[You have received a grievous wound. Damage received: 950]
[Remaining HP: 2500/3450]
Zaen spewed blood out his mouth as soon as his head was slammed against the wall. Following the attack, a constant ringing sound flooded his ears while his vision got worse.
He had underestimated the ghoul's strength, but it wasn't like he had an option to dodge the incoming attack as he was already stunned by the Ghoul. The only thing that surprised him was that despite the forceful attack of the Depraved ghoul, the slimy wall on which Zaen was smashed on to, remained unaffected.
[You're no longer stunned.]
The ghoul let go of his head and Zaen slowly slumped down the wall, marking it with his blood along the way. Zaen was in no position to understand what was going on. His head was in a worse condition than he thought.
Strangely enough, he could see blood dripping from his forehead. He could 'see' the blood smearing his clothes, but not with his eyes. To him, it felt like his body had gone into autopilot mode. He could see his body from a third-person perspective as if his soul had left his body.
However, he soon realised that it was all a hallucination induced by the excruciating pain he was feeling. Just a product of his thoughts, nothing more. He wanted to groan in pain... but couldn't even if he tried. Not a single syllable came out of his mouth.
'I have to escape from this place before it's too late.' A single thought crossed his mind.
Zaen silently used a couple of bandages to heal up a bit first. Within moments his wounds got healed and the constant ringing in his head subsided as his vision got better.
Next, he had to find an opportunity to run away. But Zaen's fate kept getting worse. As the Depraved ghoul wasn't done with him yet.
The Depraved Ghoul raised its enormous leg and was about to crush Zaen beneath it like an ant. However, Zaen was no longer stunned to keep sitting there like a duck and pray for his safety while the Ghoul did as it pleased with him.
Before the ghoul could do what it had intended to, Zaen swiftly rolled sideways and dodged the attack. He then quickly got on his knees and took his daggers out from the inventory.
Zaen trusted the artifact when it informed him, that he could not defeat the ghoul. But he didn't need to kill the ghoul to be able to leave the place. Unlike the Ghoul Zaen had no obligation to kill it. He just had to survive till the ghoul's silent kill zone disappeared.
[50 seconds remaining until the Depraved Ghoul's Primal skill: Silent Kill Zone deactivates. The Zone has contracted by 10%.]
'It just keeps getting worse and worse! Damn it!' Zaen thought before planning his next move, 'First, I couldn't run even if I tried to and now it's just limiting my options against the ghoul? This Ghoul is really leagues ahead of the others I've fought against till now.'
Zaen couldn't run away and now the zone created by the ghouls had started to shrink as well. Zaen wasn't worried about the running part as he had already tried to do so and failed spectacularly. But now that the zone had started to shrink, his problem just went through the roof.
Despite the situation, Zaen couldn't help but admire the ghoul's skill. It was the perfect skill to trap and kill someone. The ghoul in front of him was a natural predator. Someone born to kill everything and anything that gets in its sights.
But if the Depraved ghoul was a predator, then Zaen was nothing less. It wasn't as easy to kill him as it was to kill those braindead ghouls. And the Depraved ghoul was about to learn it the hard away.
In Zaen's mind, the ghoul only managed to do what it did because he had no idea about the ghoul's abilities. Had he known about its abilities, he would've made countermeasures to tackle the ghoul. But now, he had a plan.
The Depraved ghoul's feet were the reason it could jump farther than Zaen could run. If he somehow managed to take his legs out of the equation, it would make the next 50 seconds of his life somewhat peaceful.
With his daggers in his hands, Zaen charged towards the ghoul, while keeping his attention on the ghoul's slightest movements. The Ghoul saw him coming and tried to stop Zaen with its gigantic claws. However, Zaen efficiently dodged the attack by turning sideways.
The ghoul looked as if it was taken aback by Zaen's quick action, but it couldn't do anything now. Its claws were its primary source of offence and now that Zaen had dodged those, the Depraved ghoul had no other way to stop him... or so Zaen thought.
The second Zaen thought he got the ghoul, he could swear he saw the ghoul smile for a fraction of a second. Zaen had failed to account for one thing in his mind while hatching the plan... The Depraved Ghoul wasn't a normal ghoul but an A-tier monster.
Not only was it stronger than the rest of the ghouls Zaen had faced till now, but it was smarter than them as well. Zaen didn't know it but the Depraved ghoul had intentionally shown its 'weakness' to him so it could lure him in.
Previously Zaen had been outclassed in agility, strength, and even when it came to accuracy by the ghouls. But this was the first time a ghoul had outclassed him in intelligence. Zaen always thought that the ghouls were strong but mindless creatures that were driven by their hunger for flesh. But that wasn't the case with the Depraved ghoul.
Regardless of what Zaen tried, in the end, he was just another prey for the predator. And it was time he realised it as well.
The following moment, the Depraved Ghoul struck Zaen with its bone shield. It all happened so quickly that Zaen couldn't even dodge the attack and was squatted down like a mosquito. He tried to foolishly block the attack with the help of his dagger but soon realised it was the biggest mistake of his life,
[Your weapon: Corrosive Dagger was snapped in half due to Depraved Ghoul's unrivalled strength. This weapon can no longer be repaired.]