The Harem of Juicy MILFs

Chapter 38: New Lead [6]

They arrived at the 24th floor and encountered a monster standing on two feet. At first glance, it had the appearance of a human, but this resemblance was only a macabre parody. Its body was deformed and grotesque, covered with translucent skin revealing pulsating organs and hypertrophied muscles. Its face was nothing but a gaping slit devoid of a nose, surmounted by a single bulging eye that injected a malevolent turquoise glow into the darkness.

Upon seeing them, the monster let out a roar so powerful that the surrounding trees vibrated under the shocks. Without wasting a moment, the creature rushed towards them with a disconcerting agility for its mass. When it reached their level, it delivered a downward attack with its two arms fused into a mass of bony flesh.

"Get out of the way!" shouted Hae-neul as she leaped to the side.

Gerhman and Hae-neul dodged the assault by scattering in opposite directions. The impact was phenomenal. Where the monster stood, a crater formed in the ground, projecting shards of hardened material and a shockwave that made the air vibrate.

Hae-neul landed in a perfect roll. She straightened up, her eyes on the monster, her concentration at maximum. She did not waste time and activated her skill.

< Overclocking 10% >

Instantly, her aura changed. A light steam began to escape from the pores of her skin, a direct consequence of the accelerated metabolism from the massive injection of mana into her muscle fibers. Her well-defined abs contracted violently under her short black top, and a scarlet glow invaded her gaze.

In a prodigious leap, Hae-neul covered the distance separating her from the monster in a fraction of a second, leaving a burn mark on the ground under the effect of her propulsion. Barely arrived in front of the creature surprised by this speed, she delivered a powerful punch loaded with all the power of her Overclocking directly to the monster’s solar plexus.

The impact produced a dull sound of crushed flesh. The monster, which weighed several hundred kilos, received the attack head-on. The power was such that it was literally lifted off the ground, its feet losing all contact with the solid earth. One could hear the sharp cracking of the sternum bones shattering under the healer’s grip.

"Take that! Take this, you piece of trash!" yelled Hae-neul, her usual shyness totally consumed by the fury of combat.

In an excess of anger and agony, the monster swung its right hand which, in an instant metamorphosis, had taken the form of a sword made of bone and blackened cartilage. The organic blade sliced through the air with a high-pitched whistle aiming at the young woman’s throat. Hae-neul simply shifted to the right, with a fluid and minimalist movement, letting the attack pass a few millimeters from her shoulder.

Without giving it time to reposition, she made a small jump, using her left leg as a pivot, and delivered a devastating roundhouse kick to the jaw. The shock was so violent that the monster’s head pivoted at an unnatural angle. The creature’s body was thrown backward, sending it tumbling far before crashing against the wall of a rock in a crash of flesh and bone debris.

All this happened in a few seconds. Silence returned, disturbed only by the whistling of the steam that continued to escape from Hae-neul’s body as she stabilized her breathing.

Gerhman, who was watching the scene from the edge of the crater, remained motionless. His arms were crossed over his chest. A gleam of surprise crossed his gray eyes.

A human who uses muscular self-destruction as a weapon of destruction... is much too dangerous and hard to bear, but it is a form of brutality that has its own elegance. Since she possessed a healing skill, she could afford such a risk.

He had been around her for a few days and this was the first time he saw her like this. Until now, she had seemed weak to him, always complaining about fatigue or his arrogance. Seeing her like this, transformed into a combat fury capable of breaking a rank B monster with a single blow, radically changed the perception he had of her.

"She’s really not bad..." he murmured to himself, a cruel satisfaction smirk forming at the corner of his pale lips.

Hae-neul turned towards him, deactivating her Overclocking. The white steam escaping from her body faded progressively, and her cheeks, still flushed from the effort, gradually returned to their normal complexion. She took a deep breath to calm the erratic beats of her heart, because even if she deliberately limited her activation to 10% to avoid the most violent repercussions, she still felt that dull heaviness in her muscles, that impression that her nerves were pulling like overly taut ropes.

"Fuck... What the hell was that shit?" she asked, her voice laden with nausea that she did not even try to hide.

Gerhman advanced slowly towards her, his reinforced leather boots crunching on the ground strewn with debris. He stopped less than a meter from her.

"Your technique is really good," he conceded, his deep voice barely higher than a whisper. "But if you continue to use it as you do, it will end up breaking you." He paused, rubbed his thumb against his temple as if weighing his words. "I’m not saying this to belittle you. I’m warning you because Electhra cares about you. If you want to avoid ending up paralyzed, or worse, having your nerves fried before thirty, you’d better find a way to bypass this limitation."

Hae-neul opened her mouth to retort, but the words died in her throat. She knew he was right. She was a healer, sure, and she could use it on herself, but her skill had a limited duration. In the middle of combat, if she could not finish her opponent quickly, she would find herself short of resources, vulnerable. This truth knotted her stomach more surely than any blow received.

She looked away, stared for a moment at the charred patterns on the wall, then exhaled long through her nose. She did not thank Gerhman, but she did not insult him either. That was already progress.

"We continue," he cut in as he passed in front of her without waiting for a response. "The twenty-fifth floor won’t clean itself. And according to the mana readings, I think they are somewhere over there, in the central room." He indicated with his chin the place from which an unstable reddish glow emanated.

Hae-neul clenched her fists, then followed in Gerhman’s footsteps without saying a word. She hated his arrogance, that way he had of always taking the lead without consulting her, as if his decisions were the only ones that mattered.

Yet, seeing him walking like this towards the top of the tower, she understood one thing: if she really wanted to be useful to this team, she had to overcome her weaknesses.