Chapter 30: Step 30 to Greatness: Every Exploit Has Limitations
The group reached the pit trap as the moon appeared on the horizon. Thankfully, it was the full moon and a cloudless sky, giving them enough vision.
Adrian looked down and saw fourteen or fifteen slimes slowly crawling over the scraps he had thrown in earlier that afternoon.
"Just as disgusting as they looked before," he mumbled, shaking his head. "Let’s dump their bodies in and kill them—what are you two doing?"
The women who had been fearlessly leading the path were suddenly hiding behind him, their faces pale. They clutched the sides of their short pelt skirts tightly, pulling the material close to their bodies as if protecting it.
Adrian had a hunch it had something to do with the slimes, as they were women who would get scared after seeing animal remains. Sure enough, Nixa confirmed his guess.
"Those things... they eat our clothes," she said, pointing at the slimes. "If we get too close, they will dissolve the hides and leave us naked."
"It happened once before," Mika continued, sounding braver than she felt. "A small one got to our skirts while we were bathing near the stream and ate them. Nothing was left behind, and we had to hunt naked to get more pelt to cover ourselves."
As she said that, the image of all five women running around naked flashed in his mind. Adrian felt his face heat up a little and his mini-me twitch with interest.
Before any accidents happened, he shook that thought out of his head and cleared his throat.
"That sounds... inconvenient," he said. "Thankfully, we don’t have to get close to them. Just throw the corpses inside."
The women displayed their strength and basically threw the corpses of two grown men into the pit like an Olympian shot-putter from a distance.
Adrian looked down the pit, wanting to see how the slimes would eat a corpse. However, he noticed that the slimes did not swarm the fresh human bodies.
Instead, most of them slowly moved away, leaving the corpses untouched while continuing to feast on the animal scraps.
"Picky eaters, huh?" Adrian mumbled, scratching his head. "Human meat must not taste good to them. Or maybe the wanderers are just too bitter."
Since the two corpses belonged to a hostile group, Adrian wanted the slimes to erase them from existence as they did with other animals.
Unfortunately, it didn’t seem the slimes would let it happen. But Adrian wasn’t worried about it. Even if the slimes didn’t eat them, some other animal would.
As long as they killed all the slimes there, some animal or the other would come to eat them. After all, they were in Savage Earth. Adrian refused to believe animals wouldn’t eat humans even if one of their corpses was poisoned.
"I’ll teach you how to kill them, so next time you see them, you can just kill them instead of holding your skirts. Pay attention."
Saying so, Adrian took out his spear and pointed at a slime’s core.
"See that glowing crystal floating inside its body? That’s the core," he said. "As long as you hit it with enough force, the slime would explode and die."
He thrust his spear down, right into the crystal, and with a pop the slime exploded.
[Kill confirmed!]
[Killed a level 1 Common Slime.]
[Exp +11]
[Ancestor’s 10x blessing in effect. Gained Exp +110.]
[Spear Mastery +1]
As the screen appeared before him, the same screen also appeared before Mika, though she only got 55 exp. It was less than half, which should have been around 60.
The women were surprised. Normally, when they encountered a slime, they would take a detour, as no matter how many stones they threw at them, nothing happened to the slimes.
But now that they knew a way to kill them, Mika was more than excited to repay her previous humiliation.
She raised her bloodied spear and was about to attack when Adrian stopped her.
"Wait," Adrian said, holding up a hand. "Let me step back about ten steps first."
Mika looked confused but did as he asked and waited till Adrian told her to continue. As soon as she got the signal, she hit the slime, and it exploded.
[Kill confirmed!]
[Your tribe member: Mika, killed a level 1 Common Slime.]
[Exp +5]
[Ancestor’s 10x blessing in effect. Gained Exp +50.]
Adrian nodded and stepped back another ten steps before telling her to kill another slime. She did so, and he still gained exp.
They kept repeating the process, and it wasn’t until he was a full hundred feet away from Mika that he didn’t receive any exp for her kill.
The sharing has a range limit... around a hundred feet.
Adrian made a mental note before walking back. The first thing he did when he got back was to check her profile.
"Strange... it seems she didn’t get any bonus exp for the kills," he mumbled. "Only when I’m close does she benefit from the 10x blessing."
He repeated the process, only this time Mika was the one stepping away. The result was the same. As long as she was in the range, she received the bonus exp.
The exp sharing wasn’t the universal cheat he had thought. Still, it was much better than having nothing. Not to mention, they would likely do most of the killing together, so the distance debuff wouldn’t hit them.
By the time he finished testing all his theories, all the slimes were gone. The pit was covered in sticky residue, and the two human corpses lay untouched.
With the job done, the group made their way back to the settlement where the fire was already lit. The women were already eating some berries they had foraged.
Nixa saw it and flew into rage. The tribe had an unspoken rule. All members ate together, or none of them ate.
They usually followed the rule to a T. However, given they had been working all day collecting materials that Adrian had requested, and that Adrian, Mika, and Nixa had been gone for too long, the others had decided to eat some berries first.
"You two!" Nixa yelled, pointing at Amika and Amiya. "What do you think you’re doing?"
Amiya and Amika froze with berries halfway to their mouths. Meanwhile, Rixxa, at some distance, just shook her head but froze when Nixa turned to her.
"And you! Why did you not stop them? You are older. You should have reminded them!"
Before she could yell anymore, Adrian quickly walked to Amika’s side and ate the berry in her hand. While she was stunned, he also slipped his hand around her waist while looking at Nixa.
Since Amika was his mate, he naturally couldn’t bear the thought of anyone yelling at her. At the same time, he didn’t want to go against Nixa, so he joined the ’crime’, knowing Nixa wouldn’t yell at him.
"Nixa, everyone worked hard today," he said, smiling. "And we were gone for a long time. So, just let it go this time around?"
The moment he spoke, all the anger disappeared from Nixa’s face, and she shook her head. Since she wanted to make him the chieftain, she didn’t object to his request.
"As you say, Male," she replied before turning towards the rest. "Everyone, head to the stream to bathe and clean yourselves. We will eat together afterwards!"
Not wanting to test her patience anymore, the women quickly walked towards the stream.
"Guess I should clean up too," he muttered, frowning at the smell of his sweat.
