she enjoyed luxuriating in the warm, comfortable bed, the feeling of the other woman pressed against her rather pleasant.
Sabs stirred eventually, waking slowly, realizing where she was and that she was now awake after a few minutes. She nuzzled against Beth for a little while, kissing her neck and the top of her chest a little bit while she pressed their bodies together even more firmly. Beth rubbed Sabs's back for a while as she did so, kissing the top of her head and forehead several times while they embraced. Eventually, she decided she had to stir herself or she was going to spend the whole day in bed, and she really wanted to get through with Jaq's task so she could move on to taking her test.
She broke apart from Sabs and sat up, stretching before moving to the edge of bed. Surprisingly, Sabs simply rolled over with a heavy grunt and buried her face in the pillows. She wriggled back under the covers as Beth stood and stretched before walking over to the door.
"Not getting up?" she asked.
"Hmm-mmm," was Sabs only reply.
Beth grinned, taking in the sight of the beautiful girl, sprawled out and only half covered, for several moments before exiting the bedroom. She shut the door behind herself, seeing Blood still sprawled on the couch, though the twitching of her ears gave away her wakeful state. Beth moved into the kitchenette to get some tea ready before returning to the living room and setting the cup on the center table. Blood climbed up right before Beth sat, letting her snake the couch, finding the cushions almost hot from Blood laying on them.
The lupine woman had gone to get food, which Beth mimicked after getting mostly through her tea. After they ate, they finished the rest of their morning routine before heading out, their clothes and armor appearing on their bodies right before Beth opened the external door. She made sure the door closed firmly behind them, following along behind Blood as the wolf led the way, first out of the Hall and then towards their first target for Jaq.
They bypassed the kobold field, Beth wanting to monitor it but not concerned enough to be checking on the place every day. If Sabs, as well as possibly her sisters, kept pushing themselves fairly hard the next few weeks to couple months, they could likely catch up to the point where they could clear the field, if not actually venture underground. The kobold area would be a great area to farm levels and money, particularly for the others, as Beth and Blood could always take advantage of Beth’s power.
And, speaking of her power, her gate power had not leveled in some time, but she did get a vague sense that it would level primarily through use. The one very long grindfest they had done recently wasn't really enough to push it to the next level and, in fact, it would be better for them to use it more often rather than just do it all at once. The only great advantage of the way they had done it, apart from sky-rocketing their levels in a short amount of relative time, was that it put Beth's soul under more strain. A stronger soul would be more useful in the future, but for now the one benefit it did provide was slightly growing her natural mana reservoir.
She re-focused as Blood, some distance ahead of her, drew close to the coordinates. They tended to move about at a very high speed, not bothered by the small amount of mana that burned, and not caring for any beasts it attracted. There didn't seem to be anything over level one hundred roaming around, and even things close to one hundred were very rare to see and usually around some unusual sight or dungeon like the aforementioned kobold area.
It appeared this area was something similar, as Blood reported back that there were beasts in the high-seventies already. Something level seventy or seventy-five wouldn't be too unusual on its own, but a group or even a horde of such beasts was definitely out of the ordinary. Beth paused some distance out, assuming her typical crouch high up in a tree, glad that everything on Earth was slowly becoming stronger. The flood of mana was causing beasts, monsters, dungeons, strange portals, and more to pop up in massive numbers, the beasts in particular, but it would take longer to affect the materials of the world. Changing the nature of living things was an even slower process, and trees, as living things, were slower to absorb and adapt to the mana.
The tree she was in had absorbed enough mana that it was a decent bit stronger than what it would have been just eight months ago, allowing her to sit on a high branch without worrying about her somewhat increased weight snapping it. She waited as Blood continued scouting, the woman having briefly resumed her wolf form to move around the area and take advantage of her slightly better sense of smell. She kept many attributes from her wolf-form in her human-form, including a better sense of smell, but she still had more powerful senses in her wolf-form, though she rarely used it.
After half an hour, she appeared at the base of Beth's tree in her human form, and Beth hopped down with a heavy thump. Blood indicated for her to follow and led the way to their current objective, circling around it to approach from an angle that had fewer beasts and would be harder to detect. Ten minutes later, Blood led the way in slinking over a small, rocky outcrop, something the two of them could easily leap, but they were trying to be far less obvious. Crouching on top of the rocks, Beth looked down into what appeared to be a small caldera, including a pond about a hundred feet across in the very center. The whole thing was weird, as it was in the middle of an area of relatively flat ground for a few miles around, but Beth had already seen stranger stuff.
Their job here was to figure out just what this was and what was happening. They didn't necessarily have to be as thorough as with their other jobs, but each of these areas was also likely to not be as complex as the kobold area and everything it entailed. From what they could see of this area, for example, it didn't appear that it descended deeper into the ground, nor was there any kind of portal or instance entrance anywhere that they could see. The beasts in the area also weren't particularly impressive; not compared to Beth and Blood, anyway, as even the strongest at the center of the depression wasn't at level one hundred.
The area was filled with some kind of lizard-like beasts, mainly sitting in the sun and warming their scales, the light reflecting in shades of blue and green. Beth and Blood hopped down into the shallow crater, moving towards the pond at the center, ignoring most of the lizards. The lizards mostly ignored them, though that was more to do with them picking out a path that didn't pass close to any of the beasts more than the lizards not being violent like other beasts.
Still, they did have to kill a few of the lizards, though that took only a strike or two each. Beasts not yet at level one hundred were not particularly tough which, coupled with the level difference, made them a joke. It would be different if the beasts were over level one hundred, even with their advantage of fifty or just under levels, the massive boost beasts got at that level meaning it would take a good handful of well-placed strikes to kill them. It wasn't a concern for them now, however, as they moved through the area almost unimpeded.
What was a concern, they soon found, was the pond, as there was nothing else but rocks and lizards in the area. Beth looked over at Blood, who returned the look after a moment, Beth getting the distinct impression from the tilt of her head that she was frowning behind the mask, not saying anything as she picked up on what Beth was implying. Beth stared at her for a minute before sighing and shrugging, taking two steps forward before leaping into the air, easily launching herself into the center of the pond with a simple flex of her knees.
She fell into the water with a great splash, sinking under the surface quite quickly. She was not particularly buoyant, despite certain assets giving her a slightly higher percentage of body fat than she might otherwise have and, coupled with her armor and equipment, she did a rather good impression of a stone. The water was surprisingly cold, even for it being May and most summer swimming pools not yet being open because they would be too cold still. It had to be only ten or so degrees above freezing, something that would have bothered her a lot more were her stats not so high, coupled with her moderately decent level in Ice Resistance.
She didn't resist the pull of gravity, looking around as she pushed deeper into the water. Fortunately, the water was quite clear, with no sediment or impurity making it murky, allowing the light to penetrate fairly deeply quite easily. The light highlighted an area about thirty feet wide that plunged deeper than the rest. Beth kicked a little to re-orientate herself, facing downward and moving slightly to be centered over the shaft.
She noted that Blood hadn't leapt in after her. Despite how much the wolf loved to bathe and relax in the tub, she didn't seem to enjoy swimming that much, whether there was any danger present or not. Beth just shook her head as she fell deeper into the chasm in the middle of the pond, noting that while it was a little dark, she could still make out the bottom. The first thing that stood out to her as she stared downward was a small, glowing object near the center of the area.
The second thing that stood out to her was a massive shape, raising its head to stare up at her with cold, savage eyes. Its body was super thick, like a half dozen boulders lumped together with heavy, scaled plates overlapping on top. It had four massive, thick legs with huge, webbed feet at the end, each sporting five claws. The claws were very dark and quite long, with the entire length being razor sharp and slightly curved. The head was a big, blocky affair attached to a moderate length, thick neck. An armored ridge continued down the back from the base of the head, following the spine all the way down to a long, broad tail that had heavy spikes near the end. Beth estimated the beast at twenty feet in length, not counting its nearly twenty feet long tail. She Identified it as it rose through the water towards her.
Level 170 Deep Sea Rock Gator
'Blood. Help,' Beth sent, seeing and hearing the wolf hit the water before she was even done saying it.
The wolf didn't fall like Beth, instead cutting through the water almost literally, using her claws and powerful arms to slice down towards Beth at a great speed. Beth, meanwhile, had flared all her buffs and started charge mana in her limbs. Unfortunately, they didn't have anything that made it any easier for them to fight underwater, including the whole breathing part, but she wasn't too concerned about their prospects. At least, not yet.
The beast moved right as Blood passed her, surging upwards with enough force that the water around them was pushed back. Blood didn't wait for the beast to get to them, slashing out with a double-barreled Blood Queen's Claws as the beast was still rising. The beast turned its head to the side, avoiding taking the attack right to the face, and the energy claws slammed into its neck and back. Blood hadn't gone all out with that opening salvo, but the hardened plates covering the beast absorbed the damage with barely a scratch.
Beth knew that this would be her time to shine, as it often was against the more heavily armored opponents. She swam down right behind Blood, the wolf distracting the beast giving her a great opportunity to get in close and strike. The beast's defenses ironically became its weakness, as she was able to grab onto the heavy plates covering it, wedging her left gauntlet deep into the joint between two plates. She pulled her right arm back and smashed it down, hindered somewhat by the viscosity of the water, but it seemed her buffs helped slightly. Swift helped them both move faster, which seemed to provide a little aid in moving through whatever medium they were in. Beastly Body also provided a little assistance, both from her increased strength as well as the mana infusing her body seemingly making her just a tad more resistant to outside influences.
The fight wasn't quite as tough as Beth feared, though it was a little longer than she thought. What was likely a special variant beast at level one-seventy was crazy tough, especially with the water interfering with their movements, and it took a very long time to beat it down. Even with Beth Crushing through its armor and Blood taking advantage of the damage she was dishing out to add her own attacks into the mix, it was more than fifteen minutes before Beth was wedged onto its corpse. The beasts high STR and thick body with low DEX meant it had quite a difficult time trying to shake Beth off, even failing to dislodge her by slamming into the walls of the deep shaft.
Not that they came out totally unscathed, of course. Beth had been thrown around and slammed into walls and objects, she was just tougher than the walls, absorbing the hits and moving with them to minimize the damage. Still, she needed to spend a little time healing to repair the bruising and cuts, as well as the two slightly cracked ribs she was now sporting. Blood had fared slightly worse, getting torn up by a fast and skilled slash from the beast, so much so that Beth suspected it had used some kind of rudimentary skill in the attack. Blood was leaking much of her namesake from three severe gashes across her upper arms, two of them catching where her armor was open at the elbow between her soulbound weapons and the armor of her chest plate's sleeve. The third gash was a long cut alongside the outside of her right shoulder, having gotten in a seam and sliced the length of the seam and then through more of the armor, though not much, as the new armor was quite good.
Blood returned to the surface to breathe and heal, swimming back to shore to dry and clean off before sitting to meditate. Beth ignored her injuries for now, Silver-level Pain Tolerance making them no more than a very slight ache. She swam back down, ignoring the elite's corpse for now, going all the way to the bottom to investigate the object she had seen earlier. As she got closer, she realized it wasn't a random object, but instead was a plant that opened like a large, underwater lotus flower. Sitting in the center of said lotus was what appeared to be a large, oddly spherical gemstone, something that was apparently produced by the plant itself.
This wasn't exactly their first time encountering such a thing, as they had found many rare plants and herbs during different stages of the Trial of Celestial Awakening. This plant looked like it fell more into the category of natural treasures, something that could be used without any refinement, though it would still be better to let an alchemist process it into a pill or elixir. Beth very carefully harvested the gem, leaving the rest of the plant undamaged and hopefully capable of producing another gemstone in the future. She inspected the gem to see just what they had gotten from such an epic battle.
Heart of Calm Waters
Beth had no idea what that was, other than the obvious; some type of water-based natural treasure that had some kind of calming effect, though she didn't really sense anything just holding it. She frowned at the corpse of the beast as she put the heart away, grabbing it by the thick spinal ridge and dragging it to the surface. The beast was quite heavy, she had to give it that, weighing a few tons and totally uncooperative now that it didn't have any air in its lungs. She hauled it up to the surface before swimming it over to the shore, Blood having to stand up with an annoyed grunt to kill a few of the lizards that were attracted by the commotion and scent of blood.
"What do you want to do with that?" Blood asked after killing the lizards as Beth brought the corpse ashore.
"Take it home," she replied.
"Sabs won't like that," Blood said, getting an eyeroll in response. "I won't like it either."
"Look, I don't know what you're thinking, but I'm not gonna stash a forty-feet-long corpse in our bathtub," Beth scoffed with another eyeroll. "In fact, I think it would be even funnier to drag it into the shop and see the look on Jaq's face."
"Good luck with that," Blood said non-committally.
"Well, you're gonna be helping me get this back," Beth said, it now being Blood's turn to roll her eyes.
"I'll carry it. You just keep the trash off me," Beth continued, getting a grunt from Blood.
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Thanks for the chapter!
