Assimilate All Talents

Chapter 121: Many Hands Make Light Work

Sol moved mana into the ground like he would normally with [Terra Spikes], but using his experience from when he first changed the skill, he slightly altered the effects.

The ground slightly shook as the earth beneath Sol’s feet blasted outwards, raising a pillar of earth. Instead of its usual jagged and pointed cone shape, it emerged as a pillar with a flat surface. The strong force blasted Sol into the air and out of the zone of the gravity field.

[Terra Spikes] leveled up! (5 -> 6)

’Huh?!’

Sol was surprised to see it level up naturally, but while flying midair towards a boss wasn’t the ideal time to question whether it was a fluke or not, so he put it to the back of his mind for now.

The red hand changed its trajectory to continue firing at Sol, but it trailed behind too slowly, giving Sol the breathing room he needed to retaliate. While still in the air, Sol swung two [Mana Slash] towards the two hands.

The hands were easily sliced by the attack, disintegrating by the time Sol landed on the ground.

He turned to Amber and saw she had already taken care of the giant orange hand and was finishing off the blue one with another sand attack.

Sol took this moment to check the Handless Fiend’s mana.

Mana: 530/1150

’It’s still got about half, huh.’

Although the two had yet to damage the undead once, it only has half of its mana left. If they kept fighting as is, it would eventually run out of mana. But there was something that bothered Sol.

’It’s strong, but it hasn’t gone all out yet.’

As if on cue, the Handless Fiend decided it has had enough. It raised its handless arms as the seven hands formed behind it of each color. The red, yellow, blue, and purple hovered above it, while the orange, green, and indigo ones moved in front of it.

At that moment, all the projectiles were launched towards the duo. The gravity was multiplied under Amber as the red beam and indigo fist blasted towards her. The blue crescents and yellow projectiles flew towards Sol, with the large orange one moving to crush him. The green hand stayed behind, maintaining its protection.

Like a composer, the Handless Fiend moved all the hands in perfect synchronized order. With all the hands working as a team, similarly if not better than an adventurer’s party.

Sol and Amber defended against the onslaught in their own ways. Sol dodged where he could but simply took the brunt of it, trusting in his strong body. Amber, on the other hand, completely turned to sand, somehow negating the effects of the gravity and allowing her to move and dodge the red beam. The indigo fist was especially useless against Amber, as when it blasted a hole through the sand, it would simply reform.

"[Razor Wind]!"

Needing to act quickly, Sol multicasted his fastest spell. Originally, the spell would create a few tens of wind blades, but what appeared was over a hundred. Sol directed them all to the barrage of projectiles heading his way. The yellow projectiles and blue crescents collided with the wind blades, creating a blast of energy. From the blast, Sol emerged running, massively closing the gap to the Handless Fiend.

The giant orange hand trailed behind, wanting to crush Sol before he could arrive at the undead. Sol turned to it and gave a mischievous smile.

"See ya!"

Earth rumbled beneath him as another pillar of earth emerged and launched him towards the boss.

Flying towards the boss, nothing else stood in his way besides the green hand, which acted as its final defense. Gripping onto the light sword, Sol activated its third ability, which released a powerful ray of light.

The Handless Fiend knew the attack would break through its barrier, so it unsummoned the giant hand and resummoned it in front of it. The light broke past the green barrier and destroyed the hand before continuing towards the orange hand, which took the rest of the attack. It then created another green hand behind the orange hand just in time as it was destroyed as well.

The second green hand also broke, but it was enough to stop most of the attack. Only a small portion of the light went through and burned the Handless Fiend.

"Humans!"

The Handless Fiend screeched in anger while creating four new hands.

Health: 730/1000

Mana: 123/1150

Sol grinned as he saw the remnants of his attack do so much damage to the Handless Fiend. While a boss it wasn’t very durable and would lose out in that department to the Gravedigger that was 20 levels below it. The reason it was strong was that it could attack with such ferocity that most parties would wipe within the first minute against it, unable to get past the seven hands.

’Time to finish it off!’

"[Explosion]!"

Three small flickers appeared surrounding the Handless Fiend. It quickly reacted and shielded itself with the green barrier and the orange hand just as the explosion went off.

BOOOOOM!

The explosions took out not only the two hands protecting the Handless Fiend but the other five that were resummoned nearby. Before it had time to summon any more, Amber created a blast of sand underneath her and launched herself towards the fiend. She copied Sol’s idea with [Terra Spikes] but with her own set of abilities created an extremely similar effect.

She flung herself through the aftermath of the explosion and with her two daggers attacked the Handless Fiend.

"WRAHH!"

Sol could hear its ghoulish screech as Amber mercilessly attacked in rapid succession, instantly emptying out its health.

You have slain a Lv 90 Handless Fiend! Gained 3,025,000 Exp (300%)

You have leveled up! +5 Attribute points

Learned [Chromatic Red] Lv 7!

Learned [Chromatic Green] Lv 7!

Learned [Chromatic Purple] Lv 7!

[Siphon] leveled up! (4 -> 5)

Sol was overwhelmed with a flood of system messages.

’[Siphon] leveled up again!’

Ignoring the rest of the notifications, he opened the description of [Siphon] immediately.

[Siphon] Lv 5: Siphon 3 skills from dead beings. Can additionally siphon one talent skill. Increased efficiency, lowers the longer they are dead.

’Talent skill?!’