BXBX NOVEL Chapter 115: Prey == Hunters
"Let\'s have a blast."
Their magic, mana, and all physical stats increased by 30% for one hour.
At the last second, two more people suddenly arrived and made the count reach 250.
[Round 1. Start!]
Everyone disappeared from the barren land before their consciousness collectively looked at a vast desert littered with…forest?
It was an absurd battlefield where the ground was sandy and full of desert while huge and thick greenery grew out of it.
All of them saw the entire battlefield, which was fifty square kilometers in size, for three seconds before they randomly appeared below.
At the same time, crawling monsters started to spawn on the battlefield, each one between levels 90 to 100.
The monsters were capable of traveling through the sand, so they immediately made ambush attacks on many people.
Naturally, not one person died in their ambush, but a few were injured throughout the battlefield.
People like Erix and Rin, who managed to sense the incoming attacks, were different.
When a monster attacked them, both of them had already started counter-attacking after dodging, filling one to their kill count.
\'Four more to go,\' Erix thought as he looked around and jumped up.
Suddenly, he felt a danger bell ringing and immediately shot up with metal plates below his feet, dodging a spiraling orb that missed him by an arm\'s length.
Erix had already turned back while he was dodging, so he saw the attacker and narrowed his eyes, immediately flying toward him.
The attacker was a man looking in his late twenties with a faint golden-brown beard and brown eyes with a short stature, a dwarf.
Instead of running, he grinned at Erix and created a triangular barrier around him, fully confident of his defensive capabilities.
Seeing that, Erix\'s body silently hummed as he stretched his physical capabilities to the extreme and readied a punch.
Sling Shot Punch!
His gauntlets pumped up mana to and fro, condensing and permeating into his fist\'s every fiber as he unleashed the second punch technique he learned.
This punch specialized in unleashing the entirety of his physical power, and 50 mana weaved to empower his punch in an explosive manner in one hit.
When the punch struck the barrier, the dwarf\'s expression transformed from a confident one into a frightened one as he sensed his connection to the barrier breaking as Erix shattered it instantly.
*BOOM!*
Sling Shot punch broke the barrier, but all of its force dispersed in breaking that barrier as this punch technique was that type of attack. It would use all of its force on the first contacted object.
So, right after breaking the barrier, Erix spun mid-air and unleashed another punch with his superior martial expertise, Whirling Punch!
The punch squarely hit the dwarf man, who had just turned halfway around to run, and that caused Erix\'s punch to hit the back of his head.
The result?
A gruesome death with brain matter exploding around Erix.
[You have reached level 72]
\'Strange, I leveled up?\' Erix thought in surprise. \'That dwarf was at level 79, but if it was at that level, I wouldn\'t have leveled up.\'
[You have passed the first round. You will be teleported in three seconds.]
Although surprised, Erix quickly picked up the Hunter card from the dwarf\'s pocket and disappeared.
As the scenery changed before him, Erix found himself back on the barren land.
But now, only he was alone here.
\'It looks like I was the first one to pass.\' Erix thought. He looked up and saw a few things.
- [ 9:59 ] minutes of countdown until the next round starts.
\'Oh?\' Erix was surprised at the countdown, but he soon sensed another presence and saw someone appearing several meters away from him, a human man in his thirties wearing a black armor set.
And then, one by one, people started appearing.
Rin also arrived as Erix, and her met up again.
When two minutes were left, those seven subordinates of Frandal and Spena also arrived.
"They passed."
"We\'ll have a chance in the next four rounds."
"Indeed. Let\'s focus on finding them in each round. Our priority is to kill them."
The countdown reached zero, and the number of participants dwindled from 250 to 218.
…
The next round started in a giant frigid mountain with all participants appearing in random places on it.
The mountain was five thousand meters tall and a thousand meters wide, with a bunch of ice, wind, and water-attributed monsters.
Rin appeared in the middle of the mountain and just stood in her spot without moving.
She closed her eyes and expanded her senses while wielding her Blade Eater (Stormrend Katana form).
She sensed two monsters coming her way, but not moving despite that, she stood still in focus.
*Grrr!*
\'Come,\' Rin sensed a killing intent.
Her katana was slowly and steadily coated with condensed blue light, the lightning elements she finely weaved to enhance her katana\'s sharpness and raw power.
-50 mana.
-200 Blade energy.
200% focus.
Blade Concept.
Lightning manipulation.
The five-meter-tall Ape with powerful and explosive muscles coated by an ice-plated body roared and dashed towards Rin while transforming in a magic icy drill with some skill.
Its breakneck speed allowed it to reach Rin a second later, but the scene the beast expected didn\'t come into its view or feel.
Where is blood? Where is my food? It thought.
And most importantly, it didn\'t feel the impact on its target.
But a second later, when the monster came to its senses after stopping its dash, it felt a sudden dread from its soul and then immense pain.
Rin\'s eyes met the Ape\'s gaze before she released her breath and relaxed her muscles having executed her powerful technique, Blade Sheen.
\'I finally perfected it to use my entire physical force with it,\' Rin was thrilled and winked at the Ape while smiling.
*Chreee…*
The Ape opened its mouth, but then it ceased to be. A fountain of blood sprayed out as the lights in its eyes looking at Rin vanished.
The monster was cleanly cut into two before it released a burst of statistic charge.
[ You have reached level 72.]
Since Rin had killed five monsters in the previous round due to not encountering any people, she finally leveled up after killing one more higher-level monster.
She then looked at another presence she had felt, but it was no longer there.
Her brows creased because a powerful presence was also in the same direction.
"Not bad. Your blade is dangerous indeed."
Rin saw a woman coming out of the woods in the direction where she had felt another beast\'s presence.
\'It seems she managed to kill the monster there before it could utter any sound.\'
Rin knew that this woman was dangerous, and…she intended to attack her.
"You are an enemy," Rin said as she faced the woman; her grip on the katana tightened as her mana whirled, ready to be weaved by her.
"Some other would have chosen not to bother with you, but," the woman helplessly smiled. "No hard feelings; I am just following my orders."
"Die."
The woman turned into a stream of blood as she shot towards Rin.
Rin narrowed her eyes and decided to attack the incoming \'thing.\'
The previous manner of circulation followed as Rin executed another Blade Sheen.
A flash of lightning as Rin moved with extreme speed, permeating lightning in her every fiber and slashing her sword at a breakneck speed.
Even the wind resistance was entirely futile against the powerful, condensed lightning around Rin\'s blade to achieve the highest penetration she could muster.
However, the stream of blood struck her blade, cut into two, but those two parts gathered together again behind Rin into the appearance of a woman.
"Not fast enough," the woman said with a playful smile. "I separated before your blade hit me-"
*Swoosh!*
Rin immediately executed another attack as she widely swung her arm and slashed at her enemy.
The woman\'s head flew up cleanly, but the expression on her face was lively as her lips moved, "Rude girl. Don\'t you know that you should listen when elders are speaking?"
\'What?!\' Rin was shocked. She clearly felt the impact and knew she managed to cut off her head, but she saw that the woman\'s vitality was only reduced by 19.
She still had 89 vitality left!
\'Does she have Blood affinity?\' Rin speculated as her eyes narrowed with a severe glint. \'It seems that I have to go all out.\'
Rin activated her armor set\'s ability to increase her physical stats by 20%.
She could only use this ability once per hour, but she needed to use it to finish this battle as quickly as possible.
"Not bad," the woman\'s head spoke again before it released a burst of tendrils and re-attached to her body.
"Bye." Rin grinned, her expression white.
She dashed forward with a rumbling thunder crackle, cracking the ground beneath her with the force she exerted.
\'Lightning Charge, 150%.\'
Her entire body instantly crackled with lightning as veins all over her body protruded.
Her pupils shrunk to the extreme, and her speed instantaneously reached five times the speed of sound.
"You bitc-"
The woman who was taking Rin lightly finally felt threatened as she involuntarily had to go all out in defense.
A blood umbrella bloomed before her right as Rin\'s blade reached her.
But this time, It was the woman\'s turn to be surprised as Rin unleashed not just one blade but a frenzy.
Her blood vessels in her arms, wrists, and hands expanded before she explosively and quickly unleashed a flurry of slashes on the umbrella as lightning slashes physically manifested and stuck to the space with her control that required her full focus.
The umbrella started shattering despite the woman infusing her energy into it. She was not specialized in defense in the first place, but this level of offense was out of her expectations. She wanted to do something, but the threat was clear.
\'No…\'
When her umbrella crumbled, those fifty lightning blades suspended in the air instantly shot forward toward the woman, tearing to her pieces as a massive lightning charge electrocuted her entire body, in and out, and devoured her vitality.
At the end of her death, all she saw were the cold eyes of Rin flickering with lightning.