Chapter 139: Eyeball Extraction
Chapter 139: Eyeball Extraction
Chapter 139: Eyeball Extraction
Astrid approached the monster that she had felled. She connected her mind to the guardian as she effortlessly turned it over onto its back. The tremendous weight and Constitution of the monster still existed, so the added Intelligence usefulness was obvious.
As she focused on the Skill; Dominating Sovereigns Eye, the guardian’s eyes lit up. It was as if they were guiding her to do something. To pull out its eyes.
Listening to the Skill, she yanked out the monster's eyes without a lot of effort. It was as if they were hers to be pulled.
The eyes hovered in front of her, then, as if her third eye had a mind of its own–sucked in only one eyeball as the other fell to the ground with a splat.
Dominating Sovereigns Eye has extracted the Skill - Phase Wave - From the Tree Ent War Guardian.
Phase Slam: Project a mana wave that begins from your limbs. Damage scales from Intelligence and Strength.
Would you like to merge with - Phase Wave Y/N?
Astrid thought for a moment. It wasn’t a Skill she needed as she doubted it could even compare to the Stage 3 Crash. Yet, it wouldn’t hurt to at least try it out. Astrid just hoped that she could remove it from the “bank” of her Skill.
Acknowledging the Skill, it entered into her third eye and vanished within. There was a strange heat that pervaded her mind, and just like all the other Skills before, the knowledge of its use was imparted to her.
Copying the guardian’s stance, Astrid punched the air and activated the Skill. Mana surged from her eye container, then throttled through her arm and finally it was projected out her fist. The blue mana was visibly thicker than even the guardian’s own as it smashed into a nearby root column, smashing it completely. The metallic rings of hardened roots clashed to the ground from the impact.
Quickly realising that it was difficult to gauge the strength of the attack as she had just received a power up, she decided to use [Crash] as well.
As Astrid connected to a mass of matter in front of the root, she realised that the mana inside her eye was acting differently than before. It was difficult to tell at first from using a new Skill, but she had used [Crash] thousands of times.
She didn’t know whether it was thanks to the mana, or the Level up, but the matter was now so much faster to amass than before. Or maybe it was the new Transcendent Skill? Astrid thought.
After all, although it didn’t necessarily say it improved her matter control, it was an eye. Maybe it helped her gain a finer control over the matter without exactly having it in the description. Whatever the reason was, she could now use a high powered [Crash] in half the time it would have otherwise taken.
Perhaps more testing was necessary. But it seemed the tree king had finally prepared another test for her to complete.
The walls and ceilings began trembling, a sign that it was time to move on, but before that. Her System had reminded her of something. She never had the time to test it until now.
Astrid crouched down to the guardian as soil from above dropped against her Mind Barrier.
Using Disintegration on the corpse, its bark-like skin instantly turned black from her touch. Then, the darkness spread slowly as a twinkling light shone within the almost burn-like black of the Disintegration Skill. It looked like the void’s sky.
It wasn’t long before the entire body turned black, and then, it simply vanished from existence.
Skill level up!
Disintegration level 1 -> Disintegration level 2
Right now, it didn’t really have much use, but her mind turned to the future possibilities of the Skill as she rushed to the other set of enormous doors at the back of the cave.
If she managed to get the Skill to the point where the body would decompose instantly, then in theory, that could be applied to walls, and other objects. Or Skills. Although the control she would have to have over the Disintegration would likely have to be at the peak, maybe even Stage 4 for that to be the case.
Well, there was no rushing it. It was a thought for the future.
Astrid rushed past the opened root door and instantly stepped foot into yet another chasm. However, this time it was far larger than even the underground jungle before it.
An enormous river cut straight through the cave, and light shone from up above. This time, it wasn’t because of glowing mushroom spores, or any monster. But it was the actual light from above. To be exact, it was the pillar of light from the extra dungeon mission the System had granted.
The sky? However, her hopes were dashed as she squinted her eyes. The roots created a metal cage that covered the sky-line–the same as the strengthened doors. I wonder if I can blast it now? Astrid smirked, she couldn’t wait to test out her new power.
What better way to display her new found power than to blast a hole in the sky.
Just as Astrid was about to fly up to test the tree king's defences, multiple figures were moving incredibly fast toward her. Six from the river.
Preparing herself, Astrid sent out a fist full of energy from her Phase Wave Skill. She timed it perfectly, just as the monsters breached the water, the attack met three of the monsters. The attack instantly blasted their bodies into the distance, crashing against the rock walls. Just the fact they didn’t blow up meant that their Level was considerable, or they had heightened Constitution.
The other three breached from the other side.
Astrid smirked in surprise at the unexpected visitors. Frog-like heads on top of humanoid bodies. Two sets of drooping gills adorned their face, while slits for the monsters breathing were sliced into their ribs.
Spawn.
Astrid instantly [Crashed] the matter in front of two the spawn, this time, unlike the Phase Wave, the psychic crash obliterated their bodies. Sending blood and guts scattering into the water below.
Realising that she didn’t have time to [Crash], Astrid simply relied upon her Mind Barrier. There was no pink within the monster's eyes, just the familiar dark green and black tint.
The spawn had a large anchor and it was obviously the strongest amongst them, still, Astrid let the monster finish its attack. Maybe it was arrogance, or maybe it was just to test her current strength, whatever it was, the attack was laced with water. Just as the anchor was about to class against the barrier, the water around it turned frigid, as did the spawn’s eyes.
Clad in ice, the anchor slammed against the shield.
The weight bore down on her mind but the extra one-hundred points of Intelligence held against the monster, next up was the remaining test.
Suspended in air, the spawn stood on her barrier and gazed down. They were the first eyes she had ever seen that held such an animalistic desire. The desire to end her life. The spawn’s eye shield intelligence within them, so it was obvious they weren’t a creature that solely wanted destruction.
Yet Astrid didn’t care. She had learned one rule over the course of her adventuring. From the backstabbing, treachery, and blood-shed. She would kill anything that attacked her.
It may have a home, or even a family–but this world was all about survival. To see her family again, the monsters had to die.
Astrid wasted no more time and yanked the spawn’s eyeballs that were filled with wrath, tearing them from its sockets. The special effect from her ring activated and with a sudden explosion, the matter behind its sockets exploded the monster's skull. Fragments splattered against her shield.
But Astrid wasn’t focused on the body, instead, her vision lay on the eyes. The ice ability that the spawn had displayed. She wanted it.
Accepting one of the spawn’s eyes, she absorbed it into her third eye and instead of a heat, a frigid cold took its place. It reminded her of the days Leena and her had a race to see who could finish their ice-creams first, of course, Astrid always won. But it resulted in a brain-freeze that she swore was almost shattering her mind every time. Yet she always persisted. She wanted to win.
Dominating Sovereigns Eye has extracted the Skill - Ice Touch - From the Spawn Frost-Warrior.
Ice Touch: Turn any water you touch into that of an enchanted, frigid ice. The ice increases attack power. Scales with Intelligence.
Would you like to merge with - Ice Touch Y/N?
Astrid accepted the ability and focused on it. She activated the mana within her eye and felt the cold energy travel from her container, to her palm. Then, a layer of ice covered her finger-tips.
Sprinting to the edge of the water, she touched it and it resulted in a solid layer of ice on the top. Since it scaled with Intelligence, the power of the ice was great. Although she did come to a realisation about her new Skill.
Because she didn’t have a Class to synergise well with the Skill, it would remain weaker than her current Skills. It meant she either had to find two Skills that complemented her psychic abilities so that her buffs remain on the chosen Skills. Or pick some other Skills, for instance, passive buffs.
There were countless possibilities, but she had to focus on a movement Skill first. Something to give her a burst of movement, or maybe even hide her presence entirely like an illusion–but stronger. Then for the second, a passive strengthening to her Intelligence stat, or psychic power.
Astrid shook her head as there was more coming from the depths of the water. More spawn. Just like how it had always been since the Leviathan appeared. There were always so many.
From the corner of her eyes. She could see two hovering eyeballs. One was cold like ice, the other was strong like a wave. It reminded her of the “Eye Queen”. She was surrounded by hundreds, maybe even thousands of eye-balls all at once.
Did she have thousands of Skills? Or maybe she was lazy and they all held passive abilities like Astrid had in mind.
Astrid smirked and slapped the water. The entire river became encased in ice just from her touch, but it wouldn’t stop the spawn. It was as if the soft flesh of her skin had made her their greatest arch enemy.
The thick layer of ice lasted for only a moment as the spawn smashed through. It impeded their movements only slightly, but sometimes, that was all that was needed.
All five of them, with the added buff from her Oculus Witch Class, tore their eyes from their skulls as if they were originally hers in the first place. It was so easy. There was no resistance. It was merely like tearing a single piece of paper–brittle.
Then, a warm tingle formed in her hands. It wasn’t because of her new collection of eyeballs that spiralled around her, but what was down below.
Through the crystal clear icy waters below, it looked at her. It was as if an ancient sea serpent had awakened from its deep slumber.
It had such big, beautiful eyes.
Astrid grinned.