Zectas Volume I: Enigmatic Village of Nanahuatl (44 page)

 

 

Smoke asked Igniz to lower down his luminance so that they won't wake up the winged foxbats. After, taking a few steps inside. He felt that the ground was really slippery and squishy. It was very difficult to gain some stable footing and there was that repugnant smell as well.

 

 

Then it hit him. He was actually standing on guano, winged foxbat droppings! No wonder he felt so queasy. He was about to take the route towards the exit when Igniz's light reflected a stone that was giving out the same feeling as the clay stone that he was using to sharpen his arrows.

 

 

He went closer to the stone to investigate. It was about the size of a football, it was also very heavy for its size. He took out his clay stone to see if there would be any kind of reaction from this mysterious stone.

 

 

Straight away, the clay stone started to lightly shake. Smoke wondered just what this mysterious rock was, to make the clay stone move.

 

 

Smoke was about to take the heavy rock outside when an unusually large winged foxbat attacked him from the back. This was the boss of the winged foxbats. He was jostled forward, damaging him and causing him to drop the rock.

 

 

An eerie vibration came upon his skin. The large winged foxbat had called for his brethren to awaken. Igniz started creating his protective fire orbit, but this time the winged foxbats ignored the fiery sphere.

 

 

Each winged foxbat dove down and took a stab at the fire orbit. The monsters continued their endless clawing at Smoke's last line of defense.

 

 

Knowing that if he wouldn't take any drastic measure, he would be killed in the next few seconds. Smoke took out eight special arrows. These arrows were his brightest flare arrows.

 

 

He spread his targets and stuck all eight of them into the walls of the cave. The winged foxbats were blinded by the sudden bright light.

 

 

Smoke took this small window of opportunity. He grabbed Igniz and was about to grab the inexplicably heavy stone when the boss of the winged foxbats dove for the rock and stood on top of it.

 

 

He knew that he couldn't take on the colony of winged foxbats. So, he made a mad dash for the exit of the cave. He was lucky that the way out was relatively straight and his blurred vision was enough to lead him outside.

 

 

He was thankful that he knew that bats were not actually blind. Unlike owls, these nocturnal creatures just have poor eyesight at night hence the use of echolocation.

 

 

The winged foxes did not give chase. They still had the mysterious rock. Smoke wanted that rock even more, now that he knew it was precious to the winged foxbats.

 

 

There were four hours left before the winged foxbats would come out to feed and he planned on grabbing the rock while they were outside harvesting the rainbow butterflies.

 

 

Smoke thought that he needed a back up plan just in case things would go south inside the cave. He prepared his flare arrows, but he wanted a more solid defense. Igniz's fire orbit couldn't hold the relentless claws of the winged foxbats.

 

 

He rummaged through his inventory and found that he still had twenty pieces of armored armadillo carapace left over from the weir that he had built together with Darius.

 

 

Twenty pieces were enough to cover one side. Despite that, the winged foxbats would be coming in from every possible direction.

 

 

Smoke sat down and grabbed a book that would be finished in two hours. It was entitled 'Elementary Bridge Construction', he made a habit to acquire knowledge whenever he had some free time.

 

 

Since he was still confounded in a finding a way to make some sort of defense, he took the time to enjoy the view of Mount Gliseloc. He noticed that the rainbow butterflies' very fast life cycle was the reason why the spix camaw and the winged foxbats were thriving.

 

 

Thinking more about the food chain, he concluded that the spix camaw was below the winged foxbats but somehow it managed to survive. He wondered for a few seconds and then realized that it was because of their well built spherical nests.

 

 

The spix camaws had a safe haven from the murderous winged foxbats and that was the reason why they survived. He needed something similar to their spherical nests.

 

 

In the next hour, Smoke gathered as much branches as he could. With Igniz's help, he broke off some thick ones from the trees. He had become quite dexterous in using only one hand because his other one was still acquiring the knowledge from a book.

 

 

He piled up the gathered branches and molded each one into similar height and width. He would grab a branch and have both his knees and feet hold the branch firmly while his free hand would scrape off the excess wood.

 

 

He needed 800 pieces of wood for the skeleton of his collapsible spherical shield. As he continued working on the branches he discerned that he could not complete this spherical shield within the next four hours.

 

 

Grabbing all of his raw materials he went some distance away from the cave. He did not want to remind the winged foxbats that he had intruded their home just a few hours ago.

 

 

After acquiring the knowledge of the book about bridges, Smoke doubled his pace in forming the branches into his desired shape.

 

 

It was almost night time and the winged foxbats were about to come out of their caves. Smoke had just finished eating his dinner and was ready to face the winged denizens of the night.

 

 

Igniz made his protective fire orbit and consciously increased its thickness and heat. He was threatened from the time inside the cave. The winged foxbats did just make light work of his fire orbit.

 

 

Smoke appreciated Igniz's efforts in reinforcing the fire orbit but he was confident that the winged foxbats would ignore them like before and would only go after the rainbow butterflies.

 

 

The winged foxbats did not disappoint Smoke's expectations. The winged monsters moved in their usual fashion, completely ignoring Smoke's attacks at them.

 

 

For the past few days, Smoke managed an average kill of 300 winged foxbats on each nightly flight of the colony. He managed to increase his kills by having Igniz randomly fire flamethrowers and fireballs at the cloud of winged monsters.

 

 

As the swarm of winged foxbats ate, Smoke leisurely killed them with his earth enchanted arrows. He would have gotten a higher damage against them if he used Igniz's fire enhancement but he needed to increase his Earth affinity.

 

 

When the winged monsters' feeding time ended, Smoke retrieved his arrows and the loot from the bats. Aside from the bat wings, there were also some bat fangs, bat meat and bat claws.

 

 

With the retrieval of items finished, Smoke continued on his pressing task at hand, the spherical shield. He wanted it completed before tomorrow's sundown.

 

 

Now that he had all 800 pieces of his skeletal frame for his collapsible spherical shield, he started sowing in the bat wings to cover the gaps in between the wooden frames and the armored armadillo carapace.

 

 

The finished product was a spherical shield, that when expanded, had a diameter of six feet and a diameter of two feet in its collapsed form.

 

 

Smoke made a transmutation casting circle and placed his newly finished shield inside as the base item. He added in some feathers of the spix camaw, some sturdy rocks, and one mantis blade. He had hoped that the rocks and the mantis blade would increase the shield's defense.

 

 

His 'Item Transmutation' ability has reached Intermediate level 3. Which is why he wished that the resulting item would be better than before.

 

 

The component materials worked perfectly. The feathers reduced its weight, the rocks added some defense and his mantis blade increased its durability and even added in a bonus ability of return damage.

 

 

Proud of his crafted final product, Smoke paused for a couple of minutes to simply admire his accomplishment. When he was done praising his collapsible shield, he carefully stowed it away in the safety of his backpack window.

 

 

He only had about an hour left before dusk. Quickly, he hurriedly enchanted all of his arrows with the clay stone and waited near the entrance of the cave where he found the mysterious rock.

 

 

While waiting for the flying foxbats to come out, he wondered if he should try transmuting Darius' composite bow. After all, his shield did turn out to be quite satisfactory.

 

 

His curiosity got the better of him and he started creating a transmutation casting circle. He had used his last mantis blade on the shield. Now, he only had the legs of the powersaw crickets, the armband from the lamia boss, Aquaria, the lucky bunny ears which gave +100 luck, and the green dual knives from the fecund lizard boss, Alteria.

 

 

The dual knives were out of the question. He was left with the lucky bunny ears and the armband. Thinking that the lucky bunny ears would fetch a high price when he would sell it at auction in one of the main cities. He decided to use the armband which gave 25% increase damaged on water and ice abilities.

 

 

 

 

Smoke was ecstatic! Now he was ready to face that huge winged foxbat.

 

 

Like clock work, the winged foxbats swarmed out of their caves and started feeding on the abundant rainbow butterflies.

 

 

Smoke entered the cave once more. This time, he was prepared with his trusted collapsible shield at the ready.

 

 

Finding the mysterious rock at its original spot was a bit concerning. This would mean that the alpha foxbat was still here waiting for him to grab the rock.

 

 

Immediately, he expanded his spherical shield and went inside it. Slowly he moved his way towards the mysterious rock. He wasn't even two feet away, when suddenly, the winged foxbat boss came out of nowhere and kept on clawing the spherical shield.

 

 

Igniz came out of the shield and started attacking the boss of the foxbats which revealed its name and life. winged foxbat: Chiropterra (72,149/75,000 HP). The foxbat boss was accompanied by four other foxbats and they clawed on Smoke's spherical shield as well.

 

 

The monsters flew a few feet backwards as they got hurt from the return damage of the bladed spherical shield. The boss, Chiropterra let out a shriek and the foxbats resumed their attacks on Smoke's sphere.

 

 

With the monsters relentless attacks, the durability of the spherical shield was slowly dwindling. Smoke attacked the monsters from the small gaps that he intentionally added in the shield. The gaps were wide enough for his arrows to to come out and hit the winged foxbats.

 

 

After dispatching the four foxbats, Smoke focused his attention on the foxbat boss. The beast was being occupied by Igniz.

 

 

"Igniz, two pronged attack!"

 

 

The dark ember sprite flew fast, towards the back of Chiropterra. The monster responded by facing Igniz, completely exposing his back to Smoke.

 

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 2582.

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. Damage 1035.

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 2582.

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 2579.

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 2584.

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 2581.

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. Damage 1038.

 

+ Atk hits winged foxbat: Chiropterra. +EARTH DMG. BACK ATTACK. CRITICAL HIT. Damage 2578.

 

 

Because of Smoke's massive damage the winged foxbat boss faced him which exposed his back to Igniz. This time Igniz released a rain of fireballs on the monster.

 

 

The monster flew out of his unfavorable situation but his lifebar indicated that it still had (43,509/75,000 HP) left.

 

 

Chiropterra was a beast with average Intelligence. It positioned itself behind one of the stalactites hanging on top of the cave.

 

 

Smoke tried to move his spherical shield into a spot where he could hit the foxbat boss but the stalagmites were blocking his way.

 

 

Forced to collapse his spherical bladed shield, Smoke took out his green dual knives. This would be the first time that he would use these knives in actual combat.

 

 

Stealthily, the foxbat flew to one of the stalactites directly behind Smoke's back. The monster was unaware that this intruder had an ability that could detect a monster's presence.

 

 

It wanted to attack Smoke in the same manner that it was attacked. He would plunged his claws deep into his back and impale him.

 

 

Having said that, Smoke felt all the movements of the foxbat boss. He pretended to be searching in the original spot that the monstrous bat fled to.