Regnum Aetern: Dual Rebirth

Chapter 135: Against a monster

Adrian’s body unconsciously tensed, giving him warning signals of what was ahead. From the roar alone, the beast seemed to be massive in size.

Still...

’If it’s not too strong, I would rather defeat it instead of changing course.’

Changing course to avoid the danger ahead was obviously the smarter option to choose. But that would also risk Adrian losing his way in this dense forest.

But he didn’t think it was wise to charge ahead recklessly either.

So instead, he turned to look for a tall tree nearby. Thankfully, there was one right behind him. With his small body reinforced and strengthened by reaching Phase Two, Adrian nimbly climbed the tree without much effort.

When he thought he had climbed high enough, he turned to look in the direction the roar had come from.

A bit further ahead, Adrian could see the body of a massive beast, about the size of a house, on the ground, torn apart hideously with crimson blood splattered everywhere and the beast’s organs and entrails spilling out. The body was torn apart to the point that it was hard to understand the beast’s actual appearance.

And above that corpse stood another beast about the same size. It looked like a massive black bear with a strange outer shell seemingly made of white bones. The bear had two bone-like horns growing out of its head, and its bone shell was covered in spikes.

Just one look at that beast was enough for Adrian to know that he stood no chance against it. The thought of fighting it had completely disappeared from his mind.

’That’s not a beast, it’s a monster. And based on the nature of its presence... Phase three? No, maybe Phase Four...’

It seemed that he would have to take a long detour. The farther he stayed from that monster, the better it would be.

But as Adrian was lost in thought, the beast slowly turned its head...

...And met Adrian’s gaze.

"!!!"

Adrian’s eyes widened, and chills ran down his spine as he met the monster’s hungry gaze. At the same time, the bear-like monster opened his massive maw and let out another deafening roar.

"RAGGGHHHHHHAAAAA!!!"

’This isn’t good!’

But before Adrian could properly react, the monster charged towards him like a bull and slammed the tree with its head. The impact caused Adrian to lose his grip on the tree, and he toppled to the ground. The tree itself was also knocked over.

But he was quick to react, twisting his body and using his legs like a spring to absorb shock and cushion the fall. But the moment he landed, a shadow fell over him, and he instinctively jumped back, narrowly dodging the monster’s paw that smashed down the next moment.

’I have to get away from this thing; there’s no way I can survive against it!’

He turned around and started running as fast as he could.

But the monster chased after him almost instantly. The sheer force of its run shook the very earth. The monster was fast, incredibly fast. Even with its bulky body and massive size, the monster was slowly catching up to him.

Adrian’s heartbeat quickened.

Still running, Adrian began channeling mana into his palm and materialized a starlit black sphere. He launched it straight toward one of the monster’s eyes.

But the monster swatted the sphere away with one of its paws, causing Adrian’s eyes to widen.

He had seen the monster briefly cover its paw with mana moments before it swatted space implosion away.

’Ah, what a useless spell. If only I had my sword.’

The Monster was closing the distance with every passing second. Adrian took sharp turns, tried hiding behind trees, and tried to attack it a few more times, but nothing worked. It was as though the monster was obsessed with the idea of hunting him.

’I should’ve just run the moment I heard that roar.’

It seemed he had taken Ralz’s warning a bit too lightly.

Just then, Adrian saw the same absurdly massive tree he had passed by before. Without any time to think, Adrian swiftly climbed the tree and made sure to sit somewhere he wouldn’t easily fall from.

"Huff... Huff..."

The bear-like monster did the same thing as before. Using the momentum of its sprint, it slammed its head against the massive trunk of the giant tree. The entire tree shook violently from the impact. Thankfully, it didn’t get knocked over like the previous tree.

"RAAAGGGGHHHH!!!"

The monster let out an angry roar. Then it proceeded to slam its head against the massive trunk several more times.

’This is really bad!’

At this rate, the tree will be knocked over sooner or later. After that, Adrian will once again get chased by the monster. And if that were to continue, the one to eventually lose would inevitably be Adrian since his stamina was finite.

He had to either somehow deal with his monster or somehow escape it.

Just then, an idea flashed through his mind as he rummaged through his pocket and took out The Curse of Nortos. Looking at the rusted bronze nail tensely, he recalled its function.

If this nail is stabbed into a being’s flesh and isn’t removed within twenty-four hours, then that being shall die. This effect is not absolute and may fail to trigger if the target is too powerful.

Adrian glanced at the bear-like monster.

’It doesn’t seem like this monster would qualify as too powerful.’

He hurriedly broke a nearby branch. He then put the flat end of the nail at one end of the branch, and then he tore a long piece of cloth from his shirt and tied the nail tightly to the tree branch.

This way, he created a makeshift arrow with the pointed end of the nail being the arrow’s tip.

Since he didn’t have a bow, he would have to use his hand to throw the arrow like a spear. But of course, he couldn’t risk the possibility of failure, so he added some extra precautions on top.

On his other hand, a starlit black sphere materialized. He aimed both the sphere and the arrow at the monster.

Shooting the dark sphere towards the monster’s face, he threw the arrow towards its back the next moment.

Just like before, the monster swatted away the dark sphere before it could hit him. But with its attention on the sphere, it missed the small arrow that dug into its back moments later.

The monster flinched briefly, but that was all. It got back to trying to knock down the massive tree moments later.

The arrow was perfectly stuck in the monster’s flesh, protected by the strange bone shell covering the monster’s back. It was unlikely to come off easily. Which meant that The Curse of Nortos had successfully been stabbed into the target’s flesh.

’Now I just need to somehow survive for twenty-four hours.’

But something was telling him that it was not going to be that easy. Every time the monster rammed its head onto it, the tree trunk became more and more deformed. Huge splinters of wood were sent flying during every impact.

In the end, even that massive tree fell two hours later. Adrian jumped away just a few moments before the tree could hit the ground.

As he continued running as fast as he could, Adrian was sure that the upcoming twenty-two hours were going to be incredibly long.