33 Inspired

"Note to self: Psychological attacks on enemies are super effective for lowering their combat ability and general morale, but charging right at someone with a gun is stupid no matter how fast you think you are. Ow ow ow..." Li Mei muttered, slathering a layer of medicinal paste onto the bullet wound in her side. Bao nudged carefully against her shoulder, making concerned chirping noises. Li Mei laughed and patted Bao's side to reassure the distressed Fera. "Don't worry, it just hurts a little. It barely got me!"

She counted herself lucky it just nicked her, if it were just an inch more to the side it would have lodged in her body and that would have been really difficult to deal with!

Her encounters with the soldier groups were very lucky all things considered. Using the element of surprise and familiar forest terrain, she was able to take down people with strength and experience greater than her own. Li Mei fought them head-on for the sake of gaining said experience, and for the satisfaction of seeing fear in their eyes.

Those people slaughtered innocent people. Men, women, children who probably cried in fear and pain while begging for their lives. Scan clearly stated the civilian kill count eat soldier had for their lifetime, and the number - often triple digits - made Li Mei grind her teeth in anger.

They were disgusting.

She couldn't resist making the soldiers feel at least a fraction of the fear they inflicted on others, but being weaker than the people she was trying to scare put her at a big disadvantage. Fighting head-on was tough enough without taking differences in strength and numbers into account!

Using horror movie tactics was fun, but the methods weren't efficient and still held an element of danger since she wasn't actually a vengeful child ghost or unstoppable alien predator. There had to be a smarter way to do what she wanted - to kill the soldiers while letting them get a taste of fear and helplessness. Even better if she could think of a way to do it without placing herself or Bao in unnecessary risk.

Li Mei wished she watched more scary movies before her transmigration. If only she'd known it would come in handy! Especially considering it turned out she was pretty strong? Those soldiers weren't weak, but she took care of them so easily!

'Maybe... I'm actually pretty great?' Li Mei thought smugly, a grin on her face.

A deep roar shook the trees nearby, air vibrating until Li Mei could feel it in her bones. Compressed air blasted Li Mei and Bao back several meters as countless trees the size of skyscrapers snapped in half, falling to the ground with a deafening crash and dragging countless plants and creatures with them. Pure unfiltered sunlight hit the forest floor for the first time in unimaginable centuries, obscured only by dust and loam thrown into the air from the falling tree trunks.

Two enormous beasts tangled together, clawing and biting and snarling, chunks of fur and scales and flesh bigger than Li Mei's entire body falling in their tussle. The pressure from Rank 4 auras and violent killing intent combined to press both Li Mei and Bao against the ground, making it painful to even breathe and reopening the wound in the girl's side.

An enormous brown and grey serpent with short vestigial limbs curled and writhed around a black gorilla with a shimmering silver back. The gorilla roared while the serpent only ever snarled and hissed, but even those relatively small noises were enough to shake the air.

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[Young Earth Wyrm]

Male

Rank 4 (23%)

Despite the unfortunate name, this creature is no joke. An Earth Serpent that lived a thousand years and succeeded in the Tribulation to evolve into a Wyrm, thus embarking on the eventual path to being a Dragon.

He does not care about your presence at this time.

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[Gargantuan Silver-Backed Ape Sovereign]

Male

Rank 4 (20%)

Feels threatened by the strength of the not-yet mature Earth Wyrm encroaching on his territory. As an old beast with centuries of experience, the Sovereign feels he must defend his people against this potential threat and assert his dominance.

He does not care about your presence at this time.

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As the giant creatures tumbled away leaving a trail of broken trees behind them, Li Mei's eyes sparkled with inspiration.

Who said she had to do everything herself?

She kept making plans on what she and Bao would do against their opponents, but those thoughts were going in the wrong direction.

And maybe she was getting carried away in the feeling of being strong... But the Rank 4 fight she couldn't even breathe in the presence of knocked her pride down a few pegs. Her cheek still stung from the cosmic face slap reminding Li Mei of her place as a Rank 0 nobody.

The Ancient Elderwood Forest was full of dangers large and small. Strong creatures lurked around every tree, cunning ones too. And so many strange plants!

Cleverness was her strong suit, not melee combat. Her streak of good fortune couldn't last forever! Fighting things stronger than herself meant Li Mei could very well die if her luck ran out in the middle of a battle. Gaining more experience in fighting could wait until she wasn't on a Quest to take out several groups of stronger people.

When Bao completed a kill Li Mei got EXP even if she didn't take part in the fight. Surely making use of traps or other creatures would work the same way? She could test it on the next group, see if she got credit without laying a hand on the soldiers.

Li Mei slathered more medicinal paste onto her wound, waiting for it to harden before hopping on Bao's back.

...

Group 3 never even saw her. Instead of facing them herself, Li Mei spread a bunch of Walking Death mushrooms in their travel path covered by a thin layer of dirt and leaves - purple fungus caps that were harmless unless squished. Upon being crushed Walking Death mushrooms exploded into a cloud of highly toxic spores that caused slow, painful death after a series of horrific hallucinations when inhaled.

Group 3 were all dead before they even stepped on half of the mushroom caps. Confirmation of kill credit and Quest EXP popped up as the last soldier drew his final breath.

"Too bad it's so annoying to find and dig those things up," Li Mei sighed wistfully, shaking her head. She spent the entire previous night foraging mushrooms for that trap, and those soldiers didn't even have the decency to hit all of them! How rude.

Li Mei salvaged the uncrushed mushrooms, and used the same successful trap strategy on the unsuspecting Group 4.

Various special herbs were mixed with water and her own Rank 0 blood, which Li Mei sprinkled on the soldiers of Groups 5, 6, and 7 as they slept. The mixture served to lure hungry creatures looking for an easy meal, stimulating appetites and aggression. Numerous beasts broke through the camp's defensive arrays and eventually devoured the soldiers after several brutal battles.

Then she ran out of the necessary herbs and had to pick another strategy. Of course, she remembered to harvest the bodies of the edible beasts the soldiers managed to kill during their last stand. Faust already imparted the importance of dissecting kills for their Cores which could be absorbed for strength or used as currency, but many of the beasts were also delicious.

Group 8 found themselves pelted with eggs flung from the branches. Angry Verasus parents looking for their stolen eggs smelled yolk on the soldiers and flew into a rage, shredding them into pieces.

It worked well, but grabbing the eggs was dangerous too. Verasus had excellent senses of smell. They would have been able to track her through the whole forest if they weren't distracted and enraged by their young being smashed, thus losing her trail as she moved into the tree canopy.

Groups 9, 10, and 11 presented the first real problem.

They had met up and were moving quickly in a straight line toward the research facility, completely disregarding terrain or obstacles.

Li Mei frowned as she stared at the map. It took so long to move from group to group since they spread out combing the forest - while she traveled further and further in one direction, the ones on the other side were getting up to something. Were they flying somehow?

Judging by the travel times they'd arrive just after the groups did no matter how fast they ran, but thankfully the Quest didn't require her to stop them from finding or entering the place. She hopped on Bao's back and urged him in the direction of home.

Since they'd arrive late anyway, it was better to make some preparations first.