It had been almost six months since Krune entered the Primary Landmass. Unsurprisingly, he was getting rather comfortable in living in the place. His routine consisted of training in his cave after consuming a Blood Essence Crystal before starting a training session that took around two to three hours.
The time varied depending on the intensity of his training. Once that was done, Krune relaxed in the pool, healing all his injuries. For the rest of the day, all he did was satiate his hunger, drink plenty of water, and rest in the pool, healing all his muscle strains.
?
The intense training burned up his body, causing damage. And then, the healing session allowed him to recover completely, making the prior damaged regions heal stronger. It was akin to forging his entire body.
For the second day, Krune primarily hunted Monster Geckos, using them to water the bone trees he had been planting in the caves throughout the Primary Landmass. From the initial 10, he had expanded to 30 caves. Once he noticed the beneficial property of the Blood Essence Crystals, Krune was unwilling to leave it alone.
After all, it would help him even after leaving the Primary Landmass. It would help him train like mad whenever he wished. Just that alone would make the Godly Points he spent to purchase the ticket to the Primary Landmass more than worth it.
As a mortal, increasing his strength was important. Moreover, as he trained himself using the Blood Essence Crystals, his body became more fit, increasing his stamina. Moreover, he realized that the duration for which he could maintain his Neon Radiance had increased over time.
It wasn't just due to his increased control and understanding of the ability. But, the reserve of energy in his body to fuel the passive ability had increased. Before arriving at the Primary Landmass, if he unleashed his Neon Radiance to the maximum, he would be able to sustain it for 20-30 minutes before he would start to feel tired.
Now, he could sustain for double the duration before the fatigue would kick in. As he continued to train in the ability, his body was evolving accordingly to better wield it. It made him realize a certain fact, muttering, "Sooner or later, I have to finalize all the passive abilities I would use. That way, I would develop in a set direction. If I keep changing the passive abilities, then my depth of control over their usage wouldn't be high enough. I wouldn't be able to exert dominance over others in the contest of resources."
His goal was to head to Layer 2 sooner or later. After all, the earlier he went, the more benefits he could obtain. So, he didn't wish to dilly-dally.
With that, the entire second day was spent on hunting Monster Geckos. After hunting them for a while, Krune was able to target them better and better. Moreover, once he expanded his range to the third village, hunting became easier as he got weaker targets to kill.
In every hunting session, he killed three Monster Geckos, no more, no less. He kept his routine to schedule every month. In the latter half of the second day, he spent the time crafting tools that would prove useful for his hunts, especially the traps made using the bone tree branches. He also made tools that would help him after he returned to the Checkpoint Turtle and would have to be adrift on the sea once again.
On the final day, he hunted three Monster Geckos again. For the latter half of the day, he spent the time tracking the villages while laying down his traps. Krune was someone who was a practitioner of equality. Since the first village was suffering from the traps, he had placed some for the second village as well.
And now that he had expanded his range, he began to do the same thing for the third village. The surprising fact was that despite the number of accidents that happened daily, neither the Mutants nor the Kings of the three villages took any action. It seemed that something like this wasn't of their concern.
After all, after the first few days, the Monster Geckos had become somewhat alert, taking action the moment they could feel the pain in their foot intensify. So, the number of deaths thanks to the traps quickly plummeted.
Though, that wasn't Krune's goal in the first place. With that, he was fine with their decreasing effectiveness. After all, what he wished to achieve the most was to incapacitate as many Monster Geckos as he could so that he could conspire against the Mutants and the Kings.
From the day he started his scheme, Krune was indeed trying his best to instigate the Monster Geckos against one another. He was slowly but surely driving a wedge between the different villages, increasing tensions between the different groups.
And in such a fashion, his three-day routine continued until he had lived on the Primary Landmass for six months. At present, even after consuming a Blood Essence Crystal every three days, thanks to the increased number of caves, he had saved up a small stockpile.
Krune planned to increase it to the maximum by the end of his stay. That way, he could continue to train. Besides, he also determined another use, and that was the boost to his passive abilities.
Once he consumed the Blood Essence Crystal, the excess energy circulating in his body amplified his abilities, allowing him to emit more intense light and farther progressive sound waves. This did increase his advantages, allowing him to hunt better.
Just to become more accustomed to it, Krune hunted a couple of times after swallowing a Blood Essence Crystal. He soon found out that the beam of Neon Radiance he managed to unleash after that was even more potent on the Monster Geckos, increasing the duration of their blinded states.
This way, incapacitating them became even easier. The Blood Essence Crystals could be considered his boosters, an advantage he could capitalize upon whenever he fought against any tough foe.
To warrant that, he had to accumulate more. After all, if he continued with his plan, he would eventually have to tackle the Tertiary Landmass, something that would be many times scarier than the Primary Landmass he was at now.
Moreover, the criteria of the monsters there were also different, shown to have a Supreme Monster. Among the three levels of the monsters, the first was the Mutant, one that gave him one Godly Point upon being killed.
The second was the King, one that would give him one Godly Point and a passive ability upon being killed. And finally, there was the Supreme Monster that awarded one Godly Point and an active ability upon being killed.
At present, Krune wasn't even guaranteed of surviving a battle with a Mutant. If he was careless, he could very well lose his life. Even though his abilities had improved, it wasn't to the extent he could fight head-on against a Mutant Monster Gecko.
Of course, his current strength was not worth mentioning against a Monster Gecko King. As for the Supreme Monster, it was an impossibility. Krune judged that only when he could kill a Monster King by fighting it head-on would he have a chance against the Supreme Monster. Even then, it wasn't guaranteed.
Moreover, in the layer where all abilities were passive, Krune was incredibly allured towards the so-called active ability. So, instead of wasting his time, he continued to train endlessly while scouting for even more caves to use.
A week later, he finally obtained his opportunity as Krune spotted a Mutant Monster Gecko exit the second village. It seemed to be looking for something. Judging by its tracks, it was searching for Krune.
It seemed his recent actions had spurred enough trouble for one of the second village's elites to take matters upon its own hands. Moreover, it was accompanied by a team of 10 Monster Geckos scouring through the forest in search of him.
The moment his Sonic Radar detected them, the Mutant Monster Gecko was also able to detect his position, immediately charging towards him.
Krune turned tail and sprinted from the place immediately. Though, he neither tried to escape towards his cave nor exited the forest to escape their detection. He headed straight towards the first village, making mild detours along the way, knowing based on routine scouting the positions of the teams of Monster Geckos that would be collecting fruits from the bone trees.
At the very moment he spotted a couple of such teams, Krune swerved beside them, heading further towards the first village. Since there was a clear difference in the body temperature of Krune and the freezing-blooded Monster Geckos, his chasers came right after him.
Though, this worked against them now. Thanks to the strained relations between the two villages, the moment the group from the second village passed by them, the teams of Monster Geckos were shocked.
Moreover, upon seeing the Mutant leading the charge from the other village, they assumed that it was a raid, immediately brandishing their fishing rods onto the other party. The moment that this happened, the group led by the Mutant Monster Gecko retaliated, wiping out the small teams.
It sparked a war between the two villages immediately. As the news spread through a myriad of shouts, a Mutant exited the first village, accompanied by a similar number of Monster Geckos, immediately speeding towards the group from the second village.
The relations between the two villages had become so strained that the moment they spotted each other, they engaged in a bloody fight. Thanks to the intense sounds of the fishing rods of the two Mutant Monster Geckos crashing into the rocks and breaking every bone tree they passed by, the sounds produced by Krune were no longer audible to their senses, allowing him to spy on their fight from a rather comfortable distance.
Upon seeing that both the Mutant Monster Geckos were matched in abilities, he smirked, pulling out a yarn of thread that he had collected and coiled into a rope.
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