Bloodstar System: Infinite Evolution Through Beast Slaughter

Chapter 24: Kaia’s Squad!

Several black figures moved through the ruined walls like ghosts.

The wind howled, rolling up sand and dust across the sky, yet it did nothing to slow the elite squad.

"Jazz, how far?"

The young team member tossing a high explosive grenade asked casually.

The adjutant called Jazz raised his wrist and glanced at the red dot flashing on his watch.

"Less than two kilometers. The beast is slowing down. Looks like the captain’s Soul Severing Blade worked. Its tendon is cut. It cannot run properly anymore."

Just then, Jazz’s steps paused.

"People. Three humans."

Kaia, who had been leading the charge, slowed down.

Jazz increased the image magnification. The blurred thermal image gradually sharpened.

He still could not see their faces clearly, but the battered off road vehicle and the three figures of different heights made him remember something at once.

"It is that fake ID kid from earlier. And the one eyed hunter team."

At those words, Kaia’s movement faltered slightly.

She stopped on top of a towering broken wall.

The view from here was excellent, just enough to overlook the open ruin plaza below.

She did not need instruments.

With vision far beyond ordinary people, she saw the small figure at a glance.

The boy stood alone at the front of the group, holding a boning knife that looked almost laughable, facing the Gale Fiend Wolf that bore down on him like a mountain.

The young team member caught up and stood behind Kaia.

He clicked his tongue.

"Scared stupid, huh?"

"At that distance, running is useless. Turning away only gives death your back," Jazz analyzed calmly.

"Facing it head on might still leave a thread of life."

"A thread of life?"

The young man scoffed, as if he had heard the funniest joke in the world.

"When did you get so funny?"

He raised one finger and measured the tiny black speck in the distance.

"I bet one hundred contribution points he does not last one second."

For some reason, something faint stirred in Kaia’s chest.

At the checkpoint, that boy had left a deep impression on her.

Among those wilderness hunters, all cautious eyes, greed, and fear, only his gaze had been clean.

The calmness with which he looked straight at someone stronger reminded her of herself many years ago.

"You wanted to be a hunter that badly...?"

Kaia murmured under her breath.

That was what the boy had said to her earlier.

Unfortunately, reality did not tell fairy tales.

"We cannot save him. Too far."

Jazz seemed to see what Kaia was thinking and reminded her in a low voice.

"Even at full speed, we need at least ten seconds to reach him."

"And the Gale Fiend Wolf only needs two seconds to kill them all."

Even as a high ranking Awakened Warrior, she could not cross space to save someone already marked for death.

Her fingers tightened around her blade hilt.

The knuckles whitened.

In the end, they slowly loosened.

When Kaia spoke again, her voice had returned to its usual coldness. Not a trace of emotion could be heard.

"After the Gale Fiend Wolf feeds, its guard will drop to the lowest point."

"That will be the best chance to kill it."

"Understood."

Jazz and the young team member answered together.

There was no pity in their eyes.

Every day, countless people left the city carrying dreams, only to become scraps in Voidbeast dung.

That was fate.

The young team member had already raised his longbow, his sight predicting and locking onto an open patch of ground behind Joren.

He was waiting for the boy to be torn apart.

Waiting for the moment the Gale Fiend Wolf began to feed.

"Goodbye, kid."

Chewing gum in his mouth, the young man looked at the blurred figure through the scope, his tone light.

The enormous Gale Fiend Wolf finally moved.

Kaia closed her eyes for a brief moment.

She did not want to see that boy turned into pieces of meat across the ground.

Yet at the instant Kaia shut her eyes, at the very moment the young team member’s finger touched the trigger...

He actually charged.

Straight at the Rank Three Voidbeast.

At that moment, the system prompt rang out.

[Ding! Detected special Talent on target.]

[Target: Rank Three Gale Fiend Wolf]

[Available Talent to plunder: Lithe Form Green]

[Acquisition condition: Kill the target and consume 100 Bloodstars.]

A green grade Talent.

His current [Bladeborn Frame] was also a green Talent, and the terrifying boost it gave to Bladecraft had helped him enormously.

Now the Gale Fiend Wolf also had a green Talent.

And it was the rarest kind.

Agility.

If he could get it...

Joren’s mind ran at its absolute limit.

As long as he killed this Rank Three Voidbeast, the Bloodstars he gained might make him rich overnight.

Roar!

The Gale Fiend Wolf opened its bloody jaws.

Deep in its throat, green light gathered wildly.

Wind blades.

Even heavily injured, one blast of wind blades from it would be enough to cut an armored vehicle in half.

The ground beneath Joren’s feet cracked apart.

The strength of Mortal Perfection erupted without reserve.

But he did not charge in a straight line.

Buzz.

The Mental Force of a Rank One Psionic Master poured out like a flood from a broken dam, instantly covering the space around him.

The world slowed down.

Even the green wind blade that was taking shape became clearly visible in Joren’s perception.

That was...

The attack path.

If it were an ordinary Awakened Warrior, even a Rank Two Warrior, facing such an instant wind blade, the only option would be to endure it head on.

It was too fast.

Too fast to react.

But Joren was different.

In the instant before that wind blade capable of cutting metal and jade burst out, his body twisted in an extremely strange way.

Like a sheet of paper bent by a violent gust.

His left foot pushed off the ground. His waist and abdomen drove the motion. His entire body shifted half a meter sideways, almost skimming the ground.

Swish!

A half moon shaped green wind blade scraped past Joren’s scalp.

Several strands of hair were cut cleanly and scattered through the air.

A deafening crash followed behind him.

The wall at his back had been sliced in half by the wind blade, its cut surface smooth as a mirror.

He dodged it.

Taking advantage of the brief gap after the Gale Fiend Wolf had spent its old force and before its new force rose, Joren pushed off again.

His body shot straight toward the Gale Fiend Wolf’s right side like a cannonball.

There.

Its right hind leg, where the tendon had been severed.

Its only weakness.

...