Chapter 54 (2/2)

The split second bought by the shock of the teleportation failure allowed Randidly to drink a stamina potion and rush forward, Haste and Empower turning Footwork of the Spear Phantom into an impossibly fast and smooth movement technique.

Furious, the sphinx opened its mouth and  shot a fireball at Randidly, but he simply sidestepped and kept coming, stabbing over and over as fast as he could.

Still, the sphinx was simply too big. There was no way for Randidly to inflict a deadly amount of damage in a short amount of time. But the point…

The point would be making the sphinx convinced that he could.

At that moment, Randidly saw his chance. As the sphinx stumbled backwards, swiping halfheartedly at him to keep him back, while shaking its head to rid itself of the pestilence insects, Randidly jumped forward and thrust with the spear.

Inwardly, Randidly grimaced. He had drawn a deep gash in the sphinx’s head, right above the left eye; he had been trying to blind it, but it had jerked to the side at the last second.

Still, this was apparently the last straw. With movement borne of panic, the sphinx spun around and leapt towards the cave, where Randidly assumed he had additional bodies waiting to eat, just in case.

Randidly’s grin crept higher.

Gotcha.

As the creature rushed towards the mouth of the cave Randidly strolled after it, removing a mana potion from his bag and drinking it.

Then, just as the creature reached the mouth of the cave, Randidly spent all 500 or so of his mana on Spearing Roots.

Normally, Spearing Roots was an incredibly powerful, penetrative attack, that had a significant drawback, although it wasn’t truly a flaw. Spearing Roots could only be produced from the ground. Still, most everything remained on or near the ground, so this wasn’t an issue, it just limited the avenues of attack Randidly possessed, and on a monster with a huge body like the sphinx, limited the areas he could damage easily.

Where normally he could only produce the roots from the ground, which limited their effectiveness, a cave meant the ground was all around you. And the Sphinx ran right into the large mouth of its cave, only a meter or so of space between its head and sides and earth.

An onlooker watching could perhaps believe that the cave had been a mouth this whole time, and the viciously sharp roots were the teeth, chomping down at the creature that foolishly entered into it.

The roots caught it in its upper torso, probably only its head making it safely through to the cave proper, while wave after wave of root stabbed downward, burrowing long holes into the flesh of the Sphinx, all around its body. Although Randidly hadn’t been able to bring it to bear earlier due to the sphinx’s ability to teleport, there was no doubt that his Intelligence was of a level to inflict serious damage on an enemy, even if they were Lvl 30.

The roots were sharp, the force they contained was vicious, the wriggling movements of them, due to careful use of Root Manipulation, insidiously ripped the wounds open even wider.

That said, Randidly suspected that the Sphinx was still alive. Using another mana potion, Randidly used the roots to grind around for a bit, before throwing the sphinx back out to the ground in front of him. Then the roots twisted and settled, hardening to block the cave.

If the sphinx was still alive, it wouldn’t be stopped very long by the roots, but it was more than enough to slow it down while Randidly ripped into its back.

Mewing in agony, the thing staggered to its feet, huge holes in its back and shoulders. Even though that one portion of its body was a mess of gore, that was only about a ⅕ of its body. Its head, lower back, and both sets of legs were fine.

The wings, however, had been turned into broken, useless limbs.

As Randidly approached, a notification popped up.

Congratulations! Your soul seed has been completely nurtured. Upon being inserted into fertile soil, the seed shall grow.

One less thing he had to worry about then. Now was time to finish this.

“You….you….you….” The sphinx said, turning towards Randidly.

“Me, me, me…” Randidly said, stalking closer. This seemed to incense the creature, because it opened its mouth again, mana flowing rapidly to fill it. But instead of a fireball, the energy spread and covered a 10 meter area around the sphinx, including Randidly.

Within a second, the air began to vibrate. Then it began to twist and rip. Jarring, jagged vibrations, strange movements in the air, made it unbearable to be near that strange magic in the Sphinx’s mouth. Randidly stumbled to a stop, struggling to collect himself.

Although he had been through alot, this was the most painful experience Randidly had ever encountered. It made his bones ache and twist, his marrow roiling.

After what felt like an eternity, it stopped, and Randidly collapsed, coughing up blood. It hadn’t done much actual damage, but the pain, combined with the strangeness…

Randidly looked up just in time to see the sphinx leaping at him, mouth wide and teeth bared.