Becoming a Monster

Chapter 420: Chapter 420: A Subordinate Isn’t Enough to Challenge a Queen.

When the battle had first begun, it was impossible to ignore the dumb yet abnormal creature running past the army of trolls with no sense of awareness.

Even when taking serious damage, the creature remained just as mindless, racing towards the first troll who was struck to the ground.

The troll wasn’t dead, and its injuries were healing fast enough that it should’ve been able to protect itself.

The chieftain had no reason to interfere, but when the creature’s torso opened, it completely swallowed the troll’s head before it could recover. The chieftain immediately sent its elites to put the creature down.

It had assumed that the mindless beast was just as expendable as its own soldiers. Yet, now it believed that maybe it was one of their strongest. This was the best opportunity to take out a future threat.

With a simple command, the three elites were sent out to kill Dummy. Each one was unique in its own right. Their traits had physical differences comparable to the chieftain’s own, and also to the ice troll the day before.

There was a troll whose body was mostly stone; its hands were disproportionately larger than any other part of its body. As it closed its fist, each hand resembled an enormous boulder.

Then there was the largest troll, even taller than the chieftain. Its body was covered in bark. If it stood completely still in the cover of the night, it would easily be mistaken for a tree. With its abnormal height, its limbs were just as long. Making its strides seem slow compared to the others, yet the distance it crossed was farther than theirs.

And the last looked to be the strongest of the three. And it also happened to be the shortest. Although it was shorter, it was still a troll, its height easily reaching five meters. Its body was a pale ashen blue. Just like the troll whose body resembled stone, this one had stone only in specific parts.

From both knees down, both forearms, its shoulders, and the top of its head, thick stone plates covered its body like natural armor. Even its knuckles were encased in jagged minerals. Despite being the shortest of the elites, its build was the most imposing. Thick slabs of muscle wrapped its torso and arms.

And all three descended on Dummy.

Dummy didn’t even react to their approach. He didn’t even acknowledge them, even as their bodies towered over him.

Dummy had already half-devoured the troll. Despite eating so much, his torso showed no signs of the heavy meal. But the chewing inside its stomach. The breaking down of bone and flesh alike. It made even the trolls feel a vague sense of discomfort.

The stone-fist elite struck first.

Its massive hands swung down, intending to crush its opponents back. The air warped around its boulder-sized fist while the wind pressure alone carved a line in the dirt.

Still, Dummy didn’t react, not until the attack landed.

His body instantly folded. His upper back snapped backward with his spine bending as if it were snapped in half.

The two trolls on the side were already prepared to follow up with an attack.

The moment Dummy showed movement, the tree troll had lifted its foot to slam it down into his back, while the shorter troll punched out towards his head. Its fist could already destroy stone, breaking an enemy’s skull unguarded should be an easy task.

Each attack left Dummy without a chance to respond, and their strength was more than capable of denying him the chance to.

The tree troll’s foot landed first. Dummy’s body instantly sank nearly a half a foot deep into the newly formed crater. The change in depth threw off the short troll’s punch; it still connected, but only enough to fracture his skull.

Dummy was unable to do anything, not when there were three of them, not when he placed himself in such a predicament.

The next round of attacks was about to begin; this time, it would be more life-threatening than the last.

However, the three were yet to even make another attempt when all of them felt their body grow weaker all of a sudden.

The shorter troll felt its strength waning, while the tree troll felt that it was more vulnerable than before. It was only the troll whose fists were completely covered in stone that was left out.

Because of it, the unaffected troll continued past the others to finish off what it started. Its attack came crashing down. And at that exact moment, a figure flashed directly in front of it.

Arachne.

Both of its fists, which held the force to crush nearly every opponent it had ever encountered, were parried away by a single limb. The stone troll’s momentum carried its arms wide, smashing its own fists into the ground on either side of Dummy’s lower torso.

And only then did the stone troll understand something was wrong.

Instead of looking down, it noticed the legs that were closer to eye level, the same ones that deflected its attack. Currently, each one held a glint on its edge that seemed to have its own shine.

The troll could only get a glimpse of the new enemy in front of it when its body suddenly jerked. Blood spurted from its mouth in heaps. It felt pain, but couldn’t understand why.

A giant leg pierced into its chest. And from the feeling, it could tell it had traveled thoroughly through its back. Its body’s toughness should’ve been too tough to pull off such a feat. Even penetrating the layers of stone should have been difficult, not to mention its flesh. But Arachne made it look effortless. As long as she could parry the enemy’s attack, her next type became deadlier than before.

Unlike the others, Arachne didn’t like prolonged fights, especially in front of Noah. She believed the longer the fight dragged on, the weaker she appeared in his eyes. The habit she started, which consisted of destroying an enemy’s core, all started the day she was unable to kill Fenrir’s first abomination.

The first troll was dead before it even became aware of it. Arachne didn’t bother to acknowledge its last breath when she disappeared again, appearing in the air in front of the tree troll.

Just like before, the troll couldn’t track her movement. Her speed surpassed the speed of any other creature there. The troll shrieked in pain as Arachne dug four of her legs into the creature’s chest to secure herself in place.

It wasn’t pain from being stabbed that caused the troll to cry out, but the venom that was instantly injected into its flesh and bloodstream from each wound.

She aimed to finish the troll just like before.

A leg was thrust into the creature’s chest. Her ability lowered its constitution, but even then, the attack was stopped just barely before reaching her goal, showing that this troll’s constitution was much higher than the others.

Her expression showed immense displeasure at her failure. However, even though she failed, her legs continued to pump the venom into the victim’s wounds.

By this time, the troll had reacted. Its hand, nearly the size of her entire body, swung up with murderous intent. The bark-coated fingers curled inward like a cage meant to crush her whole frame. Even weakened, even dazed by venom, the troll’s sheer size made the strike unavoidable.

At least, that’s what the troll had believed.

She released her grip completely. The sudden withdrawal of her legs caused the troll’s strike to miss by a hair’s breadth, its massive palm smashing into its own chest instead. The impact knocked the troll off balance, its upper body pitching backward from the force it had generated. Before it could recover, Arachne appeared behind its falling form, her body twisting mid-air, all six limbs poised like jagged spears.

She plunged them into the back of the troll’s head.

Each leg prevented the troll’s head from smashing into the ground. Its entire body shook. Its eyes instantly went bloodshot. Its arm shot up, reaching behind it. And yet when its arms rose, when its mouth opened, everything stopped.

Its body suddenly stopped moving. Even when it wanted to, it felt as if its body wasn’t responding.

Arachne’s legs penetrated the back of its skull, digging into its brain, which released its venom directly into it.

Even when it wanted to, even as its instincts screamed at it to thrash, to retaliate, to do anything, it couldn’t.

Gradually, its eyes became unfocused, its thoughts murky. It was losing sense of its surroundings or where it even was. It wasn’t long before its body collapsed altogether. Its brain was no different than mush. It was no different than being dead, yet its chest still showed signs of breathing.

And Arachne knew it. She didn’t spare a second glance. There was still one last enemy.

She wondered why even now the creature didn’t use this chance to attack her. But when she looked over, she instantly understood why.

Apparently, Dummy wasn’t so dumb after all. He could get mad, too.