Chapter 405: Mortis Necrothrax

What stood before then was an unholy beast of bone and necrotic energy. Its skull, elongated and coated with jagged edges and a crown of spikes. The hollow sockets of its eyes burned with a demonic crimson light as faint screams could almost be heard from each flicker of its eerie radiance.

Its jaw cracked apart to reveal the needle like fangs, dripping with a disgusting blend of saliva and a thick black liquid that hissed and sizzled upon touching the snow beneath its body.

Each splash of this strange mix would corrode the ground, releasing what Alice only assume to be toxic fumes.

Strands of eroding flesh and malevolent energy clung onto its skeletal structure. The demonic spine that ran down its back was littered with countless bone spikes. The tail slammed against the ground as the tip began to regrow.

Chains and barbed wire fused against the remnants of its flesh and bone. Each movement echoed and hummed with the symphony of anguished torture. Yet despite the chains, it was not an enslaved beast. No, these chains have dug into its flesh since its conception from the pits of the Abyss.

Just its aura corroded the very air that touched it as strands of necrotic energy would overflow from its corpse like body.

Truly a harbinger of doom. A beast representing the mockery of life. An unholy being living beyond death and despair.

A beast thus named the Mortis Necrothrax.

Standing before this behemoth of death, Alice felt a chill down her spine. Never has she seen such a foul beast that dissuaded her from fighting just by existing.

"Stop spacing out!" Selen shouted, breaking Alice out of her trance.

Focusing her mind, she created a pathway of small footholds for Selen.

Rushing towards the beast while her staff was slowing down its movements. She twisted her body and slammed her sword against the neck.

*CLANG!!!

Flinching from the impact, her blade trembled from the hit as she wasn't even able to leave a scratch!

'What kind of durability is this???' Alice widened her eyes. She was very familiar with how much power Selen could exert through her attacks yet she was unable to leave a single mark!

*URAHH!!!!!

Attempting to crush Selen between its jaws, the Necrothrax missed its target as Alice managed to drag Selen out of danger using her shards.

Glancing at the others who also broke out of their trance, Alice wanted to make a path for them to attack its body but they ignored it.

A wave of arrows rained down from above, embedding themselves into its body before detonating into a brilliant sea of flames.

Yet no matter how flashy the attack was, the Necrothrax remained unharmed!

"What kind of sturdy defence is this?" Selen asked, massaging her wrist. This was the first time in her life that she felt such a backlash from her attack. Not even the instructors at the Zenia family had this kind of defence.

"There has to be a gap that we can exploit. Thankfully your flag is keeping it slow otherwise it'll be both fast AND durable." Alice sighed, creating an angled shield to push off a claw swipe for Einar.

But rather than showing his gratitude, he showed annoyance as he was fully prepared to parry that by himself.

In exchange for its blistering speed and strong durability, the Necrothrax was lacking immensely in terms of offensive power.

It wasn't a beast that was difficult to hunt. Sure durable to the point where even hitting directly with the power of a five star Hutner may not deal significant damage!

Furrowing her brows, Alice focused on keeping Selen safe and knocking aside any stray hits that may fly towards Einer and Brynja.

Ignoring the fact that Alice was trying to synchronize herself to their fighting style, Einar appeared beneath the beast after dodging a claw swipe and slashed up with his greatsword.

Yet upon landing on his feet, he noticed that the cleave was shattered by the bone armour.

Admittedly, all of them had underestimated the armour but this was still ridiculous. Not even his strength could pierce it!

"Brynja!"

"Don't shout! I'm on it!"

Jumping up, she slammed her shield against the side of the Necrothrax's head.

*BANG!!!

The impact of her slam caused the beast to stumble back as the tail twitched for a moment.

A bad feeling invaded Alice's mind. Without hesitation, she slammed her hand down and created a miniature barrier around herself and Selen.

Raising its tail, it began to twitch and soon, an omnidirectional tsunami of spikes shot out.

Even though she had made the necessary preparations with her shield, the collision still caused her to be sent back from the impact as a splinter of the bone had even made a cut on her arm.

Einar blocked what he could and tanked the rest while Brynja hid behind her shield.

Bjorn, despite being rather far out, had a bone shard pierce his shoulder.

Retreating by himself, he took this time to heal up.

Once the rain of bone spikes stopped, Alice glanced at Selen as she nodded and took a deep breath.

Since she got the signal from Alice, she was going to fight however she wanted! Alice will adapt to her rhythm!

Activating acceleration on herself, she flickered above the beast and pierced down with her blade.

However, her stab failed to penetrate the uppermost layer of the rotting flesh and caused the sword to bend.

Furrowing her brows in annoyance, she twisted her body and kicked herself away using the footholds that appeared where she needed them to be. This allowed her to block a quick stab by the beast as the spines on its back expanded rapidly before returning back to normal.

Stabilizing herself on a set of footholds floating in midair, Selen frowned.

She had a few options right now but the one she didn't want to use was her Resonance. She couldn't predict what else might happen and since she was the only one properly guarding Alice right now, she needed to preserve this trump card!

Summoning a staff, she crouched down and dashed towards the ground.

Realising what Selen was aiming for, Alice created a series of launchers that'll help her place the anchor points down exactly where she wanted them.

While Selen was doing this, Einar continued to tank the beast while Brynja granted him layers upon layers of protection and buffs to help him maintain the one on one.

However, this lack of communication almost caused Einar to drag the beast out of Selen's confinement while Brynja interrupted Selen's dash pathing, causing them to collide.

This collision allowed the beast a moment to breathe as it reared its head back and unleashed a roar that pushed away the snow.

Reacting to its cry, the bone shards that had scattered throughout the battlefield began to vibrate.

Danger!

Immediately using her fragments to protect her and Selen's vitals, Alice managed to react just in time as the shards exploded in mass and transformed into a deadly forest of spikes!

"URG!!!" Blood dripped from the corner of her mouth as Alice gritted her teeth.

The spikes had pierced through her arm, and thigh with one even coming close to taking out her eye but Alice managed to move her head at the last moment.

Her heart pounded against her chest as she struggled to free herself from the prison of spikes.

*CRACK!!!

Slashing down with her sword, Selen had rushed to Alice's side even though she had taken some damage herself. Even though it wasn't fatal, she was still bleeding across the body.

Freeing Alice from the confinement, she helped her pull out the large spikes while handing her a healing vial from her pouch.

She only had two vials after buying some from the supply shop as there was a limited amount to go around. Each person was limited to two vials.

Drinking the vial, Alice could hear her flesh sizzling as it stitched itself together but it was far inferior when compared to her original regeneration. And once again, the healing stopped once the wounds closed up.

Ignoring her anger for now, Alice turned her attention to both Einar and Brynja who took heavy damages from that last attack.

Brynja had a nasty wound on her abdomen while Einar had his forearm pierced by the spike, making it impossible for him to hold his greatsword using two hands.

"What the f*ck are you doing?!?!" Brynja shouted in anger. If it wasn't for the random crap that both Alice and Selen were doing, they wouldn't have shown such a gap to the beast. Sёarᴄh the NôᴠelFirё.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

"HAH?!?!?" Hearing this, Alice's patience had reached its limit as Brynja had done nothing but blame them since the start of this fight even though neither of them was on the same wavelength.

To her, only Alice and Selen made mistakes while they were perfect as usual.

Holding Alice back from causing a fight, Selen shook her head with a frown.

"We can fight her later, let's focus on the beast for now."

Gritting her teeth, Alice took a deep breath and nodded.

"Any plans?" Alice asked.

Her offensive power was sorely lacking and the best she could do was assist Selen's movement and fend off dangerous attacks.

The fact that they had nothing to penetrate the beast's weakness worried her but there was bound to be a weakness.

"I've noticed that it had some… strange movements while defending against attacks. It seems like there is a specific spot it doesn't want to get hit." Selen hesitated for a moment.

"Why didn't you say so earlier? Where is it? I'll help you reach it." Alice blinked her eyes, urging Selen to speak about this weakness.

Coughing awkwardly, Selen debated for a moment before opening her mouth.

"The base of the tail. Between the legs."

"???" Hearing this, Alice was stunlocked.

'Isn't that just it's ass???'