The Systemic Lands

Chapter 465: Day 906 – Fox Clan

Chapter 465: Day 906 – Fox Clan

I looked at the jungle in front of me. It was morning, and I was well rested. But I really didn’t want to go into a jungle zone. Rolling my head around on my shoulders, I let out a sigh as I looked at the massive trees and the plant filled underbrush.

The low visibility and the three-dimensional environment made it far worse than the tower. But they were only level 4 monsters. But it would be a massive headache, and the boss of the zone even more so. At least it wasn’t mushrooms. Just the thought of that type of terrain hurt my head.

“Screw it. You can’t be that bad?” I muttered out loud as I made my way into the jungle terrain. My protection detail stayed behind to kill the level 3 monsters and get some crystals. There was nothing they could do to help me against level 4 monsters in a jungle zone.

A short distance in, I could sense a lot more danger. Looking around for monsters, I didn’t spot any. Acid Shot x5. I aimed around me at the underbrush. Bushes melted along with other plants.

A humanoid fox monster leapt out from behind a tree. Fire burst from their palms. Acid Shot x5. They quickly melted and their fire attack was consumed by my Acid Shot. That was when more of those humanoid fox monsters rushed out from various directions.

I saw surges of energy in the ground and avoided those spots. An Acid Shot at one of them triggered an explosion. They were setting energy type traps while attacking me. As for the monsters themselves. It was like someone merged a fox and a human, removed all the genitalia and nipples, and called it a day. Fox heads, furry bodies, clawed hands, but nothing else.

“You couldn’t have gone with cute fox girls?” I asked out loud as I melted another one of them. The worst part of the jungle wasn’t the fighting but keeping my directions straight. It was hard to make out the light source in the sky with all the tree cover.

The fight continued as more and more foxes rushed out of the jungle to trap the terrain and attack me. I had taken to doing long loops around, clearing out the foxes. Well they were human like, so maybe a Fox Clan. That seemed like a good name and fit them.

They worked together surprisingly well. If I had less stats or less combat experience, I might have been in a bit of trouble, but as it stood it was a one-sided massacre. The hardest part being energy management, but I was in no rush.

If this push failed, then we would just build airships and sail over this hell. I slowly retreated as my energy was worn down and the amount of Fox Clan monsters seemed to be endless. I left the forest and they didn’t pursue me. Retreating back into the forest and out of my sight and my energy sense.

Level 4 monsters could team up, which was what made them annoying. They were more than happy to call for help and just attack with endless numbers. It was exhausting to fight a level 4 monster like this. I considered how I could kill a lot of them quickly.

It just wasn’t possible. While I could try to hit them with a sword, they were more than happy to use fire up close and were decently quick. If it was only a group of them, I could win. But with their numbers, I couldn’t afford to spend the seconds it would take to run them down, since they could run over their own traps without issue.

I would have to try again once a road was built and test it out. But it felt like a slap in the face that I had been forced back by level 4 monsters. There were just too many at the same time. I couldn’t just rush past them like in the tower, since the entire point was to find the level 5 boss and get a handle on how easy a skill point would be.

The simple answer was, not easy at all. Kicking off the ground, I made my way to the North. I would check out the zone there before I called it quits for the day. I tried to think how I could handle the Fox Clan better. Even a hundred to one, I would still win. But when they just kept coming and coming, trapping the ground, launching fire balls, and being just fast enough I had to put in effort, it became impossible to win.

For someone like the Divine Empress it wouldn’t have been an issue. The Body stat while consuming energy, didn’t consume that much. She could have easily fought her way through the hordes, killing anything in her path.

I might be able to do that, just rush forward, but I didn’t want to put myself in a difficult situation. Perhaps that was why I hadn’t earned a meta-point yet. It was frustrating, but it wasn’t a surprise. Better to be alive and careful, then dead and dead.

If I never got one, it would be annoying, but after the tower climb, I had given up all hope on getting one. Reaching the corner of the zone, there was a void zone to the Northeast, and a mushroom zone to the Northwest.

Of course, it had to be the constantly changing psychedelic mushrooms. I entered the zone, using the void zone to my East and the jungle to my South to keep track of where I was. A figure in a cloak rushed at me from behind a large mushroom.

Acid Shot x2. I wasn’t that worried, since based on their energy they were a level 4 monster. The figure swiped one hand at my first Acid Shot and it disappeared. The second one struck the figure. It melted, revealing a skeleton underneath the cloak.

More figure rushed out at me, and I began to kill them off. Looking at what they were doing, they were absorbing the energy from my skills to empower themselves. Their shortcoming was that they could only handle one skill at a time.

I felt ill as the landscape changed, but I kept the Jungle to my South and nearby as I made my way West. At least this Cult of Absorption was nowhere as bad as the Fox Clan. They were a cult since they had robes. If they didn’t want me to call them a cult, they shouldn’t wear robes.

At least, they didn’t constantly summon more allies like the Fox Clan. Screw the Fox Clan and the shrubs they hid in. No, the hard part was the mushrooms, which made me feel ill as the colors changed, the energy in the air swirled, and the ground itself seemed to change its height just enough to annoy me as I stomped my way through the mushrooms.

When I finally spotted darklands ahead of me, I frowned. Of course I spotted them just as it was getting dark. Going into the darklands at night might pitch darkness. I didn’t want to do that against an unknown monster. Worse of all the jungle to my South ended as well and became darklands as well.

Without the light source I wouldn’t be able to head due West in the darklands, which meant that I could drift about aimlessly and run into different monster types by crossing over zones. Level 4 zones were the worst.

Getting people, the stats and skills just to poke them would be a massive uphill climb. I would have to scout out the zones first so that the easiest ones could be found. I let out a long sigh and rubbed my head. The headache and nausea persisted. I went to the boundary of the darklands and the mushrooms and killed the last few Cult of Absorption monsters that rushed at me.

Once that was done, I sat down and waited. There were very thin strips between zones and terrain types where there were no monsters. One thing I had noticed, the higher the level the zone, the smaller this strip of safety was.

I sat there, looking at the darkness, while the mushrooms swirled behind me during the night. I wasn’t about to go to sleep out here. That was just asking to die. I really hated level 4 zones. I thought of how my protection detail was handling the level 3 mistlands.

They had enough stats each that I wasn’t that worried. There were just black and white frogs, but the people could survive. The hardest part would be locating the camp, but it was near the jungle. So, once they found the edge of the zone, it would be easy to find the camp.

If they couldn’t handle a level 3 zone, they weren’t fit to be part of my protection detail. Being able to resist basic mental effects was key to not being tricked by a low-level skill. It was that simple. Thankfully Clarissa had given me the best and they had been getting points. They were part of the core group of soldiers she was boosting up.

In the future my protection detail would be grinding a zone below me. So, this was a good test of that plan. While we had a cart right now, in the future we would have an airship that we would use as our base for each zone. To carry both crystals and supplies.

They would get experience fighting a range of level 3 monsters at the start and supplement their stats with the crystals they earned. For me it was more about combat experience and seeing all the different types of monsters out there. I hadn’t thought there might be an energy trap skill until the Fox Clan used a skill like that.

Those little things would help me figure out the monsters in level 5 zones and beyond. The higher the level monster, the greater the range of difficulty it could present as well. That issue came from both the terrain and the hordes it could summon up as evidenced by the Fox Clan.

At least I had found a possible way to the West. Even if it was a massive headache. I had to be back to my protection detail by day 915. That was the plan if I found a way through and also how much supplies they had to stay in the level 3 zone.

Another thing long term to think about was equipment. Maybe not for me, but my protection detail. I would have to hunt down monsters and get crafting crystals myself. Find a relatively easy level 5 zone and monster, and then just get all the crafting crystals I could. With the hope that Doctor Katz could upgrade them into the right type to outfit myself with a set of level 6 equipment.

That was a long-term project, up there with clearing the towers. Hopefully a road would allow people to transverse safely through a level 4 zone, or taking these two cities would be a huge pain. I didn’t even want to start thinking how much of a headache level 5 zones were going to be.

The light source began to come up and the darklands finally lit up. I got up and stretched. Time to keep moving West and see what monster was out there. I might check the zone to the South and check that monster out as well. See what craziness the Almighty System had come up with. It was really creative for level 4 zones unlike level 3 zones and below which were just recolored animals for the most part.