Medusa spat corrosive fluid from its mouth, but William had planned for this as well. When its mouth opened to spit, a single earth pillar raised from the ground at a diagonal, shoving itself down the snake's throat while poison corroded the top of the pillar.
William controlled the corroded part to detach from the rest, then continued forcing the earth pillar down the snake's throat until it was unable to even spit corrosive fluid.
"Alright you danger noodle, stay still while I test a few things out." William said as he called Mana of the Fire Element to his fingertips.
Instead of forming the usual fireball or giant fireball, William elongated the Fire Mana until it had created a long flaming javelin. He threw the flame javelin with great speed at the scaly hide of Medusa, the System Message notifying him of the creation of another new spell.
The flame javelin crashed against the scales of Medusa, bursting into flames that spread across its body as it impacted.
The snake howled in pain as the fire spread, but it went out on its own after just a few seconds since it couldn't pierce the scales.
Hmm...I need to use another Element when forming the javelin. The fire can add as support.
William tried again, this time creating a javelin with the Earth Element and coating it with fire. He threw the spear, which pierced Medusa's scales but still didn't have a long-lasting effect. It seemed the fire still didn't have any combustible material to devour in order to spread and grow stronger.
Since the Earth Javelin was embedded in Medusa, the fire couldn't spread past it and enter the snake's body.
One more time. William thought as he conjured a third javelin much to Medusa's horror, this time of the Plant Element. He ignored the snake's tearful gaze as he used the Life Element to absorb most of the vitality from the Plant Javelin, only leaving a small amount so that the fire didn't instantly consume the javelin.
He finished it off by coating the very tip of the javelin with the Earth Element for sharpness. The third javelin was thrown, embedding itself into Medusa's side while the fire raged on, seemingly with a mind of its own.
The fire eventually climbed its way into the wound of the snake, but the effects of the fire instantly cauterized the wound, increasing the snake's pain, but reducing the amount of overall damage it took.
Hmm... William entered deep thought as he tried to find a solution to the problem.
"That's it!" an idea suddenly entered his brain.
He created the exact same javelin as before, but loaded the tip of the weapon with a pointy shell of the Earth Element that was filled with gunpowder. Instead of setting the entire javelin ablaze, William just lit the back end, then threw the javelin at the snake's side.
William did a few other tests with the Wind and Ice Elements, creating a few other custom Spells that would definitely be a huge help in the future, then proceeded to test more of his Weapon and Physical Talents.
By the time he was done, two hours had passed, and Medusa had almost died of blood loss. William scrolled back to the top of his Status Panel before closing it, mostly out of habit, but something small and seemingly insignificant caught his eye while he scrolled past it.
He scrolled back down, his eyes narrowing as he read a specific line of text that he hadn't noticed before.
———
INFO: ( - )
-Name: William
-Race: Human
-Age: 37
-Lifespan: 240 Years (Excellent physical health)
———
37 years old? Is that a typo? William wondered.
He scrolled back in the System Messages, looking for anything that might have happened while he was asleep. It wasn't hard to find a specific series of messages that repeated itself sixteen times.
-Your Regeneration Talent has triggered a side effect: +1 Age
William touched his face to find a fully grown beard that extended a few inches below his jawline.
"I'm old now?!?"