Merchant Of Yliaster

The trio progressed through the tunnels eventlessly for a couple of minutes, but it didn't take long for Maxwell to detect a similar mushroom person on the periphery of his dominion. Felix was also smelling the air as if he smelled something delicious, making Maxwell unsure about how he would feed the creature in the future.

They approached the creature, and Maxwell sensed a few more in the distance, making him thank his foresight in not waking up Darve. Fighting these creatures while limiting himself wouldn't be fun.

When they entered the range of the creatures, Maxwell could see that one of the creatures looked quite different from the one he had killed. It was bigger, and it had a colorless texture resembling dirt. He observed the creepy mushrooms.

Iridescent Brother - Level 49

Iridescent Brother - Level 49

Iridescent Sister - Level 49

Are there sisters too? Common sense dictated that there would be, but Maxwell somehow forgot to use logic when he was thinking about humanoid mushrooms.

This time, Maxwell could see that the affinities of the mushrooms were different. The sister didn't shine at all, and had a brown color, but Maxwell could still detect an incredible amount of mana from the creature. One of the brothers gave a red glow, and he could easily identify the mana as fire mana.

The other brother, on the other hand, had an unexpected mana type. Lightning? How do you even find lightning in a cave? Maxwell examined the blue creature. Maybe there were storms from time to time? Maxwell was unsure.

There was a brief silence as they got to a clearing, and Maxwell could see brothers and sisters staring at him intently for a moment. As expected, he could see mana gathering in the next second.

The first thing Maxwell did was something animal rights activists wouldn't approve of. He grabbed Felix and tossed him towards the lightning brother, as that was the closest one. "You can eat this one too," Maxwell sent to him, and he received happy feedback before Felix turned into an amalgamation of tentacles and filaments in the air, moving towards the mushroom eerily while defying many physics laws.

If these mushrooms could show emotion, Maxwell was sure that the brother would make a terrified expression as it tried to get away from the range, but it was already too late. He watched as the mushroom was immediately covered with the mass that was Felix, discharges of lightning striking it from the inside time to time, but not managing to penetrate it.

Well, time for the second round, Maxwell thought, as he turned his eyes to the other enemies. There was one fire, and one earth affinity enemy, so he focused and created two shield constructs before him under the glances of the mushrooms. They seemed more cautious for some reason compared to the mushroom before.

In the next second, though the iridescent brother seemed to run out of patience, as its "mouth" opened grotesquely, revealing no teeth but the insides of the mushroom. A thin beam of fire was fired from the orifice.

The beam was similar to the light beam launched by the former brother, but it would definitely be hotter, as Maxwell could see the rocks turning red as the beam passed over them. With a mental command, he made one of his shields float to the path of the beam, and he imagined that a pattern started to appear on the shield.

When the beam collided with the shield, the pattern was not complete, and with a small explosion, the shield and the beam disappeared, nullifying each other. Maxwell immediately created another shield and worked on forming the rune properly this time. In his peripheral vision, he could see the sister charging something, too, as she was channelling a great amount of mana.

He was not sure how the creature would use earth mana, but he still created a rune of reduction for it on the other shield. The brother, though, didn't seem to like the idea of waiting around as Maxwell created things.

Maxwell's eyes widened as numerous red mushrooms were detached from the walls, getting suspended in the air. Before he could do anything, the brother released a beam of fire, aiming at a nearby mushroom.

Maxwell watched as the beam of white spiked through the numerous mushrooms with an uncanny accuracy, absorbing the fire mana inside as it passed. The process took a fraction of a second, and the only reason Maxwell could see it was his insane soul stat.

The beam reached Maxwell with immense speed, and Maxwell could see that his incomplete shield would completely fail in blocking this. The white-hot beam pierced through his chest, and for a moment, even the brother seemed surprised.

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Maxwell, though, was smiling. In the next moment, flames immediately covered his skin, revealing his body, which was partly made of fire. His chest was white with flames, as the beam was absorbed by his body on impact. One could say testing skills in such dangerous situations was unwise, but Maxwell would simply ignore that person.

He pointed a finger towards the sister and willed the flames to launch back. He released the energy he had just absorbed, imitating the brother's technique. Immediately, a similar beam shot out from his finger and struck the sister, piercing through its trunk, leaving a scorched hole before it could even understand what was happening.

Similar to the light one, this, too, released a hard-to-stand scream. And whatever skill the creature was charging got immediately released. Maxwell was alarmed to see a wave of vibration radiate from the now-injured creature. Was it planning to make an earthquake underground? If Maxwell couldn't phase, this would be a terrifying skill to face.

The vibrations struck the walls, but Maxwell could see that the energy was not directed and thus quite ineffective in doing anything. That was one of the bad sides of manipulation compared to his guiding. Without minute control, manipulated mana was quite aimless, while guided mana still did things he was told before.

Maxwell's body quickly turned earthlike as he infused himself with earth mana instead of fire for now. He simply ignored the vibrations and dropped to the ground like he was a fish.

Before the Iridescent Brother could realize what was happening, a silhouette appeared from below, Maxwell cleanly punching the creature below his cap. His new perfect control meant that he could unleash a lot of power even with his current stats, and his nonphysical state made things even more complicated.

The mushroom was immediately launched upwards and crashed into the roof of the tunnel, making the structure vibrate dangerously. Inside Maxwell's hand, a spear of metal mana appeared, and he thrust the spear upwards, impaling the creature before it could either fall down or understand what was happening.

As he was busy with the brother, he almost didn't realize a giant chunk of rock flying towards him from his left. With an uncanny show of speed, Maxwell moved the mushroom skewer in his hand before throwing it towards the incoming projectile.

The two sides met with a crash, and Maxwell's projectile won the unfair contest, as he was still controlling it. While he held the spear when he could for the added power, Maxwell didn't really need his body to exert force with his constructs.

The spear pierced through the stone, leaving the brother behind, and added a new hole to the sister's body, making it scream once more.

The brother was in no better shape, but Maxwell was still cautious. This race had way too much mana to be underestimated any time. He was soon proven true, as he suddenly felt an incredible amount of mana mobilizing, specifically being of earth and fire affinity.

To his alarm, he could also feel that the mana in the mushrooms around the cave was volatile, as if they were going to explode. Oh, no you won't, he thought, launching his shields towards their respective opponents. As the shields flew, they morphed in the air, and when they arrived at their destination, they clamped around the mushrooms like straitjackets.

Maxwell immediately overcharged the runes on the constructs, and the effect was immediate. Maxwell's runes were much more efficient than other runes, and the mana inside the creatures' bodies immediately disappeared due to the effect of the reduction rune. Without the mana, they couldn't control the other mushrooms, as Maxwell guessed that this was something like resonance rather than being something like a mental power.

The mushrooms tumbled to the ground silently, their bodies completely devoid of mana. Their bodies didn't look like they were dead, but Maxwell knew that they actually were. Losing all your mana was no different than losing all your health after all. Normally, one couldn't use it to the last drop, as their body didn't allow them, but Maxwell's runes didn't have such limitations.

Maxwell took a deep breath, relaxing his body, and glanced at Felix.

Felix liked eating. That much was clear even to him, but even he was taken aback when he saw this tunnel full of edible stuff. It was to a degree that the things on the walls couldn't even draw his attention.

He noted with some fleeting awareness that Maxwell threw him towards one of the delicious ones, and he was happy to quickly tangle around the snack. He could smell that this creature was pretty strong, but Felix was simply fearless, as his body wrapped around the dumbfounded creature. It fired some snacks at him, and Felix happily accepted them. They were such a pretty blue, too.

The snack kept firing smaller snacks from time to time as Felix watched Maxwell fight the remaining two snacks. He was a bit curious how Maxwell became similar to the creatures in how he smelled from time to time, but he could see that his master was not very appreciative of how good the enemies tasted. He didn't even bite them once throughout his fight.

At some point, though, Felix suddenly felt a feeling of danger. The feeling was quite foreign to him. He instinctively knew that he could be hurt, but he had yet to meet something that could actually accomplish that. As energy gathered around the cave, though, the feeling of danger was steadily rising. Felix immediately stopped playing with his food, as he could feel a little of the same feeling coming from his snack, too.

With a great constriction, life left the body of the Iridiscent Brother he was keeping hostage inside his body, and the feeling of danger diminished somewhat. He was unsure whether he should help Maxwell, but in the last second, he saw very fast objects flying towards the sources of danger. Immediately after they connected, all the danger Felix was feeling was immediately snuffed out like a small snack, making him feel smug.

So what if he felt danger? His master could certainly take care of everything. He finally finished his food and, with some concentration, managed to turn back to the way he was when he was with his mother. He really liked this form, as Maxwell's arm was just too comfortable to let go of.

He walked casually to Maxwell. Maybe he would give him the other bodies if he didn't like to eat them? It was definitely worth a try. He really liked his master, but Maxwell really needed to work on his appetite.