Chapter 472
Chapter 472
Since Jake could see that he wouldn’t be able to come to the humans’ aid before D reached them, he needed to stall his counterpart somehow. And there was only one way he could achieve that.
Several of his wyrmcallers had already reached the street where the chase was taking place, so he ordered them to start deploying combat units. Those of the huge winged creatures that were going to deploy wingclaws and crawlers took positions along the edges of the roofs. And those that planned to deploy smaller or land-based creatures that couldn’t scale vertical surfaces landed on the ground.
Soon enough, his combat units began to emerge from the riftmaws of the wyrmcallers. Wingclaws soared through the air, diving to the street ten stories below, while crawlers skittered down the walls of the nests.
The other wyrmcallers deployed the four new types of monsters he had recently developed: monstrosities, wasps, blastfiends, and scorpos. The last three were pretty small, about the size of a domestic cat, and therefore, a single wyrmcaller could deploy a dozen or even more of them at once.
Jake instructed all of his combat units to focus solely on D.
As he continued to head toward the scene, he kept watching the events unfold. The monstrosities were the first to attack his counterpart. These creatures, resembling huge monstrous heads, moving through the air using Levitation. Sure enough, while this ability allowed a monstrosity to fly, it came at a high cost of accelerated mana consumption. But he figured it would be justified if this type of creature proved effective in the fight against D, or in any battle in general.
He watched several monstrosities extend their tentacles toward D, their tips opening like blossoms. In the next instant, the bloated creatures unleashed Energy Spray. The ability drew on mana stored within them and transformed it into energy projectiles as it traveled through the tentacles.
Bursting from the blossomed tips, the shots streaked through the air. Some struck the ravagespawn surrounding D, burning glowing holes through their bodies. However, when those energy shots hit D, they didn’t do much, if any, damage to his powerful armor. Which wasn’t all that surprising. After all, he was definitely much better protected than the regular ravagespawn.
While Energy Spray didn’t seem to be effective against D, it still appeared to be a solid combat ability. It was definitely worth investing more time and effort into making it more powerful.
D didn’t appreciate being shot at. While he had easily shrugged off the first few shots that drilled into his armor, the next several aggravated him. At first, it seemed like they did little more than annoy him, but when Jake got a closer look at D, he spotted several scorched marks on different parts of his armor, each with a hole in the center. So Energy Spray had definitely proved to be a good combat ability, strong enough to damage even D’s powerful armor.
But as Jake learned a moment later, the monstrosities themselves didn’t seem particularly well designed. After taking a few shots, D rushed toward the closest of them. Upon seeing the approaching threat, the monstrous head fired off a few more blasts at the enemy.
While some of them drilled into D, they failed to stop his advance. Seeing this, the creature decided to retreat. It turned in the air and began to fly away. Unfortunately, its movement speed left much to be desired, and it took D only a moment to catch up to the escaping monster.
His scythe-blades sliced through the monster’s tentacles, cutting them apart. In the next instant, he grabbed hold of the monstrous head with one hand while lashing out at it with the claws of the other. His talons seemingly met no resistance as they carved through the monster, tearing it to pieces.
The monstrosity stood no chance against such a powerful opponent. True, unlike wingclaws and crawlers, this type of combat unit hadn’t been developed to its full potential yet. But even so, seeing how easily D dispatched the first monstrosity made Jake realize just how poorly designed the creature truly was. He was definitely going to abandon this type of monster rather than waste any more time, effort, or resources trying to improve it. It simply wasn’t worth it.
After dispatching the first monstrosity, D quickly scanned the area, spotted another nearby, and charged toward it. Several of the other flying heads turned their combat tentacles on him, firing one energy projectile after another. Glowing blue bolts streaked through the air, punching into the organic matter covering the pavement, the ravagespawn around D, and D himself, leaving sizzling holes wherever they struck. Most of the blasts either killed or at least decapitated the ravagespawn, yet D pressed on with undiminished vigor, cutting down every enemy in sight despite the many smoking holes riddling his armored body.
As soon as he reached another monstrosity, D unleashed a barrage of powerful punches, turning the creature into a mangled mess in no time flat. Even so, it didn’t die easily, fighting for its life until the very end. Several of its tentacles swung toward the morphus and blossomed open, firing bursts of energy a moment later.
D snapped his head to the side, avoiding one projectile. Another grazed the top of his head, carving a furrow into his flesh. A third struck the side of his head, leaving quite a large crater. It still wasn’t deep enough to make mana leak out, but it enraged him all the same.
He grabbed hold of two of the monster’s tentacles and tore them off with a savage yank. After that, he resumed his relentless assault, pounding the creature until it was finally dead.
After that, he immediately leaped toward another monstrosity. He dodged one of the shots it fired at him while two others drilled into his chest armor, leaving scorched holes behind.
As soon as he reached the creature, D seized one of its fully blossomed tentacles just as it was about to fire and aimed it at another monster across the street. The energy bolt slammed into the second creature’s open mouth, and an instant later, it exploded, sending pulpy pieces of flesh flying in every direction.
At the same time, D’s scythe-blades tore into the monster in his grasp, carving it into countless chunks within seconds.
One by one, D leaped from monstrosity to monstrosity, dispatching them with methodical efficiency. For the most part, he relied only on his primary weapons: vicious claws, crushing fists, and razor-sharp scythe-blades. D had a few much more powerful abilities that Jake was aware of, but his counterpart didn’t bother to employ them yet, as his regular weapons were clearly more than enough to deal with the monstrosities.
Also, it wasn’t Jake’s first encounter with D, and so far, he had never seen him use any ranged combat abilities. There was one exception, an ability that essentially turned D into a living missile, but he only used it against especially powerful opponents. An ability like that surely consumed a significant amount of mana, which would explain why D didn’t employ it often.
Aside from that, D didn’t appear to have any other ranged options, meaning he had to get close to his enemies to deal with them. It was a detail worth remembering, and Jake made a mental note of it.
D continued crushing one monstrosity after another beneath his powerful punches. Jake’s other combat units, however, still hadn’t reached his counterpart. D was in the middle of the ravagespawn, and to get to him, they first had to fight their way through the pack of ravagers. So while D dealt with the remaining monstrosities, Jake’s other units focused on the ravagespawn.
It took D only a few seconds to finish off the last of the monstrosities. As soon as he did, the other combat units finally wiped out the ravagespawn and turned their full attention to him.
He stood in the middle of the street, surrounded by the diverse army of Jake’s monsters. Not that D seemed discouraged in the slightest. He quickly looked around, taking stock of the enemies around him. His ripped body was now marked with numerous hollow holes from energy-bolt impacts, but the damage was only superficial and caused no mana to leak out.
So, the monstrosities hadn’t been especially effective in battle, but how would the other newly developed combat units fare? Jake was eager to find out. For a brief moment, time seemed to freeze. Then one of the wingclaws dove at D from above, and the fight resumed.