A Level Zero's Struggle (part 13)
The monster had gone on a sudden rampage which had caught the chasers surrounding it unaware. One of them was trampled to death and another was scared witless. It was then that the leader of their team managed to jump in and save the chaser who was paralyzed by fear.
The leader shouted at his chasers to maintain some distance with the monster and look for an opportunity to escape. Right now the leader was also feeling perplexed.
Usually monsters with strong defense would chose to retreat after injuring few of the chasers as it did not want to struggle till the end either. It was a strange tie between weak humans and strong monster but they would not struggle till death with a large number of hunters.
But this monster was different. It was making sure that none of them escaped and wanted to end them all here.
The environment become even worse after one of them was now trampled to death. The other level one chasers were starting to panic now.
Watching this, the chaser who had lost a level also joined in. He had come to gain some spoil so he had to help a little. But he was waiting for the moment to make the right attack. Unfortunately he had terrible luck today.
He jumped to attack the monster when one more from the other team also came forward. He was hoping that the monster would pay more attention to the other person and he could grab a few hits to get some experience. But out of nowhere, the monster decided to take both of them together. It launched its claws at both of them.
The monster had realized that it had the advantage as no one here could injure it with their low-level weapons. It seemed to be entertained with the struggle of these puny humans and had decided to end them all here. If it were to allow them to retreat they would come back with weapons that could hurt it and that would its death.
The two who had attacked the monster had not thought that it would face them both head-on. This left them surprised and unable to change their course of action. Their weapon left no wound on the monster even as its claws crushed both of them to the ground. Then the monster raised its hand again to finish both of them.
The two could see their coming death. They never thought that the monster would be this aggressive. They wanted to escape from its clutches, but the claw from before had almost knocked them out. They had no strength to survive or dodge this next strike.
Right then the monster lowered its head a bit and proceeded to kick the other chaser from the leader's team. The man flew out and crashed on a tree. His skull cracked open and rained blood all around. Everyone who saw this was aghast. The leader who was thinking of stepping in again to help paused for a second.
The other chaser who was pinned by the monster saw this and knew his death had come. He had been hoping to gain some spoils and renew his hunting life but everything was going to be over before it even began.
His last moment were swiftly approaching and the guy could only lie there. It was at that moment that…
Qiao rushed in like a shadow, jumping slightly to reach the monster and swung his weapon with all his force.
He had aimed at the head of the monster which was lowered right now. After observing the monster for some time now, he could judge that its head should be a weakness. First of all, he could not see the similar layer of defense that covered its body on its head. And he could see as its head was high, it was subconsciously protecting it. So now when the monster had lowered head he grabbed the opportunity.
It was just an observation done by Qiao.
The shapeless weapon reached right on the target as his was getting better. The guy who had lost his level, who was scheming against this youth could not believe someone would jump to rescue him.
But he misunderstood. Qiao was not helping or rescuing him. He had acted to gain some points and to show the other partied leader that he was not easy to deal with.
The weapon was shoved in the monster's head and then yanked back immediately. Qiao knew that he could not repeatedly stab this monster or else it would bash him to the ground with its head.
But this attack was able to greatly injure the monster, at least to a seventy percent limit.
The leader who was helping another chaser from the other side to get up was shocked to see this. He could tell this guy was something else, as the youth continued to survey the monster to seek another opportunity.
The chaser who was waiting for his death, dragged himself away as the monster staggered backward, it was still alive.
"If you want to earn any experience, go ahead," Qiao gestured to the leader who was standing agape. He came back to his senses.
Leader could clearly see the attitude of this youth was still the same as when he talked about weapon.
But now he understood that this guy had ability. He held his weapon and gestured his men too, they were going to earn some experience. Now that they knew its weakness and the fact that it was already injured gravely, they fought for few moments before bringing it down. It whole head was bashed in, but only one wound was visible. The one made by Qiao.
There weapons still could not injure it gravely but repeated attack had managed to kill it due to its blood loss.
Compared to the previous leader of the previous team, this leader was much cleverer. He did not attack Qiao or thought to create any grudge. He only focused on how much members he lost due to his stupidity.
Qiao looked at his experience token. There was a mark of eight hundred experience points after he almost killed the monster.
That means he was only two hundred experience away from becoming level one.
....
Now it was getting evening and he didn't want to stay in the open forest so he waited for the leader to see whether he was bringing back his team to the Guild.
The leader waited for a while to see whether the monster would dissolve and leave some spoils but nothing happened.
It meant he had to dissect the monster for the spoils.
He came toward Qiao, "You should use your weapon to dig out the spoils," he spoke in a very calm and composed way this time.
"Sure, where should I dig?" Qiao nodded and asked.
"If the head of the monster was the weakest point then you should dissect the head," the leader pointed the head. His tone was no more authoritative and blunt, he could understand in which situation he was just few moments before and if this youth had not made a move then his entire team might have perished today.
He wasn't stupid enough to still remain haughty and blunt after this.
The weapon was still dripping blood when Qiao reached the dead body of the monster.