My Devourer System: Rise of the Bastard Son

The tree crashed into the ground with a thunderous bang, sending a cloud of dust rolling over the forest. Lucen stood nearly upside on a tree, hanging from his water tail.

The impact shook the canopy, scattering startled birds into the air. A thousand tiny leaves spiraled down through the dust, glimmering faintly in the moonlight like dying embers.

He clung tightly to the tree with water tail, every muscle taut, his lungs drinking in the sharp tang of bark and burning sap.

The water rippled and glowed in the light, the forest grew quiet as the dust settled. Lucen's beating heart slowed and he watched the tree shake and tremble.

It obviously wouldn't be killed by a falling tree. Lucen dropped to the ground, watching the silhouette of the Withmare Fiend rise.

The Fiend's voice reverberated like it came from the hollow belly of a cave, a sound that belonged to something dead and rattling.

Its body was a shimmered in the heat. Six arms parting the steam, skin sheened with poison, fur invisible yet rippling like heat over stone.

Watching it stand sent a raw shiver crawling up Lucen's spine.

"Not strong… enough," the hollow, endless voice of the Fiend echoed. It raised the tree with all six of its arms. The black sap of the Carama tree burnt over the body of the Fiend, but it dripped from its body down to the ground.

Lucen had guessed that the sap would be unable to kill the Fiend. It had broken multiple branches but wasn't burned.

But it seemed to catch up to the Fiend. Its invisible fur was protecting, but with all the sap pouring over it, the damage would grow continuously.

Lucen flicked his tail towards the Fiend, sending the bone fragments he stored in the tail, enhancing his tail with [Serpent's Call].

The bone fragments expanded and shot forward at blinding speeds. Each of them was a glowing lance of light, peppering the Fiend all over its body.

The forest itself seemed to recoil at the spell. Birds fell silent, insects went still, and only the high-pitched hum of bone shards tearing the air remained.

For an instant, Lucen felt a grim satisfaction, he was carving his fear into the Fiend's body, breakingthe forest's greatest hunter and bringing it to its knees.

The Fiend collapsed to its knees, struggling to support the massive tree on its shoulder, and Lucen summoned his silver spear, pointing it at the Fiend's head.

"Do you… know why the… god's tree cannot… burn me?"

Lucen tightened his injured hand around the spear, it was still quickly healing. No time to waste speaking. His spear's radiance grew, mana inside it tightening.

The hollow voice laughed. "I have… his blood in my veins… I will bring back the glory."

There was a spitting sound. Lucen recoiled, confused. Black spittle rained over his arms and half of his body.

He looked down to his finger, remembering it had been injured. The protection ring was gone.

Lucen dropped the spear, screaming as the sap ate into the skin. He dismissed his armor to his storage and wrapped his water tail around himself.

The stench of burning flesh filled his nose, acrid and thick, choking his breath. His vision swam with red spots, his nerves screaming with each pulse of poison.

He staggered, teeth clenched so tight he thought they might break, determined not to let the monster hear his screams.

The pain was maddening, like his hand was grabbed by a live wire. He fell over a root, body screaming with horrific pain.

He managed to escape the worst by taking off his armor, but his hand and face were filled with sizzling pain.

He crawled to his feet and kept his body pointing downward, hoping that the sap would leak from the holes in his body.

He had endured a lot of pain in the last few years, but Carama tree sap was a different type of beast. It burnt past his skin and seemed to drill into every single one of his veins.

Before long, he could see his own finger and his mind was a muddled pool of disconnected thoughts.

The Withmare Fiend's blood was similar to the sap in the tree, but it also had the effects of their poison. And it was a perfect combination.

He heard the tree slamming against the ground and felt the ground tremble. The Fiend would escape the trap and come after him soon.

Lucen crawled over the blurring ground, gasping like he was drowning. He rested against a tree and dismissed his spear.

The mana in the spear should be preserved in his storage space. He tried opening his eyelids but they felt like they had been glued together.

The Withmare Fiend crawled from the sinkhole and pulled the bone spears from its body, its inhuman voice rattling the air.

"He gave me power… in exchange for killing you… I… thought easy. One human is easy… kill."

Lucen swallowed his bile. So someone knew he would come here and gave the Withmare's Hunger mana.

He had known the only problems he had to deal with weren't the Veiled King and Chester. The Void and its agent lurked in the shadows, someone among them had a powerful sense of the future.

The harder you ran, the faster destiny chased.

"I kill… you, not because of his request," the Fiend continued, "I kill you… for the glory. Prey should not see Withmare coming."

"That's nice to hear," Lucen muttered.

The last of the poison was leaking from the holes in his body, and [Blood Rebirth] was now trying its best to heal him.

He couldn't see anything. The poison wrecked not only his eyes but his mana sense too.

[It's now or never I guess.]

He saw the system's prompt even while blind. A white interface with winged gold bezels. And it was definitely right.

He seemingly had no other ways to win. If he didn't predict the next attack coming he would die. If he was too slow he would die.

But Lucen wouldn't bet his life on a whim.

Lucen smiled tightly; now these were the times he wished someone would be around. To document his triumph.

Or at least watch him die.

He felt his hands healing and hid them behind his back while dismissing Thomas' ring.

Two spells came to mind from his huge catalogue. [Final Spark] and [Embolden].

[Final Spark], which he got from killing Peter Cross, was essentially a spell for sharing pain between two living creatures. Lucen avoided using it to not weaken himself, but now that he was in far more pain than his opponent it seemed like a good idea.

[Embolden] was a skill he gained from killing a High-rank Bull Wolf. It could empower allies and weaken enemies.

Lucen used [Embolden] first. A bone-shaking scream escaped his body, making the air shiver and carry waves of magical energy with it.

The Fiend paused but the spell couldn't damage a beast of that rank easily. So Lucen used [Final Spark] immediately.

The ground shook as the massive Fiend was briefly forced to its knees. Lucen brought his left hand out from behind him, quickly resummoning his spear.

Lucen smiled. "Not so tough now."

He used [Serpent's Call] on the already mana-filled spear, releasing a fast bolt of light that slammed into the Withmare's hand.

The sharp sounds of cracks and luminous sparks danced through the forest, illuminating Lucen's ragged form and the invisible thing in front of him.

The Fiend let out a hoarse roar and pushed the spear aside, lunging for Lucen clumsily, revealing its location by uprooting the soil.

There was nothing in front of Lucen. He smirked, but just in case he had resummoned Thomas' ring too.

A blue shield appeared between him and a thunderous blow.

The Withmare Fiend had purposely cut his finger off when they were on top of the tree, to deprive him of the shield.

But what it didn't know was that Lucen never lost what he had taken.

Lucen flexed his wrist, calling his spear that should have been flying for a while back to him.

"I wish I could see the shocked look on your face."

The Withmare Fiend tried to block the spear as it drilled into him.

But the longer it travelled, the stronger it got.

There was a bang and a loud swoosh of wind rolling over him. Lucen caught the spear in his hand and felt his shoulder groan from the effort.

Something thumped to the ground in front of him, probably the invisible body of a twelve-foot monster.

"Human… only injured back… life all around… I will heal… and kill you."

"Did you think that was my whole plan?" Lucen asked. "To just drill through your spine and hope it killed you."

The clearing was silent for a moment. Lucen's tired laugh broke it.

He summoned Peter Cross' Spirit Light.

His eyes were healed enough to see the ragged man rise from white mist flowing from him. The bandages, the rags, the terrible cuts around his mouth.

Peter Cross had returned to the world of the living.