Chapter 55 (1/2)

Rolling to the side, Randidly managed to get out of the way and then Empowered his hands and pushed off the ground, throwing himself almost instantly up to his feet.

The paw smashed to the ground, leaving a huge crack in the earth, and unfortunately Randidly was still too dizzy to recover completely after leaping upwards, and could only fall back as the shockwave sent him staggering.

Gritting his teeth, Randidly forced his trembling hands to still just as another paw swipe came ripping passed. This time, he wasn’t quick enough, and the huge claws ripped through his shirt, leaving the flesh of his left shoulder in tatters.

A notification came up that his health had dipped below 20%, but Randidly couldn’t even focus on it, his eyes narrowing to view his current enemy. Although the sphinx had taken the initiative, now that he really looked, Randidly could tell that it too was slightly off from using that spell.

It hissed at his close viewing, spitting a fireball directly at his face. Randidly rolled again, his sharp eyes picking up the small form that slipped out of his pocket in the roll. Reflexively, he reached out and grabbed it, his quick fingers wrapped around the small, completely nurtured soul seed.

Fertile soil, huh…?

Recovering his spear, Randidly had a crazy idea. As the sphinx opened its mouth again to shoot another fireball, Randidly threw the small seed towards its mouth. The passage of even the small seed was enough to throw off the flow of mana for the spell, and once more the fire energy dispersed.

Randidly followed this up with a Hasted and Empowered Phantom Thrust, his spear tip hitting the seed midair and driving it forward, once more ripping into the wound on the roof of the sphinx’s mouth.

Eyes burning, Randidly didn’t just withdraw the spear this time, but drove it deeper, ripping upward through the jaw and stabbing towards the skull, hoping he hit something vital.

The sphinx began to tremble, mewing strangely, and Randidly took that time to plant his feet and shove the spear forward, even deeper, cracking against something with a wet thump.

Just when he thought the sphinx would collapse, its mouth snapped shut, snapping the spear into pieces. As Randidly was sent stumbling backwards, it raised its head and howled, and Randidly could see that half of his spear was still sunk deeply into the roof of its mouth.

Spitting out blood from his mouth, Randidly dropped the remnants of the spear and withdrew several potions, hurriedly raising himself back up to full strength. He now regretted turning down Daniel’s offer of a spear from the weapons shop. A spare spear would come in handy right now.

Apparently realizing that it couldn’t do anything about the pain right now, the sphinx turned its red-rimmed eyes on Randidly. Then it charged, all pretense of playing gone, just an extremely large, angry monster.

It was met by a cloud of pestilence to the face, blinding it, but barely slowing it at all. While it couldn’t see, Randidly had Spearing Roots rip into it at a sideways angle, aiming mostly for the tendons of its legs, seeing several satisfyingly deep gashes result.

Leaping to the side, Randidly felt a hint of confidence that this was in the bag.

That was when it twisted midair and leaped after him, its eyes glowing golden, the light burning through the vicious insects, and the huge body smashed into Randidly, knocking the wind out of him. The two of them crashed into the ground, and he felt his ribs scream in protest.

Although wounded, the Sphinx leered down at Randidly, its breath hot and hungry.

“Now, now, now wha-”

Using Root Manipulation, Randidly grabbed the sphinx’s feet and dragged it back, off of his body. The sphinx turned to face the roots, kicking and ripping himself free, and turned back to Randidly, only to be met with a Roundhouse Kick to the face.

It wasn’t enough to do any damage, but it fell back, slightly stunned.

In that moment, Randidly poured all his mana into Spearing Roots again, several sharp spears ripping upward into the earlier holes, digging deeper into the torso of the creature, ripping through its stomach and puncturing holes in its lungs.

With a high pitched screech, the air once more began to hum, then distort, and Randidly had to grit his teeth to stay standing.

The back of his head throbbed, and the strange pain in the air seemed to be intensifying. Blackness ate at the corner of his vision, and he stumbled forward, his knees weak.

This….!

Not like this….!