Chapter 492 - 486 : Riverside Fight

At a certain unnamed distributary of the great Lorls River, a huge reptile with sea-blue scales sunbathed by the bank of the river. The contracts between its blue scales and the blue lake with the green grass that grew by the side of the river, made the entire scene look like a work of art from an artist from the Renaissance.

Occasionally, the blue scaled crocodile would open its mouth wide, seemingly yawning, and at times, it would open its two eyes and glance around, seemingly searching for something. The entire scene looked picturesque but if one was in the know, they wouldn't take the blue-scaled crocodile for a harmless reptile. Just its size alone was scary, much less the power behind its limbs and jaws. However, this savage monster happened to be the target of a certain individual today.

[Linear Strike]

[Critical Hit]

-378 (???/???)

Accompanied with a strange black shadow was green blood that spilled from the creature's back. Everything has happened too fast that the monster was only able to react when the damage had been dealt.

"Grawr!"

Releasing a painful roar, the blue croc twisted itself as it swatted its tail in the direction of the attack. Independent of its amazing length of 12 feet, was the 7 feet (2.1336 metres) long tail that was covered in spiked scales just like its body that went towards the assailant.

Suddenly, Sato's figure that was previously on top of the monster, disappeared within a second only to appear 10 metres out.

'That was close.' Sato wiped off the invisible sweat on his forehead.

Due to his previous angle of observation, Sato had failed to spot the tail of the monster as it was blocked off by a few of the reeds as wellas the hulking mass that made up the monster. It was only after he had made his move that Sato had discovered the 5th 'limb', however it was then too late for him to adjust his plans as the blue-scaled crocodile had attacked with the tail. Luckily, Sato had made preparations prior to his assault just for situations like this -a situation where he would suffer a counterattack and not be able to react in time-. The preparation was the fourth skill of [Drakken], [Shadow Movement].

[Shadow Movement] had the ability to teleport its user to any shadow within a 5 metres radius or to any marked shadow within a 15 metres radius. It was the perfect escape technique and it was Sato's backup plan for retreating right after attacking. 

Though he was hoping that he wouldn't get to use it, due to its long cool-down, Sato was still satisfied that he did so or else he would have gotten hit. Looking at the weight and size of the croc's tail, Sato knew that even if he had somehow managed to block it back then, he would have gotten injured or broken an arm. It would even be worse for him if he got blasted into the river.

After sensing that the figure above it was gone, the sea-blue croc turned to see who had dared attack it during its break time. 

Within this part of the river, the croc was a lord of sorts. Very few monsters could threaten it here and all of them lived far away from it, hence the reason why it usually let its guard down during this downtime. Never would it have expected that some living creature would attack it, much less a weak looking being like Sato.

With its height of roughly 6 feet (1.8288 metres), 12 feet long length (3.6576 metres) and width of about 3 and a half feet(1.0668 metres), the croc had all right to look down at Sato who was only 1.8 metres tall.

"Grawr!"

The blue-scaled crocodile ran on all fours as it charged towards Sato, however, if one took a close look, they would notice that one of its limbs moved in a strange manner.

Due to the fact that he was unaware of the location of any vital organs of the monster, Sato had to aim for elsewhere. There were only two options left, the monster's head and its limbs. However, Sato wasn't exactly sure that he would be able to land a hit on its head as even if the creature's guard was down, by the time he would arrive above its head, it might sense him and possibly avoid the attack. 

Not wanting to waste an opportunity, Sato had decided to go for a limb. The advantage of this was that the monster's fighting ability as well as movement speed would be heavily affected and the chances of success of attacking a limb was much higher than going for its head. So Sato had gone for its right 'arm', almost severing it with that attack of his. This was all thanks to the high penetrative effects of both [Linear Strike] and [Drakken]. As a result, even the tough scales of the monster wasn't able to keep it safe against that strike, leaving it with an almost severed limb.

"Grawr!"

As the blue-scaled croc chased after Sato, it felt the pain in its right 'arm' which prevented it from running at full speed. 

Sato smirked as be saw this, knowing that his plan was successful. While he would have preferred for the arm to be cut off, having it severely injured made almost no difference.

For a monster with a 3 and a half metres long body, a 10 metres gap wasn't much even if its limbs were injured. The monster had covered the short gap within just 2 seconds and immediately lunged at Sato.

Seeing a hulking mass of brutality and savagery before him, Sato didn't try to face it head-on but retreated to the side avoiding the creature's charge.

*Bang*

Proportional to its size was the weight of the monster which caused a small dent on the ground as it missed its target.

[Sprint]

Sato then took the chance when the croc was off its balance due that terrible landing, as well as its injured limb that got in the way, and dashed towards it.

*Whoosh*

The croc seemed to have guessed that Sato would attack as its tail swung towards its.

Unlike before however, Sato was prepared this time. He had already added the large spiked tail to his calculations and so, Sato easily avoided it and still proceeded with his charge.

[Chain Hit]

-83

-78

-82

All three slashes landed on the target, leaving behind bleeding slash marks. The cut wasn't that deep as the penetrative effects of [Chain Hit] was weaker than [Linear Strike] so it wasn't able to cut past the scales as efficiently and deal more damage. Nonetheless, Sato had still managed to injure it and that was better than nothing.

"Grawr!"

The blue-scaled croc was incensed that it had been injured twice now and released a loud roar before it immediately turned and clawed at Sato with its left arm.

Sato hurriedly retreated was he skipped backwards till he felt he was safe. However, Sato had underestimated the monster as it gave chase without regards for its injuries. 

While its huge size made it seem like the creature wasn't fast, Sato realised that it couldn't be judged by common sense. Even with the injured right arm, the croc was still able to give chase at a speed that forced Sato to always be on his toes.

Slowly, the duo began to depart from the river. This wasn't an unconscious act but part of Sato's plan. Even though he had confidence in beating the monster, if it escaped to the river, there was nothing he could do about it. Therefore, right after injuring it severely, Sato's next objective was to lead it away from the river.

"Grawr!" 

With the gargantuan creature dashing after him, the environment around the river was tarnished by its movements. The grasses were uprooted with the soil turned over as the croc pursued Sato with a trail of green blood as well drag marks on the soil left in its trail.

When the two had gone about 20 metres away from the river, the croc suddenly stopped as it glared at Sato for a while before turning around and slowly walking back to the river.

Sato also stopped and glanced at it, realising that they had probably gone out of its active region, hence the reason why the monster decided to retreat lest it enters the area of another creature.

Realising that hat he might not be able to lead it further away than he already did, Sato decided that this was a good enough spot to take it on.

[Black Flame Slash]

Sato swung his black sword at the monster, sending a flaming black arc right at it.

*Whoosh*

-87 (???/??? ???)

Like hot knife through butter, the flames landed on the blue-scaled crocodile and cut through its natural defences, digging deep before flaring out in a conflagration of flames.

Sato had originally intended for the strike to hit the point where he had severely injured the monster but at the last moment, the creature had moved its body to the side, narrowly avoiding the attack from hitting the bullseye. Nonetheless, its massive frame served as a disadvantage in this situation as it still got caught by the attack and injured yet again.

'[Inspect]'

Sato finally gleamed at the attributes of the monster, spotting its HP bar to be maxed at 4000 points, just a little bit below Gatekeeper Baka. 

'Not enough.