Chapter 99: You Learn As You Fight

Elias had killed another five cannibals, but he was not fighting a mindless horde, and although he was fast and strong, two hands could not hold back a hundred; it was inevitable that he would be swarmed.

However, he had never thought he was fast enough or strong enough to avoid all the attacks against him; he just needed to be able to survive long enough to kill. Offense was always his best defense.

In the blink of an eye, he was surrounded by dozens of cannibals, and they pressed closer, their bodies piling on his own despite cutting down another four of them in seconds.

Claws raked his body, but he tried to avoid as much damage as possible by spreading the material that covered his joints over to his torso from time to time.

Teeth snapped inches from his face, and even as he moved, one cannibal managed to get a hold on his arm, and he bit deep.

Pain bloomed through his body as the bloody serrated teeth of the cannibal ground against the muscles of his arm. This was the first real damage he had suffered since he fell into this forest.

Elias snarled, the swarm surging to seal the wound even as his body struggled to stitch the wound shut, but with the cannibal still gnawing on his arm, that was not happening.

He headbutted the biter with annoyance, his forehead smashed into the cannibal’s nose with a crunch of cartilage, and the pain forced the man to open his mouth, and Elias then drove his blade through the mouth, out the back of the skull.

The body jerked, and the teeth clamped down on the blade,

“Even in death, you still chose to hold me down,” Elias growled in irritation, and he ripped the head free from its neck as he tore his blade to the side, tearing through flesh and bone with ease.

This cannibal had drawn too much of his attention, and Elias knew he had just made a mistake, but he also knew he was approaching the limit of what he was able to achieve with his attributes and was not too surprised at his failings.

Still, he had given his prey the chance to gain the advantage as one of them leaped onto his back and had their arms locked around his neck, Elias barely took in a deep breath before the cannibal began to squeeze with all his strength.

Elias had noticed that these Fury Forges were not balanced in their attributes, which was not a surprise, given that most of them had ten pools of Lumina, and at the Fury Forge Leve,l they would only gain five points to place in any attributes.

He had learned that for the civilians living inside the safe walls of Stormfall, a majority of them preferred the balance route, where they distributed these points equally across all their stats, but for those who actively battle and hunt, they favored pushing the attribute of their choice much higher than the rest.

In that way, they could have an advantage over a balanced opponent.

The cannibal that was squeezing his throat must have dumped a majority of his points into strength, and should have around fifty points in strength.

However, it should be noted that Elias’s Durability was at 119 points, and the best way for any of the Fury Forge here to harm him was by using a sharp tool and not trying to choke him out.

Elias could feel a dull pressure around his throat, even though the cannibal was screaming to the high heavens with beings popping out of his head and eyes bulging out as he used all the power in his body to choke Elias.

It was a bit funny and annoying at the same time, but the actions of this cannibal made the others scream out in encouragement in their unknown language, and it gave him time to adjust himself and see the situation of the prey around him.

His target had always been the leader, as the giant gazed at Elias, a curious glow in his black eyes that was disconcerting. For a moment, Elias thought there must be multiple people looking at him through the eyes of the giant.

Elias’s fear had been that the giant would have attacked him when he was covered by his subordinates, but it seemed that he was just going to watch. Did he really think that Elias had someone guarding him at the back and was wary of them?

This may just be the truth, but Elias knew that this test was for him alone.

Seeing that he was free to attack at the moment, and that the surrounding cannibals were no longer satisfied at watching him being choked to death, Elias reached back at the screaming cannibal who would have hurt him more if he had used his teeth and claws. His fingers found the eyes of the man, and he dug in, popping them like grapes.

The screams of the cannibal that had once been of effort and victory transformed into a hoarse scream of pain, and his grip loosened.

Elias bucked, throwing him forward, straight into the path of two more attackers, and the claws meant for Elias raked their own kin’s body instead, and he was torn apart.

’This is why you need as much durability as well as strength,’ Elias told himself, even though he knew that his talent made it unfair to compare himself with others.

From the pitiful attempt to hurt him, Elias finalized that he could be injured in this fight, but except something unexpected happens, he would not be killed, and so he allowed himself to get into the flow of slaughter, and he pressed his advantage as his blades flashed in a blur.

It was a learning experience for him also, because even knowing all the parts of a human body was not enough to properly dissect them in the heat of combat when there were so many other factors involved.

He slashed left, opening a belly, leaving guts spilling in steaming coils, and made a right thrust through a throat, then he twisted to sever the spine.

The bodies dropped, twitching, causing those behind them to stumble.

One cannibal got a lucky swing, a jagged stone club smashing into his shoulder with surprising strength that was greater than what the cannibal should have been able to do.

The stone club exploded into ash, as it seemed to be a single-use weapon. This was the unexpected factor that he had been anticipating, and it had bitten him in the behind even with his caution.

Elias was in pain as the bone in his shoulder cracked with a sharp pop. He growled, an animalistic sound that resembled a beast, and countered with both of his blades.

They raked upward, disemboweling the attacker from groin to sternum. The slash was so violent that wet intestines looped around Elias’s arm like wet ropes; he shook them free, leaving the cannibal collapsing in a heap of his own innards.

He wished he had properly seen the weapon that had been used against him, but it must be a product of Alchemistry.

Elias had not seen a Rune Weapon in this fight; he knew how hard those were to make, but these cannibals seemed to have found a loophole and were able to craft temporary weapons that were powerful.

If he were an average Siphon without enhanced durability and vitality, then that attack would have crushed him into paste; instead, his shoulders had nearly healed.

’Now, things are getting interesting,’ the hunter in him crooned.

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