Chapter 1114: The Final Race (part 11) |
Rathlana Turf!
Arriving near its border was a Pranic Beast shaped like a snail, with dozens of legs like a centipede, and a nose resembling an elephant. The base was fully shelled, stretching a length of thirty metres and a breadth of fifty metres.
Attached behind the legs were small fins meant to stir in the water, allowing it to travel freely without issues. And while on land, the legs allow it to travel and climb steep surfaces while the fins exist solely to provide balance.
The shell was in two pieces, able to open and close like the human jaw. The only difference was that it could open and close in any side. Once opened, it would sprout out its legs and move. Its nose, similarly, peeks out when the shell is lifted.
When closed, no flesh part is exposed, save for a small vent meant for the passage of air to the lungs. This vent was covered by a concave shell individually controlled by muscles, ensuring the Pranic Beast could fully guard itself without weaknesses.
Advanced Silver Grade Pranic Beast—Plumunta!
With a Prana capacity of 2790 and a lifespan of 390 years, the Plumunta lived in marshlands and sandy, shallow regions of rivers and seas. It lived a docile life, able to naturally accumulate the nutrients necessary for its body function through osmosis alone.
Theoretically, since birth, as long as it lives in a shallow region, a Plumunta could theoretically never reveal itself outside its shell. After all, it could live on its own.
The flesh of a Plumunta was nutritious enough to feed a creature twenty times its mass for an entire month. That wasn’t all. If it wasn’t clobbered into destruction, its shell would slowly regenerate its fleshly body.
Even in cases were the Plumunta had died, as long as its shell remains intact, it would overtime gather minerals and create a new flesh body.
This was how they increased their numbers. A Plumunta, upon maturity, would shed its existing shell. By using all its stored Prana, it would regenerate a new shell.
Its old shell would remain on the river bed, collecting minerals for years until eventually, a baby Plumunta forms within. In regions surrounding Plumunta habitats, any decently developed society would try to harvest Plumunta shells.
As a coveted resource, the Plumunta obviously had the means to defend itself.
Primary Nature—Spine Calibre!
When threatened, the Plumunta would sever its spine into multiple pieces, load each piece within a vertebra, and use the nose to launch them towards the target.
The Spine Calibre, upon launch, would rapidly absorb air and water like a sponge and grow bigger. It would sprout legs and a pair of mandibles, using which it would attack the enemy. A Spine Calibre, in a nourishing environment, can grow up to a hundred metres in a matter of seconds.
The biggest Spine Calibre was one launched at the Dralh Sea’s Death Hour that somehow survived the environment. It had crossed 400 metres in size, but that was a rare case.
A few Plumunta colonies used to live in the Dralh Sea until the Bludders took over. Targeted by both the Bludders and the Phells, they had been wiped out completely from the Dralh Sea.
Thankfully, they were native to the Red-Draft River, where they had thrived in large numbers for more than a million years.
Currently, over eighty thousand Plumunta had gathered before the Rathlana Turf. In unison, their shells parted to provide space for the noses to jut out and spew Spine Calibre en masse.
Every Plumunta spewed over eighty Spine Calibre, charging up the latter’s size using water from an underground tributary that they had redirected to the current location.
As the Spine Calibres grew in size and reached anywhere between a hundred and three hundred metres, the Plumunta army watched in silence. They waited for a while as water trickled to their location and funnelled nutrients into their bodies.
Once they replenished their Prana, they spewed out another batch of Spine Calibres, which was when an order was announced.
Clatter!
The Spine Calibres marched into the Rathlana Turf, stunning the Brimchoirs native to the region. Immediately in response, they launched heat rays.
Primary Nature—Heat Discharge!
The high intensity heat rays vaporised the Spine Calibres, producing smog thanks to the fumes from their burning corpses and the water content in their bodies getting vaporised. Thanks to the sheer number of Spine Calibres, a large smog cloud was created as the Brimchoirs torched them mercilessly.
Slowly, the smog cloud invaded deep into the Rathlana Turf, until it swept past the tallest mountain in the region.
Three Plumunta set foot on the region, moving steadily in the direction of the tallest mountain. The Plumunta on the right casually controlled the smog cloud to cover them while providing them clean air to breathe.
The smog cloud perfectly masked their position, ensuring no third party could detect them, even with the aid of multiple, sophisticated Prana detection means.
"Keep us hidden well, Tanpral." The Plumunta on the left commented, "This mission takes our highest priority."
"I’m well aware, Lattala." The Plumunta on the right commented and continued to control the smog cloud.
Slowly, they moved a fair distance, and once they were within range of the region’s tallest mountain, they stopped.
The Plumunta in the centre gave its command, "We’ll have to depend on you to keep Root engaged."
"Don’t worry, I’ve prepared enough." The Plumunta on the left nodded.
"Only reveal yourself when our plan is compromised." The Plumunta on the right cautioned.
"Now, let’s get going." The Plumunta in the centre announced, "For the return of His Majesty."
"Yes, Gatin." The two Plumunta at the sides saluted solemnly, "For the return of His Majesty, the Varahan Emperor!"
Immediately, the Plumunta on the right brought the Plumunta in the centre and sunk seamlessly into the earth. Steadily, they were making their way towards the centre of the tallest mountain, where a certain item was kept in safety.
Major Treasure—Turnip!
...
Drenta Vines!
One of them had collapsed, spilling over millions of bizarre, mutated creatures. Unanimously, they were rushing in the direction of a portal situated within a ruins.
The Death Tentacle Ruins!
"Ahh...ahhh! Ach!" Pulling his eyes out in sheer horror was Nirat, seeing the bizarre creatures being clothed in fabric all too familiar to him. They were all citizens of PariBota Kingdom, his home.
Even though he didn’t have an exceptional relationship with the PariBota Kingdom, he was still someone who was born and had been brought up there. And now, his home was no more.
And its inhabitants? They had become horrors beyond his wildest nightmares.
"L-Leader!" One of the horrors, shaped like a worm with intact, human lower half, rushed towards Nirat and stumbled right before him, "S-Save me!"
"Please, get up!" Nirat hurriedly healed his eyes and assisted the horror.
"It...hurts!" The horror commented and then began to bawl, "I...I killed my brother, sister, father, mother, uncle, and every single cousin of mine. They...they..."
The horror barfed bile, "They are all in my belly. I vomited everything, but it still feels like they are there."
"I didn’t want to do it! I swear!" The horror grabbed Nirat by the shoulder and squeezed, causing the latter to grunt, "I swear! It wasn’t ME! I don’t know what came over me! But when I came to, they...they were already in my belly!"
"HELP ME! Leader!" The horror pleaded, "Pull out my stomach! The horror of eating my family is...is...is too much!"
"I will help you." Nirat said in a hurry, "Please don’t lose hope. "I promise...I swear! I’ll turn you back normal!"
"PLEASE!" The horror screamed suddenly and spasmed, "HURRY! They’re coming! They’re coming out!"
Suddenly, a dozen spores burst out of the horror and morphed into the heads of every family member the horror had consumed. Like tadpoles, a tiny, wormy part was attached to the heads as they wriggled on the ground.
"AHHH!" The horror screamed mournfully as stopped as their head splattered into tiny bits.
The heads with worm bodies quickly slithered their imbalanced forms to close in upon the splatter. And then, they started to lick clean the splatters.
One of them climbed upon Nirat and munched upon a splatter patch on his shoulder.
There was no sound or shriek from Nirat. All he did was stare blankly, at many familiar faces with grotesque attachments to their twisted forms, and having lost all semblance of sentience and sanity.
"Haha...hahaha...no...sniff...bwahahaha...!" The head licking the splatter on his shoulder began to switch between cackles and cries. A few seconds later, it pleaded, "Leader, is that you?"
"I beg you," The head spoke with tears streaming down its eyes. Its mouth, however, had begun to nibble upon Nirat’s earlobe, "End our suffering."
Splat!
Suddenly, all the heads within arm’s reach splattered. His Spirit Weapons dug into the ground and pushed his body forward as Nirat began to puncture through every citizen of the PariBota Empire.
A few minutes later, he was the only one alive in the region. Slowly, he turned around and noticed a mountain covering the portal, "Brood Mother..."
Like a zombie, he approached the mountain and placed his hand upon it. There was a rapid, rhythmic motions of his Spirit Weapon that punctured through the mountain step by step. As he walked forward, a path opened before him, all while his Spirit Weapon moved an arm’s distance from his body and returned at speeds surpassing a Brimgan Royal.
"Brood Mother..." In a matter of minutes, he managed to create a path through the mountain and arrived before the portal. And then, he entered it, "I will avenge my people."
"The day I kill you," With a tone devoid of emotion, he uttered, "Is the day I shed tears and become a human once again."
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