Woosh!
The arrow shot through the horned skeleton's neck. It cut a bit of flesh and passed out from the back and hit the rubble.
Dudian's eyes shrank as he quickly pulled out the fifth arrow.
Horned skeleton stood up. The fifth arrow hit its chest. The force was so strong that horned skeleton's body stepped back before it could stabilize its. It pulled out the arrow and its scarlet red eyes focused on Dudian. It stared at Dudian as if a snake was staring at frog. The next moment its feet pushed the ground and it rushed at Dudian.
Dudian's face turned ugly. The speed of this horned skeleton was faster than the previous variant skeleton. He quickly pulled out the sixth arrow and waited until horned skeleton reached 100 meters range. Dudian firmly locked onto it and released the string.
The arrow shot past as fast as a meteor.
Dudian didn't looked at the result but turned and ran in hurry.
The horned skeleton roared in anger and raised its hand to pull out the arrow. The wound that the arrow created had dark silverish fluid flowing out. It was the result of hot mercury spewing out.
He ran at full speed for 100 meters before turning around to glance at horned skeleton. He pulled the string and made another shot.
Although the shot was made in hurry but didn't deviate. Because of his long time practice of 100 meter shots he was able to hit the target without problem. However, Dudian was still not able to hit the horned skeleton's eyes. Instead the arrow had pierced close to the previous injury.
Horned skeleton howled, pulled out the arrow and shot after him.
Dudian didn't give the chance to horned skeleton to move.
He made consecutive shots one after another. The horned skeleton began to move slowly because of the number of silver arrows shot onto its body had affected it. Dudian once again opened the distance as he turned away to run. After a few minutes he turned around to repeat the process. One arrow after another pierced horned skeleton's body. It didn't take long before it stopped moving and threw itself onto ground.
Dudian was relieved as he saw the horned skeleton fall down. His armor was soaked in cold sweat. Fortunately he had arrows mixed with mercury. If he had relied on normal iron arrows most probably he would be dead long ago.
"I have twelve more mercury arrows." Dudian counted the silver arrows in the quiver. He would still be able to continue hunting.
He approached and decreased the distance between himself and the horned skeleton's body. He used iron arrows to shoot at it. He was assured to see that there was no response. Afterwards he came over and squatted down to cut off its neck.
Kacha! The dagger got stuck.
After continuous effort he was able to cut off its head.
Dudian was not in rush to dissect its head. So inch by inch he cut off its neck to look at the body structure of horned skeleton. It's aorta was more complete. Moreover in its throat there were black blood vessels which were as thick as a finger. He cut the skull but tried to not to fracture those black blood vessels.
He shrugged up those black blood vessels. Dudian was surprised to see that those black blood vessels were connected to fangs in horned skeleton's mouth.
There were small, subtle holes in those fangs and insides were empty.
"Vampire teeth?" Dudian couldn't help but think of the scene where horned skeleton was sucking giant rat's blood off. It seems that the horned skeleton was using these fangs to do the bidding.
Dudian used the dagger to slice off its belly. A rich rancid smell exuded from the body of the dead horned skeleton. All the organs within the abdomen were frozen. There was no stomach but a mass of dark stenchy mucus.
Dudian felt nauseus as this pungent smell hit his nose. He carried the horned skeleton's head few meters away. Dudian looked at its horn raising from horned skeleton's forehead. It was sharp and had a small angle to its shape. It was similar to the horn of the rhinoceros.
Dudian used the dagger to slice off the skin from the forehead. Surprisingly the horn was directly connected to he skull and grew out form there. He didn't know how it was possible for such a change occur. The thing he was aware of that if he let the horned skeleton to continue to evolve then it was going to become a very big headache.
Dudian pondered a bit on the issue but recovered his thoughts. It didn't take long before he was able to take out the cold crystal from horned skeleton's intracranial tissue. The color of the cold crystal was dark blue. The density of the color was very pure and it was crystal clear.
The purity and the color of the cold crystal was much more cleaner than any cold crystal he had seen previously. He carefully put it into his armor and took out the other iron arrows. The sharp arrow tips had turned blunt which showed how hard the horned skeleton's skull was.
He put the arrows into the quiver and went over to pick the luggage that had materials from snake tailed crocodile. Afterwards he took the gunpowder box and was ready to leave the place. Suddenly, he sensed a very pale smell quietly approaching the location. It was about hundred meters away from the place he was standing.
His pupils shrank as he immediately clenched the bow. However Dudian't didn't dare to move his body. He didn't know what kind of existence could sneak this close to him without making him aware of its position. His eyes swiftly glanced around. His eyes focused on the grassy area where they had fight moment ago. The light smell was radiating off from there.
Dudian's heartbeat increased as blood rushed into his head. All the muscles in his body tightened. He knew that it was not an ordinary beast which could sneak so close without alerting him.
rustle!
The wind whipped the grass.
Dudian's heart startled as he looked at the grass slowly pushed open. A humanoid body that looked similar to a child walked out. Its body was only half a meter tall. Black scales had covered all of its body from top to bottom. Its hand and feet didn't have fingers but sharp claws. Its face had facial features similar to a human but there were no eyebrows. Its eyes were dark red. It looked up at Dudian but turned to the corpse of the horned skeleton that was on the lying ground.
Whoosh!
In a sudden flash it appeared by the side of horned skeleton's corpse. It was as if it teleported from one point to the other. At first sight the beast looked like a well-behaved child with small mouth. However the moment it closed onto horned skeleton's corpse its mouth opened in an incredible angle. It bit the flesh and blood from horned skeleton's corpse and began to chew it.
Dudian's face changed as he looked at this little black figure.: "Ghoul!"