Unlike what Reid had expected, the cave was not dark at all. Light was being produced by the glowing barite rocks stuck on the cave walls.
Reid was tempted to grab a few to use as light for his bunker but he restrained himself. He was here in search of cores, If he was lucky enough, not more scraps to decorate his bunker.
The wind coming from the cazve's opening tickled his skin making it crawl. The deeper he was moving into the cave, the worse his unease got.
Just for safety, he equipped himself with a tal bat. He hoped that'll be enough to defend himself from whatever was making his instincts ring in alarm.
Walking further, he could see ahead of him getting a bit brighter. Reid exited the hallway of the cave, walked into a large opening and spotted the source of brightness.
Reid couldn't help but gasp in surprise, not at the beauty the lights from the barite rocks showed in the opening but at what lay in the center.
In the center lay not one, but two glowing cores. They had different colors swirling inside and they looked a lot bigger than the fla cores he harvested earlier maybe they had a higher rank too.
He slowly walked towards them, keeping up his guard. Nothing happened even when he got close to the cores. Standing this close to the them, Reid could see that one of them had what looked like the hands of a clock within and the other was just a swirling mass a darkness.
"Evo, can you scan the cores?" Reid asked.
[Yes I can but I suggest you store them and leave imdiately] She replied warning Reid[Since there are core here, especially ones outputting this amount of energy, there'll definitely be beasts around.
They are drawn to the cores of stronger beasts and staying close to said core for a long period of ti would allow them to evolve by absorbing the energy from the core and gaining the core's property/skill]
"Alright" Reid, understanding the situation, said and outstretched his hands to send the core in his Forge Lab.
He was prepared for a surprise attack any second but it never ca, not even when he stored both the cores.
"I was sure sothing would—" he quickly jumped back before he could complete his sentence.
In his previous spot, a huge crater appeared and the cause of it was a rat-like creature the size of a German shepherd. Behind it were two more that looked ready to attack at any mont.
"Well, shit" Reid cursed "I really shouldn't have tried jinxing myself".
Rusty and Nyx were already by his side ready to defend him when Evo suddenly opened his mission log.
[
[Mission Log]
Ergency mission: survive against the four beasts and get to safety.
Reward: x10 Bronze tier alloys.
Optional Mission: defeat the beasts and extract their cores.
Beasts killed: 0/4
Reward: Blueprints for a silver ranked beast, 50 Bond stat for all your beasts.
]
"Can't I just [harvest] their cores like I did previously, with the twin's beasts?" Reid asked.
[That won't work in this situation. You were only able to harvest the cores from the previous forged beasts because they were not actively drawing energy from it.
But these rats are in battle ready mode, so they're actively drawing energy from their cores, which interrupts the [Harvest] process] Evo clarified, leaving Reid with only the options of fight or flight.
"Sigh, since I have no other choice anyway" Reid sighed tightening his hands on the tal bat "might as well be rewarded for it".
Without warning, the rat disappeared and appeared in front of Reid and his partners with its mouth open, ready to chomp on him. But this ti, Reid, Nyx and Rusty were prepared.
Before it could take a bite of him, Nyx used its skill [Smoke screen] which release a dark smoke cloud on the rat's face—effectively blinding it.
The rat exited the cloud only to be greeted with Reid's bat on its head. It was sent flying towards one of the cave walls.
"Score!" He pumped his fist in celebration. This wasn't Reid's first ti being in a situation like this, rember those trainings ntioned?
So of them involved him surviving against Iron tier beasts, the only difference this ti was that he had forged beasts with him.
This was why even though he was at iron rank, his speed and strength were a bit higher than a normal Iron ranked individual.
The rats looked at their fallen companion, it wasn't dead but it was out of the fight for now. They turned back to look at Reid, this ti in caution.
"Alright, it's now 3 V 2" he pointed his bag at them in confidence "bring it on".
The rats started moving, aiming to flank Reid. They both disappeared, one of them aiming for Nyx and the other for Reid. They seed to have forgotten about Rusty which was a big mistake.
As soon as the one aiming for Reid appeared, it swiped its claws at him but noticed it was a lot slower.
Reid took the chance with a grin on his face, slamming the bat at the rat's exposed side.
"Thanks for the assist Rusty" Reid thanked the little white chanical mouse.
"Squeak" Rusty responded. It had used its skill [delayed reaction] to slow down the rat. Nyx on the other hand used [void] to teleport away from the rat attacking it.
Reid and his partners were seemingly dominating the battle but he knew it wouldn't stay the sa if the battle dragged on.
From what he has observed, both Rusty and Nyx could only use their skills 5 tis, except if they used it on Reid—like Rusty did earlier today—which would cut down the use ti to only once.
Nyx has used its skills twice now and Rusty did so once. He knew he had to hurry or the tables would turn soon enough.
He swung the bat at the rat that attacked Nyx but it teleported away. Reid didn't mind that he missed, he just changed the direction of his swinging bat at his blind spot.
The bat landed squarely on the other rat's head disorienting it. Before it could teleport back, Rusty used [Delayed reaction] again causing it to slow down and allowing Reid to land another hit on its head which was followed by a loud cracking sound.
[Congratulations on killing an Iron-tier minor ti rat. You've gained an iron tier core] Evo's alert had confird Reid's thought, the rat was definitely dead.
[Beasts killed: 1/4]
The last rat was backing up in fear but Reid wouldn't allow it to escape. Before it could move, Rusty teleported with Reid to block its path.
It wanted to teleport but wasn't allowed to since Reid was fast enough to slam the bat on its head before it could.
Rusty was out of commission but Reid was sure they would exit the cave really soon, after taking care of the last beast so he just sent Rusty and Nyx in his inventor to rest.
[Congratulations on killing an Iron-tier minor ti rat. You've gained an iron tier core] the kill confirmation showed up again
[Beasts killed: 2/4]
"Um Evo, why is it showing that there are four beasts when I only see three here?" He asked while walking towards the last rat.
Before Evo could answer, a sudden pressure descended in the cave.
The hairs on Reid's body stood up and his instincts were screaming at him to jump to the side but before he could, a massive paw slamd into his side sending him flying towards the cave walls.
"Argh!" Reid scread in pain, the hand he instinctively used to block the paw was bent in an unnatural way, showing that it was broken.
"F*ck!" He cursed, raised his head to et his surprise attack and laughed in despair " I guess that answers my question".
[Beast identified] Evo spoke in his mind....
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