Absolute Beast Dominion - Chapter 308: Hydra - Final
Chapter 308: Hydra – Final
Chapter 308: Hydra – Final
A wave of mana burst from the Hydra’s body. In the next moment, its neck region swelled grotesquely, and the severed portion began regenerating at an aggressive pace.
First, two smaller heads sprouted, twitching as they rapidly enlarged, the neck stretching longer and longer.
Grrrrrr–
Both heads growled as the neck elongated to the previous head’s length. The Hydra stood intact once again, but now with two heads. The only altered feature was the gem embedded at the centre of each forehead—one bearing the blue-water gem, the other the purple-poison gem.
Rrrroooohhhhhhrrrrr!!
Both roared simultaneously, the sound rumbling through the air.
Leon’s eyes widened.
“We cannot defeat this—!” he began, but his words were cut short as he was forced to dodge a tail whip. He leapt high into the air instead.
“Lily! It still doesn’t want to be contracted?!” Leo shouted while narrowly evading the tail sweeping toward him.
“NO!” she yelled back.
To the side, the Treant’s spirit body was dangerously cracked, on the verge of falling apart after the previous whip.
Suddenly, for the first time, the Hydra moved from its place and, with swift, heavy steps, lunged toward Grivak in the distance. Grivak was too slow to evade the massive leg descending to crush him.
“Move away from him!” Leon roared, appearing beside the abdomen and throwing a punch. But aside from a few scales cracking and a slight groan from one head, nothing changed. The leg continued crashing down toward Grivak.
BOOM! Crack—karkat!
The oval barrier over Grivak shattered, and his body was crushed beneath the stomp, the audible cracking of his crystalline shell echoing sharply. As if one stomp wasn’t enough, the Hydra lifted its leg, rose slightly, and brought it down again. Grivak still wasn’t defeated.
The Hydra paused, confused. Its physical attacks were not as effective as it had expected—both the tail swipes and the stomps.
The first reason was that it was no longer a Low 5-star beast. The second was that it was now a spirit. In exchange for receiving less damage from physical blows, its own physical attack power had been reduced.
Realising this, the Hydra’s Water-crystal head shifted as water energy began to gather within its maw. The next instant, just before it could fire at Grivak, Nyxa appeared and slammed her aura-infused head into its jaw, altering the trajectory so the attack missed the scorpion.
Sppprreeeee!
The water pressure intensified, spraying violently. The Hydra adjusted and aimed at Grivak once more.
Crakaka!
The Scorpion felt his shell pierce as his armour shattered. In the next moment, Grivak disappeared.
“Fucking bastard!” Leon roared, charging blindly toward the water-crystal head. But what met him was a powerful kick from the forelegs, the impact reverberating through his entire body as he was hurled away.
“Idiot! Pay attention! You cannot even heal!” Leo shouted, charging from the side toward the poison head.
But what Leo failed to notice was the poison energy already condensing within the poison-crystal maw.
The moment Leo drew close, the jaw snapped open and released a torrent of poison breath that washed over him entirely.
“Leo!!” Lily screamed as the purple haze engulfed him whole.
Husss—!
The Hydra abruptly ceased its breath, as if conserving the mana it had just regenerated through Lily.
Leo was thrown back, his arm crossing over his chest as the aura coating his body flickered erratically. The exposed portions of his skin turned blistering red, corroded by the clinging purple poison.
His regeneration trait activated, the angry red blisters slowly healing. He followed immediately with [Nature’s Heal] to neutralise the poison. Even his clothes had corroded severely, saved only by the faint remnants of his aura.
“Leo! Are you okay?!” Lily called out, panic in her voice.
“Yes!” he replied, instantly slamming his palm onto the ground. Thick earthen walls rose before him, forming a barrier against the absurdly fast Hydra charging his way.
The Hydra ignored the Earthen wall and instead shifted its focus to the already distorted Treant and Niri beside him.
Swooosssss!!
Another wave of poison breath surged toward them. This time, Niri reacted by raising thick vine walls. The Treant had already exhausted his mana on minimal regeneration that it did just nowand the earlier roots and bindings.
Thwoooossss!
The breath slammed into the vines. They began to melt and corrode under the poison, dissolving rapidly as the attack pushed through toward them. The Treant stepped forward without hesitation, shielding Niri with his own body and taking the full force of the breath.
Within a second, the Treant’s body began dissolving completely as he was defeated, his spirit sent back to Lily’s soul.
The attack continued and scorched Niri’s body, but soon it halted as her own regeneration began restoring her form.
Both of the Hydra’s heads frowned, visibly frustrated that it could not unleash its full strength without quickly exhausting its mana reserves. The reason its reserves kept draining was simple—it was using Lily’s mana. The same mana that was being deducted per minute to sustain it.
So within a minute, it did not have more than 17,500 mana units to utilise. Even though it was a mid-4-star beast and could technically possess 80,000 – 120,000 mana units, it was forced to operate within that limited amount.
Just as soul’s rank in humans determined the multiplication factor of intelligence to calculate total mana pool, a beast’s bloodline determined its own multiplication factor.
For example, a human with a Rare soul—soul value 3—and an intelligence stat of 3000 would have total mana units calculated as: Intelligence * 10 * Soul Value = 90,000 mana units.
For beasts, the only difference was that instead of soul rank values, bloodline rank values were used.
Ordinary Bloodline – 1
Mortal Bloodline – 2
Super Bloodline – 4
Noble Bloodline – 6
Royal Bloodline – 8
Divine Bloodline – 10
For a Super Bloodline [4], Mid 4-star beast [Stats = 2000 – 3000] like the Hydra, its mana pool should be calculated as: Intelligence stat * 10 * Bloodline value—placing it between 80,000 and 120,000 units.
No wonder the Hydra felt frustrated, especially combined with the fact that it still perceived itself as a Low 5-star individual with far higher stats.
This was the limitation of an uncontracted beast summoned by a [Spirit Caller]; they could only function with restricted mana. But the moment Lily contracted it, it would regain its rightful mana pool, ranging from 80,000 to 120,000 units.
Leo noticed that the moment Hydra exhausted its mana, the damage across its body also stopped regenerating. And it was only 20 seconds after it had used Lily’s mana to sustain itself. Which simply meant the next 40 seconds would be pure damage to its body.
