Chapter 481: The First Hunt After Evolution

The six legs of One immediately took the weight of his large body, and his long antennae began to move.

He checked the area for a few seconds, then his eyes stopped on the hill of corpses and finally on the egg.

The giant ant stayed completely still for a few moments.

"That is not your food." Lian gave a short laugh.

One turned his head toward him, and through the link, a very clear feeling of dissatisfaction was sent to him.

The young Vorhelm put a hand on the upper part of his armored head.

"Don’t worry. We have work for you too."

He opened his panel again, his level was nineteen, but his exp was almost full.

The limited hunts One had done in the Special Area had brought him close to level twenty.

There was not much left before he reached level 20 and then completed his first evolution, as expected, monsters also had evolutions just like Awakened.

But their evolution was different from the evolutions of Awakened, the first one mostly had to perform an action that was partly natural to them to evolve.

But the second one did not, Awakened had to complete the evolution Quest given to them by the System.

Through the link, Lian directly sent him the meaning of the goal, level 20.

One raised his antennae.

"Anything we find below level twenty, as long as it does not have unnecessary danger, is yours." ℴ

This time, something like excitement came back through the link.

"Good."

He gave the egg one last look, it was still busy eating the corpses at a fast speed.

He could call it again later and did not need to worry about it anymore, the egg had already shown that it had strange abilities and could even hide and escape from an Overlord.

So they moved together with One without worry.

The hunt had begun.

The first monster was found less than twenty minutes later, Lian felt its presence even before seeing it.

Something was hiding between the old broken stones.

One noticed it too, he lowered his head and a lizard almost two meters long crawled out from the gap between two stones.

The skin of its entire body was made of thick gray plates that almost looked the same as the stones around it.

[Stone-Skin Lizard.]

[Level: 15.]

When the lizard saw them, and more exactly when it saw Lian, it turned around as if it wanted to run ... as if some kind of instinct was telling it to run!

"Yours."

The giant ant attacked at that moment, and his huge body moved forward with a speed greater than what could be expected from his size.

His heavy front leg landed directly on the lizard’s back.

Boom!

The stone floor cracked, but the monster did not die, the plates on its back spread the force, and the lizard turned with a rough sound and hit One’s side with its heavy tail.

Crack!

One moved half a step.

Lian did not interfere.

The lizard gathered its body behind its stone plates again, and One raised his claw once more, but this time he stopped.

His antennae moved, and instead of attacking directly, he attacked from the side, one of his front legs went under the lizard’s body.

He lifted its body, and the monster struggled as the giant ant turned it with more force.

Boom!

The lizard fell on its back, its soft and unarmored stomach was exposed and One’s jaws came down.

Crack!

The entire soft part of its stomach was torn open, and a few seconds later the monster became still.

[Special Colony Member, One, received Exp.]

"Great." Lian nodded, and One sent a clear feeling of pride through the link.

But their work had only just started, and they continued along their path based on the World Memory.

The second hunt was a little harder.

The Broken-Tusk Boar appeared in a small field almost an hour later, its height was close to 3 meters.

Two broken and curved bone tusks came out from both sides of its jaw, and the muscles on its shoulders were so large that the front half of its body looked unnaturally heavy.

[Broken-Tusk Boar.]

[Level: 18.]

As soon as the boar saw them, it dug the ground with its foot and then attacked.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Every step sent dirt into the air, One did not run this time and his six legs firmly stood on the ground.

His head lowered and the collision happened ....BOOOOM!

A wave of dirt spread around them, and the giant ant was pushed almost two meters back while the other monster was thrown one meter back.

Both of them stood again.

The boar attacked for the second time without stopping, and this time One did not repeat the same mistake, just one moment before the collision, he moved the weight of his body to the right.

One of his front legs hit the boar’s shoulder, changing the direction of its attack, and the boar passed beside One.

Before it could turn its heavy body back, the giant ant fell on it.

Two front legs held the boar’s legs against the ground, and the giant jaws closed.

Crack!

Its neck broke.

Lian watched from a few meters away, One was no longer just a creature that crushed everything with raw power.

He was slowly learning, and what he learned remained in his mind, which was normal, this ant had very good intelligence.

Several more hunts continued.

Two level sixteen lizards and a group of carrion crows that kept attacking from above.

In that fight, One was bothered more than ever, the monsters came down each time, attacked, and then went back up.

He could not easily reach them.

Lian only created a few ice blades in the air, but not to kill them, only to block their escape paths, and this forced one of the crows to fly lower.

One was waiting for it, and with a heavy jump, his jaws closed around the monster’s wing and slammed it directly onto the ground.

The others were also caught one after another, and after the last crow, a faint light came out of One’s body and the giant creature stopped for a moment.

The young Vorhelm opened his panel.

[One has reached level 20.]

[Maximum level before the first evolution has been reached.]

[Level condition completed.]

[Checking evolution conditions...]

He waited for a few seconds, and then a new notification appeared.

[First evolution condition is incomplete.]

[To begin evolution, the special member must absorb more monster cores.]

[Required amount: Variable.]

[The quality, level, rank, and compatibility of the core affect the amount of absorption.]

[Final condition: Reach complete saturation.]

Monsters had to eat the cores of other monsters to evolve, at least this was true for Normal monsters and, to some extent, Mutated monsters.

Of course, absorbing the cores of other monsters was one of their two paths, and it was considered the harder path for monsters.

The second path, which most normal monsters chose, was eating humans, the energy they received from eating each human was equal to three cores from monsters of the same level.

And if those humans were Awakened, even better.

For Fallen Monsters and especially higher ones such as Unholy, who had intelligence at the level of humans, their evolution conditions could be much more complicated.

In any case, the condition for One was clear too, he had to absorb the cores of other monsters, and there was no specific number.

So ten cores might be enough, or fifty.

He looked at One, and the creature moved his antennae, no special feeling of disappointment came through the link because he could not evolve directly.

He mostly seemed eager, as if he could not wait to have his first evolution.

"It’s fine, we were going to hunt anyway." He looked toward the path ahead.

From this moment on, every monster was not only Exp, and its possible core could also bring One one step closer to his first evolution.

But well, it was time for him to join the hunt too.

Hours passed, and the farther he and One moved from the base, the more the environment around them slowly changed.

There were more dead trees, gray grass replaced the open areas, and a light fog could be seen between the dry tree trunks.

And the Celestial Book of Treasure inside his storage space sent a weak pulse from time to time.

At first, Lian did not pay much attention to it, but the farther they went, the stronger the pulse became, and he stopped for a moment.

He took out the map combined with the World Memory, the purple mark was still in the same direction.

The Wolfgrave Frontier.

Almost directly ahead.

"Good, we are going the right way." He closed the map, his goal had been clear from the beginning, unfortunately, this area was still unknown on the map.

And it was considered one of the areas that had little information about it, most Awakened also stayed away from it because they did not see much benefit there unless a group went there.

One turned his head slightly and they moved again.

About half an hour later, the first howl was heard.

Awoooooooo—

The sound was far away but clear, and the giant ant immediately changed his stance, his legs bent slightly and his antennae moved forward.

Lian also stopped, the presences entered his senses one after another.

One.

Two.

Five.

There were five of them, and they were approaching from several directions.

"These ones are mine." He raised his hand.

One sent a weak protest through the link.

"Their levels are above twenty."

The protest became weaker, and a few seconds later, the first wolf came out of the fog, its body was much larger than a normal wolf.

Its fur was dark gray and it had yellow eyes, long claws, and teeth that had torn part of its lip.

[Grave Gray Wolf.]

[Rank: Normal.]

[Level: 24.]

[Grave Gray Wolf.]

[Level: 25.]

[Rank: Normal.]

[Level: 26.]

And two more.

Level twenty-four and twenty-seven.

The five wolves spread around them in a half-circle, and the young Vorhelm immediately noticed that their movements were not random.

Two were in front, two were on the sides, and the strongest one stood farther back and waited for a chance, this was the behavior of a real pack.

But the wolves did not attack immediately, when they saw him, it seemed they felt some kind of fear and their eyes moved between each other.

It seemed they were thinking about whether they should attack or run ....

The fear was so clear that the wolves even started stepping back without thinking, as if their decision had already been made to retreat.

Lian noticed this, this behavior should be because of the Fallen Monster talent, right? Normal monsters were afraid of him.

And knowing this, he attacked first.

[Thunder Step.]

Boom!

To the wolves’ eyes, the human in front of them disappeared, and in the next moment Lian appeared beside its head.

His palm was placed on top of the monster’s skull and his fingers closed.

Crack!

The wolf’s neck turned at an unnatural angle, and its body fell to the ground without even having the chance to howl.

[Grave Gray Wolf killed.]

[+2 fragments.]

[You gained Exp.]

[You gained 198 stats points.]

Lian’s eyes stayed on the notification for a moment.

198 stats points!

This was the first time he had killed a monster after his first evolution and received stats points, and by killing one monster, he received 5 percent of its stats.

Now that he thought about it, these numbers were crazy, at this rate, it would not take long before he could reach 10,000 stats.

In fact, at this rate, by killing these few wolves alone, he could gain more than 500 stats points.

The second wolf jumped from the side at that moment, and he turned his hand.

[Glacial Reaper Claw.]

A huge blue claw made of ice formed around his forearm and with one move ....SHRAAAK! The wolf’s head was separated from its body.

[+2 fragments.]

[You gained 183 stats points.]

Lian gave a very small smile.

The pack stopped, as if they had finally understood why their instincts were telling them to run .... but it was already too late.

He moved.

[Thunder Step.]

One of the wolves on the side had not even turned its head when Lian’s fist hit its chest.

Boom!

Its ribs were crushed inward, and its body was thrown several meters back like a doll.

At the same time, the level twenty-seven wolf attacked from behind.

The young Vorhelm deliberately waited until the last moment, and when the open jaws were only a few centimeters away from his neck, his body turned into ash.

[Ash Step.]

The teeth closed on nothing, and Lian rebuilt himself behind it, his elbow came down.

Crack!

Its spine broke.

The last wolf tried to run away, and One took a step forward, as if he wanted to stop the wolf from escaping.

"No need." Lian raised his hand, and an ice blade appeared on the wolf’s path, forcing the monster to change its direction.

He walked forward without hurry, and a few seconds later, the last corpse also fell to the ground.

The notifications came one after another.

[+2 fragments.]

[You gained 169 stats points.]

[+2 Fragments.]

[You gained 203 stats points.]

[+2 fragments.]

[You gained 176 stats points.]

[ Total stats points : 1079 ]