After the elf beauty could not hit Valtar with her arrow, Valtar gratefully took the opportunity and instantly closed in on her, attacking her on full throttle.
The biggest issue here was for him that he couldn't kill her, at least not before eating her. So subduing her without killing is not going to be an easy job, to say the least.
Elmyra, at the sudden attack, could barely defend herself in time as the heavy sword attack of the human pushed her. Regardless, she was the daughter of the Elven tribe leader, she was not a mere one-trick pony. She immersed herself totally in the surrounding darkness and went into close combat with the human, like a deadly dark assassin.
And she was indeed absolutely ruthless, using the deep darkness element and attacking in such manner and angles that he did not think was possible for a humanoid creature, at least.
Then there were the damn arrows trying to turn him into a porcupine. Things seemed to have taken a worse turn for Valtar. The elf beauty was coordinating in perfect sync with her archers, using every opportunity to injure Valtar.
Valtar felt himself in such a pinch that he almost felt tempted to unseal his stats. Things wouldn't even be much of a challenge for him then, he still chose not to take the easy way out.
The sole reason he was weakening himself constantly when facing enemies, was to develop his combat ability. He knew he was extremely lacking in this particular department. In all honesty, compared to all the deadly dark elves and especially Elmyra, Valtar's fighting style probably looked like an utter joke to them. The only thing he had going for himself was the strength advantage. He could release his stats any time if he were truly in danger, but in this forest, he would not get many chances to develop himself.
When he had to enter the dark elven tribe's area, that's where he would start to face real and proper danger. Afterward, things would only look grimmer and grimmer for him.
He turned off his inner thoughts and immersed himself fully in the battle. He could easily get killed if he lost focus. At one point, he noticed the elf princess seemed to be losing efficiency slowly. Well, that did make sense. It almost seemed like she went into instant-kill mode for a while to show such ruthless movement and deadly efficiency out of nowhere. It had to be mentally draining.
Valtar kept himself on the defensive, deflecting all the arrows plus fighting the princess in close combat until the right moment presented itself. Valtar found the perfect opportunity to attack.
And he did not miss. Since he didn't want to critically injure her and simply wanted to immobilize her, he attacked her knee joints with full force. The princess let out a scream in sheer pain as her joint was almost crushed by the sheer force, thus one leg of hers became useless for now as she stumbled onto the ground. Valtar did not dally and did the same for her other leg joint, then proceeded to chop at the back of her head to knock her out. Unfortunately, he couldn't knock her out, but she definitely couldn't try anything anymore.
So, he chopped again and this time, she indeed got knocked out.
But the bigger problem was, that all the archers were coming at him at once and were closing in as they saw their team leader rendered immobile. Valtar could tell they would not mind dying if that meant they could finish him off or protect their leader.
Valtar sneered internally, after having to fight so many of the possessed eastern tribe members at once. He was much better versed in dealing with enemies of more quantity rather than a single enemy with high combat prowess.
But these guys weren't mere common dregs either.
He rushed, and this time he did not hold back. Why? Because he did not have to keep these foot soldiers alive anymore. They are better used for him being dead.
Oh right, that one has to be kept alive.
They all rushed at him like one singular unit with great harmony, indicating the dark-elven team's years of experience working together. Valtar attacked one of the elves with full force at a slightly weird angle. For that reason, their short sword flew away from their hand because of the strength behind the attack.
Valtar grabbed his hand and catapulted him toward another dark elf as he lunged forward, the tip aiming for their chest, and he shoved his sword right through two of the dark elves' bodies at once.
One has to know that Valtar was fighting all this time with his eyes closed. Since the dark element rendered his vision almost useless, he had been applying his other senses through sensory vision. Somehow, this skill allowed him a different kind of vision based on his other senses, which were slightly less affected compared to his vision.
Nevertheless, it was more than enough to keep him going without hindrance. Two down, seven left, thought Valtar.
This time, five of the elves attacked him from behind at once as he promptly dodged to one side. But the place he moved to while dodging already had another man waiting for him.
It was Malrith. "DIE… Wretch…," he shouted.
The attack came from a very awkward angle. As such, he could not block or avoid it. Thus, he had no choice but to grab the blade with his bare hands. Valtar's hands almost felt like they would be cut off.
He used that opportunity to cleave off the irritating elf's entire arm with his sword. Malrith howled and wriggled on the ground from the unbearable pain. Another one out.
From then onwards, things started to slowly turn in Valtar's favor more and more as he went for the rest of the elves. All of them had looks of despair at the grim reality of the situation, and they could not flee either, leaving their leader behind.
Some of them begged Valtar the moment he was about to take their lives, but he was unbothered. He cut off every single one of their heads without a shred of mercy.
Blood flowed out from them like a fountain… He first tore off a piece from an elf's body, then went toward Malrith. That guy was standing up again and started shouting profanities again. Valtar promptly knocked him out. He had to stop this guy's bleeding. Otherwise, he would die from blood loss.
After knocking him out and wrapping the piece of cloth around Malrith's wounded arm, he took out eight cores from the eight dead dark elves' bodies.
He swallowed all the cores. [Darkness affinity gained 20%]
As expected, second-stage cores were not of any use to him apart from gaining affinity toward specific elements.
Regardless of that, he still felt a big change. His senses that were suppressed were released and were not being suppressed anymore. He opened his eyes. Now he could see, though it wasn't entirely clear, but it was more than enough.
That suffocating feeling of the true darkness was not so suffocating anymore.
After that, he chose to use the skill Ghost Summon.
As expected, something came out of the dead bodies. These ghosts seemed a lot different than those that came out of the human tribe members' bodies. These were much heavier and sinister, with the element of darkness in them.
He commanded the ghosts to go inside his body since they could not possess their dead bodies. Remaining out longer would cause them to dissipate slowly.
He was a bit worried that the ghosts would try to possess him. Fortunately, his worries were unfounded. Makes sense they can't go against their summoner. The best use case of the ghosts was to possess other living bodies.
Hehe, now it's time for him to enjoy the main dish. He went toward the elf beauty who was knocked out cold, grabbed her, and picked her up onto his shoulder like a sack of potato.
As for Malrith, he grabbed his hand and kept dragging him, going back toward the direction of the eastern tribe. As they got close to a certain point, the darkness was not encroaching anymore.
First, he tied up Malrith to a tree while keeping him in a standing position. His hands, feet, and all were tied up to the tree.
He then thought back to the Fae queen, the last thing she gave him before leaving. The Fae queen was about to disappear after bidding Valtar farewell, but she paused all of a sudden and said, "Oh yes, I forgot something."
She snapped her fingers, and something round appeared in her hands. She gave that to Valtar. "What is this?" "It is a special type of poison that makes a person lose control of their body. It is not paralyzing poison, which makes them lose all feeling in their body, but simply makes them unable to control it."
"They will be conscious and feel everything but cannot move their body?" asked Valtar.
The Fae queen nodded in confirmation.
As he heard that, an evil smirk came onto his lips, and the Fae queen disappeared into thin air with a similar smile on her face.